Apocalyptic Beauty

Nopony said a word. All was quiet. Then, completely out of nowhere, I felt a burning headache. Then, it disappeared, as quickly is it appeared. ‘Odd,’ I thought to myself, ‘I felt completely fine until now.’

Almost instantly, a moving picture, like a video, emerged in the corner of my eye. It didn’t really show anything, more two vibrating lines to indicate sound waves. Slowly, I heard a voice fade in. “hhhhHello, Silent!” It laughed, slowly fading in, “First and foremost, don’t tell anypony that you can hear me, or you’ll spoil the surprise, hee hee hee-” The voice started coughing, “-Now, you’re probably thinking: ‘Who the hay is this mysterious pony!? How is he talking to me!? I want answers, dammit!’ Hee hee, well, remember this, Silent! Sometimes… the truth hurts! Gasp! Shock! Horror!”

He coughed again. “You don’t understand? Well, let me put this in context for your puny little brain. Imagine your favourite show. You’ve been through it all! The ups, the downs, the twist and turns, when suddenly… BAM! They tell what it’s all about. How do you feel? Shocked? Angry? Confused? Upset? How come the main character became a princess? It’s not nice, is it? See? That’s what it’s like. So, my point is, don’t ask questions. Now, instead of wasting my time and energy that I could be using doing more important stuff, I’m going to let you all slowly die painfully and slowly. Why? I’m Equestria’s new ruler now, dammit! I can do what I want! And right now, I’d worry about getting to the city formerly known as Canterlot. Now… it’s known as, Armadia! Hoo hoo, a much better name, if you ask me! Now, clock’s ticking, so hurry to the newly renamed Armadia Theatre, or the leading ladies may be found dead in their dressing room, hee hee!” And just like that, the picture disappeared.

“Silent? Silent!” Rarity shouted, almost worried, as she started shaking me.

“Ugh… Was I asleep? How long was I out?” I asked, scratching the back of my head.

“Silent, we were so worried when you just dropped out on us!” she said, looking incredibly scared.

I decided to tell them the truth. “I’ve been shown a vision by an anonymous source. It told us to go to Canterlot…”

Scootaloo piped up. “Canterlot? Ugh, that’s MILES away! How’re we gonna get there?” She groaned.

Applejack interrupted and said, “Silent, in case you’d forgotten, we were sent an anonymous letter a few hours ago, and that turned out to be bullcrap, how do we know this isn’t too?”

I gave her a stern look and said, “The lives of the princesses are at stake. What choice do we have?”

She sighed. “I guess you’re right. Nothing’s goin’ to come about from us just standing here.”

We decided to prepare for the long trek by finding and gathering any supplies we could find in what was left of Ponyville. During this, I looked around and saw how much damage had truly been done. A thick fog reigned over the ruins, the bodies of ponies lie everywhere, and I couldn’t help but shed a tear. “Hey,” I said to the others as we entered the pile of wood that remained of Sugar Cube Corner, “These ponies… they deserve a proper burial, no? What, with respecting the fallen and such…”

“Silent’s right, ya’ll,” Applejack agreed, “These innocent ponies don’t deserve to just be left here. They deserve to rest in peace.” So, we rounded up the fallen, and created a cemetery by the shelter. By this, it was easy to see just how much damage had been done. Gravestones lay in their hundreds.

After the last victim had been buried, we all stood in a row, and showed our respect. Applejack was holding her hat to her chest with Applebloom tightly holding on to her foreleg, Vinyl had taken off her shades in respect while Octavia was hugging her, I had put a forehoof around Fluttershy while she silently wept, Mr and Mrs Cake rested their heads on each other, Pinkie Pie was bawling, Lyra, tears in her eyes, was trying to avoid looking at the gravestones, Bon Bon looked at the ground and shed a few tears, River Rhyme saluted at the graves while Scootaloo held on to him, Rarity looked upwards with tears in her eyes with Sweetie Belle looking towards Applebloom and tried her hardest not to cry, and Berry Punch briefly wept before she took a swig from a bottle of cider. I could feel my depression growing again. Throughout our memorial, I could only ask: Why?

A few hours later, after we had buried the fallen, and gathered what supplies we could find, we began our trek towards Armadia. To our surprise, the train, while unponied, was still fully functional. As we entered the front car, I turned to everypony and asked, almost sarcastically, “So… Anyone know how to operate a train?”

Everypony answered the same. “No.”

“Well,” I sighed, “This isn’t exactly useful, then. Looks like we’re walking.”

So, we ditched the train and continued towards Armadia. After a rather uneventful twenty minutes, we stumbled upon a cave. Applejack looked upwards and stated, “Hey, it’s getting’ dark, ya’ll. I reckon we should rest in this cave for the night.”

“Good idea,” I agreed, “I’ll just go and grab some firewood. I shouldn’t take too long.”

“I’ll go with you, too,” Fluttershy added, to my surprise, “Just to, um, keep you company…”

“No problem,” I smiled.

It got dark surprisingly quickly. As Fluttershy and I searched the nearby forest, I decided to talk to her.

“So, Fluttershy, was it? Mind if I call you Flutters?”

“No, not at all,” She blushed, “I… I must seem so weak and pathetic, it’s just…”

“No, no, no. I don’t se you as either of those things,” I said, trying to boost her confidence, even slightly, “You may not feel it, but you’re actually incredibly kind and caring.”

“You… you really think so?” My attempt at boosting her confidence seemed to be working.

“Of course,” I wrapped a fore hoof around her, “You definitely seem to be one who would have a lot of friends.”

“Y-yes… Um, Silent?” She looked into my eyes.

“That’s my name,” I chuckled.

“I… I really like you… and…” She rested her head on me.

“I like you, too. You’re a great friend,” I smiled.

“I just…” She yawned, “Wish that these changelings… that they hadn’t invaded… Just so life would be a little more… peaceful…”

After about ten minutes, we had got ourselves a good amount of firewood, and we headed back to the cave, only to find it deserted.

“What…happened here?” I asked before I started investigating. Eventually, I noticed a scrap of paper. Picking it up with my magic, I read it aloud.

“Silent, if you find this, you’ve come back safely. The changelings found us and they’re taking us to Armadia. I hate to ask for help, but… Help us! -AJ.” I turned to Flutters (who was still standing in the entrance) and said, “Those bastards took our friends to Armdia! There’s no time to rest. We need to move, now!”

We immediately left for Armadia. Climbing up the mountain where the city stood was tough, but it was admittedly worth it, even if it was just because of the beautiful sunrise that gleamed over the city, reflecting off of every single tower of the castle to create an almost picture-perfect landscape.

After a three-hour climb, we finally reached Armadia, and it was here I noticed that the place was covered entirely in messy paint streaks of red and black. “So… Here we are,” I muttered, “An unsightly mess, no? Is it always like this?”

“No,” Flutters answered, “Canterlot’s usually quite beautiful…”

As she said this, we were surrounded by changelings. “Ah, piss,” I muttered under my breath. As the crowd of changelings grew larger, Flutters hid behind me. It didn’t help in the slightest though, as when she did so, one changeling promptly ran over to me and continued to hit me in the face with a considerably large pole, knocking me unconscious. When I woke up, I was inside the city. There were changelings on every side, closing in for a kill on me...