It was early morning when it happened. Celestia was sleeping quietly in her chambers, dreaming of lovely things and such when a rather vivid scene invaded her dreams…
… She was standing on a grassy plain. The sky was black and a rather horrible storm raged overhead. Thunder rumbled causing Celestia to jump as it was accompanied by a bolt of lightning that tore across the bleak sky.
Celestia couldn’t make sense of it all. Why was she being shown this pointless scene? Suddenly there was a roar of voices, drowning out the thunder. Celestia searched frantically for the origin of the sound but could not locate it. Again the voices screamed but this time the origin was clear.
On either side of her, thousands of humans stood dressed in iron skin each clutching a spear or some form of metallic object. Suddenly zero appeared in the air above her and a single voice rang out…
… “Know what they are… Know what they have done” …
… No sooner had the voice fallen silent when the humans around her yelled out again and began to charge toward each other. Flaming boulders flew overhead impacting the ground showering dirt and rock fragments across the field. However some crashed into the hordes of incoming humans, sending bodies flying into the air like ragdolls.
The zero quickly changed to twenty and Celestia watched as the counter climbed higher and higher before abruptly fading away.
Her attention turned back to the scene in front of her and gasped in surprise. The iron clad humans had shed their iron skin. Both sides wore a different colored simple cloth uniform and each held a long piece of cylindrical wood with a pointed metal shaft on the end.
There was a sequence of small bangs and flashes of light as fire erupted from the pieces of wood each human held. On either side humans fell, screaming in pain for seemingly no reason what so ever. As if to clarify things time seemed to slow and Celestia could see the cause of their pain.
She watched as another wooden pipe exploded and a small black ball flew out the end. She followed the ball in midair until it impacted in a human’s chest, going right through it, causing the human to cry out and fall to the ground dead.
Celestia couldn’t comprehend the scene in front of her. ‘Why would they intentionally hurt each other?’ she asked herself over and over again. Another bang, louder than before snapped her out of her train of thought and she found herself standing on a wooden ship of some kind surrounded by ocean. All around her humans started shouting the same thing.
“Incoming!”
‘What? What’s incoming?” Celestia thought looking around worriedly. She suddenly felt the ship shudder and the deck exploded. Shards of splintered wood flew all around her as a gaping hole now resided where the solid wood had just been.
“Jesus bloody Christ, return fire… Return fire!” a voice screamed and the ship lurched to the side as deafening boom emanated from below followed by a trail of white smoke and off in the distance a ship which until recently had not been there exploded in a huge fireball.
“Incoming! Keep ya ‘eds down lads!” A voice yelled as the ship once again shuddered. A violent explosion threw Celestia off the deck and into the churning sea below.
Celestia exhaled sharply as she impacted the water. Down she went, disorientated and trying to find which way was up. Eventually she decided to swim towards a light which she logically assumed was the surface. She took a deep breath as her head breached the water.
Expecting to reemerge in the same place, Celestia was startled to find herself near a beach. She swam toward the beach panting heavily as her hooves found purchase in the soft sand and she dragged herself onto the shore, flopping down in exhaustion. ‘What is going on here? Who is showing me this?’ she thought bewilderedly.
Celestia took in her surroundings, carefully absorbing every detail. She was in a small cove, steep cliffs were all that were in front of her and endless ocean was all that was behind her. A sequence of loud bangs once again shook her from her thoughts.
Down the beach further there were humans jumping out of boats and sprinting toward the cliffs. Puffs of sand flew up around the humans and Celestia felt tears well up as each of them fell, blood staining the sand around them. ‘They’re killing each other! Why?’ she wept softly, closing her eyes.
When she reopened them the scene before her had changed. She was standing in some kind of city. All around her humans worked busily and their foals played happily. This greatly confused Celestia as recently she had only witnessed death and destruction. As if to answer her question a loud siren filled the air with intense high pitched whirring and a dark shadow flew overhead.
Celestia craned her head upward and saw a large metal bird flying overhead. The metal bird dropped a large metal egg and flew off. The egg fell rapidly toward the ground. Celestia watched as the egg hit the ground in the distance. There was a brief moment of silence before the ground shook and a white light blinded her. Then a shockwave threw Celestia off her hooves and sent her flying into the air. She managed to level out and flew silently above the city staring in horror at the huge mushroom shaped cloud that dominated the sky. Time sped up and the cloud disappeared.
What Celestia saw made her wish she could claw her eyes out. The city was now a wasteland, completely devoid of life save the screams of a few thousand who were burning alive. The scene melted away and the floating numbers appeared once more only this time the number was sixty six million and still rising.
“What do you want from me?” Celestia screamed hoping that whoever was subjecting her to this would make it stop.
“Know what became of them” the voice replied
She cried as the scene changed again, this time a human foal played in a field of flowers. It clutched at a small toy, running along make swooshing noises as it ran with the toy. Suddenly a shadow loomed over it and it turned slowly to face a huge object descending from the heavens. Celestia could see the fear in its eyes as more of the objects began to descend. The scene changed again this time to a beautiful glass city. Celestia turned her head. She knew what was going to happen, another metal egg would drop and destroy everything but instead a bright red beam tore through the sky cutting the buildings in half and burning everything it touched. The city was being ravished by the large object she had seen before.
The sence suddenly changed back and Celestia could see the field the foal had played in before. It was burning and on the ground laid the broken toy. She felt her heart break as her legs gave out and she fell to the ground weeping. “Why! Why show me this? Answer me!” she screamed with tears streaming down her face.
“Know how they perished!” The voice screamed
“No! No! No!” Celestia screamed and tried to shut her eyes, but the image appeared in her head instead, she couldn’t escape it.
This time Celestia watched as a familiar human ran through the burning streets. In it hands was the crystal she had seen in the image with Twilight.
The human ducked and weaved through the debris that lined the streets. Every so often the human looked behind itself checking for any sign that it was being followed. It ran toward a familiar ship and bolted inside. The scene change yet again and Celestia found herself inside the strange ship.
She watched as the human laid the crystal in a tank and hit a button causing the crystal to levitate within the confines of the tank. Next the human took a seat and fiddled with a bunch of dials and switches. The ship lurched and began to rise into the air.
It took off, speeding through the air toward the heavens. Celestia watched in awe as the ship rocketed into space and flew into a raging battle. All around explosions lit up the cold black space as huge ships fired red and green beams at one another.
The human started shouting at the ship. “Tenno, find a suitable planet… With sentient life” it said.
“Certainly, Jorik would you like to specify the kind of inhabitants?” A voice asked pleasantly.
“Non-human and as far as possible away from Thrae, we don’t want them to find us” Jorik said accentuating the word, them.
“Of course, searching… searching… suitable destination found! Class H planet found, sentient life detected… plotting course… Distance three million light years… will take three days to reach, recommend cryo stasis” Tenno said.
“Acknowledged, engage FTL drive…” Jorik began but a violent shudder rocked the ship, klaxons sounded and red lights flashed.
“Warning! Hostile ship detected… FTL drives at ninety percent charged…” Tenno said informing Jorik of the current situation. Celestia watched in stunned silence as the tiny ship faced an enormous metal construct bearing down from in front.
The object was gigantic, easily the size of Canterlot. A bright light emanated from a divot in the front of the object and a red beam shot toward the tiny ship. ‘This can’t be the end, because I saw the human land in Equestria and give that crystal to my predecessor’ Celestia thought confused.
Time seemed to freeze and the voice spoke again. “Know…what they may become” it said slowly as the image faded and Celestia found herself standing in a familiar room, her throne room, but something wasn’t right.
Celestia felt cold and empty as she walked over to a window and peered out over Canterlot. She was horrified by the scene in front of her. Canterlot was in ruin, the city had crumbled in decay, the sky was blood red and the ponies sat in the streets their coats dulled and grey. The aura of despair was thick and Celestia felt nauseated. Her heart faltered when she saw her beloved sister chained to a stake in the centre of town along with the elements of harmony. There standing beside them were three human sized hooded figures, each carrying a long intricate sword.
Celestia felt herself crying out to her subjects, but they did not respond. It was as if she didn’t exist. The sound of a door opening behind her caused Celestia to jump and whirl around. Another cloaked human stepped in the room and slowly shut the door behind it.
It stared at Celestia, its eyes boring into hers. Then it slowly removed its cloak. Celestia’s eyes widened as the figure revealed itself. It may have been shaped like a human but it was far from it.
The creature had a short white coat; long flowing blue hair which actually seemed to be on fire; it had eyes that matched its hair, blue and on fire; on its cheek was a small cutie mark which Celestia recognized as her own.
She backed away in horror when she saw her cutie mark on its face. “W-What are you?” She demanded suddenly outraged that this thing had defiled her kingdom.
It only laughed manically, a deranged smile on its face and just as suddenly its features snapped back to a deadly seriousness and it spoke words that would forever haunt Celestia.
“What’s wrong? I did all this for you, why aren’t you happy? This is the way you made me… Mother…”
***
Celestia awoke screaming, cold sweat clung to her fur. A voice faintly drifted through the air.
“The darkness beneath hides what you seek” Was all the voice said before trailing off in a series of faint whispers.
Celestia had to find Twilight Sparkle and gather the elements of harmony only together could they solve this mystery and make sense of her vision. Celestia jumped out of bed and rushed off to find her studious protégé.