The Last Something Sweet to Bite

by Knackerman

A Return to Reality

The world had fallen into utter chaos.

It was impossible to tell up from down, as rubble, books, and miscellaneous items of furniture tumbled through the air. Sunset wasn't even sure what part of the castle she was in anymore, or if such a concept held any real meaning. Thinking quickly, she threw back up her shield. Not a moment too soon, it turned out, as one of the free wheeling bookcases shattered to splinters against the shell.

This didn't mean Sunset was safe, however. She bounced through the crumbling halls, free falling like everything else, until a sudden stop against a brick wall threatened to crack her shield spell like an egg and her skull along with it. She grit her teeth as blood burst from her nostrils. It took all her magical acumen to keep from tumbling like a rag doll, but she wouldn't be able to maintain her this level of concentration for long.

As the castle walls crumbled apart, fire from outside hungrily swept through the falling timbers. Sunset's shield could withstand a few flames, but a sudden explosion of dark magic sent her reeling. One of the grimores must have lit on fire, releasing it's ancient spells and curses in a single blast of magical power. With dawning horror Sunset realized the dry, dusty tomes and scrolls free wheeling through space around her would burn all too well, and if the contents of the forbidden archives as a whole were to catch flame... the resulting explosion would be far more devastating than the palace simply collapsing. In her time in the human world, Sunset had learned of one of their most terrifying weapons of war, the atomic bomb. What was about to happen here would make the height of humanities destructive power look like a firecracker.

This knowledge did nothing to comfort Sunset as she tumbled through space, waiting for the inevitable conclusion of the long fall to the bottom of the mountain. As one after the other, scrolls and books around her were engulfed in flames, it was all she could do to maintain her shield as she was blown from one side of the palace to the other. Unbalanced as she was, it was a miracle that she didn't lose consciousness. But that was not the only miracle, for before her eyes something else caught Sunset's eyes.

A mirror.

It was plain, but tall, and she could see quivering in it's center the only stable magic in this swirling hell storm of dark magic and fire. It was a portal home. This must have been the gateway that the Candy Mare had used to cross into the human world! This was her chance at escape! But it hung just out of her reach.

Taking a risk, Sunset dispelled her shield, and instead used her magic to erect a pathway, a bridge, from the falling furniture that floated around her. Though rocks and pieces of wood whizzed around her head, she clambered onto the first piece of furniture and started scrambling one to another. A sudden roaring drew her attention to the darkness below. There was no longer a 'floor' or 'walls' where she was, so she had a fantastic view of the ground rushing up to meet her.

Sunset didn't have a single moment to lose. Bunching up her leg muscles she jumped, hurtling through the air, aiming for the dead center of the mirror. All around her the furniture was smashed to splinters. Indeed, the mirror itself struck the earth just as she slipped through the interstice between this world and the next, before it too shattered into shards of glass. The resulting mound of rubble from the fallen palace didn't exist for long, as the magical explosion that followed wiped it, and Canterlot, from the face of Equestria.

Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, there were no living eyes left to witness the devastation.
------------------------

At first Sunset thought she'd made a horrible mistake. She had ended up back in the center of the inferno. Flames roared all around her, hot enough to singe her hair. She lifted her hands to shield her eyes, and in that moment realized where she was. She had made it back through, she was in her human body again. So what was it that was burning?

She looked behind her. The familiar statue, the one of the Canterlot Colt that had greeted her on her first arrival in this world, stood soot stained and flame blackened against a scene out of a nightmare. Bodies were strewn as far as she could see and, what she realized belated, Canterlot High was the back drop to their immolation. Students, teachers, all writhed and screamed as bright flames flickered inside and over their bodies.

Sunset shimmer brought her hand to her mouth. They were still alive! How could they still be alive!? What had she done!? The stench of cooking flesh was only modestly less horrible than their cries of agony. Perhaps the fortunate ones were the students who were already dead. Their smoking remains were slumped over, their empty eye sockets and open mouths glowing merrily like jack-o-lanterns as they burned from the inside out. It would've been festive if it were not so horrible.

How was she supposed to know that the candy curse was less effective on humans than on ponies? How was she supposed to know that the Candy Mare had just been manipulating them like puppets rather than making them true candy ghouls? The agony they were in now, their pain, was this all her doing? Was she responsible for this too? The tears that welled up in her eyes threatened to rob her of her vision. What was she supposed to do? What could she do? She felt a gentle touch on her ankle. As her tears fell with a soft pitter patter, they didn't strike the ground, but rather dribbled on a familiar face.

Flash Sentry smiled weakly up at her. Though his cloths were tattered and torn and his face bloody, it seemed that the flames had spared him the torment that the other students were experiencing. Injured though he was, he was alive and free of the candy curse! As Sunset looked around, she could see that it was only the students that were more far gone than the others that were truly in peril. Even if the candied parts of their body were removed without the hungry flames, it was likely that they would still die from their wounds.

There were surprisingly number of bodies Sunset had mistook for 'dead' that were merely unconscious, trapped now by a ring of fire caused by the blaze that had engulfed CHS and a semi-circle of overturned ambulances and firetrucks. In that moment, Sunset knew what she needed to do. She bent down and draped one of Flash's arms over her shoulder and, being careful not to move too quickly, began to drag the teenager to safety.

She still couldn't stop the tears from flowing, however. There was no way that she could save everyone by herself. Already the lawn in front of the school was catching fire. It wouldn't be long before this place was nothing more than a pyre. But Sunset would save as many as she could! As long as she was still breathing, she'd keep going back for more students, more teachers.

Propping Flash up in one of the ambulances that was still on all four wheels, Sunset turned to help the next student. A girl, so badly burned her dress had seemed to fuse with her charred and blistered flesh, moved on unsteady feet towards her. It was a wonder she was still able to move at all, as not a scrap of flesh looked like it had gone unburned. Soaked in blood, what little hair still clung to her skull hung limp and greasy in front of a lipless face.

A wave of pity swept though Sunset's heart as she moved to help the poor girl. It was only at the last moment that Sunset looked into the teenagers mismatched eyes and saw there a hatred so base, so animal, that it made her freeze in place mid-stride. "You can't have them!" croaked Candy in a harsh, guttural voice. "They're mine!" She swiped at Sunset with a hand who's fingertips ended in gnarled and sharpened bone that sliced right through Sunset's cloths and opened up shallow cuts in her midriff.

"Candy!?" cried Sunset astonished, wincing from the gash in her stomach. As she looked closer Sunset could see that the girls flesh was not entirely uniform. It was clear that her body parts were as badly mismatched as her eyes, with bones jutting out here and there. The candy sheath that had coated the Candy Mare's human body had been able to conceal the corruption beneath, but already the flesh was putrefying where it hadn't been burned. After all, this body was just a collection of parts from the students and faculty of CHS. It looked like the only thing still holding Candy together was her own malice and spite.

Despite her tattered form, she was still able to stand and to walk. She was still able to leer at Sunset with a mouth full of crooked mismatched teeth. With the candy curse evaporating and the conduit that had allowed the Candy Mare to exist destroyed... "How? How can you still be moving? The candy curse is broken! How are you even still alive!?" Sunset wailed in confusion and horror. The dark magic that wafted off of this composite corpse buffeted her like the foul miasma from a centuries old garbage dump.

"You little fool," the abomination barked, "It was never about candy. It was always about flesh! Sweet and succulent, just like on that boys bones," she said pointing one gnarled finger at Flash Sentry. "Just like on all their bones! Even yours! I don't need a rotting corpse to keep myself alive! I need meat, meat, meat! Fresh meat! And this world is full of it!"

"That's not true," replied Sunset through tears. "I saw you burn! I saw you die!"

"You saw my old lives, my old power burned away," replied the decayed creature with a sneer. "But I can take new lives, new power! Just like I forged this flesh from your insipid magic and the deaths of your pathetic friends. I will be reborn! All I need are their lives!" A ghost of the Candy Mare's smile split the abomination's face, causing bleeding cracks to open on either side of her mouth. "And I'll start with yours!"

The gangly creature crouched on all fours like a predator ready to spring. Sunset only had seconds to react. If she dodged she'd be leaving Flash wide open. If she didn't, then she had no doubt that 'Candy' or whatever this foul entity was, would eat her alive. Then everything truly would have been for nothing. Then the nightmare would just begin again. Sunset couldn't allow that. She wouldn't allow that! Her finger tips brushed something just as the blood slicked creature sprang into the air.

A broken wooden beam, which had been blown free from CHS when the fires had first exploded from within, felt just right in Sunset Shimmer's grip. It felt even better as it made contact with Candy's face, causing a satisfying crack that vibrated all the way up her arms. The corpse was flung back onto the ground by the force of the blow, but Sunset didn't give her time to recover. "Do you think I'd just let you kill me? Kill more of my friends? After everything you've done tonight?" she brought the two by four down with a thud, and then swung it faster with a rhythmic thwack that sprayed blood across the lawn. The composite corpse screeched as bits and pieces of it were sent flying by the dull, rusty nails embedded in the wood. Candy scrambled away from Sunset, all four limbs tearing into the turf as she tried to escape the furious teenagers onslaught. "Did you think I was going to just crumble into a sobbing ball and let you have your way!? Let you hurt more innocent people!?"

But Candy didn't seem to be in the mood to talk. She lunged forward, batting aside Sunset's wooden club and punching the teenager in the gut. Sunset folded with a whoomph of air from her lungs, but she didn't go down, instead bringing the club back around to smash into the side of Candy's face and send more teeth flying into the grass. In an angry frenzy, Candy lashed out; clawing, punching, and biting when she could, but all the while Sunset continued to drive her back. Desperate, Candy launched herself at Sunset again, laughing madly as she landed on top of the girl and knocked her to the ground. Sunset's makeshift club fell in the grass, inches away from her fingers, but with the weight of the crazed abomination on top of her it might as well have been miles away.

Sunset felt the corpses gnarled hands wrapped tight around her throat, but Candy wasn't trying to choke her. No, instead she was lifting Sunset's face towards her open mouth. She had a good view inside of the monsters reeking, putrid maw, made all the more horrible by the blood that spilled freely from her broken teeth. Looking down Candy's throat, Sunset remembered her nightmare from the other day, the horrible hellish existence that waited at the end of that corridor, beyond the door of Candy's crooked teeth. She could glimpse it now. There was something down there.

Something hungry.

Still alive.

Waiting.

Sunset wanted no part of it.

With both hands she shoved her thumbs into Candy's mismatched eyes and pressed until she felt one burst, thick and runny, like the yolk of a fried egg. Candy howled, taking her hands off of Sunset's throat and covering her face with them instead. Thrown of balance and in obvious pain, Sunset chucked the ragged creature off of her. Wasting no time, she picked her bludgeon back up and attacked the cannibal corpse before she could come to her senses.

Though she was half blind, Candy still tried to catch the wooden beam with her hands, but with less success than before. Her fingers snapped backwards, broken. Her digits dangled uselessly from her hands like swollen sausages. She was in pain, clearly desperate, an animal backed into a corner. She tried to snatch away the club with her mouth next, but only succeeded in sending a spray of black blood and teeth splattering over Sunset's skirt. There was nothing Candy could do. Crying blackened, bloody tears, her mouth a ruined waterfall of blood, Candy was a pathetic sight to behold. "Why...why? Why can't I kill you!?""

For the first time in thousands of years, the Candy Mare found herself to be in that most terrifying and dangerous states of being. She was mortal. Just as she had visited pain and terror on her many victims, now she was the one on the receiving end. She tried to shield her body from Sunset's wrath, but Candy's bones broke from the ceaseless rain of blows. She tried to scream, for help or simply in agony who could say, but instead choked on her own blood.

"You can't do this. This isn't how it's supposed to go!" there was a whining, pleading edge to the creatures words. She curled into a fetal position, and after what seemed like an eternity, the seemingly endless rain of blows finally ceased. For a moment, Candy thought it was over... Thought Sunset's rage was spent. Perhaps she had even decided to take mercy on the shambling, tattered corpse. As Candy looked up, one eye gone and the other bulging from her head, what she saw made her shiver in dread. Sunset was sticking the end of the wooden beam into the fire. Letting the wood blacken as the paint on it blistered and peeled away. Sunset had made a torch. "You're not supposed to do this. You're one of the good guys!"

At that Sunset cast eyes that blazed no less furiously than the flames on the abomination that sat mangled and shivering on the school steps. "I guess you weren't paying attention then. Nobody at this school was really willing to give me the benefit of the doubt. They were always waiting on me to go back to being the bad girl they all loved to hate. Nobody would've given me a chance were it not for my friends... and now they're all dead." Sunset strode towards Candy, her eyes like smoldering coals as she raised her makeshift weapon. "I never had the chance to be one of the good guys. I never had the chance to be reborn. And now, neither will you!"

The monstrous wails that filled the night then went on for a long time. Long enough that they attracted other survivors, others to witness those final moments at the school. The light rose and fell repeatedly as the abominations cries grew weaker and weaker. It was said by those who were there that, from a distance, the blaze at the school looked like the setting sun on the horizon. A grim twilight at midnight.

When the screams finally died away, Sunset tossed her torch aside. She went back to the ambulance where she had left Flash. He was breathing, but only barely. Ignoring him for now, she instead rummaged through the medical supplies inside the ambulance until she finally found what she was looking for. She took what she found back to the school steps and poured the rubbing alcohol and other solvents, anything that might burn, on Candy's body until the creature was completely soaked. When Sunset picked up her torch again, it was with a certainty that brooked no misunderstanding of what she was about to do. "You were... a unicorn before, weren't you?" asked what was left of Candy, weakly, spitting a wad of blood and broken teeth as she spoke. "A pretty, perfect little unicorn, and you threw it all away for power. You're right. You're not one of the good guys. You're just like me. A destroyer. That's all...all you'll ever be..."

"I don't care anymore." Without any fanfare, or so much as a quip, she set the composite corpse aflame. The alcohol caught quickly with a faint whoosh, engulfing the tattered corpse instantly. Even so, Sunset would stand and stare at the smoldering corpse for some time as the fire did its work. As blackened flesh turned to ash and smoke, she at last turned and walked away from the flames.

Sunset realized something as she looked out over the fire-lit town. There were no sing song whispers on the edge of her hearing. There were no more screams of pain, madness, or hunger. Even the fires that had torn through the sleepy town were beginning to burn out. Though smoke choked the skies above and floating cinders fell like snow, there was a moment of calm. A moment of clarity.

Here, beside the Candy Mare's final pyre, beside the burning remains of the life Sunset had lived for the last several years at CHS, Sunset Shimmer discovered something she didn't think she would ever be able to find again.

Peace.

The thought made her laugh. It was over. It was finally all over! The nightmare had at long last come to an end. This was no twilight after all, but instead a bright new dawn! And Sunset Shimmer laughed and laughed until tears streamed down her soot stained face. The joy and relief in her heart matched only by her sorrow.

Comments

[pvzMLP]

Ummmmmmm.......... Happy ending?

[TheLunaRainbow]

I love this so much

[zap4th]

soo the candy mare is dead. what now. i know there is something else because there are more chapters.

[Midnight Radiance]

...I can't trust the author at this point...... There is one thing I'm still waiting to happen....

[LadyTheLioness]

8169037
yep

[hyreia]

If you want the happy ending, stop here. You should know by now...

I loved this final confrontation here. The way she lashed out in hopeless, blind anger and realized this remain of CandyMare is mortal now. And then she just keeps right on beating her senselessly until she's definitely dead.

"You were... a unicorn before, weren't you? A pretty, perfect little unicorn, and you threw it all away for power. You're right. You're not one of the good guys. You're just like me. A destroyer. That's all...all you'll ever be..."

"I don't care anymore." Without any fanfare, or so much as a quip, she set the composite corpse aflame.

That's SO good.

[Wahtiff]

Yeah, there’s a twist, I know. Yeah, it’s not totally a happy ending, but regardless, I consider this a win. Sunset not only saved the rest of her world but also countless others and avenged the ones already lost. After a defeat like this, the Candy Mare will have a really difficult time getting back to where she was. Even if the curse were to start again, Sunset pretty much got a huge ball rolling. Pumpkin Patch’s original body was unearthed and is now gone for good, the original story of the Candy Mare created by Lemon Drop is closed forever. If anything, any new beginning she has from now on, it’ll be much easier for ponies and humans alike who survive her onslaught to travel between dimensions to find the original bodies she started anew with- and there’s a huge chance that 90% of the people who make the attempt will be alternate versions of Luna, Celestia, Twilight, Fluttershy, Rainbow, Zecora, and Sunset, all ponies who took the fight to her.

If anything, she’s equal parts hunter and hunted now, and I’m satisfied with that.

BUT, like I said, I know there’s a twist. 😏

[lochbessie]

"You can't do this. This isn't how it's supposed to go!" there was a whining, pleading edge to the creatures words. She curled into a fetal position, and after what seemed like an eternity, the seemingly endless rain of blows finally ceased. For a moment, Candy thought it was over... Thought Sunset's rage was spent. Perhaps she had even decided to take mercy on the shambling, tattered corpse. As Candy looked up, one eye gone and the other bulging from her head, what she saw made her shiver in dread. Sunset was sticking the end of the wooden beam into the fire. Letting the wood blacken as the paint on it blistered and peeled away. Sunset had made a torch. "You're not supposed to do this. You're one of the good guys!"

XD Literally Nazi Germany after the bombing of Dresden. You brought this upon yourself Candy no mercy.

[Moosetasm]

You won… right?

[KingSombraTheTyrantRuler]

No! Candy Mare can't be dead! I'll see the next chapter.