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// Chapter 15: Broken Homestead 
// Story: OMAI: The Empire of Storms 
// by VeganSpyro97 
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The ponies and Capper slipped out of the windmill in the early morning, en route to the plaza meet up the Abyssinian had suggested. Given that Spike had always been somewhat more mature than his age would imply, he had been left in charge of the other teens, and instructed to be quiet and discreet. Not that the adults were hopeful in that regard. The crusaders and the words “quiet” and “discreet” only ever fit well in a sentence when the words “never” or “you’re joking.” 
The grownups just hoped that they came back before the inevitable gongshow. 
Creeping down the tower and out of the courtyard beneath the great rotating sails, the group slunk into the shadows of the alleyways, cloaks drawn tightly around themselves and hoods pulled low. They trotted quickly through the early morning mists, the river providing the friends some assistance with their dawn excursion’s creeping. Their hooves muffled with cloth and magic, and Capper padding easily along on his soft paws, they made good time amid the city’s early morning commuters and guard patrols. 
Thankfully, the guards were not expecting a group of ponies from the north, and as such, they were not even looking for them, and were not overly alert, even after the ruckus in the marketplace the first day. 
Static kept a wary eye out for the reindeer from the dream realm, and she kept thinking she had seen glimpses of antlers and green eyes several times, but as she continued onwards, she started to think the glimpses she was seeing weren’t really there, just her own imagination. She sighed, her thoughts turning to Luna and the other ponies fighting in Equestria…


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The desert sands rolled beneath them, the sheer rock faces now no longer so far away. The great heavy behemoth in the sky above them ponderously positioning itself above the caves that housed the Arcan’s home. 
Crimson still stood in the dining hall, the guards left by the king simply waiting by the doors on both ends of the room. He had no weapons and was still weak from his tortured captivity. He was watching his enemies draw closer to his family, to the place of his birth, and, despite his misgivings and the bad blood between him and his people, he wished nothing more than to have his sword, his armour, anything, and fight to protect them. 
But he could do none of that. 
He couldn’t do much more than stand and watch. 
Crimson snarled as he heard the familiar boots approach from outside. Gale. And the King. 
Gaul was in an uncharacteristically happy mood, a broad smile on his face while Gale was as dementedly enthusiastic as always. Soft chuckles brought on by nothing but Gale’s own insanity made Crimson grit his teeth. 
They didn’t say a word, as the citadel began to settle into position over it’s target. They just stood and watched him. Crimson watched the world beyond the window, the rocky peaks of his homeland reaching up to pierce the heavens around them. He stared at those familiar mountain caps with a growing feeling of dread, as if this was the last time he would ever see them. 
Crimson could hear screaming, and he knew that some of his people were attempting to run, to flee from the Homestead. But there were so few. He knew that so many more had not even tried to run, and would not try. 
“Fire the weapon. And, Commander Gale, after this one has seen the result of his uncooperativeness, try to get him to talk. If he still doesn’t talk, kill him.” Gaul intoned, his voice even, a guard immediately moving off to carry out the command. Gaul left after his soldier, humming a lively little tune as he walked down the corridor, tail sweeping from side to side.
Crimson felt his teeth grit, the sound of grinding bone and the sensation of tensed muscles in his jaw matched by his tightened, strained muscles that still carried that dull ache from the rounds of abuse and torture. Torture inflicted by Gale. Gale who was now behind him. Alone. 
Crimson felt something in his chest snap. 
The next thing he knew, he was pivoting on his heel to face the Commander, who had drawn a knife and was watching him like a shark watches a seal. Crimson stalked across the room, his long legs eating up the distance in a few short strides before he and Gale were no more than a few feet apart. Only as Crimson bared down on him did it occur to Gale that he might actually be in danger. 
Crimson felt the energy in the air, a thick miasma of magic that was familiar to him, the same magic he had been surrounded by for months. Pony magic. But not quite the same. Pony magic made everything feel….lighter. This very much did not. Crimson reached out with his arm, intercepted a deft and well made attempt at a knife slash, then twisted Gale’s wrist even as the vile Arcan maneuvered himself into a backward roll, falling away from Crimson, now short of a knife. The knife sped across the space between them, just cutting through the skin on the top of Gale’s ear. 
Flames billowed after the blade, to Crimson’s surprise, and Gale’s laughter grew. 
“Yes! Show me how, boy!” Gale lunged for Crimson, who leaned backwards, catching outstretched hands with his own, and twisted them aside, sending the older, but smaller man crashing down onto the table of food. The cutlery and vegetables went flying, the meat sailing every which way while Crimson bolted for the open door, charging through just as a pair of guards tried to bar the way. With brute strength, he knocked one aside and sent the other reeling, before sprinting down the hall. Endless stone walls moved past him, the uniform stone trying to constrain him.
He had to stop this. He had to do something. He had to-
-THOOOOOM!-
……..Silence. The entire Citadel went silent, and the world beyond too. Like a breath held still, or the empty skies on the darkest nights, the world was rigid and unmoving, the very air painful to inhale. No….this was wrong. All wrong. 
He started to sprint again, the sounds of crumbling stone echoing from the windows in the rooms he passed, his footfalls matching the chaotic cadence of destruction as he tried to find a way out. The corridors seemed endless, and his heart beat out of time with his dark, fearful thoughts. 
Then, he saw something. His sprint slowed to a run, then a walk. Finally, he stood still.
He had came to a stop by a door. A familiar door. One that had hidden the ripping of flesh and the burning of muscles. The pain and the screams. 
And like that, the panic was gone. He didn’t need to see what had happened to know what had happened. His home was gone. His people were gone. His family… Instead there was only anger, and a deep and terrible need. 
He forced that familiar door open, and beheld Gale’s chambers, filled with relics of his people, artifacts of the Architects who had now vanished from the world. He stared for a moment at the rack, before his eyes drifted to a length of rusted, pitted metal, the blade snapped yet still almost as large as himself. 
He crossed the room quickly, not wasting anymore time. His fingers closed around the hilt, and the bargain was struck. Not with some ancient malice enchanted to the sword, or to some higher power, but instead with himself. 
With this sword, he would bring down as many Jotunns and their Hounds as he could. 
And he knew exactly who he would start with. 
But before he could begin, he had other obligations to take care of. 
He marched swiftly out of the room and tried to retrace his steps, trying to remember where it was he had been brought from. He pounded down the corridors again, batting aside anything foolish enough to bar him, the rusted sword somehow sturdy and strong despite hundreds of years in the ground. 
Guards died in their scores beneath the fury of the Architect. 
Finally, he found what he was looking for. The cells. His fellow guards, normal ponies, imprisoned noble lords and ladies. 
They all perked up at seeing him free, the prisoners clamoring to the bars and cheering loudly, a fleeting but intense ray of hope in a hopeless place. Crimson’s sword soon slammed into the hinges, gouging them apart until the doors fell free. Then he repeated his work on their chains. Soon they were all leaving, scrabbling to get out of the prison cells and into the hallways beyond.
Their hasty retreat from their prison was loud, but they didn’t care, running a desperate bid for freedom and pummeling any Jotunn that fought to keep them at bay. 
They didn’t know where they were going, but soon found themselves in a massive room, round and tall, a huge cylinder….but it had no ceiling, the open sky above them, and the ground far below them, a massive crystal held in place in the center. There was nowhere to go. They were trapped. 
Gale and his soldiers found them quickly, crowding the crystal room and encircling the small band of escaped fighters. They could see the King approaching from one of the open doors on the far side of the room. 
They shared looks, and knew they were all in agreement. 
None of them were going to go back to that cell. 
Not one. 
The King smirked as he drew close, eyeing the ponies, holding the few weapons they had been able to acquire from the guards. Three had been killed already just to get to this chamber, and many were wounded. 
Only Crimson seemed to have not suffered any fresh injury. The angry, magical, flaming aura that seemed to spring from the patterns on his skin saw to that. Any guard who had gotten close had felt their flesh start to boil in their armour. Somehow, the raw magic was only barely lessened by their armour than any spell would be, leaving them at the mercy of the Arcan. 
Gaul’s smirk only grew bigger when the Arcan stepped forward and raised his sword in a warrior’s salute to his innumerable enemies, and settled into a fighting stance. 
Gale went to attack, but Gaul held up his hand. Gale immediately stopped his advance. 
“It’s over boy.” The King said, firmly, smugly. “Your home is nothing but rubble now. And any place your little pony friends could hide will suffer the same fate. Your little band of friends here has done an admirable job of defending themselves, but look at them. Tired, injured, on their last legs. They’ll die here. And so will you if you fight with them. Step aside. Accept the inevitable and join-”
“Save your devil’s deal.” Crimson snarled. “You lost any chance of getting my co-operation when you killed my mother, and my Uncle.”
Gaul cocked an eyebrow before looking to Gale, and jerking his chin towards Crimson.
That single motion set off a torrent of Hounds leaping through the ranks of Storm Guards, the guards being knocked aside by the rabid horde. 
The survivors braced themselves for the end, with Crimson raising his tired arms and the sword clutched in his fingers, hoping to take out at least one last foe before death swallowed them all. 
Death did not come. 
A burst of light from below revealed a form that flashed between the ponies and their rescuer, a form who in turn rescued them, blood streaming from a cut on her head, as the Princess of the Night and a small posse of thestrals sped through them and into the crowd of Jotuns and Hounds. Luna’s scythe slashed amid the tumult, her roar of anger and outrage actually getting Gaul to visibly cower for just a moment, the mare cutting down swathes of his troops while screaming her fury like a banshee, some terrifying spectre of death. 
Luna whirled about, slicing a pair of Jotun’s to ribbons as they attempted to flee from her, then a trio of Hounds as they bolted for the escapee’s. 
It was enough for the King to recover, then bark out a few orders. The Jotuns and Hounds turned their attention from the new force, and back to the escapees, trying to force their way to the tired group. 
Seeing this, Luna snapped some orders of her own, the Thestrals turning to sweep those who could not fly off of their feet before all diving over the edge, their leathery wings tucked close as they fell in single file. Crimson found himself caught by strong hooves, and pulled sharply towards the edge. He tried to resist, but a second pair swept his legs and he fell, tumbling over the edge as leathery wings snapped open seconds after his carrier cleared the bottom of the Citadel. 
Crimson yelled for the Princess, his words swept away on the wind as he caught sight of her on the edge of the platform he had just departed. She was barely standing, the bluster and fury gone now that the entirety of the Jotun and Hound forces had been focused on her. He lost sight of her then, but as his thestral soared away, he saw a flash of light, and the world seemed to tremble. 


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As she saw their friends approaching, Celestia smiled, starting forward to greet them. 
As she did, she felt a terrible cold pass over her, and a nameless, bottomless cavern of fear open in the pit of her heart. Twilight stopped just ahead of her, her eyes wide and her muscles rigid, but it was Static’s reaction that was perhaps more telling. The Knight of Luna stopped, lip trembling as she reached into her clothes, withdrawing a small, silvery disk, hanging next to a small crystal heart, not dissimilar to the one hanging around Fluttershy’s neck. The silvery disk was embossed with Luna’s mark, the bright moon on a background of darker metal. Ever since Luna had given the amulet to Static, it had always glowed faintly with a sliver of it’s maker’s power.
But now it was shining brightly, a small star in the frog of the Pegasi’s hoof. 
Celestia’s already wide eyes started to brim with tears, while Static looked up at her, her mane already starting to shift and wave in a nonexistent breeze. 
The reunited friends found they had no words, instead reaching out to comfort each other. 


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The shattered and broken mountains that had once held Homestead lay behind them, a small band of guards and escaped prisoners, mixed with the incredibly few survivors they had been able to pull from the rubble. 
The Citadel had left already, nothing more than a smear of brown stone floating miles away. The injured had been bundled onto whatever ramshackle stretchers or bits of metal plate or cloth could be found, many of the Architects still regarding the ponies in terror, not understanding why the creatures that had long been held up as their enemy, were helping them. 
Crimson worked were he could, offering assistance to the medics tend to the wounded before they were lifted or otherwise moved onto the transports they had devised. Luna had led hundred of ponies here, but most had been left on the ground while the Thestrals and their Princess had rushed to the citadel once they realized that Crimson and the others were up there. 
Only three of the Thestrals that had stayed to aid their Princess had survived, and only one was able to walk. 
They worked diligently, setting up shelter and campfires once night drew closer. No one really knew what to do without the Princess, and so they floundered. The dragons, High and Low, spent as little time recovering from their imprisonment as possible, instead choosing to haul as many injured into the rapidly assembled medical tent as possible. Their scales still gleamed through the sand, glad to have a purpose again. In fact, the Friendship Guard, who had been suffering in cages for months, seemed oddly resolved and bolstered, by their awful experiences. 
Crimson watched his squad with more than a little pride, as Greer and Gauss flew in with fresh supplies from the last encampment that Luna’s band had made before reaching Homestead. Autumn and Spinnerette, the Changeling, quickly and efficiently sorted through the supplies once they were brought down. Crimson himself was directing the setup of the camps each day, and dictating the pace of the march. 
“Sir, you should take some time to rest. Your wounds aren’t healed yet, and none of us have treated you.” One of the doctors pestered him, but he waved the stallion off with a slight frown. 
“When everyone is safe, I’ll rest.”
“You’ll die before then if you don’t take care of yourself!” The doctor snapped. 
“I said I’m-”
“In dire need of sleep.” Crimson’s head snapped up, and he pivoted on the spot as he saw who it was that spoke. 
“Sir! Captain True Shot, Sir!” 
The red coated stallion nodded his head before giving his command. “At ease, Crimson.” 
Crimson let his posture relax….a little. 
“I understand you were recovered from Canterlot by the enemy, unpetrified and tortured for information, son?” True Shot asked, his voice hard, as expected of a Captain of the guard, but a note of sympathy lingered under the stallion’s stoic edge. “You look half dead yourself. Get this soldier inside that tent, and don’t let him out until he’s actually recovered.” That he directed at the medic, who smirked up at Crimson, who ignored him. 
“I can stay and help, sir.”
“You’ve helped enough already, guardsmen. Recuperate and report to me once you can stand without trembling.”
“I’m not-” Crimson looked down at his legs, to see that his muscles were indeed straining to keep him standing. “Ah… at once, sir.” 
“Good. I’ll leave you to it. I have to keep this lot from collapsing over themselves now that you aren’t in charge.”


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The ponies and their friends sat in Capper’s suite, the setting sun streaming light through the gaps in the buildings wooden walls, creating  strips of light and shadow that fell across all fourteen of the faces sat inside the tower room. The soft grinding of the gears throughout the structure was accompanied by the whistling of the wind, the smattering of the dimming light resting heavily on all of them. 
The fifteenth pony sat outside, watching the sun pass beneath the horizon. Her eyes and pearly white horn lit up, glowing a brilliant electric blue, and with a shudder, the moon lazily listed and swung up into the sky, the new pony controlling it unfamiliar with the power in her grasp, and the object she now held dominion over. Once it was firmly in the sky, she sat back on her haunches, and looked up at the orb, before flexing that power again. 
The mare in the moon had not been seen in almost eleven years, but it rose again this night, seeming now a thing of beauty and majesty, rather than a deep, terrible shadow. A fitting tribute, the new ruler of the moon thought. 
She stood, her hooves clacking against the wooden boards as she crossed the threshold of the windmill and entered the room her friends now occupied. The fierce blue eyes narrowed, partially hidden by her mane as she unrolled a map, spreading it over the table the others were sat around, before she sat down, mane flickering with stars and eyes cold as iron. Her bronze coat was now a deep brown, it’s luster lost. Her teeth were sharp, her wings half feathered and half bat-like. Her black pupils were slits, and her eyes blazed with angry, roiling magical energy. On her breast lay the pendant of the moon, now dulled back to it’s old shine, it’s magic now filling the creature wearing it..
“Shall we begin?” Static asked.


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