Sins of Harmony
Volume 1: Balance of Power
Chapter 20: An Empire of Secrets
March 24th, 1005 ANM
Ponyville, Friendship palace.
Meeting room.
Midday
All the Princesses had gathered, save Cadance for being too far North to come quickly, due to the recent attack on the palace here, and Spike unexpectedly, as it was a grave concern.
The guards on the palace had been doubled, with Twilight's former 'hidden' guards coming back to her to stand guard also.
Celestia, Luna and Twilight headed the meeting, while Spike and the Twilight's 5 close friends, being associates to the Princess of Friendship, presented also. Even Discord had been brought in, and he too seemed in a serious mood unlike his usual self.
"This crosses a line. They had no justification, no warning, and what they did do made little sense." Luna commented.
"Varkan is back, that's certain. That alone changes things. This is someone who's scheming with others toppled empires and former governments in the East, including half of the current Oceanic Alliance members." Celestia commented ruefully.
"He's made it clear he can't be negotiated with, so why not respond in kind?" DIscord suggested. All looked at him, surprised he was proposing such a thing.
"Discord, if we attack them, it will be seen as an act of war." Celestia replied calmly.
"And what happened here to Spike, and Canterlot, and the thefts doesn't? I understand your desire for peace, but he's shown enough evidence to prove he only understands the language of violence. He sees us as dangers, and he's willing to attack us! He almost killed you Celestia!" Discord reasoned angrily.
"He saw sense, he didn't kill me because the world needed the Sun and Moon to survive." Celestia said half heartedly.
"But you forget. Luna's back, and Twilight has shown herself as possibly being a controller of the sun and moon during Tirek's reign given time. So he no longer has that barring him killing you if he wishes now." Discord pointed out, his words dripping with grave possibility.
Celestia was about to respond, before she realised with a shiver of fear that Discord was completely right. She was no longer immune from his wrath.
"We should make plans to gather allies, to gather strength as a deterrent from the Oceanic Alliance and its own allies." Twilight suggested: "It would at least stop them attacking, the threat of costs to them in war might sway them."
"Its a start. Very well, we should renew our alliances with the Gryphon Empire, the Republic and Minotaur Nation." Celestia spoke.
Much of the table seemed in agreement, though Discord looked to Spike and offered a deep look of sympathy:
Young, but attacked already. If I see Varkan myself, I don't know what I'll do.
Crystal Empire, Crystal Chasm.
Same time.
"Dragons! Get the scanners out!"
One of the Changeling drones yelled down, just as Smoulder, Cal'vel and Razak had leapt to the snowy plains atop the chasm.
Behind them, the rest of the Changelings and Lucius were ready, getting out binoculars in the case of the changelings.
The drone engaged the binoculars, switching on the detector mode, and zoomed in fully.
In the distance, he saw 4 shapes, all Western Dragons. Engaging the heat sensor mode, he saw 2 normal temperatures on the forward 2, but the rear 2 were higher than normal.
The most rear dragon had a higher temperature than all others, and was flying at an aggressive pace to catch the nearest. The one in front had a slightly higher temperature than normal, but seemed to be trying to escape its pursuer.
"The first 2 are normal. But the 3rd looks like its developing, I bet the 4th attacked and infected it by how it looks."
Cal'vel looked to Smoulder and Razak. Smoulder called it: "We're cured, but Caarim said we may get some slight aggression if infected, but we'll be fine. We need to get those first 2 clear, and see if we can save the 3rd."
"And the 4th?" Cal'vel asked worriedly.
"Its beyond help at this stage. It must be killed." The watching changeling drone replied.
As Razak flexed is wings for flight, he said aloud as he padded through the snow: "I take it this is how this whole Migration's going to be like?"
"Hopefully. Kill any that are too far, inoculate early infected, and get uninfected clear until reinforcements with more cures come." Lucius responded flatly. He was looking over at the Crystal Empire, when he had an idea.
"Anyone thought about what when more come, and we have to stun them midair? What's to stop them falling to their deaths?"
"...Nothing. Why?" Cal'vel asked. Lucius pointed to the Crystal Empire:
"We'll need them, they can use magic to in the least catch the ones falling that can be cured after we stun or sedate them."
Razak saw the Empire also, but looked to the approaching Dragons 8 miles away. He said: "Its the best we've got right now!"
Smoulder took the lead once more: "Plan! Cal'vel, you get that 3rd Dragon clear after warning the first 2 to flee the migration path, I'll kill the 4th."
"Razak, you go with Lucius and the Changelings, get the Crystal Empire on side. Karrav should be making his move to approach the leaders in the South by now."
Cal'vel leapt high into the air, releasing his control to grow to a larger size, and flapped his wings to take off with a jet like speed. Smoulder spread her wings as she grew, and pushed off slightly slower. Her slower speed to Cal'vel was not an issue, as she had only 1 target.
Razak let himself grow in size also, only half as big as Cal'vel or Smoulder, while he growled to the 2 Changelings: "Get on!"
As soon as they were aboard, Razak took off, as Lucius concentrated to become a shadow moving on the ground, following the shadow Razak cast on the snow as he flew.
Ponyville, Schoolhouse.
Midday.
Cheerilee watched over the children as they played. A Monday meant that they were energetic from the weekend normally, even if their sluggishness in the classroom showed otherwise.
As she watched a certain trio of cutie markless filies chatting, she saw Cutter disappearing quickly around the schoolhouse, looking about cautiously.
Curious, she followed.
Rounding the schoolhouse, she rounded the corner to find a sight that froze her mid step:
Cutter had shifted before her eyes to keep his grey coat, but his brown mane and tail became shorter, more crop cut, and his cutie mark had changed to a red lightning bolt with magic dust and charge signs beside it. The fur around it was blackened.
But most shockingly, he had a Unicorn horn now, even if it seemed cracked in places.
He had shifted, using magic, a large dirt pile from where he had piled his flower bed excavations. A large hole was exposed, out from which crawled creatures that he helped out.
A large, bronze Cobra, a bulky grey Komodo, a Black scaled Wyvern and a Black scales Komodo with bulky arms beneath long sleeves.
Her scream left her mouth when she saw 2 ponies, a pink mare and a blue stallion, walk around the other side and morph into ponyshape changelings before her eyes.
All their heads whipped to see her, to which she heard a gruff voice say: "Ignore her. We're coming out into the open anyway."
The black komodo, a male, had spoken, as he gestured for them to follow him around the other side of the schoolhouse.
But it was too late, as Cheerilee's scream had drawn the fillies and colts' attention. They had gathered, with whispers and some shrieks at their appearance behind the schoolhouse.
"What are they?"
"Monsters!"
"They're gonna eat us!"
"SO ugly!"
"Ain't that Cutter?"
Ohmen became slightly angry at the comments, and more so as Cheerilee looked at him with betrayal.
"You put my students at risk to hide these monsters here!?" She shrieked at him
Ohmen let his control loosen, and his form shifted to his more gorilla like, bulkier changeling pony mutate. He said to her with finality: "We're doing this to protect this town, you have no idea what's coming."
He galloped around the other side of the schoolhouse, joining the others as more shouts and panic began to rise in the town.
Ponies of all sorts fled and hid as they saw the menagerie of creatures walking down the main street, their direction obvious as they headed towards the palace ahead.
Leading the pack was the black Komodo male, with the others, a Black Wyvern, Komodo female, King Cobra, a strange gorilla like changeling hybrid, and 2 changelings.
As they walked, Karrav saw 3 ponies run towards, not away from them. They morphed into 3 more Changeling males, just as a Diamond Dog changeling form briskly walked out to join them.
It was a demonstration, a show that there was no more running, hiding, covertness. It was from here that they needed to be clear with their intent.
This time, they wouldn't be fighting, as long as their audience listened.
Karrav asked quietly as Al'kur drew alongside: "Any trouble getting here?"
"No, but we had a message from the North. First Dragons, advance ones, 1 beyond help, 1 needs help, 2 uninfected. Its already starting."
Karrav looked to the palace: "We'll have an easier time getting them to listen then. They'll have no choice to accept out help."
"But we need theirs. Lucius pointed out that we'll need a way to catch any midair stunned dragons, and the magic users and pegasi fit it perfectly." Al'kur reasoned.
"More the reason they should join us."
Ponyville, Friendship palace
"Your majesties! The ones that attacked! They're here!"
All in the meeting hall whipped to see the guard, a Sun guard, dashing in with an urgent look on his face.
"Its Karrav! And Ohmen Magnes is with him. Changelings, a Komodo, Wyvern and a Cobra!"
"Are they attacking?" Luna asked frantically.
"No. They've stopped before us, and Karrav asked for an audience with you about an urgent matter, and a reason as to why he assaulted the palace last night for miss Twilight's dragon assistant."
Celestia's brow furrowed, and she said: "All of you, come onto the balcony. We should to see this before anything happens."
All of them, the Sun and Moon Princesses, Discord, the Mane 6 and Spike all stood atop the balcony, warily staring down the menagerie that had gathered just in front of a line of guards. A crowd watched from the town limits further back.
At the front, Celestia gasped as she recognized more than one of them from long ago. Karrav, now that she saw him standing next to Kynok, was undoubtedly Varkan. But worse yet, she recognised Faral Kol beside him, the female Komodo that gunned down the 4 other ambassadors 29 years ago.
Ohmen stared back at her, passively in his true form now.
She turned to her gathered subjects, saying: "Let 3 of them in, no more. And make sure Ohmen and 'Varkan' are two of them." She stressed on the true name of Karrav, now that the secret was out.
The guards left, and Discord said: "Celestia, you can't be-"
She raised a hoof to the Dragoneraqus, to which Luna also added: "Let's hope we can get rid of them quickly."
The tension was palpable as the doors opened. Inside strolled Ohmen, padding inside on all 4 legs, his black/green armoured and grey furred body unique to him.
The odd one out, a King Cobra Male, Caarim, slithered inside. He was recognised from the Canterlot attacks, despite not actually attacking anything.
Finally, the leader, the one who was the first to break Celestia's power before anyone else.
Karrav was a facade all along. They saw nobody but Varkan as he strode inside, deciding to remove his long sleeves as he entered and pocket them.
The burnt and snapped off wing ends flexed slightly beyond his hands as they found air after a while.
Caarim had readied some documents on the meeting table, while Ohmen stood to one side, ignoring the scathing or fearful looks Twilight's friends and Spike sent him and the others.
Varkan stopped before the table, observing them quietly.
Discord could barely contain his anger, while Luna and Twilight kept their composure. Celestia's face was gaunt, determined, but he could have smiled at the sight of her slight fear had the situation been more personal.
"We have a situation, and by now its actually starting in the North, around the Crystal Empire."
Caarim opened the document case, spilling fact sheets about the Rage Virus outbreak, its mysterious, unexplained origins and mutation, and how it was affecting the Dragon Migration to become a dangerous horde.
"Believe me when I say that I hold only ill intents to one of you in this room. I care about all races, just not for certain of their leaders or governments." He glared at Celestia briefly, but simply nodded to Discord, Luna and Twilight.
"Why did you attack Spike?" Twilight blurted out.
"Because if I hadn't, he be vulnerable to a fatal and dangerous virus the Dragon Migration is carrying unknowingly, which we have a plan to solve. But even with reinforcements ready in Caninberia, we need help from your local armies to minimize casualties for both our joint sides, and of the Dragons."
"You attacked Spike, to protect him?" Twilight somewhat understood.
"No, I attacked Kurze to protect him." Valkan said simply.
The secret is out, and more along with it.
As one fibre of secrecy unravels, others come with it. Either unintentionally, or by admittance.
Please review and respond/critique as you would.
Remember though, Monday nights I can't update with a new chapter, so no new chapter until Tuesday 7th October evening.