//------------------------------// // SKULLS FOR THE SKULLTHRONE!!!! // Story: Kharn's adventurous exploits in Equestria // by rhysofpeace //------------------------------// Twilight was staring at Luna who had somehow managed to enter her home, along with around ten unicorns adorned in the ceremonial armour that was the icon of Luna’s royal guard, and had somehow set up set of complex equipment consisting of vials, tubing and machinery all without alerting Twilight to their presence.“L-Luna?” Twilight stuttered her voice was filled with confusion. Luna, previously engrossed with setting up the strange machine in the centre of the library, turned around to greet the purple mare “Why Twilight Sparkle! It pleases us that you are still awake at this hour” Twilight’s face remained frozen in surprise. “You see, from what our sister has told us, we believed that you would be...” Luna waved a hoof in the air as she thought of a word to use “ecstatic?, Yes that will do, that you would be ecstatic to help us with something that could change the future of Equestria” Luna spread her front hooves out into the air, to emphasize the word Equestria, knocking over a set of vials in the process, one of which was filled with a strange purple mass that writhed within the magically confined vial, Luna and her entire envoy’s eyes widened In horror and their horns became encased in magic as they all attempted to stop the vial filled with the purple mass from hitting the floor. They all let out a collective sigh of relief, bar Luna who maintained a look of worry, as the vial was levitated back onto its rack. “What...what was that?” Twilight’s inquisitiveness broke her state of silent confusion “in due time Twilight, in due time” Luna, now moving a lot more cautiously, walked towards an empty table motioning for twilight to follow her. Upon arriving at the table Luna began levitating a book towards her “tell us, Twilight, what do you know of Starswirl the Bearded’s studies into alternate universes?” “Well...not a lot, I mean I’ve heard the rumours and even then they’re not exactly consistent...” Twilight was interrupted by Luna’s hoof, signalling to her that she should be silent “well then what do these rumours say Twilight?” a look of amusement was plastered upon the princess’ face. Twilight, although she was slightly taken aback by the amusement that the princess seemed to take in her lack of knowledge on the subject, carried on explaining what she knew on the topic “well...supposedly he discovered some kind of spell that allowed a unicorn to separate their mind from their body and...to be honest that’s about as much as I actually know, other than the fact that he supposedly used it to somehow traverse dimensions” “Hmm, so no mention of his books on the subject then?” Luna asked baring a look of mild surprise “we had assumed more information than that had survived the years” “I-I’m sorry princess” “Don’t fret subject, there is no need to apologise, we did not come here for information that we already have...instead” Luna allowed the book, that was held in her magical grasp, to fall onto the table with an audible smack “we would like you to have a look at this.” Twilight immediately turned her gaze towards the cover of the book, as she gazed at the intricate design covering the book she struggled to keep her jaw from hitting the floor, the spine, cover and front of the book seemed to be made from slabs of solid silver etched with detailed imagery of Ponies and numerous other creatures, such as manticores and even primates, however some of the creatures pictured were strange, alien monstrosities with serrated teeth and others held strange ornate weaponry, and amongst all this was the title of the book highlighted with what appeared to be gold “Weird Arcane Rips & Paradoxes” Twilight looked up from the book “What...no...It can’t be?” Twilight kept looking from the book to Luna. “You see, within this book lay’s the magical formula that will allow us to traverse the space between dimensions and thus allow us to see into an alternate dimension” “But why would you want to do that?” Luna looked slightly confused at this question “Why? Twilight we thought you of all ponies would realise that, sometimes, science doesn’t need a reason” ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Kharn watched the havoc squad as they attached two krak grenades to the outermost part of a dreadclaw drop pod that had locked shut. They were unable to communicate with the occupants so it was assumed that they had fallen victim to the demon possessed vehicle. The havoc squad left the vicinity of the dreadclaw and detonated the grenades. The moment the smoke cleared, the unmistakable shape and colour of five blue Terminators stepped out of the wrecked dreadclaw, their weapons lit up as they opened fire on the chaos marines gathered in the hangar. Kharn merely watched in amusement as those around him were offered up as sacrifices to Khorne. The Terminators seemed to be moving towards one of the exits dotted around the hangar, unlike the power armour clad chaos space marines they did not have any need to take cover for if their armour couldn’t prevent their death then there was nothing else, outside of the warp, which could. Kharn made no attempt to stop them as they entered one of the many exits and into the corridors of the massive ship, he knew where they would be headed, and he knew where the World Eaters would be setting their ambush. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Twilight and Luna stood side by side a complex diagram drawn on the floor; Luna’s envoy of ten unicorn guards each stood at separate terminals each one measuring everything from magical influxes to the heart rate of the two ponies in the center of the room. “Are thou ready Twilight?” Luna asked concern plastered on her face. To say that Twilight was worried would be an understatement; sure she was excited at the thought of being one of the ponies behind the practical application of Starswirl’s theorem on dimensional travel but there was no doubt that she was terrified, and the fact that it was not her who had tested the theorem played on her mind, after all her life was in the hooves of somepony she didn’t know, all it would take is one mispronounced incantation, one squiggly line and that could be the end of Twilight. Twilight inhaled sharply and then exhaled “I guess it’s now or never” the two ponies in the centre of the room closed their eyes as they began to focus on pouring their magical energy into the complex diagram. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Two of the five Terminators that had set off from the dreadclaw finally arrived just outside their destination, the engine room. There was no doubt that there would be some form of ambush inside. The Terminator equipped with a power fist nodded to his companion signalling him to be ready. He raised the power fist and, as it became encased in crackling energy, he brought it crashing down into the door. They charged in fully expecting to be engulfed in lasfire, they did not expect to be greeted by the sight of a single chaos warrior fully clad in power armor, bar his left arm, drenched in blood and surrounded by the mutilated bodies of his own kind. Kharn smiled as he felt the presence of the warp envelope the ship, they had entered the warp where the presence of his lord was at its strongest. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Twilight couldn’t feel or see anything, that was the first thing she noticed, she panicked had the spell failed? Was she dead? “Twilight calm down, you must keep a level mind here we told you this did we not?” Twilight regained her composure at the presence of Luna’s voice “come Twilight, we must act quickly before the rift we have opened closes” “wait, what if it closes while we’re on the other side? Won’t we be trapped?” “Fear not we would not have brought you along if there was any chance of such a thing occurring, as we pass through the rift we take with us an essence of our world effectively making the rift permanent” Swallowing her fear she followed the sound of Luna’s voice through the darkness and into the space between dimensions. To be continued