New Friends and New Enemies

Chapter 12
Sins of the Past, Ancient and Renewed

They moved carefully over the soggy ground of Froggy Bottom Bog, through the underbrush and the ruins of an ancient stone structure. Markus followed the Insect Queen as she used her magic to move a massive boulder to the side.

"Celestia told me about the changelings and how you feed off of emotions," Markus said, attempting to draw her out, bait her, trying to get her to make a mistake. "You know, the changelings could have lived in peace with the Equestrians in a symbiotic relationship." At first as the moved into the tunnels Chrysalis seemed to be ignoring him but he knew that she heard every word. "Instead you tried to conquer them, to feed off them. You and your children are nothing more than parasites, like worms in the gut."

That made her hiss. Turning around she faced Markus. As she stared into the lenses of his mask she said "My people lived on this world long before the equines ever drew first breath and will exist long after they are reduced to nothing more than servants of my species. I will show them who the true masters of this world are. As for the gryphons, the dragons and the other lesser races they too will bow down." With a cruel and sinister smile she started walking around Markus. She asked, "Do you know where we are going? No of course not."

The venom dripped from her lips as she said in a soft voice "We are searching out a relic of your race. There first were five blades: Earth, Fire, Air, Water, and Life. That is the blade's true name - The Blade of Life. But a sixth blade was made, The Dagger of Death." As Applejack listened the fillies shivered in fright at the sheer malice and hatred in her voice. "Forged by a human it had the power to outright kill an immortal. But it was shattered and buried. Sealed away."

"The Blade of Life unlocks a map to the location of these shards. Once I have them I will reforge the dagger and I will use it to kill Celestia and Luna. I will feast on Cadance and rip the essence out of that whelp Twilight Sparkle. With them dead, I will absorb their powers and become goddess of all Equestria. I will take great pleasure in making the Equestrians suffer for you murdering my children and you will get to watch them suffer."

As Markus took a step forward he heard the sounds of Applejack whimpering as the changelings pulled on the cables, constricting them and making the fillies cry out in pain. He had to resist the urge to use the Blade as he realized that once he unlocked the map, Applejack and the fillies were as good as dead. "I should have killed you when I had the chance, a mistake I won't make twice." As the group moved through the tunnels they came upon a multichambered passageway. The queen looked perplexed, looking down each passageway – each of them identical but covered in moss and lichen.

"Lost are we?" Markus taunted.

"Four passages, three of them lead to a death trap with no escape." she said as she turned to Markus. "Use the Blade of Life to tell us which way to go. Or do I send one of the fillies to inspect the passageways?"

He could hear a whimper from Applebloom as Applejack said to Markus, "Dun do it, ya can't...."

"Send the earth pony down the passage first!" The changelings began tugging Applebloom, making her squeal.

Markus shouted "STOP IT!" and growled at Chrysalis, feeling his temper and his hatred building like a pressure cooker. "Alright I will use the blade."

He moved beyond Chrysalis, placed his hand on the blade's hilt and drawing the blade he lifted it up. Pointing it between the four passageways he closed his eyes and focused his mind and his thoughts even as he heard Chrysalis taunting him. "What a pathetic race humans are, unable to use even the simplest magics. My patience is finite. If you don't find it quickly I will send them anyway." Markus could only push her out of his mind to try and center himself.

He willed the Blade to direct him and he felt a tug on the blade to the right. As he moved the blade to the right it began to glow brightly at the third passage to the right. Allowing the blade to move further to the right it began to darken and the glow stop. He began to move the Blade to the left and the glow reappeared. "This way..." Markus said starting to walk down the passageway.

"STOP!" Chrysalis commanded and at that point Applebloom was forced ahead of them, Applejack pulling and tugging on her bindings. "Surely there will be traps to guard the way. We don't want you to accidentally miss any of them now do we..."

"No ya can't, Let me do it!" Applejack pleaded, tears in her eyes.

Chrysalis hissed. "You? He might be willing to let you die so he can use the surprise of the trap being sprung to attempt to rescue the rest. But with her leading the way... In fact, you will get to watch her progress through the tunnel."

Applejack was forced to march beside the queen with Applebloom in sight. The frightened filly whimpered and whinnied as she composed herself and with some hesitation began to move. Using the vision modes of his helmet Markus was able to identify various traps. Pressure plates and metal spikes, all of them charged with magic to keep functional. He used his tech sight to help protect Applebloom.

Finally they entered a large chamber deep underground. The sight was impressive. Sealed for ages, untouched and long forgotten. They could see statues carved in the shaped of skeletons. They could see the skeletons of Earth ponies, Unicorns and Pegasi all of them in an attacking pose as they surrounded the door, as if they would attack who ever approached it. In the arch he could see an impression of a blade. Changing vision modes as the changelings spread out among them Markus began to walk past the statues as the ground began to tremble. He noticed odd heat signatures and he could see what looked like a number of recent disturbances. Markus realized they were not alone here. Moving to the door Chrysalis had the the hostages spread out nice and wide.

Looking at the place he took one more look behind him as he noted the hostages' positions as he began channeling the hatred he had into the blade that he had found. All this had been caused by him drawing this blasted sword. Then he felt it. The blade was absorbing the hatred, the energy he was directing to it. He could feel a new power starting to awaken. Perhaps he could prevent this map from being exposed.

"Open it, NOW!" Chrysalis demanded. "I will not wait any longer!"

With resignation Markus began to walk up to the gateway and with the blade in hand he heard her say, "No hesitation, no pauses... put the blade in the lock or they die!" Forced to follow her directions he placed the blade in the indentation. There was a series of massive clunks, as if huge stones were being slide out of the way, then the doorway began to fall away. Grabbing hold of the blade's handle as Chrysalis was distracted, he channeled all his hatred and anger into the blade and lashed out with it.

The energy the blade had stored from Markus was amplified and released. A massive green wave of energy came from the blade in a crescent arc wave that illuminated the area, taking Chrysalis by surprise. The wave impacted a number of the standing statues causing them to explode and shatter.

Then came the attack, The war cry of gryphons and ponies came as they descended from the roof of the cavern. In the surprise a number of unicorns attacked the changelings holding Applejack and the fillies hostage, freeing them as they ran for cover. The gryphon ambassador alongside Luna and Celestia had appeared in war armor.

Markus lunged for Chrysalis. Holding his blade up he lashed out at the changelings that appeared in his way. Using his wrist blades Markus slashed at them and took the head of one of the changelings off as another lunged at him, knocking his helmet off. That changeling met with the Blade of Forest as it was plunged into his chest and thrown to the side.

Chrysalis looking at the escaping hostages. One figure made her sneer - the stunted winged form of Scootaloo. She unleashed a spell at the young pegasus, a bolt of sickly green energy. To her the creature was useless, unable to fly, so she thought to simply kill it.

The bolt of energy struck as Scootaloo raced under the remains of a statue. The statue exploded, shards of stone bursting out and the sound of her scream cut through the entire cavern.

Markus turned his eyes and head to the sight, watching Scootaloo tumble and roll with blood on her back and wings. For Markus the entire world vanished as he returned his gaze to Queen Chrysalis, the sheer level of his anger and hatred coming from his eyes. Markus dropped the Blade of Forest and retracted his blades into his gauntlets. He was going to tear her apart with his bare hands.

Slow methodical steps came as Chrysalis approached. Rearing up she used her right limb to smack him across his face. "Give up, you're nothing!" she said attacking him with her left limb. The sound of bone cracking could be heard as she staggered Markus. His anger was so great that he allowed her to hit him to use the pain to get past the anger.

"You'll to surrender to death!" she roared out and lifted both her hooves up as Markus, focused and with his all his hatred and strength knocked her limbs to the side as his left hand grabbed a hold of her throat.

"YOU'RE WRONG!" he roared out. Pulling his right fist back he slugged Chrysalis hard once across the jaw that made a sicking crunching sound as her jaw was broken. A second punch to her face broke the side of her head. He took hold of her horn and let go of her throat. In one movement he turned and flung her across the cavern at a damaged statue, causing it to crack and knocking her senseless as it shattered. As she struggled to recover Markus roared with all his anger as he approached her.

"I AM MARKUS ORDAIN! SOLE SURVIVING HEIR TO THE SOVEREIGN TERRAN IMPERIUM THRONE!"
Coming over to grab hold of Chrysalis he yanked her up with his super human strength. He punched her in the chest which made her exoskeleton crack from the sheer force of his blow. "AND I," he said once more punching her in the chest, causing a massive gout of green insect blood to spurt out of her mouth "WILL NEVER SURRENDER!" Pulling his right fist back, he extended the middle blade from his gauntlet. He swung the blade as Chrysalis' eyes went wide, his words the last thing she heard as the blade cut clean through the exoskeleton, tendons and sinew of her neck severing her head in one clean stroke.

As he held her head his rage began to abate, until the head he was holding began to shapeshift into the head of one of the common changelings. With that his rage almost returned as he turned to make a mad dash to the chamber. As he raced inside he could see a black box broken and shattered, and more importantly, empty. Markus felt his rage return in full force at having been deceived. While the attack happened, Chrysalis had changed places with one of her changelings and had deceived everypony there.

Exiting the chamber he screamed out as loud as he could. "CHRYSALIS, I WILL HUNT YOU TO THE ENDS OF THIS WORLD UNTIL I KILL EVERY LAST ONE OF YOUR RACE!!"

Struggling to regain his anger and self control he could see a number of changelings dead. The gryphon ambassador as well as Luna in her silver armor and Celestia in her golden armor looked at him with fear and suspicion. He recalled what he said and retracted the blade into his wrist gauntlet. He couldn't help but noticed that Luna and Celestia had multiple cuts and slashes on them. As he rushed to pick up the Blade of Forest he came over to Scootaloo, worried as Rainbow Dash and Swift Wind were helping the young Pegasus.

Rainbow Dash gave him news that pulled a weight off his shoulders. "She's alright, the cuts are only on the surface. She'll be alright." Rainbow Dash said hugging her little sister as Markus turned to look at the scene of battle. With the gryphons and ponies they had defeated the changelings.

Celestia, Luna, and the other ponies looked at Markus as he went over to retrieve his helmet. Celestia spoke up. "We need to have a talk."

"Yes we do. However I don't think that this is the time or place considering we have wounded and injured. Chrysalis is out there and she could send in an army of Changelings to harass us." Markus said.

Both Celestia and Luna came up on either side of Markus so they could teleport everyone away. Shortly after the group had left a figure cloaked in both shadows and a dark fabric cloak went around the battle site. Small vials floated out from under the cloak to collect an ounce of Celestia's and Luna's blood before placing a stopper in them and moving away. A laugh of evil erupted from its voice.