It had been a few hours since Kalis and Elana had started training. Elana was now able to hit Kalis most of the time, even when she was evading. They hadn’t killed one another yet, always aiming for body shots, but it had been close on occasion.
“Jeez, okay, Kalis. I think that’s all I can do for now.” Elana said, sitting down on the grass. The small area they had been fighting in was littered with bullet casings and deep holes, but other than that, it remained green as ever.
“Yeah, you held up a lot longer than I did in my first training session. Although, I still say Kervis cheated.” Kalis said, sitting beside her.
“How so?”
“He used two snipers and switched between them when one ran dry. He didn’t have to reload a single time while fighting.”
Elana gave a laugh and bumped her friend’s shoulder, “You still beat him though, huh?” She said.
“I wish. He wiped the floor with me for a week before I started to learn how to hit him. I swear, if you want someone to fight in a one on one, go with me. At least I’ll take it easy on ya.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
They sat there for a little while, watching the various birds fly from tree to tree in the distance. As they rested, Elana spoke up once more, “Hey Kalis? Why haven’t we gone straight for the Cabal leader and ended it there?”
The Exo hesitated a little before replying, “Because we would need the entire fireteam on board in order to even attempt it. While I hate to admit it, we would have trouble killing him and his soldiers alone. But we’ll get him, don’t worry.”
They remained silent for some time after that, only being disturbed when Kalis finally stood up, “Well, I think I’m gonna go annoy Kervis. You got anything you want to do?” She asked.
“Not really. I’m probably just going to wander the town a bit, maybe get to know some of the ponies a little.”
“Fine by me. Just be ready to come back later today. We are all going to the barracks to speak with the War Mage’s leader. Apparently she has managed to get her ponies ready, so we can start preparing to move out.”
The human gave a nod and stood up, watching as Kalis began walking back to the town. When the Exo was out of sight, she began walking as well, walking towards a part of town she hadn’t explored yet. The ponies that lived in this world fascinated her, and she truly wanted to be able to speak with them more freely, but was normally prevented by training or preparation for what was coming.
As she walked the stone streets, the citizens of the town have her waves and smiles. She returned as many as she could, perfectly happy to be polite to the ponies that had shown her such hospitality. A few streets later, she passed a larger red building. Inside, a bell rang out, multitudes of young ponies running out of the doors to spend a well-deserved break out in the play areas. It wasn’t long before a few of them noticed the lone Hunter, prompting them to run up to her.
She could hear them talking with one another as they moved closer to her, much of it being them trying to remember which guardian she was. Seeing no reason to avoid conversation, she slowed to allow the ponies to catch up.
“Hey, are you Kalis?” A small filly asked when they had gotten closer.
“I’m afraid not, little miss. I’m a new guardian.” Elana replied, looking down at her. She was a light blue filly, with a white mane and tail.
“But can you still do all those things Kalis can?” The little blue pony asked, her excited smile unwavering.
“Yup, though not nearly as well as she can.”
“Could you show us?”
The human halted at that, unsure on how to reply to that. She was only skilled enough to summon her Blade Dancer and Golden Gun, as she hadn’t had the time to learn Nightstalker. She didn’t want to scare the poor things, and she most certainly didn’t want to hurt any of them, but then, she hated to disappoint.
“What would you like to see?” The Hunter asked, hoping to stall for time.
“I dunno, anything!”
She gave a long sigh, relenting slightly at the sight of six sets of puppy eyes, “Fine, fine. Just stand back, okay? If you come too close you could get hurt.” She said.
The fillies and colts nodded rapidly, backing up a few feet to give her room. When they were far enough away, she reached into her light and channeled arc energy down into her hand. When enough had built, she drew her knife and poured the light into it, the blade rapidly becoming smothered in blue light.
The small ponies, as well as a few adults passing by, gave the blade a wide-eyed look. The blue filly jumped up and spoke up again after a few seconds, “Show us more!”
The others shouted their agreement, much to the dismay of the Hunter.
“This is gonna take a while...” She muttered, charging her solar energy.
- - -
In the skies near Solacium, a lone pegasus flew slowly, his eyes trained at the ground. He had been told that the guardians had gone to the War Mage home town, and was hoping to talk with them.
After many hours of searching, he finally caught sight of a small town that matched the description the pony had given him. However, as he got closer, his fear began to set in.
“C’mon, Flame. You can do this.” He muttered, shaking his head a little. After he had woken up, he found Manehattan destroyed, huge machines hovering above the ruins of the once great city. He had flown as quickly as he could to a neighbouring village, getting information about what had happened from the barkeep there.
He was going to go to a family member’s home, when he had been stopped by his thoughts. He was always running from these things, but now he had the option to help. The guardians were apparently building an army to fight back against the monsters, and they needed as many ponies as they could get.
Which lead him to where he was. He was still nervous about talking with the guardians again, but he truly wanted to stop being such a coward about these things.
As the town came closer, he could start to make out the various colours of ponies that walked the streets. Many wore robes, stating their place in the town, while others walked as they were, many of them being civilians or unfit for combat.
Landing quickly, he surveyed the streets around him. There weren’t any obvious signs of the three aliens, but there were plenty of ponies walking by that could help him.
Picking one out at random, he trotted over to him. The stallion noticed his approach and slowed to allow the blue pegasus to catch up.
“I hate to bother you, but do you know where the guardians are?” Flamelight asked when he reached a respectable distance from the pony.
“They are over in the barracks. Take the third left on this street and follow the path, you’ll find it pretty easily.” The stallion replied with a smile.
“Thank you, have a good day.”
“The same to you.”
Following the directions, he eventually arrived at a fairly large building, dozens of War Mages walking to and from it. He relaxed himself the best he could and walked up to the open door, stepping in slowly and looking around. The room wasn’t big, but was bustling with Mages, most of whom ignored him.
“Hey, you need something?” A mare asked. She was wearing a purple robe that covered her body, but her face was still visible.
“Uh, I was hoping to speak with the guardians, if that’s okay.” Flame said in response.
“I can ask them for you. Just take a seat over there.” She said, raising a hoof to point at a collection of benches near the door.
He gave a nod and walked over to them, sitting beside another pony. He wasn’t wearing a robe, leaving Flamelight to assume he was just a civilian.
“Here to join the army as well?” The pony asked, looking over at him.
“Oh, no. I was just here to speak with someone.”
“Ah, well you should think about joining up. I hear they are running pretty low on soldiers.”
“I would, but I’m not exactly the fighting type.” Flame said with a frown.
“Your choice, but just know that you don’t need to be a fighter to join an army. There are plenty of roles for ponies to take part in.”
The blue pony gave a small nod, looking away to think on his decision some more. He wanted to start helping others, but wasn’t sure if he was able to pick up a weapon and kill something, monster or not.
As he thought, a pony walked up to his side, “Excuse me, the guardians are fine with you speaking with them.” The mare from earlier said.
“Um, thanks. Where are they?” Flamelight said, breaking from his train of thought.
“I can take you to them if you like.”
He gave another nod and stood, following the pony into one of the many hallways. As they walked, he noticed a slow decline of Mages passing them. By the time the mare had stopped, there wasn’t a Mage in sight.
“Here we are. If you need anything else, feel free to ask one of the Mages.” She said, turning and trotting away to go back to whatever she was doing previously.
The pony gulped and looked at the door. He was barely holding his mind at bay as he raised his hoof to knock. Three bangs rang out before he lowered his leg, his heart hammering in his chest.
A few seconds passed before a robed guardian opened the door. As Flame had only seen one of them, he didn’t recognise this one. From the body shape of it, he assumed it to be a male. His robes were pitch black, various parts of it glowing a bright blue to contrast with the rest of the garment.
“You’re the pony that wanted to talk with us?” He asked, looking down at Flame.
“Y-yeah.”
“Come on in, we weren’t really doing much.”
The guardians walked back into the room, allowing the pegasus to follow behind him. The room was pretty small, only furnished by a table and some chairs sitting in the centre. The doorways to the left and right lay in the walls, though their doors were closed.
At the table, two of the aliens sat there. One he instantly recognised as the guardian he had met all that time ago. She was tearing pieces of paper up, rolling them into little balls and chucking them at the guardian beside her. The being in question had his helmet off, and was tinkering with it.
“Kalis, I swear to Christ...” The larger guardian muttered, his eyes not leaving the helmet. He looked up at her when another ball pinged off of his forehead, “Would you quit it!? I thought you were helping Elana.”
“Meh, she’s a pretty good shot. Wasn’t all that much to teach.” Kalis replied, tearing another piece of paper.
“Then could you find something else to do that doesn’t involve pissing me off?
“Nope,” The black and orange guardian said, throwing the newly-made ball at her partner.
The green and white guardian was about to say something when he caught sight of Flamelight and the robed guardian watching them.
“Oh, hey Exodus.” The larger alien said, ignoring the new pellet hitting his face.
“I see you two are busy,” The being known as Exodus commented, taking a seat at the table.
“You could say that. Who’s this one?” He replied, looking over at the blue pony.
“Don’t know yet. Seems he wanted to speak with us.”
“Ah, then what’s up?” The alien asked, igniting his hand and burning the paper Kalis was still tearing apart.
Realising that all eyes were now on him, Flame stood as tall as he could and gave his response, “I have come to help you guys deal with the monsters, if I can.”
Kalis snorted at that, bringing the attention to her, “Aren’t you that pony that pussied out every time you saw us? You could barely open the door to talk with me.”
“I… I am that pony, yes. But I want to change. These monsters have destroyed my workplace, and in turn my livelihood. And I doubt they will stop there. All I ask is that I am given a chance to prove myself.”
The guardians looked at each other, none of them speaking up. A short silence passed before the green guardian spoke up, “We did need a pegasus to test how light works on them.”
“What? You really think he would be able to handle that?” Kalis asked, “Chrome was barely able to handle it, and he’s a soldier.”
“He received a large amount all in one go. Now that we have an idea of how much is suitable, we can provide light to any of the ponies.” Exodus explained, looking the pony over.
“I still think it’s a bad idea. I guess it isn’t up to me in the end, but if something goes wrong, don’t say I didn’t warn you,” The Hunter muttered.
The green guardian looked over at Flame, a smile on his face, “So, how about it?”
“I’m sorry, I have no idea what you guys are talking about.” Flamelight said, his head tilted.
“You haven’t even heard about it?” Kalis groaned, her head hitting the table.
“It’s perfectly understandable that ponies outside Solacium haven’t heard about what happened to Chrome.” Exodus said before turning to look at the pony as well, “Basically, we can give you some of our powers to make you stronger. We have already tested it and it works. But we have only tried it once, and on a unicorn. Having another try on a different sub-species would help us all massively. Would you be willing to try it?”
Flame hesitated. He wasn’t expecting this at all, in fact, he was almost ready to be turned away. Now he was being given the opportunity to become stronger, and in time, maybe even as powerful as the guardians.
Making his decision, he looked up, “What exactly has to happen for you guys to give me this?”
- - -
Thovog walked slowly through Despectus. The ponies seemed to have warmed up to him and his team slightly, some even walking by him without a look of pure terror upon their faces. But many ran back into their homes when they spotted the huge Cabal approaching, drawing a few sighs from the Val.
His wandering eventually brought him to the town square, the space crowded with market stalls. Shine had explained that every week the town had a market day to draw in more customers. It was apparently pretty popular, bringing in upwards of a few hundred ponies at times.
The stalls were a little too packed for him to safely walk through, so he stood to the side, watching the various ponies go about their weekly shopping. His presence attracted quite a bit of attention, but very few ponies actually showed their fear, much to his surprise. Not wanting to startle any of them, he stayed still, not interacting with any of them.
His watching of the citizens of the town allowed him some time to think. Not even two days ago, he would have been happy to ravage the town and kidnap any unicorns that lived there, slaughtering the rest. Now, he was working to do the opposite. He couldn’t understand how the Primus could condone such actions. At least with the humans, they had a reason to kill any they saw. But these ponies were new to them, and they had done nothing to them to warrant such horrid actions.
As he stood, a new sound slowly became noticeable. The ponies that had been shopping all stared in fear at the direction the sound was coming from, their hearing giving them the ability to hear it far clearer than Thovog could. Looking in the direction they were staring, a distant craft could be seen, one that made him freeze.
It was a Cabal dropship.
“Team, prepare for combat!” Thovog called through his comms, reaching behind him to take hold of his Slug Thrower.
“Sir? What’s wrong?” The Centurion asked, shouts and grunt sounding out in the background.
“Dropship. Possibly hostile. Need the entire team with me at the edge of the town as quickly as you can.”
“Of course, we’ll meet you there.”
With his team on the way, he hit the safety of his weapon to switch it off and began running towards the ship, his mind clouding with thoughts of what may happen if the Primus decided to assault the town.
As he reached the edge of Despectus, a few Mages met him with his team.
“-I guess that thing isn’t with you guys?-” One of the Mages asked.
“-Not that I am aware of. Be ready to fight.-” The Val responded in their language, pointing the barrels of his gun at the craft.
As the dropship got closer, it lowered to the ground, a manoeuvre the Cabal knew well to quickly land without showing hostility. Thovog lowered his weapon slightly as it landed fully, the cockpit opening almost immediately to reveal the pilots. Two Psions jumped from the ship, their hands in the air.
“Don’t shoot, friendlies!” They called.
“Stand down, team. Leave the safeties off.” Thovog commanded, walking towards the duo, “What is your business here?”
“We came to warn you, the Primus is about to do something even we can’t stomach!” One of them said, its arms still raised.
“What exactly is he planning?”
- - -
The Mages stood at attention as they watched Thovog move to speak with the two new monsters. They spoke with each other in a language none of the ponies could understand, but from the tone they were using, they doubted it was good.
After a few moments of talking, the Val spun around, roaring to the others in their language before running around to the back of the craft, the others in tow. When they had all boarded, the ship took off without another word and flew away, leaving five very confused Mages.
“What was that?” One of them asked, his eyes fixed on the fading ship.
“No idea, but it probably wasn’t good. We need to notify Solacium. Now.” Another said, galloping back into town.
“Celestia save us,” The first one whispered, dreading the thought of what was coming.
- - -
Flame followed the Hunter closely as they walked out into the nearby field, unsure of what was about to happen. She had begrudgingly accepted to be the next to give her light, something the pegasus was still nervous about.
“Alright. You have one chance to prove to me that this isn’t a complete waste of time.” She said, stopping to look at him.
“I’ll do my best.” He replied.
“We’ll see about that. Now, Exodus gave me a run through of the sort of light you should be able to use. Solar light is out of the question, and only unicorns would be able to summon the stuff required for it. That leaves void and arc. Void would be more of an issue, but you should be able to use the stealth mechanics of it. Arc, on the other hand, should be much more viable for you.”
“I’ll just roll with what you think is best.” Flame said, “You know these things better than I do, after all.”
“Good point. There may be hope for you yet.” She said, her arm coating in arc energy, “This shouldn’t hurt, but if it does, I’m sure you’ll let me know.”
That statement didn’t exactly make it any easier for him, but he gave a nod anyway, closing his eyes in preparation. He was about to ask what was going to happen when he felt a new energy mix inside his body. His natural pegasus magic happily aligned with the new energy, converging it near his wings.
“That’s it. You good?” Kalis asked, receiving a surprised look from him.
“It’s done?” He questioned, looking back at his wings.
“Yeah. You should have enough to train with, and a little extra for you to use whenever you feel like. Without armour, you won’t regenerate it, so you’ll have to talk with me or Elana if you want a top-off.”
“Elana? Who’s that?”
“She’s a newer Hunter. Not very experienced, but she will be able to provide small doses of arc energy should you need it.”
Flame nodded, looking once more at his wings, “So how do I use it?”
“That’s the easy part. Light isn’t like magic, it has a sort of life to it. Exodus explains it better, but in general, you have a bond with the light. If it accepts you, you can control it.”
“Then how do I get it to accept me?”
“You don’t ‘get’ it to accept you. Maybe if Exodus explained, he might have found a way, but you are being taught the way I learned. Reach into your reserves and find the energy. Communicate that you do not wish to use it maliciously, and you are just using it to help others. If it believes you and finds you sincere, it will accept you.”
Following the Exo’s instructions, he reached out and found the light. It was like a storm surrounded by the gentle ebb of his own magic, the arc firing bolts within the magic around it. A thought directed at his body ceased the storm’s rage, thought it seemed to only dull for a short time. He tried again, finding more success this time. After a moment or two, the light dispersed, channeling around his body.
“I think I did it.” He said, looking up at the Hunter.
“Good. Now for the fun part. That light is connected to the Bladedancers, so you will have a few of their abilities. I made sure you received the Arc Blades, as well as the ability to turn invisible. Other than that, you won’t be able to do much else.”
“Arc Blades? I’m going to have to use swords?”
Kalis gave a snort at that, “You? Wielding a sword? Not likely. The light will find the most suitable place to go and make that portion of your body the source point. Go ahead and move the energy to, uh… let’s go with your wings.”
He pushed the light up into his wings at the Hunter’s request, the energy moving easily at the command of its new master.
“And now move it outside of your body.”
The pegasus used what little knowledge he had of magic to force the light out into his primary feathers, the energy understanding quickly what he wanted to do. He opened his eyes to find his wingtips bathed in light blue energy, the light crackling away from him as it rested on his wings.
“Looks good so far, no issues with your control of it. Now you need to learn how to use it effectively.”
“I guess you are going to teach me that?”
“Of course I am, who do you-”
Kalis was cut off by her Ghost, the machine appearing beside her.
“Kalis, serious issue. The others have been trying to contact you,” He said, drawing concern from her.
“What’s happened?” She asked.
“I’m not sure, but from how much they are trying to contact you, it’s bad.”
Kalis opened her comms at that, joining a conversation between the rest of Odium and Procor. Elana was also listening in on the talk.
“-we don’t stop them, they could wipe them out!” Procor exclaimed.
“We need everyone on board with this or it will never work, Procor.” Kervis said.
“I’m here. What’s going on?” Kalis said, gasps of relief sounding from a couple of guardians.
“Three Cabal carriers are on the move, and they have been surrounded by smaller Cabal fighters.” Exodus explained.
“Where are they headed?”
“Not one-hundred percent, but the Ghosts think they are moving upon the capital.”
Shock drove through Kalis’ mind, almost bringing her to collapse, “Holy shit.”