Chapter Forty Eight: Who really is in the cage?
The elevator doors opened, the pair angling their guns down the hallway. Lights flickered, a single, long passage leading to multiple metal blockages. They pushed on slowly, only a few doors on their left and right.
The metal barricades revealed themselves to be an intact checkpoint apparatus as they got closer. Energy hummed through multiple crystals set into the steel gate, an automated gun angling at them from the ceiling.
Sassi examined a small access pad to their right, out of sight of the gun in a small alcove. She entered the override code, a magical field powering down.
“Scans indicate everything is clear. No breaches in the past few days. Almost a week. Before that, it looks like something came and left,” she explained, tapping the pad again. “If it’s a trap, we can activate it again and this checkpoint will go live. That gun will hit anything that passes through the gate.”
“Those would have been nice on the other floors.”
Chuckling, Sassi pushed the metal grate open, pistons and gears clicking to indicate it was much heavier than it appeared.
“It’s a tricky thing. Automated upkeep, pinpoint tracking, yada yada yada. It’s expensive but set-and-forget, hence why it’s used mainly in Silo Three. Here, it’s more obnoxious and a last resort. But hindsight and all that.”
There was a second checkpoint, and then a third. After deactivating it, the pair paused.
Greeted by a very-dead skitter at a broken control panel, Sassi walked around it, head shaking in confusion. The console was set into the wall, just before the hallway opened up. The creature’s head, limbs, and torso had been spiked through with sharpened rebar, pinning it to the console.
“That’s either good or very bad,” Astral muttered.
“I vote weird. Let’s see what’s next.”
A final checkpoint and the hallway opened up into a massive chamber. It was easily half the size of a hoofball stadium and in a similar shape to a half-oval. Automated defenses were visible along the walls; spellcasting crystals and turrets were deactivated. Yet the majority of the space was dominated by dozens of the green crystals mounted on the floor, powerful spells making the air hum.
And in the center of the room, seemingly dwarfed by the massive pieces of equipment, was the Queen.
Contained in the magically-strengthened cell, she looked at them expectantly from behind the shimmering, translucent green walls. Thrice the size of an alicorn, she had a triangular head sporting eight eyes, four on each side, draconic in nature. The skin covering the Queen was almost scale-like, a cross between old, unreformed changelings and dragons, and a dull green in coloration. She even had a scaled tail, more dragon-like than a pony or insect.
Two smaller, clawed limbs rose from her back, neatly folded against her barrel. She otherwise stood on all four legs like any other quadruped complete with hooves, or something close to them. She had a regal nature despite the alien form.
“Huh,” Astral muttered as they walked down some metal steps towards the cell-like enclosure. “I was expecting more…freaky-spider-like.”
“I can hear you if you’re this close, armored helmet or not,” the Queen called out in a rather annoyed tone, her voice lacking the elongated ‘s’ the previous Skitter had. If anything, the Queen’s tone was more fitting to various nobles Astral had encountered. Refined and pointed.
“Oh, uh, sorry,” Astral said out of reflex, the Queen letting out a titter.
“A polite one? This is quite a treat,” she mused, then turning her eight eyes towards the other Thestral. “Ah, the famed Sassi. At last, we meet. I have heard quite a bit about you. Less so about you, Astral.”
Sassi nodded to Astral briefly after examining a series of crystal displays next to the cell, a miniature control room set up outside the enclosure.
“We’re clear. This level is definitely on lockdown. No motion detected for almost a week.”
The mare sat down, looking at the Queen with a guarded gaze after flipping up her visor.
“What…who are you?” she asked.
“I appreciate the distinction,” the Queen replied, sitting down as well and looking down at the smaller mare. “My name is Joro. I am-was the Queen of the creatures you call Skitters, warped as their forms and minds may be. I still am, but not here.”
“What do you want from us?”
Joro blinked, a hoof-like limb gesturing towards Sassi.
“To be free.”
“Not going to happen,” was Sassi’s immediate reply, the Queen letting out a sigh.
“Not here. I want to go back to my realm. My home,” Joro clarified.
“Wait. You weren’t created here?” Astral asked.
Joro shook her head. “No. But everything you have seen so far was.”
A huff left Sassi’s mouth, the mare shaking her head.
“Wait. So, the Skitter you controlled wasn’t like, your spawn?”
Joro bristled at that.
“No. Everything in the past few decades was grown in this place, more or less. Including the other Queen who seeks to kill you. Even the creatures here who were created still responded to my control until recently. The earlier experiments had intact minds from my realm until the new Queen took control. They are all gone now, and only the monstrosities remain.”
“Ok, wait. Sassi, we need to learn more,” Astral whispered, “you don’t know much about this Queen, let alone a second one. We may never get a chance to learn about all of this. And quite frankly, this is rather out there.”
The mare huffed, nodding as she settled down on her haunches a bit, addressing the queen.
“Astral is correct in that we don’t know much about all of this,” Sassi admitted, Joro seeming rather pleased that the mare knew she could overhear. “You said you could help, provide us information. So, where do we start?”
“If you have time, the beginning, if you so desire,” Joro said, her tone abruptly shifting. Astral’s eyes widened, a hoof gesturing to her.
“Sassi…”
The mare stiffened. As they looked closer at the Queen, they saw dozens of scars crisscrossing her body. A nearly-invisible collar was wrapped around her throat, a soft series of lights blinking on it. The lights matched a rather large orb on the ceiling of the cell.
“That collar, what does that do? Is this a trap?” Sassi hissed.
Joro abruptly laughed; a horrible, tired and pained sound.
“Trap? Only for me. Come now, Sassi. You know what this collar will do. You’ve seen it before.”
“I’ve seen a version of it on the prisoners. Remote detonation if things get out of hoof.”
Astral gulped at that.
“Correct. The device above me is a bomb, but not for me. It’s a failsafe in case their experiments failed. Do you want to hear it all, or just bits and pieces of my situation?”
Joro’s words seemed to calm Sassi, or at least make her reluctantly settle down and listen.
“Ok, how about we start at the basics. Queen Joro, where did you come from then?” Astral asked, the individual clearly brightening at hearing his respectful tone.
“Aren’t you an interesting and polite pony? It has been so long since someone has been so…” her voice trailed off. “Yes, that is indeed a place to start.”
Sitting up a bit taller, Joro took a deep breath, a wince spreading across her draconic maw.
“I come from a place you know as ‘Limbo.’ My realm is within it, a…level. That is the best translation I can use to describe it. We came here out of curiosity, to explore the magic that bled from your world into ours. A crude translation of our race would be the ‘travelers’. We wanted to find a way to access this world.”
“To conquer it?” Sassi asked,
Joro’s eyes narrowed to slits. “To explore it!” she yelled, Sassi’s eyes widening.
“Explore?” Astral asked.
Joro took a few more deep breaths, Astral gently pressing a hoof against Sassi’s. The mare nodded, taking a step back and letting the stallion lead. The Queen clearly relaxed when addressing him rather than Sassi.
“To find out what creatures could battle individuals from our realm. Your kind has accessed Limbo before, defeated enemies such as the Pony of Shadows. We wanted…” A sad, tired, and heartbreaking smile slid across Joro’s features as she looked up at the two Thestrals. “We wanted to make friends.”
The stallion stared as Sassi didn’t move a muscle.
“What happened?” Astral asked softly.
“The Stairway Company happened,” Joro growled. “They played the part of a diplomat while scheming to imprison me. When we met for formal introductions through a portal, my guards and entourage were slain or imprisoned. I was shortly after placed into this cell. It took me a few years, but I finally learned of their sick plan, and what they were doing with my blood. That was…decades ago. I don’t know exactly. I don’t age as you all do.”
“And you’ve been here ever since?”
She nodded, Astral letting out a tired breath.
“Ok, I wasn’t expecting that.”
“So, the Skitters, all the other monstrosities in this place…” Sassi asked, Joro looking at her with an odd, pitying gaze.
“Were all created due to me,” the Traveler Queen sighed. “My blood. They cloned a crude copy of myself, used my blood to make the Skitters, Spiders. She can breed in this realm. I cannot, likely the same reason the Hivemind failed. Unfortunately, our natural desire to explore was corrupted to simple bloodlust. A side effect of the interference I assume.”
“Huh?” Astral muttered, Joro smiling kindly.
“Your world is different, far too different it would seem for the lesser-developed of my kind,” she elaborated. “I can function perfectly here. But my guards? Others? They were overwhelmed when the hivemind link failed when I first came here,” Joro explained.
“Your world produces interference to conscious thought within the hivemind. Since my clone was created here, she lacks any of the restrictions I suffer under. Ergo, a stronger hivemind and the ability to lay eggs and give the Company all the experiments they desire. When the systems here failed and the magical suppression spells wavered, my Clone’s hivemind easily gained control of every Experiment here. That allowed her to control the existing creatures in holding cells in addition to her own immediate brood. The few Skitters loyal to me were few in number and only kept around for research purposes. She has been the one in control for more than two decades.”
The two ponies could only stare for a time, Astral finally managing to speak.
“Ok, I was not expecting that,” he muttered. “So, you were used as a baseline to create all those things. That’s why they don’t look like you.”
“Correct. My clone is likely more accurate to your freaky-spider expectations,” Joro confirmed. “The…purity of my blood? Genetics I think is the term. Whatever it is, some of it is corrupted by the magical fields in this world. And so, you get monsters. Actual monsters instead of a sane individual such as myself. Any creatures with a barcode you saw were grown in the labs. Those without were hatched recently, and may vary in form.”
“That’s a lot to process,” the stallion added. “So, now what? You said you have information?”
“I do. But you first need to understand the larger picture.”
“I assume you’re going to elaborate on that?” Astral asked, Joro smirking.
“Indeed. In short, there are portals that my clone is operating to access Limbo. She can bring through the minds of creatures from my kingdom there. That is how they are supplementing her natural offspring. Depending on available biomass, she can form additional Skitter bodies. There are innumerable consciousnesses in my realm that would desire an experience in yours, even in a crude ‘Skitter’ form. They are immediately corrupted of course, and the process is initially slow. But the portals are growing in strength.”
“Meaning?” the stallion pressed, a slight shiver running up his spine at the ‘biomass’ comment.
“Meaning, that some are likely self-sustaining at this point. As it stands, they are using my magical signature as an anchor. If I am either killed or returned to my realm, the portals would be destabilized and at risk of collapse. That is what the bomb is for.”
She gestured above her head.
“That bomb will go where I go. If the collar goes out of range, my head becomes, well, no longer attached,” Joro said. “The bomb is meant to be sent back with me as a failsafe. They wouldn’t trust me, of course, to close the portals out of my own goodwill. So, the bomb would destroy things from the Limbo side. The magical detonation would certainly destroy even self-sustaining portals beyond repair. I will give you more information, but you will then need to promise to help. This means you have a choice.”
“Being?” Sassi interjected.
Joro’s smile softened, a reluctant and melancholy expression on the Queen’s face. The Traveler looked at Sassi, something flickering in her eyes that made Astral pause. He abruptly felt like a third wheel, not understanding some large, missing detail.
“You will get your information either way. You can then do what you were trained to do; kill me here or send me back with the bomb. Alternatively, you can set me free, and I give you my word that I’ll close the portals when I am sent back.”
The Traveler Queen’s sad smile matched her defeated shrug, eight eyes focusing on Sassi. She looked much older now, not defeated but tired.
“That is your choice. Kill me, or trust me. But either way, at least I will be out of this nightmare.”
Hmmmmm. 
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Trust your mom Sassi and I hope you get a hug from her before she leaves
Whoa this is good.
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11199920
The gal is trying!
Level sounds like a reference to the backrooms which is sort of a limbo
That barcode. Oh, Sassi. ☹️
11200194
Yeahhhhhh....
11200161
Not an intentional reference, but I'll take it!
Huh. Interesting. Limbo, eh? I seem to recall other RadBunny stories that use creatures from Limbo. Wonder if they're related somehow?
I can't help but picture the Traveller Queen with a protogen head, but all organic. The extra arms just reminded me of XCOM 1's Ethereal aliens, regal and all. She just seems adorable all round!
I hope Traveller Queen could reach out or be reached by Twilight or Stygian and the Pillars
I didn't expect the emotional/mental rollercoaster I've been run through in like, a day. I'm so excited for the updates now!
11200638
No freaky spider thing?!
11200582
She's definitely a 'wait. what?' moment for the two
11200501
... comma instead of semi-colon. Correct semi-colon use rules.
Past how many days? Few days? # of days?
I'm unclear on your intention of this sentance. Is the equipment much larger than the Queen? or is the Queen appearing much larger than the equipment? The way it is written, the equipment appears to them to be much larger than the Queen.
Shifting to what? It's not clear what her tone was before, or what it is after. Pleasant? Rude? Sharp? Seductive (I hope not that one). Also ambigious use of 'her' here, suggest 'hoof gesturing to the Queen'.
I'm thinking you wanted "loyal to me" (Joro).
I was expecting an evil monstrosity of a Queen, so this is an interesting turn. It also explains how the Stairway corporation got into the the evil monster business in the first place. Half-Life themes coming in very strong in this one with portals to other dimensions and
manpony meddling in affairs they should not.11200946
Dang, thank you! A few still sneaking through.
And that was the twist!
This makes me think of the Rachni Quees from Mass Effect.
Also, I love it.
11201228
I was wondering why the Queens Guard was attacking them, now it makes sense. Spare the queen and let her back to her world! Do it....
Got to wonder if Queeny here would still consider being friends with every creature here. Seems they visited at the wrong place, and meet the wrong people. I mean the ponies are ruled by the "Princess of Friendship". Better get Twilight to meet with her as soon as possible, bet she would be happy to learn as much as possible about this different dimensions everything.
11418963
Lots of possibilities to be sure....
This is the in-universe stand in for Dr. Zola of Hydra in Captain America: The Winter Soldier.....omg.
11431416
Hydra. Not a bad comparison...
This perfectly sums up my reaction to what was learned in this chapter. I was expecting both queens to be either evil or forces the two thestrals would have to fight against. Nice to know that one of them is good, though unfortunate that she's another victim of this evil company. It was interesting to learn about her past history and how she came to be in Equestria though. Imagine if she actually met up with the right pony, like a certain Princess of Friendship. I bet Twilight would've been pretty intrigued to learn about the Queen and more about Limbo itself. The Queen would also get to see the best of what Equestria had to offer.
Astral continues to be a foil to the crazy world that the company has hidden from public knowledge. Even Queen Joro was pleasantly surprised to be dealing with a pony with a naturally kind nature. Seemed to be a breath of fresh air for her.
I get the feeling that Sassi was also referring to herself as a monstrosity. This sounds like the secret she hasn't wanted to tell Astral yet, given she has the barcode meaning she was made using Queen Joro's blood. How she came to be a thestral is a detail I'm curious to learn about though.
I reread this chapter a couple of times just to make sure I was catching everything I could 'cause this was a rather big update. It was during that second read that I realized something: what the queen said here is pretty much exactly the same thing Astral said to Sassi when asked if he was a good pony.
I'm hoping they'll agree to help her, though if Astral has anything to say about it, I'm fairly confident this will be the choice made.
11682668
Good observations. There's a lot of typical arcs/villains in this story- but also some twists and turns to keep it interesting.
And Sassi's view of herself is....well, yeah.