//------------------------------//
// Hot Spot 
// Story: Left Behind: Sunny Disposition 
// by The Psychopath 
//------------------------------//

King Gallant got out of bed, frustrated. He was feeling even more haggard than ever. His soldiers had caught a few missives directed towards the heads of the counties that comprised Equestria. Dozens were intercepted, but hundreds more had gone out. That alicorn was clever enough to know the messages would be intercepted, and it was infuriating. The only respite he had was knowing that that thing was supporting him with everything it had on hoof, whatever that may be. He quickly dressed up and moved into the halls of his castle, ignoring the guards greeting him. He could feel in his magic that something had been going awry since the alicorn had made it into the world and was trying to change everything. It wasn't just her need to usurp him of his title and take away everything his family had worked on for generations. No. There was something else.

"Is he here?" the king asked a guard.

The stallion saluted. "Yes, sir. It became active a few hours ago and has been wandering the garden ever since."

Gallant groaned. "Thank you, guard."

The guard gave a silent nod and stepped aside, letting the king pass the wooden doors into the inner garden. There were a wide variety of trimmed bushes and trees spread about haphazardly, the whole chaos accentuated by the wide variety of colors and different flowers.

"Why did I let her make this?" the king sighed to himself. "It's so unseemly." He looked around the mess and called out. "Are you here, partner?"

"Yes I am!"

"Then show yourself to me! I don't have all day! The alicorn has started her work and is undermining my position and authority."

The thing laughed audibly, but the voice bounced off the white stone walls. "What authority? This place is fractured and everything runs itself!" There was a pause. "How do you open the roof to let sunlight in? Is it magic or--"

"You insult me then change subject so quickly?!" the king bellowed furiously.

"Oh, come now. If I intended to insult you, I would do so. It's obvious you just inherited the work of your father and forefathers." Their tone changed to a more concerned intonation. "You know, running a country is very difficult, and the bigger it is, the harder it is to keep everypony together."

"Would you stop speaking from behind the bushes? It's infuriating!"

The thing came into view. It looked like a gray, metal doll with glowing white lines running along its sides. Its joints were exposed balls that rolled and twisted with every step. Its head was twisted into a smile, something that it shouldn't be able to do due to the lack of any mouth or joints, but the metal was folded all the same into a twisted rictus. 

"I can't help but enjoy this! I can feel everything in this automaton of yours!" the thing declared as they spun around.

The king sat down and crossed his forelegs, annoyed. "I can't believe I let you take that. That automaton is a treasured heirloom of the royal family."

Gallant leaned back when the automaton slowly encroached into his space. Its eyes looked like cogs spinning in a transparent orb. "I can always give it back and take over your servants' bodies again," it suggested ominously.

"Fair enough..." the king trailed off angrily.

"I'm quite honestly baffled as to where you got this thing," the automaton exclaimed. "I don't remember finding anything like this in the past." It paused a moment. "Maybe it was the others who found them and never told me?" it thought out loud.

"So, what do we do now?" the king asked.

"Now we build up your forces and I enchant your weapons and armor with antimagic spells," the automaton stated.

Gallant frowned. "Wait...magic spells made from antimagic? That makes no sense!" He watched as the automaton started to fumble through the base of the trimmed bushes near them and grew angrier. "What are you doing?!"

"Found it!" the automaton cheered. It was holding up a small string instrument, but the king didn't recognize it. It was comprised entirely of wood with the neck covered in an ornate shell with small extensions on its side. Finally, there was a handle on the bottom of the instrument that the Automaton poked. "The guards gave me this yesterday. Looklook!" It strummed the two chords sitting atop a disc of sorts. "Strummmmmmmmm."

"What even is that thing?!" the king shouted.

"It's a...uh..." The automaton placed a hoof on its face and frowned. "Hurdy Gurdy?" it stated pensively. "Yes! A Hurdy Gurdy." The king stared silently. "Can you believe that ponies came up with musical instruments?" It laughed and rocked in place. "So much progress in such insignificant things while I was stuck in my own little paradise," it growled.

Gallant watched as the automaton's false breathing became labored and it started tensing up. On occasion, he could hear a faint chuckle and see the briefest embers of a smile form at the edge of its false mouth. 

The king furrowed his brow with concern. "Calm down, thing," he said. "You're not in there anymore."

It shot the king a look. "Oh, but I still am! Forever and ever trapped there! I can come out physically, but I decay when the magic starts to go insane!" it stated as it clutched the instrument harder and harder. "All for the betterment of the ponies and to keep the alicorns from coming back."

Gallant hummed to himself briefly and tensed his body. "Then enjoy this moment outside without suffering through such a...predicament," he said. He wasn't quite sure he fully understood what the automaton meant. "Now that you're here, you can enjoy the outside world to the extent the metal pony allows," he trailed off. "You had a proposition to stop the alicorn, right?"

Gallant flinched when he saw the automaton look down angrily and then turn away as it tried to work the instrument. "Alicorns."

"Al...ali...What? What?!" the king stammered.

"Well, not entirely. There's a few fragments of the night alicorn's sister floating about." It waved its metallic hoof dismissively. "Nothing to fret about. With my guidance they can be taken care of with minimal losses." Gallant grimaced at 'losses'. "Although I can't seem to sense them anymore." Its metallic brow furrowed. "I'm unsure what to make of it." It paused and shook its head. "Oh wait, that means without my guidance. Oops."

One of the doors to the garden burst open, and a guard came rushing through the foliage with a letter in his mouth. "My king!" she shouted. "I...uh..." She slowed down when she noticed the automaton who waved eagerly at her. "A missive. The small county of Cinditon declared war against the alicorn."

"Pass me the letter," Gallant ordered. The contents of the letter made him groan, and the stallion handed the letter back. "He's trying to curry favor with me, the imbecile. Just because he's next to Snowfege."

"Should we do anything?" the guard asked.

Gallant shook his head. "Even if we did, by the time we arrive it will be too late." He paced slowly as he thought of a solution. Any solution, but sighed in resignation. "Leave it. Nothing we can do. He dug that grave himself."

The automaton cackled. "Time to start shoring up your defenses, King," it said. "Time to be serious and start planning in advance."

"Ignoring the obvious urgency of what you just said prior, are we still preparing the weaponry and armor?" The king asked. He turned to the guard by the automaton's nod. "Send word to the messengers to get word out to my loyalists that they will be supplied with stronger anti-magic equipment in preparation for the upcoming confrontations with the alicorn. I'm not about to let centuries of history be wiped away in an instant," he growled.

"Yes, your highness!" the mare shouted before hurrying off.

"Jumping the cannon, no?" the automaton said while trying to wind up the instrument. "How does this work?" they mumbled to themselves. "We need to test out the spells for magic dissipation. Ones for alicorns would be exceptionally complex to make."

"So, what? We can only give them to the most elite troops?"

The automaton shrugged. "Depends on how many unicorns you can teach." It scraped its hooves across the surface of its head. "And then there's the complicated spells to engrave. I can do the best ones, but learning them could take years. You'll have to make do with the simplest ones for the general troops and mine for your most elite troops," it explained.

Gallant slow-blinked. "So it's exactly what I said, then."

"Yes, but with added details," the automaton grinned.

"You exhaust me," the king groaned.

It rubbed its hooves together. "Now let's see those tasty maps. Rivers and cities and villages and forests and swamps! So much to play with!"

"This isn't a game!" the king chastized it.

"And yet you are the one who made the alicorn angry by killing the head of that city in the mountains." The automaton looked at the baffled king and shook its head. "Tut tut. A bad plan. If you really cared about your history then you would have accepted the vassalage she offered." It rotated the crank of the instrument, creating a single note. It bounced in place excitedly as a result. "Instead, you threatened her life, which failed, her protégé, and then killed her first vassal. You messed up bad."

"What?! No! She came out of nowhere and threatened my people and our very way of life with a completely outdated perception of things! Her very existence is a threat!"

The automaton cackled. "Then you should have accepted vassalage and attempted to reeducate her in this 'new world' of yours." It continued fumbling with the instrument and started getting frustrated. "Or you could have researched her and developed something to kill her." It pointed the hurdy gurdy at the king. "Pride!"

The king swatted the instrument away from his face. "You're one to talk! You killed several of my subjects with your inane way of communications!" His face became pale. "And in horrible ways!" the king trailed off. "On top of that, it sounds like you've killed alicorns in the past and have an extensive repertoire of spells and techniques to get rid of them!"

"Don't use fancy words on me!" the automaton complained. "I don't know 'em! And yes! That is exactly why I'm offering my help!" Its eyes shifted and the gears stopped moving for but a second. "Because ponies might...will become dependant on alicorns again, or worse..." It looked around the garden and hugged the instrument close to itself. "She could reawaken alicorn magic and cause them to come back. The chaos that would ensue..."



Moon had cloaked herself in the darkness of the night sky and watched the soldiers of Cinditon marching towards the mountain path to Snowfege. The alicorn was pleasantly amused. It was like dealing with the nobles who fancied themselves inheritors of her bloodline when she had no foals of her own. There were, at most, sixty soldiers armed with spears and crossbows: All antimagic weapons. It was odd. Were they aware of her, or did they think she was just a con story?

"Tch. Sticking to the ideals of your stories, old pony?" Moon whispered to herself when she saw the leader.

While the ponies were draped in simple false-leather coats with bits of iron plating, their leader was sporting a fully armored attire, but not quite plate mail. He was fully encased, and Moon could spot some gambeson sticking out beneath his iron armor. What did he think he was doing? Putting down an uprising of would-bes? This at least saved the alicorn the trouble of having to go directly to him. They could have also taken an airship.

The alicorn found it more insulting that they would do this at night. Her domain! Having had enough of observing, the alicorn let loose her magic, announcing her presence to the soldiers below. The clouds of the sky vanished away as a curtain of sparkling back and white engulfed hte night sky, and Moon's body stood out in the middle with the white, ethereal magic that flowed out of her.

"Who are you, who dare to encroach upon my lands?!" she bellowed out to the miniature army below.