Chapters Dalrion waved his hand of the pulsing rune. With only a small psychic encouragement the wraithbone door elevated up without a sound. Crouching down slightly to let his helmeted head pass through the doorway, he passed into one of the main chambers of the Craftworld.
“Please Dalrion, take a seat.” Meneria welcomed the bonesinger into the court. She was already seated along side Arrendil, the autarch that would be accompanying her on her mission. They were discussing the plans long before Dalrion arrived, now they only had to fill him in on what was going on.
“You summoned me?” Dalrion took he seat, opposite both the warlock and the autarch. In between them was a large, circular table with holograms and diagrams relvent to the operation.
“Yes, your skills are needed in a search and rescue operation that will be conducted shorty.” Arrendil answered, fiddling with his gloved fingers in boredom. The autarch was tall and thin even for a eldar, and wasn't known for sitting around when he could be somewhere useful.
“What skills could a humble bonesinger like myself offer in a warzone?”
“The operation requires you to help us enter a dying craftworld.” Meneria began, casting several runes into the air and letting them orbit around her head gracefully. “The craftworld has long been deserted, probably crashed shortly after The Fall but recently, something has disturbed it dreamless slumber and reactivated the infinity circuit. It is imperative that we retrieve the lost souls of our kin before they waste away.”
“Meneria and I have agree to the responsibility of undertaking this task. A spiritseer has already agree to harvest the souls off the infinity circuit but your services are required to reactivate the webway portal inside the craftworld so the deed may be done.”
“I understand, but is the craftworld in any danger?” Darion asked. The bonesinger was not a capable fighter at all and would prefer staying out of any warzones that could claim the lives of many hardened warriors. Meneria closed her eyes and focussed on the runes around her, trying to get some foresight on the planet's fate.
“Somehow the planet has stayed off the radar to most of the universe, it is located on the eastern fringe so it is well out of the reach of the Mon-Keigh. The foolish Tau Empire might find a interest in it but the planet is well out of their empire's boarders.” Arrendil explained, idly waiting for Meneria to finish. After a few moments, her eyes shortly opened, “Any luck?”
“None, the lifeforms on the planet must be frequent psykers and due to near constant physic disruptions, it is difficult to predict the planet's fate.”
Darion's ears pricked, “The planet's lifeforms are psykers?”
“probably, the cause of this ability is unknown but is of no interest to us, the lifeforms are not hostile and will likely step aside when we arrive.” Arrendil's hand crunched into a fist, venting some anger of the lack of any fighting to be had.
“How can you be sure of this? If the planet's lifeforms are psykers then they might be affiliated with... the dark gods of chaos...” Darion voiced his primary concern, fighting a battle of the body was one thing, but it was another thing to fight in the mind.
“According to the rangers and the striking scorpion squad that already are planetside, the planet's lifeforms are harmless, with no indication to being cultists.” Meneria reassured, having already taking precautions to assure that the planet had no link to any of the dark gods, especially to She who thirsts... if that was the case, Meneria would see that each and every one of the planets creatures were annihilated. It was a sacred duty for any Eldar to fight the one that destroyed their own mighty empire, but many servants of slaanesh had already met their end on the tip of Meneria's blade.
“Very well, when do we leave for this planet?”
“Soon, very soon...”
****
Several million light years away...
“This sucks.” Scootaloo kicked a stone with her hoof. It gentle rolled it way along the ground and plopped into the cool pool of water.
“Come on Scootaloo, just try it again.” Apple bloom said, they had just finished another failed attempt at getting their cutie marks, and skipping stones over the water was one of the many ways Apple Bloom used to brainstorm ideas. Both crusaders agreed to join her, but Scootaloo was still disappointed that her idea hadn't gone to plan.
Scootaloo grumbled “Fine...” as she picked up another rock, remembering Applebloom's advice about getting the stone to actually skip across the water. She moved her hoof back to throw it and eyed the other end of the pond, her target was to get the stone to get to the other end without it sinking.
The stone left the filly's hoof and it did indeed skip its way across the water. All three fillies watched with eyes wide as the stone hopped its way over the water. It reached the reeds that bordered the pool's edge and Scootaloo almost let out a cheer of victory.
Until the stone hit something with a metallic thud.
“OH COME ON!” Sweetie Belle shouted on Scoot's behalf. Scootaloo was grumbling something and Sweetie had already shot off to get more throwable stones from the rock bed. Leaving Applebloom to ponder what the hay the stone hit. Did somepony dump something metal into the pond?
She wasn't left thinking for long. She eyed the large mossy rock the stone impacted, she could of swore it wasn't there before, but rocks couldn't move on their own. With curiosity driving her closer, she strolled on the other end of the pond to investigate.
As she got closer, it turned out the rock wasn't actually a rock. But some sort of metal that was painted green. The front (Or what she assumed was the front) had a golden symbol on the top as well as several red gems encrusted around the sides. A black panel was engraved into the front with two pieces of clouded red glass that glowed lightly in the sunlight.
She attempted to pick it up to take home with her, but the unthinkable happened. The thing rocked back and splashed deeper into the pool, eluding her touch. Soon after, something else began to peak out the water. A black barrel with some more gems and some sort of scope on the top was pointed towards her.
“Hey Apple Bloom, I've got more stones!” Sweetie called across the pond, holding more stones than her shaky magical grip could hold.
“Comin'...” She shouted back, taking one last look into the water as the object retreated back into the depths. Normally the water was clear in the Ponyville pond, but today it seemed like the water was shrouded so she couldn't see into it. Such a shame, she wanted to see what that thing was, for it wasn't something she'd seen before. After all, she might be able to get a cutie mark out of it. Making a mental note to visit again later to investigate further, she walked away to be with her friends.
She had no idea how close her death was...
****
Later that evening...
“We're almost where I saw the thing!” Apple Bloom reassured, tugging along her older sister with her. Applejack had never seen a fish like her sister described, with gems and almost metal like skin it sounded more like more like armour than a living thing.
“Are ya sure you saw somethin' Bloom? Maybe it was just you're imagination.” Applejack theorised, much to her little sister dismay.
“I'm tellin' ya I saw something. Look over there, that's were I saw it!” she pointed her hoof over to the reeds that Scootaloo's stone unfortunately didn't make it passed. Applejack sauntered over to the reeds and looked in.
“I don't see anything...”
“Oh, ya not lookin' hard enough!” Apple Bloom stood next to her sister and looked at where she saw the creature. Nothing was there and the near sunset wasn't providing enough light to penetrate the water.
Apple Bloom felt her sister's hoof tap against her back. “Don't worry about it, it was probably nothin', come on, Granny's making some of her famous apple fritters for desert tonight.” Apple Bloom sat down, wanting to look into the water for a bit in case the creature came back. Applejack shrugged it off, leaving her sister alone for a bit and walked ahead.
Once Applejack was gone, Apple Bloom hear a familiar splashing sound. Seeing what gem covered thing resurface again, it directed the two blood red indents in the front of the helm to face her. Next the helm moved closer towards her, exposing more and more of the thing. The thing didn't stop though, a thin torso and long arms grasping strange tools emerged, standing on two legs and taking long strides towards her.
The creature towered over her, she only made it to what she assumed was knee cap height. It looked down at her imposingly and pointed the long sabre towards her, “You will forget about me, or you will die...” It's croaky voice warned. The teeth on the long sword it held began spinning and wining for added effect.
“Are ya'll mad that Scootaloo hit ya on the head with a rock, I'm sure she's sorry, she didn't mean it, honest!” Apple Bloom cried. The creature lowered the sword and raised the other weapon, aiming for the space between her front legs. In a flash of light, a small disc shot out the barrel and landed on the ground between her legs. She let out a yelp of pain as a tiny shard of the disc scrapped her leg, it began bleeding and felt increasing numb.
“You will leave, never return nor speak any word of me, or you'll die...” it warned again, lowering the weapon back to its side and slowly turned to walk back into the depths of the water.
“Wait!” Apple Bloom cried out, the creature stopped but gave no indication it was listening. “What are ya? I've never seen anything like ya before.”
“A creature like you doesn't deserve to hear the name of my race, but I assure you, I'm not of your world.” it replied, then without another word it descended back into the watery depths.
“Apple Bloom, who ya takin' to?” She heard Applejack asked off in the distance. Quickly panicking to find an good answer, she went with her gut instinct. It wasn't a good idea to lie to the element of honesty, but between death or lying, she went with the second option.
“Myself...” she gave a nervous chucked as she felt the creature in the water eyeing her...
****
“You all did great, but don't forget to keep on practising for next week.” Twilight ushered the three fillies out the door of her castle. They had just finished their weekly 'Twilight Time' and were making good progress under her teachings. However one of their mis-adventures didn't go unnoticed by Twilight when “Wait just one second Apple Bloom, can I talk with you in private?” she asked just before the filly escaped the castle.
Apple Bloom nodded her head and Twilight walked her away from the door so they couldn't be overheard. “So, Apple Bloom, I was talking to Applejack and she mentioned that you thought you saw something in the Ponyville Pond, now her description was a bit vague but from what I can tell their isn't any gem covered creatures in that pond.”
“Oh...t-that? It's nothing really. Just my imagination.” The filly gave a nervous chuckle, trying her best to defuse the topic quickly.
“Oh, are you sure? I was very interested to hear about it.” Twilight almost sounded disappointed, like the inner scholar inside her just died a little.
Apple Bloom began examining the room around her, looking for anything out of place. “Can ya keep a secret?” she asked quietly, shuffling closer. Twilight nodded and also began looking around curiously. “It was an alien.” she exclaimed.
“An alien?” Twilight rose an eyebrow, sounding sceptical.
“Yep, it told me it was from another world.”
“Are you sure? Well, maybe you could introduce me to your alien friend, after all I am a princess and should give him a proper Equestrian welcome.” She smiled confidently, pretty sure that it was indeed just Bloom's imagination. After all, aliens aren't real, or that's what she thought.
“No! Ya can't, if he found out I told ya'll any of this he'll kill me!” she cried, snapping Twilight back.
“He said what!” Twilight gasped, death threats were rare in Equestria, especially if the threatened is a filly. She couldn't believe that Bloom would imagine a alien that would threaten to kill her, crushing any thought that the filly was just getting carried away in her imagination.
Bloom quickly became sheepish, knowing the severity of that kind of threat and that she just brought more attention to the alien that clearly wanted to be alone. “He said, if I told anypony about him he'd kill me...” she mumbled. “Does that mean, he's gonna get me now?”
“No Apple Bloom, if he is threatening anypony with something like that, he is not welcome in Equestria.”
“But how will you stop him, he's big and scary, with weapons that really really hurt.” she warned, holding out her hoof and showing Twilight the scar left by the alien's weapon.
“Don't worry, I'll contact the princesses and talk to this alien myself, I won't mention your name though.” she ruffled the filly's hair to comfort her.
“Thanks Twi', but please be careful. He's dangerous and there might be more than one.”
****
Twilight walked with cautious steps. Hoping to make her stumbling onto this alien more natural and therefore making it completely accidental. She was feeling a little nervous, this was the first time Equestria had ever encounter from beyond the stars, and from the sound of it they weren't too friendly.
A part of her was still sceptical, it wouldn't be the first time Apple Bloom's imagination ran wild and why would an alien from another world hide in a pond? Unless it can only survive in water, but that wouldn't make sense either.
She stopped thinking about it, otherwise she ran the risk of a migraine. Aliens just confused her, she get her answers when she made friends with the alien or force answers from it using her title of princess. So long as the aliens were on Equestria they'd follow Equestria's laws.
Reaching the Ponyville Pond, she quickly took note of each leaf, reed and lily blossom and compared it against her memory. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, she checked, then triple checked.
Each time she looked, nothing surprised her or struck as if it was out of place. There was nothing alien about the pond. It was normal.
Sighing in annoyance and a little bit of disappointment, she sat herself next to the water. Looking into the murky depths and at her reflection, she levitated over some stones from the rock bed to be in front of her.
Idly skipping the stones in the water, she waited around for a while to see what would happen. It was probably hiding from her, Apple Bloom spotting it as dumb luck and it was just irritated that its camouflage was seen through.
As her final stone splashed into the water, something caught her attention. A whirling sound had begun off in the trees and birds had already flapped away to safety. She paid it no mind at first, but the more she thought about it the more strange the sound became. Then it dawned on her that it was a sound that she'd never heard before, cursing herself for not realising it sooner she went to investigate.
She stood up and galloped towards the sound. If the alien was trying to stay hidden then the whirling noise wasn't helping it stay unnoticed. When she got to the trees she'd noticed a path had been carved through the trees, though no remains were scattered on the ground.
Following the cut out path, she noticed how deep it when into the forest. While the forest was no Everfree, it was still thicker than most other forests in the region. Thinking about it she quickly began noticing something about the woods around her.
She never paid any attention to it before. These forests didn't even have names unlike the Everfree and the only time they were visited by multiple ponies was the running of the leaves that happened yearly, and even then the woods she was in were only sparely visited. Perhaps the alien had been around for longer than she thought, hiding and watching them.
She soon caught up to the alien. The thing was just as it was described. Tall, imposing and shrouded itself in fear. It was cutting away the trees, leaving a larger path than necessary.
Soon it reached a clearing, though it didn't look natural and more like it was cut out by similar techniques. The alien Twilight was following entered the clearing and a dozen more of the same aliens marched out the trees surrounding it, one resurfacing only a few metres away from where she was standing.
They talked in hushed tones, most of their attention focused on a large white arch that was twice the height of the aliens. One of the aliens stepped towards the arch, outstreching a large fist that was unique to that alien.
It ran the glove over some of the pulsing gems. As the last gem was touched, Twilight felt the ground shake under her hooves. A spark of light erupted from the arch and a tear in the fabric of the universe opened. Strange energies leaked out, burning away the vines that had wrapped around the sides of the arch in a blaze of white fire.
After a few minutes in silence, three figures walked out of the portal and began to survey their surroundings. The three figures were followed by many more figures and strange machines that walked on two legs. The figure in the center, rose it hand and strange symbols began to orbit her head as she caressed the air.
While Twilight was memorized by the strange figure, one of the green figures approached from behind and grabbed her. Despite all her kicks and struggles, the alien kept a hold on her and suppressed her wings and horn, preventing her escape.
"What should be done to this one?"
Meneria attempted to foresee the future, now being on planet should help the prediction become clearer. Any attempt she tried resulted in failure, too many psychic disruptions were ripping the images in her head. Perhaps they should annihilate the creatures after all, just to get a clear picture of the future.
She did however manage to track on potential path. Reeling it in like a thread of yarn from ever expanding yarn ball of fate, she observed her catch.
What was foretold made her heart stop and blood freeze. Like the cold grasp of she who thrists touching her soul, she backed out of the prediction in fear of it consuming her mind. She saw the nothingness, the icy embrace of failure and saturated soil filled with the precious blood of her race. Meditation was necessary on this later, perhaps consulting the council of farseers for further guidance.
Arrendil was already busying himself with analysing the landscape, looking for any traps and paced the boarder of the clearing like the caged lion he was. Noticing a purple disruption in the sea of green foliage, he silently signalled one of the scorpions to investigate. Soon enough the scorpion subdued an eavesdropping creature and forced it to walk forward. He quickly returned to Meneria side after finishing his patrol.
Twilight stepped forward, towards the two that looked in charge of them. She could feel the eyes of some of the green aliens watching her closely, ready to strike her down at a moment's notice.
She cleared her throat to begin addressing the aliens and nearly sent one of the aliens flying towards her in a blaze of violence. The two leaders began walking forward in gallant strides, she attempted to move out of their way but instead the more masculine alien forced her to the side. The surprising strength of the alien push sent her tumbling onto her side.
“Can you sense the Craftworld calling?” Arrendil asked, wiping away any germs he got from touching the creature. Meneria closed her eyes once again and trying to focus on the gentle pulsing left by the Craftworld's infinity circuit. Once again, she was completely lost. The choir of countless psychics jolted her off course each time she attempted to reach for the Craftworld and fear of stumbling onto that prediction again kept her treading lightly. Realising that she had as much chance of finding the correct path as attempting to find a needle in a million haystacks, she reverted back to reality.
“No, there is too much interference.” She reported, catching the spiraling runes into her palms. Arrendil huffed, spinning around to face the Striking Scorpions.
“How goes the search for the Craftworld?”
The Striking Scorpion's Exarch moved ahead, giving his chainsabre a few test swings by his side as if he was afraid he was out of practice. “Nothing to report, the rangers may have uncovered something but they have yet to return from the .”
Arrendil grumbled something about the inefficiency of the rangers. With his hands folding behind his back, Twilight saw a chance to intervene.
“Sorry to interrupt, but are you looking for something?” she asked, both the autarch's and the scorpion's eyes darted to her. The burning stares she was getting made her back up until they stopped.
“Dalrion, make yourself useful and get this creature out of my sights, I need to debrief without its meddling.” Arrendil didn't even cast his eyes on her again as he spoke. Degrading her further.
She felt a tapping on her shoulder. Turning around to see the tapper, she saw that one of the alien had crouched down, nearly making her the same height. The creature was unlike the others, he had no armor nor any weapons on its person, instead it wore some sort of ceremonial robe and had a flute in its other hand.
“Follow me.” he instructed, standing up and moving towards the portal that the aliens original came from. Twilight reluctantly followed, clearly only making matters worse by trying to help the aliens.
Dalrion placed his hands against the smooth wraithbone portal. Running his hand over a small crack that was beyond sight. Letting out a disappointed sigh, he rose the flute to his masked lips and blew. Siphoning physic energy through the flute and onto the portal, summoning wraithbone into existence to fill in the cracks on the portal.
“How do you do that?” Twilight asked, mesmerized by the aliens magic. Expecting some crude comment or verbal discredit as the alien's response. Instead, the alien chuckled and showed her the flute.
“It isn't too difficult, once you know the runes and have a conduit.” Twilight assumed the conduit was the flute and the runes were just spells. Looking at the alien's magic, it felt distant to her own but still familiar in weird ways. She had a feeling the alien's weren't going to let her into their libraries to study some of their magic.
“Can I ask a question?” Twilight asked, Dalrion stopped and focused on her for a brief moment before going back to maintaining the portal.
“Go on...”
“Why are you all here?” When Twilight first saw the aliens, she came up with two conclusions. They were here to invade or to make friends. In the short time she'd been in their presence they have gone against both theories, if they were making friends then they wouldn't hurt her or be mean. If they were invading they would of killed her or imprisoned her, and they hadn't done either yet.
“I suppose there is no harm in telling you.” he finished up with the portal, satisfied with its condition. “We're looking for something. A Craftworld lost to us many millennia ago, it must of crashed on this planet whilst it was in infancy.”
“What's a Craftworld?” Twilight inquired. Making Dalrion groan slightly as he thought up a way to describe a spacecraft that could be anywhere between the size of a small continent or the largest planets. Realizing there was no way to explain such a craft to a primitive, he gave a quick summery.
“It is just want we call are homes, like big flying houses only much bigger.”
It made sense to Twilight, that would explain their eagerness to find it and the lack of wanting other species involved in finding it. She was still curious on how big they were, after all those walker came through the portal so it must be pretty huge houses.
“Dalrion, how goes the portal?” Meneria asked, her eyes falling on Twilight for a few short seconds before turning back to the portal.
Dalrion took his place beside her and admire his handywork. “The portal is secure, should be safe to send the rest through.” Meneria nodded, snapping her eyes shut to send a quick physic message to her comrades on the other side. As soon as the message was sent, Meneria and Dalrion moved to the side of the portal and Twilight quickly followed.
Thunder sounded on the other side of the portal. In a blink of an eye a swarm of jetbikes shot out and quickly halted, nearly shaving off the end of Twilight's tail with the jetbike winglike appendages. A few of them stopped in front of the trio, saluting the Warlock. “You called for some windriders?”
“Indeed, I shall commandeer one for myself and one for the Bonesinger, send the rest out to report autarch Arrendil.” she commanded, the pilot nodded and dismounted the jetbike, followed swiftly by another dismounted pilot as they went to talk to Arrendil.
“Get on your jetbike.” Meneria ordered, sitting down on her own and getting a feel for the raw and wild craft. The art of riding a jetbike was not lost to her, she had served as one of the windriders in a battle long ago and quickly learnt that the jetbike was less of a machine and more of a living creature that required trust of its rider to work efficiently.
“Where is it that we ride?” Dalrion asked, complying with his orders and sitting down on his jetbike with much less skill. He motioned for Twilight to join him. The long sleak craft looked extremely unsafe and didn't look like it complied with having passengers. She rose her hoof to touch the craft, feeling the bike shudder under her touch like a living creature.
“I want to have a discussion with the leaders of these creatures. If they have indeed been on this planet for their whole existence, they will likely know the location of something unusual.” She reasoned, despite having one of the creature in front of her she still never directly addressed Twilight.
“Little one.” Dalrion addressed Twilight, getting her attention. “Do you know where your leaders are?”
“Y-Yes, they're in Canterlot, the city is suspended from the side of Equestria's tallest mountain.” She pointed her purple hoof towards the mountains, both Dalrion and Meneria moved their heads to look. Indeed there was a large shadow being cast from a hanging structure, spiraling ivory towers and pristine structures that wouldn't go amiss inside one of the lesser districts of a Craftworld.
“Very well, let us ride.” Meneria huffed, getting an almost cooing like sound to come from the jetbike. With a simple movement of her foot, the jetbike purred and shot forth, leaving only turned up dust in its wake.
“Thank you little one for your assistant. Have no fear, nothing will come of your leaders unless they refuse compliance.” Dalrion said before repeating similar actions to the warlock and sending his jetbike soaring across the sky. Watching the two specks disappear into the distance, she realized that she was on her own. The green armoured aliens, the other bikers and the large walkers had all vanished from sight, despite the feeling she was being watched she knew that the aliens were long gone.
Judging by the speed the crafts were travelling, they'd reach Canterlot in a few short minutes. Pooling energy into her horn, she prepared to do one of the longest teleportation spells she could manage. With a simple popping sound, Twilight disappeared in a purple flash.
A few minutes past in eerie silence, the gentle humming from the portal being the only sound for miles. Birds were too startled to return and nopony nor alien was still around to witness if anything was happening. A scratching sound began and continued for a few minutes and the sound of dirt being turned up signaled the end of the scratching.
The new sound of grinding rusty metal and gentle electronic bleeping broke the veil of silence properly. Tiny little metallic creatures surfaced from the ground and approached the portal. The newfound machines spewed bright green energy, it leaked from the two microscopic pincers and dropped onto the soil, draining it of color until it looked more like ash than dirt. Soon more and more rose from the depths until they were able to swarm over the webway portal like flies on a carcass.
The gentle humming turned to a shriek as the webway connection broke. Allowing the metal bugs to harvest the wraithbone and gouge themselves on the sweet energies until nothing was left. They quickly buried themselves back to the underworld, leaving not a single trace of their presence...
“Princess Celestia!” Twilight cried, falling to the ground and snapping her eyes shut in a attempt to stop the room from spinning like a mad carousel ride. She had appeared in the throne room of the castle, knowing that would be Celestia's location at the time.
A hoof touched her shoulder. “Twilight Sparkle, is something wrong? You know that teleportation over such a long distance is dangerous.” Princess Celestia cooed, slowly helping her fellow princess to her hooves.
“I couldn't think of another way, they'll be here any second!” Twilight rose from the ground, keeping her eyes at a fraction of their normal size as her sapped strength slowly but surely returned.
“They?”
“Aliens, there are aliens in Equestria!” Twilight's voice was loaded with new-found urgency. Her worry was met with Celestia biting her lower lip and her wings twitching in something that resembled annoyance. Her calm, godlike eyes scanned over them room around her as if she'd never seen it before, not a single corner or speck of dust was left unobserved.
Leaning in close to Twilight's ear, she whispered “What do they look like?”
“They're tall, bipedal, some covered in gems except one red gem they all keep by their chests.” she whispered back, suddenly aware of the ghastly silence around them.
“Then it is as I feared.” Celestia commented cryptically, walking around and approaching the window. Her view casting over the majority of her kingdom as tears formed in her eyes. As quickly as they came, she wiped them away.
“Have... Have you met them before?”
“Once, a long, long time ago...” Celestia's eyes became hollow, starring off as she relived past memories. She snapped herself out of her daze, turning to the guard on duty by her door. “Please fetch my sister for me, tell her that it is of the utmost importance.”
The guard saluted, darting down the hallway to fulfil his princess' duty. Leaving only one guard to protect the two princesses in case of danger, which was a possibility.
Princess Celestia took her place on her throne, Twilight taking a seat next to her as they both focused on the main door that laid in front of them. Soon the throne room echoed with voice familiar to Twilight as she grew more nervous by the second. Looking up at her old mentor assured her that Celestia wasn't faring much better, her resolve occasionally cracking before being covered by a stern look that only Celestia could master.
Soon a royal guard ran in through the main doorway, stopping in front of Celesta's throne and briefly saluting the two princesses. “Princess! I don't wish to alarm you but there appears to be aliens walking the castle, they wish to speak with you immediately.”
“Yes I know, Princess Twilight has already informed me. Call them in for me.” Celestia said, her voice as cold as stone. The guard swiftly nodded and ran back to follow his princess' demands, only to be beaten to it by the aliens.
The aliens looked the same as before, well almost the same. The one that was nicest to Twilight still wore his robes that had the strange arches over his back that looped well over his height, adding a few feet extra to his already impressive height. This time however his visor was gone, revealing his hairless and sharp features. The one which was apparently psychic also had robes on that drooped, making them look several sizes too big for her comparatively smaller size. Her helmet was completely gone, revealing long locks of bronze coloured hair and pointed ears that breached the layer of hair, on her forehead was a single red heart that blended in almost like a cutie mark would.
“Finally, we've wasted enough time already.” Meneria scoffed, barging across the hall followed by Dalrion who was taking the time to look around the throne room carefully. When his eyes fell onto Twilight, he cocked his head a little as if he was trying to work out if she was the same pony he met before.
“If time is being wasted, then let's get down to business.” Celestia voice was still chilled and emotionless, her hollow eyes watching the two aliens.
“Very well, I suppose introductions are required.” She began, placing a hand on her chest before continuing. “I am Warlock Meneria of Craftworld Biel-Tan, survivor of the Mortem Campaign and master of the seventh sense.”
“And I am Dalrion, accomplished Bonesinger for Craftworld Biel-Tan.” He voice was a tad more gentle than the Warlock's.
“I am Princess Celestia, one of the rulers of Equestria and goddess of the sun.” Celestia retorted, trying to big her title up against these aliens. Her head turned to her former student, silently giving her permission to brag.
“I-I'm Princess Twilight Sparkle, princess of friendship and wielder of the Element of Magic.” She gave a sheepish smile, clearly showing the aliens that she was not ruler material.
“Now that those pleasantry are over, we can address the issue at hand, or hoof in your case.” Meneria focused only on Celestia, trying to piece something together. In response, Celestia rose from her throne and approached the aliens calmly, never losing the hard mask she adopted for the meeting.
“Before you begin, I would like to say something.” Celestia took a deep breath. “My ponies and I are peaceful creatures, for many years we have lived in harmony and wish to continue living that way.” Her eyes suddenly narrowed, burning at the Warlock like two tiny flames. “However, we are not helpless, this harmony was not achieved without the use of powerful artefacts and brave citizens willing to fight to their last breath. If the worst is to come, I can and will burn this whole planet to ashes in need be.”
Meneria chuckled, crossing her arms with a cocky grin on her face “You're bluffing, your magicks compare to childsplay against our physic might and I doubt you have the power to destroy the whole planet.”
Celestia lips warped into a grimace“Didn't you listen? I'm the goddess of the Sun... I can send this planet spiralling into the burning abyss without even breaking a sweat. I doubt you survived your blood soaked campaign to be killed by a primitive race of multicoloured ponies.” Celestia counted, her voice staying calm and collected the whole time. Minutes flew passed like seconds as Meneria and Celestia stared each other down, seeing who would break first. Finally, Meneria blinked.
“Stalemate then... Very well, no harm will come to your precious ponies, but only because we need this planet relatively unscathed.” She murmured. While she definitely doubted the Princess was a powerful as she said she was, it was hardly worth risking the dying Craftworld as well as Eldar lives just because she was too stubborn.
It would take far too long to kill them all anyway.
Celestia's scowl faded like the morning mist, her features softening back into the Princess Twilight recognised. “Thank you, now that we have that out of the way, we can begin.”
“Did we miss something?” A new voice asked. All heads turned to see the new guest, only to find it was Princess Luna. The Princess of the Night finally stirring from her daytime slumber, her eyes also familiar with the aliens presented before her.
“And you are?” Meneria grumbled, annoyed at another distractions to the already annoying meeting.
“We are Princess Luna, defender of the night.” Luna lowered her head into a timid bow, calmly analysing both both the extraterrestrial beings in front of her.
“Fine, Meneria-” She placed a forceful finger on her own chest “-and he's Dalrion.” She moved the same finger over to her companion, introducing themselves with much less pride and intimidation.
“Now, before we get distracted again, please explain the purpose of your arrive.” Celestia pushed.
“We are here for one thing and one thing only, to recover some lost kin from a Craftworld, probably long buried under your planet due to the countless millenniums that have pasted. If you'd kindly point us towards anything otherworldly we'd leave and never return.”
Princess Celestia and Luna shared a quick, knowing look between each other. “We are not familiar with any 'otherworldly' things around here. Perhaps the craft was destroyed or has degraded over time.”
“Impossible, We've heard the calling, it is here and is very much alive.” Dalrion assured, looking down to his hands and sighing, “Whatever caused the Craftworld to stir after all this time is still a mystery however.”
“If you can 'hear' this Craftworld, then what's stopping you from finding it now?” Luna asked, getting an agreeing nod from Celestia as well.
“There is too much interference, all you ponies ripple the future like rain on water due to your physic abilities. It is impossible to see where the Craftworld is and the future of this world is so far shrouded.”
“So, let me guess. You want our help, after all we know the land and I'll assume there are more of us than you.” Celestia smiled at her leverage, sitting back down on her throne and giving a comforting wink to her former student, assuring her that it was all going well.
Twilight was too far out of her depth. She was still stunned from watching Celestia threaten to destroy everything she knew without even a thought to the consequence. Just who were these aliens? And how much did Celestia know about them to warrant the destruction of the whole planet at a drop of a hat?
“We have the searching covered, what we need is for your subjects to back down, after all we can't have distractions and you don't want any dead ponies to deal with.” Meneria reasoned, growing tired of discussion.
“I can announce that you are not hostile, but whether they agree is a different matter that I cannot help. So long as you keep your word and not harm anypony then they'll grow to tolerate you.”
“Like I said, if they stay out of our way then they have nothing to fear.”
Celestia smiled and nodded, “Very well, I will advise my subjects tomorrow that they have nothing to fear so long as they stay away from you and you will not harm them.” She once again stood up from her throne and held out her hoof towards the warlock, “Are we in agreement?”
Meneria snapped her eyes and cautiously rose her hand to meet the Princess' hoof like she was expecting pain from it. “Agreed.” she quickly snapped her hand back and wiped in against her robe.
“Your welcome to stay in the castle, the view will not doubt be useful for your search.” Celestia offered with a rather smug look on her face, Meneria face scrunched up but accepted anyway. “You can wander the castle, but please do not go into the city.”
“Dear sister, may I have a word with you and Princess Twilight in private?” Luna asked, not waiting for an answer as she left the hall followed closely by an eager Twilight. Celestia gave a farewell to the aliens and went to join her sister.
“What are you going to do?” Dalrion asked, the warlock folded her arms again.
“I'm going back to the bikes, I need to meditate, perhaps I might be able to get some foresight as this world goes to sleep. Can you keep yourself entertained until then?”
Dalrion nodded, “I'll have a wander, these creatures have... interesting buildings for a race that have no hands.” Meneria rolled her eyes at the bonesinger's antics but wasted no time getting out of the throne room, Dalrion shrugged and looked up, admiring the banners above with an artistic eye.
****
“There we are, we should go undisturbed now.” Luna muttered, casting a sound proofing spell around the room and locking the doors. Before Celestia had a chance to even sit down Twilight had already pounced at her mentor with the burning questions.
“Just how much do you know about those aliens?!” Twilight slammed her hoof against the expensive table to illustrate her point, causing the empty candle holders to jump in surprise.
“Twilight, I know very little-” Celestia began, but was interrupted by another hoof slamming into the table.
“No! Don't try to keep me in the dark, as a Princess I have a right to know everything you know about these aliens.” after a drawn-out pause, Luna spoke up.
“I agree with Princess Twilight, if she is expected to deal with these aliens then she deserves to know as much as we do.”
“You are right to think that this isn't the first time we have met these aliens, we also know where this 'Craftworld' is.” Celestia informed, getting a pat on the back from her sister as she offered to take turns explaining to Twilight.
“Back when Equestria was just formed, we went to go and met with the Saddle Arabia leaders. To do this we had to cross over the southern badlands. During the days of crossing the sands, we felt rumbling underhoof and the sand shifting occasionally.”
“This continued for several days, eventually the rumbling stopped and it never happened again.”
“Days after, we must have been about half way through our journey, when we came across something... otherworldly.”
“It was like a massive black obelisk with glowing green carvings, with stairs that led deep into the earth. Around it there was shards of that material the aliens were so fond of, scattered around but only a few skeletons buried under the sand. We collected this material and continued on, but didn't investigate further.” Celestia recalled, getting a nod of agreement from her sister.
“So do you think that is what they're after?” Twilight asked with d0oubt, she had never seen this 'obelisk' in person but it didn't sound right, the portal was white and vibrate, so far everything about those aliens seemed vain. A dark colourless pillar didn't add up seem like their style, and why would they build stairs going down into the earth? The 'Craftworld' crashed aeons ago, that meant that the inhabitants let it sink into the ground over the hundreds of years but decided to build stairs going back up to the surface.
“You sound unsure Twilight, do you not think that this is the thing they are after?” Celestia asked, recognising her ex-students doubtful tone from many years of hearing it.
“If their craftworld crashed, then why would it waste time burying itself if it's just going to leave something like the obelisk out for anypony to stumble across? Just doesn't make sense.”
After another long pause, Luna took a quiet gulp to calm her nerves, “If its not theirs, then who's buried themselves under Equestria since the dawn of time?”
“I don't know...” Twilight mumbled, thoughts of another race of aliens buried underneath Equestria sent shivers down her spine, especially if the two aliens didn't like each other. “But one of the two aliens in the castle is a builder, maybe I can ask him about it.”
“Perhaps, but what if it is the thing they're looking for, they'll know we've been lying to them.” Luna warned, fearing for the consequences of the lying to the vastly more powerful aliens.
“I'll just say a civilian saw it and sent it to us.” Twilight theorized, trying to approach this carefully.
“Very well, if you think you can handle this Twilight then you can try to talk to the aliens about it, but please be careful, this could get worse before it gets better.” Celestia said, placing a gentle hoof on Twilight's shoulders.
“I promise to be careful...”
