“My name is Valiant, and in the last twenty four hours I’ve killed several thousand people.”
The other members of the council of Valiants applauded politely.
“What are you going to do next?” asked Valiantina.
“Dunno, Disney World?” I took a sip of tequila. “Nah, probably not. You all know my thoughts on the public. I could do without them.”
“So are you going to kill everyone?” Valiantina asked.
“It’s not like I’m going for an achievement or anything.”
I checked my watch, getting back on topic. “You’re probably wondering why I called you all here today.” We were sitting in the back of my universe’s Tin Mare, parked on a hill a couple of miles away from the edge of the smoking, radioactive crater that used to be Ponyville.
“It wasn’t to brag about killing several thousand people?” said Valiantina.
“You know me too well. But no, it was a proactive defense.”
“Don’t make us draw it out of you. Spill it.”
I pointed my hoof at the door.
As if on cue, vampire Cheerilee appeared, skin peeling off but looking angrier than I’d ever seen her. Her lips had already fallen off, exposing her fangs. She was probably the only survivor of the nuke that killed Ponyville.
She pulled up short upon seeing so many Valiants.
I think she had an aneurysm right then and there.
She fell over, twitching. I pushed her off the tailgate.
“Aren’t you worried about contamination?” said Valiantina.
“Nope. With what I have in mind, everything will either be fixed by tomorrow or I’ll be dead.” Just because I could, I gave the comatose Cheerilee a kiss. Just the cheek, I was trying to make a point, not confuse people.
The Council of Valiants adjourned the meeting and I went to finally put my plan into motion. It had been a long time coming.
With Ponyville and most of my stuff gone, I had fallen back to a setup in Twilight’s library tower in Canterlot. It had a couple of things decorating the space that I’d occupied since moving in. Snowglobes, random magical objects, weapons, and electronic gear was strewn everywhere. Sunbust and Thorax’s personal effects were down at one end. Apparently Sunburst had gotten his hooves on Starswirl the Bearded’s journal. Interesting, I guess, but nobody but Twilight would care and I hadn’t told her. Last thing I needed right now was a distraction.
I did need some blood, though. The stuff I was doing kind of called for it.
Well, good thing I was on a murder spree right now. I walked outside.
The Royal Guard was milling around in front of the tower. Guard Captain Soarin’ was with them. I think they had come in response to the pile of bodies outside the door.
Twilight totally disapproved of the body pile, by the way.
“There he is,” someone said, unenthusiastically.
“Hey guys,” I said.
Soarin’ stepped up. “You have to stop this.”
“I told you before, by tomorrow, everything will either be completely safe or completely screwed. I’m just having my fun now.”
“I know what you said, and I’ve never known you to do things without a specific purpose, however wrong I always think it is, but I took an oath to protect Equestria and I can’t let you do this.”
“You know, I kind of admire your spirit,” I said. “That’s honestly touching.”
I frowned. “But to make this work, I still need some blood. Tell you what, I’ll promise not to kill whoever I get the blood from, as long as you pick who you want me to use.”
“Flash Sentry,” said Soarin’.
“Done and done.”
The guards shoved an orange pegasus to the front.
“Hey,” I said. “Thanks for volunteering.”
“Uh-” he said.
I glanced at Soarin’. “What did he do?”
“Our sisters.”
The other guards murmured in agreement.
“Well then, I’ll give you the ol’ two-for-one special: dick blood and defertilization.”
“What?” said Flash. “I don’t think-”
“You do too much thinking, apparently with your little head,” I said. “Soon it won’t be a problem.”
I got him into a chokehold and flipped him on his back. He only appeared to realize what was going on when I pulled out my switchblade.
“Hear ye, here ye, our grace Flash Sentry had committed the cardinal sin of screwing some guy’s sister.”
“Some guys’ sisters,” said someone.
“Some guys’ sisters,” I corrected. “As per thy holy axiom, ‘thou shalt not screw around with those whom thou shalt not screw around with’ we now commit him to his eternal punishment.”
“I thought you weren’t going to kill me!” said Flash.
“I’m just going to castrate you,” I said. “That’s eternal enough, quit complaining.”
I started cutting. Flash didn’t like it. I got the blood I needed, though. I sure hoped the source wouldn’t make a difference.
“And for the final touch,” I said. “Just as we burn and pillage and lay waste, here too we sow everlasting infertility. Just like the earth, we salt his loins to ensure that nothing springs forth.”
I poured the salt.
Admittedly, that was a little bit more performance art that Flash Sentry really deserved, but I was working on some theatrics for the endgame, so it was good practice.
That done, I went back into the tower. Back in the lab, I finished up my work. Finally. It had taken so goddamned long and required so many shitting resources. Tirek’s medallion, a couple of Harmony-related things, that one rock Maud had told me about that you could use to rule all of Equestria, and a whole heap of other magical items besides. And a snowglobe. My favorite one, in fact.
Wachowski walked in. She looked at the things I was doing. “So you said something about this being the final battle?”
“Yep.”
“What are you doing?”
“Buildin’ my superweapon.”
“How’s it work?”
“Well, first I pull some stylish moves and get Gabby where I want her and then I give her a little of the rough stuff like this, or this, or like so.” I demonstrated a few moves on the air.
“You look like you’re fisting an elephant.”
“Are you saying those moves wouldn’t work for fighting a griffon?”
Wachowski waved a hoof. “Proceed.”
“Anyway, after the aforementioned fisting, I’ll have her where I want her and then I’ll pull out my special superweapon, the day will be saved, we’ll ride off into the sunset and Robert’s your mother’s brother.”
“What’s with the unecessary longform?”
“‘Bob’s your uncle’ is so passé. Anyway, this’ll be a big awesome fight and I’ll need you to choreograph it.”
“How long do I have?”
“You don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
“I mean, it’s less a question of ‘how long’ and more a question of ‘why aren’t you already done?’”
Wachowski let out a long sigh through her teeth, glaring at me. “Fine. Come on.”
We got in touch with Tin Mare and met up. This was a conversation that had to be secure. With that in mind, I disabled Tin Mare’s network connectivity. We told her the plan. This was going to depend on perfect timing in the absence of communication.
Then, I went to get dressed. It was Wachowski’s choreography, so that involved a certain style.
Consequently, I was dressed in sunglasses and a black trench coat as we approached the castle roof, the sun setting in the distance.
Wachowski finished adjusting my collar and cast a critical eye over my outfit. “Do you have everything? Guns?”
“Check.”
“Tequila?”
“Check.”
“Snowglobe?”
“Check.”
“Why do you have that, anyway?”
“Part of the plan. My plan. The plan that’s either going to work or kill us all.”
“Great.”
“It sure is.”
Tin Mare came in for a hover right over the castle roof just as the sun slipped below the horizon. I turned towards the open tailgate, but paused, looking back at Wachowski. “I was meaning to ask, how is it that you’ve survived here so long?”
She shrugged. “I know my tropes.”
I nodded. “Fair enough.” That was good enough for me. I pulled out a red and white piece of fabric.
It was a santa hat. I put it on Wachowski’s head.
Her eyes rolled upwards to look at it and then back down to stab at me. "Valiant, what's this?" she said, slowly, carefully, dangerously.
"You're Santa Claus now. I'll give you my snowglobe collection." I pulled the one out of my pocket and showed it to her before putting it back. "Well, except for this one. Anyway, bye." I pointed finger guns at her, clicked my tongue, and winked before stepping backwards off the tailgate and into the night.
Making finger guns with hooves is really hard, by the way.
The sound of Tin Mare’s engines faded in the distance and I stood alone on the castle roof. Time for the next step in the plan.
I pulled out the bottle of tequila and held it up. This was the multiverse’s finest tequila. I had brewed it myself from an agave plant that I had tended with the care and nurture of a parent, feeding it the blood of my enemies. The mixture itself was octuple-distilled, and had finished off just a little bit more than 300 proof. Yeah, more than 150% alcohol, baby. It was the finest batch I had ever produced.
I called into the night. “I hold the world record for blood alcohol content. Come and take it, Gabby.”
She’d never considered being the best at that. And she couldn’t resist.
Gabby appeared out of the night, landing on the roof a few feet from me. I stared her down and held up the bottle. “We go drink for drink until one of us dies.”
“From alcohol poisoning,” I quickly added.
“I’m the best,” said Gabby simply. “I’m going to win.”
I couldn’t think of a retort, so instead I just popped the cork and took a swig. Then, I passed the bottle to her.
The bottle was gone in minutes. Neither of us was holding back.
Not to toot my own horn, but anyone else would have already keeled over. I’d been training my whole life for this moment. Liver don’t fail me now!
Gabby was good, I had to give her credit for that. But even she couldn’t avoid at least getting drunk. And that was all I needed.
“You’re going down,” I said. “I hereby declare this as your day of reckoning. I come bearing the word of my God. That word is ‘begone.’”
Hell yeah, said my amplified voice from the sky.
“You can’t touch me,” said Gabby. “Look around you, I have this whole country under my control. I’m the best. You can’t beat me.”
“I don’t have any choice,” I said. “It’s do or die. But more importantly, I’ve got righteous indignation on my side. But more importantly, this isn’t how life is meant to be lived. But more importantly, you’ve pissed me off.”
I glared at her. “My best missile killed all of Ponyville.”
“I thought it was kind of weird that you referred to Trident as a person.”
“Shut up. Because of you, well, partly because of Trident exploding, but mostly because of you, my home is gone, well, okay not my home, just my place where I keep all my stuff, but that’s bad enough.”
“I may be the best at punctuation, Valiant, but even you should have known that was a terrible sentence.”
“Shut up. I’m not finished.” I pointed my hoof at her. “And finally, I deactivated my daughter because of you, you hacking bitch!”
“Are you done?”
“Obviously. That’s what I meant by ‘and finally.’ Are you really the best at taking a hint?”
“So that’s it?” said Gabby. “You’re angry at me and you’ve finally decided to take me on personally?”
“Yeah,” I said. “That’s it.”
“Well, let’s do this.” She shrugged. “I’m the best at one-on-one combat, as well as all other kinds of combat, so this should be quick.”
“Except you’re not the best at being drunkest.” I grinned. “Come at me.”
Gabby came at me. As it turned out, she was indeed the best fighter in the world. But she’d never done it with enough alcohol in her system to kill a horse.
Her slowed reactions provided the microsecond I needed to just barely dodge her first attack.
And then, having slipped off the roof of the castle, I fell.
They say it’s a long way to the top if you want to rock ‘n roll. It’s also a long way to the bottom if you fall off a tall building built on a tall mountain.
Fortunately, we’d planned all this in advance. Tin Mare zoomed in beneath me as I was in freefall. I got my hooves down on the top of her fuselage and surfed her out into the sky.
Gabby was behind us, having flown after me. I swept my trench coat back and pulled out my guns.
Not surprisingly, I couldn’t hit jack shit. I was on an aircraft being buffeted by wind and trying to shoot at the world’s best bullet-dodger while both of us were hammered.
“A little help, Tin Mare!” I shouted over the wind.
“Hella.”
Trusting her operating system, I closed my eyes and pulled the trigger again, letting Tin Mare position us both.
Hearing a squawk, my eyes popped open. The bullet had only grazed Gabby’s wing, but it probably wouldn’t have even done that if she hadn’t been drunk.
Tin Mare banked into a turn and we intercepted the falling griffon. I grabbed her by the throat, but completely failed to remember that her forelegs were longer than mine and outfitted with claws, too. I was drunk, see.
Tin Mare rolled repeatedly, trying to give me some kind of advantage, but Gabby hung onto my throat too tightly. She knocked my guns away. I pulled my switchblade out, but she wrestled me for it.
This was it. I had only one weapon left.
And it was a good one.
It had taken a shitload of magic and creative spellwork. It had taken blood, sweat, tears, and testicle blood. It had taken magical artifacts, time spells, fix-it spells, and too many other hexes to remember. It had taken a curious funnel spell that Cadance had taught me. I can only speculate why the alicorn of love needed a spell to put big things into small things.
Regardless, I had done it. I had created an exact copy of our universe. It was overlaid perfectly and invisibly on top the existing universe, two copies occupying the same metaphysical space.
I raised the snowglobe, the inky blackness inside begging to glow. Gabby was distracted by it, but triumphantly raised the knife she had taken from me, stabbing it downward into my chest.
Not gonna lie, it hurt. I was kind of dying. But I had the strength to raise my head and whisper in her ear. “You killed me with a knife, not alcohol poisoning as per our agreement. I win.”
And then I activated the spell.
The copy of the universe I’d created was stripped away, funneled into the snowglobe. With it went Gabby and my dead self. My live self and not Gabby stayed, obviously.
Then the time magic kicked in and everything started to go backwards rapidly. I could only speculate where it would spit me out or what I would find when I got there. There was a significant chance things would be different, too, what with the major changes that would result from squeezing and compressing the universe like that.
I don’t really have time to explain it all, because this whole deal was literally about changing time. Suffice to say, it’s magic, I don’t gotta explain shit.
The world swirled in all directions, just like the universe I had just sucked into the snowglobe. It was kind of pretty, now that I thought about it. I wasn’t paying much attention to what was going on around me, though it seemed to be starting to solidify. Where was it? Some kind of room?
I took a quick glance around and smiled. The Ponyville Library, just as I had left it. A flash from the snowglobe caught my attention. It seemed like the spell was complete and starting to return to normality.
I held the snowglobe in my hooves. It seemed to glow from within, a swirling, inky blackness speckled with points of light.
“Valiant, what are you doing?” Twilight asked, in her suspicious voice.
“Nothing.” I put the snowglobe back on the shelf.
Twilight gave me a look, but couldn’t immediately prove that I was doing - or had done - anything wrong. She turned away to continue reorganizing the library.