Cadance: The Love Arsenal

by IndiBrony

Love Letters

Celestia is unconscious inside her cage. "Celestia?" Cadance calls out, "It's me, Cadance. Are you alright?"

The Princess of the Sun was completely unresponsive. Cadance's shouts become louder and louder as she attempts to awaken Celestia, but her efforts are entirely in vain.

Giving up, Cadance speaks into her scouter, "I'm sorry, guys. I had the whole day planned out for us, but it seems Love Less has other ideas. I need to figure a way out of this." The Princess lays down, pondering a way out. She pulls out a piece of paper, an envelope, a bottle of perfume and a quill and begins writing. "Talking it out might not work with Love Less, but it's a well-known fact there is much more power behind the written word."

It takes her just a few moments to write her secret note. Cadance levitates the envelope, sprays the paper with the perfume, slips the paper inside the envelope and seals it before hiding it away. Celestia finally begins to come around. Cadance notices and leaps up, "Princess!"

Celestia is disorientated, taking a moment to get her bearings right and mustering up enough of basic functions to formulate a response. "Cadance?"

"Yes, it's me. Are you alright?"

"I think so. Where are we?"

"We're in some kind of dungeon, I think."

"How did you get here?"

"Twilight sent me out to the Griffon Kingdom in her place. She ran into a few... 'scheduling problems' and asked me to go."

"I was on my way there, too, but the chariot was ambushed by Love Less and his potions. He disabled my magic and sealed me inside this cage. My guards were also captured, though I'm not sure where they are."

Cadance attempts to brew up a magic spell. Her horn glows, she lowers her head and fires a beam of intense magic directly at the bars. The cage merely absorbs the blast. "My magic is useless!"

"Sadly, yes. I've tried myself to escape, but the cage is impervious to magic and the bars are simply too strong to break with brute force."

"So how do we get out?"

The two princesses are startled by the reappearance of Love Loss, "You don't!"

"Love Less!" Cadance cries, "Let us out!"

"No."

"Yes!"

"No!"

"Please?"

"I said no!"

"With a crystal cherry on top?"

Love Less stops himself, opting to avoid allowing himself to be wound up by the Princess, "You may find yourself quite amusing, Miss Cadenza, but I will not have you make a mockery of me!" Love Less reveals a small bottle, "See this? This is my latest creation-"

"Really? I'm not sure, I mean bottles have been around for quite a while"

Cadance's tomfoolery makes Love Less flare his nostrils in agitation, "-it is a poison which corrupts the magic of the consumer. The negative energy manifests inside its host until it is strong enough to take over. It then transfers itself via aura radiation (see notes) to other ponies. Unfortunately, it also has a few side effects including, but limited to: nausea, vomiting, spontaneous magical discharge, blurred vision, headaches, joint and muscle pain, heart palpitations, shortness of breath, dizziness, slurred speech, numbness of the horn, hallucinations, paranoia, partial or complete paralysis and even death!"

"Yeah that's sweet and all, Love Less, but can it regrow a pony's hind legs?" Cadance taunts.

"And with that remark, my dear, you have just volunteered yourself for a sample!" he cackles, rolling his way towards the cage. Cadance figures this is the best time to utilise the power of the written word, revealing her letter and handing it over to Love Less. "What is this?"

"Well you said your poison can cause a severe case of death; I wrote a letter for you and I wanted to make sure you got it before you killed me."

"My dear, our relationship is far beyond the point of reconcile via childish 'love letters'. Now prepare to have your life stripped from you in the most agonising fashion imaginable!"

The mad earth pony takes the remote for his contraption and slams his hoof down on it. The cage springs into life, stretching and contorting to create a gap large enough for Cadance to simply trot through. "Thank you. That's much nicer than being in the cage. See, even you can show some love, even if it is considerably less than others."

"Jest all you like, Princess, but we will see who has the final laugh soon enough!"

"You're just so full of little clichés, aren't you? The crazy scientist vibe, the cackling, the one-liners, it's like you've come straight out of an old movie."

"Well then, I guess it is in this scene, Mi Amore, where I exact my revenge on you, and your story comes to a sad, tragic end!" Love Less takes the letter from Cadance and offers her the poison in return.

"Well, technically, if this were a movie, this would actually be the scene where I kick your sorry ass after you attempt to make me-"

"Drink the poison!" Love Less interrupts.

"Yeah, that one." Cadance pulls her head back as Love Less pushes the bottle to her face. "Wait! Aren't you supposed to give me some kind of last request or something?"

"I'm not honour-bound by any such nonsense."

"I just want you to read my letter."

"Absolutely not!"

"Please, Love Less?" the princess flutters her eyelashes at the crazy stallion. He begins to back down slowly.

"Fine." he holds out letter, opens it, and begins reading. Within seconds, Love Less drops the letter, his face awkwardly slumps down onto the floor and falls asleep.

"That should buy us some time." Cadance quickly gets to work on removing the wheels from his chair and taking away the controls to his magic cages. She places him in the corner as she ponders what to do next. She stares at the controls for the cage, but is baffled when she discovers there is only a single button. The Princess approaches Celestia's cage, "I'm sorry, I don't know what to do; there's only one button. There must be some special way of using it."

"Perhaps it's magically powered."

"But Love Less is an Earth pony, not a unicorn."

"Yes, but he's a very smart stallion. We've seen that it works; I guess we'll have to wait until he wakes up to find out how..."

Author's Note:

'Aura Radiation':-

A pony's natural magical power emits a constant aura not visible by the naked eye. Auras are applicable to all races (earth, pegasus, unicorn).

Ponies traditionally struggle with facial recognition (exceptions include family and close friends), making Aura Radiation one of the primary ways for ponies to identify each other (alongside Cutie Mark identification and scent).

Each aura is unique - like a fingerprint - and undergoes changes depending on a pony's health (physical and mental), mood, and other factors. Changes in aura do not affect a pony's ability to be able to identify them, and is as obvious as a physical injury; noticeable enough that they understand something is wrong or has changed, but not so much as to make them unidentifiable.

Aura Radiation also has the ability to affect other ponies in such a way that if one pony feels exceptionally happy, their mood will literally radiate to others, and likewise any negative effects, such as sadness and even illnesses such as Magic Flu.

Comments

[Sigmacipher]

And I'm guessing Unicorns use Aura in their spells...OH WOW!!! PONIES USE NEN!!!

[IndiBrony]

6854869 You're pretty much spot on with that. Levitation and other spells are just more intricate manipulations of the 'nen'-like power. It's all about energy potential.

[michaelb958]

Magic Flu. Dear Cadance that sounds worrying. See this bio-secure wall? Not safe. (CDC: "")

[Sigmacipher]

6855036 Heh...I've been working on an advance theory on how pony magic is actually manipulation of the various energies found within the earth, sky, mind, ect. I'll probably end up using it in a somewhat understandable HiE story format to put things into perspective.