Fragment - Part 1: Dawn for a life
By Dracarion

Wooded back road, 15 miles from Chargecago, 9:18 PM

A purple unicorn watched the armored vehicle roll along, its green cargo bound in chains and surrounded by guards. It’s now or never. She thought to herself as she gathered her magic in her horn. Just like I practiced. She grabbed hold of a wheel and pulled with her magic causing the vehicle to twist and roll. Once it finally came to a stop on its roof, she teleported down into the mangled car. “Wouldn’t you love to live forever?” She asked the chained stallion. She teleported both of them without waiting for a response, leaving only dazed guards in the mangled vehicle.

-- -- - --

The purple unicorn looked about her lair, which was little more than a long abandon warehouse. Everything was in place, the five nested arcane rings, the ‘subject’ to be used, even the alter with candles burnt to specific lengths. She’d studied the various rituals for the past two years and now, after months of preparation, she was ready to create her perfect being.

“Well, felon, you’ve led one impressive life.” She said, her deep blue eyes meeting with the green pony’s golden ones. She lifted him into the center of the rings. The inner most ring lit up with a touch of her magic, a scribed holding spell. “You have done many amazing and impressive things, terrible, true, but none the less amazing.” A twisted grin spread across her face. “The cops, the EIB, the royal guards, hell you even escaped The Family. You are impressive.” Her magic flared as the next circle started to light. “With a mind like that, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that I wanted you become my perfect being.”

Once the second circle was fully lit, white lines began to shine across the green pony. “What… What’s, ahg, happening?”

“Oh, yeah, a little discomfort is to be expected, I mean I am going to tear apart your current body and that’s gonna hurt no matter who you are.” She said nonchalantly, waving one hoof in a circular motion. “But I will give you a new body! One that will make us both…” she stood on her hind legs, front hooves in the air and face up to the ceiling, “IMMORTAL!!!” She landed back on all fours, her star covered cape billowing slightly. “And soon, Equestria will never forget the names of Dawn Hope and…” Whatever she was about to say was obliterated by his screaming. Dawn watched in morbid fascination as the light quickly did away with the green being in front of her, leaving something akin to a glowing jelly fish with eyes, large golden eyes.

“Wow, that was… um…” Dawn took a couple of seconds to gather her thoughts. “Mooovving on,” she stated, as the next ring lit up, “I still need to make sure that you’ll be able to keep up with me, so I’ll impart my scientific and magical knowledge to you.” She watched as runes from the circle glowed and launched themselves into the conscious energy. “Call me crazy, huh? Tell me it can’t be done. Well,” she snorted, “feast your eyes on this.” She said to nopony as the next ring lit. A ball of burnt orange surrounded the floating energy, and sprouted to swaths of deep blue. The orange formed a pony’s body, horn and wings, and the blue became a mane and tail. The orange colt stood glowing for a second before he collapsed onto the floor.

With a flare of her horn, Dawn lit the candles on her alter and the final circle responded in kind. The colt pulsated for a moment, quickly growing in to a stallion. Dawn held her breath as he continued to lay there unmoving. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, his eyes opened but he continued to lay there, as if contemplating his next move. At long last he lept vertically and landed on his hooves.

“WOOOOOH!!!” He shouted, laughing while his golden eyes surveying everything around him rapidly. “What a trip! I mean first I was all ‘AAAAAHHHH!’ then I was all like not there at all, and now? … I’m orange!” His eyes locked finally on the third runic ring. “Wow! My mind feels…. weird. Ah, and here’s why! You made a slight error here,” he pointed to a rune with his hoof, “here, here, oops one here too, this whole sequence is out of order, this really should be lambda….” He motioned to each error in that ring until he was interrupted.

“Hey!” Dawn finally screamed at him, snapping him from his correcting. She took a second to regain her composure. “I, Dawn Hope, have given you new life. And with this new life, you and I will step into the pages of…”

“What was wrong with my old life? I mean, it can’t have been too bad… although I can’t seem to remember anything from it.” He laughed nervously, infact he hadn’t stopped laughing since his new life began. That is, until now. He looked at her, his golden eyes filled with hatred, this was definintly not what she had expected. “You took my life from me!” He widened his stance and flared his wings. “You took MY NAME! YOU TOOK WHO I WAS! YOU! TOOK! MY! LIFE!” He ended screaming, taking a flying leap at Dawn. He started laughing manically after he felt his hoof collide with her, and continued running out of warehouse.

-- - -- - --

He had been running for some time before he felt safe enough to finally stop and collect his thoughts. A maniacal laughter had been following him as he’d run, as if though the pony responsible was right there with him. He looked around only to discover that he was alone, and that the laughter, though spiraling to a stop, was still there. He looked at a mirror and saw his reflection, and for the first time saw himself as he was now. He had a long yet decently styled deep blue mane and tail, as if though some small pieces of the night sky had been attached to him and his fur was a burnt orange, the same color as the rising sun. Piercing through his mane was a horn, which he didn’t remember having, just like the wings at his sides. “What am I?” He asked his reflection. “Who am I?”

“That’s a really good question. And ya know something? I’ve been wonder that since I met you.” He heard the laughing pony say. His voice sounded… familiar. “Ooo! Look at that glass shine! No, wait, forget the glass! Look that those GEMS!!” The laughing pony paused for a second. “Anyways, I’d like to know what to call you, I mean ‘Hey You’ really would get old fast.”

“I.. I can’t seem to remember my name.” He looked around, still trying to find who he was talking to.
“Shame. Really is. WOW! Look how big that screen is!! But most pony’s names relate to their talent. What’s your talent? Hmm? What makes you special?”

The nameless pony turned back to his reflection, it was at least easier to talk to himself than to thin air. “I, I don’t know.” He hung his head as he found himself even more lost.

“Don’t keep me in the dark!” The laughing pony said. The nameless pony looked back at his reflection. “Much better. Now check your flank! All ponies have a mark depicting what they do best! Take a peek and see what you do! Then once we know….”

“It’s… it’s markless.” Nameless let his head drop slightly again. “I’m nothing more than a markless… Mark Less… Mark…”

“Nice to meet you Markis.” Laughing said. His voice seemed to be in constant awe over everything around him. “Wow, those are big rims! So, Markis, what do you remember about your past?”

“I remember… a unicorn, vanishing, and being here now… Why would this matter now? Why are you interested? WHO ARE YOU?!” Markis whipped his head around in an attempt to find the laughing pony who seemed intent on mocking him. He only managed to make himself light headed.

“Whoa, watch it there Markis, we don’t want to be dizzy now, do we?” The invisible pony stated, his inflection was something more akin to insulted. “And I’m not sure why it’s important that we hang on to our past, but you need to remember….. something. Not sure what, but something.”

Markis closed his eyes and thought hard. He could see the unicorn on her twisted alter as a pony vanished before her. He could see the spirit hanging there. But before that…. Before the unicorn there were chains. Chains brought on by power. His power.

“They feared us.” The laughing pony said, his voice was probably as close to serious as it could get. “She feared us. Everypony feared us.” He laughed a twisted and evil laugh. “But not anymore. Oh, and um I guess you can call me Felan, that’s the last thing I remember her calling us.” Somewhere in the distance, a clock bell rang ten times. “Wow, that’s a very pretty sound!”

His amusement never seems to end. Markis thought, feeling as if though somepony was giving him a swift shove in his side.

-- ---- --- --- -

A grey stallion lay on the couch with a leg draped across his face to cover his eyes. The TV he kept perpetually on was currently tuned to a news station with a blue mare going on about the upcoming weather. “…back to you, Silver.”
“Thanks Storm.” A teal stallion who sat behind a desk turned to face the camera. “When we return at ten, why you shouldn’t get a flu shot and three things everypony has in their kitchen that will kill you.”

Two mares walked in from the garage. “Hey Carves, could youuuu…” The blue mare stopped talking for a second as the deep purple mare next to her started whispering into her ear. “Oh. I like…. Oooh, that sounds…. Ugh, never… well, maybe….” The blue mare’s attention returned to the couch. “Right, Carves, um… Groceries! Icecream! Melting!” She shoved the mare off her long enough to form a sentence. “Carves? Could you please go and get the groceries out of the van? I gotta get my mare here to bed before she gets me on the floor.”

“Oh, but the floor would be sooo much fun, darling!” She stated excited, her red eyes glistening as she smiled at the blue mare.

“Sure Shiny!” Carver said from where he lay on the couch, still amused by how ‘open’ the two were pretty much everywhere they went. “You and Prancer have fun!”

“Oh, we will darling!” Prancer called back, as she attempted to tackle Shiny to the floor.

“NO! NOT HERE! BED!” Shiny pointed towards the stairs. Prancer had started to saunter that way when a breaking news story started.

“This just in, a wrecked police wagon was found this evening on 285. We go to Sky Eyes on location for more information.”

“That’s right, Silver.” A grey pegasus with blue eyes and a dark blue suit took center screen. “I’m here on 285 where a police wagon was found overturned on the roadside by a passing motorist. This incident has led to the third largest ponyhunt conducted in the area, as the wagon was transporting none other than Dustrunner, who was just saddled with twelve consecutive life sentences earlier this week, to Canterlot Maximum Security.” The scene switched to an overturned police wagon.

“At current, there are no leads as to where he would head, or even as to what caused the wreck. We are hoping that he will be tracked down soon, but witness reports are inconsistent in every aspect of what happened.” The police representative’s voice was overlaid onto the video.

“So… Dustrunner actually pulled off his escape.” Carver said, staring in disbelief at the TV and the video there on.

“Who’s Dustrunner, darling?” Prancer asked, now working on getting at her mare’s flank. Shiny’s form, however, belied her strength and she easily kept the crazed mare off her. “Actually, who cares. Aquashine, I want your plot!”

“BED!! NOW!!” Aquashine deftly maneuvered Prancer towards the stairs. “Later Carves!” With that the couple disappeared up to the second floor.

“Later.” He said to the empty hall, heading to the garage to gather the groceries. Dusty always was fast on his hooves, and got us out of many a jam…

-- -- - --- --

To be continued

/*A/N: I would like to thank everypony so far who's kept me going on this series. Mainly Aquashine and Shadow Prancer for letting me use them in my works, and a special thanks to my beta reader, Skyclimber! Thank you guys so much, you're truly awesome! Also, don't own ponies, do own Carver, Prancer and Shiny are property of their respective bronies. No profit was made by me from this work, so please don't sue me.*/