//------------------------------// // Phantasm // Story: You're Wanted: I'll Always Protect You // by SciWriter //------------------------------// I flew a small distance behind Luna and Celestia as we flew over the ever free towards the Castle of the Two Sisters. I scanned the forest over and over as we came closer and closer. Maybe I would see her… maybe… maybe… There was a problem. Lightning did tell my friends and I of one of the things Gray needed to do to ascend. He had to kill someone in a room swelling with fear. If Gray didn’t intend to keep Lightning for continued sick experiments, then he probably meant to just kill her. After everything he had gotten away with, I wasn’t sure I could save her… I had to but… what… what was SHE doing there? I looked near the main entrance to the castle, under a stone archway and saw a white unicorn moving into the building. Vinyl? What did she think she was doing? I realized her appearance could be a trick, but it just didn’t seem logical to use her visage to distract someone when better candidates for getting our attention definitely existed. Celestia looked down and she and Luna slowed down. “Rainbow, please get her out of here. My sister and I are going to end this conflict once and for all and we do not need bystanders.” Her eyes glowed. “Dispel magic!” No blue eyes, no glowing teeth. I flew down to Vinyl, a knife at my throat in seconds. “Whoa!” I shouted, zipping back from her. “Calm down filly, it’s just me. Didn’t you hear Celestia? She used dispel magic, that should have diffused any illusions cast by Gray.” Vinyl closed her eyes. Her note pad came out. ‘Sorry I suppose. I didn’t think of that.' “What are you doing here?” ‘What do you think?’ she wrote back. ‘You think after what you just did, that I trust you to save my student? You’re the reason she’s here.' “To be accurate Gray is the reason she’s here.” I said. “I’m sorry, but it has to be said Vinyl. I’m sorry for leaving her, I really am, but I risked my life for her more than once already and I’m out here doing it again. I am still very angry at myself for what I did, and I’m not excusing it. But after everything, can you please give me a chance? I will save her.” Vinyl looked away from me and closed her eyes. ‘I know you’ll try. But- that filly adores me and clings to me like family. She trusts me implicitly and thinks the world of me. Just for being who I am, I’m amazing in her eyes. I don’t know if I can ever really explain why she means so much to me but-’ I smiled. “Stop. One word, Scootaloo.” ‘There’s a reason I called her my daughter back there. If there is any chance that she can be saved, I will see it through.’ “Still, what are you gonna do, threaten Gray with a knife? I’m sorry, but I kinda doubt that’s gonna work.” ‘Not like anything else has.’ “Good point,” I said. “But listen, Celestia and Luna are taking matters into their own hooves now-“ “We’ve found her!” came a shout from Luna. I shot away from Vinyl and back into the air. I flew back up to Luna and Celestia. Luna pointed down at a huge hole in the ruins of the old castle. There, in the midst of the rubble was a small yellow and blue figure. She was alone. “We have already dispelled magic, she really is there, she really is alone… this makes little sense. Be cautious.” I flew down to her quickly, but on the ground I approached slowly. Lightning wasn’t moving, save to breath. I walked over to her, visions of her in some kind of death trap swimming in my mind. However, as I walked around her, I realized she was fine, she was just quiet. Finally I brushed her with my hoof. “Lightning?” I looked around. “It’s okay kid. I’m gonna get you out of here. Get on my back.” I leaned down. She didn’t respond. I shrugged. “Okay… that’s okay. I can carry you. We just need to go.” “Don’t waste your time,” she said. “Kid, this is not the time to go emo on me. Save it, let’s go,” I replied. “I’m not leaving without you.” Lightning got up, not even looking me in the eyes. “He’s gone… he’s really gone.” She held up one of her hooves. It was covered in blood. “Dusk… my little brother… my best friend… he’s gone.” My breath caught in my throat. I stood still. This couldn’t be right. Dusk was off in a cave, not here in the woods. “I tried so hard to fight when I saw they had him… I failed. They slit his throat. He’s gone. I… I don’t care anymore.” I was quiet and still for a few more seconds. Was this reality? I shook my head. We could mourn the dead later, we had to go. I touched her and received a shock. “I don’t care. Just go!” she shouted. She slowly stood up. “You’re all here to fight Gray, right?” Lightning raised a hoof to point at the pedestal where me and my friends had found the Elements of Harmony years ago. At the base of the strange pedestal was a large gray egg. “He’s inside that,” she said. “I don’t know what it is. I’ve tried to shock it several times already. I can’t even make a dent.” She sighed. “Dusk shouldn’t stay here. Even if he is dead. You want to save something? His body is behind the… the thing… whatever you call it.” I wasn’t sure what to do. I left her side to go look. I still had a hard time believing Gray had gotten little Dusk. He hadn’t had much time to do that. His forces were in Ponyville only about an hour ago at best. Torkuda was drawn away from the cave, but Vinyl was there too and if someone had to overpower her, sure that was possible, but why didn’t she have any signs of the battle on her body? Heck, how would Gray’s forces have known ahead of time where Dusk was for such a coordinated assault? It just made no sense. As I walked around the pedestal and saw what was there, I felt horror, relief and revulsion all at one. Dusk’s blue coat… it definitely wasn’t brown and white… but the colt who did lie there dead, I knew. I closed my eyes, whispering his name. “Pip.” I wasn’t sure what to think, still, I yelled for Lightning to join me. She slowly walked over. “He’s… he’s not Dusk?” she asked. “I don’t doubt you saw your brother die, but that’s not what really happened,” I said. She didn’t perk up much, but she seemed to move a little more freely. “Is it bad that I’m relieved?” she asked. Luna landed behind the colt. I looked up into her face to see pure rage painted on it, eyes glowing white. She pointed a hoof at the strange gray egg. “That is him is it not?” Lightning nodded. “Far as I know,” Lightning said. “That’s Gray-“ Luna’s horn glowed and a purple pulse of energy erupted from it, ripping through the pedestal and burning the egg shell. Suddenly our entire group, including the corpse of Pip, was thrown outward from the egg. I was forced into a somersault, Lightning rolled, but Luna stayed on her hooves, scrapping the ground. Black flames surrounded the egg and the now crashed over the pedestal. Celestia landed beside her sister. The egg vanished and Gray appeared standing in the center of the circle of flames. He smiled at us. Celestia spread her wings, a yellow beam of light firing from her horn. The beam was halted by some strange field. “Dispel magic!” she shouted. However the black flames stayed, unphased by her spell. “You cannot stop this now your majesty,” Gray announced. “To think, all you two had to do was not introduce alicorn magic to my shell and I would have been trapped forever. “But combine ignorance with emotions and-“ A black portal appeared in the air to Gray’s left. “What is…” a large black hand with long black fingers emerged from the portal, slamming into the ground. “What?” Something began to emerge from the portal, Gray backing away in confusion. Luna and Celestia both fired their magic at the scene again, again to no avail. The bald head of a pitch black creature emerged from the portal. Then in a second the whole body of some kind of bipedal creature just appeared standing next to Gray. The creature’s skin did not appear to reflect any light at all, like it was a living shadow. The creature had a mouth and eyes, however no nose, and it’s lips went more than half way around it’s rounded head. The creature’s lips curled displaying white glowing teeth. It’s eyes opened to show glowing orange eyes with no pupils. “What are you?” Gray asked, fear creeping into his voice. What was I seeing? The creature was almost eight feet tall. It’s right hand reached down and grabbed Gray, lifting him up like he weighed nothing. “No… I’m supposed to ascend… what is this?” The creature’s mouth opened wide and Gray’s entire head was shoved down its throat. The four of us ponies watched in horror as Gray was slowly swallowed whole by the creature. The creature then looked at us, smiling. “What the…” I said. I backed up. I should have been elated that Gray got some kind of just desserts but- what was I looking at? “No,” came a voice from the creature’s stomach. “I know what this is. You think you will run the show now? You’re wrong. Give me what I desire, or for the rest of your days you will hear my thoughts in your own. I am more of a monster than you will ever be. Give me your power, give it to me now!” The black flames rose, soon before us a black half spear ten feet tall appeared. None of us could see Gray or the- demon I supposed- anymore. The half sphere levitated up, becoming a full sphere floating in the air. I noticed that the pedestal of the elements must have been in it, but that barely registered as important for obvious reasons. Suddenly the sphere disappeared, a five foot black alicorn appearing where it had been. The creature’s eyes opened, glowing white. The creature smiled, the same smile as gray showing, but this one now glowing white. My stomach began to feel sick and my knees began to wobble. I wasn’t sure if this was a natural reaction, of if Gray now had the power to make that happen. “We are no longer Gray,” said the Alicorn. “We are fear manifest. We are Phantasm.” Luna and Celestia shot into the air. I quickly grabbed for Lightning Strike, ready to get the hell out of there but- like I should have counted on- my hooves passed through her. More illusions! I flew into the air as well, looking around. The forest was still there around the castle, but something was wrong. As I looked at them, I realized several trees had moved, or looked like they had. Many of the ruins of the castle also looked… wrong. It was like Gray- or Phantasm I supposed- was reshaping the surrounding world. Was is it real? Was it all just illusion? Which would be worse? Two beams of light, one purple and one yellow fired at Phantasm, one beam passing through his form and the other seeming to split into a thousand different directions, several explosions going off… or perhaps just appearing to. There was a sense in my mind that much of what I was seeing wasn’t real. For one, where was the explosion from the impact of Luna’s attack? Where was the smoke from the explosions I did see? For that matter… I looked down. The ground now seemed to be hundreds of feet down- when did I- I flew down and- crashed into a ground I couldn’t see. I slowly stood up. Where was I? Where was… anything? I looked up and saw the form of Torkuda flying overhead, his massive shadow covering- far too much of the surrounding trees to actually be his shadow. Torkuda circled overhead. The black alicorn flew up to him, a black pulse firing from its horn and cutting through one of Torkuda’s forelegs. The dragon roared, turned and opened his maw, fire issuing forth. A force field protected Phantasm from this attack, which simply went around. I then heard a scream and watched as Celestia barely flew away from the encounter which… no I didn’t know she was even there. Phantasm’s illusions seemed ten times as effective as Gray’s and we could barely fight him then. What the hell were we supposed to do now? Looking up I thrust my wings down to take flight, wanting to scan for Lightning and Vinyl from the air. My right wing slamming into… something. It didn’t hurt that much, but had to feel around just to make sure I could take off. I took off a small distance… I think… and started to hear an echoing of hooves on the ground. I couldn’t tell how many hooves there were or where they were coming from. Why was I hearing them? What was coming? Was Phantasm attacking me, or were his illusions so pervasive now that they were effecting a pony he wasn’t even fighting? I started to hear a ringing. My stomach started to feel sick. I was so disoriented and sweet Celestia that ringing was ANNOYING! In fact, why would- it got louder… a lot louder. The sound climbed in octaves over and over, the ringing soon louder than any scream I could even make, which eventually I did. I fell to the ground, the sound just getting louder and louder. The castle transformed before my eyes. If the castle looked right or not I couldn’t tell. I held my head, the nausea and head throbbing getting worse and worse. Luna damn it, what was making that sound? Two hooves appeared in front of my face. I looked up to see the form of a white unicorn standing tall as it could, it’s horn high in the air. A black creature, which was far larger was next to this unicorn. The black creature starting to fall to the knees of it’s forelegs, opening it’s mouth and looking to try to scream itself. The sound stopped. I was pretty much deaf now as I watched the black and white figures. Something silvery flashed from the body of the unicorn and to the black creature. The black creature’s head dropped to the ground, and rumbling shot through the ground under me. I slowly struggled to my hooves. I closed my eyes, slowly and gently shaking my head. I looked up and over to see Vinyl next to me, struggling just to stay upright. I then looked ahead to see Phantasm, Vinyl’s large hunter’s knife sticking out of his ear and buried up to its handle. I stood breathing hard and watching as the white unicorn walked over to the barely moving body of Lightning Strike. Lightning was breathing, but she apparently had the wind knocked out of her worse than me by that sound… wait… sound? Did that actually happen? All the champions of Equestria had been fighting this monster for months and the local DJ just took him down? Vinyl slowly laid down next to Lightning, resting her left leg gently on the foal. She smiled warmly at the filly. Luna and Celestia landed on either side of me, themselves holding their heads down and moving slowly. Luna started talking, but I couldn’t hear her. After a few seconds my ears barely started working again. It took effort, but I picked out Luna’s words. “Moonstone was right, that was his downfall. We do not believe that anyone was considering what she could do.” I missed some of what she said, but from what I heard… yea, that seemed right. I walked over to Vinyl and Lightning. Vinyl looked up, tightening her grip on the foal. Her face didn’t show fear but a kind of possession, like she was trying to tell me, with just a look, “she belongs to me.”. Lightning nuzzled into Vinyl’s fur coat and closed her eyes, gradually falling asleep. Vinyl swished her tail, laying it in front of the filly. She laid her head next to the foal. It looked like she was protectively surrounding the child with her body as best she could. What does it mean to have your own child? I don’t know. Is it really something that can be defined by the law? Was Lightning Vinyl’s daughter or not? In that moment, I couldn’t tell. Pretty sure I might have looked the same with Scootaloo in the end. I looked away from the pair, watching Celestia and Luna walk over to the body of Phantasm. Celestia was burned, but not seriously. “Are we certain he is dead this time?” Luna asked. A shadow loomed over the body of Phantasm and the hand of Torkuda slammed down on top of it. “He’s dead now,” Torkuda said. “Is that really his body this time?” asked Celestia. For a few moments we all stared at the bloody remains of Phantasm. Was it a trick this time too? I couldn’t understand why Gray would want everyone to believe he was defeated by a random DJ but… “We may never know.” I nodded my head. Luna spat on the remains. “He fought so furiously not to be forgotten. We suppose he won. We will never forget him.” “We may not,” Celestia said. She turned around to face us ponies behind her, holding her head high. “But here and now this is my decree. All witnesses to these events are hence forth silenced. No one may speak of these events. Gray will be forgotten.” I shook my head. “He left his mark.” “He will be forgotten,” Celestia insisted. “AJ is crippled, I’m paranoid, Twilight is going to be in the hospital for a few months at the very least, Scootaloo is forever barren…” “His memory will then die with us,” Celestia insisted. I hung my head. “I won’t speak of this to anyone, only those who were there, I promise. I don’t wanna anyway. But as far as Gray being forgotten… I think he won that battle.” “I understand,” Celestia said. “But we’ll see about that.” She looked at the remains, her horn glowing. She set fire to the corpse. “His ashes will be scattered to the four winds,” the fire blazed, the heat and force startling me and forcing me to jump back. “His followers will be hunted and imprisoned, brought to justice dead or alive.” “And the survivors?” asked Luna. “They will receive the best help available, I will see to it personally,” Celestia answered. “They will never forget sister. Rainbow is right. He won.” “Like I said, we will see about that.” She shook her head. “Iconoclasm is now declared on any literature ever written, from this moment on, about Gray or any of his followers. Only the guard will know of him. Let’s see him come back, let’s see his followers rise again when shadows have more fame. He will turn into folk lore. In a hundred years, the name of Gray will be little more than the boogey stallion.” “I hope so.” I said. “You really think so?” came a shout. “I planned for this eventuality.” We looked up to see Pyromance standing several meters away. He looked down at a symbol on the ground. He lit the symbol on fire. A blue portal suddenly appeared next to him. “This will never end. Gray and his followers will live on. Through this portal there is a new world, a world called “earth”. There is no magic there. The impluses will descend upon them and find a way to bring their armies back here to fight for us. Let’s see how you fair against-“ Lightning Strike shot out from under Vinyl’s hoof and body slammed into Pyromance. He easily pulled her off and tossed her into the portal. I was already in motion, shooting through the portal, Vinyl quick on my heels.