No Win Scenario
The bat ponies closed on the two former prisoners. One bat pony emerged, looking to be regarded as a leader… where was Moonstone? “You know what is happening, is that not true?”
“But of course,” replied Violet. “But what are you going to do? We command fire and chains in a way you cannot understand. You cannot bind us, so torture won’t work, and you probably don’t have enough time to try interviewing us or tricking us.” She grinned. “What will you do? Kill the dragon, or let them fight it out until one falls? If you fight the dragon, I imagine most of you won’t return alive. If you let them slug it out, you could lose your princess, or perhaps both of them. Choices, choices.”
“And if we let you walk away, what then?” asked the head bat pony.
“Ya can’t be serious!” I heard a shout from Apple Jack. AJ walked over to the group. She pointed a fore hoof at the red pegasus. “This here monster lit ma friend on fire, ah have never heard Pinkie scream like that. He’s lucky ah don’t kill him ma’self!” Pinkie? My eyes went wide.
I looked over at my friends. Save for AJ right now, they had all gathered in a group to my left. The foals seemed fine and Rarity stood over all of them. In their midst Pinkie lay there, unmoving. I quickly flew over. “No…” I started.
“It’s not as bad as it looks,” Rarity said, interrupting my train of thought. “The burns sent her into shock, but she’ll live. So said the field medic.”
“How…?” I started. “I… hoped I could get back before-“
“This is not your fault Rainbow. That pegasus separated Dusk from the group. Pinkie took the attack meant for him. She probably saved his life.” Rarity said.
“Oh but isn’t it her fault?” asked Violet. “She brought the dragon. And just who told her to do that?”
“General Moonstone!” I yelled.
“When he confronted Gray in the bunker?”
“Yes! He- oh shit,” I was suddenly not so confident.
“Are you sure Moonstone gave you that order?” the pegasus asked. “Do you even know when he died, fighting Gray alone in that stairwell, he so could have used you.” My jaw hung open, my mouth going dry. “Oh what’s that? Is that the confession of a… traitor?” I stood silent.
Violet giggled. “Amazing. Honestly I’m not sure how well this would have gone had Moonstone not isolated you three in such a foolish yet clever gambit. That surely was the way to ensure Gray’s death, trapping him in a small space where his powers are useless. But it only helps if your backup isn’t a moron.” Tears started coming out of my eyes. She looked at the bat pony leader. “You think there’s anything you fools can do to stop this with just information? Very well. I know bat ponies are bound to their honor. A certain Colonel Moon Shade told the dragon that Luna was going to force his daughter into service as a soldier. You see, her power was too great for the princess not to control. When the dragon inevitably shouted in anger at the Colonel, the Colonel offered to negotiate on the dragon’s behalf with the princess, appealing to her better nature. But now that the dragon has been told his children were being attacked at a military installation, what do you think he believes became of that negotiation?” She shook her head
I suddenly had an idea. “I’m a moron huh?” I asked. “A princess fighting a dragon. Even this moron knows Gray’s powers would be useless to disguise that fight, and even if he could, he can’t keep up with me. I can stop this all by myself.” I looked around and yelled, “There’s no point in everyone following me. Torkuda could easily kill you all, but I can outmaneuver him. Please, give me a chance… I’m all you’ve got. I helped save your princess before, please, give me a chance to do it again.”
Violet and the red pegasus started walking past me. “Go for it kiddo,” Violet said, continuing to grin. I shot away and after the princess and the dragon.
(***)
As one can imagine, finding the dragon was not hard. He was in the air, holding the princess and shouting at her. I wasn’t sure who made the decision to fight where they were, a large open rocky wilderness area, but I was glad I wouldn’t have to worry about saving innocent ponies from collateral damage.
“And after all this, you dare to blame a corpse for you own actions?” he demanded of her as I came within ear shot. “I saw his body with my own eyes, as did all of your ponies. If you did not mean to conscript her, why bring a child to a military installation so far away from her parent?”
“As we said, Gray is alive. He must be. We had our suspicions about Moon Shade before, but if he told you such vicious lies, then we fear what became of the real Moon Shade, for the one you spoke to was not him.”
“There have been rumors of your subjugation of the pony race. I did not believe it myself, but now you seek to oppress even me? Your lies will not avail you.”
This was not going well. Course how had it been going before I showed up? Honestly I had no idea how powerful either creature was but this was not how I wanted to find out. “Torkuda, listen to her,” I shouted. “We didn’t mean to put your daughter in danger. This was just to research her powers, not use them in war. We didn’t even know this would happen.”
“The conflict I saw was far too large to be a random attack,” the dragon replied. “That was a full scale battle. Someone had better tell me the truth. What were my children and their guardian doing there?”
“Torkuda listen to me,” I started anew. “This is a ruse to destroy the enemies of Gray. He can’t fight you two himself so he wants you to fight each other.”
“Fear this tyrant no more Rainbow Dash,” Torkuda said. “I will end her once and for all.” His grip looked to be tightening on the princess. Suddenly his hand opened and his entire body was encased in a purple aura. He was then flung at the ground below. His impact threw up dust, but apparently didn’t faze him in the least. He grabbed his necklace and opened his mouth, the three circles appearing in front of his maw again. Luna quickly dodged right as a powerful blaze shot at her. Luna just barely escaped the blast.
Luna’s horn flared and Torkuda was tossed away from her, slamming into a mountain several meters away.
I thought aloud. “I can reason with Luna… but Torkuda… how can I talk to him? If I were that angry, who would I listen to?... Twilight… a friend… When I accused him of child abuse in his cave, Vinyl was able to talk him down… where did he put Vinyl?”
A little yellow filly suddenly came into view. “DADDY!” she shouted. The dragon was in the air again and flying in front of the foal. Lightning Strike had arrived. “Daddy what are you doing? Don’t hurt Luna.” She pleaded.
“You don’t understand Lightning, leave,” Torkuda turned back to Luna. “I warn you. Hurt her and what little I am holding back will be unleashed. Let her leave.”
“Daddy what are you doing? That’s Luna.”
“We would never harm a foal.” Luna shouted back.
“You had her in the middle of a war zone.” Torkuda said.
“You are leaving us little choice dragon.” Luna’s horn glowed, Torkuda being slammed into the ground again.
“DADDY!” Lightning screamed. I flew next to her. “I have to stop this… Rebel Rainbow… how do I stop this?” Before the dust settled around the dragon another powerful red laser shot out and this time actually clipped Luna’s left wing. “LUNA!”
I grabbed the filly. “We need Vinyl, your daddy listened to her once.”
“How can you listen to someone who can’t talk?” She asked as another laser shot into the air, just missing Luna.
“She was able to talk him down in her way. You know how she talks, by writing.”
Lightning watched as her father was dragged along the ground by Luna’s telekinetic energy. She swallowed. “Daddy! Follow me Rebel Rainbow!” She flew away, me quickly following.
In seconds we shot back over the base and towards a large rock. Lightning circled around the rock and was suddenly yanked down by white energy. I followed to see Vinyl grab her in a fearful hug. “Daddy told us to stay here. Vinyl isn’t talking to me for some reason, so I flew away.” Vinyl was crying over Lightning, but for some reason, she was right, Vinyl still hadn’t taken out her notepad to talk with us.
I shook my head. I had no time. I pushed Lightning away from Vinyl, grabbed Vinyl and shot back into the air. I then tore back to the ongoing battle. This was a longshot at best, but I had to try.
I explained fast as I could, holding up Vinyl so she could see the fight. “Okay, here’s the deal. Torkuda thinks Luna conscripted his daughter. My guess is he’s trying to kill her to destroy her political power to make such a decision. You’ve been with us the whole time, I’ll yell to get his attention, you write what happened from your perspective. He pays attention to you and clearly thinks you’re on his side.” I screamed loud as I could “TORKUDA!” Both fighters stopped and looked at me. Luna was flying in the air at about the chest level of Torkuda and Torkuda was standing in a large crater deeper than all six of us element bearers combined were tall.
The massive dragon glared at me. Yea, having anyone stare at you with killer intent can be scary, but have that person be big enough to eat your whole body in one bite- I gulped. “A hostage?” He asked. “To what low will you ponies not sink?”
“Well c’mon Vinyl,” I said. She just hung her head and pointed at her saddlebags… and yes, it had taken me this long to realize. She didn’t actually have any saddle bags on her right now. That meant no writing. And since none of us knew sign language –I wasn’t even sure Vinyl herself knew it- I had just brought her all the way out here for basically no reason.
Torkuda growled deeply as I felt Vinyl’s tears drip onto my forelegs. “So what now Rainbow?” asked the dragon. “You drop her, I catch her and I kill you without any effort.” I held her tight, doubly not wanting to drop her now.
Torkuda’s right arm snapped up, the back of his fist slamming into Luna and sending her crashing into the ground, somersaulting several times and finally landing in an unconscious heap. “Your threats mean nothing Rainbow. Vinyl can escape your grasp at any time and Lightning can catch her. Though I see you are true to your element. Loyal even when your leaders are despicable.” Torkuda turned his back to me.
“Daddy… please stop…” Lighting pleaded.
I close my eyes, not wanting to see this. I loved my leaders, Luna and Celestia both. How could this be happening? “Please… I whispered, “Someone save her.”
Torkuda’s body was suddenly ripped out of the ground, turned upside down and slammed back into the ground, his neck appearing to break as he slammed down.
The dragon’s body slumped, crashing down into the ground lifelessly. My relief was short lived when I looked over at Lightning Strike. “Dad…?” she asked. “DADDY!!!”
I looked over my shoulder to see Celestia flying behind me, glaring at the dragon’s body. I wasn’t sure when she got there, probably came to check on her sister when someone informed her things at the night guard base didn’t look good. In the end, it didn’t matter. My princesses were still both still alive, and Lightning’s father was gone.
“Fuck you Gray,” I whispered to myself, watching Lightning slowly descend to the ground. I looked back to see Celestia’s glare fade. She drifted over Lightning, looking very unsure how to approach the filly.
Celestia drew closer- “DON’T. TOUCH. MY. DAUGHTER.” Celestia and I both looked up far too late as Torkuda’s massive tail swiped at Celestia. It cut through the air and- transformed into bubbles as a loud snap echoed across the landscape. The bubbles passed through Celestia harmlessly.
I had literally never been happier to realize Discord was present in my entire life. The draconequus appeared a few feet over my shoulder.
Torkuda’s tail was restored and he reared back, his mouth opened wide, leaping right at my mismatched “friend”. Another snap and the dragon was encased in a large blue bubble. “I’m not here to fight,” Discord said. “If nopony has ever bothered to notice, I don’t fight. I see no point in it. I’ve been told it’s fun, but I’ve seen hundreds of wars, trust me, that’s not how I would describe what I saw. I’m here because Celestia sent word to Twilight when she found out the night base was under attack. Seeing what she tried to do, I see that teleporting Celestia first was a mistake.”
“You won’t fight, so you’ll just help keep tyrants in power?” asked Torkuda, still floating.
“Luna and Celestia, tyrants?” Discord responded. He twisted his face a few times. “Well they did imprison me in stone for a millennium for being annoying, so I’m not sure “tyrants” isn’t an apt term. All the same, had they never done that, I never would have found the happiness I know these days, so if it’s all the same, I’d rather they not be killed.” Well… there was a perspective shift. Guess I never thought of how it felt to be on the other side of the curses of the elements.
“I will not allow my daughter to be conscripted, I don’t care how many powerful friends Celestia and Luna challenge me with.”
“Conscripted?” asked Celestia. “At Lightning’s age, that would be a war crime. I highly doubt my sister would behave in such a way even as Nightmare Moon.”
“Are you going to try to tell me this is the result of Gray’s actions as well? It was one of Luna’s own guard who told me what she was going to do. Gray is dead,” Torkuda said that last line with such assurance.
“No he’s not,” I said shakily. “He fooled us all. This was his plan all along. I think we’re extremely lucky it didn’t work.” I bit my lip. I was so done with all of this. “Discord, please just put an end to Gray’s plans. Please, kill him, for all of us.”
“I don’t kill,” he replied.
“What?” I asked. “You… you… you forced me to watch my entire town crumble just to fuck with me. What do you mean you don’t kill? Talk about drawing lines in the sand!”
“Typical of you to start shouting when don’t get your way isn’t it Dash?” he asked back.
“Get my way?” I practically screamed back. “That creep injured all of us except Fluttershy. Is that it? Is that why you don’t care? Because she’s okay?”
Discord’s eyebrows rose. “You think I don’t kill because I don’t care? What a strange concept.” He said. “If you haven’t noticed, I’m geared to having fun not fighting. If you must know I did kill a pony once. Then the ponies who knew him stopped being any fun at all. I admit at first I thought it was just an inconvenience, but then I realized what I had done… he was gone… my toys have short lives as it is, let alone that I snuffed one out… the sad looks of those who knew him, the empty house he once occupied, the tears of his children… they haunt me to this day.” The look on his face, probably the second genuine look of regret I had ever seen from him, caused me to pause.
Still, “So don’t kill innocent ponies,” I said back.
“Who do you think kept Tyrek from killing the princesses a year ago? He had them at his mercy. However I let him know if he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life as a fluffy bunny, he would just imprison them. I do not kill. Is it so hard to believe I might have principals of my own?”
I shrugged. “I can live with Gray being turned into a fluffy bunny. Go for that,” I said.
“I do not take sides in war,” Discord replied. “I’ve spent enough time on the wrong side. However, seeing as I promised Celestia, I will resolve this fight.” I heard another snap and I found myself inches away from Discord. Discord reached into my ear and suddenly pulled film out of one of my ears. That… that felt weird. “She’s the one who just said Gray was still alive, and she sounded pretty confident. Let’s see what makes her think this shall we?”
“How do I know you won’t just show me a lie?” asked Torkuda.
“Because I’m being so partial right now,” Discord said back sarcastically. He pulled the film somehow coming out of my ear again… you get used to this kind of stuff when you’re friends with the spirit of chaos. A lens appeared on my head and suddenly projected an image into the air as a strange clicking noise came out of my head.
“This is really weird,” I finally voiced.
“Oh hush, no one likes someone who talks during the show,” Discord said. He snapped his fingers again and suddenly a bucket of popcorn appeared between my forelegs.
Lightning flew next to me, looking at me with a raised eyebrow. “Um… what’s happening?” she asked.
“Um…” I looked up at Discord with my eyes, as for some reason my neck didn’t feel like moving. I waved my hoof back and forth between the two. “Lightning, Discord, Discord, Lightning Strike.”
“She new here?” he asked.
“Kinda.” I said. “Apparently I am now a movie theater projector and I think we’re going to watch my memory sooo…” I shuffled the popcorn in the filly’s direction. “Popcorn?”
“Ummm…” Lightning just paused. “Where did the popcorn come from?”
“It’s Discord, roll with it,” I said. “Only way you’ll stay sane.” I threw some popcorn into my mouth. It was actually some of the best I had ever tasted. Do projectors normally get to enjoy concessions? I wouldn’t think so… and I had to remind myself not to think about it.
I looked up at the projection. The memory of my last encounter with Gray in the bunker played. I watched closely, trying to discover who had given me the order to fly away, but as I suspected, there was just no way to be sure. I bit my tongue when I realized that was also to be the last time I saw Moonstone alive if Gray’s lackey wasn’t lying.
The projection went away and my head returned to normal when I flew out of the bunker. “So,” said the draconequus, snapping his fingers and making the bubble surrounding Torkuda disappear. “Now what will you do?”
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It was funny seeing Discord here act so...chaotic?
6963229
Cool, thanks. He's a hard character to pin down. I love Discord for stories with moral dilemmas or that focus on comedy or really anything except... action/horror. He kinda kills all the tension. So I hope you like my reason why he doesn't fight. Come to think of it, this is now my head cannon. Discord doesn't kill because he is actually repulsed by the idea and he rarely if ever seriously fights because he both doesn't enjoy war, and he doesn't see himself as a good guy anyway.
Still I must admit, I loved having him turn Rainbow Dash into a movie theater projector and then her having to explain how the heck that even works to Lightning Strike. Just how would you explain that to a new comer?
6963307 I think it's mine too...somehow
Discord what did you do with Angel bunny
8175904
There's a thought. Maybe Angel Bunny is a former super villain that ticked off Discord, explains so much!