The End of Time

by Leondude

Chapter 19 - An Unlikely Ally

Goodking woke up somewhere. Where exactly he wasn’t too sure. His vision was blurry, but he could make out what appeared to be wheels of fortune and a pink carpet. When his vision cleared a bit more, he looked to his right and noticed a red unicorn wielding a large staff. As his vision got more clearer, the unicorn looked stranger, yet more familiar. They had three horns instead of the usual one and the stick they were holding was the Staff of Sacanas. And that's when everything clicked.

"Rise and shine, sleepyhead!" Sacanas said in a singsong voice. "Half the universe is probably dead."

"Hey, wait a minute! Aren't you supposed to be dead?!" Goodking shouted at Sacanas. "I saw you get vaporized with the Elements!"

"Yeah, about that..."

---

Sacanas woke up in a dark cave. His head throbbed with pain like he had the worst hangover of his life, and his body felt as cold as a block of ice. He observed his surroundings and noticed a blue ram standing to the left of him. It took him a while to get up and talk to the ram.

"Goat's cheese!" Sacanas spouted nonsensically, which earned him an odd look from the ram.

"Do you know who you are?" the ram asked Sacanas.

Sacanas shook his head, not because he couldn't remember but because he was trying to clear his head. And then he recognized the ram standing beside him.

"Grogar! Haha! I knew you were real! All the teachers at Magic Kindergarten and the School for Gifted Unicorns told me you were nothing more than a fairy but I knew you were real! I ought to know, I taught my own apprentice some of your spells. Now, what were you saying?"

"I asked if you knew who you were."

"Oh, of course. My name is Sacanas. Big fan of your work." Sacanas held his hoof out in a friendly manner, with Grogar just scowling at it.

"So...since I've been out of it for a while, you know, courtesy of being dead, would you kindly give me an update on what's going on nowadays?"

"There is a princess by the name of Twilight Sparkle,” Grogar said. “She and her friends have worked together and used the Elements of Harmony to defeat many would-be conquerors, including yourself."

"Oh yeah! Now it's coming back to me. This Kronos fellow paused time and pulled me from the moment of my death and sent me to this time. Then I got hit with the elements and sent back to where I died. Timey-wimey stuff, amiright?" Sacanas inhaled in an exaggerated manner. "By the way, how's Sanies? Still in pieces like last time?"

"If you are suggesting I resurrect that dragon, then you are gravely mistaken," Grogar said.

"Yeah, good call. If we let him have his way, there wouldn't be much of Equestria to conquer. In fact, me and Kronos were planning on betraying him after we had taken care of Celestia, and her little allies too."

"Would you just listen to me for five minutes?!” Grogar bellowed, getting Sacanas to shut his mouth. “I have an offer for you."

"If it's to join your little villain club, I'm afraid I'll have to decline," Sacanas said.

Grogar just stared at Sacanas blankly. "What?"

"I can read minds, Grogar! Besides, being dead changes a pony, you know. And for every villain Twilight and her friends defeat, there are those who have decided to turn over a new leaf. I mean, they have Discord on their side for Celestia's sake! Bucking Discord!"

"You know, it's funny you should mention Discord."

Grogar then proceeded to shift forms, growing taller and more slender, his bones cracking as he did so. His horns morphed from a pair of ram horns into a deer antler and a horn of some other animal, most likely an antelope or something. His colour went from a blue to a mismatched variety of colours as his entire body became mismatched in its parts. Sacanas was no longer staring at Grogar. It was Discord.

"Surprise!" Discord said jovially.

"Not really," Sacanas deadpanned. "I knew it was you and mentioned your name specifically so you would reveal yourself."

"Well, aren't you the spoilsport. So, Mr Unoriginal OC Bad Guy Sir, what made you want to change your ways and join Team Harmony?" Discord asked.

"Is that what you and your friends call yourselves now? Team Harmony?"

"It's a name in progress. Oh, and ex-villains like Starlight Glimmer, Tempest Shadow and Captain Goodking, you remember him, right? They are all part of this wonderful team!"

"Let me guess, you have this Villains Anonymous program that they are a part of."

Discord snapped his fingers, making Sacanas' horns disappear.

"Hey! Give those back!" Sacanas shouted.

"Only if you promise to stop reading my mind. It's difficult to be chaotic if somepony can tell what you're going to do."

"Your precious Fluttershy does it. What difference does it make if I do it?" Sacanas asked.

"Because Fluttershy and I are friends! More than friends, come to think of it. If somepony who is more than friends can predict what you are going to do, then they deserve their place as being more than a friend."

"Fine then.” Sacanas raised his hoof in front of him. “I, Sacanas, solemnly swear to not use my magic to read your mind while we have this little discussion of ours."

"Promise?"

"Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye."

"Pinkie Promise?" Discord added.

"I don't know what that is but sure."

Discord snapped his fingers again to give Sacanas his horns back.

"Thank you. Instead, I can do this." Sacanas conjured up an illusion of Fluttershy and Discord sharing an embrace in a glowing pink loveheart.

"Fluttershy and Discord, sitting in a tree. K-I-S-S-I-N-G."

"Unless one of us is the tree, which, contrary to popular belief, would be me in this case, if you know what I mean. Wink wink, nudge nudge."

Sacanas grimaced as his illusion faded away. "Well, that's a mental image I didn't need."

Both Discord and Sacanas shared a hearty laugh.

---

"And then we had a cider and a laugh about how he once turned Fluttershy cruel during his villain days,” Sacanas said to Goodking. “And since there was a vacant spot in a casino his cousin owned and I have a flair for hiding things up my proverbial sleeves, he gave me that spot. Oh, and for some reason he was talking about how suddenly, instead of lampooning how common it is for bad guys to turn over a new leaf in this day and age, we are instead playing it straight and unironically. I had no idea what he meant by that but then, this hairy lion-ape thing from the sky gave an obscene gesture our way."

The hairy ape thing was me, the narrator/Leondude, by the way.

"And that's how I put my past behind me and became a good guy." Sacanas then fiddled with his staff before noticing Goodking snoring loudly. He must have fallen asleep from Sacanas telling his story. Sacanas jabbed his staff into the burn wound the lightsaber left in Goodking's chest.

"Yeow!" Goodking cried out.

"Didn't anypony ever tell you it's rude to fall asleep when someone's telling you a story?!"

"I was resting my eyes!" Goodking said.

"Baloney!"

"You were at the part about a talking blue goat, right?."

"That was ten minutes ago!"

"Wait, you have been ranting for ten minutes?!"

"Have you ever been to a lecture?” Sacanas said. “There are ponies that ramble on more than I do! Anyway, I became good buddies with Discord because of our fondness of playing tricks on ponies and, long story short, he allowed me to run this casino in his cousin's absence."

Sacanas then waved about his staff, nearly hitting Goodking on the head as he did so.

"By the way, you got to be really careful using this thing. Apparently, visitors from another world borrowed it to clean up the mess you made in their world because of you messing about in your world. Then they gave it back and the princesses then gave it to Scorpan to guard. And I think we knew what happened next, didn't we?"

"Yeah, that's nice. What am I doing here, exactly?" Goodking asked.

"Oh yeah, we needed an extra guy to guard the Seal of Wealth."

Sacanas led Goodking down to a room. And in that room was a golden seal with a dollar sign on its chest. The seal burped out a small pile of coins, which glittered like they were made of solid gold.

"Well, that explains it," Goodking deadpanned.

Author's Note:

Revenge of the Fifth, mother-kriffers!