//------------------------------// // Chapter 9: Ethereal // Story: Callsign MANE VI: Twilight // by Col_StaR //------------------------------// The marble-white SUV stood in the center of the diner’s parking lot, its four wheels planted firmly on the rain-washed pavement. It appeared to be identical to many of the other cars in the Network’s fleet, but this one was different. Marrying a sleek form and powerful function, this SUV had been built by hand to meet Cell’s standard of perfection. But Cell had also made many custom alterations to this vehicle in particular, the details of which were never recorded nor revealed. Rumors from loose-lipped guardsmen had always circulated about hidden weapons and ejection seats, but only Cell knew the truth of what was inside that passenger cabin. Officially designated “Chariot One” by its creators, only a select few of the most senior ranking Illuminatus Guardsmen had the privilege of operating the most specialized SUV in the Network’s fleet. Captain Light was one such guardsman. He ignored the downpour as he stood beside the driver’s side door, his hazel eyes watching the distant haze for any sign of movement. The storm shook the trees and howled the wind, making the forest that surrounded them come to life like a ghoulish fantasy. Even as the shrubs turned to bramble and the forest grew with sharp-toothed smiles, the man would not be deterred. He had faced down greater dangers in his time, and today would prove no different. The presence of another person coming up beside him pulled Light from his mental wandering, and he quickly put his mind at attention. He didn’t need to see who it was, for the woman’s southern accent announced her identity. “The girls’re ready when you are, Captain,” Applejack said. Whether out of empathy, respect, or personal choice, she refused to look at him too. Together, they looked intently into the haze before them. Light grunted approvingly as he nodded, droplets of rain trickling down the fine wrinkles of his brow. “If they are out there, they’ll be waiting for us. We should depart before they can prepare any further.” Applejack agreed. “Rainbow’s worked out the destination in the town, so she and I’ll be on point. You’d best be on us like a tail on a dog unless you want to get lost out there.” “You do not need to worry about us. I’ll do whatever I must.” The cowgirl couldn’t help but sympathize, which prompted a question in her head. “Now you have me a mite curious about that team of yours, Light. I’ve gotten used to suits like you throwing teams like mine into fires like scraps of firewood. Yet here you are, more protective of those two than a fox and his kits during hunting season. I get that they’re important, but I just don’t get why. So who exactly are those two?” The question was one Light hesitated to answer; he understood her curiosity, but the truth was something that shouldn’t matter to her. “They’re…they’re important. More important than me.” Light turned to face the blonde woman, “Applejack, I have a favor to ask.” Had it been any other suit she’d met in her life, the cowgirl would have denied them the courtesy of listening to their plea. But, for this suit in particular, she would hear the man’s request. “Armor and Twilight are good kids, but they don’t know the world like you and I do. Now, I’m responsible for their safety but…but if something happens to me out there, I’d like your word that you’ll keep them safe.” Applejack said nothing. But in the storming silence that followed, she knew her answer. A pair of unsteady feet shuffled across the tile floor. The door was the destination, but it was an impossible length away. She may as well have been walking to the moon and back again. Twenty feet. “I can’t do it. I just can’t,” she said. “Yes you can. Come on, I’ll help you,” he said. A weak hand gripped the young man’s jacket as legs trembled against the ground. The timing of each step and the tugging at his sleeve matched each other to a hesitant beat. Together, they slowly marched to the tentative pace. Fifteen feet. “I can barely move as it is.” “You’re doing fine. Don’t stop to think about the distance. Just keep moving.” She couldn’t help it. She couldn’t stop thinking, even if she tried. Thinking is what came naturally to her. She thought about her books. She thought about a book about the central nervous system. “Fight or Flight: Exploring the Nervous System (3rd edition)”. It was in the Physiology wing of the library’s bottom floor, second shelf from the left, above the books about dreams and below the books about psychosis. She remembered spending all night copying the diagrams from that book into her notes and studying the text as thoroughly as a 12 year old could. Even now, she could imagine the nocioceptor nerve endings in her skin transmitting electrical energy from their axon up through her spinal cord, where they’ll reach the brainstem and stimulate the thalamus and the synapses of the somatosensory cortex, thus stimulating the negative sensory feedback that panged her body with every aching moment. Thinking about the pain made her forget about feeling it for that moment at least. Sometimes it was simpler to focus on numbers. Five feet. “We’re almost at the door. You’re doing good, Twilight.” He could hear her anticipating each new step with a methodical breath. As one foot uprooted itself and rose into the air, she’d let the cold air fill her lungs; as it fell to the floor, replanting itself against the infirm ground, she’d let go of her breath. Three feet. Two feet. One. And finally, none. Shining Armor was as relieved as Twilight to have finally made it. “I told you you could do it. I won’t lie to you: beyond this door, it’s pretty miserable. But Captain Light’s waiting for us with our ride out of here.” The young man gave the girl a reassuring pat on the shoulder. “Are you ready?” Her first thought was an immediate, “no”. But that thought was soon quelled by a more impelling voice. “You will not be weak. You must be strong.” Twilight nodded her head before she had the chance to change her mind. The door burst open with a sharp gust of wind that nearly blew Twilight to the floor. Shining Armor pressing her forward, the ceramic-white SUV parked along the curb was their destination. The pace quickened under the torrential downpour around them. The sky was still as dark as night, but she could make out movement between the rain and the cars. Captain Light and Applejack stood beside the SUV, staring into the darkened forest across the road. Rarity stood alone beside her pearl-white Mercedes Benz, pouting about the rain as she held her umbrella close. Rainbow Dash could barely be seen in the distance, identifiable as a narrow body running down the road with a bright red flare in her hands. The black-haired girl paused to watch the alluring amber blaze burn defiantly through the air like a firework before being doused in a puddle, the water boiling as the last light finally faded. Before long, the two had arrived at their destination. The Chariot. Of all the vehicles to be saved from the ambush, it had to be this one. Whether it was a sign of hope or an omen of things to come, Twilight was shocked to find it there. It was Cell’s personal transport, a one-of-a-kind vehicle for the Network’s most important VIP. She dared to touch the Chariot’s side. The chilling touch of metal confirmed the vehicle’s presence in reality. Embracing the naive glimmer of hope, Twilight ignored the dents and deflections of the battle-worn vehicle. She pressed her face against the center window, her hand over her forehead. She squinted her eyes to peer through the tinted blackness. Yet to the student’s dismay, the cabin was empty; her teacher was nowhere to be found. The dismal girl slowly pulled away from the window as she felt that brief moment of hope leave her. Her eyes wide with sorrow, she looked to the young man beside her. Twilight looked to Shining Armor for something: comfort, guidance, reassurance, something to distract her from the despair growing within her. As Shining Armor looked back at her, caught in her grief-stricken gaze, he answered the question she hadn’t the strength to say. “We don’t know what happened to her.” The inkling of compassion in his voice did little to soften the blow. “When we were first ambushed, things were too chaotic for us to coordinate through. In spite of this, we did what we thought we should do: we went to protect Cell. That’s when Sledge and I left you and Spike in the back of our car. But when we got to the Chariot, we found it already empty, every door already swung open, every passenger already gone…in one way or-.” “That’s enough, Shining Armor.” The Knight’s explanation was cut short as his captain stepped in. Light looked over the two once more, before saying, “MANE 3 reports they are ready to move out. They’ll be our guide and escort out of this forest, but I still want you both to be ready for anything.” The older man placed his hand on the passenger seat door, taking a moment to let the biometric scanners approve his identity before tossing it open. “Shining Armor, you’re on shotgun.” Armor understood, but he took a moment to reassure the girl who was stuck staring at her shoes. Putting on the best grin he could muster, he gently put a hand on her shoulder and tried to look her in the eyes, “Wherever she is, I’m sure she’s fine.” ‘Fine’, he said. As Twilight contemplated the more-likely possibilities, ‘fine’ became an increasingly naive statement. Could she be alright? Or was Cell truly gone: lost, captured, tortured, and killed by the very people that had once sought to apprehend her. Given the circumstances, the odds were overwhelmingly against her. It would take nothing short of a miracle for Cell to escape that, and the student was never one for superstition. For the fleeting moment as Armor obeyed his order, Twilight felt hate towards Armor and his dishonest assurances. But as the door slammed shut, she began to hate herself. “Do you know, captain?” the girl asked in a whisper, “Is she really gone?” Light stood with his hand on the rear door, his hands firmly grasping the handle. The scanners had already done their job, but he stayed frozen there, looking down upon the girl. “I don’t know,” he answered truthfully. From the way she didn’t move a muscle, he could tell the answer didn’t sit well with her. “But regardless of where she is, we should focus on what she’d want. And what Cell would want is for her protégé to get home safely. The Chariot is the most armored vehicle here, and that cabin is the safest place for you. It may be against protocol, but if anyone were to disobey it, she’d want it to be you.” With that, the man pulled the door open. The forbidden cabin of the Chariot seemed to emanate an aura like a warm breeze in the midst of the freezing torrent. Amber lights flickered softly from inside. The cabin was illuminated as if by the comforting glow of candlelight. It seemed to call to her, beckoning her inside with a warm, mothering tongue. Twilight resisted at first, hesitating against breaking the wishes of her teacher. But after the Captain gave one last reassuring nod, she walked up to the door, stepped inside, and let the warmth overtake her. As the door shut behind her, Twilight could feel the tips of her fingers tingling with anxious energy. In the center of the cabin was a luxurious leather seat that felt as soft and plush as a cloud. The throne was sized to fit Cell’s lanky frame, and as the girl took a seat upon it, she felt her slight frame was undeserving of such magnificence. The cabin’s fine oak trim was carved with a dazzling display of bas-relief, revealing hundreds of years’ worth of the Illuminatus’s history. Yet unlike in the SUV before, this cabin lacked the window between the front driver’s cabin with the passenger cabin, and the windows were tinted to a near impenetrability. The Chariot was built as a sanctuary, yet its sanctity was preserved by titanium plating and absolute isolation. The Chariot’s sudden movement caught Twilight off-guard, forcing her upon Cell’s former throne. As her body made full contact with the beckoning seat, she could feel something changing within her. The electricity in the air seemed to double in density. Every muscle in her body felt the urge to twitch and move as if out of reflex. She felt her senses being heightened by the nervous excitement, her synapses working at impossible depth. Despite the wall between them, Twilight could swear she heard Light reminding Armor to, “stay sharp and watch the treeline,” while Armor retorted with, “watching those outsiders instead.” Even further out was Rainbow Dash whining to Applejack about how she could be riding in Rarity’s, “super sweet Benz” instead of being stuck in a truck on map duty. The cabin began to fill with a quiet noise, a soft sound that she’d never heard of before. It was a song unknown to her, one with no recognizable instruments or vocals, yet made her feel as if she were being lulled to rest by a choir of angels. Every moment of the song washed over her anxiety like a calming wave, pulling her physical body into the embrace of the cloud-soft chair whilst everything else ascended into heaven. In the matter of moments between exhilaration and serenity, Twilight felt everything drain from her body. She felt herself slipping away with the distant echoes of a familiar voice. Twilight never remembered waking up in that place; it was as if she had always been there. This place was unlike anything that any mortal being could have been imagined. There were no light, no sky, no geography of any kind. This world was empty of everything, where a body of haze masked a perpetual blackness that stretched into the infinite in all directions. There was no doubt of one’s presence, but their physical body felt immaterial and intangible; mass and matter were foreign concepts in this place. She was nothing short of ethereal. The woman’s voice cackled from inside the haze, distantly echoing through the emptiness. “How does it feel to be powerless?” Twilight recognized that voice, and she was terrified to hear it again. She looked around, searching for the source but finding none. Was the question directed towards her? Was someone else there? Could they tell her where she was? The mystery alone was enough to beckon Twilight into the haze, prodding deeper into the unknown. The voice continued to speak. “How does it feel to know that everything you’ve done is now meaningless- that you have failed everything you had hoped to accomplish? How does it make you feel to know that your royal guard, a private army at your beck and call, will never hear your cries for help? “ There was a circle inside the expanse that cut through the haze, holding back the encroaching fog like a sea wall against the crashing waves. Two women, one in white and the other in black, stood in the center of this arena. Their ethereal figures stood as they faced the other down, their faces taut with equal parts esteem and contempt. This was a battle of wills in a world where nothing else existed. Nightmare made the first move. As she took the first step forward, the razor-sharp heel of her shoe clacking obediently against the non-existent ground. “Do you remember that feeling? How the stomach churns and the throat seizes shut, and how the mind runs wild while the body shuts down? Do you remember fear? After all, the last time you felt it was the last time you saw Luna.” “Don’t you dare bring her into this,” Cell responded, her venomous glare and razor-sharp tongue contrasting with her rigid demeanor. “Your quarrel is with me, not her. She is not involved in this.” The order was received with an amused laugh. Confident in her success, the woman in black continued, “Oh, but she is. In fact, I owe her a great deal, as I do to you. I thank you for the absolute control you’ve given me over the Umbra, and I thank you for shutting yourself away in that little Institute of yours for all that time. All I had to do was to pick up the pieces of the world you threw away, and Luna did the rest. “ “You’re lying,” she growled. “She may have been imprisoned, but her soul is still pure and good. She is still loyal to our cause.” “That’s where you’re wrong,” the bold woman sneered into the other’s face, taking the silvery woman’s cold indifference as a sign of her vulnerability. “You speak as if you trapped her away from me, when in reality she was the one trapped with me. You gave her a mansion, but it was still her prison. And I have ways of breaking my prisoners.” As the woman’s black lips curled into a devious smile, images flashed around her opponent’s head. Torture. Starvation. Isolation. Cell could barely contain herself as the rush of disgust overcame her. “I want to speak to her- I demand to speak to Luna. What have you done with her?” “Why, she’s right where you left her: rotting in your prison, languishing for the crimes you found her guilty of, festering with resentment and regret. After only a single year, she surrendered to my terms: I would rebuild the Umbra, and she would help me in every way that mattered; in a sense, I had to become her… in every way that mattered.” Cell’s eyes narrowed, “What do you mean?” “She told me everything about you two: what you truly are, the powers you yield, your miserable dream of a world in harmony. But more importantly, she showed me the untapped power within me. That’s how I unlocked my true potential. That’s how I rebuilt the Umbra. That’s how I brought you here. In her own words, I’m as powerful as she is. And thus, I am as powerful as you are.” What Nightmare did next made Twilight shudder in terrified awe. The woman held out her arm with deliberate poise. Soon, a flow of cerulean light began to emanate from the tips of her fingers, engulfing her entire hand and wrapping around her arm like a serpent on a branch. The aura slithered up her arm and around her neck like a scarf, before playfully wrapping around her outstretched fingers. Holding it close, Nightmare’s hand clasped shut, extinguishing the glow between her fingers in a single powerful motion. She brought her relaxed fist close to her face, and as she extended her thumb and forefinger, an arc of electricity cackled between the tips. The woman adored the power she held between her fingers. “Magic. Such fascinating power. Impossible, imaginary, yet doubtlessly real. In anyone else’s eyes, I’d be considered a monster or a witch to be burned at the stake. Even in this era, the people of this planet are petty, superstitious, and fearful; I can understand why you’d never show them the truth. They wouldn’t see us as human… but I guess that was never a problem for you. And to think… the woman you want so dearly to protect is the one who helped create your worst nightmare.” “Midnight, I am warning you. You do not understand such power, and I can feel its influence corrupting you. You were not taught to fully control it, and if left unchecked it will inevitably come to control you. Please, give up this fight and come away peacefully.” “Hah. Save your begging, Cell. There will be plenty of time for that at your execution. You clearly underestimate me if you think that you can still speak to me as a subordinate to your whims. Your guards are dead, captured, or disorganized. Your protégé is on the run and will soon be in my thrall. And once your Project Harmony is under my complete control, I will use it to destroy the Institute until it is nothing more than ashen memories. As for you… perhaps you will speak with the proper amount of reverence when you are begging for mercy at my feet.” “I know you will not succeed. I offer you one final chance…” The woman in black continued speaking, her shouting brazen with her confidence. “No. The time for diplomacy has ended, and a time for war is upon us. It will be a dark age lit by fire and lightning. But once the final night falls, the Umbra will crush the Illuminatus. Only then will we take our rightful place and reign supreme over the Earth. You wanted your vision of peace? I shall make it. But you will never have the chance to see it.” Nightmare’s hand shot forward, the flow of her magic reaching out to engulf Cell. Unfazed, the woman in white solemnly shut her eyes. Just as the cerulean tendrils reached out to strike her, Cell’s body disappeared, her image dissipating into a cloud of dust. The woman in black let out a disappointed grunt. She redoubled her stance, standing boastfully with her hands behind her back. Even after all evidence of her nemesis had disappeared, Nightmare still stared into the infinite haze. Twilight was frozen still, watching Nightmare from the boundary of the fog. She was afraid to move, afraid to breathe, but above all else, afraid of her. “I’m glad you were here to see that, Twilight,” Nightmare said. “Let it be a lesson to you.” Twilight’s heart stopped as her every hair stood on edge. Before she could turn to run away, Nightmare’s magic engulfed the girl, wrapping the light around her arms and legs. The immaterial tendrils lifted up her into the air with absolute ease. Twilight struggled to move but to no avail: she was powerless to escape. With the same deliberate poise, Nightmare turned to face her captive. “You may have escaped me before, but I will find you. Then, you will tell about Project Harmony. Then you will tell me where the Elements are. And then you will help me take what is rightfully mine. But until then, remember this day, for it shall be your last.” The tendrils began to constrict, squeezing the girl’s body all at once. But before she could scream in both pain and terror, Twilight felt herself fade into dust as well. The universe welcomed Twilight’s return with a jolt of lightning to the brainstem. As consciousness rushed back to her, she could feel every atom of her body rushing back into its place. The sensation of omniscience drained from her mind, replaced by the sluggish mass of matter. It took a moment for Twilight to readjust to the physical world while still struggling to comprehend the previous one. As impossible as the dream may have been, it felt too real to ignore. Twilight felt like she had been sleeping for at least a century. Still, she could feel the warmth of light and the scent of sterile air. Wherever it was, the room had been recently cleaned as evidenced from the lingering smell of bleach. It was all reminiscent of the Infirmary back home; despite only going there once for a severe stomach ache, the student could still recall Hippocrates and his army of nurses. However, the familiar comforts only emphasized the things that were out of place: the demure humming of an unfamiliar voice, the rhythmic breathing against her neck, the peculiar scent of raspberry. Her body felt numb, but she could feel something moving along her shoulder. Painlessly prodding and pressing the skin together, this other person seemed unaware of Twilight’s consciousness. The girl opened her eyes to find a veil of hair mere inches away from her face. The soft pink strands waved in sync with the melody of the song. Whoever this person was, and whatever they were doing, they were too close for comfort. Twilight’s words were more of a sluggish groan than an honest question, “Can I help you?” The humming suddenly stopped, as did the other girl’s breathing. Her head turned slowly towards Twilight, afraid of what she might find. From behind the waving curtain of pink hair, a pair of turquoise eyes stared back, pupils constricting with surprise. The woman jumped back off her patient with a gasp, sending a tray of assorted medical equipment crashing to the floor with a series of metallic clangs. Even after the ruckus had ended, the pink-haired girl stood shaking in her shoes as her back pressed against the far wall. From opposite ends of the room, the two stared at each other. There were a million questions in Twilight’s mind at the time: where was she, what time was it, how did she get here, where were the others? But only one managed to reach her lips. “Who are you?” The timid woman squeaked in reply.