30. Lost Empire: Arrival
Washington D.C. Smithsonian Courtyard
“Why can’t they just humor me for once. I know my research is right and Atlantis does exist.” A young man with orange hair and large rimmed glasses slowly picked up his notes. Once again the committee had snubbed him leaving him to pick up the shattered remains of his research with the same disdain of saying he should stay in the boiler room.
His name was Milo Thatch, a young man dressed overall like a scholar with large glasses and orange wavy hair, who was once regaled by the stories of his adventuring grandfather. If only they would believe him. Milo slowly lumbered back to his feet and began to make his way back to the same dingy room he used to keep close to the boilers to keep them from exploding.
“If only I was given a chance…” Milo muttered out.
“LOOK OUT!” A voice called out as Milo ducked to the side as this strange shadow like creature swooped in with it’s long sharp claws.
A strange fellow with a old detective’s coat ran in smacking the creature with this strange looking sword shaped like a key. Following him were six differing women of all sizes who all seemed to wield the same weapon as well. Several of the flying creatures came out of nowhere and immediately went after the sword wielding crew that had saved him at the last second.
“Watch out for the Air Soldiers they like to dance around making them unpredictable!” The male shouted out while the rest simply nodded and continued to work together to stop the threat.
Finally when the last creature dispersed and the strange heart crystal emblems disappeared Milo stood up unsure of what to do. He had to say something but the fact that those creatures were something he’d never seen was beyond even his understanding.
“You ok there?” The man asked.
“Uh… yeah. Sorry it’s just something I wasn’t expecting. Thank you for getting me out of that. What were those things?” Milo questioned the man.
“Those were monsters. I guess you were doing something which seemed to attract their attention.” The man shrugged his shoulders.
“I didn’t think they would immediately come out of nowhere just like that.” The young woman with the neon blue hair mentioned.
“We told you multiple times already that they would warp in at any moment.” The most prim and proper of the women mentioned. Strangely her eyes were very purple which might just be a genetic impossibility but it wasn’t Milo’s field of expertise.
‘Who are these people?’ Milo pondered as they talked amongst themselves for a while.
Gray’s Pov (Two hours before landing)
“So once we go down there I need to warn you that if there are humans we might need to give a few of you alias.”
“What!? Why?” Vinyl huffed.
“Because human names are simpler and less obvious about what they mean. I can get away with going by Gray since that is sometimes used as a first name but it’s not very often. Right now Octavia is the only one with a passing name.”
“Why are we going through all the trouble though? Shouldn’t keyblade wielders be revered as heroes?” Spitfire questioned though the look in her eyes told me that she already had some idea of why they weren’t.
“Once long ago maybe. At a certain point in history there was a great war between keybladers which ended with almost all those wielders dead and only a minute few managing to survive. Due to that war there have been numerous rumors of keyblade wielders being either bringers of salvation or ruination. Most worlds we go to might not even know anything about keyblades at all or the heartless that pervade their very world. When we get there we have to limit some of our information when it comes to locals of those worlds.”
“But why?” Spitfire pushed on.
“The last person who was told of other worlds sold their hearts to darkness and sacrificed all their friends to gain more power. While I know there are trustworthy beings who won’t abuse that knowledge I’ve made it a point to never trust immediately. Trust is earned and never given. Something I learned from experience…”
“Gray.” Fresh Coat stepped forward and placed her hoof on my shoulder. My eyes immediately woke up from my memories.
“Look… I trust all of you by now with my life and while we’re down there I know I can count on you all to watch out for each other. All I’m asking is that you trust my judgement on how much information we actually divulge to the inhabitants of new worlds. We work on a case by case system. Information of the heartless is immediately divulged when we have the chance.”
Every mare actually looked surprised. While I knew it might be reckless of trusting them so fully… I needed to do it. I knew I had to do it, to eventually get better. I can’t keep freezing up whenever my memories of the past wanted to breach the surface of the water. Each of them seemed to contemplate the severity of what I said. Spitfire and Redheart took it the most seriously almost saluting me but they quickly put their hooves down. Octavia and Fresh Coat seemed to constantly think upon those things lost deep in thought. Vinyl and Sunshower seemed to blush and flail one of their hooves as if telling me not to worry about things.
“Well… Ok then Gray. We’ll follow your lead on this. Is this only when we go to human worlds?” Octavia brought up first seemingly taking charge of the situation.
“Yes only on human based worlds. We need to ease natural inhabitants to the idea of other worlds over time.”
“Do you have an idea for names for us then? We have never met a human before yesterday. I don’t think I can just pull off a color for a name.” Fresh Coat brought up.
“Hm… Vinyl can be shortened to Vi. Sunshower to Sunny. Redheart can go by Red. Spitfire can go by Ash. And Fresh Coat can go by Pallette. It still fits you and can be considered nicknames while we’re on these worlds.”
“Why am I Ash?” Spitfire brought up.
“It’s short for Ashley but this way it fits the fire theme I still see in you.”
“Oh… I guess that’s okay for now. Still doesn’t make sense to me but if you think it would work then I’ll go along with it.” Spitfire thought aloud seemingly trying to puzzle out why this made sense. The others accepted it at face value, then again their names didn’t change much and Fresh Coat’s still had to do with painting in someway.
Truthfully I didn’t know if this would fully work but as an alias it would at least give us some form of anonymity while helping out other worlds. Though I decided right away to give Octavia a nickname because she really did have a unique name on human worlds.
“Octavia I’m gonna use Vinyl’s nickname for you. So while on other worlds I’m using Tavi.”
“R-really? Oh drat.” Octavia sighed out.
“I’m sorry. You’re name is very unique and a real name.”
“Can we not use Melody as my name?” Octavia brought up. I looked at her and facehoofed. That would work perfectly.
“Nevermind. You’re right that works much better.”
“So what else do we need to do before we head down there?” Octavia asked.
“Honestly I think we’re good. Let’s go ahead and head down there.”
The seven ponies all got into position as the teleporting platform activated. Everypony was still nervous about it but Gray was the first to step on it leaving the ship behind. Not being outdone Sunshower was the first to warp down to Gray’s position. The others followed suit not wanting to be outdone by their fellow herd mate.
When they all landed the sight of the sprawling city surprised them entirely. When I looked around to see what exactly those bracelets did and when I found the first window in our path… The sight wanted to make me throw up… It was me, as a human. The same brown eyes and the same light brown hair. I was wearing the old cobalt gray detective coat I wore so long ago alongside a red tie and dress shirt with long slacks. When I looked down I still had my hooves and wings as well. Good… it was just an illusion.
The girls all looked into the mirror and each of them were shocked as well. Spitfire seemed to be wearing army fatigues though in a much brighter color with the symbol of the Wonderbolts. Redheart seemed to be wearing a bright red dress with long black tights and had a doctor’s coat draped upon her shoulders. Octavia was wearing a modest black dress that covered her legs though she did check her legs and was surprisingly wearing slacks beneath them. Vinyl was wearing a strange getup similar to a mechanic of some sort with overalls and gloves. Fresh Coat was wearing a smock and her hat had become a green beret. Finally Sunshower was dressed in a medium goldenrod dress with white tights covering her legs and beyond. They all had illusions that made them look human.
“So that’s what I would look like…?” Vinyl questioned as she gazed at her reflection more closely. Fresh Coat and Sunshower also seemed mesmerized as well.
“Ladies we need to figure out where to go. While we do look different it’s only an illusion. We’re still ponies when we look at each other.” Spitfire broke their trances with that information allowing everypony to settle down from the shock.
“So now we need to figure out what to do as we are now. Seems like the illusions would at least give us some leeway when it comes to the natives. Gray was there any information about this world?” Sunshower quietly brought up.
“The only thing Yen Sid told me about this world was that the darkness was encroaching on this world. We need to be on the lookout for heartless of any kind. Let’s see… looks like we’re outside of a museum.”
Before anypony could answer me a mass of darkness appeared over the courtyard summoning several new heartless I hadn’t encountered yet and disappeared after the first game. Air Soldiers They shared similar bodies like them but instead of a helmet they wore aviator gear with matching goggles. I didn’t know why their caps had propellers on them but it did compliment their bat wings.
“Hey, Gray look! You're twins!” Vinyl laughed out as several air soldiers popped out of the darkness.
“I say I pull off the look better.”
I flared my wings and soared towards the closest enemy striking it with Nightmare Cascade. Surprisingly the blade had much more reach and after the third hit the Air Soldier I had smack fell asleep. Before I could enjoy that little surprise another flew straight for me kicking me aside. It didn’t hurt as much as I thought it would.
Spitfire flew to my side as we worked together to thin the numbers and weaken the group. Fresh and Vinyl took care to fire off several fire spells to keep the swarm off guard. The few that did go too far to ground got smacked around by Octavia and Redheart. Sunshower finally came up to the air casting defensive measures on Spitfire and I.
The Air Soldiers kept swarming in forcing all of us to work in tandem to keep them from overwhelming each other. Everypony got a workout from the entire debacle though after the endeavors of Merlin the girls were all decently getting better. I briefly wondered if they would have been able to help me handle the Demon Tide. A little optimistic but I survived well enough… as well as could be expected for a newbie.
As the last Air Soldier fell back to darkness and the heart emblem floated away I felt a pointed stare coming from somewhere only for the feeling to disappear. Sunshower seemed to notice as well as she looked on in concern while I was looking around for that feeling. The others finally joined us where they also seemed concerned.
“What’s wrong?”
“We all worked pretty well but why did those heartless appear in the first place?” Fresh Coat asked.
“It probably means that they are actively looking for the heart of the world. Did we explain that to you girls?”
“Yes you did. It’s basically the very core of the world and the reason that worlds manage to exist as one of the vessels of light. Because the heartless are after them they became known as the Hearts of the World.” Octavia recited from memory as if she planned for this.
“Correct. That means they have sensed it somewhere but they haven’t found it just yet. We still have plenty of time to find it and lock them off from it.”
Everypony nodded only to get distracted as another group of Air Soldiers popped out of nowhere only this time a young man with orange hair was sourly speaking to himself. Sunshower was the first to notice as she cried out to get him to duck.
“Thanks you all for getting me out of that mess but I have to get home for now. Perhaps another day we could discuss this but right now… I just need to rest for a bit.” Milo spoke as he walked off for some other place.
“Are you sure you’re going to be ok?”
“Yes… just need to clear my head.” He said though even I could tell he was feeling a bit melancholic. While Sunshower wanted to do something we still didn’t know much about this world… well most of us didn’t. I personally knew he could be trusted since I watched the movie about this world before. The problem with that was that with heartless on the set the entire script was probably rewritten to something to fit as an adaptation. That left a lot of ground that needed to be covered. Before I could fully work out something another car drove by much bigger than the standards of what this world was capable of and stopped before us.
Before today I believed that the ponies I had met and decided to give a chance to were capable of rolling with the punches and taking on anything in the world. Since they saw me effortlessly defeat heartless in a few swings and then manage to destroy the personification of nightmares in the form of an alicorn I thought them unflappable by anything. Then they saw a car moving and immediately were freaking out by the fact that it moved without any form of pony power or coal engine. That conversation had been one of the most difficult to truly convey in words what I actually meant. Now that an example was before them they were fascinated by everything that was before them making the illusions we were wearing very hard to take seriously.
The driver of the car allowed us in and we were face to face with a very old man with a balding head and long very well maintained beard. He seemed a bit knowing about things with the way he looked over us but his demeanor never seemed to hold any malice towards us. The only reason we had gotten in the car was more due to me having knowledge of him. He was known as Mr. Whitmore and was the one who would eventually fund the Atlantis expedition. Now was the time to gather info for the girls.
“So we’re here but I would like to know for why?”
“Sharp man. I like it. But I think you know why you’re here. You’re hunting heartless and I can tell that you probably need to do something important here. Plus you saved Milo and I can’t think of a better reason to approach you now in person than through an agent. Preston Whitmore, philanthropist and entrepreneur of the rare and exotic. I happened to be close by waiting to speak with young Milo before I noticed a strange group of people fighting what was most likely known as heartless in the courtyard and managing to fly around all willy-nilly as if they had wings.” Whitmore rambled on causing a few of us to flinch… myself included.
“Were you the one watching us after we finished off those heartless?” Sunshower asked politely enough.
“Why yes indeed I was mam. I was waiting for my associate to procure a few more would be adventurers in order to round out something very important I’ve been working on.” Whitmore explained.
“What could possibly be so important that you need Milo for this?” Spitfire quirked her eyebrow at him. She seemed a bit unsure why Milo would be so important for this man’s project and didn’t like how it was worded either.
“Ah that my dear is on a need to know basis and I know you want to know. Perhaps a little trade would be in order. Hm? You agree to work for me for one expedition and I give you more information about how I know what I know. This may be your one chance to get what you need to get and find what you have to find.” Whitmore spoke
“May we have a few moments to think about this before we agree to it?” Octavia answered in kind.
“Of course. Make yourselves at home.” Whitmore answered as the car finally came to a stop and the girls quit gawking over things. Outside, however, was more to gawk at as we were at the site of a huge manor.
Whitmore Mansion
The seven of us all occupied one of the larger lounges furnished with things never seen before. Well things they’ve never seen before. After they satisfied their curiosity and stopped trying to touch every weapon in Spitfire’s case we all sat down around one of the tables and pondered over things.
“So what do you girls want to do?”
I already had planned to accept the deal but I knew they were a part of it now. They were going to be a part of my life for the rest of it while I was in Equestria. So I waited for them to make their opinions known.
“We should just take the deal. It’s not like we know any better about this world than he does.” Vinyl brought up.
“I know Vinyl but we need to look smarter than that. Play coy in some cases so he knows we aren’t just trigger happy wackjobs swinging around keyblades.” Octavia responded.
“He knows about heartless though. Should we be worried about that?” Sunshower sat back on the couch cushion sinking into it which caused her to yelp about how fluffy it was.
“Most worlds do know about heartless to some degree. The problem right now is with how much he knows. He has a better hand than we have and we can’t exactly just wait around to figure out what we have to do to find the keyhole that leads to the heart of this world. Though if this expedition has to do with water then we’re going to be using the Gummi Ship to handle that problem.”
“It can go underwater!?” Fresh Coat interjected.
“Yes. It’s a spaceship but since it handles the pressure up there it should also handle the water pressure as well.”
“That’s taking a big risk with our mode of transportation. Should we really chance it?” Redheart intervened that line of thought before it went much further.
“Unfortunately that means that we are going to be under someone else’s command and we have no training using anything made by humans. At most I only trained as a cop and that limited me to driving things. I’ve never exactly earned my sea legs and only recently did I earn my wings.”
“That was only two weeks ago to this day now wasn’t it?” Spitfire reminisced about those moments, “To think it was only so long ago we duked it out in a friendly sparring match.”
“Yeah. Good times… Good times. But I’m thinking we should just take the deal. We’ll make the stipulations about our independence in some form and work alongside these experts he probably has.”
Everypony nodded and agreed to the terms. While I couldn’t help to think that maybe their feelings molded their decisions I was still happy that they weren’t being impulsive on these matters. From what I could tell, a common goal amongst ponies seems to bring even the most polarizing together to fix a common problem. At the same time with strong leadership they are slightly mostly followers at the same time. Spitfire is the only one I can see actually being willing to take the role of leadership besides me and capable of keeping it. Before I could keep contemplating individualism and the sanctity of forging one’s path Mr. Whitmore came into the lounge dressed in a very white suit. He seemed very pleased at this point.
“So have you all come to a decision about this?” Whitmore asked.
“We’ll take the job but you have to give us info first and tell us exactly what we signed up for.”
“Done.” Whitmore answered as he took a seat before us. Tonight was going to be a long night.
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Awesome chapter. Can't wait for more.
it will be an adventure to write home about.
Hope you remember the hilarity that is...Mole.
8281972 Yeah they were really fast paced and I enjoyed the extra fun because original gummi ship routes were kind of boring.
8286432 Truly an adventure worth its weight in gold. Could you believe if I had chosen to have Twilight as one of them? She wouldn't stop gushing about things while we were on an adventure.
8286618 Don't worry... I remember them very well.
8287796
Oh man...imagine if the gumi ship events were developed by the makers of F-Zero(speed),maybe throw in some Zone of Enders?(bullet hell/artful maneuvering)