Earning Freedom

by Daxisle

Courtroom Blitz (Bonus Chapter)

(A/N, this chapter takes place at the end of "Judgement Day" and is dedicated to the massive set up I had built for Sin's assault to free Spike. The vote ultimately went to the trials interruption with 4 to 3 and 1 abstaining while another chose a third option of their own design, so this chapter will hold absolutely no relevance to the story continuing onward, but I'll be damned if I don't write this for some satisfaction. Please enjoy.)

Courtroom Blitz (Bonus Chapter)

"We, the Council of Alphas, have reached a unanimous decision." They paused and looked down at a terrified Spike. "In the judgement of Spike of Equestria, found guilty of grossly assaulting and maiming to the point of disfigurement of the Twelfth Delta pack, we sentence you to death."

As the last word was uttered, Sin heard a snap of fingers to his right, and the world devolved into utter chaos, compliments of the god of the same name.

What happened over the course of the next few seconds was a hectic mess with no realizable details. Save screaming, yelling, and a mass of pink and black clouds attacking both pony and Diamond Dog alike.

By the time Sin came to his senses, he was reloading his crossbow, two of his marks already fallen by his crossbow. He placed in the second two bolts and took aim, taking a shot and hitting one of the two remaining guard dogs in the head, the last of them figured out what was happening and picked up Spike, using the dragon as a shield.

"Shit!" The Federalist cursed.

"RAINBOW! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" He heard Twilight cry, but he didn't have time to deal with helping Rainbow Dash, he had to get to Spike and get the rest of them out of there.

He jumped down to the courtroom floor and made a dash for the dog, slamming himself into Spike and using the force to push both he and the dog over. He rolled into a recover and just as quickly pounced ontop of the last guard, placing his crossbow right over the dogs neck. "No, please no kill-" Was all he could get out before the cross bow bolt powered by two hundred and fifty pounds of draw embedded itself into his neck and pinned him to the stone floor.

Covering the terrified dragons eyes, Sin looked back to see the madness going on behind him...

---

Mac's eyes widened at the final decision and just as he watched Sin raise his crossbow to fire, a puff of black and pink smoke, thick enough to almost be solid, formed before his eyes. And then another, and another. Soon, the whole court room was full of the contton candy like clouds. His attention was redrawn to Shining Armor as the unicorn lowed his head at Sin, a spell slowly charging in his horn.

Impulsively, Macintosh jumped forward and knocked Shining's head off its target, sending the spell to collide with the other side of the room. Having Shining on the ground, the apple farmer struggled to keep him down and limit the range of motion for his magical casting. "Big Macintosh? What are you doing! Get off of me!"

"Nope." Mac shook his head and placed something into the guard captain's armor, he had shining subdued and no intention on allowing the guard captain up. At lease, he didn't until another spell was cast from a different unicorn and had sent him splayed out against he wall.

He gritted his teeth and opened his eyes to find Twilight Sparkle confronting Rainbow Dash, who had her own hooves full trying to subdue her target.

"RAINBOW WHAT ARE YOU DOING!" Twilight demanded. Mac looked over to see Sin wasn't standing with Pinkie anymore, but was approaching Spike and the dog who held him captive. He looked down to find Shining Armor attempting to summon his magic, but had it constantly dissipate on him.

Mac had to admit, he wasn't sure about Sin's idea with the dragon scale, but it was working like a charm.

"Stay out of this, Twi. We're doing what you and Celestia wouldn't do." Rainbow declared, slamming her hoof into the back of Valiar's head, knocking the stallion unconscious, much to the unicorns shock and horror.

"Rainbow," she pleaded, completely besides herself with what her friend had just done. Shining also didn't take to well to the attack and charged with an audible yell, though Mac had more than enough time to recover and leaped again, intercepting the stallion and repeating Rainbow's actions, knocking the Guard Captain out cold.

"MACINTOSH! RAINBOW! What in the name of Celestia are you two doing?!" Decried Rarity, keeping a fair distance from the fight.

"We're savin' Spike!" Mac declared, seeing a dog coming from his right and slamming a hoof into its face. His adrenaline was in overdrive, and what he'd meant to be a mere knock out had sent the canim at least ten feet backwards in the air.

"Come on, Rares," The cyan flyer replied in exacerbation. "I'm the element of loyalty, did you really think I was just going to sit by as one of my best friends was about to be killed?" She quickly spun around and gave a nice buck to an approaching dog who'd escaped one of the cotton candy clouds.

Rarity and Twilight both looked to the center of the camber to see Sin holding Spike as he stood above a dead dog, then they looked at each other in disbelief at the carnage happening around them. Neither of them could believe what was slowly dawning on them. This was Discord's brand of magic, Rainbow and Macintosh were fighting against Equestrian guards ponies, and Pinkie's party cannon was firing full blast at anything that wondered too closely to her.

Rainbow, Pinkie, and Macintosh were helping Discord? It was insanity, absolutely inconceivable! Yet the evidence was incontrovertible.

Twilight looked to find both Luna and Celestia too busy fighting off a constant stream of cotton candy clouds to help, Fluttershy was crying behind a bleacher, and Applejack wasn't here.

What was she supposed to do? This wasn't supposed to be this way, first Spike and now her Rainbow and Pinkie Pie? How much more did she have to lose?

It was then that Twilight summoned her magic and lassoed both Rainbow and Pinkie, bringing them to her and holding the two in her magical aura and trapping them in a bubble shield. "Twilight, let us go!" Rainbow demanded, slamming her hoof against the prison.

Twilight shouted her rejection and huffed. "Why? Why are you guys doing this?" She asked, tears falling from her hurt and betrayed eyes. "I love Spike too but Celestia said-"

"Oh my gosh Twilight, forget what Celestia said!" Rainbow shouted. "You always do what Celestia wants you to do! Never a hoof out of place, even when your own son is about to be killed! What kind of mother stands by and lets that happen, huh?!"

She took a step back, her feelings of pain and betrayal compounding ten fold from the hateful words one of her best friends had just spoken to her. Mac saw the opportunity, grabbed another dragon scale, and slammed it into the bubble, shattering it instantly and sending a magical feedback that gave the caster a splitting head ache.

"Mac, Pinkie, Rainbow, C'mon, Let's go!" Sin shouted, Spike on his back and an purple maned mare standing beside him.

Twilight opened her eyes and saw her friends running from her and towards Sin. The mare's eyes narrowed as a few things clicked into place. Sin, that bastard, that unbelievable dunderhead was the source of all her problems and worries. He was to blame for everything that was happening now, for the loss of Spike, and now two of her best friends.

No, no she wouldn't let him get away with it. She wouldn't get away with destroying her life.

"Are you alright dea- oh no." Rarity whispered, observing the wide eyed maniacal grin she saw on the librarian's face. She'd only seen it one other time in her life, but she knew just how unstable Twilight Sparkle was when she had it. "Dear, Twilight, please, please don't..."

"Take, hehehe. Take my friends away from me, will you?" She chuckled, before her mask of mania turned to shear hatred, small wisps of flame emerging until her entire mane was ablaze. "NO YOU DON'T, NOW DIE!"

---

Sin cursed as he saw both Rainbow and Pinkie trapped in magic bubble by Twilight.

Where was Discord? he'd upheald his part of the deal, why weren't they being teleported out yet?

"SIN!" He turned to see Uppity runnig towards him. "What have you done?!"

"I did what I had to do, Uppity." Sin shot back, looking again to find Mac slowly approaching the bubble, and again to make sure that both Luna and Celestia were sufficiently distracted. What did he need to do? Yell out for the extraction or something?

"Sin, you've just..." She stopped, looking down at the dead dog under his hoof. "You killed him." her final words were lost under the constant screaming and yelling of the courtroom around. Luckily, none of the dogs had come to Spike from him yet, but how long with that last? They needed to leave, and they needed to leave right the hell now.

"I'm sorry, Uppity." Sin confessed, looking away. "But I couldn't sit back and let this happen. I made a decision that I'd save Spike from death, even if I had to kill others in order to do it."

Taking a step back, Uppity could only stare blankly at what she'd heard. Sin imagined she would be in more pain than he was over the matter, she'd probably never seen another pony or dog killed before. That plus it coming from a pony she understood to be her friend? The betrayal must have been horrendous.

"But, but I thought we..."

Sin lifted his hoof and placed it upon the orange mare's lips, halting her words. "I'm sorry, Uppity. I didn't mean to hurt you this way, but you have to understand that I've done this for good reason. Celestia would have stood by as an unfair judgement was passed, and I couldn't let that happen. And I'd have done the same for you."

If the DA's eyes got any wider, Sin was sure they pop right out of her head. Sad thing was that he meant it too. He wasn't sure when he started to care for her as he did. Maybe it was her intelligence or personality, maybe it was the fact she played nurse to him, but somehow, he'd come to care about her, not as much but still close to, Spike, Mac and Shade.

He turned back to see both of his companions freed. "Mac, Pinkie, Rainbow, C'mon, Let's go!" He declared, smiling internally as the ponies finally made their way to him for the escape. Though, something caught his eye from behind them, Twilight had somehow caught fire, but what really concerned him was the charged up fireball spell she'd cast that was headed straight for him.

"NO!"

The spell was intercepted by another before it could reach him, and as he saw her form fall to the ground in a blackened heap, Sin stood stunned at the sacrifice Rainbow Dash had made.

"Dash? Dashie! Dashie, are you okay? Speak to me!" Pinkie cried, shaking the chard pegasus mare, who coughed and hissed from the burns inflicted.

"You monster." Sin said softly, looking to Twilight, who was frozen in fear of her spell. "Mac, grab her and let's go!" The Federalist barked again, thankful that the stallion wasted no time. The five of them ran out of the courtroom and into the caverns. The carnage of the assault still raging behind them. "Dammit Discord, where are you!"

"Right here." They looked up to find the draconequus looking down at them from the ceiling. "And I must say, that was quite the delicious brand of chaos you displayed for me."

Sin voiced his disapproval for the chaos god's praise and asked to be teleported out of the mines.

To the horror of all five of them, the chaos god refused to do anything of the sort. "I'm afraid that I have no intention of helping you five escape."

"WHAT! We had a plan, Discord."

"Yea? Well plans change. Or did you forget that I'm not your biggest fan after you calling me 'not the god of chaos' but a god with his own brand of authoritarianism?"

What, when did he... No, no, no, no, no, no. He was not being that guy right now, he was seriously not holding that grudge against him. "You're still angry about that? I'm sorry, alright?!"

Discord laughed and gave a salute before parting into a cloud with a few words. "Good luck mares and gentlecolts. Hopefully you all learn something from this little ordeal."

Bastard, fucking double-crossing bastard. But he didn't have time to get hung up on that now, the plan, minus Discords assistance in getting out, was still successful. He'd need to lead them out, hopefully what assistance the draconequus had given would be enough to see them to freedom. "Follow me." He declared, running towards where he hoped the exit was.

The five of them quickly dashed past multiple caves and lamps with not a pony or dog in sight. Sin kept on point, with Mac carrying a moaning and groaning black and blue pegasus, Spike right behind him and Pinkie keeping an eye on the rear.

Sin's eyes darted as he looked past another corner. He took the momentary reprieve to load his last bolt into the crossbow. He mentally reminded himself of the bolt's finality. It was his last shot, and it may be the only thing that stood between them leaving or all of them dying.

"Clear, move up." He lead them forward, keeping an eye out in all directions. "Pinkie, do you know where we are in here? Pinkie?"

Sin frowned as he observed a drastic change he hadn't noticed before. Some how, Pinkie's bouncy curly mane had fallen bone straight, her coat slightly muted in color, and her eyes... something about them looked... dead. They reminded him alot of his brother's eyes, alot of his own eyes.

"Sorry, I don't remember." She mumbled without emotion.

Great, Rainbow's down, Spike's a mess, Pinkie's emotionally crippeled, and Macintosh was too busy carrying Rainbow to be of use. This was not good.

"Hey... Mac." Rainbow croaked. "Go ahead and put me down."

"No." Mac replied forcefully. He hadn't come this far to save one friend just to abandon another.

Rainbow didn't seem to agree. "You idiot, I'm already done for." she chuckled mirthlessly. "If you keep me, I'll just slow you down, and then none of us get out of here."

"Dashie, please don't talk like that." Pinkie pleaded, Rainbow was the only friend she had left, she couldn't lose her, not now.

Rainbow apologized, but she had already lost feeling in both her wings and her hind legs, and as bad as they were burnt, she'd most likely never fly or walk on her own again. "now put me down."

The absolute resignation in her voice left no room for debate this time, and the red stallion accepted her request, slowly and gently lowing her to the side of the cave. Rainbow hissed as her burnt plot made contact, but soon found the pain tollorable enough to speak. "I'm sorry, guys." She smiled sadly. "Pinkie, you were the best friend a pony could have, the pranks we pulled together were some of the happiest memories of my life, and I'll always cherish them, even after I die."

The addressed bit her lip as she fought to keep her legs from trembling and her stomach from tying in knots.

"I never got the chance to tell you this, but I loved you, Pinkie Pie. Not as just a friend, but as something more, and I want you to know how I feel before we say good bye."

Too beside herself with emotion, Pinkie lept and embraced Dash in a hug, completely unaware or uncaring to the fact the burnt pony had to bite the mare's shoulder to keep from crying out.

"I'm sorry, Dashie. I'm so, so, sorry..." She cried into her friends shoulder, small trails of tears slowly falling onto her friends chard back. The two parted and Pinkie planted a small peck onto Rainbow's lips, making the dying flier smile one last time.

"Sin, I'm sorry I gave you such a hard time. When it comes down to it, you're a pretty cool guy."

The stallion pressed his lips and nodded, thanking her for the compliment and apologizing for her circumstance. "Not your fault," She chuckled sarcastically, before her face turned serious and her eyes found Spike. "Don't blame Twilight for this. I think she's been through enough without having her own son hate here. She loves you, and don't you ever forget that, can you do that for me, pipsqueek?"

Spike nodded, though said nothing in reply, electing instead to give a much gentler hug.

And finally, the dying mare turned her attention to make, and unlike any of the others, she donned an expression of guilt. "Mac, I want to apologize again, for what I said about you being a colt cuddler." She confessed, her eyes falling to the side of her face. "I never meant to hurt your feelings or you. I know you-" she cut off as a massive coughing fit overcame her. "I know you said you forgave me, but I never thought you really did. So, just so you know, I never meant a word of it."

Mac watched as Rainbow entered another coughing fit, though her limbs didn't move, and her chest was heaving worse and worse with each breath she took. He leaned down and gave the mare a final hug, explaining that he'd forgiven her for her words a long time ago.

"Thanks guys, for everything." She smiled one last time before turning to Sin once more and asking for the ultimate mercy.

It shouldn't have hit him as bad as it did, but Sin felt a sting in his chest at the request. He didn't want to killer, but he didn't want to leave her to suffer either. He didn't reply at first, but she begged him, she was in so much pain and she just wanted it to end, to die with a little bit of control.

Sin finally caved and pointed his crossbow at the mare, right between the eyes, as painless a death as he could offer. Pinkie, Spike and Mac all looked away, unable to watch as one friend killed another, even if it was to end her suffering.

"Thank you, Sin." She said, closing her eyes, a content smile creeping onto her face as she laid back against the wall.

"Good bye." were the last words she heard before a dull thud echoed, followed by a light crunch and squish of the bolt penetrating her skull. His job done, the stallion slowly lowered his foreleg and gave one last look to the pegasus mare who'd gained his respect.

He felt his chest and knees shake as his emotions threatened to overflow, he found is breathing difficult to control and finally he lost it, falling to his knees and throwing up on the tunnel floor. He killed her, he killed someone he respected, someone who helped him. Yes, it was to put her out of suffering, but that didn't help like it usually did.

He sniffled and spat out the last traces of vomit his stomach decided to push out, dry heaving a couple of times as he lay on the floor. He heard Pinkie crying behind him and desperately wanted to join her. He wanted to cry for the first time in his life, he wanted to let go of the feelings he had, to cry like a little baby demanding comfort from their parents.

His breakdown was interrupted by a red hoof on his shoulder, Sin looked up to find Macintosh looking down at him in concern.

'That's right, you don't have time for this right now. You've got to those three out of here. If the dogs find them, they're all dead, just like Rainbow.'

Sin inhaled and exhaled, he stood to his hooves and gave an appreciative smile to Mac before taking point again. After a few hours of wondering, the troop finally saw daylight from one of the tunnels and made way for their escape, they were too far to be at the main entrance, so they didn't have to worry about guards being on the look out.

As they finally exited the dirt mines, each of them embraced the rays of sunlight, basking in melancholy freedom. Each keeping to their own thoughts as they wondered into the lush green countryside.

Finally, Spike decided to break the silence. "So, what happens now?" He asked, forlorn to anything but the fact of the matter.

All three eyes went straight to Sin, who stopped and slowly turned to face them. "We go to the Federation, put this whole mess behind us, and try to lead something resembling a normal life."

He turned back around and continued walking. He knew that was a lie, none of them would ever be "normal" again, but he felt responsible for all three of them now. He'd dragged all of them away from their home, and one to her death, he owed them a chance at happiness, he owed them his effort to make their lives better.

Twilight was right, all of this was his fault, and he was going to fix it, no matter the cost.

Author's Note:

Well, there it is. Hope it was as satisfying for you as it was me.

Comments are always appreciated.

Comments

[Godiswithus3]

To properly explain the emotions I was going through in this chapter:

The fight between the freedom fighters and the antagonists: ECSTATIC AND SO DAMN EXCITED, CONSTANTLY CHEERING!

When Discord betrayed them: stunned and kicking myself for not seeing it coming.

When Twilight went crazy: Oh jeez, she is seriously going to regret that.

When Rainbow Dash suffered and died: stunned and tears rolling. Feeling bitter.

RD and Pinkie shipping: Cringed and was a big turn off. I'm not a fan of homosexual fics, especially if it concerns the main characters of MLP. Hoping this does not return in future chapters or I may have to seriously consider leaving. Nothing personal.

When Sin pulled the last trigger: My heart was filled so much sorrow and grief, these moments always hit me hard.

The ending: melancholic, depressing and made me glad that this is not canon. I am not sure I would have been able to take this any longer.

[Daxisle]

6325178 No, the shipping isn't going to continue.

It was just a little tid bit added in for dramatic effect in an instance only mentioned once in the earlier chapters that questioned Rainbows sexual orientation. Wont be appearing again. (Not really a fan of it.)

Discord does hold grudges, and that plot point will make a come back, though it wont be as much of a surprise at this point.

Sounds like I conveyed what I wanted to well enough though.