The Moon hung low as if the center of the great tapestry known as the Night Sky, yet Twilight ignored this fact as she wrapped up her scratchy blanket. She rolled her shoulders in order to release some of the tension that developed from sleeping on rock, but without the magic of the Sun, Twilight took a deep breath, seizing the minute well of solar magic within her. It was much smaller than she was used to enough for one or two spells.
Ultimately, after finishing packing up her scavenged gear, Twilight pulled one of her scrolls from her belt, and glanced over the spell sigils. The wizard felt that familiarizing herself with the runes of the spells contained within might help, if Twilight was forced to fuel her spellcraft with her own volatile magic.
Confident that she has properly memorized the scroll’s sigils properly, Twilight lashed the scroll to her belt. Glad she slept, Twilight regarded Crypsis, who stood silently surveying the surroundings, before looking at the sky, as if gauging their heading.
“This way.” Crypsis rasped, and set off southward. In a better mood, she recalled that she had not gone adventuring in a long while. Grinning slightly, she strapped her scavenged pack to her back, and quickly caught up to Crypsis, the crunching resoundment of the sandy rock bit under her feet as she caught up to the Hivemind.
Over the course of the next few hours, Twilight dared to ask a number of questions all which were promptly ignored by the Hive Creature.
Walking in stride with Crypsis, she examined Crypsis closer. The false light green skin seemed eerily realistic, she spied the signature ears under his hood, and white hair. The freckles across his nose and cheeks gave him the appearance of just another elf. As Twilight thought about Crypsis’ disguise, she figured an elven form, which could practice magic, would be better than a human, which held superior durability over elves, or avis, which had wings.
Turning her thoughts away from the types of mortals in Equestria, she glanced back at Crypsis who just seemed to walk southward.
The flat badlands seemed devoid of any life on the moonlit night. Every crunching footstep resounded, occasionally making Twilight wince when a particularly loud crack would be heard. Crypsis was still maintaining the “elf” form, and Twilight was beginning to wonder why. She kept her question to herself, knowing fully Crypsis would just ignore her. After about another hour of seeming directionless traveling on the flat badlands, Twilight thought she heard something, a whining sort of noise. She turned, and saw, to her dismay, an aerial vehicle was cruising towards Twilight and Crypsis.
Reflexively, Twilight formed a spell into being, Scorcher, which would create a line of flames, but before Twilight had realized what she had done, Twilight had somehow fueled the spell with her purple crackling, barely constrained magic, fearing the spell would go off, the spell exploded into being.
The backfire of the normally tame scorcher became a line of ethereal eldritch purple flames that spread in a thirty foot line, while also magically igniting her hand and forearm. Twilight seized her hand and gritted her teeth as her entire left arm became engulfed in the flaming arcane energy.
She screamed and fell to one knee as the energy washed its way through her synapses and nerves like an electrical acid. She did not see the line of purple energy that burned on the ground and that had consumed two Hive that jumped off their ship.
Crypsis used the distraction of the errant spell and whirled into action, the Word of the Queen now loaded with rounds. The elf disguise must have held up against its own kind, and Crypsis fired three screaming rounds into one of the hulking quadruped Hive beasts charging the lone pair with its weapon firing at Crypsis.
The beast quivered as the curse of Crypsis’ twisted hand cannon set in, shadows and sick green energy clung to the Hive’s form. A black knife seemed to arc for the creature’s head from Crypsis’ hand, and the Hive’s skull burst into a purplish gory mess and explosion of green flame.
Three bullets more seemed to curse the other Hive creature, which screamed an unearthly howl. Terror filled Twilight for but a moment before Twilight regained her composure.
Twilight seized the dregs of solar magic within her soul that she had stored from the resting during the day, and formed the silver-black Solar Blade, iconography alight with solar fury. The errant spell now faded into licks of purple flames as Twilight charged her opponent, her vision blurred as pain coursed through her arm, leaving it wreathed in lavender magical flames, but Twilight managed to find her blade a purchase into the Hive’s insectoid body, as if guided by Crypsis’ curse and the intent of the holy weapon. With the death, the last two Hive creatures began to flee, getting back on their ship. The ship flew away quickly with a whine of its engines.
With a curse word, Twilight collapsed into a painful heap on her right side, her body refusing to give chase in its agony. She grit her teeth, and glared at Crypsis and yelled, “Why do we need to travel at Night? Now I’m suffering from magical shock!” She gritted her teeth has the energy began to expire, her brain now livid with a harsh migraine.
Crypsis nonchalantly strode up to the wounded girl and pulled three needles from a pouch on its belt. “I do not function well under sunlight, similar to how you cannot cast spells well at Night.” The Hivemind rasped, before stabbing her arm with the needles. Wincing, Twilight realized there was no pain as the needles were inserted, but rather a wash of cool relief surged through the affected limb that felt like it was ablaze.
“Might help” Crypsis remarked after observing Twilight examine her arm in fascination, before turning and beginning to head south.
“Aren’t they Hive?” the purple elf grunted, realizing she might have cost her and Crypsis a ride with her hasty judgement, Twilight’s face screwed up as she then felt searing pain as she brushed her right hand against her left forearm.
“Yes, not mine.” Crypsis muttered loudly, displeasure in his voice. Twilight grimaced, before weakly asking, “How far to our destination?” as she brought herself to her feet, and after regaining her sense of balance, she waited for an answer. When none came, she slowly lumbered over to the Hive corpses.
Twilight searched the Hive, and found their weapons, luckily not damaged in the melee that expired the weapons’ wielders. After sitting a moment with the weapon, Twilight figured out the weapons were similar in mechanism to the auto rifles that Celestia would require her train with once a week. Twilight again regretted her naivete, not spending time to grab a weapon from the ashened battlefield. She sighed, grabbed one of the Hive rifles, a Hive blade, and all the ammunition the Hive had. Twilight winced a little at the limb that suffered the magical backlash when it grabbed the handle of the Hive sword, and began to follow Crypsis once again. Her hand tingling as the sword was slotted in next to her pack.
The transition from rocky badland to a true desert was illustrated by the shuffling sound of the now purely sandy ground. The sand reminded Twilight of she when she was young, and when she used to be read stories by her older brother Shining Armor. He used to read stories of deserts and tombs to get her to sleep when it thundered and stormed outside. She smiled fondly on the memory, before her focus was stolen by the flash of pain as she made her way up a sand dune.
Twilight was trying her best to ignore the pain that came every few minutes, but everytime it moved, even the slightest, her arm’s nerves seemed to set ablaze with an acid wash. It was a reminder of the time that Celestia held a practice sparring with Twilight, and Celestia’s holy blade had struck Twilight, fiercely forcing Twilight’s spell to magically backlash, and Twilight ended up in the hospital for a week. Twilight just gritted her teeth, she had to do this for Equestria’s sake, and, Twilight sighed internally, her own curiosity as well.
Crypsis turned towards her after they had crested who knows how many sand dunes. Twilight was exhausted, and her arm was on fire.
She ignored Crypsis as the sun began rose again, she began unpacking her bag. The Hivemind motioned for her to come closer, and she stopped unpacking and drew closer.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the Hivemind make a small rune in its transformed claw, and then motioned, and she felt drowsiness wash over her. She stopped, and struggled to resist the spell, while weakly stuttering out a “What?”
Crypsis frowned and in an instant that Twilight did not register in her mind, returned to its Hivemind form. The Hivemind strode up as Twilight finally shrugged off the spell, and drew a knife, and plunged into into her left flank. Abject fear coursed through her, before finally blacking out, the overall shock to her mind finally granting sweet release. Darkness greeted her with open arms as she fell unconscious upon that soft, tan sand.