“Lady Chillwind. I’ve brought you someone.”
“Put him down...
“He looks familiar...
“There’s something about him...”
“His name is Flash Sentry.”
“Ah... That’s why he’s familiar.....
“He’s taken quite the beating...”
“He tried to solo a Ravager.”
“I can see why you chose him....
“Fear not Flash...
“Your watch hasn’t ended yet....”
“I stood motionless, unbreathing, my eyes closed and head bowed. My hands were clasped around the grip of the sword planted in the ice beneath me. The cold rolling down from the northern Crystal Mountains whistled in my ears. Faint voices, numerous others within the Soulscape, were but a whisper in the back of my mind. I could feel, as well as hear the thrumming of my armor. Services quietly whined at the slightest movement.
This was peaceful. A calm before the proverbial storm.
“Flash.” A synthetic mare’s voice made me open my eyes and turn my head. Before me, hovering a foot off the ice, and unheeding of the snow and wind, was a silver form reminiscent of a bipedal skeleton. Her hands twitched nervously, faint orange and red energy crackled over her fingers and arms. Golden light blazed around the symbol of the Sun on her chest, and burned within her eye sockets. The pony-like head’s mouth was twisted into a frown.
“Raven.” I responded in a hollow distorted voice. “What’s the matter?”
“Canterlot’s under attack.” Raven responded. Her golden eyes glanced around, evidence of her worry.
“What?” I blinked in confusion on instinct alone.
“Haven’t you been paying attention?! It’s the only thing everypony’s been talking about!” Raven hovered closer, inches from my face. “Changeling’s are attacking Cantelo-”
Suddenly the wind and snow died, making the air deathly quiet. A few equine heads popped out of the covered bunkers a few feet away, clearly confused.
Wha-
Arise soldiers! Arise and take the battle to the enemy! The..... I couldn’t even call it a voice. It was more of a feeling. The feeling echoed through the Soulscape like a tidal wave.
Words instantly filled my mind.
Our long wait is over.
Take battle to the north.
A grin split my face, as my eyes snapped over to the green mist-shrouded trenches at the base of the mountains a half-mile away.
“Dear Celestia....” I heard Raven gasp. “Are we finally-” Her sentence was cut off as a loom booming of displaced air erupted above us. We were instantly shadowed by whatever appeared. This was followed by multiple additional booms. Raven and I looked up, which only caused my grin to widen. Dozens of Black Necropolis hovered over the Elysian Guard’s lines. Within mere moments I saw dots begin to drop from the necropoli.
“This is Smashfucker Prime!” A deep voice resonated in my ears. “You heard our King, to the trenches!”
Take The Trenches.
Eliminate Hostiles.
The words in my mind appeared as objectives in the top right of my vision.
“Sentry, what in Celestia’s sunny flank is going on?” The gruff voice yanked my vision from the forces falling from the sky. I looked down at the angry form of Commissar Blueblood. His scared face scowled up at me, and his mechanical left eyes bored into me.
“We’ve gotten orders from our King Blueblood.” I stated, my grin returned as I spoke. “We take the fight to the Caribou.”
Blueblood’s scowl deepened as he absorbed in information. Then a grin wider than mine split his face. “About damned time!” He grunted. “Right lads! Up and at ‘em!” As the Commissar began shouting orders, and the Elysian Guard began their mad scramble to the trench walls, the first of the Necropoli forces began striking the ground behind me. Anthrofied Pony Marines in blue-gray Power Armor slammed into the ice. In seconds of hitting they charged forward, cleared the trenches in a single leap, and began their charge across Nopony’s Land. Their skull-faced helmets shrieked war cries as they charged, gripping Bolt Pistols and Combat Blades in their clenched fists.
“Raven!” I snapped, causing the living metal Necropony to somehow jump in mid-air. “With me!”
Raven nodded and hovered up next to me as I ripped my greatsword from the ice. I narrowed my eyes and heard servos whine as I hunched over, muscles tensing. I rushed forward, clearing the trenches in a leap, and slammed down on the other side. Continuing my charge, I gripped my blade in my right hand, the blade’s edge tore a furrow through the ice behind me. I felt a chill well up in my chest, and funneled it through my arm and into the sword.
Bolts of emerald lightning erupted from the green haze. I saw one of the bolt slam into the chest of a Marine in front of me, causing him to fly backwards. I ducked under the flying Marine and glanced back to not only see him hit the ground, but get up as if nothing had happened. My gaze snapped back to the lines ahead. A multitude of roars echoed through the air.
Familiar creatures erupted from the mist, tentacles thrashing and shrieking like the demons they were. I growled as I laid eyes on them. The tentacled bipeds stomped forward, only to be joined by dozens more. The chatter of Bolter fire erupted from the Marines ahead. The Bolts ripped bloody holes in the abominations. The demons began healing almost instantly but it was for naught. The Marines leapt on them, with cries of wrath and ruin of their lips, as their blades crackling to life in blue-white energy.
A monstrosity loomed in front of me, tentacles flailing and eyes wild filled with madness. It stomped towards me in it’s broken limbed gait. I would not die by a thing such as this. Not again!
Cold hatred filled me. I funneled that hate into my free hand. Blue light erupted around my arm and I roared as I threw my arm forward. I storm of wind, snow and shards of ice erupted from my hand and engulfed the demon. It shrieked as it slowed. Ice began to coat it’s limbs, crawling over it until it was covered completely. The beast was now frozen solid.
I lowered my head and shoulder, and picked up the pace. I heard the ice shatter, barely feeling the beast’s frozen form disintegrate as I barreled through it.
I continued my charge. My pounding hooves carried me into the green mist. The haze reduced my vision to only a few meters. Static suddenly filled my ears and I reflexively shut off my helm’s coms. I leapt into the trenches sword held at the ready. The problem was, there was nopony there.
The trenches were empty.
Where were the Caribou?
The objective marker in my vision filled with static as well and I shut that off as well. Something was fucking with the coms.
“Something’s wrong.” Raven almost whispered as she hovered up beside me. “Where are their summoners? Where are their warriors?”
A scream from my left made me whirl. Something burst from the mist, and I reacted. My blade swung in a wide ark, tearing whatever it was in half. As I righted myself, I turned and kneeled to get a look at what charged me.
I had been a caribou at one point. It was a male, but it’s antlers had been broken off, leaving jagged shards in their place. It’s hide looked like it’d been almost entirely flayed from it’s body. “Dear Celestia... What happened to him?” Raven murmured, hovering just over my shoulder.
There was a thud from behind me and I glanced back to see one of the Marines looking around the trench. This one was a unicorn, if the addition to his helmet was any indication. He gripped a Heavy Bolter in his fists. The belt feed running up to his massive backpack appeared to be mostly full.
He spied me. “Sir.” He nodded. “Grave Warden, at your command. The others are clearing the demons still emerging from the mist.” Grave looked around. It appears that they are coming from the mist itself.” He spied the caribou corpse, nodding at it. “What’s that?”
“A mystery.” I grunted, standing with a whine of servos. I stood a foot taller than Grave, benefits of being a new generation.
Mores creams split the air coming from up and down the trench.
“Contact!” Grave roared as he let loose with his Heavy Bolter at the things that emerged from the mist. More emerged from my side and before I could lift my sword flames erupted from next to me. Angry red-orange flames erupted from Raven’s outstretched hands. In seconds all was eerily quiet once again. It shouldn’t be this quiet. There’s fight a mere dozen meters away. We should be able to hear it. Looking around I could see the hazy outlines of the mountains looming over us.
“I think we’ll find the information we’ll need that way.” Raven gestured towards the mountains before I could say anything. I looked to Grave and he simply nodded at me.
We left the first trench line, strangely not finding anything but snow and ice beyond. Within a couple meters of the trench, we noticed something on the ground. Blood. Not dried either. It was still steaming. Something had died here recently, but where was the body?
A few meters away from that, we found the second set of trenches. These were occupied in a way. Caribou bodies littered the ground. The looked desiccated, withered, like the life fluids had been sucked out of them. They were also covered in a layer of frost. They had been dead awhile.
“And this is why you don’t make deals with devils.” Raven gestured at the corpses.
“What do you think happened?” Grave asked her as I tried to find anything that could tell me what happened here.
“Demons broke their bonds and took over. That seems most likely.” Raven responded. She was probably right, I hadn’t found anything of use of the corpse.
“We should keep going. Maybe we can find some information nearer the mountains base.” I said standing and hefting my sword to my shoulder.
We didn’t find anything of use within the next set of trenches. Only more bodies. We continued on.
Combat would have been preferable. There was nothing for minutes of walking. The silence didn’t help. I kept expecting more of those flayed caribou to burst from the mist, but they didn’t.
The closer we got to the mountains, they thicker the mist became, until we came across the source.
What we found was grotesque. There was a pile of dead caribou. These however weren’t frozen. They were bloated, baring only small patches of fur. Their skin was covered in pulsing red and purples pustules. Their heads had rotted into little more that skulls. The mist was wafting off of the pile. This wasn’t natural. Not by any means of the word. It turned my dead stomach.
“Raven. Burn it.” I growled.
“Gladly.” She responded in disgust. Flames erupted from her hands, lighting up the corpses like they were dry kindling. There were wet fleshy pops as the corpses burst one by one. As if she wanted to get it over quicker, Raven growled as her flames turned from red, to blue. Not even dust was left when she was finished.
When the blaze died. The mist began to fade and recede. Beneath the pile there had been some kind of sigils carved into the ice beneath them.
“What have you done?!” A wet, phlegm-filled voice gurgled. “You destroyed my beautiful mist.” Something... plodded its way out of the faded mist.
It had been a caribou once... I think. It was a Caribou buck. He had patched gray fur. He was more grossly fat than the bodies Raven had just burned, and he was covered with the same pustules and boils. His hooves were chipped and cracked. The skin on his face was stretched thin. His eyes were sunken, milky white, and leaked yellow pus. His antlers were bone white, gnarled and covered in cracks. A sickly green orb of light (more like an orb of dripping liquid.) hovered between his antlers.
“You... You’re responsible for this?” Raven asked, flames erupting over her arms and hands. Her fists were clenched and flames licked around her eye sockets. She was pissed.
“Yes.” The caribou nodded. “They were all sacrifices for King Dainn and the greatness of the Caribou Empire! I am Plaguelord Kahn! You will regret -” He was cut off as white flames engulfed him. My eyes snapped over to Raven. She was also engulfed in white flames.
“How dare you!?” She screamed. “Nopony deserves to die like that! Nopony deserves to be sacrificed!”
“Ahhhhrrrrgggg!” Kahn shrieked and pushed through her flames, even though his skin was melting like candle wax. “You less than nothing Bitch! You are beneath us! Only worthy to be a sleeve for my-”
Kahn’s jaw exploded as Grave had had enough of his monologuing. Grave unleashed a storm of Bolter fire into the Plaguelord’s face, causing the former caribou to stumble back.
“AGGGGGGGHHHH WIIIIGGGHHH NAAAGGHHT! YAAAGH CAAAA NAAAAGHT KIIIII MEEEEE!” Kahn shrieked as he pressed forward through the fire.
I stomped forward, walking through the flames like they weren’t there. I gripped my blade in both hands, wound up, and swung with all my might at the corpulent monstrosity. My blade sheared through the Plaguelord’s massive gut, spilled blackened entrails onto the melting ice. The flames roared over the entrails, using them as fuel. The Plaguelord shrieked as flames roared from his mouth. His eyes burst as he was finally consumed by the raging flames. I watched as his skin disintegrated, as his bones swiftly turning black, then turned to little more than dust.
Raven’s flames died. I turned and saw that she still looked angry.
With Plaguelord Kahn’s death the mist faded completely. Around us, and miles in every direction, the sow was littered with more desiccated corpses. Looking behind us showed a wall of dead tentacled demons was being burned. I noticed a couple Marines in white performing last rites over fallen Marines.
My objective marker reappeared in my vision. Take The Trenches and Eliminate Hostiles gained check marks and disappeared.
Establish Forward Base and Recon The North appeared in their place.
This war was only just beginning.
