Episode 198: Reign of Hollows
Among the sadder realities of sitting at the top was that there was very little to do but wait. Wait for the next spark of battle between the slowly shifting forces of the spirit war. Wait for the next challenger with just enough of a spine to overcome common sense and logical fear to try their luck. Wait for anything new or stimulating to come along and offer a chance to do more than... well, more waiting.
Tirek had spent entirely too many centuries just waiting. Watching the sand drip through the proverbial hourglass between moments. Sure, there had been battles now and again, moments of blessed carnage to whet his appetite for conflict, but the general stalemate with Sombra’s Quincy and his brother’s Soul Reapers had left Tirek in a continuous lurch of impatient stasis. Perhaps this, more than anything, was the reason for his whims of fanciful indulgence with oddities. Chrysalis and her blatant seductions and playful flirtations with the line between loyalty and treachery. Lament and his unusual innate power and madness married to a core of virtue uncommon in Hollowkind. Adagio and her relentless endurance and ambition to topple the status quo Tirek himself had allowed to congeal. And most recently, Sunset Shimmer and her friends with their quaint Coalition, perhaps doomed to fail, but most assured to shake things up.
Was it foolishness on his part that the more he saw this human girls struggle, and the more the likes of Adagio made progress in gunning for him, that Tirek felt the dust of ages shaking off his soul and a growing fire of certainty in his empty heart that perhaps a conclusion to the endless war started eons ago was on the horizon?
Centuries of ennui disguised as patience, and things were finally changing, and he was willing to take risks. Risks he would not have taken even just a few months ago. But in that time he’d seen too many changes, not the smallest of which was the fall of his brother. Tirek felt the precipice in front of him, the end coming, one way or another. If the spy reports from the human world were accurate, even the Beast Realm was no longer merely neutral and apart. By now the Soul Reapers would have chosen Scorpan’s replacement, but they’d still be disorganized, in chaos.
If this had been merely a few months earlier, he’d have considered this the perfect moment to strike Soul Society and potentially crush the Gotei 13.
But now he had another target, one that had been like an enticing dish seen through the window of a restaurant by a starving man. Equestria.
Tirek’s right hand twitched, as if eager to feel his sword gripped in his fingers. Ever since he saw the Soul Queen’s body pierced by a blade of magic sunlight Tirek had understood that the magic of Equestria was the key to ending all of this. Yet for so long the acquisition of that power was beyond logical reach. Portals to Equestria were so few and so small that launching an invasion was next to an impossible dream, and what little magic leaked through or was tossed into the human world from that realm was so infinitesimal as to not be worthy of significant note. Even when Tirek had learned of the magical powers contained within those young ladies from Canterlot City, he had considered them a secondary objective, worth observing and capturing if possible, but not critical. Grogar put more stock in the value of studying them, and Tirek had to begrudgingly admit the man had turned out to be right.
Those artificial siren gems, and the spirit-based cybernetics, were both powerful indeed. But they weren’t enough. Not by a wide margin, if Glory and the Zero Division were to be defeated, and all other foes crushed under heel.
That would require an apotheosis of magic. It would require a fundamental redefining of the pinnacle of Hollow power. Tirek almost chuckled to himself, his mind drifting to the ‘myth’ of Segunda Etapa, the state beyond Resurreccion. He was one of the only Hollows left who was old enough to know the truth of the legend, at least in parts. Enough to know it was possible, that there was a Hollow state that surpassed what was currently known to be achievable.
Not that Tirek knew how to achieve it, and not through lack of trying. The individual who had achieved that form so long ago had not shared the secret of their metamorphosis before practically all of Glory’s army from back then had descended upon them. One might think that would dissuade Tirek from considering Segunda Etapa to be worth the trouble, since the one who achieved it before still ended up falling to Glory. However back then Glory had led an entire army of god-like spirits, and it had taken the larger portion of it to overwhelm the original Segunda Etapa. Now Glory had herself and her four siblings.
Then there was the fact that magic amplified spirit power, so a Segunda Etapa achieved by consuming vast quantities of magic should, in theory, be even stronger than the original had been.
This made the prospect of invading Equestria not merely a temptation, but an inevitability. It was just a question of how the dice would roll, once cast. Even Tirek couldn’t guess at the outcome. Would the colorful inhabitants of Equestria prove themselves up to the challenge of repelling him and his forces? Would Chrysalis take advantage of the situation to finally turn upon him, as he’s often believed she eventually would? Or would Adagio’s cobbled together rebellion take form and prove problematic? Perhaps even Sunset Shimmer and those girls would end up surprising him in some unexpected fashion?
For the first time in a very, very long time Tirek couldn’t say for certain if he would emerge victorious in the battles to come... and that excited him in a way like nothing else could!
“Hah! Knew you were in an unusually good mood. Not even paying attention to the show happening down below, eh?”
Tirek’s self-reflection ended and he wore a loose grin of ease as he looked over his shoulder at the speaker. He’d been standing at the apex of Las Noche’s central tower, above even the immense domed roof that stretched over the fortress’ interior. The empty black sky of Hueco Mundo stretched above with its ever present crescent moon illuminating all in dull silver light. He generally only came here rarely when he felt like not being bothered by others, but Torch was one of the few besides Chrysalis who knew Tirek well enough to approach him.
The towering brute of a man that was Torch was still somehow made small by Tirek’s simple presence, but Tirek didn’t impose any great strain of spiritual pressure upon the other Espada, and simply gestured for Torch to come and stand beside him. They weren’t “friends” per se, not in the way Tirek had once thought of those in his closest inner circle of warlords, but Torch was perhaps the Espada most aligned with Tirek’s own worldview, despite the man’s strange obsession with his family.
“I’m not ignoring it,” he said, referring to the spiking sensations of reiatsu down inside Las Noches that he recognized as a growing conflict. He’d felt Gilda and Greta’s clash, secretly glad to find out that Gilda had grown enough to raise Guto’s ire. Guto was a valuable tactical asset, but the man hardly understood Tirek’s vision for the future. Now it felt as if Guto was about to clash with two of the human girls... Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie, if Tirek’s senses were accurate. He wasn’t too familiar with those girls to fully pick out their individual reiatsu yet, but he suspected he’d get to know these spiritual pressures well within the upcoming days.
“I merely don’t care,” he finished, with a huge roll of his shoulders. Torch chuckled with deep, dry bellowing chortles and came to stand beside Tirek, crossing his huge, blue arms of corded muscle.
“Hahah, the squabbles of the lower ranked are just not of any interest to you, eh? Or is it that you already know the outcome won’t change anything?”
“If we lose Guto or Hydia, it merely means others will rise in their place. Adagio Dazzle has two Fraccion who are strong enough now to rank as Espada, and your own daughter Ember has grown in power to the point I am surprised she hasn’t challenged for a seat.
Torch’s face twitched in the way it always did when it came to the topic of Ember. Again, that odd obsession with family. Tirek... supposed he was not one to truly judge. His own heart still felt unusually heavy at the knowledge of his brother’s end. His hand ached again to hold his Zanpaktou. If Scorpan had needed to die, Tirek felt he owed it to his brother to do the deed himself. Letting another do it felt like a failure, and Tirek was not one fond of personal failure. That was why family and friends were such a problematic concept. Those bonds represented cracks in one's resolve. He’d only allowed it in the past because he’d trusted a rare few individuals to not hold him back.
“Ember would mop the floor with Gilda,” Torch declared with some fatherly pride, and perhaps also some overestimation, “But I want her good and ready for a higher spot before she goes for it. Of course, who knows how things’ll be shortly. Adagio’s still gunning hot for you, and you know at this point where I stand on that.”
Tirek nodded, no hint of ire or threat in his expression as he smiled at the other Espada, “Throwing your chips in with the new blood, still, eh? Has Adagio Dazzle truly impressed you?”
“She took on every challenge thrown at her so far, saving my Ember in the process,” Torch’s eyes matched his name, like firelights of unquenchable heat. Tirek could hear the steel resolution in Torch’s voice, “Nothing personal, Tirek, but when she pulls the trigger on the fight, me and mine are in her camp.”
“So be it,” Tirek said with a shrug, “I don’t fault your choice. I continue to find Dazzle an interesting prospective rival. By all accounts she should have been dead by now, but she keeps surpassing expectations. I’m eager to see what she does when we invade Equestria.”
“If you want my guess, that’ll be the point she’ll turn,” Torch said, “She’s ruthless to her enemies, but she’s got no stomach for going after innocents. She won’t have her people attack the souls of that realm, even if you threatened her directly. Figure that’ll be the breaking point and she’ll make her move against the rest of us.”
“Hmm, strange phrasing. You said you’d be in her camp, but also you say ‘rest of us’? Whose side are you truly on, Torch?”
Torch let out another bellow of a laugh, shaking his head, “I’m past my own prime, ever since Grogar put this damn wound in me...” he patted his side with a wince, indicating the internal damage caused by the treachery of Grogar long ago, when the two had vied for similar positions in the Espada. “I’ve learned to live with the fact that I’ll never be able to take you down, Tirek, in that big brawl we always wanted. Damn shame. But I’m thinking Adagio or one of them human gals will give you that fight in my stead. In the meantime, I’ll do what I’ve always done... find the biggest, baddest brawl I know I’ve still got a chance to win, and go at it with all I’ve got!”
Torch slammed a fist into his palm, teeth bared in a fierce smile, “Figure Equestria has to have a foe worthy enough to give an old, wounded war dog like me the fight of my life! Hah, that or maybe the Soul Reapers and Quincy will join in to make it a real banger of a final war. Know there’s at least one Captain out there who’s got a bone to pick with me, and always felt a bit bad. I haven't had the chance to give him the proper revenge match he’s probably been salivating over for so long. Adagio doesn’t need my help in her rebellion, but my daughter will take care of that, I’m thinking.”
Tirek couldn’t help but chuckle a little himself, appreciating the simple honesty of it all. “I won’t hold back against any of them, you know.”
“Pffah! As if I’d want you to! Heh, but like I said, who knows if it’ll even be Adagio going at you? We’ve got a whole world of magically superpowered ponies to take on at the same time, and I know in my gut them human gals won’t sit that fight out. Speaking of which, your absolute viper of a woman already on the other side by now?”
He gave Torch a sidelong look, then slowly nodded, “Chrysalis is securing our foothold as we speak. Grogar assures me his replication of the Soul Reaper’s interdimensional portal device will work as intended. Adagio was the only one who might do something about it, but again, Grogar has given me assurances that have been accounted for.”
“She might surprise you,” Torch pointed out, but Tirek shrugged.
“If she does, it is her right as one with power and a willingness to accept the truth of this world; that might is what makes right, and violence the only true resolver of conflict.”
----------
Adagio hated feeling trapped, or as if she’d miscalculated. The possibility of Grogar showing up had occurred to her after encountering his damned mutated experiments. He’d put monitoring devices in her, once, so it stood to reason he could have done the same with his engineered weapons, and been alerted the moment they had engaged her and Fenice. She had hoped to find Thorax and get out of here before Grogar arrived, if he did so at all. And in the event he did, Adagio had felt confident enough that she, Fenice, and Thorax were too much of a combined threat for him to do more than make noise at her.
She hadn’t anticipated Catrina would show up as well. Out of all the Espada, Catrina was the largest sticking point in Adagio’s plans. Guto and Hydia she knew to be problems and largely in bed with Grogar. With Smooze and Gilda both being non-issues, and Torch and Lament both firmly in Adagio’s camp, the biggest question mark on the ladder to tackling Chrysalis and Tirek themselves was the Third Espada. Frustratingly Adagio had not been able to gather much information on Catrina outside of what was general knowledge and gossip among the Arrancar denizens of Las Noches.
Most of what Adagio knew came from her limited personal experiences and observations, which was that Catrina was mostly vain, but competent and cautious, and absolutely hated Chrysalis on the grounds that Chrysalis had breezed by her in the Espada rankings, and held physical beauty even Catrina couldn’t match.
None of this readily explained why Catrina was here with Grogar, in Chrysalis’ lair, almost as if Grogar had her along as some kind of bodyguard. Doubtful that Catrina was actually here out of any loyalty or interest in Grogar personally, but Adagio had a sneaking suspicion that if Grogar had offered up an artificial siren gem as a bargaining chip, that might have bought Catrina’s assistance in the short term. She couldn’t see Catrina’s Hollow hole, currently, to confirm whether or not the woman bore such a gem. Catrina was wearing an even more stylized and flowing set of voluminous, white silk toga robes than what she’d had on when Adagio had first met her, the fabric all but clinging to Catrina’s curvaceous form. Catrina was casually carrying the war fan that was her Zanpaktou in her right hand, fanning herself as she observed Adagio and her company with keen green eyes. That look betrayed no real hostility on Catrina’s part, just a vague distaste for their surroundings and a curious interest in the proceedings.
As for Grogar, the wretched old bastard looked disgustingly pleased with himself, and it immediately made Adagio want to just give in to her own instinct to blast his face off with a Cero, despite her more refined intuition telling her what a spectacularly bad idea that would be.
Play for time, start talking, work out a plan on the fly. Adagio’s main priority was getting herself, Thorax, and Fenice out of here alive and back to her territory.
“No time at all?” she said, repeating Grogar’s last phrase with an air of mock surprise, “Don’t be so dramatic, old goat. I sincerely doubt Lord Tirek sent you down here to kill me, especially when we’re on the cusp of invading another world. He’d want every Espada he can get for that.”
Grogar’s smirk only deepened, his two cybernetic monstrosities flanking him like ugly, silent statues. “You presume much, as you always have tended to, my dear former experiment. Tirek may not desire your loss, but he won’t lift a finger if you prove to be an issue in need of dealing with. My words were in reference to the fact that the invasion has already begun, with Chrysalis doing what that simple minded maniac does best, blood and slaughter. I’m simply here to ensure you don’t interfere with that.”
Catrina cleared her throat, casting an annoyed glance at him, “Do not ignore my presence. You all but begged for my assistance.”
Grogar’s jaw tightened, “I did no such thing. I merely asked if you’d be interested in bringing Adagio to heel and you were all too eager for the opportunity to take out your frustrations towards Chrysalis on a lesser Espada who reminds you of her.”
This earned a throaty chuckle from Thorax, “Oh Spirit Queen preserve us, Adagio shouldn’t remind anyone of my mother. Nowhere near the same body count.”
Fenice frowned slightly, “I dunno. Di Roy told me the story of how she became a Vasto Lorde. Sounded like a real Chrysalis move to me, what she did to those Hollows in the Forest of Gillians.”
“Setting aside that disturbing comparison,” Adagio said, focusing on Catrina, “The only reason you’d need to ‘bring me to heel’ is if I decided to try to turn on Lord Tirek right here and now. Which I don’t intend to do-” Just yet. “-as I am not suicidal. What reason do I have to even care that Chrysalis and her army is now in Equestria?”
She was glad she kept her voice steady, because honestly she was filled to the brim with anxiety. Chrysalis by herself, when forced into clandestine action due to working with Starlight Glimmer was one thing, and bad enough besides! But to have Chrysalis off the leash? With her whole horde at her side? That thought alone was nightmare inducing. Adagio was, admittedly, mostly fearful for the safety of her two sisters, but it wasn’t as if she was a heartless monster who couldn’t fathom the utter horror Chrysalis and her ilk could be visiting upon innocent Equestrians in the near future.
Granted she’d already known things were going this way, what with Tirek’s plans for invasion, but Adagio had been hoping to get her own forces together enough to possibly counter that at the right moment. As things stood, she wasn’t ready. At least, not as ready as she’d like. She’d sent Di Roy out earlier on an important task the moment she’d felt that time was no longer on her side, but couldn’t guess if he’d had enough time to do as she’d asked yet.
Grogar, much as she hated him, was astute and familiar enough with her to read her even through her forced mask of calm. “You have reason enough, Adagio Dazzle. You still care for your mortal family members who fled to that realm. You detest the idea of participating in wholesale slaughter of mortal souls. You certainly have no intention of aiding Lord Tirek in any earnest manner upon the launching of our full scale invasion. Indeed, I know you will do all you can to stop us, at that point. Tirek has indulged you out of his own perverse desire to be challenged, but I see no reason to wait for you to decide when and how to enact your betrayal. You’ve outlived any use I still had for you, now that I’ve largely perfected your siren gem, and found an even greater source of power to replace it. If you surrender to me, I shall install safety measures in you to keep you... loyal from now on. I will even give my word that you can keep your pet vassals, unharmed and free from any of my further attentions.”
“Such a generous megalomaniac,” Thorax drawled, “Truly, my heart is touched by such a sterling offer; become a slave again and maybe I won’t kill your subjects. Adagio, how can you refuse?”
“Can the sarcasm, Thorax, unless you find a way to weaponize it to annihilate my enemies for me,” Adagio replied dryly, and Thorax actually scratched his chin in thought.
“Hah, if only I could harness my sarcastic wit to empower a Cero. Cero Sarcastica?”
Fenice cleared her throat, “Guys, joking aside, we got a play here? Fight it out? I’m game for fighting it out.”
Catrina’s gaze shifted to the girl, one delicately elegant eyebrow raising in interest, “Just what makes you think that you have a chance against me? Also, what in the world happened to your appearance? Actually, scratch that, who are you, exactly?”
“Feni-”
“Oh I didn’t actually want you to answer, I was just musing aloud. Unimportant people don’t qualify as worthy of my attention.”
Fenice’s hands clenched around her swords, head tilting a bit as if hearing something the viking blade was saying, “Yeah, Tyr, I’m thinking I’d like to gag her, too.”
Catrina ignored Fenice’s comment and, snapping her war fan out in a provocative gesture, eyed up Adagio and Thorax, “Charming as this conversation is becoming, the reality is that your only real options are to either accept Grogar’s new leash, or be dealt with in a more permanent fashion. I’d suggest taking his offer, as its the best chance you have of survival right now.”
“I’m surprised you’re even willing to play lackey to this withered sleaze,” Adagio said, not bothering to hide an iota of her disdain for Grogar, “Or do anything that even indirectly benefits Chrysalis. What are you getting out of this, Catrina? It must be something more valuable than just the opportunity to vent your frustrations at not being able to deal with Chrysalis.”
The feline cast to Catrina’s features grew more poignant as she flashed a slightly fanged smile, “You’d be surprised just how far that alone will please me, Adagio Dazzle. You have a similar cocky attitude and think yourself far more clever than you are. But I suppose it is true that I wouldn’t lift a finger for Grogar if there wasn’t a significantly tastier bit of incentive on the table. However I have no reason to tell you what that is, do I?”
“Perhaps not,” Adagio said, “Yet whatever he’s offering, can you be certain I cannot match or beat it?”
Grogar snorted, “Enough of this idle prattle. Catrina, deal with her, and I’ll subdue Chrysalis’ progeny and the human. I could use the later for study, given her hybrid metamorphosis.”
Catrina’s nose wrinkled, “Ew, is that what she is? Well whatever, not my concern. I’m more interesting in what Adagio’s counter offer might be.”
“Catrina...” Gorgar growled in a low warning, but she waved her hand at him with a high tilt of her chin.
“Don’t take that tone with me. I am here of my own volition, not your orders, Ninth Espada. You’ve made me a tempting offer, but perhaps Dazzle has something better in mind.”
“She does not,” Grogar stated, “That I can assure you. She’s a desperate schemer, not a visionary nor a worker of evolutionary miracles, Catrina. Only I have the means to grant you your desire to surpass Chrysalis.”
“Hah,” Adagio laughed, “So that’s it, then? You’ve put some manner of overpowering Chrysalis on the table? What, another version of my siren gem? Cybernetic implants?”
Catrina made a disgusted noise, “Please, I would never pervert my own beauty by allowing Grogar to alter my form in such a manner.”
“More’s the pity, I could improve you in countless ways,” Grogar said under his breath, which only made Catrina’s nauseated look deepen.
“No. Several thousand times over, no. But what Grogar has offered is that I shall be first in line to be gifted the apotheosis he seeks to achieve that has eluded our kind for eons. A legend few even still know of, let alone dream of. The Seguna-”
“-Etapa, yes, I’ve heard of it,” Adagio cut her off, timing it well so her own self-assured tone struck with maximum impact. “And you really think if he could pull that off that he wouldn’t do it to himself first, and keep the power for himself? What good is his promise, exactly?”
Catrina’s eyes flickered with a cloud of doubt, but her haughtiness and clear hunger to have any way to surpass and destroy Chrysalis flashed brighter a moment later, “Better than nothing, when I’ve no other means to possibly put an end to that arrogant harlot. Grogar has no loyalty to her, and has assured me his latest creation is near ready to push a Hollow to that fabled stage of power. Even if he uses it on himself first, I can live with that, as long as he still grants me the same power so I can finally be rid of Chrysalis and take my proper place at Tirek’s right hand.”
There was a long, bitter desperation in Catrina’s tone that told Adagio that this was a matter that had festered inside the Third Espada for entirely too many centuries. Granted, Adagio could relate. She’d been dealing with Chrysalis for a few months and that had been more than enough for her to feel like the world would be an infinitely better place without that madwoman in it. Catrina had been living in Chrysalis' shadow for hundreds upon hundreds of years, with never any realistic chance of dealing with her. Perhaps even the small, fragile strand of hope that Grogar’s offer represented was enough to get Catrina to do his bidding, despite her pride and the vast difference in their strength.
And worse, Adagio really didn’t have a way to beat that offer. The captured research from Grogar’s lab gave her a baseline idea of how much power might be needed to reach Segunda Etapa, but she didn’t possess any such means yet. It sounded like Grogar had gotten ahold of something that might do the trick, which was a horrifying thought on its own, and only made it seem more important that she take him down soon.
But could she even hope to pull it off here, now? Not with Catrina in the way. Much as Adagio knew she’d gotten stronger since ingesting her portion of the Seed, she doubted it was enough to go toe-to-toe with the Third Espada on even terms. Even if she could, that still left Thorax and Fenice to face Grogar, his escort of cybernetic bio-warriors, and Catrina’s small entourage of unusual Arrancar Bushwoolies.
A stand up fight here would not end well for her, and Adagio knew it. So what were her other options? She’d run out of ways to stall, and unfortunately had no real offer that would appeal to Catrina more than what Grogar had put up. That left only one real choice; retreat. Of course the exit was blocked by their enemy, and Catrina was well known as the fastest of the Espada. Not ideal. But Adagio wasn’t without a surprise card or two left in her proverbial deck.
“Well,” she said, “Sadly I must confess I can’t offer you an easy, guaranteed way to off Chrysalis for good, Catrina.”
“Don't sound that disappointed about it,” Thorax said half-jokingly, “I’m still fond on my mother, her glaring personality flaws notwithstanding.”
Adagio gave him a rueful sidelong look, then turned back to Catrina, “That being said, any gift or reward from Grogar is poison, even if it gives you the power you seek. I don’t expect that to sway you, but as someone who knows what it feels like to live with humiliation to the point of wanting to take any chance at power to escape it... you can do better than accepting the old goat’s poison fruit.”
Catrina paused for a moment, face oddly still, before she said slowly, “Perhaps had you shown up a century or two earlier... but now? I’ll take my chances, any I can get my claws on.”
Adagio nodded, and said, somewhat sadly, “I figured as much,” and she then proceeded to thrust her trident forward and upon each tip charged up a gleaming ruby sphere of energy, and discharged three Ceros in unison straight at Grogar and Catrina both.
----------
Being a spirit of chaos wasn’t always fun and games, but Discord seemed to recall a one hundred percent lesser rate of himself being stabbed and incarcerated before he’d switched to the “good guy” side of the tracks. Sure, he’d been imprisoned in stone for a thousand or so years, but at least Celestia and Luna hadn't impaled him with an anti-magic shaft of metal, first. Pain kind of lost its flavor after languishing in it for... how many days had it been now? Not that many, but enough that Discord was more than fed up with his present circumstances.
How long had it been since that Sombra chap had shown up and then jetted off with promises of bringing help? Long enough that Discord had the distinct feeling something had gone wrong.
His next clue that the status was no longer quo was when the walls of his prison chamber shuddered with the distinct rumble of a distant explosion. The impaled draconequus frowned, still floating in the same field of energy he’d been imprisoned in since being dragged here. His nose twitched. Chaos was ensuing somewhere nearby. He could smell it, even if he didn’t have the next rumbling shudder of a detonation to clue him in.
Had Sombra actually gotten through back to Canterlot, then? Were the Princesses charging in like meteoric, celestial cavalry? Discord might very well kiss Princess Celestia if she managed to trot through the doors to his prison cell and bust him out of here, not that she’d at all appreciate the gesture, but imagining the look on her face would be part of the fun!
However all Discord felt was disappointment when the doors to the chamber did open and who stumbled in was a frantic, tattered looking Trixie. He could tell it wasn’t Equestria’s version of the eccentric magician, for hobbling in right behind Trixie was the tall and darkly armored figure of Eisenwald, the Bount’s Doll.
“Watch the hall!” Trixie commanded her Doll, and scrambled towards Discord’s cage of hovering spirit energy. She looked injured, bearing a cut along her flank and a scrap on her brow, both oozing blood.
“I take it you’re all not having a rowdy party upstairs, hmm?” Discord quipped, wondering at the situation. It could still be the Princesses and a rescue party charging in to save the day, but Discord’s gut told him otherwise. The Bount Trixie looked terrified in a way that didn’t bespeak of the Princesses’ usual non-lethal tactics, and that wound on her flank looked like it came from a sword, which to Discord’s knowledge wasn’t a weapon any of them favored.
That and, much as the anti-magic javelin in his gut shut off his access to his chaos powers, his magical senses weren’t completely dull. He wasn’t sensing any magic use up above, despite the occasional rumble and shake signaling more explosions in the upper levels of Hitsuyo-Aku.
At his query, Trixie shot a fearful look of heavy breathing, practically tripping over her own words, “She’s turned on us! Chrysalis! Her Arrancar are rampaging everywhere, slaughtering the Reigai.”
“How sad for you,” Discord said without a trace of sympathy, “Who could have predicted the murderous psychopath was an untrustworthy ally? This will go down as one of the top ten anime betrayals in history.”
“Anime!? What!?” Trixie the Bount blinked in stupefied confusion, causing Discord to sigh.
“Nevermind. Pinkie would’ve gotten the joke. At any rate, Starlight’s pet monster is doing as monsters do and sounds like the rest of you are in a terrible spot of trouble. If only I had my popcorn handy.”
“Don’t you understand, you asymmetrical asshole!? If Chrysalis has turned against Starlight, that means she’s got no reason to care about keeping you alive!” Trixie said, in a burst of intensity that did manage to crack through Discord’s smug exterior to make him realize that... well, yes, she had a point. He frowned, looking down at the panicked Bount.
“That is a pickle. I take it you’re here to make me an offer I can’t refuse? At least not if I want to avoid being murderized by the aforementioned murder hobo dancing a bloody swath through her former allies presently?”
“Yes! That!” Trixie said, raising a hoof towards him, “If I let you out, pull that javelin from your body, and get you back your chaos magic... you swear you get me, Firefly, and anyone else left alive around here that ain’t Chrysalis and her goons and take us to safety.”
His eyes nearly flashed red, his face creasing in a snaggle toothed grin that would unsettle even the most stalwart of souls, and remind any looking at him that no matter that he’d turned over a new leaf... Discord was still very much a spirit of chaos, and not always the nice, clean, PG variety.
“Take this cursed rod out of me and sure, I’ll keep you and yours safe. Right after I’m finished redecorating the interior of this place with the still living but highly separated body parts of every Arrancar I come across. There aren’t any left around here you care about, right?”
“I... uh...” Trixie seemed to think about it, “I don’t think so? All of them are Chrysalis’, so, sure, go ham.”
“Mistress, I sense danger approaching. Be quick,” Eisenwald said, and Trixie gulped, reaching for the controls of Discord’s spiritual cage. He watched with thirsty eyes, all but salivating at the prospect of freedom and the return of his magic so he could unleash some unholy chaos on somebody.
But then there was a breeze, and a shadow of motion, followed by Trixie making a distinct ‘urk’ noise as a curved blade rose up under her chin and a onyx hand caressed her mane. Chrysalis, having slipped right past Eisenwald with a Sonido, now leaned down over Trixie, her macabre face spread in a pleasant smile, her voice sweet as poisoned honey.
“Hello Trixie. Were you about to release the neigh all powerful chaos god to come after me?”
“Aaah... aaah... n-no?” Trixie said slowly. Chrysalis’ smile turned sharper and she patted Trixie’s cheek.
“Now, now, if you’re going to lie, at least put some effort into it,” Chrysalis said, and while she took her blade away from Trixie’s throat, she instantly gripped the Bount by the back of her head an slammed Trixie’s face into the floor hard enough to crack stone.
“Mistress!” Eisenwand flared his metal wings and flew towards Chrysalis, forming his lance of iron from the metallic mist of his mane. He thrust the lance in a powerful streak at Chrysalis’ head, but she didn’t even look up to bat the attack aside with her Zanpaktou, still kneeling over Trixie as she kept the Bount’s head pressed to the ground.
Eisenwand flew up and around, lashing with his tail of metal mist, slicing with it’s edge of iron fragments. Chrysalis allowed the attack to hit her this time, almost seeming to enjoy the laceration that appeared across her back as she let out a pleased noise. The wound closed all but instantly, and Chrysalis stood up, dragging a dazed and bloody faced Trixie with her. Trixie struggled, trying to pry her head free of Chrysalis’ grip, but Chrysalis just proceeded to ram her knee up into Trixie’s gut with so much force the indent of the blow appeared on Trixie’s back. Spit and blood spat out from Trixie’s mouth as her body went limp, stunned.
Eisenwand’s metal wings flapped as he readied himself to charge again, lance poised, but Chrysalis just held Trixie forth, dangling from her hand by the head. “Down, Doll. Unless you want to see what it looks like to have your Mistress’ head popped off like a champagne cork.”
“Fiendish wench...” Eisenwald said, slowly settling back to the floor, his ruby gem eyes flashing in anger at her. Chrysalis simply kept smiling.
“Flatter me harder, I might decide to keep you. As it stands, consider yourself fortunate that I think your cute little ‘Mistress’ will make a fine toy for a while. I want a little leverage, in case Glimmer eventually crawls out of whatever trouble she landed herself in. Now... sit boy,” she dangled Trixie at Eisenwald like one might shake a chew toy at a dog. Eisenwald growled, but slowly sat on his haunches, subdued.
Chuckling at the sight, Chrysalis turned around to face Discord, eyeing the draconequus up like a hungry restaurant goer looking at a prize steak, freshly served. “Now I don’t believe we’ve had the unique pleasure, Discord of this delightful realm.”
“I could go another millennia without the ‘pleasure’, vastly inferior version of our world’s Chrysalis,” Discord said, to which Chrysalis’ laughed like a rusty razor, eyes filled with dreadful hunger.
“Oh, I’ll bite at the bait. Just what makes me ‘inferior’ to that sad, weak willed, broken little husk of a woman? I’m dying to hear your evaluation, oh mighty chaos spirit.”
Discord’s lips twisted in a dreadful parody of a smirk, “She’s as you say, I won’t deny. Wasted her whole life wretchedly stealing love that could have been freely given instead. Brutalized her entire host of progeny into being just as callous and short sighted as she was. Never once gave a second thought to those she hurt in her pursuit of personal gain. All that having been said...”
Discord chuckled and shook his head, “I was never any better. Worse, even, if I get honest with myself. At least Chrysalis’ victims were usually unconscious for most of the love draining, and could recover afterward. I tortured my victims and took their free will, forcing them into whatever living nightmare I felt was most fun for me. I didn’t do it due to some internal hunger, like Chrysalis was unfortunate enough to be born with. I did it because I liked it. And a part of me still does. Chaos will always be a part of me. I’m only a ‘good guy’ now because one very special, and stubborn mare decided to not give up on changing my perspective.”
“Yawn. Is this going anywhere? I’ve places to burn, souls to eat, yours included,” Chrysalis said, to which Discord only chuckled again.
“By all means I invite you to try. I’m a spicy meatball, I’ll warn you. As to my point, it’s simply that wretched as our world’s Chrysalis is, she still has something you completely lack.”
“A loving family? Personal standards? A functional spine? Actual power?”
Discord looked her in the eyes, voice deadpan, “The possibility to choose differently.”
Chrysalis stared back at him for a long, slow moment, then licked her lips with an unamused frown as her emerald eyes narrowed. Like tossing aside a grain sack she chucked Trixie across the room, and hopped right up in front of Discord. She all but ripped aside the spiritual cage separating them, ignoring Eisenwand cautiously moving to Trixie’s side behind her.
“Possibility to choose, hm? I have no need for that. I know who and what I am, and will always be so. That’s what makes me strong,” Chrysalis said, grabbing Discord by the head with one hand while pressing her Zanpaktou against his chest with the other, “That’s what makes me better than feckless trash like her. Where is she, by the by? I was looking forward to ending her personally, but she doesn’t seem to be around.”
“How would I know? I’ve just been hanging around down here. I’ve hardly gotten any social calls,” Discord replied, and wrinkled his nose, “And could you back off a bit? Your breath reeks.”
“Should I remove your nose so you have nothing to complain about?” Chrysalis replied sweetly, and proceeded to move like a lunging snake. Discord felt a rip of unimaginable, searing pain that dug into his very essence as the Espada’s teeth, suddenly sharp as knives, sank into his collarbone. He choked down a scream, unable to do more than twitch under the restraints of his cage of spiritual energy. However he didn’t have to do anything, as a moment later Chrysalis leaped off him, making a soft gagging sound. Discord’s blood dripped from her lips, alongside strands of chaotically glitching strands of ichor that pulsated with shades of negative color.
Chrysalis licked her lips, blood staining her chin as her eyes shifted from sharp to dazed as she tried to digest the chaos energy she’d just eaten from Discord’s very soul, and from the way her skin itself seemed to twitch and shift, the meal didn’t wholly agree with her. Even so, her mouth formed a rictus grin, “Pfawah... you’re right, you’re quite the sizzling spicy meal. It might take me dozens of licks to get to the center of your Tootsie Pop.”
“I have never heard a more dated yet still disturbing way of describing what just happened,” Discord groaned, only able to take some satisfaction in the fact that trying to eat his essence wasn’t something Chrysalis could do without serious discomfort, “I am going to take an immeasurable amount of pleasure from watching the Princesses put an end to you, presuming I don’t get the opportunity to do it myself.”
“Ah ah ah, no cutting the line, although I very much enjoy your vibe right now, Discord. You’re... more fun than your human counterpart. He’s trying so hard to be the atoner, whereas I get the impression you care a lot less about what other people think of you,” Chrysalis said as she turned away from him and put her attention on Trixie and Eisenwand. The Bount’s Doll had gotten her up onto her hooves, but Trixie still looked dazed from the beating she’d taken.
“Now, since I can’t chow down on the chaotic dessert I’d been hoping for, I suppose the pair of you might do as a chaser. Assuming you don’t want to tell me where my microscopic minded mimic is?” Chrysalis said, stepping towards the pair with an air of graceful menace. Eisenwand moved to proactively place himself between her and Trixie, to which Chrysalis just chuckled, “Oh please, even I get tired of kicking puppies, Doll.”
“Eisenwand... it’s okay...” Trixie said, laying a hoof on her Doll’s iron shoulder and forcing herself to step forward, hobbling and looking at Chrysalis with clear fear, “Even if we told you where she is, what guarantee do we have you’d let us go? None.”
Chrysalis smiled with the glow of real mirth as she ran a finger along the edge of her Zanpaktou, “Accurate. Not that I was putting letting you go on the table, little Bount. We’re just discussing whether you get to live for a time longer, in which case your savior Starlight Glimmer might come and save you... or I just end you here and you never see her again. I wonder if she’d even mourn you? You do realize you were little more than a convenient tool for her, right?”
Trixie shook her head, “I’m not listening to your poisonous bullshit. Starlight is on a different level than your self-absorbed, hedonistic, psychopathic crap. You were the tool, here, Chrysalis. And you’re an idiot if you think Starlight didn’t anticipate you’d turn on us, eventually. When she returns, she’ll deal with you.”
Chrysalis threw her head back and her rich laughter filled the room, “If you say so. Far be it for me to keep a foolish girl from her delusions. Just remember, I met Starlight Glimmer long before you did, and know her better than you think. Whatever connections she has, genuine or not, they are still sacrificial tokens for the purpose of fulfilling her goal. Very task oriented, with a darker soul than she believes herself to have. I’m not concerned with her response to what I’m doing here, especially if everyone goes like I’m predicting it will...”
“What does that mean-” Trixie began to say, but Chrysalis’ foot lashed out with the speed of a whipping bolt of lightning and caught Trixie in the chin, all but punting her into the wall.
Eisenwand let out a chest rumbling growl and hammered his lance of iron at Chrysalis’ heart, but she caught the weapon by the tip with her free hand, stopping it dead, “From what I recall, a Bount dies if their Doll dies. I’d still like to play with your ‘Mistress’, so I suppose I’ll just have to settle for tearing your legs and wings off for now.”
“E...Eisenwand... return...” Trixie breathed, barely conscious as she struggled to crawl her legs back under her. Eisenwand’s body responded by dissolving into a swirl of iron mist, flowing back into the Bount Crest glowing red upon Trixie’s hat, which miraculously was still somehow on her head. Chrysalis pouted slightly, placing her hand on her hip.
“Boo. I was just getting warmed up. Oh well, plenty of other playmates running around. I sense Firefly’s reiatsu out in the desert, alongside another of those Reigai. The Reigai aren’t very fun as targets, what with the lack of actual blood, internal organs, and their artificial souls just taste bland to me, but eh, what can you do?”
Chrysalis snapped her fingers and a quartet of her drone children appeared in the room in flickers of Sonido, bowing to her. Chrysalis gestured to them, “Two of you, stay here and keep an eye on the floating chaos noodle,” she nodded at Discord, “The other two, pick up that-” she pointed at Trixie, “-and deposit her in another cell. Oh, and take the hat and stuff it in a box somewhere, so she can’t summon her Doll.”
“On it, mother!” the Arrancar drones almost all said in unison, and proceeded to follow their instructions, two of the moving to stand guard flanking Discord’s cage, while the other pair took Trixie’s hat and picked up the barely conscious Bount to be dragged out of the room.
“Is the building secure of those pesky Reigai?” Chrysalis asked one of the Arrancar now standing guard beside Discord. The Arrancar in question, a female with an almost reverent look on her face to be spoken to by Chrysalis, gulped and shook her head.
“Not entirely, mother. Most of the weaker ones are destroyed, but several escaped outside with the help of the ones named Starswirl and Redheart. We did manage to wound them both, however, and we don’t think they’ve gotten far, but the desert outside the canyon is very big...”
“Ah, more fun for me, then,” Chrysalis said, “I’ll send a few more of your brothers and sisters to help you watch this one. Don’t speak to him, even if he speaks to you. If he so much as twitches in a way that seems suspicious, you have my permission to kill him. I’d like him alive to keep nibbling on, but I’d like him even more dead if he turns out to be a problem.”
Discord could hear the clear note of truth in her tone that said she wasn’t joking around, either. The only reason he was still alive was because she couldn’t fully or easily eat his chaotic soul, filled to the brim with raw chaos magic. If he caused a hint of trouble, this Chrysalis wouldn’t hesitate to kill him.
“Oh,” Chrysalis said as she turned to head for the exit, “I don’t suppose any of you saw Ocellus around? I can’t sense her reiatsu nearby.”
“No, mother,” the two guards shook their heads, “We haven’t seen or felt our trueborn sister anywhere.”
Chrysalis’ face darkened with a frown, but soon brightened, “Come to think of it, Platinum and her little brat aren’t here either. If Ocellus is also missing... ah, I think I see now. They must have all gone somewhere together. I’ll find out, soon enough. I can track Ocellus’ reiatsu over a distance, given time.”
That gave Discord a cold shiver in his spine. While he hadn’t been keen on all the details, he’d heard enough earlier to gather that his world’s Chrysalis had gone to her hive on some undercover mission. Which meant if this Chrysalis could track one of her spawn who may presumably be there as well... Discord did not want to think about what might happen.
After Chrysalis had left, he eyed his two guards, wondering if he should try his luck. “Soooo... either of you know how to play Eye Spy?”
The looks he got were not friendly ones, and one of the Arrancar already had their Zanpaktou out as if trying to decide if Discord even trying to speak constituted enough reason to split him open. So, talking was definitely a no-go. However, his eyes alighted upon something, and his eyes practically glowed.
His blood.
When Chrysalis had tried to feed on him, she’d gotten his blood on her mouth, and a few drops had spattered onto the floor of the room. Just a couple of drops, utterly innocuous. Chrysalis probably hadn’t paid the blood so much as a first thought, let alone a second one.
After all, blood was just blood to most people. Inert and rather incapable of being useful once outside the body. But in Discord’s case, his blood was, like any other part of his body, utterly suffused with the pure power of chaos. And those few droplets were now outside his body, and hence no longer in contact with the anti-magic javelin still burning a painful hole in his gut.
He had to be careful, however. Those few, small drops of blood contained only a flicker of his chaos magic, and with it no longer directly attached to him even Discord would have difficulty controlling it. Chaos didn’t like to be controlled on the best of days. There was just barely enough magic in the droplets of his blood that he wouldn’t be able to pull off anything big. No instantly turning every Arrancar in the fortress into dalmatians or somesuch. No convenient teleportation into Celestia’s lap with a fresh cup of tea on offer for the Equestrian monarch. He wouldn’t even be able to make his prison vanish, or remove the pair of murderous, sword happy guards from around him.
But he could certainly do something.
He just had to think about it awhile and work out what.
----------
The game of cat and mouse had been going on for laboriously long. Sombra felt like he was at the end of his tether at this point. He was miles into the Bone Dry Desert, well away from Hitsuyo-Aku by now, but rather than being able to make a clean escape as the evening wore on and the shadows between the sand dunes lengthened, he only found the noose tightening around his neck.
Firefly and Zecora were relentless in their pursuit of him, and had the skill set necessary to make what should have been an easy task of shadow melding out of this place into a desperate contest of patience and attempts at misdirection.
Zecora and Firefly were working expertly together, with Firefly soaring high in the sky to survey and terrain and relay information to Zecora, who in turn was using her Zanpaktou’s ability to sweep each shadow of every dune to trace Sombra’s movements. With Kido she would erect wards that would box him in and block his ability to just rapidly dart from shadow to shadow. Wards he could break through with effort, but doing so meant alerting Firefly high above, and ensuring both she and Zecora would be on his position within moments. So he’d have to hide again, doing all he could to avoid Zecora’s deadly accurate Zanpaktou until he started to lose them again, but then Zecora would just throw up another ward or two, like a fisherman casting a wide net over a sandy sea, and the dance would start all over again.
Several times Sombra had tried to fake them out by breaking the ward in one direction, then switching to rushing towards the opposite side, but credit where it was due, Zecora was disturbingly good at guessing when he’d do that, and even when he did manage to fake her out, there was no fooling Firefly who had the literal bird’s eye view of everything and could sense his magic use even when he dove into shadow.
He was making a slow kind of progress across the desert, but nowhere near enough to make good on an escape. His only real hope now was that full nightfall would give him enough of an edge to get away, but as he rested within the shadows of a small dune near the east side of one of the fresh warded areas Zecora had put up, he saw that she was also rapidly making use of additional Kido to float what looked to be hundreds of those blasted lanterns into the air... all in anticipation of lighting up the area once the sun fully set.
He’d have to try to deal with the lanterns all at once to have a chance. Perhaps if he conjured enough shadow to canopy of sorts that’d block all of the lantern light? But that would take too long, giving Zecora and Firefly too much time to zero in on him. As he pondered what to do, he sensed Zecora nearby, her form flickering into view atop a sand dune across from the one he was using to hide. He tensed, ready to bolt for a new shadow to try and lose her the moment she would spot him, but right before her eyes settled in his direction. Zecora’s eyes widened and she snapped around to look back in the direction of the canyon several miles behind them. She looked confused and fearful, which immediately confused Sombra.
What was she sensing that’d cause such a sudden change in expression? He then heard the roar of air as Firefly flew down in a shattering of the sound barrier, landing right next to Zecora after having dive bombed out of the sky. The human didn’t look any more relaxed than her Reigai companion.
“You feeling it, too?” Firefly said, to which Zecora gave a shallow, pale faced nod.
“Hollows. Far too many. An entire horde of them, spreading out from Hitsuyo-Aku! And my people, their reiatsu is fading one after another!”
Zecora moved as if to leap towards the distant canyon, but Firefly caught her arm, shaking her head, “Hold on, don’t rush in. We got to assess first. If this is Chrysalis pulling a damn backstab, neither of us can take her alone. We need Starswirl, if he’s still alive, and preferably we face her three on one. Hell, why’s she pulling this crap now of all times?”
“I neither know nor care, but though my life may be an artificial one, I still have a duty to protect my people,” Zecora said, pulling her arm away from Firefly, “Follow me if you must, but I am going.”
Sombra listened in from his hiding spot, mind whirling. What was happening? He couldn’t sense spirit energy the way these two could, but it was clear they were feeling some sort of conflict occurring back at their base. Chrysalis was betraying them? Which one? Well, given the talk of Hollows, it had to be the Espada from the human world. And if they were talking about a horde of Hollows emerging at their base, that spelled serious trouble for all of Equestria. Sombra considered that his best bet right now was to lay low and see if Firefly and Zecora would abandon their chase of him, which would give him the chance to flee and make haste back to Canterlot.
The Princesses would need to know what was happening here, especially if there was now an entire army of dangerous Hollows flooding into the world.
Before he could make any further decisions, however, Firefly said, “Hold up... you feel that? It’s Starswirl’s reiatsu. I think that’s your Lieutenant's as well.”
Zecora’s eyes close for a moment, her tension remaining despite a small, relieved smile, “Yes, that’s Redheart. They’re fleeing... southward. But there’s so few others with them. Did no one else make it? And I sense some of Chrysalis’ horde pursuing them.”
“Damn, I’m not sensing Trixie’s reiatsu either, or her Doll’s,” Firefly murmured with genuine worry coating her tone, “And holy crap is that a lot of Arrancar. Feels like they’re rushing out in all directions. Did Chrysalis bring her entire horde here? How? No way the Cross Gate had enough juice left to portal in that many...”
“Oh, you know how it is, where there’s a will and all that jazz. I’ve given my children free reign to go enjoy themselves all across Equestria, and before long all of Las Noches will be joining in. Wholesome family fun to be had by all.”
This new voice was unmistakable as Chrysalis, silhouetted by the setting sun, appeared in the air above them and made a show of slowly descending towards the ground to land lightly on her feet no more than a dozen paces from Zecora and Firefly. There was a faint breeze of air, as if the wind was catching up with the speed at which Chrysalis had arrived.
“Shit... fast much?” Firefly breathed, eyes narrowing at Chrysalis, who just grinned back and tapped the number ‘2’ tattooed in white at the base of her throat.
“Segunda Espada, honey. I may not quite match Catrina’s silly levels of speed focus, but crossing a couple of miles in an eyeblink is still child’s play. Really, you two should have started running the moment you realized what was happening, instead of standing around talking about it like a pair of nitwits. Not that running would have done you much good, but it might have made this more fun for me.”
Firefly let out a ragged groan, readying the long barrel of her hexagon shaped canon, the wings of her Fullbring flaring up with intense violet energies and her Dragoon bits floating with focused intensity at her side, “You play’d ball with us this long, Chrysalis, and sure, me an Starlight knew you’d eventually go feral on us, but why do it now? You could have turned the moment Starlight went missing, if that was your only reason. There’s got to be something else going on here.”
Chrysalis smiled and raised a waving, dismissive hand, “Does there? Does there really? Well you’re not entirely wrong, just mostly wrong. I was just as likely to do this even when Starlight was around, really, if the whim took me strongly enough. But different as I and Starlight are, we share one very important thing in common; we’ll both do whatever it takes to fulfill our heart’s desire. It just so happens that while once my path to that desire meant playing nice with all of you, now... not so much. And, hey, extra benefit for me, this means as soon as I find where my counterpart went I can take a long, slow, vastly enjoyable time torturing her emotionally, mentally, and physically until she begs me to end her miserable existence. It’s going to be epically therapeutic for me, let me tell you.”
Firefly’s eyebrow twitched a little, her expression cold as the sand beneath her hooves, “Is Trixie still alive?”
“Maaaaaybe,” Chrysalis teased, “Killing her would be a bit like putting down a particularly dumb, sappy puppy dog. Which, honestly, may be tacky even by my standards.”
“Somehow the term ‘standards’ doesn’t really go in the same sentence as you, Chrysalis,” Firefly said, an she side eyed Zecora, “Hey, if I buy you time, think you can catch up with your Reigai pals?”
Zecora blink in surprise, “I might, but I thought we should fight her together. Both of us.”
“No way we can both escape,” Firefly said with a sigh, “And since it was me and Starlight that brought Chrysalis here in the first place, it’s only fitting I... take the L and clean up my own mess. No reason you Reigai should pay any more for something that isn’t your fault.”
Indecision played across Zecora’s features, her Zanpaktou raised, “I was made to be stronger than my original... perhaps the two of us will be enough.”
“Look, I appreciate the sentiment, but I don’t think the two of us can handle her if she goes all out,” Firefly said, to which Chrysalis nodded agreement.
“You really can’t, but I’m all for the spectacle of you trying. I backed down in the Crystal Empire only because it wasn’t worth it after I’d already had my fun with this realm’s delightful Cadence. But I’m feeling quite a bit more frisky today, so no, I doubt the two of you can take me.”
Sombra wasn’t at all certain he was making the right choice as he emerged from the shadows of the sand dunes, shadows that grew larger as the sun fell ever more to the horizon, lengthening the dusk shades across the desert. Perhaps it was simply that, as night drew closer and the power of darkness rose within him, Sombra felt more confident. Or perhaps it was simply that while it would have been easy to vanish into the night and leave his two pursuers to face a monster alone... that wasn’t the kind of thing that sat well with the pony Sombra had chosen to be alongside Radiant Hope.
He strode up between a surprised looking Firefly and Zecora, facing Chrysalis with the shadows creeping around his hooves like a rising, black mist.
“Then perhaps three will succeed where two would fail.”
----------
Ironically the hours of twilight were among Twilight Sparkle’s least favorite of the day. It was an awkward time where there weren’t enough hours left in the day to plan for getting anything done, but she couldn’t justify turning in for the night, either. Leisure time, basically, which Twilight had always struggled a little with. Books were her usual, go-to method of solving that problem, and even after becoming a Princess that much hadn’t changed.
What had recently changed was her and her friends literally inheriting super powers from their previous alicorn lives and both her world and the human world next door coming under deadly threat from equally super powered beings. So, leisure time was less a concern these days.
This was why the coming of dusk found Twilight and her friends, plus a rather pleasantly eager Flash Sentry, all sweat soaked and tiredly exiting the Castle of the Two Sisters, deep in the Everfree Forest. Behind them pranced the sandy form of Announcer, somehow putting an unbelievable amount of sunny disposition into a smiling expression literally made solely from san.
“Today’s training session was spectacular, my new best friends!” Announcer said, holding up a hoof and producing from the sands of her own body the image of a sheet of paper she mime checking over, “I calculate that each of you improved on your Combat Potential Ratings in at least two or three categories apiece. Oh, I can’t wait to fine tune the arena some more to provide you with an even more stimulating training experience for tomorrow!”
“Oh my...” Rarity said, running a hoof through her mane and sitting down on the bottom steps of the castle exit, “I appreciate a mare who is enthusiastic about her work, but could you tone it down just a notch, Miss Announcer? Some of us are not used to sweating quite this much.”
“But Miss Rarity, you need to improve your Strength stat the most out of everyone! That’s why I gave your part of the arena such a heavy increase in gravity!”
“Don’t remind me,” Rarity said with a sigh, “I suppose I must praise Princess Celestia and Princess Luna for being so thorough in the capabilities they gave you. Although it is rather unfortunate you can’t leave the castle grounds.”
“Yes, I suppose,” Announcer said, the glowing blue and yellow lights that made up her ‘eyes’ inside her sandmare face looking wistfully at the forest, “It’d be fun to be able to spread the joy of arena battles and training to more ponies in the world.”
Twilight cleared her throat, patting Announcer with one of her wings, “I may be able to help with that one day. Once I have time to examine the enchantments that make up you and the training arena, I’m sure I can work out a way to make you, um... more portable?”
“Could you!? That’d be so wonderful!”
“Be a’ lot more convenient fer us, too,” said Applejack, grinning quite happily as she stretched her legs. The day of hard training had been a lot easier on the already hearty farm mare compared to some of her friends. “Instead o’ havin’ ta pop into an secret underground dungeon, you could just bring the arena ta us. My farm’s got a’ lot o’ space perfect fer this kind o’ hard workin’ exercise.”
Flash Sentry had been hovering alongside Rainbow Dash, still getting a little used to using his wings as a pegasus. The long journey to the Abyss had mostly been about swimming, so he still needed time in the actual air, but by Twilight’s estimate he was improving by leaps and bounds. He lowered himself to the ground next to her, leaning on her a bit as she in turn leaned on him. She tried not to blush too hard at doing so, especially from the knowing looks her friends were giving her. There was no real secret about her and Flash’s present relationship, but that still didn’t mean she was used to being too public about it yet.
“You feeling okay?” Flash asked her, “You seemed kinda out of it a few times during the practice bouts.”
The majority of the afternoon hours had consisted of them all having increasingly intensive sparring matches with one another. Not only did each of them want to become more comfortable with their Inheritor powers, both the ones they could access without transforming and the ones they had in the transformed state, but the practice fights also provided more time to be accustomed to any lingering emotions and memories from their past lives.
Among the participants had also been Princess Cadence, although she’d left a few hours earlier due to wanting to teleport to the Crystal Empire to oversee the reconstruction efforts and spend some personal time with Shining Armor and Flurry Heart.
And Spike was also no longer in Ponyville, which gave Twilight a sense of growing anxiety, even though she’d agreed that he should go with Ember and Torch to search for that mysterious dragon, Nidhogg.
Indeed, Flash was right, she’d been severely distracted during the entire training process. Something deep inside her was agitated beyond belief, telling her that something was wrong. Beyond the already large list of things that she already knew about. Charybdis had already been sent off to Tartarus under guard. Everyone was waiting to hear whether Sombra would contact them again after they’d received his initial warning. Tempest Shadow had the Treasure well situated and crewed by now, parked just outside Ponyville for whenever the airship might be needed. Aria and Sonata were back at Twilight’s castle, resting and keeping careful watch over the Eye of the Sea, and the fragment of their sister Adagio’s soul.
Logic told Twilight all she could do was wait and prepare herself and her friends for whatever came next. Experience told her they’d be ready for anything.
...So why did she continue to have this growing sense of dread taking root in her heart? As if the lengthening shadows of dusk were an ominous omen of what was coming.
“It’s okay, Flash,” she said, nuzzling his neck slightly as she draped a wing over him, and he over her, “Just... jumping at shadows.”
----------
Even a pair of Espada couldn’t simply ignore a trio of simultaneous Ceros fired at them from nearly point blank range, especially considering Adagio herself was an Espada and hardly holding back. Yet even as Catrina, with her supreme speed, moved to easily dodge out of the beam’s path and Grogar gestured to have his two bio-weapon servants shield him with their bodies, something odd happened.
Three Garganta portals opened up in the path of the triple Cero beams, and the beams entered those portals. A mere moment later the entire underground area was rocked by a series of explosions that came from behind Grogar and Catrina, an both of them looked back that direction to see that another trio of Garganta portals had opened up, each one angled towards different portions of the wall where clusters of the spirit energy transferring pipes were built. Huge blasts crater chunks of rock and pipe, and subsequently also blew apart portions of the cell doors holding the Adjuchas prisoners whose energies were being drained to fuel the replica Cross Gate.
“What the-!?” Catrina blinked in shock, “But nobody can make that many Garganta so quickly except... Squirk!?”
Grogar narrowed his eyes at Adagio, who was wearing a smug smile as she flicked her wrist and closed the Garganta she’d created to transfer her Cero beams, an then snapped her fingers. A dozen more Garganta appeared in the air around her of varying sizes, shifting an hovering like open, dark mirrors that were hers to command.
“I got a little more out of Squirk than I think Chrysalis anticipated when she ordered me to kill him,” Adagio said, to which Catrina looked shocked, clearly having not actually known the details of Squirk’s demise. Grogar simply wore an expression of faint irritation, and intrigue, despite himself.
“It seems I’ve underestimated that gem of yours. I knew it could absorb energy, which is what I’ve based all of my replica’s capabilities on, but I wasn’t aware you could consume specific powers. Fascinating. Perhaps I’ll need to keep you alive a little longer to work out how that ability works.”
“You’ll never get the chance,” Adagio said, then swept her trident out again, the flare of a Cero appearing at the middle prong’s tip, “Fenice, Thorax, go through the Garganta now!”
There was no question as to which Garganta she meant, for she had two hover down and float behind each of them an open wide enough for either to slip through. However neither one looked eager to do so.
“What about you!?” Fenice said, and Thorax, forcing a cocky smile onto his face, nodded.
“Indeed, I do hope you’re not planning some horrifically cliché self-sacrifice moment, Adagio. I’d be forced to write a scathing review of such a gross violation of common sense.”
Adagio groaned and snapped, “I can’t go through first, you idiots, because I have to create and target the portals from an origin point! I can keep these two busy for a few seconds while you escape, then follow right behind!”
“Two? You can’t count at all. Bushwoolies, take them!” Catrina commanded, an as one her small squad of fuzzy white balls of fury sprang into action. Adagio had never seen the Bushwoolies do, well, much of anything before, so she’d always wondered just what kind of Hollows they really were. They didn’t appear to be Arrancar, and were almost all physically identical save for minor variations in the shape of their bone white fluff.
Now the horrible little fuzz balls opened up their mouths to expose that over half their bodies were bloody teeth that then crackled and vibrated with crimson Hollow energy as they flew through the air like living cannonballs made of sharp fangs. They went for Fenice and Thorax specifically, flying, furry piranha that moved a lot quicker than Adagio would have imagined possible.
Fenice and Thorax were not slouches, nor caught off guard. Fenice whipped her Phantom Blade in a side arc, causing the gleaming white ban of Gleipnir to snap out in a flash and wrap up one of the Bushwoolies, which she then flicked like a whip into its companion. Adagio, quick to react, shifted one of her Garganta portals to swallow up the pair and spit them out... somewhere random in Hueco Mundo.
Thorax resorted to physical force to defend himself, drawing his Zanpaktou to slam into the mouth of the first Bushwoolie that came at him, while gracefully spinning his whole body around an lashing out in a roundhouse kick with one svelte leg to punt another into the wall like a wooly pinball.
However simple that may have all appeared, however, the distraction was all the time Catrina needed to move with disgusting levels of speed that even Adagio couldn’t catch. There was no following the woman’s emotions. She was simply beside Fenice, and moved her war fan in a blinding sweep, the speed of which creating a brutal blast of raw wind force so powerful that it forced everyone in the room to struggle to maintain their feet for a moment, but Fenice was directly hit and sent flying into the wall with tremendous force.
Adagio swore under her breath and rushed Catrina, sweeping her trident out. Water blossomed into existence around the Third Espada in a series of coiling rings, swiftly rushing in to try and constrain Catrina. If Adagio could just limit her movements-
-Catrina was simply one from amid the coiling rush of water, and Adagio sensed the brief brush of energy as Catrina swept up beside her in a flicker of afterimage.
“Too slow.”
The cutting prongs of Catrina’s war fan cut into Adagio in a spray of blood. Only for that blood to turn into water a second later as ‘Adagio’ burst into a series of water bubbles, and the air shimmered as the real Adagio appeared from a swirl of water whose reflections she was using to hide herself like camouflage while she’d sent her water clone to lure Catrina on. Adagio didn’t bother with a quip and instead rammed her trident right at Catrina’s back, not unlike when she’d stabbed Squirk in the back in the past.
Catrina’s speed, however, was something well and above anything Adagio had ever dealt with before, and what should have been the perfect backstab was thwarted as Catrina flipped up, using one hand to grasp and do a hand-stand on Adagio’s trident as she spun around and slashed down with her war fan at Adagio’s neck. With a twist of her body, Adagio avoided the blow just barely, feeling the scrap of those sharp metal prongs on her Heirro hardened skin.
She opened a small Garganta portal right on top of Catrina, trying to close it around the other Espada’s head in what would have been a decapitating maneuver had Catrina not swiftly vanished with a ridiculously fast Sonido that placed her a good distance away near the Cross Gate replica.
“This is getting you nowhere, Adagio,” Grogar stated simply, “You cannot match Catrina alone, nevermind if I choose to join in. Be smart about this. Surrender to me and live. I’d like to re-examine your siren gem. You owe me some research for depriving me of my Seed project, I think.”
“I would literally rather tear my own heart out and smash it to paste and let my body wither into dust before ever letting you touch me again,” Adagio said with all the truly honest and concentrated venom she was capable of mustering. Grogar frowned, then shrugged.
“So dramatic. I’ll just have to take what I can from your remains. It should be obvious by now that you cannot win, regardless of having Squirk’s useful, but highly situational skill with Garganta.”
“Hmph, you think so?” Adagio said, eyeing Fenice and Thorax, the former of which was groaning as she peeled herself off the crater she’d made in the wall and was rubbing her head, wounded by still standing. Adagio’s original hope was just to get them clear, then blast as much of this chamber as possible to try and sabotage the replica Cross Gate, but since her friends (dammit, she kept using that word in her brain, stop it brain!) were being stubborn about leaving her behind she’d just have to pull out her other trump card.
She hadn’t wanted to expose the fact that she’d absorbed Squirk’s Garganta specialty in the first place. She’d been sitting on that particular card for a long while, keeping it under wraps even in situations where it might have been useful. She knew Tirek would likely demand she use it for him in ways she wouldn’t like, such as promoting further invasions of Soul Society or Quincy territory. Or worse, as she feared now, to help him with his invasion of Equestria. Squirk’s ability with Garganta had either been even better than Adagio had originally thought, or she herself had somehow pushed it even further with the help of the Equestrian magic she bore inside her, because she could do all sorts of tricks with Garganta that normally shouldn’t be possible.
Including creating dormant Garganta that could be attached to individuals with or without their knowledge to be activated remotely when she so desired. Fortunately she had trusted her secret with a handful of people she thought was trustworthy enough to know. Di Roy, Gaw, Ember... and Hard Nail.
She was now standing between Catrina and Grogar, effectively flanked by the pair, while Grogar’s cybernetic Arrancar servants moved in on Thorax and Fenice.
It was then that she raised her left hand and snapped her fingers again, and a Garganta opened up in the air, horizontally right next to her. From that portal, dropping with a cool, easy landing, and calmly surveying the situation with cold eyes that gradually started to burn hot with anger as they landed upon the wounded Fenice... Hard Nail spoke with a razor sharp menace directed at Grogar and Catrina.
“The next one of you to so much as move in any manner that is not leaving this place in peace is going to discover just how many pieces you can be torn into, and still have breath to scream.”