“We’re not killing Keith David,” Pinkie declared.

“Is this another of those scripted things where we spare him because he’s still useful to us, or because we kill him later?” Pinkamena asked.

“Well, yes and no...Yes that this is a scripted thing where we get vital info on where Kinzie is but he’s not very useful after that but he will return to us in the end.”

“Ugh...I hate plot twists when they require me to do things I don’t like. Can I at least punch him in the balls?”

“Won’t affect the plot so that’s allowed.”

“Alright, so let’s find out why our errant Vice President tried to sell us out to Zinyak.”

In the chair room, the Saints were discussing their next move.

“As much as I’d like to get back at Keith David for betraying us, knocking me out and throwing me into a closet with Asha, well the last part I didn’t mind, we need to focus on finding where Kinzie is in the simulation.” Matt suggested.

Everyone briefly looked at Kinzie’s body which was still in one of the chairs tied to the simulation. With her consciousness locked away in one of Zinyak’s nightmare simulations, the Saints were unable to go through with Ben’s plan. Everyone knew that the hacker needed to be rescued before they could execute Ben’s plan.

“Can’t Moondancer find her or something?” Limestone asked.

“It’s not that easy, there are countless smaller simulations going on simultaneously that locating her’s would require hours or days of searching, time we don’t have if we want to execute the plan before Zinyak catches on,” Moondancer replied. “If we knew her greatest fear that would narrow the search but we don’t even know that.”

“So what do we do? Sit on our asses and wait for something convenient to fall in our laps?” Pierce asked.

A system message suddenly appeared on the terminal. The beeping sound that indicated the message alerted the Saints to it. Matt opened the notification and read it out loud. “You are cordially invited to the swearing in of Super President for Life Keith David today at the Federal Building. Attendance is mandatory. Have a nice day.”

Pinkamena smirked as she saw Pierce’s jaw hanging open. She pushed it shut with a hoof. “Good job Pierce, keep working on those plot invoking skills.”

“That still doesn’t tell us where Kinzie is,” Playa said.

“Maybe, but perhaps Keith might know where she is since he seemed to buddy up with Zinyak pretty fast.”

“We’ll see. Me and Pinkamena will head into the simulation to deal with Keith David. He better have a damn good reason for pulling this bullshit or he’s gonna find out firsthand what happened to Julius.”

With that, Playa and Pinkamena boarded a chair each and closed their eyes as their minds returned to Virtual Steelport.

It didn’t take them long to reach the front of the building where Keith was giving his rally. Keith hadn’t noticed them yet so they decided to listen for a minute before moving in.

The banner above Keith displayed more of Zinyak’s propaganda that demanded total obedience from the populace.

Keith was wearing a dark gray outfit with black gloves and a white turtleneck shirt with a light gray cape that extended up past the back of his neck.

“My fellow Americans. I know first hand what this war with the Zin has cost us. How many more need to die before we realize that the time has come for us to put aside our pride and focus not on division but unity? Does Zinyak have a strong personality? Absolutely, but then again, so did the previous President. And you know what? When I look at the two of them I see more similarities than differences. Both have proven leadership experience. Both maintain their composure in high pressure situations. Both have a love of Jane Austen. But most importantly both of them will not stop until they get what they want. For this war to end, we need to stop rattling sabers and realize that victory doesn’t come from annihilating an enemy, but by making an enemy your friend.” The crowd roared in cheer. “All of us are heroes in our own stories...the time has come for us to grow up and have perspective. Earth will have its salvation, but it will come on the back of humility, not violence.” Another cheer.

Pinkamena and Playa made it to the front of the crowd to confront. Playa was the first to speak, “Cute speech, where’s the part where you talk about selling out humanity?”

“Humanity? Do you mean the nine of us? Earth is gone because you provoked a madman.”

Pinkamena guffawed, “Provoked? Please, Zinyak was probably going to do that anyway. He’s not the type to give mercy at anyone unless he gained something valuable from it. What does he gain by sparing the lives of a race he believes are beneath him? Followers? He has an entire empire at his beck and call. Resources? That can be mined from the dead husk of Earth. Labor? That would require tons of time and resources that would be wasted teaching billions of people how to use Zin technology, knowledge that could potentially be used against Zinyak. In the end, to him, humanity was nothing but a hive of insects that Zinyak decided to burn because he could.”

“You don’t get it. Zinyak said he can restore Earth...all I have to do is kill you two.”

Pinkamena laughed even harder. Keith grew more agitated from the madmare’s mocking laughter. Once she was able to speak again, she explained where he was wrong. “Aww...how cute, the backstabbing Vice President thinks the Zin are magical people. You honestly think one of the most arrogant beings in the universe would consider researching methods to restore planets when there’s nothing to gain from that? I said it before, Zinyak sees humanity as a bunch of insects for him to squish because he can. They offer nothing to him that he doesn’t have already. Even if he did have the technology to restore planets, which I doubt, he wouldn’t waste resources bringing it back. You have no real value to him but as entertainment as you act on what he told you. You’re nothing but a puppet to him, a glorified mouthpiece.”

“Maybe, but if he can do it and he’s willing, then I have to take that one in a billion chance that you’re wrong. Too many lives are at stake for me to afford not to take his offer.” Keith walked back into the building.

The crowd started becoming hostile. Playa ended the crowd using a Freeze Blast and a Stomp combo to shatter them while Pinkamena went inside the building after Keith. She quickly encountered another of those spherical attack robots that she found out were called Marauders. The machine’s rotation speed was outmatched by Pinkamena’s speed as she smashed the back of the Marauder’s head with her Knightmare and destroyed it.

Playa ran to Keith’s office while the madmare was procuring some more red paint for the office in the form of Zin corpses. Once she finished she headed toward the office before she heard the sound of someone getting beat up before Playa pleaded to Keith.

What happened next came as a surprise to the madmare as the sudden turnaround of the Vice President was never considered. Keith took a pistol from one of the Zin and fired on the guards. “I know where they’re keeping Kinzie,” he said.

As Keith helped Playa to his feet, Zinyak appeared standing on a desk. “Tsk, tsk, tsk...Keith. We had a deal, my friend...Now what am I supposed to do with a naughty little boy like you? And you, Pinkamena, didn’t your parents ever teach you that it isn’t nice to eavesdrop on conversations?”

“I’ve always been a rebel, Zinyak. Not even my parents could keep me in line,” Pinkamena retorted as she entered the office.

“Hmph...Well, I will admit that the things you told Keith were quite true, I couldn’t restore the Earth even if I tried. I also see no value in humanity, but you Ponies are another story. I will find out how your magic works. With that, I will build an unstoppable army of magic-infused soldiers who will aid me in conquering the rest of the universe. Perhaps you could tell me and I might be able to use that magic to restore Earth.”

“Are you done with your pointless monologue? I think that’s your most effective weapon against me yet: putting me to sleep with your boring speeches.”

Zinyak frowned before he turned to Keith and pushed a button on his left wristband, “Enjoy your requiem.” Playa, Keith and Pinkamena disappeared in a flash of red light.

Pinkamena and Playa appeared in a run down alley in a run down area of who knew where. The first thing Playa noticed was that they were cut off from communications with those outside the simulation. The only thing the duo could figure from where they were was that they were likely in Keith’s nightmare simulation since it wasn’t either of theirs.

After some exploring, the duo came across Keith being pummeled by a tough looking man with a brown mullet and wearing a white t-shirt that said ‘Hot Rod’ and was wearing what Pinkamena initially thought was a skirt until Playa corrected her by calling it a kilt. The sound of bagpipes playing could be heard in the background.

“You’ve gotta snap out of it! Snap out of it!” the man shouted.

Keith punched him in the face before turning the both of them over with him on top. The fight became a simple struggle. “Look, you crazy mother!” Keith shouted.

Keith appeared to be in a panic while the man was trying to beat some sense into Keith. “I’m telling you, you dumb son of a bitch, I’m trying to save your life!”

Keith broke the struggle and leapt away, showing that he had powers. The man saw the Saint and Pony nearby. He walked up to the duo. “They have him bad! I’m Roddy by the way, Roddy Piper.

Portals suddenly opened up and Zin emerged from them. Pinkamena grabbed one and slammed him into a wall before she broke both legs of another with her hooves and caused him to fall to the ground before she snapped his neck. She jumped over another and grabbed him by the chin before using her rear hooves to buck him in the back and sever his spine.

“Whoa, nice moves. Hate to fight you in the ring,” Roddy complimented.

“What was that about anyway?” Pinkamena asked.

“He’s gone crazy. He thinks we’re all out to kill him.”

“I had considered that, but my sister wanted me to stick to the script. If he knows where Kinzie is, then it’s all the more important to save him.”

As the trio entered the building, Playa asked Roddy where they were. Roddy called the building a broadcast tower and that the satellite dish on top of the building was controlling Keith.

Once they reached the top of the tower, Pinkamena dealt with the Zin guarding the dish while Playa blasted the C.I.D.s projecting a shield around the dish. Once the dish was down, Pinkamena moved in and smashed the dish with her Knightmare.

“Did it work?” Playa asked.

“No. The brainwashing is too ingrained. I’ll have to beat it out of him,” Roddy answered. “If you want to know where your friend is, now’s the time.”

Playa interrogated Keith while Roddy was beating up the Vice President with his series of wrestling moves. Keith was unable to divulge Kinzie’s location before Roddy knocked him out.

Once Keith woke up shortly after, Roddy was already gone. A gateway opened up near them and Moondancer came through it. “You guys alright?” she asked.

“Yeah, let’s get out of here,” Pinkamena answered.

As they exited the gateway and into the main simulation, Playa stated that Keith had some unresolved issues and Keith was fully aware of them.

Keith later explained that Zinyak put him in a simulation that was a reenactment of a movie he starred in with Roddy back in ‘88.

Back in the real world, Keith wasn’t hard to rescue as that simply involved boarding a Zin ship and recovering him.

Once Keith was back with the Saints, and after Pinkamena lightly shoved a hoof into his groin for his stunt which left him hunched over for a few minutes, Keith told Matt about Zinyak telling his subordinates about a series of numbers that were connected to Kinzie’s location.

Pinkamena had an idea. “Playa, since you’re heading into Kinzie’s simulation, take Pinkie with you.”

“What? Why? She’s not a fighter.”

“I have a feeling that you’ll need her. You focus on keeping her protected. I’m serious about that last part though, you’ll share Zinyak’s fate if something happens to her.”

Playa felt a chill run down his spine as she made that threat.

Playa met with CID and Pinkie at the entrance to Kinzie’s warehouse. The party pony was bouncing around in excitement at the thought of being part of a real mission without her sister holding her hoof.

Matt transferred the Data to CID. “Data received,” she said. “Hm. Very interesting. It seems GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

“Ooh, is he singing?” Pinkie asked.

“I DON’T KNOW...I-I-I...OH HERE I GO!”

With that, CID raced off like a Saint with the Super Sprint ability. For a murderbot, CID was moving very fast. Playa and Pinkie were keeping up with the murderbot before she stopped in front of a wall and scanned it, revealing the image of a white rabbit.

“Reminds me of Angel,” Pinkie commented.

“If I had to guess, it looks like this sigil is connected to some sort of secret room,” Matt mused.

Playa and Pinkie touched the icon and a gateway opened up. Inside was an empty void with a platform composed of scattered blue square flooring. In the center was a device. When they approached, the device activated and revealed a holographic network of blue and white lines that looked like a complex web of neurons.

“What the fuck is all this?” Playa asked.

“A map of the simulation,” CID responded.

“So can you find Kinzie?”

“In theory, yes. The time consuming part will be identifying Kinzie’s brainwaves in a sea of other data.”

“Ooh, that one!” Pinkie pointed.

CID scanned where Pinkie was pointing and blinked. “Illogical.”

“Don’t fry a processor trying to figure her out,” Playa warned.

CID let the matter go and opened the way into Kinzie’s simulation.

Playa and Pinkie entered an infuriating reminder of Playa’s nightmare, an orderly rendition of 50s Steelport.

“*bleep* me,” Playa cursed.

“Nice place, hope they throw some good parties around here,” Pinkie said.

The duo quickly found Kinzie but when he told her to get up from tending her flowers, her response was strange, “If you want to speak with my husband, he’ll be home this afternoon.”

Pinkie raised an eyebrow, “Why are you talking like a stay at home stallion?”

“I can assure you that I am not a man but a woman as you can plainly see, nor am I a horse of any kind. Say, I’m afraid I don’t have much of a green thumb. Oh, can you help me get this bulb to sit right?”

Playa stomped on the flowers which made Pinkie cringe a little. “*bleep* the *bleep* flowers and let’s get out of here,” Playa yelled in irritation.

Kinzie started spasming. “What...what...what are you doing?” She suddenly started speaking normally, “Hurry! I’m being held captive by…” Kinzie suddenly disappeared.

Matt suggested that they were talking to a decoy and that there might be more around.

They found another Kinzie clone inside a police car. After Playa forced the car to crash, he punched the cops unconscious.

They saw Kinzie huddled by the curb before the real Kinzie told them to find her at City Hall.

On the way there, Matt gave an update, “Do you remember Cyrus Temple?”

“The meanie who tried to blow up Amareica...Oops, I mean America?” Pinkie asked.

“He’s in charge here.”

“Oh no! We gotta stop him before he tries to blow up the country again!”

“Pinkie, Cyrus is dead and America is already blown up along with the rest of Earth,” Playa stated.

“Not in Kinzie’s mind, he isn’t,” Matt said. “The Earth and America parts though are still very much true.”

The duo arrived at the City Hall where a younger-looking Cyrus was giving an election speech. Playa tried to get on the stage to punch Cyrus in the face only to be teleported into the crowd. After several failed attempts, Playa was open to suggestions. Matt suggested shutting Cyrus up by taking out some speaker boxes all over town.

Pinkie had other ideas.

While Playa was busy rewiring the speakers, Pinkie was decorating the entire park in party favors while getting a stereo ready for the party she was planning.

Playa walked away with a Dubstep Gun, courtesy of Vinyl. While rewiring the speakers, he also blasted some propaganda trucks with his musical weapon.

Once Pinkie started her own music, everyone at the rally started dancing, including Kinzie who danced off the platform.

Cyrus was furious about the music and jumped off the podium as well, pointing a gun at Pinkie. “This ends now you murderous pink psychopath!”

Cyrus was so focused on Pinkie that he failed to notice the Dubstep Gun right next to his head. A blast of music rattled Cyrus until he fell unconscious.

Playa walked up to Kinzie, “Let’s get the fuck out of here.”

“Hey! You swore!” Matt noted.

Back in the real world, Kinzie had a furious look in her eyes as she glared at Playa, “You don’t tell anyone what you saw. Do you understand me?”

“Kinzie, it really wasn’t that b…”

“I said ANYONE!”

“Hey, you got it. Just saying, it was a cute poodle skirt…”

That was when Kinzie decked Playa onto the floor before she got on top of him and punched him furiously a few times in the face.

“Hit him again!” Pinkamena shouted.

Kinzie got up before she stomped him in the gut.

“And I thought I was grumpy,” Limestone mumbled.

While the Saints were working on getting Ben’s plan back on track, another incident occurred, one that Kinzie was personally invested in. Cyrus Temple had made his way into the main simulation and had started building an army to take the place over.

Kinzie wanted Temple taken out once and for all so she brought Pinkamena and Moondancer with her to see it done.

In the simulation, Kinzie, Pinkamena and Moondancer travel to the Sierra Point armory to deal with the paramilitary forces there. While Kinzie took a tank to blow things up, the ponies stayed on hoof where Moondancer started deleting the STAG vehicles with her Blast while Pinkamena impaled the simulated troopers with knives of varying sizes.

Moondancer was surrounded by troops at one point before she unleashed her Buff which caused the troops around her to obey her commands. Using the troops to spread her influence, it wasn’t long before she had her own little army.

In the center of the base, Cyrus Temple awaited. Temple used the knowledge of the simulation he gained from Kinzie to avoid being hurt too much by teleporting away and summoning more troops to his beck and call. Moondancer retaliated by stomping near the troops which caused them to glitch out. The glitches served her.

“How disgraceful,” Cyrus grumbled. “It’s embarrassing to see men heeding the call of a woman, let alone a mere animal.”

“It’s called reverse gender role where we come from, Cyrus,” Pinkamena said.

“Such a world should never exist! Talking ponies shouldn’t exist! Females were always born to serve the men of the universe!”

“Shut up you chauvinist!” Kinzie yelled.

“Make me.”

Cyrus summoned an entire squadron to fight the trio. While Moondancer could have easily dealt with the group, Kinzie had other ideas. The mares noticed Kinzie’s rising anger. The madmare‘s Pinkie Sense picked up an imminent large explosion so she ran to Moondancer. “Moonie! Shield! Now!”

Moondancer obeyed without question as she put up her strongest shield moments before Kinzie’s appearance changed into a sleek, form-fitting purple suit with a large hood over her head. A massive explosion followed, killing everyone around her who was not protected by a barrier.

Kinzie saw Cyrus’ body next to her so she jumped on it and started pounding his face repeatedly screaming that she will not be his slave while cursing him for ever existing.

After she had nothing left in her stores of fury, she got off the military leader’s corpse and fell on her back, laughing.

Pinkamena knew the feeling that Kinzie was feeling. She approached the laughing Saint. “Feels good doesn’t it, unleashing all that rage and frustration that you had bottled up over the years?”

Kinzie stopped laughing after a minute before speaking, “I haven’t felt this good in years.”

“Glad to hear it. Hey Matt, record the fight and put it on a storage device. Delete the footage from the main computer.”

“What? Why do you want the footage?” Kinzie asked.

“Something for me and Moondancer to get turned on to.”

“You want footage of me beating the shit out of Temple for your sexual pleasure?”

“Yep.”

“I’ll allow it on one condition, I get to watch the first time you two get intimate over watching it.”

“Deal!”

Author's Note

Zinyak's end comes soon. But first, a chapter that I wish I could have had out a month ago for the sake of timing.