Practise is vital.
When Celestia opened her eyes, she was falling. The relatively pleasant sensation of weightlessness wasn’t ripped apart by the noise of wind or similar side effects that usually occurred when one travelled through the troposphere at terminal velocity – her light suit was encased in a life support spell that made breathing perfectly comfortable, to ensure she could focus on steering her descent. As anti-aircraft shells started to burst all around her, a few expertly placed shield spells deflected fragments and allowed her to pass through the sudden cloud of fire, all while keeping the detonations’ roar at a reasonable level. The target compound rapidly increased in size; it was getting time to brake, as a new threat appeared in her field of view – a patrolling helicopter approached her original landing position in an attempt to intercept the intruder. Celestia allowed herself to grin.
The alicorn’s horn flared with golden light, and her speed started decreasing gradually. While she drained kinetic energy from her inertia, it was transformed and stored as magical energy in her very flesh, ready to be deployed when needed. KERS was wonderful, really. It was a shame only alicorns could employ it. Her wings shot open; with a roll she evaded two air-to-air missiles while a shield took care of the barrage of lesser projectiles a minigun mounted to the side of the personnel compartment unleashed upon her. Lame.
Celestia covered the distance between her and the aircraft in an instant. She flung herself around the helicopter and clung to the machine’s tail; a moment later, her spell took over the minigun, tore it from its hinges while spinning it around and mowed down the compartment’s occupants – faceless, identical figures dressed in grey body armour – in one streak. Also quite boring, to be honest. The alloy screeched as bullets tore through it. She tossed aside the firearm. Without flapping her wings she let go of the metal, and a single white beam shot from her horn, ripping through the aircraft’s bottom side. The rotors’ clamour seized abruptly; the magical impact set off all remaining explosives on board. Spreading her wings once more, Celestia manoeuvred through the rain of burning debris. The more intriguing part of the operation was about to commence.
Without a warning, the Sun exploded with scorching blue light. Any infantry that had gathered on the compound was petrified[1]. A brief royal smirk. The timing was perfect, despite there being a substantial delay to calculate. Celestia followed up with an acoustic blast: chords of FMed saw waves pushed into compression at 6Db and clipping accordingly, at amplitudes somewhere between “mind-shattering” and “facemelting”. Beautiful. As long as it was masked by her own senses, that is.
To Her Highness’ annoyance, the blue light faded rapidly, to be replaced by the usual, pale-golden glow of noon[2]. She took the liberty of examining her surroundings, before they got a chance to examine her. They tended to do that with pointy things.
Celestia hovered three metres above something that could have been a supermarket’s parking lot, if not for the massive barbed-wire-fence that surrounded it, floodlight poles, “Keep out – trespassers will be shot”-signs, and the fact that there was no supermarket. Instead, she spotted an armoured entrance to a dull, grey one-storey-structure that strongly suggested a whole universe of bunkers beneath. Excessive amounts of short wavelength light might not have helped the situation, but even without it, it seemed to have been a very hot day: a glance upward revealed flawlessly blue skies sans semblance of strata. The air shimmered over smouldering concrete. It will do.
The Princess showed no mercy as she descended upon the disoriented men like a demonic bird of prey. Four identical swords left their sheaths simultaneously, encased in a golden light, as bursts of pure magic seared trenches into the tarmac. The blades slid effortlessly through ceramic and aluminium plates: her personal technique allowed her to exploit them to their fullest potential. Really, it needed to be her personal technique. Nopony else had bothered developing one for a weapon setup that was virtually impossible to utilise. Coordination was tricky enough for most ponies to struggle moving their hooves in two different patterns at the same time, and magic was even worse. Think doing two different things with one hoof[3]. Now, one task was the norm, three was a major accomplishment, five has never been achieved save by one pony; Celestia herself.
The brief moment of shock had evaporated; shouting and gun reports resonated through the motionless air. She set up the required shields; bullets were simply repelled – in liquid state.
The sword massacre only lasted a few seconds. The soldiers fled from spinning and twisting blades, and after a moment of contemplation the alicorn decided they likely wouldn’t experience any enthusiasm in regards to taking up the fight once again, and pursuit was clearly a waste of time. The door would be her next target. Or rather, the tank that had just crashed through the fence behind her. Sigh. Fine.
The steel giant wasn’t given any time. Celestia discharged the previously stored magical energy in a channelled beam and the vehicle’s active armour was immediately set off. The gunner, relieved by how the weapon systems weren’t damaged by the blast, adjusted the barrel and pulled the trigger – maybe a thought passed his mind about how the way the alicorn appeared to grant him a free shot seemed almost deliberate.
The shell left the barrel. A pale golden glow draped itself around it. It disappeared with a flash, only to ram itself into the same tank’s turret ten metres further back. The menial sound of the detonation, a slight heatwave, and then some falling debris, fully neutralised by a shield. Now, for the door.
The alloy gave in after several short bursts of magic, allowing the Princess to pass into a long, narrow hallway that looked about as exciting as a Canterlot charity event. She clearly saw several dark red shapes move carefully behind a few stacked up crates, despite the harsh, electric light of countless luminescent tubes lining the ceiling trying hard to obscure them. Her next stop would be the security floor, and if she remembered the plan the Architect had given her correctly, these people needed to go. And her plan make them involved a “Want it, Need it”-spell and a hand grenade.
Very efficient, she noted, as she serenely stepped down a metal staircase one minute later.
The security control room for this side of the complex could be accessed surprisingly easily, as Celestia soon found out. Through the unexpectedly thin wall she could practically feel the men’s tension, as they doubtlessly saw her approach. She took her time. Having disarmed her previous opponents, the blades remained sheathed. A shield wouldn’t be necessary.
A magic blast breached the wall. Instead of shattering the equipment and raining down on the floor, the debris simply slowed down in mid-air. So did the bullets that had been expecting Celestia, and also the soldiers themselves. It made aiming four assault rifles she had hijacked a lot simpler. In literal slow motion, she unleashed fast, short, and coldly accurate bursts of projectiles. True, time-stretching spells were unforgivably show-offy, but she could certainly afford it. The fifth, remaining spell tore a man from his feet; the Princess employed him as a fly swatter[4].
A few milliseconds – an, admittedly, very long kind of milliseconds – later, time jumped back to normal. Several large pieces of concrete hit the floor, several screens shattered, several soldiers and operators dropped dead. She wouldn’t be monitored by anyone anymore. It was getting time for mission wrap-up, really. If there was one thing Celestia didn’t understand it was how humans could take their chemical-smelling, conditioned air for longer than a few minutes.
Shortly after, the Princess cut through another wall; this one had been significantly more rigid, two metres of solid ferro-concrete in fact. She had to melt through carefully, but she was positive that it would be worth it. No one would be expecting her to go this way.
Once again, Celestia found herself falling. Falling was usually good; it meant free magic charges, and it was a good situation to be studying one’s environment. In this case, her environment was a wide, cylindrical space, with thick, sickly brown walls that managed to look even less inviting than such a description would suggest. But, most importantly, a lot of said space was filled with rocket. ICBM with a nuclear warhead, to be precise. Sirens echoed through the confined air.
A circular metal grid that was wound around the missile approached very quickly. Maybe there were some controls on the rocket itself. It wasn’t what interested the Princess, the large glass panels, or rather, the control rooms behind them were, but it was a good enough indicator for distance. She titled her wings softly.
A blast of magic was enough to shatter the bullet-proof glass. She made sure not to waste the shards: five were given a subtle nudge, just assertive enough to push them into someone’s throat at 200 metres per second. Without slowing down, she leaped through the gaping hole that the glass used to occupy, swords spread. More kilograms of alicorn than Celestia would publicly admit slammed into the equipment. Red liquid squirted onto the keyboards – a calm followed the brief moment of chaos, with just the howl of the sirens hanging in the air.
But Celestia had been careful, despite the seemingly uncontrollable surge of events. She pulled one remaining operator up to his feet, giving him an adequate death stare[5].
“I, Solar God-Empress Celestia the Undimmed, command you to cancel the launch sequence of this primitive vessel immediately!”
The man obediently nodded, slapping the keys with an improbable speed. As soon as the red lights around the room faded, the Princess eased her posture, letting out an audible yet regal sigh.
“I believe I’m done here,” she said, to no one in particular, and the world faded to black.
Celestia awoke with a serene smile on her muzzle, her body resting pleasantly on a well-cushioned couch. Luna looked significantly less relaxed – she had fallen off her sofa and was lying on the floor, panting heavily.
“Tell me, Lulu, who’s next on our list of potential interdimensional enemies?”