//------------------------------// // Chapter 19 // Story: Finding My Place // by Firestar463 //------------------------------// “That’s him. That’s the one.” “Are you sure?” "Of course I'm sure. How many others like him are there?" “Bullslayer…” I tried not to glance in their direction. I really did. But it’s so difficult to not look at someone who you know is talking about you. Who’s not even trying to hide the fact that they’re openly staring. So I looked. They were innocuous enough. Two Earth Ponies, one stallion and one mare. Both ponies were off-shades of light orange - I could only assume they were related in some way - and both were holding weapons coated in blood. Fighters, still hunting for any last Minotaurs that might be skulking about. Both Ponies blanched and immediately broke eye contact as I looked in their direction. Still, as I walked past them, I could feel their gazes boring into me. Bullslayer… It wasn’t the first time I’d heard a Pony call me that in the past few hours. Fitting, I suppose, when you consider the big thing they knew me for. It wasn’t exactly like my killing of Adamant Will was a secret. I’d only done it out in the open where the entire city had been able to see it. Everyone knew me for that. Everyone thought I was a hero. If only they knew how close I’d come to letting Adamant Will get away with it… A gentle hand fell over my shoulder, stirring me from my thoughts. My pace had slowed, and I picked it back up as I glanced over my shoulder. Serenity removed her hand from my shoulder with a soft smile. She was still thin - too thin. Dangerously thin. As were Celestia and Luna, who walked a few paces behind their mother. As was Solaris, whose condition was dire enough that he had been unable to join us. It would probably be several weeks, at least, before they returned to their normal, healthy size. But all three mares had been washed up and changed into clothes that, while a few sizes too large for them now, at least made them presentable. A trio of dresses, each one matching the mare’s hair - mane, rather. Pink for Celestia, midnight-blue for Serenity and Luna. And, perhaps most encouragingly of all, the same burning fire had returned to their eyes. The trio was followed closely by six guards - or what passed for guards in the confusing aftermath of the liberation of Everfree. For all I could tell, they were just Ponies that were willing to keep the royal family safe. None of them were armored, and each one had a different weapon - One with a spear, another with a hammer and shield, and so on. No uniform. Just the same implied desire to keep their queen and princesses safe. “Are you well, Chris?” Serenity asked as I broke eye contact. “As well as I can be,” I replied truthfully. “Just… nervous.” “About what you wish to show us?” I nodded. “It’s something you all need to see,” I continued. “It’s not something I’m proud of, but it is what it is. I’ll trust you to decide what to do with it.” We rounded yet another corner. This one was on the edge of the palace, if the sunlight pouring in through the windows to our left were any indication. I felt my heart beating just a little faster as I recognized the double doors only a few hundred feet down the corridor. “We’re here,” I murmured as I came to a stop just outside the doors. “In here?” Serenity asked, moving closer towards the doors. “Yes. But hold on a second,” I added. My hand slipped into my pocket, and I pulled out one of the final two scrolls that I had stowed in there. “Let me go in first. It’s only been a few hours since we routed the Minotaurs. We don’t know if any took refuge in here.” “Very well,” Serenity nodded. “After you.” I made sure that I was standing out of direct sunlight before pressing the seal on the scroll. As the scroll disintegrated into ash, the almost-familiar pins and needles feeling swept over me. Looking down, I could see that my body had been replaced by a black silhouette. I knew that to Serenity and the others, I had vanished from sight. But nearby, another figure had appeared. Only a few paces away from us, down the direction we had just come, was another shadowy silhouette. I couldn’t see any facial expressions - the silhouette didn’t give me the benefit of seeing his face - but I already knew who it was. Sombra. He’d insisted on following us, after all. Whether to help protect the royal family against any Minotaurs they might encounter, or because he’d lost trust in me, I didn’t know. Nor did I really care. Sombra made his way down the hall towards me, ducking past the beams of light that poured in through the window. The silhouette reached down to his belt, and the distinct sound of a knife being drawn echoed through the hall - a sound that was echoed as my own knife was drawn. We exchanged no words, but instead moved towards the door. Sombra pulled gently, and the door offered no resistance, sliding open with a soft creak. The torches inside had all died down. It didn’t matter too much. The light streaming in from the door provided enough illumination to see by. The two of us crept into the room. We moved towards the only other source of light. A faint red glow coming from the far end of the room. My eyes were scanning the room. I knew his were too. We were watching. Waiting. Looking for anything to make itself known. Sombra, a few paces ahead of me, made a sweeping gesture to either side. A spray of fireballs flew away from him, each one hitting a torch embedded in a wall and lighting it. As the room grew brighter, more features became known to us. Long tables, running from one end of the floor to the other, with a series of guns laid out upon them. Tiled floor, with black and white tiles arranged seemingly at random with no discernable pattern.Three barrells pressed up against the wall to my right. A large chunk of wood leaning up against the left wall. A forge at the far end of the room, with a few embers still smoldering in the furnace. But no Minotaurs that either of us could see. I could see that Sombra was looking at me, and I nodded. I walked back out of the room and stepped into direct sunlight, allowing the concealment spell to be ripped away from me. “All clear,” I announced. “Come on in.” The other door was flung wide open, allowing even more light to spill through into the workshop. I lead the group back into the room, making sure to keep my knife at the ready just in case. But it seemed that it wouldn’t be necessary. Even with the shadows no longer concealing me, nothing jumped out at me. Nothing made itself known. Sombra was already at the far end of the room, visible to all. The shadows had faded away from him, and I could finally make out his form. He, too, was thin. The weeks of hunger had clearly taken its toll. But the weakness and hunger could be fully dealt with later. He and I both knew what had to be done first “What’s this?” I heard Luna ask from behind me as she made her way into the room. “None of this was here before… “A makeshift workshop,” I explained. “Set up by Adamant Will when I arrived. I… had to strike a bargain with him to get into the castle. Those new weapons that they had. The one that they used in the throne room to kill the informant.” Serenity raised an eyebrow. “Yes?” I sighed. “I taught them how to make those,” I admitted. “They were all made in here.” I moved towards one of the guns and picked it up. It was one of the ones that Adamant Will’s army had used - If nothing else, the black powder residue in the powder tray and around the muzzle of the gun were clear indicators of that. A quick glance towards the other guns let me know that they, too, had seen use. “High-speed ballistic projectile weapons,” I continued as I poured a small bit of powder into the tray, and the rest down the muzzle of the gun. A single shot followed after. “Far more powerful than the crossbows that the Griffons have created. More powerful… and more deadly.” I cocked the flint back and turned towards the chunk of wood leaning up against the left-hand wall. “A demonstration,” I added as I raised the rifle to shoulder height and steadied it. I pulled the trigger. BOOM! A flash of light pierced the room. A shower of sparks flew away from me out of the flashpan as the powder was ignited, and a spray of smoke and sparks erupted from the muzzle of the gun. Alongside the boom of the gun firing came a second sound - slightly softer, but piercing through the air just as the gunshot did. The crack of splintering wood. Indeed, small splinters flew away from the chunk of wood as the bullet blasted through it, leaving a small, round hole in the panel. Silence. None of the Ponies in the room spoke. I could hear my own breathing. I lowered the gun from my shoulder and placed it on the table behind me, smoke still leaking from the muzzle. Looking up, I could see Serenity, Luna, Celestia, the guards… nearly everyone looking at me with a look of shock on their faces. Everyone except Sombra. Sombra’s face remained expressionless. I had no way of knowing what was going through his mind. Surely those guns had been in use at the battle. Surely they had claimed the lives of a number of Ponies there. Did he blame me? I’d already come to terms with it myself - creating the guns had been necessary in order to kill Adamant Will and save Equestria from enslavement. But did Sombra feel the same way? Serenity cleared her throat, drawing my attention back to her. “And… you say you are the one who taught them… who showed them this… thing?” “I had very little to work with,” I tried to defend myself. “All I had to offer Adamant Will, in exchange for getting closer to his inner circle, was knowledge. And knowledge of warfare is all he seemed interested in…” Serenity held up one hand, cutting me off. “A simple yes would have sufficed,” she said calmly. “And such a device… is this the only type that your people have created?” “Far from it,” I shook my head. “These are comparatively primitive.. The ones we have now can fire hundreds of rounds in under a minute. And there are other designs that can be used for different situations. This right here is child’s play compared to some of the other weapon’s we’ve created, especially in the past century or so.” “I see…” Serenity mused. “Then there is only one thing to do. Guards!” The six Ponies behind her snapped to attention as Serenity turned towards them - not in unison, but close enough. “See to it that these… guns… are destroyed. Melted down, blown to pieces, I don’t care. I want all evidence of their existence eliminated.” The guards saluted once more. “Good. Dismissed.” The guards moved past Serenity towards the guns lying on the table. I could see them hesitate, however, as they reached the weapons. None of them seemed willing to touch them. “They’re not going to go off on their own,” I promised, grabbing the gun I had used for the demonstration and moving it back towards the rest of the guns. “They need to be loaded and primed first. And none of them are loaded or primed. They’re not gonna go off if you just pick them up.” I tossed my gun towards the guard nearest me, who fumbled and caught it. “Go use the forge or the anvil and hammer, or whatever you need to.” “Oh, and those barrels over there?” I added, pointing towards the trio of barrels lined up against the wall. “Those are full of gunpowder. Very dangerous. Do NOT light those on fire. They’ll explode. Violently. You need to burn the powder in very, VERY small amounts. Outside, preferably.” I watched for a minute as the guards slowly, tentatively, picked up the guns and began to move them towards the forge at the far end of the room. Once I was certain that they were out of earshot, I moved closer towards Serenity. “I was hoping you were going to say that,” I murmured. Serenity nodded. “Those weapons must never be allowed to fall into the wrong hands,” she replied. “They’re too dangerous to risk keeping around. All knowledge of their existence must be eliminated. Who else knows of these weapons, besides yourself?” “Adamant Will knew… though he’s not much of a problem anymore,” I smiled grimly. I held up one hand and began ticking down the Minotaurs who had worked on the guns with me. “Thunderhoof, the Minotaur that was assigned as my personal guard. Dusthorn, the royal alchemist and apothecary. Steelskin, the blacksmith who created the weapons. There were a dozen Minotaurs that handled the guns when they attacked your camp, but none of them knew the mechanics behind the gun or the chemical composition of the gunpowder. And there were a couple of other smiths that came in and worked the forge the day before they attacked your camp.” “And would all of those Minotaurs have been in the castle today?” I hesitated for a brief moment before shrugging. “Most of them would have, yeah,” I replied. “Thunderhoof, Steelskin, and Dusthorn I know for certain were there, and those are the big three. They actually knew enough to be able to build a gun from memory, or at least instruct someone else how to do it. The soldiers probably would have been present too. The smiths… probably, though they might not have been there. But again, they only worked with the weapons for a couple of hours, and had no knowledge of what made the gunpowder work. Without that knowledge, without any gunpowder, a gun is about as useful as a metal club.” “So, assuming that we got rid of those three Minotaurs, you’re the only one left on Gaia that knows how to make one of those things.” There was a longer hesitation this time. I glanced up towards Serenity, meeting her eyes. Her expression was blank. Try as I might, I could get nothing from it. And yet… “...Correct…” Silence descended upon us. Silence broken only by the sounds of the guards at the far end of the room, firing up the furnace. Preparing to destroy the last remaining evidence of firearms on Gaia. Finally, Serenity nodded. “Then I suppose we’d best double our efforts towards finding that pool in the caverns,” she murmured. For a brief second, I saw the corner of her mouth inch upwards. “After all, we had a deal. Help us kill Adamant Will, and we help you find your way home. And I’m nothing if not a mare of my word.”