Pony Fantasy V: Exodus of the Void

by GMBlackjack

XV - The Vlerryn

The ball of electricity formed itself into a humanoid shape clothed in a dull blue robe, face adorned with a long beard that trailed on the floor. In his hand was an impressive staff crackling with electricity. “The Vlerryn is not yours to take. I know not why you were sent here, but know that this facility is restricted. You can make this easy or-“

Rainbow Dash flapped her wings and surrounded him with flaming torrents. He sighed. “Hard way it is.” He raised his staff, lighting flying out of it and hitting Rainbow Dash directly, paralyzing her instantly.

Rarity raised a shield around herself and removed Rainbow’s paralysis while Applejack and Pinkie ganged up on the bearded being. He dodged both Applejack’s sword and Pinkie’s punches. Pinkie countered with a tidal wave, only to discover that electricity flowed really well through water. She passed out, smelling like burnt candy.

The attacker sighed again. “You really do make this most troublesome…” He attempted to go for Rarity before she could heal her fallen comrade, but Twilight stood in the way, hitting the staff directly with a magical laser.

“Oh no.”

The staff exploded sending a wave of electricity out that hit everyone, knocking the mares and the electric mage off their feet. Several bits of machinery around them exploded as they overloaded, sending shards of glass everywhere in a rain of sharp projectiles.

“You ponies aren’t all that intelligent…” The wizard said, standing up and regenerating the staff in his hand. “All that did was make things worse for you.”

Applejack went into an enraged state and charged, sword swinging wildly as the earth itself trembled around her. Rarity sped Applejack up, the wizard finding it impossible to dodge a berserk earth pony wielding a sword faster than physically possible. He roared in pain, preparing to smite Applejack with a bolt of judgement only to feel a sharp pain in his back.

“Oh!” Rarity said, smirking. “I suppose I forgot to mention - I did recently learn how to use a bow. The only good thing to come out of that dreadful Crescent Island.”

The wizard lost his physical form and became an orb of yellow energy once again. “You… have bested me…”

“Oh goodie!” Pinkie said, suddenly standing up and grabbing the yellow essence. “New summon!”

“What? NO! No! I will never serve-“ He sighed. “I guess rules are rules… You did beat me… Why do these things happen to me.”

Pinkie called out Shiva. “Oh hello Ramuh! Nice to see you!”

“She got you too? I thought you were better than this.”

“Eh, I was bored. Ifrit’s in here too.”

“A regular family reunion.” Rams sighed. “I am now your servant, your wish is my command. I apologize for my previous antagonistic actions.”

Shiva sighed. “Always so formal and dry…”

Applejack blinked. “Why is it that all these summons seem to know each other?”

“They don’t know the Albino Chocobo.” Pinkie reminded her.

“No, I mean, doesn’t it strike you as a bit odd that all the summons you’ve found all seem to share a history?”

“Not odd at all.” Ramuh said. “Beings of legend get transformed into eidolons regularly. We were just part of an ancient legend. Not all that unusual.”

“Eidolon…?” Twilight repeated, confused. “Is that what your kind is called?”

“Yes, though it’s probably an archaic term at this point. Spirits or summons is probably the more modern term for us.” He began to flicker. “Now, I must be off for now…” He vanished form reality. Shiva shrugged, following.

Rarity looked back at the flying machine - the Vlerryn. “So, dears. Shall we get back to returning to the Last City?”

Rainbow Dash grinned, charging up an icy blast in her wings. “You bet. Going to take out this window.” She charged, crashing into the glass with intense force - and bouncing right off.

Twilight sighed, simply teleporting everyone to the other side of the barrier. They made their way down the chamber’s railings to the flying machine. It wasn’t a huge ship - the cockpit only appeared big enough to hold maybe a dozen ponies. The doorway - like everything else in this place - was twice as tall as the mares using them.

“Who would make stuff so tall?” Applejack asked. “It doesn’t make pumpkin sense!”

“You can just say ‘plum sense’ you know.” Rainbow Dash remarked. “Trying to expand your vocabulary to other vegetables just sounds a tad silly.”

Applejack started grunting something about featherbrains.

The five mares walked slowly into the Vlerryn, finding they had to stand on their hind hooves to see anything of the controls. Applejack, Rarity, Rainbow Dash, and Pinkie Pie stared at the controls with looks of confusion. Pinkie in particular seemed the most bothered. “I… I’m a technical mastermind! Yet this seems to be completely… foreign! I don’t know what any of these buttons do!”

Twilight’s eyes sparkled intensely. “I… May have some idea.” She sat in the big forward chair, smirking. “Let’s see… flip this switch, turn this one, and pull…. UP…”

The Vlerryn began to warm up, a soft humming noise coming from the back. Outside, the blue began to get more intense, and the wings started to adjust themselves to the air currents flowing through the chamber. The chamber, detecting a craft activating, opened the roof, using powerful forcefields to pull away the hundred meters of water above, creating a hole in the ocean.

The Vlerryn slowly rose higher and higher, the levitation devices separating themselves from the craft’s hull. The ancient craft floated higher and higher, the sunlight reflecting off the bow.

Rainbow Dash looked at the viewscreen in front of her. “This. Is. Awesome. Make it go fast Twilight! Make it go fast!”

Twilight smirked. “Now Rainbow, I just got it to go up, give me a few seconds to figure out-“

“Obviously that one.” Pinkie said, pointing at the stick with a big forward arrow on it. Twilight shrugged, grabbing into it with her telekinesis and pushed forward. The Vlerryn fired it’s engines and began to move -

- only to have something explode and the ship to fall back down into the chamber, where the levitation devices caught it once more.

Twilight stood back up, the fall having tossed her to the craft’s floor. “I should’ve expected such an ancient craft to have a few problems… Heh… Come on girls, let’s go fix it.”

Pinkie bounced up and down. “Oh boy!”

—

“Mister Sunburst, your tea is read-“ Bon Bon yelped in horror at the butchered room before her. The council members were all dead in a heap at the far side of the room, with Shining Armor set aside so Bon Bon could see his face. The earth pony shuddered, backing out of the room - when she heard a whimpering noise.

She mustered up the courage to look into the room to see a mint-green unicorn mare shuddering on the ground in a fetal position.

“She… she killed them all….” She muttered.

Bon Bon gulped and walked over. “Who?”

“Princess… Luna…” She shivered. “She… She’s trying to find the Earth Crystal… Took the information right out of his… His skull…”

Bon Bon glanced at the hole in Shining Armor’s head and winced. Then something horrible came to her mind.

ALL the council members were dead. Who was in charge now?

It was never expected that all of them would die at once…

Bon Bon knew that panic was going to set in as soon as people figured it out.

“I need to get you out of here!” She said. “Come on!”

Lyra blinked. “Wha-“

“Let’s go!”

Bon Bon dragged the unicorn out of the chamber, only to run into a half dozen crystal guards, and none of them looked happy. They looked behind the two ponies, looks of horror crossing their face.

“This… isn’t what it looks like…” Bon Bon said. Lyra just moaned.

“You killed the council!”

“Uh… no… I didn’t… Uh… I just came in and saw this unicorn in there!”

“Oh and she killed them? Likely story.”

“Do I look like I could have killed Shining Armor?” Crystal Hoof pointed out. “He would have crunched me. And the hole in his head is for a horn much larger than that of this mare here.” She was really hoping her fast-talking was going to get them out of this situation.

“She’s right.” One of the guards said. “Neither of them has the capabilities to do this.”

“Then who did?”

Bon Bon looked at Lyra. “She muttered something about Queen Luna…”

“It’s an attack!” The guards yelled. “Search the city, man the armaments! We are being invaded!” They scrambled to their positions, leaving only one with the two mares.

“I’m going to have to take you two in for questioning.” He said.

Bon Bon sighed. Well, it was better than being executed on the spot…

—

The Vlerryn blasted off into the air, hovering above the ocean where the secret facility was hidden for a few seconds.

“Wait.” Rainbow Dash said, looking at the readout that showed what was below them. “WE’RE BACK AT CRESCENT ISLAND?”

“Appears so.” Applejack said. “We just can’t get away, can we?”

Pinkie giggled. “Oh, I that that Crescent Island will be important again later. It’s just that kind of place.”

“I hope that guy down there sees us in our new awesome ship.” Rainbow Dash huffed. “Stupid dolt.”

“Now Rainbow…” Rarity said. “You don’t need to get all hostile…”

Pinkie grinned. “Yeah! After all he only laughed at us continually for our entire stay, regardless of how much we threatened him!”

“Remind me again why I didn’t buck him in the face?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“I asked you not to.” Rarity observed.

At the front of the cockpit, Twilight smiled. “And this controls altitude! I got it! Thanks Ramuh, you’ve been very helpful!”

“Anything to serve my new masters.”

“You know, you aren’t our slave-“

“The rules dictate that I must follow. Now excuse me, I must beat Ifrit at a game of “hellfire cards” in Eidolon space. Don’t crash the Vlerryn while I’m gone.” He sighed. “The Vlerryn was meant to be kept in pristine condition, as a museum piece… It was never meant to fly again…” He left with a depressed sigh.

Twilight smirked. “Okay Rainbow! We’re going fast now! Back to the Last City!”

The Vlerryn launched into the sky and blasted through the atmosphere so quickly a loud BOOM could be heard, and the hull visibly heated up from the friction.

On the Vlerryn itself, everything only shook slightly. “Huh.” Rainbow Dash said. “That’s cool. No bumpy ride.”

Pinkie whined. “But I LIIIIKE bumpy rides~!”

The Vlerryn drew up on the continent where the Lost City lay - but what they saw wasn’t what they left. As they approached, the very ground beneath the earth began to shift and move, as the entire city began to lift up out of the ground. Below the stone buildings rose the great crystalline city that they had been in mere hours before - a beautiful thing, when seen from outside.

But it wasn’t done rising yet - there was something under the crystal tunnels. A tremendous mechanical shape thundered out of the ground, bright blue engines blasting it into the sky. Earth shifted around the great structure, releasing it as it flew into the sky. The Vlerryn approached the great city as it rose above them, loose earth falling to the continent and sea far below.

“What. The. Heck. Is. That.” Rainbow Dash asked.

Twilight’s jaw dropped. “Something… Something even older than Cadenza! A truly ancient city which the Lost City was evidentially built on top of!” She blinked. “The Earth Crystal. It’s in there. And I’m willing to bet it’s the main power source for that city’s engines.” She looked back. “I’m willing to bet that that city’s society was also the one that made this ship…”

The city flew higher and higher into the air, eclipsing the sun.

“What are we waiting for?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“Yeah! LET’S GET UP THERE!” Pinkie Pie yelled. The Vlerryn charged towards the city, flying right for the largest section.

A voice came through the Vlerryn’s speakers. <At long last you have arrived. Late. The evil has rerouted power to the engines, I am not able to deactivate them or switch to secondary power sources. You must hurry, I do not have long. Dock on the westernmost pier, that is the most direct path to me. I am keeping the evil occupied for now, but I cannot for long.>

The five mares nodded. “We’re coming!” Applejack said.

<Welcome to the City of Man. There is regrettably no time for a tour. Speed is of the essence.>

The Vlerryn sped into the pier, ready to enter the city.

Comments

[the other sans]

He vanished form reality
The Vlerryn fired it’s engines and began to move

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