//------------------------------// // Chapter One: Abandonment // Story: The Life Of D-Pad // by FoxVillain321 //------------------------------// “That…thing needs to be killed.” A dark blue unicorn stallion spoke up, piercing the evening silence. “But…h-he’s just a baby.” A bright yellow pegasus mare reasoned. “There you go again…it doesn’t matter what gender it is, it’s an abomination.” The unicorn growled. “No! There’s nothing wrong with him!” She defended. “DID YOU NOT SEE ITS WINGS!?! NORMAL PEGASI WINGS DON’T LOOK LIKE THAT!!!” The unicorn shouted. The pegasus stepped back in fear. “W-w-we could put him up for adoption!” She tried to reason again. “Who’s going to adopt it? With that last attack by those…those…disgraces of pegasi, no one would want to take it in. They’d probably want it dead, too.” The unicorn explained. “Please, don’t do this…” the pegasus begged. “How can you still want it? That…freak of a Pegasus did that to you…you bare its child…and you still want it?” the unicorn asked. “He’s still my child! You can’t tell me what I have to do with him!” The Pegasus shouted, crying. “It’s going to grow up to be like them! DO YOU WANT THAT!?” the unicorn shouted. “No…No he…No…He…”She stammered, choking back her tears. “Mommy, why are you and Daddy yelling at each other?” The two looked towards the new voice. A light blue unicorn filly approached the two. “Go back to bed honey, Mommy and I are talking.” The unicorn said, ushering the little filly back to her room. “Why is mommy crying?” The little filly asked. The unicorn went and put the little unicorn to bed. He then came back to the pegasus. “Fine. It’s your child. You kill it.” The pegasus’s jaw dropped. “No…NO! Don’t make me…” “If you don’t kill it, I have someone else kill it.” The unicorn spat. “You wouldn’t!” “The whole town wants all of their kind destroyed. I just have to tell everyone that there’s a baby one in my home. They’ll do anything to kill it.” The unicorn cackled. The unicorn walked back to his bedroom. The pegasus paced in fear. What to do, what to do? If she won’t kill the baby pegasus, the unicorn would rile the town to kill him. She forced herself into her room. She slowly walked over to the baby’s bassinet. The tiny pegasus stirred with his mother’s approach. The pegasus kissed her baby’s forehead. She then lifted the baby and put him in a stroller. The Pegasus and her baby approached a lake. She pushed the stroller near the lake’s edge. She wrapped her baby in a blanket and took him out of the stroller. She started to walk into the water, the baby and blanket on her back. She stopped and looked to the sky. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky tonight. The moon glowed dimly in the sky. “Oh sweet Celestia…if you can hear me, please help me.” She begged. She continued her descent into the water. “Quicksilver! Don’t fly so fast!” The Pegasus stopped and looked back. A large gray pegasus stallion was chasing a smaller Pegasus colt around in the sky. The bright yellow Pegasus rushed back to the stroller. She laid her baby back in the stroller, and then darted off into the sky. The smaller Pegasus landed to the ground. He was dark red with bright brown eyes and a black buzz-cut mane. His flank was barren of a cutie mark. The larger pegasus landed next to him. He was dark gray with silver eyes and black comb-over mane. He had a blacksmiths anvil as a cutie mark. “Come on, daddy! I just got to be ready to fly on my own. Just let me try!” the smaller pegasus begged. “I don’t doubt that you can fly on your own, Quicksilver. Heck, you flew around half of Stalliongrad when we first settled there. I just worry about you. You are my son, after all.” The larger pegasus replied. “Daddy, why did we leave Stalliongrad?” Quicksilver asked. The larger pegasus sighed heavily. He then hung his head. “It just wasn’t a nice place to raise foals.” The larger pegasus sighed. Quicksilver looked at his father with concern. He then brought his attention to the lake. “The moon looks very pretty in the water.” Quicksilver oohed. “Indeed it does.” The larger pegasus agreed. The larger pegasus then snapped his attention to the baby stroller. It was slowly rolling away into the lake, with something wailing in it. In a split second, he darted over and lifted it to dry land. He looked in the stroller, and found a tiny pegasus wrapped in a wet blanket. He unwrapped the baby pegasus. “Dear Celestia…” the larger pegasus gasped. The baby was light yellow with light green eyes and short, untidy mane. Instead of normal pegasus wings and feathers, he had a pair of bat wings. He was still wailing from the cold. "Quicksilver! Go get Windstorm as fast as you can, and bring a blanket!” the larger pegasus commanded Quicksilver. Quicksilver flapped his wings and flew into the sky. The larger pegasus did his best to warm up the baby Pegasus by cuddling up to it. The baby pegasus snuggled up to him. “Where did you come from, little one?” He murmured to the baby pegasus. After a few minutes, Quicksilver flew back with a blanket. A bright red pregnant pegasus mare with hazel eyes, long blonde hair, and a tornado as her cutie mark flew down to the ground. She was holding a baby carrier in her hoof. “Forge, is he going to be alright?” Windstorm asked. Forge wrapped the baby pegasus in the dry blanket. He then placed the baby Pegasus in the baby carrier next to another baby pegasus. “He’ll be just fine.” Forge replied. “Do you think he’ll get along with Swift Strike?” Wind Storm asked. Forge looked into the baby carrier. He listened to the two baby pegasi. The light yellow pegasus eyes slowly closed. “I think they’ll be just fine.” He replied, smiling. Forge and Windstorm rubbed noses. “I have something to tell you, Windstorm. But first…” Forge said, turning to Quicksilver. “…You need to get back to the cart and go to sleep, Quicksilver. It’s past you bedtime, and we’ll be in Manehattan in a couple hours.” “Aww…” Quicksilver whined, flying away. Forge and Windstorm took off, Windstorm holding the baby carrier with her hoof. “What did you want to tell me?” Windstorm asked. “Okay. When I unwrapped the little one, he did not have normal pegasus wings…he has bat wings.” He explained. Windstorm gasped in shock. “But that means…” “Yes…all those raids…all those ponies…he is an offspring of one of those…fiends.” He murmured. “The nearby towns will want to kill him if they find him…Forge, what are we going to do?” Windstorm asked. Forge thought for a few minutes. “…Do you believe that he deserves to live?” Forge asked. Windstorm nodded. “He may grow up to be just like the pegasi that have been ransacking some of the towns nearby.” Forge responded. “I will do everything I can to make sure he never grows up like that.” Windstorm defended. Forge smiled. “I didn’t expect anything less from you. He deserves a good and happy life. We will raise him up as one of our own.” He said. Windstorm leaned up to Forge and kissed him on the cheek. As the two landed by the cart, they noticed that Quicksilver had already fallen asleep in the back of the cart. He made a makeshift bed out of all of the suitcases that the trio had packed. He had also scribbled some words on a piece of paper. Windstorm looked at the paper, and noticed that it was a list of names. “Looks like Quicksilver wanted another baby brother.” Forge spoke, reading over Windstorm’s shoulder. One of the names was circled and underlined. “D-Pad…he’s been hanging out with his unicorn friends.” Forge chuckled. “There always talking about those “videogames” and techy whatnot.” “I like the name. It has a nice ring to it…” Windstorm spoke. Forge gave a confused look at Windstorm. He then shrugged his shoulder. “It’s an unusual name, I’ll give you that…but your right. For some reason, it seems to fit him.” Forge agreed. Windstorm hopped back into the cart with the baby carrier. Forge saddled up to the cart. After a few minutes, the family was on their way to Manehattan. Windstorm looked up at the moon. “Thank you for this gift.” She spoke to the sky. And for a split second… …She thought the moon smiled.