2) Down in Yon Everfree
A cold wind blew between the alleys of Ponyville. The day was almost ending. It was still deep within the winter seasons, just under a month after the denizen’s “Nightmare Night.” Since then I meandered throughout city streets after breaking though the veil, squeezing as much time as possible between then and today.
The imaginations of the foals are still relatively fresh, and the period of time when the creatures were temporarily more easily killed was leaving. This is the day when the immortal evils get antsy, arrogant, and bloodthirsty. The only time of the year that they were almost mortal was practically over, and their strength can only get weaker from then on. And on such a peaceful stretch of the month, who wouldn’t want to sow a little chaos and bloodshed?
Whoops. Wrong audience.
I glanced through the ice at my watch. Four hours left. I looked up into the sky. I think I can see even more ripples of others also assigned and or chosen to come to Equestria. Guess I should join up with them.
I pulled my body out of the snowdrifts and climbed up to my feet, my duster bouncing off snow around my legs. Small shadows grew under the rooftop beside me as the sun slowly climbed. I took slow steps out of the alley way, my battered fishing hat obscuring my face as I reached into my pocket and examined a stack of cards.
I flicked one out. Yellow. I picked it out and flung it into the shadows. The stunned body of a shadowy pony fell out, its head all teeth. Some version of bogeymen plus changelings, I suppose. I never paid much attention. I nonchalantly sniffed the air. It smells like the anomalies are gathering.
I stuck my right hand into the forearm of my left and pulled out a nodachi covered in glowing green cracks. I stabbed the shadow through its head, then pulled out and stabbed twenty more times.
All I needed to remember was that nightmares die when stabbed enough times. I summoned the sword’s sheath and strapped it to my side. Might as well get ready.
Don’t get a good impression of me out of this. It just that demons more often than not endanger the fabrics of the universes. I will, I must kill or amputate anything that threatens the safety of the multiverse, no matter how cute or innocent they may be.
There are no heroes here. Only those who haven’t fallen.
I trudged through the snow of Ponyville’s streets, my hands in my coat’s pockets more out of habit than the low temperatures. They were also where a pair of hammerspace portals were located.
The ponies’ cheery greetings to each other made me grind my teeth, now that I didn’t have to keep up appearances. Their happiness reminded me with bitterness of a time long gone. By my fellow’s standards, I’m barely a hundred years old. Today will be my 105th Christmas mission. I hate these the most of them all.
I continued my walk out of the town, eager to get away from the happy moods. I paused beside the town’s bakery, now that my aura was safely held within me. A pink colored earth pony stumbled out of the store, blearily looking about. She had an epiphany the night before, and was going to tell her best friend about it. I, we, couldn’t allow it. With the power her friend has... she would be finding too many secrets that the pink one was never able to properly explain in words. One warper is already dangerous, but the pink one has been too ingrained in the imagination of others to be ... fixed, and by this sole reason, managed to prevent this universe and others similar from imploding.
I visited her room yesterday. She would be...almost permanently distracted from talking about it from now on, should have forgotten it by this morning. As I passed by, she seemed to twitch slightly. Just the tiniest of tremors, easily attributable to the wind. Good. Having her sniff the air whenever I got stuck here again was annoying, and bloody dangerous. It might be enough to trigger that epiphany again. And she almost did when I almost walked into her. Almost.
I continued on, passing over the bridge and walking by the little forest cottage. I recalled a day long ago when I had a “death” match with that resident’s little bunny. Someone once had the bright idea of chaining a demon’s soul into the body of a bunny. There are constants here they couldn’t be changed, which he tried to in his bid to get free. Poor bugger never saw the Spiral Cannon on the other side of the veil. It was simple enough to make the universe to reset to default, allowing me to go on my dreary way.
It wasn’t much of a fight. A wise fighter once said, ‘If you’re in a fair fight, something’s wrong.’ Paraphrased.
Of course, with the hundreds and hundreds of worlds I have gunned through, deleted, or chained, I’m not sure this is the same one in any case.
A few minutes later, I reached the edge of the Everfree Forest. Damn place was too mysterious, sparked the minds of too many. It was also a place where the Veil was thinner, relatively, due to the battle of the Royal Sisters. Even the smallest diviot would accumulate more water than the flat plane around it, and over time, wear it down even more if no one fixes it.
I walked in anyways, weapons ready. What other choice did I have?
I left the forest from its other side a few hours later, my sword out evaporating black matter and a toy inspired 8-shot revolver smoking. Out of the corner of my eye I saw other warriors like me, almost like me, come out of the forest too, their weapons of choice smoking or crackling with power.
I sighed, dropping my gun into my pocket and withdrawing a dagger with a pronged hilt, screwing it onto the bottom of my nodachi. I called them Warm Front and Cold Front, respectively. I held it to my side as I pulled out another card. It flashed green. I tossed it into the air.
The gates of Tartarus opened for me. I could see inside: the battles for stability and the status quo had already begun. The bandages that covered my entire body tightened involuntarily. They’re my version of goosebumps; it was hoping that it could hold my horridly unstable form together against a future of sharp objects. Indecision and fear clouded my mind.
Maybe they wouldn’t notice me. I already sent my ID, I thought. I’m not even a very good fighter compared to the rest of them. I’m limited to my mind. They are unbound. I could just send a clone or a robot.
My foot began to take a step back. Black liquid, pure imagination energy, dribbled out between the folds of my bandages, curling together into a ball. Then a sharp, chilling pain shot through my charred skeleton and froze me in place, like frozen mercury.
Not again, my conscience whispered. You chickened out of the past ten. If you don’t go in, I will drag you in myself and watch you get your sense beaten into you. I am a part of you, and I care about our survival too, but you can’t just go breaking the rules like that. But I will keep you alive to the best of my ability. Never forget that.
I snarled, but rules are rules. It would be unbecoming of one who is a draconian with his other tasks but wimps out here. Nothing left to do but to make the best out of a bad situation. You see, normally, we can take one invader out, easily. Its what we do all the time. Even I can manage twenty or so at once; its part of the occupation of being an Exterminator class. I’ve seen a guy hold off against nearly a hundred. But, as I’ve mentioned, this is the one after Nightmare Night. Ghost stories and pranks are drugs to those beyond, and causes the ratio to be more like 700 to 1. This is why the loss toll is so high.
Its too easy, too enticing to corrupt what is clean.
“Only 24 days, right?,” I muttered sarcastically. “Fine C-6, I’ll go. But I’m going to be annoyed if I get a shot through my head.”
Of course I am going to protect your skull. I sit here, after all. C-6 said. A pause. Kidding. There was a tearing noise as the back of my coat split. A pair of steel grey segmented four-fingered claws sprouted out of my back, dripping the black liquids of my insides. The stuff coalesced around its claw tips, covering it. When it receded, a large, 1-caliber shotgun was held in its grip. It already had a laser diode in the center of its claws; this was just in case something was going to fall on us, and just burning a hole through it wasn’t enough..
I took slow steps towards the gates. A few hundred had already ran past me, joining the fray. This early into the fight, they probably won’t make it back. The tip of my sword dragged along the ground, black droplets swirling along the blade, my other hand squeezing my elbow like it was weighted. The stone and earth under my feet crackled and dried into sand when the blade tip passed by.
A two story headless horse appeared to catch notice of me. He galloped at full speed towards me, a trail of dead bodies at his feet, an axe made of blood blackened from the bits of the warriors it had slaughtered levitating out of its neck.
How does one decapitate something without a head?
I opened my mouth. “SKRREEEEEEAAAAAAAAA!” Dust flew up in a circle around me, and I gave the monster a devastating backhanded slash with Cold Front. A cleaver of sharpened energy blasted out from the ground, centered around my blade, bisecting the horse in two. I spun around and with a fluid motion, jabbed Warm Front at it. Five stalagmites instantly formed on its end, spearing the remaining pieces and turning them to stone.
The shotgun on my back, Jigo, roared, blowing apart the falling axe. I held the blade above my head, the bloody chunks seeping into the cracks of Cold Front. I looked up into the red rain, the droplets bouncing off my ski goggles. A jagged, sharp toothed grin spit my face.
“I am a Shtik, title: H.M. Conagher.”
A solid shaft of red sprouted out of the handle. With it, I unleashed a crescent moon shaped shockwave, blowing a sludge like tidal wave into globs, like a piece of dynamite exploded through it.
“I am the Armory.”
Orbs, black as night, formed around me.
Burn, Unlimited Weapons Factory
I danced through the crowd of bodies, weaving in and out, and launching hundreds of attacks from stolen weapons when they thought to ignore me. Conventional weapons like explosives and guns, isolated superpowers like flame generation and super strength, magic attacks like mana bombs and curses, magic tools like golems, amulets, and necromantic bombs, I used them all. A cloud of exhaust trails surrounded me constantly as I let black matter mist through my hands. I did have my own items though. I’m not that unimaginative.
As I tore through the enemy ranks, I observed a rather varied mix of “guardians” this year. I could see a lot of quadrupeds here than one normally would. Not much of a surprise. There really aren’t much worlds with freakin’ four legged herbivores as one of the dominant species, and I guess it brings them pride to defend these. It brought pained memories to me when I still thought they were just characters on a screen or a piece of paper. I even saw a few old partners in the mix. I almost decided to help them. Instead...
“Give it my all, you say?” I pointed the gun into the sky. With my mind, a red bullet rotated into the chamber. I fired, launching a blazing red flare into the sky.
When the flare detonated, a warship flickered through the flames. It had a cannon barrel, its walls a third the width of the ship as a nose, and the rest of the body covered in auto turrets, double barreled cannons, paired revolver cannons, missile pods, and a thirty story minigun.“Fire the Spiral Cannon,” I commanded,
The warship rotated through the air, pointing its nose downwards, the barrel glowing with energy. Right as it passed over the flare, it fired a 100 meter wide drill rotating a few thousand times per inch. A savage grin split my face as I watched the destruction it caused. I may have caused some collateral damage. Oh well, they’ll live. Or not. I was too intoxicated with bloodlust to care. Energy crackled across my left eye. A crosshair superimposed itself over my eyeball, and spun up rapidly. Metal melting steam boiled around the maelstrom of spinning energy.
I laughed madly, my sword and gun evaporating. Two marbles fell into my hand, and I spun towards a giant white ghost. I held the black marbles between my fingers “Cheese!” The micro black holes reentered the time stream, and sent out a stream of ultra gamma rays.
I turned around and danced around the battlefield. A pair of miniguns grew out of my hands. I raised them, my glowing eye melting bits of my left cheek, leaving a ghastly crescent moon shaped head with a glasgow grin.
Under my supercharged gaze, each bullet had flesh to rend and break.
“EXTERMINATE”
Five hundred seventy five hours and fifty minutes.
Fifty five.
Twenty four days.
I shook my watch back underneath my jacket sleeve and looked out across the gates of Hell. As I said, there was a 50% survival rate. This is why this is seen as a milestone, and for all intents and purposes used as a way to determine “age”. I have seen too many young little white knights proclaiming their lives for justice. They surpassed my ‘age’ in a tenth of the time. They died barely half a century later.
If I used my own memories as a clock, I would be nearly 900 years old.
There are a few reasons why I’ve survived so long. One, I’m a coward. Give my all? Only on a target I knew I could beat. I watched as a fellow exterminator get surrounded by one too many. I stood back as a protector jumped in to save her, but died himself. I ran from numerous engagements, even when the odds were only slightly against my favor. I ignored the cries for help as a first year was ripped and forgotten.
I’m not as powerful as those who have survived for millennia. I may not be able to curbstomp the attack, but at least I could live to fight for another day.
I looked down at a evaporating corpse under the shadows of my tree. I took a sniff. “Huh. Thirty. Less than five years of experience, and all in the same place. Must have held some sentimental value for him.
“Fool.”
I crouched down and snapped his horn off before it melted. I dropped it into my pocket full of grave robbed items. It was a specialty of mine. Having more weapons to know what to do with is always better than not having enough. After a battle is always a nice time to harvest. The dead won’t need them anymore.
I took one last look at the evaporating memories, the smell of hellfire, charred wood, smoldering gunpowder, and dreams.
They will all soon be replaced. The imaginations of creators is endless.
The monsters and demons will come back. The imaginations of creators is endless.
As long as this stays true, the world will go on. I like staying alive too much to even think about rebellion.
Oh well. I’ve done what I’ve came here for. I participated as little as I could get away with, and added the 105th Cycle to my name. I’m out.
I trudged through the snow, too tired to quantum tunnel through. I had about five centimeters of energy left. Oh yeah, I measure my energy levels with bandannas I tied around my head. The two strips smoked as they sat hidden within my hat, and were short enough to start slipping from their knots.
Just need to get into an insertion point I thought. Then I can get out of here and fix this beaten up shell.
The gentle winds blew around me as I walked off alone in thought as the others stayed behind and helped pull the injured back to their feet. I walked past a tree/library and paused. A crack appeared a foot to the side of me, floating in the air.
“Wha-?”
A massive shockwave, accompanied with the sounds of shattering blew me to the side, leaving me writhing in pain. My legs were blown off, and my left hand was mangled. I pushed myself up with my remaining right hand, deactivating the pain notifications and gazed at the towering tornado in front of me.
“Really?” I asked. “Twenty Four days was supposed to be it. No more swarms. Just a few hours of peace and quiet for once. Why now? Why here? Why me?”
I stared nearly helplessly as the tornado of dark energies writhed in place, ripping its black chrysalis off itself. Soon, I was gazing up upon a massive three headed bipedal dog.
I groaned. “Really? When is this in the timeline? I don’t have time for this shit.”
The towering shade leaned over me, sniffing out a gold mine of power that sat right beneath it.. Outsiders, no matter their state of health, were always much more fulfilling than anything else the world could offer. Plus, I looked like a sitting duck.
My conscience beeped at me once more. I exhaled cloud of steam and looked on at the swirls it made. “I know, I know. I’m not dead yet.”
There was a second reason why I survived so long. I was a shell limited to a mortal mind. And this Shell had a Ghost.
A spark of green flame erupted around my stump of a left hand. It grew, enveloping it until a blazing hand made of fire replaced the mangled one. I never figured out a way to practice wielding this power. How does one practice using a spell that burns one lifeforce?
“I hate post-Halloween,” I muttered. I thrusted my hand forward. “SOULFIRE!”
A cone of blazing energy blew out of my hand, it countering the shade’s essence with my own imagination energy and nearly instantly. Unfortunately, I was made of the same material as it.
“Arggh!” I squealed, clutching my hand as I fell over. Searing embers bounced across my frayed jacket sleeve, melting through them like acid. Unlike other injuries, they weren’t just surface sensations. Another really big reason why I don’t use this move much. This burned me down into my soul, like needles of pain shredding the inside of my arm..
It eventually burned out, but when the sounds of flames faded there was a crackling sound instead. I looked tiredly down at my feet and saw them locking up as I slowly ran out of energy to power them. I groaned, falling backwards onto the snow. My energy levels were down to three millimeters, and shrinking fast. Slowly, my lower torso followed suit, and went numb and cold. I looked back at my smoldering hand. Bits of a charred, fractured forearm bone showed through. What remained of my old body.
I chuckled weakly. The smell of charred flesh, melted fibers, moldy water, and banished dreams surrounded me. “Smells like Christmas morning,” I muttered. I looked upwards as the tunnel growing around me stretched into infinity.
A set of pink hooves stopped beside the frozen shade.