Chapters
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Catlin should've died there, in the skies above an alien world built by the ones who hated her. She was out of power, without a frame, and without hope.She felt the air whipping past her distantly, as though it was happening to someone else. No fall had threatened to harm her, not in all the years she had fought for her ancient Orokin masters. Distance was only a matter of perspective, something to be consumed by the Void.But she had no power left for that. She couldn't fade, she couldn't retake any of her…-
35.3 K •
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Catlin watched from the wall, suspended in the moment before the battle started. Behind her, her powerful companion prepared her attack, drawing down the power of the Void in a way no Tenno could ever do. The stakes here weren't all that different than the ancient battle, when Tenno united to free the Origin system from Orokin domination. This was just one planet, less technologically advanced perhaps. But if she failed here, they would be no less dead. The sun one could claim they would burn the city to…
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35.3 K •
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Catlin did not make it far with this new frame. But she couldn't stand to remain in the presence of this half-broken Sentient, slowly rotting in their own decaying sanity. She needed to get up into the castle proper, where at least things made more sense.The frame was not so strange as the first time she took on a non-humanoid form. But this one was leaner and more graceful, the sort of frame Catlin preferred. It reminded her a little of her beloved Titania Prime, without the tiny fairy wings, or bizarre…
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35.3 K •
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Princess Celestia took her down, way down. Down beneath the castle, through a spiral staircase hidden behind a wall of bricks and metal plates. Dust filled the air around them as they walked, glowing like the solar wind in Celestia's wake. Catlin walked on her own two feet the entire way, even if having the frame to give her strength would have made it much easier on her strained limbs. Some part of her suspected that if she retook the frame, the princess would attack her with another concentrated blast of…
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35.3 K •
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Catlin made the trip to see Princess Celestia within her Warframe. It wasn't just that she didn't want the pressure of needing to talk too much, though that was certainly part of it. It was also difficult to ignore just how strangely the locals looked at her. She wasn't naked anymore, and that was something—but she was also a strange alien, on a day strange aliens had killed thousands and begun to unravel their entire civilization. Luna didn't seem to care, though she glanced vaguely in Catlin's…
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35.3 K •
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Catlin heard the distant screaming—ponies on the wall, shaking with terror as forces they knew they could not possibly contain came barreling towards their loved-ones. She'd seen the defenses now, the high walls, the boiling oil and crossbow-wielding soldiers. They had minutes, perhaps, before the enemy breached their gates.In the room all around her, resistance crumbled. Luna's generals saluted to her, then sprinted off without a word. To command their troops, if they were brave. To cower in the…
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35.3 K •
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Catlin woke to agony.Her whole body ached, with a pain that suffused every limb and joint. Despite all the battles she'd fought, and all the frames that had been destroyed under her control, she rarely felt real pain.Like all Tenno, her body was supposed to be safe, sometimes a whole system away from the site of battle. She'd gambled closer proximity to the invasion fleet, trusting to her greater ability to make combat decisions to carry the Origin System to victory.She'd lost.Something splashed her,…
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35.3 K •
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Catlin ascended the steps through a castle she could scarcely even believe. There was tremendous beauty here, a whole tradition of architecture that seemed at once familiar and also entirely disconnected from anything she knew. This was not an Orokin structure—though there was a little gold to speak of, they seemed to favor glass and crystal more. But she saw no cephalons trapped in glass in this place, only ponies huddled desperately. This spectacular monument had been turned into a refugee shelter in…
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35.3 K •
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Catlin took in the battlefield before her as she had done a thousand times before. She had fought odds like this during her years of endless service to the Golden Lords, and survived.That vast bubble protected a castle packed with the alien ponies, maybe even a majority of the city's population. Many of the walkways and towers were standing room only, with terrified creatures looking down from high above.The infested overflowed from every corner—they smacked into it from the air, they filled a river that…
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35.3 K •
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The rickety lift finally ground to a stop.Catlin's instincts demanded that she retreat into the back corners of the car, letting these creatures take the brunt of whatever was waiting. But her frame wouldn't let her do that—she needed to protect these creatures, even if that meant a little more risk. What could they do, other than put their bodies in the line of fire?Besides, it would be a lie to say that she wasn't eager to see where they'd ended up. There was a whole system to hide this strange colony…
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35.3 K •
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