Quantum Vault

by WishyWish

Prologue 3 - A Hoof for a Hoof

DATE UNKNOWN

LOCATION UNKNOWN

Light.

In every direction, on every plane, there was light. Blinding. Gleaming. Infinite. The cardinal directions had no meaning, and up had no more distinction from down as left had to right. Every horizon was the same, and every path led to nothing.

In the center of nothing, a small, mint-coated mare was regaining consciousness.

Quantum Trots clamored up on shaky hooves that weren’t quite awake enough to keep her steady. Nearly falling twice, she caught herself and let out a series of raspy, throaty coughs. She couldn’t feel her glasses resting on the bridge of her muzzle - squinting her eyelids down to mere slivers against the light, she looked around for the blasted hulk the Accelerator had almost certainly been reduced to. When she found nothing, she expanded her horizons to the workshop, the school, the campus, and eventually all of Canterlot.

It was all gone. Every last spire, vista, and hanging palisade.

“Hello…?” Quantum called, perking up her ear in hopes of a response. Not only was there no reply, but her voice didn’t echo as it passed across the apparitional landscape. The sound was simply swallowed whole by the void.

Quantum cantered in every direction and even tried galloping a few times, but it made no difference. There was nothing to get closer to, nor farther away from. The minty mare pawed at the ground. Inspecting it, she found that whatever was below her was no different than what was above. She could just as easily be standing on a ceiling as a floor.

“What is this?” She mused aloud. “Am I dead?” She pictured the unstable, untested machine she threw herself into exploding along with the rest of the room, and shuddered at the idea that the blue flames had consumed her. The gruesome thought prompted her to check her flanks, tail, and under her hooves for singes. She found no damage. When she looked up again, she found she was no longer alone.

A figure stood where before there had been nothing. Wrapped from crown to pastern in robes so white they were nearly indistinguishable from the light, a tall, broad being waited patiently before her.

“Hello?” She repeated with no small sense of alarm.

Nothing.

The being stood so still it could just as well have been a statue. It had hooves like a pony peeking out from under its robes, but even as Quantum stared at them, she realized she couldn’t make out a color. Not even white. She blinked several times to dismiss possible plays of the light, but the implausible situation persisted. Beyond the robed pony’s hood was nothing more than a pitch black void – stark contrast to everything else in this place. Quantum swallowed when she laid eyes on the fathomless depths that revealed neither muzzle nor snout.

“Are you…death?” she ventured. “Is that it? Am I dead?”

Your blood pumps still

The voice, neither stallion nor mare, seemed to emanate from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. It was in her head and all around her; filling the gaps left between the horizon and infinity like caulk. There was no reason to assume it had come from the being, save for the fact that the being was the only possibly living thing, or thing of any kind, that could have produced it.

“…can you tell me where I am? What happened to the workshop? What happened to the city?”

The moment approaches

“What?” Quantum blinked and took a step away from the being, whose robes had begun to bluster despite the absence of wind. “What moment? What’s happening?”

Quantum’s ears swiveled. On the horizon, there was a sound. It began as distant thunder, but rolled in so quickly and so powerfully that she had no choice but to bend her neck and cover her ears with her hooves. When she saw the ground (or maybe it was the sky) warp and rise up before her, crashing in like a tsunami, she shut her eyes and screamed for her life.

When she opened her eyes, things were different.

The landscape was back to normal, but there was a cacophony of chattering voices. They whispered, cavorted, shouted and caterwauled, but Quantum found she couldn’t make out a single word. Behind the white clad pony now stood dozens of black silhouettes – outlines of other ponies without substance or form. They moved wildly, raising their limbs and pointing at her, but it was more like seeing solid shadows standing up on their own. The white ‘pony’ cocked its head, and the crowd fell silent.

“…who are they?” Quantum asked fearfully. She was no expert on the afterlife, but there couldn’t be anything good about these new beings. Where their eyes should have been, there were only holes going right through them; every point of light emanating from beyond their sockets was focused directly on her.

The many come

“Many..?” Quantum echoed. “What…what do they want?”

An ear for an ear

A hoof for a hoof

Quantum felt a chill. Each black shadow resembled a pony – stallions and mares, colts and fillies…even foals. A thought struck her. An abominable, terrifying…and perfectly logical thought.

“The ponies…I hurt.” She theorized meekly.

A cost must be paid

Quantum felt her heart slide into her stomach. She took another step away, but found that there was nowhere to go. She and the white being were surrounded on all sides by the jeering, accusing masses. Quantum lowered herself to her knees and shut her eyes, willing this bad dream to just go away.

“D-don’t hurt me…” she pleaded. “I’m sorry…I’m so sorry. Please…”

But none of the shadows drew close enough to rend the minty mare to pieces. Instead, the voice spoke.

The choice is made. You have been judged and sentenced.

The white pony lifted its colorless foreleg. Quantum heard a chinking noise, and watched as the dampening sheath on her horn, that shouldn’t have been removable except by the strongest of magicks, floated away and disintegrated to nothing on the nonexistent breeze.

Quantum Trots Lulamoon. You will pay for every life destroyed by rebuilding another. That is the behest of this tribunal of your peers. Succeed, and you will be redeemed. Fail, and you will never know the peace of death.

Before Quantum could ask what the cryptic announcement meant, a single shadow moved into the circle. It was nothing more than a silhouette like all the others, but Quantum thought she could make out a straw hat on the being’s head, and the outline of a cottontail reed dangling from where its mouth should be.

Violently, the black shadow pony reared up and emitted a whinny so piercing it should have obliterated Quantum’s eardrums instantly.

And that was all she heard.

Comments

[Frission]

This is good! I shall await more!

[Arcanix_Firemane]

*favorites with the full atention of a thousand obsessive lurkers*

[Mooncalf]

This is starting out very interestingly. I have high hopes here. Well-written, as well.

[Xaxu-Slyph]

Oooh, for a moment there I thought you might have been going for something out of Stephen King's Langoliers. (By which the protagonist of the story arrive in a moment that hasn't happened yet and have to wait for that moment to be 'born'.) This is going good so far as I'm a fan of Time-Travel stories!

[DerpTape]

I have always preferred the concept of restitution over retribution.

Anyone else remember a crappy network afternoon show about a executive who let people get killed by faulty tires having to team up with the ghost of a pirate to save as many live as they had caused to die? No? Well I'm not surprised, but the idea was cool.