//------------------------------// // Tale 5, Part 3: Zegor the Destructor // Story: Tales From The Omniverse // by Lucar //------------------------------// Madam Ruler, we are bringing to you a lost filly,” a guard said once they entered Madam Ruler’s office in Madam Ruler’s Orphanage. Two guards were present, and between them was Good Will, looking very scared. “No… Everything but here… Please…” she pleaded to the guards. Madam Ruler rose from her chair, looking very happy. “Oh! Good Will! They finally found you! I was very worried after I found out you weren’t here anymore!” Madam Ruler was a pink earth pony with a red mane and a ruler for a Cutie Mark. She was overweight, and she had a belt with the orphanage’s keys. Good Will glared at her, not saying a word. “You can leave her to me, boys. I will take care of her.” “Very well, madam,” the same guard who talked earlier said before they both left the office. The more they heard the guards walk away, the more Madam Ruler’s smile turned sinister, making Good Will gulp loudly. Good Will was thrown into a very small room, barely one meter by one meter with a bowl of water being the only object present in a corner. “As a welcome back gift, you will spend one week here with no food for having dared to escape. After that, I will present you back with my ruler. It really missed you.” Good Will got up and glared at the mare, making her glare back. “You dare look at me this way?” She took out a ruler from her mane. “Seems like I will present this ruler to you earlier than planned. Seems like you need to relearn to respect me.” She advanced into the room. Good Will continued to glare at her, then smirked. “No. Fatty.” Madam Ruler gasped. Suddenly, Good Will grabbed the bowl of water and threw it at her. As the mare was splashed with water and hit on the head by the bowl, Good Will immediately ran beside her and snatched the keys before she placed herself behind Madam Ruler and bucked at her butt, making her fall on the floor in the room. Good Will then closed the door and used the right key to lock it. “After living in the streets and fighting ghosts, ya’re nothing, fatty!” “Let me out! I order you to let me out! Once I’m out, I swear that I will make you regret it!” Madam Ruler shouted as she hit the door to try to open it. Good Will decided to not wait to see if she could eventually open it, and she ran into the hallways of the orphanage. Knowing it by heart, she knew where the exit was, and she had no problem escaping the orphanage for the second time. Good Will didn’t hesitate. She had to break the Parahunters out of prison. She thankfully heard that they will be kept in the guard station until they could get a trial before they will be sent to a prison outside of Manehattan. She will have to wait tonight where, hopefully, there will be less guards. Thankfully, it was getting late already. Meanwhile, she returned to the Parahunter HQ. “Welcome back, Good Will. Where are the others?” Sunny Feather asked upon seeing her. “In jail. Ah must break them out and stop the mayor.” “Say what?!” But Good Will didn’t say more as she passed her desk and went to the basement. On the way, she was joined by Misty who flew around her, wanting to play. “Sorry Misty, no time ta play. Yer daddys are in danger and Ah must save them.” Misty didn’t understand much, but she understood one word. “Dada?” “Yes. Dada. Danger. Bad guys. Save them.” “Dada.” Misty saw how serious and grave Good Will was, so she got a worried expression as she followed the filly who entered the workshop. She went to the horseshoe and grabbed it. It was still too big for her, but she could simply hold it before she decided to give it to Misty. “Keep it.” Misty took it, not sure what to do with it. “See the button? Press it. Like ya did earlier with the cannon.” Good Will showed the button, and immediately, Misty pressed it, activating the horseshoe. But then, she pressed the button a second time, deactivating it, only to press again, reactivating it. She repeatedly pressed the button, activating and deactivating the horseshoe while she laughed. Good Will sighed. Finally, it was night, close to midnight. Good Will, followed by Misty holding the horseshoe, returned to the guard station. The streets still had ponies that got scared by the ghost’s presence, but the filly didn’t mind them. When they reached the station, Good Will went to a window far enough from the entrance, where she was sure it wouldn’t be guarded. “Can ya open the window?” she whispered to Misty who, of course, didn’t understand. Seeing that, Good Will tapped the window. Misty passed the window, dropping the horseshoe which Good Will quickly caught. Then, the window was opened from the inside, allowing her to enter. They were now in a room that was thankfully empty. Good Will gave the horseshoe back to Misty. Good Will silently opened the door and peered into the hallway, seeing no guard. So she entered the hallway, followed again by Misty, and carefully walked, regularly looking behind her. She heard them before she saw them, around a corner, three guards were approaching, discussing. Good Will immediately hid behind a planted pot while Misty turned invisible. The horseshoe wasn’t invisible however, so Good Will quickly grabbed it to hide it with her. The three guards passed beside her, thankfully not spotting her. Good Will quickly, but silently, walked away. Suddenly, she heard a guard yell, “Ghosts have appeared around the city hall and are attacking the citizens! We must go!” Countless hoofteps coming from all over the buildings then sounded, and Good Will and Misty quickly hid inside an empty room. As she waited for the guards to leave, Good Will cursed. The mayor did the third ritual, certainly at midnight. Zegor was coming. Once the hoofsteps disappeared, she left the room and ran until she found the stairs to the basement where she guessed the jails were. She descended them, finding out that she was right. However, to her surprise, there was still a guard guarding them, and he immediately spotted her. “What are you doing here, little one?” “Good Will?” Dark Vision asked from one of the cells. The four Parahunters went to the bars and looked, seeing that it was her, indeed. They couldn’t believe that she was here. The guard approached her. “You aren’t allowed here.” “Sorry, mister, but Ah must save mah friends, and Equestria.” Suddenly, the guard was hit on the head by the horseshoe activated, shocking him and knocking him out right away. Misty then turned visible, babbling happily. “Good job Misty!” The ghost giggled, applauding. Good Will quickly took the keys from the guard and opened the doors of the cells, freeing the Parahunters who congratulated the fillies, Dark Vision patting Good Will on the head. “I didn’t expect my invention to be used on a guard,” Gray Matter said. “A living guard.” “Circumstances asked for it,” Soul Speaker said. “We must hurry up guys,” Good Will said. “The mayor and her cronies did the third ritual.” At that, everypony looked grave. “What do we do then? Zegor is coming,” Summer Road asked. “We do what we do best, my friend,” Soul Speaker said. “Kicking ghost butts.” “But first, we must recover the Spectrovacuums,” Gray Matter said. “Hopefully, they are still in the Spectromobile, and hopefully again, they left it before the city hall,” Dark Vision said. Thankfully, the station wasn’t far from the city hall, so it only took a few minutes to go there where they found hundreds of ghosts roaming the streets and attacking the ponies. The guards were trying to help, but they weren’t very effective. To make matters worse, buildings were burning. The Parahunters found the Spectromobile and ran for it, avoiding the ghosts. Inside the vehicle, they found the Spectrovacuums and equipped them right away. “Back in action!” Soul Speaker exclaimed. “Again, we will have to disperse to deal with all of them, but try to not go too far from each others,” Gray Matter said. The Parahunters all nodded, and they ran in different directions, beginning to capture ghosts. Thankfully, Gray Matter had planned for such a situation and gave the Spectrovacuums the possibility to augment power while giving them the risk of overheating. Thanks to that, they were able to deal with the huge number of ghosts. New ghosts were among them, beside the now usual blue ones. Large rectangular red ones, tall yellow ones that liked to throw stuff, and sneaky purple ones. Good Will activated the overheat mode and was able to capture dozens of ghosts before she was forced to return to normal mode before the Spectrovacuum could explode on her back. The red ghosts revealed that they couldn’t be captured from the front, so Good Will slammed a purple one on the closest red one to immobilize it and be able to go behind it to capture it. She then used the red ghost’s large body like a hammer on the other ghosts, weakening a lot of them that she then just had to collect. A last red ghost remained, but she decided to deal with the yellow ones first to stop them from throwing objects at her, which was very annoying and painful. It wasn’t long before all of them were captured, using debris and large objects as cover. When she was capturing the last one, she slammed it on the last red ghost to immobilize it, allowing her to capture it and use it like the previous red one as a hammer on the other ghosts. Before long, they were all captured. Good Will thus cleared her portion of the streets, but many other ghosts were everywhere else. Suddenly, wind picked up ash and gathered it into a large cloud beside the city hall that grew, and grew, and grew, until it was as big as a building. The cloud then changed shape, becoming… a ram. Then, fire began to come out of its mouth and its eyes The ram roared. The Parahunters gathered. “I think this is Zegor,” Soul Speaker said. “How will we deal with him?” Summer Road asked. “He’s so huge!” Good Will shouted. “We won’t let you bother the Great Zegor!” a familiar mare voice said. The next instant, Mayor Gray Mane, now a ghost, appeared along with her cronies, now ghosts too. “You will have to pass by us before! But I dare you to try! The Great Zegor gave us great powers to thank us for bringing him to our world!” “It still won’t stop us from trying,” Soul Speaker said. “You may be powerful ghosts, but you are still ghosts, and ghosts are our specialty.” “After over one thousand years of waiting, our ancestors will finally have their revenge! Die!” Gray Mane then sent purple lightning bolts that the Parahunters avoided by scattering. A terrible battle began, but Good Will remained out of it. Instead, she looked at Zegor who was beginning to destroy the city. By the time the Parahunters deal with the mayor and the others, there won’t be a city left to save. But Good Will had an idea. She immediately ran away, eventually followed by Misty who looked at her curiously. “Ah know what ta do ta stop Zegor! Ah must return ta the HQ!” Meanwhile, the Parahunters continued their battle against Gray Mane who was now raining lightning from the sky while the others fired levitated debris or fired all kinds of projectiles. The Parahunters had difficulty avoiding all that, but Dark Vision eventually managed to approach one of the cronies and to trap him. It didn’t stop him from attacking however as he still caused spikes to sprout out of the ground, trying to skewer the pegasus as he was dragged around. Dark Vision suddenly found himself levitated and thrown away by Gray Mane, making him release the ghost. Meanwhile, Soul Speaker managed to trap another one after getting past the chunks of road levitating around her. This time, he was joined by Summer Road, allowing them to capture the ghost. Gray Mane prepared a ball of energy only for Gray Matter to throw with his Spectrovacuum a large debris at her. The debris went through her, but it still disturbed her, making her miss her aim, the ball instead destroying a wall. Gray Mane growled at him and unleashed lightning at him, making him yell in pain. Dark Vision quickly stopped her by trapping a ghost and slamming him on her. Good Will entered the HQ and yelled, “Sunny! Ah’ll need yer help!” “What is going on? I heard a roar!” “Zegor is out there destroying the city! We must stop him! Help me bring the shrinking cannon out!” “The shrinking cannon?” “No time ta explain!” Before long, the cannon was outside. “Use it ta make me grow!” “What?” “Press this button, then this button, then this button.” “Uh… Ok.” Finally, Good Will placed herself before the cannon, far enough. Sunny Feather pressed the buttons as told, and the cannon fired at the filly who suddenly grew until she was about Zegor’s size. Sunny looked in awe. “Thank ya Sunny. Now, Ah must go. Ah have a god ta capture.” Finally, Good Will walked away, the city shaking with each of her steps, not minding the panicking ponies at her hooves, but still careful to not walk on them. Before long, she found Zegor. Immediately upon spotting her, Zegor opened his mouth and gathered a huge quantity of energy into a ball. He fired, and Good Will ducked to avoid it before she ran toward him and punched him, sending some of the ash forming him in the air while the god was sent into a building that crumbled on him. Zegor got up, the ash returning in his body, and he punched Good Will in return, and despite the filly parrying, she was sent sliding several meters back down the street. Zegor then used the ash forming his body to create small ghost-like ash golems that went after Good Will, but she easily sucked them up with the Spectrovacuum. However, she couldn't suck up the ash directly from Zegor's body. Understanding what she had to do, she ran back to Zegor and punched him, but Zegor dodged and punched her in return. She lowered her head to avoid him and punched Zegor in the gut before turning around and bucking his head, expelling a lot of ash from his body. She immediately sucked it up with the Spectrovacuum. Zegor sent several energy balls in return, and Good Will ran down a different street to avoid them, hiding behind the buildings. Zegor followed her as a torrent of ash, only to be bucked again when it entered the same street as Good Will. As the ram of ash reformed, she then grabbed his head by the horns, lifted him, and violently slammed him on the street, making the city shake and expelling a lot of ash from Zegor's body that she immediately sucked up. Zegor, however, fired an energy ball at her, and she was hit in the chest, sending her flying far down the street. She quickly got up, and by reflex, she used the handle of her Spectrovacuum as a bat, successfully sending a second energy ball back at Zegor. The god clearly hadn't expected it, and the ball hit his head, destroying a part of it. Good Will quickly approached it to suck up the expelled ash before it could return to his body, which was now full of holes as it was losing its consistency, more fire coming out of the holes. As she finished sucking up the ash, she was punched in the face. She retaliated by grabbing the leg that punched her before pulling, forcing the ram closer to her. She then punched him in the gut one, two, three times before she was slapped by a tentacle of ash forming from Zegor's body. She then gave an uppercut that sent the ram back a few steps, took off her Spectrovacuum, and slammed it on his head. She quickly put the Spectrovacuum back before sucking up the ash, only for more tentacles of ash to form and to wrap around her legs. She was then lifted and violently slammed against a building. Despite that, she grabbed one of the tentacles and spun, slamming the god into another building. This sectioned the tentacle from the main body, causing Zegor to lose a lot of ash that Good Will sucked up. As Zegor recovered, she then tackled him, and after rolling together a little, she grabbed his tail and used the momentum of the roll to violently slam him on the street. His body of ash exploded into a cloud, and she sucked everything with her Spectrovacuum. But Zegor wasn't defeated yet. It turned out that the ash was only a shell hiding his real form: a ghostly mass of fire with a face without any real shape. The being of fire sent flames to burn Good Will, but she sucked them up, and she also began to suck him up, his immaterial form making him vulnerable to the Spectrovacuum. Zegor then charged a lot of energy for a huge attack in hope of avoiding being captured, and he fired a powerful beam of destruction, only for Good Will to slam him, causing his beam to go haywire without even hitting her. However, it caused a lot of destruction to the buildings around them before it stopped. Good Will then continued to slam Zegor again and again until he was captured. Good Will breathed heavily, not believing that she won. She sat down, flinching because of her injuries. But then, she grinned. She really captured a god! Meanwhile, Mayor Gray Mane saw Good Will capture Zegor and yelled in despair. “Noooo!!! How could Zegor lose to a filly?! That’s impossible!!!” “That’s our pipsqueak!” Soul Speaker exclaimed. “Not so pipsqueak right now,” Summer Road said. “But the city is in really bad shape,” Gray Matter said. “Look! The ghosts are leaving!” Dark Vision shouted. As he said, the remaining ghosts, beside Gray Mane and what remained of her minions, flew away and dispersed into the sky. “Aw man… More work for us in the future,” Summer Road said. “Why do you sound so down? That’s great! To us the money!” Soul Speaker said. “But first, we must finish with her,” Gray Matter said, pointing at Gray Mane. Only Gray Mane and two of her cronies remained, all of them weakened. The Parahunters, however, were breathing hard. “You will not get away with this!” “Oh, but we will,” Soul Speaker said before he activated his Spectrovacuum, trapping the three ghosts. The three others joined him. Between the four of them, the two minions were quickly captured, but Gray Maner struggled hard, sending everything she had to escape. Soul Speaker was hit by lightning, but he resisted and continued to suck up. After a long minute, Gray Mane was finally captured, entering Dark Vision’s Spectrovacuum. Immediately, the four of them sat down, absolutely spent. “It’s over,” Dark Vision said. “Hehe. We stopped a millennium old conspiracy to destroy Equestria. Go, team,” Soul Speaker said. “I can’t believe we did it,” Summer Road said. “If I had known this would happen, I would have asked for a raise.” “Oh, don’t worry, I’m sure we will receive a nice sum for saving Equestria,” Soul Speaker said. Suddenly, the earth shook, heralding the arrival of giant Good Will who looked down at them in worry. “Are ya alright?” she asked. “We should be the ones asking you that. We aren’t the ones who fought a god,” Gray Matter said. “Tired. Hurt. Need to sleep right now. But Ah’m ok.” “Same for us, pipsqueak,” Soul Speaker said. “Same for us.” Misty suddenly arrived and flew among them, babbling happily. When she flew around Good Will, she cooed upon seeing something on her flank. “What is it, Misty?” Good Will asked before she looked at her flank, and she gasped. She now had her Cutie Mark. It was the exact same symbol as the Parahunters, a white ghost surrounded by a red circle with a red bar crossing it. “Ah got mah Cutie Mark! Oh mah gosh! And it’s in ghost hunting!” She began to bounce in joy, making the earth shake. The stallions stumbled and Gray Matter even fell over because of that. “Woah, calm down Good Will!” Dark Vision said. Good Will stopped, sheepish. “Oops, sorry.” “Eh. As we thought, it really is your talent,” Summer Road said. “We are happy for you.” “Thanks!” “Now, we should shrink you,” Gray Matter said. “And celebrate our victory and you getting your Cutie Mark!” Soul Speaker exclaimed. Everypony agreed. And so, the Parahunters returned to their HQ and celebrated before they got a well-earned rest. They needed it, because the situation in Manehattan was very chaotic for the following days. They had to explain everything that happened, the mayor and others had to be replaced, buildings had to be rebuilt, and countless ghosts who escaped had to be captured all over Equestria and beyond. Needless to say, the Parahunters became very busy, and Good Will was very happy. She loved this job!