//------------------------------// // 4 - Until next time, fly safe. // Story: Beneath the Sea of Sand // by Meep the Changeling //------------------------------// Keenir “Old Amber” Ka'ra - 3rd of Snowfall - Noon ‘Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don't mind, it doesn't matter.’ How long ago did I read those words in a tome of psionic lore, I do not know. I can not remember if I even read them myself. Whether I was born blind or went blind later is a mystery. Alas, it is one I will never solve. Eventually age catches up with you, no matter what trick you learned to stave it off. I had a good one too, it’s a pity it breaks down the more you use it. I passed it onto my daughter you see. I had hoped she could continue my work. While she grew up, the day of my life entered its last hour. The power of the mind my birth Hive developed sustained me for eight hundred years. If I had more will I could have gone longer. In the end my birth hive banished me to the wastes as tradition demanded. Some Emerald changelings found me dying, and the power of their Queen’s technology kept me alive four hundred more years. There is one lesson I know for certain. A lesson taught to me by life a thousand times. Unless you have powerful magic in your veins or on your person, you will one day meet the pale pony and ride off into one last sunset. Today was the day I would die. I could feel it in my exoskeleton as well as my hearts, this ‘ling would not live to feel another sunrise on his chitten. Many would be afraid, but I am prepared to meet my Maker. Whether my Maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter. I’ll have a million fold questions to ask when I wake up in whatever lies beyond. I have only two great regrets. First, I never warned Mhi'par her memory would degrade and destabilize over time as she used our trick. Last, I never found anypony to teach my other trick. There is an interesting thing about Amber Hive, we adapted to our species’s curse. Over a century, we developed a new type of magic ridding us of our species’ arcane powers for a similar yet different set. I can no longer remember the details, but we called it psionics, and it was a great boon to our Hive. The only thing about it I can remember is a trick I invented. A trick which noling ever understood, but one I was confident a pegasi would understand. Because my Hive’s magic worked on will power, I found a way for a pegasi to channel their will power to increase their flight by many orders of magnitude. I could do it myself, though not in the form of just any pegasi. I spent years refining one single pegasus form to make the best use of my trick. In that form and with the aid my trick, I had achieved speeds I assumed impossible in my youth. It was a shame to let the trick die with me. Unfortunately, being blind I could not write it down, and even so it might not be understood through words alone. Seeing is believing, at least, so I am told. At least I had crossed the biggest item of my squish list. Her Highness, at last restored to her true power, had taken me to a star, opened my cabin’s window shutters and allowed me to bask in it’s glow. I swore I saw a small pinprick of white as I faced the window, but I’ll never know for sure. Age and the mind rarely go well together. “Hello, are you feeling up for something today?” Her Highness’ voice asked, carrying the oddly caring tone it always did. I chuckled, sputtering half way though the laugh. It seemed a trachea had already stopped working. “I think, if I try my hardest, I would be up for a nap.” I answered, forgoing saying her title out loud. Old ‘lings are allowed to ignore such trivialities, even for people we respect. “I know. I picked up your bio-monitor’s feed a moment ago.” she said gently. “If I might ask… what is it like to die?” That was an interesting question. Unfortunately I had no interesting answer. Fortunately that meant I got to ramble on like a proper cantankerous old fart. “Well, there is an old saying that goes, ‘Some die at twenty five, but are not buried until seventy five.’ Death isn’t important… It’s life that’s important. We all go in the end, so it’s the story you leave that’s important. “Well, most of us go in the end. I pity you.” I finished with a sigh. “Why is that?” she asked that little warble on the vowels telling me she was genuinely curious. “Until a story ends it is hard to judge its impact. All things must end. Animals, ponies, nations, times, worlds… All swallowed by time. But once they are gone everypony appreciate them more. An old mare’s teacup a hundred years later is someone's prized ancestral heirloom. A thousand years hence, it’s a national treasure, a rare artifact of an ancient time.” I clarified as best I could. “I see.” She mused. “If my scouts had found you even a day sooner, I could have repaired your neural pattern. I could have enabled you to live forever. Would that have been an offer you rejected?” I chuckled again. “Hay no! I’d live long enough to pass on my trick and track down my daughter for a goodbye then kill myself. More time is wonderful, but death is a comfort I am happy to have soon. I remember my youngest daughter’s name, a trick for pegasi, a recipe for infusing love into water so ponies can eat it, and that I loved stars a lot. Aside from language, there’s not much else in this old body. No memories, no life. All the living I did has already died. It’s time I go join it.” Her highness was quiet for a few moments. “So you wouldn’t mind dying an hour from now instead of in the morning?” That was interesting. What was old gets-off-on-transforming-others up to this time? My chitin creaked as I turned my head to face the speaker her voice came from. “Let me guess, some young couple you’ve ‘improved’ needs a home with life support.” I teased. “No. I was going to give them more time to settle in before telling you, but right now the fastest flier in all Equestria is visiting the Hive. She’s in Gaia’s north tower right now.” she said happily. I smiled softly. “Too old, too well trained. I’ve heard tales of Rainbow Dash, she’s going to figure it out on her own one day. A professional flier isn’t someone I could teach. Too fixed in their ways. Furthermore, I doubt her body is suited for my methods.” “She brought her daughter with her.” Her highness informed. “A young mare I am informed can barely fly.” Now that caught my attention. “Barely? Why?” “According to my sources: Birth defect. She was unable to fly until she turned fifteen and was magically healed. She spent her entire foalhood trying to fly. While she can fly now, she is clumsy, slow, and-” “Determined?” I asked my voice carrying all the hope it could. It sounded more like I swallowed some hair. “Yes. Quite determined.” “Short from head to hoof, but long nose to tail and slender?” I asked. “I could give you precise dimensions... But yes.” came the reply. “How are her wings?” I asked carefully. “Small, even considering how little pegasi wings are in the first place. That’s not important for pegasi flight though, it’s magic. The wings just shape the flight fiel-” “I’m getting up. Unhook these damn cables.” I informed. “Does she fit your bill?” she asked as I felt the half dozen cables retract from my chitin, the scraping sound echoing off the walls briefly. “If she doesn’t, I get to keel over in a hallway and panic some whippersnappers. Win-win.” I chuckled. Oh Faust, there went some more organs! Quick steps Keenir, quick steps. Scootaloo Dash - 3rd of Snowfall - Noon “I think we should do something less… eyestabbingly white.” Sweetie mentioned off hoof. “I mean look at this! I could cast a mane dying spell and be invisible!” “Yeah, that’s a good point, but we sure as hay aren't doing Scoot’s rainbow idea again!” Bloom said giving me an accusing glare. “Hey! That was a great color scheme!” I protested, doing my best to make it sound like I was paying full attention to the ‘argument’. “She’s your mom now! It’s creepy! It would be like me putting AJ’s cutie mark on the wall.” Bloom continued. “So just because my mom has a rainbow mane I can’t use rainbow decorations?” I said rolling my eyes, “That’s even sillier than your idea for apple shaped beanbags.” Sweetie giggled, “They would have been way better without the stem…” Bloom groaned and slid a hoof down her face, “I didn’t know you needed to be all precise with these replicators! I mean come on, military specs are different than civvy.” “That’s no excuse! I think I may have bruised my spleen flopping onto one of those. So the rainbow livingroom stays rainbow!” nearly done… just a few more minutes. Bloom sighed and pointed to the far wall, “Computer: paint scheme, leaf green background, cream stripe one hoof thick around the room at shoulder height.” The room buzzed quietly as the paint color shifted in a wave. I had to admit, it was nice, but that wasn’t the point. “Well at least I’m not invisible now.” Sweetie sighed, “But as my sister would say that stripe is ‘positively ghastly’.” “Oh sweet Celestia, don’t do that impression again.” Bloom winced ears drooping backwards. “Yeah… you are WAY too good at that.” I agreed. Sweetie giggled, “Hey, it’s easy when you grew up hearing her practice that voice in front of a mirror for hours. What about we do… Computer, paint scheme, change strip to chestnut brown.” My implants informed, the text appearing in the lower left of my vision. “That’s way better, but I would like to, implement, a few, packages, so to speak.” I said keying in the code words. A small progress bar appeared and started to slowly fill up. “Like what?” Bloom asked. “Well, this is our living room right? Computer: floor covering, three inch slab of memory foam, leave steel struts for furniture support.” I ordered. A buzz later and everypony sunk hoof deep into the now spongy floor. I couldn't help but laugh as Bloom yelped jumping a full foot in the air. “Ah! That was so mean!” “We would never ever, ever keep this clean. How the hay would we get moisture out of it?” Sweetie protected. “Yes, I am factoring in the nanobots.” she added with a suggestive wink. I nodded. I mostly wanted to spook Bloom with that one anyways. Silly pony. “Fair point. Why don’t we try um, I don’t know something more active? Like a lighted floor which glows when you, run, on it? Maybe we could, program, something cool in it.” Awesome, we were clear! I sighed in relief, and wiped my forehead. “Okay! We are free for the next twenty minutes. I don’t think the algorithm is good for more than twenty five so it will stop automatically after twenty.” Bloom nodded and bent her left forehoof to activate her omnitool, “I’m getting you back for the spongy floor. You sure you can fool her?” Her custom silver and blue interface always looked nice. “She did get us into the biolabs with the same trick.” Sweetie reminded getting her own tool ready with a flash of blue and green. I didn’t need to activate mine. Direct neural link for the win! “Okay, I’ve got access to the room’s replicator.” Bloom announced with a smile. “Passing you the connection information now.” Sweetie nodded, her tongue slipped out of the corner of her mouth as she focused on typing with her magic, her tool’s screen filled with numbers. “Alright, I’ve got extranet access. Stable connection… Address masked… We’re anonymous! Getting you on P2P… Go!” I have my girls a grin, turned to the replicator and said, “Computer: one black flat cap please.” “Really?” Bloom facehooved as the hat materialized and I put it on. “Really.” I teased and brought up my programming interface. My vision filled with a transparent image of a simple black screen with white text. Nothing especially visually interesting, only exactly what needed to exist for the replicator’s back end. Now it was time to turn that back end into a back door. Computers are a lot more simple than ponies (or humans) think they are. They only seem complicated because most of us don’t know the language they use. A string of commands looks like gobbledygook to a pony, but a computer perfectly understands like it was plain Equish. For instance, right now I was connected to a computer in the city’s network. I tell it ‘bt > netdiscover -r 192.168.1.0/24’ and it tells me the names and addresses of every other computer on the network. Then I say ‘bt > nmap -sT 192.168.1.0/24’ and it tells me what ports are open on those computers. At this point, I would normally ask them what operating system they were running, but that was a moot point. I knew all of them. They all use the same root code anyways. Even better, I could just ask everypc what they were doing and they didn't record technopaths saying hello in the security logs. Totally different kind of connection. “Got one!” I exclaimed excitedly as I found an unsecured port on a… “Looks like I can take over the router for the upper levels of this tower.” “Will that be enough?” Bloom asked in concern. “For the next part, yeah. It’s a process. You don’t just push a button and boom, hack completed.” I said rolling my eyes as I accessed the router and told it to link to the replicator. “Sweetie, run ‘Changeling Infiltrator’ through my current connection.” I asked. Sweetie nodded, her horn glowing for a second as her spell zipped through my systems into the network. Suddenly the replicator was a computer interface with admin privileges. At least, as far as the network was concerned. Humans never built computers to counter magic based hacking. I spent the next ten minutes using the router to probe the network and check for anything I could use. Slowly building a secondary network on top of the original one, linking every system I could until… “There we go! I’ve got access to Sub-Processing Unit 43893. Huh, I don’t know what kind of computer this is.” I looked over the data with a frown. Why was a computer system in a 'Garden Grove'? It probably didn't matter. I gave my girls a shrug. “It’s got Phoenix's secondary data loop on it though… and now we have root access! We can look up anything we want.” Sweetie gave me a kiss on the cheek. “Good job! Right then, whatever she’s hiding or plotting, we will know as soon as I ca-” The door alarm chirped, announcing somepony’s presence. Everypony’s ears and tail stood straight up in alarm, interface projections crackled in the frenzy to turn everything off. “Terminate security patch!” I hissed. Hopefully the security feed would be working normally and show whoever was at the door walk in if they did… Otherwise internal and external feeds wouldn’t match and well… Problems. As I saved my subnet so we could open it again later, Bloom nervously trotted over to the door and opened it. “Hell- Oh! This isn’t a clinic sir, do you need help finding-” The oldest, most wheezing, death on the breath voice answered her with an amazingly flippant old person, “Pfheh! I just left the damn clinic. Are you Rainbow Dash’s kid?” “No, Scootaloo is over there. Would you like to come in?” Bloom invited. I quickly slipped the hat off and stuffed it under one of the kidney jabbing apple bean bag chairs of doom. “No I want her to come out.” The old guy wheezed. “I’m already out. I’ve been out since like, eighth grade.” I joked. “Not that kind of out!” he laughed. The sound of something wet hitting the floor made everyone wince. Applebloom sputtered and took a few steps back. “Um, sir, that looks like… I don't know actually but I’m pretty sure that shouldn’t- you need to get to a hospital.” “'Tis but a scratch! Now stand aside, I need to pass on flight tricks.” he said in a voice which sounded much worse than before. I trotted forwards to look at whoever this was and- Ew! Blue chunky thing in puddle of green liquid on floor! “Uhhh, you kinda coughed up a body part.” “I’ve had worse.” The old guy scoffed. Now that I wasn’t distracted by the completely obvious medical emergency in front of me I noticed two things. First this guy was so old his chitin was literally a midtone gray, second he wasn’t an Emerald, his eyes were a nearly white yellowish amber. “Oh hey! I’ve met one of your hive before!” I exclaimed. I wondered if he knew how rare that was these days... “That’s nice.” He said in an honest tone. “I don’t have time for chatting about the past. Instead I want to lecture about the past. I’m going to have Her Highness teleport me outside, and I’m going for one last flight before I die. You can come if you like, you’d learn a thing or two, or don’t. It’s up to you.” That’s when a projection of the same orange, AJ-ish Earth Pony appeared behind the gasping old changeling. “I’ve been dying to know what his trick is. He’s been looking for someone to teach it to for years, I highly suggest you go with him.” Sweetie gave him a concerned look. “Are you sure you are up for-” “Heh, the worst that happens is I die.” He wheezed. If I didn’t go with him at this point, it would look really weird. More importantly, the old guy wanted to show somepony something before he croaked. It was like when Granny passed the rest of the Zap Apple recipe to Applejack. “Are you sure I can learn what you want to show me? I mean, I kinda suck at flying.” I admitted, rubbing the back of my head. He sighed and shook his head. “What’s a way a young person would get it? Ah! Sucking at something is the first step to being kinda good at something. If you’re kinda good you’ve worked out the basics, and you become okay. If you’re okay or better you’ve worked out your way to be that good. You won’t embrace help or tips that seem counter intuitive. I need somepony who sucks… not like that!” “Not a single one of us was even thinking like that.” Sweetie said with a cringe. “Not one of you?” he asked sadly. “Enope.” Bloom confirmed. “Darn. Well guess I won't get to cross off die making one last innuendo off the list. So, you coming or not?” He asked. “I guess I am.” I decided, “So where are we-” The distinct blue flash of tech teleportation filled my vision entirely for a moment, and when it cleared the two of us were on the of of the tower overlooking the city of Gaia. “Did we move?” The old ‘ling asked. “I felt tingly.” “Um… yeah we mo-” A nagging thought hit me, the old guy hadn’t even moved his head the whole time we had been talking. “Are you blind?” “Yep.” He replied in a way to chipper about it voice. Luna’s mane this was the changeling Derpy wasn't it? “Okay sooo are you going to-” “Die? Yes. Just a moment.” He closed his eyes, a gesture I found weird. I mean they didn’t work, you would think he wouldn’t have to close then in concentration. “Phyla’s horn… I’m so stiff…” He groaned. I was pretty used to watching changelings shift. Hay, every time Vinyl threw a party Meep did impressions of random ponies after her third drink. But this old guy… The green flames were more like tiny candles that popped up randomly on his body. Small patches of black chitin turned to brown fur like melting wax. It looked painful, and slow, and not fun at all. I stopped looking when the eyes changed. There are not enough toilets in the world to contain the shit spewing fear watching changeling eyes change in patchy slow motion imparts. I have absolutely no idea why I didn’t pull off my own rainboom to get the buck away from there. Probably the sheer horror. When that horribleness was over the old guy was… a middle aged brown furred tan maned pegasus with a cutiemark shaped like… a geometric pattern. I raised an eyebrow, “Wait, you can turn into a young pony… Why don’t you just stay like that?” He shook his head, milky white blank eyes still pretty damn terrifying due to watching them change. “It wouldn’t make a difference. It’s my mind that’s old. I could make myself a foal’s body but my mind would instruct it to start failing just like my real one simply due to age. In fact, I can feel these lungs starting to seize up. Also, no I can't just shift and not be blind, it’s neurological.” He took a few steps back and turned around, spreading his wings. “You know how to shape a flight field right?” I nodded, “Yeah. Wing angle and feather positioning.” He flapped his wings, pushing downwards, his magic holding him off the ground. “What would happen if you curled your feather tips inwards and down just a few degrees?” I scratched my head in thought. “That shouldn’t do anything.” “But it does!” He exclaimed with a smile. He curled his feather tips as described and stopped flapping. I expected him to fall down, but he didn’t. He just sat there in the air, perfectly stable. “What the hay?” I gasped in shock. “This curl sets your flight field in such a way as to nullify gravity. For as long as you hold it, you can fly using orbital mechanics. For example if I roll to face west, or whichever direction this is and flap once…” he barely twitched his wings and started to drift in the direction his back was facing. “I’ll move this way. I could even orbit the Equis at this altitude, because your flight field is frictionless like this. Drag isn’t a factor anymore.” “I have to try this!” I quickly curled my feathers to match his as best as I could, and flapped slightly. I felt myself float for an instant, but then dropped back down to the roof. “Ponyfeathers…” I muttered to myself. “Did you try to do it on the ground? It doesn’t work on the ground. I don’t know why.” That would have been nice to know! I jumped, flapped, got a bit of height and curled my feathers. Instantly I felt like I wasn't moving. It can’t be explained better than that. You don't feel lighter, just… like you're perfectly comfortable laying down. “Hey! I got it!” I said beaming him a grin. Although something didn’t feel right. “How come you don't think anypony could learn this. It’s easy.” “That part is.” He informed. He tried to give me a wink, but missed by so much I would have laughed if he weren't old. “It’s what you can do like this that’s hard to learn. Follow me and pay close attention.” Trick was the wrong word. He had a whole new way of flying. Normally a pegasi has to worry about lift, drag, gravity, and speed. Our magic can only handle so much, it takes training to make a ninety degree turn and not pass out from the Gs. This old guy’s method was simple, yet complicated. You would just kinda go in whatever direction was opposite of the one you applied thrust to. You could hold yourself at any orientation and keep moving in any given direction. Changing direction was tricky as you would have to push down with your magic in such a way as to move your trajectory. Basically you push down with your wings, pushing you up. So to go left you have to roll so your belly is facing forwards and right to push your momentum to the left. It’s not something you pick up easily, but if somepony shows you you can kinda slowly pick it up. Less yaw, pitch, and roll, more Laughing’s Third Law. It felt far less maneuverable, like I was steering a bowling ball instead of well, me. But I could fly perfectly steadily and it used up almost no stamina! Once I got up to a speed I could just stay there as long as I wanted to! It was amazing! “Okay,” I admitted after a while, “That definitely isn’t something a veteran flier could learn. It’s really counter intuitive… But it’s going to be really useful for flying long distances!” He smiled warmly, and I ignored the bead of blood running from the corner of his mouth. “I’m glad you understand why I couldn’t let this die… There is one more part. Watch my wings carefully, but don’t copy me or follow me.” He angled himself to be facing upwards, and pointed to the sky. “That does not go on forever. It stops after a while, and you won't be able to breathe.” “Yeah I know! I’ve been up there a lot.” I mentioned, deciding it would be okay to say that much. “So when you angle your wings into this delta formation,” he said pulling his wings into a very specific triangular shape, “be very careful to not fly too far up, and make sure the way ahead is clear. Don’t hold the pose for more than a second. If you do, you'll move over five hundred klicks, and could easy blow yourself into space if your angles are bad.” “You’re not moving.” I pointed out, pointing to him as he hung in the air. “I know.” He gave me a smile. “You’ll like how you take off. With your wings like this your flight field is shaped in such a way where space behind you is stretched, and space in front of you is compressed. So if you give yourself just a little momentum… Well… You’ll see. “Goodbye. I’m happy I got to pass this on to somepony. I had hoped it would be my daughter, but I never found out where Mhi'par ended up. She left the hive apparently.” Mhi'par? Wasn’t that Meep’s proper name… “Wait! I kn-” The old guy kicked his rear hooves like Applejack bucking a tree and literally vanished. Just, gone. A rush of wind, the dull thud of a sonic boom, the second boom from something hitting hypersonic… “Oh buck the hay ye-” I was interrupted by the familiar ‘thweee-vum’ of a hyperdrive hitting warp one and a bright flash of green light. “Woah…” A second later and a faint light like a shooting star streaked across the sky. The old guy burning up in reentry. There was the pegasi sky burial, and then there was turning into a plasma trail for everypony to see. In the end I was left with a sad feeling in my gut, and one simple thought. “There is no way in Tartarus I am ever going to casually use that.” Keenir “Old Amber” Ka'ra - 3rd of Snowfall - Noon I saw everything. All of the universe laid out beneath my hooves. The beauty of the stars I had always wanted to see. I also saw a pale white pony, a burning cigarette in her mouth and a score card held up in her hoof. I couldn't read the numbers on it, but she looked impressed. “Death by reentry after self powered mini FTL hop. That’s a first! I’m death, let’s have those questions of yours.” “It’s going to take a while.” I admitted with a smile. No need to mention I had wanted to fly into the sun... “That’s okay. You have all eternity to ask them.” she said blowing a smoke ring. Trixie Lulamoon - 3rd of Snowfall - Midnight The Confused and Sleepy Trixie sat bolt upright in bed. Something was seriously, massively incredibly wrong. Something dark and deep, something lurked in the shadows. She could feel it… Trixie slid out of bed careful not to wake Dashie or Twily and walked out of her nicely decorated vacation home. The doors to the common room hissed open, nothing was there, no shadows with eyes, no drooling monsters. What was wrong? A door hissed open! Trixie spun, tail standing up in alarm only to see Pinkie trot out of her own room, a look on her face showing her to be equally alarmed. Trixie knew it was not a good sign. “Pinkie sense?” she asked the pink mare urgently. “A doozy, woke me right up…” she said slowly. Her eye twitched, her mane drooped, and fluffed. “We need to go outside!” Trixie nodded and rushed to the sliding doors which led from their common room to the main floor. Pinkie followed, rushed past Trixie and zipped across the floor, moving out through a set of doors onto a balcony on the side of the tower. Trixie joined her and gasped in shock. “The moon is red!” Pinkie frowned, “I don’t like it! I don't like it one bit!” A thousand feelings ran through Trixie. None of them her own. She could tell, because she felt her own panic a swell. Somewhere somepony was terrified out of her mind. Somewhere a pony was in the grips of a maddening fear no stage performer could ever invoke. “Tonight we restore my father to life.” Trixie muttered, the words simply coming to her. Pinkie tilted her head curiously. “You remember you dad now?” Trixie shook her head. “No. Trixie does not know why she said that… or why she feels that… or how she knows it to be true.” Pinkie frowned again. “That’s probably not a good thing.” Trixie nodded in agreement. “Trixie agrees… The red light of the moon is an ill omen, thoughts coming unbidden is worse. Something bad has happened tonight Pinkie… The moon… We shall write Luna at once! Trixie is sure she knows the moon’s state tonight, but Trixie must tell her what she-” More thoughts came to Trixie. More thoughts she knew to be true. Trixie’s eyes widened in horror. It could not be! It must not be! Yet it was. “Please fetch a pen.” Trixie squeaked.