It takes the combined efforts of Private Strings, Applejack, and Sergeant Stone to get Fluttershy down from the thing. It had extended its ramp once again- but being that it’s standing right next to its little base, that had come down a little far away. They’d elected to go the faster, more direct route- which, unfortunately, strained the Sergeant’s wings. He had Private Strings stand up top, using her horn to help keep Fluttershy on his back, while Applejack waited at the bottom to help receive the unconscious pegasus.
Next, while the Sergeant and Applejack carry Fluttershy inside the little structure, Privates Strings and Verbal trot down the ramp to meet them. The strange, spiderlike machine that had helped them search their destroyed base has been, ever since they decided to move, transferring the food supplies.
It takes only a couple minutes, once inside the toasty warm interior, to get Fluttershy onto one of the bunks- and to remove her armor. The armor is piled up next to the bed; it might be very, very badly damaged, but it’s still all they have.
Next, they confirm what Private Strings had noticed before.
“Her Element is broken,” Applejack states, staring at the fragments of gemstone they’d recovered from the pegasus’ armor.
Private Strings nods. “I noticed that earlier, too. I wonder what that means, though?” She points a hoof at Fluttershy’s chest.
Applejack looks up at it; Private Strings and the Sergeant had taken care of the armor problem. She tilts her head, gazing at the pink butterfly emblazoned on Fluttershy’s chest, just like a cutie mark.
Sergeant Stone runs a hoof across it, verifying that it is, indeed, a deep coloration in her fur- just like a cutie mark. “Interesting,” he mumbles- and glances up at her forehead as well. “Not only that, but her wounds have all sealed up.” He glances out at the door. “I’m betting she helped.”
The answer is a couple slow nods.
He gives a sharp nod. “Regardless, a little building like this isn’t gonna defend itself. Private Verbal, you’re with me- we’re going to examine the surroundings and establish a perimeter. Private Strings, stay with Applejack and Fluttershy- make sure she makes a full recovery.” He then heads out through the curtains and the door, Private Verbal following right behind.
When they get outside, they pause for a second to look around. Their previous conveyance has been busy. It’s parked just a little further away- and all the snow around their little building has been cleared. Beyond that, just barely peeking out of the ground, the foundations- and beginnings- of solid, metal walls are just visible. Regardless, Sergeant Stone quickly sets up a patrol schedule; if any enemy approaches, he wants to know about it, ‘handled’ by their gigantic friend or not.
Two weeks. It took all of a day for the fort to establish enough food production capacity to sustain the five ponies that stayed; however, it has taken a full two weeks to establish acceptable defenses for this new microbase, with a subspace com embedded in the walls. I am just about ready to make my next foray into the wild when one of my six roving drones crosses paths with the blue pegasus that left two weeks ago. She’s pulling a small cart through the air; radar suggests a very large crystal is contained within. I watch her fly in for a landing; I am in no hurry to depart, at this time.
My passengers have adapted to living in my base fairly well. They have set up a guard schedule, regularly pacing the walls; ever since they first started patrolling the area surrounding their structure, I made certain the walls would be entirely pony-navigable at all times. The four towers, one at each corner, are each armed with two automatically-operated Ion Bolt repeaters; I have also installed a single pony-operated repeater in each tower. Eventually, I plan to install Hellbores on this base; at this time, I have neither the resources nor the space to build such weapons. Even so, ion bolt repeaters should be enough to wipe out any attacking force, especially since the alloy walls- while also not up to eventual design specification- should stand up to regular cannon fire for decades.
I watch the pegasus descend towards the base. As expected, she seems surprised by how much it has grown; I have not yet constructed any additional structures, but the occupants have been hard at work not only in patrolling the walls but in preparing roads. She descends quickly, landing gently in front of the structure; the stallion- nickname ‘Sergeant’- jumps off one of the walls to meet her on the ground. The unicorn- ‘Pointy’- runs over from where she had been exercising her magic, I believe, in a corner of the base. She then helps them extract the large, bipyramidal crystal from the cart, bringing it and its base into the building to set them up in a corner of the map room. Sergeant pulls a scroll out of the cart, following her in, to unroll it on my map table.
I immediately spot similarities, match locations, and move my holographic map to line up with this one. I also extract the labels- I cannot understand them- onto my map, alongside the many locations on his that aren’t on mine. They seem surprised by this adjustment, as my holographic map quickly takes on the features of the paper one underneath- but they seem to accept it. He shortly rolls up his map, setting it aside, to examine the holographic one. While he and Pointy go over the map- looks like they’re trying to decide where to ask me to go- ‘Fast’, the pegasus that brought them the map, touches the crystal, triggering a surge of magical energy.
She seems to panic as the surge builds, pulling away and letting out a yelp. Sergeant and Pointy both look up at her; Pointy’s horn starts to glow, and I recognize a barrier beginning to form around the crystal.
She’s not done yet when the magic surge blasts out from the crystal. Her barrier shatters outwards instantly; at the same time, I activate my battlescreen projectors to protect my hull from any possible effects from this blast. At the speed it’s going, it will reach me before I can raise my battlescreens; the alloy walls of the fort may hinder it enough.
As the blast strikes ponies, the images on their flanks disappear and they collapse to the ground. I am able to confirm they are not dead; rather, the effect appears identical to the curse that was placed upon Necklace two weeks prior.
The blast is not hindered by the alloy walls- and I can confirm, it will have an effect on me. On contact, the power cells in the emergency lighting I installed are being instantly drained; all power in the wires in the walls is also being drawn away, causing the lights to go out. I rush my tech spider to the nearest power line and connect it in; in the event the blast wipes its power as well, I should be able to recharge it directly, rather than nanite-manufacturing a cable to connect it to power. At the same time, my drone launch tubes snap open, and I launch my two remaining drones into the air with orders to reach cruising altitude as quickly as possible and join the other six in formation. Their internal engines come on fast enough, propelling them up and away, that they manage to escape the blast.
Apple and Necklace collapse where they stand, on the wall; ‘Understand’, the earth pony that seems to understand everything I say, is struck by her falling spear after she collapses. I detect no injury.
The blast continues to travel, and strikes into my hull. As expected, all power is being sucked out; I successfully raise the innermost layer of defenses around my starboard forward survival center in time; by a stroke of luck, this is also the furthest point of my hull from the blast. As such, the already-nearly-depleted emergency survival center reserves contained with my active survival center are preserved, and I remain aware throughout the blast. I wait until the power cutoff from outside fades entirely before I lower this barrier and begin analyzing the damage.
98.37% of my armor’s solar capability has been fried, reducing me below useful production in broad daylight. 97.31% of my power cells have been fried as well; however, this is of no consequence at this time, since I’ve used less than 0.01% of them since arriving in this world. My spider’s power cell survived, at reduced capacity; all nanites beyond my survival center have been lost. All subspace comm facilities, including those in my fort, have been fried; visual analysis indicates the housings have blown apart, requiring reconstruction. All of my battlescreen projectors have shattered in similar manner; all my countergrav facilities have been disintegrated. The exposed processors show significant strain, but most are operable. My Ion Bolt repeater will need new control circuits before I can use it again; my operable Hellbore needs new targeting sensors; four of my fifty missiles require new processors. My working main battery, however, remains fully operational, even though I never accumulated the power to fire it, even on a reduced setting.
More worryingly, the processors governing the door on my base have been fried; the doors have been immobilized in a closed position. I make this a priority repair, estimated time to completion three point four seven minutes, while I feed power into my spider to help the three exposed ponies down to the door. Even now, all three of them are attempting to rise once again, but none of them seem to have the strength to do so.
Oh, and good news- the geothermal generator appears to be completely unharmed. It has resumed powering my fort and charging my power cells.
I slightly reduce the rate of charge by lighting up my transmitters once again; these have also survived. I make contact with my drones, download the logs. All eight drones have survived; the six already out appear to have been outside of the blast zone, while the last two have outraced the blast and have not yet reached formation distance. I order a tighter pattern such that it should be nearly impossible for even a hypersonic missile to reach my base without detection. At the same time, after the doors and my spider, my missiles- and the launch tubes they’re in- are the next priority repair. They are, aside from my miraculously undamaged mortar, the only weapons I can use right now; geothermal hasn’t yet given me enough charge to operate even the ion bolt repeaters.
I then debate my next priority in construction. Do I want to assemble a surveillance satellite, or go for fusion power? I…
I will go for the satellite. Once I launch it, and place it in geostationary orbit, I can safely dock all of my drones simultaneously- and travel out a far greater distance without losing surveillance capability on my base.
As I restore my fort’s damage control capability by the introduction of fresh nanites, I adjust its priorities; fully one-half of non-food production will be devoted to the creation of a pair of launch tubes on the back of the central building- one a box launcher, in which to build and launch satellites, and the other a Heavy Vertical Launch Missile Tube, with a magazine capacity of sixty and cycle time of only two seconds. Twenty of the missiles will be hypersonic, long-range one-kiloton cruise missiles, capable of striking anywhere within fifteen hundred miles; ten will be ten-kiloton intercontinental ‘ballistic’ missiles, capable of striking anywhere on the planet; thirty will be shorter-ranged missiles, evenly distributed between quarter ton, one ton, and ten ton weapons, with a hypersonic range of about twenty miles, for use in defense of the fort.
After that, and only once the magazine has been filled completely, my fort will produce alloy armor for each pony in the fort. An alloy replacement for the damaged armor they all still wear.
Private Dust touches the Fort Crystal she’d brought. As the pony that first brought it to this fort, it’s her duty to be the first to touch it, to teleport to Canterlot to report safe arrival.
She doesn’t disappear, the way she’s supposed to. Instead, she feels a surge of energy she’s not supposed to feel- and leaps backwards in alarm. Both Private Strings and Sergeant Stone look up at her; Strings’ horn lights up, casting a shield around it. If it is what she suspects it is, that’ll be very important.
The blast comes too fast. She sees the shield shatter under the force, feels the blast take her strength away… and even the room goes dark while she collapses to the floor, unable to hold herself up.
It’s a trick the Centaurs have learned- and why they often haven’t attacked ponies traveling through the sky with Fort Crystals. They can set their lifeforce drain spell on it, such that it will activate and drain everypony in the fort whenever somepony attempts to use it, dumping the resulting energy into the crystal- and causing it to explode violently, more often than not.
The annoying part is that they can set that spell from afar, through the wooden wall of a carriage. At least they can’t set it through the solid walls of a fort, or the solid stone or metal buildings they’re stored inside.
Thus, the reason repairing or replacing a Fort Crystal is such a pain.
She tries to right herself, but she can hardly move her legs, let alone lift the weight of her armor. “S-sorry!” she mumbles into the darkness, as the best she can manage right now. “I- I-!”
“Don’t worry,” Sergeant Stone’s voice comes back, similarly weakened. “That was my fault. Neither of you have the experience to spot that curse, I do.”
She’s about to reply, when the sharp crackling of breaking crystal echoes through the room, and several heavy thuds resound from where it was.
“At least it was only us,” Private Strings’ voice wafts from the darkness. “And Hope… I hope she’s okay.”
Her eyes widen. That’s right- Hope built this base, and she’s well within range of the blast! Not to mention, all the lights have-!
Right on schedule, the lights come back on, blinding her momentarily.
She takes a breath. “What about Honesty and Kindness?”
Sergeant Stone speaks up again. “We can only hope that Hope is okay… and that she can find a way to help them inside.”