//------------------------------// // 37. Lost Empire: Treachery // Story: Locksmith // by QuartzScale //------------------------------// We managed to reach the palace and entered, meeting with the King. Unfortunately Kida still hadn’t returned with Milo. That meant that they were still searching the water for secrets. Ignoring that fact I strolled up to the King. The guards stood at attention but they didn’t train their weapons on me. Fresh Coat looked a bit nervous about the circumstances but Octavia calmed her down. “The plazas have been cleared… You were right about the heartless trying to make a foothold in the city. I didn’t think that they would have gotten so far into the city though.” “The Darkness is ever growing. Those you call heartless have existed since before the beginning always entrenching itself upon the worlds as those with evil in their hearts kept pushing for new heights. While I am blind even I can see what this will come to should this evil not be stopped.” Kashekim spoke easing the guards down with his raised hand. “I take it you have heard the story about the keyblades, have you not?” “Yes. In times of crisis those who would wield the sacred weapon of light would arrive in times of need. Though, in honesty, that chronicle of history is slightly skewed. As a keybearer you are bound to the rules and not to meddle in the affairs of others. While I must say I do follow this line of thinking… I must admit that things have gotten to the point where there is little to no hope left in this city.” Kashekim explained over the course surprising the girls immensely. I was sure we told them this… I suppose that hearing it in person is more convincing than hearing it from a third party. “I’ve noticed. The moment that we reached the city and established any communication that the people immediately took to with sparkling eyes and all.” “The keyhole must be sealed… but the location had long been lost to the ages. I cannot help more than this.” Kashekim sighed as I merely nodded and got ready to leave the palace. I motioned to the rest of the girls to follow me as we trotted out of the palace and towards the main plaza. We kept quiet as we opened our ears and waited for anything else to happen. “Hey Gray… Could we talk a bit about this?” Spitfire stepped forward looking very serious. “Yes. Is it about what he said?” “No… I remember that when Yen Sid spoke. I meant more about this plan… Are you sure it's even going to work in the first place. Even though we’re good I don’t think we could handle this in this way.” Spitfire looked towards everypony who also seemed to have the same level of concern at the plan. “No plan survives first contact. Honestly I doubt it would work but… I feel this will work out the best in the long run, maybe even save lives. Unfortunately, so far, there have only been casualties caused by heartless. Especially while the bridge was collapsing. I looked over the troops before we crossed the bridge. There were only twenty five soldiers left on Rourke’s side. That means that the rest of the soldiers were either killed or taken by the heartless. And the darkness off of Rourke has gotten so heavy that I nearly threw up.” “TMI dude.” Vinyl cut in. “Sorry.” “So are you saying that he was planning this from the start?” Octavia brought up. “That would be impossible. What kind of being does that to their own kind?” Sunshower interjected. “You remember how Yen Sid said these worlds were dangerous. What you are seeing, is the first instance of a monster. A monster is someone who knows right from wrong… and willingly decides to do the wrong thing just because it amused them.” The mares were silent for a minute. Each of them were disgusted to differing levels. Vinyl and Spitfire were the angriest. Sunshower and Fresh Coat looked a bit sick. Octavia and Redheart merely frowned but even I could tell they agreed with me on this. Before we could fully debate on this an explosion rocked the palace leaving the area covered in acrid smoke that rose to the city heights. “Looks like we were not as prepared as we possibly could be.” Before we could gallop too far a group of heartless warped in surrounding us. Mostly Air Soldiers and Red Nocturnes. There were clouds of them keeping us from getting back to the palace before things could get worse. Rourke had the remains of his men lock up Kida. The Heart of Atlantis had done something. Milo had gotten in his way again. “Look Son… This is all about the money. Besides you get to be the guy that discovered Atlantis. Just come along.” Rourke attempted to persuade Milo only to receive glare in response. “It’s just business.” Rourke snidely remarked. It had been more of a surprise that over all that cash several of his specialists decided to grow a conscience out of nowhere. He looked them down just as that other group appeared in front of him. That keyblade wielder… surely another goody two shoes jackass just like all the rest of these morons. He merely snorted in frustration. He only had twenty soldiers left to his name alongside Helga. “So… what happened here?” Gray asked no one in particular. “Simple my good soldier. It’s pay day. We’re taking the Heart with us and making money. You in?” Rourke called out. There was no time for subtlety and no time for persuasion. If necessary then the Snapagator could be used as a distraction. He merely looked around at the other mercs then at Milo who seemed to be pleading with him if that sniveling look in his eyes was right. The women behind Gray looked at him with righteous indignation except for two… who wanted this to be considered. Gray mumbled a bit before he finally spoke. “Fine. I’m in.” He said. “WHAT!?” Several of the girls and Milo all shouted out. “It’s a good deal. Might as well get on the ground floor for later.” Gray dismissively. “Sounds good to me.” Spitfire spoke up. “Same.” Sunshower smiled out. “What the hell is wrong with you!?” Vinyl shouted out. “We’re not going along with some asinine plan like that.” Redheart complained. “How could you even think this would be a good idea in the first place?” Octavia argued while Fresh Coat merely crouched down trying to fight her tears. Rourke watched as the prissy one slapped Gray who merely glared and walked over to his side. It was only for a moment… he felt something was too easy but the heart needed to be taken out of the city. Annoyed, he got into the last car keeping his gun trained on Milo and the rest having Gray and his two loyal cronies get in another one. As they drove off Rourke pressed a small switch and the bridge blew up from a large explosion. (Octavia’s POV, 3rd person) “Let’s begin then. Milo we need to find a way to deal with this.” Octavia trotted over to Milo who was walking up to the palace. “Octavia… was it? I don’t know if you noticed, but right now my leading skills are not up to snuff. Look at what happened to him.” Milo muttered as he pointed over to the King. Sweet was just now placing a cloth over his face. Even with cure magic they hadn’t been able to fully heal him due to his advanced age already and the timing behind it. Needless to say the ponies had not taken that well. They wanted to do more but even Redheart knew that she didn’t have the tools or sterile environment to do more than they could. “It still means that something has to be done. We need to figure out how to get to them now.” Octavia stepped forward pushing her point more. “Octavia your leader decided to be a jerk and betray everyone else here and the city itself. How can we actually win at this?” “Oh right… wait gimme a sec. Here read this.” Octavia pulled out a small note handing it to Milo. Milo… This is Gray. Here is the plan, you see  Rourke is too smart but right now I think we might at the very least catch him off guard at least momentarily. I’ll be making sure to follow him off to wherever he stashed his way out of the underground cavern… most likely the volcano. The girls and I will make a scene and at the very least three of us will travel with Rourke and distract them well enough until you’re ready to get to us. Hurry up… I know for a fact he won’t be distracted for that long. “Wait...wait wait wait… Are you saying that you all planned this out?” Milo stared at Octavia who merely looked away from him. “Please don’t remind me. I hated having to do that to him, but I was the only one with the spine to do it. Look… Figure out a way we can get to him and maybe we’ll be able to save Atlantis.” Octavia explained before walking off with the others who seemed to be getting ready. Fresh Coat still looked extremely sad while Vinyl and Redheart did their best to calm her down as Milo got ready to talk to the mercs that were left behind. “Everything ready Tavi?” Vinyl looked up while she rubbed her hoof on Fresh Coat’s back. Her tears finally coming to a stop. “That was so hard to do… I didn’t think we could even do that…” Fresh Coat sobbed slightly still looking a little despondent. She did buck herself back up while Redheart watched the humans get things ready. “Are you okay Fresh Coat?” Vinyl brought up. “Yeah… I knew I had to play along but that was more intense than I thought it would be. This plan was really hard to do… I didn’t think we would be that convincing.” Fresh Coat sniffed slightly as she rubbed a few tears from her eyes. “I know what you mean. I was surprised when he asked me to do that.” Octavia interjected as the humans started to gather around a large fish like statue… which then came to life and floated in midair. “It’s ok Octavia. You did your best and I’m sure he’s proud of you.” Redheart patted her on her back as they joined the rest of the humans and got on their own vehicle with one of the Atlanteans driving for them. The ships were very streamlined and seemed ready to go as Milo called out to save Atlantis. Octavia wiped a tear that managed to break her facade but quickly regained her composure. Like Fresh Coat, she was feeling a bit… melancholic on what she needed to do. Still… if she was going to be the Alpha mare she needed to stay strong and go along with these plans should they ever need to. She was sure Gray was happy that she was even able to do so. Last Night… Gray finally sat them all down far away from the main camp. Milo was busy listening to everyone else’s backstories. Strangely it looked as though they were getting along… at least at their own pace. He just looked around as his group and thought long and hard about what he was going to actually do due to Rourke. “So… now that we have some time before it happens we need to make a plan to handle this guy when the time comes. I’m not sure what’s going to happen but I do have a plan for it.” Gray spoke softly. “Yeah yeah bring it on already. We all noticed that that guy is planning something crazy. I mean did you see how he looked at us when we got done dealing with that ice snake thing.” Vinyl gestured with her hoof. “I noticed that too. He didn’t look too happy that we managed to beat it. Though I’ve also noticed that I can’t really read human emotions that well. They don’t have those obvious tells that all of us have. No ear flaps, wing positions, and I don’t even want to talk about the lack of tails.” Fresh Coat scowled slightly as if she was thinking too hard about the differences. “You too… I get so confused by them. Though I did notice that that Helga mare was using her chest to coax some of the guards to keep moving…. Gray is that how human mares attract mates?” Redheart questioned him. “Well… yeah in a sense… Um… well… Teats are on their upper chest but she isn’t trying to mate. She’s technically using her sexuality to coax others to do what she wants or do it faster.” Gray answered which just made all the mares blush. “Anyways we’ll discuss this much later when we are back in the ship or back on Equestria.” Gray looked around noticing that the people were starting to go back to their tents. “Right bring us up to speed then Gray.” Octavia quieted everyone else and awaited. The other mares noticed and most of them realized what was happening. ‘She’s trying to make herself the Alpha…” All of them thought. “Ok then… Well right now we need to appear on his side. When he makes his move three of us are going to need to look as though we betray the others because of money. Most likely he’ll be too desperate to actually question it. We’ll have to make it convincing as well.” Gray explained. “By convincing… What do you mean?” Sunshower cautiously spoke up. “Uh… One of you will have to slap me.” Gray bluntly stated. All of them looked at Gray as though he lost his freaking mind… Spitfire had to keep both Fresh Coat and Vinyl from crying out in shock. Octavia looked aghast as did Redheart. Sunshower nearly passed out barely keeping herself on her hooves out of sheer willpower. Redheart remained impassive through all this. ‘Huh… I didn’t think this was going to be that big a deal.’ Gray silently mused. “Does one of us really have to?” Octavia found her voice trembling as she spoke. “Yes.” Gray nodded as he answered. “I’ll do it then.” Octavia coughed out. “You sure?” Gray quirked an eyebrow at her. “Yes. I can handle it.” Octavia tried to shut off her emotions through all this. “Okay then… I’m gonna say right now that this is going to be really hard. I can tell that I’m asking you something really impossible. If you don’t want to do it then we could always come up with something else.” Gray soother Octavia who was staring off into the embers of the now diminishing fire pit. “No. I can handle it. I’m certain of it.” Octavia quickly answered. “So… is there a stigma for this on Equestria?” Gray looked over everypony noticing how distraught they actually looked over this. “A little… See our stallion to mare pop is thirty to seventy. Most stallions become royal guards of either the Day Guard or the newly minted Night guard. While we do have equality most of Equestria is matriarchal. The only exception right now seems to be over in Appleloosa and Trottingham which have patriarchal roots. Most mares from Ponyville find it… well unacceptable to hit a stallion because Ponyville is a heavily mare filled town.” Redheart summarized the entire ordeal. “Weird… Cloudsdale is much more lax on that. Though most pegasi do like a good scrap every once in a while. It’s how we make sure that our mates could handle us.” Spitfire cut in. “So… This is harder for the rest of you to do?” Gray asked to the nods of everypony except for Spitfire who shook her head. “I can do this Gray. I’m qualified to act and the only pony who would be able to handle it.” Octavia stepped up to him bringing him eye to eye with her. The resolve she had was intimidating. “If you are fine with it then it’s good. Now who’s going to come with me and play the role of a villain?” Gray looked around noticing that everypony was still lost in thought. “I’ll go.” Spitfire raised her hoof. “Me too.” Sunshower also raised her hoof while everypony looked a bit surprised. “Ok then all we have to do is prepare ourselves. This is only Plan A if we can convince him. If we can’t then we’re probably going to have to fight them then and there.” Gray mumbled to himself but with the girl’s hearing they gleaned exactly what the consequences of their actions could be. “Hey Gray? You should make Octavia the Alpha mare of this herd.” Vinyl immediately said causing Gray and everypony else to stare at her. Octavia was slackjawed. “What!?” Octavia nearly screamed out before Fresh Coat held her mouth closed with her telekinesis. “You think so?” Gray stared into her eyes seemingly trying to find a reason for this. “Yeah. She has to do something that would kill her inside even though you are asking her to do it. It’s not easy for her to hit someone she loves.” Vinyl finished off. While everypony looked a bit disappointed none of them could actually hit Gray for no reason. Spitfire looked fine with it but she didn’t exactly want to since the last time she hit a stallion he was in the hospital in traction for another three days. Octavia was still slightly surprised since nopony else was voicing any opposition. “Ok then. Octavia’s the Alpha mare. Glad that we’ve finally decided on that order of business. I was worried about choosing honestly. I didn’t want to make any of you cry at all. “ Gray picked Octavia up giving her a bear hug while a few tears streamed down her cheeks. Everypony congratulated her before turning in for the night. It was an eventful evening with a big surprise occurring out of nowhere for them. Octavia took her role seriously as she set herself up right next to Gray’s sleeping mat. Though she knew he was going to be up a bit longer. He rarely slept more than four hours before something would wake him up. Octavia remembered just how harrowing that night had been. As all of them managed to get to get some sleep before things became worse they were awakened both by a story by Gray and the sudden flash fire that burst through the camp. The new snake heartless had been more dangerous than the last actually using lava to attack them. “Ooh… I wonder if I was getting in over my head for this.” She mumbled to herself as she got into position on one of the larger flying fish ships. Next to her were Fresh Coat, Vinyl and Redheart each preparing themselves for take off as one of the Atlanteans got into position on the driver’s spot. With a quick turn of the crystal the ship zoomed off through the tunnels following the rest of the group. (Gray’s POV) I was still rubbing my cheek after Octavia had slapped me. Must remember from now on that the mare who was decided to be the Alpha is very very strong. I had personally hoped that Fresh Coat or Vinyl would be the ones to slap me because I’ve noticed that they don’t put their entire strength into their swings if they are ever forced to use their hooves. “You ok Gray?” Sunshower fretted over me while Spitfire kept an eye on our… driver. Our driver looked as though he would be keeling over at any moment with how lethargic he was moving. Several times I noticed that he never blinked and I was certain that all his soldiers were just moments away from being consumed by darkness. It was worse when Sunshower did try to talk with him only to be completely ignored. Rourke’s soldiers, for the most part, were completely gone from reality. “Yeah… I’m good. It just stings a little. Still… it was necessary to get all the ‘money’ in the end right ladies?” Both of them nodded doing their best to keep their smirks hidden. While the driver seemed utterly unaware of his surroundings, we still took no chances with him. Throughout our trip with the caravan we all noticed how lifeless the people looked. The only two who didn’t were Rourke and Helga. Rourke looked completely manic at this point stroking something on his shoulder while he led from the front. Helga was more perturbed by the sudden shift he was exhibiting. She kept her distance and seemed to stare forlornly back at the rest of the group that was left behind then scrutinize the chamber that was holding the heart. We needed to release the heart eventually but for now we played along while the other mercenaries were lost in their own darkness. After painstakingly waiting for the caravan to return to the shaft it was clear just how much darkness had enveloped the other group. Several Soldier heartless were mulling around getting a large air balloon ready while the three of us nervously stood by while Rourke ordered the heartless around. The mercs all shuddered in place before turning into Ballasts as they loading the chamber holding the Heart of Atlantis. Helga immediately unholstered her Luger keeping it in hand while Rourke merely got on the platform of the hot air balloon. “I love it when a plan comes together.” Rourke smirked as the five of us got on the platform. I pushed Spitfire and Sunshower ahead of me to the other side of the platform behind cover as the Soldiers all prepared themselves as they had more darkness enter them turning them into Air Soldiers. Several of the Ballasts actually ripped their anchors off getting their gatling cannons ready to fire. “Now… Let’s deal with you now. You think yourself great manipulators. Ha! Amateurish at best but I will commend you on getting the little prim and proper girlie to go along with it.” Rourke sneered as he stepped forward to me. Helga took a few steps back completely isolating herself from Rourke as a large crocodilian heartless appeared over Rourke’s shoulder. I more than expected that he would realize it. It also was very lucky that I brought both pegasi with me as the hot air balloon started to rise above the ground. The darkness made the platform grow out from the center. The heartless grew in size and immediately tackled into me dragging me out to the platform while Rourke laughed into the cavern allowing his echoes to pierce the surrounding walls.