A Different Kind of Paradise

Chapter XIII: Treachery

Justice, an insane monster that had nothing but contempt for the human race and wished nothing more than to watch it burn to the ground, had been released; and was now terrorizing the Canterlot science labs.  How did Gabe know this?  In his latest nightmare he was seeing everything through Justice’s eyes.

Gabe was forced to watch as Justice ripped through dozens of innocent scientists.  Any attempt to flee was met with Justice creating a massive chain of spikes impaling them and blocking off the exit; and it was when the ponies were clustered the true horror began, Justice took in a deep breath and then all of the ponies in front of him were consumed by a huge wave of fire.

Justice only laughed as about a dozen ponies burned to death.

Gabe would have done anything to be able to turn away, but for some reason his vision and every other sense was linked directly to Justice.  He had no idea how or why, but hated every moment off it.

After Justice finished laughing to the tune of a series of ponies screaming in pain and begging for mercy, he spoke out loud “you can come out now.”

Nothing, aside from the flames the lab was dead quiet.

Justice charged over to a cabinet and punched the handle in and yelled “I SAID COME OUT!”  Hiding inside the cabinet was one last scientist; he was a unicorn with a white coat with spiky blue hair.  Justice grabbed his neck and pulled him close.  “WHERE IS THE WORM?”  Justice yelled.

The scientist began to struggle and plead “please don’t kill me, I have a family!”

Justice took his hand off of the unicorn’s neck and grabbed his head.  “Well won’t they be sad when they find out that your skull’s been crushed into powder.”  He interrogated, applying pressure to the poor pony’s skull.

The unicorn in Justice’s grasp began to yell in pain.

“You know what” Justice mocked.   “I don’t even need you; I can easily tear this lab apart, until I find The Worm.  Oh well, goodbye Port.”

“Nononononono I’ll talk! I’LL TALK!”  Port screamed, afraid for his life.

Justice let go and Port fell to the floor.  “Now was that so hard?”  Justice snickered to add insult to injury.

Port just sobbed as he picked himself up.  “It’s this way.”  He began to guide Justice to another section of the lab.  “Please” Port started “please put this to good use, my family has been working on The Worm for generations.  Please respect what 130 years of Voyages took to create.”

“It will be used to purge a distant world of evil.”  Justice replied “does that count?”

The two arrived at a framed crayon drawing on one of the walls.  “I have no idea what you mean, but despite the work my ancestors put into this, it’s still incomplete.”  He said as he opened the frame, revealing a keyhole.  “Do you have the key to finish it?”  He took a key from his pocket, entered it into the lock, and turned it.  A section of wall close to him and Justice moved back and began to slide away.

“I have something much better.”  Justice replied as he stared awestruck at the doorway and the brilliant light coming from the other side, a demonic smile across his lips.  He began to laugh maniacally as he reached out and grabbed the source of the light.

The light faded, as well as everything else.  All Gabe saw was darkness, all he heard was nothingness.

Something then broke the silence, it was someone crying, and Gabe knew who it was.  It was Danny.

“Are you still crying?”  Justice’s voice echoed through the void.  “I thought I told you to shut up!”

Unsurprisingly, that didn’t help.  “Why are you doing this?”  Danny yelled from somewhere in the darkness.

“I’m doing this because you were too much of a pussy to do it yourself!”  The void somehow shook as Justice’s anger coursed through it.  “You constantly dreamed of respect, power, and vengeance and yet something kept stopping you.  You were so afraid of consequences that you denied yourself and let wicked, arrogant assholes dominate your life.  But now I will succeed where you never even endeavored, because I will purge the human world of its greed and arrogance; those with wicked hearts will be brought to justice!”  There was a slight pause.  “My only regret is that you will not be around to see it.”  Justice tried to hold his laughter back, but couldn’t help but laugh like a psychopath.

“I thought you were my friend.”  Danny said weakly.

Justice sighed, taking pleasure in his next words.  “You made all the wrong friends Daniel.”

All Danny could do was weep to himself.  Bound by the darkness with nothing left to fight for, he had given up.

Like all of the other times Gabe’s eyes ripped open with a start, his nightmares shaking him.  But unlike all of the other times, soon after he woke up he began to laugh.  It started as a chuckle but turned into full-scale laughter; he thought about everything he had just seen and heard and couldn’t help but let a twisted grin creep across his face.

The day passed uneventfully.  Mostly because Gabe didn’t care about the day, Justice had promised him the evening, and that’s what Gabe was waiting for.  Late in the afternoon, just before twilight; Gabe heard it.

“Are you ready?”  Justice’s voice echoed through his mind.

Gabe sneered in response.

Justice must have felt the good vibes and responded with a laugh.  “Good, I am located in the ancient castle deep within the Everfree forest, here is the way.”

In an instant Gabe had received all of the information on where to go.  As if he had the memory of traversing the path from the start.

“See you soon.”  Justice bid his farewell.

The path to the castle Justice named was clear of any disruption.  Justice obviously wanted to give Gabe a smooth trip.  As he came upon the castle, or the ruins of a castle, he realized the risk of everything he was doing, had done, and was about to do.  But he didn’t care, he knew what he wanted, and was thankful Justice had shown him.

The twisted, crumbled halls of the ruined castle seemed more dangerous than the forest that was known for its wicked beasts and unnatural plant life.  It looked as though it could crumble at any moment; most of the best passageways were already blocked of by rubble.   Eventually Gabe found the chamber he was looking for; the room obviously had some importance due to its size and pillars, towards the back there was a risen dais with a stone pedestal upon it.  And atop the pedestal was a blue circle with a water-like texture, the portal was being fueled by two energy beams coming from two spheres that had four perfectly cut gems in each of them.  Gabe was actually impressed by the display and, awestruck, began to move towards it as if in a trance.

A loud thud brought Gabe out of his trance.  He turned around to see the giant diabolical figure behind him, Justice.  Since the last time they met Justice found himself some violet cloth to rip apart and wrap around his waist like a makeshift tunic.  “Does it not impress you?”  Justice asked, motioning towards the gateway.

“What is it?”  Gabe asked in response.

Justice laughed before replying.  “This was supposed to be Equestria’s next big thing.  They were trying to find a way to view into, and even visit, other worlds; but they were missing one crucial thing.”

“I’m listening.”  Gabe was interested in what Justice had to say.

“They were focusing so hard on the keys by which to access other worlds, they forgot about the lock.”  Justice said, obviously full of himself “we are the lock.  Since we are not from this world, we give of the precise energy that can connect us home given the right ingredients.”

“Those crystals are the ingredients, the teeth in the key.”  Gabe put the pieces together.

“Correct my friend.”  Justice took his place beside Gabe as they each turned to face the portal, their ticket home.  Justice sighed, but it was a different kind of sigh, a sigh of relief.  “I am glad you changed your tune, I’d feel awful if I didn’t live up to my end of the deal.”  He closed his eyes and put a hand on his chest before continuing.   “And besides, when I’m done with the human world they won’t look to me as a ruler, they will look to someone else; you Gabriel.  You will be their hero, their king, and I your humble executioner.”  He opened his eyes and saw that Gabe wasn’t there anymore.  “What?”  He heard something from the front of the room and turned to see what it was.

The portal was shut down, and Gabe was standing defiantly in front of it with a clear gem in his teeth.   Sure enough when Justice looked to the orbs that held the others one of them only showed three.  After recovering from the shock of seeing everything in front of him, Justice just laughed; this was a comical laugh with a hint of fear.  “That’s very funny Gabriel, now give that back so I may replace it into the sphere and we may return to the human world.”

Gabe just glared as he let his mouth open and the gem roll out and clatter onto the floor.

After seeing this Justice screamed.  “Have you gone insane!?!”  He yelled.  “If that crystal takes anymore damage we’ll be trapped here forever!”  He started towards the gem on the ground, interrupted when Gabe put his hoof on it.

“No” Gabe started, his gaze burning a hole in Justice.  “You’ll be trapped” he began to put weight onto the hoof the crystal was under, causing it to crack, and by extent causing Justice to panic.  “I’ll be home.”   He put all of his weight onto the gem, causing it to shatter.

“NOOOOOOOOOO!”  Justice cried, he lunged forward, knocking Gabe out of the way and began to collect the shards in his hands.   “WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!?”  He looked up, and saw that every other gem, and the two magic spheres holding them together break apart and shatter into dust.  He looked at his hands and saw that the fragments of crystal he was holding had turned into dust.  Almost on the verge of tears, he put his hands on his head and slowly put his head on the floor.

Gabe picked himself up; he looked to the broken demon and quietly began to make his way out of the old room.  Right when he was at the entrance he felt the urge to look back, he did everything he could to fight it, but in the end ultimately turned around, and immediately regretted it.

What he turned back to was the most absolutely horrifying thing he has ever seen in his life.

Justice was roaring at him with blind fury, his mouth wide open with his dreadful fangs exposed.  Past his roaring maw were his eyes; usually exhuming cold hatred now showed nothing but rage and insanity.  The roar itself was maddening in pitch, and loud enough to shake the entire castle if not all of Equestria.

Gabe’s pupils shrunk as he watched the horror unfold in front of him.  “I’m gonna die.”  He sobbed softly to himself, feeling glad he went all day without drinking anything.

“YOU HAVE ROBBED ME OF MY ONLY CHANCE TO RETURN AND REAP MY VENGANCE!!”  Justice hollered, towering over Gabe.  Soon after he began to giggle in a manic fashion and said “well if I can’t have your world, I’ll just take this one!”  He raised his clawed hand high into the air.  “And I’ll start WITH YOU!”

Gabe closed his eyes and prepared himself.

Justice brought down his claw with terrifying momentum, upon impact the floor cracked beneath the intense amount of force.  But Justice’s wicked smile faded when the dust cleared and he saw that the floor was all he hit.  “HOW?!”  He yelled, confused.

The response being a swift kick to the back of the head, upon recovering Justice looked up and saw exactly how Gabe survived.

Nero was carrying Gabe in his arms.  He had flown in at high speeds, with enough timing to snatch Gabe out of the way of Justice’s wrath.  “You” Justice started, shocked.  “You conspired against me!?!”

“It wasn’t that hard” Gabe replied.  “You were so focused on the darkness in my heart you let it blind you to the truth.  You blame me for taking away your chance to rule, but you should be blaming yourself for trusting me.”

“Nicely said man” Nero complimented Gabe’s speech.  “Now get out of here.”

Gabe nodded shortly before running out of the room.

Justice was infuriated; first his plan was ruined, and then he was outmaneuvered and badmouthed by the pony who had freed him, just to have him turn tail and run away.  “Oh no you don’t!”  Justice cried as he began for the door, only to have a series of quick kicks to the face.  He staggered back and saw Nero blocking the door, dropped down into a fighting stance.  “You’re joking.”  Justice laughed, seeing the little green pony in front of him.

Nero chuckled at Justice’s pride.  “Nope.  You want Gabe, you go through me.”

Justice shook his head with a smug grin on his face before continuing to berate Nero.  “Michael” he began “you’re a video game obsessed idiot who couldn’t pay attention to a siren.  You standing against me would be like a roach standing against a steamroller armed with pesticide.  I could kill you in ten seconds fl…”  He was interrupted by another flurry of blows to his face and gut.  He quickly recovered and glared at his pitiful assailant.

Nero landed on the floor right in front of Justice and smirked at the monster he had one upped twice now.  “If you think you can” he started.  “Then just try it.”

“You will regret this you roach.”  Justice snorted, preparing himself.

“My name” Nero began to correct Justice as he pumped his wings.  “Is Nero.”