Diary of the Dead

by AppleTank

30: Hidden Strength

The crumbling diplomatic event was startled out of their frustrations when they were interrupted by a flaming star arcing overhead. In the next instant, a heavy fog seeped down from rooftops, blinding all for a crucial instant.

None were able to react to the ground around the King erupting, pulling thralled soldiers away from their charge’s side.

The Dark King rose from his seat. “Equestrians,” he snarled, horn flaring and releasing a dark flame.

To his surprise, it was deflected by a glowing red barrier, followed by a pair of griffons landing in front of him. “I am not allowed to let you do that,” the male muttered.

Jumbled memories flowed deep within the King’s subconscious, relit by flames of instinctual hate, instantly sending him into a teeth-clenched rage. “Traitors!”

“Really?” the female griffon asked, an eyebrow raised beneath her yellow ringed mask. “You’re further gone than I thought.”

Ignoring them, his horn relit anew, this time with the purple tint of dark magic fueling it. “Soldiers! Slaves! Execute them!”

The griffons rolled out of the way of the blast, shooting through empty air. To the King’s frustration, there were only a handful of crystal ponies rushing out of the fog to meet the griffons in battle. The female griffon glanced over her shoulder, easily fending her assailants off with a talon full of small blades and quick blocks of her gauntlet. “Don’t worry. We’re not here to fight you. We’re just here to stall.”

The King stared. The pounding of hooves echoed through the plaza. A tiny, colt sized missile shoulder checked him through several walls into several walls.

---

An indigo flare arced over the cold, noon sky.

Dimi opened her eyes. “Showtime.”

Evens cackled in delight, the pair of them bursting through the snow as the guards turned, looking towards the Empire, and therefore completely blindsided when the pair of Lich slammed into them like wrecking balls. The tip of Dimi’s dagger sheared through the side-plate of the enthralled pony, causing it to collapse like a puppet with its strings cut. Evens simply slammed his metal tipped claws of his prosthetic talon into the helmets and tore through them with a powerful swipe.

A few takedowns passed before Dimi paused and spun in place, watching one of her downed targets. Upon reflection, she realized none of them wore any protection from the elements. The unpadded steel had probably made it worse.

She swung a dagger behind her as she pondered, then drew it out of the throat of a pony that tried to swing a spear behind her.

“Bwah!” Evens shouted in surprise, momentarily pausing his gleeful rampage. “I didn’t know we were allowed to kill them?”

“I didn’t,” Dimi said quietly, lifting the dagger for the unicorn to see. A chunk of congealed, half frozen blood slid off the blade and clanged off a chest plate. “They’ve already died of hypothermia long ago.”

Evens blinked at the enthralled soldier he was choking, at how the soldier was entirely unconcerned that she hadn’t been breathing for over a minute and was still trying to kick at his face. “Dang, that’s cruel.” He slammed her into the snow and crushed her neck, frowning at the frosty skin clinging to his talon. “This doesn’t feel fun anymore.”

“Unfortunately, we still have a job to do.” Dimi didn’t bother keeping her measure precise and punched her blade straight through the next corpse’s helmet. The pair quietly and methodically cut down the ranks, now noticing how stiffly the bodies moved. Even without their interference, Dimi figured that the guards would have probably fallen apart within a decade or two, longer if they kept stationary, simply from wind erosion. Assuming, of course, the King didn’t regularly replenish their ranks.

Hopefully, that would not come to pass.

Once they reached the entrance, Evens tore out the hinges and bucked the door down. Dimi soared over him, rolling to a stop with daggers drawn. They were met with laboratory, library, storage space. Dimi frowned at the lack of further security, carefully stalking around the walls, glancing at the scant light from slits high above. Evens followed in shortly after her and elected to scout up the spiraling staircase up the tower, and found a bare bones living quarter. Possibly, it was where the King stayed when taking break from whatever research he was conducting.

Circuits made, they mentally logged the items they encountered, then went to pull the obvious rug off the ground, revealing the trapdoor hidden underneath.

The open hatch gave both infiltrators pause. It was a smell they only really encountered around the elder Falcowolf, on the days where his rot was the worst before the experimental treatments. They spared a glance to each other, then ran down.

---

I stood on a side street, with no one around me as far as the eye could see, mind racing with the task before me. It was a bit ironic, I supposed. The two most lost of the Honeycomb Club, now destined to a deadly dance. One set out to one day keep the memories of his home alive, the other set out to conquer his memories so they would never leave his grasp ever again.

Then the Seer’s flare arced over me; the time for musing was over. I broke out into a walk, then trot, then full gallop. I bared my teeth as frost started coating my cheeks, despite the Empire’s controlled atmosphere. In fact, it was the perfect temperature for me.

“First Gate!” I hissed, and started sucking in energy from all around me, the air fogging behind me and the crystal floor frosting over with ice. My speed doubled; my gaze locked to the swirling fog that blossomed ahead of me. With a blink, I switched to Mage’s Sight; for a moment, I was distracted the golden and silver light pulling back, almost blinding in its strength. I shook it off and focused on the dark maelstrom that was Sombra.

I kept my head low as I entered the fog, my speed barely wavering as I plowed through a wall and chunk of debris. Then I jumped, and body-checked the dark pony at over 70 mph.

Seconds passed while airborne, my gaze locked onto Sombra’s shocked, wheezing face.

Then we hit the outskirts, carving a furrow through dry grass and crystalline trees. I managed to stop on my hooves; Sombra merely exploded into smoke and reformed, almost shaking apart in his rage.

“Hello,” I said, giving a small bow. “Would you mind stopping the conquering thing and giving my new family a bad name?”

Sombra squinted in suspicion. “An usurper!?”

I rolled my eyes. “Guess that’s a no. I’m going to have to stop you by force then.”

“An Interloper …” Sombra hissed, seemingly satisfied that I now slotted into an acceptable category. “Foolish mud-borne, thinking that he could challenge me?”

“You were Terrasire just like me when you came to Appleton. Are you for real?”

“That pony is dead!” Sombra screamed, magic flaring. “And for that insolence, you will die with the rest!” The purple green magic burst out, blowing chunks of lawn into the sky and setting stone aflame.

The debris rained down, Sombra glaring at the spot I stood as smoke billowed off the wreckage. With a huff, he adjusted his torn robes and stomped back towards his empire. He ran into an obstruction.

He looked down, then slowly, turned his head to my masked face as I held a hoof across his chest. “Nah.” I pushed forwards, the contact exploding into a cloud of superheated steam as I released a portion of my stored energy. A fog of black smoke spread around me, before rushing together, depositing a much more wary Sombra in front of me.

“You dare fight a god?” he asked, almost in disbelief.

“I mean, yeah?” I said, shrugging. “We already spit on nature’s design, might as well go all the way. And really, you haven’t scared me yet.”

Sombra twitched, then the deep purple tint of dark magic flowed around his head. His posture changed, his demeanor turning almost haughty. “Congratulations then, for I am the god of Fear.” The purple aura pulsed out, sending a wave of dark fog spreading out around him.

I tensed, falling into a crouch, but frowned when nothing happened. I pulsed my magic, shifting it to Mage’s Sight when—

---

Useless!

I flinched, my magic slipping out of my grasp. The fog began to solidify, forming familiar streets, homesick homes, nostalgic vistas.

And they were filled with smoke.

My eyes widened in panic, running and punching a door, only to be pushed back by a wall of flame. Windows and shutters shattered, sending pillars of fire clawing towards the storm clouds. In seconds, the forest too, was set ablaze. I stared and stared, paralyzed, watching my hope burn down around me.

”Cycle…” came a voice.

I spun, seeing a skull, Mom’s skull staring back at me from a flaming doorway.

“Why couldn’t you save me?”

The flames disappeared, and I was a colt again, cradling my mother’s cooling body. She turned to look at me, frowning in disappointment. “You couldn’t save anything at all.”

My pulse thundered, screamed, stopped.

My world became a nexus of terror.

My Soul exploded with hate.

“Second Gate.”

---

Sombra sneered as the usurper froze like everything else, his eyes glassy and unfocused. He walked up to the colt, looking down at the colt. “Your strength is considerable,” he mused. “Though not as strong as me, you would be a valuable asset if controlled properly. Now, to deal with those intruders,” he said the last words with a growling hiss.

He started walking back towards the Empire, only to pause when he realized nobody was following him. He turned around to find the colt aflame in magic, pupils in pinpricks and giving him a death glare.

“You destroyed my everything,” a distorted voice came out of the colt’s clenched teeth. “I will eat you. SECOND GATE!”

---

Quartave perched upon a crystalline branch. Her eyes were closed as she waved Monster’s Bite like a conductor’s baton, humming quietly to herself. “Infiltration team, progressing smoothly. Request experience for data. Combat team, objectives fulfilled. Equestrian group safely out of the danger zone. Assassination objective, progressing as …” There was an unexpected fuzziness washing over her Sight, spreading out in a wave around the city. It seemed as if the timeline split in two. One, the mission, as planned. The other, a ghostly afterimage, the eye of the distortion originating from the—

Quartave pulled a red flare out of her bag.

---

Sombra blinked as a wall of exploding mud exploded around him.

Then he was blown apart into smoke when my hoof kicked through the back of his head.

Sombra reformed, then almost fell over, gasping. I landed on my hooves, steam billowing off of me as the ice that armored me instantly sublimated from the heat. Frost coated a ring of churned up dirt and grass, while the ground I stood directly upon wilted and crumbled into dust.

The moment I found my balance I sprinted forwards again, grass dying with each step until I slammed into Sombra’s hasty shield. Finding no purchase, I opened my jaw and pulled. The shield wobbled, then shrank, being sucked into my mouth.

Sombra blasted me in the face, sending me flying head over hooves.

As I rolled back upright, Sombra summoned a dome shield around himself. “Submit yourself!” he demanded. “Unicorn magic will always be superior to a Terrasi’s.”

I glared back, and simply ran at him again. At the edge of his shield, I suddenly froze in place. Sombra’s magic, already charged, fired off anyways.

I buried my hooves into the dirt, and Held.

The ground exploded around me, magic forcedly channeled into the earth. I reared up and slammed some of the captured energy back through the ground, sending Sombra’s tumbling as his shield and a chunk of rock flew into the air.

I was on him in an instant, mouth open, and bit down.

Sombra howled, sending an omni-directional wave of force in reflex. When he reformed, his form was somewhat indistinct. I swallowed, and the chunk of burned flesh on my face started fading away.

He stared at me in disbelief for a long moment. He turned to half smoke and began flying hellbent for the Empire.

“No!” I roared, churning up dirt as I galloped after him.

He pointed his horn after me, explosive spells slamming into the soil, forcing me to dodge and weave.

“Two can play at that game!” I shouted, hopping into the air, then punching the ground. Green light shot through the earth, then blasted a chunk of stones in front of Sombra and stalling his momentum.

I jumped at him once more, slamming into another shield, and smashing it to pieces. I pushed him against the earthen wall, chunks of frost around my hooves in contact with his form holding him in place.

A red flare sent deep shadows around us.

“Demon’s Gate.” I kicked off him and ran sprinting for the border, flames erupting from gaps in my armor.

An instant later, a burst of Rainbow light shot into the sky behind me.

---

Quartave stood, sweating, on a snowy hill a run’s away from the edge of the Crystal Empire.

“Oh no.” She stared at the dome of Harmonic magic rising over the Empire outskirts. “What have you done?”

Author's Note:

References:

Holding Firm from Dangerous Business
Tarot cards
Slight FMA, ATLA
Maxwell's Demon