Requiem for a Ghost

by ChronicleStone

Chapter 2: The Need to Save

Phantom Star’s Manor
September 29, 6:13 PM

Sky stared intently at the board before him. So, maybe this one could go here, which means that that one could go—

“Blitz, what are you doing?”

Sky looked up, startled by the unexpected voice. He had been alone in the library for at least an hour, maybe more. His first inclination had been to do a little reading, but he had quickly become distracted by the marble chess set in one corner of the room. He knew the basics of the game, but he had never really contemplated the deeper strategies of it. And yet somehow, simply being in this house made the board and pieces powerfully appealing.

And so it was that he was still sitting in the floor, analyzing every piece and every move he could conceive. “Playing chess, obviously,” he replied with a smile as pleasant as he could muster.

Ghost stood in the doorway, looking equal parts curious and annoyed, though at what was anypony’s guess. He sighed and shook his head as he entered. “Blitz, you are aware that chess is a two-pony game, yes?”

Sky shrugged. “Okay, fine, maybe ‘playing’ is the wrong word. ‘Studying,’ perhaps.”

Ghost moved to the other side of the board and stared down at the scattered pieces. “You don’t strike me as a chess kind of pony, Blitz. I’d always assumed that checkers was more your style.”

Sky arched an eyebrow. He wasn’t sure if that last comment had been intended as an insult, but he decided to let it go regardless. He was trying to resolve a conflict, not start one, after all. “My dad taught me how to play when I was little, but I only played a few times, and I always lost. I guess I just got tired of losing all the time.”

The look in Ghost’s eye was all he needed to see. Ghost hadn’t said a word, but Sky understood the message: You have no idea.

But he seemed to let the comment pass and sat down across from Sky. “So why the sudden interest again?” he asked, slowly reorganizing the pieces into their starting places.

“Eh,” Sky muttered. “I guess I’ve met so many other ponies recently who are all really intelligent and calculating, and…well…I guess I was jealous of that. I thought maybe I could work on that somehow, and…um…well, chess seemed like a decent place to start.”

Ghost ceased his arranging of the game pieces for a moment and looked up at Sky with a distinct look of confusion. He then shook his head, snorted, and returned to his task. “You know, Blitz, your logic truly astounds me.”

“How’s that?”

“Sometimes, you’re so keenly aware of everything and you connect the dots like a brilliant strategist. And then other times,” Ghost continued, moving the black king into its spot before looking out from under his eyebrows and returning Sky’s gaze, “you’re incredibly childish.”

Sky smirked. “Yeah, well, I can’t let Rimshot have all the fun.”

For the first time since his arrival, Sky saw what appeared to be a genuine smile rise to Ghost’s lips. Through all the bitterness and anger, it seemed he had managed to touch a fond memory that not even Ghost could repress. A flitter of hope trembled in his chest. You know, maybe there’s hope for him yet.

“I suppose you’re entitled to that,” Ghost admitted at last as his smile faded. He raised his hoof, gesturing to the perfectly arranged chess board between them. “If you’re so keen on learning how to play, then perhaps you’d be up for a game?”

The small spark of hope in Sky’s mind suddenly sent ripples throughout his entire nervous system. “Sure!” he replied cheerfully. “I’d love to learn some pointers.”

“Well, I’m sure you remember this much, but white always goes first, and that’s you,” Ghost instructed, patiently awaiting Sky’s move.

“Oh, right.” He looked the board over for a second before moving out one of his center pawns. “There.”

“A fair opening,” Ghost said, mirroring Sky’s move. “Perhaps a bit standard, but that doesn’t make it a poor play.” He continued to stare at the board. “So, Blitz…why chess? Why not just read a book? You are in a library, after all.”

“I kinda meant to, but then I saw the chess set, and my mind wandered,” Sky explained, moving out one of his knights.

Ghost brought his hoof to his chin as he studied the board. “Fair enough. But what is it about chess specifically that makes you think that the ability to play it is a sign of intelligence?”

“Well, it’s a thinking pony’s game, isn’t it? It’s strategic, requiring thoughtfulness and awareness to emerge victorious,” Sky answered.

“That sounds like a rehearsed line.”

“Sounded good, didn’t it, though?”

Ghost snorted, still staring at the board. “If everything was about how it looked, or sounded, or simply appeared to be, then this would be a very different world in which we lived, Blitz.”

Sky grimaced. True as it was, Ghost’s response was still cynical in nature. “But appearance certainly still counts for something, right?”

Ghost paused and looked up from the board to meet Sky’s own gaze. “Tell me, Blitz: what is the goal of chess? What wins you the game?”

“Capturing the opponent’s king,” Sky answered. It was a simple enough question, but the fact that Ghost had ignored Sky’s comment was an indication that he was going somewhere with this. “That’s easy.”

“Easy in theory,” Ghost corrected. “During the game, it becomes much more difficult, because your opponent has the exact same goal that you do, and they’re going to be as bound and determined to keep you from reaching your goal as they are about reaching theirs.”

“Your point?”

Ghost moved out one of his bishops to the center of the board. “Your move,” he replied stoically.

Sky frowned. From what he could tell, there wasn’t really any particular weakness in his lineup, and his opponent’s moves to this point didn’t seem to have a specific direction, so he decided to pull a play from Ghost’s playbook and mimic his bishop play.

Ghost arched an eyebrow and caught Sky’s gaze. “Copying me now?”

“Hey, one good turn deserves another,” Sky deadpanned.

Ghost chuckled and returned his stare to the board. He studied the board for an extended time, and Sky shifted uncomfortably. The silence of the house wasn’t anything new, but somehow, within the walls of Ghost’s home, it seemed…more pervasive. Oppressive. Almost aggressive, like it was an active threat to one’s sanity. It was an unwanted spectator on their game, placing undesired stress on Sky’s mind.

I’m not even sure how Ghost can stand it in the first place.

“So…I’m still waiting for your point,” Sky repeated, feeling a little anxious to break up the intrusive silence.

“I’ll give it when you’re ready to understand it,” Ghost snapped. He took a slow breath and moved his queen out in front of his pawn. “I suspect that will be soon.”

Sky took a second and stared at the situation on the board. There was a fair amount of clutter beginning to gather in the center of the board, and no pieces had yet been lost by either side. Sky smiled inwardly. He had adopted a simple strategy: keep your pieces alive. If he could maintain the advantage in numbers, he’d be able to more easily control and direct the flow of the game. Being outmanned wasn’t usually a favorable situation.

I should know.

He moved his second knight to the right to cover the hole in his front line where his pawn used to be. Let’s see how he handles that.

Ghost leaned back and tapped his hooves together. “Interesting. I can only assume you’re trying to play defensively and protect your king so I use up my resources trying to get to it?”

Sky smirked. “Is that what you see?”

“There’s an old saying that I deem appropriate to this situation, Blitz,” Ghost explained. “Perhaps you’ve heard it.”

Sky arched an eyebrow as he listened to the words of the pony standing across the table. “We often meet our destinies on the road we take to avoid them.”

Ghost reached forward and pushed his queen straight ahead, knocking over one of Sky’s front-line pawns. “Checkmate,” he deadpanned, raising his head and staring across the table with unblinking eyes.

“Checkmate? Now hold on a second,” Sky stammered. “There’s no way you just got me in a checkmate with just four moves! I can just take your quee—”

“Wrong, Blitz,” Ghost interrupted. “My bishop’s covering my queen, so you can’t take it without exposing your king to my bishop. And you have no other way of dealing with the queen. It’s checkmate.”

Sky slid back on his haunches. What…what in Equestria just happened?

“You see, Blitz, I know what your greatest weakness is,” Ghost explained as he rose to his hooves. “I’ve seen it in you several times, but I didn’t realize it until after I was expelled from the Alicorn Guard.” He paused, and Sky wondered if he was taking a moment to recollect, or simply to try and maintain his composure. But the silence quickly passed as the unicorn began to speak again. “You’re just too much of a hero.”

Sky’s head snapped to attention. “I’m what now?”

“You heard me: you’re too much of a hero,” Ghost repeated. “You become so attached to everything and everyone around you, you can’t stand to lose any of them. And that’s your weakness. You take any kind of loss as a personal insult to your capabilities.

“You were determined to save those ponies in Polarmino from the Chimera. And then you had to save everyone, pony or otherwise, that the Chimera had consumed. Then it was Lily. And then it was Nighthawk, even though you hated him. And now it’s me. You just can’t let someone go. You have to save them. You always have to save them.”

“But…”

“That’s why you weren’t going to beat me,” Ghost continued in a slow crescendo. “Even in something as simple as a game of chess, you can’t bear to lose a single piece. You can’t make the sacrifices it takes to win. Any kind of loss makes the greater victory seem hollow to you. It’s why you’re standing in my library right now,” he said, gesturing around the room. “You think that your victory in Canterlot was incomplete, because you failed to ‘save’ one pony—me.”

Sky’s mouth had gone dry. It had never been something he had given a great deal of thought to, but hearing his former ally speak in such a way had unsettled him. “Ghost, I—”

“Save it, Blitz,” Ghost cut him short. He walked away but stopped in the doorway. “I’ve already told you that there’s nothing here to save. I’m just a villain, and nothing can change that.”

“You can change that!” Sky answered, unable to keep his voice controlled. “It’s a choice to move out of the shadow of the past. And while I want to see you move forward, ultimately, I’m not the one that can save you. I just want to help you make the choice for yourself.”

Ghost continued to gaze into the hallway, leaving Sky to wonder what he was feeling or showing on his face. The silence of the house once again began to feel heavy, and Sky was tempted to say something if only to relieve the tension.

“I didn’t think I’d need it, but if you’re bound and determined to stick around, there’s a guest room two rooms down from here on the left,” Ghost muttered at last. “Feel free to use it, but try not to mess it up. Cleaning up is surprisingly more difficult without magic, you know.”

Sky watched the violet unicorn leave the room and vanish into the darkness of the hallway. The silence once again pressed in on his mind. His thoughts seemed unbearably loud in his head, to the point that he wondered if they were being broadcast out of his ears and echoing off the walls of the library. He looked down at the chess board before him, where the black queen stood like a dark blemish in the ranks of the white army. Was it possible to save everyone? Was it possible for him to sacrifice someone to secure a greater good? Was it worth it?

He thought about all the ponies he had saved in the last two years. He hadn’t lost one yet. A perfect record; one-hundred percent satisfaction. But Ghost’s revelation had cast an ominous shadow upon his achievements. What if things hadn’t turned out so well? What if somepony had been lost? What if Sky’s determination to save everypony had resulted not in a victory, but in disaster?

Have I been wrong all this time? he wondered to himself. Is my own desire to save everypony a danger to those I’m trying to protect?

His eyes latched on to the black queen, standing like a dark conqueror over his fallen pawn. Is this the bed that I’m making for myself? Is this the fate that I’m sealing for somepony else?

And, with startling clarity, he came to a disturbing realization.

I honestly don’t know.

Author's Note:

Sky has faced enemies of many shapes and sizes in his battles since meeting Princess Luna, but none have challenged him like Ghost. He was a formidable opponent in both physical and magical prowess, but even removed from those aspects of his persona, his mind is still as dangerous as ever. And, to Sky's horror, he finds that Ghost may be more than simply intelligent and cunning--he may also be right.

Up to this point, Sky has been able to remain a very idealistic character: able to focus on and pursue the best possible outcome, without any real concern for anything else. Less-than-perfect wasn't a possibility to him. Even after Lily's near-death experience, she came back, and Sky continued on. But Sky's eternal optimism is a stark contrast to Ghost's dour cynicism. And while Sky remains determined to bring Ghost back into the light, he may be forced to answer new questions about himself. Questions born in the dark.