Apocalyptic Beauty

CRASH.

The thunder roared in my ears.

The rain hit me like bullets.

The wind felt like I was near a cyclone.

Then it hit me. A voice, one which could be heard from miles around.

That is, if anypony WAS around.

“That’s far enough, Silent Huntsman!” It boomed,

“The sins you have committed shall not go unpunished!”

Then, lightning flashed, and I could see.

Terrified, especially since I was stood on a crag.

The thunderclouds blocked out all light.

The voice, I saw, came from a statue.

‘Twas a statue… One of the bringer of the Sun.

This was not right.

The statue looked angry. Worse than angry. Furious.

Then it hit me. Not the voice, but…

The Lightning.

Then I woke up. Gasping, I frantically looked around. Nothing. Literally. I then felt a claw being placed on my head. “It’s alright,” I heard a voice say calmly, “Nothing can hurt you here.”

Being hurt was the least of my worries. “I… I can’t see! I…” I stopped. Slowly, my vision returned… but not in the normal sense.

I was blind in my left eye.

“No… No no no no no no!” I shouted, panicking. Again, I felt a claw gently push me back down (It was only then where I realised that I was laying on a bed in some sort of hospital). I turned to see that the claw belonged to Discord.

“Calm down, Silent,” he sighed, “The stress is isn’t helping. Besides, nothing’s going to happen to you. You’re safe here.”

My mind was buzzing, but one question was on my mind: “Where is here?” I asked.

“Manehattan,” Discord replied instantly, as if expecting to be asked. “I managed to teleport us away from Armadia, or at least far away enough so that THOSE ponies wouldn’t get us. Speaking of…”

As if right on cue, an orange stallion with a pale white mane and wearing a dark gas mask walked in. I recognised him instantly.

Burning Gear.

“Wha… What’s he doing--” I shouted, possibly louder than I should’ve.

Discord calmed me down enough to listen to him. “Silent,” He said with a stern look on his face, “This here’s the reason you’re still alive. Now--”

“He’s also the reason I’m blind in one eye,” I muttered.

Discord lit up, as if remembering something. “Ah, Silent, that’s another

thing-” he gestured to Burn, “-Burn, if you’d be so kind.”

Burn nodded. “Mmphmmphmph, Mmphmmpmmph,” he mumbled.

Discord chuckled. “Ah, Burn, mask?” he whispered to Burn without leaving his chair.

Burn chuckled, and removed his mask to reveal an admittedly good looking… mare?

“Hey,” she said calmly while sticking out a forehoof, “Burning Gear. Glad to meetcha.”

“L-likewise…” I said shakily, reaching out and shaking her hoof, still scared and/or surprised that this pyro was in fact female.

“Don’t look so surprised,” she laughed, “Or are you scared of a little…” she paused. She leaned in towards me, bringing out a spark of fire from her horn. “…Fire?” she added. She quickly pulled away from my terrified face, chuckling. “Nah, I’m just screwin’ with ya. I’m not THAT sadistic, y’know? That whole, ‘burning the Equestrian flag’ and stuff, it was all an act. Gotta look tough for those mouks… which is also the reason I wore this mask.”

I stared at her blankly. “I… don’t get it,” I muttered bluntly.

She sighed. “Look, changelings are weird creatures, and I’m not just talkin’ about their appearances or features. They’ll only ever follow one female. Their queen. But, when you’re a male, they’ll follow ya blindly… If you convince ‘em. But that’s not relevant. What is relevant is,”-she pulled out something out of her saddle-bag- “This.”

It looked like an eye patch of sorts, with a weird electronic ‘aura’ emanating from it. “What is it?” I asked.

Burn smiled. “I call it, DERP.”

I chuckled. “You called it derp?”

Burn was still quite serious. “Yeah,” she said proudly, “The Dimensional Entity Real-time Portrayer. The DERP.”

I couldn’t help it. I broke out into a full-out laugh. “Ha ha, you get this.. Thing, and you call it, of all things, derp? I mean, really?” I decided to keep a straight face. “All right, I’ve had my laugh. What’s it do?”

“Well, if you couldn’t tell by the name, it’s a sort projector for your eye,” she stated blankly. After seeing that I was still clueless, she added, “Simply put, it’ll technically help ya see with that ol’ blind eye there! Call it a little, ‘sorry for burning your retina out’ gift!” She winked.

I’m still a bit shocked that she’s a mare, but I can ignore that for now. It seems she’s created some sort of mechanism to help me see, I thought.

“Go on,” she smiled, “Try it on!”

Magically levitating the DERP (I can’t keep calling it that, I’ll just call it the eyepatch) from her hoof and fitted it around my head. Suddenly, it sprung to life. After a few beeps and whirrs, my left eye seemed to regain sight. Unbelievably, it was indistinguishable from real eyesight. “It works,” I said, awestruck, “I can see in my left eye again!” I paused. I had noticed it. “Say,” I asked, “What’s with the lines crossing at the centre?”

“It’s called a crosshair,” Burn replied, before magically pulling up a nearby chair and sitting down, “I know you’re a hunter. So, with that thought in mind, I added a little feature to improve your aim. Neat, huh?” She winked again.

Discord broke the mood by adding, “Ah, yes, your… bow.”

I had completely forgotten about it in Armadia. “Yes,” I said calmly, preparing for the worst.

“I, uh, sort of smashed it to pieces in Armadia while you were being brought in…” he admitted. I facehoofed. “But hey,” he added, “At least I spared your hat!” He snapped his fingers and spawned my straw trilby from nowhere. He snatched it out of the air, and dropped it on my head, patting it down like I was a foal.

Burn giggled. “I love it! Much better than the gas mask I have to wear,” she sighed.

Discord chuckled, then went back to being serious. “Okay, you’ve rested up enough. Luckily, Manehattan went relatively unscathed; that’s why we’re here. We managed to negotiate with the mayor, and we’ve got the entire city as a sort of base of operations. The positives, the place is huge, full of supplies, and there’s nothing stopping us from making more. The negatives, it’s huge; we could be attacked at any moment. Not only that, but Manehattan has a very large population: pretty much everypony who survived is either living here, or in Cloudsdale.

“Speaking of Cloudsdale, we’ve been discussing with the Pegasi there, and we’ve reached an agreement… The Pegasi are going to use their might to… somehow push Cloudsdale over to nearer our location. Because, if you didn’t know, Cloudsdale is A, right next to Canter-- Armadia, and B, nowhere near us.

“But back on topic. We need you to get to know the city, so if you’re all rested up, I say we get going,” Discord said, gesturing me to get up. Sighing, I slowly dragged myself out of the bed, and followed Discord out of the room, with Burn following behind.

The hospital walls were lined with paintings. Some lifted spirits, others pulled them down screaming. But that wasn’t on my mind right then; what was on my mind was the situation. We had a perfect base of operations, and a huge amount of ponies for support and, if necessary, for an army.

I hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

Before I could think about that, Pierce’s voice, and the odd box, came back. “hhhhhHello, again, Silent,” Pierce said friendlily, “Glad this telepathic magic still works. I mean, it’d really suck if it didn’t, right? Magic’s so convenient, isn’t it? It’s really helping our relationship mature. Next thing you know, we’ll be meeting up for romantic dinners, or even going away somewhere for a while, hee hee hee! But, let’s get down to business. Now, I was wondering if I could catch up with you. I mean, it’s been so long, am I right? Or am I right? Okay, what I came for is--” I’d had enough. Without thinking, I hit myself in the head, almost trying to get the voice out of my head, triggering some concerned looks from Discord. “Silly mortal, with your primitive brain,” Pierce laughed, “I’m not actually there with you! It’s magic, isn’t it? Scary what it can do, eh?”

This comment made me laugh. “Heh, shut up, ‘Pierce’! You’re not exactly a god, so keep the ‘mortal’ lark to yourself!” And with that, the box, and the voice, disappeared.

“Uh, Silent,” Burn asked, worried, “Who were you talking to?”

Remembering what Pierce had told me back in Ponyville, I half-heartedly replied, “N-nobody… I was just debating with myself…”

She shot a curious look my way. “It sounded like you were talking to somepony called--” She was broken off by Flutters, who had charged down the hallway, with an incredibly angry look on her face.

“HOW DARE YOU,” she yelled, “LEAVING ME ALONE LIKE THAT!? IT WASN’T UNTIL DISCORD AND THE OTHERS FOUND ME THAT I WAS ABLE TO LEAVE! WHY, SILENT!? WHY DID YOU LEAVE ME THERE, WORRIED SICK, PROMISING YOU’D RETURN! I… I CAN’T TRUST YOU ANYMORE!” It was and this point in which she brke down in tears.

I looked at Discord, annoyed that, “You walk all the way to Manehattan, and not once do you even MENTION to her that I got, oh I don’t know, my EYE BURNED OUT!?”

Discord, keeping his cool, replied, “Oh, well, at least she knows now,” he slowly flew over to Flutters (who was at this point sitting on the ground, sobbing), and added, “Right?”

“This is going nowhere,” I mumbled, “Let’s just walk and talk…” Almost as if on cue, everypony decided to keep walking.

Once we finally got outside the hospital, everypony went left, with me trailing behind, due to the fact that I had no idea where I was going. Discord was right; Manehattan seemed relatively stable. The towering skyscrapers and busy streets the city was famous for were still standing strong, and ponies were still living as if nothing had happened… for the most part, anyway.

Eventually, we reached a dark alley. “Why are we here, again?” I asked the group.

Discord replied, “This is the entrance to our main base.” He sighed. “Not exactly the cosiest of places, if you ask me. Now…” he walked over to one of the walls and knocked in a very uncommon way (He knocked seven times, with random gaps in between them).

Suddenly, one of the bricks slid aside to reveal a pair of eyes. “Yes,” a voice asked, “What’s the password?”

Discord thought for a moment, before replying, “Enigma.”

“Come in…” the voice said mysteriously, before sliding the brick back into place, and opening the wall like a door, revealing another, metal, door.

“Come on, slowpokes,” Discord said annoyingly, “We don’t want to be late, do we?”