Ponies cried out in agony, their essences tearing away from themselves. It can't have been pleasant to see a piece of yourself taken away from you like a sticker off of a wall.
"Oh, Celestia, no! Please, stop!"
Others cried out in fear as lives were changed, destinies rewritten, and fates overtaken.
"Why are you doing this?!"
She couldn't bother to silence them. Even if she were able, why do so? She deserved to hear their screams. Longed to suffer for the torment she delivered. After all, she was stealing their livelihood. Their proof of living. Their entire destinies.
This was Her life. Forcibly changing fates had become her duty. Her task in the name of Equestria. Her constant sin for a higher purpose. ssSome would say Her efforts were for the good of secrecy, peace, and safety. However, She couldn't help feeling a sense of detachment towards what were originally her passions. The organization paid her well, kept her safe, and even gave her a home.At the same time, however, She wasn't allowed to leave. Her abilities let out into the world would be a danger in and of itself, so why risk it?Why give a mare that originally desired a life none to call her own?
Why unleash her abilities into an otherwise satisfied populace?
Her life had seemed completely laid out for her, and it all looked so good on paper. That was before the Organization truly understood what she was capable of. Suddenly, she wasn't a pony to be used to help keep spies a secret. To them, she was nothing more than a tool. A thing to use for their own purposes. As a result, more ponies were supplied to her, more testing funded. She was now one of their more valuable assets, and they intended to use her, and keep her. What free will she once had evaporated within a day, and now She was a prisoner of War.
So she stayed, forcibly, in the hands of the most secretive organization in Equestrian history. A network of spies, keeping the peace behind the scenes. And She was their puppet, providing them with a more substantial means of hiding identities. After all, makeup can only do so much to change a mirror into your soul.
She was found to be the only being capable of performing this feat of magical ability. She alone could keep the network of spies that much more secret. With a price. The marks had to come from somewhere, after all, and the cries of outrage, pain, and fear were a testament to that. They had gotten to the point of appearing in her dreams, begging for their destinies to be returned to them.
She declined every time, saying it was for the good of Equestria. Every time, she received the same response: "How?"
She loathed her lot in life. Why Her? Why must She be destined to continue this task that the world had delivered unto her? It became so that She began to hate the very idea of "destiny." She desired a Land without Luck. A Plain Without Providence. Most of all, she wanted a chance for freedom.
One day, She saw her chance.
Battle cries echoed throughout the facility, on that fateful day. A shadow befitting that of giants loomed over dozens. A Bee-Bear, they called it. Lives were thrown away, and Equestria’s dark secret had finally been uncovered and destroyed, with the unexpected escape of a single creature. Not a single pony could have seen it coming.
Celestia denied any accountability, and hundreds were left without homes and jobs. More still left without lives to live. The network of spies that had tried so hard to keep their secrecy was now wide in the open, and they shriveled underneath the scrutiny of the populace.
She used that opportunity to flee. Far to the east she fled, to the farthest desert. It was there she stopped, and began to think. For a pony with mental damage, thinking is never a worthwhile idea.
All of that time, changing marks, rerouting the course of life as all ponies knew it. She had changed the lives of many, mostly for the worse. Now, countless ponies live with a changed destiny. A changed destiny She could no longer change.
She used to be in such control, and now she has to fail when the "wonderful land of Equestria" needed her most.
The thought sickened Her, caused her hatred of Destiny to grow, unbridled, until she let out a guttural scream of agony. All the lives she ruined, the lives she destroyed, the lives she lost.
And so many others that could be saved.
With wide eyes and a crazed smile on Her face, her sanity finally shattered. As the crazed realization hit, she realized there was more she could still do. Her life of rewriting the assorted fates of Equestria had come to an end, was her first thought.
Then, as Her mind further contorted, She realized that Her task was far from over. There were most likely many that still suffered from the curse that is Destiny. She herself had once thought that the retched place that HAD been her home was once her destiny, and She had managed to escape. There had to be others that were subjected to the same torment.She was truly the only one that could save them. She alone that could change destiny. She alone that could rewrite the fates of many. She alone that could alter the fate of Equestria itself.
For Starlight Glimmer, this had been the beginning. A new life, a new destiny, and a new chance. Her life in hiding had, for a very brief time, been over, but why stop there? Starlight had been kept in secret for so long that she had become accustomed to it. Throwing herself out in the open seemed like a risky plan, anyway. There was so much revenge to be served, and so many more lives to change. Why ruin that with the first few radicals to throw themselves against her? This way, at least, she could cultivate her new plan in secret.
She had a knack for twisting fate, so maybe it was time for a more fundamental alteration?
In all honesty, it wasn't really a staff. It was just a random stick she found in the desert she now called home, but it at least looked like a staff. Thinking of the uses of such an item, including the possibilities of enchantments, Starlight stowed the staff away for further examination. Finding nothing more interesting in the bare expanse of the desert, she returned to what was to be her new home.
After about a week of hard work, Starlight Glimmer managed to build a respectable house. That is, she contracted a few hapless ponies into building one for her. It was a lone house in the middle of scenic nowhere, but it will most certainly suit her needs. She even threw in a small magical garden to keep herself fed. It was offered to her based on where she was staying, and she would have been insane to say no. That is, more insane than she probably was at that point.
A burly brown pony with a grey mane was the first to speak. "Sorry, what was that? Get rid of our cutie marks? Why the flank would we want to do that?" He looked to his own cutie mark, an image of a jackhammer cracking into the ground. He then moved closer to look at Starlight's own cutie mark. "How do we even know it's possible? You still have your cutie mark."
Starlight couldn't help but roll her eyes. Of course she still had her cutie mark, she couldn't perform the oh-so-needed spell without it. If anything, she would have gladly gotten rid of it if any prior attempts had succeeded. "Trust me. If I could, I would gladly be rid of this cutie mark, but-"
"But nothing. If you can't even remove your own cutie mark, then no deal. I'm fine with my destiny, thank you very much." The construction pony crossed his hooves in stubborn indignation.
Resisting the urge to facehoof, Starlight had enough. "Fine, be that way. You all can go, then. I didn't need any of you, anyway." With that, the construction ponies left. At least, not without Starlight wiping their immediate memories. Working in that secret organization had taught her a few required and necessary memory spells, which she gladly used on the ignorant construction ponies. After all, she couldn't have anyone finding her location, yet. Oh well, Starlight thought. At least she had a home, now; as far away from that retched facility as possible, no less.
Still, the worker had a point. What good was her cause if she couldn't even be rid of her own destiny? Perhaps her entire cause was a farce she tricked herself into believing? In a fit of brief rage, Starlight threw her saddlebag to the ground in front of her new house. Her entire life led up to this? A few hapless ponies breaking her? A new life that grew absolutely no fruit?
A clatter of wood caused her ears to perk up. Turning her head to the sound, she saw a stick. The very stick that she picked up from the desert earlier that day.
"No," she corrected herself audibly. "This isn't just a piece of wood." Picking the stick up in her magic, Starlight turned and twisted the staff around to further examine it. A smile encroached itself upon her face, which then grew into a sneer, and then a maniacal grin. From the back of her mind, she recalled a particular piece of history she learned back in magic school. A very specific individual that was famous for one fact.
"I do believe I have found one of the Powerful Mage Meadowbrook's '9' enchanted items." With a dark chuckle, Starlight rubbed her hooves together in anticipation.
After the Implementation of many enchantments, including "magic amplification," the time had come for Starlight Glimmer to test her new magical item: the Destiny Removal Staff. The name needed a bit of work, and was definitely a mouth full, but that was a work in progress. Of course, the staff was nothing more than a simple piece of wood, and would continue to be nothing more extraordinary than that. However, the staff now acted as a conduit for her spells (along with a few illusion spells). She could, in theory, make any of her spells appear to flow from the staff instead of herself.
She only needed one spell to use the staff for, however: The cutie mark removal spell. The spell she had spent what felt like years torturing other ponies with. All in the name of secrecy and safety. Now, the spell had a new purpose. An admittedly more benevolent purpose: The removal of the chains of destiny from Equestria. No more cutie marks tying anypony down. The world would soon be free of fixated fates, and ponies could be anything they truly wanted to be.
As Starlight Glimmer thought once more about her new-found goal, she traveled north towards the nearby mountains. With her new staff in tow, some testing was now desired. Even though there were no ponies for miles around, that didn't mean she couldn't test her new Conduit Staff using other spells.
Starlight gave a pause at that thought, stopping on a small patch of snow that seemed to become more common the higher up the mountain she climbed. Conduit Staff, she thought. That was actually a better name than the on-the-nose name that was "Destiny Removal Staff." Starlight continued walking while thinking of the new possibilities. Conduit staff, however, sounded far more suspicious. She of course wasn't passing it off as a conduit for spells. The final goal was to find a way to hide her cutie mark and make the staff appear to do all the work. That in and of itself would take a lot of work. Perhaps she could head out to Fillydelphia and find a solution there? She had once heard of a store that sold an interesting one-of-a-kind powder.
"Woah, watch out, Lady!" A voice broke Starlight out of her thoughts far too late, as she looked up in time only to see a snow white figure careening towards her. She had no time to react before she suddenly felt pain. Oh, so much pain. There's nothing quite like the pain of being knocked into the air by a random figure.
The ground came flying towards her; or rather, she came flying towards it. Then, everything went black.
A feeling of warmth woke Starlight from her impromptu slumber. As she stirred, Starlight noticed a few pressing details immediately. For starters, she was laying on her back for some reason. Secondly, there was some kind of cave ceiling above her, judging by the stalactites above. Third, and most important, was the piercing headache.
"Woah, careful, there. That was a pretty gnarly fall, and you bumped your head something nasty." A voice. From somewhere to her left, from the sound of it. Seems that there was a cave wall to her right, anyhow.
Starlight Glimmer rolled onto her side to get a better look at her new acquaintance. What she saw was... nothing special, really. A white earth pony stallion with some weird haircut and an even weirder hat. The very look of this pony called back to her filly days, where "skater stallions" were immensely popular. From the bits and pieces of his dialogue that she caught, his vocabulary did nothing more than confirm this.
A sudden spike of pain cracked through Starlight's skull, calling an end to over analyzing somepony's personality and choice of aesthetics. "Ugh, what do you mean 'bumped your head?' It feels like I got run over by a train!" As what felt like more cracks spread through her skull, Starlight put a hoof to her forehead. Tenderly, she checked her horn. With a few pokes and prods, Starlight deemed her horn safe and thankfully untouched.
That did nothing to stop the pain in her skull, and the skater stallion grew a look of concern as she winced in pain. The stallion rushed over to Starlight and held something up to her mouth. A cup of some sort, by the looks of it.
"Here, drink this. It'll help you ride the wave of pain." the skater stallion spoke in more drawl as he held the cup of what now seemed to be some kind of liquid up to Starlight's muzzle.
After several years of working with an agency filled with spies, Starlight couldn't help but feel at least a tad on the side of caution. Reluctantly, she pushed the unknown brew away from her. "And just why should I trust you? I literally just met you, and I'm about 95% sure that you're the one that ran into me in the first place, aren't you?" It was unmistakable. A memory or two flew to her mind, remembering a coat of pure white. The very same coat that this stallion had. She had absolutely no reason to trust him, or anything he gave her. With stern determination, Starlight turned her muzzle away from her attacker, and even inched away a foot or so. Although the minimal effort it took to make such an action caused more pain on her end, she couldn't help but feel such distrust towards this pony she didn't even know.
The stallion in question then asked, "Well, I didn't leave you there, did I?"
Surprised by this question, Starlight couldn't help but ask, "Come again?"
"Well, if I really wanted to hurt you, I could have just left you out there, couldn't I? There are lots of wolves in these mountains, and any one of them could have picked you off within minutes for a fast meal." He looked out towards the cave entrance with a look of indignation. "Not to mention it's starting to snow, again. You would have frozen to death in, like, an hour. I couldn't have just left you to die."
Starlight soon found the stallion to be closer, once more, with the cup held up to her muzzle once more. Worse still, the stallion was quick enough to begin holding the back of Starlight's head with his free hoof, as if guiding and instructing her to drink the brew.
On the one hand, he had a point. If he wanted Starlight dead, she would be dead already. She still felt weak from the apparent accident, and it didn't seem like he was taking no for an answer. Not to mention that, now that she had gotten a stray whiff, the concoction did smell pretty good right now.
Caution took the reins again, however, and Starlight found herself begrudgingly pushing away the drink once more. "Well still, how do I know you're not trying to drug me? I don't even know your name, for crying out loud, how am I supposed to trust a word you say?"
"Couldn't I have drugged you in your sleep or something, then?"
Drat, he had another point. Her brain wasn't firing on all cylinders, it seemed. The fall must have caused a concussion of some sort. Once again, the unknown stallion pushed the cup to her muzzle. Another spike in her skull, and without many more options, Starlight began to drink the brew.
As Starlight emptied the cup, a look of relief made an appearance on the stallion's face. It seemed as if he was genuinely glad that you were doing as he said, and as a result, became more relaxed. "There we go. You should be feeling better in no time, trust me. I drink that stuff all the time whenever I wipe out. Name's Double Diamond, by the way, sorry for not mentioning it sooner."
A rather random time to trade names, but the combination of the warm brew and the now relaxed atmosphere caused Starlight Glimmer to become relaxed as well. As a result, she couldn't help but return the favor. Even her headache was beginning to go away, which did wonders for Starlight's mood and demeanor.
"Well, Double Diamond, I suppose we're even. My name is Starlight Glimmer."
Good News: Starlight hadn't, in fact, been drugged. In retrospect, it seemed a tad on the side of paranoia that she thought a pony who had saved her life would do such a thing, anyway. Besides that, Double Diamond had been a rather gracious host to his... cave. After a second scan throughout the cavern in which she was staying, it seemed that there were a few lines of shelving, and even a bed, to suggest that Double Diamond did indeed live here. The cave seemed to open up deeper in, so perhaps there was even more to be seen inside.
"If you don't mind my asking," Starlight tentatively began, as she lay down in front of the warm campfire between them. "Why are you living in a cave, of all things?"
Double was quick to respond. "I was wondering when you'd ask." He made a show of waving his hoof across the span of his home. "This is probably the best place I could've gotten for my hobby."
"Hobby?"
"Yep." Double turned so that his flank was facing towards Starlight, so she got a good view of his cutie mark. What she saw was three blue snowflakes. Obviously, it must have meant he was good with snow weather? Although, starlight thought, that would be strange considering he wasn't a pegasus. There's no way an earth pony could have a talent such as that.
"I'm sorry, but I don't quite understand. Your talent has to do with snow, that I can see, but you're not a pegasus, so you can't even move clouds around or do anything with the weather.
Double rolled his eyes and looked away. "Yeah, I figured that's what you'd think." He walked over to a case that sat at the foot of his bed, opened it, and came back with what appeared to be two planks of wood with boots attached to them. Once again, starlight was confused. Basic assumptions told Starlight that these objects had something to do with snow, but she had no prior experience with the subject. Considering they had boots attached, perhaps they were a special brand of equipment made for wearing on the hooves. Come to think of it, Starlight had the feeling that she may have seen a few ponies wearing this kind of equipment when seeing other agents prepare for certain missions.
She shook her head. Random assumptions were getting her nowhere. "I'm sorry, I still don't get it. Is that some kind of snow equipment?"
The only answer she got at first was a stupefied expression. "You mean you've never heard of skis before?"
"When you put it like that, I suppose I never have. If you could inform me as to what skis are, that would be appreciated so as to save us more awkward silences."
Double looked at her for a moment, then put his skis down before scratching the back of his head in thought. "Uh, well, I guess you could say they're kind of used for a kind of sport, I guess? You put them on, and you slide on the snow using them."
Ah. That explained quite a bit, actually. "So you're saying your talent has to do with using skis?"
"Yep, pretty much." Double stuck out his chest in pride. "I'm one of the best skiers in equestria!" A pause followed, and he began to look a bit embarrassed. "Well, at least I think I am. I've never actually been in any competitions. These mountain zones are great for practice, though, so I set up this cave to be like a second home." He looked around at the place with a sheepish look. "It's not exactly the most comfortable place, but it's not that bad once you get used to it."
Something about that seems a bit suspicious, Starlight thought. "If you're one of the best skiers in equestria, then why not compete?" then, a look of grief flashed across Double's face, and he visibly winced. Catching this, Starlight decided to press him a bit more. "You can tell me if you want, i'm just curious."
With a sigh, Double looked up with a sorrowful expression. "I used to want to, really, but... not anymore."
"Why not? Don't you enjoy the sport?"
"Yeah, of course I do." Double looked to Starlight with a straight expression. "It's the ponies I compete against that I don't like."
There, Starlight thought. An opening I can use. One mustn't think Starlight wasn't a tactical pony. Double Diamond could be of some use to her goals, and this seemed like an esteemed opportunity. "What do you mean? Whatever could have happened to cause you to dislike the joys and thrills of competition?" Starlight made sure to fill the words with as much sympathy as she could allow, even throwing in a few sympathizing gestures.
"I-I don't know. It's not something I really like to talk about." Double rubbed a leg, as if reliving an old ache.
No! Starlight thought. I can't lose this opportunity to gain some leverage! "I swear, you can tell me anything! I'll understand, I promise!" Starlight made a big show of almost pleading to Double, and went up to him to hold his head in her hooves so that he was sure to be looking at her. "I mean it as a friend. I am your friend now, aren't I?"
Double's eyes went wide as she finished the statement. "Friend? Really?"
"Yes, really." Starlight poured as much sympathy into her facial expression as possible. "You did save my life, so maybe I can help you somehow in return."
Double's eyes shifted from side to side, lost in thought. For a moment, however, his eyes found Starlight's, and a small smile found its way onto his face. He spoke once again. "Alright, I'll tell you. Only because you're my friend now, and I feel like I can trust you."
Starlight allowed herself a smile of satisfaction.Excellent. That was a lot easier than I thought. Starlight went back to her side of the fire, thoughts of victory filling her mind. Hopefully I'll be able to use this story to my advantage. Her new short-term goal of convincing Double to join her cause was now in action.
Both ponies settled down on opposite sides of the warm fire, and Double Diamond began his story.
