The World At Large

by ToixStory

Episode 4: Angels - Part 3

It was night before Snails dared to do anything else. He told us about safety and having Amethyst watch the streets, but I got the feeling he just didn’t want to be seen with us outside his house. Maybe it was a rich pony thing. I didn’t know.

He was at least kind enough to fix soup for us all, and I gulped mine down in shared silence with Ivory. We hadn’t talked since making the announcement of traveling to find the Assassin, which was just as well. They seemed to know bits and pieces about him, but apparently him saving my life and meeting me in that church were unknown to them both. I didn’t relish the idea of having to explain that when the time came.

Then again, I wasn’t even sure what we were supposed to do when we found him, and I don’t think Ivory nor Snails did, either. To them, he was an almost mythical figure, or like an act of nature. There wasn’t anything behind the mask because all he was and could ever be was a symbol of rebellion and resistance to Amethyst. They had never seen him act out in anger or sadness and had never heard him talk in a personal way. Maybe that was better. Take away his mask and he would be just another stallion in Fillydelphia, but keep it on and he was a legend.

I wondered how much that applied to me, and if all my friends looking at me so differently lately was because I had finally taken the mask off.

Ivory appeared behind me, silent as a shadow. I could only feel him by the way his movements curved the air around my wings.

“Snails says we can move out now,” he whispered, as if Amethyst could hear us all the way across town. “He says he knows how to find the Assassin.”

“Do you think he really does?”

“I don’t know, but do you know any other way? Last time I checked, we were full out of other allies.”

I grinned. “We could always invite Grapevine to come along . . .”

“Grapevine has her own problems,” Ivory muttered. “We’ll get to her soon enough. For now, let’s just see where this Snails guy takes us.”

I followed him from the little kitchen alcove I’d found for myself without another word. We passed by the living room and into the front atrium once more, and I shivered when I stood in front of the open door.

Snow was falling outside, and gusts of wind periodically swept into Snails’ house to banish the life-giving warmth to the farthest reaches of the home. Even with my coat and feathers, I was shivering. Pegasi are supposed to be used to the cold so we can fly up real high without getting frozen, but I wasn’t exactly acclimated to flying much at all, let alone very high, so I was as vulnerable to the cold as anypony else. Worse, I didn’t have a jacket.

I was shivering and wondering what to do when I suddenly felt warm and realized a thick, woolen blanket had been thrown over me. It was one of the blankets with intricate patterns stitched into it, made of blues and golds and coppers. I wrapped it around myself and looked up to see Snails in the doorway, giving me a long, sad smile.

“You looked cold,” said he, his eyes like tempered gold.

“I was,” I said. “I suppose I owe you another thanks.”

“Thanks are for old mares and foals. You are in my keep now while we find your Assassin friend. Some of us still believe in helping our allies.”

He turned and stalked back out the door while Ivory snickered. I wasn’t sure whether to punch him or join in, so I settled for following Snails out onto the snowy sidewalk. The loose drifts crunched beneath my hooves and the air smelled stale, almost like a hospital, but more . . . magical.

There was always something about the days before Hearths Warming that made the whole world come alive. My mother used to tell me Princess Celestia added extra magic to the world around this time of the year, and I had a hard time disbelieving her.

The car that waited for us made me stop in my tracks, for it was like nothing I had ever seen before. It wasn’t as sleek as Sterling’s roadster or bulky as a steamcar. It was more like an elongated oval covered in small ovals that contained the wheel wells and passenger seats. It was colored all in black and, from what I could see, didn’t have any sort of exhaust or, by extension, an engine.

Except, when Snails’ horn glowed, a large door on the side slid open without a sound.

“What kind of car is this?” Ivory asked incredulously, as confused as me.

Snails gave him a wan grin. “I suppose an earth pony city like Fillydelphia doesn’t seem them often, but this is a magic car. Only unicorns can drive them, and powerful ones at that, but it’s a lot faster and stealthier than any of those steam-powered monstrosities this city loves so much.”

Ivory grumbled about that, but I wasn’t about to disagree. I swore that I coughed ten times more after coming to Fillydelphia than I had before, not to mention my vision seemed a lot more cloudy.

Snails beckoned to me and I climbed inside, getting behind the front cloth seats and settling against a soft bench that felt like it was made of silk. I laid down across it and felt like I wanted to go to sleep. Snails offered the same seat to Ivory, but he shook his head and told him something about flying watch.

Once he had taken off, Snails got in the car with me and closed the door. Inside, it felt much warmer than outside, though not too much that being under the blanket was uncomfortable. I supposed the car started up, but it was hard to tell. As Snails said to me, there was no real engine, but rather a system of gears and levers powered by magic, so it made no sound when turned on.

We pulled out of the driveway as silent as a shadow, practically leaping onto the road. Snails was silent as he drove, not even using his hooves to steer. The whole thing was under the control of his magic. If he wanted to impress, he was sure doing a good job of it.

I lay back in my seat and stared out the window. Fillydelphia was beautiful at night. So many times when I had been feeling down I relied on its nightcall to calm me. It was like the dark chased away all the sins that stained the very concrete the city was based on.

Far above us, I could see Ivory’s dark shape in the night sky flying just above us. His was certainly a shape that was hard to miss. The way he swooped effortlessly through the air, it was a marvel to watch him fly. Pegasi had to fight their way through the air on magic wings, but for him, it was like he was born to fly. Snails noticed me watching.

“Boyfriend of yours?” he asked.

I turned beet red. “What? No! I have one of those already.”

“Well there’s nothing wrong with a little playing around—”

“No,” I snapped, a little harder than I meant to. “I’m not doing that again. I won’t. Not now, not ever.”

There was a moment of silence between us. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean any offense,” he said.

I sighed. “It’s fine. It’s my own fault, anyway. If I hadn’t been so reckless already . . .”

“We all make mistakes, you know. As long as your boyfriend is still alive, I would count yourself lucky. Some of us . . . some of us make mistakes that we can’t ever take back.”

I knew what he was getting at, but I didn’t want to answer him at that moment. I really wondered if I could take them back. Sterling would find out eventually, I knew. When he did . . . I wasn’t sure what was going to happen. Nothing good, I knew. He wasn’t going to stay with me. No chance in Tartarus of that happening. Maybe we could stay friends, though. That would be almost bearable.

The car was gliding through the neighborhoods of The Burb but away from downtown Fillydelphia and everypony in it. Instead, we were climbing toward the mountains outside the city, and the suburbs out that way. Come to think of it, I had never been out this way before. The farthest I had been was the downtown area of The Burb, and that was months before.

“Uh, where are we going?” I asked.

“To see the Assassin,” Snails said plainly.

I pointed back the way we had come. “He’s back in Fillydelphia. What are we supposed to do out here, smoke signal him?”

“You’re right, he used to be back in Fillydelphia. However, from gathering what evidence I could, he’s moved out into the mountains and stayed there. I guess the city got too hot for him. Though, with half the police looking for him and Amethyst personally putting a hit out on him, I can’t blame him for moving away. I’m surprised he’s even bothering to stay near this city.”

My stomach turned a bit. If it was really so dangerous for the Assassin to be in the city, why did he come to see me? Was I really that special? I didn’t know, and I didn’t really want to. I just sat in silence as the car continued to climb.

The roads, even in the fancy Burb, got rougher as we moved toward the mountains. The houses grew shorter and more stout, and the terrain changed from rolling plains to tree-covered heights. I remembered when I had arrived in Fillydelphia for the first time through a similar mountainous valley, and smiled at the memory. I had been so full of hope and confidence. Where had the time gone?

A bright moon rose over the mountains. It gave light to the road in front of us where the headlights did not. It was very beautiful. I had always liked the moon. Since I was a little girl, even. The sun reminded me of showing all the bad things about myself in the light of day, but at night, I was a different pony. I was whoever I wanted to be. Not that it always ended up being a good thing, but I could be me, for better or worse.

As I gazed at the moon, I remembered even more how I had left Derbyshire. It had been so scary to go out on my own, but here I was, half a world away. Fillydelphia could not be anymore different. It was smelly, crowded, and corrupt. I had gone hoof to hoof with the most powerful pony in town and a host of other villains, and I still lived. Despite all my flaws, I was still alive.

I looked at Snails. He snuck glances at me every once in a while when his eyes weren’t on the road, and I knew what he was thinking. He was trying to figure out if I was like him, if I was really who all the papers said I was. For the first time in a long time, I was confident that, yes, I was actually the Minty Flower all the ponies talked about. Hold the applause, please.

I saw Ivory swoop down toward us. Snails saw it too, and he slowed the car to a stop. It was hard to tell if it had, though, from how quiet it was. At any rate, we came to a halt, and Snails opened the door, climbing out. I just pulled the blanket tighter around myself and wished that he would close the door.

Ivory was nice enough to come and knock on the open door before sticking his head inside. “You don’t look very heroic wrapped in blankets, you know,” he said.

“Commander Minty of Blanket Fort banishes you,” I mumbled, not entirely coherently. What could I say, I was more than tempted to let the competent unicorn handle the whole thing instead of risk my own life and limb to find the Assassin all over again.

I got out anyway, and shivered. Stupid cold. Stupid everything, really. Stupid Assassin, stupid Snails, stupid Ivory, stupid Amethyst, stupid city, stupid mountains, stupid mission . . . and most of all, stupid me.

Snails stared at me until I realized I had been talking out loud, and the skin under my coat turned beet red. “So, uh, what’s the mission for today?” I asked in my most innocent voice.

“The road up ahead is blocked,” Ivory said. “If were going to get the Assassin, we’re going to have to go the old fashioned way.”

“By hoofing it?”

He pointed to my wings. “Flying. Snails can teleport himself past the block, but the car is too much to transport. We’ll have to go slow to find him.” Ivory gazed up into the towers of stone and forest that loomed above us, cutting into the night sky. “There’s a lot of ground to cover and not enough time to do it.”

Snails nodded. “We’ll be faster if I can use one of my spells. It’ll let us track where the last few ponies in the area have been. The problem is, once we’re in the forest we’ll have to be on the ground. No flying.”

Ivory looked flustered, but I’d spent pretty much my whole life on the ground. I mean, my parents had never exactly been happy about my wings. My mom had been accused of cheating, of course, but it had passed pretty soon. Just another thing to wish their daughter didn’t have.

I pressed down the reasons I had left home and focused on the matter at hoof. Ivory and I took to the skies while Snails disappeared in a flash. We flew over a field of scattered rocks and boulders, high enough that I could see where the avalanche had occurred further up one of the peaks.

We saw Snails up ahead, down where the rockslide had stopped, but we stayed in the sky. Sure enough, a few moments later, a bright line appeared on the ground, snaking its way up the road before disappearing off to the side in the trees.

It shone brightly from the sky, but once it was in the trees, I couldn’t see it anymore. Ivory and I instead had to fly over to where the forest started and wait for Snails to catch up. Once he did, we all nodded wordlessly and plunged into the thick woods of oak and pine.

The air up in the mountains was much more fresh than back in Fillydelphia, that was for sure. My lungs felt light for the first time in months. Plus, being in the forest reminded me of the good times at home. The way the sun shone through the leaves was the exact same way as it had back in Derbyshire. For a moment, I could imagine I hadn’t even left. Then again, that wasn’t much better than my current situation.

Ivory wasn’t having as easy a time as me. In fact, he looked downright miserable. His form, at its best, wasn’t very wieldy on the ground, and in the trees it was even less so. Branches snagged on his feathers, and his wings kept getting caught. Brambles were caught on his hooves, and his talons slipped on wet moss. I wasn’t sure whether to feel terrible for him or laugh out loud at the sheer ridiculousness of it all.

We followed Snails and his little magic trail. The spell was keeping him occupied, and hunting its trail like a hound dog. Whatever it was that was leading us on, they didn’t want to be followed. We crossed several streams, crunched through heavy patches of undergrowth, and had to leap across a small embankment. I almost slipped and fell until I remembered I had wings.

While we walked through the forest, I had plenty of time to think. As I said, Ivory was miserable and Snails was focused on the trail, so I was left to myself. I thought of a lot of things. Mostly, home, but also Sterling. I wanted to tell him, which was strange. I didn’t know if the natural urge was to confess multiple accounts of infidelity, but that’s what I wanted to do. It was strange because I knew it wouldn’t end well.

I think a big part of it was just the idea of getting it out there. To me, it was freedom. Once I revealed myself and all my guilt, that was it. I didn’t have to hide anymore or watch what I said. I could just . . . go on with my life. To me, that was valuable. Then again, I supposed, I probably didn’t have much life left, so I had good reason to want to live it how I wanted.

Since I was lost in my own thoughts, I ended up running into Snails’ rear. He was stopped before a grove of bent and broken trees. Except, when I started to look, they weren’t the normal kind of bent and broken. These trees were burnt and scarred by firearms and magic. Worse, it looked to be very recent.

Snails took off in a gallop, and I did my best to follow him. The glowing trail on the ground seemed to react to his emotions because the light flared up higher than I had seen it before. Ivory came crashing after us, mumbling and yelling curses as he went.

We followed a rough path that wove up rocky ground, up near the edge of the treeline. Beyond that was just rock, and not very climbable rock at that. I hoped that we would get to the Assassin before we reached that point. I didn’t want to have to fly up there on my own.

The closer we got, the more we could hear. There were shouts coming from up ahead and the sound of rocks crunching together. Magical retorts rang out, and I saw birds taking flight. They were smart enough to get away from the danger. Too bad for us, since we only ran faster.

I wasn’t sure what to expect when we reached the clearing, but what I saw sure wasn’t it. Four ponies were gathered in a semicircle around a cave that had collapsed. Large boulders guarded the entrance, though grew smaller with every magical attack the group’s three unicorns wielded on it.

The unicorns themselves weren’t anything special. Mangy and thin, they looked like cheap hires by Amethyst, probably meant to sniff out the Assassin. The fourth, however, was . . . odd. Something was just off about him. Something that made feel little tendrils of fear in my brain.

If Snails felt the same fear, he didn’t show it. In one quick motion, he slid a shotgun from his saddlebag and launched himself at the closest unicorn. I felt bad for the thug, who only had a second to look up before a round of buckshot met his face. He tumbled to the ground, and the others took notice of the shot.

Snails leaped at a second unicorn. This one had time to get his shield up to block the first shot. He parried and flung the pellets back at Snails, but he wasn’t as strong as the burly yellow unicorn. Snails grabbed the shotgun in his magic and brought it crashing down on his opponent’s head. The thug let out a cry and dropped to the ground. Snails stood over him and started to hit on him, again and again, letting out yells of rage as he did so.

I was about to yell at him to stop when Ivory leapt straight over me and into the third unicorn. Literally, into. Ivory’s talons sunk into the unicorn’s chest, who let out a cry and writhed on the ground. Then, the hippogriff used his beak to grasp the unicorn’s head. Ivory ripped the pony’s head off, and I was about to be sick.

Then, I was sick, but for a different reason. I was flung through the air from a blow to my stomach, and I retched as soon as I hit the ground. I landed on one wing. Pain spiked through me, but it was still serviceable. I looked up just in time to see the fourth pony standing over me.

Up close, he looked like an abomination. Less pony than machine, but still not totally either one. Large bits of metal were married to his flesh, outright growing into it in many places. His eyes glowed red, and most of his body was warped around plates of armor. I really hoped I was hallucinating, but I figured that I probably couldn’t hallucinate being picked up by the neck.

The grip was tighter than a vice, and I struggled to get air to my lungs. I could feel him lifting me off the ground like I was light as a feather. His eyes stared at me, not with anger or contempt, but . . . wonder? He looked like he was seeing a pony for the first time as a foal. All while crushing my windpipe.

I saw Ivory dive at him, but the pony whipped an armored tail around and swatted him out of the sky. Ivory landed with a hard thump just as Snails ran over. Whatever magic he tried to do, the mysterious pony shrugged off and crushed the unicorn beneath one of his hooves.

“P-Please,” I managed to stammer, not too proud to beg.

I didn’t want to die there. I didn’t want to die at all. To just be lost out in the wilderness, with nopony knowing where I’d gone . . . that was too much. I couldn’t do it. I had survived Pullmare and Amethyst both, and some no name pony wasn’t going to do me in. I had to live. I had no choice. Live or die wasn’t an option, just live, live . . .

Before I realized what I was doing, it was over. I let out a cry and flew back as a thick lightning bolt struck the pony. He seemed to pause for a moment before his eyes flashed and he slumped over as his chest imploded.

When I stood back up, I saw a single dark thundercloud over him, constructed from pegasi magic. My pegasi magic. I just stared at it for a few minutes, completely unaware, before Ivory limped over to me. He followed my gaze and chuckled.

“I didn’t know you had it in you.”

“I didn’t know I had it in me,” I said.

I looked down at the corpse in front of me. He somehow seemed . . . peaceful. Almost sad, in a way. His body was badly damaged as it was, I saw, and probably the only reason I had taken him down myself. The more my hooves shook, the more I looked at him. I realized that I had killed him. He wasn’t my first, but something about the way I did frightened me.

Snails grumbled and shoved the body off of him, which nearly caused me to jump in fright. He coughed and picked himself up. He rubbed his head. There was a bruise where the pony had hit him, but otherwise he looked okay. After surveying the corpse, he turned to me and shook his head. “So you can do magic. I thought one of your articles said you can’t?”

“I didn’t think I could . . .”

“Well, I’m glad you did what you did, or else we would have all died.” He turned and began to walk toward the boulder the unicorns had been smashing against. “Now it’s time to claim our prize.”

Ivory and I followed him to where Snails stood beside the large boulder. He pressed a hoof against it, and concentrated. The rock was swallowed in a field of magic that began to spin, slowly lifting the massive boulder from the ground and sliding it away from us, downhill. Once it reached a certain point, gravity did the rest. I heard it tumble and crash down the mountain forest.

“Not all ponies know the necessary magic to move things,” he said bitterly. “In a town like this, most learn to destroy rather than solve problems.”

I only nodded in response. Really, what could I say to that? I didn’t know for sure other than just mutter some sort of apology. Snails waved it off and flicked his head until his horn lit up. Shafts of pale green light colored the tunnel ahead. I realized, after a sickening moment, that said tunnel was slick with blood.

Bits and pieces of unicorns and pegasi lay around the tunnel entrance. They all seemed to be dressed in the same uniform, so I suspected they hadn’t been on our side. Still, I felt bad to see them all dead as they were. Nopony deserved to be cut to ribbons the way they were.

“I hope it really is the Assassin that we’re after,” Snails said. “If it turns out to be somepony else, we may be in trouble.”

He moved forward, and I forced myself to follow him. Not completely out of choice, but rather out of some misguided sense of duty that I always seemed to have at the worst moments. Being underground made it even worse, too, since every part of my winged brain told me it was too narrow and I needed to be able to fly.

We traveled deep into the tunnel. Along the way, we passed other, smaller corridors that branched off every which way. When I peered down them, I saw narrow rooms full of books and machine parts. Most looked ransacked, but a few seemed intact.

There was evidence that the tunnel had once been lit, but somepony had knocked out every single light. It made the place seem much bigger, like the hall in front of us extended on forever. Though, for all I knew, maybe it did. There were plenty of legends about places that ponies went in but never came out of. Just about everypony knew the story about Fluttershy and the Hall of Horrors.

We at last managed to come to where the tunnel turned, only to find . . . a dead end. A sheer wall of rock waited for us. Snails cursed, but he couldn’t do anything about it. We were completed blocked from going further. Trapped like rats in a dark cage, it seemed.

Then, there was little more than a whisper in the wind blowing through the tunnel. I wouldn’t have noticed it, save for the feeling of steel pressed against my larynx.

“We really must stop meeting like this,” a voice said.

The lights suddenly flipped on to reveal the Assassin standing in the middle of us, a knife to my throat. He held up a hoof to Snails, who was readying his magic. With one shake of the Assassin’s head, Snails bent his head low and sighed. I was impressed.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded.

“I could be saying the same about you,” I managed to choke out. “We saved you from the ponies outside, so you’re welcome.”

“You three killed all of them?”

“Yep, now do you mind telling us what you’re doing here?”

He put his blade away. “Well, you see, Minty, I am here with—”

From behind us came a girly shriek. I turned in time to see a mare loping toward all of us. No, loping toward me. The earth pony practically leapt and grabbed onto me, and it was when she did that my heart sank. Because, see, it was right then I recognize her for who she was.

Ivory and Snails could only gape in shock as the mare squeezed me into a hug and squealed, “Oh Minty, it’s been so long, we thought you were dead; your big sister missed you so much!”

Damn it.

Comments

[Ver0Nightmare]

Okay that ending all I can say is...whaaaaat?
Assassin=Rainbow Remedy calling it now.
And I shall start waiting patiently for the inevitable argument that Minty and Sterling are gonna get in...because I love drama

[Silverness]

WAT

I wonder what's going to happen next .-.

Also, I'm glad this updated right now because I got frustrated with inexperienced players on League of Legends

[dancing mop]

oh, snap. not the reveal i was expecting. huh, cool.

[djthomp]

Huh, a magic driven car. Makes me wonder if Grapevine is powerful enough to operate one.

Sterling would find out eventually, I knew.

He doesn't already know? I figured with his reactions to Minty these last few chapters that he wasn't remotely in the dark about what had been going on.

When I stood back up, I saw a single dark thundercloud over him, constructed from pegasi magic. My pegasi magic. I just stared at it for a few minutes, completely unaware, before Ivory limped over to me. He followed my gaze and chuckled.

Ooooo, go Minty.

Just about everypony knew the story about Fluttershy and the Hall of Horrors.

Huh.

And double huh for that ending.

[ToixStory]

3824530

He doesn't already know? I figured with his reactions to Minty these last few chapters that he wasn't remotely in the dark about what had been going on.

Denial is a powerful thing.

[Undertone]

Snails is salt Rambo.

[PersonalGamer]

It's a shame to see this cut off, but this last chapter made it impossible to easily wrap it up and force and ending. I would suggest that you put a further disclaimer that

It's obvious by the writing that it both is and isn't something your heart was in anymore. The general polishing seemed to taper towards the end. There's also a question that's been bugging me: why not talk to Marshmallow? She's been to Joya's place several times since and there's been no real mention beyond that little bit. I'm not going to ask you to continue and disrespect your request in your cancellation blog, but I think a Q & A or – if you had one – an outline of what was going to happen would be a good thing to add. There should be some sense of closure, even if it's not in story form.

[marmelmm]

Sorry to see this end; was an enjoyable ride.

[donelel]

Well, this was certainly interesting.

It's sad to see that this story is unfinished. I can perfectly understand though; there is no point in forcing yourself to write something you no longer enjoy.

Overall, I thought The World at Large was a decent story. For the most part, it kept me engaged and yearning to find out what happens next. Despite a number of people’s complaints about the use of dark tones and themes, I honestly thought it was handled quite well. You didn’t shy away from dark subject matter, which I commend. The only complaint I have about this story is that it doesn’t feel like a sequel to Freeze Frame. Sure, it has the same characters and follows it directly, but the shift in tone was completely polarizing. Other than that, I had no problems with it.

I believe The World at Large had a lot of potential, and I really would have loved to see where it went. I’m pleased with what we got though.