Princess Celestia had been taking her day court when the shockwave hit Canterlot. The armour on the bodies of the royal guards clattered, the ink pot by her throne likewise overturning to spill its black contents across the arm of the throne. Instantly the alabaster alicorns magic spread outwards to hold any object that might potentially fall or be damaged. After a few tense seconds the shaking of the room stopped and Celestia cautiously released the grip on her magic.
The princess looked around for a few moments to survey for damage. Finding none she turned her gaze upon the nobles before her. Many showed fear, a perfectly understandable reaction to the sudden occurrence. A few however held themselves together a little better, doing their best to calm those other ponies they had brought with them to the court.
“I am afraid that this court must be adjourned. I feel other situations now require my dire attention” she explained to them, bowing her head slightly forwards. The nobles did so in kind to her, much to Celestias own surprise many of them looked pleased at the new information. Rising to her hooves the diarch tapped her back hooves once each to revive the feeling in them before trotting out.
Once in the hallway Celestia was left alone with her thoughts. She was no stranger to explosions and quakes, a good many of them caused by the various assaulters on Canterlot. But this felt rather different somehow. Taking a quick gander around to make sure that she was not being watched the princess ducked quickly into one of the side doors to the watchtowers.
Despite the general assumptions of the ponies of Canterlot the tallest towers in the palace were not reserved for the princess’s chambers. At the utmost peaks there were viewing and messaging platforms, monitoring Equestria for any news that the Princess’s might need to know as soon as possible. Princess was greeted by a buzz of activity in the room she entered. Ponies were running back and forth, exchanging notes between each other. A machine in the corner of the room clicked, feeding out a roll of paper with a needle waving wildly across it.
“Is it an earthquake?” One asked loudly. The addressee shook his head.
“No, too weak and not deep enough. Surface disturbance” the Pegasus answered, his wings fluffing outwards in tension. Celestia looked at the group before stepping forwards.
“That tremor we felt, where did it come from?” She asked them. One of the earth ponies turned and bowed for a brief moment before turning back to the machine he was working on. That was good Celestia thought, her little ponies were more dedicated to their work than showing respect that border lined upon being worship.
“The geo-crystals planted around the kingdom indicate that the shockwave came from the south” he answered, the needle swaying again “At least 8.1 on the scale, whatever created it was devastatingly powerful”. Celestia mulled over this new information. The only place she could think of to the south that could potentially be the origin point of such a shockwave. But the site was beyond the Forest of Leota, could it be?
Her thoughts were interrupted as Spitfire, captain of the Wonderbolts, slid in from an open balcony. Finally gaining some traction upon the wooden floor the Pegasus stopped in from on the Princess. She was panting heavily, her usual spiked back mane hanging heavy with sweat.
“Princess Celestia” she gasped, sucking in a lungful of air “A cloud has been seen on the southern horizon, like when controlled magical detonations are used, but it’s so much larger, at least sixty four kilometres high. The force of something that big….it would devastate hundreds of kilometres” Spitfire said, trying to hold back a slight whimper of apprehension.
Celestia froze. She had only once seen the effect of an explosion of such magnitude, and that was the remains of the world of the precursors.
“Show me, now” the alicorn asked. Her usual maternal demeanour was gone from her voice, replaced instead by the stern control of a ruler. Several of the ponies fell silent until Spitfire guided her ruler over to one of the telescopes mounted upon the railings of the tower. Celestia quickly grasped one in her magic, orienting it in the direction that Spitfire flew as a marker.
Pressing her eye to the eyepiece of the scope, the princess observed the effects of devastation. The mushroom cloud rose high above, its cap red with the still existent fireball that had risen into the air, carrying dust in its wake. Surely those pollutants would reach Canterlot in time. It would have to wait though, contamination with debris and such would be a secondary worry.
“Captain Spitfire” Celestia asked “Has there been any reports coming from the installation SBD? Any news of, breakouts?” she asked the Wonderbolts member. Before a reply could be given to the ruler a sharp clicking began to emanate from one corner of the room, all eyes turning to look at it.
A telegraph key, somewhat dusty from disuse, had begun tapping erratically. Celestia’s eye turned to read the notice below it.
S.B.D
“That….that’s incredible” an azure unicorn gasped, his horn ablaze with his magic. With each tap of the key his horn pulsed slightly.
“Whoever’s at the other end has bypassed the other key entirely, it must be damaged. He’s using magic to send the message directly...but the message makes no sense at all”
“And what IS that message?” Celestia asked the colt. He squinted for a moment in concentration before his eyes widened again.
“It’s just the same thing, over and over again……it’s still alive”
Foot Note groaned as he rolled over a dune that had been haphazardly created in the carnage, his magic grasp on the cable that had once been connected to the telegraph key faltering. He gasped in pain, the ash now in the air burning his lungs like a thousand tiny shards of glass. With some effort he managed to look up at the sky above.
He was barely forty feet from the main crater, having fallen into a secondary crater created by falling debris, and the mushroom cloud stretched far above him, obscuring the sky in darkness. He remembered feeling the quake the egg….no, bomb, had generated. The ground being forced into the air in great ridges, glowing embers cloying to them. How many had been incinerated in the blast wave that had been generated? And how many more would sicken once this fallout reached the town and cities? Perhaps the mountains might block some of it he hoped.
He tried to remember how he had gotten from detonating the weapon to the miraculously survived communication equipment. He remembered being directly in front of it, crushing the casing with his magic to detonate the warhead in lieu of its long since degraded ignition chemicals. Surely at that distance he should have been vaporised? Come to that fact, what had he even been messaging to Canterlot? It eluded him.
The lack of information told him more than actually remembering probably would have.
“I’m only alive, because you wanted me to be, aren’t I?” he asked his god. He heard the footfalls, only two legs but heavy, as the tall shadow was cast across the wall of the crater. Groaning, Foot pulled himself upwards, the glassed sand under him cracking whilst several patches of his fur began falling out. With some additional effort he turned to face the deity had unleashed.
It had always been manipulating him. It had known that it would be able to survive the weapon from its age with its new capabilities. And now it was free.
And very, much, alive.
Its body, once skeletal, was now filled out. Blood once more flowed through its veins, the thin muscles well defined under supple pale skin. The hole that had been torn in its front was now healed, though the shirt that had once covered its midsection now flapped freely in the wind still blowing. Thin lips twitched at the corner, the eyes now set in moist sockets surrounded by dark circles. The once matted and greasy hair was now clean, flicking like some obscene mockery of Celestia’s mane.
The pit had been opened, and now the Human was free. And this was his reward for opening its cage, for detonating an explosive to herald its arrival. His reward was to live, until the radiation killed him at least. The remnants of the mind that had once been Foot Note was torn out at that point, replaced with a fanatical acolyte to its new master. Adoration, love and lust, to serve the human was his only will and whim. Tears fell from the eyes that were rapidly being consumed by cataracts.
“Dear god” he wept. The human tilted its head as its decay spread, now uninhibited, behind it like the tail of a comet, ash rising into the air to become none existent. Its mouth slid open, lips withdrawing from pink gums and ivory teeth.
“DO I LOOK LIKE I CARE WHAT GOD THINKS?”
Words of perfect equestrian flowed from its throat, under toned with the accent of a long gone race ready to assert its place once again. And with that it turned away, its gaze set in the direction of the Macintosh Hills.