In the Eyes of Death

Silently creeping through the foliage around me, ensuring that with every footstep I didn’t step on anything that would potentially give away my position. Not a branch, no fallen and dead leaves, nothing. Directly in front of me, plus about eight hundred meters give or take a few, was my assigned hit. I just had to get to the top of this hill, hide under all the underbrush with my spotter and get lined up. A quick check of my watch showed I still had half an hour to set up and sync up with the other snipers of this mission so I wasn’t in any real hurry.

Nearing to the edge of the path where the overlook revealed the enemy supply depot, I and my second got down on our stomachs, shouldering our weapons for the slow crawl to the edge for set up.

“Tombstone 3-2 reporting in position, over.” the whispering of the man in my ear told me that a second sniper pair had gotten into position and were already prepared to open fire. My partner and I were Tombstone 4-1 and 4-2 and just reached the edge of the cliff. While my spotter, whose face I couldn’t quite see with the shade and a particularly large leaf between us, brought out his binoculars to survey the area, I swapped out from my L96 to the .50 cal and popped the lens caps on the massive scope.

“Tombstone 2-2 reporting in position, over. Tombstone 4-2, you guys are late.” a female spotter noted, a slight chuckle in her voice as my spotter retrieved his own handset to respond.

“Tombstone 2-2, you actually just interrupted me about to report 4-2 in position so you’re the ones who’re late.” my spotter replied with a return chuckle.

“Uh huh, is that why your shooter was still opening his bipod when we reported in?” the female replied in jest before Tombstone Actual came over the radio to interrupt the banter.

“Alright, standard hit today. Your spotters all have your assigned targets and since everyone’s in position, we’ll be more than set for when they all show up at the same time.” Actual announced, sounding bored in his middle aged era. “Sit tight and we’ll be home for dinner.”

Sounds of ‘Copy’ came in from the other shooter teams before 4-2 gave our reply. Then silence.

Boring silence.

Extremely boring silence.

“Hey, 4-2. Pawn to Bishop Two, Queen’s level” 1-2 came in after a few minutes of boredom. Great, they were at this again. I couldn’t even keep up with either 1-2 or 4-2 in regular chess with a board, so how they could play 3D chess without a board was beyond me so I simply tuned them out and ensured that my rifle was up to snuff.

While the imaginary board game went on over the radio, sticking to a side channel to prevent irritating the other two teams, I continued to survey the area though my scope when something told me something was wrong. I don’t know what it was, but something felt off…

“4-2, shut it for a second.” I whispered, halting my spotter’s turn suddenly and turned my radio back to the agreed upon channel assigned to us at the briefing. “3-1, do you copy?”

“3-1. Send it.” came the reply from the remarkably large black man behind the scope to my eventual right.

“3-1, would you do me a favour and look over my quadrant from your angle a second? Tell me what you see?” I requested as I focused in on my assigned area, looking for what felt out of place.

“Copy that 4-1, what am I looking for, over?”

“I… don’t quite know. Something feels wrong here but I can’t put my finger on it. Requesting a second eye on the situation.” I replied with an unsure frown on my face. My spotter was already at work, surveying the area with his binocs to give me a third pair of eyes.

“One moment, 4-1, let me have a look.”

“Copy that.” I replied and turned my conversation to my spotter. “Do you see anything out of the ordinary?”

“Like what?” 4-2 requested and set his binocs down to glance at me in confusion. “I don’t see anything.”

“Exactly, where are all the guards? All I see down there are labourers.” I mumbled back and widened my view on the area to get a wider image to try and find any kind of guard, or even anyone with a gun.

“4-1, 3-1, come in?” 3-1 requested, setting my partner and I back to work.

“3-1, go ahead. What do you see?” I requested and out of curiosity, took a quick look at 3-1’s assigned area, then 1-1’s on my left. They had the same strange issue as well but didn’t seemed to have been phased by it.

“4-1, I don’t see anything wrong down there what so ever. I think the heat’s getting to you, over.” 3-1 reported before going radio silent. We still had about five minutes before the targets would show up, therefore we had a bit of time to go.

“Copy that, 3-1, thanks for the assistance.” I mumbled back mostly out of habit even though the radio hadn’t been turned on to broadcast my response. “4-2, tell me if you see guards down there.”

“I see guards down there. Some pretty nasty looking weapons down there as well. What’s wrong with you today?” 4-2 looked from his binocs to me in concern. “If you’re feeling compromised from something, we can get 1-1 to take our target while we retreat for medivac.”

“Nah, not necessary. I… I just don’t see guards or guns down there… All I see are labourers.” I reported back, still looking over the bodies of people working down below, unsuspecting of what was due to occur. “Maybe I’m right, maybe I am suffering heat stroke…”

“Let’s get you to the recovery base and get you hydrated.” 4-2 agreed and began the task of packing us up. “Tombstone Actual, this is Tombstone 4-2, 4-1 is suffering from severe heat stroke and is seeing hallucinations, Request permission to take him to recovery to get him fixed up. 1-1 can take our shot if necessary.”

“Confirmed.” Actual replied with a sigh of disappointment. Hey, in my defence I’d been out in the arctic for the last couple months and then I'm suddenly shipped to this fucking jungle. Never mind that I haven’t actually been back at base in… I can’t remember how many months… “Tombstone 1-1, 3-1, you two are to ensure that 4-1’s target is taken care of as soon as your targets are down. Clear?”

“Clear.” both 1-1 and 3-1 replied at the same time while I packed up my .50 cal and began inching backwards. “Heal quickly, 4-1. You’re the one who knows what you're doing out here.”

“Yeah, be back in a couple hours.” I nodded back for the sake of habit while my Spotter helped me to my feet and we began the trek back the way we came to base.

The radios were silent even after the time when the shots were supposed to have been taken. Instead of heavy gunshots all masking each other into one solitary sound, the unmistakable sound of carpet bombing told my spotter and I everything we needed to know. Tombstone 4-1 and 4-2 had narrowly escaped death by aerial bombing.

The blast waves were so great that they tore massive trees out of the ground and threw them around like plastic imitations. The blast was so great that it reached 4-2 and I almost a kilometre away while in recovery and knocked us both out.

Coming to with a heavy gasp, I bolted upright from my laying position but I was not where I remembered falling asleep.

“Where am I? What’s going on?” I demanded, looking around for potential attackers behind mostly friendly faces.

“Easy Soren, you’re fine. Your back at Twilight’s.” Applejack assured me, placing a hoof on my chest to push me back down to laying. “It’s the next day after the party you walked out on.”

“Which you’ll be apologizing to Pinkie for, by the way.” Twilight announced from behind AJ, glaring at me. What the hell was she glaring at me for? I told her no parties!

“How did I get here? I remember falling asleep at the lake.” I rubbed at my face but found that I was lacking feeling in most of my fingers. And my nose. And ears… “Why am I so numb?”

“After you walked out, Rainbow Dash followed you. She came back a couple minutes later talking about how Scootaloo’s now an orphan and that you were at the lake.” Rarity explained from Applejack’s left at the couch I laid out on. “When Applejack, Twilight and I found you, you were dead and covered in ice. We brought you back here to thaw you out and let you regenerate like you seem so fond of doing.”

“Okay, so that was… what… half an hour ago? Where’d everypony go?” I looked around at the three mares surrounding me and noted their raised eyebrows. “What?”

“You’ve been in a state of death for almost nine hours. It’s already a new day.” Twilight reported calmly. “When we found you and thawed you out, you didn’t seem to fully revive until just now when you awoke. Your body has been showing signs of trying to decompose and regenerate all at the same time.”

“Explains why my fingers and nose look necrotic…” I mumbled back and held up my hands to look at the black and dead fingers. “Okay, so why am I not regenerating properly?”

“I don’t know, this is entirely new to me.” Twilight shrugged back and hopped up onto my chest to settle down and lay on me. “Your body is still pretty cold to the touch, even through my fur so I'm going to try and warm you with my body heat.”

“No offence, but you’re like the size of a rottweiler. I don’t think your body warmth is going to do much on your own.” I groaned back with the heavier presence on my body adding to the already difficult task of breathing. Rarity and AJ both shared a look before climbing up behind Twilight to rest on my legs and lower torso.

“So we shall have to combine our efforts to properly resurrect you.” Rarity announced properly and settled down over my pelvis. AJ simply remained quiet and settled down for a nap over my legs, resting her head on her crossed hooves.

“Well great, now I’m not going anywhere.” I sighed and settled in myself, draping my arms over Twilight’s body which only made her shrink away at the action.

“What are you doing?” she demanded, sounding like I’d offended her or her ancestors.

“I can’t sleep very well with my arms at my side or above my head. Since you’re on my chest, where I usually put my arms, you’ll just have to suffer in silence.” I replied, my voice low and slow as I settled in for another sleep.

After a couple minutes of boredom and inability to sleep, “I heard there was a secret chord,” I began, low and slow.

“That David played and it pleased the lord,” Applejack continued with a pretty decent voice.

Rarity took over next and her voice was both unsurprising and surprising, “But you don’t really care for music, do you?”

“What’re you all doing?” Twilight smirked as she watched my face as we sang. Rarity and Applejack both continued on without me so I could explain.

“We’re singing. I can’t sleep and since no one is telling me to stop, neither can Rarity or AJ.” I remarked and joined in for the next couple verses.

Twilight gave a heavy sigh and joined in for the Hallelujahs following the verses I’d joined in on and soon the four of us had worked ourselves into harmonizing around me for the remainder of the song.

Once the song had run it’s course and we’d all returned to silence, all three ponies on my body settled back down for a nap. I returned my arms to lightly wrapped around Twilight’s body, making her give a small squeal before settling back down again.

“Twilight, darling,” Rarity began in a false whisper, poking the unicorn on the back with a hoof. “If you’d like, we can switch places. I’m curious what it would be like to be embraced like that.”

“Sure, we can switch.” Twilight replied, extracting herself from my light hold and stepped onto the couch long enough for Rarity to inch herself up and set herself down on my chest while Twilight took to my pelvis.

“Hello dear.” Rarity beamed and settled herself down, resting her head on my chest to stare at me. “Feel free to place your arms around me as you wish.”

“Okay…” I mumbled back and resumed my position with my arms wrapped around Rarity’s back. Her fur was significantly more soft that Twilight’s had been, as though she’d wrapped herself in the softest silk. Her body was also warmer than Twilight’s had been, not entirely sure why that was the case, but if it helps me regenerate faster then I wouldn’t complain.

“Oh yes, this is quite nice.” Rarity mumbled in mild bliss and turned to rest her the side of her head against my chest entirely, her ear pressed against my shirt and likely listening to the sound of my heartbeat. “I feel so warm… so… safe…”

“If it helps, you’re quite warm as well.” I muttered back and yawned heavily. Having spent so long partially dead or asleep, I wasn’t surprised that I was still so tired and was more than content to fall back asleep.

Except I couldn’t. Neither could Rarity apparently as she shifted a couple more times until she ended up staring at me with her big blue eyes.

“Can’t sleep either?” I asked in a true whisper given that both Twilight and Applejack seemed to have successfully fallen to slumbers.

“No, unfortunately I seem to have been well rested when I rose this morning. I find myself quite bored…” Rarity whispered back and shifted around on her hooves a bit before settling back down again. I could feel the sensation of her tail lightly swishing around over my hips and I wondered if it was brushing against Twilight or not.

“Well, I would have likely gone to the spa for a massage if I had any currency to my name. Since I don’t and I’m partially dead, I figure I might try out a bit of magic experimentation.” I whispered back and raised my hands to build the jet engine spell but held short of actually activating it and disturbing the napping mares.

“I was aware that you could fly, but I didn’t know it was with magic. Is it the same as our unicorn magic?” Rarity asked and twisted herself onto her back to look up at my hands with me. “I… suppose not. It’s quite extraordinary though, I don’t think i’ve ever seen any kind of magic like that before.”

“Yeah, and considering that magic isn’t a thing for normal humans, it only gets more extraordinary as it goes on. Twilight gave me a brief rundown of how it works so all I have to do is figure out the… keystones… and build new spells.” I explained and deactivated the spells in my hands, making Rarity turn onto her side to look at me properly.

“Well, Soren, I may not be as adept at spellcasting as Twilight, but I may be capable of assisting you in building your new magical incantations.” the white unicorn offered with a kind smile before turning onto her back once more. “So, how does your magic work?”

“According to Twilight it’s made up of at least three parts. The keystones, the bindings and the modifiers. The Keystones dictate what the spell is supposed to do, the modifiers tell the keystones how to do it, and the bindings keep it all from exploding.” I explained, rebuilding the jet engine spell again to show the different parts. “Since I was blind when I first built this spell, I am fairly certain that these larger spots are the keystones.” I explained, pointing out the larger glyphs that could have meant anything to me.

“Can you read those symbols? It’s nothing like I’ve ever seen in my life, even when I was in school.” Rarity asked, poking at the seal with a hoof though she just passed right through it. I poked at the seal with a finger and the seal seemed to expand into it’s multiple layers, the larger glyphs remaining behind everything else with smaller glyphs floating above them. The bindings floated over top all of that, still slowly rotating in alternating directions depending on which ring it was involved with.

“Nah, I haven’t foggiest idea. Twilight figured that it's using keystones whose words correlated to how jet engines work on my world. If I can figure out the other available words, then I’m sure I could build more spells.”

“Which necessitates the requirement for understanding a dead language.” Rarity concluded with an irritated sigh. “I think you’ve got your work cut out for you darling.”

“Agreed.” I mumbled back and cleared out the spell with a flick of the hand before staring at the empty space, trying to figure out how to start. “How do you think I should start?”

“I suggest with bindings. If those prevent destabilization, then it may be prudent to have those set up before anything else.” Rarity suggested, her hooves hanging limp essentially over her body as though she was a small dog resting on her back with paws in the air. Rarity, like Twilight and AJ, was about the size of a full grown rottie with the accompanying weight. “Maybe if you just think long and hard about the bindings, they’ll appear? How does your flying spell appear normally?”

“Mostly just I think about flying and then it all comes down to force of sheer will.” I explained and stared at my hand, willing the appearance of the bindings by mentally seeing the spinning layers appear on my hand. Focusing in on that word, binding, I began to push as much of my will into my hand as I could muster and searched for the feeling of that power that flowed through my hands whenever I used my spell.

Nothing came up.

“I got nothing…” I sighed back in defeat and dropped my hands to Rarity’s stomach and began drumming my fingers against her body. Rarity twisted her head to look up at me sideways, doing her best to look comforting.

“Perhaps then we should start with those key thingies? What kind of spell were you trying to create?”

“I don’t know exactly, what would you suggest?” I whispered back and shifted my head to ease Rarity’s neck as she continued to watch me inquiringly.

“‘Well, the first spell that any unicorn learns when they’re young is the telekinesis spell. It’s by far the easiest to accomplish no matter who casts it.” Rarity explained and for show, lifted my hands with her magic to create that tingling feeling I was growing accustomed to in order to bring it to her face and examine it.

“Okay, well then what would the keystones be for that spell then?”

“Well, what exactly is a keystone? How does the keystone dictate what the spell does?”

“Well, for the engine spell, I think it’s something like a keystone of ‘Compress’, ‘Fuel’ and ‘Ignite’. The modifiers tell the keystones what order to work in and what to compress, what the fuel source is and how often to ignite the mixture.”

“So, perhaps a telekinesis spell would be boiled down to something like… ‘Move’ or ‘Force’? The modifiers would then tell the keystone what direction to apply the force.” Rarity suggested, looking back up at me trying to be helpful. I gave a slight shrug and began trying to force the words ‘Move’ and ‘Force’ one after the other. Noticeably, a glyph appeared in dark blue when I began to think about the word ‘Force’ and floated in space over my hand.

“Seems that ‘Force’ is the keyword here.” I announced softly and turned my hand to see how the glyph responded. It seemed that the word followed my palm, though it remained oriented towards me so I could theoretically read it.

“Okay, so then the next logical step would be direction.” Rarity instructed, having become emboldened by the success of her suggestion. “Maybe the cardinal directions? Or perhaps it’s as simple as ‘Up, Down, Left,’ or ‘Right’?”

“Let’s try the simpler ones first…” I agreed and began thinking of such words, looking at the spot above the main glyph for ‘Forward’, below for ‘Backward’ and then at the glyph for ‘Up’ and ‘Down’. Each modifier appeared with thin lines snaking their ways to the main glyph and spinning as though they each had minds of their own and were dancing in place.

“Success! Okay, do you think you’ll want to add the bindings now? Or is there more to add?”

“Let’s just bind it all together and see what happens. We’ll add more on afterwards.” I began trying to imagine the scribblings that surrounded the spell, focusing in on the word Binding until faint traces of organized letters faded into view around the glyphs, creating a 3D model of this spell as opposed to the 2D jet engine spell. “Any idea why this one is three dimensional as opposed to my flying option?”

“Perhaps because it has more layers than the flight spell, it requires more space? I am only just giving an estimation, I haven’t the foggiest idea about the appropriate answer.” Rarity replied, watching the spell slowly rotate in place within my grasp. “Did it work? We haven’t exploded, so I suppose it may have.”

“I guess we’ll find out in a second, won’t we?” I sighed and the pair of us turned our heads towards the bookshelf ahead of the couch as I held my hand outstretched with the spell aimed at the books neatly organized. Nothing happened until I began to think about the word ‘Backward’, and pushed as much power as I could into the thought.

The books on the shelf began to shake a little bit, as though the spell was trying to work but didn’t have enough power. I rectified this by pushing even more power into the spell, feeling myself near to the bottom of the pit that contained my magical power.

“Come on!” I whispered in frustration. As though obeying, the entire shelf exploded from the bookcase and tore through the air towards our couch, startling Rarity and myself long enough that we both tried to apply a counteracting force. The sudden returning force exploded from my hand like an explosion and sent a few books aimed at the wall with enough force to rumble the entire building. The rest of the books continued to sail towards us but deflected off Rarity’s magical shield which scattered the remains across the library.

Both Twilight and AJ woke with a start at the assault, both confused and fearful of attack.

“This isn’t going to end well for us, I fear.” Rarity whispered as she twisted back onto her hooves to hop down from my chest and land on the floor to look as apologetic as she could.

“What happened here?” Twilight demanded as she noticed the state of her books and began furiously reorganizing them into their appropriate places on the shelf.

“Rarity and I tried to build a new spell, figured a telekinesis spell would’ve been a good place to start. I tested it out by trying to move a single book, but ended up pulling the entire shelf off all at once.” I reported dutifully once I’d worked myself to sitting upright.

Twilight stared at me, the workings of conflicting emotions on her face ranging from intrigue to rage. After a moment of considerations, Twilight drew in a deep breath and released it slowly to calm herself down.

“Fine, but as soon as you’re capable, you’re helping to clean this up.” she ordered and received a salute from me before turning to Rarity. “You’re helping.”

“Of course, darling. I would be remiss to not lend aid after having been a part of this disaster.” Rarity stood up proud on all four hooves before setting to the assigned task as requested.

“I think I'm plenty warm after this, I just can’t feel my legs.” I reported and swung the dead limbs over the edge of the couch to sit up properly. “Any ideas Twi?”

“Another death may expedite the recovery… I just... I don’t want to be responsible for another one of your deaths… again…” Twilight sighed with a hoof on her forehead while her horn remained lit up to help with the organization and clean-up efforts.

“Hey, I’m not arguing. I don’t really feel like adding another notch to my stock.” I agreed with a nod and poked experimentally at my thigh. Couldn’t feel it. “I just don’t feel like spending a day without my legs, been blind already and I’m done with being crippled.”

“What do you suggest I do then?”

“Maybe just break my lower spine? A solid kick should do it.” I suggested with an unsure shrug, watching Twilight and Rarity as they worked. Applejack was nearby, piling up the books that remained scattered around the room.

Upon my suggestion, “Well, if’n yeh don’t hold it against me, ah have the second strongest buck in Ponyville. I could… break... Your spine for you…” Applejack offered carefully, coming to terms with what she was suggesting as she said it and became ever more nervous about the suggestion.

“That won’t be necessary. I can just apply kinetic force to your back and make your body think it’s taken damage. It should get the regeneration working properly.” Twilight interjected helpfully and I couldn’t help but notice AJ let out a small breath of relief before returning to work. “Lay down on your stomach.”

Complying, I flipped myself onto my belly and got comfortable as best I could. Twilight climbed up onto the couch and then onto my back before approaching a spot along my spine and aimed her horn at the location.

“This… may hurt.” Twilight warned just before she charged up her horn and pushed the pure kinetic energy into my back with a thunderous clap.

The pain was immense, as though I had just got shot through the spine and left to die. The force applied flailed my legs and made me arch the rest of my body that I could feel before I fell limp once again, now completely numb.

“Yeah, remind me not to annoy Twilight…” AJ mumbled under her breath as the unicorn stepped down from my back to continue cleaning.

A belch from Twilight’s room and Spike appeared with a scroll in hand and a comic under his arm. “Letter from the princess, Twilight!” he called out and gave the scroll a toss from the second floor. Rarity caught the scroll before it hit the floor and passed it off to Twilight to read.

“Oh! I love these, I wonder what it says this time!” Twilight exclaimed with giddy, prancing about the room on the tips of her hooves before coming to a stop to actually read it. Clearing out her throat, Twilight read aloud in her best ‘Royal’ voice,

“‘Dear Twilight Sparkle. I urgently request the presence of you and the human as soon as you can be here. Some kind of strange weapon has been discovered by a local and has already injured a pony. Princess Luna and I believe it to be a weapon from the human’s world and have for now isolated the weapon in the vaults for safekeeping.’”

“If it’s from my world, then that can’t be good. Since Canterlot is still on the mountain side, it’s probably not a large explosive, but that doesn’t really make me feel any better.” I muttered under my breath and earned an agreeing nod from the mares around me.

“‘We require the human to appear and retrieve the weapon, as we believe he has the proper training and knowledge of how best to deal with this weapon. At your earliest, Princess Celestia.’” Twilight finished the read and looked up at me where I lay. “Is it possible that one of your weapons from your war had followed you here?”

With the best shrug I could give considering the state of my numb body, “I haven’t the foggiest fucking clue. Best I remember, I died with a weapon in my hands so it could have come with me and just fell somewhere else than where I exploded.”

“Then we need to get to Canterlot Castle quickly. If it’s already injured a pony, then it could only be a matter of time before it injures somepony else.” Twilight announced as she began to try and lift me from where I laid and sat me back up again. Something in my back seemed to have clicked into place and I popped upright suddenly.

“Woah, I can feel things again…” I remarked and stood up from where I sat and jogged in place a bit to get feeling back in my legs and feet. “Cool, it’s like some kind of impact massage or something… I’ll have to learn that for my own use later on.”

“Later, okay? Let's get to the train station and then we’ll talk about you learning dangerous spells.” Twilight remarked and pulled on my hand to lead me from the building. “Spike! Could you please finish up the little bit of cleaning while we’re gone?”

“Sure!” Spike called back as Rarity and AJ followed Twilight and I outside to close up.

“Rather than take the four hour long train, Twilight, get on my back and hold on.” I instructed and knelt down to allow access for the pony.

“Why?”

“I’m going to fly us there.” I explained simply, reminding the purple unicorn of my magic ability to fly.

“Oh, right.” Twilight’s eyebrows went up having been reminded about this fact before obeying and climbing onto my back to wrap her forelegs around my neck and locked her rear legs around my torso.

Standing and assuming the Ironman position, I lit the fires under myself and gave a good-bye nod to Rarity and AJ before firing off upwards.