"That was amazing!" Sunset said once the heat of the battle had died down. In all her years in the Human World, she'd never seen such a valiant display of heroism, from The Dazzlings, no less.
"You really think so, Mommy?" Sonata asked, her looks of happiness once more returning once she'd heard those sweet words that Sunset had spoken to her.
"I know so, Sonata," she pulled Sonata into another hug, causing her to blush lightly. She watched as Sonata's cheeks turned a rosy red with this warm hug that she had delivered to her, and smiled once she'd given Sonata some more room to breathe. "In fact, all three of you were amazing in that endeavour. When we get home, I think some gifts are in order..."
"For realsies?" Sonata asked, her smile growing ever wider.
"For realsies, girls." Sunset said, walking all of the girls back out the stadium the way they had come in. She smiled as the girls continued to pepper The Dazzlings with victorious comments and goodwill as they walked. She knew that The Dazzlings deserved praise, especially after the long and tiresome battle that they'd just gone through.
As the girls poured out of the stage, five menacing figures in light coloured armour watched from the roof of the stadium which hung above the bleachers. They could feel that The Dazzlings were Sirens, so the neck part of their armour glowed a sinister shade of crimson.
Raising their swords, they opened up a portal and walked through it, leaving behind nothing more than slight gusts of wind as they left for Lyrica. Each one of the figures also had the Cutie Marks of Twilight's friends imprinted on the backs of their armour. These marks were all layered above a depiction of a Furen pendant, indicating that they were Furen Sirens...
"So... Do you think anyone else saw that battle?" Rainbow Dash asked as they returned to the ruined stadium's interior, which looked like it was in an even worse state than before the battle, but still traversable. Rainbow Dash had concerns that if anyone else had seen that massive pillar of fire and the red skies that came afterwards, then some people might have suspicions and would want to question all the witnesses that were there on the scene.
"Huh?" Sunset turned to see that Rainbow Dash had passed the question on to her. "Why do you ask that, Rainbow Dash?"
"I'm just saying, that if anyone else saw Courageour getting his butt kicked, then they might start to suspect everyone who was there when the event happened," Rainbow Dash decided to explain so that Sunset was able to understand. "Sure, the other stories were come-and-go stories, but this time, they might actually start fearing for their lives if they get a logical answer."
"Don't worry, girls," a voice echoed through the hallways, reaching the ears of all ten of the departing girls as they walked. Tht voice got the girls to stop their walk and find where the voice was coming from. "I'm sure we'll be able to make sense of it, and relieve the other men and women of their concerns..."
"Snapshots?" Twilight asked, seeing Photo Finish, Pixel Pizazz and Violet Blur appear in front of the ten girls from above. She had no idea why they were up there, but did see that they were holding onto ropes which came from wrist-mounted launchers on their jumpsuits. "What's with the get-up?"
"The future truly is bright for us journalists, Twilight," Violet said, showing off her plum jumpsuit along with Photo Finish's silver one and Pixel's emerald one. "Check it out! These suits enable us to not only apply stealth, but also to handle any and all climates."
"I guess you could say zat we're super-journalists from now on." Photo Finish said as the three of them pulled the ropes back into the launchers on the wrists of their suits.
"So, you were able to take some shots of that battle?" Pinkie said, zipping over to The Snapshots at a rather fast pace. She found that there were no cameras on the three of them, but tiny little pink computer chips in their pockets. "Where are they? And if you have them, am I in them?"
"Pinkie, watch what you're doing with that!" Pixel instructed Pinkie to take good care of the chip she'd pulled out of her pocket. "That's a very delicate piece of hardware you're playing with!"
"Aww, lighten up, silly-willy. I was just looking to see whether or not you had any cameras with you," Pinkie said, promptly returning the chip to Pixel, who pushed a button that Pinkie had missed. "But, since there's no photos, I have to assume that you didn't take... any..."
Pinkie was at a loss for words when the chip quickly transformed into a thin tablet with a screen facing Pixel, and a camera lens facing the ten other girls. She was even more surprised when she watched Violet Blur and Photo Finish get the same results with their chips.
In the end, all three of The Snapshots were seen with large tablets instead of small computer chips. On their end, The Snapshots were seen dragging the pictures of The Dazzlings fighting Courageour from a side menu on the right side of the screen, to a newspaper on the actual screen.
"Truly ze future has given us ze true magicks of journalism, has it not?" Photo Finish showed the finished off product to the girls, who were surprised that such a small image had already been put onto a digital newspaper in the blink of an eye. "Ze new Journalizer 8000 really makes our jobs much easier, wouldn't you agree?"
"So, what are ya'll doin', chasin' after the ten of us like bandits runnin' from the law?" Applejack asked, seeing that The Snapshots were already typing up the headlines for the digital newpaper, as well as the tabloids underneath and around the picture.
"Don't mind us, girls. We were just interested in learning more on the stories of the connections this world has with Equestria and Lyrica," Violet decided to explain once she had a little break from writing her tabloids. "There's actually a lot of lore these three worlds share, believe it or not..."
"In fact, we're here because we're researching the oldest event in all of history," Pixel Pizazz said as she changed her screen from her digital papers to a digital notebook that came with the device. She brought up the notes and turned the device to show the girls. "The Great Lyrican War..."
"Ze very same war zat separated our three worlds completely," Photo Finish said, once she'd finished her part of the digital papers she'd been working on, and moved on to her digital notebook as well. "As ze ten of you already know, Earth shares a connection with Equestria. Ze portal happens to stand at Canterlot High School, undisturbed for tens of thousands of years..."
"Until I decided to come through when I abandoned my studies with Celestia..." Sunset said, recalling the times when she was still cold-hearted and didn't like waiting for answers.
"Yes, but zere was another portal zis world had," Photo Finish decided to scroll down the notes with the palm of her middle finger, showing the girls all the knowledge she'd accrued. "Supposedly, zis one led straight to Lyrica, ze Siren world..."
"And this involves us, how?" Aria asked, clearly wondering whether or not Photo Finish was even speaking logical things at this moment in time.
"Actually, this story might have something to do with the three of you, Dazzlings..." Pixel said, showing some special archaic drawings on her tablet. "I could tell you the story we know so far, if you'd like..."
"Might as well. After all, we've been getting back a lot of our memories back recently," Adagio pointed out, reminding The Snapshots that they were finally starting to remember their past. "But Mommy keeps saying we did something at Canterlot High School that she doesn't really want to mention..."
"That story isn't related to this one, so you're perfectly fine, girls..." Violet said, easing The Dazzlings and making sure that this story wasn't one of their darker, more undesirable past. Violet then flexed her arms, drawing the ten girls closer to her. "Now then, listen closely, everyone..."
"The Legend of King Allure..." Pixel started, showing the first of the images that was related to the story. It showed an almighty king with crystal wings on his back, as well as some archaic symbols shining brightly around his body. "A legend older than all the others..."
"No-one knows how emotions came into existence, but there was one truth that ran through our minds," Violet decided to pick up on the explanation. "When the dimensional unbalances began to kick in, existence was separated into three different pieces; Human, Equine, and Siren."
"Ze three vorlds were all ruled by powerful forces, keeping ze species in order," Photo Finish decided to show another archaic picture, depicting humans of the Human World, ponies of Equestria, and Sirens of Lyrica, all being ruled by a series of trusting eyes in the sky. "Ze Human World was commanded by ze designated vorld leader, Equestria vas commanded by Princess Celestia and her sister, Luna. But ze one who ruled ze Sirens was known as King Allure..."
"Allure spent the first millennium of his existence, creating life by singing archaic lyrics to nothing but the walls he was holed up in." Pixel continued to speak, showing a picture of the Siren with crystal wings spawning a song, shrouding the hall he was in with an otherworldly magic.
"Where we can only hear music, and make it match our visions of beauty, Allure saw through beauty, and he could truly see the Sirens inside his songs..." Violet showed another picture, showing Allure looking at the Siren that was to be created with his song. "This otherworldly strength became Allure's power. Allure's songs were truly the songs that created and sustained the Siren species..."
"However, Allure showed pity when he saw that humans and ponies had absolutely no emotions at all, and were naïve enough to believe anything that was sent their way," Pixel showed the next picture, showing The Dazzlings and The Blasters in a more primal state, garbed in armour and robes that bore their Cutie Marks. Not only that, but the left halves of The Blasters was coated in a blue aura, whereas the right sides of The Dazzlings were shrouded in a red aura. "So the emotions that he felt were separated from his body, and sent to the other worlds.
"Among the Sirens he created, he separated his soul from his very body, divided it in half with his emotions, and entrusted them to the six most powerful Sirens he'd ever made with his songs," Violet added on with their combined research. "The Right Souls of Fury, three Furens. And the Left Souls of Bliss, three Blissen Sirens."
"By separating hatred from peace, humans and ponies gained emotional will. Ve could now choose how ve felt towards certain zings..." Photo Finish showed another picture, showing humans and ponies showing either happiness or hatred towards certain things that they saw. "Using zis, we created our own civilizations on choices we vere happy with, allowing all of us to turn our once bleak and barren worlds, into zings of beauty..."
"With the Souls of Song watching over us all, we flourished for millennia on end, with a perfect balance of both hatred and bliss. It became the very Balance of Lyrica, with which Sirens were tasked in keeping the same," Violet showed another picture, showing a scale with two vials hanging from it, and two arrows pointing to how much hatred and bliss there was. "As long as the Balance of Lyrica was kept stable, humans and ponies became their own, free thinking beings."
"Life is merely a candle, and can be snuffed out easily. But now, we were all thinking candles, ones with emotions. This made us all unique, and special in our own separate ways," Pixel was about to finish, showing the girls the last picture, with The Dazzlings and The Blasters holding hands as they watched over all three worlds with smiles on their faces. "The inheritors of the Souls of Song were given pure adoration and thousands of accolades of praise. Not only that, but their Souls of Song remained for as long as they were still alive, as a sign that they were the very same Sirens that were tasked with the chore of safeguarding the worlds..."
"The Souls of Song..." Twilight said, those words very familiar once she'd been reminded of them.
"That's right. The very souls that had been passed down to Allure's six most powerful Sirens..." Violet said once The Snapshots had all pushed a button, turning their tablets back into chips once again.
"The Souls... of Song?" Adagio asked, those words vaguely familiar to her as she'd recollected all the memories she'd already has thus far. She'd barely even remembered such a thing until The Snapshots brought it back to her attention.
"As long as the Souls of Song existed, humans and ponies were able to freely control their emotions without fail..." Pixel spoke onwards, reminding the ten girls of this one fact. "They could choose whether or not they found looks and words to be either calming or angering."
"However, recently, humans have been showing nothing but happiness recently. Zey find nothing to bother zem nowadays..." Photo Finish said, telling the girls of a fatal error that was starting to befall these worlds. "After further research, we found zat ze plausible answer to zis overdose of happiness..."
"The Right Souls of Fury, as well as their possessors, were lost to the three worlds forever with the defeat of the final three Furens at the Battle Of The Bands, ten years ago..." Violet spoke, reminding the girls of events that had already transpired, but also connected with the events that had happened to them all a while back.
Twilight, Sunset and the Humane 5 all cracked a massive gasp at that. They hadn't realized that by defeating The Dazzlings, they were blindly leading the three worlds into an apocalypse of bliss. Now that there was no-one to make others angry, the balance would slowly be toppling towards bliss, making everyone die from over-relaxation instead of war after war.
So many images flashed through the minds of all ten of the girls with that last sentence. They could see old images of The Dazzlings of the past, combined with all the images that The Snapshots had shown them thus far. It all seemed to give the ten girls a pounding headache as the memories continued to flood their minds, especially the last ones which showed the Dazzlings' pendants in ruins after that final attack.
"Where did you find all this?" Sunset asked once she and the other girls had finished recollecting memories of those dark times at CHS.
"Just dug it up from the oldest museum in all of history, why do you ask?" Pixel said, giving a short and sweet answer on how The Snapshots could have possibly acquired those pictures.
"It's just that... Sirens never had any lore like this before. At least not in Equestria..." Twilight said, showing a little concern. "Now that the Right Souls of Fury have been snuffed out, the worlds are going to fall in a state of eternal bliss unless someone makes human and ponies furious."
"And without The Dazzlings doing that..." Violet's eyes widened upon the realization.
"The worlds are gonna become too peaceful!" everyone except The Dazzlings said in pure horror. Now that the truth had been spilled, it was only a matter of time before the balance began to kick in and start the end.
"But wait a second!" Pinkie said, getting all the girls to stop and listen for a brief period of time. "If the world's becoming more and more peaceful, then why hasn't the balance toppled already?"
"Maybe it has something to do with The Dazzlings felling those creatures from Euphoria earlier..." Twilight said, thinking of a logical explanation for the reason why the Balance of Lyrica wasn't affecting the worlds yet.
"What does that have to do with this?" Fluttershy asked, still in her usual timid voice.
"I think that The Dazzlings are sustaining the balance by killing those monsters from Euphoria," Twilight said, remembering that those monsters were born from peace and goodwill. "Think about it... If those monsters come from a world of peace, and are spreading peace, then what would happen if they were to perish in battle?"
"Maybe our Right Souls of Fury haven't completely vanished..." Sonata said, seeing that her hands were glowing a bright shade of red, as were the hands of Adagio and Aria.
"Hmm... Courageour said that the Right Souls of Fury were cleansed when they sang the Second Life Song ten years ago..." Sunset said, examining The Dazzlings' glowing hands. "Maybe it seems that they decided to stick around after the Battle Of The Bands, even after what had happened..."
"So, what are you ten going to be doing now?" Photo Finish asked, seeing the girls were starting to head back outside the stadium.
"We need to start training The Dazzlings how to amplify their talents," Twilight said back as the ten of them closed in on the exit to the outside world. "If we can teach them to control both their voices and their swordsmanship, then maybe we can help them start out in fulfilling their purposes as the Right Souls of Fury..."
"And are you sure you can handle that?" Pixel wanted to make sure that Twilight and the rest of the girls knew what they were doing.
"Positive." Twilight said as her voice now echoed on the walls as she and her friends finally walked outside, allowing The Dazzlings to go out with them.
Back in Euphoria, a red portal with red lightning opened up, revealing five Furen Sirens draped in battle armour. The portal vanished behind them and they saluted The Blasters once they'd returned.
"Hello, girls," Fortissimo said, watching the Sirens take off their helmets, revealing that they were Twilight's Equestria friends-turned-Furens. They looked at Fortissimo with rather obedient eyes and spoke nothing until he spoke once more. "I trust you witnessed that battle?"
"Yes, Master Fortissimo." they said in perfect unison, saluting him once more by putting their knuckles on their armour once more.
"Then you know what we're after..." he said, pulling out the locket he kept in his pocket. It showed the very picture of Adagio that he'd kept with him after all this time. "And you know what must be done to revive all your friends..."
They spoke no words, but met him with cold, obedient stares. Their swords glowed a rather menacing shade of scarlet as the marks on their backs glowed in the middle of a red light. Their eyes then turned from their normal colours, into pure red. Every part of their eyes turned into an evil red colour, similar to what The Dazzlings had pulled ten years ago. And with all this happening, the Siren 5 cracked sinister smiles as their eyes continued to glow red...