| IC date: | Autumn 61, 1007 AC |
| OOC date: | November 19, 2012 |
| PCs: | Brume, Carronade, Queen-Pegasus, Rising-Chaos, Rusty-Gears, Skyflower, Spindrift, Stormdancer, Thunnini, Typhoon-Wave, Whistlestop |
| NPCs: | Bonfire, Daffodil, Hearth, Maelstrom, Monsoon, Spectre |
| GM: | Applejack, Trixie, Fluttershy |
Today's the day… Today, the ponies of the Elements of Harmony from another world are reunited with their cohorts on the other side. But there's been a slight change of plans. It seems the Harmony Ponies won't be going home just yet. They've been informed of a new plan! Apparently all of the ponies from the other side, are going to come HERE! A mass evacuation! Through a Hive of crawling undead…
Thus it is that the Harborites and Element Ponies have set up a sort of temporary base. There's been a steady trickle of ponies coming through the portal all day, guided through by pegasi and ghosts. Each time, the pegasi stay, and the ghosts go back for another group of two or three ponies. Everybody is on guard… Anything could go wrong! But when it does, by jove there's enough ponypower sitting around to make sure it doesn't stay wrong for long!
Thus when one of the ghost foals that had been helping the Otherworldly ponies come to the land of light and laughter suddenly pops up in the middle of the Camp, with an alert of 'Trouble!', it doesn't take much for ponies to get mobilized!
So here they are. In the small Hive that the portal between worlds sits in. The portal, bright and shining, the other side so fuzzy to look at. It's like looking through a dirty window…
And the Elements ponies, all six of them, lined up. There are foals in danger… And a lot of zombies to blast! At least, according to the ghosts. Nobody has stepped through yet… But oh are they ready.
Thunnini has her poling staff ready to hit any zombies that happen to make it as far as she is… although that's unlikely, given her place towards the back.
Queen-Pegasus certainly wasn't invited, and that's exatly why she wanders into the area with Rising in tow; right about the same time the ghost foal cries out about Trouble. The taller pegasi mare glancing down at Rising. "So this is what all that hoopla is all about, hmm?" lone blue eye glancing back towards the building situation. "Oh my. Looks like we got here just in time."
Once word had gotten out the portal had been found -and- it was the source of those darn zombies, it didn't take much more motivation to get some ponies to come help. He had fireworks, he had his cannon, and he'd been helping stand watch over the place until the migration actually happened.
And now Carronade was lined up with the others, cannon out and ready should anything come out of that portal other than escaping living ponies. "NOPONY GET IN FRONT OF MY AIM," his bassy voice booms helpfully. And deafening. And this is only 'normal' volume, mind you.
Spindrift and Brume stand ready. Brume has been busying himself with the refugees, helping to check for injuries. Everybody seems to be mostly okay, aside from being obviously exhausted, comparitively malnourished and, in a few cases, stricken with frostbite. But no severed limbs, no zombie bites. He's in pretty good spirits, considering.
Spindrift is more pensive, stalking back and forth at a distance behind the six Elements, watching the portal. She was doing this even before the announcement of trouble started. Once it comes- from a ghost, no, less, WHAT is UP with THAT- she adds a little scowl to her routine. "Do you intend to head inside to assist?" she asks, of the Elements, directing her question in a vaguely Maelstrom-direction, seeing as by virtue of being the ballsiest he often sets the tone.
"WHAT?" Maelstrom bellows, walking directly into Carronade's line of fire so that he can look at the the stallion over the edge of the muzzle. "NOBODY TAKE THE BRUNT OF THE RAIN?" He quickly sidesteps out of the way. "Seriously, though, that's a pretty impressive piece. You just packin' cannonballs in there?" He seems pretty nonchalant about the whole 'zombie infestation and foals in danger back home' thing, but that's probably him just packing away his worries so that others don't see it and get nervous. Really.
Rising-Chaos has a much better reason to be here than because Queenie brought her along. When she thinks of it she'll be sure to let you know. Still, the very thought of being here makes her seem very muted and quiet, the fear of Spindrift coupled with the excitement of seeing her friends is making her very nervous. "The ponies who were sent away to the other dimension are coming back," she informs the Queen. "Would you like to help them?"
Stormdancer trots along after her employer- and, unfortunately, a certain Pink Pegasus. With a whacking stick tucked under the band of her saddlebags, and canvas wrapped and tied around her fetlocks, she's… about as ready for a tussle as she can get. Dropping back into Queenie's (probably) blind spot, she drifts over to the bucket'd seafilly. "Holdin' up, 'Nini?"
Spectre is just vanishing and reappearing all over the place tonight, as she frets and frets and frets. "Trouble! I hate trouble!" But Monsoon nods to Spindrift, as does Daffodil (who does so with an eager rattle of his noggin). "They need us in there," proclaims Monsoon, to which Daffodil adds, "We gotta get in there and help!!"
"So far so good," Thunnini admits. "Can't exactly move and fight at the same time, though, so…" Shrug.
Queen-Pegasus scoffs softly "Help them? I certainly see no benefit in this." waving ah oof dismissively. "But perhaps if an opportunity arises - I'll consider how to help…" Convienently leaving the words 'myself' out of the statement. Glancing down to Rising as she continues. "You look more jittery than a small lap dog on pegasi's back. You can't actually be nervous about ponies coming back, can you?"
Carronade's nostils flare as he snorts, even as he grins toothily at Maelstrom. "JUST cannonballs? HAY NO, I'm packin' this BABY with GRAPESHOT tonight. MORE zombies SWISS CHEESED per SHOT." For those not in the know, that's essentially the same as a cannon sized shotgun, dozens of smaller metal balls to spread out and put holes in things in every shot! The stallion nods his head back behind him. "BROUGHT FIREWORKS TOO. If we don't USE them to FIGHT, they can be the CELEBRATION afterwards."
A certain rust-red pinto has been pacing. A lot. Pacing, and scanning /every pony/ brought through the portal. And getting more and more edgy as they fail to be ponies she recognizes! Aaaagh! This is taking /too long/! And now there's /trouble/! Rusty stamps her hooves. And paces more. Her saddlebags are packed full of 'sundries' - most of the variety that go boom - and she's got a sawblade clasped between her teeth. Because if there is trouble, she is going to /face it head-on dangit/.
Overhead is another nervous-looking pony. A violet pegasus, circling agitatedly. Typhoon has /also/ been scanning the ponies coming through, looking for a certain probably-foal who she hasn't seen yet. And now foals have been captured! So she's looking pretty darn panicked. And being followed by a couple quickly-darkening clouds that she can't seem to shake. Maybe flying around when nervous isn't the best plan, but she doesn't know what else to do!
"I like the way you think!" Maelstrom says as he looks over Carronade's ammo. "Do you have a newsletter I can subscribe to?" The sound of his fellow Elements fretting draws his attention away from potential terrible ideas however. "Hold that thought," the large unicorn says as he trots over to the others. "So what are we waiting for. Let's just charge in and kick some flank." And unless somepony stops him it looks like he's gonna do just that.
On noticing the arrival of Queenie and her retinue, Spindrift looks away from the portal and the others gathered before it, shooting a glance towards them. As she suspected. The pirate is here, as well as her lapdog. Her scowl darkens, but she doesn't go out of her way to address any of them for now, focusing more on matters at hand.
As her back and forth stalking brings her near Brume and the refugees, she calls out to her associate. "Brume. Ready yourself. We can take care of them later."
Brume looks up from where he's tending to a few bewildered-looking outlander foals. "Ohhh, it'll be fine. We've fought zombies before, noth-" He pauses as he notices Queenie and co. as well, then purses his lips. He promptly starts deploying his dulcimer, setting it up with practiced ease, and taps a few of its strings. "Nice acoustics in this hive. Like a big pipe organ," he comments, idly.
Rising-Chaos watches the portal pensively. "About them coming back? Certainly not. I'm fine," she dismisses the Queen's questions. still, she almost wishes she was here without her employer, so she could work more freely. "Still, I know some of the ponies on their way back. I have personal interest in seeing them back safely."
Stormdancer ruffles Thunnini's mane with a grin. "Tell ya what- we need ta book, I'll keep ya movin' 'til we hit th' sea, aye?" Stomping a hoof, she casts an uncertain gaze towards the portal. "Ya know any'n supposed to be comin' through?"
"Maelstrom, we need a plan! MAELSTROM!" Monsoon watches the big lug charge through, and his eye twitches. Probably for the umpteenth time. "Splinters," he swears. "C'MON, ELEMENTS, WE'RE GOING THROUGH!" Spectre squeaks and bamfs her way in quick succession toward the portal, and then through; Daffodil yowls a CHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGE!!!! and runs after.
"Duuno - I didn't arrive in town until after the weird lights hit," Thunnini admits. "I hope I can make friends with them, though!"
Hearth and Bonfire exchange a nervous look before scrambling along with the other Elements, Hearth bounding up to run alongside Monsoon while Bonfire hangs back beside Daffy protectively.
"PLANS ARE FOR LOSERS AND SQUARES," Maelstrom shouts back just before he disappears through the dirty window in space and time.
There's a whirl of fogbank grey as Spindrift's cloak flutters dramatically in her wake as she charges in after the elements. Brume looks up from his instrument to see the party leaving without him! With a sigh he slings his instrument up onto his back and tromps along afterwards. "Wait! Wait for me, everypony! How can I compose a ballad extolling your heroics if you leave me behind!?"
"For coming from a world of ICE AND SNOW they sure are HOTBLOODED," Carronade rumbles to nopony in particular. Followed by a grunt as he pushes his cannon closer to the portal, but giving everypony else a chance to get through before his slower movement speed glocks up the only gateway they have.
Finally! Movement! Rusty-Gears leaps out of her pacing to charge off after the advancing ponies. YES. ACTION. Typhoon-Wave is more hesitant. She circles. Frets. Dives a bit, pulls up, circles again. But she finally makes her decision, takes a deep breath, and dives down to follow after the charging crowd.
"Tha'd be g- Ah, hay," Stormdancer trails off as ponies pack towards the portal. "Uh, boss? Ain't there some worry 'bout holdin' this side?" she calls out, before pulling her thumpin' stick free with her mouth, and giving it a couple practice swings to loosen up.
Queen-Pegasus taptaps her cheek while watching the fighting-capable ponies rushing through the portal. She muses softly - but loud enough for Rising to hear. "It's almost as if they want me to collapase this hive after they go through. Wouldn't it be convinient if all the fighting ponies were suddenly missing, hmm?" Queen seems entirely serious about this to boot.
Thunnini follows after Carronade, as the cannon-pushing pony isn't that much slower than she is and is *certainly* going to be more helpful in a fight. At least the seafilly can bop any zombies that somehow get past all of the others.
Traversing between universes via tears in spacetime is a curious sensation. It sorts of feels like you're getting all stretched out and scrunched up all at once, with everything simultaneously blindingly bright and terrifyingly dark. Other worlds flash past instant by instant, never slow enough to pay them any mind. The only one that matters is the one directly ahead: one of cold, moonlight and — if the other side of the tear is any indication — twisty mazes of passages all alike.
Since the Elements are the first to charge through the portal they're the first to see a little foal waiting patiently for them. Her teal blue mane has a pretty pink bow in it and her eyes are friendly and welcoming. "Oh, good!" she says cheerfully. "I was hoping my little ghost friend would invite you all over!" Her eyes flash with green fire and her horn glows a sickening chartreuse. "Please stay a while, won't you?" she says as a wave of frigid energy leaps out at the six.
"What!" is all Maelstrom is able to get out before the blast hits him. His reckless charge is slowed significantly as the color seems to drain from his coat, turning his bright blue fur into a dusky slate color while frost begins to rime his body. "Hey! That's… cheeaatiiiiing…"
The stallion falls to his knees and stops moving.
"Huh?! Sh—" Monsoon's swear is cut short as he finds his brown coat seeping into cold grey, his movements halted. Daffodil falls flat on his face with a whimper, and even Spectre manages to get even more desaturated than she was. The twins manage to hold it off longer, stumbling closer — but even they too must fall as their life force is drained and frost creeps over their bodies.
So much for saviors.
The teal-maned unicorn foal pauses to look over her handiwork in astonishment… then trots in place excitedly. "Ooooh, that worked much better than I thought it would!" she exclaims with a cute little squeak. "I don't know why Moon was so worried about them, heehee~"
Spindrift rolls 1d20 (Null Magic Field) — Result: 8 | Sum: 8
Spindrift tumbles out of the portal, head swimming, disoriented. That… was intense. Fascinating. Nauseating. Not as much as the sight that greets her as she pulls herself upright, though… Hearth and Bonfire, freezing solid and toppling over.
Immediately she braces herself, rearing up onto her hind hooves, throwing her forelegs outward. There's a billowing wave of force radiating outward from her, throwing up her cloak and blowing her hood back from her face. The seapony is a mere channeler, only able to work with existing forces, but here, they are plentiful, and there's a visible effect as she pushes them away from herself an ever-expanding bubble of nullified magic. It should, hopefully enough, make enough of a safe zone that those tumbling through the portal behind her have a brief moment of respite.
Such as Brume. He trips over his own stringbean legs as he tumbles in, instrument tumbling into the snow. The other Mysterious Wanderer picks himself up quickly enough, though, and retrieves his dulcimer, setting it up, but holding on playing it- creating a magical well in the midst of a field of nullified magic would probably not work very well. His lavender eyes dart over the frozen elements, grief readily coloring his features before they harden.
Spindrift is winded in short order. Try as she might, the enchantments here are oppressively powerful, and her efforts to press them back can only go so far. There's a twenty foot diameter bubble of shimmering force that surrounds her, but it wavers and warps as she struggles to maintain it.
"Why did you do this?" she gasps, glaring up at the bow-adorned filly. "Who are you and why do you interfere?"
Carronade is bringing up the rear!…. which is entirely normal for him, he's a big, slow pony pushing a piece of shaped metal and gunpowder around after all. He does take pause at Stormdancer's comment, seeming to consider it for a moment… but then his attention, short as it can be at times, gets distracted by the foal following him. In a bucket? He blinks a couple of times, then a very important question comes to mind. "HEY KID HOW COME YA AINT WALKIN' LIKE NORMAL PONIES?"
Yes, that Thunnini is -not- a normal pony has entirely escaped the big lug until right about now.
"Seapony," Thunnini replys with an indifferent shrug, as if that should explain everything - and to her, it really *does* explain everything!
Rising-Chaos pulls her machete our from below her cloak as a sneer grows on her face. "If you collapse it my Queen, I ask permission to be on the other side." She looks less nervous before, now she just looks mad. "I have some anger to work out, over there looks like fun." Besides, she adds to herself, I'm not about to let Spindrift get the credit.
Queen-Pegasus waves a hoof dismissively before suddenly putting one leg on Rising's flank, and shoving her through in a very, very ungentle fashion - the smaller mare is all but a bullet shooting through the portal. The pegasi mare sighs softly. "Shooting something doesn't sound half-bad." drawing her flintlock before following her darling pet.
Rusty skids to a stop once inside the portal, swaying dizzily and shaking her head for a moment. But she's still got her sawblade! She blinks, squints, looks around - and pauses, spotting the now-still Elements. Her eyes widen. /This/ was not part of the plan! She blinks suspiciously at the foal. "…Snowfield?" Probably lucky she's still got the sawblade, it muffles the word quite effectively. 'Mmoofeed' makes a lot less sense. …Besides, Snowfield would never have a bow.
"OH. OKAY THEN!" And it's enough for Carronade it seems, big lug that he is. "LETS GET AMOVIN" He shoulders his cannon to shove it into the portal and tromps in after it. *VLORP* or whatever sound magic portals make when you push something big through them.
Stormdancer looks hesitant about going through the portal- But, there scoots Thunnini, along with, well, everypony else she's met in more than passing. She scampers to catch up with the herd, scooping up seapony and bucket onto her back, muttering 'Hay' nonstop around the whackin' stick- And plunging on in!
Trixie rolls 1d9 (Spindrift, Brume, Rusty, Rising, Queenie, Carronade, Thunnini, Stormdancer, Typhoon) — Result: 6 | Sum: 6
Thunnini blinks as she finds herself and her go-kart placed on the back of Stormy. At least the wheelbase is wide enough for the go-kart to function somewhat like a saddle, and now Thunnini can focus on fighting instead of having to choose between that or moving.
More guests? The filly seems taken aback by the sudden appearance of more ponies through the rift. She wasn't expecting the Elements to have so many friends! And one of them is even challenging her! "Why? Well, why not? They're awfully bothersome, drawing Queen Moon's attention to my little secret hideaway like this." She takes a step forward and quirks her head to the side. "Do you know that you're the first person to ask me that in a very long while?" she says to the Mysterious Wanderer. Her eyes flick towards Rusty as the mare calls her an unfamiliar name. "You must have me confused with somepony else. My name is Harmony Charmer. It's a pleasure to meet you." She bows her head briefly but her eyes stay affixed on the group. Especially on that stallion in the back with the large cannon. "Won't you be my friend?" she asks as her eyes seem to gleam again.
Something about the filly's lilting voice is oddly hypnotic, most especially to Carronade. She seems like an awfully nice pony, yes? Being her buddy sounds like a great idea. He should really just walk right over and stand at her side and they can be best friends forever~
Strange floating foal, being a foal is aa good enough reason for Queenie to fire her flintlock pistol at Harmony Charmer. Afterall what better way to make friends than to shoot the first unfamiliar face you see? "Ugh - this place is wretched. It's like sailing second-class on a cruise line, or waiting in line at the super-market." Unlikely Queen has done either. "Wah…it's cold, and smelly…what's /that/?" eyeing a pile of frozen vomit - remnants of Ruby and Maggie's earlier trip.
The cannon lurchs to a stop as it rattles out of the portal, followed by Carronade thumping on top of it because of the distorted traversing through the interspacial passage. "THAT'S the SECOND WEIRDEST tunnel I've BEEN THROUGH…" Planting a hoof against the weapon he pushes himself up and shakes his head to clear it.
Just in time to get an eyeful and earful from the little foal, which does the exact opposite than clearing it. Was it luck or cleverness that she picked the biggest, densest one in the lot? What a nice little seeming girl, though. "HEY A CUTE LITTLE FOAL" The big lug tromps right on over.
And then tries to grab Charmer in his thick legs and scoop her up into a hug. "I'LL HUG HER AND SQUEEZE HER AND I REALLY LIKE HER MANE" A possibly very uncomfortable hug, considering he's big and burly, if the rediculously loud voice wasn't bad enough.
Carronade rolls 1d20 (HUGS?!) — Result: 9 | Sum: 9
The bubble of null magic flickers for a moment longer, then winks out; there's a subtle feeling of inward-rushing air as the lambent energies of the portal chamber refill the field Spindrift had banished them from. She drops back to all four hooves, gasping for breath, and momentarily powerless to try and interfere with the charm the evil filly is casting over Carronade- though she glances up, feeling the passing magical flows, seeing the spell pass by and hissing with anger at it.
Brume arches his eyebrows. With the field fallen, he waggles his hooves and starts strumming at the strings of his dulcimer. Lovely, lilting tunes begin to rise from the gleaming fretboard, and with them a subtle thrumming in the air, just below the audible range, as magic forces are conjured by the music. Spindrift rallies soon after, drawing herself upright, and turning towards Harmony Charmer.
"You might find yourself with more friends to ask you if you didn't try to kill them all at their first appearance. Now unfreeze them. We are only here to collect our own and want noting of your vile frozen world."
Rising-Chaos barely stood the trip through the portal, and comes out the other side with a splitting headache. She staggers through, barely keeping a hold of the machete. The sight of the other side makes her shiver, all of the element ponies out of commission and an extremely creepy filly with a creepier voice. She moves off to the side, trying to avoid drawing attention to herself while she recovers.
Stormdancer got a bit of momentum going through that portal, that she now sheds by oh-so-gracefully skidding and stumbling and not-quite-tripping over the alternate Element ponies. But with a few hops, she rights herself! And with clutching her wings about the cart, Thunnini shouldn't get any worse than a little sloshed. Loosely translated from club-in-mouth-ese: "Where's the rest of the foals?"
"That's a good stallion," Harmony Charmer says cheerfully as she seduces another fool to her side. "Is there anypony else who wants to be my fr—hurk!" Her next victim is spared as Carronade picks her up and gives her a big ol' squeeze. "Put me down! Friends don't hug until after the second play date!" she squeaks.
A gunshot rings out with a deafening bang and the filly's writhing is rudely interrupted. Bone and flesh splatter against the far wall and the unicorn's hair falls over her face.
"…that really stings, you know?" she says with a sniffle after several seconds. Her gaze lifts to pout at Queen Pegasus, lip aquiver. She doesn't appear to have been injured at all by the bullet, regardless of the evidence on the wall! She squirm squirm squirms again to get out of Carronade's grip. "I can't do that. If I let them know Nightmare Moon will come hunting for them and it won't be safe here. The only safe thing is to let her have them so she stops looking." She shrugs at Stormdancer. Foal duty isn't her purview.