//------------------------------// // Interlude II: Intrusions // Story: Distorted Fate // by Silvak //------------------------------// "Princess Celestia, it is time for you to wake up and raise the sun." Opening her eyes, Celestia released a graceful yawn as she arose from her bed. Stifling a second yawn, she looked at her bedroom's doorway to see her scheduling advisor Kibitz waiting for her. After tending to her appearance, Celestia exited her room with Kibitz in tow as she asked, "What's on the morning schedule for today, Kibitz?" "For today, your highness, after breakfast you have an appointment with your nephew Prince Blueblood over a bill he desires to pass, then you have the day court sessions for the morning till you have lunch with the ambassador from the Griffon Kingdom," Kibitz answered as the two entered the royal dining hall, where she saw her sister already eating her own breakfast. Taking the seat across from her on the table, Celestia was about to give her sister her usual morning greetings when she spotted the haggard look on her face. "Another rough night Luna?" Celestia asked as Luna raised her head to look at her sister. "Thou art correct dear sister, there were much work for us in the dreamscape again," Luna answered. "The same kind of nightmares?" Celestia asked, to which Luna gave a short nod in response. "This is disturbing news. Any progress on finding any possible origins for these nightmarish creatures?" "Unfortunately, no. Our Lunar Guard as of yet hath found no signs of anything, nor hath there be any indications that there was a magical cause for these nightmares." Frowning, Celestia stared at her meal as she pondered the implications of these nightmares. Shortly after Luna's encounter with the monstrous eye, there had been a growing rise in nightmares for Equestria's citizens, where mysterious monsters that had never been seen nor heard of have started to appear in their dreams. After finding no source for these nightmarish visions within Equestria, the two sisters suspected that it may have been caused by one of Equestria's neighboring nations, but that was dispelled when news arrived that their people were also having similar nightmares. This of course only made matters worse due to the nations' leaders suspecting that Luna had a hoof in this issue, leading to Celestia having more frequent meetings with foreign ambassadors in order to dispel these suspicions. "Did you happen to come across any irregularities with these nightmares, Luna? Any differences with the creatures?" Celestia asked, hoping that Luna might have overlooked something. "No, we have not, the creatures hath been the same in general appearance and forms." Celestia's ears began to lower in disappointment till Luna spoke again, "Though... there was a filly that had an abnormal dream..." "An abnormal dream? What do you mean?" Celestia asked as she tilted her head a bit with curiosity. "We recognized this filly to be one of the first few to hath these nightmares when they began, and the appearance of her dream caused us to suspect that she was having another nightmare. Instead, we saw within her dream some kind of... portal we suspect, that was drawing a shattered landscape into itself." "This is... disturbing news, but you said this was an abnormal dream? It sounded more like a nightmare if a filly were to dreamed it." "We agree with thou, but when we confronted the filly, she was calm, eerily calm. Though we suspect that compared to the nightmarish beasts, this dream would be far more pleasant." "Hmm... unusual... I hope this is just some errant dream and not the start of a new set of dre-" Celestia said before the dining room doors opened with a slam as a member of the Royal Guard ran in. "Princess Celestia! We have dire news!" The two alicorns look upon each other before Celestia returned her attention to the guard, her face betraying no emotion as she asked, "What has occurred, Silver Shield?" "We received news from Baltimare that an explosion has heard near the city. From what the message said, the origin of the explosion is unknown, but there are reports of falling debris raining down from the sky." The sisters look at each other again, knowing that this incident sounded similar to the one that occurred over a month ago near Ponyville. As Celestia opened her mouth to issue a command, another member of the Royal Guard ran inside, who is shortly followed by another, and another, till over a dozen frantic ponies had entered the room. "Baltimare, Cloudsdale, Fillydelphia, Las Pegasus, even the Crystal Empire..." Celestia muttered after getting the reports from the guard and informing them to send a detachment to each site where an explosion occurred. "This is... what is causing this? Could this be linked to the nightmares?" "We do not, know dear sister, but we fear that if what thou suspect is true, the other nations may have similar... intrusions within their lands," Luna said as she frowned at the thought. "However, unlike the nightmares that have built up over time, this event occurred at once, though in a magnitude that matches the growth of nightmares." "True, but this can't be a coincidence. There must be something connecting the two, but the real question is, why is this happening? Who is behind this?" "Sir, we lost contact with the probes." "What do you mean? How many probes did we lose?" "Readings indicate that we lost thirty seven probes, sir." "Thirty seven! Did the probes manage to send back any information on what happened to them?" "No, sir, we didn't retrieve any information from the probes, but we did detect a pattern. The theory on the loss of probe three nine five seems to be correct. Based on the destinations of the lost probes, there is a pattern that indicates that some dimensional anomaly occurring in or near these dimensions that would explain the loss of our probes." "..." "Sir, how shall we proceed with this matter?" "...Order all dimensional travel to avoid the locations where we lost the probes. We can not afford to waste more resources on something that we can't even get information on. Furthermore, record any further locations of lost probes and mark them down as well." "Are you sure sir? We don't know if other species will discover the origin for this anomaly." "Regardless of whether or not someone else discovers it, our probes are the only thing we can sacrifice, and yet they produce no valuable data for us to use. For now we can only avoid future losses until we discover a means to handle this issue."