Chapter 74

Dave wiped the sweat from his head as he threw the final large chunk of crystal onto the pile that he had carried up the rope and dumped at the top of the wall. The human pulled himself up the rest of the rope and sat down on the marble floor

The human looked at the large slabs of crystal that he had mined. “More than enough,” Dave sighed as he reached over and began pulling up the rope, wrapping it around into a small circle and dropping it beside him

A passing guard saluted Dave and looked at the pile of crystals, “Do you need any help sir?”

“Please have these delivered to Odio’s room,” Dave stretched his neck. “Inform him that I should be there in about half an hour”

“Yes sir!” The guard used his magic to levitate the crystals and began taking them towards the castle. Dave pushed himself to his feet and brushed the dirt from his hands. He leaned on the wall as he looked at the sunset, his mining had easily taken most of the day but he had easily got more than enough for his armour

The human groaned as a sudden jolt of pain raced through his head, his hands remained on the stone wall as he endured the pain that normally would have brought him to his knees. He looked out over the landscape and he bit his bottom lip in thought

“Just a couple of days Dave,” He sighed. “Then everything will be ready, and you will never have to worry ever again”

Meanwhile…

Celestia looked at the empty spot where Dave should be seated, her meal was untouched as she waited for her fiancé to arrive. Her waiting was futile as the dining room door never opened, slowly she looked down at her meal before pushing the plate away, her appetite had long since disappeared

A small knock at the door met Celestia’s ears, her slightly raised hopes were brought crashing down as curiosity and shock filled her. Strong Shield poked his head into the room and looked at the princess, a strange determination in his eye

“How did you get out of your cell?” Celestia asked as Strong Shield completely entered the room and sat down

“Dave ordered our release, Flux and Battering Ram are just going to their rooms,” Strong Shield looked down at his hooves before letting out a small sigh. “I know you blame me for everything, I do too and Dave has every right to hate me as well… but I knew that I couldn’t go into Tartarus and when he offered… I just had to let him do it”

“Strong Shield,” Celestia’s ears drooped as she looked at the unicorn. “I am tired of all this, all the arguments, worrying if Dave might show up or not day after day”

The black unicorn nodded in agreement, his eye rested for a moment before opening to look at the princess of the sun, “I will spend eternity trying to make amends but all I can do now is ask you for a favour”

Celestia gasped slightly as Strong Shield stood up and walked over to the princess, dropping into a deep bow as he shuddered slightly. “Please allow me to give you away at your wedding to my son, I want to feel like a real father before my time in Equestria is over”

“Shield…” Celestia smiled as she slid off her chair and wrapped a wing over Strong Shield. “I would be honoured if you can do that for me and Dave,” The alicorn smiled as Strong Shield nodded

“Where is Dave anyway?” Strong Shield wiped a small tear that had formed in the corner of his eye before looking around the dining room. “I haven’t seen him since… that prison,” Strong Shield felt disgusted even referencing that cursed place

The white princess frowned before shaking her head, “He remembers Tartarus, and he was obviously putting on a show to make sure we didn’t worry about him”

“I will see if I can talk to him… I have a few things I need to get off my chest as well,” Strong Shield hummed before shaking his head and both ponies returned to their seats. “Anyway, my friends and I are at your service should you need anything”

Celestia smiled slightly as she looked at the serious unicorn, “You never had friends for as long as I have known you”

“I haven’t had a lot of things for a while,” Strong Shield rubbed his scared eye before looking up at the ceiling, a long breath rolled out of his mouth as he rested his head against the chair he was sat in. “There is a cruise in a few weeks, starting in Canterlot and it makes its way along the coast… I am going to take Flux and I am going to marry her, if that is ok with you”

The princess nodded, “Of course, but wouldn’t you prefer it if you were here surrounded by your family?”

“I don’t feel much like a family stallion right now,” Strong Shield sighed. “It would be for the best if I took a backseat role in everything, stop trying to control and fix things my way”

Celestia watched Strong Shield almost struggle to open his eye, dark bags lined it and he looked almost starved. The princess used her magic to move her assorted meal over to the unicorn and stared at him until he started eating

“Dave said that he was going to sort things on his own,” Celestia sighed. “I don’t know what to do, should we trust him when he is in this… condition”

“Dave has always been doing what we say when we try to make things better for him,” Strong Shield looked at the single sprout that sat in the middle of his plate of vegetables. “Maybe we should let him fix it so he is happy with his own choices rather than us assuming”

Celestia reluctantly agreed with the unicorn, “Ok… whatever choice he makes, we must respect it”

Meanwhile…

Odio was humming happily until a knocking at his door caused him to flash red and fly over to the door. “What!” He yelled as he saw a guard glaring at him

“Special delivery from Prince Dave,” The guard sneered before levitating the large clumps of crystal and dumping in Odio’s room. “Oh and Prince Dave mentioned that he would be along soon”

Odio glared as the guard slowly left, the fog slammed the door before slowly floating over to the middle of the room and two long tendrils picked up a video game controller, another tendril picked up a headset and pulled it into his dense fog. His glowing red eyes moved over to a large television that was connected to a game console

“Yeah sorry guys, just the postman being a dick,” Odio sighed as he began pushing buttons and moving the thumb sticks around. “Alright, who is left on my team?”

Odio groaned as he saw that his entire team was dead and he was the last one alive against two enemies. “I swear, people need to learn how to play search and destroy”

Odio carefully moved his character around corners, making sure he didn’t stay out in the open too long as he crept towards the objective. He paused as he saw an enemy make a dash for one of the larger buildings, Odio didn’t hesitate as he took aim and shot the other player in the head

“Alright that takes my kill to death ratio up to five thousand… still can’t believe that I got killed once,” Odio sighed before resuming with his slow quest towards the objective. He crawled the final few meters before pulling out his bomb and arming the objective

The moment the game announcer proclaimed that the bomb was active and the timer had appeared in the top corner, Odio ran for the building his latest kill was going for, he hurried up the stairs before pulling out a sniper rifle and keeping watch over the bomb he had armed

“I remember this being harder,” Odio hummed as he saw the final enemy run wildly from the other end of the street and dive to disarm the bomb. “Alright I am going to play this safe,” Odio sighed as he readied his controller

Odio made his character throw a knife towards the target before making his character dive out the window and begin spinning in mid-air. The knife bounced just behind the enemy, the target oblivious to the spinning sniper that fired a single bullet that ricochet off the floor, then ricochet off the knife before passing through the back of his head

The announcer confirmed Odio’s team as the winner and the game ended and took everyone into the same chat channel as the final kill was replayed in slow motion. Odio yawned as his team began chanting applause to him, the enemy team instantly quitting or yelling angrily

“You fucking hacker,” The final kill on the enemy team yelled. “You used a hack or some shit like that you noob!”

Odio sighed, “Oh great another twelve year old that thinks he owns everything”

“You are such a dick!” The kid yelled down the microphone as Odio casually opened his window and fired a blast into the sky. “Fight me one on one and I will wreck you!”

Odio began fiddling with his posters that covered his walls as he slowly counted down. “Three…”

“You noob hacker!”

“Two…”

“I fucked your mum!”

“One…”

“Do you even lift?”

Odio smirked as the sound of walls smashing and screaming flooded through his earpiece. The noise from the sore loser ended and was replaced by a dull sobbing

“Anypony else want to mess with me?” Odio sighed as he watched the lobby empty and leave him alone. “I’ll take that as a no…”

Odio didn’t notice his bedroom door open and Luna step in, the princess curious to the noises that came from Odio’s room. “What is going on?” The alicorn asked as Odio quickly turned and floated over

“Oh I was just testing out a gift I managed to get for Dave for his wedding day!” Odio smiled innocently. “What Celestia doesn’t know is that video games will slowly bring Dave back to me as I lure him with RPG’s and expensive DLC”

Luna blinked before shaking her head, “I have no idea what you are doing but you might want to be cautious around Dave… he isn’t alright at the moment”

“When has he ever been?” Odio snorted. “I managed to find a way to get the internet to come through that portal I made up in space and do I get attention or recognition? Noooo,” Odio groaned sarcastically

Luna looked at the large box that rested on the desk and the various wires that connected it to a white box and a pile of cases containing disks. “Did Dave enjoy this?”

“Very much so,” Odio chuckled. “He is kinda responsible for me getting addicted to them… actually it is entirely his fault!”

The princess of the night picked up some of the game cases and began reading some of the cases. “Call of Duty? Skyrim? Red Dead Redemption? What are all these?”

“Books!” Odio wrapped a tendril around her as he smiled into the distance. “Except they don’t give you annoying fucking cuts!”

“Can you have multiple ponies playing these at a time?” Luna picked up one game and looked at it. “This looks… fun I suppose”

“Spec ops: The line?” Odio chuckled. “Yeah if your idea of fun is burning children to death”

Luna gasped as she threw the game down, almost horrified at its contents. “Why would anypony want to play that? Or even enjoy that?”

“That is the point behind video games,” Odio cleared his thought for dramatic effect. “Video games allow us to do things we can’t do in real life, the whole aspect is to stretch our minds out of reality and to explore our being without having to leave the safety of our home”

“So it is like reading a book?” Luna tilted her head

“No,” Odio sighed. “Can books let you build a house and once the people have eaten dinner you delete the toilets and let them slowly die of peeing themselves?”

The princess of the night looked at Odio with disgust, “Are all… video games this violent and cruel?”

“No, just the people who play them”