//------------------------------// // Act 3 - Chapter 7: The presence of envy // Story: Friends like these // by Istaran //------------------------------// Tirek's hoofsteps reverberated on the concrete with every step he took. He had grown larger and more powerful with his meals, but a sizeable portion of the noise was, in truth, using a bit of magic to play himself up. This world was very lacking in magic, so there hadn't been all that much for him to steal. But the world was very sensitive to magic, he had noticed, so a little bit went a long way. There were a couple of modest magical presences to the south, moving farther and farther away, detectible only because this world was so barren, like a couple stars in another galaxy, visible only because of the stark blackness around them. He would hunt them down later, but for now their erratic path was annoyance enough to overcome the temptation they represented. Much closer, there were another pair of presences. One steady and strong, black as the night. A dark magic user, unmistakably. But Tirek had no qualms about absorbing dark magic. The other surged and flared with power on occasion, somehow hiding his power from Tirek's senses the rest of the time. But they travelled together, that much was true, and they had one very obvious place they liked to return to, especially during the day. They were proud, he was sure of that, since they had built the tallest tower in the city to live in, a structure that was probably more ostentatious monument to themselves than functionally useful. A structure that was straight ahead, blocking the street he now walked and forcing traffic to divert around it. But he had no reason to divert. Crowds had begun to gather, wisely remaining off the street he tread. That was emptying, in both directions, including the sidewalks. Good. They'd help ensure the egos of those two morsels he sought was under threat. News crews, both professional and opportunistic cell phone owners, began to video tape him. Police didn't bother engaging him, despite likely knowing of some of his crimes, but instead simply kept the crowds out of the way. Wise. A few helicopters joined the fray, some aiming cameras at him, others mounted machineguns. Both merely watched. The tower transformed itself, slightly. A large, flat platform emerged from the side, about a story up, with massive stairs leading up to it from nearly a block away from the main tower. This will be mine, he thought. Just as soon as I take care of its pathetic, doomed owners. He grinned to himself as he climbed the stairs. They would never know what hit them. "Come out and face me! You said that you were the only villains who could operate in this town. Prove it, cow-" As he reached the top, he saw them before him, just outside of the side of the tower where no door was visible. Had they teleported? Used a secret door? It didn't matter. He'd sort out the tower's secrets at his leisure. The taller one, the human, whose power was so hard to feel most of the time, held up a hand. "A moment, if you will," Istaran requested. Tirek accented only in so much as he didn't immediately attack, instead tensing internally, preparing to steal their magic in an instant, perhaps when they were most distracted. "Why wait, he's here now, let's show him the terror of crossing King Sombra," the unicorn said, preparing his own magic. "I need to fight him alone, though you've been so good to me. I'm going to miss you so much when you're gone," Istaran said, tears welling in his eyes. "I can't bear to lose you," he added, as much invocation as anything else. "Be good to your new bride," he added as the unicorn began to glow, peeling off into beads of light. "Wait, what? Istaran?! What have you done? What are you do-" Sombra failed to complete his interrogation, as he vanished. One of Tirek's chains passed through the space Sombra had been, a second latching onto Istaran's arm, draining him instantly of all magic. It wasn't much... less than a pirin tablet, in fact. The chain held fast, for the moment. "Clever of you to send him away, he'd have only made me stronger. But now you are powerless, and I am simply going to kill you." "This is a bad matchup for you. But you've been so elusive, I had to appeal to your pride as well as your appetite to draw you into this fight," Istaran explained. "But let our abilities prove it. To the death, it is." Before Tirek could finish the first syllable of the laugh that was his intended reply, the human had vanished, teleporting behind the centaur in a surge of magic he shouldn't have had, and landing a powerful kick against the centaur's magical shield, making it flicker into visibility for a moment. "How did you?" Tirek asked, even as he brought his own fist to bare in an easily parried punch. "You'll figure it out," Istaran said confidently, as he battered Tirek's magical defenses with magically boosted strength. Tirek could sense the magic, even taste it when he got his chains around the human again, but there was so little there to eat when he did, and the human frustratingly teleported again to get free. The human didn't leave it to strength boosts, either. Tirek's more powerful retaliations, blasts of magic that ripped holes in their battlefield, he dodged with magical boosts of speed. When Tirek drove him back, he attacked with magically animated shadows. Tirek's shield held, still, but his power was being drained by the attacks, wearing him down, where even the injuries the centaur managed to inflict seemed to do nothing to slow his adversary. "How?!" Tirek finally demanded again, looking up at the taller human. "How tall are you?" Istaran asked back with an obnoxiously condescending grin. Tirek took a moment to look at himself, distracted for just a second, before seeing a fist plunged into his heart, the shatter of his shield not reaching his consciousness in time to react. Strange... he'd used some of his magic to boost his own reflexes and awareness, it should have kept his mind clearer and more responsive than this. "Your power works by stealing all the magic in a target and storing it in yourself," Istaran explained. "Then you can use it later, whenever you need it. And your victim no longer has it. My power works by stealing the nearest available magic, and using it up instantly to power my spells. With no ambient magic here, that means I'm stealing it from the nearest magical creature. A bad matchup, as I said. You would have done great against Sombra. But with both of us burning through your magic as fast as we could... in the end, I was in a better position to fight without magic than you." Enraged, Tirek grabbed Istaran around the throat with both hands, trying in one last desperate gambit to choke the life out of him, but he was so small and so weak now. Like one of his own victims, he slumped to the ground, bleeding out through the wound in his chest. "Good thing that's taken care of. And just in time," Istaran said, loud enough for the cameras to hear him. "People of Seattle, for my next big crime, I shall abscond with this entire city! In..." he made like he was checking his watch, though he wore none. "47 seconds!" Announcement made, he turned to stroll back into his tower, through a door that conveniently materialized for him to maximize nonchalantness. Those present, and those actively watching one of the live video feeds had time to be concerned, while the rest of the city continued their lives undisturbed until it happened. For most, the first sign was a sudden loss of communications, as the internet all but disappeared, along with the satellite feeds that supplied most of their television channels. Those outside and some near windows noticed a sudden shift in the lighting, the cloud-obscured sun suddenly jumping thirty degrees in the sky and growing brighter, if still blocked by clouds. The most dramatic shift hit those on the main roads heading East beyond the nearby suburbs, where paved six-lane highways suddenly transitioned to barely cleared dirt roads among the trees. Most of the drivers managed to react in a nonfatal way, but there was soon a wall of crashed cars blocking off the end of the road. From there it was quite easy to see the break in the sky, where the layer of clouds ended and cartoonishly bright blue skies began. Appearing suddenly surrounded by ice and snow was only mildly disorienting to Sombra. He had 'won' the little contest, and he knew what that meant, and it was not at all surprising that it had sent him to the spot he had disappeared from all those centuries ago. From here, he could see the capital of the Crystal Empire spread out before him, awaiting his return. The trek to the gates was a mild nuisance, but one that did not trouble him for very long. The massive plates of crystal were closed, but he had long since enchanted them to react easily to his magic, so they swung open dramatically with but a slight charge from his horn. He expected the crystal ponies on the other side to reek of fear of him, indeed he reveled in it, though he did not expect them to be lined up along the streets, armed with baskets of flower pedals, nor to toss those pedals into his path. It worried him, but he didn't dare show it. His facade of confidence was quite important, not just for his ego but to maintain the fear of his subjects. Besides, the flowers were harmless. If the ponies wielding them had any genuine love for him in their hearts, perhaps it could hurt him. If they had even been focusing on their love of somepony else, they might discomfort him. But as it was, there was naught but fear in their hearts, and bewilderment. Somepony had put them up to this without much explanation. But who? Sombra remembered Istaran's final words to him, and did his best not to show any outward signs of his growing concern. Nopony moved to stop him, not even the armed guards who were placed periodically. Those merely raised spears into arches for him to pass under, despite the undisguised loathing in their eyes. So he marched straight up to the castle, his castle, and headed straight for the throne room. Before he could enter somepony finally stood up to him. A pink pony, with a determined look in her eye, an utter lack of fear, and an alarming grin. "Wait! You can't go in there looking like that!" Pinkie Pie declared, before bodily assaulting him. Before the King could make enough sense of her movements to try to fend the mare off, she had stripped him entirely of the warn, tarnished, and snowcovered garb and replaced it with fresh gear. Silver boots for all four hooves, etched with stark patterns of inlaid gold, impressively ornate while still playing to his severe motif. A fresh, regal cloak adorned his back, and his own crown was quickly replaced, somehow buffed to a gleaming perfection in the midst of the chaos. "There you go! See you at the reception!" the mare said before pronking off, promptly disappearing from view down a side hallway. Sombra was quite ruffled by this, mentally, but his fur had somehow come out of it immaculate. Try as he might, he couldn't find a valid excuse to be angry at the pink pony for simply making him look more impressive as he returned to the throne, so he put it aside and resumed his march. Reaching the closed double doors, he reached out with his magic, threw them open, and collapsed onto his rump with shock at what he beheld. A few hundred ponies waited within, lining the court benches in their best attire. To the left, crystal ponies, every one doing their best not to show their fear. To the right, other tribes of ponies, including the mysterious pink one who had managed to get in ahead of him despite leaving in a completely other direction. These ponies were lacking in fear, but filled with interest and intrigue. Dead center, standing before his throne but far enough away that it was clear he made no claim to it was an elderly stallion with a phenomenally ornate hat and gilded robes, waiting patiently. And just to his right awaited the absolute last pony he expected to see here, least of all like this. They had met before, something he couldn't say of any of the other non-crystal ponies here. She looked at him not with the fury he had once witnessed, the unbreakable determination that she had earned the reputation for, nor even the smug confidence she showed when she had an adversary dead to rights. No, it was resignation in her eyes. Somepony had broken her will, and he knew exactly who. The spiders crawling in his brain acknowledged the presence of more of their kind. He didn't realize he was walking down the aisle, much less the presence of musical accompaniment, until he was climbing onto the dais, opposite his apparent bride to be. His mind reeled with the implications. She didn't love him, he was quite sure of that, and doubted she'd be capable of it, so he was probably safe there. He didn't know what had happened in the last thousand years, but suspected her own empire was much stronger than his at this moment, so this political marriage would practically hand him a massive jumpstart to his conquests. To say nothing of the 'conquest' she represented... The human stripper he had availed himself of recently was enjoyable enough, but King Sombra much preferred mares to women anyday. "Mawwiage," the priest began, addressing the gathering loudly. "Mawwiage is what bwings us togethew today. Mawwiage, that bwessed awwangement, that dweam within a dweam. And wove, twue wove, wiww fowwow you fowevah and evah… So tweasuwe youw wove-" "Skip ahead a bit, Impressive Clergy. Nopony wants to wait all day," Celestia said, through a strained smile from under her veil. [So you're the one he picked for me? I'll have to admit, it is quite the surprise.] [I'm surprised you're going along with this, you must know what I'm going to do once this is all done, don't you?] Sombra responded. "Do you, King Sombwa, accept this mawwe as youww wegawwy wedded wife, in sick-" Impressive began to ask. "I do!" the King announced, triumphantly. [From your reaction, I'd guess I know better than you do,] Celestia told him, a bit of an almost cruel smirk crossing her face for a moment. "And do you, Pwwincess Cewestia, take this stawwion to be youww wegawwy wedded husband," Impressive asked of the taller mare. "I do," Celestia said. "And in so doing, bind our two nations as one. Everypony in the Crystal Empire, you are now full citizens of Equestria. And everypony of Equestria, you are now King Sombra's subjects as well as my own." The look she gave Sombra gave the impression of a cat who had a bird firmly grasped in its claws, and it made the unicorn think a moment before realizing the problem. Their kiss was rather chaste by wedding standards, if not quite as underplayed as he had expected. The ongoing fear of his long time subjects was quite pleasant and filling, especially as it spiked when Celestia gave him the Crystal Heart as a wedding present, and he was able to smash it to the ground in what was, for him, the high point of the reception. And when they did retire to their royal bedchambers, everything was enjoyable enough he felt no need to complain, even in his own mind, about her lack of fear. But as the days stretched into weeks and months, his ponies slowly lost their fear of him. And why not? The random acts of violence, cruel domination, and abject slavery were all things of the past. Oh, he wanted to reinstate them, wanted to so badly. They few ponies foalish enough to commit true crimes in his empire were made to absorb his wrath in abundance, effectively deterring others from following their paths. But try as he might, the damned spiders ripped the thoughts of cruelty from his mind as quickly as he could think of them, and as his empire flourished he himself sunk into despair. "I understand," said Celestia one evening, wrapping a foreleg around him as they snuggled atop their bed before a roaring fire. There hadn't been any context, and it hadn't been needed. He looked at her, dubiously, but he couldn't help it. He opened his mouth and the words began to flow, telling her of his experiences in the human world, of the human 'friend' that had so betrayed him, and now left him here, a 'king' in title but a slave in truth. She answered with her own tale, of being made into a living weapon by the same so-called ally, being plagued with overactive premonitions, and then dragged into doing Istaran's bidding, even in matters so personal as marriage. It was a strange thing to bond over, perhaps, but the painful hint of affection he felt from his queen resonated painfully with something resembling it in his own heart, searing him from within. If he weren't what he was, perhaps they could have grown together from this. As it was, it was actually tempting even though he knew it would surely kill him. But one thing he did know: Istaran must die Clan is Clan.