//------------------------------// // Chapter 13: Gloaming // Story: Brightly Lit 2: Pharos // by Penalt //------------------------------//     Good Morning, British Columbia.  Steve Cherniki here with your Global News Morning, and as have been for many days over the past few months, all eyes are focused on the small central coast hamlet of Brightly, where today the alien princesses Celestia and Luna will apparently take steps to make travel between Earth and Equestria a more common occurrence.  For more on the story we go to Global reporter Renata Grant, who is there in Brightly.  Good morning, Renata.     Good morning, Steve.  As most people of the world are aware by now, Brightly has been playing host to not one, but two benevolent rulers of an alien civilization.  Princesses Celestia and Luna have been instrumental in helping Brightly and Earth, in general, deal with the outpouring of the strange energy that has been referred to as nothing less than “magic.”     This new energy, which everyone here is still coming to grips with, will be on full display later today as an attempt is made to raise the portal between our dimensions up from it’s current resting place roughly 120 meters below the surface, to ground level.  The attempt will be made in conjunction with yet a third Equestrian Princess, from their side of the portal at around noon, local time.  Over to you, Steve.     “Are you ready yet, my Voice?” Celestia asked the dark haired woman in the room beside her.     “Pretty much, Princess,” answered Jessica Velasquez, checking over her things.  The dark haired woman was wearing a fetching combination of shorts and tank top that exposed her long lean limbs and bare midriff.  Well worn runners and a cap emblazoned with ‘Fox News’ completed the ensemble.     “I see you’ve decided to pack lightly, Jessica,” observed Celestia.  “You know you don’t have to come to Equestria when Luna and I go back.  Especially when it’s very probable that you will become a pony the moment we reach Equestria.  I remember how… vigorous you were about being secure in both mind and body.”     “After a couple of weeks here I’ve gotten used to the concept, and as long as I’m in control of the changes, it’s something I've decided I can accept,” Velasquez stated, pausing a moment to press her fingers against the ever present coyote emblem she wore.  “Besides, it helps when you can do this… Dah!”     Four belts with several small pockets attached lifted into the air to hover at chest height, and as the elder alicorn continued to watch, the hovering objects began to weave and dance around the duo, each belt sheathed in a grey aura that was streaked with strands of black and white.     “Very impressive,” Celestia noted approvingly, as Jessica released both her concentration and her hand’s contact with her pin, whose eyes seemed to flicker a bit.  “You might wind up being a unicorn.  Levitation is one of the first spells a young pony learns, and it seems we have an idea of what your colouring will be like as well.”     “What?” Velasquez asked, turning as Celestia pointed a hoof behind her and feeling an odd pull at the base of her spine as her hips twisted.  A quick reverse of the motion created a repetition of the tug on her coccyx, and a bushy tail of grey shot through with streaks of white and black, flicked into view.       “Oh hell no,” the woman groaned, grabbing onto the new appendage and giving it a tug to make sure that it was indeed hers.  “I’m a goddamn furry.”     “No no,” Celestia gently corrected, failing to hide her smile.  “You are furry, not a furry.”     “You have seen our internet, right?” Velasquez asked, rhetorically.  “All I need is a pair of fuzzy ears on the top of my head and every otaku in a thousand miles will be after me.”     “Well, personally I think a tail looks very nice on you,” Celestia commented, reaching out to drape a comforting wing over the woman.  “Besides, you can think of it as practice for Equestria— Oh, it’s gone.”     “Huh, you’re right,” said Velasquez.  “Wonder why it went away?”     “A mystery for another day,” Celestia decided, before changing the subject.  “Do you plan on getting changed for the portal raising?  From what I understand of human norms you are dressed very casually.”     “From what I hear, the biggest problem for people after they change is getting tangled up in their own clothes,” Velasquez explained, beginning to drape the belts around her body like bandoliers.  “So I’m taking everything I need in these belts so I can just put them on afterwards, and I’m wearing these clothes because they should be easy to slip out of.”     “Sounds like you’ve thought of everything, although saddlebags are a thing you know,” Celestia commented.  “I’ve got to go meet up with Luna and start getting ready.  See you at the mine entrance?”     “Yes ma’am,” Velasquez nodded, forehead wrinkled in thought.  “I plan on being there about an hour ahead of time.”     “I’ll see you there,” Celestia replied, gently stepping out of her hotel room.     “Saddlebags…” mused Velasquez. Meanwhile…     “Careful with that!” yelled Twilight Sparkle, as she stepped out in front of the Castle of Friendship.     “I am!” Starlight Glimmer hollered back, as she moved to place the hoof mirror to Earth in the center of a complex array of runes, gems, and other arcane systems that she and Twilight had put together over the past two weeks.       “Boy, they sure are being grumpy with each other, aren’t they?” Scootaloo observed, as her fellow Crusaders came trotting up.       “They’re crankier than Cranky Doodle without his hairpiece,” opined Applebloom.  “I ain’t seen Twilight like this before.”     “I have,” Sweetie Belle added.  “A couple of times, when she’s really focused on something her manners go right out the window.”     “Set the thaumic dynamometer to nine six three oh five,” Twilight instructed, as she fiddled with a set of instruments.     “Don’t you mean nine three six oh five?” asked Starlight, eyebrow raised.     “That’s what I said!” Twilight yelled back, “We need to get this right, and I can’t afford you making any mistakes.”     “Wait, you can’t afford me making any mistakes?” Starlight asked, incredulous, as she whirled to face her teacher.  “You just told me to set the dynamometer to nine six THREE!  You’re the one making the mistakes with the numbers.”     “I NEVER make mistakes when it comes to data,” Twilight fired back, equally incredulous, as everypony present backed off while the two mages growled at each other like angry dogs arguing over a bone.  “This isn’t something you can just ‘go with your gut’ on.”     “Quick, let’s use Zecora’s potion now, while they’re distracted,” suggested Scootaloo.       “Did Zecora say how we were supposed to use it?” Sweetie asked, carefully watching the two adults argue their way towards a nearby blackboard.  “I’m pretty sure we weren’t supposed to drink it.”     “Nah,” confirmed Applebloom, eyeing the potion and attaching a sprayer to the top of the bottle.  “She said we was to ‘apply’ the potion to the portal.  So I reckon if we spray it on, that’ll do the job.”     “What are we gonna do about them?” Scootaloo asked, watching as student and teacher continued their argument, only now with calculations and diagrams that made the young filly’s mind hurt when she looked at them.     “Granny says it's never a good idea to get between two mares when they’re a-feudin’ and a-fightin’,” Applebloom stated.  “Best we get this done and let them get whatever it is outta their system a bit.  Ah get the feelin’ this has been brewin’ for awhile now.”      The arguing mares drew a crowd of curious onlookers who had the happy side-effect of providing cover for the Crusaders as they proceeded to spray the contents of the potion all over the hoof mirror and the various devices, gems, sigils, and glyphs arrayed around it.       “Oh! I see the problem,” declared Dr. Hooves, from the sidelines.  “You need to align the thaumic wavefront in conjunction with the z-axis neutrino field and then, reverse the polarity!”     The only thing that saved him from being deep-fried by the twinned glares of the bickering ponies were the quick reflexes of a hundred adventures lost in the annals of time.  After that, everypony simply stood back and watched the furious, if esoteric argument continue.     “Annnnd done!” Applebloom declared, minutes later as the last drops of the potion eked out of the spritzer.       “Should we tell them that’s it's gonna be okay now that we’ve helped?” Scootaloo eagerly asked.  “That way we’ll have helped them with the portal and their fight.”     “Are you crazy?” asked Sweetie Belle, appalled at the suggestion.  “Those two are fightin’ about science and numbers and stuff that Rarity would have to look up to explain to me.  We need to stay out of it.”     “Ah got an idea,” Applebloom replied, before raising her voice and shouting, “Oh boy!  Look at the time!  It’s sure getting close to when Celestia was expecting the portal to be ready!  Sure hope nopony is late gettin’ that done for her!”     Silence filled the air for several seconds followed by a shriek of, “Oh no!  I’ll be TARDY!”     “Do you want to be tardy, wrong or both?” Starlight asked, cocking an eyebrow at her teacher.  “Look Twilight, I want to get this right as much as you do, which means we double-check each other.  Nopony’s perfect.”     “You’re right,” Twilight sighed, slumping slightly.  “I’m sorry Starlight.  It’s just that there’s so much riding on this.  If things go wrong we could wind up trapping both Princesses on the Earth, forever.  Or we could destroy Earth, or Equestria, or unleash some eldritch abom—”     “Twilight,” Starlight interrupted, with a hoof in the alicorn’s mouth.  “Let’s just concentrate on the here and now.  Okay?”     “Okay,” Twilight replied, once Starlight’s hoof was removed.  “What was that last setting anyway?”     “Nine three six oh five,” responded Starlight, lips curved in a slight smile.  “Just like you said it should be in the first place.”     “Right.  Okay next…”     “How is Iron Heart?” Luna asked the white unicorn at her side.     “Recovering, thank the Goddess,” Foxfire replied, bowing her head a moment as her mind passed her images of what could have been had she not heeded the words of her Umbral companion.  “Apparently it was touch and go for a bit, but Medevac and Kevin have him stabilized and according to them, he should be okay to come home tonight.  Speaking of which…”     Foxfire’s words trailed off as a cream bodied pegasus glided in to execute a perfect walking landing, that ended with the pony sweeping her wings forward and bowing her head to perform a graceful act of obeisance to the unicorn.     “Greetings, my Queen,” Medevac said, eyes low even as her tail gave a single measured upward flick that brought a smile to Foxfire’s muzzle.     “Rise, Lady Medevac,” Foxfire commanded, laughter dancing in her eyes.  “What news of our beloved consort?”     “He’s awake and talking,” Medevac answered, rising in response to her queen’s command and giving a quick nod to Luna.  “His blood sugar is stable but we’re going to keep him for a few more hours, just to be sure.  Of course, he wants to go home now..”     “Men,” Foxfire commented ruefully, shaking her head.  “When will they stop thinking that their reach should exceed their grasp?”     “What happened?” Luna asked, her forehead wrinkled in thought, as fragments of memory tugged at her.  “And why are you bowing to Foxfire, Medevac?”     “Well, she is my Queen, after all,” Medevac stated, in a matter-of-fact way that had Luna’s eyebrows climbing.  “Hey, it seems like the thing to do after I clocked her upside the head.  As for Iron Heart.  Well it seems Foxfire’s favorite stallion tried his hoof at forging a magic sword last night.”     “He did WHAT?!” exclaimed Luna, aghast.       “According to the Umbral,” Foxfire supplied, tapping the side of her head with a hoof.  “My husband-to-be accidentally made five versions of Excalibur.”     “FIVE!” Luna shouted, reeling.  “I know thy legends of that blade.  Even forging one should have been impossible.  Creating five… even the attempt should have been leagues beyond his abilities.  Just creating the matrix should have drained his very essence, nevermind the forging itself, or the laying of purpose.”     “If it wasn’t for the Umbral waking me and showing me what to do, Iron Heart would have died,” Foxfire replied soberly.  “It may be a dark spirit, but it saved Iron Heart’s life, and for that, I owe it.”     “Foxfire, do not swear debt to such powers,” warned Luna.  “The price they ask to be paid for such things is too high.  Believe me when I say, I know of what I speak.”     “It’s proven to me that it will keep it’s given word,” countered Foxfire.  “Even to the point of extreme.  Besides all it asked for was to be able to experience the world first hand once in awhile.”     “You don’t mean…” Luna trailed off, aghast.       “I’ve decided to let it take the reins of our shared body for brief periods, yes,” Foxfire stated, defiant before the lunar monarch.       “T’is folly!  T’is madness of the first rank,” Luna exclaimed, looming over the unicorn, her wings half spread in display.       Be understanding of the Princess, the Umbral counseled to a seething Foxfire.  She has only known lies, heartbreak and a millennium of exile due to the actions of my kind, and she is a pony you as yet can ill afford to antagonise.     “Though others plead and threaten, I will stand my ground,” Foxfire whispered back, before placing herself nose to nose with the bigger mare.  “I understand your concerns, and I respect them and your experience.  However: my mind, my choice.  The creature within me has kept every promise given and only acted within the bounds I have set for it.  I know what happened to you was vastly different but until I find the Umbral doing something to warrant distrust I will continue to act as I am now.”     “They deceive, they lie.  Even now it is no doubt plotting to usurp thee.  Mind and body both,”  Luna’s horn began to glow a deep cobalt blue.  “I command thee to prohibit this thing—”     “Princess, you forget something,” laughed Foxfire, interrupting the princess.  “I’m not one of your subjects.  I’m a Canadian citizen, on Canadian soil.  You have no power over me, and have no right to command me to do anything.”     Luna reeled back, as if the unicorn had slapped her across the face.  “I… I… “ stammered the alicorn, before a blink and a breath brought her mind back into focus.  “You are correct, Foxfire.  Please accept my apologies.  In my great concern for thee I forgot myself, and while I indeed cannot command thee, canst thou at least take my concerns at face value and proceed with great caution and care?”     “Of course,” Foxfire agreed, her voice amiable in her victory over the Equestrian.  “I promise to be careful, and Medevac has agreed to keep an eye on me and make sure I don’t start acting like some crazed maniac bent on global domination.”     “She sees me every week for a prenatal visit anyway,” Medevac added, having stayed out of the verbal altercation.  “So doing a mental check on her as well is no biggie.”     “That is good,” Luna replied, still embarrassed at her faux pas as she folded her wings firmly against her back and flanks.  “Foxfire, you are likely the most potent unicorn on Earth, and if the puissance of thy stallion is any indication, your coming foal bids fair to be a mage who may rival the greatest legends of Earth and Equestria both.”     Luna turned and took a few steps away as if to leave, but suddenly turned and rushed to embrace a surprised Foxfire in a shroud of wings and fur.     “But should thee embrace the darkness within,” Luna whispered, so only the two of them could hear.  “Should thou allow it to consume you as it did me, the power of a Nightmare Foxfire and her Midnight Foals would envelop thy world in a darkness and misery from which it would not soon escape, if ever.  Please be careful.”     “I have friends and family to lean on,” Foxfire whispered back.  “You taught me that.  But I swear, I will take my own life before I allow it to be used against those I love.”     “Do not make me hold you to that,” Luna replied, before releasing the unicorn and adding,  “please.”     “So mote it be,” Foxfire affirmed, bowing slightly to the Equestrian, who gave a sad smile before leaping up and away into the air.     “What the heck was that all about?” queried Medevac, moving up and laying a wing over her Queen for an impromptu health check.  “And when did I agree to become your mental health professional as well?”     “It was all I could think of on the spur of the moment to get Luna to calm down,” responded Foxfire, as the two of them lost sight of the alicorn as she passed over some rooftops.  “You’ll do it, right?”     “Well, yeah,” Medevac responded hesitantly, withdrawing her wing after it told her of the perfectly healthy gravid unicorn beneath it.  “I’m not exactly qual—”     “You will obey me,” Foxfire commanded instantly, an odd echo in her mind before she added.  “Right?”     “Of course, my Queen,” Medevac responded, instantly dropping into the bow she had been taught as if she had been doing it all her life.  And this time, there was no playful flick of her tail.     “Good, because I think we’ve got just enough time to grab the kids and check on Iron Heart before the portal raising is set to happen,” Foxfire stated, feeling a thrill of pleasure at the instant obedience from her pegasus.  “Let’s go.”         “No closer than fifty meters please,” Celestia was saying to a lean, grey headed man, as Luna touched down nearby.     “Are you certain we cannot set up our instruments any closer, Princess Celestia?”  the man asked, as Luna took in the scene around the former park and the mine entrance it had contained.       “I’m afraid so, Doctor,” Celestia replied, shaking her head.  “Even for someone as experienced in magic as I am, this is new territory.  I would feel terrible if something went wrong and you or your companions were hurt.”     “My dear, Princess,” replied the man, “I may only be one of the Nine, but I say with confidence that any one of us, or indeed any of the staff of CERN, would gladly give their lives in the pursuit of knowledge.  Especially such knowledge of the phenomenon you are allowing us to witness today.”     “You remind me very much of Twilight Sparkle,” laughed Celestia, smiling widely.  “Very well, forty meters.  But no closer.”     “Thank you, Princess Celestia,” answered the scientist, and the two shared a quick Gallic kiss before the middle-aged man moved with surprising speed to rejoin his fellows.     “It’s almost time to raise the portal, Luna,” Celestia said, turning to face her sister who seemed to be very distracted, as she kept looking back into town.  “Luna?  Did you hear me?  Is everything okay?”     “Hmm?  Oh, yes,” replied the overnight alicorn, wearing a double set of heavily weighed down saddlebags, and snapping her attention to the here and now in an obvious manner.  “I am sorry, Sister.  My thoughts were occupied elsewhere.”     “I could tell.  We’ve got a few minutes before Twilight starts raising the portal,” Celestia commented, taking a moment to secure her own saddlebags. “What’s on your mind?”     “I had a curious conversation with Medevac and Foxfire, just before I left to gather our things from the hotel,” Luna began, a thoughtful look crossing her face.  “It is just… I have seen that gesture before, but I cannot remember where.  And I find it troublesome for some reason.”     “What gesture?  I’d heard that Iron Heart had done something to himself.  Was it to do with that?” Celestia asked, curious.     “Well, not so much a gesture as it was a curtsy, or a bow,” Luna answered, her gaze drifting into the distance again before a thought brought her attention back to her elder sister.  “Perhaps you would know, Sister.  You were always more focused on your court and the various forms of protocol.”     “Can you show me?” queried Celestia, one eye on the shaft the Canadian Army had bored down to the portal in the past month.  “And what does this have to do to Medevac and Foxfire?”     “Medevac landed in front of us, and did an obeisance in this manner toward Foxfire,” Luna replied, sweeping into the same arcing wings and lowered nose pose that Medevac had affected earlier.  “Then she addressed Foxfire has her Qu—”     Luna’s words here cut off as golden energy encircled her throat and tugged upwards.       “Rise, Luna,” ordered Celestia in a quiet commanding voice that brooked no disobedience.       “Sister, what is the meaning of this?” Luna demanded as she rose back to a standing position, still held at one end of the magical leash that Celestia had conjured.       “Is this what Foxfire and Medevac did?” Celestia asked, her voice stern and uncompromising, even as her face kept it’s smiling expression.  “Tell me.”     “The bowing and words yes,” Luna answered, starting to pull power to herself in order to break her sister’s mystical grip.  “But not this grasping me by the throat.  Release me, Sister.”     “Thank Harmony,” Celestia prayed, and an unseen tension seemed to ooze out of her as she released Luna from her grasp.  “I’m sorry, Luna.  I had to be sure.”     “Sure of what?” Luna pressured.  “What did you have to be so sure of, that it caused you to bind your own sister with your sorcery?”     “Slavery,” hissed Celestia, flinty eyes over a fixed smile.  “That was the bow of a pegasus slave to her unicorn masters in Old Unicornia.  Before the Unification. Before Harmony.”     “But how would either of them… oh no,” gasped Luna, whipping her head back towards town as she guessed the truth of the matter.  “The Umbral.”     “Has Foxfire been giving it greater freedom to act?” Celestia asked, wincing as she noticed the time.       “She has,” Luna confirmed, a subsonic growl rising in her voice.  “It has infiltrated her reasoning.  I war—”     Luna’s words were cut off once more as a flare of rainbow light blasted up and out of the shaft, curving and arcing until the sky resembled a multi-hued dome of light.     “No time,” Celestia concluded.  “That’s Twilight’s signal that she’s about to start moving the portal.”     “But Foxfire,” stammered Luna, already half-turned toward Medevac’s small clinic.  “If we do not put an end to this now, she will surely become a nightmare as great as I was.”     “No time,” repeated Celestia, standing tall in all her majesty.  “Twilight needs us both here to move the portal on this side and to help keep it stable while she does.  We do what needs to be done here, and then we… we…”     “We do what needs to be done with Foxfire,” Luna finished, nodding sadly and turning to face the growing lightshow from the portal shaft.  “Aye Sister.  We are princesses, and to us falls the necessity of duty.  Let us be about it.”