//------------------------------// // Chapter 54: An army of one // Story: The Hacker Pwny // by Chetzi //------------------------------// "Lay down!" The nurse commanded me. Despite the blood loss, I was already getting out of bed. There was a window next to my bed, with the sun telling me it's 6 P.M. I felt like I've been here for a few hours at least, I can't give a good estimate. Pain was still pulsing through me, but I had better things to do than lay in bed all day. "You aren't ready to move, your muscles aren't healed yet," the nurse told me, in another futile attempt to get me back into the bed. As I continued to limp out the room, I saw Vinyl walk into the room. She looked surprised to see me, or, at least, to see me up and moving. "I thought you were hurt," Vinyl said. "I got better," I replied. She gave a short chuckle. "Uh, I can see the wound on your chest. It looks bad. What happened?" "I'll tell you when I get back home." "You are not ready to leave this room yet. Now lay back down!" The nurse demanded. "Don't care, I can hurt you more than you can me," I said to the nurse. I wasn't going to hurt her, I'm just done hearing her. "What are you going to do, bleed on me?" "So, Chrysalis. Never thought I'd hear that name again," Twilight said. Twilight and I talked about Chrysalis kidnapping me, and how I escaped. We sat in chairs in her library, but I sat in an awkward position to avoid sitting on my chest wound. "She just wanted to live above ground, but I don't know why she wanted me to do it." "You're different, she thought she could do it with you. But how did you beat her, and escape?" "I don't remember much, it is a blurry memory. I think I deflected her attacks, then used a magic-infused punch." "Deflected? You're like an anti-unicorn. You are able to dispel magic, and that punch you throw did a lot more than it should've. You might have used her own magic against her, which would explain the white arua. Could it be negative magic? Anti-magic? What about..." Twilight trailed on about opposites of magic, with her saying some words every few seconds. She then got up, and started levitating multiple books toward her. "Recent advances in learning how the brain of a chimpanzees works suggest that if they were given the power to use magic, they would have very strong anti-magic abilities, because of the way magic is processed in the cerebral cortex." "So I can turn a unicorn's best weapon against them. Interesting. Wait, what?! You live in thatched roof houses, don't have dishwashers, and yet you understand the most complex brain there is." "Magic let's us read nature, and the brain has been needed to be studied because we are so reliant on magic." This is why we can't have nice things. "Understandable for you equines, but not for chimps. Why study them?" "We've studied all species, so we could understand magic more. That, and a lot of ponies wanted opposable thumbs. Their ability to grab and hold things actually made levitating things easier, once we studied them." "So what, I try to learn about the anti branch?" "Not quite, while that would be useful, you still need to have a greater control on how much magic you exert when using it." "I'm already good enough to beat you, what's left to teach?" She put the books back into the shelves, and walked over to me. "You can't beat me in a fight." "You said it yourself, I can turn your own magic against you. And all you are good at is using magic." "Is that... a challenge?" Twilight made two books float to her. "Magical fighting is prohibited unless used in friendly practice, and with medical personnel watching." "I don't have time for this. Let's see who's better, here and now." "But I could get a splinter, and the books would get disorganized and-" "We'll get Spike to be your medic." "Spike can't-" "And I thought Celestia's pupil was good at magic." "I'm good at magic, and I doubt you can beat me." Got her. I started to gather magic into my hooves. "Prove it." She kneeled down, and glared. "Fine." I wouldn't start this without knowing how she fights, and what her weakness is. She's going to start off with a magic blast, she always does. Sure enough, a purple beam emits from her horn. I grabbed it in my hooves, spun around, and redirected it back at her. A sharp pain struck me in my stomch when I spun, it must be the wound. It was healing quickly, thanks to a regeneration spell by Twilight. Twilight brought up a small shield to protect herself. "You'll need to do better than that." "If that was any better, I would've been hit. Antimagic shields aren't easy to make that quickly." "I'm waiting, try something else." Twilight vanished in a flash of light. I swung my hoof to hit the air behind me. Twilight was there, and dodged. She then teleported back to where she was. "How!?" "Stop being so predictable." Twilight charged me, and I readied myself. Before she slammed into me, she teleported. I spun to behind me, to see nothing. I spun back around, to find that Twilight had run and jumped at me, carrying a ball of magic in her hoof, about to slam it into me. Time slowed to a crawl as my quick reaction time made it so I could steal Twilight's magic sphere, and her with it, and then slam it into the ground. A bit of sawdust got kicked up as the floorboards snapped in the impact. "So... close." She coughed, got up, and dusted herself off. "Another time, I'm busy. Spike! I need you to clean up something!" She just can't admit to me being a better fighter. Not her fault, she was probably going easy on me, and all she can do is magic. Which all I'm good at is turning that against her. Eh, it was a friendly spar. It might seem like I slammed her into the ground too hard, but remember, this floor is wooden, and their building style is primitive. I mean, come on, they have thatched roofs! That, and physics aren't entirely correct here. For some reason, when ponies crash into something, it seems to do more damage than when an object of the same mass does. "I guess, I do have other things to do. Can I borrow a book?" "Sure." I walked over to the shelfs, and examined the various book titles. I found the one I was looking for, hybrid branches of magic, and took it with me as I left. This'll be an interesting read. "Oh, Neon, one more thing," Twilight said I walked away. "Stop thinking so technical, magic doesn't work like that. And that also might be why you only seem to be able to use powerful magic when angry, or protective. When you aren't thinking like a machine." "We'll see who's right," was the last thing I said before walking out. "Smexy times?" Vinyl asked me, as I laid on her couch, reading the book I borrowed from Twilight. "No, I'm busy," I replied. "Smexy times?" "No." "Now?" "No." There was a pause as I turned the page. "How about now?" "Again, no." "N-" "No! Not now! Later maybe! Can I just finish this chapter?" "So... now?" I facehoofed. "Yes! I'm done! Now stop asking!" I said as I bookmarked the page and shut the book. "Yes! Let's go out to stargazing hills." "What? Really? That seems unlike you." "Then we crank the bass up to eleven, and try to slide down the hills." "And that does sound like something you would do. And that's not what smexy times even means." "So, you'll go with me?" "Yeah." "Fun right?" Vinyl asked as she laid down next to me, staring up at the stars. We both panted from the rolling, since getting back up the hill was rather hard. The sky was clear of clouds, the stars being brighter than what you'd normally see, since there was no light pollution. "Yeah, it's nice to take a step back and have fun." "I wonder where Luna is." "Huh?" "Luna, she controls the moon. When I look at the night sky, it reminds me of her." Oh no. I don't know where she is. And I know she wouldn't stay on Earth, unless I was there. She can teleport long distances, as she did when she helped me fight Scavell. And what did she learn while on Earth? Her learning of democracy alone started a war. And even that could have only been ended by an alien invasion. What if she brings computers here? What if she overheard what I said about Celestia?! And even worse, WHAT IF SHE DISCOVERED JUSTIN BIEBER AND LIKED HIM!? I jumped up and made a run for it. "Lunaaaaa!" "Wait where are you going!?" Luna laid on a large cloud as it effortless drifted across the sky. She was somewhere near the castle, contemplating about everything that's happened. 'Could my sister really be as bad as sir Neon said,' Luna thought. 'Was all this really just her planning?' She'd ask herself these questions for hours on end, not a single answer she could accept. Luna couldn't accept that Celestia did plan all that, nor could she see how Neon could be wrong. Her heart felt broken, and her head throbbed. Her whole, very long life could really have been for nothing. Even now, she had no reason to live if Celestia's manipulating her. "Lunaaaa!" Screamed a voice from the ground. It pierced both the sad silence and Luna's troubled thoughts. She peeked over her cloud, to find Neon running toward the castle. She wasn't sure if she hated him for saying all that, and wanted to avoid him, or that she needed to see him above all others, since he would know what to do. After a long sigh, she raised her wings and drifted over to Neon. She still hated him. "Lunaaaa!" I called out one more time, desperate to reach her. Bad things will happen if I don't talk to her. Nightmare Moon can still come back, the emotion that Luna had that turned her into Nightmare Moon, despair, is strong enough to escape if Luna feels it to an extreme degree. And who knows what she's seen? There are many horrible events in history, and they would drive anypony to lose hope if they ever found out. To think that an alien race so similar to theirs is capable of such monstrosities. Their value of life is much higher than ours. Not even the evilest of villains could ever kill a pony. I started to call out her name one more time, only to have her land in front of me. A harsh glare was plastered on her face. "What do you want?" She angrily asked. "What did you find out!?" "Enough." "No, there are things you should never know. You need to tell me what you found out before something bad happens." "And this 'something bad' is me, isn't it? I heard you and Twilight. I didn't want to know." Her coat turned a shade darker. "Now I feel used and betrayed. I'm worthless, a simple toy to make Celestia more powerful." Her mane slowly melded into darker shades. "How, in your short time here, figure this out? Why, after this long, didn't I know?" I could feel the anger emitting from her. "I never should have brought you here, if only Celestia would have never found you. Celestia... Celestia. I hate that name. It brings pain." I could see the slow transformation of her into Nightmare Moon. "Luna calm down, I only said all that so Twilight wouldn't think so highly of Celestia." "And yet you showed me how she's evil. I was the one hurt here. Ponies call me the villain. I'll show them a real villain." "Revenge isn't the way to go! Attacking Celestia will only make you seem worse. The Elements of Harmony will once again stop you if you try. Let's talk to Celestia, she must have had valid reasons for all that. "Talk talk talk. I've had enough talking. Celestia needs to banished for a thousand years to see how she likes it. She needs to know the pain." Luna looked a lot like Nightmare Moon, but still had elements of normal Luna. It was clear that I couldn't persuade her by asking nicely or using reason. I made my horn glow a darker shade of green than it normally does. "Luna, this won't end well. I don't want to fight you. Nopony does, but you're going down a path that I can't let you go down." "Celestia's followers. Ignorant. Blind. Don't deserve the life they live." "Don't do this." "They must be killed. All of her followers. Everypony under her rule." "You think revenge will solve this? Celestia easily banished you the first time, and that was when you had all of Nightmare Moon in you. You can't beat her with brute force. And I won't let you." Blue lighting circled the floor around her. Small lighting sparks shot out of her, and her eyes glowed an eerie red. Her wings become sharp and the edges jutted out like blades. Her teeth grew long and sharp and black marks spread all over her body. The marks kept moving, and appeared to move around like liquid in their places. She was clearly stronger than Nightmare Moon ever was. "No, Celestia doesn't deserve death. She needs banishment. Forever. And we need a new kingdom. One ruled by the night and darkness. We need to kill all the citizens, they will never accept me as their new leader." I put a bright green aura all around me, clumps of dirt and pebbles floating around me. "Your plan will never work. I will tell you once more, stop or else I WILL stop you myself." "You are interfering with my plans. You will die first." A flash of lightning lit up the sky as Luna, no, this thing isn't Luna. Not anymore. Darkmoon would be more fitting. She trapped me in a ball of magic, draining my energy. I wasn't going to let her do that. A quick focused blast from my horn pierced the bubble's armor and hit Darkmoon. She flinched from the recoil, but quickly retaliated with a blast of magical lighting. The actual attack didn't hurt me, but I did get sent flying into Canterlot. My magic shield took most of the force upon crashing. Darkmoon abandoned the fight, looking to continue her plan. I trotted over to the MTSC, with an idea in my head. "Waaaaaah!" I screamed as I fell through the sky. A yellow blue pony flew towards me, and caught me as I fell. I could see that it was a pegasus, that looked like a recolored version of me. "You okay? You should be lucky I was here," the pegasus said, sounding just like me. He let me down on a patch of grass, and held out his hoof. "The name's Argon." "Neon, and I need you." "You look quite a bit like me." "I know. Just, I'll explain on the way back." I had to use an experimental feature I was testing on the MTSC, one that alters light variables to allow visits to alternate universes. Becuase of the limits of technogloy and magic, I could only teleport near my counterpart. Plus, I, and all entities of me in the current universe, are teleported with me using the mass biocode transport. "Who are you!?" The Earth pony incarnation of me said, his ring of knives around his hoof at my neck. I was backed up against the wall, this version of me is very protective of his territory. I was in some blacksmith or inventor's workshop building. “I’ll tell you everything on the way. We don’t have time to sit and chat. And my name is Neon.” “Radon. And you are currently an enemy to me.”