I watched the desert roll by from the cabin of the vanguard. Our forces had spaced themselves out in multiple columns, with a wall of armoured vehicles on every outer edge. In the centre of our formation, our unarmoured vehicles, tankers, and especially ammunition hauliers plodded along. It was evening, the fourth day of travel through the vast emptiness of the desert to the west of Paradise. We had passed the furthest outposts of Paradise, two days ago. They were emptied of any supplies.

It was odd travelling in the path laid out by the Imperial army. Their garbage, their presence was left in their wake. But those minute traces would be swallowed by the sand shortly. Maybe some archaeologist might find them centuries from now. That wasn’t any of my concern. My concerns were focused on our target, and the defences it surely held.

All of us in the force knew that time wasn’t on our side. And so we pushed our vehicles, and ourselves as hard as we could. It was a matter of deathly necessity. But at least we weren’t going to be worn out by a forced march like the armies of old had often been. I glanced at the clock buried in the dashboard of the transport. It was nearly dusk.

I stepped out of the cabin and entered the passenger compartment. Between the sleeping soldiers, and boxes of supplies crammed anywhere they could be fit, it was a tight squeeze as I moved to the exit door. How ponies could sleep in a rolling, bucking transport with a shitty suspension was beyond me. Then again, I had exempted myself from night watches. Compared to the commanding officers I myself had dealt with, it wasn’t an egregious insult to the soldiers.

Then again, I had fought with them every step of the way. That counted for something.

I had only been by the back door for a few minutes before I felt the APC slow down, then stop completely. I opened the armoured hatch and stepped out into the cooling desert air. In the west, the sky remained lit. As the light came around the curve of the Earth, it shifted colour from its normal blue to a brilliant orange that faded as you looked towards the east.

I leaned against the side of the vehicle and lit a cigarette. The rest of the army was slowing down as well. We were in a flat rocky patch of desert, the Ursa’s and APC’s assumed a loose semicircle around the other vehicles, our moving formation rearranged to become a condensed fortification.

I watched, as I put the cigarette out against the armoured side, my lips dropped the butt into the sand. A last smoky exhale issued from my lungs. The vehicle close behind me was carrying Permittivity and a group of soldiers. Their rear hatch had opened, and the occupants spilt out, ready to stretch their legs and eat something warm.

I was one of them, I wanted warm food, and my legs needed a stroll. Perm stepped around the side of his transport. I could feel a bit of warmth and affection as he spotted me. I had left my armour in the transport, and the black jumpsuit stuck out compared to the mostly sand-coloured uniforms of the other troops. Some rangers were walking around in their armour, but that was doctrine. You wanted a fair portion of your soldiers wearing their armour at all times.

“How much farther?” I asked Perm as we closed the distance between one another.

“You ask me that every evening. It’ll be a while.” he said before looking over his shoulder at a pony I hadn’t made note of before. “Icepick, meet Cotton Candy. Cotton Candy, Icepick.” The unicorn mare had a bright blue coat and a pink mane. She fit the name, even if I had only ever seen pictures of cotton candy.

“Hi,” I said with a bemused expression.

“Howdy,” she replied, before shooting a glance at Perm. I did the same.

“She’s the mare who helped me slay the monster,” he added after a moment of us staring at him.

“Oh!” I said before looking upon the mare with new eyes. She didn’t look all that impressive, but that kind of courage wasn’t a tattoo. Her own eyes were guarded as she looked back. “I know how Perm killed it, but I would like to know more about them in general. I know you both unloaded at him-”

“Small arms were ineffective at anything but keeping his shield pointed at us. Maybe a larger number of them could break the shield, but it would have to be a lot. I was able to bury my bolts in his shield though, that seemed to weaken it,” she interrupted me before catching her own breath.

“Magical bolts?” I asked, my eyes shooting to Permittivity for a second, then back to her. Her horn lit up, her magic the same colour as her red eyes. Just like Permittivity. The moment after that, a large blob of red began to build over her horn. It seemed to writhe and glow on its own, a mass of eldritch energy being melded and shaped by the concentrating mare.

There was a woosh as she discharged it, flinging the mass of energy into the sand a dozen meters away. It shattered on the sand, before melting the sand and shrinking in size and intensity. The orb was as bright as a flare, as it left a mark in the sand.

“Those,” Permittivity said with a smile crossing his face. “I think the interaction between her bolts and his shield spell kept the bolts charged and radiating. That really surprised the creature.”

“So magic is more effective against them, than conventional arms?” I asked them. Perm shrugged his shoulders and Cotton did much the same.

“Maybe, but we don’t exactly have a unit of spell casters,” Perm replied sourly. “I think our best tactic against them is heavy weapons. Even if they have shields that can withstand a missile fired at them, I doubt that it will prevent them from being slammed backwards or broken by the blast wave.”

“That’s a dangerous proposition, in a series of tunnels. Blastwaves, and back blasts are dangerous on the surface-” I started to say.

“I have a feeling that their magical attacks won’t be stopped by your armour. Overwhelming force is the only way to beat them. That and out-thinking them, but I have a feeling that will be difficult so close to Sombra,” Permittivity interjected.
I felt a chill from Perm as he remembered his desperate battle against the monster. I stepped closer to him and tapped him on the shoulder.

“Thank you for telling me, I don’t look forward to facing these things, but I think we can handle it. Like you said before, they can bleed, and they can die. That’s all that matters,” I said before glancing at Cotton Candy. She was still stiffly standing, her eyes gleaming in the fading light. “I’m starving, how about you two?”

“I could eat,” Cotton Candy said, and Perm nodded earnestly at me.

“Then we’ll eat,” I said before starting towards the best of the mess wagons.

As we walked, I saw the eyes of many ponies following us. One pair didn’t just watch, they glowered. Standing beside an armoured transport Rosetta had his eyes focused on Permittivity, his stance wide, holster open. Perm noticed this, his own gaze meeting the pink stallions. A moment later, Rosetta stepped away, but not before pulling a metal flask from his coat pocket and flipping open the top.

“Remember when we drove for a night and day, and thought we’d practically reached the end of the world?” I spun away from that mess, and faced Ironsight, who had trotted out from her own vehicle. Frostbite stood beside her, his normally hard eyes softened as he watched her reminisce with me.

“We were barely mares on that assignment. I had to stop looking out the windows because it made me sick,” I answered with a wry smile on my face. “If I remember correctly you got mad at me because I wouldn’t stop hitting on that knight you liked.”

“Don’t remind me of that!” Ironsight said before slapping her hoof on my withers.

“He was an asshole anyway,” I said with a shrug. The mess wagon was cooking now, the smell of casserole and bread was pouring out of the windows.

“I remember the first time I left Maidenpool. I watched the countryside roll by from the window of a train,” he stopped speaking before letting out a single weighty breath. I stepped closer to him. “Gone, gone, everyone gone to the other shore.” I heard him say under his breath, barely louder than a whisper.

“This is the farthest I’ve ever gone from Paradise,” Candy said quietly.

“To miss this beauty, this stunning landscape,” I said while shaking my head.

“This landscape was our shield for a century, it protected us against those that would have made us slaves,” Crescent Moon walked into our little group, her chestnut brown coat seeming to slip into the darkness to the east. “Once I would have died to protect the location of my home. That time has passed.”

“Slavery, serfdom, and empire will meet their end. When Sombra is shattered, only the chains of bondage are left to be broken,” Permittivity stated, his words ringing in each of our ears.

“Shatter the empires, break the chains,” Cotton Candy spoke softly. “And let harmony reign again.”

“A chance at a new beginning, a chance to do things right this time,” Frostbite added a moment later.

“Only if we have the strength to seize it,” Permittivity and I spoke simultaneously.

The reactions were mixed: Ironsight, Crescent and Cotton’s mouths gaped in surprise. Frostbite stepped backwards a pace, his eyes shooting from Perm to me. Perm briefly looked skyward, before looking me in the eyes. I leaned forwards and threw a leg over his shoulder.

“Everyone, I give you my other half,” I said before waving theatrically with my other forelimb. I could feel the blush even if I couldn’t see it on his muzzle. I hadn’t known he would say those words.

“The bond grows stronger,” Zenji said from behind the two of us. A mess kit plate filled with casserole held in her foreleg. “I’ve never heard of a soul bond this strong. No pony magic has ever created one like this before.”

“Who did, then?” Candy asked the zebra mare, who did her best three legged shrug.

“Not a pony, apparently,” I replied with a shake of my head. “But, I’m actually going to eat now.”

---===*===---

My belly was full, and the clear skies of Sall’han filled my gaze. The fire was an unimpressive affair. A bit of petrol, and a stack of empty wooden ration boxes blazed away a few meters away. It kept the cold at bay.

“They’re pretty aren’t they,” Zenji asked. My head tilted down, Permittivity was laying on his back beside me. She had sat down in front of us.

“They’re identical to my own, and just as far away,” he said quietly.

“How far away?” I asked, absentmindedly. I was looking at my favourite, the north star. “I know they’re as big as the sun.”

“Some are much larger. Most of the stars you see are much bigger, much brighter, and burn so much quicker than our star. Most of the stars that actually exist are a lot smaller. They’ll burn for trillions of years. As for how far away they are, do you both know about the speed of light?”

“It’s instantaneous, that’s why we could send a signal from here to Equestria without any delay,” I replied.

“That’s not true, light goes the speed it does because that’s the speed that anything without mass travels at, and the speed that anything with mass can never reach. That speed is a little under three-hundred thousand kilometers per second,” Permittivity chuckled as my eyes widened. Zenji had shifted her gaze towards him.

“They’re made of fire?” Zenji asked, just as our own fire cracked as a glass bottle exploded in the heat of it.

“Kind of, we know they’re made of the same stuff as everything else. The most popular theory is that, in their core hydrogen is fused into helium. It’s like a balefire bomb going off for billions of years, a battle between gravity, which wants to smoosh it all down to size, and that constant explosion,” he said before looking back at me. “The closest stars are light years away.”

“It takes years for light to reach them?” I asked.

“At least,” he said. “I was friends with an astronomer once, once you got a few drinks into him, he wouldn’t shut up.”

“I can see how you’d get along,” I said while he took a breath.

“Like you have any room to talk,” he shot back and I laughed softly.

“I know I don’t,” I said before sitting up. “Zenji, what do you think about prophecies?”

“Most of them are made up for the benefit of the person making them, some have a bit of truth in them, and a few are entirely correct, but never in the way that people imagine,” she said after a few seconds of thought. The stars above continued their enigmatic twinkling. The wind blew through our camp, and the crackling of the fire continued.

“So you don’t put much stock in them?” I asked as Perm levitated a bottle of something out of his nearby saddlebag.

“This isn’t an idle question, I know which prophecy you’re referring to,” her tone was chiding. “You certainly didn’t fabricate it for your own benefit. And I know there are forces acting through you, and Permittivity. So, if it’s any of those it’s of the last variety.”

“Icepick, she’s too polite to say it, but she doesn’t know. I don’t know, Sombra doesn’t know. That’s the thing about the future, it hasn’t happened yet,” he said before opening the bottle with his magic and taking a drink.

“So you don’t believe it?” I asked him, a hint of hope edging into my voice.

“I believe what I see, and I’ve seen a trail of destruction follow you everywhere we’ve gone-” he passed the bottle to me with his magic. “But destruction is a part of the universe. Those stars up there, the big ones explode with a power that we can’t even conceive of. But without those acts of destruction, we wouldn’t exist. When they explode, new elements are created-”

“I get it. Something to sweep away the old world, something to leave room for something new to grow. Maybe that would be more comforting to someone who didn't live their life in a world that had been immolated before I was born. I look at Paradise, it’s been destroyed. It wasn’t an act of renewal, it’s a tragedy,” I said to them, searching their faces for comfort. All I could see in their eyes was the firelight reflected back at me.

“Life is tragic, they’re intertwined as tightly as you are to one another. Life always ends the same way, in death. Cities are built to be destroyed…” She placed a foreleg on my shoulder, as I listened, the fire held my gaze. I had always been fascinated by it, but now it had my rapt attention. “Everything is Icepick. What you did was save the important part of the city, it’s people. They’re free to rebuild their city, the way they want to. You aren’t a bomb or a cursed talisman, you’re a pony. Prophecy or no prophecy, it doesn’t change what you’ve done. It doesn’t change what you need to do,” Zenji said.

“Destroy him,” I said in a distracted voice. “Destroy him so our little world has a chance.”

“I believe in that more than prophecy passed down to us by a stone demon,” Zenji said softly. “You should too.”

---===*===---

The fires spread from building to building, the dry air feeding the spreading flames. I couldn’t move. I was just a pair of eyes watching the air distort where the heat was great. It had begun with a spark of lightning, and now everything was turning to ash. The city was empty of ponies, there were no screams, no frantic running down ash choked streets, there was just the shell of a place, burning brightly in the dark night.

“This is your past, your present, and your future,” a voice echoed through my mind. I tried to turn my head, but nothing happened.

“You’ve got too much blood on your hooves to be anything but a monster. You enjoy it, the killing, the excitement of seeing who lives or dies. You enjoy making that choice,” the voice had grown closer. The words sounded like they were being whispered into my ear. I wanted to scream, it wasn’t true! But I couldn’t, all I could do is stare into the tendrils of the nearest fire. The wooden building collapsed into its foundation with a crash.

“I’ve seen your heart, I’ve seen your future. One is full of fire, the other blood,” the voice said softly, sweetly. “I had a future just like that once, I thought that I could control the flames, I thought that I could lead the world to a better plan-” the voice changed, from a non-descript whisper to a raspy baritone. The other buildings began to collapse, their smoldering remains sinking into the earth where they had stood. “There is no controlling the flames, there is no better plan.”

“I thought I was using the power for myself. But power like ours, it uses us,” the voice lessened in volume. In the corner of my eye, I saw the smoky outline of a stallion slowly walking towards the flames.

“I just wanted to save my people. But that’s the thing about fires, once they’ve been lit, either the fire starves, or it keeps burning,” the outline of a stallion said with his back turned towards me. “It’s beautiful, as endings should be. And everything ends Icepick, even me.”

I snapped free, it felt like I had been banging my head against a brick wall, but as soon as I felt the change, I felt the rest of my body too. I stood up, feeling the heat in the air press on me. “Your end is near.”

“Perhaps,” he said before turning around and looking into my eyes. His form sharpened, a charcoal coat and a silver mane falling down his neck. A pair of eyes the colour of liquid steel staring into mine. “The fire is already set, if you kill me, it will engulf everything.”

“So be it!” I spit out, advancing on the dark coated unicorn. He stood where he had been, watching like a wolf as I advanced on him.

“You say that now,” he said softly. His lips pursed, his eyes closing a moment later. A glow from his horn flashed out, the dark of his magic pulling in the firelight. “I remember speaking those same words.”

“Fuck-” I yelled at him before it all faded out of my mind in an instant.

“Icepick?” Perm asked in a concerned voice, looking down at me. The fire was gone, burned out, it was just him standing above me, moonlight leaving him a dark outline.

“Huh?” I asked, half-awake. Half of my mind was still working on names to call Sombra.

“Well, you woke me up after yelling something in your sleep,” he said poking me on the chest with a foreleg. “Was it another nightmare?”

“No-yes, err.” I felt a chill as the wind blew past above me. Why hadn’t I fallen asleep in a tent. “He found me.” His face contorted at that.

“Let’s get you somewhere warm,” he said after a long exhale, offering me a hoof. I took it and stood back on my hooves.

“Not too warm please,” I said in a low voice.

“I know just the place then,” Permittivity said pointing his head towards one of the outer transports. I pushed up to be beside him, my hooves pushing into the loose sand beneath me. The wind cut through my exposed side like a knife. Before long he had lit his horn, and pulled a worn set of keys from a pouch on his jacket.

The back hatch of the transport opened, and no-one stirred on the inside. When we had both stepped in, he shut the door and locked it. It was dark inside, with the small windows along the walls letting in the only light. But most of all it was warm and secluded. I leaned against the hatch door, while staring at Perms ass as he pulled some blankets from a crate before sitting them on the floor. His tail shook and bobbed as he worked on making a nest for us.

I was glad he had given me another chance, even if I knew it hurt him like nothing else I had done. He had his failings, but so did I. Then my mind flew back to the start of the dream-

A tendril of blue lightning had parted the air with the crack of a bomb. The coil of wire, flanked by lightning bolts, it stared right at me. I took in a rough breath before looking skyward. Only painted metal caught my eyes, but still, I knew that there were questions to ask, but no-one to answer them.

“Here you go,” he said before spinning around, catching my eyes are their odd orientation. “What did he say?”

I slumped onto the nest and rolled over, my back resting over the steel plate underneath me. Perm looked me over, before settling down beside me. His normally placid eyes finding mine, burning with concern and love for me. I could feel that in my being, I knew it was true.

“It wasn’t as much what he said, it was what I saw,” I replied softly. The vision of fire running amok swam in my head. His heart sung in his chest, that protective love spooling out of his inner being. He drew a bit closer, his hind legs splayed out ahead of him, his lap open. I felt a gentle tug around my head lifting it, before being settled across his lap. He was warm, he was gentle, and I needed him at that moment. “Everything was on fire, a city burning, no ponies in the street, just ash and heat.” I paused as I felt my heart leap in my chest again as the memories filled my mind again. I shut my eyes and shivered despite myself.

Perm just started to stroke my mane. I exhaled, before wrapping a foreleg around his nearest thigh. When I squeezed him he felt real. It helped.

“For a long time, it was just fire. Then he told me that I would cause this, that I would burn the world if I stopped him,” I threw the words from my mouth, in a panic, the words flitting through my mind as I recalled them. “But he wasn’t just gloating, or trying to scare me. He sounded genuine - sympathetic even.”

“Sympathetic? Sombra?” he asked. His hoof touched my ear and it flicked, my muscles began to relax.

“He sounded sad for me? He didn’t seem afraid of me, more afraid for me,” I replied before letting out a soft coo as he massaged my neck, gently pressing into the muscle with his hooves, before sending small amounts of current through his hooves. It felt amazing, and before I knew it, he had pulled me away from his lap, before setting me on my stomach.

“Maybe you’re reading too much into it,” Perm murmured into my ears as he himself shifted to laying across me. It felt like a kick when he planted his right foreleg on my withers. I mewled at that, melting under his touch. “He’s a rock with delusions of grandeur, I don’t think something like that can feel anything for living ponies. It’s just a mind game.”

“A-alright,” I replied just before he leaned down and nipped my ear between his teeth. I shut my eyes and enjoyed the massage, feeling my body warm up in more ways than one. A few minutes later, when he started on my lower back, something popped back into my mind. “In the dream, you started the fire.”

“Huh?” he said before roughly kneading a knot near my spine. “You said you were alone with Sombra.”

“I was, but right at the beginning, a flash of blue lightning stretched from the clouds to the city. It was the spark. You’re the spark Permittivity,” I said before looking up at him. His lips were pursed, his hooves static on my back.

“I believe you,” he said simply. I flicked my tail up and tapped him on the thigh. “Whether it means anything is another question entirely. None of it makes sense.” He let out a loud exhale, hot breath tickling my ears.

“I hope it stays that way,” I said while biting my cheek. “Maybe that’s the part we've been missing. You’re a part of it. Without you, I wouldn’t have made it out of that mine,” I said as his hooves drifted down further. The way his practiced hooves and magic worked on my flanks, it sent waves of pleasure and pain right up my spine. I felt my tail flick on it’s own, heat building between my legs as he continued to melt me with his ministrations.

“I do like to feel included,” he said with a husky laugh. His left foreleg grabbed hold of my tail, pulling it askew while his other hoof smacked my ass without any warning. I moaned hard as he lifted my ass with his magic, I had just managed to get my hind legs steady beneath me before Perm had unzipped my jumpsuit. “You’re already soaked Icepick. I think you want some attention, don’t you?”

“Yes!” I said in my own husky tone. He didn’t have to hold my tail any longer, now it was flagged to the right, and staying like that. Perm answered me by pulling my cheeks apart with his hooves, then licking around the edges of my pussy. I shuddered under his touch as his tongue pressed against my outer folds while avoiding my clit.

“That’s what I thought,” Perm said before moving his tongue to my pussy itself, slowly pushing it inside. I winked in his face, before shuddering again as he thickened his tongue inside me. “Good girl,” he said after I yelled. His tongue wrapped around my clit as it winked out. I could feel that familiar knot begin to tighten in my stomach, each movement of his tongue against me sending sensations bolting up my body.

“More please,” I moaned as he rammed his tongue inside me again. Then he smacked my ass with his hoof again. The sound of it echoing inside the vehicle. That was his queue to back away from my winking clit, and for him to lavish attention everywhere else. I started to pant as he nipped my inner thigh, his magic holding me up more than my hind legs at this point.

“Fuck me already!” I pleaded just before he grasped my clit in his magic, then electrifying it and jamming his whole tongue deep inside me. I felt myself clench around his tongue as my cries echoed in the tight confines of the APC. I fell away from the sensations assaulting me, just taking in each pinprick of sensation as it came. As I came-

Then I felt his magic pull my rump up to it’s natural height, my hinds locking in place beneath me. The sensation of warm fur pressing against my rump brought me back to the moment. I was still breathing hard as I felt the throbbing tip of his cock press against me. His weight shifted forward as I stretched around his length. I shut my eyes as the tip forced itself in.

“Fuck,” he said as he slid himself inside me. I moaned softly when he hilted himself in me, resting for a moment. I raised my forelegs, pushing up against his weight and mine. The change in angle was perfect, he was almost touching my cervix. His cock throbbed inside me, leaking into my dripping pussy.

And then he pulled back, I tightened around him, trying in vain to keep him where I wanted him. A second later, he buried himself again. There was a slap as his hips met mine. My clit winked out, pressing into his cock. My voice cracked as he worked himself in and out of me.

“Icepick!” He moaned into my ears, his hot breath tickling them, I bent my neck towards him. As he hilted in me, I could feel that shadow of his feelings, the affection and lust- it matched my own. It was like two separate oceans, finally mixing and spilling over into one another. His forelegs smacked down on my ass, his cock pulsing with unsated lust. It was my lust too-

“Don’t stop,” I moaned as he bit my neck, claiming me. His forelegs clamped down on my barrel as he picked up the pace, my hips moving in time with his. Every slap of his hips sent a pulse of pleasure as his cock stretched me around it. Before long, I yelped as his flaring cock pressed against my back wall. It twitched and bucked as it was pounded into me. I felt that sea of mounting pleasure as my clit moulded around him.

“Please, Perm!” He obliged, his cock pistoning furiously inside me. And then, the levee finally broke, my walls trying to milk him with all of their worth, but he knew me intimately. He knew I could stand being shot at, exploded and even negotiate if I had to. He also knew I became a mewling mess if he fucked me through my orgasm.

And so he did, his thrusts like clockwork as I moaned like a mare in heat. That clockwork broke down when my forelegs collapsed beneath our weight. He lost his rhythm as his heartbeat sped up, as his lungs worked overtime to keep his legs and cock supplied with blood- I could certainly feel the latter, as my sensitive pussy spasmed and clenched around him. The flare at the tip was rock hard, all of him was, as he hilted himself with a final thrust. He bit down on my neck hard enough to stress the skin, before letting out a husky moan of his own.

The flood of cum that followed was bigger than normal, as he just kept pumping rope after rope into me. My legs buckled, and his cock slipped out just in time to spurt a line of cum across my ass. It felt hot and sticky as it dripped out of me. If I had been in heat, he would’ve knocked me up, a voice inside me suggested with a flash of warmth and affection for the stallion beside me.

Perm stumbled for a second, his eyes locked on my painted rump for a moment, before shifting those lovely eyes to mine. I had rolled over, my body sprawled out and sweaty. He took that moment to get beside me, a foreleg covering my own, our heads on the same folded up blanket conscripted as a pillow.

“I love you,” he said in a sleepy voice. I yawned out of sympathy. I glanced down at my crotch. I was still oozing his cum.

“I love you too,” I said before giving a peck on the muzzle. “It’s kind of a waste, isn’t it?”

“Huh,” he said before glancing between my legs. “Oh? I reckon it is.”

“So you would?” I didn’t need to add more detail. I felt another rush of warmth from him, and I swear, a twitch from his sheath.

“I’d love to, once this is under control,” at this, he had waved his foreleg around, indicating everything. “You really want to be bred, don’t you?”

“I-I it sounds fun,” I admitted with a blush that was lost on him in the dark.

“Breeding is fun, what follows is less so. But you know that, and I’d help every step of the way,” he said with a soft chuckle.

“Yeah, you won’t be getting off easy. You’re the only reason I’m even considering it!” I said before grabbing his head with a forehoof and pulling him into a much deeper kiss. When we broke off, his eyes were half lidded and I could feel my conscious mind begin to slip beneath the waves.

“Sweet dreams, love,” he murmured sensually before shutting his eyes. A moment later he was out, his face unmoored from his pain, his scarred muzzle the only sense of what he had been through. The stallion of my dreams, in the land of dreams.

In the land of dreams…

---===*===---

I caught the shape of the mesas over the horizon, the final land mark before we reached the bunker complex. They were black stones in the desert, it was impossible to miss them in the sea of sand. They were beautiful, the Mesa’s, from tiny protrusions just big enough to see against the glare of midday, but some were grand pillars of stone, the ground around them worn into sand by time beyond comprehension. I would have been gawking like an old-world tourist if my destiny didn’t lay in a valley between the bases of the largest formations. Still-

“Why didn’t you tell me about these?” I asked aloud. Awe was creeping into my voice, I had never seen anything like these. Permittivity and Crescent Moon turned to face me at exactly the same time, Perm standing in the passenger seat of the vehicle, Moon directly beside me, squeezed into the small cabin.

“It didn’t seem important at the time,” Perm said in a voice that told me he had other things on his mind.

“Because it’s our place, it’s been ours for longer than anyone can remember. We’ve found tombs, standing stones, and altars out here. Some of them have writing carved into them, but it’s nothing we can understand. But what can be understood, I saw in one of them, a tomb built into the walls of a Mesa. I knew it was ancient when I saw art of a Minotaur embracing an Arabian,” she paused, her hazel eyes locking with mine. “Besides, you never would have believed me before you saw them yourself.”

“That old, huh,” I said before scrunching my nose up in concentration. “Are you sure they weren’t trying to stab each other?”

“The closest thing to a weapon in the painting was a necklace wrapped around the Minotaurs neck,” she said, her own confusion evident. The Arabian mare had never met a Minotaur, but those wounds of history never seem to close. That thought left me biting my lip, thinking about the great sweep of history that little ponies like me were caught up in.

“I wonder if thousands of years from now, the idea of an Equestrian and an Arabian embracing will seem just as-”

“Unbelievable,” Crescent Moon finished for me, the hint of a smile on her muzzle.

“Exactly,” I said as I physically drooped, my spine slackening as I let out a deeply held breath. That was the kindling, that was what stood ready to burn the world once more. The cycle of blood repaid with more blood. Another fine layer of ash for archaeologists to date, another bloody empire rising on the backs of the weak. The vision of it danced in my mind, another attempt to swallow the world.

It would end in the same way, the conqueror gasping for air as the world choked them to death.
“They ruled over us for hundreds of years, using us as slaves or worse, and it was only with the other subject races that we managed to push them back to their mountain citadels,” Crescent Moon said, another line in the dirge coalescing in my mind. “If they hadn’t the walls or stores, there would be no more Minotaurs.” The flames wrapped around me, everything I touched a single spark away from immolation.

“The answer depends on us,” Permittivity said in his matter of fact voice. “The future depends on us, it always has.”

“I wouldn’t be here now if I didn’t think we could live together in Harmony. I wouldn’t have helped your blonde butt one iota if I believed you wanted to see us in chains,” Crescent Moon slid a bit closer to me before pressing her forehoof into my chest. The slender Arabian mare stood eye to eye with me. I felt the phantom fire cross the gap between us, I watched as it enveloped her then melted away as she pulled me into an embrace. I shook my head and tried to slow my breathing.

She felt me go slack in her forelegs, my whole body relaxing as my mind shut down. I told myself that it was a trick of the light, or Sombra’s words warping my perceptions. It was no glamour. It had felt as real as Perm’s body against mine, as real as every memory I could recall in that terrible moment.

---===*===---

I stood at the edge of a great forest, with strange trees covered in green needles, with hard fruit growing from the branches, and littering the forest floor. When I walked up to one of the trees, I picked one of the odd droppings up. It was hard, and I knew instantly I couldn’t eat it. On a deeper level, I realized trying to eat here would be a waste of time.

“Here,” I heard a mischievous voice from behind me. The strange spikey fruit became a glob of pudding in my hoof. I turned around, sending the pudding flying off my hoof, mostly. I could hear a squish when I slammed my forelegs into the ground. It wasn’t him. I felt myself relax for maybe a tenth of a second, before the reality, or really, the unreality of the situation registered.

Before me stood an old stallion, his eyes sunken, but his lips were upturned in a genuine smile.

“Where am I?” I asked as I stepped back, my back aimed at the tree.

“Physically, you’re being examined by Rosetta, as Permittivity watches him like a hawk,” he said in a matter of fact voice. “He hasn’t tried to open him with his own scalpel yet-”

“Get me back there, whoever the fuck you are!” I yelled at him, my words accented by lighting crackling down from the suddenly overcast sky. The thunderclap resounded through the forest, followed by a flurry of birds taking flight.

“Not yet,” he said simply, before gesturing with a hoof towards the deeper forest. A peel of smoke was rising into the sky, growing thicker with every second.

“Who gave you the right?” I asked him, my muscles tightening inside this illusion.

“Some would say I did, others would say that the big mare in the sky did. Once upon a time I even believed the former,” he said before deflating, looking ancient for a moment. Crescent Moon was right, you just knew.

“I’m getting really fucking tired of being pulled into dream worlds by old stallions with delusions of godhood,” I stomped my hooves, my glare at it’s most venomous.

“Delusional? That’s quite possible but delusional about who I am, I don’t think so,” the stallion met my eyes straight on. “I’m the mysterious benefactor, and I’m sorry about what I had to do.”

“You…” I drew a blank as I tried to take it all in.

“Before you ask, I had nothing to do with choosing you. If someone chose you at all, they’re above my paygrade,” he admitted with a shrug.

“So what’s your angle? And make it quick, there’s exactly one stallion I want in my dreams, and it isn’t you,” I said, my voice straining to stay civil with whoever this was.

“I need you to shatter Sombra, and I want you to light the fire,” he answered as the heat from the forest fire began to feel less pleasant, and more like sticking my hoof in an oven. I trotted forwards, keeping my distance from him, and making some distance between myself and the inferno.

“I don’t want to burn the world!” I yelled at him loud enough to make my throat ache. Not that it mattered, ash continued to fill the air around me, the crack of great old trees finally succumbing to fire and gravity filled my mind. I shut my eyes and fell to the ground.

“If you wanted to, you wouldn’t be the right one to wield the power,” he said in something close to reassurance. “It was true of the others, and it’s true for you. They still lit the fire, because it had to be done.”

“Why?” I asked as I sucked down another gulp of sizzling air. I heard a snap from somewhere and felt a drop of water plop down on the end of my muzzle. I stared at it for what seemed like an eternity before feeling dozens more fall on me. Those dozens became hundreds, and when I next looked at the forest, it was over.

What remained was moist ash and the blackened spines of so many once beautiful giants. The clouds were gone, and in the tops of some of those trees, I spotted birds. I felt compelled to get back to my hooves.

“Go on, pick one up, I guarantee I won’t turn it to pudding in your hooves,” he said before sitting down in the grass, the light of a new dawn rising behind him only made him look older, more worn. “They’re called pinecones by the way.”

I did as he asked, stepping cautiously towards the edge of what had been forest moments ago. I spotted the brown of a pine cone caught under a blackened branch.

Except as I pulled it from beneath its prison, I saw that the once sealed, hard exterior had opened. As I brought closer to my face, a seed dropped from it, plopping down in the midst of the carnage.

“That’s why,” I felt a hoof on my shoulder, a friendly pat. I didn’t recoil, my head just turned to watch him. As the sun rose behind us, he just surveyed the scene. I did the same, thinking about this whole experience. “Credit to your partner, he told you the same thing. But he doesn't know anything about special effects.”

“Is that why you-” I started to ask before he waved a hoof.

“Changed the game? Used super glue on your souls? Left room for another?” He cracked that smile one last time. His tired eyes met mine, a glimmer of hope in them. “I wanted to die having stirred things up again, and maybe, just maybe, get to see things end happily for once. Pity, it will also be my last.”

“But-” I tried to say more, but as I did the unreality shattered. For a split second, I was floating beside a skinny monster, made entirely of mismatched parts.

“Don’t try to be a hero Icepick. Be yourself. The Destroyers that mistake the metaphor for the real job are always the ones who try to be heroes,” the voice warped in my mind as the forest scene flickered in and out of the infinite blackness…

---===*===---

“There’s nothing wrong with her!” Rosetta yelled nearby. My eyes shot open to survey the scene. Permittivity was standing to my right, his eyes fixed on Rosetta. Talon, and Ironsight stood at the foot of the bed looking worried.

“I’m not so sure,” I croaked out through the dryness of my throat.

“What happened?” Crescent Moon asked, worry and guilt spilling out with her words. She was behind me, she must have felt awful.

“Your friend took me on a field trip,” I said to Rosetta with a shake of my head and a glance at the canteen hanging from his neck. “Give me that,” I said before grasping the canteen and yanking it over his head. I didn’t give half a fuck about the way their faces lit up when I said that. They could wait until after I had slaked my thirst.

“My friend?” Rosetta asked, confusion playing over his enervated face.

“Our mysterious benefactor, he showed me something I needed to see,” I looked at each of them in turn. “I’m the destroyer, I’m here to start the fire that clears away the old, so the new can be born.” When I said this, when I believed it, that was when I saw them all in a new light. An orange halo around each of them, all except from Perm and Rosetta. Perm was radiant, a flickering blue light seemed to come from deep inside of him. When he pressed a hoof into my shoulder I felt it tingle where he touched me.

When I looked at Rosetta, my eyes widened in surprise, his form seemed to draw the firelight in. His eyes met mine, concern written across his face. I shook my head and thought of that rain falling over the forest.

“Are you sure you didn’t accidentally eat some funky bread?” Talon asked me from behind the thin membrane of my eyelids. I opened them again and looked into hers.

“Deathly sure,” I said before tearing away the few medical devices strapped to my body. The halos had retreated, everything was back to normal, except when I blinked my eyes I could see a glint of it over them. It was like seeing the corona of the sun during an eclipse, mixed with the kind of after image you felt after looking at the sun during a clear day.

“You’ve been asleep for two days, that isn’t normal,” Talon said, watching me with guarded eyes. Somehow, she had switched from scared. Ironsight on the other hoof had just gotten that bored look in her eyes. Like she had somewhere more important to be. Who had been keeping things rolling in my sleep?

“I’m not normal anymore, if I ever was,” I said with detachment “But who’s been running things?” I don’t know if I would have said that before. Maybe I had just been in denial before, it’s normally the delusional that believe they have a special purpose. But these weren’t normal times. I would have to be delusional to deny what I was now.

“You’re normal enough for me,” Perm said before offering me a hoof. I took it, my heart speeding up in my chest as he pulled me off the bed, and into an embrace. “To answer your question, it’s been me and Talon yanking Phalanx along, Ironsight has kept your armoured soldiers in good spirits, and been working on something she wants to show you when she can. You’re the best at making speeches, and being our moral center-”

“Permittivity, I know that I’m the general, not the general staff.” I said before nuzzling his neck softly. He scoffed at my words but I felt the warmth inside him as we touched. I took another second to enjoy his scent, the feeling of his heart beating beside mine, before turning towards the others. “Well, I’m glad you didn’t start the party without me.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Permittivity said as he leaned down and propped his muzzle on my head. I could feel him relax as he said those words. He was happy for me to be back, for so many reasons. I snorted at him but shifted my eyes as I heard Rosetta clear his throat.

“Did he say he was sorry?” Rosetta asked me softly.

“He did, but I don’t know why,” I replied. Rose just looked skyward for a long moment. The next moment he was trotting away like we weren’t even there. He knew why- “That fucking bastard!” I yelled before stomping into the yielding sand. Crescent Moon bolted towards the door to follow him.

“Rosetta?” Perm asked, my unexpected fury overcoming his distaste for the pink stallion.

“No! The fucker that gave Rosetta the orbs and the knowledge on how to use them,” I said as I felt my anger leave me. He wouldn’t have done that for fun, or would he?

“I see,” Perm’s face blanked. Even I couldn’t read it, but his heart was bubbling with mixed emotions. So was mine. “That fucking bastard indeed.”

“Icepick, we were so-” Talon started to say before her voice cracked. “I thought I had lost you again.” Dislodging myself from the stallion I was wrapped up in, I walked over to her, one of the few mares who could meet my eyes without looking up. My forelegs seemed to wrap around her all on their own.

“If I’d had a say in the matter, I would have put a cocoon around myself. Then at least you all would have understood what was going on,” I hugged her tightly once more, before dropping back to my hooves. “Not that I knew either, I’m still processing it myself.”

“I wasn’t worried, I’ve seen you sleep something off how many times?” Ironsight said before punching my shoulder. “Everyone else though, they’re still shitting their pants.” I rolled my eyes at her before sliding back over to my mom.

“I know you have smokes, I need one after that,” I said to her with a sigh of exasperation.

“If you think that’s hard, try pushing a four kilo foal out of you,” she said before passing me a half empty pack. Before I could say anything Permittivity had one of the little cylinders burning at one end. I pulled it between my teeth, and took a hard draw.

“Talon, you know how she is about competition,” Perm interjected.

“You’re on old mare,” I said before locking a foreleg around Perm’s neck, and swinging my tail over his flank as possessively as I could. “If I push a unicorn out, I win right?”

“If they’re anything like you, have fun getting poked from the inside every hour they’re awake,” Talon stuck her tongue out at that. I turned to look at Perm, he gulped audibly.

“The idea of you in heat scares me-” I stopped his words with my mouth. His heart shuddering in his chest, and he leaned into me.

“That’s not all,” I whispered into his ear as he caught his breath after the kiss. I felt a spicier version of his normal affection reflecting back into me. I resisted the urge to just pounce on him.

“Icepick, I know your tail only moves like that when you're thinking about getting railed, but remember what I said about ponies shitting their pants in worry?” Ironsight knew how to throw cold water on my desires. She’d had a lot of practice.

“How far are we from-” I was cut off by her sharp tongue.

“Only a day’s travel away,” she said before throwing open the door flap, letting me see the centerpiece of this camp. A roaring fire cast shadow ponies into our tent.

“ Perfect time, as usual,” I said with a laugh.

“And the stage is set,” Perm whispered in my ear. “She’s right about your tail by the way.”

I responded by stepping forward and flicking him across the nose with the base of my tail. As I came towards the fire, I felt the eyes of hundreds, then thousands fall on me. It warmed me and scared me, but it was my element. I understood that now.

I found a wooden crate, waiting to be immolated. I stood atop it and I waited for a long moment, my breath frozen in my chest.

But when I saw Perm walking confidently up to me with all my friends in tow, I took a deep breath of fire warmed air. My eyes found a turncoat Arabian that I had spoken to a few times. He would be the one my eyes stayed on, even as thousands of others watched with the same unspoken questions.

“Sorry about that folks, I know I missed a few watches,” I said in the loud but clear voice I slipped into when I spoke to a crowd. For a second, there was only silence, but when one pony laughed, the silence was shattered.

“I have something to say, something you all deserve to hear, if you’ll listen,” I said after the laughter had died down. “I never expected to have an army listen to my words. I never expected to be anything more than a bully in a suit of power armour. But here we are, expectations be damned,” I looked over to the west. “Tomorrow we make history. Tonight, we leave our pasts behind us. Tomorrow will mark the start of a new age. Tonight we become the flames that clear away the old one. When the chains melt, when the tyrants are only ash, then we can build a world of peace, harmony and freedom.” A silence settled over the crowd. When I judged it was time, I continued.

“I know it sounds impossible, it sounds like a dream. But if I’ve learned anything recently, it’s that dreams matter. Your dreams matter, because in the new world, everyone matters. Arab, Zebra, Pony and Orangutan, we’re all more alike than different. I dream of a world where we focus on that, instead of our differences,” I paused to take a breath. Their eyes were still on me, and the Arab I had left my eyes on had met mine. “In each of you, I see the strength to change the world. In each of you I place my hopes for the future. I know I can’t do it alone.”

The Arab stallion was pushing through the crowd, growing closer to me, but I kept my eyes on his. He wore nothing but cloth, an imperial rifle hanging from his withers.

“What’s your name?” I asked him just as he pushed past the rest.

“Pleasant Breeze,” he said softly. He seemed nervous. I mean, I would have been if roles were reversed. I smiled at him and waved him closer. He was a bit taller than I was, and maybe a bit older. His coat was a light brown, the colour of tea mixed with milk.

“What kind of world would you like to leave behind?” I asked him, before pressing a hoof to his shoulder.

“I dream of a future where the children can’t understand why their parent’s once killed one another,” he seemed quiet to my ears. But the crowd must have heard him.

“Will you fight for that future?” I asked him, my mane blowing in the breeze.

“I have been, with every breath, every pull of the trigger,” he replied, a proud face staring back at me. Slowly, I began to feel a warmth come from his withers. When I blinked my eyes, the whole of his form glowed like incandescent steel. This time, I was ready. I stepped back onto my milk crate, letting him stand beside me.

“Will you fight for your dreams? Will you fight for the new world we’ll create, together?” I yelled my question at them, eyes sweeping through the mass of people. With a roar the people answered. In that moment, I felt their fire sweep over me, the whole mass growing brighter with each passing second. I snuck a glance at Permittivity. His iridescent blue made him stand out, but I could tell he felt a bit of what was overwhelming me. He nodded once at me, a flicker of pride and affection reflected back at me.

I shut my eyes and basked in the feeling, the thousand candles burning with the light of hope. I had become the destroyer of worlds, I accepted it now. All I had to do now was actually destroy the old world, starting with an immortal piece of furniture.

As I watched Pleasant Breeze trot back into the crowd, I couldn’t help but remember the number of ponies I had already killed. I had been the destroyer all along. Everyone had seen it but me. They followed me not in spite of it, but because of it.

Well, the match was lit now. It was only a matter of time before the whole forest went up. If they could trust me, I could trust them. I didn’t have much of a choice now.

And so, I watched the dance of a thousand flames with a smile on my face.

Author's Note

Sorry about the delay there. The next chapter is being worked on, but it's difficult

Being close to the end of a FoE story is strange