Cards and Changes
[Present]
[Celestia]
Celestia froze as the city echoed with the laughter of a insane god. The sound did not follow the laws of the universe any more than the being that made it did. It echoed oddly, changed in pitch and tone randomly, and would stop and start again with no rhyme or reason.
This was bad. How bad, Celestia was not sure. It could be anywhere from completely terrible to apocalyptic; it all depended on how Discord had taken his imprisonment. If he had taken it the same way he had taken all of her attempts to imprison him over the years, then at least some ponies would survive. But if she had wounded his pride or, even worse, broken one of the ‘rules’ he held for himself and all that challenged him, then Celestia feared for her little ponies.
“What do we do?” Celestia turned to face her sister, trying desperately to not show how panicked she was. She opened her mouth to say they should both go and confront Discord when her eyes fell upon Spy. While she would not dream of trying to use the being on the ground against Discord, neither could she leave him in the street, especially if what Luna had said was true.
It was a simple decision. She needed somewhere that could hold Spy, no matter what other tricks he held in reserve. That meant the Vault. Nothing could escape the Vault, bar Discord, and he didn’t count.
“Take him to the Vault, sister. I shall stall Discord. If you see Chrysalis, send her to me.”
Luna nodded, levitating Spy and gathering energy in preparation of teleporting around the wards of the Vault. Celestia readied her own teleportation spell. No need to go in search of Discord. His arrogance meant there was only one place he would be. In a flash of brilliant white light, she vanished.
The throne room was, surprisingly, exactly as it should have been. As soon as she arrived there, before she had even opened her eyes, she scanned the room for traps. She found nothing. When dealing with Discord, however, that did not mean there were no traps. She was not too arrogant to admit that Discord was at least as intelligent as she was. As crazy as it was possible to be, perhaps, but intelligent. Quite probably he was more intelligent than her.
So she stood exactly where she had teleported to, and stared at the thing lounging in her throne room.
The god of chaos sat on a throne of old bone and new wood, one leg thrown over the side, head leaning over the, antlers brushing the floor. Discord glanced at her, then returned to cleaning his claws. “You’re late,” was all he said. He looked just as he had before the Elements of Harmony imprisoned him in stone.
Celestia was in no mood for games. “What do you want, Discord?”
“How much longer you expect this Spy fellow to be a nuisance?” he asked, holding his claws up to the light.
“I do not,” she replied. Giving him the answer he asked for and nothing more was a lesson she learned long ago. Give him to much, and he felt things too easy, which made him bored. Give him nothing, and he accused her of cheating, which made him angry. She wasn’t sure which was worse.
Discord glanced at her, his face twitching towards a frown that didn’t even have time to form before a look of understanding took its place, which was itself quickly replaced by boredom. “Ah, you have him captured. Which means the Vault, yes?” If he noticed her surprise, he didn’t show it. The Vault had been built after his imprisonment. There had been no point to building it, or indeed building anything, before. Had he just let something slip?
“Which means either Chrysalis or the Lunatic is guarding him, probably Luna.” He grinned wildly at that, a sight that brought with it a great deal of worry.
“Why do you care about this Spy?” Celestia asked. “How do you even know about him?”
“Why, he came to visit me, of course!” His voice came from over her shoulder, and in the split second the change in direction distracted her, Discord moved. He was inches from her face, staring her in the eyes. “Asked for my help in bringing all your dreams to ruin. Had quite the compelling argument, as well.” She felt herself panicking when he continued, “I turned him down, of course. I’m strictly a solo act, after all.” Discord leaned back, flipping completely around.
“And my first question?” Celestia asked. As discreetly as possible, she sent a feeler of magic towards the sun. She hadn’t felt Discord touching it, so if it was where it should be, she had been speaking to Discord for somewhere between two and five minutes. Time was tricky near Discord, like even it wanted to be away from him.
“Well, I don’t care about him. Normally, I’d thank him for freeing me a little early and send him on his merry way, but he has gotten in the habit of breaking my toys, which simply cannot be allowed. So, my little pony, I have a deal for you.”
Celestia almost dismissed the draconequus out of hand, but stopped herself. They had Spy in the Vault, and despite his many other failings, Discord had always honored a deal, if not exactly the way you expected.
“And what would the terms of this deal be?” she asked.
Discord was next to her, one arm thrown over her back and wrapping completely around her. “It’s quite simple, really. You have five days to bring Spy to me, and in return I’ll send him away. He’ll never be a problem again.”
She looked at him. The deal was quite literally too good to be true.
“And,” he continued, not looking at her, “to sweeten the deal, I’ll even give you a years head start, after.”
“‘Head start’?” she asked. He couldn’t be offering what she thought he was.
Discord was above and in front of her, floating idly. The arm around her remained, and had started brushing her tail. “Yup. After this whole Spy business is over, you have one year to plan and prepare. Of course, I also have one year, but I promise not to peek at what you’re doing. So, yes or no?”
“Why?” she asked before she could stop herself. “This is easily the best deal you’ve ever offered. What has Spy done to make you do this?”
“As wonderful as I am, Celestia, I do have a few faults. I do not share, Celestia. You and your little ponies are mine. Spy must pay for what he has done, and as for whatever sent him here, well, I do not take kindly to poachers.”
Celestia looked down at her hooves. It was too good to be true. It was too good to ignore. But if there was anything about Discord that had remained true over the millennia, it was that he held to a deal. There was really only one choice she could make.
“You have a deal, Discord.”
The lightning that flashed as she spoke was not at all ominous or portentous.
[Present]
[Luna]
The air in Vault the buzzed with magic, power barely contained behind the greatest wards the world had ever seen. It set her on edge and made her fur stand up.
Luna lay Spy on a workbench, putting away the scribbled notes of whatever unicorn had been working here. She cast a few quick spells to bind Spy to the table, then looked towards the throne room and her sister. She should be at Celestia’s side, helping her think through whatever machinations the mad god had planned, but she had felt nothing, not even a trickle of magic from the throne room. Could things be going peacefully? No, the could not, but a lack of peace did not mean open violence. Deals had been struck before, and if Discord wanted her there he would bring her there. If she stayed here, she had a chance to study Spy while he slept, something she had never managed before, something she had wondered about during her banishment. Curiosity won out, and she reinforced the bindings before beginning.
Slowly, carefully, as if worried even the slightest brush of magic might awaken the monster that lay before her, Luna searched Spy’s clothing for items, and was only slightly surprised at what she found.
Two blades. The first was clearly the product of remarkable skill, the blade etched with an intricate design and a number, the handle no doubt carved to fit Spy’s hand perfectly, and polished to a mirror sheen. The second was a complete contrast to the first, a solid piece of some black metal, with only a ragged cloth as a grip. From what Luna knew of weapons wielded by creatures like Spy, it was weighted oddly, not quite right for stabbing, not quite right for slashing.
Also in his possession was a unicorn horn, a stallion’s by the look of it. No doubt it once belonged to Shining Armour. It was coated in a mixture of blood and dirt, but the tip was surely sharper than it had ever been when the Captain of the Guard wore it ‘pon his head. He had not seemed the type to sharpen his horn.
Next were what seemed to be two impossibly tiny clocks, but that could not be the case. One was the size of her hoof, and the other even smaller! If not for the fact that the time they showed matched the time the stars told her, she would not know what to make of them. She set them aside, with the blades and the horn, for later study.
Next were two items that confused her. One was a case, made of a metal that at first looked like silver, but from the weight of it was most assuredly not. After a few seconds fiddling, it popped open. One side held a few long, thin sticks she had never seen Spy use, the other held what seemed to be a black mirror. It went next to the blades. The other was a set of small cards, fifty-two in number, similar to those used in Las Pegasus, though with designs relating to Spy’s species. There was nothing magical about it whatsoever. She looked through them, looking at the designs and marvelling at the quality of the construction. Every card was exactly the same size and thickness.
Last was possibly his most dangerous weapon. She lifted it slowly and kept it pointed away from her at all times. She had seen what that could do to ponies, and was at once both respectful and disgusted, even as she saw it for what it was; a work of engineering to rival the greatest of arts. So much power, from the smallest twitch. She levitated it slowly to the other side of the room.
Quickly checking the restraints holding Spy, she set about probing the two blades with magic. When she saw the results of the first few scans, she focused on them more closely. The results made no sense. There was magic in the blades, but it didn’t do anything. She started a few more scans when her restrains failed. She teleported to the other side of the workbench. When the flash faded, Spy was sitting up, looking right at her. She froze. Even under his mask, Spy seemed weary.
“So, you’re what passes for Luna now?”
She remained silent, gathering magic for a high strength, wide area binding. It shouldn’t have been necessary, but he should be dead.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” Spy said. “So, the parts of Luna that Celestia approved of, how do you feel knowing Celestia essentially killed her real sister and let you take her place?”
What?
Concentration lost, her magic sputtered momentarily, but she kept a hold of the spell. It took her a few moments to realise Spy was waiting for her response, and a few more to formulate an answer.
“What?”
It was a very complex spell.
“Okay, stop me if I’m wrong. Celestia sent her personal student to cleanse you, someone who was fanatically devoted to Celestia, enough to make all the other fanatics look like non-believers.” Spy pushed himself off the workbench and to his feet, taking a few shaky steps. “And the Elements don’t have a mind of their own, thats why they need bearers to direct the power they give. Magic acts as the main director, which means you were cleansed off everything the bearer of Magic felt was wrong, which included not thinking Celestia was perfect.”
Luna shook her head. “Too many unknowns for a valid hypothesis, Spy.”
“Oh really? Then tell me, when was the last time you disagreed with Celestia?” Spy took a step forward. “The last time you acted like a diarchy, instead of a monarchy?”
Luna rolled her eyes. “You realise this is pointless, don’t you? I trust my sister, and even if she would do something like that, the Elements would not.” She levitated Spy back onto the workbench and bound him to it again. This binding prevented him from moving more than a few steps from the bench. “And if they would, I would not be able to doubt my sister enough to fall for it. Face it Spy, you’ve lost.”
She didn’t expect an answer, but used the time to study Spy. He glanced over his shoulder to where his knives and non-weapons sat. Turning back to Luna, he reached up to his hat and removed the card from the band there. Placing the card between his two hands, he blew on it gently, and when he opened his hands the deck was sitting there. There had been no flash, no sound, nothing to suggest it was magic other than the teleportation. Luna just added the deck to the list of questions she had, right under ‘what are you?’ and ‘how are you not dead?’
Spy shuffled the cards quickly and without any fuss, before fanning them out and holding them out to Luna. “Pick a card,” he said. “Any card.”
[Present]
[Spy]
I held out the deck of cards, not feeling all that worried. If I knew Luna, and I did, then she couldn’t not pick a card. But the silence was starting to get to me.
Luna peered at the cards, horn glowing. “What magic is in these cards?” she asked.
“None. No magic is in these cards.” Technically correct, in case she had some sort of lie detector spell. Ridiculous, but you never know with these ponies. I mean, they’re inherently ridiculous themselves because, y’know, ponies.
She looked up at me. “Why should I?”
“You want to know what these are for, don’t you?”
She shook her head. “I’m not doing anything you ask, Spy. How stupid you must think me to even try it, I don’t want to know.”
Huh. I guess she’s changed more than I thought. Oh well. It works better if its voluntary, or so I’m told, but if she won’t do it herself, I guess I’ll have to. I took one of the cards and flung it at her. She caught it in her magic. As soon as her aura touched it, the colour changed, shifting to a lighter blue with purple sparks.
Luna shuddered for a few seconds, letting the card fall to the floor.
“Good to have you back,” I told her.
She blinked a few times, shook her head, then nodded. “Yes, yes, of course it is. We have a problem, however.” She paused as I put everything in its place, only continuing when she had my attention again. “Discord is loose.”
Only one thing to say to that, really. “Shit.”
She nodded again. “I can match my sister blow for blow, but even combined we could not match Discord. Even with the Elements, I suspect he let us win.” She was looking at me expectantly now.
“I doubt there is much I can do, if he’s even half as powerful as you said. Still, there’s a chance he won’t get involved.”
“True. But this is all theoretical and, quite frankly, boring. You were in the middle of some sort of vengeance crusade against my sister before you were captured, correct?”
I nodded. “Thats right.”
She gave me a grin that made me think explosions would be in my near future. “Want some help?”
I grinned right back. “From you? Always.”
“Then I believe it is time to remind those outside why I was called Nightmare Moon.” Still grinning, she moved about the room we were in, taking random items from the shelves. I picked up the card I’d thrown at Luna, the King of Clubs, and put it back where it belonged.
Welcome back, I told the voice.
She caught it? Before I could answer, the voice continued. Good. Now only Her and the abomination remain in our way.
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ahjdgh;lahlfhk;ltnFAILHLHIDGFVAILIL!!! :brain.exe shut down due to sheer anticipation:
So the Element made Best Princess into Celestia's bitch?
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...
...
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.......fuck.......
Okay, I've got to admit, I had been following the story for Spy's awesome murder spree, but now, now I'm giddy. This has gone from good, to potentially mind-bending in the best way possible.
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Dayum, lovin this!
Oho! OHO! OHOHOHOHO~!
I was thinking of PMing you to continue this story as well! Everything is looking up!
Awww-yeaaaah... Sweet.
meh, never liked the elements of harmony anyway.
carry on.
*an
I don't get the card thing. Am I missing something?
Also, IT STARTED
I was thinking over the deal. Discord could hide, but he seems to want Spy gone quite a bit.
4672036
What sent Spy to Equestrian in the first place?
4672085
You mean the year hiding after? Or the five days he gave Big C?
4672144 indeed, I remember now. I'm reading so many stories at the same time...
4672144 The Five Days. I was trying to think of what loophole he left, when I realized that he said 'If you can bring Spy to me' Which could mean that he doubts they will be able to bring him, or that they won't be able to find Discord.
moar now
Keep these chapters coming. Is very good.
This world feels more hopeless than Dark Souls does.
Should have been the Queen of Clubs
7131892
Well... no. He was brought here by The Merchant with the King of Clubs, but I can totally see your reasoning.
Oh my goddess he's saying what I've been saying since season 1!