You Wouldn't Believe Me if I Told You

by PinkiePiedPiper

Chapter 16: The Fellowship Fails

I don’t own MLP: FiM. That belongs to Lauren Faust and Hasbro.

You Wouldn’t Believe Me if I Told You

Chapter 16: The Fellowship Fails

The battle atop Barad-dur continued wordlessly. They say actions speak louder than words, and there were plenty of those.

Neither side was willing to give an inch. Both launched attack after attack, each one strong enough to devastate a large number of less powerful beings. Fragments of energy and waves of heat radiated from the smoke-concealed fray. It looked very much like a fireworks display going off in the clouds during a thunderstorm.

Discord anxiously awaited the addition of more pony essences to his ever expanding collection. He was glad he had selected so many of them, and that he had altered the minds of some of the more vengeful ones to help in wiping out the docile ones. But because he only had a highly damaged Trixie left up his sleeve, he decided he needed one more pony on his side to mix things up a bit. Satisfied, he turned his full attention back to the task at hand. Soon enough he would get more power. Then he could end this.

He did not know it yet, but he was winning.

Meanwhile on the other side of the battle, Sauron could feel his diminishing power over the realm, sensing the holes forming across the battlefield as he choked off the power siphon. Using a fraction of his focus, he had started to keep the area around the combatants as stable as possible. He hoped that keeping them safe that way would buy him enough time to regain his Ring of Power and destroy Discord. Those hobbits thought that they were so sneaky. He had maintained a nearly constant vigilance on them ever since one of his Riders had discovered them in the Dead Marshes. They kept an eye on them from above the clouds all the way to the Black Gate, down to Minas Morgul, and up the staircase. He had almost lost it after the orcs had reported that the Baggins did not have it, but it re-emerged with the other one shortly after.

Turning part of his consciousness back to Middle Earth, he scoured the blackened volcanic ground for signs of life. He heard the call of his Ring just as his gaze fell on the Baggins himself, who promptly collapsed. The Ring was at the base of Mount Doom. After some seconds of thought on the matter, he looked to his front gate where the last great army of men waited on his doorstep. They had tried to distract him with their little ruse to give Frodo some time. Little did they know, both they and the Ring were precisely where he wanted them. Soon he would have his Ring, both Discord and the human armies would be destroyed, and both realms would be securely under his power once more.

Soon…

* * * * *

Twilight galloped as fast as she could manage through the rough, overgrown terrain. Steve was no less than a length behind her. He accelerated slightly and came up beside her. Both were not used to quite so much exercise and were beginning to pant from exertion.

Steve gave a few awkward hops as he tried to get a look at the LSD.

“From what I can tell,” he called over the noise from their charge, “is we should see them any second now-”

His sentence died in his throat as the two of them entered into a small clearing where they saw Ditzy and Bon Bon some meters away. The odd thing was, Bon Bon had Ditzy in a headlock with an uzi against her head. They skidded to a stop.

“Back off!” Bon Bon shouted at them, briefly waving her semi-automatic in their general direction. “This kill’s mine! Go find your own!”

Ditzy whimpered in fear, utterly confused by Bon Bon’s sudden attitude change.

Steve asked nervously, “Bon Bon, what’s gotten into you? What in the world are you doing?”

“Put the gun down. We can talk about this,” Twilight said calmingly, raising and lowering her hooves in the ‘calm down’ motion. “Nopony has to get hurt.”

“Open your eyes!” Bon Bon shouted. “We all have to get hurt! That’s the whole point of the game, isn’t it? Nopony is getting out of here until there are only three of us left. By my count, there are five right now, and I am nowhere near being in that top three!

“You think you can save us?” she mocked. “Who have you saved so far? Sure, you found Ditzy and me, but who did you save? Not any of your friends, that’s for sure! Not Applejack, or any other Apples, and not Fluttershy or Cheerilee or Rarity, either! They all died! And you know as well as anypony that two more here have to die!”

She paused briefly, staring down the purple unicorn and blue pegasus.

“Wait,” Steve said slowly as to avoid any rash panic, “You said Rarity… how do you know…”

“Because I saw the other pony just back there. The lone survivor…” she paused with a tear, “is Rainbow Dash. She’s just over there, passed out under a big tree, and it ain’t pretty.”

Both Steve and Twilight were excited to hear that Rainbow was ok. That feeling was dampened, however, by both the implications of who else had died and by their current unresolved situation.

“Not any of MY friends survived! No, of course not! Just your friends! It’s always you and your friends, the Elements of Harmony!” Bon Bon was in a full-fledged rant, growing more and more agitated as she shouted. The muzzle of her gun was digging painfully into the side of Ditzy’s head. She had shut her eyes and was grasping her grenade belt to brace against the pain.

“My friends! MY friends are gone! Lyra; dead! Berry Punch; dead! Oh, and we already knew about Cheerilee, but let’s not mourn over her! No! Let’s look for YOUR friends! They are the only ones that matter, aren’t they?!”

Bon Bon was hysterical, with tears running down her face. Twilight was crying from the cream-coloured pony’s accusations. Ditzy was still frozen in pain and fear. A trace of blood trickled down her temple from where the muzzle was slowly cutting into her skin. Steve was starting to get angry, and absentmindedly took a step forward.

Bon Bon whipped the gun from Ditzy’s head and in his direction. Steve turned and dove on top of Twilight as Bon Bon sprayed a small barrage of bullets. Despite the wildly inaccurate gun control, several bullets embedded themselves into his soft flesh.

Steve yelled in agony as the hot metal burrowed in, setting his nerves on fire. He rolled off of Twilight, bleeding from his side, flank, and his neck. Twilight, who had only sustained some small scrapes and bruises, jumped to her feet to examine his wounds.

“Steve! Are you ok?” she asked without thinking.

He just looked at her, gritting his teeth against the pain.

“Nevermind.”

She unravelled the bandages from his forelegs to wrap around his neck.

“I TOLD YOU TO STAY BACK!” Bon Bon shrieked.

Twilight looked up at her. “That doesn’t mean you had to shoot him!”

“Maybe not, but I’m starting to think maybe I did. Maybe I should just kill you both, and Rainbow back there! With your stars, me and Ditzy here can get back to Equestria and live long lives; all thanks to your sacrifice.” She leveled the gun at them purposefully and smiled. “Looks like you saved somepony after a- mmmph!”

As she was completing her last word, Ditzy sprang into action. Unhindered by a gun at her temple, she yanked two grenades from her belt, activating the ten second delay and leaving a pair of lonely pin hanging in their place. She twisted in Bon Bon’s loosened grip and shoved one grenade into her mouth and the other she pressed against in between them. She held Bon Bon’s mouth shut with one hoof under her jaw and the other on her head.

“Looks like I’m the one saving them from you.”

It was Bon Bon’s turn to be afraid.

Ditzy looked over her shoulder at Steve. “Hear that? You’re not allowed to die, cuz I just saved you. Take care of Dinky for me, ok?”

Steve did not manage to reply, but instead said hoarsely to Twilight, “Get down!”

She ducked in behind him and he rolled against her side with his forelegs over her head just as the grenade went off. Although neither was watching, Bon Bon’s head blew apart nearly instantly. Both ponies were ripped apart from the second grenade which went off a millisecond afterwards. That one caused the remaining three on her belt to ignite and explode in perfect unison. Pony flesh and metal shrapnel radiated from the epicenter and showered the two cowering ponies just five or so meters away.

As the force, sound, and heat of the explosion died away, skyward debris continued to clatter to the ground. Twilight poked her head up slowly from beneath Steve’s hooves.

All that remained of the deranged Bon Bon and the brave Ditzy were their collars, neatly undamaged by the explosion and sitting in a shallow crater. She got up and looked at Steve’s back. It was riddled with cuts and shrapnel and coated with dirt. Steve gave a painful cough and groaned.

“Steve!” she cried, kneeling do his face. “Are you ok? Say something!”

His body shuddered as he took a few painful breaths, coughing a few more times.

“What… what’s with you…” he struggled breathlessly and made a weak smile, “…and that stupid question?”

Twilight picked up his hoof and held it against herself. She squeezed her eyes shut and purged a few hot tears. She immediately felt a jagged metal object press against her chest. She saw that it was the LSD, which had been struck by a bullet and some shrapnel. The display was shattered and a blank dull green. Blood and oil oozed out from underneath it and down his leg.

Something glowed off near the crater. Twilight was about to check what it was, but Steve placed his free hoof against her face and looked into her eyes meaningfully.

“Go,” Steve coughed, “go find… Rainbow Dash. You two have to… get out of this… this place.”

Twilight shook her head sadly. “I can’t leave you! And the LSD is busted, so I don’t know where she is…”

“I’m right here.”

Twilight and Steve looked back towards the crater. Before where there had been two collars with one star apiece, was one collar with ten stars; worn by a burnt black-and-blue one-eyed pony with a rainbow coloured mane, a badly scarred face, and a bandage around her middle. She had a crossbow on her back, and was brandishing a gleaming sickle.

Her face twisted into a grotesque smile.

* * * * *

Pinkie flew through interdimensional space, faster than she ever had before and far faster than was safe. Her contact, whom she held in the firm grasp of her hoof, had nervously voiced as such several times since their departure. She tried ignoring him.

“All I’m trying to say, Miss Pinkie,” the thin, spectacled purple stallion warned, “is that we are both in grave danger if you maintain this speed of travel!”

“Are you done, Grapes?” she replied flatly, glancing back to her semi-willing passenger.

Grapes, whose real name was Cherry Topper, was called such due to his purple colour and a cutie mark depicting a bunch of grapes in a golden goblet. His parents had wanted him to decorate cakes for a living, but he had found his passion in grape juices and wine making.

He still preferred his real name, however, and scowled at the nickname in a playfully emphasized manner. “Perhaps, Miss Pinkie.”

Pinkie smiled and continued her flight.