Last Light of the Illustria
“Commander, you really should come and see this.” despite the awe in the stallion's voice, the scratching of a charcoal pencil continued unabated.
“Yes-yes, I'm sure it's fascinating, Hop.” the mare muttered unenthusiastically around the stake of charcoal and flapped her azure wings in annoyance. It was no more of interest than the ceaseless reports from guardsponies all across the north, each amounted to thousands of words for the same rambling conclusion: all is quiet in the north. The pallid Unicorn finally edged back into the hall. Princess be praised, the quick prayer concluded with a snort.
The charcoal pencil fell from her gaping maw at the lights radiating in the heavens. It was still a few hours until dusk and there shouldn't be an aurora, yet here it was.
“Oh Immortal one, send Your gaze to me with benevolence. Watch over Your servant and protect me from peril.” the soft alto's cadence intoned the harmonious prayer as if borne aloft on wisps of incense among the cathedrals of Ophelia.
The spangled fabric of existence shimmered in that vacant void between those massive planetary bodies; bodies like the one bellow warmed by the lambent kiss of its sun which dragged a feathered brush of clouds over verdant lands and caressed the cerulean seas. The sunward gaze was alluring in its haunting promise of both the coming dawn, and the looming dusk; separated only by the fleeting glimmer of twilight.
“O most High and Holy one atop the Golden Throne, I see Your light and feel Your presence. Keep me safe from the void and vacuum.”
“None of the astro-charts are computing, Ontoreim. Where are we?!”
Distant stars sang in the own celestial choir, a silent melody that filled the ether and spoke to the myriads of countless beings below. Another sapphire band raced across the heavens, pulled like a curtain. Attention was quickly cast from banks of pulsing red and yellow runes back into space, a nearby adamantine star glinted and listed like a lumbering leviathan.
'Computational astro-rhythms complied: Segmentum unknown, Sector unknown, Sub-sector unknown.' the mechanical voice of the cogitator rasped.
“I-it's not here, the choir, I can't hear the Navagator's choir!” the Navigator squirmed in his armoured sarcophagi, dozens of mono-filament leads rustled like leaves.
Outside, a great beast, thankfully silent, twisted and writhed in prolonged agony. Red blooms erupted from the beast's pock-marked hide as grey-green scales sheeted off and flickered like quicksilver. Its great beak was warped, adamantine plates buckled and scoured clean of ornamentation, denuded before the world below. The beast's breath seeped into the void as gouts of incandescent flames. Its heart still beat, the great predator bled in geysers of searing blue plasma; but its pulse grew faint and it begged for its eternal rest.
As the bright alien sun beat down on its hull, the Illustria began its torpid plunge towards the embrace of that uncharted world.
“This is Lord-Captain Aggaro Sagattus,” the broken tone echoed over the squealing vox-network, “all remaining vessels are to converge on my coordinates and begin descent.”
Wing-Captain Ontoreim was shaken from her liturgies. The auspex-assisted visor honed her vision in on a winking light outside the canopy; a green glyph blinked to indicate the Lord Captain's personal lander. The hundred meter long vessel elegantly angled itself, shining rays across its baroque reliefs.
Another crackle echoed over the vox-network, “My Lord Captain, Havoc-two reporting and banking to assist.” a blinking speck in the cosmic distance flared into existence and raced towards them.
Ontoreim swallowed and activated the communication rune, “Havoc-six reporting and banking to assist as well.” She looked behind her control seat at her gunnery officer, “Gunnery-officer, offer your prayers to the Lord, then check your grav-harness.”
Sevric gazed up through the thick void helm and grunted, “Yeah-yeah. Setting auto-loaders for the turret.” He quickly checked his pressurized maroon flight suit and tapped the metal grilled respirator in the centre of his chest.
“Your irreverence will be the end of you, turn to Him and He may show grace.” the nimble void-fighter bucked hard as its vernier thrusters fired, sending the ball of blue tumbling in the fore-screen.
Pulling alongside the golden lander a scant kilometer away, Havoc-two glided to the port between the two craft. The Fury-interceptor was an ugly voidcraft some sixty meters long, bristling with banks of lascannons, and auto-cannon turrets in its tail and nose. However, the red numbering and eagle talons of the Obscuras fleet was a welcome sight.
There was a momentary burst like a flare a in the distance beyond the flag-lander. Moments later, a second and third flicker erupted in the void. A voice wheezed and over the network, “This is lander Truncheon-three, having problems with our rear port vernier thruster and leaking fuel. Truncheon-one, Truncheon-two, and our fighter screen are gone. We've got micro com-”
A trail of silver swept over the nose of the Fury before a burst of light dissolved the nose in a flash of shattered glasteel. The clean strike atomized the servitor gunner leaving nothing but a hail of crystalline shards and twisted metal brackets. No noise escaped except the buckling void-frame and the wailing of a mechanical alarm.
A second warning light flared as Ontoreim reflexively put her ship in a dive away from the horizon. Havoc-two's wing was struck, sending it into a terminal spin. The craft noiseless pirouetted on three axises before the centrifugal force tore the void-fighter to pieces. Its thin skin peeled away in a winking mass of silver splinters scything in all directions. What was left hurtled towards the planet, and moments later, the fiery trail of radiant orange and smoking black was the last testament to the war-machine and its crew.
The pilot bobbed her head in solemn respect, then depressed the comm rune, “Flag-lander this is Havoc-Six. Havoc-two is gone.”
The ensuing silence was deafening, “Flag-lander?” Looking to port for a sign of the craft, it ponderously rolled on its belly. The fuselage was torn open, venting the interior into the void while the engines still ran hot. In a single moment they were alone.
Glancing back at the ungainly bulk of the Illustria, several more raking bursts tore themselves from the armoured prow before a languid twist shattered the vessel's kilometre long spine and split it in two. The pilot quickly dragged her hand across the holo-plates and cancelled the obnoxious klaxons that signalled a half-dozen mechanical failures from arrestor clamps, and munition feeds, to the astro-navii cogitator.
“Holy lord of mankind, carry my soul back along the ethereal tide. Let it not go to waste, but ever be for Your serv-”
“This isn't the time for prayer, nav is gone and if you screw this up we're going to burn up on re-entry!” Sevric's voice wavered. It was blasphemy, but the pilot couldn't do this without him. He hastily made a sign of reverence over his heart in deference to the holy creed and shut his eyes, hoping not to feel the scorching pain of a las-bolt for the offence.
The tension broke as Ontoreim's steady voice echoed in the smoke smothered cabin, “Navigator.” There was no response from the enfeebled man, “Navigator, Wistromm?”
A whooping gasp was accompanied by a spastic thrash as gaunt fingers pulled at plugs and socket indentures along the base of his skull, “Y-yes, yes Wing-Captain. I know not what warp tide we sailed upon, but we are beyond the astronomicon and no longer under His aegis.”
Silence again, the gunnery officer tapped the holo-plates to check over local topography, “Then shut up and keep yourself plugged in, we're going to try to land.”
Wistromm sedately bobbed his head and peered past the pass the entangled wires of the command seats to the obscured canopy beyond. A single incandescent streak blazed across the sky before shattering in a million pieces like a fireworks display.
Jarring her desk forward, the garrison's Pegasi commander unsteadily made her way into the hall and towards the spiralling stairs of the bastion tower. Ignoring the narrow doorways and empty rooms, she picked up her pace: from a meandering walk, to a trot, then a full galloped up to the top of the the frontier outpost.
The Pegasi burst through the wooden doors, stiffening the spines of the ponies on watch. Their commander stumbled forward and set her hooves on the old worn stone without a shriek or bellow. To the normally lax Pegasus and Earth-pony mares on duty, it would be a first.
An uncomfortable interjection disturbed the stillness, “Ahem. Commander, ma'am?”
The sky pulsed and beat like a living creature and the figure in charge stared wordlessly at the painterly expanse which rolled across the sky. A single twinkling star fell from the sky. The heavenly body seemed to slow rather than speed up. That tiny pinprick of light was swelling in size and growing progressively larger with each passing moment. Soon it was no glowing dot of light, but a black bead racing across the sky with a great white trail streaming behind it.
“Ya'll are seein' this raht?” The Earth-pony gasped as the pair of Pegasi dumbly nodded in silent awe. Whatever it was, it swooped low like an enormous bat over the snow-capped peaks and glassy blue outcroppings of the crystal mountains.
A sudden crack and bellowing rush of blue fire from its head conjured up images of a fearsome dragon. The trio ducked behind the stone crenellations. One final cataclysmic echo on the other side of the rift rocked the mountain peaks before dwindling to the low hiss of the winds scraping over stone.
“F-Fairlight-” the commander stammered in a hollow croak, “Get Hop Scotch, be at the front doors in one minute or you're going on report. If there's a star dragon in these mountains I want to know about it!”
“What am ah s'posed ta do?” an indignant Earth-pony chirped.
“Stay here, we can't leave the post empty.” the commander's steely gaze stiffened the golden mare's spine, a quickly thrown salute of obedience was enough to set the other ponies in motion.
A hacking, retching fit seized Sevric as the officer fell to his knees and tapped the malfunctioning respirator unit. Its artificial gills bent inwards and embedded shards of the holo-plate still jutted from the metal. He blindly groped across the ruptured floor of the smoke-choked cabin, hoping to avoid the tangles of wires and shredded cabling.
“Wing-Captain? Ontoreim?!” He bellowed, hoping the link in his helmet was still functioning. It replied in a crackle of static then a high-pitched screech. With his breath growing short, Sevric chanced the unthinkable: quickly clawing at the metal clasps and gauges at the pressure ring of his neck, he ripped his helmet off and flung it aside.
The man still hacked and coughed against the flow of smoke that strung his eyes and scorched his throat, but there was precious air here. “Ontoreim?” He called out again as a silent groan bubbled from wretched lips noise behind him. Wistromm was still alive, but the witch-sighted Navigator was the least of his concerns.
The Navigator gagged and spluttered on the oily smoke as he dragged himself from the sarcophagus towards the boarding hatch. The front of the craft had caved in, crushing the pilot and buckling the deck. Most of the cabin was lost in a mass of cables, warped steel girders, and shattered consoles. Amongst the debris a battered and perforated ribbed flight suit was barely noticeable. Her visor was smashed, and twisted tresses protruded from her motionless chest.
Sevric glowered, swiftly searching the pilot's zippered pockets, then snapped up the mag-locked survival chest from between their seats. Pulling himself from the flickering tongues of a sparked electrical fire, Sevric darted for the escape hatch that the Navigator pried open. The frail form's spidery webbed fingers ripped the metal latch off and let the slick oily smoke stream out.
Hacking and coughing, the Gunnery-Officer shoved his way out of the fiery wreck, dropping ignobly to the snow which crunched underfoot. The survival chest fell from his hands and, in a few moments, his legs buckled.
“Juste ciel!-” a stammering voice took both by surprise.
“-heavens! Are you okay? I mean you just fell from the sky!” the Unicorn panted, each exhalation rushing out in an icy cloud. He stared in wide-eyed wonder at the two creatures that recoiled from him on the cusp of the ruined remains. They patrol had set out at once and, in the space of a few minutes, rounded the high mountain turn marking the entrance to the alpine field.
The beings were scrawny but tall, one had a short blond mane, beady amethyst eyes stared in stunned confusion from beneath a hooded brow. Its skin was sickly smooth, sharply featured, and aside from a few tufts, it had no coat to speak of. There was a single cutie mark on his forehead shaped like an eagle. Rearing up on its hind legs, it wore an extra skin of red and was shod in iron.
As strange as the red beast was, it's companion was even more bizarre; it had no mane, no hair, a red band across its forehead, and cloaked in thick purple vestments with golden trim like a fastidious Canterlotian. But it had distended webbed claws and waxy skin like some sort of emaciated albino frog.
'Sh-sh' it hushed the other. “Potest dicere. Hoc teneant.” the gaunt figure's sibilant croak seemed intelligent
“Hop, you blathering foal-” the commander seethed through clenched teeth as the other Pegasi landed with a ruffled crunch in the high meadow's snow-pack. “It can't understand a word you're saying!”
The aqua-maned Unicorn half turned with a silly star-struck grin. “How can we be sure-”
“-vous etre sur?” the pale creature's grin and springing bounces got the better of it. Each of its hooves seemed to leave the ground, one after another, like it couldn't stand still.
“You see, Sevric, they are talking.” The Navigator's grin grew wider, needle-like teeth showing as his thin lips parted. “The creatures are like horses. They defer to the blue and grey one, extraordinary.” Wistromm's wet inhalations unsettled the gunnery officer who busied himself rifling through the emergency chest.
“Order, order exists, even outside His holy light. The Wing-Captain would hate this.” a mirthless grin cracked across the Navigator's lipless mouth. Glassy eyes beheld the stymied argument as the blue winged equine-thing, silenced the ashen creatures with a horn protruding from its brow. However, that grey and gold one, much like their leader, stood apart at the foot of the rocky mountain side. That one levelled a spear at them, wings flared out in what could be a threat display.
Sevric pawed through the container, quickly setting aside rations, water, lamp-packs, then carefully palmed the studded surface of the grenade and secreted it away before wrapping set of prayer-beads around his wrist with a jangle. Stroking the pistol he looked up through hate filled eyes, “your mind is sick-”
“-male habent Navigatorii.” the maroon clothed creature bearing a mark of an eagle continued its seethed conversation. It still caught Fairlight's attention as she awkwardly ruffled her feathers and shot a glance back at her commander. It was begging for action, something; these things smelled weird, they looked worse, and something about the needle teeth made her uncomfortable.
“Commander-commander.” The Pegasus guardspony hissed in warning. Bobbing her head over, it caught her superior's attention.
“What?” her sharp topaz eyes bored into the guardpony.
“I think the red one took something.” Fairlight was doing her best to keep calm, but her rapid breaths and fluttering wings gave away the agitation. The spear was still tucked against her side and crooked under a hoof to strike at a moment's notice.
“Pleeaaase commander,” the excitable Unicorn pleaded as if to keep a stray dog, “I'm usually good at this. Besides, they've got hands and everything! This might be just-”
“Hop, shut it.” amidst the pattering hooves she was growing perturbed. The Pegasus considered that for a moment, shutting her eyes and pondering about the possible paths. She silently mused with a few spastic jerks of her head.
“A thinking xeno is a dangerous xeno.” Sevric hissed as he checked the green power node on the charge-pack and jammed it into the bottom of the pistol.
“Of course. But they may be pets. If there are horses, where are their riders?” Wistromm tried not to take his eyes off the leader. As she bobbed her head, he shut his eyes and drew in a becalming inhalation.
Sevric bit his lip as the temperature sharply dropped. That coppery tang filled his nostrils; a sign of the lingering taint of astromancer's dark magic. His fingers passed over various prayer beads, something that hadn't happened with any meaning since he was a child. Ontoreim's words returned, 'turn to Him and He may show grace.'
“Navigator...” the harsh edge was a warning as he glanced down at the laspistol as his skin prickled.
“Hmm, what else lies past the veil here.” The navigator's mouth hung open as ropes of saliva dripped from his quill-like teeth, brow furling with effort. An electric tremor caused him to twitch unnaturally before clasping his hand to his nose. The tips of his finger were a bright scarlet as he cackled and spasmed.
“Allo!” that creature with the single horn edged forward carefully and removed the metal champron in a haze of azure sparks. Sevric's eyes widened as the Navigator held out a webbed hand to the creature, “w-witchcraft! I told you Navigator-”
“-vos Navagatorii! Infectum m-malum est!” Hop Scotch stopped edging forward towards the proffered limb. The red one's voice was laced with fear and panic.
“Hey hey, eaaasy now fella', eaaasy there. Commander, do you have anything sweet in your pack?” he looked back over his shoulders; Fairlight's eyes rolled, muscles tensed as coiled springs.
“Sssevric.” The waxy lowered to a sibilant hiss as it stretched a clammy limb out only to gnash its teeth as the Unicorn took a tentative step back.
The red creature took a lurching step forward, waggling something like a hammer in its claws, “S-silentium!”
A flash of grey and gold peeled past the Unicorn, Fairlight sprang ahead, “Hop, get ba-”
Her voice was cut off by a harsh snap and searing beam of ruby light. The incandescent ray blazed from the barrel of the laspistol and punched through the fluted equestrian armour. Fairlight collapsed, sending up a plume of white powder as her wings jerked and flapped.
“Ssssevric...” the navigator's wet wheeze tore from his throat as the gunnery pilot's free hand fumbled for something in his zippered pocket.
“I-I said quiet! You've gone mad!” Sevric turned the smoking barrel of the pistol on the Navigator, eyes wide and grasp on the handle faltering as it rattled and quivered in his grasp. His eyes kept racing back to the last few kicks of the winged creature, his own mouth hanging open at the sight.
The Unicorn edged back as the other Pegasi darted forward towards the painfully still Fairlight. “Je vous en prie, arr-” the Unicorn's voice quivered and cracked, on the verge of tears as the pistol was turned on him.
A wailing, squealing note ripped from inhuman lungs and rocked the mountain tops as Wistromm lunged. His gnarled talons reached out to tear the navy officer apart. The sight stole Sevric's breath away, but as he screeched, the crack-whine of the pistol discharged again and again. It ripped through clock in tongues of flame that licked at the material as lance after lance burst through the onrushing figure.
A scarlet bubble enveloped the Unicorn that reeled from the harsh crackle. Turning the weapon, a light of mania burned in Sevric's eyes as he squeezed the trigger. The first few beams snapped off across the sky in wild abandon before once more streaming at his target.
Incandescent sparks showered down as it impacted the barrier. Blast after blast blazed across the scintillating surface and melted the snow at the Unicorn's hooves. The last whine died with the clack of a drained power cell as the pistol dropped from senseless hands.
“Monsters, monsters!” he unsteadily puffed out into the freezing air and tore at his back pockets. The Pegasus placed itself between the two, not fifteen meters away, bellying down and ready to pounce. Sevric's finger slipped across cold steel. The crewmen tore it from his void-suit, dragging the jangling beads and emblazoned silver eagle loosely strung on the grenade's pin. His eyes were wide, memories of each sermon ignored in the ecclesiastical temples.
“T-this is my faith!”
“..fides nostra!” the creature shucked the jangling charm and hurled the hoof sized block. More by reflex than design, the mass struck the Pegasi's wing, causing it to flap and flick the offending object to where Fairlight had stood.
A calamitous crack and whizzing hiss sent scything rock chips and twisted metal scything past her ear like angry hornets. It mingled with rising plume of snow that rained back down moments later. “By the Princess...” the horrid spectacle overrode the sensations of pain as a red rivulet streaked down her chest. The rolling growl of the mountainside was the precursor as rocks splintered and shook the ground with a roiling rumble. The mountainside was starting to give way.
“Run-run-run!” she shoved the Unicorn back as he galloped off. The Pegasi commander shot a single glance at the motionless Fairlight, then at the parchment-white creature who could have wrought so much destruction. The bewildered red-clad figure shivered and flinched as the mountainside cracked with a roar far greater than that of a paltry explosive.
The commander hesitated for a second, Fairlight's gone, this creature's to blame, the destruction's on its own head! In its eyes was a light, so much like anypony elses, a reflection of tremendous trepidation in those purple orbs staring up at the all-consuming wave demise. With a reluctant yowl she darted over to thrust a hoof out to the red-cloaked figure. He dumbly stared at the appendage then up into her amber eyes.
“C'mon!” she was drowned out by the rock slide. There was no recognition in his glassy eyes, no spark of intellect to save his own. Thrusting out a hand it recoiled, stared at it's claws, then took one last look at the other Pegasus laid out in the cold. 'Why'
The commander streaked off towards the Unicorn and sped him away from the meadow. She peeked back, just long enough to see the creature staring up at it's approaching doom. It spent it's final twilight moment staring at the motionless Equestrian. The thunderous roar swept them all away under a relentless tide, engulfing the burned out remnants, and returning a haunting peace to the alpine meadow amidst the settling dust.
What can we say when the light of a candle fades? What melancholy world exists where fear controls the mind and taints the heart? Is there such any force but fear where one can spurn a helping hand, to turn on their neighbours, and cast their lot in with violence over reason? How can we start to heal from the loss of optimism?
I saw a golden possibility: it flickered and faded like the last rays of sunlight which retreat from my window, towards the uncertain embrace of endless night. I don't want to forget what we are and wallow in ignorance. What happens if we forsake everything our unity has achieved; the kindness wrought in kinship and understanding? We've forsaken violence for an era of peace and prosperity under the guidance of our greatest paragons. Maybe it's my own fear, so please forgive the ramblings of a tired pony.
For every creature great and small, far and wide, I pray this: when we stand on the precipice of something new, may the abyssal expanse beyond this peaceful land amount to more than the hollow embrace of destruction. May there always be a beacon to steer us through the night, and arrive safely on new shores to the blissful warmth of a radiant dawn.
As ever: I am, and will remain,
~Your Humble Servant
The last scratching line jotted down on the parchment as the Pegasus mare pushed the letter aside. Quiet sniffs and crackle of a lonely hearth filled the small stone outpost, warding off the chill of the night. Silent forms huddled around the hearth, still as statues. The Pegasi mare sighed and looked out the window again, staring at the quivering bands of prismatic glory that danced across the horizon.
“Hop, you really should come and see this.” sparkling traces streamed across the starry canvas in countless swarms, bedazzled the jewelled sky.
“Yes-yes, I'm sure it's fascinating...” glancing over her shoulder and through the door as the Unicorn's shoulders slumped down with a sigh, falling to his crossed forelegs in front of the fire.
Her own gaze went back to the sky to watch the endless gallery of shooting stars. Each string of diamond sparkled for a moment then vanished without a trace, their only legacy being an ephemeral memory bestowed to those on the tranquil world below.
Author's Note
*Particular thanks to thecrazeddiplomat! He pointed out a loop that I rather liked and I just decided to reinforce it a bit with a single bit of restructuring.
Anyway, It's not a new story, it's not particularly original, but it's a writing exercise focused on sci-fi in general (so it's sci-fi that just happens to be a crossover). As such, I'm open to hearing any suggestions to improve my writing too.
Story wise, the choice to not name the Pegasi commander was intentional but I can't say why, there's probably something rattling around in my mind about imprinting, but I can't quite say. I chose not to include any indication of when this was and where this was as I didn't think it mattered too much.
40K wise: I chose a duality for languages because of the obvious Equestrian isn't High Gothic/Latin, so understanding it would be impossible. Traditionally, High Gothic's Sino-Anglic roots are written in Latin so I kept that theme while Equestrian I just needed a language that I understand, and isn't particularly harsh: so I chose French. It seemed like the best option at the time to show that gulf.
It's meant to have a few moments of thought in it, maybe draw some different conclusions, so hopefully it was worth the read.
Anyway. Hope it wasn't too bad. Y'all take care now eh?
