//------------------------------// // Villainy Ballad // Story: FoE: Snippet Story // by Windrunner //------------------------------// ' Through all the wastes a cold echo rings hollow, unheard. Silent and unheralded. All that yet dwell in this land emptied of life and spirit feel something deep inside. Some unknown dark come creeping among them in the quiet. A quiet that should not be concealing a soundless menace of grand import, lurking. This horror to stand above other horrors finally reaching out to engulf all the present. The world already knows monsters. This is something else, something worse yet again come to bedevil the world of the still living. Stark terror rises in the hearts of the bravest as this feeling passes by like a shot of cold wind. The dual worlds of light and dark gambling once more on the outcome of this most bizarre occurrence. No mere monster does this feeling stem from. Every single life still clinging to the world notices the slightest change in the air as it passes. There is no accounting for the depth of despairing emotions this engenders. Furtive glances to and fro reveal nothing more amiss than expected, but it is there. Something powerful and dangerous beyond all reckoning. Seeking to strike a final blow against good perhaps, or, maybe it is just the depressive atmosphere surrounding. After all, what more and else could possibly present itself that is worse? The very light failed here, what more is there to fail? What further burden and misery could possibly be inflicted on those few behooved still intact in this blasted land? The feeling only worsens. Something huge and awful and unforgiving is stirring, out there. In the vast tracts of devastated cities and towns. A vexing, sickening writhing thing raising itself among the darkened corners of some long-forgotten hall where nothing moves. It dare not. To set in motion something so dire is to condemn all which is good and right. What little of this still holds power here? If any, it is of no consequence. The responsibility of life has lain shattered for eternities of quiet contemplation. Destruction took the world to the brink and teeters on this knife-edge of imperfect balance. So close to total collapse a single action might tip the scale. One further gamble gone wrong may topple the rest. The fires of true hope burn dimly, all but extinguished. Here, at this very moment, the pain of yearning begins to make itself known. A pain all have known, unnoticed or not. None wish to acknowledge it in the enduring darkness enforced from above, or dangers from below. Any number of miseries make themselves known across the land to one and all. There are no fortunate ones here. There are the living, and there are the dead. Occasionally perhaps, something in between. Hearts skip a beat while this distant toll is being demanded. A toll of reparation and broken lonely hearts that cannot be mended. This level of misery is too great for allowing that. What shall follow on from this murderous feeling of pain and sorrow? No one cries out to be saved. Everypony knows nothing will answer such a call. The intelligent have been rendered the same as the insane. Some would say it fitting. Most would rather say nothing at all, and they do not. The wide and narrow streets formerly trod by all manner of passersby lay atumble. Does a city miss its inhabitants? The lively trot of hooves and rushing clawed alike with all their feelings and desires? Can a place contain such feelings to be presented so long after their passing? There were so many here long ago that maybe their echoes could remain, buried in the walls and cobblestone streets. Wanting a return to the vibrancy once afforded a great city. Or maybe it is only a passing thought. The illness and urgency descending across the face of the world never felt before. That something so amiss in feeling is present alarms all despite their current struggles, whatever they may be. This is a pain so deep it carves into itself ever deeper only to suddenly lunge forth with a ferocity unheard of amongst the most wild of given stories. No matter the where, this feeling in the when hurts inside. From every dusty empty abandoned corner to the most populous remaining settlements, it can be felt. A disdain for them so great it transcends distance. The impact is perhaps not considered so great. It is just a passing feeling. A fright simply added to all others waiting to spring forth. An easily forgettable moment. It is not so wise to forget when every slight and easily overlooked thing might just kill you. This slipping apprehension may be slight, but it is vast among the whole of things. Bated breath and too quiet minutes winding down as the ponies wonder. What was that? The faintest slightest flicker in the far immense reaches of Equestria. Is there no foundation of good left in the remains of ponies' greatest works? This wicked determination has set forth to wreak havoc most foul and run amok the entire country. If it might still be called a country. As anywhere else it lays fried and torn. Wherever one stands, it is felt. All-around and in the still air, silent as it has been for so many decades of illness given to the world. No gift, but a tremendous conflux of forces clashing only to then lie still and dead save for the occasional outburst. Final gasps before an almost inevitable end. An end that may have already fallen upon the remainder. The truly dead are gone from here, pained no longer. The stale unmoving air itself if it could, seems as though dead in these lands once beautiful but now little more than shorn backdrop to devastation. Every remotely major city was struck to some degree when war finally sounded its final note before silence fell. A silence which has grown deeper ever since that one awful moment when everything stopped moving forward. It now grows deeper still. --- This silence like a cancer grows, when it stops nobody knows.