//------------------------------// // Chapter 2 // Story: No Gods // by Akouma //------------------------------// The irate dragon reared back, towering over the group of ponies below after having repelled all their attempts to defeat it thus far. “Is this really Their Majesties’ finest?” it thundered, sounding more like two mountains crashing together than any voice Twilight had ever heard. The earth buckled under the dragon’s weight as it came back down, swiping one of its claws in a wide arc. If the dragon completed its sweep, Twilight knew most of the ponies attempting to engage it would be crushed. I have to do something, she thought. I’ve got it! A brilliant flash of light lit the grass beneath her as the glow of her horn grew so bright that it nearly blinded her. A violet aura engulfed the dragon’s arm up to the elbow, rapidly dragging it to a stop. Just as the dragon began to look down to see what was preventing it from completing its attack, its claw wrenched backwards faster than anything of that size should have been able to move. The great beast yelled in pain before looking around, its eyes eventually settling on the bright light emanating from Twilight’s horn. She let her hold on its claw drop a moment later, but the dragon had already selected a new quarry. It took in a massive breath, and Twilight knew what was coming next. I need something. Teleporting’s no good; he’ll just do it again. A shield would just give me a wall of heat. The fire’s about to come. Think, Twilight! Think! A wall… that’s it! Putting her idea into action, Twilight tore the ground immediately in front of her apart, sliding it up to create a makeshift barrier. Heartbeats later, she could see licks of flame curling around the edges.  The stone soon began to glow, and the heat radiating from the rock would still have been enough to roast her alive, but her armor’s enchantments could compensate now that she was no longer in the fire’s direct path. It wasn’t quite enough to stop the sweat from forming, though. With the dragon occupying itself spitting flames, Twilight took the opportunity to catch her breath, only to go into a coughing fit from the smoke pouring over the side of her protection. When the flames stopped, she chanced a peek around the edge of her fortification. A blue pegasus had gained the dragon’s attention, harassing it with lightning strikes. It was taking another deep breath, disrupting the mare’s flight path with the sudden change in air currents as it inhaled. Right as the first plumes of flame emerged the pegasus went into a dive, and a flash of light enveloped the pegasus, bringing her over to Twilight. Unfortunately, this had the side effect of the pegasus plowing head first into the ground from her attempt to dodge before she had teleported. “What the heck?” the mare yelled, trying to get her bearings. As she got back to her hooves and looked around, her gaze settled on Twilight. “Oh, unicorn. Freaky magic. Figures.” After looking over her new comrade to see if she had any obvious wounds, Twilight poked her head around the side of her earthen wall again. The dragon briefly looked for its lost target, then did a quick sweep with its tail to ward off the opportunistic soldiers trying to take advantage of the distractions. Its attackers held at bay for the time being, the dragon turned back towards Twilight. Whether it had realized what happened or not, it clearly intended to resume hunting her. “Hey, can you still fly?” Twilight asked the pegasus. The other mare turned away from watching the dragon. “Yeah. Got a plan?” “That depends, are you fast enough to dodge it if you get close?” The pegasus gave a cocky grin wholly inappropriate to how much danger they were in. “The fastest!” Twilight nodded. “Right. So, the plan is for you to fly in as close as you can get, as low to the ground as you can. Get its attention, and try to stay near its face. If you can lure it to bring its head low enough, I think I can hold it down.” She took a nervous gulp, hoping the other mare didn’t notice. “And then all we have to do is um… finish it.” “Get him low, keep him low. Got it!” Without any further parting words, the pegasus sped off to meet the dragon. Twilight thought she heard a battle cry of “hey ugly” right as the pegasus’ front two hooves connected squarely with the side of the dragon’s mouth. Its attention acquired, she proceeded to stay inside its reach, close enough to make doing anything about her presence difficult. Eventually, she dropped to mere feet above the ground, slowing down considerably. The dragon took the bait, bringing its great maw down over her with a roar, only to catch nothing but air as the she accelerated again. Before it could recover, shining chains of magic erupted from the ground to bind its neck and limbs. As it thrashed against the fetters, one more set of magical restraints appeared to force its jaw shut. Twilight knew several spells she could use. A well placed bolt of magic would be the easiest with her target unable to move. The sergeant that had briefed them on this deployment had shown them in a diagram exactly where to aim. She just had to put the biggest bolt she could manage right through its eye. Instead, she froze, barely maintaining enough concentration to keep the dragon bound. She had personally witnessed it hurt (and probably kill) several ponies in the fight already. It was fighting with the intent to attack Equestria if it broke through the line. It had tried to kill her, very nearly succeeding. She knew this needed to end sooner than later. But the dragon was still a living, thinking being. No matter how much she thought about it, she couldn’t bring herself to actually act. In the Royal Guard Academy, they’d taught her how to kill, but not how to find the courage. Even knowing everything she did about why this was necessary, and that ponies needed to be able to count on her to do this kind of thing, she just couldn’t. Her thoughts were interrupted by somepony near the dragon’s front claw firing a bolt of their own. Twilight turned away from the scene once it had gone limp, letting the effort she’d put in start to get to her. As the adrenaline wore off, a headache began to blossom right at the base of her horn. The pegasus who had acted as her distraction came flying back over, looking far less tired than Twilight felt. “Hey, good work out there, Spearface,” she said. Twilight couldn’t help but chuckle, even though it wasn’t very funny. “You did pretty good yourself. And it’s more of a wand, really. If I tried to use it like a spear, it would probably splinter on impa-” “It was a joke, lady.” Twilight rubbed a hoof on the back of her head in embarrassment. “So uh, I don’t think I caught your name.” The mare in front of her puffed her chest raised her head a little higher. “Rainbow Dash!” The pegasus extended a hoof, which Twilight bumped with her own. “Twilight Sparkle. Thanks for your help out there. I don’t know how much longer I could’ve lasted against that dragon if you hadn’t zapped it.” Twilight narrowly resisted the urge to look back towards the dragon’s remains. Bolts of magic weren’t a particularly grisly way to go, but she didn’t want to look at a corpse. To keep her mind off of it, she used what magic she could muster through her growing headache to find the pill to alleviate that pain. “Heh, yeah. You would have been in some serious hot water if I hadn’t flown in,” Rainbow said as she shined a hoof against her chest. “What was stopping you from finishing it off, though?” The fog that had been gathering in Twilight’s mind dispersed a little as she chewed on the tablet of solidified magical energy. It was only one thousand vortices, but it would keep her from collapsing until she could make it to somewhere she could sleep. Her attention returned to the conversation now that she could properly focus on it. “I was getting close to passing out from that stunt already. I didn’t need to add to that stress.” It wasn’t exactly a lie, but she was still neglecting to mention that she easily could have fired one bolt without any issues. Rainbow thought about that for a moment as she sized up Twilight, who tried to not appear uncomfortable lest she be found out. After completing her examination, Rainbow looked Twilight directly in the eyes. “So you chickened out. I don’t know much about magic, but if you could do that I get the feeling a laser wouldn’t have set you over the edge.” Twilight didn’t attempt to deny it at this point. Her breathing quickened, and she placed her hooves on Rainbow’s shoulders frantically. She looked around to make sure nopony else was listening before speaking. “Okay, yes! I couldn’t do it, alright? Just please don’t tell an officer! I’ll do better next time, I-” “Hey, hey. Easy now,” Rainbow said as she brushed Twilight’s hooves off of her. “It’s alright. It’s not like you were useless out there or anything, Twilight. If it wasn’t for you, that dragon might have gotten all of us. As long as you’re pulling your weight, I won’t tell anypony. And if you can do that again, you’re definitely pulling your weight. But you might want to get better at not looking guilty if you want to keep this up.” Twilight took a deep breath, bringing a hoof to rest on her chest where it clinked against her necklace. “Thanks. Now let’s get back to camp, I could really use a rest.” “Yeah, I could use a nap myself,” Rainbow said, not even covering her mouth when she yawned. ________________________ Celestia heard a knock from the other side of her study’s door. The various wards told her it was her advisor, and so she opened them as glanced back at the document she’d been reviewing. “Good evening, Perspicacity. What news do you have for me tonight?” The earth pony mare placed a clipping from a Canterlot newspaper on her desk. “I believe this should be the first order of business. I believe the article here speaks for itself.” Celestia took a moment to read the article. Apparently, somepony had founded a religion dedicated to the worship of her. The first service had been held the previous morning, and was calling itself the “Sunfire Fellowship.” The founder claimed their principal tenant was that Celestia wasn’t merely the pony who controlled the sun, but the spirit of the sun given form - a goddess. According to the one leading the congregation, Celestia’s divine nature rendered her incapable of being wrong. It wasn’t true, of course, but she at least appreciated some ponies thinking she was right for once. It wasn’t the first time she’d become the object of worship for some cult or another. It was just a natural consequence of being both immortal and powerful. Normally, she would either meet with the head of the congregation to set them straight, or mention publicly she’d rather not have ponies calling her a goddess. Either way, the group would usually disband not terribly long after that. The longest she had ever seen one last was a few years, and that had been generations ago. But what’s the harm in just letting them continue? Celestia thought. They’re not hurting anything with their worship. Maybe I’ve been a little too heavy-handed with the issue. Besides, even though I’m no goddess, they’re not technically wrong about me being a sun spirit. I guess… “I say we let them have their fun, Perspicacity. I’ll follow their development closely, and put a stop to things if I think they’ll become a threat to anypony.” Celestia’s advisor stayed silent for a moment. “As you wish, Princess,” she finally said in a puzzled tone. ________________________ Twilight had very much hoped to have the opportunity to sleep more before being given additional work. But when an officer was willing to overrule the medic’s recommendation that she be given a few days to recover from the magic fatigue, she had no choice but to go with it. The sun was just barely rising as the green mare bearing the markings of a lieutenant led Twilight to the command tent. As they crossed the threshold she saw three ponies all in the purple and gold associated with being a captain in the Royal Guard. Twilight couldn’t help but gulp when she saw them. Whatever it was that she was here for, it was definitely not something small. One of the three captains - a pegasus stallion with a red coat - looked up from their conversation and saw Twilight. Twilight was put a little more at ease when she saw him smile, before she remembered to salute. The resulting clink was enough to draw the attention of the remaining two officers in the room. “Private Twilight Sparkle, reporting as requested, Captains.” “At ease, Private,” said another captain, this one a yellow earth pony mare. Twilight put her hoof back on the ground. The officer who had first seen her enter spoke back up again. “We’ve called you here to congratulate you. The dragon that you dealt with probably would have claimed many more lives if not for your intervention.” Twilight couldn’t help but smile. “With all due respect, sirs, it wasn’t a solo effort. I had a lot of help there. I don’t think I could have dealt with it all on my own.” “Actually, Private, we think you could have,” said the green unicorn stallion who had up until this point been silent. Twilight’s heart skipped a beat, and she had to remind herself to breathe. She managed to retain her composure when the captain smiled warmly at her. “Either way, a lot of ponies owe you their lives, which is why we are proud to present you this.” As he spoke, a silver disk a little smaller than a bit floated towards her wrapped in the captain’s aura. “Their Majesties’ Royal Guard Medal of Heroism.” Twilight’s jaw dropped as a brief flash of light affixed the medal to the plate on her shoulder, right next to her rank insignia. “B-but I didn’t do anything somepony else wouldn’t have! At the very least, Rainbow Da-” “Has already been awarded hers,” said the mare, holding up a hoof. “Speaking of Rainbow Dash,” the pegasus said. “She mentioned the stunt she pulled to distract the dragon was your idea. That’s some good instinct. Tell me, do you have any ambitions towards an officer position?” “Yes sir, eventually. My brother was actually a captain before this whole…” Twilight tried to find a word that wouldn’t make her sound bitter. “Conflict, with the dragons. I think he would have been proud to see me as an officer too.” “Shining Armor, right? I guess the ridiculous things he could do with magic must run in the family,” the earth pony said with a hint of sadness. The unicorn cut in, trying to steer away from the melancholy quickly overtaking the room’s atmosphere. “We only ask, Private, because we have been monitoring your progress since we saw how well you did on your final exam in training. We think the time may be right for you to begin officer training. Do you accept?” To Twilight, there was no question what her answer would be. “I don’t know what to say except yes, sir,” she exclaimed without any hesitation. “Excellent. You’ll ship back to Canterlot tomorrow morning. Until then, you are dismissed, Private.” Twilight walked back outside the command tent, where she saw Rainbow Dash proudly showing off the bit of silver on her shoulder while a few of her comrades sat listening. “-nd then he goes to chomp on me, but I sped up and he plowed face-first into the ground. So then, that unicorn did this crazy thing with her magic and all these chains came up-” Rainbow stopped when she realized that the unicorn in question was standing right next to her. “Oh hey, this is her, guys!” Her gaze drifted to Twilight’s shoulder, and she noticed that Twilight’s new adornment. “Oh my gosh, you got a medal too! It’s so awesome, isn’t it?” Rainbow asked with a grin. Twilight found the good cheer of her comrade to be infectious, and smiled herself. “Yeah, it’s pretty awesome.” She kept the fact that she was being promoted quiet; she didn’t want to ruin Rainbow’s moment.