Pale liked the night. She was comfortable in the dark, when she didn’t have to show her face. It was concealment. It was an advantage. It was a time to strike.
She stood at the top of Abysmal Abyss, her back to the crevasse. The wind whistling out of it ruffled her cloak. A light rain was falling from the dark sky, shrouding her and the others standing nearby.
In front of her, in groups ranging from five to a dozen, were other guilds.
It hadn’t been easy to find them. Pale and her fellows had spent weeks looking, and probably hadn’t even found them all. It hadn’t been easy to convince them to join, either. What lay ahead was going to be even more difficult. But all of them had eventually been persuaded by the same goal. They’d all collected here tonight to wipe out the cyclops.
Pale took a step forward, pulling back her hood. She was already wet, but she did it to show her face. It was something she’d never done before. But a leader could not hide who they were.
“I want to thank you all for coming,” she began, speaking above the rain, but no louder. Every one of the assembled assassins had their eyes on her. Mostly ponies, of course, but here and there a donkey, mule, or griffon, and even one minotaur. Pale wasn’t sure if her face and horn helped keep their attention, but hoped they were actually hanging on her words.
She went on. “We’ve all been studying this stronghold.” It had been impossible for the many guilds from across Equestria to all meet in one place before now, but they’d collaborated on information and planned for this night. It had been exhausting to coordinate everything across so many different groups.
Not to mention trying to find a way to get parasprites down to the bottom of the Abyss through the strong winds. In the end, Shard had hollowed out a pineapple and tossed it in. The parasprite rode down to a relatively soft landing and then ate its way out.
“You’ve got the layout of the caves,” said Pale. She’d drawn sketches based on what she’d seen via parasprite. “Priority one is sealing the deeper tunnels to prevent any cyclops from escaping.
“Next, we kill them all.”
Pale looked at every face in front of her. She saw no reservations.
There was no time to consider how unnatural it was that so many could be committed to extermination. She didn’t stop to doubt her plan or question her own part of this. It was time.
They’d set up five long ropes. Each was anchored securely at the top of the Abyss. Pale already wore a climbing harness and walked over to the edge. After clipping to the rope, she took a last look at them all, and slid down.
Pale braked with her hooves on the way down. Long seconds passed in near-freefall. The wind roared around her, trying to pull her off the rope.
Two ponies from other guilds, expert shots, had come down with her. Each carried heavy crossbows.
Glancing downwards, Pale saw the bottom of the Abyss coming up. The others swung around on their ropes, aiming down at the cyclops guards below.
The howl of the wind muffled the noise of the armored cyclops hitting the ground, crossbow bolts buried in their necks.
Pale stepped down off the rope and faced the entrance of the caverns, seeing it with her own eyes for the first time but knowing it well. It had been her mastery over parasprites that allowed her to build detailed plans that had helped convince the others to join.
She could hear them arriving from down the ropes, building up into a proper fighting unit behind her. The rattle of equipment and low voices reached her ears, but she ignored it, focusing on what was to come.
From inside her cloak, Pale let out the three black parasprites. They circled around her, already reaching out her vision to parts unseen. Behind her, she saw the last of the assassins arrive from down the ropes.
She knew the capabilities of her own guild members, and had fought alongside them. The others were a partial unknown. They’d brought a broad collection of weapons: spears, swords, crossbows, magic, potions, and - being assassins - an assortment of knives. Unknown they might be, but they would do. They would have to. This, the eclectic collection of ponies and others backing her, was Equestria’s only hope and chance against the Blight.
Pale could see them behind her via parasprite, but pointedly turned to face the group. They gave her their attention. She nodded. Nothing needed to be said.
She turned, and walked forward into the caverns.
The parasprites, and Pale herself, scouted out ahead. There was a curved tunnel that led away from the bottom of the Abyss and its wind and rain. It opened into a high chamber that appeared to function as a kind of community square, if this had been a conventional settlement. The dwellings and buildings were made of a combination of the natural rock and stones hauled from elsewhere, plus minerals and metals mined from deep within the earth.
She stopped and pointed to a couple of ponies, the two with crossbows and another with a bandoleer of cartoonish-looking bombs wrapped around his middle. This had been preplanned, from another guild offering up an infiltration force. The three of them joined her quietly and together they went deeper into the cave.
There were few cyclops out this late, and fewer ready guards. Pale had made sure to keep herself and the others on as low a profile as possible in the weeks leading up to this attack.
She and the other two skulked by unseen. They knew where they were going, to the tunnels that led deeper underground and connected the cyclops’ caverns to other thoroughfares.
Upon reaching the passage, Pale drew up short. Four guards stood here. Apparently the cyclops had learned from the guild’s misfortune, reinforcing their back door.
Pale gestured the crossbows to take aim and then crept forward on silent hooves. The years of practice in stealth all added up to this. With any luck, this would be the last time Pale would ever have to sneak in the shadows. She made it one to remember.
Her knives took the middle two guards. Simultaneously, the crossbows took the others. Pale darted side to side, grabbing each steel-clad body before it could clatter to the ground. All the infiltrators let out a breath. That was one hurdle down, and an unknown number remaining.
The bombardier immediately began rigging the tunnel for destruction. Pale whispered to the others, “If I’m not back in five minutes, blow it.”
She disappeared back into the cavern, leaving one parasprite behind for overwatch. Using the other two to aid her, she slipped into another tunnel.
This was where the families lived. Young cyclops had to come from somewhere. Pale had neglected to mention it to any of the others.
Cyclops kept their young ones together, in some sort of brood-like organization. Maybe it was something like a boarding school. Pale didn’t know about that, but she knew what she had to do. She slipped inside, to the room where all of them slept.
Appearances could be deceiving and no individual was guaranteed to represent the whole. Pale herself was living proof of that. She looked at the young cyclops sleeping in front of her. Children hadn’t started the Blight. But every cyclops had to die. It was the only way to ensure, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that the Blight ended here, tonight. The cyclops had wanted the same wholesale death of others.
That didn’t make the task any easier for Pale to do it. The rest of Equestria didn’t know what the guild did, how many they had killed to protect the innocent. And, Pale decided then, that was best. They shouldn’t know.
She kept quiet, moved efficiently, and did the job. But she hated every moment, every throat slit in the darkness. It felt wrong, savage, all the way to her core. But what was the alternative, the guilds of assassins raising the young cyclops whose parents they had killed? Letting them go? There were no other options.
Pale realized she hated death. It was a part of her existence, all around her, created by her own hooves. She had no cutie mark, or formal education, or real life. She was nothing but a tool of destruction. What point was there in having a soul if she was only going to stain it with this?
She stopped at the end of the room and forced herself to look back and count, though she knew she hadn’t missed any. Then, she took a breath and went to rejoin the others.
They made ready to move when Pale appeared. The explosives expert lit the long fuse. The three of them swept down the tunnel, checking every crevice along the way. Wherever they found a cyclops, they killed.
When the bombs went off, the escape tunnel came crashing down with an unmistakable thunderclap. From far away at the entrance, voices rose up as the ranks of guilds and assassins charged into battle, magical flares soaring into the air to light the whole cavern and ensure there were no dark corners in which their foes could hide.
The attack was planned ahead of time. The main force would push into the cyclops’ space, sweeping to ensure there were none missed. A fast element would break away to join Pale and her escorts, opening a second front near the closed escape tunnel. They would use the choke point to catch any cyclops attempting to flee.
The support arrived as expected. Shard and a dozen pegasi flew across the high cavern, bypassing the cyclops ground forces that were still in disarray. Some carried spears to get past the cyclops’ swords. Some carried explosives or lethal potions.
And then, the first opponents began to arrive. Most were not armed or only barely so, having gotten straight up from bed to run.
Pale stepped forward. The sabre felt good in her magical grip. She knew exactly what she needed to do. It was a slicing weapon, taking advantage of speed and reach. Pale had plenty of both. She drew first blood, but hardly the last of the fight.
Every time the group of assassins cut down an opponent, they moved forward, expanding their line. Over at the entrance, Pale could hear the sounds of battle, shouts, weapons clashing, and explosions. It was coming closer, and the goal was to clear enough of the cavern for the two groups to link up, closing like a trap around the remaining cyclops.
The ceiling of the cavern wasn’t very high, but it gave pegasi enough room to maneuver for slight advantage. Pale herself was using every tactic she had, every trick she’d ever learned. The parasprites around her provided unprecedented awareness, almost like being able to see in all directions at once, and she made full use.
Fighting through another wave of cyclops, Pale saw a pegasus go down. He managed to stand up, but seemed to be dragging a broken wing. Pale turned and cut down the offending cyclops.
As the group pushed forward, Shadow and Whisper appeared, signaling the assassins from the entrance were near.
Shadow had time to quip, “Lovely evening, isn’t it?” as they went by Pale, each striking at different targets.
Now that the two groups were linked back into a single cohesive unit, Pale advanced again, spotting oncoming cyclops for the whole group and calling them out. She handled the ones in front of her.
Her sabre went all the way through the neck of a cyclops who had come at her with a sword. Without looking, she pointed a hoof. “Two more, that way! Another just around the corner!”
She heard the others behind her quickly move to follow her orders. One mare was stabbed straight through as she rounded the corner, but her companions quickly overpowered the cyclops on the other end of the weapon.
She spared a glance across the battle line. Blood was all over the floor of the cavern, spilled from both sides. Pale knew it was impossible that they would get out unscathed, the cyclops were simply too powerful. But as long as they held together and kept the initiative, their chances of success were optimistic.
Even still, Pale knew they were outnumbered. There simply weren’t enough guilds to be found. The cyclops settlement was too large. There was a very real possibility that they all could die down here, every one of them. But it would be worth it to eliminate the cyclops.
The revelation nearly stunned Pale and she almost lost her head to an opponent before counterattacking. She was no hero. She had killed children and would do it again if she had to. She loved nothing and no one. But Pale realized she was willing to die for this.
She could have picked any cause. Had she been a normal pony, she could have joined the Royal Guard. She could have been a doctor. But Pale’s cause was stopping the Blight, for those who would never know her name. If not her, then who?
Pale kept going forward, but had to keep reminding herself to hold back. It wouldn’t do to get separated from the others. She depended on them to watch her back. They depended on her for direction.
She fought her way closer to the center of the cavern. A unit of cyclops had managed to kit up with armor, shields, and weapons. They advanced as a unit, heavily protected. The obvious threat they posed immediately became the focus of everypony, but the cohesive armor deflected crossbow bolts, spears, and even the exploding potions hurled at them.
Pale leapt forward, swinging her sabre. The six cyclops leaned into their shields and thrust out their spears. Pale hacked the pointed tip off one and then swung her sabre horizontally, slicing down the length of the wood and into the cyclops’ limb that held it. She planted a kick in the center of the shield, denting the metal and driving its disarmed owner backwards.
That was the opening she needed, the crack in the armor that let her in. She slashed out with her wing razors and forward with her sabre, ducking attacks and blocking blows. Not for the first time that night, blood gushed over her, staining her coat, splashing her lips.
The armored unit broken, she charged ahead, flanked by the others. They were gaining ground, even as Pale heard cries of pain behind her.
Resistance was still heavy. Pale kept calling for attacks to her sides and fighting personally to her front. She parried spears and dodged crossbow bolts fired at her from afar. She locked blades with desperate cyclops. Some of them challenged her, lasting more than one exchange of strikes. None of them succeeded in besting her.
A larger dwelling, decorated with more gold than the others, lay directly ahead. Half a dozen cyclops, larger than she’d seen so far, barred the way. Each wore heavy, lapped armor and carried two swords.
This was the only time Pale paused. She knew her flanks were secure. Nothing was lost by delaying an instant to evaluate, taking a page from Coin’s book.
There was no way she could penetrate the armor, and it was unlikely she would be able to wedge her weapon through the cracks while the six of them attacked her. Blunt force, then, to scramble them inside their shells. Or…
Pale tried magic. It still felt unnatural, but her aim was true. The cyclops she’d hit slapped at the slits in his helmet, not hurt, but surprised. That was all she needed.
Charging forward, Pale kept up the fusilade of magic bolts. It bought her time and distraction. And, if she concentrated hard enough - there! She’d managed to craft a narrow enough lance of magic and angled it just perfectly to slip past the armor slits and sting the eye inside. The cyclops never saw her hoof coming, and as hard as she kicked, perhaps would never see anything again. To be sure, though, Pale wrenched the armored head back and quickly slashed across the seam that spread open.
That left five, and ten swords. But they hadn’t a hope of catching her. Pale used her wings, her legs, springing off the floor, the ceiling, convenient walls. She swung her sabre backwards, using the curve of the blade to hook a cyclops towards her where she thoroughly wrenched the helmet, putting her whole strength into spinning it and the head inside nearly in a full circle.
She used the armored torso to push off, even as the body fell, ducking under a double sword swing to tackle another cyclops to the ground. The tip of her horn lowered nearly to the slits in the helmet, she lanced magic inside and got a scream and convulsions back in return.
Alerted by the parasprites of attack behind her, with a beat of her wings she went up, lashing out with her hooves to knock her attackers back, buying time to turn her momentum into a spinning kick that knocked two of them down. The third raised his swords but she swatted them aside with her sabre, driving the tip into the helmet slits. It didn’t go deep enough to wound, but it was just enough of a catch to force the cyclops’ head back as she went over, landing on the floor behind and pulling them down.
Vaulting the prostate cyclops, Pale slashed backwards, up under the armor’s belly plates and striking flesh. She kept spinning into the next cyclops, who was getting up, and slashed upwards, blade sparking off the steel, until it finally caught under the chin and Pale forced it into a seam. Fresh blood rained down on her as she turned again and shot towards the next target.
The cyclops was getting up and was too slow to raise their swords. Pale came up from the ground and wrapped her forelegs around the front of the helmet, hugging it to her chest and putting her full body to work on it, wrenching upwards and hearing bones crack from inside the armor.
Not stopping to look around, the parasprites could do that for her, Pale mounted the stairs of the dwelling. There was a cyclops at the door with a knife, but she cut him down with a slash from throat to groin.
The room appeared to be some kind of royal chamber, featuring a throne and gilded walls. Was this from where Arimaspi and his successors had plotted the Blight?
Whoever the cyclops was that now held title over the throne, he was cowering behind it. He tried to circle away from her, but Pale grabbed him by the horns and twisted his neck back. Then, she cut his throat just like any of the others, his blood splashing over the ornate walls.
He didn’t say a word as he died. He knew why she was there. His gaze slid off to the side, looking out the door and taking in the destruction. He knew the cyclops had been beaten.
Pale stopped then. It was almost jarring. She blinked and looked around. Turning, she walked to the door. Around her, there were still pockets of fighting, but the conclusion of the battle was clear.
It was almost quiet. Pale blinked and swallowed. Bodies lay everywhere, most of them cyclops. Small groups of ponies had started to work their way around the cavern, stabbing bodies to ensure their demise.
Pale started to walk down the steps to join them. The job had to be finished. She noticed something seemed to be wrong with her hind leg. She turned her head and saw a long cut up her hip. She spread her wings, but saw that the razors had loosened under heavy use, the straps that held them on tearing at the holes in the gossamer. Several other small cuts had appeared all over her body. And still, most of the blood wasn’t even hers.
She saw that a laboratory had been discovered. Shard and a few colleagues descended on it to scrape up whatever information they could. They firebombed the rest. Coin and a few others were scavenging anything else they could find, data or notes. Pale thought she saw Jolly heading for a kitchen.
Seeing that cleanup was going well without her supervision, Pale sat, taking the weight off her leg. She watched, but the others knew their jobs and carried on without direction. She allowed her eyes to close, just for a moment. It was over.
Coin found her there a few minutes later. “We’re starting to move. The cyclops have been taken care of and just about everything else has been seen to.” Handsome was with her, splattered in blood, but eyepatch in place and apparently unmussed.
Pale got up, moving slowly. Despite her injuries, she was still mobile. Pale made a tour of the cave, ensuring that the task was done, completely and totally. With every body, every drop of blood spilled, she reminded herself that the death was for something. It was much easier to convince herself when the dead were cyclops.
A number of Pale’s compatriots had also fallen. She reminded herself that they knew what they were getting into, and commemorated their sacrifice with the knowledge that the cyclops were destroyed.
They had left a few ponies at the top of the Abyss, for security and to haul if necessary. The most severely injured were lifted first and the others began to follow. Pale stayed to the end. Supervision wasn’t necessary, but she felt she should be there until the last task was done.
She watched as one last charge was set and one last explosion brought the entrance of the cavern down, sealing it.
The matter was closed, and the Blight finished.