Crystal Blood

Crystal Blood Part 1: Discovery

Crystal Empire, Day -1

Doctor Emerald

“Bang, bang, bang!” the sounds of hoofs slamming against wood was enough to drive Doctor Emerald insane, let alone wake her from her shallow slumber.

“The Tartarus?” the young earth pony coughed as she rolled out of bed and onto a pile of research papers. She lifted her hoof onto her nightstand and pulled herself up. “Who’s got the nerve to knock on my door in the middle of the night!” the doctor thought to herself as she fixed her green mane and grabbed the satchel that was fixed to her bed rest. She had had a rough day studying all of the gems in the Crystal Empire and just wanted to sleep.

As Emerald collected her things, another salvo of bangs rang out from her hotel door. This time, the noise was followed by a stallion's shout. “Doctor Emerald! Open up!”

“Sweet Celestia!” the mare shouted with a yawn as she approached the door. “Give me a damn minute!”

The banging halted as the doctor wrapped her forearm around the doorknob and complained. “Seriously, who knocks on a sleep deprived researcher who’s just trying to hit the hay-” the doctor froze as she swung the door open.

Two guards in Crystal Empire gear stood in the doorframe. A carriage was parked directly behind them. One of the guards, a unicorn, used his magic to pull a scroll from his pocket.

“Yup, this is her,” the guards replied as he dropped the scroll, revealing a simplified sketched of her cutie mark: which was a simple crystal.

The mare gulped. “Uhm…am I in trouble?” she asked with trembling hoofs.

The other guard appeared to hide a smirk.

“Is something funny?” Emerald replied.

“No,” the guard replied apologetically. “It’s just that you are not the first person to ask us that tonight.”

“Not the first? Are you pranking other tired ponies tonight?”

“I wish it was that simple,” the first guard replied. “Unfortunately we have been sent on official business from the Crystal Empire. You, and a few others, have been requested to come to the palace immediately. You will be compensated for your time, of course.”

Emerald stumbled back in confusion. Her mind raced. “Why?”

“Unfortunately, that is classified at the moment. You can either accept or decline your offer and we will be out of your mane and on our way.”

The scientific, curious side of Emerald tingled. “What do they want at this hour of the night? I guess there's only one way to find out.” she thought to herself. “Fine, I’ll come. This better be important.”

The two guards looked at each other with worried expressions. “For your sake, lets hope its not,” the smirking guard replied as the two went back to the carriage and strapped themselves to the front.

Emerald hopped aboard and climbed into the passenger compartment, where she was surprised to find two other ponies in the same predicament she was in. “Uh…hello. Did they also wake you guys up?” Emerald half joked as the carriage accelerated at a breakneck pace and threw her into a seat.

The guards did not even wait for her to get her seatbelt on.

A crystal pony chuckled. “You can say that. What’s your name?” she questioned.

“Emerald, I’m a gemstone researcher from the University of Manehattan.”

An orange stallion with yellow hair and an amber cutie mark spoke up. “The names Professor Jewels, I’m from the Canterlot Academy for Geological studies.”

The crystal pony with a white coat, spoke up. “I’m Jeweled Beads. I teach a class here at the Crystal Empire's university on gemstones. I see we all have similar skill sets.”

“About that, do you guys know why the Crystal Empire wants us?” Emerald replied.

“Your guess is as good as mine. Those guards told me nothing.” Professor Jewels explained.

“Same here. But they made it seem important,” Jeweled Beads replied.

“Important my flank!” Professor Jewel responded. “We are in the Crystal Empire aren't we? Shouldn’t they have their own gemstone experts to wake up in the middle of the night? Why do they need us?”

The carriage began to slow down before eventually grinding to a halt.

“We’re here!” One of the guards shouted and opened the carriage door.

“I guess it's time to find out,” Emerald replied as she stepped out of the carriage before almost fainting. “Woah,” she whispered as she observed the area. The carriage had been parked directly under the Crystal Castle and next to the Crystal Heart. An entire division of guards had been placed around the castle like a giant, shining fence.

“What are they guarding?” Emerald asked.

The guards that had driven her there did not respond.

“Let me guess? Classified?”

The guards nodded in response as they lead the party of scientist to one of the corners of the Crystal Castle.

“Wait, are we going into the Crystal Castle?!” Jeweled Beads exclaimed. “I can’t wait!”

“We’re not tourist,” Professor Jewels replied cynically as the group made their way to the Crystal Castle’s entrance.

“The professor is correct,” One of the guards replied. “This will not be a vacation. You will each be tasks with the study and retrieval of the items we are about to show you. There will be no gandering. Besides, you won’t be going into the castle.”

Emerald went quiet as she pondered the guards' words. Then, she looked around in awe of the massive, light blue crystal that filled her with love and confidence, despite the circumstances.

The guards halted in front of one of the four staircases. A large construction tarp had been
placed in front of it.

“Uhm, it looks like we can’t go this way,” Professor Jewels noted.

The guards paid no attention to the professor, much to his dismay, and pushed through the tarp. “Follow us and be careful, there's a lot of debris you need to watch out for.”

Emerald carefully passed the tarp before gasping. “Who did this?”

The staircase that led to the top of the Crystal Castle had collapsed, revealing a large crack in the floor that extended downward like an abandoned staircase. A line of hastily placed torches lit the way down.

“No pony did anything. These stairs were due for maintenance, when some construction ponies began their work, they found this secret entrance,” the guard replied as he stuck his snout down the staircase and screamed. “Commander, are we clear for entry?”

“Come on ahead!” a handsome sounding stallion’s voice echoed from the unseeable bottom of the stairs.

The guards marched and the scientist followed.

Emerald looked down the obsidian black staircase and the walls which were covered in black crystals that stabbed into the air at odd angles. It was a scene that was familiar to the mare. “This architecture just screams King Sombra, don’t you think?”

Jeweled Beads shivered. “I was thinking the exact same thing. This must be one of his secret rooms that he used in the old days, but I thought Princess Twilight Sparkle uncovered them all. I’m surprised this room lasted as long as it did.”

Emerald whispered out of earshot of the guards. “You don’t think what is down here has anything to do with such an evil monster?”

Jeweled Beads started to tremble and her crystal coat dulled. “I hope not. He wanted the entire realm to suffer under his rule. He could have any number of evil objects in these catacombs.”

Emerald bit her lip nervously as she stood in the silhouettes of the guards that escorted her. “It would have been nice if the guards told me I was going to be dragged into Sombra's personal dungeons,” she thought to herself.

The staircase got wider as the party approached the ground. The sounds of mining equipment slamming against crystal and the huffs of ponies echoed up the stairs. The sounds got louder and louder with each step until Emerald was sure that she was almost at the bottom.

The guards stepped off the stairs and went to the side, allowing for Emerald to finally learn why she had been brought here.

“Woah…” Emerald gasped as she laid eyes on the sight before her.

A room, the size of a large buckball field was laid out in front of her. At least a dozen or so blood red, pony sized crystals were spread out evenly across the floor. Something about the crystals did not sit well with the doctor. They did not look like anything she had seen before. The crystals had sections that reached out in random directions like an octopus’ tentacles that attempted to grasp at the air around them. Each tentacle ended with a large spike. Additional spiked crystal formations spread across the floor like roots.

The crystal closest to the stairs had been hacked out the ground with pickaxes and loaded onto a sled to be pulled up to the surface.

A wooden crane had been hastily constructed out of pulleys and was being used to lift and second crystal off the ground. A team of ponies worked to slowly maneuver the crystal towards a second sled.

At least fifty royal guards could be seen assisting with the excavation. About a handful of additional scientists were with them too. Many of them, despite wearing protective armor, had minor cuts on their legs from the jagged crystals.

“Why don’t you guys just teleport the crystal upstairs?” Emerald asked.

“You don’t think we tried that?” one of the guards replied like he was offended. “Some our best magic users attempted to teleport the crystals to the surface, unfortunately, the crystals appear to have some sort of immunity to teleportation spells, none of the spells worked.”

“Interesting,” Emerald pondered as she watched two large stallions struggle to bring a sled and its crystal contents up the stairs. One almost lost his grip and dropped the sled, but was able to catch it before anything catastrophic happened.

Emerald was careful not to cut herself on any of the crystal shavings that littered the floor. Despite her fears, Emerald's curious side motioned her closer to the peculiar structures. “What are you?” she questioned as she looked deeply into the clouded, red mysteries. She could see her distorted reflection in the crystals.

The reflection of a white unicorn with blue hair appeared behind Emeralds.

“That’s for you to find out,” the unicorn replied in the same handsome voice she had heard at the top of the steps.

Emerald turned around and was face to face with Shining Armour, Princess Cadance’shusband and captain of the royal guards. Emerald gasped and bowed.

Shiny Armour reached his hoof out and pulled Emerald to her feet. “I appreciate your respect, but we do not have time for formalities,” Shining Armour replied with a charming smile.

“Yes, of course,” Emerald replied, embarrassed.

The other researchers crowded around Shining Armour in awe.

“You must be the other researchers. The Crystal Empire is honored to have your minds with us tonight.”

“The honor is all ours, your highness, but I don’t know if we can help you, I’ve never seen anything like this. The origins and shapes of these crystals appear…unnatural,” Emerald replied.

“Nonsense!” Professor Jewels exclaimed as he pulled a microscope and hammer out of his travel satchel. The professor hacked off a piece of crystal and took a few minutes to prepare a sample for his microscope, then a few more minutes to adjust the many settings of his device.

Emerald stood to the side as she twiddled her hooves next to Shining Armour. A combination of nerves and excitement caused her to rock back and forth in anticipation as the orange and yellow pony took his time in examining the specimen.

“By Celestia’s light!” the professor finally exclaimed with a fearful expression.

“Wait, what is it?” Shining Armour asked.

Emerald stood up in anticipation. “Yeah?” she replied.

“No, no, no. That can’t be right,” Professor Jewel muttered to himself.

“What is it?” Emerald responded, eagerly. “Tell us!”

Professor Jewel continued to hog the microscope as he adjective it’s settings while muttering to himself. He began to sweat.

“I can't take this guy anymore,” Emerald thought to herself as she pushed the professor to the side and swiped his microscope.

“Hey, you better not break that! Do you know how many bits it cost me to get a microscope that is both powerful and compact?” Professor Jewel whined.

Emerald ignored the stallion as she readjusted the microscope and stared at the crystal below her. At first, all she could see was a bright red haze. Emerald adjusted the microscope and was finally able to get a clear image.

She gasped.

“I see why you were so shocked, Professor Jewels,” Emerald replied.

The crystal structure was nothing like anything she had seen in a crystal before. However, it was not unfamiliar. Emerald could see hundreds of round, dark red, tightly packed particles that were stuck together. Somewhere small and compact, others looked like they were in the process of splitting in half. Almost all of them had a strange dark spot in their center and were unmoving.

Emerald had taken a biology class years ago when she was still in school. She had looked at blood under a microscope once to view and understand the cell structure better. The image she was looking at under the microscope was almost identical to the collection of red blood cells that she had observed all those years ago.
“These crystals have cells,” Emerald concluded.

“Impossible,” Shining Armour replied. “These are crystals, not animals.”

“With all due respect, you asked for my opinion on this issue, and I have concluded that these crystals have some sort of organic origins,” Emerald replied as Professor Jewels furiously took his microscope back.

Shining Armour took one look back at the blood colored crystals. His demeanor had changed from charming and welcoming to secluded and pondering. He looked at the crystals like they were puddles of blood. “Cadance, you might want to get over here,” the stallion shouted across the room.

The majestic sounds of wings flapping captured Emerald attention. The mare turned to see the Princess of Love floating across the room while being flanked by two elderly mares who carried a pile of books.

Emerald had seen the two elderly mares before and recognised them as the local librarian, Amethyst Maresbury, and the legendary unicorn sorceress, Mistmane.

She was now even more starstruck.

“Yes?” Cadance replied, her eyelids wrinkled from a lack of sleep.

“We might have found something,” Shining Armour announced as he looked down to Emerald.

“Uhm, yes, your highness,” Emerald stuttered. “I believe that these crystals have some sort of organic origin. They appear to be made up of blood cells, like a ponies body.”

Cadance looked just as surprised as Emerald. “Blood cells? That certainly is a new theory,” she pondered. “Mistmane? Amethyst? What do you two think?”

Amethyst flipped through an old encyclopedia on gemstones before closing the book and dropping it to her side. “I’ve been looking through the olden tomes in the library for hours and I haven’t found anything on living crystals.”

“I also have never seen anything like this, either a thousand years ago or today,” Mistmane added.

Professor Jewels pushed his way past Emerald and scoffed. “Do not worry your highness, I am also skeptical of Doctor Emerald's claims. There must be some sort of reasonable explanation for these crystal formations then them being made out of blood. There is no way an organic material like this would be able to last so long down here. If I could get a better look at these crystals at my lab in Canterlot I could figure out their secret.”

“With all due respect,” Emerald began. “We can all see the cells under the microscope. The secret is looking us right in the face!”

“Oh please, your just some filly who’s seeing monsters in her closet right where a coat hanger is located,” the professor snapped back.

Emerald poked her snout between Professor Jewel's eyes. “I’m not seeing things, you're just in denial. And I bet that if I get a sample back to my lab, I would be able to prove that!”

The two ponies growled before Shining Armour stood between them. “I believe that we have come to an agreement,” the stallion sternly interjected.

“And that is?” Professor Jewels asked.

“You two both want to take a sample back to your labs, right?” Cadance replied as she used her magic to slam a pickaxe into the nearest crystal. Three hoove-sized pieces broke off along with tiny crystal particles. Cadance wrapped each chunk into separate bags and floated them over to the three researchers. “Here you go, Mrs. Emerald will take a sample back to her lab in Manhattan, Mr. Jewel will go back to his in Canterlot, and Jeweled Beads will stay here in the Crystal Empire. Hopefully one of you will be able to use your unique tools and skills to figure out these crystals,” the princess eloquently explained like a diplomat.

“Great,” Professor Jewels replied as he pocketed the crystal. “My people at Canterlot will solve this crystal problem for you in no time, your highness.”

“Not if I beat you to it,” Emerald replied while Jeweled Beads just sat and watched the argument in an awkward silence.

Emerald went to pocket the crystal, only for a sharp pain to run through her hoove. She winced. The doctor squealed in pain as she looked down at her hoove. The bag that the crystal was stored and had torn open and the crystal inside had pricked her.

Blood, the exact same shade of red as the crystal, flowed from Emerald.

Cadance's eyes widened as she gasped and cast a healing spell. “Careful! these crystals are unusually sharp. Many of the guards have pricked themselves just by brushing up against them.”

The pain in Emerald’s hoove faded as her small cut was magically sealed shut.

Emerald pocketed the Crystal and did not think too much about the injury. “Thank you, your highness, I will not fail you.”

Cadance flashed a calming smile. “Don’t fret, I trust each and every one of you. And you can just call me Cadance,” the princess added with a chuckle.

Emerald chuckled too, though her nerves were still not healed. Her mind raced with hypotheses.

Shiny Armour pointed to the exit where two guards were still attempting to haul a massive crystal up the steps, more guards rushed to their aid. “You better get going. Time is of the essence.”

Professor Jewels lead the way as Emerald, Jeweled Beads, Mistmane, and Amethyst followed. He stopped at the foot of the stairs and waited for the guards to move the sled covered crystal that blood their way. “Those brutes better hurry,” he snarled as he watched the stallions struggle.

Emerald felt the urge to buck the professor in the back of his head, but restrained herself.

She looked back up at the struggling stallions and contemplated offering a helping hoof. As she did, a crisp snapping sound echoed throughout the enclosed room.

“The crystal snapped the ropes! It's going to fall” one of the sled ponies warned, his tone urgent.

The crystal began to slowly slip out of the sled's restraints and fall onto the stairs. More and more ropes snapped as the crystal ran up against them.

The guards who were on the floor shouted for help and ran to hold the crystal in place.

“Stand back!” one ordered the researchers.

The guards only got halfway up the steps before the finally rope snapped and the crystals came falling down the steps like a guillotine's blade. The guards immediately did a 180 and ran down the stairs while screaming.

“Get out of here!” Emerald panicked as she pushed Professor Jewels and Jeweled Beads to the side before turning and gently, yet firmly, pushing the two elderly mares into a corner.

The crystal hit the floor and shattered like a vase that was just knocked off a dinner table. A loud crashing and shattering noise filled Emerald's ears. The ground shook.

A flurry of small, dark red crystal rained down across the room like pieces of snow in a blizzard as larger pieces ricocheted like chunks of hail.

The ponies that were closest to the crystal disappeared in a wave of razor sharp particles that tore into their skin.

A buckball size piece slammed through the makeshift crane as it was in the process of transporting another crystal, sending it and its cargo tumbling to the ground, causing further carnage. Dozens of crystal shards flew towards Emerald and the others. The doctor curled up into a ball and covered her face.

“No!” Cadance yelled from across the room. She lifted her horn as magic pulsated from her body.

A sky blue beam of energy reached from the princesses horn and formed a bubble around the team. The crystals impacted the bubble and immediately shattered like they were glass bottles hitting a bar wall.

Emerald looked up to see an unprotected Cadance take a crystal shard through her wing and fall to the ground.

Shining Armor screamed out before jumping onto Cadance and shielding his wife with his own protection spell.

The crystals did not even dent Shining Armor's magical, pink sphere.

Within the blink of an eye, the chaos had stopped.

The loud shattering had been replaced by a silence as all the ponies held their breath.

Next thing Emerald knew, the screams of stallions crying out for a medic began. At least half of all the ponies in the room had been injured in some way.

Trembling bodies laid across the ground.

Both protection spells disappeared as ponies got back on their feet.

Emerald watched Shining Armor hold his wife in his arms with a tear in his eye. “Cadance? Cadance! What happened?”

“Are the citizens safe?” Cadance moaned.

“Yes,” Shining Armor replied. “But what about you?”

Cadance held up her blood cover wing with a gaping hole the size of a hoof placed right in the middle. The princesses' eyes watered. “I don’t know how bad it is, but everything hurts,” she cried.

Shining Armor clenched her teeth. He turned his head as he scanned the chaos that flowed around the room. He screamed. “The princess is down! We need to get her to our doctor now!”

Bruised and bloodied guards rushed the princess and placed her on a stretcher.

Shining Armor kissed his wife on the forehead before trotting over to the critically wounded guards and used his magic to drag them out of piles of crystal shards that littered the ground.

Emerald turned back to the others.

Professor Jewels groaned in pain in a pool of blood. He had landed directly on the satchel that held his crystal sample. A corner had been impaled directly into his flank. “Help!” he demanded.

Emerald removed the crystal and immediately used her hooves to cover the wound.

Professor Jewels had gotten lucky, his wounds was shallows and far from any of his internal organs. It was essentially a glorified papercut. Within a minute, the bleeding had mostly stopped and the professor was able to get back on his feet.

One of the guard’s that had brought Emerald to the castle ran up to her. “We need to get you guys out of here,” he announced as he turned and ran towards the exit. The three researchers, librarian, and sorcerer made their way through the maze of crystal shards, injured ponies, and medical personnel who stormed the room.

Some injured were screaming at the tops of their lungs, others were just groaning softly.

Thankfully, it looked like all of the guards were still alive, although most of them were in critical condition.

Emerald watched as a guard attempted to hold one of his colleagues down in order to wrap his gushing thigh with a bandage and felt compelled to help.

“Keep moving! We soldiers will take care of the wounded.” the guard replied as he turned and dragged Emerald forward.

Emerald stumbled out of the exit in a blur and collapsed against one of the support beams of the Crystal Castle. She was breathing harder than she ever had before. She watched as a steady stream of guards flowed into the basement with an empty stretcher and out with a bloodied pony. Emerald counted about thirty guards with injuries ranging from large cuts, to bones bent at unnatural angles, to having large crystal shards sticking out of their bodies like glass.

Professor Jewels hobbled up to a medic and got his cut properly treated.

Jeweled Beads helped the elderly ponies get to a nearby bench and rest.

Emerald was finally starting to calm down when a familiar voice approached.

“Are you injured?” Shining Armor asked, his white coat was painted with splotches of red and his eyes were locked in a hundred yard stare.

Emerald's stomach dropped. “I’m fine, but are you?”

Shining Armor looked down at his blood covered body. “I’m fine too, none of this is mine,” he replied.

Emerald leaned back up against the Crystal Caste and did not say a word.

Shining Armor pulled out a pouch of bits and dropped it at Emerald's hoofs. “Well, if you are feeling strong enough, this pouch should be enough for a train ticket to Manehattan.”

Emerald looked back in surprise. “You’re sending me home? Isn’t there anything I can do to help here?”

Shining Armor turned away. “Crystal General is close by and will provide care for all of our wounded. The only thing you and that professor pony need to do is to find out the secret to those crystals.”

Emerald got on her hooves and nodded. “I will do my best.”

“And the Crystal Empire is forever in your debt. I hope that Professor Jewels is right and that those crystals have nothing special about them. However, if the crystals really are a danger to the empire, we will need all the information necessary to defeat them. Now, the next group of trains leaves in less than half an hour. I already sent one of my guards to escort Professor Jewels to his train.”

Emerald nodded and took off towards the train station at the edge of the empire. She made it just as the last train to Manehattan was leaving the station.

Emerald hopped onto the train and found her way to her seat: a comfy, white coach cushion. The doctor collapsed onto the coach like it was an expansive bed and began to drift off to sleep.

The soft conversations and snores of the ponies aboard the train were her lullaby as she began to fall into the comfort of Luna's domain with the satchel containing the blood red crystal snuggled next to her.

Emerald was about ready to sleep when a sharp pain erupted in her hoof. She jolted up and looked at her hoof, theorizing that her gash had opened up, however nothing was happening. Her wound was still fully healed thanks to Cadance's healing spell, however Emerald was beginning to feel a pain in her hoof. It felt like a small piece of crystal was lodged inside of her, however she had no wounds.

“I must be losing my mind,” Emerald thought to herself, but the pain persisted. Additionally, her mouth felt dry, her stomach growled, and her head began to feel fuzzy.

Emerald took a glass of water from a stewardess and laid onto her coach. “It's been a long, hard day,” Emerald noted. “All I need is some rest and it will all be fine,” the doctor thought. She closed her eyes as the train chugged its way to Manehatten: the largest city in all of Equestria.

Crystal Blood Part 1: Discovery

Day 0