//------------------------------// // You can see it from here // Story: Secure, Contain, Protect // by Teh_Zodiac //------------------------------// “It may be our only chance to set things right. The only way this wounded world is going back to its natural beauty.” Luna lowered her hoof on the dancing flames, and in the general wonder, picked up a small trail of ember blaze. It coiled in the dark, humid air of the shelter, until it took a shape that was deeply unnatural for a simple flame: a stable and fiery representation of a tower. A tower all the ponies had seen at one point or the other in the past months. “We need to reach the Crystal Kingdom and find the Crystal Heart. Everypony, think of it as a metaphorical tuning fork for Akasha: its magical power is great, so fine adjustments to its matrix will be able to affect all ponykind. With the right spell, we can reveal the pony with the special talent we need: guiding the Sun across the sky.” The strange flame dissipated with a loud snap, and everyone fell silent for a moment. Then a cacophony of voices rose up and filled the small, cramped room. She couldn’t make up what everyone was saying, but it warmed her heart to see that, in a way she didn’t quite understand yet, shook them out of apathy and despair. She walked between the groups of discussing ponies, nodding slowly and taking in every bit of apology, accusation, critic or complaint they directed at her. She noticed one small group was staring silently between themselves instead of talking. In the dim light she couldn’t really make up their faces, but she heard abruptly a small sigh and stopped behind a column to listen in. It wasn’t really fit for a princess to hear out on private conversations but, again, there wasn’t an Equestrian Kingdom anymore. As soon as she listened more closely, she recognized familiars voices, the voices that whispered to her when she was still Nightmare Moon. She remembered how the Elements of Harmony were the last to present to the Town Hall for evacuation, making sure everyone was safe before finally let themselves be teleported by Luna with the others to a safe location only known to her. But in the haste and the anxiousness for all of her subjects, she had relegated them to the background of her mind. “I say that wasn’t really her. We all saw her girls! She was in the casket, we buried her, we cried for weeks and then we moved on! The real Twilight would never make us believe something so….” “Dear, we can’t really exclude this from the realm of the possibility. The Princess personally removed every possible enchantment from whoever that mare was, and what was left was Twilight! You do remember how she could be obsessive, at times, right?” “But to leave us, Rare? And make us believe she was pushing daisies? Ah was the first to say that Twi might have been a lil bit OCD about them books of her, but this? Ah think-“ It seemed such a minor issue to Luna now, but that showed just how much their friendship went: even in the face of the apocalypse, it seemed to them that it was more important to try to understand this mystery. Still, Luna had personally placed the runes that tore through the enchantments, and what she felt after she activated was a familiar magic signature, one she would have never been able to forget as long as she lived. She stepped from behind the column and neared the group. They all turned around, except Fluttershy, who was still eyeing the floor and sniffing softly. Their expression immediately softened and turned into a light, cautious smile. “Princ- errr… Luna. Didn’t see you there!” Said Rainbow Dash hesitantly. “It’s quite alright. I picked up on your conversation, and decided it was for the best to dispel any doubts you might have” Their smiles disappeared and made place to a serious nod, an invite to continue. “What you saw back in that barn… It was indeed your friend, Twilight Sparkle. Her magic signature, the one that led all of you with the Elements… I could never forget it.” She looked down for a second, apparently lost in her thoughts. “You just can’t imitate that kind of magic.” Some ears drooped, and some eyes fell to the floor. Rarity and Applejack just shook their heads and sighed, while Rainbow Dash huffed indignantly and almost barked to the Princess: “But why would she do that? If that mare was Twilight, why she decided to leave us, to fake her death? That’s totally uncool! That’s not cool at all. Just… just not cool, Twi.” Her angry eyes darted around the room before setting ultimately on the dusty floor in front of her. Luna took a step forward and her left wing moved ever so lightly to the distraught mare, but ultimately it settled still at her own side again. In her eyes still danced the flickering flames of the dim fire. “I wish I could say something to help you… Maybe it’s best if I leave you to your own thoughts.” She said, turned around and walked away. Luna walked between the aisles of distressed, talking ponies, that yelled at each other, discussed animatedly and waved around to prove their points. She reached the end of the room, and moved the old wooden wall with her magic, careful not to produce any startling, creaking sound. The door closed behind her, and the faint light of the bonfire and the animated chatter left place to darkness and muffled sounds. Her eyes didn’t even need to adapt to dark, as it was her rightful domain, and she was through them like in the clearest summer day. So she had no trouble spotting the hunched figure at the end of hall, rummaging through some old books that were left in the dungeons. She walked slowly behind it, her hooves sounding softly against the stone floor. As soon as she was just a hoofstep away from the bipedal outline, she asked with a playful tone. “Have thou found what thou were looking for, sir dragon?” The dark purple shape didn’t turn around, and kept looking through the old books. A bunch of seconds passed before Luna heard an answer from a deep voice filled with apparent seriousness, but that actually barely contained laughter. “I thought you had finally stopped with the Shakesneigh.” “Thou surely jest! We hath been most modern in our way of speech!” She waved a dismissive hoof at the silhouette. He turned, and faced her with an expression so intense in its annoyance that Luna actually thought to have angered him. But his gaze was immediately softened by a small chuckle that spread to the former princess. “So, you told them about the Heart, right? How did they take it?” The dragon asked softly. “Well, at least they are a discussing it, that’s a start. I had a small chat with the Elements..” Spike nodded and turned back, giving half of his attention to the ancient looking books stacked in front of him. He went through them rapidly, the darkness not hindering his reptilian eyes, designed to see in the thick shadows of moist caves. “About what?” He asked curiously. Luna looked nervously to her side, searching for something to say, but her gaze was only met with dark cobblestone walls. The dragon stopped in the middle of an old tome, and asked in a calm and collected voice, without even turning around to face her. “It was about Twilight, wasn’t it? They weren’t sure it was actually her.” The mare moved an hesitant hoof to his shoulder, but before she could him, he stood up, turned around and continued, looking at her with eyes that made a hole through her skull. “I’m not like them, Luna. I’ve known Twilight all my life. The moment I saw her in that barn, I knew it was her, and not some clone. No doubts about it.” He kept staring at her for a moment, then suddenly turned around and knelt down on the dusty volumes, picked another one up and started going through the pages quickly. “I have to find some kind of map of the Kingdom, even if we’re going to follow the train tracks.” The mare, still surprised by the sudden outburst, managed to utter a single question, in a voice so small and soft one could doubt it came from such a large and majestic creature: “Aren’t you…angry?” He didn’t turn around to answer her. “I can be angry when it’s all over.” “Duck!” The stallion whispered at them. Kalos flattened his body as much as he could and Twilight Sparkle dived quickly behind a big chunk of rubble. The towering mass of flesh lazily moved its steps in front of them, sniffed the air a bit, then moved on. They waited for half a minute before coming out of their hidings, with carefully balanced steps. One loud noise could attract the Walker again. In front of them, just scorched ruins and battered, rundown buildings voided of life. It should have been summer, but there wasn’t a single cricket screeching, the temperature was almost polar, and there wasn’t a sun in the sky, just an endless plain of brown clouds and a dim, sickly light that encompassed everything. They looked around one more time, to make sure there wasn’t anything watching them, and Bright Light teleported them in the building across the street, the only one nearby that could still be considered somewhat structurally safe. Twilight conjured a big chunk of wood and placed it, careful not to make any sound, on the opened doorway that didn’t have a door anymore. She looked around: there were two rows of seats, a counter and a scratched, almost invisible insignia above it that said: Neighton Postal Office Kalos was not to be seen: he had probably went ahead to scout the building, making sure there was nothing inside, and Bright Light was already intent on setting up a small perimeter inside the lobby, as organizing up sleep turns was not enough to satiate his justified paranoia. Walkers were parading magic insulators, that runes, unicorn magic and even wyvern manipulation couldn’t touch. So, if you fashioned magic in form of a rudimental circuit and left it open, when one of those things stepped over the perimeter, the magic flow would stop, something that was noticeable by a unicorn. Still, it was just a way to make sure not to get your guard lowered. He was kneeling down, with his horn glowing, whispering incantations and formulas the mare couldn’t get understand. It was night time according to their respective biological clocks, so they had decided to just stop the march and sleep it off for a while, an activity rendered kind of hard by the lumbering monstrosities walking about everywhere the eye could see. They had just appeared out of nowhere, and they seemed invulnerable to magic but vulnerable as much as the next faceless giant to mundane damage inflicted by weapons. It was still hard to bring such a big creature down, even if, watched in the distance it seemed relatively peaceful. But they all had seen what a Walker could really do. It had happened shortly after the sun disappeared from the sky: they had reached the nearest town, Sacramare, and there weren’t ponies in the street. Buildings were already destroyed in large part, probably by the Walkers. Still, while the group wandered on the deserted Main Street, they spotted a mare trotting warily between the aisles of rubble. Before they could yell at her, she slammed into a big, smooth grey column, a Walker’s leg. The beast turned around with a speed that was almost impossible for such a size, scooped the screaming, kicking mare with its hand and bit her head off cleanly. Then, he tossed the lifeless body with nonchalance and kept on going. It had been a week since that moment. A week of slowly drifting from city to city, carving a way through ruins, making sure not to get spotted and generally sleeping with an eye or electric receptor open. But that wasn’t the thing that was actually scaring or unnerving Twilight Sparkle. She should have been terrified witless, but the more time passed, the more she thought about surreal this situation was, even for a Foundation agent. Bright Light hadn’t really said what he meant by that “He’s back” he uttered when they all saw the sun shatter, and every time Kalos or Twilight called him out on him he changed topic quickly. She got behind the counter, and opened silently a door that led into the inner offices. Inside, there were two rows of five desks, and Kalos going through various papers with a tentacle. He felt her presence and greeted her amiably: “Oh, Twilight. I was just looking through these documents to find something that could be useful for us…” One advantage of speaking with a Wyvern is that you don’t even have to open your mouth: everything is done through the mind: “Kalos, we need to talk.” His pattern of luminescence darkened for a bit before he answered: “Ok, about what?” “About Bright Light, about all of this. Doesn’t it seem suspicious to you that he keeps dodging questions about what he said? Who’s back? And why? And this whole situation… It seems off, I don’t how to explain it.” The giant squid hovered briefly up and down, the Wyvern equivalent of a nod. “Yes, it is strange. We haven’t met a single living soul apart from that poor mare a week ago and those monstrosities. And even though building are often destroyed, we always seem to find enough food and water to keep going for another day or so.” “Now that you mention it, we always have enough to just move on to the next city.” “I don’t know Twilight, but something is strange around here. When I think about that mare, it seems like there’s only a logical conclusion.” “What? I mean, she bumped into the Walker and then…” “No, it’s different. I mean, it could have just been an unfortunate accident, and maybe lots of ponies are dead or in hiding. But we would have seen the bodies by now, if they were killed. We saw how the Walkers don’t really eat things whole. And even if they did, we would have stumbled across another accident, or even an attack on those creatures. So, if we cross the “killed” option, they must be in hiding. Yet you, a personal student of the Princess and sister of the Captain of the Guard don’t know about any possible shelter made for this kind of situation. So where did everyone go?” Twilight nodded in understanding. What Kalos said did make sense. “So there’s something wrong with the general populace here. But how about that mare? We saw her, even if I wish I hadn’t…” “I think I have an answer for that. If she wasn’t hiding or trying to kill that thing, she was sure pretty adamant on going through that rubble face first into a Walker. No hesitation, no fear, no confusion. And everything conveniently happened just in time for us to see it. Twilight, that wasn’t a coincidence. I think that mare was-“ Tiles started piling up in her mind, and as Kalos drew closer to the conclusion of the argument, the absurdity of it all suddenly made sense to her: “A warning…” “Exactly. A way of saying ‘stay away from these creatures’.” “But from whom?” “I don’t know and I don’t like it. I suggest keeping your guard up for the time being. We’re already near the Badlands, where Bright Light said we would find the key to get to Akasha and find the new Regent of the Sun. We see what we have there, and then we decide what to do-“ A familiar if unwelcome voice reached from the lobby. “What are you guys doing in there? I finished setting up the alarming spell, we can whip up a fire or something, it’s freezing in here!” The wyvern and the unicorn shared a look of doubt before going back into the lobby. Bright Light was standing in the middle, smiling at them. As they neared him, he asked them eagerly: “About the sleep turns tonight, I thought maybe I could-“ Twilight interrupted him by putting a hoof on his mouth. “Don’t worry Light. Tonight it’s me and Kalos who will stand guard.” He looked at them puzzled, since it was unusual to offer to spend half your sleep cycle awake and jumpy, but just shook his head, turned around and started levitating small pieces of wood in the center of the room. “It’s your funeral.” A freezing desert of dirt, sand and dust. It was strange how even with the cold temperature, there wasn’t any snow coming from the infinite cover of dark clouds above. Sometimes a serpentine lightning slithered through the black haze, and Twilight and Kalos waited for the thunder to follow, but they were met with only an eerie silence. She remembered this place, as they were near the Buffalo stomping grounds. Yet, no one was to be seen: even Appleloosa, looming in the distance, was still and lifeless. As they reached a big, solitary boulder standing in the middle of nothing, Bright Light stopped, gave the rock three quick knocks and two slow, and waited. After a bunch of seconds, the sound of old gears and rusty mechanism finally moving after who knows how much time filled the dead air. It was a pleasant change. They always marched in complete silence to avoid detection, even when there were no Walkers to be seen, and any sound, any noise at all was a welcomed friend. The boulder moved to the right on invisible tracks, revealing a pit that fell into darkness after a few meters. The stallion closed his eyes, his horn was enveloped with a grey aura and a small ball of light appeared in front of him: it flickered slightly, like a consumed light bulb. The ball descended in to the pit, and Twilight could see now that it wasn’t just a hole in the ground, but something dug deliberately in a square shape and covered with what now were just rusty iron plates. The orb fell for 20 meters before finally showing them what could be called a floor. Bright Light didn’t wait for questions and just teleported straight to the bottom. “I don’t like this.” “Just keep your cool Twilight. Don’t act suspiciously.” The stallion looked at them with his penetrating grey eyes, clearly waiting for them. Twilight just teleported at his side, while Kalos hovered into the pit until he reached the bottom. Bright Light nodded slightly and proceeded forward, following the orb closely. The corridor was covered with the same iron plates as the pit, and their hooves clicked loudly against them, somehow making the mare nervous. Kalos stood behind her, never leaving his attention from the stallion marching in front of them. The atmosphere was so tense that the two almost jumped in surprise when Bright Light turned around and uttered these few words: “We’re here.” He stopped, and the two friends saw behind a rusty door. Above it, she couldn’t make out exactly what was written, but it seemed a number, something with two five, but it was too hard to read the rest. 155? No, it wasn’t here in the Badlands. Now that she thought about it, she didn’t remember this particular containment facility. “You’re wondering why I brought you here. Why, for a week, I avoided your questions about the object that lies behind this door. The thing is, those were questions I couldn’t answer, and now you’ll see way.” The handle was encased in a grey aura and the door opened with a weary creak. The orb quickly moved inside the small room that was in front of them, illuminating a small pedestal on which a completely mundane object lied. There wasn’t anything particularly threatening about that thing, and even with the sharp instinct for “seems innocuous but it will rip your eyes out” SCPs the agents develop for their job, it seemed completely and utterly normal. Bright Light grabbed it with his magic and moved it closer to them, so that they could see it better. Twilight broke the silence and asked: “What is that thing?” The stallion smiled a bit and answered: “This is the key to open Akasha and turn everything back to normal.” A sharp, clacking noise startled both the mare and the wyvern, as they turned around to see that a small pebble had fell into the pit. They turned back to face Bright Light and she asked curiously: “Were you talking about something? And what is that thing?” The stallion groaned. “This is going to take a while.”