The Darkness in our Souls

by Black Light

Chapter 105

Chapter 105

I was laying on the ground my eyes pinned shut from the flash. I groaned as I began to stand up. I looked up and saw Scaled Heart starring at me with a look of disbelief. "I expected that to do more than blind me." I said rubbing my head.

"I think it may have done more than you think." I heard the darkness say.

"What do you mean?" I asked to disoriented to speak internally.

"Perhaps you should turn around." I heard a different voice say. The voice seemed so familiar, but I don't think I had ever heard it before. I slowly turned my head around to look behind me.

When I saw who had spoken, I froze. "...Erebus?" I asked in disbelief.

"It would appear so." He answered. "We are just as surprised by this as you."

"So." I heard next to me. I turned and saw the darkness standing there. His body was made of shadows, the same as when we were separated the first time. "-What in the pits of Tartarus is happening?!" He asked annoyed.

I stood there frozen as I watched the two other parts of me move about freely. Erebus took the time to observe his surroundings. I could tell by the way his wings tensed he wanted to fly up and retrieve Skies from he griffin. The darkness on the other hoof. The sound of cracking echoed through the cave as another stone was broken under the darkness' hoof in his angry pacing. As he moved I caught a glimpse of something. "Hold on a second." I said to him causing him to stop. I walked up next to him and looked closely at the spot I had saw. As the shadows moved around his body I occasionally caught a glimpse of something within them. It took me a few seconds of staring, but I eventually saw it clearly. "...The coin is inside you." I said.

"What?" He asked. Suddenly the shadows around him began to move. They pushed forward the coin until it was outside of his body. "...It's only black. He said looking back at me surprised. Suddenly he faltered as he was looking at me. "You-your-" He stammered.

"My what?" I asked.

"We believe he wishes to tell you that you're cutie mark has changed." Erebus said.

My eyes suddenly widened and my head spun around. I starred at where my normal apparent blank flank cutie mark would normally be. Instead of seeing the black circle blending with my coat, it was a white circle. I looked closer at it and saw that it had the same design on it as the white side of the coin. My gaze turned to Erebus, his cutie mark altered as well. A grey ring surrounding the heads of two ponies, one was white the other black.

The three of us stood there staring at each other my own face filled with confusion, the darkness would no doubt be showing it as well if he had any detailed facial feature, and Erebus seemed as indifferent as always.

I took a deep breath and lifted my hoof to my head to try and clear my head. I stopped as I felt something cold touch my head. I pulled my hoof back, around my leg was a metal gauntlet much like Scaled Heart and the others were wearing. However the one I was wearing had a white circular gem embedded in it. I turned to look at Erebus, along his head was a circlet with an identical gem only his was gray. Erebus turned his gaze to me, and I saw somepony behind me. I kicked out and felt my hoof connect with something solid. Looking behind me I saw the changeling appear in a green flame. 'How did I know he was there?' I thought to myself.

"It would appear that we still have more of a connection than we originally thought." Erebus said.

"Alright you know what!?" The darkness shouted out. "I'm sick and tired of these type of things always being so damn confusing. Why can it never be just straightforward? Go to place, beat up everyone at place, leave."

I looked over at Scaled Heart. "Well, we can still do step two." I told him.

I felt the darkness grin. "Oh, I will gladly do step two." He said.

"Alright you go for-" I was cut off as the darkness rushed towards the nearest thing that wasn't us. Which happened to be the changeling.

I sighed. "He is quite impulsive." Erebus said.

"Yeah, it's hard to imagine that part of you is him." I said turning to look at Erebus, but he was no longer there. Looking up I saw him squaring off with the griffin holding Skies. "I stand corrected." I said turning to face Scaled Heart. "Looks like it's just you and me now." I said.

Scaled Heart scowled at me. His surprise replaced by anger. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. When he opened his eyes again I could still see the same anger as before, but now it was tamed, now it aimed entirely at me. "Are you so sure about that." He said snapping with one of his claws. I didn't even have time to react before the wall next to me suddenly exploded inwards. I was sent flying towards the center of the cave. I looked up at the once intact was and saw a oversized fist attached to an equally oversized minotaur.

"I think I'm going to mount your wings and horn on my mantle piece. The remains of an alicorn are so very rare. It would be so great to own you." The large minotaur said.

"Golden." Scaled Heart said getting the minotaur's attention. "Go and help Talon he needs the most muscle."

The minotaur growled with annoyance. "Fine, but I'm claiming the remains of this one." He said pointing to me.

"That will be decided after we kill them." Scaled Heart said. "Luster."

"Yeah." A quiet voice said from behind the minotaur. The crystal ponies' head peaked out from around the minotaur's leg not long after.

"Go help Masquerade, you seem like the best choice for this." Scaled Heart ordered.

"Okay." The crystal pony said walking slowly towards the battling changeling and shadows.

A wicked grin came over Scaled Heart's mouth. "Tally, how about you help me in disciplining your disrespectful son?"

My eyes shrank with anger as I watched my father come out of the hole in the wall. "Gladly. I never beat enough sense into him when he was younger. Maybe if I had he would've been a better foal." My father said.

"Maybe if you had been a better father, you wouldn't have ended up in the Canterlot dungeon." I said with a smirk.

My father scowled at me. His horn began to glow and the gauntlet around this leg began to emit a light as well. "Insolent foal. You will show me the respect I deserve." He told me.

"The only thing you deserve is chains and a swift kick to the b-" I was cut off as a slab of rock slammed into my side. I groaned and looked up seeing the rock poised above my head in my father's magic. I rolled out of the way as the rock crashed into the ground where my face had been. I let out a breath I had been holding. My own magic activated and I fought for control of the rock with my father. His gauntlet pulsed brightly and my magic was expelled. He swung the rock at me again. I barely dodged out of the way, looking up I was a fist inches from my face. Scaled Heart's punch sent me flying back into the cave's wall. I groaned as I stood up again.

"Persistent aren't you?" Scaled Heart asked. "Why do you care so much about this 'sister' of yours. You're not even related by blood."

"There's more to family than simply being related by blood." I told him in between raged breaths.

He chuckled. "Well see about that, maybe if you beg really nicely. I'll kill her quickly before we convert you. How's that sound, it's a great deal isn't it? You get power, you don't have to worry about your last bond to your miserable life, and it won't even be painful."

I was about to respond but I was interrupted. "Shadow!!" A voice called out. I turned and looked towards the entrance of the cave. I saw Rainbow flying towards me. Behind her was the rest of the girls, and even the princesses. I chuckled slightly, I knew I gave them that hint, but I still didn't expect the princess to get it that quickly. I heard a sudden snapping. I looked up and saw Scaled Heart's claw had a purple hue around it. Looking back towards the entry to the cave I saw a purple wall suddenly appear. I saw Rainbow and Applejack begin to kick and hit the barrier, but it didn't even shake. They then began to shout at me, but not even their words got through the barrier.

Scaled Heart sighed. "I had hoped that you would've come alone, but it seems that idea has been thrown out. Maybe It'll change your mind if we bring one of them in there and pull out their insides.

"You're sick." I said.

"No, it's the world that's sick. All this 'harmony' shit. The world isn't so perfect as they want to believe. We're just here to prove that." Scaled Heart said. "We're going to show how the world truly is. We're going to make all those too blind to the truth see the fantasy world their living in."

I took a few deep breaths. "You know...somepony said something really similar to me some time ago. Want to know what happened to him?" I asked. Scaled Heart looked at me with a small smile. "I killed him, and now I'm going to kill you." I said activating my magic and sending a blast in his direction. He stuck out his arm and his gauntlet absorbed the blast.

"Oh come now Shadow, you actually see the world for how it is. I'm sure you do. Doesn't it make you sick seeing all those insane ponies walking around blinding themselves from the truth of the world?" Scaled Heart asked as my father slammed another rock into my side.

I groaned. "No...it gives me hope...that maybe one day, the world will be that way." I told him standing up again. I looked up and saw Scaled Heart standing in front of me scowling.

"You've spent too much time among those dreamers. You're being blinded by them. There's still hope though." Scaled Heart said grabbing the back of my head. He pushed it down to the ground. It was now that I noticed that I was laying right by the river in the cave. "Drink, and help us show the world." He said to me forcing my head towards the river.

I used all my strength and began to push back against him. "You're the one who's blind." I told him. As soon as I had room I rolled out from under his clawed hand and used my wings to put some distance between me and him. "You refuse to see the potential of this world, you only see how it currently is." I told him.

"Future, Past, Present. It's all the same. It's always been like this, and it always will be. Unless we show them now." Scaled Heart responded. "Perhaps a demonstration of how terrible this world still is might convince you better." He added on with a grin.

I looked at him with some confusion and then I heard a scream, it was a scream of pain. Both the darkness and I looked away from our own fights and towards the air. The griffin holding Skies was smiling, and Skies had a fresh cut along her side. Erebus was in the middle of a power struggle with the minotaur and glaring angrily and the griffin hiding behind the large behemoth. The darkness and I turned away from our own fights only for us both to get slammed by a blast of magic. The two of us tumbled to the center of the cave we crashed into each other and groaned. As we tried to stand the minotaur lifted his foot and kicked Erebus. Erebus was sent flying by the kick and landed on top of the darkness and me.

The darkness was groaning and breathing heavily. "I can't beat the two of them...every time I focus on one, the other gets me." He said.

"Even my physical strength is nothing compared to that minotaur, and he shrugs off magic like it's nothing." Erebus said wincing as he stood up again.

I stood last looking at the six figures forming a line in front of us. As I looked at the six of them my mind flashed back to the begin of our meeting with them. 'Oh come now, did you really think that there was only one set of elements in the entire world?'

"We have to have something, don't we?" I asked under my breath only Erebus and the darkness hearing me.

"You want to believe that these coins, they are another set of elements?" Erebus asked.

"Well what else could they be?" I responded.

"A waste of our time." The darkness suggested.

"I'm putting faith in Gaia, she said it would help." I said.

"How? How has it helped? I don't know if you remember, but so far nothing good has come from taking that coin. Nothing good has come since we met Gaia. Nothing good has happened in a long time...Maybe we should just show that to the rest of the world. The darkness said.

My eyes widened. "It seems you're little crew is already beginning to fall apart." Scaled Heart said.

Slowly the darkness started to walk over to the six of them.

"You-you can't be serious? After all we've done, you're just going to give in?" I said my voice shaking. Erebus slowly stepped forward walking towards the six with the darkness. "Not you too." I said my voice weak.

Erebus paused and looked at me. "We are truly sorry, but we decide things based on the balance between your and the darkness' mind. The darkness has chosen his side, and your own belief has faltered. Going to them...it is what we have decided to do." He told me.

I slumped down on the ground. My face not even able to be lifted towards them.

My father began to laugh. "And I thought I was supposed to be Betrayal. Now here you are, part of yourself betraying you."

Scaled Heart began to laugh. "So what are you going to do now? Two have already come over to our side. What will you do?" He asked.

I lifted my head slightly and looked at the girls behind the barrier. My expression no doubt showing how defeated I should feel. They were silently staring at me. Then I let a slight hint of a smile through. "What will I do?" I asked. "I think I'll watch you bleed." I said turning around with a smirk.

The six of them were suddenly forced to the floor as they were tackled by a large mass of shadows. The darkness chuckled as he used his form to hold them. "Did you seriously think we would give in like that? Even if I agreed with you I still wouldn't join you. I hate you all to much to even think about doing that."

Erebus flew forward and grabbed Skies from the griffin and flew behind me taking care to be gentle with her.

Scaled Heart glared angrily at me. He brought his fist up and slammed it against the floor sending a shockwave of purple energy around them. The darkness was flung off of them and landed next to me. The six of them stood up some of them having parts of them twisted in angles they shouldn't be. Scaled Heart's leg's being two of them. He grimaced as the minotaur picked him up and began to go towards the hole he had made earlier. "You will hear from us again, and when our master arrives. You will regret not joining us." He said as the minotaur reached the hole. "Oh, and one last parting gift." He said bringing his fist back he sent it forward a blast of purple energy coming from it. The darkness and I jumped out of the way the blast missing us completely.

I was about to say something about his aim, but I was cut off.

"NO!" I heard Erebus shout. I turned around quickly and my entire mind froze. I saw Skies, and I saw four purple spikes protruding from her chest. Her body fell to the ground, not even having enough time to scream in pain.

Author's Note:

I hereby officially declare this story two years old, that's like twenty one is story years so break out the booze, but don't spill it on the pages. That would kill it.
~Black Light

Comments

[Amethyst Blade]

Seriously? How many stories have made the villians get away while the heroes lying around monolouging? Crush, Kill, Destroy, Swag! Those are very simple rules and so many times the villains still got away...

[Equinox3141]

Happy birthday, awesome story!!!!!

Wait, since these are a new set of elements (I'm going to guess that there the elements of darkness, or balance) does that mean that there are at least four separate sets of elements now!? Dang. Your trying to make this universe as complicated as possible aren't you? Oh, well even if you are that means more fun for you and us. And even more chances for cliffhangers

I appluade you good sir

This story is awesome, your awesome, have a good night, and happy Nightmare night!!!

~Equinox_

[Spyromancy]

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Make a wish it's your birthday!
derpicdn.net/img/2014/1/31/539404/full.gif
Make a wish it's your birthday party!

[Black Light]

5212531
Yes, it's called wringing it out for all it's worth.
5212555
I enjoy the complexity of it. It makes it harder to follow, and less people call me out on my major swings in canon and continuity.
5212628
...I wish the party would last forever. Ha ha, now everyone is trapped here.
~Black Light

[Alicon Glactistar]

A birthday present for me. So happy.

Just so you know, it was yesterday.

[Spyromancy]

5213033
Jokes on you. I'm already in an unending party.
Seriously, I'm still in Cytubes mlp Anniversary stream, even though the anniversary was 3 weeks ago.