Chapters Subject: Shadow Shield
These were the words I read on the document. I was a target in this wretched place. As flattering as it was that I would have been given transportation heedless of my previous actions, I visited on my own accord. This was concerning though. I was sent on a mission to investigate what this place was. I had assumed I was picked for my expertise in this field, but I fear there was some other agenda being fulfilled.
The place in question was a cavern, either created or overrun by diamond dogs. It smelled like tar and liquids dripped from up top. I had seen many diamond dogs lurking around, but it seemed they weren't guarding anything, or even expecting company. I had assumed from this document that it was a trap, but no paws had attempted to detain me.
Confused, I tucked the document under my armor and continued to lurk around. Hearing some dogs, I hid behind a large rock protruding from the ground. I listened to their steps, and soon heard voices as well.
"So what's the job you picked up again?" A voice rang out, one which certainly belonged to a diamond dog. It made sense for diamond dogs to sell out to the highest bidder. undoubtedly for something petty like gems.
"Shadow Shield. We've got to capture him." A second voice. Deeper, but certainly of the same species.
"What, we can't kill him?"
"No, we can hardly even hurt him."
"What bonehead gave us this job anyway?"
"Kunik."
Kunik. Kunik. I ran the name through my head but to no avail. I collect info for Equestria, I just hoped I hadn't screwed over the wrong pony. Still, something bugged me. Why would he want me almost untouched? If they were going to interrogate me, then being nice was the least of their concerns. I just hoped I wouldn’t find out what they were going to do. The document itself seems rather out of place too. it was wrapped in cloth when I found it, which was rather odd for someone whose standards were a smell cave. and it just seemed too… neat for diamond dogs. It was probably from Kunik.
What they talked about afterwards was useless to me, so I began to inch away. I needed to get out of here and get what I know to Shining Armor. He would probably know who Kunik was.
As I approached the entrance I came through, I could hear hoof steps and something being dragged along the ground. again, hiding in silence, I listened in.
“Where should we put her?” Another Diamond dog piped up.
“Kunik said to put her in a cell.” I nearly jumped when I heard that voice. It clearly did not belong to a diamond dog. I peeked around the rock and saw something that sent chills down my spine. It was a griffon, strong in posture. It’s eyes were tinged purple with a green glow. I’d seen that before. Without a doubt it was dark magic. It’s face looked bruised, like it had recently been in a fight. The body being dragged was a pegasus. She had a pink coat of fur and a green main.
I knew nothing of her, however I needed all the information about the situation I could get. I decided to follow them and wait for an opportunity. I had no weapons but I wasn’t defenseless. My armor was black, thick and most importantly quiet. I had a noise grenade, and a flash bang in case I got spotted. I was also rather adept at magic, but hardly anything that hurts. I did know how to pick locks, So I was probably going to pick the cell door unless I came up with a better plan.
Following was rather easy, as the cells were not a common place to hang out, and with the even worse oder, it wasn’t hard to tell why. It also seemed uncomfortably easy to get grabbed by a prisoner reaching between the bars. I just strode confidently by the cells and none of the prisoners gave away my location. I wasn’t sure if it was because they thought I worked there or out of spite to those that did.
“Are you alright?” I whispered between the bars after I was sure no one could hear me. Her eyes slowly opened and as she regained consciousness.
“Wh-what? What did you say?” She mumbled, rubbing her eyes.
“Are you alright?” I repeated.
“Yeah. No! You can’t keep doing this!” She seemed a bit more awake now.
“sh! I’m trying to break you out!” The other prisoners seemed to perk up at that.
“Oh. Then we need to hurry!” she frantically whispered.
“Here, I’ll pick the lock.” I started doing so with my magic.
“How much do you know?” She asked me.
“Not a ton.”
“Did you… find any documents?”
“Yeah, why?
“Good, we’ll need it.”
“Why- Got it!” The door swung open as I pulled. A big sense of relief came between the both of us.
“Good job there kiddo.” I froze in response the voice behind me. Slowly turning, I realized it was just a prisoner. A diamond dog, rather old.
“Uh, thanks.”
“Let me out.”
“Are you crazy?”
“Why do you think I’m in here?”
“No.” The mare I saved gave a look I couldn’t quite distinguish.
“You’ll regret it.”
“Still, no.” Realizing what he meant, I suddenly comprehended the look the mare gave me.
“GUARDS!” The prisoner yell at the top of his lungs.
“You idiot!” She hissed.
“Do you know how to fight?” I hissed back.
“Yes.” She continued in our snake imitation tone.
“Is that-” One of the diamond dogs began, before being rammed in the chest. Distracted, I rammed the other one with my full body strength. The armor doing most of the work for me, he fell down in pain.
As if satisfied with my performance, she nodded at me and began running towards the exit. Something that seemed rather strange for someone who hadn’t seen the way in, but now was no time for suspicion and hoof pointing.
I joined her, sprinted towards the exit. As we passed through a large open room, a shadowy figure sprung out from behind one of the rocks, pinning the mare to another rock.
“Gah!” She yelled. I darted over to the shadowy figure, and started pulling it off of her. eventually I pulled hard enough to yank it off, and see it was just another diamond dog.
“Look behind you!” She pointed out. we were surrounded. ambush. “Do something!”
“Like what?” I asked.
“I’m not the one with the equipment!”
“This wasn’t supposed to be a rescue mission!” They were beginning to close in on us.
“That!” She yelled, pointing to my flashbang.
“You sure?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“This is going to in ring your ears badly.”
“Just do it!” They were closing in pretty quickly.
“...okay.” I pulled out the grenade with my hoof and bit out the pin. “Cover your eyes.” I threw it down violently and everything went quiet for a second. Nothing could be heard but the ringing in my ears. I felt a hoof pulling me, and knew it was my new friend. Everything faded in and we were far away from the pack.
“You seemed alright considering- oh my…” I looked into her eyes and saw the purple tinge and green glow that was on the griffon’s. “What is…”
“It’s why they wanted me.”
“But…”
“I’ll explain AFTER we get out of here, alright?” I didn’t respond. as we reached the exit, the only thing guarding it was the griffon I saw earlier. He was staring to the outside, before locking a glare at us. I gritted my teeth, expecting the worst. The mare braced for impact.
“Go.” The griffin urged. bewildered, I was speechless, and for once the mare was too. “Did you not hear me?”
“Uh… right! let’s go then.” I announced.
We trotted off and finally breathed fresh air after so long...
“Your diamond dogs are incompetent. They just let Shadow Shield walk on through like he owned the place.” I explained to Kunik, arms crossed.
“I expected no better from them. They were the cheapest I could find. What I’m more interested in is why you didn’t stop them.” He asked. He didn’t seem angry, but with him it was hard to tell these kind of things.
“I was already out of there and back on my way back here. I only know because I headed back when I heard the commotion.” I gritted my teeth as I told my lie, but relaxed when he seemed to buy it.
“Shame you weren’t there. your taste for blood would have been helpful.” As we spoke, a diamond dog approached the office like room we were speaking in.
“Sir, Shadow Shield has escaped with the prisoner.” It spoke as it walked in. I wondered if he drew straws between his friends to see who got to tell the bad news. Kunik had a reputation. Most of it was nasty rumors, and few were true.
“Oh? and who let that happen?” His voice remained steady and calm. Despite this, the diamond dog shuttered when he was done speaking. Kunik wasn’t evil, but he sure as hell was intimidating. I might’ve been intimidated too if we weren’t good friends.
“M-m-m-me sir.” The diamond dog muttered, hardly able to speak. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t enjoying it.
“Your honesty is… Helpful. I suggest you leave.”
“oh, and-”
“Now it’s an order.”
“Yes sir.”
“You too Chronicks.”
“Sure.” I left the office-like room as instructed, and walked down the hallway. I was looking for Onerra. If there was anyone I could talk to uninhibited, it was her. She was my best friend and she didn’t trust Kunik. Those were some views I needed right about now. I walked into my room, deciding to rest before continuing the search.
“Why’d you lie to him?” I nearly jumped. Spinning around I was glad to see in was Onerra.
“What makes you think that?” I asked, toying with her.
“Well, you yourself did ask me to talk Shining Armor into sending Shadow Shield on the mission.” She had a massive smile on her face. Probably glad I lied to Kunik.
“Oh right, that.”
“I was listening in. I know you were there. What happened?” When she asked that I quit toying with her and sighed.
“Kunik… well he’s sent us on this strange mission.”
“What mission?”
“He wanted us to capture Shadow Shield, someone capable of dark magic, alive and unharmed.”
“hm… That’s weird. What do you think he’s up to?”
“No idea, but I want to find out before just handing over someone like that. He also escaped with a prisoner, who’ll explain the whole thing to him no doubt.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea? I mean if Kunik found out…”
“Hey, he wants him alive and unharmed anyway. I’m sure this will only save him the time of explaining it all.” I smirked as I spoke. “Now go to the castle and get to know this guy. I need to find out as much as possible.”
“Alright, if you know what you’re doing...”
“Of course I do.”
*******************************************************
“So… Briefly go over what the whole situation is.” I repeated. I think I asked her at least three or four times to do so, and she explained each time. Her voice did become much less gentle though. She didn’t seem to be the patient type of person. We were approaching the crystal empire, and I really didn’t want to screw anything up.
“Kunik is part of a small group that kidnaps those born with Dark magic and executes them in a foolish gesture to maintain order. Dark Magic is a terrible force that corrupts the mind over time in exchange for its incredible power. Its power slowly deteriorates as the wielder ages, but dark magic can never die. It instead searches for a new vessel after the wielder dies. If the wielder is killed however, it get’s absorbed into the killer regardless of their capabilities. Kunik always sends his pet griffon to kill them, and uses him as a container for all the dark magic they collect. 30 years he’s been doing it. 30 years worth of dark magic and killing has slowly degraded his mind, leaving an extremely unstable griffon only brought down by his age. I’m a dark magic wielder, not by choice of course.”
“Can a pegasis even use dark magic?” I started wondering if it was too late to ask the question in the back of my mind.
“Not in a literal sense, no. But it makes us much stronger and more agile.” Well I might not know her for much longer. Would be a waste of time.
“So when Sombra came into power, did he kill ponies to gain his power?” I started really considering if maybe I should ask.
“Probably. I don’t know much about that personally, but on an educated guess I think the dark magic corrupted his mind” Maybe I could just wait until she maybe mentions it...
“Yeah, er...” I needed to ask it. “what’s your name?” I regretted the question as soon as I asked it.
“Sylwen. This entire time and only now you ask?”
“Sorry about that.”
“You’re fine. just a bit… odd is all.” Relief.
“Well here we are. I’m a regular in this place. I’ll escort you to my room in the castle so we can finally get some rest.”
“I’m afraid I can’t go with you.”
“Why? your eyes have gone back to normal. You can blend right in.”
“I’ve done some things here I regret. Some things that cannot be forgiven.”
“What? What did you do?” She didn’t reply to my question. Her gaze drifted away from mine.
“I’ll be going now. It might be for the best if we never speak again. I don’t want to be caught in the crossfire when you’re captured.” This came as a surprise. It felt like she just suddenly hated me. Maybe it was the two dozen questions.
“But I need you!” I pleaded.
“I told you what I could. I can’t be any more of a help. Goodbye.” And just like that, she walked away and left me behind. I stood there for about half a minute, trying to decide if she was being cowardly or ungrateful, but I couldn’t convince myself of either. With a sigh, I walked towards the castle, I needed fill Shining Armor in on all I knew. I couldn’t waste time.
Once inside, most of the guards seemed to be hurrying to get on their gear. Now I certainly couldn’t waste time.
“Hey, could you hold up a sec?” Came a mare’s voice from my left. She had a blue coat of fur and a silver mane. “I need to talk to you a bit.”
“I’m sorry, I’m in a hurry. Could you tell me where to find Shining Armor?”
“I’m his adviser, Onerra. Just tell me what you need and I’ll run it down to him.”
“This is really a personal matter.” I urged. I really didn’t want more ponies involved than there needed to be.
“...Fine. follow me.” She seemed hesitant. I wondered what she stopped me for. Taking pity, I asked her.
“What did you want by the way?”
“What the information you got from your mission was. It’s rather relevant stuff at the moment.”
“The information? Yeah, that’s what I needed to tell him actually. how did you get involved?”
“I’m his advisor, I’m told everything about missions. So I can ‘Advise’.” Taking a hint from the condescending tone, I moved onto a question I was actually interested in.
“You mentioned that it’s relevant right now. what did you mean?”
“Oh, the diamond dogs are causing trouble.”
“What kind of trouble?” Our conversation was interrupted by a castle guard walking up to us. It was Shining Armor.
“There you are Shield.” He spoke with authority in his voice.
“Yes sir. I have plenty the information on the cavern.”
“We can talk all about that later. To arms, we’re being invaded!”
“Here it is Chronicks. Remember this?” Kunik pointed to a cold isolation chamber with a glass window in the door.
“Yeah.” I pointed out. “That’s the isolation chamber you found me in when you claimed this place.” I might have gone on further, but I wanted to see where he was going with this.
“Indeed it is. I freed you from your captivity. I gave you a sanctuary to rest. And through all of it we have helped each other.” He was acting weird, no doubt. I had never seen him so soft, nor nostalgic.
“Why are you showing me this?” I asked, genuinely concerned.
“You’re getting old Chronicks. I don’t know how much time we have left together. I just want to make the most of it.” He replied, in a softer tone than I’d ever heard him speak.
“Thanks, I appreciate the concern.” I felt bad for judging him so quickly, but at the same time I certainly didn’t buy any of it.
“Great news Kunik.” Came a voice from the end of the hallway. I spun around and saw it was the same diamond dog from earlier in the day.
“Spit it out.” Kunik said. His sudden change in tone was jarring. Now I knew something was up.
“We’re assaulting Canterlot! We’ll have Shadow Shield here in no time!” The diamond dog said. Kunik glanced over to me, signalling me to take over the conversation.
“You did what?!” I growled.
“Well, we won’t hurt him!” He promised, his smile quickly fading off his face.
“Onnera is there! You could get her killed! And what happens when they strike back? You’ll be massacred!” I wasn’t worried about them however. They deserved whatever miserable fate fell upon them. Onnera was innocent though.
“We can handle ourselves. Besides, We’re going to lose many friends out there too. You might lose Onnera but it’ll be worth it!” Wrong choice of words. I reached out and grabbed his neck, like I’d done many others. I lifted him a few feet off the ground before I heard him speak again.
“Please… I’m sorry…” He choked out. I was expecting a reprimand from Kunik, but instead he spoke a different command.
“Kill him.”
I wasn’t an idiot. I knew Kunik wanted him dead for some sick plan. Or maybe he just wanted to stay on my good side and not call me out. The anger that swelled inside of me prevented conventional thought however. I squeezed tighter around his throat until he couldn’t breathe. He beat his paws against my arms unwilling to accept his fate. As he squirmed I dug my claws into his neck. Warm blood trickled down along my talons. The squirming stopped, and his eyes closed. Dead. I dropped the corpse onto the ground and looked away from the it in shame.
“What will you do now?” Kunik asked me.
“I’m going to Canterlot.”
“But you’ll get noticed. You’re eyes Chronicks, remember them?”
“I have to make sure Onnera is alright. Maybe I’ll even get Shadow Shield, I have to try.” At this Kunik seemed to ease up a little.
“You know what? Go ahead. But don’t come back without Shadow Shield.” This came as a surprise. Kunik had never threatened me before. “And bring Fali and Gwandon with you. They are professionals, you never know when they can help.”
“Fine.”
*******************************************************
Life is a line, drawn continuously along the wall of time. A pen, forever pushed until it runs out of ink. Never can we pull it away, change the decisions we’ve made in the past, nor the ones made for us. Instead every moment is but a pivot. some will mean little. But others, will change everything that comes ahead. Nothing is truly set in stone, as the stone will always age. The markings will become blurred and unreadable. No future is ever sprung fully formed from a pony’s head.
Nothing in my life had ever been so pivotal. The moment lasted seconds, but it felt like hours. The thoughts rushed through my head, yet I considered every one thoroughly. Anger. Sorrow. Adrenaline. Frustration.
And above all, denial. None of this was happening. None of the horrors would last. None of the Pivots would matter. These were the thoughts that flowed through my mind. none of the anger, sorrow, adrenaline, or frustration would matter. And yet my eyes welled up. my heart pounded. My brows scowled. My teeth were grit. It all felt real, and it was. To deny it would only made the pain stronger.
“Now breathe out, slowly. don’t let what remains tear you up inside.” My eyes refocused, bringing back to where I stood. The balloon of denial slowly drifting downward, no longer paining me. I breathed out like she said, letting the reality sink in.
I had just killed a Diamond dog with dark magic. I watched the pain that has gripped his entire body. I watched him feel the burning in his flesh. I watched his pain as his blood boiled inside of him. I hadn’t stopped him from feeling that pain. I caused it.
“Shield, we need to get out of here.” Her voice seemed calm despite my emotional state. “Come on.”
I didn’t respond. I just stared at the body, wondering what it must have felt like. wondering if he deserved it.
“There are at least 7 more coming this way, we need to go!” She was starting to worry, that was obvious.
“How did you know?” I finally responded.
“Know what?” I thought she was joking, but there was what seemed to be genuine confusion in her voice.
“Is killing so brutally really so mundane you just forget it that quickly?” I spat out. I had my wits about me again, but my hooves still wouldn’t budge.
“You did that, not me.” At this point I was losing patience.
“You told me how to breathe. how to aim. how to focus. how to kill. An adviser wouldn’t tell me how to use dark magic so effectively.” Three diamond dogs came around the corner. Fifteen meters separated us. They were moving closer never faster than brisk walk.
“I’ll explain later. Right now we need to run!” Twelve .
“And just how can I even trust you?” Nine .
“They’ll see the body of their friend, they’re going to kill you!” Six . I began considering running, but I didn’t know what plans she had for me, or even who she was.
I sighed heavily, weighing my options. Five . While I did this, I saw Sylwen sprint around the corner. Four . I began backing up, hoping to buy her enough time to get to them. I could always fight them myself. Could I really do it intentionally though?
I was glad I didn’t have to. Sylwen came up from behind one of them and slammed into him. The other two spun their heads in surprise. I took advantage of this by tackling and pinning another to the ground. The ‘adviser’ joined in, slamming the third against a wall, hard enough to knock it unconscious. I moved my horn to the face of the one I had pinned.
“Don’t. Come. Back.” I grunted. He nodded, fear in his eyes. I moved away from him and he scurried off away from us. when he was a considerable distance away, I turned my gaze over to Sylwen. “Thanks.” Looking me in the eyes, her expression changed.
“Your eyes…” Sylwen said, backing up. I was suddenly aware of the burning in them, and the green tint I saw everything in.
“I know.” I replied. A long ways behind her, I saw Shining Armor turn around the corner and trot along the hall. I spun my head behind me, making sure he didn’t see my eyes. I wondered if there were any laws about dark magic. I wondered if advisers were above them.
“Halt!” Shining Armor yelled. I’d wondered if he saw my eyes. “You’re under arrest.” I realized his voice was directed not at me, but at Sylwen.
“Why?” I asked. I wanted to know what crime she committed, she never told me that.
“Murder.” Shining Armor stated. I had to stop myself from turning around from surprise.
“It’s… true.” Sylwen admitted. I wondered if I could trust anyone at this point.
“But she’s a hero! she stopped at least 3 diamond dogs and saved my life!”
“I’ll... take that into consideration.” He replied sternly, but still showing sympathy.
“Shield, it’s okay.” Sylwen conforted. I wondered why I was even being so defensive of someone I hardly knew. I was so naive.
The guard took her unrestrained, and I turned my head to watch them slowly walk away, somewhere out of sight...
