Beneath the Surface

Griff fakely bows. "Your wish is my command, commander." He shortly says and backs up, ready to protect the group if changelings decide to rush them.

"Come... come close." Theria whispers. Ician complies hesitantly, his horn beginning to glow, but with a fizzle and a pop the glow dissipates.

"I..." Ician hesitates.

"You know who I am." Theria says. It was not a question,

Ician nods mutely, tears forming in his eyes.

"Ician," Theria asks softly, "do you love me?"

A question, but not a real question either. Ician nods again.

"I've known." She murmurs. "I've known forever." And she pulls him tightly in a hug. "But it's not enough to stop you from taking my life, is it?"

"... A time to shoulder duty's weight..." Ician whispers.

"I have a duty too, Ician. To my people. But you never thought about that, did you?"

"They killed you! For insubordination!" Ician shouted hoarsely.

"They didn't. It was a misunderstanding." Theria shuts her eyes tightly. "You have your duty, and I have mine. I cannot let another hundred, another thousand, another ten thousand, starve to death again. Not anymore. Not... anymore."

"... Theria?" Ician asks shakily.

"I'm so sorry." She opens her eyes again, and this time they glow sickly-green with power. "I love you, Ician."

With all her might, Theria pushes Ician away, a huge solid tendril of pink energy emerging from his chest and flowing into Theria's.

Ician falls limply to the side.

"ICIAN!" Griff yells and rushes to him. He then looks at Theria. "WHAT DID YOU DO?!"

"ONLY," her voice cuts through the air with the force of a megaphone, "WHAT I HAD TO DO."

From the other side of Griff, what was left of the earlier horde of changelings advances, reinforcements coming from the catacombs.

Theria's eyes shift from a green glow to a pink one. "FOR YOUR SAKE, AND THE SAKE OF YOUR FRIENDS... STAND DOWN."

Griff stops all his movement. "And what." He begins "Was that?" he tries to keep himself from drawing his swords.

Storms heartbeat is slow and faint. His breathing shallow and slowing until it almost stops and the heat begins to drain out of his body.

"LOVE IS A WEAPON." Theria replies simply. She begins to float into the air, supported by her telekinetic power. "HE LOVED ME. I USED IT. AND I AM SORRY." She raises a hoof at Griff. "BUT I HAD NO CHOICE. AS IS THE CASE FOR YOU NOW. SURRENDER NOW, OR BE DESTROYED."

Quimia panicks, both at Storm's state and Theria. Shakily, she opens her saddlebag and pulls out a health potion, pouring it into Storm's mouth. "You call yourself a monster, but you are wrong. If only you could see just how much you've done, and how much you've tried to atone..." The first bottle empty, she picks out a second and repeats the process. "Wake. Wake, and see the light."

Griff grins "And yet so far we came.." he says. "Where are the god damn soldiers??" he thinks to himself as he looks down, then at Ician, Quimia, Storm, Divine and Ruby. "So far... and we were so close.."

Very slowly Divine climbed to her hooves, her armour falling off her body like rain. As it hit te ground, it resonated softly. She dropped her sword and it impaled itself in the ground. "I failed. To protect him. Your cause is not just, it is selfish and dangerous." She walked forward slowly, each step like a thunderbolt.

"YOU KNOW NOTHING!" Theria's voice boomed out at Divine. "YOU KNOW NOTHING OF THE THOUSANDS WHO STARVE, EVERY DAY, BECAUSE THEY CANNOT BE FED! YOU KNOW NOTHING OF THE LIVES WE LEAD, BECAUSE YOU AND YOUR PRECIOUS LITTLE EQUESTRIA ARE ENCLOSED HAPPILY IN YOUR BLASTED IVORY TOWER OF HARMONY!" She jabs a hoof at Divine. "DO NOT BE SO QUICK TO ACCUSE, JUDGE. NOW STAND DOWN OR BE ANNIHILATED."

Meanwhile, Ician stirs weakly. He turns his head ever so slightly towards Griff. "Griff..." He whispers, almost no sound coming out. "... Come... here..."

"And their hardship is enough to tear apart our country?" She shook her head, still advancing on Theria. "You ignorant little whelp. You deny what you do not understand. The scales must be balanced, there must be good for every bad. This is the truth of this world."

"AND WHO IS TO SAY THAT YOU PONIES ARE THE ONES WHO TAKE THE GOOD END OF THE SCALE?" Theria snapped. "I AM THEIR COMMANDER. MY DUTY IS TO PROVIDE FOR THEM. IF IT COMES AT THE PRICE OF CONQUEST... THEN SO BE IT." Her horn glows even brighter as she floats higher up into the air. "THIS IS YOUR LAST CHANCE. SURRENDER."

"You cannot strike me down. Because you still do not understand." She continued forward. "If I have to die, so be it. That is the way of the world." She smiled. "But you will not win."

"I WILL. AND I HAVE." With that, Theria unleashes a powerful, wide web of paralysing lightning, with Divine at the centre of the area of effect.

She doesn't move as it descends, allowing it to strike her. She simply continues to smile, ears twitching.

Theria turns to her amassing army of changelings. "Come here. Arrest her."

They advance slowly, keeping out of the range of the lightning as they draw closer.

She stands there quietly, ears twitching as she remains still, waiting.

Five changelings out of the horde step forward. They direct their horns at Divine and let loose a much more powerful bolt of lightning, these ones not intended to simply paralyse but to completely incapacitate.

A figure steps in the way of the beams, unaffected by the lightning and their bolts. The corpse, missing half it's face, smiles at them. Divine remains quiet, listening.

"Hmph." Theria raises her horn and unleashes a powerful disintegrating beam at the figure at the speed of light, never once interrupting the flow of paralysing lightning. "Alert the magic artillery."

"Yes Commander." Three of the changelings at the back of the horde lift their horns and send three sparkling beams of light into the air.

The corpse dodges the strike, chuckling. "Really? Artillery? I thought you would know better." Arcane's voice echoes out of the corpse's mouth.

"I PAID YOU TO LEAVE." Theria says flatly. "AND YOU WILL. NOW. ARTILLERY?"

"Yes, Commander." The platforms aim at the ceiling, and with a series of powerful concussive blasts, bring the entire ceiling down in a hail of soil and trees.

Sunlight floods the entire stretch of the cavern, save for the catacombs.

"I did leave. My corpses however..." He gestured as they started to kill the artillery men. "Well, they never signed any contracts." He said as the dead soldier danced around the falling terrain, breaking any before they hit Divine.

"I'M DONE WITH YOU." She gestures to the sunlight in the cavern. "EITHER HIDE OR BE DESTROYED." More changeling mages step forward and, horns alight, form a ring of fire around Theria, Divine, Storm, Quimia, Ician, and Griff.

"AND AS FOR YOU, DIVINE..." She unleashes a powerful beam of arcane magic energy at her.

Divine watches the blast approach, still smiling. "If you want to kill me, hurry up and do it. but know that it will not lighten your heart. The blood of innocents is already on your hooves."