Ghosts of the Past

CHAPTER 7 – Opus at the End of Everything

Date: Unknown. Location: Unknown.

The sound of an explosion could be heard in the desert. A ball of flame appeared out of thin air, above a group of cactuses, and something passed through it.

It crashed on the ground.

Date: Unknown. Location: Unknown.

Sprawled in the sand, a badly hurt pony was passed out. One of his rear legs was trapped under a strange contraption that did not look like anything the dogs saw before.  He wore a leather jacket, and had some kind of protective helmet near him. It was not adapted to his head, though. Something was off with him.

All this didn’t really matter. He landed near their den; it was a free slave and a way to buy them some time. No more, no less.

The diamond dogs quickly took everything there was and carried it all into their underground city.

Date: Unknown. Location: Unknown.

“Wake! Up! Pony!” The dog shouted, slapping his new slave.

“Hein? Quoi? Où est-ce que-“

The pony’s eyes widened in surprise. “Merde! Putain, un chien qui parle! Oh, je…”

He passed out again with a sigh.

The diamond dog was furious. “Stupid! No-good! I… Be back!”

Date: Unknown. Location: Unknown.

The driver woke up on the road, his bike trapping his left leg. His jean was torn off, and his leg’s skin had been burned by his slide on the road. Groaning in pain, he removed his helmet and tried to reach his mobile phone, inside his coat’s pocket. A few seconds later, he found it, resting in several pieces. The device had been crushed by the shock, and was unusable.

Roughly a minute later, he heard footsteps coming to him. He called for help, but, instead of receiving what he asked for, he only heard a laugh.

The stranger kneeled near him, and looked in his eyes. [“You can get out of here if you can. You just have to try. For example, like this.”]

The man looked at the motorcycle for a second.

The bike lifted itself up and flew to the other side of the road, freeing its driver’s leg.

The driver was as amazed as he was scared. [“Who are you?”]

[“I am the one who brought you where you are right now. Someone else vouched for you, so I transported you there. You are not on Earth anymore, little man. And you are not even a little man anymore.”]

[“That’s pretty much Earth right there, and I’m human. I don’t see what’s different.”]

[“Oh, that? No, that’s not Earth. That’s your last memory of Earth when you left it. It’s just a dream.”]

[“A dream. Like I’d believe that.”]

[“I think you should believe all of this is a dream. After all, your bike actually was a tricycle made for little girls all along, and you have the legs of a chicken.”]

[“What the hell are you talking about.”]

The driver looked where the huge bike was a few seconds earlier. A pink tricycle was standing there.

He didn’t even want to look at his legs.

[“Ooookay. Let’s say this is a dream. Then, if it’s a dream, why am I conscious, and why don’t I control it?”]

[“Simply because talking to people in dreams requires consciousness; and because I am the one controlling your dream. You are still locked up in a prison cell as we speak.”]

[“Okay, okay, that’s a lot to comprehend right there. Where am I exactly, and why did you bring me there already?”]

[“You’re in a place where gods are playing. And, as a god, I brought you there to be my champion. My Piece, as the others call it nowadays.”]

[“And what if I don’t want to be your champion? I never agreed to that.”]

[“Oooh, but I don’t need your agreement, silly mortal. You just need to know that if you want to survive, you have to win that game for me. If you don’t win, I’ll kill you.”]

The driver shivered, as the stranger’s tone went from jovial to ice cold in the last sentence.

[“Now have a nice sleep, and be ready to do anything to survive. Take time to get accustomed to your new body, and think fast. You’re going to be in deep shit,”] the maniacal stranger said, laughing to his heart’s content.

The world faded to black.

Date: Unknown. Location: Unknown.

The contraption the pony brought with him was really fascinating. It looked like centuries ahead of the dogs’ technologies, even centuries ahead from what all the ponies could have… Yet, the Alpha could see it was not hand-crafted. Things were too regular, too orderly for something that was not chain-manufactured. Even though it looked damaged, everything was too perfect. Something was off with this machine. It couldn’t be Equestrian, and yet it was there.

This pony definitely was something to worry about.

Furthermore, according to the reports, he spoke an unknown language during the few seconds he was awake, which made communication very difficult. He would have to take care of him with his own paws.

Date: Unknown. Location: Unknown.

The newest addition to the slave reserves of the Blackdune clan woke up in a very uncomfortable position. He was resting on his back, and each of his legs was tied to pillars in the corners of the room. Something prevented him to see anything, and he felt a few sunburns on his skin.

“Euh… Au secours?”

His body was dehydrated, and the voice he heard wasn’t the one he was used to. It was raspy, and slightly lower-pitched.

After a few minutes of getting together, he tried to stretch his fingers, to no avail. He did not feel anything at the end of his arms.

A light gust of wind he could feel on his sensitive skin informed him that he was nude. He panicked. “Qu’est-ce qui m’arrive!”

[“I hope I wasn’t kidnapped by sadomasochist rapists.”]

He tried to rock back and forth, but the ropes wouldn’t budge. Squirming around like a fish deprived of water, he was noisy.

Soon, footsteps could be heard.

“Well well well, what do we have here. Someone’s ready to get interrogated!”

The loud voice was anything but reassuring.

Mustering his courage and all of his awful knowledge of English, the pony babbled: “Euh… Heylo?”

“Hello indeed.”

The pony could feel something sharp tickling him, going from a side of his belly to the other.

“It seems you do speak Equestrian after all.”

“I speak bad. Sorry,” the pony said with a strong accent. “What is Equestrian?” He asked.

“Do you not even know the language you speak of?” The other voice asked, audibly surprised.

“I speak English. I do not unduhstand.”

“Call it whatever you want, it still is the Equestrian language.”

“Putain, je comprends rien…”

“Speak Equestrian or shut up.”

He felt the sharp object on his throat, near his arteries. “O-o-okay. Talk slow please.”

“What is your name.”

“L-Louis.”

“Good. Louis, what was that machine with you?”

“Machine? Bike?”

“Yes.”

“I can show you. Not explain. I don’t know ze words.”

“Fine. Try to make a move and I kill you.”

“Okay.”

He felt a hand undoing a knot on the side of his head, and, suddenly he could see. Another dog was standing in front of him, featuring flat colors, an outline and a gilded collar. “Encore un chien de dessin animé. C’est pas possible.”

“Speak Equestrian, fool!”

The pony, feeling his arteries threatened again, apologized. “Sorry! I forgot.”

He turned his neck around and looked at his limbs. No hands in sight, only stumps, at the end of a light yellow leg, featuring an outline as well.

“I have no hands!”

The wolf looked at him and chuckled. “You’re a pony, idiot. Why would you have hands?”

“Hein? Un- A what? Me? Why?”

“Why? I don’t know! You’re a pony, it’s all I know!”

“I’m human!”

“I don’t know what a human is. But I do know what a pony looks like, and you’re one. No doubt about it.”

“Poni… Pony… Poney? Attends, je suis un poney? C’est quoi ce binz!”

The slaver slashed one of the captive’s legs with his claw.

“Aïe! Enfoiré!”

The dog moved his face right above that of the pony, and ordered: “Talk. Equestrian.”

Louis winced, still feeling the pain in his leg. “Yes. I will.”

“Let us go then.”

The dog untied his prisoner’s legs, and pushed him on the ground.

Coordinating his four legs was hard. Louis could not manage to walk like a quadruped, so he tried to walk on his hind legs. Unfortunately, his new pelvis didn’t have the right shape for that, and he fell on the ground.

[“I can’t even walk… What’s happening…”]

He tried again, and managed to stand up by leaning on the walls.

“Slave! Why do you walk like us!” The dog exclaimed, before pushing the pony back on the ground violently.

“Gros con,” he whispered, and tried his best to walk on all fours, the way his new body was supposed to, although he sometimes held his bleeding leg in the air.

The slaver harrumphed and led him through the corridors, occasionally pulling on his hair violently to make him turn, eliciting a few complaints.

The unsteady pony managed to walk on all fours decently after a while, and avoided being mistreated at every corner by following his captor closely.

A few minutes later, they reached a big room with a particularly high roof, columns everywhere, and a throne. In front of the throne, a motorbike was laid down on the ground, some of its parts torn off and put aside in a small pile.

Louis bit his lips. [“Fuck, what did they do? I hope it still works.”]

The Alpha shouted. “What is it? Make it work!”

The prisoner walked to the bike and examined it. The parts they removed actually only were unimportant pieces of plastic. He lifted the bike with surprising ease, and was thoroughly amazed at his ability to grab things without fingers. But there were more important things to do than looking at how his limbs worked. For example, getting out of that crazy place was important. He didn’t know where to go, but anywhere else would do. It would be hard to find a place worse than this one.

He clumsily climbed on the motorbike, now slightly too tall for him, and started it. When the engine noise echoed in the vast room, the dogs in the vicinity all howled and fell on the ground. The Alpha, closest of them all to the engine, put his hands on his ears and yelled: “Make it stop!”

Louis smiled. That was unexpected. [“I guess they’re very sensible to noise. Take that, bitch!”]

The pony looked at his defeated captor writhing on the ground, did not say anything, and turned the throttle. The sound increased and some dogs curled in the fetal position, but he didn’t care. He grabbed the clutch and pressed it, switched to first gear, clumsily released the clutch with a hoof, and drove through the dark corridors. Fortunately, although the blinkers had been ripped off, the main lights still were operational.

Behind him, Louis could hear the sounds of dogs yelling and running. [“Try, bitches. You won’t get me.”]

A few minutes later, after turning around in random circles, dogs chasing him continuously, he reached large stairs and slowed down. At the bottom of the dark tunnel going up, he could see a faint ray of light. “Bingo.”

He put the crutch in place, jumped off the bike, and climbed the stairs faster than he ever thought he could, adrenalin racing through his veins. Upon reaching the top of the stairs, he noticed the strange nature of the door blocking the exit, and the adjoining room. He immediately ran to the room and saw the wheel attached to ropes going near the door, deprived of its guards. Feverish, he grabbed the wheel and spun it as hard as he could. The doors opened slowly.

When he saw a ray of light he considered big enough, Louis jumped back to the stairs and hopped through the door.

He was greeted by hot wind, the blinding sun, and a sharp spear in his left buttock.

The impact made him fall to the ground and hold his injured leg with both his front hooves. He instantly started to cry because of the pain. “AAAAAAAAIE! Non, non, non! Pas maintenant!” he sobbed, trying to walk with his remaining legs.

Footsteps could be heard soon after, and the Alpha jumped through the door, landing on the wounded pony with a thump. The impact moved the spear in the leg and widened the gash, blood flowing from it at an alarming rate.

The dog was wearing an improvised turban around his ears, to muffle the unbearable noise. “No one escapes me, little bastard.”

He twisted the spear around, forcing his victim to scream in pain once again, before removing it with a quick movement.

Staring into the eyes of the injured prisoner, he licked the blood coming from the wound, bathing his mouth in blood, before announcing: “You shouldn’t have tried to escape. Now I have to eat you.”

Louis’ ears flicked backwards as his eyes widened in fear.

And, immediately, the Alpha punched the terrified pony in the head with a shattering blow, rendering him unconscious.

Date: 18th of August, Second Year of the Game. Location: Appleloosa.

I was playing the piano in Appleloosa’s saloon, entertaining a few ponies scattered on the few tables with my exotic songs. After some heard about my music, they came frequently to hear it, even if I only had a very limited repertoire. With True Notes who took the piano from time to time, however, we almost could play during all day.

While I was playing a merry tune I particularly liked, I was interrupted by a green flash.

I immediately stopped playing, and the few ponies sitting around groaned in disagreement.

“Sorry guys, I have a message to read,” I said, before escaping through the wall, thrilled. Finally, I had something to do.

The message said: “Go back to the dog’s den. You’ll find something interesting near the entrance.”

The first idea I had was that Mercury finally decided to make me fight the dogs. It was better than doing nothing at all, but I wasn’t sure how I was going to do that.

Nevertheless, I said goodbye to True Notes, told him I’d be gone for a while, and headed to the diamond dog den after jumping out of the Mortal Dimension.

Date: 18th of August, Second Year of the Game. Location: Diamond dog den.

When I reached the big rock where the door was, I noticed an unusual shape in the sand.

I crouched, and examined the ground. The shape was that of a set of knobby motorbike tires. That could only mean one thing: there was someone human around there.

The second thing I saw was a dried pool of blood on the sand, near the den’s gate.

The driver was probably hurt, and I had to save him.

I passed through the door, and headed into the corridor, following the trail of blood on the stairs.

At the end of the stairs, I saw something I didn’t want to see. It was a big group of dogs, examining closely a black enduro motorcycle with gilded rims and a digital panel. It was badly damaged, but it still was a bike I knew too well.

The license plate was completely mangled, but one part of it remained. Its remains displayed the first letter, a K. The bike I used to drive had a K on its plate too.

I had to eliminate all doubts.

Turning around the motorbike, I checked a particular place on the front mudguard. On the right side, a tiny square of paper was glued. A few legal scribbles were written on it, as well as the bike’s plate’s number.

“KR 21 A.”

The realization hit me like a brick wall.

Only one person in the world could drive this motorcycle: my little brother.

“Mercury… I swore it once already; now is the second time. You will pay.”

Running through the halls, passing through the unaware dogs, I erupted internally. My mind was on fire, images of revenge flowing through it like lava burning away all my common sense. The trail of blood seemed to never end, and as I was running, I did not look away from it a single time.

Before reaching the throne room, I could smell the scent of decay and hear someone crying.

When I entered that room, I witnessed the most horrible thing I had seen in my life. It was too terrible for the land of friendship and happiness, even in the twisted version of it where I was sent.

An overly large wooden table was sitting between the mighty pillars and only one chair was near it.

The chair was used by the Alpha. But that wasn’t really disturbing. Chairs are made to be sat on, after all.

The real problem was that the Alpha’s muzzle was buried into the guts of one of his soldiers, resting in an oversized plate, while a lanky yellow pony was strapped to the other end of the table, condemned to watch the mad dog eat one of his subordinates. He was crying and biting his lip, his left rear leg had been cut open and bitten in some places, and he looked rather pale, probably because of the severe blood loss.

The Alpha was eating slowly, savoring the taste of fresh blood. I watched him for a full minute before even thinking of reacting. It was so disgusting I could only look at him, munching on the poor dog’s insides, ripped out and scattered around on the plate. He occasionally plunged his hands in the insides of the corpse and ripped a few organs out, biting on them in delight afterwards.

A few moments of watching the Alpha were enough to make me feel sick, even though I couldn’t watch anywhere else.

I looked at the dead dog, to see if I recognized him. I did not, but the face’s expression taught me one thing: he expected it. And, if a dog was expecting to be eaten by his Alpha, it could only mean that the Alpha had been a cannibal for a long time.

“I’m a retard. This is why his hands were shaking. He didn’t have Parkinson, he’s a cannibal.”

However, his little meal didn’t last forever. Soon, the Alpha stopped gnawing on the dog’s entrails and looked at the pony straight in the eyes, blood splattered all over his coat and a twisted look in his eyes.

His nightmarish appearance combined to his short-term plans made me react without thinking.

I jumped through dimensions and appeared with a flash of smoke.

My scythe aimed towards the dog, who suddenly looked slightly bigger, I shouted: “Freeze, son of a whore!”

Something was off. I didn't feel good at all.

Startled by my appearance, both the Alpha and the pony looked at me. The first was surprised and snarled, while the second was more than surprised and passed out.

“Who do you think you are, stupid creature?”

The smoke suddenly darkened the entire room, as I pointed my weaponized arm at the Alpha. “I am the destroyer of souls, and I will shatter the miserable remains of your spirit. I am the emissary of the gods, and I will unleash their wrath upon you! I am Death, and you will fall before me!”

The dog grinned. “A Soul Guide, huh? Too bad for you, I’m more than a simple dog.”

“Yup. Totally unnatural. He shouldn’t know that.”

With an unnatural strength and speed, the Alpha leapt at me, his fist raised in the air.

I watched him come without moving, waiting for him to fall through my pony avatar before I could use a decent spell on him.

Instead of passing through me, his fist went right for my head and hit my mask with an incredible force. My nose was broken by the impact and I fell backwards, pushed away by the weight of his body. When I hit my head on the ground, everything went black.

Date: 18th of August, Second Year of the Game. Location: Unknown.

I opened my eyes on a floating island again.

“I may have forgotten to tell you I just allowed you to jump through dimensions completely. Try to get used quickly to being in the body of a pony, it's not quite the same as that of a human.”

“Dammit, Mercury!”

I lost consciousness again.

Date: 18th of August, Second Year of the Game. Location: Diamond dog den.

I was lying on my back, on the cold ground of the dog’s den.

For the first time in over a year, I could feel the cold wind brushing over me. I could also feel the pain of my broken nose, and the heat of the blood flowing on my face under the mask. I could not feel my fingers, nor my feet; but I had a tail. My forelegs could not easily bend forward, but they were somehow elastic, as if I my bones were made of latex.This whole body made my head spin faster than a scientific centrifuge.

It took my brain no more than thirty seconds to decide I had to empty my stomach, and shortly after, I could feel the bile of this new body inaugurating my oesophagus. It seeped through the mask's holes while I rested there, lying on a side, sometimes moving one leg or the other. I could hear footsteps getting further from me during these moments.

After a few minutes, I turned around and pushed with my forelegs. Slowly, I stood up on my hooves unsteadily. They felt like bendable suction cups instead of actual hooves. On Earth, hooves are only very thick nails, and as such, they are incapable of moving. The hooves I had were more akin to a hand trapped inside a very thick latex cylinder.

Looking at the table, I noticed that the yellow pony that my brother now was had been taken away from the table, his shackles hastily cut off.

The footsteps resounded from behind the throne, tipped on its side. Behind it, a tunnel extended into the wall.

I staggered towards it ever so slowly, holding the mask on my face with my left hoof and trying to walk with three legs instead of two. I did not only hold the mask to prevent my broken nose from stirring around, but also to keep myself awake with the sharp pain it provided.

Date: 18th of August, Second Year of the Game. Location: Unknown.

My footsteps echoed in the tunnel, surprisingly very well lit, during several minutes. It had a steep slope, and it was a bit slippery because of the humidity. I fell a few times, but at least, I managed to hold my mask in place. Most of the time, I leaned on the side of the tunnel with my sides, leaving a trace on the wall.

After the tunnel ended, I reached a tiny rock bridge suspended over an endless abyss, that lead to a large platform against a wall.

Only a yellow body was lying on the platform. The dog wasn’t there.

I crossed the bridge slowly, looking around constantly, but nothing moved.

Reaching the pony’s body, I checked his pulse. It was weak, but he was alive. The question was: for how long?

While I was looking at his wounds, trying to cast spells to close them without any result, the wall’s eyes opened, and a scaly mouth that was masticating the Alpha’s corpse greedily gulped it down in an instant.

The sudden movement in my peripheral vision was largely enough to startle me. Instinctively, I grabbed the unconscious pony and dragged him away. In a few seconds, I almost reached the bridge; but then, a very loud voice could be heard, coming from the wall. “Where do you think you are going, you little weasel!”

When I turned back, I saw it.

A gigantic snake-like being was partially encased in the wall. He was as black as the stone around him, and looked at me with piercing yellow eyes. His head was at least three times my size, and his fangs were dripping with venom.

“I am Sstharos the Great Black Basilisk, eater of cities and destroyer of minds. It’s a pleasure to meet you, and it’ll be a pleasure to eat you.”

He laughed with a guttural voice.

I took a few seconds to find appropriate words, moving my strange new mouth in an unnatural manner. “You… Look like a pretty awful basilisk. Why am I not petrified already?”

“What are you talking about? I’m not a cockatrice, idiot. And I have resisted many of your fellow Guides in the past. Nothing makes you different from them. Why do you think anything different will happen?”

I was terrified. I was vulnerable, unable to properly defend a passed out pony, and facing a giant snake of doom.

“If music worked for the ponies, music will work for horrible snakes from hell. Right?”

I whispered to myself. “Music will make things different.”

My brain, functioning at its maximum power, chose a song for me. I remembered the first few lyrics. And, while I did so, various instruments started playing.

The basilisk was dumbfounded as much as he was angry. “How can you use magic here? Damn you, bastard!”

Then I sang, as loud as I could without magical enhancers, even though I was singing off-key sometimes because of the pain. I told the snake how hard I would hit him, without needing anything byt my hooves.

In response, he spat on and around me. When I protected my face with the scythe, it instantly turned to stone, as well as a few parts of my cape. Hiding my surprise, I kept on singing, promising him the gruesome death he deserved. I slowly walked towards the snake, seeing my distorted reflection in his hatred-filled eyes, and raised my stone scythe in the air, now significantly heavier.

Once I was halfway through the song, after claiming my mercilessness, I stopped walking, and assumed what would be a heroic stance, my cape flowing in the rancid breath of the snake.

Shouting instead of simply singing, I vowed to free Equestria of the scourge he was.

I was abruptly cut off when the snake decided he did not like power metal. His head lunged at me in less than a second, and he bit me.

The enormous fangs perforated my right lung and one of my back legs. Unable to scream, I could only cry as I grabbed a fang with a hoof. It turned to stone and became locked in place.

The snake chewed, and chewed, and chewed again; and I could feel several parts of my shiny new body go numb, before being violently disconnected from the rest of my body. I could feel my blood and organs escaping in my last moments of consciousness. The distress of each one of my body cells was felt and amplified by my brain when they were ripped off of me.

I tried to hit the inside of the snake’s mouth with my scythe, but it did nothing, and soon, I was reduced to a bleeding half of a torso with a barely functioning brain and a very determined hoof made of stone.

The last thought I had was: “I lost.”

A few seconds later, the snake cleared off the last remains of his opponent from his mouth and savored the taste of the rare treat that a Soul Guide was, before eyeing the passed out pony with glee.