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// 29 - Head of Magnus 
// Story: The Hollow Pony 
// by Type_Writer 
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The lips of the decapitated head of Commander Flash Magnus moved, and we realized at once that he was still trying to speak, but couldn’t without lungs or a complete throat. The best he could manage in this state was a faint sucking noise that emanated from his lips and stump at the same time.

Everypony recoiled at once in shock and disgust, except for Dinky. The brave filly stepped forward in between me and Maud, her horn already brightly aglow. “Hold on! I might be able to help.”

Magnus’ stump came aglow with the golden light of her magic. There was a loud whistling noise, and then Magnus could speak again, though his voice was tinny and echoed in an oddly ethereal manner. “—cover me back up you fool you—Oh thank the sky I can speak. Cover me back up, and stop distracting me, or there’ll be a panic!”

Instantly, the Princess flared her wings, and everypony froze. “All of you stay put! Pinkie, keep anypony else from getting close, and do not do so yourself!”

“Okay…?” Pinkie said with a great deal of confusion, a short distance away. Maud turned to watch her specifically, and moved to shield Magnus from Pinkie’s sight.

Tinder did as he was ordered and flicked his wing back over Magnus' face, but we could still see the dark blood as it slowly seeped out from underneath. The casual observer would just assume it to be Tinder's own blood, or, at least, that was the hope.

Magnus was actually the first one to find his words. "Princess! I take full responsibility for the failure of the scouting mission, I—” He grunted suddenly, then continued. “—I made the call to follow Applejack into the tunnel, and ordered the guards to follow me."

"It's...quite alright, Commander. You were ambushed, and you all did the best you could in that situation. Tinder here deserves a commendation for...saving you while making a successful escape—"

"They shouldn't have been in the tunnel!" Magnus barked, though his desired volume didn't seem quite possible for the spell to emulate. His voice was even more clearly artificial for a few moments, before it stabilized. "I underestimated Applejack, and the rest of her cabal. I thought she was going to run off and hide by herself, but this seems to be some sort of secondary fort. Dozens of Hollows out there, easily. Loyalists of some sort."

"Perhaps more direct members of the Apple family?" the Princess offered. "Can you tell me anything else about them?"

Magnus was silent for a moment, before he let a sudden grunt. "Engh! Strong, and they've got stronger kicks. I'm counting at least three sets of hooves still wailing on me."

Princess Celestia blinked, as an expression of sheer confusion dominated her face. "I'm...sorry? Do you mean presently?"

"Give me a second, I can't talk and fight at the same- rope! I feel a rope around my- agh, you bastards, my wing!"

I noticed that the severed head was wriggling slightly, the stump of his neck flexing and bending against the ground. It was almost as if he was trying in vain to muster movement, to crawl along like some morbid caterpillar or slug, but it was too irregular and erratic for him to get anywhere. As I watched, though, I imagined what it would be like if he was still attached to his body, if he was ducking and weaving around attacks. Even while decapitated, the fighting instincts must have still been there.

Magnus let out a few pained wheezes and grunts that slowly trailed off, and eventually, he groaned in pain. "Damn it all, they're good with those ropes. I can't move a muscle."

"Are you...quite alright?" the Princess asked, with confused concern. "Beyond, ah, the obvious."

Magnus took a few moments to respond, as he let out ragged breath after ragged breath. Eventually, he groaned, "I'm not dead. I can thank the winds for that, at least. They seem to be carrying me somewhere—I can feel my body being hauled on another's back."

"Broken wing, left," he continued, as he started to list off his injuries. "Didn't like me slapping them around with it, I'd wager. Tied against my back, but it's going to set wrong without a splint. Broken rib, right. One hay of a kick there. Too many bruises to count, come morning. Sprained left forehoof, somepony grabbed it when I came out of the tunnel and gave it a nasty twist."

He grunted again. "And they've just tossed me onto a hay floor. Probably a barn. Lemme see if I can stand-" All of a sudden, he let out a sharp whinny, that devolved into a sad, pained whimpering. "B-bastards...kicked me in the thunderheads...guess they want me to stay put."

Several ponies—stallions, mostly—winced in sympathy, while Magnus wheezed gently under Tinder's wing. While he gathered his wits, Dinky's horn lit again, and we could see the golden glow of magic shining from underneath. "Don't mind me. I might be able to help with the pain, but I need to get a better idea of how...whatever this is...works."

"Good." Princess Celestia nodded at Dinky in approval, before she lowered her head to look at the injury for herself. "Magnus, can you describe the neck injury specifically? It's the most...pertinent detail, at present."

"...I'm actually trying not to think about it." Magnus grunted. "I feel as though if I focus on it too much, it's going to cause problems."

"I...see," The Princess murmured in confusion. "What about the moment of separation? Did Applejack do anything, or use any sort of unique-looking weapon to make this cut?"

"No, just a normal-looking wood axe. I never felt any separation, though I felt the cut. I actually thought she'd just buried the axe in my throat, or only gotten half my neck, until Tinder started to fly away, and took me with him. Was still fighting—blind—that entire time."

"Wonder if that might have distracted them," one of the ponies around us murmured.

The Princess turned to Dinky. "Tell me when you have something."

"Nothing yet…" Dinky murmured, more to herself than the ponies around her. "He's not enchanted in a way that I can tell, at least not with Unicorn magic. If it's some sort of bewitchment or hex, cast using Pyromancy, then it's outside of my skill set."

For a moment, the Princess sighed, and there was a flicker of disappointment across her muzzle. She spoke as a teacher, chiding her student for not having done their homework. "You still haven't even tried to learn Pyromancy?"

Dinky blinked in confusion, and her magic flickered out. She looked suddenly embarrassed, as she looked up at Princess Celestia. "I, um...no…"

"Twilight mentioned, at length, your distaste for Pyromancy. I had hoped that had changed, in the time since she left. You knew Zecora, and a dozen other skilled practitioners in Ponyville. And yet you haven't—"

"I was busy, alright?!" Dinky interrupted, as her voice cracked. In the long silence that followed, she seemed to realize she'd interrupted Princess Celestia, and she slowly shrunk down as she at everypony around her. "I-I thought magic was magic. And on some level it is. I thought—I think, that everything that can be done with pyromancy, sorcery can do too. I just had to keep learning, and I'd work it out from the other end, you know?"

Princess Celestia slowly, sadly, shook her head. "So much would be far more simple if that were true. Do you know, Twilight thought exactly the same way? Even after she came here to Ponyville. She was adamant about it, until Trixie came back for revenge, and my faithful student had to learn Pyromancy to match what Trixie was doing."

The Princess closed her eyes, as she remembered. "Do you know who taught her that Pyromancy? I'm sure she told you."

Dinky looked unsure at first, then nodded. "Z-Zecora."

"That's right." The ghost of a smile crossed Celestia's face, but she didn't open her eyes. "You could have apprenticed under her at any time here in Ponyville, you know. She would have been happy to take a student again."

"She did," Dinky mumbled. "And sh-she was, when I t-talked her into it. To repay Holly."

Princess Celestia opened her eyes, and looked at me for a long moment. Then she made a humming sort of noise, as though considering something. After a moment, she shook her head, and held her head up high above the other ponies to look over them. "Pinkie Pie? You'll need to see this soon enough anyway. Brace yourself, but come over here."

Pinkie nodded, though she looked confused, and approached cautiously. Maud looked as though she was going to keep Pinkie from seeing Magnus' head anyway, but the Princess glanced at her, and the stone-armored mare stepped aside.

Pinkie winced when she saw the blood, and her eyes went wide as she recognized Magnus. But  when the beheaded stallion spoke, that seemed to calm her worries. "Pinkie, don't be alarmed."

"Magnus? You're...not dead?"

He rolled his jaw. If his body was still attached, he might have been rubbing it, as if considering how to describe something. "Not as far as I can tell. I can still feel my body."

Pinkie still looked unsure. "So you're...okay? Not dying or in danger or anything?"

"I wouldn't recommend any other pony try to copy this, but yes? Are you going anywhere—"

As Magnus confirmed he wasn't dead or dying, a relieved grin split Pinkie's face. "Okay! Then that's actually pretty cool!"

"—with…with…what?"

Pinkie pronked forward and reached under Tinder's wing to pull Magnus' head out from where it had been covered, and started to turn him around to look at his stump, then back at his face. "Oh that's super gross, I'm gonna find you a scarf or something to cover that. But yeah, this is really cool! You're way more portable like this, and really light, and I could totally carry you all around town and hold you up at eye level when you need to talk to ponies! Oooooh, and the pranking potential!"

"Pranking—Pinkie, this isn't funny—!" the decapitated head protested.

"It's a little funny," Princess Celestia said, with a subdued smile. As Magnus spluttered indignantly, the Princess looked to Pinkie. "I know you're not a Pyromancer yourself, Pinkie, but I know that you'll know somepony who might be able to know something about what's happened to Magnus. If they were part of the Militia and can take over now that Applejack has left, all the better."

"Aye aye Princess!" Pinkie pulled off a snappy salute with one forehoof, while she held Magnus with the other. "I know a couple ponies that fit the bill already. Want me to go get them?"

"Magnus should stay here with us, but yes."

Pinkie was already trying to balance the helmeted head on her back, but she pouted and passed him to Dinky, who took hold of him with her magic. "Awww, but okay! Back in a bit, Princess!"

Pinkie disappeared from the town square in a Pinkie-shaped cloud of dust, and Princess Celestia looked around, to take stock of the ponies around her. Her eyes quickly fell to her injured guard, who was still lying on the ground before us. "Knight Tinder, you are relieved of your duties. Stay here and rest. You, wearing the blue barding. Please find a pony with a medical talent to get his wounds tended to properly."

The guard on the ground shuddered, as a militia mare in our group ran off on her orders. "I'm sorry, Pr-Princess—"

"None of that," she declared. "You will get a commendation for saving Commander Magnus. I'll send orders to Raven, to send a squad of guards to escort me and the phaeton back, and to scout Sweet Apple Acres from a safe distance. You'll stay here in Ponyville until your wing heals, and then both you and your brother will fly back to Canterlot, together."

The guard smiled, and relaxed a bit on the ground. "Th-thank you, your highness."

Princess Celestia had already begun to assemble several papers taken from the abandoned podium, and several further pens were discarded as they were found to be dry. When she found one that worked, she wrote the letter in moments, and then it disappeared in a flash of green, while the Princess had already moved to another piece of paper. "Need a list of priorities, to be reorganized as needed. Rescue Magnus and Flint. Scouting required first to prevent further losses and ambushes. Send negotiators to parley for peaceful release of hostages. Pull several squads off of the front line to reinforce Ponyville from potential counter-attacks. Retrieve Element of Generosity…"

The Princess looked back at our group, then nodded. "Anypony who has ever been to Baltimare before, raise your hoof."

Three ponies raised their hooves, including Maud.

"Of you three, who knows a path there by hoof?"

The other two ponies lowered their hooves, which left only Maud. Princess Celestia focused on her. "Knight Maud Pie, excellent. You have command of this group, and will lead them to Baltimare. The rest of you, follow and trust this pony. She's a veteran of the Dragon War, where she earned the title 'Stonebreaker.' She'll lead you well, and any wishing to join the Golden Guard should seek to emulate her conduct. Head to the northeast gate, there should be an army caravan there, and they can supply you with standard gear as needed."

The ponies present nodded, and turned towards Maud, who started to lead them in that direction. Instantly, I was presented with a dilemma. I had followed Dinky here, but fallen in with the group of ponies being sent after Trixie, and hadn’t really objected. But did I actually want to go with them, or should I stay here with Dinky?

I didn’t terribly want to see Trixie again if I could help it, especially not so soon after her betrayal. But a small, innocent and hopeful part of me was still worried about her. If the element had driven her mad, maybe she was still a decent pony again once they were separated? And even if not, then the other ponies in the squad could probably use an explanation of how she thought and acted, if that might help the track her down.

But Dinky was free, which had been the thing that had been pushing me forward until now. Before our imprisonment...I was learning under Zecora. But Zecora was gone. I could stay here with Dinky, but I’d mostly just be keeping her company. I could claim to be keeping her safe, but with Applejack gone, Ponyville seemed to be the safest it had been in a very long time. There was the occasional demon incursion over the wall, but those would be better fought if I helped out the army. But I had no intention of returning to the free-fire line, if I could at all help it. What was I to do here, in Ponyville?

Princess Celestia saw my hesitation. Her eyes turned to me as I took a half-step to follow the other knights, then froze. After a moment, she coughed, and I looked at her. It got Dinky’s attention too, and she looked between me and the Princess, as the latter spoke to me.

“Holly. Your name keeps coming up.” She tilted her head, and looked at me with a sort of intrigued curiosity in her eyes. “Friend of Dinky Doo, apprentice to Zecora. Guard for the caravan, and one of very few ponies who made it back in one piece. And then you went and found one of the missing Elements of Harmony. Like a moth to flame, it seems like you’re attracted to important goings-on. Very interesting.”

I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. It certainly didn’t feel like it, from my perspective. Things just happened, and I happened to be there. They didn’t even feel all that important until afterwards, when I was able to dredge context from other ponies.

“You should go with them,” Princess Celestia suggested. “They could certainly use another set of hooves. And I think, with you there as a part of that squad, important events will find you.”

I turned to Dinky, who looked as though she wanted to argue. But she glanced at the princess, then Magnus’ head, still held aloft in her magical field. Then she swallowed nervously. “I’ll be f-fine here, Holly. Trust the Pr-Princess.”

Trust the Princess. Trust the sun.

Okay. I could do that.

I nodded, hesitantly. Then I remembered something in my bottomless bag. I reached over to open it. “Um...I’ve g-got something I was s-supposed to keep safe, too. Zecora m-made it.”

The Princess nodded, and her eyes widened slightly as I pulled the flask of sunlight from my bag, and brushed some pale dust from the glass. “Ah, Meadowbrook said two had been made. Hers was one, and this is the other, I presume?”

I nodded, and held it towards her. But she surprised me when she held up a hoof. “Thank you, but one is perfectly sufficient for her research. I assume you’ve discovered the liquid’s…beneficial properties?”

“D-do you mean...the w-way it heals ponies?”

“Not ponies. Undead, specifically.” Princess Celestia smiled knowingly at me. “I think you should keep that for yourself, Holly. I suspect you’ll get quite a lot of use out of it on your journey, though I dearly wish it’s not needed.”

I looked at the glowing flask once more, full to the brim with liquid sunlight. It seemed especially heavy here, before the Princess, as if it could tell how close it was to the living goddess. As if it could feel the sheer intensity of the loving inferno within her body, like I could. After a few moments, I nodded, and slid it back into my bag. “Th-thank you, Princess.”

“Don’t thank me, my little pony. Thank Zecora.” Princess Celestia smiled at me again, with tired eyes, and then looked towards the street by which the other knights had left. “Now, good luck, Holly. As I said, the northeast gate.”

I nodded one last time, before I turned and started to trot after Maud and the others. As I left, I heard the Princess speaking to Dinky. Her voice faded into the distance as I left. “Now, as for you, Archmagus, I’ll send another letter to Raven with a list of books regarding Pyromancy…”


*	*	*


I had only been delayed by a few minutes at most, while the Princess had helped me sort out where I was going. In that time, the others had reached the gate first, and exited out to the foggy road outside the wall, where a military wagon waited for the town to open back up. There, they seemed to have caused no end of trouble. The scattering of ponies, both former militia and not, had set upon the guarded caravan like hungry piranha. The soldiers guarding the arms and armor looked as though they wanted to object, but Maud stood tall between them, and it seemed that the authority of the Golden Guard, and the word of the Princess, was enough to allow them access.

And access it was. While Magnus had been conservative when equipping the caravan, Maud had no such compunctions. I doubted the military wagon was keeping the top-of-the-line gear, like rifles and full gilded steel plate armor, but several ponies had already shed their normal barding for steel barding and those strange flat military helmets. The only unicorn in the group—a stallion with grey fur—looked down the sights of a slim revolving pistol, while a yellow pegasus mare flicked her wings in practice swipes with her new wingblades. Another pegasus mare, with green fur, had already mounted a spear to an armored saddle, and a bulky earth pony stallion—who still wore his yellow construction helmet—swung around a sledgehammer to test the weight and heft of the tool-turned-weapon.

My cheap, ragged quilted barding suddenly felt like rags by comparison. I might have liked the armor, and found it quite serviceable for the time I’d worn it, but given the choice between it and the steel barding, which seemed to be in ample supply? Well, that was hardly a choice at all.

The new armor was much less warm than the padded coat had been, and it was significantly heavier. I could feel myself being weighed down as I pulled it up my legs and cinched the belts tight around my barrel, and I wondered if I might actually weigh less than it did? After all, pegasi had hollow bones, while these plates were solid steel, connected and wrapped with leather.

When I’d pulled the armor on entirely, I looked back at myself to inspect it. Most of the barding was still really just leather armor, with thin strips that protected my joints, while the larger bones and stiff parts of my body, like my legs, back and barrel, were protected by solid steel. I flicked my tail, and felt the clack of a hinged plate that even protected my dock. My breast had another separate plate that covered it, with the sigil of the Equestrian army stamped into the metal, while the high collar of the armor protected the back of my neck. My throat was slightly exposed, but as I pulled one of the flat bowl-shaped military helmets on, I found the strap that wrapped around my chin was protected by a small metal plate of its own. That would protect both my throat and the buckle itself, preventing it from being sliced off and letting the helmet loose.

This was undeniably an upgrade, and I hoped I was able to keep this armor after we returned to Ponyville. After all, if we were to be knighted upon our successful return, then it didn’t exactly make sense for us to strip off our gear? Though as I turned back to the nervous-looking army ponies, I noticed that their own equipment was actually less protective than ours.

I’d seen their armor before, when we’d passed through the firebreak and back. It seemed to be a midpoint between what I wore before and what I wore now, with separate steel plates that protected the body looped through straps of a quilted jacket. It was less protective, but looked as though it would be faster to put on and take off, as well as being much easier to repair or replace. So, their armor was made to be easily mass-produced for cheap, while our own equipment was more expensive, but more protective because of that cost.

As I was inspecting my armor, the militia pony who had run off to get somepony to help Tinder arrived. She apologized for being late, Tinder was going to have his wounds treated, and that Pinkie was going to see all of us off before we left. Another pony said that now was as good a time to introduce ourselves as any other, considering we were all present, and several of the others nodded in agreement. Maud shrugged, then nodded, and pointed at the pony who’d suggested it. “Start.”

The barely-Hollowed burly stallion blinked in confusion for only a moment, before he introduced himself. “Uh, right. I’m Rivet, used to work construction here in Ponyville, or work on contracts in nearby towns.”

“Doesn’t your brother work delivery? Same colors as you, but a pegasus?” The Hollowed yellow pegasus mare asked.

“Yeah, you know him? Nail, does heavy lifting.”

“We’ve crossed airspaces a few times,” the pegasus mare said, with a roll of her eyes. “Anyway, I’m Raindrops. Used to work in the weather team, then worked for the militia. Glad to wash my hooves of Applejack and that whole mess.”

There was a wave of nods and affirmations, and a Hollowed gray unicorn stallion spoke up next. “Star Bright, astronomer and militia as well.”

A cream-colored earth pony mare—who had escaped Hollowing, thus far—spoke up. “Isn’t it kind of hard to see the stars now, with the sun the way it is? What use is an astronomer now?”

“Well, that’s...why I’m in the militia, I suppose, since it’s something to do while we wait for the sun to start rising and setting again…” Star Bright mumbled, as he absent-mindedly fidgeted with the revolving pistol in his magic.

“Cut him some slack, Roma.” Raindrops grunted. “Didn’t you sell tomatoes, before? That’s not much better.”

“Selling things is plenty applicable, I’m not just limited to—” Roma was cut off by a gunshot, and everypony yelped in surprise; especially Star Bright, who had been holding the firearm in his magic when it went off.

One of the army ponies used their own magic to grab the revolving pistol, and they forcefully removed it from Star Bright’s field. He sheepishly rubbed his armored foreleg as he shrunk down a bit, and looked around the group. “Eh-heh, uh, sorry...Was playing around with the hammer, and I guess it had enough spring to...it’s not important.”

Maud herself gave him a subdued glare—subtle as all of her expressions were, and yet the intensity of it was inexplicably staggering. “Don’t ‘play around’ with firearms. Point it and shoot it. Leave it holstered otherwise.”

Star Bright nodded. “Um. Y-yes ma’am.”

Maud stared him down for a few moments afterwards, just to make him sweat. Then she turned away, and only glanced at the army ponies. “Give him back the gun, for now. As you were.”

One of the other remaining ponies who had yet to introduce themselves was a Hollowed pegasus mare, with green fur, who looked as though she was still shaking from the noise of the gunshot. A pink and red earth pony mare, who was only about half as Hollowed, was trying to calm her down. “It’s okay, just breathe.” She noticed everypony looking at the two of them, and she smiled comfortingly. “Uh, I’m Posey Petals, and this is Merry May. She’ll be alright.”

Everypony’s eyes finally turned to me, and I flinched back. I was easily the most Hollowed pony in the group, and I could see a wide range of emotions as they looked at me. The former militia ponies looked at me with fear or at least discomfort; I think I recognized Raindrops, and I suspected we’d crossed paths before, when she was working as one of Applejack’s goons. The other ponies seemed more sympathetic, and only Merry May looked nervous when she focused on me.

“I...I’m…” I swallowed another lump in my throat, and looked down at my hooves. “I’m H-Holly. Pinkie named me, b-because, um…”

There were a few nods from the group. Raindrops was the only one to step forward with a question. “Are you gonna hold it together for the journey?”

“Raindrops!” Merry May hissed, offended on my behalf. “You can’t just ask a Hollow that!”

“It’s a fair question, though she could’ve been a bit more gentle about it,” rumbled Rivet. He turned to me, and smiled. “Are you keeping it together? All we need to know.”

I nodded, hesitantly. “I’ve-I’ve actually been g-getting better. Learning P-Pyromancy helped.”

“Then we’re good.” Rivet said with a nod, before he turned back to Raindrops. “Right, ‘Drops?”

The mare nodded, though I noticed she didn’t seem like the smiling sort, like she was perpetually grumpy. I couldn’t really blame her, all things considered. “Yeah, that’s all. We’re ready to go, Maud.”

“Good,” the stone knight stated, before she unrolled a map, and started to point with her hoof while she explained our route, in her usual monotone voice. “The shortest path to Baltimare follows the rail line. A coal mine was extended into a train tunnel that passes through the range, which is about six miles long. If we find it’s collapsed, then we’ll have to go the long way around.”

Raindrops shivered, as she looked at the map. “A pitch-black six mile tunnel, or mountain climbing in the fog. Not sure which I prefer less.”

“I know that tunnel; I’ve ridden cargo trains through it before,” Rivet said, as he rubbed his chin. “It seemed plenty sturdy, from what I could tell, and the mine tunnels are all signposted. So long as we follow the tracks, it should be a nice, straight shot through.”

“Let’s hope,” muttered Roma, as Maud rolled up the map once more. “We’re just waiting on Pinkie to see us off, then?”

“That’s what she said,” confirmed Merry May, as she and Posey nervously looked out at the foggy road.

Rivet wasn’t terribly worried about it himself, and after I’d spent so long trekking through that same fog, neither was I. He turned to the army ponies, who had closed up their wagon after we’d finished raiding all of their equipment. “So, anypony here got a good story to kill time with, while we wait?”