The Marks of War

by DungeonMiner

Chapter VII

Oraban slung his rifle behind his shoulder as he knelt down next to his kill. Yet another human messing with things he did not understand.

He shook his head, before checking the body for anything that would be of use.

Sweetie Belle watched in silence, having learned almost a month ago that nothing was going to keep Oraban from killing any of these strange human creatures. The Eldar tossed the bronze ax aside with little care, and casually glanced at the massive wound that had all but disintegrated this man’s neck.

“Ah...food,” Oraban said aloud, as he pulled a small loaf of bread from a pouch on the man’s belt. “Here, enjoy!” he said, tossing it to her.

She stared at it.

“Come on, eat,” Oraban said as he continued to search the corpse’s bags.

She shook her head, and took the bread, but still did not eat.

Oraban glanced at her. “That is one of the few pieces of food that isn’t meat. Eat it now, enjoy it, and then we’ll move. After that it’s back to meat.”

“I know,” she said.

“Saving it?”

She hesitated a moment. “No,” she said.

The ranger paused his looting and regarded her. “Then what are you doing?”

She looked down at the corpse and took a deep breath. “All you do is talk about how the mon-keigh are worse than you. You tell me that they don’t have the weapons you have, they don’t have the smarts that you have, and they don’t have the morality that you have.”

Oraban nodded. “Yes, and they don’t.”

“Then why are you afraid of them?” Sweetie asked. “Why can’t you just let them go? Let them live? Why do you have to kill them all?”

Oraban shook his head and rolled his eyes. “Alright, let me ask you a question, Sweetie Belle,” he said, standing. “Do you have dangerous creatures on your world?”

An image of a Timberwolf popped into her mind.

“That will do nicely,” Oraban said, plucking the image from her mind. “Now, these creatures, these Timberwolves, they are dangerous, no?”

She nodded. “Yes, they’re dangerous.”

“Yet they cannot speak as you can,” Oraban noted.

“No.”

“They do not have the technology you have.”

“No,” she said, giving an exasperated sigh.

“They also do not build as you can, or think as you can, or much else, can they?”

“No,” she said, rolling her eyes.

“Then how are they a danger to you?”

“I get it, thanks,” Sweetie Belle said.

“The mon-keigh are beasts compared to the Eldar,” Oraban told her, “to say otherwise would be a lie of the highest order. Even so, beasts can be dangerous, and while these mon-keigh are but cubs, they can call on stronger beasts that can tear my home asunder.

“Do not underestimate a beast, Sweetie Belle, no matter how small or how backward they are. All beasts carry a secret power. Even you.”

“Hey!” Sweetie Belle cried.

“What?” the Ranger asked.

She glared at him, offended by that last comment.

Oraban blinked, and then shrugged, before continuing to pick through the body’s belongings.

---=][=---

Oraban and Sweetie Belle moved through the jungle, with the former moving along the branches while the pony sat content in her pouch.

The Eldar had put the little pony on silence so that they might move unnoticed through the jungle.

Even still, Sweetie Belle made it known that she did not really appreciate it.

They moved quickly moved through the forest, the quick footsteps of the Eldar pushing them forward at incredible speed. So far, they had done well today and had made good progress according to the Ranger. Progress to what, Sweetie had no idea.

Still, he was happy with it, so she decided she should be happy too.

The two were shadows against the canopy, leaping from branch to branch, and sliding between the beams of sunlight.

Unfortunately, they were not the greatest hunters in the jungle.

Oraban froze suddenly, his fingers tightly gripping his long rifle.

“What? What is it?” Sweetie Belle asked.

Oraban shook his head, his eyes scanning the world around him. “I thought I heard something.” A beat passed, and the jungle offered nothing other than its deep, disturbing breathing. “I could have sworn…”

A roar erupted from the left, and Oraban turned just in time to see a massive, scaled insect, with six, long, armored muscular legs. Large compound eyes shone as the monster dived at the Eldar, revealing its long mouth and massive, pointed teeth.

The massive jaws snapped down as the creature’s large, leafy wings fluttered crazily, almost as if trying to blind the Eldar with its wings. Oraban just barely managed to jump back, narrowly avoiding losing his long rifle to the monster’s jaws.

The long, almost reptilian insect sat on the branch, opposite the Eldar. Its massive, powerful tail swished silently through the air as it regarded its prey with its compound eyes and wildly twitching wings.

Oraban, in answer, raised his rifle, while Sweetie Belle gaped in horror at this horrifying crocodile-insect hybrid.

Oraban shook his head as he took aim for the creature's throat. “Don’t worry...this’ll be over quick.”

The crocomoth leaped forward with horrifying speed, and its massive jaws slammed down on the rifle. It rolled along the branch, its wings unfurling to keep it airborne as it ripped the rifle from Oraban’s hands. The Eldar leaped back, suddenly disarmed, and suddenly found himself staring down a massive monster, floating through the air as its wings flapped wildly.

It landed back on the branch, before spitting the rifle out, where it fell to the muddy ground below.

Oraban said something in a language that Sweetie did not understand.

The crocomoth shot forward again, its massive, muscular tail pushing it as its mouth snapped open, ready to eat.

Oraban quickly pulled his pistol, and got off two quick shots, firing two disks, each 5 centimeters wide, and slamming into the armored back of the monster. The edge of the flying shuriken, just over a millimeter thick, eagerly bit into the thick hide of the crocomoth, yet not an ounce of blood was spilled.

Oraban repeated that word again.

Looking down, Sweetie found the knife next to her pouch and quickly grabbed it with her hooves.

The Ranger shot twice more, the shuriken pistol spitting its spinning ammunition as fast as it could, trying to find purchase in the monster’s hide.

The crocomoth’s mouth snapped shut, biting down on the ranger’s cloak, and keeping him in place. A forceful tug from the monster forced the ranger down onto the branch, and the crocomoth moved in, getting closer to the now prone Eldar.

“Here!” Sweetie yelled, tossing the blade up to the ranger. Oraban grabbed it from the air and dived for the monster’s eyes. stabbing down with all of his might.

The blade bit into its eye and ichor shot out the new wound, and the monster hissed in pain. It leapt backward, wings fluttering madly, as it took to the air. Ooze flowed freely from the wound, and both the ranger and the monster shared a glare between themselves.

A tense second passed.

And the crocomoth decided it could find easier prey.

Oraban watched it go, before letting loose a long, deep sigh. “That was too close.”

Sweetie Belle nodded. “Yeah, just a bit…”

“Thanks for the knife…” Oraban said, before sliding down the branches to the ground.

“You’re welcome,” she said, smugly.

“Stay silent.”

The smile on Sweetie’s face disappeared. “You’re welcome,” she thought, frowning.

“Better.”

The ranger hit the mud and carefully made his way to the rifle that lay in the mud. Removing it from the muck, he grimaced as he looked down at the scarred sides of the rifle. “That’s not good.” he thought aloud, the words reaching little Sweetie Belle.

“What? What is it?” Sweetie asked mentally, remembering the earlier order.

He opened a small chamber to the side of his rifle, before cursing. “The focusing chamber is out of alignment. The rifle is all but useless now…”

Sweetie Belle looked up at him from her pouch. “So...what are you gonna do?”

He took a deep breath, and let loose a long sigh, before turning to face the small pony in his pocket. “It seems you are going to see what I am guarding after all.”

---=][=---

Sweetie Belle looked at the odd, hook-shaped structure that seemed to grow from the ground. It looked like some sort of strange mix of bone and plant, growing with strange holes and long, tendon-like bundles of bone cord that disappeared into the green cap of the talon.

“So…” Sweetie began, having been told that this place was safe to speak in, “what is it?”

“It is a Webway gate,” Oraban said.

“Okay…” Sweetie said. “What is it?”

Oraban smirked, before he approached the massive structure, and began to activate it with his thoughts. “The galaxy is a vast place, and it would take many of your lifetimes to cross, most species use the warp to travel such distances, going through the timeless void to travel through space without moving through time. You follow?” he asked.

Sweetie Belle shook her head.

“Good,” Oraban said without looking back. “For the Eldar, such a thing is dangerous, so we use the webway, a thousand paths that crisscross the galaxy, connected to a thousand gates, allowing us to travel without a second passing between a million steps.”

“So...you have a different warp?” Sweetie asked, trying to connect the dots.

“Not truly. The webway is a dimension that is half warp, and half reality, stabilizing the former while folding the latter. We are safe there, though we skirt the edge of our doom. Now, come on, into the bag.”

Sweetie nodded, as she got up into the messenger bag-sized pouch.

“Now remember,” Oraban said, and he got her properly into the bag. “You do not leave the bag, understand?”

She nodded. “Right.”

Oraban nodded, and an ethereal, blue plane suddenly snapped into existence, contained perfectly by the talon of the webway gate.

And together, they stepped through.

The trip through the web way had taken only one hour for Oraban and Sweetie Belle, yet they arrived at their destination in half of that time from when they left.

Either way, the trip was too short for the little unicorn.

The tunnels of the webway had been healing to her. Calming and soothing her mind, body, and soul as they moved through it. Even the atmosphere of the tunnels was a relief to her, the cool air a perfect contrast to the never-ending humidity of Arconar.

Coming out of the webway was a disappointment to the little unicorn.

Yet this disappointment passed away as Sweetie’s eyes beheld a new sight.

Sweetie blinked.

Oraban smiled as he looked down at the pony in his bag. “Welcome to Alaitoc,” he said.

Sweetie Belle’s jaw hit the bottom of the bag, as she looked up at the horizon-spanning glass dome above her. The dome was held aloft with massive, branch-like buttresses while spindly towers sat beneath reaching for the starry sky beyond the glass. Thousands of Eldar walked the streets of this massive city with seamless buildings. Between the towers, floated a steady stream of personal anti-grav vehicles, carrying Eldar across the artificial sky to wherever they needed to go. Below the air traffic, a hundred tiny gardens sat, warmed by a hundred lamps, and tended by a hundred gardeners.

Every square inch of the city seemed to be made of the same, off-white material that the gate had been built from. That living, almost breathing, stone that grew in massive bundles of cord-like pillars, leaving natural, organic holes in almost every surface.

The city walls seemed alive to her. Almost...familiar to her.

“Well, here it is,” Oraban said, as he began to walk down one of the many pathways that wandered through the gardens. “Welcome to the Dome of the Starlit Path. One of the four minor domes of Alaitoc,” Oraban said, before slinging his rifle across his shoulder. “How you say, home, sweet home.”

Sweetie gasped as she stared at the towering spires and the tall, alien trees that reminded her of the ones she saw in her school textbook from Zebrica. “Wow…” she said.

Oraban smiled. “You like it?”

“It’s huge!” she said.

Oraban smiled, despite himself. “It is a masterpiece, isn’t it? Grown from some of the best wraithbone in the galaxy and tended to by its best bonesingers, and as much as I hate being here, I still love it.”

Sweetie said nothing but merely gaped at the walls around her.

Oraban chuckled to himself. “Come on, let’s head to the Artisan’s quarters.”

A thousand red and blue gems decorated the walls, while giant murals of bygone plains reminded Sweetie Belle of Sweet Apple Acres.

She was starting to like it here.

---=][=---

Oraban stood in front of a strange Eldar with a strange flute.

They stood in a large, open room, decorated with small statuettes of various figures, all Eldar, and most did not hold Sweetie’s attention.

The two Eldar spoke with each other in their odd, musical language that Sweetie didn’t even try to follow after the first few seconds of listening. She tried, to her credit. Yet considering that many peoples of the Imperium dedicate decades of their lives to understanding the Eldar Tongue, it was no surprise that Sweetie was quickly lost between the two.

This left her bored.

She sat, in her bag, chin resting on the edge of the bag, and gave a long-suffering sigh as she stared at the blank, off-white, far wall.

That one wall was perfectly bland, not a painting, nor a mural, not even a shelf holding more sculptures. All that sat by that wall was a single pedestal with a wraithbone tiara set with a large, round, teal stone. The stone was beautiful, she would gladly and readily admit that. She could practically see Rarity drooling over it, thinking of a thousand different outfits to go with the off-white crown. The issue was that it was not extravagant enough to entertain her long.

Sadly, it was the only thing in her field of vision. The only other wall she could really see was the one where they came in, and that was mostly occupied by a series of arches that served as doors.

She sighed.

Oh, she was bored.

Scootaloo could not reach this level boredom.

“I’m bored,” Sweetie thought to Oraban, only for both Eldar to pause in their conversation and look at her.

“You know everyone can hear that, right?”

Sweetie blushed. “Oh...sorry…” she thought, pinning her ears back.

Oraban shook his head, before turning back to the Eldar behind the counter, apologizing before continuing on.

Hiding her face in her bag, Sweetie instead turned to focus on anything else she could.

Which happened to be the tiara.

That dumb, plain tiara with its dumb green stone.

Wait, green?

Sweetie blinked, taking a long hard look at the gem set into the crown.

She could have sworn that the stone had been teal, but...but now it was quite obviously emerald green.

That...that couldn’t be real…

Could it?

Curious, Sweetie shuffled in her bag, leaning over the edge to try and get a closer look. It was still too far away though...

She looked up at Oraban, and could only remember his explicit instructions to stay in the bag.

She looked back to the tiara. “Well,” she thought to herself, “let’s see if I’ve gotten any better with my magic.”

She stuck out her tongue in concentration as she brought all her focus onto the piece of jewelry. Her horn began to glow, and the ring of magic was heard in the room. Then, with every ounce of control that she had, she reached out for the tiara.

And the room exploded.

The wraithbone grew outward into a thousand spikes, piercing into the walls of the room at incredible speed. Statuettes exploded as spears of wraithbone slammed into them. Half of the columns of the arches that lead outside were split almost in half, the long spines of the tiara rammed into them with such power that they made the room shake. Oraban just barely missed having his head impaled as Sweetie yelped in surprise.

Her magic went dead, and the room went still, the tiara freezing, now supported by a hundred spikes that stuck into various walls and pieces of furniture.

“Well…” Oraban said aloud. “That’s interesting.”

---=][=---

They had been lead to the Hall of Atherakhia, the center of judgment on Alaitoc.

The artisan, the injured party, stood before a well-dressed, ornately-jeweled, lady Eldar, ranting in his almost musical language to what had to be Sweetie’s judge. The bonesinger continued, singing his grievances to the judging Eldar, while Oraban rolled his eyes.

Of course, she didn’t need the Ranger’s eye roll to tell that the artisan was whining. Having grown up with Rarity, she knew a whine a mile away, and even apparently in a literally alien language.

The real trick was figuring out when he was complaining.

“He wants you to pay restitution fees,” Oraban told her.

“What?!” Sweetie thought. “I can’t pay for anything! You don’t even take bits!”

All eyes went to her, and the artisan went silent.

“We can all still hear that…” Oraban thought with a sigh.

“Oh...sorry…”

The Eldar judge smiled before standing. “So, Benelion,” she said, speaking aloud in a language that Sweetie understood, “you wish to have a creature that has no services or gifts to provide, pay you for the loss of your crown? What do you expect her to pay in?”

The artisan said something in his own language.

“I speak so that the accused may understand me, is it not fair for her to know what is at stake?” she asked.

Benelion grumbled. “Farseer Elahina, I hardly need anything that this pathetic creature could offer me. Yet the laws of this craftworld state that restitution must be made. I could hardly care what she offers me, but something must be offered.”

“And so it shall, but first, we need to know what she can offer,” the Farseer said, before turning to Sweetie Belle. “Now, little beast, tell me, what can you offer him?”

“Um..well…” Sweetie began, “I...guess I could help make more statues?”

“What?!” Benelion said. “You caused the last piece of wraithbone you touched to explode! I didn’t even know wraithbone could explode! And you want to be around more of it! I knew you lesser lifeforms weren’t quite developed in the mental sense, but by Isha that is dumb!”

"Hey!" Sweetie said.

“I think that sounds fair,” the farseer said, which caused the artisan to gape at her.

“Wha-wha-wha…?”

“The punishment should fit the crime,” the Farseer said, before turning to the artisan. “Don’t you think?”

Benelion stared into the eyes of the Farseer for a long moment. “Y-yes...yes, Farseer Elahina.”

“I’m glad you agree,” Elahina said, before turning back to Sweetie Belle. “I’m going to need you to follow me.”

---=][=---

Oraban watched behind a wall of wraithbone glass, watching Sweetie Belle as she “practiced” working with wraithbone.

So far every piece she had touched with her non-psychic telekinesis had reacted much the same way as the crown had, exploding outward with enough violent force to crack and chip the wall that separated the two of them. Sweetie herself stood behind another transparent shield, protected from the more dangerous explosions.

Elahina, the farseer, stood next to him before speaking to him in the tongue of the Eldar. “She is dangerous,” Elahina said. “Any contact from her energy can cause wraithbone to grow and expand at a horrifying rate.”

“So is she to be put down?” Oraban asked.

Elahina shook her head. “No, no I do not think that will be necessary.”

Oraban nodded. “Good. I would like to keep her, she is entertaining.”

He watched as Sweetie tried once more, only for a blade of wraithbone rammed into the glass, the slightest tip of the blade just breaching the glass.

“So what’s your plan?” Oraban asked, moving away from the hole in the window.

“Well,” Elahina said, “I had her blood looked at, and I found that her DNA is rather pliable. It will adapt to whatever new material comes in contact with it.”

“Malleable DNA?” Oraban asked.

“That is what they saw. I have no explanation, simply that it is. However, there is where we will find our answer. We can alter her abilities by implanting wraithbone into her being. This way, it will make her safer, give us power over her, as well make her more useful.”

“Useful?” Oraban asked.

“She’d be able to grow wraithbone at an incredible rate, and she would able to provide maintenance of wraithbone items as well.”

“So, she’d be able to fix my rifle?”

“Rifle, armor, knife blade, whatever you need,” Elahina said. “Not to mention her own abilities and lifespan would multiply exponentially.”

Oraban nodded, and turned back to look at the little the pony as she tried once more to work the wraithbone.

“How long would it take?”

“Roughly thirty standard years.”

Oraban nodded. “Very well, I’ll see you then.”

---=][=---

Sweetie concentrated on the last lump of wraithbone, and just barely touched it with her magic before it reacted, turning violently into massive spines that suddenly bit into the glass on the far wall and split apart, letting it shatter to pieces.

Elahina poked her head into the testing room, a mess of wraithbone spikes and blades, and spoke. “I think that’ll be enough for today, little one.”

She pinned her ears back as she came out from behind her protective shield. “Sorry…”

Elahina shook her head. “Worry not, little one, come here. I have a plan to help you.”

---=][=---

“Listen not to the alien, look not upon the alien, speak not unto the alien!”—Imperial Thought of the Day.

---

Wow...sorry that took so long guys. I just had a lot of things to look up.

"Like what?"

Well, apparently, the Eldar either don't have a currency, or they trade in arrogance.

"...What?"

It's a joke.

"Oh I love jokes! How does it go?"

Um...well...okay, from RPG.net.

The more Arrogance an Eldar has, the more products he is provided by the Craft-World.
Arrogance is measure in Conceit Points, or CP.
CP is acquired by associating with lower life-forms, giving them cryptic and useless messages, and then dismissing their capacity to understand it.
The CP increases by the level of the lower-life. Saying to an Imperial Guardsmen "You mong-keigh waste time chasing us, ignoring the TRUE threat" would net an Eldar around 50 CP
Saying to a Space Marine "Such knowledge is not meant for your primitive mind" would get an Eldar over 500 CP.
The wealthiest Eldar can express contempt for a whole civilization with just a single raised eyebrow.

"That's the joke?"

It makes more sense in the grand scheme of things. Anyways hoped you enjoyed the chap! Be sure to comment and stuff.

"See you next time!"

Bye!

Comments

[commissar craner]

wow

trade in arrogance.

[Evowizard25]

Oh Eldar, you and your long term plans and arrogance. I really like how you set up this Oraban character. His relationship with Sweetie Belle is cute and how he's growing attached to her. Good job.

[Cadmium]

He said she is entertaining to him that's like a declaration of love coming from an eldar if directed at a "lower" lifeform.

[boronium]

Where would we be without fa/tg/uys ^^

[ArchAngelGundam]

Finally got around to reading this. Looks good.
Keep up the good work. Deus tecum.

[ArchAngelGundam]

6334540 Thus dashes my hopes of Tau being present in this fic as more than a foe to be beaten (if that).