Gnashing.
Not the low-pitch gritting of rusty hinges. On the contrary. Creaking of a glass-cutter, drilling through your braincase like a screw. Leaving the ringing in your ears. Piercing. Angry. Demanding.
Luna opened her eyes just in time to see the shield deploying above her head. It was somewhat beautiful. There were no sounds audible behind the storm but she knew it from memory. The click of a plate block extending from the cannon bone. Then the extender blocks slide up and down, to the forearm and the hoof, turning a compact stack into a thin stripe. Then, at last, the “Ironwall”. Armor plates shift into position, expanding into rectangular full-height barrier. Flashlight had to kick some jammed segments twice, though; the shield was never designed to operate in the midst of a sand cloud.
“Administering adrenaline solution.”
Two seconds later the alicorn felt a prick in her thigh and jolted. She knew Shadow had no needles whatsoever but still shivered in her shell. Meanwhile the two shields closed up above her, providing a single cover from hostile fire. It seemed Serenity wasn't quite satisfied with the reaction of the pony he was in charge of, but now he was keeping his displeasure to himself. He and Flashlight had other troubles to take care of. The violent wind splashed against their deployed shields, trying if not to take them off then to tear them away with the legs. There were no more shots, and the guards separately decided to lower their rectangular pieces of plate armor, sticking the spikes designed for that on the lower rim in the sand.
“How long have I been unconscious?”
“Not long. Several seconds,” Shadow informed. “Armour integrity not disrupted. Biometry signs are... acceptable. Light haematoma in thorax section. I wasn't fast enough to amortize,” there were traces of guilt in her voice.
“Forget it.”
“I recommend...”
“Forget it, Shadow,” Luna winced. “Some bruises never killed anypony. What was that?”
“Weapon not identified.”
“You are very helpful. Could you determine anything at all?”
“Solid full-metal projectile. High stopping power.”
“So I've heard,” the princess sighed, rising up. Liquid energy was spreading through her veins. “I am fine, captain. Let's move on.”
Serenity gave a tiny nod and started moving, using his shield as support in place of the leg it was fixed on. A step. Place closer. Another step. Move the shield again. Flashlight tried his best not to fall behind him, and their small barrier of iron gradually shifted. It looked like the captain got the direction right, because after a while the shield caught another hit. Their barricade shook but absorbed it. Howling of the storm suppressed any gunshot sounds but this time the princess managed to see the muzzle flash clearly. She pointed the direction with her hoof.
“Where did she get a gun? She shouldn't be armed.”
Serenity just shrugged with his free shoulder in response. Looked like he wasn't interested in such details. He had caught the rhythm, mounted it and now pulled his companion along. Two shields kept moving slowly but surely, almost in unison, closing in on the mouth of the canyon, leaving hoofprints in the sand. The wind of sand itself seemed to weaken here. Their path started sloping downward, two piles of stone rising to the left and right from the shroud of dust. Barely distinguishable, they resembled some queer monsters.
Another flash. She caught a sharp, angry plop of gunfire through the armor-filtered noise now. The projectile jabbed at the shield, deforming it, but the armor plate endured it again. Now, though, the princess could see the shooter. Sokolka appeared out of nowhere, merely several meters in front of them. Mecha's frame that looked compact while in the spacious hangar now towered like a threatening dark shape in the middle of sand whirlwinds between two rocks. Yet she could not pick out any weapons.
The cannon above Serenity's shoulder jerked weakly but didn't move. He sharply growled in the microphone and caught the handle with his free hoof, tugged it down, and the corbel hesitantly gave way, gritting, rotating the whole barrel length to face the offender. He moved his hindlegs farther, the hooves unsnapping additional support plates to compensate the recoil.
“Cease fire,” the headphones were instantly filled with noisy humming feedback. Captain's voice was barely recognizable behind the teeth-grit-inducing ferruginous low pitch and palpable affectation typical for integrated verbocoder. “Or be destro-”
Roar of a new shot left another dent on the shield, interrupting the guard mid-sentence. If he expected to impress the enemy, his efforts were vain.
“Do not return fire,” Luna hastily growled, and the captain turned to her, his hoof remaining on the cannon handle hanging over his shoulder. The alicorn silently counted to ten and explained. “I am unharmed. If the shield wasn't affected when this close, the weapon cannot penetrate our armour.”
Serenity kept silent for a while, then sharply snorted.
“Let us pull closer.”
“It is close enough.”
The voice. Hoarse, hissing, matching the wind roaring around them and only slightly muffled by armor's frequency filters. Screaming. Gasping. That voice. She realized somewhat late that she used the common channel — the same Serenity's autotranslator used to send his threat.
She had heard this voice once. No, not this one, but the one very similar to it. Sending shivers through her bones, making her cold stomach stiffen.
“A word of advice. Do not threaten before proving yourself.”
The mecha moved, parting with the rock and adjusting its... manipulator? Hand? Leg? Its end had no hoof, nor the fingers akin to these of diamond dogs. Instead there was a large box with a pile of ribbed elevations, cables and a great and powerful...
“It's a barrel,” she realized in a flash. A two-segment barrel ending in a thick round prop plate with some strange staples protruding from it. With a caliber of a pony leg. Next to a giant like this even the captain's Geyser looked pale in comparison.
“Weapon not identified,” Shadow repeated, highlighting the assembly with a band in the screen. No wonder. A cannon integrated into the vehicle frame... and unlike anything she saw before.
“We are looking for Celekh,” she decided. Made a step forward, cautiously showing herself from behind the shield. “One service worker Celekh. The umbrum.”
Sound of inhaling in her headphones like a grinding sound of a metal brush.
“You've found her. Your move?”
The vehicle drew closer, moving its legs heavily, impending over them. The cabin windshield rippled, becoming transparent again.
And Luna faced her nightmare.
She had a chance to inspect a Sokolka back in the hangar during their prolonged tour. Still, now when she had a fully working CRV in front of her, the storm raging above them, it somehow looked bigger. The princess casually put a hoof at captain's shoulder to calm him, moved the shields aside and stepped forward. A mecha towering before her looked bigger indeed, although her conscience reasoned that all the Sokolkas are similar. A massive awkward frame standing on two three-segment supports resembling unproportionately enlarged pony legs. A convex windshield covered most of the cockpit, and there, behind it, hooves on the levers, was its driver.
Luna steeled herself for this moment. And yet she felt horribly unprepared when she got to it. The levers of steering rods ended in flat round latches fastened to forehooves. The shadow pony vaguely resembled... a ghost. A skeleton. A usual pony frame, completely flayed, if only to ignore the fact that it was smoking. The entirety of her body, stretched, thin, with long skinny legs and protruding ribcage, was woven of micaceous smoke and dust, flowing in misty trickles disappearing somewhere in the cockpit depths. It was as if she embodied a part of the storm raging above the canyon. And at the same time she didn't belong to it. The storm, however magical, brutal, merciless, was a natural phenomenon.
The shadowpony whirled around her axis, never loosening her hold on the levers, reminding once again her body wasn't limited by anatomic constraints, and stretched her long horse-like muzzle adorned with crooked mismatched teeth forward. Two plates of eyes, dripping sickly light, stared at the stranger again.
“What's next?” she repeated, shifting her hoof. Sokolka moved her arm sideways, the barrel muzzle pointing at princess' chest.
“No need for that,” the alicorn shook her head and knocked on her cuirass plate lightly. “It is moonsteel. Designed to withstand direct meteorite hit. Do you really think you can pierce it with your... your... what is it, anyway?”
“Assembly Power Hoof,” Flashlight cut into their channel. The princess inclined her head questioningly, barely turning, and he hurriedly explained. “It's a construction cannon. It, er, it shoots nails.”
“Nails?”
“The bigger variety.”
“Oh,” the princess smiled, thankful for the glass hiding her expressions. Still, the box that she assumed to be a feeding magazine was quite impressive. “That changes things, obviously.”
“I should aim for the face then,” the shadow pony bared her teeth, raising the mech's arm to point the barrel at Luna's forehead. “Or is it some sort of ‘moonglass’?”
“You don't even see my face,” the princess reproached, stepping closer. “But fret not. You've shown yours. It would be impolite for me not to respond in kind.”
The canyon gave them some cover from the sand, so the visibility was somewhat better than in the open. At least that's what she was counting on. Her glass, too, rippled from the polarization filter switching off. She imagined looking at herself with foreign eyes. A sleek, smooth, elegant armor suit, her helmet with Y-shaped visor glass. The decorative necklace with her symbol lighted up on her chest, one of the few embellishments she did allow. Shadow caught the hint and even turned on the spine-mounted projectors, the second time for today. Although her spectral mane would probably not look so impressive in this whirlwind of dust.
“...Princess Luna?”
“The one and only.”
Shadowpony blinked, grew haggard, hunched up. Even her muzzle seemed to shrink. Not for long, for a moment.
“Don't come any closer. I will shoot you.”
“You know, Celekh...” Luna forced herself to stare at the pony intently, “I envisioned you differently.”
A screech? A cackle. Umbrum leaned forward abruptly, pressing her face against the windshield. The features of her muzzle got blurred, plate-sized eyes dangerously narrowing.
“I can be... many things.”
Luna barely avoided shuddering. The likeness was... unnerving. Still, it wasn't her. The princess took a deep breath, then breathed out, calming herself. The nature of these nightmares eluded even her so far. It would be much simpler if it was Sombra. His predatory grin and her silent powerless scream inside her shell of stone.
Yet is wasn't he she had dreamed of. Not the former ruthless emperor and tyrant of the Crystal Empire. She dreamed of his closest assistant. The grand-vizier. “Lady” Rabia.
“You must leave,” the shadowpony croaked, shifting her cannon again. “Leave. Now.”
“Celekh,” the princess sighed impatiently. “This nail-thrower can't scratch me. Even when shot in the face.”
“I can overload the accumulator of this vehicle,” the umbrum offered gloomily. “The explosion may not necessarily harm you... Are the suits of your companions made from moonsteel as well? What about the canyon itself?” she puffed hollowly, widening her holes of nostrils. “Leave, princess. Return to your castle.”
“We will not go back without you,” Luna grimly responded.
“And you are going to force me how?” Umbrum's round eyes mockingly glimmered. She poked the mech's free arm at the captain who still aimed at her. “Threaten me with this gun?”
“This gun will crack your machine...”
“...like a tin can,” the umbrum cut Flashlight up. “An Ironshod HAPC-4 ‘Geyser’. I know what it is, my little pony. Do not think I am scared of it.”
Luna nearly groaned. Of course. To think of it, it was so obvious.
“Identify yourself, soldier,” she said dryly.
“Sergeant Celekh. Repair detachment, company D, 4th Battalion,” the shadowpony exhaled before she had a chance to think.
“The Fourth Republican?” the puzzled mechanic asked.
“Of course the Fourth Republican it is,” Luna confirmed, coolly glancing at the driver. “You didn't seriously think Celekh served in the army of the Umbrum Empire now, did you, Flashlight? Whatever could possibly give you this idea?”
“Yeah, really,” Flashlight mumbled. “Whatever.”
“You see, we have something in common, Celekh and I...”
“You have no idea what you're talking about, princess,” the shadowpony hissed.
“Do I?” Luna narrowed her eyes. “Captain Lash blabbed about him trying to get rid of you when someone in high ranks got in the way. If we remember for a moment that captain Lash is a military pony, however bad at this he is... Truth be told, there is only one explanation. You're under the same High Command.”
“You know nothing, princess,” her headphones practically oozed poison now, Luna's title almost a profanity. “You are a royal co-ruler of the most powerful state on Equus. The whole planet bears the name of your country. And I am a wretched spawn of the cursed empire. We can have nothing in common.”
“For a spawn of the cursed empire you are exceptionally overconfident,” the princess couldn't stop herself before replying with a jibe in turn. “I was exiled you know. For some thousand years.”
“Oh really?” the shadowpony rustled with a pale smile. Her rusty voice suddenly grew strong. “...So great was her reign, so brilliant her glory that long was the shadow she cast, which fell dark upon the young sister she loved, and grew only darker as days and nights passed...”
Umbrum sang. The princess shivered. It was probably the last thing she expected. There was some perverted, biting, insinuating caress coming through Celekh's expression. And while she herself certainly knew the tune, it was the first time she heard it being sung like that. The shadowpony herself seemed to change as her voice grew stronger. Her legs, the bones clothed in dry sinews, grew meat around them. The face was thawing, melting like candle wax, and for one brief moment Luna almost saw the face of a pony. A haggard, skinny one, with sunken cheeks and smoking fluorescent holes of eyes.
“...Soon did that pony take notice that others did not give her sister her due... And neither had she loved her as she deserved; she watched as her sister's unhappiness grew.” The spell was gone. The shadowpony bared her crooked teeth. “I know everything of your exile.”
“‘The Tale of Two Sisters’,” the alicorn respectfully said. “‘Lullaby for a Princess’. I'm impressed.”
“I may be an umbrum,” Celekh's voice once again screeched in her headphone like shards of glass on somepony's teeth. “But that doesn't mean I never studied history... or been to the opera.”
“So you do know history,” Luna agreed. “The official one. The opera approved by the Royal Committee of High Arts. The one that underwent all the corrections and editing. But how about what really happened?”
She picked the hatch on her forearm with her nose and opened the slots for memory cards. There was a crystal glowing in one of them, the one she knew all too well.
“Do you know what that is?”
“A memory ember,” the shadow pony moved forward, hanging on the control levers while she inspected the crystal. “An amber with reminiscences inside. But why is it... so...”
The alicorn remembered what her “ember” looked like. A small faceted shard of the usual honey yellow. The unusual were the branching ebony rays of needles that pierced the crystal, the rays that belonged to the star, frozen in the middle. There, in the depth two sparks were dancing and circling, a cold of dark purple and a warm of shiny silver.
“Because it is mine,” Luna simply answered. “And I want you to share it.”
This time, it seemed, she managed to surprise the pony. Umbrum frowned, flaring her nostrils.
“Is this some kind of trick? Don't take me for a fool, princess. One does not leave a stranger's memory so easily.”
“I said ‘share’. I will go with you. We will dive in together and leave together.”
“This will take hours,” the umbrum snorted. “Meanwhile the storm will completely drain our batteries. Do you really wanna die so badly, princess?”
“Celekh,” Luna shook her head. “Memory recording technology was created in my lab. It is a brainchild of mine, if you wish. And you think I can't rewind the data?”
“If captain Lash thinks-”
“Captain Lash thinks nothing,” Luna cut her off. “If you wish to know he tried to stop me. Forget Lash. This is between you and me. Your move?” She grinned. “This is not something I offer to anyone.”