Chapter 1- Shield Us From Harm

    The spell was too complex. Twilight knew that when they first started this whole experiment. But tell Trixie that, or the rest of the Department of Magical Studies. The purple alicorn wearily rubbed an eye, while the other kept a diligent watch on the magical readout in front of her. In the room below her, the former stagepony-turned-magical researcher and her team sprinted to and fro, horns aglow as they adjusted various knobs and magical fields on the device. And what a device. Twilight had to admit, the tower of pure basalt was impressive, more so when the lower half of it was inscribed with Draconic and glowing a light blue. Trixie’s team had affixed a bronze apparatus in various concentric rings around the tower, amplifying the stone’s magic for their spell. But it was still… too… complex.

    She pushed open the window to the control room with her magic, eyes still glued to the readout.

    “Trixie! If we stop now, we can safely lower the magical levels and-”

    “The Great and Powerful Trixie will not stop her experiment for you, or anypony!”

    Twilight merely sighed and shut the window. Ah well, worth a shot. She just had a bad feeling. She had had a bad feeling ever since returning from the less-than-successful talks with the ambassadors from the recently-discovered Ursan Empire. Whether it was coming from the Bears, or from Trixie, however, she could not know. The first thing she had found on her desk was the paper detailing Trixie’s Interdimensional Shield device, along with half-a-dozen papers from various professors in the Department extolling her work. Twilight, however, had been utterly flabbergasted. The needed magic for the spell was enormous. A backlash at any time of the complicated spell-casting would drop a blast that would make a Sonic Rainboom look downright puny, and could annihilate the entire College. And considering the whole College had been HER idea, Twilight was loathe to put it at risk. But she was also loathe to dismiss Trixie and the rest of her professors who were so behind the idea of an impenetrable shield that could protect an entire city, especially during dark days such as this.

    Ponies were on edge. In the skies above, Pegasi leaders had been discovering far more Griffin outposts and hunting parties in the mountains around Equestria’s borders, and the Griffin king had yet to respond to Celestia’s inquiries about them. Ponies are naturally skittish creatures, and the mere thought of razor-beaked killing machines in their forests had sent more than one into a small panic. Sadly, that was not the only call for worry recently. Twilight herself had seen strange ships on the western shores during a trip to the White-Tail Woods with her friends, but had been unable to approach them due to a curiously repellent magical field. The Princess of Magic was certain she could have pierced it, but did not know at the time how the occupants would have taken to that. And now with talks of dragon forays into the Badlands, and with new creatures from across the sea… Equestrians were looking for some kind of assurance. So she let the project continue.

    The control room door opened, and Trixie led her team of unicorns inside, each of them quickly taking their places at various consoles and readout stations.

    “Magical levels?” Trixie barked, glancing at Twilight.

    Despite being the head of the entire College, Twilight allowed Trixie to have her time of “power” when she was doing her experiments. It was good to have an outlet, at least.

    “Everything in nominal. I’m a bit worried about the interdimensional flux, though. It’s peaking in places and-”

    “It will be fine,” Trixie cut her off, “Are the shields in place?”

    “Yes ma’am!” One of the researchers called back, “At full strength.”

    “Scanning matrices?”

    “Online.”

    The former stage pony carefully settled a scroll on her console, unfurling the precious parchment. With a glance, Twilight could see that it had been written in Draconic. That only worried her further. Using Dragon magic in a spell of this magnitude could lead to… side effects. It was far more chaotic than unicorn or alicorn magic; she had seen that firsthand when studying a quickly growing Spike. It only served to further enlarge the knot of worry in her stomach. And Trixie began to speak.

----------------------------------

    Gaius Marius was going to die. The Roman Centurion knew this as he saw the Eagle standard fall to the ground, kicked about by bloody, screaming, fighting bodies. His cohort was falling to pieces around him, and he could not stop it. A man, covered in furs and blood, roared as he charged up the hill, dirt kicked up by his iron shod boots. He fell back seconds later with a cry, blood spraying from his neck. Gaius spun around, gladius hacking down a spear-wielding Celt, his thick scutum shield bashing the body away from him. He was tired; his arms were on fire, and the Centurion knew he was bleeding badly from his back where a lucky Celt had managed to spear him. Well, unlucky now, and quite dead. A Legionary beside him roared as he charged a particularly ornate Celt, body and shield slamming them both into the throng of men still charging up the hill they had died defending. Neither man rose up again. A prayer to Jupiter whispered past Gaius’ lips. He would follow soon, brother.

-----------------------------------

    The obelisk was nearly white-hot and blinding, and Twilight was screaming in Trixie’s ear.

    “Stop the spell! The flux is beyond peaked, there is too much power in the runes!”

    But Trixie would have none of it, the hissing words of the Draconic spell slithering from her lips, her horn glowing an unusual red. Cursing, Twilight spun back to the readout, watching in horror as the levels kept climbing. This was insane; the power from this spell could do more than crater the College. It could annihilate half the countryside, Ponyville included, if it spiraled out of control. She had to either shut it down, or stabilize it. The Princess of Magic eyed Trixie, anger draining till her face was set in stone. Horn flaring to life, she joined Trixie’s matrix.

----------------------------------

    There were ten of them left. Ten legionaries, ten men Gaius had trained and lived with for ten years now. They had fought side by side countless times as the Emperor drove the legions further into Celtic and Germanic territory. They had seen the fall of kings and generals, the deaths of cities and the raisings of forts and flags. The Empire had stretched ever northward, and Gaius had been proud to see civilization spread amongst the barbarians. He did not hate them like some Romans. They were simply ignorant. Most of them, anyway. But there were some he did hate. This tribe, for example. It had been two days prior that his cohort had marched through a Celtic worship sight. They had found it then. A vat, filled with the drowned bodies of men, women, children. Roman, Celtic, even Gauls. Nationality, sex, or age had not mattered. All had been sacrificed to one of their barbarian gods.

    And so here they were, dying to keep the barbarians away from another Roman city, just down the hill. To give them time to prepare for the onslaught and wait for reinforcements. The Centurion turned back to the mass of Celts below, their dirty faces and black eyes glaring up at the ten men who had managed to push them back down. Interlocked shields, pila held ready above their heads. Clenched in his scutum-holding hand were three more pila; Gaius knew he could get all of them down before the Celts could make it up the hill. Four kills, then it’d be back to the gladius.

    “Are you ready, Sons of Mars?” he asked quietly, turning to his brothers.

    “Yes, Centurion,” they replied as one.

    “Are you ready to die?” he asked, tone growing louder.

    “Yes, Centurion.”

    “Are you ready to kill!?”

    “Yes, Centurion!”

    Gaius bared a grin feral enough to make a Gaul wince, “Kill for whom?”

    “For Rome!”

    “For whom?”

    “FOR ROME!”

    The ten men roared down at the mass of warriors with all their might, pounding pila against shield and shield against ground. With a roar overpowering their enemies, the Celts charged once more.

---------------------------------

    “Get ready to release the bindings!” Trixie yelled out to the researchers; everypony’s horn were glowing brilliantly, barely able to contain the immense power of the spell-soaked obelisk.

    Twilight was straining mightily, wings flared to steady herself as she and Trixie worked to point the focus of the spell skyward. They had to do this correctly, or hundreds could perish. Twilight knew she was in for a chewing out by Princess Celestia after this. If she lived.

    “Release!” Trixie practically sobbed out, pain-filled tears running down her cheeks.

    The researchers let out a collective gasp as they released their various containment spells… and were flattened to the ground by the resulting explosion. Brilliant light stabbed skyward, annihilating the ceiling above and spearing high into the sky. A suction seemed to follow the powerful beam, and several chunks of stone were sucked out after it. And with a anticlimactic rumble… nothing. Twilight dropped to her side beside a panting Trixie, staring up at the sky. Had it

worked? Where was their shield?

-----------------------

Gaius was all that was left. Septimus had taken a spear to the throat as he speared the Eagle Standard back into the ground. Gnasis had disappeared beneath a mass of screaming Celtic warriors. Toro, the Nubian auxiliary, had fought with his oaken club like a man possessed; it had taken an axe decapitating the bull of a man to stop him. Keldandra, a Gaul women whom Gaius had allowed to secretly join their cohort, had fallen to the ground, eyes glazed as a score of arrows pierced her chest. The rest had been swept away by the tide of battle, and Gaius was left with his back to the Eagle, a Celtic longsword in one hand, and his gladius in the other, his scutum at his feet, pila piled beside it. This was his last stand. For Rome, and the people of the village beneath him. He hoped they made the most of his sacrifice.

    For a moment, the Celts subsided, staring up at the bloody, exhausted Roman with respect and not a little fear. One man, a giant of a man with a dark beard and hair, stepped from the ranks.

    “Yield.”

    It was a simple word. A command given out of respect for a beaten combatant. Gaius knew he may not even be killed. The Celts could ransom him back to Rome, or set him up in their tribal hold as a trophy. A beaten dog, not worthy to be called civilized. The Celt tribal leader probably never felt the bite of the thrown longsword as it buried itself in his eye. And as the Celts roared, Gaius steadied himself on the Standard, planted in the blood-soaked ground… and the world exploded with light.