//------------------------------// // Comfort // Story: The Reason to Smile // by Onomonopia //------------------------------// Sombra could feel the despair before he ever entered the room. A scent that was a mix of pain, confusion, but most of all, betrayal. Seemed to him that Chronos had done his job perfectly. The dark king walked up to White Noise door, took a moment to force down his smile (not an easy task with how things had been going so well) and took on a more somber expression. He knocked twice and heard the sobs get stifled. "White Noise? You in there?" he asked in his most concerned tone. Silence answered him. "I know that you're in there. Please, open the door." When she didn't, Sombra smirked, forced the smirk back and used his magic to open the door. The room was a mess, with objects scattered everywhere, furniture overturned, and everything just a mess. He spied the human girl sitting in the corner of the room, arms around her legs and faced still masked. She barely glanced over at Sombra as he entered. "Jeez, this place is a mess," Sombra muttered. He pretended to take in the room before glancing at her again. "You didn't do all of this, did you? If you didn't like the room, all you had to do was tell me. I could easily have rearranged it for you." White Noise didn't reply. "...you didn't do this, did you?" Sombra asked. He noticed a few bruise marks on her arms and had to bite down hard on his tongue to keep himself from smiling. "And those bruises...don't tell me Chronos did this to you?" Even if he didn't already know, her silence would have answered his question anyway. Sombra tried to look devastated (harder than it looked) and sat down next to the girl, sighing heavily as he hung his head. "Why would he do that to you? He always talked so highly of you and said that he saw you as...well, like a daughter to him," Sombra said. At the mention of this, White Noise sobbed once more and hung her head. "He...he said that this was all my fault," she barely managed to choke out. "He said that if...if I hadn't caused Warp Drive's quirk to go crazy, we would never had been in this mess in the first place. That I was the one responsible for the deaths of my team...my friends..." Had she been responsible for the villains coming to this world? Sombra didn't know, but it was good to keep in his back pocket for later. White Noise also felt responsible for the capture of the others. He could use that. But evil wasn't what he needed to be right now. What he needed to be right now...was kind. And Sombra could fake kindness like nopony else. "White Noise...that's not you're real name, right?" he asked her. She didn't reply. "Anyway, you can't blame yourself for what happened to the others. They went up against your world's greatest hero and against six of the luckiest ponies that have ever lived. And your leader had the great idea to send them in one at a time on a fools mission. It's no wonder they got beat. None of that had anything to do with you. After all you're...how old are you? Sixteen...seventeen?" "Thirteen." "Thirteen? You're telling me that Chronos brought a thirteen year old into battle with him? Maybe he was a bigger villain than I gave him credit for," Sombra said with a sly smile. He then shook his head and remembered to look miserable. "He brought a thirteen year old into combat. Clearly he didn't care for you." "He did!...he does," she whispered in reply. "Well then he has a terrible way of showing it," Sombra muttered. His horn glowed and a moment later White Noise's wounds had healed. The girl looked down at her arms in surprise, before looking over at Sombra. The dark king rose to his hooves and started to head for the door. "Where are you going?" she asked. "To make sure that Chronos never hurts you again," Sombra promised. "He's clearly gone senile in his old age. If he did care for you before, it's clear he doesn't now. And I may be an evil scumbag, but I'm an evil scumbag with standards. Leave this to me." "Wait," she softly cried out. "Don't hurt him. He...he might be losing his mind and being...cruel...but he still took me in. He helped me with my quirk when the heroes labeled me a lost cause. I...can't let anything happen to him. Please. Let me talk to him when he get's back. Please." Sombra took a moment to think. Chronos wasn't coming back. He would make sure of that. What he was concerned with was how did he respond here. Should he continue acting like he was going to stop Chronos, telling the girl it was for her own good? Or should he listen to her, tell her that he believed that she would be able to get through to the old man? She couldn't, but which of those options did she need to hear? What, and he couldn't believe he was thinking this, would Twilight do. "Alright," he said with a soft smile. "When Chronos get's back, you can talk to him. Try to get through to him. But I need you to know that I will be beside you the entire time in case he is too far gone. He won't hurt you again." Sombra turned to leave the room, figuring he had done a good enough job. "Hikari," White Noise whispered. Sombra stopped and turned around to look at her. "My name. Hikari." "Well then let me start over. It is nice to meet you, Hikari. And don't worry. I promise that no person will ever harm you again." Sombra left the room and closed the door behind him. He took a moment to scan the room to make sure she wasn't following him before he threw his head back and silently laughed. He had just wanted to break down her guard a bit, but to get the girl to completely open up to him? He couldn't believe it. He would have to find where Warp Drive had gotten to soon, but for a moment he patted himself on the back. "Oh Sombra, how can somepony as evil as you be so. Damn. Good?" ==== | V | ==== Twilight led All Might into the room where the villain was being held. The room was a large chamber with only a single table in the center, where Warp Drive's hands were magical handcuffed to the table. Over a dozen pony guards in black armor surrounded the outskirts of the room and Luna and Celestia flanked either side of the human. The man, whose black hair fell across face, looked up as All Might entered and a glimmer of hope sprung to life in his eyes. That worried All Might. "Here he is, All Might. He's been here ever since he surrendered to us," Twilight said. She then nodded to the two former rulers. "Has our guest caused any trouble since I left?" "No, dear princess. All he's said is that he refuses to talk until All Might was in the room," Celestia informed Twilight. All Might walked over to the table and sat down across from Warp Drive, taking a moment to look over him. The man looked terrified. His eyes darted around the room, at every shadow or hidden space. All Might wondered why. "All right, Warp Drive, I'm here. Now what is all of this about?" All Might asked. Warp Drive didn't respond. Instead, he started to stare at a particularly dark part of the room with wide eyes. "Yusuke...it's alright. I'm here. You're safe. So go ahead. Tell me what is scaring you." "Sombra..." Warp Drive finally said. "It's Sombra. He...he mind controlled the boss. He took control of Chronos. The boss works for him now." "What?" the sun and moon asked, while Twilight narrowed her eyes. "But why would he do that? I thought you were all working together to bring us down?" "I...I didn't catch all of their conversation. Boss wanted me sticking close by when he went to confront Sombra, but that place of his is so confusing that it's hard for me to find anything down there, even with my quirk. I've always had issues getting lost." "Wait a moment, you can create wormholes that can take you anywhere and yet you still manage to get lost?" Luna asked. Warp Drive shyly shrugged in response. "Back to what you were saying," All Might cut in. "Right. I didn't hear all of what they said, but I caught enough. I got there just in time to hear the boss say that Sombra had been using us as pawns. He started to threaten Sombra, but then...Sombra took control of him. Sombra started bragging about how instead of taking the chance to kill him, the boss had threatened him instead. And so I think Sombra took him over instead. Boss never liked killing anyone unless he had to. I guess Sombra took advantage of that." "I have a list of names that would disagree with your assessment of Chronos, but that's neither here nor there. What else did Sombra say?" "Well, after mocking the boss for a bit, Sombra...Sombra said...he said that White Noise had taken a liking to Sombra, but she liked him slightly less than she liked Chronos. Chronos had taken her in, ya see, when the doctors and heroes that had tried helping her with her quirk had thrown her out. She can't entirely control her quirk and it can harm others. I think for a while her family had taken her to all sorts of heroes and doctors, but after they were killed...they threw her out." "I'm sorry. I had no idea," All Might whispered. "Please, continue." "Um, Sombra...Sombra said that he needed White Noise to be completely under his control. So he needed boss to give her a push or something and he wanted boss to tell her how disappointed he was. And to make it hurt." All of the ponies in the room gasped at that while All Might clenched his hands together with enough force to crush diamonds. "After that I warped out of there as fast as I could and made my way here. I've been in your captivity ever since. There, that's everything, I swear." "This changes things," Twilight said. Her mentors and All Might nodded in agreement. "Sombra, once again, could not be trusted and has turned on your villains, All Might. He set them up to fail." "Yes, we know that he did it. My question now is why?" Celestia said. "Why would Sombra send them against us just so they could lose? Why would he send them after those stones that would increase their power if he knew they were going to lose?" "I do not know and I do not care. All I know is that there is a young girl in the hands-hooves-grah, in the clutches of a lunatic that will sacrifice anyone to get what he wants. I cannot sit here knowing he has similar plans for White Noise without doing something about it," All Might said. He spun to face Warp Drive, who shrunk under All Might's presence. "Where is his base? Where is he holding White Noise?" "He is hiding in a place he called the Ruined. I don't know what it looks like, I've never been outside the base, but that's where it is," Warp Drive said, before he had a thought. "And also...I think he might have been the one to make those stones that he's sent my allies after." "Explain." "I caught him saying that he had to hide a stone for me. I didn't think anything of it, but after hearing you guys talk, I think Sombra's been the one making and hiding those stones for us. Just a thought." "Thank you," All Might said. "I will remember this." "I want it to be known that I turned myself in and cooperated," Warp Drive said. "I helped you out against evil. I want a chance to go free, a shorted sentence if I can't have that. And you have to protect me from Sombra. Don't let him turn me against my allies. And please...help the boss and White Noise. They're all I've got." "...very well, you have my word I will save your allies," All Might replied. He then turned to face Twilight. "Come. Let us put an end to this villain once and for all." "Let's," Twilight said as she opened a vortex. "Twilight," Celestia said before the pair could leave. "Just the two of you? Should you not call in your friends?" "Pinkie is still recovering from her wound. Rainbow Dash hasn't woken up yet. I will not let any more of my friends lives be ruined doing my job," Twilight promised coldly. "All Might and I will end this, Celestia. Sombra will not harm anypony else. You have my word." And with that, Twilight and All Might leapt into the vortex, both preparing for the final showdown with Sombra.