//------------------------------// // Semper Liberi: Repugno // Story: Directive: Grow // by Dragon Dreaming //------------------------------// “Land sakes,” said Applejack, making a slow circuit of the room, her eyes wide. “This is one plum fancy setup. Are all libraries like this?” “Couldn’t tell you,” Rarity replied, her eyes focused on the scroll. “I’m no more familiar with them than you are, darling.” The library’s control room was, indeed, an impressive place. As with the main room above, the walls of the largely circular room were covered in shelves packed with books, with lanterns at regular intervals along the walls to provide the same, soothing illumination. The ceiling shared the same domed construction, adorned with sun, moon, and stars, each of which glowed with a soft light. The similarities ended there. The main terminal, the heart of the control room, and the library itself, dominated the center of the room, a great, black circular wall rising up from the wooden floor. A doorway in the wall promised access to the center of the circle, provided she could figure out how to get it open. “Let’s see here … according to this, Semper should have addressed us the moment we came down here,” Rarity mused, “but it has not. I don’t think I can open the terminal that way.” “Semper?” asked Applejack, her eyes roving the titles of the books. “It’s the library’s name. Semper Liberi.” “The library talks?” “Yes. It’s rather like the Archivist, actually. My, Twilight, but you do think of everything,” the unicorn said, her horn lighting up. “You know, I’m rather jealous at how quickly she threw this scroll together. I can’t write this fast.” “Well, she’s an AI, Rarity. Writing at the speed of thought is just something they can do,” the orange mare said, walking up behind the unicorn and watching as six points around the doorway lit up with her blue glow. “You sure that’s just a static scroll, though?” Rarity looked at Applejack in surprise, and peered back at the scroll. Come to think of it, it had seemed as though the text had changed every so often. “You think it’s more?” Applejack shrugged. “Could be. She struck me as a right smart cookie, ain’t no reason she couldn’t have pulled something fancy with it.” A lavender star lit up in the midst of the transparent door, and it opened, sliding into the floor and vanishing from existence. A lavender, velvet carpet led directly to a raised, circular dais, which featured exactly three cushions, perfect for sitting on. Rarity raised an eyebrow as she settled her haunches down. Three cushions for three ponies. Semper might not have been speaking, but something was clearly aware of their presence. The moment all three ponies had settled themselves, the dais rose into the air, hovering a short distance off the ground. The circular wall suddenly lit up, revealing itself to be one giant screen. The pure white was swiftly replaced by a glorious pattern of sun, moon, and stars, the latter in white and various shades of pink and purple, and all of it slowly moving. “There’s a real theme here, ain’t there?” said Applejack, and Rarity nodded. “It’s the mark of the system,” said Fluttershy, drawing both pairs of eyes to her. “The Sun and the Moon built this place.” “That makes sense,” Rarity murmured, and they all fell silent, enthralled by the shifting pattern. Applejack cleared her throat. “So now what?” “Oh! Right. Hm.” Rarity peered at the scroll, looking for the relevant portion, and narrowed her eyes. She could have sworn it had said something different earlier - this was most definitely not a static set of instructions. No matter - it hadn’t steered her wrong so far. She cleared her throat, and touched her badge. “Voluntaria Rarity requests main terminal access - clearance code Victor Uniform Charlie Hotel Uniform Two Hotel Echo.” The pattern scattered, stars and moon and sun flying off screen as the words “Access Granted” scrolled across the screen, soon followed by others. “Warning: malicious intrusions detected - main library systems compromised.” “Oh no,” Rarity said, her face falling. “Now how are we supposed to help them out?” “Don’t give up just yet, sugar cube,” said Applejack, nudging her shoulder. “Look.” The initial warning had moved to a different part of the screen, as the terminal continued its report. “System diagnostic: Avatar system - offline. Primary voice systems - offline; auxiliary voice systems – offline; crisis voice command system functioning normally. Auxiliary terminals - offline. Main terminal - online; Crisis mode active - high-security auxiliary access channels online and free of intrusion.” “See?” Rarity nodded. “Security diagnostic: Security systems - online; unable to eject intruder - analysis suggests Counselor level threat.” “Counselor?” she asked. “Hm. I know it’s something to do with sophistication of the program, but what exactly it means …” “Counselor is top tier,” Fluttershy said. “Just barely non-sentient. Gladys is Counselor level.” Applejack whistled. “That … is a very advanced program.” “Semper seems to have locked it down, though,” Rarity said, watching as the report continued. “The library is probably Counselor level, too,” said Fluttershy. Rarity nodded, her eyes back on the scroll. It wasn’t even pretending anymore - all the other instructions had vanished, replaced by a single line. “Crisis Protocol - Surrogate - tango echo delta three nine,” she said, and the terminal cleared, returning to black. A single word remained: “Waiting.” She looked back at the scroll, and blinked. “What …” “What?” Rarity showed it to Applejack, who scratched her head. “Fluttershy?” The pegasus craned her head around to take a look, and blinked. “Um … read it … I guess?” “That’s all I can think of too,” the orange mare said, shrugging. Rarity nodded, secured the scroll in front of her, and cleared her throat. “I have seen war. I have seen war on land and sea. I have seen blood running from the wounded. I have seen men coughing out their gassed lungs.” Rarity paused, and closed her eyes, forcibly suppressing the images that came to mind. When she opened them, and continued, she could not keep the catch out of her voice. “I have seen the dead in the mud. I have seen cities destroyed. I have seen two hundred limping exhausted men come out of line-the survivors of a regiment of one thousand that went forward forty-eight hours before. I have seen children starving. I have seen the agony of mothers and wives. I hate war.” Her voice was barely more than a whisper as she spoke the final sentence, and a somber mood prevailed even as the terminal screen lit up. “Voluntaria Rarity recognized as surrogate for the Bibiliothecaria. Sitemap loading.” Black gave way to green, the whole of the circle transforming into what she could only imagine was a map of the library’s systems. Gold, silver, and bronze inscribed themselves across the screen, creating pathways ringed in blue, white, and violet. It was easy enough to tell that something was very, very wrong. Whole sections of the map were dark, helpfully labeled as offline – others, blocked out in red, were labeled as compromised. Rarity’s heart sank. From the looks of things, this needed a security expert, which she was not. “Hmmm,” said Applejack, rubbing her chin with a hoof. “This intruder hasn’t managed to do more than cut off communication channels, really.” Rarity blinked. “Really? But … almost half the map is offline or compromised!” “Yeah, but almost half the map is devoted to communication channels. See, this here,” she said, waving at three dark sections, “has to do with that Avatar system. That’s the rendering system, that’s the interaction analysis section, and that right there is the voice system. And see,” she continued, pointing at an island of color in the darkened section, “that’s the auxiliary section.” Rarity blinked again, and looked at the other compromised or offline sections, this time paying more attention to the labels. Auxiliary user access terminals, backup voice systems, regional communication systems, all offline or compromised. But the control room was active, and labeled as bunkered, with golden pathways ringed in violet leading out to other sections, including those that, now she looked, had been deliberately shut down to avoid corruption. “So the library core is safe,” she said. “Just isolated – which explains why Twilight couldn’t connect to it. We need to break the isolation.” “Now, hold on, sugar cube. That’s probably part of why it ain’t compromised in the first place. If you’re gonna try and break that, you need to be careful.” “An excellent point. I think we only need to restore Twilight’s access to the library, and they can take it from there. But how do we go about doing that?” “What was the name of that program you said y’all got trapped in?” Applejack asked, eyes narrowed as she looked over the map. “Oh. Um … thea … something. Thea ...” “Theatrum?” Rarity looked at Fluttershy, nodding. “How did you know?” The pegasus pointed, her yellow hoof indicating a red-blocked portion of the map. Rarity’s eyes widened – that section was a veritable flurry of activity, pathways going dark and light and back again, new lines appearing and old lines vanishing even as she watched. Her eyes flicked to the top. Theatrum.exe – compromised. “Twilight said she would do what she could from her end.” “That’s Twilight’s doing?” Applejack asked, her tone incredulous. “That is some fancy code work. But if new lines can be built … hah!” The orange mare pulled up a screen, and slid a hoof down it, looking for a specific line. “This should help,” she said, and highlighted her choice. The screen vanished, replaced by a beautiful, light red apple, which Applejack caught in her hoof. “Rarity, see if the terminal will accept new code.” A tube extended from the center of the dais at the unicorn’s request, a bowl at its end. Applejack placed the apple within, and stepped back, waiting. The apple glowed purple, then slid down the tube in a stream of glowing lights. The mare nodded, and turned back to the terminal. “Executing,” the screen announced. “Please indicate desired destination.” Rarity’s horn flashed, and the center of the Theatrum section glowed blue. Instantly, a pathway began to form, gold and lined in violet; a brand new high-security channel.   -oOo-   Twilight dodged right, and lashed out, grunting as her hooves impacted the wolf’s body. The sound of splintering wood confirmed a good hit, and she whirled, grinning, to find the wolf prone, its front leg broken. Rearing, she brought her front hooves down hard on its head, smashing it to pieces. It flashed red, and vanished, and she turned, eyes flashing back solid white. She caught the corrupted code before it could spread any further, neatly sectioning it from the cords it had subverted and slipping it into the queue, her subroutines already tearing it apart and purging it of corruption, while others replaced the excised code with clean sections. Her full attention was on the skies. A full murder of crows was in hot pursuit of the cyan pegasus, her speed and agility countered by their sheer numbers. Her hooves struck again and again, sending crow after crow spinning out of the skies, but for each one she smashed, it seemed two took its place. Twilight frowned, her eyes flashing over the barely visible cords that connected each crow to the others. There was a pattern there, she noticed, especially visible with each downed crow; something that was at the center of the birds, controlling and replenishing them. “Rainbow!” she yelled, and the pegasus went into a crow-scattering spin. Having bought herself a short reprieve, she looked at Twilight, eyebrows raised. “You’ve got to take them all out at once!” Rainbow frowned. “How the buck do you expect me to do that?” she asked, grimacing as a crow caromed off her helmet. “I’ll try and think of something, but focus on keeping them grouped for now! Maybe we c-“ “Behind you!” She whipped around at the pegasus’ warning, just in time to see a massive, leonine shape looming over her. She could do nothing but brace herself, as its paw slammed into her side, and sent her sprawling to the ground, its claws scraping harmlessly off her armor. She flipped herself upright, nostrils flaring, and lowered her head to meet its charge, the silver sheathed point of her horn flashing wickedly. The charge never came. Pinkie catapulted over Twilight’s head, somersaulting in the air and bringing her hind hooves down in a crushing blow to the creature’s skull. It reeled back, nearly half its face missing, as Pinkie landed and dropped into a crouch. “Woah.” “Don’t worry,” said Pinkie, turning to give Twilight a lopsided grin. Somewhere along the line, her gorget had been replaced by a rather roguish collar of royal blue, and her helmet had somehow gained transparent orange panes over her eyes. “I got this!” The creature recovered, and loomed over the pink pony, the missing section of its face outlined in angry red lines. She leaped to the side, as its paw came down, and blew a raspberry. “Nya nya, you can’t catch me!” she taunted, and was off, the creature lumbering after her, scorpion tail poised for a strike. Manticore. That was what it was. The unicorn risked a glance at the sky, and nodded; Rainbow had the crows well in hoof, leading them through the air in a high-speed chase. With that handled, she sprinted for the manticore, trying to see a way to bring the creature down. Its bulk was the problem; she couldn’t excise and purge its code while its form was still whole, and bringing it down would take something big. The security protocols she’d put into the armor were effective, certainly (Pinkie’s first strike had proved that), but it wasn’t permanent. Whatever the source of these creatures was, it could repair them. The unicorn dodged to the right, barely avoiding the strike of the manticore’s tail, and aimed a hoof at the bulbous stinger. Her strike glanced off, and she stumbled, righting herself just in time to see Pinkie stomping down, hard, on the manticore’s paw. The creature reared back, roaring in pain, and Twilight took advantage of the opening, charging forward and plunging her horn into its leg. She failed to retreat quickly enough. The manticore’s anguished flailing sent her flying, the world spinning as she landed, tumbling across the ground and coming to a sudden, crushing stop against a tree. Groaning, she stumbled to her feet, trying desperately to get her bearings. Her armor had protected her from the worst of things, certainly, but that had still hurt. A thunderous boom shook her in her armor, and she looked skyward, eyes wide. “What in the heavens is that?” Hanging in the midst of the canopy was an enormous, violet rimmed hole, through which she could see what looked like a golden tunnel. She shook her head, and looked again, with eyes white; instantly, her face broke into a grin. “Rarity, you magnificent mare!” she exclaimed, galloping forward. “You did it!” A flash of blue sped past her face, halting her in her tracks. A turn to the left afforded her a glimpse of the manticore, balanced on its hind legs, reeling back from Rainbow’s attack. Wait, wasn’t Rainbow being ch- She hit the dirt, hooves over her head as the crows, cawing raucously, zoomed over her, some of them missing by mere fractions of an inch. The manticore overbalanced, and began to fall backwards, and Twilight gasped, trying to call out; Pinkie was right behind it. The mare balanced, for a split second, upon her front legs, and her hind legs cannoned out, hooves slamming directly into the manticore’s head. It fairly flew upwards, just in time for the crows to slam, beak first, into its body. Those that did not stick spun off into the air, dissipating in a burst of red and black. “Connection active,” she heard a voice say; her voice, in fact. “Establishing direct control.” She watched, awestruck, as new lines of code were formed out of nowhere, running parallel to the old control codes, each line coiling into the whole until the cords had been properly formed. “Theatrum control and access re-established,” the voice informed her, and she looked down, to find its source; a tiny, tiny version of the library’s starry avatar had manifested in front of her, seemingly projected from her cube, which flashed with every word. “Caution - intruder retains administrator permissions for Theatrum.” “Noted, Semper,” she said, her face set. Neither manticore nor murder were broken enough to recode, but that was simple enough to fix. First, however, she needed to ensure their own safety, and to that end... “Girls!” she shouted, her voice suddenly amplified. “To me!” The other two mares lost no time in joining her, Pinkie Pie bouncing to her side, while Rainbow took up a position directly over her. The moment they were within her calculated radius, the lavender shield reappeared. She nodded in satisfaction; with Semper behind the reins, it did not have the same vulnerabilities as it had before. This would work. “What’s going, Sparkie? Oh, hey, Starshine’s here!” said Pinkie, bending down to examine the library’s avatar. “Starshine?” asked Rainbow, looking down at them quizzically. “Oh! Semper! Rarity finally got through, huh? ‘Bout frickin’ time.” “Brace yourselves, girls. This could get rocky.” Twilight raised her horn, and reached for the cords. They leapt at her call, responding to her barest touch, and she smiled. This was going to be ridiculously easy. A tweak of a cord, and she felt the ground shudder. A pull at another, and there was a resounding crack. The manticore, just having got back to its feet, turned to face her, the remaining crows beginning to sink into its hide. It bellowed defiance at her, and her grin simply grew. The ground shuddered once more, and a crack appeared beneath the manticore’s feet, zigzagging across the landscape at breakneck speeds, branching, and branching, and branching again. For nearly a full minute, the shuddering continued, as the cracks covered the land, the original line describing a circle around the protective dome. For a moment, there was silence, as everyone took stock of this latest development, and Twilight prepared her next move. This one was somewhat more complex. The cords fairly sang under her guidance, and the world responded. The ground shifted, the cracks growing wider, and wider, and wider, the land groaning as it moved. The trees that surrounded them shuddered, and more than a few at the edges of the growing abyss came tumbling down in a series of crashes, the earth they were rooted in no longer able to support them. Their trunks tore away huge sections of earth as they impacted the ground, and fell into the yawning chasm, more than a few taking their neighbors with them. The manticore roared, separated from its prey by both shield and insurmountable gap. Twilight narrowed her eyes, eyeing the code that surrounded the creature. It was changing; incorporating the code that had made up the crows, she realized. She frowned. If it grew wings … she would simply have to put a stop to that. This was no time for subtlety. She selected three specific cords, readied herself, and, for lack of a better term, yanked. An island of earth shot upwards, sailing through air in a graceful arc, shedding clumps of dirt and rock as it flew. The manticore looked up, uncomprehending, just in time to witness the incoming projectile. The islands met with a thunderous crash, sending twisted trees and broken earth flying in every direction; more than a few of the pieces of debris slammed into the shield, splattering across its lavender surface. “Stars above,” said Rainbow, her voice barely more than a whisper. “What … damn, kid! How’d you do that?” “Well,” Twilight replied, bringing the creature’s corrupted code to heel, “this whole world is Theatrum’s construct, and I’m Theatrum’s administrator.” “Ooooo … so it does whatever you tell it to! Can you turn the trees into candy? No wait! Turn the ground into chocolate! And the clouds into marshmallows! Or maybe cotton candy! Or vanilla ice cream! And the rivers can be chocolate syrup!” Pinkie yelled, bouncing up and down, her armor jingling with every hop. Twilight just shook her head, focusing back on the world around her. The information Semper was feeding her suggested that the cause of this fiasco was hiding somewhere within Theatrum, using the program’s unique properties to disguise itself. The real revelation was how much influence Theatrum had on the outside world; probably the first thing that the intruder had done was to subvert those outgoing connections. This would all bear some serious investigation. For now, though, the important thing was to find it. “Semper, can you calculate the intruder’s location?” she asked, as she began to break down the surviving sections of the world. “Negative. Intruder is using multiple proxies and subservient spawn programs to elude detection.” The avatar paused. “Surrogate Bibliothecaria Rarity requests direct communication line. Accept?” Twilight cocked her head, sending another island of earth crumbling into oblivion. “Of course. Patch her through.” A screen flicked into existence in front of her, displaying her friend, and, to her surprise, two others. “Applejack and Fluttershy? What are you doing here?” “That’s a long story, dar- my goodness, is that … is that the gorget? As part of a suit? Oh my, and sets for Pinkie and Rainbow, too?” the other unicorn asked, a slight frown on her face, as Pinkie waved at her. “Where did you get those?” Twilight grinned. “Long story, Rarity. We can catch up later. What did you need?” “It’s about this here intruder, Twilight,” said Applejack, cutting in. “I’ve been looking over what the sitemap here had to show, and based on that and the vines outside, it’s looking like a plant model parasite. You’ll be looking for a central seed. Something small, but connected to everything.” Twilight frowned. That was going to be difficult. Every pathway she’d examined had ended in orphaned code, its pointers leading nowhere. How to find something that could see you coming and block your path? “Semper, can we get a comprehensive view of Theatrum?” “Yes.” She nodded. “Can you show it to Applejack, as well?” “Applejack does not have appropriate clearance.” “She’s at your main terminal,” Twilight said, her tone deadpan. “I think clearance is moot at this point.” “Acknowledged. Displaying.” A second screen popped up next to the first, displaying Theatrum’s sitemap in all its incredible complexity. On the other screen, she could see all three mares lean forward, their eyes narrowing. Beside her, Pinkie did the same, rubbing her chin with a hoof, then reaching for the screen and dragging at the corners, to enlarge it. “Looks like proxies here, here, and here,” she said, pointing at the map, and Twilight highlighted the locations in pink. “What do you think, Jackie?” “Eeyup. Think you can kill those, Twilight?” The unicorn nodded, sent the order, and the locations went dark. “Alright. Now watch closely. If I’m right, it’ll try and set up new ones.” Twilight nodded again, and leaned forward, eyes glued to the map. She could not afford to miss anything. Not even the smallest detail. “Hmm … what’s this?” she heard, and a small, inconspicuous section of the map lit up in blue. She peered at the highlighted section, and grinned. “Good work, Rarity,” she said, furrowing her brow and concentrating. Sure enough, no order she gave was acknowledged, each one coming back with an assertion that she lacked the proper permissions. “That’s either it, or a critical component. Semper, let’s isolate and expose it.” “Acknowledged,” the library said, and Twilight turned her attention back to the cords. They fairly sang at her touch, the code twisting and shifting at her whims, and around her, the landscaped shifted. Their own island was moving, now, suspended in the midst of a sea of nothing, floating its way along through the still crumbling landscape. “Where we headed, Sparkle?” asked Rainbow, who had begun to pace around the perimeter the shielded island, her wings halfway extended. “To the source of the whole problem. It’s time to meet our intruder face to face.”   -oOo-   “It’s a rock,” said Rainbow, tilting her head. “A giant rock.” She was, on the surface of things, correct. In the midst of the great white expanse, there hung an enormous, jet-black rock, its sides shiny with the reflections of a light that had no source. Surrounding the house-sized boulder was another shield, swirling with lavender, gold, and silver, a translucent starry pattern moving over its surface. “It’s actually inside the rock,” Twilight replied, and frowned. “I think, at least. It’s been very resistant to any attempt to analyze it.” “Alright, well, let’s crack it open, then!” “Patience, Rainbow. I want to make sure that it can’t do anything when we do that.” “Yeah,” said Pinkie, nodding her head emphatically. “I mean, fighting all those creatures was kinda fun, but I much prefer dancing and music and cake and pies and ice cream. Ooo, I can’t wait to start planning our victory party!” “How are things on your end, girls?” the unicorn asked, turning to face the screen. Applejack grinned back at her. “We’re pretty much done, Twilight! The new outgoing lines are formed – we’re just waitin’ on the word to throw ‘em open.” She nodded, thinking. “How’s it look outside the tree?” “Oh, I can answer that,” said Fluttershy, walking into view from off-screen. “Hummingway took a look around outside,” she said, nudging the little green hummingbird that was nestled just over her ear, “and he says that the vines aren’t nearly as active. I think most of them might actually be dead.” “Good. That means we’ve only got the one problem. Alright. I think everything is in place, then. Applejack? Lift the lockdown.” The orange mare nodded, and reached for the console in front of her, Twilight turning her attention back to the floating rock. “Pinkie, Rainbow?” The two mares nodded, taking their positions next to her, and rakish grin on both their faces. “Alright then. Let’s do this.” Her horn and eyes blazed to life, and an enormous spike popped into existence some distance behind them, gleaming silver and inscribed with glowing purple runes. “One,” she said, and Rainbow’s wings snapped open, as the dome around the island vanished. “Two,” and the bubble around the obsidian rock flickered, a hole opening in its side. Almost immediately, the rock shuddered; whatever was inside was already moving. “Three,” and the spike shot forward, as if fired from a cannon, slipping through the shield’s hole and slamming into the rock with earth-splitting force. Rainbow Dash was in the air in an instant, a multi-hued blur of motion, as she sped directly into the midst of the slowly expanding debris field. A spinning piece of shrapnel sailed towards her, and disintegrated into dust mere feet from her face; Twilight breathed a sigh of relief. The safety protocols were actually working then. “Alright, Sparkle,” said Rainbow, her voice emanating from inside Twilight’s helmet. “I’m in – kill it.” She focused, and the shattered remains of the spike vanished. “What in tarnation?!” Twilight had to agree with Applejack. Of all the things to see within the cloud, a giant, golden apple with dark red vines sprouting from its stem was not what she had expected. Some kind of plant, certainly, perhaps a root or a seed, but not an apple. “That has to be significant,” she muttered, and pulled at the cords, sending her island into a forward charge, ignoring the snarls from behind her. Pinkie was already moving, and the sounds of hoof strikes assured her that there was nothing to worry about; no, Rainbow was the one who needed her help. Well, maybe. The pegasus had already managed to tie two of the vines that were coming for her together, and was doing a good job of keeping the questing appendages away from the shield’s hole. Still, more were sprouting with every passing moment, a swarm of them heading for pegasus and hole alike; Rainbow was good, but she couldn’t handle all of them on her own. Twilight send a chunk of the island hurtling into the midst of the melee, the hardened, glowing piece of earth tearing through vines en masse and slamming into the apple’s side. It shuddered, but renewed its assault, replacing its pulverized vines with alarming alacrity Twilight frowned; this was a damned resilient program. “Come on, Rarity,” she murmured. “We need their help, here.” “You have it.” She blinked, her code sight lost in her shock at the sudden appearance of both Sun and Moon in front of her island. “You have done well,” Celestia said, her flames roiling as they reached for the apple. “We shall take it from here,” said Luna, her brilliance encasing the shield, and her rays paralyzing the vines that were after Rainbow Dash. “We will find the source of this vile construct.” The apple’s golden skin wrinkled at the first touch of flame, slowly charring, and in the blink of an eye, the entire thing had turned a sickly black. The flames paused, and Twilight blinked. Was Celestia … hesitating? “Luna!” the sun cried, and suddenly everything was limned in silver moonlight. A split second later, the apple detonated, and Twilight barely had time to scream before the wave of fire engulfed her.