What?

“What do you mean?” you ask the still mirthful stallion.

“What do you think I mean? I’m dead, pushing up daisies, six hooves under!” He shouts as if it were obvious. “Sombra might be a control freak when it comes to the content of his books, but he never lies in them. Unless you count lies by omission…” he mumbles under his breath as an aside.

“How did I see you? You gave me that cart of food, you talked to the commander!”

“You don’t know how being a rogue spirit works, do you? I project myself from beyond for your eyes only; ponies in emotional distress in particular are easier for me to interfere with making you the perfect target. Combined with that collar he put on you, it was a simple task making myself look alive and well.”

“I’m not in distress-” you object before Silver cuts you off.

“Oh please! Not outwardly, but I’ve never met somebody as troubled as you my friend; new body, new world, emotion amplifying collar. You are a goldmine!”

“So you were the one who attacked us with the armor?”

“Indeed, I couldn’t have my only real method of interacting with the outside world lose her luster. If he took the collar off, I thought I wouldn’t be able to reach you anymore; and I was right. I can only talk with you now, through this dreamscape and even that is hanging over the edge.”

“What about the food cart you gave me on the first day?”

“A demonstration of just how bad it was for you, I could make you believe you were interacting with a physical object that wasn’t really there.” Now that he mentions it, the cart did disappear for no reason, and after you ate you were still hungry and had to go down to the kitchen.

“What about you talking to Lily to get me out of that cell?”

“I didn’t, I listened in on her and used it as an opportunity to build your trust in me by posing as a member of their organization. She always intended to release you and use you as an inside mare,” he explains. Are you fucking serious? You gawp at him for a moment, mouth opening and closing like a goldfish. “Don’t do that, you’ll catch flies,” he quips.

“Why go to all this effort? What are you hoping to achieve?”

“What do you think? I used to think petty revenge was beneath a stallion of my station, but it creeps up on all of us one way or another. I wanted to push you to go against Sombra, but it has become clear to me that you sympathize with him,” he claps his hooves together, “well done, you’ve successfully dismantled my plans.”

“That’s it? No final stand, no secret back up plan?”

“Life isn’t like an adventure novel, Rose. I’ve been defeated, and there is no way for me to claw this back. Well done.”
“I didn’t really do much though,” you point out.

“You… defied my expectations,” he wraps a hoof around your shoulder, “and managed to stay the better mare. When you first arrived I saw opportunity, a scorned, angry pony who wanted to take revenge by any means possible. It turns out that I was wrong and my faith was badly placed; you kept your head above the water and have come out all the better for it.”

Not that it makes you feel any better, if anything your insistence on keeping your head down has only been an internal frustration. It might have saved your ass one or two times but now you can’t help but wonder how things might have been had you gone down a different, more driven path. You’re alive, but not exactly well.

The two of you move onto the cold, stone steps. “In fact,” he continues despite your internal monologue, “I’m starting to think that I’ve been wrong the entire time. Here I am after so long and you’ve made me go and doubt myself.”

“Don’t change your mind on my account,” you say shifting on the stone step as it digs into your sensitive behind. “You have every right to be angry about what he did.”

“It wasn’t what he did; it was what he didn’t do. He chose the nation over his own flesh and blood to keep himself in power.”

“To keep everybody else safe…”

“Safe? From us?” you look over to him.

”…No, from the Equestrians. They were knocking on your front door, and from the sound of things it would have been much worse if he hadn’t picked to stay out of it. I find it hard to believe myself, but Sombra really does want to protect the ponies living here.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” he grunts.

“Why don’t you? You can move around can’t you?”

“I need an anchor to attach myself to; you’re the most suitable so I’ve spent most of my time following you around. I’ve gone too and fro, like your maid, but she spends most of her time sitting in the library and reading. She’s very concerned for her brother you know.”

“I know. So no secrets for you to fill me in on or traps to warn me about?”

“None as far as I’m concerned. I may be able to anchor myself to Sombra, but he has many safeguards against spies, tangible and supernatural.”

He remains silent, in deep thought on the matter. You look out into the pitch black void and wonder just how safe you really are. Silver has made you feel like an idiot and thrown you for a loop, it seems your previous paranoia was fairly misplaced as he only wanted to keep the collar on you so he could follow you.

He looks back with a smirk, “Don’t look so down about it, you’re not the dead one.” A bitter chuckle follows. You shake your head and lean back, looking up to the ceiling. “I suppose our time is running out for tonight. Please don’t mention this to my Brothers; I don’t want them to worry about me.”

“Okay?”

“And watch out for Fury…” he says as the world begins to fade around you.

You peel your crusty eyes open and wince at the early morning light. Despite having no windows, the crystalline construction of the palace allows more than enough light to filter in through every surface. One thing is for sure, it helps get you up in the morning. Today is the big day. A brush floats over surrounded in your distinctive red glow.

You trot over to the dresser and give your reflection an optimistic smile, which turns into a wince as the magically motivated brush pulls itself through the tangled knot of hair. You need a haircut or whatever they call it here, a manecut?

Your horn sure is pointy now, ending in the same wicked looking spike. The carefully crafted grooves that once noted you as a unicorn have been burned away by an unknown force leaving it smooth and shiny. There is some slight red discoloration at the end which wasn’t there before; similar to Sombra’s, perhaps a consequence of the magic you’ve been using.

It draws a sharp contrast to your still girlish appearance, you might even be considered beautiful by pony standards, with high cheekbones, just the right amount of fat, and a sharp looking pair of ruby eyes. You’re feeling reflective this morning. It’s been a long while since you’ve evaluated yourself.

You place the brush back onto the wooden dresser and glance once more at the large mirror. Your eyes look different, more vibrant and less glossed over, an external reflection of your newfound optimism. You’re going to leave this room today, help stop this war and in the absence of the ability to go back home, find your own place in this world.

Where has all this come from you ponder. The taps run cold as you grab a towel from the rack and wash away the stress of last night’s revelation. Something Silver must have said, that you were in emotional turmoil. You didn’t admit it but he was right, this entire time you’ve been pushed down river by ponies other than yourself but you were too distraught to do anything about it.

It’s given you a burst of confidence, partly in not wanting to prove his observation right. You can’t act like this forever. Eventually you’re going to have to take charge and make your own decisions, and that time is going to be today. The adrenaline is evidently already pumping through you, despite the small inkling of fear inside your chest. There may be bloodshed in the future.

Freshened up and ready to go. As you pass by the mirror you give yourself another go over and a shaky but still optimistic smile.

The mages quarters were unusually quiet. In your mind you had pictured something different, with mages rushing back and forth to finish their last minute preparations. Instead only a few remain behind to ensure that nothing happens to Sombra before the plan can be enacted. The King had greeted you with a nod, but closed his eyes soon after so you decided to leave him alone.

The mages weren’t much for conversation either, still poring over books and tomes. It seems that not even the upcoming battle can quell their thirst for knowledge. A pessimist would describe it as the calm before the storm, for your own sake you refuse to describe it as such.

There isn’t any kind of time piece in the room, odd considering how important keeping on schedule would be for a cabal of the empires mages. It doesn’t do much to quell your unease with the entire thing, sudden confidence boost or not. There’s so much that could go wrong. You’re placing trust in somepony you’ve only really known for a short time.

Not to mention what Silver said, “Watch out for Fury.” Why did he have to do that? As if you don’t have enough to worry about today. Sombra steals a glance at you as your face screws up in anxiousness.

“Nervous?” He asks breaking the silence.

You look over before sighing and laying your head on the wooden table. “What gave you that impression?”

“Your expression, the tenseness of your muscles and you seem to be muttering to yourself.” Did you say that out loud? You hope he didn’t hear that.

“That’s fairly on the nose, did you ever consider that I was using a figure of speech…” you roll your eyes, “pointing it out isn’t going to make me feel better.”

“I did actually. Sometimes honesty is the best medicine.” Well that’s just great. All you need after puffing yourself up this morning is for this asshole to bring you crashing back down again. “You never solve a problem by hiding from it; in fact you just multiply them,” big talk from the stallion who’s about to engage in a Scooby-doo plan concocted by his brother.

Silver’s little story hasn’t done him any favors in your eyes, but it has been equally unflattering for Sombra. At least Silver has the good sense to give up when he’s beaten; a little defeatist really. Sombra isn’t like that and has the opposite problem; he doesn’t know when to give ground. Either way you’re not going to get an un-climatic end to this little saga.

Silver might not be out for the count, your mind butts in like an unwanted ex, he could just be lying to you to get you of his back so he can try and kill you again. For the sake of convenience you didn’t bring that up with him last night. As long as he keeps talking you can hold off, he’s filled in a lot of gaps for you provided that his story was accurate.

It doesn’t really matter right now anyway. When all of this war business is out of the way you can sort out your opinion of him. Right now your job is to sit back, let Fury do most of the work, and run up into the infirmary to make sure he isn’t dead by giving him the antidote.

Author's Notes:

unhappy with this one tbh, silver isn't done yet and he'll be back later for some resolution with his story

endgame is here, get hype