Mephisto and the Pony

Mephisto stood atop his castle, glaring at the moonlight.  Clouds had gathered over the mountains to the north, and he was worried.  He didn't know what Celestia had wanted with Ariel this time, but he hoped that he had told her exactly what she had wrought for him.  Mephisto turned and waved his ridiculous mane around at one of his men.  He hated having it so long, but he could feel how mares, and even some stallions, thought about it.

Mephisto was glad, then, when Ariel turned up at his castle.   He fluttered down to meet the most rncid gaze he had ever met.  Something twisted in the pit of his stomach.

"Good, your here.  Anything interesteing happen?"

"I have never craved the system's sympathy."

"Oh great, your still on that."

"Compensation for a misconducted life?"

"None, I'm afraid.  I know from experience."

Ariel relaxed a little.  "It sure is hard to wake up with your heart and soul deprived."

"We can fix that."

"How?!"

"Follow me."

Mephisto turned his back on Ariel and entered the castle.  Inside, there was a show.  Five mares (Ariel only recognized Fluttershy) danced and sang.  Ariel turned to Mephisto.

"What does this have to do with anything?"

"Not only do I really like it, but there is a bit at the end I want you to consider."

Ariel looked at the show.

"While you've been wandering the mountains, I've been working.  An old poem, I believe it shall shed some light."

"What?"

"Hush, this is it."

Rainbow flew atop the others, while Rarity made her glow like the moon.  Fluttershy stood ready to recite, and Pinkie threw confetti at the crowd.  Applejack hoisted a stallion on her back, over the crowd.

"There was once a stallion."  Flutttershy sang.

"He looked at the moon, and he said.  Wont love come soon?  And what else can exist, inside a cold heart?  Except the thought, of a very silent murder."

The crowd cheered and the girls took a bow, the stallion whispered something in Applejack's ear, and she bucked him up to the next floor.  The crowd cheered for that, as well.

Ariel turned to Mephisto.  "I'm not..."

"You wouldn't know if you were.  You also wouldn't care."

Ariel shook his head.  "I cant be, I have love."

Mephisto looked him dead in the eye.  "Who are you trying to convince?"

"Everyone, actually."

Mephisto sighed.  " have something to say."

"What?"

"Helena didn't.. you know."

"Mephistopheles, pick ypour next words very carefully."

Mephisto leaned in close and whispered "I killed Helena."

Ariel leaned back and gave Mephisto the most powerful punch he had thrown in his life.  Mephisto gave into the strike easilly, but he also laughed at Ariel.

"A cold heart indeed."

Ariel fled from the castle, fled from Mephisto, and fled form the village, for the last time.

...

Ariel was back in the mountains, freezing to death in the cold and winds.  He wore nothing as he sit in the open field.

Of course, Mephisto found him.

"What are you doing?"  He asked the pony.

"Come wind come snow come winterland!  I have resigned myself to death!"

"That's a little dramatic, don't you think?  I did it to free you from her, not so you could just give up."

"Come will to show the hidden hand!  So I can draw my final breath!"

"Ariel, get up from there."

Ariel looked at Mephisto.  "You could take me higher, so you said, I trusted you!  I may be a liar, but betrayal lies on you!"

"Thats a little harsh."

"I can feel where the journey ends!  Final call for a last defense!"

"Ariel, listen to me!"

"Darkness come tonight!  I have no fear of what you hold!  Darkness come alive!  You are the stories I've been told!"

Mephisto seemed nervous at that.  "Now look, i'm not the worst thing that exists, not by far, so, uh, stop talking like that!"

A pair of eyes lit up in the distance.

Ariel ignored him.  "I posses the power of survival in the cold!"

"Ariel!"

Ariel smiled at Mephisto.  "We all know when the time has come.  This is where I willl linger on..."

Mephisto jolted.  "Say that last part again?"

Ariel looked up, where the rays of the moon could barely be seen.  "Here we are, under the same old sun!"

"Yea that's great, but uh, while your denouncing evil and all, could you go back a little?"

"Mephistopheles, our sins can't be undone."

"Your kinda preachin' to the choir on that one."

"Love.  Love is the only truth, at least until it breaks your heart."

"Enough already!"

"You took me higher than the mountains I have climbed!"

"That's better!"

"You waited all your life for me..."

"Uh, what?"

"But we will meet again!  We will meet again..."

"Not talking to me anymore, are ya?"

"Mephisto!"  said Celestia.

"Oh great, your back.  Come to tell me how ugly I am?"

"Take your foul presence away from here! Give the pony his final peace!"

"Close enough.   Lemme know when he dies!"  Mephisto shouted as he flew away.

There was silence for a moment, before Ariel spoke to Celestia.

"Who wants to separate the world we know from our beliefs?"

"Ariel...save your strength."

"Who sees only black and white?"

"Mephisto does."

"Distinguish loss from sacrifice?"

"Not even I can."

"Someday we may come to peace with the world within ourselves."

Celestia smiled.  "Ponies don't live long enough for that."

"The final winter comes to us all... but your not the only, who must pretend were a second in time were the last in the line, of the prey that walks the earth.  Good and evil combined!"

Celestia's smile faded.  "I am the god in my own history.  As are you."

"You really tried, Princess..."

"I always have."

"The deal is done within."

"I know, Ariel."

"I want mercy for all..."

"So do i."

"I just want to pay for every sin..."

"Its time to go, Ariel."

Helena stood next to Celestia on the ground.

"Victory, not plunder.  Remember your mortality."  She said to him."

"There is one last thing to do!"  Celestia said with slight reluctance.

Celestia and Helena took to the skies, flying to Mephisto's castle.  Mephisto stood atop it.

"So, he is dead then?"

Helena nodded at him.

"Good!  When will you be ready for me?"

"Now."  Said Celestia as her horn lit up.

"What are you doing?"

Then Mephisto understood.  and he bowed before them, and he accepted his fate.

"With a voice, I fly, but I prevail.  It is a sweet and seemly thing, to die for one's country.   Remember that you will die!"

Celestia and Helena lifted up from the crumbling castle, fire leaking out from the sides as Mephistopheles screamed like a demon.  The castle buckled and fell into ruins, the mountain opening up and swallowing it with fire.  Only smoke and ash was left.

...

Celestia, Luna, and each of the mares circled around Ariel as he lay dying.  "Just wait," Celestia had said.  "You need to hear this."

Ariel could barely speak, barely even keep his eyes open.

"Remember one thing, girls."

Only Rainbow seemed not to be engrossed in the pony.

"Life can never be better, than it is, right now."

...

The girls walked together through the mountains, in silence.

Finally, Rainbow said "songs of pain."

"A soothing lullaby,"  said Rarity.

"Songs of happiness,"  said Applejack.

"Some that make us cry,"  said Twilight.

"One song we share,"  said Celestia.

"A cross we all bear,"  said Luna.

"One that segregates,"  Whispered Fluttershy.

"One that unifies,"  said Luna.

"If once given life we must die..."  Whispered Twilight.

"Sing the saddest of all,"  said Rainbow.

"The song we all serenade," said Luna.

"The more we know, the less we understand..."  said Twilight.

"Life," she continued, "eternity."

"The savagery of stallions,"  said Rainbow.

"Hold on now,"  said Celestia, "Don't leave, don't let it go."

"Dance away the waltz of life,"  said Rarity.

"Right or wrong, the seed we never sow, that's our loss, our sacrifice," said Twilight.

Celestia looked up, where she could see Ariel, if only briefly.  She looked down, satisfied.  "What does the winter bring, if not yet another spring?"