Sunset Shimmer Goes to Hell

by scifipony

"Nopony Hurts My Friends!"

Nebulous pale purple and blue phosphenes swam in my vision and my head ached and my ears rang with the half-remembered wet thunk of my skull being hit. Multiple tightening muscle pulls on my neck and chest showed I'd reflexively jerked away. That Lord Tirek didn't wear horseshoes had also helped save my life.

How long?

I scrambled from under the bush and stood, wobbling. I shook my head to clear my vision, and then a second time, despite the pain, to focus and get my balance.

Lord Tirek stood beside the rock on which Twilight Sparkle now lay on her side. His claw encircled her muzzle as he pressed down. Her long red tongue lowed out. Like he had me, he'd obviously stuck the unicorn unconscious. He'd positioned her head so her horn pointed toward his gaping mouth and inhaled a thin thread of magenta energy the same color as her magical aura. As before, flashes of red circled the wan stream like pangs of pain made visible.

I leapt forward, galloping without regard to thorns nor safety, yelling. I tackled him, bouncing him against the rock with a meaty thud, breaking his hold on the unicorn.

His upper forelimbs freed, he pummeled me with fisted claws then grabbed me by the neck as I screamed and bucked ineffectively. I tried to bite, but he shoved me so hard that I tumbled toward the rim.

I wasn't imagining it. He had grown stronger.

Rocks ground together and shifted below me. Stones bounded away from under my legs to clatter into the depression as I slid toward the drop. I hooked my forelegs, shoving desperately downward into a crevice. I lost a horseshoe but anchored myself with my rear hooves dangling.

He glared, breathing noisily through his nose like an angered bull. His aurochs horns had lengthened side to side while the skin on his face had darkened. He looked less wrinkled. Younger. More muscular.

"Stay down," he growled. With his claws, he snapped his cowl so his cassock again covered his face and larger body. The magical fabric had also grown to cover him.

The way my concussed head whirled nauseatingly, and judging by the iron taste of blood coating my loosened right teeth, staying down would have been good advice. I wasn't taking it though, reaching to find purchase with my back hooves. He again grabbed the unicorn mare by the muzzle and loudly inhaled a wan thread of magic from her horn.

Before I could finally thrust myself upright, another dove to her rescue. The yellow mare, whose flying I'd described as languid and leisurely, dive-bombed him suddenly; she actually snapped her long tail across his forelimbs and muzzle like a whip before he even realized she was there. He yelled, staggering back, as she zoomed around, up, and in a long curve back, raging.

"Nopony hurts my friends!"

Lord Tirek righted himself as Fluttershy attacked again, amateurishly diving with the sun in her eyes and with her target in shadow. He jumped and swiped at her. She shrieked as she flew past, less a couple of see-sawing feathers—but made a determined barrel roll to hurdle hooves first at his face. He ducked about a pony-length. She only skimmed his flank, but like a crow harrowed by a sparrow, he looked more annoyed than hurt.

As I got my rear hooves on solid rock, Fluttershy alighted atop Twilight's rock. "Nopony hurts my friends. Nopony."

The leggy pegasus close-up looked almost my height, though she probably massed half what I did. Breathing heavily, she stood her ground, even as Lord Tirek stepped closer.

"No! Stay back!" she persisted, and when he continued, she craned her neck forward and gave him an incredibly harsh stare.

Even I could sense the power in her attack. It reminded me of what Jewel, the glitter cobra, could do with the flashing scales on her neck.

"No means no!" she said in that dangerously low tone mothers used, guaranteed to turn a foal into gibbering jelly.

Lord Tirek was no foal.

He inhaled from her also. He'd said he could only sense powerful magic. Being one of the bearers of the Elements of Harmony probably meant she was immensely powerful. It was her magic "stare" against his magic-stealing, and though he shook his head to fight her terribly disconcerting glare, I knew who'd win.

I heaved myself at him.

This time Fluttershy distracted him and I didn't yell to announce myself. I managed to spin and buck before he could fully react. He reared to avoid me, but not fast enough. My hooves plowed deeply into his muscular withers. The combined force of his dodge and my kick lifted him up onto Twilight's boulder mini-mesa.

He collided with Fluttershy. She squawked and tumbled hooves over hindquarters backward and out of sight. Before he could recover, I kicked him in the lower chest, cracking ribs. I threw him to the ground and pinned him with my weight. We deputies practiced our constable moves… occasionally. He may well have magically grown, but I still out-massed him.

Pushing with my talent, I said, "You hate ponies, don't you?" Coercion worked best if initiated with agreement. I knew he thought this for a fact.

He opened his mouth and inhaled.

A thread of amber magic swirled down from the area above my brow. It felt like he'd opened a vein. My body went cold; invasive exhaustion gnawed at my muscles and ability to think... but my magic didn't matter to me one tail shake. I'd lived as an earth pony so long, as I've said, that living the rest of my life with magic would have been little more than a cruel joke compared to failing now. I'd lived forty-five years with a special talent to convince ponies, which Starlight Glimmer had realized had nothing to do with my unicorn magic. Let him delude himself about his attack.

Just this once, I would use my talent for the right reason.

I added, "You want to leave this land you despise. You've escaped Tartarus."

Nothing. His eyes burned like tiny yellow suns.

"Isn't it time you went home?"

He halted an instant. He exhaled in a cough, then inhaled with further determination. He started kicking, trying to roll me beneath him. I leaned closer, pressing a knee into his upper diaphragm, fighting his ability to fill his lungs, slowing the magic he stole from me to a dribble. I dipped my horn toward his throat.

Not yet. It wasn't right thing to do. Yet.

Instead, I said in as friendly a tone as I could manage, "Time to go home. Home, Lord Tirek. To your home—to Midnight Castle."

I pushed.

He shuddered. The balanced boulder of his resistance toppled over.

He closed his mouth. His face looked distracted, contemplative. The tension in his body drained, but I held ready. I would not be fooled.

Then his eyes turned distant.

I stepped back. He blinked and stood. He glanced west toward the sun, not even seeing a disheveled Fluttershy who—smeared with red dust and shaking—had climbed back to crouch protectively over her friend.

Sotto voce, I said to the still thoroughly radiant pegasus, "I'm a constable," which wasn't exactly a lie. She nodded and looked relieved.

Lord Tirek looked east. I asked, "You miss the lands of Midnight Castle, don't you?" I pushed aside the opening in his cassock and touched the bristly short fur hidden in shadow below his upper chest. I'd imagined he'd be as cold as stone, but he felt no less warm nor cold than a pony would have. I felt him breathe.

His words came out as a whisper, sounding awed, "I never thought that I would return, or want to, but I was lying to myself."

"It has been too long?"

"Much too long."

"You want to go back. You want leave this unfriendly land of ponies."

"I do."

"Then leave now. Avoid all the annoying ponies so they won't get in your way. Don't stop until you get home."

"I shall do that."

"Go."

Without even a good-bye or thank-you, he picked his way through the maze of paths around the rocks. Fluttershy scooted back as he passed her, then watched him askance, grimacing as he retreated.

He never once looked back. They never did. I'd become meaningless. Cancelled out in an epiphany of self-absorption. Pretty much forgotten.

It was a gift, and a curse.

Fluttershy stroked Twilight, got her tongue back in her mouth, and put an ear to her to chest to listen to her heart. She didn't look at me, perhaps the shy part of her name taking over. Finishing her medical exam while alternately assuring herself that Lord Tirek wasn't turning back, she finally asked, "Should you not arrest that bad po— whatever he is? I mean, I don't want to be pushy, but he might hurt somepony."

I touched the yellow pegasus on her shoulder, which under the frog of my hoof felt exceptionally downy. I said, "This has been very scary for you, hasn't it?"

By the time she turned to look at me, her eyes had taken on that distant gaze. I also noted they were a paler blue, not the deep blue I'd seen before. There could be no doubt Lord Tirek had done this. Hopefully, he hadn't depleted her pegasus magic beyond her reserves. I examined her from nose to cutie mark, but she looked otherwise unharmed. What magic Lord Tirek had stolen from the ring had regenerated in half a day. She probably felt the same drained feeling I felt now as I spoke to her, but she'd recover.

It didn't take much to get her to talk about her animals and how they'd be waiting for her and how she wished she'd never gone along with Twilight Sparkle and Cerberus. The sticking point was her friend, but I delicately and slowly talked her through her concerns and let her assure herself that Twilight Sparkle wasn't so much knocked unconscious as now asleep. The unicorn had begun mumbling to herself about spikes and books and time paradoxes.

Finally, I said, "It's best to go home where your animal friends are and to forget today happened at all."

"That would be very nice."

"Go then. Count this day as a nightmare you can forget."

She nodded. "That would be wonderful. Thank you."

Thank you? Nopony had ever said that to me before.

She flapped her extraordinarily beautiful long wings, blowing dust into the air and leaving me coughing. With considerably more difficulty than before, she rose into the sky until a thermal rising from the entrance to Tartarus hurdled her airborne. She glided away into a glorious sunset like an angel.

The sky had turned purple and orange by the time Twilight shook herself awake. She rubbed her jaw and flinched when she saw me.

"I'm a constable," I said reflexively.

"What happened?" She rubbed her head. "Ow."

I could sympathize. My head still pounded and my—everything—really hurt.

I answered, "You may have fallen over." Or been throttled by a magic stealing centaur. "How are you feeling?" I asked, touching her outstretched hoof.

"Very tired. Like I haven't slept in a day and my body has transmuted to lead." She sat up, looking toward the sky. I reached to keep contact as she said, "Where's Fluttershy?"

I said, "Where's who? Flutterguy? I don't see any stallions."

"Wait? What?" As she looked at me, I saw her eyes were bloodshot. Her irises were a gray-purple, recognizably an abnormally pale shade like Fluttershy's. To be sure she wasn't hurt elsewhere, I glanced about her face, head, side, and past her gathering-of-stars cutie mark. I saw no contusions or cuts. I said, "So… You herded that big black three-headed dog and sent him down into that cave down there?" I pointed with my nose.

"I did." It was and wasn't a question, but I felt my idea taking hold. She had herded Cerberus. That was true. I reached out with my magic for the ball, but nothing happened. I grunted, feeling as drained as she probably did, and trotted over to the bush. I dribbled it like a hoofball toward Twilight. She caught the ball up in her magic, which sputtered at first, but with a frown, she brought it before her, placing it between her forelegs. She looked down at it like she hadn't really seen it before. "She hides balls all around Ponyville in case of ball emergencies." She lay back down and rested her chin on the pliant rubber sphere.

She continued. "I could have sworn Fluttershy—"

I touched her again and said, "Herding that big dog was quite a feat. He looked ferocious. You may have saved Equestria."

"From Epic Pony Wars or something. Right. I have. It's all about time. It's undoubtedly what Future-Twilight was trying to tell me before she returned."

"And now you want to go home and forget the whole thing."

"Until Tuesday, when I'll try to warn myself of some disaster. You're right about one thing, Constable. I need to go back to Ponyville and ensure everything is all right." She yawned widely and smacked her lips. "And to tell Fluttershy—" Another yawn. "—I dreamed she came with me."

I pushed harder and said, "You probably want to leave the dream part out. Forget it." Too pushy. "You want to forget it anyway, right?"

"Riiight?"

"It might scare her."

The unicorn looked past me, her gaze turning distant. She nodded. "Most things scare her, except all animals, except of course dragons, except for Spike because he's a baby dragon." She chuckled at an in-joke. "I keep telling Rainbow Dash it's bad sportsmanship to scare Fluttershy, but she doesn't listen—" She let go of the foal's rubber ball and when it rolled to her hooves, she pushed it toward me. "Keep the ball. Pinkie has hundreds."

I let go of her and put a hoof atop it. "Go home and tell everypony you returned Cerberus to Tartarus safely."

"I will," she said brightly. My string of suggestions suddenly aligned with the actions she wanted consciously and subconsciously to do. She forgot me completely, hopped down from the rock, slid on the gravel gracelessly as if on roller-skates, then trotted through the maze of rocks to appear lower down on the dried grass hill headed west. She headed towards Ponyville.

I stood, an increasingly cool wind blowing my mane. The forgotten ball rolled away, dropped, and bounced like a billiard ball down the rock-strewn hill making a lonely sound. I looked at the colors of the sunset and the red-tinged clouds hovering near the horizon. It had been a long day.

And I stood alone.

My shoulders slumped. I'd done the right thing, hadn't I? It felt like it. Would Princess Celestia be proud that her lesson had finally sunk in? Of course, considering that I wondered about it probably meant I'd really misunderstood the whole concept. Not the best of students, remember?

Of course, I could have told Fluttershy or Twilight Sparkle what had happened, but it hadn't occurred to me. I had still been in a fugitive-escaping-Tartarus mindset.

I reached up and touched my horn, or rather the ring that was still there. Lord Tirek had welched on his promise. No telling if it had become transparent again or if he had taken my magic; using my magic didn't hurt but didn't work either, so maybe taken. Really—didn't matter, did it?

The question was, what next?

I could walk south. There I'd learned I would find badlands, swamps, or jungle. A railroad linked Appleloosa with the Democratic Oryxian Republic, Equidor, and the Land of Silver.

Or I could walk east. I didn't dare contact former business partners in Baltimare or Manehatten, but I knew a few ponies who owed me favors who might visit a safe deposit box for me. I could then buy passage on a ship to the Griffon lands and from there take a caravan to Saddle Arabia or Mareitanea.

Further north, I could take the ferry to Trottingham. Lots of possibilities.

And I hadn't a clue to what I would do when I got to any of those places.

I didn't think anypony, except upper-echelon officers in the constabulary or EBI would recognize my magical accessory, especially if it were as transparent as quartz.

I was free.

Yay me.

Going to none of those places seemed worthwhile. Friends who really liked you for being you really did make a difference.

All those years thinking about what I would do when I got out... I huffed. I felt empty. Here I stood under an Equestrian sky, inhaling cool air, wind in my mane, free and unfettered—and all I felt was empty. I had not known what I would make of myself getting here, or what getting here would cost.

Running Mead was finally dead. So who was this White Stockings fellow?

He stood alone.

The goal had turned out to be meaningless. Only the journey made it worthwhile. And it was over. I started laughing.

Princess Luna raised the moon in distant Canterlot. I watched the white orb rise above the cloudy horizon until it slowed a quarter of the way into the sky. That blue-gray mare was one troubled pony. She'd been sent to the moon for her crimes. For her, even Tartarus hadn't been secure enough. Instead, she'd suffered a thousand year imprisonment, a curse that I suspected had been shared by both princesses. Yet…

Yet, thanks to the strength of the petite little purple unicorn I'd saved today, even that nightmare terror—who had frightened Princess Celestia into searching for crown princesses who might succeed where she failed—had found redemption.

I remembered something that hung around my neck. My heart sped faster as I took the fully silver amulet off and placed it with a click atop Twilight's boulder. It twinkled in the moonlight as I rubbed it with frog of my hoof. Body heat had warmed it.

I had a choice.

I chose a little white lie. By putting the incarceration amulet upon the rock instead of around my neck, it wouldn't follow me. The same way it hadn't followed me when Ice Arrow had used it to spirit us away.

I'd been careful not to be seen by anypony. Except Lord Tirek. Except Sunset. The former had gone to Midnight Castle, the latter back in time. Neither of the Element Bearers would likely remember me. If they did, I'd be a random constable. As I would be to Sunset, the way I'd played my part.

I did have a choice.

I made it. I touched the amulet and said, "Incarceratite one pony."

Remembering the dark frosty vacuum during my last teleport, I inhaled deeply first.

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[scifipony]

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Well, that's a big oops. I did not see the link on my phone. Nope. Not based on that, but I did add it to read later, so thanks. If you read at the long description for this novel, you'll see it is rooted in two other previous stories of mine, a novel and a novella. The concept for the visit to Tartarus is based on some MLP episodes to provide some backstory. In "Nopony Hurts My Friends!" one character names the episode in passing.