//------------------------------// // Chapter 30: Rounding out the Week - Part 2 // Story: Fillies and Monsters // by Solaris Vult //------------------------------// Monday. Celestia woke in the morning, stunned by what she saw in her chambers… A pile of scrolls, no doubt delivered by Twilight, most were accompanied by different items or photos, including a pile of mechanical parts that looked vaguely like an abyssinian, and a mound of large books…  Celestia pulled herself out of bed and set to work on the scrolls… Luckily they were numbered. She had bearly begun on the first scroll when Luna came barging in, “Sister! When I returned from the dream realm this morning, I found myself buried in scrolls!” “Yes, according to this Twilight has convinced Discord to send her to this alien world we were discussing…” “Really?” Luna noticed the scrolls piled around her sister’s room, including the numerous photos and trinkets, and the mechanical diamond dog skeleton in the corner. “Yes…” Celestia sighed, “Bring the ones Twilight has sent you, and we’ll go over them together, it might be a good idea to contact Cadance…” “Of course…” With that, Luna left for her scrolls while Celestia raised the sun. When she returned, the two read through the first scroll together, documenting how Twilight had landed on this alien world and where they were. The photos showed a snowy tundra in the middle of the night, not a single piece of vegetation in sight, it reminded the two of the Crystal Empire. Celestia’s eyebrows raised at the sight of a cloud city without any clouds supporting it, the landmass was truly massive and tethered to the ground by large cables… Celestia wondered about what Canterlot would be like if it could fly. The monsters that assaulted her student and her friends looked equally alien as everything else, but the pictures of the mares as these alien creatures were fascinating. Both princesses were disappointed to hear that their first interaction with these aliens was a fight with their guards, but luckily there were only two living among them, the rest were some kind of alien automaton, one that Celestia realized was now sitting, dead, in the corner of the room. “Luna, please send that… Thing, to the Canterlot Institute of Engineering…” Luna nodded and teleported the device and an attached letter before returning to scroll reading. They were impressed by the city, Mantle, it was apparently called, but were a bit perturbed by how rude the aliens were to their ponies… It was clear that these creatures wouldn’t be as welcoming as a fellow pony empire, and should instead be treated like an empire of dragons or griffons… The clinic the ponies found themselves in was equally fascinating as everything else, but the thing that really attracted the ponies eyes was the picture of this Laywind Whitemane and her mechanical arm, that was infinitely more advanced than any prosthetic currently available to ponykind, the thing functioned like a flesh and blood arm according to Twilight’s discoveries. Luna cringed a bit at the pictures of the shattered moon, “If I ever figure out what kind of villain did this!” Luna began to shout, but Celestia calmed her sister down. “Whenever we get a chance to travel to this alien world, you have my full permission to attempt to fix the damage to this world’s moon… Come, there’s much to do today.” Gathered around the table were a dozen of the most important ponies in all of Equestria… The three princesses and the prince of the Crystal Empire, Celestia, Luna, Cadenza, and Shining Armour… Next to Shining was the captain of the Crystal Empire’s royal guard, one Flash Sentry, and the new captain of the Equestrian royal guard, one Silver Sable. There was the trio of scientists that ran the three largest schools of science in Equestria, the Royal Canterlot Institute of Magical Biology, the Canterlot Institute of Engineering, and the Equestrian Royal Institute of Physics and Thaumaturgy… One Doctor Rick, Professor Wolfram, and Academician Valence. Prince Blueblood, royal ambassador of Equestria was sitting on the other side of the table, followed by Fleur-De-Lis, keeper of the treasury, and her husband Fancy Pants. The dragon lord was unable to make it, but sent his daughter, one Princess Ember, in his place, next to her was also Queen Gwendolyn the eighth of Griffonstone, a name that made Celestia uncomfortable, but not due to this particularly Gwendolyn’s actions, but rather the actions of her distant predecessor. Grand Sorceress Catrina of Abyssinia was standing in for the king and queen, and finally, both King Aspen and Kaiser Erebus had both managed to make it in person, the deer and zebra sitting next to one another. “I’m glad most of you could make it today,” Celestia began… She was wearing her most resplendent and, admittedly, gaudy dress, to emphasize the importance of this meeting. The magic weaved into it made it glow and flow like her own mane, and the golden circlets around her head and neck glowed like molten metal, resembling a halo. She didn’t really like the dress, as it only fed the cults who worshipped her like a deity, but it was certainly intimidating. “I don’t see what could possibly be so important to drag me out to this pony place!” Princess Ember began, “Umm…” She blushed in embracement as a look of fear crossed her face, “Forgive me, Princess…” “Mind your tongue, dragon, you are in the presence of the most powerful creatures in this world and their representatives… Not since the days of the Great Crystal War, and the Lunar Insurrection, have we all been gathered together in this place at once…” King Aspen said, “It is a shame though that empress of the kirin could not attend…” Celestia rolled her eyes, today was going to be a long day… “Listen… As some of you may have heard, there was an incident involving Discord…” That got the room’s attention. “What has the serpent-king done this time,” Catrina said. “Sent several ponies, most of whom were fillies, to an alien world…” A silence fell over the room, many of the creatures present bearing stunned looks, “A-Another world? You mean another realm, such as the realm of dreams!” The Academician began. “Or perhaps the realm on the other side of the Mirror-Gate, the one Princess Twilight had visited?” “No…” Luna said, “Not another universe, another planet, one in our very own galaxy…” “Intriguing…” Professor Wolfram replied. “That’s insane! My sorcerers have gazed at all the planets in our solar system, not one possesses an environment conducive to life, those ponies would have surely died!” Catrina said. “As I said…” Luna continued, “Not in our solar system, another planet in some completely different region of space… Surely you’re aware of the theories that there could be other planets orbiting distant stars?” “It seems those theories have been proven,” Aspen said. “Is there any way to create a portal to this other planet?” “Perhaps we could try to copy or reprogram the Mirror-Gate?” Academician Valence said. “Perhaps, but before we figure out how to travel to this universe, I believe we should share some of the information we have on this other planet… My own student, the Princess of Friendship, has travelled to this realm and taken ample documentation thus far…” “Does this have anything to do with the mechanical abomination you teleported into my office this morning? Or those strange weapon designs you sent to our institute a few days ago?” Wolfram said. Rick was simply looking smug, he had already been informed of this other world when he was given the samples of the wolf-creature, not much information had been gleaned from their studies, but they had yet to test exposure to the magical remains of King Sombra. “Yes,” Luna said, “That… Device… Was a kind of automaton, apparently used as guards by the inhabitants of this alien world…” “W-Wait?” Rick said, “You’re tellin’ me that this world has creatures living on it, smart creatures not home to Equus…” “Interesting,” King Aspen said. The Kaiser of the zebras had been silent this entire time, but he was clearly just as shocked as everyone else, “T-The star-kin? They’re real?” “No,” Luna said, “I do not believe these creatures to be the mythical Star-Kin, we have photos of the inhabitants of this world… Apparently called Remnant by their inhabitants…” “Show me!” The zebra said. With that, Luna retrieved a projector, and began showing the photos from the alien world, starting with the picture of the ponies-turned-faunus… “Discord was kind enough to transform our ponies into the natives of this planet, creatures known as Faunus, they still bear some of their pony parts, but here you can see their basic body shapes.” “They look a lot like my kind… Fascinating, a planet of bipeds…” Catrina said. “They don’t appear to bear any fur, how do they survive the cold, the planet looks rather frozen…” Aspen said. The next slide showed the shattered moon, and that drew the attention of everyone, exclamations and swearing filled the room as everyone stared, horrified, at the broken moon, even Luna, who had already seen the image. Then the image of the floating city was brought up. “A flying city, I thought only pegasi could create such structures?” Gwendolyn said. “No clouds?” Flash Sentry said, “How’s that possible?” “It’s… Massive…” Ember said. “Imagine the wealth these creatures possess…” Fancy Pants continued. Then there came the pictures from inside the city of Mantle, and everyone was mostly enthralled by the technology shown, particularly when Celestia explained what Twilight had told her in the letters, everyone imagining what such devices would do for their kingdoms, Catrina seemed less than impressed with the ponyless carriages, explaining how Abyssinia had steam-powered carriages already, but on the other side, Flash Sentry and Gwendolyn were wondering if those carriages could be modified for flight. The swarms of small airships overhead interested the land-locked creatures in the room, Particularly Aspen and Erebus. The images of the automatons had drawn lustful gazes from Wolfram, and the technology in general interested the scientifically minded in the room. Finally, the image of the alien female with her mechanical arm was shown… Everyone was amazed at how such an advanced prosthetic could be produced, and Rick was happy to have a close-up image of an actual alien. Celestia, though aeons of experience, already knew what everyone was thinking… Gwendolyn’s kingdom was in shambles, famine and economic devastation had crippled the kingdom of the Griffons, even the capital of what was once such a great empire, Griffonstone itself, was a shadow of its former glory… The very idea of the technology proposed, such as automatons, could solve their hunger and finally lead to industrialisation in the northern kingdom, and to an economic revolution for griffonkind. The dragons had always baulked at the idea of technological advancement, they were already the apex predators of this world, they had no need for spears or crossbows, they had their claws and teeth and breath, and they had no need for architecture, the mountains and rocky plains were all the shelter they needed… But, clearly, Ember was starting to rethink dragon culture.  The abyssinians were the exact opposite of dragonkind, survival was difficult in the southern deserts, and so they advanced faster than most others, they built their steam-chariots and clockwork airships, but those paled in comparison to the machines shown here… The weaponry also attracted the cat’s eye, they bordered the domain of the Storm King, and while the lord of the diamond dogs had yet to make a move, it was clear the peace between their two nations wouldn’t last, particularly after Eris Archipelago was subjugated nearly two decades ago… Celestia had wanted to launch a military campaign to liberate the islands, but she didn’t want to alienate the diamond dogs living in Equestria, nor go to war with the Storm King. To a deer, magic was all that mattered, but the machines shown here surpassed most spells the fawns of Aspen’s kingdom could master… Erebus was clearly more focused on the aliens themselves… Zebrakind was a pious bunch, with strange superstitions, said superstition nearly leading to a war with ponykind a few years ago, back when Luna first returned to Equestria, luckily, Erebus’s predecessor, the rather fanatical Kaiser Hades, had died in an accident, and while Celestia had her own suspicions of Hades’ death, the young Erebus had done his best to quell the more fanatical parts of his own people… These revelations, that the creatures of Equus were not alone in the universe, would lead to radical changes in zebra society. What this would mean for Equestria? It was still too early to say… Once the discussions were over, Aspen and Catrina simply teleported back to their homelands, Gwen and Ember flew off, and Erebus was left to take a carriage back to the zebra lands. Eventually, Fleur and Fancy started to wander off, leaving Celestia alone with the scientists and the guards, “One last thing,” She said before she allowed them to leave. The princess raised her horn and summoned a pile of books, “These are tomes from the alien planet that my student managed to acquire, I want you to study them…” The three scientists nodded and left. Tuesday. The ponies sat around the table, gathered for another, smaller, meeting, this time the only attendants were Princess Luna, Professor Wolfram, Soarin Cloudlash, Flash Sentry, and Silver Sable… Just from the collection of ponies, any onlookers, of which there were none, as this was held in a private chamber, would have instantly understood the nature of this meeting. Wolfram pulled out a stack of papers, “These are some, rather rudimentary, designs based on the weapons designs Princess Twilight Sparkle sent us, as well as the images captured from the alien world… As soon as I got my hooves on the designs, I ordered half my staff to work on them, and so we should have the first functional prototypes completed within a few days…” “Good, may we have a look at the designs?” Silver said. “Yes...They don’t have an official name yet, but until we actually build one and test it, they will be designated the PMEW-01…” With that, Wolfram gave the schematics to the ponies present, a large boxy contraption, mounted by a swivel mount to a saddle, a hose out the back connecting it to a back-mounted device loaded with liquid rainbow and powered by bottled lightning, out of the front of the weapon was a long, ringed, metal barrel with a horn-like point at the tip. Most of the ponies there stared at the designs in confusion, bearly to understand what each of the symbols and markings were supposed to represent, “Fascinating,” Luna spoke up, “You use some kind of electrically-operated pump to suck up the liquid rainbow from the tanks on the back, then you break down the rainbow and convert it back into magical energy, channelling it down the rod like a unicorn would channel energy down a horn, finally releasing a disintegration spell out the end… I believe it would be more efficient if the spike at the end were made from pure silver and the rings around the barrel were copper… You should also place some safety runes inside the device to prevent the spells from damaging the weapon itself…” “Exactly what my unicorn consultants said,” Wolfram replied, “They helped with the more arcane parts of the design… “ “Well, that all sounds interesting…” Flash Sentry began, “But what exactly does it do…” “Weren’t you listening?” Sable said, “It uses liquid rainbow to cast a beam-disintegration spell out the end with the aid of various spell matrixes imprinted on the rings on the barrel.” “This is the future of warfare, with this, anyone can bring the destructive power of a trained battlemage…” Soarin said. “The best part,” Wolfram began, “The amount of power put into the spell is directly proportional to the amount of liquid rainbow pumped into the conversion chamber, that means that we can directly control how powerful a given casting is, and increasing the size of the design means a drastically more destructive spell… Of course, that comes with its own problems, but those can be solved.” Wolfram pulled out other schematics, “These ones are a little more experimental, but I feel they should also bring drastic changes to the equipment we give our guards…” Everyone went over the papers before Luna said, “And, what about armour, before we design these weapons, we want a way to keep ponies alive should these weapons fall into our foe’s hooves…” “Until we get a chance to test the final design, I’m afraid any attempts at making armour would be a waste of time since we wouldn’t know exactly know what such a suit would require to properly protect a pony…” Flash Sentry nodded, “Speaking of which, let’s keep this discreet, we don’t want the changelings or diamond dogs learning of these advances for as long as we can help it…” “Although,” Sable added, “Once the weapons have been tested and are ready for production, I want enough of them to fully equip the Canterlot Guards in the event of another hostile attack…” Wednesday. Unicorns marched up and down the mineshaft, casting spells that revealed where the buried gems rested, and the workers followed, digging at the stone with their hooves and picks, prying the gems from the walls. The mine seemingly went on forever, breaking through several gem-filled caverns. The larger caverns were filled with forests of massive crystal spires, ones that had to be cut down into more manageable chunks before they could be moved. Hauling teams moved carts of gems back to the surface, and the unicorns cast spells to keep the air clean of stone dust and suck fresh air in from above… Limestone marched up and down the length of the mine… She wanted to go back home, she missed her family, perhaps in a few months, but working here paid well, and Celestia knows she needed the bits… At least she was promoted to the boss of this Celestia damned place, and that meant she didn’t need to raise a pickaxe again for her time here. There came the sound of galloping hooves from the path that led back up to the surface. A stallion approached the mare, “Limestone ma’am,” “What is it!” She shouted, “If it’s Quartz breaking his Celestia-damned legs again that bastard will have more to worry about than broken bones!” “N-No ma’am,” The stallion, standing a whole head taller than the mare, shrunk back at her gaze, “R-Representatives from Canterlot, they say that they have a message from the princess…” Limestone growled, “Well! What are you waiting for! Get your sorry ass back to work!” “Y-Yes ma’am…” The stallion galloped off as Limestone marched up to the surface to talk with these ponies… The smog and gloom of Fillydelphia eclipsed the horizon, the mine was built just outside the city, and practically right on top of the railroad tracks heading into the bastion of industrialisation that was Fillydelphia. Outside, dozens of ponies were taking the carts full of gems and sorting them, then loading the sorted gems into hoppers to be later loaded on the trains. In all the bare brick structures and metal scaffolding, the thing that stood out the most was the chariot sitting just outside the mine entrance… It was elegant, gilded, and bearing the symbol of the sun… A chariot from Canterlot… “What do you want?” Limestone bitterly asked the unicorn who marched from the back of the chariot… “Here to shut us down?” “Just the opposite… Celestia has decreed that all gem mines are now government property and expects to double productivity within the next year…” Limestone wanted to laugh, “You’re kidding, I’m working these mares to death and you want us to double productivity!” “You will be funded directly from Canterlot… The details are here,” The unicorn raised a sheet of paper, bearing the stamp of approval from both Celestia, Luna, and the Canterlot Institute of Engineering… As they talked, several more chariots landed, the much larger kind meant to carry cargo, and they started unloading tools… No, not just tools, magical tools… Pickaxes with gemstones embedded in the heads, and hammers with runes inscribed into their shafts, there was even a box of wands for the unicorns… “What is all this? What’s going on?” “It’s all on paper, some kind of development project, we need to double gem production by hearths warming…” Limestone growled… There went any chance of getting home for the holidays, and with it, the chance to quit this job any time soon... Clouds, charged with magical energy, were pumped into an arcane compressor, and from there into a distillation column, in the end, coming out as a thick translucent glowing liquid… The process was relatively simple but dangerous to any pony not wearing copious amounts of magical energy protection. Thus, in his T-Hazmat suit, Warm Front watched the machines churning, making sure that nothing leaked and magically irradiated the entire facility. Warm Front adored the simplicity of the process, yet its theoretical intricacy… The whole idea was far more complicated than one observing the process would think, first the unicorns would pour magical energy into the clouds, not actually casting any spells, but simply charging them with enough magic to cause severe magical energy poisoning to anyone without protection, then the clouds were compressed into magically charged water, and boiled, resulting in slightly irradiated steam, and pure, liquified, magical energy, or Liquid Rainbow. There were many ways the process could work… You could grind up magically charged gemstones and mix them with a fluid, then remove the gemstone chunks and boil away the fluid, or you could extract the blood of a magical creature and boil away the plasma, leaving the energy, but, the most efficient way was charging the water, far less wasteful than the other methods, as the steam could be recycled into another cloud for the process…. Warm Front just sat there, observing, as liquid rainbow was pumped out of the distillation device and flowed on to the radiation cleansers, which would soak up any excess magical energies and render the fluid, more or less, safe to pony life. There came the sound of a door opening and Warm Front turned to see several ponies in T-Hazmat suits marching up, adorned with the symbol of the sun… What did Canterlot want with the weather factory? He got his answer later that day, when it was revealed to the workers that they had been told that the government was taking full control over liquid rainbow production and that they were expected to double production by hearths warming, and that eighty percent of the facility’s product was to be stored in metal drums and shipped off to Canterlot… Why would Canterlot need this much Liquid Rainbow? Warm Front thought to himself as he realized he probably wouldn’t get a day off of work for the next few months... Thursday. Luna watched as Soarin marched out to the firing range. The testing was hosted inside the Wonderbolt’s HQ to help limit who was allowed to observe the experimental weaponry… Sable and Wolfram had both needed to be pulled up on a chariot, one which Luna pulled herself. The Beam Caster as Wolfram had named it, was just as bulky as the schematics showed, and Luna was excited to see what it could do. These tests would need to be repeated once the Immolator and Disintegrator were complete, luckily, the Beam Caster was the top priority and finished within only a day… Well, the prototype at the very least was, the final version would need to wait a bit longer. Soarin aimed the device and bit down on the mouth-handle, there was a loud whine as the pumps inside the weapon sucked liquid rainbow into the machine, then, the barrels started to dance with magenta lightning, half a second later there was a loud zapping-burst noise and a blast of pink energy flashed across the eyes of everyone inside the room, melting a hole through the target, and a portion of the wall behind. Then, a half a second later, still biting down on the trigger, another burst of energy launched forth, and another, and another. Luna stared, surprised, two shots a second, not even the best repeating crossbows could compare...