For What Darker Purpose #10
So many Shadowbolts. There were now so many Shadowbolts that Sunset Shimmer was unable to keep track of all of the new faces. Becoming a Shadowbolt meant a new lease on life, the erasure of all debts, and a scrubbing away of one’s criminal history, if one had a criminal history. Ponies and other creatures from all walks of life were choosing to walk to the darkened path and to serve the Night Court.
Overhead, the zeppelin known as Voidbringer hovered, a ship of sleek design, a new style with the long, thin, delicate looking nacelle with an integrated cabin, all of which was made of sleek, shadow infused aluminium. It blocked out the stars and it’s shiny hull gleamed silver in the moonlight. It was a unique ship in that it was powered by the dark. During the day, it was little more than a common airship, but come nighttime, it was a ship that could cross oceans in hours, or almost anywhere in Equestria for that matter. It was, perhaps, Bucky and Luna’s single greatest creation made in cooperation with one another.
Several of the Shadowbolts now roamed the swamp, having gone hunting. Whatever creatures lurked in the abysmal mire were no longer at the top of the food chain. Bigger, scarier, far more capable predators had arrived.
Sunset watched as Belisama, the shadow-touched griffoness, had a quiet moment of comfort with the one-eyed blind colt Darkwater. Darkwater was scared by all of the hubbub, noise, and strangers milling about, but he seemed to be calming down as Belisama crooned to him. The griffoness’ singing voice was a miraculous thing and it was no wonder that she was the chosen skald of Odin.
Sunset was tired, weary, she needed sleep. It had been far too long a day and now it neared midnight. She was exhausted and she had reached the absolute ends of her endurance. She eyed the airship and wondered if she could get a few hours of shuteye up there, or if she was going to have to go and return to Hibiscus’ house and get some rest there.
She didn’t want to return to Hibiscus’ house. She wanted to go home, to be away from this forsaken swamp. She wanted her familiar room at the top of the squat stone tower. She wanted cool air. She wanted to hear the voices of those she loved. She wanted to be away from this place.
She glanced over at Belisama again, and saw Bucky fawning over her. For a moment, she envied them both. Both were very busy creatures and there were times that they didn’t get a chance to see each other for a while. But they had each other now. Sunset watched as Bucky nuzzled Belisama’s neck as the griffoness continued her crooning for Darkwater.
Looking around, she saw Graham. He looked lost, confused, and a bit scared, but he was holding himself together for Zoysia. As for Zoysia himself, he stood near Brook, yawning, but even in his sleepy state the colt looked excited. Moving away meant a new life for him—for all of them.
Making a decision, Sunset Shimmer decided to spend some time in the rack aboard the Voidbringer.
“As you continue your quest… look for what does not belong. There are many secrets hidden in plain sight.” The words of Mother Malady echoed in Sunset Shimmer’s head as she awoke. She was sweating and she didn’t feel well. It hurt to breathe, her eyes were dry, irritated, and her mouth felt as though it was full of cotton.
Look for what does not belong. Lifting her head, Sunset Shimmer had a good long look at the fetish hanging from her neck, lifting it up in her magic and eyeballing it. It was strange magic, bocor magic, the magic of the zebras. She could not help but wonder if there was some sort of psychic influence imparted upon the fetish.
Blinking her eyes, Sunset Shimmer sat up in bed, rising up to her haunches, the blanket still draped over her. The sun had not risen yet, or so her magic told her. She had not slept much, but she had slept. She yawned and thought about a nice shower.
As she left the narrow bed, she wondered what did not belong in the swamp.
As the sun rose in the east, the temperature outside was one hundred and two degrees, and this was before the one hundred percent humidity was factored in. With the heat index, the temperature could only be measured as miserable.
Sunset Shimmer stood on the outskirts of Granther’s Polder, wondering what the zebra meant by things not belonging. She looked around the town and the only thing she could see that seemed out of place was the rose coloured marble of Hibiscus’ house. Sunset Shimmer’s head tilted to one side. The fancy furniture, the rose coloured marble, the remarkable waterfall and cooling system.
Was that it? Was that what the zebra had been hinting at? What sort of clue was it? And what did it have to do with the apparent curse that this wretched, forsaken town seemed to be under? With the way the zebra spoke, there did seem to be a curse of some sort. Necromancy? Something from the past? Was some sort of horrible curse from long ago festering away, poisoning everything?
It was possible.
Anything was possible.
But what did Hibiscus’ house have to do with it?
Was it what was ‘out of place?’
The mansion up on the hill had been made out of wood. Sunset looked up at the ruin. There were pegasi circling overhead and Sunset wondered what they were doing. She wondered if there had been any remains, and if so, had they been recovered?
Her eyes looked over the town and lingered upon the workhouse. It was now almost a crumbling ruin itself, having seen better days. Some of the windows were broken. It looked dilapidated. It was missing its doors and other bits of wood, all of which were no doubt scavenged and used on something else.
The entire town was made of wooden buildings. There were houses along the base of the hill, a ring of what had once been prosperity, and the outer rings were comprised of run down looking shacks, shanties, and sheds. A dyke had been built around the town to keep the swampy waters out when the region flooded.
The rose pink marble house stood out from everything else. Frowning, Sunset Shimmer decided to pay Hibiscus a visit even though it was still very early in the morning. Perhaps if Sunset was friendly and kind she could pry some answers out of Hibiscus, some old town secrets. There could be no doubt that the earth pony was at least affiliated with the town’s gentry… her family seemed far better off than Blackwater’s, whose mansion had seen better days before burning to the ground.
The unicorn maid had been more than a little grumpy when she let Sunset in, but Sunset forgave her. Standing in the entryway, Sunset watched as the maid departed in a huff, armed with a feather duster, a spray bottle, and cleaning cloth.
It seemed that Hibiscus was in the shower, so Sunset had to wait. She had herself a good look around the entryway, studied the waterfall, and marveled at the simple but effective cooling system. It was cool in here, almost cold even. The breeze was damp and felt good against her heat withered skin.
The furniture in the Blackwater mansion, from what little bit that Sunset could remember, was just as rotten as the mansion itself. The furniture here, while a little worn, still looked newish. It was remarkably well preserved. The whole house had the illusion of fantastic wealth.
Sunset Shimmer tried to put herself into the mind of an earth pony trying to improve their place in the world, with hard work and effort. She thought about trying to endear one’s self to a cold, unfeeling noble house like House Avarice, trying to gain favour, trying to get noticed, trying to make one’s self indispensable.
This family had succeeded. The furniture, the house, and the air circulation system that ran without electricity was proof of that. Sunset, in an analytical mood, shifted the shoe to the other hoof. What good reason would a cold, unfeeling noble house like House Avarice have to give all of this furniture and provide all of this seeming wealth to earth ponies?
The more Sunset thought about it, the more it didn’t make sense. The unicorns on the hill would have been far better recipients. The rose marble house would have looked a whole lot better on top of the hill. Why give earth ponies anything at all? Why would House Avarice want to do that? What was there to gain? The corners of Sunset’s mouth were tugged downwards into a scowl by her growing sense of unease.
It bothered her that to sort this out, she had to think like a bigot. She had to think of earth ponies as something less than equine. Something almost but not quite a pony. She felt a growing sense of loathing for earth ponies welling up inside of her and then she felt the warm, happy fuzzy feeling radiating from the fetish hanging from her neck.
This place was getting to her. Something here fed on hate. Something here was corrupt and rotten, almost like Canterlot had once been corrupt and rotten. Standing beside the waterfall, Sunset Shimmer looked up, eyeing the many balconies and walkways up above her. A cool breeze wafted past her as the water fell in an endless loop.
What fell, yet stayed where it was?
A waterfall.
Sunset Shimmer pondered riddles—this place was a riddle.
So much magic had been invested into this dwelling, a priceless gift of magic. The air circulation system alone was out of reach by all but the wealthiest of ponies or well practiced enchanters. Intrigued, Sunset decided to have herself a better look.
Horn glowing, Sunset cast one of Bucky’s fine tuned enchantments upon her eyes, something that would allow her to see magic. It had threads of divination magic woven into it, it was a powerful spell, and it was obnoxiously difficult to cast. It would give most type threes fits to even attempt it and it was challenging for type fours. It was a spell of mind boggling complexity—
But was worth it. Blinking, Sunset looked around. The entire entryway was thick with magic. It was everywhere. Faint glows surrounded everything. She passed through the doors into the parlour and froze in place at what she saw.
The furniture glowed with fierce light, it was almost blinding, and from each piece of furniture, from the clock, from almost every bit of finery in the room, even the rug, a thin silvery ribbon of magic extended and went to the far wall. The ribbons were moving, vibrating, almost as if they were tied to something. Fascinated, Sunset wondered what she had discovered.
Everything in the room was magically linked to something. It made sense now why the furniture was so well preserved—it had been infused with magic. Sunset wondered what everything was connected to and why.
The why might be quite interesting.
The magical ribbons bobbed as whatever they were connected to moved. Sunset watched and she heard the faint sounds of hooves on the other side of the door. The door opened, revealing Hibiscus, and Sunset could see that every single ribbon of magic in the room connected to her.
As the mare passed through the door, Sunset could see ribbons coming down out of the ceiling, more ribbons passing through other walls, hundreds, if not thousands of ribbons, all of them no doubt extending from items and were connected to the mare. Sunset looked around, feeling alarmed, wondering what strange magic was at work here.
Hibiscus was a puppet being pulled by countless strings, or so it seemed to be. Her love of her finery might be caused by magical compulsion. Sunset Shimmer blinked as Hibiscus approached.
“Good morning,” the matron mare said in a low voice. “How are you?”
“I’m fine, thank you,” Sunset replied, trying to be polite. She did her best to not reveal anything. As Hibiscus moved about the room, the ribbons remained connected. She watched as Hibiscus sat down upon a fainting couch and got comfortable.
“Perhaps it is for the best if Graham left this place. He was never happy here. I shall miss him, even though all he did was hide himself away and mope.” Hibiscus let out a haughty sniff and gestured at the sofa beside her. “Do have a seat. I presume that you came to have a chat?”
“I did.” Sunset looked at the sofa and did not want to sit down upon it. What might happen if the ribbons connected themselves to her? Was this the reason she and Bucky had been invited to stay here? The magical ribbons didn’t seem to be connected to anypony but Hibiscus, but Sunset was still wary about what other means of compulsion the house might have. It was, after all, cool, airy, and comfortable, just the sort of place a pony would want to stay inside of.
For some reason, Sunset Shimmer was reminded of a venus fly trap.
Standing there, Sunset Shimmer made a decision. It was time to cut the ribbons. Whatever magic was here, it wasn’t good. Not at all. Sunset thought that a powerful dispelling of magic should be enough to severe all the magical ties to Hibiscus. Sunset wondered what sort of compulsions Hibiscus might be under, how it might affect her behaviour, and what sort of control it had over her.
There was a brilliant flash from Sunset’s horn that illuminated the room, a powerful crackle of magical static, and Sunset Shimmer felt something tugging on her horn. Strange magic… unknown magic. She felt it pushing back, trying to resist, trying to prevent her from undoing it.
Hibiscus sat wide eyed, her stare vacant, she was now unmoving.
Summoning her will, Sunset Shimmer made a powerful mental push and felt the magic around her shatter. The ribbons all tore away, becoming glittering shimmers in the air as they disintegrated. The clock stopped. The faint soft hum of the air circulation system ceased. The house went still.
Hibiscus, sitting wide eyed on the fainting sofa, pitched over and fell down to the floor. She lay unmoving, her eyes vacant, and a puddle of drool began to form around her muzzle. She made no movement save for her own breathing.
Sunset Shimmer felt something pop inside of her ears and then it felt as though some great weight was lifted off of her. She blinked, looked at Hibiscus, and felt afraid for the prone earth pony mare. She moved to Hibiscus’ side just as the door to the parlour was opening.
“What have you done?” the maid demanded. “Do you know what you have done?”
Eyes narrowing, Sunset looked up from Hibiscus’ fallen body and looked at the maid. The maid’s expression was not one of fear, but of fury. For a moment, Sunset feared that the maid would attack her.
But the maid did not attack. Instead, the unicorn pulled something small from a pocket on her pillbox hat, popped it into her mouth, and bit down. Sunset watched in wide eyed horror as the maid began to foam at the mouth, her body convulsing, and then with a heavy thump, the maid fell over, her body thrashing upon the floor as more foam erupted from her mouth.
Sunset Shimmer stood there, slack jawed, not knowing what to do or how to respond.
With a gasp, the maid went still, her bowels and her bladder releasing. It took a moment, but Sunset Shimmer realised that the maid was dead. Sunset shook her head, not believing the strange and tragic turn the morning had taken. She looked down at Hibiscus, who was still breathing, but doing nothing else.
Not knowing what else to do, Sunset Shimmer knew that she needed Bucky.
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Well looks like Hibiscus was perserved by that magic as well...
........ The fuck was that?
6875512
That is a very good question.
Wow...
An interesting turn of events, it would seem some still cling to old ways. I wonder if it will turn out like I am thinking.
And with this is where I conclude that despite what we saw during the trial forever ago and then Bucky murdering a whole bunch when they captured him and Sunset, there are still active members of House Avarice continuing their plans.
Well, that just made thing interesting.
6875616
That's been apparent for a while now. The corrupt pharmaceutical company whose waste created the rat-o-diles was evidence of that. And from what else we've seen thus far, they probably work for the mirror travelers now. Though what they were doing with the swamp beyond another possible dumping ground escapes me. While the mind control furniture WAS probably intended as a trap for Bucky, it had already been there for ages. I wonder if the Avarice's were actively trying to separate the tribes, as it seems obvious that they were using Hibiscus to spread racism against unicorns. And that opens up the question as to whether Blackwater was the bigoted moron he seemed, or was he being manipulated too?
6875705
True, but other than that Pharmaceutical company, the last we saw of any of Avarice was those who tried making Bucky chomp Sunset. And I think likely only a couple of them at most were Avarice while the rest were just Unicorn Supremacists. I figured that might have been the last of them actively capable of doing anything after Bucky blocked off the magic of all of the ones being shipped off to the Hinterlands.
Bucky: What have you done, Minion !?
Sunset: It seems that I´ve...
*sunglasses on*
...pulled some strings...
YEAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH !!!!
I feel a need to post a song....
Who could be this one's Master of Puppets? And exactly how many puppets are there?
I just thought of a way they could easily get the answers they need from the Maid. Bring Larch to the swamp, cut open one of her legs to expose the bone, and then have him touch it.
6876584
6876591
Hey. It's a legit way to get information from a fresh corpse imo.
6876595 Yeah, sure, no childhood trauma at all..here, here, Larch...good boy...wanna a fresh bone to gnaw a little ?
6876764
...He got his cutie mark touching the bones of a filly who was raped and murdered and saw everything that happened to her. This would likely be less traumatizing than that.
6877391
It's one thing for an adult to have to go through stuff like that, making a child have to experience that over and over is a bit of a dick move. When large is older and more emotionally stable will make a great medical examiner. Until then with the poor boy enjoy his childhood.
6877437 Tsc, tsc, tsc...I pitty the poor Omniousbrony´s soul...the guy will be a long time resident on Tartarus...child abuse is a serious thing !
6877967
Mercy indeed. When we stop looking at people as people, but as numbers or resources is when we are truly damned.
But I don't think we'd have to go so far as employing magic to solve this. I think some good old fashioned detective work will suffice. A look into the maids background will probably tell that she is from the Bitters family. Most likely a few generations ago her family has been "attending" the house. The fact that the area feeds off hate, and given the fact that hate empowered Sombra, this might have been a farm set up to collect power for Sombra's ghost.
My other theory is that this isn't a trap for ponies, but a trap for deamons. Like a fly bag, the smell of suffering and death will attract evil. And the constant smorgasbord of suffering will trap them, further adding to the decay. I think it might have been possible this place originally had a good purpous. Sucks upper all the evil so Canterlot stopped killing itself. Obviously with bias and stupidity this only made a bad situation worse. Now host to incalculable number of evil things this place became more of a prison. And our unicorn maid was it's warden. With the trap turned off the warden knew before long her fate would be worse then death... she took the easy way out.
Personally I like my second theory but the first seems more likely.... well see what Kudzu has planned.
6877967
6877999
The thing is, he is likely going to be using his talent in the future as a Black Cloak. Not using it until then will make what he experiences when touching bones a lot more intense than if he got used to it while he was younger. Enough practice using it could also likely even let him pick and choose what memories he experiences when touching bones so that way he can only look for what is relevant. But such things take times to learn and master and the only way to do so is to just do it.
Pina and Dinky are training themselves in their respective talents for use in the future. So is Boadicea with her stealth. Same goes for many others. And guess what? Only way Larch can do that with his is touching bones and experiencing what they have to tell.
6879680
You see I think you're coming at it from the wrong angle, just because he's going to be using his power in the future, doesn't mean he should be exposed to this kind of hatred and suffering. As a child he can still use his power on things like small animals or pets that have long been dead.
It's like someone who has a talent for the carnal pleasures, just because the talent doesn't mean they need to be practicing it as a foal. There are just some things that emotionally and psychologically children shouldn't have to be exposed to. And even though they've been exposed to it once or twice doesn't mean they're ready to handle it on a regular basis. It's a tragedy how larch got his talent. He should be able to grow into it on his own terms.
6875616 Though i have to say it looks like there is one less lacky to deal with.
Oh my...
Seriously Kudzu, what the actual FUCK??? Just when I think I have things figured out, you keep creating these crazy new things!! @.@