//------------------------------// // 12: Burnt out Sun // Story: Imbalanced: Legacy of Light // by Nameless Narrator //------------------------------// “Uh, hello?” Harriet withered under the glare of the Silver Sun earthpony guard dressed in short white robe. The Corrupted on the other side of the gate watched her, back tentacles wobbling only slightly with Harriet’s every step. The earthpony looked her up and down. “Can I help you, miss?” “I’m looking for the Order of the Silver Sun, and someone called... mister Bucket?” “Are you here to join?” “No, sir,” Harriet shook her head, and raised her bandaged foreleg, “I’m a dragonpony, and I was told that someone here could help me heal my scales.” The guard nodded, pressed a speaker button on the wall by the gate, and said: “Reception, we’ve got a visitor for sir Bucket. A wounded ‘dragonpony’ looking for healing.” “Send them in. I’ll call the boss immediately,” came from the speaker. With a buzz, the gate opened, and the guard pointed towards the mansion door connected to the outer gate via a wide road of white gravel. “Just follow the path to the main entrance, miss, and somepony will be with you shortly.” “Thank you,” Harriet gave the guard a quick bow, and entered the Silver Sun premises. The Silver Sun mansion was a three-story, V-shaped white building with windows neatly lining the walls, and a balcony on each end of each floor. From the outside, Harriet couldn’t see anything too unusual about the place. What did catch her attention was that behind the guarded outer wall there were wide open lawns on which many more ponies wearing white robes tightly wrapped around their barrels and covering their cutie marks were fighting each other. No, not fighting, practicing. On the lawn to her left, there were two five-pony groups trying to outmaneuver each other under the watchful eye of a griffon in his fifties. The right lawn reaching all the way to the outer wall separating the premises from the rest of Manehattan was filled with previously mentioned uniformed trainees fighting in pairs with two instructors not wearing anything walking among them and correcting mistakes. Harriet tried not to stare as she walked towards the mansion, mostly because she was rather scared. She might have been big and strong, but those ponies obviously had combat experience or at least training, and her past encounters with ponies like that hadn’t gone well. She didn’t want to offend anyone. Anyway, one of the instructors was a tall black batpony with dark purple mane and tail. Contrary to everything Harriet had ever learned, a sword was flying by his side, casually swinging at random against the practicing pairs who had to defend themselves from the unexpected attacks. Batponies weren’t supposed to be able to use telekinesis, but at this point Harriet simply filed the weirdness under ‘things I have never seen before and know nothing about’, and kept inconspicuously looking. The other instructor had to be a Corrupted, judging from his back tentacles occasionally slapping the recruits and disappearing immediately, However, two things made the situation weird. First, he wasn’t completely black, merely dark grey, and his mane was off-colour dusty light blue. Second, he was clearly talking to the trainees, and explaining things while correcting their postures and movements. A Separated maybe? Harriet squinted at his legs. Nope, that equine was a Corrupted. By the time Harriet reached the mansion doorway, a regal-looking pristine white unicorn mare wearing a see-through gown decorated by gold and gems with long, purple mane was standing in front of it and watching her. Contrary to others Harriet had met before, she wasn’t intimidated by the dragonpony vastly taller than her whatsoever, even going so far as to look rather… bored. As Harriet walked up the short stairs to the mansion entrance, the mare’s horn flashed green in tune with her eyes. Harriet felt something grip her muzzle, and turn her head from side to side, then the bandages on her legs started unwrapping all at once. They’re not the bad guys, they’re not the bad guys, they’re not the bad guys. A second pony as tall as Harriet walked out of the open double door, making her gasp. It was probably a unicorn stallion, but one made of shiny white metal neatly sliding over his body with his every step. She even caught a glimpse of muscle-like cables underneath the armor whenever the mechanical pony moved. His eyes were completely black aside from bright blue segmented circles in them. Hastur’s words came to mind. ”You’ll know him when you’ll see him. He’s hard to miss.” Bucket. Hastur had referred to Bucket as ‘he’. “A dracon indeed,” Bucket’s voice was slightly distorted as if coming from a damaged radio, but easy to understand, “How is she, Starlight?” The unicorn mare whose telekinesis was making Harriet raise her legs one by one in the meantime, shrugged. “Stripped scales, tissue damage underneath, first level corruption, probably the victim of overeager dragonslayers. The dumb ones tend to go for weaker targets first before facing real dragons. Excellent physical condition, but unused to combat motion. Likely a country worker who eats well and works hard. Not worth my time, really,” Starlight gave Harriet one final look before facing Bucket. “I didn’t know you had this much experience with dracons, Starlight.” “I’ve had a dozen or so dracon foals over the years. Fooling around with dragons in their real form is fun. The trick, of course, is stopping them from eating you first.” Real… form... Harriet’s jaw dropped. She, of course, knew that older dragons like her father learned magic allowing them to shapeshift into smaller species, hence the possibility of her own existence. Now, though, this… pony was saying she slept with dragons… as DRAGONS?! Blush engaged. Does… not… compute… Bucket’s shaking her by the shoulder saved her from her temporarily broken imagination. “Do you have any treatment for lost scales like this then?” “I’ve got the formula somewhere. I don’t tend to store something that degrades quickly and isn’t exactly useful anyway. You, girl,” Starlight’s telekinesis made Harriet looked at her again, “You’ll heal in a year or two on your own, got it? I don’t see a reason to waste my valuable research time on a minor nuisance like this.” “Ehm,” Bucket cleared his throat. Why, that was beyond Harriet, “Starlight, possibly speed is of the essence. You, dracon miss, do you need your legs fixed quickly? Or am I completely wrong, and you’re not here because of your lost scales?” Harriet tried to nod, but couldn’t move a muscle until she felt the telekinesis dissipate. “It’s the scales, sir. It really itches and stings sometimes. I’m afraid it’ll get infected or worse. Nothing like this has ever happened to me before. It would be really nice if you could fix it faster than in few years.” “Excellent,” the corners of Bucket’s mouth curled up, “Starlight, research notes, if you will?” The unicorn rolled her eyes, and huffed. “Ugh, fine, but don’t think I don’t know what you really want.” “I wouldn’t dream of trying to fool you.” “I’ll have it on your desk in a minute,” Starlight teleported away with a ‘pop’. Harriet let out a sigh of relief. The unicorn had seemed unfriendly and annoyed. “Follow me, miss…?” “Harriet. You must be… mister Bucket, right?” The robot nodded, entering the mansion with Harriet in tow. “That’s my name. Now, miss Harriet, I’m willing to help you, and it won’t cost you anything but your time. Time which we’ll spend by preparing whatever cure Starlight prescribes anyway. Considering how rare you dracons are, I’d like to take some measurements and notes.” The mansion lobby was an expansive circular room. In truth, it had to span a good fifth of the floor. Two staircases leading to the upper floors lined the walls, and in the center of the room sat a receptionist’s desk manned by a female unicorn wearing the same white robe as everyone. The red carpet under Harriet’s hooves and talons was thin, but dampened sounds extremely well. In fact, the inside of the mansion was incomparably quiet to the combat chaos outside. “What do I need to do?” Bucket led her through the vast lobby to a staircase down leading to the cellars, and eventually they ended in a room filled with mechanical and electronic contraptions lining the walls. “Simply follow my lead as I take my measurements. The physiology of dracons is something I haven’t examined before, so I’ll be going for as most complete tests as possible.” Bucket sat her down into a chair, took her bandages off, then put electrodes on various parts of her body, carefully avoiding her sensitive legs. He worked with practiced and mechanical precision until she was firmly, yet comfortably, tied to her chair. “Let’s start with something simple. Imagine a circle. Good. A sphere. Nice, thank you-” Imagining a stream of shapes turned into Bucket poking her with needles which shocked her lightly, and in about an hour she was out of the chair. “Test one done.” “Test one…?” Harried choked, “Of how many…?” “Twenty-three. Don’t worry, this was the longest one, and I’ll provide refreshments as requested. Our unicorns are already examining Starlight’s notes, and I’ve received a message that they should have the healing balm and dosage ready by this evening.” Harriet didn’t question how the mechanical pony would receive a message despite no one interrupting his experiments yet. Probably a radio or something. There was a different matter she was curious about, though. “Mister Bucket, do you know someone by the name Hastur?” “It’s a fairly common griffon name, miss Harriet.” “That’s it, this wasn’t a griffon. This was a… he called himself a dracoequis or something?” “A draconequus?” Bucket’s head snapped towards her, “That shouldn’t be possible.” “It is! He showed me the way here. I met him on the ferry from Griffonstone. He was completely white, had green eyes, and I saw lightning rush through his coat at one point, I swear. He told me your name too. He knew a lot about Corrupted and he said he was there when Corrupted first attacked Equestria.” Bucket froze. “Intriguing,” he mumbled after a moment, “However, no. I have never met the draconequus in question. Now, miss Harriet, are you hungry or thirsty?” “No, sir. I’m used to working all day if need be.” “Excellent,” the robot’s predatory grin, as far as Harriet could tell, told her that she might have made a mistake, “Well then,” he pointed towards a large square pad on the floor, “go stand there, and we’ll begin test two.” *** “Oooooof...” Harriet stumbled out of the mansion, wandered over on the lawn a short distance away from a fresh batch of practicing trainees so that she wouldn’t be a distraction, or more of a distraction, as she noticed some glancing her way, and sat down, watching the lesson. The examination had taken hours, and had been anything but interesting, at least to Harriet. Bucket had probably learned about her more than she knew about herself, but considering she had no clue what most of the devices she’d been subjected to over time did, Harriet had simply felt silly. Finally, though, it was over, and she had free access to the Silver Sun outside premises, so she decided to take a short break before… what? Probably a trip around Manehattan until the healing balm was finished. Then… the long trek back home. One part of Harriet was happy that she’d see the peace of Windy again, but a new, different part of her didn’t want to return to the… boredom. “A visitor, or a fresh, beautiful face to train under me?” a pleasant male voice rang in Harriet’s ear, making her realize she got lost in thought. “Oh, heheh, I- eep!” Harriet looked up into the soft and unbelievably handsome face of the Corrupted trainer, trying not to get lost in the complete blackness of his eyes only brightened by their amber pupils. The talking Corrupted, and clearly a smooth talking one on top. Beautiful… under him... This close to his powerful yet shapely body, she could smell fresh grass, and her first thought of training ‘under’ him involved her lying on her back on said grass with his tentacles filling her mouth, nose, and everywhere they could reach. The minotaur in Wyrmlure… he’d been only the first step into real pleasure and depravity she knew she now craved. Corrupted were the real path to fulfillment, to scratching an itch she never knew she had before, and it was growing stronger, and stronger, and str- Her boiling desire evaporated instantly when she felt something soft touch her nose. It was the Corrupted’s own booping her. Suddenly, she was completely clear-headed, breathing heavily, but without any distracting thoughts other than the Corrupted’s worried eyes so close to her. Is he able to… stop me from going all crazy? He leaned away, and Harriet felt the heat return, only at a much slower pace. “Better?” he asked, faint smile on his rather delicate muzzle. He was masculine and yet soft at the same time. Harriet nodded. “H-How did you do that?” The Corrupted sat down next to her, returning to watching his trainees. “I’ve had trainees, especially female, who reacted as strongly as you. I used to be a pony, and I still recall the first weeks of fighting it. Yet, corruption can be extremely rewarding to somepony with enough mental discipline, and I’ve learned how to… deal with certain situations. My name is Heavy Hoof,” his back tentacle reached out, and Harriet shook it. “Harriet. Can you cure me?” she asked hopefully. “Definitely not. I just know some tricks, that’s all. Queen Nightshade is stopping all research into curing corruption, and the princesses follow her request. The delicate balance between ponies and Corrupted mustn’t be disturbed by some maniac creating a chemical able to purely destroy taint, and using it against Corrupted as a weapon.” “Awww...” Harriet sighed. Heavy Hoof tapped on her forehead. “You look strong all over, but this might need work. Are you here to join?” he repeated himself. “No,” Harriet presented her freshly bandaged forelegs, “I got hurt by a group of dragonslayers who stripped my scales, and sir Bucket is helping me get better. Speaking of which, do you know anypony by the name Black Thorn?” Heavy shook his head. “No, I don’t. We don’t exactly employ monster killers for hire, we just train them for money. Bucket might know, he has records of every recruit. Our best teams travel around the world, fighting signs of evil before they grow too big for us to handle.” Harriet looked at all the training ponies, griffons, and one or two Corrupted. “I’ve met few experienced mercenaries who were still afraid of wild Corrupted, and a group of dragonslayers who fled from a single Separated. You are smart and experienced enough to train others. What could be too big for you to handle?” Heavy’s gentle smile withered. “I learned the hard way how woefully weak I am, Harriet. You don’t want to know about the true horrors, and I know you want to sleep peacefully at night, so I’m not going to tell you. I know what lies ahead, and I’ve been having… nightmares for a long time now. The best of us couldn’t stand against the real darkness when it came four years ago… all we could do was run.” “What happened?” Harriet still asked, now wanting to know more than before. Hastur had said a similar thing. Seeing Heavy Hoof suddenly worried and sad worked like a cold shower, though. “Have you been to the dead zone in Manehattan?” “I arrived today,” Harriet shook her head, “Most ponies I've met were souvenir vendors.” “A big part of west Manehattan is a dead zone where black fire still burns,” he looked into the distance, “A circle with the old Silver Sun mansion in its center. An enemy attacked us, and killed our best… warriors, heroes… friends. Tio and I,” he nodded towards the batpony still walking between the trainees, “managed to save some recruits, Bucket, and several others, but those who fought… lost. They bought us time, but paid the highest price. These days we’re training as hard as we can for a fight we know will eventually come. A fight we can’t win,” suddenly, Heavy shook his head, “I’m sorry, Harriet, for ruining the mood. We… I lost far too much that day, but I shouldn’t be bothering you with it.” He stood up, and stretched. Harriet’s eyes couldn’t help sliding over his godlike body again. “Sorry for bringing it up,” Harriet’s ears drooped. Heavy’s smile returned, although this time it felt at least partially fake, and his tentacle patted Harriet’s head. “Don’t worry about that. Anyway, it was nice meeting you, but I can’t be lazying around while my recruits do all the hard work. Gotta lead by example, as they say.” Harriet watched him walk back to the fighting recruit pairs before standing up as well. In the bright daylight, whatever dark cloud Heavy’s story had brought didn’t last long, and she finally noticed what Hastur had talked about - a small door in the mansion’s corner with a sign “Gift shop” above it. Still hoping they take griffon bills. Heheh, not too literally. *** “It’ll be alright, she’ll just be really happy, not want to eat me or mate with me or anything...” Harriet mumbled to no one in particular, barely stopping herself from shaking. This would be the real test, the one test she mustn’t fail. Hastur’s instructions had been right, and the Silver Sun gift shop had offered some great toys and trinkets for a fraction of their price at the docks. She hadn’t bought anything for herself, believing that her now pitch black nose scales and somewhat annoyingly persistent dirty thoughts would never let her forget Equestria anymore. She had, however, bought a silver-framed ‘shifting’ picture for her dad. In the picture there was her, beaming brightly and completely covered in some temporary black goo suit making her look like a full Corrupted, tentacles, three tongues, all wobbling whenever she took a step forward. It wasn’t a video recording, just magical photo combining several still ones which cycled repeatedly. That way, her dad would have a silly memory of her as well as a little something for his hoard. Also, it wasn’t possible to see the bandaged legs under the fake Corrupted disguise. No reason to make him sad. Anyway, afterwards she’d still had few more hours before she’d have to return to Bucket for the healing salve, balm, or whatever it was supposed to be, so she’d decided to roam around Manehattan. Carefully hailing a female… very, very female Hunter pulling another taxi, Harriet had wanted to do something probably extremely stupid. However, her curiosity had been far too strong to handle at that point. She’d asked the Corrupted to take her near what Heavy had called ‘the dead zone’, and apparently the Hunter had understood. When the taxi had stopped, Harriet had noticed something else Hastur had mentioned before, though - a solitary black berry the size of her hoof hanging from a tree branch high above her head, and a devilish plan had hatched in her head. Asking the Corrupted to wait for her a while, and being both surprised that it had worked and struck with how adorable the strong Hunter mare had looked when she’d simply curled up on the ground and closed her eyes, Harriet had climbed up the tree, and brought the berry down. The Corrupted was on all fours again now, one tongue hanging out, and watching Harriet with tilted head and back tentacles completely rigid. “Here… you… go…?” Harriet extended her foreleg holding the berry. She had briefly considered taking a bite herself just to try it, but had decided against it. If even the air tainted a pony lightly, what would eating natural Corrupted food do to somepony like her? However, the reason for feeding the Hunter wasn’t only gratitude, it was a test. She would be happy, and- The Hunter bit into the berry. Harriet found herself on her back instantly, the Hunter being out of her harness, lying on top of her, rubbing her lean barrel against Harriet’s, and showering the dragonpony with licks and kisses. Now focus, Harriet. Not on how soft her short coat is, not on the oily, slippery heat seeping from her barrel into your, not on the fact that right now all you want is to grow some tentacles too so that you could feel her with more than your grasping legs. No, focus on the pure joy the Corrupted is experiencing, not erotic one, that’s just the side effect. She’s happy like a foal on Hearth’s Warming who got all the gifts it wanted, plus some it couldn’t even imagine. The Corrupted wants to eat you up, not because she wants to breed you, but because bringing you to heaven like that is the only way she knows how to repay the food you gave her. Harriet wrapped all four her legs around the Hunter’s barrel, and pressed her muzzle against her neck. “Blrblrlblblblblblblblb...” the Corrupted gurgled happily, reciprocating the gesture, and soon Harriet found herself in an unmoving cocoon of legs and tentacles. The overwhelming heat inside Harriet subsided a little as she calmed down. She doesn’t want to eat me, she doesn’t want to breed me, she doesn’t want to corrupt me. She’s just happier from that little berry than I’ve been from any gift ever. “Heheh,” Harriet chuckled quietly, patting the Hunter’s head, “Looks like I made a friend.” “Blblbl?” the mare licked Harriet’s nose. Most importantly, I remained in control. Barely, but in control. Heavy Hoof was right. I need some mental discipline. “Hey,” Harriet scratched the mare behind the ear, “Let me go now, will you? Thanks for the ride here.” “Blrbrlbl… blllbl...” the Hunter stood up, and helped Harriet back on all fours with her tentacles still tangled around the dragonpony’s barrel. “I gotta go now. There’s something I still want to check out,” said Harriet when the last prehensile limb wrapped around her neck retracted. The Corrupted nodded, licked a drop of the berry juice remaining around her muzzle from how messily she’d devoured it before, lay down, and immediately fell asleep, her back tentacles extended only slightly, and answering Harriet’s first steps backwards with mild tremble. Like a house cat, in a way. Would it be foolish to think wild Corrupted would be this easy to work with? Harriet recalled the horror of meeting the feral griffon Hunter. Definitely. She turned towards her destination, her happy smile withering. This is what Heavy had talked about, and Harriet was beginning to grasp the weight of his words. There was almost no one in this part of Manehattan. At the end of the long street, thin smoke was rising and covering the strangely open space unlike any other she’d seen during her rides through the city. More and more decrepit buildings lined the street as she reached its end, and eventually... she saw it. Ruins everywhere, chiily air, patches of black fire still burning here and there. Empty or crumbled skyscrapers, skeletons of normal brick and mortar buildings, and ash everywhere she could see, and she could see far and wide now. This was the dead zone, and in its center, supposedly, was the old Silver Sun base. She knew she should do a quick one-eighty, and ask the happy Corrupted to take her back to the living part of the city… but curiosity, the old curse, didn’t let her. It took Harriet over another hour of casual trotting to recognize her surroundings. This part of the city must have been the rich part at one point, considering most of the crumbled structures surrounding her were mansions and broken walls separating open, scorched tracks of land around them from the common streets. What happened? Horst said that the best Empire chemists haven’t found a way to stop corrupted vegetation from spreading, and yet this place is still completely dead. Anyway, how was Harriet able to even remotely recognize a place where she’d never been before? Most importantly due to barred metal gate hanging on ashen hinges, featuring a grey and burned sun symbol. On top of that, the area behind the gate was similar to the current Silver Sun mansion she’d seen before. A long road separating two wide open lawns with blackened pieces of armor and weapons still lying on them, the mansion in the center of the property… ...and also the blackfire pyre in front of the building. It was freezing cold here, even for Harriet, and she felt weak just from the sight. Stretching to stave off the frost, she passed through the main gate. The burning mansion was off limits, obviously, but maybe she could see something interesting around. Five minutes later, she found herself behind the building, looking at a completely black wall which seemed out of place. It couldn’t have been a part of any shed or anything, there were no more ruins around. It was simply a black wall covered in white scratches. Carefully stepping around another small patch of the weird fire, Harriet walked over… ...and realized that the scratches on the wall were columns of names. “Maybe a monument to fallen Silver Sun members?” walking over to the right, she went to look for the last names, possibly to gain some insight into who were the lost warriors and friends Heavy Hoof had talked about, “WHAT IN THE EMPEROR’S INFINITELY SHARP TALONS?!” Harriet’s head started spinning. The last name on the wall was one that by no logic should be there: Red Wind.