Ponystuck

by confoundtheseponies

Chapter 15

[fractalAbomination began pestering crespucularMagicant]
FA: hey
CM: Oh, hi. What is it?
FA: we're about to go fight our black king
FA: which we're all a little nervous about, but w/e
FA: i just wanted to check what all that stuff about the ring was about earlier
FA: it sounded almost like you were going to prototype with one
CM: We were.
FA: oh. well, that's either very surprising or totally expected
CM: And we did.
FA: wait, what?
CM: They only had a few seconds, they had to do something!
FA: why would you do that?
FA: could you really find nothing else other than a ridiculously powerful game item that ponies shouldn't even have lying around on the basis that we can't even fucking wear rings!?
FA: not even a pillow or something?
CM: No, it was because of our artifact, we needed to prototype something powerful.
CM: The artifact was Rarity's prototyping sphere.
FA: really? that's a bit far fetched, i hope you realise
CM: Well, it was. And the 'puzzle' was to fix it, by prototyping something powerful enough to repair the damage.
FA: wait, it was damaged? how?
CM: It's a long story. The point is that we didn't have a choice!
FA: ok, fine. i just...
FA: i mean, we're struggling, if i'm honest
FA: are you sure you guys can handle it?
CM: Well, we'll just have to manage, won't we?
FA: :c
FA: well, good luck i guess
CM: You too.
FA: i'll speak to you later, assuming we're both still alive
[fractalAbomination ceased pestering crespucularMagicant]

"What did he want?" Spike asked, as Twilight dismissed the communication spell once more.

"To check up on us, like always. He was just asking about Rarity and Rainbow's prototyping." From somewhere in the nearby forest, a horrific shriek echoed around them. "Speaking of which, stay close to me. We might be in for another wave soon."

"Isn't there anything we can do about how strong the enemies are?" Spike asked. "Can't you go back in time to before, and warn them?

"No, because if I did that, then I already would have done, wouldn't I?" Twilight paused, thinking it over. "Actually... now that I think about it... that gives me an idea for this planet." Retrieving her book from her sylladex, she began flipping through the pages frantically. "There were tons of frogs on this planet, before they all disappeared, right?"

"Uh... yeah. Why?"

"I have a feeling I might know why they disappeared." And with that, she closed the book, flinging the two of them back in time.

"Pinkie Pie! Look out!" Applejack called out, as Pinkie nimbly leapt around the oncoming basilisk. What Applejack hadn't been prepared for, however, was that this meant that the basilisk was continuing its charge towards her. "Let's dance, ya scaly son of a-"

Applejack was cut off as a sickening crunch marked the union of Pinkie's club with the back of the basilisk's neck. Roaring in pain, it attempted to flip the earth pony off of its back as Pinkie continued to attack, its many limbs grabbing and slashing at her. It was at this point that Applejack decided to get involved, rushing up to the underling with her scythe in hand. Dashing past the creature and hacking furiously at its flailing limbs, Applejack couldn't help but feel a certain grim satisfaction as one of the creature's forearms was severed. Twisting around to face it once again, she paused for a moment to watch Pinkie Pie. Having thrown her club to one side, Pinkie had instead decided to dual wield umbrellas. Only Pinkie Pie would think to use umbrellas as a weapon, and only Pinkie Pie would succeed at such an attempt. The basilisk writhed in pain, before it finally rolled sideways and Pinkie was knocked off of it and lay on the floor, injured. Quickly getting to its feet, the creature scuttled towards where she had been thrown, its fangs bared. Now Applejack was sprinting towards the creature, time seemingly slowing as it drew nearer to Pinkie.

Suddenly flying out from where ever she had been hiding during the battle, Fluttershy shot towards Pinkie, and began to fly her upwards as quickly as she could. Beneath them, the basilisk screeched as it leapt upwards, desperately trying to grab hold of them. And, by a mere millimetre, it was able to grab onto Pinkie's leg. After the two ponies and the basilisk seemed to be frozen impossibly in mid-air for a few moments, they began to plummet downwards again, smacking into the ground all too quickly.

"Pinkie! Fluttershy!" Finally reaching them, Applejack quickly finished off the crippled basilisk, and brushed aside the shower of grist which the game offered her as a reward. She could now see Pinkie and Fluttershy, lying together in a crumpled, bloody heap. "Oh... oh no."

In the end, perhaps what happened was inevitable. Perhaps, despite their best efforts, no matter what they tried, Skaia would always have found a way to screw them over. That was what Comet chose to believe, if only because it shifted the blame away from himself. Because, at the end of the day, he really should have seen it coming. All of them should have seen it coming.

In front of him, a mighty battle was taking place, although the ending had been spoiled - now it was just a memory, repeating itself before his eyes. He watched with something approaching pride as he and his friends attacked the Black King, acting with brutal efficiency. His own role had been one of the most important parts of the battle - to freeze the king in time for as long as possible. Then, after he had used most of his energy, he had settled for slowing the king down during attacks in order to give his friends enough time to evade the attack.

"It's a shame, isn't it?" A quiet voice whispered behind him. Glancing behind him, Comet was greeted by the sight of a bright pink winged unicorn, whose bright eyes contrasted with her tired smile. She was wearing a deep blue shirt, with pointed shoes and a tall conical hat. Somehow, this didn't look as silly as it should have done. "To fight so well, for so long, all for nothing."

"Who are you?" Despite having never seen her, Comet couldn't shake the feeling that he knew this mare somehow.

"I'm Pinkie Pie. I'm from Twilight's group." Oh. Wasn't she the one who had advised the prototyping of a queen's ring? "And you're Comet, right?"

"Yeah. Aren't you the crazy one who somehow knows everything?" Pinkie seemed to find that funny, as she laughed quietly before answering. In front of them, Summer activated her fraymotif. Neither of the two dreamers watching paid much attention to what was happening, but it seemed to involve giant dice-shaped gaming abstractions.

"I suppose so. It's only natural for a player with my role to know so much about the game. Destruction of obfuscation, and all that. As for crazy, well..." One of the Black King's attacks slipped through Comet's time warping, but luckily Silver was able to slightly change Ember's fate to cause the attack to miss. "Since my dream-self died, I've been... changed. Everything seems a lot more serious now. Maybe it's just me growing into my role, or maybe my dream self was related to how silly I was?" She shrugged. "In the end, I don't suppose it really matters."

"I guess. Anyway, next question." Gesturing towards himself as past Comet swung his unabridged encyclopaedia into the king with a deafening blow. "Why are we floating above the Battlefield of my session, four hours in the past?"

"Well, it took me forever to figure this out, but we're dreaming!" A spark of excitement crept into Pinkie's voice as she explained. "Now that my dream self is dead, I don't dream of Prospit anymore. I dream here. Of course, you never dreamed on Prospit, but now that your dream self is dead you come here all the same. Where exactly 'here' is, I'm not too sure." She nodded towards the battle. "But it seems like we can relive memories here, and share them with others."

"My dream self isn't dead." While his dream-self had never fully awoken, Comet was pretty sure it was still alive. Surely he would know if it had died?

"I'm sorry to tell you this, but it is. It's incredibly dead. I saw it happen, in fact." To her credit, Pinkie remembered that she was meant to say that sentence with remorse, but quickly perked up again as she got back to the point. "Anyway, there is a point to reviewing this memory. You need to properly understand what happened, and what the consequences were."

Summer was knocked away by a blow from the Black King, only to be replaced by a very angry Destiny. Diamond checked up on the wounded Heir, while Destiny and Mild once again used the fraymotif they had used to defeat the Black Queen. Comet slowed the king's progression through time during the attack, as they had learned that he had some amount of health regeneration - the key was to cause as much damage in as short amount of time as possible, which was aided by slowing the king down. It was an ingenious plan, if Comet said so himself. Which he did. Not that it mattered, in the end.

"The rise and fall of Team Fuckass, all over again..." Comet muttered as Pinkie happily laid down in mid-air and watched the epic battle taking place in front of them. "Great."

As it had turned out, Fluttershy was not too badly damaged, and Applejack had been able to patch her up to the extent that she would be alright. Pinkie, on the other hand... Pinkie had been too far gone for anypony to have saved her. Fortunately for her, Sburb had many routes to revival, which Gummysprite had been more than willing to talk about. And so Applejack had carried Pinkie across LOPAL, until eventually she had found the planet's quest bed on top of a large hill. And so she laid Pinkie to rest on the quest bed, and watched as her friend became a God.

Ascending to God Tier carried with it a great deal of fanfare between laying a dying player onto their quest bed and the actual ascension, but eventually Pinkie disappeared and the music and lights faded away. Having taken care of that, Applejack headed back to Fluttershy, who had been in substantially better shape than Pinkie. This was to say, she wasn’t dying.

"Fluttershy? Can ya hear me?" Applejack resisted the temptation to add 'yet' onto her question. It wasn't Fluttershy's fault, and she had tried her best to help. She should be patient with her. And, sure enough, the pegasus' eyes began to flutter faintly as she came to. "There we go. How are ya feeling?"

"Mrmrmm... ow. Hurts." Her eyes open properly now, Fluttershy glanced around, taking in the large mound next to them which housed Pinkie's quest bed. "Where are we?"

"We're at Pinkie's quest bed. She was in a pretty bad way, so Gummysprite said Ah needed to bring her here and lay her down on her bed. Ah'm not sure where she's gone now, but she should turn out OK."

"And what about us? We can't continue like this. I'm no use in a fight, and you can't take on those things by yourself." Applejack paused, considering their options. Fluttershy was right, of course. There was no way that the two of them could continue to fight their way around the planet.

"Don't y'all worry about that. Just focus on getting your health back and Ah'll think of something." She hoped that her reassurances would calm Fluttershy, because they certainly weren't working on herself.

The king lay dead, and all across the Battlefield the soldiers of Prospit and Derse laid down their weapons. From all corners of the planet they came towards the eight ponies standing by the dead monarch, repeating their ceaseless chant.

The King is dead. Long live the heroes of Skaia. Long live our champions. Long live the Page, who steered us through the winds of Time. Long live the Maid, and may this victory calm her endless Rage. Long live the Thief, who we keep forever in Mind. Long live the Witch, drenched in the Blood of our enemies. Long live the Sylphs, who brought us Hope when our Doom seemed near. Long live the Heir who will lead us into the Light. Long live the Prince who has created Space from its own ashes. Long live our Glorious Speaker, that we may hear his Vast Croak.

The assembled ponies were, of course, feeling thoroughly pleased with themselves. They had finally defeated the Black King, they were finally being recognised as heroes, and their seemingly endless campaign had at long last come to an end. It made Comet feel sick to watch the celebration taking place below him. Why were they celebrating? They were all fools! Pinkie caught his pained expression, attempting to reassure him.

"Don't worry about it. What's done is done, and-" she was cut off as Comet held a hoof in her direction, without taking his eyes off of the scene below him.

"Don't bother. Let's just watch this and get it over with." And so they watched as, all too quickly, the celebrations came to an end...

The Black King was dead, but there was still a Reckoning to take care of. Picking up the Black King's sceptre, now shrunk to a more manageable size, Mild raised it into the sky and allowed its power to fill him. Undoing the magic which had begun the onslaught of meteors, the oncoming missiles slowed at first, before stopping entirely and flying back into the Veil. The cheers of the watching Prospitans and Dersites told him that the task was complete, and he lowered the sceptre. Finally, it was done. And yet, there was so much more yet to do.

"Well then, that's that." Comet said, as he walked away from the rest of the group to where Mild was standing. "I'm just about ready for a nice lie down." Mild smiled grimly.

"Can you bear to stand on ceremony for just a little longer? I take it you have the frog ready?" The rapidly approaching beginning of his plan was, admittedly, the part which Mild was least sure about. But in the end he had to agree with his friend, who seemed to know much more about what was going to happen. Being from the future did give him an unfair advantage, though.

"Yeah, but I think I should probably leave it in my sylladex until we've gotten Skaia ready." Wait, what? No, that was wrong; he was meant to hand it over. "This is silly, since there’s no danger, but I just feel really paranoid about the damn thing. It took forever, after all." Well, this was a problem. He couldn't very well kill a frog that was tucked away inside a gaming abstraction. Of course, there was one very simple way to get what he wanted, but using his powers on a close friend... he glanced in Silver's direction, to find her staring back at him. She nodded, and of course she was right. They were too close to walk away now.

Swiftly reaching into Comet's mind, and taking it for himself, Mild reached out a hoof to pick up the frog which Comet dutifully removed from his sylladex. The surrounding soldiers, unaware of what was happening, cheered at the sight of their glorious speaker. Though Comet was entirely under his control, Mild swore quietly as the cheering drew the attention of the others. Destiny was the closest.

"Mild? We're not ready for the frog yet, we still need to heal the Battlefield." Destiny frowned as she approached, inspecting Comet. The unicorn was staring off into space, not showing any awareness of what was going on around him. "And what happened to Comet? He didn't-" she paused, as she saw his eyes. They had filled in a solid green, bearing a Mind symbol in a lighter shade of green. "Mild..." Fuck, Mild thought to himself, fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. He decided it would be best to play dumb.

"Yes? What is it?" He asked cheerfully, in a very forced voice, while slowly moving around Destiny towards where Silver was standing. Suddenly he halted, so as to not impale his neck on the outstretched sword which was now in front of him.

"Mild. You'd better have a good reason for this." Of course, Destiny had instantly assumed the worst, but she was at least prepared to hear her supposed friend out. "What are you doing with that frog?" Mild thought for a moment, mainly to come up with a suitably badass book-based pun. Finding none, he shrugged.

"Screw it; it's not worth the effort." Before Destiny could figure out exactly what he meant by that, she was suddenly preoccupied by an unabridged encyclopaedia smashing into the side of her face with a terrible crack. Correctly expecting that this wouldn't go unnoticed, Mild grabbed hold of the nearest soldiers and ordered them to attack the rest of his group - besides Silver, of course. By the time Summer and the others realised what was happening, they found themselves fighting off a swarm of oncoming agents. Making the most of the distraction, Silver began to sprint towards the waiting warship, while Mild waited for a few moments to watch his friends fighting back their attackers. Obviously, after such a huge victory, a few measly foot soldiers weren't even approaching a challenge. Ember in particular was enjoying himself, swatting three or four out of the way with each swing of his warhammer. Acapella, having managed to stab her way into some breathing space, shouted out to the watching God.

"Hey! Mild! What the hell do you think you're doing?!?" As a response, Mild tossed the frog into the air.

"I like to think of it as... tying up loose ends." Now the frog was falling, but it wouldn't have time to hit the ground. Swiftly equipping his knife, Mild jabbed the weapon upwards into the glowing amphibian. Satisfied that he had been suitably badass, he then turned and began flying after Silver. Acapella turned angrily towards Summer.

"Are you just going to let him get away with this?" In all fairness, there wasn't a lot any of them could have done. Comet had passed out after Mild had released his mind, Destiny was lying on the floor on top of a thick lake of blood, and the rest of them were all struggling with a group of soldiers. Even so, Summer kicked her attackers away, and flew up and out of their reach. By the time she had brought up her rifle, Mild was already halfway to the warship. But with luck like hers, there was basically no way she could miss.

Except, in an instant, Mild released the soldiers. He needed all of his concentration for his powers to work over such a distance. Kicking his way into Summer's mind, Acapella and the others could do nothing but watch helplessly as Summer quickly swung the rifle downwards, firing a bullet directly into Ember's vaguely surprised face. Throwing the rifle away, Mild then released Summer, who promptly fell to the ground due to a combination of surprise and fatigue. A short distance away, a Dersite warship flew off into the depths of the Medium, as the few survivors tried to make sense of what had just happened.

"Rarity." Rainbow said, remarkably calmly, as she burst through the front door of the Boutique and slammed it shut behind her. "We have got to do something about this."

"About what, Rainbow?" Rarity asked sweetly, but it was anypony's guess whether she was being sarcastic or genuinely clueless. Rainbow rolled her eyes, which was a suitable reaction to either option.

"About the giant monstrous enemies who are completely surrounding your home." She paused. "And also the fact that the whole planet is apparently on fire." Another pause. "And, for that matter, the fact that I'm the one going out and risking my life while you're staying in here." To her mild annoyance, Rarity laughed.

"Oh, don't worry about any of that. I have it all under control." She reached into her safe modus, taking the first thing which it offered to her - a pair of pointed silver knitting needles.

"Um."

"Shh!" Equipping the needles into her needlekind abstrata, Rarity made a few rapid slashes through the air. "I've spent an awfully long time making these, so they should work pretty well."

"Knitting needles? Really? Are you going to knit a scarf and strangle them with it?"

"Laugh all you want, Rainbow Dash, but we'll see who's laughing in the end." Opening the front door and trotting outside, she waited for a bemused Rainbow to follow her before continuing. "Watch and learn, my dear, watch and learn."

Now that she had stepped out into the open, Rarity was almost immediately greeted by an enormous Obsidian Ogre, which growled a low, rumbling growl. It reached down with a clawed hand, and Rarity lashed out with her magic, causing the needles to swipe clean through the underling's hand in a flurry of wool and pain. It quickly retracted the hand, but the needles continued their onslaught, flinging themselves upwards towards the ogre's head. What happened next was entirely too graphic to describe in detail, but suffice it to say that Rainbow made a mental note to never, ever get on Rarity's bad side. Ever. Rarity gave a light laugh and turned to her side, where Rainbow Dash was staring open mouthed.

"Your turn."

"OK, there we go. It turns out Mild was in cahoots with Silver, he stabs the frog, I kill Destiny and Summer shoots Ember, and then Mild and Silver escape with the Black King's sceptre. Then the others revived Destiny and Ember's dream selves, and now they're sitting around waiting for me to come around. Big whoop." Watching Mild's betrayal a second time had left Comet thoroughly annoyed with everything, not least the ridiculous party pony with who he now had the pleasure of conversing. "Was there any point this at all?" As if in response to his question, the scene around them faded into darkness, only to resolve into a starkly different one. "Wait, what?"

"This is what I need to show you." Pinkie explained, pointing out the two ponies in front of them. Mild and Silver, presumably fresh after their escape, stood in what looked like a part of the warship. They were talking to somepony, who was conveniently hidden from Comet's apparently limited view. "This is what you need to know before you wake up."

"Well, that went rather smoothly, all things considered." Mild thought so, anyway. They had left Team Fuckass crippled, with all the players down to just one life each, and they had managed to escape unharmed. "Don't you think, Silver?" The unicorn in question seemed somewhat less happy with their escape.

"We got out alive, so that's something. But we can't rest on our laurels yet. They'll be chasing us, and we need to get moving before that happens." Retrieving a sheet of paper and a Monopony board from her sylladex, she nodded towards the unseen figure. "I've got the components you asked for." Although Comet couldn't see this shadowy pony, he could hear his rich, yet sinister reply.

"Ah... thank you, my dear. Not long now before we have all of the necessary pieces. And what of the frog? Is it dead?" The voice betrayed the urgency of the question - whoever it was; they clearly wanted to make sure their instructions had been carried out exactly.

"Yes, of course it is." Mild answered, displaying an uncharacteristically solid backbone as he replied to this mysterious pony that was imposing enough even without being visible. "You leave my jobs to me, and worry about your own tasks. It will soon be time for you to make good on your promises."

"I would comment on how you've got some nerve to speak to me like that, but it would only go to your head, and that's the last thing I need. What I would really like is for you to be quiet for a few minutes." When he next spoke, it was clear that the pony was addressing Silver. "Are you ready to complete the next stage of the plan?" She nodded, which seemed to cheer him up slightly after speaking with Mild. "Excellent. You know what you have to do." Nodding again, Silver walked out of the room - presumably to carry out whatever they had been talking about. Now the voice spoke again, this time to Mild.

"Now Mild, I will leave you and Silver to meet up with my dear friends in their session... But if you'll excuse me, I have some business of my own to take care of, with a certain Twilight Sparkle..." The mystery pony allowed himself a quiet chuckle, which faded away into nothing as the entire scene fell away into nothingness. Once again, Comet and Pinkie were alone in the darkness that somehow didn't obscure them in any way.

"So what was that about then?" Comet asked, thoroughly confused now. "There's some other pony, that's what you wanted me to see?"

"Well, I guess that's one thing you can take away from all this. But no, the important part is that big super evil mystery guy is heading to Twilight's session!" Pinkie seemed thoroughly excited about this. "So when you wake up, you've got to come to our incipisphere and help us right away!"

"I thought you said you were more serious now?" Pinkie shrugged.

"It comes and goes."

SS: really.
ss: Yes really
ss: I know it looks bad but trust me im on your side
SS: of course you are.
SS: that'll be why you took off with the guy who just killed two of our friends.
SS: knowing full well that your plan would involve our friends getting killed.
ss: Theyre alright now though right
SS: well, yes. but that's not the point!
SS: you can't just come crawling back and say 'oh, it's OK, I was just pretending to be a traitorous bitch!'
ss: Well believe what you will
ss: Im just trying to help so here you go
ss: Milds next move is to head into nublets session
ss: Yuu8E3Es
ss: Thats the code for a device that lets you travel anywhere in nublets incipisphere
ss: You should be able to use it from outside their session in order to break into it
ss: Although just a word of warning
ss: Youll end up somewhere in the session but using it from outside makes the final location a little uncertain
SS: and you know this because Mild trusts you completely, of course.
ss: I guess
SS: hmph. we'll see.
ss: Of course and i wouldnt expect you to trust me after what happened
ss: Just try and remember that im helping you as best i can
SS: OK.
[shiningSeraphim (ss) ceased pestering suspiciousSerpent (SS)]

"OK everypony, listen up." Diamond hadn't exactly been at the forefront of the group during this campaign, but it wasn't difficult for her to get the attention of the rather sombre group of ponies. Destiny and Ember were still recovering from the shock of having been dead until recently, and Comet was still unconscious. "Silver's been in touch; apparently she's just pretending to be with Mild, so that she can help us from behind enemy lines, as it were."

"Does she realise that none of us are going to believe that?" Ember asked bitterly, his pride hurt more than anything else. "Why didn't she say anything if she knew all about this plan of his?"

"The excuse she gave me was that we wouldn't stand a chance in direct combat, and we need her on the inside to have a chance of defeating him, but whatever. The point is that she's sent us the code for something that will let us get into Nublet's session, since apparently that's Mild's next target."

"It isn't." Slowly picking himself up, Comet was relieved to see Destiny and Ember staring down at him. At least they were alive. "But we need to get over there anyway, they're all in trouble. And yes, hello everyone, I'm back from my semi-spiritual ghost dream."

"We know that they're in trouble, you already told us that." Summer pointed out. "Didn't you say we just had to hope that they got through it all?"

"That was about the prototyping thing. This is different, somepony is heading to their session who’s in cahoots with Mild and Silver." He nodded to Diamond. "And he wants us to face him in Nublet's session, which is why Silver's sent you that code."

"In that case, wouldn't it be a really bad idea to go to Nublet's session?" Comet pretended to think about Summer's question for a few moments before shrugging.

"Well, thanks to that guy, whoever he is, our frog is dead. I spent ages making that frog. So if it's all the same to you, I want him dead." And that was really all there was to say on the matter.