Guardians of the Elements

The room fell silent, with the Princesses watching indifferently. It was Applejack who broke the silence with a small cough, then muttering.

“Do you need to ask?”

Rainbow Dash decided to add her thoughts to her friend’s question.

“Yeah, what gives? Didn’t the Princesses alread-” was all she got off before her Twilight interrupted her, pressing her hooves to her friends face, her make a sort of fishy face as a result.

“Rainbow! Don’t you know what this is?” at the shake of her head Twilight sighed, let her go, started pacing and continued

“It’s a Terran Oath! Almost nopony gets to see these! Do you realize how much of an honor this is for all of us?”

Rainbow just rolled her eyes at her friend’s eccentric attitude. “I don’t really see the big deal here Twi, Oaths are just words aren’t they?”

Twilight looks as if Dash just sent her puppy to the moon.

“Terran Oaths are the ultimate show of loyalty! I don’t know how it works exactly, but if a human swears an oath to somepony, they have to keep to it! I thought even you would know at least that much.”

Rainbow Dash, for her part, looks as if Twilight just spit on, punted and curbstomped her puppy then sent the remains to the moon for good measure.

She looks down and mutters to herself.

Twilight, with nothing more to say on the subject, trots up to the two still kneeling humans and sits in front of them. “On behalf of the elements of harmony, we accept your pledge.”

After the words leave her mouth,a small light shines from the left sides of their necks, a little above where the shoulder and neck meet. After the light fades, the mark on their neck is now clearly visible.

A look of relief flashes across both Princesses faces, Luna even more so, but they quickly fall back into their stoic composure. This time Luna is the first to speak.

“Now that this is all cleared up, I believe you should all be returning soon to Ponyville if you wish to make it there before nightfall.”

With that, they all nodded and bowed, saying their goodbyes and farewells to their Princesses, then they all left through the main entrance, on their way back to the train station.

As the six ponies and two humans left the throne room, Celestia turned towards her younger sibling. “That went well.”

Luna, still staring at the door, simply nodded her head.

Celestia adopted a look of concern. “Is something wrong Luna?”

When she got no response she lightly poked her in her side. This got a response out of her.

Luna shook her head and turned towards her sister. “I’m sorry Tia, I was deep in thought.”

She sighed and continued “I have only been back two years and already we are at war. I cannot help but think this is somehow my fault”

Celestia opened her mouth to say something but Luna continued

“Not only that, but being head of our military after so long, i can’t help but feel out of touch, and that the old tactics in my mind are no longer implemented and outdated by something better.”

She turns away and looks down at the ground between her hooves. “Multiple nations are against us, we don’t even have the full support of one! The Terrans send us only two soldiers, and we are forced to use them to protect one of our own assets, and The Dragons are indifferent to war as long as it doesn’t directly affect them. Our own military strength, while respectable, is not enough to fend off three nations, when we are forced to divert all our own troops to defend inside our own borders no less. Our defenses will waver and since we cannot pull together any form of counter attack without leaving a hole in our own defenses, we are merely fighting for time Tia.”

Celestia was silent for a moment. “While the Terrans may have only sent two, the fact they sent any at all is a sign that they are willing help. Had they not cared they would not have sent any at all. We must hope that their Terra is willing as well.”

She looks up and out the window that hangs above the tall throne room entrance as it lets the evening light shine through. “The Crystal Empire has already agreed to aid us, the Dragons haven’t quite said ‘no’ to helping us yet, the Zebra’s have agreed to aid in supply at least, and the Saddle Arabians are far away and will take some time to get here.” She clears her throat.

“So yes, as you put it we are fighting for time. But it's not like that time is all for nothing. We are defending until we can garner enough support from others to be able to fight back. All is not as hopeless as you make it out to be.” she looks away from the window and smiles at her sister, who has finally looked up from her hooves and returns her sister smile in kind. “Have a little faith Luna.”

POV Shift, Third Person, EOH

The group was walking in relative silence, Deka to their left and Trinity on their right. After a moment, Rarity decides to break the silence. “Do you think we might have time to just walk around? Maybe do some shopping, see a play?”

Trinity answers her before anyone else can. “No, the earliest train from now leaves in a few minutes.” Rarity huffs at this and pouts for a moment before a small smirks plays across her face.

“But you swore an oath to us right? Doesn’t that mean you have to do as we say?” Deka burst out laughing, to which Rarity gave a confused look.

“Not even ten minutes and they’re already trying to find a loophole!” his laughter died down a bit and he continues with a smile on his face “Even if it did work that way, it was the princesses who told you all to head back to Ponyville. As such, we have no say over that.”

Pinkie managed to find some form of humor in his response as she starts giggling. “You just got outplayed by the human!” she chortles out as the rest of her friends board the train.

Thankfully, the car is empty, probably because nobody wants to go to a place that was recently attacked. Everyone finds a seat, Fluttershy sits in a corner seat next to Applejack. Rainbow Dash sits next to Twilight; keeping her eyes anywhere else but on the two humans across from her; who sits directly across from Deka and Trinity who are sitting next to each other. Rarity sits a few seats from Trinity, and Pinkie sits a few seats from Deka.

Trinity starts mumbling to herself softly, seemingly incoherently as she nods off leaning her head against her fellow human. Deka replies to her in the same seemingly incoherent way, to which she nods and falls silent.

Twilight’s ears perk up a little bit at this, and she clears her throat, garnering the attention of their guardian. “The way you're speaking, I can’t quite recognize what language it is. Is it some sort of human language?”

Deka smiled a little bit “Yeah, it's THE human language actually. Not many non-humans know it, and you’d be hard pressed to find someone willing to teach you.”

Twilight gains a hopeful look and tries her best at puppy eyes “Would you be willing to teach me?”

He merely chuckles at her. “No, there is a reason not many non-humans know it, sorry.”

Twilight starts pouting and stomping her hooves uselessly against her seat. “But new knowledge! Please teach me! I must know,everypony knows about humans, but there's hardly anything known about your kind!”

Deka frowns a little at this. “I have the feeling I’m gonna get a lot of questions from you aren’t I?”

She nods with a hopeful look in her eye, as if he might change his mind.

He rolls his eyes and sighs “tell ya what. I’ll tell ya the vowels, but the vowels only. Hows that sound?”

She nods happily and leans in expectantly.

“A,E,I,O,U, in that order, translates over to: Y,A,E,U,I. The way our language works, is each letter has a translation.”

She smiles widely and makes some sort of squeaking sound. “Ooooooo, this is so exciting!” she starts to go off on a rant about how much she’s going to learn from them.

POV shift, First Person Deka Pov

I feel a smile coming on from the unicorns enthusiasm towards learning new things, something most humans, unfortunately, don’t share a similar mindset in. I frown a little, thinking about how most just find one thing to lean on, and stick to it. You could say I’m a hypocrite when it comes to that, only using one element. The difference between us and most humans is we can use our element in more than a few ways, while most can only use it in three or four different ways.

I shake my head, shaking myself from my thoughts as I remember something important. Reaching into my front left jacket pocket, I pull out six small gray rhombus shaped gems, and hold them in the spaces between my fingers in one hand. I clear my throat to gain everyone's attention.

Holding them up for everyone to see, I start talking “These are summoning gems. You will each get two, one from me and one from Trinity. They are to be used in cases of emergencies ONLY, as they are very hard to acquire, and are the only ones we have. Do NOT lose these, as you will not get a replacement. Simply throw it at the ground in front of you, and it’ll pull us to you, no matter where you are, including but not limited to: Wormholes, Black holes, Pocket Dimensions, Alternate Universes or Realities, Illusion Incantations, Tartarus, Magically nullified area’s, and almost anywhere in between.”

I get up from my seat, letting Trinity’s head fall, startling her awake. I start handing out the small gray gems to each of them, and Trinity soon pulls out her own which are a shimmering electric blue in contrast to my solid gray, and starts handing them out as well.

“Hopefully you won’t need them, however unlikely that may be.” My companion says. “I assume my compatriot already gave you the rundown of how these work?” she says with a yawn, to which everyone nods. She smiles groggily before spreading her arms in a stretch, then lets them fall to her sides. She jumps back to her seat, seemingly more energized. “When we get to town, we’ll escort you back to your respective homes.” she steals a glance at the clock on the wall above the door. “Which should be in a few minutes…”

I look to Rainbow Dash whose wing is in a cast. “From what I was told, your home is in the sky. Where are you going to be staying?”

She looks at me for a second with a look I can’t quite place, then speaks. “I’m staying with Fluttershy until my wing heals.” she winces as a bit of phantom pain grips her, and rubs at her cast.

I nod and immediately afterwards the trains whistle blows, signaling our arrival at the Ponyville Train Station. The train lurches forward to stop, then we all get up and head towards the exit.