On My Honor
Chapter 17
By Honored Service
Edited By: Spirit of Harmony and Duncan Zundel
I walked forward slowly as I aimed my plasma rifle into the air and gently squeezed the trigger.
FZZSH
I smiled at the familiar smell of ozone the gun emitted. The vibrant flash of purple as the superheated gas splashed into the flying targets, dropping them instantly. Maybe it was the sounds of battle, the smell of victory as I passed by another speared Timber Wolf. Something about it all was incredibly serene, beautiful.
I grinned wickedly as I looked to a group of recruits who watched me move through the battlefield from behind a rampart made of desks and storage crates.
“Where are the Elements of Sanctuary?” I asked, my deep voice rumbling out as a hundred hooves and one paw pointed towards the center of camp to my right. “Thanks.” I gave them a nod and raised my gauntlet in a fisted gesture.
“FOR THE EVERFREE!” A loud piercing screech sounded out from above me and I looked up to see a griffon diving at me with two short swords clasped in her claws. I smirked.
Opening my hand, I aimed my gauntlet at her and released my magic. The griffon froze in directly overhead. I slowly levitated her in front of me and smiled at her.
“Oh my, what spirit you have.” I said sarcastically, my voice like a clap of thunder.
As I slowly began to close my fist, the griffon dropped her swords and began clawing at her throat, trying feebly to stop the force that was slowly squeezing around her neck.
I continued to watch as her breathing became slower, more laborious, until it stopped entirely.
POP
Her body dropped to the ground, but her head remained floating in the air, blood leaking from the wrinkled neck, her face frozen with a look of pure terror and pain etched into it.
“Weak,” I sneered before tossing the head beside the body. I moved away and continued on my way to my friends.
“Faster, please!” Luna stood behind the conductor of the train as he adjusted a few levers and knobs on the train. “We mustn't be late. Honored can only do so much alone!”
“Let the bodies hit the floooooooorrrrrrrrr!” I sang aloud giddily while spinning in a circle, firing my plasma rifle and M16 at the same time. I clutched both weapons tight in my hands and wielded them with lethal precision as the circle of enemies around me began to jerk erratically, rounds and plasma ripping into their flesh and armor. A bolt from a crossbow whizzed through the air, but a tendril of black magic shot out of my back and intercepted it, throwing it back to the griffin that had shot it.
It hit its target with a resounding SHLUNK.
I looked to the tendril of magic sprouting from my spine and smiled. The tendril bobbed up and down before slithering over my shoulder and taking the plasma rifle from my hand, coiling around the grip and trigger. It aimed the weapon behind me and began to rattle off shots while I faced the front.
“Nice.” I smiled as I blasted a chimera through the head with well-placed burst from the rifle. I dropped the empty magazine on the ground and then pulled it up with my gauntlet and shot it forward, smacking a griffon right in between his eyes.. He staggered backwards, swinging his sword wildly, trying to score a hit, but was failing.
I smirked, “Pathetic.”
I slammed a fist made of solid crystal into his head, the bones collapsing in as my fist went through the skull with ease. “Damn, what can’t you do?” I asked as I made a fist in front of me, readying another spell with my new magic. Around me, the chimeras and griffins stopped fighting and stopped to stare at me.
“Let’s have a little flashback, shall we?” I laughed as I released the spell and watched the creatures begin to attack each other as I watched. I took this time to load my rifle and clean some of the blood and flesh off of the gun while I watched the massacre in front of me.
At the end of the fighting, one chimera with one remaining head stood dazed as it looked around. I snapped my fingers and the creature jumped forward onto a sword.
I looked around. "What, nobody else? Darn, just when things were get-
"ROOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR"
I felt the earth shake as a massive red dragon with a yellow underbelly and spiked back flew out of the forest and landed at the front of the training camp. I stared it down as it lowered its head, revealing a some shiny motherfucker with red and green eyes.
Sombra.
Sombra was riding a fucking dragon. That lucky son of a bitch.
I felt the new magic within me surge towards him, almost as if trying to pull itself closer.
“Ah, the human. You should have died, yet here you still stand before me. How is that?” He asked with a neutral voice, a slight frown on his face. I noticed that his transformation was complete and he looked now just like the original.
“Eh, I got better.” I rumbled at him. I turned my head and saw the familiar glow of the Elements coming towards me. Good. With my friends here, we could end this much faster.
'Friends.'
'Why do you need friends? Look at what you did by yourself.'
I turned and survived my area of the battlefield. Hundreds of bodies covered the area, large skewers of dark crystals jutted out of the ground, bodies piled on them like kebabs. I looked to the rifle that was still wrapped in the tendril of manifested dark magic. The bolt racked back again on the plasma weapon and the gun began to emit a humming noise.
I had done this. All of this was done with just my weapons and magic. My power.
I smiled. My friends could get hurt.
'Or get in your way as you deliver your glorious power unto your enemies.'
Ookaay. That was weird.
I reached up and placed a hand on my top most pocket on my chest rig. I felt three little bumps in the pocket. My smile grew wider as I reached into the pocket and slowly pulled out a single purple glowing 5.56 round. I looked at Twilight’s enchantment and then closed my eyes as I let my newfound magic begin to weave itself into the round as well.
I opened my eyes to see the tip of the bullet glowing purple, and at the middle of it, a black ball of energy lazily spun around. I grinned wildly and dropped the magazine from the weapon and pulled the charging handle back, sending the normal round out. I dropped the magic round into the chamber and closed the bolt. I lifted the rifle and aimed at the dragon and Sombra about two hundred meters away.
“When you have power, use it.” I felt my magic reach what would be a unicorn's second corona, and a wall of crystal formed along my back, digging into the ground and branching out four or five feet. Hopefully that would keep me from suffering the mammoth recoil this round would create.
I squeezed the trigger at Sombra’s head. Through the minimal zoom in the scope, I think I saw him gasp. The world around me seemed to suddenly lose all its light, all the sunshine vanished as it was sucked into the rifle’s barrel. Around me it became night time, as the end of the barrel exploded in light and vanished as a solid line of black shot forward, almost too fast to see. A thin black line nailed the dragon in the center of its head, and then exited out the back and continued into the Everfree forest for five hundred meters.
Then the thin beam of black magic expanded a hundred fold, exploding outwards to the left and right, making everything it touched simply vanish. It just ceased to be. Buildings, trees, grass, rocks, creatures, and the dragon just vanished in a quick flash of dark magic.
For over five hundred meters the world ceased to exist. Just a trench of dirt carved like an ugly scar onto the Equestrian landscape.
Like an angry God took a knife to the world.
The trench tapered to a point that ended right below my rifle barrel. I looked at the M16 and noticed that the barrel now emitted a black fog along its length.
It has absorbed the power of those whose lives it took.
"Duuude."
Crkkkk
I looked down at my feet, noticing that there were cracks spiderwebbing their way across the crystal wall.
“HONORED!”
I spun around, shattering the remnants of the wall as I moved, bringing the weapon to my shoulder and aiming...
...into the face of Stand Bold.
He and the rest of the Elements of Sanctuary skidded to a halt before me. Stand Bold stared at the weapon in my hand and then back to me. “Honored?” He asked.
“Heheh, whoops!" I said, dropping the weapon.
I was about to pull the trigger.
Why?
'The power from these creatures would make that weapon unstoppable.
Make you unstoppable.'
I shook my head and quickly looked away from my friends. “Guess I got a little carried away.” I looked back to the destruction that I had caused. “We'll, that's that."
WHAM
Blinding pain erupted from my side as I flew through the air and crashed into the side of a wooden building. The wall gave way and I soared into the building, landing in a heap in the center of the room. Everything spun around me as I tried to move, but everything hurt.
“You know not what power you wield, you sniffling whelp.” I groaned and rolled over, trying to feel for my rifle. My hand found the end of the sling, the clip on it broken, my rifle somewhere between here and the spot from where I had been hit at. “You think you can kill me? I have had over a thousand years to master the dark void and its crystal magic. You think that after a few days you have even the faintest hope of defeating me?” Sombra stood over me, his eyes ablaze with anger. I could see that some of his smoky tail was gone, no doubt because of my rifle.
“You DARE think that you have what it takes to defeat me? That you have that kind of power?”
“No.” I coughed and looked at him, a small, defiant smile slowly forming on my face as my hand found the grip to my pistol. “But I think I can make do.”
I pushed myself across the ground with a burst of magic while a faint Tune began to fill the air.
I spun around and came up, aiming my pistol down at Sombra and squeezing the trigger on the Berretta. The nine millimeter rounds dented into Sombra’s black armor but failed to break him.
He was right, alone I couldn’t beat him, but I wasn’t alone.
'They will get in the way.'
I dropped the empty magazine for the pistol and slipped a full one into the mag well.
"Nah-ah-ah!” I leapt backwards a spear made of crystal slammed into the ground, shards of the powerful black magic scattered through the air. "Gotta be faster than that!"
Sombra stood opposite me, several spears floating in his magical grasp. I holstered the pistol and reached over my shoulder. I gripped the handle of the Element of Sanctuary and drew it to my side.
I felt Tune roll up behind me, his lights illuminating the building and his weapons all aiming across the room and tracking the lone target.
“You’re about to find yourself in a world o’ hurt, buddy," Stand Bold said as he aimed his crossbow at the pony.
I looked over my shoulder to see all of my friends standing behind me. Stand Bold had his weapon aimed at Sombra, bolt ready to fly. Hammer Strike and Quick Flurry both stood side by side, Hammer’s hammer (heh) and Quick’s dagger were both pulled back, ready to strike. Battle Plan stood farthest to the left, his bow drawn taught, three glowing arrows resting on string. Covert reached forward and swiped his katana around in the air before drawing it across his body and pointing it down.
All of Tune’s weapon systems were trained on the lone assailant as he watched us all with hate filled eyes. He widened his stance and cracked a smile, “Six against one? Grab a few more guards and it might be a fair fight.”
“Then I think I should suffice.” I turned and looked up and saw Princess Luna perched on a windowsill overlooking the battle torn room. Floating beside her was the machine gun I had given her, loaded and ready to kill. Behind Luna I could see Night Guards and Crystal Guard pegasus floating in the air, spears and swords clutched in their hooves. A loud bang filled the air as the doors to the building exploded in and unicorns form both the Day and Night guards filled in the room. Crystal guards, griffins, a few diamond dogs, and even a small dragon followed in behind the unicorn battle mages.
My mind went blank as I realized the sheer amount of help that we were receiving. For once it wasn’t a handful of warriors against a monstrous enemy. We had the support of nations all across Equestria. The Equestrian Honor Guard had multiplied rapidly, accepting all warriors loyal to Equestria, and here they were. Ready to fight.
'We had it under control.'
“Whoa, wait, who's we?” I asked aloud.
Everybody looked at me, even Sombra gave me a look.
“Uh...I mean, you’re going down Sombra.”
Every weapon was pointed at the lone unicorn and every horn was charged with a spell. Sombra simply looked around and smiled.
“Very well, I can tell when I have been bested, I surrender.” He closed his eyes, jammed his spears in the ground, and waited. No one dared to move.
“Is this some sort of jest?” Luna asked from her spot above the large room. “Surely you can’t be serious.”
“Oh, but I am.” Sombra looked up to Luna, “I can tell that even if I was able to finish casting my spell, I would only kill half of you here, leaving the other half alive. And that just won't do. I know you Luna, Honored, Elements of Sanctuary. You have integrity, honor. You wouldn't kill an enemy that is giving up.”
“Guess again.” I glared at him and walked forward. “I have no sympathy for you. You think that by surrendering you'll get to live and kill us later?"
Sombra didn't respond, didn't move a muscle.
"THINK AGAIN, FUCKBOY! I will gladly kill you now and save us the trouble of dealing with you later!"
I leveled the pistol in my hand at Sombra’s head and squeezed the trigger.
CLACK
“Eh?” I looked down to see the hammer caught in a orange aurora. I turned to stare as Battle Plan took my pistol from my grasp and Stand Bold moved forward.
“Honored, what the fuck, man?” He asked as some of the guards began to relax. I turned my attention back to Sombra, but kept my sword ready to strike. He knowingly smiled at me and seemed to wink at me. “There was a time when you didn’t welcome battle. But today, Honored I don’t know what I saw today. I watched you take enjoyment of killing all those creatures. You looked like a demon. I know that’s your nickname, Demon King, but today you truly lived up to it. You relished in killing those creatures."
I kept my sword pointed at Sombra’s neck as he smirked at me. “You know why, don’t you, 'Honored Service'?” He gave a deep chuckle that sounded out through the entire building, “It's flowing through you. I feel it. I know you feel it, too. It’s what gave you the unimaginable strength to fight so many in such little time..” He jerked his head to the side motioning towards my friends behind me, “Go on. Tell them. Tell them what it really is.”
“I…” I began but felt something pulling at me. My newfound power, this dark magic was truly the root of it, but it also gave me this unbelievable control that let me strike down an entire army in a single swoop. It was too great, but it was too important to not have. It gave me the strength to defeat all that stood before me.
But at what cost?
'Friendship? Is that really worth giving up this power?'
Well, duh.
I lowered my sword and took a deep breath.
“I-I learned dark magic. The same that Sombra uses. It gave me the strength to fight him. When I lost that battle in the Everfree, I failed all of you. I’ve come close to death, but look at what my failure has brought. We just had an all-out battle in the middle of Equestria. I failed to stop him,” I jerked the sword back at Sombra and noticed how much it was shaking, “And he brought war back to Equestria.”
“Honored.” Luna said from above.
“And on that note.” Sombra slammed his hooves into the ground and a bubble of black magic shot forward, shoving everyone back. Sombra leapt backwards as I reared up and tossed a throwing knife at him. He dodged the blade as the back wall exploded, scattering guards in every direction.
Everyone took cover as a two hydras broke into the room and began shredding anything and anyone they got ahold of.
“GET DOWN!” I yelled from behind a desk. I reached down to my sling but groaned as I felt the broken clip. Something knocked me in the head, jarring me to focus as a floating M16 bobbed next to my head. I snatched the weapon out of Luna’s field and popped up from behind the desk and began to fire concentrated shots into the hydra’s many heads.
“Where the fuck did he go?” I asked out as I rolled to the side, a hydra head snatching the desk in its jagged teeth.
Tune joined in the battle as he skidded to a halt in front of me, his .50cal barking shots onto the enemy hydras, blasting them back out of the building.
On the way out, a hydra hit one of the support beams, and the ceiling shuddered.
“Sir, we must take this fight out into the open, before the building collapses.” Tune’s robotic voice spoke over his music.
I nodded and reached out, grabbing onto his equipment rack and getting to ride what was once my iPod onto the battlefield.
Three hydras in total were smashing apart the training camp eating everything they crossed. Unicorns launched spells at them while pegasi dove around their heads, slashing with their short swords. The Diamond Dogs used strange gem-powered crossbows. The one young dragon I saw stood held two cutlasses and used his scales to his advantage, fighting his way through the oncoming waves of minions that Sombra still had control of.
“Sombra.” I muttered under my breath as I saw him across the training camp retreating towards the Everfree that he had emerged from. “I don’t think so. Tune, step on it.”
“With pleasure, sir.” We began heading through the war torn camp. Tune’s weapons fired periodically as we drove, expertly placed shots knocking enemies over left and right while I fired my M16 from on top of Tune. As we neared closer to the retreating villain, one hydra broke from the rest and began lumbering its way towards Tune and myself.
“Tune, 180 and heavy bravo.” I called out as I prepared myself.
“MARK!” I leapt into the air and summoned a sheet of black crystal beneath me as Tune’s gun mount swiveled around and unleashed a withering barrage of fire at the hydra. The hydra stumbled at the sudden impacts along its body, failing to notice me flying towards it on my crystal platform.
“Hit him.” I jumped forward and the crystal board morphed, becoming long and thin like a spear and lodging itself into the hydra’s chest. I slammed into the crystal with my boots, pushing it all the way into the hydra. I dropped down, sending a tendril of magic out and stabbing it into the hydra and then swinging myself around the creature’s three necks, keeping the magic flowing so that soon the three heads had been tied together by the black rope.
I landed in front of the creature and squeezed my fist tight, jerking down. The rope went impossibly tight and sliced through all three necks at once, bringing the whole beast down to the ground in a splatter of pooling blood.
I turned and smiled wickedly at Sombra who stood watching from the wood line. ‘I’ve got you beat and you know it.’
‘You think these simple parlor tricks can even hope to stop me?’ Sombra's voice echoed in my mind.
‘I don’t think –‘ I thought before reaching out and releasing my teleportation spell, “I know!” I yelled at Sombra as I appeared alongside him and drove a crystal-encased fist into the side of his head, causing his silver and black helmet to fall off and his body to go sprawling across the ground. He looked up to me and vanished in flash of black mist before reappearing in front of me. A long, curved sword made of crystal hovering beside him, 'Void's Blight' engraved in the side. I smirked at him before taking my own sword out from its sheath and holding it at my side.
"Fuckboy wants to play games, eh? I’ll play, I'll play."
I looked around, taking note that everyone else was far behind us in the camp. I smiled before laughing deeply.
“What is it? Laughing at your own demise?” Sombra asked, raising a eyebrow AND smiling.
“Nope.” I grinned before reaching down and slowly drawing the .44 magnum form its thigh holster and holding it in my right hand. “The fact that it’s just you and me out here, so I can do anything to you and the ponies will never know.”
“What's that- Sombra began but suddenly the air was filled with a series of ear-shattering blasts.
Sombra stared at me as the smoking handgun slowly was lowered back into its holster. Sombra’s eyes cut to the side and he saw that his sword, Void’s Blight, forged from hundreds of void crystals, holding energy lost to millennium of time, forges from hundreds of years of effort, was gone. Only the hilt and a small section of the blade remained.
Sombra stared at the pieces scattered on the he ground.
“Yeah, playing fair is lame, especially when I can just end it like this.” I smirked as Sombra realized his mistake. “The ponies see me as the great honorable warrior. Which I am, mind you, but what they don’t know, won’t hurt them.”
'Crush him and absorb his power. Make his magic yours. Give in to the power and let it truly flow through you.'
I shook my head but found that the fog that was in my mind was still lingering.
“I know you feel it.” Sombra said, his voice not as loud and confident as it had been before. “That was my mistake. I listened to that voice that you are hearing now. I have no choice but to obey it now.” Sombra jumped forward and slammed a hoof into my side, momentarily freeing me from the fog. “It consumes you!”
POW
“Takes away everything that made you who you are."
POW
“Makes you believe that without it you are nothing.”
More pain.
“It makes you know only power!”
I lost my breath as another hit struck my back.
“You are falling just as I did.”
Sombra was on top of me, slamming his hooves into my armored chest, trying to beat me to death. Or was he trying to kill the thing that was inside of me.
“It is too late. He is in you,and soon he will take over your mind! When he is finished, everything will be over. He wants power, and will do anything to get it!” Sombra was screaming, almost begging, at this point. I was so confused. I knew what he was talking about, but the power wasn’t an actual being. It was just that, power.
“No, Sombra,” I said from my position beneath him, “I won't let him.”
SHUNK
Sombra staggered back, gasping as he stared down to his chest. Planted up to the hilt was Bad Bertha.
The dying king stared at me with paling red and green eyes as I stood up and walked over to him. He only looked at me as I reached down and slowly twisted the hidden spike out from the handle.
“It is finally over. Thank you.” He mumbled.
“Yes. Yes it is.” I slammed the small handle spike into the side of Sombra’s head and watched his eyes roll back into his head and his body slumped forward into my arms.
'Perfect. Only two more to control.'
“What?” I asked aloud again. “What the fuck are you?”
'I am you, the true magic flowing through you. I am the void.'
I picked up Sombra and tossed him over my shoulder. I began walking back towards the camp, hoping Tune would be along shortly so I could drop this heavy bastard on his back.
'Don’t you want more power? Only two others know our magic. With them gone you would be the only one left.'
“Nah.” I shifted the body. “That was Sombra’s problem. He only wanted more power, he gave into the greed that you fed him. No, I'm good. I only needed to beat Sombra. Thanks for getting me there.”
'Y-you played me! You used me!'
“Sure did. I recognize that tone of voice anywhere.”
“Welcome back, Nightmare, ya traitorous son of a bitch"
'Fuck you, too, Honored, fuck you, too.'