Chapter 11
The dust cleared, Twilight looked out into where Celestia, Overdrive, and the Siblings Nightmare had been previously. Nothing remained save two piles of ash, one white, one black. The remains of Princess Celestia and the Siblings Nightmare, Overdrive had left no trace behind, as his body was already long gone.
“It’s over!” Twilight said with a sigh. “We won!”
She looked to her side; the ghostly outlines of Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy were sitting next to her, smiling softly at her. Fluttershy looked at Rainbow Dash and gestured with her head, it was time for them to go.
Rainbow Dash nodded and gestured to Twilight, asking for a moment. Fluttershy nodded in approval.
Rainbow Dash trotted over to where Twilight was lying on the ground, helping her to her hooves.
“Rainbow...” Twilight began, Rainbow Dash however interrupted her by raising a hoof to shush her, she leaned in close and kissed Twilight gently, after a few moments, she broke the kiss and gave Twilight a wink.
She and Fluttershy faded from view, never to return again.
Twilight frowned, but then gave a smile where Rainbow had previously been. “Goodbye Rainbow Dash.”
“I hate to rain on everyponies parade,” Vinyl Scratch said trotting over to the bomb. “But this isn’t over yet, the bomb is still active.”
Everypony snapped back to reality, there was a lot of murmuring about what they should do.
“Everypony listen!” Vinyl Scratch called out. “All of you! Each and every one of you needs to get as far away from here as you possibly can! I’m going to try and disarm the bomb... and in case I fail... well then I’ll be the only one to suffer from it.”
“What! Vinyl!” Twilight called out. “You can’t!”
“I can, and I will. Don’t you get it Twilight? I’m not like you, I wasn’t one of the ponies that Princess Luna needed... because I did a lot of bad things in my life, now this is my chance to make up for them,” Vinyl said. “I have to do this Twilight, and you need to leave.”
“But... Vinyl...” Twilight began, and was once again interrupted.
“No buts, besides! I’ll be fine! Obviously! I’m too cool to get killed!” Vinyl said with a grin. “And even if I do, I’m going to have the greatest light show ever created to send me out!”
“All right,” Twilight said with a sigh. “Clearly, nothing I say is going to dissuade you from doing this.”
“Nope!” Vinyl said with a grin. “Don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine!”
Vinyl gave Twilight a hug goodbye. “It’s been fun.”
“Yeah... yeah it has,” Twilight said, returning her embrace. She gave Vinyl a smile and with that, everypony galloped away at high speed, leaving Vinyl Scratch alone with the nuclear missile.
Vinyl spent several hours looking through the electronics; she had mild experience with electronics from working turntables, the basics of a circuit were pretty much the same, she was able to navigate through the internals of the missile, but the more she looked it over, the more she began to realise that she had about a fifty-fifty chance of disarming it, or blowing it up.
“I’d wait a moment, if I were you,” said a voice from behind her. This one was different; this was a voice she’d never heard before.
She turned around and looked, sitting before her was a spectral earth pony, with a grey coat, an orange mane, and blood red eyes.
“Who are you?” Vinyl asked.
“The name is Montana Ulhan, you can just call me Monty though,” Monty said with a smile. “We haven’t met, but I’ve wanted to meet you for a very long time, Vinyl Scratch, I couldn’t show myself until they were all gone.”
Monty pointed to the ash piles that had once been Celestia and the Siblings Nightmare.
“See thing is, every smoke monster and their grandmother have impersonated me at some point, usually so that they could get somepony to do something for them,” Monty explained. “Twilight Sparkle and her friends would do anything that anypony who chose to appear as the ghost of Monty Ulhan said, because they put me in a position of trust while I was still alive... Got to say though, I have no idea why. Every word that ever came out of my mouth was a lie.”
“What is it that you want me to do?” Vinyl Scratch asked.
“I want you to set off the bomb,” Monty said.
“You just told me that you’re a liar, and the first thing you want me to do is set off the bomb!?” Vinyl cried out in surprise. “Why should I listen to you?!”
“Because, unlike everypony else who wanted to use the bomb. I want to use it for good. This world is a horrific place, there has been so much suffering here. That bomb? It’s a second chance.”
“I don’t understand,” Vinyl said.
“I know,” Monty said with a small smile. “But you will.”
Vinyl thought about it for a few moments, the promise of a second chance was appealing, sure, but as horrid as this life had been, Vinyl believed that this life was still worth living. She had Scootaloo; she had family to go home to. She wasn’t about to throw it all away, not for anything.
“I’m not going to set off the bomb! I won’t do it!” Vinyl said.
“Fair enough,” Monty said with a smile. “If that’s the choice you’ve made, well then that’s your choice.”
Vinyl eyed the spectral earth pony with suspicion. “That’s it then?”
“I’m not an Alicorn, Vinyl Scratch; I can’t force you to do anything. I’m not like them,” Monty said, gesturing the ash piles. “Nor would I want to if I could. The bomb is a second chance, but if you believe that the first chance is salvageable, well then more power to you! Well, I’ve got to go now. You don’t need me anymore anyway... nopony does.”
Montana Ulhan smiled at Vinyl, and then disappeared from the world, never to be seen again.
Vinyl Scratch looked back at the bomb and swallowed hard. What was she going to do? She had already decided that she was going to disarm the bomb, she want to live this life, now all she had to worry about was turning that line of thought into practice.
“Vinyl?”
Vinyl looked around to see Scootaloo standing behind her.
“Scootaloo?!” Vinyl said with a mild panic. “What are you doing here?! Don’t you know how dangerous that is!?”
Scootaloo nodded. “I listened to the recordings from Emerald Sparkle. I didn’t want you to have to do this alone!”
Vinyl smiled at Scootaloo brightly. “You’re a good kid Scootaloo. You’re old enough to make your own decisions now, so I’m not going to make you leave.”
“Good, ‘cause I wouldn’t have even if you did!” Scootaloo said returning the smile.
“I’ve got it narrowed down to two wires. One will disarm them, the other will make it explode,” Vinyl said. “I don’t know which one does which though.”
“Doesn’t matter which one you pick,” Scootaloo said. “All that matters is that we’re together!”
Vinyl smiled at Scootaloo, she’d grown up a lot since they’d met. Vinyl was proud that she had done a good job with her.
“Oh how sweet,” said a familiar, eerily cheerful voice from behind her. Vinyl Scratch froze, and slowly turned her head to face it.
Surprise had risen to her hooves, the immortal pegasus’ neck injury had healed, and she was holding a chainsaw knife in her mouth. The chain revved loudly and menacingly as she trotted over with the intention to murder them.
Vinyl turned back to the bomb. “No time for thinking! All time for action!”
She picked a wire and pulled it out.
The bomb exploded.
(authors notes: this is not, as I previously stated, going to be the last story in the series. I always do an Epilogue, but I've discovered that the way the epilogue was going to go, it'll be too long and too different to actually be a part of this story. This it will be rolled into its own, and THAT will be the finale.)