Chapters Interlude Confrontation
Hello! Discord here, the author is currently unconscious due to a mishap with the Elements, so I guess it’s up to little old me you fill you in.
Discord! Stop messing with my account already!
Oh you’re awake…pity I was going to explain what happened when miss prim and proper Celestia, little Sparkle-Butt and her friends crashed our party.
Given that this chapter is titled ‘interlude’ I think changing to the traditional format of writing would be more suitable for explaining what happened.
Fine have it your way…
Human’s POV (since Discord is too rude to ask for my name)
So after about a minute of waiting Princess Celestia, Twilight Sparkle and the other element bearers show up, shit hits the fan, I try to reason with them, fail miserably and stuff happens with the elements and Discord somehow escapes, bringing me along with him.
Here’s the far longer third person view of events.
One minute after the events of last chapter
As soon as Pinkie left. in a flash of magic she had returned with her five friends and with the princess of the sun, Celestia.
“Discord! I can’t believe you had the nerve to show up near Ponyville, and now as the element of magic and student of princess Celestia I have to arrest you” Twilight stated firmly.
“Oh really Sparkle-butt? I only just got out of my prison and you want to lock me up again? What happened to second chances? ‘Innocent until proven guilty’?” Discord replied.
“After what you did to us and all of Ponyville last time you’re lucky you even stayed out here this long!” Applejack retorted.
“Haven’t you guys heard of negotiation?” this came from the slightly pale, two legged orange haired creature standing near the Draconequus.
“Quiet human I didn’t order you to speak yet” Discord remarked.
“Stop. Calling. Me. Human! I have a name” the human replied.
“Alright what is it then?”
“I don’t think you can pronounce it..”
“Try me”
“DISCORD!” this exclamation came from the princess. “How dare you bring a human, of all creatures, into Equestria? Do you know what they can do?”
“Yes, but this particular human raised the issue of such chaos depending on what kind of person the human is, so I decided to test this out and here we are” he replied.
“Princess Celestia that creature…is it really that bad?” Twilight asked.
The princess sighed. “Twilight while their…disposition can vary like any animal in equestria, there are some things about humans that cannot be changed, the way they live can cause as much destruction to the environment as Discord and if giving the tools, can create weapons of mass destruction…among other things” she explained.
“So not all of ‘em are bad, just some of ‘em?” Applejack summarised.
“But surely such and ugh ugly thing like this must be trouble” Rarity commented.
“It may be that my fears are mistaken, but for the peace and safety of Equestria I cannot take that chance, Discord send the human back at once!” Celestia demanded.
The Spirit of chaos got into the princess’s face, gave a sly smile and said the two most immature words in the history of Pony kind.
“Make me”
“Very well then, Girls the elements!” she ordered.
“Wait you’re going to use the elements of harmony on him?” the human asked.
“Tia you do realise I am the one who brought this human here, and only I can send her back” Discord stated.
“We will find another solution, with or without you” Celestia replied as the white light began emitting from Twilight’s eyes, surrounding her and her friends, lifting them into the air to begin the sequence.
“But they can’t turn you stone!” this shout came from the human, as she grabbed Discord’s lion paw and pulled him out of the way.
“Twilight stop!” Celestia shouted as the rainbow beam of energy fired; however instead of hitting the Spirit of Chaos and Disharmony, it hit the human instead.
The Alicorn and the chimera watched as the beam faded, revealing the unconscious human girl. With one look towards the shocked element bearers, Discord snapped his eagle claw fingers, and he and human vanished.
And there you have it; now Human what is your name anyway?
Human? Girl? Oh she’s fallen asleep again…and what...What is going on? She’s changing. It must be a delayed reaction to the Elements. This certainly makes things a little more interesting.
The Dark Side of Human Nature
Ha ha ha…it worked, the elements separated us. FINALLY! AHA FINALLY I AM FREE!
Pardon the outburst but it has been a long while since I was let loose last. Oh silly me I forgot to introduce myself, as the chapter name above states, I am the dark side of the brat that fool Discord warped to Equestria.
What an idiot. If I was the main villain here I would do more than just mess with the balance of nature...oh no I would throw the minds of every equine, animal and magical creature that inhabits this world into Psychological turmoil.
But don’t get me wrong, I am not evil, just…a little bit insane. Ok very insane but that is beside the point.
My name? You actually want to know my name? How very brave of you. I’m sure the humans that know the poor girl in this little fairytale would know who I am instantly, but for you newcomers, the bronies and pegasisters reading this, I am embodiment of change, a creature created to test the mental strength of whatever I come across, a villain who is feared and a hero who is hated.
I am Manaquire.
Any questions? Oh come on now, no need to be shy I am actually quite civil, no? Alright then I’ll leave you with a small bit of information, and a riddle.
Rule one- I am insane, not evil, yes there is a difference.
The riddle is this- Two gems exactly the same Identical in every aspect, every single way The only difference lies with their names. What are they?
If you can solve that then…well I guess I can do an interview or something. Good Luck humans, you’ll need it.
The real chapter 4- WTF?
“Hm let’s see, the head of a pony, the left front leg of a cat, the right arm of a..lizard..I think, the left leg of a dragon and the right leg of a wolf, two bat wings and the tail of a fox…well this is certainly a new development” Discord muttered as he looked over the unconscious newly transformed human girl.
Her entire body from head to bushy tail-tip was midnight blue, she did have the head of an earth pony, in a shape similar to the bearers of the elements, the right arm was skinny with three almost bird like talons for fingers and had leathery skin instead of scales or feathers. The left arm was the front of a common house cat, the claws currently sheathed. The length of her body wasn’t really as long, nor as snake like as Discord’s, with the entire torso being something akin to a dog, just skinnier. The left leg was that of a three toed dragon, while the right one was that of average grey wolf (except, as stated earlier, her entire body was dark blue). The Fox tail was as long as Discord’s snake tail, the very tip was the same shade of sunset orange as her mane.
Now her mane, it was the same shade it had been as a human, vibrant fiery sunset orange, like the brightest of flames. The fringe was slightly curled and parted in the middle, the majority of it covered her left eye, while the couple of bangs of hair that was left on her right side hung over in front of her right ear and framed her face. Both sides reached down to her cheeks.
The rest of her mane simply hung down her serpentine-like neck in scruffy style, a cross between Big Mac’s mane and Rainbow dash’s tomboy look.
“Well this has never happened before, a human turning into..well a draconequus….by Chaos another draconequus..I wonder if she can use magic..oh ho I just see the kind of chaos we could cause! I wonder what Sparkle and her friends will make of this?” the spirit mused.
“Eh? What the hell happened?” the Human said groggily as she sat up.
She looked at her hands, blinked, then as she shock set in…
“WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO?”
“Me? I didn’t do anything, you were the one who got blasted with the elements” he replied flatly.
“but I..I’m a chimera..”
“A what?”
“A chimera.. A-a creature with the body parts or genetics from other living organisms” she explained shakily.
“I see, well what can you make of you new appearance? Anything related to you..or humans in general?”
“um..um let me see, head of a pony…right arm of tyrannosaurus Rex, a giant meat eating lizard” she explained to the spirit’s puzzled expression. “Arm of a cat..huh both wings are bat wings..one leg of a wolf and the other of dragon..and I have a fox tail..oh…I think I get it” she realised.
“Really?”
“Um yeah the t-rex arm is from a very dangerous predator, mostly used in books and stuff as a creature of evil, some cats are considered ill omens, wolves, again, are hunters and are considered evil in many cultures, dragons are a mixed bag as some are evil and some are good...And the fox, in one culture, is seen as demon, a trickster and shape-shifter, the more tail it has the stronger it is, the highest being nine” she explained.
What she didn’t tell him was the personal significance of these creatures, quite a few relating to a villain she had dreamed up as a child and expanded upon as a teen and young adult.
The creature known as Manaquire.
“Ok now you need a new name” Discord suddenly declared.
“What?”
“Well the story can’t keep referring to you as ‘Human’ now can it, and since you will be helping me spread Chaos across the world, you need a new name, one that matches your new appearance. Any ideas?” he asked.
“Huh? Oh um how about Sunset Sapphire? After the colour of my mane and body”
“Hm…too pony-ish but it will do, can’t have you upstaging me now can we”
He grabbed her and teleported them away saying “Come on we have Chaos and Disharmony to spread!”
“I’m doomed...”Sunset deadpanned.
They reappeared on a cloud above the Ponyville library.
Discord grinned and was practically bouncing around in excitement. “ok let’s see what you can do!”
“Huh?” Sunset replied.
“Go on use magic to create chaos!”
“I’ll try…I guess”
She tried Discord’s method of snapping her finger, she tried the ‘point and think’ way from old TV shows, staring really, really hard at something, wishing/willing/ praying to Celestia and nothing happened.
After five minutes of her trying various methods, cursing Celestia’s, God’s and at one point Discord’s name to the high heavens and lots of other profanities, it was clear she could not use magic.
“Alright, alright fine so I can’t use you to cause chaos on your own with magic…hm how about you come up with some idea and I’ll use my magic to make it happen?” a very bored Discord decided.
“You know if you want to target Twilight specifically I have an idea” Sunset replied with a grin.
“Oh you do? well what is it, it had better be good”
“You still got that laptop?”
Discord pointed to the small black electronic device floating the air near them…still typing.
“It’s a running gag in the story why?” he asked.
“Does it have internet connection?”
“Yes why?”
“Because I’m going to introduce you to the wonderful world of fan art” she stated.
Princess Celestia paced back and forth within her private chambers, her brow creased in worry. Discord had escaped, again! But now it was worse…so much worse. He had summoned a creature that could spell doom for not just Equestria, but the whole world!
The princess of the sun continued her pacing, thinking, and trying to come up with something, anything to prevent the worst case scenario.
Discord would be wary of Twilight and the other Elements of harmony, his chaos spreading powers only appeared in random bursts across Equestria, as it had been doing for the last few days, every time Twilight and her friends went to confront him, he was already gone.
She knew he was toying with them, wearing them down while he planned his next move.
Then there was the human, could Discord trick her into working alongside him, or worse, get her to spill the secrets of human technology?
“Oh this is interesting princess; go on pace away, try to predict my mistress’s actions all the while leaving the fate of your kingdom to a bunch of children. Just like a God to sit back and watch as the mortal realm is shattered by evil once again ” a voice mocked.
“Who dares to break into Canterlot castle, do you know who I am?” Celestia declared, halting hr movements and looking around the room.
“Don’t fret little mare I mean you no harm...no physical harm anyway ” the voice replied with a chuckle.
“Who are you?” she asked sternly.
“How rude of me, I am Manaquire, being of near infinite knowledge; I am either your enemy or your saviour. Depending on your future actions of course ” the voice replied.
“What do you mean?”
“I have the gift of foresight, among other psychic abilities, I can see what will happen and what must not happen ” he replied seriously.
“Enough riddles! If you can see what is to come…then tell me, what will Discord and the human he summoned into this world do?”
“They will cause chaos, whether it is intentional or not, chaos will be created ”
“How can I prevent this?”
“This is where I come in, your actions, along with those of the spirit of chaos will determine whether your world lives in peace…or lies in ruins ”
“What do you mean?”
“You do realise I will never give you a straight answer?” Manaquire deadpanned. “But if you insist I can tell you this-
Harmony and chaos, life and death, between each pair lies a very fine line. Overstep these boundaries, intentionally or not Your kingdom will end before its time ”
“Are you threatening me?” Celestia asked.
“No this is a warning. Be very careful when dealing with Discord in the future princess, or you may not like what you have created, until next time Princess Celestia ” Manaquire explained.
The princess was left to her thoughts as the presence of Manaquire left the castle.
Lounging on a storm cloud out over Cloudsdale was a large…dragon-like thing. It was completely black in colour, had the body of a t-rex, tail and spines of a crocodile/alligator, a snake like neck, large bat wings and it had a long almost alligator like jaw, two horns pointing straight out the back of its head (they were slightly rectangular and very blunt).
The creature’s eyes were snake-like, the whites of the eyes were completely red, the iris was non-existent and the black pupil was a diamond shaped slit.
This was Manaquire.
“Hm now what? I have a few minutes to kill before I’m supposed to mess with Discord, since my ‘better half’ is showing him fan works maybe I should do the same ” he pondered, bringing printed copies of some written fan works into existence.
“Let’s see how they cope with the horrors of gridmark...now which one...Sweet apple massacre perhaps…no no too much of a troll fic... ” he mused going over the copy of said fanfiction.
“Oh I know rainbow factory…hm too tricky to recreate...plus I can’t time travel ” he sighed and threw the copy of ‘Rainbow factory’ along with afore mentioned troll fic away, both copies landing near an unsuspecting Derpy.
“Ah yes the most notorious and gruesome of the gridmark works, Cupcakes. Noted for being a horror fic and surprisingly keeping the antagonist in character while performing unspeakable acts of torture on her fellow pony, Yes this will do nicely, now the question is should I leave the fic for the ‘mane 6’ to find or hypnotise little miss pinkie into becoming the character the story depicts her as..Ah both options will scar those ponies for life I can’t decide which one… ”
A watch poofed into existence and Manaquire used it to check the time.
“Ah almost time for my next appointment, time to get going ” he got up, cast one look at the ponies that had gathered around Derpy, who was now reading ‘rainbow factory’ out loud, smirked and flew off towards Ponyville.
“He he…BWAHAHA! This is hilarious! Discord! Discord you have got to see this one AHAHAHAHA!” Sunset was laughing her head off at the picture currently displayed on the laptop’s screen.
“What is it?” Discord looked over her shoulder at the screen, read the comic and soon joined Sunset in a fit of laughter.
“Ahahahaha! Priceless! Whoever invented that is a genius! Oh we have to use it!” he declared through his fit of giggles.
“Haha! I know right? You distract Twilight, I will go get ready, besides I’ll have to adjust some of the lyrics to fit my style after all, see you in a bit” the Spirit of chaos stated and vanished.
Discord reappeared in a hollowed out area underneath the library, it was an area he had just created with checked flooring, half-made buildings (some of which were floating) and the sky strewn with his signature cotton candy clouds.
“Perfect, now I just need to memorise my lines and- what the-?” Discord looked confused as the sound of thunder rumbled behind him. He turned to see Manaquire sitting on a throne shaped storm cloud.
“Greetings Discord, I am Manaquire ”
“How did you get in here?” the spirit of chaos snarled.
“Is that any way to greet a guest, show some manners will you ” the black dragon retorted, pouring himself a glass of black current juice from nowhere.
“I-ah WHAT! Manners? You barge in here and you more concerned with manner?” Discord shouted, nopony was supposed to able to get into one of his creations without his say-so.
“Well duh ” Manaquire replied rudely. “I may be able to come and go as I please, but I do expect some form of civil behaviour, even from you Spirit ”
“What do you want?” Discord stated.
“I was here to give a warning of the future, and an expiation of why I’m here, but since it looks like you’re busy, I’ll make it quick. You like riddles right? ”
“Um yes? Why?”
“Then listen well, Spirit, I refuse to repeat myself- Chaos and Harmony, Life and Death, between each pair is a very fine line Destroy this balance, and like it or not You will meet your end far before your time. ”
“Is that some sort of threat thing?” Discord asked childishly. “Hah do you really think you can actually kill me?”
“No I don’t do threats like that, and in my line of work, killing something is being far too merciful. Good day Discord ” Manaquire replied seriously and left in a explosion of black mist.
“Show off” Discord deadpanned.
Sunset glided down from her perch above the library and knocked on the front.
“Applejack is that you I knew you were coming over but-WAAH!” Twilight was startled by Sunset’s appearance.
“Uh hi?” Sunset replied nervously, walking inside.
“You! You’re the human we hit with the elements! oh my gosh I am so sorry i-!” Twilight rambled but was silenced.
“Wait a minute you’re not scared of me? You don’t care that I’m with your enemy?’
“Um a bit scared, but I’ve learnt not to judge a book by its cover” the unicorn replied confidently. “So I’m Twilight Sparkle, what’s your name?”
“Sunset Sapphire, you’ll probably hate me for this but I am willingly working with Discord”
“Willingly? Do you know what he can do?” Twilight exclaimed.
“Yeah but I’m working with him for my own reasons” Sunset replied.
“Oh really?”
“Well at first it was just so I can go home...but after a few minutes, I decided I’d prove both you and Discord wrong about who I am as a human”
“And how do you plan to do that?”
“By being a neutral presence in Equestria, I know I sound like a Mary sue-“
“A what-“
“A cliché, but if I’m doomed to be hated by at least one side I’ll try prevent that as best as I can” Sunset explained.
“Hated? but I don’t hate you”
“You don’t but I can guarantee you others will, and I know once Discord is done with me he’ll put me out in the trash, Celestia will want peace for her kingdom so I’m possibly a threat, and knowing some ponies, like Applejack and Rainbow Dash they won’t be friendly right from the get go”
“I think I understand now, but from the way it sounds, it almost like you expect ponies to dislike you” Twilight stated.
“Humans are a mixed bag when comes to being nice or mean, I have had the misfortune of befriending people who end up ditching me for my behaviour, personality, appearance and even because of my reputation among others” Sunset explained.
“But nopony would ever do something like that here” Twilight exclaimed.
“You can’t be sure about that, when people, or ponies in this case, are faced with the unknown, they do or say things they wouldn’t to others like them. Since I am not clearly a pony and originally from a species with a bad reputation, I do expect some kind of discrimination”
“…” Twilight looked solemn for a second, before her gaze hardened into one of determination.
“Sunset, I will make my duty to help you on your quest, no matter what!" the unicorn declared.
“I hope you stick to that Twilight, because Discord has plans of his own”
“Well what are-AHH!!” in the middle of that sentence a trap door opened up underneath the purple mare and she fell through.
Twilight fell through a black empty space, and landed with a dull ‘thud on a checked surface. As music began playing she looked around, confused as she recognised Discord’s handiwork.
A figure appeared in the shadows.
“Well, well, well” a voice sang. “what have we here?”
“Sparkle-butt huh? Ooh I’m really scared” Discord mocked as he pooped out from the shadows.
“So you’re the one everypony’s been talkin’ about AHAHAHA!” he laughed as he danced around her.
“You’re jokin’, you’re jokin, I can’t believe it now. Your jokin me you gotta be this can’t be the right gal” “She’s purple, she’s nerdy. I don’t know which is worse” he mocked. “I might just go to pieces if I don’t die laughing first”
He picked the unicorn up and did the tango while he continued singing.
“When Mr. Discord’s master plan says mayhem’s close at hand, you better pay attention now ‘cause I’m the chaos man” “And if you aren’t shakin’, then something’s clearly wrong. ‘Cause this may be the last time you hear the chaos song”
He then unceremoniously dropped her.
“Woooah!” he sang
“Woooah” a keeper of the grove echoed back.
“Woooah!” he repeated, a little higher.
“Woooah!” his glass window cut out replied.
“WOOOAH!”
“HE’S THE CHAOS MAKING MAN!”
“Release me now or face the dire consequences” Twilight sang. “My friend’s are all expecting me so please come to your senses!”
“HAH! You’re jokin’, you’re jokin’. I can’t believe my ears! Somepony gag this filly! I’m drowin’ in my tears. It’s funny I’m laughin’, you really are too much”
“And now with your permission, I’m going to do my stuff”
“What are you going to do?” Twilight asked nervously.
“I’m going to do the best I can" he replied with a smirk.
“WOOOAAAAH! The sound of strife is music in the air! Cause I’m a gamblin’ chaos man although I don’t play fair!” he sang.
“It’s much more fun, I must confess, with minds on the line. Not mine of course but yours old horse, now that’d be just fine”
“Send me back or you will have to answer for this heinous act!” Twilight demanded, but soon found she was floating in the air by Discord’s magic.
“Oh sister your something! You put me in a spin!” “But you aren’t comprehending the position that you in, it’s hopeless, you’re finished” “EQUESTRIA IS MINE!”
By now Twilight looked mortified.
“Because I’m Discord, Twilight dear, and I think its Chaos time!”
As the music died down Twilight’s fearful expression remained and the draconequus laughed evilly.
Author notes- and that my faithful readers, is Discord’s musical number, I decided to keep this as a separate chapter so the plot wasn’r rushed or interrupted.
Sunset snuck out of the library and headed for the secluded forest that lies beyond.
“Ok so I need to find a way to make allies among the pony community, um…um…crap I got nothing...”
She was too busy thinking, and unfortunately, tripped over rock, tumbled down a small cliff and crash landed in a ditch. Her head throbbed with pain, along with her scrapped limbs, as she tried to find her balance and regain her vision.
She looked up to find she was in front of a blue, old fashioned police box. It took a second to realise what this meant. But when the possibility clicked, she sat down in shock and her jaw dropped.
She was still gaping in awe when the door of police box opened and a light brown earth pony with dark brown spiky mane and tail, wearing a blue suit underneath a long brown coat poked his head out and looked down at her.
“Um are you alright?” he asked in concern.
“Uh….”
“Oh sorry how rude of me, I’m the Doctor, just the Doctor” the pony introduced himself.
“You’re the doctor and you’re a pony”
“Yep that’s me”
“A Timelord pony”
“Yes, and is that an Australian accent?”
“Huh?” Sunset replied in a daze.
“I said is that an Australian accent?”
“Yeah it is, because I’m from Australia”
“But that would mean you’re human!”
“I am human” she replied.
The Doctor pulled out a small silver tube from the inside of his coat, it made a high pitched whirring sound and the end lit up in a blue light as he scanned her with it. After a few seconds he held the device sideways in his hooves, as if getting a reading from it, he then looked at her in astonishment.
“And so you are human, hah! A human all the way out here! This is brilliant! Hold on…” his mood went from elated to deadly serious in typical Doctor Fashion. “That means you’re the human that-that thing-“
“Discord?” Sunset supplemented.
“Yeah that’s the one, so Discord brought you here, and the both of you are wanted by pony kind all over Equestria...You haven’t done anything bad have you?” he asked.
“No I don’t think so, I hardly think suggesting an idea for a musical number is bad…is it?”
“Musical number? No everypony loves musical numbers! They break out in song all the time here!” he replied happily, but then frowned. “In nine hundred years of time and space I never thought I’d use the word pony so many times”.
“Hah the Doctor speaks brony!” Sunset joked.
He looked at her oddly.
“Uh anyway how did you end up here?’ Sunset asked.
“I should be asking you that” he replied.
“Well long story short, Discord hacked my computer, teleported me here, I got blasted by the elements of harmony and voila I end up going from human to chimera in less than a day”.
“I see well I was doing some general maintenance for the TARDIS and somehow wound up here, looking like this, oddly enough” The Doctor explained.
“You forgot to put the shields up again didn’t you?”.
“Yeah…” he replied sheepishly.
“Wow in the space of one day I get teleported to Equestria, turned into a magical creature, meet an all powerful god of chaos and crash into the ship of my TV hero”
“TV hero?” he asked.
“Parallel world, where I’m from both this world and yours are nothing but TV shows” she explained.
“Ah”
“This, in all honesty is a dream come true, meeting you I mean” Sunset said suddenly after a few minutes of silence.
“Really?”
“Yeah, you see every human who watches your show has a favourite regeneration; funny thing is you’re my favourite”
“Thanks I guess uh-?” the statement hung in the air as he didn’t know her name.
“I’m calling myself Sunset Sapphire while I’m here, no need for a human name if I’m no longer human” she explained.
“Ok then, but if you somehow say…got turned back into a human what would I call you?” he asked.
“Got a pen and paper? I’ll write it down for you”
They spent a few more minutes just sitting in front of the TARDIS just talking, about his adventures, her fan-made theories and trying to figure out a solution to deal with Discord should the time ever call for it.
It was only when the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver let off a signal, did the pony-fied Timelord jump to his hooves and hastily entered the TARDIS.
“Sorry it looks like there’s an opening to my universe, I really need to go if I want to get back, Rose is waiting for me you see and I really don’t want upset her…or Jackie by extension” he explained hurriedly as he poked his head out of the doorway to say good-bye.
“It’s cool listen if you manage to find a way back to this universe, look me up ok?”
“Alright then, say you could-“he began.
“Don’t even try it Doctor I am not going with you, Fangirl or not some things just can’t happen” she cut in firmly.
“Ok..Allons-y!” the Timelord declared.
“Oh and Doctor, before you go”
“Yes?”
“Has anyone told you how awesome your coat is?”
With that statement and a silly grin on both their faces, The Doctor closed the door, fired up the TARDIS and dematerialised before Sunset’s eyes.
Sometime later she walked back to the library to find an irritated Discord waiting for her.
“And just where have you been? And what is so funny?” the Draconequus asked as Sunset grinned.
“I just ran into some pony and we talked for a while, why?”
The explanation was met with Discord throwing a teacup at her. It missed her and shattered against the wall.
“You’re late for tea!” Discord replied and with a snap of his fingers, they were in Discord’s little wonderland he had made for the song. Before them was a long table with a white table cloth covering it, on top of said table were cups and saucers, plates laden with an assortment of confectionary, and a large china teapot in the centre.
Twilight was sitting near the head of the table, Spike next to her surprisingly. Discord sat at the head of table and gestured for Sunset to sit on his right side.
“Well this is new” Sunset commented.
“You’re telling me” Twilight replied.
Spike was too busy stuffing his face with chocolate coated gemstones.
“Let’s eat!’ Discord declared and snapped his fingers once more, causing a plate of food to appear before each of them.
“Relax Sparkle-butt they are just normal cupcakes, not like they’re made of ponies or anything” Discord stated to the purple unicorn.
“Yeah come on Twilight, this is the best, who cares if Discord made it” Spike reassured her between mouthfulls.
“Twilight I don’t think Discord is the kind to poison ponies anyway” Sunset deadpanned. “Enjoy yourself for once”
The purple unicorn sighed and took a bite, finding that they were indeed normal (albeit very tasty) cupcakes, she continued eating.
The reason why Twilight was nervous about eating was rather obvious.
Discord was eating a hamburger.
It was snowing over Ponyville. While the concept was odd in itself, as the weather ponies hadn’t scheduled it to snow, but what it was exactly snowing.
Much to the delight of many a young colt or filly, it was snowing sugar. Yes it was snowing sugar.
Courtesy of Discord, who at this moment was out in the middle of town square, dancing alongside a very hyperactive and very happy Pinkie Pie? The pink pony was the first to discover to sweet tasting snow and had bounded into the streets, only to bump into its maker.
After presenting her with a bouquet of paper flowers the draconequus spent a good five minutes explaining his actions to her and begrudgingly apologised for turning her gray in past events.
For you see, Sunset had finally decided to get off her ‘lazy arse’ as hse would put it and actually work towards being a neutral presence in Equestria. She did this by working out a compromise between Twilight and Discord.
He would cause (mostly) harmless chaos and she wouldn’t get her friends together to turn him to stone. Of course the actual argument that took place was long and very immature.
Here’s what happened.
Sunset returned from the bathroom to find…something happening, she deadpanned as she listened to the conversation.
“Discord you can’t just go around Equestria causing chaos, it’s not right”
“Oh really Sparkle-butt? What are you going to do, turn me to stone?”
“With the way you’re acting, yes!”
“Uh guys-“Sunset stated but was left unheard.
“Twilight, you just can’t expect me not to cause chaos, I am the spirit of chaos of disharmony after all”
“But that’s no excuse to go around taking things to such extremes!”
“What else do you expect me to do hm?”
“Discord I really think-“Sunset tried again.
“Not now Sunset I’m busy” he dismissed her.
“I expect you to show a little self control!” Twilight snapped.
“Seriously guys chill ou-“Sunset tried to intervene again.
“Now now Sunset” both arguing parties replied.
Now when it came to friends arguing (as she saw Discord as her friend, whether he liked it or not) Sunset usually tried to be the voice of reason. She was used to being ignored, she was used to others not listening to her that was true, but the one thing she could not stand for, was being interrupted.
She HATED being interrupted.
“WILL YOU BOTH SHUT UP ALREADY?” Sunset yelled in frustration.
Discord and Twilight looked over at the very irritated blue chimera. They tried to reply to the outburst, but Sunset continued to glare at them.
“Right...now then I think I have an idea, Twilight would you be ok with Discord creating chaos that was harmless and ponies could enjoy?” Sunset suggested.
Twilight nodded.
Discord looked offended.
“Don’t you give me that look Discord, since you brought me here to cause chaos, we will cause chaos, except we do it my way, we could oh I don’t know, make it snow sugar or something”.
“Snow sugar? That’s impossible” Twilight stated.
“Snow sugar? That sounds wonderful!”Discord stated with a grin.
“Good, maybe if you caused fun chaos, you could gain the ponies favour” Sunset said.
And that lead us up to Discord dancing with the pink party pony.
“He he! This is the best; you know what this calls for?” Pinkie asked.
“What?"
“A party of course!”
“A party? Whatever for?” Discord asked.
“It’s snowing sugar! What better reason for a party that this!”
Sunset watched the festivities as they kicked into full swing. DJ PON-3 had been called in to provide music, Mr and Mrs Cake had supplied picnic tables laden with treats, and ponies from all over Ponyville had come to have a good time.
She smiled softly; her plan was working. Soon the ponies would forget she had ever been here; she could leave for Canterlot and talk things over with the Princess. She would find a way to let Discord live and cause chaos to his heart’s content, ponies would enjoy it, and although things wouldn’t be as smooth as the fairytales would be, some sense of perfect balance between Chaos and harmony would be achieved.
“Where is she? Where is she?” Rainbow Dash’s voice rang out amongst the celebration.
The music stopped as the crowd looked at the rainbow maned Pegasus.
“Where’s the human! I’ll make her pay I’ll—I’ll”
“Rainbow! Calm down, now tell me what in Equestria is wrong?” Twilight asked.
“What’s wrong? What’s wrong? This is what’s wrong” she replied, shoving a piece of paper into Twilight’s hooves.
“What but this stupid, who would write such things anyway” Twilight declared as she read the letter.
It was from Cloudsdale, a letter from the weather factory, explaining the city was in political uproar from a piece of literature that proposed the idea of live ponies being used to create rainbows.
“It was the human that did this it must be!’
Sunset sighed.
“I’m too young for this shit” she deadpanned.
She leapt down from her perch and walked up to twilight and Rainbow.
"Some pony looking for me?"
"Yeah I am! What gives huh? Are you trying to ruin Cloudsdale?" Rainbow Dash demanded.
Many ponies noticed the blue chimera was beginning to lose some of her colour.
“Ok judging from what Twilight said somepony obviously showed some poor pony the story Rainbow Factory, and before you interrupt Rainbow, No I did not bring it here, I don’t know who did, but I am not responsible” Sunset explained in a flat tone.
“But you know what it is then?" Twilight asked.
“It is a fictional work written to greatly disturb or frighten the reader, otherwise known as grid mark” Sunset deadpanned.
“Well if it’s from your world then who else could have brought it here?” Rainbow demanded.
“Not me”
“Well who else huh? You are a human after all!”
That was the turning point; Sunset began losing her colour more rapidly.
“Oh for the love of- you know what fine! If it pleases you little deluded minds then fine blame me for it! Just because I am a human, just because I know the origin of these things, just because your Princess fears what I could do, does not mean I am the exactly what you see me to be!” she snapped. “I’m right aren’t I? You all thought I’d be as evil and destructive as Discord, admit it! Gah! Some things don’t change!”
With that final outburst she walked off, leaving some very stunned ponies in her wake.
“I-I didn’t mean to- I just thought” Rainbow stuttered.
The sound of slow clapping got everypony’s, and Discord’s, attention.
Manaquire stood nearby.
"Bravo, Bravo ponies you have officially destroyed my better half, you all must be so proud ” Manaquire said in a flat tone.
“Rainbow didn’t mean to hurt Sunset’s feelings!” Twilight defended.
“Oh really, then tell me Miss Sparkle, what did Miss Dash just do, go on enlighten me ” he stated.
“She just jumped to a conclusion that’s all” she replied nervously.
“Oh no, you see miss Sparkle, what your friend just did was immediately discriminate and harass Sunset just because she was not a pony, just because she was Human, just because of some superstitious rumours that she hadn’t even bothered to dismiss or confirm. Am I right? ”
“Well I-“
“Now just hold on a minute there mister, just what do get away sayin’ those things?” Applejack came to the defence of her friend.
“I am glad you asked, you see I am Manaquire, and the poor girl you saw run off is my creator ”
“Creator? but I thought she didn’t have any magic?” Twilight stated.
“Let me elaborate, you see when you all hit her with the elements of harmony, the magic within them sought to change her into a creature that could live in this world, try to make her harmless as possible, so then in order to do that they took the negative aspects of her personality, some of which you saw just then, and give it another host, but finding no suitable host nearby, they used a creature from the girl’s own memories and placed that energy within it, bringing it into existence ”
“And that was you?” this question came from Discord.
“Yes, I am a character she had created for some stories, and over time, she gave me aspects of her personality that she very rarely showed, but has become part of who she was on earth in the past few years, an example would be depression, pessimism, Paranoia, among a few others ”
“But I haven’t seen any of those traits, I should know I brought her here” Discord replied.
“Yes but you haven’t seen her be discriminated, bullied, harassed and looked down upon for who she is, and for how others see her ”
“Ok so what are you doing here anyway?” a pony asked.
Manaquire grinned.
“Chaos and harmony, life and death, between each pairs lies a very fine line Your actions determine if the balance will break, and then you will see If all you know will lie in ruins or be perfectly fine, such events will become known in time” he answered. “I’m afraid that is all the information I can give you, now I had better be off, I have a teenager to comfort ”
With the riddle playing their heads, confused looks on their faces, Manaquire left.
Events, show refences and swearing.
This will be a short chapter because making up insane things for Discord to do is hard..and trying to mix in well known show references as well is really hard…
Maybe I’ll let Manaquire take over next chapter or something….
“Well that went well” Discord remarked.
“What? How can you...oh forget it” Twilight started.
“I’ll leave you to sort this Sparkle-butt, I’m going to have some fun, Ta-ta!” the Draconequus stated and walked off.
Twilight sighed.
“Pinkie...”
“Yeah Twilight?”
“Go keep an eye on Discord will you?”
“Okie dokie loki!” the party pony replied and bounced off.
“Hey where’s Fluttershy?” Rainbow asked.
The yellow Pegasus pony in question had left her friends and was hiding behind a tree, she pulled a low hanging branch downwards, revealing it be a lever that opened up a hidden trap door beneath her, she squeaked as she fell in, went down a long slide and landed on a soft cushion in middle of a room deep underground.
“U-um hello? Mr. Time wing? I followed your instructions” Fluttershy called out nervously.
A golden Pegasus stallion with dark blue eyes, short, wavy white mane and equally white and wavy tail stepped out to face Fluttershy. His muzzle was white and he had white fur covering his hooves. His cutie mark was an hourglass printed on the open wing of a dove taking flight.
“I’m sorry if the ride down here frightened you Fluttershy” the Pegasus said sincerely.
“Oh no it wasn’t very frightening at all Mr Time wing” the shy mare reassured him.
“I think a first name basis would be fine Fluttershy, please call me Gold” the other Pegasus stated, helping her to her hooves.
“Oh um ok…so Gold I followed your instructions to come find you if something happened and...Well”
“Yes Fluttershy?”
“The human that Discord brought here..has…um turned grey” she replied softly.
“Oh, well I need you to go and make sure she regains her colour alright?” Gold asked.
“On no I don’t think I can…”
“Nonsense just be yourself, you are the element of kindness after all” he said kindly.
“But what if she yells at me, or-“
“If that happens then treat if she was one of your animal friends, she’s probably scared, angry and lonely right now”
“She is? Oh my I’d better help her, after all No pony likes being alone”
“That’s the Spirit Fluttershy, good luck” Gold said enthusiastically as he sent the other Pegasus on her way.
Manaquire soared over the Everfree forest, having seen Sunset run in this direction he began searching for her.
Manaquire’s POV
Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!
Damn ponies, damn draconequus, damn everything!
They were supposed to blame Discord with the grid mark, not her.
Any pony but her. She’s just…well she’s a girl, a human girl! An average, normal, harmless human girl and those idiots turn grey, of all things she turns grey! She’s not supposed to turn grey!
This ruins everything! Time knows what could happen! Things could-No! Focus damn it do not stress about the what ifs now, not now!
Focus!
I need to modify my already existing plan that’s all, alright so in another day or so the ‘Mane 6’ will found out that I’ve sent a few inconveniences towards their family in other parts of Equestria, While they run around trying to sort out their personal lives, I’ll get Discord out of the way, then usurp the princesses.
Pity I was hoping to lead them on for a while, but due this mess up I have to push my plans forward.
…Speaking of that brat...where the hell is she?
I could’ve sworn I saw her enter this forest….great now I’ve lost her…
Shit…she could be anywhere, anything could’ve happened, without her my plans are-
God damn it FOCUS!
“Hi Discord!”
“…Hello Pinkie…”
“What’cha Doin’?”
“I’m about to take a swim in a lake of jelly”
“I don’t see a lake of jelly”
SNAP!
“There is now”
“Oh! Hey Discord can I join you?”
“Now why would you want to do that?”
“Because Twilight said I should keep an eye on you! so I was all ‘okie dokie loki’! So here I am, but that doesn’t mean I can’t have fun right!?” Pinkie explained quickly.
“I guess-“Discord began.
“Great!” Pinkie exclaimed happily and leapt into the lake of jelly.
Discord frowned as his face was splattered with Jelly.
“What am I going to do with you?’ he asked no one in particular.
Well there’s a ‘Phineas and Ferb’ themed chapter for my younger readers, I don’t like the show, but it seems popular enough so I might as well add it reference.
Manaquire’s mind is a bit of a jumbled mess, he is insane after all, so in order not to go completely off his rocker he has very structured plans, or at least a general impression of what he wants to do.
I must also note that he isn’t one to swear (the only exception is his degree in blasphemy), so the best way I could show him paicking is well, swearing…which even I find strange as he doesn’t give a damn about insulting various gods (normally to their face or infront devoted followers) but is above using the following swears-
-(usually above using) coarse language involving words relating to faeces (even though I use ‘crap’ all the time, must be a personal preference)
-swears about fornicating (he hates those)
-words often used or invented to degrade women (he will find you and end you if use such an insult at a female he actually knows)
So there’s the oC info for this chapter, Read and review, oh but please don’t bother commenting on my grammar, I already know it needs improving. Hopefully this year at university changes that.
Dragonfire2lm is unavailable so HAH! In case you haven’t noticed, this is Manaquire doing today’s update, I’m starting to get impatient, and now that those STUPID ponies have ruined my plans it is time I kick things up a notch.
Discord, the mane 6 and a still grey Sunset were suddenly warped to the interior of a tall black castle.
“Before you ask, no, this wasn’t my doing” the Draconequus stated.
“Of course not, this was my doing” Manaquire replied from a nearby armchair.
“Hey how come your voice isn’t in bold, like it’s all distorted and stuff?” pinkie asked.
“I got bored sounding like that, not to mention it is too cliché for my taste” the dragon replied.
“Says the Mad genius stereotypical villain” Discord deadpanned.
“You are based off Q from star trek, you have no room to talk” Manaquire countered.
“You’re…real…” Sunset was in shock. A character from her fantasy world as a child was here before her very eyes.
“Of course I am my dear, who else would be insane enough, other than you, to show the pony’s grid mark?"
“So that was you? I’ll teach you to mess with Cloudsdale” Rainbow dash declared and dashed (no pun intended) towards him, only to find she was tied up and gagged.
“I think I’ll borrow one of your ideas Discord, no flying, and no magic” Manaquire stated, and every pony’s respective horns/wings vanished.
And Discord was turned into a mismatched earth pony.
“Now then” Manaquire began, muzzling Discord as he began to rage about his new form. “Gags, fandom references and character development aside, I have a job to do, since you nasty little ponies won’t learn things the easy way, I guess I’ll have to move things forward on my schedule”.
“But I’m not a pony” Discord reasoned as he (somehow) removed the muzzle.
“Have you looked in a mirror lately?” Manaquire deadpanned.
“What is it that we have to learn? Surely if you just explain it to every pony, then you wouldn’t have to do any of this” Twilight tried to reason.
“I left warnings, I showed you the grid mark, I even left my beloved creator to her own devices to try and assimilate herself into pony society, but it hasn’t been a full day yet and already, you have effectively destroyed your only hope of learning this nicely, good job ponies” Manaquire stated with malice.
“Learn what?” Twilight demanded.
“That there are worse things in life than what you know! ” Manaquire roared. “That there are creatures far more dangerous than Discord, beings with much more evil in their hearts than a human, than Sunset! If I had not intervened just now, Celestia would have been forced to take drastic measures and discord would have learnt the hard way that there are worse things than turning into stone!”
“I don’t get it?” Rainbow stated, her gag had been removed by Applejack.
Manaquire face faulted.
“……”
“So what you’re saying is things could be worse?” Twilight summarised.
“How can things be any worse than turning to stone?” Discord asked childishly.
“You don’t want to know” he replied seriously. “So as punishment for not learning this lesson, you will learn it the hard way” Manaquire explained seriously.
“What are you going to do?” Sunset asked.
“Why my creator, you should know, I’m giving them a little taste of your world of course!” he declared brightly.
“Oh ok”
Every creature in the room did a double take at her words.
“You don’t care/” Twilight asked.
“Why should I?” Sunset replied.
“All of Equestria is in danger! Besides he’s your creation! Shouldn’t you do something?’ the purple unicorn explained.
“Equestria can go to hell for I care” Sunset replied.
“What…but why?”
“Miss Sparkle, you have doomed us to a musical number” Manaquire deadpanned.
As if on cue, the music started as soon as she started singing.
“Do you ever feel like breaking down? Do you ever feel out of place? ” Sunset sang “Like somehow you just don't belong and no one understands you ”
She faced the bearers of the elements with a sour look on her face.
“Do you ever want to run away? Do you lock yourself in your room? With the radio on turned up so loud that no one hears you screaming? ”
“Well no-“Twilight began.
“No you don't know what it's like when nothing feels alright, You don't know what it's like To be like me ”
She looked almost heartbroken as she sang the next few lines.
“To be hurt, to feel lost, to be left out in the dark, to be kicked when you're down to feel like you've been pushed around ”To be on the edge of breaking down and no one's there to save you. No you don't know what it's like ”
She glared at them.
“Welcome to my life ”
“I’m sure it can’t that bad sugar cube-“ Applejack began.
“Do you wanna be somebody else? Are you sick of feeling so left out? Are you desperate to find something more before your life is over? ”
“Uh...”
“Are you stuck inside a world you hate? Are you sick of everyone around? ”
Her tone turned into one of sarcasm.
“With their big fake smiles and stupid lies while deep inside you're bleeding ”
“Look if it’s about earlier I’m sorry ok?” Rainbow tried to apologise.
“No you don't know what it's like When nothing feels alright, You don't know what it's like, To be like me ” Sunset snapped.
“To be hurt, to feel lost, To be left out in the dark, To be kicked when you're down, to feel like you've been pushed around. To be on the edge of breaking down And no one's there to save you ” she continued
“No you don't know what it's like, welcome to my life ”
The blue chimera rounded on Applejack. ”No one ever lied straight to your face ”
Then onto Fluttershy “And no one ever stabbed you in the back ”
Before Pinkie could say something Sunset zoned in on her as well “You might think I'm happy. But I'm not gonna be ok ”
“Hey come on now” Twilight started to say but the poor unicorn was snapped at as well.
“Everybody always gave you what you wanted, You never had to work It was always there You don't know what it's like, What it's like- ”
“To be hurt, to feel lost, To be left out in the dark, To be kicked when you're down” Manaquire calmly cut in, much to their surprise.“You feel like you've been pushed around, to be on the edge of breaking down and no one's there to save you?”
“What the fuck?” Sunset exclaimed.
“I do know what’s it like, what it’s like to be hurt, to feel lost To be left out in the dark. To be kicked When you're down. to feel like you've been pushed around. To be on the edge of breaking down And no one's there to save you. I do know what it's like, welcome to our life” he finished for her.
Sunset was standing there gaping at him as the music ceased.
“I have your memories after all my dear, I happen to know everything about you and vice-versa of course” the black dragon summarised.
“Really?” Sunset asked, her colour was starting to return.
He gave her a ‘well duh’ look as Fluttershy walked up to the blue chimera.
“Um…Sunset I know you’re angry with us, but Rainbow Dash really is sorry...and we’re going to need your help to stop Manaquire...Please don’t be mad at me!” Fluttershy tried to calm her, but quickly cowered before the larger creature.
The sight of the fearful element of kindness triggered a part of Sunsets caring nature, and the rest of her colour returned, along with her mane becoming longer and scruffier.
“Oh before I forget...” Manaquire said as a rainbow coloured glow surrounded Sunset. “I had some leftover energy from the Elements of harmony, I was going to use it against Discord, but I think I have better use for it”
In a flash of light, Sunset went from chimera, to becoming a dark blue Pegasus with large alicorn-style wings, blue-grey almost human-shaped eyes, black oval shaped glasses, and long scruffy mane and tail that was sunset orange streaked with red.
Sunset looked at her new form, and realised she could possibly reach up to Celestia’s shoulder in height. Her hooves were normal horse hooves, and the same shade as orange as her mane.
“Wow I’m a Pegasus…geez I’m tall” she exclaimed.
“Now then, Discord I return to you your original form and power, and to my dear creator, I give you this-” Manaquire stated and produced a scroll and a large package wrapped in brown paper.
Handing them to Sunset he smirked at the rage on Discord’s face.
“What’s the matter, you weren’t a pony for that long you know” the dragon mocked.
Discord just glared at him and left.
“Fluttershy...thanks for the pep talk” Sunset told the yellow Pegasus.
“Oh your quite welcome sunset” she replied.
“Hey girls...So are we friends or...” Sunset asked.
“Of course!” Pinkie replied, glomping her.
“Yeah any friend of Twilight is a friend of mine” Rainbow said.
“Yah didn’t even need to ask sugar cube” Applejack responded.
“Applejack is right dear...and I’m sorry about calling you ugly when I first saw you" Rarity apologised.
“Eh I’ve heard worse” Sunset shrugged.
“Then it’s settled” Twilight declared. “Now can you please send us home?” she asked Manaquire.
“I shall Miss Sparkle, and to be fair, I give you and your new friend three days to prepare before I make my next move” Manaquire declared and returned the seven of them to the town square.
“Hey uh Twilight, you and the girls mind if I change my name do you?” Sunset asked.
“Why would you want to do that?”
“I have a new form now, I kinda want a new name to go with it” she explained.
“Oh ok, did you have anything in mind?” Twilight asked.
“I was thinking the readers could send in ideas”.
“What readers?” the purple unicorn asked.
“You know the people reading this story”
“But this isn’t a story”
“Don’t worry Sunset, just because other ponies can’t see them doesn’t mean everypony can’t” Pinkie declared.
“What in tarnation are you going on about?” Applejack asked.
“Never mind” Sunset deadpanned. ‘You wouldn’t understand anyway”
“Now Sunset darling you must allow me to make something for you” Rarity declared.
“Ooh that’s a good idea Rarity! You two go do that, I’ll keep an eye on the reviews for name suggestions!” Pinkie explained. “Ok Readers, Sunset needs a new name, and since she doesn’t want to use the obvious choice of ‘Dragonfire’-“
“You know about that” Sunset cut in.
“Well duh of course I do silly! Manaquire gave us both a share of his fourth wall breaking ability”
“Huh he can really do that, cool”
“Well anyway, you readers come up with a new name ok? We’ll catch up with you next chapter...hey I wonder where Discord is?” Pinkie asked.
“Who knows and who cares” Sunset stated as Rarity lost her patience and dragged towards her boutique.
“Bye every human! See you next chapter!” Pinkie waved good bye as the chapter came to an end.
“Just you wait Manaquire, Twilight Sparkle and her friends will prevail and defeat you” Princess Celestia declared.
Manaquire was laughing his head off, not because he thought it was a ridiculous idea, but because the entire statement had come from the mouth of Filly Celestia.
“Aha! That’s cute Princess, but it will take more than six children with ‘the magic of friendship’ to stop me” he replied, patting the small white alicorn on the head.
“Now then, with you as a filly, your sister trapped on the moon fighting her darker self Nightmare Moon, the only major power left is the Spirit of Chaos and Disharmony, I think I’ll deal with him now..” Manaquire declared.
Five minutes later
“Shut up Tia” the infant Draconequus snapped at the giggling sun princess.
“Now you two behave while uncle Manaquire goes to work” Manaquire mocked as he left the two children to continue his plans.
Sunset was having a mini break down.
“I need to get a job, I need to find a place to stay…I need…a lot…of….stuff….SHIIITTT!”
The reason for this was obvious; this was the first time in several hours that she had been given a chance to think about the situation, she came to these conclusions-
One- she was not going home any time soon
Two- she was a Pony
Three- she had no clothing, no possessions and nothing of her own to use/ sell/ live with.
Four- she was completely and utterly broke.
Hence Twilight and Applejack watched with raised eyebrows as the orange maned Pegasus rambled in a state of panic, with the occasional swear. Fluttershy was hiding under a table, Rarity was watching with a look akin to annoyance on her face due to the swearing and Rainbow was laughing hysterically.
“Hey girls come check this out!” Pinkie called out.
The other occupants of the room turned to look over at the pink party pony, she had unwrapped the package Manaquire had presented Sunset with. In her hooves was a long black two tailed trench coat.
“This is...my coat, my decade old trench coat…”
“That thing belongs to you? Darling you must let me make you something more stylish” Rarity declared.
Sunset slipped it on, Manaquire had somehow modified it to fit a pony, including holes for her wings. It fit perfectly, it was so long that the end covered her flank and left just enough room to have her tail fit through the gap between the coat’s tails.
“I knew he was good with his psychic abilities, but this is just wow..” Sunset stated in awe.
“There’s a note too!” Pinkie shoved a yellow sticky note into Sunset’s hooves.
“Rule one: insane not evil, rule two: the world is gray, remember that ponies, signed Manaquire” Sunset read.
“What in the hay does that mean?” Applejack asked.
“And why would such a ruffian be nice to you?” Rarity queried.
“Ooh! Maybe he likes you!” suggested Pinkie.
“It’s not that Pinkie” Sunset chuckled.
“But you saw what he did to Cloudsdale, and how he treated us! So what else could it?” Rainbow dash reasoned.
“RD is right Sunset, logically speaking what else could it be?” Twilight stated.
“Do you ponies even know the definition on the word ‘insane’?” Sunset almost deadpanned.
“Crazy”
“Coco in the loco”
“Evil”
“Ok that’s not entirely the case” Sunset explained. “Insanity, to my knowledge, is acting, saying and generally behaving in a way that is against the way the rest of society works”
“Pardon?” this came from a confused Applejack.
“Manaquire does things..that…well would seem to evil to whatever civilisation he comes across, he has varying levels o insanity, that range from Discord style pranks to full blown evil mastermind-“ the dark blue Pegasus continued.
“If that’s the case the why is he being nice to you?” Twilight interjected.
“He said he was here to teach you a lesson right?” Sunset asked, receiving nods all around she continued. “I’m not the pony he’s teaching it too, I already know the lesson, also it could be a case of he’s the problem and I’m somehow the solution or something, I don’t really know everything that he’s thinking”
“But you created him!” Twilight stated. “If any pony has a chance of figuring him out it’s you”
“That may be true, but there could be a hundred different things I think he could do, but I have no way of knowing just which one out of a hundred things he would do” Sunset replied.
“Hey there’s a bag in here as well!” Pinkie had returned to going through the package and placed a black satchel on a nearby table, un-zipped it and began rummaging through its contents.
“Wow! There sure is a lot of stuff in here!” the pink pony giggled as the front half of her body went deeper into the bag, much to every pony’s surprise, as the bag itself was about as large as two saddle bags being put side-by-side.
Curious, Twilight walked over to the bag, with Pinkie’s rear end sticking out of it, and waved a hoof above it, she felt no strings or wires. She looked underneath the table it was on and waved a hoof in the empty space, there was no hidden trap door or secret compartment.
“How is that possible?” she asked, perplexed as Pinkie finally pulled herself out from the satchel, her mane wasn’t even showing the slightest hair out of place, even though she had stuck herself face first into a bag barely large enough to fit her head.
“It’s bigger on the inside!” Pinkie laughed, and fell down giggling.
“Huh so it is…” Sunset inspected the bag herself.
“But that shouldn’t even be-“Twilight began.
“Some things are better left alone Sugar cube” Applejack interrupted before the purple unicorn got worked up over it. “Not everything has an explanation”
“So…Sunset now that you’re, you know hanging with us and all, what are you going to do?” Rainbow asked.
“I dunno, hey Pinkie any ideas for that new name yet?”
“Um…Oh! There’s Stellaris!” Pinkie offered.
“Hm…cool”
“Since you’re so fixated on finding a new name, I have ideas” Twilight offered. “How about Moonfire? Or Ember? Maybe Eclipse?”
“Those are some really good ideas! Stellaris is the only reviewer submission though” Pinkie replied.
“What’s a reviewer?” Rainbow asked
“Eclipse sounds good Twilight...but too cliché, Ember is also Cliché, Moonfire is a good one though, but I think I’ll wait and see if any pony else has some ideas” Sunset stated.
“Well it is your name after all” Twilight replied.
Rarity sighed at the coat Sunset was still wearing.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to make you anything?” she asked Sunset.
“I’m cool with my coat, but if you really want to, a necklace or a hat will be fine, just nothing too girly or extravagant ok?” she replied.
“You guys go do that, I’m going to check the weather patrol” Rainbow Dash stated.
“Hey Fluttershy?” Sunset walked over to the yellow Pegasus.
“Yes?”
“Since Dash is busy, do you think maybe you could teach me how to fly?”
“I don’t know, Rainbow is a much better flyer than me, I’m sure she’d be happy to teach you” Fluttershy replied.
“And I do not want to learn how to fly fast or do fancy tricks” Sunset deadpanned. “I just want to learn how to fly casually, you know like a bird”
“Oh then…Alright, we can go to my cottage, I know a few birds who could help us out with teaching you” Fluttershy offered.
“Great!”
Manaquire watched from afar as Pegasi all over the country side flew about trying to tame the huge storm that was rumbling towards the rock farms dotted throughout the land.
“And so it begins” he muttered and vanished.
Later that night ...
Manaquire lounged around the Canterlot castle throne room, Discord was trying (and failing) to make his tiny wings lift him off the ground, Celestia was reading a book on beginners alicorn magic to try and do something to stop Manaquire while stuck in the form of a filly.
“I wonder…Tell me princess do you know of a race called the Daleks?” the black dragon asked.
“No” the sun princess replied.
“Good, because you’re about to meet one” he replied, his eyes glowing as something like a large metal saltshaker with an eye stalk, a plunger and a gun appeared in the room.
“EXTERMINATE” the metal life form stated in an electronic voice.
Celestia, being unable to do anything with her magic, ran for cover, Discord eyed the strange creature carefully.
“Exterminate what?” the draconequus asked.
The dalek’s response was to shoot him, luckily it missed.
“Right...” Discord deadpanned and used what meagre magic he had to summon a diamond as large as the daleks head.
Now diamonds, being one of the hardest substances in the universe was no match for the dalekcanium the dalek’s outer shell was made out of, add that to the almost cartoon-like physics of the pony world….
And the emotionless genetically altered alien and it’s metal body crumpled like paper under the weight of the giant gem.
Manaquire looked impressed.
“That is why I’m the Spirit of chaos and disharmony” Discord said smugly.
Sunset was staying at Fluttershy's for the night. she looked out of the window of Fluttershy's bedroom (For the yellow pegasus has refused to let her guest sleep on the couch), the faint moonlight illuminatedt he many skid marks, minatuar craters and upheaved earth around the house she was staying in. All of which were results from failed attempts to fly.
The blue pegasus found she couldn't sleep. she was worried about her new friends, about her fate in Eqeustria, but also she was worried about Manaquire.
Not what he would do, she was sure it was something the mane six could handle, but about his fate, sure he was mentally unstable and would most likely turn the kingdom upside down, But to her Manaquire was just a long lost friend.
She had created him at the age of eight, as nothing than a villian, an obstacle to test the heroes of her made-up world. But she grew up, the memories never faded, every back story, side character and abandoned plotline she had remembered.
The characters she had made as a child she had expanded upon in high school, for creative writing in English, exams and even for roleplays.
she cared about them too much to leave them completely. it was because of this that she adjusted and evolved the personalities of her first creations.
Manaquire being one of them.
He was still the villian, in some sense, still crazy, charming and with a knack for insulting almost anything. But she had made sure he could redeem himself if he wished, he had friends and family he could count on, no matter how hard he pushed them away they would stand by him.
It was a predictable plot device from her, no matter how hard it got the aftermath had something worth while, something worth fighting for.
Her musings made her relaize something...Where was the creatures that usualy stood by him to reel him in when he got over the line? She had yet to see or hear anything from her story counterpart 'Dragonfire', nor from the God of time, Tempus. And she certaintly hadn't seen anything remotely resembling the first group of heroes she had created to bring him down before.
If he was here why weren't they?
Sunset fell alseep dreaming of her characters and their world, with the faint hope that she could both Equestria and the mad man that now threatened it...
The next morning at the Library.
"Twilight! Twilight!"
The sound of an all too familiar dragon roused Twilight Sparkle from her dreams.
"Ugh..Spike do you have any idea what time it is?" the drowsy mare grumbled as the purple dragon shoved a letter in her face.
"Twi, we gotta get to Canterlot now! The princesses are in trouble!"
Still dazed from the wake-up call Twilight read the letter, and as she did so her tired brain got working and realisation dawned on her face.
At Sweet Apple Arces.
"Apple Bloom! get Big Mac to check all our reserve stock, we need to get as much as we can out to Appaloosa!" Applejack hollered from the front of the Apple family house.
"Why sis? is there somethin' goin' on?"
"It looks like a huge sandstorm hit the farm over there last night, most of their crops are ruined and they don't enough stocked food left to keep the town goin' for much longer, so we need to rustle up all the support we can" the orange earth pony replied.
At Sugarcube Corner.
Pinkie Pie was packing all sorts of things into a suitcase, with three other already filled bags lying at the foot of her bed.
"Don't worry Sisters, just because a mysterious rain storm flooded the rock farms doesn't mean no pony can't help you, Pinkie Pie is coming to the rescue" the pink pony said with seriousness and determination.
"But Rarity why do we have to go all the way to Manehatten?" Swetie Belle whined as her older sister used her magic to pack her various sewing materials into a bag.
"Well Sweetie. I have to go to Manehatten because most of my clients canceled their orders and an advertisibf agency has offered me the chance to drum up some more business, but in order to do that i need to go over to manehatten." the fashionist replied. "And you have to go too because i can't find a foalsitter".
Back at Fluttershy's, after spending most the morning praticing, Sunset had finally achieved a state of lift that could be described as flight.
"WOOO!" she yelled in victory as she flew upwards to do what she always loved to do in any kind of video games involving flight.
Sunset tried to see how high she could go.
Fluttershy watched nervously from the ground as the sapphire pony flew higher and higher.
Sunset was ovrjoyed...so overjoyed that shefailed to notice manaquire perching on a coud further above her. So it was no surprise that she cried out in shock when the black dragon swooped down, plucked her out of the sky, and caried her off laughing.
Sunset walked down the beautiful halls of Canterlot Castle, admirering the stained glass windows and the stories they told. She was too focused on them to notice another pony walking towards her, also captivated by the bright colours of the windows.
Thud
"Sorry" both ponies said simultaneously.
Sunset did a double take and got a proper look at who she crashed into.
Before her was a light grey pegasus pony, a scruffy mop of sandy blond hair made up her mane, with a tail as equally scruffy swishing lightly from side to side. The other pony's eyes were a shade of gold reminscent of amber or honey, and what was most perculier was the fact that her eyes were (for lack of a better word) derped.
Both pegasi chuckled sheepishly.
"Sorry about that" they said.
"I'm vision impaired" both stated in unision.
The grey pegasus looked at her oddly before speaking.
"How are you-?" she began to ask before Sunset quickly answered by tapping a hoof over her left eye.
"Half blind, you?" Sunset replied.
"Isn't it obvious?" the grey mare replied with a chuckle.
"Right, right, my bad"
"Eh no big deal, I'm Derpy, what's your name?"
"Sunset Sapphire, but I'm thinking of getting my name changed"
"Oh ok. So how'd you end up here?" Derpy asked.
"Well, long story short, got kidnapped by a dragon"
"Wow...that makes my story a little sad in comparison" Derpy laughed.
"it can't be that bad" Sunset replied.
"You weren't the one delivering mail to the royal guards when this place got hijacked...by a dragon" Derpy admitted sheepishly.
"Could be worse" Sunset replied. "So what are you gonna do now?"
Derpy placed a hoof to her chin as she thought about her options.
"Well....I saw a coffee shop down the hall, wanna grab a bite to eat? My treat"
"There's a coffee shop in a castle?" Sunset asked.
Derpy waved a hoof dismissively.
"They hold tour groups once a week, they needed someplace for ponies to get some lunch" the mail mare replied.
"Can't argue with that, are you sure you wanna pay though?"
"Course I will" Derpy replied with a grin.
"Eh ok then, lead the way!" Sunset declared.
Twilight and co looked at the dragon before them, Manaquire had said his piece and now it was time for them to decide. On one hoof, if they declined, then they would be pressed for time as Manaquire created more obstacles for all six of the elements of harmony and their respective beaers.
On the other, there was a chance, not matter how slim, that they might defeat this villian once and for all.
Needless to say, his offer was tempting.
The three shared a look, and Twilight made her decision.
"Ok then, we accpet your challenge" she declared.
Famous Last Words.
Author Notes: I apologise for the lack of content in my recent chapters, University has been busy..plus there was computer problems yesterday, so I'll ty to write something much longer next update, just working on a few things atm.
Feel free to comment
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The search for True Harmony (Shortened intro)
Author notes: this one chapter stands alone from the rest of the story's plot, mainly due to the fact that it is the start of a light dark short story that shows exactly what manaquire's challenge is, involving adult themes, implied character death, sevre injuries and doom for all of equestria, you have been warned.
Twilight woke up, wiped the sleep from her eyes with a hoof and took in her surroundings. She was somewhere made of wood, a hollowed out tree. Dozens of hap-hazardly made shelves lined the walls, crammed with books, scrolls, pieces of strange metal objects and jars and beakers filled with strage substances.
As she noticed the staircase winding it's way up to another floor, she realised her current location.
"Isn't this...Ponyville Library?" she asked herself.
"Good guess Twilight, it is our library, though not in the way you remember it" A voice, clearly female praised her on her revelation and Twilight turned around towards the speaker.
"Nghn... Man what'd I do last night?" a groggy Rainbow Dash said as she woke up on a cloud idlely floating across the town's skyline.
"No wait a minute...That jerk! He tricked me!" the blue pegasus declared in rage as her memories returned.
"Tricked you huh?" a voice, female and with a slight unnatural buzz to it, spoke up. "And here i thought we agreed to it?".
Fluttershy let out a squek of fear as she woke up and found herself in the dark and dangerous Everfree Forest.
"Tw-Twilight? Rainbow?" the yellow mare meekly called out.
She curled up into a ball as she heard some nearby bushes rustle.
Author Notes: this was going to be far longer, but I'm unsure whether to add 'The Search for True Harmony' into this story as part of the plot, or just make a stand alone seperate short story and only refernce it in this one...I really dunno...
If i did I'd have to change the catagories and stuff....
What do you guys think?
Manaquire paced back and forth in the throne room, Celestia and Discord were harmless, the element bearers warped away to the distant future and every single guard and servant in canterlot had been brainwashed to follow the dragon's orders.
"Now there's only the matter of my creator.." he mumbled, his mind going a million miles an hour with idea after idea popping up.
His original plan was to let the human think for herself, with a little help from the princesses, to bring about the characters and events needed to issue his defeat. Sadly that was no longer an option, as he had failed to take into account just how stubborn Princess Celestia was, and the fact that Sunset had a slight fear of those with authority (as she had refrained from activly seking out Celestia). So he ws forced to re-think his stratagey.
Now normally, the god of time, Tempus, or the guardian of reality, Dragonfire, would step in and present advice, since they were unfortunately busy fixing another mess five years in the future they wouldn't be around.
Manaquire sighed, he'd have to do it himself.
But the question was how?
He thought over everything he knew about Sunset and himself, the rules of his homeland and how it was founded, it then he found the answer.
"Sunset's inspiration for my..character came from the most early views of evil, the most well remembered villian, her favourite villian in all of history.....'sigh'" Manaquire face palmed at how obvious, and ridculous, the answer was.
As if on que, the members of the royal guard in the room began singing a low key continuos note as Manaquire began his little monologue before the main song.
"I never thought singing essential. iIts dull and makes me sound completely vain...but I suppose iIhave to convince her somehow, to share my vision, no matter how strange..."
The music and voices of the royal guard resonated throughout the castle, as soon as Sunset heard it, she couldn't believe her ears as Manaquire teleported to appear before her, a sly grin on his face as he started singing.
"I know that your powers and potential, are as great as the Princesses combined. but thick as you are Pay Attention! " he snapped, seeing the stunned look on Sunset's face. "My words are a matter of pride ".
"It's clear from your confused expression the lights are not all on upstairs. But we're talking fame and attention! Even you won't caught unawares " the dragon continued using the mares natutal want to be accepted as leverage.
"So preapre for the chance of a lifetime, be preapred for sensational news. A shining new era is tip-toeing nearer "
"And where do I feature?" Sunset asked, in return Manaquire just patted her on the head.
"Just listen to teacher" he replied with a smirk. "I know it sounds sorted, but you'll be rewarded and at last you'll be given your dues! " he continued singing and picked her up and danced with her.
"And in Justice delishiously squared...Be Prepared! "
"Ok..Be prepared...Prepared for what?" Sunset asked as he placed her back down on the ground.
"Why for my defeat of course" he replied smoothly.
"Defeat? but how? why?"
"Simple really, a hero comes forh and gets every other major power from Equestria and Vardos together to combine their might and vanquish me" Manaquire explained.
"Um..who's the hero?"
"...Idiot" Manaquire muttered under his breath "You will be the hero!".
Sunset looked at him in surprise.
"Listen to me...and you'll never be lonely again!" the dragon declared.
"It's great that you'll soon be respected, a hero that is all time adored!" chanted the hypnotised royal guard.
"Of course quid pro quo you're expected, to take certain duties on board " Manquire sang, showing the blue pegasus a image of his homeland.
"The future is littered with praises and though you're the main addresse, the point I must emphasis is ...You won't hear a word without me!" he thundered.
"So prepare for the fight of the century! "
"Be preapred for the murkiest scam! "
"Meticulous planning, tenacity spanning, the toughest of trails, all simply while I'll....be hated, rejected, defeated and you'll be seen as the wonder you are! Yes my plans and ambitions are pared.. "
"Be Prepared! "
"Yes his plans and ambitions are pared.." the guards sang.
Manaquire struck a pose for the final line.
"BE PREPARED!"
Sunset looked at Manaquire thoughtfully as night fell once more over Equestria.
"You want me to bring about your defeat?" she asked.
"Yes"
"....No" she stated firmly.
"And why not?"
"You. Are. My. Friend! I refuse to do anything that puts you or anypony else in danger!" Sunset replied firmly.
Manaquire sighed.
"Oh Sunset....you know as well as I do that I'm only on level one of my grand scheme, if Twilight and her friends fail to uderstnd things where they are now...things in this world are going to get much worse, do you really want all of equestria to see what I can do?" he asked. "Stop me and the entire kingdom escapes a horrible fate, refuse and everything and everypony will suffer"
"But I know you don't want to do this, just stop! Just think!" she pleaded
"I could very easily turn against you my dear, I am trying to give you the easiest option here" Manaquire stated.
Sunset sat down and thought for a minute, and finally sighed.
"Rules are ruless, I wrote them after all...."
"And who better to bring the players to their places than you eh? Of course you'll need help, I'll have a portal established tomorrow morning, you can take whoever you want" Manaquire explained.before walking out of the room. "If you need me i'll be on the roof".
"Hey Sunset!" Derpy called as the grey mare spotted her friend walking down a hallway.
"Oh hey Derpy, something wrong?" Sunset asked, noticing the worried look on her friend's face.
"Yeah..well kinda, you remember how we met Lyra at the cafe?"
"Sure I do, the three of us where joined by The Doctor as soon as you mentioned your special talent" Sunset replied
-------------FLASHBACK--------------
Sunset's coat was hanging on the coatrack near the cafe's entrance. Derpy had ordered a platter of assorted muffins (both Sunset and Derpy found cupcakes too sweet for thier liking), and was soon joined by Derpy's friend Lyra Heartstrings, a sea foam gren unicorn with amber coloured eyes, and a two toned foam green and white mane and tail that was nearly as scruffy looking as Rainbow's with a golden lyre for a cutie mark.
"So who's the blank flank Derpy?" Lyra asked casualy.
Sunset introduced herself, and Lyra did the same.
Five minutes of casual conversation later the three mares started discuccing Cutie Marks.
"So Lyra what does yours mean? if you don't mind me asking" Sunset asked.
"Well the legend of the lyre is that it has magical properties, any song played on it can calm any pony or animal. My special talemt is kinda different, every song ever created has a passive and active magical power, my cutie mark means I can unlock that magic and perform the spells that the song has hidden within it. like a song to make ponies happy or to change the weather and even to transport myself to other places" Lyra explained.
"Wow, that's cool" Sunset replied.
"I know, but wait till you hear Derpy's"
"You're going to like this" Derpy said with a grin. "My cutie mark is one of a kind, it means I can make cloud portals".
"Cloud...Portals?"
The last astonished statement came from a brown stallion Sunset reognised as he walked over to them.
"Hey Doctor...You remember me right?" Sunset asked the Timepony.
"Oh Hello Sunset! So what's this I hear about cloud portals?" The Doctor asked.
"It has to do with my affinity for three different elemental magic" Derpy started to explain, but then noticed how confused Sunset and The Doctor were.
"You guys don't know about the elemental magics that are a part of all ponies?" Lyra asked.
"Uh..No" the former human and Timelord replied simultaneously.
"Well to explain it simply, all magic has a base make up of an element, and each of three species of ponies can weild certain types of elemennts and their conresponding magic" Lyra explained. "Earth ponies have Earth, Fauna and Flora. Pegasi have Water, Wind and Lightning and Unicrons have Light, Psychic or Spiritual"
"Ok then what about the Princeses?" Sunset asked.
"Well from the stuff I learnt here in Canterlot Alicorns have Life, Death and Time. But there are sub-elements that can be derived from the major three of any species, Ice is wind and water, fire comes from light, metal comes from earth and then there's stuff like empathy, telepathy, foresight, healing and even creation and destruction magic that is way more complicated, some ponies are even born with an affinty for multiple elements, and even elements that aren't normal for their species" Lyra hapilly continued.
"There's a Pegasus Pony in ponyville that has an affiny with Fauna and healing, most ponies are born with one affinity, two is rare, but I have three, that makes me unique" Derpy explained. "I use Wind and Water to form clouds and make a hole in one, then I vibrate passive lightning magic in the air to make a film of charged water over the hole that connects to where I wanna go and just fly through, then..well I'm there"
"Fascinating..." The Doctor muttered, who had been taking notes the entire time.
"Wow..wonder my element is?" Sunset wondered out loud.
"I can find out for you" Lyra replied "I just need a feather off your wing, and then I go and test it out, I should be done by tonight"
--------------------------END FLASHBACK--------------
"So what did Lyra find out or something?" Sunset asked.
"Yeah but...something happened" Derpy replied, but before Sunset could ask Lyra trottoed up to them, wearing a pair of saddlebags.
A toy earth pony was hanging out of one of the saddlebags, it was brown, with brown eyes and it was wearing a dark blue suit.
Sunset was mesmerised by the toy, but was startled when it blinked.
"Doctor?" she asked.
"Yes I'm toy...a toy can you believe it? One minute I'm helping Lyra with the element test, the next this great big dragon appears and turns me into a toy...a toy! " The Timepony ranted.
"A dragon..." Sunset repeated.
"Yes a great big giant black dragon!"
"Ok I see where this is going, I think I need to explain something to everypony.." Sunset sighed.
One explanation later Sunset atched the faces of her new friends for a reaction; Derpy was a mix of wrry and fear, the Docotr was sympathetic, while Lyra...
"You mean to tel lme that this is your fault?" the unicorn asked in shock.
"Yes...No...I don't know anymore ok! Look I'm sorry but if i could stop him I would" Sunset replied.
"You know..." The Doctor began from his new position atop lyra's head. "Something's been bothering me, if you're a pegasus, then why are so tall?"
"Yeah I was wondering that too.." Derpy agreed.
"Even your hooves are different from the normal pony, your wings are larger...and I don't remember seeing you with glasses the last time we met" the timepony realised.
"What you think its the glasses?" Sunset asked.
"Have you taken them off yet?" Derpy asked.
"...No I was so tired last night that i just crashed onto Fluttershy's bed and dozed off....you think there's a spell on them?"
"Only one way to find out" Lyra commented.
Sunset grasped the handle in her hoof and removed her glasses, everything in distance became a fuzzy blur, while she could see everything in front of her with only slightly les clarity than she could with the glasses on. she stared at her hoff, eyes wide in surprise, it was no longer orange, it was now as plain as the hooves on her friends, round and smoth with a thin layer of fur that matched her coat.
She looked back up at her friends to find they were staring at her.
"What?" she asked.
"You have a horn.." Lyra breathed.
"Huh?"
"You're an alicorn..." Derpy said, stunned.
"Huh? "
"Look at you, magnificent! Hah! a human Alicorn..Of course! you told us that you created Manaquire, to him you're nothing short of a Goddess, and how are goddesses represented in Equestria? As Alicorns. Oh that's Brilliant!" The Doctor rambled, eyes gleaming with curiousity and wonder.
"HUH?" Sunset was still confused by this, even if in some part of her mind it made sense.
"Go on look" The Doctor pointed to a window.
Sunset tucked her glasses under her wing and walked over to the window and took in her reflection; she was exactly the same, the only chagnes that had occured was that her hooves looked as normal as any pony's, the addition of a spiraled horn and the red streaks in her mane and tail had vanished, However she still lacked a Cutie Mark.
Ok so I'm an Alicorn, my mane and tail aren't flowing so that means my er...magic is only at it's full strength while i'm inside the boundaries of Vardos, the world I created (I need to think up a better name for the place), or I'm not a ttrue alicorn like the princesses, the first option is more likely though, the rules state a creatures power cannot esceed the limits of magical power of the world they are in...if only Manaquire would follow that rule then things would be so much easier... Sunset thought.
"You ok?" Derpy asked.
"Yeah yeah" Sunset replied casually and waed a hoof. "ok I clearly need to 'mare up'. Right one of my own creations is putting Equestria in danger, by my own laws I cannot directly stop him, so therefore I need to travel to his world and gather the original six heroes that have defeated him before, but I need help, if you want to help me then meet me in the throne room tomorrow morning, any questions?" Sunset stated.
"Six heroes?" The Doctor asked.
"Yeah.." the alicorn replied
"Six ?"
"So?"
"Six hereos that defeated him...six elements of harmony" Lyra stated.
Sunset mentally face hoofed at her stupidity.
"Oh right...I was eight years old when I created them, I didn't even know Equestria existed back then.." she replied.
"Well weird then..I guess this explains the test results then" Lyra replied. "You have an afinity for Time, Creation, Telepathy and Emapthy, though Time is the most prominent"
"Makes sense..right I think I'll just go find a room and sleep" Sunset stated, putting her glasses back on, and surprisingly she did not change back into a pegasus.
The enchantment must've idspelled as soon as I realised what it was She reasoned.
Manaquire was on the roof, halfway through downing a large bottle of wine when it suddenly vanished.
The dragon frowned and turned around to face the pegasus pony called Time Wing.
"I am an Insane, Psychic insomniac, the last thing you should do is take my wine" he growled.
Time wing frowned back.
"The only time you drink is when you're worried"
"Well Tempus, great god of time, why wouldn't i be?" Manaquire snapped.
"You've almost taken over this place, nopony can stop you..so why?" the pony he adressed as Tempus asked.
"Three events shall doom Equestria, Vardos and all connected to them" Manaquire explained.
"I know, I've just helped in cleaning up the second of those events" Tempus replied.
Manaquire sighed.
"The first shall test their values, the second shall test their power, the third will put the first two too shame, but even then the worst is yet to come" the dragon stated.
The pair spent the night talking, and fighting over the various wine bottles Manaquire tried to summon.
When the sun rose that morning the pair parted ways, both on opposing sides, but both friends for all eternity.
Author's note: yay for the wall o' writing, also I do not encourge excessive drinking in any way...please comment and yes there are spelling/grammar mistakes...with my writing there always will be.
ENJOY!
Manaquire quickly opened up a glowing pink portal and dispersed before anypony reached the throne room that morning, Sunset was already there, using what little control of her magic to constantly levitate a plate of Vegemite on toast, and was munching a piece when two ponies, and a moving plush toy pony the size of a cat walked in.
Sunset swallowed her food and set down the half eaten slice of toast back on the plate as she looked at her friends.
"Am I dreaming?" she asked.
"Nope" Derpy replied.
"Wow... OK well after breakfast we'll head out, are you guys sure you want to do this, you can back out if you want to..." Sunset said.
"Sunset you sound like Fluttershy" Lyra deadpanned. "There is no way I'm letting you go out there to face Celestia-knows-what without help, no pony can do this sort of stuff alone"
"Sunset, I can't pretend to understand, but this..it must hard for you, Manaquire and all those creatiions here before your very eyes...a single pony facing the unknown, well why bother going alone eh?" The Doctor stated.
"Friends stick together no matter what!" Derpy said.
After breakfast the group stepped through the portal, to be faced with a vast desert of yellow sand and angry looking storm clouds covering the sky.
"My TARDIS!" The Doctor yelled happily, spotting the blue phone box sticking out sideways in a nearby dune.
"Hey what's that?" Derpy asked, pointing to a red light floating in the air in the distance.
"A better question is where are we?" Lyra asked.
Sunset flew up high and glanced around, behind her was more desert, and before was moredesert with the tel tale prinpicks of vegetation in the face off distance.
"Filles and Gentilecolts, this is The Dessert of Storms, the most nothern region of Vardos. Behind us lies more sand, and beyond that the badlands, sealed off from this world by the storm clouds above us. if we continue going forward we'll eventually reach The Volcaneo, to the east of that are the ruins of the Time Scribes and the jungle surrounding them, to the west of the volcaneo is The Bone Blizzard mountain range. if travel south of the volcaneo we'll reach the plains of paradise and Black Stone Castle, that building is in the very centre of this contintent, to the east and south east of the castle is a large expanse of forest, if you go directly east from the forest you'll reach a huge plateau and departure falls, south of Black Stone Castle is the rocky shores of sea serpent beach, west of the Castle is the graveyard...and that is all of Vardos that is knownto..well me..i think, there is the possibility that i forgot somethiing" Sunset explained after she landed.
"Wow that sounds..huge" Derpy commented.
"Well let's get started then" Lyra declared, setting off for the red light in the sky.
The others had no choice but to follow.
Well The Doctor stayed behind to dig out the TARDIS.
"Oh my Celestia." Derpy breathed in shock at what was before the three mares.
The red light was actually a large cluster of red lightning that was attracted to a yellow dingo with white lower jaw and chest, the underside of its tail was also white and his eyes were green. the poor cainie was flailing about in the air desperately trying to get down and out of his lightning prison.
"Ben?" Sunset gaped, and at this outbirst the adressed dingo looked down at the three ponies.
"Oh thank The Original someone is here! Listen a dragon called Manaquire reversed my electrical charge and altered my magnetic feil so I'm stuck up here unless you can get rid of this damn lightning!" Ben hollered, having a slight mix of an American and Australian accent.
"i got this" Derpy stated and flew up to the floating canine.
"Derpy are you crazy!" Lyra yelled.
Sunset just remained quiet and watched.
The grey pegasus flew closer and hoveed just out of the lightnings range before diving in and grasping a large mass of the red electrons in her front hooves. her face scrunched up in concerntration she disperesed the charge until it was at a manageable, and mostly harmless, level before sending it coursing through her body and arching out of her wings and back hooves heading toward the ground.
This continued for a few minutes as the build up of power lessened and the pony and the dog slowly floated back to earth. Once they touched down Ben began inspecting the grey mare's body for burns and saw that her hooves, wing tips and parts of mane and tail suffered from burns.
"Is she ok?" Lyra and sunset asked simultaneously.
"I can get her back to my place, I have medical equipment there, the burns aren't that bad, she won't be walking for a while and I think some feathers need to be pulled out, but in the long run she'll be fine" Ben smiled softly.
Derpy grinned sheepishly "Hey somepony had to help you"
Ben rolled his eyes, then tuned back to face the other ponies.
"So I'm Ben, last of the Thunder Dingoes, who are you/" he asked casualy as he hoisted the injured Derpy onto his back.
"Name's Lyra"
"Sunset S-" the blue alicorn began.
"Loz?" Ben asked in astonishment as he recognised her voice.
"...Did you just use the nickname my favourite primary school teacher used?" Sunset asked.
"Um yeah...seemed appropriate" Ben replied sheepishly. "So it's really you?"
"Yep"
The dingo and the alicorn burst out laughing.
"Who would've though it eh? The Great Goddess of Vardos here in the flesh, great to see you!" Ben happily exclaimed. "But first things first, let's head to my place and patch your friend up".
Author's note: this chapter was going to be a nice side story of how Lyra and Derpy met as foals, but i decided to something different, and explanation on why I did change this chapter's original idea will be at the end of the chapter.
Sunset's POV
Night had fallen, Derpy's burns had been bandaged and Ben had set up mats for us to sleep on in his undeground home dug of the rock that lay far beneath the sand. it was a nice home, I even remember where I found inspiraation foor it, a town in the northern territory..or South Australia...somewhere in the centre of the dry country where people had homes underground to escape the heat of the 'outack'.
Right now I'm on a cloud over looking the dessert, the storm clouds have parted, a rare incident in this place, and i can see the moon.
if you were in my position, what would you do?
Think about it if I actualy tried I could be what the role players call 'god-modding' right now, I could..well I could solve everyone's problems, stop the bad guy, hell I'm pretty sure i could even revive the dead.
I said everyone because...it feels normal to say that here..must be magic.
Hah Dragon fable's great loop-hole.
Sorry I'm rambling, I tend to do that.
I technically have all this power, most people if they were the god of their own planet would either make it a hell-hole or a paradise. but I have rules, I made my own laws of magic and time and...stuff, and I don't want to break them.
To be honest I have no freaking clue what I'm going to do, if I go all out and just change things using raw power there will be consequences, if i fail to do anything both my world and Equestria are doomed.
It's not fair, I'm no hero. the worst part is that I have no support, sure I've got Derpy and Lyra and Ben, but there's no force of pure good to govern my actions or a deity to guide my way...that's how it always worked, no matter what there always someone mortal or otherwise to help you out. whether you were good, evil or didn't care there was always someone.
Maybe I just have to find them...I think it's too dangerous for Lyra and Derpy to come with me, I know how dangerous this place can be...the ponies aren't reasy for this, not yet.
Ok then...I have no back-up, no map (apart from the one inside my head), no supplies and no chance in hell.
But I'm stubborn, impatient and I love my characters and my new friends to death, if I'm going down....
Well you know the rest.
END POV
Ben walked outside to check on Sunset when he heard a sonic boom and saw a blue streak shoot across the night sky in the general direction of The Volcaneo.
He sighed, walked back inside and hoped she wasn't as idiotic as his best friend, who had a tendancy to do thigs first and think second.
Sunset passed over the land, her eyes widening as she saw what affect Manaquire had on the environment: The Volcaneo was frozen over, the ruins of the Time Scribes encased in a strange blue crystal, a small portion of the eastern forset was ablaze with red fire she knew was the work of a Kitsune (she suspected Manaquire had turned into one only briefly to harness the power of Fox Fire) and departure falls was now a lifeless barren landscape and the plateau beyond it was covered in fog.
She landed near the western rainforest, neutral territory between a race of demon-like wolves that lived in a graveyard at the base of the mountains and the white dragons that occupid a fishing city made of diamonds on a large cliff west of the beach.
She looked around for the tell-tale signs of an underground tunnel and spotted a rock with a blue swirl painted on it next a tall tree not too far from her and after looking around, found the entrace to the network of tunnels built by the time scribes that ran throught the entire continent.
Glowing gemstones provied light as she walked down the grey, neatly made tunel and it wasn't long before she found a map of the tunel system and made beline for the heavily protected centre, directly beneath the plains and Manaquire's castle.
TO BE CONTINUED
Advice is appreciated, and yes i know there may be grammatical/ spelling errors.
Enjoy
Lyra woke up the next morning to find no trace of Sunset. She was careful to avoid waking Derpy as she tip-hooved through the house in search of her other friend.
"Hey morning Lyra" Ben greeted from the archway behind her.
"AHH!" the unicron yelled, startled by the dingo's sudden appearance.
Ben simply snickered at her reaction.
"Dude! Don't do that!" she fumed, but this only Ben to burst into laughter.
"Man oh man, you are so much like a friend of mine, it's almost uncanny" he said between bouts of laughter.
Lyra merely grumbled something in response. After he had calmed down, Ben asked Lyra what she was doing and after her response he seemed to lose all signs of playfulness.
Ben scratched his chin as he tried to put into words his assumption of Sunset's actions he had seen last night.
"Well you see...she decided to go it alone ya know? After seeing Derpy getting hurt, although in the long run everything will work out, I think she blames herself for it and doesn't want any of her other friends getting hurt" he explained as Lyra looked more confused by the second.
"What she doesn't think we can defend ourselves?" she retorted angrilly.
"Well..." Ben replied, unsure of how to answer.
"Oh no, no way man am I just going to sit and do nothing, no way in tartarus" Lyra ranted.
"Ok, Ok before you blow a fuse just here me out" Ben placated the angry pony. "Can you defend yourself at all?"
Lyra snorted "Of course I rutting can, I grew up on the strets of neigh york for crying out loud!"
"Right..um can you read a map?" he asked, wary of the mare's temper.
"Yeah, I'm not stupid" she replied.
"Last question, would you be willing to take a life?" he asked seriously.
This stopped Lyra in her tracks, as tough as she was, there had neer been a circumstance where she had to take the life of another being, pony or otherwise.
"Now just hold on a minute!" she snapped, her composure regained. "Just what do you take me for? I am not some ruthless killer"
Ben grinned.
"Good to hear, just be careful though, there are others who won't hesitate to kill, be it for food or power" he stated.
After getting a map, some dried herbs, a few containers of water and beastiary from Ben and sharing a quick breakfst with Derpy, Lyra began her treck across the dessert in search of her friend.
Several hours and complaints later...
The frozen volcaneo that rose from the surrounding vegtion loomed evr closer in the disttance as Lyra tridged forward and tried her best to ignore the buzz and hum of the heat wave that washed over the sandy dunes. the dried herbs she had snacked on only served to make her mouth all the more dryer, and it wouldn't be long before she ran out of water.
"Ok I can do this, if I can just make it to the edge of the forest then I can rest and plan my next step...huh?"
The mare looked up to see a black winged thing circling her high in the skky.
"oh great just what i need, a damn buzzard thinking I'm its next meal, Well sorry to disappoint you pal! but pony is not on the menu!" Lyra yelled up at the sky.
Determined to prove the bird wrong Lyra grimaced and pressed forward, her hooves sinking in to the soft sand slightly as she walked across the dunes, and with the storm clouds behind her and her goal infront, she kept moving. time semed to move to a crawl, the bird of prey continued to follow her every movement, but it wasn't long before her hooves touched down on soft moss covered ground raather than sand.
"Oh thank Celestia I made it WOO!" the mare yelled as she leapt and bounded on the moss covered path that wound its way through the forest.
An unnatural screech broke her train of thought. She looked up to see the bird from the dessert perform a nose dive towards her. As it got closer fear ran through Lyra's viens as she realised it wasn't a bird.
"Oh Crap, oh crap, oh crap" she exclaimed in sheer terror and bolted for the cover of the trees.
This did not appear to detour the winged monster that raced after her, she continued to run. she did not dare to look back even tough she heard the sound of wood splintering and shattering as the monster plowed its way through the forest to reach her. Running on fear and adreniline Lyra ducked and weaved through the trees in an effort to shake off her pursuer, it had no effect as it simply used brute force to smash its through any obstacles to reach her.
Thinking fast she decided to change tactics and used levitation to hurriedly propel herself over a rock. she landed awkwardly and scrambled to her hooves and fought her tired muscles to run ever further as whatever was after her got nearer, and running out of options she hid behind another rock further away.
She gasped for air and tried to slow down her racing heart as the sounds got closer. she covered her nose and mouth with her front hooves as the smashing of wood slowed to a complete stop and silence filled the air. A hissing noise reached her ears and she could sense the creature was padding around near the rock she had levtated herself over, as if searching for a trace of her. She screwed her eyes shut as the hssing gained an irritated tone and she heard her pursuer as it leapt over the rock and landed with a dull thud not to far from her hiding spot.
The sea green unicron could hear the irritated hissing from her hiding place behind the boulder, her heart hammered inside her and for a brief moment she feared its volume would alert the beast to her presence.
Come on Lyra! You can beat this guy! she thought in a manner that Rainboe dash would be proud of as she gulped and steadied herself for the confrontation of the century.
It was then that the creature spoke.
"Come out My Little Pony, don't make me strain myself more just to pry you out from behind a measly rock" the creature, although soft spoken, sounded male and very annoyed with her.
Lyra burst out from behind the rock...And froze as soon as she looked into venom-green eyes with a slitted pupil.
What is this? Is he some sort of cockatrice?
She willed for her body to move, but her hooves felt as if they were glued to the ground and in her fear and desperation she looked at her captor more closely, while at the same he was doing the same thing to her, having never seen a pony in his life.
The creature was roughly manticore sized, with a very dark shade of green that could be mistaken for black. it had the head and neck of a snake, webbed ears and a crest of echidna-like spines jutting out from the back of his head and a small way down his neck. He had a body shaped vaguely like a bird of prey's with powerful legs with owl-like talons. he lacked any fore limbs and instead large and pwerful webbed wings were half open at his sides. his long serpentine tail had a thin scythe-like blade on the end.
"How can such a small creature possibly survive out here?" He asked himself.
Lyra could do no more than pronouce a sm all "Eep" as he studied her with his hypnotic gaze.
"Hm no matter,You will make a nice source of entertainemnt for The Idiot" he said and launched himself into the air, hovered over her and in a quick motion he grasped her in one talon and flew upwards to escape the confinements of the canopy.
As they soared over the rainforest the wyvern (For Lyra could think of no other creature to call him) banked left and headed to the plains.
"What are going to do with me?" Lyra managed to ask as her piolet descended to land at the doors of a giant three-towered black castle in the centre of the plains.
"I'm going throw you into a cell with a dragon to study your interactions" He replied as if it was most the normal thing in the world.
Needless to say, she had nothing to reply to that.
This day aria birthday remix
Back within the maze like network of tunnels that run deep underground our heroine Sunset Sapphire had reached the centre of the network and after an unusual encounter she set about making herself familiar with the layout of the song chamber.
The tunnel had led to a large wooden door that was unamrked by the pasage of time, and after solving the simple riddle to unlock it, she found herself in a giant room with a large, round stage carved out of the rock at the centre of the back wall. the wall connected the stage had large slabs of blue gemstones fused into the rock, almost like a natural mirror.
As she approached the stage the door slammed shut behind her and a black tar-like substance oozed out from the floor to create a blockade between her and the door.
"No, no!" she exclaimed in panic as she searched for a way to escape, but all other exits had been blocked by the same goop that barricaded the first one.
Back at Canterlot Manaquire was busy making his final preparations for the return of the elements of Harmony.
"With Sunset and her band of misfits busy in Vardos absolutely nothing can stand in the way of my plans, I will shatter the spirits of the element bearers, take over the throne, and be victorious in controling equestria!" he bragged
"This is what it's all about? " Time wing/Tempus roared as he materialised before him. "Control? I thought you knew better than that!".
"Oh spare me the lecture" Manaquire replied in a bored tone. "If I play the tyrant for a few centuries, then maybe the lesson will sink in".
"But-but....Why?"
"Because old friend, you have been to merciful, and so has those pathetic princeses. It is time for these ponies to get a tatse for cruelty, whether they like it or not" he repplied seriously.
Before Time wing could argue he was dispelled from equestria and reappeared standing on a distant star with no way home.
Sunset was worried, after spending a couple of minutes trying to escape she had turned her attention towards the gemstone mirrors fused into the wall behind the stage, and after she had accessed their power she used them to scry on her friends and her heart sank as she realised things were worse than she thought.
Lyra was beig chased down by one of Manaquire's minions, Derpy was close to recovering, but it would stil take a couple of days before she was of any use, The Doctor was fighting a losing battle at the ruins of the time scribes And Manaquire had removed all hope of her ever succeeding in her quest.
Manaquire.....if you continue to do this you will be making a mistake, and as much as I know you need to face whatever consequences occur from your actions, I can't help but think something isn't right. I think..You might be the one who needs saving She thought as the events played out before her.
She then wondered about something and commanded the mirror to bring up the days date, and her jaw dropped in surprise.
"Oh you have got to be kidding me.." she said in disbelief, for the date that was revealed was her birthday.
Manaquire grinned in anticipation for his upcomng success, And he knew instantly that it was a cause for celebraation, in more ways than one.
As a slow piano note began to play his grin only got wider, he would definately enjoy himself.
"This day is going to be perfect, the kind of day of which I've dreamed since I was small" he sang, his deep voice matching every note perfectly. "Everypony will gather round, say I look lovely in my crown. What they don't know is that I have fooled them all..."
Back in the cave Sunset was torn what was to be done and began singing without a monents hesitation, if only to get it off her chest.
"This day was going to be perfect, the kind of day of which I've dreamed since I was small, but instead of having cake with all my friends to celebrate, my birthday wish may not come true for me at all..."
"I could care less about their stress, I don't give a damn about their plans, For my speech I'll be lying when I say, that through any kind of weather I will watch over them forever, the truth is I don't care for them at all...No I do not care to find a shred of mercy in my mind, But I still want them to be all Miiiinneee!"
Sunset raced around the cave trying to figure out how to get passed the barriers. finding no way out she started to panic.
"I must escape before it's too late and find a way to save the day, oh I'd be lying if I say, that I don't fear I may lose him to one who wants to use him, not care for, love and cheerish him each daayyy!"
She sank to floor in despair.
"For he is my closest friend, I don't want him to meet his end...Oh Manaquire...your life I will defend!"
Summoning up her strength, she cloaked herself in magic and used the full force of her weight to slam through the door, and still running she then cast a teleportation spell and found herself near the plains. seeing the giant, black three towered castle in the distance she bolted towards it.
Manaquire meanwhile had warped to Vardos and was making his final preparations to a stange machine in the depths of black stone castle.
"Finally the monent has arrived, for my plans to take their greatest stride!"
"Oh the castle I won't make he'll be making a mistake!"
"Manaquire will be...."
"This world will be....Mine all mine AHAHAHA!"
Happy birthday to me..this was just a bit of fun, and some character development, Enjoy please comment!
Manaquire looked up from his work in surprise as he heard the double doors of the main entrance slam open and was equally stunned to find Sunset standing at the entrance.
"Manaquire!" she yelled. "This ends now!"
He simply smirked at her boldness.
"Let me guess, you have realised what may happen to me if I continue, and being the bleeding heart you are, have come to try to 'save me' am I right?" he asked.
"of course! You'll end up doing something-"
"Been there heard that, anything else?" he interrupted with a smirk.
"W-well than I'll just have to stop you myself!" the alicorn declared.
"You stop me and all by yourself no less...how interesting" he replied.
"What you think I can't do it?" she asked, her temper flaring slightly.
He looked at her and saw all her frustrations, all her worries and fears and shook his head in disbelief.
"I know you can't, you are not only imcomplete as a pony, but you lack the heart the finish me, face it" he sneered "You are weak".
Manaquire could see the gears turning in her head as she not only interpreted his statement, but tried to work her next step.
"I-I'll.." Sunset tried to come up with something, but words failed her.
"You lack the willpower, firepower and allies to take me down my dear, your best hope is regain what you lost and start pushing your weight around a bit. So as a last bit of advice before I go to break those little ponies, ignore your rules and do what any other human would do in your situation then hm?" he stated.
"No I won't I.....I have no choice do I?" she asked.
"Embrace the darkness my dear, Time knows you'll need to in order to defend yourself against Celestia"
Sunset just watched Manaquire as he teleported back to Equestria, her plans, her hopes and her dreams crumbled around her as the sun began to sink downwards, signalling the end of the day.
Her heroes were either unaccessable or too busy facing their own demons, Manaquire would most likely destroy the very souls of the element bearers and as far as she knew the princesses and Discord were pretty much useless. She had started this journey with the hope of helping everyone she cared for, she had believed she could pull it off and save the day. But any shred of hope she still had was snuffed out by the truth, she lacked any total control over her powers, she had no cutie mark to define just what exactly she could do to help and to top it off her friends were all in danger with no way for her to help them.
Her throat felt tight as she tried to push back the tears pricking at her eyes. She sucked in a breath to try to stop herself from crying as the spiral of depressing thoughts around defeat and letting down her friends engulfed her mind. She sniffed and felt the pit of self loathing within her as silent sobs racked her body, she willed herslef to stop, to calm down but it was of no use the tears kept coming and it was only through her irrational fear of being reprimanded for shedding those tears did she cry quietly into the night.
Manaquire is right...just look at me I'm not fit to be a hero or even a freaking Alicorn...
It was these thoughts and many more that plauged her throughout the night while she trudged through the dimly lit plains into the eastern forest. Her hoof would catch a branch she couldn't see and she would tumble to the ground, only to continue her depressing monologue as she shakily got to her hooves and walked on. She payed no heed to the sounds and disturbances in the night, her purpose was to simply walk, she wasn't sure where all she knew was that she had to go somewhere, anywhere where she could be left in peace to sort out her jumbled mind.
And as her mouth registered the salty taste of her tears once more, her hoof slipped again and this time it sent her tumbling down a small slope into a rather large forest clearing. She didn't bother pulling herself up this time, tired and weary she curled up into a ball and slowly sleep began to ovetake her and with her cheeks and muzzle still wet with her tears she feel asleep and slilently hoped that things would be better in the morning.
Ok another chapter done, why aren't you guys commenting? i wanna know if you like it/hate it or don't really care. Come on people! Comments means more motivation to write!
Earlier that day...
Manaquire had teleported back to Canterlot's throne room to find Princess Celestia and all six element bearers waiting for him. He noted that they had the elements of harmony at the ready and upon seeing this, he smirked.
"So you found your precious elements, well now I can really have some fun" he stated with a grin and telekinetically flung Celestia to the other side of the room and erected an invisable barrier to keep her seperated from the elements and their respective weilders.
"Quickly girls use the elements before he has a chance to attack!" Twilight commanded but shrunk down in fear as Manaquire towered over them, a menacing grim on his face.
"You know full well they won't work the way you want them to Miss Sparkle" he said, even his formalities sounded dangerous to the group of mares.
"And besides" he continued. "You would have to attack the source if you ever hope to defeat me".
Before any of them could get a word in his eyes glowed and as he stepped away, Celestia watched as all six mares had glazed over eyes and an aura of red magic surrounding them as Manaquire got to work.
"Just what are you doing to them?" The Princess demanded.
"Oh I'm giving them their own personel nightmare that's all" he replied casually and waved a claw in dismissal.
"How can you just stand there and do this to them, what right do you have to torture innocent ponies like this?" Celestia exclaimed.
Her outrage was clearly visible as she rose to her full height and attempted to engage the dragon in combat.
"But how, that was raw magic.." Celstia was at a loss asto how he could have survived the attack.
"No Princess, that was nothing compared to the things iIve been through, believe me when I say there are far more dangerous beings out there" Manaquire replied but smirked as he noticed that his illusion spell was taking its toll on the main six.
"And now Princess Celestia your heroines are useless, your sister imprisoned and your greatest foe left to his own devices. So I ask you this, ruler of equestria, what now?" manaquire bragged as he lowered the barrier to allow the truth to sink.
Each of the six mares had undergone a severe mental transformation, Rarity and Applejack were sobbing quietly in a corner, the once proud and boastful Rainbow Dash was a quivering mass of fur and feathers on the ground, terrified beyond all sense of sanity, The once kind and caring Fluttershy was stiff and unmoving, her eyes void of any emotion, any compassion as if she was locked away in her own world of tragdey and finally Celestia locked eyes with her faithful Student Twilight Sparkle and calmly and quietly walked towards her and reached out a hoof to confort her.
"GET AWAY FROM ME!" Twilight screamed and scrambled away from her mentor as fast as her hooves could carry her.
This sudden out burst shocked Celestia and she once more tried to help her student.
"Twilight It's me...Princess Celstia"
"Oh I know who you are!" Twilight growled as a mix of fear and anger flashed her eyes. "And I said to get away from me, you won't come near me you here!"
Confused as to why her prized pupil was acting so strangely the princess tried all she could to reason with Twilight.
"Twilight please I'm not going to hurt you!"
"No stay away! STAY AWAY!"
"I-Twilight what is going on? Why are you acting like this?"
"No you won't come near me, not now not ever..I-iIwon't let you" Twilight's voice faltered as her fear of her teacher increased and she once more tried to scramble away, only to be met with the wall of the palace.
"Please Twilight..." Clelstia begged softly, putting every ounce of kindness into her words. "I promise i won't hurt you, i promise nopony will everhurt you, just stop, Please Twilight.."
Celestia reached out a golden shod hoof to her beloved and most precious pony...and reeled back in shock as Twilight slapped it away and teleported out of sight. Dejected and horrified at these turn of events Princesses Celestia could only stare at her hoof in shock as her mind tried to comprehend what had transpsired.
Manaquire watched the entire scene with a bitter taste in his mouth, he knew he had gone to far. He regained his composure and flashed a cocky grin at the downtrodden princes.
"Well what do you know, I win" he said to her with a tone of faked glee that nopony seemed to notice.
What all of them failed to notice was the disappearance of a certain pnik, party lobing earth pony...
i hated writing that..two sad chapters in a row yeesh...anyway please comment, and thanks for the 20-something faves, next chapter we go back to The Lyra Saga
EDIT: what was going to be the next chapter has been added onto Lyra Saga 1, next chapter is a whooping 1000 word chappie about stuff that i had a lot of fun writing!
Author's note: I had a few differnt versions for this chapter, but this one fitted the conversation without going off topic. other versions included Sunset meeting up with the Docotr and another hero of Vardos and the other version was Sunset meeting her future self..but yeah, Enjoy Please comment!
Sunset slowly opened her eyes-well eye as she could only see out of one- and found the vast expanse of space stretching out to eternity before her. She awkwardly climbed to her hooves and realised she was on a sparkling white surface that shone with a enchanting white light that complimented the sparkling stars around it.
This..this is a diamond..a gaint diamond..in space..
Her mind tried to think and understand where she was, and even in her tired and hazed state she was able to call up enough facts abouts about Vardos to know where she was.
"It's real..It's really real.." she said, using the moment to quote Doctor Who.
"I'm on the moon! I'm on the bloody moon!"
"Indeed you are Lunar Creator" an ancient voice that crackled and roared like a blazing fire stated calmly.
"Who-who are you?" Sunset asked, her voice slightly shaking. "and what did you call me?"
"It seems some things about this world have escaped you when you were brought here o' Ten Tails" the voice stated rather disappointedly
"Ten what now?"
"I will explain; the sun of this world is not a star, but the coiled body of the first and last golden dragon, I am that dragon and my given name is Ignis"
"Ok..so what does this have to do with me?"
"The moon of this world is, as you have noticed, made of diamond and gives off its own light and magic. This is because it is the enchanted Fox Ball of the Lunar Creator, a Ten-tailed Vixen who forged this universe from energy and song, I am sure you can work out the rest" Ignis explained.
"But Foxes don't exist on Vardos"
The mortal canines you call a fox does not, but the divine muti-tailed creatures do, or they did, before I became this world's sun it was the moon that gave light to both the day and night, it was the moon's light that plants evolved to feed upon and it the magic of the kitsune and other ancient beasts that controlled the ebb and flow of reality"
"So they died out or..Oh ooohhhh I'm a moron"
"Explain"
"Manaquire's people were wiped out in war and he ended up here, but that wasn't the case, his kind were wiped out but he survived, went insane and became the new force of evil for this world..wow this really is my fault"
'Despite the hardships of this worls you have tried to give the mortals times of peace. To the very first of the gods, Myself included, You are the origin of all that is good and evil, you have kept things in balance for eons and you must embrace this in order to prevail"
"But why?"
"The forces of Power and change constantly fight, while the power of balance keeps things right, This is an old saying from the Soul Dancer, even the symbol of our world, three swirls joined to form a triangle, makes it clear that there are not two opposing forces in this reality, but three"
Sunset closed her eyes and let her mind process this information and almost instantly something made itself clear to her. She opened her eyes and whirled around to face the sun; through some form of alicorn magic she could see the giant golden furred chinese dragon with a mane of flames and amber coloured eyes looking at her calmly.
"Manaquire is change, Tempus is power and I'm balance....something has changed the force of change itself and the force of power lacks the strength to stop it, so I must embody both power and change to set things right and save Equestria" she said, if only to reassure herself.
"And how will you do that?" Ignis asked.
"Well ok let's see, i need to the temporal abyss to gain power to stop manaquire, but I also need to aquire an even amount of darkness and light energy to allow a complete metamorphasis to control such energy" Sunset rambled.
"That was surprisingly easy to deduce wasn't it?"
"I have a knack for thinking up ways for the impossible to become possible...but still..."
Sunset faltered as memories of the day before surfaced. She looked up at the dragon as she felt a sudden warmth on her shoulder, though the mighty creature had not moved from his position.
I am normally not one for words of comfort But if its any help, you have both the heroes and villains of this world to turn to for guidence, the soul dancer is lost in his own inner darkness and the light moulder has been taken by rogue forces, that I'm afriad is all i can tell you "
Sunset tried to give a face to the titles ignis had supplied and two popped into her minds eye.
"Fester....The first hero and Rainbow...The Seven Tailed Vixen; goddess of the seasons..Ignis! Did you see who the Rogue one was?"
"All I saw was a False beauty that radiated life but held no compassion for others"
"that means it was...Auraka....I thank you Fire Mancer and may your light never go out" Suset thanked him with a bow.
and I thank you Lunar Creator, for showing us the light in the darkest of times" the dragon ofthe sun replied with a nod of his head.
As Sunset teleported back to Vardos to rescue her friends and end the mess she had created, the golden dragon curled up in space looked down at the world below. it was not a rounded sphere, but flat with the continent of vardos surrouned by the badlands on three sides and with the south openning up to a small beach, beyond the badlands to the west was the mirror realm, a place only heard of mystery and beyond it the rest of the plane was shrouded by fog which concealed things Sunset had yet to create or things she had yet to discovr on her own.
All in all Vardos looked like a painting in a novel from the viewpoint of space.
Sunset rematerailised in front of the frozen volcano, her face scrunched up in concerntration as she pondered what had caused the area to be covered in freezing snow and ice. her gaze drifted to the mountains in the west, memories of its inhabitants surged forth and she instinctively looked back the frozen piece of land before her.
It wasn't Wolfrena the ice queen, she has a peaceful relationship with Fire-ress and since Fire-res lives in the volcano there was no way she could have frozen it. Wolfrena's rival Priest Tirgora doesn't have enough power to do this but who could've-
The ground rumbled beneath her hooves and something emerged from a large chunk of ice. It was a long white serpentine-like beast with a white canine-like head with ice blue eyes and two long whiskers on the end of its nose that flowed and moved with the creatures movements. the short legs with four clawed toes on each werewhite and a long spiky dark blue, almost black mane ran down the entire length of its body.
"Oh Shit.."
"SO DRAGONFIRE YOU HAVE RETURNED TO FACE THE WRATH OF LORD CYCLONE" the dragon-like creature bellowed.
"I'm not Dragonfire" Sunset deadpanned.
The beast took a proper a look at Sunset and then decided to throw a tantrum in the most comical and un-evil posible.
"SO WHAT! DO YOU KNOW HOW LONG I'VE BEEN WAITING TO AMBUSH SOMEONE? I DON'T CARE WHO YOU ARE, I'M STILL GOING TO DESTROY YOU!" Lord Cyclone roared and charged at the dark blue alicorn.
Due to his immense size and being roughly as large as a skyscraper, Sunset barely had time to move away from Cyclone's line of sight. She ran as fast as her hooves could go as Cyclone turned sharply to follow her. she glanced behind her to see the beast's jaws openning wide and a feezing blast of snow and ice came roaring forth and headed straight for her.
She tumbled forwards into a tree as her body registered the cold blast. her legs and wings froze up and she struggled to stay conscious as her body went into shock from being unaccustomed with such low tempretures.
As the dragon prepared to fire a lethal blast of snow and ice, a ball of fire rocketed down from above and hit Cyclone on the nose and with a roar of pain and frustration he looked up to see his attackerwas yet a second alicorn
she was snow white with a flowing mane and tail of various shades of orange. she had dark blue eyes and regular suzed pegasus wings that was somehow keeping her aloft even though she was the same size as Princess Celestia. she had a long horn that spiralled upwards from her forehead. her cutie mark was a navy blue sheild with the image of an orange dragon curled around a sword.
"Dragonfire.." Sunset murmurred as she blacked out.
Dragonfire looked down at the smaller, unconscious alicorn.
"Of all the times to..ugh" she muttered, she sounded almost like an older version of Sunset but with less of an accent and slightly higher voice.
"SO NOW YOU MAKE YOURSELF KNOWN TO ME DRAGONFIRE!" Lord Cyclone thundered and turned his attention to her. "PREPARE TO FACE MY WRATH!"
"I really don't have time for you right now" she deadpanned and swiftly moved to the left as a blast of ice headed her way.
Dragonfire was a lot like Sunset in many ways, the same likes and dislikes, similar personality, they were almost identical. The main difference was that when Sunset doubted herself, Dragonfire knew what she was capable of, when Sunset hesitated, Dragonfire went in guns blazing. Dragonfire's origin was fairly simple, she was what Sunset wanted to be, Sunset had taken the good aspects of her personality such as her kindnes her loyalty and confidence and intensified those traits in dragonfire. She was more confident, more powerful and more beautiful than Sunset, but her flaws and weaknesses were exaggerated as well, due to having more responsibility than Sunset Dragonfire often had higher stress levels, more nervous breakdowns and brief of fits of insanity that could never befall her creator.
Dragonfire gracefully dodged another blast from her opponent and swivlled round to face him head on. her horn glowed with a golden light as she dived towards him. Surprised by the attack, Cyclone recoiled backedwards and attempted to move, but she was too fast for him and was hit by a scorching blast of golden magic.
Dragonfire flapped her wings to gain altitude and prepared for another dive when Cyclone's tail shot up from beneath her and wrapped itself around her like a python. With her sings pinned to her sides and her chest aching from the pressure she was pulled down to be eye-to-eye with the monster.
"SO IT HAS COME DOWN TO THIS MY MORTAL ENEMY. WHAT WILL YOU DO NOW?".
Yesterday shortly after Sunset left Black Stone Castle
Lyra was dragged through the halls of the castle and upon reaching a set of doors the wyvern that held her in his tail opened them.
"CARBROS WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN!?" a male voice with a slightly nasal neight york accent yelled from within the room
The wyvern adressed as Carbros frowned.
"Quiet Idiot I boight you a new toy" he snapped and swiftly threw Lyra into the room and slammed the doors behind him as he left.
the room was lit by simple torches that lined the walls, the black depresing stone the room was comprised off offerred no sympathy to the green unicorn. Lyra turned her attention to the rooms occupant and froze at its appearance.
Sitting in a dog-like fashion on a pile of straw was a teenaged black dragon with an alomst cat-like build. though it had no horns or spines to speak of Lyra assumed it was male judging from the voice she heard earlier. He had a swan-like neck and the head of a snake with slightly narrow webbed ears. his eyes were black ana to Lyra, they looked more pony-like with rounded pupils instead of the slits she knew Equestrian dragons had. his limbs were skinny and his bat-like wings were folded agaunst his back. his long tail curled around his feet in such a way that the white scythe-like blade on its tip was in clear view.
He raised an eyebrow at her in irrataion.
"What's the matter?" he asked rudely. "Never seen a dragon before?"
"Well um not one like you anyway" Lyra answered hestiantly.
"Damn tourists" the dragon muttered and roled his eys. "Anyway the name's Broc, who the hell are you?".
"Lyra" she answered "Lyra Heartstrings"
"Righty-o Harpo" Broc replied with a grin.
"Don't call me harpo" Lyra deadpanned
"Whatever you say, Minty"
"I really don't like you.."
"Nice to meet you too" Broc replied with a cheeky grin.
Lyra was woken up the next day by a fiece earthquake, she scrambled to her hooves and made a bid for the door. Broc fell off the windowsilll he had been sleeping on and after yet more foul langauage he followed after the green unicorn.the duo stood in a nearby doorway until the shaking stopped, and after slamming Carbros into a weapons rack the pair headed outside.
Lyra's heart skipped a beat as soon as she laid eyes on the wolf-headed serpentine-like beast that towered over the land.
"What is that?" she asked hesitantly.
"Long story short, something really eveil" broc replied and spread his wings and took off towards the monster.
Broc left the mare behind. He flew low and fast over the plains and soared upwards over the forest towards the volcano only to see another equine, a white mare with wings and a horn in the beasts clutches.
"Bout time you got here!" she yelled angrily and it was only then did he recognise her voice.
"DF? why the hell do you look like a rapidash gone wrong?" he asked.
"Now is not the time!" she snapped back.
Gearing into action Broc flew forward and zipped past the massive creatures tail and used his clawsto leave a series of deep gashes into the beast. It roared in pain and let its quarry escape, the white alicorn crashing to the ground with a dull thud.
"So Lord Cyclone is back huh?" Broc asked.
"Oh you just noticed" Dragonfire replied sarcastically.
Lord Cyclone wasn't to pleased with the sudden interruption and made a swipe towards the much smaller black dragon. Broc didn't see the massive paw coming his way and was surprised to say to least when he found himself hurtling towards a tree.
"Shit shit shit!"
Slam!
"Ow" Broc groaned as he slid down the tree. "I'm gonna feel that in the morning".
Lyra finally caught up and was shocked to find the black dragon covered in splinters and in a daze from his impact with a tree but out of the corner of her eye she spotted something blue.
A familiar shade of blue.
"Sunset!" she cried out and rushed over to fallen blue alicorn. Unfortunately for her this was thetime lord Cyclone had decided he had engouh interuptions and opened his mouth for one more icy blast.
TO BE CONTINUED
Author's Note
Yes there is swearing, deal with it.
Sorry for the late update, anyway this story is nearing its conclusion but there will be sequel!
if I get more motivation to write i might just set up a proper schedule for updating.
oh and pokemon reference yay.
Sunset awoke to find herself the single audience member of natures most spectacular light shows. a golden auroara danced above and glimmered with splashes of green, orange, red and blue and almost as if it were to thank the sole pony for seeing it in all its glory the heavenly lights descened to the ground and took the shape of a fox.
Though it was unlike and fox Sunset had ever seen. it had slightly longer legs, giving it an almost wolf-like build. its golden fur shimmered and danced in a nonexistent breezed in the same tempo that its seven tails elgantly swished to.
The fox's ice blue eyes seemed to look right into Sunset's very soul. And then, it spoke.
"Do you remeber me?" it asked and only then did the alicorn realise it was a female.
Sunset was confused, her mind was foggy, hazy almost like a dream. the fox semed disapointed.
"I assumed as much, I am Rainbow auroara, the seven tailed vixen of the seasons, of life, of time itself" it stated.
"Why are here?" Sunset asked.
"To help, or hinder considering your view of the world" Rainbow replied.
"Huh?"
"Things are spiralling out of control and even now you lack the power to stop it" the vixen explained. "I am here to ofer you a deal, as one of the highest forms of power on Vardos, not including yourself, Ican alter the flow of events and bring peace and harmony to equestria and vardos. For a price"
".....what do you want in exchange?" Sunset deadpanned.
"For you and Manaquire to sacrifice your poers and memories of these events and to be at the mercy of Princess Celestia you will both be sent to an alternate Equestria to fulfill whatever duty she shall give you"
"So even with the Vardosian failsafe in place I have to abandon everypony, and draconeqqus I know to end up in an unknown world?"
"With the full wieght of your human life before you" Rainbow clarrified.
"I....you know I'm not um the most friendly of humans right?" Sunset asked.
"While the losses and scarring you have as a human is not as terrible in comparison with other evils on earth..in equestria the life you lived is one of the most appalling, tragic instances to ponykind, I have organised so the world you will be sent to will challenge your fears and do its best to make you a betterhuman and pony" the golden furred fox explained.
"No" Sunset stated firmly.
"Why not?"
"Because well...ok so I may not have had to deal with the darker evils of humanity but I didn't exactly live the perfect childhood either I know I'm messed up and that is scary, really scary I know I have issues and i don't want to do a damn thing to change that because I've given up. I gave up years ago when slammed a 14 year old up against a wall and screamed at him to leave me alone" Sunset replied.
"I will not go into details, for you sake, but the offer still stands it is your choice" Rainbow stated and vanished.
When Sunset woke she felt different, not scared, not worried (she was surprised to find she wasn't in pain) as she stared up at the ginat monstrosity before.
She just didn't care.
This startling revalation resulted in a single conclusion. she was back to normal, back to her messed up self yet still an alicorn.
Time to god mod you son of a bitch she thought with a grin.
"Oi!" she shouted which in turn caused Cyclone to snap his mouth shut and per down at her.
Sunset chanelled magic through her horn and it sparked violently with a golden white aura.
"Vale" she said firmly and let the magic do its job. One second Cyclone was there, the next he was just gone.
"What the fuck just hapened?" a voice askedin shock.
Hang on I know that voice..
She turned around and lo and behold was a skinny runt of a dragon she knew very well.
"Holy shit good to see you Broc" she greeted.
The dragon before did a double take, his eyes wide in shock.
"No way!"
"Yes way" she replied to his outburst.
"you're here?"
"Yep" she answered with grin.
They shared a cheeky grin and proceed to glomp each other.
"About time you got here! when you just stopped the puppetry and stuck to daydreaming it kinda of a let down ya know?" Broc said.
"What can I say, I grew up" she replied.
"I know geez how long has it been ten years?"
"Um sory to interrupt but what the hay is going on?" Lyra asked as she walked to them.
Author's Note
Vale is latin for farewell, where exactly Cyclone went is a mystery.
more explanations next chapter oh Sunset and manaquire finally go head to head in the next few chapters..I think if you can't tell half the time I'm just winging with only a few points of the storyline planned out.
"So let me get this straight" Lyra began. "You two know each other because Broc, his sister, Ben and his sister all started off as hoof puppets that became characters in your everyday play sessions with friends as a foal and because of that they retain memories of their time in your life back home?".
"Pretty much yeah" Sunset clarrified.
"Right" the green unicorn replied slowly.
"So what now?" Broc asked as he leanded against a tree lazily.
"Well either we let everything play out until the high coucil intervene or..." Sunset began.
"Or what?" Dragonfire asked as she sat on tree branch above the others.
"I sacrifice myself to the golden vixen and she fixes everything" Sunset stated.
"You're kidding, please tell me you're joking" Broc said.
"Unfortunately I'm not..."
"Wait who's the golden vixen?" Lyra asked.
"I ain't saying anything" Broc stated in a 'not it' style voice.
"The golden vixen is the ultimate overseer of vardos, the bringer of time, of life itself, even though it was Sunset here that gave rise to the laws of the world, the golden vixen has almost as much power as her and much greater control" Dragonfire explained.
"She's also the most cunning, she never does something unless she gains something from it" Sunset elaborated. "Though that something can range from simply seeing a family safe and sound to someone giving up everything they own to her".
"Seriously?" Lyra exclaimed. "So if you don't surrender then.."
"Basically we're fucked" Broc commented.
"So what I do?" Sunset asked her small band of friends.
"It depends do you really want to let this world and Equestria suffer anymore if you can prevent it?" Dragonfire replied.
"Do you really want to finish this fanfic on such an anticlimatic note?" Broc asked.
Everyone else gave him a flat look.
"What?" he replied.
"Well I'll tell you what my parents, my friends and even the princess has told me" Lyra began. "Just be yourself".
"I know Lyra...but what if being yourself means you don't want to implement what power you have just because you fear it could make things worse?" Sunset replied.
"Sunset come with me please there's something I need to tell you" Dragonfire and glided down from the tree she was perched on and began walking to more secluded area that was out of earshot from the others.
"What is it?" the much smaller alicorn asked when she got there.
"Look you know as well I as I do that if you even try to confront Manaquire you will either be defeated or things could spiral even further out of control" Dragonfire explained seriously. "if you do nothing then lives-innocent lives as well as the lives of those you know- will be lost. You just can't simply fight and expect to win, you're not ready...Maybe it might be best if you took the deal that was offered to you"
"But-"
"I know" Dragonfire said calmly. "But you will see your friends again, you just won't know it and niether will they! Think about it a new start, you could make friends in this other Equestria, live the life you've always wanted. Wouldn't that be nice? You could finally be in a place where your fears and doubts are unwarranted, where there are others around to help you. heck you could even live a life there and maybe finally meet a nice guy huh?"
Sunset chuckled slightly at that but soon wilted.
"I don't handle change well you know that, plus with my past...I don't know, I could accidently offend someone or something.." she stated.
"Would rather deal with the pain of loss instead?" Dragonfire asked sadly.
Sunset sighed in defeat.
"Ok fine if there is absolutely nothing more I can do, I'll sing her song and become nothing"
"Even I know that reference was a half-hearted one" Dragonfire replied.
"Shut up" Sunset grumbled but she still smiled anyway.
Author's Note
Ok first off if you've read the fist chapter of the sequel and downvoted it..what the fuck guys? at least wait for the next three chapters before voting. if you haven't read that yet the first chapter is purely there to give an insight to our heroine and myself.
in case anyone missed the update the sequel to human nature is called 'to imprive human nature'.
kinda got writers block if i should go for the huge battle ending or something more calmer, i'll think about it.
read and comment yada yada yada. it's a hot day today so yeah.
Back in Equestria
Everypony continued with their lives in an almost robotic fashion. their eyes had misty, far off look as red most danced around them. Life was boring, predictable and jobs that ponies once loved had become as dull and repetitive as one of the royal guards.
High above the dreary lives of those in Canterlot Manaquire looked down at his victory. The elements and their bearers were useless, the god of chaos had vanished and the royal pony sisters were trapped under the same red haze as everypony else in Equestria.
Of course the dragon couldn't help but wonder of his defeat, ruling an enture kingdom was nice and all but if you've ruled one you've ruled them all.
He realised this was going to get very boring very quickly.
"Oh sweetie.." a voice sighed from behind him. "Must you do this to yourself?"
A familiar, yet at the same time uncomfortable pang twisted within the mad man's mind as he turned around to give a bored stare to the seven tailed fox sitting behind him in the doorway.
"I see you escaped" he replied in a shtern voice.
"And I see you have made an even bigger hole for yourself Manaquire. Must this all end in voilence?"
"What would do if you were my place Rainbow Auroara?" he asked her.
"You haven't said my full name in eons, things must be bad" the golden vixen stated.
"Cut to the chase, what do you want?" Manaquire snapped.
"A deal, your current exsistence in exchange for everything going back to the way it was" she stated calmly.
"Why?" He asked.
"Death is looming ever closer my love, this world has yet to bear the burden of vicious warfare and spilled blood of innocents"
"Again with your heartless riddles my dearest Rain? Surely you can do your part for free?"
"Says the rock calling the boulder grey" The fox replied with a smirk.
"Despite what you might believe, I am in no hurry to abdocate my new throne just yet" Manaquire said.
"I thought as much" Rainbow replied with sigh. "When you change your mind you know how to call me".
"You mean if I change my mind" Manaquire corrected but the vixen shook her head.
"There no 'if' this time around" she said and vanished.
Manaquire sighed.
Here we go again... He thought and braced himself for impact.
Princes Celestia and Princess Luna were awoken from their jaze clouded exsistence by the sound of a large blast fo magic coming from another room in the castle. They shared a look of surprise and hope for a brief moment and galloped towards the source of the sound.
Celestia slammed the doors open with magic andlooked at the scene before her only dimly aware that her sister was standing beside her also visibly surprised by this turn of events.
Manaquire was on the floor unconscious with the last dregs of sky blue magic fading from the back of his head from where he had been blasted. Standing behind him was a creature that could only be described in one word.
Divine.
A white quadrapedal dragoness standing a head taller than Celestia. her slim body and elegant swan like neck had the beauty and grace of a goddess. The angelic wings, slightly oval shaped snake-like headm feathered owl-like ears and long flexible tail with a feathered plume and its tip only served to enhance her features. the dragoness's blueeyes sparkled like gems and the long unicorn-style horn juting from her forehead spoke volumes of her might and power.
"You-You defeated him?" Celestia said when she found the nerve to speak.
It was at this time that the afore mentioned evil mastermind woke up.
"A word of advice ladies" he growled as he pushed himself up from the floor. "Run"
Knowing what he was capable of the two princesses backed out of the room ,while the white dragoness merely smirked at him.
"Does the madman really think he can challenge me?" the feathered dragon said. "You are a fool if you think you can challenge life itself"
"Ah but Life has no importance without the will to live now does it" Manaquire replied as started circling aroind her in an arrogant way. "To be honest Auraka I hardly think you deserve your tittle as hoddess of life when you plan on killing everything here".
Auraka fired a blast of sky blue magic from her horn, Manaquire deflected it with a wing.
"Petty attacks such as that will get you no where fast" he commented.
"Then say your prayers vermin" Auraka hissed. "For-"
"Last time I checked I was not a rat" Manaquire interrupted with a smirk.
Auraka was fumming.
"Be silent!" she screeched and her wings snapped open to their fullest extent. "I will not deal with your taunts any longer!"
"Does that mean you surrender? Because I can not bear to look upon such a disgustingly ugly dragon any longer" Manaquire replied.
Manaquire was promptly blasted into a window and crashed landed onto the street below.
he looked up to see Auraka had teleported herself to the top of the tallest spire in Canterlot and perched herself upon it.
"You may mock my plans, my desires but never, ever mock my beauty!" she roared and her horn flared to life.
It was only when she fired a red bolt of magic at him did Manaquire realise he had overstepped his limits and as the magic began to take effect he had one thought before he blackedout.
I'm too old for this shit...
When it all goes to hell Part 1
Somewhere on the streets of Canterlot five friends woke up to see grass and plants wilting, small animals dropping down dead, many ponies so weak that they could hardly move and strange blue trickles of magic coming from every living thing and leading to a single point at the top of Canterlot Castle.
"What's happenning?" Applekack asked Twilight while Rarity was busy attempting to calm down a distraight Fluttershy.
"Yeah and where's Pinkie?" Rainbow Dash asked as she hovered above them and searched the crowd for any sign of their pink friend.
Twilight looked around as confusion and worry etched onto her face. where were the princesses? Why was everything dying? She looked to see where the trail of the blue magical light stopped and came to a descision.
"I don't know girls but if we can find out what that light is, then maybe we can find Princess Celestia and get some answers" Twilight replied and with her friends in tow she headed towards the castle.
The five mares cast worried and nervous glances at the many ponies they passed that were struggling to even stay on their own four hooves.
"This is terrible" Twilight said. "What could be causing this?"
"The better question is why isn't it affecting us?" Applejack asked
The small group nodded in wary agreement as they walked on, each on trying her hardest to not let the situation affect her. Upon reaching the castle they had stop and look again at what they found. lying on the pavement was Manaquire, though he looked nothing like the charming beast that had enslaved them only moments ago; his scales had turned from black to pale grey, he lost a lot of weight and was almost skin and bone and he looked old, very old.
"Oh my...." Fluttershy whispered. "Is he...?"
"I'm not dead yet you simpleton" Manaquire rasped as he opened his eyes and barely managed a glare at the five mares.
"What happened to you?" Twilight asked and carefully approached.
"A very powerful death spell, though it didn't have the intended effect, it still did enough to render me useless, and I suppose those elements of yours must be sheilding you from the greater affects of the life draining spell..." he explained.
"Who...did this?" Twilight asked, clearly afraid of whatever was capable of casting such spells.
"A very vain, narcissic exiled goddess that wants to gain enough power to free her allies from prison so they can dominate the universe" he replied bitterly.
"Can't the Princesses do anything to stop all of this?"
"Not without cracking the planet like an egg" Manaquire said.
"What?" Twilight exclaimed. "But why?"
"Because my faithful student" Princess Celestia said wearily as she walked to them. "Equestroa has a delicate balance of magic and right now it is unstable. If Luna and I were to fight at our full potential it cause the world to shatter and break as the magic that keeps it functioning collapses".
"Princess! You look aweful what happened?" Twilight asked and ran up to her mentor.
"You and your friends are protected by the elements of harmony, my sister and I are not"
"Is there anything we can do?" Twilight asked.
Celestia looked over to Manaquire for an answer.
"Summon Sunset, if you can do that and convince her to fight, then we might be able to win" he stated.
"Might?" Rainbow asked.
"Auraka might be too powerful for Sunset to handle. If it should come to that, I have a back up plan" He answered.
"Well what is it?" Twilight asked, a small hint of hope in her voice.
"You don't want to know" was all he said.
"What do we need to do for the summon?" Celestia asked.
Back on Vardos the sun was setting and Sunset had spent the rest of the day prearing for the fight ahead, she knew it was going to happen soon and she knew she would need to be ready for anything.
She felt a gentle tug on her horn, like something was trying to pull her away from the world she created. Sunset took a deep breath and let the magic whisk her away.
When she appeared before Celestia, Twilight and the others she breathed a sigh of relief. When she turned around to find the life literally being sucked out everything and Manaquire rendered to nothing but skin and bones she felt the fear and panic begin to well up.
"Sunset? Sunset?!" Twilight yelled to get her attention.
"Huh?"
"We need your help...We really need your help" Twilight pleaded.
"Yeah you're the only one that can save Equestria from the evil dragon!" Rainbow added.
"Come on now sugarcube we can't do this on our own, we need your help" Applejack said.
"Applejack is right darling, you are the only one with engouh knowledge and power to stop that uncouth snake from destroying Equestria" Rarity added.
"Please..?" Fluttershy said.
Sunset took a step back, the severity of the situation sinking in.
"I-I'm not a fighter, I can't!" she proteted.
"You must!" Celestia cut in. "You alone hold the knwoledge to bring about Auraka's defeat".
"But-" Sunset began but was cut off by a sharp glare from Manaquire as he forced himself to his feet.
"What must it take for you to help them hm? Would you rather wait until one of them dies? When you have no choice but to help them. This happened because of the both of us, and by Tempus I have had it with your whinning and whimpering that you are nothing but a useless waste of space! Mare up woman and show that disgraceful worm who's boss!" he ranted.
Sunset looked at everypony there and slowly nodded.
"Ok I have a plan But I'm going to need a distraction..."
When it all goes to hell Part 2
"Ok I have a plan but I'm going to need a distraction..."
"A distraction?" Twilight asked.
"The elements won't work on her because she mainpulates positive energy, the life force of others, and the elements themselves emit that energy. If we were to use them on Auraka then that would only serve to fuel her more" Sunset explained.
"So what we do?" the lavander unicron asked.
"You girls need to keep her distracted while I'm going to see to it that Auraka is put in her place, with a little help of course" Sunset replied.
"Ok. Rainbow can you fly up there and taunt her, just don't get hit by her energy blasts" Twilight ordered. "Applejack I need you to rally any able bodied ponies to form a ground assault and Fluttershy you and Rarity can work together to build some sort of safe zone and help anypony that needs it"
"But what about Pinkie?" Rainbow asked as she hovered above them.
"Don't worry about Pinkamena, I'll find her" Sunset reassured the group.
"Well ok then but what about you Twi? What are you going to do?" Applejack asked.
"Somepony needs to keep things organised and the Princesses can't do it all on their own" Twilight replied with a confident smile.
The five bearers of the elements that were present said their well wishes and good luck's while Sunset raced off to another part of the castle.
"Sunset, a moment if you will" Princess Celestia called out.
The sapphire alicorn turned around to face the pony that raised the sun each day looking slightly confused.
"What is it?" she asked.
The princess walked up to her and gently nuzzled her and smiled.
"Thank you and good luck" Celestia said.
Sunset raced to another part of Canterlot and came to a halt outside the entrance to the sculpture gardens. her legs burned from the amount of strain she had put on them from her sprint to her destination and after resting a minute to regain her strength, she walked over to a familiar stone pillar and jumped onto it.
This was the stone pillar that Discord was once coiled around the first time he was imprisoned and with that knowledge Sunset activated her magic and with her wings spread wide, she started her spell...
High above, and still perched on her spire, Auraka looked over the land of Equestria and the large volume of magic and life essence she was recieving from its inhabitants.
"Soon my mother, soon you and our master shall be free and the universe will ours. From there perfect order will be achieved..." the white dragoness whispered.
"Hey ugly! Over here!" A voice shouted
However, her bliss was short lived. She whipped her around to find a blue pegasus with a mane and tail the colour of a rainbow smirking at her.
"Who dares insult me?" Auraka hissed.
"The name's Dash, Rainbow Dash, and boy are you uuuglly!" The pegasus crowed and darted around her laughing.
"You pathetic worm do you have any idea who I am?" Aurakaasked as her anger at this new intrusion grew.
"Princess Ugly face?" Rainbow guessed.
And thus began the tirade of insults from one Rainbow Dash as she mocked the dragoness from her looks to her abilities. But for the safety of our readers we won't repeat the unsults here should anypony attempt to try (and fail) to blackmail our villianess.
"And thirty chapters later the narrator breaks the fourth wall...bloody brilliant" Manaquire grumbled as hept an eye on the swooping and darting Pegasus as she swerved and dodged the blasts of energy coming from the horn of the now enranged dragon goddess.
"Should you of all creatures really be complaining?" Twilight asked as she walked past with a check list hovering behind her in a levitation feild.
"Since when were you even aware of the fourth wall?" He asked.
"Ever since Equestria started going to Tartarus in a hoof basket"
"So just now.."
"Yep" Twilight replied.
"...It appears the script has been thrown out the window...Why am I not surprised" Manaquire asked himself.
In a flash of blue light Sunset teleported next to him with Discord and Pinkie in tow.
"Because the first thing Discord does upon returning to Equestria is to decide that 'hey this is the second last chapter, let's break the fouth wall as much as possible'" Sunset stated in irration.
"Oh come now Sunset it's not all that bad" The draconeqqus replied.
"Um excuse me Sunset but um what we do now" Fluttershy asked as she landed next to Twilight.
Before she could answer, the conversation was cut off by a yell as Rainbow crashed into her like a bowling ball.
"Oops my bad" Rainbow said sheepishly and climbed off of the young alicron. "That evil dragon kinda swat me with her tail... and uh are you ok? I can't help but notice that you're really, really cold, like ice cold"
Sunset pulled herself to her hooves and shook her head to clear it of the dizzyness.
"I'm fine, just an after effect from the summon" Sunset replied.
"I hate to interupt but-" Rarity began.
"But things are starting to get real serious here!" Applejack called out.
"Ok, ok new plan....Discord?" Sunset asked.
"Consider it done" the spirit of chaos replied and snapped his eagle claw. from that single snap everypony shuddered as an unnatural wave of magic swept over the land. The group heard an avion-like screech and looked up to that the flow energy had all but stopped, but was so small that it barely gave off any light.
"What just happened?" Twilight asked as she lookedaround. Ponies everywhere looked healthier, plants were springing back to life, it was almost as if Discord had reversed the flow of energy.With a calculating eye, Twilight followed the trail of light from the Auraka as it travelled down towards past her and split into three braches of power leading to Discord, Sunset and Manaquire.
"What did you do?!" The purple unicorn demanded.
Author's Note
I think I pulled this right out of the 'Bullshit plotline' folder..anyway it's another warm day over here in Australia and don't worry i will have the next chapter done soon, just thinking of a good finale song for Sunset.
read and comment!
When it all goes to hell part 3
"What did you do?!" The purple unicorn demanded.
"Nothing much, just giving everypony else a chance to surivie this" Discord replied idly.
"Don't wory about it Twilight, just get everypony out of here and to somewhere safe alright? Leave Auraka to us" Sunset said gently.
"But-" Twilight began to protest.
"Go before she tries anything!" Sunset ordered.
"Sunset-"
"GO!" Sunset bellowed and used her magic to push the protesting mare away. the element bearers and the princess looked at the trio once before moving off to evacuate the city. With the others out of sight Sunset turned her attention to their opponent as she descened from her perch and landed before them filled with fury.
"You insolent peasants! You have ruined everything! You will pay for this!" Auraka ranted.
"Uh-huh" Manaquire, Discord and Sunset replied flatly. the response left the dragon goddess flabbergasted as her mouth opened and closed like a fish out of water in an attempt to reply.
"Now then she's distracted, Manaquire you and I will seal her, Discord I need you to go make sure everypony is ok" Sunset stated and stepped forward.
"You can't be serious" Manaquire. "I can barely lift myself let alone perform a space-time sealing spell"
"Ok then I'll do it myself just get back" the sapphire alicorn said.
"You take on her? Hah you've got to be joking!" Discord remarked.
"Rainbow Dash noticed that I was ice cold, and while I said that it was a result of spell, you two are smart engough to know better".
They fell silent for moment unsure of what to say. Sunset turned to them with a small smile on her face.
"It was nice having you two as friends.." she said softly as her horn glowed gold.
"Sunset you can't honestly be thinking of-" Manaquire began but Sunset cut him off.
"I have to, you've seen what would happen otherwise"
The spell charging in her horn was stopped as Discord grabed her and lifted her to eye level.She was surprisedby the mix of seriousness and sorrow depicted on his face.
"You don't have to do this" the spirit of chaos said calmly.
"Would rather see the alternative?" she replied.
"Ah but you seem to forget, I am chaos incarnate, I know the alternative"
"And that doesn't bother you?" she asked him.
"I'd prefer it be me rather than somepony I care about" Discord said sincerely.
"Of course you would..." Sunset replied
"You all don't care do you?" Auraka blurted as she gaped at the trio. "You don't care about me or your own lives een!"
"For starters I made a deal with a fox goddess so that I can help save everything, Manaquire can't permanently die and Discord is immortal" Sunset clarrified
"So you're just going to seal me? That's it?"
Discord raised an eyebrow as he set Sunset down onto the ground, the shock and uncertianty that raidiated of Auraka was amusing.
Sunset's horn began glowing again.
"This is the safest option for everypony..." she began. "With you sealed and unable to free your comrades things won't be so bad".
Flashback
Sunset sat atop the stone pillar her horn glowing with temporal energy. She could feel the ebb and flow of time, the many branches of fate and something else.
Something was wrong, a vile twisted power was forcing its way across time and space, robbing those who guided history of their powers and sealing the fate of the universe. Sunset saw, heard and felt the devastation of gods of vardos and the fate both they and all of equestria was condemmed to.
There was nothing but static and death, a sacrifice for a lost cause and the universe plunged into a kind of chaos that was nothing but a nightmare.
"When chaos rise and humans arrive the master of the mind shall come" SUnset chanted taking the will of the just and good and fusing it with her magic.
"When chaos dies and true love hides the master of the mind shall come"
She made Discord's demise never came to pass.
"He shall destroy the world.."
She stopped that, but only just.
"And he shall save it.."
She knew he couldn't, not yet.
"And when all is lost and gods have fallen..."
Time was runing out.
"And the heroes have quit"
She could feel hope was fading fast.
"His goddess shall stand tall.."
The final pieces were in place, all she had to do was wait, and then she would sing...
Flashback end
Sunset stared at Auraka, then looked at her own wings and the tip of her horn poking in her feild of vision.
"This isn't me...." she said and time stopped.
Everything, everywhere, froze with that one sentenece and Sunset caught her reflection in a piece of fallen glass. A sapphire blue alicorn with a slightly scruffy sunset orange mane and tail. She looked at her cutie, not even knowing when it had appeared on her flank. A circle with the top half resembling Celestia's cutie mark while bottom appeared to be the lower half of a full moon. In the centre were three dark blue swirls that came together to form a downward facing triangle.
"This isn't my talent..." she took a step back and took a longer look at the world around her. the flaws and inconsistencies became clear, the princesses should've been able to defeat Manaquire or at the very least imrpison him. By all rights she should be dead by now from Lord cyclone's attack or even the blast from the elements.
She blinked as she realised there was more wrong with her time here than she first realised, if she could walk on four legs perfectly fine then why couldn't she fly just as wel? Infact she should've been as steady on her hooves as a newborn foal!
Discord didn't once even try to mess with her or the element bearers, Manaquire shouldn't have been able to even touch the spirit of chaos let alone transform him.
Something was defintely wrong.
"This isn't real" Sunset stated. "This...This is.."
"This is all a nightmare!".
Sunset used a wing to sheild her eyes as everything was swallowed by a white light.
Author's Note
the final story arc has been extended for another couple of chapters. I have noticed that when i first started this fic there were 'inconsistencies' in character behaviour and the overall adventure. Rather than try to correct them and thus ad on the older chapters I decided to make this a part of the plot line that is all one big lie to begin with.
the line "This is all a nightmare' is a reference to 'Pokemon mystery dungeon explorers of time/space/sky. it is the line the main characters says when refusing to join Darkrai and realises it's all a trick.
So who do you think is mastermind behind Sunset's adventure? You'll find out whenever I have the motivation to write another chapter.
When Sunset opened her eyes she found she was back in Equestria facing down the evil life dragon Auraka.
"You will not win!" her enemy proclaimed.
"Why did I create you again?" Sunset asked herself.
While the dragoness fumed, Sunset looked around to find she and her opponent were the only ones there. Discord and Manaquire were nowhere to be seen.
"What the-? I couldn't have been gone that long.." she wondered.
Pain assualted her senes as something hit her in the back and sent her careening into the white dragon. Feeling dazed from the impact she was shocked when Auraka placed a fpot firmly onto her back and prevented her escape as a figure stood in front of her.
It was a light brown wolf with electric blue eyes, while his paws, face and chest were white. he smirked at her as his form glowed with electric blue energy. She shivered in fear as she recognised him.
"The corrupted one..." she whispered.
"You are correct Lunar creator, I am indeed Samuel Wolfgang, the corrputed timewalker, and you know why I am here don't you?"
"You wish is to corrupt me and spread your vision of perfect order across reality..."
"Precisely..." Sam replied.
The crackle of lightning hit her ears as the pain returned once more with a greater intent, her mind filled with voices that begged her, ordered her to give in, to give up. She had spent her whole life with people trying to change her, with murphey's law dogging her every step and hopelessnes eating away at the corners of her mind.
"I'm sorry...." she whispered. "My time is done".
Her horn glowed white and her cutie mark morphed into a gold flame a the image of a saphire blue dragon with orange spines and a white hide formed behind her. Auraka scrambled back and fired a red blast at her that should have ben lethal, but no damage was visible.
"What is this?" Sam exclaimed in confusion and quickly moved backwards as white cracks started to spread from the sapphire alicorn.
"When I was summoned to Equestria I was subject to it's laws" Sunset explained. "That held true when I was brought here to stop you".
"What do mean?" the wolf shouted angrily as he kept a careful eye on the cracks.
"Because my life, one in a world where friendship can be tossed aside like garbage, cannot exist in this world, where friendship and harmony are values that connect entire empires and kingdoms. My past, while not exactl physically scarring, has emotional scares that are considered truly horrific in this culture" Sunset continued. "Therefore by the laws of equestrian magic I should not and can not exist as a pony".
"And yet here you are"
"Wrong!" she declared, her wings spread to their fullest. "You see Rainbow dash noticed that I was ice cold, as did Princess Celestia, now anyone with enough knowledge on magic knows that a summoning spell does not cause the caster to experience extreme cold, no it was something else, I mean why else can't Auraka kill me huh?".
"No.." Sam whispered, the truth staring him in the face.
"I died as soon as I returned to Equestria, but to ensure that my death would not result in a total event collapse, The golden Vixen cast a soul containment spell on me shortly after I spoke with her...." Sunset said. "And as you know my exsistence here prevents this timeline from collapsing as long as I remain in my body.."
The cracks were spreading and had begun to trail up the alicorn's legs. Sam and Auraka looked on in fear as reality began to tear itself apart.
"By releasing the spel, I end this reality and all memory of my exsistence is purged from Equestria and it all goes back to the way it was before I arrived, and you two go back to your cages" Sunset said a smirk.
"No you'll stil die! No one would so foolish!" Sam roared.
"If I permently die, then Vardos does as well and I would never let that happen" she stated bravely and then looked up to the auroara dancing in the blackened sky above.
"I accpet your deal Golden Vixen, this has gone on for long engough" she shouted.
There was an earthshattering boom as blue and gold energy burst from her equine form and spread across the land. Her body felt heavy as she crashed to ground and let sleep overtake her as her glasses slid down her nose.
Author's Note
next up the mandatory 'happily ever after chapter' otherwise known as the epilogue.I plan to make that oneover a thousand words with musical numbers from Manaquire, Discord and our heroine..actually thw whole thing might be one big party with musical numbers, friendship lessons and cheesy declerations of love and friendship.
after that will be alternate endings, maybe an alternate storyline and different versions of older chapters, oh and character bio's.
feel free to comment.
Previously
"This is all a nightmare!"
Manaquire awoke to find himself surrounded by nothing but a vast, empty white space. He could feel something solid that resembled the ground beneath him but when he looked, there was nothing but white. It was starting to give him a migrane.
"Anyone here?' he asked in mild irrataion.
Just me a voice replied.
"Oh joy a psychopony..." the dragon grumbled sarcastically and he heard the unmistakable sound of a facehoof.
Why me.... the disembodied voice groaned.
"Well for one, you are Pinkamena Diane Pie and are most commonly associated with murder" Manaquire replied. "And secondly who else but a madmare would choose to watch over the void".
I really don't like you...
"That makes two of us"
Right..I'm sending you back, try not to destroy the world
"No promises" Manaquire replied with a smirk and was answered by another facehoof.
Sunset gasped as air was forced into her lungs, her chest throbbed as heart started to beat and her body elt numb and heavy. she looked around and spoted something gold lying on the pavement and with a mix of fear, worry and doubt she realised it was the golden vixen.
The fox's fur had lost its divine glow and six of the goddesses seven tails had vanished. She lay on the round unmoving and if it weren't for the subtle rise and fall of her chest Sunset would have thought she was dead. This realisation was followed by the fact that Sunset herself was alive . No longer was she one of the walking dead, nor was she a ghost, the pain in her chest and legs confirmed it, she was alive.
It felt wrong.
"What in Time's name happened here?" a new, familiar voice asked insurprise.
Sunset barely managed to lift her head and saw that it was Manaquire, who was back to full glory. she tried everything she could to move, to stand even but the weight of her limbs and the constant ache she felt across her body stopped her in her tracks.
"Well Manaquire, come to join the fun?" Sam sneered.
The black dragon took in thescene before him as Sam gloated. His beloved Rainbow had been stripped of her power, his creator was-
He looked again, the reality of what happened sent off alarm bells in his mind, Sunset was trying to move, to get up, the tired yet frustrated look on her face was evident to this.
"You forcefully revived her?" Manaquire hissed.
"Oh her? Why of course I did" Sam replied with a gesture to the now unconscious Sunset. "With her still alive this timeline continues to exist and my victory is secured!"
"Do you have any idea what you've done?" Manaquire growled.
"I performed the most heinous act in history, not even you messed with the realm of the dead" Sam gloated.
Their conversation was interputed by the sound of hooves pounding against cobblestone as six famiiar ponies galloped towards them.
"Ah Miss Sparkle. I'm glad you and your friends are here, I always like having an audience" Manaquire said to the group of ponies as they came to a stop behind him.
"Audience for what?" Twilight asked.
The ear to ear grin Manaquire had when he turned to face her sent shivers down the spines of the ponies present. the calm yet almost mad glint in his eyes soldified their fear.
"I little thing I like to call judgement" Manaquire replied calmly.
Warning Horror up ahead
In an instant Sam and Auraka found themselves peshed against a slab of granite by manauire's telekinesis as the dragon in question walked towards them with the joker-esque smile plastered to his face.
"You can't kill us! You know you can't" Sam roared the trace of fear evident in his voice.
"Who says i'm going to kill you?" Manaquire retorted. "When I can do so much worse!".
He burst into a fit of maniacal laughter as Auraka began to struggle against the psychic bonds.Noticing this Manaquire dragged her over to him with a mere thought, the avaion like dragoness stiffened as the madman examined her with a critical eye.
"Hm I can't kill you...."he said to himself in mild annoyance but his face brightened as he had an idea.
"I know, since you and your little gang of renegades tried to take everything I hold dear, why not return the faviour!"
"No..please no..." Auraka whimpered, all signs of confidence and bravdo gone from the dragonesses demeanour. "Please have mercy!"
"Manaquire you've frightened her enough, Stop this isn't funny anymore!" Twilight shouted.
"Yeah why are you doing this?" Rainbow Dash asked..
"Because she tried to break me" He replied in a sickly sweet voice.
"She tried to destroy everything that matters to me, my home, my friends, my family and even my creator..." He explained and then turned to Auraka with a frown.
"You really shouldn't have done that" he said to her.
There was a sickening snap of breaking bone as the delicate frame of Auraka's wings were shattered, pristine white feathers became stained with blood and fragments of yellow-white bone covered in blood and gristle poked out from key joints that were disfigured and bent in unnatural ways. This was followed in quicj succession by Manaquire grabbing her by the necj with one hand and using the other to gain a firm graps of the unicorn horn on her forhead. There was time to scream or uter another plea for help as in one quick motion the black dragon ripped the horn off her head and left nothing but a white stump that wasslowly leaking blood from where the nerve cluster at the base had been severed.
Auraka was nothing more than a whimpering, incomprehensible mess as her tortuer threw her horn aside and reached towards her chest cavity. The arm went through her via the use of some sort of phasing spell and she gasped as a twisting sensation filed her gut and her body felt likeit was going to rip apart. Manaquire pulled his arm back out, in his hand he held a large blue gem covered in a thin membrane of tissue and blood vessels. it pulsed softly al most like a heart beat. He tossed that too over his shoulder and it landed with a thud by the horn. With a dis pleased look he let his victim fall to the ground and rudely kicked her aside.
With new found glee he walked over to Sam who was still pinned to the rock.
"No..No NO!" thw wolf creid as the dragon got neaer and all attempts to escape failed utterly.
"Oh Yes Samuel Lupus Tempus...I have something specail planned for you"
"No Brother help me!" sam yelled in a painicked effort to escape whatever pain was about to head his way.
"Oh look Sam you're in trouble again and this time big brother isn't here to save you" Manaquire said. "Speaking of your brother he's a fan of old peace keeping sayings, I think you them yes?"
Without warning Manaquire lunged forward and tore out the wolf's eyes.
"See no evil"
With a swift Yank to either sides of his head Sam's ears were torn clean off, blood streaking down the wolf's face as he screamed.
"Hear no evil"
Sam attempt to cry out to say or do anything that would stop the madnes. Manaquire's claws sliced his throat open and pulled out the suffering canines vocal cords before he could react.
"And Speak no evil" The dragon finished, healed up he throat wound and tossed the wolf aside in same way he did with Auraka. With a wave of his hand his victims vanished to some unknown corner of the universe. Heturned to the six ponies that witnessed the events and in a red flash all traces of the torture session was wiped from their minds and all evidence of what had transpired disappeared from the area.
Horror Over
Author's Note
About what I said last chapter about this being the finale- I LIED!
Next chapter will the last for the main storyline, after that will be bonus chapters with alternate endings, plotlines ect.
Just in case you don't follow what happened, shortly after Sunset was sent back to santerlot Manaquire ends up in the 'realm of Pinkamena' after some quick banter he gets sent bak to find Sam as defeted the golden vixen before shhe could seal him and used dark magic to bring Sunset back to life and keep her alive despite equestrian magic trying to 'expell' her because she shouldn't be there in the guise of a pony.
necromancy on vardos is reanimating the bodies of the dead, the physical form of creature and bending it to ones will, the spirit is left alone, as it not needed. What Sam did was force Sunsets spirit back into her body and used his power to place her physical form in a 'loop' of something resembling a beating heart.
Manaquire gets pissed off at this, mainl because Sunset is emotionally suffering. so he goes all 'evil mastermind' on them. Since Sam and his brother Tempus (Known as gold timewing in this fic) are linked, he can't kill sam otherwise he'll kill Tempus. He can't kill Auraka yet eiher due to the fact that her presence keeps the balance between life and death stable.
So he tortures her instead, renders her powerless and blinds, deafens and mutes Sam before tossing them to aside to be collected by the high council later that day. Oringinally it was only Auraka that was going to be tortured but I decided I may as well do both to really get it to sink in, it might be overkill but hey, Manaquire is really mad.
Well here we are again..
And where is here exactly?
What you don't recognise this place Manaquire?
No
This were it all started, where I got blasted by the elements, where I first landed in Equestria.
Ah fitting then, considering
I know...so this is it huh? Our memories will be erased and we get sent to a new version of Equestria....
Pop! Hello everypony!
Huh I was wondering when you'd show up Discord.
'Sigh'
Well this is the final lchapter of the main storyline is it not? Besides I'm going with you!
Please no...
Really!?
What you think I'd want to stay around and risk Celestia using her 'faithful student' to stone me again? And let's face it, you wouldn't be here if it weren't for me.
Kill me now....
Oh lighten up, at least he'll be in stone fpr a thpusand years, Hey! maybe when I get to canterlot i can like visit you or something!
Well that would make things more interesting I supose
Cool!
......I'm surounded by idiots...
Excuse me?
Nothing, nothing!
Good. So are we doing the mandatory finale musical number or what?
Nope, I figured we can save the theatrics for te sequel, I hear the first musical number of the story is Eurobeat Brony's LUNA.
WOO!
Shouldn't we do a proper thank you to the readers or something, this is the last we'll see of each other for a long time
Yeah you've got a point, I guess I'll start. Thanks to everyone who read and favourited this story, I think on behalf of the alternate version of me who's tpying this thing I can honestly say it was a blast sharing this adventure with everyone.
And although it got a little crazy attimes, I hope everyone who read this liked the ideas, jokes and characters that made an appearance in this little tale of ours.
Ok that should do it, your turn Manaquire.
For those of you that the rather 'out of character' rampage I went through last chapter, i would like to say that if i managed to unereve some of you, then that means i did my job correctly.
The purpose of that brief stunt as a b-grade horror movie villian was to give the story an ending fitting of Vardosian lore instead the sappy, predictable and cowardly speech that Sunst orchestrated.
Hey!I'm just being honest. Anyway you won't be seing me again, but there might hints of my personaility in some powerful unicorn somewhere in Equestria, so keep an eye out hm?
Right that's it I'm doing any of that feelings sap
Well I suppose it's my turn then, You will undoubtably be seeing me again, and don't think my actions in 'the return of harmony' are going to be the same this time either. Oh no I have the upper paw now and This time Celestia won't be able to save her precious luttle Dusk Shine from my chaos
Wait did you say Dusk Shine?
Keep an eye out for 'to improve human nature'
Wait DIscord-
We'll see you then!
Wait you guys-!
Author's Note
the bit in bold, italics and inderline was both Discord and manaquire saying the same thing.
I might do a revised version of this later i dunno, i did have a longer conversation and way more fourth wall breaking in the draft but I kinda forgot most of it...
Manaquire strode about Canterlot as ponies of all kinds ran and cowered in fear.
"You monster what did you do to my sister!" A voice yelled out from behind him.
He turned to see a white unicorn stallion with a blue mane and tail. his cutie mark was a sheild with a familiar pink starburst onit.
"Ah Shinning Armour a pleasure to meet you at last" the dragon greeted.
"You-You evil creature how dare you harm the princesses, how dare you hram Twilie!" the captain of the royal guard roared.
"You do know I could do much worse than this right?" Manaquire asked.
Shinning stopped mid charge and gaped.
"What?!" the stallion asked.
"Oh it's quite simple you see.." Manaquire replied as string instruments began to play.
"When the Devil is too busy, And Death's a bit too much ." Manaquire sang. "They call on me, by name you see for my special touch "
In a flash he appeared right infront of a small crowd of ponies that had gahthered.
"To the gentlemen I'm Miss Fortune, To the ladies, I'm Sir Prize ".
"But call me by any name Any-way it's all the saaaame! "
As the music picked up into a steady tempo Manaquire sauntered around, occasionally frightenning a few pnies while he sang.
"I'm the fly in your soup,I'm the pebble in your shoe"
'"'m the pea beneath your bed, I'm a bump on every head"
"I'm the peel on which you slip, I'm a pin in every hip"
"I'm the thorn in your side. Makes you wriggle and writhe! ".
In a flash he teleported to the top of a fountain the town square and struck a pose.
"And it's so easy when you're evil! This is the life, you see! The Devil tips his hat to me! "
He reappeared before Shinning Armour with a grin.
"I do it all because I'm evil, And I do it all for free! "
There was a pause in the music as Shinning continued to stare at him.
"Your tears are all the pay I'll ever need! " he sang with a smirk.
"You're terrible!" one pony stated.
"Why thank you" Manaquire replied with a leering grin.
"While there's children to make sad, While there's candy to be had" "While there's pockets left to pick, While there's grannies left to-trip-down-the-stairs" "I'll be there, I'll be waitin' round-the-corner" "It's a game, I'm glad I'm in it,'Cause there's one born every minute "
"And it's so easy when you're evil! This is the life, you see! The Devil tips his hat to me! "
"I do it all because I'm evil, And I do it all for free! "
"Your tears are all the pay I'll ever need! "
"I pledge, my alle-giance toooo all things dark! "
"And I, promise on my dam-ned soul to, do as I am told, Lord Beelzebub has never seen a soldier quite like me "
"Not, only does his job, but does it happily ".
With a mad grin he stalked around the now terrified ponies.
"I'm the fear that keeps you waked, I'm the shadows on the wall. I'm the monsters they become, I'm the nightmare in your skull. I'm a dagger in your back, An extra turn upon the rack. I'm the quivering of your heart.A stabbing pain, a sudden start "
"And it's so easy when you're evil! This is the life, you see! The Devil tips his hat to me! "
"I do it all because I'm evil, And I do it all for free! "
"Your tears are all the pay I'll ever need! "
"And I do it all for free! Your tears are all the pay I'll ever need! And I do it all for free! Your tears are all the pay I'll ever need! "
The music begun to slow down and the black dragon singing his heart out looked almost remoreseful.
"It gets so lonely being evil...What I'd do to see a smile, even for a little while. And no-one loves you when you're evil... "
He flashed the group of ponies a mad grin once more.
"I'm lying through my teeth! Your tears are all the company I need! "
Author's Note
After my good friend showed me 'when you're evil' by voltaire I just knew this would be Manaquire's theme song, so I just had to write a scene with him singing it.
enjoy this little 'deleted scene' of a chapter.
The Adventure Continues (Sort of)
Sunset could only stare at the farewell party Pinkie had thrown for her, it wasn't a huge party that included the entire town of ponyville and, much to her surprise, almost everypony, dragon and creature she had met during her time here was present. Tables ladden with food, a stage with a band playing music and decorations sporting her mane and coat colours decorated the small forest clearing where it was being held.
"Hay there guest of honour!" the pink pony in question said cheerfully. "Like it?"
"It's really cool Pinkie, thanks" Sunset replied with a smile.
While our heroine went to mingle, a certain blck dragon was having a serious conversation with he seven tailed vixen.
"So we just saved this world for nothing?" Manaquire sighed and resisted the urge to facepalm.
"Unfortuately yes, the corupted one is slowly, but surely destroying this, and all other timelines connected the two of you" the golden-furred goddess replied. "With Tempus unable to stop him and my power unable to counter him there lies only one solution".
"No" he deadpanned.
"Sweetie please see reason-"
"You call erasing the creator, then fusing Vardos and Equestria into a fused time loop to save our universe reason?" Manaquire asked.
"The creator you see is one of many" she replied. "A mere echo created in a parraellel universe by another version of herself to exist in this timeline, even the one you call dragonfire was avariation of her from long ago".
"Yes I know, but a fused loop!" he exclaimed. "If I go throwing around that kind of power who knows what would happen!".
Manaquire sighed and looked down at the ground.
"Isn't it already bad enough that our world is unheard of by those who already know so much about Equestria? to see a complete fusion of two timelines, one of which is unheard of could very well cause haos amung other universes..." he said.
"I think the fandom can handle some originality dear" the vixen stated.
He glared at her.
When the flow of time has come undone. Two worlds shall become one. History re-lived with new roles for all. New friendships are made to change destinys call.
In a world where friendship is magic and nature controlled. A hero of vardos shall watch events unfold. From the Nightmare to Discord and other such beasts She'll grow in body and mind and tackle newfeats.
A princess of friendship shal wonder a place Where its magic and creatures are of a different race. The magic of friendship will not be enough She'll learn new powers, lpre and all kinds of stuff.
Two worlds so different, yet some parts are the same. Facing foes, playing a mad god's game. Bonds will be tested, new adventures ahead. when two heros are thrust down the other's instead!
Author's Note
This just a trial run for an idea, the main heroine of Vardos (Not me) takes the role of Twilight Sparkle and vice-versa. Originally Human Nature was going to have all six heroes of vardos team up with the main six to defeat the badguys, but i felt that introducing that much original content was a bit much for the fandom to take, so you ended up with the previous chapters.
The part about the timelines being destroyed was me fitting a reasonning as to why fics like 'Surprise' and 'to improve human nature' got cancelled and well, I needed an excuse to do a time loop sort of fic set in this universe....
Please don't hate me...if you guys like this idea I'll write it up....
Terminology, Refernces and Random Pies
This is for anyone- or should I say anypony- who well…has wondered about the human in Ponyville theory.
You want to know why I’m writing this. Really? Ok then well it all started after watching the return of harmony parts 1 and 2 (twice) and thinking that Celestia’s explanation of what Discord did a thousand years ago didn’t really match up to what he did in the show…turning the world upside-down can’t be that bad right? I mean-
(Download interrupted)
So sorry to interrupt...Oh wait No I’m not sorry, far from it actually.
What the hell?
Ah yes hello my little human so good to finally meet you, and a big loud hello to any stunted apes with the same mindset who is reading this ‘lovely’ piece of work here.
I’ll say…er write this again (as it seems my computer is talking to me...Or I’ve finally lost my mind) what. The. Hell?
If you were insane my dear I would not be here, no your computer is not talking to you, nor are you insane or dreaming, I believe I could be interpreted as a split personality. You’re opposite so to speak.
Ok…my ‘opposite’, who ironically enough has the same writing level as me, just a different way of using terminology…so you are an anti-me?
That is putting it simply. I am almost everything you as an individual human and as a human in general, are not.
Huh?
Use your head for something other than video games and calculating you budget for a day out. Can you do at least that?
I repeat, huh?
Oh honestly, you as a human, as a member of your species has been raised to show kindness, generosity, honesty and loyalty to your own kind and to other animals, does that sound familiar with this story’s current category.
The Elements of harmony?
Yes good human, the elements of Harmony, the human race has those values, but Humans have much more than that, the darker side of human nature you could say.
You mean like greed and hatred and stuff?
That and the darker parts of one’s persona that make them capable of performing things frowned upon in your society, Murder, Rape, Theft…just to name a few.
And those things don’t exist in Ponyville?
No the first two are virtually nonexistent, as the circumstances to create motives for those do not and never will exist in pony society, accidental deaths do happen, things such as jealousy, rage and lowered empathy levels In the brain just do not happen in a world where the worst things that can happen is weather turning into confectionary.
Heh he fairy floss clouds with chocolate milk rain…that would be awesome.
I know right? Anyway we are getting of topic; the thing is, since such ‘human’ behaviours are nonexistent, a creature of you kind would be the very end of such a ‘gag’ happy and orderly world.
Wouldn’t it depend on the individual who ends up there though?
Hm good question…want to find out?
Ah I see you readers are still here, the author is...currently unavailable, and I must be going I have cotton candy clouds and chocolate rain to spread back in Ponyville, Ta-ta my little humans!
I’m in Equestria…
Yes Yes you are
Holy crap I’m a human in Equestria!
I think we have established that fact already.
Discord? I can hear you but I can’t see you, and why is there a laptop typing everything I say?
I thought the other members of your species would want to know what happened to you, I do not need your world’s military ruining my plans. Also turn around.
You have plans?
Is it really that hard to believe?
You’re Discord, spirit of chaos and disharmony hello ring any bells? Chaos and planning don’t exactly go together.
Neither do cotton candy clouds and chocolate rain, but here they are. And did you just alter one my lines from the show?
Eeyup.
You did not just say that…
I said it all right, humans rule and Discord drools.
Oh do they now? Let’s see if I can turn the tables on this shall I?
Hey what are you doing wit that pie- MY HAIR!
And that is why you should never mess with the spirit of chaos kiddies.
My Hair!? YOU RUINED MY HAIR!
Do you have any Idea how vain you sound right now?
God damn it Discord you-
Now I’ll cut you off there Human, since you are clearly not on your home planet any more, I suggest you use the correct terminology.
But my hair….
Stop your whining already it can be washed out, or do you want cotton candy mixed in there as well?
Keep the fairy floss away if you know what’s good for you.
We are in Equestria use the correct terminology will you?
I’m Australian; I am using the correct terminology!
But you are not on your planet anymore so please for the love of chaos say things properly!
Make me.
I could turn you into a pony, and then you would have no choice but to use this world’s terms.
How would tuning me into a pony cause that?
The ancient magic of this world has certain laws that not even I can break, one of them being that human behaviour and terminology must not exist, and everypony will speak using terms that are meant for ponies.
Then wouldn’t my presence break the rules?
Why do you think I brought you here in the first place?
Oh wow I knew it! Cotton candy clouds and chocolate milk rain! Yippie! This is the best day ever!
Did you just hear-?
The element of laughter? Yes I did.
Gasp! Discord! So you’re behind the wonderful-but evil- chocolate rain? I knew it! Hey who’s that with you? It looks like a weird monkey. Hi monkey! I’m pinkie pie! What’s your name?
What is Pinkie doing here?
Well the chapter name did say something about random pies.
Oh! oh! You have pie? Can I have some?
Uh….?
Oh no wait! there’s no time for pie. Discord’s back! I have to go tell the princess! Gasp! I have to get the others and wield the elements of harmony and stop Discord! Again! Then that means…Oh my gosh! the weird monkey is something Discord summoned! it must be some weird evil chaos spreading monster! You wait right there I’ll be right back!
She said that so fast…with so many exclamation marks…
That’s the element of laughter for you.
Discord?
Yes human?
We are so screwed aren’t we?
Maybe, but you can never be too sure.
And why is that?
Because I am the spirit of chaos and disharmony, if anyone can get us out of this, it will be me.
Right…we’re screwed.
Oh ha hah the readers can just about see the deadpan in your voice.
Lovely...Oh look here they come.
This is Discord and the human signing off!
Twilight walked down the road towards Canterlot with Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash in tow, after meeting the others on the way the Mane Six had decided to deal with their family issues first and them meet up at Equestria's Capital.
"I can't believe that creep! ponynapping Sunset like that" Rainbow argued, kicking a rock in her frustration.
"I know..I just don't understand why though?" Twilight replied.
"Do you....Do you think she's ok?" Fluttershy asked.
The three ponies turned around as they a snort of laugher, only to find Manaquire standing behind them.
"Oh please like I would bite the hand that fed me.." he replied.
"What have you done to Sunset!" Rainbow charged towards him, only to crash into a tree as he vansihed.
"if you think I captured her to harm her, then you are sorely mistaken" the black dragon stated as he reappeared in front of them.
"Then why?" Twilight asked.
"You'll see" he replied with a smirk, then he became serious once more. "But that's not why I'm here, it seems Applejack, Rarity and Pinkie Pie have their own troubles don't they?"
"How do you know about?" Rainbow demanded.
"Who else would? After all i was the one who flooded the rock farm, sent the flyer to Rarity, and created the storm that wiped out an entire farm" He bragged.
"But that's just-" Twilight began, lost for words.
"-The tip of the iceberg, Miss Sparkle, I have far more planned ahead, which brings us to the main reason I'm here. I give you a choice; you can soldier on as it were, and wait for your friends, or you can face my first set of challenges to save your friend, the princesses and the entire kingdom" Manaquire explained.
"Challenges?" Rainbow asked.
"In order to face me, you must prove your worth, if you fail then Sunset will have to find her own way to help you, if you pass, your little human rejoins you for the final confrontation, so what do you say?" Manaquire asked.
Author's Notes: short chapter because I feel like crap, so anyway you'll find out more about Sunset next chapter, working on 'Surpirse!' right now because I find it easier to write while being tired as hell.
Feel free to comment
Sunset was surounded by white. There was no distinction between where the ground ended and the sky began. there was nothing but white, it hurt to look at it so she closed her eyes.
"Where..am I?" she wondered out loud.
Where do you think? a voice replied. it sounded female a bit deeper than pinkie's but higher than say, Princes Luna's.
"Who are you?"
I'm the mare who watches over and repairs the fourth wall
"Uh...What?"
What you know as the fourth wall is barrier of energy between all dimensions, by breaking it you can see and know things that lay beyond that barrier. It my job to ensure that each time it is broken it does not reach the point where it can no longer maintain itself and cause total event collapse the voice explained with an air of maturity and wisdom.
"The entire Multiverse?" Sunset asked
Pfft don't be stupid. I only watch over a small portion of it. I'm not the only one you know
"Oh right sorry, so are we in the fourth wall?"
Yes, I had to bring you here so your little revelation didn't shatter my section of the multiverse
"Sorry"
It's fine, you have an intersting mind you know. Tell you what, I'll send you back so you can make that deal with time weilding vixen if you promise to be my friend in your new life alright?
"Ok Pinkamena"
Oh you're good, nice meeting you Sunset Moonfire*.
Author's Note
this a short stand alone chapter, I feel that adding anything more to it would ruin it.
enjoy
*the name sunet moonfire is a reference to the sequel of this story.
