Equestria's Ray of Hope

by The_Darker_Fonts

Aerial

The swirl of colors led to a night of celebration of song, which was the first time anybody but Sugar Belle heard him sing something from his homeworld. It was also the first time he bothered to learn any of their traditional songs, though they weren’t too hard to learn. The best part of the night was when everybody slowly began to leave, AJ and Rainbow inebriated enough that even being led by the CMC, they were unable to move straight. Both Sugar Belle and Big Mac didn’t have any of the cider, meaning that all of the beverage had been split between him and the couple of mares.

By the time they’d all left, he was feeling drowsy, realizing that he had completely bypassed dinner in favor of finishing the last half dozen muffins and three pieces of cake Pinkie had left behind. Surprisingly, she had barely partaken in any of the confectionary goods she’d somehow produced, leaving him with a few extra treats to enjoy during the week. Taking a quick shower, he got ready for bed. Slipping out of his shorts, realizing he had to go back to the local laundromat, he slipped into bed with a glance that reaffirmed that his alarm was set.

When he woke up, a week had passed.

Smiling, he tripped out of bed, still not quite awake. Otolo was already impatiently fluttering near the window, reminding him that he needed to leave the door open at the very least. “Sorry Ohs,” he apologized, popping the window open, goosebumps rising of his arms as he felt the chill of the morning fall air enter his room. After another chorus of disappointed twitters, he reminded her, “You know I can’t leave the windows open now. It gets too cold in the nights for a house with no air conditioning to do that. Just wake up later.”

Early bird gets the worm. “Yeah yeah, the infamous adage I myself don’t ever fulfill. There’s no birds though! As you keep reminding me, you intentionally skipped migration to stay with me for the winter. You gotta accept that life’s gonna be a bit harder up here where it gets cold!” You should be accommodating me for staying. “Aren’t I? I mean, you have as much food as you want in here anyways. Why go out there in the first place?” Reasons. “Okay, keep your secrets. You know I have no reason to tell anyone anyways.” If any of the other animals that knew Fluttershy found out...

“I’ve already become practically immune to your little pecks,” Ray dismissed the warning, pulling on pants and a shirt. Recognizing the challenging look in the little bird’s eyes, he told her, “That wasn’t a challenge. Don’t take it as one.”

A fierce bit of chatter from her only served to remind him exactly who he was arguing with. Rolling his eyes, he strolled downstairs, deciding that his body needed something more than just cold cereal. Grabbing a few eggs from the fridge and a banana from the fruit bowl that had mysteriously appeared in his house sometime that week, he began cooking the food.

Seeing as Otolo had escaped to an unknown destination for the morning, he could get away with eating the breakfast delicacy, and he was going to take full advantage of that. Cooking up an omelet for himself while he downed the banana, he glanced out the kitchen window, which had a thin layer of vapor on it. The first frost would come soon, sometime in the next two weeks, Applejack had told him. Then, it would just be maintaining the trees and animals through the winter. It also meant that the workdays would be a bit shorter as they lost daylight. Apparently during the winter, there was only daylight for about nine hours during late December and early January. It wasn’t too unsimilar to Pittsburg, though in the city, the lights kept the streets lit through the night.

Quickly adding salt, pepper, and some paprika to give the omelet more of a kick to start his morning. Chowing down on it quickly, he washed the few dishes that had built up over the week, not eating enough at home for it to be a daily ordeal. The water had gotten colder as well, he realized, the warmest it got was still not quite room temperature, the pipes cooling with the season. Shaking the water off, he turned and left the living room, getting ready to leave for training, when a book on the shelves caught his eye. Frowning slightly, he saw that it was new, delivered somehow to his house sometime between last night and this morning.

Walking over to the bookshelf, he gave the book a disregarding stare, but grabbed it anyway. He knew that it must have been teleported into his house by Twilight, since Otolo would have gone crazy if anybody had entered uninvited. Pulling the thinner book off the shelf, he read the cover: Species of the World. Curious, he flipped open the book to the front page, surprised to find not a lengthy introduction, but a warming smile of a creature he couldn’t quite identify.

The strange creature had a beak, but more like an octopus’ than a bird’s, that was smooth and sharp at once. Its face was covered in silky, oily-looking pink fur that gave it a kinder impression than the jagged beak entailed. It waved flippers at the camera, and it was only then that Ray realized the setting of this picture was underwater, and not on land. The coat of the top half gradually transferred to scales as the rear end became more aquatic, like a fish tail. The image of the strange creature with its friendly, Pinkie-esque eyes and half-pony half-fish body reminded him of mermaids. Finding the footnote in the bottom corner of the page, he read, “Hippogriff student at the School of Friendship (Ponyville) in her seapony form.”

Now intrigued by just what the book had to reveal, he flipped to the title page, dismissing it and reading the table of contents. By the looks of it, not only did it have a page for information on the different species and their customs, but also pictures of the different physical appearances of them. Smiling, he began flipping through the book, taking little mental images of each of the different unique species that he hadn’t yet had the opportunity to meet, knowing his time was limited before he had to leave.

The last pages contained the ponies of Equestria, and he couldn’t help but stop on a page that displayed all three species. The unicorn was a small filly, the earth pony a grown mare, and the pegasus an elderly looking stallion, all smiling at the camera as they displayed their different and unique bodies and their advantages. The unicorn was levitating several objects while the mare was holding a large bundle of sticks in one hoof with the stallion flying overhead. The simple image of the three different, random ponies resonated deeply within Ray, a simple thought that there were thousands of them out there, thousands of faces he never had never would see. And he was going to defend them all.

Smiling at the thought, he propped the book open, not sure he would remember to pick it up again unless he left it out. Pulling the door open, he shivered beneath his short sleeve shirt, wishing that he had asked Rarity for some warmer clothes until it had already become too cold for shorter sleeves. The past couple days of training had been rather miserable, cold skin and a runny nose being some of the highlights. The real pain, however, came from attempting to learn archery with stiff fingers and hands instead of hooves.

For some reason, the concept of drawing back an arrow with some sting and making it fly was much, much harder than he had anticipated. His very first attempt at actually using the bow and arrow was a mess, mostly because he had gone in completely blind. Skalos had given him a bow and a singular arrow that was almost too dull to pierce paper and pointed him to a straw dummy. The actual problem hadn’t been with drawing an arrow back, but keeping the arrow on the bowstring. It seemed that every time he had finally lined up the perfect shot, the arrow somehow leaned away from the bow itself. Then, when he finally fired, it flew about three feet too high and ten feet to the left. The shot was so bad that Skalos verbally laughed, though he cut himself off quickly.

There was no redemption the next day, just sore arms and the first time he managed to graze the dummy. The only bright side was that he was finally keeping the arrow on his bow instead of letting it drift off. He expected that today would be more of the same, attempting to build up his aim and keeping his arms strong for multiple shots in a row. The force it took to pull back a singular arrow usually left his arm a bit achy and he had to take a few minutes to regather his strength before firing again, during which time Skalos would either explain to him what he’d done wrong or how he should be more relaxed for the shot. Either way, he would spend hours on end firing the same few arrows with the same simple wooden stick to hit the same hill instead of the hay figure.

Oh well, he thought, realizing that he had begun jogging the familiar path to the lake, his muscle memory taking him there instantly. There was a bit of relief in the knowledge that he was getting better, if ever so slightly. Perhaps today he would finally be able to pin the arrow into the dummy and begin to get the flow of the bow and arrow down. Skalos had told him about the way that archers and archery itself had been a major part of the wars the Fallen had fought previously, the way that it had turned the tide of their first battle with endless clouds of arrows descending on their enemy.

The mental image was certainly powerful, and archery was indeed an interesting prospect that Ray didn’t dislike. It was simply the harsh learning process of the art that made learning it as tough as it had been. Chuckling slightly, realizing that, while he had indeed been worn out and physically exhausted by the other aspects of training, it was archery that was his first true challenge. Who would’ve ever thought that a simple pairing of string and wood would have ever been so complex as to drive him to being angry?

Shaking his head at his own ridiculousness, he crested the hill that led to the familiar lake, the waters looking gray as an onset of clouds had set over Ponyville. Squinting over the area, he didn’t initially see Skalos, but upon descending the hill, he noticed the Fallen standing besides his Hobbithole. The stallion immediately caught sight of him, and began waving Ray over immediately.

As the distance closed between them, Skalos questioned Ray, gesturing inside with his hoof, “You said you wanted to visit us Fallen more in our home in Tartarus? I hope you were earnest in that arrangement, otherwise I just remodeled for no reason.”

Ray stared inside with wide eyes, the entire opening room past the short front hall an intricate arrangement of burnt ground that formed a vaguely familiar pattern that surrounded the much smaller version of the pattern. The ceiling was now completely missing, a wide hole in the earth directly above the waypoint allowing sunlight and the densely cool air in. Somehow, it seemed as if Skalos had taken the ceiling off perfectly, leaving nothing but an unnatural circle in the ground above them. Furrowing his brow, slowly spinning around the room, he opened his mouth to say something on the appearance of his friend’s residence, but he found he didn’t have the words.

“Huh,” was all he managed to get out. “You uh, you say you remodeled yourself, eh?”

“Come now, Ray,” Skalos comforted, noticing the human’s discomfort. “After living a millennia in the depths of Tartarus, there’s no other place I could conceivably call my home. I’ve known the pits so well that I could recognize every single building, crevice, stalactite, and curve. Besides, this was only a temporary residence anyways, a simple hole in the side of the hill from a few hundred years back. It’ll serve us better as a waypoint directly into my true home than as a substitute. With this established, we’ll be able to travel to Tartarus and back in minutes for your training, as often as we require.”

“Well what was wrong with the other one,” Ray asked, turning pointedly to the room where the other one was.

“If you’ll remember, I told you the waypoint gets burned out by the use of it, as darkways do,” Skalos explained simply. “However, we used the waypoint twice that day. I knew it would ruin Zecora’s, mine, and the Fallen’s darkways once we used it, but you were injured, so I took the cost. This is a daypoint, or a waypoint that uses light in the center darkway and the outer rings to transport anybody to a specific area, though it can receive transport from any other waypoint. Since it receives much more light, it generates light where it is opening up, easing the transportation and keeping both sides cool. And with the floor already scorched in on both sides, it can withstand multiple trips a day without being damaged.”

“I don’t understand,” Ray honestly confessed. “Isn’t that what the other one did?”

“Not nearly,” the Fallen stallion told him, beginning the process of tracing the intricate lines on the inner symbols. His horn lit ever so slightly as he continued to demonstrate, “This one requires more than just the natural magic of a verbal enchantment that can be used by anyone. Unicorns are the only ones able to activate it, though once somebody has been touched, or blessed, by the creator of the daypoint, they can use it just as easily. The key difference is that daypoints use sunlight to displace darkness, first transferring the sunlight on the inner rings to the other daypoint, allowing it to have natural light for the outer ring to connect to.” Smiling keenly at the complex explanation he’d given Ray, the stallion asked, “Any questions?”

Surprisingly, he didn’t have many important ones, so pressing his lips together, he simply shrugged. “Good,” Skalos remarked singularly, bending his head to the point where his horn was practically scraping against the floor. Once again, he began chanting in the strange tongue, the flow of his words steady but uncanny all at the same time. There was a slight respite between phrases this time, however, as Skalos ignited his horn and dipped it into one of the oblong equine figures. A golden glow slowly overtook the room as the insignias on the floor were activated by the Fallen’s actions.

Eventually, the entire inner combination was alight, which Ray took as his cue to step into the waypoint’s center. Skalos entered the center with him, exclaiming “Rafsa!” This, of course, began the warming of the air that Ray had felt himself a few weeks ago, the air beginning to brighten itself. However, the next word that came was different as Skalos shouted, “Ankishur!” In a flash, the outer ring suddenly exploded in light, this dimming the inner pattern as it began to transmit the light to the other side. There was a low swishing sound, as if a jet turbine was slowly being turned on, as the light began to be literally sucked through the insignias on the outer rings, which now appeared to be black. The light continued to drain into the symbols, the noise beginning to become an uproar, and somehow, over the terrible sound, Skalos bellowed, “Jahez!”

Too quickly, the roaring silenced, leaving a serene quiet to overtake the pair, though they could no longer see each other. Ray hadn’t realized it until then, but the light had intensified to its gentle, blinding state. The beam kept him from seeing his surroundings, though he was able to feel the Fallen’s presence beside him and hear as he yelled, “Haleck!”

The calm warmth of the light overtook him, dispersing any vestiges of the morning chill left, blinding light intensifying until he was back in that same white room, featureless white surrounding the pair. Ray looked down at Skalos, both as a source of comfort and to have something more solid to stare at when the light settled back to darkness. Sure enough, with an ear-splitting snap, the light broke, small particles of it spreading throughout the dark room.

Stepping out of the inner circle, he found the same darkened, slightly misty room as before, the low roof above him looming dangerously near his head. Had he really grown that much?

Immediately, Skalos was leaving the waypoint, the briefest impatient pause to glance behind him, signaling Ray to follow him. The human hurried to follow the Fallen down the long, featureless corridor, darkness tinted slightly by the light of Skalos’ body and little floating orbs. The two traveled in almost uncomfortable silence, the echoes of Skalos’ hooves and soft squishing sounds of Ray’s shoes reverberating softly against the cavern's oblique walls.

It was actually Skalos who broke the uncanny silence, muttering softly, “We should really install some lighting in here. Maybe some bullwater to give it a natural, softer light.”

“Pardon,” Ray said, confused by the stallion’s sudden talking. He had heard the Fallen just fine, but he hadn’t quite comprehended what exactly he was supposed to derive from his statement.

“Ah, I was just saying that since this is going to become a daily routine for us, it would be best if we installed some sort of lights for you,” Skalos explained, a subtle smile crossing his face. “Personally, we Fallen don’t require any source of light to see in the dark, since we produce enough light ourselves for our eyes to use. Luminescence has been an… unconventional adaptation to our physicality, one that we do appreciate. Our eyes faded with our bodies, but luminescence gave us a literal light in the dark, a new way to see ourselves and our surroundings. We assume it’s from the bullwater we subside off of down here, Celestia knows we didn’t need to experiment with it.”

“Huh, what’s bullwater,” Ray asked, many of the words Skalos had said not making much sense to him.

“Ah, it’s a luminescent liquid that’s full of different minerals and proteins,” he answered. “We don’t know much about it, other than it being a rather unique liquid. You see, it’s too thick to simply evaporate in the sun, which means all of the proteins are an actual composition inside of the liquid. It’s not even water, rather hydrogen and oxygen with something else, though we don’t quite know what yet. Either way, most ponies aren’t brave enough to try to drink a glowing pale-blue liquid, but when you live on the edge of boredom every day of your eternal life, you attempt some unique things to entertain yourself.”

Chuckling softly, Ray muttered, “Well, if I lived forever, I would have to figure out some way to entertain myself, now wouldn’t I? Guess drinking strange substances and carving houses into cliff faces would be satisfying entertainment, eh?”

“Well, it passes the time,” Skalos admitted, his voice still cheerful even as a forlorn thread entered his voice, his footfalls faltering. “When you don’t have anything to do, you find yourself asking more questions and trying to find more answers to the how rather than the what. We Fallen have made a science of ourselves and anything else we could manage down here. Celestia and Luna even occasionally visited us to see our progress and fund it from time to time. They fed our curiosity.” The Fallen stopped thoughtfully as they reached the opening into a much more… organized cavern. Before stepping into it, the stallion muttered softly, “Bless them for forgiving us after so many years.”

Ray didn’t have time to respond before the stallion entered the strange cavern, noticing that he didn’t wish for any further comment on the subject. Ray had finally begun to understand the stallion that had introduced him to the person he was going to become. He was a sentimental stallion, his emotions well concealed but not repressed. He let Ray see that he had more emotion than the cold exterior he put on during training, letting his friend know that there was personality there. He was showing Ray more than just how to be a general, but how to be a sentient killer, someone who could understand life.

Slowly, as Ray had come to the knowledge of the subtle lesson Skalos was teaching him, he began applying it to his own life. He had worn a mask since the moment he left the shower the night he had arrived, the only one seeing him without it being Otolo. Now he needed to stop hiding in his shell and begin facing the truth and the utter reality of being who he wanted to become. It was the greatest lesson this stallion could have ever been taught, and it was why he knew Skalos, while imperfect in nature, was the perfect companion to charge into battle and lead armies with. Smiling softly as the silent Fallen hurriedly left a second opening just a few feet away, he let the stallion have his silence. They didn’t need to be completely transparent with each other, even if Ray was rather see-through.

It was only after Ray exited the secondary opening that he realized the cavern they had just been in wasn’t a cavern at all, but a house carved into the side of the main cave. Stepping into the open, confined area that made up the home of the Fallen, he found himself in a view he had never been in before. He was staring out across the long field of sparse grass and stone from what was most likely a balcony. Stepping up to a simple stone guardrail, he stared down, looking around in slight bewilderment.

The room he had emerged from was at the very top of the town of stone buildings and houses, intricate staircases weaving themselves back and forth through the entire town. They led to several different varying levels, and quickly counting them, he found that there were four different levels in the city, none too distinct from the other. There were dozens of Fallen moving through the dull, smooth streets, the roads looking as if they were simply carved from the earth as well. Ray had only seen this small city of the Fallen from afar, but now that he was here, he couldn’t believe how large it actually was.

Several distinct buildings stood out among the organized jumble of structures, some having dome tops and others looking like half circles with open rooms facing the plains. These buildings were teaming with Fallen, who moved about in an organized fashion. The Fallen themselves walked and acted like any other pony out and about doing their daily chores, though many of them were casually carrying around spears or bows. The calm, dull nature of their movement and walking was contrary to the kind ponies they were. However, taking their surroundings into account, along with the nature of these Fallen and their lives, he found the scenery of the cramped city… relaxing.

Looking around at the gentle chaos of the city of stone and ghostly ponies, he found himself almost feeling at home. The tight roads and short alleys between buildings were much more familiar than the openness of Ponyville, the cramped environment comfortable after living so long in the rundown sections of Pittsburg. He smiled at the sight of so many of his people, the soldiers and personalities that he would lead and fight besides. They were not invincible or flawless, nor were they cold and born killers. They were simply ponies who were trying their best to redeem themselves and make the world better.

The comforting fact did have a more concerning side to it, the fact that, for over hundreds of years, they hadn’t done much fighting, though they had allegedly been training still. Indeed, it looked as if they were ready for war with their weapons carried about them as casually as they were. However, what did they actually have? What did normal acting ponies have against towering beasts well armed and brutally effective in killing, wanting to do nothing but that? As concerning as those questions were, he didn’t have time to contemplate them, he was ushered away by Skalos.

“We don’t have too long to tarry about,” the Fallen informed him. “We have to take a bit of time walking out to the archery range, so you can’t stop to goggle at the sights. I too find myself staring at this city often as well. We Fallen have spent a good deal of time mastering the carving of stone to make ourselves a city. We call it Abrasia, or the City of our Own, where we can be free to do as we please with our free time. A good number of us visit the chapel or the halls to discuss the latest scientific or political debate.”

“So you guys have a religion,” Ray asked, taking the steps down to the next level of the city two at a time. He had never found any of the ponies he knew to be religious, so the concept was rather shocking.

“Well, yes,” Skalos answered, dodging past a gray Fallen who was rushing in the direction they’d come from. The stallion barely seemed to note Ray’s presence, giving him a simple nod as he passed. For some reason, Ray had expected the encounter to be much more… personal, for the Fallen to have been shocked by the sight of the human suddenly in their home. With a soft smile, Ray tuned back into Skalos’ discussion.

“I’m personally a patron of the moon, and have been ever since my colthood,” the stallion told Ray. “Many ponies here are converts to being patrons of the moon, as it was the Princess of the Night who conquered us and sentenced us to this lifestyle. Her mercy was not clouded by rage in the moments of our capture, and not a single one of us died when she captured us. There wasn’t even a battle, only a siege and a long winter until we surrendered ourselves to her. Our commanders were executed for their part in leading us on our horrible, murderous rampage through the valley, but otherwise, we were kept in relative safety.”

“Praising her is a strange way to show your appreciation for being captured,” Ray said, giving the stallion a look.

“Well, yes, it is a rather strange tradition for many who aren’t us, but we Fallen were humbled by our experiences,” Skalos told him. “You see, we were one of the largest enemy forces to be faced by the Princesses. Previous engagements with us had led to the deaths of thousands in every battle. The fact that eighteen thousand of us were captured with almost no death on both sides was a statistically astounding event. We were intelligently outran and outlasted, surrounded completely and left with no options but to hold out. There hasn’t been an occurrence like the capture of the Fallen since it happened and we respect our Princess for the way she was able to spare us and herself while accomplishing her goal.

“We learned a great deal from the Princesses in their mercy and attitude for us, and while it took them a couple hundred years, they eventually announced their forgiveness to us. It was that event, the announcement of forgiveness, that gave us the will to actually begin to live as ourselves. We built our own culture down here, a scientific and politically based system of living in which we attempted fulfillment and integrity. A thousand years passed and our development as individuals was excellent, however, we stopped feeling completed, and we didn’t have much hope for the future. Ever since Luna was banished, we had felt our unity and our fulfillment waning, and it came to pass about one hundred fifty years ago.

“During that time, and since, there have been many clashes between us Fallen over the matter of whether Luna or Celestia was in the right and wrong, and that division eventually led to a few major things. Namely, we, until about five, six years ago, had a divided city, where believers in Luna’s purity one part and believers in Celestia’s in another. We still met, however, there was an anger and darkness on us all for those decades, and we felt as if there was a civil war about to start between us. Then, we were visited not by Celestia, but by Luna, and peace was restored, for the most part.

“The reintroduction of us old friends to one another was probably the happiest time of my life, but the cultural divisions were still there. That’s when we formed our different sects of Grims, Moderates, and Foals. Grims are mostly traditional Lunars, such as I, while Moderates are radical Lunars and Celestials, with the Foals being the mixture of both. When we learned about you, lordling, there was an uproar for weeks, though it wasn’t a violent or disruptive matter, more questions upon questions. ‘What’s a human?’ ‘Why does he get to lead us?’ ‘Who will represent us?’”

Turning over his shoulder, the Fallen gave him a rare, genuine smile. “You can imagine my surprise when Twilight’s test was of intelligence and not popularity, and my shock when she announced my leadership. After living together for almost seventeen hundred years, everybody knows who other ponies are, so everybody knew my name and face, but I wasn’t popular. Still, the others accepted Twilight’s judgement, and I’ve tried my best, taking some tutoring from Twilight, but mostly reading the books she lent me on general affairs and the sorts.

“It was a rather busy year leading up to your arrival,” Skalos informed him, taking a pause as he glanced around the empty street they were on before deciding their direction of travel. “You see, while you didn’t know we were going to call upon you, we did, and we had to prepare both for you and the minotaurs. We rearmed ourselves and began the process of accumulating weapons once again, as most of our weapons had fallen away to time. There were some preparations for a quarter for you here, but we decided against it. If you were going to join us, you didn’t have to be us, or live like us. This way.”

Suddenly they were turning and walking down a sloped path, the stone angling down behind buildings of the third and second levels, heading straight for the first level. Curiously, it seemed to turn around and head into one of the actual buildings of the first level. Indeed, upon getting to that point in their journey down the slanted path, they turned in front of a solid wall and walked into a house not too unfamiliar with the one from earlier. This house was actually lit by torches on all four walls, leaving the room in a curious red and yellow lighting rather than the pale blue of the cavern. They were out of the room in an instant, however, and across the short stone walkway until they reached the plains themselves.

The grass was rigid but not exactly stiff, more like rubber. It was strong but bent beneath his weight, throwing Ray off at first. After a few steps across the grass, he balanced himself out. There were dozens of Fallen out here, doing anything from sleeping to running, maximizing the use of the large space in their cavern. Some of them saw him while others didn’t, but overall their reactions to him were much the same as before, a slight smile or nod of recognition, but nothing more. This came as a relief, as while he wanted to become more involved with those he was supposed to be leading, he didn’t want to be flooded by their attention.

Skalos led him along the edges of the grass, near the city’s edge until he found they were past it. They were suddenly encroaching on an odd box-shaped structure a few feet into the grass that he hadn’t noticed before, the monotonous stone blending with the nearby edge of the cave. Curiously, there was nobody around this structure, which was rather small compared to the simple houses and ramadas that made up the city. They wrapped around it to where Ray saw there was an entrance, though it was small enough that Skalos had to duck under it. Getting on his hands and knees, Ray scooted himself through the small opening, finding himself facing a drop of a few inches.

Following the drop, he found that these were stairs that descended into absolute darkness, no light entering the structure from the outside and no light source within. The only thing that he was able to see was Skalos, his luminescent body descending into the abyss through the stairs. “Pardon our lack of light in here and the tight fit,” Skalos apologized over his shoulder. “We hadn’t the space to make this any bigger for your comfort or ours. This was discovered just a few years ago in its own right, and we haven’t finished mapping it out quite yet.”

“What do you mean,” Ray asked, though there was no answer. Skalos had disappeared suddenly, either from descending too far to see or perhaps because of a turn. Sighing, he reached up and touched the roof of the structure, the stone cool beneath his hand. Using it as his guide to how tall he could be, he crouched over and began descending blindly down the stairs. Indeed, after several steps, he found his foot bumping against a solid wall that was completely flat. Turning, feeling his way around with his hand, he turned over his left shoulder to find an opening there, and began to descend more stares. Just a few steps down, there was a glowing hole in the ground where Skalos stood.

“This is a natural cavern that has been formed by flowing water that runs under Tartarus,” he explained, suddenly handing Ray a rope. “We don’t have any wood down here, so we used some broken bow strings to make this rope to help us travel down here. This is our make-do archery range. The water provides a buffer for our arrows, but it isn’t that deep, so we can retrieve any misses or thrown away shots. The main cavern is probably half as large as the one we live in up above, which serves well enough for its purpose. It’s much better than having them firing arrows across our park and damaging the little bit of soft ground we have.”

“So you want me to climb down there,” Ray questioned, glancing down. There was indeed light down there, and though he couldn’t see much through the hole besides the rocky ground below. Tugging on the rope to check how firm it was, he stepped up to the hole and began to scale down the wall. It didn't take long, maybe a minute at most, before he reached the ground. Looking up at where Skalos peered on him from. Holding up his rope, he inquired, “How do I get this back up to you?”

The Fallen gave him a knowing look before tugging on the base of the rope, sliding it up out of Ray’s grip and taking it back up. The human smiled sheepishly as he watched his friend proceed to slide down the rope, not bothering to scale the wall like Ray had.

“No need to show off,” Ray jokingly chided.

“I did no such thing,” Skalos denied the claim, walking past him and behind the human. “I was simply giving an example of how this procedure is supposed to be carried out.”

“Yeah, of course,” he sarcastically agreed, turning with the Fallen. His attention was immediately diverted from his jesting with the stallion and to his surroundings, awe instantly overtaking him.

The cavern before him was nothing like the dull one above them, alight with bright white and colors that reflected off of the water's slightly rippled surface. Large stalactites hung from the roof of the cavern, each filled with mysterious blue or white chambers that glowed. These chambers seemed to be what provided the cavern its magnificent light, bright beams gleaming all from dozens of large stalactites that gave the room an ethereal atmosphere. There were hundreds of Fallen standing on the wide bank of the lake that disappeared beneath a wall that must have been almost a mile away. The clear water sparkled in the light, the reflected beams shining crystalline light across the dimensions of the cavern.

“Wow,” he breathed, not sure if his voice carried the sentiment.

“It’s strange,” Skalos suddenly mournfully said. “We found such a beautiful room such as this, with its magnetic attraction and otherworldly beauty, and instantly we made it into a new archery range to train in killing.” Glancing behind him at Ray, Skalos’ eyes lacked any sense of irony, only a deep sadness within. “Don’t become like us, lordling,” Skalos instructed Ray, his voice sounding broken. “Learn to enjoy the world around you. Don’t look at the world as if each piece of it is part of a battle. Let yourself have peace more than once.”

Ray stared at the Fallen mutely for a second, intending to say something to reassure his friend, but the words weren’t there. Instead, he just nodded, pressing his lips together in a slight smile.

“Ah, Skalos, and my lordling friend,” the hearty voice of a mare suddenly called. The both of them turned to face the voice, finding a stocky earth pony mare approaching them. There was a bow strapped horizontally on her right side with a quiver of arrows on the left, tilted up slightly to prevent them from falling out. Ray briefly recalled the mare, her glowing, deep purple body being distinct from a majority of the other Fallen he’d spoken to, but he couldn’t remember her name exactly.

“The name’s Adant,” she introduced herself, thrusting a hoof out. Ray took it, shaking it firmly as her broad smile infected him. “I hear you’re havin’ some trouble with archery. Glad you could come and visit us, ‘cause I’m pretty sure we have a few answers to your problem.”

“Yeah, it’s definitely not my specialty,” Ray admitted, rubbing the back of his head in embarrassment.

“Ah, don’t feel ashamed of anything,” Adant encouraged. “Archery is an art like any other and takes a good deal of training and the right teacher to learn.” With a pointed, taunting look at Skalos, she added, “There’s certainly a great deal more difficulty to it than simply pushing a spear back and forth, I’ll tell you.”

Skalos rolled his eyes as he passed the mare, using his magic to take the bow and quiver of arrows from her to give them over to Ray. The human grabbed them both from the magical grasp, slinging the quiver over his shoulder and dutifully following Skalos, not quite sure what the two’s attitude towards each other was supposed to mean. The companions stepped onto the sandy bank of the underground lake, Skalos turning to him and pointing to his quiver.

“Stick those arrows into the ground here,” he instructed, though his eyes were on the Fallen behind them. Lowering his voice, he suddenly told Ray, “I apologize for any awkwardness that ensues. Adant claims that we were lovers some time ago, though I personally have no recollection of what she’s talking about.”

“Uh, o… Okay then,” Ray muttered, accepting the unprecedented apology, not quite sure how to react to such a claim. Sticking the arrows firmly into the sand of the bank, he asked, “Why have her be my instructor then?”

“Because I’m the best archerer they have,” Adant proclaimed conceitedly. She stepped between Ray and Skalos, taking the bow roughly from Ray’s hand, pointing to where he’d been gripping it, inspecting the wood. “Well,” she contemplatively observed, “you seem to know how to hold it for a bipedal creature. That’s a good start. Hit one of those targets over there.”

Ray followed where the purple hoof pointed, to a target probably a hundred or so feet away, much further than the ones he’d been shooting at by the lake. He took the bow back and pulled one of the arrows from the sand, pulling it back on the string and pointing the arrow at the target. Taking a deep breath in, he let the arrow fly as he breathed out, watching the arrow sail shakily. It flew for a while, his high aim carrying it far, but not far enough, as the arrow dropped into the water short by a good few dozen feet.

“Well, there’s our problem,” Adant exclaimed. “Let’s work on that”

Author's Note:

Whew. Got it out today, working on more tomorrow. Enjoy, and as always....

Comments

[jasha3558021]

Estoy confundido 🙄

[The_Darker_Fonts]

11046813
I felt it would be tedious and take too much time to go over every exercise and piece of Ray's training, so I lead on to certain things to give you an idea of what's happening. I decided to skip out directly on archery and whatnot because I don't know much about archery itself and because I didn't have anything plot necessary in it.