Come Dawn or Darkness

The voice had died out by the time the ruins came into view. The whispers of the old blade faded to nothingness as the trees passed by beneath them; the grey stone spire of the ancient palace standing out like a lone buoy amidst a dark green ocean. The wind rushed beneath her wings; cold, harsh, and sinister. It blew through the forest and set the trees swaying, as wind is wont to do. Yet the sterile scent and empty taste which traveled upon this breeze filled the little pegasus with a sudden fear that she had never known from any other force of nature.

Sudden glimpses of red eyes filled her thoughts as sharp, black tendrils whipped at her subconscious. A twinge of pain rippled through her side as she remembered how easily the little monster had overpowered her. And now there's going to hundreds of the. Thousands! She wanted run, to fly back to her home and hide in her bed; safe from the monstrosities that stalked the shadows and haunted her dreams. She was tired of always being the brave one, always being the first one to charge into bad situations. She could slip away now and let someone else take her place. Someone else could lead the charges. Someone else could have the glory. She just wanted to live.

Without a second thought she reached up, with one fluid motion, slammed herself across the face with her hoof. And just who else would step up to the plate, huh? Those slowpokes behind us? All the good fighting will be over before they ever catch up. The other scouts? Those clowns are only here because I'm in front. If I hadn't stepped up they'd still be cowering back on the ground with the rest of 'em! No, its gotta be me and its gotta be now!

The dull orange glow surrounding her sword faded as she came to a halt, still many yards from the Palace of the Two Sisters. After a moment of waiting the other pegasi arrived, several of them panting loudly as their wings beat away gravity's loving embrace. "Alright, listen up! We've got one shot here. These freaks still don't know we're up here and they have no clue that there's an army heading their way. So here's what we're going to do..."

* * * * *

The journey through the portal was as long and agonizing as she remembered it being, if not more so. Seconds had drawn on for decades as the Abyss begrudgingly released her and comrades. As she stepped forward the ground became far more sturdy beneath the metal-rimmed leather of her boots.

Ancient stone bricks replaced the ethereal nothingness that passed for a floor in the Void, her talons clicking softly against it with each step. She lifted her visor and inhaled deeply, taking in a lungful of the freshest air she had tasted in years. At long last their pilgrimage had come to an end. This world was alive, fertile, and young. Her people would thrive here as they once did in the place they had called home so many centuries before.

She emerged fully from the portal; odd strands of darkness trailing from her shoulders and legs as she stepped into the great throne room of the long-abandoned castle. To her left and right more of her kind were breaking free of the Abyss' grasp; the darkness clinging lightly to their tall, thin frames. The soulflayers had come through first, with the savages close behind them. They were already filing out of the castle by the time she and the rest of her race began entering it. As they gathered in the moon-lit gloom of the old palace the next battalion of barbarians began to come howling out of the portal after them.

Her specie's numbers had dwindled to almost nothing in the wake of their migration. World after world had played host to their, and world after world had forcefully rejected them. Yet even with the savage orange races facing the most casualties each time, it was always her people who suffered most. Swift and deadly in the darkness and far more intelligent than their soft-skinned comrades, they lacked only for the shear muscle and tenacity of those others who made up the backbone of this unfortunate army of theirs. In each and every world they visited the new climate had brought pestilence and disease upon them. The barbarians shrugged off such plagues without much notice, yet they became a death sentence for the susceptible masses of her scaly race.

With such loss marking every stop along their journey, her people had nearly given up hope of finding a land to settle in once more. Yet here was a world so very much like the one they ha lost so long ago that the nostalgia threatened to make the high priestess forget the entire reason they were there. One day we will rest peacefully in this world. One day we will reestablish the cities and kingdoms if our past in this new land. Our people culture will live again... but first this land needs to be properly prepared for us.

More and more soldiers stormed forth out of the swirling vortex of the Void. Their numbers were great and their spirit was unbroken; the majority lived only for the rush of conquest these days, and they could all feel this new world longing for them to begin. Its inhabitants would put up little resistance, if the general's scout was to be believed. If they were weak they would flee, if they were smart they would surrender. The bravest among them might try to die with some form of honor left intact, attempting whatever it was that qualified in this world as "fighting back." Yet they would die just the same.

The thoughts of battle faded from her mind as her little battalion made its way out of the castle's entrance. Beyond the heavy oak doors she was met with the sight of dark autumn night in a dense, foreboding forest. All around them trees grew in such twisted and gnarled shapes that they appeared to be writhing their way right out of the soil. Above, a full moon of such monstrous size and brightness that it made it appear to almost be day shone down upon the massive army of their allies.

The beauty of the scene was overwhelming; all of it was far too much like her old home for to have been a coincidence. "Brothersss, sissstersss. Thisss iss it... We're home..." They all looked up as one, staring lovingly at the moon. At one time in their history, the moon might have been revered as a god or a goddess; the stars around it being its guards and the souls of those who had passed on. Their journey through the Void, in the company of lesser races who craved only war and death, had robbed them of such beliefs. Yet here, under Equestria's newly-risen harvest moon, the old ways seemed to be calling them back.

A wave of orange-skinned Gorrets pushed past them; their leader, scoffing at the awe-struck expressions on the reptiles' faces. "No dawdling, scalies. Keep standing around doing nothing like that and you're like to catch your death... and oh what a loss that would be..." The platoon moved on, a few members chuckling under their breath as they passed.

The high priestess cursed them under her breath; her kinsfolk followed suit. They returned their collective gaze to the heavens, but were surprised to find their eyes met with a far different sight than what had been present only a minute before. While the light of the vast full moon was still visible, its venerable form had disappeared from the sky; hidden from view by a thick layer of clouds. The rest of the night sky soon began to fill with similar obstructions, blackening the beautiful star-lit evening.

"The weather isss... ssstrange here, your grace."

The priestess nodded in agreement. "Indeed. Frontsss move much fassster here than I've ever ssseen. But I'm sssertain that iss what keepsss thesse woodsss sso fertile. It'sss likely nothing out of the ordinary for thi-"

A clap of thunder stopped her thought dead in its tracks. The immensity of the blast seemed to put the entire army on edge for a moment, as scouts and commanders alike quickly began looking around to ensure some massive beast had not wandered into their midst. Their fears were quickly put to rest as a the sky began to light up with a rolling wave of lightening. The entire congregation of strategists and soldiers turned to follow the path of the electrical light show with their eyes. It was only once it crackled out of existence at the end of its arc that they realized what a mistake that had been.

The first scream came from a warrior who was completely unharmed. He had fallen to the ground on sheer panic as something brushed passed him in the darkness. The next came from soldier who had found himself short one arm when the lightening died out; his severed limb lay in a pool of purple blood half a yard away. The third came from a pikeman who, unbeknownst to him, had just narrowly avoided a similar fate. His scream was not for himself, but for the comrade he had just seem get beheaded by what could only be described as a-

"C-C-Colors! Pretty colors!? Pretty Color Demon!!!" He ran back to the main group, gripping his long spear tightly in his shaking hands. He and his partner had been on the outer edge of the vast clearing surrounding the ancient castle. They had abandoned their watch for a split second to watch the wave of lightening roll across the sky. But as their gaze returned to the world around them, something small and heavy knocked them aside. A plethora of colors trailed behind it in a blindingly vibrant typhoon on death. While it had done little more than knock the wind out of the pikeman, his partner had fallen to the ground in two pieces; his head rolling away into the underbrush as the demon's tailwind grew stronger. Following the trail of colors, he could see it change direction and immediately strike the next closest pair of watchmen. When neither of them stood back up, he grabbed his spear and rushed back to the front of the castle; screaming of unholy creatures and fragmented light as he ran.

These claims suddenly became the least of the army's worries, however. As a few of the soldiers attempted to calm down the survivor, a nearby tree exploded with a massive CRACK! Burning sap and fiery splinters rained down upon the congregation as a second tree burst in a similar manner on the opposite end of the clearing. Freezing rain began to fall as a third tree was blasted to pieces, knocking several of the nearby warriors to the ground and pelting their shocked comrades with smoldering branches.

Another clap of thunder shook the ground, rocking the ancient castle to its foundations. Bricks and chunks of thousand-year-old mortar began to fall upon the forces still filing out of the portal, smashing skulls and shoulders as the unexpecting masses escaped the Void. Outside, the assembled army was slowly tightening their ranks as bolts of lightning continued to corral them with, blasting more and more trees to pieces with every passing moment. The wind grew to a low gale, whipping the warriors with chilling sheets of rain; sapping their strength and further demoralizing their spirit.

The foot soldier continued to cower before the sudden change in climate, but the officers stood unimpressed. Whips cracked as sever commanders began forcing their troops back into formation; barking orders as they beat them back in place. The high priestess and her clerics watched from the comfort of there people's invisible barriers as rain washed down its sides. She felt a certain satisfaction as she observed the Gorrets scrambling to reassemble; their commander standing like a grimacing statue as his forces rushed to get back in place before he unleashed his own wrath on them.

"Keep grinnin' and your scaly face is libel to get stuck like that, missy." The commander's deep growling voice seemed to come from a great distance away as he spoke without turning to face her. If he said anything else it was quickly drowned out by another booming clap of thunder. His battalion shook in their boots as the ground quaked under the massive clap. The commander remained still as stone, freezing raining and whipping wind colliding with his intimidating form as he stared skyward. The priestess could not see what he was looking at, but the determination he was putting into his vigil discomforted her far more than it should have.

"Rest assured, Hrwankwin, if I'm smiling its simply because I've not seen a natural thunderstorm in well over a hundred years."

He growled beneath his breath, but did not let his annoyance with her manifest into words. "Rest assured, priestess, this is no natural thunderstorm; and if you really think this storm is mere coincidence you're and even greater fool than I thought... There's something up there, and I intend to bring find out what. ARCHERS!"

The orange-skinned warriors around him dropped their spears, and swords, and axes. They unslung the crossbows from their backs, mounted large, forked bolts between the pre-wound arms, and clasped the cold wet stock in their near-frozen hands.

"TAKE AIM, SKYWARD!"

Fifty archers hefted their bulky crossbows toward the clouds, preparing to take revenge on the bitter cold rain that was so viciously assaulting them. Behind them, the commander unslung both of his massive firearms. Taking one in each arm, he lifted them toward the source of the latest blast of thunder. The four huge black cylinders on each of his weapons quickly grew slick with rain as he leveled them out with the cloud layer.

...They held...

The wind continued to whip around them. The foot soldier shivered as the temperature continued to fall. The rain came down harder and harder, obscuring everything within the clearing.

...Nothing...

The rain intensified further, hammering against the heavy armor of the Gorrets and the clear shields of the high priestess and her acolytes. As the rain grew harder the wind began to let up slightly.

"The heavens weep... Make them bleed..."

The commander's growling voice was barely audible over the drumming of the rain, but the thunder from his shots got the message through all the same. Eight balls of fire and fifty forked bolts flew into the sky. After a few moments, the lightning ceased and the thunder quieted.

* * * * *

Just a few more minutes. They can't be more than a few miles away now...

She looked back I've her shoulder, the dark orange sword floating by her side as she hovered just above the cloud line. Below her a layer of black storm clouds roiled and rumbled as thunder rocked the air and lightning scarred the ground. A dozen more pegasi scouts had arrived as they had been waiting and were now hard at work cooking up one of the most turbulent storms they had ever been allowed to create.

Another burst of thunder echoed throughout the forest, shaking every tree below them as it rolled across the sky. Two of the pegasi rushed to a cloud a few yards away from where Dash was floating and kicked it with their hind legs. As it compressed a stream of lightening belted downward into the center of the enemy's ranks; spreading further chaos on the field below.

She looked back over her shoulder to where a trio of weather ponies were busy attempting to corral some of the black, rumbling clouds back into place. The weather patterns of the Everfree Forest had always seemed to have a mind of their own, but with this many pegasi focusing their efforts on a concentrated spot it hadn't proven too difficult to force them into position. One cloud managed to slip away as they were just about to move on to the next portion of the storm.

"Thunderlane, you got one trying to escape behind you!"

The dark gray pegasus glanced backwards and had just started moving toward the runaway cloud when the sky around them suddenly lit up with an unnatural red glow. All four of them had just enough time to look downward as a group scarlet lights sped upward through the storm, growing rapidly in size as they climbed like a fish preparing to leap from a water at some unsuspecting insects floating above.

But before any of the pegasi could make out what was approaching, a flurry of thick iron barbs filled the sky around them. Thunderlane took a pair of the forked bolts to the wing and plummeted through the cloud layer, screaming. Bluebell attempted to fly after him, but was intercepted by one of the glowing red projectiles as it burst from the clouds. The explosion left nothing but ash and red mist behind as it lit up the night sky. Dewdrop looked on in horror for a moment before she too was skewered by the remaining bolts. Pierced through the neck and skull while another bolt pinned one wing to her side, she fell to the ground below without a sound.

The rest of the pegasi who were scattered about the sky began to panic. They broke away from the clouds, trying to escape the range of the jagged projectiles. Rainbow Dash, however, plunged headlong into the clouds, diving toward the ground with with every ounce of speed she could gather. The distance wasn't great enough for sonic speeds to be an option, but she came about as close as she possibly could all the same.

Thunderlane had managed to survive the fall, having wildly flailed about with both his good and injured wing the whole way down. A thick patch of mulberries broke his fall, leaving him dazed disoriented as the nearest group of monstrosities turned their attention to his position. They began moving in as the storm started to disperse; their minds quickly deciding that catching this potential prey was a more pressing matter than the increasingly-infrequent lightening. It was not until they came within a few feet of him that they realized the extent of their mistake.

* * * * *

The high priestess moved in along with the rest of her congregation. They followed close behind the small battalion of Gorret crossbowmen and their commander, careful to keep just enough distance between them the archers' bloodlust would not put her forces in danger. The commander remained unflinchingly quiet as he walked behind the rest of his men, slowly reloading the two massive multi-barreled cannons he had been using. His concentration was a thing to be admired, as thunder crashed overhead and the last few bolts of lightening the storm could muster struck around them.

"You're sssure it came down in thisss direction?"

He said nothing, his hands moving deftly from one barrel to the next as he opened them and filled them with some strange powder from the bags on his belt.

She intended to press him further on the issue, but it proved to be unnecessary. As they reached the edge of the clearing where the clouds had moved away from, one of her acolytes cried out in terror.

"They're dead! All of them! H-How could..."

His sentiments were echoed by several of the other clerics in their group. The closer they came to the tree-line, the thicker the bodies were piled. Though it gave the priestess and her people reason enough to pause, the Gorrets held no such aversion to the situation. They strode forward, unconcerned by the shallow sea of dead soulflayers and other such parasites.

"Found it!" One of the archers dropped his crossbow and grabbed a large, hooked knife from his belt as he sprinted ahead of the rest of the group. His mouth hung open as he let out a deep roar, all the while charging headlong toward a small brambly patch of foliage on the edge of the clearing. Something was kicking wildly within it, clearly caught in the branches of the bush fighting desperately to get loose.

The Gorret's boots pounded the soil as he charged. The thin exoskeleton of a soulflayer crunched softly as he strode over its decapitated corpse, pushing it deeper into the freshly made mud. He roared louder as he drew closer to his prey, confident that none of the others would be able to catch up in time to steal this kill from him. His mouth continued to hang open in a ferocious snarl even as it left his body.

He hadn't looked back, nor had he looked to his sides. He was too focused on the prey in front of him to have noticed the rest of his battalion stop dead in their tracks. He hadn't bothered to acknowledge the fact that the rain had stopped in that one isolated section of the field. He hadn't cared that the wind had switched direction suddenly while he was running. And he certainly hadn't seen the blur that smoothly seperated his head from the rest of his body as it passed.

The priestess had no idea what she had witnessed, all she knew was that the result of it had meant death for the overexcited bowman. She planted her feet in the mud, stretched her arms skyward, and raised her faith to the heavens in the hopes that her gods would aid her once more in defending her people. Her prayer was answered as the collective barriers which surrounded her acolytes combined into one vast dome of invisible energy. She was confident that it would be more than enough to keep out whatever strange projectile had decapitated the charging Gorret.

The creature in the bushes was crying out in a horrible, terrified whinny; like the screams of some helpless horse or donkey who had found its leg broken. She had heard similar sounds during the first part of their journey, when such beasts of burden were still a viable commodity. The road had been long and harsh, and they had lost many good mounts along the way. Eventually, when her people had finally found themselves at the mouth of the abyss, their steeds had been left behind in favor of that dark, empty path.

The thoughts of the past were driven from her mind quickly and harshly as another Gorret was struck down by a projectile all too similar to the first. The blur of light severed the warrior's legs at the knee, sending him flailing to the ground just as he got close to the mulberry bushes. A bright trail of colors tailed the object as it flew, obscuring the air behind it and marking the its bizarre flightpath. A moment later another warrior fell to an identical object, this one closer to the main group than the first two had been.

The commander was sending his men forward one at a time, and each was being cut down closer and closer to his starting point than the one before him. After five more had fallen the priestess determined without, much uncertainty, that the object was the same each time. It was not some projectile being fired from somewhere in the distance, as she had originally assumed. Each time it slew one of the soldiers it did so with a single, horizontal cut, with a spray of blood trailing for just a split second off one side or the other.

"Ssstudentsss, I require your' sight. Aid me!"

The acolytes surrounded her in a small circle, each one standing with his or her clawed hands folded in front of them as they faced their leader. After a moment the eyes of every acolyte in the circle began to shine with bright white light. A moment later, they all fell to the ground in a daze; blind as if they had no eyes at all. The high priestess' eyes, however, suddenly saw enough to make up for all of them.

As the next Gorret ran toward the place where its injured prey lay kicking and screaming, time began to slow. The priestess looked far to the left of the charging warrior and saw the air itself begin to twist and distort as something plowed through it at an unnatural speed. It took a moment for her to make out what the object was as it hurtled toward the unwitting crossbowman, but finally she was able to see it clearly as it came within a few feet of him.

A pegasus: small, blue, and hornless, but otherwise identical to the ones she had once heard ancient myths and legends speak of. It traveled through the air with such speed and agility that, even with the spell bringing time to a near-standstill in her eyes, the creature still seemed to be moving at an almost ordinary pace. Its wings continued to flap as if time were moving regularly, albeit with an intense outline of displaced air flowing from the tip of each feather. A multicolored stream of fragmented light followed the little creature as it flew, tracing an outline of its entire flight pattern as it moved, likely fueled by some bizarre magic native to this world. Gripped in its clenched teeth was a dark orange sword with a particularly cruel looking curve in its blade; a small river of blood streaming from its edges.

The most troubling part of the entire scene, however, was not the pegasus itself, but rather the increasingly clear mach cone which was forming in front of it as it flew. No living creature should have been able to reach speeds of such ridiculous extremes, even if aided by magic. The priestess had seen failed attempts at such things when she was young, when rebellious young mages would attempt to concoct their own, unrestrained spells. At a certain speed any organic being would fall victim to the limitations of its own body, with most being skinned alive by the wind or suffering catastrophic displacement if internal organs. Yet here was some tiny winged horse doing it as if it were nothing even while carrying a blade that had to weigh almost as much as it did.

She stood awestruck as the little pegasus cut down each of the warriors as they stepped forward. One after another they charged the edge of the forest, and one after another they were sliced to pieces by the deadly streak of color. Yet the Gorrets' commander continued sending them in one at a time. His eyes darted back and forth as he stood just outside the barrier, following the darting pegasus as best he could with his unaided vision. It wasn't until only a half-dozen troops remained that he finally made his move.

His guns fully loaded once more, he released the last six soldiers under his command. They stormed toward the bushes without the slightest sense of self-preservation; each carrying a long, hooked knife in one hand and their empty crossbow in the other. They did not try to spread out or serpentine in the slightest as they plowed on ahead, knowing full well that they were likely just seconds away from death. Watching them run, the commander scanned left and right with his guns cocked and ready. The moment he saw the first sign of the deadly rainbow speeding toward his troops he leveled out the barrels and took aim at the last warrior the multicolored monster would strike.

He waited as the creature cut through the first of his troops, then the second and third less than a fraction of a second later. The forth fell just as he pulled the trigger on both guns. All eight barrels erupted with a blinding burst of crimson fire as he braced his massive arms against the recoil. The thunderclap of the shots rumbled across the entire clearing and through the trees. It silenced the storm and brought the attention of every creature therein to his position.

* * * * *

They're getting desperate! Won't be long now. Any second now Celestia's going to come blazing over the trees and the rest of the army will charge in here to back us up. She watched as the final line of orange warriors broke into an all-out charge. The last six soldiers were running with every last once of speed they could muster, closing in on Thunderlane's hiding place just as he was pulling free of the brambles.

One last pass... then back up above the clouds. The moment he can get into the air again, we're outta here. She sped back, closing in on the first of her targets as it neared the tree-line. It would take less than a second to catch him, and only another second after that to cut through the other five.

Adrenaline rushed through her as she rocketed in front of the first warrior, her blade separating his head from his shoulders as easy as if he were made butter. She tilted slightly as she hit the next one, slicing diagonally through its shoulders and upper torso. Her sword continued to feed fuel her with an enhanced combat rush, filling her with a thrill she had only rarely been able to achieve during her most death-defying stunts in the past. So long as she kept cutting down these invaders in such a way, she was confident the feeling would never fade.

That thrill wasn't quite enough to distract her from the sudden blast of thunder that seemed to rock the very air around her as she cut into the second-to-last warrior. She looked back to the spot where the warriors had been coming from and saw a flash of red accompanying the sound. Time seemed to slow as her sword met its final target; she barely noticed the satisfying SHINK of the blade as it cut through armor, flesh, and bone. Her eyes wee transfixed upon the wall of fire and jagged lead heading her way.

There was no time climb out of the way. No where that she could dive to to avoid it. Rolling to either side would only delay the impact by a fraction of a second or bring it about a fraction of a second sooner. Her sword was halfway through the unfortunate invader when she turned her head away, closing her eyes and bracing herself for a pain unlike any she had ever known.

* * * * *

Thunderlane finally managed to free himself from the mulberry bushes, though had he known it would take so much of his energy to do so he would have gladly remained caught within them instead. Scratched and bruised, he stumbled from the brambles with a profoundly dazed expression on his face. His head was pounding, his vision fading in and out as he stood back up. He had taken some pretty hard falls in the past, but never one quite as violent as that, and never in the middle of a forest. The bush may have broken his landing, but all the branches he had hit on the way down had done little to keep his body in one piece. He wasn't sure he'd be able to walk out of Everfree in this condition, much less fly.

He whipped his head around, almost involuntarily, as a clap of thunder erupted from the somewhere behind him. He turned just in time to see something huge and metallic spinning through the air toward a blazing bolt of color that could only have been Rainbow Dash. Just as it stuck in the ground in front of her, a barrage of bright red lights belted off of its surface. Chunks of burning lead flew left and right as they ricocheted off the massive pillar of green steel.

Rainbow Dash sped onward, climbing into the sky just a some great winged beast descended toward the clearing. For a split second, Thunderlane had hoped that perhaps it was Celestia, arriving with the rest of her army and what hope of victory the might still be carrying with them. But the shape was all wrong, this thing was clearly not of their world. And while Celestia would surly arrive in a glorious blaze of sunlight, this beast seemed to be trailing even more darkness behind it. And to top it all off, it was descending from the wrong direction. While the army would be approaching from his end of the clearing, this creature was coming down from the direction of the castle ruins; from a sky which showed no sign of the morning light he had so hoped would be breaking through by now...