Cyclosa

by NorrisThePony

The Trading Cluster

i

I awoke to cold, and saw that despite the darkness of night, the sun and not the moon was poking its way through both a hole in the clouds high above and the ceiling of moldy boards before me. It would seem Discord had been exercising his control over the celestial bodies to some ridiculous extreme, although the difference was merely aesthetic. Most ponies did not quite know what had brought about such a strange shift in the draconequus’ behaviour; normally he seemed content to keep his chaos limited to his immediate surroundings. I had some vaguely selfish, inkling suspicion that the recent silence on the subject of Erisia’s “Alicorn Hunt” had something to do with his restlessness.

Luna was still asleep, curled into a ball and with her blanket scattered haphazardly about, kicked away by some vividly active dream—a good one it seemed, judging from the small grin she was wearing. I couldn’t help but smile myself as I delicately rose from beside her. I gingerly crept my way up until I was first sitting and then standing, and then I left the raggy cot that we had been sharing behind.

Rotten boards—perhaps from some airship or fishing boat—were still contained within the small indent in the wall of the single-room building, but they had refused to catch fire as the others had done, thus flooding the room in a frigid cold several hours earlier than I’d intended. Even as I removed them from the fireplace in my telekinesis I could feel the moisture within the wood, and let out a disappointed sigh. I’d done my best to keep the wood we had found amongst the scrap dry from the storm, but Discord’s rapidly changing weather made it increasingly difficult to do so. I would set them out to dry in a blistering summer heat, and awake to find them soaked with melting February snow.

I found a few dry logs and placed them in the fire, and then I removed the lid off of the musty glass jar Luna had found amongst the other garbage in the scrapyard. Encased within were several papers from the weeks past, the sad few bits of news that actually made it to the tiny, isolated trading cluster. I stopped for a brief moment to gaze upon the headlines, not surprised in the slightest by the titles for I had read them many times before. The bold text proudly screamed to me lying headlines like: “Search for Alicorn Extremist Still At Large!” or “Alicorn Runaway Murders Earth Pony Couple In Fiery Airship Disaster!”

I would enjoy—as I had every time I’d lit a fire in the weeks prior—watching the front page sketched depiction of myself curl and wither into ash. At the bottom of the jar I found a single unlit match—my last one, I noted sadly—and used it to ignite the newspapers I had tucked underneath the firewood.

With the fire lit and it’s heat sweeping through our hasty shelter, I grabbed my heavy jacket from the nail on which it hung, with my intention being to make a clean escape without Luna waking. I tiptoed towards the gaping tear in the wooden flesh of the derelict airship gondola and slipped out into the midnight, sunlit darkness of the scrapyard. Luna did not stir.

I emerged into the cold, the entire world being assaulted by snow. Through its swirling midst, I could still make out the tall mountains to the East, standing like giants overlooking the insignificant trading cluster below.

Eight weeks. Eight weeks since the Damask Rose had exploded in flame.

These weeks had crawled by agonizingly slow. The trading cluster (an unnamed settlement known simply as Cluster 13, built between two mountain passages to the North and East) became Luna and my temporary home; I was unwilling to wager our lives on an airship as passengers once again, but without an airship of our own we were as good as stranded.

Luna and I lived off muddy rainwater and rodents we found scuttling across the discarded scrap. It was hardly pleasant, but it kept us alive and we had been conditioned not to ask for a whole lot else.

The stretch between Cluster 13 and the nearest actual settlement was too far to walk with Luna without preparation, but it was not my intent to walk this distance at all.

I was going to steal an airship. A small, vulnerable one, that would not be missed too dearly.

Yet small and vulnerable airships were not often seen in Cluster 13—Discord’s sporadic weather had made flying an unwelcome activity—and as such I was forced to revise my plan. Instead of waiting for a small airship to appear, I would attempt to repair one of the many left to the snow. I’d done it before in Cyclosa, and for myself and Luna, I could do it again.

Luna had not taken a liking my plan at all. She had insisted that stealing was wrong, especially with something as large and expensive as an airship. After what she had seen with the Damask Rose, and her clear and evident disgust at the apathy I had expressed, it had only served to further disintegrate the illusion she had always carried that I was a good and caring pony.

I trotted my way from the scrapyard into Cluster 13 proper. The settlement itself was nothing particularly impressive, a few tent-like-houses, and many grounded airships.

One of them, the Sisyphys, was hovering several feet off the ground. I smiled a little at the sight of the familiar ship. Obviously it wasn’t mine, but I had spent so much time working on it that it almost felt as though it was. Her history was a mystery to me, all I knew was that her original owners had vanished and the ship itself was making no flights any time soon.

The Sisyphys resembled a giant goldfish, with its crimson red balloon arching into an enormous fish-like tail fin. I’d done my best to repair the holes in the balloon, but it still evidently sagged in places. The electrical wiring was another problem that I had yet to remedy; the small gondola bolted directly to the balloon had no working running lights, and the propellers had a lottery’s chance of activating.

Still, as pathetic as it was, the ship was the product of my work, and I was proud of it—although certainly not proud enough to bet my life on it with the prospect of flight.

The Sisyphys was berthed alongside a few other airships that easily tripled it in size. The little goldfish was nestled beside the immense whales that were transport ships, each with a dozen propellers to the Sisyphys’s two.

Beside the airships was a cheery looking tavern. Warm light beckoned to me through the darkness of the black sun overhead, the lines of glass windows against the shockingly well built building considering the decrepit nature of its surroundings. On some nights, I would be able to hear the sound of boisterous jubilation from within, but now the stillness of the early morning seemed uninterrupted by any drunken stupor.

And yet when I pushed to door to the tavern open and made my way into the familiar building, I saw that it was populated nonetheless. About half a dozen ponies beyond myself were also there; none of them sitting alone but not all sitting together. The barkeep traced my own path to an isolated booth and nodded to acknowledge my presence. It was to be a lonely one once again.

“The usual, Solana?” she asked as she trotted over to the booth I had sat down at. I didn’t know her name and I didn’t really remember how she knew mine, but I was just thankful she didn’t care enough to dig into my story any further.

“Actually I’ll just have a...” I started, and then cursed when I forget the very name of the thing I wanted. “Y’know, that imported stuff from Griffonstone?”

“Coffee?” she guessed.

“Yeah, yeah. Coffee.” It had been bitter and dreadful, but it had also been different. A illegally imported relic from a city that did not exist on a map and may as well not have existed at all in the eyes of the average fool complacent to Discord’s rule.

“Are you gonna be paying for it this time?” she ventured.

I reached into my saddlebag and dropped my coinpurse onto the table with a sheepish smile. She nodded without breaking her stern expression and left to get me my coffee.

As I sat waiting, I found my mind wandering—as it so typically did—towards the other ponies around me. I knew some of them were watching me with curiosity, but many of them had grown quite used to the lonely cloaked unicorn mare, and knew better than to disturb her.

It was when I first started frequenting the tavern that I found out I was seen by stallions as a relatively attractive young mare, and it was also on that same occasion that I taught them that when I stated that I would prefer to be alone, I truly meant it. I broke one stallion’s nose and then was kicked out of the tavern by the same barkeep that was preparing my coffee.

Ever since that occasion, though, most ponies knew to leave me alone.

The barkeep, I think, knew that Solana was not my true name, and that my story about being a repair technician on a cargo ship shot down by raiders was a silly fabrication. Word of “Celestia the Alicorn” had not simply blown into Cluster 13, it had swept through it like a tempest. Erisian Scoutships had descended around the pathetic trading cluster like vultures to a corpse, and Luna and I had been forced to stay in hiding underneath piles of scrap for the better part of a week. And when their search turned up nothing in the settlement, the assumption they produced was that I had perished with the Roses in the fiery inferno that their ship had become.

Still, they continued to search. And yet the barkeep did not say anything to tip them off. I respected her greatly for that, even if I did not express it with my inability to pay for the bottles of mead I drowned myself in.

More importantly, she did not object to me working on the Sisyphys, choosing instead to turn a blind eye to my morally grey actions.

“Mind if I sit?” A stallion’s voice jerked me from my reverie. I darted my attention upwards and met his eyes… he was several years older than me, although surely no more than five. He had a grey coat and long black mane, and was peering at me with wide green eyes. He was, admittedly, quite a handsome stallion.

“As a matter of fact, I do mind,” I replied without hesitation. “Sorry pal. Not interested.”

“You sure about that, Celestia?”

I nearly started at the mention of my name—my actual name—but knew better than to express my shock. Instead, I locked eyes with him, glaring for several seconds, and let out a grunt like some feral animal.

“Fine. Sit down,” I growled through clenched teeth, motioning at the booth across from me. I knew I was in deep trouble the moment my name was dropped, but I also knew that to make a scene out of it would not help. “An Erisian Royal Guard, or a bounty hunter?”

“Curious stallion,” he replied, sitting. “Nothing more.”

“Name?”

“Is it important?”

“Discord knows it is for me.”

“Well. Aren’t you the charmer, Celestia.”

He grinned innocently and extended a hoof, as if expecting me to shake it. Like doing so was some rite of passage I’d need to fulfill in order to hear his name.

Instead, I bared my teeth and scowled.

“Stop calling me that!” I barked. In the corner of my eye, I could see the barkeep looking at me warily. From last time, she knew that me sitting with anypony other than myself usually meant something was wrong. “Listen, pal. I don’t want any trouble, but if you don’t leave me alone—”

“With respect, Celestia, if I so much as raise my voice and scream the word “alicorn,” then there will be trouble. So just settle down.”

“What do you want from me?” I asked, my brain a swirl of activity as I analyzed my situation. If things escalated… if this stallion truly followed up with his threat (which he was in no position to be frightened of doing) then I was good as dead.

I could only imagine what terrible things he wanted from me, with the knowledge that I was in no position to refuse.

“So it’s true what they say about you, huh?” he drawled. “You’re an alicorn?”

“Yes.” I said, with plenty of malice lining the one sharply spoken word.

“Your wings,” he said simply. “Can I see them?”

“In here? How dense are you?” I snarled. “Just take my word, or else get lost.”

“There’s really no need to be so rude, Celestia.”

“You’re threatening me. My life's in danger just by talking to you. I think there is.”

He was about to speak, but the sudden presence of the barkeep bringing me my coffee was enough to flood him into silence. She looked at me and I met her eyes with clear desperation, but there was nothing she could do.

She probably knew exactly why I had not simply told this stallion off already.

Yet instead of intervening, she set down my coffee, returned my desperate look with a sullen frown, and left us alone once again.

“She knows, too.” The stallion said, the moment she was out of earshot. “About your secret.”

At that moment, and for some strange reason I cannot explain, I felt more frightened than I had ever felt before. Even when I had been sprinting for my life while being chased by the guards in Cyclosa, it had been a logical fear. One that motivated my actions and drove me forwards. This was a different fear entirely.

What sickened me further, however, was how selfish my fear had become. When I look back at that moment, I remember no amount of concern being directed at anypony other than myself. It was as if I had forgotten Luna had existed at all.

“Please don’t do this,” I heard myself saying, as if I were listening to my own voice speaking to me through a long tube. I hated myself, I hated the words I was saying and the cowardly tone I was speaking them in.

“Relax, kid. I just want to ask you about your wings. How you got them, and why.”

“I don’t know,” I replied instantly. “Honestly. I went to sleep one day, the next morning I’ve got two wings on my back. Didn’t want them, didn’t ask for them, would give them away in a heartbeat.”

“So you fled.”

“Well yeah. No shit,” I said, and laughed awkwardly, the sound coming out as more of a demented squawk.

“So you don’t know where your wings came from?” he asked, sounding quite disappointed.

“No. I know that sounds ridiculous, but it’s true,” I replied. “I’d give you mine if I could, pal.”

“Celestia.” he said, adding a bit of volume to my name. This time, I knew for a fact that he had done it intentionally. “I don’t want any harm to come to you, but you’re really giving me no choice.”

“I’m telling you the truth. I don’t know.”

“You parents were alicorns, weren’t they?” he ventured. I shook my head. “Just your mother then? Father?”

“Let me make one thing perfectly clear,” I said, no longer afraid, indeed quite furious by contrast. “My mother and father are nothing. To Equestria, and to me. I’ve been alone my whole life, and I only made it a full-time gig when my parents decided a winged unicorn was the last thing they wanted to be the proud mother and father of.”

“So, where do you get your stunning good looks from, then?”

“Is… is that what you want from me?” I gawked. “Are you out of your mind?”

He shrugged.

“Eh. Not every day you meet a pretty young mare who also happens to be an alicorn. Worth a shot.”

“Yeah, I suppose it isn’t,” I replied, not paying much attention. “And sorry. No. Not interested. You seem decent enough to let it go at that, so please don’t prove me wrong.”

“You’re worth a couple thousand bits, you know,” he mentioned almost casually, as if it were a passing point of interest.

“Yeah. I am,” I replied calmly. “Of course, I can also buy you a drink instead. Worth considerably less, but wouldn’t you much prefer that then letting such a ‘stunning’ mare get hurt?”

He looked stunned by my demeanor the moment he realized I was being fully serious.

“Did you really kill that Earth Pony couple?” he asked, referencing the Roses without bothering to connect the awkwardly phrased question to the rest of the conversation.

“Yes,” I lied. “They shouldn’t have put me in a position where I had no choice. And trust me… neither should you.”

“I have no intention of doing so.”

“Then what exactly do you want from me?”

“First of all, I want to offer you some advice,” he said, his playful demeanor evaporating in a moment. “Quit being stupid. Wandering into taverns and becoming a regular… are you nuts? You’re Erisia’s last hope for peace, don’t end up dead because of some bounty-hunter in a tavern.”

“Duly noted,” I rolled my eyes. “Not keen on Discord’s rule, I take it?”

“Not the sort of thing a stallion goes screaming out, but no, I’m not. That’s why I’m pleased to meet you.”

“Yeah?” I said, and snorted rudely. “Then you’re delusional. I couldn’t care less about Discord’s rule.”

“You’re a liar,” he replied shortly.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” He narrowed his eyes. “Listen to me, Celestia. You’re more than just a slum-rat without a destiny. And I know that you despise Discord. Don’t let him win.”

“What did I say about calling me—” I began, and then sighed and shook my head. “Ah, forget it. So is that all you want from me? To tell me some cryptic nonsense about destiny? You think you’re some kind of sage? Who are you, anyways?”

“Let’s just say I’m a stallion who shares an ‘anti-Discord’ common interest with you. Are you travelling north, Celestia?”

“No,” I lied instantly. “East. Griffon Kingdom.”

“You’re lying again, Celestia. First of all, it’s Griffon Empire. Not Kingdom. And the Griffon Empire is to the West. And they kill ponies on sight anyways, so you’d have a piss-poor chance of surviving.”

I said nothing, and took an angry drink of coffee.

“Have you heard of the Crystal Ponies before?” He asked. I said nothing and shook my head.

“Then I suppose that means we’re doing our job properly, ” he shrugged. “Well if you do end up going north, you’re always welcome with the Crystal Ponies. You’re somewhat of a legend amongst us.”

“Yeah? How can I expect to find your little alicorn fanclub?”

“You can expect us to find you.”

“There you go, speaking like a sage again. Sorry, but I’m really not impressed or whatever.”

“Fine, fine,” he said, and rolled his eyes. “I’ll introduce you to the Crystal Ponies when we meet again in the Frozen North. I imagine that then, you would be impressed.”

“You… knew I would be here,” I said, ignoring his boasting. “How did you find me?”

“Another answer for another day,” he replied. “But I’m not the only one, either. I’d bet Discord’s been watching you for awhile. And just so you know, an Erisian Scoutship is enroute towards you. Straight out of Stormsborough. If you’re gonna steal an airship, you’d better do it now.”

I tensed a little, but recovered in an instant and narrowed my eyes. The stallion echoed my response and narrowed his own eyes, evidently quite finished with my snarkiness. “And trust me, Celestia, they’ll make those earth ponies look like sweet old matriarchs.”

I remained silent, stirring my coffee passively.

“I’m giving you a warning,” he continued. “You’re lucky I want to help you, because if I was them, you’d already be lying face first in your coffee with a knife in your back. I suggest that you keep the ponies who care about you close. They are out there. You belong with us in the Frozen North.”

“I travel alone,” I replied firmly. “But thanks anyways.”

“Understood,” he nodded, and then, rising, outstretched a hoof. “Good luck, Celestia. I sincerely hope we meet again.”

“Never did get your name,” I replied, ignoring his outstretched hoof but giving him an enigmatic smile all the same.

“Yeah, you deserve to know it. Sombra, at your service.”

I finally took his hoof and gave it a shake, without bothering to get up. “Sombra. I’ll try to remember that name, in case we really do meet again.”

“You owe me a drink, after all,” he teased. “Good luck, Celestia.”

Where are you going? I felt like asking, although he turned and left before I had the chance. I had seen no airship besides the huge transports, and I didn’t really think for a moment that he was the sort of character who would be serving on one.

Instead, I watched him trot his way out of the tavern and into the snowy shipyard outside. The wind slammed the door behind him, and he vanished from sight.

I sighed and turned my attention back to my mug of coffee with a little chuckle. I sat alone in introspective silence through the growing midnight darkness, although a clock on the wall told me it was the middle of the afternoon—Discord still had not allowed the celestial bodies to resume their natural progression.

The odd stallion’s claims about the Erisian Scoutships reverberated through my mind at random points as I stood sipping my cooling coffee. Surely he was mad, but still his warning resonated with me despite what logic dictated.

Eventually, curiosity got the better of me and bled into concern. I rose from the booth and collected my coat. I withdrew from it my coinpurse, removing two silver pieces and slamming them onto my table as I left.

ii

It came as a subtle sound carried on the wings of the blowing winds, nearly drowned out by my hooves crunching through the snow. A droning sound, like humming machinery.

I heard it before I saw it, but I recognized the sound in an instant all the same. I strained my ears to listen closer, and felt my blood curdle as they confirmed what I desperately hoped I had not heard.

Airship propellers.

I stood like a fool in the snow, staring in the direction of the sound. The wind that had saved my life tugged at my unbuckled coat, sending shivers into my unkempt wings, and I could not manage to force my hooves into action to bring me home.

They were coming, after all. Sombra had been telling the truth. He hadn’t been a mad stallion after all, rather, I had been the stupid one. I hadn’t even come up with a plan.

Or rather, I had—the Sisyphys. It was my only chance, now. It had been my plan from the beginning, but the ship could barely stay afloat, let alone outrun an Erisian Scoutship.

I cleared the remaining distance to our temporary home in record time.

“Get up!” I barked, violently throwing Luna’s heavy cloak at her sleeping form the moment I was inside the warm derelict gondola.

“What’s going on?” she grumbled.

“I… screwed up. We’ve gotta go.”

“What happened…?” Luna said through a yawn, wiping the sleep out of her eyes.

“Get up!” I shrilled loudly in response. “Do as you’re told, Luna!”

In a terrified frenzy she stumbled onto her hooves and into her cloak. Already I was stuffing as many of our gathered articles as I could fit into the pockets of my own cloak; wet matches and rusty knives and empty cans, anything that would come in handy if we became stranded yet again.

I had no doubt in my mind that we would be. The pile of scrap that was the Sisyphys would not be getting us far.

“Did you find a ship?” Luna guessed shyly, evidently frightened I was going to snap at her again. I had never permitted her to leave the scrapyard and venture into Cluster 13 proper, nor did I tell her anything about the Sisyphys.

“You could say that,” I replied, softly this time, less out of guilt and more out of fear of my voice carrying across the scrapyard. I wasn’t about to repeat what Sombra had told me. He was an insane old nutcase, and Luna had already gotten too excited at the prospect of her possessing any sort of destiny when we had dreamed that odd dual-dream in Pillory.

Fly north. It was simple. Tangible. Like birds migrating. We didn’t need to do anything more. I repeated it over and over in my mind, like a war cry.

Steal an airship, fly north. Steal an airship, fly north. Steal an airship, fly north.

The promises of some distant glorious sunrise (or, moonrise, as Discord’s present chaos seemed to demand) were thankfully not yet lingering on the cool early morning sky when I led the way out of our temporary home for the last time.

Thanks to my panicked rushing, it had taken all of ten minutes for me to rush back home to Luna and make it back to the tavern. The lights of the incoming Scoutship were now visible as a pinprick on the horizon, like blinding stars splitting through the swirling snow. They must have had searchlights, sweeping across the wastelands below and seeking out ponies attempting to flee Cluster 13 by hoof.

The barkeep was watching us as we trotted from the depths of the scrapyard. She was wearing a vibrant red scarf as if to conceal her identity, but I recognized her from her stronger build all the same. Her focus was evidently drawn more towards Luna than it was the arrogant young mare who got into fights in her bar on bad days and refused to pay for her drinks on good ones.

Against my own common sense, I trotted towards her first instead of darting for the Sisyphys.

“So, you must be Celestia’s sister, huh?” She ignored me and immediately greeted Luna instead, lowering her scarf. For the first time, I saw her smile; a cautious affair probably reserved exclusively for innocent little fillies and colts. It looked akin to attempting to smile after reading an instructional book on the concept of joy. A book without illustrations.

“Yep!” Luna smiled back. “I’m Luna!”

“Pleased to meet you, Luna,” she trained her smile on my sister for all of a second, before turning her attention to me, her usual cold glare returning. She pointed to the approaching airship without speaking. “You need not worry, alicorn. I’m not gonna rat you out or anything. I’ve got no idea why, other than that I hate Discord more than I hate you.”

“Thanks,” I nodded. “I appreciate everything. Truly.”

“Can’t say you deserve it,” she replied. “Get moving, before you cause me any trouble.”

“Right. Come on, Luna.”

We made our way towards the gondola. Luna gasped in wonderment as she beheld the whole thing before her, evidently looking beyond its clear imperfections to instead focus on its strange and intriguing design.

“Thank you,” I turned towards the barkeep again, casting one quick farewell glance back.

“I don’t really feel comfortable accepting thanks from an alicorn, all things considered,” she replied dryly. Like everypony else, she spoke the word like it was an insult, but ironically I felt rather complimented that she saw me as a freak but still insisted on helping me. It was refreshing to know that behind illogical fear was equine morality, and that the latter was still stronger than the former.

I nodded humbly and turned back to the airship. Luna was already analyzing it curiously, but she sprung into action the moment I started up the gangplank into the gondola proper. Only one flimsy mooring line had been attached, and with our sudden weight the ship shifted dangerously as we clambered into the gondola.

Two battered seats faced a musty window that stretched across the majority of the forefront of the ship. The control panel was nearly identical to the quick glimpses I could recall of the Damask Rose, although the Sisyphys had a relatively simple steering column by comparison; it was less a full wheel and more like half of one, without any spokes.

I wasted no time in sitting in the seat facing the steering column, and Luna leaped gleefully onto the passenger seat beside me.

Starting the Sisyphys was a troublesome affair, but the initial step was as simple as the flip of several switches. A few lights on the control panel flickered to life with a warm glow cutting through the cold cabin air.

“This is really happening!” Luna gasped merrily, forgetting for a moment to wonder why it was happening. She looked as though she had the urge to flip every single switch and throw every single lever on the control panel, but instead she stood back and regarded me with implicit curiosity.

“Yep.” I said after a short lull. Surely I’d seemed considerably less enthused, my cloudy gaze locked on the ship coming at us on the horizon.

“What’s going on, Celly?” Luna sighed, detecting my troubled tone. “Why now? Why didn’t you tell me about any of this?”

“Luna… I’ve been working on this ship for a few weeks now,” I explained. “She’s not really ready to fly, but I don’t have a choice.”

I outstretched a hoof in the direction of the speck of brightening light approaching us.

“That light there? You see it?”

“A star…” she breathed.

I laughed rudely, without humour. “No. Not a star. A ship. An Erisian Scoutship.”

Luna’s eyes widened. Wordlessly, she leaned over the control panel and peered through the musty glass at the approaching light, although her own uneasy breathing instantly clouded the glass anyways.

“So listen, Luna,” I forcefully reached forward and turned her around. I could not afford her mistaking my instructions. “We need to escape now. Problem is, this piece of junk’s electrical wiring is shit, and the props won’t start. So we have to improvise.”

Luna said nothing, but nodded slowly.

“There’s a strong wind. It’ll take us South, but it’s better than nothing.”

“What about out running that Scoutship? Didn’t you say those things are super fast?”

“Yeah… with their engines. That’s why when they land, I’m gonna sneak over and sabotage them.”

“But they’ll see you!”

“Possibly. But we don’t really have a plan B.”

In sullen silence we sat as the ship formed out of the blinding star on the horizon, it’s black balloon and freshly painted white gondola gaining shape. I saw venting gas swirl and dance through the wind and snow as she shed altitude. We could only watch for so long before I commanded Luna to follow me as we hid underneath the control panel instead of exposing ourselves from the wide front window. A few flicks of the switches and the glow of the instrument panel dimmed and died.

Still, I listened closely as the frequency of the engines shifted in pitch as they slowed, descending from a healthy hum to a sickly warble, and then cutting out completely. I heard gangplanks open, then close again, and I knew it was time to make my move.

I found my set of tools in the dark underneath the control panel, and threw the bag across my back as I darted into action.

“Luna, stay hidden no matter what happens, alright?” I said, pausing as I tiptoed to the back of the ship.

“Hurry back, Celestia,” came Luna’s simple reply as I eased our own gangplank open and tiptoed into the swirling snow and surrounding shadows.

iii

The Scoutship was even larger up close.

Seeing nopony around, I wasted no time trotting over to the exposed engine car jutting off the side of the gondola. I knew from my work on the Sisyphys exactly what I was doing, and with my familiar tools I made quick work of the maintenance panel, revealing the intricate system of wiring inside.

I gutted the thing quickly with a rusted knife, enough that I knew it would take a little time and effort to repair. There would be no way I could actually permanently harm the engine with what little time and resources I had, but it would be enough to allow me the time I needed to flee the trading cluster.

Coiling the snapped wires up, I tossed it as far as I could manage into the freshly falling snow. Then, I rose to my shaking hooves, ready to canter back to the Sisyphys.

Before I could, however, a sudden feeling of sharp cold split through me as something distinctly metal was pressed almost gently to the back of my neck. I knew without looking that it was a blade, and the feeling of my blood already gently trickling further confirmed what I desperately did not want to know.

“Don’t move, alicorn.”

It was a deep voice, although it sounded less like a natural one and more like some stallion trying to sound more frightening than he was. I knew without turning that it was a guard.

Despite his orders for me to remain motionless, the guard wasted no time in grasping me by a heavy bundle of my mane and flinging me back in the direction of the Scoutship gondola.

My head struck first, and I fell without grace into the snow. I flinched and tried to scuttle backwards, only succeeding in colliding with the hard surface of the gondola once more. My head was still throbbing the whole while, sending rhythmic courses of pain through me as my vision struggled to focus on the stallion attacking me.

I felt another sudden burst of metallic cold, this time around my horn, as something was forcibly placed onto it. Instantly I was snarling in fury and pain as I felt this strange object split into my magic flow, so that every spell I tried to cast resulted in a splitting headache.

“Celestia the Alicorn,” I heard somepony say, although with the object tearing my magic and thoughts apart it sounded like it was coming through a funnel.

I replied with profanity, which despite nearly screaming I could not hear myself speak. The guard replied not with words but by using what I could only presume to be the shaft of a spear to harshly strike my forehead, sending me sprawling down into the snow once more.

I stood gasping for air, whirling around in a frenzy, trying to recover even for a moment so that I could at least get a good view of my attackers. Every time I managed to rise, I was promptly beaten back down. Even with my head throbbing in pain and my world a blur I could feel the trickle of blood down my sides and from a gash underneath my left ear, the blood seeping down my face. I was merely thankful he had not hit my eye with the shaft of the spear instead.

Amidst the panic, Sombra’s warning suddenly rung clear. These guards weren’t like the Roses. They would be satisfied simply dragging my corpse to Discord.

Had they not taken me by surprise, I imagined I could have taken them, although even I knew it to be a wishful internal boast considering they had weapons and I did not.

I snarled like a caged animal as my mane was pulled again, and I was jerked to my hooves to face an Erisian guard who, to my surprise and indignation, looked younger than me. And furthermore, he was wearing a jubilant grin that went beyond sheer satisfaction and ventured into the realm of enjoyment.

I swallowed and stared right back, keeping my eyes narrowed and my terror buried deep. Slowly the device on my horn ceased it’s painful throbbing (or perhaps I’d simply grown used to it), and I allowed my mind to calm from animalistic survival instincts and return to rational thoughts.

The guard looked at me quizzically for several more seconds, before hitting me with an armoured hoof once more, sending me crashing back down into the snow which was quickly becoming red with my own blood.

“Stop it!” Another voice rung out, somewhere between scolding and pleading. Distinctly a mare, and not sounding a whole lot older than myself. “What are you hitting her for?”

“You saw the way she was looking at me! Alicorns like her deserve a whole lot worse.”

“Well, she wasn’t doing anything. Can we try to be civil about this?”

I stumbled to my hooves once again, hoping to whatever was above that the hotheaded little snot-nosed savage of a stallion didn’t strike me back down again. Fortunately, the mare who had intervened seemed to quell his unjustified violence, allowing me to finally analyze them closer.

They were both Erisian guards, although despite being younger the stallion seemed to be the authority. He was wearing a helmet with horns from a minotaur, and extravagant looking armour compared to the armour that the mare was wearing, although I saw as my vision focused that she had been wielding the sword that had first stopped me dead in my tracks. They were both unicorns.

With surprise, I recognized the mare as one who had owned a stand in the marketplace of Cyclosa. She had disappeared not long after I had started working in the scrapyard, although I had never found out where to or what her name had even been. I did not exactly have any ponies who I could have asked.

“She sure is quiet,” The mare observed, earning a chuckle from her partner. “Hey, alicorn! Tell us your name.”

“Celestia,” I said simply, looking down at my hooves dug into the reddening snow. “My name is Celestia.”

“From Cyclosa?”

“Yeah. From Cyclosa.”

“Told you,” The stallion took a step forwards, wordlessly grasping the mare’s sword in his own telekinesis. He brought it down towards me, and when I instinctively moved to back away he scowled and used the sword to cut the twine of my cloak. It fell away, my wings catching the howling wind and instantly unfurling.

“Told you,” The stallion said again, giving the mare her sword back. “Celestia, the scrapyard alicorn from Cyclosa.”

“Can we hurry up and take her inside the ship?” The mare groaned, beating the snow with a hoof impatiently. “It’s cold out here!”

The guard in the horned helmet rolled his eyes, but nodded. Before I could react, he had grasped me by my mane again and begun walking towards the opened gangpank of the Scoutship.

“Y’know, I’m capable of walking!” I snarled, trying and failing to wrench myself free. The guards ignored my protest as we mounted the gangplank and entered the ship, and the stallion rudely pushed me the remainder of the distance inside the moment he could.

I hit the metal floor of the ship, and before I could recover back onto my feet I heard the gangplank slam shut again.

I stumbled up, backing away instinctively from the guards. We were both silent for almost a minute, almost calmly examining each other. I took the time to analyze my surroundings, too, although I felt no increase in confidence as I looked about and realized the guards were standing in front of the only route of escape.

The first true sentence I spoke to them was—at the loss of my pride—a shakily asked question.

“Are you going to kill me?”

“That depends on what you tell us, alicorn,” The stallion responded. It seemed as though he would be doing most of the talking.

“Not sure what I can tell you that you don’t already know.”

“Why don’t you start from the top? You’re from Cyclosa?”

“Yeah. I was a scrapper there,” I said.

“Slave work?” The stallion guessed.

“Only for the first year. They started paying me during my second.”

“And how long did you work in the scrapyard? A few years?”

“Yeah. Since I was a filly.”

Both guards shared a surprised glance, as if having an intense and silent conversation, and finally the mare piped up.

“Since you were a filly?” she repeated.

“Twelve,” I elaborated, although the moment I opened my mouth I realized the reason for their confusion. “I wasn’t an alicorn then. My wings grew in not long after I turned eighteen. A year ago.”

“So you weren’t born an alicorn?”

“Obviously,” I snorted. “You really think I managed to stay hidden in a city like Cyclosa for eighteen years?”

Both said nothing in response. I tapped a hoof on the metal flooring impatiently as the silence stretched on. It did not take long for the creeping tenseness of the situation to grow maddening.

“Is that all you want to hear?” I finally asked. As much as it did not affect me, these guards knowing about my pathetic fillyhood was hardly bolstering for my pride. “Are you going to cut off my wings and send me off with a slap on my hoof, or what?”

“What about your sister?” The stallion asked calmly, once more ignoring me completely. I could hardly believe that this was the same stallion who had been beating me merely for enjoyment a moment ago, for he seemed completely unimpacted by my sarcastic remarks now.

And that was to say nothing of the question that he asked… for a moment I felt my throat catch and my mind reel in fright. Then, equally as calm as my opposition before me, I quelled my emotions and looked them straight in the eye as I replied.

“My sister is dead,” I said flatly.

There was no hesitation on the part of the stallion. He leaned forwards and brought an armoured hoof sideways across my muzzle. I was dazed for a moment as I felt blood trickle from my freshly broken nose.

“You’ll get that every time you lie to us, alicorn,” he seethed with a grin. “Now, where is your little sister?”

“My little sister is dead,” I said, keeping my tone level and still meeting his eyes.

True to his promise, he once more struck my already broken nose. This time, my response was beyond sheer surprise and I cried out in indignation and pain.

“Your sister! You’ve hidden her, haven’t you?”

Clearly, they would not accept my lie no matter how firmly I stated it. Instead of repeating it a third time, I twisted my false desperation into a knowing smile.

“You’ll never touch her. She might be a little filly, but she’s already braver and smarter than you two halfwits combined.”

This time, when the stallion approached me I was ready for him. I couldn’t hope to overpower a muscular and armoured stallion, especially one with a partner and a sword, but I’d be damned if I would simply accept the injuries he was inflicting on me. The moment he moved closer, I spat directly into his face.

His armoured hoof came once again all the same, once more onto my broken nose, fueled by a much greater degree of fury, but I had my satisfaction all the same.

“She isn’t gonna tell you that,” The mare had been watching, looking detached from the scene before her, but she had not spoken for some time and her voice came to me as a surprise. She was lounging against the side of the gondola, more focused on polishing the silver sword before her then the two of us.

“If she knows what’s good for her, she will!” The stallion turned his fury to his comrade, who shirked a little in response but remained largely indifferent.

“We’re not threatening her with anything,” The mare pointed out. “Except pain. And she’s experienced a lifetime of that.”

He looked back at me critically, as if weighing her points. Under his glare, I looked down at the metal floor, wiping my broken nose with a hoof. It was bleeding profusely, but I could already feel it starting to clog from the cold.

Eventually, he sighed, turning away from me to address his companion.

“Alright, Wisp. You’re right. She ain’t talking. Kill her and let’s go home.”

In an instant, the panic and fear was back, but I’d be damned if I would let the guards see it. Instead, I swallowed it down with effort and kept on glaring daggers at them. The mare rose to her hooves and angled her sword towards me.

She took a cautious step towards me—clearly, she was reluctant even now to approach such an infamous foe to Erisia, but with her sword drawn she seemed much more confident.

The stallion, on the other hand, looked relatively indifferent. When he saw his partner’s sword, however, he rose an eyebrow and let out a frustrated sigh.

“Damn it, Wisp. Take her outside if you’re going to be using that. I just had these floors waxed.”

“On your hooves, alicorn.” The mare guard—Wisp, it seemed—ordered, her voice wavering slightly despite her best efforts to keep it sounding firm and commanding. “Move towards the gangway. Don’t make a move, unless you want—”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said impatiently, already rising and turning back towards where I had entered the airship. “I know. I’m not stupid. I’ve seen this routine many times now.”

I was marched at swordpoint to the closed gangplank, which Wisp opened with a quick flare of her magic. The whole while I could feel the sharp steel of the sword rubbing against my mane, wordlessly warning me that any sudden movements would result in an end more painful then I was hoping for.

The gangplank fell and in an instant the howling winds and swirling snow were all around us, grasping my mane and further rubbing it against the silver sword. My hooves crossed from metal to snow, and I continued staring straight forwards as I stopped walking.

There was an audience watching from the windows of the tavern—they must have seen the Scoutship land and been fearfully curious as to what it was doing in such an isolated trading cluster. A few stray feathers flew freely from my wings, which I awkwardly shuffled as if to take flight. In truth, I was merely gauging what her reaction would be, but received no obvious signs.

She seemed reluctant.

“Hey,” I called back at the guard mare, not daring to actually turn. “Wisp, right? That’s your name?”

The wind was the only reply, so I chuckled lightly and tried once more.

“Come on, I’m just asking your name. Don’t I have the right to one final request or something?”

“Willow Whisper,” she finally sighed. “My name is Willow Whisper. What are you doing, alicorn?”

I did not answer her question, but instead posed another of my own. “I used to buy fruit from you in Cyclosa. You were friends with my boss in the Scrapyard. ‘Heard good things about me,’ you’d said. Do you remember?”

“No,” she replied, although it sounded like half of a lie to me. “I don’t remember. You know what they do to Erisian Guards.”

“I’ve heard stories. Didn’t actually think it was possible, myself,” I shrugged, grimacing a little as the sword scraped against the back of my neck.

“What are you hoping to accomplish, alicorn?”

“Celestia. Call me that. It’s my name.”

“I don’t give a damn what your name is! You’re a dangerous little slum rat—”

“You’re conflicted about doing this, aren’t you?” I cut her off. “Murdering me, I mean. You don’t want to.”

“What are you talking about? You’re an alicorn! Of course I do!”

I let out a long sigh through my broken nose. Looking up, I saw that the ponies were still gathered at the Tavern window, watching both myself and the mare holding a sword level with my neck from behind me.

The silence stretched for what surely was no more than ten seconds, but it was time that I had expected a sudden sharp pain to split through me as she dealt a fatal blow with her sword. It did not come, nor did she speak again. Instead, I was the one to break the silence once again.

“Hey, Willow Whisper,” I said. “I’m gonna turn around. Just to face you. Don’t freak out and lob my head off, alright?”

I received no response, but I began slowly turning anyways. I felt the blade brush against my mane as I moved, turning my back to the onlookers in the Tavern and instead meeting the eyes of the mare who was supposed to be killing me.

“Listen to me, Willow Whisper,” I said softly. “You are not evil. You are not Discord. You’re just afraid. I guess fear does things to the way ponies think, and it gets to the point where you feel so committed to whatever path you’re on that you don’t think you can change.”

“You can’t seriously think you can talk your way out of this!” she said, narrowing her eyes and letting out a harsh chortle.

I continued as if she had no spoken.

“You know, that’s how I thought, too. In fact, hell, the path I was on was the same as yours. I thought that there were evil ponies, and then there was me. Everypony that wasn’t me was an evil pony. Have you ever met a young foal or filly, Wisp?”

Willow Whisper shook her head to tell me that she had not.

“Heh, well, it’s neat the way they think. With their hearts instead of their minds. My sister thinks like that. I used to think it was a problem—y’know, I think I still do—but I’m backed in a corner now and I’ve tried everything already. Maybe she really was onto something.”

I gave Wisp a sly smile, and it was a smile I saw echoed back at myself from the blade angled level with my snout, wavering weakly from the doubt in the mind of the mare keeping it levitated. I met Wisp’s eyes reflected with mine down the cold metal of the sword, as I searched for any signs of equinity still lingering there.

“I can introduce you to my sister, Willow Whisper. You’d probably like her. She’s very sweet and kind. Just put down the sword.”

“You’re insane. How weak minded do you think we are, that you can manipulate us so easily?”

“Well then… who are you killing me for? For yourself? For Discord? Or because you’re too afraid of what’ll happen to you if you don’t do what you’re told?” I rose a hoof and rested it on the top of the sword, guiding it downwards so that it was no longer level with my snout. She did not make any obvious moves that told me she even noticed. “Open you eyes, Whisper. You know that what you were told about me isn’t true. Do you really want to kill an innocent young mare and her twelve year old sister?”

“Discord will have me killed if I don’t,” she replied. I felt a rush of excitement as the tone of her words shifted suddenly. I’d suspected her doubt up until then, but now she had just admitted it herself with blunt honesty.

“Yeah, he probably will,” I nodded. “But I can give you a lift to the nearest settlement if you want to slip away. Trust me, I don’t really think hunting you down would be Discord’s priority with me on the run.”

All through my speech, I had refused to break eye contact with Willow, and for the first time I looked away from her and back in the direction of the Sisyphys.

Then, I turned and started walking in the direction of my ship.

Judging solely by the fact that the action was not followed by a sudden assault from a sword, it seemed Luna’s childish preachings of kindness had really gotten through to somepony after all.

Comments

[Carbon]

Glad, that Sombra not so bad here as in original show.

[Backlash91]

Oooooooh! Now I really really REALLY want more! You added the one character I love the most: Sombra.

[IMFoalishFace]

so very glad that you've gotten back to this story
Have to say this chapter was a really good way to come back, Celestia is wonderfully scummy, Sombra's pretty neat, and there's some wonderful pony on pony violence (you got pretty far with out having the main character being beaten senseless and that was bugging me, FO:E kind of ruined me for that ). This series continues to be a very interesting interpretation of the Royal Sisters' backgrounds and the world is still awesome. Celestia's character seems to have gotten a lot of development (she really has turned into a fearful, narrow minded animal that is just desperately holding on to life yet not completely lost) and I am very exited to see where it goes. I guess I should complain about a lack of Luna but I'm not that worried by it.

Any way great job and see you with the next chapter

[Ice Star]

I. Love. Sombra.