Breaking the Route... - 0.1.A
One small change can affect the future in an infinite amount of ways, the more time passes the more apparent the differences will become. In a way, the variation between two close Parallel Dimensions can be as much as one sand grain being out of place, but this still being enough of a difference to cause an untold amount of damage to the World as a whole.
[Fate] watched as one Thread that belonged to the infinite variations of Equestria whirled off its course and all because of one simple change before the protections that [Fate] put in there were in place. [Destiny] couldn't help, as there wasn't anything wrong with the beginning and the Cause, it was [Fate]'s jurisdiction to make sure that the results would be as they should. Even then the limited amount of influence it could exploit left almost no options to salvage this mess, it clenched its fists really wanting to have a physical manifestation to strangle the pathetic worthless Earth-Pony that managed to screw things up so royally that the whole World would be left to die.
It was rare, it was almost less than one million's of a percent of a chance to happen, but sometimes there were Worlds that were left beyond saving no matter what. Twilight Sparke bore a colossal weight in the whole scheme of things that were yet to come, and due to one single missed opportunity there now would be far less of a chance for her to even survive long enough to tap into her true potential. [Fate] has a limited amount of options here, the limitations that were applied to the amount of influence it could exploit to nudge the World onto a proper course once more. It was far from enough to literally take Twilight's hand to guide her through all the obstacles on her way and not let her die or break before she would fulfill her role in keeping this literally suicidal World alive.
[Fate] rubbed its forehead with a groan, Equestria was one of the most troublesome Worlds around and require so many things going right to be kept intact that it wasn't even funny. It had to expand all its allowed influence on each and every of its versions to make sure that the dumb Ponies with no actual common sense or instinct of self-preservation didn't keel over due to reasons that even a retarded mouse would be able to find its way out of. Oh, when this World only came around for the first time [Fate] experimented a little with it, but apparently simply directing the Heroin to do lethal blows to her enemies led to her being labeled as a Villain no matter the circumstances and therefore left the World to crash and burn from the next Calamity that decides to come knocking. Getting Twilight prepared before the start of the disasters upset [Destiny] too much as Celestia often simply didn't take the filly as her student seeing her rather nonplused attitude towards actually making sure that things that haunt the citizens of the Country are dealt with properly and without any chance to come back to bite them.
This was a mess, and with [Time] being adamant about the amount of the changes that can be efficiently done to the Timeline from the inside [Fate] didn't even have the option of a Stable Timeloop being put into the list of possible solutions. No amount of nudges and small alterations would solve this World, Twilight simply didn't have the capacity to perform to the best of her Potential without that small fact that now was outside of [Fate]'s reach simply because it will take all the possible alterations for it to get that stupid change undone and there still will be Calamities coming without it being able to prevent them. [Destiny] would not let [Fate] remove some of the load of the things to come as each one of those little bastards also had their proper End and Role to fulfill and damn the consequences! For the potential good it could do [Fate] was now even ready to consider dropping a Nuke onto the whole Country and let the things play out as the Ponies will be baptized by fire into living beings with actual backbones!
Suddenly [Fate] blinked, it wasn't like it couldn't do so but it will surely exhaust all what it could do to this particular World in one big swoop. But there was some potential here, as many small changes didn't work so on the other side one big one should be a possible solution. Twilight Sparkle needed Spike, as he was one of the key pieces for her development and actual maturing into the mare she was when she took the Element of Magic onto herself. He gave the most of the nudges she needed to be ready mentally, Celestia taught her some Magic and other little things and then she was learning by experiencing things in Ponyville for the foreseen future. One of the consequences of the original difference was the lack of Spike's egg, the test was still hard but nothing on the scale of what happened originally.
[Fate] smirked, if [Destiny] wanted its results so desperately then they would justify any means, right? While simply restoring Spike on his proper place would be possible and would give Twilight the right background for her to recover the Elements, she won't be able to face the Challenges and Obstacles ahead and will either die or break into more pieces than anyone would be able to collect and put back together. No, she would still need similar Experience but with a severely amplified intensity to toughen her up and provide some more protection for her to be able to bring out on demand when things will start going south. That meant that she would require a substitute and a valid one that will actually fit the bill on multiple occasions, brute-forcing things here was the only option as nothing else would actually manage to work.
Now, [Fate] only needed a possible replacement of the little Dragon that right now was unredeemable out of a picture. Pulling something out of Equestria was out of a question, only somehow binding Discord himself to her would suffice and, while possible, would cause to much collateral damage to be anything but a footnote. That left an introduction of something new to the World, but there were so many options that [Fate] honestly was hesitating on the choice here. Putting something too powerful will certainly do the deed, but it will remove the whole thing with Twilight becoming an Alicorn and probably a good portion of the map would have to be redrawn after some of the candidates would encounter Discord. Weaker options simply didn't pull through here, anything that came from an egg and was weaker than a freaking Nemean Lion in its prime wouldn't simply cut it. Pity those tank-like puffballs were mammals, or [Fate] would've had a good solution already. Any of the more Mystical Beasts were also out, the ones that grew fast enough to reach the appropriate Power-Level by the age of eight would be too strong later on or simply too big to provide any assistance without stepping on someone.
[Fate] paused, the factor about them being too strong can be sidestepped if their strength would be directly connected to Twilight and will force her to grow along with them to keep up. It was a bit too crude for [Fate]'s tastes, but beggers can't be choosers and with how badly everything could turn out in the end... So that was one problem solved and about a billion ones to go, next came the fact that he would need to look for something that won't cause too much damage itself because otherwise the whole point would be lost and the result will be the same in the end. The fact that they would need to be coming from eggs let [Fate] a lot more leeway as it provided far more space for the maneuvers due to cost on bringing in an infant in was a lot less than even a child.
[Fate] smirked, with the amount it could pull in it would be able to pull at least...
Suddenly it stopped, and a borderline devious smile come to its lips. The problem also was in Twilight making friends with the five that were connected to her that hippy-shockwave, but they weren't actually a constant and could be either replaced or removed entirely. They were just the most convenient and easily accessible candidates for the position of the Bearers, this was mostly [Destiny]'s way of putting all the pieces in place for the big brand finale that it wanted so much. Well, [Fate] was limited only by the goals of all Villains being defeated and Twilight becoming an Alicorn in the end while all the additional bonuses were all produced for one of these goals to be achieved easier. They also provided lessons for Twilight to learn on her path to Ascension but in the grand scheme of things they were as useful as rocks with words scribed on them with an explanation for each and every lesson needed.
If Twilight will learn all these things on her own...
More so, if she will be encountering them at a far close proximity and will be a lot more involved in them. There was potential there, but it will require for her to be emotionally invested into finding the solution for the trials that will await her in the future. A small shift in her interaction with the replacement would guarantee that, but at the same time may result in an overt feedback that would cause her to crumble long before being able to pull weight on her own in a situation like that. [Fate] frowned, it will require some work but if she would feel a strong enough desire and if her own development would be connected...
This variant will require not one, but two or more beings being involved.
[Fate] smiled, it already could see how this will work out if all will go according to plan, even without [Time]'s assistance to see the things to come. It even came up with perfect candidates for this, a little bit of alteration for them to fit the purpose and make sure that it won't cause any diminishment of their Power... Compression was a better solution, it will cut off some of the possibly needed alteration at a later date but it was already a gamble and [Fate] knew that there was a good chance that Twilight will manage to pull through. With a flex of its Power seven eggs containing seven particular beings were inserted into the peaceful land of Equestria, to be found and then hatched by Twilight Sparkle at a later date.
[Fate] sat on its throne above all Creation and watched the events unfolded, it actually counted how much rocking of the boat it will take for [Destiny] to come screeching about its plans being ruined and burned down. This, in the end, should prove to be so much fun.
Top Marks sighed as another hopeful candidate for the prestige School for Gifted Unicorns walked away, this was becoming a rather productive year as several of the newly accepted students showed some great promises. He certainly wasn't complaining about the fresh youth coming, the Exam that the children had to finish was upgraded once again and his curiosity was going up several notches as he watched the new arrival walking through the door while being accomplished by her parents. He honestly wasn't sure what Princess Celestia was trying to accomplish with this last test that she integrated several years prior, the rather simple examination with a machine that any decent hospital possessed could probably tell you what Magical Potential the filly had without the need for an elaborate thing that he was now going to supervise.
'Honestly, if these things managed to resist her own Magic then what hope could a filly have?' The candidate, Twilight Sparkle his notes supplied, was apparently a very gifted little one with a rather noticeable academic mind and a thirst for knowledge. Her theoretical portion of an exam was already finished and she earned full marks, only on this Top was ready to pass her without the need for this formality that was this whole thing. He looked her over, a rather short one with slightly pale skin and bright violet eyes, pale light-grayish mulberry horn poked out on her forehead. Her moderate sapphire blue hair with moderate violet and brilliant rose streaks cascaded down her back right down to her knees and matched her tail, she was wearing a white sundress with a light purple west and brown shoes.
'Oh, familiar faces.' Top noticed Twilight Velvet and Night Light standing behind, he had a very good memory and remembered another candidate that passed several years ago and was followed by these two. His name was... Shining Armor? Yes, the colt was all nervous to the point of almost breaking down but he was slightly more composed than what now appeared to be his younger sister. Well, if they had the same potential then this test would be a breeze for her, Top exchanged glances with three of his colleges and still keeping a rather bored mask on gave a small nod of acknowledgment. They answered in kind, Twilight was already accepted and this last part was mostly a formality that had to happen due to Princess' insistence that it will show the youth that all is ahead of them no matter what.
Crystal Clear would be indifferent, the mare needed her dose of coffee before she would be able to operate as a living being and her dull look and almost closing eyes were telling Top that she didn't get her morning fix. It was a miracle that she wasn't snoring right now, at least she had her glasses right side up instead of upside down like she tried to wear them the last time she ran out of her 'elixir of life'. Arpeggio was mostly doodling on the backside of his list, probably another tune for his little musical club that he had going under his administration. Top honestly was wondering when he will stop wearing his puke green checkered jacket over a white dress shirt and very dark green bowtie, it made a horrible combination with his light-gray pants and black shoes that reminded him of some kind of an old fashion statement that earned the speaker a tomato to the face. Apple Polish was actually marking the homework while pretending to be paying attention to whatever will happen, she already went through at least ten from this morning alone and apparently wasn't going to even bother to mark the performance.
'Why couldn't Miss Hackney be here today?' Top was actually substituting for her at the moment, mostly because she took a sick day and he owed her a favor for that one time with the frogs attempting to stage a rebellion after one of the students screwed up with the Motivation Spell. How could a rather simple and low-powered Spell that temporary removed fatigue and refreshed the person make all of them fall into a frenzy and attack the members of the facility he would never know.
Top looked over to the filly that was fidgeting before a long line of highly secured and reinforced metal boxed, seven containers that were mostly stored in the Castle's Treasury and left it only once a year now for this particular exam. He knew what was inside, and Celestia provided a full review of the results of the tests done to these particular pieces of the mystery. With a small spark of Magic from his horn, he made the top parts of these containers slid back and reveal the content that made Twilight's eyes go round and mouth to hang slightly open. Seven giant eggs that were at least twice a big as the ones from Dragons were sitting inside on the special cushions made out of hard cotton, Top honestly felt a shiver going down his spine whenever he so these things and it had nothing to do with their size. They were redicoulously resistant to Magic, even the simple act of levitating them was borderline impossible of not for the roundabout method of just levitating whatever they were put onto. Princess herself struggled to do so and had seriously to overpower the Spell to move them around, good thing that they weren't needed very often. Apparently, they were still alive and ready to hatch, but just weren't doing so for a reason unknown and every attempt to coax them and help the babies inside to get out were met with failure due to no Magic was actually able to get inside the eggs.
"You can begin whenever you're ready, Miss Sparkle." Arpeggio intoned without raising his head.
The girl nodded nervously and looked at the eggs, her face scrunched in concentration as her horn came alight with a light brilliant raspberry Magical Aura. Top could see how she pushed her Magic further and further, trying to grasp the eggs or at least touch them with her attempt of a Spell. She already knew Telekinesis, he saw her levitating her book in front of her face as she was waiting in the lobby so that meant that she had a good enough grasp on her Magic to waver it into a Spell. He suppose they could give her a minute or two before giving her a rather rehashed speech about not giving up and her need to excel and inform her that she passed, he was just happy that she was the last one today and he had some good back tea waiting for him in his office with his name on it.
As the clocked showed that only about fifteen seconds were left before Top would be in need of stop the girl that had a rather particular expression on her face that made her look more constipated than concentrated, something decided that the day was too peaceful and things were in need of being shaken up. As if the world itself had something against his tea time suddenly a huge shockwave tore through the building and a wave of rainbow colored energy shot through the sky, whatever it was it apparently scared the poor girl enough that her fight or flight response was triggered. Twilight's horn came alit with enough power to shine brighter than the sun and incredible surge of raw Magic was released from her, Top had only a split-second to throw up one of his more crude Spells to protect himself as all the Power, that the filly was letting out, shot towards the eggs. Apparently, she was so concentrated on the task that she decided not to bother with changing targets and in her panic dumped all what she had into her targets.
'This is not good.' Top cringed as he could feel the Magic running rampant through the room but all going into the seven eggs that were all but inert to all other attempts to awaken them. But somehow now they were drinking in Twilight's Magic without any sign of stopping and he could swear that they were even moving and cracking. Top shook the weird thought off and concentrated on the problem on hand, simply stopping the surge wasn't an option as he had no practice with that kind of Magic and it could harm her rather than help. The only other option was knocking her out, and while rather crude and potentially unpleasant it would stop the whole thing from escalating even more. But right before he could cast the Spell several things happened at once, and only one of them good in his opinion.
With a flash of golden light, Princess Celestia herself materialized in the auditorium.
With a cracking sound, all seven eggs suddenly hatched at the same time.
Twilight Sparkle collapsed unconscious on the floor as the threads of Magic were cut off by the Princess' own Spell.
Seven different screeching calls came from the newborns that now occupied the boxes, and none of them sounded happy.
Celestia sighed as she sat on the provided chair while Precise Stitch, her personal doctor that apparently never took 'No' for an answer looked over her hand and hummed. She already healed it all by herself, but the itch that was left behind and the fact that she was foolish enough to mention it in his presence immediately made her a patient under his care and with his ethics...
'I wish things weren't as complicated.' She sighed and removed a strand of her multicolored hair from her eyes.
"Is there anything you can do?" Asked Night Light as he looked at the prone form of his daughter on the floor. "Can you, I don't know, just teleport her out of there or something?!"
Celestia resisted the urge to groan, she understood the worry that the father was feeling at the moment for his daughter but it was a rather delicate situation and she really needed to concentrate. The mother, Twilight Velvet if she remembered right, was solely preoccupied with trying to glare the reason for their inability to reach their child into submission, the reason answered with a rather squeaky growl as it barred its teeth at the mare. Well, at least one of the reasons, six others were busy with making sure that other fronts were clear and nobody was trying to sneak up on them while they all grouped around Twilight's unconscious body.
"I'm sorry, but we're not aware what happened and how these newly hatched... younglings would react to her suddenly disappearing." Celestia shook her head. "I don't want to risk them becoming aggressive and attack others." She paused and glanced at her now intact hand. "At least more aggressive than they already are."
'Some strong teeth and jaws you have there for a newborn.' Celestia looked at the hatchling that was currently glaring at Twilight Velvet, she looked mostly like a Pony with the exception of clawed hands and feet and a rather long thick reptilian tail coming from her tailbone. She had long black hair and orange eyes that almost glowed as the young female... whatever she was, matched glares with the mare. On her back and right under her neck Celestia could see three strange coral-like bony growths, another bigger set grew right over the place where her tail came from and on the whole length of her tail she could see three small rows of the same growths. Also, while not as visible, Celestia noticed strange bony growths on the higher sides of her head on both sides right above the places where the ears should be.
Oh, and she was naked too.
The situation was getting from weird to downright ridiculous very fast and she honestly had no clue what was happening here. Having thousand plus years of experience didn't give you the ability to avoid curveballs or instantly find solutions to problems that literally came out of the left field. All her scientists and she herself were absolutely sure that the eggs were alive but inert and there was literally no chance that they would hatch. She placed them into the Treasury just so they would be safe, it wasn't like someone could actually do anything to them but she decided not to risk it with the whole mysterious appearance out of nowhere that they pulled on her. Nopony was able to actually decided just what was going to hatch from them, one thing everyone agreed on was that Equestria has never seen anything like that before.
"Well, Princess." Dr.Stitch finished examining her hand, his horn winking out and the sensation of small pins poking her skin stopping. "I can say that you did a passible job on patching yourself up, but this little bugger left some form of leftover energy when she bit you that looks almost like Aether. I would strongly recommend you will avoid any more exposure to whatever this is, I took all the readings I could without actually cutting off myself a sample as I thought you won't appreciate it."
Getting such a high praise from a normally dismissive stallion made Celestia chuckled a little, she honestly respected him for his rather casual disposition towards anypony who he took under his care and never bothered with sugarcoating anything. He didn't care just who is in front of him, she remembered when her nephew Blueblood was ill and she asked Stitch to look him over. While calling Blueblood 'half-filly bratty whiny rag' may have been a bit much it also was rather funny how his parents' faces looked like they ate a sour lemon and when they looked at her they saw that Princess Celestia was rather distracted by the new shiny clock they bought not long ago.
Shaking away the memory Celestia was more worried about the strange energy that he found, she knew Aether and it was what was literally woven into the World itself like a background Mana that anypony had inside their bodies. In some places the concentration was higher, in some lower, but the 'Blood of the World' was everywhere and sipped through the every pour of the Existence as she knew it. Celestia frowned and look at her hand, Aether poisoning wasn't actually possible as it was around them and manipulate it was simply impossible due to the sheer quantity of it as even she didn't possess the raw Power to wrestle against the tidal wave of the whole World. Using it by proxy was another matter altogether, some of the older defenses that were established to protect the Canterlot's Castle and the ones that may still be working in the Old Castle were set to slowly drain Aether to constantly power themselves up. For a living being to actually being able to weild Aether on any Level... was unnerving.
"Thank you for not chopping off a piece of me." She deadpanned. "And what can you tell me about Twilight Sparkle's condition?"
"Well, considering that these little beasties are all hovering over her like she's made of glass and from what her parents told me..." He shrugged as he packed some of his papers. "Exhaustion and maybe a minor backlash from the sudden Magical Surge, nothing a good sleep won't fix and she's already getting some here. Nothing I can do at the moment, maybe when the situation will have a lot less claws and teeth involved then I would be able to check for any internal damage..." He snorted. "But I can't see it happening any time soon, so... See ya!"
The short slightly chubby stallion in a brown suit and old case with a gray hair, short goat-beard and bald top of his head saluted and walked off towards the door. Nobody bothered to try and stop him, his reputation truly preceded him among the Royal Guards and anyone who interacted with Princess on the everyday basis. Nopony else was ballsy enough to knock her out with a sedative dart to give her check-up when she tried to reschedule it, Celestia made sure that none of the present Guards would as much as snort about the whole ordeal. The picture that Dr.Stitch now had of her on the floor with her tongue hanging out and her drooling on the floor and mumbling about too much light and too small cakes would forever be the reminded that Precise Stitch was and always will be a Field Doctor first before he became too old to run around all over the place.
As soon as the door behind the Doctor closed there was a bright bluish flash of light, that made the present Guards instantly come to alert but Celestia waved them off as her niece and her coltfriend appeared out of obviously hastily applied teleportation. She made to note to talk with Cadance about it, simply appearing like this could earn some problems later on and that spoke volumes about the training she made sure the Guards were going through that the two teen weren't already skewed by a spear or a sword from a newbie on a hair-trigger.
"Where is she?!" Shining Armor called out, panic in his voice and in contrast with him being barefoot, in pants put on backward and a sweater on bare torso also told Celestia just what the pair was doing when her message arrived. "Where is Twily?!"
Cadance was standing behind him, she wore a white shirt that, seeing the Cutie Mart on its center, obviously belonged to Shining, a pair of capri-pants and fluffy white bunny slippers. She also looked worried, it was understandable as she too bonded with the small filly that she babysits whenever her parents are away and Shining is busy in the Military Academy. Celestia made sure that the notes on his progress would be delivered directly to her, he looked rather promising and knowing Cadance and how much she held onto him... Well, it was all musings for the future and therefore can wait, unlike the miniature golden lightning that almost took Shining's head off if not for Celestia putting up a hastily constructed barrier in its way.
The culprit was another one of the hatchlings, this one was slightly taller and had long golden hair. Her hands and feet were clawed too and she also possessed her own set of unique traits, like two long rather thin in comparison to the other one tails ending in a spiky bony growth that reminded Celestia of pinecones. From the middle of her back grew a pair of golden wings that were a mix of draconic and bat-like traits including a clawed thumb growing out of the 'wrists', due to rather muscled built when folded the wings slightly reminded her of a pair of actual arms with incredably long fingers with thin golden membrane growing between them and a long claw on the ends. On the small hatchling's head she could see golden bony horns growing from the top, two long ones from the higher part and two sets of three shorter ones behind her ears. With a hiss the youth narrowed her metallic golden eyes and closed her mouth from which not a moment ago she launched an attack, Celestia actually felt as her barrier strained to stop the blast and she put enough Mana into it to have the same hardness as that of steel.
'This is... worrisome.' She dropped the barrier and looked at the agitated newborns. Sharp teeth bared, ready to attack but not daring to step away from the prone form of the filly on the floor. She was really considering the idea of simply teleporting them all, but there was always a chance that it could harm the babies and also Celestia had no reason to assume that they will remain hostile for long as they only attacked when someone tried to get near Twilight, one of them or were too loud.
"Cadance, Shining, it's good to see you two." She smiled. "I presume that you had a nice time together? I'm sorry for calling you out like that but the situation here is rather worrisome as you can plainly see."
Thet two teens blushed bright red, which made her smile only grow bigger.
"Shiny!" Night Light pulled his son into a hug. "Look what happened!"
"What?" 'Shiny' finally registered the presence of the seven bundles of questionable joy surrounding his sister. "What the?!"
"Oh, they are adorable!" Cadance squealed as she tried to get closer to the one that was closer to her.
This one actually was one of the calmer ones, she mostly stayed quite and studied everything around them with a wondering expression. Her short blond hair and blue eyes made her look far less threatening than the rest, and a pair of colorful butterfly wings growing from her back and two fluffy white antennas from the top of her head. She looked rather harmless and only cocked her head slightly to the side at Cadance's approach while others looked rather agitated but didn't move, and after a moment Celestia saw why.
Suddenly the fluffy antennas gained a rather ominous red glow, and before Celestia could do anything two thin beams of red energy shot towards her niece. She still wasn't sure what happened next, maybe it was luck or something else altogether, but Cadance simply managed to stumble from the sudden glow and waiver just out of the harm's way as the attack connected with the wall behind her and took off a large chunk of it. The newly made hole in the outer wall made the Alicorn of Love suddenly pale and scramble back as fast as she could, if not for a blind luck she would've been the one being hit and there was no chance she could've survived this.
"Wha?!" She latched onto Shining's arm as they looked fearfully at the seven children. "What was that!?"
"That was what I was trying to tell you about here, these seven were hatched by Twilight Sparkle from the seven eggs that were prepared for the exam." Explained Celesta dryly. "We're still not sure who they are, but nopony was let even near Twilight and they won't hesitate to attack no matter who will try to approach. I already tried to put them all under a Sleeping Spell, but they shrugged it off with no problem and I won't be risking putting too much Power into it due to the possibility of causing actual damage to their brains."
'And because I'm a bit rusty on it and there is a chance I will let some of it slip out and hit Twilight too.' Celestia inwardly winced, she really needed to pick-up on her own practice and get her skills up to snuff again. All these years of peace and quiet led to her capabilities deteriorating and she wasn't happy to find that hard way just how much. This whole incident was leaving a really sore taste in her mouth, but at the same time she was more inclined to count this as a good thing in the end as she finally managed to find out just what was inside those eggs that remained a mystery for so long. And if a slight glimpse of a newly acquired Cutie Mark that Twilight possessed now was any indication good things would keep coming in the long run, if only her parents would agree then she would even gain a student out of it.
Celestia mentally shook off the image of another bright and talented filly that vanished not long ago, this wasn't the time nor the place for such thoughts.
"Wait..." Cadance blinked and looked at the older Alicorn. "Those things that left you sleepless for weeks actually hatched?! And these little fillies came out?!"
"Not... exactly." Celestia frowned a little, trying to come up with a properly worded explanation. "They were hatched by Twilight's Magic, as she had a very powerful Surge in the middle of an Exam. I'm still not sure just what are they, but with how viciously they're defending Twilight here I think they may have imprinted on her as their parent. Don't take my word for it, I'm only guessing and therefore won't have any proof of that right now besides their strange behavior."
"And what exactly are we going to do about them?!" Shining stammered as he watched one fo the hatchling nudge Twilight and, when she didn't move, released a small whine.
"Well..." Celestia smiled at this question. "I already sent for our best expert, Professor Double Spiral will be here soon and I'm sure that he will be able to solve this problem."
"And who exactly is he?" Asked Twilight Velvet.
"He is..." The smile on Princess of the Sun's face grew.
"Marvelous!" A blond haired stallion with a narrow face and blue eyes exclaimed. "This is just fantastic!"
He was wearing light-brown pants, brown shoes, white shirt, and yellow vest under a white doctor coat. It took him two tries to actually enter the room as he managed to stumble on the first one and fall, making all of his notes and books that he brought with him skimmer around the floor. After he picked them all up and introduced himself, while almost gleefully eyeing the hatchlings he started the observation of them and was at it for the next two hours already.
"What exactly is marvelous?" Celestia sighed.
"See these growths on her back and her tail?" He pointed out. "They are actually pure crystal, and her organism is producing them as a part of her body! Incredible, she feels no discomfort with their presence and looks more like they are there for some kind of a purpose. I can't say for certain so far, but her inner biology should be revolutionary! This isn't a Magical Phenomenon, it's a purely organic process that lets her exist like that and actually live without any drawbacks. I'm not sure if her whole bone-structure if like that or not, I would need to perform some tests by myself to see just how she distribute the minerals inside herself to supply her own body with them to account for such additions."
The hatchling in question looked very similar to the first one, with the exception being the fact that on her forehead Celestia could see a golden bone-like growth with three sharp trident-like growths with the middle one having another two smaller ones on its sides. Her hair was also long and black, and her eyes were yellow instead of orange, but what made her look differently the most were crystal growths vertically coming out of her shoulders. Celestia could swear that they even glowed a little, but it was really hard to tell at the moment. The crystals also replaced the bony growths on her back and went down her spine right to her also leathery tail, which bore a spiky crystal tip. This one was much bolder in her actions as she gave out strange growls and little screeches as if challenging others to try and approach while she herself remained glued to Twilight's side.
"And?" Shining was sitting on the chair that he dragged from behind one of the tables of the auditorium.
"This is literally an unprecidental occurrence, the amount of scientific information we would be able to get by studying them is unmeasurable!" The man all but squealed with excitement. "Imagine all the potential discoveries! They literally came from eggs, and that would require for them to be..." He paused. "From the weight that was registered in the papers, and if we take into the account the possibility of their growth being somewhat accelerated due to the infusion of Magic..."
"Can we get somepony here that is actually useful?!" Called out Night Light as he glared at the ecstatic Professor. "All this one actually do is fawn over these things while my daughter is still there!"
"I understand that you're worried, but Professor Spiral is the best Specialist that can help us here." Celestia said diplomatically, even if she herself was getting annoyed with the lack of progress. "Professor, is there anything you can tell us about how to get Twilight out of there?"
"Oh?" The stallion blinked as he snapped out of his daydream. "The filly? Nah, these babies imprinted on her as their parent and they are protecting her from anypony that will try to come close." He shook his head and waved their concerns off dismissively. "I'm pretty sure that they will fight rather viciously for her, all we can do right now is wait for her to wake up and calm them down. I would also strongly advise bringing some food, as they are looking rather hungry and with the form and shape of their teeth I wouldn't put it past them to try and munch on somepony here if they will get hungry enough."
"... What?" Twilight Velvet almost choked out. "These things eat Ponies?!" Her question ended in a squeak.
"Well, for them right now we're meat." Spiral shrugged as he added another line to his notes on his notepad. "They're too young to be reasoned with, too smart to be tricked and too attached to the filly to be lead somewhere else. I'm not sure if they would even eat anything that we will bring them, it all depends on their level of intelligence and how they will perceive the food we will try to present them with. Honestly, it can go either way as they see us as aggressors no matter what we're doing right now."
"Can't we just bring them gems? Like with Dragons?" Asked Shining.
"Nope, the only one here that is even remotely resembling a Dragon is the blondie there, and I'm not sure if she can digest them." Professor frowned as he observed said hatchling. "Her teeth tell us that she's an obvious carnivore, maybe even an omnivore like Griffons, but that's debatable due to the fact that I didn't see them eat anything so far."
She growled as the others were still present, she wasn't sure what they were doing as she didn't understand them but they tried to get close to Mother and that was unacceptable. The Big One tried the first, she still could taste her blood in her mouth as she glared at the Loud One that glared back, she will not back away and let them get to Mother while she was vulnerable! She didn't know much from before she came from her egg, all was a blur of darkness and tightness all around her and it was really hard to think. Then came the Warmth and she could feel Mother, her call, and her presence were like a beacon and she answered without hesitation, breaking out and instantly going after Mother to get closer to the Warmth.
It was strange, she wasn't alone and others were here too as they also came to Mother. She could feel them, Sisters were also connected to Mother and felt the Warmth that she could feel in her mind coming from Mother. Something was wrong, Mother wasn't moving and others were nearby and tried to come near Mother. Mother was theirs! She and her Sisters won't let anyone take Mother! Her tail swished behind her as she bared her teeth at the Loud One and growled once more, they could try to come close but they won't succeed no matter what!
She didn't know what the sounds the others were making, they confused her and she didn't like that one bit! But she couldn't do much, and if they were to fight them there was a chance Mother will get hurt and there was no way she would let it happen! She could smell something in the air, the Loud One and the Blue One were smelling slightly similar to Mother. Were they kin? No, she didn't feel any connection to them so they were no kin and therefore they were intruders and therefore they will not come close! Mother was asleep, tired, but she and Sisters can feel that Mother's Warmth was returning and soon Mother will awaken. Mother was strong, not as strong as the Big One but Mother was young and the Big One was old so Mother will grow stronger with time, but before that she and Sisters won't let anything happen to Mother.
She released another threatening rumble to ward off the others from coming closer, she and Sisters couldn't leave until Mother would awaken and therefore they would need to stay alerted till then. Big One learned that coming closer would result in pain, Loud One and Blue One weren't going to try and the Smelly One was with Big One and wasn't paying any attention to them at all. She didn't care about the Smelly One, he wasn't a threat as he smelled of old age and weakness and will die fast if they were to fight. Her tail twitched in irritation, this wasn't Nest as this place didn't smell like Mother so they would obviously have to move from here soon and Mother will lead them to the Nest as soon as she will awaken. She hoped it would be soon, feeling Mother being weak was very unsettling and wrong and it made her feel agitated due to the lack of choices when it came to defending themselves and Mother. She flexed her claws and growled, Mother was in danger and she couldn't do anything and that was what angered her the most.
She looked around, her lips being pulled back to show her teeth. Whatever these things were, they looked kind of like Mother but smelled differently and there was no Bond that she could feel. Sisters were around, all of them were alright so there was good and she could feel her Power pulse inside her from the agitation. Big Sister bit Big One and was now stopping the Loud One from approaching, she herself was trying to gauge them to come closer so she and her Sisters would be able to attack them without getting away from Mother. She didn't know what other can do, Big One did something to heal the wound and it will make her hard to kill if she will attack or become too much of a threat to Mother.
Blue One also was a threat, she wasn't sure about the Smelly One as all he did was come in and never made any attempt to approach. He also smelled of age and weakness, if he would try to take Mother away it would be really easy to kill him and then move on onto more dangerous enemies. She could feel how Mother's Warmth was slowly growing and with each moment she was coming closer to awakening, which led to the problem that they were still surrounded and she knew not what Mother will do or will Mother be able to move or fight. She released another growl to see if any of others will answer, but so far they were too smart and stayed away from her and Sisters, while not bad it was also irritating that nothing was happening and they were literally doing nothing. She could feel a small amount of hunger starting to stir in her stomach, the Loud One look very appetizing right now and she was sure that her Sisters thought the same about the Blue One and the Shiny Ones near the hole in the wall. Big One was too strong, they would need to put down others before taking her down and she had a good idea just how to do it, but without Mother there was nothing she or Sisters could do right now.
Mother knew best, Mother was a Parent and therefore always knew best. She knew that Mother would know what to do, her instincts were telling her and the Bond reinforcing that statement with the welcoming feeling that she could feel coming from Mother. Big Sister was growling and getting more and more agitated, soon the fighting will start and Mother must be kept safe no matter what. She really didn't like the lack of guidance right now, and other Sisters weren't helping as they all were ready to fight but other than that they knew nothing else what to do to help. She hissed in anger as the Big One and Blue One made strange sounds, they were communicating and it wasn't any good that neither she nor her Sisters could understand them right now. Smelly One was also making noises and then he stood up and just walked towards the hole in the wall and disappeared, at least it meant one less problem to worry about at the moment. Still, it was irksome that they were so sure of their position, the crystals on her shoulders pulsed with Power in response to her irritation and worry.
She huffed and hissed, her segmented tail flicked behind her as the pincer on its end was all but itching to tear the flesh of the others in the vicinity. The golden floral pattern under her chest also itched to release its Power upon the pathetic creatures, she wasn't killing them now only because it would require her to leave her position near Mother and that was unacceptable. Upon hatching she could feel the Warmth of Mother flooding her with comfort and the sense of belonging, she knew that nothing will even be the same or anywhere near as wonderful Mother's presence and the Bond they shared along with Sisters. It was the knowledge that was a constant and unquestionable truth in her mind, Big Sister already tasted the blood of their enemy and Crystal Sister was trying to provoke the others to come closer so they will be able to kill them and be done with it.
She huffed, her own Power pulsing through her golden sharp horn as she glared at the Big One. She wasn't going to let the lack of aggression from the enemy stop her, they weren't kin and therefore they were enemies or food, or even maybe both at the same time. Mother will awaken and then they will kill the others here, it will be a good way to show Mother how strong she and her Sisters are against these others! Maybe Mother will let her destroy this place too? It smelt of the others and therefore couldn't belong to Mother so destroying it shouldn't be a problem! She shifted her wings a little, just in case she would need to use them for something as she had no idea how to fly as Mother didn't teach her that just yet. She released a screeching cry of alarm as in a flash of light two new others appeared nearby, Golden Sister launched an attack as a warning and a wall of light stopped it.
She felt irritated, the Big One did that as her horn glowed when the wall appeared. Big One was strong, Golden Sister was aiming to kill one of the intruders and Big One stopped the attack without even moving. She knew that she was strong, but now she could see that Big One was strong too and that made her feel the itch for a fight. Mother was here, maybe they should kill the others while she wasn't awake so she and Sisters would be able to show how strong they were to Mother when she will awaken? Mother's Warmth was getting stronger, and it only meant that Mother will soon be with them and they will kill the others and then leave this place to wherever Mother will decide to be best for them. The four growths on the back of her head weren't for show, she could feel Power pulse in them, and she was sure she could use them in a fight somehow, but simply had no clue how to do so and it will probably be the first thing she will ask Mother after the awakening. And how to fly, that will be the second most important thing.
She huffed, the Big One stopped her attack and she failed to kill the Squeaky One! She hissed as she closed her mouth, her attack was a pure reflex when she thought that it was an attack coming but at least she now knew that she could do it. Her wings twitched as she thought about trying again, but decided against it as she eyed the Big One with narrowed eyes. This one was dangerous, this thought made her lips stretch into a twisted grin as she thought about fighting a strong opponent like that and coming out victorious. Will Mother reward her for her victory? When Mother will awaken she will show off her Power, maybe Mother will let her burn this place down? Destroy the whole thing? The idea felt just right as her two tails swiftly waved behind her from the satisfaction that the idea brought to her.
She and her Sisters will meet these others and will defeat them, she could feel her Power surging through her body and with Mother's Warmth also growing they will annihilate the others without much of a problem! Big Sister already chose her opponent, Crystal Sister would probably want to face the Blue One and the Red Sister will surely go after the Big One herself. It would leave one of the two new intruders to her, she would prefer the Squeaky One as it felt wrong to leave him alive after she already failed to kill him once. Maybe Mother would let her destroy the place too as they will be leaving? It will be so much fun! Truly, there was nothing better than wiping the alien place away and then getting praise from Mother! Her mood suddenly soured as she watched the Squeaky One making these strange sounds others used for communication, were they preparing to attack already? It didn't bode well for her to fight near Mother when Mother couldn't fight back!
She felt a small sense of satisfaction as the one she was now calling the Stupid One got almost killed by Fluffy Sister, Stupid One thought that Fluffy Sister couldn't fight back and decided to attack her first and almost died! She prepared to fire her own attack but pasued as Stupid One latched upon the Squeaky One and made more noises while Big One answered. It was really frustrating how she couldn't understand what they were talking about! Another hiss escaped her mouth as she glared at the Stupid One, Fluffy Sister will kill her and she will make sure to hurt the Squeaky One a lot before killing him as his sounds were really annoying and the only reason she didn't try to tear his throat out was because he was too far away. Surely Big Sister won't stand for this? Soon they will attack and will tear these others apart and then she will burn this place to the ground and Mother will praise and her... and maybe hug her too! And maybe even cuddle? Yeah, the thought about cuddling with Mother sounded really good right now.
She growled as she watched the Stupid One backing away and latching on the Squeaky One, her wings fluttered slightly and she felt the Power behind her eyes spike but she held back. Fluffy Sister fought back and the attack failed, but the Stupid One survived and she won't let it happen again! Nothing threatened Mother or Fluffy Sister and survived, she realeased a hiss of irritation as she made sure to keep the Big One and the Supid One in her field of vision. Fluffy Sister will tear the Stupid One apart and she will be there to help, but the Big One stopped the warning attack from the Golden Sister and that made her a threat to them and to Mother. Well, she will show them what happened with the ones that decided to harm their Family and their deaths would be a show of Power that will make others back away and stay out.
All she needed was the start, Big Sister was already prepairing and Golden Sister looked close to attacking so it won't be long before she will be able to fight too! She will protect the Bond, Mother's Warmth won't be extinguished and they will forever remain together no matter what! She let out a small screeching call, daring others to attack and come closer so she would be able to fight without leavign Mother's side. It was frustraiting to simply do nothing, it made her feel caged and threatened as her whole being pretested against simply being present and not acting on her Instincts to protect Mother and Sisters. She watched as others made strange noises at each other, she knew not what it was about but soon another one appeared and was making things even worse with the sounds he made. Irritating One would be hers to kill, his calls made her head hurt and she knew that Sisters felt the same way about him.
Irritating One did not have the smell of fear as Stupid One had, and yet he did not come close to them. He was smarter than the others, Big Sister already bit Big One upon her attempt to sneak closer to Mother and probably harm her in some way. There were things that she could do about it now, but it wasn't the time and she could tell that Big Sister was waiting for something. She could feel as the Bond was vibrating with exitement from Golden Sister, she craved battle and destruction of everything and that was alright as long as she will be able to participate. Fluffy Sister was more curious about things around her, while Crystal Sister felt more frustrated than anything else. Red Sister was just feeling eager and waited for things to go off so they will be able to fight. Soon they will fight, soon they will clash and win...
Soon Mother will be with them and all will be right.
She looked at the Stupid One, was that an attack? She wasn't sure, maybe the Stupid One was trying to learn what they could do? She attacked the Stupid One because she got too close, and she missed too. It was bad and Mother won't be happy if she will fail, because failing was bad and therefore it will make Mother not like her. She suddenly felt something and instantly prepaired for a fight, the Irritating One was still talking and that only meant that it was not him who made this feeling, so that only left...
Big Sister suddenly growled loudly and that was all the warning other got, time for waiting was over.
She watched everything around her, the others were a threat and Sisters were reading for battle. Sisters will fight and she will reamin to protect Mother, this was what she thought would be the way thing will go.
[Energy Level: 100%]
She was ready to fight, Mother was precious and she will destroy all those who will try to harm her. Her Sisters were the same, as they will show no mearcy towards anyone attempting to strike Mother while they are alive.
[Armor Integraty: 100%]
[Maser Cannon: Online]
[Laser Cannon#01: Online]
[Laser Cannon#02: Online]
There was nothing that will stop her from fighting to the best of her abilities, Loud One and Blue One were the first to react and therefore they will probably try to get to Mother First. She made sure to prepare to launch her own attack as soon as the battle will start.
[Missle Launcher#01: Online]
[Missle Launcher#02: Online]
She knew her duty, and as her vision turned red as she prepaired her own attack she knew that her Sisters knew it too. Her red eyes glowed slightly as she made sure to acquire a Firing Solution for every possible target that she could detect, there was no way she would not assist her Sisters even if she herself couldn't leave her own position.
[Flight System: Online]
[Absolute Zero Cannon: Online]
She will not fail.
[Kiryū: Online]
[Target: Acquired]
Author's Note
A/N: Honestly? This is basically an Experiment of Sorts. I'm trying to make something Unique here and, by accident, I stumbled upon the Pics that I used for this Story... And that's how this Story was born. It will include a lot of things from MLP-Lore and also a lot of Lore from Godzilla-Verse, and while some things may look kind of farfetched I will be trying to make it work in the end. My Goal here is to show a Story that will threat Canon as a Base and not an Absolute Rule that must happen no matter what. What do you think will happen with they will encounter Nightmare Moon? I know that the beginning looks kind of forced and awkward, but this is the best I could get with the literal ton of landmines for this Particular Type of Story.
Just give it a chance, please?
Breaking the Route... - 0.1.1
Twilight opened her eyes slowly, she could feel pain pulsing in her whole body and her horn felt as if it was ducked into a bucket of ice. She wasn't unfamiliar with the symptoms of a Magical Overflow, every young Unicorn suffered from it at least once or twice during their childhood due to them not knowing their own limits. It was a tenth time for her, and she really was starting to hope it will be the last as she didn't like the feeling and her mother always scold her for overdoing her practice after she usually regained her consciousness.
"Oh, damn it..." Twilight muttered as she nuzzled into her warm plush and hugged it tighter to her body.
The plushy gave out a soft purr and she felt being hugged back, the warmth she was feeling grew a little as she let herself relax and tried to ride the exhausting of her conductive organ off. Maybe she could say she was sick today and stay at home while reading books that she still had borrowed from the library? It was one thing to get out of the house for fresh air and totally another when whenever you tried to use Magic it felt like an icicle was shoved between your frontal lobes. She read a book about this, it said that she had to just rest and let the symptoms go away on their own.
"Twilight." She heard her mother's voice.
"Five more minutes..." She mumbled as she yawned.
Her purring hug-pillow held her tighter and there were some strange growlings around her as if someone released several small critters into her room and they were trying to appear scary. She once was in a Zoo where they were let to come near a young lion cub that was trying to intimidate his chew toy only to look more adorable than scary. For some reason, she felt this was the same.
"Twilight, please, honey, get up." For some reason, her mother sounded almost pleading.
Why would her mother sound so desperate? Sure, she had to get up and probably fell asleep on the floor due to how sore her body felt, but it wasn't a reason for her mother to sound so scared. Maybe it had something to do with those growls? Did some kind of an animal got into her room while she slept? This thought shocked her into a more lucid state, her eye fluttered open as she looked up at her hug-pillow and a pair of brilliantly orange eyes stared back.
Came the strange voice in Twilight's head as the naked girl she was hugging cooed at her with a small smile.
The ten years old girl's mind went blank.
Twilight opened her eyes and yawned as she tried to stretch but found her arms bonded by several pairs of arms that didn't belong to her, without even batting an eyelash she just relaxed knowing that it will take some time for other occupants of her bed to wake up. It was Sunday and she had nowhere else to go, the sounds of several people sawing logs were her usual morning's alarm bells.
"Girls, you need to wake up." Twilight said. "I think my arm fell asleep."
"Sleepy..." Muttered a mop black hair that was taking her whole sight. "Mama... warm..."
The pressure around her small and lithe body increased, the arms that were as tough as bars of steel coiled around her and she was slowly feeling the circulation of her blood being disrupted. It wasn't painful but her body was starting to fall asleep and not in a good sense, she thought after all those months of waking up like this she would get used to it but it didn't happen. No matter how much she tried to teach them to sleep in a separated room or at least in different beds it was all for naught, even locking the room didn't work as a simple piece of wood had no hope of stopping someone who could tear steel apart like paper. Her parents were really uncomfortable with the new residents of their house, her mother even saying that they should just let the Royal Guards lock them up and throw away the key...
"Twilight, you need to get up!" Came the voice of her mother from behind the door.
Several rather half-hearted growls of annoyance as the girl reacted with hostility to the idea of leaving their 'Nest', Twilight would've agreed with them if not for the fact that she really didn't want to wait before she will need to go to the toilet. It was a rather tiresome process of making sure that all of the girls were properly taken care of, the fact that she was officially considered as their mother made her feel all of the responsibility for them weighing down on her shoulders. A year ago she was taking that exam, she came out with seven incredibly dangerous and devoted daughters that right after their birth took on Princess Celestia and several Royal Guards on and almost killed several Ponies with her parents being two of them.
'How many things can change in a year...?' Twilight smiled slightly as she closed her eyes and reached down towards the familiar pulsating knot of warmth and emotions and dived right into the center of it. Instantly she could feel a swirling torrent of raw belonging that she now felt whenever she reached out to the new members of her family through their unbreakable Bond, with a small nudge she sent the feeling of urgency through the links. Instantly all seven of her children tensed, she could feel their reaction as they all instantly came to attention and prepared for battle but relaxed as the next feeling Twilight sent a pacifying sense of calmness. She could feel as the bodies around her started to move and untangle from the pile that they were all in, all moving to pull their limbs from wherever they ended up during the night. It wasn't normal from the perspective of normal Ponies, but it was for Twilight Sparkle for at least eleven months now.
Without even blinking she wiggled her way out of now looser grips of the girls and twisted to the side, crawling on all four she got over her still not fully awake companions and slid onto the floor. Getting on her feet she managed to blearily see her slippers and after putting them on she headed directly towards the door of her room, it was time for morning bath and breakfast that she hoped something other than oatmeals. It was a good thing that her mother stopped trying to converse the girls into vegetarians and agreed to Princess Celestia's suggestion to organize a delivery of fish on weekly basis or there may have been a sharp decline in the population of pets in the nearby houses. Twilight yawned again as she felt the presence of one of the girls right behind her, she didn't need to even look as the Bond told her all she would need to know about the one that walked right behind her.
"Ah, I really hope that mom won't be against us going out for a walk." She muttered. "You all really need to get out more and work out all this energy."
"..." Gojira made a rumble of agreement.
The girl that now stood a head taller than Twilight with long black hair and orange eyes with slit pupils walked right behind her, her long leathery tail swishing behind her in a calm manner as she kept her closeness to Twilight. Due to the girl's coral-like growths on her back, it was far easier for her to sleep in the nude as she tended to tear any nightclothes she was given. Out of all the girls, Gojira was the most clingy one and refused to leave her Mother's side no matter what and responded with violence when someone tried to separate them. The first time they noticed the problem was when some Royal Guards tried to prevent her from entering the same room as Twilight did, it was the same day that they found that enchanted armor worn by them was no better than tissue paper against the diminutive hatchling when she didn't pull her punches. Poor Guard suffered a shattered ribcage as she sent him flying with one punch that made his breastplate crumble inward, other girls not even batting an eyelash as they just followed her lead.
From that day nobody stood between her and Twilight, the sheer protective aura that the diminutive girl projected around made anyone back away on a pure instinct. Twilight felt it too, inside the Bond she could feel the others metaphorically wrapping their own presences around her own in a protective cocoon that guaranteed that she would never be harmed by anything or anyone. It was such a nice feeling, any fear was instantly washed away by the sheer magnitude of raw Power coursing through their joined connection and it held a promise of an unstoppable force that will never yield and will forever be protecting the one Twilight Sparkle no matter what.
Another thing that Twilight held dear was their names, as she could feel that Gojira wasn't just a mere name but something more that described the girl on the deepest level that nothing else would be able to. Same was with others, their names meant something far more than simply giving other something to call them, they were literally engraved into the Bond on the deepest level and nothing could change them.
Another presence pulsed through the Bond, a small spike of mischief and the feeling eagerness for an outlet for the energy accumulated during sleep. As Twilight opened the door and walked down the corridor towards the bathroom she sent a smooth but firm feeling of calmness and reassurance, it was one of the easiest ways to calm Xenilla down. Her second daughter was probably the smartest of her children, she was always curious about her surroundings and investigated everything that gained her attention. She looked rather similar to Gojira, but instead of coral-like growths, she had literal crystals growing out of her spine and two big ones out of her shoulders. The growth on the upper part of her forehead that looked like a golden forking horn that Twilight could tell was a bit like the one Unicorns had but different in its usage and structure. Her yellow eyes were always moving around, always studying the surrounding and Twilight could almost see the constant whirlwind of thoughts going behind them, Xenilla never stopped thinking and never stopped learning as she grew around her Mother's impressive intelligence. She was the second one to figure out speech, beside the youngest of the sisters Kiryū who literally had a computer inside her head.
Xenilla's sly voice rang in Twilight's head.
Twilight twitched as she removed her nightgown and stepped into the shower, Gojira dutifully following her. Playing in Xenilla's opinion was more in lines of roughhousing with Goji which always ended with a lot of collateral damage done to the surrounding area, Doctor Double Spiral was all too happy for a chance to observe the girls using their full capabilities in combat. At first, Princess Celestia said that it was alright, but after she saw the aftermath of the clash between the two elder sisters she instantly changed her opinion and told them to 'play' as far outside the city line as possible. Twilight agreed wholeheartedly, the pure destructive potential their little spars brought out made anything else she saw in her life pale in comparison.
Twilight learned to use the Bond to talk with the girls, but it took a lot of time to get used to.
She felt a wave of a slightly reluctant acceptance as Xenilla did the closest thing to pouting she could pull off, she won't argue with Twilight but it didn't mean that she wouldn't complain about the decision being made. It was one of the things that were established almost from the get go, Twilight's word was the law and none of the girls would disobey or oppose her in any way or form and will always support her no matter what. It couldn't be said about the other Ponies, as the girls had no desire to listen to anyone else and trying to enforce someone else's will upon them always resulted in a very hostile response and it was almost always accomplished by physical violence.
Twilight felt as a sponge was pressed against her back, Gojira tenderly and extremely carefully rubbing her back while paying all the attention to making sure not to hurt her. It was a rather twisted norm for the young Unicorn, girls treated her as if she was made out of glass and became insanely overprotective whenever they had even the slightest reason to be. Gojira took it to the extreme, she tended to try and help Twilight with everything she could and even if she failed most of the times she never stopped shielding the filly from everything and anything that could cause her harm. It also served as one of the ways she showed her affection, doing so verbally never was Gojira's thing and she preferred actions over words when it came to expressing her feelings. Due to her rather unortodox situation she was allowed to attend classes with her hatchlings, the actual feat of making the gaggle of girls to properly sit through one was an another matter altogether. School for Gifted Unicorns wasn't a joke, it had the best teachers in Equestria when it came to the Arcane Arts and the only better education you could've gained through an apprenticeship which was an incredibly rare thing to happen nowadays. The only Professor who didn't fold under the collective glare of the seven small girls that had the reputation for tearing steel like tissue paper with their teeth was Inkwell, and the old Unicorn managed to even stare down Destroyah who was the most violent of them all.
Came said girl's voice.
Twilight could feel her most troublesome daughter's tone, the walking talking Natural Disaster was in the mood to attack and she would need to keep an eye on her. Right after hatching and while Twilight was unconscious Destroyah managed to fight Princess Celestia and almost leave her without her right arm, almost all of the skin up to the Alicorn's shoulder was literally burned off by the attack of small newborn. Sure, Princess wasn't taking the hatchling seriously and didn't just crush her as she could, but it didn't mean she wasn't keeping one of her more potent shields up and the blast sent by Destroyah managed to literally tear through it and almost cripple the Sun Monarch! She was a bit taller than Gojira and Xenilla, with very dark red eyes and black hair with a huge pair of leathery wings and a segmented tail with a pincer on its end. She had a spiky bony growth on the back of her head that protected the skull and served some other mysterious purpose that they were yet to discover. She also had a long golden horn coming out of her forehead with a bladed tip, this one had a very specific function that Twilight saw firsthand and had to stop the girl from using again. One more thing that stood out was the flower-patterned like growth on her stomach, it also served a purpose and it was the reason for Princess' Celestia's wound and one of the walls missing completely.
Twilight answered as she felt Gojira carefully starting to wash her hair.
Destroyah was also the one who was prone to violence the most, she literally liked to destroy things around her and lay waste on everyone who would try to oppose her. After her third rampage Twilight made sure to always find something more productive to do with her time than tearing down everything around her and also teaching her that violence is not the answer for each and every problem. The last part was a work in progress and it was going better than expected with Twilight being able to prevent Destroyah from going berserk when Inkwell was staring them down for disturbing the class.
Came the reply and a flood of love and affection through the Bond, it would've been even sweet if she couldn't also feel the staggering amount of bloodlust that the girl was also feeling.
'Yeah, and I'm afraid of your idea of playing.' Twilight didn't let this thought leak into the Bond, she didn't need another cuddle-pile today that the girls used to make her feel better and to reassure her that everything will be alright. One of the most important things that Twilight learned was that physical contact with the girls was the best method to calm them down and to reassure them if they were confused or unsure. They initiated it whenever they wanted attention or were showing their affection and that lead to many different moments of awkwardness when they would randomly start nuzzling or hugging her due to something she said or showed to them through the Bond. Other Ponies couldn't hear their conversations and therefore it looked rather out of the blue for them, but Twilight could never refuse them with the sheer amount of pure happiness they always felt whenever they did it and just bore with the consequences.
Twilight took the sponge and absently started to wash Gojira too, the rumbling purring that came from the girl and the warmth of joy flooding the Bond was the response she got. She knew that it will take her an long time to properly finish washing them as the other girls will join them soon, it was an incredibly tiresome process to wash them all and make sure that she got all the more hard-to-get spots. For example, it took almost an hour to wash them all and that was when they all came at once with how the bath was also upgraded to fit at least ten grown Ponies without much of a problem. Doctor Spiral spared no expenses when it came to studying the girls and making their lives comfortable, as the head of his particular research facility and with a backing of Princess Celestia he was making wide strides in his particular field of science since day one. Each girl was an 'unique speciment' that he made sure to study separately and write down all of his findings, with one copy going to Celestia and one to Twilight, over the year they managed to figure out enough of their structure to start producing some of the fruits of their research. Sure, they were still having problems figuring out most of the parts of their biology as it was incredibly alien for Equestria as a whole, but the technlogical knowledge they gained upon studying Kiryū already brought two revolutions in the fields of electronics and computers. The technological level of Equestria wasn't very high, Twilight could agree that the country was eons behind the technological titans that could work with whatever her youngest daughter had inside of her.
Twilight's train of thought stopped in its tracks as the door into the bathroom was flung open and the other six girls barged in, naked and ready for being washed by their Mother. The young Unicorn could only sigh with a small smile, these were the usual morning for her now.
"Eat up, I and your father are going for that wonderful convention of professional photographers." Twilight Velvet said as she levitated plates onto the table, making sure to stay out of reach of the girls. "Don't forget to visit Doctor Spiral and let him know about the progress that you have made with the girls..." She skilfully sidestepped a swinging tail of Xenilla that would've probably broken her ribs if it would've connected. "... if there is any at all."
"Mom!" Twilight whined as she took a bite out of her sandwich. "They aren't causing any trouble and I even explained to them why they can't fight others that they meet on the street!"
"And it took you an year to get them to stop attacking other Ponies." Her mother noted drily. "And that's without counting the time it took you to explain to them that our house was not a nest in need of a constant protection, it's a miracle that we still get mail at all after Kiryū ambushed Mr.Track."
"And she apologized for it." She countered.
"All she did was repeat what you told her to say, I saw more sincerity from muppets in the children's theatric shows than she had while saying it." Night Light said as he took a sip of his morning coffee and walked towards the main room. "It didn't help that she was glaring at him the whole time like she was about to start blasting away any moment."
Kiryū, the black-haired girl that was slightly smaller than Gojira and had her tail and spines on her back made out of metal, she was the only girl of the bunch that didn't need to have her clothes tailor-made. The expression on Doctor Spiral's face when she first materialized her armor and weaponry and fought with them, it was like several of his birthdays came early and at the same day all at once. Her red eyes weren't natural, the mechanical look and the constant glow they had about them was a very easy way to tell that she wasn't fully organic even if you ignore her tail and the coral-like spikes on her back that imitated Gojira's. Another part of her that made her stand out was the line going between her breasts and then split right under them, these were the outlines of armor plates that opened to reveal one of the most devastating weapons in her arsenal.
Came another call and Twilight reflexively reached out with her left hand and patted the head of the golden-haired girl with two scaly tails with pinecone-like growths on their ends and two big leathery wings. She also had several horns growing on both sides of her head, giving her a very similar appearance to a Dragons but different at the same time, a pair of eyes the color of molten gold gazed at her with adoration as she happily accepted the reward.
Ghidorah was the tallest of the bunch and the most troublesome one when it came to reining her in, she was either trying to cuddle with her Mother or looking for fights all around the place. Twilight had to stop her more than once from getting into problems by hurting other kids with her overwhelming strength that would've left them broken and beaten from one punch. It created a lot of problem with interactions with other Ponies for the girls when their playful punches could punch holes through concrete and the only one they treated with care and any restraint was Twilight. Only Mothra, the blond-haired blue-eyed girl with white furry antennas on her head and multicolored moth wings and Battra, her red-haired red-eyed twin with slightly differently colored wings, were mostly unaggressive and that was because the first was just calm by nature and the second was always more concerned with protecting her twin than picking fights.
"Twili!" Came her father's call from the entrance. "You have a guest here!"
Twilight could only sigh as she finished her food and stood up, being instantly followed by all seven girls with Gojira hovering protectively right behind her. While it was hard and incredibly tricky She still managed to make friends in school... somehow. Most of the other students feared her, they didn't show it openly but Twilight could see all the side glances and whispers that followed her around and how everyone backed away from wherever she and girls went.
'I still can't tell if it's a good thing or not.' She thought with a snort as she looked down at her light purple blouse, beige skirt and brown sandals over white socks. Well, she was already ready to go out and she had no desire to stick around for her parents and her friends to start interacting. As she walked towards the opened door she felt a shift in the air as Gojira suddenly appeared in front of her and there was a sound of collision and someone grunting and then falling onto the floor.
"Whao!" Came the voice of a girl with brilliant gamboge eyes, pale, light grayish opal and light gray waist long hair and tail and a very light aquamarine horn on her upper forehead. She was wearing a green turtleneck and blue jeans with gray shoes. "Damn, Goji! You're as vigilant as ever!"
"Hi, Lyra." Twilight said from behind her daughter as said girl stood up from her position on the carpet. "Why are you still trying to do it each time we meet?"
"Because one day I will be able to get to you!" Exclaimed the girl. "Goji won't be able to always guard you, I will give you a meeting hug or die trying!"
"You're starting to sound like Minuette." Twilight deadpanned. "Remember how it ended?"
"With Goji almost crushing her neck." Answered the Unicorn. "So what? She didn't make such a big deal out of it and was all too happy to join us in our Quest!"
"Lyra..." She could only groan. "You understand that there is no way your information in any form or way is actually credible? We checked every part of Canterlot already and none of these 'Urban Legends' were even remotely close to truth."
"Ah, but this time I have a solid lead!" The young Unicorn was all but bouncing on her feet. "The warehouse that housed the fish that is usually is sent to the local restaurants with the carnivorous menu was emptied! The ones who did it managed to tear their way through the wall and the floor and leave without anyone noticing during the night! I can feel that I had them now!"
"And the fact that it can be a group of Diamond Dogs looking for an easy meal?" Twilight asked as she walked outside with the girls and Lyra following close behind. "They were noticed in stealing things from the usual trade routes as of lately, Doctor Spiral read it in the newspaper and made sure to loudly announce his opinion of them."
"No, these weren't as refined as Dogs usually do, and breaking walls is something they had no reason to do!" The mint-haired filly grin widened. "I tell you, these were the Night Crawlers!"
"Ignoring the fact that they don't exist, what actual proof do you have?" She knew that arguing was pointless and the constructive route was a lot less migraine inducing. "Was there any sightings? Footprints? Whitnesses?"
"There were whitenesses!" Lyra said with a huff. "They saw red glowing eyes in the dark alleys not far away from the warehouse in question!"
"Then why are Royal Guards aren't handling it?" Twilight asked, she already gave up on the prospect of a calm day with Lyra this pumped up. "If there is something dangerous in the the city then they should be the ones catching it, right?"
"Mou, they are useless." The mint-haired girl huffed. "Goji can beat them up no problem, only the best of them could slow her down!"
"True." She couldn't argue with that, seeing that the Royal Guards took it with a sore note that their best members were crushed like bugs by a newborn hatchling. Shining even mentioned that his Instructor in the Academy was secretly participating in a betting pool who would get roughed up by Gojira next, one Cadet overdone it with his drinks and openly challenged the diminutive juggernaut on the street. He had to run for his life when he threw and empty bottle at Twilight when she tried to peacefully dissolve the situation. "Princess Celestia, on the other hand, won't take it kindly that walked into a dangerous situation without supervision or even worse, started a fight with an unknown. As her student, I must uphold myself at the same standard as a responsible adult."
"... I already told Minuette and Trixie about it." Lyra said with a smirk after several moments of pause.
"..." Twilight stopped and looked at her friend with a deadpan glare, even Goji gave out a threatening growl as she sensed her Mother's irritation. "As an responsible adult I would need to oversee the foolish endeavor of far less mature peers and make sure that they will emerge unharmed from their childish crusade."
With that, she change directions and started walking towards the working area of the city where the warehouses were built for the trading and construction goods, she heard no protests from the girls as they simply followed along right behind her. Lyra snickered as she fell into step with the still blank-faced Unicorn and looked more amused than ever, in moments like this Twilight wondered if her life would've been better without making friends in school and just concentrating her full attention on studying full time.
"... You just don't want to let Trixie lord this over you for months to come, aren't you?" Lyra was still snickering and then burst out laughing at her friend's twitching eyebrow.
'On the other hand I always can stuff them into bags and ask Goji to throw them as far as she can into the ocean. Decisions, decisions...' Twilight wondered as she walked towards her destination while mentally painting a picture of quiet life where there will be only she and girls and her studies under Princess Celestia. Sure she would miss all the fun they had together, her headache would be lessened too and it was a very interesting way of challenging herself when she studied all those obscure subjects that Lyra brought up... Trixie, even if she had a rather annoying habit of turning any project into a competition with Twilight was still a very intellectual and rather insightful girl that had an insane knack for Magical Artifacts and Enchantments along with the creation of the former. Sure, some of her inventions very potentially hazardous and unstable but with Twilight's help, she discovered her true calling as she made a tremendous leap in her performance when they put their heads together and studied what her Special Talent actually meant. To this day to find an actual true-blue Artifier was a very hard task, most were rather specialized and could work only with some types of Artifacts, but Trixie had a literally untapped potential in her noggin to be the best there is with everything. She and Twilight shared the Top Spot on the board in the theoretical class with Twilight being better in practice because of her far superior raw Power out of all students in the school, with Trixie constantly trying to better herself and them both working in tandem it was really challenging to keep up with her.
Lyra was... well, Lyra. She made sure that there always was something interesting to discuss, brought out incredibly obscure subjects onto the table and held true to her surname Heartstrings as she always knew how to make everyone feel better. She wasn't manipulative, she was empatic and also never let anyone of their group stray away from whatever they had their goal set upon. She was also the source of their many 'adventures' that Twilight still wasn't sure actually happened as most of them looked like fevered dreams for the most part, that one where they found an underground fighting club and Goji won all her fights and they left with three full bags of Bits right before the Royal Guards broke down the doors and arrested the owners. Or that one where Lyra was investigating the rumor of the 'swamp monster' that managed to make its way to the outskirts of Canterlot, it was the first time in her life that Twilight could honestly say that she saw so many things being blasted to pieces as Gojira and Xenilla tore through the old mansion while ignoring doors for the sake of just crashing through walls. It was good that Destroyah, Ghidorah, Battra, and Mothra were left outside to patrol around the perimeters from the sky and Kiryū prioritized guarding Twilight instead of chasing whatever that thing was.
'I'm still not sure how did we manage to hightail out of there before the Royal Guards showed up to find out why the whole mansion literally came crashing down.' She grumbled as she felt another piece of her normal life broke off and turned to dust from just remembering the whole incident.
Twilight was so engrossed in her thoughts of self-pity and wondering how it all could have gone that she didn't notice that they were already nearing their meeting place, it was only when she felt a spike of irritation through the Bond from Gojira and felt her eldest daughter move in front of her that she finally stopped and noticed her surroundings. This area of Canterlot didn't have such a dense population as others, it was mostly small houses that were trying to squeeze themselves between the looming forms of the warehouses and less populace-friendly production lines like metalworking and large carpentering ones that simply could not be position in the generally populated area. While small shops were alright, the Noble Families of Canterlot raised a rather fierce protest about building factory-esque building near the center of the city and Princess Celestia actually agreed as nobody wanted to smell burned wood, ozone and the metallic scent of whatever the metallurgists were currently working on.
"Need... air..." Groaned out the voice that came from the front where Gojira stood, the threatening growl that followed all but confirmed Twilights thoughts about the identity of her 'attacker'. "Please..."
"Let her go, Goji." Twilight said as she stepped from behind the taller girl and looked at the girl that was now sitting on her rump on the pavement and rubbing her throat. "By this point, I'm inclined to believe that you actually enjoying it."
"I'm..." The girl with moderate blue with light persian bluish gray stripes and rarely a very light blue highlight hair and tail croaked out and then coughed several times as she tried to ease her vocal cord into working properly again. Her moderate sapphire blue eyes were slightly teary from the pain but she wasn't actually crying, her light cornflower blue horn made let out several sparks but failed to lit-up due to the stress and lack of concentration. "I'm not like that!"
"I think you had it coming." Came a voice from another Unicorn that strode near them but stopped just out of reach of Gojira's hands as she looked at her gasping friend with a bored expression on her face. Her dark grayish violet eyes locked with Twilight's and she smirked. "Oh, so you decided to actually join our grandeur endeavor? I imagined it would be just too primitive for your tastes!"
"More like I decided that it would be a lot less troublesome to accompany you so I would be there to bail you out when the time will come." Oh, Twilight sure changed from the excitable filly she was a year ago and became a lot more levelheaded. "Saving you would be far easier than explaining to your parents why are you missing."
"Hoh? Well, someone is grumpy today!" Trixie fixed her pale cornflower blue with very pale cerulean stripes hair and then helped Minuette to finally stand up from the pavement. "When will you learn?"
"Never!" Choked out the girl. "Goji will have to accept me as I will never stop trying to hug either her or Twili!"
Came Gojira's voice through the Bond, the girl bared her sharp teeth slightly and narrowed her eyes.
Twilight answered.
Came the reply, it was a statement of the fact that meant that she didn't consider anyone outside of the Bond a part of the Family.
The last part was met with the feeling of agreement from the other girls, they never let their guard down when there were others around besides the ones joined in the Bond. There were no persuading them otherwise, Twilight tried to explain it several times but the sheer concept of someone being not a threat while not being Kin was pretty much incomprehensible for them. She didn't try to do so because she understood, the could feel the Bond and their connection only grew over time and made the young Unicorn pick up some of the traits of her daughters. Twilight was a lot calmer now, had a lot cooler head on her shoulders as she was constantly reminded of the sheer Power that pulsed through the Bond and that she would never be alone anymore and no danger will ever be able to overcome it.
Trixie lit up her brilliant azure horn with her pale, light grayish magenta Magic Aura and lifted a rolled up piece of paper from her backpack. She unrolled it and made it float right in front of Twilight, it was some kind of a map of many different paths that were marked by different colors.
"You should be happy that I was so generous to provide us with the map of the Canterlot's sewers." She puffed her chest up with pride. "It took my unparallel skill and a lot of planning to perform such a heist!"
"... She bribed the Archivarius with his favorite sweets to get it and said it was for her History Project." Minuette said with a deadpan voice.
"Traitor!" The indignation in the exclamation just made the girl burst up laughing.
"And why would we need it?" Twilight asked. "Don't tell me we will be trying to actually go there? I read about it in the book about the construction of Canterlot, the sewers were built right when the indoor plumbing was in its infancy and then slowly upgraded over the years. It's a maze that has literal natural deathtraps there."
"Because we already eliminated the possibility of any other route of escape." Minuette answered as she walked near Twilight and finally got her throat to work properly. "Royal Guard searched the nearby tunnels and didn't find any footprints or any actual signs that Ponies visited that place for a long time."
"And that's not counting for all the vermin infestations that the sewers are suffering from up to this moment." Added Lyra. "Rats and other pests managed to chew through some of the older support constructs and made the whole thing rather unstable so they didn't dare venture any further. I heard that they even encountered a colony of bats there, but I can't confirm it as nobody in the Royal Guards blabbed about the currently ongoing investigation."
"And why are we going to venture there and poke around?" Twilight asked. "Isn't it dangerous for us to do so? If Royal Guards aren't going to go there due to it being too dangerous for them then I have no desire to risk it without a good enough reason."
"Because they are looking in the wrong direction!" Trixie said with a triumphal expression on her face. "They aren't trying to get lower, where the older and a lot less known parts of the sewer systems are still open and were left unchecked for decades. They think that if they themselves can't get in there then nobody else can, and I'm actually speaking from the confirmed facts here as I overheard some of them talking with each other about it."
"Where are you getting this information?" Twilight can't help but wonder.
"She's using her Magic for that Illusion Spell that you helped her learn to make herself invisible and sneak into a bar that is frequently visited by the members of the Royal Guards on the leave." Lyra answered with a shrug. "It's one of the things she's so proud of doing all by herself."
"... Why am I friends with you again?" Trixie asked with a twitching eyebrow. "Sidebar, I managed to overhear that their superiors don't want them going any further than now because it will make most of the communications with them impossible. I'm not sure what exactly is the problem, but their hesitation makes no sense as a standard deployment cuts off any proper communications too and they are literally would be five minutes away from a reinforcement or recovery crews!"
"And why am I going with you, again?" Twilight raised an eyebrow.
"Because you're the one who pulls us out of the dangerous situations and knows when to fold?" Asked Trixie.
"Because with you around girls will come too and with them with us, there won't be anyone short of a Princess able to stop us?" Asked Lyra with a smile.
"Oh, I know!" Minuette grinned. "It's because you will feel guilty if something will happen to us and we're the only ones who even talk to you because everyone else got scared away by Goji when she blasted holes through several walls with her awesome Death Ray!"
"..." Twilight stared at the trio and hang her head in resignation. "I really need to rethink my life..."
Twilight looked at the heavy padlock that was hanging from the chains that were keeping the entrance into the sewers, the bars were rusted and mostly there for the purpose of keeping the Ponies out if they didn't have any way to deal with the padlock. The small stream of water that was leaking from the dark tunnel brought the smell of rotten water and decay that wasn't all out of place here, she could tell that even girls weren't pleased with the rather foul odor. Their sense of smell was far beyond what anyone would consider normal and the stench was probably like acid on their sinuses right now, but they didn't complain even for a moment as Twilight was the one to lead them here.
"First obstacle." Commented Lyra.
"I'm more worried about the reasons for this particular entrance being unguarded." Commented Twilight as she looked around for any sign of it being false. "Should Royal Guards be making rounds around here?"
"This is one of the less known and more clogged tunnels." Trixie said as she pulled a couple of crystals from her hidden pockets and made them come lit with direct beams of light into the tunnel's dark depth. "As you can see, it was partially sealed and therefore nobody would think that someone would be determined enough to breach it."
The wall that was made from red bricks that were almost fully encompassing the tunnel also had a small opening from which the water was coming from, it didn't look as old as everything else and had a sign of recent renovation with fresh patches of cement being used to cover some parts of it. Twilight didn't know much about building codes, but this was obviously a shoddy work at best and wouldn't stand a chance against any of her girls.
"After you." Minuette said as she stepped to the side from looking through bars while giving Twilight a smirk.
'Once again, I'm breaking any and all rules that I know for the sake of friends... Is it how other children are? Is this how friendship suppose to work?' Twilight managed to not show her rather depressing train of thoughts before giving a mental nudge to Destroyah. There wasn't any reason not to be at least somewhat discreet here and the rather violent girl was more than suited for this, as her dark-haired daughter stepped forward she felt a spike of Power through the link.
Destroyah stopped in front of the group and yellow energy started crackling over the growth on the back of her head and over her hair, the build-up was minimal as she opened her mouth as a purple and pink energy tore through the rusty steel and literally evaporised it. The wall behind it didn't fare any better as it now was spotting a watermelon size hole in it with the bricks being simply gone along with part of the bars and the padlock. Twilight stepped forward and patted the now a rather smug girl on her head and received an almost bone-crushing hug from the rather diminutive terror.
"No matter how many times I see it, there is no way for me to fully grasp just how destructive these girls are." Sighed Trixie as she walked towards the now opened door and pushed making it open with a groan. "And I'm not even going to joke about it."
Nobody had anything to say to that and they all followed the Unicorn inside, the ark made out of stones loomed over them as the group of eleven moved into the sewers. Trixie's crystals provided enough light for all of them to see the path ahead of them, the hole in the wall was big enough for them to squeeze through even with Gojira breaking out several more bricks for Twilight to step through without crouching. Kiryū was walking the last in their group as she always did, her rather obscure additional senses provided a good cover for anyone who will try to sneak up on them. Xenilla was smart enough to come-up with this formation with Kiryū, it wasn't much but it was mostly them standing in a circle around Twilight to keep her safe at all costs.
Came the voice of Gojira.
Twilight asked as she grasped her hand with her right one and Xen's with her left.
Xen answered as she sniffed the air.
The tunnel was stretching forward with any end to see, the crystals weren't strong enough to show them anything more than a dozen meters ahead. It wasn't that much but Kiryū could see in the dark and all girls' senses were sharp enough to substitute for vision, and that meant that they had no blind spots.
Twilight felt a chill going down her spine, but any hints of fear were washed away by the tidal way of reassurance and warmth coming from the girls that tightened the circle around her.
Xenilla answered.
"We may want to turn back." Twilight said, making the others look at her. "Girl can smell a lot of blood, fresh blood, all around us and I don't like where this is going."
"Can this be the place where the blood from the hospital goes?" Lyra asked. "It wouldn't be much of surprise if it also smelled..."
"No, it's too far away from anything meaningful to float here." Trixie asked. "And they are using special tanks that are then disposed of via Magic."
"I'm not even going to ask you how you know it." Twilight said as they moved kept walking. "But can we at least stop?"
"Why are you afraid of a little blood?" Asked Minuette. "Your girls eat fish raw and I'm pretty sure that it's a lot more graphic than a simple knowledge that some of the blood was spilled here."
"Because..." She wasn't able to finish as suddenly they heard a rumble, as if something heavy rolled right under them. "... What was that?"
"If the old maps are right then we don't have anything underneath us." Trixie answered. "It should be solid rock, nothing more."
"Well, something caused this noise and I'm not sure if I'm comfortable with the idea that there is anything even remotely mobile and operational here." Twilight said. "What if we're walking over some kind of a pipe system? Like the ones they have in Manehatten?"
"... How do you know about those things?" Trixie asked with a blink.
"They were mentioned in the book about the fishing industry that I read." The Unicorn deadpanned. "But it's not the important part, we can very well be above a crossroad and that would mean that..."
Twilight was interrupted as Goji suddenly moved with a sense of alarm and the ground under their feet collapsed, her girls weren't fast enough to fly her up or even remain in the air and all they could do was to wrap around her so their much tougher bodies would take the brunt of the fall. They didn't even have the time to scream as suddenly the world spun with a crack of the stone and everything went black, the feeling of Gojira's body pressing against her was the last thing she felt before she felt as the gravity pulled her down.
"Get off me..." Twilight heard Lyra's groan as she finally regained her bearings. "Please..."
It was a miracle everyone ended up mostly unharmed, with girls not being in any actual danger and her friends landing rather nicely onto something soft. She was looking around as she watched the rather comical pile of limbs that were Trixie, Lyra, and Minuette as they struggled to pull themselves apart on the ground. The rather big cave they ended up in was mostly covered in a thick layer of moss that saved their lives by preventing them from breaking their necks, it was incredably thick and actually acted as a soft buffer between them and the hard rocks below.
"What could've caused its growth?" Twilight wondered aloud as she touched the green coverage. "It's probably a meter thick at least!"
Came the answer from Xenilla as she stood nearby and was looking around, the light coming from the crystals on her shoulder providing enough illumination to show them the whole cave.
Came Kiryū's voice as she stared at the far side of the cavern where one could notice several holes in the walls.
Goji growled as she looked around, her spines giving a slight glow as she scanned the place for any more possible threats.
There wasn't much that Twilight could say as she watched Kiryū's arsenal and armor fully materialized on her being, silvery metal gleaming in the light as the blue one marked her flight engines and weapons. Even if she always had the best control over her emotions it was obvious how nervous she was as her tail was swinging from side to side in an erratic pattern.
Goji's spines came lit with bluish glow and small arcs of lightning-like energy started to jump from one spike to another, same bluish glow could be seen coming from behind her bared clenched teeth and she stood protectively in front of Twilight.
Xenilla's crystals glowed brighter as yellowish energy started to gather in her mouth, her excitement was causing literal vibrations through the Bond as she prepared for her first real combat.
Destroyah was nonchalant about it, but only on the surface as she once again started charging her attack and lightning-like energy started to dance over the growths on the back of her head, this time the build-up was far more powerful than the one she did to blast through the metal bars and a brick wall.
Ghidorah's tails were waving around in excitement, sparks of golden energy dancing in her half-opened mouth as she too prepared to face whoever was coming with deadly intent, she ever lifted herself up in the air with a couple of flaps of her wings and hovered over the group.
Battra's eyes came aglow as she lifted herself up to hover near Ghidorah, a hiss coming from her mouth as she bared her teeth in a twisted grin. While not as violent as others, Battra was always the first one to vote for killing or destroying anyone and anything that was considered a threat.
Mothra also flew up, hovering above the two with her antennas glowing red as she was looking around curiously but keeping herself position in a perfect position to fire upon whatever was going to emerge from the entrances into the cave. Even if she was the most passive and peaceful of the girl, Mothra never gave up and kept her position as a protector of the family whenever she could and even in their spars she was able to go toe-to-toe with Goji for some time.
"Is this part of the tunnel system?" Asked Minuette that was finally able to untangle herself from the pile and climb onto her feet. "It doesn't look habitable at all."
"I'm not sure." Trixie said as she shuffled through the stack of maps. "I can't find anything, but it also can be a natural formation and therefore it won't be marked here and I didn't take any geological maps with me."
"What is this smell?" Lyra asked as she sniffed the air. "This is awfull!"
"It's the smell of decomposition." Twilight said as she was using the Bond to stay calm. "The smell the girls felt before? It was coming from here, the moss grew so much because of the nourishment it received from the dead bodies here."
"... What?" All three girls asked as they slowly looked down with disgust and horror written all over their faces.
"... Are you talking about the rodents and other small vermin?" Lyra asked with a bleak tone. "Because I can't figure out any other way it can..."
"If only the whole population of them from Canterlot came here to die." Answered Twilight. "No, the smell of blood is too fresh and strong and won't be caused by dying rats."
Beside the agitated growls of the girl the four Unicorns now could hear screeches coming from the tunnels on the other side of the cave, scraping sounds that reminded them as if someone was scratching at the rocky surfaces. Twilight moved a little bit backward as she saw small red lights moving inside the darkness, it was as if the whole thing was pulled out of some rather clique horror movie and they were about to be attacked by some monsters. Her mind whirled as she tried to figure out what could these things be, her knowledge about the creatures of Equestria was rather broad due to her studies under Doctor Spiral and getting a tad bit hyped on his enthusiasm about them.
Kiryū said as energy started to slowly envelop her metal spines.
Twilight couldn't risk her girls attacking for no actual reason, it was one of the things she learned earlier this year.
Suddenly four shadows the size of the adult Ponies burst from the tunnels and into the lit cavern, their appearance made the four friends freeze on the spots as they looked over the newly arrived... things. While their general shape retained what they supposed to look like it was almost impossible to tell the same about everything else, starting with the giant size and the huge disproportional fangs and claws on their feet. Brown coats covering their bodies looked torn and downright falling out with some twisted and unhealthily deformed skin being visible in some places where the patches of fur were gone fully. Their twisted and grotesque muzzles twitched as they sniffed the air and their glowing solid red eyes were looking at the newly arrived company, their ragged ears twitching and bony tails swishing from side to side as putrid slime dripped from their slightly open maws.
Gojira released a rumbling growl as she took a step forward, the glow around her spikes growing in intensity as she challenged the creatures to try something. The only problem with her taunt was that she was far too small for it to have the desired effect, the four unnatural animals stood there for a moment and then released their own screechy growls in response.
"Are those...?" Lyra asked.
"I can't see any other explanation, but what happened to them?" Trixie muttered with her face growing paler. "It's like in one of those comic books that are on sale right now, about mutated monsters attacking the city to eat its inhabitants!"
"Thank you for that mental image..." Minuette even lost her usual cheer. "... So, can we just escape through the same way we fall through?"
"It closed behind us, probably some of the rocks collapsed and blocks the hole." Trixie said. "And we have nowhere to go..."
Suddenly the leading creature released a screeching call and jumped towards the group, in response to the incoming danger the energy around Gojira's spines blazed to life brighter than even Xen's crystals and with a growl she opened her mouth. A blast of bluish energy roared to life from her maw as it enveloped the still airborne assailant as Twilight had to shield her eyes from the intense light and step away due to the heat. The twisted mutated and downright unnatura abomination of a rat that just tried to eat them had no chance against the intense beam of destruction as its smoldering remains crashed into the mossy ground. There wasn't much left as the skin and flesh were almost instantly incinerated by the five hundred thousands degrees Celsius, and it was an miracle that the bones managed to somewhat remain intact enough to be recognizable.
The remaining three mutated rats stood silently as they gazed upon the smoking remains of their comrade, it was impossible to tell what they were thinking as they suddenly looked directly at Gojira and hissed. Her eldest daughter answered with a rumbling growl as the glow of her spines didn't dim in the slightest, there was no way for this situation to end in anything but fight with the girls now drowning the cave in their collective bloodlust. She had to wonder for a moment if these mutated rats were somewhat defective when it came to their mental facilities, their instincts should be all but screaming for them to run and hide by now.
'Maybe they are blinded by their desire to protect their territory?' She read once that some of the animals never backed away when encountered on their own turf, like Manticores when they were fighting near their home to protect their young. Were these monsters the same? It was a moot point by now, Gojira just witnessed them treating her and Twilight didn't feel like calming her down after almost getting munched on by the creatures. These There was no time for Twilight to even properly register what was happening as the creatures charged too, this time going on the ground and directly towards her eldest daughter. Gojira released an titanic roar that made the two monsters stop cold, the monstrous below made the whole cave shake and also made Twilight, Trixie, Lyra, and Minuette cover their ears while trying to keep their hearing intact.
<Kill.> This wasn't a question that Twilight heard through the Bond, Gojira wasn't playing around and for the first time since her hatching, she was going to fight seriously. She wasn't sure what her eldest daughter was going to do, but the sheer presence that was now coming in waves from her spoke volumes just how enraged she was right now. Twilight could even guess why as it was the first time that she was put in any real danger and anyone actually attacked her with the intent to kill. These rats didn't know what was coming, they weren't capable of comprehending how big of a mistake they made by not fleeing.
Author's Note
I'm really sorry for the long wait, but I had trouble coming up with the proper continuation of the previous Chapter. Yes, this is a massive Time-Skip, but it's not done with an ill intent! Parts of the Year will be slowly uncovered in flashbacks to show the Character-building and how Twilight changed from a Teacher's Pet into what you saw here. Is she OOC? Yes, because she went through a year of being Bonded to the most Powerful beings in Equestria and had to literally babysit them and prevent them from going onto rampages, saving the lives of the population in the process as even Celestia will need a lot of effort to stop them if they will really get going.
Was the change of scenery to quick? Maybe, but it's the way this Story will go for now and no more massive Jumps with this being the only one as I'm trying to show and compare to what was and how it's now without doing the crappy 'Date This' routine.
Also, here is the Mutated Rats they ran into:
