The End: Darkness
Holding the partially disintegrated equine body by the barrel, Cromach returned back into real world through a rift which Mistake closed behind him. Then and only then, the unicorn stopped glowing, and within seconds, the blue shimmer all over the horizon disappeared, plunging the world into almost complete darkness. There were no stars in the sky, no sun, nothing. The only sources of light came from the ground - the pink, shimmering dome of the Crystal Empire in the distance, glowing horns of unicorns milling around, and overarching glows of alicorn princesses trying to instill some sense into the situation.
Celestia was lying on the ground, surrounded by unicorn medics and Magnus, screaming her throat hoarse from the feeling akin to her insides and brain being scrambled and ripped out. Luna was just standing there, gasping for breath and staring into nowhere.
“Yep, having the sun and moon disappear on you will do that. You should have seen me when I had to spend few weeks without a horn,” said Magnus, “It’ll pass, and it will have to pass, because we’re currently without a sun and from what I can see the rest of the universe too. We might temporarily avoid freezing to death, but food’s going to be a problem as well as whatever crazy stuff is about to happen due to the reality being eaten. It’s probably a good thing about all those dead in Zebrica, eh?” he finished the thought with his usual tact, “Speaking of which, weren’t those guys big on solar energy too?”
Celestia froze. It wasn’t because of what Magnus said, though. With a final roar of defiance, she rolled over and pushed herself on all fours, blood pouring from her mouth from the constant screaming as well as biting the inside of her mouth. The feeling of void opening again cut through her agony, and woke her up in an instant.
Her eyes locked at the center of the crater where the altar used to be, and where a white griffon was cradling a body in his forelegs. Celestia pointed, and croaked something unrecognizable. A short flash of her horn followed, and the blood disappeared.
“We need to stop that,” she said, “Now!”
Four alicorns and one ex-alicorn disappeared in a flash of golden light, and reappeared around Cromach who gave them a terrified glance, stood up on his hind legs while holding Flow’s body with its disintegrated surface in one-legged embrace against his own barrel and pointing at the alicorns in front of him with the other one.
“No,” Cromach breathed out, “You’re not fucking up everything again!”
Celestia screamed, pure wordless rage at the end of life on scale unseen before, scale which made even Void an irrelevant blip on the radar. Cromach was exhausted. A trip into the void for few seconds was a thing he could barely handle in his state, and the sight of Celestia’s horn glowing so bright it burned his eyes wasn’t giving him much hope. There was only one thing he could do. He lowered Flow on the cold ground, and stepped in front of him.
“You think this is going to stop me, Cromach?” hissed Celestia, “Do you even understand what… what that monster did? Can your tiny bird brain comprehend the scale of creation he destroyed? I don’t know who that monster is, why all this happened, and I don’t care anymore. However this started, it ends here. He- no… it dies, or both of you die.”
Cromach didn’t move. The ultimatum wasn’t even a choice for him anymore. He knew Celestia must have been weakened drastically by keeping the Herald at bay, but so was he after the brief trip into the void, and Celestia wasn’t alone. No, she had never been alone while he and Blaze had. Alone against villains, against gods, and most of all - against guys like Celestia whom Blaze wanted to save. At that moment, Cromach understood completely why Blaze had retreated into his pocket dimension. He knew that no matter if he succeeded or failed, he would be the enemy of, well, everyone.
“For an alicorn who lived thousands of my lifetimes, you sure still understand nothing!” he hissed back at her.
She reared on her legs with a furious roar, and a thin beam of light so intense it could likely cut through the entire planet shot out of her horn and straight at Cromach who snapped his talons.
Well, here we are. my love. Finally together. Would have been nice if I got to tap that semi-Corrupted ass of yours one last time, but even this is better than being separated again.
The scorching beam got stopped before it could hit by a magical barrier.
A purple magical barrier.
Celestia’s ray of burning death was being harmlessly absorbed with a rather nice effect of orange corona spreading around by Twilight, carefully approaching the heated situation. By the look of it, Celestia was even more surprised than Cromach.
“Twilight?” she asked with incredulity.
“I don’t know why any of this is happening, but I won’t let you execute anyone,” said Twilight in a serious tone, “The rift into the void closed on its own, our planet was temporarily relocated out of the way. I need to know more before I pass something like the ultimate judgement.”
“TWILIGHT!” Celestia’s loud scream made the alicorn of Magic frown, “It DOESN’T matter! You couldn’t feel it, you’re not connected to life like I am. He- IT ended all life in the universe, all existence other than this planet. It needs to die-”
Twilight cleared her throat.
“Considering our lack of any knowledge of the situation, I can’t evaluate the situation properly. However, I’m sure that with the blackfire wings and Cromach here being involved, Flow is Blazing Light in some form. And I’m not about to kill anypony for whom death seems to be just a vacation.”
“IT MUST DIE!” Celestia screeched like a madpony.
“I hate to agree with my sister in a situation like this-” Luna joined in.
“SILENCE!” Twilight’s voice boomed, making both princesses stumble backwards, “As the supreme ruler of Equestria, and clearly the only level-headed pony here right now, this is my sentence! Flow will be imprisoned in the Silent Circle of Tartarus forever. It held Void long enough, and this time we know how he got out, so we can cover that weakness.”
Chill ran down Cromach’s whole body as a wave of nausea hit him.
“You… you’re not splitting us up again… no… I refuse...” he breathed out, and purple dome pushed him away as he tried to grab Flow’s body again. Only the three princesses and Flow were left inside.
With a flick of Twilight’s horn, a twisting portal appeared next to her. With the next spell, Flow groaned when something akin to a black orb formed floating above him, connected to him with ethereal chains. Cromach knew what it was, he knew Void’s story well. It had taken Scream eons to figure out how to get Void out of Tartarus, and Twilight knew how now, so it would be impossible to do again.
They were separating them again.
“YOU CAN’T DO THAT! KILL US BOTH, IMPRISON US BOTH, BUT I WANT TO BE WITH HIM, I NEED TO BE WITH HIM!” he yelled.
Twilight turned her head to him, and shook it with a sad sigh.
“That wouldn’t be much of a sentence now, would it?”
At that point, Cromach fully realized it. It was punishment for both of them. They were both immortal, they were both what each other needed the most, and now they would never be together.
“I’LL KILL YOU! I’LL KILL ALL OF YOU! I’LL DESTROY EVERYTHING YOU LOVE AND CARE FOR, AND I WILL BREAK HIM OUT NO MATTER WHAT! YOU WILL NEVER BE SAFE FROM ME, YOU WILL NEVER HIDE, AND I WILL-”
The dark portal to Tartarus shifted, shadowy talons extended out of it, grabbed Flow’s limp body, and pulled him inside.
The portal closed, and with it ended Cromach’s litany and threats, leaving him open-beaked and crying.
As Twilight made the protective dome disappear, the griffon looked up with an expression of frothing fury. The princess was expecting another scream, but nothing like that happened.
“He destroyed the gods for you, he saved you from eternity of being their puppets,” Cromach hissed, “And in the end you, the worthless, ungrateful trash he wanted to protect, did this to him. He ended Nightmare’s threat alone, he won, and for that you condemned him. He destroyed a god,” with a sudden wide smile, Cromach turned away from the alicorns, “But if you want Nightmare alive so much, then I will become the worst one you’ll ever see, and I will make you release him even if I have to pick all the locks of Tartarus with your broken off horns.”
One snap of his talons later, he was gone.
***
It was over.
Several days later, Hex Guard forces marched on the Silver Sun property in Manehattan, finding no one in charge. Recruits were doing their exercises, at least until they saw the heavily armed procession led by princess Twilight herself, upon which a terrified unicorn secretary listened to their business, and let them in.
Bucket was gone, Heavy Hoof was gone, Shadowstep’s changelings were gone, hidden vaults were bereft of anything valuable. Further questioning of recruits, however, revealed that several bodies of Bucket along with queen Shadowstep’s group of changelings had left last night in a strange black airship which had disappeared shortly after taking off. Questions about Cromach left the interrogated ponies puzzled.
“Who?” they newer ones said. The older members only repeated that Cromach had disappeared after the destruction of the old mansion.
Much further south, in the city of Pine Hills, Desert Shade and her companions were packing in a hurry, and there was a lot to pack.
“You know, since you’ve managed to keep everything you did secret from a god, why do you think the princesses will know you were the main actor in all this?” asked Lyam, currently wearing four backpacks with unique blueprints and technology that, if sold, could likely buy him a rather large kingdom. It wasn’t even a tenth of what he and Des had managed to track down or dig up over the years.
“I’m not risking anything,” replied Des, “They might not know now, but they will keep looking. Besides, I heard Zebrica looked lovely at this time of the year. After Mistake’s massacre, there will be new warlords, there will be wars for territory, and now we know the location of one Silversmith cache as well. This is just another huge chance to do some good in this world… for profit, of course.”
“Wouldn’t have it any other way,” Lyam nodded to the others, “Alright, this safe house is done. Let’s go clear out the next.”
Not too far underground from them, Guiding Light and Crimson Heart were sitting at the circular table in the throne room of the dreamling hive.
“I don’t want you coming with us,” said Guiding, “You weren’t involved in this at all. There’s nothing the royals can-”
“Guiding,” the unicorn interrupted her, “I’ve been with the Silver Sun for almost twenty years now. I got a message that the princesses are searching for any senior members now that Bucket and Cross disappeared off to who knows where. As soon as I put a single hoof on the streets of Canterlot or Manehattan, I’ll be politely asked to join the princesses in the dungeons. Well, considering my connections to you, they might not even bother being polite now that I think about it. I’ve already sent a letter to my wife explaining everything, and that everything I had is only hers.”
Guiding Light sighed.
“The destruction of one world under Nightmare brought us here, and it seems that having saved this one from her is forcing us to escape one more time.”
“Do you have somewhere in mind?”
“No, but we’ll find a new home, I’m sure of it.”
***
The situation in the north was different, as the delegation of unicorns from the Crystal Empire had just discovered.
They were standing in front of the enormous stone and metal gate of Rift, talking to warlord Sinew himself.
“Considering your involvement, I think that a permanent station for several unicorns within your your city’s high-ranked positions is a reasonable request.”
“Indeed it is,” Sinew smirked, “and I still disagree. You will leave this place and you will not return, unicorn. If you or your princesses do, they will find Rift ready to fight for the Dark Prophet to the last youngling,” he turned his back on them, walking back towards the gate cracked open, “Minotaur always repay their debts, and our debt to the Prophet is eternal.”
With the fuming unicorn diplomats left standing outside, the gate closed behind Sinew with a resounding boom.
And just like in Pine Hills, part of the events was happening underground.
Three was sitting on boss’ back, looking into the crowded tunnel behind them.
“They all look like they need a hug,” he said, taking in the seemingly infinite line of dwarves with filled backpacks.
“Don’t worry, Three,” the old dwarf wearing a tool belt filled with electronic devices standing next to the boss replied. His name was Hard Reset, and he had taken over the leadership of the dwarven council after Granite’s death of old age, “I know our history, and under boss here we’ve managed to recover and restore the knowledge of our ancestors like never before. This is far from the first dwarven migration, and we are leaving without being chased, which is a huge plus,” he chuckled, “They’re just shaken from having to leave their homes, but they understand why.”
“I hate this...” sighed boss.
Gem, standing next to him, nuzzled his neck.
“You know when to fight and when to bend, dad. I saw how it ended, and now I believe that Flow could have ended the dwarves as well as us in one swoop. I almost messed everything up.”
“You saved everyone, Gem,” said One, “But don’t make a habit of disobeying your dad or I’ll have to spank you.”
“I know ponies who would pay good money to see that,” Gem wiggled her eyebrow at One, “Now, are you sure you don’t need me coming with you all the way, wherever you’re going?”
“Honey,” said the boss, “I don’t want to force you to stay down here, I know how you love the surface, and the only way for you to stay that safely is to not know where we went. No one but the dwarves have any idea where the ancient sites of Silversmith cities from the lost archives are,” he kissed Gem’s forehead, “Don’t worry. When we’ve found a new home, we’ll find you as well.”
“And Brauheim?” asked Gem.
“Six and my engineers stripped every piece of technology that was possible to disassemble and move,” said Hard Reset, “The city is only a set of caverns and tunnels now. After we’ve all moved far enough, we’ll set off the self-destruction process, and there won’t be anything left.”
“Do you have enough food, water, medicine-?” Gem couldn’t stop herself from worrying. A mass migration of hundreds of thousands dwarves was sure to have dire consequences for some.
“I’m glad you look out for us, miss Gem,” Hard Reset patted Gem’s foreleg. As a dwarf, he was too small to reach further up, ”but we’re ready. The king has been preparing us for this possibility ever since we got involved with this Flow individual, and we took his concerns seriously. We have energy sources, we can grow food on mobile carts if we occasionally dig out some fresh soil, we have sources of energy that have lasted since the times of our ancestors. We have water filters, we have everything. Now that the sun is gone, our worst enemy will be cold, but if we have to, we can move down to the magma tunnels. That, and fresh air, since there will be too many of us in tunnels without proper ventilation. However, we have a plan for that as well.”
“Which is?” Gem raised an eyebrow.
Hard Reset glaned at the boss who nodded.
“As the king said, we deciphered and restored much of the lost archives, including the potential locations of ancient cities. We don’t know if the ancestors destroyed those while they were pushing the Twisted to their final tomb, but there were no indications that was the case. They just either died or were transferred into machines. We want to settle more of these sites with groups of dwarves, possibly rebuild them if necessary. The dwarf civilization will rise again...” he paused, “A figure of speech, of course. We want to stay underground, and we’re still small.”
“Only where it doesn’t count,” said Three with a proud smile.
“Indeed,” Hard Reset nodded.
Gem sighed. Considering the current state of the empty universe, the dwarven migration was probably one of the smallest problems out there.
***
I slump down on the bed. I’m so tired.
The black orb standing on a pedestal in the corner of the grey room is humming quietly. I don’t know how it works, but I know what it does. In here, I’m powerless, I’m just a pony with horn and two rather neat-looking wings, if I say so myself.
But I’m finally done.
I close my eyes, and see Void on the inside of my eyelids.
“You did what I could not, young one,” he says, “Both in regards to attaining the freedom I fought for, and in the kind of destruction I was too afraid to cause.”
“Meh,” I snicker, “Anything to stop your memories nagging me.”
“I can’t help but think of Joy and Cromach, though. I know what the three of you wanted more than anything.”
“I’m trying not to think about it. I can’t get out of here, and the idea of them being out there is the torment, the punishment, the point of keeping me here. Besides, Twilight was right. Killing me would probably just mean that I would eventually be back again.”
“As long as they might be alive, you will keep returning. You consider death to be the final peace, but it isn’t one for you.”
“Yeeeah, Cromach is just that hot.”
Void laughs.
“I suppose this is the end for me then, whatever little part of your fragmented consciousness I am. Sleep well, Blazing Light. You were the torch of Hope I knew you to be from the moment we met. No, you surpassed my expectations on all levels. After everything, you deserve a good rest.”
“Heh,” I yawn, “I suppose that down here in Tartarus, I’ll finally have the time.”
“And do you know what the fun part is?” asks Void’s fading voice.
“You mean besides the fact that Twilight made literally the same mistake as Celestia made with you?”
“Heh heh heh. Exactly. The circle is now complete, young one. Celestia’s successor imprisoned mine just like Sunny did to me.”
“And while you had Scream on the outside, I have Cromach and Joy. Heavy and Mistake. Guiding Light and Des.”
“Indeed.”
“Good night, Void,” I yawn again, “You’ve earned your rest. By which I mean you, you overly chatty hallucination. The real Void has been gone for over two hundred years, railing Scream on daily basis somewhere in the happy alicorn afterlife.”
“Good night, young one. The mantle of Death will be there waiting for you in the morning.”
This took a lot longer than its word count would suggest. To everyone who stuck with this all the way - Why would you do this to yourself? 
Now go and read "Hard Reset" if you haven't done so yet. It's far better than anything I can write. Shoo!
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It's sad.
Wha?
10114494
My life would have to be a lot better for me to be able to make up a happy ending. So, no dice these days. Still, it could have been worse.
10114568
It's just a way better story, that's all
How did Blazing and Mistake survived or come to live?
Why was Des helping him?
Cromach that will be worse then nightmare and discord combined.
Twiggle and Celes should see error of their ways! Blazing approach is horrendeous but there is no one with better ideas.
Imprisoning protector of souls departed? This calls for some good ol' necromancy.
There is dire need of sequel or shorts explaining everything to fills the void in this story.
But its alright if you are not feeling like it.
Up to this point it was a good ride, thank you.
Also you may want to change Currently Going On block on profile page.
10121230
It is possible to figure out, but yeah, I know it wasn't made clear.
Des and Guiding are very loyal daughters who know what's at stake.
Considering what Scream's original plan was to get Void out of Tartarus, Cromach has big shoes to fill.
Literally the entire reason for both Dawn of the Silver Sun and this ending this poorly.
Exactly what happened after Dawn of the Silver Sun and Void's departure.
I originally intended to have Flow's entire campaign be here, but that would kill all suspense and mystery, not that there was much anyway.
Thank you for reading, especially if you went through the whole storyline from the beginning.
Yeah, will do.
I am actually with Blaze on this. If I had someone threaten or killed my daughters, like Nightmare did. There is not much I would not do to protect them. This poses a very hard dilemma. I look foward to more.
10133199
Thank you for reading. Whether or not there will be more, that's a big question.
10840485
The wall is running on Windows and like Windows Update, you really can't stop it.
Well this whole series gets a 9/10 for excellence. Maybe I'll try reading the changeling stories as at the time I didn't know they were connected to this universe. Maybe. At least I can finally get some sleep.
10842364
You, sir, are a madman.
ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: Masochist.
10842417
Why am I a masochistic maddracoling? This is definitely not the best written piece of work I have read by a longshot but there's a lot of heart put into it.
10842424
Welp, most people just quit at some point, so I kind assume reading this is an ordeal more than anything. 9/10 is extremely generous of you but I doubt most people who happened to stumble upon this chain of stories would agree.
Alternatively, I suck really bad at accepting compliments.
Anyway, before I say something completely stupid, thanks for reading and, for some ungodly reason, enjoying this.
There's a final story to this chain in "One Hug Bug", but that one requires knowing the Lovebugs storyline, and it's far from finished because these things are extremely draining to write at this point. I'm busy with "They're EVERYWHERE!" mostly to relax before I return to writing 1HB and finishing Blaze's plot entirely.
10842498
I admit this chain is dumb and stupid at some points...and yet you have built a very cohesive interesting world featuring a relateable very unlucky person just trying to survive so yeah I think you just suck at accepting compliments.
Edit: Also above 9 my scale goes magnitudal or exponential or something like that. there's like 2 9.5's in the 1000+ stories I've read and only 1 9.7. 10 is perfection and therefore impossible.
10842498
Yeah you suck at taking compliments, because this series is actually good. I read it all through when it was on Corrupted Lands, and when next parts was published i had to reread some of the previous parts to jog my memory. Sounds arrogant but that's not something i do lightly, so when i saw this self-deprecating comment i had to respond.
In my opinion there is stories do not get good because they are short or long, they need to take as long as needed, Austraeoh for example. I'll wait until new parts get published and will reread from the start because i do not remember plot exactly but i remember that it felt good.
You story is good because you got characters just right to feel alive to empathize with, there is no Mary-Sues, good character development, no pianos in the bushes. Everything you may ever need. There is some people that long for good ending for Blazing but you should'nt go with crowd opinion. I personally want sequel where Cromach goes on the warpath and makes Alicorns shit their big boy pants. You can't have everything i guess.
Tl;dr: Your stories are good, don't sell youself short.
11104086
Yeah, it's the eternal unavoidable impostor syndrome, but sometimes the readership statistics add their weight to the problem.
I recently unpublished and hope to be rewriting "One Hug Bug", which was supposed to be the final story of Imbalanced, and that's kiiiinda what Cromach does with Silver Sun and Griffon Empire resources. However, I started writing "They're EVERYWHERE!" to relax and I could never get back to 1HB. I wrote too many things too wrong. Maybe on my next try it will be better.
11315044
1 obvious thing but the twist of flow and blazing was obvious
2 Blazing, mistake, desert Shade and bucket were completely in the wrong here and the only reason I can see of Nightmare actually losing rather than everyone just being erased was because mistake wasn’t able to fully release the world erasing entity
3 you don’t get to say you’re on the right side when all your current actions are exclusively for vengeance and include killing an entire continent of innocent people in the pursuit of power and you’re summoning an existential threat to existence itself.
And no amount of writing names on a wall and fake regret will change that
11315087
1 - obviously,
2,3 - I won't go as far as to say this entire point is "moral ambiguity" but I clearly succeeded in making sure there are no entirely clean good guys.
11315223
Harriet and three
Edit: Also I wouldn’t be too sure of yourself about there being no right side to this after all while nightmare might have been the one true god she was also the only god now existing for all eternity with a conscious, sentient mind all by herself. She had put herself in a catch twenty two because
A she doesn’t have the creativity by herself to just make a new universe
B she is obviously not just a force of destruction anymore so non existence wouldn’t be fine by her anymore and
C as a sentient and thinking being who despite her existence is as flawed as any other living thing she would go insane without things to keep her from boredom.
She needs them to be alive and “entertaining” because otherwise she would lose her mind so she literally can’t do whatever she want lest she risk losing the life forms that keep her mentally stable
Sorry but Blazing was in the wrong here plain and simple
11315257
As they say - You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.
11533871
100% agreed. Btw you skipped a story. New Age is first. Legacy of Light is the penultimate story and the final one is currently unpublished indefinitely.
11536829
I told youuuuuuu. New Age is first!
11536821
Mmmm, big ass.
11536630
Feel free to.
Final thoughts:
Well that happened, time to finally read something not written by you- oooooooo 'Hard Reset' you say?
11769992
Wow, I randomly checked a minute after a post
Sums up the lasting value of my stories. I guess once I'm back home this will be a drinky weekend.
As always, I recommend:
Hard Reset (the entire Timeshift Trilogy inclusing extras). I didn't read the rewritten versions, so no idea how much changed.
Affliction of the Heart. I read only the first story, or the first two, I can't recall.
11769994
Wait wait wait, Timeshift Trilogy? Affliction of the Heart? Did I miss something??
11769995
I think those are some of the best fanfics out there. Obviously, they're not mine.
"Hard Reset" is the first book of Timeshift Trilogy, and inspired me to write in the first place. It's been rewritten and I haven't read the new version.
"Affliction of the heart" is a series of changeling stories. The first one gave me an idea for a setting of "Hard to find the right words" and I think I read the second one but can't recall. I know there are like 5 stories by now, give or take.
11770001
Ohhhh ok, thanks for the recommendation!
Also, your fics are the ones which inspired me to start writing! Well, my first fic was cancelled after a few months of writing and struggling with too many perspectives, but I'm working on my second and hopefully much simpler one.
I suppose these things come full circle.
11770003
Wow, I'm glad to be an inspiration, although I don't think I should be an example of how to do it right
11770063
You certainly are a good example! The stories are well-written, with a great balance between action and description, the pacing is just enough to keep people interested, and the characters are very easy to get invested in.
This is a world-class word salad.