Unbearable sadness
“Phew, am I glad a meteor struck the factory, incinerated all the killer robots and left me miraculously alive and well.”
I stretched my wings, testing them to see if I had sustained significant injuries. It made me flinch, but it could have been a lot worse. ‘Somehow, I get the feeling I should be a lot less used to this crap than I am…’
I stared at the burned down remains of what used to be a bunch of monsters set on annihilating me and all that those that loved me… all those… well, not every robot can be an overachiever. Then again, it may or may not require extradimensional travel, so who was I to judge?
“Now, to go on my merry way.” I grinned, showing my fangs to whoever was watching me at the moment. With a happy jump, I started skipping around, Pinkie Pie style.
A cold shiver went down my spine mid-jump. With that, I fell face first again the ground. Again.
I turned and then, suddenly, eyes shrinking down to the sizes of tiny silted dots, I gulped loudly, staring at the ginormous black striped cloud and the flashing red alerts. With a startle, I put my all into running away from the chaotic construction, only to freeze when I heard the booming voice that followed.
“ATTENTION CITIZENS OF DISCORDVILLE! THE MORNING DESTRUCTION OF PUMPKINS EVENT WILL START IN FIVE SECONDS. YOU HAVE TWO HOURS TO GET INTO GEARS AND DESTROY PUMPKINS. THIS MESSAGE WAS SPONSORED BY YOUR BENEVOLENT MALEVOLENT RULER OF ALL, DISCORD AND HIS LITTLE DADDY’S BOY, HONEST HAVOC.”
I stopped dead in my track. D-did that cloud just made me accomplice of a pumpkin destroying event?!
“W-what?!”
My blood started boiling. Literally. Tickling sensation aside, steam was coming out of my fur. Every strand of fur on my body was standing on its end, a strange burnt smell coming to grace my nose. I tried to ignore it, but it made me sneeze.
‘W-wait… what am I doing? It’s getting away!’
“YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!” I screamed, feeling the flame of my rage grow within my guts. With all the indignation I could muster, I unleashed all my anger into that shout, willing the lying cloud to evaporate into thin air and explode.
Then, a stream of actual flames shot out of my throat, passing harmlessly on my tongue and the inside of my mouth. Funny, I always figured fire could hurt the gums. Guess I was wrong.
Oh, and also…
“I CAN BREATH FIRE?!”
The following events were only discovered after a massive bribe of cupcakes and pastries changed hooves. Further reading requires acknowledgement of the sacrifice suffered by the royal kitchen and the princesses themselves.
She wasn’t quite sure what had happened. Weird, usually, ponies were looking at her like she had done something extraordinary by pulling a canon out of thin air or teleport between dimensions. For once though, she was the one being a little dumbfounded at the chain of events. The transition from Giant Cave with a dragon thingy to…
Ponyville? And not just any Ponyville! Good ol’ Ponyville, meany mad god and ‘unbalanced sweets not balanced by the perfect ratio of ice cream’ free.
“Oh well, we probably just blasted off that meany pant again while sleep walking.” She shrugged, deciding it didn’t matter all that much. “Or maybe it was the mind-control from the aliens on the third planet in the next solar system.”
Whatever it had been that had saved the day, it was gone now. There was nothing she could do about it now, so the next best thing would be to look around town, trying to find ponies or non-ponies in need of some cheering up. She could guess that a lot of her friends would need somepony to rely on in those times of need.
Quickly, the mare scanned the crowd, hoping that nopony needed her in earnest. That would mean they had been hurt, and she didn’t like that. Luckily, thank chocolate pies for that, all her fellow Ponyville citizens looked peachy.
Happiness around meant she had some time on her hooves to kill. And then give the mouth-to-mouth to, ‘cause she’d never kill anything! Unless they were pastries, but that didn’t count, because pastries were soooooooo good.
The thought made a tingling sensation spread in her stomach and her mouth watered at the idea of sweets. Hmmmmm… a sweet honey aroma filled her nose just from remembering the goodies that were waiting for her at SugarCube Corner.
However, her culinary experiences brought other memories back to the surface.
‘I wonder where that cute little draconicorn stallion is now? Oh, but I’m not supposed to know that’s how they’re called yet,’ she thought, mentally giggling. ‘He tasted so nice with caramel. His horn had a spicy little kick to it too.’
Very strong, with just a tiny itsy bitsy touch of volcanic fume to it. At the memory, which she could almost taste on her tongue, a low rumbling noise reached her ears, just as her stomach seem to rumble.
“Whoopsie,” she said. “I guess it’s time for me to go see if the ice cream was finally delivered.”
Or so she would have done, if, mid jump, she hadn’t seen a very familiar bunch of mares on the other side of the streets. For a very very very very short moment, Pinkie almost didn’t stop, because she was really hungry. Fortunately, that thought was banished to the ‘bad thoughts garbage bin’ presto.
“Girls!” She shouted, zipping to their levels in a blink. “Wanna see my new special party canon batter mix?”
Excited, she wasted no time pulling the trigger, hoping to spray a piece of the world with confetti and streamers. However, just as the canon moved back from the pull, somepony jumped underneath it and stood up, changing the aim completely.
“Applejack?” She blinked, a little shocked that her friend had diverted her party canon. “Why did you do that? Did I forget to add the sugar to the eggs?”
But her friend didn’t make any annoyed remark. Not even a small one. Applejack just looked at her as if she had tried to steal her last apple pie. But she wasn’t one to do that! She’d never steal anything from her friends!
And to her growing tummy freezing terror, the rest of them were also looking at her with a mixture of embarrassment and hostility.
It shook her to the core.
“Girls?”
They didn’t answer; Twilight hadn’t even looked up at all since the moment she had been there. In fact, the poor mare’s head hung low, with an expression of horrible loss and defeat.
Luckily, she had the best on-hoof therapist hidden under her balcony, in case of therapist emergency. “Somepony looks like they need to talk to their best confident, Mr. Smiley!”
“Why do you have to be such a clown all the time?!” Her purple hoof violently swatted the smiley ball away. “Nopony wants to deal with you today!”
Her eyes grew wide as saucers at the unbelievably cold tone Twilight had used. W-why was she saying that? Nopony wanted to deal with her? But their friends liked her! Why would they suddenly be mad at her? She hadn’t done anything wrong!
“B-but Twilight…!” She pleaded, reaching forward.
“Leave me alone!” Her purple friend shouted, recoiling away from her touch.
“But-”
“I said NO!” Twilight suddenly scrambled to her hooves, and galloped as fast as she could.
“TWILIGHT!” Applejack and Rainbow Dash yelled together, running after her.
“T-that wasn’t… the best time, Pinkie.” Fluttershy hid her face behind her mane, still refusing to make eye contact.
“I… what did I do?”
Briefly, the pegasus and the unicorn exchanged a saddened look, followed by a sigh from Rarity. The white mare’s presence seemed diminished, as if something was weighting down on her. “She just received a letter from Canterlot. Her father has passed away tonight.”
If possible, her eyes widened even more, as a horrible feeling settled in the nest of her stomach. Inside her, she could already feel the energy fading away.
“Then she needs somepony to cheer her up! We can’t let her be sad like this!”
There! She said it! They would understand that she had to be there for Twilight! That she had to help her feel better. She didn’t want her to be sad! They understood that, right?
“Just… go home, Pinkie…” The fashionista could not look at her in the eyes. “Please… You’re not the one Twilight needs.”
She was the only one to say anything else to her. One by one, her friends turned around and left. Their slowly shrinking forms filled her with an unbearable cold weight in her stomach. Her legs seemed made of lead and she heard a sizzling noise coming from her mane.
“Applejack? Rainbow Dash? Fluttershy? Rarity?” Her voice trembled, as she started to fight tears. Her mane had fallen across her face; it made it harder to blink away her sadness. “T-Twilight?”
“Please don’t hate me…”
‘Why did everything suddenly turn gray?’ She asked herself, looking sadly at her own hooves. They weren’t pink at all…
The following scene was extracted from the official Royal Canterlot records, cannot be distributed outside of the library and its content must not be divulged to outsiders. Offenders will be prosecuted and risk facing punishments reserved for traitors against the crown.
Are you seriously going to keep ignoring this warning? Of course you are, my little humans, you never really cared much for warnings, did you?
“You might want popcorn for this next part. I created the perfect scenario. Imagine it, it’ll be like Celestia and Luna all over again. Two sisters (in-law, minds you) fighting to the death, until one of the two triumphs and breaks her own heart in the process.”
“Who are you talking to, Lord Discord?” An electric eel asked, piercing the surface of the pool the draconequus had conjured up.
“Oh, I’m just narrating for the sake of those that might listen. So, popcorn or no popcorn?” Discord flashed a bowl of buttery snacks in the face of the talking eel, getting up from his long chair and dropping his sunglasses at the same time.
“No, thank you, sir.” It shook its head, before diving underneath the surface.
“Alright then, let’s get back to business.” The draconequus rubbed his paws together, a malevolent glitter in his yellow eyes.
A few meters away from him, there was a young unicorn who could not care less about the Spirit of Chaos. Her attention was entirely focused on her sister-in-law, whom she had always loved like her own. It was easy, oh so easy to summon back the images of the loving alicorn.
And albeit a tiny voice whispered in her ears about the futility of it all, she still believed in that most naïve hope that this wasn’t just another one of Discord’s tricks.
She stared at Cadence. And the alicorn princess stared back.
Twilight fought a recoil of horror. Love was absent from that gaze. It contained naught but contempt and a touch of a deep seethed hatred.
“C-Cadence…” The younger mare asked, her heart slowly being ripped out by the look the alicorn had sent her way. “N-not you too! Please tell me he didn’t ge-”
“Who put a baby seal and a colt in my path?!” The princess shouted, before violently kicking them both out of her way, which happened to contain a shaking gray colt.
Feeling faint, Twilight dropped to her knees, letting out a small cry of despair. Both! Discord had gotten to them both!
Silently, in a distant corner of her mind, the mare cursed her naivety. To believe there were any moment under Discord’s influence that wouldn’t be shock and surprises… was the same as believing there was mercy in that blackened soul of his. He was just a monster.
“W-who are you, Miss?” The little colt asked Cadence with a trembling voice, backing away quickly from the towering mare every time she took a step forward.
Their little game continued for a minute or so. Eventually, he ran out of space to back into, and his head hit a wall. The poor colt didn’t waste much time on cursing about that little bout of pain, not with such a threat looming over him.
Shaking, pupils shrunken to dots and tail curled up between his legs, the foal’s body betrayed every ounce of fear he felt.
“Urgh,” Cadence muttered with a gag. “Shining Armor, you’re so disgustingly pathetic. Look at you!”
“W-what’s wrong with me?” He sniffed, sounding a bit defensive.
She did not like his tone. Not one little bit.
“What is wrong with you?!” She yelled, snarling. “Are you kidding me?!”
Shining Armor let out a cry of fear, burying his face under his legs. He could not bear to look at that scary mare.
His reaction only intensified the burning loathing her gaze carried.
“You’re a weakling! A pathetic foal that carries himself like he can protect his loved ones when all you can do is fail and rely on somepony else! When I was all alone in that cave under the castle, I could only cling to the hope that you would never be fooled by that imposter!” She stomped forward, her eyes narrowed on the form of the foal in front of her. “AND WHO CAME TO MY RESCUE?! YOUR LITTLE SISTER, THAT’S WHO!”
“Cadence, stop!” Twilight shouted from her cage. Her eyes were shining with tears. “That’s not you! You’re not hateful! You’re a loving, wonderful pony!”
Something in her broke when Cadence ignored her completely.
“You’re a worthless runt, Shining Armor! A pony who never lives up to his special talent, even at the most critical times.” The former princess of love snarled, rising on her hind legs, one hoof posed to strike. “Not even for yourself.”
“Don’t!” Shining’s sister shouted just as he was hit.
The room, strangely the size of a football stadium now, fell completely silent. A sickening crack had ringed to Twilight’s ears. She was frozen with shock.
S-she could not believe it. Her senses were deceiving her! N-no, what was she thinking!? Discord was deceiving her, the lying, conniving, bucking snake! There was no way her favorite foalsitter could have hit her big brother best friend forever.
Trembling, she pushed the bars of her cage, hoping to dispel that illusion and prove to her brain that it was mistaken, but her prison remained very real.
“No…” She whispered, her throat tightening. “No, no, no!”
But the more frantic she grew, the less probable her hypothesis seemed. Not a detail was wrong about Cadence or her brother, if one ignored her coloration or his age. The scenery was exactly the kind of thing she had come to expect, with moles chasing each other upside down on the ceiling, with the pool in the background singing some low-key opera and the general air of madness emanating from Discord’s direction. She had even picked up the smell of blood. She dared not think of its provenance.
In her heart, Twilight felt something weaken as fire started to pour in her veins.
The draconequus’ yellow eyes narrowed with malicious glee. With a deliberate slowness, he stretched one of his arm, longer and longer, until it was literally in her face. Then, and only then, did he snapped his fingers, and suddenly, she was more than a hundred meters away from her brother and her sister-in-law.
“NO!” Twilight yelled, looking more and more disheveled, as she realized they could not even hear her.
Apart from the distant shouts that were too indistinct to understand, the former princess of love caught only the noise of mastication, of irregular teeth crunching and crushing popcorn. She shot a venomous look at the draconequus, who happily waved back from the top of his Zamboni, but did nothing more.
To him.
Looking down on the whimpering foal at her hooves, her expression once more turned to pure hatred. However, just as she seemed ready to clench her thirst for violence, she picked up a chirping noise. Puzzled, she paused long enough to catch sight of the threat and threw herself backward. A bolt of purple lightning flew inches away from her face.
“Get away from him!”
The corrupted princess raised her hoof again, ignoring the impotent cries of rage from the captive, but stopped short of another hit the next second.
It wasn’t for lack of trying though, as her legs were entwined by purples streams of magic. Shocked by this phenomenon, green light suddenly reflected against the corner of her eyes, Cadence turned toward the cage that was drastically closer than before. The sight inside had her stepping back cautiously.
Under the stunned gazes of two ponies and one pleased Spirit of Chaos, waves of oozing green magic started to leak through the bars of her prison. In the midst of the evil light, the lone figure of Twilight Sparkle was obscured by shadows.
‘Now we’re getting somewhere,’ the draconequus thought, his claws tented together and his mouth twisting into a pleased smile.
You’re curious, aren’t you? But this is not something anypony gets to know.
You don’t care? Fine, but do not complain you were not warned.
Rarity was sitting to her right, Fluttershy to her left, and she was having the time of her life.
“The tea was delightful, Twilight,” her fashion obsessed friend said lightly.
Of course, she was amongst the first to agree. Then, the rest of her friends nodded and added their own interpretation of the preparation they had been given. Hers was particularly eloquent and flattering.
Twilight’s cheek had turned dark purple instantly, while her lips stretched into a very pleased smile. The compliments had touched her.
She didn’t suspect the truth. Not everypony had been very sincere. Perhaps Rarity and Pinkie had truly liked it, but the rests… hadn’t wanted to hurt her feelings.
Starting from her. She absolutely couldn’t stomach the stuff.
“I loved it, really. You think you could give me the recipe for my grandmother’s midday snack? It would do wonder for her rheumatism,” she said pleasantly, taking another sip of the beverage.
It made her sick. She was more of a cider gal. The last guy that had tried to take her cider away had gotten hit with a saddlebag.
But she wasn’t about to tell her friends that. The world was going on fine as it was. Discord was gone, Ponyville was back to normal, her family was safe and sound again. So what if she had to hold her tongue once in a while?
She could do that. It wasn’t a big sacrifice, right? Watching her friends chatter over tea was fun, she would not rather be outside and do things less froufrou-ey.
Her name was Applejack. And she was still the bearer of the Element of Honesty, darn it!
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The fun part is how I can be completely confused and still enjoy it.
FINALLY!
3475979 It's a rare crack fic property. Hope it'll stay that way for you.
3476103 Yup. Did you at least enjoy it?
3476449 Does this mean you'll be updating more frequently?
"Are you seriously going to keep ignoring this warning? Of course you are, my little humans, you never really cared much for warnings, did you?"
What? I have read it every time. I thought this was being distributed legally.
3476486 I'll try
3476529 Oh, excuses, excuses... they won't help you when they find you.
I'm confused but I trust the author…
… to confuse me more
The more I read, the more worried I become since everything is making more sense.
Yay! Thank you for the update.
I haven't gotten around to reading this yet but could you mark it as a sequel to Ten Trips using the recently-implemented sequel marking system?
I generally prefer to only "Read It Later" the earliest thing in a series that I have yet to read (so the list shows only stuff I can read immediately) and Ten Trips is still on my TODO list.
(I'm worried that, when I finish Ten Trips, I won't remember that this is a sequel to it.)
3923836 There's a sequel marking system?
Hum... okay, I don't mind, but I don't know how to use it.
3924815
There's a new field just below "Title" in the story editor called "Prequel Story ID" and, if you fill it in, this story will show up in a special "Sequels" block in the sidebar when people look at Ten Trips.
It's explained (with screenshots) in this announcement (just scroll past the part about tagged blog posts).
Man... It's been half a year... When are you going to update?
Just caught up with this story and love it!
I do hope to hear something about the story soon, I'm shocked it hasn't had more chapters added.
Well, if it's true, it's true.
Ooh! She finds him cute? Shipping ahead?
I was actually going to follow it the first time, just to be random, but then I remembered the author isn't omniscient and therefore wouldn't appreciate the joke.
What the heck pinkie pie.
I admit nothing.
Meh. I'm a rebel.