The Crooked Wing was filled with partying cheers as the griffin, Hermes Mercury, jumped around the room. He was so hyped by the sugar, the drinking, and the food. The rest of the occupants weren't much help in keeping him contained.
Some just watched him fly by without a care in the world. Rare few were too drunk to even notice anything going on. And plenty would cheer him harder. This left Red Steel and Silver Pear alone. Not that he minded caring for the griffin greatly and often.
Meanwhile the earth pony was barely keeping himself together. Silver Pear was never great with heights and even though he was inside on solid ground, his legs were still shaking. He could barely keep anything down longer than five minutes and he certainly couldn't get drunk.
The greatest problem lay in the closeness to the Pegasus isles. The Crooked Wing, being a part of the middle belt of the Giant Blue Hourglass, was in neutral territory. However, it was also lying on the east side of the Giant Blue Hourglass, the outcaste to the celestial ocean gave them a direct view of any oncoming forces like the mortal enemies of the pegasus, the griffins.
Hermes never cared for the warring between the griffins and pegasus. He hated conflict and especially rage. Which is why he was so close to the calm soul of Red Steel. They were always seen as the odd couple, even if they were just friends. A mighty and tall wall of fur, and yet a kind-hearted buffalo who never spoke a word as long as the griffin knew him. As such, Hermes was perfectly fine, being the voice for both of them.
Neither knew each other's motivations for hiding away among the random public, far from their homelands. Neither cared as long as they stood beside each other to the very end. The purest symbol of best friends. They were great companions to Rainbow Dartz and were glad to go with him when he got the call back to his homeland, even if they wouldn't enter the very land itself.
The two had no idea why Rainbow Dartz needed to come back to his homeland. Nor did they know what his current fate was. Ignorance was bliss to them only because they desired no conflict at all. Sure, they could openly boast for it, well at least, Hermes would, to excessive detail. But neither wanted it.
The griffin went for another lap around the bar. This time he took every drink he could into his claws and hugged them down just as quickly, hoping to hit the ultimate crash. Ponies helped by ordering more and laughed louder with him.
As a limit was reached, Red Steel held up his hand. He grabbed Hermes out of his griffin blur with no effort at all. The griffin shook violently, laughed loudly and cheered while trying to hold in a puke. "That was fun. Let's do it again in an... hour." This was the slowest the griffin would ever talk. No surprised as he could barely keep his mouth open.
All of them came to a halt as shadows swarmed through the room with no warning. This blackness charged toward the centermost clearing and twisted around into a vortex of shadowmancy. The ones sober enough to notice came to attention at the sight of it.
Their cheering was stopped in place by the blackening shadow. Red Steel dropped Hermes to the ground and stepped forward. He lowered his sight as if sensing what the others could not. Out of the shadows fell, Princess Platinum and a siren filly wrapped tightly in a cloth in the arms of Clover the Clever.
The seafoam unicorn was very hesitant to be in the place. She couldn't put up much of a fight with a broken leg. Nonetheless, she bashed her bow staff on the floor as a show of strength.
Red Steel smiled and walked forward. He bowed to the body of Princess Platinum. Picking her up with ease, he didn't even give a word to Clover. Instead, he took the princess to a table and laid her down.
"Red Steel! Wait, that is you?!" Twilight's voice echoed from the vortex. The buffalo turned his attention back and nodded in agreement. "Perfect, Clover, give the child to him, too."
"Are you sure?" Clover was hesitant. She knew the siren had been through a lot of hell. She wanted to take it back to its siblings, but the unknown magic within the titan airship prevented this.
"You can trust... him..." Hermes could barely stand, making her fears only worse. The griffin never understood discretion.
"Yes," Twilight assured her again, "There is no kinder soul in this timeline. Ney, no greater rival for the Element of Kindness."
"Okay." Clover presented the child to Red Steel and stepped back into the shadows. "Let's finish this as soon as possible." Her eyes widened as the shadows didn't overtake her. "No!" she shouted. "I'm going with you."
"You are injured," Rex's voice echoed from the shadows. His regret was unmistakable.
"You will only be in the way," Cold Blue was so blunt with his answer.
"Please, stay behind," Twilight tried to speak kinder. "We will come to find you when this is over."
"I..." Clover traced her eyes over the shadows and the occupants of the bar. "I understand... but..." She limped over to a chair and sat down.
"Wait, a minute!" Twilight shouted. "Silver Pear!!" Her alicorn magic reached out of the vortex and grabbed him. "What are you doing in here?!"
"No, no, no!!" he shrieked away. "I'm not going out there!!"
"Oh yes you are!!" Twilight roared.
"Never!!" He pulled out his claymore and aimed it at the hand of magic.
"Silver Pear! You are worst then Applejack with heights!"
"I said, I'm not leaving."
"Fine..." Twilight turned her magic back to Clover and picked her up. She dropped her into Silver Pear's arms and laughed, putting on a posh rich kid accent, "Oh, daddy, I want that annoying stallion to listen to me! Could you force him to carry Clover around so she doesn't feel left out."
This action left Silver Pear utterly confused. Before he could give a rebuttal, the earth pony fell into his own shadow along with his weapon and Clover. Twilight gave a gleeful yawn. "See, Rex, you are good at this job."
"I'm not spoiling you." Rex deadpanned as the vortex closed, and the shadows returned to their original positions.
******
Deep within Pegasus Isles the battle was getting harsher pegasi scattered at the explosive crash of the two fighters. Starlight and Clovis prepared themselves as one of the fighters skirted over to them.
"What's going on here?!" Starlight summoned her gentlemare sword.
Hurricane crashed at Starlight's feet and winked at her. "Hey, sexy! How about you and I go on a date?"
"..." Starlight barely had time to process such a bold question as the tables flew back toward them. Hurricane spun her crooked spear around and knocked all the tables away from Starlight. Clovis wasn't so lucky, but he did manage to teleport through them.
"What's going on here?" Clovis stopped teleporting.
"No idea, unicorn?" Hurricane snarked back. "I just woke up and found this freak using my brother's body." She pointed to Aitym walking out of the rubble.
"Rainbow Dartz?!" Starlight's eyes widened at the host.
"Damn?!" Hurricane laughed. "Don't tell me you know my pitiful brother, too?!" She rolled her eyes up Starlight's rather sexy form. "He must have gotten so popular after leaving this place behind."
"Your brother..." It took a moment for Starlight to realize due to the chaos. "Wait, you are Commander Hurricane?!?!"
"The one and only, sweet heart--" Hurricane was stopped by Aitym crashing back into her, thrusting his sharded hand into her spear. "Always great to meet a fan." She kicked back the air with her wings and pushed Starlight out of the way. "Stay out of trouble while I deal with this and I'll fuck you later!" She rushed Aitym through the entire parkway, tearing up the ground as they went.
"... did she just?" Starlight was again at an utter loss.
"Don't even attempt to process." Clovis dusted himself off. "Commander Hurricane's flirtation with mares is legendary."
"What? I don't even swing that way?" Starlight laughed.
"Huh, and here I thought you would be more worried for Silver Pear."
Starlight's face went red. "Me and Silver Pear are not a thing at all either!!"
"Not going to matter. I heard she once bedded three mares at once while slaying a dragon that was holding them prisoner."
"I... I... That makes no logical sense." Starlight turned to Hurricane and then to Rainbow Dartz, almost expecting a confirmation, totally forgetting the current mind control he was under. "Right... questions for later." She pointed back to Clovis, who was facing the exit. "We can't waste time warning people anymore. The dead are here and here to stay unless we take out the source. Get everyone near here to safety while keeping your body here to help us from a distance."
"What are you going to do?"
Starlight smiled and filled her body with the levitation spell. She fueled her gentlemare sword with magic and trained her eyes on the battle at hand. "I've got a friend to save."
Aitym dodged the first strike from Commander Hurricane only for Starlight to catch him off guard. Her sword was barely parried by his crystal hand. Hurricane swung the opposite end of her spear, making him jump back and forth. However, he was stopped as Clovis teleported a table directly behind him, forcing him to duck under Starlight's next slash, tearing through the table.
The body stealer was again sent away into a roll as Hurricane stabbed the ground multiple times. Almost trapped as Clovis dropped several chairs on top of him. Using the wings, he cut through the cloud floor and fell through and out of sight.
"Ha, ha, you have good skills," Hurricane laughed at Starlight's efforts. "Are you this good in bed?!"
"Is sex all you think about?!" Starlight screamed in defiance as she scanned around them. "Where is he?"
"No," Hurricane sounded offended. "I just like a good tight ass."
"As a pegasus, you should be more worried about his ability to fly!!" Clovis agreed with Starlight. He teleported a table directly under them as blue blood shards rose to stab them. The two jump from table to table dodging each other.
"Damn it, how is he able to use so much light magic?" Starlight sliced three shards that nearly impaled her.
"Yeah..." Hurricane grumbled. "Dartz was a former practitioner of light magic."
"What?!" Starlight's eyes widened. "You mean to tell me I could have learned to train under him as well as Twilight!!"
"How is that a problem now?!" Hurricane questioned.
Clovis's eyes widened at realizing what Starlight was getting at. "Because she's an omnipony!" He threw down a shadow spell. He was never as good as his father or Rex, but he was good enough to do the simplest spell. "Shadow Spell Number One, Blackened Floor!" His shadow expanded around all three of them.
Starlight smiled and turned the tip of her sword downward. "Can you take it?" She smiled at his wink and filled the gentlemare sword with light magic. She stabbed directly down into the shadows. Passing through the blackness, her tip blasted bright light into the clouds. "Light Reversal!!"
"Light what?!" Hurricane covered her eyes as the light reached through the shadows.
Clovis screamed from the strain as his shadows slowly ripped apart. But, Starlight grinned prouder at the holes as her plan took effect. The clouds reversed through time until they were nothing but water vapor, revealing Aitym's hiding spot.
"Now, thirty degrees to the commander's right!" Starlight shouted.
Hurricane took the order and threw her spear in that direction, impaling Rainbow Dartz's body into one of the permafrost pillars. "What the fucking hell was that?!" she shrieked as she couldn't see where she hit the target. "Never seen Dartz do a spell like that."
"Twilight can only teach dark magic and normal magic, so I've been forced to rely heavily on enemy experience for my light spells." Starlight winced as she retracted the spell. "Luckily, Clovis was buffing us, or else that spell would affect us too."
"Doesn't explain your reliance on the actual spell over number spells." Clovis coughed hard as his shadows retracted. He was barely able to keep his levitation spell intact so he teleported to the near piece of the cliffside.
"What do you mean? I wasn't taught much about numbers."
Clovis raised an eyebrow at her words. "Really?! Yet you are so powerful."
"What's the point of numbers? I noticed that a lot in this timeline compared to the future."
"Invoking the full name of a spell amplifies its power." Clovis was dumbfounded by her reaction to this. "You don't even use the incantations either, in the future?"
"Nope." Starlight shyly smiled.
"The future sounds so childish."
As the light and darkness faded away completely, Hurricane's eyes widened in horror as she saw where she landed Aitym's host. "Fuck no, fuck no, fuck no!!" She rushed over at the sight of the crooked spear torn into her brother's chest.
"Huh," Clovis raised an eyebrow. "And here I thought she was pretty heartless for attacking her brother's body so wildly."
"All bravado..." Starlight sneered at the realization of what she had forced her to do. The unicorn raced down in the same direction. She filled her hand with more light magic, fearing the worse and unsure how to fix it.
******
Within the mindscape, the fleshing arms and faces squirmed around. They struggled violently against Rainbow Dartz as he reached out his hand. Their forces seemed to strain at the stabbing of the crooked spear.
Rainbow Dartz's chest twisted in agony. He looked upward as the images of the outside played out. He reacted reasonably to the sight of his sister stabbing him through the chest, by grabbing his chest tightly, expecting blood to burst forth.
It took him a solid few moments to remember that he wasn't grabbing his true body, but rather the mental manifestation for this realm. Despite the wound not appearing on this body, the agony was as real as the actual wound.
And yet, he smiled at this. Looking back up at the image of his sister, his eyes narrowed at her own reaction. The shock spread in her eyes to the trembling in her mouth. "Go ahead..." He mocked. "You hate me... now kill me!" he screamed at the image, hoping she could hear him.
"You... want this..." the voices around him echoed from each of the faces. All of them questioned in different tones and pitches, "Why?!"
"Because I deserve this." His smile grew bigger. "Whether it's through drinking myself under... or by her hands..." He laughed at the pain. "Actually this is even better. Go ahead..." He reached out to her with a screaming proclamation. "End my pain!"
"Is this what you truly desire?"
"Yes, with this... at least she will avenge Zword." Rainbow Dartz leaned back, presenting his chest in the mindscape as if he was still in control of the body as the crooked spear tore through him in reality.
Aitym's eye twisted around as if giving a wicked grin.
******
Back in reality, Hurricane rushed down and screamed at her brother. "Don't you dare fucking die, you asshole!!" She punched him across the face and grabbed at the crooked spear. Stopping, she remembered that pulling it free would only make him bleed faster. Her face turned just as pale as his by the second. "No... Come back, you jackass!"
"Stop it!!" Starlight pushed her out of the way. "First you tried to kill him, then you panic and slap him."
"I hate that jerk, I never wanted him dead!!" Hurricane shook the body, her eyes tipped with tears.
"Stand back!" Starlight screamed as she pressed the light magic-filled hands onto his chest. "Mini Light Reversal!" The male pegasus shook violently from the hit, but the blue blood kept flowing.
"Do it again, you stupid bitch!!" Hurricane dropped all flirtations and screamed louder.
"I'm trying!" Starlight stopped her yelling out of fear as this pegasus made even lesser sense by the minute. The emotions of this famous commander were a massive mix of wildness and recklessness. The pegasus mare was nothing like the history books, However, she did start to notice similarities to her teacher's descriptions of a similar pegasus mare in their present time. "Rainbow Dash... I'm sorry," she whispered under her breath as she blasted the male pegasus again with more light magic.
His body jolted again before stopping completely. Starlight's eyes widened and she pulled away, making the commander break until the tears couldn't be held back. "No..." Hurricane struggled to speak. "Don't give up."
"Why?!" Aitym's laughter cut them short as shards of blue blood shot out from the chest wound, pushing the crooked spear out and into his hand.
They jumped back as he swung at them. "How? His heart stopped?!" Starlight shielded them.
"I'll admit you are better than any amateur at light magic. But even that is nothing compared to a master like me." With a wave of his hand, all of Rainbow Dartz's wounds were healed as if they never happened. He blasted them all back
"You cold hearted monster!!" Hurricane roared.
"Monster?!" Aitym narrowed the host's eyes. "And after what I did." He spun the weapon toward them. "His soul might have left his body for a moment, but I managed to take it back before Saturn's scythe could claim it."
"Let him go, you fucking monster!!" Hurricane repeated as she charged forward to take her weapon back.
"You're the one who kept trying to stab him," Aitym laughed, meeting her advance with a punch to her gut with the blunt end before letting her have it back. "You pegasi only see monsters, because you are monsters too."
"What are you talking about?" Starlight jumped back.
"It was their species that purged all griffins from the mainland." Aitym pointed the host's hand at the pegasus.
"No, we fought them bravely." Hurricane boasted proudly.
"Brave? Such a strange word for slaughter!" Aitym raised an eyebrow.
"We are not monsters... not like you alicorns!!"
"Yes, it was one of our kind that brought the umbrums to near extinction, but that was after my time." Aitym used the blood around Rainbow Dartz's face to form a new face, showing his original appearance. This revealed an alicorn of incredible beauty, lacking all flaws. "I wasn't always a monster... I had a wife and even beautiful children." The blood fell away as if his power couldn't hold the form of his face, changing back to the face of Rainbow Dartz.
"What happened to you?"
"I wanted too much... I craved too much." He narrowed his eyes on Starlight. "However, not for the reasons you think. I wasn't greedy, or selfish. Everything I took, I stole for another."
"Prove it."
"As a Nykur, my daughter wanted so desperately to be a leader, like you." He pointed to Commander Hurricane. "So I gave her to a king without a single hesitation, all so she could stand as one of the greatest queens in existence... The same happened with my sick wife, I gave her as much land as could be given and life, and yet..." The eyes lowered and Rainbow Dartz's throat dropped as if dread tipped the alicorn's voice. "I gave both my daughter and wife the shiniest kingdoms in the land and it turned them into blackened monsters with sunken flesh!"
"Wait..." Starlight's eyes widened, almost knowing every detail of that legend. "You are related to..."
"It's good to know my daughter still exists in the present. Unfortunate that her mother couldn't see this grace you think of."
"Whatever he means," Commander Hurricane raised her weapon higher. "His examples are nothing. He is an alicorn, using the body of a traitor, therefore he must die." She charged forward one final time. Having heard enough, she pushed her wings out with all her might, ready to kill him where he stood.
Stabbing into his shoulder, she crashed him back into the wall and twisted the sharp edge of her crooked spear toward the heart of her brother. However, as she did Aitym saw his chance and used the pegasus blood to morph the face again, stopping the mare in her tracks.
"Gale..." a small male voice echoed out from Rainbow Dartz's lips. Half of the face had been changed, it wasn't of Aitym or Rainbow Dartz, instead, it was of a young male light blue pegasus with a long golden mane.
"No..." her reply was filled with so much trembling. She couldn't hold her spear after seeing that face. Backing away from it in defiance and horror. "That's not fucking right!" She screamed as she fell away
"What's wrong?" the voice continued. "Is it simply easier to kill a stallion you deny rather than the colt you can't deny?" Aitym forced a smile from both Rainbow Dartz and the new face and boasted with the voice louder. "I never knew why you and your brother hated each other so much. He kept that memory locked tightly away." Aitym pulled out the crooked spear and ripped off the green cloth. He clenched it to the new face as it melted away. "But, you are far more clear. All warriors wear their shame like a banner."
Aitym stained Rainbow Dartz's blood and the image of the colt's face on the green cloth and dropped it into the clouds. "Zword is the shame that both of you bare." He stepped over Commander Hurricane and continued with Zword's voice. He held the crooked spear over her head. "The shame of murdering your little brother." With that ultimate sentence, he dropped the tip downward.
"What kind of monster are you?" Starlight stopped the tip with her magic.
Aitym turned his attention to Starlight and remarked. "Before the alicorns, there was the Nykur and Kelpie." He looked back to Commander Hurricane. "I have the answers I need." Throwing the crooked spear into the countryside, he vanished in a bright light.
******