Chapter I

Part I: The Stable that Never Sleeps

The skies above Manehattan were as thick as old porridge—and arguably the same color—and seemed to hang barely inches above everypony’s heads. It had been expected, of course—for the better part of this week, the Manehattan weather teams had been preparing this snowstorm. What had not been expected, though, was the time and circumstances of the event.

There had admittedly been a number of neighsayers about the new mayor’s decision to have a snowstorm only a week before the city’s annual Nightmare Night festival, of all days, an event so large that quite a bit of Manehattan’s revenue came from that one huge spike in tourism every year that coincided with ponies, griffons, and many other denizens of Equestria journeying to Manehattan for the sole purpose of celebrating Nightmare Night as only this city could. A snowstorm, they had said, would likely turn away many of these tourists, and deprive the city coffers of the money needed for other, more crucial needs of the city—especially since the mayor had himself spent a sizable sum on building up hype for the festival, which he never ceased to remind everypony who would listen was going to be Manehattan’s most memorable Nightmare Night ever.

But the mayor had disagreed, and told them all a story of how, as a foal, it had snowed during the first Nightmare Night he could remember. He had told them of the amazement he had felt when he saw the snowflakes falling from the sky, the awe he had experienced when he looked at the mounds of white that grew to be bigger than his house by the time the first foals came to the door for the candy his parents had put in their biggest mixing bowl. And even a few of the neighsayers had chuckled when he told them of the snowball fight he’d put together that night—still in his Blackmane the Pirate costume—and how one snowball had hit him so hard, he’d flown right out of his fake pegleg and landed in a snow drift.

The snowstorm over Manehattan, the mayor had said, was an opportunity for everypony—foal, filly, colt, mare and stallion alike—to share in the experience he’d had that Nightmare Night. Also, he’d added as an afterthought, to create a bit of an atmosphere.

Again, the neighsayers had laughed; if there was one thing that ponies across Equestria appreciated, it was puns in every shape and form.

Even so, the mare that was currently crossing Blinker Street couldn’t help but feel a little annoyed. The storm was a far cry from an honest-to-Celestia blizzard, true, and the lights that made the Manehattan skyline glow like Luna’s full moon were so luminous that any snowflakes touching the damp streets were melted in seconds. This didn’t change the fact that the cold wind and snow had been blowing in her face ever since she had stepped out from her apartment.

A unicorn walked past her, his horn glowing faintly. The mare could barely make out a faint shimmer in front of him that shielded his face and mane from the weather. She turned away from him, and narrowly missed receiving a concussion by way of the pegasus that zoomed past her. She noted how low to the ground the pegasus was flying, and glanced up at the sky, eyebrows raised.

As if waiting on her cue, a low grumbling noise stirred in the clouds, echoing across the sky and startling the mare. Thunder! In a snowstorm! She shook her head and smiled—no doubt somepony on the weather team was just itching for a chance to add a few personal touches to tonight’s already crazy weather.

After another look at the sky, she continued on, though at a slightly faster pace than before; after all, she was neither unicorn nor pegasus, and all she had to rely on to cover her face at the moment were her two front hooves.

The wind died down slightly, and she chanced lowering her hoof from her eyes. Her heart rose as she saw the faint glow of windows from a squat building squashed in between two apartment complexes.

Not a moment too soon.

The weather forgotten, she made for the door at a gallop, reaching the threshold just as the wind picked up again. The mare exhaled loudly, shaking the melted snow off her coat before trotting inside.

The wooden floor was losing its finish in a few places, and half of the raised cushions at the counter looked like they had some stuffing missing. The tune that blared throughout the room sounded as old as the record player it was coming from; most ponies the mare knew had no interest in jazz, Buddy Trot or otherwise.

The Waterhole had seen better days. But she and the other dozen or so ponies inside could agree that right now, it was heaven.

“What can I get ya?” grunted the bartender in the mare’s general direction as she sat down at the counter. He had the look of a strongpony gone slightly to seed; his dirty white apron looked a little tight around the barrel.

“Sweet Apple reserve,” she responded, her voice measured and cool. “Just a bit on the hard side, thank you.”

“Ten bits,” the bartender said, a tankard already in hoof. While he poured out her drink, the mare promptly reached into her left saddlebag and pulled out a drawstring purse. After a few seconds of digging around, she fished out a few coins from inside and placed them on the counter. The bartender scooped them into his apron without a word and set her foaming mug on the counter. “Enjoy.”

After thanking the bartender, the mare wasted no time in taking a quick sip. She immediately felt the warming effects of the cider inside her. She sighed as she continued drinking, a rare feeling of contentment washing over her like the waves at Miamare Beach. But the feeling quickly passed as she finished her tankard; as much as she desperately wished to think otherwise, she was here on business.

Unofficial business, but still.

“‘Nother round?”

She started in her cushion—so absorbed had she been in her drink that she hadn’t heard the bartender come up. “Oh! T-that’d be fine,” she said, nodding.

“Second round’s another six.”

The mare laughed. “Oh, you don’t need to lower the price just for me.”

The way the bartender chuckled told the mare it wasn’t something he did very often. “Filly, please. Nights like these, ain’t nothin’ warms a pony up like Apple family tradition,” he said. “And lemme tell ya, that’s somethin’ everypony in here could use right now.” He pointed a hoof out the window; the wind looked like it had intensified, and some of the awnings across the street were starting to collect the blowing snow.

“Point taken,” smiled the mare, hoofing over another six bits as another tankard was set before her. “To supply and demand,” she added, raising the mug in her hoof to a mutual laugh.

As she put the cider to her muzzle, she went to work.

The mare knew many ponies would have relished the opportunity to do what she did for a living—especially those colts and fillies whose idea of a role model was a mishmash of every comic book known to ponykind—but she knew few among them would have genuinely enjoyed it.

What was often an unglamorous job often began in places like these: establishments with a less-than-savory reputation often had just the right mix of clientele and background noise to avoid suspicion. The Waterhole was her favorite place for this very reason—though their Sweet Apple reserve wasn’t too far behind, a small part of her admitted. It attracted ponies from just about every walk of life Manehattan had to offer. And Manehattan was a big city; she had once seen a mare that looked pretentious enough to be Canterlot nobility rubbing shoulders with a unicorn she’d bet her bottom bit was a regular at every rave club from Central Park to Bucklyn as though they were old friends. With diversity like that, there had to be some interesting conversation among everypony inside the bar. Conversation that could conceivably be used to drown out ponies who wished to speak more discreetly than others.

Ponies that, if he had been telling the truth, could be right beside her.

She closed her eyes and took another sip, pretending to enjoy the cider as it worked its unique magic. She scrunched up her brow a little, concentrating as much as she could without potentially giving herself away.

As the cider’s warmth dissipated, the mare allowed the world to shrink around her, mentally reducing all of existence as she knew it to the half-full tankard in front of her, the slice of wooden counter on which it stood, and the stool on which she lay. Everything and everypony around her disappeared into the closing blackness, the only hint of their existence being the snippets of voices that continued to echo in her ears.

Now.

—did you see that one hoof-off in the Baltimare game—

—that internship with Carousel Boutique could finally get us the bits we need—

—total manure, ain’t that right, Tackle—

—marriage is in trouble, which is not helping Down Feather at all—

—never seen a filly put away a drink so quick—

—But Ponyville’s so far away, Violet—

—could lose that scholarship to Canterlot University—

—had his hour, Digger. He ain’t comin’—

—never seen many fillies then, have you?—

—if they start Flanko against the Manticores, my fantasy team is bucked—

—least your husband doesn’t think with his loins. You know what Drill Bit suggested we do the other night?—

—been farther apart than that before, Spark, and for much longer than—

—none of ‘em looked like you, sweet flanks—

—wring his buckin’ neck myself, Trinny—

—spit your bit? Detrot’s pee-eff-pee-ay’s less than point six—

—is that even possible with a saddle on?—

—Vy, I need to think about this—

—last chance, Hay Bale!—

—Get the hay away from—

—Bucklyn Bridge, half an hour, alone. Be—

“—there.”

The instant the mare had murmured the word, her eyes had snapped open. Without turning, she looked off to her left, at the booth nearest the door, where the faint sound of hooves hitting wood told her their occupants were ready to leave. She instantly downed the rest of her cider, taking the opportunity to chance a look at the ponies as she did so. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw them: a unicorn with a fiery red coat and tan mane, and a large brown pony in an overcoat who filled the door completely with his bulk. She allowed herself a smile—it seemed her informant had been telling the truth after all.

Just as Cracker described.

The door to the Waterhole opened, and the hoofsteps were lost in the continuing snowstorm; then that, too, fad-ed
into silence as the door slowly slid closed.

The mare quickly downed the last of her cider, and slid from her stool in one smooth motion. She hefted her
saddlebags over her barrel as her hooves touched the ground, and as she made for the exit, she began counting down.

Five … four … three … two … one.

By the time she reached one, she was back in the storm—but the two ponies were already gone.

What?

The mare surveyed the street, confused. She was certain she’d timed everything perfectly—those five seconds were always enough time for her to begin shadowing her targets. One second less and she was likely to be spotted, and all her work would be for nothing; one second more could be enough for her to lose sight of them.

She put a hoof to her muzzle, and began to think. She hadn’t remembered seeing any carriages on the curb on her way inside. And she doubted the taxi coaches would be out for a while; the weather was far from dangerous, but any passengers were likely to get an uncomfortable ride until the coaches were properly outfitted for cold weather.

But it wasn’t long before she forced it into the back of her mind. Where they had disappeared to didn’t matter. She now knew where and when they were bound to turn up. She also had a legitimate physical description.

Now, it was time to do what she loved to do best.

She ducked into a nearby alleyway, a tight squeeze of a space that was barely three ponies wall to wall, then quickly looked around to make sure nopony saw her. Only when she was sure her only company was the duo of rats in the nearby dumpster did she unclasp her right saddlebag.

She had practiced this routine hundreds of times during her morning exercises. She had to—when it came to jobs like these, one wasted effort could decide the lives of ponies both innocent and guilty.

The mare began counting under her breath again.

—five—

With a flick of her hoof, the contents of her saddlebag spilled into the air. She crouched to the pavement, like a cat before a buzzing fly—

—four—

—and leaped into the air, forelegs outstretched as the first two “Horseshoes,” thick, navy blue hoofwear wrapped over specially made metal cleats and worn as boots, slid effortlessly onto her hooves—

—three—

—a cowl, cape and bodice draped as one over her form with ease as they met at the apex of her leap; she tugged the mask over her head with her teeth, then coiled her back legs, bracing her forelegs as she prepared to meet the cracked asphalt—

—two—

—and bucked hard, fitting her back hooves into her other pair of Horseshoes at exactly the same moment as her front hooves met the ground, pushing her off into a handspring and all but into the rest of her form-fitting suit—

—one—

—which she quickly sealed shut with a zipper, well-concealed against any clinging obstacles like television an-tennas or stray hooves as she landed cleanly on all fours.

She shook her head. Olympia would have me running laps if she saw that, she thought, memories both fond and not-so-fond of her gymnastics tutor rushing through her mind for the briefest moment. I still need to practice.

I still need to be quicker.

She craned her neck upward, gauging the height of the alleyway. Twenty … thirty … forty feet, give or take. Easy enough for a mare of her build to scale. Just in case, though … She tapped her back hooves together, then her front ones. A couple slight jumps from under her hooves, like the ground had suddenly decided to give a tiny hiccup, told her that all four horseshoes were in good working order.

They were not ordinary horseshoes; these horseshoes were lighter and more durable. They’d also originally belonged to a noble of Canterlot who apparently spent his teatime designing these sorts of things for the Royal Guard of all things, and had practically foisted them on her after she’d returned a marble bust of his ancestor from somepony who’d broken into his mansion a few months ago. “Something that ought to put a little more umph in your step,” the mare remembered him saying.

It had only taken one leap to know he wasn’t kidding.

She pounced for the brick wall, and for a moment it was like her first time all over again: as the hidden springs sandwiched into the apparatus catapulted her ears-over-tail towards the wall, the familiar surge of adrenaline spread throughout her body, and though she knew it was hard to see under her violet cowl, the biggest smile imaginable was plastered all over her face. She barely resisted the urge to cheer.

She willed herself back to reality just in time to stretch out her hooves and connect with the wall. A quick contortion of her body put her rear hooves a few feet above where her front hooves had just been. She bounced off the wall like a foal on a sugar-high; another tuck into her barrel propelled her back legs toward the wall that had been behind her …

“Buck! Tuck! Catch!” she imagined Olympia bellowing at her, slamming one hoof into the other with every word—a mantra she’d heard at least a thousand times while practicing her acrobatics. She coiled her back legs—

—buck—

—lunging upward once more, hooves stretched out before her, she curled up into a ball—

—tuck—

—letting her momentum carry her up and over until her back legs connected with the wall again—

—catch!—

—four down, plenty more to go, she thought—

—“buck … tuck … catch! Buck … tuck … catch! Buck … tuck … CATCH!”—

—until where the wall had once been, there was now empty air, and a final somersault readied her for a dis-mount. And when she felt all four hooves land solidly on the roof of the apartment, the mare imagined Olympia standing right before her, wearing that little half-smile she’d come to associate with a job well done.

But this job was far from done.

Turning to the south now, her destination a little more than a mile in the distance, the mare applied the final piece of her costume—a large fedora, the same shade of purple as the rest of her bodysuit and billowing cape—and placed it upon her head with a flourish.

Now came her favorite part.

“Ponies of Manehattan, never fear,” she said to nopony in particular, striking an elegant pose. “The Mysterious Mare-Do-Well is here.”

A bolt of lightning—too far into the clouds to be seen as more than a flickering glow—split the sky in two, fol-lowed swiftly by a rumble of thunder overhead.

The dramatics concluded, the Mare-Do-Well set off for the Bucklyn Bridge at a gallop, her powerful earth-pony legs carrying her from one rooftop to the next with purpose in every leap and step, occasionally punctuated by a low boom from the sky. The buildings of Manehattan were so close together that, in any other situation, her spring-loaded horseshoes were not all that necessary; her natural, earth-pony strength was often all she needed. But the Mare-Do-Well had been called upon to save lives in the past—and she had learned the hard way that time was not something she could afford to waste.

So focused was the Mare-Do-Well in getting to the bridge on time that she didn’t pay any more heed to why exactly a pegasus would need to put thunderclouds in a snowstorm.

As a result, she completely neglected to consider the slight possibility that this thunder and lightning might not be completely natural.

To see Princess Luna’s night sky as it was meant to be seen was a very rare treat in Manehattan; there were so many lights in the sprawling metropolis below that the only object in the heavens not drowned out by the artificial illumination of the skyline was the moon that had once held Luna prisoner for a thousand years. Tonight’s storm, however, blocked out even that. But the same clouds that obscured the sky from the city also concealed the city from the sky, allowing the many thousands of stars of Luna’s heavens to shine almost as brightly as the moon itself. It was a gift enjoyable by very few, and for very little time; at this altitude, the air was so freezing that even the most adventurous of pegasi would find herself a ponysicle inside of a minute. But even then, everypony agreed that seeing those myriads of twinkling pinpoints of light was worth nearly freezing to death.

Those same pinpoints of light suddenly reflected off the dark shape hurtling towards Manehattan.

Lightning flashed in every direction. Not lightning as anypony had ever known it—natural lightning could reduce the strongest of trees to smoking hulks of matchwood in the time it took to blink an eye. This lightning, while nowhere near the destructive power of its counterpart, was also as destructive as its unseen master wished it to be—which was far from a comforting thought for the airborne object.

The pegasus was entirely clad in heavy black armor from muzzle to tail. His abnormally large wings were similarly protected—even the individual feathers appeared to have sharp-looking shards of dark ebony shielding them—and were swept behind him like a peregrine falcon in free-fall. His streamlined helm might have resembled the curved beak of any predatory bird in Equestria, with fiery streaks of yellowish-orange energy where its eyes ought to be. Contrails of a similar color trailed behind his wingtips like the flames of twin candles.

The source of the lightning suddenly burst into view—another armor-clad pegasus much like himself, but larger and of a light shade of grey. Wisps of a periwinkle-blue color tried in vain to keep pace with the new arrival, but there was nothing faster in the Manehattan skies right now. And both pegasi knew it.

The gray pegasus abruptly executed a barrel roll, dropping in on the other pegasus from above. His wingtips seemed to flare a deep blue for only an instant before they released another miniature magical storm, every single bolt zooming straight for the black flyer like parasprites to an apple. It accelerated, decelerated, and rolled continuously, somehow managing to narrowly avoid the lightning’s assault.

But not the gray pegasus.

Exactly one barrel roll later, the two were wingtip to wingtip.

One barrel roll after that, a burst of sparks bloomed from their wingtips as they collided, and the black pegasus had sent his attacker spinning like a windmill through the clouds. He immediately adjusted his course downward.

Only seconds later, however, there was a flash of blue-white, and a peal of thunder from somewhere above him. The pegasus looked upward to see his assailant falling towards him—but the pony was not a pegasus anymore; those armor-clad wings were nowhere to be seen, and there were several other key differences.

Namely, the lethal-looking blade that was swinging in the general direction of his neck.

In a split second, the pegasus executed a quick snap-roll, bringing himself to rest above the silver pony as the sword passed harmlessly through the air.

Change.

Like the drip of water in a silent cave, the word echoed in his mind as the bright flash of light surrounded him. There was another loud crack of thunder, and the black pegasus had disappeared. In his place was a near-perfect copy of the gray pony, even down to the sword in his hooves.

Deflect.

Their blades crossed, and shrieked like banshees in their masters’ freefall. Swarms of sparks darted across their armored faces like dozens of glowing gnats, illuminating their helms for the tiniest fraction of moments. Both ponies were less than a hoof away from each other, and each of their slices, stabs, thrusts, and parries was so fast that a normal pony’s eye would never have been able to see anything beyond a blur.

Up.

The thought had crossed his mind long before he’d actually heard the command. He knew he and his opponent were too evenly matched in their swordsponyship; close combat was out of the question, and air-to-air combat was even worse so long as he was on the defensive.

He had to get to higher ground, or otherwise he would almost certainly die.

The word hadn’t even faded from his brain when he kicked himself away from the gray pony. A moment later, he was encased in blazing light once more, and there was the black pegasus again, streaking skyward like a fleeting shadow. It didn’t take long for the other pony to copy him; within seconds, an azure streak of light was in hot pursuit, and cobalt-tinted lightning stitched the night sky once again.

The black pegasus did not stop accelerating until he had broken through the topmost layer of cloud, Luna’s gigantic moon filling his vision completely. He threw himself into a controlled stall, now; at the exact moment he felt the grip of gravity begin to tug him downward, he vanished in a burst of orange flame, and the earth pony was back in his place, sword in hooves. He streamlined his body as he fell faster, turning himself into an equine bullet.

He would only get one shot at this.

The pony twisted his body to avoid the bursts of magical flak; any one of them could peel his armor like an orange if it so much as grazed him. But still he kept on falling, falling towards the gray pegasus that was just beginning to emerge from the storm clouds—

Finish.

He raised his blade, ready to channel every last bit of his strength into this one blow. As an added bonus, the friction of the atmosphere against his sword had turned it red-hot. It didn’t matter how protected the grey pegasus was now—even his armor had a weak spot, and right now, the black pony was just about to burn right through it.

He swung his sizzling blade downward with a roar—

—which promptly choked in his throat as his glowing blade met the grey pony’s own sword, which itself was glowing faintly—but not with heat. A quick look at his opponent’s helm told him everything—the curved, metal-plated horn that had certainly not been there before was glowing the same shade of pale blue as the sword.

The sparks from the blow hadn’t even dissipated when the black pony quickly kicked himself away from the silver unicorn, quickly vanishing from view in the clouds as if the failure of his attack had settled the matter. A faint flash and a barely audible grumbling was all the unicorn needed to determine that the pegasus was fleeing.

He hovered aloft for a few seconds longer, levitating himself mere inches above the storm as he watched the ebony missile streak away. Beneath his armor, his lips curled in a disdainful sneer.

Weak.

One flash of sapphire later, the pegasus had resumed his pursuit, flirting with the sound barrier for much of the near-vertical descent, even as the retreating pony slowly expanded into view.

Then, without warning, they broke through the clouds, the sudden and unexpected brilliance of the skyline below distracting them both. The grey flyer had largely remained unshaken, as most of his concentration was focused on the dark form mere feet ahead of him. But the black pegasus had not adjusted to the abrupt change of light in time; he bobbled slightly, and his velocity dropped noticeably to compensate.

That was all the opportunity the grey pegasus needed.

As the dark thread of the river directly below slowly became larger and larger before his eyes, the gray pegasus opened fire—and this time his aim was true. One well-placed bolt to the withers was all it took to send his challenger out of control, dropping like a rock toward the water. Another withering volley of transient sky-blue fire ravaged the black form of the crippled pegasus as they plummeted towards one of the city’s most recognizable icons …

It was not the longest bridge in Manehattan, nor was it the oldest—and a number of bureaucrats maintained that it wasn’t even the safest, either. But the sheer presence of the Bucklyn Bridge over the East River was so imposing that many ponies, both inside the city and out, still considered it the crowning achievement of equine architecture.

And in an ordinary situation, the Mare-Do-Well would be among them. But most “ordinary situations” didn’t require her to travel the Bucklyn Bridge in ways that only a madmare would ever have dreamed! Granted, that was what the Times called her half the times they managed to catch a blurred picture of her, but still—she was a smart pony. Surely there were other ways for her to sneak up onto her two targets without herself being seen!

She heaved a long sigh that went unheard in the screaming wind as she slowly crawled her way down the suspension cables of the bridge. Sometimes, she wasn’t sure what to make of her occupation. Most of the time, all she did was menial work—jobs that she could easily have left to anypony on the fire brigade or the authorities. In the past week, she had stopped three fights before they’d had a chance to start, rescued two cats, three dogs, a family of finches, and a turtle, and helped to find four lost fillies and colts. The euphoria of having done something good for somepony else had lasted her this long, just like all those other times, but eventually—inevitably—the same thing would always happen.

Every night, as she lay in bed after her regular workout, she would think about that burglary in Canterlot. It had been the one job she had genuinely liked—and not just for the fringe benefits, she consoled herself. No—she had accepted that stallion’s offer because she had seen it as an opportunity, a chance to catapult herself onto a bigger stage, to become the one thing she had dreamed about ever since she had been a filly. She had tracked down the burglar, recovered everything he had stolen, and received a reward, all in the span of three days.

And then, the following morning … it was back to lost-and-found fliers.

From one extreme to the other.

“Would a little balance be too much to ask?” the Mare-Do-Well grumbled out loud, at exactly the same moment that one of her back hooves decided to slip. She sucked air through her teeth, grasping the safety cables as tightly as she could to keep her from falling over a hundred feet into the East River.

Before beginning her trek over the thick cables that supported the Bucklyn Bridge, she’d swapped out her spring-loaded Horseshoes for something more suited to climbs like these. These Horseshoes, unlike the generous gifts from last month, were something she’d made herself, in her apartment. They were simpler than they looked—all she had done was take an older set of shoes from her costume and coat the bottoms in layer after layer of rubber. Several days of meticulous whittling later, the remodeled shoes could not only offer her better grip and control in treacherous conditions, but could also muffle her hoofsteps for the odd jobs that required some snooping around.

But even her change of gear did not change the fact that the suspension cables of the bridge were thinner around than the Mare-Do-Well was tall, and the weather was making them next to impassable. She had to pick up the pace right now—she was a third of the way past the bridge; this high up, there would be ice on the cables within the hour—and even with her special gripping shoes, that was a situation she wanted to avoid. Not only that, but she had left her watch back at her apartment. She had no way of knowing whether or not that half-hour was already up.

And her keen eyes still had not picked up any trace of the ponies she’d been tailing.
She fished out a small spyglass from her saddlebags and brought it up to the left lens of her costume. When she peered through it, she was offered a better view of the bridge she had still yet to cover. There was very little traffic through the six-lane highway, and the hoofbridge above it—a thin stripe of wood barely five ponies wide—was completely deserted.
Except for two silhouetted forms in the exact center of the bridge.

The Mare-Do-Well’s brow furrowed underneath her mask as she adjusted her spyglass. Two—no, wait—three ponies. The largest of them looked like he’d played a lot of hoofball in his time. She had a feeling that on another of the ponies would be—There! For the smallest moment, one of the ponies had turned his head, and his shadowed form had betrayed the slightest protrusion of a unicorn’s horn.

Between them was a mare, and instantly the Mare-Do-Well had an idea of what this entire business at the bridge was about. The dim streetlights on the bridge illuminated her face enough to where she could see a faint tinge of white on the mare’s face—or at least, the parts of her face that weren’t concealed by the strips of cloth over her eyes and mouth. And she didn’t need the spyglass to see that she was scared out of her wits.

Now there was a fourth pony arriving on the scene; the Mare-Do-Well had seen him come up out of the edge of her vision. His face was turned away from him, but there was no mistaking those hoofsteps. They were the hoof-steps of many a pony who had done everything in their power—and often their bank account—to rescue something or somepony very special to them.

This, then, had to be “Hay Bale.”

As quickly as she could, she replaced her spyglass in her bags, and tugged on what appeared to be a loose, but rather thick thread on her left front hoofwrap. The Mare-Do-Well let it unravel, the tip of the would-be thread unwinding further and further away from her hoof until it whipped around in the wind, twenty feet or so behind and to the left of her. After several seconds, she carefully wrapped the stray filament around a padded fetlock; it briefly glinted in the glare from the streetlights. The cord was nylon wrapped around a metal wire, and strong enough to support her weight—for a time. It was only good for one use, maybe two, before it would break, which suited the Mare-Do-Well just fine; it was often a matter of timing the break and the leap right, her body and momentum could do the rest.

Plus, she knew she wouldn’t be getting any second chances tonight.

She crept further down the cable now, analyzing the four ponies before her. She could see hooves waving animatedly in the air, pointing from one pony to the next. She already knew what they were talking about, and she already knew how both parties were going to react. But she did not concentrate on trying to hear them—she was still trying to stay out of sight.

The Mare-Do-Well quickened her pace, muttering a few calculations under her breath as she did so. She need-ed to find the right angle to time her attack, and the right speed at which to do it. She hoped those few physics lectures she’d slept through in college wouldn’t work against her. She quickly spied a point on the cable, perhaps fifteen feet away, that looked promising.

A hostage situation—especially where a ransom was involved—could be difficult to resolve. The Mare-Do-Well didn’t need all her hooves to count the hostage situations she’d been involved in, but each time, she had preferred to use a more … aggressive approach to diplomacy. It had worked out fairly well so far, she thought. And as long as she kept up the element of surprise, she saw no reason to change her tactics tonight.

In hindsight, she ought not to have thought about that so soon.

“So where is it?” rumbled the large brown pony.

“W-what are you talking about?” stammered the unicorn across from him. His coat was a chalky off-white, which was not entirely because of his natural coloration, and his emerald-green eyes shivered with fear.

“You told us you would be delivering the money right here, right now, Bale!” said the other unicorn, next to his giant of a partner. “And in return, we’d make sure dear ole wifey over here found her way home!” He shoved the mare in question—not lightly; the gesture sent sprawling on the wooden hoofpath.

“I went to your friend, Digger—I swear!” shouted Hay Bale in the direction of the giant. “I contacted Cracker, told him we’d meet at the alleyway behind the Marecy’s store, I’d hoof him the money there, and that would be that! He should’ve given you everything hours ago! I should have had Amber back before the storm hit!”

“Well, that’s a shame,” said the unicorn in a falsely consoling voice. His demeanor was not improved by a grin that would not have looked out of place on a Timberwolf. “Manehattan’s a big place, you know. Easy for somepony to get lost in this city. And lots of ponies tend to go missing here. Lots of ‘em don’t even come back.”

“L-l-let me call Cracker again,” Hay Bale shivered. “Th-there’s a t-telephone … at the other end of the bridge. I-if you can just let me—”

“I told you this was your last chance!” growled the huge pony. “So Cracker took the money and ran? That’s his problem, now.”

“As for your problem,” said the unicorn, his horn beginning to glow a pale reddish-pink, “ … well, that depends on just how faithful you are to your precious Amber.”

“Trinny, what the hay’re you thinkin’?” The unicorn’s compatriot backed away from him, a note of panic suddenly creeping into his deep voice as he looked at the glowing appendage like it was a bomb.

“Do you, Hay Bale, take Amber Bale to be your lawful wedded wife?” Trinny somberly intoned, his grin be-coming even wider. “Will you love her, respect her, care for her and comfort her, in life and in death, so long as you both shall live?”

Hay Bale tilted his head, confusion taking over in spite of his fear. “I … do?”

Trinny’s face was that of Tartarus itself. “Then by the power vested in me, I pronounce you both”—his horn flashed a brilliant scarlet—“dead, dead, dead.”

And then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw something on the bridge, illuminated with the miniature light show his horn was producing. It looked like—a pony?

“Horse—”

Chapter II

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—apples, the Mare-Do-Well swore under her breath.

The second the unicorn’s horn had started to glow with a bright, vivid red, her confidence in a sneak attack had plummeted like a stone.

Quick as a whip, she flicked her hoof—the one with the loose length of cord—and lashed it around the thick cable under her hooves. She had no time to test if the tether would hold—it would have to do.

For one more dangerous second, she waited, taking a deep breath.

And then, the Mare-Do-Well jumped.

Trinny’s and Digger’s jaws hit the bridge as they watched the purple- and blue-clad pony, a hundred feet above them, soar into the air—and drop like a stone.

Then, their eyes strained at their sockets as the pony somehow flew under the cable, soaring upwards into the air, with a series of somersaults and twists that left them both cross-eyed. Hypnotized by this sudden act of foalishness, neither pony noticed where she was traveling until two pairs of hooves hit the wood.

The two criminals turned around, hoping to get a closer look at the strange new arrival. That was exactly what they got—the back hooves of the mare were barely inches from their muzzles.

CRUNCH.

The giant pony went first, his muzzle bleeding profusely from the mare’s furious buck. The momentum from the impact sent him through the catch fence of the hoofbridge and over the edge. Whether he hit the highway below or the East River, Trinny was not sticking around to find out for himself.

Like every aspiring criminal in Manehattan, he had heard the stories about the purple pony mere feet away from him. Some years ago—Luna only knew how long—there had lived six mares in a small town far away. Ponyville, they usually said. These six ponies were well known and respected by everypony else in the town, and even by the royalty of Canterlot, and many of their adventures were legend throughout Equestria. One of them, however, had let her desire for fame get to her head one day, and her five friends had created an elaborate ruse to rein in her boasting.

From that ruse, the legend of the Mysterious Mare-Do-Well had been born. And mysterious she certainly was—the only thing everypony agreed on was that she was always female. From there, nopony could decide if she was a unicorn, a pegasus, or simply an earth pony. Some even said she was somehow all of the above, and still others said there was more than one Mare-Do-Well. A few of the craziest ponies even suggested that the Mare-Do-Well was one of those six ponies from long ago, impossible physique for such an old age notwithstanding.

And while Trinny would admit to subscribing to many of these and other urban legends about this so-called hero, he also knew that in spite of all those stories, she was far from royalty. She was just a normal pony.

His horn brimmed with a scarlet glow once more as the mare in mauve got ready to buck again.

BANG.

The hoofbridge below her splintered into kindling, throwing the mare off-balance and down at Trinny’s hooves.

“Special talents—Luna, you gotta love ‘em,” smirked the unicorn. His voice was still a little tremulous—no doubt because of his near miss—but seeing the costumed pony struggling to get to her hooves gave him even more confidence than before.

“My family was in the fireworks biz,” he said to her matter-of-factly. “They always told me I’d be the best little firecracker in all Equestria. Shame they didn’t live to see me earn my cutie mark—a real shame I earned it when I blew ‘em and their shop halfway to Hoofington,” he added. He chuckled evilly as he turned himself to where the prone mare could see better; emblazoned on his flanks were three lit sticks of dynamite arranged in a triangle.

“But you know what?” he went on. “I found out who I was that day. What I was born to do. And that’s to make things go—” he spread his hooves apart while making a soft “pew” noise. “And I’m good at what I do. I don’t need anything else but thin air. My magic plus one puff of wind equals one big boom for Trinny.

“So here’s what’s gonna happen,” Trinny said, his eyes blazing with a fire more infernal than his horn. “I dunno who you are, or why the hay you’re dressed up for the Nightmare Night parade so early, and frankly? I don’t care—I got business to get back to right here.” He aimed a disdainful kick at Amber Bale. “And if you even think about interrupting my business, I swear to Luna I’ll tear this whole buckin’ bridge apart, and everypony here with it!” He grabbed the Mare-Do-Well by her muzzle. “Don’t. Think. I. Can’t,” he added in a sinister whisper.

“ … thnnk … wnnt … ”

Trinny moved in closer, unsure of what the costumed mare had said. “What’d you s—uunnngh … ”

The Mare-Do-Well removed the blunt end of her Horseshoe from the rapidly swelling bruise on the back of the unicorn’s neck. “I think you won’t,” she corrected him as he slumped to the wood, out like a light.

She galloped over to Amber Bale, tearing off the blindfold and gag to deep breaths from the former hostage. “Are you hurt?” she asked softly.

Amber slowly shook her head, refusing to take her eyes away from the costumed mare in front of her.

Hoofsteps came running up behind them. “Amber!” Hay Bale’s face was a perfect portrait of relief as he embraced his wife. “Oh, Celestia, I’m so sorry,” he sobbed. “I’m so sorry … ”

The Mare-Do-Well allowed herself a smile at the reunion of husband and wife before she remembered the unconscious unicorn. “Go to the police,” she instructed the ponies. “The 5th Precinct station is just a mile to the north. Give them what they need, they’ll give you what you need.”

“What’re you on about?” Hay Bale asked.

“I mailed a package to the 5th Precinct. Courtesy of your friend Cracker.”

“What kind of package?” Hay Bale looked wary.

“Himself.” The Mare-Do-Well regretted that her cowl could not show the mischievous grin on her face. “I decided to send the postage with him, too,” she added. “He was heavier than I thought he’d be.”

“Postage?” It took a second for the Bales to understand. “He still has the money?” Amber gasped.

“Technically, the 5th Precinct has the money right now,” said the Mare-Do-Well. “All Cracker has right now is his rights—for all the good they’ll do him.” Also, a few bruised ribs and a black eye, she added to herself, but that wasn’t important right now.

“What about the other two?” said Hay Bale.

“I gave the police an anonymous tip. There’s three units on the way right now. And even if they run away, ponies like Cracker are all the same. He’ll break eventually. Name names. They’re not going anywhere.”

“And what if they do?” said Amber. She still wasn’t looking at the Mare-Do-Well, instead fixating her gaze on something behind her shoulder. “What if the police can’t stop them?”

Beneath the lenses of her cowl, the Mare-Do-Well rolled her eyes. “Then I guess I’m the only thing standing between Manehattan and a couple of psychopaths.”

Hay Bale swallowed. “Is that something you’re prepared to do?”

She said nothing, but merely gave a solemn nod.

The unicorn raised a hoof. “Then you’d better look behind you.”

And just like that, the dramatic moment was gone as the Mysterious Mare-Do-Well planted a hoof over her masked face. She had never liked those three words. Never. Not once in her life. Because no matter the situation she was in, they always seemed to spell trouble. And so, with a thinly veiled sigh of resignation, she looked behind her.

She was not altogether surprised to see the red unicorn slowly clambering up to his hooves. She was surprised, however to see the brown pony from before helping him up. His overcoat was gone, leaving nothing to conceal the pair of wings that held him aloft right now. Worse still, the Mare-Do-Well could see his right hoof glinting in the glare of the streetlights.

He’s wearing horseshoes, too?!

“Go,” she ordered the Bales, with as much force as she could put into her voice. “Now.”

They didn’t need telling twice. As the sounds of their hoofsteps faded away, the Mare-Do-Well lowered her body, digging at the wood with a front hoof as she prepared to charge.

And again, that wood exploded beneath her. But the unicorn had produced a much more powerful explosion than before; this one had sent her quite a distance in the air.

Right into the path of a very angry pegasus.

Instinctively, she raised her hooves to block the oncoming pony. Pain seared through her forelegs as the horse-shoe-clad hoof of the monstrous flier connected with her, sending the earth pony tumbling end over end across the hoofbridge.

SHHKK.

The punch had sent the Mare-Do-Well flying at least thirty feet, but she heard that sound so clearly it might as well have been inches away from her ear.

Inches—

She ducked—narrowly missing another punch from the brown pegasus, who had rushed in from behind her. She was so close to him, she could see the multiple glints of light on his horseshoes—wait, multiple?

She looked again—and practically heard the color drain from her face.

A split second later, she literally heard the sound of bones crunching as no less than ten inch-long spikes—each one attached to the iron horseshoe of an immense hoof—drove into her barrel with the force of a locomotive, shredding her costume into confetti.

The Mare-Do-Well felt pain spreading throughout her entire body—not a searing pain, like something she’d get after taking a very bad tumble. No, this was a cold pain. Very cold—like all those metal spikes had been icicles. Instinctively, she immediately knew she was seriously hurt.

Her breath came out in ragged gasps, and instantly she knew her left lung was gone—if not the horseshoes themselves, then whatever fragments were left of her ribcage had finished the job. She could see large amounts of blood on the pegasus’ hoof. Her blood. It had soaked into his coat completely, all the way up to the knee.

Nopony could lose that much blood and live.

I am going to die.

Her senses were already fading; the pegasus above her becoming blurrier and blurrier, and the sounds of the wind around her fading into silence. Her mouth tasted faintly metallic—she knew she was hemorrhaging blood; it was trickling from her mouth. From far away, she heard somepony laughing, and she thought it was the pegasus, having a good gloat at her broken body. But it was too high-pitched to come from somepony his size.

That was when the Mare-Do-Well realized she was the one laughing.

This isn’t funny, some distant part of her thought. I am going to die. Why the hay should I be laughing?

“You think this is some kinda prank?” she thought she heard the pegasus say. “Huh?!”

She felt the spiked hoof tear itself from her chest, and the sensation of her hitting the bridge was met with only a faint surprise. Then, she felt her body crushed into the wood as the spikes came down again, crushing her withers with forces no pony’s bones could possibly withstand—least of all the Mare-Do-Well’s spine.

She did not hear the snap—she only felt a freezing sensation, like her entire body below her neck had been suddenly frozen inside a solid block of ice. She could not move any of her legs at all.

She was helpless.

And yet she still heard that infernal laughter, still felt the corners of her mouth turned up, even as she began choking on her own blood. She heard herself coughing, followed by a spattering sound. Yet still she didn’t stop.

Celestia, I was a foal. That faraway voice had spoken up again. I should’ve just listened to the police last time. She heard gruff voices in her head, and though she did not know what they were saying, she knew from many times in the past what they had meant for her. We catch you doing our job again, we’re putting out a warrant, and so on and so on. She stared up at the sky, her deteriorating eyesight not focusing on anything in particular.

The sky was growing lighter—perhaps the storm was clearing up? Was it daylight already? How long had she been lying on this bridge? She did not see the shadowy forms of Digger and Trinny looming over her anymore. Did they run off? Yes—at the very extent of her failing hearing, she thought she could hear the approaching sound of a police siren.
Her heart rose against her will—help was on its way! Maybe she would live through this after all! Her days of helping to buck crime and corruption in their ugly faces were certainly over, but to the moon with that—she would still be alive!

No, said the voice once more, calm and resigned. I’m too far gone. And they don’t know if anypony’s been hurt. They won’t think to send an ambulance until they see me. It’s too late.

It’ll always be too late.

She tore her eyes away from the sky as it grew bluer still, and forced herself to close her eyes—she did not want to remind herself about any light before the tunnel. That had been one reason she’d stopped watching those old soap operas—they were too dramatic, too sappy. There was nothing sappy about dying. Especially not when you were lying in a pool of your own blood.

A strange noise reached her ears, strange in its shear dissonance with the dank, urban environment around her. It was high-pitched and rapid, a quick thew-thew-thew noise. It was faint at first, coming from somewhere overhead. But even the Mare-Do-Well could tell it was getting closer.

It sounds like … birdsong?

And then, in the space of one tiny little moment, her entire world exploded in a burst of light and sound—

And stopped.

MANEHATTAN POLICE DEPARTMENT, 5TH PRECINCT

CONFIDENTIAL TRANSCRIPT

INTERNAL USE ONLY

(The following is a transcript of an audio recording recovered three days after the destruction of the Bucklyn Hoofbridge. The identities of the ponies herein have been confirmed and verified by Lt. Bullhorn of the MPD.

Investigation into the incident is still ongoing.)

LT. BULLHORN: Sergeant Saber, what’s your twenty?

SGT. SABER: We are, ah, about a half-mile north of your chariot, Lieutenant. Looks like one of your strobes burned out again. Might want to get that looked at (chuckle).

BULLHORN: (grunt) If you’re going to use those sharp eyes of yours, Sergeant, I suggest you at least be productive instead of being smart with your superior.

SABER: Noted, sir. Ready, fillies?

OFC. GLOSTER: Ready!

SGT: GRUMMAN: All set.

CDT. KOMET: (faint groan)

GRUMMAN: (chuckle) First time over the East River, huh? Don’t worry, Cadet, you’ll get used to the smell before long. Gloster, check right, get the greenhorn into your slipstream. We’ve got two dangerous foalnappers on our hooves here. Last thing I want is somepony’s puke on my feathers.

GLOSTER: Hear, hear, Grumpy.

GRUMMAN (under breath) Really wish he’d stop calling me that …

BULLHORN: Okay, everypony. Just so we’re up to speed: ten-thirty, we got a 911 call. No name, sounded like a mare. Scared out of her wits. Reported a possible hostage situation and aggravated magical assault on the hoofbridge up top. Suspects were described as a red unicorn with a tan mane and a big brown pegasus with an overcoat.

(brief burst of static)

KOMET: (slurred, indistinct, possibly “Sky so beautiful”?)

DET. 2ND GRD. GLASS: We cross-checked criminal records and found two matches. The pegasus is called Digger Wasp. Real loose cannon, that one. FUI record from here to Detrot, loves to start fights even more than he likes to finish ‘em. The unicorn’s called Trinny. No idea if that’s an alias, but his profile matches the same perp behind that string of arson attacks in Alpony over the summer. Suspected of murder—

SABER: Suspected, my flank!

(burst of static)

KOMET (clearer): So bright …

GLASS (sputtering): With respect, Sergeant, I would appreciate it if you didn’t interr—

SABER: No, I mean he’s doin’ it right now! Something just exploded on the bridge, and I’ll bet my left wing that’s our ponies right there! Break formation, everypony! Close in from both sides—don’t give them a chance!

GRUMMAN: Komet, pick up the pace for Celestia’s sake!

SABER: Bullhorn, where the buck are you?

BULLHORN: Coming up on—

(shout of pain)

BULLHORN: Glass? Glass, you all right? Glass!

GLASS (flat): Pull back.

BULLHORN: What?

GLASS: All units, pull back!

GLOSTER: What’s going on down—

BULLHORN: Detective, what’re you—

SABER: Are you crazy! We can’t turn back now!

GLASS: Saber, get out of there. Get out of there, right now!

SABER: Just a few seconds, Glass! That’s all I—

BULLHORN: Saber—!

(tremendous burst of static)

(Recording fades in and out for approximately thirty seconds before fading out entirely.)

Lieutenant Bullhorn had just turned the police chariot onto the expressway that led to the Bucklyn Bridge when it happened.

His companion, Detective Second Grade Looking Glass, had been updating the pegasi patrol when his horn suddenly lit up with a shower of greenish-white sparks of magic. Immediately, the unicorn clasped his hooves to his forehead with an uncharacteristically loud cry of pain, like he’d suddenly suffered an immense migraine. Instinctively, Bullhorn whipped his head towards him.

“Glass?”

No response.

“Glass, you all right?” Bullhorn wondered if the weather had been getting to his partner. It wouldn’t have been the first time—for some reason, stormy weather always had this strange tendency to play tricks with Glass’ magic. He’d had to take a few days off during the first rains earlier that spring. Then there was the “microburst incident” from two years ago; Bullhorn still had nightmares about the paperwork he’d had to do after that disaster. In fact, every time it rained or snowed in Manehattan, Glass’ unicorn magic simply went haywire—the worse the storm, the worse he was affected. It was like he had some kind of supernatural allergy.

And right now, those allergies looked like they were about to flare up again.

“Glass!” Bullhorn yelled, almost into his ear. Suddenly, the unicorn sat bolt upright, so quickly that Bullhorn nearly fell off the chariot.

“Pull back,” Glass said. His voice was monotonous, and his eyes had a quality to them that Bullhorn had only seen in veterans of the brief but brutal Second Age of Discord. They stared straight ahead, unmoving, unblinking.

“What?”

Glass grabbed the mouthpiece of the radio transmitter, startling Bullhorn even further. “All units, pull back!”

Now the lieutenant was concerned—he’d known Looking Glass for six years, and not once had he sounded so frightened. “Detective, what’re you—?”

Gloster’s voice, tinny over the radio, sounded equally worried. “What’s going on down—?”

“Are you crazy?” screeched Saber. “We can’t turn back now!”

Glass was nearly foaming at the mouth. “Saber, get out of there!” he bellowed. “Get out of there, right now!”

Lethal, fragile flowers of charge blossomed above the clouds, dying in the same instant that they had been born. Bullhorn saw them, and somehow he knew exactly what was about to happen.

“Just a few seconds, Glass!” Saber was shouting back. “That’s all I—”

Bullhorn knew from his studies that lightning traveled at over a hundred and eighty-six thousand miles per second—fast enough to travel to the moon in the blink of an eye. He also knew that if there was any chance of rescuing his subordinates from certain death, he had to act even faster.

Time seemed to stand still as he snatched the radio from Glass, and roared into the mouthpiece with all the lungpower he could muster. “Saber—!”

That was the only word he was able to say before all Tartarus broke loose.

Unbeknownst to the rest of her flight team, Cadet Komet had been recovering from a bad head cold for the past few days now, and this, combined with tonight’s bad weather, had hampered her flight skills noticeably. Of course, she would never have confessed this to her teammates; Komet, like any other young Cadet, would be banished before missing out on an opportunity for the fame and recognition that might come when catching criminals. Her squadmates had therefore attributed her erratic flight to the notorious odor of the East River—which, in and of itself, was not without a kernel of truth.

As they approached the bridge, she could hear Grumman—ahead and to her left—trying to coach her to go faster. She looked down at the bridge, trying to get a bearing on the suspects she and the rest of her team had been as-signed to apprehend, and for one tiny moment she thought she had seen something flying below her, racing over the hoofpath. Komet blinked instinctively, and then it was gone; a very brief but very blinding burst of fiery light, like she’d looked head-on into a camera flash. It streaked across the bridge in what had seemed like no time flat.

Which was exactly how long it took for the first bolt to crash down from the heavens; a jagged J-shaped blast of deafening sound and blue-white light—hot enough to perhaps challenge Celestia’s sun itself—that couldn’t have been more than thirty feet away from her. A hot wind seared her face, and she smelled ozone.

Komet didn’t have time to catch her breath—almost immediately, the second bolt filled her vision completely, right in front of her and striking the nearby suspension tower. Though it was gone as quickly as it had arrived, she still banked sharply out of instinct. She had to stay low now—she had learned in flight school that lightning was more likely to strike the highest possible place in the area; for instance, the lightning rods atop Bucklyn Bridge.

But Komet realized too late that right now, those lightning rods were not the highest point in the area.

By the time she turned to look at the unsuspecting pegasus above her, the third bolt had already found a suitable attractor in Grumman’s right wing. One blinding flash of light later, Grumman was plummeting like a rock—and Komet was right in his path. The poor mare had no time to react before the limp form of her sergeant plowed into her like a cartload of bricks. She felt a burst of pain somewhere in her withers, a burst of stars, and the lightning and thunder faded into silent, infinite blackness.

The situation was no different for Bullhorn and Glass. One moment, they had watched as one blast of lightning after another enveloped the bridge in white-hot energy in a matter of seconds.

Then Bullhorn had noticed that the lightning was moving in a very strange and disturbing pattern—strange and disturbing because it was heading right towards them.

Without a second thought, he heaved on the reins of the carriage, flashing back for only a moment to his grand-pappy’s range in Omareha, where he’d lassoed his first bull. The two cadets pulling the carriage quickly responded as they’d been trained to do right as the lightning storm hit.

For the longest moment of his lifetime thus far, Lieutenant Bullhorn’s world was nothing but light, sound, and an unpleasant sensation in his stomach. It felt like his face was on fire, and the stink of ozone nearly suffocated him. But as soon as the unpleasant sensation began, it was over, and Manehattan as he knew it returned to his senses.

After twelve seconds of regretting having stopped over at the Donut Joe’s near the station earlier today, Bull-horn clambered unsteadily from the carriage, just in time to see the last of the lightning bolts zigzag towards a television antenna several blocks away. Thunder was still rumbling, both outside the carriage and inside Bullhorn’s ears. But both were gradually fading, and it wasn’t long before Bullhorn came around to check on Glass.

The detective had certainly seen better days; he was shaking so violently he appeared blurred around the edges. Glass’ maroon eyes were mere pinpricks, and his dark green mane, normally curly and impeccably maintained, was standing on end; whether that was because of the lightning or because Glass was that scared, Bullhorn decided not to ask. Instead, the lieutenant merely extended a hoof outward, which his partner slowly accepted.

“Detective?” Bullhorn eventually asked, concern in his voice.

“Ugh—I’m all right,” replied the unicorn, tottering unsteadily to his hooves.

If he had a bit for every time he’d heard that before, Bullhorn thought, he’d have retired years ago. “You sure about that?” he pressed on.

“Didn’t I just say I’m all right?”

He’s fine. Bullhorn couldn’t resist cracking a grin—nothing could shake the unicorn’s normally prickly mood for long. He turned back towards the bridge. “We’d better get up there,” he remarked. “Climb on my back, Glass—we’ll get there quicker that way. You two”—he pointed a hoof at the cadets at the carriage—“fly back to precinct, tell them to send backup to the Bucklyn Bridge. Medical squads, fire teams, the works—I want them here five minutes ago. Stay as low as you can. Understand?”

“Sir!” The two pegasi wasted no time in lifting off, carriage and all, and racing back to the police station. Bullhorn, meanwhile, was already galloping for the bridge as fast as his legs could carry him, Glass on his back.

Nopony bothered to give a second glance to the lone mare nearby, occupying a bench as though an electrical storm had not just ravaged one of the most vital transportation routes of all of Manehattan. And if anypony had, they would have been surprised to discover that same bench wasn’t so occupied anymore.

The first pony Bullhorn and Glass encountered when they reached the bridge was Trinny. Bullhorn guessed a lightning bolt had struck very close to him indeed; the luckless unicorn’s fur was singed and smoking, and the expression on his face left the policepony with little doubt that he wouldn’t be speaking complete sentences any time soon. Bullhorn snapped cuffs around his hooves anyway, and fitted a special cone on his horn to nullify his magic completely, on the off chance he might be faking his injuries. Bullhorn had seen less convincing acts before that had fooled better and more experienced ponies than he; it was best not to take any chances.

There was no fooling from Digger Wasp, though. Bullhorn didn’t need a medical team to know that this one was beyond saving. From the knees down, the pegasus’ front legs were just … gone; half-melted remnants of what Bullhorn suspected were illegally modified horseshoes were mixed in with the decidedly messy remains of Digger’s front hooves. He quickly averted his eyes from the scene, and turned toward the hoofbridge—or what was left of it.

Trinny had done a spectacular job, Bullhorn grudgingly admitted as he began setting up evidence markers for the forensics teams. As far as he could see, the entire wooden length of the bridge, from one end to the other, had been gouged down the middle. Among all these splinters and shards of wood were two large bloodstains about fif-teen feet apart that he’d cordoned off specifically. One he knew to be Digger. The other was somewhat more vex-ing; there wasn’t near as much blood as with the unfortunate pegasus, but there wasn’t a body either. And there was no evidence to suggest that this other victim had been thrown off the bridge onto the expressway below, or even into the river.

In fact, the more Bullhorn looked at this, the more he was unsure about whether it had been the unicorn or the storm that had done more damage here.

What in Celestia’s name happened here?

“Lieutenant!” Glass’ voice drew Bullhorn back to reality. “I just found Grumman and Komet!”

Bullhorn galloped over to the unicorn, who was crouching over a pair of pegasi. “How are they?”

“They’re alive—somehow,” Glass said incredulously. “Looks like they both took a nasty fall. Komet must’ve had the worst of it—look here: cracked ribs, maybe some head trauma, definitely a bad concussion. She’s going to be out of commission for a while.”

“What about Grumman?” Bullhorn wanted to know, but his question was immediately answered when the sergeant in question slowly, gingerly got to his hooves.

If he had fared any better than the cadet, it wasn’t by much. One eye was closed and bleeding, and much of the right side of his tan coat was a sooty black. His right wing looked particularly bad; more than half the feathers were nowhere to be seen, and much of the remainder were smoking stubs. But Grumman, miraculously, was still kicking.

“And I think I owe it to her,” he groaned, pointing a bloodied hoof towards the still-unconscious Komet. He gave a pained chuckle, shaking his head. “If I told her once, I told her a hundred times. But the damn hotshot still thought it’d be a good idea to play hero. Guess even I have to eat my words sometimes.”

“Don’t talk too much, Sergeant,” Glass advised. “That lightning strike did a number on you both. Just take it easy for right now; there’s ambulances on the way now, and—”

“I think I know my own body better than anypony else,” Grumman said dismissively. He spoke a little louder than necessary; Bullhorn wondered if the lightning had possibly affected his hearing. “I’ve had worse happen to my wings before. Remember that changeling nest under Stallion Island? Couldn’t do crazy eights for a month after that, and I still bounced back, right as rain.”

Bullhorn did indeed remember. “But that was completely different, though—”

“And as for the rest of me, I think I can walk my own self to the ambulance.”

Bullhorn knew Grumman well enough to know that the pegasus was certainly old and reliable—and about as stubborn as the lid of a jam jar. Nothing short of brute force would get him anywhere beyond the mandatory checkup. Looking to change the subject, Bullhorn asked, “Did you see Saber and Gloster anywhere?”

Grumman sighed. “Last I saw, they were ahead of me before the lightning struck,” he said somberly. He looked at Bullhorn in a very meaningful way. “Not all the bolts hit the bridge. They never had a chance, sir—I’m sorry.”

Bullhorn felt his heart sink. Nopony in the MPD’s long history had made the rank of Sergeant faster than Saber, and even though Gloster had only been with the force for ten months, he’d been on track to break that record. But more than that, Bullhorn had liked them both very much; he was going to miss their unique brand of enthusiasm around the office for a very long time.

After what felt like hours, he rose to his hooves, the faint sound of ambulance sirens drawing closer and closer. “It’s best I break the news, then,” he sighed, already mentally steeling himself for the emotional grief he’d be hearing from the two fallen pegasi’s family members. “Look, I’ll be heading back to precinct soon. It’s going to be a long night for me, no matter how I slice it. Glass, stay with Komet and Grumman. I don’t think there’s much more we can do here; it’s up to the forensics teams now.”

“Need a lift back, sir?” Glass’ horn started to glow, only for the lieutenant to wave him off.

“I’ll walk back,” Bullhorn assured him. Though he wouldn’t admit it, he did not trust teleportation as a reliable means of transportation, even in emergencies. And while Glass was certainly capable—he’d graduated from the Canterlot Military Academy as one of the top fifteen unicorns in his class—there was no telling what those “allergies” of his would do if he tried to teleport a mouse five feet, let alone zapping a full-grown earth pony like Bullhorn a full mile back to the station. At least walking back didn’t run the risk of displaced insides.

Once a pair of ambulances had arrived to transport the casualties (Bullhorn silently thanked the Alicorns once they’d zipped up Digger’s remains into a body bag), he set off for the police station, making a mental note to brew a fresh pot of coffee once he made it to his office.

Even at this late hour, the waiting room of the Manehattan Downtown Hospital was a constant murmuring of noise. A pair of starved-looking mares half-covered in purplish bruises sat unmoving on stark wooden benches, speaking indistinctly under their breath and trying their best to stifle their crying, and an equally emaciated pegasus stallion jerked back and forth in his seat, eyes staring straight ahead, unblinking, and hooves twitching every which way so quickly and violently they might fly off at any time. He muttered incoherently in a language most likely known to himself and nopony else.

The one element of silence in this room was the receptionist at the front desk. She lounged on her stool with a bored expression on her face as she turned the pages of Mareika Leonard’s latest release. “Octane?” she called out.

The pegasus in question jumped a few feet from his seat, evidently not expecting his name to be called so soon. As calmly as he could—which is to say, not at all—he sped out a nearby door that led to the emergency rooms.

The front doors of the hospital blew open suddenly, briefly startling everypony except for the receptionist, who merely flicked her eyes upward to see what new victim of Manehattan’s streets had walked through her doors. Finding nopony standing before her or taking a seat, she shrugged. Must’ve been the wind, she decided as she returned to her reading.

One of the bloodied mares shrieked.

The receptionist, now slightly annoyed, turned to reprimand the unfortunate pony, then noticed the mare’s bruised hoof was pointing somewhere in front of her desk. Frowning, she rose from her stool to look for herself.

It was a testament to her years of experience that the receptionist did not scream, run for help, or otherwise cause a scene when she saw the sight before her eyes—and more importantly, that she still appeared to be alive, if only by a thread. Instead, she quickly produced a radio from her uniform, summoning doctors and orderlies to the waiting room with calm, practiced efficiency.

The next few minutes passed by in a flurry of activity as the receptionist attempted to calm the waiting patients while half a dozen doctors and surgeons burst into the waiting room, barking indistinct orders and medical jargon barely audible above all the commotion.

“ … severe lacerations and bludgeon wounds … multiple injuries to barrel, forelegs and spine … get a gurney with IV drip immediately … five units of Aa-positive … prep the operating room, stat!”

A nurse rushed to the side of the new arrival, putting a calm, reassuring hoof on the mare’s shredded withers. “Do you know where you are?” she called out, looking into her eyes, which were already half-clouded over. “You’re in a hospital! Can you hear me? You’re in a hospital! … ”

You should not have done that.

I should have left her there to die, you mean.

You know full well you have no power in this city. None of those ponies was your responsibility.

I don’t care about just the city! I care about Eridanus, and you should, too! If those two creeps hadn’t been stopped when they did, there’s no telling how much damage they’d have done to both worlds.

Insignificant. Irrelevant.

Don’t tell me you didn’t see it. There was something about that mare. I hope we haven’t seen the last of her.

You believe you made a difference.

Heh. You think I was fast at the bridge? Should’ve seen me back before I met you.

Part of your duty is learning to accept that your allegiance no longer lies with Equestria. You are no longer one of them—

—and I can’t let such petty nonsense get in my way. Yeah, yeah, you’ve told me a thousand times already. But still, I think this would qualify as extenuating circumstances. Look at them. All that bad blood between them—it was bound to happen. Maybe if we’d stepped in sooner, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.

…

Oh. Right. All I’m saying is, with Kraz and Chiba still at each other’s throats, somepony’s got to pick up the slack around here.

That pony is not you.

Really? Since you apparently seem to know everything, just who might that pony be?

That is for this city to decide. Remember that in the end, we are only observers here. Nothing more.

Whatever. So, who do you think’s going to win?

That is for this city to decide.

…

It’s time to leave.

… Fine.

Chapter III

View Online

III

The tide had turned in the battle of the two armored warriors in the sky.

The tipping point did not come during a searing flash of magical lightning or a shriek of crossing blades, even though these were never few or far between. Nor did it come in the times when their struggle became a flurry of flying kicks and well-aimed punches, though these were just as common.

It came as the battle shifted from above the clouds to the skyline of the great city, the metropolis that both had once known as a small collection of wooded cabins, and had watched it grow and blossom and prosper and wilt and grow again through the ages, like a mother would watch over her own child.

It came as they descended upon its tallest spire, a massive construction of stone, metal and glass that towered above its brethren like a great oak before new shoots of grass; it came as the summit of this great tower became the focus of what both gladiators knew would be their final confrontation.

It came when a force without age or form resolved itself into the champion it had helped to guide for all these years.

It came when that champion finally found himself helm-to-helm with his silver-clad nemesis.

For only an instant, a flash of lightning had illuminated the sky above their battlefield, casting shadows on the silver pony before him. In that instant, as the black fighter looked into two wholly different eyes—one carried since birth, another that stared back at him with the cold, dancing lights and calculating indifference of a machine—the ebony-clad warrior had seen the truth, the truth that had concealed itself inside the gray armor of the unicorn he had once considered his friend and compatriot.

And he realized just how much his friend had changed.

Somewhere in the thousands of years—had it really been that long?—since this silver warrior had taken on the mantle of a legend far older than the city a thousand or more feet below, something had happened to him. He himself had grown into a legend in his own right. But his friend had kept on growing, kept on evolving, kept on changing into something—no longer somepony—something wholly different than the hero he had once tried his best to emulate. He was no longer a protector of the city.

He was the city.

He had seen the city’s magnificence and splendor, its awe and mystery. As it had grown into the crown jewel of a prosperous civilization, so too had he matured to be a paragon of justice and security even among his own kind. But he had also seen its decline and squalor, its decay and deterioration. And one forgotten day, for a brief, forgotten moment, this great protector had pitied the less fortunate residents of this metropolis, and despised that so many were forced to live in such poor conditions; he had opened his heart out to them.

And just like that, the damage had been done.

What had begun as a fleeting moment of sympathy had mutated into an obsession. And he had mutated with it; now it was impossible to tell where the pony ended and the corruption began.

This was no longer a rivalry, the black pony realized. This was an intervention.

“Do you fear me, Chiba?”

Even the voice of the silver unicorn did not sound entirely natural; it was distorted and slightly filtered, with traces of a high, cold monotone that reminded the ebony warrior of wind rushing against a swordblade. Whether it was because of his helm, more arcane machinery, or something more malevolent, Chiba did not know, nor did he wish to.

“I only fear what you became, Kraz,” he answered. There was no trace of emotion in his voice at all, even as he readied his blade in preparation for an attack.

“I have become nothing,” Kraz declared coldly. “I am not finished becoming.”

His glowing metal horn was all the warning Chiba had. Kraz’s sword had moved for only an instant, swinging inward in a tight arc as though he was preparing to parry a blow. Then it had abruptly swung back outward, and the blowing snow surrounding them was dispelled. The unblockable blast of wind he had just conjured rushed straight for Chiba, catching him like a fully spread sail and sending him tumbling over the edge of the skyscraper.

Almost.

Kraz did not seem to move. In less time than it took for another bolt of lightning to leap from one cloud to the next, he had disappeared and reappeared mere inches in front of Chiba, stretching out a metal-clad hoof and preventing him from plunging to the streets far below. With a great heave, he pulled Chiba up by the helm and right up to his own armored muzzle.

Mere inches away, he hissed in his ear, “I have not even begun.”

Then Kraz released his hoof, and Chiba fell.

There was no doubt that the millions of ponies who called this land home had become a highly advanced society. It was not apparent on first glance—the combustion engine, for example, had not yet fully caught on in a society that still preferred the old-fashioned horse-drawn carriages, despite having been invented over half a century ago. But there were certain frontiers that even they had yet to breach.

It was not completely out of inconvenience that nopony had flown where no pegasus could fly before. It was the dream of many a young colt and filly to see the “sky beyond the sky”—that great black canvas that provided a medium for the ever-changing masterpieces of their Princess of the Night. That was often reason enough—while a pegasus could conceivably skirt the outermost layer of the skies above Equestria, the space that lay beyond that was unquestionably the Alicorns’ domain. Breakthroughs in science and mathematics made sure that every young pony knew just how unbelievably massive the sun, moon, and stars were compared to how they appeared to be from Equestria, and it was a testament to their rulers’ power that even these great celestial bodies could be commanded by their ancient magic.

Out of reverence for them, therefore, nopony had bothered to pay serious thought to what could possibly be beyond even the “sky beyond the sky.” For what star, they said, could possibly match the power of Celestia’s own?

One of those stars twinkled.

Only if somepony had been expecting it to happen would it have been noticed, and given its largely unimportant place in the heavens, even a completely clear sky over Manehattan would not have given it any sort of attention. This star, however, did not belong to Luna, or to her sister. It was not alone—not every star in the sky was thrall to Luna’s power over the night. Perhaps it was because many of them were so insignificant in the grander scheme of things that they did not warrant her attention, and were left alone as a result.

This star, however, had apparently decided it was tired of languishing in the background, and was now determined to outshine even the moon. But just as it looked like it was about to succeed, something swirled around the tiny point of bright light—something formless, blacker than even the void around it.

The star blinked.

Suddenly there was no star anymore, but a single eye—lidless and pupil-less, a tiny point of blinding light wreathed in darkness—staring at an even darker presence as it prepared to kill in cold blood, many miles below.

Not yet.

As quickly as it had appeared, the eye had closed shut, and the star was back in its rightful position; in place of the strange oculus was a silent echo of words, spoken in a language that no living pony in Equestria had even heard aloud before, nor would hear tonight.

Time felt as though it had slowed to a crawl, and still the wind was screaming in Chiba’s ears as he continued his uncontrollable descent to the street below. He guessed he had fallen about three hundred feet already, which wasn’t good. His kind were substantially more durable than the average equine even without the heavy armor they often wore, but nothing remained durable for long during a thousand-foot freefall such as this one—even his armor, enchanted with magic far older than the world below him, would not be unscathed, let alone the rest of him.

Then, in some back corner of Chiba’s mind—distinguishable even through the shriek of the wind—he heard it.

Look to the east, look to the west,

Look to the north, look to the south,

Look to the earth, look to the sky,

Feel his shadow, hear his cry,

Behold! The legend, here and now!

As the last word faded in Chiba’s thoughts, he felt something coursing through his armor—no, his body. It was a slightly warm feeling, like the sunshine he could never truly feel again spreading its rays all over his coat. He could feel it strengthening his body; the words had reinvigorated him as only they could. Now Chiba could feel the warmth concentrating on him; gradually the rest of his body was cooling down, while at the same time less and less of his body was still heating up. Before long, his left forehoof felt like he was holding it in a roaring fire.

Left forehoof …

Only at that moment did Chiba understand entirely what was happening, though not entirely why, and without a second thought, he raised his burning hoof—now starting to glow a faint orange from the sheer heat from within—his gaze searching for the speck that was Kraz, hundreds of feet above him …

Kraz had been watching his nemesis fall for the few seconds that had passed for the ponies below, and what might as well have been a lifetime for himself and for Chiba—well, he reflected with a faint smirk, perhaps only for himself. He had then turned away from the stone precipice, the battle seemingly won.

Then, from the corner of his eye, Kraz saw a thread of orange light split the sky down the middle, and over the howling wind, he could hear the faint but rapid clink-clink-clinking noise of a ratchet and chain. He followed the path of the scintillating cable until he saw its glowing pinpoint burrow its way into one of the stone columns that encircled the space he occupied as if they themselves were witness to this battle.

Even now? Kraz thought. How typical of Ebene, to struggle to the last.

He turned back to the edge of the skyscraper where he had sent Chiba to his apparent death, and sure enough, faster than a fleeting shadow, there was the ebony equine, tethered to the other end of the chain as he propelled himself to the tip of the spire. There was the dull crunch of metal on stone as his armored hooves connected with the towering structure, followed by the faint but harsh scrape of a sword being pulled from its scabbard.

Kraz smiled as the black pony brought his blade into an attack stance, one that he himself mirrored as he unsheathed his own weapon. Swaths of blue flame washed over his silver armor, consuming his metal unicorn horn to make way for the earth pony’s superior physical strength. As soon as he felt the telltale invigoration in his legs, he crouched low to the ground, took a deep breath, and leapt into the air.

As the two warriors sailed towards each other like missiles primed to strike, the sky directly over the great tower began to glow once more. For an instant, the world around them was obliterated, replaced by some enormous, fragile flower whose stem was as blindingly white-hot as its petals. At any other moment in time, the two ponies might have set aside their differences, and agreed that seeing this moment—frozen in time around them for an eternity too short to be measured—was more beautiful than anything in the world. But the lightning bolt dissipated all too quickly; the blast of thunder muffled the sound of Kraz’s and Chiba’s blades crossing, the sparks flying from the impact far inferior to the one that had dared to intervene in their contest.

Also flying was Chiba; the force of the lightning—coupled with a well-placed buck from Kraz’s left hind leg—had sent him careening the other way. Only the reflexes he’d spent entire centuries honing to perfection had kept him from smashing through one of the stone columns; instead, his body had briefly blazed, and armored wings had unfurled to slow his velocity enough to where the aged rock merely cracked under the impact of his four hooves.

Kraz was not done, however; right as he’d kicked Chiba away from him, he’d transformed back into his unicorn self, using his magic to separate some of the razor-sharp scales of armor covering his hooves. These he launched at Chiba like knives, glowing faintly blue from his telekinesis. The black pegasus was forced to assume his own unicorn form, conjuring a citrus-colored shield to protect himself from the worst of the shrapnel.

He could see that Chiba was determined to stay on the offensive, however. The instant the last of the missiles had struck either shield or stone, he had reverted back to his pegasus form, streaking for Kraz with the desperation any pony would feel if they possessed the desire to win at any cost.

Kraz possessed that same will as well—which was why he had finally decided it was time. It was with mixed feelings that he came to this decision; he had much rather enjoyed tonight, and though he had yet another long life to live ahead of him, it would admittedly be a lonely life without having anypony to call a rival around. But even his kind had limits—and Chiba was testing his.

It was time, then, that his former friend knew just how far Kraz had come.

Even as Chiba took to the air, he could see the gray unicorn hovering high above him, sword magically suspended mere feet away from his muzzle. His front hooves were moving rapidly, forming patterns and poses too quick for a normal eye to see. But Chiba did not need to see them; he could already sense the air around Kraz was changing. The sensations he felt around the gray pony were at once familiar and unfamiliar, but they were definitely energies that he recognized as his own—and that was what alarmed him the most.

Impossible …

In a split-second, Chiba had extended his wings to their fullest capacity. But he already knew it was too late—he’d built up too much speed. Even turning into a unicorn wouldn’t do him much good; on top of the time he’d need to transform, he would need so much magic to arrest his momentum that if the force of deceleration didn’t kill him on its own, then he’d be so depleted that Kraz would finish the job.

And so Chiba decided, rather calmly, that this would be his last, highest gamble.

He put on another burst of speed; it was clear to him that Kraz was doing some kind of incantation. Why, Chiba did not know; their kind had enough power as it was, not to mention that that power could be exercised in a much more efficient way than simple gestures. Only just now had it occurred to him that perhaps Kraz was performing this incantation because he needed the time. Which meant that whatever he was doing, the results were bound to be devastating—which in turn meant that Chiba had to act fast to stop him.

He drew back his front hoof, ready to lash out with his blade—and was instantly blinded by a piercing light. Initially, he thought there had been another lightning strike, but immediately rebuked himself after not hearing the thunder that would have followed. No—this light seemed to be coming from Kraz himself.

He can’t have—

Then, as suddenly as the light had been born, it had faded into darkness. In its place was something so unexpected—so logic-defying—that even the normally stoic Chiba felt his jaw go slack at what he was seeing.

He has.

Kraz the unicorn was still there, still chanting as if nothing had ever happened. But the two massive, silver-armored wings that had sprouted into being from his shoulder blades told Chiba everything he had wanted to know—and much that he had never wanted to.

There’s no hope for him now.

The pegasus/unicorn—to call it an alicorn would have been blasphemy—turned its head slowly, almost insultingly, to regard him. Then there was another flash of light, this time from the unsheathed blade in Kraz’s telekinetic grip. The glow engulfed the sword, and suddenly there was not one blade, but two—

I’ve failed.

Each sword, identical to the other, began spinning in deadly arcs like sawblades. The tiniest effort of will from the abomination that controlled them sent them both shrieking through the air—straight for Chiba. The pegasus, too numbed by the sight of what he had just witnessed, did not notice where the twin swords were heading until they’d sheared through his outstretched hoof—and both of his wings.

It was surprisingly painless—a testimony to the sharpness of Kraz’s blades, Chiba thought in reluctant admiration. However, not having any pain to concentrate on made the pain to come that much more unbearable. Without anything to slow his velocity, Chiba was nothing more than an errant arrow that had just missed its target. Unfortunately, he didn’t have the luxury of silently landing in a grassy field—only the sickening crunch of his armored body ricocheting off a stone pillar, then plowing into the unyielding concrete surface fifty feet below him.

The pain was excruciating—a sobering reminder that his kind, though immensely powerful, were far from invulnerable. As Chiba tried to ignore the stabbing sensations that had erupted all over his body, he heard the faint sound of metal against stone—his sword, he realized, clattering to the ground. With some difficulty, he forced his eyes open; through the worsening snowstorm and the blood trickling from the wound on his head, he could barely see the faint glint of his blade—twenty feet away, perhaps, and just off to his right.

He’d never reach it in time.

Something further in the distance distracted him, some dozen feet behind the sword. He heard the hooffalls of spiked shoes against the concrete, and forgot all about his injuries.

It was almost insulting how slowly Kraz—the wings nowhere to be seen, but the horn still very much visible—was closing the distance between the two ponies. Some small part of Chiba knew he was only being toyed with, that Kraz was trying to goad him. The rest of him, shaking not only because of the blood loss, knew he was succeeding.

How could you?

Without glancing downward or breaking step, Kraz leisurely plucked the blade from its resting place with his magic, gave it a telekinetic twirl, and launched it straight for Chiba. The crippled pegasus had no time to cry out as the blade found its mark—

Kraz smirked as he saw the once-proud warrior’s body at his hooves. In ancient times, back before even he had been in his prime, to die by one’s own sword was considered by certain cultures to be a form of atonement for a grave dishonor committed in life. It was what Chiba would have deserved, he considered. Like him, Chiba had also seen the best and worst of the city they had watched over the centuries. But while Kraz had accepted the reality of the situation, Chiba had rejected the truth, closed his eyes to the light, but most disgraceful of all, he had shunned the less fortunate below. Sooner or later, Kraz knew he would have to make amends for this.

And tonight, he’d provided him with the one opportunity to atone for his dishonor. But something inside him had stayed his hoof for the tiniest moment, and the blade—on course to impale Chiba through his skull—had veered just a little to the left, nicking him on the ear but shattering his helm, exposing his face for Kraz to see.

He saw quivering eyes the color of red wine, fresh blood matting the chestnut coat and dark gray mane—he saw fear. He was so surprised that he nearly lost his composure then and there. Surely, he thought, Chiba would be at peace with himself by now, and would welcome death with open hooves after he had given it his all in this battle. But no—he was shaking like a scared little foal, and that was enough to destroy any temptation to laugh.

He’d never seen anything more disgusting.

“Do you fear me now, Chiba?” he sneered, his synthesized voice freezing the bile in his words into icicles.

The broken pegasus’ mouth moved, but for a few seconds no words came out, until—“H-how could you?”

Kraz arched an eyebrow. So it wasn’t just the fear he was shaking from, was it? “I was just the better swordspony tonight,” he answered simply. Then, as an afterthought, “Those were your words, you know. The first time we trained against each other? Do you still remember those days?”

“A-always,” Chiba choked out, though the anger in his voice was still palpable. “I kn-knew you’d—ergh—fallen a long way.”

“And yet you still thought you change that?” Kraz had to do his best to stifle another chuckle. “You always were the optimist,” he said sarcastically.

“Until—augh—tonight,” Chiba said scathingly, teeth clenched both in pain and rage. “You betrayed Ebene tonight, Kraz. You … you betrayed all of Eridanus. Even we weren’t meant to—unnh—to go as far as you did.”

“Have you forgotten who gave me this power in the first place?” Kraz asked, raising his voice only a little.

A pause. “No,” Chiba replied. “Because … because I know that that power can never be truly mine. And it will never be yours.” A grimace flitted across his bloodied face. “Corvus would … would be ashamed of you,” he added. He was coughing now, and beginning to hack up some blood.

Kraz readied his sword—he had had enough of this. “You tell him that,” he said. “You’ll be seeing him soon enough.”

The blade came up. “And you can tell him—from me—that you will be the first.”

The blade came down.

There was a great explosion of light, and Kraz was forced to brace himself against the unexpected shockwave. Through a barely-opened eye, he saw the suit of black armor disintegrate completely, a thousand pieces swirling around the fallen warrior like the feathers of a bird, though they were not being carried by the wind.

As Kraz watched, the vortex spun higher and higher, becoming lost in the storm clouds in a matter of seconds. Then—as swiftly as this mystical tornado as been born—there was another flash of light, a deafening boom, and Chiba, body and all, was gone.

Kraz turned away from where Chiba had once lay dying, but his gaze did not leave the point in the sky where the vortex had vanished. Tonight was truly a night of firsts, he thought, a slight smile on his face. Though even his magic could not clear the sky above him—or rather, he reflected, not yet—he could imagine that a certain faraway point of light was shining just a little bit brighter tonight.

So this is what happens, he thought, when I kill a star.

He did not dwell too much on it; he knew that even the stars could never live as long as a legend. But he had more important things on his mind right now. He could sense that some distance below, on one of the highest floors of this skyscraper, the future was waiting for him.

For the last time tonight, Kraz replaced his blade in its scabbard. The tiny clank was lost in the howling wind even before he, too, vanished into blue flame, leaving the battlefield as empty as it had ever been before tonight.

The conference room already took up half of the eightieth story of the Sun & Moon Plaza, but its minimal furnishings made it seem even more massive. The featureless surface that served as a table, splitting the forum down the middle, was hewn from the dark wood of the Zebrican ebony tree, and obsessively polished to a mirror finish. The entire east wall of the room was composed of clear glass panels that opened into a balcony; here, on a clear morning, Celestia’s sun would shine while directors and executives of companies and firms throughout Equestria would meet and plot—discussing the fates, for better or worse, of everypony and everything that called this land home.

It was a fitting place to hold tonight’s upcoming meeting.

The last of the attendees had arrived five minutes ago. Most of them stood against the walls, while the others had taken seats at the great black table. All told, they numbered around twenty. Their faces were largely hidden in shadow; several glowing orbs of magically conjured light had compensated the lack of sunlight. They hovered over the dark surface, flickering like candles.

Yet their light did not compare to the great orb suspended inches over the balcony outside; a glowing sphere, bright as day and large enough to admit a fully-grown stallion, held their undivided attention. The congregation could sense the power presently contained within; they knew better than any creature in Equestria that it was not something to be trifled with—and so they waited. The first to come had already waited for over an hour, but they were all prepared to wait for an eternity—or longer, if their master wished them to.

But now the sphere was fading, the bright light resolving into translucent, and finally transparent spheres within spheres, layered with arcane glyphs of a language that no longer existed on this world. These, too, dissolved in a matter of seconds, and the form that had been floating inside it like an unborn child had levitated to the ground.

Two of the glass partitions glowed a faint periwinkle, the telekinetic force of the magic shifting them left and right without a sound, opening wide for the latest arrival as he strode in. Every other step he took was accompanied by a dull metallic clunk. Then, with a sound like a match being struck, a second ball of pale blue light flashed into being. It lazily drifted over the table, growing in size and luminosity until the other mage-lights in the room had been consumed by it, and the entire room was bathed in its cool light.

The unicorn was certainly a remarkable specimen; he was thin but sleek-looking, and stood a head taller than the average stallion. His sky-blue mane had been swept to one side of his face, obscuring the strange device that rested where his left eye ought to have been, but not the sigil that adorned the other side of his head. His gray coat was indicative of the obsessively neat—or perhaps the obsessively vain—; the glow of his mage-light reflected off his fur so perfectly that it might have been liquid metal.

Though his eye was closed, the unicorn could feel the eyes of everyone present locked on him, and he wondered privately if perhaps they were trying to avert their gaze from his right foreleg; it was mostly covered up by a thick sleeve of black wool, but just enough of the false hoof showed through this sleeve to give anypony plenty of reason to stare, however impolite they were being. The thought entertained him for only a moment, as he reminded himself that the creatures before him had already proved their allegiance to him a thousand times over, and respected him greatly, but the thin smile still lingered on his face as he finally broke the utter silence of the conference room.

“Do you remember your history?”

His voice was breathy and quiet, as though he was talking to himself as much as he was to his assembly, and his mouth had scarcely moved when he had spoken. But they had heard him, and they had understood, and nodded their assent.

“They do not,” said the unicorn, his head jerking imperceptibly toward the open balcony, indicating the sprawling skyline eighty stories below them. “They have forgotten why they were permitted to live in this world—why their right to exist can never be called a right at all, but a clause … a condition.”

His words were tinged with acid. “They have even forgotten us,” he added, “their memories of the Star-Beasts of old, and the celestial thread that connects their world with this one—everything has been purged. They only accept the Sisters now.” He emphasized that word with a stomp of his artificial hoof; the impact left an indentation in the hardwood floor beneath him. “And this cesspool is the result of their foalish and misplaced adulation.”

The unicorn opened his single golden eye, and a bright but tiny spark flared to life beneath his mane, where his other eye used to be, and scanned his audience.

The congregation was a motley sort indeed; mares and stallions of every type of pony regarded him with a look that could only be described as blind loyalty. There were even a few non-equines here and there; a pair of Diamond Dogs was in attendance—one of which was seated at the table, the other resting behind and to his right—, a tough-looking griffin female stood next to the doorway like the bouncer of a nightclub, and a phoenix rested on the withers of the equally intimidating mare next to her, occasionally ruffling its smoldering feathers.

“You and I have sacrificed a great deal to come this far,” said the unicorn as he looked at them all, “and for that, you have my greatest of blessings, to use however you may wish. But there is still much to be done, and very little time to accomplish it.” The forces of the Sky-Bridge were not ignorant, he knew. By now, they would have sensed the destruction of their comrade, and he was certain that they had already begun to search for a successor. Even he did not know how long it would take—in his experience, it could be anywhere from a few days to a few decades.

He knew his audience could sense the urgency in his words, and he betrayed a glimmer of silent admiration when he saw the pony at the opposite end of the table—a burgundy mare whose jet-black mane and tail were styled into thick, segmented braids—rise to her hooves.

“We are at your command,” she responded, her voice low and throaty, but clear as a bell, “and your disposal, Lord Kraz.” Murmurs of assent, like waves breaking on a shoreline, echoed her words.

“How long do we have?” asked another pony seated at the table, a burnt-orange stallion with a mane as bushy as his beard.

Kraz had anticipated this question. “Little enough,” he said simply. “But we must not forget.”

He raised his false hoof, flexing it, admiring the ornate handiwork before he turned the contraption so that—on a living hoof—he would be staring at the triangular frog and the bare sole. On this hoof, however, an oculus somewhat larger than his own eye had been implanted into a recess. The eye blinked a metal-clad eyelid several times, and then it flared with a bright blue light, outshining even Kraz’s own mage-lights.

Kraz stretched out his metal hoof for all to see. He lifted his head a fraction of an inch, looking everyone gathered in the eye, and told them, “We must remember the Star-Beasts.”

And they will remember us, he privately thought. After all these long years, they will all remember us once again …

Ebene …

Now what?

There is nothing we can do here.

Didn’t you hear any of that? Didn’t you hear what they were trying to do? We have to stop this somehow!

There are too many. If you challenged them to battle, Chiba would not be the only one who died tonight.

Ugh. Then what can we do?

We must look out for ourselves, and our city.

Again with the city?

With Chiba gone, this city lacks a protector. Kraz’s actions have disrupted the balance of power here; if any one of us were to assume Chiba’s duties now, then their city would be at stake.

…

It is up to Corvus now. Until then … This city is old, and it has weathered much tragedy and disaster in its time. Perhaps they will survive.

You’re putting your trust in Corvus?! It could take ages to find somepony! Kraz has a window of opportunity that he’d be a foal to ignore right now, and you’re saying we should just do nothing?!

Kraz is not a foal at all. But what he is planning will take time. There is a chance that Corvus will find a successor before Kraz can make his first move. It will have to be enough.

… Am I the only one of us who thinks this is a waste of time?

…

... I hope you know what you’re all doing.

End of Part I

Interlude I

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Interlude I: The River in the Sky (Part II preview)

Apart from the thousand-year period where Princess Luna lay sealed in the moon, modern Equestria has always known in some way the reign of the Sisters Royal.
However, this was not always the case. At least two thousand years ago, before the accession and coronation of Celestia and Luna—even before the Strife of Discord—everypony in those days practiced a form of animistic religion; the stars in the sky, according to these beliefs, formed patterns that corresponded to creatures often found on Equestria. These were called “constellations,” and were venerated by the ancient tribes as spirit-animals with great power that was said to equal that of an Alicorn. Certain secluded communities throughout the world still hold these spirits in high regard, revering them as equals to the Sisters, or even as gods.
One such community is also the largest of its kind: the Aquastrian Empire of the eponymous ocean, or—to use the Equestrian vernacular—the sea ponies. According to Aquastrian lore, the sea ponies were much like any other pony; even today, traits of the three subspecies are still present in their physiology, while in the past they were only distinguishable from everypony else by a love for swimming, sailing, and other water-based activities. But at the onset of the Age of White, when the blizzards wrought by the Windigoes were just beginning to blow, their shamans saw a glimpse of the future, and the strife that was soon to come.
They petitioned the spirit-animals for guidance, and if records of those days are to be believed, they were told to break off from the other tribes of earth ponies, pegasi and unicorns in order to fend for themselves, instead of informing them of the events in store for the world. They did so, and their bodies were transformed; sleek scales and slick, slippery skin of many colors replaced their coats, gills opened along their necks, and streamlined flukes and fins took the place of their manes, tails, and even their hooves. With these new bodies, they realized they could thrive in the ocean for as long as they wished, and they slipped beneath the waves without a moment’s hesitation as the waters began to freeze above them.
(At this point, it should be noted there is controversy as to whether the plight of the sea ponies should be interpreted as a blessing to help them survive and build a new culture unique to them, or a curse for abandoning their comrades. In the interest of neutrality, the author would like to point out that each side of the argument comes with an equal amount of bias and misinformation; proponents of the former theory are largely Aquastrian themselves, while on the other hoof, many supporters of the latter believe Princess Celestia cursed them personally. This latter statement is dubious, as no major historical records make reference to either Celestia or Luna until their uprising against the god Discord.)
The pantheon of the sea ponies, however, is generally agreed to be factual, as it shares many similarities with other religious beliefs of its kind, such as the zebras of the southern jungles and the traders of the Mareabian dunes. The many spirit-animals the sea ponies worshipped were called Star-Beasts in their culture; they were said to live on the shores of the great river Eridanus—the “River in the Sky,” and one of the largest of all the constellations. The waters of this river, according to lore, flow from a place that the sea ponies call Anyparxia, or “nothingness,” into the world of Equestria. The nomads of Mareabia, who have traditionally assigned a name to every single one of the countless stars in Luna’s sky, refer to this location as Anha'eyh Aghyh, meaning “infinite void,” while most Zebrican tribes refuse to give it any name at all; they consider its inhabitants to be evil beyond any comparison or reason, and that to speak of it would surely bring that evil upon their lands.
To ward off this evil, the zebra tribes that still venerate these spirit-animals hold a special ceremony. On a clear, moonless night, in the presence of the tribe, a seasoned warrior of age communes with a spirit called a Star-Mother, who they call Ebene‡. With the aid of herbs, aromatics, and the prayers of the shaman and every zebra in attendance, the warrior slips into a trance. If the rite is successful—that is, if the star-mother finds the warrior worthy—then he is gifted with the power needed to vanquish the darkness that lies beyond Eridanus. In exchange for this power, his soul is considered the property of Ebene until such a time as the forces of evil have been dispelled. During this time, the warrior’s body—his soul’s only physical link to Equestria—lies comatose, and the tribe vigilantly looks after his physical well-being until his service is complete—or, as is more often the case, until his death.
‡When consulting the zebra herbalist Zecora (see the section Acknowledgements for further information) on the nature of the rituals of her species, I was informed that “Ebene” is actually taken from a Prench word for the color black, though Zecora also inferred that a more contextual use of the term might be the absence of color, or of light. Whatever their reasons, I can only surmise that the zebras elected to use a foreign word as a name for their “star-mother” because there was simply no applicable phrase in their language for something as mysterious and undoubtedly alien as Ebene must have appeared to them.
- Excerpt from Lost Lore and Legend, Vol. I
Dusty Tome, Royal Archivist of Canterlot 2025-57 CSE (Coronation of the Sisters of Equestria)

2066 CSE

Four years later

“Your attention, please,” came the pleasantly cool voice from the intercom of Manehattan Grand Central. “The seven-forty from Baltimare is now arriving on platform three. Please stand clear of the tracks at this time.”

The largest train station in all of Equestria was also one of the oldest still in use today. The same could be said of a large fraction of the trains that, on any given day, more than one hundred thousand ponies used to get to and from Manehattan. There were the more modern “bullet” trains of Bellerophon Industries, able to rocket from one point to the other at nearly half the speed of sound, but the old-and-reliable steam locomotives were still in use after so many years, frequented less by commuters and businessponies than by tourists, who preferred an opportunity to sit back and enjoy a wide-open view.

The seven-forty from Baltimare was neither of these; angular, blocky, and a very drab gray, it was one of Equestria’s first attempts at implementing its new mass-transit system. More thought had clearly been put into how many it could fit inside than how comfortably it could fit them. With “economy” trains such as these, space was always at a premium. Fortunately, the ride was smooth and quick enough to almost make its passengers forget how merely squeezing in and out of their seats could constitute the day’s exercise. Almost.

Poorly lubricated brakes raised a harsh, but futile protest as the train slowly came to a halt, capped by the pneumatic hiss of double doors opening. Within seconds, dozens upon dozens of sapients flooded out of the train, a murmuring babble of indistinct noise adding to the already chaotic hustle and bustle of Grand Central.

Suddenly, the noise stopped.

Almost immediately afterward, so did everything else.

For a single, imperceptible moment in time, time itself had frozen. And since even the smallest of thoughts take time to think, no pony—no creature—would ever be aware that the world around them had ground to a total halt.

Except for one.

The tan stallion presently emerging from the seven-forty was fairly tall, but had the look of a hoofball player who’d lost about a hundred pounds in the span of two days. His face was gaunt and unshaven, with a clear five-o’clock shadow over his muzzle. It didn’t look like he’d slept well; the earth pony’s dark brown eyes, concealed behind slightly tinted eyeglasses, were half-lidded from a combination of insomnia and boredom. An unzipped, dirty white overcoat at least two sizes too big for him covered his entire barrel, cutie-marks and all, and a heavy-looking guitar case and rucksack was slung under one foreleg and over his withers.

This pony did not even seem to notice—or even to care—that the world around him had ceased to exist outside of that one moment. He casually threaded his way through the silent, motionless crowds with all the practice of somepony who’d done this quite a few times before, jauntily humming a tuneless song to himself as if this was merely the world’s biggest game of musical statues. Occasionally, he would bump into one of the ponies who’d been frozen in place with the rest of time; he did not stop to apologize—as if it would have been any help; moreover, they would only assume somepony else must have bumped into—

Something moved.

Immediately, the stallion stopped, his eyes suddenly wide and alert, scanning the section of the station ahead and to his right, where he thought he’d seen something shift position in the corner of his eye. His right foreleg slowly moved towards his guitar case.

More movement.

Sure enough, it was near the turnstiles again. The stallion also happened to see what—or rather, who—was responsible. He relaxed, but only a little; very few creatures in all of existence had the means and the ability to erect a chronotonic nullification spell of this magnitude, and even fewer had the ability to break through it. Those that could were either very powerful, or very dangerous.

The pony he saw was certainly not the latter, and frankly, he thought it didn’t look all that powerful, either. In any other situation, this would have instantly put him on edge. But once he saw what he—at least, the stallion thought it was a he—was doing, he had to fight the urge to laugh. Quickly and silently, he crept up behind him until he was so close that he was tempted to dramatically breathe down the pony’s neck.

Then: “‘S a pretty cheap thing to do.”

The stallion chuckled to himself—the little colt had jumped so high he’d nearly touched the ceiling. The ticket he’d just filched from the saddlebag of the unaware mare just ahead of him fluttered to the ground, and he followed shortly thereafter, his face blushing every color possible.

Quite literally every color, noted the stallion—and the change wasn’t just limited to his muzzle, either. “Oh, sorry,” he said, in a mocking but goodhearted apology. “Didn’t mean to throw ya off your game. And for what it’s worth,” he added, “that’s a neat trick to have—the way you can change like that? Nopony ever looks twice in this city. And if somepony ever did, who’s to say they’re still lookin’ at the same pony they just passed a second ago?”

The colt was silent, perhaps just now coming to the realization that he, too, wasn’t the only one in this place who could apparently control the flow of time. The stallion had noticed, and raised his forelegs defensively. “It’s okay,” he said reassuringly. “I’m not gonna hurt ya. You don’t look like the kind what goes around causin’ the kind of trouble that gets ponies killed.”

A silent sigh of relief.

“Now that bein’ said, pickin’ pockets is no way to go through life, son, and it ain’t what our kind’s good for.” The stallion’s smile turned wry, and his kind voice gained just the tiniest bit of an edge, like a father scolding a foal who’d done something wrong but wasn’t old enough to know better. He pointed a hoof at the ticket on the floor. “C’mon, then. Put it back where you found it.”

Slowly, reluctantly, not daring to take his eyes off this strange stallion, the colt obeyed his instruction—though not without a long look at the turnstile ahead. He turned an inquiring gaze back to the stallion.

The stallion grinned, as if he knew what the colt was trying to say. “See, when ya got this kind of power, you start to see every way you could possibly get somethin’ done. Long ways, short ways, by-ways—subways,” he chuckled at his own pun. “Long way—see the turnstile up ahead, but ya don’t have a ticket, what d’ya do, steal somepony else’s.” He paused for emphasis. “And then there’s the short way.”

A quick shake of his barrel, and his guitar case had shifted down across his right flank, exposing his sandy brown withers. “Want a ride?”

A few seconds of confusion passed before the colt’s eyes suddenly lit up, and suddenly he was shimmying onto the stallion’s back. Without further ado, he shot off at full tilt, galloping faster and jumping higher than anypony else ever could, sailing over benches, passersby, and finally the turnstiles as if they weren’t really there.

In no time flat—which, from a certain point of view, wasn’t completely an exaggeration—they’d spotted an empty table at a nearby outdoor café, and sat down on cushions that, despite being slightly understuffed, were quite more comfortable than a three-hour train ride.

“Somethin’ on your mind? You ain’t said a word this whole time, kid,” the stallion coolly observed, plucking a daffodil from the plate of a passing waitress, frozen in mid-trot. “Well, I dunno if I oughta call you a kid at all,” he laughed, munching on his flower; it was a little on the dry side, he decided.

“You look pretty young for a pony, sure,” he continued. “But I think we both know by now that’s not what we are. And for all I know, you’re probably a whole lot older than me.

“ … ”

“Now, I don’t like to get my muzzle in things what don’t matter to me, so I’m not gonna ask what you’re doin’ out all this way from the River. You, on the other hoof … well, ya look the curious type, so I guess there ain’t harm in spillin’ at least one or two beans in the jar.”

The stallion rested a hoof affectionately on his guitar case, which he’d plunked onto an added cushion all to itself. “I’ve got some family comin’ to town. I imagine they’re all here already, probably waiting on me. Be nice to see how much they missed me—it’s been awhile since I last showed up to any of our ... reunions.” His face darkened slightly. “I hope they’ll enjoy it as much as I will,” he said, “‘cause I don’t expect to be showin’ up to any more.”

“ … ”

“To be completely honest, that ain’t why I’m here. Why I’m here … well, I got a debt to settle; an old friend of mine—very old. Let’s just say he likes his assets very, very liquid.”

He gripped his guitar case again, and checked a battered-looking wristwatch. He frowned slightly; why he was checking the time when time was still frozen around him, the colt did not know. Evidently, it made sense to the stallion, as he abruptly stood up, purpose in his eyes.

“Y’know what they say? ‘Time waits for no pony?’” asked the stallion. “Well, there’s a few things out there what don’t wait for time. And I dunno about you, but I’d rather not be late.”

The waitress holding the plate of daffodils suddenly turned around, thinking she’d seen somepony reaching for the strings of her apron. It wouldn’t have been the first time; she’d only just settled out of court for that last case of harassment two weeks ago. But nopony was at the table behind her, though she did note it was somewhat odd that a table for two currently had three cushions under it.

She gave a noncommittal shrug before turning back to delivering her order; perhaps it had merely been a bird. Yes, that was it. There wasn’t anything to be gained by wasting second glances on a flock of pigeons.

After all, nopony ever looked twice in this city.

Chapter IV

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PART II: Opening Gambit

(The following excerpt was taken from a Tailex communiqué between the headquarters of the Equestrian Royal Navy and the Naval Division (codenamed DWRDIV) of the Equestrian Secret Service. After the requisite five-year waiting period mandated by Equestrian law, the document was declassified in 2071 CSE with the express permission of former Fleet Admiral Blue Aegis, acting commander at the time of the carrier SSR (Ship of the Sisters Royal) Dream Valley.

All information herein has been preserved in its original state for posterity.)

TOP SECRET
094935Z ****2064
ESS DWRDIV SITREP
ERN HQ MARELINGTON
MESSAGE FOLLOWS
AT 083145Z TECTONIC MONITOR STATIONS [REDACTED] [REDACTED] AND [REDACTED] RECORDED ANOMALOUS HYDRODYNAMIC ACTIVITY FROM BUOY DELTA ONE SEVEN SITUATED IN AQUASTRIAN OCEAN 97 NM W OF BORDER OF AQUASTRIAN EMPIRE XX DATA CONSISTENT WITH COMPRESSION WAVE OF EARTHQUAKE POSSIBLE MAGNITUDE 5
AT 083500Z AN “ALL SHIPS” BROADCAST WAS MADE BY ERN HQ IN RESPONSE TO ANOMALY XX MESSAGE DURATION 46 SECONDS WITH 2 REPEATS
AT 083738Z ESS FOREIGN AFFAIRS REPORTED ALL CONTACT WITH AQUASTRIAN EMPIRE HAD CEASED XX ERN HQ DISPATCHED SSR DEIMOS XANTHOS LAMPON AND PODAGROS OF DIOMEDES SQUADRON AHEAD OF FLEET TO INVESTIGATE
AT 093034Z DIOMEDES SQUADRON ENTERED AQUASTRIAN WATERS 22 NM WSW OF AQUASTRIAN CITY OF NEIGHTILUS
AT 094233Z SSR LAMPON REPORTED UNIDENTIFIED SONAR CONTACT 6 NM ENE OF POSITION XX DIOMEDES SQUADRON MOVED TO INTERCEPT
AT 094423Z HOSTILE CONTACT INITIATED BETWEEN DIOMEDES SQUADRON AND UNIDENTIFIED SUBMERGED OBJECT
AT 094544Z LAST RECORDED TRANSMISSION FROM DIOMEDES SQUADRON XX TECTONIC MONITOR STATIONS [REDACTED] [REDACTED] AND [REDACTED] RECORDED HYDRODYNAMIC ACTIVITY FROM BUOY ZETA TWO THREE SITUATED IN AQUASTRIAN OCEAN 6 NM NW OF POINT OF TRANSMISSION XX DATA CONSISTENT WITH COMPRESSION WAVE OF EARTHQUAKE POSSIBLE MAGNITUDE 6
EVALUATION: INSUFFICIENT EVIDENCE TO CONFIRM AQUASTRIAN MILITARY IS ARMING FOR WAR XX TECTONIC ANOMALIES ATTRIBUTED TO NATURAL GEOTHERMIC ACTIVITY XX CONCLUDE DIOMEDES SQUADRON DESTROYED BY MACROFAUNA OF UNKNOWN ORIGIN
END SITREP
ESS SENDS
095011Z
BREAKBREAK

SSR Dream Valley

2066 CSE

The Aquastrian Ocean was relatively quiet today. There was not a cloud in the sky to discourage Celestia’s sun from shining its rays on the sea, though the brisk wind blowing from the east did not make for a pleasure cruise.

Not that newly minted Fleet Admiral Blue Aegis paid it a lot of mind. For one thing, he had seen very little action as the commander-in-chief of the Equestrian Royal Navy. The incident at the Aquastrian Empire’s western border was practically the one exception.

It had been almost two years since contact had been lost with the three hundred sixty-two ponies that made up the Diomedes Squadron, and still it weighed heavily on Aegis’ heart. That assignment had been the one stain of dirt on his otherwise commendable record; he’d come within inches of a general court-martial, as DWRDIV believed he had not only acted rashly and against his better judgment, but had also circumvented authority in the process. Only by insisting that his intentions were for the sole purpose of reconnaissance was he able to escape that fate—it had helped that a formal investigation had revealed that all four of the Diomedes submarines had only taken on sufficient arms to merely defend themselves, not to effectively start a war.

Ultimately, Aegis had been issued a reprimand, and relegated to clumsily pushing around a pencil with his teeth in a Marelington office for a long while. What he had done between then and now to not only see himself back on the ocean again, but also in command of the naval forces of the Royal Princesses, was genuinely a mystery to him. But he had not questioned anypony when he had been given this honor; Aegis saw this as his second chance. He sensed he wouldn’t be with the Navy much longer, as he was getting on in years, so it was his hope that he made the most of it as best he could.

He took a deep breath through his nostrils, savoring the salty air while he listened on his earpiece to the second reason his mind wasn’t on a slice of future real estate in Miamare Beach today.

“Zero-three-eight, zero-three-five, zero-three-three, no contact,” a voice crackled forth from the tiny crystal that linked Aegis with the response teams.

“Roger,” came a second voice, deeper and calmer. Aegis recognized him, and fought the urge to smile.
“Zero-two-niner, zero-two-two, zero-two-one. Red four, Red two, White three, White one—all clear.”

“Roger, Stable Two. Aura group, prepare seismic buoy, deploy at grid 330.”

“Primed.”

“Drop, drop, drop.”

“Drop, over.”

A beat. “Stable One, this is Aura Leader,” said the calm voice. “Grid 330 has been marked. Proceeding along bearing three-one-seven mark six-five to grid 341, over.”

“Roger, Aura Leader,” Aegis replied, failing to keep his grin from splitting his face.

A bark of laughter burst forth from the earpiece. “Tell me that ain’t Ol’ Blue!”

“I won’t tell you, then,” retorted the aging admiral to the son of one of his old friends, who had retired as captain of the Baltimare only three years ago. “Been a while, greenhorn.”

“That’s Major Greenhorn to you, sir!” Another jovial laugh.

“I bet old General Beeline a whole paycheck you wouldn’t make it out of latrine duty. That was five years ago—may he rest in peace. And the first I hear of you since then is that you’ve got the reins of your own wing?”

“Yes, sir!”

“Sounds like your father and I are due for another chat,” said Aegis. “Your CO and I go a ways back; I’ll have a word with him, see if I can’t get him to give you some leave sometime soon. You and your dad and I can get dinner in Canterlot—I’ve been wanting to see how much you’ve grown.”

“You’ll be seeing me sooner than you think, sir!” chortled Greenhorn. “Over and out!”

And indeed, no sooner had he said the words than half a dozen pegasi—four of them towing a special cloud modified for both high-speed aerodynamics and storage of sensitive equipment—streaked over the port side of the Dream Valley at cruising altitude. Aegis’ eyes could briefly see the formation of an arrowhead before the ponies of Aura Wing shrank into pinpricks as they headed south-southeast to their next objective.

Aegis had been hoof-picked to coordinate the testing of the Equestrian Geological Survey’s new seismic buoys—the “sensitive equipment” currently in the care of Aura Wing and all the other squadrons in the ERN. Tectonic activity in the Aquastrian Ocean had been increasing at a constant rate of nine percent over the last four years, which was making the higher-ups uneasy, as the Aquastrians were still not answering any attempts at communication. Aegis had to admit their stubbornness was legendary; they had survived without the guidance of the Sisters Royal for a long time, and—unless they were willing to risk a war—they preferred to keep it that way. Which was why none of the Equestrian armed forces had even dared to attempt so much as a flyover of Aquastria.

But this operation—while not ostensibly aggressive—was far more than a simple flyover, Aegis reflected.

A unicorn ensign approached him suddenly, and saluted him. “Dispatch from the Everfree, sir.”

Aegis stretched his sore hooves, grunting dramatically. The Everfree was one of the submarines operating concurrently with the field test. He had personally opted for its deployment; the Everfree was still a relatively new craft, but if those rock farmers on the Survey had managed to make something better than the ERN’s cutting-edge sonar, he wanted to know about it. “Let’s hear it,” he said.

The ensign levitated a manila envelope to Aegis. “It’s an eyes-only, sir.”

Aegis frowned at the telltale red tape that sealed the package, wondering what the Everfree might have found to warrant something with this level of security. “Dismissed,” he nodded to the ensign, who gave one last salute before trotting away.

After he was satisfied that he was alone, Aegis broke the seal, and opened the folder.

The first thing he noticed about the Tailex message was the large red A preceding the time and date. An “A” prefix on these communiqués constituted a very high-priority message—definitely enough to warrant an eyes-only, as the ensign had said:

A 110405Z 09182066
E Y E S O N L Y
FM: SSR EVERFREE
TO: COMAQUA
INFO: CINC ERN FLT
//NOOOOO//
EQUGEO COLLAB OPS
1. APPROX 1100Z MONITOR STATION NEIGHSAU REPORTED ANOMALOUS HYDRODYNAMIC ACTIVITY XX SPECIFICS UNKNOWN BUT CONFIRM CITY OF DELFIN IS EPICENTER OF ANOMALY
2. ALSO REPORT UNIDENTIFIED SONAR CONTACT WITHIN ANOMALY XX PATTERN FAINT BUT EVIDENCE OF UNKNOWN ACOUSTICAL CHARACTERISTICS XX SIGNATURE DOES NOT REPEAT DOES NOT CONFORM TO ANY KNOWN PARAMETERS OF AQUASTRIAN DESIGN
3. REQUEST PERMISSION TO INVESTIGATE XX SUSPECT DELFIN UNDER ATTACK BY MACROFAUNA OF UNKNOWN ORIGIN XX BELIEVE HIGH CHANCE TO LOCATE AND IDENTIFY AT CLOSER RANGE

Aegis replaced the Tailex in the yellow folder, eyes suddenly out of focus. It was tough at his age, having to slog through so many capital letters in one place. But trouble reading wasn’t the cause for the sudden chill rising up his spine, or the sinking feeling in his stomach.

Hydrodynamic activity … unidentified sonar contact … macrofauna of unknown origin …

No.

Updates from the squadrons suddenly forgotten, Aegis galloped for the bridge.

Five minutes later, after hurriedly calling for a meeting of the Dream Valley’s senior staff in front of her bemused captain, he and a dozen other ponies were seated in the ship’s “war room”, looking just as confused. Some were quick to note the tension in the air; nopony had ever seen the admiral looking so scared.

Aegis was the only pony standing. For his part, he’d managed to calm himself down since he’d stumbled onto the bridge. All things considered, that was a remarkable feat. Now, though, something far more difficult was looming in front of him, because this time, he knew what he’d have to do, and what it could very well cost him.

He exhaled, looking at everypony seated at the table once, before he spoke. “I apologize for calling you all here on such short notice,” he began. “Frankly, I’d have liked some more time to properly prepare—as it stands, I don’t think DWRDIV would be happy that this conference is even taking place. Therefore, what I’m about to tell you should be considered highly classified information. As such, it is not to go beyond the bulkheads of this room. Am I clear?”

Everypony nodded.

“Good. Two years ago, Foreign Affairs out of Canterlot reported that regular contact with the Aquastrian Empire had simply stopped—not so much as a trickle. That much you already know. But what you don’t know is that six minutes before the breakdown in communication, three separate monitor stations for the ERN received reports of unusual hydrodynamics well within the territory of the empire. Per standard procedure, an “all ships” alert was put into effect.

“It was determined that the anomaly was the result of an undersea earthquake, presumably from the active tectonic rift that divides the empire down the middle. Director Pie of the Geological Survey confirmed the data gathered was synonymous with that of a magnitude five. That’s nothing especially severe, to be sure. But it was the strongest earthquake in that region in almost two hundred years. And I thought it smelled wrong.”

Silence.

“I was a commodore back then,” continued Aegis, “And long story short, I believed the earthquake was a result of testing seismic weapons—and that the loss in communications was a prelude to war.”

“Seismic weapons?” piped up a pegasus stallion, a lieutenant commander that Aegis recalled served as the Dream Valley’s tactical officer, bearing the rather unfortunate name of Itchy Hoof. “With respect, sir, weapons of that nature certainly have potential for destruction, but they’re not illegal—at least, not under Geneighva, sir.”

The Geneighva Convention, as anypony who called himself a part of Equestria’s armed forces knew, was the final authority on war and peace—and Aegis knew its many sections and subsections inside and out. “They’re regulated nonetheless,” he told Itchy. “Even though they’re not so much weapons of war—these days you mostly see them with shady Diamond Dog mining magnates, looking to get rich quick. But as you said, Lieutenant, there’s a massive chance of collateral with such an indiscriminate tool. And if a foreign power was making them without any properly explained intent … well, I suspect you would be feeling just as uneasy.”

“Permission to speak freely, sir?” Another lieutenant commander, this one a unicorn mare with a slight Stalliongradi accent, raised a hoof.

“Granted.”

“I only want to be clear on something. You were assuming the Aquastrians were arming for war … under a hunch?”

All the air went out of the room. Itchy Hoof was looking at the mare as if she’d gone mad.

Aegis’ pained expression at that old ghost didn’t last long. “I wasn’t ruling anything out, Ms. Mareze,” he explained to the Dream Valley’s communications officer after briefly clearing his throat. “War was certainly a possibility, but the top priority was that the Aquastrian Empire might be in danger, and however their stance toward us, we were obligated to offer our assistance.” Here, Aegis paused; he wasn’t sure how everypony here would react to what he was about to reveal to them, he would have to choose his words carefully. After clearing his throat a second time, he began. “I chose to deploy the Clover and the Hurricane to Aquastria for the aid mission; I also chose for the Diomedes Squadron to escort them.”

Many of the ponies exchanged looks of surprise; the four submarines that made up Diomedes—Lampon, Deimos, Xanthos, and Podagros—were almost to the ERN what the Wonderbolts were to most pegasi. Their mysterious disappearance from the public eye some years ago had only served to fuel the tales of their exploits under the sea. The story went that they were on an extended tour of duty in the northern ice fields, but Aegis knew full well that was all it was: a story—one that he’d had a hand in putting out himself, no less.

“Diomedes was given additional orders,” he went on, “to scout out ahead of the convoy, and to investigate and confirm that the Aquastrians were indeed testing seismic-based weapons. If not, to continue with their escort mission as usual, and if so, to order a nonviolent cease-and-desist.”

Nopony dared speak. Finally, Mareze tentatively ventured a question.

“And?”

Aegis heaved a sigh. “We never found out. The squadron picked up an unidentified sonar pattern twelve minutes after they entered Aquastrian territory. Whatever it belonged to was hostile—according to their transmission logs, they were attacked less than two minutes after it showed up on sonar. Eighty-one seconds after that … ” Aegis had to stifle a gulp. “They were never heard from since.”

The ponies were stunned. Aegis couldn’t blame them, really; he had reacted much the same way when he’d first heard the grim news for himself. He could already see Itchy and Mareze preparing to ask about Diomedes’ supposed “tour of duty,” and something told him that he’d have to face that particular music eventually. But however much he hated to admit it, there was a time and a place for grievances, and this was neither one. “That brings me to today,” he said before anypony else could speak up, the bluster back in his voice.

“Ten minutes ago, the submarine Everfree received a message from our monitor station in Neighsau; they confirmed a massive hydrodynamic anomaly centered on the Aquastrian capital of Delfin. Everfree also reported a sonar pattern near the outskirts of the city, unlike anything the Aquastrians have ever produced. They want to risk a closer look to be sure, but they suspect the city is being attacked by some kind of creature—as we speak.” He paused to let the effect of his words, and the sense of déjà vu contained therein, sink into his audience.

“I’m prepared to grant their request. But I don’t want history to repeat itself—I want to be ready for anything out there, and I mean anything. So,” he rested his forelegs on the table, “I need options.”

Itchy tapped his hoof impulsively. “We could remotely detonate some depth charges, modify them to carry a slightly lower yield than usual. The compression waves might be enough to destabilize these anomalies, and possibly even slow down whatever this creature is.”

An earth mare next to him shook her head. “Depth charges in Aquastrian territory? They’d be well within reason to consider that an act of war!”

“Add to it, there’s too many variables involved,” Aegis said. “We don’t know if the anomalies or the creature are causing more damage—or whether the depth charges would be more destructive than both. I’d much rather this be as clean as possible.”

“Then we go for precision,” Mareze offered. “Send an armed escort with the Everfree, we can use that to lure this creature out of Aquastrian territory. Safer waters if possible, into the fleet if absolutely necessary.”

“And if this creature decides to attack our fleet instead?” Itchy’s query was not intended as a challenge, but he still wilted under the look Mareze was giving him.

“Absolutely. Necessary.” The lieutenant’s face was an expressionless mask as she repeated those two words. “Or do you doubt the most potent naval power in the world?”

Itchy tried to stutter a reply, but Aegis quickly intervened before the mood turned sour. They were both good ideas, to be sure, but nothing would be gained today by slinging cutting remarks at everypony within range. “Perhaps we could work out a compromise?” offered the admiral.

Nopony said anything. This bothered Aegis a little bit, though he was wise enough to not let it show. Having his orders questioned by somepony of lesser rank was oddly more fulfilling to him than when the pony actually outranked him. It was one of the things he’d missed since the grand old days of when he used to command the Marebourne; back then, he’d taken every available opportunity to turn his war room into a forum for ideas and creative solutions that ended up being beneficial to all parties involved in the long run. Aegis considered it his way of “fostering the future of the Royal Navy,” as the blowhards who went out recruiting for the ERN always liked to say.

But since nopony appeared to want to contribute, “We’ll send out two Hurricane-class submarines to join the Everfree,” he explained. “Their combined power should provide enough of a target for this creature to chase. In the meantime,”—he fished out a map that he’d procured earlier—“I want to deploy the fleet along here.” He tapped his hoof to a point situated about ten nautical miles outside the western border of Aquastria, then swept it several inches in either direction.

Itchy got the point almost immediately. “Like a giant net.”

“Actually,” Mareze piped up, “I think that’s enough distance to where the Aquastrians wouldn’t sanction us for hostile intent. Not easily, anyway.”

She looked at Itchy Hoof. Itchy looked at her.

“Depth charges?” the lieutenant commander said. Aegis swore his eyes almost looked hopeful, like a colt pleading with his mother to buy a Royal Guard action figure. He consequently had to fight a nostalgic grin.

Mareze gave a thin little smile. “Absolutely necessary,” she said for the third time in as many minutes.

Aegis silently cheered. There’s that creativity I was looking for.

“Right,” he said, taking this truce as his golden opportunity, “Itchy, set about getting your charges ready. Make sure they can be remotely activated and deactivated, so that any that we don’t end up expending can be easily retrieved after all’s said and done. Removal will take precedence; I don’t want any collateral at all out of this.

“Mareze, work with him. Get the word out to the rest of the fleet so they can prepare their own armaments accordingly. I’ll be expecting your final report within the hour. Also,” Aegis paused for emphasis, “I want you to share this plan with the Aquastrians. Advise them of our situation in full—don’t spare any details.”

Mareze blinked. “But the Aquastrians aren’t even—”

Aegis cut her off. “Doesn’t matter,” he said bluntly. “Send them regular messages on all possible frequencies. Every five minutes if you have to. They’ll have to answer eventually, and even if they don’t, we’ll be keeping a full log of those transmissions. So on the off chance they do try to sanction us, we’ll already have an ironclad reason.”

“Understood.”

Aegis looked around at everypony, and sighed. “I don’t need to tell you all what could be at stake here,” he said heavily. “Whatever we’re dealing with has the capacity to take down an entire empire in a matter of minutes. And if we don’t stop it, then all of Equestria could be in danger. We’ve all got our work cut out for us. Dismissed.”

All but one of the ponies stood up and left; this last stayed in her seat at the opposite end of the table. She was an old gray mare in many senses of the word, but her drab coat and iron-colored mane did nothing to dull the cheerful, attentive look on her face even after hearing today’s grim revelations.

“Director Pie,” Aegis said to her, “I’d advise you and the rest of your team to head back to the mainland.”

“You sure about that?” The infectious, helium-fueled voice of Inkie Pie’s famous sister was apparently genetic; it was so incongruous with the usual mood of the war room that Aegis couldn’t resist breaking out into a smile.

The admiral composed himself. “With respect, Inkie, this is no place for civilians. And I’ve got enough innocent blood on my hooves already—if I lost any more lives because of another bad decision I made, I wouldn’t be able to live with myself.”

“My old dad used to say ‘One pony can move a rock, but a herd can move a mountain,’” Inkie chirped.

Aegis frowned. “Meaning?”

Inkie laughed, and smiled knowingly at him. “Meaning I’ve got a plan.”

“What kind of plan?” Aegis asked.

Inkie told him.

SSR Everfree

900 ft below sea level

A 111835Z 09182066
E Y E S O N L Y
FM: COMAQUA
TO: SSR EVERFREE
A: SSR EVERFREE A 110405Z 09182066
B: COMAQUA INST 1679.3
EQUGEO COLLAB OPS ASSIGN //NO3229//
1. REQUEST REF A GRANTED
2. AREAS PAPA SIERRA TANGO REF B ASSIGNED FOR OPS RECON ALPHA 112000Z TO 150001Z
3. SSR WINSOME SSR AETHON TO ESCORT FOR DURATION
4. SILENT RUNNING ONLY XX MAINTAIN LINK TO SSR DREAM VALLEY AT ALL TIMES
FADM AEGIS SENDS
BREAKBREAK

Captain Deep Six had read this Tailex nearly ten times already, but the more his eyes lingered on the page, the bigger his grin was becoming. He’d been critical of the Fleet Admiral more than a few times, but one thing about Blue Aegis that Deep Six had always admired was that if you asked him a question, then by sun, moon and crown, he’d give you an answer. And when it came to naval emergencies that could potentially jeopardize the future of Equestria, Hurricane-class attack submarines proved to be the best answer to just about all of them.

“Conn, Sonar.” The submarine’s PA system blared harshly in the cramped space of the submarine interior.

“Conn, aye, this is Six,” answered the captain.

“Aft array just picked up two Hurricanes. Closing thirty-five knots either side.”

“That’ll be our escort, then,” Six said. He pocketed the Tailex, and made his way to the bridge. “Anything new on our tango?”

“Negative.” There was a pause. “Network complete. All three submarines are now linked up with each other—along with the Dream Valley. They could hear a pin drop over here now, sir.”

Sonar could be so incredibly awesome sometimes, Six thought. He, like almost everypony who worked a … well, sonar station in the ERN these days, was a chiropony, a rare species of equine that, up until Princess Luna’s reappearance more than fifty years ago, had carried the kind of social stigma that went hoof-in-hoof with their association with the darkness—specifically, their role as the royal guard of Nightmare Moon. Their unique appearance in relation to the average pony—large triangular ears, dark purple coat, flat leathery muzzle and tail, yellow cat’s eyes that were nearly blind, and most unsettlingly, their gleaming white fangs—didn’t help much, either.

But Sonar and the other chiroponies—whether by the machinations of the thing that had once possessed the Princess of the Night, or by the winds of change that accompanied the passage of time—possessed an aptitude for magic that exceeded most unicorns’ abilities. Most of the time, this magic was sound-based, and allowed them to hear things that most ponies could not. Much of this magic was used to help them see more clearly, especially during the night or in the dark, or to communicate with other chiroponies. But a select few were particularly gifted even among their race; they could broadcast these sounds throughout a large area, or to a totally different species of equine—an experience almost like telepathy, Six had recalled saying on the day he’d first met a chiropony. Sonar was one of those few—which made him a perfect candidate for the ERN as a navigation officer.

The Everfree’s sonar station was standard-issue: a perfectly spherical chamber whose outer layer was laced with acoustite, a type of crystal that could literally absorb incoming sound waves like a kitchen sponge. However, a properly calibrated magical field, such as the one Sonar maintained near-constantly as per his job description, could agitate the microfractures in the acoustite layer, and transmit those sounds through his magic to his ears, allowing him to pinpoint the shape, size, and exact direction of anything that made the tiniest peep in the ocean.

Sonar was the crucial part in this cutting-edge technology, though Six hated having to think of a fellow equine that way, and he had instructed the rest of his crew to treat him as they would one of their own. They’d risen to the occasion quite well, he thought; though his job didn’t allow him to get out much, Sonar was more than their eyes and ears, he was almost the heart and soul of the Everfree. In fact, Six was secretly hoping the Geological Survey’s new equipment wouldn’t be up to par with Sonar’s magic. He’d been one of the many jobless during the recession of the 2050s before signing on with the ERN; many of his friends had been in the same position as well. That had hurt Six, and it would hurt him to see Sonar potentially replaced by a few simple little crystals.

Which was why he was secretly glad for the Fleet Admiral’s change of plans today.

Taking his seat on the dimly lit bridge of the Everfree—dimmer than usual, owing to their current status as "running silent"—Six lifted the communicator to his mouth, making sure to press a button that would ensure his conversation could be broadcast along Sonar’s entire private network. “Stable One, this is Echo Leader. Escort is counted for; all systems go. Permission to commence Recon Alpha, over?”

Lieutenant Mareze’s tinny voice filtered through the speaker after the minimum transmission gap of five seconds.

“Granted, Echo Leader. You are clear to proceed, over.”

“Acknowledged, out.” After switching off the communicator, Six cleared his throat—it was time to go to work now. “Helm, take us to twelve hundred. Ten degrees down-angle.”

“Aye, sir. Twelve hundred feet,” responded the diving officer, turning a bulky-looking wheel with his free hoof. He clasped an equally large lever with a free hoof, and shifted it toward him several notches. “Ten degrees down-angle.”

“All ahead full,” ordered Six.

“All ahead full, sir.”

The low, barely audible rumble of the Everfree’s massive primary screw beginning to turn soon filled the cabin, and the submarine slowly began the first leg of her charted course to Delfin.

Author's Notes:

FINALLY

SWEET ZOMBIE LUNA this turned into a right snowball.

Anywho, this chapter and the next are an homage (or a blatant ripoff, depending on how you look at it) to "The Hunt For Red October"; my dad got me into Tom Clancy's books over Christmas break, and Red October ... well, long story short, I just couldn't put the blasted thing down. So, chalk another mark in the column for "Why I Am A Slow-as-Molasses Writer."

Next chapter may be a while coming, I'm sorry to say; I want to concentrate more on my schoolwork and my portfolio for the time being. Also, I wanted to leave you all with a cliffhanger. Because I'm evil like that.

(I am not)

As always, feel free to drop me a line in the comments section. I really hope you're enjoying this piece; it makes all the countless revisions and formatting worth it. It really does.

On that note, I leave to massage my aching hand. Ta!

Chapter V

View Online

Manehattan, Lower East Side

“From EBC Studios in Manehattan, I’m Head Line with your "News at Noon." Troubling news from Canterlot Palace today, as reports of military action near the western border of Aquastria appear to be confirmed, refueling suspicions that the reclusive sea-pony kingdom, from which no communications have been received for nearly two years, may indeed be arming for a potential offensive. Joining me now is our palace correspondent Inside Track and, ah, Ms. Track, I have to say these reports seem awfully farfetched. Has there been any official word from the palace regarding this information?”

“ … Nothing direct at this time, Mr. Line. I’ve spoken with several of the Princesses’ advisors, and all that I’ve been able to glean is that less than two hours ago, both Celestia and Luna called an emergency session with Equestria’s joint chiefs of staff. We’re anticipating an official statement any moment.”

“Have we, ah, heard any word from the Royal Navy? Are they mobilizing in response to this potential threat?”

“ … Hard to say. There are reports that Fleet Admiral Blue Aegis was not among the ponies attending the session. Some of them are saying he may even be working in the field as we speak. These rumors are putting a considerable number of the nobility on edge, and by extension, a large part of the popu—”

“Ah, Ms. Track, so sorry to interrupt, but, ah, an edict has just been sent down to me; I’m to go live to Canterlot immediately. Pending any other developments, we’ll continue our discussion later in the hour.”

“ … Of course, Mr. Line. Thank you for your time.”

“My pleasure. … If you’re just tuning in now, viewers, ah, this just in from our correspondents in Canterlot: I’m being told that Princess Luna has called for a press conference regarding the reports of renewed military action by the Aquastrian Empire. After the break, we’ll be taking you live to the Palatial Gardens, where the conference is set to take place.”

The small throng of ponies that had been gathering near the bank of brand-new televisions in the display window had turned into a sizable crowd. Through this, the news story that had been blaring on every single one had spread like wildfire, and it was immediately apparent that everypony was beginning to look uneasy. Granted, this was unexpected; uneasiness was almost second nature to a pony, a deep-seated neurological reaction that was very hard to overcome. But there was a line in the sand between uneasiness and panic—and this crowd was looking to cross that line.

The trouble was, they never had the time; for time itself was presently slowing to a snail’s pace, and within moments had stopped entirely.

There were only two ponies were apparently unaffected by the connotations of the breaking story—or, for that matter, by the sudden freeze in time—but even here, in the case of the larger stallion with the guitar slung over his back, he was more frustrated than anything. His smaller companion, barely even a colt—or so he looked—only appeared uneasy more because of the growing crowd than the televisions. He clung to the stallion’s hind leg like a lifeline, not even daring to let go.

“Well, on the plus side, that makes it a bit easier for me to find him,” grumbled the stallion, almost inaudible under the cacophony of the rabble around him. “Minus side … it makes it a bit easier for him to find me.”

He turned to the colt. “Feel like goin’ swimming?” he asked him kindly. “Where you’re from, I bet you’ve done it a lot more than I’ve been able to. I used to swim too, y’know—quite a bit, really. But my body ain’t the same as it was back then. Wouldn’t be able to take it anymore.”

The colt stared at him for a good ten seconds, before he finally, slowly nodded.

“C’mon then, hop on,” the stallion offered, freeing up some space on his withers and neck. “Word o’ warning though, kid. The river over here ain’t quite like the one you’re used to. And I’m gonna need some time to get set up, so you’d best brace yourself in advance—an’ don’t wander off on me, ‘k?

“ … ”

“I’ll take that as a yes. C’mon.” And the pair launched away through streets and alleyways, dodging frozen passersby left and right. Occasionally they passed more crowds of ponies and other sapients; all of them looking on the verge of mass panic as the news began to spread even further.

Something suddenly caught the stallion’s eye, and he skidded to a halt; at the same time, time resumed its normal progression. A camera crew—probably one of the local stations, the stallion decided—was interviewing a random pony, presumably about current events. The stallion snorted—in his eyes, they were trivial. The real danger—the real current event—was still to come.

“So what do you imagine the Princesses’ response will be?” asked the newsmare. The camerapony behind her was looking directly into the concrete-gray face of a rattled-looking blonde pegasus, only inches away.

What the pegasus’ reply was going to be, the newsmare and her audience never found out, as the stallion had strode up almost muzzle-to-muzzle with the camerapony, who now trained his equipment on him. The newsmare let out a surprised “Oh!” and instinctively brought the microphone to his muzzle, as if she was actually anticipating a reply from him. This prompted a laugh from the stallion.

“You really think it’ll matter what they say?” he said, calmly—almost jovially. “Maybe ya haven’t taken a look around lately. All these ponies what got their saddles all knotted up—and how d’ya think they ended up like that?”

As if to emphasize his implication, a carriage raced by, nearly bowling the camerapony over. A quick glance out of the corner of the stallion’s eye showed the official symbol of the police department emblazoned on both the carriage and each badge of the four tough-looking ponies that occupied it.

“You ponies are weird, y’know?” he laughed. His voice was calmer now, almost deathly so. “It’s like ya enjoy bein’ in a tizzy. Like ya almost thrive off gettin’ the wits scared outta ya. But that’s exactly where ya gotta watch your step. Mass panic in the streets is one thing. Stampedes an’ riots are another. But knowin’ that ya just might’ve caused ‘em to happen?”

The stallion left the question hanging for a few seconds, taking in the sight of the newsponies. Both looked like they had half a mind to shut off their equipment and turn tail.

Eventually, he breathed a hefty sigh. “Eh, whatever. Can’t remember the last time my word actually meant somethin’ to you lot, anyway. I can already tell none o’ ya are gonna bother payin’ me any mind. I’ll be here one moment, gone the next. That’s how it always ends up.”

The newsmare blinked, clearly lost for words.

“Welp, I gotta be on my way. Take care now.” The stallion flipped a jaunty, mocking salute at the bemused newsmare and her camerapony. Then he was on his way, the colt in tow. With a single effort of will, he slowed the flow of time to a standstill once more, and did not lift the spell until he and the colt had arrived at their destination.

SSR Everfree, 120123Z

1200 ft below sea level

“Twelve hundred feet,” said the diving officer over Sonar’s PA, easing the lever back to its upright position.

“Slow to one half. Set course two-seven mark four-four-nine,” Deep Six’s voice followed moments later, and Sonar smiled as he felt the voice of his friend permeate the spherical chamber. “Admiral, we’re in position, over.”

“I read you, Echo Leader,” said Blue Aegis gruffly. “Begin your sweep, over.”

“Roger, Stable One. Over and out.” Click. “Sonar, conn. How’re you doing in there?”

“Sonar, aye. Never better, Captain.” Sonar spoke in the characteristic raspy, sibilant voice of the chiroponies, yet another of the stigmata they’d had to overcome in the last half century.

“Ready to do your thing, old buddy?”

“I’ve already synchronized my magical leylines with the arrays of the Æthon and the Winsome,” Sonar answered him; indeed, his curved horn was filling the entire chamber with a soft violet light. “The three of us together should be able to create a large enough field to scan the affected regions from here.”

Six cackled. “Sonar, I dunno about you, but next time you get shore leave I’m treatin’ you to a night on the town. I know this one club where the mares just about melt in your mouth—if you can repeat what you just said to any one of them, I guarantee they’ll be swooning in ten seconds flat.”

“Melting in your mouth? You sure that wasn’t the soft-serve you had thrown in your muzzle that one time?” The diving officer’s cutting remark was met with hoots and sniggers from ponies on every end of Sonar’s channel, and Sonar swore blind that even the Fleet Admiral was chuckling. The chiropony couldn’t help but contribute to the laughter at his friend’s expense, and even Six joined in after a few seconds.

“Sisters’ sake … ” he wheezed. “Seriously though, Sonar—a regular night owl like you? You’ll have to beat the mares off with a stick before long!”

“You flatter,” Sonar replied dryly, “but now’s not the time to have visions of pretty mares dancing in my head—unless I can concentrate perfectly, they’ll be dancing in the sonar as well. And that’d be a sight to see, wouldn’t it?”

“Wish I could join you in there, ol’ buddy.” Six’s voice sounded wistful—not entirely because of dancing pretty mares, Sonar suspected. “Bet it gets beautiful inside.”

“If you ponies ever invent a small enough camera that won’t get fudged up by my magic,” Sonar said, “I promise I’ll let you have the first look, Captain.”

“Sounds good to me.” One last chuckle from Six, and then it was all business. “Let’s get started.”

Sonar fitted a chrome metallic casing onto his curved horn, smoothing out the many wires extending from it behind his mane; this would give him better freedom of movement, as well as a largely unobstructed view. Next was a special set of goggles over his eyes; Sonar’s magical field could readily tell the shape and size of an object and the direction it was coming from; but the distance was not so easy to tell. These goggles, when connected to the instrumentation covering his horn, could correct this shortcoming easily.

“Sonar, Echo Flock; Sonar, Echo Leader. Ping on my mark.”

“Sonar, Echo Two, aye,” came the reply from Æthon’s navigation officer.

From the Winsome: “Sonar, Echo Three, aye.”

Sonar waited a few tense seconds later, closing his eyes and exhaling. Then: “Mark.”

Several things happened at exactly the same time; first, a high-pitched “byooooooooonnnng” sound, as clear as a bell, sounded within the chamber. Second, the chamber was immediately plunged into absolute darkness, at which point Sonar sent a controlled surge of magic through his horn, precisely coordinated with the arrays of Echo Two and Three.

He pricked up his oversized ears; seconds later, the chamber began to glow a faint, purplish color, spreading from the top of the enclosed sphere. Slowly but surely, the Aquastrian Ocean as seen by the submarines of Echo Group began to unfold before Sonar’s eyes.

The image was not completely crisp, nor would any adjustments by Sonar make it so; the same microfractures in the acoustite that made the Everfree’s sonar array possible also interfered with the clarity of the images produced. But it was clear enough for Sonar to discern differences in light and shadow on the near-white shapes off to his right; the Winsome and the Æthon appeared stationary relative to the Everfree. This was good, Sonar thought; their teamwork thus far had been executed almost as flawlessly as the image their combined efforts had produced.

“Starboard lateral array confirms Echos Two and Three currently maintaining formation,” Sonar dictated swiftly. “Aft array is reading normal fluctuations from engine noise. Forward array—ooh, that’s a big school of fish right there.” He frowned as he turned his attention to the other side. “Portside lateral array is currently picking up interference, distance three nautical miles. Assume normal byproduct of hydrodynamic anomalies in the region. Compensating.”

Sonar siphoned off a little more magic from his horn, directing it to the portside array. This was one of his workarounds for the limitations of the sonar array; a denser magical field would increase the definition of the image in a specific region. It wasn’t without its drawbacks, however; it was one thing for a unicorn to create a perfectly uniform force field, but it was another to create a non-uniform field, and to maintain it indefinitely. Sonar had done this procedure so many times in his years of service that it was almost second nature, but it would always leave him with a splitting headache. Most times, though, the resulting image was worth the headache.

Today, as he soon found out from the portside array, was not going to be one of those days.

He squinted through the goggles at the picture before him. What in the world?

“Conn, Sonar.”

“Conn, aye.”

Sonar’s voice sounded worried. “I’m picking something up on portside lateral, Captain. You better have a look.”

Deep Six signaled a technician. “Put sonar on your console.”

“Aye, sir.” The technician flipped a bank of switches, and his console screen lit up with a two-dimensional overhead view of Echo Flock’s combined array.

“Sonar, put it on speakers.”

There was no acknowledgement from Sonar other than a single, faint flick of a switch. One second later, the PA blared to life with the sounds of the Aquastrian Ocean.

And something else.

“Sonar, what is that?" Six was bewildered by the strangeness of what he was hearing. “That doesn’t sound like the anomalies we were listening in on an hour ago.”

“They are,” Sonar said simply. “But that was when I was doing this all by myself, sir. With all three of us combined, Echo Flock’s array is picking up better details at a better distance, and right now I’m picking up these anomalies as clear as day. Can you?”

“Confirmed,” said the technician, peering up from his screen. “The magical residue’s starting to fade, but I studied fluid dynamics in school, sir, and I know a rotation when I see one. That’s definitely some kind of vortex. A whole bunch of them,” he added, his expression suddenly incredulous. “Hundreds, it looks like.”

“What?!” Six nearly bowled him over in his rush to get to the console. And truly, the entire upper right corner of the readout was infested with those tiny distortions. “Where’s Delfin in all this?” he asked.

The technician tapped his hoof on the console, exactly where the rotations were the thickest. Six guessed that was about five nautical miles’ distance, north-northeast of the Everfree’s current position.

“How big are these vortexes?”

“Vortices, sir, and they’re not that big,” corrected the technician. “I’d estimate average funnel width is maybe two, three feet wide maximum. But width isn’t what really matters with a vortex; it’s the speed of the rotation, and unless these readouts are playing tricks on me, these vortices are pulling nearly twenty kmh!”

The news was like a kick to the gut for Six—that was faster than most known whirlpools in the world. “Those vorte—vortices are too close together,” he said. “There’s no telling what could happen if we tried to rush them head-on!”

“This must be the Aquastrian defense network,” the diving officer surmised. “And a tight one it is, too. Anything non-magical goes through there gets thrown off course but good. We won’t be able to rely on torpedoes here.”

Non-magical … thought Six. “Echo Leader, sonar, Echo Flock,” he said, a sudden thought coming to him. “Boost the output on your arrays. I want to see if we can’t map a way through this.”

“Copy, Echo Leader.”

“Ping on my mark.” Six held his breath for what felt like a whole minute. “Mark.”

Byooooooooonnnng!

The effect was immediate—the readout on the technician’s screen suddenly lit up like Hearth’s Warming. The distortions on the screen could be seen in much clearer detail. Immediately, Six’s eyes began flitting this way and that, looking for patterns, gaps in the patterns, anything that might prove useful to circumventing this—

“Conn, Sonar!” Sonar’s voice sounded alarmed.

“What is it?”

“There’s something inside the vortices!”

Inside the vortices? Six wondered. “How is that possible?” he asked nopony in particular.

“I don’t know, sir, but something’s in there. It’s very faint; we’re too far away to make anything o—Dammit!”

Six could count on his hooves the number of times he’d ever heard the normally eye-of-the-storm calm Sonar swear out loud. That scared him more than anything. “Conn, report!” he bellowed into the PA.

“Some of the vortices are heading right for us.” A tense pause, and then: “It looks like … torpedoes!”

Six swore under his breath. “Echo Flock, Echo Leader. Battle stations, load all tubes—repeat, battle stations!” he roared into the PA, slamming his whole hoof onto the ALERT button. Immediately, the bridge dimmed further still, and was suffused in a bright red color. Klaxons began sounding all over the ship, calling the crew to arms. “Sonar, I need details!”

“Full dozen of bogeys incoming, Captain,” Sonar reeled off, raising his voice only slightly over the clamor of the alarms; the acoustite absorbed the worst of it, allowing him to work without much interruption. “Bearing eight-nine mark two-two-three!”

“Helm, bring us about. Move to return fire!” Six shouted over the alarms. “Tactical, status?”

“Locked and loaded, Captain,” Sonar heard a controller respond.

“Echo Two standing by.”

“Echo Three standing by.”

“Tubes 1, 2 and 5, AT-yield. Fire!”

At Six’s command, three torpedoes streaked out from the launch tubes of the Everfree. AT-yield meant anti-torpedo, Sonar knew; it was the first line of defense in submarine warfare when the other side made the first move. Upon detonation, they released a cloud of chaff imbued with explosive magic that could disrupt most torpedoes in use today. The ensuing reaction almost always resulted in a premature detonation for the enemy torpedo, allowing the other side enough time to return fire.

The torpedoes’ aim was true; five of the enemy missiles—registering as purple distortions in his magical field—had faded out of existence in the near whiteness of the AT-yield’s detonations, and a faint rumble shook the Everfree’s hull. But seven were still headed their way, and it would take time to reload another salvo.

Save us.

“Who said that?” Sonar asked instinctively, ears up, eyes alert. The voice was rough, harsh and grating like sandpaper, and it was so crystal-clear that if Sonar was anything other than a chiropony, if he’d closed his eyes, he could almost imagine it was whispering in his ear. “Who’s there?” he said again, starting to feel spooked.

Silence.

The torpedoes were getting closer.

In times of great danger or stress, a unicorn or any other magically attuned creature can experience a sudden boost in their magical abilities, similar to an adrenaline rush in an earth pony. The reaction is a biological occurrence, evolved as a defense mechanism. Therefore, it can be both unexpected and impossible to control, except under meticulous conditions.

The conditions of the Everfree’s sonar station, when combined with the ensuing battle outside and the puzzled consternation inside, did not fall under that particular definition of “meticulous.”

Without warning, Sonar’s horn radiated an incredible wave of magic that nearly overloaded the sonar system, and the images before him glowed with a brightness that outshone Celestia herself. Blinded even through the goggles, Sonar squeezed his eyes open after a few moments, hoping to chance a glance.

The glance immediately turned into a stare, and the chiropony sat slack-jawed at the images he was seeing.

The waters around him were like fresh, clean air, the Æthon and the Winsome were bringing their own torpedo tubes to bear; he could see the shadows they were making against their hulls. The enemy missiles—

Wait.

“Save us,” the voice had said.

Those aren’t torpedoes, Sonar realized. They’re …

Oh, no.

He snapped out of his daze just in time to hear the Æthon’s captain bark, “Tubes 3 and 4, C-9 cap. Fire!”

Sonar felt his throat seize up in sudden panic as he yelled, “No, wait! Don’t—!”

But it was too late. A pair of streamlined shapes had already been loosed from the Æthon. Sonar closed his eyes tightly, and tucked his ears along his head as far as they would go. He did not need them or the sonar array to know their aim would be true.

And sure enough, when he dared to look ten seconds later, the array was clear. There were no more bogeys.

Sonar wasn’t sure how to feel. There was a chance that he could just have lost his life, along with everypony else he’d learned to call his friend. But knowing what he did now, he wished that had been the case.

“Sonar, conn.” Six’s voice was coming through, but he did not acknowledge. “Sonar, conn. Do you read?”

With shaking hooves, Sonar grasped the PA. “Sonar … aye,” he managed to say.

“Sonar, what in Tartarus happened up there?” Six’s voice sounded immensely relieved. “I thought I’d lost you.”

The chiropony shook his head. “I’m … not sure,” he said, half-truthfully. “I don’t know if I can tell you right now. But, Captain, we’ve got a much bigger problem.”

“Did those torpedoes damage the array somehow? Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Those weren’t torpedoes, Captain.”

“What the hay is that supposed to mean?” Six said, a little louder than he’d meant to.

“ … That surge of magic,” Sonar said hesitantly. “It picked up … ”

There was a long pause, and what sounded like a pained hiss of breath.

“Picked up what?” Six shouted.

“ … Life signs.”

Six nearly dropped his PA. “Life signs?!”

“Aquastrian life signs, sir.”

Six really did drop the PA this time around. It clanged on the metal floor, but the sound went unnoticed, as a cold sweat was now forming on every single pony’s neck as the ramifications of Sonar’s revelation slowly sank in.

The Dream Valley

Twelve hundred feet above, the mood was no different on the bridge of the Equestrian Royal Navy’s flagship. Lieutenant Mareze had a hoof to her muzzle, Itchy Hoof stood alongside her, eyes shrunken to pinpricks in utter shock, and Fleet Admiral Aegis had a look on his face that suggested a very close friend of his had just passed away. Even Inkie Pie looked unusually somber, her normally wispy iron-gray mane falling limply across her withers.

“Twelve Aquastrians,” Mareze said slowly, shaking her head side to side, not wanting to believe it. “Twelve innocent ponies … and we just killed them.”

With great effort, Aegis turned his eyes away from the communications console—where everypony on the bridge had been practically glued to since the Everfree had sounded their alarm—and made his way to the door. “Lieutenant … get me a secure line to DWRDIV. Route it through to my quarters. Then contact Echo Flock, and tell them to make their way home. We’re aborting the mission.”

“Sir?”

“Abort the mission, Lieutenant.” Aegis’ voice was hard as diamond. “That’s an order.”

There followed one of the loudest silences that had ever been heard before.

“Aye, sir.” Mareze said briskly. She moved her hoof to the comlink …

… and promptly drew back when Captain Six’s panicked voice crackled through the speaker.

“Stable One, Echo Flock. Do you copy?”

Mareze recovered quickly. “Stable One, aye. Captain, status report!”

“It’s bad. Very bad.”

“We know about the Aquastrians, Captain.”

“It’s worse than that, Mareze. All those vortices we spotted over Delfin? It’s not a defense system—it’s a smoke screen!”

Aegis frowned. “Explain, Captain.”

“It was just a cover, Admiral. As long as they were active, they were concealing the real danger.”

“What danger?”

“Sonar says it’s forty feet wide and sixty long, and that it’s heading right for—”

The rest of Deep Six’s transmission was lost in a deafening burst of static. Almost instantly after that, a massive BOOM rocked the Dream Valley, sending everypony flat on their backsides.

“What in Tartarus was that?” Itchy Hoof asked.

Mareze pointed out of one of the starboard windows. “Look!”

Everypony crowded around her just in time to see a foamy white plume expanding in the distance. It was comparatively tiny, but Aegis knew it was much bigger up close—possibly hundreds of feet high.

It was the unmistakable explosion of a depth charge.

“Admiral.” Mareze’s voice was shaky. “That was the last reported location of the Everfree.” She immediately raised her communicator. "Echo Flock, Stable One." A beat. "Echo Flock, Stable One, respond!"

Aegis felt another dull blow to his barrel as Mareze frantically continued to futilely reach the ill-fated craft. “There were nearly two hundred and fifty ponies on board those submarines,” he said hoarsely. Almost as many as Diomedes Squadron, he recalled. That was six hundred lives he’d been responsible for—six hundred lives he’d led to a doom they should never have deserved.

How could he live with something like this now?

So absorbed was he in his grief that he almost didn’t see Inkie Pie making her way to the navigational console. “What do you think you’re doing?” he asked—he was too broken to raise his voice. “Get away from there.”

Inkie stared him in the eye. “I told you I had a plan. Don’t you remember?”

Aegis’ jaw sent slack. “I remember telling you it was a bunch of horseapples. There’s too many X’s and O’s in the air for it to work!”

“And wouldn’t you know it, they just all came together,” Inkie said, that infectious demeanor of hers beginning to work its way back. She tapped a few buttons, and stepped back with her legs crossed. “I’m waiting, Admiral.”

Aegis stared. What else do I have to lose? “Do it.”

Inkie giggled, and produced a remote-control device from somewhere Aegis didn’t see. The device contained a single red button—and Inkie pushed it with all her might.

Nothing happened.

At least, nothing anypony could see.

“I made some modifications to your sonar system,” Inkie explained with a smile—a monumental achievement in and of itself, all things considered. “Go on—take a look for yourself!”

Aegis decided to table the issue of how Inkie was able to commandeer such an advanced console, and one she’d never seen before at that, for a later time. The Pie herd had long been associated with the improbable and the strange; it was often better to just shake your head and go with the flow.

He activated the sonar system, and he thought with a pang of Echo Flock, who’d been wiped out in less time than it had taken to bite into an apple. But his melancholy was instantly replaced with—

“Surprise!” Inkie laughed. “Pretty cool, huh?”

click

Aegis, albeit grudgingly, had to admit it was. He suspected Inkie had rerouted all the seismic buoys—the same ones the ERN had spent half of today dropping in preparation for their testing—through the console. The large slice of ocean that was currently displayed on the sonar proved it.

click

“Inkie … ” Aegis was stumbling for words. “I’m … I’m impressed,” he eventually settled on.

click

“You’d better save it for later,” Mareze said, peering over at the screen. She tapped the far right of the monitor. “I think that’s our bogey right there.”

click click

“Sisters,” Itchy Hoof swore. “Whatever it is, it’s pulling forty knots easy. It’ll be right under us in two minutes!”

click click

The bridge exploded into a hive of activity. Alarms lit up all over the ship. “All hands, battle stations!” Aegis spoke urgently into the PA. “I repeat, all hands to battle stations. This is not a drill!”

click click click

“Bogey is accelerating, sir!” the nav officer yelled. “Reading sixty knots now!”

click click click

Sixty? Aegis stared wild-eyed out of the forward windows, where he imagined that whatever this bogey was, it was right there. There isn’t a submarine out there that can hold that speed for long!

clickclickclickclick

“What in the name of Celestia is that noise?” Aegis shouted.

clickclickclickclickCLICKCLICKCLICKCLICK

“Eighty kno—augh!”

The navigations officer screamed, ripping off her headphones, which she had been using to listen to the sonar feed. She was clearly in pain, rubbing her ears tenderly; Aegis guessed something loud must have—

BOOM.

The Dream Valley lurched violently from a massive detonation somewhere under its keel. Everything and everypony that was not properly secured was sent flying. Itchy careened into a terminal, which sparked briefly and went dead; he slumped to the ground unconscious. Aegis fell against his seat, and was instantly winded as the armrest hit him directly in the ribs.

And then, as suddenly as it had begun, it was over.

Aegis tottered to his hooves. “Report,” he coughed.

Mareze checked a monitor. “Minor flooding in Engine Room 3. Emergency bulkheads stopped the worst of it.”

“Casualties?”

“Nothing serious, sir. Got an ensign with a head injury over at deck ten. Medics are already treating him.”

“What about the bogey?”

Mareze checked the sonar. “Heading west-northwest, maintaining eighty knots … Sir, it looks like the bogey is shrinking.”

Aegis galloped over as quickly as he could. “What do you mean, it’s shrinking?” He looked at the readout.

He was only able to see it for a little less than two seconds before it disappeared completely. The shape was about the size of the frog of his hoof. It was vaguely triangular, with two smaller, thinner triangles branching out from both sides, and then a series of shorter triangles bringing up the rear, like the flukes of a tail.

Then Aegis saw that the strange object was, in fact, shrinking. In one blip, it was half the size it was before, and in two blips, another half. On the third blip, it disappeared from the screen completely, and only then did Aegis notice how silent the bridge of the Dream Valley was. He turned around, and for the third time today, felt like his stomach had just dissolved.

Inkie had hit the cold metal floor head-first; her iron-gray mane was matted with blood, and it was still trickling from the wound over her left eye. Mareze was gently prodding her with a hoof, but the mare wasn’t responding at all. And considering how advanced in years she was, this put her in a very precarious situation. And Aegis knew it.

“Get her to the ship’s doctor,” he ordered. “Now!”

A pair of ensigns gently lifted Inkie onto their backs, and walked out of the bridge side-by-side, taking care not to upset their precious cargo.

Mareze looked mournfully at her prone form before it disappeared. “Our doctor won’t be enough,” she told Aegis. “A mare her age needs proper medical attention. We have to get her back to the mainland quickly. There’s a hospital in Manehattan,” she added reassuringly. “Their geriatric ward’s one of the best in Equestria. If anypony can help Inkie, they can.”

“Does she have enough time, though?” Aegis looked doubtful.

Mareze sighed. “With respect, Admiral, the question is whether we will have enough time.”

“Lieutenant?”

The Stalliongradi mare had a thousand-yard stare about her that Aegis didn’t like one bit. “That thing … that creature … it’s heading right for downtown Manehattan. It’ll make landfall in less than an hour.”

Chapter VI

View Online

Canterlot Palace, 12:45 P.M. local time

The Palatial Gardens had played host to a wide variety of inhabitants for almost as long as Celestia and Luna had ruled Equestria. Some of its more exotic flora included the Amarephophallus titanum, which was large enough for a fairly large colt to hide inside, and a few young visitors would surely have tried that one time, if not for the fact that it smelled like a vulture’s idea of Hearth’s Warming dinner. Then there was the sprawling banyan tree that took up one whole acre of the gardens; it was also a favorite with the foals, who loved to try to climb the many lower-hanging trunks and thick branches of this tropical wonder.

The fauna that called the Gardens home were just as diverse; while most of the animals were the standard woodland creatures native to Equestria (and, incidentally, the descendants of a very kind donation from the previous caretaker shortly before her retirement some years ago), there were the shocking pink flamingoes of tropical Zebrica, so named for the electrically nasty surprise in store for anything stupid enough to try and make a meal of them. There was even a nest of rare golden eagles (with twenty-four carat plumage, no less).

Today, for one day only, a new attraction was coming to the Gardens, and not very many of its occupants—or, for that matter, a great deal of ponies—were happy about it: the dreaded equus intrepidus, or as it was more commonly known, the freelance reporter.

Of the sixty ponies or so who were currently waiting on the lawn that led to the Gardens’ exit, only half of them represented a legitimate news organization. Most of the remainder represented their own amateur news reporting agencies, which were mainly sponsored by various nobles and well-to-dos in order to either further their own agendas or undercut those of their opponents. The television was just beginning to become a fixture of Equestrian civilization; the nobles had noticed this, and recognized its potential. So they created their own miniature media empires, with the ostensible purpose of creating mass awareness in current events—but it was common knowledge to anypony who kept up with their programming that the results of its slanted presentation were more akin to mass hysteria. Unfortunately, the legal system of Equestria, as was oft the case, was slow to keep up with technology, and as long as the scheming nobility found loopholes to circumvent—and had the clout to do so—they were free to weave whatever twisted webs they wished.

These five dozen ponies currently occupied five dozen cushions, each embroidered with the Equestrian coat of arms. These were currently splayed on the lawn in two sections of thirty each, leaving an aisle in between wide enough for a carriage to snugly fit inside. To underscore the implicit animosity between the freelancers and the “legitimate” reporters, each group had taken a section for their own. A neutral observer could clearly see which side was which; while equally sour looks were traded between both sides every so often, the freelancers would so do more often among their own kind. It was a metaphorical flexing of muscles, the first shots fired in a silent, subtle war—but at the end of the day, it was just as petty as the nobles that pulled the strings.

The far-off bang of a heavy oak door closing provided an immediate, though inevitably temporary cease-fire, as everypony turned and stood as one to greet their regal hosts.

Princess Celestia led the way, flanked by two stoic members of the Royal Guard, and followed by four of Equestria’s five Joint Chiefs of Staff (there were some murmurs here; apparently there was some truth to the rumors of Fleet Admiral Aegis operating in the field after all). The expression on her snow-white face radiated the calm serenity that always helped to put her little ponies’ hearts at ease. A closer look, though, might have revealed that the diarch looked rather anxious as well; her eyes were slightly downcast, and gave the impression that she was very worried. Whether this was due to recent events—or, as the nobles constantly maintained, that she was finally starting to get on in centuries—nopony could tell for sure.

Last to arrive was Princess Luna, likewise accompanied by another pair of guards. Unlike her elder sister, however, she had dispensed with any body language that so much as hinted at calm. Though the Midnight Mare was mature enough to keep the worst of it under control, a practiced eye could see the signs of somepony who was obviously troubled: her trot was brisk, filled with purpose, and her countenance was like a statue, unmoving and unblinking, never daring to stray an inch to the side.

Once a pony could put two and two together, there was fair reason for this disparity between the Sisters. Not only had Luna organized this conference to begin with, she was also the commander-in-chief of the standing forces of Equestria (Celestia, who had historically preferred peace to war, had relegated most of those duties to Luna upon her reinstatement as Princess of the Night). Add in the knowledge that this conference would certainly involve military matters, and most ponies might agree that right now, Princess Luna looked every inch a general.

The Sisters now trotted to the podium that had been erected in the middle of the lawn, Celestia taking up a position behind and to her sister’s left. The Joint Chiefs took up spaces around them, two on either side, while the guards split off to oversee the reporters on both sides, just in case order would need to be maintained.

Once everypony was in his or her proper place, a well-dressed stallion at the front row nodded, and stood up. “Your Highnesses,” the moderator said deferentially, “esteemed members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, we’re ready for you to make your statement.”

As he sat down upon his cushion, there was a further fifteen seconds of silence, broken only by the shuffling of notes and the odd click of flash photography. Then, Princess Luna’s horn glowed for only a split second, and then she cleared her throat, her voice magically augmented (albeit slightly) to reach her audience.

“Good afternoon, everypony,” she began, speaking in an even contralto that nevertheless caused a few vibrations in the bones of the ponies closest to her. “Earlier this morning, at eleven o’clock local time, we received reports of abnormal activity from the Aquastrian Empire, chiefly within the boundaries of their capital city of Delfin. These reports state the activity was hydrodynamic in nature, and was suggestive of a large cluster of vortexes, or whirlpools. We have confirmed that this is a part of the Aquastrian Empire’s defense network, however”—here, Luna raised a hoof—“further intelligence suggests that this action was not taken as a prelude to war.”

Luna turned away, and glanced at her sister while the reporters were busy putting quill to paper. There was a few seconds of silence between the two before Celestia nodded once. Luna, apparently bolstered by Celestia’s act of reassurance, continued on.

“Less than half an hour ago, we—that is to say, myself and Celestia—intercepted a message that we have good reason to believe comes from the Aquastrian Empire.” Ignoring the muttering and clicking of cameras that had suddenly resurged, she went on, “The message consisted of only two words: Save us.

“Subsequently, we now have word from our Chief of Naval Operations, Fleet Admiral Blue Aegis, that an unknown sea creature did engage in open conflict with members of the Equestrian Royal Navy that were stationed in the west Aquastrian Ocean at the time. We are still waiting on a full report from the Admiral, although we have been informed that the carrier Dream Valley was damaged in the skirmish, and that several smaller vessels had been sunk. Admiral Aegis also suspects that this creature has been responsible for several incursions in Aquastrian territory dating back to approximately two years ago.”

More murmuring. The clicking of cameras, and the scratching of quill on notepad appeared to grow louder, and the flashbulbs brighter.

“Lastly,” Luna continued, “Admiral Aegis has confirmed that the creature has set a course for the city of Manehattan, and that its estimated time of arrival is in approximately half an hour. In response to this,” she had to raise her voice in order to quell the swell of mutters and whispers of surprise, “in response to this, we have declared a pre-emptive state of emergency for the greater Manehattan area and all surrounding settlements until further notice. To all of you here, and to all of you watching or listening, we urge everypony to please remain calm until this situation has been resolved in its entirety.”

She stepped back from the podium, and then, for a seemingly infinite instant, there was absolute quiet. This was the first round of the pundits’ silent war; each side was now daring the other to make the first move, to set a standard of measure by which everypony else’s questions could be answered. Inevitably, the questions would become more and more outrageous; even now, in what was fast looking to be a tense situation for Equestria at large, sensationalism was likely to reign supreme over the cold, hard facts.

Then, one of the “legitimates” finally stood up from her cushion, a toffee-colored mare with her blond mane tied back in a bun. “Inside Track, EBC,” she introduced herself. “What measures have you taken to ensure the safety of Manehattan’s residents in light of this information?”

“An order of evacuation was put into effect fifteen minutes ago,” Luna answered. “All able-bodied and non-essential sapients are currently being directed to shelters stationed outside the evacuation zone. If you wish to hear the details, I will refer you to General Home Tree, our Chief of the National Guard Bureau. He is in charge of the operation.” An olive-green stallion behind Princess Celestia inclined his head in response.

“Able-bodied and non-essential, Princess?” one of the freelancers mused audibly, and not without a hint of condescension. “Can you clarify?”

Luna frowned. “As you know, Manehattan is among the largest cities of Equestria,” she explained. “Therefore, even the most efficient of evacuation plans will take time to carry out. Police and rescue authorities must see to it that nopony gets left behind.”

“And ‘able-bodied’?” The smug freelancer ignored the acidic glares he was getting from every direction. It was becoming increasingly apparent that he (or, more to the point, the noble who was likely bankrolling him) was looking to fabricate a story of triage on the part of the Sisters.

“A catch-all,” Luna said simply. “Able-bodied, in this case, means anyone who is not currently residing in hospital, whether for short- or long-term. In the event of evacuation, hospital residents are relocated to secure, reinforced facilities beneath the hospital that—and I feel this must be stressed—that have the means to keep. Them. Safe.” Her volume augmented a notch or three at this last, causing a brief gust of wind strong enough to undo Inside Track’s bun. She punctuated her statement further with a glare at the freelancer, who sank back to his cushion, scribbling furiously on his notepad.

“Blue Kite, Trotters,” announced a stallion whose coat was almost the same shade of midnight blue as the Princess he was addressing. “Based on what you’ve said, Princess, there’s a lot we’ve yet to know about this monster. How prepared are the National Guard to confront it?”

Many of the freelancers glared at him with a mixture of grudging admiration and pure venom. This was a loaded question, one that a number of freelancers were no doubt hoping to ask themselves. That a respected news organization like Trotters would dare ask something so laden with subtext could only mean the old expression “two can play at that game” was now in full effect. They were starting to play hardball.

Fortunately, Luna seemed to have anticipated this, as she coolly parried, “As always, I would expect that they are as prepared to defend Equestria just as equally as they would the lives of anyone who lives there. Please speak with the General if you have any further questions on the matter.”

“Can you elaborate on this message from the Aquastrian Empire, Your Highness?” asked another freelancer, a unicorn mare who looked as if she had slept, not worked, her way to where she was now. “Why is it that, after all this time, the sea ponies chose to send a message not to all of us, but to you specifically?”

The moderator cleared his throat. “Ms. Scoop, that is a personal question, and therefore one that the Sisters Royal are not obligated to—”

“It’s all right,” Celestia spoke for the first time. Her normally peaceful, motherly voice was only the tiniest bit shaky, but it was enough for everypony to give her their undivided attention. She motioned for Luna to stand aside so she could take the podium.

“Ms. Scoop,” she asked kindly, “How was your trip to Canterlot?”

The façade of the freelancer faltered slightly. “Excuse me?” she asked, a genuinely puzzled expression on her face.

“How was your trip?” Celestia repeated.

Hesitantly, Scoop answered, “Well … fine, I suppose, Y-your Highness. I had a bit of a headache on the carriage from Trottingham. I chalked it up to nausea—I’m not usually one for flights, Your Majesty.”

If she was lying, Celestia didn’t acknowledge it. “Quite understandable. About when did you have this headache?”

Scoop scrunched her brow, thinking. “About half an … ” Her face suddenly gave way to utter shock. “Half an hour ago … ”

“The Aquastrians tapped into an ancient magic to relay their message,” Celestia explained. “More I fear I do not have time to say, but this message resonated in all magically attuned species. Some may have heard it clearer than others—for instance, Luna and myself—but in most other cases, unless you possessed a very high aptitude in magical theory and practice, their call for help would not have manifested as more than a particularly bad headache.”

There were murmurs on both sides now, and the other unicorns were seen to nod their heads in understanding. Scoop, for her part, had sat back down, her face now totally expressionless.

“And on that note,” Celestia added, all pretense of worry purged from her voice, “I have been assured that their plea will be answered. Thank you for your time.” She nodded curtly to the moderator, who produced a small bell from beside him. He rang it once, signifying that the press conference had ended.

Here, the climax of the reporters’ war took place. Any modicum of subtlety went out the proverbial window, and both sides closed in around the aisle in which the Sisters and the Joint Chiefs proceeded out the gate and into the palace. The guards moved to intercept them, but despite their best efforts, they were outnumbered fifteen-to-one, and the entourage had not even made it ten paces before chaos set in.

“Why was the Navy so close to Aquastrian territory?”—“What did this monster look like?”—“Why weren’t the Navy prepared to deal with this monster when it attacked them?”

By the time the great oak doors to the Palace banged shut, the steady stream of questions had morphed into a giant, indistinct waterfall. The guards formed a barricade in front of the babbling press, and began the slow process of shunting them away from the grounds.

Within the castle, two royal sighs of relief were heard by everypony inside.

Manehattan, East River dry docks

“Hey, what’re you doing here?” a burly policepony asked bluntly, unable to believe his eyes at the scene before him. “Don’t you know we got an evacuation going on?”

The stallion shifted his body, and the guitar case resting on his overcoat hit the wooden dockside with a thud that sounded quite heavy for a string instrument. “Do ya now?” he asked, not a hint of worry in his voice. “And here I thought all them pretty mares was just runnin’ from my ugly mug.”

The officer skeptically glanced at the colt, splashing his hooves in the shallows as if he truly did not understand the severity of this situation. That these shallows happened to be inside one of the dry docks was odd enough—he’d arrested thrill-seeking colts and wannabe stuntponies with more sense than to swim here. What was even odder, however, was the colt himself. The policepony could not find words to describe the colors of his coat, let alone his mane and eyes—mostly because they simply would not stop changing.

“Is there a problem with your friend, sir?” asked the officer, maintaining his gruff, no-nonsense exterior, but adding a dollop of subtle concern for the colt as he pointed a hoof at him.

“Poison joke,” said the stallion hesitantly. “His ma was nine months with ‘im when she got a whiff by accident. Couldn’t stop talking in burps for three days, and he … well, I still dunno which of ‘em ended up better off in the end, but he don’t seem to mind much,” he added, jabbing a hoof at the polychromatic pony.

The policepony privately admitted he’d heard more bizarre stories from less savory ponies than this one in his time—and historically, those stories had proven both true and false in equal measure. But he’d learned to read between the lines over the course of his career, and he had to admit: between the stallion’s unwillingness to explain himself, and general aloofness of the situation at large, this story was holding less water than his granddad’s old rowboat—Sisters rest his soul. Even so, the officer knew, there were bigger problems right now.

He raised a nightstick in his teeth, deciding the time and place for arrests was his future self’s problem. “Gentlecolts, for your safety, I’m gonna have to ask you to come with me,” he said, as authoritatively as he could with his mouth wielding the wood. “My carriage is at the entrance to the docks, I’ll drop you off at the nearest shelter.”

The stallion considered this for a moment. “Sure,” he shrugged. He held up his guitar case. “You wanna take this for me? The kid don’t take to strangers real well—no ‘fense.” And truthfully, the colt had stopped playing in the water the minute the policepony had singled him out, and now looked quite scared.

After studying the colt for a few seconds, the officer eventually nodded, and reached out his hoof.

What happened next was very fast. The stallion swung the guitar case around his hoof in a downward arc, catching the policepony square in his jaw. The impact caused him to bite down hard on his nightstick, turning the toughened wood to kindling in less than a second. The policepony groaned dramatically for a few seconds, and finally slumped to the wood, spark out.

“Sorry,” said the stallion as he tucked the policepony into a closet. “Better if I’m out here than in a shelter. Better for everyone.

“Right,” he said to the silent colt. “Playtime’s over, kid. This place’s gonna start poppin’ real soon. An’ if I don’t say anythin’ ‘bout it, ‘s gonna start poppin’ a lot. So I’d get someplace safe if I were you.”

It wouldn’t do to send the colt back where he came from, he knew. Granted, if the colt so desired, then he could do it under his own power. Problem was, creating a portal of that magnitude left a lot of residual magic. If a powerful enough creature was aware of it, that magic could be traced.

And no one on Equestria knew better than he of the kind of magic this particular creature could do.

The colt scurried into a locker, and peered out from a knot in the wood at the stallion as he opened the clasps to his guitar case.

“Hey, one more thing!” the stallion hollered. “Hold onto your ears, and don’t let go ‘til I say so!”

As the colt obeyed, the stallion opened his guitar case.

Even from what little the colt could tell from his peephole, he knew that the contraption he was pulling out of it was most assuredly not a guitar. The device was massive and tubular, nearly half as wide around as an average hoof, but more than half as long again as the pony who was holding it. It was a golden, brassy color, and shone with all seven colors of the rainbow. The stylized profile of a full-grown bear in mid-snarl had been expertly engraved on both sides into the metal, with miniscule rubies inserted where its eyes ought to be, glowing like hot coals.

In another lifetime, the stallion had fashioned this weapon himself, but now it felt just like yesterday. Though he had made others, this had been his first real success, and he had never made another like it since—not even before the one time in his life where everything had changed.

Ready to meet the folks, big bro?

He patted his gun several times, and then stepped onto the water.

Not into—onto. While all creatures living in Equestria had some form of magic to call their own, his was particularly unique—from a certain point of view, anyway. The leading experts in theoretical arcanics called it “proto-magic,” an exceptionally old energy said to be the origin of all magic in Equestria, both ambient and applied, and for which the search for any modern equivalent had turned up nothing thus far.

It was this magic that allowed the stallion to do the many things he could do—stop time, walk on water, among others. But, he reflected, he had had to pay a very, very high price for this power, and so he had to be very, very careful about letting it get to his head.

Some of this magic was now directed at his hooves, keeping him high and dry. Now, he siphoned off a little more, creating an invisible ripple that radiated outward from his body at speeds that even he would be hard pressed to match. In less than three seconds, that magical pulse detected what he was looking for.

Fifteen seconds later, he’d detected quite a few other things. Quite a few thousand, as it turned out.

«Well, how about that,» he thought, quite a bit more loudly than usual. «Guess I’m not the only one who’s been a busy little bear.»

He waited a few seconds. Then,

«Who are you?»

The telepathy was low, coarse, and primal, just as much so as the creature whose mind was speaking it.

The stallion gave a little mental laugh. «Not even five years, an’ you’ve already forgotten me? That hurts, buddy. That hurts me bad.» Another laugh. «But not as much as I wanna hurt you.»

He slipped a magazine into his rifle. The rounds inside it carried black tips that seemed to suck the light out of their surroundings. «I know what you’ve been doin’ out there—the hell you’ve been puttin’ all those thousands o’ ponies through. And I gotta tell ya right now, you should be lucky I found ya first.»

It was the creature’s turn to laugh; it was a deep, bilious, gurgling sound, like water circling a drainpipe. The stallion could feel it coming closer and closer, faster and faster. «You don’t know what you’re dealing with, foal. I am older by far than anything that has ever existed on this world.»

The stallion saw the beginnings of a crest forming in the water, and quickly cocked his weapon when he realized the creature was about to surface—and that it would do so right on top of him.

«Does that include dwarf-star materia?» he asked.

«What?! How—?»

The stallion aimed his gun at the water, braced himself against the edge of the dock, and fired once.

Dwarf-star materia was one of the most mysterious substances known to Equestria; it did not naturally exist anywhere in the land, very few papers had been published on the subject, and the only known recoveries had taken place in impact craters from meteorites. In older, less civilized times, when it was discovered that the ultra-high density of the materia made it extremely resistant to magic, it was sought after in the forging of weapons and armor, but its rarity made any sort of mass production impractical.

The materia, however, was in far greater supply where the stallion came from, but it was also far more dangerous to obtain. It was formed from the remains of “black” stars, celestial bodies that had been tainted as a result of passing too close to the Nothing. The taint had stolen their light, and would always continue to do so—but the Nothing had not stopped them being able to generate the reactions that produced it. It had taken a very, very long time filled with trial and error before the stallion had learned to harness these reactions; he had started by combining an agitation spell with an arcana-electrified amethyst that served as a rudimentary battery. Then, he’d miniaturized and streamlined the process to the point that he could fit everything inside a single, tapered tube of magically reinforced brass—a tube exactly like the one he’d just fired at the monster.

Several things then happened in rapid succession: a misshapen form the size of a house broke through the surface of the East River with a mighty, gurgling roar. That roar immediately turned to a howl of pain as the bullet connected with the creature with a noise like metal on crystal.

Then, at the exact moment when the bullet impacted, a massive explosion of light and sound tore through the dry dock, smashing the adjacent piers into matchwood and severely cracking the concrete berms of the dock. Every single drop of water in the dock at that time was either instantly evaporated into a billowing cloud of steam or displaced into a great column of foam, high as an apartment building.

Something large and metallic impacted the remains of the pier behind the stallion, narrowly missing the door through which the colt had been watching the whole time; he immediately leapt back with a panicked shout. The monster, meanwhile, had fallen (or, wondered the stallion, had he simply retreated?) back into the water, continuing to growl in pain and only pausing to hurl foul oaths aplenty at the stallion.

«Aw, give it a rest, would ya,» thought the stallion, as he trotted to the pier; now that the creature was this close to him, he no longer needed the water to communicate with it. «I didn’t even hit ya that hard. ‘Sides, ‘m sure all those little fishies you got locked away’ll give you a good meal. Few dozen or so of them, you’ll be right as rain, won’t ya?»

«My master will hear of this!» rumbled the monster in his own telepathy. «You’ll wish you’d been strong enough to kill me, you senile old crow!»

The stallion laughed at this, long and loud. “Funny you should think about crows,” he said out loud. He walked over to the object that had nearly razed the locker containing the colt. It was almost as big as he was, bluish-gray and pitted with corrosion, and resembled a giant, elongated lobster’s claw.

“Even if I could kill ya, I don’t have the kind of authority they do,” the stallion conceded. “And to be honest with ya, there wouldn’t be any need for me to kill ya now. I’ve already said what I wanted to say.”

«You’re not—?!»

He rested the gigantic claw beneath his hoof, and pushed down once with a hidden burst of strength. The severed appendage briefly sparked magenta, and then exploded into scrap metal—which in turn, by some unknown magic, degraded further into a clear, light red liquid. The substance ran in rivulets towards the dock, where the monster still lay.

«The crow’s callin’, Praesepe,» the stallion thought cryptically, a smirk creeping along his face. «Tattle to daddy all ya want, but if I were you, I’d make sure ya get a nice, big dinner right about now.»

«How the hell do you know my name?!»

«The crow’s callin’!» repeated the stallion with a jovial wave towards the monster called Praesepe. «An’ unlike me, they ain’t scared to fight a sea monster under the sea!»

Though nothing could be made of what approximated for the creature’s face, anyone who could have seen it might also have seen a flicker of understanding illuminate it at that time. Praesepe loosed a low growl of pure malice at the stallion, and then he finally turned around. For a moment, there was a spiked, spaded tail of shiny, metallic chitin breaking the surface of the water, turning around in a circle. Then it slipped beneath the water, and was gone.

The stallion watched the rapidly retreating shape of Praesepe a while longer before he finally turned to the locker, forcing it open with a single buck from his hooves. Out tumbled the colt, who looked very shaken indeed, but otherwise unhurt.

“Welp, ‘s only a matter o’ time till he finds me now,” mused the stallion, half to himself.

“ … ”

“There’s an old switchyard near the outskirts of the city, mile or so to the west,” the stallion explained as he disassembled his gun, replacing the pieces in his guitar case. “Hasn’t been used in decades. We’ll get some supplies on the way; hole up there for a few days. The more we keep out of sight, the better.”

The colt gave a look at the closet where the unconscious officer still lay, then turned back to the stallion. His wide eyes, continuing to shift a thousand colors, almost looked pleading.

The stallion frowned, considering. “Guess we could drop ‘im off near his carriage,” he shrugged, opening the closet and tugging at the policepony’s collar, dragging him along.

Twenty minutes, a length of rope, and much swearing later, he had tied his tail with that of the downed officer. “I hope he don’t remember too much ‘bout today. I don’t need anypony else on my case right now.”

He hoisted the guitar case onto his back. “Let’s go,” he said to the colt, motioning him to climb on. When he did so, he froze time around him once more, then—with some difficulty, owing to the officer bumping around behind him—galloped off from the ruined pier with the speed of somepony truly fearful for his life.

The Dream Valley

En route to Manehattan, 133045Z

“News from the Admiral?” Captain North Star’s face looked harried.

“His convoy just arrived at Manehattan Downtown, sir,” Lieutenant Mareze said as she looked up from the fresh Tailex in her hooves. She frowned. “Only one report of damage from the monster so far—looks like the East River dry docks got hit pretty hard. No details as of yet, but it doesn’t look like there were any casualties.”

“That’s odd,” Star mused. “Usually, monsters like that just go about wrecking anything in their path.”

“Maybe there’s a reason it only attacked that one place?” Mareze offered.

“Maybe,” thought the captain. “Or … or maybe something turned it away?”

Mareze was incredulous. “Captain, this creature destroyed three of our best submarines in seconds—and two of them were Hurricane-class! With respect, no body of law enforcement in Equestria, let alone Manehattan, has that kind of power!”

The words had barely left her mouth when the navigations officer cried out, “Bogey One incoming! Bogey One is incoming!”

North Star was by her side in a flash. Sure enough, a familiar shape had appeared on the sonar feed, approaching from the west. “Report!”

“Bogey is heading east by northeast,” the officer said frantically. She tapped her screen with a hoof. “Depth two hundred, pulling seventy knots and rising!”

“Signal the fleet, all stop,” North Star ordered. “All hands, battle stations!”

For the second time today, klaxons began blaring across the ship, and everypony aboard—already on edge from the first alarm—rushed to their stations.

“Itchy!” Star called out. “Status on depth charges?”

“Last of the net was deployed ten minutes ago, Cap’n,” responded the lieutenant commander. “We’re lucky we didn’t have enough time back then to cast that net, otherwise this might not have worked.”

North Star knew Itchy Hoof was right about them being lucky—not only for this second chance, but also for the monster causing (as far as he knew) only minimal damage to Manehattan. But luck could only go so far before it ran out—and he suspected that this was the last time they’d be able to make use of it. If something went wrong now, then there was nothing stopping this beast from terrorizing Aquastria again.

“Bogey depth?” he asked the nav officer. She checked her readout.

“Four hundred feet, sir—and dropping,” she frowned. “I think it’s diving away from us. It must be in a pretty big hurry if it wants to avoid another battle with us.”

That enraged North Star, though he didn’t let it show. “That ‘battle’ cost us more than two hundred lives,” he said in a low voice. “I am not about to let that stand! Lieutenant, detonate on my mark!”

Itchy nodded, and punched a few buttons. “Charges primed, sir. Once the monster reaches a depth of five hundred, I’ll detonate them all. If we play our cards right, that monster won’t even have time to react.”

“Four fifty!” cried the nav officer. “It’s passing right under the fleet!”

“Steady,” North Star said, as calmly as he could. The tension was almost unbearable.

There was a low, rumbling noise, and the Dream Valley seemed to bob just a few inches higher in the water, and sway just the tiniest noticeable bit more from side to side.

“It’s passed,” said Mareze, letting out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.

“Four seventy-five.”

“Steady … ”

Finally, after a moment of time that felt like hours: “Five hundred!”

“Now, Lieutenant!” North Star barked.

Itchy Hoof slammed his whole hoof onto a bank of switches, and roared, “Order’s up, mother—!”

The rest of his impromptu battle cry was lost in a full fifteen seconds of muffled explosions that North Star suspected would make even the most ardent of movie directors in Applewood salivate like a foal in front of a candy store window. He looked aft toward the horizon, and saw the many telltale plumes of water spewing into the air—nearly blocking out the sky outright in the process. The Dream Valley rumbled long and loud as the shockwaves passed over the fleet, but unlike last time, the damage, if any, was much more minimal.

When the chaos had subsided, North Star walked over to the nav officer. “Report?”

The mare frowned for a few seconds, listening intently on her headphones. After a few seconds, a smile split her muzzle. “Nothing,” she said triumphantly, fighting the urge to cheer.

At least for a few seconds, anyway—though to be fair, everypony else had broken into raucous whooping by that time. Itchy was hugging Mareze, who made a show of trying to break free of his grasp before giving up completely, North Star was stamping his shod hooves on the floor, unimpeded by the aching soreness he was likely to be feeling in the morning.

It took a minute or so for the jubilation to die down. When it finally did, North Star turned to Mareze. “Lieutenant, contact Admiral Aegis with the news, and request permission to return to base.”

“Yes, sir!” Mareze smiled.

Manehattan Downtown Hospital

“ … Despite reports that the monster has ceased attacking Manehattan and retreated into the ocean, the city remains in a state of emergency. The Princesses are continuing to enforce the evacuation order placed on the surrounding area until these reports are confirmed. Inside Track, EBC News, Canterlot Palace.”

Nurse Vita groaned inwardly as she shut off the television. The hospital had been in bedlam ever since that thrice-cursed order; the second it had been announced, she and the rest of the staff had had to safely transfer every last one of the patients to the sublevels of the building, a process that took more than half an hour even in drills—oftentimes, there were simply too many patients to effectively streamline the process.

Vita worked in the geriatric ward of Manehattan Downtown; in this hustling, bustling world-unto-itself of a hospital, she had set herself apart as a mare who liked to stop and smell the roses (or occasionally eat them as a treat during payday). Most of her extended family had served in the changeling campaigns from before she was a foal, and the stories of their exploits both in and out of battle always left her awestruck as a filly. For Nurse Vita, everypony had a story to tell, and the little notepad that she carried both under her medical hat and on each of her flanks was symbolic of her wish to save the stories of the past for the generations of the future. The geriatric ward was the perfect place to find these kinds of stories, and no matter how tedious they often were, Vita always enjoyed keeping her patients company.

Unfortunately, she grudgingly reminded herself that there was no time for storytelling today, and she rose up from her space near the television, she grabbed a sheaf of papers and resumed her patrol of the hospital’s subbasement, where many of Manehattan Downtown’s residents lay.

The light was no less abundant fifty feet below the earth’s surface than it would be in the normal wards. But it was noticeably harsher on the eyes; the peaceful rays of the sun filtered through half-open blinds had been replaced by long, fluorescent tubes. These, combined with the overall whiteness of the level—the tiled floors, the painted cinderblock walls—lent a very stark, sterile feel that Vita felt contrasted very poorly indeed with the needs of the patients within.

As well as their guests, she noted, as she saw the uniformed stallion in the middle of the room, who was just finishing a hushed call on a portable earpiece, looking quite out of place next to all the sapients who were resting, coughing, or murmuring to themselves in various states of deliria.

Fleet Admiral Blue Aegis had arrived just as the hospital staff had begun to put their emergency plan in effect. Guests were admittedly a gray area in said plan; for the most part, today’s guests had to be escorted off the premises—including those who had been visiting long-term residents. But one did not simply turn away a Chief of Staff; Aegis had not even had to use his position of authority to persuade Vita to stay with the mare he and his retinue had towed over by cloud.

“How is she?” the admiral asked Vita, pocketing his earpiece. Though Vita could tell that whatever news he’d just heard had been positive indeed, it was painfully clear that it was not where his mind was at right now. He was looking at the nurse with an expression that made him look about thirty years older than he ought to be. Not because he was effectively stuck here with all the other patients and staff until the crisis had passed—and Vita had no idea when that would be. She did, however, know genuine sympathy when she saw it. These two ponies must go way back, she decided.

Vita glanced at the papers she brought with her. “We’ve managed to stabilize Ms. Pie’s condition,” she told Aegis. “There’s a hairline fracture in her skull where her head hit the floor. Fortunately, preliminary tests showed no sign of internal bleeding, which will make it that much easier to treat.”

Aegis frowned. “And the bad news?”

Vita couldn’t help but bristle a little bit at those words in indignation. For a species that (for the most part, anyway) valued friendship, love and tolerance as much as it did, ponies could be so pessimistic at times. Nevertheless … “We want to run a CT; a mare as old as Ms. Pie is more susceptible to concussions than younger, tougher ponies. Unfortunately, we won’t be able to know the extent of that for sure, considering our … present situation. We don’t keep any equipment like that down here, I’m sorry to say.”

Aegis was slowly deflating like a teething puppy’s old squeaky toy.

“Between us, though, I think she’ll be fine,” Vita soothed him. “She may be old, but she’s also an earth pony—and she’s a Pie at that. If even half of her sister Pinkie’s exploits have any truth to them, I’ll wager a full dozen of roses that dear Inkie will be right as rain in a week’s time.”

For the first time since he’d entered the hospital, Fleet Admiral Aegis cracked a little smile. “I’ll take that bet,” he chuckled weakly. “She could use something nice to eat.”

Before Vita could respond to that, a sudden sound distracted the two ponies—a rough, grating caw-caw. The noise was faint, but unmistakable—and all the more perplexing for it. Vita immediately bustled down the hallway, towards where she thought the noise had come from.

“Was that a crow?” Aegis asked, hurrying after her as quietly as he could, so as not to wake any of the sleeping patients. “I thought there weren’t any windows on the sublevel. How could a bird have gotten in?”

“It could have been the ventilation,” mused Vita, flinching slightly as the caw-caw noise came again. Which raises even more questions, she added privately. How in Celestia’s name could a bird find their way down an air duct—never mind one that went to the lowest levels of the hospital?

As they rounded corner after corner, narrowly missing a startled nurse or two, the cawing continued. It was getting closer, Vita thought. Definitely here—somewhere off to her right, she thought.

Then she realized where her hooves were taking her, and immediately threw out a hoof to stop Aegis.

“What’s wrong?” the admiral asked. The hallway had opened up into another room full of beds.

Vita’s voice was a whisper. “This is where we relocated our long-term residents,” she said. Her voice was not quiet out of fear, but respect. “Some of them haven’t woken up for years, so we need to be very quiet.”

Another caw; Aegis didn’t notice until after the impudent birdcall had faded away just how quiet it was here. He noted that there was a strange lack of machinery in the room—including machinery that could keep them alive, if only just. Moreover, he noticed that a number of the sleeping patients seemed to be emitting a faint pink glow from their bodies—or at least, the parts that weren’t covered by their bed sheets.

“Temporal stasis spell—a last resort for our most severe cases,” Vita explained in a whisper. “Only a handful of ponies in Equestria are qualified enough to even cast it. It freezes the subject in a time bubble, and that completely halts the spread of any damage, be it injury or disease. Nothing gets in, nothing comes out.”

“How do you treat them, then?” Aegis asked, momentarily forgetting about the elusive bird. “That spell doesn’t seem like more than a stopgap to me.”

Vita considered this. “Perhaps,” she admitted. “But it’s a perfect stopgap. The only way the spell can be undone is the magician who cast it. Even then, they only do so when we have sufficient preparation to treat the patient.”

Aegis had been walking around the room, looking at the ponies sealed away, and felt a pang of pity for them. How long had some of them been sealed away? Years, Vita had said. How much longer would they remain frozen in time, all the while unaware that while they were essentially immortal, their friends and loved ones lived and died? And how would they react to all this news, when they finally woke—

The crow cawed again, and Aegis jumped—it had felt like the sound had come right in front of him. Instinctively, he looked at the beds nearest him. Both were occupied by two ponies—one an athletic-looking earth mare, another a male pegasus who looked much smaller than he ought to. The glow of the stasis spell made it hard to get much more identification than that; their cutie marks, the color of their coats and even their manes could not be determined.

He heard Vita sigh next to him. “Oh, dearie me. I’d nearly forgotten about those two,” the nurse said sympathetically.

The admiral frowned. “Why? What happened?”

Vita turned to him. “Do you remember the night the Bucklyn Hoofbridge was destroyed?”

Aegis said he did. “That was a few years ago, though, wasn’t it?”

“These two ponies were admitted that same night,” Vita said, to mild surprise from the Admiral. “Both of them looked like they’d been fighting a whole pack of rabid Diamond Dogs, so I was told. The mare came in first—punctured lung, half her ribs broken, paralyzed from the withers down. Nopony knows who brought her in—the story goes she just appeared in the lobby. Like she just popped up from the floor.” She paused. “It’s a shame, really. So young, and yet she chose to waste her life the way she did.” At Aegis’ look, she clarified, “She was dressed like the Mare-Do-Well.”

Aegis nearly lost his balance then and there. “The Mare-Do-Well?!” he asked incredulously. “You’re saying this mare is actually—”

“There’s no way to know,” Vita shrugged, readjusting the mare’s covers. “Hardly anypony here thinks she is—it’s more likely she was just another imitator. It’s not the first time one of those has come through our doors, either. Besides, even if there is a real Mare-Do-Well, nopony’s seen her in years.”

Aegis turned to the pegasus. “And what about him?”

Vita thought for a moment. “He came in not two hours after she did. If memory serves, a weather patrol found him on top of the Sun & Moon plaza. Like he'd just fallen from the sky.”

That surprised Aegis. “What was he doing up there?”

“I wish I knew,” Vita said sadly. “Because there’s no way a fall could have caused his injuries.” Very carefully, she pulled back the pegasus’ sheets.

Aegis blanched visibly at the sight. The pegasus was no longer a pegasus; both his wings were nothing but bandaged stumps. There was nothing of his left foreleg past the elbow, and the position of his remaining limbs looked too contorted to be natural. He opened his mouth, but found he had nothing to say.

“The strangest thing about these ponies?” Vita said as she replaced the covers. “We still don’t know anything about them at all. No immediate family, no previous medical records on file, no ID of any kind.”

“What about cutie marks?”

“Not even that. Nothing matched.”

There was a moment of silence.

“What do you think?” Vita asked. “About the Mare-Do-Well? You’re somepony who helps to keep Equestria safe. What do you think about a pony that supposedly wants to do the same thing?”

“Well, assuming she’s still alive, and if she keeps her city safe from behind a desk … ” Aegis chuckled hollowly. “But in all seriousness, I think her heart was in the right place. Maybe the police don’t see eye to eye with her all that well—one is doing the job of the other and all. But she must have called Manehattan home at one point, same as every other pony in the police, right? If that isn’t an incentive to protect your home—and anypony who lives alongside you—then I don’t know what is.”

Vita gave a thin little smile. “I hope you’re right about that, Admiral,” she said in a soft voice that had little to do with her surroundings. “Because I think we could really use some protection right now.”

There was another long moment of silence.

Finally, Vita looked around, and stretched her legs. “Well, wherever that crow was, it’s gone now.” she said, a wearied finality in her voice. “This room’s a dead end. Probably flew back up the air ducts.”

She checked her watch. “I ought to head back to my rounds before my boss notices where I’ve gone.”

“Do you have a spare chair?” asked Aegis. “Since I don’t think I’ll be going anywhere else for the near future, I’d like to stay with Inkie awhile, if you don’t mind. It’s the least I could do for an old friend.”

Vita smiled. “Of course, Admiral.”

Aegis smiled back. “You can just call me Blue, Nurse.”

The two made their way back to the makeshift ward, not noticing the soft flapping of wings behind them, at the end of the room. Nor did they notice a pair of jet-black hooves alight upon the tile floor without a sound, and stride up to the foot of the very beds they had just left.

Chapter VII

View Online

VII

Soft.

It was though she had woken up from her first dream. Or had it been her last dream—or even a dream within a dream? Now she was back in her bed, trying as hard as she could to remember what it was she had dreamed about.

Her bed was soft.

But was it her bed? As she tried her best to retrace her mental steps, she made a discovery that would have been extremely unpleasant were it not for how pleasant her surroundings felt.

I … don’t …

With the greatest effort she could remember expending—that is to say, the first she could remember now—she opened her eyes.

Light.

The room was golden and hazy, illuminated in soft light in every direction. Windows lined all four walls, and there were no shadows whatsoever.

Slowly, reluctantly, she rose up from her bed, noticing the whiteness of it all, how pure and spotless the pillows and sheets were, and how deceptively stark and simple it looked. There was nothing else inside the room at all—no dresser, no mirror, nothing. Aside from the bed, it was completely empty.

… Where … where am I?

With another tremendous effort of will, she forced herself to take a step forward, feeling her hoofsteps on the warm wood. Her body was stiff and achy, and wanted nothing more than to return to her bed—to whatever it was she had been dreaming.

Were those voices?

She listened for a few seconds longer, hoping to catch more of the strange noises she had just heard. She frowned, shrugged, then returned to her current situation.

It was easier to walk now; no longer did it take so much out of her to just take a simple step. Her movements were still jerky and slow, and she felt herself swaying from side to side—though only a little—but she was quickly improving.

How long had she been asleep?

Her nose was only a foot away from the glass of the window, and she could just barely something move outside. She squished her eyes shut, and opened them again. Something was definitely out there, and whatever it was could clearly see her, but she could only recognize a vague feeling of form. She racked her brain for any more words to describe that form, knowing full well that it was in vain, and no words existed within her mind to do so.

She turned away from the glass.

Out of the corner of her eye, the form turned back.

It hit her only then that that form was herself; it was just her reflection. She felt a little more relaxed now—insofar as a pony that, at the moment, amounted to little more than an empty shell could be relaxed.

Now her hooves were moving again, carrying her forward. This time her steps were more fluid—much more so than before, perhaps even too much. It did not feel like she was fully in control of herself; like her self had been shifted aside, and made to stand like a passenger while someone or something else had taken control. If that was the case, then who … ?

Wordlessly, she raised a sock-clad hoof, pressing it gently on one of the walls. She was only a little surprised when that section of the wall swung outward, revealing a hallway filled not with windows, but with doors. The same pleasant light shone from slits near the ceiling.

There were other forms as well; these were not her reflection, she knew. Some were taller than she was, while some were smaller. Others were wider, and still others thinner.

But she did not need to futilely probe for memories that were no longer there, or find words that constantly escaped her knowledge, to know that absolutely none of them looked remotely like her.

What … is this?

She heard the noises again, and this time she was sure they were voices, and that they belonged to the beings that half-walked, half-floated past her. But they were not voices in the sense she had imagined they would be; they were high-pitched, delicate and mewling, neither young nor old—and seemed to bypass her ears completely, and penetrate the very core of her body.

The hallway ended here; another door stood before her. The edges were brighter than even the golden light, and her first impression was that something—a very powerful something—stood behind that door. For a moment, she was in control of her faculties once again, and her foreleg, stretched out to push the door open, shied away for only a moment. Then, whatever it was that had possessed her had reasserted its control, and her hoof rested upon the wood, and pushed.

The light was blinding. For a moment of time that felt both too long and too short, she forced her eyes shut, unwilling to open them again until they had readjusted to the glare. When they had, and she felt it was safe, she gingerly opened her eyes.

And she stared.

The first time she opened her eyes, and beheld the scene before her, would forever define every moment of her existence, waking or otherwise. She did not bother trying to think back this time; she was absolutely certain she had never seen anything quite like this.

Stars. So many stars around her: it was a number that could never be counted in all of time, every last one of them drifting slowly around her, too far away to be properly measured. They burned and twinkled with every color imaginable—every color and more. They were every possible size, but they were all so very small in comparison to the rest of their surroundings—the largest could have been fully eclipsed simply by holding her hoof in front of it.

She was so absorbed in this impossibility that it was several minutes before she discovered that her jaw had been hanging slack this whole time, and that she was short on breath from simply forgetting to breathe.

Then she looked upward, and all the wonder and awe drained from her body. Where there was light all around her, there was absolutely none above her. It was a vast, unending expanse of … nothing. The more she looked at it, the more terrified she was, and the more she wished to turn away and run back to her room. But her hooves stayed rooted to the spot, while her body shook with the sort of fear that always comes when confronted with something as alien and unknown as nothing. The swirling masses of stars around it turned the entire void into an enormous eye—the eye of something infinitely old and infinitely powerful.

The hairs on her neck began to rise as she finally turned her gaze away from that great eye, and focused on her more immediate location. It was a deck, she surmised, tapping the wood beneath her subconsciously. It was both wide and wide open, and tapered to a point before her.

A … ship?

And it was at that moment that fear gripped her again, a fear far greater than that brought on by the massive void that stared down at her. For while many fears in existence are of things that cannot be known or are not yet known, the most terrifying fear is caused by things that are known to mortal minds, that do indeed exist in some concrete form or fashion—yet in a place where they clearly should not exist.

Impossible … I …

Deep within the dense fog that clogged her mind, something flickered, a brief moment of recognition from another lifetime.

I … know this place …

She turned around, and jumped as she saw the tall figure that had soundlessly appeared before her.

It looked like a mare, and yet not. There were four hooves, a barrel, and a muzzle, but from there, nothing could be defined; everything was a hazy black mass devoid of color and physical form—somewhere between smoke and fire. Some of those ethereal wisps billowed out from behind and either side—perhaps half-formed wings and a tail? What might have been ears, a mane, and perhaps even a horn wafted from the top of a vague head, like the shadows of steam curling up from hot water, and added even more height to a figure already half as high again as she was.

The—whatever this being was—stared straight ahead, unmoving, and she had the impression that it was somehow able to see right through her, despite having no apparent eyes. Closer examination, however, revealed three distinct points of light within the swirling mass of darkness that constituted its “head.” At least two of them might have been eyes, and the one in the center was considerably higher placed than the others—almost in the middle of her forehead—and it shone with a light that could rival any one of the stars around the ship on which they stood.

Hello … Gienah.

The voice was neither male nor female; it was soft and intimate, and clear as day. But it resonated deep within body, mind and soul, and she felt her entire self vibrating, shaking like a plucked string. Though the thing before her had no visible mouth, something told her that it had spoken those words.

Gi … e … nah?

She felt her lips moving, soundlessly repeating the unfamiliar word. Was that her name, then? It did not sound like any name she had ever imagined to hear before. She raised her hoof to her head, intending to scratch her mane in puzzlement, but gasped when she felt something hard and metallic graze against her mane. She looked at her hoof, and was even more confused.

It was not a shoe—at least, not any shoe she would have thought was practical. Crafted from shiny, black steel, it covered her entire hoof—frog, sole and all. In the center was a glass lens, perhaps three inches wide. She peered into this lens, squinting; she could almost imagine there was something behind it.

As she continued to study it, that something blinked to life. Startled, she leaped back, but immediately felt a calming sensation spreading through her body. She felt content and at peace, forgetting the stars, and forgetting the void. Totally entranced, she stared with wide eyes at the glowing light behind the glass.

The glass lost its transparency, and glimmered with the pale luminescence of a hundred phantoms. They shifted across the glass’ surface, and into depths unable to be measured. Then they coalesced into lines, thick and thin alike, expanding and contracting, and contorting into geometric patterns both simple and complex. And in the middle of it all, like a tiny negative of the giant eye above her, a single point of light stared back at her from the exact center of the glass.

She would never have believed that while this amazing, miniature light show was taking place, her very self was being probed. Her body was being mapped; her reactions compiled, and her mind, once teeming with memories of a past life that could not be remembered, was being rewritten, refilled, its original contents preserved in a far more durable shell.

How long the process lasted, she did not know, nor did she care. By the time it had finished, any semblance of the pony she had once been no longer existed, remembered only by the being behind the glass; a living repository of the memories of untold thousands of sentient creatures. Those memories were part of her now, as if she had always remembered them.

She looked away from the strange device, and at the smoky-looking equine, the slow signs of recognition spreading across her face. Her mouth turned upwards in a fond little smile. They needed no words for this moment; old friends reuniting with one another after spending so many years apart rarely did.

But all too quickly, the moment passed.

Are you ready? The voice was gentle, but firm and authoritative. It was not a question up for debate.

The mare called Gienah stiffened, and her eyes lit up with duty. Her new memories had told her everything that was happening a whole world away, and what she would have to do in order to stop it.

I’m ready … Ebene.

Delfin Palace, 7:00 P.M. local time

500 ft below sea level

Delfin was the birthplace of Aquastrian civilization. Here, on a huge pinnacle of coral-covered rock that descended thousands upon thousands of feet into endless darkness, the sea ponies had laid the foundations of their society millennia ago. Tens of thousands of ponies had reshaped this natural formation over the years, carving it into a gigantic spire that resembled a mile-high conch shell. From this spire, dozens of outcroppings of coral stretched out hundreds of feet, and each one was dotted with myriads of small golden bubbles that twinkled in the water. They were only small in relation to their surroundings—the smallest bubble would have encompassed a fair-size house.

At the top of this spire sat the largest bubble of them all; enclosed within this glowing sphere, hundreds of feet high, the grand palace of the Aquastrian Empire was the crown jewel of sea-pony architecture. On any average day, its golden spires shone with many colors in the midst of all the blues, greens, and blacks of the waters around it.

Tonight, however, was sadly not an average day.

Tonight, this bubble was stained in a demonic shade of red. The entire population of Delfin—male and female, young and old, from the graceful, iridescent mermares to the tough, chitin-plated lobstallions and every imaginable amalgamation in between—was suspended inside its transparent walls, each one encased in its own private vortex of rapidly swirling liquid. As the pockets of water swirled around them, clouds of red issued from the bodies of the helpless population, drifting out in a straight line that pointed in the direction of the highest spire of the palace …

… towards the open maw of a sea-pony that defied description. While his upper torso was mostly sleek and slippery, his hindquarters and tail had fused to form one fan-shaped organ, covered in thick organic armor. Where there were once ribs, there were now a number of segmented legs that clicked, clacked, and snapped at the water as if they had minds of their own. A single long, spiny dorsal fin ran along the length of his back all the way to his completely bald head.

Praesepe’s face was something out of a nightmare; he had two wide eyes, red and glowing as the dawn—even the whites—where a normal pony would have them, but above these were two more eyes, beady and gleaming like ripened fire rubies, extending from his forehead on long, thin stalks. The entire right side of his jaw—if it could be called that, considering it was festooned with tubular feelers and clawed mandibles—was simply gone, a lasting reminder of his humiliation earlier today.

And as if that had not been enough, then there had been the unexpected—albeit temporary all the same—setback in which he’d swum headlong into what felt like an entire field of miniature novae. Though his true form could take—and had taken—much more punishment than that, the same could not be said for his disguise. Battered and weakened, then, Praesepe had limped to Delfin—at times, he had been reduced to simply drifting with the current, which was why it had taken much longer to arrive than he would have tolerated. But arrive he finally did, and he had quickly reasserted his will over the populace of the city.

It had been just as easy the first time as it was years later; the insipid politics of this world and these two nations proved the perfect distraction for him to slip in without too much of a problem. Their Empress had been consumed in a matter of seconds. He hadn’t bothered being as flashy with her as he was being with her former subjects right now. Nor had he stood on ceremony with the crews of the strange little boats that could sail underwater. They had been most interesting prey--it wasn't often his food had the chance to fight back, let alone the will.

«Almost done,» Praesepe thought to himself as he flexed his scaly, webbed forelegs. One hour of feeding had made him much stronger than before, though—and the first thing he was going to test that strength on was that upstart of a pony who had dared to spill his blood. Oh, he was going to enjoy crushing his neck in his jaws—

Look to the east, look to the west,

Praesepe paused, looking around. Where was that voice coming from?

Look to the north, look to the south,

Look to the earth, look to the sky,

He could swear it sounded familiar.

Feel his shadow, hear his cry,

Behold! The legend, here and now!

A flicker of movement far below distracted Praesepe from his confusion. Looking down, he saw a figure approaching the entrance to the palace, a tiny speck from his perch on the parapet above.

It looked like—a pony?

Meanwhile, on a completely different ocean, on a ship that sailed the stars like they were water, Ebene made her move.

Now, Corvus!

As you wish.

Monster and mare regarded each other for one tiny moment longer. Neither of them felt any fear; one was confident in its arcane power, the other was committed to a sacred duty. Finally, both acted.

As Praesepe crouched into a jumping position, the mare called Gienah clenched her foreleg—the one containing the glass-and-metal contraption—and held it to her barrel until it glowed a deep and fiery gold. Then, she thrust it outwards as far as she could.

Her hoof exploded in a blaze of light, and slammed onto the vitrified coral beneath her with the force of an avalanche, cracking the surface. The all-consuming illumination crept up Gienah’s foreleg, and spread over her body like an out-of-control fire. In its wake, the light left behind something completely different—black as night, smooth and cold as ice, but burning with the ancient fury of a sun in its prime.

One final explosion, and that something now stood where Gienah had once been. Clad head-to-hoof in heavy black armor, as tall as an alicorn, the pony’s eyes blazed behind a beak-like helm with an arcane violet light as it prepared to unsheathe the weapon strapped along her armored barrel.

Draw.

At Ebene’s command, the transformed Gienah did so. The scabbard separated into dozens of iron shards, and disintegrated into purple fire that wound along the edge of the claymore, seeping into the ornate filigree. Balancing her body into a two-hooved stance, Gienah twirled the weapon this way and that with all the skill of the hundred-odd warriors that had come before her, whose memories were now just as much a part of her as Ebene was.

Praesepe laughed evilly as Gienah brandished the blade in his direction. «So, you finally decided to force your hand, eh, Corvus?» he bellowed. «Good! Finally I’ve got an excuse to cut loose!!»

With a mighty roar, Praesepe’s already misshapen form expanded, all the while constantly contorting and kneading into itself like dough. Corroded plates of iron, burning with energy, replaced his slippery scales and toughened chitin, and his forelegs stretched and split down the middle, dividing in half from hoof to knee, mutating into enormous, rusted pincers that could cut through an oak tree like a scythe through wheat.

All this happened in a few seconds; by that time, Praesepe was no longer an abomination of the sea-ponies—he was an abomination unto himself. Easily three times as tall as Gienah was now, and at least six times wider, he looked like a failed experiment of crossbreeding a crab with a lobster. Pitted metal spikes covered his carapace, each one as long as a pony stood tall, and glowing like a furnace. A sulfurous stench pervaded the palace grounds—along with a few other smells Gienah did not wish to know about.

Praesepe launched himself from the palace, dozens of feet above the towers. His corroded claws began to glow with the same fiery color. «Come on!» he roared at Gienah, smashing them together. A sphere of bluish-green energy sizzled within his claws. «Show me what you got!!»

He flexed his metal claws inward, and there was a sinister, echoing series of clicks. Louder and louder they became, faster and faster they repeated—until it all melded together into one long, deafening hiss.

«Die!!»

Praesepe thrust his claws outward, and there was a massive, reverberating BOOM. The force of the blast he’d generated was such that it generated tremors all over the grounds, unbalancing Gienah and throwing her unceremoniously to the grass. The giant bubble protecting the palace failed completely, shattering into translucent pieces of magical construct—and the blast did not stop there; as far as Gienah’s eyes could see, the sheer force of it was displacing all the water around the palace for miles around, creating bluish-green walls as high as skyscrapers. And when the effects of the blast wore off, there would be nothing to stop all that water from crashing back from whence it came, destroying anything in its path.

This was a problem.

Change.

Gienah obeyed. Within seconds, purple flame consumed her, and reformed her body into something more suited for casting spells on a large scale. When her unicorn form was completed, Ebene spoke again.

Channel.

Gienah slammed her blade to the coral surface with an adrenaline-fueled shout. With a sound like a thunderbolt, a blast of magic radiated from the point of impact. It caught up to the gigantic wave Praesepe had created within seconds, disintegrating the wave before it could grow any larger. A second such motion from Gienah—more fluid and controlled than the one before—released a much slower wave to keep the water from rising too fast, thereby minimizing any damages that might have been incurred otherwise.

Concentrate.

Some tiny, hidden part of Gienah wanted to protest, but she knew Ebene was right. Praesepe was too great a danger; he needed to be addressed first—not the sea ponies. A moment of silence passed before she spotted the double meaning in Ebene’s command. Another moment after that, and she was an earth pony again, crouching to the ground, focusing her magic—their magic—into her hooves as she prepared to jump.

Fly.

The exact moment she soared into the air, the surge of seawater snapping at her hooves, Gienah transformed a third time—now she was a pegasus; armored feathers on her newly created wings shining like a hundred knives. She sped for Praesepe like a bullet, directing a large quantity of magic to her wingtips. Seconds later, the recently vacated space between sea level and Delfin Palace erupted in magical purple lightning. The multiple blasts of energy emanating from her wings were highly spread out—the increased area of effect would take away any of Praesepe’s escape routes, trapping him like a—

A second energy blast from Praesepe distracted her. The magical shockwave deflected her lightning attacks easily, redirecting them into the ocean below, exploding harmlessly on the waves.

«Is that all?!» Praesepe taunted her from above, his claws still stretched outward, glowing with arcane magic as he continued to levitate above the warrior. «I haven’t even broken a sweat!» He flexed his claws again. «I have consumed thousands of these pitiful creatures,» he bragged. «I have stripped them of their strength and life, and I have bound them to another life—mine!

«Come then, my slaves!» he screeched. «Your master calls you to his side!!»

Gienah only just realized what was going on. Quickly, just for an instant, she risked a glimpse downward. The entire ocean surface had erupted in tiny explosions; in their wake, glowing blue missiles streaked upward, bearing straight for her.

Study.

Gienah let the amethyst-colored flames wash over her, returning to her unicorn form again. Her eyes flashed purple, and she analyzed the incoming projectiles. They were organic—sapient, she noted—and then realized that Praesepe had just summoned every last one of the sea ponies he’d trapped in the palace grounds earlier, eyes glowing like hot coals. He was going to use them as cannon fodder.

Deeper.

She frowned. What did Ebene mean by that? If she went back underwater, Praesepe would regain his advantage. Or, she thought, maybe she was telling her to study the sea ponies further. Her eyes flared again, brighter this time. What this spell revealed, Gienah never saw coming: Praesepe was channeling his magic into the vortices that surrounded his ponies, overriding it, forcing it into one single point inside their bodies. Praesepe was going to overload them—he was turning his own thralls into guided bombs!

Quick as she could, Gienah descended to the surface of the water, sword raised in a stable, two-hooved blocking position. Her eyes flitted back and forth, taking note of the sea ponies as they surrounded her.

«Blow them back to the River!» roared Praesepe.

The sea ponies charged.

Equal.

Gienah spent a few dangerous seconds pondering the meaning behind that before she understood: the magic Praesepe had used to condense that of the sea ponies was cast using a very specific frequency. If she could match that frequency exactly … She gripped her claymore tighter; slowly, the filigree of the blade began to glow a bright fuchsia as it responded to its wielder’s silent command.

Reach.

This time, Gienah understood her completely. As the sea ponies closed in around her, she altered her stance, preparing to unleash a devastating horizontal swing. The blade glowed a bright, blinding purple.

Defuse.

As the first thrall crossed within striking distance, Gienah swung the blade with all her might. As she did so, a ribbon of lavender magic issued from the tip of the blade, catching everypony in its path with a sizzling burst of light and an otherworldly, mournful scream as the physical forms of the unfortunate thralls disintegrated into a harmless mist, never to hurt another being against their will again.

The armored warrior continued to slash this way and that, more beams of lilac-colored energy slicing through the air, and did not stop until she had released every last one of the sea ponies from their unlife. Gienah stared up at Praesepe, who continued to hover some hundred feet above the ocean, and was faintly aware of a rage burning inside her—but it did not feel like her rage, which was strange; perhaps she was—

Up.

The command was more forceful than usual, and for a split second, Gienah wondered if maybe Praesepe was getting to Ebene somehow. She buried the thought immediately afterward; she could faintly sense the frustration Praesepe was feeling. They both knew he was fighting on his last legs.

Speaking of …

Her armor erupted in a violet explosion as she was struck by a thought, and she was a pegasus once more; bearing upwards like a rocket as she brought her blade to bear. Fifty feet … twenty … ten … five—

Freeze.

Immediately as she drew level with Praesepe, Gienah felt a surge of energy radiate out from her body that she knew did not belong to her. She could see Praesepe leering at where she had been just seconds ago, his ugly, mechanical face snarling defiantly at an enemy who was no longer there. Then it hit her that “freeze” had not just been a command, but a spell of Ebene’s own; somehow, she had commanded time itself to stop with just a single word. She had frozen this space, Praesepe and all, and in doing so, she had given Gienah the perfect window to attack.

Then the spell had ended, as quickly as it had been cast. Praesepe, noticing that he was glowering at nothing but air, instinctively looked up. Seeing Gienah right there in front of him, he gave a startled growl, and tried to leap back. But that moment of distraction was all Gienah needed. One lengthwise cut from her claymore later, and the mechanoid horror had been cloven in two at his croup. Red-orange liquid and arcs of magical electricity spilled from the wound, and Praesepe bellowed in agonizing pain as his severed lobster-tail sank into the depths with a splash.

Finish.

Gienah, still in her pegasus form, continued to hover where she was. She began to twirl her still-glowing blade, pointing it upward like an arrow ready to be loosed.

"Praesepe!" Gienah thundered—or was that Ebene speaking through her? she wondered. "In Corvus’ name, and in his blade, we hereby judge you for your treasonous crimes against Eridanus! What say you?"

«You don’t have that power anymore.» The abomination’s voice was faint, and much less bellicose in the wake of the extreme damage he had sustained, but it was clear that he would be defiant to the end. «Only Kraz can judge me now.»

He laughed evilly, the remains of his cybernetic body beginning to glow. «And he will judge you very soon.»

Gienah moved only a handful of milliseconds too late. Roaring in exertion, she hurled her scintillating claymore at Praesepe with a mighty heave, like she was throwing a javelin. The enchanted blade flew straight and true, and passed through Praesepe like he wasn’t even there.

The problem was, that was exactly the case: with a blinding flash of reddish light, the half-dead horror vanished into thin air—just as Gienah’s blade passed through where his heart ought to have been.

Gienah had no time to feel any disappointment; Ebene had discovered Praesepe’s last moment of treachery only a second before she did. Now, she felt that alien rage returning, hotter than before, licking her insides like dragonfire.

Then, suddenly, it disappeared, leaving an uncomfortable void behind.

Return.

The tone of Ebene’s telepathic voice scared Gienah as she slowly descended from the sky. She had never heard a creature that commanded such power sound so … burnt out? Defeated?

But it was not her place to question Ebene. There was little else she could do but obey her master’s instruction for now. Any questions could wait until after she returned to Eridanus.

Sheathing her claymore, then, she finally touched down on the ocean. A second later, her armored form erupted in purple yet again. There was a flash of light, a roar of magical fire, and then she was gone.

Manehattan

Sun & Moon Plaza, 80th floor

Inside the darkness of the empty conference room, a tiny spark of light flickered to life.

The spark grew larger. Then, it grew brighter. Within a short time, it burned hotter and brighter than even the sun. Then, just as it did so, it faded away into the darkness.

Where that spark had flared, the battered form of Praesepe stirred, glistening with blood from a dozen wounds. He was panting heavily, a combination of the onset of fatigue from his retreat and the extent of his injuries—but more so the incandescent wrath that burned inside him at the thought of how he had run like a coward from Corvus’ wrath.

Suddenly, a far brighter light than that which had transported him here erupted around him. Brighter, but there was no warmth to it at all. Even less warm was the single golden eye that was currently staring back at him.

“M-my lord!” Praesepe stammered, the shock of seeing the unicorn before him etched upon his iridescent face. “I-I have urgent news for you. Corvus—”

“—has found a successor to Chiba,” Kraz interrupted. There was no trace of emotion in his silky voice whatsoever. “I am aware, yes. I am also aware that you fought her just now—and that you failed.”

Praesepe swallowed. “N-no, my lord,” he replied. “The successor was powerful, yes. I merely wished to further gather my strength, and to seek your counsel as to how I should kill her—”

“Spare me your excuses, Praesepe,” Kraz said dispassionately. “That is not the failure I speak of. You had the strength to oppose Corvus’ new champion. More than enough, I daresay, to have killed her then and there. And you amassed a great deal more over the years since Chiba’s death—but instead of using that strength to help fulfill our plans, you wasted it on your own selfish ends.”

“No, my lord!” Praesepe shouted. “I became stronger to serve you!”

“And that, Praesepe,” Kraz chided him softly, “is why you have failed. You do not serve me. You never were supposed to serve me. You were supposed to serve them, just as I do.”

He raised his false hoof. The eye implanted within blinked, and opened wide.

“And since you have chosen to forget them in your greed, you no longer have anything to contribute towards our great cause.” Kraz’s voice was tinged with acid. “You’re of no use to any of us now.”

The eye began to glow. “I’m sorry, Praesepe,” Kraz whispered, not sounding sorry at all.

“No, my lord! Please, don’t kill me! There’s another one out there! He knows me! He attacked me! I can still—!”

The light from the eye condensed into a bright, concentrated beam; this then solidified into the perfectly balanced, ornately carved, whisper-thin blade of a sword. Kraz twirled the weapon around his hoof with the experience of entire centuries. His blank expression never left his countenance at all—not even as he lunged at the fallen sea-pony with the speed of a shooting star, not even as he fed his luckless subordinate every last inch of the star-forged metal, and not even as Praesepe’s freshly slain body glowed with demonic red light, and was consumed in celestial fire until nothing remained but a few charred embers, resting on the ebony wood of the table.

Only then did Kraz shift his expression to one that betrayed just a little more concern. His horn glowed briefly, and the lights of the room brightened further still until the entire conference room was bathed in its glow.

The rest of his loyal followers had been stationed against the walls the entire time, the shadows from before having concealed them completely. There was nothing on their faces to suggest they were fearful of further retribution from their lord and master, nor was there any inkling of an opinion that Praesepe had gotten what he deserved—either at Corvus’ hands or Kraz’s hooves.

“Antares?” Kraz asked.

A unicorn with a coat the color of red wine rose up from her cushion. Her mane was as sleek and black as night itself, and was expertly styled into two long, intricate braids that fell behind each ear and past her head, while her tail was nothing but one long, thick plait, and coiled every which way with a mind of its own, and all the grace and danger of a cobra ready to strike.

“My lord?” Antares’ voice was deep, rich, and every bit as intimate as the classical temptress of olden tales.

“Do you remember the Star-Beasts?”

Reverently, almost lovingly, she brushed a hoof over the symbol on her flank. “I remember them, Lord Kraz.”

“Basilicus?” A stocky pegasus with a sienna coat and a full beard and mane the color of a roaring hearth likewise stood, and likewise touched his own sigil.

“I remember them, Lord Kraz.” He spoke in a low, purring baritone.

“Antecanis? Canicula?”

The two lone Diamond Dogs stiffened. The chosen species of their masquerade was all they had in common; from there, any similarities ended. The one called Canicula, a muscular, golden-furred specimen with a tattoo that rested over one of his olive-green eyes like a strange monocle, stood tall and erect, in stark contrast to most of the species he had chosen to mimic.

His companion, Antecanis, was far more difficult to describe. Perhaps, in another lifetime, he might have resembled a Diamond Dog, but the bone-thin monstrosity was now more battle-scarred than even his master. What little of his body was not clad in bandages or an oversized, tattered trench coat was nothing but scabbed flesh and patchy, dirty-brown fur. Heavy, opaque goggles obscured the quasi-canine’s eyes—above which rested his own unique tattoo—and every last one of his sharpened teeth was visible in his mouth, permanently stretched into a nightmarish rictus that served as a smile.

That rictus now moved, and produced sounds that might have been speech, but was instead a horrifically auto-tuned imitation, filtered and distorted nearly to the point of incomprehensibility—yet with just the faintest hint of something that was, for want of a better term, just plain wrong in the head.

Evidently, however, Canicula appeared to understand his companion’s words well enough. “We remember, Lord Kraz,” he affirmed. His voice was terse and clipped, but surprisingly lacked much of the grating harshness that characterized most Diamond Dogs’ speech. This, combined with his appearance, gave him the air of a bad-tempered floor manager who absolutely hated to be bothered with trifling matters.

Kraz looked around the conference room. “And the rest of you?” he asked.

“We remember, Lord Kraz.” The chorus from the remainder of his supporters was scattered, but their devotion was no less diminished.

“And will you serve them, in life and death, until our cause is fulfilled?” Kraz raised his voice the tiniest fraction of a decibel.

This time, the consensus was more unified. “We shall serve!” they cried out.

For the first time tonight, Kraz smiled. “Then go now. The Star-Beasts sense that the balance in this world has been restored, and now they are more restless than ever. Continue to serve them faithfully, and we will be that much closer to achieving our goals.”

With these words, the gathering had come to a close. Most of them filed out through the doors; the others—the mare with the braided mane, the stallion with the bushy beard, and both of the Diamond Dogs—remained where they stood at a glance from Kraz.

“There are still too many pieces out of place,” Kraz conferred to them. “Praesepe spoke of someone else who attacked him—before Corvus even made his move.”

“Impossible,” Basilicus scoffed. “Only he and the thrice-cursed Ebene have the power to defy us.”

“Perhaps this one is rogue,” mused Antares. “This may make him dangerous.”

“It would make him misinformed,” growled Canicula. “He would grossly underestimate us.”

Antecanis laughed, a grating, glitch-filled giggle, before launching into an unintelligible monologue punctuated with glowering looks at Antares and Basilicus.

“True,” Canicula agreed. “Whatever threat this new arrival may pose is irrelevant. We ought not waste any more resources in hunting down a so-called rogue, my lord.”

Kraz, deep in thought, furrowed his brow. “Even so … ” He stiffened. “Tell the rest of the Fixed to redouble their efforts. With any luck, our increased activity can draw out the rogue—and perhaps Corvus’ new toy as well—without us having to take any unnecessary risks.” He nodded once. “You may go.”

As the quartet departed the conference room, Kraz strode to the window, regarding the view of the city below. Perhaps he might have admired it, and he could certainly understand it if the lesser beings of this world found beauty in such a sight. But to invite those feelings into his heart was to invite more of the corruption that he knew had stained this city like blood.

He would not give in.

He could not give in.

“Why?” he whispered, partly to himself, partly to the earth a thousand feet below, and partly to a certain group of stars in the night sky that had played a part in the events of tonight, unseen amidst the clouds. “Why do you still refuse to acknowledge me?”

Why do you not listen to your savior?

Three days later

“From EBC Studios in Manehattan, I’m Head Line with your News at Noon. Our top story today: After more than two years of total isolation, the Aquastrian Empire stunned the world yesterday by reopening communications with Equestria. Princesses Celestia and Luna are currently en route to Delfin to meet with the new Aquastrian Empress, who is expected to hold an internationally televised conference regarding the period of silence, and provide details on the events that took place within that time.

“Closer to home, Blue Aegis announced this morning that in the wake of the attempted attack on Manehattan, he is stepping down from his position as Fleet Admiral of the Equestrian Royal Navy, effective immediately. Mr. Aegis has denied reports that he was pressured to resign, instead citing concerns over his health in light of the Aqua-Equestrian Crisis. The former Fleet Admiral had this to say:”

“‘Nopony will ever know exactly what happened out there. There are a few things that even I’m not sure about. But I can tell you that in my time, I’ve seen a lot of brave mares and stallions sacrifice their lives in the line of duty—and I will tell you now, their sacrifice was not in vain. Even so, each and every one of those sacrifices has weighed heavily on my heart for some time. Today, I have decided that their loss has been affecting my ability to make the judgments and decisions that are required for a pony of my position. It is for that reason that as of this morning, I am no longer in the service of our Sisters’ armed forces. Ancestors preserve them, just as they have preserved us all. Thank you.’”

“Blue Aegis also stated that he would not be seeking another term as Equestria’s Chief of Naval Operations, and that the future of his current term was quote-unquote, ‘in serious doubt’—”

Blue Aegis sighed, watching his likeness fade from the television screen before finally switching it off.

“It wasn’t as tough a decision to make as they’re making it sound,” he told Inkie Pie, who lay in her hospital bed. She was happily munching on her third rose of the dozen he’d sent over, undaunted by the bandage wrapped around her healing head wound and tied off in a comically large bow. She’d been given the go-ahead to leave in a few days’ time; when Aegis had heard the news, he had gone over to a nearby florist’s and purchased the best roses he could find. Never let it be said I don’t back down from a wager, Nurse, he thought. Or from an old friend, he added on further reflection.

He resumed his story. “When they tried to offer me a commendation for this whole thing the other day, I knew then and there that they’d gotten their priorities way out of order.”

“A commendation?” The director of the Equestrian Geological Survey punctuated her surprise with a reedy, exaggerated gasp.

“I know,” Aegis huffed. “It was like they had no sense of decency at all. The life of any beast, no matter how monstrous, is not worth that many lives. And it certainly isn’t worth a medal that won’t end up doing more than sit in a shelf and collect dust at the end of the day. I’d tell you where I told DWRDIV they could shove their commendation, but that probably got classified, too—along with everything else about this thrice-cursed clusterbuck.”

Inkie laughed.

“Still, if they hadn’t kept anything under wraps the way they did,” Aegis continued, “I’d imagine the whole of Equestria’s armed forces would be in the middle of a PR fiasco right now. The nobles in Canterlot have been screaming their stuffy heads off at the Royal Court for going on two days! Decline in military power, reluctance to defend our soil—you name it.”

“Oh, you poor dear. Those nasties haven’t been getting to you, too, have they?” said Inkie sympathetically. She ruffled Aegis’ mane, something that caused no small discomfort.

“Inkie, please. My wife is outside!” he said in mock pleading tones.

The old gray mare immediately stopped. “You’re right—my left flank hasn’t started itching yet!” she giggled. The two shared a few seconds of mirth at this.

“I am worried for Silver, though,” Aegis said after a while. “I’ve gotten a few black notes in my mailbox already.” The black note was exactly what it said on the tin—a small sheet of parchment, completely black. It was the worst kind of threat a noble could give to anyone, though considering the rate at which they followed through, this said very little—a fact which Inkie quickly brought up.

She tut-tutted. “Oh, Bluesy. That was hot air fifty years ago, and it’s still nothing but hot air today.”

Aegis nodded ruefully. “Yeah, but still. Silver Coronet and I have been married for thirty years now. Our foals are all grown up—they’ll be heading into college soon enough. What if they get targeted next?”

Inkie didn’t answer. Aegis thought he might have known why—as a sister to one of the Elements of Harmony, Inkie had probably bridled at the prospect of “fame by association” when she was that age. And fame could go both ways, Aegis knew; if somepony didn’t like another pony that happened to be famous, and wanted to do something about it, then more often than not they went for one of the immediate family.

“You really shouldn’t let them discourage you, dear,” Inkie said kindly, laying a hoof on his withers.

“I know. I’m trying not to, but—”

“Don’t try.” Inkie’s voice carried all the weight and wisdom of her sixty-seven years. “If you’re going to be this serious about keeping everything hunky-lunky-dory in your family, then don’t try. Do.”

There was a pause.

“I’m heading back to Canterlot in a few days,” Aegis said heavily. “DWRDIV still needs the Joint Chiefs’ say on all those classified files. And I want to make sure they don’t get buried forever.”

“That’s gonna take awhile,” Inkie said in a sing-song lilt. Aegis knew it was true—with the Equestrian legal system, it would be half a decade before the last voyage of Diomedes would even have a chance to see the light of day.

“I don’t care how much red tape I’ll have to go through,” he said resolutely. “The public needs to know just what it costs to keep Equestria safe. I can only hope that telling the truth won’t put any more ponies off from enlisting.”

“Blue?” Inkie asked the question hesitantly, as though she were trying to choose her next words very carefully. “If you had a chance to … you know … start over again? Would you ... have chosen me?”

The sudden change in thought confused Aegis at first, but he recovered in short order. “I think you already know how I’ll answer that,” he replied. A half-smile crossed his face. “Besides,” he added, “Silver thinks I already spend enough time with you as it is.” He laughed. “I’d tell her she’s right, but we both know how much time she spends gossiping with you.”

Inkie smiled. “You care a lot about your family, then,” she remarked. It was not a question. When Aegis nodded in reply, “Well, if everypony else cares as much about their family as you do, then I don’t think you’ll have any problems with getting new recruits.”

Aegis patted her shoulder gently. “Thanks, Inkie. And talking of family, I think I’ll head back home to Hoofington when I’m done in Canterlot. Silver’s probably been worried sick about me these past few days, and I could stand to see the kids at least one more time before I start thinking about Miamare Beach.”

The door to Inkie’s room opened, and Nurse Vita strode in.

“Mr. Aegis.” Her voice was warm, but dutiful. “We’ll be changing Ms. Pie’s bandages momentarily.”

“Of course,” Aegis said politely. “I’ll be out of your way in two shakes of my tail.”

He stood up. “Stop by for dinner when you get the chance, okay?” he said to Inkie. “You’ll always be welcome under our roof.”

“Is that an order?” Inkie’s wrinkled muzzle was split in a smile that made her look fifty years younger.

Blue Aegis smiled. “The last order I’ll ever give.”

He performed a mock salute, and stepped out the doors of the ward, and into the fresh Manehattan sunshine of a new day—and the inviting prospect of a new life.

End of Part II