=== BABW: A New Conflict ===
=== Chapter 36: Marble Cages ===
[ March 04, 2082 – Safe Haven ]
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“So you are really going through with this whole meeting with that Amanda woman?” Vague said, as the magic of the Practice Room put him in a human-like form temporarily, save for his skin being the same tone as his coat (electric blue); all the while engaged in one of his favorite pastimes - somewhat inaccurately, shooting baskets on the simulated basketball court he had programmed into the ‘suite’ the two of them occupied. Sitting on the benches, in the out of bounds area, was Twilight Sparkle, still in her natural form.
“Yeah, this is something I really feel I need to do,” Twilight responded politely, trying not to give away her actual motive for wanting to go to Pasadena in the next couple of days.
“And here I thought you’d want nothing to do with the militia side of things, at least when it comes to the action on this side of the Aurora,” Vague responded, as he continued to shoot from different spots on the court, and audibly groaning with every miss.
“You know you seem to be having quite a bit of trouble making these baskets,” Twilight remarked, wondering if a jump shot was supposed to be that inaccurate.
“It’s because he is using poor form while shooting; he’s trying to rely on latent muscle memory that was wiped clean during his Conversion,” a young but stern voice said, as a green shimmering image appeared on side of Twilight on the bench near the court Vague had made. The image was that of the third of Pamela's three cyber-fairies, said Head Technician's eyes and ears (and everything else within the system itself) when Pamela wasn't focused on any particular part.
“That schoolmarm-ish voice could only be Control, so what brings you this way?” Vague said, as he continued with his routine.
“I was just traversing the system ensuring that no intruders were trying to make their way in; to date, we have only had cursory sniffing from the usual trolls and low-level hackers, nothing simple traffic redirection could not handle,” the cyber-fairy said, the bangs along the left side of her face created by her current hairstyle giving her the appearance somewhere between “schoolteacher” and “librarian”, and the dark-green, pseudo-form-fitting jacket she was wearing giving her the appearance between “lab technician” and “security guard”, given her current self-appointed task. She was roughly the size of an average human woman while in the Practice Room with Vague and Twilight, as she adjusted her clothes and her glasses again, to keep her prim and proper visage.
“Yeah, that’s what you’re usually up to Control, but I’ve never known you to just dive into other people’s Practice Rooms for observation,” Vague replied, as he continued to shoot his baskets, and still finding himself missing 7 times out of 10 on balance.
“Well, part of it was observing your… struggles… with your jump shot in this basketball simulation. The other, simply indulging my curiosity regarding Miss Sparkle’s meeting upcoming with the leadership of the Flames of Southern California,” Control replied, as she adjusted her glasses slightly higher up along her nose, her fae-wings shimmering with the same color pattern as Alternate and Shift.
“So what are you trying to scry about my coming meeting?” Twilight asked of the cyber-fairy, who sat on the bench, constantly scrolling on a ‘pad’ to scan for incidents she might need to tend to during her conversation with the two Ponies.
“None besides determining the intent of said meeting. My curiosity was piqued when Shift was remarking on how a non-military Pony such as yourself seemed to hold outsized interest in who exactly the woman who calls herself the leader of the Flames was,” Control replied as she continued to observe Vague’s humanoid form intently.
“I see. Actually, I’ve been wondering when would be a good point to start discussing it with you all,” Twilight thought aloud as she watched Vague continue to struggle.
“Before Twilight starts with her explanation – Mr. Vague, maybe it would be best for you to re-establish proper form and mechanics with your shot from a set position?” Control asked of the temporarily transformed Unicorn on the court proper.
“I… ugh come on I should remember how to shoot a basketball in a virtual environment, I only spent untold hours doing it before I Converted,” Vague responded, grumbling as he found himself still not able to coordinate himself.
“May I offer a supposition – the software that this simulation is based on is refined according to the particular mechanics of tens of thousands of different human shooting motions. Your brain has likely lost the grip on the nuances said simulation would have you learn, such as the fine motor control in your wrists and fingers that would allow you to automatically adjust your shooting touch while in motion,” Control then said politely but sternly, once again mimicking the tone of a schoolteacher, or in this case, a coach.
Vague stood there with the basketball underneath his shoulder. He contemplated what the green-clad cyber-fairy had said in those few moments - trying to find some kind of counter argument, but eventually came up empty. “Ugh, I really thought I could just jump straight back on the bike. But this isn’t working at all.”
Twilight looked on as Vague used the ambient magic of the Practice Room to change the parameters of the simulation; the court changing configuration slightly to have a small target circle that Vague could move, and a persistent and refilling rack of basketballs that would always appear adjacent to the target circle.
“Per your suggestion, Control, looks like I’m gonna have to start from scratch, until I relearn how to use this sim-body again,” Vague said, as he began going through the motions like was shooting the most basic of free-throws.
“Since that is a simulated body, I doubt it should take very long to relearn your shooting motion for it, but it will take time nonetheless. In any case, back to you Miss Sparkle. You said you were willing to divulge at least the thesis behind your requested meeting with the Flames,” Control replied, as the cyber-fairy and the Pony watched the human-shaped Pony on the court slowly going through the mechanics of a jump shot, relearning what he thought he already knew by muscle memory.
“Yeah, I’m having my suspicions about why no one can figure out who this Amanda Bunn is. And it’s because that particular Amanda Bunn is a total fabrication,” Twilight offered.
Control was piqued by the suggestion that ‘Amanda’ wasn’t who she said she was, while Vague stopped almost mid-motion, trying to figure out where the mulberry Pony was coming from.
“That would be a severe accusation to make toward the leader of one of the more successful of the resistance movements, Miss Sparkle,” Control replied, as she adjusted the glasses on her face slightly, and beating her wings slightly.
“It would not be an accusation I would levy in this particular meeting, because for me to accuse Amanda of operating under a false identity confidently, I’d have to be completely sure of her actual identity,” Twilight said, as she took a breath. “But I do have a strong – almost overwhelming – suspicion of her actual identity.”
“And that’d be…?” Vague said, as he resumed his shooting.
“My former senior school partner, Sunset Shimmer,” Twilight replied, with all manner of gravity.
Vague nodded, and resumed shooting, before the realization hit him; and when it did, it hit him like a ton of bricks.
“Wait wait wait… How could Amanda be a Pony? That makes all of no sense to me!” Vague said, as he walked over to the bench to make sure he was clearly in ear-shot of the Element of Magic.
“It didn’t make any sense to me either, when I was watching that footage of the battle in Los Angeles… at least at first. Then I remembered there was something I read about in passing in the Canterlot Archives some years ago,” Twilight started, not losing a beat despite the surprise in the face of the transformed Terran Element of Water. “If the texts and diagrams that we both found that day were in any way accurate, there were persistent physical portals to the Human World all this time, despite the Bridge having not been in place until the last couple of years.”
“That’s crazy, you really think she could have been here all that time after she graduated or whatever?!” Vague replied, not sure what to think about this potential revelation.
“Not that much time - because she would write the school every so often, since she graduated in disgrace, especially given her status until an… unfortunate incident. That was until about half a year ago. Sometime in September, her letters stopped. And from what some of the HEA Contacts and soldiers down in Los Angeles said, that was when Amanda appeared. Then, she was using spells that I know for certain Sunset developed; heck I’ve even taken a couple of them to the flanks here and there, I better not have forgotten them,” Twilight concluded, now as confident as ever in her supposition.
“All of this sounds crazy, but my actual body is an example of that magic, or something like it, still existing… so I guess we just need to see if you can find a way to confirm it…” Vague figured, as his brain started to get around the idea of Amanda being like him, except backwards in some way.
“I don’t intend to expose Amanda or Sunset, or whatever, to the rest of the Flames; the HEA will definitely need their help, and Amanda is proving herself surprisingly capable of running that whole venture. But I need to get a better grip on what it is she wants to do, because I’m not sure if she’d want to stop at just running the Society out of town,” Twilight figured.
“Well far be it for me to speculate on someone I have no experience with, so whatever you think needs to be done, you should go ahead and do,” Vague said, as he walked back to his target circle to resume his exercise, thinking about the whole situation from his limited perspective.
|| Around the same time, in split meeting-and-classroom ||
“By the Spirit-Queen, this place is just… oooh so invigorating~!” Cinnamon said, as she absorbed the ambience of Safe Haven, along with the ambient Terran Mana that always filled the place.
“While I wouldn’t be so demonstrative,” Coral started, as she watched Cinnamon flitting about the room filled with vigor and vim. “… I do agree that this place is very alive with both Terran and Equuan mana. It does make the air feel electric for those of us who are mana-sensitive.”
That figures. I was more or less at the epicenter of the release of Terran Mana during the Day of the Black Sky, and the air felt like it was on fire to me; that’s probably what triggered my Flash Puberty… Spike thought as he contemplated what the meeting was about with the three of them in the room they occupied for the time being.
After a couple of minutes, the door opened with Mr. Edwards and Adamantia entering the room; the Dragoness taking the lectern at the ‘head’ of the table, Richard sitting at the table with Spike on one side, and Coral and Cinnamon (who the former finally managed to snap to full attention) sitting to other side.
“Before Adamantia gives you the specifics, I would like to personally welcome you to Safe Haven in particular, and the H.E.A. in general, Miss Coral and Miss Cinnamon,” Richard acknowledged, while the bluish Dragoness at the head of the table prepared her brief remarks.
“Yes, and I welcome you all to this location and organization as well,” Adamantia started, as she looked at her short paragraph written in Draconic script. “As you all know by now, this is the base of operations of the Human-Equus Alliance, and while I am council-dragon and the three of you are here, your new practice hall and classroom.”
The three younger dragons all nodded in understanding at the implications.
“Since I am one of Rosethorn’s former students, she entrusted me with your lessons while you are on this side of the Aurora, and that is exactly what I intend to do. At the same time, I want to learn from you all, and the other Dragons here, as we begin to assess how to move forward in this new era where we will work in closer concert with the other species and major Powers both here and back home.”
Said three dragons contemplated what that last couple of sentences would end up meaning as the river of time flowed onward.
“In any case, we will do a simple diagnostic test just to see how your bodies are reacting to not being bathed in thaumatic-epsilon radiation, or in other terms, how well your bodies are adjusting to the dominant Terran mana here on Earth.”
| About fifteen minutes later, in a Practice Room |
“Proc Ural C’stal[Split Fire Ball]!!” Cinnamon shouted, as she fired a ball of flame from her maw, which split into myriad smaller fireballs, pelting a bunch of amorphous training dummy-like targets Adamantia conjured with the assistance of the Practice Room’s imbued magic.
Both Spike and Coral looked on with intent stares, Coral taking the measure of the strength behind Cinnamon’s conjuring, and Spike trying to analyze the nature of the Invocation, trying his best to do a Twilight Sparkle impression when it came to Explicit Magic.
“Hrm, that was very good for someone of your age; seems like Spike is not the only one here with some natural talent for Invocation,” Adamantia praised, much to the embarrassment of Cinnamon.
“Stop flattering me… I think I’m much better at claw-to-claw combat anyway!” Cinnamon said with a faux embarrassed tone.
Coral took notice of Cinnamon’s tone, not having heard much of it in her still somewhat limited interactions with her Trinary Partner. I wonder why she would be embarrassed at someone praising her Invocation Skills. I frankly would have expected her to crow to no end about something like that…
“So you say you are better at claw-to-claw combat…” Adamantia figured aloud, as she conjured larger targets, ones that appeared more draconic in nature. “So let us test that assertion of yours, Miss Cinnamon.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Cinnamon stated, as she took a ready stance, one precluded by a certain bow that Coral recognized quickly.
So she’s trained in the Kuruk arts? Coral thought to herself, knowing quite a bit of the martial art that Cinnamon appeared to be ready to use.
The first ‘drone’ attacked Cinnamon frontally, as it rushed her quickly, trying to throw a left hook, which Cinnamon sidestepped. To Spike’s surprise though, she did not attempt an immediate counterattack.
“I thought Cinnamon would try to counterattack the dummy immediately after that missed punch…” Spike thought aloud, but not so loud to where Cinnamon would get distracted by what the two younger Dragons were talking about.
“Normally a Kuruk-user would try the immediate strong counter, but it seems like she wants to assess what the strength of the conjured opponent is first,” Coral responded, watching intently at the red-orange dragoness who seemed more content to soft-counter and dodge for the time being.
But as Coral figured, it was simply a stalling tactic until Cinnamon was more or less sure of what the actual strength of her opponent was.
With a kiai[1] as loud as Spike could remember hearing of any human martial art recording he watched, Cinnamon threw her first attack, which was a right-cross that hit the drone square in its chest, which was immediately followed by a second shout and a left-cross that hit the drone right across the ‘snout’, which sent the dark gray entity staggering backwards.
Cinnamon held tense for a moment before she was took a couple of steps forward in approach, putting both of her surprisingly strong (at least to Spike) clawed hands on the shoulders of the drone, and drawing herself in, and putting a knee right where the diaphragm would be if the drone was a human instead of a vague dragon-shaped thing.
This is something, all of her strikes are so focused… nothing like the kinda flighty and flirty normal personality she’s been showing me the time I’ve been with her. Is this the real Cinnamon, or is this just a special mode she gets into when she’s in a fight… Spike thought as he watched the display from the winged Dragoness who was the most senior in age of the group (by the barest of margins).
Now that is more like the Kuruk that I am familiar with, it seems that assessment phase she enters is as much as to focus her own mind as it is to assess the strength of her opponent… Coral thought, as Cinnamons action now made far more sense to her, as the demonstration went on.
She has had extensive formal training in the Kuruk branch of Draconic Martial Arts, though there are some holes in her game, as it were; but they can be ironed out in time and with her own will… Adamantia thought as she continued to watch the solid and powerful strikes Cinnamon delivered to the drone.
Cinnamon, thinking the fight was in hand, decided to go ahead and end her demonstration with a flourish. As the drone attempted one last rush attack, Cinnamon grabbed him by the hands, as the two stood in a test of strength. Spike and Coral watched with continued interest as the drone tried it’s best to overpower Cinnamon, but found itself unable to generate any leverage on the draka that was of even height and apparent weight with it. As the lock-up continued, it was clear that Cinnamon had the advantage, as she began to exert her leverage over the drone, forcing it down to one knee.
Spike saw the flash in her eyes, as the sclera started to turn red, signaling… something.
The something… a massive gout of flame erupting from her open maw, as pure ruby-red and orange tinged dragonfire erupted from maw of the nineteen-year old draka. Scorching the drone until half of its mass evaporated away, blasted away by the intense flames she was generating.
Needless to say, Cinnamon’s demonstration of combat abilities was over at that point.
“Alright, that was a perfectly fine display of Kuruk-style combat, but the dragonflame at the end takes a few beats too long for you to conjure. You would need to incapacitate your target further if you wanted to use the same… flourish… in a live situation,” Adamantia noted as Cinnamon sat on the bench next to Spike, and Coral went into the ‘ring’ for her demonstration.
Coral seemed to be intently staring at the drone conjured for her demonstration, as she stretched her long limbs, her half-Long heritage making her the tallest of the three young Dragons there by a few inches from head to sole as she stood.
And as much as Spike found himself blithely staring at Cinnamon before she started her demonstration, he found himself drifting into admiration of Coral’s figure. Cinnamon for her part silently protested the absent-minded drake, but thought better of saying something aloud about it.
Those three will get along just fine, so long as we can find a way to keep them together… Adamantia thought to herself as she raised her arm to start the drone for the demonstration.
The drone attacked immediately on Adamantia’s signal, trying to throw a punch right in the sternum of Coral, which was brushed aside as quickly as it tried to throw it.
The drone quickly regrouped, trying to rush and grab Coral, but Coral grabbed it by one of its arms and spun it around, holding her ground as the drone went stumbling off in another direction for a couple of feet.
Spike was wondering what exactly Coral was doing, until he felt something stinging him. At first he thought it was Cinnamon trying to get his attention somehow…
“Hey, Cinnamon, I’m trying to watch this, what’s goin’ on?” Spike asked incredulously, as he tried to split his attention between the chalk white and iridescent-blue draka in front of him and the fire-like red-orange one to his side.
“Yeah I’m trying to watch it too, I remember reading about the Longs’ preferred fighting styles, and if I feel the charge in the air right, I think I know which one exactly she’s using,” Cinnamon responded.
Charge in the air… wait… Spike thought, before he let his ear fins help him read the atmospheric conditions for traces of mana. Though it was hard to perceive, he could feel epsilon mana starting to roll in, like a thin but still noticeable fog in the morning.
He thought for a few more moments after that, as the drone continued to swing wildly at Coral, only to be rebuffed repeatedly, with an almost disturbing casualness on the part of the white draka. It then hit him like a proverbial thunderbolt – just as a literal (but magically induced) thunderbolt hit the drone.
“This must be the Vikka-style of martial arts I saw in that book you showed me a few weeks ago,” Spike realized, as he remembered Cinnamon showing him a bunch of books on the basics of unarmed Dragon martial arts.
“Yeah, although Coral there isn’t a full-blooded Long, she still has the natural abilities of one, and the best known is generating lightning from seemingly anything, even something as simple as a slight abundance of mana in the air,” Cinnamon said, her focus on the draka in front of her locked in, as she watched the swift palm and elbow strikes from Coral on the drone being punctuated by lightning striking at the same spot at the same time. “As you read, and as you can see, the Vikka-style’s foundation is using lightning strikes in conjunction with swift strikes from the hard points on your upper limbs while in a two-legged form.”
“Because Long aren’t as physically robust in terms of raw strength as a Wyrm or a plain Dragon, they’ve used their innate control of mana and weather to act as a booster. This makes hybrid Long especially dangerous fighters; because in exchange for a mild loss of overall control of weather they conjure, they also lose some of the strength penalty regarding their bodies, if you were to put this in war-games terminology,” Adamantia added.
Spike nodded as Coral continued to work over the drone in a flourish of strikes, both physical and conjured lightning, appearing almost as if she was dancing to some unheard rhythm as she delivered the blows. As she did, the action before him began to remind Spike of something else while he was on Earth the first couple of times with Twilight and the others (and still in his pre-adolescent form).
It’s almost like watching an actor in those Asian martial arts films Storm showed me way back when… wuxia I think the general term for them were… Spike thought as he saw the physical blows that Coral was throwing starting to ‘de-sync’ from the lightning strikes she was controlling.
“The drone looks completely scrambled now, especially since the physical blows aren’t following the lightning strikes anymore…” Spike thought aloud, as he watched the action as it was appearing to reach its climax.
“That means this demonstration is reaching its conclusion… but how she will end it, hrm…” Adamantia thought along with Spike; a faint smile on her face as she witnessed the martial prowess the chalk-white draka.
Coral took a step or two back, still calling down lightning but using her ear-fins and the short whiskers along her snout to do the job instead of her arms. She then waved her arms around in a pattern, something that Cinnamon and Spike were having trouble deciphering, but Adamantia was quite familiar with.
Interesting finishing blow she is winding up for… Adamantia wondered, as she watched Coral take a short step forward, before they all heard the battle cry.
“Varag Mahq!!!” Coral shouted, as she thrusted her right arm like she was throwing a right hook, a swirl of air surrounding her fist, landing the blow right in the side of the drone, as if she had hit a human right under the ribcage near the kidneys.
The air around her fists exploded with a loud bang, as if someone had set off a loud (but invisible) flashbang. The drone flew a couple of feet backwards, as part of its side was blown off by the explosion of conjured air and magic.
“Wow, Coral… that was something else…” Cinnamon remarked; surprised by the martial ability of the bookish-sounding draka that was her Trinary Partner.
“I was partially raised in dojos, and my family, from eldest to youngest, has a deep curiosity and insatiable desire of knowledge of all kinds. Such was passed on to me, and I am duly learning all I can of the Vikka branch of unarmed combat. Hopefully I will be able to master all of the forms of unarmed Draconic combat arts, but such a thing will remain to be seen,” Coral responded, as she began to ratchet her mana down, being out of a combat situation and not accidentally wanting to conjure lightning when she didn’t want to.
Spike nodded knowingly as he walked into the ‘circle’ for his combat demonstration. He looked at the drone that was conjured as his opponent, which almost seemed to be a mirror of him size-wise. He took the best ready stance he could manage for someone with almost no time to really learn any of the Draconic martial arts.
“And… begin…” Adamantia announced, as the drone charged Spike almost as soon as Adamantia got the words out of her mouth.
In a mild panic, Spike turned to get out of the way, but swung his heavy tail with the mace-like spiked tip around out of instinct, completely taking out the legs of the drone that rushed him.
“I wonder if he planned that or if he just got lucky,” Cinnamon remarked as the drone went sliding on his chest and belly for a couple of feet, as Spike tried to regain his nerve enough to focus on the task at hand.
Spike searched his Rolodex for Draconic incantations, and couldn’t come up with one solid one… so he did what he always did when he was in a panic and trying to think of a incantation – he made up one on the fly.
“KRUF STOMP!!” Spike shouted, as he stomped on the ground; and as he did, a jut of earth shot up from the ground about 4 feet high, hammering the prone drone and flipping him over on his back.
“I would wager that it is some of both. He seems to have a good instinct but is not sure of its depth, but he possesses enough knowledge and instinct, nonetheless, to know when to press an advantage…” Coral responded, seeing how quickly Spike assessing the situation.
The drone soon righted itself, and tried to rush Spike again. This time though, Spike had already thought of a counter.
“IQUAL RASJANA!” Spike shouted as he spat water from his maw like a hose, drenching the ground in front of him in conjured water.
Something the drone didn’t notice until it was too late, as its feet hit the slick and it immediately lost traction and began to slip and stumble – right into the arms of Spike.
Spike smiled briefly as he used his tail as a lever and catapulted the drone over his back and shoulders in something resembling an inverted German suplex.
“It’s good to see he’s not forgetting how strong he is as a drake, and how much physically stronger he can get as he grows into himself more. I would hope that you two don’t forget that you won’t be far behind him, should you keep your physical training up,” Adamantia remarked.
The two drakas nodded knowingly as they continued to watch the amethyst-colored drake fight with a combination of Invocation and plain grappling.
The drone tried to rush Spike again, but Spike was clearly over his momentary jitters at first, and was starting to remember the full breadth of all the Invocations and combinations he had been practicing. He grabbed the drone by the arm and spun him around so that said drone was back-first to Spike. Spike then raised his arm up, and held it straight as he could as he shouted “KIZAK PARVYAT”, and swung down as hard as he could, gashing the conjured drone along the back as he did, and leaving visible sparks as the mana along his hand and forearm interacted with the condensed aether that made up the drone.
The drone staggered, as it found itself almost unable to move, that blow to the back serving two purposes as the other Dragons watching quickly figured out.
Spike’s eyes began to glow green, as he focused his mana into his dragonfire, causing a feedback loop that dramatically intensified the heat and destructive power of said flame. So much so, that the flame appeared to be turning into something else entirely.
“Is that what I think it is? How could he have learned something like that…” Cinnamon questioned, possibly recognizing what Spike was attempting in the moment.
“It’s not something you can necessarily be taught, you have to possess seemingly instinctive control of the mana in your body. But once you have it, it becomes one of the most recognized reasons to why Dragon Magi are so sought after in the Legions,” Adamantia replied.
There was no Invocation spoken this time by Spike, but there didn’t need to be one – he just needed to point his maw at his target (and away from friendlies) and let it rip. And let it rip he did, as what looked like a stream of bright green plasma erupted from his maw, in a neat tapered cylinder shape.
That drake is something to behold… he’s blessed with mana control that most trained Dragons three times his age struggle with. And I don’t even think he fully realizes it yet… Adamantia thought as Spike’s ‘Emerald Beam’ carved a clean, nearly perfectly round hole right through the middle of the drone.
Needless to say, the drone didn’t last very long after that last attack, crumbling into disaggregate mana soon after, not even hitting the ground before it did.
Spike for his part, dropped to one knee, not even entirely sure of what he had just done, but exhausted nonetheless.
“Yeah, that’s definitely a finishing blow. I’m not even sure I could do that twice in one fight, unless someone took over for me…” Spike said as he panted, trying to regain his bearings.
“Well, you have all done well to show me where your strengths are, and what you need to be taught to refine those strengths. I will send for you when I have another training assignment or otherwise,” Adamantia stated, as the four of them left their Practice Room and re-entered the more normalized environment of Safe Haven.
-[ Half an hour later… ]-
“So how did the session go with our three young Dragons?” Richard Edwards asked of his council compatriot, interested to hear and later see what younger Dragons did to train and learn and how that might have been different from training young human adults.
“The diagnostic went as well as I could expect. I didn’t put them through anything strenuous yet, just a basic assessment of martial ability. What surprised me was the purple drake, Spike. For as little formal training he has had, he has quite the adaptive mind in a fight. I would wager his observations of his Pony adopted family and his immersion in your human media has helped in that regard,” Adamantia responded, much to the interest of not only Richard, but the whole of the Council.
“Now that’s surprising to hear. I would have thought him to be less martially inclined than any other male Dragon of his age, given the way he acts in general, to be honest,” Stern Balance mused aloud, with a nod from Wal’byo.
“I’m not surprised. Given the fact that Twilight Sparkle was apparently comfortable bringing him along during their various adventures in trying to combat the myriad threats to the Equestrian Kingdom - it would stand to reason he was not a burden, at the very least. It wouldn’t surprise me that with the proper motivation and inspiration, it would turn out that he is more than capable of holding his own in combat,” Sven responded.
Everyone thought about it for a few moments, and more or less agreed with the snow-leopard-morph Gryphon.
“Still, I would caution in how you train them in this regard, Adamantia. The last thing we would want is to have someone so promising get overextended in some way, and we end up smashing what confidence he is starting to build,” Richard added.
“I am no Bloodthorn, or am I of her ilk. I simply plan to teach them what I can of what techniques any Dragon of their age should know in and out of combat. How they apply them will ultimately be their decision. Though given how they are all interacting with the more permanent denizens of this base, I think they should be duly motivated to assist us in whatever capacity they can,” Adamantia reasoned as she responded.
“Keeping the bonds that the Conduits and the Bearers have forged, but with a far more strong Dragon brother-by-adoption… should be a boon for both them and us,” Richard figured as he got a ping on his private messaging system.
“Always looking for an advantage in any dealing, I see,” Adamantia chuckled.
“It is who I am. This ‘company’ may be much smaller than Edwards Nanofacture, but I feel it is FAR more important to the health and viability of this world. In any case, it seems like one of your superiors should be joining us in the next few moments,” Richard responded in kind, as he heard a rapping on the door.
With a press of a button on the panel of their conference table, the door slid open, revealing his secretary, Candace, and Silentclaw.
“I would assume you all need no introduction?” Candace asked in a knowing tone.
“No, no I think we all know what this is likely about,” Richard responded.
“Then I’ll excuse myself until you are done. I was in the middle of a movie in any case,” Candace replied, as she nodded her head, and pressed a button on the outside of the door frame to close to door back once Silentclaw cleared said door frame entering.
“Always had a hard time getting between her and a good movie unless it was a dire emergency,” Richard mused aloud as he turned his attention to the black and blue-spined Dragon before him and the rest of the Council. “So how goes your observation of the Caged Bird we’ve been trying to free?”
“Our window may be starting to narrow. From what I have been able to gather, the SPH leadership are confident they have rooted out any potential resistance from the United States’ government’s bureaucracy,” Silentclaw reported, as he took a seat at the council table, putting the recently scanned reports he had written in a memory chip slot near where he was sitting.
Everyone else skimmed through the report that was being duplicated to the computer terminals installed in the table, nodding at the assessment that Silentclaw had made.
“It’d stand to reason. Even though President Aguillar is no more than a figurehead, she is still a very powerful one. There is no telling what may happen to the resistance movements if she is discarded as the SPH apparently intends to do,” Sven rationalized.
“At the same time, while we could execute a rescue this very moment… what would that do to the public relations we are tenuously building?” Wal’byo asked of everyone there.
Everyone thought about it for a few moments… and then Richard spoke up when he came to his or her personal conclusion. “I do not presume to speak for everyone here, but I think we’d be robbing the resistance forces of their agency if we did. As much as we may seem it, we do not have infinite resources, and we cannot be seen as the only entity that has to capacity to destroy the SPH and to rebuild this world.”
“I agree… but at the same time… who else has the capacity to execute a stealth rescue like this?” Adamantia asked of the rest of the council plus Silentclaw.
Silentclaw, for his part, merely smirked a bit, as he nodded knowingly at Richard, who nodded back.
“I have recently made contact with a resistance force from Japan, I believe you may have heard their name in the international news and being bandied about here in Safe Haven.”
Adamantia thought about it for a few moments, before it struck her like a ‘bolt from the clear blue. “Oh that’s right, the Midnight Blossom. They fancy themselves ninja for the modern age, right?”
“They just don’t fancy themselves that - they are as close to the ninja of fiction and legend as humans can get, given their depth of knowledge and practice in Magic in general. And of course, they have a certain, modern flair, that will make them more than suitable for this mission,” Silentclaw responded.
“It would be best if a human contingent not under our banner executed this operation, that way we minimize the risk of the public ascribing more power to us than we can be reasonably be assumed to possess,” Balance figured, to the approval of the others.
“At the same time, I would be remiss if I left the Midnight Blossom have to execute this mission without personal knowledge of the layout of the President’s compound and impromptu prison. Therefore, I have chosen to oversee this personally,” Silentclaw offered to the rest of the council.
“That’s quite generous of you, Mr. Silentclaw. But I thought we just went around the council-table regarding how it needed to be a human contingent executing this mission,” Richard wondered.
“There will not be any problem regarding that,” Silentclaw responded, before he was enshrouded in a dark gray fog. When the fog cleared, there was an apparent human of Japanese descent standing before the five councilmembers, somewhat taller than the natural form of Silentclaw, but nothing aside from unusually bright blue eyes to show that he was anything but a normal human. “This disguise should suffice during operations. And the gear that your armorers were developing to be used in conjunction with this form should be more than adequate if we are caught in a true combat situation.”
“Wonders never cease, do they?” Richard chuckled, as he figured an expert stealth and reconnaissance Dragon like Silentclaw would know any myriad of tricks to get in and out of somewhere without attracting under attention.
-[ About the same time, in Washington, D.C. ]-
“The time has to be drawing near, doesn’t it, Secretary Yanovich?” Speaker Wilmington asked of his SPH compatriot.
“It is, Speaker Wilmington,” Yanovich replied over the video-phone. “Soon enough we will be rid of that Aguillar woman, and you will ascend to the Presidency.”
“Good, good… there is nothing I want more than this office, and my name to go down in history as the ‘face’ of the beginning of the Restored Humanity,” Wilmington replied.
“I understand, I truly do. It helps that the Leaders want to remain in the shadows as they are, and once we are decades down the line in this venture, no one will care one way or another,” Yanovich added.
“I have ideas… plans… for how to make this country the Shining City on the Hill that was always talked about. And now we have the power to do it, and more importantly, to bowl over anyone who would put petty grievances and concerns in our way,” Wilmington added.
“Of course. Once our war machine is fully armed and operational, there is none that will stand before us. The question is, how do we hold our position until said machine is armed and operational?” Yanovich thought aloud.
“I believe getting rid of the President will help. The problem is, the Leadership works on their own timetable. I just hope they aren’t picking a date that will be too late,” Wilmington figured.
-[ And in the White House Compound ]-
“It cannot be coming to this,” Aguillar thought, as she was boring a hole in the wall with her stare. “I did not get into politics in this day and age to end up a hostage to some malcontented Domers. At the same time, who could have guess they would have gone to this point to preserve the supposed hierarchy.”
As she stood up to walk over to a water dispenser, she continued to contemplate her position, holding the amethyst charm in her hands as she did. “I do not want to abandon this place… my post. But what good am I to my people dead? Sure there will be those that fight in my posthumous name, but really… how many? How many people would lay down their lives to restore a government that no one would have any idea of how to rebuild? Then at the same time, so many have been purged out of both local and national government, how would we rebuild it if they could get me out of here…”
Do you trust them? A voice spoke to her, calming and matronly.
“I…” Aguilliar thought in response, not questioning where the voice was coming from… but still wondering about the question posed.
Do you have faith that those who profess to fight in your name will deliver you from this captivity? The voice asked her again.
“I do. The words of Silentclaw all these times he’s talked to me, those were the words of someone fully committed to the task of getting me out of here.”
I believe he responded to the faith you had for one Richard Edwards and his organization to see you out of this captivity, your second-in-command for accepting the role of new President should the unfortunate befall you, and in your husband for holding the family together despite your separation. He has seen the faith all of those men and women hold for you in varying regard, and now I ask of you… are you going to hold firm to your faith in them? The voice responded, and then asked.
“I will… I know I still have work to do in this world, and it will be in this office, and beyond this office. I am not ready to leave this stage yet,” Aguillar responded.
Your faith will be responded to in kind, believe in that… the Voice concluded, as the presence that Aguilliar felt while it was speaking dissipated.
“That’s not the first time she’s spoken to me in this captivity. I hope I learn just who she is, and what her aim is in these conversations,” President Aguilliar said, as she calmed herself, and continued writing her notes.
“At the very least, this time in captivity has given my lawyer’s brain a lot of time to think. When the government is restored, there are innumerable things I want to do. I cannot let the state of this country’s government and infrastructure wither away any more than it has already,” she thought to herself; the giant stack of draft proposals nearly reaching six inches already in the last couple of weeks of writing.
[ March 05, 2082 – Pasadena District, Los Angeles, USA ]
========================================================
“I thought Miss Amanda was running some kind of operation… but this is… wow…” Twilight Sparkle thought aloud, as she, Terry, and Spike were walking through the once-abandoned strip-mall that had become, for all intents and purposes, the home base for the Flames of SOCAL.
The three were duly impressed by all the technology the Flame had managed to jury-rig in their base, as it reminded them of a low-grade version of the communications rooms in Safe Haven.
“And I welcome you, Twilight Sparkle and fellow travellers, to our humble abode,” Amanda Bunn stated, as she made a courteous bow, as if she was the hostess for a fancy dinner and not the leader of one of (if not the most) successful of the North American resistance/loyalist militias.
“Say, Commander… don’t you think that’s a little too formal for something like this?” Enrique mentioned with a bit of an exasperated tone, as he calmly walked on side his superior.
“Perhaps, but we are dealing with an Equestrian VIP. There is no telling how much we can benefit from being in the good graces of one so close to Princess Celestia,” Amanda replied, with a smile.
And it was a smile that immediately made the mulberry Unicorn look askance of the slightly tan-skinned, fire-engine-red-headed woman.
A look that was returned by said woman, though not directly in response to Twilight looking at her funny. Instead what seemed to beguile Sunset in that moment was the Dragon that was standing to Twilight’s right-hoof-side.
I could swear that Dragon looks like Spike’s older-by-ten-years twin brother, if such a thing were possible… Amanda thought to herself as she looked at the young but clearly adult Dragon that was only a few inches shorter than the H.E.A. militia man to Twilight’s left.
That sounds just like Sunset when she’s trying to quash her emotions. I doubt I could be any more confident of my theory unless Amanda told me the truth herself… Twilight thought, as she went back to a more neutral but friendly expression.
The five of them walked into a more private room, a simple conference table and padded chairs with a pair of tablet terminals on the table, as well as a large, nearly cubic super-terminal [6] sitting in a reinforced frame off in a corner of the room, to prevent the internals from getting damaged from shelling or up to a moderate earthquake.
“Enrique, would you get the reinforced chair for our Pony guest?” Amanda asked of her lieutenant, who duly complied and replaced one of the chairs with one that was wider to accommodate the width of a sitting adult male Earth Pony, so of course it was big enough for Twilight.
“It seems like you have gone to quite a little bit of trouble for our sakes. I hope we aren’t imposing any undue burden,” Twilight inquired, as she sat in the reinforced chair; inwardly remarking on how comfortable it was, despite being obviously jury-rigged like most of everything else that wasn’t a weapon in the Flames’ base.
“No, not at all. Turns out that despite the lack of high-grade resources like those in the Domes, we Outsiders are perfectly capable of more than getting by,” Amanda replied, keeping her polite tone and doing her best to not let the resentment of four years ago get the best of her here[7].
She still doesn’t sound natural talking like that. I don’t know about anyone else but I can hear that hitch in her voice when she refers to herself as an Outsider… Twilight thought as everyone else took their seat.
Funny that someone doing all of this for fellow Outsiders doesn’t sound entirely natural talking about it. Even Secretary Richardson, when he speaks on behalf of the Chicagoland resistance force, is more adept with that rhetoric, and he’s from a two generations of a Domer military family… Terry thought; unknowingly echoing Twilight’s sentiment as he listened carefully to the content Amanda and Enrique words, and their manner(s) of delivery.
Now that I think about it… she sounds just like Sunset Shimmer. And I don’t know why but she sounds really insincere when she’s talking about herself as an Outsider. I wouldn’t think most resistance leaders would sound like that given where they come from… Spike thought, as he lounged (as much as he could) in his chair, listening to the two Flames the same way Terry was.
“In any case, I was piqued when someone told me about the wonder woman who came out of nowhere to galvanize and lead arguably the most successful of the resistance forces, in terms of wresting local control away from the Society. So, just apropos of nothing, I decided I wanted to see what was going on here in Los Angeles,” Twilight started, as she thought some more. “One of my comrades helped manage and oversee the Bureaus here.”
“Oh you mean La Huracana de Rosa? Yeah, now that I think about it she was considered a VIP by the Muni Government when I was just milling about the Bureau grounds. At least that is what I heard,” Enrique said, remembering, with some bit of consternation, the stories of the cotton candy pink Pony that seemed to be living emotional energy, albeit positive to said Pony’s credit.
“Yeah that sounds exactly like Pinkie Pie,” Terry and Spike said in a bemused tone simultaneously, to the surprise of everyone else in the room.
“Ah that’s right, that was the name of the former Director. At some point I think I might want to see her, seems like an interesting lady, if you will,” Enrique said as he chuckled at the notion, and the slight consternation that put on the face of Amanda when he said it.
“Should we get things calmed down and restored vis a vis the Society, I think you’ll get a chance to meet all of my friends and compatriots. Wouldn’t that be a good thing, Miss Amanda?” Twilight responded, with a slight edge to the last few words.
Said edge was starting to get Amanda’s goat, as her politeness began to waver due to the veiled needling she received from the mulberry Unicorn mare sitting around the conference table.
“In any case, you were coming for a courtesy visit?” Amanda asked, trying her best to maintain her polite tone as she looked at the Unicorn, Human, and Dragon who were her guests.
“More or less, although if you would indulge me, I’d like a little while of one on one conversation,” Twilight Sparkle said, with a look on her face saying ‘and it would be in your best interest to agree’ without speaking it.
Amanda, for the first time the whole meeting looked genuinely flustered, as she gripped the armrest of her conference chair tightly… and Enrique could feel the temperature in the room starting to rise, the telltale sign that his superior was becoming emotionally overheated.
Though, to the transformed Unicorn’s credit, she managed to rein herself in before she went off like a tea kettle, grabbing control of her frustration and her Terran Fire Magic before they started to ‘leak’.
“Enrique, would you mind leaving with Mr. Terry and Spike so that the Unicorn and I might speak alone, and in confidence?” the commander of the Flames of SOCAL asked of her second.
Enrique sighed a heavy sigh as he didn’t want to leave her alone to let her emotions (or her magic) get out of control, but he could also tell that whatever Twilight wanted to say was between the two ladies. “Alright – Terry, Spike, I want to show you all around a bit at some of the other amenities we have while the two of them hash out whatever they need to hash out.”
Terry and Spike agreed, as they could read the tension in the air, and decided it was best to not argue the point with either the orange-ish tan woman or the purplish Unicorn. The three of them left the room, as Twilight cast a sound-proofing spell as soon as they left, to make sure that none of them could overhear without trying to dispel the spell themselves.
“Alright, Miss Sparkle, just what is it that you want here. A VIP from Equestria wouldn’t come all this way from… wherever just for a guided tour,” Amanda asked much more tersely, and to Twilight, much more like the Pony she suspected her of being.
“You’re right, Amanda Bunn, I didn’t come here from Equestria just to get the guided tour of your facilities, although it is appreciated. Always good to see how my former classmates are doing…” Twilight Sparkle replied, almost nonchalantly.
Amanda’s jaw dropped… stunned into silence by what the mulberry Unicorn barely half her size had just accused her of. She tried to regain her composure, just hoping the mare was fishing and trying to get her to reveal something she had no idea of… or that she shouldn’t have had any idea of.
“What do you mean your former classmate? Did your brain get scrambled on the way here from across the Aurora or something?” Amanda asked in a deeply accusatory tone.
“No, I think my mental faculties are quite in working order. I should ask the same of you, even though you used an older magic, didn’t you, Sunset?” Twilight replied, keeping her tone confident but not overbearing.
All of the muscles in Amanda’s-Sunset’s- body became tense. She was ready to erupt in a firestorm of Terran and Equestrian Magic. But just as her fuse was about to run out and the bomb was about to go off, a part of her mind snuffed out the spark on the fuse.
“What do you want here, Twilight. I came here, by accident mind you, to get away from you and everyone else that reminded me of my shame back in Canterlot,” Amanda replied through gritted teeth.
“I want to know what the ultimate reason for you being here is. If you were just trying to escape your shame in Canterlot, you wouldn’t have been trying to figure out the Portal back to the Human World, or I guess we need to update some of the archives with its proper name of ‘Earth’,” Twilight Sparkle replied, dropping the confidence from her voice, as she couldn’t guess in any way what Sunset wanted out of this entire venture.
“Isn’t that enough? I wanted to make a name for myself, so I had to get away from anything that you did over there in Equestria. A position that could have been mine if I wanted it…” Sunset replied, as her tone grew colder as well, as she tried her best to hide her ultimate intentions from the Unicorn before her.
“Do you really think that I was groomed to be the Element of Magic?” Twilight Sparkle replied, confused by the statement and its implications.
“I don’t put anything past Celestia when it comes to restoring her family and the world at large. And you shouldn’t doubt that mare has had double and triple dealings when it comes to keeping the world at peace and harmony the last two-plus centuries,” Sunset Shimmer responded.
“Hrm, awfully cynical of you Sunset. Then again you were always that way, weren’t you?” Twilight remarked, as she felt that Sunset was still guarding something, but she had no inkling as to what it could have been.
“I find the cynicism helps me from being disappointed when the world shows it’s not neat and tidy like Celestia would make it seem,” Sunset replied.
Twilight Sparkle sighed a heavy sigh, as it felt like they were having the same argument the two of them always had when they talked about whether or not Celestia was being completely honest with how the world was when she gave her grand pronouncements about whatever world event was relevant.
“As much you might think you’re right, and I think I’m right about this… I don’t feel like rehashing this discussion, the same one we’ve had a hundred times over,” Twilight stated as she tried to re-rail the conversation back on the track she had it on before. “So I ask you again, what is all of this about?”
“Put it simply, I show up, then Terran or whatever Magic shows up, I kinda took a shine to the people here, the Society tries to take over everything, and I felt like fighting them. I didn’t think I’d do this well fighting them, but hey, strike while the iron is hot and all…” Amanda replied with a matter of factness that Twilight found almost unnerving.
The fact she’s not bragging about doing as well as she is in this fight is telling me that’s not her true aim. At the same time, she’s not giving me a hint as to what it is. In any case I might as well just take what I know now and ruminate on it. Maybe she’ll leave a hint in what she does later when the HEA start putting things the way they were before… Twilight thought to herself.
Sunset picked up on a pad, and activated the intercom app, trying to figure out where Enrique and Twilight’s co-travellers were. “Enrique, what’s your 20?”
“Armory, showing them how we’ve been making our body armor and stuff like that,” Enrique replied through the speakers in the pad.
“Stay there, Twilight and I will be with you in a couple,” Sunset said, intoning that the conversation they were having was about to end.
“Fine, since you want to be like that. It’s your building, I’m just here on tour, as it were,” Twilight, replied to unspoken intonation, as she hopped out of the chair and stretched her legs back out to walk out the door, dispelling the soundproofing as she did.
“Good to see that our silent communication skills haven’t degraded these last few years…” Amanda said with a polite tone.
Twilight rolled her eyes as she exited the room with the transformed former schoolmate behind her.
-[ At around the same time, across the Aurora in Canterlot ]-
“And it seems like an old rivalry is about to be rekindled…” Celestia said, as she could feel the conversation two of her most prized graduates of the School for Gifted Unicorns were having on Earth.
“I see… although… not sure what that has to do with the… minotaur before us,” Luna said, as the pair’s attention was turned to the shade over 4 Length tall Minotaur, with slate gray fur and a long flowing black cape with fringes in all the colors of the Elements flowing behind him, billowing in an unseen wind.
What intrigued the two Princesses, and the lookers on in the room in which the two of them were holding their interchange[8] meeting in, was the fact that A) there was a masked Minotaur standing before them, possessing an ornate, thick, and very sharp-looking axe; one with a blade almost as wide as the broad shoulders and back upon which it rested, and B) the cape that billowed from under the axe (and somehow avoiding being cut by it) was fringed in the colors of the Terran Elements.
Neither fact was lost on the two observant Alicorns.
“I am not lying to you, Princesses of Equestria. I come bearing a strange and wondrous power, the Power that will serve as the VANGUARD OF THE ELEMENTS!” the Minotaur bellowed, stunning everyone else in the room aside from himself and the aforementioned Alicorns.
“Right, ehh…” Luna started, not wanting to sound like her usual curt self. “Not to sound unappreciative or somehow doubting you, but…”
“Say no more, Princess of the Moon! For I will show you, AND EVERYONE ELSE HERE, the incontrovertible PROOF that I speak nothing but the truth to you all before me,” the Minotaur bellowed.
He took the axe off his back, holding in his hardened hands. The guards around him made ready to defend the Princesses for a moment, but it was unnecessary as the Minotaur slowly placed the axe on the ground.
And as he did, the cape and the mask vanished, revealing a Minotaur a few fractions of a Length shorter and slightly less muscular than the one that was previously before them, and projected over the axe… was a Human.
“Princesses and all attendants present, I present to you, the Knight of Legend, the Vanguard of the Champions of the Elements, Ser Oscurio[9],” the Minotaur stated firmly, but nowhere near as loudly as he did while wearing the mask.
“Yes, it is I, the Myth, the Legend, THE Ser Oscurio!” the knight clad in black and fringed in blue, red, yellow, and green stated with powerful flourish
“Right…” the two Princesses replied in the most flat monotone either could manage without practicing.
“AHHH! That tone of nonchalance and poca consideracion tells me that you are unaware of my Legend! Please, allow I, the Great Ser Oscurio, to regale all of you with my great and many deeds in service to the Champions of the Elements!” the Knight clad in black said, with what to the two Princesses sounded like a modern Castilian accent, though he clearly couldn’t have been from modern Spain; his voice showing his near-offense taken to the fact that no one except the wielder of his axe knew who he was.
“Please listen to his stories. I’ve already heard most of them at least 10 times in trying to get here, and I’m trying not to go for eleven without someone else having heard it…” the Minotaur replied in an exasperated tone.
“Fine, Mister… well… Ser Oscurio, give us your best shot,” Luna said, as she figured she might as well humor the phantasmal human and his Minotaur carrier.
“My Legend began in… in… actually I have no idea how much time has passed since my sealing and since my release by yon Steel Valve here…” Oscurio started, before realizing he had lost all sense of time in his stasis.
“We’re going to be here for some time, aren’t we, Sister?” Luna asked of her elder sister.
“It appears so…” Celestia replied, trying her best to not sound as if she was trying to be anywhere except that room right then and there.
=== ~~~ ===