When Music is Silenced

by Summer Knight

Falling Apart

For the second time in as many days Thunder found himself on a stage, preparing to lure out the most dangerous creature he’d ever seen. After a quick flyover by Rainbow Dash had revealed that the stage from yesterday’s ambush was still mostly intact, and that the equipment still worked, they had gone there to bring an end to Cacophony.

Thunder worked in a daze, struggling to catch up with everything that had happened the day before. His mind still rebelled against the idea of letting these six fillies throw themselves in harm’s way for his sake.

“That’s pretty egotistical,” Twilight had said at one point. “What makes you think that Cacophony is your responsibility? Do you think that you’re the only one who can stop it?”

Thunder had shaken his head. “I know damned well that I can’t stop it, but it just doesn’t feel right.”

“Look, darling,” Rarity had reassured him, “it’s very kind of you to worry about us, but it truly isn’t necessary.”

That had been about half an hour ago. Now Thunder was hooking up the microphone he had been using yesterday, checking the connections, and making sure that he could still put on a show that would bring the monster running. His particular style of singing didn’t exactly lend itself well to performing a capella, but hopefully it would still work.

“Cacophony attacked us almost instantly last time,” Thunder warned as he tapped a hoof on the microphone. The speakers sent out a satisfying pulse of sound. “Whatever that jewelry does, be ready to do it, because I doubt I can hold it off for long.”

“You shouldn’t have to hold it off at all,” Twilight responded. “We’re ready when you are.”

“Right.” Thunder stepped up to the mic and cleared his throat, then froze. Something was preventing him from singing: a tension in his throat and stomach, a strange coldness in his hooves…

Celestia dammit, I am not afraid of that thing!

“Um, Thunder?” Fluttershy whispered. She floated over to him and placed a hoof gently on his shoulder. “You’re shaking.”

Thunder snorted and shook his head. “I’m fine. Let’s do this.” He put his mouth up to the microphone and took a breath.

“The night... will last... forever!”

If the others thought the song's subject matter was in bad taste, they kept it to themselves.

“Shining bright above the frozen land,

her coat as black as night, your lives like grains of sand.

The sun shall never rise again, it's true.

The Mare in the Moon is watching you!

The Nightmare falls upon you all tonight.

You cry out to be saved but there's no hope in sight.

The foals will cry, the crops will die,

for the Nightmare Moon is in the sky!

“Equestria, your queen behold,

your final fate shall now unfold,

all light and joy she shall withhold,

and grip you in eternal cold!”

“There it is!” Twilight’s voice was all but lost under Thunder’s growling. “Get ready, girls!”

Fragments of black shadow were indeed racing across the open field toward them. As they watched, the shadows clumped together directly in front of the stage and formed into something vaguely pony-shaped, though as usual Thunder’s eyes refused to make sense of the conglomeration.

Thunder stopped singing as his blood seemed to fill with ice. He wanted to run, to hide, and possibly to piss himself. Instead, he placed all four hooves firmly on the ground and set himself to fight.

He never got the chance. As Thunder prepared to charge, a massive stream of rainbow energy blasted out of the sky.

“What the buck?” Thunder traced the magical downpour up into the sky, and then back to directly behind him, where Twilight and the others stood—floated?—surrounded by magical auras. He turned his attention back to Cacophony in time to see the dark non-shape break into pieces and dissolve in the torrent.

The magic faded, leaving behind six very tired ponies and one very excited Thunder Growl.

“We did it! Buck me, you did it, I didn’t do an alicorn-damned thing! Take that, you foal of a nag! Ha-HA! Cacophony, meet Harmony!” He raced to the six friends behind him, giving each a solid hoof-bump. He was greeted with weak smiles and shaky legs, but the six seemed unharmed, though tired and a bit disoriented.

Thunder froze. He thought he had seen a small patch of darkness dancing where there should not have been one. He turned around, praying to whatever alicorns might be listening that his eyes were playing tricks on him.

The entire field writhed with shadows. As he watched they formed together into another Cacophony. Then another, and another, and another. Dozens of the creatures stared at the small group gathered on the raised stage. Thunder felt his legs turn shaky and weak.

“What in tarnation?” Applejack forced herself back up to her hooves. “Fire up those Elements, girls, we ain’t done yet!”

“Uhnn…” Twilight stood as well and tried to tap back into the powerful flow of Magic, but she felt so drained. She’d never had to use her Element twice in a row before. The others seemed to be having similar trouble, but the determination in their eyes never wavered.

Twilight closed her eyes, and when she opened them again they glowed white with energy. The power was coming, but slowly, so slowly. Through the haze of magic she faintly saw Thunder holding his ground in front of the approaching Cacophonies, trying to protect her and her friends.

“Don’t touch them!” he was roaring, “You get the buck away from them, it’s me you want!” As Twilight watched, he lowered his head and rammed his shoulder into the nearest one. It didn’t budge, but Thunder went stumbling back.

We aren’t going to make it. It was a stunning realization. Somehow, the Elements of Harmony had failed.

Twilight closed her eyes and forcibly broke her connection with Magic, and by extension the rest of the Elements. Instead she focused her own more mundane magic into her horn. It glowed a brilliant lavender, then gained a second layer of blinding white glow as she poured more power into the spell. She put every ounce of what she had left into the burst of magic, and with a flash she, her friends, and Thunder Growl disappeared.

Thunder reappeared next to the others in the middle of the Ponyville library. His hind legs wavered and he fell to his haunches. Part of it was that he was disoriented by the teleport, but the larger part was that he simply couldn’t be bothered to stand.

“There’s more than one of those things?” Rainbow demanded.

“A lot more, apparently,” Twilight answered. “Everypony okay?”

A chorus of affirmatives answered her. Thunder remained silent, staring into space.

“Thunder?” Twilight walked toward him hesitantly. “Are you okay? Are you hurt anywhere?”

“No.”

“Which question was that answering?”

Thunder shrugged.

“Hey.” Pinkie walked toward him from the front, ducking her head low so that she could look at his face. “C’mon, Thunder. We beat one of those Cacopho-ninnies. Next time we’ll get them all!”

Thunder grunted. His gaze was still somewhere miles away, staring at a darkness that would never go away, and from which his friends would never be freed.

Pinkie crept closer and looked into his face. He blinked once and met her gaze. Almost as soon as she saw his hollow, haunted eyes, her own eyes filled up with tears. She threw herself around his neck and he felt a warm wetness on his shoulder.

“What are you crying about?” Thunder asked. Even his voice was distant.

“Your eyes,” Pinkie’s voice was choked. “Eyes like that mean you need to cry, but you can’t. So,” her breath hitched, “so I’m crying for you!” She leaned back slightly and gave him a watery smile.

“That’s…” actually kind of touching, in a bucked-up sort of way. “You are one weird pony, you know that?”

Pinkie nodded and leaned back into his shoulder, sniffling. A gentle hoof on his back signaled Fluttershy joining the pity party. Applejack stood nearby, her sturdy presence reassuring in itself. Rarity tsked and murmured soothing nothings. Rainbow seemed unsure whether she was supposed to be comforting Thunder Growl or Pinkie Pie, and settled for awkwardly hovering a few inches away.

Twilight stood several steps apart from the others, her powerful mind already working a hundred miles a minute. Too much of what had just happened didn't add up. By the time Thunder had shaken off her friends' attentions and gotten a bit of life back into his eyes, she already had half-a-dozen theories that she desperately wanted to begin researching. First things first, however.

“Spike, take a letter.”

Spike, barely recovered from the shock of seeing his friends appear with no warning, and in such distress, nonetheless reached behind him and produced a roll of paper and a quill. “Ready.”

“Dear Princess Celestia,

“I regret to inform you that Cacophony has not been stopped. While our plan to lure it out and use the Elements of Harmony on it was successful, we underestimated the scope of the threat. The creature that was hit by the Elements' power was seemingly destroyed, but there were others, and we were forced to retreat. I estimate that we saw roughly twenty of the creatures before teleporting back to Ponyville.

“We are all safe. There are many things about the encounter that I wish to research. I will write to you again soon with my findings.

“Your faithful student, Twilight Sparkle.”

The report vanished in a puff of green flame.

“Well, what now?” Applejack asked.

Twilight sighed. “I need to do some research. A lot of research. I should have done this in the first place, but I wanted to get rid of Cacophony as soon as possible and I never expected the Elements to fail. Maybe we should meet up again tomorrow, I don't think there's much to be done until then.”

“Are you sure, dear?” Rarity asked. “Perhaps we should stay with you. Seven heads are better than two.”

“You've all got things to take care of,” Twilight answered. “Besides, I do my homework best alone.” She smiled at her friends. “Thank you all for your help today.”

“Anytime, sugar cube. Well, I'll see ya tomorrow, then.” Applejack tipped her hat. She clapped Thunder on the shoulder on her way out. “Buck up, Thunder. Twilight ain't gonna let ya down.”

“I'm so sorry it didn't work out the way we hoped, Thunder.” Fluttershy said. “Um, well, I'll see you tomorrow?”

“If you need anything, anything at all, you come straight to the Boutique,” Rarity said, and then she, too, was gone.

Pinkie finally pried herself from his shoulder. She looked at him with big blue eyes that showed no signs that she had ever been crying. “You just wait. We'll get those Cacopho-neeny-meanies, and that's a Pinkie Pie Swear! Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye!” She gave a totally unresponsive Thunder one last hug and sprang out the door.

“Right. Well, uh. See you tomorrow.” Rainbow pawed the floor, not sure what else to say.

“Hey, Rainbow?” Thunder finally spoke up.

“Yeah?”

“You drink?”

Several hours and many, many drinks later, Thunder stumbled out of the tavern with a drunken grin plastered across his face, Rainbow leaning against one side of him and Berry Punch on the other. Whether they were doing so to help his balance or their own was debatable.

“Think I’m gonna go take a nap,” Rainbow announced, stretching out her wings. “This was awesome, we gotta do this again soon.”

“Whoa,” Thunder held out a hoof, “you sure you’re okay to fly? Don’t need anyone getting an FUI.”

Rainbow laughed. “If they wanna give me a ticket, they’ll have to catch me first!” She took off, and a slightly wobbly rainbow streak tore across the sky.

“I’d better get home too,” Berry said. She was even more drunk than Thunder, and could barely stay upright.

“Let me walk you home,” Thunder offered. He held up his hooves at her suspicious look. “My inten-shuns are hono… honr… good. Just wanna get you home safe. Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye.”

Berry giggled. “Well, now I know I’m safe. You don’t want to know what happens to ponies who break a Pinkie Pie Promise.”

After seeing Berry safely home Thunder staggered back toward the library, looking forward to a nap of his own. He opened the door to find Twilight, still buried in a book, and Fluttershy, who had apparently come back to help. Fluttershy spotted him first.

“Oh, goodness!” She darted over to him, taking in his unfocused eyes and wobbly steps. She laid a hoof on his forehead. “You’re burning up!”

“I’m fine,” Thunder mumbled, brushing her leg away.

“Oh no, you’re not fine,” she tried to guide him over to his bed in the corner, “you’re very sick.”

“He’s very drunk,” Twilight said. Fluttershy squeaked and darted away, looking at Thunder uncertainly. Thunder looked up to see Twilight glaring at him. "Again."

“Yeah,” Thunder said flatly, “so what?”

“It’s the middle of the afternoon!”

“Again, so what?”

“You are unbelievable!” Twilight stomped across the room toward him. “We’re doing everything we can to help, and what do you do? You run off and get dung-faced with Rainbow Dash!”

Thunder snorted angrily. “You aren't my bucking mother, whatever you might seem to think, and Rainbow’s old enough to make her own decisions. I let myself hope, again, that we were going to beat Cacophony and save my friends, and then that came back to bite me in the flank like it always does, so excuse me if I needed a bucking drink!” He was shouting at the top of his lungs by the end of it, head lowered as if to charge.

Twilight was silent for a moment. “Get out,” she said quietly.

“What?”

“I said get out! How dare you, how dare you speak to me like that? We’re all doing everything we can, Thunder, you’re the only one who’s giving up. By the way, if you want to drink yourself to death then do it, but don’t try to take my friends with you!”

Thunder stared at her, stunned.

“Until you’re sober and ready to help, you can find somewhere else to stay.” Twilight used a pulse of magic to shove Thunder back out the door, then slammed it behind him.

Thunder wandered the streets of Ponyville in a daze, wondering what he should do next. How does this bucking town not have a hotel or something? He could ask one of the others for a place to stay, but that would only work until the nag told her friends not to help him. He could just leave, of course, hop on a train to anywhere in Equestria, but something told him not to. Twilight, her friends, and their fancy jewelry might still be his best chance to take down Cacophony.

With nowhere else to go, he eventually found himself back in front of Berry Punch’s door. Hesitantly, nervously, he lifted a hoof and knocked.

“Hol’ on. Jus’ a second,” a terribly slurred voice called from inside. The door opened and there stood Berry, balancing a wine bottle on one hoof. “Thunder! What brin's you back here?”

“You’re still drinking?” Thunder blurted. He was starting to worry about her, and that was saying something.

“’Course I am,” Berry answered, “ain’t like there’s much else ta’ do.” She motioned with the bottle. “Well, wha’re ya standin’ out there for? Come in!”

Author's Note:

Wherein Twilight Sparkle is sick of your shit.

Comments

[blowngasket]

When you successfully pissed Twilight off to the point where she kicks you out onto the street, you done goofed big time. Still have to cut the guy some slack, however. Please do continue on with this. I am genuinely intrigued to figure out the origins of that weird beast thingie.