//------------------------------// // Luna's dream. Twilight meets Dante. // Story: The last black crusade // by ThatRarityIsaSpy //------------------------------// Luna allowed herself a nap. About four more hours until her shift. Silently, she slipped into dreamland again. The very reason she slept less often now. In her dream, she saw countless astartes, daemons and ponies battle in a massive valley. A familiar one at that. The crystal empire was still in sight. She saw this dream from a bird eye's view, unable to say anything, but witnessing and hearing it all. For some reason, she knew every name of every combatant. From Kaldor Draigo to Marneus Calgar to Dante, from Ulkair to Skarband to Fateweaver. Shifting her view, away from the massive battle in the valley, she watched the crystal empire only to find that it too, was under siege from chaos. She watched as hundreds of astartes hold the line against chaos space marines, watched as Draigo dueled M'kachan in one of it's plazas, watched as Dante desperately attempt to push Skarband away from the crystal heart, watched as Temperus Maximus fought Kharn in the crystal palace and Tia? She watched her sister fight her way through it's streets, past countless daemons and chaos space marines, right into a mass of loyalists. They were staring grimly at some smoke. In that smoke, a blue glowing blade flashed, she saw her sister charge headlong at the blade. And that was when her dream ended. _____________________________________________________________________________________________ "Your tur.... are you alright?" Celestia asked as Luna entered the room. "Fine. Fine." Luna said as she began to cast her spell. "Go take a break or something...." Celestia shrugged and left. Luna was careful not to make eye-contact with her during this time. But it was certainly not possible to avoid eye-contact with the man she was healing................ _____________________________________________________________________________________________ The Emperor frowned to himself as he took a peek at what Luna was thinking about. Luna didn't exactly notice since he wasn't exactly Mr. Happy-go-lucky-guy-who-likes-to-smile. The Emperor only let out a silent sigh as he thought about Luna as a person and her past. He too, readied for the final battle. He had already prepared for the worst. ______________________________________________________________________________________________ "Twilight? There's someone you should meet." Gabriel said. "The first wave of the Emperor's legions have arrived." "Already? Well, what are we waiting for?" Rainbow Dash asked as she waved Twilight over. "C'mon! I can't miss meeting even more humans!" Angelos did his best to remain emotionless. "My name is Dante. I presume you are Twilight.. are you not?" The Blood Angels chapter master said introducing himself. He did cut a regal figure.... though that mask he wore gave many a pony (and space marine) an uneasy feeling. "Yes..." Twilight said staring at the mask. It creeped her out to no end. Dante under his mask, smiled. He always felt rather amused when ANYONE showed visible signs of uneasiness or apprehension over his mask. "And of course...... we have more men.... in high orbit of course. When the fight begins, we shall unleash the wrath of Sanguinius upon our enemies." Dante said proudly. "We have about 40,000 battle brothers. Ready under my command." (Most chapter masters either were reasonably convinced or "persuaded" that Dante should lead any successors of the original legion.) 40,000? That's twicethe entire armed forces of Equestria! Twilight thought. "And don't forget about the Iron Hands cha..... representative." Dante said. "Though he wasn't too keen on coming here. I suspect their numbers are slightly.... maybe two, three thousand under ours." 87,000 humans? This fight should be easy..... unless chaos has more. Oh good heaven, please make it so chaos doesn't have more men. "I do believe everyone else is on the way." Dante replied. "Can you believe it? The Emperor himself ordered about 600,000 space marines to be here in Equestria. Never would have expected so many brothers in one place." "Especially considering the fact they were defending the home world of some random aliens. Aliens that the Emperor seems to have a liking to. Meh, if they do have a connection to the Emperor than maybe their worth keeping around. Their gifts do put them on.... better terms with most battle brothers than the average alien, myself included." (This part, Dante said over the vox to Angelos.) "Oh, and Gabriel, I thought you nearly were killed. Wounds like that don't go away in an instant do they?" "They did with Equestrian magic. Any other day, I would have tore the place down ranting about witches. My friend Thule received a similar treatment. He is now once again no longer detained within his dreadnought. Nearly dead, and yet in her endless compassion for almost all beings, Twilight had dragged him from the jaws of death to once again serve the Emperor." "Nice. Nice." Dante said nodding. "I will remain here for now. When the traitors come, our chapters will show them the wrath of the Emperor." "Praise the Emperor. Let none find us wanting." "Indeed brother. Indeed." ______________________________________________________________________________________________ "Mr. Dante, may I have a question?" Twilight asked watching the astartes take a look around in ponyville. "Speak your mind." Dante replied. "How old are you?" "Odd question." (Not odd at all actually.) "Why do you ask?" "Well, I heard space marines... aren't like other humans and live a long time...... and I heard that the Emperor is older than Princess Celestia, and that the humans called the primarchs are also older.." "Wel..." "He's like 10,000 years old too." A blood angels scout joked. "Right sire?" "Shut up." Dante replied. "Didn't your elders have tell you it's not polite to ask someone their age." "Especially when he's like as old as the Emperor?!" The scout once again fired up. "C'mon, don't feel bad, you can share about the time when you shook hands with the Emperor." "No I did..." "See he did!" "Shouldn't you be somewhere? We have about 3 more weeks. I want everyone to be ready. Go." "We should fortify this place up. One place in particular though." Twilight said. "It's the most important part of the Emperor's plan!" "How did you know about his plan?" Dante snapped. "He...... he... told me...." Twilight said a bit nervous at the sudden menacing tone Dante spoke in. "Oh. Okay then. I agree. I suppose the Iron hands wouldn't mind lending some men for the job." _____________________________________________________________________________________________ Elsewhere, the vile forces of chaos launched their massive fleets to attack both, holy Terra and Equestria. ETA of both planets? Approximately 3 weeks. 3 more weeks for the Emperor to finish up healing, and for his primarchs to fortify the last of Terra. And 3 more weeks for the hundreds of thousands astartes to prepare on Equestria.