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Ah!
Yes,yes, welcome.
No, I haven't been expecting you, some of us are quite busy.
But you are welcome, nonetheless.
How on earth did you get in here?
I made sure the door was locked, and the circuit is actually working.
Hmmmm. Are you supposed to be somewhere else? No?
What?
A story?
Well. I can't actually tell you a full story in order, the council's listening.
What council? What do you mean what council?
I've got a lot to explain don't I?
But little filly, do you have time?
I do. I hold time in the palm of my hoof, and it looks at me and I look at it, and we both look at each other.
What? I'm not lying Of course I can hold time. Look- What? Oh, right, I did promise you a story didn't I. Well, a long time ago, the Alicorn sisters ruled Equestria and- What? What do you mean what happened before? Well, there was Discord and The Elements and then Earth and Equestria.
Well, there may have been a few thing that people have forgotten over the ages, but that's a longer story still, and besides, don't you have homework? No? may be I can tell you a little part.
In our beginning, there was the Elements, the spirit Discord, and time and space. Of course, back then, they didn't have names, or bodies, or even a purpose. And in lacking unity, they were frustrated. They did not understand who had put them there, or why they were still there. They did not know of the concept you, or me, and so the thoughts of the first gods were muddy at best, if the first hints of something could be considered thoughts. However, Discord managed to separate his thoughts from the other through his, particular talents. His whole being came into space, and saw a uniformity.
He hated it.
His entirety shook off its first layer, giving a part of himself to create something new, something chaotic, and what he got was a bang. A really big bang. The Big Bang.
And that's when the universe started.
Energy suddenly came into existence, along with quarks and leptons, charges of negative and positive, and the concept of concept was created, and the so was the concept of law and theory, and concept of gravity, and forces, and matter and atom. The intricacies sprawled form there, giving rise to the concept of a star, and novas, and the thoughts of thoughts and the thoughts of no thoughts. And then the concept of travel was started. And the universe suddenly opened its eyes, and saw the space, and exploded outward, creating galaxy after galaxy, spirals, shapes, letting space be an ever expanding canvas. The stars grew old, and shattered into bit of millions of stardust, and its neighbors roared out in flares of light, spiraling into each other, letting the world fall and rise, burst and blaze. Clouds of gas curled into itself, and wrapped and warped into waves and surreal shapes and figures. And then, on a whim, he molded himself a physical body, letting only a fraction of his true self into it.
And on a second itsy bitsy tiny whim, he made four more bodies.
He didn't stop there.
Her long mane flowed like an everlasting river, billowing in some unseen wind, dancing to the movements of it's owner. Her hooves danced along the floor, practically hovering over the steel and glass. As her hoof grazed the floor, her wings flared out, brushing the gently parting falling snow aside. Her horn glowed a wicked light, echoing in her mane as it's stars gave her the strength needed to wheel around and smash into the next annoying robot that tried so hard to knock the living moonlight out of her.
She shrieked, swinging a smoldering spell into the metal arm of yet another hulking humanoid looking robot, slicing open it's chrome plating to revel a second layer of complex protection. The machine took the impact in stride, literally striding past her, only to turn around with a devastating uppercut to her underbelly. It's hand continued to rise, tossing her up into the air like a rag doll, a majestic, six foot alicorn shaped rag doll. She dropped to the floor with a crack as the glass gave a little, splitting under her impossible weight. The Mech grabbed her horn, and in one swift motion, yanked her off the tallest building on the planet, which happened to be on the tallest natural cliff on earth.
The mountain seemed farther and farther away as she plummeted feet first, frozen in shock. Jutting edges shimmered into sight as the snow parted to revel more and more of her surroundings, which unfortunately, was almost exactly like the place she had just plummeted from only two hours earlier, a vertical wasteland of protruding spires and solid rock faces.. A sharp crack echoed over head, snapping her out of daze. She glazed up and saw the Mech joining her in her plummet, not even bothering to avoid protruding rocks, choosing instead to simply crash through them.
Her horn flared as she got ready to cast a spell, and her wings flared out as she prepared to save herself from a lot of pain. In one swift motion she let a shielding blaze loose and stroked her wings downwards. A surge of ice and wind filled her feathers, flinging her up and away from the blinding shield.
Quickly, she gasped for air, and gathered another spell in her horn, flinging into the rising wall of stone in front of her. The surge of magic exploded, throwing fire and rocks everywhere, revealing a nearby waterfall through a gaping fiery hole. She pushed her wings, and shot through the rubble with a burst of speed. Her eyes blinked once as she put on another surge of rushing speed. A second blink, and her wing caught on an outcrop. In a second, she pitched to the side, colliding with the slag of the melting wall, and she dropped like a stone.
A part of her wanted to scream, but she tucked her wings in, and flipped, righting herself. As all four of her hooves braced for impact, she glanced up. The Mech had been held up by her spell, but it's solution had been to simply go around it, and was almost directly above her, arms locked tight as it hurtled down faster ans faster.. She jerked her head back down, gritting her teeth as she rushed toward the ground, and braced herself for impact.
She landed. In an instant, the solid ground gave way to sheer force as stone shattered, sending debris everywhere at once. She whirled upwards, preparing another spell.
It was too late. The Mech fell right on top of her, feet first. One of it's massive feet leveled her skull with the ground with a dangerous crack, slitting the air. With one foot on her face, both of it's massive hands latched onto her horn.In a fraction of a second, it tore at her horn as her entire body lurched about with her head screaming at her. A high pitched snap split the air. The Mech's grip solidified, and with on last jerk, broke the horn in half, leaving the jagged remainder in her skull.
She screamed, long and piercing, like a demon's wail. The solid bone in the robot's hand started to dissolve without it's owners magic in it, and crumbled into dust as the giant hand clenched tighter and tighter. The remainder of her horn snapped and popped as sparks flew in every direction. Her eyes rolled over , and she collapsed to the floor with a thump, the multiple lights in her mane going out in the blink of an eye.
The robot advanced, it's glowing eyes spinning in it's metal sockets. It's feet lumbered toward her limp form, and picked her up, the motors in it's arm faltering a little. It pushed on, gathering up the alicorn in the entirety of it's arm, the almost hideously disfigured metal already beginning to close up, microscopic fibers reattaching themselves and rearranging until it's massive arm was whole once more. It slung her over it's shoulder plate, and activated a device on it's temple, speaking in a hollow, metallic voice.
"T-12_16 reporting. Target acquired. Three Mechs disabled. Twelve Mechs destroyed. Area secured, returning to base with target thirteen."
She woke up.
"Gaaaahrggg" Her throat felt like it had been given gravel by the hoof-fulls. Her wings started stretched out, but stopped at a jolt of pain ran up her feathers. She winced, then rubbed her eyes, letting her eyelids open to stare at the ceiling, then the floor.
Wait... Why- she thought. This fog, it- Then her vision cleared just the slightest, enough to let her make out the very edges of the room.
Woah..woah, woahwoahwoah as her head swiveled around the room. It was utterly massive, the size of one of the smaller craters on her lovely moon. Her horn reached out with a soft glow of magic, and let it prob the room. "Ow, ow, owieowie" Her magic had sudden stopped at the wall. She looked closely at the glow coming off every corner of the room, squinting her eyes to look closely at-
She stopped. What in the elements was she looking at? Her vision told her the wall was made of light, as if someone had taken the cover of a star and laid it out oh so thinly. Wait, no, this is too odd, I need to think she reached out her magic again, letting it continue to flow outwards. "OW" a sudden shock caused her to yelp, What is wrong with me, reaching up too inspect her horn. For a second, her hoof struggled to find the tip of her horn, and she was filled with dread as she felt the end a foot lower than it should have been.
NONONONONONONONONONONONONONONO
Her head screamed at her, the air around her fluctuated widely as the space around her distorted in waves. Her teeth ground together, her hooves clamped themselves over her ears, her tail curling around her entirety as she opened her mouth to scream.
A man in a white lab coat fiddled with the controls on the table in front of him, flicking his fingers this way and that, running them across various sensors. Most of them gave a glaring little red light, and abruptly shut off.
His eye twitched. "Gah! Who on earth put this thing here? How does me being a genius mean miracle worker? Even I can't pull a mech class containment unit out of my ass." his ramble cooled to a muttering, running his fingers through his short hair.
"Got it", he said, snapping his fingers. He brought his hands down and raced them across the surface. A few lights came back on, and he gave a sigh of release.
A door slide open, letting a ridge-back man step in.
"Doctor Cliff. What happened."
"Colonel , I don't-"
" Doctor, I lost twelve Mech-Units, and three more are in need of sizable repairs that we can't do. The other ones only took down one or two at most." He leaned in "At most. Doctor." He stepped toward the window, eyeing the ailcorn with ridge dismay.
" This one and the other one are the only exceptions. The public is still being kept in the dark.These things are dangerous. Very dangerous. Get it in the enclosure with the others, then get answers. In any way."
His eyes lingered on the ailcorn. He turned back toward the doctor. "Status report." he snapped.
"It seems that the air around her is heating and cooling rapidly,and changing pressure just as fast. The team is working fast, but our sensors will burn out at this rate."
"So that's why we can't move it?"
"Yes sir. This containment unit was the first one we could find for this one , but unfortunately it was previously used for the lightning magnets, so the only things we can do is look in and apply electricity to specific areas, wherever want. Other than that, we can't much more than observe and take notes." The doctor started typing again.. "However we could try to subdue her and get some vacuum tubes to float her over to the new container."
"Go ahead. Knock it out any way you see fit, then set up the transfer. Notify me before you start the transfer."
"Right away sir."
There was a silence in the room for the moment. Cliff swallowed nervously, avoiding the colonel's unsettling stare.
"Doctor. Can I ask you question?"
Cliff nodded
" Do you know why you're in the war?"
"I do. I actually do"
The colonel kept his unsettling stare focused on Cliff's eyes.
"Back to work Doctor Cliff"
"Yes sir"
The interface on his glasses flickered to life as the lights began to pop into visible shapes, displaying various measurements and numbers running from one side to the other. His fingers tapped away at another set of holographic keys on the wall in front of him. His eyes roamed over the various sensors, noting the rapidly changing orange lights and glow around some of the more delicate instruments. One of the lights gave an urgent beep as its light changed from a deep orange to a bright red. Cliff gritted his teeth, tapped a few other keys, and pushed a physical button under the table surface.
"Celestiaaaaaa. This better not be some sick joke. My horn can't do anything. Celestia?"
Luna gingerly reached up and touched her horn for the hundredth time, recoiling again as she felt her hoof touch her now very flat horn tip. Her teeth clenched, and as she lowered her hoof and tried to open her wings, she hissed out as she was met with another shock of pain.
She slumped down in regression, her mane copying her action and almost deflating to the floor. She absentmindedly shook her hair out of her eyes.
"This isn't from Celestia is it?" she said out loud. Her head dropped to the ground again.
She should have known it wasn't some test the moment one of those metal golems tried to roast her alive. How they were able to spew fire from their shoulders was anyone's guess. Her wings unfolded and slumped, feeling the warping air twisting around her feathers, ruffling them. But then again, the golems would never harm her. Well, she was asleep. Maybe she pissed them off? But wait, if she was asleep, how would she have pissed them off? She rolled over, tucking one wing in to lay on her side.
Maybe Celly got into a fight about the contract again? Granted, it wasn't terribly unfair, but it was more than fair anyways, stopping the curse. She shook her head. She wanted to get out. grumbling, she looked strained to look at her horn and wings. She contemplated just bashing her hooves against a wall or the floor until it gave way. Well, I'm not as strong as Celly, but I could probably do it.
Then a slight tingle crept through her wingtips, lifting her head off the floor. "Wh-" she grunted.
Suddenly it increased to an unending shock. She gasped for air, struggling to get up while the force of the shock continued to increase in magnitude. Curse this mortal body!, her mane and tail were slowly straightening out in spasms as she stomped a hoof to the ground. A tiny crack split the air, announcing her strength, her eyes widening to the sound. Her ears flattened as all her effort flared into her horn, in a desperate attempt at magic. The sparks started to fly off in tiny explosions, Come on, work, just work right now as the current running through her body was drawn up and out through her horn.
Luna screamed as the current rushed past her heart and crammed into her skull, forcing its way out from her horn. The sparks amplified, blazing up and away.
No..wings..gotta.. she clamped down, shut her eyes and refocused. Whipping the sparks back and forth, she directed it back to the ground, slamming her broken horn into it.
In an instant, the shock tripled, pouring out of her horn in a bolt of unrelenting lightning. All at once it stopped. She opened her eyes. Yes! I can do this, I can get out! The floor around her was now charred and smoking, but more importantly, a decent sized crack had sprung up from her efforts. She gritted her teeth, wondering where the energy had been coming from. Shaking the thought from her mind, she reared up and brought her hooves down swiftly, resulting in a thundering crack.
And just like that, the floor gave out. So did the lights. But just before it went dark, Luna caught a glimpse of wires, tubes, and a stone floor. Along with a dozen golem looking creatures with mostly white fur.
Mostly.
