Uprising - A Saga of Rebellion

Fire.

They're falling.
'Kill them', he shouted.
Flames.
The piano in the hallway plays a gentle note.
Independence is illusion.

Falling.

'Easy as can be.'

My eyes shot open as I sat up, panicked. A pile of old, dirty blankets flew off of my body.
"Anika!"
"Oh- oh god... agh..."
I laid back down as I felt a sharp pain in my back. I looked around - I was in the middle of a dried up canal, under a small bridge. I was laying on soggy cardboard. I tried to remember what happened. I just remembered...flames. A rising inferno. Then falling. I tried to slowly get up, looking down on my body to find a large amount of red/brownish stains all over my hooves and chest.
"Whoa... lots of blood."
I managed to get up and further inspected myself, trying to ignore the massive amount of pain everywhere in my body. I had several, large, open scars across my body.
"My blood. ...Lots of my blood."
I groaned and tried to stretch my wings - My left wing hurt like hell when I tried to move it, and my right wing wasn't responding at all. I went from sitting up to fully standing and tried to put pressure on my leg - It hurt in a similar way to my wing. I limped around the area, searching for any other signs of ponies. There was an old, dry bagel nearby with a note attached. It read "STAY STRONG". There were a few candles (which had all been extinguished) lying around as well. After a minute or two, I found Anika under a big pile of ragged blankets, which had been thoughtfully placed on top of her.
"Nika. Nika, wake up."
I lightly shoved her with my hoof. She remained unresponsive.
"Anika? You okay?!"
I continued to nudge her.
She let out a light groan.
"Oh, thank god."
She started rustling around and slowly sat up, looking at the small pool of blood underneath her.
"Nika, you're alright!"
"What-... who... Sky? Where are we?"
"I... I don't know. I woke up a few minutes ago."
"Holy shit, what happened to you?!"
"Huh?"
I spread out my wings and looked over myself again.
"Are you okay?!"
"Yeah-... I think."
She quickly stood up and ran over to me, checking me for further wounds.
"Nika- Nika, I'm fine."
"Your wing's trashed..."
She stepped away and began inspecting the area.
"What is this stuff? Candles? Food? Blankets? Did you do this?"
"No... I have no idea. What do you remember?"
"I found you lying in a pile of debris. You were pretty messed up. I carried you a few blocks away before I passed out."
"Huh. Someone must've done all this..."
"Looks like the local hobos are pretty friendly."
I looked down again and remembered falling out of a window - There were several small scars along the front of my body.
"They even pulled out the glass from my chest. Hobo doctors, huh?"
"What?"
"...Nevermind. Let's find out where we are."
We ate some of the food and traveled around the area. There was a downward slope nearby and at the bottom was a pool of shallow water.
"Sky, look at yourself..."
I walked up to the puddle and looked at my reflection. My mane and tail were singed, there was a big gash along my forehead, my left wing was heavily burnt and my right one had a big hole in it. Anika didn't look much better; both of her wings had been slightly burnt and she had a bad scar along her leg.
"What the hell happened in there?"
"...We have to get back to Fillydelphia. We have to find someone."
"We can't get back to Fillydelphia without figuring out where we are now."
We looked for any more of our belongings; my entire belt and both of the canisters were gone. Afterwards, we went downriver along the canal for a few minutes until we found 3 ponies sitting around a flaming barrel. One of them took notice of us.
"Sunny, it's the freedom fighters! They're up!"
A white pony with a torn beanie and dirty jacket stood up and walked over.
"Hey there, friends."
He had a soft, yet somewhat rugged voice. He had a friendly tone.
Anika eyed him suspiciously.
"Who're you?"
"The name is Sunshine Blossom. My friends call me Sunny. Are you my friend, friend?"
"...Uh..."
"I'm Skywing. This is Anika. Are you the guys who found us?"
"Yeah, man. We found you in an alley. You were both pretty beat up, so I got Appleseed here to help me take you back here."
A light-greenish pony wearing a tattered fedora stepped forward and made a bowing gesture.
"Anyway, some drifters saw you there, man. They were so surprised you were alive that they thought you were, like, Celestia's reincarnation or something. Forever immortal, you know? They brought candles and food and blankets and all kinds of stuff. We ate most of the food, though. Sorry."
"It's, er, alright."
"Then some ex-doctor came by, tried to patch ya up. He couldn't fix your wings, though. And now you're awake."
Anika stepped beside me and spoke up.
"How long ago did you find us?"
"About two weeks ago, sleepyheads."
"...What?! Sky, we've been out two weeks?!"
"Where are we?"
Appleseed joined our conversation.
"We like to call it Beautopia, man. The lost, forgotten part of the city. Washed away and forgotten in the waves of time-"
"Also known as Western Hoofington, friends."
Anika stepped backwards and began to pace around.
"Wait, uh, Sunny - What's happened in the last week?"
"You're Skybeard, right?"
"Skywing. What's happened?"
"The cops've gone crazy, man. There was a big arson a few blocks away from where we found you. Then a bunch of psycho criminals started looking around the whole city looking for something, started mass-looting and all kinds of stuff. So the cops thought it was, like, terrorism or something. They're doing all kinds of background checks for everyone, searching buildings, a whole raid of the underground network. What they found didn't help lower panic, either. They found out about this huge mafia and resistance movement. It's hell down there."
Quickly, I reached for the Transponder in my satchel - However, my entire belt was missing.
"Where's my belt?"
"Oh, about that. Well, uh, a guy said he'd give us 50 bits if we gave him your belt and the little radio thing. Hope you don't mind."
"I used my bits to buy a new hat!"
"Appleseed, quiet down and keep looking for loot."
"Alrighty, sir."
I looked up and down the street.
"Where's the metal cylinder that was on my belt?! Please tell me you didn't sell that too."
"No, man. I'd never hurt a friend. That guy was all like, 'gimmie the package yo', I said 'no way, that belongs to my friend', then he went all psycho and tried to kill Markie. I kept your thing, though."
"I like Markie."
"Appleseed, you're bumming me out."
"Sorry sir."
"Anyway, here's your box thing, friend."
Sunny went over to a small cardboard box and opened it to reveal a small, metallic cylinders.
"Thanks. You don't know how much this means to me - ...Where's the other one?"
"Oh, no idea, man. You only had the one in your belt when I found you. Somepony else must've took it."
"...Great."
Anika finally came to her senses and went up beside me.
"Yeah, uh, Applesun, where is Fillydelphia from here?"
"Not far. I have a cart, I can take you. Appleseed, hitch up! We're leaving!"
_________________________

"This guy is crazy."
"Just-... He's giving us a free ride, don't insult him."
"Why not?!"
"Would you rather be walking to Fillydelphia?
"...Fine."
"Hey, uh, Sunny?"
"...Yeah?"
"Do you have any idea where we are?"
"Yeah, man."
"It kind of seems like we're lost."
"No, no way. I'm following the stars, like an astronomicaler and stuff."
"...Sunny, it's daytime."
"Exactly. The sun's a star, friend. It's telling me where to go, man."
"Of course it is."
Anika had been bottling up her emotions for the last 4 hours - She was starting to break.
"Yeah, uh- hi, do you have any other hippie friends who can drive us to Fillydelphia?"
"...What's Fillydelphia, man?"
"Oh god."
"Nika, just shut up and let Appleseed pull us."
"These people are insane. They're going to take us to Ponyville for slave trading, or something."
I sighed and looked around. We were in some kind of woodland forest along a dirt road - The air smelled of cherries.
"Sky, maybe we should find another way - any other way - to town."
"We're doing fine, and we're almost there. I think. I hope."
Appleseed began to sing a folk tale about a turtle, which both me and Anika tried to tune out.
"Are you going to do something soon? This is almost as bad as the damn fire."
"I'll... handle it."
After a few more minutes of chanting, Sunshine and Appleseed were interrupted by a loud, distant sound.
"Sky... What the hell was that?"
Suddenly, the cart was enveloped in a transparent, purple, sparking shield.
Appleseed cried out.
"Unicorns!"
"They're after our loot, Apple! Keep runnin'!"
The cart was shoved by an invisible force to the left, then suddenly to the right - Someone was using the levitation spell to try and run us off of the road.
"Sunny, we've get outta here, man!"
"Just run, Appleseed! They can't catch us on the far side."
Anika wasn't any less worried.
"What the hell is the far side?!"
There was then a large boom of a tree falling, then something soaring through the air - I poked my head outside of the cart to see a large, uprooted tree and a chunk of dirt flying towards us, both being visibly controlled by a distant unicorn. They crashed into the ground near us as Appleseed attempted to pull the cart out of the path of the debris. Another small tree and a large bundle of rocks were hurtled at us as some of the rocks tumbled into the roof of the cart. The same force took over the vehicle again and attempted to pull us into the forest along the sides of the road - One of the wheels splintered into pieces as we were rammed off of the path. Appleseed did a pretty good job of driving around the trees, but we were still being pelted by boulders and dirt. Within moments, the back of the cart swerved into a large tree, shoving out me and Anika. We tumbled for several meters from inertia until I slid to a halt. Nearby, I heard the sound of splintering wood. I went over to the source of the sound to find her lying at the base of a tree.
"Agh..."
"Are you okay?"
"No... I don't think I can get up."
"What happened?"
"You know-... a week ago, I could've said 'Hey, this guy is attractive,' but right now I'm really starting to hate you."
"Eh... yeah, I'm starting to hate myself too."
She couldn't stand up on her own, so I had to carry and support her the rest of the way.
"Sky, this really seems like a lot of offense to put on just two people."
"It might be defense."
"What'd we do? Seriously, I'm starting to lose the plot here."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean, we're just two messengers. This whole thing is a misunderstanding. Why don't we just give them the message and just get on with it?"
"I... I don't know. One thing I do know is that they don't have good intentions, and if they have whatever's in this that it'll be bad news."
"What are we even going to do when we get to Fillydelphia? Tell the police? They're not going to help illegal couriers. This isn't our fight."
"I-... uh... we can find other couriers. They could know something."
"Like what? Sky, this isn't a battle we can win. If you're trying to make up for what happened in Coltagena-"
"Don't even talk about that."
"...Right. But we can't do anything about this - Do we even know what they're looking for?"
"We can find out."
I set her down and opened the metal canister. She looked up intently.
The sound of pressurized air escaped out of the cylinder as three items fell out.
One was a piece of paper, with neat, clean writing on it.

"1B 17R 4E 0A 10K 8i 13N 6G 3D 14O 22W 13N 19T 7H 4E 4E 13N 3D 14O 5F 19T 8I 12M 4E 18S 95 22W 7H 4E 17R 4E 3D 8I 3D 19T 7H 4E 24Y 6G 4E 19T 14O 5F 5F 3D 14O 4E 18S 0A 13N 20U 12M 14O 17R 9J 20U 18S 19T 8i 5F 24Y 19T 7H 8I 18S 97 12M 4E 6G 8i 3D 3D 14O CHARLIE"

The other was a picture, pasted on a different piece of paper. It looked like some kind of courtyard with a fountain in the middle and a large blast door at one end.

The third was a steel disk with several inner circles - each had numbers and letters engraved on it.

"What the hell are these..."
"No idea, but that's only one of the canisters. The other one must have something else."
"Think there's anyone back in town that can help?"
"I think I know somebody."