Chapter Eight: Sins of Our Past
Scarlet Rose
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“They shoot now!” I cried, shaking behind a metal crate as sparks flew in every direction. “Luna's bloody flank, why do they shoot now?!”
After Midnight’s carelessness led to the beginning of our demise, a wave of protectrons suddenly marched out of a hidden panel in the wall. Unlike last time however, these tin cans were armed with laser weapons shooting from their horns.
Blinding beams of red shot around us like some kind of deadly dance party. Every impact from the lasers dug deep pock marks in the metal crates and flooring around us, showering us with molten metal and sparks.
Midnight had dove behind a crate on the other side of the room from myself and Aurora. Our biggest problem was that the only gun we had belonged to that stupid colt.
Midnight’s hunting rifle roared in the metal room, sparking harmlessly off of the much thicker armor of these improved robots.
“Aim for their combat chips!” Aurora yelled over the hail of laser blasts.
“The buck is a ‘combat chip?’” Midnight ducked down and racked his bolt.
Aurora face-hoofed and stretched out his foreleg, “Just, toss me the gun!”
“No, I’ve got this!” Midnight peeked up and aimed at the closest protectron.
He shot at its glass-topped head, rupturing the circuitry and shutting it down. The protectron crumpled over but another one casually walked over the heap of metal. There had to be at least ten of them.
“You won’t have enough bullets to kill all the buggers, give me the bloody gun!” Aurora hollered, ducking as a laser almost took his hoof off.
“But-” Midnight clutched his rifle to his chest.
“Give it to him Luna-dammit!” I screeched.
Midnight sighed and tucked the rifle in his pegasus wing, he crouched and flung it across the room. The gun clattered and slid at Aurora’s hooves.
The experienced guard quickly snatched it up and galloped behind a line of crates, getting behind the lead protectron. He slammed into a crate and braced the rifle on top of it, aiming carefully before biting on the firing bit.
The rifle round smacked into the back of the protectron, causing the robot to stumble but remain standing. The glass dome on top of its fake-pony-head flashed from white to red and it suddenly turned around, doubling its rate of fire and shooting at the remaining robots.
The laser beams sparked off of the armor of the other protectrons but the overwhelming fire began to do much more damage than anything we could have, tearing limbs or cutting important wires of its comrades. The other robots didn't seem to notice one of their own was even shooting them, they were probably programmed to only shoot certain targets.
Soon, the rogue protectron had mowed down the entire robot squad and stood alone, spinning in place and blasting every corner of the room with careless fire. The metal horn on its head was glowing nearly white-hot from the intensity of its attacks.
The glass dome on top of its head suddenly ruptured, toppling the final robo-pony over. Its white eyes flickered off with a high-pitched whine as its red-hot horn sizzled in a pool of oil. Aurora had waited until the last moment to finally put it down.
“Combat chips, lad,” Aurora ejected a shell from the rifle and crossed over the pile of smoldering robot corpses, “are how you deal with anything made by Robronco.”
Midnight took the rifle from Aurora and nodded. I gulped as I noticed the bolt was open. It was empty. We were completely out of ammunition, not to mention Midnight lost his pistol earlier too.
“Well, now what?” Midnight slung the gun over his shoulder. “I can try hacking into the-”
“No,” I smacked his shoulder, “you’re not touching any more computers.”
Aurora hummed and began searching among the weapon crates around us, “Water, water, everywhere, yet not a drop to drink.”
He paused and back peddled, wiping a hoof along the dusty label on one of them. It read ‘Flash Industries, Hoofington Equestria.”
“Now we’re talking. Com’ere lad, I need your young muscles,” Aurora tapped the crate with a wingtip.
The two stallions braced behind the steel crate and shoved it off the bottom shelf of the rack. I took a step back as It landed on the floor with a cloud of dust. The contents made a metallic rattle.
“What’s Flash Industries?” I sat down, watching Aurora fiddle with the lock on the crate.
“Another bastard company,” he sat back and sighed, “Hoofington was the magic tech hub of Equestria before our Zebra friends decided it needed to become a crater. But right now, they may be our saving grace. You mind if I borrow that bobby pin, lass?”
I tilted my head and grabbed the pin out of my mane. The red hair fell across my face and I blew it aside, “What for?”
“It’s a miracle you foals made it this far out here,” Aurora sighed as he took the pin in his mouth. “Pay attention now because I only teach this free of charge once,” he winked.
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I aimed down the sights of the laser rifle. It was bulky, almost too much for me to hold without reaching a wing out and supporting it.
The crate contained a whole stack of these things. I never saw laser weapons before and frankly, I wasn’t impressed. They were closer to fragile computers than the mechanical marvels of traditional firearms. But, I guess it would get the job done.
Apparently these things used raw magic crystals and condensed them into bursts of laser energy. The ammo was rare but really efficient if you ever found any. I didn’t know all the details though, that’s unicorn stuff.
Aurora showed us how the protectrons each had a crystal stored in that glass dome in their heads. We could take them and load it into our rifles, effectively giving us hundreds of shots before needing to reload.
What was more important though, is those crystals could power all sorts of things, including the cargo lift. If you had a hoof for magic tech.
“So what makes you so good with all this kinda stuff?” Midnight asked as he pointed his rifle at invisible targets around the room.
Aurora was on his back, tinkering with the controls of the cargo lift. “My wife’s a unicorn, if you'd believe it. Only one in town,” he grunted and grabbed a magic crystal and some wiring from a dismantled rifle, shoving them into something beneath the controls. “She’s our resident scientist for any pre-war tech we get to before the Steel Rangers do. I learned a thing or two from her.”
I smiled down at him, “Who is she? I’m glad you two could get married, despite everything.”
Aurora closed the panel and rolled out from beneath the control system, “Amber Night, fitting for a mare who’d fall for a bat, eh? I’ll introduce you to her when we get back.” He slapped a button on the control panel and the lift cage rolled open.
“In ya’ go now,” he gestured with his wing.
Midnight and I stepped aboard, careful to avoid the puddle of Taint that trailed off the side. The cargo cage rolled back shut.
“Wait! What about you?” I hit the cage with a hoof.
“I’ll meet you topside,” Aurora pressed the lift button and we jerked upward. “Somepony’s gotta get rid of the Taint and purge the water system.”
“But we could help-” I was cut off as a wall of concrete filled my vision through the metal mesh.
I looked at Midnight worriedly.
“He’ll be fine,” he waved a wing, “he can obviously take care of himself better than we can.”
The lift ascended at an agonizing pace. Only the light from the slowly approaching door above us gave us an idea of where we were. I flinched as the cables groaned and popped along their ancient rusted spools. I’d much rather fly than use some stupid lift in a cage.
Soon, the lift rolled up to the top level and a pathetic bell rang twice before giving up, letting us know we reached our destination. Through the metal cage, I could see we were back at the warehouse. The flickering fluorescent lights illuminated another loading dock.
“Mr. Bubblegum may still be around,” Midnight lifted his laser rifle as the cage rolled open, “look alive.”
I gulped and tried to lift my own. The heavy rifle was too unwieldy for my taste.
We slowly trotted out of the lift. Pointing our new weapons at every corner as we made our way into the massive empty room. Like the main dock, this one was filled with empty shelves and destroyed crates. Clearly these outer areas were picked clean by looters centuries ago.
A low groan rumbled beside me and I jumped, pointing my gun at one of the closed loading doors. I breathed a sigh of relief, it was just the wind outside.
“B-Birdie came back?” a slimy voice echoed across the warehouse.
Midnight and I both yelled in surprise and faced the opposite wall. The disgusting lump of flesh that was ‘Mr. Bubblegum’ slithered out of a hole from the ceiling, flopping down on a catwalk with a meaty slap. His tentacles writhed around him as he pulled himself across the rickety metal walkway that passed overhead.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Midnight groaned and aimed up at the undulating mass. “Hey, ugly, obviously you’re smart enough to talk, so do you mind just letting us slip by?”
My legs began to shake as I watched the creature slowly approach our position. I steeled my nerves and took a slow breath. I wasn’t going to freeze. We were either gonna shoot this poor bloke or walk out in peace.
“Hah… Birdie, f-friend.” Mr. Bubblegum slipped his way directly above us. His deformed and slick body drooped partially through the metal grating. “H-help us, friend.”
“‘Help?’” I coughed, catching the stench of his rotting flesh. “After what you did to us?”
“Bat friend,” it said slowly, “Birdie friend… Help us. End us. End… this.”
I furrowed my brow as I heard that. The creature was breathing heavily, two of its tentacles acting like forelegs as it gestured to itself.
“You want us to – kill you?” I lowered my gun.
“E-end… us. End. This.” Mr. Bubblebum repeated without any change of vocal inflection.
The mound of flesh suddenly launched itself over the railing. Midnight and I both yelped in surprise and I fluttered my wings, flapping off to the side as Mr. Bubblegum splattered onto the ground at our hooves.
The mound of meat slowly crawled itself back together, rearranging itself into a similar, but different form. The tumor-ridden head was now in a new location, the withered legs sprawled out in a star pattern around it. I took a timid step back as one of its milky eyes looked at me. I could almost see the pain behind its dead expression.
“I-I cannot,” its body-mouth said solemnly. “I cannot… end us.”
I felt my heart drop as I realized what this creature was trying to tell us. It was invincible. Or, close to it. Despite falling nearly two stories, this mound of flesh didn’t die. Nor did bullets do any measurable damage. It had no say if it wanted to live or not. Luna knew how long this thing had been around, aimlessly wandering the halls of this warehouse. It was a sentence worse than death.
I flinched as a tentacle gently raised in the air. The tip of the fleshy appendage touched the barrel of my laser rifle.
“This.” it took a labored breath. “This. Destroys… molecules.”
Midnight gave me a sidelong glance. He was pointing his rifle at Mr. Bubblegum the whole time. “What’s he trying to tell us?”
“He wants to die.” I said slowly. “He can’t do it himself. But, maybe these guns can?”
Mr. Bubblegum gently pressed the barrel of my laser rifle against its head. I quivered at the thought of how certain this poor thing was. I tried to let go of the firing bit, but felt a tentacle tap on the barrel again.
“Friend,” it said slowly, the hole in the middle of its body opened and closed as it articulated its words somehow, “showed us… showed me, life. From before.”
A tentacle reached into its mouth-body and pulled out a large wad of partially chewed bubblebum. It delicately placed the slobbery piece of gum on top of my rifle.
“Are you sure?” I almost whispered. I couldn’t believe I felt pity for such a vicious creature. But, how couldn’t I?
“P-Please” Mr. Bubblegum’s white eyes stared at me.
I looked at midnight around the grip on my firing bit. He lowered his gun, watching me with a concerned expression.
I nervously looked into the eyes of the creature before me. He stared back, his unfazed eyes hiding a mixture of pain and desperation.
“Why?” I whispered, staring into his gaze.
“T-too long. We… I hurt too many,” he replied slowly, “Want to go… Home. Home before bombs.” He pressed the barrel of the gun harder against his head and closed his eyes. “Been r-ready… Too long. Please.”
I felt my jaw tighten as I stared down the barrel of my weapon. This was a mercy kill. It was different. I wasn’t hurting anypony. I had to do the right thing, no matter how much I felt he didn’t deserve this after what he did to ponies… Or how much my heart ached at the thought of what good he probably did deserve before becoming this abomination.
Regardless of what I felt; I wouldn’t let myself freeze this time, not for my sake, but for his sake.
I bit on the trigger.
A percussive blast shot from the barrel of my gun, momentarily blinding me as a flash of red zapped the flesh that was pressed directly against the focus-point of the energy weapon. Mr. Bubblegum’s body lurched backwards from the magical impact but suddenly began to glow like an ember. Its body quickly disintegrated, crumbling to ash as a wave of magical energy overcame it.
I stared wide eyed, watching the pile of ash spread across the concrete at my hooves. Its entire fleshy body had completely cremated. I had no idea how powerful these weapons were. I dropped the gun and let it clatter on the floor. The world blurred as I felt tears well in my eyes.
I sat down and began to cry.
“Scar,” Midnight slowly approached me, “hey, Scar, it’s okay,” he wrapped a wing around my shoulder.
I leaned my forehead against him as I stared at the cracked concrete below. His gesture helped more than I cared to admit, but I still kicked myself internally for how ridiculous I was being.
“Why am I crying?” I coughed, “that thing was a mutant that tried to kill us.”
Midnight backed up and looked at me, “I know,” he said softly then looked down at the ashes, “it’s not sad because of what it was. But it’s sad because of who it was. He didn’t deserve this fate, but you helped him.”
I wiped a foreleg across my face and cleared my throat. I didn’t need to cry over something like this. This world sucked. It was awful. But this wasn’t the only thing so terrible. I picked up my laser rifle and watched as the wad of chewed gum fell atop the ashes.
Maybe his world wasn’t so bad before ours. Maybe that was why I felt the way I did. Ponies from before the war didn’t deserve any of this yet were dealt the worst cards of all.
“Let’s go,” I sat straighter and tucked my rifle around the strap of my carbine across my back. I tried to compose myself and began trotting toward the stairway of the catwalk. I needed to see what was upstairs.
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Midnight and I scoured the upper floors, gently flapping our wings as we tread around precarious holes in the floor. It wasn’t hard to find the ‘home’ of that creature, all we had to do was follow the slick lines of Luna-knows-what that coated the floors, leading to its nest.
We came upon a room that was completely filled to the brim with junk. Tables, terminals, picture frames, lunchboxes, all arranged in a way that almost enshrined the objects. The dimly lit room was a sort of organized chaos, with a table featuring stacked cups around an old radio, or a skeleton of a thestral propped up in a seat with a birthday hat on its skull. This was clearly the doings of Mr. Bubblegum as he remembered the life he had before his gruesome purgatory.
“Yup, this is creepy. Are we done now?” Midnight cringed from the doorway, watching me pick through the piles of rubbish.
“Not until I know his name,” I said flatly, scooping piles of refuse off of a table. “He’s got to have something around here.”
“Or not, it’s been two centuries, Scar,” Midnight deadpanned.
He suddenly sat down and fumbled his hooves as I tossed him his Tidus 11.
“See? Now this trip was worth it,” I spat, reeling from the questionable taste of the pistol grip. “Now shut your trap and help me give this bloke a proper send off.”
Midnight and I picked through the junk and eventually uncovered some things of note. We found a horseshoe box that easily contained twenty empty cartons of ‘Pony Pop Triple Bubble.’ Inside the box, a slip of faded paper had some kind of password and a small hoofwritten note that read: Save one for a rainy day~
I could only imagine the password was for that safe outside. Nestled in the bottom of the box, a faded and yellowed plastic ID card finally gave me what I was looking for.
At the top of the card was a picture of a smiling young stallion. He was an earth pony with a bright pink mane and a light blue coat. Apparently he was a security pony and had only been hired a few months before Tidus 77. He’d probably barely been in Transylvania a year before the world fell apart, maybe even traveled far from home and family for this job. Along the bottom, the words ‘Officer Bubble Pop’ were printed.
“Bubble Pop,” I stared at the ID card, “he was our age.”
Midnight inspected the card and pointed below it, “it’s got a barcode on it. Think we can access anything?”
I flipped the card over and nodded, “maybe the terminal downstairs. Come on, let’s go.”
I placed the card into the horseshoe box and tucked it under my wing. We carefully made our way back out of the room and across the perilous upper floors, eventually finding our way to the catwalk that led to the second loading dock below. I was curious to see if we could find the remains of the other Renaissance Guard that came with Aurora, but there wasn’t anything to be found.
We crossed the floor of the dock and I paused briefly at the remains of Bubble Pop. His ashes were scattered neatly across the floor. I set the box down and scooped some of the ashes in my wing, pouring them into the box and sealing it up again. Midnight looked like he was going to say something, but kept it to himself.
Midnight and I crossed another door from the dock back into the wandering halls of the ground floor offices, finally making our way back to the front security desk. The blue pegasus was about to sit at the computer before I shoved a foreleg in front of him.
“No more computers,” I gently pushed him back and sat before the old terminal. Midnight rolled his eyes and watched over my shoulder.
I looked along the bottom of the terminal and spotted a slot that looked about right. I carefully inserted the aged ID card and smiled as the computer beeped and a new screen appeared.
Ofc. Pop, IF security Badge ID BP-1176
The screen flashed back to its original layout and I queued the cursor down to the lines that contained the redacted information. I hit the enter key and read as new lines wrote across the screen.
I.M.P Delivery Received on 10/18/77
Client: Ministry of Arcane Sciences - Transylvanian Division
Courier: Ministry of Awesome
Below it, a few file logs were available to read. I selected each of them as I read:
FROM: Chief Rock Bottom
TO: Sgt. Nova
CC: Ofc. Bubble Pop
SUBJECT: Storage for Stable-Tec
“Nova, we’ve got another one of those glasses-pushers asking to bring this shipment downstairs. It's due for that new bat pony project they’ve been building out of Smokey Mountain. Apparently our FIREARMS warehouse is becoming a trash heap for every government goon in the area. Send the new guy to do it, I know he’s not cleared on the forklift yet but we can’t afford any of the experienced guards away from their posts since those terror attacks in Vanhoover last month.”
FROM: Mr. Turner
TO: All Employees
SUBJECT: Maintenance
“All, please be aware that our faucets and toilets will be out of order from 12pm to 5pm this afternoon as maintenance works on the pipes again. I don’t know how many times I have to say this, but FLUSHABLE wipes are NOT FLUSHABLE. Don’t believe everything you read on a package.”
I smirked at their issues and moved down the line:
FROM: Sgt. Nova
TO: Chief Rock Bottom
CC: Ofc. Bubble Pop
SUBJECT: Ofc. Pop
“Hey boss, the new guy’s been out sick for a week now. I told him he’s got to show up tomorrow or he better book the next train back to Appleoosa. Though I have to admit, it’s been nice not hearing the constant lip smacking in the guard shack recently.”
FROM: Mr. Turner
TO: Chief Rock Bottom
CC: Ofc. Bubble Pop
SUBJECT: What did you do?
“Rock. Meet me in my office immediately.”
I frowned and tried to queue further down the list. There weren’t any more entries after the last one.
“Bombs fell,” Midnight spoke over my shoulder.
“Yeah, I guess so.” I stood up and yanked the ID card out of the terminal and placed it back in the box. “I guess we know what happened to Bubble Pop afterall.”
“I wonder what they meant about Stable 17,” Midnight spoke behind me as he followed me out to the loading dock. “I mean, obviously they were delivering that Taint stuff, but look at what it does to ponies.”
“It’s called ‘I.M.P’, whatever that is,” I tilted my head. “It was from the Ministry of Arcane Sciences and was mishandled by poor Pop back there. It was just another chemical spill that went wrong. The Stable probably used it for fertilizer or whatever. It’s not like the Ministry wanted ponies to turn into mutants.”
I wanted to believe the words I said. So badly. Because truthfully it bothered me to no end imagining that our Stable had some sinister motive behind it. I pushed it to the back of my mind as we stepped over the cold metal carcasses of the protectrons in the main dock, walking back out to the loading ramp.
I led Midnight out into the frigid night and to the corner of the lot, where a pile of rubble from a collapsed wall was spread across the tarmac. I carefully set the horseshoe box down and began sorting through the pile of stones.
“What are you-”
“What do you think, Middy?” I sighed, collecting anything larger than my hoof, “I’m burying him.”
Midnight watched me for a moment and then began to sort through the stones too. Soon, we had enough to cover the box entirely as a miniature burial mound. It was a small gesture, but it was the least I could do for a pony who put his life in my hooves. It was my responsibility to see it through to the end.
I stood and brushed myself off with a wingtip. I looked at Midnight, his face contemplative as he stared at the mound as well. His mane was unkempt from everything that transpired tonight. I reached my wing up and brushed his black and red mane back from his face. He started and looked at me.
“Thank you,” I said softly. “I know, it’s ridiculous.”
“It isn’t,” he shook his head. He locked his golden eyes with mine, speaking with sincerity, “I understand.”
I looked up at him and smiled faintly.
“You lovebirds ready to head out?” the familiar voice of Aurora startled us both.
“Ahh!” I chirped, “We’re not–!”
“You really have to stop sneaking up on us like that,” Midnight interrupted. “Where were you?”
Aurora tightened his saddlebag and new laser rifle around his back. “I shut off the send line from the building. Nopony really uses tap water these days – not like we have any pressure – but it should keep the Taint from spreading.”
I sighed and regained my composure, “You mean the I.M.P?” I asked.
Aurora paused and looked at me, “I.M.P?”
“That’s what it’s called,” I shrugged, “we found out in one of those terminals. Nothing about where the other shipments are, though.”
“Right,” Aurora ran a hoof through his mane and looked at the moon. It was just barely peeking above the treeline that surrounded the buildings. “We should report back to Major Starline, mission accomplished. Mostly thanks to you two, but I knew you both were special from the moment I saw ya.”
I tilted my head at him. Did he really mean that, like everypony else being so surprised to see us back in Renaissance? Or was he just being a nice buck?
Aurora spread his wings and took off, hovering above us as he waited expectantly.
Midnight nervously shuffled his wings and looked back up the road, “I, uh, I think I’ll trot back.”
I felt a frown tug at my lips as I looked at Midnight’s new set of wings. He had a perfect thestral left wing and a perfect pegasus right wing. Yet together, they were nearly useless. Whatever mutation overcame him didn’t necessarily harm him, but just further drove the idea of him being half of each. It was like some kind of cruel joke.
“We’ll trot back together,” I pat Midnight’s shoulder reassuringly. “Maybe we can point out some flying tips?” I looked up at Aurora.
Aurora gazed up at the moon one more time and sighed heavily, landing on the pavement with soft hoof clops. “Fine, we’ll teach the lad how to fly like a bat.”
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“Nay laddie, your other wing!” Aurora shouted from above midnight.
“Don’t listen to him, lean into your feathered wing!” I shouted from below him.
Midnight flapped desperately and spiraled out of control, barely getting his hooves beneath him as he landed on the dirt path and galloped off the landing. His right wingtip, the feathered one, stalled that time. But, oh who’s gonna listen to the mare? Nopony apparently.
“You know what? Maybe I won’t use either wing,” Midnight groaned in frustration and trotted further ahead to blow off steam.
I leveled my wings and looked up at Aurora who flew above the forest. I rolled my eyes. This wasn’t going anywhere, especially if Aurora and I disagreed on everything.
“Just, let me handle this okay?” I cried up at him.
Aurora looked down at me and shrugged, climbing higher to the low hanging clouds that were gleaming with the setting moon.
We had spent the last few miles trying to get Midnight to take off and glide in a straight line. Foal stuff, really. But the poor buck couldn’t get his wings level. It was like he had to hold them at two different angles all of the time. That may not sound difficult but imagine trying to write your name forwards and backwards with both your hooves in opposite directions. It's sorta like that.
Thestral wings, and I imagine pegasus wings too, were built to work in tandem. It was like they were wired together in our brains or something. That meant that we always had equal and symmetrical control of the small things like edge angle and flapping in synchronization. Talented fliers figured out how to control those small things separately and could pull off some crazy acrobatics. Kinda like how everypony can trot but not everypony can dance. Unfortunately, the only way to get to that point was a lot of practice.
I spread my wings wide and let myself descend slowly, flapping as I leveled off at my usual height just above Midnight’s head.
“Middy, you’ve just gotta keep trying. It’ll click, I promise!” I tried to encourage him.
Midnight just huffed and kept looking along the path, “easy for you to say. I can’t do the one thing I was so good at doing. Do you know what that feels like?”
I drew my lips, I guess I didn’t really know. They always said that flying for a pegasus was more natural than even breathing. Rumors said they could even glide for miles along the air currents above the clouds while fast asleep. I couldn’t imagine the frustration he felt, but I wasn’t going to give up so easily.
“What if I hold your wingtip for you?” I flapped above him. “I know what the bat wing should do, you know what the bird wing should do. So we each focus on the things we know and we do it together.”
Midnight recoiled and looked up at me, “Hold my-... Scar, are you serious?”
I began to pet my mane absently. Like hoof-holding, flying wing in wing was pretty normal among… couples. It was an intimate gesture, I know, but it wasn’t like we were gonna be all over each other. I’d just be grabbing on and wrangling the dang thing! I just wanted to help!
Midnight sighed heavily and spread his wings, arching them over his back as he picked up speed, “Don’t drop me, okay?”
I looked at him in surprise but smiled, descending to just a few inches above the path and flapping my wings to stay in line with him.
Midnight galloped, spreading his wings to full extent and letting them fill with air. He quickly flapped them at the same time and I reached a hoof out, gently nudging the leading edge of his thestral wing to where I knew it needed to be for take-off.
“Okay now keep flapping,” I fluttered higher and flew directly above him, holding my hoof at the base of his thestral wing to keep the angle on course as he repeated the motion.
Midnight flapped and gained altitude, continuing to flap steadily as we rose a few hooves off the path and gained enough speed to fly at a proper pace.
Once fast enough, Midnight spread his wings to glide but immediately began to wobble again. I quickly banked left, lining up beside him and tipped his wing tip with my own as necessary to keep level flight. I was careful to only trim the wing up or down very subtly, letting him balance himself.
“Flap again, our wings are slower than feathered ones,” I reminded him as he began to rapidly lose altitude.
Midnight’s expression was completely focused as he flapped his left wing harder than his right to maintain level propulsion.
He began to climb higher and pick up speed again. I smiled as I glided beside him, only occasionally nudging his wing with my own as we flew tens of hooves above the path, nearly level with the forest canopy.
“Luna’s grace,” Aurora called from far above us, “did ya finally figure it out, lad?”
Midnight’s focus broke and he almost rolled completely over on his left wing but I quickly banked into him and laid his wing atop mine. We leveled off together, our wings supporting each other as we glided through the night.
I looked over at him and smiled brightly, “See! It’s working!”
Midnight took a moment to look back at me, his eyes softened and he finally broke into a smile in return. His wing felt nice as it was held on top of mine. I never flew like that with somepony before but I quickly understood why it was considered such a close thing to do. We depended on each other to stay aloft while our wings were essentially flying together as one between us.
He held his gaze a moment more, his tufted blue ears bent back and a hint of a blush fell on his features.
I felt my own face warm as he looked at me like that. I knew I said we wouldn’t, but we flew wing in wing together. The stars and moon around us almost made this a beautiful moment if we weren’t rapidly descending toward the forest again.
“Middy, flap!” I widened my eyes in realization and peeled my gaze from him.
Midnight blinked and looked forward. “Whoa, crap!” he shouted, banking away from me as we let a tree pass between us. We had flown clear into the forest.
I inverted my wingtips and rolled to the side, dodging another tree as we flew clear off a bend in the path. I fluttered and desperately looked for Midnight through the thick brush, I felt my heart quicken as I couldn’t see him at all.
“Midnight?” I cried into the forest, flaring my wings and hovering as I craned my ears to hear him.
I felt my ears perk as I heard… laughter?
I looked up and a streak of white light passed over the forest canopy. White light that trailed behind a blue pegabat flying gleefully above. Ethereal looking plumes of white embers glittered behind him and gently spiraled into the forest around me. I quickly climbed out of the forest canopy, hovering above the treeline and felt my jaw drop as I stared at him.
He was flying.
Just like I had seen him before, when he fended off the ghoul, he was being propelled by something that could only be described as ‘starlight’ itself. He flapped his wings and rolled, white streaks flaring from his feathers off his right and from the membrane tips off his left. If he wasn’t half pegasus already, I wouldn’t believe I’d ever see a thestral fly as gracefully or quickly as he was then.
I quickly flew after him, catching up as he banked in a circle, laughing in glee and flipping inverted.
“Scarlet! I’m flying!” he cried and flapped harder, flying vertically up towards the clouds.
“Yes, I can see that,” I huffed, flapping desperately to keep up, “now can you slow down please?!”
“I don’t think I can!” Midnight chuckled and pulled into a vertical loop.
I circled around and joined him on his dive back down, I wasn’t going nearly fast enough to do something like that. Heck, I didn’t think I could even if I wanted to. It’s not like we had enough room in the orchard back in the Stable to practice stuff like that.
“Holy Luna, I don’t even know how I did that!” Midnight flared his wings and slowed down slightly, finally giving me a break.
His wings were glowing along the leading edges, like some sort of magical aurora was wrapped around them. I would have been impressed but I was too distracted by the fact we kept flying higher and higher.
I nervously looked down at the ground. I never flew this high before in my life. And neither did he. We were already past the first layer of low hanging clouds.
“We should land,” I gulped and looked over at him, “I mean, I’m glad you’ve figured this out and all but this is kinda scary.”
“What?” Midnight looked down and his eyes widened, “Oh, wow.”
The light around Midnight’s wings suddenly winked out. He did a double take on either side and then looked at me, “Oh… wow.”
He began to wobble and I quickly banked over to support his left wing, but the air was thinner up here. My EFS happened to have a handy-dandy altimeter and right now, it was saying we were over five thousand hooves off the ground.
“Luna’s moon, mate,” I strained, trying to keep us level as we both flapped our outer wings against the air, “we need to descend. Now.”
Midnight and I slowly circled down, maintaining our glide as we held each other up. Eventually he was able to glide on his own and I separated from beside him, using my wingtip to correct him occasionally again.
Far below, I spotted Aurora sitting… on a cloud? We continued our spiral until we were within earshot.
“In all me days,” Aurora called up to us while he was quite literally laying on the cloud. “Never thought I’d see that.”
“Same could be said here,” Midnight strained as he fought to keep his wings level, “how’re you doing that?”
“Doing what?” Aurora leaned over the cloud as we descended past him.
Midnight and I shared a look, “Scar, do you think we can…?” he began.
An excited smile slowly crossed my lips, “let’s find out!”
We pushed together and climbed back up to Aurora. Already, Midnight was able to climb up with only the slightest little nudges here and there. He was definitely getting the hang of his new hardware.
We approached the edge of the cloud and I timidly reached a hoof out and tried to place weight on it. I yelped as I fell through and my vision was obscured by frigid droplets of water that clung to my fur and mane. I quickly flapped back up and grabbed Midnight, who had involuntarily begun to descend again.
“Lass, you’ve gotta will it,” Aurora smacked his forehead with a hoof above me. “What, you never saw a cloud before?”
“What do you mean ‘will it?’” Midnight screwed his brow, “like, this– whoa…” he alighted on the cloud beside Aurora.
I carefully lined up beside them and tried to land on the cloud, imagining it was some kind of solid platform, like a branch, or a porch–
My hoof touched down on a cool soft surface.
“Luna’s moon…” I mumbled, delicately setting my weight on the cold pillowy substance.
It felt like a cold damp mattress – which doesn’t sound appealing at all, but I promise it felt amazing. Midnight and I carefully trotted around on the surface of the cloud, pushing down on it and swatting the vapors of air around like fog.
“Good goddesses, you two really are foals,” Aurora sighed. “Well, now that you two had a romantic flight and got to play on a cloud, I believe we’ve got somewhere to be,” he gestured over his shoulder.
Midnight and I looked over the side of the cloud. From where we were, hundreds of hooves above the ground, we could see miles into the horizon. The ground below us slowly moved by as the frigid autumn air pushed the cloud along its path. Around, the sickly brown forest expanded in every direction, only the slightest clearings and rooftops of abandoned settlements gave any idea that Transylvania was inhabited at all.
Following the path far below, we could see the dim glow of Renaissance in the distance. The moon had nearly set and bathed the night in a brilliant pale aura. Twinkling lights and blossoms of fire danced around the perimeter of the town and from within.
“It’s beautiful,” I said softly.
“Yeah…” Midnight whispered beside me, though I could have sworn his gaze was mostly on me.
I tilted my head as I looked at the town more closely, “why’s it twinkling?”
“What?” Aurora sat up quickly. He stiffened as he caught sight of the town. He quickly spread his wings and looked back at us, concern splayed across his expression;
“Because Renaissance is under attack.”
XXX