RQ2: Rising Storm

by Zetriax

VII - Taking Action

Chapter VII- Taking Action

“Where is Shattered Ice?” Lady Arcus asked mostly to herself.

It was midday and the clouds above loomed low, heavy with the rain that was soon to fall down over the plains. Hadn't it just rained the other day? This was not helping her rather foul mood. She stalked over to where a blue unicorn with a yellow mane stood guard at the gate to the fortress.

“Stardust, have you seen Shattered Ice anywhere, I need to speak with him.”

A blank look crossed the blue mare's expression. “No offense ma'am, but don't you already know?”

“Where did he go?” Arcus asked vehemently.

Stardust grimaced. “He told me that you ordered him to take Adamant Shield and Caelum to perform a reconnaissance mission on Iridis' walls during today's rainstorm.” She seemed to shrink in on herself as she reported back to her leader. Lady Arcus kept a respectable relationship with her followers, but they knew that bad things were going to happen when she was angry.

“Thank you Stardust,” Arcus nodded, “You may resume your duties. I would also like you to report to me as soon as Shattered Ice returns. He's got a lot of explaining to do.”

“But,” Stardust said, “What if he... doesn't return?”

“Then we will have lost a valuable asset to our rebellion. Now return to your duties.”

Stardust nodded and turned back to the gate, watching the forest beyond with keen eyes. Lady Arcus in turn decided it best to return to her room. There was very little she could do in this situation. She knew she could always send out a party to retrieve them, but that would just put her other ponies in danger. It wasn't worth the risk.

Lady Arcus entered the main hall and turned immediately right, climbing up the stone staircase. At the end of the hall upstairs was her room, which she entered and closed the wooden door gently behind her and locked it.

Now she was free to be herself. No longer the strong, collected, and revered Lady that she appeared to be in public, she became the naive, confused, young mare that she was. And the only one that actually knew what was going on in this world. Arcus curled into a ball on her bed and pulled out a small crystal shard from under her pillow.

“Mother,” she whispered. “I need help. My people are losing faith in the Savior. What can I do to regain their spirits?”

Arcus closed her eyes tightly and felt sleep wash over her after a while. Dreams came and went. Dreams of battle training. Dreams of the Devil's Spire falling. Dreams of the Emperor dying at her hooves. They were quite common as those were her main focus in her waking hours. Then a voice filled her mind, more lucid than the other dreams.

“Hey there...” came the warm voice from nowhere at all.

“Mother...” Arcus smiled, feeling like a filly again with that warm, protective voice over her. However, her pressing thoughts encroached on her once more.

“I can feel your agitation. What's wrong?”

“They're losing faith in me,” Arcus said. “Shattered Ice went over my leadership to scope out Iridis even though I specifically told him not to. That it's too dangerous.”

“Maybe they sense a hesitation in you... Have you been losing your faith in the Savior's coming?”

“Of course not!”

“Are you sure? It's been much longer than you thought, isn't it?”

Arcus sighed. “It's been far too long. When will she arrive?”

“You've asked me many times that very question. And I have given you the same answer each time.”

“I know... 'The Savior will arrive when the time is right.' But when is the right time? I don't know how much longer I can maintain a rebellion that never actually rebels! We have been training to fight a battle that hinges on the coming of a pony from an alternate world! All I've done is teach these ponies to fight and fill their heads with stories of a bright future without the rule of a cruel Emperor. I've already lost half my strongest soldiers who would rather submit to a twisted ruler than have a hope in an unseen force.”

“You have to be strong for the rest of your followers. The time is nearly upon us. The course of action has already been set. You must have patience.”

Arcus awoke abruptly to the sound of loud moans of pain. She got out of bed and rushed out her room and outside where Shattered Ice and Adamant Shield were carrying a blood stained pegasus between them through the gate.

“Caelum!” Lady Arcus exclaimed. “Stardust, go get somepony from the medicine wing, now! You two set her down there!” As she dashed through the rain up to Caelum, she noticed the arrow shaft protruding from between her ribs, a large amount of blood still seeping from the wound.

“Is it a barbed arrow?” Arcus demanded.

“Yes,” replied Adamant Shield immediately, “She's lost a lot of blood on the way here. I'm surprised she survived the journey.”

Just then, Stardust returned with the a pair of nurses.

“Barbed arrow,” Arcus reported to the nurses. “What can you do?”

The nurse frowned. “This isn't good at all. We're going to need to surgically remove the arrow to avoid infection. But the odds of her surviving the operation is very low. We'll do what we can, but we're going to need a miracle for her to survive.”

The other nurse demanded a tent be set up to negate the rain and produced a small knife and a bonesaw from her bag. Caelum cried out in pain as the nurse began to cut into her.

Lady Arcus glared at Shattered Ice. This was all his fault. “You!” her voice lanced as she stormed up to him. “I aught to kill you for this!” He gazed resolutely at her as she yelled in his face. “Not only did you directly disobey my orders against going into Iridis, but you have put these ponies' lives unnecessarily on the line! Now Caelum is on the verge of death because of YOUR stupidity!”

“We needed to take action! It was an opportunity we couldn't pass up! We can't waste time on idle dreams anymore! We need to do something!” Shattered Ice disputed.

Lady Arcus raised a hoof and punched the white pegasus directly in the face with brute force. He collapsed onto the ground unconscious and bleeding heavily from his nose. She gazed down at him with fury. “Never put my ponies lives in danger again!” she hissed through clenched teeth.

Adamant Shield stared in shock at Shattered Ice's unmoving form. “Wasn't that a bit harsh?” the grey earth pony asked.

Lady Arcus shook her head. “He sent you on a suicide mission. One that went against my very orders. He needs to learn that I am the one in charge. I know what I am doing, even if he doesn't understand.”

“I see,” he said.

“Now, tell me what happened...”

So there was a pony from Equestria in this foreign world. Rainbow could hardly believe it. Had this Lady Arcus gotten here the same way she herself had? But that begged the question how she herself had wound up here. All she knew was that the purple pegasus had caused her to fall asleep and she had woken up in the tower.

Rainbow shifted in her cot to look up at the ceiling. A series of rusty pipes coursed behind the grated ceiling. Every once in a while, one of the pipes would let out a puff of steam. Somewhere beyond the pipes was an indiscernible light source. That was the extent of the aesthetics the ceiling provided her with. She wanted to go back home with her ever-changing cloud ceiling and warm blankets. The only reminder of home was the pattering of the rain just outside her small window.

The gentle pitter-patter eventually lulled the cyan pegasus into fitful slumber...

She opened her eyes to see a stormy sky above her. Rain fell from the sky and into her face. Everything in her body ached. Breathing was a challenge. It felt as if she was going to die, right then and there. But there was a drive to get up. As if she knew there was something important somewhere around her.

Rainbow saw two figures in the rain: the shadowy version of herself and somepony else. He was a yellow unicorn with a green mane peaking from beneath a silver helmet. His red eyes pierced into her own. Then he turned to the black pegasus.

“Come on,” he said, “Let's go. You'll have all the time in the world to get revenge after I'm done with her.”

The shadowy double didn't acknowledge him, instead casting a loathing glare at Rainbow. “Your day is coming,” she spat. The unicorn then cast a teleportation spell then they were gone, leaving Rainbow alone.

Rainbow found the pain coursing through her too much to bear and lied back down on the wet ground.

“I'm sorry...” she whispered.

It wasn't what she meant to say... in fact she hadn't meant to speak at all. Rainbow was very confused. Why was she so hurt? Who were those ponies? And why did her double have a vendetta against her? And why had she said sorry?

This is another dream, isn't it? Rainbow thought, as soon as the possibility occurred to her. This one was slightly different than the others though. That black and red unicorn was nowhere to be found. For some reason, the thought made her a little sad. But aside from that, it felt just as realistic as the other dreams.

It seemed this black pegasus was becoming more prominent as well. Hadn't she imagined she was in the cell with her the other day? There was obviously something wrong here. This pony... what was the name she said they decided on?... Dash...

Why did that seem right? It felt like they had decided on it... But wasn't Dash just a figment of her imagination? Or was she? There was something deeper going on here...

“Am I still dreaming?” Rainbow asked herself. Her eyes were closed and she could still here rain, but her thoughts were very lucid, moreso than she thought possible when dreaming.

“Not anymore,” came Summer Blaze's voice.

Rainbow opened her eyes to see her prisonmate looking at her all disgruntled. The yellow unicorn was clearly woken up by Rainbow's sleep-talking. Rainbow wondered how much she had heard. Probably not much, considering she had only said two things.

“Sorry to wake you, Summer,” she apologized.

“Oh, it's not completely your fault. There's a couple of guards chattering up a storm at the end of the corridor. I'm surprised you can sleep through it.”

The pegasus listened for a moment and realized she was right. The sound of voices and obnoxious laughter were echoing down the hall. Now that she heard it, she couldn't block it out.

“Geez. I see why you can't sleep,” she said. “I must've been out cold.”

“No joke,” Summer replied.

“Wait...” Rainbow said, her eyes furrowing. An idea had just occurred to her. “We may be able to break out of here...”

“Are you insane?!” Blaze hissed.

Rainbow nodded. “But it may work. The guards carry keys on them right?”

Blaze shook her head. “You can't be serious. What do you think we're gonna do? Ask nicely for it? Mug him through the bars?”

“Nope, we're gonna distract him. Or rather, you are. While you hold his attention, I'll reach through the bars and sneak it off of him.”

“That's crazy! Why do I have to distract him?”

“You told me on the first day that you had a way with the stallions. Plus, I'm just the loud one. They won't listen to me.”

“Here's why that's a load of bull-”

“HEY!” Rainbow yelled out of nowhere.

Summer Blaze's eyes went wide. The plan was already in action.

“You can't talk to me like that!” Rainbow blurted again.

The guards' cutting up halted and the sound of hoofsteps approached their cells.

A large stallion, covered to the neck in bronze-colored armor glared into the cell. “Shut up, pegasus! It's sleeping time.”

“Well, this mare over here is threatening me! I'll go to sleep if and only if you tell her to stop.”

“Geez! You're so annoying!” the guard said, exasperated. He turned to Summer's cell, said stop, then turned back to Rainbow. “Happy now?”

Come on Summer! Say something! Rainbow thought. The yellow mare was just standing there, shock still on her face.

“No, she needs to understand that she can't just go around telling me what I should or shouldn't do!”

“You know what!” the guard said. “You're the one that's making all the noise! And I can tell you what to do! Now shut up or you'll be hung upside down and bludgeoned to death. You hear me!” The guard gave a solid whack to the bars for emphasis.

Rainbow nodded, fear making her comply.

“Thank you!” he said and stormed back down the hallway. It wasn't long before the guards started back up their conversations.

“Blaze! You were supposed to distract him!” she whispered harshly.

“Well, I thought you were doing that just fine on your own.” Summer said.

“Yeah, but...” Rainbow faltered. Summer Blaze was holding the keys in her hoof.

“But what? Like you said, you're the loud one. Much more distracting.”

Minuette placed the purple feather into a glass cylinder attached to the side of a large machine riddled with pipes, tubes, and wires. This was her time machine. Her horn began to glow as she supplied the magic necessary to start up the device. The time machine roared to life, she looked over the moniter as it scanned the feather.

“What's happening?” Soarin asked over her shoulder.

“Shh. It's analyzing the feather on the molecular level to pinpoint the various stages of genetic age and comparing it to similar compounds in our own time. Therefore pinpointing the time it was in previously.”

“Which means?” Soarin asked.

“It's finding out when it's from, now hush! I have to pay attention to the screen to be sure it's working properly.”

The blue mare studied the screen intently, watching the numbers shift. There was something wrong... The numbers didn't add up. There was no way an item could be from the future and past at the same time, which is what the data seemed to be suggesting.

“That doesn't make any sense!” she said. She wracked her brain for what it could mean. It was a temporal anomaly. There couldn't be a reason for this. The machine must be broken.

Soarin stepped closer, “What's wrong?” Suddenly the numbers began rolling again. It rolled to the year scrolled up by nine, rolled all the way back to zero then went up to thirteen and stopped. Minuette's eyes widened. That was it. She knew what had happened.

“The world restarted...” she whispered to herself. She turned to Soarin. “She's in the future... twenty-two years into the future.”

“So we can get there?” Soarin questioned excitedly.

“I hope so. There's just one thing, there was a reset. A rebirth of the world. According to this data, the world ends in nine years...”

“WHAT?!” Soarin exclaimed. His wings were fully extended, a look of pure shock across his features. Minuette figured she could have found a better way of letting him in on that fun fact. She herself wasn't worried because she could always time-travel away from the apocalypse. Soarin on the other hoof...

“What I'm saying is that Rainbow is probably thirteen years past that in a new world. Now we can get there, but I'm not sure if the machine can handle a time reset. I've never tested anything like that.”

“You mean... we can go to this new world?” Soarin asked.

“Maybe.” Minuette replied, “But to be honest, the machine could overload at the nine year mark where time ends and begins. It's like flying into a black hole. No one really knows what happens when you go in. Do you get crushed or warped to the other end of the universe? We will be traveling to somewhere nopony has ever been before.”

“Aside from Rainbow and Arcanum,” Soarin added.

Minuette nodded, “True. I'll leave it up to you. We go or we stay.”

“Wait, we? You want to come?”

Minuette rolled her eyes. “I kind of have to come. You don't know how to work the time machine. And besides, I've been after Arcanum for a while. This is probably my one chance at getting to him.”

“Well, you make a valid point.” Soarin shook out his feathers and sighed. “Alright... We'll do it. I'm going to save Rainbow.”

“That's what I like to hear!” Minuette said. “Now let's do this!”

Comments

[Zetriax]

8247361
As much as I would love to bring a new chapter out, I just haven't had a whole lot of time to spend on fanfics since graduating. I'm not saying I'll never update it, but it could be a while longer.

[vanilla28]

you do not continue this story?