Ghost Town

by Dash The Stampede

Shattered Hopes

Princess Celestia carefully extricated herself from the residence of Twilight's parents with a grimace. Her visit had gone according to plan, but she still felt defeated from the reactions she had garnered. Velvet had been...beside herself in grief, and Night Light...

She couldn't bring to memory a time when she had seen a pony shed so many tears.

Celestia adjusted the re-packed saddlebags on her back, Twilight's fragments and parchment shifting about uneasily. The thought that she was carrying around the remains of her faithful student in her bags brought a wave of nausea and unease. 'I could have done without dumping her all over the table...' she thought, putting a hoof to her head, attempting to cease the ringing in her eardrums. Looking above, the cloudless sky held no reservations for its warmth, beating down on her coat with an oppressive heat, making her sweat. Celestia lit her horn and teleported back into the castle, appearing next to a group of guards defensively holding back a small crowd of angered, irate ponies. The sudden appearance of the Solar Princess caused the rage in the ponies' hearts to begin anew, their frothing, roiling mob nearly mauling Celestia where she stood.

"Get back! Back, all of you! The Princess is not going to stand for this!" Celestia recognized Sharp Sight from before, his helmet now on and keeping his face safe from the punches being thrown his direction. "Princess, I suggest vacating the hallway immediately!"

Nodding, Celestia took to the air, disappearing in a bright flash, to the disappointment of the crowd. Reappearing with a flash and a soft clop of hooves, Celestia alighted upon her throne, just in time to witness the great double-doors smashing open with a torrent of rioting bodies. Throwing up a defensive barrier, Celestia cowered as her subjects angrily beat on the barrier, screaming her name and yelling for vengeance.

"Your mistakes killed my daughters!"

"How could you let this happen?"

"Damn your experiments! My son is gone!"

"A WHOLE TOWN! A WHOLE GODDESS-FORSAKEN TOWN!"

Celestia hadn't seen such rebellious behavior since the Discordian era, and her heart broke to see her subjects' red eyes and tear-stained bodies, mauling each other to have a chance to rip her apart.

"ENOUGH!" Luna's magnified voice boomed through the Throne Room, bringing the crowd to their knees, holding their ears in pain. "YOU WILL EXPLAIN YOUR HERESY AT ONCE!" her eyes were narrowed at the crowd as she came to land next to Celestia, the latter dropping her barrier to hug the former.

"She's the reason my family's gone!" One mare screeched in the front, pointing accusingly at Celestia.

"My son never asked to become a pile of worthless shreds!" A stallion spoke up in the rear.

"I want justice for her careless mistakes!" The first mare bellowed, rousing an affirmative cheer from the rest of the crowd.

"Yeah! Justice!"

"Turn her into a balloon and pop her!"

"Pop the Princess!"

Luna had heard enough. With a resounding crack, she slammed her forehoof down, splitting the marble staircase in two, the crevasse threatening to swallow the irate crowd. "I have kept aside and listened to you all threaten over and over to ruin my sister, your Princess, and I shall hear no more!" Lighting her horn, a wall of marble erupted from the floor on all sides of the crowd, effectively trapping them within its confines. "Until you are able to conduct yourselves like proper ponies, and refrain from tearing my sister into a pulp, you shall remain here!" Luna and Celestia took to the air, the ponies below them running about their makeshift prison, searching for a way out. Some began to buck fruitlessly at the walls, their bones shattering as they forced them into the marble over and over.

Celestia grimaced at Luna. "I do not approve of this method of reformation, Luna." Celestia shook her head as another Earth pony pounded at the floor, trying to dig underneath. "Even with their negative intentions, I do not believe they would harm me."

Luna gazed in shock at Celestia. "Did you not see nor hear their words? They wish to see you pop like Twilight!"

Celestia looked back between Luna and the enclosed riot, contemplating her options. She needed time to figure out the Ponyville issue, and the spell, but she couldn't rightly escape without repurcussions from the angry mob once they were released. "Luna, I have an idea, but I will need your expert assistance with illusions."

"I am unsure as to your intentions, sister. Are you sure you know what you are getting into?" Luna gave Celestia a raised eyebrow, as the solar princess took on a smirk.

"These ponies want to see me pop? They'll get to see me pop, alright." Celestia smiled, leading Luna away to discuss her thoughts.

---

Afternoon settled in as the ponies trapped in the marble prison began to laze about, their previous bloodthirst all but lost in the fear from their predicament. Suddenly, with a large rumble, the walls of the makeshift cell receded into the floor, allowing the captors free movement once again. Stunned, they looked about, only to see an empty throne room. A bright light above them stole their attention away, however, and their anger began to froth again as the shape of Celestia emerged from the teleport, next to her sister, Luna. Exhausted, they could only watch as Luna lowered the duo to the floor, and surrounded them with a barrier once more.

"Ponies of Equestria!" Celestia's voice rang out from her spot next to Luna. "I have come to terms with my involvement with the Ponyville Disaster, and accept any and all judgment that comes to pass as a result." Luna turned and lit her horn, surrounding Celestia in a midnight-blue aura, the alicorn's body showing signs of swelling. "I have decreed that I shall follow in the same line of fate that the victims did, that I shall be inflated to bursting point, and popped." Celestia lowered her head, her limbs seizing up as she began to rise to the top of the barrier, her legs growing steadily in size.

The spell worked its way through Celestia, puffing out her wings and body, growing her rounder and rounder by the second. Her breaths came in labored squeaks as her limbs retracted into the balloon she was becoming, her tail and mane following suit. The Celestia-balloon had ceased its breathing, her organs converting to rubber as seams began to appear at her edges. Celestia's eyes faded to black, soulless beads as her mind began to disappear into a haze of inflation. Her vision petered out as her body faded into the balloon she had become, the sound of air slowly hissing out of her loose seams permeating the silence in the room. Luna's horn stopped glowing, and she looked up to see the remnants of her sister float to the top of the barrier, before disappearing with a raucous boom. Shreds of white, green, blue, and pink rubber rained down upon Luna whilst the assembled ponies cheered. They bent to the floor, worshipping the ground upon which the remains of Celestia fell. Luna glared ahead stoically, chancing a small smirk as pieces of her 'sister' rained down upon her.

---

Back in the Town Hall in Ponyville, Princess Celestia resumed her tedious work of assembling the shredded ponies into the shapes of their former selves, devoting entire buildings to storing the re-assembled bodies. Before her, on the floor of Town Hall, laid the outlines of six distinct ponies, their cutie marks showing plain as day in the macabre collage. She smiled, noting the complete structures of each of the Element bearers' bodies, and took the scroll she had attained from Sombra out of her saddlebags. Just then, a note poofed into existence next to her.

Celestia could not force back the smile creeping onto her face as she read:

T'was a great plan, sister, and it has worked just as well. The crowd believes you are but shreds in their hooves, floating amongst the victims of Ponyville. They have all left, rejoicing the 'Popped Princess' and their needs for justice sated. I fear for their hearts once they learn of your fluke, Celestia. Your stunt has given you countless days to attempt the reformation of the victims, but it will not be long before somepony comes looking around. Good luck, 'Poplestia'.
~Luna

Celestia grimaced. The spell required a day's casting time, and more energy than she could rightly give on a day like today. It had also mentioned using a 'Piece of self' to cast the reformation. She sat in thought as to what it could mean by a 'piece', absentmindedly shifting about the Bearers' bodies with a hoof, before realizing her error and fixing the shreds. She had at least four days, if her estimates were of any good. Guards had been stationed sparsely around the perimeter of the town, so as to alert her to incoming ponies, but not to alert pegasi to any suspicious activity. Her populace believed she had been erased from the world, and for all intents and purposes, she had.

If she could consider herself a ponnequin, that is.

She had delegated all her royal duties to Luna, promising a private cake room addition to her suite in exchange. 'If only everypony could be bought with cake...' Celestia mused, before turning back to her collage. Placing the scroll on the Mayor's desk, she rose, and strode from the Hall, headed for a nondescript home on the edge of town. Entering the building, she noticed all the furniture had been pushed to the edges of the room, as though sent outward from the center. She had found thousands of scraps in this particular room, and judging by the photos on the mantle, the whole family had been in the room when it happened. Pushing the gruesome thoughts from her mind, Celestia strode upstairs and made herself comfortable on the bed in the master bedroom, before drifting off to sleep.

---

Celestia awoke to a bright light in her eyes, unused to seeing her own star in the sky before her awakening. Blinded, she stumbled out of the bedroom and down the stairs, before rummaging about the cupboard for non-perishables. Finding a box of hay grains, she grumbled an affirmative and poured herself a bowl. After struggling to dry-swallow the grains, she set about for Town Hall. Arriving at the hall, she noticed some of the piles had been shifted slightly, as though moved by a gentle breeze. Her heart rate increased sharply as she noticed the doors had been closed when she left last night. 'But...but how...?' she wondered, staring about the room, before coming to a stop on a small pile of ash atop the Mayor's desk. Slowly walking forward, Celestia pushed the pile around the desk with her hoof, watching the blackened fragments turn to powder at her touch. With a stabbing pain in her chest, she realized the ash pile was right where she had left the scroll!

Tears caught on her eyelids as she tried to process what she was seeing. Her one way out, her one sliver of hope, was now a mere smattering of ash on a desk, and her dream of restoration now crumbling like the remains of the scroll. She turned about, searching for clues, when she heard the unmistakable sound of hooves on the wooden floor outside the Mayor's office. Celestia froze in fear. Her subjects were under the impression that she had been removed! She scrambled about, searching for an exit, when the doors slammed open, and a cloaked figure trotted into the room. Celestia turned and regarded the newcomer with unease. Something about this pony seemed both familiar, and yet scary, and she couldn't place the pony's gender.

The intruder raised a cloaked limb and pointed at Celestia menacingly, glowing yellow eyes emanating beneath the hood. A cultured Zebrican voice rose above the silence, shocking Celestia. A Zebra!

"Beware, beware, what you are giving, to return these souls to the land of the living! Their bodies remain, but souls do not, they return in body, but the mind will rot. Beware the cost of restoration, of reviving the dead, of altercation! Your spell was a curse, for those who've died, their bodies would become zombified!" The zebra mare spoke, her cryptic rhyme chilling Celestia to the bone, before turning about and running back into the shadows from which she had emerged.

Celestia considered the mare's warning, of zombified ponies, and minds rotting, and her stomach churned. She thought of the spell reviving Twilight, only to have her body decay and fall apart while she had no idea it was even occurring, limbs breaking off with sickening snaps, and her stomach fought to purge the sickness rising inside her. Celestia heaved, emptying her stomach's contents, and her shoddy breakfast, out the window, before she settled to the floor in a slump.

Her heart broken, and her hopes shattered, Celestia drifted off into a fitful sleep under the watchful eye of the zebra in the shadows.

Comments

[Cerulean Voice]

Well, shit.
What do now, Celestia?

[LeylaQuartz]

Well, then, Zecora, do you have a better idea?