Much to the duo's surprise, the guards did not immediately tackle them. Instead, several of them directly in front of Stellar and Life stepped aside to make way for another guard. The guard to come through had a rather gentle demeanor to his face and gave off an aura of calmness and safety in his immediate area. This stretched towards Stellar whose tension started to well down, making her muscles creak and her back lower into a more comfortable position. Life saw this happen from the corner of his eyes, but he was not duped. He had enough experience to know what this encounter would entice.
The guard in question was the son of the current rulers of the kingdom. His mane and tail were a mixture of vertical yellow and blue stripes that brightened the lower they went, and the left side of his mane was tied into a dangling pony tail with the help of a golden mane band.. His coat was a strange color that confused Stellar as to its actual spectrum. Was it a pale blue-gray or a pale gray-blue? She couldn't figure it out. Life recognized the armor he wore as being that of the royal family. After all, who else would wear golden chest necklaces embedded with a blue sapphire as well as golden hoof armor? As for this guard's cutie mark, it was composed of two swords crossing each other in a downwards motion, the whole thing covered by a glimmering blue heart.
Unlike the other guards around, his body did not take on a cautious stance and was completely calm. Perhaps it was because he was extremely powerful or, perhaps, was it because he was an alicorn and did not need to fear anypony but the sisters themselves. Whatever the case, he stopped just a few feet away from the duo and the exit they were blocking. Even if the guards hadn't noticed yet, the pair realized that the other prisoners were behind them, waiting in the darkness. Worry was clenching everypony here.
"Hello. I am Valiant Heart," the guard spoke with a soothing tone and a faint smile. "Who are you?"
Valiant extended a hoof outwards so as to specify that he was not here to fight. His face even adorned that of a worried pony who simply wished that their kindness would be returned by strangers he liked.
"Why do you want to know?" Stellar replied aggressively.
"I simply wish to know so that we may defuse this little...incident together. There's no reason to be worried. I won't hurt you or your friend."
Stellar took a step back and lift a hoof by instinct of self-preservation. Life, meanwhile, remained cautious of the whole situation. He was watching everything around him. He knew that the guards would jump him and that mare when they were given a signal. He was just waiting to see it.
"Yeah right. Like I'm supposed to trust somepony when they have tons of guards armed with swords and spears surrounding me?" Stellar sat on her rear, crossed her forelegs, then huffed. She was simply unreadable to Life who couldn't help but look at her with a look of complete 'agapedness'. If ever that were a word or became one, it would fit the situation perfectly.
"What's wrong with her? She treats every situation like it's a game. I bet he's expecting me to say something. I'll wait and bide my time. She's digging out the relic from the dirt for study. I'll see what I can dust off the revealed pieces in the mean time," Life thought.
"Would you be more comfortable to discuss this if my guards placed their weapons on the ground?" Valiant calmly suggested.
Stellar hummed and tapped her chin with a hoof in a bid to look like she was thinking. It just made her look like a fool, really.
"Sure. Throw them far behind, where I can't see them and where it would take them a while to get to. If you do something suspicious, then we'll have time to flee," Stellar grinned mischievously. She felt as though she had just won at a great war of the wits. However, a shining glare in Valiant's eyes suggested that it was only a small, insignificant battle.
"Yes. While it is true that you and your gaunt friend would indeed be free to escape, would you really leave your companions behind?"
Stellar laughed loudly and nervously. "I don't know what you're talking about."
The mare still looked behind herself through reflex and caught a glimpse of the frightened, disheveled mass of ponies still in the tunnel. They were looking at her with wide eyes. She was to be their salvation, and they needed to escape. They had to. They wouldn't last in that place if they were sent back. Valiant responded with a bemused expression.
"I seriously doubt that you thought I couldn't see the others behind you nor that you would abandon others like you below. This is for your own good and everypony's safety. I beg you to understand this. We haven't done anything wrong. We just worry for the safety and integrity of our people and Equestria as a whole," Valiant insisted. If he had hands, he would place them together and beg for forgiveness. "I really prefer that this doesn't end up as becoming a fight."
The stallion's words were met by a forced, but mocking, laughter. They came from Life who pushed Stellar to the side with his right foreleg. The mare was irritated at first, but when she looked down at the leg to push it off of her, she realized the words of skepticism and sadism he spouted were from personal experience and views. The details had become clear.
Life was so thin that his bones could be seen sticking through his teal coat. Of course, the orange cracks still raced along it and singed the coat around them, but the teal still fought for dominance amongst the ashes. His eyes were faded to a near blind-like appearance, but the blue they once held could still be seen behind that milky mist; Both eyes were dragged down by heavy bags that denoted not fatigue, but sickness and disease. Even his tired gaze denoted some sort of anger that was kept within for many many years. Life was tired of everything.
"Cut the nonsense. Do you seriously want me to believe that you did this for the 'safety of Equestria'," Life mimed. He was mocking Valiant and didn't seem to care that the guards around the two were coming closer. "It's ponies like you who always intended to 'help' everypony but ended up destroying it anyways just to further your own goals."
"But I--"
"No! I will not hear your excuses! For too long have we all been subjugated to pain and torture. I have seen dozens of my friends die down there because of your-" Life stopped suddenly, his eyes widening into saucers. Slowly, a grin formed on his face, leaving way for a full smile to bloom."Your fear. How ironic."
"Wh-How dare you," Valiant hissed as he stomped a hoof forward.
"Hmhmha. All is going according to plan..almost. I wasn't expecting a full jailbreak. Well, I'd love to stay and watch but they seem to be really invested into arguing," the cackling shadow mused to itself. "I'm going to quietly sneak away and continue watching from another angle."
"What would a small colt know about the responsibilities of protecting everypony? I have trained as hard as I could, and still do, to be able to protect everypony I care about. What do YOU know about that?" Valiant said.
"A colt?! I know more about loss than you do, pretty colt. Oh, thinking he's so 'high and mighty' because of his parents and because he ascended into some sort of pegacorn."
"I'm an ALICORN!"
Life shrugged and looked away, preferring to display his lack of interest at others."Sure you are. Sure."
"I--"
"WHAT'S GOING ON HERE?!" a powerful voice shouted from above.
All the guards gasped and dropped their weapons from their surprise. Cadance had decided to fly down the tower while her husband had been teleported behind the ring.
"Move aside, soldiers!" Shining Armor roared.
"Y-yes, sir!" the guards obliged.
Valiant felt a knot form in his throat that wouldn't go back down no matter how hard he tried to swallow. The closer his parents got to him, the smaller he felt and the more pressure he could feel baring down upon him.
"H-hi, mom. Hi, dad."
Cadence looked behind Valiant to see the two strange ponies looking back with curiosity as well as the many eyes reflecting in the darkness below them. The filly looked so familiar.
"What is going on here?" Cadence asked with an authoritive tone.
GO TO A DOCTOR IF YOUR BRAIN HURTS! IT MIGHT BE A SIGN OF AN ANEURYSM! GO! GO! GO! I HAD ONE! GO!
Also, excellent story by the way.
5637386 Sounds like fun!
5637398 You are one insensitive bastard. I had one and I am trying to get you to protect yourself!
5637970
5639901 Wow...
You do realize that I had an aneurysm, do you?
5640897 An actual aneurysm or RP aneurysm?
5640924 What do you mean RP aneurysm? A blood vesself popped in my head and they had to do surgery and everything.
5640958 Shouldn't you have died or gotten brain damage? Every member of my family that got that died afterwards.
5640997 5% chance of life. 4% chance of full recovery.
Sorry, just worried about you.
5642378 Oh. I won't get that. I checked what the cause was and I don't have problems with those. My head hurts when I'm not sick for two reasons: I'm tired and forced myself to work; Or, I waited too long to write something which causes mental build-up.
5643398 Ahh... Sorry. Paranoia saves lives!
5643667 Also, lucky you.
5643795 Best lottery ever. The lottery of life.
5644707 Huh. I've had that too, but mainly with tornadoes and planes.
5644717 Really?
Also you should capitalize Last and Shadow in the title.
5646154 It's done on purpose, just like with my story with Psycho.
Also, yes. I was chased by a tornado in Arizona, a F3 passed over our heads when we were sleeping and, when we woke up, pretty much everything around us had been destroyed. Later, my mother and I were taking a long road back home and, apparently, when we left that road, a tornado had formed on the other side.
5647629 LUCKY!
5648644 The States...I only hate the weather...
5648777 Except Hawaii. Sorry.
5648928 I'm not fond of its weather or its volcanoes. I like the cold and snow.
5649103 Really?
5649430 Yes. Snow>rain>cloudy>Sun.
5649439 So you no like sun?
5649450 I don't hate it, but I don't like that it brings excessive heat at times.
5649743 Ahh... Kind of like the drought now?
5649761 Yeah. I hate droughts.
5649776 Yup!
More please!!!
5650494 Ah'm doin' what ah can, cap'n!
5660043 What kind of errors? I thought I fixed this. Stupid discount fixing machines.
5662716 Yeah. I noticed that, for some reason, the size command suddenly stopped working on this site. It's happened to my other stories, too.
I love a good sward, quite tasty.
Wow, I have nothing to say after this chapter; I must be withholding for the next one that this chapter built to.
5665506 WH...but I put each chapter...Never mind. I-eth giveth upeth-eth-eth.
5665520 Woohoo! I won! For once, you have nothing to say to what I've said!
5668536 It has nothing to do with what you said. I keep passing these things through a spell checker as a basis for spelling repair.
5668615 Then your options are find another spellchecker that actually works or find a person to check your things before posting. Because if its getting that reaction out of you for not working then something needs to change.
Though very few have noticed so it probably doesn't matter now does it?
5668692 I'll look more intensely now. It's just gotten out of the cage, lately.