//------------------------------// // Finale IX: Vengeance // Story: Sometimes They Call Me Super // by KorenCZ11 //------------------------------// Blood Orange It was… worrying. Less than a minute left. No signs of life anywhere. Usually, on days like this, you could feel it in the air. Somepony was ready to walk out. To set the stage, to make the arrangements, to start the performance. But today? Something was… different. While I’d never been on this side of things, I’d seen repeats of history through the shared memories of the ponies beside me. I knew what it was supposed to feel like. It is because I’m here? Is this old reproduction I’m wearing inspiring some kind of confidence in me? Or is it the finality of it all? Even the air knows this is the end. The last battle. The suspense should almost be tangible, but somehow, I was relaxed. Overcome with a sense of calm I hadn’t felt in… over a decade and a half at this point. Why is that? “Ten seconds,” Twilight sent. I suppose they refer to her as ‘Centurio’ in costume. Not surprising based on her looks. Applejack told me there was a long winded explanation for it, but the short of it came down to emulating her mother. Of course, now that the world knows the truth, the costume didn’t quite match up to the reality. Nine. Brightness and I suspected that this one would probably begin differently than the others. Silicon is all that’s left. The moment he puts that mirror on, Stannum is likely to go with him. Nopony to operate a camera, nopony left in his corner. He’d come alone, perhaps he’d have a drone set up to send a final broadcast out, but Argent tower would be left undefended. The royal guard would storm it and take over all electronic communication as soon as Brightness disables the emitter system, and we’ll be home free. Eight. And then comes… the aftermath. The most powerful country in the world was taken hostage by a single boy with a near unlimited wealth at his disposal. Not only this, but he is still not the wealthiest pony in Equestria, let alone the world. A pony with the power to disrupt a nation, completely unchecked, out of the reach of the government and the ponies that command it. How many others could try something like this? Seven “So… I’m thinkin’ pizza when we get done with all this,” Blur said. Six “When we… You’re thinking about food? Now? Are you serious?” Centurio accused. Five “Yeah, really,” the Crow added, “You need to think bigger than pizza! This is the last one! We need a real celebration! Somethin’ fancy, like something we could never afford, even on this weird hero salary that we’ve got.” Four Diamond tapped her lips. “You know, it has been some time since I’ve had lobster and a good wine. I haven’t left Equestria in almost three months. This is the longest I’ve gone without an overseas assignment to do something or other, a truly high-class meal would suit the occasion.” Three “S-so long as it d-dosen’t come from Champagne, I’m game. Th-that was the first time I’d ever w-went out with Goose, and I… I… I’m j-just not ready for that yet,” Target continued. Two “Well, don’t let him ruin a restaurant fer ya. That’s the last thing he’d want. Pizza, lobster and wine, any kinda meal, any kinda celebration. Just so long as… we’re all here ta have it together, Ah don’t care what we do after this,” Applejack… Marevelous finished. One The clock struck noon and the bell tolled across Manehattan. Silence filtered over the air waves, and finally, that tangible anticipation was upon us. Every muscle tensed, every power within reach and ready to explode the moment I thought about it, everypony on the team ready to move at the slightest sound. And so we waited. And we kept waiting. Before we knew it, five minutes had passed. Diamond coughed. “Rather rude of him to be late to an appointment that he scheduled; don’t you think?” Marevelous scratched at her mane. “Yeah, this is… all kinds of wrong. Brightness, is he even in the area yet?” “If he is, I can’t see ‘em. Silicon ain’t the kinda guy to be impunctual, so somethin’ must’ve happened. Princess, do a sweep and see if you can find any movement at all. I ain’t so good with inanimate objects. Maybe we just lucked out and he ran his clock?” We didn’t really have much of an idea as to where Silicon would be coming from, so today we were waiting just outside the burned area of Manehattan in an effort to make less of a mess this time. We should be able to see anything around us between all the scanning powers we have at our disposal, so… unless something’s changed… Then, I caught movement to my right. Something had ducked into an alley at the edge of the burned area. “Did anypony see that?” I asked as I stepped closer. “See what?” I pointed, “Something moved, right over there. Do you—” I turned my head to look at the pony next to me. Unfamiliar eyes met mine. I froze in place. How did he get here? He shouldn’t be here. There are three of us! A beast! A hemokenetic! A heroine with excellent reflexes! How? How? How!? Smiling underneath the mask, he raised a hoof in peace. “Now, now, no need to be up in arms… just yet. I know I’m late to my own appointment, yes, but surely you didn’t expect me to come all the way out here personally without a dialogue before we begin, did you?” He cannot be here right now. I’m looking at his face and I don’t sense anything from him. This doesn’t make any sense. How did he get up here? I thought he couldn’t walk on his own. But… but… did nopony hear him? How did he sneak up on us? In the middle of our group? Is this… even real? Ever so slowly, I went to touch him, just to make sure this wasn’t some kind of trick, but he met my hoof with his before I reached his chest. It was… strangely cold. “Ah! A friendly hoof shake before the fight. How sportsmanlike! Fitting, for a Red Hoof recolor, I suppose.” The grip was strong. Almost like hoof wrestling with Applejack. This was Silicon, but… there was no possible way this was Silicon. The body was too healthy. The muscle structure was something closer to a stallion in perfect condition. And… bigger than I remember? Taking in everything I could with my eyes, he hardly looked like he was here for a fight. Casual clothes, black jeans, a black jacket by some high-end brand, a baseball cap, and finally, Persona’s mask. No supports, no misshapen legs, no… breath. He’s not breathing. What’s happening? Nopony had moved. We were all just stunned into silence. Not a thought crossed the line. What were we supposed to do at this point? I swallowed. “Who are you?” A hoof on his chest, he was taken aback. “Who am I? Surely, you must all know by now, don’t you? You’re clearly involved with her, hasn’t she told you?” He turned to Diamond and pointed. “You recognize me, don’t you Ms. Belle? We met at the tower a few months ago.” Her mouth made shapes, but words wouldn’t come. “Ah, cat got your tongue? I suppose I do look a little different now. I doubt even my own staff would recognize me without the wheels. Losing a weight like that isn’t something just anypony can do, after all.” Finally free of the spell, Applejack stepped forward. “Alright, Mister Persona, we get it. Ya snuck up on us. Ah don’t know how that could’ve possibly happened, but you’ve made yer point. What do ya want?” Behind the porcelain mask, you could see a smile form at the corners of his eyes. “Always the first to step up, aren’t you, Marevelous Red?” He tilted his head and stroked his chin. “Or, do you prefer Mrs. Carcharodon? Ms. Apple? Word around the one percent says Carcha’s owner changed recently, and now some country commoner has command of hundreds of millions of bits. They’re a very tight knit community; I recommend you avoid them if you can now that you’ve, ‘joined the club,’ so to speak.”  Obviously provoking her into attacking, Applejack took the bait and went straight for it. Filled with magical rage, Applejack launched her hoof at Persona’s mask, only for it to be stopped by his hoof, but… not in a way I could’ve possibly imagined. The skin, the muscle, the flesh of Silicon’s leg, along with the sleeve of his jacket, were all blown away. The bone, however, remained. Not only did it remain, but it held firm and even pushed back against her. It was connected by nothing, held together by nothing, but all the same it was of equal or greater force than Applejack’s punch. Horrified, Applejack backed off. Persona clicked his tongue. “Oh, how indecent. My apologies. I’m still having trouble keeping it all together.” Blood and viscera flew from around us and reformed on top of the bones that made up Persona’s leg. He twisted it left, then right, flexed it once to make the muscle act as if it were really his. “That’s better. While I expected my clothes to be destroyed here today, I do wish we could’ve kept that jacket in better condition. It was my favorite.” The Crow stepped forward. “You son of a bitch! You already did it, didn’t you!?” Persona took a bow. “Well, yes, I did. How astute of you.” He pulled the neck of his jacket down to show us. Oblong, not much bigger than a cellphone, so bright that it almost looked to glow, a picture of everything and more inside it. However, unlike the one I was wearing, this one was bound to collar bones. The skin and muscle that would normally be above the neck bones had been stripped away like somepony had taken a knife and carefully peeled it all off, fiber by fiber, layer by layer. “Interesting, isn’t it? By all accounts, I’m not even a living pony anymore.” I blinked. “How is that possible?” Persona turned to me again, the smile in his eyes easy to see. “I’m glad you asked!” He sauntered over as if we were close friends and put a hoof around my neck. “You see, the way my powers used to work is that I could trap a soul in a fresh corpse, forcing it to magically bind to said corpse, not unlike an A.I. inside a robot. I had limited control over the soul itself and were a corpse to be repaired to the point where the soul could run it without my intervention, it would simply rebind naturally. “In other words, I could revive the recently dead, provided the body could be repaired to a suitable state. Doing so, however, would slowly eat away and twist the magic vessels in my body which eventually started to disfigure my bones. The longer I held onto a soul, the quicker the disfiguration would occur. It was a very slow, painful process, and when my father initially died from a stroke three years ago, I’d obtained a clear, quick expiration date.” Persona removed his hoof and trotted to the center of the group. “Today, my father asked me to let him die. Back in the place he would’ve lost his life. It was the first time in years that I’d seen him act like himself. The staunch, resolute stallion I remembered from my childhood. I couldn’t refuse him, he knew that.” The melancholy in Silicon’s voice was so heavy that I… I felt for him. A boy desperate to keep hold of his precious father, I… know all too well what that feels like. So many of us here do. “I let go. His final words were, ‘thank you,’ and he died with a smile on his face.” His head twisted quickly and unnaturally toward me. A sharp crack accompanied it. I swallowed. “Do you know why he was smiling?” “If… if he was anything like my parents,” Blur began, “It’s probably because you finally did the right thing.” Twisting even further in the wrong direction, the skin and muscle around Persona’s neck ripped and his burning orange eyes stared into her. “Incorrect!” His head righted itself, the flesh reattaching as if it were nothing, and he came inches within Blur’s snout. “He tricked me! Driving his car, knowing full well that he was the only pony I’d ever put my unconditional trust in, he stranded me on purpose! I could never have made it back to the tower on my own! He did this as some last-ditch effort to stop me from being here today!” This time, his head twisted to an exact ninety-degree angle, part of his neck ripping apart as it did. “It was, as you may have figured out, futile in the end, however.” The unhinged pony reset to normal and walked toward the edge of the rooftop we were on toward central park. “Whatever fate has been aligning the stars for me has seen fit to do it again. I’ve always kept one in my pocket. The first one. One I made with my own two hooves after years of trial and error, countless hours of research, atop a pile of corpses, I did this!” Slowly, he locked eyes with each of us, one by one. “Two ponies unleashed a curse upon this world. A curse we are all victim to. Everything wrong with your lives, everything wrong with my life is their fault! And once I’m done with you… they are next.” Rising to his hind legs, Persona held out both forehooves aimed at the sky. “It’s ten past noon. I wanted to do this as far from the moon as possible, but my plans were delayed just a bit longer than I wanted. “Heroes, this is your final battle. When you die, I may decide to keep you. I believe it would be most ironic to set you loose after your masters, don’t you think? I am Persona! My mask has been dropped and now I show you my true face! Heroes, traitors, pretenders, Go beyond!” Eyes filled with enough malice to engulf Manehattan smiled wickedly behind the mask. “Or die trying.” Silicon fell backward off the apartment complex, and very quickly, a familiar orange light started to envelop everything around him. “Everypony scatter!” Marevelous called. Just as we jumped away, a vortex of dust and debris swirled with the light. Faster, faster, faster it spun until the building itself was sucked inside. Lightning struck the center, blinding us before we even had the chance to look away. The howling came to a stop, the dust began to settle upon us, and slowly, my vision returned. He hadn’t explained how it worked now, but I had a feeling I could guess. A dead pony, a necromancer, nothing more than a skeleton and magic, had the ability to recompose flesh and manipulate the dead. Silicon, Persona, the monster of sinewy muscle and bones he had become, was something now that not even a mirror could grasp. As if he had absorbed the building’s mass into himself, there was little doubt he was less than fifteen stories tall. A massive, bulky, pony shaped bundle of flesh and bone with an eyeless skull. Despite the lack of vision he should have in this state, he turned those hollow bores directly at me. “Now then! As the chief subject my first pet put down, I believe I’ll start with you!” The monster rumbled; his tone so low it was barely intelligible. With speed unequal to his size, Persona’s massive hoof rose to cast a shadow nine times the size of my body over me, only to slam it down the next instant. Only two powers in my radius now, only one power I was capable of using. Both powers exploded into existence in the form of bright auras around our bodies. Red light spilled from out of my hooves and the muscles I shouldn’t have, bundled up and ready to spring. Shadow darkening rapidly over my head, the light from within gathered and solidifying around my balled hoof. I wasn’t used to it just yet, so it took me longer to charge this power than I wanted. Luckily, my job wasn’t to be the opening act. From my left, An orange ball of heat and light slammed directly into Persona’s foreleg, easily stripping away the muscle and boring right to the bone. Trajectory changed, Persona’s massive body shook and twisted, throwing him off balance. The earth heaved, a deep grunt echoed through the air, and finally, I’d gathered all the power I could. “GO!” Marevelous shouted. On command, I let all the energy out. Breaking the concrete below, I launched directly up and after Persona’s jaw. Twisting my upper body with everything I had, I slammed my hoof into ‘the button’ just in front of his neck. The bone shattered and splintered, teeth slammed together and cracked, muscle flew like tissue paper into the air. Persona’s massive body staggered harder and tripped, but the attack wasn’t over just yet. Feeling the rush of blood wash over me, my eyes turned left to see three crimson wings charging after the falling giant. The bright red in the blue sky started to spin horizontally like a massive saw blade. “I’ve been waiting to do this to you for half a year now, you bastard!” Slicing into the neck like a hot knife in butter, the red blade cut cleanly through the monster's cold muscle until the head started to fall at a different speed. The body crashed, the dust and debris flew into the air like the waves of a rock crashing into a pond. Even still, we weren’t done yet. “TOKI WO TOMARE” “ZA WARUDO!” The world froze. The waves halted, the sun lost its color and so did everything else. A three-legged pegasus broke the horizon. Dark bodysuit clinging tight to her figure, blemishing the gray sky, red cracked between her teeth. Falling, wings disappearing, body growing, from pony to predator, color returned. The wave of dust threatened to engulf me, so I jumped to watch what happened next. The one-armed monster slammed her claws into the giant’s decapitated head. Bone cracked, skull shattered, and all at once it fell to pieces. “Bad call. He’s not here,” The beast called out. Naturally, as if he were in our mental network, Persona appeared from out of the chest of the massive skinless pony he’d inhabited. “Of course not! Of all the famous movies in the world, don’t you think, ‘Should’ve aimed for the head,’ is a common sentiment among superhero fanatics? You’re not dealing with a lower intelligence monster like Sachiel, or even a deranged child with a few too many mental health issues like Sahaquiel; you’re dealing with one of the most successful business ponies in Equestria! If I’m not genre savvy, I’m not doing my job!” As if nothing we’d just done mattered, the scattered pieces of Silicon’s giant turned to dust, swirled up into the air like a dark fog clouding the sky, then reformed back where it came from. With incredible speed, the humongous creature Silicon had become stood like he was getting up out of bed for the morning. This time, massive eyes flooded the skull’s sockets. They turned and spun, each one as if it were independent of the body until finally, Silicon’s orange rings focused on me. The huge corpse’s mouth opened far too wide, as if to try and smile. “That said, I do appreciate your absolute lethality. It’s almost as if you have a grudge against me or something!” Muscles bulged, and all at once, the ground shook. The monster leapt into the air, both fore hooves raised high above his head, casting a shadow over all the blocks that contained Harmony. “Hit the deck!!” Marevelous called, but it wasn’t as if she needed to say that. We scattered as fast as we could. Borrowing Blur’s powers, I ran to grab Centurio, then to the other side of the ‘burned area’ and up the tallest building at its edge. Blur had followed me, along with grabbing Diamond and taking her out as well. That’s four. Persona had reached the top of his arc, wild eyes with a malicious smile, he pulled his hooves back behind his head and tilted forward as he started to dive. Marevelous shot out from under the shadow like a bullet, deep into the burned area, but not quite out of it. At the very least, she was beyond the shadow. Five. Crimson wings soared above and away. It took a lot of buildup and taking him unawares for her to slice clean through Persona, so I doubt she’ll get a chance to do that again. The Crow out, that makes six.             Finally, with her janky three-legged sprint, the beast had exited the shadow, but Persona was coming down fast. Is… is she going to make it? Should we call time? Are we even safe this far away? What… what should we—             “Save your time, I’ll be fine!”             No more than a single Beast-length gallop away did Persona come crashing down. A tremor unlike any other sank deep into the ground like a rock being tossed into a pond. Shattering and upheaving the manicured earth, the wave blasted outward like a bomb.             “Target!”             As if she were a piece of rubble herself, the beast went flying into the air with the explosion, streams of red trickling behind her in a trail. Like a haboob in the New Caballo winds, a wall of dust and debris hit us with the rumbling earth. Anypony who was grounded quickly found themselves in the air, and everypony who wasn’t was blown away by the oppressive wind. The offices we’d been above fell beneath us like houses of cards, and before I knew it, I was inside a bubble of violet light.             “Are you three alright?” Centurio asked. The rushing dust made it difficult to hear anything but wild wind, but her voice still came across crystal clear.             “I’m fine,” Diamond began, “But more importantly, did anypony see Target? Is she okay?”             “She’s hurt, but she ain’t dead. Ah grabbed her before the dust swallowed us. She was already in the middle of revertin’ back by the time Ah got her. Shoulder’s bleedin’, leg’s probably fractured. Crow, what’s happenin’ up there? Can ya see anythin’?”             Truly, a leader unlike anypony else. To think my temperamental niece grew into such a cool headed pony under pressure like this…             “Dude, it’s like a fucking sandstorm hit Manehattan! I got blown way up here, maybe even a mile out just because of how much air I caught, and I can’t see a damn thing down there!”             A sandstorm? Good Goddess, has Manehattan ever seen a sandstorm before? Almost thirty-two years here and the worst I’ve ever seen is a blizzard or two. Though, it wasn’t as if the comparison was inaccurate. I’d never seen white out conditions, but this was probably close to what it might look like. Nothing but rushing wind and fine gray particles beyond the violet bubble that protected me. I could feel Diamond, Blur, and Centurio near me, but even if they were touching me, I couldn’t see them.             “Hold on. Something’s changing,” The Crows said.             The dust had started to slow but was no less dense. Like a cloud of fog was suspended in front of us.             “Uh… The sandstorm is like… going backward?”             “Backward? What do you mean?” Centurio asked.             “I don’t know man, like, reverse or something! It’s starting to spin too, but it’s getting smaller!”             That… couldn’t possibly be good. In short order, the spray of abraded concrete started to flow back toward the epicenter of the explosion. Soon, visuals were clear, but the wall of dust was becoming thicker, more concentrated toward what was likely the burned area.             “You know, hero etiquette usually dictates that the villains all come at the hero one at a time for a fair fight. If I had to fight all of you alone with those masterful coordinated attacks of yours, I wouldn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of winning. It’s common practice in games to rush through all the previous boss fights before actually being able to fight the final boss. So, in the spirit of fairness, I think we should all have our own little battles to fight.”             And then, it set in. The truth of this new power of Silicon’s. He didn’t just approach us on top of that office for no reason, he needed material. He’s recomposing any matter he finds into flesh. And with his ability to trap souls in bodies… it’s not an army of undead to be worried about, but rather an army of kaiju.             “Rise again, my servants! Your second, your third lives await you if only you can defeat the obstacles in your path!”             The shattered earth had been reformed into bodies of similar shape and size as the new form Person had taken. There was no longer one giant, but seven. Three female shapes, four male shapes. One Giant with a bone mask. Two giants with dichromatic irises. A giant with one larger and one smaller iris. A female with eyes like kaleidoscopes. A skinless giant with an open-mouthed smile filled with malice unlike any other.             “Hehehe… Hahaha!” Marevelous… Applejack was laughing. The light that normally came with her powers ‘turning on’ was a dangerously darker color than I remember. “That’s him, ain’t it? The smiley one. It’s him, AIN’T IT, PERSONA!?”             Oh no.             The Master of the giants brought a hoof to his mouth. “Oh my, it seems as if there is a grudge here! Well, if you must know, then yes, it is. As much as he would like to speak, complex structures like vocal cords are unnecessary for the purpose my servants serve in this particular moment so I didn’t make them. Wave to your favorite hero, Sahaquiel.”             Focusing its eyes on Marevelous, the smiling giant tilted his head and began to raise a hoof. She, however, didn’t need any more confirmation than that. As if a cannon had been fired, the ground around Marevelous’s hooves shattered and she launched after the smiling giant. Moving quickly to intercept her, the giant braced itself and raised a hoof to protect its chest. Marevelous slammed into the massive foreleg, knocking the giant off balance and even going so far as to lift him into the air. The skinless giant fell back further into the empty wreckage of what used to be central Manehattan, then swung his damaged foreleg away, shooting off a familiarly shaped ball of orange-black light.             As if he were merely a spectator watching a game, Persona tilted his head in amusement. “Well, somepony seems awfully eager to start! I didn’t even get to explain the rules of the new game mode. Very well then,” Persona pointed his hoof at us. “Your reward will be life eternal at my side in my new world order. Destroy them.”