//------------------------------// // How many times do I have to die in a day? // Story: A glitch in the program // by Lonepone //------------------------------// Cold hard ground. I lay there, wondering why that amazes me. I wonder why it’s always hard to remember things right when you wake up. Probably natures way to keep you from freaking out the second you wake up. I don’t know. I open my eyes, but it doesn’t seem to make a difference. It’s black, either way. I stand up. It’s disconcerting to stand, and yet not see anything. I stand, and slowly things come into focus. I’m in a large... area. The ground is black, and there seems to be a fog hanging over anything, restricting how far I can see. I try to think back to how I got here, but my mind pulls up a blank. All I can remember is the fight with Runner, him stabbing me, and then what? Am I dead? I walk forward, unable to see anything. Something appears out of the corner of my eye, but when I turn to look at it, it vanishes. And then theres another one, on my left now. I turn around, and I can see it running, but then it too vanishes. It’s all black, with long limbs, and yellow eyes. I turn around, and I can see more of them running. More yellow eyes. I stand there, and a horrible feeling of being watched comes over me. I can feel their eyes on my back. ‘Don’t turn around, just don’t turn around’ I tell myself. If I turn around, they’ll be there. If I don’t, I could just be imagining them. And so, without turning around, I run. I run the fastest I’ve ever run, and I’m a good runner. Long distance, short, I’m fast. But I can hear them behind me, keeping up with me. As I run, I find that I know what those things are. Changelings. I can’t run any further. I stop. I whirl around, but they aren’t there. I can hear them running around me, but I can’t see them. I close my eyes. If I can’t see them, I might just be imagining them. But those sounds sound real. I can hear one of them skitter closer to me then the rest of them. I open my eyes, and I see it’s hideous form standing inches from my right foot. So I do what comes naturally. I kick it. My foot lands with a satisfying crunch, and the creature goes flying off. The other ones circle me warily, but they don’t leave. They just stare at me with those sickening yellow eyes, those pools of yellow amidst the shadows. It’s really starting to piss me off, them just standing there, staring at me. “What do you want?” I shout at the nearest one. It charges me, and I time myself just right. Right as it launches itself into the air at me, I reach out and grab it. It hisses at me, tries to bite my hand, but I have it around the throat. I grab it’s body with my other hand, and bring it down onto my knee. I hear a sharp crack, and a green fluid oozes out of it. One down, trillions to go. Another one jumps at me, this one bigger than the last one, and this time, I line it up perfectly with my fist. I punch it right in the face as it comes flying at me, and it falls to the ground. I kick it, and it goes flying back. Two come at me at the same time, and I catch one, and throw it at the other. This continues on, until more and more are coming at me at once. They’re small, but nimble. I can easily take on three at a time, but anymore, and they start overwhelming me with sheer numbers. Eventually, one big enough to knock me over tackles me, and I hit the ground, hard. They all pile on top of me, and I can feel countless, sharp teeth sink into me. I manage to get one arm free, and I swing at them until they manage to weigh me down again. I’m feeling tired now, and I don’t have a clear sense of time. It seems that these changelings are sucking the life out of me, literally. I lay there, not resisting. I give up. I lay there for an indeterminate amount of time. It could have been only a few seconds, or it could have been years. A thought passes into my dull mind. How many times does a guy have to die in a day? Eventually, It feels as if a weight is lifted off me. It’s the changelings being torn off me, but I can’t think of why, or who, or what. “Took me forever to find you” says a familiar voice. I pass out. I wake up on the same cold hard ground. This time, I can think clearly right away. “How many fucking times am I gonna wake up on the ground?” I ask to myself, but, to my surprise, someone answers. “However many times you get knocked out” Says the same voice. I know that voice. “Runner” I growl. I spring up, and see him sitting there, in pony form, looking content. “Hello. You’re welcome for me saving you, by the way” He says. “Where the fuck are we? Why aren’t we dead? And why did you save me?” I ask. He laughs. “Where are we? You’re guess is as good as mine. Why aren’t we dead? Same answer as before. Why did I save you? That, I can answer. We have no clue where we are, or what might be happening. My guess is that we’ll have a better chance of survival sticking together. And really, I don’t feel like wandering around wherever the hell we are, with only my own thoughts to keep me company. Soon as we get back though, I might try killing you again” I shrug. which is when I notice I’m back in pony form. I gotta figure that out how that works. “Even for how much I hate you, I still have to agree with you. Horrible to be stuck inside your own head with no outlet” “You say you hate me, and yet I am you. You are one strange person” He looks at me. “Whatever, let’s get moving. I hate this place” I walk forward, and he follows. We walk for what seems like hours, but its hard to tell time in a place where there’s nothing that changes. Eventually, Runner’s ears perk up. “Ya hear that?” He asks me. I listen, but I can’t hear anything. “No. Sure you aren’t just hearing things?” “Na, it’s like people talking. This way” He starts walking in a different direction, and I follow him because there’s nowhere else to go. We walk for an indeterminate amount of time, me following him, and him just walking, blackness surrounding us, and the pale yellow eyes following us, and the same, damn, oppressive darkness pushing in, suffocating us. I’ve always been claustrophobic, and this is like hell to me. “Almost there. The voices are getting louder” I can’t resist. I have to make a wisecrack about that. “You sure those voices aren’t in your head?” He grins. “Possibly” Even for this guy trying to kill me, I’m liking him against my better wishes. “Against your better wishes? Am I really that awesome that I got away with almost killing you?” He says. It almost seems as though he can- “Yes, I can read your fucking thoughts” Interesting. I might “Be able to put this to use, yeah. Might come in handy. You might as well say everything out loud. You can’t keep secrets from me” “Fine. Since you insist. Why are you causing all this chaos?” He laughs. “I’m guessing I’m gonna have to tell you eventually. Might as well pass the time as we walk” I see something on the ground up ahead. “What’s that?” I ask Runner, pointing at it. “Oh, what, because I have super vision, or something? Yeah, I can bend the laws of space and time, but I’m not that good. On that note” He closes his eyes for a second, and I can feel the location I’m at shift. Next thing I know, we’re standing right next to the object. And it’s a body. And I know the body. It’s- “Holy fuck. Who talks like that inside their own head? It sounds like your writing a book, or something. Really? And yeah, it’s Vinyl Scratch” “I, um, thought you killed her. What is she doing here?” “Well, I thought I killed her to. Obviously, though, she’s here. And this is where the those voices are coming from” “I don’t hear anything... You sure?” “Yeah, you don’t hear it?” He thinks for a while. “I know. Let’s try this” Without warning, I feel his mind press up against mine, trying to grab hold of it. I instinctively recoil, but it doesn’t stop him. He presses in, and he opens up a part of my mind that I didn’t know existed. I can hear his thoughts now. “Wonderful. Now I can’t keep any secrets from you, either. Know listen, tell me if you hear it this time” I listen, and I can hear a faint murmur of voices coming from Vinyl’s direction. “She’s dreaming” I say, cause that’s what’s causing it. “Well, no shit, Sherlock” I focus harder on her mind, and I can make out the basic details of it. Something about fishing on a boat, and catching a bass, then dropping it. Very confusing. “Well, wake her up. She’d probably flip if her would be killer woke her up, right?” I walk up to her, and shake her shoulder. Her eyes fly open, and the dream fades. “Sound? Heavy Sound, that you?” She asks me. She blinks a few times. “I can’t believe it’s you. Where are we? How did I get here? Last thing I remember was, being killed?” “I got some bad news for you. I have no clue who this Heavy Sound person is, and all three of us are probably dead. We have no clue where we are, or how to get back” She looks around, Then jumps to her feet. A surge of fear rushes into her mind, along with a tint of anger. “Why the fuck is he here?!” She takes a step back. “You killed me! Why are you saving me?” She takes another step back, then turns and runs off into the darkness, the yellow eyes following us. I run after her, and Runner keeps up with me. “You know, you could just teleport in front of her so we don’t have to run. Be a lot easier” I focus on where I want to be, which is right in front of her, and I feel my location twist into the spot I want to be. I stand there, Vinyl feet in front of me. She tries to stop, to turn, but her momentum carries her forward into me, and she crashes into me. She gets up to continue running, but I grab her front leg, and hold her down. “Calm down, Vinyl, He’s not going to hurt you. Not yet” “But”- she pants -”But, he killed me. I’m, dead?” She says the last part as a question. She struggles a little bit more, then gives up. “So who is this ‘Sound’ person you thought I was?” I ask her. “Just a college friend. You look exactly like him” I look at myself, and yep, I’m finally in the right gender. “So where the fuck are we?” Runner sighs. “No bucking clue. I have no idea where or when we are. This might be heaven, or this could be hell” He hears what I’m thinking. “Don’t even”- I start singing. “And I knew, this could be heaven, or this could be hell” “Really? buckin’ really? You just had to break this serious moment with some random singing, didn’t you? This isn’t a Disney movie, this is a chapter on FimFiction, idiot. We don’t sing” I just laugh it off. “Seriously, am I dead, or...” She trails off, as she notices the eyes watching us. “Um, dafuq?” “Ignore them. As long as you’re around me, they won’t come near us. I have no clue why, just so” Runner says. She looks uncomfortable, but she listens to him. She does, however, keep me in between herself and him. “So, now what?” I can feel her thoughts bubbling confusedly, not sure whether this is real or not. “We just keep walking on, until we find something” I say. Her thoughts turn a little depressed. She smiles, trying to hide that sadness. “Well, might as well get moving, right?” I nod, and walk forwards, not sure where I’m heading. We all continue onward, against the oppressive blackness. I can hear the other two’s thoughts, but eventually it all quiets down. In this profound mental silence, I can hear a background murmur. It’s like thousands of people all whispering. Whenever I try and pin down the source of these thoughts, they seem to slip out from under my mental grasp. If I was stronger, like Runner, I could probably get into it’s mind, but I’m not. I feel some thoughts coming from Runner’s direction, and I wait, waiting to see what it is. Eventually he sends me a thought. ‘So you wanted to know why I’m causing all this chaos?’ I think back to him ‘Well, obviously. There must be some reason why you’re doing this’ ‘Because everyone here is so much under the control of the leaders. They’ve disguised it as a utopia, but it’s not. Everyone is under the hoof of the rulers, unable to make any free choices. I’m here to liberate them’ ‘But they’re happy. They like it like this’ ‘Do they? You couldn’t hear thoughts like I could until now. If you listen closely, everyone seems happy. Most of them even believe their own lie of happiness. But deep down, they’re not not happy. Everyone, whether human or pony, longs for chaos, for no control, to be their own master. For their to be discord. Let me put it to you in a way you might understand. You love grimdarks, right? ‘Course you do. If not, where did I come from. But why do people like dark things like that? Of taking an innocent and perfect thing, and twisting it into something delightfully horrible like that? Because it satisfies our desire for chaos. Unfortunately, they don’t have a similar vent like that here in Equestria. So it builds up in a persons subconsciousness, slowly poisoning everything” He pauses while I soak his reasoning in, before continuing. ‘So, I am hear to satisfy that urge, to provide wide scale disharmony’ He finishes thinking. I try and reason with what he said, but I can’t find a way that to bring down his logic, other than it’s just simply wrong. ‘See? I’m right. You might as well help me’ I’m conflicted. The good side of me wants to go against him, and yet it’s so tempting to go rogue. Couple that with the fact that if we’re on the same side, there would be no one to stand against us other than Luna, and together, we could easily overpower her. ‘No worries, you don’t have to decide this moment. Just think about it until we get out, then decide. Anyways, who said you have to be the good guy?” His words cut right into any arguments I might have had against it. And wouldn’t it be nice to be one of the most powerful ponies in Equestria, if not the most powerful? Runner speaks out loud. “Okay, let’s set up camp here. Good as anyplace. I’m tired, and it wouldn’t seem fair to make Vinyl take first watch” He looks at me. “Fine, I’ll take it” The other two lay on the ground, and I stay sitting, watching the yellow eyes watch me watch them. I sit like this for a few hours, until Runner gets up and takes his shift. I walk a few steps off, and lay in the ground. I’m asleep in seconds. “UP! EVERYONE UP!” I pull my self to my feet, and rub the sleep out of my eyes. When I can see clearly, I notice something has changed. It seems to be lighter, and all the changelings seem to be gone. “How quickly did it start to light up?” I ask. “Really quick” Vinyl finally wakes up. “Huh? What’s happening?” “Something. I’m not sure. It’s getting lighter” The three of us sit together, first Runner, than me, than Vinyl, and we watch the sky get brighter. Eventually, it get’s to the brightness of a sunny day, and yet there is no sun. We can see till almost forever now, and it seems we’re just on a giant, featureless, flat plain. Eventually, a bright light appears in the distance, and grows brighter the closer it gets. Eventually, the light dies down, and two ponies are standing before us. “Why, hello” She looks at Runner. “Well, you look familiar”, says the larger, white one. Runner says nothing, but I can hear his thoughts saying one word: FUCK!