Old Wounds

Canterlot Medical Center, Day 2
1:00PM Local Time
Dawn

When my father had said that somepony had to go to the hospital with Cosmo and his team, there were certainly volunteers from members of the Guard. Me? Well after some quick assessments that yes, I was in fact recognized as a Princess, I did the only thing that could come to mind.

I pulled rank.

While just about the entire cadre of guards looked confused, I got the impression from my father’s knowing nod of approval that at least he understood to an extent. The reality of my decision was simple. Out of all the living beings that I had met after leaving Faust, Cosmo and his cadre were the first that didn’t try to kill me. They recognized that De Witt and his cronies had done a number on me, and they didn’t care who I was or how I was in Palas. They just helped me out of the goodness of their hearts. And to me that’s worth more than I could ever hope to repay, so watching out for their collective wellbeing would have to do for now…

Or maybe longer? Hell if I know. All I know for sure is that you’d have to kill me to get me to leave this hospital right now. Phalanx sure as hell knew it. While he basically got out of this whole ordeal unscathed because he was running the back end of Polaris’ jaunt into the catacombs, he still fell under my umbrella of care. But when he suggested that he could watch out for Polaris, I might have gone a bit overboard with my response.

“Do you have a siege mortar? Because blasting me in the face with one will at least get me out of here until I drag myself out of the crater and come back.”

Yeah… Overboard. I might have to answer to that later, but right now I don’t care in the slightest. Cosmo had been discharged around an hour and a half ago on account of rather minor injuries. He was followed half an hour later by his half-brother, now sporting a pointed scar across his left eye.

Thankfully his eye was undamaged by the blow that left the scar. But that didn’t go for the rest of his body. Under the clean shirt and pants were roughly forty separate lacerations, all but one of which had been dug at with blunt instruments. Lucky none were more than a half an inch deep, but all had been showing signs of contamination, requiring them to be opened, cleaned and examined before being stitched closed.

As for Cloud Runner and Sky, we only had heard that Cloud’s wings had been dislocated. Sky was another matter. She had gone into shock almost immediately, something that was unsurprising when a limb was forcibly removed. But what the doctors did tell us is that they had to call in a trauma expert, as they had nopony on staff that could remotely come close to properly treating her wounds and try to reattach her severed wing. And that wing was on all of our minds. The doctor had said it was a fifty-fifty chance that it could successfully be reattached. Beyond that? No guarantees in the slightest.

Suddenly the doors to the waiting room swung open, and out stepped a pearl colored pony in bloody blue scrubs. “Well, she’s in recovery now.” Constellation said as she pulled her mask off.

Cosmo admittedly looked surprised to see his mother standing there, but I doubt that it really mattered. Having been under the mare’s care myself I knew that she was skilled. “How is she?” he asked.

Constellation sat down in one of the leather chairs opposite of us and hung her head. “I’m just going to say it. I doubt that Sky will ever fly again.” When the older mare’s head came up, I saw the red eyes and tear trickling down her muzzle. “The cut was far from a clean cut. We’ve fused the bone fine, but the nerves, tendons and muscles are another matter. The tendons and muscles were basically chewed up at the point of the cut on down. Reconnecting the nerves was easy enough, but when I ran tests to search for nerve activity, I was only getting about fifty percent of the nerve cells in the severed wing firing and responding consistently.”

The reaction amongst the colts sitting with me was near universal. Dejection, sadness, depression.

But Storm Cloud stood out. He angry. That much was clear when he rose from his chair, tossing the small coffee table that sat in the center of the sitting area like it was a ragdoll. “Storm… This isn’t your fault.” Cosmo croaked out.

“Does it fucking matter?!” Storm yelled, an odd looking golden coated earth pony on the other side of the room watching the spectacle intently. “We walked right into a trap. You know it, I know it, hell Luna knows it! De Witt made it damn clear that he managed to play a god damn master of dream magic! Not only that, but he had been playing us for four god damn years! We’re a collective fucking joke!”

At that moment Constellation rose from her chair, strode over to Storm Cloud and smacked him so hard across the face, that the sound of the smack must’ve broken the sound barrier. “You are not a joke! You can’t hope to do anything if you don’t know the game you’re supposed to be playing! So quit the ‘woe is me’ attitude. It’s not going to help you, and it sure as hell isn’t going to help anypony else right now. So buck up, because if you’re talking like that when Sky wakes up, then so help me I’ll beat you senseless!”

So… That’s Constellation when she’s pissed off? OK, I’ll just make a mental note to avoid pissing her off. But at that moment, a nurse stuck her through the double doors to the waiting room. “Doctor Constellation? Your patient is waking up.”

That seemed to calm Constellation down. “Alright, let’s go. Dawn, you want to come?”

I glanced over at the pony that had watched the whole affair. “Give me a minute, I’ll catch up.” It was clear by the rapid departure that nopony else in the group had noticed our observer. I didn’t even have to get up from my chair before she slipped in behind the departing group and grabbed the chair that Constellation had occupied. “So how’s Sky?” The mare asked.

Well she’s direct, I’ll give her that. “And who are you?”

The mare looked at me like I had two heads for a moment before she seemed to come across a moment of understanding. “Oh that’s right, we still haven’t met. Name’s Archer. I’m the one who was at the stick on 201 yesterday.”

Now the voice immediately connected to the back and forth I had heard over the airship’s intercom. “So… How long have you known Constellation?”

“Jeez, eight years now. Met her right after Cosmo joined the Marines. Go figure, we met because I broke my leg falling down some stairs at Vanhoover Tech, and she just happened to watch my less than gymnastic approach to creating a compound fracture.”

“Ouch…” I observed, noting the small scar that was slightly hidden by the outside of her left boot. “So… Do colts find scars attractive?” I asked, trying to make as polite conversation as I could. Frankly I was probably risking making myself look like a fool, but I didn’t know what else to say.

But Archer just chuckled. “Yeah I’ve gotten the occasional glance at the beach, but it’s not hurting my bikini looks so I could care less. Anyway, back to my question… How’s Sky?”

“Constellation doesn’t think she’ll ever fly again.” I said, feeling somewhat guilty at the thought that I could’ve been down in the catacombs sooner.

But Archer roller her eyes and pulled something out from under her jacket. It was low profile, and looked almost like a scale down version of the fans that were on the airship. “I’ve told her once, hell I’ve told Conny a million times. She’s got the best damn engineer in the country on her payroll. And I’m certain I can tweak this here jump pack for constant thrust without much issue. Ain’t gonna be near the same as proper wing flaps and the like, but at least Sky won’t be grounded. Problem is I need to figure out the power supply…”

Admittedly I don’t know why Archer was already digging out some sort of contraption, but she definitely had my interest. “What’s the power issue?”

“Simple, longevity.” Archer explained. “That’s why this is only a jump pack. I can get four ten second bursts before the power cell runs out and needs a recharge. What I need is some sort of self regenerating energy crystal. Problem is finding one that can use a pegasi’s latent magical abilities to fuel it.”

“So like the Crystal Heart, but instead of cumulative positive emotions in it’s proximity you’d need to tap an individual’s own magical potential in such a way that it doesn’t drain them dry.” I thought back to one of the earliest lessons with Faust on just how the Crystal Heart was made, including all of the magical formula. Part of that formula was the source energy equation, which she had specifically said was possible to replace if you could determine the replacement equation and adjust the intake governor matrix to account for the difference in energy intake. “What if I told you I’ve got most of the equations to make a crystal like what’s needed?”

Archer stopped dead, stared at me for a moment, before finally cocking an eyebrow. “You mind telling me how you’ve got that?”

“Well, Faust taught me the complete set of equations to how the Crystal Heart was created and how it functions. And she showed me what parts of the matrix would need replacement and calibration for repurposing the magic for something else.” I suddenly realized that Archer looked even more confused. “What’s wrong?”

“You do realize that you’re turning the historical record on it’s head, right? The Crystal Heart was thought to be a fluke of nature.” Archer retorted.

“Like hell it is. It was an experiment in energy storage.” I suddenly realized that with my tidbits of knowledge, and the clear lack of corresponding knowledge on Archer’s part, Equestrian History was certainly far off the mark. “OK, remind me to make a list of all these important historical tidbits that Faust has taught me. Because I’m getting the impression that the few bits of pre-historical information she’s taught me might make most historians change their careers in shame.”

Archer paused, but her facial expression once again changed. This time to absolute determination. “Obviously we’d have a lot of experimenting to do, but you think that we can make this work?”

“Well, yeah, given the time and effort. The magical source matrix won’t be the issue, but adjusting the governor intake will take some time. And frankly I’d have to be the one to test it because I’ve got the magical reserves. Devise some measuring matrixes and we can determine the exact rate of absorption-”

Archer suddenly rose from her chair, grabbed my arm and dragged me to the double doors. “Then we’ve got to tell them!”

I tried to pull back, but Archer’s status as an earth pony should’ve been the dead giveaway that she had some serious strength behind her. “Hold on, we could easily be a year away from a working crystal.”

“And I’m not going to sugar coat it either.” Archer retorted. “This might not work at all at the end of the day, but right now this is hope. Hope that nopony in there probably has right now.”

We must’ve moved faster than I thought, and Archer clearly knew where to go, because as we rounded the corner the first door on the right was her target. Running with hands full on the fly, the mare just lifted her right boot high, swung down to catch the handle, and pushed it open.

To say that the room felt bleak was an understatement. Sky was sitting on the side of the bed, with everypony else crowding around the room, trying to give Constellation room while she did her exams on the reattached wing. The atmosphere just felt down right depressing and bleak. “So… I found Archer.” I said as Constellation glanced up at us.

“I thought that you would’ve been outlining the repair and refit schedule.” Constellation observed, not looking up from Sky’s back.

“Please, I was done with that by breakfast.” Archer replied. “Look, I had an idea after I heard what happened down in the catacombs, so I broke out an old prototype.” She said, holding up the jump pack.

Constellation looked over Sky’s left shoulder and furrowed her brow. “Archer, what’s the jump pack going to help with?”

“Simple, if I get the power situation dealt with it’ll be a thrust pack that recharges using Sky’s latent magical potential.” Archer retorted, looking quite triumphant.

“You do realize that what you’re suggesting is entirely theoretical?” Cosmo said from his chair opposite of the door.

“It’s not, I’ve got the equations from the Crystal Heart’s creation and know what we have to modify to make a working spell matrix.” I said, cutting in before Archer could retort. “I’ll be honest, I don’t know long it’ll take, but right now there’s nothing in front of me that says that the proper spell matrix can’t be created and imprinted on a suitable crystal.”

The whole room went silent, and I could feel the glares of most everypony in the room burrowing into my skull. It felt like judgement was being passed, to be totally honest. “You’d do that for me?” Sky finally asked, breaking the silence.

I just nodded. “I’d do it for anypony in this room. I owe you all at least that much if not more.”

As the room fell silent once more, Sky immediately rose from the bed and stumbled over to me. She just stared at me, her eyes red and tears welling before she jumped and wrapped me into one hell of a bear hug. “You’re a damn saint Dawn.” The mare sobbed out. “Thank you for stepping up to try.” She said as she let me go.

As Sky stumbled back to the bed, Constellations expression turned to something I would describe as sheer pride. “You ain’t gonna be able to do it alone kid. Just because you’re an alicorn doesn’t mean you can do crazy mage level stuff solo, so I’ll make some calls and get you a staff put together. If this pans out, you’d be helping far more than just Sky.”

As the looks around the room turned from sorrow to hope, two feelings washed over me. The first happiness. The fact is these ponies were at least hopeful that I might be able to help, and that was one hell of a good feeling. But that conflicted with a polar opposite emotion. Fear. Pure, unbridled fear. And I knew exactly why I was scared.

Because I’m afraid to fail.