Phase 1: Awakenings, Part 6
The stars shimmered in the evening's sky, though they were less bright than they had been the previous evening; and while a pony might be able to guess this, Mir knew it to be true. There were changes in the atmospheric refraction, and they didn’t seem to be weather-related.
Luna’s supposed to be the “artist of the night sky.” It did seem more beautiful last time I checked. Is it because she’s busy?
Mir put it out of her mind.
First things first: She had to give Sweetie a lesson in song magic so she could go back to her husband and her bed.
The road to the park was tree-lined and passed over the river running through the town. Off in the distance, she could see a dam that presumably supplied the town with electricity.
After a few more minutes of walking, Mir and her student arrived at a grassy, flat area that sloped into a hill gradually, upon which a platform with a curtained shelter was erected, most likely a stage for performances, Mir guessed.
Mir considered using the stage for just a moment, but there was the possibility of collateral damage to the environment, however slight. Best not to practice near anything too flammable. She checked the dryness of the grass. Slightly damp, that’ll do.
“Alright, this seems like a good spot. You read the homework I assigned you, right?”
“Uh-huh!” Sweetie positively vibrated with energy, rocking forward a bit as she replied; her voice seemed a little louder too.
I wonder if this “cutie mark” thing taps into that connection I saw with this world’s Heart. It would seem like the Wills of the Planet would be the only entities that could assign you a destiny. Or maybe it’s not really a destiny. Even the ponies themselves seem a little confused on the issue.
“Now, you remember what Blue Magic is, right?”
“It’s… magic that makes stuff better?”
Mir smiled. There was hope for her studiousness after all. “Yes, that is correct. It provides some beneficial effect. Usually it manifests as a healing effect.”
Sweetie nodded, the energy that had possessed her making her shoulders tremble with excitement. “Uh-huh! I know unicorn magic can heal wounds, but it’s really high level.” Her face scrunched up. “I can’t possibly do that. Even Twilight had trouble with it before she became an Alicorn.”
Mir smiled. “Emotional wave conversion is far more efficient. It’s a scientific fact. That’s why I know you can do it. The core Luna and I installed…”
“Princess Luna.”
“...right. The core we installed contains a basic blue magic. I’d like you to demonstrate it for me.”
“Sure!” Sweetie paused. “But… what does it do?”
Mir smiled. “It’s a healing magic. But… I’ve learned over the years that you can use it to fix inorganic things as well, as long as you have some understanding of what they look like. Here.” Mir levitated a teacup from her saddle bag, wrapped in her red aura. “You should be familiar enough with this, I belive.”
“That’s… one of Rarity’s cups! It’s from her good china set.” Sweetie’s eyes widened with realization. “You… you can’t break it! Rarity will be so mad! I’ll never be allowed to have friends over again!”
“I’m sorry, but one peculiarity about song magic is that it’s harder to do if you aren’t feeling something. What you’re feeling isn’t necessarily important, so this is simply the most efficient way.” The cup drifted up above Mir’s head. Suddenly, Mir smacked the cup with her horn. If Sweetie had been less worried about what Rarity would think, she might have noticed that the aura gripping the cup dimmed and flickered but did not fail.
The cup wasn’t damaged as much as Sweetie had expected: the handle had been severed and there were a few fine shards where the point on the side of Mir’s horn had hit it. Still, this was a calamity. The young unicorn sat totally still for the first time since she had awoken, staring at the cup.
“I know it is possible for you to fix it. Simply picture it becoming whole. Search your feelings, and sing.” Mir tried her best reassuring smile, which still seemed a little sinister. Sweetie seemed to be panicking about this as much as much she had expected. “Here, I’ll get you started. Hum along.”
Mir began to hum the tune a friend used for blue magic. She tapped her forehoof with the tune, and Sweetie began to follow along. Then it happened.
“Wee ki ra….” Sweetie was singing. It was really happening!
The cup and its fragments hovered in a green aura. Sweetie’s song was soft, not intended for any mortal listener outside of Sweetie herself, and even Mir had to lean in to hear it. A set of bells affixed to a cord manifested. Mir supposed they were Sweetie’s construct, and bells certainly made sense. Many who sang blue magic associated it with musical instruments rather than more conventional healing tools. She recalled that ancient holiday celebrations used similar accoutrements, in particular the winter gift-giving one.
After what seemed like an eternity to Sweetie, but was actually a little over a minute, the song built to its crescendo and the handle and shards joined together. With a sudden flash of green energy, they fused to the cup.
Mir grabbed the cup from Sweetie’s magical aura with her own as the song died down. She levitated it to her eye, paying close attention to where the cup had been fractured. “Excellent work. Well done,” she said with a satisfied nod of her head.
“That was… that was… you shouldn’t have done that!”
Mir tried for a disarming smile again, but only got as far as “only a tiny bit sinister.” “I’m sorry if I betrayed your trust. But it was necessary for you to feel strongly to master this song.”(1)
Sweetie frowned at her mentor. “You didn’t have to do that.”
Mir shook her head. “Well, I had to do something. As I said, this works more easily if you feel strongly. Besides, I practiced repairing these cups beforehand. If you had, for some reason, failed I could have easily fixed it.”
Sweetie’s eyes bulged. “You broke Rarity’s good cups?!!?”
“They’re fine now. Good as new.”
“Still!” Sweetie wasn’t going to calm down just yet.
Mir smiled. “I got your sister's permission first, actually.”
Sweetie’s eyes remained wide with shock, though the panic had left them. “What? She let you?”
“Yes.” Mir nodded. “The other section of that book contained a few special types of cloth that are used in my homeland. The offer was quite simple.”
“But…” Sweetie smiled thinly. “You scared me!”
“As I said before, I had to make you feel something strongly, and some emotions are easier to come by than others. I did not lie to you, and I apologize for not informing you that there were no consequences attached to the test. I will never lie to you.” Mir leaned in with her head. She’d seen parent ponies do this, so she felt it was the pony equivalent of a hug.
Sweetie, to Mir’s relief, raised her head and they rubbed their necks together.
“Now, since you’ve done quite well, you deserve a treat. How about a story?”
“Well…” Sweetie backed up out of the neck-hug. Before she could answer, a rumble from her stomach interrupted.
“I thought that might happen. You’re providing your own amplification, so your body has to burn far more energy than a Reyvateil would. Here, have a little.” Mir levitated a chocolate bar over to her pupil.
“Really?” Sweeties eyes had become impossibly wide as she stared at the bar. “I can eat chocolate late at night?”
“Don’t think you’re getting away with it entirely. I’ll think of something else to make sure you’re tired enough for bed after this.”
Sweetie accepted the chocolate with her aura, with a barely perceptible wobble. She began to unwrap it.
“It seems that even your non-song magic has been getting a little smoother. The principles of exercise work for your magic as well as your muscles.” Mir lay down on the grass and patted Sweetie on the shoulder as she began to munch the chocolate bar wrapped in her green aura. “That’s not the treat, though. I shall share with you some of the history of healing song magic.”
"VRRRRRZZT!"
Twilight turned from her preparations for the next morning towards the sound. In the dead of night there shouldn't be any sounds in the library besides Spike's snoring. Her senses locked onto a pile of books spilling out of a shipping case: her most recent set of transfer requests from Celestia's library.
"VRRRRZZT!" One of the books flashed in time with the sound, an odd red-and-pink wobbly aura. That sounds like a malfunctioning spell. Twilight knocked the other books away with her forehoof. The consequences of touching her magic to a poorly-understood malfunctioning spell could be, well, anything really. Randomly assembled magic was almost always a profound negative and mostly-always an explosion.
The book had no title, but Celestia's cutie mark in the center of the cover. Twilight's horn glowed as she gingerly applied her knowledge of the emergency management classes at the School for Gifted Unicorns. First up: Tenderhorn's Glamour Understander. OK, it looks like Celestia's the caster. I can't mistake that resonance signature. There's dimensional magic used to get information from somewhere else, a conjuration magic that creates ink, and a linked audio and visual illusions to make the book more noticeable, as well as a telekinetic magic to make it vibrate.
OK, the root spell looks to be the dimensional magic. It's... really complicated. I know I've seen it somewhere, but I'm not sure where. There's some kind of problem with it, and that's affecting the illusion component. Fortunately it's not affecting the telekinetic component. That's good, I can lift it with my magic and it won't blow up. Always handy. She wrapped her aura around the book and flipped it open.
OHHHHH. It looks like it's set up to copy another book somewhere else, but was interrupted in the middle by something. The dimensional magic... it looks like it was cut and then reassembled. If someone was sending something while that happened, it'd cause mana blockage. I just have to fake a 'close' message here. The glow of Twilight's horn pulsed briefly, and the book's flashing and noise stopped.
Twilight looked at the actual content of the last entry, and her eyebrows shot up in alarm. It was a message from Sunset Shimmer to Celestia, asking her to contact Twilight. Unfortunately, it had ended right as Sunset was beginning to write down the reason she had chosen to make contact at that moment.
It was definitely worth looking into, but the Changelings potentially infiltrating Ponyville had to be dealt with before she could deal with this.
“The history of healing magic sounds interesting.” Sweetie had enjoyed the history lesson, at least somewhat. She liked knowing things. Really, though, she was just happy with the chocolate.
“A long time ago the originator of song magic, Sunset Togasaki, demonstrated song magic publically for the first time at the so-called ‘battle of the bands’ where she destroyed a criminal organization known as ‘the Sirens.’ Very little information about what actually happened at the battle of the bands survives to this day, but we know that Sunset brought what eventually became the core of the Orgel of Origins and used it to create song magic, causing an immense explosion. Shocked at the destruction she had caused, she sang of her regret and horror, and their wounds were healed.”
Sweetie stopped eating for a moment. “But… why was there an explosion?”
“I explained red magic to you, yes? It’s necessary sometimes to fight. The Sirens were bad people, and were using the battle of the bands to harm others. Sunset had to stop them, and from what we know, she was very desperate at that point.”
Sweetie nodded. “Like a hydra… or a dragon. But… why’d she hurt pon– people who weren’t the sirens?”
Mir smiled sadly at her pupil. “Force… is hard to use. It’s very easy to use too much when you’re afraid of what will happen if you use too little.” She leaned forward to stare intensely at her pupil. “Now that you are learning Song Magic, you must learn this lesson as well. Although I don’t plan to go into the details of using Red Magic, you already know it innately, so it will always be available to you. If you do ever sing Red Magic, you must treat it with the care and respect it deserves.”
Sweetie looked down. “I… don’t want to use it. At all.”
“I suppose that’s a reasonable hope. Most people live entirely peaceful lives, after all.”
“A pity you can’t.”
Mir was on her feet in an instant, turning her head towards the voice. Sweetie just looked over at it confusedly. The interloper seemed to be a pony in a heavy cloak, back seeming hunched with age and his frame thin, however, an arm ending in fingers was evidence to the fact that this stranger was no pony.
The cloak was flung away, revealing a creature Mir had never seen before. It had a baboon’s head, a bull’s horns, a human’s torso and arms, and clawed hands, but the barrel, legs, and tail of a pony. It looked emaciated and drained, but the glint in its eye promised menace. Mir knew it was far more dangerous than it appeared, but wasn’t quite sure what form the danger would take. “Sweetie! Get behind me!”
Sweetie backpedaled behind her mentor, peeking her head around Mir’s thin frame. “Is… this isn’t another test, is it? Please say it is.”
“No, I’m afraid not.” Mir couldn’t use song magic at this range. He’d smack her and disrupt the casting. Maybe I could try to cast through it? No, if he knows better he’ll put his hand in my mouth and that’s it.
“Oh, I assure you child, I am very real. My name is Lord Tirek, and, well, explaining anything to either you is really pointless." Tirek waved a hand. "In a few seconds your magic will be mine and you won't be in much a state to talk, I'm afraid.” Tirek stamped and opened his mouth. Mir braced herself for some sort of attack and had begun her shielding song magic, when it cut out. A ribbon of energy streamed from her horn into Tirek’s mouth.
Anomalous power drain. Unable to maintain song. Dammit! What the hell is that?
“You have so much magic in you, so wonderfuuuu….uhhhh. What IS THIS?” Tirek had already drained more magic than a unicorn should possess, but more continued to stream from the horn into him. The magic tasted wrong somehow. It wasn’t unicorn magic, it wasn’t pegasus magic, it wasn’t earth pony magic, and it probably wasn’t alicorn magic, although he’d never tasted that. It was raw, unrefined magic. He couldn’t quite handle it. It would be hard for his system to process, but it might be possible, given time. The more immediate problem was that his efforts to consume the magic from the unicorn babbling fearfully behind his first target weren’t working. He’d tested the limits of his powers, and knew he had trouble absorbing more than one type of magic at a time. Inconvenient, but rarely a problem. He doubted that a mere filly could stop him, but he would be vulnerable while processing the raw magic. Already he was starting to feel bloated. How much magic can that mare have?
diagnostic -rvst enter! Power drain prevents song magic. No other problems at this time. Power drain is growing in accordance with the song magic exponential curve. It will become dangerous in 7 minutes. Dammit.
“Don’t eat my magic! I just learned how to use it!” Sweetie had crumpled down behind Mir and was bawling fearfully.
“Sweetie! Listen to me! We can get through this, but I’ll need your help.”
“It’s a horrible, super-evil monster! We’re all doomed! Only the princesses can save us now.”
“Pity you won’t make it to see them.” Tirek took a step forward. “Obstacles must be smashed.”
“Nooo don’t smash me! I’m too young to be smashed.”
Mir took a deep breath. This is it. Dig deep. Fight like you did back then. “GET THE HELL AWAY FROM HER!” She charged.
She slammed into Tirek’s chest hooves first, bouncing off and landing ungracefully on her rump. Tirek skidded backwards and landed in a crouch. Dammit. I really miss hands right about now. I’ve bought some time, now for part two. “Sweetie, listen to me. You have the power within you to turn your emotions into energy. It works like many legendary artifacts. We, the two of us, can defeat Tirek. But I need your help.”
“HA! Amusing. You think a mewling brat can aide you against me? I’ll make her watch what happens to you.”
Sweetie stood shakily. I don’t want to be smashed. I don’t want Mir to get smashed, she’s awesome. I’ll fight!
She thought of defending her friends and family. She thought of forcing a bully to restore what he or she had stolen. She thought of heroes, of champions, of valor. She thought of the color red. Her mind filled with syllables in a blaze of insight. She begun to sing.
“Was granme ga…” (2)
Warning. Undefined unknown uncommanded power excursion.
The pale, white-haired young woman startled awake. Her body was experiencing a bizarre type of pain.
Not the body most people would see when they saw her, that of a slender teenage girl.(3) Her other body, the tower that stretched to the heavens and weighed four trillion tons. Unlike most (people that appeared to be) teenaged girls, she was never particularly sensitive about her weight.
Shurelia was linked to the tower and administered it. It was her. And it hurt.
“What’s the matter?” Her partner, Lyner, had woken up on the bed beside her, his spiky blonde hair spilling over his brown eyes. If this wasn’t such an emergency she’d think it was cute.
“Something is… pulling energy out of the tower. Like a vampire!”
Lyner bolted upright and threw on a shirt from the pile beside him. “What’s causing it? Where?”
Power drain is localized to emitter 01043, serving socket MIR_TEIWAZ_ARTONELICO. “It’s Mir.”
“What? I thought for sure she wouldn’t…”
“No. It’s not her. The drain was uncommanded. Mir’s MO was always to highjack authority and give commands. I’ve given her more than enough authority to do anything she could dream of.”
adminpanel -socketreport -i MIR_TEIWAZ_ARTONELICO enter. MIR_TEIWAZ_ARTONELICO is not sending any emotional energy. Her current emotional state is “was granme ga”.
towerstatus -emitter 01043 enter. Emitter 01043 is in danger of overloading. Thermal load balancing has been scheduled. After three thermal load balancings, a forced reset will be required.
“This is bad. Mir’s… fighting something I think. She’s protecting someone from something. If she can’t win in time to stop the power drain… I might have to force reset her connection to the tower. It’ll cause her to fall unconscious and might kill her. If she’s still fighting when it happens, she would die for sure.”
“Then..” Lyner paused. His lips pursed as his eyes drifted downward. He hated not being able to do anything more than he hated anything else. “...we’ll have to have faith in her. We saved her. She helped save the world. We owe her that much.”
Mir could feel the harmonics field cover the area around Sweetie. It was odd not being the one generating it, but it really did feel comforting to have. Too bad about everything else about the scenario. If only I had some hands to wrap around his scrawny neck. Wait a second. My Miros “costume” transformation gives me claws instead of hands.(4) What would it do to hooves?
“TRANSFORM!” A flash of light enveloped Mir, and when it faded her form had changed drastically. Red crystalline spikes jutted from her shoulders, as well as adorning her sides and flanks. Further spikes covered her tail instead of fur, ending in a crystalline barb. Most importantly for her, though, were the four sets of crystalline claws that had replaced her hooves. Ah, digits. So nice to have that back.
Sweetie gasped in fright. Sensing the song faltering, Mir turned around to smile at her. Despite her more frightening appearance, the gesture did seem to reassure Sweetie and she returned to the song. Mir noted that the construct for the song was currently a cord that seemed to hang up into the air. Odd, but song magic does what it wants sometimes.
That was when Tirek struck her, grabbing her neck with his hand. “Pitiful poniEAARRRRGGGH!!!!!!!!!” Mir bit down on Tirek’s forearm, her teeth also now sharp crystal shards. Blood filled her mouth. She released the arm and spat it into his face.
Tirek dropped her to try to clear the blood and saliva from his eyes. “I’ll kill you!” He took a kick at his currently-unseen adversary, but hit nothing but air. As he cleared his eyes, he could see the ribbon of magic connecting her horn to his mouth. Magic… Behind his current target, the filly was doing… something with hers. It seemed unusual, but he admittedly was unfamiliar with current magical trends. Regardless, he needed to stop it.
“Fool! Relying on a filly to save you.” Red magical energy began to build between his horns. “I’ll just obliterate her first.”
Mir’s thoughts raced as she realized what was about to happen. Crap crap crap ok how does Croix do it think fast ok now! As the bolt of energy was fired, she lept into its path.
Ching! The combination of Mir’s action and the harmonics field she was using had successfully broken up the attack’s waveform, but the deflection wasn’t perfect. Mir could feel some of the fur on her side had caught fire. But she’d successfully prevented it from hitting Sweetie and neither of them were dead. That counts as a success.
Sweetie could feel Mir’s protectiveness. She could feel her fear, her triumph, her determination. It mixed with her own emotions. I can see to the bottom of Mir’s heart. She’s fighting Tirek himself not just for herself, but for me. I have to do better for her!
The song coalesced into its true form. Mir could sense the feelings contained in the song feeding into the harmonics field.
There once was a unicorn mage and his apprentice, in the days when the three tribes lived apart. They walked together from town to town, him teaching lore to her, but always judging her harshly and treating her gruffly. She followed by his side and listened intently. They continued like this for years.
One day, as they were travelling down a road through the forest, a bandit king and his men surrounded them, too close for them to safely use their magic. "I know you, wizard."
Huh, she’s learned more than I thought. I can do this. Mir rushed forward. Tirek was readying another blast from his horns, but Mir’s leaping claw attack caught the left horn. The ball of magical energy exploded above Tirek’s head, staggering him. Did he get bigger between the last attack and this one?
Mir grabbed onto his left shoulder with her right forepaw, and dug in. She began to rake at his foreleg with her two back legs and bit at his face.
Tirek tried to punch at her head, but she rolled and let the punch land on her left shoulder spikes. It hurt her, but it seemed to hurt him more. She was Mir, she could deal with pain. It was the skill she had the most practice with.
“RRRGH! Wretch, you cannot last forever. Each moment I grow stronger.” It seemed accurate. Tirek was growing taller, even if he was also growing puffier. If that flab could convert to muscle, Mir would be in trouble. The ribbon of energy that connected Mir’s horn to Tirek’s mouth had gotten a little wider.
Tirek rolled over. The impact with the ground knocked Mir loose and he was on his feet while she was still on her back. At least the burning fur on her side had gone out. Being smooshed like that hadn’t broken whatever link connected her horn to his mouth. Rather than deal with her, he took off towards Sweetie.
No you don’t! Can I block from this angle? Only one way to find out. Mir scrambled to her feet and took off after him. As he approached Sweetie, Mir made contact with his tail. With her mouth.
Ping! The block was somehow good and Tirek spun around in place with Mir holding onto his tail with her teeth. Tirek stumbled dizzily while Mir let go once the spinning stopped and took a quick look at her charge. Still in the same spot. I guess in that trance state nobody can move much. I’ll just have to move him. Mir rushed at the still-disoriented Tirek and landed each front claw on each buttock. Her target cried out and stumbled forward.
Tirek’s tail grabbed her and smashed her into the ground. “FOOL! I am unbeatable. This power fills me!”
Mir scooted forward under Tirek and clawed at his belly. Tirek leaped aside, and Mir stood up, only to be slashed on the side of the head. She could feel Sweetie’s fear spike after the blow landed, but took a moment to turn around and smile at her to keep things on track. The actual damage of the blow was comparatively unimportant. Then she lept over Tirek’s head, aiming for his back.
"Then you know I'm not worth the trouble," the wizard replied.
"Yes, but that filly should do in your stead. Hoof her over!"
With that, the filly screamed "NOOOO!" and ducked under her master's tail.
The master thought about it for a moment, and answered. "You may not have her."
With this the bandit king became enraged. None dared defy him! He stepped forward, his subordinates forming a circle around the confrontation. "I will take that filly, if I must do so over your corpse! Be reasonable and give her over."
The master looked him in the eye and said "No."
Tirek had gotten bigger, large enough that Mir could stand on his back with all four paws. As he reached around for her she sunk her teeth and the claws of her left forepaw into the back of his neck, and the other three paws’ worth into his back. His hand couldn’t quite reach her, and she smacked it with her tail.
He changed the angle he was reaching for her, and she slid onto his side away from the arm, slashing deeply into it with her claws. To both her and Tirek’s surprise, a burst of energy from the wound knocked Mir off. The wound leaked a stream of magical blasts for a moment, then closed.
What the… How much energy has this guy absorbed?
The massive metal chamber near the Tower’s energy emitters could probably house most of Ponyville, assuming you didn’t mind it getting set on fire by the ambient heat. Metal blocks turned to reroute couplings for the giant heatpipes criss-crossing the room. Overburdened heat exchangers were disconnected to cool down, while unused ones were connected.
First thermal load balance completed. Next load balance in 195 seconds.
High above, Shurelia monitored the status of the Tower. The drain had reached immense proportions. No Reyvateil, not even Mir, could put forth the emotion necessary to amplify into that much energy, but it was being drained from the central reactor without any normal process. The Tower had originally been designed to support thousands of simultaneous Reyvateil songs, but whatever was going on would soon absorb energy even faster than the Orgel of Origins could safely generate. The auto-cutoff would close the emitter well before the drain would deplete the emergency reserve used for holding up the Tower, but it wasn’t exactly an ideal situation.
She wondered if this was what a human would feel while starving, or if it was closer to having your blood depleted. She also wished she had a rabbit to pet to take her mind off the crisis for a bit longer. She settled for grabbing Lyner’s arm and squeezing.
Tirek’s growth was once again losing the battle with his bloat. He’d come to resemble an overinflated balloon version of himself, and Mir knew why. It’s the different power rate breakpoints. He increases how fast he can drain, then how fast he can incorporate it lags.
The Centaur stood several times the height of the average pony. Rather than fire off a blast again, he simply stomped on Mir. She tried to perform a harmonic block but botched the timing and was pinned. Through the pain she could feel the feelings of Sweetie’s song still.
"Fool! Your stubbornness has cost you!" With that, the bandit king kicked him in the shin. There was a cracking sound, but the wizard stood immobile.
"No," he repeated.
The bandit king reared back and struck the wizard in the horn, cracking it. "Now your foolishness has cost you your livelihood. Move aside or it will cost you your life."
Mir couldn’t employ magic and couldn’t move any of her limbs. The only part of her not under the monster’s foot was her tail. Any second now he’d use the opportunity to blast Sweetie. She couldn’t allow it. Dammit. What can I possibly do. I can’t bite through his hoof, and the only thing I’ve got free is…
Mir’s tail lashed and whipped against the side of Tirek’s leg. The commands to the new limb were unfamiliar. She could picture what she wanted to do, but executing it was another matter.
The tail twisted and and turned, then jammed the barb into the back of Tirek’s knee. Reflex brought the leg up and made the centaur step back. Mir immediately rolled to her feet and dived under a furious but hasty sweep of Tirek’s arm. She rolled to her feet again and slashed at the passing arm with her forepaw, resulting in a surge of glowing fluid.
Massive pumps roared to maximum power. Molten liquid sodium moved forward, heated to white hot as it passed over the heat exchanger surrounding emitter 10143.
Back in the heatpipe room, the pipes were shifted back to the first set of exchangers. Each switch would happen faster, until there wasn’t enough time for them to cool off at all.
Throughout the Tower, cryogenic coolant was pumped towards the emitter bank to prepare last-resort cooling.
Second thermal load balance completed. Next load balance in 125 seconds.
Tirek seemed to have finished adapting to his new form. He was no longer flabby or puffy, instead possessing an impressive set of muscles. All the more impressive for the fact that some of them were now big enough for Mir to climb inside.
“Enough of this.” Tirek reared up and slammed both front hooves to the ground. Three lines of rock spikes extended out from the impact point, one extending forward and the other two extending in arcs from either side.
So he’s smarter than he looks. Mir could see Tirek was varying the timing of each… I have no idea what the term for that is. ...spikey thing to have them all hit Sweetie from different directions at the exact same time.
She could block one of them no problem, and maybe even two of them, but Sweetie was just a kid and had no protective clothing. Mir didn’t want to think about what even one hit would do to the poor tyke. Wait, the Cluster method. Mir vanished, riding the Harmonics back to their source. Appearing next to Sweetie Bell, she grabbed the filly’s tail with her mouth and pulled. Sweetie slid away as Mir backpedaled out of the impact point.
As the attacks hit each other, jagged shards of rock sprayed out from the impact zone. Mir turned to offer as much surface area to the shards as possible to cover Sweetie. Jagged rocks cut into her left side and took a chunk off her ear.
Tirek watched the results of his attack. What appeared to be blood dripped from the relatively bigger unicorn, but when it hit the ground it shimmered and vanished. “What are you?”
Mir smirked. “I am a Reyvateil.”
While Tirek seemed to be trying to remember if he knew what that was, Mir began to focus for a counterattack. Sweetie’s going to eventually run out of power. I can’t use my song magic, but you don’t need any magic of your own if you’re using another’s Harmonics. Heck even idiots like Lyner could do it. Mir could feel the Harmonics emanating from Sweetie. She tried to think of something to do with them, but her mind stuck on the trailing images Croix and Cocona would leave behind during some of their most ferocious attacks.
Well, he’d never expect that.
Mir rushed forward, charging towards Tirek. The giant centaur regarded her contemptuously, readying an arm to swat her down in the midst of her attack. As Mir was about to enter his strike range, she suddenly put on a burst of tremendous speed, leaving nine sets of trailing images, each showing her preparing to attack from a different angle.
Tirek hesitated for a moment, trying to discern which of the attacks was the real one, only to lose the opportunity entirely as nine sets of foreclaws connected with him. Energy blazed forth from wounds on his forelegs, barrel, and torso. As it faded, he could see the real Mir crouched in front of him, having ducked under the majority of the blasts. (5)
Mir immediately leaped back as Tirek blasted her position to a crisp. A stomp liquified the ground around her, requiring another leap just before the suction would have kicked in.
“I’ve figured you out, insect.” Tirek punctuated the proclamation with a hearty laugh. “You’re held together with magic somehow, and I’m not draining that yet.” He grinned wickedly. “I can’t wait to crack you open and get it all.” Tirek fired another gigantic red blast, not at Mir or Sweetie but at the ground.
High above Ponyville, and for that matter most of Canterlot, two charcoal-gray unicorn stallions stood on the palace’s southern watchtower.
“There’s some weird lights coming from down there. Should we get somebody?”
“Eh, it’s Ponyville.” The second unicorn lifted a pair of binoculars to his face. He could see flashes of light, but whatever was causing them was blocked from sight by a row of tall pine trees. “I’m sure that if it is anything, Princess Twilight will handle it.”
“Hah. She can’t let the guard have any credit for anything big. I’ll log it as ‘bright lights near Ponyville’ I guess.”
As the smoke cleared, Tirek saw Mir standing unsteadily on her hind legs in front of Sweetie, her forelegs crossed in front of her face. She dropped to the ground and rushed forward once more. “Are you so eager for pain, little Pony?”
Sweetie was afraid. She could tell Mir was afraid too. She could see, however, that Mir was fighting on despite the fear she somehow knew the older unicorn felt. Real courage is to continue despite being afraid.
"No." The bandit king dove forward, preparing to break the wizard's neck. When he made contact with the wizard, however, his intended victim jammed the cracked horn's jagged edge into his neck, killing him instead.
At the death of their leader, the bandit king's followers fled. The filly gazed up at her master's damaged horn. "Why did you risk yourself for me?"
Mir went flying back over Sweetie’s head, trailing her vanishing blood. She disappeared, and appeared once again next to Sweetie, fortunately upright and relatively still. Good going, Cluster method.
The massive heat pipe junction shifted once again, bringing back the second set of connections. The “fresh” set of heat pipes was still visibly glowing, albeit not as much as the just-used one. By the time this set reached its limits again, the first set would not have cooled off sufficiently to make the switch worth it.
Above, emergency dump valves around the white-hot emitter began to spray it with cryogenic inert gas. The super-cold liquid became vapor before it could even get close to the emitter and a swirling white maelstrom obscured it from sight. Tons of cryogenic gasses bought a few seconds.
Forced reset in 87 seconds.
Mir could hear the inner voice telling her how much time she had left. Another, instinct-mimicking inner voice told her she couldn’t take any more punishment. Tirek was bigger and faster and even a mostly-successful block couldn’t save her. Unlike her husband, she didn’t possess the practice necessary to have confidence in a perfectly-timed block.
Her left eye wouldn’t open anymore, her left ear had torn completely off, and there was a lot of pain coming from her front right leg. Attacking Tirek any further would be futile.
It was time.
“Sweetie Bell, finish the song.”
Forced reset in 34 seconds.
Mir charged Tirek one last time, hobbling as she did. She needed a few more seconds.
The master smiled down and said, "Because you said no."
The filly knew that despite her master's strictness, he loved her. She fashioned her gratitude into a ribbon, and wrapped it around the damaged part of the horn. In time, it healed and they were happy again.
Mir blocked the fist with her front right leg. Even with a moderately successful Harmonic Block, the impact snapped the leg at the radius bone.
It was good enough. The song was executing, and Tirek didn’t have time to do any further attacks. Mir lept backwards using only her rear legs, clumsily backflipping to allow herself to watch whatever happened. She just hoped it could deal with all the energy he’d accumulated without… Don’t think about it. We must appreciate what this world allows us to have. Mir made her peace with whatever would happen now. She’d done her best for Sweetie.
Forced reset in 7 seconds.
At the conclusion of the song, the cord hovering in the air above Sweetie wrenched as if pulled with tremendous force. Above Tirek’s head, a shining circle appeared. He had just enough time to lift his eyes to it before it shot upwards, leaving behind the form of a massive temple bell.
Then it landed on him. Or rather, around him. Mir wondered as she fell if that was it, but then she saw the clapper. The trunk of a massive redwood swung on great cables towards the bell. Mir covered her ears with her hooves.
G
O
N
G
!
Mir hit the ground, but couldn’t feel it. The sound had seemed to be the loudest thing she’d ever heard, blotting out all other sensation. She couldn’t imagine what it had been like for Tirek, inside the bell.
She noticed she couldn’t feel any drain anymore. A shiver came over her as the Tower’s system performed the much safer soft emitter shift. Now we just need to see if he explodes or not.
As she tried to right herself, she looked over at the bell. The top was glowing and swelling. An immense beam of red and violet light burst through it and shot into the sky. After a moment the bell faded from existence.
Mir couldn’t see Tirek, but she couldn’t be sure of his status. She sung a quick healing song for herself, then stood back up. I have my eyes, ears, legs, and magic again. If he wants to continue the fight he’s going to wish he’d died.
“There, see? Purple light. Princess twilight had it in the bag the whole time.”
“Whatever ‘it’ was.”
Tirek might have wanted to continue the fight, but his body couldn’t. He had returned to the size he’d been before, but had considerable folds of skin visible. Mir supposed it fit with losing weight too fast.
There were numerous gashes and rents in his skin, as the energy he’d gathered had apparently burst free from him. Blood oozed from the edges. His breathing was ragged and shallow. Mir could detect that his breaths were getting slightly farther apart. Good riddance.
At about that point she realized Sweetie Bell wasn’t singing or saying anything. Mir’s head spun about as she looked for her student. She saw a crumpled white form near where she had landed.
Oh no oh no oh no! Mir dashed over to the filly’s side. Sweetie was still breathing, and didn’t seem injured, but wasn’t standing up.
“Mir?” Sweetie’s eyes opened groggily and she looked approximately in the direction of her instructor. “Did we win?”
Of course. She was using her own energy for that. I’m surprised she had enough energy in her for an attack of that magnitude. And to dissipate the energy safely as well! Mir looked over at where her saddlebags lay in the grass and levitated over an especially sugary chocolate bar. Her aura unwrapped it, then began to warm it. After it had lost consistency and turned to a gooey mush, she levitated the blob into Sweetie’s mouth and rubbed it on her gums.
“Mmmfffh… Mir. Thank you. All while you were fighting Tirek I could tell what you were feeling. That you were risking your… life to protect me. Thank you.”
Mir smiled down at the filly and rubbed her head with her forehoof. “No, I should thank you. I had no power of my own to oppose him with, and was forced to borrow yours.” She dipped her head. For the first time in hundreds of years, Mir did something resembling a bow. “Please forgive me.”
Sweetie Bell batted away the hoof with her own. “You saved me! You protected me and got hurt doing it! Don't appologize! I should be thanking you!.”
Mir offered a slight smile, and levitated another chocolate bar over in response. Sweetie’s aura flickered briefly, and the chocolate bar wobbled to her mouth.
“I want to grow up to be like you.” The words hit Mir harder than any blow Tirek had landed. The deep tension of anxiety spread across her body.
“No, you don’t.” Mir’s voice had gone cold and she had involuntarily scowled at Sweetie.
Her protégé winced and gulped down the chocolate in her mouth. “I…” Sweetie’s saddened eyes moistened as she looked up at Mir. “...what did I say?”
Mir shook her head, banishing the scowl and trying to smile again. “It’s alright if you want to be brave. It’s all right if you want to be strong. But being like me… it’s not good for you. What made me the way I am is pain I hope you can never image. I want you to be safe and happy.”
At that point, Mir suddenly came to a realization. If Tirek dies, he was killed by Sweetie. I don’t want her to be a killer.
“What’s wrong?” Sweetie had noticed her teacher’s eyes open in horror and that she was starting to stand.
“I’d better check on mean ol’ Mr. Tirek. As bad as he is, I don’t want anything to happen.” Mir walked back over to the fallen centaur. Still alive, but barely. Mir began to chant, and a small girl bearing bandages appeared over his body. Dozens of them were slapped on haphazardly, but the real magic was taking effect.
OK. Lungs sound good. No more bleeding. Mir’s aura grabbed the curtain of the stage and tore off two strips. One she balled up and stuffed in Tirek’s mouth. The other she wrapped around to hold the ball in and his mouth closed. After checking that he could still breath, she turned back to see to Sweetie.
Then she heard wing beats. Mir stiffened and looked up, ready for another fight. Two grey ponies with bat-like wings and dark purple and blue armor came over the tree line. Maybe they’re with Luna? She said she’d send the paperwork for me. Or maybe they saw the fight.
“Ancient Alicorns above!” The first one swore. “That’s Tirek!”
Mir nodded. “I won’t charge you for this one.”
“Charge?” The second bat-like pony’s expression had suddenly switched from business to baffled. A couple of his face muscles cramped up from the sudden shift, making him look a little silly.
Mir smiled. “I’ve done this sort of thing before. I’m a consultant, specializing in dangerous magic.” That was stretching the truth a bit, but she did submit invoices to her “sister” Shurelia.
“Uh, gotta warn you. Bounty laws prohibit us from paying you if there’s no reward posted in advance.”
“Hmph.” Mir smiled smugly at the stallion. She wasn’t at all interested in more fighting, but why tell him that?
“In any case,” the first stallion interjected, “we have to get this guy back to Tartarus.” The pony turned his head and removed a thin black cloth from under his armor. Unfolding it several times, he set up a two meter by two meter square of inky blackness.
“Nightspider silk!” Sweetie whispered in awe. Her sister had told her all about the special fabrics used by night-ponies.
The second stallion had withdrawn a flare-gun and flares from his saddlebag. After carefully loading the gun with his mouth, he gripped it in his teeth and squeezed hard, firing a flare into the sky. It burst green, yellow, and blue. “Situation cleared” in the Royal Guard Flare Code.
The two night-ponies drug Tirek onto the square carefully, then each grabbed two corners and tied them together. A cord was wrapped around the middle to keep Tirek from sliding and off they went.
Neither night-pony gave any thought to completing their original errand of delivering some documents, their surprise at seeing Tirek defeated by a lone mare and their panic at having to deal with him had blighted their rational thought.
Mir returned to Sweetie’s side, noticing her student not merely standing but dancing for joy. “What’s this?”
“I! GOT! MY! CUTIE! MARK! OHMYGOODNESS!”
“That’s wonderful. Could you hold still for a moment so I could see it?” Sweetie came to a halt mid bounce, and Mir examined her hip. Sure enough, it was no longer blank. A red bell, green star, and blue musical note were arranged in an equilateral triangular formation. A song magic cutie mark. I knew it. “Congratulations. I’m afraid we must get you back home now, this is too much excitement for one night.”
“So she’s still alive, and things seem to be back to normal?” Lyner munched on an apple.
Shurelia paced the room. “It’s not that simple. Whatever it was Mir was fighting, I want to know more about it. I thought we’d finally run out of conspiracies and ancient mistakes, mostly by process of elimination.”
adminpanel spatial_locate MIR_TEIWAZ_ARTONELICO enter!
Unable to localize the target. Please check the sensor calibration.
“That’s weird. I can’t localize her.”
Lyner stopped eating. “Did she withdraw permission or something?”
“No, that’s not it. Here we go.” She approached the glass-topped table and the display on it flickered to life. In addition to the information on its surface, a holographic image of the tower and its surroundings hovered above it. “OK so you see the tower here, right?”
“Yeah.”
“These red dots here…” Several red dots appeared on the side of the tower. “...are the emitter clusters. These orange dots up here…” Several orange dots appeared above the top of the holographic tower. “...show repeater satellites. Each one knows the distance to the reyvateil using them. By drawing spheres around each one, we can find the place where they intersect and that’s where the reyvateil will be. For example, this is me.”
Each dot suddenly projected a sphere around it. As Lyner leaned in, he could see that each one intersected each other at one place - the top of the tower where they were.
“But for Mir…” The spheres winked out, replaced by new ones. Lyner could immediately see what was wrong. Some of them didn’t intersect at all. Their sizes and intersections seemed completely random.
“What could cause that?”
“Well, it could be caused by poor sensor calibration. But I just checked with myself and that was 100% accurate. To be honest I’m not sure what could be causing it, but whatever it is, if it’s attacking Mir it’s probably bad.”
“We’re going to call them, aren’t we?”
Shurelia gave a curt nod. “Call Metafallica and Sol Cluster. Summon the Origin Council.”
“Sweetie, what was that story I heard in your song?” Mir walked down the road to Ponyville, head held high and a half-eaten chocolate bar hovering next to her in her aura. Victory was sweeter than chocolate, but coming out of it with Sweetie unscathed was sweeter still.
Sweetie paused for a moment to think, rubbing her chin with her hoof. Mir stopped and turned her head to look back at her. “It… came to mind, really. It was an old, old story about Clover the Clever’s childhood. My mother told it to me last Hearth’s Warming Eve.”
Mir hadn’t read up to “Clover the Clever” in the encyclopedia, but since she’d been reading it in the wrong order she’d seen “Hearth’s Warming” and knew well enough who that was. As she predicted, it had a certain relevance to the events happening around it.
“There we go.” Mir’s magic silently opened the door to Sweetie’s home. It had only a very simple lock, so Sweetie didn’t even need to retrieve the key from its hiding place under the porch (which was far too obvious for Mir’s taste).
Sweetie Bell gently walked across the threshold, trying not to make any noise. “You go to sleep as soon as you can, ok?”
“Ok.”
Mir turned around and headed back towards the boutique. It wouldn’t be the least sleep she’d ever operated on, but it was always nice to get a good night’s sleep. She’d get whatever she could in the few hours left before dawn.
It was time. The foolish Princesses of Equestria would not stop him this time. Recent events had proved Celestia and Luna unwilling to fight any more. Clearly the weight of the years had broken them down, made them unwilling to fight. If they liked change so much, they should have made sure to grow rather than diminish! The younger, more vital Princesses could pose an obstacle, but they had a weakness. They were both enmeshed in a web of trust. If he could penetrate it even at one point, he would be able to take the whole thing apart. I will turn Celestia’s precious students against her. She will be slain by the very ponies she sent to the Crystal Empire to stop me.
He checked the wave balance on the will-working he’d put up around himself. This new knowledge. It has proved to be entirely reliable and mathematically sound. It protects me from the vision of the very gods themselves. They will have to rely on mortal eyes to find me. By then it will be too late.
Ahead, the edge of the Everfree loomed. The first rays of the sun peeked over the horizon.
End Phase 1: Awakenings
Begin Phase 2: Escalation
(1) This was originally very different and darker: rather than the cup, Mir would use her own body. I decided that it probably went outside the bounds of what I consider acceptable for this crossover. It was vaguely inspired by lyrics in Harmonius_Fusion, implying that Mir would metaphorically stain the white roses red with her own blood so that she could properly express her feelings.
(2) This set of emotional prefixes indicates that the singer strongly wants to protect someone, but wants to get it over with as quickly as possible.
(3)Honestly, given that Origin Reyvateils had to have each of their components handmade and cost hundreds of millions of dollars, it makes sense that they’re as small as possible. Presumably they’d be toddler-sized if the designers thought they could work.
(4)
(5) This is actually a reference to the penultimate technique from Rurouni Kenshin.
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An update?1 Awesome!
I love the nod to Rainbow Rocks there.
That was beyond awesome! Sweetie owning Tirek like that, wow, really made my morning. I totaly loved the little story with Starswirl and Clover that was used in Sweeties song. <3
6626499
Thanks. I knew going in that describing an Ar-Tonelico style fight could easily get boring as hell, since you could often summarize it as "the Vanguard does stuff to buy time until the Reyvateil one-shots the enemy". I knew I had to come up with some interesting thing for the Reyvateil's portion of things.