War of the Unfoals

by NPP6

Chapter 7 - Contracts

The glow around Midnight’s horn faded. “Alright, the good news is they aren’t lifebound or bloodbound and there’s no sign of reflective wounding, sympathetic pain, or empathetic injury. The bad news is that Applebloom was right about what the mistletoe did to the spell.”

Applejack took a step forward. “So yall’re sayin’…”

Midnight nodded. “Under the Ancient Laws of the Deep Magic, these two are married.”

---

The colt snorted, crossing his forehooves over his chest as he smiled smugly. They had locked him in a small side room while they discussed options. He didn’t care, every minute they spent trying to decide what to do with him was a minute they wasted not stopping the attack.

He closed his eyes and rested for a moment, letting himself – his eyes snapped back open. Somepony was watching him.

As he scanned the room, the shadows in the doorframe pooled and flowed into the center of the room. They then solidified, a filly rising up from the midst of them.

“Ranger.”

The filly sighed, “Well, there went the chance that you were just an idiot who got handed a script.”

“You’re wasting your time Black Diamond, I have nothing to say to you and you have nothing to offer me.”

The filly nodded. “Fair enough. I’m curious though, what are you getting out of this?”

“What?”

“This whole fiasco, what are you in it for? You’re obviously not just some loyal lapdog, you’re acting all wrong for that. No, you’re a mercenary, you get something out of this. What is it?”

“The chance to destroy Applebloom.” His smirk widened as he said it, he knew how these spineless cowards would respond.

“I thought so.” For the first time since the pair had met, the colt visibly reacted to something Diamond said. As he stared at her in surprise, she continued, “I recognized that look in your eye, when you see her. I know that loathing very well.”

The colt spluttered, knowing he was on his back hoof. “What could you possibly know about my vengeance?!”

She laughed, “Oh, I don’t know anything at all about why you hate her, I just know that you do. And I’ll let you in on a little secret about hating Applebloom; it never ends well.”

“You know nothing. You know not my rage, my pain, my anguish, my–”

“Blah, blah, blah. You’re right, I don’t know about any of that garbage. But I do know about your path. Oh, do I know that road. You see, you don’t know who I am. I’m something of an authority on hating Applebloom.”

The shadows began rising around the filly, whipping about and creating the impression of a billowing cloak. “Do you get it yet? You’re following in my hoofsteps. I forged the way you’re taking, I blazed the trail you’re galloping down, I hated her first. And do you know where that took me? Where it will take you?

“Right off a cliff.”

The colt was backing away from her now, still trying to save face though. “You think you know hate? Because you’ve seen a few dark things?”

“You just don’t get it, do you?” Diamond headed the tirade off at the pass. “Alright then, I guess I’ll have to show you.” The billowing shadows peeled away from her fur, revealing pink one strip at a time.

The colt’s jaw hung limply. “What?”

Diamond Tiara smiled. “So tell me, do you hate her as much as I did? More? If so I pity you, it just means you’re that much more gone, and I was barely salvageable.”

“N-no, you can’t… you can’t even begin to understand–”

“Kinda like you refuse to! I was born to hate Applebloom. That road only leads one place, and the Darkness is waiting for you with open hooves at the end.”

“What do you know of Darkness? What do you–”

“Great Faust you’re annoying! Again with the same shtick! Alright, I tried this the nice way, now we do it this way.” The shadows wrapped the filly again, then reached out and started wrapping the colt as well. Tendrils of the edge of light snaked about the colt, coiling around his head. “And, Sleep.”

Both foals dropped to the ground, shadows rising to cocoon them both with a few tendrils connecting the chrysalises.

---

The colt’s eyes fluttered open. He twisted, finding himself floating in a void. Even as he thought about it though, the void began to fill, stars appearing in the distance, including one blue one that seemed particularly bright.

A pink ledge appeared beneath him and gravity asserted itself. He looked around again. The pink ledge was sticking out the side of a cliff made of the same stone. There was no way for him to get down or up, but he could see a purple forest at the top of the cliff. “Where am I?”

“A Dark place.”

The colt spun to find Black Diamond standing in the air behind him. She was walking as if her hooves were on a floor of glass or… shadow. He could see it now, tiny platforms under her hooves giving the impression that she was walking on air.

“Don’t worry,” She continued, “The Darkness here isn’t dangerous to most ponies. It’s subtle, quiet Darkness. The kind that patiently works away at you a tiny bit at a time until it gets under your skin. After that it owns you, but until then it’s perfectly harmless.”

“Why did you bring me here?”

“Because you need to see, but refuse to open your eyes.” The colt turned again to see Diamond Tiara sliding down the side of the cliff to where he was. “So we had to bring you somewhere where you didn’t have any eyelids… That metaphor sounded way better in my head.”

“Oh, and so this is where you convince me of the error of my ways?”

The fillies were circling him now, even as he turned in the opposite direction, trying vainly to watch both of them at once. Black Diamond shrugged. “Not really. Honestly we didn’t really move you, this is just where you already are with a new paint job.”

“And we already tried talking you out of this, did you forget that already?” Tiara chimed in.

“So then why go through all this to show me a metaphorical cliff?”

Black laughed. “There’s not really much metaphor here. Your cliff is very real, trust me.”

Tiara picked up where she left off, the pair speaking in an eerie tandem, “As for why; we wanted to make it very clear that if you decide you don’t want to be saved, we’ll throw you off the cliff ourself.”

“And why should death scare me?”

“Who said anything about death?”

“You have no idea what waits for you beyond the shadows. The Darkness is eager for your soul, can’t you feel it? It wants you bad, especially since it’s so close. You’re almost a Nightmare already.”

“And I hunt Nightmares.”

“You actually think you’re scaring me, don’t you? Do you honestly believe that Day or Night hold any terrors for me?”

“He just doesn’t get it does he?”

“We’ll have to show him.”

“No. We don’t let her out. Ever.”

“I’m not saying that. Let him see her as she is now, in her prison. Not a door, a window.”

“…It’ll scare him.”

“Not a bad thing.”

“That makes her more powerful.”

“He can’t be any more afraid of her than Featherdown was.”

“It’ll still help her.”

“More than the alternative? You know what she feeds on first and foremost.”

“She can only feed if it’s not right.”

“You know as well as I do what our real intentions would be. It would feed her.”

“There’s no other way to do this?”

“Not that I can think of.”

“…Fine.”

One filly stopped moving and the other continued her path until she joined her. They had their backs to the cliff, which left the colt with open air behind him.

Tiara started, “We’re about to show you something, because somepony we’re trying to learn how to trust told us that you need saving.”

Black picked up, “Be prepared, this… The last pony who saw this still wakes up screaming some nights.”

“You see, this entire time you’ve been thinking of this in terms of Day and Night. And you’re right, you don’t have much to fear from either side of light. Yet.” Tiara stamped her hoof and a tendril of light shot across the ground towards Black, arcing up before it reached her and curling back towards itself.

“But in all the times we told you to be afraid, we never said anything about the light.” Black mirrored her counterpart’s move and shadow responded, crossing the light twice to complete a large oval between them.

A large oval that quickly filled with a black, oily substance. The colt could only stare at what looked for all the world like a mirror that devoured light instead of reflecting it. The Darkness thickened, forming up into a shape.

A filly, hanging suspended by the chains that bound her. A black chuckle began resonating as the picture clarified, and then…

The filly opened her eyes and looked through his and straight into his soul.

prey

He took a step back. He could see the portal leaking round the edges. She was going to escape, to come for him. He took another step back as she gave him a fanged smile. This was it, he had finally met his death. Another step. No, not death. Death was too simple a word for what this nightmare was…

His next step almost sent him tumbling into the void, he had reached the edge and there was nothing beneath his hoof. As it was, he fell and hit the ground hard, scrambling with his three hooves still atop the ledge to keep his weight up there.

He saw the filly’s cat-like eyes again and began wondering if falling to his demise was really such a bad idea. Demise? That was it, that was what this filly was, not his death, his demise. Without even realizing it, he let the word slip between his lips.

“Demise.”

Both Diamonds went wide-eyed, but their eyes weren’t the ones he was worried about. In the instant before the not-mirror collapsed, he saw the nightmare’s eyes. And he watched as they turned golden.

There was a long moment of silence before the colt asked. “What was that thing?”

“That was us. That was us if we had stayed on that path.”

“That was where hating Applebloom leads.”

“That was your future.”

“Or not. Up to you.”

“…What do you mean when you say that was my future?”

“The Darkness will take you and make you like her.”

“And then she’ll probably have to be the one to kill you.”

“…Why do I feel sick?”

“Because the Darkness doesn’t own you yet.”

“I guess that means you’ve still got a chance.”

“You’re not of the Day by any stretch of the imagination.”

“But if exposure like that affected you, you’re not Dark either.”

“…So what am I then? If I can’t have my vengeance and I can’t walk away from it, where does that leave me?”

“The Night.”

“Which brings us to the plan.”

“We should mention, this is a terrible plan.”

“And it probably won’t work.”

“But that pony we’re trying to trust?”

“She told us to do this.”

“So we’re gambling on her.”

“And we’re gambling on you.”

“One question, do you want to fight the Darkness trying to take your heart?”

“I can sense the burning in there that’s driving you to this.”

“Something just corrupted that.”

“So, do you want to fight the Darkness?”

The colt hadn’t looked either filly in the eyes since the window had collapsed. Finally he took his eyes from his hooves and shakily nodded. “Yes.” He gulped. “Free me.”

Tiara smiled and returned the nod, then turned and walked up the side of the cliff.

Black Diamond smiled as well, though hers was sadder. “I can’t actually do that.”

“What?”

“Only you can save you from this, and I can’t give you the ability to save yourself. I can however give you the ability to save others, and if that lets you protect yourself, that’s really not my doing.” A wind picked up, washing away their surroundings, and a moment later, the colt found that they were on a different cliff, with a sheer drop behind him and a sheer climb before.

“I still can’t believe I’m doing this, but there is an order…”

---

The conversation was lively to say the least. Four of the ponies involved were struggling to get a word in edge-wise as they talked over each other. The fifth was sitting quietly to the side, waiting for the cracks he was seeing to fully burst.

The conversation was cut off by a colt’s scream. Amid the traded glances, Midnight asked the question, “Where’s Black Diamond?”

It wasn’t so much a race to the door as everypony travelling in Applebloom’s wake as she rushed to keep her friend from doing something she’d regret. The filly threw the door open just in time to see the shadows finish cocooning both Diamond and the mysterious colt.

Midnight and Granny Smith traded a glance before the alicorn lit his horn and lowered it to the strings of shadow running between the encased foals. “It’s the Cloak of Nightshade spell… I have no idea how she knows this…” He looked up at the Apples. “The Cloak of Nightshade is a spell that lets you force one pony into another’s dreamscape. It’s frowned upon, as it can have severe consequences, but not technically forbidden, as so few can cast it.”

“How many ponies we talkin’ about?”

“Apparently counting Diamond? Ten, possibly eleven.”

“Oh… So Diamond just invaded his mind? Good on her, after what he did to Applebloom he–”

“Applejack, one, never even joke about that. My apprentice has to tread too close to Darkness as it is. Two, no. She didn’t go into his dreamscape, she dragged him into hers.”

Author's Note:

And now waiting for fallout.

This is actually the scenario I originally created the character of this colt for, although my original plan was to have Applebloom be the one to botch a control spell, and the colt (Whose name I know, I swear, he just doesn't have one yet in the story) to join the Rangers when all this blew over. That just didn't fit, so we wound up with this.

As a side note about the unintentional marriage, there will be nothing resembling Stockholm Syndrome going on here. Applebloom is not going to just accept the situation, Applejack is not going to start liking the colt because he's technically family, and our heroes are not going to simply move on with the important details.

That said, there'll be about one more chapter directly dealing with this and then it'll take a backseat while our favorite ponies try to figure a solution out instead of blindly trying everything that comes to mind.

I'll go ahead and let you know, I already have the direct sequel to this planned out, and it'll be in the direct sequel to that that the marriage fiasco gets resolved.

Comments

[Bronydude23]

So what happens next? Does Diamond Tiara and her shadow ranger counterpart successfully recruit Applebloom's now husband to the shadow rangers?

[NPP6]

7468825 Yes.

[Bronydude23]

7469472 Seriously why would you reply with a spoiler alert, it was just two simple questions I asked out of curiosity.

[NPP6]

7469892 No particular reason, just feeling impish.

[Bronydude23]

7469937 Okay then, but still what will happen next

[NPP6]

7470513 We're actually getting very close to the point where they blow a hole in reality.