Ch1. On a Mission from Celestia pt-1
Excalibur awoke in a daze. The silky comfort of the palace guestroom bed offering little comfort to his condition. The night before was a blur, he briefly wondered how he could feel as drunk as he did, given that he had no mouth or stomach it was quite the mystery. Adding to that mystery was the presence of the unconscious bodies of three unicorn bridesmaids that lay around him.
A quick check of the nearest one’s pulse quickly abated his fear of harming one of the adorable little ponies. The white coated mare with the pink mane snoring contently atop the blue one in a loose sixty-nine position. He maneuvered to his hands and knees slowly crawling his way to the edge of the royal plus sized mattress. Somehow managing not to wake the lime coated one after grazing one of her sprawled limbs. He tiptoed round the floorboards, checking if any squeaked from his added weight, and stealthily maneuvered around them. The thousand-plus year-old wooden floor creaking and groaning despite his care as his considerable mass shuffled clumsily across the room.
Finally finding his way to the entrance of their impromptu orgy chamber he carefully creaked the massive white and gold decorated doors shut behind him, turning the knob before the wood met the frame to more covertly secure the portal without alarm. “Good morning operator!” the little floating diamond of blue chirped happily as he materialized. “I hope you had a pleasant evening- a-A-aMoNg ThEse liTtLe sAvaGes-with your new allies.”
Frantic hand waving and exasperated hand motions to the overly chirpy, and very loud, cephalon to keep quiet quickly flew from hung over Tenno. His mechanical head swerving around as if to glare the vibrations of his companion’s intrusion from waking his still slumbering bed mates. Before swiftly bringing that faceless glare towards the little blue calculator himself, who wilted under his master’s stern attention. “My apologies operator,” he chirped dejectedly “I was simply too overcome with joy at seeing you again I didn’t think, I shall prepare myself for self termination immediately.” An ominous countdown began ticking from 10 in a much deeper more ominous approximation of the cephalons own, but barely reached 7 before Evan interrupted it.
‘its ok Ordis, just uh… what time is it?’ he thought to his little helper/proxy-speaker, finally noticing the sun out the window was totally still in the middle of the morning sky. “It is precisely 9:16:43 AM Sol standard military time operator. Do you want me to set this time for your awakening in the future?” he gleefully squeaked quizzically.
Evan performed some mechanical equivalent of a sigh as he slumped his shoulders, waving off his little helper he proceeded to stroll the elegant halls of Canterlot castle. He didn’t want anyone listening in for what he was about to ask.
‘ordis…’ “yes operator?” He hesitated, he wasn’t sure how to ask what needed asking, how best to communicate his wish. The Orokin empire had lasted for centuries before the old war, and the betrayal of the tenno, and whatever the hell caused the warframes to be returned to frozen slumber after their first. He had no idea if a standard 12-month calendar would even WORK for a space fairing people, scattered as they were among the planets. What he needed was something outside the sphere of ever changing human history, something objective…
‘how old is that star?’ he outstretched his armoured hand, pointing at the sun. Ordis, though formless, seemed to blink in surprise at the question. “Unknown operator,” the AI replied, “most of the lisets sensors remain damaged, a-AnD unNdeEr an EntiRe m-MoUntaAin, however from what I can deduce from your warframe’s sensor array that is not a natural star anyway.” Now it was Evans turn for an eyeless blink of worry, ‘if that’s not the sun then what is it?’
“From what I can tell, from the limited data of the last day or so, the actual object in question does not in fact generate solar rays. Based on the measured weakness of the rays themselves against archived data from earth, I’d say they were reflected through the atmosphere not generated. From this I extrapolate that the ‘sun’ is in fact a large orbiting reflector disc moved in such a way as to imitate a typical day-night cycle on earth, with the equivalent to Lua reflecting even less solar rays to imitate night. However, I can detect no emissions or heat signatures typical with standard means of propulsion to operate such advanced orbital machinery, so how the stations continue to function with such regularity in their cycles without any measurable decay is curious.” Evan racked his brain while absorbing the cephalon’s tirade, trying his best to take what the machine consciousness was telling him and fit it in with what he knew about the strange convoluted mythology of the warframe universe. ‘sooo… we’re on Venus then?’
“Unclear sir. I require more data.” Well, that was frustrating. Without any accurate data related to the age of the sun and thus the universe, the displaced human couldn’t deduce whether he was in the future of his own world or not. If the sun was older than 5 billion then it was good evidence to the former, if it were younger or, stranger still, exactly 5 billion, then it wouldn’t exactly give a definite answer but would at least eliminate an option. He was, in truth, stabbing at the dark here. His “rebirth” might all be a simulation, a dream, a movement of his consciousness across dimensions, a strange x factor in some mad god’s experiment or game. Evans very existence in this world, this land of pastel coated equines… it implied something more, some greater game he could not yet de-
“h-Hey! You!” Evan turned to face the voice that had pulled him from his existential wanderings. To his surprise a short male unicorn approached him not in frustration as his voice had indicated earlier, but in a more subdued almost sheepish manner. The small anthropomorphised mythological horse creature seemed to steady himself before he spoke, “They say you are the creature that saved my nation and mind…” He paused as if digesting the words he himself spoke. “They also say you slaughtered the entire invasion force… singlehandedly.” Evan nodded, the stallion’s demeanor seemed to cautiously shrink slightly at that, the displaced warrior suddenly became quite conscious of his current monolithic stature and legendary lethality. “My wife also says you saved her life,” he eventually continued, “a-and my sisters. So, for this... ALL of this, I wish to thank you. For protecting my family.”
The massive space ninja looked at the stallions shaking outstretched hand, stepped back and kneeled to something approximating equal height for a creature 1/3 his stature and gripped his appendage softly. “Excalibur,” he said, his voice now a bit deeper than before. An alteration made to the otherwise still present system of having Ordis transcribe anything Evan wished to speak to the natives like a glorified text-to-speech device, one made when several of twilights fellow bearers had made comments about the difficulty of differentiating when the warrior was speaking or the blue cephalon himself. “and it is I who should first be thanking you and yours for waking me.” he continued, “If not for your wife and your whole sordid predicament I may well have continued to sleep within the void forever.” The blue maned captain seemed taken aback at his voice, (or possibly the words?) but smiled regardless and returned the handshake. “All the same I am still in your debt Excalibur.” “And I look forward to the day you repay that debt, Captain Armour.” The ninja replied, returning to his full height. “Just as soon as I repay mine to you.”
“Heh, um yes well… all that aside.” He turned his head and coughed into his fist awkwardly, “are you just going to leave that… thing attached?” “Thing?” Evan adjusted his vision to look slightly lower at his own crotch area. There, a single long and still semi moist candle stick protruded from the war machines groin, affixed there by the melted wax from its head. The two males stood in awkward shock at the giant warrior’s ingenuity and forgetfulness. ‘Well at least that explains how I bedded those bridesmaids.’ The former human thought to himself.
Quick as a flash Evan moved his arm to cleanly pull the foreign protrusion from his person and toss it spinning into the air and around the corner. They breathed a sigh of relief. Out of sight, out of mind.
“Whom is Flinging about candles at this hour?!” A deep feminine authoritative voice boomed through the halls. “Why doth it land upon our royal horn?” The princess of the night continued from around the bend, her angered shouts carrying with her into the adjacent hall to investigate her treasonous assaulters.
Only to find nopony to receive her wrath, Evan and the prince having absconded in opposite directions the moment they heard her first shout. The physical and mental exhaustion of the previous nights clean up had exhausted the alicorn however, so she decided against pursuit of her assailants in favour for her daily rest. ‘Besides,’ she reasoned, ‘t’was probably just the staff fooling about with some silly game or the like.’ Still she couldn’t help but wonder as to what part of their activities could lead the thing to be so sticky.
***
Celestia was pissed. Well only if you knew what to look for that is. Raven Inkwell was one of only the handful of creatures on the planet who could so correctly read the subtlest of twitches in the royal Diarchs demeanor, and today she was pissed as buck.
On the outside she wore a face of perfect neutrality, absolute serenity, all while her various guards and advisors updated her on the status of her city after a failed invasion. Ever more grim statistics and numbers where recited, hanging in the air like tombstones. The total numbers of injured, dead, or missing, property, business’, and homes, destroyed in the chaos, symbols of loss that in the hours of a night so late it was now morning, were too much to fully process. Yet with the practiced ease afforded only from a thousand years of disaster relief dealings and crisis suppressions, the princess sat silent and unflinching, the gears and cogs of her ancient mind spinning at lightning speed to generate solutions and plans even as the grim report was given to her. The tragedy of the report was not what angered her.
“- but it could have been a lot worse.” The reporter concluded, “If the changeling forces weren’t stopped when they were…” “Thank you Clean Record that will be enough for now.” There it is. Raven could see the princess’s frustration build and Record’s words, the unfinished insinuation. Even as her horn and hands moved in concert to note the royal’s orders on refugee placement and supply lines, she took mental notice of her body. The small twitch of a feather on her left wings, hiding itself beneath its cousins, a brief but sudden straightening of the ears, the miniscule bulge of a single muscle in the neck, she was pissed alright.
The grey coated secretary could guess the target of her leader’s ire, but not the reason. This alien, this… Excalibur, he had saved them, saved princess cadence and her husband’s lives. Clean Record was right, it WOULD have been worse if the mysterious swordspony hadn’t shown up when he did. Despite the horrifying implications of a single warrior destroying an entire bucking army in a single day, it worked, and the terrifying creature had yet to harm anypony as far as Raven knew.
Perhaps that alone WAS the reason, the only thing that could match such a feat before him were mystical artifacts like the Elements of Harmony, and even those had limitations. Perhaps it was merely the implication such a creature had that set her ill-at-ease, all that power contained in a single creature of alien origins with unknown agendas…
The little secretary shook herself from her disturbing thoughts. Returning her full attention to the task at hand, until a barrelling interruption in the form of a haggard guardspony made his way into the meeting room. In accordance with the Emerald Accords any form of confirmed changeling activity was to be shared between nations through secured channels, mystical messaging systems based off old dragon magic that could not be used by creatures with changeling magic affecting or within them, not too dissimilar to the messaging spell secured through spikes fire breathing. It had become something of a cultural staple for dragons to greet each other through exchanges of fire breathing ever since a changeling plot had almost started a war between the dragon clans and the rest of the world, this is also why the Emerald Accords where made. Naturally the invasion of Canterlot and its result had to be shared under that treaty, but the news was not taken well. Most were dumbfounded by the message, thinking it was a trap of some sort to use Equestria as a staging ground for a mass changeling invasion, and immediately demanded proof for the outrageous story. The negotiations took hours, though the delivery of the messages was instantaneous, the haggling and debate around the table on how to interpret each nations message and how to best convince them to stand down. Finally, though it had taken almost the entire day an agreement was made, and a meeting would soon be held in neutral territory, the dragon lands, between the Accord members to prove Equestria was not yet a hive of love sucking villainy and decide the final fate of the last changeling queen.
Only one nation still refused to attend, the Griffin Empire, going so far as to threaten the lives of the diplomats still within its borders if anyone attended the ‘cunning Changeling trap’. It made the immortal sun pony absolutely fume. It was a hostage situation, clear and simple. The greedy bastards had moved beyond plausible deniability and had moved straight into extortion, hinting at how they might release a few diplomats for more bits to gorge their silken purses.
The room was as tense as Celestia’s balled fists. Until a certain trouble making alien came crashing into the room before frantically shutting the door behind itself as though to bar the pursuit of some deadly creature.
The room fell awkwardly silent.
Tension soaked the air like a bucket from on high, the massive alien as big as a goddess tried in vain to shuffle his way out of the room as nonchalantly as one would expect when all eyes were upon him. Miserably. Then one of the nobles stood quickly bracing himself on the table with his hands as he proclaimed, “Milord Excalibur!” lord Fancy Pants proclaimed, “While I know you have already done us a great service might you-”
“Lord Fancy!” Blueblood interrupted, “might I remind you that we are lords of internal affairs, not military. If there is anything to request from this… this, creature, it must be from those within that station. …as is proper.”
Raven jumped in her seat slightly, the tall imposing warrior seeming to loom over her as he addressed the council, “Is something wrong?” his mechanical voice asked with clear concern. The alien turned to the princess, Raven’s eyes followed and beheld the angriest alicorn she had seen in all her years. Her rage bristled like a raging storm on the horizon, hairs on ends, feathers ruffled, muscles taught, but her eyes were the worst of it. Her ice filled stare glared daggers at the imposing destroyer of an entire army who was currently RIGHT BEHIND HER. Raven could feel the sweat trickle down her snout as two demigods of destruction spoke over her, one of whom looked about ready to kill the other.
The mechanical killer spoke first, “If there’s any-” “The griffons are exploiting the invasion and holding our diplomats hostage for money!” Raven blurted in a panic. Everypony’s eyes turned to the mare with a mixture of worry and scorn.
“This is my fault isn’t it?” the assassin stated. His words hung in the air like a noose, conflicting emotions holding each head of state’s tongue unmoved within their muzzle. The tense atmosphere was them broken by the uncharacteristically insensitive questioning of the highest authority in the land, “And what are you going to do about it?” The massive alabaster alicorn sneered with a tilt of her head, “Run all the way over to Griffinstone and mercilessly slaughter yet another species?”
“Well, he can’t exactly run the whole way… it is across the sea after all.” Raven added helpfully, though it did little to ease her monarch’s ire.
“If I may…” a gleeful chirp arose, his diamond blue avatar swiftly following his words. “What do you want you prattling ghost?” blueblood sniped at the tiny disturbance. “I aM Not a GhOsT! Uh...” Ordis corrected. “I am a ship Cephalon, I exist to serve the operator in all capacities for whatever mission they undertake. Including but not limited to, espionage, sabotage, extermination, excavation, defence, assassination, aaaaaaand Rescue!” the digitized servant turned to the little grey mare, “So if you have any information that would be useful to the successful collection of the targets in question, I would be most grateful.”
“So, you expect me to just let you run off and slaughter another sovereign nation?” the princess cut in.
To ravens surprise the giant not-unicorn kneeled to the alabaster alicorn and said in his oh so deep otherworldly voice, “By your command your majesty.”
The air hung with the tension of a thousand gallows now, everypony darting their eyes between the deadliest figure in recent history and the immortal royal he had just given permission to command him. The room was silent, nopony daring to move to breath for fear of breaking the royal from her thoughts as she assessed the offer before her.
Finally she spoke, “Very well alien, you may rescue my little ponies…” half the room breathed a sigh of relief while the rest bristled at the implication of her words. “But…” she continued, “you must not harm a single pony or griffon, if even a single death results from this mission you will be returned to your eternal slumber one way or another. Am I clear?”
The warrior was silent, his head still bowed before the sovereign of the sun.
“By your command.” He said, rising to his feet he gestured Raven to follow, “I will need your intel... miss?”
“Oh, uh… R-Raven sir, uh Raven Inkwell.” She sheepishly answered.
As the giant warrior leads the shaking secretary out into a separate room for the briefing, she looks back through the closing door to the steeling gaze of her boss following her out, the gears turning behind her eyes.
***
Hours later the newly crowned Prince Shining Armour stood with his boss Princess Celestia at a large palace window watching the mysterious swordsman walk along the castles far most wall still conversing with his smaller bluer half. The once motherly and warm sovereign gazed at the prince’s alien savior like a windigo sizing up a potential prey. In total and uncomfortable silence they spied until, “Princess,” shining began, “What is it that upsets you?”
The alicorn remained silent.
“Is it his power? Chrysalis? I… I don’t understand.” The new prince’s tone growing more confrontational with every passing syllable.
“My mood is not your place to assess guard captain.”
The use of his former title did not escape the stallion, a minor slight meant to remind him of his station beneath his ruler. But still he pressed on.
“That colt saved my wife, saved my sister, saved everybody with but a single sword! Everything he has done has been to help us, though he’s only been awake a few days he’s already offered to help rescue our people yet again.” The prince drew in an exasperated breath, “does that not earn him at least some benefit of the doubt?”
“A single sword…” she muttered, “Suppose he has friends? Suppose they wish to hurt our people?” Celestia continued, “and suppose some of them are stronger than even he with secret powers we cannot counter? Do you think any of us could beat him?” she clasped her hands behind her, returning her attention from the stallion to once again focus on the swordsman. “Suppose we have merely traded one villain from another…”
As the blue spectre dissipated from the alien’s palm and eruption sounded from the mountain. A metallic firework, glinting in the midday sun racing across the sky towards Excalibur. Running to meet the projectile the metal unicorn met the unknown thing midair in a perfectly timed jump revealing the object to be a set of great metallic wings. With his new appendages equipped he flew off into the distance, at times moving with such velocity as to blink across large sections of air in an instant.
“Find out where that thing came from and dig it out. I want to know exactly what else that thing has up its sleeve.” The princess barked forcefully.
The prince bowed and moved to the door to complete his task. “Y’know princess back when I was a guard captain, a superior once told my that; ‘supposition is proof of a wild imagination, nothing more.’ …By your leave majesty.”
Shining Armour bowed and exited, leaving the immortal alone to her thoughts.
Author's Note
phew, this uh... took an embarrassingly long time. i mean at the beginning it was understandable as i had to keep glancing back at the first story to remind myself of all the little details like characters height and such. but then my school assignments had a lot more essay writing involved than i initially calculated and the very thought of looking at a word document when i didn't began physically exhausting after a time.
like at first it was a form of escapism to hide away from my report on Lincolns secret obsession with vampire murder to type about cute pony antics but eventually the "Rigid" plot i had for this thing became restricting.
maybe i should make an anthology thing? just something to dump random ideas into for fun. i dunno let me know if that's something you'd want to see.
also let me know what you think of the dialogue in this one, i lost count of how many times i had to redo every conversation trying to get it right, and i'm not completely convinced i did.
either way, welcome back and happy (late) new year!
Ch2. On a Mission from Celestia pt-2
The land flew like a waterfall, rocks, trees, country farms, towns, cities, whole forests and mountains blurred together beneath the human’s flight. Evan however was much to busy to truly appreciate this fact as he zoomed and glided around the various shapes of cloud, darting between each fluffy white formation and straight boosting through the more substantial masses. His non-existent lungs where a chorus of ‘yahoo!’ and ‘wheeeee!’ reverberating around his now titanium laced skull with each new maneuver, teleport, and barrel role.
This was the most exalted, pure, highest, feeling of Freedom he had ever felt before in his life. While Archwing had been at best a glorified taxi service and at worst a frustratingly restrictive game type before, here it was extraordinary! The wind! The air! The mountains! The sea!
Blinking and accelerating around the sky like an immortal Icarus, he soured high beyond the clouds until the onboard systems screamed at him to turn around or face the fires of out of atmospheric transition. Then dipped at frightening speed, enough to snap the neck of any other mortal creature, to bring himself near level with the writhing blue beneath him. his hand hovering above the water just so, until finally cutting into it with all the delicacy of a preschooler, laughing as he admired the light of the planets false sun dancing between the droplets of spraying wet.
Before long that mesmerizing play of light and matter ceased, as the manufactured day gave itself to the shroud of night lit only by a lesser but same fabrication. All around him now was dark sky above a darker infinite sea.
The distant lights of a foreign harbour twinkled in the distance, drawing in the former humans most simple of instincts for warmth and company, but he fought these urges. Whatever grade of telescopes the harbour masters possess was probably not advanced enough to discern him at this distance, yet. He stopped his acceleration and afforded himself a moment of quiet reflection, they would be expecting him he reasoned. Or at least some kind of response from the Equestrian nation in the form of a boat of troops or delegates, they didn’t know about him yet. He began to drift to the side guiding himself along the waters surface, keeping the light of the griffon capital always in his sight, gliding to somewhere along a quieter section of shore to make his infiltration without spoiling the surprise.
The motion was slow going, Evan’s mind drifting in its own dark sea of thought, ‘So here I am, alone. A not-human, under a not-moon staring at the lights of a none-too-safe harbour.’ His “mouth” made an announcement of something resembling a long heavy sigh. ‘I still don’t know what exactly this planet even is, hell! It might be flat for all I know!’ the systems maintained a steady course as their users gaze drifted to the distant stars, his sensors marking them as irrelevant distractions and nothing more. ‘I don’t know where the hell I am, or if I even can get home from here. This dimension, this future, this whateverthefuckidontgiveashitfeverdream!’
He writhed uselessly in his flight harness, like a fussing infant trying to escape the protection of its parents’ carrier. Until finally he stopped, the harbour lights now hidden behind the rock of a cove that he had drifted into, he was too tired to thrash and wallow anymore. The trees swallowed the sky and silenced the light and worry of distant worlds. Evan reminded himself of his errand, why he was there. ‘this was my fault.’ he thought privately, Ordis left utterly unaware of his master’s inner turmoil. ‘my actions put these natives in danger, while I cannot repair whatever great cosmic error has led me here, I can fix this.’ He released the Archwing from his back, falling to the soft sand coated shore as the mechanism faded back to its voidspace holding.
“Operator are you alright?” Ordis materialized suddenly, his once cheery glow now muted in worry as he ran scan after scan to explain the tenno’s earlier fit. ‘fine Ordis’ Evan lied, ‘pre mission jitters is all, lets get going.’ There was still much to plan and prepare. The mechanized humanoid puffed out its chest, resolute, marching to the nearby woods and began to make his way towards the city.
***
“Eeep!” the Princess of love winced in pain, setting her just-a-bit-too-hot-for-now tea to her side the pink alicorn returned her attention to the evening paper before her. It hadn’t even been a full day since her wedding anniversary was made to pull double duty as the same anniversary of the day canterlot was invaded/became a slaughtering house for that same invading army, and she was already behind on the news. Naturally she had a reasonable excuse this time, she was consummating her marriage after all, and what with the very recent threat to their lives sending their biological imperatives into overdrive the newly wedded couple hadn’t really seen any reason to… detach any time soon that morning. Cadance might not have let shining get up to attend his morning duties at all if her dear husband hadn’t bucked her brains out of her head for a good few hours. A slight smile graced her lips at that thought, ‘husband’ she repeated in her mind. They were together now, forever and always, and nothing would ever threaten that union again so help her!
The alicorns eyes drifted across the alchemist’s section, some drivel about the ecological sector getting pissy about their continued denial of access to the changeling husks for "research purposes". Though for what she couldn’t’ imagine, something about the chemical composition of changeling goo or sap or something, she wasn’t really paying attention.
Something was missing.
Shining was still finishing up his duties, handing over control of the entire palace guard to its new captain, but he would be joining her soon enough. That wasn’t it. Twilight was apparently still chewing out her friends for doubting her, if the sporadic increases of volume from across the palace where anything to go by. She wasn’t lonely, had nothing to worry about now that the threat had… deceased.
It was something in the air she realized the millisecond of hesitation in the servant’s movements when he had brought and poured her tea. Glancing around the corner of an open door the pink bride watched a maid over fluff a pillow and readjust its position for what must have been the millionth time, before finally moving on to repeat the process on some other menial chore. The staff was uncharacteristically restless, something in the air was wrong.
She picked up her tea again, blowing on it this time to make sure the temperature was suitable, stopping just short of bringing the fruity warm deliciousness to her lips at long last, when it hit her. “Wait…” she said to nopony in particular, “where’s Excalibur?”
The doors on the far end of the room gracefully, almost mechanically, swung wide. In stepped no other than the highest pony of the land, if not the whole world, her hands searching across her heavens shaped body adjusting a dress older than most definitions of fashion into just the perfect arrangement so as not to uncomfortably pull at her fur. It was a militaristic style ballgown of sorts, the colors of the equestrian flag danced in exquisite lines down the double buttoned top down into the flowing curtain of fabric around her legs, a tiny mostly indiscernible seem around the head of the flowing flourish to indicate it was removable and quickly if necessary. A pair of more combat suitable pants no doubt waiting beneath. But of course, being pretty wasn’t its only function, gold tassels on the shoulders each containing a minute gold charm laced thick with protective magic swayed lazily in the air with her every movement. It wasn’t just a pretty dress no, like usual, everything Celestia did had some hidden double meaning or purpose. This was a statement. One of military prowess and strength.
It worried Cadance.
“um… auntie are we at war?”
The eldest diarchy’s response was as casual as it was foreboding, “Not yet.” She mumbled, almost absentmindedly, before her eyes widened and she turned to the pink alicorn with a notice in her eye of what she had just so errantly implied, “its just for show niece. I must speak with our neighboring nations, in pony, and assure them that we are not all currently enslaved beneath a ludicrous deception of Chrysalis’s dark weaving.”
“Oh.” A pang of guilt leapt into Cadance’s chest, sure the bug queen had endangered HER shining, and assaulted HER wedding, but… to lose her entire hive, possibly her whole race, in that action… it was hard for the compassionate princess of affection to not feel some measure of sympathy for one who had suffered so. Even if she was her enemy. but while her heart sat heavy with the weight of that consequence it led her back to her original thought before her aunt’s appearance.
“say Auntie,” she asked, “have you seen Excalibur? I haven’t seen him since the wedding.”
“He’s away.” Celestia answered, much too slowly for Cadances taste, “On something of an errand for me, some ambassadors went missing just around the time of the invasion and he suspected there might be more changelings somewhere behind this, so I gave him permission to investigate.”
She answered, “Oh… that makes sense.”
“oh and It probably goes without saying but don’t bother shining too much today, I’ve placed him in charge of the excavation of the alien craft, and I think our helpful guest would be most pleased to return with his fully restored vessel as a little thank you.” She glanced at the clock, “I must be going farewell niece.”
The white alicorn left the pink one where she sat a stew in her thoughts. Something was not right with Celestia just now, she felt. ‘and why would an alien take an interest in some random ambassadors, and why suspect more changelings afoot?’ Cadance thought to herself, unconvinced of the explanation given.
Something was not right at all, and just as sure as she had been to sense the feelings from one uncommunicative love bird to another, she knew there lay a pit of unspoken something in Celestia’s words that said far more than was actually spoke, an unsaid motive, but why?
Celestia, High Princess of her race, Diarch of the nation, Goddess of the sun, Immortal warrior, kind, gentle, loving, accepting, awesome and powerful, Celestia… was lying to her.
Author's Note
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