A Crafter's Dream (Discontinued)

by ruthim345

A Crafter's Dream Ch. 33: Trial by Fire (Part 1)

Steve stood behind the two sisters as they hugged and cried. For a minute or two, he simply looked on. Sighing, he sheathed his blade, garnering the attention of both alicorns. Brushing her tears aside with a hoof, Celestia slowly trotted over to the Crafter with an unreadable expression.

“How are you here?” She asked.

“I’m assuming you mean here in Mindscape. That, in and of itself is a long story, so I’ll give you the rundown. Super-powerful being that’s kind of an ass trapped us, as well as a few others, here in the Mindscape. I’m on a wild goose chase trying to find and free everyone. That’s the gist of it, at least.” Steve spoke, looking at her with a deadpan expression.

Celestia’s face turned blank for a moment. After a few seconds, she took a deep breath and began to speak.

“Who put..?”

However, she was interrupted by a loud “BING!!” sound. Moments later, just as before, a large wooden door suddenly appeared before them. Sighing, Steve looked back at Abyss, Trench and Aura before gesturing towards the door.

“C’mon. Looks like our ride is here.” He turned to Celestia, who had a confused looked on her face. “I’m sure you have a lot of questions, but first, we need to leave this place.” Steve walked to the door, gripped the handle, and threw it open, revealing a swirling mass of nothingness on the other side, just like the last two times.

“Wait.” That single word caused him to stop. Looking back, he saw the Princess of the sun looking at him with a narrowed and distrustful gaze. “How can I trust you? You’re the very being that has hurt my subjects on multiple occasions. You put two dozen guards in the hospital!” Her voice rose in volume as her horn glowed. “You have fought and hurt my own sister! Why should I trust you!!??”

“Because the way I see it, you don’t have much choice otherwise.” The Crafter’s calmly spoken words made Celestia freeze in realization. Steve continued. “You are a powerful being, no doubt about that. But you have little idea where you are, and as far as I know, no idea on how to get out, just as I don’t. Which means you have two options. One, stay with my group, find and rescue the others, and hopefully escape. Or two, you try and escape on your own, by your own means.” Steve let a small smirk grace his lips. “But something tells me you won’t take option two.”

“And why is that?”

“Because there are four other beings trapped. And as much as you evidently hate me, from what I've heard you also care a lot for your subjects. There’s no way you would leave them to die.”

Celestia stared silently at him, their gazes locked on the other. After a few tense moments of quiet, Trench stepped forward towards his ruler.

“Princess, I know he’s done some stuff, but after everything I’ve seen him do, how he acts, I don’t think he’s bad, or evil, or something.” He let out a small laugh. “In fact, despite what I did, he still helped me. If it weren’t for him, I’d be dead.” The alicorn looked at the general in confusion.

“What do you mean? What did you do?”

Trench visibly gulped. “W-well I uh, I mean…”

“Hold on.” Steve interrupted. “We can and will continue this conversation later, but for now, we need to get going.” Trench gave a sigh of relief and nodded, before walked through the door, followed closely by Aura. Abyss followed suit, but stopped just before entering. Glancing back at Celestia, her gaze hardened.

“Steve is my friend, Princess. If you continue to do what you’ve been doing to him, he isn’t the only one you’ll have to worry about.” She spoke with just a hint of venom in her voice, before stepping through the door.

“Sister, what will thou do?” Steve’s gaze focused on the dark blue alicorn as she stepped beside her sibling. Celestia remained silent, not taking her gaze off of Steve, though the anger and distrust had disappeared for the most part.

“I suppose, the best option would be to go through that door, and see where it goes from there.” She said, after a few more moments of silence. Sighing, she turned to Luna. “Goodbye, sister. I will see you soon.” They hugged once more, before Luna disappeared with barely a twinkle of her horn. Turning to Steve, she trotted up to the door. Glancing at him out of the corner of her eye, her eyebrows furrowed. “Don’t make me regret this.” She warned, before stepping through.

Sighing, Steve followed soon after.

* * * * *

Just as he arrived back in the main room, Steve suddenly got very dizzy. Groaning, he rubbed his head as he managed to stay on his feet.

“You alright?” Looking up at the question, he saw Abyss standing beside him. He sighed and nodded his head.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just a bit disoriented.” Looking past her, his gaze settled on the four doors still remaining. Walking over to them, he contemplated which one to open.

“Where are we?” He heard Celestia speak from behind. Glancing back, he saw the princess looking around in confusion. “Why are there four doors?” She continued gesturing towards them.

“This is kind of the starting room where this all began.” Steve explained. “Each door leads to each of the captive’s minds, where I have to take on their worst nightmare, one way or the other. One such nightmare would be you turning into Daybreaker and ruling with an iron fist, or hoof in your case.” He stated offhandedly, ignoring the flinch his words had brought from the alicorn.

“Yeah, only instead of harmless figments of imagination, these nightmares can probably kill us.” Trench chimed in. “We don’t know for sure, but better safe than sorry.”

“Yeah. Speaking of nightmares, while I’m a big fan of small talk, which door should we go through next?”

“We?” Questioned Celestia, making everyone else look at her with a questioning gaze. She explained. “Well, there are five of us here, and four doors. If we were to split up…”

Steve swiftly interrupted her. “If we were to split up, we could get all the doors done faster, yes. But that leaves the risk of one of us getting hurt, or worse, on their own. That’s not something I want to risk.”

Celestia smiled in confidence. “Trench and Aura are both well-trained and respected fighters. I have the utmost faith in their capabilities.”

“Really? Because I don’t.” Steve replied simply. Her mouth dropped open slightly in shock at his blunt statement, while Trench and Aura both looked at him with slightly hurt expressions. “Look, they are great fighters, I don’t doubt that. But I know the man that put us here and I know how ruthless he is. So trust me when I say this. If we split up, not everyone in this room will leave this place alive.”

“Just, how ruthless is this being? Because I have faced many villains in my time and…”

“He’s single-handedly responsible for the death of my entire species.” Steve spoke, cutting her off. Her eyes widened.

“What?” She asked. Steve opened his mouth to respond, before shaking his head as his eyebrows furrowed.

“Look, can we talk about this later? We have more pressing issues to deal with.” He turned back to the doors, before quickly choosing the door on the far right. “How about that one?” He asked, gesturing to it. Upon getting no arguments, he walked up to the door, gripped the handle and opened it. Without a word, he stepped through, into the blackness.

* * * * *

The next thing he knew, he was in Ponyville’s main square. Quickly searching his surroundings, he found the square was surprisingly empty.

“Where the Nether is…?” The Crafter was interrupted by a quiet rippling noise. Turning around, he saw Abyss appear out of thin air. Moments later, Trench appeared, followed closely by Aura and the Princess.

“Hey, what took you guys so long?” He asked with a smirk on his face.

“Oh quiet.” Abyss said with a playful grin. Looking around, her smile faded as she probably realized what Steve had moments before. “Hey, don’t want to worry anyone, but where the heck is everyone?”

“Uh, Steve!? You should probably take a look at this!” Steve whirled around to see Trench a short distance away, looking at something. Sprinting over to him, he saw the object of interest.

It was a poster. On it, in giant letters, read:

There was silence as everyone read the poster. After a short while, the quiet was suddenly broken by Steve.

“Well. Shit.”

* * * * *

Only a few minutes later, Steve was running through town, followed by his allies, as well as Celestia as they made their way towards the town hall.

“How much farther!?” He yelled behind him.

“Not much further! Take the next left!” Aura shouted in response. Nodding his head, Steve put out his hands for balance as he skidded into a turn, feet grinding into the dirt before taking off down the road. Looking ahead, his gaze landed on the familiar sight of the Town Hall. In front of the building, a small crowd had gathered. Pushing himself through the herd, he eventually made his way to the front doors, where two guards stood, keeping the civilians back. Their eyes widened in shock at the sight of the tall Crafter.

Steve reached his hand over his shoulder, preparing for a fight. However, much to his surprise, they hastily assured him inside, muttering about how “late he was.” Just as he stepped through the doorway, the guards shut the doors behind him, leaving him alone in the short hallway. Chalking it up to the weirdness of the mind, he shrugged his shoulders and walked over to the far door. Just above the entrance was a small wooden sign that read “Courtroom.” Taking a deep breath, he gripped the handle, twisted, then opened the door.

Silence greeted him. Stepping inside, he was confused to see everyone in the room was staring at him, not in fear or wonder, but as if they were expecting him. Slowly making his way forward, his gaze looked all around.

“Oh, Mr. Steve! You made it!” To the Crafter's confusion, a green pegasus mare trotted up to him with a smile on her muzzle. Her black mane was pulled into a bun. “What took you so long? Come on, let's get to our seats.” Before he could respond, the mare pulled him along with a hoof, leading him over to a table with two chairs positioned to face the front of the room. She took her seat before looking over to him and patting the chair beside her. Playing along for the time being, he sat down, eyebrows furrowed.

“Don't worry, Mr. Steve. With all of the evidence I've prepared, there's no way we can lose.” The mare reassured him. Just as he was about to ask her what she meant, a side door opened. A gray earth stallion, dressed in a black suit, trotted into the room.

“All rise for the honorable judge, Mr. Iron Gavel!” Everypony, as well as Steve, stood as Iron Gavel took his spot on the raised platform at the front of the room.

“You may be seated.” He spoke in a deep voice. Everyone sat. The stallions dark eyes looked around the room for a moment. “Alright. Mr. Codswell! Are we ready to begin?”

A chocolate brown stallion responded. “Yes, your Honor.”

“Very well. Guards, you may now bring in the accused.” Steve heard a door opening, followed shortly by the sound of rattling chains. Looking over, his eyes widened in shock at what he saw. Trotting slowly into the room, heavy chains shackling her legs and a rope tied around her wings, came a light blue pegasus he easily recognized.

It was Rainbow Dash.

She looked down at the floor, head dropped low. Flanked by two guards, she was lead over to her seat, sitting down with one final, heavy rattle.

“The accused has been seated.” The gray stallion raised his gavel.

Bang!! Bang!!

“Let the trial of Rainbow Dash, commence!!”