//------------------------------// // Light vs Dark Pt. 3 // Story: My Little Pony: Legends of Old and New // by AlphaToothless95 //------------------------------// Dodging Sunny’s attacks was not easy, especially since she kept constantly attacking after her friends kept dodging. Askari, who had refrained from using metal bullets was only left with rubber ones. They didn’t pierce Sunny’s skin or armor but they did leave bruises wherever she was hit. Sunny was quickly getting more and more annoyed. She distracted her friends by blinding them all using her magic and targeted Askari. She landed next to her hard enough to cause a shockwave that created a massive crater in the ground and knocked Askari 20 feet away. Askari quickly recovered and threw a flash grenade at Sunny, only for it to be knocked miles away. Askari sighs and stands up straight staring at Sunny. “Look I get it, ok? You want revenge but you also wanna protect your friends. I wanted revenge against you and when I thought I finally got it.. I realized that it wasn’t worth it, and I know that’s too little too late but.. I finally realized it wasn’t your fault for what happened to my parents.. so I wanna help make things right, but look at you.. this isn’t the way to go about it.” Askari says as she and Sunny circle each other. Sunny just glares at her, sick of all of them trying to convince her to stop and come home. She couldn’t stop now, not when she was so close. “It doesn’t matter.. what you say..” Sunny says, sounding out of breath. “I. Will never. Stop.” Izzy suddenly freezes Sunny in place and keeps it up, trying to make the ice as thick as possible so Sunny can’t break out. “Sunny please! If you keep going at this rate, it’s only a matter of time before you get yourself killed!” Izzy pleads, still keeping Sunny trapped. “What happened to Artemis wasn’t your fault..!” she yells and Sunny suddenly stops trying to escape, her eyes starting to fill with tears. Everyone looks concerned as Sunny’s memories of Artemis start to resurface. She smiles at them, tears running down her cheeks as the memories bring her happiness.. until she remembers the moment Artemis died. She opens her eyes, both of them glowing a darker gold than before and her body and hair starts glowing. “Yes. It. WAS!!” Sunny yells before screaming and having a magic overload that causes a explosion that destroys the ice and knocks everyone away from her. She flys up, glaring at them all, the wind picking up from the power she’s emitting. “I have to make it right! No matter the cost! I owe it to her, my dad, and everyone else who’s died, suffered or lost someone because of Midnight.. and me!” she yells before landing and causing another shockwave. Hitch quickly gets up and charged at Sunny, dodging all her attacks before grabbing one of her arms, sliding behind her and pinning her arms back. Hitch uses his strength from his powers to keep her pinned but she’s slowly starting to slip free. “Sunny this has gone far enough.. you’re not to blame for anything that happened.. you didn’t intentionally hurt anyone. You couldn’t save them either, but how could you? There was nothing you could’ve done but there’s something you can do now.. you don’t have to do it alone though. We can help, we’re your friends.. your family..! We’re in this together!” Hitch says, still struggling to hold Sunny still. Sunny yells and head-buts him, flipping him over her and cracking the ground as he lands on his back really hard. She throws a punch at his face but he dodges it and moves from under her. She blasts him to make him stay down but Skylight tackles her soon after, tumbling with her before kicking her away. Sunny slides to a stop and charges at her. Before she gets to her, her magic glitches and she falters a bit, feeling pain throughout her entire body. She falls and tumbles to a stop right in front of Skylight and cries out when the pain intensifies. “M-Make it stop..!!” Sunny yells desperately, not knowing what’s going on but really wanting it to end. Her friends are all instantly by her side, Izzy trying to form a spell that would ease her pain. “What’s happening to her?!” Skylight asked, worried just like the others. Naturally, no one knows but they just want to help Sunny however they can. The glow in Sunny’s eyes flickers on and off until it stops and she passes out, her alicorn magic deactivating automatically. Izzy starts panicking and so does Hitch until Askari tells them she’s alive, just passed out. Skylight feels her phone vibrate in her pocket and she checks it, seeing she got a message from Pipp and her face pales when she reads it. “Uhhh in other news, I just got a text from Pipp, Zephyr Heights was taken over.. and Queen Haven is dead.” Skylight says, earning shocked looks from everyone. “Ummm.. there’s going to be a funeral for her this afternoon so.. we better get back to Bridlewood.”she says through her own shock. Izzy nods slowly and teleports them all back to Bridlewood.. or at least close to it. She had exhausted her magic on the way over, during the rescue, and in the fight with Sunny, and from healing Sunny as best she could and now from this. She was very close to collapsing, but for Sunny, who was in her arms, she could endure. Three hours later Sunny had startled awake and looked around, breathing heavily. She then went through some breathing exercises she learned a while back until her heart rate slowed. She noticed that Izzy was next to her, running a soothing hand through her hair softly. Sunny would be lying if she said she didn’t miss how good it felt and how much it calmed her down. It was nostalgic for her. She couldn’t help but let out a sound of contentment, making Izzy smile. “Hey.. how do you feel?” Izzy asks with the softest voice Sunny’s ever heard. Sunny tries to sit up but realizes that she’s too tired and way too sore, falling back onto the bed. “Like I ran around Equestria nonstop..” Sunny says with a chuckle, prompting Izzy to giggle. Sunny looks at herself and sees that her armor is gone along with her gear and she’s wearing clean new clothes. Sunny frowns at the idea that Izzy saw the evidence of everything she’s been through. “Did.. did you see?” Sunny asks hesitantly and Izzy looking down and sighing was all the answer she needed. “Only for a second.. I didn’t see them all but.. can I..? Please..? I need to know just how much you’ve been through Sunny.. how much pain could’ve been avoided.” Izzy says with a pleading tone, the hurt in her eyes almost painful to look at. Sunny sighs, turns away from her and lifts the back of her shirt up, revealing the multitude of scars and bruises on her back. Izzy gasped in shock and hesitantly touched the biggest scar and gets very angry, promising to make Midnight and her goons pay for every. Single. One. Sunny tenses up, feeling the anger coming from Izzy and remembers that she’s supposed to keep Izzy and the others safe. “Izzy.. if it helps, a lot of these were from myself making stupid mistakes.” Sunny says, hoping to calm Izzy down so she won’t do anything stupid. Izzy shakes her head, still angry. “No.” Izzy says firmly and Sunny sighs, pulling away from Izzy’s touch. She needs to leave before she gets too attached and something bad happens again because of her.. but a part of her cries out in anger and sadness at the thought of leaving everyone behind again.. and fear. Sunny may have said she was ok with dying if it meant her friends would be safe and have a chance at stopping Midnight for her.. but she wasn’t actually ready to die.. especially not with all the information she has.. especially not with her dad depending on her. “Izzy.. why did you bring me back here?” Sunny asks and Izzy smiles then frowns, grabbing Sunny’s hand and sighing. “Because I love you dummy.. and I’ve wanted you back ever since I found your note.. and.. and there’s about to be a funeral for Queen Haven in a few minutes.. so the least you can do is be there and support Zipp and Pipp..” Izzy says and Sunny is shocked by the news of Queen Haven’s demise but then grows a determined look, planning to actually be there for her friends and nods. Izzy smiles then helps her up. Sunny smiles back as Izzy helps her walk out of the room and get ready to go. After they’re both properly dressed, they head out to where the funeral is supposed to be. Everyone in Bridlewood is there, including Alphabittle, Thunderbird, Zipp, Pipp, Sprout, Brightburn, Firestar, Twilight and her friends and everyone else. Everyone looks shocked when they see her and she flinches under their gazes.. until they smile and all greet her, welcoming her back. She almost cries but apologizes instead for leaving, realizing that doing that might have been a mistake. It had almost cost her her life and the lives of innocents multiple times. She walks up to Zipp and Pipp who had obviously been crying and hugs them both. They hug her back and she tells them that she’s sorry for their loss. They stay in the hug for quite a bit before separating. After that, the funeral starts and everyone takes turns saying nice things about Haven and saying goodbye. After Zipp's turn, she takes out the crown and places it on Haven’s head carefully. “Goodbye Mom.. don’t worry.. we’ll be ok.” she says sadly before they close the casket and bury Haven. Zipp and Pipp both start crying more but this time, ALL of their friends are there for them. Sunny’s magic glitches again and she groans in pain, pulling away from the group hug and holding her chest. “Again..? Why does this keep happening?” she asks and everyone looks confused and concerned. Before Zipp, Pipp or anyone else can question exactly what’s going on, someone they never expected to meet there practically limped from behind a tree: Nebula. “I.. I might have the.. answer for that..” she says weakly and out of breath. Everyone gets ready, aiming their weapons and powers at her and she frantically backs up, tripping over a log. “Wait please! I didn’t come to fight.. I came to help you.. in hopes that you would help ME.. I need your help to save my friend.” Zipp scoffs, her arms radiating with lightning. “Why should we believe a word you say?” she asks harshly, wanting nothing to do with an agent of Midnight. Nebula chuckles before coughing, her injuries clearly worse than they look. “Because I stole something from Midnight.. that you wouldn’t have been able to get yourselves.” she says as she reaches in her pouch, causing everyone to instantly go on alert and move closer as a warning. Nebula holds one hand up in surrender and slowly takes out.. Grogar’s bell. “You’re welcome..” she says before passing out, everyone instantly rushing to her side and trying to help her. If she was serious about helping them, they couldn’t afford to lose such an advantage and opportunity to get the upper hand against Midnight for once.