//------------------------------// // Chapter 31 // Story: Hegira: Rising Omega // by Guardian_Gryphon //------------------------------// Earth Calendar: 2117 Equestrian Calendar: 15 AC (After Contact) December 15th, Gregorian Calendar General Norris sighed, and shook her head, glaring down at her hooves and willing them to behave the way she wanted. Stupid bucking...  *Fucking* hooves.  Damn.  The Pony brain really liked it's 'what the hay's' and 'bucking dear sweet Celestia's.'  Norris felt like she was fighting a war on five fronts just to even summon anything resembling a real killing aggression. Requiem tossed her vibrant orange mane, in that insufferably practiced way that Norris had quickly grown to hate, and once again lashed out with her own front hooves as a demonstration.  The hidden ceramic blades were almost invisible throughout the entire maneuver.  Norris only caught sight of them because it was the four dozenth time she'd seen the display of prowess, easily. The ballistics-gel dummy sagged as a significant portion of its chest cavity was savaged. Norris shut her eyes tightly, concentrating hard, until she felt the telltale electric tingling sensation across her skin, and the sudden micro-momentary loss, then reappearance, of a sense of self, and balance. She opened her eyes to see her familiar Human hands, clenching and unclenching them to relieve stress as she began to pace frustratedly around the training arena's padded perimeter wall. As she ranted aloud, she focused on the cadence of her steps, readjusting to the familiar balance of a bipedal stance.  She refused to admit it aloud, but Norris always experienced a microsecond of terror during the transformations that the gem in her throat somehow miraculously enabled. Would she be able to get back everything she was? Would she make it in one piece, going in either direction? What if something disrupted the spell contained within the gem while it was in the middle of rearranging her very being at a subatomic level? "This is pointless.  I've trained for decades to fight, and kill, with *HANDS!*  The Diamond Dog form is much closer to familiar, and it at least has the common decency to get with the fucking program when I want to kill something.  How the hell you expect me to do anything with those damn hooves, with that *god-damn* passivity instinct choking my brain half to death, is beyond me." Norris relished the ability to spout off invectives in the casual, familiar, comforting way that military life so often cultivated.  A thought struck her as she glanced back at what was left of the practice dummy, and she rounded on the little red Unicorn who had become her trainer and tormenter, at Lindstrom's insistence. "And just how in the hell are *you* managing this so easily?  You fight with every weapon in this room...  Hoofblades front and back, crossbows, throwing knives, spears, swords...  Like you've been doing it for your whole life.  I've seen Ponies with the gumption to kill.  Hell, I've seen Unicorns fire RACs just as easily as you fired that crossbow... But never a Pony who *relished* it.  Like you do." Norris leaned over Requiem's head to try and instill some intimidation, and instantly regretted it. Dammit...  That Unicorn's smile was frightening.  No other word for it, much as Norris hated to admit it.  She straightened up reflexively as a similarly predatory note entered into Requiem's voice, her response sounding more like the sort of thing Norris would have expected from a Gryphon, or a Dragon. "What part of this do you not understand?  I *kill people* dear.  It's my career of choice.  Just like yours..." Norris grimmaced as Requiem brushed past her, flicking the General's leg coyly with her tail on the way to the training chamber's door. "...Well no, I suppose not much like yours, actually.  You sit at a desk and dispatch warheads to swat a fly.  I kill with more grace, precision...  And..." The way Requiem glanced over her shoulder as she delivered the final word ignited a fiery hatred in Norris.  Along with an opposing ice cold sense of fear. "...Style." As the Unicorn plied the door's control pad with her magic, she tossed her mane again, adopting a faux disinterested tone. "As to why you can't go back to the Diamond Dog?  Well.  Not everyone can be a 'lone wolf' the way Korvan can.  Easier to break the passivity instinct of a Pony than the pack instinct of a Dog, as you've experienced for yourself.  Twice now.  And I think we both know that we both look *much* better as Ponies, than as Dogs.  More approachable." Norris folded her arms and glowered as Requiem exited the arena, Lindstrom making his way in as soon as she had cleared the doorway. The Councilor raised an eyebrow, and jerked his head over his shoulder. "Finding her to be a little frustrating?" The General threw up her hands, and shook her head.  She hated to accept it, but Requiem was absolutely right.  As usual.  A Pony was much more approachable than a Diamond Dog.  A much better form for intelligence gathering, targeted assassinations, and thieving, when travelling in Equestria. Norris restrained her tone, and the content of her words.  The last thing she wanted was to appear weak in front of Lindstrom.  It had become frighteningly apparent, very quickly, that he ran the EarthGov continuity Project with a velvet coated iron fist. And as much as she struggled to trust anyone she had met so far in the ECP, Lindstrom included, Norris had been forced to admit, both aloud, and to herself, that their goals were admirable.  The briefing packet had laid it all out in a way that somehow managed to succinctly and brilliantly enumerate everything wrong with the way the HLF had been going about things for years, in under ten thousand words. "Somewhat.  Nothing I haven't handled before.  The primary issue is the Equine instincts.  I can't believe people take the serum willingly.  The aversion to violence is *insufferable.*  Almost makes me want to try being a Gryphon.  At least they have the appetite for blood." Lindstrom nodded, and spread his hands in one of the hypnotic 'be at ease' gestures Norris had begun to peg as his trademark, matching the gesture with the register of his voice. "Requiem has a valid point.  Not only are Ponies more approachable than any other species, but though the instincts of Ponies may be strong, they are not unbreakable.  They can be molded, or shattered entirely, based on your will.  With Diamond Dogs it is...  different.  Dragons too.  Far too risky until you've had the time to complete the five month assessment and training regimen.  Gryphons..." The Councilor chuckled darkly, and shook his head.  When Norris cocked her head in curiosity, he snorted, and gave a wave-off gesture with his hand, as he finally put words to an explanation. "Gryphon forms don't work with the Siren Gems.  We know.  We've tried.  It almost cost us the program.  You can turn into one...  But then you can't ever turn back.  If you survive the imposition of their programmed ethics.  And the shattering of the gem." Lindstrom chuckled dryly again.  The sound conjured the same bile inducing feelings for Norris as the predatory smile on Requiem's face had.  The Councilor's words were equally disquieting, though not at all surprising, based on Norris' experiences. "Of our thirty test candidates, seven were incinerated because their... Well their soul, for lack of a better term, was incompatible with being a Gryphon.  If you've never seen that process, it will very swiftly make you reconsider Gryphons in their entirety.  Their morality-lock is not a figment of culture, nor imagination, training, or instinct.  It is an absolute and irrevocable component of their base nature.  It defines the sphere of their free will.  They can not defy it, and live." Norris blinked, and stared, trying to come to grips with the idea of something being stronger than the horrific white hot needlepoints of the Diamond Dog pack instinct.  The horror of that experience had been so intense that she'd reverted to her Human form within just five seconds, reflexively.  The second attempt she had done moderately better.   She'd made it to eleven seconds. Lindstrom shrugged, and threw up his hands. "Of those who found they could live with it, another twenty one died when their gems shattered explosively, killing them mid-transformation.  Small imperfections in the crystalline structure that would have been no issue otherwise..."  Something about the way he dismissively rendered the explanation for twenty one deaths in such cold, calculating terms left Norris feeling even more queasy.  His next words were even less reassuring. "The two who survived to functionality?  Their new ethics-failsafe drove them to fight us.  They killed a hundred and thirty six of ECP's best armored Human troopers, and a half dozen of our most experienced Diamond Dog mercenaries.  Completely unarmed except for the built-in sharp edges and blunt surfaces.  Completely unarmored." The General closed her eyes briefly and suppressed a reflexive shiver.  She'd come within minutes of being delivered over to those feathered freaks... "We had to blow up the building they were in, and everyone else who was in it at the time, with a gunship-launched cruise missile.  To stop them from betraying the program outright to the world.  All told we lost over two hundred fifty people to that little...  Fishing expedition." Norris opened her eyes, and Lindstrom's were there to meet her gaze with a steely expression that left even less room for argument than his tone, as it dipped into a timbre Norris hadn't yet heard him use regularly. "So, no.  We do not provide a Gryphon pattern in the gems we issue.  We also strongly suggest you not acquire one, nor try to experiment with the idea.  We also do not provide Draconic patterns at the outset, for reasons you are, I'm sure, intimately familiar with.  We learned many lessons from the HLF's use of gone-wild Converts.  We impose an even stricter training and filtering regimen than the Conversion Bureaus do before we allow access to that kind of...  Power." Norris shook her head, and rubbed at her brow in frustration.  Looking up into the middle distance as the enormity of what they were fighting against came rushing back in like a flood.  She managed to keep defeat, and exhaustion, out of her tone, at the very least. "We've got a hell of a fight on our hands, Cam.  Now, and in the future.  We're gonna be sorely disappointed if we have to rely on Pony forms for the majority of our defensive cordon in the years post-Earth." Lindstrom folded his arms, and pierced Norris with a quizzical, analytical stare, before gesturing towards the door with his head. "I want to show you something.  I think you'll find it...  Encouraging.  And illuminating." The pair walked in silence for the better part of fifteen minutes.  Norris spent the time observing her surroundings, all the while unable to shake the overwhelming sense that Lindstrom was in turn observing her. She hadn't been allowed to see very much of the facility in the short time she'd been there, and the journey took the General very quickly into areas that she hadn't seen before.  It did not take long to realize that the base was far larger, and had by far a larger resource pool, than Norris had first guessed. The corridors, some small as a battleship hallway, others as vast as an aircraft hangar, were filled with Humans, Ponies, and Diamond Dogs, a few with gems like her own embedded in their throats, but many without. Noticing a particular quirk of her expression as she watched a pair of Pegasi dart past, hauling a munitions cart betwixt them, Councilor Lindstrom grinned, and inclined his head, proffering a brief explanation. "Not everyone will be receiving a Siren Gem.  They are...  Expensive.  To create.  We all have to leave the Human shape behind someday.  Soon.  Hopefully not forever.  But potentially.  That being said?  Almost every non-Human here is a Convert.  We're trying to preserve the EarthGov, and Human society.  Not necessarily the Human shape.  Plenty of Converts understand the practical limitations of our future, but have no desire to live outside the guarantees of the EarthGov constitution." Several more minutes of silent walking ensued, during which Norris noted that the corridors seemed to be getting larger and larger.  And the air more and more moist, and cold. At last, the pair rounded a corner so wide at its apex that three cargo trains could have driven through it abreast, and Norris beheld a sight that was at once both encouraging, as Lindstrom had hypothesized, and somehow both revelatory, and baffling in equal measure. The Councilor and the General found themselves standing on the threshold of a chamber cut from solid granite, two hundred stories high, three thousand yards wide, and ten thousand yards long, at least, in Norris' estimation. A series of docks, gantries, and slipways led out into calm, deep blue water.  But it was the immense hulks in between the gantries that seized on the eyes, and the mind, as soon as they came into view. They were clearly ships.  Six naval ships.  Each the size of a JRSF light carrier, at least.   And, judging by their shape, and the texture of the hull plating, and a thousand different subtle design cues, they were Human in design. But something seemed...  Off.  About the way the light bounced off the metal of the hulls and deck, and hatchways. Lindstrom smiled widely, and gestured to the fleet. "What do you think?" Norris furrowed her brow, and the Councilor launched into an explanation without hesitation as the General swept her eyes up and down each hulk in turn, then settled into watching a parade of vehicles, Humans, and Equestrians as they marched up and down one of the side-mounted loading ramps;  Darting in and out of the five story, hundred yard long loading bay cut into the nearest vessel's side with tonnes upon tonnes of crated goods. "They are made entirely of Equestrian steel, iron, wood, copper...  Every single atom of their construction was imported from Equestria as raw ingots, and boards.  Every single atom of the machines that assembled them was also made of imported Equestrian materials, hand assembled inside level ten clean rooms." Lindstrom began to walk towards the nearest slip, and Norris followed in a daze.  The HLF and the EarthGov Army alike had considered what it would take to pull off what the Councilor was talking about...  But they had both believed the science to be five years away, at best. Lindstrom began to speak again, and Norris listened raptly as she gazed up at the gray steel curve of the nearest ship's hull. "They have fully functional onboard computers.  Not quite so fast or powerful as what you might expect to find in the Army...  But within the same weight class.  Working magnetic launch coilguns, and chemical driven mortars.  Heavy duty coal-fired turbine power plants that can keep pace with a fusion generator.  Electric lights, heat, cooling...  Radio.  We finally figured out the necessary insulators.  Or rather, the Genesists did with the help of some enterprising Equestrians, and we...  Borrowed the data." The Councillor finally came to a stop at the slip's railing, and nodded towards the vessel's hull as he continued. "These six will be ready to sail within the month, each loaded with ten thousand Converts and Gem Bearers, food, prefabricated structures, manufacturing tools...  Repeater rifles...  All Barrier-transmissible.  We'll be sending them to the opposite edge of the Barrier than the crossover point.  They'll come through thousands and thousands of miles away from the Equestrian Nation, the Gryphon Kingdoms, and any of their power, influence, and conflicts...  We'll have a dozen more ready before the end of next year.  The seeds of a fully fledged EarthGov Colony." He turned, and raised an eyebrow. "What do you think?" Norris stared at the vessel for a long moment, allowing the enormity of the idea to sink in.  To kindle a fire in her belly that she hadn't truly felt in years.   Lindstrom was no pushover.  No starry-eyed visionary, all talk, and no try...  The ECP was not some pipe-dream, and what she had read in the intake briefing finally made sense as more than just breathless hot air. Norris felt hope rising, like the grin on her face as she finally turned to respond.  If this was what she had to fight for...  Then it would be worth every second of pain, and effort, to put those damn Pony instincts in their rightful place. "I think it's a damn good start." "Status." The way the Major delivered the word inside the cramped confines of the remote control and operations cubicle left the Mission Specialist's ears ringing.  She grimmaced, knowing the dim lighting, and her position surrounded by armature-mounted holoscreens, would hide the visible indicators of her frustration from the Major, if not the Pilot. Her voice remained professional, practiced, and firm. "Vehicle is fueled, and all weapons have been loaded.  Optimal launch window for strike package 'Medea' opens in ten minutes.  Time to weapon delivery on-target, presuming a stealth approach, is twenty minutes from this mark.  Turn-and-burn approach, worst-case, assuming vehicle loss to countermeasures;  Weapons on-target in eleven minutes." The Major nodded, and scanned the compartment's central multisystem display screen with a detached curiosity as he continued belting out orders. "Prepare a stealth approach flight path.  Run final systems state-check." The Mission Specialist's fingers danced over a host of keys and switches, instructions flying from her mind, to the computer displays before her, then across kilometers of fiber optic cable that stretched from the buried shipping container under the Coventry Earthgov Army Airforce Airbase parking lot, all the way to GMCC satellite control servers in London. From there, the signals jumped wirelessly through EAAF's 'Hexagon' SatVision backup system, down to the Orbital Drone secreted in a launch tube buried deep inside Pagon mountain in Brunei. The Malakim's veritable legion of onboard AI responded nearly instantly.  The Mission Specialist read the results aloud as the Pilot silently cross-checked. "Launch rail power-on self-test is nominal.  Impulsive drive system voltage nominal.  Navigation AI reports all GNC systems nominal.  Internal emission sinks power-on self-test is nominal.  Warhead alert lights...  Negative.  All warheads report nominal subsystems self-checks.  Spaceframe and associated structural sensors green across the board.  Malakim is ready." The Pilot nodded, and spoke up immediately as he placed his fingers in readiness over the short-hand command entry keyboard on his chair's left arm. "Confirmed, I have a green board.  Stealth approach flight path entered, taking into account the positions of the SatVision network, and the Shenzhou.  Ready to issue launch command." The Major nodded, and reached into the front of his uniform jacket, extracting a small silvery firing index as he gave his next order. "At this time, please verify your mission orders.  Upon verification of valid mission orders, open the authenticator." The Pilot exchanged a brief glance with the Mission Specialist, then nodded, parroting the command for procedure's sake. "Verify mission orders.  Open authenticator upon confirmation." The Mission Specialist nodded, her pulse rate rising slightly.   EAAF had made them practice a hundred different kinds of drills, a hundred times over, each, never knowing if the situation was real, or even if the Malakim vehicle itself had actually been loaded onto its launch rail. Rumors among the small group of duty-station officers that were read in said that the vehicle hadn't even been certified for flight until very, very recently. In her opinion, this didn't feel like a drill. She snapped open the small red plastic 'biscuit' container that the Major had given her as he entered the control center, the telltale 'CRACK' sound repeating itself as the pilot did the same. She entered the thirty six character alphanumeric sequence into her console, and an amber bar with bold lettering flared to life. "I have a valid Launch-and-Strike Mission Order." The Pilot's words confirmed that he'd gotten the same result.  The Mission Specialist nodded, and grit her teeth. It was real.  They were launching Malakim. "I agree." The Pilot nodded, and entered another command sequence as he spoke once more. "Unlock Authenticator." The Mission Specialist began to type her own Authenticator unlock code from memory, barely remembering to repeat the order for confirmation's sake.  Most of her energy was spent keeping her hands from shaking. "Entering unlock code for Authenticator pad." At the final keystroke, the control center's lighting dimmed from its already dark aspect to outright blackness, with only the red-shifted keyboard backlights, floor navigation lighting, and display screens to illuminate the space. A soft but insistent alarm began to sound as a biometric denial and authentication pad snapped out of a compartment in the console between the two control station chairs. The Major stepped forward and inserted his firing index into the proffered slot, pinching it with his thumb and forefinger to allow it to sample his DNA as he entered a numeric authenticator sequence on the pad's 0-9 keys, and spoke a passphrase aloud. "Major Lionel Aulrich.  EAAF golf kilo two sierra nine eight five.  Day Word;  Cottonmouth.  Command Word;  Trinity.  Action Word;  Jericho." An insistent tri-tone sounded, and the control center's main AI responded aloud in a piercing genderless montone. "Authentication accepted for launch.  Verify final strike package authorization pass-phrase, and code sequence, for Medea contingency target package." Major Aulrich folded his hands behind his back, and began to recite the required lines of poetry from memory.  The Mission Specialist winced as an overwhelming feeling of dread began creeping up the base of her spine. "Because I could not stop for Death, He kindly stopped for me.  The Carriage held but just Ourselves, and Immortality." The words 'ACCEPTED - ENTER SECONDARY NUMERIC SEQUENCE' flashed on screen. "Eight.  One.  Five." 'ACCEPTED - ENTER FINAL ACTION WORD' "Gabriel." The Mission Specialist winced as her main status board began to light up with pre-launch indicators, and the control center AI spoke one final time. "Malakim launch sequence initiated.  Liftoff in T-Minus eight minutes, mark.  Commit-phase positive control point in T-Minus twelve minutes, mark." In a perfectly timed computerized ballet of machinery, hydraulic rams raised the Malakim vehicle from its horizontal loading and fuelling position, into a locked vertical position against the magnetic catapult launch rails. The dull jaw-rattling thrum of impulsive drive engines spooling up began to fill the concrete cylinder of the launch silo, accented visually by amber warning strobes, and auditorily by a klaxon, both of which were mostly unnecessary. Though designed so that living personnel could inspect the facility, the launch tube, storage rack, and fuelling bay were maintained, and operated entirely by AI driven armatures and machinery. A silent countdown cycled through to completion, and the electromagnetic launch rail fired without further ado.  The silo cover retracted with only a tenth of a second to spare, blown backwards by explosive bolts as Malakim soared upwards first on the momentum of a rail launch, and then increasingly on the power of an impulsive drive thruster. Not a single living thing stood on the slopes of Mount Pagon to witness the ascent of the matte black vessel, and its cargo of death. Earth Calendar: 2117 Equestrian Calendar: 15 AC (After Contact) Twelfth Month, Fifteenth Day, Celestial Calendar Fyrenn I took a moment to drink it all in as everyone took their seats around the table.  The room was a beautiful, light, airy, dramatic piece of architecture that perfectly framed a very dark, weighty, dramatic moment. Two Alicorns, two Unicorns, a Pegasus, an Earth Pony, nine Gryphons, five Changelings, and a Dragon.  Twenty one beings, all sat at one enormous round oak table. I felt a sudden pang in my chest.  Since when had I become an Arthurian Knight, sitting in the presence of a Dragon, and five Monarchs from three different species, alongside warriors who would someday soon be legends, if they weren't already? I suddenly felt very out of place. But Sildinar had asked both Neyla and I to sit as representatives under him, along with Kephic and Varan.  The King and Queen had agreed, and who was I to disagree? There was no arguing the point that I had a very close connection to the Nightmare in my own way.  Perhaps the only ones at the table who had a closer tie, and who had known her longer, were Celestia, and Luna.  For obvious reasons. Taranis had agreed, at Luna's request, to sit as a Draconic voice, and the voice of another experienced warrior, though he had no authority to speak for the complex, loose structures that bound various groups of Dragons together. Hutch and Aston were present less as Gryphon representatives, and more as representatives of Earth. Across the table Skye, Carradan, Shining Armor, and a wizened looking Night Guard Earth Pony acted as the Pony representatives under Celestia and Luna. They were good choices, and though I felt that from a place of bias, I could also enumerate practical reasoning.  Skye had direct experience with the Nightmare, and more guts than most of the Day Guard put together.  She also was the only one who knew any kind of spells that might be effective against Wisps, at least, until she could teach others in turn. Luna had asked her to scan every Pony and Changeling participant before they were allowed into the room.  Herself and Luna included. To everyone's relief, there had been no nasty surprises. Stan was probably the bravest and boldest Pegasus alive, and he also provided some representation for Earth.  He also had the benefit of being completely divorced from any Equestrian politics or political persuasions. Shining Armor and the Earth Bat-Pony were both obvious choices, both for their experience, and as a concession to Equestria's more old-guard sensibilities. Beside them sat IJ, with four of her own hoof-picked Changelings, though the gesture was mostly symbolic.  As I understood it, she could consult her entire Hive on any issue, and they could render a perfectly democratic vote in a matter of seconds.  In that sense, her whole Hive was present, yet acting as one, and through one central locus. Not for the first time I found myself wondering what that was like.  Not that I felt as though I'd prefer it to the life I had, but I'd always been the curious sort, and I'd always liked to gain as much understanding as I could for what it was like to live inside a different head. William, Shierel, Alyra, several more of IJ's Changelings, and a small assemblage of both Day and Night Guards sat in hastily assembled seating around the room's perimeter, providing an additional advisory circle that could contribute to the decision process, but wielded no direct representative power. Our whole family, and clan, was in the room, I realized with a small smile, except for Miles.  Alyra was a warrior through and through.  She had seen and heard the worst.  Experienced the bloodiest horrors a being could experience. Miles, on the other claw, was a young Pegasus Convert still trying to rise out of the depths of a very raw trauma.  The last thing he needed was to hear and see the kinds of clinical, callous discussions about life and death that would doubtless be happening at the table. Bill and Shierel hadn't wanted to part with him at first, but Celestia had summoned a pair of Pegasi dressed in outrageous blue and gold flight suits to be his caretakers for the day...  She'd called them 'Wonderbolts,' and assured us all that they were elite acrobatic flyers, and trustworthy guardians. Miles had certainly seemed interested when they started talking about their feats of speed, and style, and seeing him make an effort to come out of his shell, Bill and Shierel had taken a small, but substantial leap of trust. I remembered how it had felt the first time Alyra had gone to school for the day.  I still very occasionally had nightmares about the time E12 had staged a night raid on us, right in the heart of Manhattan, and tried to snuff out her life. It had not been easy to adjust.  But her strength, and character, and excellent common sense, to say nothing of substantial physical prowess, had made it doable.  Prayer and faith had done for the rest. Celestia was the last to seat herself.  Luna remained standing, and I shook myself from my reverie, realizing that she was about to speak. She waited a moment until all eyes were on her, then struck her right hoofguard against the table three times slowly. "As the summoner of these proceedings, I hereby call this session of the Council of War to order." A moment of somber silence passed, and then Luna spoke again, her tone low, somber, and resonant, shifting her eyes to each of us in turn. "You all have some concept of the threat we face, but I will elucidate, so that there are no illusions.  The Nightmare, Queen of the Wisps, and the parasite which once drove me to become Nightmare Moon, has returned." The sense of tension in the air was something I could almost taste.  I'd been in a war room, or CIC more than once when a commanding officer had to deliver bad news, or make a tough judgement call.  The taste of stress, and worry, and fear, was very familiar. "Her kind require our bodies, to escape their eternal torment, and to influence and feel the physical world.  They will stop at nothing to rule all Equestria.  Turn it into a breeding factory, and slave state to service them, and them alone.  All who can not be possessed, or coerced, will be killed.  And it will start with this city." A few murmurs made their way around the outer ring of advisors.  Alyra raised one eyebrow and inclined her head towards Neyla and I, as if to say 'We're in trouble if the Changelings and I are the only steady ones out here in the peanut gallery.' "The Wisps have already breached the Crystal Empire at least once.  Stolen the Elements of Harmony.  We are gathered here to determine how best to now mount a defense.  To win this war.  To save our world.  Each of you have been tested and tried in the fires of war already.  You are, one and all, brave, and loyal, and strong, and true.  We must stand now, as we once did long, long ago.  Together.  And face this darkness..." I could see that more than a few Pony faces bore expressions of shock, and terror.  Not everyone had known about the Elements of Harmony coming into the room.  Luna's words seemed tuned specifically to elicit fear.  I suppose her intent was to ensure everypony took the situation deathly seriously. "...Or we will all be consumed by it." Silence descended again on the room like a soaked blanket.  Filled with lead fishing weights.  I could see plenty of dour faces, but amongst the Gryphons, Changelings, and Taranis, the general sentiment was one of readiness. Amongst the Ponies, the expressions were anything but reassuring. Nonetheless, the Earth Night-Guard raised a hoof, and spoke out, proffering a good question, obvious though the answer might've seemed to some of us, in a voice that had only a tiny hint of hesitation. "We are...  Sure that this city is the Nightmare's first, and primary target?" Skye smacked the table gently with one hoof, and nodded emphatically, answering in a pained, stone-faced monotone. "Absolutely.  No question.  Been in her head.  Seen it.  She's not far off from being ready.  When she is?  She is coming here.  With everything she has." I nodded, and murmured aloud out of force of habit.  I had a tendency to vocalize my inner train of thought aloud sometimes, that had gotten me into worlds and worlds of trouble in the Marines. "It makes logical sense." Looking up, I suddenly found all eyes on me.  Not for the first, nor last time, I was grateful that the red of my feathers could hide a blush excellently at-range.  Luna inclined her head for me to continue. I inhaled deeply, gathering my thoughts into a coherent stream, and then launched into an explanation. "Celestia and Luna, with respect?  You represent one of the greatest threats Nightmare faces.  Without the Elements of Harmony, you two represent the greatest concentration of castable, shapeable magical power in the worlds.  Equestria itself also represents both the stock of bodies they sorely need to conquer the rest of us.  And then...  Earth."  There was nodding all around, and I was glad.  We couldn't take what Skye and I had seen purely at face value.  Logic provided an assurance, together with the way we had surprised her, that what we'd seen was not a fabrication of the Nightmare's, but her real, deadly intent. When no one else moved to speak, I continued, as the last of my thoughts coalesced. "And too...  You are the glue that binds us all together.  Without you, there is far less chance of any alliance between the other military powers of this world." Taranis rumbled deep in his chest, and scratched at one edge of the table absently with an enormous talon, his voice putting a very blunt, inescapable surety to his words in a way that felt as ominous as an approaching thunderhead. "If Canterlot falls, The Royal Sisters fall with it.  If Canterlot falls, Equestria falls.  If Equestria falls, the Wisps will have an army of millions.  If they raise that army..." I grit my beak, my own tone dropping to a bone-shakingly low register as I could not help myself but finish his dark, but very much accurate thought process. "The Wisps will kill us all.  Any that they can't directly infest, or control in some way." No one moved to speak again for a long, long moment.  We were all, the old veterans, and greenhorns alike, busy trying to process the enormity of the foundational concepts we needed to even converse about planning to defend against such a threat. Go on then.  Now is the time.  You know *exactly* what has to happen.  Say it. Now is not the time for fear, especially not in such good company. I grit my beak again, and stood, reflexively placing a claw on my chest and feeling the glass and bronze containment vial hung around my neck, concealed in the feathers and fur. "They are going to come here with an army.  An immense force of bone combat platforms, larger than any single army in this world.  Nightmare will march at its head.  They will have at least three starships for support from above..." That got everyone's attention in a hurry, most especially the Ponies who had heard only rumors of the engagement between the Nightmare's PER elite, and the JRSF.  I forged ahead, the groundwork for my point well laid, if the feel of the room was anything to go by. "There is only one way to win this war.  Face them head on, outright.  Claw to claw.  Beak to muzzle.  Beat 'em in an all out slugging match." I could sense a rising tide of objection, so I slammed one fisted claw into the table to punctuate each word  of the next sentence as I continued making my case, voice growing stronger, and more sure, from adrenaline as much as from actual confidence. "We need every single militarily capable power in this world to fight.  To make a last stand.  Here.  As one single fighting force.  Armed and equipped with the most powerful Human weapon and defensive technology that the forges of every ready and willing city can churn out." I could see all my fellow Gryphons nodding.  IJ, Taranis, Skye, and Stan as well.  Everyone else in the room was busy sharing concerned glances, trying to suss out the implications of mass producing Human weapon technology, and putting it into the claws, paws, horns, and hooves of every single race in the worlds, all at once. Close.  So close.  I needed to hook the doubters.  I decided to play one of my cards out and out. "I have already secured aid from the Genesists, and the JRSF.  They will turn their own personnel and systems towards building manufacturing machinery from Equestrian materials, and armor and weapons in turn using those machines.  If we can secure the aid of the Diamond Dogs, the Zebricans, the Yaks, the smaller tribes of every other race that will stand...  Any Dragons who will rise to the call...  And the Changelings.  All of the Changelings..." I shared a brief meaningful glance with IJ.  God bless her, she nodded once grimly, but firmly.  She understood as much as I did that we'd need every last able bodied fighter drawing breath. "...Then I believe we stand a chance.  And I do not believe we have any other viable path to victory.  We can fight as one, and many will die...  But we might just snatch victory from the abyss, for all future generations."   I shrugged, and moved to sit back down between Neyla and Kephic. "Or we can equivocate, cower, and fracture...  And then we can all suffer the consequences.  Forever.  Your choice." As I sat back down, Kephic clapped me hardily between the shoulderblades, and Neyla smiled, nodded, and planted a brief peck on my cheek. Once more an uneasy silence fell.  I could see a myriad hushed, or even completely silent conversations taking place, not the least of which was an unspoken argument between Celestia and Luna. IJ's voice was the first to break the stalemate, clear, and bright, and confident. "We agree.  We cast all our votes in favor of Fyrenn's plan." I blinked, and dipped my head in a half-nod, half-inclined-bow of thanks, which she returned. Taranis spoke up next, chuckling grimly, and folding his forelegs across his chest. "For whatever it counts, I also agree.  There is no arguing with the simple numerics of war.  We either face the storm...  Or we die in it." Shining armor shared a quick glance with Skye, Stan, and the Night Guard, before nodding, and thumping one hoof against the table. "Equestria, and the Crystal Empire, agree,  We cast our votes in favor." Sildinar rose next, gesturing with one claw and wing as Siidran and Linnea looked on approvingly, nodding all the while. "The Gryphon Kingdoms will cast all our votes in favor.  Victory as one, or not at all." All eyes turned then to Luna, and Celestia.  The latter had her head down, chewing reflexively inside her muzzle as an unconscious attempt to relieve stress as she contemplated.  Luna had her sister fixed with a stare that bore, for the first time I'd ever seen it directed at her, a little bit of anger. At last, Ceelestia sighed deeply, and began to nod slowly. "I fear that we have no choice.  I have no hesitation to support the idea of a unified effort.  But the mass production of Human weapons of war...  Means of killing..." Luna thumped one hoofguard against the table, and spoke out sharply, that hint of anger carrying through into her voice in a way that surprised not just me, but clearly Celestia as well, if her shocked expression was any indication. "Canterlot votes 'yea.'  On both counts.  We can ill afford hesitation now, and we must seize *every* advantage we can." Celestia blinked rapidly for a moment, before finally nodding, demuring fully to her sister's decision in spite of her disagreement for what must have been the first time in a long time for a matter of such magnitude. Once again I found all eyes were drawn to me, and I suppressed the urge to shiver as Luna rose, and gestured to first me, then the table before us. "Very well then, Fyrenn.  Let us have a map rendered on the table for us, and then we shall talk of how best to execute your plan." I nodded, and exhaled slowly through my nares, taking comfort from the expressions of support, love, and pride, that my family were one and all sending in my direction. Warmth swelled in my chest, and along my wings, and I felt hope rise again with it, as it so often did when thinking about them all. We could win this. We had to. I had a very good idea what I'd have to do if we couldn't.  And I hated the idea more than I'd ever hated anything, except perhaps the Nightmare herself. Earth Calendar: 2117 Equestrian Calendar: 15 AC (After Contact) December 15th, Gregorian Calendar Internal reaction wheels were not a common feature of modern spacecraft, of any stripe.   Malakim had four, wound more than tightly enough to provide a variety of possible orientation changes on-orbit without expending any visible bursts of monopropellant, or expelling the heat and exhaust gasses of an impulsive thrust quad. The black and steel-gray spacecraft resembled nothing so much as an old 'Skylon' SSTO, albeit with a more angular, aggressive aspect.  And over twice the size. Powered by shielded supercapacitors charged at ground level, propelled by deeply inset stealthed impulsive drives modified from stolen Genesist designs, coated in proprietary EAAFstealth composites, and venting all of its generated heat into internal emissions sinks, Malakim was completely invisible to all known forms of detection or early warning technology. Even the best detection systems of the EarthGov itself. The vessel did not send nor receive instructions from the ground after launch, bearing only a small passive antenna that would allow it to receive an emergency 'STOP' code, if it was broadcast widebeam from the Hexagon SatArray before Malakim reached its positive control point. Otherwise the spacecraft was loaded and fuelled, launched, and flown, entirely by AI, based on the instructions given at launch time.   It's weapons were fired by AI, and the warheads in turn each held three AI intended to see to their navigation, detonation, and defense against countermeasures respectively. All told, loaded with nearly the maximum complement of Nuclear Ground Strike missiles that it could feasibly carry, Malakim and its payload cost more than an entire staffed and armed JRSF Naval destroyer, and weighed almost one quarter as much again. When the GNC AI determined it was time, Malakim flipped over to point its nose, and four launch tubes, into a retrograde orientation, as the Barrier slowly crested the horizon. The seconds ticked by, and the tactical spaceplane reached its positive control commit point. No broadcast came. The Fire Control AI began its pre-strike checklist automatically. Unlock warhead safeties on missiles on thru twenty four.  Done. Verify optimal stealth strike positioning.  Done. Open torpedo launch tube outer doors...  Done. Finalize Target Selection.  Done. Finalize Time-on-Target Programming.  Done. Issue final Nuclear Mission Order authorization codes to Warhead AIs...   Done. Charge pneumatic low observability launch systems... ...In progress. The twenty four Nuclear ground-strike missiles didn't look especially large, or intimidating next to their delivery vehicle. Each was a 'mere' one point five megaton yield single warhead, wrapped in a foot thick layer of alloy armor, jet black stealth coatings, and copper colored heat abalators;  Shot through with enough electronic countermeasures to knock out a small city's communication grid. The missiles hung over the curvature of the Earth, moving solely on the force of the emission-less pneumatic ejection system that had 'fired' them from two tubes near Malakim's nose, until such time as they reached the upper atmosphere. By then the warheads were already quite spread out.  And moving far too fast to easily intercept, even with railgun fire. Where any number of ballistic missile systems would have been most vulnerable at the apex of their trajectory, Malakim's warheads could be inserted without emissions, or trace signatures, right up until the final moments. Until there was no viable targeting solution for a countermeasure. As twenty four identical solid rocket fuel motors ignited, the missiles accelerated away, and retrograde, on plumes of gray and red gas, quickly reaching velocities that would have pulped them into a plasmatic goop against the atmosphere, if not for their ablative heat shield layers. Twenty four tiny pinpricks of light, as seen from orbit, speeding towards almost invisible silver dewdrops of metal, equidistantly placed to the Barrier. Twenty four Angels of Death, bearing Nuclear fire.