Aftersound: Side stories

=================================

Written by:

Flutterfinar & Geka

Proofread and edited by:

mikemeiers, IAmApe, Jay Tarrant

Cover art and chapter art done by:

Geka

Broken Promise

====================

I slammed the glass on the counter with a loud bang, nearly breaking it and making everypony around jump. What a load of crap…

Passing through Canterlot, I had swung by a local bar to get a taste of some decent cider for once. Except it seemed the booze they served here was the same donkey piss in moldy barrels we received at the front. And I thought Canterlot was all about being fancy and having the best.

Since Flim and Flam had been allowed to take over the production of all food and drinks, nothing tasted the same. The stuff was still being made at Sweet Apple Acres, but their cider didn’t have the taste, aroma or tanginess of the Apple family’s. It tasted like somepony mixed together water, pure alcohol and apple juice with emphasis on the first one. Maybe even vomited a little in it. The only thing it was good for was wiping the scenes of the battlefield from your memory.

Never helped me, though. The lifeless faces would become blurry, but never go away for long…

Gah! I came here for a familiar taste, not to get wasted. I couldn’t anyway – Twilight would kill me if I came to the trial with a hangover. At least the so-called drinks were on the house, since the bartender recognized me. Not like I would have paid for that dishwater anyway.

Sadly, there was little difference between the stuffy underground bar and the streets of outer Canterlot. Even being so distant, the ongoing war had changed the city. Canterlot had become a hub for the army, supplies… scrap it, seemingly everything and everypony. Anything that went to the front had to come through the city perched on the mountain. The stream of recruits, civilians, trade goods and the recently appeared zebras made Canterlot lose its shine. It was now dirty and worn out, like a soldier’s horseshoe.

Despite the day being nearly over, the streets bustled with ponies. Meanwhile the sky above was obstructed with ropes hanging between the buildings, not to mention swarms of couriers all but bumping into each other. Flying was out of the question, so I swiftly moved forward, falling into a familiar marching tempo. The passersby immediately made way for me – the uniform of the Special Air Force had such an effect.

It was simple yet easily recognizable, even by civilians. A deep blue jacket with a fleece neckpiece sporting a pair or silver bars on each shoulder. Warm, practical and nothing extra, just what the frozen battlefield needed. Maybe it was this way because it wasn’t designed by Rarity. I mean, she made the best dresses, but we were at war, and war had no place for beauty. Still, she somehow managed to get her hooves on most of the uniforms of the higher ranking officers. When did she even find the time…

Finally, my hooves brought me to the edge of the city. Before plunging into the sky from the railing, I stopped for a moment to look into vast emptiness starting beyond it.

The sun was setting.

Fluttershy or Rarity would have said something sappy about it. Maybe even Twilight, if things were very different – the sunlight made her fall silent and somber nowadays. For me, it painted the faraway spires of the Crystal Empire in blood. I couldn’t set eyes on them, not from here, but in my imagination they gleamed with their cold malice, watching over the massacre beneath with glee. If I closed my eyes I would see the stubborn fires peppered across the dark permafrost – the Equestrian army preparing for the night.

I should be there right now...

When was the last time I slept? The train had to be patrolled in case of another attack, and before that a lot of things had to be wrapped up with my subordinate officers. It would be a good idea to have forty winks if I didn’t want to fall asleep during the trial tomorrow.

My visit to Canterlot wasn’t official; it was classified in fact. That meant that I had nowhere to stay due to nopony knowing about my arrival. However, there was one place I could easily crash at – the barracks. They were half empty these days, anyway.

With that destination in mind, I climbed the marble banister and plummeted down.

***

I woke up with a jolt; anyone who had spent time on the front knew it all too well. After countless nights spent sleeping inside cold tents on bloodstained rugs, I had forgotten what the other ways even were. Sitting straight on the army cot, I looked around.

As expected, the barracks were empty, the same as when I arrived. The Royal Guard left Canterlot years ago, somepony had to be the first soldiers. Those few who now patrolled Canterlot were almost entirely rookies, falling from exhaustion at their twenty-hour shifts.

My gaze fell on the clock: it was still hours before the trial. No wonder there was nopony here – it was too early even for the changing of the guard. However, my body had had enough rest. It didn’t need a whole night anymore, another habit earned while surviving on the battlefield.

Letting my head fall back onto the greasy cloth taut on a rusting frame, I sighed, filling the deserted hall with a somber echo.

The war sucked. But what sucked even more was that we were losing it. I was so tired from still hearing everywhere, despite the fact that it had been years, “Hey, Rainbow Dash, we have the advantage in numbers. We will overpower them,” or something like, “We have earth ponies, pegasi and unicorn magic, even an alicorn at our side. We are bound to win.” To be fair, I once thought it would all be easy peasy lemon squeezy, myself.

Only civilians who had no idea what was going on were saying that stupid shit. Though, maybe it was for the better. Rarity and her hoity-toity nobles were pulling the wool over everypony’s eyes for a reason – ponies would lose their minds if they knew.

When Sombra and the Crystal Empire were banished, or whatever happened to them, they were frozen in the state they were in one thousand years ago – at war with the Princesses. When they re-emerged they had their ponies ready for war, they had their economy attuned for war and, most importantly: they had experience. Hell, they were whooping demigoddesses' asses so hard they had to be sent to another dimension.

Equestria? We boasted millennia of peace, and that was only the beginning of our problems.

What was the use of numbers if half of the army didn’t know how to hold a blade or hadn’t even heard of guns? The most elite parts were only experienced in guarding vases in the castle halls.

Magic? When was the last time anypony saw a unicorn using their magic for fighting? Just as I thought.

Even the pegasi were pathetic most of the time. The weather teams were little use in war. There was only one forecast: heavy casualties.

This war was a fucking nightmare from the very start. It was hard to admit, but Sombra was a brilliant general; he always knew where and when to strike to hit the hardest. He also had a very nasty habit of appearing on the battlefield himself. Shining Armor joined us in a battle more times than I could count, but… he was a defensive unit. Nothing could pierce through his magic shields, and that was awesome. But when Sombra decided to take action, shit hit the fan and one shield, no matter how good, wasn’t going to help.

I was there when he did it for the first time. We were in the middle of the fight, even kinda winning it for once. Then I heard the screams. That bastard teleported to the black crystals behind our lines and began to destroy our ass-end like a stallion would do a mare in heat. No fanfare, no bright flashes, no maniacal laughter. He just materialized from thin air and started to slaughter us. We lost a lot of good ponies that day.

If only things would have ended there.

The next time he appeared it was pretty much the same. Screams from behind, lots of black magic smoke, lots of dead ponies. Figures, he could teleport to any crystals, not only the black ones. Twilight got all the smart unicorns for her playground, and ours weren’t able to think a single step ahead.

A mare, some snob from Rarity’s clique, who I was telling that story during one of my visits to Canterlot years ago, asked me, “Rainbow, why were you fighting on the ground, anyway? Aren’t you one of the best fliers and all?”

Because fuck you. And fuck me.

Sombra didn't have many mages, but any sorcerer he had was worth a hundred of our dull hornheads. Their spells weren’t a fart on the wind, that’s for sure. Our pegasi had been awesome at the start of the war, but that all changed pretty quick.

Fucking invisible flames.

Pockets of air so hot it burned feathers away in the blink of an eye. And that was the fate of the fortunate. I witnessed a pegasus become a cloud of ash; he was going too fast. That’s why I spent weeks on the ground, fighting alongside the infantry and pegasi who didn’t have their heads turned into cinders.

When it wasn’t Sombra, it was his Coven. Different asshole, same shit. Except the shit wasn’t always the same – something new every fucking time. It was kinda simple with Sombra: you see black smoke, you run. You see the treacherous ‘Demon Mare’, run and pray that our unicorns could negate at least half of her spells so you didn’t have half of your body roasted. See that fucking zebra witch, just pray, because fuck knows what she came up with this time. How were we supposed to deal with freaky zebra witchery and alchemy? Even Twilight’s smart hornheads didn’t know, and that was their only job.

Advantage in numbers? Bullshit. When ponies died, they died. We buried them if there was something left to bury. When crystal ponies died, they were raised again to fight because they were basically made from rock and it apparently wasn’t a big deal to make a crystal golem from their corpses. When those zombies died, whatever was left of them was whomped up and sent to battle again. Then again. And again. I swear there was a pony I killed, like, five or six times in one day.

The alicorn on our side? You know, a lot of ponies said that it was Twilight who got hit the hardest when Celestia died. She was very depressed, no shit. Hard to blame her. But Luna had completely gone nuts. She helped us only once and it was a disaster.

It all started fine, she was a helluva mage, mind you. But then we noticed that she kinda didn’t know what friendly fire was. Then we just ran. It was the first and the last time I ran from the battlefield. Needless to say, it was a huge hit for the army’s morale.

Speaking of which. All that crap was bad, alright, but not the worst.

The deserters and defectors. The scum. After the first week ponies began to leave at night. A quarter of the army was gone in three fucking weeks. And half of those who didn’t leave at night tried to do it on the battlefield. Pathetic cowards. It got even worse soon – we began to notice our former soldiers fighting for Sombra. The traitors thought he was some kind of a new god or something. Not sure if they were false-hearted or just brain-dead.

This was why we were losing the war.

Every battle, even the smallest one, had to be planned extra carefully. We had to spend more time scouting than fighting. We couldn’t fight with crystals on the battlefield, it was like inviting Sombra to fuck us up. We had to know which shithead from the Coven was going to join the battle, or we got fucked up in no time. We couldn’t fight with a sky full of magic traps, we couldn't fight on minefields, we couldn't fight near the walls because of the prism cannons. We couldn't fight most of the time, or we lost by default. And when we could it was ‘hard hard lemon hard’.

Right now the army was barely one third of the size it was on the first day. There was no more advantage in numbers. And Sombra knew it, he wasn’t a stupid fuck like half of our command. He began to push back a few months ago, and we couldn't do shit to stop him. Honestly, I didn’t know why he even waited in the first place.

The whole siege was a one big joke from the start. Why did we even start it? Oh yeah, Sombra captured Cadence, Shining was super upset with it, that’s totally understandable. But we weren’t ready. Come on guys, we couldn’t just declare a war because we felt like it. Our concern wasn’t how to win it anymore, but rather how not to get completely fucked up.

Those damn Elements. I know that Twilight wanted to take all the blame, but she was not the only one who screwed up. Sure, her Element didn’t work, but to be honest, I didn’t remember Fluttershy’s working either. Or Pinkie’s for that matter. We were all still devastated from what happened at the wedding.

If we had listened to Twilight back then, all this shit wouldn’t have happened. If anything, it’s all our fault, not hers. Which is extra stupid because it was the second time we didn’t listen to her when we most definitely should have. But the milk was spilled already.

That ‘cybersuit’ was the only hope, really. We needed it like nothing else. At this rate it was a question of not months but days before Sombra would break the siege. If Twilight was right, that armor was going to give us what we needed to deal with all that magic bullshit and more. It was gonna make our half-baked army faster, stronger… better.

I volunteered as soon as I heard the news. If this suit could handle me, it could handle anypony. It would be faster this way, no time wasted picking testers and less paperwork. Props to Twilight and Moondancer, it took them mere months to get from sketches to a fully functional prototype. Guess I wasn’t the only one who didn’t get much sleep lately.

There was still enough time before the trial. Would anypony mind if I turned up early? Though, it was too early for ‘early’... or I could just go out and fly like before, without doing it to escape death. That sounded better than warming up a cot for some greenhorn or wallowing in whatever I was wallowing in – that was Rare’s job.

***

A nice place they got for themselves, huh. Even set the weather right, perfect for a flight. Looks like not all the good pegasi were getting fried in the skies above the Crystal Empire.

It was a good idea to arrive earlier than I was supposed to. Twilight’s team had already started the preparations, and she herself was going to be there any minute now.

The Crystal Empire was beyond my sight, but my eyes were still drawn to the North. I caught myself holding a breath, as if I was expecting something to happen. Maybe a huge cloud of thick trademark black smoke would rise and destroy the last hope we had; his spies were everywhere after all. Or maybe a glorious sunray would wipe that fucking Empire from existence – that would be nice. But Celestia was dead, Luna went batshit crazy and we had yet to save Cadence.

Steps behind me.

I almost flicked my ear – still couldn’t get rid of that reflex. It was so strange to hear ponies not trying to conceal themselves – it had to be Twilight.

Mustering as much positivity as I could, so I wouldn’t sound and look like my bed owed me a decade of naps, I greeted her:

"Hi, Twilight."

I turned to my egghead friend only to see her smiling at me.

"Hi, Rainbow."

It had been a while since I had last seen her, or anypony, smile. And, goddesses, she looked terrible, maybe even worse than me. I guess you didn't have to be at the front to feel the war.

I leaned in to give her a hug. A few years ago I would have cringed away instead. But after hugging a rifle for twenty hours straight in a mud and blood filled trench, I began to look differently at such things – I started to look forward to them.

“Pinkie says hi,” I whispered to Twilight. I swear, every time I saw Pinkie Pie she asked me to do it, and I knew that she would somehow learn if I didn’t.

Parting from the embrace, she sat by my side. The inevitable happened – her eyes became drawn to the north, trying to see the horrors of war in the distance. When her tired gaze found nothing but the blur of snow and sky, she began to ask questions.

I obliged her with answers, relishing in the bittersweet feeling of finally talking with somepony about it without hiding the ugly truth.

***

For fuck’s sake.

Why did I even agree to test this crap? The damn final version was huge and bulky, like the plate armor of those Stalliongrad weirdos. We tested two prototypes before and they were sleek, lightweight and badass. I doubted this hulk of steel was even capable of taking off.

But it wasn’t as bad as Twilight, who sounded like she was going to read me a full-length lecture on magic. Did she want my brains to melt? I thought that was the Coven’s job.

"Uhhh," I hastily interrupted her before it was too late, "in case you forgot, I'm not a unicorn, Twi."

"Argh! Fine!" Twilight barked at me. "You just need to start talking and we will hear you at the stand."

“Alright." Sheesh, why couldn’t she tell me that in the first place… Anyway, I had some real questions. "What do I need this mask for?"

As we talked, the technical personnel were putting the final pieces of the plating and other weird stuff on the exoskeleton base. I did know some egghead words, and yes, I also knew what it meant. Speaking of which, the exoskeleton chaffed in every place possible, and it was as uncomfortable as it could get. I wouldn’t want to be stuck inside it for long.

"It's an oxygen mask.” Please, not another lecture! “You will need it to breathe in the suit. It's tightly sealed, remember?"

Thank the Goddesses, I was spared a half-hour long lecture about the enchantment used to filter air or whatever this thing does. Twilight was obviously proud of each and every enchantment they invented at the RCRC, and she had every right to be – without them the war would be lost already. But sometimes I had the feeling that she was forgetting why they had to be created.

"Okaaay," I replied, concerned if the mask had been field tested. However, nopony cared about my doubts and it was put on my muzzle, the tubes unpleasantly rubbing against my nostrils. Not the most comfortable thing, but better than the gas masks – they always smelled like something had died inside them… or somepony.

"I'm going to the stand to check out the recording machinery and the communication crystals," Twilight said as she departed to the edge of the flight strip. Before that she gave me an awkward hoof-bump (they were always like that with her) and wished me luck.

What I needed was something to distract my mind as I seemed to be doomed to resemble a statue and die of sheer boredom while she decided to have a nice long chat with Moondancer. I had nothing against her, though, Moondancer was a cool mare – she preferred flashy demonstrations to boring lectures, despite looking even more nerdy than Twilight.

As they were waffling on, the technicians put on the last pieces of the plating. It was time for the helmet now, the only part of the cybersuit that actually looked awesome – like a dragon’s head.

I was standing fully concealed in the cybersuit, and it felt like I was crammed inside a tin can. It was stuffy and too close-bodied – way too uncomfortable for me. The worst part was that I couldn’t move, not until the gems fired up.

With the trademark crackle of magic the armor came to life. Numerous glowing indicators appeared in the glass visor – I couldn’t remember what half of them meant. Altitude, airspeed, vertical speed... compass… attitude indicator? Those were the most important, the rest was arcane mumbo-jumbo with which I had no business – I was a pilot and a soldier, not a mechanic. Goddesses forbid I ever let some of that stuff clog my brain.

Suddenly, I heard Twilight’s voice in the headphones:

"Rainbow, can you hear me?"

I would never get used to those things; it was like the sound was coming from inside my head, not from the outside. Her voice was loud and slightly crackly, like a brewing thunder cloud. Or was that the gems of the armor?

"Yeah, a little bit too loud and there is a strange crackle." I wasn’t really bothered by it – I didn’t expect the armor to be silent, but Twilight had asked me to report anything unusual to her. The problem was that I had no idea what was supposed to be usual, so I was going to tell her anything that caught my attention.

Instead of replying to me, she began to shout something to Moondancer… Really? Was I going to fly today?

"Rainbow, Moondancer says that it will become less loud after you take off, and the crackle could be overlapping magic fields." The only laps I cared about were around a track during a race, so her words made no sense. "I don't think this will affect the cyber suit.” Yeah, I didn’t think so either – not my job. “Its enchantments are protected by arcanium runes after all."

Deciding to not voice the remark about those enchantments also very effectively protecting Twi’s virginity, I asked with hope, "So if everything is fine, can I take off then?" Five more minutes and I was going to die. "I'm tired of standing in one place already!"

"Yes, on the count of ten."

Yeah, sure, count my ass to ten.

Even through the noise dampening protection of the suit I heard a loud message:

“Everypony must immediately leave the flight strip, we are starting the test on the count of ten! I repeat, everypony leave the flight strip!"

Finally. Now I had to remember how to fly this thing. If it was even going to take off, of course.

"Ten," Twi began to count. “Nine…”

The turbine was controlled by the special buttons for my hooves just like during the previous test; it was nice to know that they hadn’t changed anything fundamental – I accidentally forgot to read the instructions this time. And the direction of the metal wings was controlled by… my wings. Easy peasy – now it was time to squeeze some lemons.

I pressed the buttons and with a deafening roar rocketed to the sky – it actually took off! And it also was fast; not as fast as me, but it would do for now.

"Fi..." Twilight’s countdown echoed in my headphones.

She was gonna kill me when I landed, but it would be worth it.

"Sorry boss," I chuckled, "couldn't hold on any longer."

"Ugh. Is everything all right at least?" Twilight asked me.

Moving my wings I took a sharp turn, intently listening to the armor, expecting the metal to violently protest against the wind. It remained absolutely silent, not a single creak of insubordination. Though… yeah, the crackling was still there. Probably the turbine or something else – the thing was made too quickly to be perfect.

"Yeah, all's fine, your voice is not so loud anymore, but, uh, the crackling is a bit louder now," I reported back to Twilight.

She didn’t answer, so I decided that meant a green light. I had come up with a flying routine for the cybersuit. It needed to be tested out for basic aerial maneuvers and moves we used on a daily basis, plus some advanced stuff to challenge its toughness.

I had to admit, I was impressed; Twilight and Moonie had done a superb job, though I expected nothing less from them – they were the best we had. The controls were smooth and responded without any delay whatsoever. For its size and weight the cybersuit was quite fast and very maneuverable, almost comparable to that of a pegasus. It was exactly what we needed on the battlefield – simple to ride, it was perfect for our featherbrained soldiers.

However, as I was pirouetting through the skies I noticed the crackling was becoming louder and louder to the point it started to concern me; call it an achievement.

"Hey, Twi,” I called to her, realizing that she had been strangely silent all that time. “The crackling has gotten louder, I think it's coming from the turbine."

"What!? Are you sure?" Twilight gasped as if I had startled her from daydreaming.

I wouldn’t blame her, though – all the fun was up here; she also looked like the last time she slept was before the war. If I were her, I would have relaxed and continued to enjoy the show – it wouldn’t be a prototype if everything worked as intended.

I strained my ears – it wasn’t in my headphones. The sound was coming through the helmet from the outside.

“Yes, it's sure becoming louder, and it's not from the ‘com’. It's coming from somewhere behind my helmet," I told her. It had to be the turbine – figures, I was too fast and badass for this suit. One more test might be in order.

""No, no, no, no, no, no!" Twilight began to panic. Though she was prone to that even without a good reason, I couldn’t help but tense up.

It was then that the controls refused to obey me and half of the indicators on my visor started to blink with an unhealthy red. Unfortunately, not all of them were about arcane parameters – the drop in altitude was nothing to joke about, especially when I weighed like twenty pegasi and the wings I had could be used only for steering, not hovering.

“Rainbow, listen to me!" Twilight continued to yell, but I barely heard her – the alarms and the crackling were almost deafening. Nor did I have time to listen to her. I was trying to figure out how not to die as Rainbow Crash.

"Rainbow, something is wrong. You need to land right now!”

No shit Sherclop. In addition to having my hearing assaulted, I started to choke on smoke. Judging by the searing heat at my withers, it wasn’t hard to guess where it was coming from. Any moment I expected to smell burning fur – the heat inside the suit was becoming unbearable.

“Can you hear me?” Barely – the turbine was whining at a high pitch, making my teeth answer with agony. “You need to..."

But I didn’t get to know what I needed to do – something exploded behind my head and I was blinded by unimaginable pain.

My last thought was of the somber talk I had with Pinkie Pie at one of the campfires under the Crystal Empire’s walls, the night before the very first battle.

If I died, but not on the battlefield, would I break the Pinkie Promise?