//------------------------------// // 60 // Story: Yonder Wandered Fluttershy // by Darkonshadows //------------------------------// “Look I have her, you want her and I’ve played your game. Now when do you want me to deliver?” Bonnie was glaring at the deep glowing red eyes of Zurg’s purple helmet as he chuckled darkly. “Oh, the games not over yet, I believe Torque is still in play. If you can get away from him and any of the rest of the thugs while evading Star Command and the Alliance Armada to somehow manage even reaching Planet Z with the ambassador still alive, then I might consider the game over and let you in through the defense systems for an attempt at your goals.” Zurg gave out a dark laugh. “This is all kinds of delectable on the evil scale to me already, don’t disappoint me now. I sorely need that new torture subject, my current one might not last another week.” As the screen cut off Bonnie had suddenly had a glare on her face and her fists was clenched and shaking. Zurg would pay for everything, even if she had to blow up his whole planet to do it! “He’s really scary… also I’m sorry to tell you this, but I might need to use the bathroom soon.” Fluttershy certainly didn’t like Zurg; she also didn’t understand why Bonnie was listening to him but something about the game and the fact that he was currently torturing someone seemed to have Bonnie looking positively filled with a murderous rage. Maybe getting her mind off of it for a moment would make her look less murderous? “How do hostage situations like this usually work when the captor is trying to keep the hostage alive and well? Does that mean you have to get me something to drink as well as feed me? I know you’re obviously not going to untie me any time soon and I’m okay with that.” “Oh for the love of…” Bonnie was once again clutching at her skull with her ears dropping downwards as Fluttershy mentioned being a hostage; it was causing her to have a slight migraine. “Are you okay? You look to be in a lot of pain.” Honestly if she wasn’t currently tied up, she would be at Bonnie’s side trying to make her feel better. “I also want to know why you’re so angry.” “What do you care, I have you tied to a freaking chair and I plan to hand you over to the nut job that’s been torturing…” Bonnie quickly closed up and didn’t say anything else. She looked away while crossing her arms. “Look, just drop it. It’s better that you don’t like me, I think you’ll even learn to hate me Sweet Cheeks.” “I don’t think I can really truly hate anything, at least for a long time anyway. I can fear and maybe be deeply upset with someone, but I don’t really get angry easily unless a friend of my mine is in danger.” Speaking of, Fluttershy wondered if everyone else was alright and what had happened to Roller in all the chaos? She hoped that he hadn’t gotten lost; he was one of the few constants she has had since she herself got lost in the universe. “Yeah, believe what you want. I’m not about to untie you, but you do need to take care of your business… doing it in that suit wouldn’t be so unpleasant would it?” Clutching at her head again Bonnie couldn’t help but let out a grunt of pain. “Actually the suit I’m wearing runs on clean water and sunlight, it’s got a very good life support system. Unfortunately the people of Rhizome have yet to actually make these suits to where they can handle bodily wastes. Professor Triffid said he was still working on it and that was before… right.” The pink petals at the back of Fluttershy’s head wilted in front of her face as she gazes at the floor. “Whoa, what hit the depression button on you?” Her headache wasn’t alleviating as long as she personally held Fluttershy prisoner, her programming was quite painful in this respect. Holding others prisoner was something neither she nor Clyde could do for an extended period of time and they personally hated jail with a passion. Some people actually belonged in jail and she knew that to be a truth, even if she didn’t like it. “Look maybe I can untie you, but I don’t feel particularly good about letting you out of my sight so you can drain you’re fluids into a Porcelon’s mouth.” “What’s a Porcelon?”Fluttershy squirmed a bit as she felt a pressure build up between her hind legs, at this point she was about ready to promise Bonnie anything to dodge the embarrassment of going on the chair she was tied to. “They are a race of these guys that basically look like living toilets; some are smaller than others and sometimes get mistaken for bodily waste receptacles...” Bonnie had a disgusted look on her face as she stuck her tongue out, she had seen the oddest fantasies on the Galactic Alliance interconnected networks about them and she wished she hadn’t. Some people will always come up with the weirdest crap involving the subject, quite literally. She had to wonder how some people could even find something that horribly repulsive in any way, shape or form, attractive. “What if I promise you I won’t even begin an attempt at running away? Oh, I know I can make you a Pinkie Pie promise!” Of all the things Fluttershy did not want to do, is pee herself in this chair. She was a civilized pony and she didn’t like the idea of doing something like that, especially not in front of her captor. “I Fluttershy do hereby Pinkie Promise…” - Pinkie’s ears started twitching; her hair was in an almost constantly half deflated state wanting to always hear news about how Fluttershy was doing from Discord. Once she got off work, hearing from him that Fluttershy was still among the living brightened her day considerably. What she had felt, was that someone was making a Pinkie Pie promise. Somehow the feeling perked her up considerably. After a moment she stopped working in the bakery at Sugar Cube Corner and walked up to Mrs. Cake. “Excuse me Mrs. Cake I have to go somewhere for a minute, I’ll be right back!” Getting a nod from Mrs. Cake, Pinkie Pie hopped off as she felt a second tingling feeling that she was needed to shout something at someone a long distance away. - “That I will truly be your friend and that I will not run away from you until I’ve assisted you in handing me over to this Emperor Zurg or finished helping you in your goals involving him. It doesn’t matter whichever comes first.” Of course Fluttershy knew this had to happen now or she’d be stuck at Bonnie’s side forever unless something were to separate them against her will, but she could live with it. Unfortunately Fluttershy also realized a huge problem with her wording, but it was too late to take it back. Now she couldn’t physically run away from Bonnine, she could only run towards her or walk away from her. There were loopholes however; at least flying away did not count as running away. “Hah, do you really expect me to believe that you promise that you will let me hand you over to that ruthless dictator?” Bonnie certainly didn’t look convinced. “He’s going to do horrible things to you when I get you to him, you do realize that right?” “Of course, I made a promise and I will stand by it. Because breaking a promise is the quickest way to lose a friend…” Fluttershy would not bend now, she was speaking in a solemn tone and her promise was set in stone because she invoked Pinkie’s name for it. She would help Bonnie Jookiba, even if it got her killed and was the very last thing she did. Fluttershy knew what would happen to her, but at least Bonnie will be able to rescue whoever it was Zurg was torturing, it was obviously really important to her and who was Fluttershy as a good friend to stand in the way of that? Obviously Bonnie loved this individual enough to kidnap her, which seems to be tormenting her physically for some reason. Of course at the end of her statement, the most expected event in the universe happened in front of Fluttershy and it shocked her as much as it did the person who had her tied down. “FOREVER!” Pinkie screamed as she popped out of the couch causing Bonnie to jump in shock, she even had pulled both her blasters and had them aimed at Pinkie who just stared at her. Then Pinkie started speaking in an alien dialect that Bonnie obviously understood and that Fluttershy heard through her translator. “Oh hey, you’re new. Here have a cupcake! That’s for someone nearby who made a promise in my name; it’s been a while since someone so far away did that. Now whatever you do, tell that pony whoever they are that they can’t break a promise made in my name or you’ll get one just like that right in the eye! Oh hey there Fluttershy, I hope you and your new friend are having a lot of fun, I would hug you but you seem a little tied up at the moment. Uh oh, I have to get back work!” With that Pinkie went back into the couch leaving a very confused experiment holding a cupcake and a saddened mutated pegasus pony who stared longingly at the couch. After a moment Bonnie slowly set the cupcake down on the table, holstered her blasters and looked under the couch cushions to find nothing was there. “Did that seriously just happen?” It was all Bonnie could say as she turned to Fluttershy, she looked at the cupcake and then back to Fluttershy quirking her brow at the pony. “That was my friend Pinkie Pie and yes, that did just happen. I would have asked her to stay with me, but that would have been selfish of me since all the ponies back home need her more than I do at the moment.” For the life of her Fluttershy could not understand why Bonnie was staring at her with such an incredulous look on her face. She knew Zurg was going to be horrible and would do painfully agonizing things to her, but she was accepting of that as long as she could help Bonnie be a better… created being. - “Okay I’m back Mrs. Cake and you’ll never guess who I saw, I saw this weird little green alien thing with these weird things it pointed at me and she also had…” After a moment Pinkie’s face went blank, her pupils shrunk and her hair immediately deflated. She slowly turned around and walked out the back door to Sugar Cube Corner while being followed by Mr. and Mrs. Cake with worried looks on their faces. After which she slowly trotted up to the nearest tree and started bashing her head against it while repeating one word over and over again. “Stupid… stupid… stupid…” A few hours later at the municipal hospital found in Ponyville, Pinkie groggily started coming around to a bunch of worried faces. She could vaguely see the edges of bandage wrapped around her forehead; she felt she might have stitches in there too. “I should have stayed with her!” Pinkie wailed as she finally fully woke up and came to her senses; this scared every pony in the room. After it was explained what happened all her friends just stared at her with sad frowns. “It’s okay Pinkie, it’s not like you could have done… well whatever it is you do…. to bring her back with you right?” After a moment Twilight realized that she was right in Pinkie not being capable of bringing Fluttershy back with her. Pinkie could have, as she said so herself, stayed with her and been at her side. Seeing the destroyed look on Pinkie’s face, Twilight knew she wasn’t capable of moving other ponies around unless it was between two points on Equus. Say something to cheer her up; you’re the brain pony here! “Maybe we can tell her to say that line again so at least one of us can be with her!” “It doesn’t work like that Twilight! It only works when I’m not expected to appear! So if we tell Fluttershy I’m expected to appear the next time she does say something like that, then I most certainly won’t! It won’t work if she’s truly expecting me now either, even if we don’t tell her! She’ll be so upset that I won’t appear with a cupcake next time!” Pinkie then started sobbing into her hooves hysterically and was brought into a hug by Rainbow Dash. She was deeply upset about the missed opportunity to be stuck somewhere else in the universe with Fluttershy, she even talked to a strange alien that had obviously tied her up. Oh no what if Fluttershy was in Danger because the alien was going to hand her over to some torturous complete monster on a hellish stormy planet because it was torturing her brother and she needed to rescue him? Pinkie started bawling all that much harder, she could have helped both of them! She only gave them a single cupcake…. wait… what if it was enough? - “Look I don’t know if I can fully trust you, but after that… well…” Bonnie took a deep breath and closed her eyes. She went with her gut on this one, with a pull and a twirl Bonnie fired her blaster once. Her aim had not been off and the ropes fell to the floor leaving Fluttershy to shake the numbness out of her legs and to look towards her questioningly. “Go to the bathroom, it’s over there and don’t you dare take forever in there.” Fluttershy went through the bathrooms sliding door as indicated by Bonnie and as soon as the door closed behind the pony, Bonnie felt an immediate load off of her skull. She logically knew she was still holding Fluttershy captive, but allowing her some freedom had eased her headache by a lot. It wasn’t likely going to go away until she finally let Fluttershy go into Zurg’s clutches and the weird thing about that promise; she actually believed Fluttershy meant it with her heart. Heck Bonnie should have had a harder time believing anyone who would make a promise as insane as that one sounded. Lifting an ear Bonnie could hear the sound of tinkling and after a moment a few plops sounded in the toilet, some wiping paper was being rustled in there as well. After having invaded the pony’s privacy long enough Bonnie sighed and went over to the fridge to find something to eat. There were a few alien vegetables and some meat for a sandwich in the fridge; Bonnie knew Fluttershy was an herbivore and that she shouldn’t feed her meat. Maybe she could make some ramen and chop some of the vegetables into it, she didn’t know exactly what would be safe but she decided to take a wild guess that most inert plants wouldn’t have too much of an adverse affect on her. Hopefully Jo-adian produce doesn’t cause her anything more harmful than some gastrointestinal problems. Sighing to herself she started working on the soup and noodles for the pony. She wasn’t very hungry having already had her fill and she watched as Fluttershy walked out of the bathroom with clean hooves and a bright smile on her face. The pony simply just walked over to the couch and planted her butt down. “What, you’re not going to attack me or anything?” Bonnie was almost expecting Fluttershy to rush from the bathroom to try and attack her physically. None of the blows would have hit her, but she was still rather expectant of them to come “Why would I do that, I think we’re making some wonderful breakthroughs in your aversion to befriending others.” As an afterthought Fluttershy decided to add a snippet she knew would make Bonnie irate, it needed to be asked and she wasn’t about to avoid the elephant in the room. “Zurg is torturing someone you love isn’t he? Also it hurts you to kidnap and hold me hostage; I can tell you really don’t like this. Have you been feeling better since you um… shot the ropes off me?” “Yes, to both your questions Sweet Cheeks. I’m am unrepentant thief, not an unrepentant kidnapper.” That was about as much as an apology as Bonnie would give to Fluttershy. “Besides I don’t have an aversion, I’m friendly!” “Then why can’t you simply just accept that I’m willing help, especially since I promised I would let you do that to me? You said you even wanted to do that to me.” It was okay for Fluttershy; she already knew that the Grand Councilor would keep her word. Now it was crossed bridges and all. “No one is that nice, especially not here anyway. This place is a hotbed of people who’d kill you the soonest you walked out a door if they thought they can make some money off of your lifeless corpse. If you ever get lost here, you better not trust someone you don’t know or else rape is truly the least you’d have to worry about.” For some reason upsetting the pony made Bonnie happy. “Yeah and if what I know we both heard was correct, four arms is still after you… and me. I’m going have to keep you alive and out of trouble too.” “I made a Pinkie Pie promise because breaking one is the best way to lose a friend…” Looking around expectantly Fluttershy looked down at the cupcake on the table with a sad frown. “Forever….” “Yeah the crazy chick was one of you cute and cuddly types, ponies you called yourselves? Don’t know how she honestly did it, but I know that at least one of my hundreds of brothers and sisters would be just as good at doing something like that. Now drink some water, I’ll get your meal and then I’m going to look up a good ship to steal to get us off this planet.” Standing up Bonnie went and pulled the haphazardly made noodle soup off the stove. Everything Bonnie used was a hundred percent stolen; she accepted no substitutes. She wasn’t that bad a cook at all, especially after making so much prison food. “Why do you need to steal a ship, don’t you already have one?” If she didn’t then Fluttershy was about to ask bonnie about how much she has stolen. “Yeah, keeping an Alliance Armada property is not a good idea or even a smart one. Especially since they know what planet I’m on already, ditched the thing after we were low enough in the atmosphere. It was a good thing you weren’t awake for that. I’m really good at stealing things, so everything I own is stolen. This room, my blasters, the holster and the remotely detonated grenades I used in my kidnapping plan… even the ingredients for the soup you’re currently eating.” Bonnie smirked and waited to see what Fluttershy would do, the pony didn’t stop eating the soup which led to some confusion on her part. “The ingredients are gone; therefore this soup itself isn’t stolen. I think it’s nice that you’d give me some food that I can handle that I couldn’t pay for anyway. For someone who doesn’t care that much, I’m a happy hostage knowing you’re willing to take care of me.” After slurping down some noodles, Fluttershy smiled at Bonnie’s flabbergasted expression. “I stole the keys off a thug that was part of my assault plan on the flagship.” This was something that Bonnie would hope that Fluttershy would hate her mentioning. Fluttershy simply reached over and pulled Bonnie into a one hoofed hug and the alien blushed vibrantly as Fluttershy drank some of the soup with her other hoof perfectly balancing the large bowl on it. After she finished she nuzzled Bonnie’s antenna and smiled at her. “Well you’re the nicest thief I’ve ever met.” And Fluttershy meant it too; Spike wasn’t so nice when he started stealing things. She was sure that since Bonnie saw no value in her stuff, she’d be allowed to have it back. “Please don’t say that, you don’t know what I’m like. I might even shoot you on purpose if you keep cuddling up to me like this Sweet Cheeks. Besides I’ve heard I got people killed attacking the flagship, doesn’t that bother you?” After a moment of looking at the ceiling to ponder this, Bonnie just stared blankly at the pony as if she were a complete idiot. “Somewhat, but I know your really trying to be nice. Besides you’ve never killed anyone yourself have you?” After that Fluttershy noted that once again that Bonnie was struck a bit speechless. “They knew what they were getting into and you didn’t take their lives, you shouldn’t feel guilty about what they chose to do in the end.” “No, never killed anyone personally and not for the lack of trying either mind you. Father made us all to be evil, yet every single one of us has failed at killing anything and one of my brothers even has a built in plasma cannon for a head!” It really made Bonnie wonder about the odds though. “If Clyde were here with me he’d tell you all about our other brothers and sisters, he spends more time with them then I do.” “He’s the one Zurg captured isn’t he, you really miss him if you’re doing all this for him even when it hurts you.” A bit of sadness entered Fluttershy’s voice; she looked to the cupcake. She picked the cupcake up and held it out to Bonnie. “Eat this it will make you feel better.” “How is eating this supposed to make me…” She looked into the adorable eyes, rolled her own and took a bite out of the sweet snack being proffered to her by Fluttershy. After a moment she greedily took the rest of it into her mouth. “Meega Nala Queesta, that’s good! I’m beginning to think you’re alright.” “I hope my translator is wrong, because that is possibly the most vulgar thing I’ve ever heard in my entire life.” After a moment Fluttershy’s face turned a little green. “I don’t think anything can even beat it really.” “Belgium… so hate me now yet?” Bonnie only received a stare so powerful she could swear her heart stopped.