//------------------------------// // Best Laid Plans // Story: When The World Bets Against You // by Tie RoamingHooves //------------------------------// “Just please... I...” I asked a little more desperately before I trailed off. I’m stupid for thinking that I’ll get any kind of mercy from her. She’s just going to leave me alive only to suffer more. I’m still alone, how could I have forgotten? Nopony cares and I’ve only got myself. Tears start streaming down my face again. Its not that I’m sad... well, I am but... it’s just that this is just so bitterly cruel. So, so, so bitterly cruel. Another familiar face to bring me pain but not try to kill me. Ha, how ironic. The ponies who cared for me the most turned out to be the ones who hurt me the most. To find out that family means nothing... To get filled in that my friendships were based off of only lies and deceit in the harshest of ways... To know that I've been taught and practically raised by the pony who would one day enjoy seeing me in pain... I’ve started to sob and I wonder why I’m still letting myself be tortured by my thoughts? Why can’t I stop thinking? It hurts... it hurts... it just hurts so, so much... Why won’t it stop? “Please make it stop...” I plead quietly in between sobs. I just want them to stop! Even though I already know the cruel truth it never hurts any less... And then my thoughts started slowing. I was alarmed until I felt my strength being sapped which put me at a sudden sense of ease. I looked up and saw Cadence looking at me with tear filled eyes... and her horn shimmering lightly. I looked at her and smiled appreciatively. Mercy... maybe I was wrong about her. That was my last thought before I couldn’t stay conscious any longer and slipped into silence. She thought she’d prepared for everything. She was prepared to break the law. She was prepared to defy her aunt. She was prepared to break Twilight out of her prison. She was prepared to fight. She was even prepared to die. Out of everything she was prepared for, she wasn’t prepared to hear that. All of the momentum in Cadence for attempting doing anything suddenly died in a surprise explosion within the confines of her mind. Alarms were blaring and mini-Cadences in labcoats were running around trying to avert catastrophic mental shutdown. Papers of various sorts flutter in the air as mini-Cadences in firefighting gear rushed in the logic center to fight the fire that threatened to spread to other areas of her mind. Cadence however, recovered from her shock when Twilight started crying. She couldn’t take seeing that. The princess of love felt tears running down her face. What did they do to her? “Please make it stop...” cried the displaced unicorn. Just what in tartarus did they do to her? Nopony deserved to have to hurt like this, ever. Cadence’s anger flared up. Somepony is going to have to be held responsible for this. Her sight returned to the distraught ball of emotions that was Twilight. A spell came to mind and her horn glowed softly. Twilight can’t be helped in this condition so she did both herself and Twilight a favor by casting a spell designed to put ponies to sleep. In the midst of it taking effect, Twilight had stopped crying looked at her with a soft smile before letting the spell take hold and shut off her conscious mind. Cadence moved to her and looked down. Somepony was going to pay dearly to the pain that was inflicted on poor Twilight. She didn’t deserve this. Nopony did. Cadence hefted Twilight onto her back and looked up. Suddenly Cadence’s horn shone with a blinding light. With a roar of righteous fury, she shot a beam of magic that melted through the mountain and out to daylight. The alicorn took flight and flew threw the tunnel which still was glowing red with immense heat. This as far as ahead as Cadence had planned but there was thankfully only one thing to do. Get away with Twilight. Anywhere was good but here. She looked for a way to escape but then saw it was futile. Pegasi guards controlled the air around her. She looked down and saw both horned and earthbound members of the Royal Guard had arrived to stop the escape as well. Cadence put on a face of rage and her horn glowed at the ready. She’d fight them all if she had to. She may not be nearly as powerful as aunt Celestia or Luna but she could easily take on the Royal Guard in its entirety without so much as breaking a sweat. Any and all hope for winning was crushed when a new player entered the field. Princess Luna teleported to the skies above the western courtyard in a flash of blue magic. She quickly closed the distance and found herself in front of a battle ready Cadence. Cadence took this time to come up with a plan and smiled at the other alicorns confusion. There were alternitives to fighting rather than trying to stave off Luna. Just as Luna opened her mouth to speak, Cadence flashed into existence elsewhere. She teleported herself and an unconscious Twilight in front of her chambers to the surprise of the two armor clad ponies in front of her door. “Princess Cadence!” the stallion on the left yelled in surprise and alarm. The armored mare on the right didn’t even flinch at the sight. She lifted a hoof to silence and other protest that would come from them. These were her personal guards, Cool Ember, the unicorn stallion on the left, and Brisk Wind, one of the few pegasus mares in the Royal Guard. She trusted them with her life and theirs with her. The two had been tasked with the protection of Cadence a few month before her wedding. Cadence didn’t feel like she needed guards and disliked them but eventually they developed a strong friendship as the grew to respect one another. “I don’t have time to explain. I just need you to trust me now more than ever. I really need you both to come with me to Ponyville...” Cadence’s urgent plea trailed off when she noticed the flat look Brisk was giving her. Brisk looked at the former still flat and still unamused. “We’re going against the rest of the Guard again aren’t we?” she deadpanned. She was referring to Cadence’s last escapade. The young alicorn had pitied captured changelings locked away in the dungeon after the wedding. She’d spent months teaching the drones Equestrian speech and how to earn love rather than steal it. Eventually the princess of love asked that they were released saying they had changed. Being outright denied Cadence took it upon herself to free them. In doing so she had to protect the changelings from unjust imprisonment but by then the changelings she taught and befriended in the dungeons had proven themselves to truly have changed for the better. Brisk Wind and Cool Ember stuck with her the entire time after seeing that Cadence was right. It was a fiasco that made their friendship stronger Cadence nodded and it got a smile out of the pegasus. “Well, I’m in. What about you Cools?” The stallion in question shook his head not believing this was happening again. “Why do you try to seem to pity everything in the dungeon?” he asked rhetorically. Cadence smiled until a castle maid walked by. She quickly used magic to knock out the mare before she could scream. Both of the guards looked at this with varying emotions. “I can guess that the rest of the Guard knows already if you're silencing castle staff.” Ember began. “So how are we getting to Ponyville?” The stallion was answered when he momentarily disintegrated and then found himself in what seemed to be the back of some store. The room was painted a pale yellow and sported a wooden floor and thatched roof. There were various racks on the opposite side of the room with freshly made candy laid out on trays. He was standing on a table and definitely standing in something as well. His hoof was sticky. He looked down to see a cream colored mare with blue and pink curls holding a wooden spoon in her mouth with the front of it inside of the bowl Cool Ember stood in. She was staring at him with a blank expression meaning she had absolutely no clue what just happened. Cool nonchalantly lifted his hoof from the bowl and used magic to remove some kind of paste from it. He then hopped of the table and strode out the door looking one last time at the mare. She looked back at her bowl for a few moments, then to him, then back the the bowl this time cocking her head to the side. Cool stood in the door and saw the this room was a little worse for wear. A few shelves were knocked over and candy was everywhere with a disgruntled pegasus attempting to get up in the middle of the mess. She got to her hooves after a bit of intense effort but slipped and fell down again on the gumballs that were numerous in that particular spot. Looking to his left he saw the unconscious forms of the human and Cadence on the back wall behind the counter with three cups and many suckers littered over that general area. The mess originated on the counter next to the cash register meaning the cups were meant to belong there. Cool looked out one of the large windows and saw ponies walking to and fro. During this time, the armor clad pegasus managed to get up and walk over to him. Brisked looked into the kitchen and saw a mare with three pieces of candy on her flank experimentally poking a mixing bowl with her hoof. “Ma’am?” Brisk asked. “Yes?” the mare replied in a vacant voice without breaking eye contact with the mixing bowl. Cool Ember had turned around and seen this as well. “Are you alright?” She didn’t respond and poked the bowl again with a hoof. Brisk looked at the display with a raised eyebrow. “Um, I think you broke her.” Ember moved closer and began to speak in a hushed voice. “Never mind her right now. We need to figure out what we’re going to do. The princess is unconscious and we’re in the middle of some town!” “Why are you looking at me like I know what to do? You out rank me!” “Because this is a te-” A bell jingled signaling a door being opened. “Hello?” a mares voice called from the front. “One moment!” Brisk called The two looked at each other and instantly hatched a plan. Brisk began taking off her armor and her coat changed back to its natural color from the default white caused by the armors enchantment. She was hot pink with yellow eyes and a short blonde mane to match. Her cutie mark was two clouds with a bolt of lightning arced between them. She was a weather pony through and through but not everypony gets to work with their talent. Brisk had a talent for manipulating particularly dangerous storm clouds when nopony else could if they get overcharged with lightning. She had a place on the weather team in Vancouver but with the advances in the cloud making process back in Cloudsdale making this problem impossible to occur, Brisk was put out of a job. She’d joined the Royal Guard soon after. Brisk trotted out front to the counter leaving Cool Ember to make sure this mare didn’t do anything. He was confident this plan would work until he overheard Brisk in the front. “Hi! Welcome to... never mind. How may I help you?” The unicorn facehooved loud enough for those out front to hear.