Saros

by shortskirtsandexplosions

Goddesses

"Strong and resilient Elektra, I entreat you. Protect Noktyrn, her family, and the families of Chaar and Pulsade with your bastion of earth. Cast the darkest shadows over the eyes of our oppressors, so that they may never find those loyal souls who would take shelter in your timeless grace..."

Choral shuffled around the corner of a long hallway in the center of the temple, looking for Myrk. Glancing to the left, she finally saw him. He was squatting before an altar lit with blue candles. Erected before him were the porcelain figures of six alicorn deities. With a soft breath, she leaned against a granite pillar and patiently waited, staring across the shadows at his penitent figure.

"Blessed Gultophine, goddess of life and death, I pray that you usher the souls of Chaar and Pulsade into the silver pastures beyond," Myrk murmured, his head bowed. "Judge them not for their penultimate actions, but instead punish me for having brazenly guided them to such an end. I can only beg for your mercy and forgiveness, but I cannot demand it, holy Gultophine. I am humbly yours to bless or curse as you see fit."

He took a deep breath and spoke with greater zeal.

"Goddess Nebula, this sarosian's hooves and wings are yours. Grant me wisdom and tenacity to deal with the consequences of my actions, that I may restore balance to this moon, and bring your sister Luna's citizens even closer to the harmony of your glorious nature."

Choral slowly trotted towards him, careful not to make her hoofsteps too loud as his prayers continued.

"Wise and ever vigilant Entropa, I ask that you give me patience. Now more than ever, I need your intellect and all-seeing vision to guide me through these perilous times. The prophecy looms, and your sister's fate hangs in the balance. Light my path, as you have so quietly shaped it, so that I may know the direction of my flight ahead."

He was silent for a spell. Choral sat beside him, adjusting the folds of her cloak. After a few seconds, she summoned the strength to utter, "Myrk—"

He blindly held up a hoof. She silenced herself as he opened his mouth one last time, "And I entreat you, Princess Celestia, keeper of the Sun..."

Choral bit her lip and stirred with a slight nervousness. Nevertheless, she quietly listened as he went on.

"...Protect the souls of Equestria, as you always do. Maintain the law and harmony of earth, for soon you will be reunited with your sister once more. I ask that you show the same mercy to her as that which spared Luna's life a thousand years ago. Though Nightmare Moon has been on a path to destruction, your strength and maturity has preserved her, and—more importantly—the spirit of your younger sister imprisoned within. I apologize sincerely, Celestia, that I have failed in summoning your older siblings to come to her aid. Please hear my prayers, so that you may remember the power of true humility, for there will come a time when you will confront the goddess of the moon again. By the power of Epona and Consus, I pray. Your shadowed child, Myrk, son of Slaad."

In the silence that followed, Choral sat on folded hooves and gazed softly towards him. "Do you always pray to every goddess?"

Myrk slowly nodded. "Even the four cosmic ones."

Choral's eyes darted across the candles. "How come I didn't hear you pray to Luna?"

He swallowed and said, "All my life, I've let my actions be my prayers to Luna." He turned and looked towards her. "Do my words with the goddesses still disturb you, Choral?"

She fidgeted, avoiding his gaze. "Erm..." She muttered, "Only when you try to talk to the last one."

"Celestia is hardly the villain that the Empire has forced us to label her all these centuries."

"It still won't stop you from being beheaded on any platform above Marefall."

"Do you feel the same way when you pray to your patron goddess down here in Tranquility?"

"Entropa isn't my patron goddess, Myrk," Choral retorted. After a sigh, she said, "She's simply been... the most useful."

Myrk's brow furrowed. "Even you have always known better than to relegate a holy alicorn to mere application."

"Th-that's not what I meant! I... Nnngh..." Choral sighed and ran a hoof through her blonde mane. "I don't feel the same intimate connect with the daughters of Epona and Consus that you do, Myrk."

"If Entropa is all whom you pray to, that can be understood."

Choral snickered. "I swear, you and Noktyrn have been exchanging notes..."

Myrk tilted his head to the side. "I beg your pardon?"

She sighed and pivoted to face him directly. "For your information, Entropa means more to me than just the goddess of time. She's a spirit of patience, of diligence, of hard work and scientific dedication. Everyday that I work within the Lunar Energy Commission, I'm depending on her for strength and guidance and intellect."

"Has she complied with your humble requests?"

"I would like to think so!" Choral exclaimed. "With help from my father and several of his closest associates, I've devised a formula to enhance the storage of individual unicorn leylines by nearly five hundred percent!" She smiled with a brief air of pride. "I've personally conducted several breakthrough experiments. I've been able to store unfathomable amounts of energy in my horn alone, enough to make battle-hardened soldiers like your dreaded Pierce Stellar envious. If a delicate mare like myself can store half a mana battery's worth of energy into her horn, who knows what specially trained sorcerers in just a few years can do?! We can transport power sources across opposite ends of the moon without relying on hovercraft and polluting cargo trains! We can make a cleaner and safer future for the Empire!"

"Or Nightmare Moon could seize the magical breakthrough and harness it into newer and far deadlier manarifles," Myrk exclaimed. "I've seen the Empress do it before with your father's previous discoveries."

Choral gave a long sigh. "Look, before you steer this topic down another one of your self-righteous tangents, let me first finish my thought." She looked gently at his face. "Entropa has always been a part of my life, but I know better than to depend exclusively on her. What I am now, and what I've accomplished, is either the result of my personal work or the close assistance of my family and friends. We are the sculptors of our own destiny, Myrk. Face it: the age of the goddesses are over and done with. It's honorable and just to pay homage to the cosmic sisters, but the Empress is the only alicorn that matters—now and forever."

Myrk nodded slowly. He took his time before quietly replying, "You have always thought for the future, Choral. That's one of the things I love about you. But you must realize that the future means nothing without taking a stake in the past."

Choral exhaled hard, her breath upsetting the candles beneath the porcelain figures. "You really are like a broken record..."

"Please, hear me out," Myrk said, gesturing towards the ceiling with a hoof. "What lies above us?"

"Tranquility," she replied in a muttering tone.

"No, Choral. What lies above that?"

She fidgeted slightly before murmuring forth, "Marefall."

Myrk nodded. "And what is so special about Marefall?"

"It's... well... It's where all the founding members of the Lunar Empire came from: unicorns, sarosians, and even Nightmare Moon herself."

"Precisely," Myrk said. "And just how many members of Imperial society care to remember that fact?"

Choral made a face. "What are you talking about? Everypony knows about the importance of Marefall."

"Do they, Choral?" he asked gently. "Do they really? Do they feel the unnerving thought of it stirring inside their hearts every lunar sunrise, as they wake faithfully from their beds to continue doing their Empress' unquestionable work?" He shifted and turned to face her with a coal-black stare. "Do they remember that we were all once soldiers and murderers, traitors to the Celestial Monarchy in a time of great war and violence, swayed into subservience to a fascist, all-powerful warmonger whose heated ambition was enough to make her slay her own flesh and blood?"

Myrk pointed once more through the cathedral ceiling above them.

"We all started on that tiny strip of earth, Choral. You, me, your father, my father, Noktyrn's family and even Stellar's soldiers; they all had ancestors who were unwittingly caught in the magical bands that spewed from the burning core of the Elements of Harmony. When Nightmare Moon was projected onto the moon, they were teleported here along with her. Even to this day, I've had astronomers inform me that a gorge of ghastly proportions still resides in the heart of Equestria where the fated confrontation between Celestia and Luna took place. The ponies of Earth obviously haven't tried to cover up the scars of the past. But what has the Empire done to pay homage to yesterday’s sins?"

Choral said nothing. She merely stared at her hooves.

Myrk leaned forward, speaking, "They've abandoned that strip of land, Choral. Following Nightmare Moon's lead, they burrowed their way up as far as they could, distancing themselves from the moon’s one and only precious piece of home. They built Ponymonium using the same weapons that brought them here. They paved the ashes of Consus over with glass and obsidian. They built oceans and rivers out of transmogrified water in a veiled attempt to create artificial terrain. They've utterly forsaken the past, Choral, and in so doing they've forgotten the very nature of their sins, the same blemishes that cursed them to a thousand years of exile to begin with. Now..." He took a deep breath and entreated her gaze with a sincere expression. "Tell me, with a history cast to the fires of neglect, what chance do we have in avoiding a repeated holocaust in your highly anticipated future?"

Choral muttered, "We're more powerful than ever before, more intelligent than ever before, more learned than ever before." She turned to look at him. "We have the means to achieve harmony, Myrk."

"But do we have the motive?" he asked. "Knowledge is one thing, but it was also knowledge that led Princess Luna down the corridors of madness. Her task of guarding her father's remains turned into an obsession, and she transformed from a gravekeeper to a dark avenger. If she had clung to the spirit of harmony that gave meaning to her task, maybe she would never have let her anxiety and fears get the best of her. Look at the Empire now. Look at its ambition, its hubris, its militancy and xenophobia and try to tell me that the future won't be anything less than the horrific past being repeated!"

Choral shook her face with a pale expression. "Myrk, I am just one soul in the center of a barren Moon. How can I be expected to carry the entire weight of the past on my shoulders? Not even an immortal like Luna could do that, not after so many years of building one thing and one thing alone."

"Perhaps Nightmare Moon's greatest sin is fear," Myrk said. "Fear of being exposed to her mistakes. And perhaps that..." He spoke as he stood up slowly. “Perhaps th-that is the one and only quality that I share with the Empress that I've spent so many years guarding."

"Huh?"

"I can't hide here any longer," he stated. "If I don't face the consequences of my actions, then nothing will change. What kind of an example would I be for Princess Luna, even if all I've ever wanted to do was save her?" He shook his head. "No, the time of hiding is over."

"What... What are you saying, Myrk?"

"I'm leaving this temple," he said. "I'm leaving Tranquility and turning myself in."

Choral's eyes widened as she gasped. "Wh-what?!"

Comments

[Csquared08]

Myrk is awesome.

[Oddend]

Myrk with a mouth...

Wow...bad puns are bad...

[Emberspeak]

"a gorge of ghastly proportions"
I see what you did there.

On another note: I thought that in EoP, all the ponies that were sent to the moon died long before NMM returned to Equestria. Am I just remembering it wrong, or is that part of the story not canon to the EoP universe - only the runecrafting etc. are?

[Remortius]

1277951 That was what I was thinking... I remember Scoots saying they died after a couple of generations and NMM just was there all alone.
Or maybe all of the knowledge in Equestria assumed they died and in reality they didn't.

[Future Regret]

"gorge of ghastly''
I wonder what he's referring to here

[Revan]

I don't know how we get from here to last chapter... but I'm sure it's entertaining.

[AppleTank]

1911303
Could be they never got off the moon and NMM leaving them behind killed them.

[FOXTrot2]

Choral's eyes widened as she gasped. "Wh-what?!"

Yeah, that throws a dent in her romantic plans. Hope Myrk has an Ace up his wing.