Bellum tyranni sol et luna Benedictus

By ChAoS pOnY

Occultus civitate Vapor est , anni , et terrorem.

The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown. - H.P. Lovecraft

Some people fear the future and wish to bury it because they know they a just one cog in the machine away from no longer being needed.

Sunset Shimmer blasted another Clockmen into the the wall and yelled, "Their trying to heard us into the hole!"

"I noticed, but damn it all to Tartarus if I'm going to let a bunch of over grown take me with out a fight!" Starlight Glimmer yelled back as she tried to freeze the ground under one in to a solid sheet of ice. Only there was a loud chink noise from it's feet and "OH COME ON! WHO BUILDS SPRING LOADED CLETS INTO BOOTS!"

"That would be the same pony who enchanted every last nut, bolt, cog, and spring in them to reassemble them after a minute if you knock them apart and beat them over the head with their own arm." Muad pointed out as the arm in her hands was yanked loose by the magic and flipped her the bird as it flew across the chamber to it's owner who brought up another hand and made it a double bird. "And obviously Starswirl the Bearded made them a bit rude."

"Hands Off!" Sunburst yelled as he launched a rocket at the one about to reach Starlight Glimmer, giving her enough time to throw up a shield . "Get your own girlfriend, she's with me!"

"Brother of mine, I do believe I am starting to miss the spiders" Flam said as he flicked a burning ember from his mustache.

"Without a doubt, but at least these clockwork chaps don't smell bad." Flim pointed out as he smacked the hand of another Clockmen with a broken gun as it tryed to pull itself over the rubble to get to them in the acove they were hidding in with the Shim Sham Sisters. "How's the surprise coming girls?"

"Roam wasn't built in a day." Shim said in a sing song voice.

"Yeah Flimmykins, it took them at least a week to choose what drapes went with the columns." Sham chipped in as she tore a strip off the bottom of her skirt and rolled it in black powder and not even noticing her sister rolling her eyes as she mixed rust and aluminum powder together in her purse before puting a strip of magnesium in it and then dumping her sister's purse out beside her stuff from her purse and pouring the black powder for the guns in it and shoving them both into a half empty box of nails. With her home made fuse half hanging out of the black powder bag, she closed the lid with just enough room for the fuse to be hanging out. Then she grabbed her matches and ran over to the rubble just as another hand came over the edge. Lighting the fuse she shoved it into the hand which grabbed it and yelled, "Happy Birthday!" as they all ducked down as the hand pulled it onto the other side... Then there was a loud 'KABOOM!' as part of the rubble collapesed.

As they all looked over the remains of the pile they saw pieces of at least 30 or 40 clockmen smoldering on the floor. "What exactly was in that thing, dear sister?" Shim asked as she looked on in disbelief at the sheer mechanical carnage.

"Nothing much, just a two stage super thermite bomb with extra shrapinal and the 400 extra nitroglycerin pills from last weeks order for ponyvilles apothecary. She kind of ran out because of the mayor eating them up like candy and that nice Granny Smith who gave me a pie and Mr. Cake who gave me cookies, something about pinkie promising never to let Pinkie Pie throw a Super Mega Quentuplet Ultra Party at Suger Cube Corner ever again." Sham said as she nudged a piece of one of the clockmen. "Shouldn't they be putting themselves back together so we can play with them some more. I'm sure I can whip up something better with those gumdrops from your purse, a match, some asprine, my lipstick, and your panties."

"WHAT? Why my panties? Why not your own?" Shim demanded.

"Because I would need the nylon and polyester from your black satin panties you wore, as well as the black dye in them since I wore a white cottion pair of panties. Besides, we need my panties for the elastic for a sling shot to firer it, and rocks, at them." Sham pointed out as she motioned to the dozen or so Clockmen now surrounding them. Then she noticed and joined Flim and Flam in holding her hands up in surrender. "Parley?" she asked before one put a sword to her throat and shook it's head no. "Didn't think so... So umm... Are you here for the picnic as well? Because the giant spiders already stomped it flat earlier." Several of them looked at each other before shaking their heads no again. "Okay then is it surrender?" Getting a nod she smiled and said, "Then we accept your surrender." At that point 11 Clockmen, Flim, Flam, and Shim all faced palmed as the one holding the sword to her throat just shook his head no. "Oh, you mean our surrender." That got a nod, "I'm sorry, but Shim said I was no longer aloud to negotiate terms of surrendering to others, something about nearly getting married off to a minotaur noble." With that, it took it's sword away from her thoat, walked over to a wall and banged it's head several times against it. After it left a small crater in the wall it walked back over and just picked her up and walked down into the hole. "Well if you insist, but we may need to stop by the little fillies room on the way."

"I swear mother ate poison joke when she was pregant with us." Shim said to the Clockmen who was carrying her. The Clockmen just shrugged as it entered the hole, passing more Clockmen heading up to join the fight. Up ahead it saw the two flyers and the monkey thing that had already been captured, waiting for the rest to be brought down before heading deeper. It knew the more of them they captured the better, but how it wished it had been built with the ability to speak. Unfortunately only ones from the first 100,000 had been stationed at the enterance and it was odd because there was nothing there last time, yet that was definately a Tirekian temple. It would have to be destoryed as soon as the last one was brought down. It ignored the kick to it's leg as it place the female unicorn next to the others.

"... It's only a partual translation, but I'm sure the writing engraved on them is Shadhavaress. So far I've got bits and pieces of each one guarding us has their personal history etched into their metal, but Shadhavaress is more of Muad's specialty than mine." Daring Do told the Shim Sham Sisters. "I got the war against Grogar, Tambelon's disappearance, as well as some referance to a Tirekian cult sacrificing children to their dark god and the Clockmen putting a stop to it, but I'm having trouble with the part about 'The Curse Born Lord and The Dark Lady of Suffering. It seems to refer to them as being alive and dead at the same time and a love that will outlast the Sun, Moon, and Stars or kill the Sun, Moon, and Stars. Like I said, Shadhavaress is not an area I specialize in because I'm not a teenage girl dreaming about a dark immortal lover and there is so few real artifacts left behind by the Shadhavar."

"But I like 'The Fallen Knight' series." Sham pouted before adding, "Shimmy has the whole series as well as the 'Slendermare' novels and 'The Daemon King's Bride' series."

"Only the first Slendermare novel is a romance story based off the ideal that she was the mystery being in 'The Tragedy of Grogar'. The rest are horror and very gory and I told you to stay out of my books." Shim yelled at her sister."If you glued the pages of 'The Princess of Tartarus' with peanut butter, chocolate, or marshmellows before I could read it I'll be an only child soon."

"You can have my copy, but I should warn you, the guest author is a bit hung up on romance and the horrors of Tartarus and the Daemons seem to be a bit flat, Tirek is made to be less harsh and brutal, and Primrose is made to be less of a victim slowly winning the monster's heart and more of a kinky partner playing the role of a victim." Daring told her. "That's why I never let a guest author write my books. Sure, I might be a bit late, but the stories never suffered from having someone who got F's in history class and wanting to have the Clockmen fighting in the Thousand Year War."

"Why did they let a guest author write it then?" Shim asked as Flim and Flam were brought in.

"Marigold's tumor operation was a bit more difficult than they thought and her recovery took longer than they thought it would." Lightning Dust said. "But she has already started writing the next book, which explains everything in 'The Princess of Tartarus' was a dream and her heart was trying to show her the side of Tartarus she has already glimpsed in the other books. The guest author was in on it and even left clues to it in 'The Princess of Tartarus' just like Marigold planned before the operation."

"WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PONIES?" Ahuizotl Demanded as soon as he got loose from the ropes and pulled the gag out of his mouth. "WE'RE PRISONERS OF A CLOCKWORK ARMY, BEING DRAGGED WHO KNOWS WHERE, AND YOU'RE DISCUSSING ROMANCE NOVELS."

"Would you please raise your hands if you have been held prisoner by some one with a small army and dragged of to certain doom?" Daring Do asked and everyone of them raised their hands, inclueding the Clockmen guarding them. "And please keep them up if it has been more than once?" Every hand stayed up. "And more than a dozen times?" A few of the Clockmen lowered their hands. "And over 25 times?" all of the Clockmen had now lowered their hands. "And over 50 times?" Lightning Dust lowered her hand. "And over 100 times?" Shim and Sham lowered their hands. "And over 150 times?" Flim and Flam lowered their hands only leaving Daring Do with a raised hand, which she lowered before looking at Ahuizotl and saying, "My personal record is 239 times. Trust me, around the 6th or 7th time you learn to stop panicing and just distract yourself while waiting for something to happen. Flim and Flam critic everything happening around them and discuss inventions, their neice, and anything else that pops in their heads. Shim and Sham bicker like the sisters they are, critic the 'villains' lair, which we haven't reached yet, minions, who aren't the usual bunch of primatives who have yet to learn to bathe but an impressive army of mechanical wonders, and discuss books and their own inventions. Then there's my daughter, Lightning Dust, who either will do snide comments or just join in any conversation going on at the time. And then there's me and Maud, who try to work out any ancient language we see or compare either the current 'villain' to others we have dealt with or current books and compareing them to the original source material from legends their loosely based upon or we sometime just nap until we get to where ever we're being taken to. I don't know Starlight Glimmer or Sunburst very well to know what they do and Sunset Shimmer spends most of her time jumping from subject to subject depending on the make up of the group, while soaking up every detail about our surroundings, who has captured us, why, and what forces they have avalible at the time." Thinking about it she also added, "And we sometimes bet on who will be the last to be captured and how long it will take."

Ahuizotl just looked at all of them and shook his head, "You're all completely insane."

"Says the guy fixated with ancient artifacts of power from someone who, more often than not, was defeated. Instead you could just write books and live a nice comfy life by turning in those artifacts to Celestia for the finders fee or use the finders fee to buy legal protection and political power as a noble and rule over your usual band of savages as the lord of what ever armpit of Equus you set up shop in. Trust me, anyone that can tame a small piece of the Badlands will get Celestia's sealof approval." Daring pointed out to him.

"And a week later she has a new lawn ornament. Thanks, but no thanks." Ahuizotl sneered, "Besides, at least I'm not her lap dog. She says fetch and Daring Do is off on another adventure. So how much did she offer you to bring her the Clockmen Army?"

"Not a Tartarus damn thing. I'm here against the crowns wishes because you with a real army means alot of innocent people, not just ponies, will get hurt. You always go for artifacts that cause massive damage and kills alot of innocent people. If you want to take down her 'Imperial' majesty that's fine by me, but leave everyone else out of it." Daring stated, glaring at him. "Your type wants to end her rule, but you never think of all the people that will get hurt in the process. How many mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, children, friends, lovers, and innocent bystanders will you kill just to remove a tyrant clad in religion and peace? How many will be crippled and scarred by your quest for vengence? Will you feed the starving masses after you destroyed their farm lands? Will you shelter and clothe those who lost everything when 'Gods' clash? Will you care for the children you made orphane for some screwed up sense of justice? Tell me how you plan to fix everything after you destroy everything just to get to her? Do you have a grand plan for the day after you beat her? A week? A month? Years and centuries after you defeated her? Tell me 'Godling', DO YOU HAVE WHAT IT TAKES TO STEP UP TO BECOME A MAJOR GOD? TO WIELD NOT JUST THE POWERS OF A MINOR,LOCAL SPIRIT OF A FEW BACKWATERS SAVAGES, BUT THE VERY POWERS OF THE COSMOS? TO WIELD POWERS THAT DOSEN'T JUST EFFECT A FEW LOCALS, BUT SPELLS THE VERY DEATH AND DESTRUCTION OR LIFE AND SALVATION OF BILLIONS YET TO EVEN BE BORN?" Daring was out of her seat being restrained by several Clockmen, who were trying not to hurt her, as she screamed at him, "ARE YOU READY FOR SUCH A RESPONSIBILITY? OR DO YOU PLAN TO LEAVE THE WORLD IN A STATE OF CHAOS AND DESTRUCTION?" Ahuizotl flinched as she demanded, "TELL ME, OH MIGHTY GOD OF NOTHING, CAN YOU BECOME THE GOD THIS WORLD NEEDS? CAN YOU RAISE THE SUN AND MOON FOR THOUSANDS UPON THOUSANDS OF YEARS FAITHFULLY? CAN YOU GUIDE THE COURSE OF HISTORY AND FATE WITH OUT FAIL? CAN YOU HOLD BACK NOT ONLY THE FORCES OF TARTARUS, BUT THOSE THINGS HIDDING IN THE CRACKS OF REALITY, JUST WAITING FOR A CHANCE TO DEVOUR ALL OF US PATHETIC MORTALS SOULS AND LEAVE THIS WORLD A BROKEN WASTELAND OF DEATH? TELL ME AHUIZOTL?" With that she broke free long enough to slam him back into a Clockmen as she pounded on him, "TELL ME? TELL ME? TELL ME?" Finally they pulled her back and held her down, finally not caring if they hurt her.

Ahuizotl looked at her in shock, normally she was just glaring at him as either a disappointed mother or a put upon teenager look, but this time he saw death in her eyes. He saw she would kill him if he wasn't immortal and for once she actually scared him. It was a look that screamed not just death, but hatred for him and every other God out there. It was also the type of hate that only pain could bring, pain so deep it tore at the very heart and soul of the person feeling it. Normally he never thought about what her life was like when she wasn't interupting his, but there was only one type of pain that could do this. "Daring, what happened to Lightning Dust's father?"

The very scream she let out would have sent Tirek himself fleeing. From somewhere deep inside a new strength surged thru her as she dragged the Clockmen with her. She didn't even feel the searing pain as her wings gave way or the blood pouring down her back as her hand clamped around his throat with inhuman strength. "DoN't YoU dARe TaLk Of HiM!!!" she hissed as her eyes flashed with an unholy black light, as if something had crawled inside of her once and left a taint of something unspeakable. "DoN't YoU eVeR sPeAk Of HiM aGaIn Or I'lL teAr OuT yOuR hEaRt! It WaS sUpPoSe To Be YoU wAiTiNg FoR mE! nOt ThAt ThInG! It WaS sUpPoSe To Be YoU i FaCeD iN tHeRe! NoT sOmEtHiNg ThAt UsEd mE lIkE pUpPeT! NoT sOmEtHiNg ThAt RaPeD mY SoUl, mInD, aNd BoDy fOr 300 WhOle YeArS iN a PlAcE wHeRe TiMe WaS bRoKeN! It WaS sUpPoSe To Be YoU! nOt SoMeThInG tHaT bReEd Me LiKe CatTle! FoRcInG mE tO BiRtH hOrRoR aFtEr HoRrOr! It OnLy LeT mE gO wHeN mY lItTlE lIgHtNiNg DuSt CaMe OuT nOrMal! sO nEvEr SpEaK oF hIm AgAiN bEcAuSe YoU wErEn'T ThErE for me the one time I needed you." Sobbing, she let go of his neck and clung to him. "You weren't there to annoy me and banter with me. You weren't there to flirt and make dumb threats before putting me in an easy to escape trap." Ahuizotl wrapped his arms around her as she sobbed, floating her wings over and healing them with his powers. "You were always there before, making it fun to be an adventurer, but this time it wasn't you Celestia sent me to stop. She said it was you, but it wasn't. No tribe of savages. No ancient temple in a jungle. No you. Just desert, a cave leading to a ruin, and him." Sobbing harder she buried her face in his neck. "She gave me to him as the price for not leaving his ruins for another 10,000 years. He broke me in so many ways, but it was the day he let me go that broke the one thing that kept me going, faith that you would be there for me. That you would find out and come for me and hold me like you did when my parents died. You always came, but this time you didn't and it broke me."

"I never knew, kitten, but I should have." Ahuizotl said in a soft and gentle voice as he cursed himself for forgetting the price of a mortal adventurer's life. For forgetting the darker things out there and preparing her better for them. For being so young for a God and that his mere 500 years was nothing compared to beings who measure their life in eons. He should have taken her as a bride years ago, then even Celestia would have thought twice about sending her. She might not respect much of the old ways, but even Celestia respected the rule about harming mortal lovers.

The rest of them all looked else where, except Lightning Dust who watched them. "I could have been your daughter." Was all she said, already knowing about her father.

"True, but that doesn't mean I can't do the right thing this time around." He stated before kissing the top of Daring's head. "I won't let you down again and Celestia won't send you into harms way ever again." He held her closer as she relaxed into his arms and fell asleep, knowing she was safe.

Author's Note

I'm back and ready to go. This one is all over the place and feels right.

Yes, I am shipping Ahuizotl and Daring Do. I feel his character has the feel of a young God, he is only 500 years old. Also yes, Daring has had a run in with a lovecraftian horror and it has tainted her in a way.

Also note 'Super Thermite' doesn't work like that in the real world, in fact sham's bomb would have only hurt one of the clockmen if they were lucky.

This will be a three parter, and focused on the Sunset Shimmers group, the Clockmen, a Clockwork city, and The Curse Born Lord and The Dark Lady of Suffering, who wait deep in the city.

I also have a Patreon account right here.