The first Lunar Laws

by vadram

Chapter 5 From Above (M)

From Above

(Warning, this chapter contains scenes of violence and some gore)

The two conscripted guards were still busy cowering behind their rock as the noticed Celestia coming towards them. Immediately they jumped from their position and turned their sights towards the tunnel that led to the mushroom filled room they were supposed to be watching.

“Alright you two you can stop pretending now. I saw everything. Honestly, did you actually thought that i would believe you have been standing guard this whole time?”

She was not angry at them, just a bit disappointed. The unicorns lowered their heads in shame.

“Honestly. Listen, we will soon have to leave this place. It’s not safe anymore.”

“Discord?” one of them asked.

“No", she replied firmly trying to calm them down. "Not Discord, but something else. A creature... or creatures we never encountered before. They are stronger than earth ponies, faster than pegasi and appear smarter than your average unicorn.” She had no idea if that was true or not but it did serve to get her point across.

“We will be leaving as soon as Luna and the rest gather some supplies for the journey. You should get something to eat as well before we leave...”

Celestia’s ear twitched. She rose her head up in attendance and made a sign for the two to be quiet. Something was bothering her, a noise, a low sharp sound. She turned her attention to the tunnel, but the origin of the sound lay somewhere else. She moved her head around in an attempt to figure where the sound was coming from. She had no success, the sound seemed to come from thin air, it vanished just as fast as it appeared, the room was silent again.

“My Queen? Is something the matter?”

“Did you hear that?” she asked still looking around for anything out of the ordinary, everything seemed to be as before, but that sound, that mysterious sound, "where did it came form?" she wandered.

“Hear what my Queen?”

“That sound... it was like hearing ice cracking, or glass shattering.”

“We are sorry your highness, we did not hear a thing.” one of the guards said looking at the other.

“Not a thing.”

“The sooner we get out of here the better.”
"Keep it together Celestia, you are getting jumpy."

Luna appear a few hours later with the rest of the group. Some of the unicorns had large mushroom caps on their backs tied down with a sort of string made from the fiber from the stem, a few had a little water in them. Each earth pony was carrying about as much as all the unicorns combined, they did not seem to mind.

“I am sorry we took so long sister. Somepony...” she said looking at one of unicorns, “managed to eat the only poisonous mushroom in the whole cave.”

“Poison? Are you sure we are not all infected?” one of the guards asked.

“Only if you ate a red mushroom with black stripes.” the earth pony stallion said.

“But i am sure none of you did,” her mare friend continued, “if any of you had you would already have experienced nausea, stomach pains, blurry vision, hallucination, loss of balance as well as a violent case of...”

“Any way..." Luna interrupted her before she could enumerate with graphic details all the side effects of food poisoning. "We are ready to go... Sister what is it?” Celestia was looking around again.

“Listen Luna. Can you not hear it?”

Everypony was quiet. Luna closed her eyes and focused, she concentrated on the sounds she was hearing. At first it was like a flood of noise, then layer by layer she peeled them away searching for what her sister was telling her to listen for. ”I can hear their breathing... their heartbeats... their blood flowing through their bodies... and something else...”

“I can hear it! It’s faint, but... it seems to be coming from all around us... no, that ca not be the case... from the walls?”

“No Luna, its not from the walls.” The two sisters walked to the nearest wall and looked at it.

As with the rest of the cave it had crystals growing out of it, some of them were cracked from Luna’s earlier outburst. As they brought their heads closer to the crystal formation they noticed that something was wrong.

“The crystals?” Celestia said. “they are vibrating.”

“It sounds like they are singing... no not singing... crying, the crystals vibrations resembles the crying of a foal .”

“The cracks are getting larger to.”

Luna looked at them. “They do not appear to be cracking.”

“You can not see it yet, not with your eyes at least, the cracks are too small to see, but you can hear them, if you pay closer attention. But why?”

“I know i was loud, and I may have cracked them, but the cracking should have ended by now.”

“Unless...”

"Unless?"

"Unless you were not the one that is causing this. Luna make sure the rest are safe, I am going to make some light."

“Yes. Right away. Everypony come to me.”

They did, and soon all of them were gathered around Luna, as soon as they all were beside her, she started channeling her magics, her horn started glowing and a blue sphere started forming around them. Layer after layer of blue darkness quickly blocked all light coming from the outside. All of them were starting to get scared. However they quickly noticed that there was a lot more light inside than what they have gotten accustomed to from outside of the sphere. The light from the mushrooms they had gathered was being reflected by the smooth surface of her magic force field.

“Ready sister.”

Celestia took a deep breath and focused her magics. Energy started gathering right above the tip of her horn, at first it was a dot, barely visible to the naked eye, but it shortly started growing. Slowly at first but then faster and faster. Before long it had formed into a sphere, big enough for a pony to pick it up with its hoof, but as bright as the sun once was before Discord decided to turn it black. In an instant it shrink back to its initial size then exploded in a spectacle of heat and light.

It quickly filled the entire room with a light so bright that anypony should have gone blind from it. Nopony did, since Celestia had her connection with the sun, was immune to its effect, while the others sighs were shielded by Luna's spell. They did however feel the warmth hitting them as the sphere expanded, the light lasted but a moment but it was enough for Celestia to see what she wanted.

Luna lowered stopped her spell and layer by layer her shield seemed to melt away.

“Did you see anything?”

“I did sister, twenty or thirty creatures, a mix of black and grey. They seemed to be unfazed by my spell, so we can assume they are either blind or sleeping.”

Luna took a look around the room, she saw nothing. “Where?”

“Above us, a little lower than 1000 feet up. Should we attack them?”

Luna was looking up, nothing but darkness laid before her eyes. “Maybe we should...”

She felt a chill down her neck, before she could finish talking she heard a scream coming from behind her. Reacting to it she could only catch a glimpse of something white disappearing into the darkness above. The scream stopped shortly. A couple of mushroom caps floated down from above, gently landing on the ground. Luna raised her shield again this time only a layer would be needed.

Her eyes darted from place to place trying to see some movement, a silhouette, anything... Nothing, all she saw was darkness. A thud was heard as something hit her shield, but by the time Luna turned her head it was gone.

“Sister anything?”

“Nothing.”

Another thud, then another, then two more in quick succession. Still no sign of the mysterious assailants.

“Sister swap with me.” As soon as Luna lowered her protective barrier Celestia replaced it with hers.

“Now lets get a better look at you.” Luna could feel her body slowly change as she started releasing a bit of her energy.

The blue mist started forming around her body, “Slowly... slowly...”, her pupils started to narrow and her eyes became red again.

”FOCUS.” The mist scattered and her eye color returned to their old blue selves. ”Good, now lets see.”

She looked into the darkness, everything was now a clear as it would have been during a clear day. Above her, nested among larger crystal formation tens of creatures stood. Some of them fighting over the corpse of the pony they previously took from behind her, some of them waiting for the two to finish.

“These creatures are not like the ones we... I fought. They look more like... like bats.”

Luna looked at them closer. Their faces were like nothing she ever saw before. The first thing that grabbed her attentions was that they had no eyes and apparently on eye sockets either. A piggish snout and four large ears look up most of their face, their mouths seemed small at first until she saw one with it open. Its lower jaw split into two parts moving in opposite directions revealing several sets of teeth, both on what she assumed were the cheeks and on the upper part of its mouth.

Two large specimens drove the rest off from the body of the unicorn and were now facing each other trying to appear as large and as threatening as possible.

The rest of their body was equally as frightening. Their head connected by a thick pulsating neck to their muscular torso. They had two pairs of long thin arms. One pair was on their sides, where the arms of any bipedal creature would be, while the other, much smaller in size hang from their chest. The smaller ones ended in three digits, all with sharp twisted claws. While the longer ones had a thin flap of skin connecting their tips to their body and to their legs, the skin was covered with veins, some popping out from place to place. From place to place holes and cuts were visible in their fleshy wings. The larger arms also doubled as a second pair of legs since their regular ones were short, thick and stubby. The creatures were mostly hairless except for small patches on their back legs and in the groin area.

She wanted to analyze their body further but she noticed that some of them turned and faced her. Their mouths were partially opened and droll was falling to the ground where the puddle once was, a few stray drops landed on her.

She spread her wings and strongly flapped to create lift.

After she was barely a few inches from the ground they attacked her. They caught her by surprise. She barely had time to erect a small barrier around her body when the first two tried to grab her with one of their their small arm. Smaller would better describe them, since the creatures were massive, even their smaller arms still could easily pick up an adult pony. Almost like how an owl, or other predatory bird would pick up rodents while hunting.

Luckily she was no ordinary pony.

The creatures tactics, if you would call it that, was dive bomb their targets, grab them with one hand, and fly away before the rest could notice. If the prey would be to loud and attract the attention of the others it would have snapped its neck with the other arm. Or so Luna thought judging by their attack patterns and what she assumed happened to the pony they took from alongside her.

Regardless the beast were unable to pick up the powerful alicorn. While she was not large enough so the creatures could not grabber her with their claws, they instantly lost their grip as they tried to ascent. It was like a pegasus trying to grab a mountain.

They made a few attempts but all meat the same fate. The last one who grabbed her tried using both his arms but only managed to fall from to the ground. Luna looked disappointed at the creature, raising her hoof and leting it fall on the beast rib cage. A loud crackling noise could be heard as the bones broke. Luna's foreleg now stood in the body of the beast, going straight through all that stood in the way of her hoof and the ground below.

She looked at the dying creature and a small smile crept on her face before lifting her hoof again and squashing it head cracking its skull and spilling its contents on the floor. She looked up at the rest of them, with the same smile on her face, she had gotten their attention.

The creatures spread their wings and proceed to swarm her. They did not try to grab her anymore, instead they rammed their thick skulls into her before flying away only for her to be hit by the next one. They have gone berserk.

She could barely feel any pain but the force of the impact first forced her to the ground then with each consecutive blow made her sank deeper and deeper into the ground.

Most of them aimed for her chest or her sided since they were the largest targets and the easiest to hit, but some of them, mostly by accident, did hit her in the head, causing it to be knocked back ever so little and causing a mild neck pain.

She wanted to fight back but she had to wait for an opportunity.

The attacks were so frequently that if she moved she would have been knocked down before she could react.

She could have lifted a hoof to hit them or break their bones with a single swipe, but a hit from the other side could have had the same effect.

Lastly she could easily have cast a spell and fire a beam of energy incinerating them all, but a hit to her head could have caused it to miss and the whole force of the energy emulsion could have hit the cave wall possible causing a cave in. Also casting the spell meant weakening her shield, if only for a split second.

So she waited. She waited for the assault to die down, for the creatures to tire.

While she waited for an opening, she endured their attacks, their relentless attacks that caused her... minor discomfort and a slight neck pain.

These creatures were not strong, at least not compared to her or her sister, even some hydras hit harder than them. They were not smart either, she could have compared them to a swarm of butterflies relentlessly hitting their head on a stone wall trying to break it down so that they can pass through, and she would not be wrong.

But these creatures were persistent, and fast. Celestia tried to lower her shield to help her sister who seemed... tired of the whole ordeal, but as soon as her shield opened one of the bat like creatures swooped in and grabbed one of the unicorns instantly snapping its neck and disappearing into the darkness.

“Uh... this is taking forever.” Luna said bored out of her mind. “Celestia raise that shield of yours we are going to clear the room.”

Celestia quickly added a second layer to her shield, then a third, a fourth and finally a fifth, for the ponies in the inside it was like they were surrounded by fireflies. She did her best to keep the brightness to a minimum so that the ones inside would not be blinded by her light.

“Now then foul beast be prepared to...” one creature smashed head first into her face causing a few drops of blood to drip from her nose and make their way into her open mouth.

Luna busted into white light, it quickly filled the room burning everything it touched. the ground itself was set ablaze by the raw magical energy emanating from the ‘injured’ goddess.

Once she calmed down a little she looked around at the destruction she caused.

The crystalline formations that once covered the walls had fused together from the intense heat. Beneath where the ground once had been now a giant crater stood. The creatures as well as the mushrooms were now gone, vaporized by her outburst.

She looked around to see the bright ball of light that contained her sister, her friends and some annoying unicorns, but even with her enchanted visions it was nowhere to be seen.

“Sister?” she asked the empty void that stood before her.

“Temper sister, temper.” Celestia voice could be heard coming from under a pile of dirt. She lowered her shield and the dirt fell, she did not have to lower all the layers, because all of them except one had been blown away by Luna's blast.

“You think you could used a little more force next time?” Celestia said laughing, trying to cover the shaking of her voice.

“Ha ha...” Luna responded nervous.

“Well if these were the creatures you were so afraid of baby sister i think we have nothing to worry about.” Celestia told Luna as she put her wing around her, trying to comfort her sister.

“They were not the creatures that we... that I fought. They were just about as fast, but smaller and more insect like. Like...” Luna was looking around for something to compare them with when she noticed something partially revealed by explosion she had created. ”Like this.” Using her magic she tried to pull on the partially buried piece of black chitin. It did not budge. She used a little more force, it started moving. First came out the leg, then the upper body and the head, then the second leg then nothing.

She brought the creatures exoskeleton closer for inspection. Celestia provided the light and half of the creatures shell was visible to all, even the other ponies came closer to see it.

It was mostly whole, but small cracks were visible everywhere and except for it just being half of a shell only one other wound could be seen. A big hole between what seemed to be its ears. They took a look inside and found that mostly dirt and some pieces of bone was all that remain of the creatures skull. The inside of its body was also empty and slice marks could be seen everywhere, its insides had been eaten, and its outside discarded, possible by the creatures that attacked them or by something else. It looked just like the ones Luna had fought against, only a little smaller, not to small but the difference was noticeable. It could have been from the smaller subspecies but it was missing the spikes on the back of its neck.

“I see so these little things are what you had us worrying us about?” one of the unicorns said.

Luna turned to him, her eyes have not yet changed back, that caused the unicorn to take a few steps back in terror.

“You should know that size does not always matter.” Luna said annoyed.

“Sure they say that now.” one of the younger unicorns said trying to be funny. The rest of them ran away from him fearing that they could be hit by the goddesses reply. Lucky for him it never came.

“We should get going.” the earth pony mare said to the rest of them. Celestia’s horn light the room as they looked for the exit.

“Where is the door?” somepony asked.

“I think it is covered by the melted crystal.” the stallion said.

“That will not be a problem”, Celestia said giggling. “Everypony please cover your ears.”

Luna gave her a funny look. “Sister please.”

“Oh come on Luna, we both know it has been ages since we heard you sing.”

“And for good reason.”

“Now do not be shy. Nopony can hit the high notes like you can. Remember when you broke all the windows in town?”

“How can i forget, I spent that whole night cleaning glass.” Celestia smiled at her. “Fine.” She took in a deep breath.

“Wait!” she yelled causing Luna to choke with the air she inhaled.

“What?” Luna was coughing violently. “What?” she asked again.

Celestia created a barrier around the rest of the ponies and after covering her own ears with a wide smile on her face said “Go ahead.”

Luna tilted her head and wanted to ask her sister if she was now just making fun of her. But she did not, instead she just rolled her eyes and sang.

Even with their ears covered and inside Celestia protective barrier they could still hear Luna’s voice.

It was like nothing they ever heard before, it was loud but it also was beautiful, all of the mares and a few of the stallions bursted into tears. Her music was touching their souls, while still hurting their ears. It was painful to hear but you just did not want her to stop.

The crystals started vibrating as she singed, miniature ripples started forming on their smooth surface. At first they were small and far between, but they grew, picking up speed and height. For every one that crashed into something and faded away five more would appear, it was like a musical hydra. The vibrating crystals matched Luna’s voice provident the the music for her melody.

When Luna began singing the music provided by the crystals seemed to be lagging behind her, it had since picked up speed and after a few minutes it had gotten ahead of Luna. She was constantly altering the song ever so slightly in a attempt to keep up with the music but it was getting harder and harder for her to do that.

Mid song she just stopped, all that could be heard was the humming of the crystals, until it all came crashing down.

The wall cracked as the crystal that once laid embedded in it turned to a multicolored cloud of shards. The dust settled on everything, including Luna, who looked like an ice sculpture and shined in the light provided by Celestia’s horn.

After shaking it off she and her sister picked the group up from the ground and levitated them to the now visible entrance, they flew over, turn and held a moment of silence for the two fallen ponies.

All of them left through the tunnel and returned to the large room ware hundreds of tunnels lead into every direction.

From above them a green pair of eye was watching them.

Comments

[Effigy]

This has promise, but you might want to look into fixing all the typos. Copy/pasting into Word or Google Docs and doing a spell/grammar check could do wonders.

[vadram]

2317728
i write in gdocs and check with the autocorrect,
then paste it here and check again
so that's about all i can do