Silence in Equestria

The Sector II: Episode XXVI

Tartarus - Day 4: The fan

"There we are." said Whisper as she docked with her boat.

"So, um, are we just going to... you know, go along the shore and look for it?" she asked with doubt.

"So far I have no better plan. Meanwhile, though you might as well tell me a bit more about this place, maybe it'll come in handy." Silence replied with a sigh and a yawn following her sentence.

Thus, they took their way to the left in the sand, looking for anything shiny. The scene didn't change anywhere as the went down the riverbank: water to the right, woods to the left and fog everywhere, not to mention the demons.

"Hmm... Do you think the demons could take it?" asked the pegasus.

"They're not really intelligent, but it is possible. You know, this river is endless, things won't change as we go, so if they did pick it up..."

"We're just wasting time... Is there anywhere else it might be?" Silence told, finishing Whisper's sentence.

"I don't know..." turned away the ghost.

Suddenly, from the corner of their eye something shined up. They came closer, and by the way it looked it was the fan of the princess... almost. The feathers all disappeared from the hold, the golden handle cracked at places and an onyx gem missing from a side. It wasn't as graceful and elegant anymore, but it was still a piece of memory the princess needs badly. Silence flew closer.

"(It is too easy.)" she thought and began to look for traps over and around the item, she even borrowed Whisper's spear to stab into the water, just in case, but nothing. But as soon as she touched it something grabbed her, a quick black shadow erupted out of the gold and before Silence could even scream it crawled up to her head and swallowed her entire body as a whole.

"Silence!" screamed Whisper at the top of her lungs as she ran to her friend, ending up also being engulfed by the black mass.

Slowly they woke up in a strange place, a huge swamp.

"For attempting theft against a pure soul, the outsider Silence and the ferrymare has been found... Guilty."

"Uugh." Silence told as she slowly regained consciousness.

"Executioner Gaia?" said Whisper who was already awake.

As Silence stood up she noticed a griffin looking down from a giant treetusk, carved in a way that it look similar to those tables af courts. Judging from that and the way she spoke it was clear that they were on one. The courtroom however was nothing but a mossy swamp filled with enormous trees.

"You know her?" asked Silence in sudden shock.

"She was the judge who decided the fate of the dead, whether they're pure of corrupted, but later she turned corrupted herself as well, that's why they use runes insist-"

"Quiet!" shouted the griffin in anger. Her feathers and bodyparts stained with the black corruption, but not entirely.

"Executioner, we were only to take back the fan to the princess."

"The fan has been found guilty for being both black and white at the same time, so did you." stomped the gryphon on the trunk she was standing on.

"What do you mean?" shouted Silence, raising her voice.

"You entered this realm, the realm of dead as a living, thus unbalancing the natural flow, along with the ferrymare helping you. You both committed a crime against the law of Nature but now you'll pay for it."

Gaia really was crazy... crazy and corrupted. Silence wanted to shoot her down so bad, but that might have meant losing the fan as well. She decided to try another approach.

"Is there any way we can prove our innocence?" she asked.

"For a creature so sinned and corrupted like you, immortal being, I'd not allow, but it is not my choice. Lust, greed, hatred and most of all dishonesty, your crimes should not be tolerated at the slightest." replied Gaia, with a piercing look she made, glinting her intense violet irises. "...however, everyone deserves a second chance."

The gryph raised her volume "To prove her innocence, the sinned must participate through the Purification Ritual. Only afterwards they are allowed to achieve nirvana. If you want to receive your fan, you must pass the ritual as well."

"And what does this ritual consists of?" asked Whisper with a sort of fright showing on her face.

"It's really simple, each of you are going to carry a wagon through the land. The wagons are as heavy as your sins are." explained Gaia pointing behind herself, to two empty wagons.

The two girls took a look at the rusty old carts. The wheels and the holder made of wood, with an all rusty crate made of steel bars, like a small mobile jail. The steel rings completely covered by rust, but they had no choice but to put it on.

"Steady? Follow me then." said the gryphon, leading the way through the swamp of gigantic trees. Silence however could barely move her wagon, despite it was empty. No matter how hard she tried, the wagon didn't want to move much. Her hooves dug into the swampy, wet terrain as she tried, as well as the cart leaving a trail after itself as well. Whisper on the other hand had no such problems, her wagon seemed pretty lightweight compared to hers. Still she seemed to suffer as well. Silence however was breaking sweat, moaning constantly as she tried to move.

After a bit of painful hard trying Silence finally got to make her load move in a somewhat normal way, until Gaia led them to an uphill session.

Whisper collapsed in despair. The sadistic Gaia just grinned wickedly as she looked behind while walking up the hill.

"We can't...nngh....stop now...nnngghh...we....must....get...the fan." motivated her Silence from behind while shedding a tear from sheer exhaustion and pain.

As they reached to the top, Gaia turned around.

"Get into your wagons." she said, making the two ponies open the wooden top of the cage, and crawl inside.

The gryphon grabbed the two steel canters and put them on her back legs and began to pull.

"It is time for the second part of the ritual." she said. In a sudden a fierily path appeared in front of them, burning the huge forest into ashes in a split second. The gryphon began to pull them onwards the transparent, orange way that was surrounded by huge flames. The two ponies just kept looking in shock when a literal flashback appeared. Suddenly they found themselves somewhere completely different.

"I know I can't trust you, you're now hereby exiled from the Castle, and thus banned from nirvana, forever." shouted Princess Nirvana at Whisper, suddenly disappearing in the same flash afterwards.

"Wait! No! Princess!!". But it was too late. The ferrymare got back from the illusion, into the pulled jail.

Meanwhile, Silence had her own fantasies.

"Master, do you think it is a good idea?" a familiar voice of a blonde asked a brown hairier girl, while sitting on a bed.

"Trust me, if this works we will never have to be afraid if the Sun anymore. We'll rule both the day and the night." the brown one with the huge wings replied, piercing the injection into her friend's shoulder, than flashing up.

-

Few seconds later another one appeared. Screams from a dark room were heard. A girl screaming, like if she were killed. The voice of the same, blonde girl as before tried to comfort her "Shh. It's okay, it's okay. Master will come and-" but before she could finish her sentence, the pink haired screamed again and with a huge swing she clawed right into the face of her friend. A flash appeared again then another one few seconds later.

-

A blacked-out forest. Some strange sounds of crawling were heard.

"April! Are you there? April!" the brown girl asked while wondering around. In a sudden she found another girl, with huge, black cat ears, a tail, sharp claws, wearing a suit. She just crouched there, in front of a tree filled with clawprints everywhere. Her body was shaking, but she turned around, showing her enormous groan and two pupils with such strange details. She behaved like a wild animal, groaning and wheezing.

"Okay, lil' Domy! I won't hurt you. Let me just-" but the girl, with a huge battle groan attacked, leading to yet another flashback.

-

Silence knew what those were, as well as who those were: Memories. Her heart felt being stabbed all over again and again and again. And the memories kept coming and coming.

A girl being shot in a dark alley. An explosion in the middle of a forest. A horde of fairies slaughtering each other in the middle of the desert. She knew them all, and she didn't want to recall them ever again. During her over a thousand years of life, she has seen so much things, she made so many mistakes, she fought so many wars... she gathered so many sins.

Every flashback was just another claw tearing up the old wounds, making them bleed again.

-

The entire hall was filled with fairies, all looking the same way, either red, green, blue, or brown, waiting for the orders. A short, brown haired girl with huge wings were standing in the middle, completely quiet, her nerves on fire when a rectangular hologram popped up.

"Hey, Master!" a familiar voice, the voice of the blonde girl from before said, her voice softly distorted by the device and her face smiling gently with a reddish glow. "We fixed the TTD's anchor, you should be back soon. Look!" she said holding up a cake to the camera.

"Happy Birthday to You!" she started singing, an entire crew joining from behind "Happy Birthday to You! Happy Birthday to you Mel! Happy Birthday-"

"NOOO!!" screamed Silence releasing an uncontrollable shockwave, breaking the illusion into pieces. She were crying rivers, so heavily she barely got any breath.

Gaia just took a lazy look back, stopping the cart and saying "Did you regret the sins you had? We arrived then."

"Wait, this is where we came from." Whisper said.

"Indeed, now that you're all pure of your sins, you both are forgiven." the executioner stated, leaping to her place on the giant tusk. "You may take the fan now." she added as the two ponies took off their weight.

Silence was still crying, but her face was not red from the tears anymore, but because of the sheer anger. After raising her head back up, with the salty liquid still pouring from it she screamed up.

"YOU! Why?! Why did you show me all this?!" she shouted, showing her very teeth she was about to break from the sheer power from forcing her jaws at each other.

"It was a part of the ritual. The dead must fate the sins of their past before achieving nirvana." Gaia explained taking the chains off.

"Die..." whispered Silence, slowly turning into her hole filled form, and began shooting wildly at the executioner from behind the bars, from Gaia's huge surprise, with a huge scream. "Die!"

The energy of the weapon blasted the gryphon's limbs and the steel bars into practices.

"Die! Die! Die! Die, die, die, die, DIE!!" Silence kept repeating as she stepped closer and closer towards the dieing creature, not even thinking about lowering her firearm. Even when she was only ashes and almost nothing were seen from the constant dirt and dust, the pegasus kept shooting and shooting. But that was not enough for her, oh no.

When she saw felt this is still not enough, Silence let out the loudest, angriest and probably saddest scream she could ever have done. Her body began to glow, turning all white and eventually shattering, releasing her final alicorn form. The power of her feelings were being focused in her horn. She raised her head high up, where the horn opened into three triangles and began to shoot sparks, with black smoke emerging and gathering at its top. As she lowered her head, she released all the power, all her anger on the place where there was nothing anymore, but small holes in the mossy, burnt ground.

As soon as the bullet of a giant black cloud hit the ground it exploded with such a force their mane felt like being tug by someone. The explosion created an even bigger cloud of black mist, making Whisper cough a little, but as soon as it disappeared only a huge crater, enough for a fully grown pony to bury in were seen in the ground only. Silence, still crying and rosy red collapsed on the ground, shattering her alicorn form into pieces and reverting back to her normal form. She couldn't move at all, and it was not like she even wanted to.

"Are you alright?" asked the ferrymare with shock and confusion reflecting from her face. No answer.

"Quick, we must go!" she said, picking up the fan from the executioner's table, putting the pegasus on her back and leaving as fast as she could.

"Okay..." said Twilight in herself, her mane all messy, her nerves are on the loose as she knew the patrols are all out there... and that they may appear at any moment at her library. She opened the black covered book yet once again, and another one, one from her library, then a third one. She kept looking back and forth, switching randomly between either the books or the door behind.

"It... should be possible." she said pointing at one of her books. "Let's see, there are four kinds of magic: Arcane, Astral, Material and... *gulp* Black. Arcane comes from the very soul, controlled by the mind. Astral magic consists of taking power from a differing source, usually with the help of a medium like a wand, staff or a horn. Material magic is influenced by and used with the help of materials and those only. And finally, Black magic." she explained, ending with a huge gulp again, then taking a huge breath and continuing:

"From the spells of this book, Black magic can be any of the ones above, but is mostly arranged for aggressive reasons, and powered by negative feelings. However..." she added, taking a look at the third book "It can be possibly to fuse Black magic with others, since it shares all categories from above. If my speculations are right, this could bring magic to an entirely new level." she explained to herself with hope shining from her eyes.

"But..." she looked back at the door. "But what if they find it out. Awwwnn!" she smacked her head into her book from frustration. She was shivering and sweating all over the place as she raised her head, peeking back into the forbidden grimoire. Another nervous look back then she began to infuse her horn with magic.

"Okay... just... just a tiny one..." she whispered as her horn began to glow, fading from purple to black and becoming all cold.

"Day 4: Tartarus. I can't stand this anymore. End of entry four."