109 - Chain of Command
Bon Bon slid against the wall, huffing softly. "Easy in there... Your mother's doing important things." She coiled on herself, looking at her belly. "I can't have you coming into a destroyed world, now can I? Let me work a little longer, so we can be together properly when you come out." She planted a smooch on her own side and righted herself, looking more confident after her little speech. "Hopefully, Luna will resolve this."
"Father."
The leader of the priests turned to regard the image. "Are we prepared to begin?"
"We can't be while House Hawkwood's ship remains at battle readiness," advised the floating top half of a person. "We have to deal with them before we can safely begin the cleansing. But, Father, that is not what I came to report."
As if anything else mattered. "What is it then?"
"There are reports spreading across the ship." He raised his hands into view, clasped in prayer. "We have determined the presence of magic. We are under attack, by some form of psychic or demonic entity."
Oh, the scowl that manifested on their leader. "Rouse the liturgists to action to protect us. There are rituals against this very thing."
"There are, Father," agreed the man with an obvious caveat. "But, only for one person at a time. We do not have enough liturgists to shield the entirety of the ship's crew." His hands lowered and his figure moved as if he were pacing, though the figure itself remained largely in one place. "We can exorcise, but by the time we are aware of its presence, it has moved on. Whatever it is, it seems unwilling to remain dormant for long."
His knuckled popped as he clenched his right hand. "Then they are searching for something. Someone. If we cannot protect every soul, focus on those in vital places and with vital information." He pointed at the floating half-figure. "Enough talk. Get moving!"
The image faded out just as they were bowing, ending the call. "Such a foul world," muttered their leader, turning away from the projector entirely. "My mind will be harder to crack. If you think this will protect you, you are direly mistaken." He reached over, smashing a button. "It is time we began moving. If Hawkwood won't leave, we will make them. Ready for battle."
Luna was working her way forward. "How do they fit so many in such a small space..." There, her eyes followed an outline that seemed right for the next person up. Each person only knew well the one they reported to. "I am drawing closer." She had to be. They couldn't have an endless chain of leaders. "They are quite stubborn." Not all of them had given her the information she wanted easily.
She trotted through the astral ways to find the one she saught, daydreaming by the look of it. "Not as good as a proper sleep, but we have no the time for being picky." She stepped forward into it, or tried. She crashed and thumped back on her haunches, entirely denied access to that human. "What...?" She reached out a hoof and began to feel at what should have been an open portal, but it was sealed over.
It glowed beneath her exploring touches, revealing a symbol similar to one she had seen on Gregor's ship. "Human magic," she grunted. But humans were not unicorns! They feared magic. "It can't be as powerful." Her horn began to glow as she picked and pulled at the barrier, looking for weaknesses. "I just have to..."
But the flat plane of power was perfectly smooth, with no obvious defects. She could see no way to dismantle it gently. "Then force." She backed away from the figure just in time for it to vanish. The person had stopped daydreaming and returned to full awareness. Luna raised a hoof with a heavy grunt. "I will find you."
"Laud."
He jumped with surprise, reaching a hand up quickly to his ear. "Laud Mountbatten here."
"Sensors show their ships are warming up. Looks like the fight's starting. If you have any tricks, now's the time for it. Stay safe down there, over."
Laud slammed the crystal map with a balled fist. "She has failed."
Lyra jerked awake at the loud thump. "What huh? What's wrong?" She bounced to her hooves.
Laud flicked his station back to the merchant channel. "Word from above, the church is preparing for battle. We are as ready as we can be."
"We're not letting them have this treasure," came the call of a female human in the human tongue. "We'll join the fight as soon as it's started."
"Don't make promises for us," grunted a male human. "We're ready though," he quickly added.
Lyra pawed at her ear and the strange voices coming from it. "Can you translate that for me?"
"The merchants are ready to fight, but will join after it begins, likely to avoid being the primary target." He started away from the table, moving instead for one of the windows to peer up into the sky. "If this becomes as violent as I fear, we will be able to see it even here from the ground. The stars may yet fall to the ground in great streaks of fire."
"That sounds both pretty and terrifying," admitted Lyra as she cantered after Laud. "How do we help?" She stepped up beside him, looking to the same bright day sky. "I can't do magic that far away!"
"Here you go," came a new voice, sparkles dropping from where Starlight had appeared. "How many did you need?" She began setting down communicators. "Wait, you two look like something's going on."
Laud turned to regard the other unicorn. "Who asked you to do this? How did you--"
"Twilight, magic," answered Starlight quickly, pointing at him. "Now what has you looking like the world might end?"
Laud casually picked up one of the radios and slid it onto and into Starlight's ear as she wriggled and squeaked. "There, now you can remain updated as we go. The church is preparing for battle. Hawkwood stands ready to meet them. The merchants are ready to join after the battle properly begins."
Starlight felt over her mildly violated ear. "Warn a mare before you do that... Okay, so, a big fight." She looked past them to what Lyra was still staring at. "In the sky?"
Lyra pointed upwards. "Past the sky. In the stars."
"Is that why Luna's taking a nap?" Starlight inclined her head. "She looked like she was having rough dreams."
"She is fighting, in her own way," spoke Laud in serious tones. "Though I fear she will be too late to change the tide of what is coming." He set a hand back on the smooth wall of the tower he was in. "Would that there were more direct things I could do to assist." But he was but a single man, without a ship. The battle ahead would have no space for a landed noble on a planet below.
A soft warm thing pressed into his hanging hand. Lyra was nuzzling into his palm. He smiled a little and curled his fingers, rubbing along her snout and across the top of her head. "You are good at bringing a smile."
"One of my talents," she sang, leaning against the petting with an almost purr coming from within her. "That and I like you, silly hubby sort." Her eyes rolled suddenly. "I really expected I would be the first one to be a mom. I hope Bonnie's alright."
Starlight tilted her head. "I'll go check." And she vanished in a puff of sparkles.
Luna could not find the figure she had originally chased. They were awake, wide awake. She could not visit the mind of one who was alert and conscious. A small rule, but one she could not change. Speaking of that, she noticed it had become barren around her. There were precious few twinkling motes.
The ship was awake, as a whole. "What is going on?" Before, it seemed like roughly a third of them had been sleeping at any given time. But then, they had all faded away, leaving her on a basically empty ship. "What could inspire them all to be awake at once?"
There was only one mote left she could see. She went towards it, trotting both easily and with impossible swiftness to it. "Stay. Stay..." It obliged her, still there as she came up on it. It felt like that of someone in meditation, smooth, orderly, but potentially reachable.
Not as easy as a dreamer, or even as easy as a daydreamer, but not impossible. It would have to do.
Luna stepped into it as if pressing through near-frozen water that pushed back at her. Her head broke the surface first to see a great bladed weapon coming down at her neck. She lurched to the side, hopping through and to the side at once as it came down, sending sparks and loudly clanging.
The polearm was held in the hands of an older human that was scowling at her. "Demon, you will not find my mind an easy resting place."
"I seek to speak, not harm anyone." Her horn glowed brightly as she willed a floating shield into place, fitting the idea that the man could accept as a defense. She parried an incoming strike, dancing backwards. "Tell me where your leader is, so I may speak with them."
"There is none holier than I on this vessel," spat the man as he strode forward with confidence that disagreed with his years. Of course, it was also his mind, his imagination. It was just as he saw himself, Luna realized. He was a confident soul, and would fight that way.
"Then I would speak with--" She grunted as she was cut along her shoulder, her shield moving a fraction of a second too slow to stop it. "--you." Imagined injuries could hurt just as badly, worse in some ways. "I am not here to harm you."
"I am here to harm you, demon," stated the man with utmost conviction, striding forward.
Suddenly he was thrown back, Luna spreading her wings wide as she changed before him, her teeth growing sharp, armor springing into being, black and lustrous in its purple hue. "If you want a demon, then have one. Face Nightmare Moon, if it pleases you, pathetic whelp."
"The truth is revealed." He pulled himself up, using the spear partially as a walking stick for the moment. "By the power of the Pancreator, I will smite you back to the pit you crawled from."
As they met in a bright clash of wills, the sky lit up.
Below them, ponies, griffons, dragons, and other creatures craned their heads back to see the strange streaks that began to light up the sky, so bright and harsh that even the sun could not hope to drown out their brief little lives. They could even see the faint impression of the great shields that protected the ships, flaring to light with each strike of a laser or munition it had to deflect.
The sky had gone seemingly instant from peaceful to an alien thing of confusing enchantment. Was a show being put on for them? They couldn't know, but somewhere inside them, they knew to fear it. Whatever was happening, it was important, and dangerous.
At his pulpit, facing his few faithful, Gregor dipped his head. "Let us remain calm and put our hearts where it can do the best. Pray, brothers and sisters. Let our will be known to the Pancreator even if nothing else can hear. Our allies fight vigorously for what they believe in. None of them are wrong for doing that. We pray that they understand whose belief is right, that they can come to understanding before more life is lost.
The room was a soft murmur of anxieties and concerns, but they did as Gregor asked, praying feverishly for the battle to end without too much blood spilled across the stars.
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Whoops, looks like they did have eyes watching after all.
Credit where credit's due, his first response is to get everyone else under his command out of the line of fire and then fight the intruder head on. He's a man of real conviction, and he's willing to put his blood on the line.
10367605
Decent to his subordinates. Shame they'll all die if Luna can't convince him to lay down their arms.
Grand auspicious leader, I dubb thee,
Bif Tannen.
Cos you sure as
jumped face first into it.
The biggest problem is each ship has a shield, but theres only a few ground locations capable of being shielded similarly in a defensive manner, so if things totally go Cozy, theres only Terminaly Offensive options left available?
If a fighter cant be shielded, and magic cant grab a shield, then can magic smear a fighter against a shield to use it as a pusher plate?
The forces of the church don't understand they are being offered mercy. Luna could smear them across her moon and smash the gate. The only hope for them lies in the high priest seeing reason.
"closer." she had to be."
"closer." She had to be."?
"or munition it had to defray"
..."defray |dɪˈfreɪ|
verb [ with obj. ]
provide money to pay (a cost or expense)"?
I assume you meant some other word? Or is this a specialist usage?
10368069
Huh, didn't know that word was so specific to money, Fixed!
10368171
No problem; I had to check a dictionary too. :)
10367631
i dont see them being reasonable, now they get to deal with the wrath of at minimum two goddesses, this should be fun
10367617
additional fun, i dont know how those shields work or what exactly they block but if the basic tk magic is able to work on things behind one then theres a lot of fun and volatile things you can do to a spacecraft. failing that, the classic giant rock approach never fails
Luna notes their hypocrisy towards magic. Humourous.
Too bad she didn't keep them under to delay them reporting her intrusion. Oh well.
Let's see how low we can keep the casualties, eh?
Keep going! ;)
Well now, the head dude may be a zealot but he's no coward. So far, in any case.
God knows men reveal their true selves when death is about to take them.
10368577
I'm looking for reason to win the day because David Story, but he's subverted my expectations before. And it's important to note that when they found it, the gate was wrecked from their side. So this fight has happened before, and it went bad enough for the side that built the gates that they smashed it on their end.
I wonder why Luna assumed the guise of Nightmare Moon? She had to know that all it would accomplish was confirm the delusions the Church has over ponykind.
10374692
Fatigued and stabbed a moment ago, one does not always make informed decisions.
10374692
10374784
Yeah, I don't imagine Father Gregor's prior questioning of how she could be related to Celestia yet so different helped her mood or mental state either.