//------------------------------// // Doors Open // Story: Amber Ashes // by GMBlackjack //------------------------------// Rainbow stared intently at the elevator door. She couldn’t see through it, which was both good and bad. Good, because it meant anyone hunting them down couldn’t see them. Bad, because she couldn’t see where they were going. The clank clank clank had become CLANK! CLANK! CLANK! at this point. It was still possible for the three of them to hear each other speak, but it was no longer possible to force the rhythm of the Mesh into the background. It was oppressive, demanding, and all-encompassing. Rainbow’s pulse cannon was aimed directly at the doors. Rarity was still standing on her hind hooves, though she had taken to leaning on the elevator wall to keep from tiring herself while still being ready to jump into action. Fluttershy had her wings pressed tightly to her armor, having arranged her swords over them to provide spotty armor. There was no warning. The ding of arrival happened at the same time the doors opened. There was a crew of six mechanics on the other side, waiting for the elevator atop a smooth bronze disc the size of a hoofball field. They froze in surprise when they discovered the elevator had occupants. Only one of the occupants froze – the other two jumped out. Rainbow fired the pulse cannon twice, ejecting a pinkish-purple burst of energy from the device strapped to her hoof. The coursing projectiles each hit a different pony. Upon impact, the attack absorbed into the ponies’ skin, interacting with their nervous system and shocking the entire body into unconsciousness. The ponies flew back from the impact, smacking into their colleagues. Rarity took the opportunity to rush forward, swords high in the air. The mechanics in the back managed to slip their wrenches out quickly enough to catch her blades. She had expected something like this to occur. Using the grip of the wrenches to propel herself forward she kicked the ponies’ skulls as hard as she could manage. Dazed, they were easy targets for the pulse cannon. The remaining two ponies split – one took on Rarity, the other took on Rainbow. Rainbow was expecting an easy victory, which allowed her attacker to jump over her shimmering projectile. The mechanic punched Rainbow across the face, knocking her to the ground. He was a stallion, young, much younger than Rainbow, but with eyes filled with determination. He swapped his wrench out for a screwdriver and aimed it at Rainbow’s neck, careful to use his other hooves to pin her wings. He drove the screwdriver down. Rarity skewered him in the side with enough force that he fell off Rainbow, screaming in agony. Rarity removed the sword as quickly and neatly as she could, but the blood still squirted out onto Rainbow’s stomach. Rarity herself had suffered a cut along her back leg – punishment for ignoring her own attacker for the sake of Rainbow. She didn’t appear to feel it, a fact Rainbow noted with respect. “He needs medical attention,” Rarity said, placing a hoof on the elevator wall. “You should take him.” The only remaining mechanic – a mare with a bloodied knife strapped to her hoof – stared at the downed stallion in shock. “I said he needs medical attention!” Rarity shouted. “He will bleed out if you don’t treat him!” “I… r-right…” The mare scrambled into the elevator shaft, removing some bandages from her kit. She began wrapping him up, though it didn’t completely stop the bleeding. Rainbow stood up and stretched her wing. “Thanks, Rarity. You okay?” “If it gets infected, it will be a problem. Otherwise, I will be fine.” She frowned. “We should move. She will raise the alarm when she takes him in.” “First…” Fluttershy walked up to the mare. “Hey… have you seen the thief recently? We’re looking for her.” The mare stared at her in dumbfounded shock. “If you tell us where she is, you know we’ll be looking for her too. We’ll all be in the same spot, easier to capture.” “S-she was last seen near the Heart of the Mesh…” “Ah.” Fluttershy looked up and out of the elevator. Clank! Clank! Clank! “I think I know where that is.” She turned her attention to the injured stallion. “You will need to apply pressure and change his bandages every hour. Feed him more than the average pony.” “Even if he survives… he’ll walk to a furnace…” “Then it’s your job to ensure he doesn’t.” Fluttershy stood up, turning to her friends. They understood that now it was time to go. They carefully trotted over four unconscious ponies and stepped out onto the bronze disc. “There,” Rainbow pointed, gesturing at a large copper ladder that went up into the Mesh. “We use that.” Her two friends nodded, heading toward their goal. No one looked back at the battle they left behind. ~~~ “Stay here!” Riot shouted to Pinkie at the others, rushing the monstrous bird. She pulled a lance off her back, pressing a button and extending it to four times her own body length. The tip ignited with a green, leafy aura that launched thorny vines at the bird. The attack passed right through the bird’s cosmic feathers while bouncing harmlessly off the smooth obsidian foot. Rage appeared from behind, wielding an immense hammer in his hooves. He brought it down in front of the bird, prompting a fist of solid earth to erupt from the ground and connect with the beast’s jaw. This got the bird’s attention. With a squawk, an invisible pulse hit Rage, throwing him through the window of the town bar. Riot took the opportunity to pull out a rifle brimming with orange magic, aiming right at the bird’s eye. It had apparently encountered guns before, because it knew to get out of the way, allowing the orange laser to pass harmlessly into its starry feathers. More hunters arrived in a matter of seconds, activating any number of complex spells and weaponry, most of which were simply devoured by the monster’s feathers. “Pinkie!” Twilight shouted, forcing her attention away from the monster. Twilight had already created a portal back to the desert, both her and Applejack waiting for her on the other side. “You’re… leaving!?” “We’re leaving!” Twilight shouted. “We aren’t welcome here! Come on!” Pinkie heard a squawk and a scream behind her. “N-no! We can’t leave, they need our help! We’re heroes!” “We are not heroes!” Twilight shouted. “We are ponies, and the gods of this world are going to skewer u-“ “Skewer you!” Pinkie interrupted. “They’re going to skewer you! I… I…” She was having enough difficulty accepting that ‘gods,’ plural, definitely existed in this world, and were apparently like the cantankerous deities of myth… “You just want to protect yourself!” “Yeah, I do! I don’t need to be there! The hunters can handle it for themselves, they’re used to this!” Pinkie glanced behind at the battle unfolding. Already several buildings were flattened. She saw blood, though she couldn’t see who it was coming from. The hunters tried a coordinated attack, but once again the invisible force pushed them away, breaking a few bones. Pinkie shivered. “They… they need help…” “They’ve lived without me f-“ “You’re being selfish!” Pinkie shouted, waving a hoof in anger. “You… you have all this power and you’re not willing to risk anything!? What kind of leader are you!?” “We don’t have time for this! Come on!” “I’m not leaving,” Pinkie said, putting her hoof down. “It’s not right to leave them.” “You can’t do anything!” Pinkie turned her back on Twilight. “And you can.” Pinkie heard Twilight’s “UGH!” and then the pop of a closing portal. She swallowed hard. That was very stupid of me. Shaking, she turned to look at the feathered monster once more. It was laying waste to Musk, and while the hunters were doing an amazing job of moving ponies out of the way, given the blood and screams she’d heard… somepony had probably died in the mess, even if she couldn’t see it. The bird could have eaten them for all she knew. Nopony with a blade was allowed close enough to do anything, the invisible barrier keeping them at bay. Most projectiles could be deflected or were simply allowed to vanish within the starry darkness of the bird’s feathers. Only the guns seemed to be of any effectiveness, and the monster dodged those despite its size, always moving to allow the shot to vanish in the darkness. Pinkie got an idea. She didn’t like the idea. “What is a cosmic beast doing here!?” Riot shouted, launching a massive bomb at the monster. The explosion’s shockwave broke glass in all the nearby buildings that remained standing but did nothing to the intended target. “We’re of no interest to them!” “Our visitor?” Rage suggested, trying to cut through the barrier with a red sparking drill – to no avail. “Was she really that important?!” “It may be so,” Brick called, rushing into the fight himself, brimming with the orange gift of Jupiter. “The gods themselves ejected her, but did not smite her.” He shoved a hoof forward, summoning an ethereal fist. The divine favor pushed toward the bird… and the bird swept it away with a wing. Pinkie gulped. They weren’t having much luck… She forced herself to do something. With a whimper, she pulled a red gun off the wall of Fluttershy’s shop. She stood on her hind legs, using the wall of the shop for support. It wasn’t difficult to arm the weapon – she located the safety, the scope, and the trigger with ease. She put the scope to her eye and pointed right at the beast’s burning eye. Pinkie whispered a prayer, one that no doubt confused the gods of this world, for it was not directed at them. After a barely whispered ‘amen’, she pulled the trigger. The monster wasn’t expecting anything from the pink pony that had such intense fear. A massive explosion erupted from the barrel of the gun whipping Pinkie’s mane back with a heatwave. The knockback would have thrown her to the ground had she not supported herself on the wall. A spherical rock took in the midst of the explosion, fire streaking behind it with a white heat. This gun shoots meteors. Pinkie giggled at how ridiculously over the top that was. The meteor-bullet hit the monster in the eye, exploding in a shower of pink and purple flames. The beast’s eye was no more, burned to nothing because of a pink mare and a meteor-gun. “TAKE THAT!” Pinkie shouted, holding her gun up in victory. With a “SQUAWK!” the bird turned to face her with the other eye Pinkie had forgotten existed. “…Oh.” It flapped. The invisible force hit Pinkie like a car, cracking two of her legs from the impact alone. Everything went blurry as she screamed in pain she couldn’t comprehend. She’d never broken a bone in her life. It was so alien, the jarring, scratching, numbing pain. Her body was unsure what to make of it. Should she go into shock? Lose consciousness? Gain heightened awareness for the sake of survival? Suddenly, all that was gone. All she was aware of was the monster’s beak opening to devour her. Then, purple. “I’m sorry, you’re on a diet. Don’t want you getting diabetes, do we?” “T-twilight?” Pinkie said, confused. “Excuse me, I have to take this.” Pinkie felt an explosion that shook the fabric of reality, twisting her stomach. Immediately afterward, all pain and shock was gone from her body. The world snapped back into focus, for she was healed. She was riding on Twilight’s back, the alicorn’s immense wings flapping to keep the two of them airborne. All the hunters were looking at her in shock. A fair distance in front of them there was an immense smoldering crater. “What did you do to it?” Pinkie asked, jaw hanging open. “Gave it the ol’ Twilight special,” Twilight chuckled. “Of course, it’s not enough…” “It never is.” Twilight twitched at first – but then she smiled. “Yeah, it does seem to go that way, doesn’t it?” The monster rose from the crater, letting out another “SQUAWK” intended to throw Twilight away. Twilight shrugged it off with a yawn and a simple barrier spell. “Hey, birdy, can I call you birdy? I’m calling you birdy.” Twilight smirked. “Invisible barriers just aren’t flashy enough in this day and age. Let me show you how to really make a scene.” With a flap of its immense wings, ‘birdy’ charged Twilight, beak open. “I thought it was smarter than this…” Twilight’s horn shone like a star and her eyes went white. Pinkie watched in awe as several dozen interlocked circles of magic energy appeared in front of Twilight, cycling like a complex machine. The purple glyphs all pointed at one central point, where a sphere of energy was forming. “Right in the kisser,” Twilight predicted, tossing the sphere directly into ‘birdy’s’ gullet. The spell went down its throat easily, traveling deep within. “Have a nice day,” Twilight said, waving. The spell exploded. Pinkie had her doubts a regular explosion of any sort would have done anything to the cosmic beast, but this was no ordinary explosion – whenever its flames touched a part of ‘birdy,’ that part was transformed into more explosion. Twilight’s energy rippled out of the beast’s body, rippling along the edges until every part went up like a roman candle. The eye was the last thing to be consumed. It held no fear. ‘Birdy’ dissipated into nothing long before it reached Twilight and Pinkie, having become nothing more than warm air. “HOLE IN ONE!” Pinkie shouted, raising a hoof in the air. “YEAH!” The entire town of Musk broke into applause and cheers at the spectacular defeat of the monster. Twilight smiled at all of them, waving. Pinkie saw her and Brick lock eyes and nod to each other in understanding. “…Can we leave now?” Twilight asked. “Yeah,” Pinkie said. She wrapped her hooves around Twilight’s neck in what she hoped was a comforting hug. “I’m proud of you.” Twilight let out a contented sigh. “You crazy, crazy mare, you.” She cast the dimensional spell again, returning to the desert. She landed next to Applejack. “You have fun?” Applejack asked, noting the big smiles on their faces. “Yeah,” Pinkie giggled. “I’m also terrified and probably traumatized, but that was fun!” She realized that, somehow, she was still holding the gun. She dropped it into the sand like it was a disease-ridden corpse. Twilight lifted the gun into the air… and tossed it away. “We won’t have to worry about that ever again.” “T-thanks.” ~~~ She watched them. Three ponies – two pegasi and a unicorn, ready for battle. She had been watching them for a while, ever since she had seen them coming. She was relatively sure the unicorn had seen her at one point, but there was no way she suspected anything. These three… they were the key. A desert wanderer who understood much more than the others. An armored warrior who couldn’t fight. And that blue pegasus. That stupid blue pegasus. The thief hated looking at her. She was just… With a shake of her head, the thought was dismissed before it could fully form. She couldn’t afford to hesitate here. She needed to act. She needed them. With a slow, quiet breath, she dropped from her hiding spot. Her landing behind them was timed perfectly with the clank! of the Mesh around this area. It was so loud ponies needed to shout to hear each other here. The source of the sound was visible: an immense piston that rose and fell with a regular rhythm, steam pouring out of it at virtually all angles. The Heart of the Mesh. An important place crawling with ponies. But, unfortunately, it had been a completely useless visit. Which just left these three. “HEY!” she called. “I DON’T WANT ANY TROUBLE!” The unicorn whirled around first, an easy action seeing as she was walking around on her hind hooves. She pointed a sword at the thief and growled as her two companions continued turning. “Neither do we!” “Good.” The thief removed the part of her suit that covered her face, revealing her blue coat and multicolored mane. “I am the Blue Bolt.” The unicorn and the armored pegasus stared at her in shock. The other pegasus… She just grinned. Oh, how that made the Blue Bolt’s blood boil… “Let me guess, your real name is… Rainbow Dash?” “You can shut up right now,” Bolt responded in a voice identical to Rainbow’s. She reached into her suit and took out the dimensional device. “I need you to get this thing to work. I saw you access New Alice City. I need to go home, and you need out of this Mesh.” She narrowed her eyes. “What do you say? Deal?”