Secure, Contain, Protect

by Teh_Zodiac

Zenith

“I told you you would regret this.”

The orb flickered and buzzed above their heads, its cold, white light illuminating faces stricken with the surprise of a lifetime. The silence took its place in the center of the room, and reigned for what seemed an eternity. Twilight Sparkle gazed at them, losing all hope she would come out of this barn on her own terms; the resignation transformed her face into a blank, impassive surface. Sometime she imagined, mostly among missions, what a reunion would be like, and she pictured herself much more panicked Instead, she was as calm as one can be in such a situation, and actually, she found herself almost enjoying the discovery, almost like a sick, twisted surprise party.

The same couldn’t be said for the other ponies in the room. Everypony had the same strange expression, a mixture of astonishment and horror that made Twilight want to burst out in a big laugh and say:

You should see the look on your faces, priceless!

The calm was expected; yet, it was strange. Twilight Sparkle had every reason to stay still and not utter a single word, but why her ‘friends’, the princesses, just stood still, observing her, that canvas of fear and guilt, surprise and anger, and pure unadulterated confusion plastered on their muzzles?

It took her some seconds to realize they weren’t just too disconcerted to say her anything, all the ponies in the barn apart from her were actually frozen in place. The only movement she could see was the slow expansions of their chests.

The door shot open, startling the unicorn and directing her head backwards with a snap: in front of her, standing outside, with the pale light of Luna’s moon shining upon them, there were a grey unicorn with an amused and slightly startling expression on his face. His eyes were gleaming with excitement. By his side, a hovering mass of tentacles that emitted a constant buzz. She heard a familiar voice dancing in her ears:

“Emon filion, we have to go. I can keep them blocked, but not for much, we need to get out of here!” He gestured her to come closer with a long tentacle.

“Kalos?” She asked, bewildered. What was he doing here with Bright Light?

“Twilight, leave them, we have to go! He can’t hold them much longer!” This time was the stallion’s turn to speak: he didn’t even remotely sounded preoccupied or distressed: actually, it looked like he was enjoying every minute of this sick get-together. Also, he sounded very different from the bookish, timid, folklore-loving stallion that she knew. Even so, she didn’t have much of a choice: it was either following them, or stay here and face whatever the princesses had in store for what could be considered a long list of felons, including treason, espionage, first degree murder and illicit use of magic. Ages passed since crimes like this actually received a trial, and she wasn’t going to stay and find out whether they would give her life sentence or actually banish her then give her a life sentence. She dashed out of the rune and in the open, and felt like an enormous weight had been lift from her shoulders: she tried to levitate a fallen leaf, and she did with no difficulty whatsoever. Twilight Sparkle turned around one more time and looked at her old life, the life she lost a fateful night of a scorching summer, frozen in front of her eyes, before mustering all the magical energy she could and disappearing in a dazzling flash of light with the grey stallion and the wyvern. The world turned off, everything stretched around them like an enormous black elastic, and they all felt the unfamiliar, peculiar sensation of being in a complete void: The darkness in front of the three flickered, and suddenly, they were in a gigantic cave, lit by a pale moonlight. Everything felt wrong, a powerful nausea took over her senses and made the mare kneel down, trying to fight the urge to vomit her intestines out. She had never teleported herself (or anybody herself, for that matter) so far away. She tentatively lifted herself up and managed to walk, stammering a bit, to a rock wall on which she rested her back. Twilight Sparkle breathed slowly and steadily, trying to shake off the sickness that invaded her body. The air in the cavern was cool and moist, and she felt a light breeze caressing her mane and cooling her entire form. The rhythm of her breath calmed her, and after a short while, she was ready to stand up again.

It didn’t took much a toll out of her the striking yet evident realization that her life was over. It was a quiet chaos: the fact that the Foundation would negate to the death that they ever employed her. The fact that she deceived everyone she thought she held dear. The fact that she wasn’t really concerned about the moral consequences of her actions but more about the legal ones. Banishment? Life imprisonment? Capital execution? Was there even a punishment left for the likes of her? The fact that she was alive, or dead, would only serve as a remainder to the ones she had wronged. Justice isn’t about retribution, though. How many valuable informations were inside her mind? How many things that weren’t supposed to see the light of the day or the darkness of the night? These questions kept swirling inside her, and the more they showed up, the less she could bring herself to answer them. Her old friend, panic, started to creep up its ugly head.

Twilight was on the brink of crying, when she remembered she wasn’t alone in the cave. The lavender mare looked in front of her, and saw the three beings she owed her life to. Bright Light was looking at her, completely unfazed by the long range teleport, a comforting smile on his muzzle. Kalos was hovering beside him, and she could discern the bioluminescent equivalent of compassion plastered all across his soft, glowing membrane. Behind him, the charred mass of meat and feathers that just kept grinning at her. Twilight remembered fondly of how he came to save her from Celestia, how he managed to grab her and get her out of that barn, and whispered lovingly in her left ear:

“Always.”

She closed her eyes and darted them open again. It was gone. Her sudden show of fear startled the stallion and the wyvern, as they rushed to her side and the former asked, somewhat concerned:

“Twilight, is everything okay?” She moved her head left and right. They were standing beside her, enclosing the mare in a warm space. These were her true friends. She smiled at the grey stallion and answered.

“I’m fine. How did she....” No, something was much more important to her now “How did you know I was in danger?”

Bright Light sighed and looked at her with eyes full of pity. Twilight felt a familiar sensation, and saw an absurdly soft tentacle making its way to her shoulder.

“They sold you out, Twilight. The Foundation.” She really wasn’t prepared for this. Twilight Sparkle wasn’t naive, at least not anymore. But she thought that as long as she was useful, the Council wouldn’t bother with her and would have treated her like any normal agent. Why?

“Why?”

He looked at her, trying to form a reasonable explanation. He had one, but it pained him to say it. Fate was not without a sense of irony. He needed to be honest with her, even if he couldn’t understand why. Why did he save her?

“I was detained by Celestia for a while. She tried to discover if the Foundation was bubbling something up” Twilight ears perked up and she started to look around for an exit, trying not to be too obvious. She failed. “It wasn’t me who sold you out, Twilight. If I did, why did I risk going against the orders of my superiors? We are fugitives as much as you are.” It looked like that calmed down a bit, as her eyes stopped darting at the infinite, quiet forest she could see in the distance, out of the cave. “It was your discovery, actually. Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of irony. You were right. You did discover the dossier of a SCP. It wasn’t fabricated. A real, genuine document from another dimension. Believe it or not, it was from a Foundation, almost identical to ours. Same objective, same scope, same organization, almost. And it was managed by humans. Maybe it will be of some relief to know that they thought of us as mythic creatures as much as we did of them.”

The old flame of knowledge was rekindled in her spirit, despite the horrid situation she was in. Humans! They were real! From another dimension! She discovered them! They had a Foundation! What artifacts they had in custody? Myths about humans were fairly notorious, but few in numbers and clarity. They were depicted as small, biped creatures, kind and wise, that lived long, had no magic to speak of and shared Equa with ponykind far before the Princess, the three tribes, or even Discord. They had Mare-eval technology: carriages, crude machinery, swords and bows. She couldn’t even understand how they could contain abominations without magic. Her eyes beamed with excitement: she was ready to inundate
Every bit of info was like tasting a drop of water while dying of thirst in the desert. The realization that she would have never been able to study these creatures was killing her. She didn’t even care about the fact that Bright Light was completely different from what she remembered, or that she was discovered. Her old scholar self, dulled by many months doing just practice and not enough theory, reappeared.

“Look, it’s not important.” She opened her mouth, looking to explain in the tiniest detail why it was of paramount importance, but a gray hoof covered it. “It’s important that you stay focused. You need to hear the whole story.”

---

The sun was not even peeking on the horizon when they arrived at the alley. Clef looked at his digital watch: 4.55 A.M. Right on time. The driver stopped at the deserted sidewalk and the four got out from the back, the sound of their boots reverberating from the wet cement. They were in the suburbs of Paris, inside a fairly normal residential zone. They still had various spotters around the corners, to warn them in case someone or something suspicious should come around. Their ears were filled with the constant sound of speeding cars in the background. While the three field agents donned the imposing and ghastly suit of armor, Clef decided to, as he put it, ‘stay casual’, wearing long jet black jeans, simple boots, a dark trench coat, a grey shirt, a black fedora and a pair of black teashades. The whole ensemble was fairly inappropriate, and it managed to gather a few annoyed puffs from Lorenzo, a not so well hidden giggle from Anya, and a shrug from Frank. Everyone had their weapons and equipment: aside from the guns, that Clef considered as important as a newborn infant (‘You will always love your son more than the snotty brats of your friends!’’) and always left them free of choice, he demanded that every FA working under him, aside from standard Foundation equipment, brought the following items:

-A plastic-wrapped cinnamon twist (‘If I hear the word ‘Twinkie’ another fucking time, I will your rip your throat out, Gedhiman’)

-His book “Reality Bending: Why Amon was right”, that you actually had to buy with your own money through a shady, even for Foundation’s standards, publishing house located in Castroville, California

-A dogtag, it didn’t matter if anything was carved on it (‘It’s for sentimental value, silly Anya’)

-A copy of Trout Mask Replica by Captain Beefheart, any format is fine

-A single mint (‘You’ll thank me when you’re done with your garlic filled spaghetti and you have a breath that can kill 682, Lorenzo.’)

They all heard two things about Clef: he was beyond strange, and he was dangerous. So far, they had seen only the strange side. And it was a source of enjoyment for some and a bother for others.

A jubilant voice broke the silence:

“Everyone, get your dossiers out, it’s reading time!” said Clef, almost snickering with excitement. Everyone reached in their backpacks for the small files. The doctor started to read, but a gust of wind tore the document out of Frank’s burly hands and made it fly in the alley.

“Oh, for goodness sake, Frank!” Clef threw his arms in the air in a rather comical display of frustration. “Oh well, just share it with Lorenzo.” The gigantic black figure grunted, annoyed, and walked to the side of the smaller man, who tilted the page a bit to let the giant see better. “It’s not like an extradimensional entity might find it and discover about the Foundation, m’right? Anyway, as I was saying-”

---

“The griffin huffed, the crates on his shoulders weighing him down. He hated field research, it was a vacation for the docs and hell on earth for the D-Class. All day, shuffling around and carrying heavy stuff, and hearing the researcher nerding about some ‘artifact with high magical output’ or things like that. It didn’t help that they were in Equestria. In Grifonia or the Dragons Lands they were allowed to do their jobs and then go relax a bit. Here, it wasn’t possible: the pony princesses were always alert and vigilant, and the Foundation couldn’t risk getting discovered. It was like walking on a thin line of solid ground squeezed between endless rows of hot coals: one false step, one bad call, and you get burned. Not that it was his problem, he was just an arm, the brawn, following orders. But even if the majority of the D-Class was renowned for being fairly average if not a bit slow, he realized that this was dangerous: everyone looked like something could swoop down at any moment. What he managed to grab, he couldn’t put together. While he was carrying some crates around, he heard two docs discussing vaguely about ‘another Foundation’ and ‘humans’. He heard of humans before, pony folklore: harmless little midgets that wouldn’t hurt a fly. Certainly not nightmare material. Then, why all the ones that were supposed to know what the hell were they doing covertly setting up a research camp in an alley in Fillydelphia were as tense as a violin string? The tents were set up, the runes at the entrance of the alley were set up, and everyone that walked through them would just enter a small pocket dimension that looked just like the real deal. Really fancy griffonic magic, never understood a thing about it. There were mostly griffins, a couple of wyverns, some dragonlings and the Doctor, the only researcher who actually talked with the Ds even when there wasn’t any order to bark. Or chirp. Or telepathically send. Depends on species. The griffin couldn’t blame them, though: the Foundation standard procedure for covert mission on Equestrian territory was level 3 classified info, and you had to be amnesiac at both arrivals; he didn’t remember how he came to be from his bed to a simple back-alley in Fillydelphia. He lowered the crates of food slowly, careful not to break them. After they landed with a thump, he slumped down and sighed, overwhelmed by the fatigue. Everything was done and ready to go, so no one would come to him and yell him to get back to work. Now it was only a matter of waiting. Waiting goddess knows what. He rested his back against the crates, massaging his sore talons, while looking around, trying to pick up something about what the hell were they doing in the biggest city in Equestria. He was in the residential part of the camp: 4 small dormitories inside white tents were lined up behind him: there was a fence that separated the barracks from the labs and the contact zone. The labs were under black, magically enchanted tent that reflected every known magic and the most powerful and fast of crossbow bolts: nothing could through the thick material. In front of them, the contact zone: field upon field of enchantments, designed to complement each other and hide magical signatures and energetic signatures. Everyone was tending to their own business: his D fellows were just resting after a long day of work, the researchers were running various checks on the instrumentation, and the security was fairly alert and ready to react to whatever would turn down that alley. He immediately recognized the form of the Doctor: he was the only pony in the Foundation (actually, he heard another one joined recently, but he hadn’t seen her or him), so he was always easy to found in any crowd, even though everyone was fairly accustomed to his presence. He usually looked quite jovial and easygoing, but this time it was different: he looked somewhat nervous, slightly pawing, as if he were waiting for something really bad to happen. He kept darting around, and his gaze fixated finally on the exit of the alley, behind the griffin. He stood there for a second, and his eyes, from slits of grey, turned open in a show of surprise, and he teleported out of sight. The griffin bolted up, hoping to find him and ask him what was wrong, when he heard the most unnatural sound he could possibly imagine: it seemed like someone broke both a vase made out of glass and a chunk of ice at the same time, and then mixed everything together and ran it backwards. It came from behind him. He turned around to see the surface of the spatial rune, something that looked like liquid mercury, rip like a common cloth, and show a swirling amount of everchanging colours behind it. The tear got bigger, and with it the noise.The surface, behaving like a fabric, shattered, out of nowhere, like a glass, and his vision was invaded by the most intense light he had ever seen. He closed his eyes, fearing to get blind. After a couple of seconds the light faded away, and he felt a freezing coldness clutching at his talons and a scorching heat investing his muzzle. All he could see when he opened his eyes was Celestia and Luna glaring at him, shining with light and darkness, before something that felt similar to pony magic grabbed him and shoved him into a wall, causing him to pass out.”

______________________________________________________________________________

Twilight gasped like a little filly. Bright Light laughed at the show, and the mare blushed furiously, before assuming a more serious tone and asking:

“Wait a second, Princess Celestia and Luna discovered you? Actually, why are you telling everything through the perspective of a D-Class?”

He sighed: “I’m setting the mood, geez. Let me find pleasure in the small things, Twilight, it’s not like I have much left.”
She pouted a bit:

“It’s just that it makes it really hard to follow. Weren’t you supposed to be held by the Princess? How come you were there?”

“She freed me two days after you made your discovery. Me and Princess Luna... had kind of a run-in. She knew I wasn’t going to talk anyway, so she let me walk away free. I tried to visit you, but the council told me you were on a mission. I guess they were afraid that If I met you we would be able to put the pieces together. Anyway, back to what happened....”

______________________________________________________________________________

“I was at the camp, when I felt it. It wasn’t clear, at first. More like a background noise, or a really faint smell. Yet, you can always pick it up, when it’s something familiar, it doesn’t matter how feeble it is. And I couldn’t ever forget that particular... It was Luna magic. Slowly but surely, it was all around me. It was feeble, and it was a forgotten feeling that only I remembered. But I knew what was going to happen. I have no idea how they discovered us, and now, it’s not really important. As you know, teleporting out of that alley is hard: you need to concentrate a lot of magic and I just didn’t have the time. So I just teleported myself on a roof. I figured that would be the last place they’d think to look. I was right. I could see how far the thing actually extended from up there. As far as the eye can see. There’s probably no end to it, at least, I didn’t see it. Anyway, I managed to teleport myself on a nearby roof when the spatial rune was ripped. Frightening display of raw magic power, as always. The demonic sisters, that’s how we called them sometimes at the Foundation. They just tore through it like wet paper, when it would have took me at least three hours or so. They were swift, too: as soon as they entered the alley, they incapacitated both the D-classes and the wyverns. Security couldn’t even react. Celestia and Luna just banged them together repeatedly. They left the researchers that weren’t wyverns conscious though, and they started to do what they do best: interrogating. Same spell you were taught. Actually, it was my invention. They discovered everything in a short span of seconds: about the SCP, its properties, the human Foundation we came for, everything. Not that it really matters, but none of the researchers knew you were involved in the discovery, or knew you at all. That’s when things started getting... complicated. Your brother, I believe, entered the alley, accompanied by three Royal Guards. -My brother? He wasn’t hurt or anything, right?- No, he’s fine. I only put him to sleep. -YOU WHAT- Look, I needed a disguise. I’m not a changeling, I can’t turn into an alicorn, an earth pony or a pegasus, I can only change my color and my eyes. He was the only unicorn excluding me, the other guards were all pegasi. They started searching through the instruments and the notes. I waited for him to split from the others, I sneaked up on him, fired up a tranquilizer spell and changed into Shining Armour, captain of the guard. -Hmph- I needed to know why and how Celestia and Luna homed in on us. So I approached them and reported we didn’t find anything. That’s when Celestia answered:

“Not that I wasn’t expecting to find anything really important. I must applaud you, Shining Armour: you were zealous and professional not to disregard those strange movement of magic-resistant containers through Equestria. I wonder why they got so lass about these operations.” She looked fairly happy, I guess she was joyous they busted our bubble. “This discovery, however, it’s both very unsettling and very promising: the legends about humans were already old when Luna and I rose to power... If we are to believe them, and the document the Foundation discovered, we have another organization, only directed by an ancient and wise race. I’ve learned too late not to be hasty when making my judgements” and looked at Luna, busy scooping around field manuals, with a loving smile”, so I’m putting here a standing guard and contact force. I’m not going to alienate the first contact with humans by letting the Foundation greet them first, and-”

“Dearest sister...” Luna interrupted her, and by moving my head to look at her, I realized why. Celestia turned around and asked: “Yes, Lu....na..”

They were standing there, four of them, at the first turn of the alley, just outside the camp. They weren’t at all like what the legends portrayed them. They stood as tall as a young dragonling, slender, and fully erect, not hunched like the Diamond Dogs. They were completely clad in black, and three of them had an helmet of some sort and clutching a strange long and curvy object, but the fourth one was uncovered, so we saw what one of their faces looked like. I couldn’t stand to look at it for too long: it was like a spiral, sucking you in the center. A wide, unsettling smile was on his face, muzzle, whatever. I don’t know. I could see the canines poking out of his upper lip. Two eyes, that stared me down. I turned around my head a bit, and saw Celestia and Luna as much as disconcerted as me. These things were predators, we could all tell. We knew they used a language identical to Equestrian, but it’s so strange, when you hear it in first person. Especially if they have a Manehatten accent. It reached for a strange kind of sheat, he removed a small metal thing and waved at us:

“Uh, ponies. Well, that’s something I never thought I actually- Wait, I did! You owe me fifty bucks, Frank.” The voice was undisputably male. He turned to a figure that stood taller than the others. He answered, but the voice was muffled and distorted by that strange helmet:

“Come on, Doc! I thought it was just a joke!” He said, with a booming volume and a somewhat comical whiny tone.

“AH! A deal’s deal, Lieutenant! Oh, the cinnamon rolls I’ll get with this...” Answered the other male, joyfully, as the bigger man handed him some strange pieces of green paper. Another one spoke: this time it was clear it was a female. The figure was smaller and curvier, even through all that clothing.

“Look at them, aren’t they just adorable? Look, that one has a uniform! That’s so cute!” She reached for the human that had remained silent with an arm and pointed at me. He didn’t answer right away, but after a while he raised an arm, pointed it to Luna and uttered, emotionless.

“The blue one.”

“Yes, what about the blue one?”

“I really like her mane.” He said

The one without the helmet turned his head to Celestia, and said:

“Look, that one has a crown! How cute is that? Ok, who got the tranquilizing darts? We’ll take these adorable little ponies back for testi-” We all jerked in surprise. I was going to say something, but Celestia beat me to it.

“Wait!” The humans stared her, completely silent. She gulped, and then continued: “I’m Princess Celestia, she is Princess Luna, and he is the Captain of the Guard, Shining Armour. We wish you no harm.”

The one without helmet shrugged and answered:

“Uhm... okay?”

If he was surprised, he hid it well. Celestia was going to answer, but Luna just fired up a question:

“Are you humans?”

“Last time I checked, yes.” He answered, the smile slowly creeping back on his face.

“Do you have ponies in your world?” Luna kept asking, eager.

“Damn right we have. They don’t talk, though. And they certainly are not blue.” The humans behind him were starting to check, I think, the strange contraptions they were carrying. Weapons, probably. But the unmasked man looked back, saw them preparing, and waved them to stop.

“Why are you here?” Luna actually sounded excited the more they answered. She’s kind of like you. Really curious. He answered shortly:

“Define ‘here’’” He said, with a hint of amusement in his voice.

Luna turned to Celestia for a moment, with a pleading face. She nodded, and the sister snapped back to the human:

“Equestria, human. We have found your dossier, and this is one end of your ‘SCP’.” He quickly slapped himself in a manner that looked suspiciously similar to a facehoof, turned to the hulking figure behind him, managed to muster the most terrifying gaze I have ever seen and turned back to face us.

“So, you know about us. You know how to get to our world, though?” He asked.

“No.” Luna shook her head.

“Good. I need to know if you have ‘Any kind or manner of aggressive behaviour and/or reason to attack, jeopardize or otherwise threaten the stability, well being, normality or survival of the human race’.” He said, annoyed.

Celestia and Luna snorted lightly.

“We wish you harm, I believe we told you a minute ago.” Answered Celestia with a hint of annoyance in her voice.

“Standard procedure, shit like that. Perfect. Then the feeling is mutual.” He holstered the strange weapon and sighed in relief. For the first time, I spoke up, wanting to ask something that bugged me a bit:

“You don’t seem too surprised to see ponies talking, human.”

He looked at me, and laughed a bit, before answering:

“I’ve seen stranger.”

I had to agree with that. Celestia turned to me and whispered gently:

“Captain, I need you to get a team of unicorn mages and five guards. We’re taking them to Canterlot.” I nodded vigorously and ran for the still broken rune. I dashed through the remains and found myself in Fillydelphia, in front of a simple alley. I wanted to talk to you, Twilight. It took me over a week to reach the Foundation, since I had no evac. When I arrived, no one could tell me what you were doing or where were you. It was starting to get suspicious: first, a busted operation by Celestia and now, I couldn’t find you anywhere. That’s when I thought about reaching the friend you talked me about.”

And he pointed to Kalos, who had remained silent the whole time.

“Doctor Light contacted me just after I returned from a mission. He told me that he had a need to talk with you but couldn’t find you. We went together asking, even tried getting an hearing with the Council, but to no avail. We both agreed there was something... how do your people say it... fishy going on, and Doctor Light remembered about M’bura, your Observer”

“When even your Observer said he didn’t know your whereabouts, I realized that something was REALLY wrong. While Kalos here held him still, I probed his mind. Maybe you’ll find comfort in knowing that he was completely oblivious about you getting discovered. The mission they gave you, it screamed ‘trap’ to me.You, a pony, ex Ponyville resident and former Element of Harmony, sent to do a mission regarding the Element of Honesty? Please. We looked through the files and the registers looking for the funders: Orange wasn’t one of them. Kalos told me more about the Element of Honesty: he had listened to you ranting about her and the other Elements for hours. We put two and together:

You got to Sweet Apple Acres and introduced yourself to the Apple Family. Applejack, being the paranoid lie-detector that she is, ran straight to the postal office to send a telegram to her Uncle Orange. Orange answered fairly quick. Applejack warned the Princesses. They realized you were a Foundation Agent. And... well, you know the rest.

The only thing I don’t understand is... why? Why they just didn’t accept you as a member and dumped everything on me? It was me who recruited you, they could have just laid the blame on me and it would have been the truth! We have bigger problems right now, though. The sisters will look for us. The Foundation will look for us. We are in a clamp, squeezed between two fronts: one wants us dead. The other, I don’t really want to know what Celestia will dish out on us if she manages to capture us.”

The sun started peeking over the horizon, on the black forest. Its light slithered inside the cave, tickling with its warm the three fugitives.

“I heard that basilea Celestia can see through the Sun like a giant eye” Twilight Sparkle giggled a bit, before answering:

“Kalos, that’s not true. It’s just a legend. I saw the Princess raise the Sun personally lots of times, and she can’t do that.” Well, there was that one time... “Maybe.”

Bright Light stretched himself and gestured Twilight to stand up. After an hour or so of just sitting down and listening to the stallion, the nausea was gone. She jumped on her hooves, ready to get out of the cave. He looked at the slumbering forest that just now waking up, before turning to face them:

“So, where are we going? I think around Appleloosa there should be-”

That’s when the Sun dashed into the sky, culminated and stood there for a moment. A sound so powerful their insides were shaking up got over everything. The lament was a scream and everyone in the whole world could hear it: it was pain, and sorrow, and anger, and despair, compressed and released in a booming cacophony. The howl lasted for a time that seemed too long. There shouldn’t be something capable of releasing a sound so great and horrible and sublime for such an amount of time. Yet, it stopped, abruptly, and the silence took over everything. The early birds had stopped singing, and the furious river under the mountain flowed muted. Kalos was the first to talk:

“What in Tartarus was THAT?”

Bright Light managed to regain his composure and answered:

“I don’t know, I’ve never heard anything like that in all my life...”

Twilight shook her head vigorously, trying to erase from her memory that bellow that had infiltrated her entire body, horn to hooves. Her tongue was dry as sand, but she tried to voice her opinion anyway:

“Maybe it was-”

She stopped midsentence, mouth agape. The sky was turning as dark as a starless night, yet the sun was hanging over them like an overgrown lamp. The darkness crept up from the horizon, and everything started to blacken, and get less visible. She never understood the meaning of silence before now: the only thing she could hear was her own heart, beating and pumping blood through her veins. Even with the aster in the sky, the dead shadows, the inert darkness that grasped everything and felt like swimming through air was familiar to the three of them. It was the prime companion of something they all had survived.

“The Training...” whispered Twilight.

“This can’t be...” Kalos said. “It was a controlled environment! The Training was just fancy runes that blocked light, strange noises and psychological tricks created to scare us! It wasn’t real!”

The only blot of clear sky was now covered in black. A familiar light, much similar to dusk, made it’s way and sat on the horizon, making everything just barely visible.

That’s when the sun shattered. Like a glass ball, without any noise, it just exploded in a million pieces of pure light that faded away almost immediately. The quivering voice of Bright Light resonated in the hollow cave:

“He’s back”

Comments

[Misterf]

You keep describing humans as "short" compared to ponies. A group of Bronies ran the numbers: the average pony is about 3 1/2 - 4 feet tall at the head, significantly shorter than a human

[Teh_Zodiac]

The legends portray them as short. On the other hands, Bright Light saw they are as tall as a dragonling, that are usually between 6' and 6'3''. I guess that if it's not clear I'll edit it a bit.

[Misterf]

1401784 for some reason i was thinking of Spike when you mentioned Dragonling.

“We wish you harm, I believe we told you a minute ago.” Answered Celestia with a hint of annoyance in her voice.

Clef responds to this by holstering his weapon, so I think you're missing a "no" in there somewhere

[Teh_Zodiac]

1407736

Yep, my bad. I'll edit this later on.

FIY, we're nearing the end of the first part of the story. The following two chapters will be dealing with whatever happened in the week between the first contact, Twilight getting discovered and the whole Sun thing. After that, we will enter the second part, that'll feature a radically different Equestria as setting.

[Misterf]

1412661 well damn you, then. i'm going to be on the edge of my seat for the next, like, two months.

[SuperIntendant]

Man this is getting good. Hope you update.