... Flutterpriest Saves Anon...
Author's Note
Let it be known that, as sure as there is air to breathe and cartoon horses to lewd, I, Lack of Tact, am going to Hell.
this shit'll go through the wash after i'm done feeling like shit. i'll clean it up right good, don't you worry!
... Flutterpriest Saves Anon...
Anon Middle Name
[REDACTED] - [REDACTED]
"Fuck all of you guys.
Seriously."
You didn't want to believe your eyes when you saw the tombstone appear in Ponyville's pet cemetery the other day. Anon the human, the sole human of Equestria, was dead. After you and the four of your friends—including that white pony no one seems to know the name to—vaporized the living evil out of Nightmare Moon, him being caught in the crossfire, you'd assumed he would have just walked out of it normally. He'd stopped the mare responsible for the coup against the sun by simply grasping at her horn, after all. What else could affect him? Yet, after the waves of blinding light vanished, so too, was he. Not a sight of the person you've come to call ~~victim~~ friend.
All of what you could read from him screamed anti-magic, therefore he must have been religious. So it shouldn't have done him in. It was a friendship beam, not a rainbow-laser of death, right? The Curious Case of Anon Middle Name, indeed. Why is it that magic had been his undoing when normally it couldn't have affected him in the first place? It didn't add up to you, no, not at all. You tap the tip of your hoof against your chin in wonder, looking up through the night sky at the newly designated 'Man in the Moon.' What was once a mare's face is now replaced with, of all things, two spherical objects sitting at the bottom of a... a mushroom? It was rather hard to tell. It was almost as if the design was drawn by a foal, to be honest.
Maybe it was supposed to emulate his face, but very very poorly. One will never know, but nonetheless, everypony far and wide had taken to calling it so. Fitting, as he was the only human. If only his already short life wasn't cut shorter by your actions. Let alone everypony else's involved. You let a sigh rumble from between your lips, you pitied the man, to be sure. He was your—well, you would like to assume he considered himself your friend, anyhow. Celestia knows you loved him-
The faintest whisper of no I didn't blows through the wind. It was very chilly tonight and the bristling breezes themselves seemed to agree.
-and you would do anything to bring him back. You feel a sense of determination flow through you, your eyelids lower and you hold a hoof up to your chest. "And I-I will do anything to bring him back!" You nod to yourself, looking back at Anon's empty grave, next to one Opalescence's, and gently rub a hoof down the front of it. Feeling every engraved letter press underneath the frog of your hoof, you pull it back.
You know the moon isn't where he's actually located. It's just the highest guarded cell in Tartarus... or, well, that's what the stories say anyway. Complete isolation, no windows, no noise, just you and utter black. A nightmare, one that you wouldn't wish on anypony, let alone your true love. An idea blinks to life in your head, one you were utterly surprised you didn't consider.
In order to save him, you need Princess Woona's help. She's been to the moon before—for the sake of the story, you're calling it the moon. Mainly because being trapped in a "high security, low maintenance cell" doesn't sound as appealing a story to tell yours and Anon's children; moon is much better—a little too soon, you understand, but you don't care. To tartarus with kindness, your true love needs your help!
You step away from his grave and turn away, into the shroud of night's eternal darkness.
You've got a princess to meet.
. . . . .
"No."
"O-oh, u-um... w-well, you see, I... um... okay." You mentally huff, the guards here in Canterlot are so rude! They denied you access to seeing the mare of the night all because 'mysterious threats and allegations were made against her highness'; you mentally scoff. She's a bucking all-powerful princess, for Celestia's sake! What're the assailants going to do? Stab her? You turn away from the sneering guard and wander the shadow-blanketed streets of Canterlot, alone. Maybe saving Anon might be a little harder than you thought.
A voice catches itself in your ears and they turn in the direction of it. A preach of some kind, coming from a building with a bell tower. You're no stranger to these structures; those who enter them say they worship a God more powerful than Celestia herself. One who not only created all of ponykind, but all of, well, everything. Maybe a quick peek won't hurt. Who knows, maybe this God of theirs will actually be able to help you! With refound confidence in your self-appointed quest, you trot up to the church, pausing only to take in the holiness of it all. Something is calling to you, here. Something... powerful.
As you enter the building, you expect to see a few ponies in the pews facing the podium, but not only do you not, nopony is behind the podium as well. The church is empty as empty can be, and that's pretty bucking empty. Tentatively, you walk down the middle of the aisle, towards the stage. Taking in the giant statue of a pony, nailed gruesomely into a cross, you shiver. It's both unsettling as it is alluring in a sense. This is the supposed equine to have died for all of ponykind's sins?
Jesus Horse.
Looking at him now, you feel a small shred of belief growing within you. You don't know what it is, but there's something here that feels right to you. You finally reach the stage and step onto it, closing in on the inanimate Horse. You stop, looking back at the podium, now behind you, and see a clerical collar. Unused and still. It seems... it seems the object calling out to you here was this little bit of neckwear. Peculiar, indeed. You nudge it gently with your hoof, to see if it does anything, but it does not. It's just a bucking collar, you dummy.
You grow braver at the thought of your own brain insulting you and pick it up entirely. Feeling its weightless weight in the frog of your hoof, you glance back to the statue of Horse. Maybe this is how you'll save Anon? You don the thing and you get an all-new feeling course through your veins. Something you've only heard about in legend. Something... holy. Anon's religion burns its way into your mind and you see it all, you see everything he ever believed in! This! This is why magic hadn't affected him up until this point! Religion protected him! Horse protected him! Friendship isn't magic, magic is sin and therefore friendship is sin! Anon didn't want to make friends because it would be against his religion! You understand it all, now!
It was his shake in faith that was his downfall, when he felt he had been growing closer to one of the ponies—likely Twilight, that bitch—his religion couldn't protect him any longer, not against that friendship-is-sin-beam... you must show him the error of his ways! You must travel to Tartarus, alone as you may be, Horse will be right alongside you! You will reform him, bring him back to the ways of Ponianity!
And holy hot-shit, did you use a lot of exclamation points in your head. Wow, and... and is the censor finally gone? Holy hot-shit again! Religion is the fucking best! You shake your head, a wide smile spreading across your cheeks. Turning back to the podium, you grab the only other thing outside of the collar; the Holy Hayble. You will not only save Anon, you will bring him back to the side of good.
He won't have any friends, not for as long as you live. Lovers, though you may be, friends you are not. And it's going to stay that way.
By Horse's name, it will.
