It's About Time In September

by Nintenbrony

Rating: everyone
Tags: Cutie Mark Crusaders, Tragedy, Twilight Sparkle, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Original Character
Length: 2226

Based off TheLivingtombstone's "September," A pony's discovery will change life in Equestria...

This story takes place in the timeline of "It's About Time." A nameless OC pony wakes up after taking a blow to the head. He discovers Equestria is now a wasteland. With no memory, he turns to his journal archives and whatever is in his saddle bag to discover the dark secret of the fate of Equestria...

Published 2012-07-07 14:24:01 UTC
Last updated 2012-07-07 14:24:01 UTC

It's About Time In September

I woke up with my body aching all over and a throbbing headache. I was lying on the cold dirt floor in my underground shelter. I barely remembered what happened. The last thing I recalled doing was writing in my journal and taking an unsuspecting heavy blow to the back of my head. All other details of the past seemed vague and distant.

I tried getting up, but I realized I was halfway under the table I was working on, hitting my head. More pain, just what I needed right now, I thought. I crawled out into the open, and saw a tall wooden bookshelf leaning over the table. So that's what hit me over the head, I thought. I mustered up my strength to put the book shelf upward to reveal my journal and a calendar.

I couldn't possibly live without my journal. I write down every thought and detail so I can always go back and glance at the archives of the past. The attention to detail and journalizing in it is so natural to me, it is the reason I have an open book and a feather quill as a cutie mark.

The journal was open, the right side of the journal was covered in dried-up black ink because of the tipped over bottle of it right next to it. Whatever I wrote before my blackout was completely lost. Great, I thought. Now that my precious journal is ruined, how am I going to write in it, let alone figure out what happened? The calendar next to it was spared from the puddle of ink. The third Tuesday of September was circled, and all the other days before it were crossed out. Something important must have happened on this Tuesday! Somepony in town must know what happened! I thought.

I moved towards the door to remove the wooden plank that barricaded the door. I gave the door a mighty shove. I felt the Sun's warm beams meet my face. As my eyes got adjusted to the sudden change in light, I gazed around my surroundings. I was in disbelief of what I was seeing: Ponyville and all of its residents were gone. All the surrounding buildings were demolished. The only thing left were boards of pony's houses thrown all over the place. The only thing I could easily recognize was the town's library tree. It was charred and uprooted on the ground. From the distance, I can see a crater where town hall once stood. Corpses and parts of ponies were sprawled all over the place. The smell of fire and death was like no other. What happened here? Is everypony dead? I thought.

After finally getting the details of what happened I started to piece together the mystery laid before me. I tried thinking of the best possibility of what cause this damage. Dragons, I thought. a dragon could leave a town in a burning rumble like this. I observed the dead town once again for any evidence of a dragon attack. It looked like a potential dragon attack, then the thought came to me. It couldn't be a dragon, I thought. the bones spread all over the place make it impossible for a dragon attack. It would take a dragon a while to capture and kill that many ponies and throw bones around. That means whatever did this, had to have destroyed Ponyville in one swift, powerful motion!

I descended back into the shelter. Whatever happened here, the archives of my journal must have some information about this disaster! I thought. I returned to the table and flipped the book back a few pages. That is where I discovered an entry from last week.

Tuesday, September 13, 2011:

Today, I was walking down to the market when my attention was directed towards Twilight Sparkle. She stood on the bridge with a very concerned look on her face. She claims her future self came to warn her about the future events of Tuesday the 17th. She didn't know what the terror was, but she assigned everypony to go out and make Equestria "disaster-proof." She assigned me to patrol the Everfree Forest tomorrow.

The barren wasteland outside must be that event! I thought. it still doesn't explain how it happened though. I turned the page and returned to reading.

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Twilight Sparkle putting me on patrol duty in the Everfree Forest had to be the worst plan ever! She could have at least chosen a pegasus who could fly away from danger or a unicorn who has magic. With all her panicking lately, she must not put a lot of thought in decision making lately to realize she sent a pony to a dangerous location alone. About two hours into going deep into the Everfree Forest, I have discovered two mysterious objects: a round, metallic object and a small remote of some sort. The round object about the size of a soccer ball, and in faded paint red paint, has the word "LIBERATION" across it. With its faded paint, and how deep it was covered in foliage and mud, it must have been there for a long time. The remote also had the word "LIBERATION" on the backside of it. It looked damaged from the elements of the outdoors. I snuck these objects back into Ponyville in my saddle bag and not tell anypony about it for now. With Twilight Sparkle panicking all the time, she might consider this discovery the threat. This must be the object to free us from the terrors of next Tuesday! I will protect it with my life!

My saddle bag? I thought. I looked next to the leg of the table to see my leather satchel leaning against it. I peered inside to find these mysterious objects; but all I found was the remote. The round object was nowhere to be found. Well, I wonder what happened to it. I thought as I turned the next page. This entry was from a few days later.

Sunday, September 18, 2011

I have been studying the orb and remote nonstop since I brought them home. I decided to call this discovery "Liberation" because of the word on it: The orb seems all fine, the remote looked like it had circuitry problems. It took all day to do it, but it seems to be working now. Tuesday is just a few days away. I know can save them all!

So the remote works? I thought. I picked the remote up and placed it on the table. I pressed the button. It beeped as I pressed my hoof on it. I removed my hoof and it continued beeping for ten seconds until it went silent. Nothing happened. The beep kept ringing in my ears. It felt like something distant calling out to me.

It finally came to me. The sound of the button helped me regain my lost memory. I looked at the blacked-out section of the journal to remember exactly what it said before I lost my memory. My face turned pale, and I had a sinking feeling inside of me. The memory of what really happened to Ponyville loomed in my mind. The flashback hit me like a train.

The Flashback

It was those darn fillies snooping around that late Monday afternoon. Those darn Cutie Mark Crusaders, discovered my orb that I stowed away in the storm shelter until Tuesday. They ran off to go tell Twilight Sparkle about it. Knowing the mind of a filly and Twilight's current paranoia on safety, they would have taken it the wrong way. Twilight would want to destroy ponykind's ticket to freedom. I had to hide it in the last place anypony would think of looking: town hall. It was recently rebuilt, so it wasn't inspected as much as the rest of town was.

On that night, I put the orb and remote in my saddle bag, and walked the streets of Ponyville. I discovered Twilight was currently in Canterlot on some lead to save Equestria from the doom. Oh, what little did she know about true secret to solving everything!

I went to the town hall, and began planning where to dispose of the orb. Whatever it did, I would activate it with the remote from afar, and be crowned a hero when it was all over! With all the fame and glory for saving Equestria, I couldn't wait!

I put my saddle bag down and got to work. The floorboards were replaced after an incident of ponies falling through the floor, so ripping open a board and tossing the orb in would be an ideal spot to hide it. Because of the new floorboards and nails, it took about half the night to open a hole big enough with no tools. I tossed the orb in. It took about three seconds until I heard it hit the ground with a solid clunk. I put the board back in and nailed it in by stomping on it. Nopony would ever think of looking there! I thought.

I started to walk back really slowly because most of my stamina was used in the work I have done overnight. By now it was almost sunrise on Tuesday morning. My mind was kind of dizzy from all the work I have done. I was not thinking straight because I was short of breath.

"Finally, finally it's done!" I chuckled to myself. "It's finally done!" I started to laugh like a maniac. I don't know whether it was the stress from working or my own desire to save everypony, but I had completely lost it.

"Stop him! He's trying to kill us all!" I turned around to see a mob of ponies chasing after me.

Those darn fillies must have went around town telling everypony about it because they couldn't find Twilight! I thought. I turned my back to the mob and bolted to my underground shelter, the only safe spot for me as of now.

"Stop him!" One of the ponies shouted. I was probably a good 15 yards ahead of them before they reacted. As I ran, I compared it to the time I ran the Running of the Leaves in the fall. I was so exhausted at the end because I was never the athletic type. I felt the same shortness of breath, heart pumping fast and the sound of hooves hitting the ground in a stampede: hooves that are coming after me.

I finally reached my house and ran around the back to the underground shelter. I dove into the hatch and blockaded the door. I stumbled down the stairs and approached the table. I took out my journal, ink bottle, and the remote and sprawled them on the table. With the calendar already there, the table looked like a mess. To me, that was organized chaos. I heard pounding hooves on the barricaded door. The yelling of the mob was loud and impossible to make out with the door muffling the sound.

"I'm going to save you! I'm going to save you all! Don't you try to stop me!" I yelled over the mob. The thought of victory and freedom, praise and worship, came into my mind. My selfish desire of saving them all with the "Liberation" orb and taking all the glory was all I thought about. "This is your redemption day, everypony! Go away from me! Stay away from me! Go away!" I yelled. Once again, I began laughing like a maniac. I now began to taunt the crowd outside and pretended to act like they could see what I was doing. "You can't touch me now!" I put my hoof over the button. "you see this button here? I'm going to press it!" I yelled.

I pressed the button. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. That remote wouldn't stop beeping. After ten seconds, that remote was still beeping. "This remote is useless!" I yelled. I tossed the remote back into my saddle bag and focused on my journal to write:

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

It was a failure! I had everything set up, and in the end, I still failed! Now I have the mob outside to confront. I think this maybe my final stand. My objective to save Equestria alone has ended with me saving myself FROM Equestria. How Ironic! If anypony reads this after I am gone, I just wanted to say I-

All of a sudden, A giant shockwave traveled through the ground. I heard the chanting of the crowd turn into screams of terror as the shockwave flew by. before I could turn around to see what was going on, the bookcase behind me toppled over onto me. The unsuspecting blow knocked me out cold and made me fall under the table with the bookcase leaning over it.

Revelation

My flashback showed me the hard reality of what really happened. I was still in denial, but I know how it all happened. I went to my journal and flipped to a page that was not coated in the black ink spill and began to write:

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

It looks like it's all over. Rather than saving Equestria, I destroyed it. I'm the one who killed them all. I survived after the fall!