Diary of the Dead

by AppleTank

34: Shell World

To Evens’s surprise, Cycle’s wraith was simple to control. He let his magic flow while thinking about what he wanted done, and Cycle would go do it. But it couldn’t replicate a personality. When asked questions, opinions, while the answers were close enough to what Cycle might say, they were delivered in a monotone, and stopped moving afterwards. If Evens didn’t tell it to fake breathing, it would resemble a statue.

He couldn’t help but feel as if he was puppeteering his friend’s corpse. But eventually, his scheduled visit to Sunny Pines came up, and if nothing else, this was probably what Cycle had wanted. Even his corpse said so.

The road between Appleton and Sunny Pines was still almost completely unused. But the regular treks Evens and Cycle had made had pounded the dirt flat, with Cycle’s talent drying out the earth to ensure it remained clear. Evens felt many complicated feelings when Cycle was asked to cast his signature spell and still showed the capability to do it.

A few hours along the road, Evens found time for even more concerned feelings when Cycle abruptly stopped, Evens being jerked sideways when the momentum from the cart behind them jolted sideways. When Evens untangled his limbs, he looked up to see what should have been impossible: anger.

Cycle’s eyes were locked onto something off into the forest, his teeth bared and foaming. And turning his body. In a panic, Evens pointed a finger at Cycle and shouted, “Stop!”

This only made said pony freeze for a few seconds before it continued moving, legs tensing.

Evens tried again. “Hold still.” Another few seconds. Evens groaned and palmed his face. “At least take off the harness first?” To his surprise, Cycle quickly unlatched the straps. Then started marching, trotting, running. “Oh no.”

Evens lit his horn, quickly pulling off his own straps and sprinted after Cycle’s tail. The dying leaves and bushes made it quite easy to figure out where he was going. Despite the straight path Cycle carved through the forest, Evens still had to command him to slow down multiple times to make sure he was still within sight. “I really hope he isn’t going to find some new problems,” Evens groaned after the fifth branch he ran into, still not used to running with the new limb.

To Evens’s disappointment, it was a new problem from an older time. He quickly ran through several commands through his head. “Cycle, restrain!” Said pony slightly altered his stance to tackle the silhouette to the ground. To Evens’s relief, Cycle didn’t start tearing out throats or other nonsense, though from his bared, foaming teeth, it certainly seemed he wanted to.

Evens took a few moments to shake the tiredness out of his limbs before focusing on what Cycle had taken down, and to his surprise it was something he had never seen before.

It was a mare, pony-shaped but not really. Her body was coated in a black, almost reflective shell, with iridescent blue bands around her barrel. Her wings were not flesh or skin, but glittering, insectoid ones. Most alarming of all was the crooked horn upon her head.

Evens gaped in shock as the mare turned slitted, red-rimmed eyes still wet with tears towards him. After a moment, she went back to dully staring off into the sky as Cycle snarled over her.

“… This is going to suck,” Evens finally managed.

---

Dimi packed simply. Cloak, camouflage netting, goggles, rope, gloves, lockpicks, extra bags. The trip back to the Empire’s former location was uneventful for Dimi. The heavy cloak and winter protection she carried about her obscured most of her identity, even if someone somehow recognized her face. The most interesting thing she picked up were the gossip, or rather, lack of it.

The towns she passed by weren’t that far from her destination in her opinion, yet there didn’t seem to be many that concerned about an entire city vanishing. Sombra’s decade of isolationism certainly didn’t help keep them in public consciousness, she mused. The Equestrian Crown certainly isn’t all that interested in spreading stories about the failed mission. In that, at least, we are in agreement with.

It took a week at her much more casual pace, traversing known trading routes instead of plowing through underbrush and pitch-black forests with brute force. Soon enough, she crested a snow dune and saw the grey peaks of Sombra’s towers.

She pulled out knitted netting dyed the color of storm clouds and took to the air, making a wide circuit around the former Empire. Almost nothing of the siege remained. The undead guards had been cleaned away. The stone pillars and craters from Cycle’s fight with Sombra were buried beneath layers of formless snow. No guard posts were left behind.

She altered her path slightly to glance back to look at her entry point. It had required memory to navigate, as the last hundred kilometers had become heavily overgrown, the former trading path deteriorating at a speed that couldn’t be explained with age. It seemed that Equestria was content to bury the memories of its former ally, old secrets hidden behind lock and key in forbidden vaults.

Dimi pursed her lips, and angled down for a landing.

---

Wally stood besides Quartave as Evens carefully peeled Cycle off the blank-eyed not-a-pony. “Right, so, you two can deal with this, right? I’m basically constantly distracting Cycle here from going feral.”

Quartave nodded. “Yes, go on. We will investigate this matter.”

Permission received, Evens initiated a hasty retreat, dragging the struggling Wraith behind him every step of the way.

Quartave frowned under her cloak as it fluttered in the breeze. The “mare” in front of her was certainly equine shaped, but chitin covered instead of skin and fur. It was also somewhat concerning that she was both equipped with a horn, if extremely jagged and crooked, and wings, if flimsy and see-through— alright, you all know what that's describing.

“Changeling ...?” Quartave muttered under her breath.

“You know what she is?” Wally asked, raising an eyebrow.

Quartave opened her beak, but paused, jaw working in the air. “Rumors and gossip, I didn’t believe them myself,” she finally managed. “Well, until now. Equine creatures fused with insectoid characteristics. Parasitic in nature.”

The changeling queen slowly raised her head. “You ... know what I am?”

“Something like that. What I’m curious about is why you don’t seem all that concerned about being confronted with a ... a pony trying to kill you.”

The changeling stared blankly back. “Well, you just said it. Parasite. You think I want to live like this, draining the life out of others to save my own?”

“What.” Quartave choked on her own spit. Her beak worked the air as she struggled to get her thoughts back in order. “Okay, hold up. That statement just implied that this was a recent development. Go back, all the way to the start. Tell me how this all began.”

---

The second try at reaching Sunny Pines went much smoother, once Evens was able to wrestle Cycle into turning his head around. Fortunately, the path was still so devoid of travelers that the only visitor was a curious bird that flew away when the pair drew near.

Once the construction materials were checked, and both were strapped in, they continued their journey without incident.

However, it was a different story once they reached the molding gates.

Evens winced when he noticed Cycle’s head twitch at an unseen target, eyes and ears locking onto something in the distance. The unicorn held his breath for a long moment, but unlike before, Cycle didn’t break into a murderous rage.

Evens quickly guided themselves into the porch of one of the houses before unstrapping them. “Alright, Springfield, what are you seeing?”

Cycle remained silent and started walking instead. Evens casted his eyes around the pair, and upon seeing nothing, flexed his prosthetic claw and loped behind, watching the rear.

The trek didn’t take long, as Sunny Pines wasn’t the biggest, and would never grow either. Soon, they reached one of the first houses repaired, Cycle’s old home. The old pine on the front yard was the largest for kilometers. Cycle’s tending during the Eternal Winter kept it alive when many other forests had withered, and now it was towering over the town as crystalline shards poked through its bark at irregular intervals, glittering from an inner green glow.

“You know, I probably should’ve questioned what was going on with that tree,” Evens muttered. “Not as many leaves as it should have, yet it looks fine.”

Cycle, as usual, remained silent. Instead, he advanced until he could place a hoof on the trunk of the tree. The crystals flashed a blinding white, pulling a startled squeak out of Evens. Evens groaned, his talon covering his eyes as he blinked furiously. “The heck was that?” he asked no one.

Cycle blinked. He looked down, a faint green aura coating his body. “Huh. I’m still here.”

Evens choked on his tongue.

---

“Discord again … “ Quartave whispered through clenched beak. It was quite annoying to keep running into problems caused by the spirit’s chaotic romp through the continent. The changeling mare used to be a flutterpony named Elma, until the spirit found some carcass lying about and fused them to the local flutterpony population for kicks. And she had a growing suspicion what carcass was used as a base for Elma’s concerning transformation.

At least one of Elma’s sisters had gone mad from the fusion, and had set off to prepare for “a harvest”. Elma had wandered off when she found herself unable to stop her sisters, and went looking for the most lifeless void she could find to die. Coincidentally, Cycle’s wild magic during his first “death” resulted in a wide swath of earth that would be dearth of life for centuries to come, and found herself walking towards the dead village at the same time Cycle and Evens were doing the same.

On the other hand, since she doesn’t appear to have anything to live for—

Quartave noticed Wally glaring at her from the corner of her vision. “Oh, come on,” she complained, waving an arm. “This isn’t any worse than how I recruited you.”

“That’s exactly the problem,” Wally rumbled. “You target the one’s who have nothing left to live for, and take them for yourself.”

“What, am I supposed to sing at beings that I know will reject me?”

“You can at least try letting them come to you.”

“Did you forget about our ‘pretend we’re dead’ policy?”

“That’s not going to be forever.”

Quartave rolled her eyes. “Well, y’all got real uncomfortable when I considered practicing my sword dances. As long as that policy is in place, I’m going to want more talons to hold weapons and walls that I’m forbidden from. Mighty hard to feel safe in my own home when you’re breathing down my neck.”

Wally spat. “As if you aren’t constantly doing the same.”

“Exactly!” Quartave smiled widely. “It’s a mutually beneficial arrangement. You make me question my every waking moment, I make you reconsider your life choices. The moment I start risking Honeycomb for no beneficial long-term goal is the day I’m doomed to failure anyways. So trust me in that my every action is geared towards our general survival. Besides, I’m looking out for those who would’ve died prematurely. Isn’t that what doctors do? I’m the best doctor.”

“Should I be here for this?” Elma asked. Both death-siders snapped her gaze towards the changeling queen.

Quartave shrugged. “Well, no, but its an argument that can be put off for later.” Wally rolled his eye-lights. “Now Elma, you seem to be suffering a conundrum of personal failure, and a loss of purpose. I have a proposal I’d like for you to try, one of mutual agreement! Your sisters seem like they’d be a future thorn in our sides, and with your help, we can pool our resources to … address that. What do you think?”

---

“Come on, we got to deliver the good news,” Evens cried as he ran down the old road. “Why’d you stop?”

Cycle stood at the town’s border, hoof frozen in the air. “If I take one more step,” I whispered. “I will reach the furthest distance I am allowed to exist.”

“… What?”

“I will cease to be, friend.” He turned blank eyes to Evens’s shocked ones. “It was … fortunate that I had left bits of myself here before, but now, this is the only place I can be.” He looked back at his old home. “Despite everything, it looks like I have ended up becoming Sunny Pines after all.”

Evens slowly moved closer. “So you’re stuck here? Forever?”

“As I am, yes. My soul is bound to Sunny Pines. If I leave, I will return to being a shell without a ghost.” He gave a soft pat on Evens’s shoulder. “You should go back. I’ll work on the repairs. Thank you for being here for me.”

Cycle turned around and walked back into the old town, leaving his friend behind. Tendrils of smoke curled off his flesh and grabbed the cart and forgotten planks as he passed by. More magic broke free off his bones, burrowing through the earth and cradling every house he walked past.

He reached the center, little more than a misty skeleton. “I’m sorry, Evens,” he said, looking into the sky. “I still don’t feel myself. Still hollow, empty, as if nothing is real until I say it out loud. But I have already put too much on your shoulders. I must bear this myself. I will bear it myself” Planks, nails, broken branches, dried mud, bones, and glass shards swirled around him. “It’s good to be home.”

---

“Absolutely not.” Gladas glared at the pale green mare over the counter of Option P.

“Why?” Winter Apple demanded. “I waited until I was an adult, just like you said. I took all the classes, apprenticed under both you and Cherry Blossom. I want to protect my home too. What am I missing?”

“Did you not get the message that working with the Seer is a bad idea all around?” Gladas gritted out.

“Its not as if all of you are really allied with her,” Winter said. “I can choose to spend my time working with you instead.”

“For what?” Gladas asked. “There is no honor here. You will become repulsive to everything outside our borders, forever marked an outcast, forever feared, forever forgotten. What could you possibly see of value here?”

“The same reason you joined. The same reason Cycle joined. To become strong enough to protect my home, my family. This is what I want to devote my life towards.”

“And look what happened to him—” There was a burst of light from Winter’s flank. Gladas put her talons over her face and groaned.

END OF ARC 2: The March of the Dead

Comments

[Alitaher003]

So Cycle is forever bound to Sunny Pines? Neat.

[AppleTank]

11172664
thanks, fixed
11172878
a somewhat understandable mistake since she saw basically a child covered in dark magic surrounded by other undead, but still, whups. Also EoH dying someone is not something that just happens.
11172886
Cycle can leave Sunny Pines, but he soon reverts to a barely sentient automaton.

[Orderly Disassembly]

Glad to see this outta the grave, hope to see more of it soon. :)