LEGEND OF THE GODDESSES
Whispering Desert, 1,077 years ago
Weeks had passed, and Kolassa was still standing on one leg in the center of the massive birdcage, eyes closed and breathing steadily.
Spectatus floated beside her, looking her over carefully. Kolassa had stopped and resumed her meditation numerous times in the past few weeks, but had been in this particular trance for a very long time—though it was impossible to say exactly how long in this lightless dungeon.
Spectatus started to speak, but stopped himself, instead retreating a short distance away, not wanting to distract Kolassa in any way.
From above came the creaking of a door, and the whoosh of massive wings coming closer and closer. Spectatus glanced at the door in the ceiling, then at Kolassa. "This could work out," he muttered to himself. "You keep on feeling the energy of the universe, girl. Channel it… whatever it is you do. I know you'll get out of this. You have to." He vanished.
The hatch opened and Corvid dropped into the room with a loud thud, her body hunching over at the impact and her wings folding. The great white bird stood erect to peer at Kolassa. "Hello again, sister."
Kolassa was completely unresponsive. Corvid shrugged and glanced around the room, batting at some of the torture devices with her wings, and tapping others with her feet. "They haven't taken the bait yet," she said casually. "Perhaps, somehow, they don't know I have you yet. But I think I know what to do."
She unhooked the birdcage from the chain from which it dangled. She gathered up the cage in her feet and started flying back up the massive tunnel. Kolassa didn't shift in the slightest.
"Perhaps I need to bring you out in the open," Corvid went on, "and make a very real attempt on your life. Surely they'll be aware of that… aware, through some extrasensory means, of the talons of one daughter going straight for the skull of another, with very real murder in my heart."
She burst out of the tunnel, the door in the pyramids sliding shut behind her, and set the cage down in the sand. "Yes," she muttered. "They'll take notice of that."
Corvid lifted a talon and gently opened the cage's door, just as Kolassa abruptly opened her baby-blue eyes.
"One… thousand… breaths," Kolassa whispered, before jumping at Corvid's face.
Kolassa's tiny body collided with Corvid's, and the great bird tumbled down to the ground, landing flat on her back. Kolassa quickly got her balance on Corvid's chest. Corvid attempted to snap Kolassa up in her beak, but Kolassa rolled out of the way, landing neatly in the sand and starting to gallop away. Corvid rolled as well, attempting to crush Kolassa under her bulk, but the pony outran her. The bird got to her feet and glared harshly, unleashing a blast of wintry breath at Kolassa's retreating back.
Kolassa responded by looping around, charging straight into the blizzard. The icy burst split in two as it reached her, her head parting it like a ship cutting through the water. Kolassa kept charging after the breath stopped, ramming Corvid in the ankle with enough force to break the hard black skin of the bird's legs.
Corvid screeched and swiped at Kolassa furiously, her gigantic claw slashing her across the face. Kolassa's face was like iron, and sustained no damage at all. Corvid snarled and waved a claw, which glowed with white-blue energy.
The sand beneath Kolassa's hooves changed into snow, and the snow started coming to life, tendrils of it reaching up to grab Kolassa. She twisted and flexed, always calm and in perfect control, and the snow could not maintain a solid grip on her. Furiously, Corvid beat her wings, and the rush of air accompanied by the continued grappling with the snow distracted Kolassa for a split second, long enough for Corvid to scoop her up in a talon and squeeze as tightly as she could.
"You must be so proud," Corvid sneered, holding her up to her. "'Discipline'… you're not so special. I have a brain too, you know." She lowered her head, and a nearly-invisible beam of energy shot from her mind into Kolassa's. Kolassa cried out and writhed in pain. As the beam increased in intensity, it became powerful enough to blast Kolassa clear out of Corvid's grip and send her on a painful collision with the desert floor.
Corvid cackled. "You're mine now." She lunged at Kolassa with her beak, but Kolassa was back on her hooves in an instant, both of her front hooves flying upward to smack the beak and deflect it away, leaving it cracked. Corvid let out a feral and primal screech, clutching her wounded face in a talon.
Kolassa jumped, nearly the full fifty feet of Corvid's height and almost straight up, to land a powerful punch on Corvid's face with both front hooves, then one kick after the other with her hind legs.
As Kolassa started falling back to the ground, Corvid batted at her with a wing, sending her hurtling far off into the distance. Corvid flinched and stared in disbelief at her wing, which was radiating with pain from its collision with the small pony, but shook it off and hurled herself bodily toward Kolassa, sailing through the air with her wings clamped tightly at her sides, to body-slam the young mare with her massive shoulder.
She fell short of her mark, but the impact of her body kicked up a storm of sand. Kolassa, laying on her side, was unprepared, and the hot sand stung her wide-open eyes. "Agh!" Kolassa cried out, clamping her eyes shut and rubbing them madly with her front hooves.
Corvid grinned wickedly. Her talon reached out and pinned Kolassa to the ground. "I'm not taking any more chances," the huge bird said harshly, starting to stand up. "Maybe a bit of sorcery will get you to sit still."
She started chanting under her breath, waving and gesturing with her wings. After some thirty seconds of performing this strange chant, she took a step back, her eyes always on the prone form of Kolassa.
Kolassa rolled into a standing position, and realized to her surprise that she was expanding, growing larger. She smirked at Corvid. "Are you making me bigger?" she demanded. "Hey, thanks. That should help…"
"Bigger, but not stronger," Corvid said gently. "Soon, your strength won't be sufficient to hold up the weight of your own body. You'll break. Snap in two like a twig, collapse upon yourself." She turned her gaze to the sky, her wings spread wide, and called out, "You see her now, Father? Her fancy willpower and meditation cannot keep her safe. She's not magical. She's just an earth pony, still bound by the laws of physics."
Kolassa stumbled, her knees buckling beneath her.
"Eh-hahahaha," Corvid cackled. "Feeling heavy, little sister?"
Kolassa tried to stand back up, but as her body grew bigger and bigger her legs simply couldn't support her weight.
"Excellent," Corvid muttered darkly. "I'll be back in an hour to see what's left of you. My money's on an unrecognizable gigantic lump of flesh." She saluted with her talons. "Ciao." She started strutting away on her clumsy bird feet.
Kolassa breathed heavily as she grew steadily more massive. Spectatus appeared in front of her face. "Kolassa!" he cried out frantically, almost in hysterics. "You've got to focus! You can—"
"Shush!" Kolassa said harshly.
"Wha… what?" Spectatus squeaked.
"I'm trying to listen," Kolassa growled, shutting her eyes tightly. Spectatus retreated in fear, but did not say another word.
"Just an earth pony, she said," said Kane's voice in Kolassa's mind, though she perceived it as being whispered in her right ear. "Oh, you're so much more than that, kiddo. You're our daughter. And more importantly, you're the master of your own mind and body."
"You're not gonna let a little thing like the square-cube law defeat you now, are you?" Boll chuckled in her left ear.
"There's a way out of this," Kane went on."There's a way out of everything if you know where to look."
"But what is…?" Kolassa whispered through her strained, collapsing lungs.
"The sand," the two Old Gods said in unison. "Be the sand."
"The sand?" Kolassa mumbled.
"The magic's in you if you know where to look," Kane said solemnly. "And you know every crevice of yourself. You understand everything there is to understand about your body, brain… and soul."
"Yeah, soul," Boll slurred. "Souls are cool. We're into souls."
"So you know where the magic is," Kane whispered.
Kolassa sensed, somehow, that the Old Gods were no longer present, that they would not be speaking to her again. She nodded her massive, bulky head and took a deep breath. Instantly, sand started swirling purposefully around her body, much of it being swept off of the ancient pyramids and being drawn to her as if by a magnet. And the sand began going inside her body.
She felt the sand inside her, at first coating her innards, and then taking their place. She felt the process of every one of her bones and organs changing into a sand replica of itself.
She was still growing larger, and she cried out a bit at the pain of her own weight. She coughed, as the inside of her mouth was now coated in sand, which then began consuming her entire face. The sand enveloped her purple-pink coat, then her mane and tail, which had become even longer and shaggier during her time as Corvid's prisoner. The sand shaped itself into a solid imitation of her mane and tail's style.
Finally, the sand took over her eyes, changing them into solid tan orbs. Lines appeared, in imitation of her irises, pupils, and the reflections of light. The last thing Kolassa felt was her cutie mark, the three pyramids, being etched into her flanks, before she blacked out.
She regained consciousness again almost immediately, and examined herself mentally without opening her eyes. She had stopped growing, and supposed that she now resembled a statue of herself—a perfect likeness, but sixty times the height she had once been, and five hundred times the mass.
Kolassa opened her eyes and gazed up at the pyramids indifferently. She was neither impressed nor afraid by them any longer; she simply didn't care about them. She turned her head, and was surprised to see that Corvid was still in sight, walking away leisurely.
Kolassa hauled herself into a standing position, groaning with the effort. She stretched a few times, testing the feel of this body, and found that she could support her own weight.
She quivered in terror, terror at what she had become. As she always could due to her years of training with Spyder, she could feel and control every process her body was going through, but now it was all sand. Sand clinging together and acting as living cells, but nevertheless she had done as the Old Gods had bid: she had become the sand, gaining her body enough strength to survive at a huge size. Though relieved at being alive, and truly impressed at what she had done to herself, she could not contain the quiet, nagging fears that wondered what this meant for her long-term future.
She took another look at the pyramids, curious as to whether, in a standing position, she might be taller than them. She was mildly relieved to see that she was not; the pyramids were roughly twice her height. To her, they now looked about as impressive as three houses. She shrugged and reminded herself of the matter at hand. "Right," she muttered.
She began pursuing Corvid at a brisk walking speed, scarcely a jog. Her massive hooves shook the ground with every step.
Corvid whirled around and gazed up at Kolassa, her jaw dropping. "No," she whispered.
Kolassa kept coming.
"No!" Corvid snarled. "How is that even possible?"
Spectatus appeared in front of Corvid's face. The bird screamed.
"Haven't you figured it out yet?" Spectatus taunted. "This is Kolassa's universe. The rest of us just live here."
"What in the blazes are you?" Corvid demanded.
"I'm an observer," said Spectatus. "And I get the feeling this will be something worth observing. Yeah, I'm gonna observe the hell out of this baby!" He floated away, very far away, far enough to get a good look at the giant bird being run down by the absolutely titanic pony. The bird who had been able to squeeze the pony in one talon was now roughly the size of Kolassa's head.
Kolassa pounced, and Corvid ducked down underneath her. Kolassa overshot and skidded through the sand. Corvid whirled and tensed up to face Kolassa again, but she was gone. Kolassa had vanished completely and reappeared behind Corvid's back.
Kolassa lifted a hoof and chopped at Corvid's shoulder. Corvid dodged and waved a claw in the air wildly, conjuring up three huge spears of ice which darted into Kolassa's head and torso. Kolassa cried out in pain as the ice pierced her sand skin, and the frost spread out from the wounds. She shook her body, dislodging the ice, and stood up on her hind legs, reaching down to hold Corvid's beak between her two front hooves. She twisted, flipping Corvid down onto her back.
Corvid coughed and raised her claws in the air, twirling them in a complex pattern to summon up huge orbs of ice. They collided with Kolassa and exploded, soaking her with a freezing fluid that grabbed her limbs and solidified into ice, slowing her. Kolassa flexed her entire body, shattering the ice, and put a hoof on Corvid's outstretched wing, holding it in place while her other hoof slipped underneath the wing and pulled up, breaking the bone.
Corvid cried out in fury and starting getting to her feet, but Kolassa spun around and swept the bird's legs, knocking her back down. Kolassa loomed over Corvid's prone form, and Corvid retaliated by darting forward and biting Kolassa's face.
The bite left a jagged gash between Kolassa's eyes. Kolassa staggered backward and clutched the wound, which was visibly beginning to mend itself together. Corvid took the opportunity to get to her feet and start up another chant. A great icy orb appeared over her head, and shot a beam of blue energy at Kolassa.
Kolassa struggled against the beam, trying to resist its burn, but found its force too powerful. Without thinking, she teleported out of the beam's path and reappeared looming over Corvid.
Kolassa had been accustomed to fighting opponents larger than herself, and for the first time ever it occurred to her to use her size advantage. She slammed her entire body into Corvid's and knocked her over, then pinned her down with her front hooves.
"Please," Corvid whispered. "Spare my life. You do that, don't you? You're the good daughter. The good one always spares someone's life, right?"
Kolassa gritted her teeth. "Hmm, well, maybe you should have thought of that before you told me how many lives you've snuffed out over the centuries, and how many more lives you intend to end in the future. No, sister, I can't let that happen."
She leaned her entire body weight into Corvid's ribcage, cracking and crushing it, collapsing her entire torso. Corvid's head rolled back in her death throes, and she gurgled as icy-blue blood poured out of her beak.
Kolassa stepped back and felt the wound on her face again; it was almost sealed. Spectatus floated back to her, needing to be nearly two hundred feet off the ground to reach her eye level. She could scarcely see him, apart from a cluster of white dots.
"Wow," Spectatus remarked. "That punk pixie pony was right. You're a goddess now."
"…Yes, you're right," she muttered. "I can feel it in my blood. I'm going to live forever… just like this."
"Just like this?" Spectatus repeated. "Is there any way for you to get smaller?"
Kolassa bit her lip. "No," she sighed. "Trust me, I know my capabilities. Always have. I'm stuck like this."
"Wow, I'm sorry about that," Spectatus muttered. "And… wow, I really want to stick around and see what kind of goddess you're going to become, but… I have to go."
Kolassa tilted her head curiously. "What do you mean, go?"
Spectatus looked around at the desert wistfully. "Your world," he said tenderly. "I love it here and everything, but its atmosphere… I'm not built to live here. I've lasted as many years as I can, but I'm sick and getting sicker. I never mentioned this before because I didn't want to worry you, but I need to return home to my own world before my condition gets worse. I don't want to leave, but…"
"I understand," Kolassa said hastily. "And besides, you have to tell your supervisor about… this." She gestured to her body. "I get the feeling this is the kind of thing you were sent to check on, am I right?"
Spectatus averted his many eyes. "I… don't really have a supervisor," he mumbled. "I made that up."
"Really?" Kolassa said, raising her eyebrows. "You weren't assigned to watch me?"
"No," Spectatus admitted. "I just… I came to this world, and I noticed you, just like all the monsters do. You seemed special, and I wanted to be your friend."
Kolassa smiled. "Well, you've done that," she said. "And if being here is making you sick, then please, go. I would rather you went home and got better than stayed here just for me. Will you be able to come back?"
"Maybe," said Spectatus. "I got here once easily enough, but coming again… it'll be very difficult to get that arranged. If it ever happens at all, it'll be… many hundreds of years."
"Okay," Kolassa said softly in acceptance. "I'll be waiting, my friend. And if you can't make it, that's fine, I completely understand. I love you, Spectatus."
"Love you too, Kolassa," he said, choked up. "So long." His body spiraled and grew smaller, being sucked into a pin-sized point of darkness, which itself shrank into nothing.
Kolassa sighed and looked around. She froze in surprise when she turned back to Corvid's corpse; Kane and Boll were standing over her, looking her over with sorrow.
"How do you like that, eh Boll?" Kane muttered, clasping his two hands with Boll's one behind their back. "Two of our spawn enter, and one prevails. As the lords of flames and terror, we should be happy to see the strong triumph over the weak. But as a father… that's a bit harder to figure out."
The two heads looked up at Kolassa in unison. They drew their hands forward and applauded slowly, walking over Corvid's body on their one hoof and one talon, approaching Kolassa.
"Well done, kiddo," Kane said graciously. "You pulled it off. Turned yourself into a goddess through sheer force of what you had in you—willpower and the magic you were born with. Always knew you would."
Kolassa scowled. "I'm not the kind of deity you are," she said coldly. "I never shall be. I'm going to be a beacon of hope that stands tall like these pyramids." She gazed at the ancient stone structures. "I'll be stronger than the pyramids," she amended. "Realer. I'm going to help people, and there's nothing you can do to stop me."
The two heads glanced at each other, then smiled at Kolassa. "Yeah, we kinda figured," Boll mumbled.
"You can be whatever kind of goddess you want to be," said Kane. "Point is, you're here, you're our contribution to the 'goddesses' project, and we're content with that. So we're movin' on." He lowered his voice menacingly. "You'll always be our daughter."
They clapped their hands. A pillar of rainbow sparkles as tall as the sky enveloped them, and when it faded away, the two-headed Old God was gone.
-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-
Kolassa marched slowly toward Twixt, the tiny ring of huts around its stone courtyard looking like no more than a toy town now. Long before she arrived, she could hear screams coming from the town, the citizens running to their huts, doing the only thing they could think to do: hiding.
When she reached its edge, she crouched down as low as she could. "Please, everypony, don't run away," she pleaded. "It's me, it's Kolassa. Mother, Father, Spyder, Mr. Elan—it's me, Kolassa!"
Elan was the first to emerge, the green horse creeping out and blowing his blond curls out of his eyes as he stared incredulously. "Kolassa?" he breathed.
Other residents started creeping out to get a better look at the mountainous mare looming over their village.
"Lady Kolassa," Spyder said smugly, coming to the front of the crowd alongside Elan. "So you have fulfilled your destiny, as Spyder knew you would. That one took you away, and now… now you return." She turned toward the gathered residents. "Look upon her, folk of Twixt!" she announced. "All hail Lady Kolassa!"
She looked around expectantly, but was greeted by silence. "Spyder said all hail!" she snarled. "She doesn't see you all-hailing!"
A few residents quickly started bowing down.
"Yes!" Elan agreed eagerly. "Praise Lady Kolassa—the Titaness of the Whispering Desert!"
Kolassa snickered. "Mr. Elan…"
"No, no, trust me," Elan said seriously. "That'll stick! That's what I've been calling you for years, actually, whenever I tell folks about you. All across the Whispering Desert, you're already known by that name. I just thought it was a catchy moniker for a politically-minded young mare; never thought it'd be so damn literal, but…" He shrugged and laughed. "There you have it!"
Kolassa's eyes darted to her parents' hut, and she bit her lip at the sight of the gray stallion and blue mare emerging from it.
"Mother, Father," she called to them, squinting. "Let them through the crowd! I can barely see you, any of you. But… I guess this is who I am now."
Chronus and Rhea made their way to the front of the gathered crowd. "Honey…" Chronus stammered in a strangled voice. "It's…"
"You're magnificent," Rhea sighed in awe. "We love you, honey. We're glad you're safe… happy… free…"
Kolassa swallowed hard and nodded. "I feel that way, yes." She sniffled. "Yes, I do. I guess I won't ever be normal again, but… when was I ever?"
"You were always exceptional and rare," Chronus agreed. "It was… frightening. But ever since the moment your mother and I were blessed with your birth, I knew that keeping you safe was worth anything and everything. And look at you now."
Rhea's eyes welled up with tears and she embraced her husband. "Oh, Chronus…"
"You and I will have a talk later," he muttered playfully. "You're the one who named her Kolassa. That's just asking for an impossible situation like this…"
Rhea and Chronus laughed together, and looked back up at their daughter, still embracing each other. "What will you do now, darling?" Rhea asked softly. "You know you're still very much welcome here."
"I want…" Kolassa said slowly. "I want to go change the world. I want to tell everypony what I believe in. And I think they'll listen. I'm… kind of hard to ignore now."
"Indeed, Lady Kolassa," Spyder said solemnly. "You change that world and you help it accomplish the dreams it never knew it had." She frowned, looking uncharacteristically doubtful. "You're sure you won't… stay a while?"
"Of course I'll stay a while," Kolassa assured her. "But where I belong is… the horizon." She turned her eye toward it, where the sun was beginning to set. "Always going toward the horizon," she whispered. "Trying to… trying to catch it." She reached out with a hoof, as if grasping at the horizon itself.
The villagers began stomping their hooves, slowly at first and only a scattered few of them, then escalating in speed and volume until the entire town of Twixt was applauding her. She beamed at them all, nodding her thanks, tears of sand welling up in her throat.