Iconoclast

by KaleVeggies

Chapter 1

Dirt erupted from the ground as soon as she hit the ground, dirt filling her mouth and grass trying to pierce her eyes. She closed her eyes tightly, fighting back tears and forcing the lump down her throat. She grit her teeth and curled her fingers, gripping the grass and dirt in her fists. When her eyes opened, the abandoned monastery in the valley vanished and she was right back where she started. The mountains in the distance slowly vanished with each blink, giving way to the familiar dilapidated slums of the pegasus alienage. Tears fell from her eyes, no matter how hard she tried to keep them from dripping down the bridge of her nose and her cheek.

A kick to her side flipped her onto her back, making her groan and clutch her rib tightly, her light leather armor replaced with the rags given to her since birth. When she opened her eyes again, the sun almost blinded her, but she could make out the outline of him. She almost heard his taunting voice, but her hard breathing and blurry vision managed to tune out his voice. He bent down closer, but she reached beside her and felt the handle of her blade and threw her arms in the air, curving up and slicing him from the chin and swiping down, bringing the blade down on his shoulder.

Blood sprayed on her face and rags, but she didn’t care. Her violet mane dripped sweat, dirt and crimson, with anger blinding her vision. The ponies around her circled around them, but not one did a single thing about it. They all just stared and watched in horror as he begged for mercy after every strike. No matter how many times she hit him, more blood poured out on her and he just kept thrashing.

“Scootaloo!” He yelled, but his voice was far and distant like he were screaming in an empty space. She didn’t listen to him. “Scootaloo stop!”

“Die!” She yelled back above the rising voices of the crowd. With each wild swing and swipe she yelled, “Die, die, die, die, die!”

“Scootaloo!”

She was back; the trash ridden streets having vanished and the crumbling, dead monastery returned beside her. Cobblestone was replaced with grass and hay, trash with leaves and puddles with wet mud. The boy was no longer there. Rainbow Dash snatched the sword from Scootaloo in a fit of understandable anger. Scootaloo looked around, seeing the grand vista from the top of the hill. The mountains were back in their place in the distance and hills rolled before them like waves of water.

Rainbow Dash sat on a broken slab of stone and brushed her mane aside. Scootaloo approached with caution, but Rainbow threw the dull blade at her, missing by mere centimeters. The battered mare spat a string of crimson at the ground which hung by a thin liquid thread on her lower lip. Steam left her mouth with each breath and she refused to even glance at the filly. She rubbed her newly bruised cheek, beginning to unlock the straps of her armor afterwards. She put a hand on her rib and flinched. “Fuck.”

“I-I’m sorry,” Scootaloo murmured. She picked up her practice blade and hung her head in shame. She stepped closer to Rainbow, but decided against it. She didn’t know if the older mare would wind up hitting her back or beating her half to death like she had just done.

Rainbow turned, trying to restrain herself of whatever infuriated outburst that would have spewed from her mouth. She grit her teeth, Scootaloo hanging her head even lower and keeping her eyes trained on the ground. The silence between them was deafening. Rainbow tried to think of the words to say, but her mouth just hung open, red from blood. Scootaloo felt a pang of guilt just seeing the external damage done to her. If they wanted a full review, a healer would have been worth the cost. And all their gold.

“I’m sorry,” Scootaloo repeated, louder this time.

Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes and spit out another stream of blood. “You’re...sorry? That’s it?”

Scootaloo didn’t answer.

“You’re sorry? For what, almost smashing my fucking face in? Breaking all my damn ribs?I’ll give you one thing kid, you’ve got the anger, but you gotta work on when it comes to play in a fight. When I got you down on the ground, I could have killed you in a real fight. I’m lucky that’s not a real sword. Next time we train? Keep the damn anger in check.”

Scootaloo remained silent, watching as Rainbow sat and stared off into space. She was unsure of whether or not it would have been a good idea to sit next to her, so Scootaloo crept away and opened the grand door to the monastery, stepping in and taking in the sweet dusty and rotting scent of the old temple. Her makeshift leathery bed sat in the corner beside a stained glass window of one of The Old Ones. She couldn’t say who the pink alicorn goddess was, but Scootaloo prayed that she wasn’t watching over her like the ponies in Sanctuary said they were.

She grit her teeth and threw her practice blade against the wall, dust rising as the single stone she threw her blade upon shed a layer, pebbles crumbling down onto her bed. Her hands curled into fists as she threw them against wooden beams, punching wildly and kicking against the beam with all her built up fury. Scootaloo’s vision went blurry again, her cheeks feeling warm and her knuckles soaking the in all the pain like a sponge.

When she finished, she leaned on the beam and fell on her rump. The stones were cold, but she ignored it, bringing her legs to her chest and holding herself tightly and banging the back of her head against the wood in a fit of irrational anger. “Stupid, stupid, stupid! Why do you have to go around screwing everything up? First I get my parents killed and now I’m gonna lose the only pony caring for me. What else after that, huh?”

Scootaloo looked up at the pink alicorn on the glass. “If you’re so holy and divine and care for all ponies, whoever you are, why am I so damned useless?! What’s the point of watching over me if you aren’t going to help me out every now and again? If you’re so powerful, why the hell don’t you just give me my parents back? If you’re so damn powerful, why don’t you just kill me?!”

Scootaloo stood silently in under the gaze of the alicorn, waiting for some kind of answer, but like she expected, there was no answer. “Of course. What was I expecting from an alicorn? We killed all of you, so what am I talking to a dead god for?”

The door opened, Rainbow Dash coming in, staring at the ground as she moved to the darkest edge of the room, where all her equipment was. It was like she had tried to put as much distance between Scootaloo as she could when not traveling side by side. “You’re doing it again kid,”

“W-what?” Scootaloo stammered.

“Talking down to yourself again,” Rainbow rolled the bed and strapped it against the side of her bag and worked on stuffing everything else she owned inside. “Or berating or whatever the hell you wanna call it.”

“I’m just...Everything’s...” Rainbow approached Scootaloo, trying to stretch her arm enough to get it through the loop of her bag, wincing in pain. “I just have a lot of...things built up inside, too much for me to handle. I never get a proper release like you do when you...”

“When I kill somepony,” Rainbow finished. The two stared solemnly at each other. Rainbow looked up at the pink alicorn herself, the first time she had since arriving two days ago. She bit her lip and looked back at Scootaloo, tears of her own forming in her eyes, but unlike the filly she was looking at, Rainbow had done a much better job at keeping them from falling. “That doesn’t give me any release kid, and it won’t for you neither. Trust me on that one. Now get you stuff together. We got a hike to make. I’ll give you some time to..uh...calm down.”

With that, she left Scootaloo alone in the monastery. She didn’t leave a single second for Scootaloo to call for her like she wanted to, but she thought that may have been for the best. She wasn’t sure of what she’d say to Rainbow.

When she finished packing her bag, she checked inside her pant pocket, making sure her mother’s journal and father’s stopwatch was still in there. She released a long sigh when she felt them in there safe. She stepped outside to find Rainbow Dash throwing rocks at various pieces of land, a glum expression plastered on her face.

“I’m ready,” Scootaloo said.

“Good,” Rainbow replied walking back onto the trail overrun with weeds and dead leaves. “C’mon, Templars’ll be catching up with us if we don’t hurry up into Follower territory.”

Scootaloo nodded and followed the rainbow maned pony down the trail, trying to keep a decent space behind her. The walk down the path was long and silent. Their stolen boots crunching over dead leaves and the contents of their bags shifting together proved to be the only sound besides the forests creatures. Leaves rustled together and squirrels sent leaves falling off and dropping their food on the heads of the pegasi below. Dead twigs and branches littered the ground like arms and legs of the old and brittle. It reminded Scootaloo of what she thought the supposed massacre of Manehattan; limbs ripped from Followers of The Old Gods and left in the streets in full view of everyone.

Dirt began to give way to mud as rain began to pour through the forest. Their boots sank deep, requiring extra effort just for them to move forward. Both suffered from the problem of brushing their damp mane from their eyes while trying to ignore their clothes sticking to their fur. Trees became more abundant as the dou trudged through the path, still maintaining the same five foot distance between each other since leaving the monastery grounds. Scootaloo wanted the rolling hills back and the trees gone, hoping to see more of the mountains their destination was supposedly located in. Then again, if they were going to be in a town at the mountain’s base, the hope for trees to disappear seemed like a childish wish.

The trail soon gave way to cobblestone stuffed lazily into the ground followed by a marker jutting out of the ground, crooked and the words almost unreadable. Rainbow Dash approached it, looking both ways of the road before she did so.

Scootaloo felt the color and warmth of blood leave her face and her heart fall deeper in the pits of her body. “We’re on a main road,” she said.

“Not anymore it isn’t..” She took out a dirt covered parchment, yellowed with age and blotches covering it where water had fallen. Rainbow placed a hand on the hilt of her blade, but didn’t take it out. “We can take it, but there may be trouble down the road. Whatever you do, just stay back and we should get to the actual main road without a problem with only a mile left to Follower territory under the mountain. Outdated or no, the sign’s got the right directions and we’re headed the right way anyway.”

Scootaloo, reluctantly, took a step forward with the mare, following closely behind her.

---

Blood soaked the very fabric of her clothes, staining her coat with crimson. The two bodies on the ground lay with barely any life left in them. Scootaloo watched as the mare made a feeble attempt to crawl over to her, but Scootaloo’s body was as still as a statue. Her mind drew up blanks as she watched the pitiful figure try to crawl without scraping her wounds on the pebble ridden surface of the ground. Scootaloo had seen this mare before. Lived with her and loved her more than anything in the world.

“Mother...” Scootaloo managed. She moved her arms, but they were too weak for her to even lift them all the way up. She tried to crawl on her hands and knees, but her muscles refused to allow even the slightest movements. “Mother!”

The mare shifted on her side clutching the wound tightly, trying to stop the bleeding. She looked over at the other figure beside her, managing a weak cry. Her gaze turned to Scootaloo and she opened her mouth to speak, but no words left.

Scootaloo shot up, not from the ground, but in her bed. She looked about in the room, realizing she was no longer covered in blood. She wasn’t even in her wet clothes from earlier swapped out for something more civil and clean. The long sleeves were gone, replaced with shorter ones stretching only inches past her shoulders. She stared at her arms with shock and surprise, looking from her bicep to her forearm.

When did I get so...big? Scootaloo thought, turning her arms for different angles. She never thought she’d earn herself a few well toned muscles, especially at such a young age. Her hands were calloused from weeks of using her dull, practice blade with Rainbow Dash. She smiled, feeling satisfied knowing she had more muscle than most of the boys in the alienage.

The alienage, She thought. Anger replaced satisfaction in an instant, but Scootaloo released it with but a few deep breaths, although it still lingered like an infection. She thought back to the dream. Or were they memories? Scootaloo wasn’t quite sure what it was, but it was vivid. The look in her mother’s eyes. The pain and anguish. So many years of life all undone with one swift action.

Scootaloo hit the bed, not realizing she might have hit Rainbow. She turned to apologize, but the cyan pegasus was nowhere to be seen. Scootaloo’s heart skipped a beat. “Rainbow Dash?”

She hopped off the bed and on her feet. The dampness of the wood diffused through her socks and chilled her to the bone. The room was fairly small, only able to fit the double bed, a nightstand beside it and a mirror adjacent from the door. Their bags were tightly packed in front of the nightstand, crushing whatever food that wasn’t rotten inside and the glass jars full of water. A single candle stood atop the nightstand, while two were placed on the walls in front of the door opposite from each other.

Scootaloo opened the door slightly, surprised to see nopony in the inn from the small crack of vision the door allowed. The drunk keeping her awake most of the night was gone from his chair beside the fire pit, which was still burning despite nothing being cooked. It granted enough illumination for Scootaloo to make out the dark frame of Rainbow Dash, sitting by herself at the counter in the far end of the inn. Scootaloo opened the door wider, feeling it safe to come out.

A hand touched her gently on the shoulder, but Scootaloo punched it away, jumping back from the innkeeper who recoiled from the filly’s reflex. The griffon’s purple eyes flashed with brief fear, but her weak smile betrayed any signs of it. “Apologies little one,”

“No,” Scootaloo said relaxing herself. “I’m sorry about that.”

The innkeeper knelt down slightly to Scootaloo’s level. “Is everything okay?”

“I’m fine,” Scootaloo said, swallowing. She personally didn’t know how she felt. Confused seemed to have summed it up and the griffon was able to see that.

“Come young one,” She gestured for Scootaloo to the bar in a seat besides Rainbow Dash. “We should get you something to eat.”

Scootaloo silently carried herself up the high stool, looking at Rainbow. She was passed out, glass of ale half full still in her hand. Her head rested on the table mane draped sloppily over her eyes.

The griffon slid a wooden bowl of soup to Scootaloo. Carrots, broccoli seemed to be the main contents, but Scootaloo didn’t mind it at all. It felt like days since her last meal and she was much too hungry to be picky about what she wanted in her soup. The first spoonful was hot, almost making her spit out all of it. Instead, she forced most of the soup down her throat while continuing to chew on the vegetables. Her tongue burned hotter than the sun on summer days, but she tried not to make it seem apparent to the innkeeper.

“You were causing quite a racket in the bed earlier.” The griffon poured water into a cup with a tender smile. “I was going to come in to make sure you were okay.”

“Is it late?” Scootaloo asked after finishing a mouthful carrots. “Or is it early in the morning?”

“I’d wager about two hours after midnight,” she placed the cup beside the wooden bowl. “I’m surprised you hadn’t woke the other guests.”

Scootaloo looked at Rainbow Dash again, snoring lightly. “How long was she out?”

“Only recently,” The griffon took the ale from the pegasus. “She has quite the tolerance for Black Griffon Brandy. Have you two been traveling together long?”

Scootaloo grew silent for a moment. “We’ve traveled quite a bit together.”

“Where from?”

“I’d rather not say.”

“Alright then,” She poured the alcohol into a bucket and placed the glass on a counter where other used glasses sat. “Can I at least know where you are headed?”

“Someplace safe,” Scootaloo blurted out without thinking. The griffon looked with a raised eyebrow, but she remained silent. “We’re both in a mess. We needed to come to Follower territory to get away from...things.”

“The Templars,” the innkeeper finished solemnly. Scootaloo nodded. “Your friend has quite the mouth on her. She may be drunk, but I’ve heard enough of what she’s said.”

Scootaloo sat there quietly, eating her soup staring at the bowl as she ate. She was much too tired to even know what she should have thought at that moment.

“Speak no more young one,” the innkeeper said with a smile. “In the land of The Old Gods, you are safe. Tell your friend to see me before you decide to take your leave. I believe I can help you to your next destination.”

Scootaloo only nodded again, watching the griffon as she cleaned the glasses with a simple wet rag. Her vision drifted to Rainbow Dash who slumped over and hit her nose against the counter. Despite the thud against the timber, she managed to stay asleep.