Shadow and Flame

by Questionable Object

Rating: teen
Tags: Adventure, Dark, Alternate Universe, Human
Length: 21161

The Third War of Eternity has come down upon Equestria, dragging countless innocents into the fray.

A war has been raging throughout the cosmos for well over a century, unstoppable forces clashing to devastating effects. Something has happened and Equestria is no longer free of the burden of bloodshed as immortals reign from the sky and magic and steel burn the land.

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2013-01-11 08:02:20 UTC

Loyalty through Bloodshed

Rainbow Dash alighted atop a stray cloud, her wings fluttering slightly as they tucked against her sides, pressing slightly uncomfortably against her barding and the crossbows strapped to her sides and surveyed the scene below her.

Hundreds of ponies clashed violently in a flurry of noise and colour as bolts, magic, boulders and bodies went flying every which way in the force of the two opposing forces.

Behind the defenders, the so called “Nightmares”, a large stronghold squatted at the foot of a mountain, connected to an immense wall that stretched out to connect to another stronghold which in turn connected to another, creating a massive stone plug designed to block and guard the quickest and safest route between Equestria and the Griffin Kingdoms, a tiny bottle-necked valley between the Alicorn Alps and the farthest edge of the Shattered Talon Peaks.

At the other two strongholds similar battles were being held to capture the strongholds which acted as the gate-houses from one side of the wall to the other as well as a home for the defending forces.

The stronghold was flinging boulders over the Nightmares and amongst the Equestrians attempting to crush any land bound forces unlucky enough to be in the path of the projectiles.

Groups of four to six guarded unicorns worked together amongst the mayhem on the Equestrian side to smash the boulders being lobbed at them into mostly harmless debris or to catch them and send them flying back at the Nightmares where their unicorns were starting to try and deflect them as well creating a form of deadly ping pong.

In the sky pegasi were swarming back and forth along the vertical axis of the battle, exchanging blows and bolts with each other and any viable targets below.

Rainbow’s magenta eyes flicked back and forth across the chaos above and below, looking for an ideal opening to charge in and wreak havoc.

A distinct movement caught her attention and she locked her eyes onto a pegasus mare charging towards her, black barding covering their body and face, a glaring red serpent devouring itself was emblazoned on either side of their flank where the armour covered their cutie marks.

A bit was held in their mouth, metal reigns leading from it to a pair of crossbows strapped, one on either side connected to a loading mechanism full of bolts waiting to be loaded into the weapons.

Rainbow Dash met her enemy’s gaze, purple meeting sky blue as she spread her wings wide in challenge.

The blue eyed Nightmare pegasus twisted momentarily holding the crossbows diagonally to each other then pulled the bit in her mouth down, shifting the metal reigns and releasing the firing mechanism, the trigger holding the string taught snapping down and sending the pair of bolts the rainbow maned pegasus’ way.

Dash leaped up off the spongy, white cloud and flapped her wings twice banking to her left just long enough for one bolt to sail past her left ear and the other to glance off and scratch the emblem of two alicorns, one white, one black, chasing each other around a green orb adorning the grey plating protecting her right cutie mark.

Rainbow gripped the bit controlling the firing mechanism for her own crossbows and fired a return pair of bolts at her assailant then pulled into a steep dive while yanking the bit up shifting the reigns to pull the crossbow strings back and slide a fresh set of bolts into the mechanism from a pair of boxes attached to the crossbows.

The pegasus Nightmare swerved easily out of the way of Dash’s first attack and reloaded her crossbows and dived to follow Dash.

The blue pegasus hissed around the bit in her mouth as she felt a bolt speed past her scratching the armour protecting her neck and another shoot through her tail hairs tugging a painful prismatic tuft out with its passing.

Dash twisted around with several beats of her wings then launched herself upwards at her descending opponent, glaring

death at them as she fired her weapons, one bolt aimed wide and the other flying for the kill.

The Nightmare’s eyes widened and they faltered for an instant in surprise at Dash’s brash surprise attack then her sky blue eyes scrunched up in pain and she shrieked as the bolt hit home.

Tendons and muscle tore as the bolt wedged itself in the pit of her wing, spraying blood and causing the feathered appendage to seize up.

Rainbow Dash flew past the black clad pegasus, blood splattering on her helmet.

She didn’t even blink as the red droplets collided with her helmet and let a wry smile creep along her mouth at her flawless victory over yet another Nightmare, slashing one of the curved blades attached to her forelegs against the wounded wing with brutal force, breaking the brittle bones at the joint and tearing ligaments apart destroying any chance for the Nightmare to save herself as she plummeted, screaming, to her death far below.

Dash ignored the death cry, speeding off into the thick of the melee and silently added a tally to her score.

A good year ago Dash wouldn’t have killed a manticore if it had bitten her flank and a rude comment about her mother. Sure she would have given it the beating of the century in ten seconds flat but never killed.

And yet here she was now, killing without hesitation even keeping count of her kills to boot, holding the highest kill count in her battalion.

At first she had despised the act of taking another pony’s life, her mind spinning in circles around the morals and effects of the actions, keeping her up at night.

Then as time had passed and the Nightmares had become bolder and cruel, pushed onwards by their dark masters and as Dash had witnessed the aftermath of Nightmare occupation of several towns her resolve had been set in stone.

The Nightmares were filthy traitors, not just to Equestria or even all of ponykind but to all things good and right and if Rainbow Dash didn’t fight and kill for Equestria she would be betraying the trust that those who could not fight for themselves had placed in her and her fellow soldiers to defend them.

With this in mind the Element of Loyalty had thrown herself, body and soul, almost recklessly, into the fray, slaying every enemy in her path even making a game out of it with her sisters in arms, seeing who could skewer the most Nightmares.

Rainbow laughed as she felled her eightieth Nightmare of the battle, the large ornately armoured stallion swing his mace one last time before collapsing in a bloodied heap, she had a feeling that if she kept this up she’d beat her personal best of one hundred and twenty kills.

The cyan pegasus hovered in place for a moment looking about the field of battle.

Most of the catapults in the stronghold had either been shattered or crippled, the rest abandoned, no doubt to a lack of ammunition.

With the catapults rendered harmless all of the Equestrian unicorns were now focusing on attacking, launching missiles of magic and elemental attacks at the Nightmares or just working in groups to pluck the few remaining Nightmare pegasi out of the sky or dumping mounds of rock and earth on the land bound Nightmares.

The gap between the rear of the Nightmare force and the stronghold had completely closed as they had been steadily forced back into a corner and the gates of the Stronghold had been slammed shut by the cowards within denying the wounded and terrified fighters outside any chance of retreat forcing to face the relentless onslaught of the Equestrians.

In the air the Equestrian pegasi launched volleys of bolts with only the occasional attack from a unicorn to worry about as what had remained of the Nightmare pegasi had been slain or fled.

Earth ponies and unicorns lined the walls of the stronghold firing with crossbows or magic at the Equestrians below targeting anypony who came too close though they seemed uncaring whether it was friend or foe they slew with their sloppy aim.

Rainbow Dash spun into action as she fired at any and every target she could lay her eyes on transforming into a rainbow streak of death.

She quietly cursed the slow firing nature of the crossbows. Being the speed demon she was she wished for a weapon that could keep up with her. To make up for the sluggish nature of the crossbows she flew low raking and clawing at any exposed faces with her hoof-blades in between shots.

Rainbow Dash was having a ball laughing as blood streaked across her coat and armour, the latter more than a little dinged up from lucky swipes from below.

A large metal club suddenly ended her spree, flipping her onto her back for a moment a hard throb arcing through her back.

A large green stallion stamped his hoof down next to Dash’s head as she rolled onto her hooves back peddling away.

The stallion glared daggers at her and she raised an eyebrow, recognising the ornate armor and large obviously-compensating-for-something mace.

Hadn’t she already killed this guy?

The buck charged swinging the mace at the blue pegasus.

Rainbow Dash attempted to distance herself only to get a blade in the hind leg.

She hissed and looked behind her, a bloody purple earth mare grinning wildly as she plunged her sword into Dash’s leg.

The quarters were tight and she was surrounded by enemies at all angles and the large new dent in her back wasn’t helping her manoeuvre.

She bucked hard, dislodging the sword from her hind leg and hitting the mare in the face then lunged out of the way of the stallion as best her wounded leg would let her as he charged forwards, barely missing her with his mace and she collided heavily with another Nightmare who shouted drawing more Nightmares’ attention to her.

They beat and grabbed at her pulling and pushing her back and forth, bending and shattering her armour and Rainbow thought she heard a few ribs snap along with the countless cuts and bruises they had dealt to her.

The rainbow maned pegasus had always been able to get out of sticky situations with her agility and strength but now there were too many and there wasn’t enough room.

She did all she could thrashing and slashing in all directions but she knew she was doomed, she couldn’t lie to herself on that matter.

A deafening roar caused time to stand still for an instant, looks of shock and fear suddenly crossing over the faces of all the ponies around her.

Then it got really cold.

Rainbow Dash got to her hooves gasping in pain as Nightmares fled from her vicinity and the source of their fear came into view.

A gleaming silver scaled dragon covered in equally gleaming silver and blue armour brought it’s fore-claws down upon the screaming Nightmares it’s jaws open wide as it spewed frozen wind and shards of ice at them roaring so loud that the ground shook.

Though not as large as the native Equestrian Wyrms the colossal reptile easily crushed multiple ponies at a time beneath it’s claws and it’s tail swept aside enemies with bone crushing swipes.

The large Nightmare with the mace charged the silver dragon only to be crushed, his body popping like balloon by a smaller but equally intimidating brass dragon wearing silver and brown armour that joined the silver in the slaughter spewing a tight stream of liquid fire creating a deadly contrast to the silvers cone of frozen death.

Rainbow Dash ignored the pain in her sides, forcing herself into the air with several laboured flaps of her wings as a loud cheer echoed up from the Equestrian forces announcing that the battle had become a slaughter.

The pegasi charged forward towards the stronghold as a second brass swooped over the Nightmares lining the wall burning them and melting the stones they stood upon and the ponies below followed the silver at a safe distance as it made it’s move to break down the massive wooden gates.

Dash joined in the cheering, throwing off the broken pieces of her armor and charged forward despite her beaten state diving over the flames to strike at the fleeing unicorns and earth ponies in the courtyard.

A gust of wind and a ear-splitting crack announced the shattering of the gates as the silver dragon snap froze the wood and bowled through them.

In moments the stronghold had been taken as the Nightmares had surrendered and begged for mercy then rounded up into the courtyard, stripped of their weapons and armour.

The sky blue pegasus laughed and cheered at another almost flawless victory before groaning and collapsing in a heap as the adrenaline and endorphins wore off and the pain returned with avengeance.

Rainbow Dash figured she should probably go find a doctor and sort out those snapped ribs and the gash on her leg among other things.

Kindness through Pain

Fluttershy gave the bandage a sharp tug causing the pony whose waist she was wrapping it around to grunt and hiss in slight pain and discomfort.

"Oh hush you." Fluttershy said sternly but not unkindly before she ripped the bandage and tied it with her teeth and hooves to secure it.

"There. Now try not to strain yourself or the wound will open up again." She said to her patient with a firm look and the large lime green mare nodded.

The pink maned pegasus helped the larger patient out of the large tent and a few other ponies came over to take the wounded pony to the temporary barracks.

Fluttershy took a deep breath of the warm but sterile air and sighed heavily closing her eyes for a moment before taking a look around the leveled courtyard.

Five large tents were set up in the ruined courtyard, their pegs driven into the melted slag of the courtyard stones, two of them made of a sturdy blue cloth serving as medical tents for wounded Equestrians, two tents made of a similar grey material serving as the temporary barracks for wounded and exhausted soldiers to rest and recover and one red tent which had a few guards posted around it for the surviving Nightmares to be treated and held before being taken away to prisoner of war camps for interrogation and judgement.

The Silver dragon from the earlier battle sat just behind the red tent, now free of it's armour, preening itself, ready to release a breath of paralyzing gas should the prisoners get any ideas, though it's mere presence was more than enough to convince the occupants of the tent to behave.

The dragon stretched its wings with a slight flap causing the tents to rustle with a gust of wind that carried the scent of mountain air and winter flowers that clung to the Silver and it's flight.

The dragon noticed Fluttershy's eyes on it and paused it's grooming long enough to give her a respectful nod before resuming.

When Fluttershy had joined the military they had recognised her medical skills and had advanced it from healing various animals to care for the wounded soldiers and after some time in the military she had stared down a Copper dragon that had gotten a little too out of hand with it's choice of pranks and she had been assigned part time to handling the huge elegant creatures though normally they took care of themselves just fine.

Fluttershy smiled to herself then looked up at the broken battlements where the two Brass dragons had just flown over into the courtyard tucking in their manta-like wings to land, closely followed by a flock of pegasi carrying supplies and more tents.

As one of the Brasses strut past her Fluttershy spotted an unmistakable cyan pegasus exiting the second blue tent sporting a wide variety of bandages, a particularly large one wrapped around her right hind leg which she was limping on though she appeared to be hiding it rather well.

"Rainbow Dash!" Fluttershy shouted as she half ran, half flew at the rainbow maned pegasus.

"Fluttershy?" Dash replied dumbly before she was tackled by the excited yellow mare.

Fluttershy wrapped her fore-hooves around her dear friend’s neck in a tight hug.

"Oh Rainbow it's been so long! I thought you were in a different battalion!"

"Yeah, got transfered, good to see you too Shy..." Dash croaked through Fluttershy's stranglehold. "Could you loosen up a bit?"

"Oh I'm sorry!" The yellow pegasus squeaked before releasing her friend then looked her up and down her ears flattening with worry as her eyes fell on Dash's wounds.

"How did you get so hurt?"

Dash laughed and gave a cocky smile.

"These little scrapes?" She spread her wings, flinching as the right one gave a little resistance. "I've had worse."

Fluttershy maintained her concerned expression and Rainbow Dash pulled her wings back in looking away for a moment.

"I'm fine Shy. Really. There are plenty of others worse off than me, I'm not gonna just drop dead."

The pink haired pegasus pursed her lips into a worried line.

"Fluttershy, come on, stop giving me that look." Rainbow Dash said with a weak smile. "I'm fine I promise!"

Fluttershy nodded slowly then returned Dash's smile.

She took a moment to watch one of the Brass dragons bound past then leap over the battlements, wings spread, leaving behind the aroma of sun-baked sand.

Dash chuckled quietly and Fluttershy looked back at her.

"What's so funny?"

"You." The rainbow maned pegasus said with a wide smile poking her friend gently in the side. "You're like a whole new pegasus."

"What do you mean by that?" Shy replied shrinking back ever so slightly.

"What do you think I mean?" Rainbow Dash said with a laugh. "You don't stutter anymore or talk in a whisper, you're out here patching up bloody messes of ponies and a dragon just about jumped right over us and you didn't so much as flinch!"

A blush crept up Fluttershy's cheeks, murmuring, "I'm only doing whats necessary..."

"Well you don't need to go about shouting about it." She said looking away.

Dash laughed and pulled Fluttershy into a sisterly hug with one leg.

"Ah, don't sweat it Shy you'll always be that adorable kind pony we all know and love." Dash gave Fluttershy a reassuring squeeze and a winning grin. "Just twenty percent cooler!"

Fluttershy giggled and hugged Rainbow back.

"Thanks Dash." Fluttershy said before glancing back at the blue tents which had other smaller tents being pitched around them. "I've got to get back to work. You should go rest up."

Rainbow Dash snorted and puffed her chest out.

"I don't need rest! I'm Rainbow freakin Da-"

She was cut off by Fluttershy's stern gaze.

"On second thought I guess I am kinda tired."

Fluttershy gave Rainbow Dash another hug.

"Thanks Dash, I'll see you when I've finished."

The yellow mare let go of her friend and fluttered back to the medical tents.

Rainbow Dash suppressed a shudder.

"Yikes, that mare can be scary..."

Magic through Control

It all began four hundred and twelve days ago, just over fourteen months, when the sky had been ripped open and the first contact was made.

Though in all honesty it was less of a contact as it was a free-for-all between two flying castles and the combined strength of the princesses above the plains surrounding Canterlot.

On that day the princesses had unleashed the fury of the sun and moon upon these strange invaders and as their castles had been torn apart they had fled in all directions in streaks of blue light and in the bowels of metal birds.

For sixteen days disappearances, sightings of bipedal creatures and skirmishes with these creatures with drastically different cases of them avoiding a fight or actively looking for one were reported across the kingdom, inciting panic amongst the towns and villages near wild areas such as the Everfree Forest, even in cosy little Ponyville, ponies were considerably more cautious.

Finally, in the dead of night, just as the seventeenth day had begun three of the bipedal creatures infiltrated Canterlot Castle and approached Princess Luna.

At first the Princess had lashed out in self defense wounding one of them severely and in a bid to appease her the creatures threw their weapons to the floor and prostrated themselves swearing upon their "Honor as warriors of the Aeon Empire." that they meant no harm and that Equestria was in grave danger.

After Luna had summoned her sister and healed the warrior she had attacked the trio explained the apparent danger.

They claimed that throughout a large swathe of the Cosmos, within hundreds of worlds they referred to as "Planes", two superpowers were pitched in a cataclysmic war.

On one side the Illuminati, the conglomeration of the holy and mighty angels of the Twelve Mounting Heights, the malevolent but honor bound devils of the Nine Infernal Pits and the industrial, magical and technological powerhouse of the Aeon Empire from the Cradle of Eternity, who fought side by side with any mortal race who stood for the preservation of any form of order or sanity.

On the other stood the Shadow, a loosely aligned force of semi-deities and corrupted powers leading a seemingly endless horde of demons, aberrations and tainted mortals on a crusade to plunge the Cosmos into bloody chaos hailing under the banner of a twisted true-deity known as Variarneer.

According to the three aeon Equestria had been hidden in the fabric of the Cosmos, protecting it from detection and the war raging on around it until just a few months ago when some strange force had caused Equestria to surface, appearing on the Illuminati's and the Shadow's radar. After sending scouts to prospect the world they discovered the world's incredible abundance of resources and of greater importance the wide variety of abundant life that the Shadow would take glee in destroying and corrupting it became a high priority on the Illuminati war agenda.

The Aeon Empire, who had taken the role of initiating first contact out of the three Illuminati factions, had originally planned to arrive peacefully, to avoid panic or misunderstandings, but spies reported that defectors from the Empire were planning to invade much more recklessly forcing the Empire to move into action early to stop any unneeded bloodshed.

Despite the preemptive move to secure the plane and by some twist of fate the so-called Sky Forts of both the Empire and the defectors arrived simultaneously above the fields around Canterlot and they had naturally opened fire on each other, abandoning fort when the Princesses had come to defend their home with devastating force.

Now after over two weeks of hiding, regrouping and fighting the Shadow aeon they had managed to contact the Aeon Empire and reinforcements were on stand by simply waiting for news of whether the Princesses would accept their aid or not.

After a time for thought and deliberation the Princesses accepted the Aeon Empire's aid and from that moment forward Equestria had been at war.

"Twilight! Twilight hey wake up!" A gentle shaking and moderately loud voice drew the purple unicorn from her slumber. "Come on you're gonna be late."

Twilight Sparkle lifted her head off of the book she had been reading, then using as a pillow and blinked a few times at her draconic assistant. "Huh? Late? Late for what?"

Spike, who was now almost as tall as Twilight and no longer chubby, with a lanky and far more serpentine body due to a growth spurt, dashed off grabbing a brush and a fresh cup of coffee he had just made then dashed back.

"Come on Twi, the meeting!" The purple dragon said offering the beverage and brush. "It's starting in ten minutes!"

Twilight's eyes bugged momentarily and a sparkling violet glow enveloped her horn, the brush and the mug of coffee as the two items were taken from Spike's paws.

The lavender mare drank the steaming, caffeinated drink, burning her tongue and throat, while running the brush through her messy mane and tail at a breakneck pace.

After painfully attempting and failing to tame the wild hair she grabbed her notes and several folders jamming them into her saddle bags which she levitated onto her back then galloped out of the door of her study/bedroom and down the halls of Canterlot Castle, nearly bowling over several servants and guards of the night shift.

The violet unicorn barreled into a large circular room containing a massive table which had an accurate three dimensional map of Equestria and it's neighbouring nations carved into it's surface, a variety of ponies and a few griffins and aeon, standing almost as tall as Princess Celestia, standing around the table.

Twilight's sudden and less than quiet entrance drew some attention and a dark skinned aeon gave a wry smile.

"Miss Sparkle." The feminine aeon who's name was (if Twilight's memory served) Karedena said. "Your punctuality is impeccable."

Twilight smiled weakly back at Karedena and approached the large table after catching her breath.

The aeon always had such odd names but then they thought the same thing of pony names so who was she to judge?

A scarred griffin gave a derisive snort and opened his beak to say something, no doubt insulting to everyone other than his fellow, but was interrupted by a bright flash announced Princess Luna's arrival.

The ponies and griffins bowed low while the aeon placed their hands over their chests and bowed their heads.

The night themed goddess nodded in acknowledgement and everyone relaxed slightly.

Her horn glowed a deep navy blue and the double doors leading into the room slammed shut and the map on the table of Equestria, the Western Barrens, the mountainous regions of the Griffin Kingdoms and the Frozen North lit up in a mixture of red, blue, green and grey.

The glowing red terrain represented the Shadow's areas of control and filled most of the Griffin Kingdoms and almost all of the Frozen north as well as a sizable portion of the north east of the Western Barrens.

The blue sections represented the Aeon Empire, the Equestrians and their allies’ influence, covering all of Equestria and most of the west along with a few scattered blotches along the southern portion of the Griffin Kingdoms.

The green, splotched at random about the red sections, represented areas of resistance against the Shadow but separated from the Aeon and Equestrian armies.

The grey areas, mostly situated around the north, deep within the red territories, were where all signs of resistance and activity had fallen disturbingly silent without warning.

Everyone remained silent for a moment, scanning over the map.

If Celestia had been heading the meeting they would have had to go through a variety of procedures such as a roll call and announcements of meeting protocols, Luna however was not overly fond of arduous protocols and the meetings began unannounced upon her arrival and everyone present had been to enough meetings to know each other and the procedures well enough.

After a few minutes of silence a pegasus stallion with a green coat spoke up.

"There are more grey zones."

"Five more..." The scarred griffin growled. "I trust someone here has at least some intel on that? Four of them are in the mountains."

"Well um... I'm not sure if it's relevant but I think I might have something." A light blue unicorn mare with white splotches across her body and a blue and white striped mane half mumbled. She was the newest member to the council and appeared intimidated by the non-ponies.

"Well spit it out then!" A large but young griffin barked at the unicorn prompting her to fumble with her reports.

The griffin received a few glares from a couple of aeon and some of the ponies.

Relations between ponies and griffins had always been stressed but they got along well enough.

The aeon however had a mutual animosity with the griffins even though they were both more or less warrior races as their attitudes were drastically different. The griffins were persistently loud and rude and throughout their divided kingdoms they clung to old traditions that grated against the aeon's nerves. The Aeon were passionate and forward thinking, throwing aside old traditions and showing respect to all who stood for what was right. But despite their differences they respected one another enough on the battlefield for their own reasons to be able to resist gutting each other in the war chamber.

"R-right here it is." The light blue unicorn said levitating a sheet of paper out of a folder. "The border town of Cherry Blossom out in the Barrens near the edge of the Shadow’s territory in the Barrens and the Northern Griffin Kingdoms found a deranged and traumatised griffin male wandering about aimlessly in the desert." She read from the report sheet.

"He rambled about monsters and that 'They're all insane' and 'They're all dead'. He also appeared to experience night terrors and would have to be sedated or else he would harm himself and others. After being..." The mare trailed off into a mumble and stared at the paper for a while.

"What is it?" The dark skinned aeon asked.

"I... I hadn't read the report in full..." The unicorn began.

An aeon with red tinted skin frowned and spoke before she could say any more. "You should have done. That was irresponsible of you."

"I'm sorry... It's just it hadn't seemed that important at first..." She said looking away.

Twilight gently took the report from the mare who just sat there looking uncomfortable.

Twilight skimmed over the report and continued where the blue unicorn had left off.

"After being held at Cherry Blossom's medical centre for five days the griffin..." She reread the last part to make sure she hadn't misread it. "The griffin wrote a message on the walls in blood and died of a violent explosive head trauma." Twilight put the report down. "Oh my..."

The aeon looked at each other and started to talk quietly amongst themselves in their native tongue.

"What... Why didn't we hear of this sooner?" One of the griffins half shouted.

The spotted mare tried to answer but the griffins and some of the ponies had begun to talk and shout at each other.

"SILENCE!"

Everyone fell silent instantly and looked at Luna who glared back.

"Can thou not see that Frozen Waters is attempting to explain herself?" She said in her old Equestrian manner. "Now be silent and listen to her!"

Everyone's attention turned to the blue and white unicorn.

She swallowed thickly then spoke.

"I only received the report this morning and the event only occurred a few days ago."

A few griffins and ponies grumbled before a pale aeon stepped forward.

"Does the report say what the message on the walls was?"

Twilight picked up the report again and ran her eyes over it.

"No but it does say that the body and pictures of the scene are being transported to Helsinki."

The aeon nodded with a frown. "Well that's a nuisance... Who wrote the report?"

"Sergeant Butter Biscuit."

"Trust a pony to screw up." The young griffin sneered.

"You're one to talk." A green tinged masculine aeon growled back. "If your people weren't so backwards and didn't brainwash your citizens to your corrupt kings' wills the mountains wouldn't be such a headache to liberate."

The griffin hissed at the aeon.

"Say that again." He leaned forward. "I dare you."

Luna stomped a hoof warning the two to stop bickering.

"Apologies Princess Luna." The aeon said pressing aer hands to aer chest and bowing aer head.

The griffin just snorted and stepped back.

"Well, if we're quite done insulting each other." The dark skinned aeon said giving the green tinged aeon a glare. "I have some good news."

Everyone turned their attention to the aeon and ae cleared aer throat before speaking.

“In a combined effort the devils and aeon have managed to quell the Lazarus Insurrection and have made sure they won't try and rise again." She put emphasis on "again" and a few of the other aeon snickered or shook their heads in what appeared to be pity.

"So now the resources that had been put into quelling the insurrection are now being brought here."

She shuffled a few papers absent mindedly before continuing.

"The figures aren't exact at the moment as they may increase or decrease but we're definitely receiving at least one Beta Class Sky Fort with a complement of eight hundred to nine hundred personnel and a full complement of aircraft and land assault craft. We may also be receiving several mobile weapons platforms and one or two small land boats. They should be arriving in a week at the latest." The aeon put aer notes away and a pleased murmur ran through the ponies and griffins.

"That is indeed good news and the timing couldn't be better!" One pegasus said.

"Indeed." The dark skinned aeon concurred. "Now onto the next topic."

She held her hand over the glowing war table and small illusory scale models of towns, cities, forts, villages, Sky Forts, prisoner camps, battalions and supply routes among other things flickered to life across it.

"In the past week, as we all know, our forces have dived into the Eastern Kingdoms and have begun to uproot the Shadow and liberate the enslaved griffins and ponies on the edges of the mountains. But now as the majority of you know the Shadow are amassing a counter attack, spear headed by the Nightmares. They will be ready to strike in approximately six days according to our infiltrators, most likely before reinforcements arrive."

She ran a hand through her grey streaked, dark blue hair.

"What we have to decide now is whether to fortify the supply routes running between the Western Barrens and Equestria which has been weakened by a reshuffling of forces or to reinforce the strongholds on the threshold of the East. Either way we'll be hoping that they won't attack the less defended area and if they do that they'll be able to hold off until off plane reinforcements arrive."

A unicorn picked up the monologue without missing a beat levitating a wooden rod to act as a pointer.

"If they do attack the strongholds, which we suspect they will, it will be directed here, here and here." The pointer flicked between three small adjacent strongholds squeezed into a natural bottle neck.

"Battalions seventy two, forty, sixteen and seventeen are stationed at these strongholds, battalion seventeen specifically..."

Twilight's ears perked up at the mention of battalions forty, sixteen and seventeen.

As Twilight and her friends had joined the army they had been split up due to their differing specialities and the seventeenth, sixteenth and fortieth battalions were ones some of her friends had been assigned to. Specifically Rainbow Dash in the fortieth (recently transferred from the nineteenth), Fluttershy in the seventeenth and Applejack, alongside her older brother Big Mac, in the sixteenth.

Twilight hadn't seen Dash or Fluttershy since they had enlisted but Applejack's battalion had made camp on the outskirts of Lower Canterlot while they had been moving between positions a few months ago. She had excitedly made her way down to the encampment and hunted down her old farmer friend, however upon finding them Twilight had found it confusing and a little frightening how little they had been able to talk to each other. It was as if Applejack had become a completely different pony, she had become incredibly quiet, she refused to leave her brother’s side and her eyes had adopted what could only have been called a haunted shadow.

Just as concerning were the numerous scars that now dotted the large red stallion and when she had inquired Big Mac had simply stated that it had been a "stroke of bad luck." and politely refused to elaborate.

This short but painful reunion had planted a seed of fear for her friends that had grown into a vine that choked her thoughts whenever she thought about them.

"Twilight Sparkle?" The moon princess' voice pulled the purple mare back to reality.

"Huh what?" She said looking around to find all eyes on her.

"Art thou unwell?" Luna said with a look of concern.

"Oh sorry, no. I was just thinking..." Twilight gave a weak smile. "Guess I didn't have enough coffee."

She flinched as a few eyebrows were raised at her.

"A-anyway, what was it you were asking?"

"We were asking thee on thine opinion on the matter of the allocation of our forces.

Twilight gulped and her eyes lost focus for an instant.

Upon enlisting Twilight had been recognised quickly as a tactical genius and she always carefully calculated using logic to come up with the most beneficial decisions towards the war effort she could.

She had been asked to make hard decisions before but this...

This was almost painful.

Twilight clamped her eyes shut, took a deep calming breath and dived into cold logic.

One of the first things Twilight had been taught was that an army functioned on it's stomach.

Without sustenance even the hardiest warriors would be reduced to a starved wreck even the Aeon who could pick themselves up from even the most fatal of wounds admitted that food was their major weakness, their metabolisms requiring as much nutrition as possible to run their ridiculously strong bodies.

But still the strongholds were not without importance, being the first proper gateways to the feet of the eastern mountains and if they were to lose them it would be months before they could retake them or gain another hoof-hold of similar advantage.

Not to mention that if the strongholds didn't hold her friends could...

No! What would they say about you thinking like that?

If the supply routes were cut the armies would be severely handicapped even with the off world supplies brought in by the aeon and would be cut in half jeopardising the entire war.

Twilight opened her eyes and looked down at the map.

Her gaze hovered over the three glowing models guarding the bottleneck between the Alicorn Alps and the small Shattered Talon mountain range.

The purple eyed gaze wandered away from the strongholds down the length of the Alicorn Alps.

An ordered retreat would allow the enemy attack force to spread out and move more freely once they had passed the stronghold as well as cause the ponies stationed there to lose their advantage of the bottleneck, thus it was out of the question.

She glanced at the glowing lines representing the trade routes between the west and south.

Although to an untrained eye the routes appeared well defended Twilight could see at least eight weak points where the enemy could easily charge through and bunker down.

If they lost the strongholds the aeon and equestrians would be delayed by half a year to a year at most.

If they lost the trade routes they could lose the war in a matter of months.

The choice was simple.

But agonising.

Twilight looked up at the moon goddess and met her gaze.

Was that a glint of concern she saw?

Or was it pity?

The vine of fear and doubt strangled her thoughts momentarily.

She took one more calming breath then spoke.

"We should defend the trade routes. The war is more important than a single stepping stone."

The assembled aeon, griffins and ponies all nodded murmuring approval and Luna spoke.

"Very well. The vote is unanimous. We shall send the order out when the meeting is concluded."

Twilight was vaguely aware of what was going on for the rest of the meeting, most of it consisting of status reports from various regions along the Shadow border and a few farms suffering from drought the only thing really capturing her attention being the mention of a group “Dusktreaders” coming to oversee the war effort, but her mind was fogged with fear and doubt keeping her from concentrating.

As the meeting was concluded she left quickly, feeling a pair of worried eyes on her back. She knew it was the Princess’ pitying gaze but she couldn’t care less.

She arrived at her sleeping quarters which was made up of a study area and two separate bedrooms for Spike and herself.

Spike was sitting at the small table that served as a dining table with a mug of steaming hot chocolate in his claws and another steaming mug across from him.

"Hey Twilight I made you some..." His expression fell from a smile to a concerned frown as he saw Twilight’s downtrodden expression. "What's wrong?"

"I'm fine Spike." She replied dully. "I just need some alone time." She opened the door to her room with a violet aura. "If anypony comes tell them I'm busy."

Spike said something but Twilight didn't hear him as she had already closed the door.

The violet mare climbed up onto the bed and rested on her belly letting her head sink into the soft pillow.

A strangled sensation gripped her and tears began to flow down her cheeks.

No matter how hard Twilight tried she could shake the strangling fear for her friend's lives.

"Oh please, please don't let them die." She said in a choked sob, curling into a tight ball.

Honesty through Agony

Applejack screamed in rage and desperation, slamming her steel clad hind hooves into a Nightmare's face creating a satisfying crunch of bone shattering.

The Nightmare assault had been expected and prepared for but a few less than small problems had crawled under the high command's radar along with a few internal issues.

A mobile weapons platform (better described as a massive glowing cannon on four spidery legs) had escorted the Nightmare battalions to the stronghold and had taken up a position to pummel the structure to dust.

At first the stronghold's magical shield generator that had been installed by Aeon engineers had absorbed most of the barrage but for some reason the generator had malfunctioned and exploded spectacularly, killing dozens of ponies and shattering a large portion of the masonry, no doubt due to sabotage.

Now as the stronghold was being reduced to rubble the garrison was fleeing the marauding Nightmare herd to little good effect as they were outnumbered and outflanked.

Big Mac, calm and stoic as always, lashed out at any Nightmare folly enough to approach as he stood by Applejack's side. Applejack herself lacked her usual stetson which would have surprised most people but after a few cautionary words from veteran Aeon she had decided it best to leave all the way back at Ponyville with her little sister so it wouldn't get destroyed in the chaotic insanity of the battlefield.

The pair were trapped in a group of maybe fifty other Equestrians who had been cut off from the rest of the garrison, surrounded by almost triple their number while the rest of the Nightmare's pursued the other Equestrians.

A mare in black and red armour charged forwards, snarling intimidatingly, only to be tripped up by a faint teal glow and face-plant in front of Applejack where she pummeled the Nightmare's head to a pulp with her fore-hooves.

The muscular, orange mare ignored the gore smearing her legs and armour and glanced over towards the teal unicorn with a white and teal mane and tail who had tripped Applejack's assailant.

Applejack recognised her as a fellow Ponyvilleian, Lyra, if she remembered right, Bon Bon's partner.

Lyra had been assigned as a weapons maintenance specialist as she had displayed an impressively precise control over her kinesis and an uncanny comprehension of Aeonic machinery.

Not that Applejack fully understood all that hoo-haa but she did know that Lyra was an engineer not a soldier and the look of disgust and fear plastered on her face showed this clearly.

Applejack was brought back to reality by the bone shattering sound of her brothers hind hooves colliding with a Nightmare.

The blond maned earth pony reared up, flailing her fore hooves in the face of an advancing Nightmare stallion as Big Mac's hooves came back to earth with a heavy thud.

One of her hooves struck the stallion in the side of the head, denting his helmet and forcing him back momentarily.

"Sis?" Big Mac grunted.

"What?" Applejack replied without taking her eyes off of the enemies around her.

"There's barely any of us left."

"So?"

"Just thought you should know."

Applejack glanced around, confirming her elder sibling's statement as she saw that the previous fifty had been reduced to less than twenty, bodies of Equestrians tangled messily in piles with the bodies of Nightmares being trampled by the crazed dark mass of hateful ponies.

Applejack's apple green eyes went wide as a large heavy weight collided with her, sending sharp pains through her side and she cursed herself for not paying attention.

As Applejack hit the ground with a loud clatter of metal colliding with metal she flailed her limbs attempting to strike her attacker.

A hoof hit her face causing her vision to explode with stars and twisting her head around as it hit the ground hard, giving her a brief view of her brother, the massive red stallion bucking violently with several new open wounds, attempting to dislodge several ponies and magical auras clinging to him.

Applejack felt a pair of hooves on her chest and she returned to her senses, continuing to struggle and lash out.

One of her hooves connected with something solid and the stallion atop her cried out in agony and fell backwards off of her.

Applejack rolled over quickly and began to stand but froze in shock as she saw Lyra.

The teal unicorn was beaten and bruised, bleeding heavily in several places, a stallion was positioned behind her, a few other Nightmares both mares and stallions, laughed and shouted and as Applejack's eyes fell on him her vision turned red with rage.

Before she could leap forwards and gut the wretch she had in her sights a pair of hooves came down on her back hard, knocking the wind out of her lungs.

"You'll pay for that you apple flanked bitch." An eerily familiar voice said and a familiar green face came into view causing Applejack's rage to sky rocket.

Although his name escaped her she recognised him as a citizen of Ponyville and a frequenter of her apple stall before the war.

"You... Ya pathetic horse-apple eating piece of filth!" She screamed at him. "Ya should know better ya damn traitorous fu-"

An earsplitting screech followed by a blinding flash and deafening boom cut her off and made her ears ring painfully.

Applejack twisted her head around just enough to see that where once the mobile weapons platform had been in the distance there was now a rising plume of fire and smoke and twisted metal flying in every direction.

A loud murmur of surprise ran through the surviving Equestrians and Nightmares which escalated into sheer panic among the Nightmares as dozens of blue flashes announced the arrival of just as many Aeon clad in dark blue full plate armour wielding massive scythes with blades shaped like the crescent moon.

The stallion above Applejack was sent flying with a loud crack as a metal clad fist collided with his face and the owner of the fist leaped over her, the Aeon swinging it's weapon at the ponies near Lyra sending them into retreat.

Applejack scrambled forwards towards the abused mare who was soaked in blood and other bodily fluids cringing in slight disgust but not hesitating to go to her friend’s aid.

"Lyra?" Applejack said when she reached her side. "Lyra can ya hear me?"

Lyra half opened one eye and looked at the orange earth pony.

"Applejack? That you?" Her voice was hoarse and her body was quaking in pain and exhaustion.

"Yeah it's me sugarcube. Ya'll gotta hang in there Lyra. Helps comin' ya gonna be just fine." Applejack said lowering herself to Lyra's level, unsure whether it was the unicorn or herself she was trying to comfort.

Lyra gave a weak chuckle which turned into a violent wet cough, blood leaking from her nose and mouth.

"You're awful at lying." Lyra smiled grimly and Applejack looked away for a moment spotting a large flying structure above the dark mass of the Nightmare battalions in the distance tearing up the landscape with beams and bolts of light, no doubt the Sky Fort that had brought the Aeon reinforcements to their rescue.

A faint glow and a pained grunt brought Applejack's attention back to her wounded friend.

Lyra's horn was glowing faintly but nothing was happening. The glow ceased and Lyra sighed sadly then spoke again.

"Applejack, my magic isn't working... Can you help me out here?"

"Of course I can sugarcube," Applejack replied trying to smile but just managing a grimace, "What do ya need?"

"Under my armour, on the right side, there's a small brown bag made of felt, can you get it?"

Applejack nodded and stood to walk around to Lyra's side.

Using her teeth she undid the straps made of a leather-like bark tasting the sickening iron flavour of blood and removed the dented half plates revealing a multitude of hideous bruises on the unicorn's side.

Applejack cringed at the bruises and looked at the pouch which was miraculously undamaged.

She gently undid the knot holding it in place and carried back to Lyra's face showing her the bag.

Lyra sighed gratefully and an honest smile crossed her face, her eye closing.

"Oh thank Celestia it isn't damaged." She coughed weakly and her breathing slowed. "Bon Bon's in the seventeenth battalion." Lyra chuckled quietly. "You two made the most amazing apple chocolate." Applejack's memory wandered back to better times. Bon Bon and her had been good friends, especially when it came to making sweets and it was through Bon Bon that Applejack had met Lyra.

Lyra continued speaking. "I want you to give her the bag and tell her I'm sorry I won't be able make it."

Applejack lay down by Lyra's side again and placed the bag gently on her forelegs to keep it off the ground.

"Don't say that sugarcube. Healers are comin' soon, ya'll make it." She said almost too quiet to hear.

"Thanks." Lyra said just as quietly, "The optimism is nice, but you should hold onto the bag just in case."

Applejack bit her lip and nodded even though Lyra couldn't see her.

"Did Bonnie ever tell you how we met?"

Applejack couldn't bring herself to speak.

"I didn't think so. She's always so, so embarrassed by it." Lyra took a deep shaky breath. "It was about three- no four years ago. I was moving into Ponyville, I'd just finished at college and well it's not easy finding a place to stay without a job..."

Applejack wasn't sure when she had started crying, sobbing and shivering but never ceasing to cling to every word and staying close to the dying unicorn.

She wasn't sure when Big Mac lay down next to her, draping a comforting foreleg over her shoulder quietly, without interrupting her as she chuckled at a bad joke Lyra had made.

She wasn't sure when the unicorn had ceased to breathe, peacefully sighing away her terminal breath, without leaving her side, Lyra's tired head resting against her shoulder.

She wasn't sure when a set of heavy boots and two sets of hooves had come galloping and running towards them, the owner of the boots dropping to their knees quickly, hands extended over Lyra's prone form, a green glow enveloping them momentarily.

Applejack only regained her grasp on reality when the Aeon cleric finally spoke, the young androgynous face looking downcast, as the aeon stood using its odd weapon for support.

"I'm sorry. She's-"

"I know." Applejack interrupted. "I know." She repeated in a whisper.

The survivors of the sixteenth battalion, along with the numerous dead, had been escorted to the adjacent stronghold where the seventeenth was stationed while the Aeon reinforcements moved up the bottleneck of mountains to confront the second wave that was due after the Nightmares.

It hadn't taken long for Applejack and Big Mac to find Bon Bon as the other pony had been searching amongst the survivors herself.

"Applejack!" The curly haired mare galloped towards the duo. "I’ve been looking all over the place! Have you seen Lyra? I'm really worried."

Applejack reluctantly met Bon Bon's gaze and a deeper shade of fear replaced Bon Bon's concern.

"Wh-what happened?"

Applejack detached the small brown bag from her armour and offered it to her friend.

Bon Bon's eyes widened and she snatched the bag away by it's bottom shaking it a few times until it's contents clattered to the ground.

It was a gold anklet with a small diamond embedded in it.

An anklet identical to one Bon Bon owned.

An engagement anklet.

Bon Bon stared at the ring of gold with horrified eyes.

"She... Lyra... Said she was sorry she won't be able to make it." Applejack said in a whisper her voice cracking painfully.

Tears welled up in Bon Bon's eyes and she collapsed into a sitting position, her fore hooves covering her mouth, eyes clenched as a choked sob escaped her.

"Oh Celestia no." She said keeling over, tears pouring down her face, "No, no, not my Heartstrings, not her."

"I'm sorry." Applejack said reaching out with a hoof.

Bon Bon recoiled at Applejack's touch, staring at her for a moment with wide almost accusing eyes before bolting away, disappearing through the crowded courtyard followed by a few yells and shouts as she shoved her way past everyone in her path.

Applejack stood stunned for a moment, eyes hovering over Bon Bon's path of escape.

Then she silently and quickly scooped the anklet into the brown bag and trotted away.

Macintosh watched his sister go for a moment, his face emotionless but his eyes full of worry, glancing the way Bon Bon had fled, then followed his younger sibling.

Generosity through Sacrifice

Rarity yawned daintily as she slowly stood and stretched on her small bed mat, her bed sheet rising with her before sliding off into an inelegant  heap.

As the pale unicorn stretched several joints along her back and legs popped and creaked slightly. A year or two ago Rarity would have been appalled by her body producing such unladylike sounds but now she just enjoyed the sudden looseness in her limbs as she idly looked around her spartan room.

It was a tiny thing, almost a cubicle with plain grey metal walls, a single lamp dangling from the ceiling, a basket in the corner for dirty clothes, a box with clean clothes neatly folded by Rarity, two bed mats, one for her, one for her room mate, and a single door leading to a corridor, lined with doors to identical cubicles, leading to the showers and outside world.

Such was the accommodation of one who works in the factories constructed by the Aeon within the Everfree Forest. Definitely not the grand penthouses that Rarity had longed for in Canterlot but still she found herself content with the circumstances.

A sudden loud snore and a shifting of cloth abruptly ended the unicorn’s reverie and she glared at her room mate for their graceless behaviour.

The grand fashionista of Ponyville had to admit that not all that long ago she had sadly been speciesist. Being a unicorn of high tastes she had been quickly exposed to the prejudices and snobbish nature of her ‘betters’ of the Canterlot elite and that had developed a sort of disdain for other beings of Equestria further deepened by her experience with Diamond Dogs and what she’d heard of the griffin, Gilda’s behaviour. Even around Zecora she had felt uncomfortable.

But then the war had come.

The Aeon had simply disturbed her.

True they were graceful in their own bizarre bipedal way but they were just too different, too wrong. At least other non-ponies had a familiar equine shape.

They were so strange with their bizarre tongue and accents and the way their skin colours were so uniform even if their hair colour varied greatly.

When her friends had decided to join the Equestrian army she had been a little reserved about it. If she hadn’t been so worried about letting down her friends she wouldn’t have done it for the sake of keeping a maximum distance between herself and these aliens.

Now with her talent with gems revealed to extend towards all minerals in general she was working among ponies, mules, donkeys and aeon constantly in a filthy factory producing weapons and armour for the Equestrian and Imperial armies.

Naturally she had been very reserved, a lady among brutes, keeping to herself and refusing to talk to anyone, but inevitably she had become lonely and a kind soul managed to finally crack open her self made shell.

Rarity growled at the offending smelter between coughs as the soot cleared and the machine squealed and died.

Someone had somehow gotten organic matter on the production line, much to the taskmaster on the upper level’s fury and it had gone unhindered down to the smelter where it melted and burned, clogging the magic powered contraption, causing the pressure to build to dangerous levels.

If Rarity hadn’t practically torn the release valves right out of their pipes the whole thing would have exploded in a violent rush of molten metal and untapped mana.

She raised a hoof to wipe the soot from her face only to find her leg pitch black with the gunk.

The fashionista wailed as she realised that she was covered from what was left of her mane and tail to her still well maintained hooves in soot.

Never before had she gotten this filthy!

Her surroundings weren’t much better off, everything being covered in layers of black dust and sludge originating from the large metal pipes that held the pressure valves.

A sharp laugh caught her off guard and she spun around to see a group of the mules from the upper levels giggling uncontrollably.

Rarity pouted and looked away, what little was left of her pride starting to fray rapidly.

“All right you, get lost.” A feminine voice with an odd unmistakably aeon accent said. “You’re not even supposed to be down here.”

The no-longer-white unicorn looked behind her to see the mules walking off still laughing under their breath while a tall- though short for an aeon- red skinned aeon in thick forge garments glared at the departing mules with their hands on their hips.

The Aeon looked back at Rarity and the unicorn looked away at the concerned look on the Aeon’s face.

“Hey you alright there?” She heard the heavy footfalls approaching. “And why aren’t you wearing your protective barding?”

Rarity glared at the floor.

“I was simply on my way to my lunch break when the warning beacons went off and I won’t wear that hideous thing unless I have to.” She said in a sulky mumble too insulted by the filth coating her to care about keeping appearances.

The aeon laughed to Rarity’s surprise.

It wasn’t the laughing itself that surprised her but the way it laughed.

It reminded her of the way Applejack would laugh when Rarity would speak of fashion, playful, not mocking, something the country pony would do before saying, “Well that’s just Rarity for you, prissy and prim.”

Rarity looked up to see the aeon crouching down and producing a surprisingly clean cloth from one of their pockets.

“Want me to clean up your face?”

Rarity blinked in surprise.

“Well... I- um.”

The aeon chuckled again.

“I just thought you’d rather walk out of here a little cleaner, and there isn’t a mirror in here, so...” An honest smile crossed their freckled red face.

Rarity smiled back a little.

“If you don’t mind.” She said quietly.

The aeon leaned forward slowly and began to gently wipe the soot from around her mouth and eyes, rubbing the soot off of the cloth and on to their pants legs to keep from spreading it around too much.

Rarity began to feel uncomfortable under the alien’s ministration as her original surprise at the aeon’s kindness  faded.

In a bid to reduce her awkwardness she decided to ask a question that had been bugging her for a while.

“If I may ask miss...” Rarity began.

“Vesena. You can call me Ves.”

“Ves.” Rarity smiled a little again, “If I may ask why is it that among yourselves you always refer to another aeon as ‘ae’?”

Ves blinked a few times, temporarily confused by the question then grinned almost mischievously. “Now you're the first native to ask that far as I know and there’s an interesting reason for it.”

And now Ves lay on the other side of the tiny room, aer bed sheet messily scrunched around aer front as ae snored quietly on aer side, revealing aer light red skin which bordered on pink with black freckles peppering aer arms and back and aer short coppery hair which was somehow tangled despite being so short.

Rarity sighed and stretched again this time her limbs remaining quiet then trotted over to Ves to attempt to wake aer up.

“Ves.” She said poking her room mate in the arm.

Ves groaned in reply without moving.

“Ves get up it’s almost dawn we need to get ready for work.”

“Just a few more minutes.” Ves grumbled.

Rarity gave the back of Ves’ head a disapproving look.

This was just about a ritual in the morning between Rarity and Ves, the unicorn almost found the aeon’s morning laziness infuriating.

Ves had explained a few days after they arranged to share a room that all aeon had a ‘sin’ which they were born with and it imposed a weakness or craving upon the bearer, the sin was always made plain by a coloured birthmark around the right eye.

Ves’ was Sloth, a sulfur yellow mark standing out around aer eye.

Apparently ae loved to sleep.

In effect ae wasn’t much in the way of a morning person.

“Ves we’ve been going through this for three whole months now just get up.” Rarity said rolling her eyes. This reminded her too much of Sweetie Belle on school days.

“I dun wanna.” Ves replied moving to grab aer sheets and pull them tighter around aer.

Rarity was faster, using her magic to pull the sheets away. That ended up being a mistake.

“Ves why are you naked?”

“I put my pyjamas in the wash late.”

Ves was also a forgetful aeon.

Rarity gave a drawn out sigh, one which before Ves and her had begun sharing a room she’d reserved for Sweetie Belle alone.

Some days it unnerved her how much she was reminded of her younger sister, right now it annoyed her.

Under normal circumstances she wouldn’t be fazed by a pony’s nudity but Ves not being a pony and having aer ‘parts’ in plain sight was not exactly pleasant and so caused Rarity to growl at her friend to put something on by time she was back.

Rarity whipped a towel out of her clean clothes basket and trotted out the door, leaving Ves to make aerself decent as she headed down the hall to the showers.

The reason as to why aeon refer to each other as “ae” and “aer” even when not speaking in their native tongue regardless of their immediate appearance or mannerisms turned out to be that unlike almost every other sentient species known to ponykind (reinforcing the feeling of them being “alien”) aeon are, as a species, hermaphroditic. They lack the gender and sex binary shared by the vast majority of the known cosmos (according to Ves) and so only have one word and set of suffixes for referring to each other, other than by name. In effect this meant that they lacked sexism and gender stereotypes -such as mares are dainty and stallions are tough- they are free to act and dress however they feel truly comfortable.

This was also why up until the equines from below had moved in with the aeon factory workers there had been no separation between the mares’ and stallions’ toilets and showers.

At first that had lead to embarrassing and irritating problems but the Aeon had caught on to the issue quickly, with a few hints from the various equine workers, and had separated them all out into three groups for toiletry, mares, stallions and Aeon, the Aeon separating themselves for those who didn’t feel comfortable washing in the presence of Aeon or vice versa.

Rarity cantered over to the same shower she used every day, the cleanest one in the far corner, and turned the nozzle to activate the flow of water, waiting for twenty seconds for it to reach the right temperature then stepped in.

It was in that same shower that Rarity had idly pondered the nature of the aeons’ unigendered state. She had wondered; if ponies had been created (or evolved depending on who you listened to) with a single gender instead of two would she care so much about being a lady? Would she only be interested in stallions who were chivalrous and kind? Ever since she was a little filly she had been brought up believing in the princess and the prince, the set roles of each gender.

Her acceptance of the friendship of Rainbow Dash and Applejack had definitely opened her eyes fully to the fact that mares weren’t absolutely supposed to be ladies, obsessed with appearance and etiquette and the Blueblood incident had shown her that not all princes are gentlestallions, in fact they’re more likely to be twits, having been spoon fed their every wish from birth.

But now in the darkest hours of Equestria and the world she was wondering if any of it meant anything at all.

Now she thought about how Blueblood had acted, and how she would have acted similarly, given the chance, but because he was male it was unacceptable for Blueblood to act that way (he did take it to an extreme though). Is there anything wrong with a chivalrous female and a dainty male?

If ponies were as the Aeon would Rarity have thought it acceptable for Blueblood to act as he had?

However when she had brought it up with Ves the aeon had simply smiled in a bizarre maternal fashion and hugged her.

“There’s no need to have an identity crisis just because you’re a mare and want to be a lady.” Ae had said, “What’s important is that you act as and be what you feel comfortable as.”

That had been what had sealed Rarity’s friendship with the aeon, despite her minor xenophobia and doubts Ves was kind and quirky and understanding, qualities Rarity loved despite everything.

Rarity trotted out of the shower cubicle as the noise in the room began to rise with the trickle of mares moving into the shower room, chatting as they washed, and toweled herself off as she moved, so she wouldn’t drip on the floor on the way back to her room.

Upon arriving she was happy to see that Ves was dressed, even if ae was lying in bed again.

Rarity shook her head then set about thoroughly drying her mane and tail, the once luxurious coiffure now cut down to a tiny purple hedge along her neck and head to keep it from catching on any of the equipment in the factory.

Of course that didn’t stop her from taking good care of it, maintenance of her hair was just one of those things that made Rarity, Rarity.

Once she was satisfied that her hair was dry enough Rarity magiced a brush and her safety gear from the clothes box, attaching the dull brown and silver materials to her limbs and body as she brushed her mane and tail working what little knots could find their way in back out.

The protective barding was a simple thick and durable material that covered her legs, body and neck, as well as various plates of silvery metal for a little extra protection without disrupting manoeuvrability.

Rarity liked to think that despite the barding’s drab appearance she made it look as fabulous as anything else she laid hoof on.

Finally Rarity floated the brush back into the box and levitated a pair of bulky safety goggles out, stretching the strap to fit behind her ears and resting the lenses on her forehead.

She turned towards Ves slightly posing dramatically for a moment, causing her room mate who had lifted their head up to look at her to smirk.

“Fetching as ever Rarity.” Ves said before groaning to aer feet.

“Oh why thank you darling, I do try.” Rarity replied, leading the way out of the door.

They walked together out of the massive metal complex that housed the workers and traveled in an elevator up onto a higher level where the nature of their abode was revealed.

From an elevated walkway they could see all the lower levels of a series of interconnected platforms and domes, beams and elevators crisscrossing through the air seemingly at random, creating the massive airborne structure of Hathor, an Aeon Sky Farm, feeding and arming the aeon and Equestrian forces across the continent with the aid of a few others placed at strategic locations.

The fashionista and the aeon stopped a moment to admire the view across the colossal flying structure and across the Everfree forest.

Near it’s centre, a few kilometres off from the ruins of the Temple of the Two Sisters, five monoliths reached for the sky, the spires of a Mana Refinery, the tip of the centre most spire passing the lower layer of clouds, creating a tiny purple sun in the sky as raw energy was forced from a split in a ley line through the Everfree into a tiny point at it’s tip, compressing and weaving it from an ether into a gas then funnelling it down colossal pipes to the four smaller spires, placed evenly away from the central spire to be processed and compacted into a liquid then solid state to form the power source of the entire mechanical aeon battle force, their sky farms, sky forts, flying machines, walkers, tanks, sea ships, sea forts, land forts, dreadnaughts, all powered by raw solidified magic.

Rarity couldn’t help but find the spires elegant in their simplicity, powerful structures fueling the mind bogglingly immense machine of the Aeon Empire across the stars and all of known reality.

A machine that was slowly killing our world... Rarity thought to herself, suddenly sullen. She had heard rumors of the fiercer battles between the Empire and Shadow where their greater war machines and demons had pitted themselves against each other, destroying the landscape and rendering it unrecognisable and warped.

Ves, sensing her unicorn friend’s sudden change in mood, patted her on the shoulder and motioned gently to get over to the hangar bay.

A short while of walking had them accompanied by other groups of ponies, mules, aeon, donkeys and other creatures of strength, filing on to two massive flying machines dubbed “rocs” which were pretty much huge flying boxes smothered in layer after layer of protective plating and shielding runes.

Their eight wide wings spread shadows across the platform as everyone walked on in an orderly fashion, scaling the passenger ramps then finding their seats on the passenger level of the fuselage, the large and slightly cramped room housing just over a hundred and fifty seated aeon and equines while the deck below held replacement equipment and parts for the factory that was it’s destination.

Once everyone was aboard the underside of the wings of both rocs lit up with a dim blue light, the air shimmering with force as the levitators activated, humming loudly, and reduced the roc’s weight significantly.

The large ramp on it’s rear retracted and the double doors slid together with a hiss, sealing the occupants within as one roc lifted off the ground and sped off the platform in the general direction of the Mana Refinery, closely followed by the second.

After a short but uncomfortable trip that Rarity had grown used to, wedged amongst so many fellow workers, the roc landed with a slight bump and a drawn out hiss, the whir of the engines died down and the doors opened, two ramps sliding out, the one above releasing the workers and the one below giving the aeon and their awkward looking walkers access to the cargo.

Rarity and Ves walked together through the throng pushing their way towards the ramps leading to the higher levels of the tall factory with it’s many exhaust chutes giving off a dull red glow with a tiny trickle of smoke and steam from each.

At a guess the factory was thirty stories high though Rarity had never bothered to count exactly how many there were. The fashionista made metalsmith worked about the middle on the sixteenth floor just above the assembly floors for small single aeon flying craft called the “dragonfly” and below a floor reserved for storage of spare parts and repair tools waiting to be picked up and sent to the front lines at the end of the week.

A short elevator trip brought Rarity and her co-workers, most of which consisted of other unicorns and mainly red skinned “volk” aeon similar in skin colour to Ves, to the smelters where they crafted masterwork weapons and armour for the aeon elite forces.

It was a point of pride that Rarity, despite her change in occupation had continued to be a master in her profession going from making dresses for the high class to making armaments for the best of the best.

Rarity went straight to her station, next to Ves’ she was happy to note, and without missing a beat checked the state of the machine, fiddling with valves and switches and checking the nozzles from a safe distance, nodding in approval at it’s top notch condition, activated the machinations and set to work, the others in the room doing the same in a strange state of synchronisation.

Molten metals pooled into a cauldron in front of the alabaster unicorn, swirling and mixing while being watched carefully by her to make sure the mix was just right, next several gems, namely diamonds and rubies, clunked into a pan next to the unicorn.

She levitated the gems one at a time, eyeing them carefully even though they had already been checked, double checked and triple checked before coming to her section of the factory but it always paid to be a little extra careful, then crushed the mix of gems with a quick effort of will, keeping the dust elevated above the blisteringly hot mixture before reaching out with her magic again to scoop up the right amount of metal, shaping it into a more or less crescent shape while mixing the gem dust with the metal making sure to keep it even throughout by kneading the glowing orange liquid with her magic, impurities and a lack of uniformity being unacceptable in this level of weaponry.

Once she was satisfied with the gems’ concentration throughout the metal Rarity closed her eyes relying on her magical touch rather than her sight, feeling the heat, texture and shape of the molten metal, kneading and coaxing it like putty into a crescent blade, slowly prodding it until it’s surface was perfectly smooth.

With a final flourish of magic Rarity pressed the edges of the blade into a sharp edge, though abnormal in shape, the crescent moon blade, once attached to it’s shaft, was ideal for dismembering and holding the monsters that the aeon warriors known as “Tevana” were trained to slay.

Opening her eyes the unicorn held the blade against the surface of a water bath to cool it into a completely solid state before turning the blade over several times, inspecting it carefully and pushing the background noise of the other workers out of her mind.

Satisfied with her work Rarity placed the blade on a conveyer belt behind her cauldron that carried the blade onwards in the production queue to have runes etched into it’s surface to increase it’s already impressive durability and potential for damage and to have it fitted onto a pole before being sent to be used on the battlefield.

Rarity glanced to her side, seeing Ves already on her second blade, aer hands rising and falling and moving in a rhythm to shape the lump of molten metal in mid air, a look of concentration on aer face.

The unicorn looked back to the cauldron before her and continued to shape and mold the metal refusing to let her mind wander or distractions take her.

Hours later Rarity and Ves, both tired from the metal smithing sapping their magical energies, went down to the cafeteria, adjacent to the factory instead of inside it, for their lunch break.

As Ves wolfed down aer workers portion Rarity looked at her own tray with a conflicted look on her face.

It took a moment for Ves to pick up the fact that aer friend wasn’t eating and ae stopped, taking a few gulps from the cup of water in front of aer then looked at the small unicorn with a concerned expression.

“You okay Rarity? You look a little down in the dumps.”

“Oh I’m fine...” She replied with a sigh, “Just thinking.”

“About your friends? And home?”

Rarity nodded.

“Yes we all heard about the loss at the Alicorn Alps...” Rarity rubbed a hoof against her forehead, her eyes closed. “I’m sure my friends are fine but the battalion Applejack is a part of took massive casualties and Rainbow Dash has a knack for getting into danger, as I’ve learnt from experience... And Fluttershy was there with the medical team... I’m scared I’ll have to tell Applebloom that her big sister is gone or if I had to-” Ves stopped her by placing a comforting hand on the alabaster pony’s shoulder causing her to open her eyes, finding her vision misted with tears.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I should know better.” Rarity said wiping her eyes.

Ves squeezed the unicorn’s shoulder and shook aer head.

“No Rarity it’s okay to be afraid for your friends, I know I get worried to bits whenever my friends in the fighting force get into trouble...” Ves said quietly, “Even more so when my friends who aren’t fighters get caught in the crossfire. I’m sure your friends are going to be fine, Arbedos arrived in time to save the majority of the sixteenth and seventeenth battalions and routed the Nightmares in time to face off the Shadow...”

“I know I just... I can’t help it...” Rarity said.

“I know it’s hard not to worry.” Ves bit aer lip for a second and decided to change the subject. Now wasn’t the time for that kind of talk. “So were you thinking about Ponyville as well?”

“Oh... Yes just thinking about my boutique... I would very much like to go back there. Even see Sweetie Belle and my parents...” Rarity said.

“Don’t worry, just a little longer and you’ll be on military leave as well as your friends.” Ves comforted. “Another couple of months and you’ll be able to re-open your store and see everyone.”

“For a month.” Rarity said with a huff. “And I’ll probably spend all that time dusting and reorganising.”

“Oh don’t be like that.” Ves chuckled, “Things are going uphill I bet the Empire won’t need Equestria’s help in time and you can all get back to your old lives.” Ae spread aer arms out with a wide smile.

Rarity shook her head.

“No we won’t be able to get back to our old lives... We’ve seen and sacrificed too much to be able to go back.”

Ves went silent for a while, the two of them left in their own sea of thought before the aeon spoke up.

“Come on Rarity, eat up. It’ll do you good.”

The mentioned unicorn looked at her food sadly for a moment then picked up her fork and tried to eat, not really feeling any hunger.

Laughter through Slaughter

Pinkie loved to laugh.

Laughter was her element after all, it was in her nature to giggle and guffaw.

In fact her laughter made her almost fearless, one of her many mottos “Giggle at the Ghosties” empowering her to chuckle at anything remotely spooky and concentrate on how silly it was.

And yet no matter how hard she thought about it, no matter how hard the adorable, quirky, pink party pony tried she just couldn’t laugh at one massive, evil, terrifying ghostie that had been plaguing all of Equestria for well over a year.

That ghostie was war.

No matter how you looked at it war was not funny.

It was tragic and hurtful, cruel and careless, decimating and defiling everything it touched, tearing families apart, forcing sons and daughters, brothers and sisters into battle and separating them with the veil of death.

At first Pinkie could see the little good that came of war. Ponies who would never have met before, coming together and

becoming as close as siblings, the flames of battle forging ponies, griffons and aeon into kin despite differences in species, age or gender.

But then time wore that illusion down, as it does with all things.

Pinkie had a gift, multiple gifts in fact, two most notable being her Pinkie Sense, the supernatural ability to divine immediate events through spasms and sensations throughout her body, and the one that the aeon were most interested in when assigning her to a role in the military, her ability to “Blink” as the aeon called it.

The bizarre pink mare, despite being an Earth Pony, had the power to disappear and then reappear a short distance away, regardless of obstacles.

Before joining the military Pinkie used this ability to bring surprise and joy to the denizens of Ponyville, springing from all sorts of odd places to spread her infectious jubilation.

However the military saw it as a way to turn the bouncy mare into a battlefield assassin, Blinking towards a target, slaying them, then Blinking away again.

Even her Pinkie Sense was seen as a potential weapon being able to detect incoming dangers before they come and deflect or counter them.

It had taken many long months of hard training and yelling and screaming but the military had finally carved the party pony into a flashing instrument of death.

Now after a year and a half of bloodshed and mayhem laughter was an alien concept to her. When others would cheer and party at the end of a victorious battle she would sit apart, mourning the death and loss of all who had been hurt or killed in the fighting.

With her straight mane and tail instead of a crazed puff of cotton candy, her coat a dim grayish crimson instead of it’s usual vibrant pink she had devolved into one she had once dubbed “Saddy McSadpants”, her old, miserable, lonely self, Pinkamena Diane Pie.

And at this exact moment in time, she was doing what she had been trained to do best.

Kill.

She took no pleasure in it, no joy or even the slightest sense of victory.

It was murder that she committed, plain and simple.

Even when she ran her blades through the neck of a demon, no matter how grotesque the creature was, she had to wonder if it was aware of what it was doing, if it was in its nature or if it was being controlled by the Shadow.

She wanted to cry every time a pony or shadow aeon cried out in pain as she struck them.

She always tried to make it quick, going for the neck and head but there was always that one last gurgling gasp of shock as blood flew from the lacerations in their trachea and jugular and their eyes widened in shock.

Pinkamena grunted as a shudder ran through her body and she Blinked, a flash of pink in two locations signalling her point of disappearance and reappearance, a massive limb crashing down where she had been a second ago, the demon that it was attached to growling in what seemed like annoyance at the lack of a satisfying crunch before bellowing in pain as a heavily armoured Tevana leapt onto it’s face, ramming the crescent blade it wielded into one of the demon’s many eye sockets and pulling the organ from it’s place with a slicing motion as the Tevana launched itself back off of the demon’s face.

The crimson pony didn’t bother to watch the rest of the fight, returning her attention to the rest of the battle.

It was a small skirmish by the recent standards of the war, a hundred or so Equestrians and a hundred or so Nightmares facing off while being backed up by a few squads of Aeon and demons on either side.

A walking gun platform that the Aeon had brought into the fight swiveled on it’s four insectoid legs, guns flaring and booming violently as it turned Nightmares and demons into red mist with flashes of aggressive mana, it’s shields glowing deep purple under a barrage of eldritch energies from a tall, gangly demon opposite with far too many limbs and mouths.

Pinkamena flashed three times, diving in and out of the enemy lines, ending four more lives and as the blood on the blades attached to her forehooves met the ground the sky roared and opened in a torrent of rain and lightning.

A few aeon wavered momentarily, while others became empowered, beginning to harness the elemental energies of the storm against the enemy.

Pinkamena’s mind burned with the faces of the freshly slain, confusion on some as if they weren’t aware that they had just been killed, silently thanking the sky for crying when she had no time to do so herself.

A faint whisper trailed through Pinkamena’s ears, barely audible and yet clear through the chaos around her.

Giggle at the Ghosties It seemed to say in a croaking old motherly voice.

It reminded her strangely of her long passed Granny Pie.

The straight maned mare looked about, confused as to where the voice had come from. She blinked a few times then shook her head deciding to think nothing of it as she leapt forwards once more into the fray, soundlessly murdering more ponies.

As she struck another fatal blow the whisper came back trailing into her mind, Giggle at the Ghosties Guffaw at the Ghastly, don’t be afraid, just laugh and party.

Pinkamena blinked and stared at nothing.

What was that? Where was it coming from?

She had no time to dwell on it as a series of twitches and shudders alerted her to incoming enemy air support.

She Blinked several times, landing her in front of the field commander, a statuesque tan aeon in heavy armour and holding a pair of binoculars standing atop a shielded platform and relaying commands across the battle and seemingly unphased by the torrents of rain, not even squinting as the sheets collided with aer face.

Upon the dull coloured mares arrival the commander looked down at her and spoke.

“Anything to report S.O. Pinkamena?”

“The Shadow has incoming air support, possibly five or six units. And they’re close.” Pinkamena replied, her once cheerful and bouncy voice now filled with spite and hurt.

“Thank you Pinkamena.” The field commander raised aer wrist and shouted into it, after a short burst of static. “We have incoming enemy air units, keep your eyes on the skies people!”

There was a garbled reply and the weapons platform’s top most guns began to swivel towards the bleak clouds sweeping back and forth while the rest continued to pound the enemy ground forces and retaliate at the eldritch abomination that had been throwing balls of green death at them earlier.

Just as Pinkamena turned to blink back into the battle words met her ears, louder this time.

Don’t be scared, life’s a party don’t let death get you down. Go play and frolic, there’s nothing but fun to be had.

The battlefield shimmered and flickered with bright lights and the fighting turned to play before her eyes, the demons becoming clowns and the aeon becoming stuntmen and actors, screams becoming laughter, rain becoming confetti.

Pinkamena gasped and staggered in shock blinking and shaking her head, returning the battlefield to it’s original state, the colours fading with the sheets of rain and howling wind.

Piercing cries split the air as flying horrors dived towards the ground, dodging blasts of magic and snatching up ponies and aeon alike, oblivious to the continuous stabbing at their feet from those they grabbed.

“Are you unwell Pinkamena?” The field commander shouted at the mentioned mare.

“No I’m fine!” She growled back and disappeared in a flash Blinking back into the battle.

Within moments she was atop the back of one of the flying beasts hacking and slashing at the back of it’s neck sawing away at the space between it’s vertebrae. With a screech of agony and a hideous tearing and popping sound the beast fell from the sky, it’s link between it’s brain and body severed and Pinkamena returned to the ground, landing atop a shadow aeon and slamming her blades into the back of it’s neck giving it the same treatment as the flying beast.

The world spun and blurred suddenly though she remained centered, bright colours blurring and flashing amongst the dull.

A massive clown cackled and bounded towards Pinkamena and she flailed in confusion, unsure whether this was some conjuration of her cracking mind or real.

She lashed out instinctively cutting the clown in it’s shin and a gurgling cry sounded, the clown disappearing like smoke, being replaced by a regular unicorn wearing the Equestrian army armour and insignia, their throat slashed open and spurting blood that was diluted in seconds by the rain.

Worse still she recognised the unicorn, a bluish-purple stallion who had laughed and entertained the other soldiers with magical light shows to take their minds off the coming battle.

An ally and friend to many and she had just murdered him.

She tried to tell herself it was a mistake, an accident from a bizarre apparition but something in her brain wasn’t letting her.

Oh dear, oh dear look what you did. But don’t fret deary, look at them... Don’t they look peaceful now? So calm. It’s like they’re asleep isn’t it?

She stared at the corpse, their face now blank, eyes wide but no longer looking confused or betrayed. She reached out and pulled their eyelids down, closing them.

The unicorn did look asleep. So peaceful.

Life’s a party and death’s just the after-party. Don’t be scared or worried. Don’t fret. Just laugh.

“Just laugh.” Pinkamena said a queer, alien sensation crawling up her spine. “Life’s a party.”

Somepony was shouting something at her, shaking her violently.

Just...

Pinkamena shoved the pony away, her coat suddenly brightening and her mane springing back into a poofy mess.

Laugh...

Pinkie Pie slammed a hoof into the pony’s face, driving the blade attached to it into their cranium.

“It’s time to party!” She screamed at the top of her lungs, giggling maniacally as something else took hold of her limbs, ethereal tentacles worming into her brain.

Hours later a trio of Valkyrie Gunships landed in the mud, a ramp lowering from their streamlined underbellies and a squad of aeon hustled out, weapons ready.

A garbled message from the field commander had brought them here, something about one of aer soldiers snapping and killing everything.

They were expecting a rogue aeon when they slunk into the bloodied terrain, most likely managing to somehow get into the weapons platform and mowing everyone down by surprise.

So it was easy to say that they were surprised when they found the weapons platform a mangled wreck it’s converter overloaded and blood and bodies decorating it’s surface, blood and water glinting on the slowly returning sunlight.

They spread out, trying to find any survivors.

Demons were brutalised left and right with a savagery not even maddened Tevana would put out, their entrails spread wide, aeon were dismembered and decapitated in greater number and ponies were absolutely everywhere, their bodies lacerated beyond recognition but all their faces, untouched, their eyes closed and mouths slack as though sleeping.

One of the aeon suddenly shouted, waving an arm frantically for the others to come, calling out that they had found a survivor.

The others approached swiftly, but slowed, becoming cautious as they drew near.

In a small depression in the earth, clear of any bodies except two, a bright pink earth pony in light Equestrian armour stared blankly, into space, breathing without pattern and tears streaming down her face.

In her forehooves, held in a tight hug a seemingly untouched bluish-purple unicorn stallion lay in her forelimbs, seemingly asleep other than the clean slash across his throat.

In the Eyes of Immortals

A lone, pearl white alicorn gracefully moved between the statues and slim well maintained trees of the Canterlot Gardens beneath the faint glow of the moon.

She stopped for a moment to look at an empty pedestal, a brow twitching in surprise and concern before she smiled and shook her head, remembering where the statue had been taken to. Celestia sighed and approached the empty pedestal contemplating why it was she hadn’t ordered the pedestal removed.

Not having enough time to really think was her internal answer to her internal question.

The Princesses had been hard pressed ever since the incident in the skies of Canterlot, Celestia doing her utmost to keep everypony calm and Luna working day and night to keep information flowing across the battlefields of the world.

The two weeks after the aeon’s first appearance had been uneasy, with a new threat looming and the world seeing their beloved sun princess using her powers for harm.

Of course the majority had called her a protector, her sister as well, their love for her growing with the knowledge that no matter the occasion she was there for her people. The minority however, many of them being from the aristocracy, had their reservations about this new aggressive side of Celestia, the younger sister they had expected it from, but not from the elder.

These ponies had spread rumors and attempted to dig into past events best left to collect dust. Celestia of course hadn’t been able to so much as raise a hoof to stop the trouble makers as that would have just given them more reason to dissent.

In a way the war did her some good, as the aeon’s appearance into the limelight took the heat off of her and brought it on to the war that was now raging back and forth across the continent.

Not that she was happy with the war.

Celestia was anything but. She hated the conflict and bloodshed, understanding that it was necessary but not taking any joy from it.

The white alicorn did however take solace in comforting the kingdom on a daily basis, as she had been set up with the help of her leagues of pony aides to lead a propaganda campaign, keeping the spirits of civilians and soldiers as high as possible, portraying the Aeon as helpful guardians, painting the Nightmares as sick traitors and showing signing up to the military as being the highest of honors.

Celestia turned her head, causing her ethereal mane to change it’s direction of flow as she watched an Aeon silhouette approach her, the bottom of a long coat flapping as their feet moved smoothly across the stone brick pavings. Moonlight glinted across smooth armour plates on either arm and off of their long silver hair and a white strip across the front of their mask, where the eye holes would be on a normal mask, glowed dimly.

As they came closer, it became clear that not a single piece of skin was visible, their hands covered in gloves and their neck hidden by their hair and the large collar of their coat as well as the fact that they were heavily armed as the various weapons they carried beneath the midnight black cloak and straps holding a pair of longswords to their back glinted in the dim light.

Once they were a metres distance from the princess they stopped walking and spoke, a synthetic touch to their voice.

“Your highness, shouldn’t you be asleep? It’s another bright day tomorrow and the people won’t think too highly if you have bags under your eyes.” The aeon spoke as if ae knew the princess even though she was sure she had never met this heavily armed individual before.

For a moment she wondered why this particular aeon hid under layers of cloth and steel while most other aeon wore simple clothes that showed off their arms and never hid their faces when out of combat.

She decided to shrug it off as a quirk and turned her attention to the pedestal once more.

“I think I can go for one night with a little less rest.” The alicorn’s voice spoke with soft authority though had a detached sound to it. “I assume you are the one I had asked for?”

“If what you asked for was ‘An important individual from the Starlit Bane.’ then yeah that’s me.” There was a click and a hiss followed by the sound of fabric and armour moving. “Dusktreader of the first degree, founder of the elite force ‘Aeos’ Fist’ and high field commander of the Aeon Empire, Daedalus Narius at your most humble service.” Celestia looked back at Daedalus seeing that they were now kneeling and their mask was in their hand, though their face was still hidden behind their hair as their head was bowed. “How may I aid you?”

“I’m afraid you might not be the individual I’m looking for.” She said plainly, her mind slightly in another place. “Please, rise.”

The aeon snorted then stood, flicking their hair out of their face, revealing a face as unblemished as almost every other aeon Celestia had laid eyes on.

Rather anti-climatic was the princesses assessment of the hidden face though she figured that there was some important reason for Daedalus wrapping aerself up so thoroughly.

“Well then you should have been more specific on what it is you wanted an important individual for.” Daedalus said, the synthetic undertone gone with the mask.

“I simply didn’t want what I was asking for to somehow become public by a slip of the tongue or some such.”

The aeon laughed and looked back at the princess. “If it’s underhanded then I’m the aeon for the job. How about you tell me what you need and if I turn out not to be cut out for the job, I’ll pull a few strings and make sure someone who is gets straight on to it.”

Celestia sat on the pavement and sighed, something Daedalus hadn’t been expecting, causing aer to look rather uncomfortable for a moment.

“There are six ponies who are very important to both all of Equestria and myself.” Celestia began, looking up to meet Daedalus’ eyes. “They joined the Equestrian military soon after recruitment had begun and when they did they were separated because of their differing skills.”

Daedalus rose an eyebrow, unsure of where this was going. “I would have asked my sister to take care of this but she’s far too busy. I let it slide when they first joined as I knew my dear pupil wouldn’t appreciate interference or special treatment but now something terrible has happened to one of these six and I want someone to bring them back together and look after them.” Celestia paused in her speech to sigh.

Daedalus mouthed a few words to aerself then took advantage of the lapse in speech to jump to a conclusion. “These six ponies wouldn’t happen to be the ‘Elements of Harmony’ I’ve heard tell of would they?”

Celestia nodded not feeling any need to speak.

“Why were they separated in the first place?” Daedalus said more to aerself than to Celestia rubbing aer chin and looking at the ground. “Don’t they need to be in ‘harmony’ or something like that to work?” The aeon glanced up at Celestia to see her nod again, causing Daedalus to say a rather foul sounding word under aer breath before saying, “Well someone’s going down the chain of command hard and fast.”

“What do you mean by that?” The white alicorn finally said.

“I mean someone in the command chain thought it a good idea to split the Elements up, therefore making them useless, the elements not the bearers, and for that act of extreme stupidity they’re going to get kicked out of their position and probably stripped of their honor if they can’t prove it as an honest mistake.” Daedalus turned sharply and stood at attention before the sun goddess. “Your highness I’ll take care of everything, if you could just divulge the names of the six I can track them down and help them as best I can.”

“Thank you Daedalus.” Celestia said with a faint smile. “Their names are; Twilight Sparkle, Rarity, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy.”

“Pinkie Pie? As in Pinkamena?” The aeon scratched the side of aer face and glared at the ground. “I take it that’s the very bad thing huh?”

Celestia nodded. “Yes. And don’t worry, Luna was the one who told me so that particular piece of bad news is still under wraps.”

Daedalus nodded and bowed again. “I shall take my leave your highness and begin preparations immediately.”

“Thank you again Daedalus.” Celestia said as the aeon turned and walked quickly away into the darkness, replacing their mask onto their face.

Once she was sure the aeon had left earshot she turned to a particularly dark patch of shadows.

“You can come out Luna, there’s no need to hide during your beautiful night.”

The shadows swirled and the night princess slowly stepped out, pure darkness trailing off of her body as the spell was dispersed.

“Please forgive me for eavesdropping dearest sister.” She said with her head bowed. “I was just wandering the gardens when I heard you talking with the aeon.”

Celestia smiled warmly and stood to trot over to her younger sibling and hugged her. “Think nothing of it Lulu, you always were the inquisitive one.”

Luna snorted over her sister's shoulder, playfully annoyed by her pet name.

As they parted from the hug Luna seemed to study Celestia’s face for a moment before speaking again.

“The aeon was right. You should get some sleep, you look very tired.”

“Oh Luna we both know the kind of tired I am can’t be cured by a few short hours in bed.” The larger alicorn’s smile became a little sad. “I guess you must have to be going to another meeting soon.”

Luna smiled back. “Not for another hour. New tacticians from the aeon are coming from one of their flying towns and it will be awhile before they arrive.”

Celestia’s smile brightened again. “Oh excellent. Would you like to sit with me and watch the stars? It has been so terribly long since we’ve done that together.”

Luna blinked momentarily, her smile disappearing as she hadn’t expecting the request but a large grin sprang back on to her mouth as she processed what her elder sister had just said.

“I would love to stargaze with you dear sister, it has indeed been a long time.” The dark alicorn shuffled over to sit beside her sister who draped a wing over her shoulders holding her against her side.

“Not since you came back to me.” Celestia replied somberly.

Luna rested her head against Celestia’s shoulder while she traced her eyes over the stars she already knew better than any other living being.

“I promise I won’t ever leave again.”

“And I won’t ever send you away again.”

The two celestial sisters sat side by side wordlessly taking comfort in each others presence, unaware that beyond Luna’s beautiful curtain of light foul machinations were beginning to turn.

Desperate Times Desperate People

After aer meeting with the equine sun goddess, Daedalus moved quickly through the palace gardens into a large courtyard used as a landing platform for the airborne chariots pegasi would pull through the sky, striding towards the far end near the very edge of the elevated castle where a Valkyrie gunship stood, its boarding ramp and landing struts fully extended from its slim teardrop shaped underbelly and the levitators beneath it’s sickle shaped wings glowing with a faint blue aura, ready to take back off upon the approaching aeon’s return.

The pilot and three aeon gunner crew loitered next to the ramp sharing a cigarette as they waited for Daedalus, talking quietly in their heavy native tongue, two of the group chuckling at some joke or another made by one of the others.

As the Dusktreader slipped by the group, brushing past the pilot, ae spoke in the aeonic language. “Hurry up and finish your smoke, I need to get back to the Starlit Bane.”

The grey skinned Ston pilot jumped at the surprise contact and snatched the cigarette from the mouth of the aeon opposite aer, stubbing it out against the metal ramp of the Valkyrie and following Daedalus up it. “Apologies skio, we didn’t realise you would be back so soon.” Ae replied, still in aeonic.

“I don’t care for your excuses.” Daedalus said simply, aer masked face and voice betraying no emotion as ae took the seat nearest to the hatch, allowing the crew to rush past and take their positions. “I have much to do and not much time in which to do it.”

“Of course skio.” The pilot bowed slightly with the honorific and all but leapt into aer seat, aer fingers flying across the crystalline controls of the valkyrie, the gunners doing the same.

Daedalus glanced down the length of the valkyrie at the crew as they went through the take off sequence, saying things back and forth between each other as they did so then lifted one side of aer cloak, reaching under the metallic cloth to retrieve a pencil and pad from one of the many pouches and pockets.

The dusktreader flipped a few pages of the ring bound booklet (ring binding and perforated paper being a very neat commodity the Aeon Empire had learned of from Techno World humans among other things) until a blank page came to the fore and began to write a short to-do list in scrawling runes as the valkyrie gunship closed its ramp and took to the air with a faint hum, the streamlined craft cutting smoothly through the sky.

High priority extraction: Applejack, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Rarity + any important individuals related.

Quickly + quietly move PDP to Starlit Bane.

Daedalus paused in aer writing to tap the blunt end of aer pencil against the part of aer mask that was covering aer mouth for a moment and contemplate pony names, finding it odd for the hundredth time that their names seemed to almost always reflect their personalities and/or “Special Talent” as they called it, names given at birth no less.

At least that was how it had been with every pony ae had met so far.

The Valkyrie encountered a moment of turbulence and the jolt brought Daedalus back to reality and ae continued writing aer list.

Interrogate and demote the idiot who separated the EoH.

This “to-do” was underlined several times and a scribbly skull and crossbones were doodled next to it. Daedalus was understanding when it came to honest mistakes but whoever split up the six greatest assets Equestria had, had won “Dumbarse of the year award” in aer eyes.

Bump military leave forward a few months.

This “to-do” would generate a horrendous amount of paperwork but Daedalus felt it was a necessary sacrifice to get the Elements off of the battlefields for a short while without annoying them too greatly.

Get Daeva to babysit EoH.

There was no way Daedalus would look after a bunch of ponies from a cutesy little town. That was more the Daybringer Hierophant's area of expertise. The warzone was Daedalus’ place of recreation, a cherry setting would drive aer up the wall.

Daedalus paused in aer writing again as the pilot began informing the Starlit Bane that they were landing, wondering if ae had missed anything else of importance.

An idea struck the dusktreader just as the valkyrie’s landing struts extended and ae jotted down one last note before putting the notebook and pencil back away.

Make pony version of Aeos’ Fist.

Daedalus hadn’t the faintest idea what they’d call the Equine elite battalion but ae did know that doing something of the sort would not only give the Elements a place to fight while being somewhere where Daedalus could watch and protect them without them feeling singled out, it would also raise morale amongst the Equestrian population, seeing a group of great ponies being given the same respect and status as the strongest Aeon battalion as well as them having the same effect on the battlefield as Aeos’ Fist, empowering their allies and striking fear into their enemies. Now all ae needed to do was send out messages to as many commanding officers as possible to give aer nominations for this “Ponified Aeos’ Fist”.

As the boarding ramp extended Daedalus stood and addressed the crew. “I have a few things to do but I’ll be back, don’t pack away this Valkyrie but go get something to eat then come straight back.”

The crew saluted in affirmation and Daedalus left.

At the far end of the vast hangar, approaching from a large doorway leading into the Starlit Bane proper, the one to the left was a titan of an aeon, a grey skinned Ston wearing jet black armour, themed like the Tevana’s but much more intricate and decorative and far more intimidating with spikes and blades protruding from strategic spots and swirls and runes of gold along the edges and centres of the plates, aer uncovered face was chiseled and hard, a firm, square jaw and defined cheekbones showed a strength rivaled only by the stone of the mountains, though offset by bright pale blue eyes, like a winter’s clear midday sky, sparkling with softness. Aer dark grey hair was little more than stubble against aer head and an orange curse mark of Gluttony wrapped itself around aer right eye.

The one to the right was far smaller, though still slightly taller than Daedalus, aer was garbed in plain brown robes, rippling as ae walked simultaneously hiding yet flaunting a curvy childbearing figure with wide hips and a large chest, an amulet in the shape of a stylised ten pointed star swung from around aer neck and a dark blue, metal staff with a large, heavy head of the same design as the star around aer neck clutched in aer hand, aer skin was a creamy brown in colour and flowing sand coloured locks of hair fell around aer shoulders, curling slightly near the tips. Aer face was soft and maternal, rounded and full of love, aer eyes a vibrant pink in colour. A red curse mark of Wrath stood out around aer eye.

Daedalus and the two other aeon stopped approaching each other about a metre apart and regarded each other momentarily.

“Bala.” Daedalus nodded at the large black clad Tevana. “Daeva.” Again this time to the smaller Alexuran.

“Daedalus.” They both said in unison nodding back, a wry smile tugging subtly at Bala’s lips.

Daedalus looked around, turning aer head to one side then the other scanning the entire hangar.

“Where’s Hayrona?” Ae said after a pause.

“Hayrona was called out to the Barren’s frontline to mop up a few ‘problems’.” Daeva raised aer hands and made air quotes with aer fingers, “Ae’ll be back in a day or so.”

“Pity. I was hoping to speak to aer about a certain matter.” Daedalus took a few steps forward, making to step past the pair only to be intercepted by an armored arm, sweeping aer up into a bone crushing hug.

“Don’t be like that, love of our Kalas.” Bala said with a massive grin splitting aer chiseled features. “We missed you.”

Daedalus wheezed and flailed to little effect as the air was squeezed out of aer by the titanic aeon. The dusktreader didn’t technically need to breath having an Aeros spirit but still it was an unpleasant feeling.

“So we have.” Daeva concurred, pressing a hand against Daedalus’ back. “Its been too long since we were all together.”

“Daeva its been a month.” Daedalus croaked weakly. “And Hayrona isn’t here.”

“Close enough.” Bala purred tightening aer grip.

“Bala I have something to do!” Daedalus squeaked, furiously hitting Bala’s armored belly with the palm of aer hand.

“Oh you’re no fun these days.” Bala’s grin turned into a frown as ae let go of aer prize, Daedalus returning to aer feet and taking a few deep breaths. “So what’s this something?”

“Princess Celestia asked a favor.” Daedalus said once ae had straightened up and leveled aer breathing. “Wants me to pull some important individuals out of the lines without causing too much disruption. Namely the “Elements of Harmony”.”

“The Elements of what?” Bala’s face blanked in confusion. “Is that some kind of ancient artifact?”

“Kind of.” Daeva says. “If what I’ve managed to research is true they’re ancient forces that manifest in six specific individuals and empower them with the Magic of Friendship.”

“What...” Bala gave Daeva a deadpan look. “Seriously? What happened to the “Righteous Fury of Helios”? At least that sounds badass.”

Daedalus ran a hand over aer masked forehead. “It's nothing we haven’t seen before, just with a lot less smiting and a lot more rainbows.” Daedalus scratched aer neck and straightened aer jacket before making for the entrance to the halls circling the outer ring of the Starlit Bane. “Never the less it's very important that we get them out. We have a lot to do so lets go get comfortable so i can explain what we’re doing.”

The two aeon behind Daedalus shrugged at each other then followed in tow.

==*?*==

The three aeon sat in their quarters, a spartan apartment set up in the general’s wing of the military quarters, in a triangular formation so they could all see each other.

Bala had removed some of aer armour revealing more of aer muscular form, Daeva had laid aer staff beside aer and Daedalus had taken aer mask off.

“So...” Bala began. “What needs doing?”

Daedalus opened aer mouth to begin speaking only to be stopped by Daeva who reached up and ran a finger roughly across Daedalus’ cheek, creating a smear of pale powder on aer finger.

Upon inspecting the substance Daeva glared pointedly at Daedalus.

The Dusktreader sighed resignedly, crossing aer arms. “Daeva this really isn’t-”

“You’re wearing make up.” The Hierophant interrupted.

“Daev-”

“If you’re going to hide behind make up why do you even wear that mask?”

“You know why I wear the mask.”

“You said you’d take off your mask in front of the Princess, when I asked you to be a little honest with he-”

“And why should I do that? I don’t know her, she’s just another Aeos damned ruler in another Aeos damned plane of existence.”

“Daedalus its not about that, it’s abou-”

The sudden argument was interrupted as a heavy strong hand rested down upon the shoulder of both by Bala.

“Daeva.” Bala said softly. “Daedalus is right this isn’t the time.”

Daeva looked up at their colossal companion then sighed resignedly.

The large Tevana turned her attention to Daedalus. “You should wash that off.”

Daedalus nodded stiffly then pulled a cloth out from aer coat, then wiped aer face with it, covering aer features completely with the white fabric, sighing then lowered aer hands and threw the cloth aside into the kitchen sink across the room, revealing a face far from unblemished, numerous scars and slightly discoloured patches of skin all over aer face, some particularly wicked looking ones around aer eyes and mouth and one particularly wide scar running just under aer eyes and through aer nose.

“Happy?” The pale aeon asked coldly.

Daeva nodded slightly looking somewhat embarrassed.

Daedalus grunted in response then pulled aer notepad out of aer cloak, flipping it open.

“Well first off since Hayrona isn’t here I’m going to have to ask you to do aer job.” The cloaked aeon said nodding at Bala. “I need you to go get Pinkamena Diane Pie from Helsinki and bring her here.”

“Alright.” Bala nodded. “Any reason why?”

“Well to keep her safe. She’s one of the Elements.”

Bala looked confused and concerned by this but didn’t say any more.

“Also I would like you to talk to every Field Commander you can get your hands on and start digging up exceptional individuals.” Daedalus added. “I’m wanting to make an elite battalion to put the Elements with once we clean this mess up.”

“Another Aeos’ Fist?” Daeva asked.

“Pretty much. Oh and could you root around for the one in charge of the Canterlot recruitments, that’s apparently where the Elements signed on.” The dusktreader turned aer attention to Daeva. “Daeva when I’ve rounded up all the Elements I need you to baby sit them, just make sure they’re safe until we get this pony Aeos’ Fist thing sorted, especially in regards to Pinkamena.”

“Wait...” Daeva closed aer eyes and shook aer head. “You’re not seriously sending her out into a civilian population in her state?”

“Well yeah.” The scarred aeon shrugged. “We extracted that thing in her head, she won't be alone and you’ll be nearby constantly so I don’t see the problem.”

“My problem isn’t her lashing out at anyone, my problem is her being petrified of thinking she will.” The robed Hierophant crossed aer arms and gave Daedalus a hard look. “I went by Helsinki and I saw her, she’s a psychological trainwreck.”

“Well this is all a part of making her better.” Daedalus shrugged nonchalantly again and put aer notepad away. “Well I need to be off to get some paperwork and have a long chat with someone up top so I need to be off.” The dusktreader picked aer mask up off the table and replaced it on aer face, once more completely hiding aer skin and returning a synthetic drone to aer voice. “Clear your schedule and get ready for some R&R in pony-land.”

An Artist of Agony

A peppy electronic tune blasted loudly through the small dark room, moisture clinging to the stone bricked walls, dirt and filth clinging to the floors, pools of brackish water and other fouler liquids vibrated with the cacophonic beats.

One such pool splashed apart as a bare foot landed in its centre, quickly exiting it as the owner of the foot laughed and bounded across the room, spinning and kicking to the tune, erratically dancing too and fro in a wild mood, what little light there was glinting off of their shark-like teeth, starkly contrasting against their dark, blood streaked lips.

Various objects and tools hung from the roof and on a few spots on the walls, clinking together at random despite the windless nature of the room. A figure watched with wide eyes, noiselessly observing their captor as they danced and laughed, stopping occasionally while bouncing on the spot to touch an implement and mutter to themselves, from their vantage point on a steel rack.

With a few short bounds the artist was in their captive’s face, giggling quietly, the music quieting slightly, a dim mana crystal in the corner dimming further.

“Oh its been too long since I indulged myself.” The dark skinned aeon cooed to the pale human in a harsh voice. “A pity I don’t have something more durable, but your pretty, smooth skin will make an excellent canvas.” They chuckled light heartedly as the captive attempted to choke out a sob then continued to almost lovingly whisper. “Oh shush, you’re going to be immortalised as something far more than you ever would have been in your mortal little life. Hey, maybe you’ll be an exceptionally good piece and I’ll put you on display in my home. Oh it’d be nice to have something new to show off.”

The aeon danced away again, spinning a few times, plucking a tool dangling from the roof and another from the wall before bouncing back.

“Now my darling.” A slow purr graced the captive’s ears as a terrible smile took hold of the aeon’s hawkish features. “Where to start?” The aeon raised one hand holding a gleaming scalpel.

A loud bang, a gust of wind and a wide ray of light interrupted the aeon as they growled, raising their arms to cover their eyes as the filthy ‘art room’ was flooded with light, illuminating the naked aeon and terrified human, the music ceasing.

The aeon was covered in scars, the light lines standing out greatly on aer dark muscular flesh, their black hair was a matted mess, spiky and ruffled in every direction like the crest of some odd bird, even oddly having several feathers tied into it, the centre of the aeon’s chest was a ruined mess, an odd ten-pointed star shaped wound, perpetually oozing and bleeding lightly. Aer face was sharp and cruel, a hooked nose and sharp jawline accentuating the unnatural sharp teeth in aer mouth. Upon their forehead and in their left eye the ten pointed star was also emblazoned as though in black ink, not bleeding unlike the one on their chest. Around their right eye a bright purple mark called out the Sin of Pride.

“Aerov.” A tall figure said from the doorway, statuesque and faceless, a pair of flaming purple eyes gazing about the room, six tendrils acting as hair and four great tentacles swaying from its back, its body seemingly made of dark purple plate metal, a spike protruding from each elbow and spikes covering the tops of its forearms. It strode forward on cloven hooves, a twin tipped tail swaying behind it. “I’m afraid you’re playtime will be cut short.”

“Oh Abaddon, such a nice surprise.” The aeon, Aerov said sarcastically, curtsying in a mocking fashion, dropping the clamp to the floor and waving the scalpel about. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“A decisive strike against the Illuminati.” The Dark Archon, Abaddon replied, ignoring Aerov’s attitude, striding into the small room, letting the door close behind him, his glowing eyes and tips of his waving tentacles shining sinisterly. “Plans have managed to come to fruition, giving us a chance to sweep up the Celestial’s on a silver platter and dine on their home.”

“Oh. Thats fantastic.” Aerov replied with not-quite mock joy. “I’ll have all the angel feathers I could ask for to stuff my bed things with.” The aeon looked thoughtful for a moment. “Say... Do you think Cherubim down would make a nice lining to a coat?”

Abaddon chuckled holding up a nameless torture implement and inspecting it. “Well I suppose you’ll find out.”

“So what's this got to do with little old me?”

“I need you to go and make sure we don’t lose this golden opportunity.”

Aerov tapped aer chin. “Well then why don’t you wade in since this is so important.”

“Because I’ve come to an...” Abaddon paused, hanging the device back up. “Understanding as it were, with the locals of this plane we’re after. I’m all there is keeping a pair of goddesses wading into the fight as long as I don’t get directly involved.”

“Wuss.” Aerov poked looking bored at aer prisoner still teary eyed and strapped to the bench.

Abaddon ignored the insult with the wave of a clawed hand. “Daedalus is there.”

“Oh?” The aeon looked at the dark archon with suddenly piqued interest.

“Of course Seraphim’s welp is there.” Abaddon chided. “I just said that this is a very important plane.”

“Well there are lots of important planes.” Aerov muttered smiling lightly to aerself. “Its been too long since I’ve kicked the little foursome around.”

Abaddon shook his head and turned to leave. “I will grace you with three days, then you, Juno and Eris will be sent to this plane, gather whatever forces you need.”

“Eris? Is good old Thanatos in on this shindig as well?”

“Of course. Any excuse to attempt to dig his claws into Queen Celestin’s nethers. Only he knows why he wants that Solari Cherubim filth.” Abaddon shook his head in disgust. “In fact he’s directly involved in the abysses we’ve managed to force into existence around the target plane. Accelerating their decay so we can open as many portals as possible to keep the pressure on the Empire and culling every Celestial that attempts to close the abysses.”

“Oh I think I know why he wants our dear Holy Flame.” Aerov murmured tapping the scalpel against aer chin with a sly grin. “And as much of a stick in the mud Juno may be, it will be very fun playing with Eris again... So many good times.” A wistful sigh escaped the aeon’s lips, aer tongue following, licking the drying blood from them.

Abaddon opened the door to leave and looked over his shoulder one more time. “Three days, at the Crucible, no later, be ready. I want this plane to burn and I will not accept failure.”

“Whatever you say Aby darling!”

The aeon was ignored as the door slammed shut, plunging the room back into darkness.

“Oooh so much to do, I need to prepare!” Aerov almost squealed as ae threw aside aer scalpel and bounded to the door, threw it open and dashed up the stairs, laughing madly all the way.

The door slowly closed with a quiet creak before clicking shut, leaving the room completely silent and pitch black only interrupted after a moment by a cracked, choking sob.