//------------------------------// // Delicate State of Mind... // Story: Honor Above All Else // by Honored Service //------------------------------// Honor Above All Else Chapter 23 By Honored Service “Girls, he’s in a very delicate state right now so please be extra careful what you say around him.” Twilight’s voice sounded clearly through the door leading into the library. I was just about to open the door when I stopped because of the talking. Sky was in a better place now, at least somewhere that wasn't filled with Day Terror. The thought of that creature chilled me to the bone. It got me angry. It got me mad. I wanted revenge. Slow. Painful. Never-ending. Revenge. But that’s what really upset me. No matter how badly I wanted to kill Nightmare or the new Day Terror, there was nothing I could do. Harming Day Terror would ultimately bring about pain or death to Celestia. She was still trapped in that body and needed to be saved. Then Nightmare would get what he deserved. I swung open the library door and entered into the crowded space. Guards were stationed all over Ponyville to protect the Elements of Harmony and the citizens of the small town. With Canterlot taken over by Day Terror, Princess Luna moved everypony to this small town as a way to keep everypony safe in the meantime. As I stepped into the room everypony looked at me and there was a lot of awkward shuffling of hooves. “It’s alright guys,” I held my hands up, hoping to sound convincing, “I'm fine. Just needed some time to say good bye.” Princess Luna was the first pony to break the silence as she walked up to me. “Honored I am terribly sorry for what happened. If only I had remembered to get the Elements…” I waved a hand to cut her off. “No Princess it isn't your fault. We had all been tricked. If anything it’s my fault. I basically brought the Nightmare right to his target.” I hung my head. “I failed you.” I looked up to all the ponies in the room, “I failed all of you.” “No.” I looked over to the unicorn that spoke. Twilight stepped forward in front of her friends and glared at me. “You didn't fail any of us! You got the Elements back from the clutches of Day Terror and made it back safely. Now you can help defeat her.” A faint smile began to appear on my lips. “And just how are we going to do that?” “Easy.” Applejack strode up next to Twilight. “We blast Day thing with the Elements and separate Nightmare from Celestia. Then ya do your thing with the Nightmare.” I placed a hand on my chin and stroked the stubble, thinking. “I believe that could work. The biggest thing is separating the two and keeping y’all safe at the same time. Getting Day Terror alone might be hard but we could do it.” I turned around to face the ponies. “With some more planning, I believe we can beat Nightmare.” I was about to start more planning when a guard busted through the door. His golden armor was slightly singed and burnt from the earlier fight at the castle. “Princess Luna and Lieutenant Honored, there’s something you had better see.” He gestured outside of the library. I stepped outside, followed by Luna and more of her Night Guards and the main six. As we stepped outside, ponies from the surrounding houses and businesses also cautiously began to move outside to see what the commotion was about. “I don’t see anything.” Luna said, turning her head to the Royal Guard. He pointed up at the sky towards the castle. I looked and could make out the burning city. Smoke billowed up into the night sky, the flames casting an eerie background on the city silhouette. The building were still standing, so I knew it was type of magic casting those flames, not actual fire or the city would be destroyed by now. The guard’s hoof moved from the castle to the sky over the castle. “Oh no.” Luna whispered. “This can’t be good.” Twilight shook her head in disbelief. “Get everypony inside!” I barked at Luna before staring back up at the sky. Above the castle, in burning green and black flames was a message. HERE IT COMES was written in the fire. I gulped and made sure the rifle was loaded. Nightmare was cocky. Day Terror was Nightmare, so this wasn't a warning, it was plan. The flames slowly began to fade inward until they were just a speck of fire against the starry sky. The Night Guards were ushering ponies into their homes and trying to maintain some type of order, but that all fell apart when the little pinprick of fire exploded in the sky. CRACK-BOOM The sky above Canterlot exploded into a massive fireball. I turned my head and shielded my eyes from the intense light. When the light show died down I turned back to see streaks of fire hurtling straight towards Ponyville, here it comes. The first impact was almost on top of me. I jumped over to the side as the fireball crashed into the street next to me. It came in low, whooshing over the tops of houses before crashing into the street creating a crater from the impact. I crawled over to the crater and edged my over to the side of it, before taking a look inside. My stomach dropped at the sight. These fireballs that were about to start raining down on the town were filled with flame shadows. five to each ball of fire. Inside of the fire they uncurled from a fetal position and stood up glaring at me through burning red eyes. One opened a mouth, and a familiar voice addressed me. “You shall not survive the night human.” Day Terror’s voice rang out perfectly clear from the shadow’s mouth. I stood up and aimed my rifle at the group of shadows, “Good luck.” I fired into the hole, killing ever shadow before they even had a chance to climb out of the hole. I looked back to the library and sprinted to the door. “Luna, these fireballs are carrying flame shadows from Day Terror. Tell your guards to be ready for a fight here in Ponyville. Keep the Elements safe.” I turned to leave the room but a flash of colors shot in front of me, blocking the door. “And what are we supposed to do? Just sit here while you and the guards fight?” Rainbow Dash was hovering inches from my face, hooves on her hips. “We can help you know.” Another crash sounded out from nearby. I jumped up and grabbed Rainbow just as a bolt of fire sliced through the air where she had just been. I rolled up from the ground and leveled the rifle at the group of shadows climbing out of the impact crater in front of the library. BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG I slowly stepped forward as each round punched its way through the head of flame shadow. Ash slowly filled the air as I reached the impact hole and fired into it, killing the remaining shadows. Once they were all killed, I turned back to the open door of the library where the main six were watching the scene unfold. “Stay. Safe.” I said. I dropped the empty magazine from the rifle and pulled a fresh one out of a pouch on my chest rig. Releasing the charging handle back into the weapon the gun made a satisfying click. I faced the rest of Ponyville as more of the fireballs began to impact around the town. I sighed. So much for coming back and avoiding conflict, I thought while raising the rifle to my shoulder and firing a couple rounds into shadows leaping over a building. They collapsed into piles of ash. Another group of the shadows turned around a building in pursuit of a fleeing mare and her foal. I ran to intercept them and leveled four of them before the rifle ran dry. I let it drop to my side and unsheathed my swords. I was hoping to get the first strike, but the remaining flame shadows were giving me their full attention. Both of the shadows charged at me, there arms turning into long four foot blades made of pure fire and heat. I turned ducking under one swing and bringing a sword up to block the other. The shadows danced around me hacking and slashing, trying to find a way through my defense. I was just waiting for an opening, and there it was. One of the shadows twisted just a little too far to the right swinging at my head. A quick upper cut removed its arm and then a sideways slash removed its head. I turned to the remaining shadows, but saw that it was thrusting both of its bladed hands right at my chest. SH-BANG SH-BANG SH-BANG SH-BANG There were four flashes of bright blue and the sound of lightning as the shadow jerked back and forth being struck by the magical blue bolts of energy. I turned to find Short Blade painting heavily, holding my Berretta in his magical aurora. I lifted an eyebrow at him. “What? If when you had magic it worked, then why couldn't I focus my magic through it.” He shrugged his shoulders as the pistol waved around in his magical grip. I was a little uneasy with how the pistol just swung around aiming everywhere, including myself. “Just please be careful with that.” I kept staring at the waving pistol, but soon another group of shadows had my attention as they ran for the library. I brought both swords to my side and sprinted towards the group, running up behind the group unnoticed. I ran the swords through the last two shadows before ripping them out and swiftly kicking the dying creatures to the side. Jumping to the side, both blades slashed through another startled shadow before the group finally realized something was happening. The dance with blades began again. I twisted left and right, dipping and dodging my way through the burning blades all around me, while at the same time trying to land a hit on the attacking creatures. An uppercut perfectly sliced a shadow in half, and I was about to deliver another powerful slash to the remaining shadow, but a crack and blue bolt of lightning ripped through the air inches from my face and pulverized the flame shadow’s head. I turned around to the smoking pistol and the nervous smiling Short Blade. “A little close that time, don’t you think?” I asked while sheathing the swords and bringing up my rifle and loading in a new magazine. “Sorry about that.” Short Blade levitated the pistol over to me and lifted the cover on my holster next to the belt. He slipped the pistol inside before closing it and patting the case with his magical aurora. “Probably enough for one day. You think you could help design some more of those?” I checked to make sure the pistol was secured on my belt before nodding to Short. “Yeah it might be easier to just develop pistols made for enhancing magic spells rather than ones firing slugs like this one does.” A fire bolt smashed into my shoulder knocking me over against the side of the library. The golden armor protecting my shoulder was completely burnt and scorched black, covering up most of the EHG symbol. I twisted on my side and fired the rifle into the unlucky flame shadow that had thrown the fire bolt. It crumbled into ash just as another two replaced it. “Oh fuck me.” I groaned and fired again, while moving into a crouched firing position. “Short get in there and ask the Princess how the Night Guards are handling this.” The orange unicorn nodded and ducked inside while I stayed outside covering the door. Short Blade was gone for nearly five minutes when another group of flame shadows appeared from the center of market and began dashing towards the giant tree. “Damn it.” I let the rifle do the talking as round after round punched through the fiery heads of the shadows. The last shadows stumbled and collapsed in front of me as the rifle went dry and the library door opened. Short Blade stepped out and looked at me with a concerned smile. “Well are the Night Guards holding the rest of the city down?” I asked while loading the rifle again, “Because I could do this all night. It’s a great way to burn off of this anger.” The unicorn simply shook his head. “Wait so they aren't doing good?” I said, letting the rifle drop to my side. He nodded and pointed towards the east side of the town leading towards the Everfree Forest. I looked and my heart rate increased and a smile spread across my face. A large Alicorn with a mane of fire was descending into a large field, causing Night Guards to flee in every direction. “Oh thank you god.” I whispered to myself. “Short, tell the Elements to get ready, I’ll keep Day bitch occupied and then they’ll hit her. And before you know it, we’ll have this all wrapped up.” He started to reply, but a fire bolt lashed across his helmet, knocking it off his head. Parts of his brown and black mane were smoldering as he ducked back into the library to avoid any more damage. I began jogging towards Day Terror, but that jog turned into a full blown sprint as I neared closer and closer to the large field. Another fireball came crashing down from the sky, landing right in front of me. I jumped over the impact hole, leaping through the smoke and having the flames lick at the souls of my boots before landing across the hole and rolling up, continuing my sprint towards the evil Terror. I stopped on the path leading into the field and breathed heavily, facing down Day Terror. She stood tall and proud on top of a hill, smirking down at me. Her golden armor reflected the burning buildings of Ponyville and her mane of fire billowed out behind her. I gulped and strode forward. Hopefully the Elements would arrive shortly, I wanted to keep this fight as short as possible. “Well, well, well human. It seems you are alive. And here I thought that little pegasus wouldn't be quick enough to save you.” My fists tightened into balls as I stared daggers at Day Terror. “Oh my, you look so angry. I hope I didn't strike a nerve. No wait, I struck a Fast Sky.” She leaned her head back and laughed deeply into the night sky. I jerked my rifle up and fired a round straight at Day Terror’s head, briefly forgetting about Celestia trapped inside. The magic bullet struck some kind of force field the flickered red around Day Terror. “My you are angry. I didn't think you would have it in you to shoot at me. Glad I thought about putting a barrier up just in case. Don’t want this to end too quickly, now do we?” I dashed forward, screaming at the top of my lungs. Every single fiber of my being wanted to kill Nightmare for what he had done. He betrayed my friends and me. He used me for an entire year just to get close to the Princess. Then once he became Day Terror, he killed my marefriend. And now he/she/it was trying once again to take over Equestria. My advance was halted as I found myself floating into the air and pulled right in front of Day Terror. I hung there feet from the thing I hated the most, unable to do anything. “I should really thank you human.” I stopped struggling and stared at Day Terror. Her red eyes stared right back at me. “Oh don’t look so surprised. You see thanks to you, I was able to do all this.” She gestured to the burning city of Canterlot in the background, and then to Ponyville. “What?” I choked out through her telekinetic grip. “You did bring me right to the Princess, but I’m not talking about that.” Day Terror smiled at me. “Oh no, I'm talking about the lessons you taught me as we traveled. You showed me the way to solve any problem we faced, was to simply destroy it or confront it with violence. The giant rats, the shadows, the cockatrice, you name it, we destroyed it. And that I figured out what went wrong with my last plans. I was being too careful. I dint want to harm ponies, that just somehow seemed wrong. They would make wonderful servants or a bountiful food source. But now I see that they are just pawns in the way, and you showed me how to remove them from the game board… by force.” She put extra emphasis on the word force and hurled me across the field and into the ground where I bounced like a rag doll and crashed into a tree near the edge of the Everfree Forest. Everything hurt from the crash and the fall combined with the large stick that was stabbed into my thigh I was finding my self-confidence wavering. I slowly sat up and propped my rifle up on my knee to only find it ripped from my hands and held above my head where the sling wrapped around my neck and jerked me up too. I hung there suspended again in midair slowly suffocating as Day Terror waltzed up to me smiling. “So thank you human, for everything. And as a reward for your help, I’ll have a statue erected in your honor at the steps of my new palace. Because all this, was because of you.” My eyesight began to fade as blackness slowly began creeping into vision. I dropped my hand to my waist and in one last attempt to get free, yanked my knife out and slashed the sling in half, dropping to the ground gasping for air. “Still some fight left in you I see. We can fix that.” I rolled over trying to bring the knife up, but her hoof pinned my wrist to the ground. Slowly she stood up and placed her other hoof on the stick still lodged in my thigh. Lightly she began to apply pressure to the wound. “AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” I jerked away, trying to remove myself from the pain. I flicked my wrist and sent the knife flying right into Day Terror’s leg. She jumped back howling in pain before yanking the knife out and holding it in her sickly green magical aurora. “A little too much fight I see.” She flipped the knife around a few times in midair next to her. “You see human, I'm going to kill you, there is no doubting that, but I want you to know that I have to because you pose the only real threat to me. You’ll take my life, unlike these ponies who will merely try and stop me.” “You leave him alone!” we both turned to see Princess Luna, a shit load of her Night Guards, and the mane six at the edge of the field staring at Day Terror. They all charged at the evil Alicorn, the girls’ elements beginning to shine brightly as they got closer. I saw a look of actual fear in Day Terror’s eyes as she stepped back. I flipped over and limped as fast as I could towards the girls and Luna. “Look out!” Pinkie Pie screamed grabbing her shaking tail as I limbed towards them. “OH NO YOU DON’T!” I heard Day Terror scream as I neared my friends. Then I stopped dead in my tracks. Something snapped in my back and a quick burst of pain rushed forward, knocking me to the ground. “Honored!” multiple voices screamed out. “I’ll return soon.” Day Terror said before I heard a loud whooshing noise of flame and a flapping of wings. I felt the pressure of hooves on my back. “Honored are you alright?” Twilight sounded panicked. “Can you hear me?” A timid quiet voice asked. I tried to respond, but all I could do was cough. The grass in front of my mouth stained red with blood. “Girls we need to get him to the hospital now.” Rarity’s voice sounded just as panicked as Twilight’s. Again I tried to speak, but then darkness set in around my vision and lost consciousness. Five minutes prior to current events “Come on girls, he ran off this way, and I can hear talking!” Twilight rushed ahead of her friends and the Princess, determined to get to the human and help him in his plan to stop the Day Terror. “There they are!” Rainbow Dash shouted, hovering above the group of ponies. She pointed off in the distance at the large field near the Everfree Forest. As they got closer, they could hear muffled talking. Luna gasped when she saw the human suspended in midair and then flung across the field with ease by the Day Terror. “Come we must hurry before it’s too late!” Princess Luna exclaimed as the group of friends and guards rushed to help the human. As they finally got closer to the fight, they could only watch in horror from a distance as Honored was lifted off the ground and hung above the dirt by his own weapon sling. The girls picked up their pace, dashing ahead of the guards and Luna, trying to save the human. They all gave off a massive sigh of relief when the human cut himself free and dropped to the ground. The girls were getting closer and together they all began to charge up their Elements. “Get ready girls,” Twilight instructed, “focus on separating the Nightmare from Celestia. They all nodded in agreement. “Leave him alone!” Twilight screamed at Day Terror as the Element resting on her head began to charge and glow with a powerful magic spell. The other Elements also began to grow brighter as they approached the unfolding scene. Day Terror momentarily was stunned as the girls rushed to the rescue. Twilight felt a great sense of joy as the human lept up to his feet and began hobbling his way towards the group, a significant wound on one of his legs. Pinkie Pie gasped and grabbed a hold of her shaking tail, staring at the human. “Look out!” she screamed. Twilight followed to were Pinkie was staring and her blood ran cold. Day Terror flipped the knife once in the air while screaming, “OH NO YOU DON’T,” and then slung the weapon after the human using her telekinetic grip. She tried to reach out with her own magic to stop the flying blade, but it was too late. The girls stopped and stared in horror as the knife impacted into the fleeing human’s back. He stumbled towards them for a few more steps, before collapsing on the ground in a heap. The knife embedded up to its handle in the humans back. The group of ponies gathered around the fallen human as Day Terror laughed deeply and took to the sky, flying back towards the castle, laughing until she was out of sight. Present The blackness filled my vision as I just drifted through consciousness. I couldn't move and it was extremely hard to breath. I would catch a few words or sentences at a time as I was being carried somewhere. Nothing would work as I made multiple attempts to move or speak. “The knife is in too deep.” An unfamiliar male voice said. “Backbone is severed.” “Nerves are cut.” “He… human…. Know…nothing about.” My hearing finally began to fade until everything just became a constant drone. Slowly I began to feel cold. The coldness crept into every extremity. Somehow I heard something else. “The Elements.” I know that it was Twilight speaking and then Applejack spoke up. “It’s the only chance.” Then everything went cold and I just stopped, lost in a sea of blackness and pain.