Eclipse Born

by Seeking Dusk

Forest of Terror

It was a minor complication, honestly not that important, but it was jarring when I noticed it in the mirror. The spell did have a side effect, or at least a minor change that slipped past the metamorphic matrix’s collapse when it the spell was dismissed. How I didn’t notice it bouncing around as I moved was beyond me. My hair. It obviously wasn’t a mane anymore, as in it didn’t run down my neck reaching for my spine, but…

It was still in dreadlocks. And still a mix of gold and black. I didn’t notice it until I tried to scratch at an itch and hit the thick mess of hair getting in the way. First the brilliant gold eyes, now dreadlocks and two toned hair. And it seemed to be natural. Well, as natural as a magical pigment change could be. But as far as I could tell, it went all the way to the roots and the strands I plucked looked the same, aside from the colour.

Magic… was confusion. It was no wonder people started abandoning it in favour of science. “Just how difficult would practicing magic be in a place without much of it?”

“Damn… Right. No time to focus on this right now,” I chastised myself, shaking my head and exhaling explosively, getting momentarily distracted by the locks bumping around. Yep; a lot of getting used to. I wasn’t going to cut them off. I always wanted locks. Or an afro. At least, so long as it wasn’t dangerous.

But back on topic. We had a forest to get back to. I didn’t have much in terms of exploration supplies, or experience, but I donned the thickest pair of pants I had, emptied my bag of most of its contents and restocked it with a rope and knife from Twilight’s stock room. I slipped my cell phone into my pocket and grabbed a broomstick from the closet to serve as a weapon.

The rest of the group was already waiting downstairs; all five bearers, decked out in the magic jewelry that apparently held phenomenal cosmic power, as far as the stories I’d hear claimed, Lyra, Spike and two Royal Guards. Wait… five?

“Calie’s ready!” Pinkie suddenly yelled from behind me. I’m proud to say that I didn’t fall down the stairs. I merely leaped to cover the last six steps in a single bound and landed rather gracefully.

“Pinkie, you are either the best thing for my heart, or the worse,” I said, trying to calm my ticker down.

“Aw, you say the nicest things,” Pinkie said, hopping down the stairs cheerfully. “Nice hair.”

I groaned inwardly and joined the group proper, deciding not to worry too much about that one. Instead, I could focus on Twilight and minor argument she was having with Spike off to the side of the group.

“But I want to help, Twilight!” Spike was saying, glowering at Twilight. Lyra was with the other bearers and the guard while Twilight was occupied, giving them her point of view of what we had encountered on the way there, going by the snippets of the conversation I was catching. I lay the broomstick across my shoulders and moseyed over to the clashing pair

“I know you do Spike,” Twilight said with caring tones. “But I would much rather you say here and take care of the library.”

“Take care of the library? No way!” Spike explained in frustration, slashing a hand through the air. “I’m coming with you.”

“No Spike! It might be dangerous,” Twilight countered.

“No, it’s definitely dangerous,” I added. Twilight shot me a grateful look. “That’s why it’s a good idea for Spike to come.”

“What!” her expression shifted from gratitude to shock.

“Really?” Spike said at the same time. “Awesome!”

“No, not really,” Twilight said firmly, glaring at me. “There is no way I am letting Spike come with us. He’s a baby dragon!”

“He’s a fire breathing magic filled reptile with scales that naturally repel the worse of the effects of the forest,” I pointed out in a level tone. “Best case scenario; he’s an extra set of eyes that won’t need to be covered by your shield. Worst case scenario; his fire breath is an asset and a direct line to Celestia.”

“Princess,” Twilight said, automatically correcting me, her frustration clear in the manner in which her eyes shifted back and forth.

“Just be prepared to book it if things turn sour, and otherwise listen to what we say,” I said to Spike, patting Twilight on her head lightly. Spike nodded and ran off to grab something. Bending down, I whispered softly in Twilight’s ear.

“You’re worried about your little brother, I get it,” I said. I still worried about my folks. “But he’s growing up. He’s fourteen, going on fifteen. Still young, I know, but he’s told me about the Crystal Empire, and the changeling attack and the raid on the diamond dogs and more. He’s also a young dragon. He worries about you too, and you underestimate what a baby dragon can do.”

“But what if he gets hurt? I’d never forgive myself,” Twilight whispered back with a little whimper as Spike stopped, sharing something with Rainbow Dash.

“He says the same thing about every adventure you and your friends have,” I told her, looking directly into her eyes. It was slow coming, but I could see the realization and concern spark in her eyes. “Just believe in him, just like how he believes in you. You’re not that much older either. You’re just nineteen. Your parents probably worry all the time too.” My parents were probably freaking out. I gave her a quick squeeze. “But you still do it. And he wants to help.”

Twilight was quiet for a while. “Okay…”

“We spent enough time talking!” Rainbow Dash declared, zooming up to hover near the ceiling. “It’s time we got going already!”

“Now hold on, Rainbow Dash,” Applejack said, taking a few steps forward and glaring up at the impatient mare. “We can’t just run off willy nilly into this. ”

“No, she’s right, AJ,” I said. At least there was someone else who though we should be doing something rather than just lolling about. Then again, this was Rainbow Dash. She was probably just impatient. “This is weird magic effects in a forest that ponies regularly go to. And your sister’s already been affected by it. It’s dissonant magic, it affects people and makes them sick to the point of passing out, Twilight has a barrier spell that can protect you from it, there is a core. That’s what we are going for. To zappa the core with those fancy necklaces of phenomenal cosmic power.”

“What he means is that I hope using the elements of harmony on the source of the dissonant magic will undo the effects and revert the forest to its natural state, much like what happened when we used them on Discord before his reformation,” Twilight said, shooting me a glare, clearly disapproving of my callous rendition of the plan we, as in Twilight, Lyra, Spike and myself, put together. And by that, I mean mostly Twilight. My contribution had been pretty much limited to ‘why don’t we just cut it off at the source?’ The magic-babble it produced was mind boggling.

“I must admit I am quite ready to use the elements on whatever ghastly thing has turned the White Tail Woods into such a travesty!” Rarity declared with almost venomous passion. She hmphed when we looked at her with mingled expressions, refusing to look ashamed as she flipped her hair back. “My sister is in the hospital because of this, you shall have to forgive me if I am somewhat more passionate about his endeavour than you would expect.”

“Alright fillies, you heard the lady!” Pinkie suddenly said in the mannerisms of a cliché drill army general. She had pulled the appropriate hat out from somewhere and was marching back and forth before us.

“Not all of us are female,” I interjected, pointing at the royal guards, Spike and myself. A slight lifting of the eyebrow was the only change the stoic expression of the guard on the left allowed. I could totally understand why Dash had tried to prank them when they came to town.

“Oh! Thanks, Calie,” Pinkie said, her chipper and cheerful self again before getting back into character, glare and all. “Fillies and colts, we have a weighty task ahead of us! We don’t know what’s really out there! We don’t know what to truly expect! Now, I want to see your serious faces! Like ‘Grrr’!”

Dash, Spike and I got right into it, giving impressive snarls. Applejack snorted and tilted her hat to shade her eyes a bit, which was admittedly fairly intimidating. Fluttershy merely meeped and hid behind Twilight and Lyra, the latter laughing and the former rolling her eyes. Rarity narrowed her eyes and leveled a stern expression at Pinkie. “I am a lady, it would be most undignified for me to growl.”

“Okie Dokie Lokie!” Pinkie said, tossing her hat aside. “Ready to go Twilight?”

“Alright Ladies… and gentlecolts… we have a forest to save,” Twilight nodded.

----------

It was official; the area’s effect was expanding. It was slow and irregular, but the guards who had been watching the edge confirmed it moved almost two thirds of a meter in the two hours it took us to get back. I didn’t like the sound of that progression. I liked it less when Twilight did some of her fancy mathematics and gave us a better picture of what that meant.

“We have to hurry,” Twilight said grimly. “We will try to get as far as possible before I cast the protection layer over you. That way, we can get a more precise sense of bearing between the side effects prevent Caleb from seeking out the source accurately.”

“No, cast it from now,” I told her.

“But wouldn’t that-” Lyra started.

“Trust me, just cast it,” I said. Time to see if my intuition was right. It worked for telekinesis and for somehow creating a species transformation spell. The last one I was actually proud of, now that I was past the ‘Oh God I’m stuck as a pony’ fear. A barrier should be somewhere between the two in difficulty. And much closer to the first on that scale.

“Are you sure, Caleb?” Twilight asked.

“Tick tock expansion,” I reminded her. Twilight nodded and turned to the others.

“Okay… this will feel a bit strange…” She closed her eyes and her horn started glowing as she prepared the spell. I quickly focused my magic senses on her, ignoring the feelings of disease and followed suit, clasping my hands together. It wasn’t as clear as the direct contact, but I could still hear and feel the spell pattern. I quickly discarded the sections that felt external to the spell, recognizing them as the portions that let her cast it on multiple targets.

Just cast it. Well what did you think I was doing? Jeeze, my intuition could be annoying. I still followed it though. It felt like cold ooze crept over me, quickly crawling down my arms and reaching my torso before spreading to the rest of my body. The moment every inch of my person felt the cold, it warmed, tickled and faded. I could still hear the pattern humming in the back of my mind, so I knew the spell was up and running. I actually did it.

“Caleb?” Twilight’s voice broke my concentration.

I blinked and grinned at her. “Yes, Twi?”

“Did you just cast the barrier spell?” Lyra asked, looking at me with something like confusion.

“I believe I did,” I grinned at them. Rarity looked somewhat shocked. Pinkie Pie clapped her hooves and cheered. The other three mares merely looked confused, unsure how to react. The royal guards looked stoic. They were good at that.

“But… how?” Twilight asked.

“Luck, intuition, non-standard magic sense? All of the above, likely,” I said. I tentatively opened my senses fully. I smiled. The horror movie feeling was still there, as was the dissonant magic, but it was akin to standing under an umbrella verses being in the direct rain. You could feel the rain in both cases, but the umbrella didn’t get you wet.

“I… we… We’ll talk about this later,” Twilight said. “For now, let’s go.”

“But do we have to?” Fluttershy asked softly. I was surprised she held out this long. “It’s dark and scary it doesn’t look like it particularly wants visitors…”

“For pony’s sake,” Dash exclaimed. She leapt over and bumped Fluttershy’s shoulder. “Look, we know it’s bad in there. They told us that much. But that’s why we have to go. The weather teams already found a rogue cloud forming over it!”

Fluttershy only whimpered and hid behind her mane some more.

“Imagine of you had to live in there!” Pinkie interjected suddenly. “It so super scary that I don’t know if I could still stay in there!”

“My animal friends! Oh dear, I didn’t think about them!” Fluttershy gasped.

“I’m sure they are okie dokie, lokie!” Pinkie said. “They only got their homes turned into a dark and spooky scary place that looks like the Everfree forest.”

Fluttershy quickly trotted to the front of the group. “We have to hurry and fix this so my friends can get back home, everypony!”

Pinkie looked back at us with a smug smile. Huh. You know, the more I learned about Pinkie, the more I was glad she never used her powers for evil. Malicious evil, that is. Her pranks were an acceptable evil. We actually had to hold Fluttershy back, in her new determination to reach the goal. On the bright side, while the forest had gotten more foreboding, it hadn’t quite gotten more dangerous.

That didn’t mean I loosened my grip on my impromptu staff any, only that we were jumpy and wary of all the shadows. We didn’t even have much conversation aside from my hushed comments, occasionally ensuring we remained on course and the periodic checks to make sure everyone remained together. Even with the protection spell Twilight provided the very atmosphere was oppressive.

The canopy was even denser now than before, and I could swear the vines were actively coiling around the trees. In fact, I didn’t need to swear. I took three pictures with my phone and compared them. The vines were slowly curling around the trees. Pinkie had started half humming and half singing a song as we progressed, something about giggling at ghosties from the snatches I could get of the words.

Twilight, Rarity and the unicorn guard that accompanied us provided use with three points of illumination, both a blessing and a curse as it held back the otherwise engulfing darkness and shadows, but also made the shadows between the trees worse. It also startled the strange things that the dissonant magic had birthed.

I held in my hands what, for the life of me, looked like a grass type crobat. It was dark grey and had glowing indigo eyes, but it had four knife-like wings and two stubby graspers attached to a small oblong body. The wings seemed and felt like a leathery leaf. The feet were vines and thorns. The fangs and teeth too. The body was like a dense fuzzy seed pod. A swarm of them had erupted from a small cave in the ground and scared us. Between the reactions of Rainbow, Twilight, Spike, Apple Jack and the Guard, we knocked a few out of the air. My own swings had hit nothing but air.

“So… is this normal?” I asked the group on a whole.

“Well I sure ain’t never seen anything like ‘em before, sugarcube,” Apple Jack said cautiously. Spike and RD were taking turns poking at one of the stunned ones.

“I… kinda looks like a bat,” Lyra said. Helpful.

“They are like fruit bats!” Pinkie Pie said in her typical exuberance. “They are bats, but they are fruit too! Or maybe they are seeds.” She leaned in and glared at it, prodding it with her hoof. “Seed Bats doesn’t sound as good though.”

“Ick, Caleb darling, could you not dangle that… thing so close to me?” Rarity said before moving closer to where Fluttershy was huddling. “It’s a horrid thing.”

“Okay… guards?” I asked, seeing if they had anything useful. They shook their heads.

I shook my prize at Twilight, her horn glowing as she studied a sample of her own. “Your opinion?”

“I think… it’s indigenous. A magical creature born from the magic that is taking over this forest,” Twilight said slowly. “This is bad, This is very very bad! I have to let the Princess know right away!”

“Mind telling us while yer at it?” Apple Jack asked.

“These things are like timber wolves. A magic construct creature created by the location,” Twilight said, pulling out her ever present stationary. “It’s been less than a day and somehow this place has created, or influenced the birth of, its own creatures.”

“So it’s definitely getting worse,” I said, tightening my grip on the broomstick.

“Then what are we waiting for?” RD exclaimed again. “Twilight, Caleb! You two eggheads know where the thing we need to hit with the elements is, right?”

“Vaguely, we have a general idea,” Twilight said, finishing up her scroll.

“Then point which way and we can get moving!” she insisted.

“Lyra… am I an egghead?” I asked her.

“Yes,” Lyra said without hesitation.

“Okay. Egghead says...” I closed my eyes and pulled up the sense I was following, keying in on the strongest source, letting my hand settle in the direction. “That way.”

“Then let’s get going!” Rainbow said, landing in front of Twilight and poking her.

We ran. It was more of a sustained jog, but we picked up the pace. It was pretty clear we were heading in the right direction though. The trees had faces. Actual faces, not just the mental trick. The underbrush had to be blasted back through a combination of the magic from the unicorn guard and Twilight, with Lyra and Rarity helping Pinkie, Apple Jack and I beating back the sides as the vines were even more active this close to the center.

Rays of magic and blunt objects were the name of the game as we all tried to focus on getting to the center and not focusing on the fact that the forest was fighting back rather effectively. What has started as a vine or two slipping back out into the path cleared has escalated into a full on Attack of the Foliage.

“This is ridiculous!” I yelled, swinging my stick hard to snap the ends of two vines as they reached out for me. They started thrashing madly for a few moments before their sap and fluid in them drained and they fell limp. I was just glad the broomstick was solid enough to bash through these with enough force behind a swing, and that the vines themselves were somewhat fragile enough to allow it.

“Ridiculous ? This is fun!” Pinkie said, skipping from place to place, each hop managing to bring her hooves down on some of the vines. Behind me, Rainbow was using some form of pegasus martial arts to tear into them. Apple Jack was having no troubles at all. Farmer vs Plant . Rarity had pulled out two larges shears and simply sliced anything that came close to ‘sullying her pristine coat.’

Twilight and the guard kept up their magic attacks; flashes of purple and peach light coming from their direction, the occasional beam lancing out from behind my field of vision. The second guard mainly guarded Fluttershy, who admittedly wasn’t doing much more than avoiding the vines. Not everyone could be a fighter. Lyra on the other hand… She was using a mix of hoof strikes and magic to rip the vines apart.

“Is this really the time for chatter?” Twilight yelled, sounding frazzled.

“When else am I gonna find myself be in the middle of a tense situation that lets me make quips?” I tossed back. I over extended on a swing and staggered, loosing my balance. A vine shot out and snagged my leg, yanking me the rest of the way.

My vision danced for a moment as I crashed to the ground hard, the improvised staff almost falling from my grip. I hardly had time to process that before the vine started dragging me off. Of course, I reacted like a man.

“AAAAAAAHHHHH!” Seriously. Mutant plant tentacle in a dark forest was dragging me off. This was either going Audrey II or Hentai. Both of those were bad ends. Very, very bad ends. I tried swinging the broomstick at it again, but the angle was horrible and there was hardly any power behind the blows. Two more vines lashed out from the darkness of the rushing underbrush, one catching my hand, the other wrapping around my other leg.

“Oh dear lord I’m not dying here!” I yelled. My magic swelled, yelling with me, but all it did was bolster my body enough that the vines pressure didn’t crush me. I didn’t know enough to do anything more than that instinctive response. Even the barrier wasn’t a physical one, it was just one to keep the dissonance off the person it was layered on. But my panic had caused the shield to fail, and the chaos in the air from the fight worsened the local dissonance, and it was crashing down on me, my head pounding, and I struggled for every breath.

I don’t know how it happened. I less than ten seconds, I went from cocky to fearing death. It was all I could see coming for me. My mind was scattered, thoughts running from family to the princesses to what I had planned to make for dinner that day. My magic bucked and shifted, somehow moving into that focused state, yet one that was focused outward rather than inward. I could feel the vines pressing on me, not just physically, but through my magic touching it.

It was filthy. Slimy. Like being millimetres away from electrified befouled bog water. Out of place. I wanted to recoil from it, but it had me.

“Calie’s in trouble!” I heard someone faintly over the buzz of my magic and the dissonant aura it clashed against. My vision shifted to that pseudomagic sight, the darkness shifting to strange colours and forms that I really didn’t have time to try and make sense of. It was hurting my eyes and edging into epileptic seizure territory on top of everything.

“No!” The voice rang with a magic I recognized. Something changed. The chaos I was seeing suddenly calmed, like a rushing stream dammed off, the surging colours stabilizing into natural and somehow background greens and yellows, though streaks of wild colour still lances through it. Something caught my free hand and held on. Still panicking, I shot it a glance.

From my prone position, it loomed over me. It was equine in shape, but I was seeing and hearing the magic in its being and voice as it spoke, and I know it. Hell, you could argue I knew that magic intimately. I did, well, steal some of it just a couple hours before and mesh it into my own. Lyra’s form wasn’t the green of her coat, but a soft, somewhat translucent and faded gold of her magic and eyes, a network of sharp gold coursing through it, pooling in her eyes glowing like the soft lights parents leave out for their children, a shaft of brilliant gold marking her horn.

“You can’t have him.” Her voice and magic thrummed together and her gold magic danced through the air, darting towards the vines binding me. They looked at bad as they felt. Like crappy CGI from the seventies in an HD movie. Or an awesome HD effect in a crappy CGI movie from the seventies? My mind was muddled and fuzzy. Her magic was like a crisp clear sound in the chaos, like a power stringed solo that would have been fit for any top orchestra.

The vines were suddenly caught in spasms and ruptured, their sap spraying over me, spattering both the fluid and the vile magic. Lyra yelled, screamed, sang. I don’t know. Maybe all at once, and launched herself into the fight once more I really wished I had the time to watch her skills a bit more, but I was still trying to recover, to get the vile sap off me and staggering back onto my feet so I could take advantage of reach and the slight edge being a biped afforded. I probably wouldn’t even have made it if it wasn’t for Spike.

Twilight and the guard’s magic hadn’t slacked. Lyra had gone full power on the vines. Spike did as well.

Spike was a beast. Pausing for a moment to make sure I didn't collapse, he charged in. Green and purple churned in a complex cage or network of minute deep purple and silver-black magic strands like chainmail as I watched him, his natural magic a roar that I had no trouble translating as dragon, even as much as it sang out of his youth. Was that was a dragon looked like to this new... magic sight/hearing?

He had been using his fire breath sparingly. It was, technically, a finite resource, and he didn’t want to strain himself and be unable to use it if and when we really needed it, nor did he want to set the place on fire. He didn’t need it. He had claws and a tail that could dig through dig with little effort. His jaws and teeth treated gems like candy. His scales could withstand both intense pressure and heat and he apparently belly flopped into a pool of lava from the high board once.

The vines didn’t stand a chance. The battle ended soon after. As I regained my breath, I could feel the vile magic on and around me, and my own magic swallowing it, soundly slightly like cries of indignation and faint traces of sunshine and moonlight. I grabbed my stick once more, and brought it down on any vine I could reach that still moved.

I didn’t have much more of a role to play at that moment, but I watched the others. Lyra hit the vines with her spell/cry, causing them to pop like balloons. Pinkie, a shining form of pink with blue and yellow within, darted about the place, snuffing out traces of the out of place vile magic with snare drum-like hoofsteps. Apple Jack was golden orange and red, radiating a soft deep feeling and tone that the ground responded to, like a slow heart beat, as if the earth itself was responded to her, though lethargic.

Rainbow hurt to look at. She seem to be wrapped in a spectrum of colours that sliced through the dissonance in the air with her quick moments, the vines seeming to be stunned when she hit them, each blow disrupting the magic pumping inside them, a wild beat hidden under that cloak of colours. The unicorns were like Lyra. Forms of purple, peach and pale blue with pillars of brilliant versions of the same colour on their heads, their magic singing strong and loud; Simple pitched notes for the rays Twilight and the guard launched, the familiar sounds of the levitation spell, though the more complicated sounds of it’s workings lost, coming from Rarity. Spike was like a fireplace, flames and popping stones.

The steady drums of the earth, the wild rushing voice of the sky, the rhythmic patterns of magic itself, and the crackling flame and mineral. The small battle field was filled with the sounds of the three tribes, native magic fighting the invader. The last of my energy was fading as I realized what was missing. Two voices. This close to unconsciousness, without the regular mess of thoughts, instinct and impulse could identify the magic signatures I had unconsciously been sensing every time I met these ponies as easily as I could with my normal eyes.

Two were missing. I struggled to keep myself upright, leaning on the staff. Where were they? My awareness opened again and even against the jarring dissonance of the background that rattled my bones, I could feel them. Lyra and Spike noticed something was off with me and came over. I could make out their mouths moving, but I couldn’t here them, my focus elsewhere even as my mind started shutting down as my magic strained.

AJ’s sombre and steady beat that was stable like the soil and vibrant like a plant in bloom, Pinkie’s wild somehow sustained crescendo backed by a more uncertain rapping, Lyra’s strings and tingles, The unicorn guard who’s name I really should learn like a blossom with a soft hymn, Rarity’s gentle hum that accented itself, Rainbow’s wild and racing stanza, Twilight’s peppery yet well modulated recital. Two were missing.

Twilight joined them, the pillar of purple light that was her own pulsing in different shades as her magic quickly sang out something I couldn’t recognize and my own weakly resisted. Lyra was beside her, the golden pillar on her head strobing, my magic, once connected with hers, faintly trembling in response. Pinkie was behind me, her snare beat rapping out concern, AJ and RD lingering and watching, yet they didn’t seem to notice either. My head still spun, I could feel the tang and tingle of Lyra’s touch on my chest, the warmth and spice of Twilight on my head. But they were missing the important thing.

My consciousness gave up and the blackness crashing in, bringing silence with it, though one thought was the last to fade. Fluttershy... the other guard... where were they

Comments

[Seirs]

Dang it. I never got a notice a new chapter was out.

A nice update. I'm really glad I went looking through my favorites or I might not have seen the new chapter.