ARC 2
TENSION AND MUTANTS
“Great…” I said as I opened my eyes. I was standing in the black void again. Which could only mean one thing…
“Indeed,” the voice said. I turned around to find the shadowy figure. “Because now, I can kill you humans without hesitation!”
I stared down those damned red eyes as they stared back. “Yeah, like you hesitated when you killed off the rest of humanity?”
“Believe it or not I did,” the figure said. “For a long time, I debated whether or not I should. Even now, I debated. But you wouldn’t understand.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I wouldn’t. Only a monster would understand. Which is what you are buddy.”
The figure laughed, “Maybe I am. But you humans are as well. However, these ponies are something entirely different. They haven’t had a war in a long time, let alone serious crime.”
“I doubt that very highly,” I said. No war? Please.
“Doubt what you will,” the figure shrugged. “It doesn’t matter now. What does matter is the fact that you did not heed my warning.”
“Yep,” I said. “I don’t take orders from scumbags.”
He frowned, “Is that the best insult you can hurl at me?”
I snorted, “I don’t need to play your game.”
“Right,” he said. “Enough games. I think it’s high time I killed you.”
“You can’t kill in a dream!” I said. Yet I was still scared, was it possible? I was about to find out.
“Try me,” he said. The figure pointed at me and all of a sudden, I felt a huge pain in my chest and I fell to my knees. I didn’t scream though, I could at least give him a hard time. After a second, the pain stopped and I looked back at the figure, who was now walking towards me. “Hmph, your willpower is stronger than I expected. I suppose it’s only natural, humans can be stubborn.”
I took a ragged breath, “Eat shit…”
“Wow,” the figure said. “No need for those words. Anyway, I doubt you’ll last another round.”
Then the pain came again, a little worse than before, I willed myself not to scream and kept holding on to my consciousness.
“Really?” The figure said. “I’m genuinely surprised. You are a very determined human. Almost a shame I have to kill you.”
“Or maybe,” I said, smiling. “You aren’t as strong as you thought you were.”
The figure laughed. “You’re not in the position to say these kinds of things you know.”
“I can say whatever the hell I want,” I said. “Ever heard of free speech?”
“You’re snide remarks will get you nowhere, now die!” The figure said as he lifted his finger again. I braced myself for the pain, but it was much worse. I almost fell unconscious that time and even grunted a couple times. Eventually I fell to the ground. But I held on. Then the pain stopped. I looked up again to find the figure breathing heavily. “H...how? You should be dead!”
“Getting tired?” I said, I was confused as to why I hadn’t died yet too.
“Shut up, human!” The figure said. Once he stood up straight, he snapped his fingers and a pistol suddenly appeared in his shadowy hand. “I will admit, you arestronger than expected. But…”
I gulped, I didn’t know what he was doing before, but a gun? That would definitely kill me.
“Scared now?” The figure said as he put the barrel of the gun against my head. “Though, since you made it this far, I guess I’ll grant you one request before I kill you.”
I thought about that for a second, what should I ask of him? “You’ll kill me no matter what, right?”
“Well of course!” He said.
“Then at least leave the village be,” I said. I couldn’t bear the thought of my friends dying.
The figure seemed to mull over that for a second, “Fine, as long as they don’t interfere with the ponies, that’s okay.”
I sighed with relief.
“Now,” the figure said. “I suppose this is goodbye, Jack Stephens. You weren’t as bad as I thought you would be.”
I closed my eyes as I felt the barrel press into my skull more. I waited...but nothing happened. After a couple seconds, I opened my eyes and looked up at the figure to find his mouth agape, seemingly staring into space. Then I looked behind him to see the dark blue pony from before. Her freaking horn was going through the figure’s chest!
“Holy crap!” I exclaimed. “Did you just kill him?!”
“Nay,” the pony said. “This shadowy figure was just a projection.”
“What do you mean?” I asked. “Wait, who are you?”
“I am Luna, Princess of the Night,” she said. “This figure wasn’t real, I guess you could compare it to a hologram.”
“Okay,” I said. “So that whole dreamwalking thing you said was true, huh?”
“Of course!” Princess Luna said. “To be honest, I don’t know how you humans survived without magic.”
Then there was a small rumble in the void, Luna looked at me. “You seem to be waking up, we can talk more once you are up and about.”
“O...okay…” I said. Then she vanished as the rumbling became more and more violent. Eventually, I closed my eyes and blanked out.
“Sister? Is he waking up?” A voice said.
“Indeed,” another voice said. It sounded like Luna’s.
I groaned as I felt the light shine upon my face. If I remembered correctly, I was in the hospital on the spaceship filled with ponies. Never thought I’d see the day I’d meet talking technicolored ponies. Then again, I’ve never thought about talking technicolored ponies in general. Slowly, I opened my eyes.
“Surprise!”
And wished I never had. Seriously, my eardrums hurt from that. But after my ears stopped ringing, I looked around. Everywhere you looked, there was confetti and balloons! And in the middle of the room...was the nine ponies I’ve met so far, plus that mismatched animal guy. Hard to miss him. But I had one question…
“Um...why?” I asked.
“It’s a party silly!” The all pink one said.
“Yeah I got that,” I said. “But for what?”
“To thank you of course!” She said.
I just tilted my head.
Twilight rolled her eyes. “For everything, Jack.”
“Everything?”
“Yeah! For saving us from those monsters!” The blue one with rainbow hair said.
“Even though it was rather...disturbing,” the small white one with purple hair said.
“I mean,” I said. “I did what I had to do.”
“But that’s not all,” Twilight said. “You were nice to us, even after we treated you like that. We were such...such…”
“Poopy heads!” Poofy pink haired one said. I rolled my eyes, my people would probably use way worse words than that.
“Exactly,” Twilight said. “But that’s over now, so we decided to throw you a thank you party.”
“Well,” I said, rubbing the back of my head. “Thanks, I guess.” Then I realized the fact that Fluttershy was up.
“You’re better, I see,” I said.
Fluttershy nodded shyly, “Thanks to your friend.”
“My friend?” I asked.
“Anthony,” the rainbow one said.
“What’d he do?” I asked.
“Well,” Twilight said. It looked like she was unsure of what to say. “We think he might’ve used magic to save Fluttershy.”
I looked at her like she was crazy, “Anthony...used magic?”
“Basically,” Twilight said. “Yeah.”
I thought about it, to be honest, seeing all that I have seen these past few days, I wouldn’t put it past that statement being true. But one thing bothered me.
“Why wouldn’t Anthony tell me something like this?” I asked, more to myself than anyone else. But the big white pony spoke anyways.
“It’s possible that he didn’t know that he had magic in him, or that he could use it for that matter,” she said.
“I guess,” I said. “But how has my race not used magic before? You’d think that would be a big thing in the history books.”
“That’s a good question, Jack,” the white pony said. “One that shall wait for another day, as we still have to celebrate.”
“And you are?” I asked.
“Oh that’s right!” The white pony said. “We still have to to do the introductions! My name is Princess Celestia.”
“Ah,” I said. “Well, I already know a couple of your names. Fluttershy, Twilight, and Luna.” I said, pointing to each one respectively.
“Good,” Celestia said. “Now let’s start with the rest.” She pointed to good ol’ rainbow hair and said. “This one’s Rainbow Dash.” Rainbow Dash gave a wave.
“Then there’s Applejack,” she pointed to the orange one with a stetson hat, who in turn said
‘Howdy’ in a southern accent.
It went on like that, her introducing the rest. The pink one was Pinkie Pie. The small white one was Rarity. And then there was Green Leaf, Fluttershy’s husband. Finally, Celestia pointed to where that mismatched animal guy was, who was gone.
“Where’s Discord gone to now?” Twilight sighed.
The other ponies just shrugged. Then Rainbow Dash said, “I don’t know, but I’d love to get this party started sooner or later.”
“Yeah!” Pinkie Pie said. “Let’s party!”
And so we did. To be honest I was having a good time, the best part was that I could go home whenever. I’ll be honest, I was probably procrastinating, staying so long. But I worried of what would happen when I got back. They told me Anthony was fine so I didn’t have to worry about that. But, I am the leader now, which a lot of people didn’t like. Plus the fact of my dad’s funeral, which still had to take place. Just thinking about that made me sad.
“You okay Jack?” Twilight asked, noticing my smile drop.
“Uh,” I said. I had to think fast, I never told them about my dad’s death. “Yeah, I just have to...go to the bathroom!”
“O...okay,” Twilight said, she didn’t buy it. But she seemed to let me go. As I walked out of the room, I noticed the one known as Discord, standing a ways down the hall. I walked over to him, like me, he seemed to be down.
“What do you want?” Discord asked abruptly.
“Wow,” I said, taken aback by this fellow’s mood. “Why so grumpy?”
“Not really any of your business,” Discord said. “Now please leave me alone.”
I was starting to think this guy was a real piece of shit, then again, everybody gets grumpy now and then. Though he seemed to not want to share why. But, I didn’t feel like giving up just yet. I had to think of something that might help.
“My dad died yesterday,” I said. Why I was saying this, I didn’t know, but he seemed to be surprised at the statement.
“I...I’m sorry to hear that,” Discord said.
“Yeah, my sister’s taking it pretty hard, she’s young so it’s tougher for her,” I sighed.
“If you don’t mind me asking,” Discord said. “How’d he die?”
“Not at all,” I chuckled in spite of it all. “He died of an unknown sickness. We checked all the medical books we could find, nothing.”
“And your mother?” Discord asked.
“She died from the same sickness when I was around 18,” I said. “My sister was only 14 at the time.”
“Sounds like you’ve had it rough,” Discord said.
“Haven’t we all?” I asked. Then I leaned onto the wall and said, “Your turn.”
“I don’t know…” Discord seemed reluctant.
“Come on man,” I said. “You can’t keep everything inside.”
Discord chuckled, “I get that a lot. Just...promise you won’t tell them.”
“Deal,” I said.
“Alright,” Discord said. “I think I’m...in lo...lov…”
He seemed to be trying to say something, but was having a hard time saying it. “You’re what?”
“InlovewithFluttershy,” he said rapidly.
“Woah,” I said. “Was not expecting that.” I looked back at the party room. “So none of them know?”
“Well,” Discord said. “Some of them might think I have a minor crush on her, but I think it’s way more than that.”
“Isn’t she...you know…” I said, not able to say it. But he knew what I was saying.
“Yeah, married,” he said. “Why do you think I’m so depressed?”
“Point taken,” I said. “Looks like we both have it bad right now.”
“Indeed…” Discord said solemnly. “You know, I used to actually despise these ponies.”
That was news…”Really?”
“Yeah, I was what some would call, the ‘bad guy’.” Discord said. “You know the one, he wants to take over the world and is evil just for fun.”
“You were like that?” I asked.
“For thousands of years I was,” Discord nodded. “Then those six came into my life, Twilight, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Rarity, and Applejack.”
I stayed silent, encouraging him to go on, and he did.
“Originally, they were sent to defeat me, which they did using the Elements of Harmony.”
“The what now?” I asked.
“I’ll tell you later,” Discord responded. “Anyways, for a while, I was encased in stone again. So-”
“Wait,” I said. “You were encased in stone?!”
“Yeah,” Discord said nonchalantly. “It’s basically my prison.”
“T...that sounds terrifying,” I said. I don’t know why, but that thought just gives me the willies...
“You get used to it after the first time,” Discord said. “So, Celestia, being the enigma she is, decided to free me and make be a better draconequus. That’s what my species is, by the way. And she put me in the care of those six.”
“And you’ve been good ever since?” I asked.
“Well,” Discord hesitated, but then admitted. “I’ve made some mistakes.”
He seemed to be bothered by something, but I let it be. We stood there in silence for a little bit, until Discord spoke again. “You’d better get back to the party.”
I looked at him, “Okay, but if you need anything, come on down to my village. I’m a good listener.”
“Thanks,” he smiled. “I knew humans weren’t what he said they would be.”
And with that, I walked back to the party room, yet as I was walking, something in my mind was telling me there was something wrong with his last sentence. But I just couldn’t figure out what it was. As I reached the party room, I noticed everyone staring at me.
“What?” I said.
“Jack,” Celestia said. “I think I should tell you why we came here.”
“Ok…?” I said. Confused as to why they were serious.
“Our planet is dead,” Celestia said solemnly.
“Dead?” I asked sitting down. “Planets can’t die.”
“Ours can,” Twilight said. “At least it’s magic can, which then causes the planet to be a lifeless husk.”
“Wow…” I said, taking it in. “So that’s why you’re here…wait, does that mean you have your entire race on these ships?”
Celestia nodded, “Almost 1 million permanent residents of our country, Equestria.”
“That’s it?” I asked.
The ponies seemed taken aback by my question.
“Yeah,” Luna said. “How many humans were there?”
“At our race’s peak, there were over 8 billion of us,” I said, trying to remember what I was told.
The group gasped. Celestia spoke, “That’s a lot of one race.”
“Yeah, especially for you guys,” I said.
“Indeed,” Celestia said. “How did you maintain such a strong population?”
“I don’t know, but it wasn’t really a good thing,” I said. “All those people and the extensive use of resources caused disease, resource shortage, and famine. Plus it was estimated that global warming, caused by greenhouse gases, would cause icebergs to melt and raise the sea level, not to mention make it extremely hot. For some reason that never happened after the nukes fell.”
“Wow,” Twilight said. It looked like they were having trouble taking it all in.
“I’m sorry to break the mood everypony,” Luna said. “But there is an important matter to discuss.”
Luna looked at me, I then remembered the newest dream I had.
“So...that shadowy guy tried to kill me in my dreams today,” I said, maybe a little too abruptly.
The group gasped, except for Luna of course.
“I can’t believe we trusted that guy,” Twilight said frowning.
“It’s okay Twilight,” I said. “The past is the past.”
“Did he say anything?” Celestia asked. “Anything that could help us figure out who he is?”
“Not really,” I said. “But if it weren’t for Luna, I’d be dead. He had a gun and was about to shoot me. Then Luna stabbed him from behind.”
The group looked at Luna nervously.
“Don’t worry,” Luna said. “It was just a projection. He wasn’t really there.”
“Oh,” Twilight said. “But why use a gun? I thought he despised those.”
“He didn’t use one at first,” I said. “First, he tried to kill me with magic. But for some reason it didn’t work.”
“That’s odd…” Celestia said.
“Yeah,” I said. “He seemed surprised too.”
We all fell silent for a second, until I spoke back up.
“Well,” I said. “Before anything else happens, I need to head back to the village. I am the leader, though not very liked.”
As I sighed, Twilight spoke, “Why don’t the populace like you?”
“It’s not that they don’t like me,” I said. “They just don’t think I should be leader of the village. The only reason I am is because my dad…”
I stopped as soon as the word dad came out of my mouth.
“What’s wrong?” Twilight asked. Donning a worried expression. I didn’t want to, but I knew I had to tell them. They’d find out sooner or later anyways.
“My dad died yesterday,” I said.
Literally everyone except me gasped. Too many condolences were thrown at me at once to the point that I didn’t know who was saying what.
“Guys!” I said, maybe a bit too loud. “It’s alright, I just have a hard time thinking about it right now.”
“Are you sure Jack?” Celestia asked.
“I’m sure,” I lied. The words were hollow, I was far from alright. But I had to do my duties back at the village, so I couldn’t stay any longer. “Anyways, I’ve got to get back to the village. Many a things to do, plus, I’ve got to make preparations for the funeral.”
They all looked at each other for a second, then Twilight spoke up.
“Do you mind if we come to the funeral?” she asked.
I was definitely taken aback by their question. “Um, not really, but I have to ask why?”
“Because, silly,” Pinkie Pie said. “We want to be there for you, what are friends for?”
You know I hadn’t really stopped to think about that, but I guess they were my friends now. “Alright, you can come.”
They all nodded.
“Now,” I said. “Where’s the exit?”
“I’ll show you the way,” Discord, who I didn’t even notice was back in the room, said.
“Alright,” I said. And with that, I waved goodbye to everyone in the room and the two of us walked towards the exit.
“I just wanted to say thank you,” Discord said suddenly.
“Why?” I asked, feeling a little weirded out by all the odd looks I was getting from the ponies. “Oh, because of our talk?”
“Yes,” Discord said. “I realized that there are ponies and humans alike that have it worse than me right now.”
We stopped at a door that had a big exit sign next to it. Discord opened it and said, “Here we are.”
“Thanks,” I said, and as I walked out I said, “Just remember, there’s plenty other fishes in the sea.”
As I was walking back to the village, I took my time and looked around. I was starting to see everything differently now. I felt less...alone. Which was good. But then something caught my eye, there was an old ruined store. Which would seem normal, but there was a display out behind a glass window that was somehow not broken. There were some figures and above them was a sign with three simple words, yet those words filled me with confusion and nervousness.
“My God…” Those three words? My Little Pony.