Salvation

by voroshilov

Terminus

Penumbra awoke in an officer’s room below the command centre. Her bed, under any other circumstance, would have been far from comfortable - but to her weary self it had been the greatest and most mind-numbingly pleasant thing in the universe.

Slowly, she rolled over. A deactivated terminal on a desk greeted her - next to a wardrobe and door leading somewhere, most likely a bathroom. At first, she desired to check the terminal, before deciding that she actually desired to sleep some more and rolled back over again.

Only four thunderous knocks on her door stopped her from passing out again. With an almost stubborn sluggishness, she rose from her prone position and moved to the door. Her mane was probably a complete mess - coat too - but the amount she cared wasn’t worth the mental effort required to quantify.

She pushed the unlock button and the door slowly slid open, revealing a pair of Dominion Warriors and Astrid.

“Good to see you up,” Astrid said, “Ablazed Glory has asked for you in the command centre.”

Penumbra rubbed her eyes absentmindedly. “Can’t I get a clean up first?”

“I’d be happy too, but whatever it is shouldn’t take long.”

Again, Penumbra acted without thought, nodding her head and stepping out of her room. “Okay,” she said, before stretching out her wings and yawning, “lead on.”

Ablazed Glory - looking in significantly better shape than she had been before, and Penumbra for that matter - lorded over the war room. From her command chair, she gave orders and checked consoles, working faster than ever before.

She turned as Penumbra entered. “Good,” she said, turning back to the situation maps on the many viewscreens, “you’re here.”

Penumbra tried to speak, but a yawn swiftly overcame her. “Glory,” she mumbled, volume trapped by the aftermath of her yawn, “what’s up?”

“Well, as Astrid no doubt didn’t inform you, we have a big problem on our hands.”

From behind Penumbra, the Archon huffed. “Speak for yourself,” Penumbra thought she mumbled - though in her general floatiness she wasn’t sure.

“What’s the problem, Glory?”

“The Worms have sped up. They got within 3 light years in an instant. Our previous estimates for how long we had to defend ourselves have run significantly shorter.”

Ablazed Glory turned to see Penumbra’s reaction. Upon recognising that her fellow alicorn was practically asleep, Ablazed Glory sighed. She toyed with changing her message, but settled upon just waving her off. “Astrid, go clean her up - get her some coffee or something.”

“Coffee ran out three days ago,” a Warrior said, “but there’s still some combat stims in the clinic.”

Normally, Ablazed Glory wouldn’t have even considered giving Penumbra combat stims just to wake her up - but in the extraneous circumstances she allowed it. “Astrid, do whatever you think is right.” Enough leeway to get a useful effect but not enough of an order to give her a share of the responsibility for a potential disaster.

Astrid knew she would have had to drag Penumbra to the clinic - though her physical strength allowed her to simply carry her alicorn companion. With great care she lay her onto one of the beds and moved to check the cabinets.

“I think we might lose, Astrid,” Penumbra mumbled.

The Archon turned. “I don’t think we will,” she replied, only for Penumbra to laugh.

“You’re lying,” she said, “you think the same as I do.”

Astrid smiled. “Perhaps. But, whilst we deny potential failure, we have hope for potential success.” She considered turning back to the cabinets, but instead walked over and kneeled by Penumbra’s side.

“Every so often,” she said, “we fail. What we do then is learn from failure and use it to prevent future failure. So, failure is a learning experience - a success as it were. But, we don’t wish for failure, instead we wish for success. So, either, we get our wish and succeed - a win - or we do not, but we learn - also a win.”

Penumbra chuckled. “Until, we fail so badly we die, then we can’t learn.”

“We cannot die, Penumbra,” Astrid said, to which Penumbra’s gaze snapped to her and an almost mocking expression of disbelief crossed her face.

“We cannot die, Penumbra,” Astrid repeated, “and I will prove it to you. Until I die, I am alive - therefore I am not dead. If I die, however, I am no longer alive - you would think that would mean I am dead. However, I am dead - therefore I cannot update the record to change my status from living to dead. Therefore, I am immortal and cannot die. You are the same.”

Penumbra stuttered. “What. What? What, what? I. Hang on. Eh. Did you just? No. No? Yes?”

“I think you just tricked me into believing in it,” she said, “how did you do that? No magical trickery?”

Astrid smirked. “A little terminological trickery, perhaps.”

“Ah,” Penumbra said, with a feigned seriousness, “you did magically trick me.”

“Only insofar as my words are magical.”

Penumbra chuckled. “Yeah, yeah they are. Alright, let’s get those stims.” A sudden light flashed in her eyes. Yeah, she thought, I’ve got time.

“You know, I’ve been thinking...”

From her command chair in the war room, Ablazed Glory managed the defence of Ferrus and scowled.

What’s taking those two so long, she thought, all Penumbra needed was some damn stims.

Every few seconds her eyes snapped to the viewscreen observing the approach of the worms. How the hell had they gotten so close? Practically instantly they’d travelled ten / twelve lightyears. She squirmed slightly in her seat - things didn’t work that way, space travel didn’t work that way.

The orbital cannons were all secured in the base shields; they would be no use against the worms, Ablazed Glory knew that. But, they might prove some use against the cult fleet in orbit - maybe buying time for the Dominion troops to escape.

She rolled around times in her mind. How long would they have before the worms got within range? Upon first arrival, there’d been an estimate of about 3 months - more than long enough to figure out a way to react. Then, most of the distance had vanished over the course of a single instant. Three months had become less than three weeks.

Where the hell were Penumbra and Astrid?

Ablazed Glory knew one thing for certain: she needed a coffee. Another thing she knew was that she could not have a coffee as there were no means of producing one in the base. What kind of self respecting fortress didn’t have a proper supply of coffee beans? Even instant coffee would do, she thought, just some damn caffeine to take the edge off.

She’d never ran a siege before and she hoped that she’d never have to ever again.

Bloody hell, where are those two?

It was then that the war room doors slid open. Penumbra, looking somehow more ragged than when she first left, entered, followed by Astrid, who still looked completely made - though the Archon always seemed to be perfect.

“It’s,” she started, before stopping herself. Come on Glory, no need to be rude.

“Alright Penumbra,” she started, again, before again stopping herself. “Hell’s bells, you’re flustered - are you burning up? Are you allergic to the stims?”

Penumbra stuttered a little. “No, no, no, no. Just a little, erm, adrenaline, probably, yeah.”

Ablazed Glory shook her head as she looked the alicorn over. Then, a moment of apparent clarity crossed her. She shook her head again and pulled away, back to the command seat. “Give me strength,” she mumbled.

“Alright,” she said - with a little more than an annoyed tint to her voice - for the third time, “the Worms are closing in. With their rate of movement, we can’t get a proper estimate for when they’ll arrive. So, the plan is, simply, we break out and get into space.”

“The cultist fleet will prevent that,” Astrid said, almost immediately.

Yes, Ablazed Glory thought, I know that you bloody, hot-blooded fiend. “That’s the problem. We need to open the shields long enough to deploy our cannons against the fleet, clearing us a path into space.”

She realised that she was, as before, talking mostly to Astrid. Penumbra had been rendered essentially useless by her lickerish exploits. Gods in their tombs, she didn’t like that thought.

“Can the other bases be accessed remotely?”

“Already tried. We can but doing so might allow the cultists access to the networks. We’ve estimated a window of around eighteen minutes.”

Astrid stroked her chin. How come, Ablazed Glory thought, she was so composed when Penumbra was practically a braindead wreck? What was the difference…

Oh shit that was the difference.

No, stop it, bad Glory! Focus on the plan, get that out of your mind - no room for distractions of any kind. This has to be pitch perfect, no room for errors here - everyone’s lives are on the line!

“Ablazed Glory,” Astrid questioned, “are you alright? You’ve flushed up.”

She focused herself - forcing her flames to recede slightly. “I’m quite alright,” she said, “can we focus on the problem at hand? Because the Worms could be here any minute.”

Again, Astrid thought. “They will be a few more days yet,” she said, as the skin on her cheeks flashed waves of purple and green. “However, hmm.”

“What?” Ablazed Glory felt the back of her mind starting to flare up. Relax, she breathed, relax, no stress - only focus.

“I sense something else approaching through the Rift. I’m almost certain.”

“What is it? More cultists?”

The Archon shook her head, eyes glowing quietly beneath closed eyelids. Her blonde hair fell over her face a moment, before slowly slithering its own way back over her shoulders. “They are not cultists, unless the cult have recently changed their recruiting patterns. They’re something else.”

Focus Glory, no stress, only focus. Focus on the plan.

“Okay, then we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

From behind her, an officer shouted, “we have incoming, multiple Rift signatures!”

Ablazed Glory spun. Everything was all too sudden. Astrid could have warned her sooner. Why didn’t she say anything before? Where were the gun controls? How many ships? How many soldiers would they bring?

Focus. Focus Glory, no stress, only focus.

She breathed out.

“Identify!” She called out to the officer, jumping down to their console.

“They’re coming through now, sir, scanners giving us a profile soon.”

The scanners were not, however, faster than an Archon. Astrid’s eyes opened again, glowing blue. “They’re Dominion.”

Had any words, Ablazed Glory thought, ever been more wonderful to hear. She looked to the Archon with nothing except absolute elation. Astrid’s hair had, somehow, re-plaited itself, she noticed, and she had almost certainly gained slightly more colour to her skin. How odd, she noted, before leaping at the biped and crushing her and Penumbra in a hug.

“Ferrus Control, this is Fleet-Admiral Skryer. Starlight-makes-Joyous Seeker informed us you need assistance. Prepare your ships, we’ll bring you aboard once the sky is clear.”

Joyous-Seeker, Ablazed Glory laughed in her head, so he really had gotten through.

“Fleet-Admiral Skryer,” she said over the comm, after prying herself away from Astrid and Penumbra, “this is Ferrus Control, are we glad to see you.”

The Dominion officer on the other side chuckled heartily. “We arrive precisely when we’re needed. All guns, light them up!”

From the fortress war room’s viewscreens was visible a veritable massacre of the cultist fleet. The spear-head shape of the Dominion fleet cut forwards quickly and mercilessly, leaving dead hulks in its wake.

Now that was a beautiful sight, Ablazed Glory thought, that’s the luck of the Equestrian for you.

“Ablazed Glory,” Astrid’s melodic voice floated behind her, “we must get to the ships. Almost everyone will already be waiting for us.”

Focus, Glory, she thought, focus. Focus, then we can get through this all.

“Alright,” she called out to the few Warriors who still remained in the war room, “let’s pack it up and get to the ships!”

Within an hour they were aboard the Dominion ships. Though, they were given no time to rest, not yet.

“We’re moving to Terminus,” Skryer said, “a defence has been set up there. We stop these things in their tracks right there.”

“And if we can’t do that?”

Skryer shook his head. “Not an option. We stop them there, that’s the end of it.”

Focus, Glory, focus. No stress, only focus. Lives are at stake.