Applejack growled in frustration.
She’d been walking for hours, searching the labyrinthine cave tunnels for the…exit? She stopped and looked around. The caves were enormous, paths of softly glowing crystal stretching in all directions.
What was I looking for again? Applejack blinked repeatedly. “Rarity!” she exclaimed. It came back to her. I was looking for my friends. We were separated while getting in here, and-
There was a loud crack, and then the ceiling exploded with shards of crystal. A pale blue, crystalline spider as wide as a barn door fell into the tunnel, its mandibles snapping threateningly. It lashed forward with its forelegs, blades as long as a pony raking the floor where Applejack had stood just moments before.
Applejack recovered from the roll and countered - stomping her front hooves, she caused a pillar of crystal to shoot from the floor beneath the spider’s thorax, and when it spread its legs to regain balance, she shot forward like a bullet, headbutting it with a force that sent it flying through the tunnel, shards of broken blue crystal left in its wake.
“What is this thing?” she whispered under her breath. Is it even alive, or some kind of a construct thingy?
She eyed the monster, waiting for it to get up and attack again - it was still moving, although its movements were jittery and uncoordinated. But before it could finish picking itself up, something caught Applejack’s eye - a niche in the corridor to the right. There was something there at the end of it that was neither stone nor crystal.
A door?
Leaving her enemy behind, she ducked into the narrow passage. The door looked heavy, made of rusted metal, with a wheel in the middle. She grabbed it with her teeth and pulled, turning until she heard the noise of a mechanism moving. With a hiss the door opened inward, disgusting stench venting from the now opened tunnel.
Is it a sewer? thought Applejack, hopping in and pushing the door shut behind her, the skittering of the injured spider’s legs falling silent as it closed.
As a matter of fact, it was. She quickly projected a thin aura of power around her, keeping the stench and filth away from her fur and hooves, and illuminating her way. There was no pathway, forcing her to trudge through the sewage, but luckily there wasn’t that much water. More importantly, the place was beginning to look more and more familiar.
“My friends are there somewhere,” she said to herself. “I just need to find the way up.”
And there it was, another door, much plainer than the last. Pushing the doorknob with a thin strand of power, she uncovered the stairs up. I’m close, she thought as she started climbing. The next door led directly outside the building, into an alley behind two houses. It was afternoon outside, and the air heavy with factory smoke.
I’m here, thought Applejack, pushing the protective barrier off her to leave the stench of the sewers behind. She made sure the overcoat was okay and the scarf around her neck hid Honesty from view, pulled the hat lower over her face to prevent random passers-by from seeing her eyes, and then walked out into the cobbled alley.
Where did I get a coat and a scarf?
There were other ponies there, similarly dressed, stern-faced and busy with themselves, hurrying to get home before… curfew, she realised, as a helpful memory surfaced. I need to hurry if I don’t want to sneak through patrols on my way back.
She took a turn, then another, finding her way through the now familiar streets. There was just one turn left to take before the meeting spot, and…
As she looked up to make sure the path was clear, she caught a reflection of her face in a window pane. Except it wasn’t her reflection. Beneath the orange eyes of Honesty, there was an angular muzzle of a familiar, young stallion.
A sound of broken glass ahead. A fight? There was no time to think. The Element of Honesty dashed through the street, sliding across the cobblestones in a sharp turn. And just as expected, the sounds of a fight came from a familiar house - an armored guardspony had just been thrown out of the second floor window.
Judging by the noise, the fight was still on upstairs. There was no time to waste.
A young, scruffy, blue unicorn ran through the front door, blood dripping from behind his injured ear, and the two almost crashed into each other in the doorway. “Whisper?” he gasped in surprise.
“I’ll cover you, ” said Whisper, igniting his Element under the scarf. “Now run.”
He walked in, and cut off the way of the two soldiers running down the stairs. They started shouting something, but stopped when they saw the light, and recognized just who they were facing - the rapid stop almost made them tumble down instead.
“You can’t win this fight,” he said, slowly, letting the power of Honesty seep into his words. The two soldiers looked at each other, and then bolted towards the back door of the building. Whisper meanwhile charged upstairs, towards the noise of the fight.
He got there in the nick of time. Fan, the pegasus mare he was supposed to meet there, was struggling against two guards. She was caught in ropes that grounded her, but still too mobile for the guards to pin down. The fight had already trashed most of the furniture. A broken window marked the spot where the third guard had been forcibly ejected.
As they saw Whisper enter the apartment, the guards hesitated. He could almost see the calculations running in their heads as the balance of power shifted - they had started the fight with an over two-to-one advantage; now not only were the numbers equal, they were suddenly facing an Element. Even with the magic-numbing fumes from the factories filing the air, this was a fight they couldn’t hope to win.
Fan didn’t do any calculations. She dove straight for the unicorn guardspony, using the distraction to land a vicious kick in the jaw. The blow was hard enough that he let go of the rope. Whisper then dashed at the other guard, ramming him with the force that flattened him against the wall with a loud thud.
“Hurry!” he shouted at the mare, forming a cutting wedge of magic around his hoof to help her get free of the ropes. The guard Fan had kicked wisely pretended to be unconscious, leaving them free to run down the stairs. Before they could get to the ground floor though, there was a sound of more hooves below.
More guards, thought Whisper. He considered running right through them - there was a good chance the soldiers had nothing that could stop him. But before he could charge down, Fan turned her head in the other direction. “There!” she said, pointing her wing at the window at the end of the corridor.
Understanding, Whisper dashed through it, his power protecting him from harm as he flew out in a cloud of wood and broken glass. He hit the ground running and dashed down the street. Fan was close behind him, gliding low. The few civilians who hadn’t disappeared at the first sound of trouble were scampering out of their way into the nearest doorways.
No air support yet, thought Whisper, but if we don’t lose them soon… He wasn’t afraid of guards, a hundred wouldn’t be enough to stop him, but all they needed to do was slow him down. A fight in the middle of the city would soon attract much more dangerous opponents.
Fan overtook him, switching from flight to a gallop without missing a beat. “Follow me!” she shouted, taking a sharp turn into a nearby alley. With the sound of many hooves behind, and no better ideas for what to do, Whisper followed her lead; down an alley, through the back door of a shop, into another street, and into a backyard behind a bar, he followed her through the nooks and crannies of the city, a new door opening each time he thought they’d hit a dead end, the sounds of pursuit slowly dying off in the distance behind them.
They evened their pace, trying to behave naturally, but even though there hours still till the curfew, the nearby streets were almost empty.
“There,” said Fan, indicating another door in the backyard. She pushed it open and descended the stairs into darkness. As Whisper followed suit, flaring his aura to light the path, she pushed past him to lock the door and set an empty can at the top of the stairs as an early warning system.
The inside turned out to be a large cellar, corridors lined with doors leading to small storage rooms where the tenants kept their coal or preserved foods. At the end there was another door and a stair further down, surprisingly leading into something that but for a lack of windows would have been a small apartment. Another door at the end, this one made of metal, provided a second exit, likely into the sewers.
Whisper looked around the room. “Will your friend make it?” he asked.
“Not to here,” replied Fan in a tired voice. “Don’t worry about him, he knows where to go. Let me get some tea,” she said, lighting a small stove.
Whisper slumped at the table. “So… the plan is done for then? If they know about you…”
“Then there is not enough time to investigate where the information leak occurred,” said Fan. “Not only will the Resistance be of no help, but the Elements will have to keep them them in the dark to prevent an ambush. With…" She opened her wings and shifted her pinions one by one, counting… “eight possible suspects, half the network in the city is not safe.”
“And how many of them know about this hideout?” asked Whisper. His ear turned towards the entrance.
“Only three,” replied Fan, “None of whom got caught in the ambush.”
“It might be safer to move right now,” said Whisper. “Regardless of whose fault it was. That reminds me. Are you really Fan?”
The orange gem flashed. The pegasus shuddered. “Yes, I am,” she said, staring back at Whisper.
Whisper snorted. “You know the procedure. I should’ve done it earlier.”
“They wouldn’t be that stupid,” replied Fan. “They know you can do that.”
“And that’s why I need to keep my guard up,” said Whisper. “They’re prepared for me. I can’t rely on it either. They know how to cheat past it. I know I’m starting to get paranoid, but I keep looking for trouble everywhere, and it has kept me alive so far. Like… the guards came to arrest a pegasus. So how come there was no air support?”
Fan frowned. “You don’t know that. We just didn’t see any.”
“If there were any, they were out of position,” replied Whisper. “Everypony knows how Vengeance treats failure nowadays. Her surviving officers aren’t that incompetent.”
He got up, looked towards the stairs up, and then the other way towards the metal door. The sudden movement made his head spin. “What?”
Fan turned to face him. “You can’t leave,” she said. “Nor can I. This… isn’t really a stove.”
Whisper looked past her. The flame was slightly off color, and he suddenly realised that his sense of smell had gotten worse. The mare was standing oddly stiffly, staring at him with an anguished expression. “And now I know that I’m not Fan.”
Whisper was already lighting up, his Element reacting way too slowly for his liking. He could now hear multiple hoofsteps approaching from the cellars above. He charged past not-Fan, hitting the metal door of the emergency exit, and breaking it off its hinges. He expected to fall into the sewer, but something stopped his momentum. The broken plate of metal slowly fell to the side, revealing the obstacle that had stopped it, a large black stallion with a short mane, dressed in a long coat. “Hi,” he said with a grin, kicking the door with a force that send Whisper flying back into the hideout. Hate, he realised as he hit the opposite wall, so hard that he fractured the stone around him. Whisper’s barriers failed from the immense force of the impact. As he groaned and tried to scramble to his feet, he saw the hooves of not-Fan rear over his head.
***
Twilight Sparkle circled over the wasteland. The fortress below was barely recognizable. Vengeance had fulfilled her promise - the Empire was no more. Swept away by city-swallowing explosions or worn away by rains of poison, everything south of the mountains was just an endless expanse of dull brown where nothing would grow for many generations.
And there in the middle of it all stood the compound, like a dark, rectangular scab on a diseased hide. The cemetery outside the wall had disappeared. So had all the trees surrounding the hill. The only sign of life that remained was the tangle of thorny vines covering the inner structures of the fortress - no doubt some new creation of Eve, engineered to survive in the hellscape of their creation.
The Element of Magic circled downward, incinerating the vines with a thought before they could do any harm; they tried to absorb the magic and turn it against the intruder, but their power turned out pitifully inadequate. Verba folded his wings and looked around, stretching his magical senses. No other traps activated, mundane or otherwise. No other guards showed up. The facility where all of them had met so many years before, where they trained together to become the foci users and then lived after becoming the Elements and the Shattered, was now an empty shell, with less life to it than even an actual tomb.
And yet this is where you're keeping them, isn’t it? thought Verba. He walked towards the main entrance, his senses stretched out in search of traps, especially ones meant to trap or redirect his power. He felt something; it was too weak to trap him, but he chose to go around it just in case, opening his own passage through reinforced concrete. Then he finally found what he was looking for. Some of the machinery was still working, down in the bunker below. It seems the gamble has paid off, he thought. There are few places left that are both suitable and screened enough to hide them.
Cautiously he started descending deeper and deeper, through dark tunnels and abandoned labs. Now let’s hope the rest of the gamble pays off too. If Diamond Dust and the new Elements can make it, there will only be Eve left for us to find - unless I’m ridiculously lucky, and catch her here.
Finally he reached the lowest level, extinguishing the light of his horn as he saw the lights were on in one of the rooms. And as expected, there was a line of heavy cylinders there. He could feel the pony shapes floating in the liquid behind thick glass and metal shells, bodies improved by Eve’s pattern powers, ready to be inhabited the next time one of the Shattered reasserted themself.
And now we wait.
***
The hive was filled with a buzz of hundreds of wings. Even from the tunnel she was walking, Rarity could feel the crowd ahead, united in their feelings: anticipation. It had probably been decades since any of them had seen Queen Protea fight. Even the elite warriors escorting her felt the same as their brothers, much as they tried to remain calm.
What am I doing here?
As her head cleared, memories clicked into place. She had followed Whisper when he went to get the sealing gems from the Resistance, making sure he wasn’t tailed. Instead she overheard him being contacted by the enemy - and found that he wasn’t Whisper anymore but a meat puppet pretending to be him, with Deception pulling the strings. She couldn’t retreat before an ambush was sprung on her - apparently it all had been planned. It wouldn’t be the Elements taking down Vengeance once and for all. Her friends were walking straight into a trap, and she wouldn’t be there to warn them.
And now she was here, captured by the changelings after she managed to collapse the Resistance hideout, taking out most of her enemies. The shapeshifters found her unconscious in the storm drain below the hideout, stripped her of her Element, but did not kill her - as they discovered her true nature, a pony-changeling hybrid, they decided to bring her in front of their queen instead.
Once again Crystal felt some doubts about her plan; appealing to the queen’s ego had saved her from immediate execution, but now she would be facing her in the very heart of the swarm. She took a deep breath, calming her body and shielding her mind. She couldn’t let the enemy feel her fear.
The tunnel ended in a huge cavern, a nexus connecting dozens of underground paths, dimly illuminated with large, glowing crystals growing from the ceiling.
Have I been here before?
It was full of changelings, black carapaces taking all the walls and the ceiling, every surface except for the arena in the middle of the floor, a round platform about 40 feet in diameter surrounded by a ring of crystal spikes. The crowd parted at Crystal’s approach. She walked straight forward, hopping onto the platform, putting her acting experience into looking confident.
As soon as her hooves touched the arena, green fire and smoke erupted in front of her. From out of the cloud, queen Protea emerged. The air in the arena filled with the scorn she radiated. The buzzing of wings increased in volume. The queen spoke to one of the guards, not even looking at Crystal. The question was asked in the language of changelings, a string of hisses and clicks.
“Has the half-changeling recovered sufficiently to fight?”
The guard bowed. “Yes, your Majesty, much faster than we had anticipated.”
There was a tiniest hint of doubt in the queen’s reaction at the words, one that Crystal was sure no-one but her felt. Protea stepped back from the centre of the platform. “Then, let us begin. It is time for you to see the difference between a true changeling and a vat-grown fake.”
The guards around the arena lit up their horns, channeling magic into the crystal spikes, which started glowing green. Crystal took a few steps forward, eyes already focused on her opponent. “Any rules? From what I see, no weapons or armor allowed.”
Protea sneered. “A changeling is the weapon. There is only one rule. The duel lasts until the winner emerges and the loser dies.”
The crystals finished charging, and a green dome of protective force sprung up around the arena, shielding the audience from what was about to happen. Protea didn’t wait for any other signal, her horn shooting forth a snaking stream of green flame.
Crystal conjured a force shield in front of her, letting the fire wash harmlessly over it. Before it was finished, she focused another spell, her own green magic conjuring a trio of javelins in the air, sending them at the queen. The changeling didn’t even try to deflect them, instead ducking under the salvo, her horn lighting up for a powerful beam. Sparks flew as the attack collided with Crystal’s shield, the two warriors struggling to sustain their spells until finally the attack slid off the barrier, hitting the protective force dome.
Crystal couldn’t sense any doubt or hesitation from the queen now – her mind radiated nothing but pure killing intent. Trying to take initiative, she pumped extra force into her horn, sending her energy shield forward like a battering ram towards the queen. Protea’s horn lit up, cutting it clean in half.
The queen launched another projectile, this time a ball of energy. Crystal was about to deflect it when the ball exploded in the air, flooding the arena with blinding light.
As she was temporarily blinded and her instincts told Crystal to pull up a shield and prepare for the inevitable blow, experience told her otherwise. Her enemy would be counting on her doing that. Crystal heard approaching hooves, caught a flash of an energy shield coming up. The steps suddenly became heavier.
Crystal transformed, her limbs stretching and slimming into those of a leopard. She jumped up with all her legs, launching her new feline body into the air and out of the way. Just in time, as a buffalo wreathed in a changeling ramming shield charged right through the spot she had just stood in, slamming into the energy wall behind it with a force that made the guardians outside shudder. The initial stage of testing each other was officially over.
Shaking off the last of the flowing spots from her eyes, Crystal shifted forms again, growing into a tiger to pounce at her adversary. The queen had already shed her oversized form and was back to her changeling body. She still couldn’t turn fully in time to shoot Crystal, but as the claws descended onto her wings, she disappeared in a flash of magic, reappearing on the other side of the arena. Seeing her charge up a spell, Crystal dropped the transformation to regain access to her horn – she activated her own teleport just as a cage of energy beams descended onto a spot she was taking.
“You’ll have to try harder than that,” she said, smiling at her opponent. With the next spell her form blurred, splitting into three identical unicorns. They separated, trying to surround the queen. Protea stepped back, a flash of green flame changing her into a giant scorpion.
What is she planning? That form isn’t very fast, and she can’t cast her spells like this. With my mind shielded she can’t feel my emotions...
Protea suddenly shifted forms again, assuming her natural changeling guise. Whatever she had wanted in her scorpion form, she had already got it. The changeling charged a blast at the nearest Crystal, but then turned at the last moment, firing it at a different one. The real one. Crystal activated her shield a split second too late; she prevented a direct hit, but the explosion sent her rolling backwards. She stopped and forced her voice to sound amused.
“Interesting. How did you find out?”
Protea shot her a predatory grin. “I felt the air. Your illusions are hollow...” Her words were interrupted by a surprised gasp as the unicorn she had pretended to aim at earlier slammed into her side.
And charged with a tactile telekinesis spell that allows them to touch things. You weren’t expecting this, were you?
For the first time Crystal’s smile was genuine. The horn of the illusion managed to crack Protea’s carapace. The first real injury of the battle. Just as she was about to follow up with an attack of her own, the queen struck back, dispelling the illusion and then... disappeared.
Crystal’s eyes narrowed. She wouldn’t teleport out of the arena. She must be invisible. She must be shielding her mind too, I can’t feel her emotions anymore. And with all that noise...
Her other doppleganger disappeared, ran through by an invisible attacker. Crystal shot a spell in that direction, but missed. With the sight, hearing and empathy useless...
I could feel the air.
In a flash of green flame, Crystal transformed herself into a giant scorpion. She instantly understood what the queen had meant. The first strange feeling was an all-round vision. The cluster of eyes on top of her head gazed in all directions simultaneously, except for a blind spot created by her own tail. Much more important though were the hairs extending from her shell. She could feel the air moving around her, as if touching everything around her at the same time. She felt where the queen was. She also felt her taking a breath, a bulge growing in her throat. She reverted back to unicorn form, but not quite quickly enough.
Protea reappeared, the glow of her horn focusing on her own snout. She had a mouth full of changeling resin and now spat it out, spraying it forward between her sharp teeth, strands of sticky substance stretching under control of her magic, connecting in the air to form a web. It fell on Crystal and stuck to her, and a moment later a wave of crackling energy flowed through it, nearly bringing the unicorn to her knees. The queen pulled with her mouth, forcing Crystal to brace with all her legs to maintain balance. The tug of war continued for several seconds, all the while new waves of pain washing over Crystal. She could see wisps of smoke rising from her fur. If not for her changeling powers letting her stick to the floor, she would have fallen down and be left defenseless. The queen had spread her wings, and was now pulling with them too, her horn glowing brighter and brighter.
***
“You think this can stop me?” said Vengeance coldly.
“Not for long, but it can,” replied Sauti. “You will not hurt another pony.”
Rainbow Dash got up with a grunt. Her first instinct was to charge into battle, but the power emanating from Kindness stopped her too - it was not within her power to interfere with the two mares. “Aquila?” she called weakly.
Aquila righted herself, eyes squinted shut, no longer glowing white. It was obvious she was not okay, but she still managed to point her horn at Vengeance - standing the furthest away, she could act, at least to an extent.
“Oh, you are mistaken, mule,” said Vengeance. “I can’t escape you, but hurt you? For all your power, you’re holding me down. Your Kindness is imperfect and so is your protection. I can strike back against you.”
Sauti just held tighter. “I know.”
Rainbow Dash saw nothing, but her magical senses screamed in warning about the buildup of pattern. Something was radiating from Vengeance, suffusing both mares.
“Sauti!” she shouted.
Something small and black flew at Vengeance, embedding itself in her chest plate. Aquila finished her spell, and everything was bathed in blinding light.
“Murderers get no protection at all,” said Aquila.
The black diamond seemed to grow, or rather, the space around it seemed to fold in fractals. Vengeance hissed in anger as her body shrunk, slipping out of Sauti’s grasp, before collapsing upon itself and disappearing. As the light faded, the gemstone fell among the rubble, sparks of red now dancing underneath its surface as its magic strained to contain the foreign energies.
Sauti stood still for a while, as if surprised that it was all over, before falling forward. Aquila’s magic caught her before her face could hit the floor, lifting her suddenly limp body into the air and bringing her to the unicorn’s side.
The Element of Loyalty flew to join them. Aquila’s eyes were still closed. She was covered in cuts and bruises the Elements magic had had no time to heal. However, Sauti looked much worse; despite few visible injuries she was clearly in pain, her breathing quickly becoming shallow.
“Sauti?” asked Auila, another spell growing at the tip of her horn.
The blind mare smiled sadly. “Too late for that… I’m afraid she knows her tricks well… I can tell, I’m already dead inside. Better use it on yourself. You can still be healed.”
Aurora looked at her, absorbing the statement, a death sentence her friend had pronounced upon herself. There was no changing the truth of that…
Truth!
“Whisper!” shouted Aurora in sudden horror. Moments before all of her energy had been devoted to winning the fight, keeping herself and her friends alive. Now with the adrenaline levels falling, her stomach clenching from the sudden surge of stress it had undergone, she was beginning to once again think clearly.
He disappeared after the first blast. Was he buried under rubble? But we blew up the next floor or two when we fought! Where is he?! Is he…
Her thoughts becoming more frantic by the second, Aurora rushed around the ruined tower top, scouring the rubble for any signs of life or magic. She caught one signal, and rushed towards it, her throat clenching when she recognized Laughter. Tossing the amulet aside, she kept looking. There was nothing more there.
“WHISPER!”
“Aurora?”
The voice called from behind her. It sounded out of breath, but definitely alive. Whisper crawled from from among the rubble and stood, taking in the scene, a weak current of magic pushing the dust out of his coat.
“She dropped me down the shaft,” he managed, his eyes widening as he comprehended the situation. “Had to climb back up. I’m… too late.” He stared into her eyes. “Is it over? Did we get her?”
“Yes,” managed Aurora before galloping at him. She almost collided with the stallion, their amulets clanking together as she grabbed him in a desperate hug. “She got Jingles… and Sauti…” She felt suddenly torn between the comfort of his hug, and her friend breathing her final breaths behind her.
“We… need to get out of here,” she whispered.
Something stung her in the shoulder.
***
Fluttershy hugged the edge of the cloud and cautiously looked around. She was still a fair distance from her quarry, but she knew her camouflage was imperfect - the white paint on her helmet was just the right hue to match the cloud, but the chalky white dust hastily applied to her coat could only do so much, especially once it got damp. As far as staying hidden went, positioning was still the key factor.
The enemy hadn’t taken nearly as much effort to stay in stealth, it seemed. She could clearly see the griffons, brown and grey specks in the distance. Tasked with coordinating air support for the ground troops below, they just stayed on top of their cloud, mostly concerned with observers on the ground. With the amount of troops they had nearby, they felt secure in their air superiority.
And rightly so, she thought. Ducking back into cover and looking around, she could only see two dozen pegasi hiding on the cloud with her, all lightly armored and covered in dull white. An elite unit, but one that just didn’t have the numbers to do the job. That’s why she was there. It will be up to us two to make the difference, she thought, looking down at her chest, where the pink gem of Kindness hung in an elaborate gorget. She swallowed loudly. She knew she could count on it. The doctor said she had astounding compatibility. That’s why they kept her in the project despite all of her -
A familiar wing fell comfortingly across her withers. Ruddy feathers that the camouflage could barely do anything about. She turned her head and looked up at a familiar, fanged mouth stretched into a reassuring grin.
“We’ll do it together, Gentle,” said Lightbringer. “We’ve trained long for this.”
And despite herself, Gentle Touch was not afraid anymore. As Lightbringer moved aside and stretched his wings, preparing for a long dive, she clasped her front hooves in front of her gem, preparing a sleep spell. War is a horrible thing, she thought, Let us make it less painful at least.
And then the fight started, and Lightbringer was a streak of orange light, matching the color of the burning horseshoe on his cutie mark, the others flying behind him in a wedge towards the surprised griffons. With her spell already charged up tingling between the frogs of her hooves, she was ready. She did not freeze up as she had so many times during the training sessions. Her spell overtook the charging unit, hitting the enemies just as they bunched up into a hastily formed wall of spears. As Gentle Touch glided down to join her companions, she could see that it didn’t spare them the violence as she had secretly hoped - it did however spare them the pain and fear.
She landed on the cloud, but the fight was already dying out: with the final impact of Lightbringer striking down the enemy commander, silence fell. It didn’t even take twenty seconds.
“Search the bodies!” barked the lieutenant, getting back to his usual role as the two last moment additions to his unit had done their job. “We need to be out of here before they retaliate!”
And so Gentle Touch looked around, scanning her surroundings for anything out of the ordinary. She could see Lightbringer grab the griffon leader’s body. The others were already sinking through the cloud stuff, and would soon rain upon the entrenched positions below. Time was of the essence.
Then she looked over the edge of the cloud, and her eye caught something - a slain griffon sprawled on the cloud just below theirs. He was unarmored, some kind of adjutant or a messenger. On his bloodied chest there was a small, rectangular bag, attached with a harness that kept the wings free to move.
As Gentle Touch descended to examine the bag, she noticed that the body wasn’t sinking like the others. He’s still alive, she realised. She leaned closer and examined the griffon. He was very young, as young as she was, and clearly still breathing; the hoof blade that would’ve ended his life had got tangled in the straps of his harness, ripping them, but stopping short of a lethal blow, even though the blood loss would stoon render the point moot.
Gentle Touch pulled at the bag to open it and saw some papers inside. But before she could pull them free with her teeth, the feeling of a life going out right in front of her made something inside her throb painfully. The focus on her chest grew warm in resonance with her feelings, and in a second she knew what she had to do.
“We have a captive!” she called out loud, pressing her hoof to the griffin’s chest, a small spark of magic arcing from it to seal the wound.
There was a movement on the cloud above her, and the lieutenant’s face looked down on her. “We can’t afford that now, not with -”
He was probably going to say something about the need to hurry, or the military secret that her presence was. Instead his mouth opened in a warning shout. Gentle Touch felt the body buckle underneath her, and the half-bird’s eyes shot open wide with pain and panic. He didn’t have a breath enough to scream, but swung his talons wildly towards her throat, just above the metal of the gorget. The fair coat was splattered with dots of red.
***
“He’s there!”
Pinkie Pie didn’t need to hear the soldier announce the obvious. She could clearly see the explosion in the distance, where an airship’s power core detonated, seemingly without a reason. The surrounding imperials all looked at her, and she briefly saw the twisted reflection of her face in a soldier’s polished face plate: chalk-white fur and a muzzle with prominent fangs poking onto her lower lip even when she wasn’t smiling, like just now.
Wait... is this really me?
“You know the plan!” she shouted at the surrounding pegasi. ”We need him alive this time! Otherwise we’re back at square one!” She checked under her wing for her small holster of needles, coated with magical sedative. “I’ll slow him down,” she said grinning, but there wasn’t the usual stubborn cheer behind it. She stepped off the deck of the ship and Laughter lit up like a beacon. She flashed in and out of existence, launching herself forward in a sequence of quick teleport-hops, her supernatural senses scanning her surroundings.
There you are, she thought, as she caught the anomaly moving, the absence of background magic a hundred meters to her right. They reached the next ship almost simultaneously. As his power penetrated the protective barriers, displacing essential elements of the engine, she landed on the deck and stomped her hooves, sending her own magic through the hull. It bulged, but did not turn into a fireball - instead confetti and streamers shot out of the gun hatches, the whole ship descending rapidly, softening and deflating, turning what would’ve been a fiery death for the whole crew into a semi-controlled crash.
The white pegasus was already on the move again, guided unerringly by her instincts. “Stop!” she yelled mid-teleport, bucking at empty air. She could feel she grazed against somepony who existed there for only a split second, and turned in the air, following the line of the impact just in time to see an unfamiliar black pegasus materialize into view. Then their gazes met, and in an instant she had no doubts who she was looking at. Enigma. So this is him now? she thought. He’s… wearing this pony?
Enigma stopped, standing in the air, wings spread out only out of habit. “Surprise,” he said, glaring.
“Enigma… stop that!” she said in response. She didn’t take her eyes off him, but she could feel the ships moving around them, her own pegasi squad slowly catching up to her under the cover of clouds. Enigma moved, but she was ready, keeping her distance with him, while spreading her power towards him, doing her best to prevent him from affecting his surroundings.
“It’s Guilt now,” he corrected her. “Enigma was murdered. Or did you miss that?”
A magic beam from a nearby ship swiped dangerously close to them both, some panicked crew member ignoring the mission orders. Enigma went after the ship in an instant, and it was all Surprise could do to transform the ship’s ammo compartment into a backstage powder room, denying him bombs to detonate. Instead, he grabbed the mirrors she conjured; as they appeared on the bridge, she wasn’t quick enough. She managed to push the captain and his helmsmare out of the way, twisting them into awkward positions at the heavy shards of broken glass fell past them, but the other two crew members were not so fortunate - the walls of the small room were sprayed with red.
She launched one of her needles with a swipe of her wing, guiding it through the chaos, its magic too focused for Enigma to displace it. He brought a thick plank from the hull’s outer layer to take the shot for him.
“Stop it!” she shouted again. “You’re not like that!”
They emerged from the ship and into a nearby cloud, Enigma’s fur dusty and stained with red, as he no longer bothered with shifting his body neatly. “I’m not like that?” he said. “The world says that I am. The Empire says that I am. I’ve already been killed for it. Who are you and me to decide otherwise?”
Surprise grabbed the corner of her vision with her teeth, and pulled. The scenery changed, the cloud becoming a speaker’s pulpit, keeping Enigma in the limelight, if only for a moment.
“We’re both powerful ponies,” she said. “Strong enough to change the world! We already know the coup wasn’t your doing!”
“And what difference does it make now?!” sneered Enigma, a twisted reflection of a smile that didn’t even try to pretend at humor. “I made my choice years ago, made my mistake, and became a monster.”
“You fought for a better tomorrow,” said Surprise, landing on the cloud in front of the podium, “same as I.”
“But there is no better tomorrow, is there?” replied Enigma. “No matter how much blood we get on our hooves, it hasn’t changed. it’ll never change. It’s always just ponies killing ponies."
Surprise felt her face become hot. “That’s not a reason to kill senselessly!” She swiped her wing around, indicating the crippled air fleet. She could not see her team, but she could feel they were in the clouds, cloaked by her distraction, ready to strike if her plan to talk Enigma down didn’t work, which seemed more and more likely by the second.
“Senselessly?” Enigma followed her gesture. “This whole army has been sent to stop me! How is it any more senseless than the hundreds of ponies I killed before? You didn’t have a problem with that, did you?”
Surprise forced herself to meet his gaze. She could feel the shape of the pulpit blur a little, as the spell waned in potency. “That’s not the same,” she said, “and you know it.”
“How is that not the same, Surprise?” asked Enigma. “All the ponies I killed before had their lives, their hopes and dreams. Their families. The buffalos that Gloria poisoned, the zebras starved by Eve’s creations; all the enemies of the Empire that you and your friends burned? How was that any different from today!?”
I don’t burn ponies, was what she wanted to say. Instead, her jaw clenched, as a memory came unbidden, the first time she saw what the parasprites had done to the zebra lands on the southern front, a wasteland stretching as far as the eye could see; the night when the wasteland retaliated in a deafening roar of hungry spirits, brought together by a mad zebra shaman in a last ditch attempt at revenge.
She could feel Laughter blink before she could see it. The limelight went out, and the pulpit disintegrated, Enigma reacted before she could as much as draw breath, disappearing in the clouds. She rushed after him, but even as she did, he knew she wouldn’t be quick enough. Eight needles flew, but none found their target. Eight ponies died, in half as many heartbeats.
“Stop!” she screamed, kicking forwards blindly. She felt it connect, and something cracked, but there was barely any magic behind her blow. She saw Enigma standing in the air in front of her. His face was weirdly scrunched, and blood was dripping from one of his nostrils, but when he spoke, his powers made his voice completely clear.
“Not much to laugh at, is there?” he asked. “Or perhaps you can’t see the irony? You can’t save anypony anymore, just like I couldn’t.”
He disappeared, and Surprise was too slow to follow. Another ship blew up, right in her face. It brought the number of active generators below what was needed to form a power net around them, turning what had been a backup plan in progress into a flock of defenseless targets. But the white pegasus couldn’t process that thought, as she tried and failed to chase what used to be her friend. He no longer moved, but kept shifting, standing in front of her, just out of reach no matter how fast she moved, lives ending abruptly all around them.
“The colts I wanted to save when I joined the plan? All dead by now, conscripted and killed in the line of duty. I killed and killed and killed, but I couldn’t save any of them, not a single one.”
Surprise spread her wings wide. “These are ponies too!”
“But now I’m a monster,” said Enigma. “The Emperor was very clear about it when he had me poisoned. I died surrounded by his soldiers, at my own table.”
“He was…” started Surprise, but the next explosion knocked the breath out of her. Her light was fading. Her spells were no longer up to the task of keeping her out of harm’s way.
Enigma did not relent. “Can you imagine Lightbringer’s face, when that was his reward for his zeal? Can you imagine Absinthe’s?”
She fired ribbons of blue magic to tie him up, but his aura made them dissolve before they could touch him.
“But that’s not all,” he continued. “Gloria would’ve felt the poison, and Eve was with her. So instead they were ordered urgently back to the capital. The portal was warped, and Gloria arrived home in bloody chunks. Eve felt something was wrong, but she was no fighter like us, so they just swarmed her, stabbing her until they got all of her hearts.”
A flying piece of wood nicked one of Surprise’s wings, taking her off balance. She missed her mark and crashed face-first into a small cloud bank. She emerged, trying to reignite her magic, but the light of Laughter was barely a flicker now.
“And then there was Libra, the most devoted of them all. She had no weaknesses, except for what was left of her emotions.”
“Prince Severus... told us,” stammered Surprise. “They used her mother as bait.”
“I see they spared you the details then,” said Enigma. ‘How merciful of them.”
He appeared in the air above Surprise and slowly dropped lower before her. “They used her as the executioner. They knew she alone could catch her off guard, so they went to the old general’s widow, and told her that her only child was a traitor to the Empire. And it worked like a charm. Libra hesitated and died, and the last thing she got to see was her mother turning the blade against her own throat.”
The light went out, Laughter turning into a dead weight around Surprise’s neck. She just stood there on the cloud, staring forward, unable even to tell if the smudges in the soot on her face were from tears or from the cloud she had flown into. “Please, stop…” she whimpered.
Enigma snorted, blowing out a few droplets of blood from his nostril. “That’s all there is to it. Everypony’s lost. Vengeance has said we’re putting an end to this sad farce, and if the only thing left for me is one last choice, I choose to stay with the only friends I have left.”
Surprise stared into his eyes one last time. “Wasn’t I… your friend too?”
His expression softened, but only for a moment. “You… I can put out of your misery at least.”
He stared at her head as if looking straight through it. She had just enough time to understand what was going to happen before she registered a tiny droplet of red appear in the air in front of her.
***
Hours passed, and nothing happened.
That alone was not a surprise. The Shattered needed time to return. The stronger the magic that killed them, the more time they needed. And if everything went according to plan, none but Libra would’ve had the time to leave their bodies before being trapped.
Eve isn’t here either, Verba pondered, but that’s logical. With her shapeshifting, she’s their backup plan if everything goes wrong. And with all this being automatic, she doesn’t need to be here.
But the thought didn't calm him down.
What if I’m wrong? What if there is another hiding place I didn’t think of? What if I wasn’t through enough? I won’t know until she comes back.
Verba’s imagination responded with an instant image - a blinding flash, and a giant mushroom cloud of flame where Diamond Dust and Concilio had brought the refugees. The thought made him swallow loudly, the saliva bitter in his mouth.
It has been bitter for a while now.
Touched by a sudden realisation, Verba sprang to his hooves. The sudden motion made his head spin, and his stomach turn, almost making him fall, as he stumbled towards the nearest container and ripped open the outer shell of metal. The body was there, behind thick glass, definitely real and alive, but…
Now, without the screening, he could clearly feel it. He isn’t modified. He’s not prepared to be a host. He’s just here as bait. They all are.
Verba turned towards the exit, and his head protested the sudden movement. Panicking, he scanned the room again, and this time caught a detail he’d missed the first time. There was something else there, not alive, but organic. With a pull of his power, he ripped the container out of its mounting, and set it aside. Behind it there was a tiny thing in a dusty corner, as if waiting there to confirm his suspicion; a freshly dead cockroach.
The bitter taste in his mouth became a painful heartburn.