Changeling Internment Camp
December 25, 2011 6:00 P.M. Canterlot Local Time
Near Canterlot, Equestria
Nothing.
If someone were to ask what Love Withdrawal felt like that would be the response: nothing. It wasn’t that it didn’t feel like anything, but more that it was a lack of anything to feel with; a complete emotional void which provided neither motivation nor direction. Only the higher intellect and basest of instincts remained to keep the body moving, searching for something to fill the hole that should not be there.
The Camp, however, was perhaps the most impersonal facility ever constructed. Grey walls, strict schedules, faceless guards, and food that was considered bland and tasteless even by changeling standards converged to sap whatever feeling one might have had beforehoof, such that even the most frugal of hoarders had long since run dry, leaving a race of empty automatons. That was what Queen Chrysalis saw as she gazed indifferently around the communal meal room: robots going through pre-programed motions towards some unreachable end. This is what has become of my people, she mentally stated. They wouldn’t care if they simply dropped dead. They don’t have anything to lose anyway.
At that thought, something happened; something so subtle that she almost didn’t notice. In the abyss of her dysfunctional heart, a dim sensation flickered to life. Initially confused by this new feeling, it took a moment to find a proper name for it amongst the dusty annals of her mind. Pity, she eventually settled on. I’m feeling pity. Pity for my people, obviously, but where could it be coming from? Glancing about briefly, she could spot no guards which she might have unconsciously tapped for power. All she could see was her own subjects, all completely devoid of any emotion which she might have taken. The only other being present was…
Me? But how? Changelings can’t produce their own emotions, can they? Reluctantly, she let a wisp of this new emotion out, intending to follow it back to its source with her magic. Sure enough, it led back into the region of her body that most creatures called the “heart,” but changelings simply called “storage.” Instead of heading back out, however, it delved deeper into the otherwise-empty vaults which were supposed to house her ill-gotten emotions.
She traced the trail farther and farther into herself, only stopping when it disappeared into a wall, an unnatural barrier which stood closed around something deep within her. The barrier, which she had never noticed until now, seemed battered and worn, and she eventually found the crack from which the mystery pity sprang. Now curious, she prodded the seal with her magic, wincing as it crumbled further and let another emotion out through the expanding cracks: anger. Anger at the world that had betrayed her people to this fate, Anger at the ponies that had defeated and imprisoned them, and very quickly, not just anger, but a seething rage and whatever had erected this barrier and condemned her to a life of miserable theft.
Perhaps there was a trickle of joy escaping as well, but Chrysalis couldn’t help be smile as she grabbed hold of this new resource. As any changeling past the age of three months knew, anger, along with fear and love, helped form the emotional trinity, the three most powerful feelings found in mortals. While it was still not as great as love, and by far the most unwieldy of the three, it was far more than enough to tear down this wall.
Redirecting the flow of energy, she slammed it against the seal, shattering it like a glass vase. All at once, emotion filled her. Sorrow, joy, fear, love, and uncountable other feeling sprang into place as though they had always been there. At first she tried to erect her own barriers to bottle up this wealth of power- after all, they were her emotions, so why should she share them?- but that quickly proved impossible as the power flowed through her, quickly lighting her eyes with magical overflow. Her horn sparked and sputtered in a deep, watery blue that felt more right than the toxic green which had adorned her horn for as long as she could remember.
As her own containment crumbled, the queen abandoned the effort and instead focused on exerting control over the escaping rush of energy, directing it towards and into the on looking changelings. The power lanced through them, straight to their cores where it found more barriers, each one broken in short order to unleash a similar flood of emotions. As the chain-reaction reached its peak, the light could be seen as far away as Ponyville and the raw magic unleashed could be felt across the globe.
Once the glow dimmed away, Queen Chrysalis gazed across her people once more, this time seeing not empty husks or starved thieves, but a race as vibrant and alive as any other, each one overflowing with a lifetime of withheld emotions. Well this changes everything, she thought as the changelings’ eyes slowly dimmed almost back to normal. Good. We’ve been long overdue for some change of our own.
ONI Testing Facility A-51
2 January 2552 1500 MST
Planet Reach
“Increasing output to one terawatt. I repeat, this is a directed energy beam powered to one terawatt, testing against a standard shielding rune at seventh degree fractility.”
Due to the nature of the equipment in use, the test was being held outdoors. At one end of a barren field sat a two foot square sheet of Titanium-A alloy, the very same material used to armor warships. What set this particular piece of metal apart from the standard hull tile, however, was the glowing symbol at its center, and the dull-orange field of energy that covered the sheet like the energy shields which had caused so much frustration since the war’s inception. The resemblance to that defensive measure was far more than passing, as demonstrated by the beam of angry red light which shot across the range, only to sputter and halt just shy of the plate. A nearby portable fusion plant, attached to the rune as a power source, hummed quietly in effort. Behind its immaterial shield, the rune flared impossibly bright, sparks occasionally shooting from the ends of the many swirling lines.
The stalemate held for several seconds, the sparks of undefined energy jumping off with ever-increasing frequency. The rune itself began to flicker, struggling to sustain itself against the energy it was conducting. Suddenly, it failed, the shield winked out, and the laser spent another couple of seconds trying to vaporize the plate itself before being powered off.
Back across the field, a team of scientists gingerly remover their heavily tinted goggles, glancing between themselves as they did. “Well,” one of them said. “Seventeen seconds at one terawatt; that ought to do nicely once it’s scaled up to warship-levels.”
“Too bad going any higher comes with an exponential price tag.”
“At least now we know we don’t have to make them out of those crystal matrices. Now that was expensive! Only the SPARTAN II program could afford them, and they were only fractal to the third degree.”
“Kind of handy that they could be recharged, though. Once a rune burns out, you have to replace it.”
“As soon as we can figure out how to make them at fifty feet across without bankrupting the human race, I’ll let you know. Carving eldritch symbols on every ship in the fleet will be expensive enough as it is.”
“And we still have no idea how the hell it actually works.”
“Who cares? It works and it’ll close the gap between us and the Covies. We can ponder the nature of the universe once we aren’t staring down the barrel of a gun.”
“Amen to that! Now who’s up for lunch once we get this stuff packed away?”
Hearty affirmations resulted.
ONI Press Room
8 January 2552 1200 MST
ONI HQ, New Alexandria, Reach
After much deliberating, the Powers That Be at the Office of Naval Intelligence decided upon an unusual display of honesty. They were going to reveal almost everything pertaining to the discovery of the Equestrians. That included the slipspace accident which transformed the crew of the Guam, the probe that mistakenly brought home Princess Celestia, the strange capabilities of the four subspecies of pony which was to be explained with some technobabble about “Dark Energy” despite no one knowing enough about dark energy to confirm one way or the other, all culminating in the introduction of Princess Luna who would present Equestria’s interests in the proposed alliance. The one subject which would not be brought up, however, was that of the object that they were still convinced was Forerunner in origin.
It was a shame then that the one time they present the truth, the press can’t believe it. Sure, they had gotten excited at the mention of friendly non-human intelligence, but many declared “Bullshit” when told of the state of the Guam, and others lost interest as the nature of the new species was revealed. By the end of the initial presentation, several reporters had left despite knowing full well that it would likely mean losing their jobs, and others remained simply to see how far ONI was willing to take this bizarre hoax.
Boy, are they in for a surprise, the orator thought with a smirk. “And now, it is my honor and privilege to introduce Her Highness, Princess Luna of Equestria!” He gestured grandly towards the security door he had come in through, which refused to open for whatever reason. The resulting awkward silence was quickly interrupted by the muted sounds of dull pounding and a string of curses which would not have been out of place among the works of Shakespeare, all emanating from beyond the still-closed door.
This racket ended with the offending portal being slammed to the ground beneath the front hooves of a rather irate-looking princess. After a few calming breaths, Luna straightened back into her regal posture before turning to regard the stunned expressions of everyone present. “My apologies; the door would not open.”
The presenter was the first to recover from her unorthodox entrance. “You were supposed to use the key pad! I told you the sequence for a rea-” Luna interrupted him with a raised hoof, displaying the size and shape which almost perfectly matched the touch-screen keypad that could be heard sparking pitifully just past the broken entrance. “Right… anyway; Ladies and gentlemen of the press: Princess Luna.”
Once again, the only sound was the whirring of hovercams.”Well, uh, yes she’s real,” one of the more vocal skeptics eventually stated, “but can she really do magic?”
“Yes I can,” Luna replied with a huff. “But I suppose somepony like yourself would prefer a demonstration.” Without waiting for affirmation, her horn ignited in a midnight-blue aura which moved to envelope the discarded door. The crowd watched in interest as it rose into the air, then in amazement as it began to change, the metal flowing like liquid but giving off neither heat nor light. Though her eyes were closed to concentrate on the details, Luna could hear the near-silent tak-tak of fingers on datapads. Good, I have their attention. Once I finish this spell, we can move on to more important matters.
As the newsies hastily rechecked the lazy notes they had until then been taking, a form began to emerge from the amorphous blob of material. First a vague shape, then finer details formed from the lump, until the finished product dropped to the flood with a resounding thud. “Behold! An exact likeness of myself, crafted from whatever that door was made of. Impressive, is it not?”
It most certainly was. What had once been a dull steel slab now shimmered like moonlight and managed to portray the same regal standing as the princess herself. The face, currently set in an expression of monumental patience tinged with boredom, seemed like it would shift to display any appropriate emotion. Indeed, it probably wouldn’t have surprised anyone in the audience if it possessed internal anatomy as finely made as its external façade.
“As you can see,” Luna continued, “we Equestrians are possessed of natural abilities which your technology would struggle to match. All we asked in exchange for our aid is protection from your enemies and ours and information to begin advancing our own comparatively primitive technology. While your leaders have accepted these terms and are already taking action to uphold their part, I was hoping to acquire a sense of where the people stood on the matter before giving it my final approval.
“I believe now would be the time in which questions may be asked and answered.”
The first question was, obviously, “How does magic work?”
“That is a… difficult question,” replied the princess, frowning in thought. “I suppose the most apt analogy would be that of arguing with the universe. One must present power or it will not even stop to listen, and one must focus on one’s intentions or details will not function, or worse, function incorrectly. The more drastic one’s vision differs from that of the universe, the more power is needed to convince it to change, and the more delicate the inner workings of the spell, the more focus is needed to get them right. Focus can be fine-tuned by practice, but a body can only hold so much power before overloading and external sources must be tapped to surpass this limit. The most common source of power used is emotions, as they are produced naturally simply by being alive, but any other source could theoretically work if focused through a rune; a spell who’s details are woven into a symbol instead of focused by the mind-
Someone in the audience noisily cleared their throat, diverting Luna’s train of thought from its winding course. “But I digress,” she concluded without missing a beat. “Next question.”
Ponyville Militia Firing Range
15 January 2552 1400 MST
Ponyville, Equestria
Hearth’s Warming had apparently been a calm before the storm, as no sooner had it ended than all militia training was accelerated to an almost frustrating degree. The fact that various construction and excavation projects –some of them headed by diamond dogs, of all things- started at nearly the same time led many to believe that something had happened to convince Princess Celestia that the Covenant was coming, but nopony had thus far worked up the courage to ask. After all, knowing the truth wouldn’t change what they could do about it, and they were already doing all they really could.
Which led to today’s lesson. Apparently, somepony (probably from the Guam) recently developed a new combat spell, dubbed the Magic Machine Gun. It actually only resembled the weapon in its effect, being basic telekinesis taken to its logical extreme. The main body of the spell was a small cyclone of power which would pick up small rocks and debris, accelerate them to lethal velocity, and then release them in a constant stream at the desired target. While most unicorns did not possess the raw power to simply throw objects at such speeds, any of them could apply the constant acceleration to work up to it before letting centripetal force take over. The tricky part was releasing the projectiles in the right direction; that was why practice focused more on control than damage, and why paint balls were used instead of rocks or such.
At the moment, Twilight was on the field surrounded by a humming blur of purple paint. The goggled eyes of other ponies peeked around the edges of portable, paint-spattered barricades. Farther down the field sat a large bull’s-eye, also painted in a rainbow of splotches. Twilight opened fire at a shouted command, the stream of paint zeroing in on the target in a matter of moments and remaining on it for nearly half a minute before stopping.
Once he was sure that no stray ammo would be headed his way, the drill instructor trotted out onto the field followed by most of the watching trainees. “Impressive, Miss Sparkle. Most impressive.”
For her part, Twilight seemed slightly winded as she turned to face him. “That was-huh- quite a workout.”
“That’s what you get for taking an entire drum of ammunition at once,” he retorted. “Most ponies just grab a couple dozen at most. Still, points for accuracy.” Looking at the bull’s-eye, it was now almost completely covered by a perfectly centered purple stain. “Heartstrings! Go get another target from supplies.”
“Yes sir!” The minty mare saluted before trotting off towards the main building. Her demeanor changed once she was alone, however. Very few ponies knew it, but the entire business about the UNSC frightened her. The symbols they used, the vehicles they rode in, all of it clawed at her subconscious, digging up vague memories she had left buried there. Until now she had thought that they were just dreams, nightmares that caused her to wake screaming in the middle of the night well into her teen years, and she eventually forgot about them because they weren’t real; they couldn’t touch her.
Except they were, and they could.
Now alone in the supply room, Lyra scanned nervously for the bull’s-eye targets. Her eyes, unfortunately, had other plans. Falling upon one of the Elite mannequins, they immediately switched to the worst of her memories, more vivid than ever.
The scene was dark, partially silhouetted against a distant blaze locked in the center were two figures, an elite clad in unadorned blue armor, holding a human more than two feet off of the ground by his neck. The human was bloody and burnt; he was missing one arm, and the other desperately flailing, trying to drive a knife through a sparking shield and into the claw gripping him. The ground behind and surrounding them was littered with bodies and burning hulks of metal, and in the distance more alien figures could be seen stalking ever closer.
As the vision played out, Lyra could hear somepony- no she could hear herself, but younger than she ever remembered being, crying out for “Daddy,” as she was carried away by a strange man. The other human, her father, glanced up from his struggle before finally jabbing the knife home. As he fell from the elite’s grasp, he snatched something from its belt and threw it back at its former holder, where it stuck and smoldered before exploding like a blue sun. Though he had dived to safety, her dad didn’t come back to join her, instead grabbing a pistol and firing at the advancing army.
The remainder of Lyra’s human memories were a blur of movement, be it hers, the escape shuttle’s, or that of another elite which seemed to form out of nowhere to force its way into the only compartment on the ship which was not packed with refugees: the Drive Room. As trans-dimensional holes tore the ship apart and shunted the pieces across time, space, and the multiverse, she could hear somepony calling to her; somepony she recognized.
“Lyra. Lyra! Come on Lyra, snap out of it!” At the urging of the familiar voice, she climbed out of the delirium and eased back into reality. Taking a deep breath to try to calm her racing heart, she allowed her eyes to flutter open and found herself face-to-face with her marefriend Bon Bon. It was unclear which of the two initiated the following hug, but it didn’t take a changeling to feel the love coming off of them.
“I had another episode, didn’t I?” Lyra murmured into the other mare’s fur.
“Yea,” Bon Bon replied softly. “But it’s over now. Come on, we still have so training to do.”
“Sorry,” the sergeant interrupted as Lyra was helped back to her hooves, “but no you don’t.” Everypony immediately directed incredulous stares his way, until he felt compelled to explain why their friend’s sad little quirk barred her from training. “Most of you probably don’t know much about it, but I can recognize PTSD when I see it. At some point in the past she suffered some sort of experience that seared itself into her brain, and whenever she encounters some sort of trigger, and judging by where we found her I’d say elites are a big one, she falls right back into the scars. We’re lucky we caught it during training. If she had locked up during real combat, someone probably would have died.”
They turned back to Lyra, their faces mixing pity, fear, and confusion in varying amounts. Bon Bon was the only one to try to defend her, one foreleg still draped comfortingly over her withers, “But- but they’re just foalhood nightmares! They aren’t real, are they?”
“I’m not so sure anymore,” the shaken mare replied. “Too much of what I see lines up with the humans and their war. Oh, if only I could just show it to you, you’d get it.”
At those words Twilight’s face lit up before disappearing in the flash of a teleport. She reappeared moments later with a large tome in tow, which she immediately commenced flipping through. “Magic Missile, Mnemonic Enhancement, Aha! Memory Projection! ‘This spell causes the target to project a chosen memory onto a nearby surface, where it will play out in its entirety with accompanying sound. Warning: does not distinguish between true, corrupted, and wholly artificial memories.’ That sounds like just the ticket. Assuming, of course, that you really want to go through with it.”
Lyra glanced around nervously before gathering her courage and giving a firm nod. Pinkie Pie appeared with a bucket of popcorn (enough to share, obviously) and a small camera which may or may not have started out inside a helmet, and the spell was cast.
By the time the image was engulfed by a shimmering hole into a Canterlot alleyway, Pinkie’s hair had flattened and she had engulfed Lyra in a teary hug, several of the watching ponies had fainted, and even the sergeant seemed horrified. “Th-that was Madrigal,” he muttered, as if afraid to invoke some angry spirit. “I vacationed there once as a kid. And that man… I think I met him once.” Everypony still conscious jerked their heads up in surprise as he continued in a dazed, almost wondering tone. “Yea, I remember him now. An ODST stationed on some frigate that was flying overhead. He was a beast on the battlefield, but afterwards… if there was ever a dead man walking, it was him. He took his helmet off once or twice, and you could hear the saddest little tune playing on the speakers.”
Suddely aware of the glittering amber eyes locked on his, he reset his face to its usual scowl and made for the exit. “Don’t get your hopes up kid. Even if it was him, that was years ago. He’s probably dug his own grave by now. All Helljumpers do eventually.”
Author’s Notes: Poor Lyra. She spent most of her life trying to ignore a horrible nightmare, only to find out that it might be all she has left of her real family. Why would I be so pointlessly cruel? There’s actually a weird story behind that. You see, a couple of months ago, I had a dream which perfectly mirrored the writing of part of that passage, right down to the shirt I was wearing (steampunk ponies, if you must know) and the substitute teacher we had that day. Creepy, I know.
In other news, the changelings are free of their curse, if not their prison (that’ll probably follow soon enough), magic being prepared for use on the front lines, and the public announcement of ponies to the UNSC public. Next chapter I plan to stack in a bit more backstory (what is up with them diamond dogs?), then check in with the good captain in a bad spot. Last chapter seems to have been the tipping point over this hole, because all I can see is Dark, Dark, Dark for quite some time (though not Grimdark. Never Grimdark (probably).). I’ll see if I can plant some torches along the way, but no promises.
Thank you for reading, and thank you for your feedback.
Arcane Howitzer