Reaper: Requiem's Reflection

by Ise no Kami

Lost Souls

Trixie plodded along through the empty black roads of the Crystal Empire. The last week or so of her life had been an absolute spiral of hell. As the disaster got worse, and the monsters from above became more and more aggressive, she had slowly lost everything: her career, her traveling stage with all of her supplies, and even the one friend she'd ever had had broken off all contact for both their sakes. She'd almost lost her life on several occasions, and now she was even denied contact with other ponies-nay, other creatures in general. That point was hammered home as she trudged her way through the deserted city.

Odd. There weren't any monsters raining down on the city...

She turned a corner into the main road to the palace, and finally saw some sentient life. No, not just life, but someone she recognized. Her slow dragging plod burst into a gallop as she ran to Alex, who stood alone, staring up at the pitch black palace above. Surprised to hear hoofsteps, he turned around, only to be shocked again to see her of all ponies running toward him.

"Trixie? How did you get here?" Alex inquired.

"I- *ahem* The Great and Powerful Trixie...doesn't know," Trixie answered. "When you saved her, she just...wandered. She- I didn't know where I was going, or where to go, and I just ended up here. Is something wrong with this place?"

"This," Alex began, motioning not to the city, but to the world as a whole, "this isn't your world, merely a warped reflection of it that's been forced into contact with the one you know. If you just wandered into this world, than the boundary between them must already be in tatters."

"But, if this is a reflection of Equestria," Trixie began to ask, "then where are all the ponies? This is still a city, right? Where is everypony?"

Alex looked away, unable to make eye contact. "They're...they're all gone. The Riftspawn ate them all. Look upon this empty city, Trixie. This is the ultimate fate that now faces this world...and yours."

"A-all of them!?" Trixie stuttered, the sheer weight of what had taken place here shattering her act completely.

"All but three," Alex replied. "I can't say for sure what he's doing, but my master has decided to hole up here. Even with these worlds speeding toward their ends, he's still not satisfied."

"Of course not. That's just who I am."

"Well speak of the devil," Alex shot coldly as the possessed Celestia-Lucifer popped into existence behind him.

"Alex," Lucifer greeted him. "You've certainly made yourself difficult to find. And yet you still decided to crawl back to me. Come back to me, and I'll just forget your transgressions, give you a clean slate. What do you say?"

"Is that so?" Alex asked sarcastically, his back still turned to his master. "Doesn't sound like you."

"Look, I'm gonna be honest with you," Lucifer replied. "I've been having...difficulties with your old friends since you left. Faris has lost his marbles, and Silas went AWOL too. What's more, I can't feel his soul anymore. I think he went and got himself killed. So please, come back and be my sane servant again, and I'll make it worth your while."

"Oh, so Silas kicked the bucket for real this time?" Alex noted, a smile spreading across his face with an odd mix of pity and hope. "Well, that's too bad, because I'm not coming back."

"Excuse me?"

"Get out of here," Alex whispered to Trixie. As she fled into a nearby alley, Alex addressed his master once more. "You heard me. I'm not coming back. I've been your slave for long enough, and I'm sick of it. So if you want me back that badly..." He summoned his ice katana, and turned to point it right at Lucifer's nose. "...you'll just have to take me down."

Lucifer just laughed. "Really? Even if you could defeat me, you're willing to slaughter this world's last true monarch just to get to me? No matter how little good it actually does you? Now that's just priceless."

"Maybe," Alex replied, "but there's one thing I know that you don't." With that, he lunged at his master. He stepped back, using Celestia's wings to take to what air was under the palace, and retaliated with an orange bolt. Alex immediately raised an ice shield to block the attack. The shield was vaporized, but otherwise he was unharmed. At the same time, he channeled his magic through the crystal pillars around them to send out ice spikes, hoping to clip Celestia's wings. Lucifer was prepared for this, however, and teleported behind him. Alex noticed just in time to raise another ice shield as his master threw a bolt at his back, but this shield wasn't ready for the blast, and Alex was sent flying into a pillar.

The force of the blow nearly knocked him unconscious, and he could feel himself fading. To stay in the fight, he let out an explosion of his frigid power, freezing himself to the pillar in a large chunk of ice. While his body would be out of commission in this state, his mind was still very active, and that was all he needed. From his glacial coffin, he sent forth waves and waves of ice magic through the crystal ground, sending out long ice spires to skewer his master. In response, Lucifer took to the skies, dodging spike after spike as naturally as a trained pegasus. Occasionally, he would dive low enough to take a shot at Alex and his frigid shell. The cryomancer was prepared for this, however, and set up ice shields as the beams approached. Even when a beam did make it past Alex, his shell was thick enough to tank the blow...

...at least at first. After a while, the orange magic began to take its toll on the glacial coffin, leaving a large and rather damp dent that just got deeper and deeper with each shot Lucifer managed to land. Trixie, watching all of this from her little side alley, started to get worried. If Alex lost this fight, she would lose him forever. And though he was doing a good job of holding his master back, it clearly wasn't good enough. She had to do something, anything, to save her only friend. In desperation, she pulled out a pouch of what little magic supplies she had left, and came up with a plan.

Lucifer managed to land another blow on Alex's glacial shell, and took to the skies once more to dodge the frigid spires that were shooting out at him from all directions. He noticed one spire coming straight at him from the ground, and prepared to soar away to the side, when his wings were suddenly pushed together. With all the attacks he'd had to dodge, he hadn't noticed Trixie's rope floating its way through the sky to bind his wings together. With no way to move through the air, and no time to teleport, he plummeted into the spire below, the frigid spike going clear through his-Celestia's-abdomen. Realizing that he had actually hit his target, Alex quickly retracted the spike, slamming Lucifer into the hard ground below and causing the wound to bleed out.

As Lucifer lay there in Celestia's broken body, he just laughed a pitiful, maniacal laugh. "So, my little pony," he chuckled, addressing Trixie for the first time, "you want in on the action too? Perhaps you'd like to be my new host should this one actually kick the bucket. Or do you just want to die that badly? I'll gladly give it to you, if that's what you wish."

"DON'T YOU DARE HURT HER!" At that moment, Alex burst out of his frozen coffin and sped toward Lucifer with ice katana in hand, ready to lop Celestia's head right off. He reached his master and swung...only for Lucifer to put up a hot orange barrier by his neck, vaporizing the blade before it could reach its target and leaving Alex with nothing but a hilt. He was left speechless as he tried to process what happened.

"Word of advice, cryomancer," Lucifer mocked him. "Don't use ice against a sun goddess." With that, he blasted Alex backward, then immediately teleported behind him and bucked him high into the air. Finally, he teleported above his old servant, and obliterated him with a giant golden beam, sending him crashing to the ground near Trixie.

The blue pony ran to her friend as the power dissipated. He was in no state to fight anymore. "You have to run!" she pleaded. "I...I can't lose you!"

"It's okay..." Alex replied weakly. "It'll all be alright..."

Lucifer teleported back in front of the palace, ignoring his own wounds entirely. "Would you like to try again?"

"If you go back out there, he...she...it'll kill you for sure!" Trixie warned him. "Wait, what was that one thing he didn't know? Do you have an ace in the hole?"

"Oh, that..." Alex replied, getting painfully to his feet. He was too wounded to fully stand upright. "What he didn't know...was that I never intended to win."

Trixie's eyes widened with horror as his implication sank in. "Y-you intend to-"

"I've been Lucifer's pawn for so long," Alex explained. "I've been forced to commit far too many unforgivable atrocities to count, without even the sweet release of death to free me from my chains. It's time I was allowed to rest. But letting myself die won't break this cycle by itself." He brought his hand to his chest, and flecks of white magic filled the air around him. When he took his hand away, he was holding a glowing yellow orb: his very soul.

"If I give this to you, Lucifer won't be able to drag me back from the abyss if he kills me. And if you take it, you'll never lose me. I'll be right here, with you...forever." He bent down, and extended his hand out to the blue pony. On its own, his soul floated into her chest, and the white magic-his magic-flowed into her at that spot. She took it all in...and cried. She knew that Alex wasn't going back now.

"Remember, I'll always be with you," Alex reassured her. "Now, you need to go. If Lucifer kills you too, this will all have been for nothing." Using what little power he'd kept to himself, he opened a hole in the road beneath Trixie. As she plummeted into the abyss, she screamed out one final time for Alex to save himself. "I'm sorry, but I can't go with you. My time was up long ago. Now it's time for me to rest."

Cold determination filled his empty shell as he went to face Lucifer once more, knowing that the outcome was already set. His old master charged up a great golden beam, then shot it forth toward his servant. Alex closed his eyes, awaiting the sweet release of the impact, welcoming death as he was engulfed in the light.

Sayonara...