I am in Queen Celestia's torture chamber.
Why am I in Queen Celestia's torture chamber?
I honestly have no idea.
"It's time to choose, Star." Celestia hovers over me. "What can you live without?"
Maybe I should tell you how all of this came to pass. I mean, I know Celestia has always hated me, but she's not just going to drag me into her torture 'fungeon' for no reason.
This particular incident began with a bunch of snowcones.
Don't believe me? Why don't we take a look about... 12 hours into the past.
12 hours earlier.....
"Who wants snowcones?" Draven hollered as she fliew into the rebellion base.
"What's with the snowcones, Dra?" I rolled my eyes. It wasn't unusual for her to roll into the base with food, but it was usually just enough for her, MAYBE for the other rebellion leaders. This looked like enough snowcones to feed the whole camp.
"Well, I thought the rebels deserved a treat today, so I went to the mountains and bought hoof-made snowcones from a bunch of reserves hiding out up there." Draven smiled that cocky smile of hers. She knew I didn't have the heart to turn away a reserve looking for work. Usually I wouldn't take pity on any member of Celestia's army, but the reserves are the saddest bunch of ponies I've ever seen. They're all forced into working for her, and most of them flee into the safety of the Bedrock mountains before they can be called into battle even once.
Bedrock used to be where the unicorns were forced to live, but ever since the Rebellion took over, the unicorns have (for the most part) either joined us or Celestia and don't live there anymore. It's become a refugee camp for those poor reserves, as well as ponies who refuse to pick a side in this war. And to think, all this has happened in the last month alone!
"Fine, you can keep them," I sighed. Then a terrible feeling sunk over me. "Hey, Dra?"
"What, Star?"
"Did you put the snowcones down on the Rebellion's tab?"
"Yep!" She says with a smile. "Why, do you want me to pitch in the price?"
My heart sank completely. No, it didn't really sink. It kind of jumped upwards so that it formed the giant lump in my throat. But it was still beating there, still functioning, so that my breath started hammering with my heartbeat.
"Dra... Celestia can track ponies down through their credit cards. We told everypony not to use the Rebellion tab."
She looked at the floor and was silent for several moments. "Oh..."
Suddenly, the alarms began blaring.
"This is an air raid!" Cadence flew into the room, obviously in a panic. "This is not a drill!"
All of the rebels started filing into the shelter in the basement. Filing isn't really the right word for this, but it sounds calm, so I'm going with filing.
Draven was in shock. She just kind of stood there, stiff, looking like she was ready to to collapse.
I swooped down and started dragging her by the mane down the steps.
She didn't seem to care. I didn't care that there was an air raid right outside, I didn't care that Celestia was getting ready to bomb us, all I cared about was getting my friend to safety.
"Just leave me," she murmured. "I did this. I betrayed you all."
"You didn't mean to," I told her as I flew us both down the staircase. I realized mid sentence that Draven's tail was dangling from my mouth, and she was hanging upside-down, all the blood flowing to her head. I flipped her onto my back, realizing my mistake, and continued my rant. "Yes, I won't deny that this is bad, but we know you, and we know that you would never do this on purpose. You are the best pony around, and we couldn't have built all of this without you. We all make mistakes every once in a while, but what's important is to learn from your mistakes and fix them when you can. Hanging onto them isn't going to help you at all."
I put a break on my rant when we reached the bunker. We were the last ones inside. Just as the door began to close, Draven started talking again.
"But I'll never be able to make this up! I'll never be able to do fix all of my mistakes! All of these ponies are going to die because of me and my... my... snowcones!" Draven was full on sobbing at this point.
"You at least had good intentions with the snowcones," I said after a moment of silence.
"No!" She charged past me back to the door and lit her horn with magical flame.
"Draven, no! It's dangerous!" I screamed. But it was too late. The spell had been cast. She had teleported to the other side of the door. She wasn't safe anymore.
Just after she did this, the bombings started. I could feel the tremble of the earth above us. It wasn't that big a tremble, mind you. We were very deep underground. We were safe for the time being.
But Draven wasn't.
"I have to go after her," I told Luna.
"You can't," she said firmly. "We need you here. There are several ponies who were trampled on the staircase. See to their injuries."
"Can't Cadence do that?" I groaned.
"She went to retrieve supplies from the second bunker," Luna said matter-of-factly.
"I can do that real quick and bring Cadence back here! Then I can go find Draven!"
"Star, no means no. I need you here," she growled.
Before I could argue, the lights suddenly flickered off. A second later, they came back on, but there was a new pony standing in the center of the room. She wore a cloak that covered much of her face and other features, but I could make out a gun held in the tractor beam of her magic. The gun was pointed at me.
"Come with us, Star," said the mysterious pony.
"Us?"
A large group of at least 20 more ponies dressed in a similar manner stepped out from the shadows. Where did they come from? The only noticeable difference between the henchmen and the pony was that the henchmen were all stallions.
"Come with us, Star." the pony repeated her message.
"Why should I? Who wants me?" I was pretty sure I knew who wanted me, but I was honestly curious if the cloaked mare could say anything but the message she had said so far.
Suddenly, the mare fired a shot from her gun, right at Luna.
Screams could be heard from nearly every pony in the bunker as Luna fell to the floor, blood pooling behind her.
I stared at the now dead Luna with a newfound purpose. True, I was trembling in my horseshoes. But I had no choice but to take action.
"I'll come with you."
I know it's strange, but I could actually feel the cloaked mare smiling. "Fantastic," she whispered, and at that moment, I knew who she was.
"Des?"
She pulled off her hood, revealing a very, very familiar face. "Hello, sister."
Author's Note
Random reader: Why snowcones?
Me: I dunno. Ask my soul.
Soul: You are craving snowcones.
Me: I am? :O
Soul: Yes. Satistfy your craving.
Me: Ok! (Eats random snowcone)
Random Reader: (backs away slowly)