The breathless silence was broken by Flurry Heart, taking a few trepidatious steps forward toward the door, “What did you just say Private?”
The Private takes a hard, heavy swallow, nodding a few times as his body shivers. “Shadow, Captain Flurry. King Sombra.”
Ah, it was a name, not the word ‘shadow.’ Things like that did have a way of tripping up the translation matrix sometimes. But then, the question was, “Who is King Sombra?”
Every head in the room swung toward him as fast as they could, each face adorned with varying levels of shock or incredulity. Except for Princess Twilight, who looked equal measures annoyed and angry.
“For Celestia’s sake don’t tell me Sombra is pulling a Nightmare Moon already, it hasn’t even been 50 years yet!” She yelled, a few strands of her mane sticking up at odd angles.
“Twilight,” Cadance began and made an odd motion with one of her forelegs, pressing her fetlock to her barrel and then moved her hoof back and forth away from herself, “I know this is a stressful situation, but as a Princess you can’t let yourself go like that.”
Twilight copied Cadance’s motion, breathing in through her nose and out through her mouth. “Right, sorry Cadance.” She took one more big breath, letting her barrel puff out as she inhaled through her nose, and then exhaled slowly, while every other member of royalty in the room moved toward the guard to get more information. “To answer your question, King Sombra was the dictator of the Crystal Empire before he was deposed in favour of Cadance and Shining. We thought he was destroyed by the power of the Crystal Heart, but he must have survived.”
“An undead dictator coming back for his throne then?”
“Probably. And if he’s able to come back from the dead like that, there’s no telling what he could do if he is able to gather a slave army.”
The Doctor paused for a moment, his expression turning from neutral curiosity to dour anger. “A slave army?”
Twilight nodded sadly, “Yes. I’ve seen it myself, if he’s able to brainwash the citizens of the Crystal Empire like he did then and raise an army, he’d be able to beat Equetria’s army, and destroy Equestrian society as we know it.” She takes another few breaths, repeating that same motion from earlier. When she calmed herself again, she looked startled when she opened her eyes and remembered she was talking to someone. “Not to worry you, or anything.”
“Twilight.” Cadance called from across the room, waving for Twilight to join her as the guard departed back through the door he came in. They were probably planning something, but the Doctor wasn’t able to listen in.
As Twilight joined Cadance and Shining, Flurry broke away and walked toward the Doctor. As she neared she craned her neck around and lowered her voice to a whisper. “Alright, let’s not disturb their little meeting, we’ll go out through the kitchen so we can start getting you to your ship.”
She didn’t stop for him and kept going toward the kitchen, so he followed just behind and beside her. Though they were both stopped when Cadance spoke from across the room, just a bit louder than was strictly needed to carry her voice across the room. “Flurry, where are you going.”
Flurry groaned under her breath, and then muttered something that sounded strikingly like an expletive before turning to her mother. “As the duly appointed Captain of the Crystal Scouting Corps, I was given a directive and thus do fully intend to execute the duties of my station faithfully and with zeal, Ma’am.” She recited, projecting her voice and even saluting as she said ma’am. And then she rushed to turn around and put her saluting hoof on the door into the kitchen. She only had the time to push the door open a few inches before a sparkling, baby blue aura surrounded her body.
“That guard speak your father taught you won’t work this time Flurry. King Sombra is out there, the Scouting Corps isn’t equipped or prepared for something like that. It’s not safe for you to be out there, let alone your guards.”
“It’s just an escort mission mom, the chances we run into Sombra without looking for him are low. Besides, what I said is technically true. You gave the Captain of the Scouting Corps an order.” Flurry reacts, tilting her head down just a bit so she could be sure of her footing- hoofing?- when her mother lowered her back down.
“And I could just as easily change that order. In fact,” Cadance starts, her eyes narrowing just a bit, tensioned nerves tainting her voice with annoyance and possibly even anger, “I order ‘the Captain of the Scouting Corps’ to stay within the walls of the castle whenever a threat deemed to be beyond the scale of the Scouting Corps’ capabilities to handle with or without the aid of the guard at large by the Prince or Princess of the Crystal Empire is within the immediate vicinity to it. Can the Captain of the Scouting Corps follow those orders?”
The Doctor could practically see the pent up emotions falling out of her mouth, almost feeling the bite that comes with the emphasis on the word Princess. At least Flurry doesn’t seem to be affected, simply saluting once more. Though, she hits the floor with a bit of oomph when she puts her hoof back down. “That order seems simple, Ma’am.”
Flurry turns around and lowers her head, her voice similarly turning down to a whisper. “Come on, at the very least we can start getting you fitted for a coat for later.” She leads the Doctor through the kitchen door, her magic lighting up the door for a second to push it inward.
As the two disappear between the closed door, Shining walks up to Cadance’s side from behind, gently placing a hoof on her back. “I know Flurry worries you sometimes Cadance, but I think you were a bit hard on her.”
Cadance takes a minute to think it over and then sighs and deflates, looking down toward the floor tiles. “You’re right, I just thought she’d grow out of it by now. She’s going to take over this Empire from you and me one day, and she’s way behind Twilight. Twilight was almost half her age before she became a Princess, and all Flurry knows is guard protocols and combat and defensive magic. I’m afraid she’ll turn out like-”
Shining silenced that line of thought by moving closer to her, pressing his side against her’s and nuzzling along the length of her neck. “She won’t Cadance. Even if she takes a while to grow into the whole Princess thing, you’ve always been a great mother to her. She won’t turn out like that.”
Flurry led the Doctor through the kitchen without a word, ignoring the sideways glances of the kitchen staff as she weaved through their chaotic cooking line with grace and ease, the Doctor only able to keep out of the way by practically gluing himself to the end of her tail.
When she led him out of a side door and into another series of crystal halls, he was able to walk up beside her and see her face. It wasn’t the most important thing for him to do, but he was worried about her emotional state after her mother spoke to her like that, and he could at least look and see if she was frowning, had wet eyes or something like that without slowing down, so why not?
But, instead of anything like that, she was smirking. Why would she be smirking, she got told off, her mission canceled, and put on the back benches. He knew her type, stern, head-strong military type with authority issues. He’d expert shouting, cursing, disobedience of the highest order, why would she, as a Captain, be so smirk-y right now- Oh…
He peaked side long at Flurry again, thinking about it for another minute, and then smirked back as he noticed Flurry glancing back. This caused her smirk to grow, and her eyes to twinkle with mischievous flare. Oh, she knew he knew. “What’s so funny, Doctor?”
“Oh, you are a bit of a clever one, aren’t you Flurry?” He replied, making Flurry’s grin open up to a toothy smile.
“Me? Well, I suppose I am. But whatever are you talking about, Doctor? I just got the Captain of the Scouting Corps wrapped up in my mother’s red tape. Hardly seems very clever to me.”
“Yes you did Flurry Heart, you did get the Captain into a new layer of bureaucracy. And with great purpose, I assume.”
Flurry couldn't help but laugh this time, reaching up and polishing a random spot on her armour with her fetlock. “Well, I can’t really brag, I came up with this idea forever ago and have been saving it for a rainy day. Seemed perfect for when it’s hailing sideways like this.”
“I can’t disagree, but why not let me in on the grift, I haven’t figured it all out just yet.”
“Well, when I asked to be in charge of my own little division of the guard and be a Captain like my dad used to be, my parents were worried about me not being able to handle the stress. So when they formed the Scouting Corps for me, they put a few lines in the fine print that said I can do something a little bit like this.” Flurry turned on a dime, heading into a room through a door with an ornate silver plaque that said ‘Scouting Corps Officer Rec Room.’ Assuming being with the head of their whole outfit was enough of a guest pass, he wasn’t far behind.
The room was relatively bare and boring, a coffee table covered in magazines, he could imagine they were all years old and had the shipping information in the corner of the cover snipped off, two couches facing said table, a counter and cabinet along one wall with a mini-fridge, a coffee maker, and a microwave, a few vending machines on the opposite wall, and then a little round table with four chairs that took up the space along the rest of the wall. And there were a few ponies, mostly unicorns and pegasi with two wingless and hornless ones mixed in, but the only important one at the moment was a transparent light blue crystalline unicorn mare Flurry walked up to immediately as she was poking and prodding through the fridge.
“Aqua Marine, at attention.” Flurry said, going back to her authoritative, projective voice.
The unicorn stood up straight as a card and turned toward Flurry, saluting so fast the Doctor couldn’t even see her leg moving up for it. “Lieutenant Aqua Marine, at your attention, Ma’am!”
Flurry returns her own quick salute, and then replies in her normal voice, “At ease Lieutenant. Lieutenant Aqua Marine, it is in the best interest of the Crystal Empire and my own self interests that I renounce my title as Captain of the Scouting Corps, and thereafter grant you both the honour and the privilege of taking up my mantle, with all the responsibility it carries. Do you accept this title, and therefore swear to protect your charges, and lead them with distinction and honour, in the name of the Crystal Empire?”
“Flurry Heart, I do accept this honourable title you grant me, and thank you for the faith you must hold in me to entrust me with this great honour. In the name of the Crystal Empire, I do solemnly swear to protect my charges, and lead them with distinction and honour.” Aqua replied, almost droning it out as if it hardly mattered.
Both of them said these things with such a calm air, which itself was surprising, but it was almost unbelievable he was hearing that from Flurry. From the few minutes he knew her, she seemed to hold such a great stake in her title as Captain that she was all but renouncing her royal title for it, which he must assume came with no lack of great benefits. So why would she give it up so easily, and why would the other mare hardly react? It hardly made sense.
“Good, now Aqua I need you to prepare a squad as quickly as you possibly can. Also, you can’t come.” Flurry said, quickly turning and rushing out the door. Ah, running, his favourite pastime. He and Aqua sped off after her, making sure they were right by her side in a moment.
“Why can’t I come, what’s the mission?” Aqua asked, flicking her view in between the hall in front of her and Flurry every so often so they could talk.
“We’re going to escort this stallion here back to his crashed airship.” Flurry replied, keeping her eyes right forward, and nodding toward the Doctor as she mentioned him.
“And why can’t I go with you? And more importantly, why did you need to pull out your trump card to get it done?”
“My mom just put forth an edict that the Captain of the Scouting Corps can’t leave the castle if Sombra is outside, basically.”
“But Sombra is dead.”
“Don’t tell anypony, but that might not be strictly true anymore.”
Aqua took the news in rather good stride, only tripping over herself for a second before she broke into a hard sprint, perhaps a gallop as it were, speeding ahead of the Doctor and Flurry and out of sight as she rounded a corner ahead of them.
The Doctor moved over to her other side, taking up the space where Aqua had been. It seemed to be more clear of obstacles that side, and he may have been knocking furniture and crystalline servants before then. Maybe not servants, that Aqua was a crystal being too, and she seemed respected. And that was an officer longue, and they were all made of crystal too. The thought brought his earlier pondering right back to the forefront of his mind as he followed Flurry through the castle’s hall. Slaves they obviously were not, nor were they simple near mindless constructs. The ruling caste obviously placed trust in them, and the crystal constructs didn’t seem to hold any kind of hostility or animosity to them. Maybe they were like the janissaries and raised from a young age, too young to grow those feelings? But that seemed like an awful lot of work just for servile maids. Maybe they were like House Elves and enjoyed their slavery, but beings like that probably wouldn’t be used for war. He was once again torn away from the prodding question as Flurry turned ahead of him, snapping him out of his thoughts.
Somewhere along the way, the hallways turned from decorated pathways to Spartan ones. The lights lining the walls were torches hung near the roof with ugly metal sconces, and the carpet was done away, leaving on the smoothed crystal floor, and the tables and plants were gone as well, leaving the area empty and soulless. This was definitely where the rank and file of their not-a-military military worked.
He turned to the right and followed Flurry through the door, ignoring whatever the placard on the front said. The room was lined on one side with lockers with little cutouts for paper inserts, each one no doubt bearing the name of one of the grunts in the room, a long wooden bench running right down the middle of the room, and on the other were little wooden cubbies filled with what he would assume was their standard gear. Thick whitish-pinkish coats with fur hoods and sleeves, big heavy looking rucksacks, Native Canadian looking snow goggles, and a trapper hat, slash ear flap, slash ushanka type cap. He got to see the kit both on and off, and in the various stages in between as the room was alive with various crystal ponies rushing themselves into it, with a few cubbies at the end left ignored, probably some spares.
Flurry extended one of her wings and placed it against the Doctor’s back, keeping him close as she guided him through the swarm of ponies rushing back and forth between their lockers and the bench, or the cubbies and the bench, or even hopping right over the bench to get from the lockers and the cubbies, or vice versa. He would have called it complete chaos, but things seemed to be moving at a remarkable case for chaos, and Flurry was able to make her way through with surprising ease, stopping, starting, turning, and ducking exactly when she needed to. So either she was just very perceptive, or there was some kind of method to the madness. He chose to believe the latter, as it made him feel a bit better about the competence they might or might not have.
When she got him to the other end of the room, she curled her wings back against her back, and pointed at one of the untouched cubbies at the end of them. She quickly grabs up the coat, goggles, and hat and toss them at the Doctor, each one bouncing off his barrel onto the floor one after the other. “Jump into those, quickly now. Can’t risk mom or Shining Armour finding out about my trick before we’re outside.”
Finding her advice to be sound, he quickly starts stuffing himself into the too-large coat. By the time he was pulling the zipper up over his barrel he noticed how easy it was to do, when he was somewhat expecting it to be a chore to figure out. He could only guess that he was up to pick up walking and using his hooves so easily was just part of the regeneration process, the mind picking up the kind of things you don’t even think about doing like walking, breathing and using hands when you finish regenerating, but no one ever noticed because no other Timelord ever managed to regenerate into a horse.
By the time he was done thinking about it, the hat was on his head, flaps loosely bouncing around the side of his head, and the goggles were flipped up over his forehead… How were these staying on actually, his ears are on the top of his head, so there's nothing for them to… Probably best not to think about it.
He looks around, the room significantly calmer now the troops, or guard as they were supposedly called, standing in two rows beside the bench looking toward Aqua and Flurry at the far end of the room. He makes his way over, moving past one row of guardsponies and occasionally brushing against one as he made his way to Flurry, taking up next to her side as Aqua started to announce their mission to the guards. Scouting mission this, crashed ship that, he knew about it all already, so he took a sidelong glance at Flurry. She was grinning again, practically oozing confidence and excitement. She was very cocky, and he kind of admired that in her. It reminded him of someone, someone deep in the back of brain, someone he just couldn’t quite recall. Someone very important, he could remember that much.
He did wonder how far that cockyness would get her, she did just give up her position as the head of the Scouting Corps, and her position in the aristocracy seemed strained to say the very least. What could her plan possibly be to come out of this on top. He ruminated on that as Aqua Marine finished briefing the guard, and Flurry took over as she started to lead them from the castle, The Doctor unconsciously following in her trail.