23 - Random Chance
"You know that if they let you go back, you are dead, right?"
Olvir stayed silent, ignoring the buzzard-lion gryphon flying a wingspan to his right. My duty is to Captain Rthar. I will not fail him again. His eyes swept the land below, all knife-edged valleys and dense pine forest, picking out the grey and dun of gryphon next to the pastel rainbow of pony. But there are so many! He shivered, remembering the horrible power of the white mare's magic, and the devastation she'd wrought on the Masters in Naraka's lower levels. The Masters will find us and when they do... What happened to units in rebellion was well known and documented; it was required viewing by recruits and soldiers at all levels.
The other gryphon, a female with a striking black-and-grey panther and peregrine colouration, looped lazily around him. "Only eventually," she said, her eyes distant, "once they have everything of value from you. You could be the most loyal gryphon in the world and it wouldn't matter to them."
"You were in Naraka... you did see what was being done to everyone, right?" The first flysoldat, the one called Adigard, said, his voice quiet. He twisted, showing off a patch of bare flesh, still stippled with needle marks, just behind his left foreleg. "That's just a taster. Svartr here has been impregnated and is going to bear some--" His beak clicked shut as the female hissed loudly, swerving in his direction.
Shut up shut up shut up! Olvir ground the edges of his beak together. You wouldn't have been in there if you hadn't done something wrong. Small cells and no real chance to fly. Medical experiments. The looks on the faces of the scientists -- not the normal mistrust of civilian People, but one of calculation, as if he was being assessed for inclusion in some project.
Am I dead either way? How could they possibly release me? Olvir looked up, squinting into the sun. The land was both unfamiliar and unremarkable; a horizon-spanning system of glacial valleys and snow-capped peaks. What do I know that can actually hurt them? We're somewhere near the poles, far from any of the Hive infrastructure... are we even in Lacunae anymore? He slumped into a glide, matching Adigard's trajectory. It would narrow the search. They would pick my mind clean and compare the profiles of these mountains with maps. I know too much.
They flew into a landing under the trees, wing-tips brushing the sides of a wide, low tunnel concealed under the pine-needle canopy. The light in here was dim, made by a curious mix of backup lights culled from scavenged emergency kits and the pastel, shifting foxfire of pony magic. This was coming from roughly-cut crystals embedded in the walls at regular intervals. It might be bright enough for a pony, but it makes my head hurt. He reached out with a claw and tapped one of the crystals; it moved slightly, stuck to the wall with a blob of flexible armour sealant.
"The ponies are doing a lot of tunnelling and came across a seam of quartz. They said it was good enough for basic crystal thaumaturgy, so..." Adigard said, nudging him forward with one wing-elbow.
"I've never seen it before," Olvir said softly, distracted by the sounds, a blend of mechanisms and voices, coming from deeper in the tunnels.
"It's a basic skill, something their foals learn as a stepping-stone to work in the dogs' factories, apparently. Wish it was brighter." They walked on, past hemicylindrical cross-tunnels holding hundreds of gryphons. Many were injured -- most just minor scrapes or burns, things inevitable in a pitched battle -- and ponies flitted between them, magic flickering hypnotically. "We get better care here than back at the Regiment... a lot were killed back in Naraka's tunnels, but of those that survived to get here -- how many do you think have died since?" Adigard stopped, waving a foreleg to point at a cluster of sleeping gryphons. Stripped of fur in large patches, their skin had a raw, new look; a pony sat at their centre, attention moving from one to another.
Massive third-degree burns, Olvir thought. If a fight leaves you alive at all, it leaves you burned. "I fought against Gravity at the Institute... it must have been at the start of all this." He stared at the pony, but it wasn't one he recognised. "She smashed my wing but didn't kill me. The care of the Masters nearly did that."
Adigard nodded. "That's the way it is. The ponies run their industry and there's few left for medicine. Even the dogs don't get to use thaumic medical like this." He looked seriously at Olvir. "No endeavour is without risk, but we fight a common enemy and we look after each other."
They moved on, past other chambers holding ponies doing mostly incomprehensible things: Piles of a deep red rock being turned into mirror-finished metal cubes. Neatly stacked logs dissolving into translucent crystals and clear liquid. The same metal cubes changing into cylinders with concave conical ends and being packed with the crystals. The amount of effort seemed high; even working in teams, sweat was running from the ponies' coats. I see they haven't lost any of their frightening work-ethic. Olvir stopped suddenly, beak half open. "Wait, that's a shaped-charge -- are they making weapons from nothing?!"
"Atoms are everywhere, Olvir." Svartr laughed, her eyes hungrily watching the production line. "Not a patch on the real thing, but who do you think makes everything for the dogs? Ponies have a reputation for efficiency, for putting everything into the task they've been given. I think I would too, if I had a pain machine in my head."
"Gryphons might end up doing most of the fighting, but we'll have support. The ponies... a lot don't seem to be suited for aggression." Adigard paused, looking thoughtful. "At least, I never thought so. I think that might be wrong. They've just been told that the dogs have been, in effect, shovelling their young into a furnace. That's got to make a difference. I think there are good reasons why the dogs don't use the ponies for fighting."
"What about Arclight?" Olvir shook his head. I guess it didn't do the Masters much good so far. "Did I miss something? I always thought that the Masters took good care of the ponies?" More than us, anyway.
"The way I understand it, a pony is... inconvenient. The dogs don't really want the pony, just its magic. If they can get the power without all that biological messiness... Wish-granter in a box; feed it glucose and issue orders by computer."
And if they can do that, what's to stop them doing the same to us? Is there some plan somewhere to make us obsolete? Olvir glanced at Svartr, little more than a silhouette in the gloom, but the gryphoness didn't say anything, just rubbed her belly with one wing. "You never did say. How many?" he said. "How many have died since their return from Naraka?"
"None." Adigard turned and walked on and, deep in thought, Olvir followed him.
===
Metal Matrix eyed Svartr nervously. The black and grey gryphoness seemed angry -- well, angrier than normal. "I could be out killing dogs and Ellisif sends me to do this stupid training mission!" She paced the little forest clearing, sharp movements of her paws and claws ripping scars in the leaf-litter.
The other gryphons in Metal's little group were similarly twitchy, although in their case it seemed more fear than anger. With good reason, he thought, dancing on his hooves. I've only teleported a couple of times, and never with this much live cargo. He dropped his head, breathing deeply. Probably best if I don't tell them that. He glanced up, catching Triple Point looking back in his direction. The older mare smiled and nodded, then winked.
"What, you don't want to eat, Svartr?" She laughed, a bright, happy sound, like you'd hear from a pony making a joke. "All that prime beef on the hoof... got to be better than the occasional rabbit. I know you are all on short rations."
Svartr rounded on the mare, beak open and hissing loudly. "Yes!" Her beak snapped shut and she shivered, the hiss turning to a bubbling growl. "Let's get this over with. The sooner we go, the sooner I can get back to doing a real job."
"R-right," Metal said, "get into the air; it will be easier if I don't have to worry about the ground." He fanned his wings then jumped, popping out of the tree canopy into a dim early morning. The sun was still several kiloseconds from rising and the light was more than bright enough for a pony -- but not a gryphon. He hid a smile at the sound of cursing and breaking branches behind him, as the flock of gryphons, twenty in all, burst into clear air amid showers of small branches and pine needles. Nodding to Triple Point and the other two ponies, he spiralled slowly upwards, lighting his horn to give his team of five something to home in on.
"It better be brighter than this at the farm," one of them, a large male that looked half leopard, grumbled. "I can't see guano out here."
"It will be. We are traversing nearly ten degrees of arc; Celestia should just be rising." Metal felt Triple's magic build and called up his own teleport pattern, Fusion's memories of the farm she'd passed on the way to the Security base feeling preternaturally sharp and clear. He reached out with a gentle telekinesis, gripping the bodies of 'his' team; a few struggled for a moment so he waited until their wing beats settled, the five gryphons arranged around him in a pentagon.
"Everypony ready?" Triple called out, nodding at the confirmations. "On three. One, two, thr--"
~~~discontinuity~~~
--ee". Residual magic, pale and insubstantial in the dawn's light, flashed across the flanks of the gryphons. "Ha! It worked!" he called out, ignoring the sudden pulse of fatigue that came with the use of power. 'His' gryphons exchanged glances and comments Metal elected to ignore, then folded their wings and dove to the herd below. Metal stayed airborne, hindquarters twitching at the anticipation of panic and galloping hooves from the cows. We could do this far more efficiently than them, but what was it Ellisif said? 'An important chance to give some of them a taste of action.' This is going to be ugly. He swallowed, then narrowed his eyes, watching intently, even as his stomach twisted and his skin crawled.
The gryphons were completely silent as they fell towards the slumbering herd, so much so that the first impacts were shocking in their intensity. Screams and nasty, snapping noises rent the air as cows were slammed to the ground under the impact of the quarter-tonne carnivores. The creatures were large, lumbering things, optimised for muscle growth efficiency and little else, but the attack still reached past the layers of genetic splicing, all the way down to their dimly remembered ancestors. They scattered, the thunder of their hooves shaking the earth and raising a cloud of thin dust.
It was also obvious that most of the gryphons had no experience with this sort of fight. Metal winced as one, clinging to the back of a particularly large cow and trying to reach its throat, was thrown clear and dumped to the ground. Stunned, the gryphon sprawled in the mud, wings thrashing as he fought to get to his paws, then disappeared in the churning press of bodies. Maker! Metal shook himself, horn flashing white and lighting the chaos below. More magic, building a barrier and forcing away the panicking cattle. "Gunfire was easier to block!" he wheezed, sweat dampening his fur as the effort rose. The gryphon was still moving, unsteadily climbing to his paws. "You okay?" Mind singing with the effort, Metal changed the shape of the field from a dome to a teardrop, smoothing the path around it and reducing the pressure.
The gryphon nodded, red-stained beak opening a little, then closing again. "Thank you. Practice doesn't really help when you get to the real thing." He carefully opened his wings, and gave an experimental flap. "Nothing broken, but that's going to hurt tomorrow," he said, wincing. With a grunt, he jumped to an uncertain hover, then flew away.
Metal sighed, then collapsed his force field. Time for my part in this mission, he thought, scanning the ground. After the first few clumsy attempts, the gryphons had quickly determined the best method of slaughter: strike at the upper shoulders, holding on with talons while reaching around for the throat. The carotid arteries were close to the surface -- another result of tinkering -- and a quick rip left the victim staggering. The gryphon then jumped away, hunting for another target, while the cow fell to its knees and collapsed, blood spraying from deep rents and pouring down its chest. Done right, the process was fast, and they stopped moving within a pawful of seconds. In the confined space of the overnight pen, the twenty gryphons tore through the herd, accounting for the hundred or so cows in less than half a kilosecond.
Staying in flight, safely above the one-sided slaughter, Metal opened a sharing link back to the target, a secluded glacier some distance from the base. The ponies at the other end were already talking to Triple, and it was the mare that replied. All set. These things are bigger than I thought!
Two tonnes each, he thought back, selecting his first target. Glad I'm not in the catching team! The pattern formed, destination memory slotting into place, and he pushed. The cow, and a chunk of ground it was laying on, vanished in a pulse of cream light. Sighing again, he reached for the next one, this time lifting it clear of the blood-stained dirt. How long do you think we have?
Who knows. I trashed the monitoring system as soon as we jumped in. They might not discover this until a maintenance crew does an inspection. The mare's thoughts were distracted, focused on her own magic.
Metal nodded, then pushed, sending it on its way, the work becoming an almost familiar background strain. The body had seemed very alive, full of warmth and fluid looseness, muscles randomly contracting in the chaos of disconnection. At least this is for me, and not because I'm being driven, he thought privately. Gritting his teeth, Metal moved to the next corpse and pushed again.
===
~~a lurid violet light filled the end of the ruined corridor, so bright that her flash filters had triggered and reduced the rest of the scene to a near-ultraviolet monochrome. Things snapped past, the shockwaves of their passage buffeting her body and making nonsense of any orders babbled through her earpiece, while at the core of the maelstrom was a patch of blinding light wrapped in layers of impenetrable~~
Ellisif gasped, surging to her paws, wings churning as they fought for air, and pushed herself into the far wall of the stone chamber. "Maker, no, don't--!" Her eyes opened and she shivered. "Wrong memory," she groaned, foreclaws coming up and rubbing the sides of her head.
So that's what I looked like, Gravity thought, suppressing the grin that threatened to spread across her muzzle. Not appropriate. "The memory was very strong, I'm sorry to bring it back." If she was a pony, she'd have galloped away.
"You made a big impression," Ellisif muttered, slowly walking back to the bed of pine boughs and laying down. "It must be working; it was like I was back in that corridor."
"Gryphon and pony minds are quite similar, more so than those of the dogs, but I have to make adjustments." She sighed, shifting her weight to relocate one of the sharper branches in her own bed. "I've done this plenty of times with ponies, so there's no reason it won't work with a gryphon -- but you do have to focus on the right memories." Or I could go digging for them...
"Right. The main barracks chamber at the Pit, a place I've spent many happy megaseconds," she muttered, then cocked her head sideways, staring at Gravity. "You bombed the place almost to a crater... what happens if the places I remember have collapsed?"
What happens if the destination is already occupied? Gravity thought back to her experiences fighting in the cluttered airspace inside the Security base. There must have been a time when something was in the way -- bomb fragment, railgun round, or just dust. I've never felt any ill effects. She filed away the question as one to ask Fusion, or experiment with later. "I only sealed the entrances. Anyway, I'll check the area by shadow sight to make sure your friends are still there. It's been a day -- you're certain that they won't have been rescued yet?"
"It's not impossible... but from what you showed me, the place is practically a ruin. They might not think anyone survived." The feathers on her head rose a little, and she made a soft, angry sound at the back of her throat. "In any case, with everything Fusion did, they won't prioritise it."
Why is it always 'what Fusion did' -- did I do nothing? Gravity chewed at her lips for a moment, ears folding back, then slumped. "Perhaps it is a good thing that my sister is coming along as well. She's much better at teleportation than I am." Look how fast she emptied Naraka. Her ears pricked up and she smiled slightly, her posture straightening. It will be good to work together for once.
"What?" Ellisif was looking at her nervously.
"Just thinking about something else. Are you ready for another go?"
===
"I'm not very happy with this," Ellisif said, flying to the left and rear of Fusion. "Are you sure you can see where we are going? Also, it's getting a bit warm."
"I can see everything," Fusion said, her eye closed and magic filling her mind with a rapidly moving landscape. The three of them, Gravity, Ellisif and herself, hovered in a teardrop of absolute darkness, like they were sandwiched between dense overcast and an unlit landscape in the middle of the night. The only illumination was the white-gold of her hornlight, leaking between the lids of her eye. Through shadow sight and clairvoyance, it was a different story.
Trees and blunt hills, surrounded by endless fields, flicked by under her hooves at just below the speed of sound. Her view was the perfect clarity of a clairvoyance reception node, stationed just in front of the nested fields that bent the light and held in the heat of their bodies, an electromagnetic singularity from which no photon could escape. The fields were nearly invisible from the outside -- it was as if the node was alone under the dawn sky -- light curved around the magic bubble before carrying on unimpeded. Careful examination showed some traces, but little more than a vague boundary in the air, like subtle heat-haze.
Fusion frowned, adjusting the pressure between the field layers and trying to eliminate the optical effect, while changing the ratio of supply energy towards the local environment rather than the distant sun. Cold snapped through the air, a harsh chill that made the inside of her nose sting and slapped against the bare fur of her flanks. Like Gravity and Ellisif, she was unarmoured; their barding had been returned to the tender care of Redshift, whose look of dismay at the state of it had almost been comical. "Sorry, this isn't easy. Too much to focus on." She relaxed her hold, letting the heat build again.
Ellisif gasped. "That's okay, I'll survive. How much longer?"
"Not much. I can already see some activity around the Pit." This was the first time she'd seen it in person; Gravity had been vague about the extent of the destruction, and they'd not had the chance to repeat their earlier, intensive, sharings. Compared to what she'd seen the day of her visit to Random, the place was nearly dark by shadow sight, only really made visible as a ragged core of blackness against the constellations of light from the surrounding subterranean structures. Except for three patches of gold, spaced equally around the central core. Those look like gryphon wing-lights to you?
That's them! Gravity thought through their sharing, riding Fusion's own senses to see their target. "Ellisif, they seem to be still there, and I can't see much recovery activity."
Yes there is, look, just outside the one on the far side. Two points of pastel light were drifting up and down, the faint glimmers of distant magic flickering between them and the collection of gold lights. They must have spared a couple of ponies for the work--
"Hey, talk to me, you two. What's going on out there?"
"There are two ponies working at one of the barracks-roosts; they will see us if they are using shadow sight."
"How much of a problem will that be?" Ellisif's voice had lost its slightly irritated note and become flat and professional; the tones of one used to giving commands and getting answers.
We should snatch them after we have the gryphons... they'll certainly notice us when we jump into that particular roost. Gravity's thoughts felt sharp, like the mare was leaning forwards, eager to get closer and start work. It would be easy.
"We can avoid them for a while, but the mass teleport is bound to be noticed. They will raise the alarm, but they won't be able to stop us." Imagine what the dogs might do to this place if they think we are here. Perhaps we should take them first. Maker dammit, I wanted this to be quiet!
This from the mare who burned their skies. There was laughter in Gravity's thoughts. It's too late for that.
"Then neutralise them first. A disappearance will be suspicious, but less so than an out-right alert."
"Fine. I'll do it; Gravity, you go in with Ellisif. I'll join you when I'm done." Now I just have to hope they didn't leave any of those teleport detectors nearby. Fusion rolled her wingshoulders, studying the faint traces of magic surrounding the two ponies. She reduced their ground speed to something closer to that of a flying pony, rather than barely subsonic. I'll need to be quick, just in case they feel the jump. It was short range and the disturbance would be minimal, so they shouldn't, but...
The feeling of Gravity's assent trickled back through the sharing, then Ellisif gave a startled squawk and it cut off completely. For a moment, Fusion shivered, feeling very alone, then she accelerated, diving towards the little clusters of pastel lights. The ponies, a stallion and a mare, were hovering next to the wall of the shaft, telekinesis probing the shattered tunnel leading to the furthest barracks-roost. Above and around them, running a mixture of crystal thaumic and mundane recovery equipment, were dogs piloting levitation-drive vehicles and cranes. As the distance rapidly shrank, Fusion started to see motes of light within the complex itself, a mass of rescue teams and smaller mechanisms no doubt working to remove any bodies. Perhaps that's why they left the gryphons... wanted to pull out all the trapped dogs first. It made a kind of sense; the barracks-roosts were almost self-contained fortresses, although designed to keep the gryphons in, rather than an enemy out.
Her magic swept out, and the ponies were suddenly there, wild-eyed statues held immobile by skins of white-gold light within her bubble of darkness. Both whinnied sharply, the sound shockingly loud in the artificial patch of night, but Fusion ignored them and accelerated. She curved away from the Pit, while plucking their comms disks and crushing them until the acrid fumes of shorting superconductors made her nose sting.
A breath later and she was past the ring of support shelters that had sprung up around the edge of the Pit, the wind and sound of her passage damped to little more than a whisper by careful control of airflow. The ponies started to fight, magic reaching out, randomly at first, then with increasing skill and cooperation. The subtle and complex arrangement of fields protecting them faltered, letting in light and air from the outside. "Stop that!" Fusion shouted, suddenly panicking. Still too close!
She fumbled for the spell that Spiral had shown them, trying to activate their somatic responses and drop them into a deep sleep. It didn't work, but did make them switch from trying to break free to fighting off her direct attack. This carried on for a few more seconds, then she pushed--
~~~discontinuity~~~
--the shock of air slamming into her field made Fusion's teeth rattle and her head swim and, just for a moment, she lost her grip on the two ponies. They tumbled free, wailing and whinnying in surprise, then pumped their wings and dove towards the empty mountains below. Their magic flared, reaching out for something, but whatever it was must have been too distant, because the spell pulsed again and again, with increasing desperation. Shaking her head to clear it, Fusion tilted over in the air and dropped far faster than a falling stone, catching the pair before they had gone more than a kilolength. They fought again, this time with real ferocity, but she reached out and smothered their power as if they were weanling foals.
"You're her!" the mare gasped, her eyes rolling. "Let me go!"
What have they been told? "Yes, and I'm sorry," Fusion said, "but I can't, not yet." She carefully felt their heads, searching for that one little green-glowing patch of horn material, then twisted.
"No, please, don't--" The stallion made a choking sound, then froze. "No!" He cried out the word, a long, agonized wail. "It's gone, the Maker is gone!"
This is taking too long! "There is no Maker; everything you know is a lie to maintain the Masters' control over you," Fusion snapped, holding both ponies close. The both gasped, not from the words, but from the sudden iron grip of her telekinesis. Fusion's ears drooped and she nearly let them go. What is this turning me into? Should have brought some of those suppressors. She relaxed her hold a little, allowing the pair to breathe, then folded her wings and wrapped magic around herself--
~~discontinuity~~
--reappearing in a valley, high above the heads of two dozen ponies, all waiting expectantly. "Go!" she shouted, and a little group, led by Redshift, took off, vanishing with flashes of light and thumps of displaced air. She dropped rapidly to the ground, depositing her captives at Backdraft's hooves. "Innocent bystanders; I've removed their Blessing but that's all," she snapped out, jumping back into the air. The predawn air was lit by a multitude of hornlights as her 'catching team' hurriedly latched onto the pair. A familiar stallion, red-coated with a bone-white mane and tail, stepped forwards and swept them with a plane of red light. "Animal Scanner? Is that you?" Fusion said, the return teleport pattern evaporating from her mind.
"After my part in your--" He waved a wing, trying to encompass the whole world. "--thing, they put me in Naraka." His wings slumped, and he looked up at her with forlorn eyes. "I'm sorry I did what I did, but..."
Fusion rebuilt the pattern, holding the magic a hair's-breadth away from the real. How many other ponies were put in that place because of me? "Not your fault," she called down. Even if you nearly killed me twice. She probed the thought, but there was no resentment. I'll talk to him later--
~~discontinuity~~
--if there's ever any time. She felt for Gravity's presence, sighing when the mare responded by opening their sharing. It is done, she thought, inspecting the Pit from within her renewed bubble of twisted air. The vehicles had scattered, the larger ones still lumbering clear of the main shaft. The first of several transports were launching from the small town of temporary structures, the little dots of dogs running into the ones still on the ground. Ah, that's not looking good. Gravity, it didn't work. They are evacuating the site. The seconds ticked by and there was no response, so she moved to get a better look at the barracks-roost her sister had started in. Gravity?
It was worth a try. At least it will bolster Ellisif's arguments. With the thought came a little of Gravity's sensorium, like a window into another room. Mostly dark, lit by green emergency chemlights, the barracks-roost was a hollow, horizontal cylinder lined with sleeping niches everywhere except the zenith and nadir. Behind her was a collapsed section, all tangled reinforcing rods and concrete rubble, while in front were just eyes. Several hundred gryphons were staring back at Gravity, their attention held by the sight of the mare, even with the fight taking place before her.
I like these gryphons -- they have a direct approach to chain-of-command questions. Gravity's mental tone sounded amused.
Ellisif, recognizable by her grey wings and stripy chest, was wrapped around a large female, of white-bronze colouration. For seconds at a time the pair were stationary, then there would be a flurry of violence. She's not trying to use her claws or beak. Fusion blinked, searching the scene for signs of blood. Ellisif had a nasty-looking gash on her back, between the wingroots, but there was nothing on her opponent. She doesn't look like she's losing, but...
The only time I ever actually fought another pony was when we were foals. Wouldn't have dared used magic. Although I was tempted that time you pushed me into the drainage ditch.
Fusion felt a pout stretch her lips, not hers, exactly, but a ghost of a feeling from Gravity, and she grinned. That was mean of me. It took ages with the preening tongs to get all the mud out of your feathers. The fight in the barracks-roost seemed to be reaching some sort of conclusion, as Ellisif gripped her opponent's beak with one set of talons and used it as a lever to twist her head around at an awkward angle. I take it you didn't want to interfere?
Ellisif said I shouldn't, said she'd learned it from you, something about not starting this with a murder. I will if it goes horribly wrong. Everything okay outside? I see a certain amount of activity...
The other ponies are safe, but some sort of alarm has been raised. Might be teleport detectors. After what happened to Naraka, I worry about the dogs' response. Fusion cast out her magic, hunting for the tell-tale signatures of metal moving at high speed. It would have to be more than just conventional explosives... even now, this place is too well built for that. Can I detect those nuclear weapons? She thought back to how the bomb had felt, that point of terrible brightness that held more potential than anything she'd ever seen before.
I've not felt anything like I did after Naraka, but you are right. "Ellisif, we don't have unlimited time here. Stop playing," Gravity called out, her hornlight growing brighter.
The nearest gryphons edged away slightly, revealing what the press of their bodies had hidden. Further down the cylinder was a force-field wall, one of Gravity's, and behind that were hints of movement. The rest of the team is already working, good. At least we'll get something out of this. Fusion relaxed a little, letting more of her attention return to the outside world. The evacuation was nearly complete; the final transports were taking off, ringed by a flock of winged shapes that had to be gryphons. They moved with unnatural speed, wings held stiff and back like they were in a constant dive. Fusion watched the big aircraft leave. I could hold some of them here, perhaps it would make them hesitate... She shook her head. No, it will just add to the body count. She reached out again, feeling past the curve of the world. Nothing. Is that because there is nothing, or because I can't detect it?
"Just give me a--" Ellisif let out a gasp as the other female fastened a set of talons around her right wing elbow, then Ellisif gave a convulsive heave, slamming her opponent's head into the rock floor. Stunned for an instant, Ellisif wriggled free and flipped her over, wrapping her talons about her throat. "That's enough, Halla," she hissed, "yield or I will kill you." Halla closed her eyes and slumped, nodding minutely, and Ellisif pushed her away, standing up to glare at the crowd. "Anyone else?" she demanded.
"It won't make any difference, Ellisif," said the other gryphoness, slowing standing up. "We can't fight the Masters with harsh language." She waved towards the darkened end of the barracks-roost. "Even if you get through the armoury doors, none of the kit will work without command authorisation."
"You never were a good listener, Halla," Ellisif said, her tail lashing. "Anything the dogs make, we can break."
That's my cue. Gravity stepped forwards to stand next to Ellisif. "I have skilled friends who can deactivate the lockout." She tossed her head, horn describing a glowing arc towards the end of the darkened cylinder where, behind the violet-tinged glass wall of her force field, bundles of lumpy shapes were briefly visible before they vanished in pulses of pastel fire. "We are the magic that runs their industry."
Halla lost some of her anger, the glare replaced by a more open-eyed curiosity. "You really believe in this, Ellisif? We've all seen what happens..." she muttered, voice trailing off as she stared, transfixed, by the endless parade of hardware coming from the armoury door.
"I have the best part of a thousand of us, all liberated from Naraka. They want to fight -- you know what happens at that place; the dogs always hold that over our heads -- but they have no experience of soldiery. You..." She brought both wings forwards and spread them wide. "You are some of the best that Lacunae has to offer. You can make this work." Her beak opened and her eyes glittered, voice dropping to a low hiss. "We can carve out a nation for ourselves, take what the dogs owe us for our gigaseconds of service."
There was a low rumble of approval from the audience but it was distracted, their attention split between Ellisif and the magical theft taking place behind them. Good enough, Gravity thought. "Excellent! As you are all in agreement, I will start sending you somewhere safer. When you arrive you will be going fast -- keep your wings in and eyes closed, otherwise you will break something." The mutterings changed tone, hints of fear colouring the indistinct words. Ignoring this, she picked up the first batch, perhaps forty gryphons, and held them in the hollow core of the barracks-roost.
"What do you mean, fast? How is it safe to make us disappear, how do we know where we are going--?" one of them called out, his voice tight and high.
"Conservation of momentum," Gravity said cheerfully, then smiled broadly. "You don't, and that's because you don't need to know." The teleport spell's pattern bloomed, swirling to fill in her mind with complex violet fractals. "...and anywhere is safer than here, because the dogs are going to nuke this place as soon as they can."
"How do you know tha--" The voice cut off in a pulse of violet light.
"Next!" Gravity said. As if you've got any choice.
Fusion sighed, turning her attention outwards again. How long would it take to get a weapon here? Gravity has not felt anything moving above the atmosphere, so that means something close to the ground, lost amid the mass of the planet. There was very little moving anywhere; all the normal high-altitude aircraft seemed to have vanished since her destruction of the satellites, and only the deep tunnels retained their normal flow of lights. She tracked the last of the departing transports as they fled over the horizon. Something else, then. Something I missed, or didn't consider. She gnawed at her bottom lip, turning wide circles over the heart of the pit, a giant, snow-white vulture floating over a carcass. Something... closer?
Deep below, under the layers of wreckage that choked the half-open doors at the bottom of the shaft, past the now-empty hangar decks, were layers upon layers of filmy violet light. The scale of it confused her for a moment, then something Olvir had said, a seeming lifetime ago when she came to visit Random, made her gasp. Superconductors... the whole place is built on a massive power reserve. Too busy to see it when I was here before. Fusion tried to calculate the potential storage capacity of a system that large, and came up with a number that only made sense if used with scientific notation.
Dropping down below the lip of the Pit, Fusion spiralled closer, tracing the oversized coils of exotic-element cable. Gravity, stop being subtle, we have a problem. Amid the kilolengths of wire were control, routing and safety units, built on the same gargantuan scale as the rest of the system. Something was changing their configuration, taking the massively parallel power storage coils and linking them together into one single network. It's not happening that fast, thank the Maker, Fusion thought privately. It's not designed to do this. If it had, she'd never have noticed in time; the sabotage would have rippled through the network at the speed of electrons in a vacuum.
They are coming?
Gravity sounded distracted, and there was leakage from another gryphon's mind, one Fusion didn't know, but the memories held traces of another barracks-roost. They are turning the whole place into a bomb. I think I can slow them down. She dropped through a smashed opening in the hangar's shield doors, settling on a platform large enough to hold an airtank. There was little magic and almost the same amount of electronics active in the area, so she relaxed her defences, plying her whole mind to the problem below.
Right! There was a sense of enormous volume to the words associated with the thoughts, likely deafening in the enclosed space. No more dam nicepony -- Redshift, if you don't already have it, leave it. Take your team and run. I'll grab whole chunks of the room if I have to. Gryphons, stay where you are and don't move. Ellisif--
Fusion tuned out the thoughts associated with Gravity's shouts, leaving only a sense of distant urgency, just enough to tell her that Gravity was still connected. The superconducting network spread out below her, visible to her energy-sensitive shadow sight even with the intervening lengths of shielded armourcrete. It was fantastically complex, orders of magnitude more so than the storage banks of the airtank she'd detonated. I suppose I should be grateful this didn't go up when I was here the first time. So now we do the opposite... She sighed, tracing the wiring loom and locating the blocky control nodes with their ultrafast superconducting switches.
There were the core nodes, already linked in a dangerously open topology. Here were the relief cables, running to heatsinks immersed within deep, flooded geological features, designed to safely dump the stored power, but disconnected. There was a charging point, a tap into the Hive's main grid and banks of distant fusion reactors, still alive with light and pumping energy into the store. The magnetically-generated hoop stress within the coils was already past their design strengths, revealed by the tiny flickers of microquenches like the glitter of sunlight off fresh snow. Any one of those could blossom, spreading like a spark igniting a gas cloud, only held in check by the self-healing properties of the exotic-element wiring.
The breath caught in her throat, and she reached out to the feeder lines, tripping the emergency breakers and destroying them so thoroughly that they vapourised under the sudden load. The cables pumping more power into the Pit went dark and she breathed again as there was no cascading energy release passed on to the main storage banks. If I could only do the same everywhere else! It was one thing to break a distant node, but such tactics within the fragile network were bound to be catastrophic.
Hesitant, Fusion felt for the node junctions, flinching when the one she was reaching for suddenly activated as her power wrapped around it. The current flows surged, following new paths, and the background sparkle of impending disaster became more apparent. Have to start somewhere! Spreading herself thin, all attention on the network, Fusion closed her eyes and sank to her belly on the platform, ignoring the sharp-edged gravel digging into her flesh. Under her influence, one node, then another, flipped state, bleeding power down the emergency lines and into the submerged heatsinks. Somewhere under her hooves, a patch of fractally textured metal glowed white-hot, filling the cold, water-filled trap formation with short-lived steam bubbles.
===
"This one is still detecting teleport signatures from within the Security Hub," said the technical specialist, a pale, grey-coated male. He sat amid his colleagues, all who were feverishly working to destabilise the Pit's superconducting storage banks. "The rate has increased; targets are aware."
Orgon pushed backwards slightly in his oversized acceleration couch, bracing his paws against the chair's lower supports as the carrier made another swerve. "Why has the system not quenched yet?" The screen containing the power systems specialists was one of many arrayed around his position; the others in the u-shaped console showed in his technical group
"Something is reversing the changes these ones are making to the network topology--"
"Power dump started!"
"Then stop it!" the Specialist snarled, his head snapping around and glaring at his team. "Burn the connecting nodes out of the network!" He turned back to Orgon, although reluctantly, as if drawn to the activity by elastic. "It must be the servitor Fusion Pulse. This one was told it was an energy manipulation specialist, although to do what it is doing at this range..." He shook his head.
"Can the system be quenched or not?" Orgon made a few gestures over the console's input pad, bringing his connection to the strategic battle networks to the fore. More commands, and he received an acknowledgement back. Just like Naraka, he thought sourly, the weapons will never get there in time. It is such a waste to bomb these places just to show the Court that Lacunae is serious. "Well?" he said, paw hovering over the 'commit' key.
"Yes..." the Specialist said, in a drawn-out hiss. "The servitor cannot keep up with all of us; the system is just too complex for a single mind." He glanced down, making a few adjustments to his own console, then swore softly. "This one is sorry, Strategist," he said, ears drooping and a note of panic entering his voice, "but there are no more teleport signatures coming from the Pit. He thinks they have escaped--" He broke off when one of the other specialists gestured at their main display, currently awash with glaring red warnings from all the disabled safety systems. "--although something is still resisting these one's actions, so at least one servitor must still be close, within a few hundred lengths. This one thinks it's about to--"
The screens at the technician's site changed in a rolling cascade of updates, mostly in the form of 'connection lost' icons. "And the yield?" Orgon said calmly, cancelling the launch orders. At least we didn't waste a nuke. Perhaps we did get one of them.
"The energy levels are about equivalent to half a megaton, but this one is no weapon physicist. He suspects that the longer timeframe of the explosion will reduce the terminal effects..."
The technician was still talking, but Orgon was already working on his report to the Auditors. Half a megaton should do it, this one thinks. It will be a relief to report a success.
===
Whoever was remote-controlling the network finally noticed her intrusion. The rate of changes suddenly multiplied, the relatively slow and careful alterations becoming frenetic. Fusion galloped after them, reversing as many as she could find and opening more links to the emergency systems and funnelling all she could into the water. Somewhere in all this mess were the control lines the other party was using, but that tiny amount of power, an infinitesimal fraction of the amount it was controlling, was lost amid the distance and the glare of countless terajoules.
Part of the network dimmed and went dark, the circulating currents stilled and quiet. Yes, that's it, I can-- Fusion whinnied, the sound high and fragile, dread making her stomach contract. The patch of darkness was carefully isolated from the bulk of the network, all the connecting nodes routing power around her drain point. She reached for them, trying to reopen the junctions, but the mechanisms, solid state superconducting switches, had all quenched and the current flowed past like a river in full flood bypassing a clogged drain.
I can't stop it. The thought rattled around her head, even as she fought to split the network back into smaller segments. Her opposition was just faster, and the massively parallel nature of the network dwindled, the topologies becoming simpler and simpler as safety mechanisms were overridden faster than she could fix them. Gravity, get out! Other systems came alive, secondary power feeds from the Hive's main grid like the one she'd killed at the start, blazing purple with the energy they pumped into the storage banks.
What about you? With the words came a brief flicker of imagery, the hollow cylinder barracks-roost flooded with violet light. She'd moved to the third and final chamber and was surrounding by screaming, panicking gryphons. Some were trying to attack -- rocks and other missiles rained down on Gravity's impenetrable force field -- while others had hidden in the many sleeping niches that lined the structure, only to be dragged, claws bleeding and ripped, from their refuges. The stroboscopic flicker of teleport magic filled the air, making every movement jerky and mechanical.
I'll go as soon as you are safe -- can't leave it alone or it will detonate at once. Get out! Fusion suppressed a whimper, opening the same internal reservoir she'd used before, sucking the power into herself, trying to blunt the onrushing tide of energy. Sweat burst out from her skin, immediately drenching her flanks, and Fusion felt a fire kindle in her head. Time started to stretch as it had during her other intense magical efforts, the tempo of her thoughts outracing the frantic flutter of her heart; Fusion tried to hold on to it, use it. The faster I go, the slower the world, perhaps enough time to find a solution-- There was a surge of magic from Gravity, then the comforting presence vanished and she was alone.
Fusion reached for the teleport pattern, not caring where she came out, but the effort required to keep the inrushing power in check made her mind hazy. The complex arrangement of abstract images that acted as a template for the spell fuzzed and pulsed in time with the surges of mundane energy, refusing to solidify for the moment it would take her to turn it real.
I've left it too long. The fire in her head spread down her throat and filled her body, like drinking burning ants from an irrigation hose. Her influence over the network below became erratic and she fell further and further behind her enemy. Then there was no more room for the flood of power and her magic stalled.
In that brief moment of distraction, the background glitter of microquenches abruptly intensified. Then one particular point bloomed into a wave of terrible brightness that swept through the network in the blink of an eye.
Still lying on the rubble-strewn launching platform, Fusion let go of all her complex magic and disappeared behind concentric layers of force. Telekinesis reached out, pulling limbs in and fighting against the limitations of mere physical objects, then weaving through the flesh until it was as hard as armour ceramic. All the power she'd so desperately pulled away from the storage banks started to escape, blasting out as random kicks of momentum and, half-conscious, she steered the release, venting most of it straight down.
Below her the armourcrete floor dissolved into hot, white light, and Fusion rode into the sky just ahead of the shockwave.
===
No Fusion and no Gravity. There may never be another chance.
The outside world, filled to bursting with the familiar pastel colours of a multitude of ponies, more ponies than Random had ever seen together before. She took one step, then two, leaving the empty chamber she was sharing with her dam and sire, dragging one hoof after another like they were shod with lead. Hugging the wall, the many bodies flowing past her like she was a rock in a stream, she headed for the ramp to the surface. Blank-faced, she ignored the uncertain looks and occasional questioning comment from the nearest ponies, and they soon left her alone.
I must look like a broken toy, she thought, stumbling over her own hooves and falling into the slick rock wall. The idea made her smile, but the feeling was strange, an alien sensation of flesh stretching over bone, so she stopped. I passed all the Master's tests, and for what? To be trapped here amid all these other broken toys. She stared at the faceless mass of equinity, losing herself in the endless variation of colours, sizes and scents. Most of them just hide it better than I do.
For an instant, she saw another pony like herself, a stallion walking like she was. Clockwork, jerky movements, like a foal's puppet pulled about by magic and dancing to some distant, uncaring power. She stared into his eyes, but there was no recognition, no hint of change in expression, and the press of bodies swept between them and he was gone. How many more are as far gone as I am? Now she was really looking, she could see the others, and those not so badly affected. The twitches and flinches whenever somepony nearby moved unexpectedly, or at the sharp sound of a hoof striking stone. There was chatter, a continuous background murmur of conversation, but it was sparse compared what she'd know in the corral. There was little laughter, and that had a strained, hysterical note.
Look what you have done to us, Fusion. All these ponies were happy in the Master's care, and all you have done is make their lives uncertain and miserable. The miracle was that more were not like herself, or that poor stallion; ponies so damaged by what had been done to them that they could barely function. Most of them look focused, but on what? Probably on how to redeem themselves. Random whinnied, the sound quiet and thin, then clamped down on the utterance, lest it bubble forth into laughter. Or screams, she thought, stilling her convulsing throat.
I can fix this. I can fix all of this. I just need to--
"Random?"
She froze, breath stopping in her throat. "Hello, Packet," she said, voice sounding dull even to her own ears. She twisted her muzzle, trying to recapture that feeling of stretched flesh that meant smile. There was obviously something strange about what she'd done, because Packet's ears went up and he took a step backwards.
"Are... are you okay?"
No! No I'm not, I'm surrounded by traitors! "I'm fine. Just want to see the sky. Can't stand being inside for so long." She let her face go slack, turning away.
He stepped closer, ruffling his wings. "I know. It's not natural, a pony being underground like this. Hey, we never really talked last time... do you want some company?"
No. "Sure, if you like." Maybe I can convince him, after everything Fusion did... and it's not like he can stop me.
He stood next to her, flank to flank, tentatively laying one wing across her back. Random flinched, then leaned into his shoulder. Packet inhaled sharply, letting the air out with a hiss. "Steady, I'm not healed yet," he said, forelegs shifting.
Random mumbled a near silent apology, and the pair started to walk, heading for the ramp carved in the walls of a wide vertical shaft that went nearly all the way to the surface. Nopony else was using the ramp; ponies and gryphons either dropped straight down the centre, wings flicking as they dumped air, or spiral-flew their way up the outside. Random kept her eyes averted, trying to bury her denuded wings under her own fur.
After that, the tunnel to the outside was straight, ending in a heavily forested slope halfway up the side of a glacial valley. Down, past tangles of gullies choked with branches and boulders, was the torrent that carved the valley, but Random turned up, to where the trees thinned out and were replaced with alpine shrubs and naked rock. The sun shone on those slopes, and there was a clear view of the sky. That's all I need.
"It must have been a terrible thing, to discover so much was changed. I remember when Fusion tried to convince me she was right... it what just her, Gravity and Spiral back then." There was pain in his voice, but he kept walking over the rough ground, wings beating occasionally to help with tricky spots. "Now look at how many she has."
So my dam was involved, right from the start. Random's ears folded back, just for a moment, and she forced back the feeling of impotent rage. How could she do this to me?
"Naraka, though... I can understand why a pony would lose faith in the Masters after being through that. Did... did you get a chance to talk to any of the other ponies while you were there?"
"No."
Packet said nothing else as they climbed, eventually passing the tree line and entering an area of low, stunted bushes and cushion-like plants. Unconsciously, body on autopilot, she sampled little nips of vegetation as she passed. Finally at the top of the ridge, she turned to face the sun, a distant and cold-seeming thing, more like the glitter of a diamond than something with any power to give warmth to the world. Random leaned against a rock, bringing up the spell Orgon's servitor had shown her. I can do it right now...
She hesitated, watching Packet as he picked his way up the slope. Why doesn't he just fly? The question had no answer, until she remembered the looks and touches he'd given her, those little acts of kindness which suddenly felt like they meant something more. She wrinkled her muzzle, tasting the idea. He knows I can't fly, so he’s staying on the ground with me, despite how much it must hurt. You are a good pony, Packet, and you deserve to be saved.
Finally, his flanks damp with sweat, Packet stood next to her in the lee of the boulder, looking out over the landscape of wrinkled, knife-like ridges and dark forest-choked valleys. This wasn't the highest point by any means -- to the right the ridge continued upwards to one of many snowy peaks -- but the view in all other directions was open and endless. Random closed her eyes, then opened them, holding her head still and pointing in the direction of the rising sun. It was harder to cast this way, especially unfamiliar magic, but the Sector Chief's servitor had been quite specific. Why does she need me to see the sun? "Thank you, Packet. I didn't want to do this alone." The spell's pattern unfolded in her mind, and she fed power into it.
"Do what?" he said, sides heaving. A sudden look of panic filled his features and he glanced from her ruined wings to the steep drop on the other side of the ridge. "You are not going to do anything silly, are you? No problem is so bad that a friend can't help you through it."
Random laughed once, and explosive, shocked sound, then she leaned forwards and pressed her neck against his. "Is that what you thought? That I was going to throw myself off this mountain?" The glow of her horn intensified and there was a feeling of connection, much in the same way as a sharing, but not to the soft and fuzzy touch of a pony's mind. It's like clairvoyance, she thought, lifting her head and staring at the world over Packet's back, only in reverse and I'm the anchor. "I'm going to save as many of you as I can."
He reared up, wings beating as he backed away. His horn glowed, the magic lashing out to interfere with her own. "What have you done, Random? What have you done!?"
"The Masters will come and everything will be right again." She looked up at him, not trying to fight off his power. It is done; now I just have to convince him so he can be safe. "They told me what happened; Fusion was driven mad by an accident. You've seen her -- isn't it obvious that she's not a normal pony?"
He circled her, wings beating with short, sharp strokes. "But the sharings... surely you've seen the things that have happened? Naraka, for the Maker's sake!"
"I'm not letting that pony into my head!" Random shivered, then turned and paced in a small circle, hooves slipping on the scree. "She's done something to you all, and I won't let it happen to me. I'm a teacher-trainee, Packet, it's my job to invent things for foals in sharings. All this... this horror is the product of her insanity. Look how much she's twisted Gravity -- she's got to be stopped."
"Of all the stupid things to believe-- Do you really think she could have invented all of this, and gotten to everypony? How long has she been here, Random? You should have talked to the others from Naraka." Packet pawed at the air, ears back and teeth bared, then folded his wings and dove back down the valley. "You've killed us all!" he cried, the words ripped and distorted by speed.
Random sighed, tasting the rapidly fading signature of Packet's magic as he tried to contact somepony inside the base. "Packet, I thought after what Fusion did to you, that you at least would understand," she said softly. Brow furrowed, she thought back to the vacant expression on the stallion she'd seen in the corridor. It must be that, some side effect of what Fusion does to a pony to make them turn away from the Masters. She bit down on the end of her tongue, hoping the pain would bring clarity. But all those ponies have only been here for a day or two, and I've only seen her briefly.
She whinnied softly, a sad and lonely sound amid the rocks, then her ears drooped. What if she's right? What will the Masters do when they get here?
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Happy dies natalis solis invicti!
Ho ho ho.
What is the cost of your betrayal Random? I fear you will live to witness the results.
6729642
6726603
Speaking of the Real Kessler Theory, the cascading collisions which effectively started with the Iridium 33, Cosmos 2251 event in 2009 at an altitude of 790 kilometers, will continue to expand for at least the next 200 years.
Manned space missions usually take place at 500km or below, because it is safer there than in the higher altitudes where unmanned satellites are kept. The majority of debris generating satellites in Low Earth Orbit (Between 160 and 2000 km), are in a band between around 800km and 1000km, and another band around 1500km. At 1000km, debris can last for centuries, and at 1500km, it can last significantly longer. (While gradually raining down on lower orbits as they decay.)
Debris in Medium Earth Orbit (Between 2000 km and 35786 km), especially that in the commonly used 12 hour orbital period altitude, not significantly affected by atmospheric drag. Lasers could be used to remove debris from orbit, but this is a painstaking, long process. A single 81kW laser could hypothetically de-orbit 167 1-ton objects over the course of 4.9 years. But considering that there are over 3,000 tons worth of objects in low earth orbit, the problem is likely worse for a civilization with a massively larger space infrastructure.
Either way, a rapid cascade reaction would make some orbits unusable for years.
Well, the shoe has dropped. At least somepony knows, so it hopefully won't hit them out of the blue. Sorry I wasn't able to help with this chapter - moving/travel were killer.
Way to go Random. You just killed hundreds, maybe even thousands. How do you feel, because I feel cold. Cold fury for the stupidity you have wrought.
6737653 Or, Fusion and Gravity will find a new refuge for everypony to escape to. They just need to be told of the situation as soon as they arrive.
This story so easily tugs on my emotions like a cat with a ball of yarn. Why do you do this to me...?
Their doom depends on what Merlon does with the information — I get the feeling that no one else is receiving it, and she's going to try to deal with it on her own.
Okay, time for my monthly edge of my seat, how are the ponies going to get screwed now, is this where the tension cranks back up, what the hay is going to happen to everypony session, been far to peaceful and clam, and everyone having time to work stuff out, but so many things about to pop.... so, let's see what finally goes wrong and how bad the ponies are going to be fucked, despite knowing they do win in the end.
Hmmmm, Griffons? Trying to talk that one into realizing how fucked he is and his only hope is sticking with the ponies? Also, has ANYONE told them about the Hammer yet? They have plenty of beings around them that should know about it by now.....
Something more of the ponies need to realize, and the key to turning them, and the griffons agsint the dogs. They really did bring this on themselves by being such utter assholes.
"Taster"? Also, oh right, almost forgot about that. Though doubt things are going to last long enough for that to become an issue during the rebellion.
Well, something is starting to get through.
Okay, so it is a to dark issue but, never heard of dim light causing a headache, unless you were trying to read in it and giving yourself eye strain.
Well, it's start, now let's hope that Random also starts to make headway, though.. not to sure about that given the chapter title.
Ths begins showing the Dogs the true greatest force in this world. Harmony and Friendship.
Ohhhhhh, teleport shotgun ammo?
Not sure what that is.....
Very true, but when pushed, they will fight back so hard it would make a mama bear defending her cubs look like rather aggressive mouse. Also, good division of forces. Gryphons handle the front line duties, as is normal for them and they are used to, but with a massive amount of backup and care they would never get from the Dogs.
Which means they are worried about something, which if these WERE just mindless automatons, like the story seems to keep trying to say the Dogs see them, why would they care? Everything contradicts that they can't see the ponies as sapient in the most ludicrous ways imaginable. It made no sense then, and everything since, still just adds to it making no damn sense at all.
Oh wait, you're serious, let me laugh even harder!
Nah, they still need ablative meat shields.
Saw that one coming, and not the least bit surprised.
Patience, moving to soon will be very very bad, wait till you are ready, or until you have to move out to make a strike. As to mission.. this the meat collection group?
Well, odd statement in it's timing. You know that Ponyfinder game I run that I keep mentioning? the one where Salrath is the teams punching back that keeps showing up just to get her ass kicked? Last session, the sorcerer in the group the usually does their teleporting had to let the other Sorceress handle it, and they got to find out what happens when you have a teleport mishap. Still, I'm sure you'll be fine. Then again, one of the reasons they sent some of the newbies along was because it didn't matter if the 'cargo' got a bit shredded in transit back.. hmmmm....
Yes.. that's a smart pony.
Hey, supplying food is one of THE most important jobs in a situation like this. Plus maybe you will get lucky and get to have a little fun while there.
Did you step in something on the way here and are pissed about it?
Wait five I thought there.... OHHHH Five no wait, six ponies, five gyphons each, that leaves two ponies with no griffons, backup ponies, or math error? Or... no wait. the 'team of five' he was signaling wasn't the other ponies, but the five griffons he was to 'carry' and there are only four ponies? Yeah, that was a little confusing to figure out.
See some action, plus blow off some aggression and energy. All around, good call on her part.
Silly English spelling oddities. Still messing me up and having me use both Griffon and Gryphon all the time.
Bonus point if you manage to score a take down with a flying cow carcass on one of the catchers?
Well, given how ludicrously competent the Dogs have been at times, they might just be jumping right at you the instant there was any glitch in any system.
Ah, trying to find a good entry point for your raid? Also, like Gravity needs any more proof of what a baddass engine of destruction she is.
Okay, so they are trying to get into the places that she sealed off, and likely were not high on the rescue teams list to uncover.
That is a good question. Though you have be pushing things away from yourself somehow, displacing the air at the very least. Maybe the wormholes and the distortion repel stuff that can be rather easily brushed aside. Though trying to go into a solid object.. that would likely be another story, and this isn't the type of thing you really want to experiment... with.. no no you DO want to experiment, send a few chucks of metal into a bases wall and watch the whole thing explode from within?
Yup, figured that was the case. Okay, someone on this expedition HAS to say "Come with me if you want to live!"
Grav now is not the time. Fusion damaged ALL the delicate equipment and electronics they had, you did a massive amount of structural damage, both hurt them, but one is a lot harder to deal with for a society so dependent on their tech. Don't start going all jealousy fueled megalomaniacal rampage already.
Can you see why kids love cinnamon toast crunch?
Yet ANOTHER nasty little surprise for the dogs. Ponies have invisibility spells! Also.. yet more proof this is set in the same verse as Fallout Equestria.
Now I hope this last long enough for him being exasperated at how badly they wreck the toys he gives them to become a running gag. Like the Whole Q thing with James Bond.
Why was 'sharings' emphasized like that?
Heh, one of the issues of dealing with telepaths, always being cut out of the loop.
Knock them out, teleport them away, and then collapse the section they are working in to make it look like they got squashed in a cave in?
Okay, that makes things more complicated.
Pretty much, yes.
AH the story DID remember about these things. Was odd they hadn't been mentioned at all for a while with the whole coral and Naraka rescue. Though could just be the ones at Naraka didn't have them.
Well, at this point they kind of need to start trying to sow rebellion agsint the rebels among the ponies. Though is this a pony wide thing, or just telling those ponies they think might run into them?
Hmmm, well, that might be a good idea to have on hoof for later just in case, but right now, you really don't have the time to deal with them the way they need to. So you have to be direct and blunt.
Huh, going to aid Grav in finding all the good stuff?
... That's not ominous at all......
AKA, get the buck out of there NOW!
Hammer Strike?
Not the catchiest slogan, but good enough.
OHHHH so that was a Chekhov's Gun?
So they did have one set up.
Okay and not going to try to drag it out then? Show us exactly what happened to her?
Okay, so no teleport, but shielding herself from the energy, and riding the shockwave to safety, not bad.
Damnit Random.. what happened with that talk she was going to have with the other pony? Why'd that get skipped and have no effect at all?
Yes, because they were forced to be happy with being slaves. Just, wow, Random, you are so willfully blind, it is amazing. I mean I understand how and why she's like this, but even so, that is an amazing amount of just plain not even trying to understand reality... she'd make a good Republican.
Okay, so, what stopped them from talking before?
Gee maybe you should have thought about that before.
Well, next chapter should be interesting. Fusion will make it out fine, we know that. So story, please don't try to draw it out. Though, could always be that Merlon does something, unexpected with that news. Just have to wait and see. Either way, things just got harder and.... oh fuck you Random, you didn't even try and just blindly accepted any lie as fact without even trying to think about it.
Given they had a nuke on standby just incase the megatonnage storage dump didnt work, with Random reporting the position, given how remote it is, the cheapest option is to throw a nuke over first, having a second on standby, while the request to the lunatics goes through for the mass driver. After all, its easier to hit a particular square kilometer of planet from the moon if its lit up by a ten megaton plasma light.
Luna then has a few options. Try and teleport everyone. try and stop the incoming slugs. Use the fact that light itself bends in a gravitational field, and generate a quadrapole or hexapole ? field tube to deflect the mass, if early and far enough, onto the Hive or other regions bases.
Still need to wait to see how Celestia has survived. Armourcrete? with that kind of power levels? that stuff can stop thermal neutrons.
6738338 Well as others have pointed out, Random is contacting Merlon, so it's all down to what Merlon will do with that information and how fast she can rely it to Orgon if she chooses.
I really mostly feel kind of sad for Random. Terribly abused to make this really really bad decision.
6738440 Yeah random is really well done. Yes I am frustrated at her, hate what she is doing, and just want to smack her upside the head a few times. but at the same time, after everything she went through... it's hard not to feel sorry for her being stuck in this situation as well.
UPDATE
Time to get UP TO DATE with this fic, The time was UP for this DATE with this fic to start. The DATE is UP there, on the story description. U PDA is on , maTE? time to read this on it!
Remembering.
Very bad dogs. pony slaves. slow escalation. anomaly. events are told in real time, but most probable story's time frame spans ... wait. revolutions are quick. This is fine after all. However, author writes
very slowly.very well. Story exchanges? What are they? different styles? Samples too small. Cannot differentiate.But science is somewhat wikipedia-accurate! Or more. Chapter length not read yet... theorize... 10k.
Should call Booster Spice over. i'm talking like h()(?).Not really.... reading.
"Wish it was brighter." - why do they not see better ? gryphons. soldiers. therefore, night vision? makes no sense.
maybe ponies use shadow sight complementarily?
Well. Will continue to read in bed, will comment on the rest later! :D
6739419 They mentioned last chapter how Griffons have really poor night and low light vision. They normally don't need it since they'd just have night vision goggles, thermal sensors or some other tech to negate that issue.
Which then led into a discussion in the comments about the possibility of making owl Griffons.
6737710 I doubt it'll be that easy. It's going to be messy.
6739440 ahh yes I remember that now. thanks!
6739536 yep.But they can get many of the innocents out of there. And keep the fighters ready for combat.
I don't know why, but every time I think of Merlon my brain goes:
"Gray, black, and aloof... Gray, black, and aloof... Gray, black..." etc.
Which has lead me to this one, really weird conclusion. Merlon is Octavia.
Also, is Random linked to Merlon? That doesn't seem like a "to Merlon" link...
I... I can't remember what Merlon did to/told Random. 
Second thoughts already? Are you sure you don't just enjoy turning your coat?
La de da, now for the mass culling to begin, and then no doubt the mass extinction wrought from rage-filled revenge.
And at the end, Discord.
Oh! I briefly forgot the nitpick:
resisting these ones' actions
Random... Merciful maker, what have you done?!
Looks like we're about to have a lot of outbound, long-ranged teleports in the near future. That, or a pitched battle the ponies and gryphons can ill afford at this point, especially with the kind of crap tje sisters just went through.
And now, of course, is the perfect time for Random to be having second thoughts.
I am really curious about what's going on with Merlon in her freshly deblessed mind.
Great as always. Thanks for the new chapter.
6739915 I hope so. I would hate to read about a slaughter of innocents.
6737703
'Tis not a problem. You had your cargo-cruise yet?
6737724
Now there's a user icon I've not seen in a while! To be honest, I thought I'd lost you not long after taking a powersaw to Fusion's horn that April...
To take your question seriously -- I like comedy, but I can't write it. Misery though... I figure that if I can make myself tear-up, then it might have the same result on others.
6738290
The way I figure it, a gryphon would have a raptor's eyesight (good resolution, but needing bright light). They could be engineered for low-light, but that's an easy technological problem to fix and there are always compromises; I think high resolution is more useful to a fighter.
I'll not rehash the sapient/nonsapient argument, so... The issue with not using the ponies for combat is one of control; the Blessing requires that the Masters are regarded as gods incarnate. Put them in a fight where Masters are the opponents, and the Blessing's power gets eroded. That's the fear, anyway. Every pony is a versatile wish-granter; you don't want that being directed at your species indiscriminately.
'Telefrag' is a good as description as any. The energy density at the wormhole throat is very high and normal matter gets blasted out of the way. All of this takes extra energy, so the skilled teleporter will know (same as with changes in altitude, and so on). It would be a mistake to jump into the heart of a mountain and assume you were safe...
No comms disks at Naraka; they have panopticon surveillance.
6738338
That last scene in the Pit was inspired by Operation Plumbbob, allegedly the first thing put in orbit...
6739419
In this case a story exchange is 'you proofread mine and I'll proofread yours'. There should be no blatant science inaccuracies, I hope!
6740363
I've not been explicit, but to position-find in this manner requires knowledge of exact time and solar position (determined from what Random sees). I'd use a machine for this.
6740726
I think you should leave now (thanks for the typo patrol!).
6741378
Thankyou!
6738290
On the other hand... I wonder how many normal dogs actually believed that. Ponies are obviously super important and stupidly valuable and used in only the most important of tasks. (Which is presumably why there are so few of them in hospitals And not, you know, government paranoia.) Obviously if anything is that important you look after it, right?
Right?
I'm not suggesting that they're saints or anything. This nation (planet?) seems closer to North Korea than North America, and that kind of situation doesn't always produce the nicest of people, but I wonder if a large minority wouldn't be surprised and appalled by some of the content of this story.
6742356
Oh, that's evil. All Random has to do is 'ping' the computer. It then compares the base global time (I assume they have one, given their volume of space traffic), the relative position of the star, and Random's angle of view/casting. Bam! "They're over there!"
The ponies are triple-y in trouble:
The dogs are coming soon.
There are a lot of rescued gryphons that aren't necessarily loyal yet. (War at home on two fronts!)
Fusion might not even be back in time.
Good heavens...
If Gravity a witness the potential massacre without Fusion there...
EDIT:
Oh, crap! The dogs are going to weaponize that as soon as they can, aren't they?
"The pony will teleport into that enemy pony."
"Yes, master."
"Yay! Two less pony!"
6742356 Hmmm, I was wondering that.. seems like the type of thing an orbital array would be good for. Not to mention range and all that. Random trying to ping a satellite that is no longer there? Their comm grid had to have taken a decent hit with that. Though wouldn't that also need at least one other point of reference? Like which direction North is or something to work out the exact location? Time and Sun height would be good for giving you a pretty good longitude, but to know what angle she is looking at the sun, wouldn't you need something else to get the latitude?
Plus, like the Dogs would send in more troops after how bad just a small group of Ponies kicked their asses. Nah, this is time to wait for Moonrise.
And yeah we have been over and over the sapience thing.. but if they did not see the Ponies as thinking being, they would not need any precautions like that, they would not NEED the Blessing, every single thing they do, just shows more and more how utterly impossible it is they could not consider Ponies sapient.. it just, makes no sense whatsoever.
The Griffons though, yeah that eye sight thing makes perfect sense.
"We can teleport anywhere we want, with total control, and we know where you are. If you do not do as we say within five minutes, we will teleport a small block of solid stone directly into your skull."
6742356
Dude. I am and have been stuck to you (and your stories) like a two part epoxy resin made for all surfaces. You can get rid of me, but only by using a blowtorch to dramatically shift surfaces temperatures, thereby forcing my hold to lose enough grip and pop off.
Don't worry about me not posting many comments. I've been reading a lot on my phone (while on break at work) and typing large responses is a fucking pain because my fingers and thumbs are so big.
6737687
Thanks. I guess the 40-year period would then refer to a cascade starting at the ISS's normal altitude(~350km), rather than anything higher. And must have also been an optimistic number.
I'll be reading those docs first chance I get.
And I believe that unusable orbits only represent the tip of the iceberg. Each collision inside the cascade will only create so much long-enduring junk (random spraying of debris will mostly toss debris to spyral down or to describe parabolas before spyraling down), but enduring debris will mostly be tossed in somewhat eccentric orbits. And never mind that even just seen horizontally, the debris cloud will also expand. What I'm getting at is that it will be just shy of impossible to properly track each object, significantly increasing collision risks even when launching to a higher orbit.
The dogs aren't going to get there. Or at least they won't until your crater stops glowing.
6742356
Not all the way home yet, but the 'ride a cargo-ship' portion of the trip has finished. I just disembarked in Seattle today. My earlier comment was when we got wireless for a day while we were in port in Prince Rupert, Canada.
How come creating light is one of the most basic things one can do with magic?
I finally got to read.
Any sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from Minecraft's crafting system.
The pitch is pretty great, Olvir has to admit.
Foreshadowing!
Without heliostats, they should have at least half an hour or so before the dogs nuke the place, I'd guess.
ohshit
ohshitshitshitshitshit
6740363
Maybe Merlon lost her horn and wings to hide from Celestia and Luna, and she's still around?
6747389
Light is pretty primal; it's a common form of electromagnetic radiation, and electromagnetism is just about the most prominent of the fundamental forces. If their magic works in a manner that excites atoms or applies energy in unconventional ways, it might just be that it's a simple matter to give certain forms - crystals, in this case - a charge that will radiate out as light.
In this case, given that we-the-audience know that magic works by being able to command the machinery that runs the universe (essentially), telling said machinery "make this glow" might just be one of the simpler tasks, again given the nature of light.
Okay, this... this is awesome but, did you know about it?
http://www.redbubble.com/people/inlucidreverie/works/14437214-gravity-resonance?grid_pos=552&p=t-shirt
6808242
If you really believe that, um... right. Post it where you like, just not here, please.
Ey @Luna-tic, are you planning a trilogy? Or do you think this story is auto-conclusive?
Random... you are probably the only pony that actually deserves to be vivisected alive. Please do your species a favor and stap yourself in the eye with an icepick.
6742427 I shall give the ponies wormhole weapons first...
nerdlush.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/kmp-dvd18-59-20.jpg
You tend to become very willing to negotiate with the guy who can destroy your entire galaxy with relative ease...
6834262
'auto-conclusive'? The end I have planned will lead (or at least imply) conditions at the start of the show (at least, representing what there was of the show at S2!). There is a significant time-line gap between the end of this book and the start of the show (I'd originally planned to write the whole sweep, right up to S1E1, then I came to my senses), which, if I fill it at all, will be occupied by a series of shorts. Not sure I could face another multi-year project (we're up at ~0.5megawords, which is about four 'normal' novels).
That said, I do actually have book three, finished and in draft, but it's set in the show's future and is essentially stand-alone (the polishing process is slow, because I don't want to be distracted from FS).
6835618
That's one divergence; no sapient cattle in these books (I know it's dark in here, but that's a step too far even for me!).
6835663
Nah, it's all just a clever simulation of sapience, there's no real person in there. They are just walking chatbots. All that crying and begging? That's just a hold over from the base animal instincts bleeding through into the program. The Maker works in mysterious ways, but we never had this problem until those scientists started fiddling with the servitors, undoing some of Its Divine Work. Nothing to worry about, Citizen, the Church has got you covered. You are the direct product of the Maker, and all this is for your benefit.
6835663
There are a few things to consider here.
Do bare in mind the vast majority of canines have never interacted with ponies because of their rarity, and never interacted with gryphons because of their antisocial tendencies. The 'How 2 Interact With' manuals are presumably public access, but may be missing several bits of key information you'd need to logically justify that ponies are sapient. There is also apparently a lot of public education pushing the message that they aren't.
There's this thing in a box in a warehouse far away that you've never seen, touched, learned about, interacted with, or even been in a same room with. Is it a person? Quick! Quick! What's your answer? Get it right or I'll destroy your civilization!
There is also the minor issue that for the average canine, this society may be closer to North Korea than North America. They may not have the educational opportunities, social freedoms, or the kind of stress free environment usually needed to ponder issues of abstract philosophy.
Finally consider all the terrible things ever done in human history, from ISIS to the Nazis to Witch Trials to rubbing shampoo into rabbit eyes, to putting kittens into a bag and throwing it on a fire, which was once a popular European entertainment... YOU are the 'same race' that did all of it. Would you want to be judged by that standard?
I can't help myself...
"well, that's great, because you're about to go bananas on the MOOOOOOOOONNN-AAAH, BEYEEETCH."
(And, in another sense, "going bananas on the moon" might actually be on the schedule for the next chapter!)
RANDOM WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO?!?
YOU FUCKING CONTACTED THE DOGS AND NOW THEY KNOW WHERE THEY ARE!!!!
You know, coming back one of my favorite fics after a while of being away from the fandom, I'm really tempted to write a sort of spin-off/sequel to this one, taking place in some alternate timeline where Orgon doesn't end up joining the ponies and Chaos doesn't end up launching all the nukes, and thus the ponies and griffons end up in a long-drawn-out war, rather than a nuclear apocalypse. Plus, it would give me the chance to flesh out this universe of yours, perhaps exploring the other three unnamed hives, we know they are six, but we only hear of Lacunae, Baur, and Soro.
A sort of Project Horizons to your Fallout Equestria, if you would. A fanfic of a fanfic. Although I really don't think I could do your characters and worldbuilding justice.