The ensuing conflict was not a battle, it was a slaughter. The thestrals were not the innumerous mindless hordes of lost ones that blindly threw themselves at the changelings, but sane beings that barely numbered over three hundred. The field artillery cut a wide swath of them to ribbons with grapeshot. Those who survived that found a wall of lead from the riflelings sizing them down to just over half their original number.
Although only five remained, the flamethrowers proved the most terrifying of all. Primitive fire magic was well known in the empire, but those spells were useless in the rain. With the flaming oil however, the rain only succeeded in spreading it far across the ground. The changeling spell-weavers took advantage of that and pushed the oil away from them to form a wall of fire. The oil clung to fur, and seeped through chinks in the imperial’s armor. The blaze was as brutal as the swordlings waiting for them at the front. The changelings didn’t need to rely on their mouths or wings to wield their weapons. Their telekinesis gave the drones the reach of a spear and the dexterity of a dagger. To make matters even worse for those few imperials that reached the changeling line, the swordlings were focused completely on defense. They stalled just long enough for the riflelings behind them to take the easy shot. Even while Arya fended off two imperials lucky enough to reach the front with her iron-bark wings, she couldn’t help but to gawk at how quickly the thestrals were being cut down.
Rainbow Dash and her squad feigned death near the beginning of the charge and stayed along the left flank, so the artillery fire could focus elsewhere.
The two scions struggled to keep the imperials’ morale intact in the face of such technological disparity. She dropped to the ground to keep a perfect field of view on the two glowing thestrals. The male was slowly walking forward with a convex teal barrier protecting him and well over a dozen imperials. He stops moving every time the artillery buckles his shield. I hope they’ll be willing to surrender.
The scion mare flinched from behind the teal shield as an artillery shot deformed it frightfully bad before it recovered. With most of the imperials dead, she slammed the butt of her staff into the marble ground so it would stand on its own. From there she drew upon the ley line tethering her to Gethar to empower her staff. Gethar himself stopped his electrical assault to assist his champion.
Rainbow Dash waited for the clockwerks to reload as she watched the scions. What is she doing?
While her wings were extended, the raw power the scion was channeling lifted her off the ground as her voice took on a deep husky tone that demanded to be heard over the rain. “Servants of the Empire, arise anew!”
A blinding wall of golden light enveloped the entire plaza. The guns fell silent as everyone averted their gaze. The power needed was so massive that the ley lines withered, and the rain stopped completely. Even Gethar felt dimmed by the sheer demands of granting another his power. I can only channel so much of the world’s energies before having to use my own.
Twilight Sparkle rubbed her eyes to clear the spots from her vision. That was a massive restoration spell. Just what kind of power did the old empire have?! She shook her head to finally clear her vision to find the dark clouds above were breaking up as Gethar could no longer focus on them anymore. Yet that was not what stunned the changelings as they recovered their sight.
All of the imperial guardponies that had been cut down by the changelings were now standing around the scions in perfect health. Most stumbled about in a daze from having their lives returned to them. The male scion impatiently and noisily slammed his staff onto the ground, cracking the marble floor. “Form ranks and prepare to charge again!”
With practiced ease, the imperials obeyed, forming a phalanx. The changelings were stunned by both the magic, and the ponies’ swift acceptance of a second suicidal charge. “Again?” Ferrum challenged as he shoved his way through the gathered thestrals to get in front of the scions. “We just got slaughtered!”
“And?” the male scion replied coldly. “Attack and resurrection is standard operating procedure to gauge an enemy’s tactics and strength when scions lead the army. Shouldn’t you know this?”
Ferrum’s ignorance caught him flat-footed as more thestrals started to scrutinize him until Rainbow Dash came to his rescue by shoving her way in front of him. “Have you taken one good look at our equipment?! We’re in no shape to attack again.”
The imperials may have been physically healthy again, but many of them had broken weapons, shattered by cannon or rifle shot. Some of them had torn up armor while others feverishly tried to remove their armor which was still covered in burning oil.
The female scion was too winded to respond, so it left was up to the stallion. He snapped his head around to bark angrily at Ferrum. “Know your place, Recruit! It is not our place to question the avatars!”
“Maybe it should be,” Rainbow Dash replied harshly as she shoved her way to the front. “Were you watching that fight? We were slaughtered!”
“And yet here we stand, whole again. We can fight indefinitely!”
The mare scion propped herself up on her staff. Her steely gaze tried to instill discipline in Rainbow Dash, but the queen held her ground. “The Justicar protects his own. I can bring you all back again and again if need be.”
Riposte made a show of slamming his sword on the ground. Please don’t break. Ignoring his sword’s plight, he swept a hoof at the changelings who had stopped firing. “That might help if we actually did something to them! As far as I can see, not one of them lies dead.”
Rainbow Dash risked a quick talk with her sister. <How long do we have to jerk them off before the blow hard comes back?>
<He’s already monologuing again, but I draped a sonic dampener over the thestrals so they won’t hear him. I’ll stall for all the time I can.>
Rainbow nodded slightly before returning her attention to the argument. The thestrals were starting to look questioningly between the disguised changelings and the scions. It was obvious many of them did not want to face down the technological might of the changelings a second time. “Why don’t we try talking to them?” She interjected in the middle of the scions’ rebuttal.
Everyone stared at her as if she was mad. “The royal family sees us as traitors for attacking them. They’d never let us live.” One guardpony called out nervously.
“He’s right. Our best chance is to run. We can’t stand up to such power!” said another.
“I can’t believe what I’m hearing!” The mare scion raged as she swept an accusatory glare at them all. “We have the Justicar on our side! With him, we can’t lose.”
“We just lost pretty damn badly a minute ago,” called out a disguised changeling.
“That’s right,” Ferrum pointed out. Several nearby thestrals shouted their agreement. “If the imperial family wanted us dead, they’d still be attacking us right now, but look!” He pointed past the translucent barrier. Every changeling remained where they had originally started. “Of all the monsters we’ve fought so far today, not one has given quarter to any of us, let alone be smart enough to use whatever magic they have to wipe us out so fast. I say we try to talk to them.”
The stallion scion’s eyes flashed with anger and leveled his staff at Ferrum’s face. The drone froze in place as the scion spoke slowly, clearly, and dangerously. “You will fall back in line, or I will kill you where you stand. And this time, we will not bring you back.”
Riposte was not about to let his clutchmate stand alone, and pushed two thestrals out of the way to stand at his brother’s side. “Take a look at her!” He stabbed a hoof at the scion mare. The ley line connected to her was as thin as a candle, and she was gasping for breath. She struggled to rise to her hooves, giving Riposte an excuse to press his point. “She’s got what? Maybe one, two of those left?” The scions growl at him as he grabbed a soldier and hauled him forward. “Look at him! His armor’s ruined, and his sword’s nothing more than a hilt now.” He let go of the hapless pony. “How many others have ruined equipment?” Most of the soldiers started muttering to each other as they compared the poor state of their arms and armor.
“Enough!” The male scion roared. He slammed the butt of his staff into the ground, creating a teal ripple along the cracks. “Get back in line, all of you, or be sentenced for treason.”
Rainbow pinged her sister, letting her know now was the time to sow even more dissent. Twilight used her magic to make her voice carry to the thestrals without distracting Gethar from his monologue. “Soldiers of Rookhaven. Stand aside and you will not be harmed. Judging by your priest’s weakened state; I know you cannot resurrect yourselves twice.”
The scion in question tried to rise on shaky legs until a sudden influx of power from the ley line in her back and Gethar finally discovered Twilight’s subterfuge and ripped the sonic dampener away. “Do you honestly think your paltry tricks could prolong your lives? The true sons and daughters of Rookhaven will no longer stand by while you destroy the land!”
The disguised changelings silenced themselves while the scions cheered for their master. Twilight opted to play a different game. She made sure her voice would carry to everyone. “I did nothing of the sort. The destruction of the ley lines was your fault! If you knew one iota about them, you would know they are not to be used as somepony’s personal playthings.” The very air rumbled at Gethar’s fury, but his hesitation gave Twilight an opening to continue. “Have you bothered to tell them you allowed the good ponies of Rookhaven to be trapped here for thousands of years? If you could free them at any time, why have you not done so earlier?”
“Trapped?” one thestral queried with confusion. “What is she talking about?”
“Yeah, it’s only been four hours, max, since everything went to Tartarus!” yelled another.
“They remained here to defend this city!” Gethar raged, silencing all debate among the soldiers. “They swore an oath to defend the Empire with their lives, and they will keep it.”
“And what about the civilians?” Twilight challenged. “Did they swear an oath too?”
“Any loyal citizen of the Empire would die to protect it! It appears that is something you have forgotten.”
Rainbow Dash saw a perfect opening to dissolve the imperial guard’s loyalty, and put on an air of insulted rage. “Is it true, Justicar? Has it really been thousands of years?”
“So what if it has? Everything I have done was in the Empire’s name, and to protect the world from the corrupted ones.”
“How do we know you didn’t cause it?” Ferrum barked accusingly. “You always hated Arcanum, and yet there you are controlling the threads of the world.”
The male scion slammed the crown of his staff next to Ferrum’s head, purposefully missing it by inches. “It is not our place to question why, only to follow and die.”
Gethar’s ley lines blue-shifted as he regarded his champion, but Riposte saw an exploitable flaw that he was all too eager to snatch. “Isn’t that exactly what we did when we attacked the royal family in the first place? Our duty lies with them, not the Justicar!”
The scions quickly found the soldiers starting to bicker about who to side with. The drones kept sowing more confusion on top of it all until the scions became the objects of the soldiers’ distrust. Twilight was getting increasingly impatient with every second the lost ones gouged their way deeper into the Deception. <Let them bicker, we’re leaving. Children, lend me your mana.>
Twilight concentrated on the shattered steps leading into the palace. The glow of her horn would have pierced the growing gloom of nightfall were it not for Particle having the presence of mind to weave an illusion to mask the spell cast.
Not that Gethar would have noticed as his rage reached new heights at the growing resentment against his scions. “Traitors, all of you! I should have you all executed, but you have served your purpose in stalling the royals.”
Right before their eyes, hundreds of lost ones raced out of the northern districts of the city filtering throughout palace itself and every nook and cranny they could squeeze through. The scions dropped their staves out of profound shock and betrayal. The mare was the only one of the two that could speak. “You were controlling them all along?”
Gethar ignored the comment. “I will consider everypony’s… assistance when I call upon you again. But I have a special task for you, my scions.” Without another word, he removed the ley line from around the thestrals, leaving them frozen in time within moments. The two scions were heaved into the air by the ley lines tethered to them and were yanked in towards the center of the palace. During which time, Gethar scarcely noticed Rainbow’s squad was still active in his attempts to keep the lost ones corralled away from the imperials so his monstrous minions would not phase back out of time.
Twilight’s spell neared completion with only one other thought running through her head. <Rainbow, Run!>
A moment before Gethar could unleash another bolt of lightning, Twilight and her entire remaining escorts blinked out of existence, rendering him dumbstruck. The changelings reappeared on the far side of Rainbow's squad, in the middle of the one place that the lost ones were not coming through, a long flight of stairs that lead straight towards the center of the marble palace. Rainbow and her squad dropped their disguises and made a mad sprint towards Twilight’s new position as her drones opened fire on the waves of lost ones. “You can teleport!?”
The sea of mutants may have lost their original target after the teleport, but Rainbow’s squad was exposed in the center of the plaza and an inviting meal to them all. With Gethar still reeling from witnessing teleportation of such scale, Twilight and a few of her mages dropped their protection to grapple the fleeing changelings with their kinesis. <Hurry and pull them in before he thinks to electrocute us!> Gethar saw Rainbow’s team as an easy target, and abandoned his thus far ineffectual lightning in favor of seven spear-like ley lines that he sent racing towards them.
“YOU! You caused them to betray me!” The sky turned red at Gethar’s boundless fury. “I should have killed the whole royal family all a long time ago. Time to rectify that mistake.”
Serrated tendrils speared through the air at Rainbow’s squad, catching two luckless drones along the way. Aegis saw her two siblings casually tossed into the carpet of lost ones to be torn apart. She briefly checked her fuel gauge which sat at just above half a tank. Better make it worth it.
The moment Rainbow’s surviving team entered the formation, the changelings opened fire with everything they had to slow the tide. Even with the withering opening salvo of rifle fire and ribbons of burning oil slaying nearly a hundred in seconds, the mutants behind them simply trampled the dead to get at the drones. Arya saw a hole open up in the hastily formed ranks and jumped in to shore up the flagging left flank. The instant she was at the front, she planted her hooves on the ground and lashed out with her iron-bark wings and sunk her barbed tips into a skinless lost one and ripped it away from the rifleling it was about to cleave in half. The lost one’s blade-like forelegs slashed at her wings, but her hardened bark proved superior, for the moment. Trusting her allies, Arya refrained from going on the offensive and wrapped her wings around herself to ward off the barrage of retaliatory slices from her opponent.
She barely had to suffer four seconds of its blistering assault before a trio of bullets and one magic blast found the beast’s head, pulping it in the process. A series of heavy whumps drew her attention above her head to find a lavender-orange dome was flashing constantly at the relentless ley lines hammering against it.
Rainbow Dash did a quick assessment while her sister provided a heavy kinetic pulse to push the lost ones back far enough for a round of artillery grapeshot. It’ll buy us time, but not much. She studied the lost ones before realizing something. She was stunned and exultant at once. <Twilight, the freaks aren’t coming from the central hallway! We can rush right through and kick this bastard’s ass!>
Twilight’s face was a permanent scowl as she blasted three airborne lost ones with arcane ice. <These things are faster than we are, plus we can’t fly and concentrate enough to keep those ley lines from ripping us apart.>
<Then I’ll stay here with the crew. Get to the center and end this!> She growled as a lost one tackled her in midair. Rainbow suffered several cuts across her belly before she got her legs underneath it and kicked it away with a pained yell. Lighting her wing with a steady magneta aura, Rainbow spun in mid-fall and cleaved the lost one in two. She did not get long to savor her victory because the act forced Rainbow to the ground, dragging her injuries across sharp broken stone.
Barely a moment later Twilight and two drones helped her back up. A medic quickly started to bandage her wounds with what little gauze was left. “Go” *grunt* “On, I’ll be fine. Somepony has to keep these Hollymare rejects busy.”
Twilight knew that stubborn angry look meant her sister would not back down. “Just stay alive, RD.”
“I could tell you the same thing,” Rainbow shot back with a pained smirk.
Nodding, Twilight let go of her sister to concoct a plan. Under Rainbow’s direction, the changeling formation slowly backed into the main entry hallway of the palace. It was spacious, but the entrances themselves were quite narrow, and there was only two ways in or out. Once they were inside, Rainbow had the mages erect a heavy energy barrier at each entrance. Luckily, the sturdy construction of the palace meant that the countless cracks and fissures in the walls were not large enough for even the smallest lost one to crawl through.
Twilight only glanced at the frozen history she was standing in as her mind focused on the matter at hand. “Aegis, on me!”
Not knowing what to do, but sensing Twilight was going to try something, Arya joined Aegis and her clutchmates in escorting their queen. For her part, Aegis was winded, but refused to show it. “Good work, all of you, against the thestrals. Now we just need to get to the center of this place before Gethar can send his army through the service passages to block us off.” The drones nodded their understanding, prompting Twilight to look to Arya. “I was going to call for you, but I’m glad you showed up first. Is there anything else about Gethar you might know about?”
“Maybe yes, maybe no. Many tales of him that would shine light you already know through his actions. Justicar is avatar. I know not what is story and what is truth. But one always gave my branches a cold night shiver. It is said that when one avatar’s body failed the druids of old would prepare a new body for them.”
“Are you saying if we kill him, he’ll try to find somepony to possess?” Ferrum queried incredulously.
“Or us?” Aegis replied out of disgust for the idea.
“As I say, it is the story that reminds me of all the avatars. The Justicar will not rest his blade until he suffers true death.”
“Then we’ll figure out how to give him that death later,” Twilight butted in while trying not to sound impatient. “I can handle it if I can get in contact with the ley lines at the center. Is there anything else we need to know about Gethar?”
“None you have not seen, if your intent is to fight.”
The deaths of two more drones from within the Deception erased what was left of Twilight’s patience and willingness to plan. “Then we’re moving out.” <Rainbow, keep the lost ones and Gethar focused on you until we deal with him.>
The shields blocking the entrances were buckling under the pounding assault from Gethar and the lost ones. Nearly every drone was adding their magical talent to the shields to keep them intact. <You got it, Sis. Just get it done.>
Twilight only nodded in response. With her five escorts huddling around her, Twilight concentrated on the expansive ley line that flooded the whole area. The drones were at odds with Arya joining in with Intel voicing the shared thought. “You should stay here—”
The front shield crackled loudly as it bent backwards under the constant attack. Rainbow wisely kept several drones in a reserve cycle between resting and reinforcing the barriers. Yet it was obvious over the hive mind that fatigue was starting to set in. It would not be long before the shields fell.
Arya’s fear of the flamethrowers was starting to overcome her fear of being torn apart by the horde. She had to say something to get the group moving before she ran for the hills just to get away from Aegis and her flamer. “I must go! Promises and oaths made to see this queen’s victory today.”
“We don’t have time to argue,” Twilight snapped more hotly than she intended. “Brace yourselves. No pony could be manipulating this many ley lines without being at the center, so we’re going to ride one straight to him.”
“What do you mean, ride it?” Riposte asked with a lump in his throat.
The group’s perception of the world twisted from the altered teleport spell. They were compressed into a thin line and streaked through the massive, yet diluted, ley line. Arya wanted to scream in terror at the warping reality around her. The group blitzed through half a kilometer to find a massive antechamber. A small figure was held aloft in the center of the uprooted ley nexus, and only noticed the changelings in the last instant when they were flung out of the fount of mana.
“What, how!?”
The baseball stadium sized antechamber’s floor had been ripped out by the ley lines into a jagged landscape. Were it not for the changelings’ ability to act quickly after a teleport, the lot of them would have smashed into the rocks. Arya slammed into a thankfully flat surface. Her bark-like hide took the brunt of the damage, and she found her footing on a small patch of marble below. The changelings spread out to encircle Gethar.
“Aegis, burn him out of them now!”
With a quick flick of her magic, Aegis took aim with a sinister grin at the half-full fuel gauge. “Ready to roast!”
“HOLD!” A massive blast of magic exploded out from the center to blanket the entire city. Every single person in the city was locked in place except for one, Gethar. The spell was so thorough that not even Twilight could summon her magic. His astonishment fell away quickly as he took stock of Twilight’s sudden appearance. “You continue to surprise me, royal. Since you’re so intent on reaching me in person, I will allow you to see the extent of your family’s sins before I kill you. Here is where your family’s fall was total.”
Now that all she could do was look at him, Twilight finally registered what she was seeing. The once regal structure was truly massive for its time, reaching seven stories tall. Not that anything of the roof remained aside from chunks of stone floating in the air. The ley lines themselves ranged from spidery filaments to ones as thick as houses. They uniformly shifted from red to a steady sky blue, but Twilight’s real focus was the figure held aloft at the center. It was obvious to Twilight from the amount of floating debris that the ley lines had exploded out of the ground, destroying much of the palace in the process.
Gethar was easily the size of Princess Luna, but aside from his roughly equine shape, that was where the similarities ended. He had been a thestral originally, but he could no longer as claim such anymore. His forelegs were broken and twisted from wild mutations. His hind legs were little more than emaciated bones wrapped in skin. His barrel had growths more akin to grotesque cancer than any sensible design. His neck had shrunk away to the point where his head emerged out of his barrel. His wings were elongated and rippled with misaligned muscles rendering them useless. Only his head remained somewhat normal, save for being furless.
Twilight shared in her drones’ disgust at the avatar’s appearance. “You murdered my children!” She shrieked with heartbreak. “As soon as I break free of this enchantment, you’re dead!”
“And you murdered an empire. As for you breaking free, you might as well try to lift the world itself. Unfortunately… I can do nothing else while holding this stasis spell.” He narrowed his eyes. “What I can do, is wait for an eternity." It was a slight bluff, as he wanted to keep the scions empowered, but couldn’t do it for weeks on end.
The local hive mind buzzing in Twilight’s ear was in complete disarray. While everyone was locked in place, many drones both aboard the Deception and in the entry hall of the palace were staring down the jaws of a lost one. Others were kept on death’s door, with one unlucky changeling having a claw freeze in the process of eviscerating him. Twilight couldn’t stand for it and tried to lash out with a trio of psionic blasts only for the density of the ley lines render the attack powerless. “I don’t care about your archaic sense of justice, all I want is your head!”
Gethar ignored her threat. “You are obviously unrepentant, that comes as no surprise.” A tendril rubbed his chin as he regarded her further. “Regardless of your dismissal of the law, you traveled along the ley lines.” Twilight squirmed in her fur at the burning gaze Gethar was casting her. “That is an art I thought only us avatars knew how to perform. Tell me where you learned how to do that, and I’ll grant you a painless death.”
“I’ll tell you exactly where to shove your painless death!” Aegis barked back. “Now let me go so I can burn your ass!”
“Your execution will be in due time. For the moment, I find myself intensely puzzled by you, royal. Not only do you possess a secret art, you bear the curse of the imperial family, and yet you are not suffering from it at all. Why? I would have remembered your unique appearance, so you are obviously a descendant. How is it that you have survived all these years?”
“The only thing I’m interested in is taking you down, Gethar!” Twilight growled. She was finally reigning her emotions in check, if only just.
“You fail to acknowledge the situation,” he countered coldly. “I am holding everypony in place while the planet itself powers the spell. I can keep this up for a very, very long time. Long enough for you to die of thirst, of that I assure you.” Twilight lashed out with an even more powerful psionic bolt, and almost cut halfway to the Justicar, but again, the sheer raw mana of the ley lines proved superior.
“You really want to know?” Twilight fumed, refusing to avert her gaze from the horribly disfigured avatar. He did an approximation of a nod. “Every changeling in history has fed on the love of others to survive. Aside from myself, mother, and sister, every other queen has forcibly taken love from others. For at least ten thousand years, your curse caused nothing but suffering for innocent ponies the world over!”
The ley lines flashed scarlet at Gethar’s first inclination was to denounce her, yet even he could see the facts. “I cannot trust a word you say, but your very presence here this day is irrefutable.” Twilight squirmed in his vice-like grip while Gethar turned away to face a massive hole in the building. There he could see the edges of the frozen city. “I will admit that freezing the city in time has blinded me entirely to the world outside. Tell me, royal, if you have any shred of decency within you, tell me of the land outside of Rookhaven. Is it still a desert?”
Twilight was about to verbally lash out when Intel stopped her short. <My queen, begging your pardon,> her fury washed over him, but he pressed through to speak. <See if you can get him to release Aunty and the others for medical attention.> This guy won’t free us so close to him, but maybe we can save a few drones this way.
Biting down on her tongue and fury, Twilight put on her best attempt at sounding diplomatic, feeble though it was. “Release my children from your hold so they can be healed, and I will tell you the truth as I know it. I swear on my honor as queen.”
As if I could take her word for it. “That is quite impossible. The hold I have on you is either city-wide, or none at all.” His demeanor soured at her phasing. Children? An odd phrase to call one’s subjects. “Do I need to reiterate my profound patience?”
Bastard! Twilight growled. Every second her dozens of wounded children remained in agony did nothing to calm her down. “No,” she said at length. It took surreal force of will to remain civil. “There is nothing but swamp land surrounding the city. Beyond that is a forest choking with creatures far deadlier than those lost ones you were so kindly throwing at us. To top it off, an active volcano borders the land to the south, and nearly year long gale force winds at every corner gave this land the name, Chaos Lands.”
“So that is why none of my scouts ever returned…” Confusion washed over the changelings, plus one tea’la, as the ley lines shifted to a deep blue. “Everything I did was for naught. The damned array’s influence still spread throughout the empire.” The deep blue tinted to an angry purple as Gethar screamed his eons’ long torment. “My sacrifice was MEANINGLESS!!”
In an instant, he removed the ley lines from all the lost ones in the city and severed his stasis hold on the changelings. Rainbow’s platoon was in tatters, well over half of their remaining numbers were casualties. The cyan queen herself heaved a heavy sigh at being able to move again. <Twilight’s bought us some time. There’s no telling how long until Mr. High and Mighty brings the mutants back. I want medics tending the wounded, and our shield experts recuperating.>
The drones shouted their compliance, but it did nothing to help her mood. Tsk, we’ve got too many wounded to move right now. I don’t know if we can split up again without leaving both groups too exposed. You better make it out of this, Twilight.
Gethar’s hostile audience was unsure of what to do when he didn’t seem to attack immediately, but readied themselves to fight nonetheless. “I damned many to sin and this frozen hell for the greater good. But intent is not enough when the failure is this profound! Only to compound it all by failing to stop the array’s influence from spreading out of Rookhaven!?" His eyes stopped wandering and recentered on Twilight. “I see only one path to salvation left before me now.”
“Suicide?” Aegis jabbed hopefully. “Or execution by firing squad sounds about right.” She briefly nuzzled her flamethrower while keeping her eyes fixed on Gethar.
Ignoring the drone’s sarcasm, Gethar’s gaze never left Twilight. “Our sins are equally incalculable. Trial by combat is the only way to purge either of us from the stains upon our souls.”
“To the death?” Ferrum queried worriedly.
“As if you need to ask.”
“Of all the asinine… Fine,” Twilight fired a blindingly bright beam at Gethar to stun him long enough for her escorts to engage.
Aegis left her brothers to handle the scions and tried to blitz towards the disoriented Gethar, but he lashed out in a blind kinetic pulse that pushed her all the way back to Twilight’s side. While her mother unleashed a scathing salvo of fireballs, a manic idea graced Aegis. <Momma, toss me!>
Grunting in the effort of diverting a clumsy swipe from a ley line, Twilight was baffled by Aegis’s request. <What?>
<Toss me!!>
Twilight yanked a chunk of stone up to block a veritable lightning storm. <...Alright.> The queen mustered her mana and flung Aegis headlong at the center of the forest of ley lines.
“Wwwaaaa hooo!” Aegis angled her approach to launch a stream of burning oil. Gethar slid through the root ley line to duck under the flames and brought several thin ley lines up to grab hold of her. Twilight let go of her daughter and sent a quick slash of mana to sever the thin strings of mana before they caught Aegis.
Ferrum was light on his wings and ducked and weaved through the stallion scion’s attempts to smack him with his staff. He spun his rifle around and thwacked his target on the side of the head, but his helmet absorbed most of the impact. “Why do you keep fighting for this creep? You heard what he did!”
The scion belted a war cry as he swung his staff at the drone. Ferrum flew backwards as predicted and got hit by the unseen pressure wave that followed the weapon. “I have been chosen! My life belongs to the Justicar now!”
Ferrum recovered in the air just in time to see Arya jump down from behind the scion and dig her barbs into his armor. “Blinded one, own your choices.” With surprising strength, Arya locked her barbs in place and flipped the scion off his hooves and planted him flat on his back.
Ferrum saw the stallion’s underbelly was exposed, whirled his rifle back around and fired. The shot went wide when the mare scion sent a jolt of lightning his way. The bullet cut through a strap in the stallion’s armor, allowing him to tear himself loose from Arya’s grip.
Riposte’s sword flashed to cleave the mare’s head off to get her attention away from Ferrum. “Your fight’s with me, big mare!”
The alicorn sized scion smirked at her lone opponent and caught Riposte’s sword on her staff. Her grin fell instantly after seeing the weapon so up close. “This sword… You were one of the soldiers from before!”
Riposte flashed a savage grin and donned his old disguise. “Guilty as charged.” The sudden shift made the scion balk at him, allowing his skysteel sword to slip under her guard and split her neck from sternum to jaw. Just for good measure, Riposte channeled his magic through his sword and severed the ley lines tethered to the scion.
A blast wave from Gethar cut Riposte’s victory short as the avatar blasted both Twilight and Aegis away from him. Everyone save Riposte was flung to the far ends of the room while he had crashed into an floating boulder and was pinned in place. “An eye for an eye!” Before Riposte could recover, a ley lines snaked around his body and held him aloft so Gethar could see him directly. “That’s enough of you.”
Twilight shook the stars from her vision only to watch her son being electrocuted. “Riposte!” The box of pent up grief shattered at the sight of one of her first hatched being killed before her eyes. Arya and the others recovered and stormed Gethar, but Twilight went straight for Riposte.
The grief from every last child she had lost today came roaring back as Twilight sent a wild lance of caustic magic to free her son from the ley line and caught him before he fell. A river of tears and shaky lip obliterated what was left of her regal bearing. She tried to heal him with magic while taking him to a floating boulder. “Come on, Ripossy, you’re going to be okay, you’re going to be okay!”
The glow of Twilight’s spell steady intensified as Riposte failed to stir. “You have to wake up! I can’t lose any more, not you, not anypony!”
Gethar swatted Ferrum with an almost lazy swipe, pushed Arya back with a hailstorm of loose gravel, and forced Intel back with a series of rapid strikes. Only Aegis and her flamethrower posed a real threat after she mimicked her mother’s spell that allowed her oil to burn away at the ley lines. Yet not even she could ultimately get close enough to truly threaten the Justicar.
However, his attention was fixed on Twilight. She weeps? Since when did royals love anyone other than themselves? Gethar briefly noticed the remaining scion try to electrocute Arya, only for Intel deflect the bolt with his magic. I must test it further. He singled out Aegis and carefully lashed out with a dozen lightning bolts and half-hearted attempts to grapple her in order to guide her slowly towards the distraught queen.
Aegis blindly sprayed the area in front of her while turning back to her mother. <My queen, we can’t get close enough to hit him!>
“I-I can’t save him.” Twilight whimpered. “I couldn’t save any of them.”
Aegis could barely stand the sight of her dead brother, but one thought gave her strength. <My queen, if we win, we can beat that resurrection spell out of him!>
That snapped Twilight out of her daze and she fixated on Gethar. The Justicar sent out just enough lightning to stun Aegis and provoke Twilight, but the queen quickly deflected it with a spear of mana. A cold fury radiated off of her as Twilight summoned the depths of her magical power. <Then we take him alive.>
With a burst of magic and a feral war cry of her own, Twilight teleported directly above Gethar and unleashed a maelstrom of caustic mana upon the root ley lines protecting the Justicar. He discarded his old plan and pulled from deep in the planet to summon more power. The two forces clashed with a blinding flash of light that sent the drones and Arya sprawling.
Lavender-orange magic burned away layer after layer of the world’s ley lines, while Gethar redoubled his efforts. A titanic ear splitting grinding noise quaked the chamber as Twilight poured everything she had into stripping Gethar of his power. Even the scion stopped his duel with Intel to dive for cover. Arya ducked behind a rocky outcropping next to Ferrum. “Is not right! Veins of world burn with her touch!”
“What else can she do? Our magic can’t cut through that much raw mana!”
Twilight could see Gethar becoming slowly concerned as she dug deeper and deeper towards him. “I will have you, for killing my children!”
“Why do you care for them, royal? Are they naught but pawns to you?”
Grinding her teeth all the while, Twilight tried to send psychic needles at the object of her hate. “I. Am. Not. My FOREMOTHERS!!” Even though exhaustion was creeping up on her, Twilight redoubled her beam’s strength, further pushing Gethar back.
It took a bit longer before he felt one needle graze his cheek and then a second along a tentacle before he realized Twilight’s true attack. Rather than counter attack, he simply slid around the ley line to evade. “Why should I believe you?”
When Twilight’s only answer was to keep pushing her attack, Gethar swung a loose ley line around her flank and bashed her out of the air where she smacked hard against the rocks. The wind was knocked out of Twilight. Her beam cut a huge swath of before stopping just short of cleaving Ferrum in two.
“You have power, I’ll give you that. But neither you, nor your war machine could ever hope to overpower the world itself!” Gethar’s gloating was matched by the sea of ley lines snaking their way towards the prone and dazed queen. “Your wretched life ends here.”
“Stay away from her!!” Aegis’ manic command was heralded by a wash of fire as she landed next to Twilight. Her queen could barely keep her eyes open, so she stepped protectively over her. Her remaining brothers, Ferrum and Intel took position at her side.
Even Arya stood atop of the rock face Twilight was leaning against and flared her branches protectively. “You’ve not earned her life!”
“Oh I think I have, priest.”
<Captain, how much oil you have left?> Intel inquired fearfully as he loaded his last three rounds. All around him, the red ley lines snaked through and around the rubble.
<Pushing him back took almost all I had left. I’ve got five seconds, tops.> Aegis stood firm, even as the ley lines closed in.
Riposte’s skysteel sword hovered threateningly next to Ferrum. <Tell me one of you knows how to teleport.>
All he got back were negatives. “Why do you protect her? What has she done to deserve your loyalty?” The drones stiffened as the monstrous form of Gethar closed in on them. “I will let you, and the rest of your… people leave this place if you give her over to me.”
“Never!” Aegis wanted desperately to burn his hide, and her magic tightened on her flamethrower. Coward has too much mana to eat through.
“Why defend her? She, like all the others of the royal family, controls your lives with no regard to your wellbeing, save to keep you useful. Has she exploited her own laws at your expense?” Gethar tested, fully expecting them to deny it. Yet what he was really looking for, an ounce of hesitation, or a glimmer of striking the truth in their eyes, never revealed itself as Intel retorted with as much acid his voice could carry.
“She’s the Queen-mother. I would think you can understand that,” Intel spat bitterly.
“And where do you get off prejudging our queen?” Aegis snapped off at Gethar’s confused expression. “If it wasn’t for Aunty or Granny, she’d be the only queen in existence that truly cares for us drones!”
Ferrum coated the last three rounds in his rifle with mana burning enchantments and aimed for Gethar’s face. He only wished firing would actually matter against the Justicar’s defenses. “Damn right! I’ll kill you right here and now!” I just got to figure out how first, he mused worriedly.
Before any of them could act, Gethar’s ley lines sank into each drone and Arya, freezing them in place, and rendering them unable to even think. I must know the whole story if justice is to be satisfied. Movement off to the left of the changelings caught his eye. The remaining scion was clambering over the rocks with his staff primed with mana. “Stay your weapon. The truth of this matter lies within them, and I will have it.”
He didn’t like it, but the scion would not disobey. “By your will, Justicar.”
With the matter settled, Gethar sifted through the drones’ combined memories, searching for any and all information on Twilight and anyone else who the drones considered royals. Finding the Tea’la a mostly useless source of information, he focused only on the changelings and zeroed in on the biggest memory fitting those parameters: the summit. As luck would have it, Aegis’ squad had been present at two of them. He witnessed the other queens’ complete disinterest in history, and utter ignorance of their past. Perhaps they couldn’t stand to remember what they had lost, and chose to forget both their subjects and their crimes. How typical.
Gethar was momentarily distracted by movement coming from Rainbow Dash’s direction. The palace was massive, and the colossal amount of floating debris this close to the ley line nexus slowed her platoon’s movement considerably. I will brook no distractions. A shame it’ll be easier to simply delay them. I must know who Twilight Sparkle truly is.
He hesitated before diving into Twilight’s mind. No… She was using some kind of new magic outside of normal mana. Even in her state, she could use the mind-link to overpower me.
Sticking with the drones, Gethar grew increasingly disgusted with the actions and motives of the other queens. Just as I expected. They haven’t changed at all. These…changelings they call themselves, may be physically different than when I cursed them, but their hearts are as black as their chitin. Still… this Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash are completely different. But why?
His search brought up multiple encounters with Discord, but his alien amalgamation of parts was far different than what Gethar had pieced together in the previous age. As such, he did not recognize the product of his own hasty actions. However, Gethar made a dead stop when one memory came across the royal alicorn sisters. A genuine smile came over him. So Celesti and Lūn survived after all. Their new bodies are strange, but their emblems are unmistakable. If they survived, perhaps Twilight Sparkle learned how to travel the ley lines from them. Either that, or they made the knowledge public. As much as he dearly wanted to know more about his old friends, the task at hand was more pressing and he refocused on Twilight.
That’s when he saw it; the series of events starting from Aegis finding the circlet, Rainbow’s slow transformation, and when she hatched from the chrysalis. Finally, so much of what had been hinted at from so many different memories made sense.
She wasn’t born into the royal family… she was adopted! He pulled back to think, but had the presence of mind to keep his hold on the drones. Twilight is an aberration among her own kind!
Gethar was at a loss as to what to do. She has still committed crimes this day, the destruction of the threads of the world alone is tantamount to heresy and murder. And yet…
He noticed Twilight beginning to stir. Using the ley line as a tether, he pulled the remaining scion to the far side of the chamber so he would not interfere. Locked within this city, I can never bring the other queens to justice, and killing Twilight Sparkle will not satisfy the cosmic balance. His thoughts drifted towards the ebony queen, Chrysalis. Her actions alone made all of the ley lines shift to bloody crimson. I cannot allow such an embodiment of sin to roam free. If Twilight lives, those two will eventually come to blows, of that I am certain. There is still the matter of this trial by combat to resolve.
Knowing what had to be done for the sake of bringing the descendants of the imperial family to justice, Gethar steeled himself for his next act. He withdrew his ley lines from the drones and shifted his position towards them, peeling back his layers of protection all the while. “Twilight Sparkle! I tire of this, and of the sins I bear. I will personally end your life!”
Shaking off Gethar’s stasis spell, Aegis hunkered down next to her mother and aimed her flamer. “Not happening!” Knowing it was futile, Aegis fired the last of her oil at the rapidly charging Justicar. Instead of only burning through a few centimeters of the ley line, the oil cooked straight through like dry grass. Gethar was wreathed in flames, howling in pain.
The drones, and Aegis most of all, were completely dumbstruck. “T-that worked?!” Aegis commented dumbly.
Gethar’s control over the ley lines faltered and he fell in a heap in front of the group, reeking of burning meat and fur. Arya was quick to act and jumped from her perch with one wing’s barbs aimed straight for Gethar’s chest.
Intel freaked and tried to push Arya’s attack with his magic. “No! We need him alive!”
His magic came too late. Arya’s barbs had already rooted themselves into Gethar’s ribs and when she was forcefully shoved off, half of Gethar’s chest and part of his ribcage went with her. Arya herself went went flying head over heels with her open flowers’ sleep pollen away as well. “Giyaa! What you think I doing?!”
Twilight’s vision was only just now clear enough for her to see it happen. In a panic, she clumsily pushed her kids off of her to jump to Gethar’s side. “Tell me how to use the resurrection spell!”
He ignored her as his brackish brown life fluid drained away. “You walk away, purified of guilt.” *gurgle cough* “The reigns of the empire have always lied with the Family. Maybe now you—”
“I don’t care about that!” Twilight raged. She shoved her face into Gethar’s slackening eyes. “Tell me how to use the resurrection spell!”
Gethar coughed up blood, splattering Twilight’s face. His gaze was losing focus and his breathing became shallow. May you bring the rest of your cursed kin to justice. Even if they force—you to…
Twilight’s bile rose as Gethar went limp. Any hope of bringing her children back sunk until she heard Ferrum pulling the male, and still very alive, scion out from behind a marble slab. She ignored the low but growing rumble emanating from the center of the ley lines and teleported straight in front of him. Now that Gethar was no longer feeding him power from the ley lines, the thestral had returned to normal, but his magical armor had disintegrated, leaving him defenseless.
Ferrum smirked while pushing the barrel of his rifle into the pony’s flank. “Found him trying to run away after Arya wasted Mister High and Mighty.”
It took all of Twilight’s measure and poise to keep the tears back as she stared down the cowering thestral. “Tell me the resurrection spell, NOW!”
“I-I can’t, it’s impossible without the Justicar.” The normally hard soldier was still reeling from Gethar’s death.
“Lies!” Twilight bellowed. Her horn took on an angry sheen of mana. Despite the fury of his queen, Ferrum noticed the ley lines were started to move almost randomly and an impossibly complex alchemy array started to materialize thirty meters above ground. “Tell me how to cast the spell, or where I can find a book on it!”
The former scion could stare at the most hideous lost one and not flinch, but Twilight petrified him. Her alien appearance wasn’t helping matters. “I swear to you. Only the avatar of the Justicar Path can wield such magic. With him dead, his spirit will try to find a new vessel. But even if he found a new vessel this instant, it would be too late to use the spell on anypony.”
“Vessel? What do you mean?” Twilight demanded.
“T-the avatars are partially immortal. If their bodies die, their power transfers to a new host, preferably a prepared one.”
“Arya was talking about something like that.” Ferrum commented, breaking Twilight’s gaze on the scion.
Everyone turned to find the Tea’la in question, only to find her standing over Gethar’s body. She was muttering something while Aegis watched on. Intel had run off to gather Riposte’s remains. <Aegis, what is she doing?>
The captain couldn’t decide if Arya’s bizarre ritual was more interesting, or the vast pattern centered on the ley line nexus forming over their heads was more disconcerting. <Something about locking away a ghost or whatever. But, my queen, I think we better run before whatever that is, does something.>
“Ah tech-gala!” Arya fussed as she hurried to finish painting on Gethar’s corpse. The ritual markings were next to impossible to adapt to his mutated form, and the gaping hole in his chest wasn’t helping matters. Nevertheless, she was skilled enough to make it work. Hopefully. “Stupid bug boy had to push me. If spirit escapes before the true spirit stone can claim it, there will be such fury upon him, ancestors as my witness!”
Her eyes widened as a pulsing blue orb with tendrils poking out in random directions seeped out of the corpse. Arya’s work had made Gethar’s spirit visible to the naked eye, but was by no means ready for the task. “Yeea’ nou! Get back in there, you ball of met’vat’lu!"
“Stick-wings. What are you doing?”
“Amend your kin’s folly is what! Now sush sush shh!”
Her painting was starting to become highly difficult as the ley lines writhed in the air and shook the ground. With no one holding them in control, the veins of the world were retreating to their normal states, but there was still an array blocking their path. It was beginning to crack.
From his distant location at Riposte’s side, Intel was the only one who could see exactly what was going on. <Everypony, get away from the center, the whole array’s going to break apart!>
An array!? Twilight gasped at the runes and glyphs that danced across its surface. <I thought that was just his method of control! Get out, everypony, out!>
Aegis shouldered her weapon and grabbed onto Arya. “The whole place is about to blow, we gotta move!”
“If leave now, he be lost for all time!”
A thunderous crack rang throughout the entire chamber. The glowing lines and runes of the array shattered into tiny motes of mana as the ley lines forced their way back underground. A pressure wave of mana so dense that it threw everyone over forty feet away washed over them. Arya screamed and howled curses as Gethar’s spirit was propelled by the wave front and was lost to the sky. The wave spread throughout Rookhaven and beyond, blasting away the fogs over the swamp. It stripped the forest of countless leaves, and went so far as to shove Mount Boom’s ash cloud all the way over into Equestria.
The veins of the world set about restoring themselves. Yet that most immediate thing on Twilight’s mind was the free floating rocks across the chamber starting to crash back to the earth as gravity reclaimed them. Even now, her surviving brood was reporting both lost ones and thestrals were moving on their own again.
Yet all of that was drowned out by Riposte’s body she found draped across Intel’s back. The grief she had forgotten about hit her again with full force. Not even Rainbow Dash’s call over the hive mind could be heard as the profound sense of loss paralyzed the lavender queen, never again to hear the voices of so many of her beloved children.