//------------------------------// // victory? // Story: Paradise Sundered // by q97randomguy //------------------------------// Chapter Six: victory? From their place in the palace, the Elements responded. She could feel the link to them open wide, allowing the nearly endless flow of power to pass through her. The power filled her up and gave her what could only be referred to as “the sight”. Everything became clear to her. From the expanding wave of her magic, just now obliterating the last of Sombra’s influence, to the hole in time where Cadence had been, to the chronomancy surrounding her quarry, and even the massive and risky spell he was weaving. The effect didn’t stop there; she could feel every facet of every house, every hair on every newly freed pony, and every settling speck of dust. It was almost too much for her, but she once more succeeded in focusing entirely on what she needed to do. She focused all of her magic and all of her mind on one thing. Him. That monster. He was trying to escape, but she saw her target, and he was hers. A brilliant ray of power lanced forth, and there was a titanic outpouring of energy from him before it connected. She paid it no mind; her goal was getting rid of the tyrant that had taken Cadence. He became incorporeal just as the power of the Elements crashed into him. If she hadn't been so focused on what she was doing, she might have laughed at the last, pathetic attempt to save himself. The Elements seized him despite his lack of a physical manifestation, trapping him within a coruscating vortex. Luna tightened it around him, tightened it into him. Luna crushed down harder until she could feel that the strain would end his wretched existence. She didn’t want that; it would be too light a punishment for a monster like him. So using the almost limitless power at her disposal, she cracked open a nearby glacier hurled him in, sealing him away to rot for the rest of his miserable days. As power left her, Luna slowly settled to the ground. The feeling of drive and confidence went with it; now she only had her sorrow. She barely felt the rushing of the wind or the thunderous crash of air filling the voids left by the absence of a city. What she had seen gave her a faint hope — a fool’s hope — one she felt obligated to pursue. The hole in time let Luna know that Sombra had not simply killed Cadence, just sent her forward. Could it be that he only displaced her for a short while? She desperately hoped so, but deep down, she knew that it wasn't to be. This is my fault. I should have made sure she didn't follow me. I should have struck harder. I should have just started with the Elements. I failed her. I took her under my wing, and told her I'd protect her, but I couldn't save her. Luna gazed at the place where Cadence had been, where she would one day be again. I will wait for her. It's all I can do... without abandoning Celestia. She went back to her campsite and brought her supplies back with her. Then, she waited. For days, she waited. Waited and thought. On the third day — or had it been four by then? — Celestia contacted her. [Luna?] She waited for an answer. No answer was forthcoming. Luna stared through bloodshot eyes at the same spot that she had for much of the last thirty hours. [Luna? What's wrong? Are you okay?] [I... I'm fine. But... I failed.] [What do you mean? The Elements activated and gave everypony a fright. It took me days to calm them down, even after warning them. How could you not have succeeded?] "It took me days to calm them down," how can she care about something so, so trivial? [I mean that I wasn't strong enough or fast enough or smart enough or ruthless enough. I couldn't protect her or them.] Luna could feel her sister's shocked silence through the link. [What? Not what you were expecting?] she asked bitterly. [Oh, Luna, what happened?] [I don't want to talk about it; it's still too painful. I need some time.] [Are you sure? I can be there right away, if you need me. Wrap things up here, then fly as fast as my strength will allow. Maybe even teleport there, do you think—] [Don’t bother. There’s nothing you can do. I just... I need to think.] There was a pause before her sister continued softly. [Take as long as you need. I’ve got everything back here under control.] Luna didn’t respond, and, soon after, she felt the link fade. Snapped from her reverie, she decided that now would be a good time to eat; she was starving, now that she thought about it. She opened her pack only to find there were only a few meals left. I packed for a week. Has it really been six whole days? As she ate one of her few remaining meals, her eyes were once more drawn to their resting spot. She knew that, with the amount of power Sombra had had at his disposal, he could have sent her easily decades, possibly even centuries into the future. Something had kept her here, but now reason must prevail. I don’t have enough food to get back without foraging along the way, and I’ve spent far too long here already... It just feels like by giving up, I’m abandoning her. She quickly packed what remained of her supplies. She heaved a great sigh before turning south. Home. Maybe there I can put all of this behind me. But I will not forget her. I will find some way to make this right. She took to the sky then ascended to the prevailing northerlies. She didn’t want speed; she wanted to fight the wind. It didn’t make much sense, but she felt that she needed some sort of penance for her failure. When she arrived at the palace three days later, her coat and feathers were a royal mess; her ethereal mane seemed to be the only clean part of her. As she landed in the courtyard, the few ponies there bowed at her arrival then went about their business. She walked to the door of the throne room and opened it. Inside, she found Celestia laughing at Pudding Head’s antics in explaining some point or another. “Celestia, I’m back—” Her sister slowly turned to face her. Luna froze. The scene before her was eerily familiar to something she would rather forget entirely. She tried to banish the sense of déjà vu and the memories that came with it. It can’t be real. It can’t be real. It can’t be real. “Luna! You’re back!” Celestia took in her sister’s appearance. “What happened to you?” Of course it wasn’t real. She would never abandon me. Luna let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. “It’s... complicated.” “Hang on just a second.” She turned back to the petitioners and government officials. “I’m sorry, my little ponies, but I must talk with my sister. I promise to get back to you all tomorrow.” She headed over to Luna. “Let’s go somewhere private. My quarters?” In response Luna wearily began walking there; Celestia fell into step beside her. The trip passed in an awkward silence, Celestia not knowing what to ask, and Luna not knowing where to begin. But they eventually reached their destination. “So... Um... Three?” Celestia finally asked. “Yeah... Three.” “Wait, isn’t that what you were hoping for?” “It was, but it just all went wrong so fast.” Luna sighed and shook her head. “I meant three as in three of us.” “Three of us? Like us us? Yes, of course! I knew that magical burst felt familiar, but I never would have guessed another one of us!” “Well, it was, but the situation was... it was bad, very bad. When I found her she was... broken. I think she crashed into the ground from exhaustion right before she could reach me. And she was young too, not much more than ten, I’d say.” “But that magic, she must have been fully realized, right? But how?” “I guess the Earth is more generous than the Sun or Moon. Other than that, I have no idea. But she was abused, malnourished, and emotionally scarred. She was even worse than Starswirl... all that blood.” She shuddered, trying to shut down the memories that came with talking about it. “I managed to heal her, though. You must have felt it, right?” “I wondered what that was; all of a sudden, your influence seemed to shrink down to nothing. I think even the few ponies with me felt something too. If you healed her, though, how come you’re so upset?” “Her parents had been killed, murdered right in front of her, I’d guess. And it looked like she’d been kept captive, maybe even tortured.” She cut off her sister’s questions with a wave of her hoof. “No, just let me finish this. It was an evil stallion, a unicorn, that did it. He also took over the whole Crystal Empire — though from what I saw, it looked more like a city state — and enslaved the populace. I went to stop him. I thought I went alone. But she must have followed me, and actually ended up saving me, but—” “Wait. You’re telling me that a unicorn was beating you? You have nearly sixty years of experience with magic, and you used the Elements! How could you be losing? And how could a filly have done anything to stop somepony like that?” “Like I said, it’s complicated. But long story short, I used the Elements too late. She’d already been hit, not killed... but it feels that way. She’s gone, just gone. He flung her through time, and with the power at his disposal, she could even be gone for centuries.” Luna hung her head, and murmured, “We could have been a family. Finally, somepony that would be able to bear the millennia with us. But he took that from us, maybe not forever, but you know...” “So... Now what? We just wait? Or is there any way to fix this? And what about the ponies of the Empire? Are they safe? Do they need help? I can organize a relief effort!” “No, no, don’t bother. Just before I stopped him, he sent it somewhen else. I was distracted at the time, but I think he said something about trying to become an alicorn, so he probably tried to follow her. So now all we can do is wait. Even if I could tell when he sent her, I doubt we have enough power to get then. It’s out of our hooves.” Celestia put a foreleg over her sister’s withers. “Luna, you sound like you’re giving up. That’s so unlike you. Come on, we can figure out this together.” “No! Don’t you get it? There is no solution. There is no magic fix. I failed, and now we both have to pay for it.” “You can’t blame yourself for what he—” “Don’t play that game with me. I could have stopped him, and I didn’t. It’s that simple.” Luna snapped, glaring at her sister. Celestia calmly met her gaze. “Do you want to talk about it?” “No. At least not yet. Maybe I’ll take a walk, go see Starswirl.” She headed for the door. “I’ll be here whenever you’re ready,” Celestia called after her. Luna closed the door quietly and started walking to Starswirl’s room. As she arrived, an earth pony doctor exited his room. He hastily bowed. “Welcome, Princess. I hadn’t heard you’d arrived.” “Rise. I only just returned, so that’s not very surprising. How is he?” “His situation is...” he searched for the right phrase “... one of a kind. Yes, that fits. We’ve never seen such a powerful unicorn use all their power, and honestly we weren’t quite sure how to go about treating him. That led to some... complications. Don’t worry! Don’t worry. He’s stable now.” “Explain. Now.” He flinched at the ice in her words. “I apologize. That was uncalled for.” Luna sighed. “I am not feeling like myself lately.” “Yes, uh, not a problem, Princess. So, how do I put this? When the other doctors tried to heal him with their magic, it didn’t go very well. You remember the crack on his horn? It got worse. We’re worried any more magic done to him could extend it all the way to his skull. The others said something about resonance and severing will from the body, most of it went over my head.” He waved a hoof over his hornless head. “But what I did get sounded like any more would be quite a risk. We’ve just been using herbal remedies and making sure he gets his rest.” Luna silently opened the door a crack and peeked inside. Through the gap, she saw Starswirl and Eveningwatch curled up next to each other. I guess I can wait until morning to talk to him. She closed the door with a soft click. She started heading to her room, but then she remembered that her stock of paper and quills was running low. She headed to a storeroom first. She didn’t feel quite up to sleep yet; her mind was much too active from dragging up the painful memories of her failure, to learning that her old student couldn’t be healed, and the still disturbing parallelism between her return and the nightmare imposed on her by Sombra’s magic. She entered her room with a stack of parchment and a bird’s worth of quills. She lay down on the soft carpeting, and began to write. At first, she worked on drafting the tax codes she had brainstormed what felt like ages ago. As the night wore on, she began nodding off; it was dull, monotonous work. Got to finish these tax codes before I turn in. Oh, you just don’t want to go to sleep because you’ll see it again. I know me too well... Maybe writing it out will help me get some closure. Besides, Celestia will want to know more about what happened. She pulled over a new sheet and began to write. I had set up my tent and was just falling asleep when I heard a muffled impact a good distance away. It jolted me awake, and I decided to investigate... ... but I passed straight through him and into the tower. It sapped my strength, just like the crystals from before. I panicked and teleported away, but the damage had been done. I could feel the dark energy cutting through the air towards me, and I tried to teleport again, but I’d lost so much energy I couldn’t manage it. So I did the only thing I could. I dove, and tried to evade. His aim was unerring though, and... She stopped writing. What she had seen was just a trick, a horrible trick; it would never happen. There were ponies like Starswirl and Eveningwatch that cared for her and her night. There was no reason to worry Celly unduly, right? No, of course not. ...it knocked me out. When I came to, it was because Cadence shook me awake. That’s how she saved me, sister; without her intervention, I might still be up there, waiting for you to rescue me. But you already know the cost. If we aren’t there when she returns, she’ll need to find some way to run her country. There’s no way that she’ll be ready so soon after the death of her parents and at such a young age. We need to be there for her. There for all of them. She put down her quill. It was late, very late. Yawning, she rolled up the scrolls and tied them off using ribbons emblazoned with her cutie mark. It took little more than a thought to send them to her sister’s door. She stretched as she got up, each joint protesting lightly after being in one position for so long. One light flap and she landed softly in her bed. Then she remembered what a sorry state her coat was in. Ponyfeathers. I should have washed first. Cleaning these sheets is going to be such a has— Oh right, Princess. Still, this is going to make the cleaning pony’s job more difficult than it shou... Celestia woke up just before dawn. Her mind buzzed with questions and worries as she washed up and preened her wings to perfection. How did an entire empire of ponies go unnoticed? If I had gone, would everypony have been saved from being thrown Stars know when? How can I make this right? Luna said that all we could do was wait, but if that’s all we can do, I will do it right. Their return will be a met with a warm welcome. They will be in need of guidance, which I— we will provide. Yes, it’s good to have a plan, she thought while she opened the door. She was stopped by the sound of rustling parchment. Luna must have left me a note before going to bed. There it was, sticking out from behind the door. Grabbing it with her magic, she started down the hall, only to stop a second later. There, underneath Luna’s seal, were the words “Eight of Eight”. She slowly turned around in not entirely faked horror. As the label implied, there were seven other scrolls sitting to the side of the door where they had been pushed just out of sight. These aren’t a simple note, are they? They must be laws, taxes, and regulations. I’ll get to them later, when I’m not so busy. She gathered them up and dumped them unceremoniously on a desk in her room. Looks like I know how I’m getting to sleep tonight. She started walking again and ran through her agenda for the day. She still had to conclude her abruptly ended meeting, distribute land, hold court... Why does making everypony happy seem to require so much micromanaging? Oh well, at least there’s another marriage scheduled for today. That’s just what I need to take my mind off all this. The day passed much like those before it: Celestia talked to the ponies who needed things, and she directed other ponies with matching talents to them. She went out and allocated land and started reorganizing the pegasi into an effective irrigating force. As the day wore on, she wondered where Luna was. Shouldn’t she be up and about by now? But she brushed it off; her little sister must have been exhausted, between how far she had traveled to staying up till who knew when working on all those papers. If Luna wanted to take a day off it was fine with Celestia. Besides, she had important work to do; one of the pegasi had mentioned hearing wolves in the forest. Wolves. She hated wolves. Her wing idly brushed along her thigh; some things you never forget, even after so much time. It seemed that her earlier efforts with the pegasi hadn’t been entirely successful, which wasn’t surprising, but it was disappointing. I suppose that it will take a while before the entire Everfree is a safe place, but by the Stars, it will be one day. To that end, she went about finding anypony that would be able to secure the forest. Obviously, her first choice was Commander Hurricane. It took an hour of flying around and asking many groups of pegasi, but she eventually found Hurricane atop a cumulonimbus far to the east of the forest. She looked to be in the process of cloud sculpting. There were griffon caricatures, a few manticores, a hydra, and a pack of wolves. Celestia landed on the cloud and gave a soft “Ahem.” Hurricane crushed the last scorpion tail into place with significantly more force than strictly necessary. She wheeled on Celestia. “What do you want? I mean, what do you want, Princess?” The venom in her voice took Celestia by surprise. “What’s wrong, my little pony?” “That!” Her own outburst seemed to catch her off guard. “Never mind, it’s nothing, really. Just get back to running Equestria or something. I’m sure you’re really busy,” Hurricane spat. “Whatever it is, it doesn’t sound like nothing. You can tell me... I’m here for you.” She turned away, “No, it’s nothing... You just... go.” Little twitches ran across Hurricane’s wings. “Just let me help you. I only want to help.” “Well, some help you are! I had a life. Now I just have this.” She punched the cloud manticore’s foreleg, and it burst. “There’s nothing wrong with cloud sculpting; it’s a perfectly fine art form, and there are plenty of—” “Not sculpting! This!” Before Celestia could even ask for clarification, Hurricane burst into action. She blitzed under the three-legged manticore, one wing dragging through the cloud beneath her. Celestia felt a massive charge being pulled up from the cloud. As Hurricane slid to a stop in front of the faux wolves, she whipped her wing out of the cloud. A blinding sheet of lightning arced through the path her wing had traced, and the entire pack was wiped out in one strike. The concussive blast from the thunder nearly blew Celestia over, but Hurricane somehow caught hold of it and used it to catapult herself backwards. She hurtled through the air on her back on an intercept course with one of the griffons. Just before impact, she curled into a ball and bucked straight back through the vaporous neck, obliterating the head and upper torso with it. She flared her wings and cut her speed to practically nothing in the next instant. Then she fell into and through the cloud. Over the years, Celestia had seen many fights and participated in quite a few of them. She’d seen drunken fights, she’d seen duels of honor, she’d been through skirmishes with inequine horrors, and she was, for all intents and purposes, a god slayer. None of that had prepared her for what had just happened. In the space of a few heartbeats, one pegasus had wiped out half the targets. And it felt like she wasn’t done yet; there was a twisting, gathering sensation coming from the cloud below. Hurricane burst from the cloud beneath the hydra with another crack of lightning. She speared straight up through its center and emerged from its back. What happened next would stay with Celestia for the rest of her life. An inverted tornado pulled itself out of the cloud and followed Hurricane’s flight path. It ripped the hydra into pieces which appeared to fly off in random directions — until they each struck and crushed a manticore. The tornado followed in her slipstream, a path that looped around the lone griffon. It started to make the turn, but, when it self-intersected, it collapsed with a muffled boom, crushing the figure into an unrecognizable smear. Hurricane skidded to a stop directly in front of Celestia, lightly panting. For once, Celestia had no idea what to say. She just stared at the pony before her and the wrecked cloudscape that was slowly merging back together. “This. This is all I have. You took everything from me. Fighting was my life! It was what I did. It was who I was. But your kingdom doesn’t have any room for a pony like me. You just want kittens and flowers, not what I do.” There were tears in the corners of her eyes. “And you know what’s funny? You want to know the best part? I know you’re right. It sounds like a great future... just not for me. I don’t belong anymore.” Hurricane fought a losing battle against her tears. “Oh child, I—” “’M not a kid.” “No, I suppose you’re not. But you’re hurting, and I can help. I came here to ask you to be the Captain of the Guard. A pony like you can be relied on to keep everypony else safe, and you’d get to use your rather... special... talent. What do you say?” Hurricane tried to hide a sniffle behind a cough. “You... you really mean it?” “Of course. I need ponies I can rely on to help me take care of the kingdom and all the ponies in it.” “Yes! A thousand times yes! You have no idea... Just, thank you.” “You’re welcome. I just wish that some of my other subjects problems were this easy to solve.” She paused, contemplating her next move. “You should head back to the castle and see about gathering a group of able bodied stallions and mares on the way. After all, you’re going to need a Guard to be the captain of.” “Heh, yeah. Don’t worry, Princess; I’ve got a few ponies in mind. I’ll have you a full battalion in no time.” “Thank you, Captain, I’ll see you back at the castle.” “No, thank you! But I’ve got to go. I’ve got to find some lieutenants. Thundertop, Biting Wind, Downdraft... I’ve got to get going!” She galloped towards the edge of the cloud. Just before the edge, she skidded to a halt then turned back sheepishly. “Um, I can go right?” A smile and nod were all it took; she dove backwards over the edge. As she was so near to the rivers, Celestia had decided to parlay with the river serpents. It was only courteous to ask your neighbors for permission to build towns and cities along their domain. Hopefully, I can find Sodarayg, he may be a bit gruff, but he’s kindhearted. She saw that they had drifted directly over the fork in the river as she left the cloud. Well, this place looks promising. I might as well start looking here. And so she began to search anew.