Dragon Scales and Other Tails

Chapters

Spared or Struck?
The Cold Truth
The Beast Below
Chapter Zero
Duel Personalities
Chaos Kombat
Critical Failure
Of Death and Decisions
Dream Scream
Tartarus Commander
The Path of Harmony
March of Progress

Spared or Struck?

I ran down the hallway, the door at the end holding my focus. I could barely see it through the tears. The memory of what I had seen still burned in my head. It wasn’t true. It couldn’t be true. There was only one way to know.

I burst through the door, running across the medium sized, round room. There was a desk at the far end. On the desk sat a letter, freshly unrolled, still curling back in on itself. I ran to the desk and snatched it up. Even though I was frantic, I started reading slowly. I couldn’t afford to misunderstand here. The more I read though, the harder it was to read. The tears kept coming, faster now, coming back almost faster than I could wipe them away. I finally reached the end of the letter and dropped it, backing away from the desk.

“No,” I said. “It can’t be. No, NO!” I dropped to my knees.

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!”

I sat bolt upright, chest heaving. I grabbed my phone off of the table to the side of my bed. It was 6:28. I let out a laugh and put the phone back down. At least the nightmare had served a purpose. I was awake. I sat back in my bed, thinking about the dream. The nightmare was no surprise, seeing as it was Today. I avoided thinking of the actual name. Honestly, I should have expected this last night. I always had a nightmare the night before Today. It was a joke among my family that I never got a good night’s sleep. A joke that was completely true. I smiled as I thought of what their reactions would be. I would have to call and tell them about it later.

I would have been with them for Today, but my college classes were hitting me pretty hard right about now, plus the drive from Oregon back down to Utah was a lot of time to take just for one day. Besides, there was a reason I’d moved out here in the first place. My family was a bit excessive and one could only take so much of them. Besides, the Fourth of July was coming up and I could see them then.

As I sat thinking about my family, I heard my roommate’s alarm clock go off on the other side of the wall. “My Little Pony, My Little Pony...” I rolled my eyes at the ceiling. Seriously, he was way too into that show. I had nothing against My Little Pony. In fact, I’d seen the show, watched every episode. I wouldn’t call myself a brony, though. The show was good, but I wasn’t rabid about it. I wasn’t about to go start writing fanfiction for it or anything. My roommate though, was another story. The show had ended five years ago, yet he still had it as his alarm, ringtone, computer background. He even still posted on theory sites. How does a show dead for five years still have theory sites!? I’d never understand this fandom.

I heard the alarm cut off mid-song. Huh. That was weird. My roommate usually let the entire song play out, whether he was awake or not. Maybe he was finally getting tired of it. I doubted it. He was seriously obsessed. I couldn’t judge him though. Not when I was just as deep in Doctor Who as he was in MLP. I tried getting him interested in the show to console him after MLP ended, but it never really caught on. He liked the show, but it never held the same fascination for him that MLP did.

I heard him get up and move around his room. He didn’t normally get up this early, but today was a special day. I groaned. I forgot that we shared Today. I figured I may as well get up. If I didn’t, David was going to come in here and drag me out of bed himself. “Allons-y,” I said and got up and got ready to face the day. My birthday.

I left my room and entered the living room it was connected to. I walked towards the kitchen, passing the doors of my two roommates on the way. I could hear movement behind David’s door, but nothing from Shane’s room. I went to the kitchen and got myself some cereal. David’s door opened and my roommate entered the kitchen. He was about a half a foot shorter than me, reaching about 5 foot 6, while still being five years my senior. Today was his 25th birthday. He and our third roommate, Shane, were the same age. David had bright red hair that he kept above his eyes, but that was all he ever really did with it. I commented on this fact.

“Looks like you win the Crazy Hair Contest today, David.”

He grinned at me. “Have I ever lost?”

I chuckled. “Nope. I suppose one day I’ll have to get you a medal to celebrate.”

“I’d settle for a girlfriend,” he says looking at me hopefully.

I laugh. “Sorry, can’t help you there.” My luck with the ladies was legendary, I usually had a date lined up every week, if not twice a week. I was never able to pass it on to others though. “Although, you might do better if you actually combed your hair.”

David rolled his eyes. “Don’t you remember? The last comb that touched my hair stayed there for about a week before I could get it out. Besides...” He struck a pose that I think was meant to look suave. “...Good looks like these need no improvement.”

“Says the guy who can’t get a girl.” I shot at him.

“Says the guy who can’t seem to keep one.” He shot back. It was true. I did have luck when it came to picking up girls, but I never managed to keep a steady relationship for more than a week or so. I’d never met a girl I’d really ever fallen for anyway.

We sat there for a bit longer, both of us eating cereal. “Oh, Happy Birthday, by the way.” David said.

“Meh,” I replied, through a mouthful of cereal. “Happy Birthday to you too, I suppose.”

David grinned. “That’s right, I’d forgotten that you were anti-birthday,” he said as a third door opened and our roommate Shane entered the room.

“Peter’s anti-birthday?” He asked. Shane was a pretty cool guy. He had plans to join the police force someday, but his parents had made him agree to take a few years of college first. He was working as a security guard in the meantime to earn money. “Why are you anti-birthday?” he asked.

I shrugged. “I’ve just never had a good birthday. I’ve never gotten any awesome presents. Usually a pair of socks and a book or two from my family. They’ve never been good when it comes to buying gifts. Plus, when you think about it, it really is just a celebration of an arbitrary number, which is just a random measurement mankind created in order to keep track of the flow of progress. Time is like speed. If there was nothing to measure it against, it would cease to exist. All its measuring is the time when I first started to exist outside another person. It’s just a random countdown someone started at that moment just because. Why should this new random number be any more important than the old random number?”

David clutched his head in mock pain. “Too many concepts to keep track of! Make it stop!”

“Things getting too wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey for your simple little brain?” I said to him. We looked at each other and burst out laughing.

Shane just rolled his eyes at us. He never got our admiration for our shows. He’d seen both Doctor Who and MLP, but he wasn’t obsessed with them like we were. He always spent his free time either exercising, or being with his girlfriend Kate. Things were getting pretty serious between the two of them. I couldn’t blame him. I’d be getting serious too if I had a girlfriend as good as his.

“Well, it’s probably time we got going,” he said to David.

“Hold on just a second. I’ve got to grab something.” David jumped off his chair and walked to his room. Shane usually served as David’s main ride to the college whenever Shane went to his job at the bank. David knew how to drive and had his own car, but he was notoriously bad at driving. He’d owned and totaled three cars in the five years he’d had his license, and he was now driving a navy blue Nissan Cube he’d gotten cheap because the owner had thought that the engine was bad. David had tried to tell him what was wrong with it, but the guy had wanted to get rid of the car pretty badly. David bought it, fixed up the engine, and now let it gather dust in the parking lot while mooching off Shane and me for rides. We were fine with it though. David was that bad at driving.

I looked at the clock. “Ugh. 7 o’ clock. What in the world were you guys thinking getting classes this early?” I said.

Shane shrugged. “Classes have to happen sometime. Why not now?”

“I couldn’t do it. I’m not meant to wake up early.” I said. “I’m still half asleep, and I woke up a half-hour ago.”

David came back from his room. “Hey, tonight, is our birthday celebration” he said, pointing at me, Shane and himself. “So that means we’re having a gaming night! I’ll bring the pizzas,” he said and he and Shane left to their respective engineering and criminology classes. This left me with about an hour and a half to do little more than ponder David’s ideas of what constituted a good time. I shrugged. I had nothing better to do today, so I decided to go along with it. Pizza and video games wasn’t that bad. I pondered what David had said. Was it really Shane’s birthday today too? Huh. I supposed May 2nd must have been a busy day at the hospitals. I couldn’t believe I’d known the guy for 6 months and hadn’t asked him what his birthday was. At about 8:30, I got out of bed again, got ready and heading off to my Geology class.

Geology wasn’t really my passion, but it was as good a field as any. I didn’t have any specific interests, but there was something about dusty, shiny jewels that I found interesting. What could I say? Geology rocks. I went about my day in the usual humdrum manner. Classes lasted until about 4. After, I headed back to my apartment. I always needed a nap after classes. Especially if I was going to be up all night partying. I got back to my apartment to find Shane and David already there.

“Perfect,” David said. “We were just about to go get the pizza. You can come with us.”

“Actually, I was just about to go take a nap,” I said. “You two get them without me.”

Shane shook his head. “Sleeping until 8? A nap every day? Honestly Peter, you have the energy level of a ten year-old.”

“What can I say?” I said, yawning. “I tire easily. Is that a crime now?” The two left. Once they were gone, I plopped down on the couch, grabbed a pillow and settled down into unconsciousness.

I didn’t know how long I had been sleeping for, but the regular ethereal flow of my dreams was disturbed by another dream, this one more vivid than anything I’d seen. There was darkness. I heard a swishing noise, as if some heavy was flying through the darkness, circling.

A voice cut through the darkness, echoing in the space. “The invisibility won’t hold us for long. He’ll find us very soon.” A monitor flickered to life a few feet in front of me. By its light I could see a face. A face that wasn’t a face. Its’ features were way too skewed to be a human face. The face’s eyes looked into mine. “This is very important. Pay attention. The psychelock won’t last forever, but my body wouldn’t survive this mind. I know what his plan is, and it would kill me.” The thunderous crash that slammed against the door of the room seemed to answer the unspoken Who? that had formed in my mind.

The face looked at the door. “He’s here. We’re out of time.” I started to panic. The face looked at me. “Don’t panic. Stay calm. And remember, find the Jo---” My mind seemed to fill with static, as if something was hiding the name from me. Yet, my head nodded, as if some part of me had understood what the face had said. Another boom rocked the door. The face bent down and placed a helmet on its head. “Alright,” it said. “Begin.” The lights in the room blazed into life. A scream filled the air as the door burst open-

“BOOYAH!” screamed David. I sat upright, pillows and a blanket flying. I looked around wildly. I was in my apartment, on the couch. On the couch next to me, facing the T.V, were Shane, David and Kate. David was busy doing a victory dance in front of the screen, which had Epoch Wars, the latest FPS playing across it. I checked the clock. It was 8:24.

David noticed I was awake. “Hey Peter, guess what? I beat Shane at Epoch Wars, can you believe it?”

I was still trying to come to terms with my abrupt return to reality. Kate looked over at me and smiled. “Looks like someone slept like a filly, huh?” I grinned back. Kate knew about MLP and often made references to it to humor me and David. I always suspected she knew more about it than she pretended, but I was never quite sure.

David got our attention again. “Um, Hello? Are we all just going to forget about the fact that I just beat Shane in a first-person shooter?” It was a rather impressive feat. Shane almost never played video games, yet he still played brilliantly when it came to first-person-shooters.

Kate, always ready to defend her boyfriend, responded. “Oh, please. You only won because Shane zoned out at the beginning and you used that against him.”

“Zoned out?” I asked.

“Yeah,” said David. “There were a few minutes when the match first started where Shane was off in La-La-land. Speaking of which, what was that about?” he asked, looking over at Shane.

Shane shrugged. “No idea. One minute, the round was started, next second I was down 15 - 2.”

“I started playing,” Kate chimed in. “It was embarrassing to see him getting his butt kicked.” She and Shane shared a quick kiss.

“Anyway, now that you’re awake, let’s start the presents shall we?” said Kate, getting up off the couch. I looked over at the table. There was a small mound of presents.

“Wow,” I said. “Who are all these for?”

“They’re for all of us,” Shane said, looking at Kate.

I glanced over at David, who glanced at me too. “Is it your birthday too, Kate?” I asked. Neither of us had bought her a gift.

“No,” she said. I relaxed. “My birthday’s tomorrow, but the party’s here today, so we’re celebrating it today.” Well, that was short-lived.

I winced, looking at Kate. “Sorry,” I said. “Neither of us got you a gift.”

She laughed. “Don’t worry. I asked Shining not to tell you guys it was my birthday. I knew you guys didn’t know me that well, and I didn’t want to go through the hassle of exchanging well-meant, but useless, gifts.”

With that thorny social issue resolved, we got down to opening our presents. David got a Lyra plushie from Kate, which sent him into self-replicating cycles of sheer ecstasy. It was one of the few his collection was missing. I got the 13th Doctor’s Sonic Screwdriver, which I squeed over in a proper fanboy manner. Shane had given us each a black T-shirt with red lettering and a picture of an angry pony wearing a T-shirt on the front. The lettering said: “I Watched MLP For Five Years And All I Got Was This Stupid T-Shirt.” We thanked him and then made him open our gifts.

David had gotten him a new state-of-the-art gaming controller with gel grips and a six-month warranty. I got him a new barbell. It had been a gift from my family a while back. A gift I’d never used. Shane nodded at me. “Thanks,” he said. “My old barbell broke last week. I’d been about to replace it.”

“No problem,” I said. I didn’t bother to tell him that I’d been the one who’d accidentally broken it in the first place. I still wasn’t sure how I’d managed to do it.

David gave Kate a sly look. “So, what’d you uh, get Shane for his birthday?” he said.

Kate smiled. “I got him a new car radio. Wireless compatible too,” she said. “He’d been complaining about the old one for over a month.” David and I nodded, suitably impressed.

Shane presented his gift to Kate, a long thin box. She opened it and her eyes widened. “Oh wow,” she said. “Where did you get it?”

She held up a thin silver necklace. On the very end of it was a blue, faceted heart, with golden curls coming off the sides in a handle-like manner.

Shane was leaning back in his chair, arms behind his head. He knew that he’d rocked it when it came to gifts this year. “I saw it in a store window one day and it made me think of you. Do you like it?” he asked.

“It’s beautiful,” she said. “I love love love it.” She threw her arms around him in a grateful hug. “Well,” she said, releasing him. “I’d better get going. I only came here to stay for a few hours or so. Shane’s got to drop me off back home.”

Me and David exchanged a sly look. “Uh huh, sure. He’s going to ‘drop you off back home’ is he?”

Kate gave us a look. “Actually, my parents are in town and staying at my place for my birthday, so he really is just going to drop me off back home.” As she turned away though, it might have just been my imagination, but I thought I saw a look of disappointment cross her face. I definitely saw one cross Shane’s face. “Hold up,” David said. “Peter still hasn’t gotten my gift yet.” I opened the flat gift still under all the wrapping paper to reveal: Portal 3. My eyes went wide.

“No way!” I yelled. “This game only came out last month! How did you get it?!”

“I have my ways,” David replied. He turned to the table and opened the package I got for him. Inside was a black fedora, with a limited edition Twilight Sparkle (his favorite pony) keychain inside it. Immediately he put on the fedora, leaned back in his chair against the wall and started swinging his keychain around his finger, like something out of a film noir movie. We all laughed.

David got up out of his chair and moved as if to say something, but then froze and stood stock still in the center of the room, as if he had been hit by a brick or something. His eyes had gone very wide. We all looked at him. Shane walked up to him and waved his hand at him “Hello? Anyone home? What’s up, Doc?” Then he rolled his eyes. “Oh, I get it. He’s doing an impression of me when I zoned out. Very funny David.” David didn’t reply. “Whatever,” Shane said. Something about his question struck me. I let it go for now.

Kate snapped her fingers. “Oh, wait, didn’t you guys want to do something special with your birthdays today? Something like like noticing the exact time when your ages changed?”

Shane smacked his forehead. “That’s right, we did. We missed mine though, it was around 8 o'clock. David’s was...” He looked at the clock. “Huh. Right now,” he said. “Well’ if he wants to be so busy poking fun at me, then he can miss his birth moment.” Shane said with a grin.

“When was yours?” Kate asked, looking at me.

“Hmm, mine was at about 8:23, if I remember correctly.” I said

“Rats. If only you’d woken up just a little bit sooner.” she said. “We could have celebrated it.”

“Doesn’t matter,” said Shane. “It was just an idea.” he turned back to me. “See you guys in a little bit.” And with that, the two departed.

As the door snapped shut, David blinked hard, shaking his head a couple of times. I laughed. “Okay, that was funny. Was that really what he looked like?” David looked confused.

“Was what what who looked like?” he asked.

“You know, was that really what Shane looked like during the game. You were doing an impression of him, weren’t you?” I said looking at David.

“Oh... Oh yeah. That. Yeah, I was.” He said, looking away. He looked bothered though.

“What’s up?” I asked.

“Nothing,” he said hurriedly. “Let’s just try out that game now. I can’t wait to see it.” I readily agreed and we sat down and put the disc in. “Just a sec,” David said. “I’ve gotta use the bathroom.” He ran off to the room at the end of the hallway. I sat on the couch waiting for the disc to load. After a few seconds, a message flashed on the screen: DISC ERROR 603. PLEASE CONSULT THE INSTRUCTION MANUAL FOR DETAILS. Hmm, Error 603. I’d never heard of that one. I opened the disc case and pulled out the manual. As I did so, I heard a muffled yell, several scuffling sounds and a thud come from the bathroom. The sound of running water joined them. I heard muffled expletives next. I sat back, bemused. What was going on in there?

The sound of water stopped. About ten seconds later, the door opened to reveal a soggy headed David standing in the doorway, glaring daggers at me. “What happened?” I ask, keeping the laughter out of my voice.

David continued to glare. “I tripped and fell on the water controls in the shower after I saw your little prank.” I looked at him.

“Dude, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” I said.

He scowled. “Yeah right, you know perfectly well that I’m talking about this.” He turned his side to face me and pulled down the waistband of his pants.

Whatever I was prepared for, it wasn’t that. Plain as day, plastered across his thigh, was a clearly defined, hourglass cutie mark. I burst out laughing. “Oh, seriously!? You got a cutie mark?! And out of all the hundreds of canon and non-canon ones you choose Doctor Whooves’s!? You don’t even like him! You think he’s ridiculous! You won’t even discuss him on the theory forums.” I stopped laughing and looked at him. “Seriously though, I hope you don’t expect to start some kind of brony revival movement, because it’s not going to happen. It’s just not.” David was looking at me with a mixture of confusion, frustration and desperation. I didn’t know why he’d wanted me to think I’d put the mark on there, but I hadn’t. “Kind of a lame joke, trying to convince me of thinking I did something like that,” I said, trying to change the subject. “That had about, what, a .1% chance of working?”

“Actually it was about .000235%” he muttered absently, still looking bewildered.

“Whatever,” I said. “You engineers and your statistics.” I didn’t understand why he was confused. He hadn’t actually expected that prank to work had he? What confused me more was the decision to get the mark in the first place. David was a die-hard brony, sure, but he didn’t seem like the kind to do this. Especially not Doctor Whooves’s mark. Twilight’s was a maybe, but only just. We sat there in silence for about five minutes, me pretending to try and read my owner’s manual, him still trying to stare answers out of me.

Our silence was broken by Shane returning through the front door. “Hey,” he said, walking into the living room. “Anything new?”

“Why don’t you ask the newest contestant for world’s biggest brony.” I said, gesturing at David, while still reading my owner’s manual.”

Shane looked at David. “What’s he talking about?”

David stood up slowly. “Now before you ask, I didn’t do this to myself. I don’t know how it got here, it wasn’t there this morning and I swear I didn’t do it.” With that, he lowered his hands to his waistband and showed Shane his cutie mark.

Much to my surprise, Shane didn’t start groaning and rolling his eyes. He shrugged. “Huh. That’s a really well done tattoo,” he said. “Much clearer than any I’ve ever seen,” he looked at me. “But how does this make him the world’s biggest brony?” he asked.

Oh yeah. Shane wouldn’t know a lot about the background ponies. “That’s the cutie mark of Doctor Whooves, from MLP.” I said.

Now Shane rolled his eyes. “Seriously? You got a cutie mark?”

David glared at him. “I told you I didn’t do it!”

Shane gave him a deprecating look. “Are you telling me that someone else gave you a tattoo?”

David threw up his hands. “I don’t know! All I know was that it wasn’t here this morning.”

“How did you find it then?” Shane asked.

David recounted the experience. “Well, I was sitting on the couch, when I noticed that my legs were really itchy. So I went into the bathroom to see what had bitten them. And when I looked down, there they were.”

Shane froze suddenly, his eyes going wide and his face going pale. “Wait,” he said. “Did you say, itchy legs?” He slowly looked down at his own legs. I did too. It was only then that I noticed that he’d been absentmindedly scratching his own leg the entire time he’d been home. Slowly, he lowered his hands to his own waist and pulled down the waistband. There, sitting on his thigh, was a dark blue shield with a bright purple star on it, with three blue stars raised above that.

I sat stunned. I had a hard time believing that David would go and get a cutie mark, but now Shane? Shane had barely seen the episodes.

David looked as stunned as I did. “That’s Shining Armor’s cutie mark,” he said blankly. “Why do you have Shining Armor’s cutie mark?”

They both looked at me.

“Oh, so I’m a suspect now!?” I said, clenching the manual in my hand in anger.

“I don’t know.” said Shane. “But there’s one way to find out. If you didn’t do this, then someone else must have, and why would they go through all the trouble to get us and leave you alone? So, let’s see. Show us if you have a cutie mark or not.”

“This is ridiculous,” I said. “It won’t prove anything.” They just looked at me intently. I sighed and lowered my waistband. I was a little curious myself. I looked down. My thigh was completely blank. Shane and David stared at me.

I tried to pass it off as nothing. I went back to reading my manual. “See guys? I told you that it proved nothing. Look, I promise you that I- I- I...”

A fierce itch rose in my nose. My eyes closed peremptorily. “ah.. Ah.. AH... ACHOOO!” I let out a huge sneeze. I wrenched my eyes open, just in time to see my manual get engulfed in bright, emerald flames. I looked down to see a long, thin reptilian tongue retreat back into my mouth.

Oh. Well. That was... different.

The Cold Truth

We stood there, staring at her, and she stared right back. After the initial shock wore off, I noticed that it wasn’t the real Princess Cadance. It was a person. But they were obviously going through the same thing that had happened to us. Her hair was in the exact same color and style as Cadance’s mane, her eye color was the same and there was something vaguely pony-ish about her face.

She wore shoes, but I could recognize the stance of someone who was standing on hooves instead of feet. She was obviously a few stages behind Shane, who was having trouble standing upright at this point. She also wore a baseball cap, probably to hide her horn, whereas Shane’s horn had grown to the point where no baseball cap would hide it. I could also see her tail, and her wings, which she had made room for by cutting holes in the back of her shirt, even though she tried to hide them.

Beneath it all though, there was a person, recognizable, but whose identity still eluded me. “Kate?” asked Shane, staring at her closely. “Is that you?”

I facepalmed. Of course! I should have seen it immediately! Who else would be at Kate’s house but Kate? How she got caught up in our pony curse I didn’t know, but any new development was an extra clue to work with.

“Shane?” Kate asked, looking at him. Then her eyes turned hard. “Please,” she said slowly, barely controlling her temper. “Tell me that you had absolutely nothing to do with this,” she gestured at her current form.

Shane quickly held up his hands in defense. “No way,” he said. “I know just as much about it as you do. It’s happening to me too, see?”

She looked at all the obviously apparent changes in him and sighed. “Okay. Sorry to get accusatory, but I couldn’t help being suspiscious, not after you gave me this,” she said, holding up her necklace.

Shane looked confused. “What? What does that necklace have to do with anything?” he asked.

Kate looked at him. “I thought you knew what it was when you bought it for me,” she held up the necklace, still attached to her neck, heart pendant spinning at the end. “This heart is Cadance’s cutie mark. The very mark that had appeared on me the morning after your party.”

“Wait, I thought you said your birthday was after ours,” I blurted out from my hiding place. Kate and Shane turned to look at us.

“Oh yeah,” said Shane, who had obviously forgotten us. “Kate, you remember David and Peter?”

Kate’s eyes widened. “That’s you guys? You’re caught up in this too?”

“Yes, yes,” I said dismissively. “Ponies, ponies everywhere. But please, can we get back to the matter at hand? You said your birthday was after ours, did you not?”

Kate shrugged. “Yeah, by about six hours. I was born 2 o’clock on May 3rd, so it is the next day. But what does my birthday have to do with anything?”

Shane interjected. “We’ll explain later. It’s kind of a long story. We came here because we wanted to ask if you would do us a favor and let us stay with you while we get all this sorted out.”

Kate shrugged. “Sure, why not? We’re all in the same boat now, so we may as well paddle together.”

“Thanks,” said Shane. “We’ll go get our stuff.”

“Stuff?” Kate asked.

“Yeah, we brought supplies with us.”

We went and started to unload our gear out of the car and bring it into Kate’s living room. “Nice outfit,” I laughed, looking at Kate’s shirt with the holes cut in the back for her wings.

“You’re not looking too trendy there yourself,” she replied, looking at my pants. As I’d grown smaller and smaller, I’d had to cut off lengths of my pant legs so that I could walk around. It didn’t look pretty. Not that I really cared.

“Touche,” I said. Once we’d carried everything in, we told Kate about our theories and plans for the near future. She agreed with our planning and decided to help us out in our search for information. Hooray, I thought. Kate has joined our party. All we need now is the white mage and we’re all set. It’s not that I didn’t want Kate to help us, it’s that we had come over here to find answers eventually, not more questions. Now we had another pony-turned-human case to investigate. Where was this headed? Was the entire world going to end up as ponies?

I snapped out of my musings as Kate spoke up. “Well then, I guess we’d better get packing.”

“Packing?” I asked. “Are we going somewhere?”

“Eventually,” she replied. “And when we do decide to go somewhere, we’ll want our supplies packed in those saddle bags, and that’ll be much easier to do with hands instead of hooves. So, let’s get to it.” We all agreed and started packing various supplies into the saddle bags.

“So,” said Shane, busy coiling a rope. “If you were suspicious that I had something to do with this pony thing, why didn’t you call me and ask me about it?”

Kate snorted in irritation. “My parents,” she said. “They were here for my birthday and only left around this afternoon. I couldn’t have an extended and possibly loud phone conversation with you with them hanging around. And after that, I was trying to decide if I could get out to the store and get some supplies before I got too noticeable.”

“Well then, it’s lucky for you that we came along,” said David, trying stuff a hatchet into a bag.

Yeah, lucky that all four of our birth times just happened to be within six hours of each other, I thought. There was no way that it was a coincidence, but what did it all mean? As we talked, Kate kept us entertained with stories of hiding her pony transformation from her parents, how she’d had to pretend that she’d gone to a stylist and had her hair dyed Cadance-style, how she’d had to develop a fondness for baseball caps once her ears and horn had shown up, and how her tail was still cramped from keeping it hidden for almost two days.

Eventually, we got all the supplies packed into three sets of saddlebags sitting by the front door, ready for use. By that time, it was pretty late, so we decided to call it a night and go to bed; Kate to her room, Shane to the guest room and David and I to the couches in the front room. I tossed off the pants that were already too long for me again, grabbed a blanket and jumped up onto the couch. Listening to the creaks and sounds of an unfamiliar house, my mind eventually settled down to sleep.

I awoke to the sun blazing through the window opposite the couch where I slept. I reached for my phone to check the time, before I realized I’d left it in my pants. I hopped off of the couch and grabbed my pants, rummaging through them to get my phone. I pulled it out and pressed the button. 9:00, the phone read. I slid my finger along the bottom of the touchscreen. A scratching sound told me quite clearly that dragon claws were not compatible with mobile phones. Wincing, I tried again, making sure to use the flat part of my finger, instead of the claw. It worked. I smiled, glad to see that the touchscreen still responded to fingers, even if they were scale covered. I put my phone away. It was time to do the daily physical check.

I went into the bathroom, stood in front of the sink and checked the mirror. Or tried to, at least. It turns out they don’t put bathroom mirrors at the three foot high mark. Grumbling, I grabbed a chair from the kitchen and carried it back to the bathroom. Standing on it, I gazed into the mirror. Spike the dragon gazed back at me, a look of shock on his face. Eventually, the shock was replaced by sadness and resignation.

I scanned myself completely. I was all purple scales, from head to toe, except for my new belly scales, which were green. I gave them a few raps, and they rung with a solid-sounding ‘ding!’ At least I was well-armored. That was a definite bonus. I sighed in defeat. Well, I’d known that this was going to happen. I guessed it was finally over now. At least I could stop with these self-checks. I sighed. Mondays.

First, I went around closing all the curtains, to make sure that no one might possibly see us, slim as that chance was. Then, I went to the kitchen to get myself some breakfast. I opened up Kate’s fridge and got out a carton of eggs. Fishing underneath the stove, I found a frying pan, and then realized that the stove, much like the mirror, was not compatible with toddlers or small dragons. Shrugging, I cracked an egg into the pan and lit up the bottom with green fire. Burn, baby, burn, I thought to myself. Who needs a stove when you’ve got a dragon? After hearing some movement from upstairs, where the two bedrooms were, I decided to make breakfast for everyone.

As I went to the pantry to get some food, a blinding flash of pain shot through my head. I collapsed to the ground with a cry. The same kind of hammer-pounding-skull feeling I’d felt before at the apartment had returned with a vengeance. The throbbing continued a few more times, until I felt like screaming to release the pain. Then, slowly, sluggishly, it subsided. I lay gasping on the floor. What was that?! The change was complete, wasn’t it? There was nothing left to change, so what was that pain about?

Nervously, I probed my mind again, poking at the crack I’d felt before. I didn’t even know how I was poking, but that was the only thing I could call it. I felt the crack again. Now, where before there had been one crack, a whole spiderweb of splinters had “appeared” in what seemed to be a “sidewall” of my mind. The whole experience was unnerving, and I found myself breathing heavily. What was going on? Was I going mad?! Would I lose my mind? I took a deep breath, trying to calm down. There was no point in panicking. I couldn’t overreact. The only thing that could be done was to wait and deal with whatever happened when it happened. Shakily, I got to my feet and started making breakfast.

About a half-hour later, my concentration was broken by the sound of a body tumbling down the stairs. Expletives and female laughter followed shortly. Looking out into the hallway, I could see Shane lying in a pile four white hooves at the foot of the stairs, every bit Shining Armor from horn to tail.

Kate was obviously at the top of the stairs, laughing her head off by the sound of it. “Oh yeah?! Well if it’s so easy, then why don’t you give it a try?” said Shane angrily. The was a creak, a sound of fluttering wings, and Princess Cadance floated slowly into view, her purple-tipped wings flapping to slow her descent.

“Cheater,” Shane grumbled, picking himself up and stumbling into the kitchen. Kate stuck her tongue out at him.

“You can fly?” I asked, impressed.

“Not really,” said Kate. “I haven’t practiced yet. It’s still more like falling with style at this point. Shane’s actually better than I am at walking, but stairs would give anyone trouble. What’s for breakfast?” she asked.

“Eggs for me and sandwiches and fruit for the new vegetarians,” I replied.

Kate looked at her plate, which contained a peanut butter-and-banana sandwich and an apple and sighed. “I hadn’t realized that yet, but you’re right. Ponies can’t really eat meat, can they? Fare thee well, bacon. Fare thee well.” She tilted her head, trying to decide which way was best to turn her head to eat the sandwich.

Shane laughed, some of his good humor returning. “Here, try this,” he said, levitating his sandwich up to his mouth.

Kate stared at him. “How did you do that?” she asked. “I’ve been trying to do magic ever since my horn appeared and I’ve gotten nothing!”

“It’s all in the way you think,” Shane replied. “You have to imagine the spell a certain way. You can’t imagine the object floating, or some invisible hand picking up the object. You have to imagine a magical force surrounding the object and lifting it up. It’s all about the specific way to think about it.”

“That’s probably what the magic books in the show do,” I added. “They probably tell you the way you need to think about things in order to get the spell to work.”

Kate nodded, then frowned at the sandwich, concentrating. A flickering blue aura appeared around the sandwich. It stabilized, and the sandwich lifted into the air and into Kate’s happy, open mouth. “Wow,” she said, around a mouthful of sandwich. “That’s cool.”

David entered the room and approached the table. He opened his mouth to speak, and tripped over his own hooves, crashing into the table. “Owwwwwww!” he yelled. I winced in sympathy. Never had I been so glad for my bipedal form. David reemerged from under the table, good mood instantly gone. The awkward silence stretched. Like Kate, he stared at his sandwich, but he had no magic to pick it up with.

“Here,” said Kate, her aura surrounding his sandwich. He glared at her. The magic died away.

“I don’t need anyone to feed me, thank you,” he said witheringly. His head snapped forward and he grabbed the sandwich in his mouth, holding it and eating it at the same time. “Mmmpfsee? I’mmpf fine,” he said, his words muffled.

Kate looked away and turned back to the rest of us. “So what’s on the agenda for today?” she asked.

Shane shrugged. “I wanted to go out in the back for a bit and see if I could practice my magic. You know, try and figure out some of the spells that are in the show.”

“Sounds cool,” I said. “I could try out my dragon powers.”

“And I’d love to learn to fly!” said Kate excitedly.

We looked at David, awkwardness starting to creep into the room again. He noticed the mood change and looked abashed, some of his bad mood fading. “Don’t worry about me,” he said. “I need to figure out how to make my computer pony-compatible and that’ll take a while. You guys go do your thing.”

We turned to go. “Actually,” said David, stopping us. “There is one more thing I’d like to talk about,” He looked uncomfortable. “I know we haven’t decided on our next move, but there is something I’d like to do. You see, a while back, I’d been a little low on cash, and I’d needed to pay the rent on the apartment, so I went down to a pawn shop and sold something of mine, an old family heirloom I’d had all my life. Now that we’re ponies, we don’t really need to save money for school, so yesterday, I withdrew some money from my account, enough to buy the thing I sold. So I was wondering if we could go and get it back sometime. It’s in a deserted part of town, so no one would be around to see us, and we could go at night. We could disguise Peter and have him get it. Even if the owner did see, us, who would believe that two ponies and a dragon had come and bought something from his shop?” He paused, looking at us.

We stared back at him. It was a very risky idea, but I could tell he was really earnest about it. So could Kate and Shane. “I suppose it’s not all that dangerous,” said Shane.

“And you do have a point,” Kate said. “No one would believe a story like that. We can do it. But we can’t put it very high on our priority list,” she said, looking at him.

“Oh, I know,” said David quickly. “Whenever we get to it is fine. Thanks” he said, turning back to his computer. I knew that it was probably still pretty lousy to leave and go practice all these cool new abilities and leave David inside without anything, but I didn’t really see what I could do. Together, the three of us cleaned up breakfast and trooped out to the backyard.

Kate’s backyard was perfect for practice. It was a field of grass, extending for about ninety yards behind the house, where it was bordered by a low wooden fence. About ten yards behind that was a well-defined treeline, which extended into a forest beyond. To top it all off, she had the only house around for ten miles, which made it a very secluded place where it would be very hard to catch sight of some unsuspecting ponies.

As we entered the backyard, Shane suddenly let out a cry and dropped to the ground, writhing in pain. We rushed over to him, but there wasn’t much we could do. We tried lifting him to carry him back inside, but as we started to pick him up, he stopped moving, gasping. “It’s alright,” he breathed. “I’m fine. You can put me down.” We dropped him.

“What happened?!” Kate asked, panic in her voice.

“I’m not sure,” said Shane. “All of a sudden, my head just started hurting like crazy. It’s gone now though.” Kate still looked worried. “Relax,” he said. “It was probably just a magic cramp or something. Maybe a magic growth spurt. Let’s go. We need to get practicing.”

We started walking again, but I watched Shane closely. He had an introspective look on, as though he were searching inside himself for something. Maybe a crack, my brain suggested. Shut up brain, I suggested right back. It was a crazy thought. We weren’t going crazy, nothing was going to happen. I wasn’t very reassured.

We stopped in the middle of the yard. Shane went off to go help Kate get her flying practice off the ground. I watched them for a bit. Kate wasn’t bad. She was a bit wobbly getting into the air, but once she did, her practice really took off.

I went back to focusing on my own practice. I needed to fully analyze my combat capabilities. First, I started by running around the yard to test my stamina, then I unleashed my physical strength on one of the fenceposts at the border of the yard. The results were in. I had the stamina, strength and fighting prowess... of an eight-year old. It was pathetic. While dragons grow up to be formidable creatures, right now I was honestly little more than an armored toddler. I did have several advantages, like my tail, with its semi-blunt spike and my razor sharp claws on hands and feet though. I looked around, a little discouraged. I could see Shane by the fence, making his horn glow with an illumination spell.

Since there wasn’t much I could do in the Department of Punching, I decided to devote my energies to my most formidable dragon power yet: that of Fire Breathing. I tested it lightly on myself first, to make sure I was fireproof. The severe lack of burning told me that I was. Next, I picked up a rock and started blasting it with fire. It grew red-hot under the river of flames. I practiced manipulating the stream with my mouth, making it wider and more engulfing, or narrower and more intense. I tried seeing how long I could breathe fire for without taking a breath. While doing so, I discovered something: I could breathe out fire and breathe in through my nose at the same time. There must be some secondary air system that let dragons breathe out and in at the same time. It made sense. Fire breathing wasn’t a very good defense system if you had to stop to breathe often.

I stopped after about two minutes. Fire breathing was actually harder than regular breathing. There was probably a muscle back there that I was working, just like regular exercise. I pondered the possibilities of fire breath. It wasn’t bad, but it ended up being a rather close-range move. There had to be some way to better weaponize it. I leaned against a fencepost, thinking.

I saw Shane over on the other end of the yard, struggling with some new spell. Kate was still flying around the yard, doing wobbly loops and unsteady somersaults, practicing her coordination. I looked down at the rock in my hand, still glowing red from the heat of fire-breath. It gave me an idea. I backed up about ten feet, relit the rock with my fire and threw it at the post. It stuck fast, still smoldering. I looked at it, pleased. A flaming hot rock attack. Promising. Now I needed to practice my aim.

I looked over at Shane, who had managed to conjure a shield in mid-air around a ten-foot tree. As I looked, the shield seemed to shimmer and waver weakly. Shane could probably use some endurance training. I bounced the rock in my head. I knew how we could kill two birds with one stone. “Hey Shane,” I said. “Come here for a second...”

We combined our training, all three of us. Shane conjured a shield orb in mid-air and I tried to hit it with rocks, while Kate simultaneously tried to ram it. Whichever one hit first got the point. We trained like that for a couple of hours. Kate was a lot better at flying than I was at throwing rocks, and she won most of the rounds. Fortunately, there was no shortage of ammo, so I kept on practicing. Shane got the most out of it though, his shieldwork steadily improving over the course of the day. At one point, he conjured a shield as big as the first story of the house. He leaned against it, immensely pleased with himself.

We soon tired from the exercise however, and took a short break, resting underneath one of the trees, basking in its shade. Sitting there, with Shane and Kate, it almost made me forget what was going on, that I was trapped in a strange body that I didn’t understand. It was like we were all just hanging out as friends again, the way things were before...

The moment passed. Shane stood. “Alright,” he said. “There’s one more spell I want to try and learn: the laser spell.” I stuck around, intrigued. So did Kate, apparently having the same idea. We watched as Shane approached a tree and closed his eyes, concentrating. His horn started to glow and soon, a beam lanced from it and struck a small tree branch, which fell to the ground, singed. “Nice!” I said, Kate applauding. Shane grinned. True, it wasn’t much of a laser, but that would come with practice. The hardest part was learning how to do it.

Shane turned back to the tree and started firing again. I hopped on top of a fence post to get a better look. We watched him practice for a few minutes, his aim slowly getting better. Eventually, I turned to leave, and nearly and fell off the post I was standing on. “Ahhh!” I gasped. Shane turned towards the sound, horn still glowing. As he turned to face me, he fired. A blast came rocketing towards me, blinding me and leaving purple afterimages. It slammed into me, hitting me full force. I flew backwards off the post, hitting the ground.

I heard Kate scream. She and Shane ran to where I lay on the ground. “You idiot!” she yelled at Shane. “You could have killed him!”

“I’m so, so, so, so sorry,” said Shane, who had turned pale, a feat that I would have thought impossible. “Are you okay?”

I shook my head to clear it. “Actually, yeah. I’m fine,” I said, hopping to my feet to prove it. Shane and Kate looked stunned. I couldn’t blame them. Even I was surprised.

“But how?!” Shane asked “Not that I’m not happy you’re okay,” he said quickly, looked at Kate’s glare. “But that was a pretty strong blast, yet you don’t even have a mark on you. How?”

I pondered that question myself, and the answer hit me. “Magic resistance!” I cried.

“What?” asked Kate.

“Magic resistance,” I said again. “Dragons are naturally resistant to magic. That’s why the blast didn’t hurt me!” Shane’s eyes widened in understanding. I was fired up now. This was going to be a very cool power.

Kate was still confused. “But that doesn’t make any sense. Twilight uses magic on Spike all the time in the show. Like levitation and teleportation. Those ones still work.”

I shook my head. “It’s different. Dragon scales are what give a dragon magic resistance. It’s like armor. You can pick it up just fine, but you run into problems when you try and stab it with a sword. Stuff like transformations and magic attacks aren’t going to be able to get through dragon scales unless they’re extremely powerful.”

Kate blinked. “Oh. Well, that’s useful, I suppose.” Having settled the matter, we resumed our training.

Around 2 o’clock, we decided to head back to the kitchen to get some lunch. When we got back in, we found David sitting at the table with his laptop open, staring at the screen. When he saw us, his face brightened. “Oh good, you’re here,” he said. “Peter, I need your help. I need you to tape these to the side of my hooves. He held out duct tape and what appeared to be two fish hooks bent so that the hooks pointed sideways instead of up. I taped them to him and he went back to his computer. “There we go,” he said. “Now I can type without having to hold a fork in my mouth.”

I sniggered at that mental image. “So, found anything useful yet?” I asked.

David looked at me, a little grumpily. “No, I haven’t. It’s not as easy as it looks. It’s slow trying to type with a fork, and do you even know the type of results you get when you Google ‘turning into a pony’?” I could only imagine. Still, a big part of me was disappointed that David hadn’t found anything. I knew it was unrealistic to want results on the first day, but I still felt irritated. Angry, I trudged into the kitchen to make lunch.

About twenty minutes later, I came back to the table, carrying a tray loaded with bowls of soup. The other three were talking amongst themselves about possible sources of information on the Internet. I set the soup on the table. Kate and Shane both thanked me, took their bowls and started to eat. David looked at his bowl with outrage, and then knocked it aside, spilling some of it onto the table.

“Hey!” I said. “I worked hard on that! You’re not even going to eat it?!”

David looked at me angrily. “Is that some kind of joke?! How can I eat soup? I don’t have hands!” he yelled.

Inwardly, I winced a little at the oversight, but my anger was still burning. “Well, Kate and Shane don’t mind and they don’t have hands either!” I said.

“They have magic, you nimrod!” David yelled, slamming his hoof on the table. The room turned cold.

“Hey, cut it out!” Kate snapped at David. “Peter was just trying to do us a favor. It was an honest mistake.”

“Stay out of this.” said David and I in unison.

“Watch it,” said Shane. “Kate’s trying to help you resolve this.”

David snorted. “Well she helps too much! She treats me like I’m helpless, just because I don’t have magic! I can do things by myself!”

Shane opened his mouth to reply, but was cut off by Kate. “Really!? I never would have guessed, from the way you keep carrying on like you are!” She was really steamed now. She was so steamed that I could see her breath clouding as it left her mouth. “You get offended when people don’t take your missing fingers into consideration, but when they do and try and help you get along without them, you yell at them for patronizing you! Make up your mind!” The wind howled outside.

“Uh, guys?”

“Well at least I’m doing something productive!” David yelled back through chattering teeth. “I-I’m not just twittering around outside, doing nothing! I’m actually t-trying to look for a solution to our problem!”

“Hey, guys.”

“And what good has all your research done? Oh yeah, that’s right, NONE!” shouted Kate. “Y-You’ve spent all this t-time in here staring at your laptop and it hasn’t done a bit of good! So don’t pretend like you’re some kind of-”

“GUYS!” I yelled “Shut UP for a second!” They stopped talking, and finally noticed their surroundings. The temperature in the room had dropped drastically, and we were shivering. Our breaths came out in clouds of vapor, and there was a thin layer of frost on the table. The wind howled outside, and I heard another sound in it, a higher, more menacing sound. I went over to a window and pulled a curtain back, looking outside.

A pure white eye looked back at me. I gasped, reeling back, my eyes still fixed to the window. “What is it?!” cried Shane.

“Windigos,” I snapped. “Three of them. Shane, we need a shield around this house, now!”

“What?!” said Shane bewildered. “I’ve never made one that big before!”

“It doesn’t matter!” I said. “We need one NOW!”

Shane gritted his teeth and closed his eyes, fueling his magic with desperation. His horn flared with light, and I looked out the window to see the three windigos repulsed by a purple shield which enveloped the house.

“Windigos?!” Kate asked. “What are windigos doing here?”

“Only one way to find out,” I said, turning the front door handle and going outside.

The windigos were waiting at the edge of the shield, hovering over the street. I approached them, trying to look commanding, and not three feet tall. “What business do you have here?” I demanded, hoping I sounded official.

The lead windigo answered in a voice like pieces of glass in a bucket of ice; aka sharp and cold. “We have come on behalf of our master, We seek somepony. We have traced his energy and know that he is here. Do not try and hide him from us.”

“Who do you seek?” I asked, carried away by the old-timey style.

The windigo’s eyes glowed. “We seek the Time Pony. Do not conceal him, or you shall feel of our master’s wrath.”

I went cold. They had come for David. Why? “Who is your master?” I asked. “And why should I fear him or his servants?”

The windigo looked at me, obviously pondering whether or not to answer my question. “I shall tell you,” it said, smiling evilly. It clearly thought that his master’s name would have an impact on me. “I serve the Chaos God, Discord.” Spot on, Windigo, spot on. I gulped, shuddering. My worst fear had come true. Somehow, Discord had some hand in this situation, and now it seemed like we were on opposite sides. I had to work hard to keep my shoulders from slumping. How did one fight against a god? How could you beat someone who could change the world with a snap of his fingers?

The windigo seemed to sense my distress and pressed its advantage. “Give us the Time Pony,” it said. “We will show mercy if you cooperate. Resist, and you will all suffer.”

Whatever the windigo intended its words to do, they did not do it. Its statement brought the situation home to me. There was no way were going to hand David over to these things, which left only one thing to say to them. “Buzz off, Frosty,” I said, doing away with the formal style.

“What?!” roared the windigo, outraged.

“I said beat it. We’re not giving up the Time Pony, so you can forget it.”

“We were ordered to retrieve the Time Pony, dead or alive. If you resist us, you can rest assured that your fate will be the latter!”

“I’d like to see you try, you sorry excuse for an overgrown snowball.” I said. I turned away and walked back to the house, pursued by the angry screams of the windigos. As soon as I got inside, the others jumped me asking for questions. I related my conversation to them. “So basically, we hand over David to them, or we’re all dead,” I finished.

“So... what do we do now?” Shane asked.

“We don’t hand over David of course!” I said angrily.

“Uh, guys?”

“Well duh,” Shane snorted, rolling his eyes. “I meant what do we do to escape from here?”

“Hey, guys.”

“Hmm,” said Kate. “We’ll need to come up with several plans and discuss the best options. We can’t rule out fighting either.”

“GUYS!” David yelled. We looked over at him. He seemed nervous, and his legs were shaking slightly. “Don’t I get a say in this?” he asked.

“No,” we said in unison. He glared at us. “Look,” I said. “There’s no way we’re handing you over.”

“But it would be better for everyone if I just lef-”

“You’re not the one who gets to decide that,” said Kate, cutting David off. “We are.”

“But you could all get hurt trying to-”

“We don’t care,” said Shane, cutting him off again. “We’d rather die than turn over a friend. What kind of cowards do you take us for?”

“But I’ll just hold you guys bac-”

I held up my hand, silencing him for a third time. “There’s no way we’re turning you in,” I reiterated. “And we have no qualms about knocking you out if you try it yourself. Right now, we need to spend our time devising a plan, and we really need your help. So we would prefer to have your conscious assistance, rather than your unconscious acceptance, okay?”

David looked at us belligerently for a few seconds. Then his facade broke, and he sank to the floor, his legs trembling violently. “Thank you,” he said, his voice hoarse and whispery. “Thank you.”

“Any time and every time,” I said. “Now, we need to come up with a plan. What are those windigos doing?” I asked.

Kate walked over to the window. “Two are circling the house, keeping an eye on us,” she said

“What about the third?”

“It’s ramming the shield, I can feel it,” said Shane, wincing and touching his horn. I paused. Sure enough, I could hear a rhythmic thumping, coming from the windingo’s assault.

“They’re just made of spirit though,” said Shane. “They don’t have as much of an impact as a regular pony. Is fighting an option?” he asked.

I shook my head. “No. Windigos are ice spirits, so I’m willing to bet that the only thing that will hurt them is fire, magic and fire-magic. Unfortunately, Shane is the only one who knows any offensive magic, and I’m the only Fire-type we have.” I looked over at Kate. “Sorry, but you won’t be much help in this fight. Flying types are weak against Ice,” Kate shrugged. “That leaves two fighters who’ve barely had their powers for a day against three spirits who’ve had their powers for who knows how many millenia. It’s not good odds.” I continued.

“So fighting is out of question,” said Kate. “What about escape? Could we leave out the back when the windigos circle to the front?”

I shook my head. “They move too fast. Even if we went right as they were out of sight, we wouldn’t even make it past the fence before they were back around and after us.”

“We could widen the shield,” David suggested. “It would take them longer to circle it.”

Shane shook his head this time. “If I widen the shield any more, it will get weak, and the windigos might break through. Besides, I’d have to widen it quite a lot to get us the time we need, and I’m not sure I can make it that large. We could leave out the back and distract them, which could let David leave out the front.”

“No,” said David firmly. “I appreciate all of you sticking with me against the windigos, but I draw the line at you sacrificing yourselves for me. Besides, Peter said they can track me, so a diversion is pretty much useless.”

“We could tunnel our way out,” I recommended. “From what I’ve seen, Spike isn’t a bad digger,” Kate squashed that one. “Impossible,” she said. “There isn’t anywhere in the house we could dig from, and if we tried it outside, the windigos would see it. What if we hid in the house, let them try and look for us, and then leave when they’re gone?”

I shook my head. “They have orders to bring David in dead or alive. If necessary, they’ll destroy the house looking for us.”

We went through several ideas, each more feeble than the last. Eventually, we realized that there was only one option. Wait it out. For better or worse, the house was under siege. We put on our saddle bags, ready to run if an opportunity presented itself, which was unlikely. Then, we all returned to the living room to wait. Over time, we came to realize that the whole thing hinged on Shane. He was the one keeping the shield up and if it failed, there was little to no chance of surviving.

As the evening drew on, our hopes rapidly crumbled around us. Shane grew more and more tired, going from a standing position, down to a sitting one, to eventually lying on the floor with his eyes closed, trying to conserve his energy. He’d started shaking violently whenever there was an impact, and his breathing was long and drawn out now. We all sat around him, huddled together for moral support. I checked out of the window. The one spot where the windigo had been ramming was now spiderwebbed with cracks. We’d tried to make conversation, but one after another, we all fell silent. We watched Shane’s horn. The light around it grew weaker and weaker. We all knew that once it went out, so would any chances of survival we had.

As it neared midnight, Shane spoke in a weak, quavery voice. He shook violently all the time now, and we couldn’t tell when he was feeling an impact and when he wasn’t. The light from his horn was wavering weakly. His breathing was shallow. “Guys...” he said. “I can’t... hold it anymore... I can’t... do this,”

“Yes you can,” I said, though I didn’t believe it much.

“Don’t say that,” said David. “You’re the strongest person I know.”

“Look...” gasped Shane. “I’m not... looking for moral support... I’m apologizing... I can’t do this... I can’t save you... I’ve let you all down...” He hung his head and kept his eyes closed. His last bit of hope had been crushed.

“If you can’t do this,” said Kate quietly. “Then we’ll all... die.” The word seemed to hang in the air, almost echoing around the room. It seemed to hit us then, how fragile our lives were.

It seemed to hit Shane too, literally. His head snapped back as if he had received a physical blow. He stopped shaking. His eyes opened and there was fire in them. “No, we won’t,” he said, and his voice was steady. I was stunned. A change seemed to have come over him. He was no longer shaking and he stood up straight. What had happened?

“Follow me,” he said. “Stay right on my tail. Things are going to get interesting.” He went to the front door. I opened it and he exited the house, with us following behind. I stopped for a moment to climb onto David’s back. The windigos, seeing our approach, had gathered to the front of the house and were rearing for a final charge at the barrier, which was now more cracks than shield. It wouldn’t survive a solid hit from the three of them.

Shane charged down the driveway, the three of us right behind him. The windigos charged too. They were getting closer and closer. An instant before they hit shield, Shane deactivated it. Not meeting the resistance they were expecting, the windigos were thrown off balance. Shane charged towards them, his horn glowing brighter and brighter. The windigos recovered and charged towards us too.

The two sides drew nearer and nearer. Just as we were about to crash together, there was a brilliant flash. When it cleared, we were standing thirty yards away, the windigos behind us, their momentum carrying them almost up to the house. They whirled around, but Shane was faster. His horn blazed with light again, and the shield reformed, a thousand times stronger than before. It surrounded the house completely, and it was now so purple it was almost opaque. From behind it, I could hear the muffled cries of rage from the windigos.

I gaped in amazement. How had Shane done that? He’d only learned the shield spell today, and he definitely hadn't practiced teleportation! I looked at him closely, at his stance, his attitude, his power. My jaw dropped in realization. Shane couldn’t do that. Shane hadn’t done that. This wasn’t Shane.

The unicorn walked up to the shield, behind which the threats of the windigos could still be heard. “You will face the wrath of our master!” they cried “Listen to reason! If you give us the Time Pony, Discord will spare your lives!”

“Shane” trotted up the the windigos, looking at them with cold fury and pure disdain in his eyes. “Tell Discord,” he said. “that Shining Armor says he can go to Tartarus.” With that, he turned and ran down the street, the three of us following in his wake.

The Beast Below

We ran down the quiet streets, going at top pace in order to keep up with Shining Armor. He didn’t slow down until we had gotten about a half-mile away from Kate’s house. Coming to a stop by the side of the road, he turned to face us.

“Whew, that one was pretty close, huh?” he said grinning and breathing heavily. We said nothing, our breaths coming in winded gasps. But that wasn’t what caused our silence. We looked around at each other, not sure how to answer the white pony. Was this the real Shining Armor we were talking to? As in, co-ruler of the Crystal Empire and Twilight’s brother? And if so, where was Shane? Did he even still exist?

Shining looked at us quizzically. “Come on guys,” he said. “It wasn’t that bad.” Then he caught sight of Kate, and he lit up with joy. His face looked completely changed “Cadance!” he cried, running over to her side. “Wow! I can’t believe you escaped! I thought Discord would’ve had you for sure! Guess I shouldn’t have doubted you, huh? Don’t know what I was thinking.” he chuckled to himself. Kate backed away, looking nervously at him, unsure how to react.

He looked at her, puzzled. “Cadance,” he said approaching her gently. “It’s me, Shining Armor. Don’t you rec-” he stopped, his eyes going wide, having fully comprehended the situation. “Discord did get to you. He cursed you. Which means... you’re not you... We failed. I-I failed.” He looked crushed. As much as his face had lit up at the sight of his bride, it was now completely devoid of anything remotely resembling light.

My brain went into overdrive. Discord? a curse? Was Discord behind more than just attempting to kidnap David? How far did it go? What exactly had the curse done? I shook my head. I needed to pay attention now, not ask questions.

Kate stepped tentatively towards the defeated unicorn. “Um, Shining Armor?” she said timidly. “Uh, don’t worry. It’s all right. You didn’t fail, you just saved us from those windigos.”

Shining Armor shook his head. “It’s not that. I failed... I failed to protect you... from Discord... and now he... now you...” he gasped, trying to take deep lungfuls of air. “Discord!” he said, spitting the name like a curse. “His spell... sapping my strength... I don’t have much time...” he was now very weak, leaning on Kate for support. “I don’t... have much time...” he said, panting heavily. “You have.. have to find... only thing that can help... find him, please.” He was slipping to the ground, becoming incoherent in his delirium. “Please... find... him...” He sank to the dirt, unconscious.

Kate reached forward slowly to help him, when suddenly she gave a loud cry and fell to her knees beside Shining Armor, clutching her head in her hooves, obviously in intense pain. David and I rushed forward to help her. Before we got there though, she relaxed, the pain having subsided. “I’m fine,” she said, getting slowly to her hooves. “Just a bad headache.” I wasn’t convinced.

Next to her, Shining Armor groaned and opened his eyes. He got unsteadily to his feet. “Kate, David, Peter, are you guys alright?” he asked.

“Shane! It’s you!” cried Kate, throwing her arms around his neck.

He gave her a one-armed return hug. “Yeah. Yeah, it’s me,” he said, almost as much to reassure himself as to reassure her.

“Do you remember what happened?” David asked him.

“Yeah,” he said, nodding. “But I’m not sure of the how. I remember sitting in the living room, trying to keep the shield going. Kate said that we were all going to die, and then I felt this really intense pressure build up inside me. Then, it was as if I was watching a video, like someone else was moving my body. I saw my legs move, felt my mouth move. Then, I watched us escape and someone else... I guess it was Shining Armor, talk to you guys. He collapsed. Then, my limbs got pins-and-needles, like they were waking up, and I could move again.” I listened to Shane’s story, my brain working hard. How had Shining Armor come to be in Shane’s head, or was it the other way around? How had he woken up? Why had he fallen dormant once more? Would he wake up again?

David shook his head, obviously clearing away the same kind of thoughts I was working through. “That doesn’t matter right now,” he said. “Shining Armor’s managed to give us a gift. That,” he said, pointing to Shane’s horn, which he had still managed to keep working even subconsciously. “The shield is much stronger this time, but Shane won’t be able to keep it going for long, and once it’s gone, those windigos will be back on our trail.”

“So what do we do now?” asked Kate.

“We have to continue our search,” David replied. “We need help against the windigos, and that means finding someone from Equestria.”

“But we have no leads,” protested Kate. “And we can’t just sit down and surf the web until we come across something, not with those fiends after us.”

David hesitated. “Actually... we do have one lead. The pawnshop. The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that it has something to do with what’s going on with us. Anyway, it’s the only lead we have to go on and you’re right: we don’t have the time to do a full out search. We only have one lead to follow, so let’s follow it.”

“Sure, sure,” said Shane dismissively. “Sounds good, let’s do it. But can I please get something to eat first? I’m absolutely starving!” Smiling, I reached down from my position on David’s back, dug an apple out of his saddlebag and tossed it to Shane. He caught it in his mouth and started eating it, core and all. “Right then,” he said around the apple. “Let’s ride.” We galloped down the road into the rising moon.

Kate lived outside the south end of town and according to David, the shop was on the outskirts of the east end, about a half-hour away. All in all, the journey would take about an hour to complete, so we got started right away. We ran in ragged formation, Shane running about fifteen feet or so ahead, acting as lookout. David and I ran in the middle, and Kate brought up the rear another fifteen feet back.

I decided to use the travel time to try and gather some information. I thought back on my experiences at our apartment and Kate’s house, about Shane’s collapse in the backyard and Kate’s collapse near the house. “David, have you gotten any sudden, really intense headaches lately? Like, since we started turning into ponies, lately?”

David looked back at me quizzically. “Actually, I can’t say that I have. Why?”

“Well, Shane had one while we were training in the backyard at Kate’s house, and Kate had one right after we talked with Shining Armor, so I was wondering if you’d gotten any.”

David shook his head. “I haven’t. Do you think it might have anything to do with the connection between Shining Armor and Cadance?”

“Maybe,” I said hedging. Personally, seeing as I’d had them too, that possibility didn’t seem likely. But the fact that David hadn’t felt any headaches cast some doubts over my suspicions that they were actually relevant at all, so I held back the rest of my information. We lapsed into silence.

Soon, I noticed that something was off. David was being rather quiet. True, running isn’t exactly the most talkative of states, but David was being even more serious than usual. “Thinking about the ‘Discord Curse’ Shining Armor mentioned?” I guessed.

David sighed. “You caught that too, did you? Well, that kind of was the most important thing he said. And it confirms that Discord is behind all this.”

I raised an eyebrow. “I thought learning that Discord had a price on your head did that.”

David shrugged, an impressive feat to manage while running with me on his back. “It doesn’t matter how it was confirmed. The point is that now we know: Discord is the reason we turned into ponies.”

I hesitated. I had an idea, crazy as it might sound, but I knew it had to be voiced. “Maybe not,” I said.

David looked back at me, his face skeptical. “Are you saying Discord didn’t do it?”

“No,” I replied. “I’m saying maybe Discord is the reason the ponies turned into us.” He looked back at me again, both eyebrows raised. “Think about it,” I said. “What possible reason could Discord have for turning us, four random strangers who have nothing to do with Equestria, into ponies?”

“The obvious fact that it would cause entertaining chaos,” David said.

“Well then there’s Shining Armor’s reaction,” I countered. “When he realized that Cadance had been cursed, he said “You’re not you.” That means that he knew that because Cadance had been cursed, she wasn’t her. That must mean that the curse had something to do with changing the ponies.”

“So you’re saying that the ponies were cursed and forced to share bodies with us for several decades,” David stated.

“Something like that,” I said, shrugging.

David snorted in anger and stamped his hoof mid-stride. “We need information!” he said angrily. “I’m good at solving problems, but I can’t make bricks without clay!” he said, quoting his favorite detective. “We don’t have enough to go on. We can’t afford to start speculating. We have to follow what concrete leads we have.”

I shrugged, palms out. Realizing that David couldn’t see this, I spoke. “It doesn’t matter to me. I never expected it to change our plans or anything. I just feel we need to consider our options, and at some point we’ll have to sit down and figure all this out.”

“Agreed,” said David, sighing again. “But not right now.” A few minutes later, Shane called for a break. We came to rest by a stream, about a good half-hour away from Kate’s house. We stopped to get a drink from the stream and eat some of the supplies we’d packed. I could tell that Shane was starting to feel the effects of simultaneously running and holding a shield up. I hoped that he’d be able to make it.

We got ready to travel again. As I made to hop up onto David’s back, Kate spoke. “Actually Peter, could you ride with me for a bit? I have some questions I wanted to ask you.”

“Sure,” I said, walking back to Kate and climbing on her back. We started off again in the same formation, with Kate and I bringing up the rear. “So,” Kate began. “Since it might be important later, I was hoping you could tell me everything I might need to know about Doctor Who and Doctor Whooves.”

I let out a breath. “Well, there’s a lot to tell, and not a lot of it is really relevant. Let’s start with this: what do you know about the Doctor?”

Kate looked back at me, confused. “Wait, so his name isn’t Doctor Who?”

I facepalmed. “Well that answers that,” I said. “No, his name isn’t Doctor Who, it’s just the Doctor. He’s an alien called a Time Lord who travels through time and space in a blue box called the TARDIS that’s bigger on the inside. He’s generally a really good guy who helps people out wherever he goes. That’s about the gist of it.”

“Okay, where does Doctor Whooves fit in?” Kate asked.

“Fans theorize that some event knocked the Doctor between dimensions from where he was to Equestria. Oh, and it killed him.”

Kate looked back at me, bewildered. “What?!” she asked. “Then how is there a Doctor Whooves!?”

“Time Lords have the ability to regenerate from lethal injuries.” I replied. “They change their appearance and bring themselves back to life. They can do it twelve times, so they basically have thirteen lives. If the stories are true, which, seeing as Doctor Whooves is running about fifteen feet away from us we should assume that they are, then the Doctor is on his twelfth life, and is in pony form because he landed in Equestria.”

Kate took a deep breath, trying to take it all in. “Okay, then here’s the question that I really wanted to ask you: do you think that David is acting like the Doctor?”

I considered the question for a little bit. “Not really,” I replied. “David’s his own person. I haven’t really noticed any Doctor-like tendencies from him, other than his interest in engineering. Why?”

Kate bit her lip, and I could see an amount of fear in her eyes. She glanced over at Shane. “You can tell me,” I said. “I seem to be everyone’s confidant today.”

Kate let out a deep breath. “Okay. But, and I know this sounds childish, you have to promise not to tell anyone. Okay?”

I smiled. “Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake-”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” said Kate, cutting me off. “I get it. What I’m wondering is... how much of mine and Shane’s relationship is really real?”

My face instantly paled. Oh no. Oh no no no. I’d accidentally gotten myself involved in the world of relationships. I was doomed.

Kate turned, saw the look on my face and gave me an annoyed glare. “I’m not asking you for relationship advice,” she said. “I’m just asking you to listen for a little bit. Please?” There was real pain in her voice.

I instantly regretted my earlier trepidation. “Sure,” I said. “Sorry.”

Kate sighed. “I’m just worried. Ever since Shining Armor showed up, I’ve been seeing more and more similarities between us and the ponies we look like. Shane’s a guard, you study geology, David’s an engineer, and me... Well, I don’t know, but then, I wouldn’t, would I? If I’m being influenced by Cadance, then what would seem normal to her would seem normal to me,” she sighed. “What I’m trying to ask is: are my feelings for Shane, and his feelings for me, actually real? Or are they just part of the influences of Shining Armor and Cadance, who do have a real relationship?”

I thought about that for a bit. “Well, I don’t think so,” I replied. “I think you’re right a bit about being influenced by the ponies, but I don’t think it changes our entire lives. I mean, we’ve all turned into ponies from the show, but Shane’s barely even watched it. David is Doctor Whooves, and I’ve tried to show him Doctor Who, but I don’t think he’s watched more than five episodes of the show that’s supposed to be his life. I don’t really think all of our lives are predetermined by the pony side of us.”

“Thanks,” said Kate. She opened her mouth to continue, but was interrupted by Shane calling from up front.

“Hey, Kate, come here. I just had an idea,” he said. Kate trotted up over to him. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of this sooner, but I should teach you the laser and shield spells I learned.” Kate and I agreed, and I made the transfer onto Shane’s back, so as not to throw off Kate’s aim, which already had to deal with the constant motion of running. Once Kate had learned the basics, she returned to her position to practice them, and I ended up on Shane at the front.

A few cars passed us along the road, which sent us scurrying for the bushes at the side. Luckily, the road was raised a good six feet above the hilly landscape around it, so the sides were good cover. As we went further along, I started thinking more and more about our encounter with Shining Armor. Finally, I spoke up. “Hey Shane,” I began. “What did it feel like, when Shining Armor took control of you?”

Shane didn’t answer for a moment. “Definitely strange,” he said at last. “But, not altogether bad. Sure, I’d rather prefer to stay in control of my own body, but the experience wasn’t something out of a horror film or anything. It was as though there was a second option, an option that had always been there, and someone had decided to use it. It wasn’t painful or scary. Just... really weird.” He sounded pretty calm when he talked about it. I was glad he wasn’t traumatized by the experience, as that was the last thing we needed right now.

We entered the city limits. Traffic became much more frequent, but there were alleyways and other places to hide in now. Still, for safety’s sake, I dug four large blankets out of the saddlebags and made makeshift cloaks out of them for each of us. Better for people to see four dark shapes than to see four crazy creatures.

As we neared the road where David said the pawn shop was located, Shane’s pace decreased more and more. Finally, as we were about to turn the corner onto the street, Shane stopped and sat on the sidewalk, panting. “I just need a break,” he said to our inquiring looks. “We’re really far away from the shield. It takes a lot of energy to keep it going.

“Drop the shield,” I told him. The others looked at me, stunned. “Look,” I said. “We don’t know how this lead of David’s is going to turn out. It could lead us somewhere safe, but the odds are high that it won’t. If that’s the case, we’re going to have to find somewhere to make a stand. We can’t keep running from these windigos forever, and if we’re going to fight, we shouldn’t have our best fighter near unconscious from exhaustion. We have more options now, and we need to be ready to act on them.”

The three of them looked at each other uneasily, but no one offered any objections. Shane let out a deep breath and, slowly, released his focus on the magic shield. “That’s it,” he said, his voice instantly stronger and more stable. “They’re on their way. The windigos should be here in about twenty minutes.”

“Then let’s get started,” I said, turning towards our destination.

************************************************************

Dale stood behind the glass counter in the middle of his shop, wiping down the surface with a rag. He looked at the clock and sighed. It was 2 o'clock. That meant he had about six more hours until the day shift manager he’d hired showed up to take his place. Not that keeping his shop open for 24 hours really did him much good. No one really came to this end of town at night. No one really came to this end of town at all. The only things here besides his shop were a small grocery store and an old bowling alley, both of which closed at 9 o’clock. Everything else was run down. He himself was just looking for someone to buy his shop so he and his family could move on.

His musings were suddenly interrupted by the sound of the bell above the door. He turned towards the sound to find a figure, about three feet high, standing next to the door. The figure was draped in a large black blanket, with a section folded over its head like the hood of a cloak. Dale stared at it. The figure was motionless. Then, it moved quickly off to the right, down towards the hallway where the bathrooms were. Dale blinked in surprise. Was this someone’s kid? He’d seen crazier things in a 24 hour pawn shop at 2 in the morning, but he followed after the figure anyway. The figure walked down the dark corridor until it reached the end. The hallway was illuminated occasionally by a flickering bulb at the back.

The figure stopped and turned to look at him. He couldn’t make anything out under the cloak. “Are you my mommy?” it asked.

“Uhh, no,” said Dale, confused. “I’m not your mommy.”

“Are you my mommy?” it asked again.

“No,” he said firmly. “Are you looking for your mommy? I can help-”

“Mooooo-my” said the figure in a sing-song voice, cutting him off.

“Look, I-” Dale began.

“I want my mommy!” the figure interrupted, voice rising in anger.

Dale approached the figure cautiously, more than a little unnerved. “Now just calm down, and I’m sure we can-” he stopped when he noticed the figure’s hands moving slowly towards its hood. The hands were wrong. They were purple, and scaly, as though they were covered with a horrible skin disease. He stopped where he was, a few feet from the figure. Suddenly, with a quick movement, the figure jerked back its hood. A purple reptilian face leaped out at Dale, its bright green eyes contracting, a hiss escaping from its mouth.

Dale leaped back with a scream, falling off his feet and hitting the floor. He whirled around to run, only to find three more figures in cloaks behind him, each one taller than the serpent.

“Death, death, death, death,” they chanted as they stepped towards him.

Their steps made thunking sounds as they walked, like the sound of skeletal feet hitting the tiles. Their bodies seemed to stretch out behind them with inhuman proportions. The chanting grew louder.

“Death, Death, Death, Death,”

Dale was rooted to the spot with fear. The figures seemed to descend beneath him, and he looked down to see that he was slowly being raised into the air. The chanting rose even louder.

“Death! Death! Death! Death!”

Dale tried to struggle, tried to fight against the invisible bonds that held him in the air, but he could do nothing. The first figure walked over to join the other three, its fiery green eyes leering at him from above a wicked smile. A silver knife floated from off its post on the wall near to him and hovered to a stop in front of his face. He looked at its glistening point and his blood ran cold. The chant reached a tremendous volume.

“DEATH!”

Dale’s nerve broke, and he blacked out.

**************************************************

“Whew, that was a close one,” said Kate, lowering the knife to the floor and levitating some rope out of her bag.

“Gotta hand it to the guy, he held out to the end,” said Shane, magicking Dale gently to the floor and tying him up with the rope. “I thought we were actually going to have to knock him out.”

“Good thing it didn’t come to that,” said David. “Now, we have to hurry. We don’t have much time. Shane, I want you and Kate to be looking for anything we can use as weapons. Guns, knives, swords, anything. Gather it all in a big pile in the front. Peter, I want you to go to the second floor and see if you can find at least one piece of ammo for that,” he pointed at a large object mounted on the wall.

I grinned. “Sounds fun.”

“If you can’t, then we’ll make do with what we can gather for it. I’ll start searching for what we came here for. Now let’s go.” Shane and Kate broke off and started pulling stuff down from the walls. David moved to the front of the store and started looking through the counters. I made to go up the stairs when a thought occurred to me.

“Hey David, if I’m the only one upstairs, shouldn’t I be keeping an eye out for the relic too? What if it’s up there?”

“You’re right,” said David, not looking away from the cabinets. “Keep an eye out for it.”

I had two eyes to keep out for it, and I rolled both of them. “I don’t actually know what it looks like, or even what it is,” I told him. “We’ve just been calling it the heirloom this whole time.”

“Don’t worry, you’ll know it when you see it. It’s silver and it has a whole bunch of circles on it.” he said, looking at me.

I crossed my arms and glared at him, my face deadpan.

He sighed. “I guess you’re right. I am being pretty defensive about it.” He leaned closer to me, as though afraid the others might hear. “It’s a pocket watch.” he said. “A silver pocket watch with circles on it. Now hurry.” he turned back to searching the cabinets.

My mind reeled from the force of what he’d just told me. If it was a pocket watch, the pocket watch... I sprinted up the stairs and burst through the door on the second floor landing, my eyes frantically searching everywhere for a glint of silver. The upstairs room was completely filled with clutter. Boxes lined the bottom of every wall, stacked until they were almost toppling over. Glass counters took up most of the room, each one filled with random knick knacks and piles of junk. There was barely enough space to walk.

I remembered that we needed spare ammunition for the thing downstairs. There was no way I’d find any of it’s ammo in here, but if I could find enough random small objects, that would work too. I reached into the nearest box and started pulling out any metal things I could find and stuffed them into the saddlebag I’d brought up with me. The more I took though, the slower I seemed to go.

A fork, a couple of knives, a locket, a few coins. I moved onto the next box.

A silver plate, an iron cup, a box of steel silverware, a brass lamp. Next box

Some shiny coins, a couple of glittering trays, a few dazzling helmets and an assortment of polished rings. I started grabbing things that weren’t metal, anything I could see, as much as my hands could hold, and stuffing it into my bag. My gaze fell on one of the glass cabinets in the middle of the floor. It contained an assortment of small, glittering gemstones. I walked over to them, mesmerized. They were beautiful. They were perfect... They were Mine.

***************************************

The windigos hurtled up the block, racing to where they felt the pulsing emanations of the ponies. They would not fail their master this time. The target would not escape alive. They raced towards the end of the street and turned the corner. There was a shimmering purple forcefield around the third house in on the right side. The lead windigo snorted in impatience.

When would these fools learn? A force such as theirs was inexorable, impossible to stop. They were sustained by the emanations of hatred that practically oozed out of this pathetic little mudball. Against such a background of hatred and spite, the gentle creatures that were ponies stood out in stark contrast. There was no escape, no point in running, only a delay to the inevitable death.

The windigos rushed at the shield, intending to ram it, when they saw someone standing next to its edge. A light brown pony with dark brown hair. The target. They stopped at the last minute, drawing even with the pony. “Y-You’re the windigos, right?” he asked. They nodded.

“I’m surrendering,” he said. “Just don’t hurt my friends inside, okay?”

The lead windigo laughed. “You have made the right choice. A noble sacrifice. Your friends will be spared our wrath.” There would be time later to come back and slaughter the rebels once the target had been delivered.

“W-what does Discord want with me?” asked the pony, taking a step back. The windigos moved a step forward, impatient in their eagerness.

“Our master merely desires to speak with you,” the windigo lied. “There is some business that you have with him, something you would not remember. He wants to talk with you about that.”

The pony edged two steps to the right. The windigos moved with him, never taking their eyes off of him. “And you s-sure my friends will be safe?” the pony asked, looking down at the ground in nervousness.

“Absolutely,” said the windigo, making its voice as smooth as it could manage.

“Then there’s one more thing I need to make sure of,” the pony said, still looking at the ground.

“And what might that be?” asked the windigo politely.

The pony looked up, a smile on his face, seeming much more calm than before. “That you’re perfectly centered,” he said.

******************************************

David pulled his back leg forward, pulling on the string tied to it. Inside the store, the bell above the shop rang. As it did, Shane lit the fuse. David dropped to the dirt. The window behind him exploded as the large cannon, stuffed with bits of red-hot random metal deployed its charged directly at the windigos. They screamed and tried to move out of the way, but one of them was caught directly by the barrage and blasted into the building behind it. Severely weakened, it flew back up to join its fellows.

“You will pay dearly for your insolence!” roared the windigo.

We’ll see about that,” said David. He turned and re-entered the shop.

“We have to take them out quickly,” David said to Kate and Shane. “I doubt very much that the cannon blast went unheard and even if it did, someone’s bound to drive down this street sooner or later and see what’s going on. Kate, how are we on weapons?”

“Not too good,” she said. “I found a few pistols and some ammo, but I’m not sure how good those will be. The bullets will be hot, so they can do some damage, but only minimal damage and the bullets aren’t that big.”

“What about that cannon? Do we have enough ammo for another shot?” David asked, turning to Shane.

“Yeah,” he said. “But it won’t do much good if we can’t heat the metal up. We can do it with laser power, but it takes a while. Has anyone seen Peter? We could use a little dragon fire right now.”

Suddenly there was a tremendous crashing sound from directly above them. The whole building shook, and several of the lights flickered and went out. A storm of brick and glass rained down on the pavement, and the street cracked under a heavy weight.

*****************************************

The creature looked out from its lair. It could identify three beings outside. They had come dangerously close to its lair. The only thing stopping it from attacking was that it did not know what their intentions were. It heard a noise, like a small explosion somewhere nearby. One of the creatures went down, but recovered soon after. The creature watched them with narrowed eyes.

Their group reformed, and as one, they attacked the barrier that surrounded his lair. He let out a low rumble of anger. So that was it then. They intended to steal from him! To rob him! To plunder his lair! Well then, he would show them his might!

He threw himself at the wall and hit it with a shattering crash. He burst out into the air, landing on the ground with all the force a fifteen foot purple dragon could muster. His purple scales shimmered and his claws glinted dangerously. “Who dares attempt to attack me?!” he bellowed.

The intruders floated up to head height and stared at him. “Begone, lizard,” they cried. “This fight is of no concern to you. If you wish to suffer a painful death, then by all means, remain.”

The dragon glared at them. He would not let such insolence go unpunished. “You would challenge me?!” he roared. “I am mightier than any foe you have faced! My armor is as a shield, my teeth are swords, my claws spears, the shock of my tail is a thunderbolt, my wings a hurricane and my breath death!”

The intruders answered in kind. “You cannot defeat us! We see your heart. It is corrupted by greed, anger, hatred. We will feast on your power until we have consumed you, and then we will consume the world!”

“Consume this,” the dragon rumbled. He opened his jaws and a torrent of pure green flame burst forth, engulfing the windigos. They screamed and tried to flee, to attack, to do anything, but it was too late. The molten hot flame engulfed them, draining and nearly consuming them. With the last vestiges of strength they had left, they cast themselves into the void between worlds, to the safety of Equestria.

He roared his triumph, and turned to return to his den. He spotted three other ponies, a pink one, a brown one and a white one. More intruders, he thought. They shall die like the others.

“Don’t do this Peter!” the brown one said. “This isn’t you!” The dragon lashed his tail out, knocking him aside and into a wall. The dragon raised his clawed foot over the two other ponies, ready to crush them both. The pink one was trying unsuccessfully to summon a feeble shield. Her foolish effort would be wasted.

The white one stared up at him, unafraid. “Go ahead then,” he said. “If this is who you are, then crush us. But I know that there’s something in you, deep inside, that won’t let you do this. Pull yourself out of it, I know you can.”

Something about his words seemed to resonate within the dragon. But then the dragon shook the feelings away. There was no time for sentimentality. He must secure and expand his hoard. Though the dragon had shaken the feeling off, something else had not. The dragon suddenly felt a pressure on his mind, as though something in it was being pushed. He clutched his head with one claw.

The feeling grew and grew, until the dragon nearly went cross eyed with the force of it. There was no pain, only an intense pressure. Finally, the pressure released, and something in his mind seemed to crumble. It felt as though a wall in his mind had fallen away, and something behind it was stirring. A presence. The dragon felt it wake up, shake itself and peer out through his eyes.

The presence surveyed the scene. It whistled. “Well, you sure seem to have made a mess of things,” the presence said in a matter-of-fact tone “Though I can’t say I’ve never done anything worse.” The dragon roared in outrage. What was this?! Did this invader dare to think that his mind would be vulnerable when he was distracted? The dragon did not know how this assailant had entered his mind, but it would soon come to find that a dragon’s mind was as sharp as its claws.

The dragon threw the force of his mind at the presence, causing it to retreat slightly. “Oh a tough guy eh? Well, I know just the thing that will cut you down to size!” Suddenly, unbidden, images and memories started appearing before the dragon’s eyes. Visions of ponies, many ponies, swam before him. Pink, blue, orange, yellow, purple, but mostly white. A white pony and a small dragon, talking together, laughing and helping each other.

The dragon shook these thoughts away. No! That was not its life. These were not its thoughts! The intruder would pay for such an invasion. The dragon attacked again. “You don’t scare me!” said the intruder. It reached into a section of his mind, forgotten, pushed aside and unused. “How about something a little closer to home!” Again, images flashed before his eyes. This time, a family. A human family. Memories of them playing together, crying together. Of love and friendships formed over years. A family. My family.

I looked around, not understanding where I was. Slowly, I felt the huge waves of greed and rage inside me start to dissolve. As they slowly started to disappear, the ground seemed to grow steadily closer. I looked down to see that I was shrinking back down to my original size. In a few seconds, I was three feet high once more.

My body felt weak. I was utterly drained, as though I’d run a few miles over the past few minutes. The presence inside me looked around, satisfied. “Well, looks like another job well done,” it said smugly.

“What?” I thought at it, confused. “Who... Who are you?”

“Spike the dragon, at your service,” Spike said cheerfully.

Chapter Zero

I sat there, stunned. “Spike?” I thought at him. “As in, Spike the dragon?!”

“The one and only,” he said.

My mind started to short out. “But what are- I mean, how are you- I mean, is this even possible? Or-”

“Not right now,” he said, cutting me off, mid-ramble. “I have something to show you, and I promise it will answer all your questions, but we have to get started right now, because it’s really really important. Now, just relax and pay attention.”

As he spoke, I could feel his presence tugging at my mind, dragging me to the newly expanded corner of my brain, where, for the past twenty years, Spike had apparently slept, dormant. The tugging grew more intense, until it was almost like a force of gravity, sucking me down, deeper and deeper into the black depths of my own mind. My vision faded away, everything going black, only to be replaced with different scenery. I was in an ornate, round room, a study. The wall to the right of me was a half-circle of bookcases, packed with books, rising to the ceiling. The wall to the left of me was a half circle of windows, all looking out over a garden that I’d seen before. A garden that I’d only seen in animated form. The Canterlot Castle Gardens.

I tried turning my head, but found that I had no control over my actual body. As I struggled to move, the scene before me seemed to mist over a little. “Quit struggling, will you?” said Spike. I stopped, and the scene came back into focus. I guessed it was a memory, played out Harry Potter style. Not much to do but observe.

It was a very unnerving experience to see my body doing things of its own will. As I watched, Spike walked over to the desk that stood by the far end of the room and started rummaging through the drawers. He pulled out a pen and ink, but was interrupted by a large belch and a cloud of smoke that erupted from his mouth. From the instant the letter materialized, I could tell something was wrong. The letter looked rumpled, as though it had been written with great force and speed. The seal, a six-pointed star containing the letters TS, was very crooked. Spike frowned and popped the seal open, unrolling the letter.

It was written in neat, tidy, slightly loopy handwriting. The writing was shaky though, as if its author had been in a great hurry. As Spike started reading it, his counterpart in my head read it with him. He was completely caught up in the scene. I could feel the emotion pouring from him, as he relived what seemed to be one of the most traumatic memories he had. His emotion poured over to me, and I could feel it almost as if it were a memory of my own.

The letter began like this: Spike, as soon as you get this letter, it is imperative important that you do exactly what I tell you to do right away. Don’t even finish reading this letter. There will be time for that later. Princess Celestia is dead.

The line had been dotted by a tear splotch. I need you to get the Elements of Harmony. Now. Go.

Ever the number one assistant, Spike dropped the letter and bolted from the room, his mind blazing with cold fear. The princess... dead? It couldn’t be possible. He hurried to the Canterlot vault, home to the Elements ever since their unstable reaction in Ponyville before the Coronation. He ran up to the sealed door, accessible to only a few in Canterlot, including him. He ran his clawed finger down the crack in the door, leaving it glowing emerald green. A hole appeared in the center of the wall, and he breathed flame into it. The doorway shone and pulled back to reveal the chamber within. An empty chamber. The Elements were gone.

Spike stumbled back in shock. No. It was impossible! Only he and the Princesses could open the vault. He ran from the room, back where he had come from, towards the main hallway. As he entered the entrance hall, the doors burst open. In struggled a ragged group of soldiers. Spike recognized them immediately as the back-up contingent that Celestia had brought with her to fight the Tartarus monster. They were battered, soot-stained and exhausted. And each one of them had bitter, tear-streaked faces, despair etched in every line.

Spike stared at them, not wanting to see the truth in their eyes, but unable to ignore it. He left the room, running down the hallway that led to his study, the door at the far end holding his focus. He burst, through the door, running to the desk at the end of the round room. The letter was still there, curling back in on itself. He snatched it up and started to read again.

The Princess is dead. I saw it with my own eyes. She’d asked me to monitor the fight, so that whether she won or lost, Equestria could be prepared. I saw her get hit and fall by a volcano. She asked Discord for help. He killed her instead. He pushed her into the lava. As soon as it happened, a forcefield appeared around the library. I can’t get out, not even with teleportation. All I can do is send this message. Discord’s coming for me. I know it. He plans to try and take over again, and he needs the Elements of Harmony out of the way. You need to get the Elements of Harmony and find my friends.

The writing grew shakier, and more and more tears dotted the page. You’ll also have to find a new Element of Magic, too. Spike, I wish I could tell you to leave. I wish I could tell you to run and hide and never come out until this whole thing is over. I wish I could even tell you not to be scared, but I can’t ask you to do something I can’t manage to do myself. Discord’s here. I can hear him knocking. My own forcefield won’t hold for long. I don’t know what will happen. I may or may not survive this. It may be years until we meet again, or never at all. But, before I go, I just want you to know that you are, always were, and always will be my number one assistant.

Forever your friend,

Twilight

The letter became impossible to see through the stream of tears. Spike dropped the letter, his despair total. He cried out, a cry filled with sorrow and denial. He collapsed against the desk, sobbing.

I don’t know how many hours we sat there, just the three of us: The shadow of the past, the watcher from the future, and me, the spectre in between. Eventually, I heard a sound, the sound of hooves hitting tile. Someone was coming this way. Spike was still leaning against the desk, eyes closed, so I couldn’t see who it was. The hoofsteps grew louder, until they were right next to us. I could hear the letter on the desk being flattened out, then a little bit later, a sigh.

“I am so sorry,” said a voice. “Really, I am. This whole mess is my fault.”

Spike sat up, wiping his eyes. He opened them to find a tan pony with brown hair kneeling in front of him at eye level. “What are you talking about?” Spike asked.

The tan pony sighed again. “I knew Discord was up to something. I knew he hadn’t reformed so easily, but no one would listen to me. I should have tried harder,” the pony’s face grew pained. “But, I guess some part of me wanted to believe it, wanted to believe that, just this once, people could change.”

Spike was confused. “But who are you? Why would the princesses have listened to you?”

The tan pony gave a half-smile. “I’m not surprised you haven’t heard of me,” he said. “I’m a bit of a well-kept secret. The princesses call me in when stuff goes wrong. Very wrong. I’m a bit of an impossibility. Someone who can do things other ponies can’t. Just call me The Doctor.”

Spike slumped back against the desk.”It doesn’t ma-matter,” he said, his words stuttering. “We can’t do anything. The Princess is dead, the Elements of Harmony are gone, and Twilight... Twilight...”

His eyes started welling up again, and the Doctor grabbed him by the shoulders “Listen to me,” he said firmly. “This is no time to go falling apart. Equestria is in the middle of a crisis. They need help. They need some impossibility. They need someone who can do things other ponies can’t,” he looked intently at Spike. “They need you. Twilight Sparkle’s final wish was to ask you for help. Equestria needs you. I need you. She needs you.” The Doctor raised one eyebrow. “Or do you intend to let Discord get away with this?”

Spike grabbed the Doctor by the throat. “DISCORD!” he yelled. “WHERE IS HE!?” his eyes dilated, and his pupils became slits. “I’LL TEAR HIM TO PIECES!!!”

The Doctor batted Spike’s hand away and jumped to his hooves. “There we go!” he said. “That’s the energy we need! But we’re not going after him yet, oh no. We’ve only got one shot at this, so we’re going to make it count. To the TARDIS!” the Doctor bolted out of the room, and Spike hurried after him. The Doctor ran down the hallway and into an old, empty meeting room on the left. Except it wasn’t empty.

Standing in the middle of the room was a large blue box. It was tall, about three and a half ponies high, one pony wide and it had frosted windows decorating each side. A yellow light at the top was glowing faintly, bathing the room in a soft light. Spike was majorly confused. How had the box gotten in here? The doorway was too small for it. And how would this help them fight Discord?

The Doctor opened the door, beckoned towards Spike and stepped inside the box. Slowly, Spike walked up to the box and stepped inside. He found himself standing on a metal walkway in a cavernous room, with silver steel walls. The walkway led to a center platform, which held a circular console surrounding a pulsating energy source that filled the room with a dim blue light. Runes comprised of circles decorated rings that connected to the ceiling above the power source. Occasionally, a rushing sound could be heard, as if some ethereal wind blew through the machine.

Spike gaped, his jaw dropped in astonishment. “The inside...” he breathed. “It’s... It’s...”

“Yes?” asked the Doctor, his head cocked to one side, eyes half closed.

“It’s magic!” Spike gasped.

The Doctor frowned, as though put out by something. “Well, yes,” he said, moving to the control console. “I suppose you could call it that. In any case, welcome to the TARDIS, Spike. That’s Time And Relative Dimension In Space. This baby can take us anywhere and anywhen in the universe you could possibly imagine.”

“Can it take us back in time to save Twilight?” Spike asked eagerly.

The Doctor bit his lip. “Well, yes it could,” he said. “In the same way that it could rip a hole in the fabric of space and time, which is what doing that would cause.” He sighed. “Think of it this way. By the time Twilight sent that letter, Discord was upon her. It was already too late. If we saved her now, she wouldn’t be there to send a letter to you, which means you wouldn’t have gone back to save her, which means she would be in danger again, which means you would have saved her, which means she wouldn’t be there to send a letter to you, which makes time rip itself apart out of the sheer impossibility of it all. I’m sorry, but it can’t be done.”

He looked at Spike’s crestfallen face. “Don’t worry though. I have a plan that will save our friends, stop Discord, and turn everything back to normal.”

Spike looked up at him. “What’s the plan?” he asked.

The Doctor gave him a smile. “To trust me,” he said, “I’m the Doctor. Can you do that?” he asked the dragon. Spike nodded. “Good,” said the Doctor, clapping his hooves together and dashing to the center console. “Then that’s all I need. First things first, we need to pick up some items.”

“What items?” Spike asked, trying to follow the fast-moving Doctor.

The Doctor looked up from his console. “The Elements of Harmony, of course!” He yanked a lever, and the machine lurched into motion, knocking Spike off of his feet. The whole room jerked violently from side to side, as if being tossed about by the waves of the sea at high wind. Then, as suddenly as the shaking had begun, it stopped. Spike got to his feet as the Doctor hurried to the door. He strapped a nearby hanging saddlebag to his side, flung the door open and ran out with Spike following in his wake.

They stepped out into the storage cupboard they had entered minutes before. As they entered the hallway, Spike saw early morning sunlight streaming through the window. “Where- I mean, when are we?” he asked.

“At the beginning of the day, about twelve hours earlier,” the Doctor called back. “Now hurry, we need to get to the Vault. It’s locked, and I need you to open it.”

“But earlier- I mean, later- I mean, before we left the future, I checked the Vault and it was empty,” Spike said, puffing as he tried to keep up with the Doctor’s sprint.

“Exactly,” said the Doctor. “Because we’d already collected them in a second now.”

“Okay,” said Spike, trying to make sense of the confusion. “So because we collect them now, they won’t be there in the future for us to collect back then.”

“Precisely,” replied the Doctor. “Getting the hang of it now?” he asked.

“No, not really,” said Spike.

“Good, you’re smarter than most,” said the Doctor as he slid down a hallway, coming to rest in front of the door to the Vault. Spike opened it to reveal the six Elements of Harmony, gleaming softly on their pedestals. The Doctor took a sack out of his saddlebags and scooped the Elements into it. He turned to leave.

“Wait,” said Spike, a thought occurring to him. “How did you know that we’d been here and taken the Elements though?”

The Doctor stopped. “Oh, you’re right. Thanks for the reminder.” He fished a stamp out of his saddlebag and marked the empty pedestal with it. The stamp left no mark. “Infraviolet ink,” he said to Spike. “Very outdated. I’m the only one who still uses it, so my sensors can still detect it. Kind of like a message to myself. I noticed it when I was in this room in the future.”

Spike hopped up onto the Doctor’s back and they dashed back to the TARDIS. “So, what’s next?” the dragon asked as the door closed behind them. He hopped off the pony’s back.

“Now, we need to find some reinforcements if we’re going to get this thing to work.” He strode over to a screen on the console and tapped a few buttons. He looked at the screen and let out a sigh. “Well, nothing for it now,” he said.

“What is it?” asked Spike.

The Doctor looked away from his screen. “There’s only one place to visit.” He flicked a few more switches, yanked a lever, and the TARDIS began its rattling ride again. Once they’d landed, the Doctor strode over to the door and looked back. “Stay here,” he said. “I should be back soon, and please please please for the love of all that is good, do not wander off!” The pony opened the door and strode out.

About twenty minutes later, he returned with Shining Armor and Cadance in tow. Spike could tell from their faces that the Doctor had broken the news to them. Cadance’s eyes were rimmed with red and tears were still busy streaking down her face. Shining Armor’s eyes were completely dry, because the inferno that raged in them completely boiled away any moisture that might happen to leak from them.

Their faces changed as they seemed to take in the inside of the magical machine. They stared in astonishment, and Spike thought he got a pretty good reflection of what his face must have looked like.

“It’s... It’s...” they began together.

“Yes?” asked the Doctor, his head cocked to one side, eyes half closed.

“It’s bigger on the inside!” they intoned.

A wide grin spread across the Doctor’s face and his eyes lit up. “That it is, my friends, that it is. And with it, we can travel anywhere and anywhen we need to go in order to stop Discord’s chaos. Now that we’ve gathered Equestria’s strongest forces, we can put our plan into action.

“Wait,” interjected Cadance. “I know you said that Celestia and Twilight were... gone.” She gulped. “But what about Luna? Can’t she help us?”

The Doctor grew somber. “I scanned Equestria for Alicorn power signatures,” he said. “Yours was the only one that showed up.”

“Oh...” she replied. More tears ran down her face, but they did so silently.

The Doctor hesitated. “My scanners also showed... the Element bearers have all disappeared. Discord’s gotten to them all. We need to investigate their crime scenes. See what happened to them. Then we can get working on what needs to happen next. The good news is that they aren’t dead.”

We all looked at him with surprise. “They’re not,” he confirmed. “First off, killing isn’t Discord’s style. Only an act of extreme anger or vengeance would drive him to that. Second of all, the TARDIS would still be able to find the Bearers even if they were dead. The fact that it can’t detect them means that something else is going on.”

Having reassured us, the Doctor began racing around the console, pressing buttons, programming in a new destination. He yanked a lever. So began a series of erratic and uncomfortable rides. Each stop we made, the doors opened on a new location. Sugarcube Corner. Empty. Carousel Boutique. Deserted. Sweet Apple Acres. Destroyed. Fluttershy’s Cottage. Annihilated. We even opened on an blank stretch of sky, the clouds around it warped and scorched, as if burned by some terrible magic. At each location, the Doctor leapt out, scanned around with mysterious machines, and then returned to the TARDIS, intent on the next scene. At the last one, Cadance and Shining Armor even had to hold him out of the TARDIS with magic to get him where he wanted.

Finally, we made one last trip. Even before the door opened, Spike had steeled himself for this. He was determined to see it, no matter how much it hurt. The TARDIS touched down, and its doors opened on Twilight’s library. Nobody spoke. One by one, they quietly made their way to the entrance, the door having been blasted off of its hinges. We entered the tree. The Doctor began poking around with his machines, while the rest of us took in the scene.

The library was completely trashed. The books were all in disarray, tossed off of their shelves and scattered on the floor. The edges of all the pages were singed and several of the stairs on the staircase were broken. The room smelt of the burnt-metal smell of magic. There was another scent there too, one that Spike didn’t recognize. An acrid, sour, burnt smell.

Once the Doctor had finished his investigations, we retreated back to the TARDIS. “Well, at least Twily didn’t give up without a fight.” said Shining Armor as we walked from the library.

“How can you tell?” Spike asked.

“The smell.”

“All the magic?” Spike asked.

“No, the other one,” Shining Armor replied.

“I smelled that one too,” said Spike. “What was it though?”

Shining Armor gave a bitter half-smile. “Burnt goat.”

Once we’d returned to the TARDIS, the Doctor went straight to the center console and punched in the data he’d received from his machines. After it was all analyzed, the Doctor stared at his screen for a long moment. Then, he shook his head slowly and let out a long breath. “What is it?” asked Cadance.

The Doctor looked at us. “He’s changed them,” the pony said. “He changed them and sent them to another universe. And to a planet. One I know well, very well indeed.” The Doctor paused. “He’s sent them to Earth.”

There was a long silence. Spike, Shining Armor and Cadance looked around at each other, nonplussed. “Is that name... supposed to mean anything to us?” asked Cadance after a while, looking at the Doctor quizzically.

“Oh. I suppose it’s not.” said the Doctor, frowning. “But it does mean that I know what he’s doing and how to reverse it. To do so, we need two things: the Elements of Harmony, and Discord. Luckily, my ship’s locked onto his energy signature, so we can track him.”

“Alright,” said Shining Armor, in a down-to-business tone. “We’ll need to work fast if we want to stop Discord before he can sink his teeth into Equestria.”

The Doctor smiled. “Why work faster when you can work earlier?” he asked. He started running around the console again, pressing buttons and flicking switches.

“Where are we going this time?” Spike asked.

“To about a week ago,” replied the Doctor. “This plan needs quite a bit of setup.”

******************************************************

The sun didn’t set on Discord’s Empire. That wasn’t due to the Empire’s size or its length, nor was it an abstract metaphor for the power Discord wielded. It was simply due to the fact that, for the first five days or so, the sun just didn’t go down. It stayed where it was, stubbornly shining in late afternoon position. The moon had taken to revolving around it, like an electron orbiting the nucleus of an atom. Gravity went wonky, the clouds changed color and the sun kept on shining.

It shone on the sky. It shone on the draconequus swimming through the sky. And it shown on the clearing of trees where, down below, four pairs of eyes watched the draconequus approach. They all nodded to one another. As Discord flew onwards, he was unaware of the movement down below. He was unaware of the plot made against him.

He was unaware of the dual-cast stunning bolt, right up until the moment when it hit him in the back. From his hiding spot down below, Spike saw Discord plummet towards the ground, straight towards them. For Twilight, he thought grimly. About fifty feet before he hit the ground, the stunning spell lifted. Discord tried to fly away, but two beams of magic caught him and they, with the help of gravity, slammed him down against a stone platform that had been set up in the center of the clearing.

Instantly, before Discord could react, a purple force field shimmered into place around him, containing him. Six of the trees in the clearing had their disguises torn away, to reveal six pillars, cunning combinations of stone and machinery, each with an Element of Harmony set at its core, with wires connecting them each to a large glass globe set on top. At the push of a button, power surged through the wires. The Elements glowed softly, filling the glass globes above them with colored light. The globes fired their beams at Discord, each one hitting him directly. He howled in pain and dropped to the stone.

Immediately, three ponies and a dragon leapt from the bushes and rushed to the writhing draconequus. Each member of the quartet was wearing goggles to protect them from the bright lights of the machines. “Are you sure this will work?!” asked Shining Armor, yelling to be heard over the roaring of the Elements.

“Of course!” yelled the Doctor. “These machines convert the arcane energy from the Elements of Harmony into an electromagnetic form, which should reverse Discord’s spells, bringing the Bearers right here, next to both their Elements and Discord, ready to kick his hairy-”

There was a bright flash. Discord leapt to his feet, the energy from the Element rolling off of him like a wave. That wave swept through the clearing, knocking the four off their feet. The pillars were no longer firing their beams, and were instead sparking erratically. Discord stood inside his purple prison, smiling maliciously.

Shining Armor sprang to his feet. “You’re not going anywhere!” he cried.

“How boring,” Discord said, and yawning, he snapped his fingers. Shining Armor’s horn disappeared, and the forcefield winked out of existence. Discord floated over to where the Doctor was struggling to get to his feet. “Well, well, well, Doctor,” said Discord. “I see, you’re still around, meddling in other ponies’ business.”

He looked around at the six pillars that surrounded the clearing. “I take it this is your attempt to foil my latest plans?” He burst out laughing. “Honestly, a Filly Scout troop with water guns could have picked your plan apart. The Elements you once knew might have been able to work with machines. Might. But that was a long time ago, and these Elements have been tamed, controlled. They only respond to a bearer who is worthy of them, not a heartless machine.” His face turned serious. “Unfortunately, I’m afraid this can’t go on any longer. You’ve messed with my plans one time too many, and I intend to pay you back for that.”

He advanced towards the Doctor with a claw crackling with black energy. The Doctor backed up until he was against one of the mechanical pillars. “I’m afraid I can’t include you in this little game I’m playing with the other ponies,” Discord said. “You’re simply far too dangerous. So I’m afraid it’s good bye, Doctor. Forever.”

“Stop,” the Doctor said. “You don’t have to do this.” Discord paused. “You could see so much more,” the Doctor continued. “You could see beauty.” He looked up at the sky, where stars were twinkling, despite the afternoon light. “With a mind like that, we could appreciate the stars. Because you don’t need to twist the universe, just see it. To have the privilege of seeing the natural chaos that is the whole of time and space. That’s entertainment enough. There’s enough out there without you having to shape it on your own.”

Discord paused for a moment. “No...” he said finally. “I have my plan and I’m going to stick to it. I’ll do things my way.” His cruel grin returned. “Besides, my way’s much more fun.” He raised his hand to strike.

“Well, if these are my last words, I suppose I’d better make them count,” sighed the Doctor.

“Oh? And what would they be?” asked Discord, amused.

“Never let me talk!” cried the Doctor. He kicked out with one his back legs and hit a button on the machine behind him. The machine, already damaged from Discord’s maltreatment, went haywire. The globe on top of it burst in a brilliant flash of dazzling light. The quartet, already wearing protective goggles, were unharmed, but Discord was blinded.

“Run!” yelled the Doctor, and the four burst into motion, leaving the cursing draconequus behind to recover his sight. They dashed through the forest, weaving through the trees. They followed the Doctor’s lead, hearing Discord crash through the brush behind them, searching for their trail. They burst into another clearing, where the TARDIS sat, waiting. They all ran through the doors and inside. Once there, the Doctor raced over to the console and pressed a blue button. There was a high pitched sound and all the light in the room dimmed, to the point where we could barely see one another’s faces.

“I’ve turned the shield into an invisibility field,” said the Doctor, who was still busy pushing buttons on the console. “It should buy us some time. I had to disable the converters on the TARDIS to use them for our plan, so I’m afraid we’re sitting ducks. But there’s still a way out of this. We can still survive.” He grabbed Cadance by the shoulders and pulled her over to a screen. “But it all depends on you, Cadance. I need you to learn this spell. It’s a variation on Twilight’s memory spell, and I know the princess taught it to you to use in emergency Discord cases like this. Can you do this variation?”

Cadance studied the diagram. “Yeah,” she said. “It doesn’t look too difficult, but it will take a while. What does it do?” she asked.

“Discord’s going to turn us into humans,” the Doctor replied. “I know, you don’t know what that is. It doesn’t matter. When he does, we’ll lose all our memories. This spell will ensure that, at some point later on, we’ll regain those memories in force. They would return on their own eventually, but if we’re going to stop Discord, we’ll need them as soon as possible.”

“But what about you?” Shining Armor asked. “Discord won’t curse you, he’ll kill you!”

“I need to make him curse me,” said the Doctor. “Fortunately, I know just how to do that.” He pressed another button and the diagram on the screen changed, He looked at Cadance. “What about this one?” he asked. “Can you do this spell?”

Cadance blinked in surprise as she saw the spell. ‘Oh!” she cried. “I already know this one!”

“You do!?” cried the Doctor.

She nodded. “Yeah, I learned it a while back.”

The Doctor grabbed her and kissed her on the forehead. “Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you,” he said “Thank Celestia for you. Now, there’s one last thing to take care of.” He pressed a button on the console and a helmet descended from the ceiling. At the same time, he pulled a pocket watch out from a panel underneath the console.

“This helmet is called a Chameleon Arch,” he said. “Discord will change me into a normal human. I can’t let him do that while I’m a Time Lord. A Time Lord mind plus a human body is a fatal combination. So, I’ll use the machine to turn myself into a normal pony and store my mind in here,” he held up the watch. “I’ll lock it, so it isn’t opened at the wrong place and the wrong time, and I’ll write down how to open it, but you three need to find it. I won’t remember. Cadance’s spell won’t work on me, because all my memories will be in the watch. I’m trusting you guys with this. Now, here’s what we do next...”

******************************************************

Spike stood in position, just as the Doctor had instructed. He heard a heavy noise cut through the darkness. It was Discord, flying towards us. A voice cut through the darkness. “The invisibility won’t hold us for long. He’ll find us very soon.” A monitor flickered to life a few feet in front of me. By its light I could see the Doctor’s face. He looked around at the three of us. Cadance stood off to the left, deep in concentration. Her horn was glowing intensely, and a light glow shimmered around us too. “This is very important. Pay attention. The psychelock won’t last forever, but my new body wouldn’t survive this mind, it would kill me.” We heard a crash as Discord slammed against the doors of the TARDIS.

The Doctor looked at the doors. “He’s here. We’re out of time,” he said. Panic started to fill Spike’s mind. “Don’t panic,” said the Doctor, looking at him sharply. “Stay calm. And remember, find the Journal of the Timekeeper.” Spike nodded. Another boom shook the doors. The Doctor bent down and placed his head in the helmet. “Alright,” he said. “Begin.”

The lights in the room blazed to life. Electricity coursed through the helmet. The Doctor began to scream. He was obviously in excruciating pain. The doors burst open, and Discord entered the room, adding to the existing chaos. Spike launched himself at Discord. No, this wasn’t right. It was too soon. Cadance needed more time. Spike stood between the group and Discord. “No!” he cried. “I won’t let you hurt them!”

Discord chuckled. “A little pipsqueak like you? Stop me? That’s just too funny.” His voice turned low and cruel. “Fine, if you want to go first, I won’t get in your way.” He looked back to where Cadance was still struggling in the throes of magic. “I’ll have plenty of time to fix you and deal with that princess before her spell’s up.” He raised a claw filled with white energy and fired it at Spike. The bolt caught him square in the chest. Discord cackled and began to speak.

For Five Score! Divided by Four!

Your memories removed! Your bodies confused!

For Chaos’ sake, a game we’ll play!

Cast off to a land far, far away!

To crush all resistance and annoying persistence!

To sink in despair in a land unaware!

In retribution for acting the fool,

So begins Discord’s new rule!

Discord’s mad cackle rang in Spike’s ears, but the cackle stopped abruptly. “What’s going on?” he said. “Why is it taking so long? You should have been gone by now.” The magic kept pouring from his claw, building up slowly, agonizingly slowly, around Spike.

Spike smiled grimly. “Magic resistance,” he said. “Quite the useful talent.” He looked over at where Cadance was continuing her spell. “I guess you won’t be able to get to your other plans as quickly as you thought.” Discord snarled and moved to pull his hand away from the spell.

“Ah, ah, ah.” said Spike warningly. “You know as well as I do what happens when you try and cancel a spell this strong mid-cast. You know where that energy goes. Boom. So it’s either plod along with this spell here, or risk disintegration.”

Discord roared in frustration. “You will pay dearly for the time you bought!” he hissed. “This magic resistance comes with a price! I was going to send you to the human world quick and easy, but you’ve bought yourself a snail-mail seat. Who knows, it could even take years to make the journey. Hope you brought a few books.” Spike stared at him, resolution in his eyes.

Finally, after a solid minute, the spell was complete. Spike’s body began to fade away slowly, starting at his toes. Discord ripped his gaze away from the dragon to look at Cadance. Just in time to see her finish the spell. There was a blinding flash of light. Discord, wise to the trick, covered his eyes with his hands and looked away.

Spike looked down. His knees were starting to vanish now. After, five seconds, the light faded. Discord turned to look at the others. Shining Armor charged at him. Contemptuously, Discord swatted him aside. He sailed away and smashed into the center console. Discord shot him with a blast and chanted the same spell he’d used on Spike. In a flash, Shining Armor was gone.

He turned to Cadance. She was wearing a saddlebag and standing, looking extremely bewildered. “What... Who... Where am I?” she said.

“Confused?” said Discord. “I can fix that. I won’t, but I could.” With a wave of his hand, Cadance was blasted with the same spell as her husband. Spike glanced away. His waist had disappeared.

Discord stalked towards the Doctor, who was huddled against the center console. He reached out and grabbed the Doctor by the throat, lifting him into the air. His claw crackled with black energy again. “Wait,” said the Doctor. “Just-just let me-”

“Just let you what? Talk your way out of this again? Not likely. It ends now.” Discord hissed. He raised his claw to strike. The Doctor relaxed. Pink fire started at his middle and spread all the way down his body. Wherever it passed, it left pink fur in its wake. As it passed over his back, wings appeared. A horn and a bright, multi-colored mane appeared as the fire spread over his head. In seconds, Discord was left holding Princess Cadance.

“What is this?!” cried Discord, confused.

Cadance grinned. “Did you think I’d go through an entire changeling invasion without picking up a few tricks? I’ve been working on that spell for quite some time, and I must say, it’s one of my favorites.”

Discord shook the princess. “Where’s the Doctor?” he growled.

Cadance didn’t stop grinning. The spell was up to Spike’s arms now. “The Doctor isn’t feeling too well,” Cadance replied. “In fact, the last time I saw him, he was looking a little pink.” Cadance’s grin broadened as the truth dawned on Discord. “We switched places during the flash.” she said.

Discord’s smug grin returned. Cadance’s disappeared. That grin meant bad news. “So, what you’re saying is that my princess is in another castle, eh? Well, don’t worry. I have a few cheat codes. I like this one. It’s my very own homemade tracking device,” he said. The energy in his hand turned white, and he stabbed it into Cadance’s chest. She screamed. Discord began to speak.

For Five Score! Divided by Four!

Your memories removed! Your bodies confused!

To act as a stake, to gather together,

The other rebellors, the birds of a feather!

Like moths to a flame, to you they’ll be drawn,

Go into the world, my unwilling pawn!

A link to the others, from you to the rest,

So go ahead ponies, put me to the test.

Cadance continued screaming as the light engulfed her. Just then, the spell reached Spike’s eyes. My vision faded to white. The memory ended, and I knew no more.

Duel Personalities

My return to consciousness was the exact opposite of my descent from it. My mind rose slowly, drifting through scenes and memories, some of which were my own, some of which were not, yet still felt familiar. As my mind became more awake, I became more conscious of my surroundings, and of voices speaking nearby.

“Hurry up! We’ve got to go! They’ll be here any second.”

“I have to find it! It’s the whole reason we came here in the first place. We can’t leave until- Here! I found it! The watch! Let’s go!”

I opened my eyes slowly. I saw a blurry pink field in front of my eyes. Consciousness was rapidly returning to me, and I realized that I was draped over Kate’s back. We were moving rapidly. I slowly sat up, and shook my head to remove the fogginess from it. I saw David and Shane right in front of us, running towards an alleyway on the side of the street we were on. David’s teeth were clamped around a silver pocket watch, which glinted in the moonlight.

I looked behind us to see the wreckage of the pawn shop lying at the end of the street. The damage wasn’t too bad, but the entire front wall of the second floor was now littered over the road. I could hear sirens in the distance, rapidly coming closer. Someone must have called the police.

We made it to the relative safety of the alleyway and donned our cloaks once more. David stowed the watch in his saddlebag. “All right,” he said, turning to us. “We need to decide where we’re going to go next. I suggest we think fast, because those police are definitely going to be on the look out for whatever trashed that shop. He looked over at me and let out a sigh of relief when he noticed I was awake. “Peter, you’re okay,” he said. “You had us worried there for a bit. You were out for a good five minutes after you changed back.”

“Yeah,” I said. “I saw some crazy things while I was out. I’ll tell you about them in a bit. But first, I think I know where we need to go. Or I have a clue at least.” I looked around at the three of them. “Have any of you ever heard of the Journal of the Timekeeper?”

Shane and Kate looked puzzled, but David’s eyes widened. “How do you know that name?” he asked quietly.

“I’ll explain later,” I said, looking at him intently. “Right now, I need to know where it is. We need to find it.”

David nodded. “It’s at the town museum,” he said. “About a good two hours away from here. Let’s go. I’ll lead the way.” We galloped off down the alleyway, me still perched atop Kate’s back.

“Okay,” said Shane. “Can someone please explain to me what this journal is and what it has to do with anything?”

David started to speak, his head still turned straight ahead, not looking at us. “When I was born, my parents brought me home from the hospital, and noticed when they got home, there was a saddlebag sitting on their table. There was no note, or message or anything with it. The only things inside it were this pocket watch and a book, called the Journal of the Timekeeper. My parents agreed that they’d let me decide what to do with the items. They didn’t care too much about them. Both the watch and the journal were locked, and we could never get them open. I was about ten or so when they told me. I gave the book to a museum, but I kept the watch. Up until about a few weeks ago, that is.”

David turned to look at me. “Now,” he said. “The real question to ask, is how you know about that journal in the first place.”

I took a deep breath. “It’s a very long and insane story.” I spotted a nearby park, shaded from the view of the street by many trees. “Let’s go talk over there,” I said. Once everyone had taken a seat on the grass, I began to tell them about the memory I had seen. I told them about Spike’s discovery, the meeting with the Doctor, the failed rescue attempt and subsequent defeat. As I came to the end of my story, I looked around. Kate had tears running down her face. Shane looked extremely confused. David, meanwhile, looked as though the explanation to gravity had fallen right into his lap.

“Can someone please explain to me what this all means?” asked Shane.

“What does it mean?” cried David. “It’s the answer! The explanation! This explains everything that’s happened to us!”

“What are you talking about?” asked Shane.

“We had it all wrong from the start,” said David. He got to his hooves and started pacing back and forth, his brain obviously working at lightspeed. “We assumed that we were turning into ponies, or that the ponies we looked like had gotten trapped in our bodies somehow, but we were wrong. We didn’t turn into ponies, we turned back into ponies. We actually are the characters from the show.”

“That’s impossible!” exclaimed Shane.

“No it’s not,” said David.

“Yes it is,” said Shane firmly. “I remember living here, I remember growing up in Oregon, not Canterlot. I live here, not in some magical land of Equestria.”

David snorted in frustration. “That’s a part of it too,” he said. “You are Shining Armor and you aren’t. Well, you’re both at the same time, actually.”

“That doesn’t make any sense!” cried Shane.

“It really has to do with what you consider to be the definition of identity,” said David. ”After all, what is a man?”

I opened my mouth quickly. David turned to me. “If you say ‘a miserable little pile of secrets’, I swear I will hit you.” I shut my mouth again.

“Let me rephrase that,” said David. “What makes a person themselves? Their thoughts, memories and emotions,” he continued, not waiting for a response. He looked at Shane. “You were born in Equestria. That is your place of birth. But, when Discord cursed us and sent us here, he wiped out all your thoughts and memories, essentially everything that made you you. For all intents and purposes, you became a different person, because you thought and felt differently. So, in a sense, you are no longer Shining Armor, but you once were.”

Shane took a deep breath, trying to remain calm. “Then tell me,” he said slowly. “Why are there two people in my head instead of just one?”

David snorted. “Well what else did you expect your brain to do?” he asked. “All of a sudden, one day, after it’s already had to deal with the traumatizing process of turning into a pony, Cadance’s spell activates and it finds that suddenly a good quarter-century of completely new memories it has to deal with. And all of them are of you being an entirely different creature in a world totally different from your own. Your brain flipped out. In all honesty, you’re lucky it didn’t snap entirely. It couldn’t handle all of this new and confusing stuff, so it decided to create an entirely new personality based around those memories in order to pretend it happened to someone else. It’s a well-known defense mechanism actually.”

“Talk about your splitting headaches,” I said. We all chuckled.

“So you’re saying that the Shining Armor personality that’s living in my head is just a figment of my imagination?” Shane asked.

“Exactly,” confirmed David. He turned to Kate. “You’ve been really quiet this whole time,” he said. “What do you think about all of this?”

Kate took a deep breath. Her face had dried, but I could still see the tear streaks that had run down it earlier. “I don’t know,” she said. “It all seems a little too hard to believe. Maybe that’s just because I don’t have any of these memories yet. But, looking back at everything that’s happened to us lately, is it really so hard to believe that we could have been these ponies all along?”

“So where does that leave us?” I asked, wanting to get this conversation back to a more productive place. “What do we do now that we know the truth? Will these personalities just leave on their own? And why haven’t Kate’s memories returned yet?”

David paused, considering my questions. “Well,” he said. “I don’t know what will happen to the alternate personalities. Usually you have to go through therapy to get rid of them, but that’s mainly because they’re caused by some traumatic experience, not by a person remembering their former life as a result of some magic spell. If I had to guess, I’d probably say that they’ll eventually merge with the rest of us once our minds come to grips with the fact that this is who we really are. As for Kate’s memories, well, they do have about 25 years worth of replacement life to fight against. My guess is that a traumatic event will bring them out, like you and Shane had. The longer it gets, the more likely it is to happen.”

“Is there anything we can do to help our minds along?” I asked. Having another presence sleeping in a new corner of my mind was more than a little unnerving.

David thought about it. “Just become acquainted with your new memories,” he said. “It might also help if we referred to each other by our real names.”

“What, you mean like Spike?” I asked.

“Yeah,” said David.

“Alright, what about you then, Doctor?” I teased.

David shook his head. “I don’t think it works like that,” he said. “I don’t have any memories yet. They’re all in the watch.” He tapped his saddlebag. “Besides, I think it’s going to take a little bit more than calling me the Doctor to help me acclimate to about 1200 years worth of memories.”

He looked more than a little troubled by that statement, but I tried to help him shrug it off. “We’ll worry about it when the time comes,” I said, and he agreed. “What about you, Kate?” I asked. “Is it okay if we call you Cadance?”

She bit her lip and looked away from us. “Not... not right now,” she said. “I don’t like pretending to be someone I’m not.” She spoke again as David moved to say something. “I know that there is a possibility that I am the real Cadance, but I don’t have any of her memories and it’s still too confusing to try and come to grips with it.”

She looked at David. ”But what’s going to happen now that I know what my brain’s planning on doing?” she asked. “I already know that any personality my brain comes up with is going to be a coping mechanism, so will it still try and do things that way? Or will it try and pull some other coping mechanism?”

David shook his head. “It shouldn’t. The subconscious is a very stubborn thing. Just because you’ve been alerted to the fact that this alternate personality is real doesn’t mean your subconscious has. Even when you convince someone with a second personality that the second personality exists, the personality still hangs around. The subconscious has to come to grips with what’s happening, and that can take a lot longer. In fact, you should recover sooner, because you’ll be prepared for it. The only reason we’d recover naturally at all is because the trauma is magical and these memories are what we really are.” Kate nodded.

“What about you, Shane? Should we start calling you by your real name?” I asked.

Shane snorted. “You’ve been calling me by my real name this whole time,” he said “It’s Shane.”

David sighed. “Look, we’ll call you whatever you want us to call you, we’re not going to purposefully make you uncomfortable. But this whole thing will go a lot easier, and save you a whole lot of trouble if you just accept that this is who you are.”

“You can call me whatever you want to,” said Shane. “I really don’t care. I just find it hard to believe that I’m a pony from another dimension who was cursed to live on Earth, that’s all.”

David and I looked at each other. There really wasn’t much we could say to that. Shane looked at us and sighed. “Go ahead with your name plan or whatever,” he said. “Just don’t expect me to accept this theory without some concrete evidence or proof, okay?”

“Alright Sha- I mean, Shining,” I said, abbreviating his name. If I was calling him something different now, it may as well be as easy as I could make it. We all got up, preparing to leave.

“Hey, isn’t that your necklace?” Shining asked Kate, pointing with his hoof over at a silver glint in the grass.

Kate looked at it in surprise. “You’re right, it is. It must have fallen out of my saddlebag when we sat down.”

“Here,” said Shining. “I’ll get it.” He levitated it up and into Kate’s bag. Having searched the area for any more dropped items, we made our way again towards the museum. I was on Shining’s back, and we were bringing up the rear.

We traveled on in stony silence. I thought about Shining’s objections at the park and decided to get to the bottom of them. “So, what’s up with the whole reluctance to believe our theory? “ I asked him.

Shining Armor snorted. “You mean, besides the fact that it’s completely crazy?” he said.

“Yes, besides that.” I replied, not fazed.

Shining snorted again, this time in deep frustration. “Personally, I don’t see how you can be so quick to accept it. I thought I was being the reasonable one! Why are you all so quick to believe that you all were ponies and that this is your destiny? Are you just that obsessed with the show?”

“It’s not that,” I replied. “It’s the fact that everything about this fits perfectly. Especially the memories. I can feel them. They feel right, as if they always were a part of me. I really do feel like there legitimately are people in Equestria who are relying on me, who want to see me again.”

“Well, in case you’ve forgotten, you have a family here that wants to see you again too. So do I. So do all of us, in fact. Are we just supposed to say ‘Sorry Mom and Dad who’ve spent over twenty years loving and caring for me, now that I’ve turned back into a magical pony, I have to get back to my real family and leave you guys forever’?”

I sat back, silent. I hadn’t really considered that thought. Despite our origins in Equestria, we still had a family here and they still had a right to see us, to know of our fates. We supposedly belonged to Equestria, but we belonged to this world also. How were we supposed to stay in both?

“I don’t have an answer for you,” I told him.

“I didn’t think you would,” he replied sardonically.

“But that still doesn’t explain why you’re so reluctant to accept the name idea,” I continued. “Just because you have a new name doesn’t mean you have to live in Equestria. It really is just to help with mental health.”

“That’s the worst part!” replied Shining. “I can feel that it works, feel that it helps. Every minute, these new memories feel less and less new, more and more familiar. I can feel it changing things about me, the way I feel and think, and I don’t want them changed! I feel like I need to make all the decisions I can now, before it’s no longer me making them.”

I shook my head. “That’s not how it works,” I told him. “You’ll still be you once your two personalities merge. In fact, I think you’ll be more you afterwards than you are now. You’ll be the you from Earth and the you from Equestria. The two can co-exist, you know.”

“I hope you’re right,” said Shining, sighing.

“In fact,” I said idly. “You may be more the you from Earth than from Equestria. I think you’ve lived longer here than you did there. How old was Shining when he was cursed?”

Shining thought for a moment, obviously glad to be on a throwaway subject. “23, from what I can tell,” he said finally. “Which would make Spike...?” he asked.

“Fifteen,” I replied.

Shining looked surprised. “Really? He seemed very small for a fifteen-year old, at least, from what I saw of him in the show.”

I shrugged. “Dragon aging, I suppose. Dragons age so slowly, fifteen is probably still considered a toddler age for them.” We continued on in our conversation for about another hour or so before we finally arrived at the museum. As far as museums go, it was completely average. It was your basic block of building, complete with a cliche faded banner announcing an exhibit that had probably been over for months now. As we approached the grounds, I noticed that all the lights in the building were off. As far as I could see, there were no security guards in sight. The building looked completely abandoned.

“Are we sure that the journal’s even still in here?” Kate asked, looking at David. “It has been fifteen years. Maybe it was moved from when you last saw it.”

David shook his head. “I don’t think so. I saw it just a few years ago when I visited here last. It’d already been up for twelve years at that point, as part of some Local Treasures collection. I can’t imagine they’d have had any reason to move it to storage or anything.”

We went up to the front door. “So how do we get in?” Shining Armor asked. “I don’t happen to know a lockpicking spell.”

“We could just try kicking it in,” suggested David.

“I might be able to fly us up to a window one at a time if we needed to,” Kate contemplated.

“How about the front door?” I said, pushing the door smoothly inward.

“Oh. Well, I suppose that works too,” said David, walking past me into the building.

We walked down the main hallway, both Shining and Kate lighting up their horns to illuminate the building. The main hall was very large, with most of the space at the center taken up by a large model reenactment of a scene from what was the Battle of Gettysburg, according to the plaque below it. Figures. The museum was so run down it couldn’t even afford a giant dinosaur skeleton. We made our way down one of the secondary corridors branching off of the main hallway, behind the center admissions desk. “We shouldn’t have to go far,” said David, his voice at a whisper. “The room we’re looking for should be on the third floor, close to the back.” We all nodded and proceeded onward.

Shining Armor was frowning, deeply troubled. “It shouldn’t be that easy,” he murmured. “There should have been an alarm, or something. The door should have at least been locked. I don’t like this.”

I shrugged. “It’s a pretty run-down museum,” I responded. “There’s probably not enough in here to warrant protecting.” Shining didn’t look convinced. The further through the building we walked, the more nervous he got.

Eventually, he turned to face the rest of us. “Look, I have a really bad feeling about this. We should have heard at least one security guard by now. This place has to at least have a surveillance room. I’ll go and check it out. You guys go on ahead.”

David was hesitant. “We can’t let anyone know we were here,” he said. “What if you’re discovered?”

“I won’t be,” said Shining reassuringly. “I don’t even need to make it all the way to the surveillance room. I just need to find someone. This place is way too empty to be normal. I have to know what’s going on.”

“How will you be able to meet up with us, though?” David asked.

I looked around and grabbed some brochures and a nearby pen from off the wall and stuck them into Shining’s saddlebag. I also grabbed some for us. “There,” I said. “Now, if he needs to contact us, he can send a scroll-message, and as long as I stick with you guys, we can send one back.”

“Alright,” said David, looking uncertain. With a nod and a quick smile, Shining Armor ran down a side passage and into the darkness. I hopped up onto David’s back and we continued onwards. As we walked, I could tell that something was wrong with David.

“What’s up?” I asked him.

He sighed. “I’m just wondering.”

“About what?” I pressed.

“About the watch,” he said, gesturing his head towards the saddlebag that contained it.

“What’s the matter? Not excited to finally get it open?” I asked.

David turned to me, eyebrows raised. “Finally get it open? Spike, this watch contains the mind of a 1200 year old alien, a mind that, when released, is going to rapidly occupy the space that my mind is currently sharing with no-one. I don’t think it’s going to be a matter of me getting used to all those memories, I think it’s going to be a matter of the Doctor getting used to the little there is of me.”

I sat, thunderstruck. How had I not seen that before? I didn’t have any words. David turned and looked back at me, seeing my shocked face. He snorted “Relax,” he said. “I’m not some fractured personality brought on by an overstressed mind. I’m pretty sure I’m not going to be absorbed into the Doctor’s psyche. At the very least, we’ll have enough time to work out a solution if the situation does end up being a problem. After all, he is the Doctor, right? Still,” he sighed. “It is a little disconcerting.” He looked up. “Ah! Here we are!”

We entered the room in question. It was rather large, being about twenty yards from one side to the other. It was a square room, with glass cases lining three walls of the chamber. The fourth wall was taken up by a large stained glass panel depicting a medieval battlefield. Several suits of armor holding assorted weaponry surrounded the painting behind a cautionary velvet rope. The floor was made of a polished tile, and Kate and David’s hooves clacked against it loudly as we made our way into the room.

We spotted the Journal, set in its own glass case over against the wall. It sat there on a cushion, small and unassuming in a navy blue cover. The words Journal of the Timekeeper were scrawled at the top in flowing gold letters. The book had two lines running down front, perpendicular to each other, dividing the cover into four sections, like the squares on a door. A little plaque at the bottom read: “The Journal of the Timekeeper. An unknown, unopenable book. Found locally.” We all stared at it for a few minutes.

“All right,” said David. “We need to get this thing out of here. Kate, can you lift the glass on it?”

Kate stepped up to the pedestal and both her horn and the glass around the book began to glow a bright light blue. After a couple of seconds of straining later, Kate stopped, gasping for breath. “It’s no good,” she panted. “The case is bolted down.”

“Fine then,” said David, facing the book. “I guess we’ll have to do things the hard way.” He turned his back on the book and crouched down onto his front hooves. He lifted his back ones off of the floor and coiled into position, ready to explode with force. He was interrupted by a large belch that echoed around the room, which was followed up by a billowing cloud of smoke which coalesced into a pamphlet. I opened it up to read a hastily scrawled message from Shining. Something’s very wrong. No one’s in the guard room and the screens are all broken. Every screen’s staticky. We have to go. Now.

I dug a pen out of Kate’s bag. “It’s a message from Shining,” I said to the expectant David, who was still crouching in position.

“It says we need to get out of here,” I replied.

David shook his head. “Tell him we can’t go yet. We’re about to get the book.” I scribbled furiously for a few seconds, and then engulfed the pamphlet in flame. The smoke disappeared down the passage behind me. It came back a few seconds later reading: No. We need to go now. Where are you? I relayed the directions to our positions. This time, only a scrap came back. On my way, it said.

“Hurry,” I told David. “We need to get out of here, quick.”

“Stand back,” said David.

Unnerved by the situation, Kate and I retreated a good ten feet away from the case. David kicked behind him with all his force. An ear splitting crash resounded through the room. Shards of glass rained down upon the ground below the pedestal. We sat still, listening hard. Once the sound of the shattering glass died away, we noticed something else: Nothing. There was no alarm. By this point, even David was beginning to get nervous.

He reached out and grabbed the book in between his hooves, trying to open it with his teeth. “It won’t budge!” he cried, frustrated. He turned the book over, looking for an answer. There, on the back of the cover, was a dark spot, hoof sized and shaped, and of a different shade of blue than the rest of the journal. Tentatively, David reached out and put his hoof on the spot. It flashed green several times. “DNA Authorization Confirmed.” spoke a voice. There was a click, and the cover of the journal now swung freely.

“Come on,” I hissed, motioning at David to join us. “We have to go.” But David wasn’t listening. He picked up the book and turned it to the front, opening the cover. “It’s blank,” he muttered, apparently to himself. “But it’s hollow,” He bent his nose down to the book and came away holding a small silver key to his teeth. He turned and dug the pocket watch out of his bag. He held the watch in the crook of his arm and stuck the key into the keyhole where one sticks the key to wind up the watch. A small, audible click echoed through the room. Reaching up with a trembling hoof, David pressed the button on top. The watch opened with a click.

************************************************************

Shining Armor ran down the hallway, muttering under his breath. Why wasn’t anyone understanding him? They were in big trouble. They had to leave this instant. Forget about some stupid book. It wouldn’t do them one bit of good if they were all dead. He thought back on the scene he had witnessed just moments earlier. The surveillance room. The whole place had been turned upside down. Every single TV screen had been turned on and filled with static. The volume had been turned off on each, so that the entire room was filled with an eerie bluish-white light and silence.

As he galloped down the hallway, he passed a side corridor. He checked it to make sure that it wasn’t the one he was looking for. It wasn’t. It was the statue gallery. He was about to turn away, when something caught his eye. He turned and shone the light on a group of objects at the back of the room.

As the light focused on them, they came into view, and his blood turned to ice. He stood there, transfixed in silent horror at the objects before him. Eventually, he shook himself from his stupor and tore his gaze from the sight of the sixteen statues. He galloped down the hall, at double the speed he started with. There was no time for warnings, no time for letters. He needed to get to his friends, or die trying. As the unicorn went down the hall, his light went with him, and no longer shone on each of the security badges the stone statues were still wearing.

Shining Armor tore down the hallway. He saw the sign of the room he was looking for: Local Treasures. He ran into the doorway. He saw David, standing near a pile of broken glass, holding the pocket watch, Kate and Spike standing some distance away. He saw David press a button on top of the watch, saw the watch open and an orange light begin to spill forth from the watch, swirling around David, engulfing him in light.

He did not see the spear that lanced out from the shadows of a nearby hallway. It sliced through the air, thrown faster than any human hand could possibly manage. It cut across the intervening distance like a stainless steel bullet. The spear struck David and passed through, sticking into the wall a half-foot away.

David looked down at the part of the spear still in him, then looked up at his friends in utter shock and pain. The orange light swirled around and sank into him, disappearing completely. He gave a sigh, closed his eyes, slumped against the wall, and died.

Chaos Kombat

I stood there, my mind blank, staring at my friend, his motionless body still held upright by the spear now stuck in the wall behind him. I didn’t understand. What was going on? Why wasn’t he regenerating? He’d opened the watch, something should be happening by now! I felt a tug on my arm. I looked up to see Shining Armor trying to pull me away.

“We have to go,” he said, his eyes brimming with tears. “Quick, while we still can, before he finds us.”

“No!” I said, my voice sounding shrill and faint in my ears. “He’ll regenerate. He has to! You’ll see! He opened the watch.” Shining Armor was pulling harder now. The more I stared though, the more frantic I got. Time passed and there was nothing. No sign of movement, no orange glow. He merely slumped there, dead.

“Come on,” said Shining Armor, his voice coming out thickly. “I’m trying to keep you all safe.”

“NO!” yelled Kate. We looked over at her, shocked. Her face was wet with tears, but her eyes burned furiously. “We’re not running away.”

“We can’t fight!” cried Shining Armor. “It’s him! He’s here! Discord!”

“I DON’T CARE!” roared Kate. “I’m going to find him, and I’m going to rip his ugly goat head off! And then, I’m going to shove it up-”

“Now, now, now, princess, such language,” said a smug voice, seeming to echo from nowhere. There was a loud snap. The lights overhead, previously at nighttime setting, flared into life. The room around us shone, and the exits were illuminated.

There, leaning against the exit in front of us, absently twirling his beard around one claw, was Discord. He turned towards us, his face a mask of boredom, but malice gleamed in his yellow eyes. “I’m impressed, Cadance,” he said smoothly. “I didn’t know you had such a colorful vocabulary.”

He snapped his fingers again and stone shot up in each of the three archways leading from the room, sealing them completely, leaving us against the only normal wall. “Wouldn’t want you leaving before the fun’s even started, now would we?” he said.

“Who said anything about leaving?” yelled Kate, stepping towards the draconequus. “I’m going to make you pay for what you did to David!”

“Ah yes, him,” mused Discord, glancing over at the body pinned to the wall. “Really though, the Doctor should have learned by now to keep his nose out of my business, whatever form he’s in.”

“You killed him for no reason!” cried Kate.

“No reason?” repeated Discord, affronted. “Au contraire, my Princess, I never kill without a reason.” He looked over at David again. “I had a score to settle with the Doctor and I settled it. Game, set and match.”

Kate’s eyes boiled with rage. “This isn’t a game!” she yelled, her horn blazing with blue light. “It’s GAME OVER!” She let loose a blast of pure wide bore magic laser surging towards Discord. The room shook. Unfazed, Discord snapped his fingers. A ramp of pure black metal appeared in the floor in front of him, directing the beam over his head, missing him entirely. The blast exploded out of the roof and into the night air with a sound like a jet engine.

Discord stood, unharmed. But the blast was a smokescreen. Shining Armor came charging up the ramp behind the beam, Discord unaware of his foe until the unicorn was upon him. Shining leapt at Discord, a sword from one of the suits of armor gripped in his magic and swinging at the villian. Discord’s eyes widened in surprise, but he snapped his fingers and a blade of his own appeared in his hand. He parried Shining’s blow.

“Perfect!” he cried, delighted. “Things were starting to get dull!”

The two went back and forth, hacking at each other with their blades. Discord was clearly toying with Shining Armor, letting the fight drag on. He even swept his blade out to the side, leaving himself defenseless. Shining sliced at his middle. Discord’s body separated itself, and the blade passed cleanly through the gap, which sealed behind it. Discord grinned broadly at Shining’s stunned face. Shining Armor swung at him again, and the battle continued.

My eyes drifted over to David, to his limp body. Tears filled my eyes, and the more I looked, the more disgusted I became. I didn’t care what happened, I knew I couldn’t leave him there, pinned like a bug on a card. I ran towards him, intent on my target. I could feel Discord’s attention on me, could feel the spell he launched at me. It felt like I was moving through syrup. I looked down at my legs and seemed to see the image of tree roots layered over them, as though they were trying to occupy the same space. I struggled against it, until my dragon scales shrugged off the transformation spell and I shot forward, grabbing onto the spear handle. Discord grabbed me in levitation magic and yanked me backwards, blocking a cut from Shining at the same time. I kept my grip on the spear and it flew with me as I crashed into the wall next to Cadance.

Discord turned to Shining Armor, obviously bored of the fight. With a wave of his hand, he sent Shining Armor flying backwards into the wall to land beside me. Shining Armor jumped to his feet, intent on fighting. I noticed his head twitching from side to side, as if he were having an internal conversation.

“Who’s there?” I asked. “Shane or Shining?”

“Yes.” he said.

“Well, I must admit, this was entertaining,” said Discord, slowly walking towards us. “But I think it’s time we moved on to Round 2.”

“I’m not through with you yet!” cried Shining Armor, charging at Discord with his sword thrust forward. “I’ll run you through!”

A hole opened up in Discord’s body and the sword passed right into it. As the sword entered it, the hole closed around it, encasing it completely. Shining Armor stood in horror, looking at the protruding sword.

“You’re a nasty liar,” said Discord. His hand shot out and he planted a finger on Shining Armor’s head, directly underneath his horn. A wave of grey ran through his body, leaving his coat dull, and his mane monochromatic. His eyes stared blankly ahead, unfocused.

“After all,” hissed Discord. “Anyone can see that you’re not going to even lay a hoof on me, are you?” Woodenly, Shining Armor shook his head.

“I thought not,” said Discord. He turned to us. “Now it’s time for some real fun. There’s so much you can do with a sword, and none of it even has to involve death. It’s quite fascinating when you think about it.” Shining Armor stiffly turned around to face us, his eyes blank and unseeing.

“Now, who should we have you work on first?” he asked, looking at the two of us, “Oh, I know, how about your lovely wife Cadance!” he cried. He unsheathed the blade from his body with a sound like a sword on metal, handing it to Shining Armor, who took it in his magic. Shining Armor started to move towards Kate, sword held high.

Kate stared, her eyes going wide in panic. She was obviously facing her worst nightmare. She backed up a step, staring at Shining Armor in terror. All of a sudden, her pupils dilated and shrank until they were mere pinpoints. She shut her eyes. Something shifted. When her eyes opened again, they were at their normal intensity. She stared calmly at Discord, a half-smile on her face.

“Well, well,” she said. “We meet again, Discord. It’s been a while.”

Discord’s grin broadened further. “The real Princess Cadance! You’re back! This is just too perfect.”

“I was never really gone,” said Cadance. “And I fail to see the perfectness of the situation.”

“You do?” asked Discord skeptically. “You don’t see the poeticness of the whole setup, attacked by your very own husband?”

Cadance raised one eyebrow dramatically. “Attacked by my own husband? Now why would he go and do a thing like that?” She looked at the still advancing Shining Armor and feigned a sudden understanding.

“Oh, I see, I see.” She shook her head. “I really have been gone for a while, if you think I can’t deal with a cheap old trick like that.” Her horn glowed blue, and a heart sprouted from the tip of it. It floated lazily over to Shining Armor and hit him right between the eyes. Instantly, his mane returned to full color, his eyes lost their unfocused look and his coat turned white.

He shook his head to clear the fog out of it. “What? Where am I? What happ- oh, not again! Seriously?!”

Cadance smiled at him “Don’t worry about it.”

“Spoilsport,” said Discord, frowning. “Ah well,” he sighed. He snapped his fingers. Instantly, the three of us were immobilized by grey magic cords, tying up our four limbs and splaying us out like dissection subjects.

“I suppose if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.” The sword appeared in his hands once more, and he stalked towards us. “Let’s begin, shall we?”

An orange beam of energy lanced in from the side, hitting Discord’s blade and knocking it from his hand to land charred and melted on the floor. A tut-tutting sound came from off to Discord’s left.

“You know better than that,” said a voice. “Any and all operations should be performed by a trained and qualified Doctor.” Standing there, grinning confidently, was the Doctor, upraised hoof smoking. He fired another blast, which caught Discord in the gut and sent him flying. The Doctor trotted over to stand next to us.

“But- what? How?” Discord sputtered. “I- the spear?”

“Good ol’ regeneration,” said the Doctor simply. “I must admit though, large metal spears are not very conducive to the process. Thanks for that, by the way,” he said, nodding at me.

Discord got to his feet. “It doesn’t matter,” he growled. “I can kill you as many times as I need to until you stay dead!” He snapped his fingers. Nothing happened.

The Doctor grinned. “You forgot the first rule of supervillainy: Go big or go home.” He raised one eyebrow. “My body’s equipped to handle near complete cellular regeneration. A spear wound is child’s play. And as such, my body has quite a bit of regeneration energy left over. A lot of it, actually. Enough, in fact, to do this!” He reared up and slammed his front hooves on the ground, A large, shimmering orange sphere erupted from the Doctor, shielding us completely. As the sphere passed over our limbs, the grey cords dissolved and we dropped to the floor.

Discord roared in anger and charged at the shield. He hit it and stopped, unable to go any further, pounding his fists in frustration against the orange surface.

“What?” I stammered “But- How?”

The Doctor wasted no time. “Regeneration energy,” he replied, dropping to the ground and scooping up the pocketwatch. “Discord’s magic twists and manipulates anything it touches, but regeneration energy is exactly the opposite. It fixes and creates, restores things to their full state. The two are polar opposites. So, that means that Discord can’t do anything to it.”

He clicked the watch open and looked at its face. Instead of a clock, it was a screen, with a long set of numbers displayed on it. The Doctor nodded, obviously understanding what the watch displayed. He turned to Shining Armor and Cadance.

“I’m going to assume that some part of you is awake that can use your full powers, correct?” he asked. The couple looked at each other and nodded. “Good,” said the Doctor. He showed them the face of the pocketwatch. “I need you to put a shield at these coordinates. It shouldn’t be that hard.” Shining Armor and Cadance looked at each other. “Now! Hurry!” cried the Doctor.

The two sprang into motion. They put their head together and closed their eyes, concentrating intently. Their horns burst into light, slowly growing in power, glowing a deep purple, the color of their magic combined.

The Doctor turned back to look at Discord, who was smiling evilly. “You think you’ve won?” Discord hissed. “That you’re safe behind your little shield? Well, I’ve made friends since my little visit to Earth. Literally.” He snapped his fingers. The stone that filled the archways on the other three walls of the room began to ripple, as though it had suddenly turned to water. Shapes could be seen slowly moving through the stone. Fingers, hands, arms, belonging to beings that were made of stone themselves.

Sixteen stone people emerged through the doorways, five from one, five from the second, and six from the third. They wore security guard uniforms, and bore badges that carried the insignia of the museum. Our shield was positioned near the center of the room, so in order to catch sight of the other guards, I had to turn and stare in the opposite direction. The Doctor gasped when he saw the figures, his eyes going wide. He glared at Discord, who floated above one such group. “You monster,” he spat.

Discord laughed. “How unoriginal. You don’t know how many times I’ve been called that.” His face grew pensive. “You know, maybe I should keep a count of how many times I’ve been called certain insults. It would make things more entertaining.”

“What?” I asked the Doctor. “What did he do? What are these things?” I tried to keep my eyes on both groups of guards that were in front of me, but I could only watch one set at a time.

“Weeping Angels,” the Doctor replied. “He turned the security guards into Weeping Angels.” The bottom dropped out of my stomach, and my blood ran cold. Weeping Angels. The nightmares of the universe. Living statues. When you looked at them, they were stone, completely immobile. But the minute you looked away, the second you blinked, they were on you, lightning fast. They zapped you back to the past and fed off of the energy of your now non-existent life in the present. Or sometimes they just snapped your neck. That was always a possibility. They were completely indestructible, and now we were cornered, forced into a staring contest with a wall.

My breathing grew heavy, and I tried to keep both groups in my sight, but I couldn’t. They were too far apart. They moved closer all the time. I could see it. They slowly stalked towards us, intent on dragging us from our safety to face the wrath of their master.

“Keep your eyes on them,” said the Doctor. “I’ll take this other group. The Angels are stone if you look at them, but-”

“I know about Weeping Angels!” I snapped, my mind freaking out. “But I can’t watch them both! They keep moving!”

“How do you-?” asked the Doctor, confused. “Oh, right, that TV show. Well, It doesn’t matter. Just calm down. Do the best you can. These Angels don’t seem to be as fast as the normal kind. They won’t get here in time to stop us.”

“Stop us? Stop us from doing what?” I asked, but the Doctor didn’t answer. He spoke to Discord.

“So, you figured out how to make Weeping Angels, did you?”

Discord grinned broadly. “Indeed I did. I must say, I’m rather proud of my handiwork.” He ran a finger down the side of the face of one of the statues immobilized by the Doctor’s gaze.

“Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get the knack of making it so that they can transport people through time, which is a real shame. It’s their most chaotic feature.”

I whipped my gaze back and forth between the two groups, but the Angels were slowly advancing. The Doctor continued his conversation. “So how did you learn to make them anyway? There’s only one place I know of that has information on the chemical composition of Weeping Angels.”

“Is that so?” replied Discord serenely. “And that would be?”

“The TARDIS database, as you know full well,” the Doctor snapped. “That’s the only place you could have learned it.”

Discord chuckled. “Ah yes, that wonderful machine of yours. It was quite informative, now that you mention it. I got so many wonderful ideas from that little wellspring of knowledge.”

Strangely, the Doctor smiled. “What exactly did you do with it when you were done reading?” he asked. “I know you couldn’t have managed to get it to fly.”

“What business is it of yours?” said Discord with a sneer.

The Doctor continued. “A ship that powerful, my guess is you didn’t leave it behind when you came here. Knowing you, I’d guess you stored it in a pocket dimension? Maybe something with these coordinates?” He flicked the pocket watch open, displaying the coordinates for Discord to see.

“Clever,” growled Discord.

“Nah,” said the Doctor flippantly. “Just a simple tracking device. But here’s what I don’t get though. The TARDIS is excellent at escaping from pocket dimensions, and I had it set to return to me upon the activation of the pocket watch. So why isn’t it here?”

Discord snarled. “Do you really think I’m that stupid? I designed that dimension specifically to hold it! The walls of that place would rip it to pieces if it made contact with them.”

“Oh, I don’t buy that for a minute,” replied the Doctor conversationally. “The TARDIS’s shields are strong enough to handle anything you could make on your own.”

“Your shields were down when I busted through and sent you to Earth, remember?” snapped Discord. “There are no shields.”

“Oh yes, you’re quite right. The shields are quite disabled.” said the Doctor in a tone of mock disappointment. “If only we had a way to conjure up a secondary shield for it somehow.” He glanced back at Shining Armor and Cadance, who stood with their horns blazing, fully illuminated with magic. “Nah, forget I said anything. Where would we ever find something like that?”

Discord’s eyes widened in understanding. “No!” he cried. “Get them!” One group of Angels surged forward, pushing through the orange forcefield. But it was too late. There was a whirring, whooshing sound that seemed to echo all around us. The sound was deep and low, like someone dragging a key over a piano string.

The scene in front of me faded in between the museum, complete with Discord and his statues, and a cavernous chamber with steel grey walls, illuminated with a bluish light. The image of the cavern grew clearer and clearer as the whirring sound grew, until the image became a reality, and the Doctor, Cadance, Shining Armor and I were standing in the TARDIS.

The Doctor dashed off to the console and started hitting buttons. “Ah, home sweet home,” he said, looking up at the room around him. “How I’ve missed this place. And now,” he said, grabbing a lever. “To make our escape!”

“Where are we going?” Cadance asked.

“Anywhere but here!” The Doctor threw the switch. With a rattling shake, we hurtled away from the museum and out into the stars.

After the rattling stopped, we picked ourselves up off the dusty floor. “Where are we?” asked Shining Armor.

“A distant galaxy,” the Doctor replied. “Somewhere far away from Discord. That’s all that matters.” He began to tap buttons on the console once again, looking at various screens.

A thought occurred to me. I hesitated, afraid to voice it, afraid to know the answer. “Doctor,” I began. “Is David still in there? Is he still alive?”

The Doctor glanced up at me. “What? David? You mean the-”

His head suddenly jerked to the left. “Don’t worry Spike,” he said. “I’m still in here.”

His head jerked back to the right. “Oy!” cried the Doctor. “I can answer his question perfectly fine, thanks.”

His head jerked to the left again. “Why shouldn’t I answer him myself?” David asked. “He’s my friend, after all.”

Back to the right. “Because it’s my body, that’s why,” snapped the Doctor.

Relief flooded through me. “How?” I asked. “How are you still here? Not that I’m not totally glad that you’re still around, but I thought the watch would erase you!”

“It has to do with the restoration matrix in the pocket watch,” said David. “You see-”

“Oy!” cried the Doctor. “I’m the one talking here! Wait your turn!”

“Why can’t I tell it?” asked David. “I can tell it just as well as you can.”

“My body, my rules,” said the Doctor. “Besides, I like doing the explainy parts.”

I sat there, bemused at the sight of the pony standing at the console, having a heated argument with himself. “Look,” I said, cutting over their conversation. “Will one of you please tell me exactly what is going on here?”

There was silence. “Thank you,” said the Doctor. “Now, it has to do with the restoration matrix in the pocket watch. You see, when the watch was opened, it began to restore me to my Timelord state. However, I had a bit of a problem at the time. Well, more like a huge, gaping spear wound problem. So, instead of restoring my memories first, it worked on regenerating my body, using the Timelord template it contained. Normally, there are safeguards, and David should have been erased. However, David is more developed than your average filler personality that takes up residence when you use the Chameleon Arch. He has his own memories and experiences in his life. The filler personality was erased when Discord cast his curse.”

I tried to follow along. “So... you’re saying that when the watch regenerated you, it also regenerated David too? Wouldn’t that make him-”

“Back and better than ever!” cried David. “The world’s first part-Timelord.” The Doctor scowled.

I laughed. “Well, you’re actually not the world’s first part-Timelord, if Doctor Who is to be believed. But you’re certainly the coolest.” David grinned.

“Yes, well, if you’re both through reminiscing,” said the Doctor stiffly. “I have some diagnostics to run. So if you’ll excuse me,” he walked over to the console and examined some screens.

“So what’s next on the list now?” asked Cadance.

“Now, we need to get our primary shields online,” said the Doctor, tapping buttons. “We have rudimentary shields, and those will serve us well enough for now, but we need to get the primaries up as soon as possible.” He continued tapping. “And... that should do it,” he said, flicking one final switch. There was a faint shimmering sound. The Doctor grinned, pleased with himself. Suddenly a shudder ran through the ship. There was a lurch, and everyone was knocked off their feet.

“What’s going on!?” cried Shining Armor.

The Doctor pulled himself up to the console, staring at one of the screens. His face paled. “The engine,” he said quietly. “The TARDIS engine is malfunctioning.” He stood bolt upright. “We have to get down there and fix it!” He dashed down one of the walkways and out of sight down a corridor. He poked his head back around. “Well? What are you waiting for?” he asked. “Quick! To the center of the TARDIS!”

Author's Note

Hey guys. You're getting this early because of the Fourth of July, so, hooray!

Critical Failure

Warning: This chapter contains some Doctor Who spoilers. As will most of the rest of this story. You have been warned.

Cadance, Shining Armor, and I trotted down the corridor after the Doctor. “So when you say the engine is malfunctioning,” I began. “What exactly do you mean?”

“The engine hasn’t completely failed yet,” the Doctor replied. “I received a warning message though, and we need to act fast.”

The Doctor ducked into a side room. It was thin and the walls were packed with drawers, which he started opening and emptying, stuffing supplies and spare parts into a fresh saddle bag.

“Here,” he said to Cadance, tossing her an electronic device. She caught it with her magic.

“What does it do?” she asked.

“It’s a scanner. Just let me know if it starts beeping.”

“Can’t we just evacuate?” asked Shining Armor. “I know we don’t want to just give the TARDIS up for lost, but surely we could find a safer location to try and deal with this problem.”

The Doctor shook his head. “It’s not that simple. This isn’t just engine failure due to damage or a part malfunctioning. The TARDIS was imprisoned in a void made of pure chaos. She’s absorbed too much of that energy and it’s destroying her. She could repair herself from it, but her engine is being torn apart as we speak, and that’s stopping her. If we don’t get down there soon, the core will go critical.”

“How big of an explosion are we talking? Super big or just kind of big?” I asked from my perch on the Doctor’s back.

The Doctor turned to look at me. “Does ‘the TARDIS exploding at all points of time creating an explosion large enough to annihilate all matter that ever did, does, or will exist in this universe’ cover it?”

My face paled. “Yeah, that about sums it up.”

We walked down a few more corridors until we reached an intersection. Three hallways broke off from the room in different directions, with a fourth hallway leading back the way we’d come.

“Which way do we go?” asked Shining Armor.

“Straight forward.” replied the Doctor. “Always straight forward. The TARDIS is infinite and can rearrange itself at will. She wants us to fix her, so she’ll guide us down the fastest path and it will always be dead ahead.”

We were about to move on when we were stopped by a beep. A beep that came from the device Cadance had suspended above her. The beeping started out faint, but soon increased in volume and frequency.

“Uhh, Doctor? Your scanner’s beeping.” said Cadance. “What does that mean?”

I looked over at the Doctor to see his eyes closed in resignation. “It’s a life signs detector,” he responded. “It picks up any activity other than us.” The beeping from the machine grew steadily louder and faster, until it was almost a constant whine.

“Back away from that hallway!” the Doctor snapped.

We all jumped out of the hallway we had emerged from and into the doorway opposite, when three figures emerged. They were ponies, but they were the most grotesque looking ponies I had ever seen. They looked as though they were made from congealed magma rock, like they had been carved straight from the walls of a volcano. Their skin looked like it was made from melted rock, and rivers of fire ran down their sides. Their faces were missing, except for a gaping mouth and two burning holes for eyes. Their manes and tails were liquid and running, made from oozing ash. Two of them were unicorns, while one was an Earth pony. I recognized them immediately, and their presence chilled me to the bone. But I couldn’t help noticing that something was off. If these were what I thought they were, then something was missing.

The three of them sat looking at us for a few seconds, before opening their mouths and releasing a guttural scream. They charged at us. The Doctor whipped around and pressed the button to open the door behind us. We dashed through and the door slammed closed, the Doctor locking it behind us. We raced ahead through more doors, pausing when we had left the monsters at least six corridors behind us.

“What... were those things?” asked Cadance, trying to catch her breath.

“It’s not important,” said the Doctor.

Cadance looked at him. “What!? What are you talking about? Of course it’s important!”

“It’s better that you don’t know,” said the Doctor, trotting over to the door at the end of the hallway.

I scoffed. “And that’s for you to decide, is it?” I turned to Cadance. “Those things are us, from the future. The TARDIS is broken, so it’s leaking time. Those things are what we’ll end up looking like if we die in the TARDIS core room. Our skin will burn and end up looking like that.”

The Doctor looked at me in astonishment. “How did you-” He scowled. “That TV show! I swear, if I ever get my hooves on that writer... Anyway, Spike’s right. Those monsters are future versions of us, pulled from recent time. There might be other versions of ourselves down here too, so don’t go chasing anything down any side tunnels. Stick together.”

He pressed the button by the door. It sparked and hissed. “Oh, no, no, No! The monsters damaged the control panel! I’ll have to fix it.” He bent down and ripped the face off of the control panel.

A loud hammering came from the door we’d just entered. A vicious growl from the other side told me our volcanic counterparts had arrived.

“Uhh, we’ve got some bigger problems,” said Shining Armor.

“Yes, I can hear that! Thank you!” cried the Doctor.

The window set in the center of the door shattered as a lava pony stuck his hoof through it. I could see the faces of all three ponies snarling. Something still felt different, out of place. Something was missing.

“Doctor, what happens if those things get their hooves on us?” Cadance asked, her face pale.

The Doctor sighed. “Well, the human versions liked to claw your face off, but these ones don’t have hands. They’re driven mad by pain and are little more than beasts, with no thought of mercy or fear. Their main weapon though is that they’ve been irradiated and burned by the TARDIS, so most likely they’ll try to melt your face off with their several hundred degree body temperatures.”

A blast of fire shot through the window. “And apparently they have fire magic,” the Doctor added.

The answer hit me like a bolt from the blue. “That’s it!” I cried. “Fire!”

The Doctor looked looked at me warningly, but when he spoke, his voice was different. “Oh no,” said David. “Don’t even think about it. I know what you’re planning, and it’s crazy.”

“What?” asked Cadance.

“Don’t you see?” I said, turning to her. “That’s what’s missing! If these are our future selves, then where’s the dragon? I’m not there because I’m fireproof! By the time the core gets hot enough to melt me, the TARDIS will have exploded anyway.”

“So what!?” cried Shining Armor, struggling to keep the door closed against the monsters.

“So let me fight them.” I said. “I’ll distract them while you get to the core room. Once I’ve beaten them, I’ll come back and find you guys. All they have is heat touch and fire magic. It’ll be a piece of cake!”

The Doctor groaned in defeat. “Fine,” he said. “I’ll program a secondary path for you. Just take the left-hand side of any intersection you come to and it should lead you to the core room.”

“If you’re going, then I’m going to,” said Shining Armor.

“No, I said. “It’s too dangerous. Besides, you need to stay here and protect the others from whatever else might be down here.”

He glared at me, but stayed silent. “Alright... now!” I yelled. Shining Armor yanked the door open and I dove through.

I crashed into the monsters head first. My entrance caught them off guard. Before they could react, I punched a unicorn in the gut, causing it to double over. I was caught from behind by the second’s magic and brought up to face it. I held my breath as it hit me with a gout of fire. I felt nothing but a warm breeze. I smiled widely, “Too cool,” I said.

I lashed my tongue out and wrapped it around the unicorn’s horn, pulling the horn towards me and bit down on it hard. I shuddered. The thing tasted like ashtray. The unicorn dropped to the ground with a scream, curling into a ball. Yeah, I know, it was a cheap shot, going for the horn, but these weren’t my friends, they were monsters, so anything goes.

The second one had recovered by now and was charging towards me, blasting fire ahead. I dove through the flames and underneath it, planting my legs on the ground and sweeping the pony’s legs out from under him with my tail. He toppled over and I gave him a vicious kick to the horn to make sure he stayed down.

Memories came flooding back to me. Spike was no master at fighting, but he knew enough to use his natural talents at least. When you’re the only dragon in Ponyville, you have to teach yourself, I guess. I knew I’d felt Spike’s mind underneath my own, guiding my movements. He felt content enough to lend a support role though, and leave the main work to me. Thanks.

The third pony, the Doctor clone, after seeing me dispatch its two associates, tried to make a break for it. I dove after it and caught it around a back leg, bringing it down. I scrambled up onto its back and, using something Shane had taught me this time, wrapped my arms around its neck and squeezed, trying to knock it out.

The pony thrashed, rolling over and over onto its back, attempting to shake me off. I gripped on tighter and was never more thankful that I still had hands. Eventually, the pony’s struggles grew weaker and weaker until the monster fell into unconsciousness. I climbed off of its back and went down the hallway the monsters had come from. A second passageway forked off to the left, and I took it, going deeper into the bowels of the ship.

Several corridors later, I heard a roar behind me. I turned to find six monsters standing behind me, two unicorns and four earth ponies. “Oh come on, you’re making more?” I asked the TARDIS in an accusing tone. While I wasn’t afraid of fighting them, getting buried under a mound of lava ponies did not seem like a comfortable option. Sooner or later, they’d find a way to deal damage.

I turned and ran down the corridor behind me, the monsters close at my heels. I ducked down several more left turns, until the monsters grew farther and farther behind. Coming to one particularly obscure corridor which almost seemed to double back the way I’d come, I opened the door and rolled inside, the door closing behind me. I stayed crouched, listening to the footsteps of the monsters pass through the intersection. When all was quiet, I slowly got up.

Lights on the path in front of me flickered into life, leading, one pair after another, to a massive computer screen, which was already illuminated. I walked up the path to a large chair which sat before a keyboard and the screen. Curious, I tapped a button. ‘TARDIS Database’ appeared on the screen.

I already knew all I needed to know about the Doctor Who universe from my knowledge of the show. Besides, now really wasn’t the best time to be reading. I started to turn away, but stopped. If this thing had been in Equestria for the past 25 years, maybe it would have information on what was going on there.

I sat down at the computer and hit Enter. The words ‘Guest Account Password’ appeared on the screen along with a box. I frowned. Guest account. The password probably wouldn’t be too difficult, if this was just a guest account. I typed in TARDIS. The words ‘Guest Account Password’ changed to ‘Search’. I grinned.

I typed in Equestria. The words ‘ Equestrian Discord Crisis’ appeared, along with the subsections ‘Land Conditions’, ‘Resources’, ‘Discord Movement Patterns’, and ‘Ponies’. I keyed down to the fourth section and hit enter. I knew that Twilight and our friends had been hit, but I needed to know who else had been affected. The screen changed, and a picture of a pony with a name underneath appeared on the left-hand side of the screen, side-by-side with a picture of Discord on the right.

Zecora’s picture appeared, and then a red box with the letters TERMINATED flashed across it. Her picture then disappeared, replaced by another.

Bon Bon: TERMINATED

Carrot Top: TERMINATED

Cheerilee: TERMINATED

Colgate: TERMINATED

Daring Do: TERMINATED

Derpy Hooves: TERMINATED

Flim: TERMINATED

Flam: TERMINATED

I stood up, my hands pressed against the keyboard. So many. All cursed.

Fleur De Lis: TERMINATED

Lyra Heartstrings: TERMINATED

Octavia: TERMINATED

I stared, my eyes wide with horror, as picture after picture flashed by.

Spitfire: TERMINATED

Trixie: TERMINATED

Vinyl Scratch: TERMINATED

I closed my eyes in despair and sat back down. I looked back at the keyboard and typed a set of names into the search bar. Mr & Mrs Cake.

A picture of them together filled the screen along with a status. Location: UNKNOWN. I sat back in the chair and sighed with relief. If the TARDIS didn’t know where they were, Discord sure didn’t. At least some ponies had made it out ok.

Against my better judgement, I typed in another name. I didn’t know what I expected to see, but I had to see something. To make it official. For some kind of closure. Twilight Sparkle.

Twilight’s picture appeared. I stared at it for a few seconds, fond memories rushing back to me. I looked at the status. Location: KNOWN.

WHAT!?

There was a crash behind me. The lights in the room flared to full brightness and I saw that monsters had reached the locked door behind me and had busted out the glass trying to get in. It was time for me to go. I sprang off the chair and ran towards a door on the right, but found monsters at that door too. I looked around. There were no more doors. On the left wall was a small ventilation grate though. I dashed over to it and pulled on it. It was bolted to the wall. Drawing on my memories, I moved my lips as if to whistle and exhaled fire.

The fire emerged as a blowtorch-like stream and I cut through the bars. I removed them and dived into the shaft. It was small and cramped and I barely fit through. I crawled for a few minutes, the shaft curving in a wide half-circle. I reached the other grate and cut through it. As I exited, I took one of the severed bars and heated it with flame to use as a weapon.

I looked around. I was underneath the floor in one of the TARDIS’s hallways. The space was almost completely filled with cables. A ladder stretched up to reach the floor, five feet above, where a horde of monsters was still raging against the door to the room I had just left. I climbed the ladder and quietly removed one of the panels from the floor, climbing out into the hallway. Sneaking over to the doorway at the end of the hall, I jammed the bar I was carrying into the control box of the door and ran through it, shutting it behind me. There, let them break that down, if they could.

I ran down the hallway, my mind racing at what I had found. Twilight’s location? Known? What did that mean? She was cursed like the rest of us. Had she turned back too? She must have. Were the rest of my friends here too? My mind spun with the possibilities. I shook them from my brain. I had to focus. The entire universe wouldn’t stand a chance if we didn’t get the TARDIS under control.

I came to the end of a hallway and found a single door. Opening it, I entered the room and found myself standing on a walkway above a chasm filled with fiery energy. The rest of the room was illuminated by a light off to the side, coming from what was unmistakably the TARDIS’s power source. An exploding star. Ripped from its orbit and suspended in the TARDIS, the star was the reactor that powered the entire machine.

I gazed at the star for a minute, basking in the warmth that it provided, intolerable for humans and ponies, but comfortable to me. I remembered what the star had been called, back in the episode of the show where it had been mentioned. The Eye of Harmony. I gave a slight chuckle.

A hammering on the door behind me told me that my pursuers had caught up with me. I ran to the door at the end of the walkway and pulled it open, dashing into the room. The TARDIS engine room. This room was much like the first one, massive, and bridged by a steel walkway. The walkway led to a platform in the center, above which, suspended in midair, was the Tardis engine.

It was round, and metal, almost looking like a mechanical planet. But that planet was falling apart. Already it looked like the engine was exploding. It was an unnerving sight. The pieces of the engine, now just twisted metal, had exploded, and were now slowly, with excruciating sluggishness, being propelled away from the core.

The core was nothing but a field of pure white. A stretch of energized nothingness that expanded just as slowly as the metal, threatening to engulf the entire room, and eventually the universe with pure white nothingness. It already covered a space as big as a house, and was expanding at a slow but steady rate. The core continued to grow with each second that passed.

All of that was only discernable over the noise. A huge, immense rushing wind filled the air with its howling. Tendrils of pure white lightning lashed out from the core, striking and leaving huge scorch marks on the metal walls that extended a hundred feet out from the walkway.

Cadance, Shining Armor and the Doctor were already there. The Doctor was furiously tapping away at a nearby computer console, while Cadance and Shining were staring, transfixed, at the core.

They turned when I entered the room. “Spike!” they cried in unison, galloping over to my side.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay, I’m all in one piece,” I said, as Cadance grabbed me in a hug. “Although I did bring some company with me, that may or may not want to tear us limb from limb.”

“I’ll go reinforce the door,” said Cadance, rushing off behind me.

“Doctor, what’s the report?” I called out to him.

“Not good,” replied David from the console. “The Doctor’s busy remembering formulas right now, so I’m handling the button pressing.” David stared at the screen, contemplating something. He closed his eyes, and seemed to come to a decision within himself. “Yes, there’s no other way,” he muttered.

“Alright,” he said to the rest of us. “The auto shield over the core has been disabled, so we’re going to have to do it manually.”

“Do what manually?” asked Shining Armor.

David explained. “The TARDIS is sentient, it has resources, therefore, it can repair itself. But, the damage it has sustained is critical. The core is out of control and the engine is exploding as we speak. The TARDIS has placed it in a temporal lock though, so it’s exploding as slow as possible, to keep us safe and give us more time. Now, normally there is a shield around the core that keeps it stable and prevents things like this from happening, but it went offline when our other shields did. So, the bottom line is this: if we can create a secondary shield for the TARDIS and contain the core, then the TARDIS should be able to rebuild its engine and stabilize itself long enough for the main shield to come online.”

“So, all of that basically means that I have to go out there and put a shield around that thing, doesn’t it?” Shining Armor said.

“Yep,” David replied. “Don’t put a shield around the metal bits though, just around the core. The metal bits will take care of themselves.

“Got it,” said Shining Armor dryly. He turned and made his way over to the walkway that led to the central platform. Above the howling of the wind we could hear a louder, more guttural roar.

“Anytime you guys could finish up what you’re doing, that would be great!” shouted Cadance, who was pushing both her back and her magic against the door, which now had the force of a whole horde of lava monsters beating upon it.

Shining Armor strode forward, straining against the howling wind. His horn glimmered into light, and a purple shield encased the core and started contracting around it, forcing it back into place. He strode forward a few hundred feet down the walkway, until he was almost touching the core itself. A lone figure standing in shadow against the blazing white core. Lightning bolts, as big around as cars, shot from the core at random, raking the walls and scorching them.

Shining Armor stood as his shield slowly contracted around the core. As it did, the pieces of metal that were drifting away began to move in reverse, converging back upon each other slowly, as the core became smaller. David watched him, his face solemn and watchful, almost sad.

A few minutes passed, with no discernable change. “Hurry up!” cried Cadance. “They’re cutting through!” It seems that the monsters had decided to take my ideas and started combining their flames to blowtorch through the door. They were attacking the hinges, and were almost through.

A few more tense moments passed in relative, howling, moaning silence. Then, suddenly, it felt like something happened. A line had shifted, a point had been crossed. The core began to shrink smaller, the pieces converged faster. The howling outside the door became more frenzied, until, all of a sudden, it died away. The flames stopped, as well as the pounding. Outside the door, the monsters faded away and disappeared completely, as the rips and tears in time were repaired.

David tried, but couldn’t quite give a full smile. His half-smile never reached his eyes. “Awesome work, Shining!” he yelled. “The main shield is coming back online! Get yourself out of there!”

Shining Armor turned grinning broadly. There was a small, shimmering, transparent field starting to form around the core, which was almost completely encased by engine parts now. David closed his eyes.

A bolt of lightning shot from the nearly-encased core. It twisted through the air in a blaze of light and landed directly in the center of Shining Armor’s back. His eyes widened in surprise and pain. He cried out, the lightning pouring into him. I cried out as well, unable to look away, as slowly, Shining Armor disintegrated.

Of Death and Decisions

The black scorch mark where Shining Armor had once stood was still smoking. I stared at it. I was distantly aware of a faint screaming coming from somewhere, but my mind was too stunned to care. First David, now Shane. No. It couldn’t be true. I could feel the memories burning in my head. Memories from my still distant dragon side, of my various experiences with Shining Armor. But the memories from my human side, of Shane, my friend, burned hotter still.

I became aware that the screaming was growing louder. I turned to see Cadance galloping madly towards the spot where Shining Armor had once been, her face in shock, eyes streaming. David, tears pouring down his face, noticed her too. Instantly, he pressed a button on the console. A large transparent shield slid into place, blocking Cadance’s path as lightning continued to pound the scorched area. Even though the engine was fully repaired, lightning repeatedly lashed out, although much less frequently, and all blocked by the shield. Cadance hit the shield and stuck, gazing with desperation at the smoking stain that was all that remained of her husband.

I looked at David, feeling my insides torn by raw pain. How could this happen? How could Shining Armor, the best fighter I’d ever known, just die? I looked into David’s eyes and saw something there. Something more. Despair. Acceptance. Knowledge. Something clicked in my mind.

“You” I whispered, my brain filling with sudden rage. “You knew.”

David looked up at me, crying heavily. “I-I had to... The- there wasn’t any other...” He couldn’t finish.

‘You knew!” I yelled.

“I, I-I” David stammered.

I plowed through. “You knew what was going to happen, that the lightning would strike, and you just let him die anyway!”

“Yes, I knew.” David said, sobbing. “But y-you don’t understand, there wasn’t any other w-way.” He pointed to the control console next to him. “The computer can predict exactly when the lightning would strike. if we hadn’t put the shield up now, there wouldn’t have been another opportunity. The TARDIS would’ve exploded before the lightning s-stopped.” Even now I could hear the lightning still repeatedly striking the bridge.

My anger would not be brushed aside though. “There could have been another way!” I shouted. “if you’d given us some time, we could have found a way around it! You sentenced Shane to death all by yourself!”

David’s cheeks grew hot and he burned with anger. “You think I didn’t think this through? That I didn’t fully consider every other possible option? I don’t just throw my friends’ lives away!”

“You could have fooled me!” I said. “You didn’t even tell Shane what was going to happen, or ask him if he wanted to go. You just let him die, scared and alone!”

“I tried to save him pain!” David cried, my words twisting in him. “It had to be done either way, or the universe would explode! I didn’t want him to go into that knowing that it was a suicide mission. He would have wanted to die not knowing.” He turned away from me.

“You don’t know that! You don’t know anything about what he would have wanted, what he was thinking or feeling as he died! You don’t-”

David whirled around. His face was absolutely livid with anger and pain. “I don’t know? I can’t not know!” he screamed. “Ever since I got this in my head-” he indicated his Timelord brain. “I’ve been forced to know! I knew exactly how much time we had before the universe ended, I knew exactly how crucial it was that we put the shield up.”

He advanced on me, eyes wild. “And I know exactly how much agonizing pain you feel in every molecule of you body when you get completely disintegrated by pure lightning! So please, if there’s something that I don’t know, tell me what it is, so I can relish in the fact that I DON’T KNOW IT!”

David whirled around and stalked away, sitting hunched over by the control console, body shaking with angry sobs. I stared at him. My anger towards David hadn’t faded any, but I didn’t really know what to say to something like that.

Turning away from him, I walked over to Cadance. She was kneeling with her face pressed against the forcefield, staring at the bridge, her eyes unseeing. She winced with every new bolt of lightning, as if it were hitting her, not the blackened bridge. Her face was drenched with tears. If she’d heard me and David arguing, she gave no sign.

“Look, Kate,” I began. “I don’t know if this will mean anything to you, or if you’re even paying attention to me, but I want you to know that even if Shining Armor didn’t know that he was going to die, even if he had, he still would have done it for you. He loved you, before the end, just as much as he ever had.”

Cadance looked at me, wordless, her eyes till pouring. I didn’t know quite what I meant, or how much of it was true, but I knew I had to say something, anything to soften the blow, to try and make her happier, by any amount. I dug through her saddlebag and pulled out the necklace Shining Armor had given her, back before this whole thing had started. “See?” I said. “This proves it. Even before we turned into ponies he knew who you really were. He bought this necklace before we started remembering, and it looks just like your cutie mark. His memories of you must have been so strong that they leaked through your suppression spell. So when he saw this crystal necklace-”

The Doctor’s head shot up. He rushed over to us and stared intently at the necklace in my hand. “Did you say crystal?!” he asked. “Is it really solid crystal?”

“Um, yeah,” I said, perturbed. “It’s 100% crystal. It came with a certificate and everything.”

The Doctor looked at the ceiling in silent hope. “Oh please let it be one of those days.” he begged. “Has Shining Armor ever used magic on it?” he asked Cadance sharply.

“Um, well I-I... I don’t-” Cadance stammered.

“Hurry, please!” snapped the Doctor. “It’s life or death!”

“Yes!” Cadance blurted. “One time, at the park, he levitated it and gave it to me.”

“You’re completely sure?”

“Positive.”

“Alright then!” cried the Doctor, snatching the necklace out of my hands. “No harm in trying!” He scooped me onto his back and galloped full tilt out of the room, Cadance in tow.

“What are we doing?” I cried, holding on desperately as the Doctor barreled down hallways.

“Magic,” said the Doctor. “It starts in the brain. It operates on the same brainwave frequencies. That’s why you need to know the precise way to think things in order to perform magic. Crystals can refract and contain magic. Imagine a small solar powered battery capturing energy from the sun and containing it. Are you picturing it?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Well forget it, because it’s nothing like that, but it’s the closest analogy you have.” He entered a room that was dominated by a large tube. Several console lined the sides of the tube.

“That doesn’t explain anything!” I said. “What are we with doing with the necklace?”

“Bringing him back,” said the Doctor, tossing the necklace into the chamber and closing it. He sprang to the consoles and flitted between them, entering commands.

“What, Shining Armor?!” I cried incredulously. “That’s impossible! You’re just going to create him out of nothing?”

The Doctor laughed. “Not out of nothing. Out of magic! The universe’s super DNA. It stores all the information about a body inside it, including memories and being. You’ve heard the phrase pouring yourself into your work? Well, unicorns take it literally.” The Doctor threw a lever, and the necklace in the chamber began to pulse. Cadance leaned against the glass of the chamber, watching intently, her face slightly hopeful.

“Creating new cells is nothing. People are growing new kidneys and livers and arms and legs all the time. Putting a person into it though, a living, thinking, personality, and not just that, but a specific one as well, with all its memories, goes beyond science, and into the arcane.”

“Well then, why aren’t we all just wearing magical necklaces with backup copies of ourselves then?” I asked.

The Doctor rolled his eyes. “It’s not that easy. Crystals can only hold magic for a few minutes, an hour at most. But this,” he said, looking at the necklace, which was now pulsing more intensely. “This is a crystal heart. There’s a reason why the true Crystal Heart is heart shaped. It isn’t just for symbolism. The heart shape is the best at catching and holding magical energies. It might give us just enough...”

The heart in the container suddenly blazed with light. “It’s like a computer,” I said. “You have a spare file. You’re-”

“Restoring from a back-up!” cried the Doctor.

The heart shattered. A mass of rapidly swelling purple energy expanded from its remains, coalescing into a thick mound. The magic started swirling, rotating into a column. The Doctor watched it sharply, studying its movements. It began to form a familiar shape. The Doctor smiled. The shape wavered wildly.

“Oh no you don’t!” the Doctor cried, hooves flying over the console. “You’re not getting away so easily!” The shape steadied and began to glow brighter. As the shape became more solid, Cadance’s face became more intense. A fearful hunger grew in it, wanting desperately to hope, but not daring to. The energy finally settled into the shape of a pony. As it did, it released a blinding burst of light. We looked away.

When we looked back, Shining Armor was laying in the bottom of the tube. He looked up sluggishly. “What?” he questioned. “Where.. How... am I?” Cadance was straining, magic forgotten, trying to pry the tube up with her hooves. The Doctor pressed a button and the tube ascended with a hiss. Cadance shot forward and buried herself in Shining’s mane, sobbing uncontrollably. Shining Armor, thoroughly bewildered, reached up and patted her back. “I missed you too,” he said to her.

*****************************************

We all made our way back to the control room, supporting one another due to our exhaustion from the night’s events. The Doctor ran a diagnostic scan, searching for any more problems.

“Well, it appears that everything is in tip-top shape.” the Doctor said. “No more enginey exploding core problems to deal with. Now that that’s out of the way and we finally have a spare moment to breathe, I suggest that we figure out, what we’re going to do next.”

“How about sleep?” I proposed from my place by the railing. The other two nodded their heads emphatically. “Speaking of which, are there any beds in this place?”

“Yes. If you go up the stairs, there’s a floor full of bedrooms. That’s all that’s on that floor. Take your pick.,” replied the Doctor. “But we should have a plan for the future before we go to bed. Sleep is 2.5 times more restful if you’ve made a determined plan before hand.”

“Really?” I asked.

“No idea.”

“Well, isn’t it obvious what we need to do next?” said Cadance. “We need to attack Discord. It’s time to stop playing cat-and-mouse and take the fight to him.”

“Sounds great.” said the Doctor. “Just wanted to make sure we’re all on the same page.”

“Let’s do it,” I said.

“Count me in,” said Shining Armor. “I still owe him for that last swordfight.”

“No.”

I stared at the Doctor, stunned. The look on his face was one of intense apathy, mixed with a burning pain. His eyes were dead and blank, with no emotion in them whatsoever.

“You’re all fools,” said David. “You’re going to get yourself killed. Go home. If you need me, that’s where I’ll be.” He turned and walked from the room.

********************************************************

David sat in a room. He wasn’t sure which. There was a bed in it. He sat on the floor. The others were fools. They were going to die. You couldn’t take on Discord. It was impossible. They needed to be working on a way to change themselves back to humans, live normal lives and pretend that none of this had happened, not running off antagonizing chaos gods.

He turned his thoughts to the vast new store of knowledge that was now in his mind. Every law of math or science he’d ever known, he now knew to be either completely untrue, or having at least thirty two new side notes to them. He examined a small corner of his knowledge, turning each new fact over in his mind with detached disinterest, like someone passing through a shop, looking at each of the items in turn and replacing them on the shelves. They didn’t really matter anyway. None of it did.

He heard footsteps behind him, and the door to his room opened. “David?” Spike said.

David didn’t answer.

“David, we came to talk to you.”

No answer.

“David, if it’s about what happened in the engine room, yeah, I’ll admit it was pretty intense, but it’s nothing you have to go and leave over.”

David was silent.

“How would you even leave?” Asked Spike. “You’re stuck inside the Doctor. You can’t leave unless he leaves.”

“I’m a Timelord,” David said in a dead voice. “I’ll think of something.”

“You can’t just go,” Spike said imploringly. “We need you. We can’t do this without you.”

David scoffed. “You don’t need me.” His voice was hoarse and self-mocking. “You have the Doctor. He’s all you need. He brought Shining Armor back. All I managed to do was get him killed.”

Spike sighed. “Look, what I said in the engine room. I was too harsh. Everything was panicked, the universe was going to explode, you didn’t have time to really think about what you were doing. You made a mistake. I shouldn’t have yelled at you like that.”

David said nothing again.

Spike’s voice grew anxious. “Please David, you’re my best friend. Don’t leave me to do this without you. Equestria’s waiting for us. We’re the only ones who can save it.”

David shook his head. “Equestria’s waiting for you guys, not me. There’s nothing for me there. There’s nothing for you there either now. Can you imagine what it’s like back there? Twenty five years under Discord’s rule? There’s nothing there but a blackened mound now. A blackened mound and Discord sitting there with a knife and a smile.” He shivered.

“You don’t know that,” said Spike forcefully. “Discord was defeated before, we can do it again.”

David said nothing. There was a long silence. He heard Spike sigh, and walk slowly from the room. “I... I understand why you did what you did,” said Cadance. “I’m not mad at you for... for Shining Armor.” She sighed. “At least, I’ll try not to be mad.” She too turned and left the room.

David continued to sit, his mind empty. What was he going to think about? What mattered anymore? The Doctor seemed to be keeping his distance, staying in a far corner of their mind, not interrupting. David heard hoofsteps enter his room again, the hoofsteps of the last person he wanted to talk to.

“I killed you,” he said to the pony behind him.

“Yeah,” acknowledged Shining Armor, who sat down beside him, staring at the same corner he was staring at. “You did.”

“I suppose you’re here to tell me not to go too.”

“No,” said Shining Armor. “I’m here because, well, you killed me. And I never got to say thank you for that.”

David looked at him. “Thank you? You’re thanking me?”

“Yeah,” said Shining Armor. “You did what you had to do to save everyone. It was a soldier’s call to make, and you stepped up to it without hesitation.” He looked at David. “You did the right thing.”

David turned away. “Spike and Cadance don’t seem to think so.”

Shining Armor snorted. “Spike and Cadance don’t know what they’re talking about.” He frowned. “Don’t tell Cadance I said that, though.” David cracked a half-smile.

“Anyway,” continued Shining Armor. “No matter what they say, you did do the right thing. We needed to shield the core, and there was only one way to do that. I needed to be where I was to place the shield. I just relearned the shield spell yesterday. I may have access to my memories, but that doesn’t mean I know what to do with them. They’re all still like movies to me.”

He sighed. “I’m sure I’m telling you stuff you already know. You knew we were out of time. By the way, exactly how much time did we have left? Was it down to minutes?”

“Three,” whispered David.

“Ah, see? There was definitely no spare time left. What would have been the point in saving me, if the universe had then blown up minutes later?”

“But you don’t understand,” said David, looking at him sadly. “I didn’t even tell you. I didn’t give you a chance to decide for yourself if you were willing to die. I sent you to your death not even knowing what was going to happen.”

Shining Armor waved it away with the air of someone who was coming to terms with death and death-like situations. “Whether I knew it or not makes no difference. I still would’ve done it anyway. Like I said, what’s the use of staying alive an extra three minutes? Sure, maybe I would’ve liked to know beforehand that I was going to die, but only so it wouldn’t be so unexpected.” He looked at David. “And that’s certainly not something that’s worth you beating yourself up about.”

Shining Armor stood up. “Anyway, whether you decide to stay or go, I’m not worried. You know how to handle yourself.” Shining Armor nodded at him and left the room.

**********************************************

David sat in his mind, turning over the things that Shining Armor had said to him. Some of the crushing weight he’d been feeling had lifted, but it still didn’t change his decision. He wasn’t about to go up against Discord.

He noticed the Doctor moving around. They were in a workshop. David didn’t remember them getting there, but he had been preoccupied. The Doctor removed a headset from a dusty wooden box underneath one of the many tables that dotted the room. It was a black wire headset, with lights rimming the side and a center circular panel. The Doctor made his way back to the bedroom they had entered previously. It was a simple room, containing only a bed with a blanket and a pillow. The Doctor laid down on the bed, placed the headset on his head and flicked a switch on the side. David’s vision went black.

When it returned, he was standing in the control room of the TARDIS, looking at his own body. He blinked. His body blinked back. He tried raising a hoof. His body did not do the same. His hoof did raise though

. He looked down. He was in a different body, a pony with light blue fur. He turned to look behind himself. His untidy mane and tail were a bright ginger red and his cutie mark was a digital clock with the time 1:11 on it. He looked back at the pony he now knew to be the Doctor.

“What is this place?” David asked.

“It’s a dream state,” replied the Doctor. “I figured we needed to talk face-to-face.”

David gestured at himself. “Why do I look like this?”

“It’s a dream state,” reiterated the Doctor. “Your subconscious decides what you look like. It knows it’s not supposed to look like me, but it doesn’t know what it should look like, so it came up with something.”

“Why this though?”

The Doctor shrugged. “How should I know? It’s your subconscious. Anyway, that’s not important now. We need to talk.”

“There’s nothing to talk about.” said David. “I don’t want to fight Discord.”

“That’s not what I want to talk about.”

“Then what is there to talk about?”

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. “Well, you did become part-Timelord. That’s probably quite an event.”

“Oh. Well, there’s nothing to talk about there.”

The Doctor’s second eyebrow joined his first. “Really? Nothing at all?”

There was silence for a few minutes. “How... how do you deal with it?” David asked softly. “The choice... of who lives and who dies? Which ones are the important lives? How much of the universe can you allow to crumble for the sake of one person? or two? or three? Are there people who don’t deserve to be saved? When do they get to such a point, if it even exists at all?”

He turned away. “The others don’t understand. Spike and Cadance. They call what I did a mistake. They’re wrong. If I could go back and do it all again, I’d still make the same choice. And I hate it more than anything.”

The Doctor sighed. “The age old dilemma of the Timelords. Our price for seeing the edges of the universe. All that power. What does one do with it? It’s a question that leaves no one intact. Some have been twisted. Some have run away. And others,” he stared at a distant wall, as if seeing another person. “Others have been driven mad.”

“How did you deal with it?” asked David.

“I ran,” said the Doctor with a bland smile. “I run and I don’t look back. I trust that I made the right decision, and then I don’t look at the answers. I imagine they would scare me stiff more often than not.”

“I don’t want a life like that,” said David, looking away. “I don’t want to be the one to make those decisions. That’s why I’m not going with you guys. Because that’s what this quest means. Another opportunity to get my friends killed. To be the one who decides when they die. And I don’t want to do that. Ever. Again.”

“And I envy you that choice,” said the Doctor plainly. “If I had the option to settle down somewhere, perhaps with a family of my own, I’d snap it up.”

“But you do,” said David. “You’ve saved every planet in the universe at least three times. You’d have your pick of any place to settle down if you wanted to.”

The Doctor gave a sad smile. “And what happens when my past catches up with me? When my enemies finally track me down? Who else would I have to bury then?” He shook his head. “Running’s not a bad life though. It keeps you on your toes.”

"So you're not going to try and convince me to stay?" asked David.

"I'd help you leave any way I could," said the Doctor. "Unfortunately, I'm not sure what to do to help that along. You're kind of stuck with me until we figure out a way to separate the two of us. I'll devote my time to finding the solution, but not if it puts the others in harm's way by inaction. We do have a power crazy chaos god hunting for us, after all."

"Of course," said David. He nodded and smiled. "Not if it puts them in harm's way."

"Well," said the Doctor briskly. "I'd say this conversation's pretty well wrapping up, wouldn't you?"

A low, evil chuckle echoed around the room. "Au contraire, my Doctor." said a voice emanating from nowhere. "I'd say that things were just about to get a bit more... exciting."

Dream Scream

“That voice...” said the Doctor. “Discord! Where are you?”

The voice chuckled again. “Very observant, Doctor. Your knowledge never ceases to amaze me. Who else did you expect?’

David looked around in alarm. “How can Discord be here!?”

Discord laughed sinisterly. “Your precious Princess of the Night isn’t the only one with the power to enter dreams, Timebrat.”

“Stop it. Discord’s messing with you,” the Doctor told David. “Now let me think... You couldn’t have gotten on the TARDIS after we escaped, and you certainly weren’t on it before, which only leaves... an essence dump!”

“Essence dump?” David queried. He paced around the control room, his head twisting back and forth, looking for signs of Discord.

“Magic with a brain. Think of it like a mini ball of Discord, running around, trying to cause trouble. Not nearly as powerful as the original though.” An offended snort echoed around the room.

“And now it’s in our dreams!?” cried David shrilly. He began to tremble and unbidden memories flashed through his mind. Memories of yellowed eyes and of cold, sharp metal.

Discord laughed again. “Very astute of you, I must say. By the way, if you can’t tell, I’m rolling my eyes right now.” The sound of marbles rolling on a metal floor suddenly echoed around the chamber. Lights started flickering on and off. David looked around nervously.

“Relax,” said the Doctor, rolling his eyes in turn. “Discord can’t do us any harm. This is an artificially constructed dreamstate. Any damage done here isn’t real. In fact, I can turn this machine off anytime I want. All I have to do is trip the circuit breaker preset to exist in this dream. In this instance, a button.” He walked over to the center console and tapped a button. Absolutely nothing happened.

“Is this the part where I start feeling relaxed? Because it’s not working!” David backed away from the console still looking around. His sides began to ache as though in memory of pain. He backed into something. Something warm. His heart froze. He turned around slowly. Discord was standing there, grinning wickedly and holding a short silver knife.

“Boo.”

David screamed and bolted from the room. He tore down a hallway, not caring where it led. His hooves, fueled by adrenaline, carried him away faster than he would have thought possible. Left, left, right, left, left, right, right, left. He turned down so many corridors that he could no longer tell where he’d come from.

He stopped at an intersection to catch his breath. He looked around, trying to find some way to get his bearings. Something grabbed him from behind.

********************************************

I walked to the room I had claimed as my own, all the bedrooms being the same, trying to come to grips with the change in our party. David leaving was hard to accept. All the things we’d faced, he’d been there to give a solution. He was at least someone to think up ideas with, even if those ideas later turned out to be completely wrong. I didn’t know how he could leave, seeing as how he was trapped inside the Doctor, but that wasn’t really an obstacle. They were two Timelords after all.

Still, I couldn’t fault him for wanting to get out of this. He only had one family to go back to, and nothing for him in Equestria. The quickest way for a normal life for him was the exact opposite of where the rest of us needed to go.

Thinking about David’s family got me thinking about my own. I realized it’d been nearly four days since this whole mess started. Four days that had felt like four years. I was supposed to have talked with my family on my birthday. Were they worried about me? Had they tried to find out where I was? Or what had happened to me? What would they think if they saw me like this.

I snorted and lay down on my bed. Sleep started to take me and make my brain fuzzy. Surely they wouldn’t go crazy. My family may be quirky, but they were the most accepting bunch I knew. My brother might find it weird and my parents would be surprised. My sisters, big fans of MLP, would find it amazing. All in all, it would work out.

But that wasn’t the real problem. What about my Ponyville family? Twilight, her friends, and the rest of the people in Ponyville I’d come to consider my extended family. I couldn’t just leave them all behind forever. Which world did I truly belong to? With these thoughts chasing each other around my mind, I finally fell asleep.

I found myself at my house, the home I grew up in. I opened the door and walked inside. Everything was there, just as I’d remembered it. Most of the lights were off, giving the place a dark feel. I wandered through the rooms, looking for others.

“Hello?” I called. No one answered. I pushed open a door. My brother sat on his bed, looking away from me. I went over to him. “There you are. I’ve been looking for you all over the place.” He turned to me, staring at me with a blank, unresponsive look.

“Who are you?” he asked dully.

“What do you mean?” I asked. “It’s me, your brother Peter.”

He continued to stare. “What... what are you?” he asked in that voice.

“Oy, cut it out. It’s me, Peter. Pet-er. Enough with the idiot act, you’re too good at it.”

He didn’t react. “What... are you?” he asked again, this time with a note of disgust in his voice. I looked down at myself, at my dragon self, and then back up at him. I didn’t know what to tell him.

I turned and ran down the hallway, running into a separate room at the end. My two sisters were there, huddled next to each other and whispering together. I could hear what they were saying.

“Wow, what a freak.”

“I know. What even is he?”

“I don’t know. Let’s stay away from him.”

“Yeah, maybe if we ignore him he’ll go away.”

The words stung me. I turned and ran from the room, back into the hallway, which had changed behind me. There was now a different room at the end of it. I entered it, and there stood my parents, gazing down at me with cold, unfeeling pity in their eyes. “Mom, Dad...”

“You have no home here,” they said in unison. “Leave this place. You do not belong. Earth is for humans. You do not belong. Go back to where you came from.” They continued talking, repeating their message in monotone voices. I turned to leave, but the door was no longer there. Instead, I had turned to face my parents once more. “Leave this place,” they continued. I turned again, but there they were. Each way I turned only brought me to face them once more. Scared, I put my head in my hands. When I lifted them again I was in Equestria, in the Ponyville town square. The houses were destroyed and the city was in ruins. A pile of blackened bodies was in front of me, in the center of the square. I recognized the faces of my family among the dead. Atop the pile stood Discord, wielding a knife and grinning.

“Welcome home,” he said.

The ground beneath me shattered and I fell into darkness.

When I came to, I found myself surrounded by darkness on all sides. Off to my far left, a spotlight shone on five silhouettes. Directly ahead, a spotlight shone on one figure. Off to my right a spotlight shone on a vision of Ponyville. My thoughts were very clear now, as if I was conscious. I recognized this as a dream.

I looked at myself. I was no longer a dragon. I was the six foot tall, blue-eyed, and black-haired human me. Why did I look like this? I shrugged. Why did anything happen the way it did in a dream? I walked up to the center spotlight.

There stood Spike, slowly pacing around in a circle, a look of anxiety on his face, muttering to himself. “Have to choose. Must choose. Can’t choose. Won’t choose. Can I choose? Who should choose? Must I choose?”

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“I have to choose,” Spike replied, not looking at me. “Here or there? Here or there? Ponyville or Earth? Ponyville or Earth.” He stopped pacing, clutching his head. “I can’t choose. I can’t choose. I can’t choose!”

I crouched down and looked Spike in the eye. “Hey, don’t give up.” I said. “I know now. I’m you and you’re me. And do you know what that means?”

“What?”

“It means that there’s two of us!” I shouted. “Plenty to go around. Enough to satisfy two worlds! We shouldn’t have to choose, and if we do choose, we choose to live in both worlds!”

“Live in both worlds?” said Spike incredulously. “But that’s... that’s impossible!”

“Ha!” I snorted. “Kick logic to the curb and do the impossible. That’s the way Team Doctor rolls. We have two homes that love us, the power of magic and the might of science on our side! There’s no way we can lose!”

Spike smiled. “You’re right!” We high fived.

“Now get going!” I said. “You’ve got somewhere to be, and so do I.” Spike turned and strode confidently towards Ponyville. I turned and walked in the opposite direction, towards the five waiting silhouettes. Towards my family. Slowly, the world around me turned white and faded away.

I opened my eyes, and found myself lying on a bed in the TARDIS. I was back in my now familiar dragon body. I swung my tail to the side, hearing the comforting rustle of scales, the sound I’d known since birth. How could I have ever grown up without that sound? I yawned, and a small jet of fire shot out. It left a now familiar smell behind. I examined my memories, and found that my Ponyville ones were just as fresh as my ones from Earth, as though I’d lived both lives side by side, not one after the other. I was whole at last.

The lights were off all around me. The TARDIS must have gone into nighttime mode. The Doctor had told us that all the lights on the TARDIS corresponded to the sleep schedule of its occupants. So, the lights were off and would stay off for a couple of hours, or until otherwise programmed.

I stepped out into the hallway. It was incredibly dim, with only faint lights at intersection entrances to see where the corridors changed direction. I could barely see my hand in front of my face. What caught my eye immediately though, was the bright blue light, sitting stationary in the middle of the hallway. I stared at it. It stared back, looking at me like an eye, devoid of all emotion. When it spoke, two white lights to the side of the blue orb flickered and illuminated in time with the voice.

“YOU ARE THE DOCTOR’S COMPANION?”

“No,” I breathed, my blood turning to ice. “Not you.”

“SCANS INDICATE THAT YOU ARE THE DOCTOR’S COMPANION!”

I backed away slowly. “No. No, no, no.” I repeated, in utter shock.

“YOU WILL BE EXTERMINATED!”

I ducked a laser which flew over my head and hit the wall behind me. “Noooooooo!” I screamed, turned into a corridor and bolted down it.

The thing behind me screamed louder still. “EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!”

*******************************************************

An arm clamped over David’s mouth and spun him around rapidly.

“Shh, it’s me,” said the Doctor. “Calm down.” He took his hoof off David’s mouth.

David let out a long, slow breath. “You nearly gave me a heart attack. How did you get here ahead of me?”

“I keep trying to tell you, this is just a dream. Everything, even the scenery, is all an abstraction created by the helmet. You never ran anywhere, it was just your mind trying to distance itself from Discord.” The Doctor stepped out of the hallway and into the four way intersection. “We can’t die here. Discord can’t do anything to harm us. Even if we die in this dream, it won’t matter. It won’t be our real bodies, just a mental representation of them.”

David dropped his eyes. “Sorry,” he said. “I couldn’t take it. The knife, the spear wound, it all just...” He couldn’t finish.

“Relax,” assured the Doctor. “Anyone would be traumatized after what you’ve been through. “Death isn’t something you just get up and walk away from, even if you’re a Timelord.”

“How touching,” said Discord, emerging from the shadows. “And if you’re looking for the way out, I think I could lend a hand.”

*****************************************************
Shane lay on his bed, staring up at the ceiling. He thought of David and their recent conversation. David had been so torn, so worried about his choices. The responsibility of knowledge and the duty to keep the universe safe. It reminded him of his first days training to be a Royal Guard.

No! Shane thought to himself, pushing the unwelcome thoughts away. That’s not me. Those aren’t my thoughts.

Yes they are, said another voice in his head. They’re a part of me and I’m a part of you, no matter how much you hate me.

No, said Shane defiantly. You aren’t me. I’m a human. From Earth.

Exactly, agreed Shining Armor. And you’re also a pony from Equestria. Or, at least, I am.

Go away. I don’t want anything to do with you or Equestria.

Really? replied Shining. Not even Cadance?

That gave Shane pause. Her name is Kate, he thought. Not Cadance.

They’re both the same person. I don’t see what’s so hard to understand about all of this. Speaking of which, why aren’t you with her right now?

She’s sleeping, thought Shane.

So? Shining thought right back. You’re her husband. You’re allowed to share a room with her.

Cut it out! thought Shane. We’re not married!

Uh, yes, you are, thought Shining. I remember it. It was a pretty eventful day, after all.

I’m going to ignore you now. I need some sleep.

Fine, the unicorn replied. When you need my help with some new enemy, just give me a call. With that last word, Shane finally drifted off to sleep.

He walked through the woods, no longer equine, but human. The night pressed in close, kept at bay only by the wan beam of his flashlight. He didn’t know what he was looking for, but he had to find it fast.

His ears picked up a noise. He whipped around, scanning behind him. The forest was empty, his light landing on nothing but empty trees. He turned back, walking more hurriedly. The endless trees shone dully in the glow of his flashlight. Something caught the light, reflecting it back. It was a white object. He jogged up to it. The object was a white piece of paper taped to a tree. On it were written the words: THE MIRROR STOLE HIS IMAGE.

There was movement. Shane whirled around. There, next to a tree ten feet away, stood a pure white pony, a unicorn, gazing at Shane with a face missing every single facial feature. His mane was a dark blue, evenly mixed with streaks of lighter blue. Terror gripped Shane and he ran. He sprinted through the trees. He had to find a way out. He knew what would happen if that thing caught up with him. Only one thing could happen. Death.

He ran until he felt certain he’d left the monster behind. He thought of its face. It had no eyes, yet it had stared at him with unmistakable intent. He saw a path ahead of him and started following it. The trees around him started to thin, until he came to a clearing where six trees stood. None of the trees had any branches and they had all been cut down from their full height, leaving nothing more than tall stumps. Taped to the stump in the middle was another piece of paper. He took it. HIS MASK HIDES THE TRUTH.

He could feel the eyes of the creature on him. He stuffed the two papers into his pocket and ran on. What did they mean? What was following him? Why did it want to kill him so badly? How could he escape!?

His thoughts were broken by the appearance of a giant rock in the path in front of him. He looked closer. The rock was actually two rocks, split down the middle. Another sheet of paper had been taped to one of them. With trembling hands, he took the paper and read it. 1+1=1. His breathing was faster now. He ripped the page from the rock and turned around, to stare directly into the blank face of the pony. Its blank face filled his vision. He screamed. The bulb on his flashlight shattered, and the world fell into shadow.

He opened his eyes to find himself in a world made completely of darkness. He got to his hands and knees. Off in the distance, he could see his friends. Kate, David, Peter, they were all there. He saw them cower under an unknown threat. He stood up and ran towards them. He had to get there, had to help them.

A burst of magical energy, a raw arcane explosion appeared in the darkness, hurtling towards them. In desperation, he reached for his magic and threw a shield over them, protecting them from the blast. As it continued to engulf them, he stood there, sweating and blinking from the strain of holding the shield through the assault.

He heard a noise behind him. He turned to see the white pony, gazing eyelessly at him, slowly walking towards his position. Gritting his teeth, Shane put a shield over himself too. The pony stopped at the edge of it, staring at him, unicorn horn glowing, unable to pass. Minutes ticked on. The explosion continued, and Shane felt his energy draining fast. He sank to his knees. He could see both shields fading fast. He could only keep one up.

He looked at the silently waiting pony. “If I let this shield fail, let you get to me... can you promise that my friends will stay safe? Will you protect them?” he asked. The figure said nothing. Then, slowly and silently, it nodded. Shane sighed and let the second shield drop. The pony walked up to him and placed a hoof on his shoulder. Shane’s body convulsed, as if filled with electricity, and the world faded to white.

Shining Armor gasped and sat up in his bed. His mind burned, filled with images, all familiar. He sorted through them all, his first life and his second, both completely clear. He looked around him, at the unfamiliar room. Who was he now? He’d never stopped to think about it. Was he Shining Armor? Was he Shane? He was neither and both. He had the memories, the responsibilities and the benefits of both. He looked through all his memories. His family, would he ever see them again? What about his kingdom, the Crystal Empire, how was it doing after 25 years?

He got up off his bed and went into the hallway. He paced around, thinking hard. He heard footsteps running towards him in the pitch black corridor. “Who’s there?”

“Shining? Is that you?” Spike called. “Hurry! We have to get away from here! There’s a Dalek on the TARDIS!”

“Dalek? What? Is this more of your Whovian stuff again!?”

“It doesn’t matter!” cried Spike. “We have to leave before it kills us! How are you not getting this?!” He ran to Shining’s silhouette and began pulling him down the hall.

Shining pulled back. “Slow down. What in Equestria’s a Dalek and why should I be afraid of it?”

Spike growled. They didn’t have time for this. He spoke at top speed. “It’s.. How do I explain this? Picture a small alien driving a golden mix between a trash can and an iron. It has one horizontal eyestalk and two arm-like attachments. One looks like a whisk. The other looks like a plunger.”

Shining Armor doubled over laughing. “And I’m... I’m supposed to be afraid of this?”

“Yes!” cried Spike. “It’s a super smart alien driving an indestructible golden trash can-iron with a self-repairing eyestalk, a face-crushing plunger and a whisk that shoots unstoppable instant death lasers!”

“That sounds a little more intimidating,” Shining admitted, still skeptical.

“Yes it does, now come on!” Spike urged. “I think I finally got away from it. It doesn’t move all that fast, but it could appear behind us at any moment.” They started down the hallway. A desperate, terrified scream broke the air behind them.

“Cadance!” Shining cried, and tore off down the other end of the corridor, Spike at his heels.

********************************************

Kate sat in horror as Shane burst into flames and sank below the lava. Discord stood on the other side of the pit, cackling with laughter. Cadance stood, impassive, watching the scene with disinterest. Shane’s arm, vastly out of her reach, stretched at her, begging her to save him from his fiery death.

The scene shifted. Spike was facing Discord, sword flashing desperately parrying blows from the draconequus. Kate and Cadance stood watching the scene.

“Do something!” Kate yelled at the princess. She didn’t respond. She never did. Kate watched as Spike’s sword was swatted aside and Discord ran him through.

The scene shifted. And shifted again. Each time a new nightmare. David shot. The Doctor disintegrated. Shining Armor drowned. Over and over the visions played out.

The scene shifted. Shane stood against a wall, Discord looming over him with a spear.

“No!” screamed Kate. She ran up to Discord and started punching him. He shrugged the blows off as nothing. She pulled at him, trying to wrestle the spear away. He turned and knocked her aside. Discord lifted the spear at the ready, Shane in his sights. Kate looked up from the ground, murder in her eyes.

She stood up and summoned her magic. In the air halfway to Shane, the spear stopped. It was surrounded by a light blue aura. Cadance smiled and rolled her eyes.

“Finally,” she said. Her horn also started glowing. Kate felt Cadance’s magic, her magic, flow into her. She gripped Discord’s throat in magic and raised him off his feet. The spear floated into her hand.

“Now,” she growled. “Let’s see how solid you really are.” The world faded to white.

Cadance awoke with a start. She could hear a loud crash in the hallway outside. Everything was pitch dark. She crept to the door and peered out. She could see a blue light moving down the hallway. When it reached a door, it turned, blasted it inwards and entered the room inside. “SCANNING,” It said in a loud robotic voice. “NO LIFE SIGNS DETECTED. CONTINUE SEARCH.” It re-entered the hallway. She stared at it. The blue light, the screaming voice, the white bulbs that flashed in time with its words. She was never a huge Doctor Who fan, but she’d seen enough to recognize a Dalek when she found one.

She performed a spell. A disembodied scream sounded from behind the Dalek and it turned to look the other way.. She grinned. Perfect. She waited until it reached the end of the hallway. She readied her favorite spell, her magical widebore laser, a present from her eighteenth birthday, and stepped out into the corridor. The blue light heard her hoofsteps and turned to face her.

“Let me ask you,” she said. “Does a machine like yourself ever experience fear?” She lowered her horn to fire.

“Cadance!” Shining Armor cried. He and Spike rounded the corner and stopped, right behind the Dalek. In the line of fire.

Cadance raged. “Move out of the way before I blow you to Tartarus!”

“What?” called Shining, oblivious. The blue eye turned towards the pair. “COMPANIONS LOCATED.”

Cadance’s eye twitched. Instantly, she changed her plan. She fired. Instead of a widebore laser, she released a blinding flash of light.

“VISION IMPAIRED!” screamed the Dalek. Cadance shut her eyes tight. Working from memory, she ran forward and leaped over the Dalek. Still keeping her eyes shut, she grabbed the stumbling duo and pulled them down the hallway. They ran, even after they had left the light behind them.

“Are you insane!?” Cadance yelled. “What in Tartarus possessed you to come in and ruin my attack!?”

“We heard you scream,” said Spike.

“That was a spell,” raged Cadance. “A distraction, you nimrod!”

“It doesn’t matter! Do you even know what you were up against?” Spike asked.

“A Dalek, of course,” huffed Cadance.

“Exactly! Which means any attack you were going to do wouldn’t have made a bit of difference.” Spike shot. “We need to find the Doctor.” They turned and ran down a long corridor, and stopped.

“A dead end!?” yelled Shining Armor, incredulous. “We’ve run up and down this ship and now, the one time we need to keep running, we come to a dead end!?”

They turned to run back the way they’d come. The blue light advanced towards them. “We’re pinned,” Cadance said, taking charge. “Shining, start trying to cut through the floor with your laser.” She lowered her horn and charged up her own widebore laser once more.

“I keep telling you,” repeated Spike. “Your laser won’t do anything!”

“Do you have a better idea?” snapped Cadance. Spike was silent. Down the corridor, behind the Dalek, a light flickered on. So did the next light. And another. As the ship entered daytime mode, the lights in the hallway flickered to life. Spike, squinted through the light and stared at the Dalek. He gasped.

****************************************************

“No way,” said David. “There’s no way you’re just going to give us the way out.”

“Of course not,” Discord snorted. “Who said anything about just giving it to you? If you want the way out, you’ll have to play my little game.”

“Oh, come now,” said the Doctor. “You’re not fooling anyone with that, especially not two Timelords. You can’t keep the breaker from us. It exists wherever we go. Scenery is an abstraction. If you tried to remove the breaker, the system would collapse and the dream would end. It’s a failsafe. You can’t even cause us physical pain. The most you could possibly do is try and hide the breaker from us.”

Discord smiled, unperturbed. “True, true. But what makes you think I want to do anything more than hide it from you?” He snapped his fingers. Spike, Cadance, and Shining Armor appeared in front of them. They were magically frozen, eyes staring at them in fear, mouths bound by magic.

“The name of the game is Pick and Choose.” said Discord. “One of your precious friends is the breaker. The other two are not. In order to trip the breaker-” he snapped his fingers and a knife appeared on the ground. “you’ll have to kill them!”

“...What?!” cried the Doctor. “Seriously? This is just too simplistic, especially for you, Discord. There’s no challenge, no mystery. We know these aren’t really our friends, so what’s the point of having us kill them? It might be slightly traumatic, but this is really low stakes, not your style at all.”

Discord grinned cruelly. “Is that so? I suppose I did forget to mention that events are moving quite rapidly while you stand here talking. You shouldn’t have left me such an empty vessel, Doctor.” He snapped his fingers. A TV screen materialized and Discord vanished with a chuckle..

` *******************************************************

Standing in front of us in the hallway, was the Doctor. His eyes were dull and unfocused. His coat was pure grey, every last shred of color drained from it. A headset sat on his head, crackling with black electricity. A wire, blown from its original position, dangled down, sparking intermittently. “EXTERMINATE!” the Doctor cried. A laser shot from the dangling wire and I ducked.

I sprang towards Cadance, who was about to fire. “Stop!” I grabbed her head and turned it so the Doctor was in her line of sight.

“What!?” she cried and powered down. “The Doctor!? What’s he doing!?”

“Trying to kill us, apparently,” replied Spike. “It’s that helmet. Something’s wrong with it. You have to get it off him!”

Cadance tried, straining with her magic. “It’s no good. Something’s keeping it on. It’s too strong!”

“We have to do something,” said Shining Armor, taking in the situation.

“Here,” exclaimed Cadance. “Help me move those walls!” Using their magic, they ripped the metal from the walls and bent it backwards to block the Doctor’s path.

“EXTERMINATE!” yelled the Doctor. A beam shot from the wire and pierced into the metal, cutting through it like scissors through paper. The Doctor cut a path for himself and kept walking.

************************************************

The Timelords watched events unfold through the TV screen. Finally, they tore their eyes away.

“Right,” said the Doctor, picking up the knife. “We need to get out of here, and for that, we need to find the breaker. What if we just killed all three of them?”

“That might work,” David replied. “Except that I’m sure Discord’s programmed these friend-bots to fight back when we attack, and we don’t have time to subdue them all.”

“So then we have to guess who it is,” reiterated the Doctor, pacing furiously. “It might be Spike. He’s small, but dragons are hard to kill. It could be Shining Armor. The real one wouldn’t have any qualms about dying for the others, but I don’t think that matters here.”

“I know who it is!” cried David suddenly. “I know who the breaker is. Give me the knife.”

“What!? No,” said the Doctor. “I’ll handle the killing. You just tell me which one.”

“Doctor, we don’t have time for this. Just give me the knife.”

“What do you mean?” shot the Doctor. “We have less time for you to take the knife. I’ve already got it.”

“Doctor, please,” implored David. “This is part of Discord’s plan. He’s playing to your weakness, just like he did with the others.” On screen, the Doctor moved closer to the others, who were desperately avoiding his increasingly more accurate attacks. David talked faster. “When Discord tricked the Mane Six, he played to their weaknesses. Rainbow’s loyalty, Applejack’s love for truth. He’s doing the same thing to you. You have this need to take all the blame on yourself, to let it be you that’s responsible for the bad things in the universe.”

The Doctor looked at him, still unconvinced. “It also boils down to a lack of trust.” David continued. “You can’t trust anyone else to do what you do, to know what needs to be done to save the universe and be willing to do it.” He extended his hoof. “So please, just this once. Trust me.” The Doctor placed the knife in his hoof. “Thank you,” David said solemnly.

He started circling around them, behind each pony, never close enough to strike. He circled behind the Doctor and came around again, slowly pacing, talking all the while. “It’s the perfect plan. Discord played it out perfectly, choosing which pony to be the breaker. He hid it from you so well by playing on your weakness. You couldn’t see it.” He circled around behind the Doctor again.

“Well?” asked the Doctor “We’re running out of time! Which of them is it?”

“None.” Instantly, David lashed out with the knife, and cut the Doctor’s throat. The Doctor slumped to the floor, as did the other three, like puppets with their strings cut. David dropped to the floor and took the Doctor’s lifeless form in his hooves, tears running down his face. “The perfect plan, playing on everyone’s fears,” he continued. “Even mine... The fear of choices.” The world faded to white.

*****************************************************

“So let me get this straight,” said Spike. “Discord planned to have you kill us individually, and when nothing happened, you’d have to watch us die via television?”

“That’s about the size of it,” replied the Doctor.

“And in order to break the circuit you had to kill the Doctor?” asked Cadance.

“Yep,” David answered.

Shining Armor whistled in amazement. “That’s devious.”

“So... you’re sure he’s gone?” asked Spike uncertainly.

“Completely,” assured the Doctor. “The essence dump used up all of it’s power to control the circuit. Once the circuit broke, there was nothing left. I even did a scan of the ship. There are no more pockets of Discord left anywhere onboard.” The Doctor sighed. “Which means, we’re back to where we started. We have to go after Discord.” He hesitated for a little bit. “Is everyone agreed? I won’t take anyone into battle who doesn’t want to be there.”

“I’m still okay,” said Shining Armor.

“Me too,” agreed Cadance.

“Same here,” affirmed Spike.

Everyone looked at the Doctor uncomfortably.

David sighed. “I’m really not going to be able to run away from this, am I? I don’t suppose Discord will leave me alone?”

The Doctor shook his head. “Not now that you’re a Timelord.” He gave a wry grin. “Neither can live while the other survives.”

David rolled his eyes. “Hardy har har. All right, I’m in. Let’s go show that goat who’s boss.”

The Doctor grinned. “Wonderful! Now that that’s settled, it’s time to get started, time to take the fight to Discord.” He started inputting coordinates into the TARDIS navigation. “As of now, we hit the front lines.”

“Where’s that?” asked Cadance.

The Doctor pulled a lever. “Equestria.”

Tartarus Commander

The sun hung low in the sky, glaring relentlessly at the land below, burning the sky a deep orange. The moon circled confusedly around its still partner, occasionally drifting off into an obscure corner of the sky, but always returning to erratically orbit the merciless sun. The stars in the sky, bright enough to shine during the perpetual day, glowed with a sick green light. The lights writhed as if they were in agony.

The land below shone in their unsteady light. The terrain changed colors constantly, a nauseating wash of every color but the proper ones. The hills were a deep blue, the rivers were a pink so bright it made one’s eyes hurt and the trees were a dull grey. The next minute, the entire landscape changed to look like a normal sky so convincing that any animal on the landscape would freeze with terror, waiting to fall down into space.

Hovering boulders dotted the horizon, floating motionless in mid-air, until a woodland creature moved underneath one of them. The boulder dropped, pulled towards the earth at ferocious speeds. The creature was crushed.

On this bleak landscape lay the remains of a town. The wind tore along the empty streets and down through the roofs that had long since rotted away. The houses looked on, empty windows vacant and devoid of life. Glass littered the streets and rats the size of dogs fought each other for supremacy. The wind howled on.

Over the sound of the wind, another sound could be heard. It was a deep, heavy, echoing sound. Its groan swelled and shrank. In the alleyway between two houses, a blue box materialized, its solid color a contrast against the chromatically changing buildings. The blue box solidified completely, and its occupants stepped out into the world.

The Doctor exited first, followed by Shining Armor, Cadance and Spike. The Doctor looked around, his twice occupied face showing confusion and deep concern. Shining Armor mostly felt confusion.

“Where are we?” he asked. “This can’t be Ponyville. It looks nothing like it.”

Cadance was just as confused. “I’ve never been to Ponyville, so I can’t really add any input.”

“I’ve only heard descriptions of it from Twilight,” Shining Armor admitted.

Spike looked around in slowly growing horror. “No,” he said quietly. “This is Ponyville. There’s Town Hall over there,” he pointed to a decimated heap of rubble at the center of town. “And there’s the Quill and Sofa shop. And that- oh no...” He walked slowly forward, his feet carrying him almost unconsciously. He came to a stop in front of the burnt husk that was all that remained of the Golden Oaks Library. No one spoke. The library was destroyed, with the singed ruin reaching no higher than six feet at most. Charred pages littered the area and burnt covers could be found here and there. Spike bent down and picked up a page. The Art of the To-Do List: Volume One it read. Spike crumpled it in a balled fist. He turned to the others.

“I swear,” he he growled, his eyes burning with rage. ‘If it’s the last thing I do, I’ll-”

“Would you like to finish that declarative statement of vengeance, or should I just kill you now?” spoke a voice from the shadows. “By the way, this is me asking questions first and shooting later, so you’re welcome.”

Instantly, from amid the ruins of the buildings around them, a squad of ponies rose up and surrounded them, each with a glowing wrist weapon pointed at the four. All of the squad wore black bodysuits, keeping their features hidden. Their leader stepped forward.

“State your identities and your business. Remain where you are and do not attempt to use magic, or you will be shot. Understood?”

The Doctor stepped forward. “Perfectly,” he said. “These are my friends Spike, Shining Armor and Princess Cadance,” The tension in the air thickened at the declaration. “Oh, and I’m the Doctor,” the Doctor said in an offhand way. If the tension in the air had thickened before, it solidified now. The leader motioned another pony to him, a pegasus.

“Report back to base,” he said. “Tell the general we have a positive match on Spike, Cadance and Shining Armor, and that we have a possible match on the subject known as The Doctor.” The pegasus gave a short salute and flew off at top speed.

The leader turned back to the group. “The rest of you, we’re on escort duty now. Back to base. Move out.” The leader approached the four friends as the squad formed up. “You four are under our jurisdiction now,” he said. “We will take you to the general, who will decide your fates.” The group set off to the west.

Cadance approached the Doctor. “What’s the plan?” she asked softly. “Do we just go along with them?”

“I was actually hoping for a situation like this,” the Doctor responded. “I held no illusions that we’d come back to find Equestria as we’d left it, although I must say that I didn’t imagine it’d be this bad. At any rate, there seems to be a resistance force here and if we could ally with their leader it could give us a big advantage. So for now, we play along.”

Hours passed as they walked. They had long passed through Whitetail Wood and were crossing a large plain. The members of the squad paused and removed the headpieces to their suits so their faces could be seen. The Doctor decided it was time to get some intel.

He approached the squad leader, a stallion with a black coat and a short dark red mane. He was young, younger than Shining Armor, but he had hard face that made him out to be older. “So,” the Doctor began. “Why are all the soldiers removing their masks?” The pony looked up and considered the question.

“We’re approaching the base. The sentries are ordered to shoot anything unidentified on sight. If they can see us, they won’t shoot.” The squad began moving again. The Doctor stayed with the leader, continuing his inquiry.

“And who might you be, commander?”

“Colonel Firestorm,” said the pony shortly.

“Hmm. You look a little young to be a colonel. How old are you?” questioned the Doctor.

“Twenty-one.”

“Well then Colonel,” the Doctor asked. “What exactly are you a Colonel in?”

“The army of the United Pony Nation,” said Firestorm, starting to warm up to the questions.

“What exactly is the United Pony Nation then?”

Firestorm stared at the Doctor. “You’re not from around here, are you?” he stated more than asked.

“Not for a while, no.” replied the Doctor. “Not for the last twenty five years.”

“Twenty five years...” repeated Firestorm. “Interesting. About the time this nightmare began, so I’ve been told. Well, the United Pony Nation is the three races of ponies united and dedicated to helping one another survive, and eventually to terminate the reign of the tyrant Discord. That’s his tower over there.” Firestorm pointed to a silhouette in the distance, a lone tower that stood miles off.

“Really? And you built your base this close to it?” asked the Doctor, skeptical.

Firestorm shook his head. “Of course not. The tower moves around. It never stays in one place for more than a week or so. It’s close to us at the moment. We’re nearly at the base.”

The Doctor gazed around at the scenery, shaking his head. “It’s hard to take in, the damage Discord’s caused to Equestria.”

Firestorm started. He looked at the Doctor and gave a little chuckle.

“What’s the joke?” asked the Doctor.

“Nothing. It’s just been a very long time since I’ve heard anypony call this place Equestria.” replied Firestorm.

“What do you call it then?”

“Tartarus.”

About an hour or so later, they stopped in the middle of a field. Grass covered trap doors opened up around them and ponies aimed out of them, wielding more of the curious wrist weapons.

“Identify.” commanded one of them.

“Colonel Firestorm.” spoke the colonel, staring straight ahead. Several seconds passed.

“Identity confirmed,” spoke the pony. A massive trap door slowly raised itself out of the landscape, revealing a wide staircase leading into a dimly lit underground cavern. The party descended. As they went deeper underground, the only light came from several bare bulbs set into the walls, casting a weak electrical glow on the group.

“Anachronistic electricity, Keep Out sentries, aggressive stares - has someone been peeking at my Christmas list ?” remarked the Doctor, grinning.

As they walked, they passed and were passed by ponies going in various directions. All of them wore grim, purposeful looks on their faces. Some of them carried supplies, papers or other important bundles. None of them, except for the sentries and their own group were wearing the wrist weapons, the Doctor noted.

As they passed the ponies, the four noticed that some of the ponies would act strangely when they saw the group. Some would stare open mouthed, some would drop what they were holding, and others would even burst into tears. Only about half of the ponies did this though. The other half showed no spark of interest and kept on walking.

Eventually they came to a stop in front of a steel gray door, above which a red light shone. The four friends gladly sat on the ground, weary from their walk.

“You will be taken in to see the General,” Firestorm barked. “If it turns out you are our enemies, well then... Then would be the time for shooting.” He gave the group a grim grin.

“But, you know, no pressure.” He stepped up to the steel door and knocked in a specific pattern.

Knock-knock-knock-knock

He paused.

Knock-knock-knock-knock

Another pause.

Knock-knock-knock-knock

The Doctor stood bolt upright in an instant. “No,” he breathed softly, eyes wide in disbelief. “It can’t be.” The light above the door turned green and the door opened. Firestorm led them into the General’s office. It was simple, yet spacious, completely undecorated, save for a desk and several filing cabinets.

Behind the desk, in a simple folding chair, sat a unicorn. He had a light orange coat with a messy sand-colored mane and a tail cut short. He wore a black jacket and his cutie mark was a pocket watch with both hands pointing to twelve. He looked up at the Doctor with a grin filled with a thousand years worth of cunning.

“Hello, Doctor.” he said. “It’s been a while.”

“The Master,” growled the Doctor, his eyes as hard as steel. “I want answers. Fast. How did you get here?” The Master laughed. Spike noticed that his hoof absently tapped out a four beat pattern on the table. He seemed unaware of it.

“How quick to the point. You haven’t changed at all since we last met, have you?” The Doctor’s glare didn’t waver. “Very well then,” said the Master, bemused. “Colonel Firestorm, you may go.” The colonel saluted and left the room. The Master turned back to his guests. “I assume you recall our last meeting?”

“You were riding the planet Gallifrey down into the center of the Time War. It was Time-locked. Inescapable.”

“So it was,” agreed the Master. “However, moving a planet like Gallifrey back and forth in time and space put a lot of strain on the fabric between dimensions. As the planet fell, reality splintered, and I fell through the cracks. As it happens, that crack led me here, about fifteen years ago.”

“So what then?” asked the Doctor. “Enslavement? World domination?”

The Master laughed again. “Ever the Doctor. You were always so quick to think the worst of me.”

“You can’t deny that you’ve earned my animosity many times over,” the Doctor retorted.

“True,” admitted the Master.”But my plans aren’t nearly so grandiose this time. Revenge is all I’m after. When I first arrived here, I was human. The space between dimensions had healed my body so that I was no longer dying. I even kept my lightning powers.” Sparks flew from the tip of his horn as proof.

“But not a day after I landed, I was attacked by the homo sapien zoo reject known as Discord.” The Master’s faced burned with anger. “He turned me into this repulsive form and left, cackling all the while.” The beat he tapped out grew louder.

“So you’re using these ponies as pawns in your fight against Discord,” the Doctor growled.

The Master rolled his eyes.”Don’t be so dramatic. I haven’t enslaved these ponies, they joined me willingly, recognizing my superior military experience. They help me get my revenge and in turn, I free them of an evil tyrant. It’s very symbiotic. That’s not to say I couldn’t take them over if I wanted to,” he added.

“But now that you’re here, everything’s changed,” he continued. “Our plans can be put into place much faster. In exchange for a small fee of course,” he said slyly.

“What do you want?” The Doctor asked, unsurprised.

“All I want is transportation out of here,” said the Master. “Let these ponies have their tea parties and cake, I just want to get back to my proper universe in my proper body. Do we have a deal?” He extended his hoof.

The Doctor stared at him for a long moment. “Deal,” he said, shaking the hoof. “But if you betray us, or do anything else to harm this world, I promise you, you will quickly get acquainted with the real Tartarus.”

The Master grinned. “Come now Doctor, why on Earth would I ever betray you?”

“We aren’t on Earth,” said the Doctor. The Master grinned even wider. “So, what is your plan?” asked the Doctor.

“We plan to stage an assault on Discord sometime in the near future,” the Master said. “We can either wait until we have enough pony power to overwhelm Discord ourselves, or we can try and locate certain artifacts known as the Elements of Harmony.”

“I’m familiar with them.” replied the Doctor.

“Good,” said the Master. “We think we know their location, but every squad we’ve sent there has failed to return. We don’t know what’s guarding them, but it appears to be formidable.”

“Sounds like a job for a Doctor. I’ll look into it. Just one question.”

“What?” asked the Master.

“How are you, as a group, still alive? Discord should have dealt with you by now.” The Doctor stated openly.

“Because honestly... we’re worthless!” The Master laughed, a tiny manic gleam in his eyes. “Without those Elements of Harmony, we’re nothing. But we still keep fighting. I keep these troops filled with determination, because that’s all they have left. No hope, no joy, just determination and revenge. It’s been 25 years of torture for them. They’ve given up hope that the Elements of Harmony or their princesses would ever come back to save them. I’m sure it led to some rather interesting reactions as you came to see me. From the ones who born in the days before Discord, of course.”

“I noticed that,” said the Doctor. “I was surprised we weren’t mobbed by crying ponies on our way down here.”

The Master smiled. “I’ve trained them well. The mission before all else. He pressed a button on his desk and Firestorm came in from outside. “Get the coordinates for the Elements and four gem guns for our newest recruits,” the Master ordered. Firestorm saluted and turned to leave. “Oh, and good job today, Firestorm,” the Master added, almost as an afterthought. The Doctor caught the look on his face at the remark. It went past respect, almost into protectiveness. Firestorm gave a small smile and left the room.

The Doctor watched him go. “He’s been twisted,” he remarked.

“They all have.” said the Master harshly. “Most of them were born into this war. It’s all they know.”

“Not much of a war when the other side doesn’t even have to fight,” quipped the Doctor. “Speaking of which, what are gem guns? Are they those wrist weapons?”

The Master nodded. “Magic filled wrist crystals that allow any pony to fire lasers like a unicorn. The magic only lasts a few hours, so they’re only to be used when they’re needed.”

“And I suppose you’re responsible for the out of place electricity?”

The Master shrugged. “Why should I plot in the dark?” Firestorm returned shortly with the weapons and a map to the suspected location of the Elements. The Doctor looked at the map and snorted with laughter.

“I could’ve told you the Elements were there.” he said. He showed the map to the others. “This is the same spot where we laid the ambush for Discord all those years ago.”

“I had a feeling you were mixed up in that mess,” said the Master. “Rumors of your name float behind every big event around here. Business as usual, I suppose.”

“Right,” said the Doctor decisively. “Time to get to work. Cadance, I want you to come with me to get the Elements. Spike and Shining Armor, you stay here and assess the resistance’s resources, to report them to me when I get back.” The Master seated himself at his desk once more and the group left them room.

“That’s not all I want you to do,” he continued to Shining and Spike once they were a good ways down the corridor. “Keep an eye on the Master. Let me know what he might be planning. Something’s different about him and I can’t afford to let him run around here unobserved. Find out if the ponies here are really with him willingly or if there’s some form of coercion going on.” He tossed two of the gem guns to Spike and Shining armor, who strapped them to their wrists.

“Got it,” the two said.

“Good,” finished the Doctor and he walked down the corridor, Cadance in tow. He tossed her weapon to her and she equipped it. He equipped his, but left it turned off. He wouldn’t dare touch it unless he had to.

“Can you really trust that guy?” asked Cadance as they left the base behind. “The Master, I mean. I don’t know too much about him, I never got to that point in the show, but he seems like a real piece of work.”

“I was just about to ask the same thing,” seconded David from the Doctor’s mind. “I know even less about the show than Cadance does. I’m kind of just staying out of the way until I find something I know. Besides, you’re better at this negotiation stuff.”

“Oh, I trust the Master as far as I can throw him. Which is to say, not at all. But if there’s one thing you can count on with the Master, it’s his thirst for revenge. That’s what I’m banking on,” the Doctor replied to them both.

“What do you mean by that?”

“It’s kind of a long story,” the Doctor deflected.

“We have a pretty long walk,” Cadance noted.

“I suppose.” He paused, trying to think of how to explain. “The Master didn’t start out insane.” he began. “He didn’t even start out evil. He was a Timelord, like me. We were friends, once. Then, as part of Timelord initiation, when he was eight he was taken to stare into the Heart of Time. It’s a grueling experience. It was there that Rassilon, leader of the Timelords, implanted a link in the Master’s mind, one that would later allow Rassilon to escape imprisonment. It was a drumbeat, a repeating pattern of four drumbeats that sounded in his head every waking moment of his thousand year life. It drove him insane.”

“That’s... horrid,” Cadance managed to say. The continued along, the bleak landscape providing the perfect setting.

“Indeed,” continued the Doctor. “Later, Rassilon tried to use the link to escape the Time lock and bring our home planet Gallifrey with him. The bloodiest and most horrific war in the history of the universe, the Time War, raged on Gallifrey. Millions died every day, in ways more barbaric than you could possibly imagine, but that meant nothing to Rassilon. He planned to destroy Time itself, thus ending the universe, but allowing him to ascend beyond it. I stopped him.” The Doctor continued as though unable to stop until the poisonous tale was recounted in full.

“The universe was saved. Everyone was saved. Even the Master was saved. Rassilon was falling back into the Time Lock not five feet away. But the Master crossed that distance. He crossed the threshold, rode a dying planet down into Time’s version of an inescapable Hell, all to take revenge on the man who’d ruined his life.” The look on the Doctor’s face was pure bitterness, as though he himself, not the universe, had been rejected. “It wasn’t enough to send Rassilon to Hell, he had to personally escort him there.”

“So... What do you think the Master’s plans are?” Cadance asked after a while.

The Doctor sighed. “I honestly don’t know. From the looks of it, the drumbeats are still plaguing him, and worse than ever.”

“Why are they still going if Rassilon’s plan failed?” asked Cadance.

The Doctor shrugged. “Time. It’s a mess. The bigger question is what his motivation is now. Those drumbeats are a big part of the Master’s life and now there’s no mystery to them. They’re just a simple curse. I know he wants revenge, but what else? Revenge and power? Revenge and glory? Maybe just revenge and a normal life? Perhaps there’s some way to reason with him, some chance for change. Maybe his ties with the resistance...” He trailed off and sighed. “I don’t know.” They both fell silent and walked on.

***********************************************

Back at the base, Spike had just finished relating the same story to Shining Armor. They were standing on a balcony, overlooking a large room filled with bustling ponies, each one going about their business.

“And we’re supposed to be keeping an eye on him!?” cried Shining Armor. “How can we keep an unobserved eye on a pony who’s just as smart as the Doctor and twice as crazy?”

“You can’t,” said the Master behind them. They whirled around to look at him. He approached them with a bemused smile on his face. “The Doctor sent you to spy on me. I know he sent you to spy on me, he knows I know he sent you to spy on me and I know that he knows that I know. The knowing is all part of the game.”

He walked up to stand beside them on the balcony. “It’s a game me and the Doctor have played since childhood, each of us trying to get the upper hand on the other, using the setting at hand to accomplish our purposes. Nothing else matters. If there were no setting, no current crisis, our battle would last forever, a permanent stalemate.”

“You’re wrong,” stated Spike. “The Doctor actually cares what happens here. He’s trying to free Equestria.”

“So am I,” agreed the Master. “But we both are trying to use this crisis to accomplish our own goals as well. He has his weapons and I have mine. He has foolish sentimentality, while I prefer ruthlessness.” He looked at Shining Armor, who was glaring at him icily.

“Don’t get me wrong,” the Master said. “I don’t pretend to think of sentimentality as a weakness in itself. It has its strengths and weaknesses like any weapon. So does ruthlessness. The winner of our game is the one whose weapon works best with the current situation.”

“This is all just a game to you?” spat Shining Armor. “You’d enslave us if you could?”

“In a heartbeat,” agreed the Master emphatically. “I would, and I can if I wanted to. Luckily for you, a willing populace serves my purpose better than an army of drones would, so your people retain their free will. Later, who knows? But as long as I get my revenge, I see no reason to change how things stand.” Spike thought on what he had seen in the office and noticed that the Master was watching Firestorm as he moved through the crowd below.

“And what about Firestorm?” Spike asked. “What would his fate be?” The Master didn’t look at him, but his face turned thoughtful.

When he spoke, it was quietly, as though he wanted the words to exist for as short a time as possible. “If someone else were to profit from my success, were to have a good life, what would I have to do about that?” The next words were even quieter, as though said unknowingly. “I never did have a son. Why shouldn’t I find one here?”

Spike looked at the Master’s face, heavy and weary, almost sad and decided on a course of action. He turned and made his way to a staircase at the back of the balcony. He ran down it, coming out in the large room below his previous spot. Ponies were milling about, attending to their business, without so much as a glance towards one another. Spike’s resolve strengthened.

He ran up to a table containing pots of food, manned by a pony he thought he’d seen in Canterlot once. Apparently she’d seen him, because when the pony noticed him, she let out a gasp and dropped her ladle in surprise. Spike leapt onto the table, grabbed the dropped ladle and a pot lid and started banging them together loudly. The ponies in the room stopped and looked at him, confused. Once he had everyone’s attention, he spoke.

“Ponies of the resistance,” he began. “My name is Spike the Dragon. Some of you might know me from the days before Discord.” Judging from the mutters in the audience, some of them did. “I’m here today to tell you that hope is back.” He looked up at the balcony. The Master’s face was livid with rage. He motioned to a few guards around the room and Spike knew his time was short.

“I want to tell you that not only am I back, but so are Princess Cadance and Prince Shining Armor. You can see him up there on the balcony.” The crowd turned to look at a rather startled and bemused Shining, who waved back nervously. Spike saw the guards rushing at him and hurried his speech. “I’m here to say that hope has returned! Shining Armor and Cadance and I will not stop until Equestria is free! Together, we will win this war!” A guard fired his gem gun. A sizzling ball of blue energy hit Spike in the face and he knew no more.

He awoke to find himself in a dingy grey cell, the door manned by guards who stared ahead impassively. Another figure was in the room.

“I won’t even bother asking why you pulled that boneheaded stunt,” said the Master, who turned to face him. “You wanted to give them hope, didn’t you?” His voice was full of venom.

“I did give them hope,” Spike asserted defiantly. “Something you’ve been depriving them. You should be thanking me. I made your army stronger. I gave them something to die for.”

“I already gave them that!” the Master hissed. His eyes were filled with mad fury. “Do you think that I, a Timelord, would run an army for fifteen years and not think of that?! I had all of them united in their hate against Discord, willing to die for the pony next to them if it meant hastening the end of Discord by even one second. You gave them a weakness. You didn’t give them something to die for, you gave them something to live for!”

“I thought you said hope wasn’t a weakness,” Spike shot back.

“It is here!” the Master slammed his hoof down. “You humans are so naive. You think that the Doctor will come and save you from every problem you’ve ever had. He’s just a Timelord, and Timelords do not equal gods! What happens if he and that princess of yours fail to return? I’ll tell you. Your precious hope will shatter like glass. I’ve sent many of my best ponies to get those elements and not one of them has returned. There’s no guarantee that the Doctor will do any better.” He paced around the room, quivering with rage.

“There’s only so many times that a person can have their hopes crushed before they lose the will to keep fighting.” The Master advanced on Spike, his horn crackling with electricity. He back-hoofed Spike, sending him to the ground and placed a hoof on his chest. He moved closer, until his face was inches from Spike’s.

“”Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t kill you right now,” he said quietly. There was a long silence. Spike broke it.

“Because the alarms have gone off.” The Master listened. Faint klaxon horns were sounding. He shot upright.

“Go!” The Master ordered the guards. “See what’s going on.” The guards rushed from the room and the Master followed behind them. Spike left as well. The corridor was dark and the lights were flickering. The sound of screaming filled the air and the room at the end was filled with the dancing orange glow of fire. It illuminated a figure ahead of them. Discord.

One of the guards had already disappeared and the second was charging the draconequus. When he got close, Discord grabbed the guard by the throat and raised him to eye level. He smiled evilly, snapped his claws and the guard disappeared. The Master fired a bolt of lightning from his horn, hitting Discord straight in the chest. He shrieked in pain. Discord recovered from the blow and raised his claw. The Master was surrounded with magic and pulled into the air in front of Discord.

“What a nasty little spell you have there,” he said. “Wait...” he laughed. “I remember you! My little human pony. How nice to see you again!” He stared intently into the Master’s eyes for a few seconds. “And a Timelord to boot!” he finally said. “How interesting. How very, very... interesting.”

“What are you doing here?” asked Spike. “Why are you attacking?”

“I smelled hope,” said Discord simply. “And I thought somepony was having a barbeque. So I came over. It turns out somepony was having a barbeque. Me.” The Master struggled in his trap. Discord glared at Spike. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten about you. I have a very special place for you.” He snapped his fingers and the world went black.

***********************************************************

The Doctor and Cadance reached the TARDIS sometime later and traipsed inside, worn out from their long walk. They went to the kitchens to find a snack. Neither of them spoke. Finally the Doctor sighed and punched in the coordinates on the TARDIS computer.

“Look,” he said. “Let’s try and put that conversation behind us. “We need to focus on the task at hand if we’re going to succeed.” He flicked a switch.

“I suppose you’re right,” said Cadance as the TARDIS began its journey. When it stopped, the two ponies stepped out into the clearing they had left twenty five years before. This was the one spot of solidarity in an ever changing landscape. The trees and bushes in this section of the forest had all been scarred pitch black, a curse from Discord to scare potential visitors.

The Monoliths stood exactly where they had before, the mixture of stone and machine weathered by moss and passing years. The Elements atop them gleamed as brightly as ever, though.

“Keep your eyes peeled,” said the Doctor. “We have to be on the lookout for Discord’s defenses. They stepped into the circle of pillars. Something rustled in a nearby bush. Cadance turned, raising her gem gun at the ready. A squirrel jumped from from the bush, looked at Cadance, cocked its head to the side and scampered into another nearby shrub.

Cadance lowered her gun and shook her head, annoyed. She turned back to examine a pillar. From that bush shot two beams of green energy. One struck the Doctor, slamming his head against the pillar of Loyalty. He fell to the ground, groaning. The other slammed Cadance side first into the pillar of Magic. Cadance recognized the biting, stinging feel of the magic.

“No,” she panted. “Not you.” A buzzing sound filled the air. From the bush flew Chrysalis, Queen of the Changelings, her horn glowing with magic. Her eyes, normally green and burning with malice and hate, were now pure white and pupilless, staring ahead blankly. She opened her mouth to speak, but instead of her typical malicious snarl, a male voice spoke.

“What a pretty little fly I’ve found in my web,” said Discord. “I’ve had plenty of strong ponies fall into this trap, but never a princess. This must be my lucky day.”

“Discord,” groaned Cadance, unsteadily getting to her hooves. “Why am I not surprised to find that you’re behind this too?”

“Well, well, it seems you can learn after all.” snarked Discord. “I rule here. Absolutely. The sooner you realize that, the better off you’ll be.”

“What have you done to Chrysalis?” asked Cadance.

“I’ve given her what every changeling dreams of,” he replied. “Absolute power. Sure, the changelings gave me a bit of hassle at first. Something about disturbing the natural order of things. Apparently, absolute chaos means zero love and zero love means no food. Who knew?” Chrysalis shrugged, unconcerned.

“Anyway, I showed them a better option, and now they have all the love they could possibly need. It’s love for me, of course, but it’s still love. And it keeps them smiling. Not that they have much choice in the matter.”

“Why?” asked Cadance. She didn’t know why she was stalling, but if Discord was willing to monologue, she was willing to listen. “Mind control seems like the opposite of your style of things. Way too much uniformity.”

“It’s a necessary evil,” Discord replied, but he made Chrysalis look decidedly bitter. “I have much bigger plans than dinky old Equestria.”

“I don’t know,” said Cadance. “If you ask me, it seems-” She fired. Her wide bore laser slammed directly into Chrysalis. When it cleared, she stood there, unfazed.

“Weren’t you listening?” asked Discord, amused. “She has the power of her entire hive behind her, with as much love as they can hold. Your powers can’t possibly touch her.” Chrysalis picked Cadance up and slammed her against the pillar of Magic again, suspending her with her hooves off the ground. She approached Cadance slowly.

“And now,” Discord said. “I’m going to take you and put you with the rest of your friends. I have special plans for you too, Princess.”

That got Cadance’s attention. Her eyes flared with anger. “My friends? What did you do to my friends!?”

Discord chuckled. “Well, let’s just say that now all your base are belong to me.” He laughed.

Cadance’s mind boiled with anger. She thought of her friends, writhing under Discord’s control. Her anger began to build. The angrier she got, the clearer her memories of her friends became. And the clearer her memories became, the brighter the light above her head grew.

Discord stared at something over her. “What? No! But how?!” he sputtered. Cadance was too furious to care what he was talking about. A beam shot from above her and hit Chrysalis, tossing her away like a rag doll. Cadance dropped to her feet.

“Don’t you dare lay a claw on my friends,” she growled. “Or I swear, I’ll rip you limb from limb.” She turned around to see the Element of Magic glowing brightly atop its pillar. Chrysalis turned to fly away.

“Not so fast!” cried Cadance. She reached out with her mind. Another beam shot from the Element of Magic and wrapped itself around Chrysalis, sinking into her. Discord cried out and there was a loud snapping sound. Chrysalis stood upright, looking around wildly, her green pupils flickering back and forth in confusion. She looked at Cadance.

“Go,” Cadance said. Chrysalis nodded and took to the skies, flying off into the perpetual afternoon. Cadance went over to the Doctor and helped him to his hooves. “Are you okay?” she asked.

“Well, that pillar was no pile of pillows, I’ll tell you that,” replied the Doctor. He looked over at the Element of Magic, which was glowing faintly. “Well, fancy that,” he said. “Looks like you’ve been claimed Princess, and as the Element of Magic no less.”

“Claimed? What do you mean?” asked Cadance.

“Well, the Elements of Harmony can be transferred,” he explained. “Just like they switched control from Celestia and Luna to the Mane Six, they can switch control from the Mane Six to anyone, and vice versa I might add. All it takes to control the Elements is a sufficient amount of the Element in question. You’re the Element of Magic, so it must have responded to your feelings about your friends. Now all we have to do is find our other Elements and get a hold of a draconequus victim.”

“It’s not going to be as simple as you think,” Cadance said. She explained what Discord had told her. The Doctor paled.

“We need to get back there and salvage whatever we can of this.” He and Cadance retrieved the remaining Elements from their pillars and entered the TARDIS once more.

The Path of Harmony

The TARDIS doors burst open as the Doctor and Cadance rushed out into a clearing. They darted through the trees running the short distance to the edge of the plain that contained the Rebel Base.

“Things are moving much faster than I want it to,” said the Doctor. “Discord’s playing his hand and we haven’t even drawn our cards yet. We have to get to the base while there’s still something left to... save”

He came to a halt ahead of Cadance, looking down from atop a hill at the field below. The base entrance had been blown apart. Pieces of rubble were strewn around the plain. Fire burned in three out of the four sentry posts and a dim orange glow from the entry tunnel told of more below.

The Doctor stood, taking in the scene. Then, gathering himself, he strode purposefully down underground, Cadance following behind. Neither of them spoke. Their hoofsteps echoed loudly in a hallway that was silent but for the sound of crackling flames. Shredded cords sputtered sparks from sockets that once held lamps. Doors lay broken on the floor, their doorways dark portals filled with foreboding.

As it grew darker, Cadance illuminated her horn to light the way. Whenever they came to a doorway, they peered inside, Cadance’s mind conjuring up new horrors that might await in each room. But in each room they came to, they found nothing. No survivors, no injured, not even any corpses. The entire base was deserted.

“Where is everypony?” Cadance asked. “Discord- He didn’t send them all to Earth, did he?””

The Doctor shook his head. “The TARDIS’s sensors would have picked up an energy spike that massive. Ten or twenty could slip under the radar, but not a few hundred. They’re still somewhere in this local universe.”

“That narrows it down,” Cadance quipped.

They moved on, going from level to level, looking for any sign of life or movement. Eventually they reached the lower levels and rooms that looked decidedly less comfortable. Holding cells, Cadance imagined. Cadance popped her head into one and saw the form of a pony lying on the ground.

“Doctor!” she cried and dashed into the room. She illuminated the unconscious form. It was the Master. The Doctor bolted to him and immediately began checking his pulse. He sighed in relief.

“He’s alive,” assured the Doctor. Next, he checked the Master’s breathing, eyes and finally he put his ear right next to the Master’s head. Cadance wasn’t sure what that was supposed to do, but the Doctor’s eyes widened in surprise. The Master’s own eyes opened.

“Bah!” he cried, backing away from the extreme close-up of the Doctor. “Doctor!” he said. “What are you doing?”

“Just checking to see if you were alive,” The Doctor replied calmly. “What happened here?”

“Discord,” spat the Master. “He attacked us and made my soldiers disappear, as well as the two you had with you.”

“Why didn’t he take you as well?” asked the Doctor piercingly.

The Master shrugged. “Search me. One minute he had me by the throat, the next I was flying through a doorway into unconsciousness. That’s not important now. Do you have the Elements?”

“Yes,” affirmed the Doctor, holding up the large sack he’d brought with him. “All we need now are some new Bearers.”

“Perfect,” the Master grinned.

“Where did he take the others?” asked Cadance urgently.

“I don’t know. If I had to guess, I’d most likely say his tower a couple miles from here. That’s the logical guess. Then again, nothing that freak of nature does is logical.”

“It’s the best place to start though,” mused the Doctor. He stood completely still, staring at the Master.

The Master stood completely still, staring back. “Yes,” he asked. “What is it?”

The Doctor shook himself. “What?... Oh! Sorry. It’s nothing. If you have anything you want to get before we leave, you should get it. We probably won’t come back here, whatever we find. The Master nodded and left the room.

As soon as he left, the Doctor fell to having a furious conversation with himself. “No, it’s not! and besides, do you have a better one?” The Doctor snapped, apparently replying to someone. He paused. “It doesn’t work like that, we need to do it this way.” He paused again. “Look, I’ve trusted you plenty of times, now it’s your turn to trust me.” There was a short pause. “Good,” he said.

The Master re-entered the room. He tossed a gem gun each to the Doctor and Cadance. “Here, yours are probably nearly dead,” he said. Cadance put hers on. So did the Doctor, though he didn’t bother to power his up. Their business finished, the three ponies trooped back to the Tardis. As they entered, a wide grin spread over the Master’s face.

“Don’t get any ideas,” the Doctor warned.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” said the Master, grinning. The Doctor punched the coordinates for Discord’s tower into the TARDIS computer and they rattled away.

*****************************************************

Groggily, Spike awoke, his head filled with both noise and pain, pounding at the sides of his skull. The noise was coming from the room around him, the pain from inside. He opened his eyes a crack and then snapped them wide open once he saw the source of the noise.

He was in a cavernous room, filled with thousands upon thousands of other ponies. Not just ponies, too. He saw griffins and minotaurs, changelings and crystal ponies, all gathered together. They stood motionless, their eyes blank, all chanting in unison. The volume was deafening, but Spike could make out what they were saying.

“To write the countless wrongs of our day
We shine this light of true redemption
That our world may become as chaos
What a wonderful world such would be.”

He gritted his teeth in pain. A pounding force in his head was driving him to join the throng, repeating the meaningless phrase endlessly, until the end of time if need be. His tongue was unconsciously forming the words. He scowled with determination. He would not give in. He shook his head and the pounding shook also, tuning out like a fuzzy radio. The pounding lessened. He had to find Shining Armor and get out of here.

He pressed through the mass, searching face after face, looking for the one he recognized. He found Shining Armor near the edge of the throng, eyes blank, mindlessly repeating the empty chant. Spike rolled his eyes. They seriously needed to do something about this. Set up a spell, or get Shining some mind training, or get him a tinfoil hat at least.

He grabbed one of his friends’ hooves and pulled him towards the edge of the mob, Shining Armor following obediently. They reached the edge of the crowd and found the way blocked by a typical jail door, all bars and gaps. Spike supposed that there really didn’t need to be all that much security. The door could have been gone and still no one would have escaped, except for him.

He approached the bars, the pounding in his head protesting against his every step. He grabbed a panel of bars and engulfed it in flame. It glowed a dull red for a few short moments. Spike sighed. It was going to be a long day.

*****************************************************

Once the TARDIS had stopped, the three gathered by its door. They looked at one another solemnly, nodded and pushed open the door.

Their first glimpse of Discord’s tower was not what they expected at all. A plain black spire met their eyes, squat and unassuming. It was barely even foreboding. It stood 50 feet tall and narrowed down to a single room level at the top.

Cadance looked at it, confused. “Somehow, I expected something a bit more... grandiose.”

The Master shrugged. “I wouldn’t let your guard down just yet.” As they made to enter the tower, he turned back to the Doctor. “Aren’t you going to hide the TARDIS?”

The Doctor shook his head. “No need. Discord’s already been in there once and learned all he could from it. There really isn’t anything in there that could give him more than what he already has.” Turning back to the door, a plain black rectangle set in the stone, he pushed it open.

Inside was a grand hallway, patterned with grey and black tiles whose borders seemed to undulate and shift, mixing with one another. The ceiling of this one entryway alone stretched at least a hundred feet above their heads. Suits of armor decorated the wide hall, each one radically different. One was bright pink. One was a suit of armor for a bunny. Three were playing poker on a table in the corner. All the while, a low murmuring sound filled the room.

The Master looked at Cadance smugly. “How did you know it would be like this on the inside?” she asked.

“Simple,” the Master scoffed. “Chaos is all about betraying a person’s expectations.”

Suddenly Cadance fell to the ground, clutching her head which was throbbing in agony. The ever present murmuring sound seemed to swell louder and resonate with the pounding in her head. She cried out in pain and the Doctor ran over. He swore under his breath and rummaged through the bag on his back. He withdrew the golden tiara bearing the Element of Magic and placed it on Cadance’s head. Immediately the throbbing stopped and the volume of the murmuring returned to normal.

“What was that?” gasped Cadance.

“I’m betting it was an attack by Discord,” replied the Doctor, studying Cadance’s eyes closely. “What did it feel like? Tell me everything.”

“It felt like another mind was trying to override my own,” Cadance responded. “It was trying to wipe out all my thoughts. Why did it stop though? Was it the Element?”

The Doctor nodded. “The Elements of Harmony protect against almost all other forms of magic. Discord’s magic is no exception.”

“Why are you immune to it then?” asked Cadance.

“Timelord brain,” said the Doctor, tapping his head. “It works on a different frequency. It won’t keep us safe forever, but it should keep us safe for long enough.”

The Doctor opened a door on the side of the hallway and the murmuring grew significantly louder. “This way,” he beckoned. The doorway led to a descending spiral staircase, which they quickly traversed. The deeper into the tower they went, the louder the murmuring became until it reached a roar of united voices. Eventually they had to shout to hear each other above it.

They came out of the staircase and into a massive dungeon. An enormous throng of creatures met their gaze, confined behind a giant jail cell door. The cacophonous din came from the crowd and the three ponies had to concentrate hard to think through it. Eventually they were able to pick out the words of the chant.

“True redemption? What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Cadance.

“Some gibberish Discord came up with, no doubt,” replied the Master.

The Doctor was busy scanning the crowd. “Over there!” he shouted, pointing to a figure at the far end of the cell, puffing spouts of fire furiously over an ever reddening panel of bars. They dashed over to where Spike stood, the cherry red bars beginning to melt.

“Spike!” Cadance cried. She attempted to hug him through the bars, but stopped, realizing their temperature.

Spike grinned. “Glad to see you’re safe. I thought Discord would’ve gotten you too.”

“Not in a million years,” Cadance boasted. “What happened to Shining Armor?”

Spike rolled his eyes. “He got caught by Discord’s spell.”

“We really need to do something about that,” said Cadance.

“No kidding,” Spike replied. “But we can’t worry about that write- I mean, right now. We have to break the curse and get Shining out of here.”

Cadance shook her head. “We need to get you safe before Discord’s curse starts affecting you too.”

Spike’s smile was a little bitter. “I’m afraid it’s true- I mean, too late for that. It’s already activated. I can hold out though. It’s harder to brainwash a dragon than Discord might light- like! Argh!” One of Spike’s knees buckled and he slumped, clutching his head, shivering.

“Spike’s right,” said the Doctor, already rummaging in his bag. He drew out a golden necklace with a ruby red lightning bolt on it. “Here,” he said, handing it to Spike through the bars. “Put this on Shining.”

“Loyalty. Figures,” muttered Spike, fastening the necklace. Shining stopped his chanting, but his eyes remained glazed and unfocused.

“That should stop the spell from re-establishing itself. Now we just need to break the curse,” began the Doctor.

“Allow me,” said Cadance, stepping forward. She approached Shining Armor, horn glowing, and touched her horn to his, deploying the memory spell. The air around Shining Armor shook, but the look in his eyes didn’t change. Grimacing, Cadance closed her eyes and hearts from her love magic joined the aura of energy surrounding Shining Armor. The hearts sank into him and his eyes snapped into focus.

“What!?” he cried, looking around him wildly. “What happened?” He looked at Cadance, who was smiling uncontrollably and giggling under her breath. He groaned.

“Don’t tell me I didn’t?”

“You did,” she said, trying hard not to laugh.

“Can we please pretend this never happened?” he begged.

“You’re going to have to face this problem sometime,” she replied, smiling. Shining Armor ignored her. He picked the weakened, shivering Spike up and placed him on his back, put a forcefield around them and walked through the melting molten bars.

The Doctor went up to them and pulled a necklace out of his bag. “Put this on,” he said to Spike. “It’ll counteract the spell.”

Spike looked at the necklace and shook his head. “An Element of Harmony? I tried using that before when Discord first appeared. It didn’t work. It didn’t even light up, then turn off, like the others’ did. It just did nothing.”

“So I’d heard,” nodded the Doctor. “But that wasn’t because the Elements won’t work for you, you were just wearing the wrong Element.” He reached up and fastened the necklace around Spike’s neck.

Instantly, Spike’s shivering stopped and he sat up straight. “The Element of Laughter?” he questioned, looking down at the blue balloon around his neck. “That doesn’t even make any sense. I’m not a jokester like Pinkie Pie.”

“All will be revealed in due time,” replied the Doctor. “I’ll have to go through the explanation later anyway and I prefer not to repeat myself.”

“Alright then” said Spike, rubbing his hands together. “Now it’s time for us to decide what to do next.”

“That all depends on Discord’s plan,” The Master stated. “Until we know what it is, we can’t act.”

“I know what it is,” piped in Shining Armor unexpectedly. The others looked at him. “Well, when I was, um, out of commission, that was all that was on my mind. Basically, his plan is to brainwash every sentient creature in Equestria, bring them to Earth, not as humans but in regular pony form, release them from his control and just watch everything run amok. Total chaos. Then, when everything is beginning to settle down, he’ll do the same thing to Earth and move on to another universe.”

The group sat there for a moment, pondering the ramifications. “Well, I think we can all agree that’s sufficiently diabolical,” said Spike, breaking the silence.

“Indeed, we need to stop Discord while we can. Let’s go.” He turned to leave.

“Woah, woah. What!?” cried Spike. “In case you haven’t noticed, we only have five ponies here.” He lowered his voice. “And I’m not sure if all of us can use an Element of Harmony anyway.” He avoided looking at the Master, who was scowling intensely at him.

“Hey!” snapped David. “I’m still in here too, you know.”

“Yes,” replied Spike. “But you’re stuck inside the Doctor and I don’t think the Elements will work unless you’re physically here.”

“Not so, actually,” the Doctor objected. He reached into his bag and withdrew another Element. “Together, the Elements are powerful enough to do just about anything, but alone they are pretty powerful too.” The Element of Generosity in his hand shimmered and wavered and disappeared. The blurry, indistinct outline of a pony appeared beside them. Spike could make out a coat of light blue fur and a bright red mane. The pony’s cutie mark was too indistinct to make out, but it resembled a clock of some sort. The pony soon solidified, halfway between indistinct and defined, with a face that was clearly and unmistakably David’s.

“Did ya miss me?” he said, grinning.

“Awesome!” cried Spike.

“I know,” The Doctor beamed proudly. “We made him tangible again.” Spike reached out to high five David, but the claw passed through his hoof.

“Well, mostly tangible,” the Doctor amended.

“That’s all well and good,” began Cadance, smiling at David. “But we still have the problem of, to put it bluntly, I don’t think that the Master could use one of the Elements of Harmony. From what I know of him, he doesn’t seem to fit any of them.” The Master scoffed, but didn’t disagree.

“I know,” sighed the Doctor. “But we have to work with what we’ve got. We don’t have time to spend on this issue. Discord could launch his plan at any second, so we’ll just have to make do.” He retrieved the two Elements from his bag. He looked at the Element of Kindness, looked back at the Master, and placed the Element of Honesty on him instead.

The Master shot him a withering glare. “I appreciate your faith in me,” he said sarcastically.

The Doctor shrugged. “Nothing personal.”

“We could always try freeing another pony,” Shining Armor suggested.

Cadance shook her head. “I could only free you by using my love spell and the memory spell at the same time and in order to perform the memory spell, you have to have significant personal knowledge of the pony you’re performing it on.” She looked around at the million other ponies in the room. “I don’t recognise any of them right now, and it would take too long to find one that I do know.”

“I guess you’re stuck with me then,” growled the Master.

“Stop taking everything so seriously,” said the Doctor, rolling his eyes.

“Let’s go.” said the Master, turning and heading up the spiral staircase. The Doctor made to leave, but David’s hoof on his shoulder stopped. David said nothing, only looked into the Doctor’s eyes, a serious question in his own.

The Doctor nodded. “I know what I’m doing,” he assured. Somehow, those words sent shivers up the spines of the other ponies.

The group ran up the stairs and back into the main hallway. They spotted another spiral staircase across the hallway, this one going upwards. They ran up it, higher and higher, going up floor after floor.

“How come we haven’t encountered any resistance?” panted Shining Armor. “Shouldn’t this place be guarded?”

“Does Discord even know we’re here?” theorized Cadance. “For all he knows, every pony but three is under his control. Why should he need security?”

“Discord knows we’re here,” the Doctor affirmed. “He’s not oblivious enough to miss what’s going on in his own tower. Besides, we broke his spell over Shining Armor. He’s bound to have felt that. As to why we’ve met no resistance, well, that’s just another thing we’ll have to ask him.”

The group reached the top of the tower and came to a stop in front of a massive set of iron double doors. The Doctor approached them slowly.

“This is it everypony,” he said. “The end game.” He opened the doors and they rushed inside.

The throne room was large and cavernous, completely empty, except for two large disembodied light sources which covered the room in a dim yellow light and a throne placed dead center in the chamber, upon which sat the draconequus master of Chaos.

“I see you’ve come to attend my going away party,” quipped Discord, unfazed at their presence. “But I’m afraid you’ve gotten turned around. The main party’s going on downstairs. Are you sure you wouldn’t like me to redirect you?”

“Pretty sure,” the Doctor bantered back. “Nice place you have here. A bit empty though, isn’t it?”

“Oh, when you travel as much as I do, what’s the point in decorating a waystation such as this?” dismissed Discord, waving a claw.

“The security’s rather scanty as well,” remarked the Doctor. “One would almost think you wanted us here.”

Discord roared with laughter. “My dear Doctor, whyever should I keep you out? You’re giving me everything I want, The Elements of Harmony, the last sentient ponies on the planet and sweet,sweet revenge all on a silver platter served directly to my door. What more could I want?”

“Enough laughing, Discord.” growled David.

Discord raised his hand to his ear and cocked it in David’s direction. “I’m afraid you’ll have to speak up, sonny, it appears you’re just a Shade too quiet.” Discord cackled at his pun. His face snapped back to solemn again. “You’re quite right though. I’m afraid our little game of cat-and-mouse is done. I’ve got places to go and Chaos to wreak.”

“You’re not getting away this time,” said the Doctor. “We’ve brought our secret weapon.”

Discord scoffed. “What, you mean the Elements of Harmony?”

“No,” replied the Master. “Me.” Lightning shot from the end of his horn and struck Discord full in the chest. He howled and dropped to the ground, writhing under the constant stream of lightning.

“Now!” cried the Master.

The Elements glowed softly as the Doctor began to speak. “The Elements have been gathered here by these six Bearers. Cadance, who links her friends together, bound by magic and her care and compassion for them, represents the Element of Magic.” Cadance’s tiara blazed with light and a bright purple glow lit the room.

“Do we have to have these didactic little speeches!?” growled the Master through gritted teeth, as Discord’s screams continued to fill the air.

“Yes,” snapped the Doctor. “It’s part of the magic. The Elements need to recognize their bearers. Now don’t interrupt.”

He turned back to the group. “The Element of Laughter is more than just the physical action of laughing. It represents hope, joy and the ability to continue in the face of absolute despair. Spike, who kept us all moving when we’d hit our lowest points, who continued to push this group on when no hope was left, represents the Element of Laughter!” Spike’s necklace lit up with a light blue glow that beamed cheerily next to the purple that filled the room.

Discord growled, looking up at his impending doom. He tried to summon his magic, generate anything that could break the monologue, but the electricity coursing through his body paralyzed his muscles and he couldn’t snap any of his five sets of digits.

“David, who gave up his chance at a normal life to pursue just for a cause that wasn’t his represents the Element of Generosity.” A soft, dark blue glow emanated from David’s necklace, almost engulfed in the other colors, but still faintly present underneath it.

“Yes, yes. And for showing loyalty to his friends, Shining Armor is the Element of Loyalty.” Grunted the Master as sweat poured down his face. “Can we get on with it?” A blazing red light suddenly sprang from around Shining’s neck, mingling with the blues and purple. The Doctor frowned at him disapprovingly.

David picked up the thread. “For his mercy, hatred of death and appreciation for all life, the Doctor represents the Element of Kindness.” A blinding pink glow burst from the butterfly necklace at the Doctor’s own neck, shining along with the other colors.

“And the Master...” began David, before stopping uncertainly. “...represents the Element of Honesty.” he finished. A single orange spark shot from the charm fixed to the Master. He shot David a withering glare.

“Hey, don’t look at me,” protested David. “It’s not my fault you don’t represent the Element of Honesty.”

“Whatever,” snarled the Master. “Just fire already.” The Element bearers were lifted up, gathering together in a circular formation, engulfed in the magic of their respective elements, their colors mingling together and turning white. The Master managed a low hover.

There was a loud boom and an immense, five-color rainbow arced upwards in the air and slammed down with tremendous force onto Discord, who screamed in terror. The room filled with a brilliant white light, engulfing everything.

The six ponies lay sprawled on the floor. So did Discord. Their breathing was quick and heavy. So was Discord’s. Their breathing strengthened and they sat up. Discord didn’t.

The Doctor looked around. Everyone else was sitting on the floor, blinking owlishly, trying to regain their senses. The Doctor looked over and saw Discord lying on the ground, barely moving, looking at the group with weary, hate filled eyes. The ponies got to their hooves.

“He isn’t turned to stone,” said Cadance quietly. “He’s still here.”

“He’s weak,” noted Shining Armor.

“Yes,” hissed the Master. “Weak enough.” He looked at the Doctor. “Now’s your chance. You have a gem gun. You have to kill him.”

The Doctor’s eyes hardened and he opened his mouth to protest, but the Master cut him off. “Yes, I know. You never take a life if you can help it. But this time, there is no other way. Discord may be injured now, but he will recover quickly. We don’t have time to waste and we can’t trap him in stone. You need to do it.”

The Doctor looked uncertain. Eventually, he sighed and walked slowly up to Discord, assessing the draconequus.

Discord looked back at him, unremorseful. “I’d do it all again,” he hissed, his voice filled with malice. “In a heartbeat. As long as I live, you and your friends are never safe.”

The Doctor looked at Discord and his eyes hardened. He turned his gem gun on and set it to kill. He charged his gun and pointed it at Discord, right between his eyes. The Doctor whirled around and fired directly behind himself. His blast met the Master’s in midair. Both exploded, doing nothing.

The Master chuckled, but when he spoke, his voice was no longer his own. “Very astute,” Discord said, standing up on his back hooves, his front hooves crossed over his black jacket. “Still, I suppose I should have known you’d see through this disguise. Tell me though, how long did you know I was in this body?”

“Since the very beginning,” replied the Doctor, his eyes cold.

“Aw, really?” said Discord, disappointed. He levitated himself into the air, hovering above the four ponies and a dragon, a good twenty feet high. “I was hoping I could have fooled you longer than that. I guess it was a bit of a silly plan. But when I came across this little guy in that little rebel base, I just couldn’t resist the opportunity. What gave me away?”

“The drums,” answered the Doctor. “When I last met the Master, when I was very close to him, I could hear the drums pounding in his head. I couldn’t hear anything in yours.”

Discord laughed. “So that’s why you were listening to my head. I wondered what you expected to hear.”

“Your convenient knowledge of your own tower was also a dead giveaway. As well as the fact that the Master had recently begun to develop a sort of nervous tic. Whenever he was agitated, he began tapping out the drumbeat on things around him. It was a tic you failed to imitate.”

Discord eyed the Doctor slyly. “Well then, seeing as you knew I was there, don’t you think it was quite a big risk to let me go with you undiscovered?”

“It was a bit risky, true,” the Doctor acknowledged, glancing at David, who was giving him a steady look. “But I feel it was worth it in order to have you right where I want you.”

“Right where you want me?” Discord snorted with incredulity. “I fail to see this perfect scenario.”

The Doctor grew cold and his voice was filled with anger. “I don’t see how you could miss it. We have the Elements of Harmony and we are going to turn you to stone.”

Discord looked at him with scorn. “Did those Elements addle your head? Last I checked, there were only five of you. I have your friend's body now. I’ve crushed his mind. There’s nothing left. He barely put up a fight. And besides, even if he were here, what’s he going to do? He was black to the core. Some fifteen years of self-imposed community service isn’t going to make a big enough difference.”

“I don’t care what you think,” the Doctor said flatly. “We have enough ponies, we have enough Elements and we’re going to turn you to stone.”

“What, no room for mercy?” mocked Discord. “No second chances? Aren’t you going to give me a chance to reform and to see the error of my ways?” he cackled with laughter.

The Doctor’s rage boiled over. He set his gun to capture and fired a lasso of pure energy up to the laughing pony, grabbing him and slamming him into the ground twenty feet below. The Doctor held out his hoof and an Element appeared in it. David’s form wavered and disappeared. The Doctor strode over to Discord, who had struggled to his back hooves. The Doctor came to halt in front of Discord and back-hoofed him across the face.

Stunned by the blow, Discord didn’t react as the Doctor ripped the Element from his neck and replaced it with a different one. This one felt unnaturally cold, as though he were caught around the neck by an iron band.

“Not so high and mighty now, are you?” hissed the Doctor in his ear. “You’ve bound yourself to a pony form. Your strength is limited.” He stepped back and looked at Discord. “You used your second chances long ago. You squandered them on deceit and lies.” The Doctor’s face was filled with disgust. He was weary. His face seemed to show every bit of his over one thousand years, a tiredness and sorrow only one other person could know.

“I have no more words to say to you now,” he whispered “I’m done with you.” He turned back towards the others.

Discord, recovered from the blow, snarled with rage. “We’re not done yet!” he growled. He snapped his hoof out to hit the Doctor. His hoof moved itself back. “What!?” he stared at his own hoof in confusion. He lashed his leg out. His leg moved itself back. “What are you doing?” he called after the Doctor, who had moved back to join the other ponies.

True to his word, the Doctor said nothing more to Discord. Instead, he held the Element of Honesty up in the air, “Honesty is about more than just the truth,” he said. “It’s about trust. This Element goes to the one pony who I can trust with my own life.” The Element shimmered and disappeared. David shimmered back into existence, fully solidified and completely tangible, a solemn look on his face and the Element of Honesty around his neck glowing with a bright orange light.

The other Elements responded too, each glowing out with their own colored light. All except for the Element around Discord’s neck, which sat pulsing, waiting. Discord tried to reach out with his hoof and rip it off of his neck, but every time he tried, his hoof moved itself away, going back to his side.

“What did you do to me?” Discord snarled. “Why can’t I move?!”

“He didn’t do that to you,” said a voice in his head. “You did that to yourself. It seems you picked the wrong pony to possess. What a shame”

Discord’s eyes widened as he recognized the presence. “You!” he thought “I crushed you like a bug! You shouldn’t exist anymore!”

The Master roared with laughter. “Oh, I’d forgotten what’s it’s like to go up against people who weren’t the Doctor. You’re delightfully dim-witted, aren’t you? Extinct is not that same thing as dormant. Honestly, I’m surprised you can tell up from down with your level of intelligence. And now, it’s time to end this.”

“What are you talking about!?” growled Discord angrily.

“Well, someone’s going to have to stay in here with you to make sure you can’t escape,” said the Master smugly. “And since we aren’t planning to let you out anytime soon, that means staying here with you for eternity. I’d say that’s a pretty generous move on my part, wouldn’t you?”

The Element of Generosity shone like the sun, its blue light bursting forth and mingling with the other colors to make a spectrum that left the viewer awestruck.
“You knew this would happen, didn’t you?” realized Discord. “From the moment I possessed you, you and the Doctor planned this all out!”

“Of course I did!” The Master cackled. “I’ve just been biding my time, waiting for this. I’ve even taken the time to compose a little poem, just for you. I’ve heard from numerous sources that you like poems. Let me know if this sounds familiar:

Five Score,Plus forever more

Your body a stone,Your rule overthrown

Cast off to a land where the sun never rises

To torture no more with your cruel surprises

My vengeance enacted, your torment to be

A presence to haunt you through eternity

A battle of minds, one which neither can win

I’m along for the ride though, so shall we begin?”

The Elements gathered in a circle around the Master, their eyes glowing white. A high pitched noise began to fill the room, growing slowly louder, like a jet plane revving up.
The Doctor looked at the Master, his eyes sad, filled with pain. “I’m so, so sorry.” he sighed.

The Master took back control of his mouth. “Do it.” he ordered.

“No!” cried Discord, comprehending his situation. “Why are you doing this? Why are you sacrificing yourself for these ponies!? They’ve given you nothing! Why give them anything back?”

“You’re wrong there,” said the Master softly. “I’ve gotten several things on this planet. I’ve gotten old. I’ve gotten tired, tired of running and tired of losing. And most of all, I’ve got something to die for.”

The Element of Generosity blazed with light. A pillar of dark blue light shot into the air. Beams of light shot from the other elements in an arc and converged on the blue pillar, creating a rainbow spiral that surged down the blue pillar and directly into the pony at its base.

The Master stood, his four hooves planted firmly on the ground, his head defiant, staring determinately into his fate. The stone shot up from around his hooves, quickly encasing them. As it climbed up his body, he did not flinch. No sound escaped his mouth as it too was frozen and he closed his eyes as the rest of his body was instantly entombed. The room around the Elements faded to white.

Spike awoke slowly. He felt different. He decided to take inventory of the things that were different. For starters, there was a fiery feeling in his gut. That was different. For another, he felt grass underneath him. That was definitely strange. And finally, he felt sunlight on himself. Not the harsh sunlight of an angry sun, but warm, nice, relaxing. He opened his eyelids and the relaxing sunlight poked him in the eye.

“Ack!” he said, sitting up. He opened his eyes fully. He was perched on a hill, overlooking a wide valley. The entire expanse was an inviting green, and a forest of trees waved lazily in the distance. The bright blue sky stretched overhead and the sun shined in it. Down in the valley, a million creatures lay, unconscious and resting, sleeping off as much of twenty five years of living in hell as sleep can take away.

Next to him on the hill lay Doctor Whooves, Shining Armor, Princess Cadance and a fully human and clothed David. The statue of the Master stood not far away. The others began to stir. Shining Armor looked around.

“We did it,” he said disbelievingly.

“We did it?” asked Cadance. They looked at each other.

“We did it!” they cried, holding each other and dancing around the hilltop.

“You sure did,” said the Doctor, smiling. His smile faded slightly as he looked at the statue of the Master. The Element of Generosity gleamed golden against the stone statue. The Doctor removed the necklace and placed it on the ground.

Spike looked at the statue. “So... what do we do with him now?”

“I know of several caves beneath Equestria,” replied the Doctor. “Where no one can or will ever find this statue again. It will never see the light of day.”

“Is the curse permanent?” asked Spike.

The Doctor nodded. “The Master was an Element bearer, if only for about five seconds and his sacrifice has made the seal unbreakable. No matter how many times the Elements change hooves, those two will never escape.” He sighed. “It almost makes me feel sorry for Discord. Almost.”

Spike whistled. “Those Elements sure are powerful.”

“They are indeed,” said the Doctor. “The Elements of Harmony can fix all problems.” He looked at Spike. “All of them.”

“What do you mean?” asked Spike.

“I imagine you’ve come back with a little something extra, some kind of magic. Try concentrating on it,” instructed the Doctor

Spike did so, focusing on the new fiery feeling in his stomach. A purple fire engulfed him and traveled up his body. Everywhere the fire burned, his body changed. Skin replaced scales, hair replaced spines and his tail disappeared. Within seconds, he stood, fully human and, to his relief, fully clothed. He focused again and changed back into his dragon form.

The Doctor smiled, satisfied. “The Elements of Harmony are meant to restore balance. Discord created an imbalance, gave you two lives to live and a body that would only let you live in one. The Elements fixed that. I imagine these powers also came with a way for you to get to and from Equestria, without my TARDIS having to ferry you around each time.”

Spike was stunned. When he recovered he spoke again. “But how do you know all this? How did you know this was here?”

The Doctor smiled. “When you know the Elements of Harmony as well as I do, you tend to learn how they work.”

Spike turned to David. “Do you have a pony form too?” he asked.

David shook his head. “No. I think I’ve had enough of being a pony for one lifetime. I’m fine with just being me and living a normal life on Earth. I don’t have a life here in Equestria.” He smiled a clever smile. “I am still a Timelord though, so I can find a way to pop on back here, for visits.”

“Visits?” asked Spike “What do you mean?” He looked at Shining Armor and Cadance. “Are you... not coming back with me?”

Shining Armor sighed. “Probably not.” He looked out over the valley of a million ponies. “We have a lot of work to do here first. When these ponies wake up, they’ll need someone to lead them. Twenty five years of torture and misery don’t just go away overnight. Most ponies will probably follow us, because we’re a remnant of the old days, a promise that life will return to normal. But there will still be complications. Wounds to heal, towns to rebuild.”

“But you have lives at home, too!” Spike protested. “Families that love you.”

“And I’m sure we can visit them,” assured Cadance. “We have magic and we have my mirror, if I can ever figure out how that thing works. We’ll probably have to explain the situation to them, but we can still see them from time to time. But it won’t be for a few years at least. There’s too much to do here.”

“But then... what will I do?” asked Spike.

Cadance smiled. “Find the others, of course. Discord may be gone, but there are still plenty of ponies on Earth who have no idea what’s going on. You can find them and help them cope with their situation.”

Spike smiled. “Of course!” he said. He thought of the TARDIS, of a computer sitting in its depths and of four words. Twilight Sparkle - Location: KNOWN. He would find her, find all of his friends and bring them back to the world he had helped save.

The End

Author's Note

Well, it's been a great ride with all of you and I thank you for reading. Any feedback you have is appreciated and I sincerely enjoyed every comment I've received. I wish I'd responded to a lot more of them. I hope you enjoyed reading this. Feel free to let me know what you thought of it. Much, much special thanks to my editor Dusk Writer.

March of Progress

There was silence. We all sat there, stunned. My mind tried to reboot. It wasn’t until the green fire had completely turned my manual to ash that my brain was able to form a coherent thought.

“So... green fire.” I said. It wasn’t much of a thought.

“Well, this has gone from mild prank right on down to serious business,” said David.

“Did we really see what I think we just saw?” asked Shane.

“The ash proves as much.” I replied.

“So, what do we do now?” asked David.

I was very thankful for the question. With something to focus on, my brain clunked back into action. “That depends on what happens next,” I said. “If this is the extent of what happens, then we ignore it, try and have the marks removed and pretend this never happened. If it’s not...” I trailed off, not knowing what to say. What can you say to such a possibility?

“What do you mean by that?” asked Shane. “What else do you think is going to happen?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “All I know is that now I can do this-” I breathed a jet of flame. “I have no idea what happened to let me do that. And call me paranoid, but I think that whatever can make that happen isn’t going to stop with just two cutie marks and a party trick.” I sighed and rubbed my forehead, trying to iron the tiredness out of my brain, “Look, it’s pointless to speculate about this with so little information. We may be getting worked up over nothing. We should get some sleep and await further developments in the morning.” I went to my room.

As soon as I got inside, I flopped down on my bed. My mind was in turmoil. A very big part of me, most of me, just wanted whatever happened to be a dream, some kind of hallucination. But a small part, deep down, was very intrigued by what was going on. This was more than just some semester final. Life was finally getting interesting. I would get to the bottom of whatever this was. If it doesn’t kill you first, said the big part of me. True, there was always that. With these thoughts chasing themselves around my brain, I fell asleep.

When I awoke the next morning, the clock told me that it was 9 in the morning. “Well, nothing like a Saturday for sleeping in,” I said to myself. The events of the previous night came back to my mind. Had it all been a dream? Nervously, I grabbed the trash can from the corner of my room, took a piece of paper from my desk and held it above the trash can. Bracing myself for the answer, I took a deep breath and let it out over the paper. The paper was buried in green flames. Sighing, I dropped it into the metal can and watched it burn out. So much for that hope. I got up and left my room.

Shane and David were already in the kitchen fixing themselves breakfast. The room was silent. I could tell from the nervous stances and shifting eyes that things were just as real for them as they had been for me. As I entered the room, they glanced at me, but said nothing. I walked over to the counter, trying to decide what to eat. I heard David clear his throat behind me.

“So... do you have any ideas?” he asked tentatively.

“About what?” I said, feigning ignorance.

“About last night,” said David annoyed. “And what to do about it."

“I thought we were going to wait for further developments before deciding anything,” I said, turning to face him.

David and Shane shared a glance.

“What?” I asked.

“Um... you haven’t noticed?” Shane asked.

“Noticed what?”

“Take a look at your eyes,” David said.

Curious, I walked into our bathroom and looked into the mirror. My normally blue eyes were now a vivid bright green. The pupils, once round, were now slitted, like a reptile’s. A very certain reptile in particular.

I came out of the bathroom and back into the kitchen, now making sure to glance at the eyes of my roommates. Both pairs of eyes were blue. They had always been brown before. I sat down on a stool near the counter. “Is that the- Are those the colors of-?”

Shane nodded, cutting me off. “We looked it up. Blue is the eye color of both Doctor Whooves and Shining Armor.” I sat there for a few seconds, stunned.

David looked at me, anxiety clear on his face. “What do we do about this?” he asked, the panic in his voice rising. “I mean, how far is this going to go?”

I looked at him, noticing his scared, almost frantic expression. “I don’t know,” I said, grabbing a fork out of a nearby drawer. “But at least one good thing came out of this.”

“What?” asked Shane.

I grabbed a piece of nearby bread and speared it on the fork. Holding the fork in front of my mouth, I let loose a stream of fire in front of the bread, making sure to toast it evenly on both sides. “We never need to buy another toaster again,” I said, dropping the toast onto a plate.

There was silence for a good three seconds. Then we all burst into laughter. The relief in tension was almost palpable. We kept laughing, unable to stop for a good minute. “Oh wow,” said David. “I don’t know how, but that made me feel loads better.”

“It’s because you’re taking this too seriously,” I said. “You have to accept it with a certain amount of resignation. We have no idea how this is happening, but we do know that we didn’t do it to ourselves, so until we find out what did do this, there’s nothing we can do to change it. Why continue to freak out and worry? That’s not going to do anything. We just need to roll with the punches.”

“So that begs the question,” Shane said. “What do we do next?”

“Well, I say we prepare for the worst possible eventuality.” I replied. “Let’s assume that we’re going to go all the way and turn into Shining Armor, Doctor Whooves and Spike. If it does happen, we’ll be prepared. If it doesn’t, we’ll be pleasantly surprised. Agreed?” They both nodded. “Good. Now, let’s get down to the discussion every brony has contemplated, but never fully considered; What would I do if I were to turn into a pony?”

We sat at the table for a few hours, talking about the things we’d need to get and what we’d need to do. As we talked, I toasted some breakfast for everyone. We decided that we needed supplies. We left the question of our base of operations until later. We knew that we had to go somewhere. Our apartment was near the university campus, which was near the center of the city. It was far too localized and there were way too many people around. But every time we tried to think of where to go, we were stopped by the question of what to do. There was no point in going somewhere if we had no direction to go. Eventually we settled for getting supplies and waiting out the day, monitoring ourselves and charting out the progression of the change.

“Well, I’d better get going if I’m going to get all the stuff we need,” Shane said, turning away from the table. My eyes followed him.

“Yeah, uh, double time it,” I said, looking at his hair. “You’re getting more noticeable by the minute,”

Shane caught my look and pulled at a strand of his now-abnormally-long brown hair. The ends were lightly colored several different shades of blue. “Let me guess,” he said. “Shining Armor’s mane color?” I nodded. “Great,” he huffed, and without another word, he headed for the door. I turned to see David inspecting his own hair. I could see differences as well. His hair was now several shades darker than its usual color, already making the transition from red to brown.

I tried looking at mine. It seemed that mine hadn’t lengthened like the others had. I went to the mirror and saw that my normally black hair now had tips of solid green. The ends had also fused together in some places, creating clumps that could not be completely separated. I walked back out to find David still staring at his hair, looking distant. I walked over and put my hand on his shoulder. “Don’t worry,” I said, looking him in the eye. “We’ll figure this out.”

He nodded, but then stopped. “Uh, you’re looking me in the eye,” said David.

“Yeah, so?”

“Um, aren’t you about a half a foot taller than me?” he asked.

I froze. “Yeah, I am.” I said comparing our two heights. We were now more or less even at 5 foot 6. "How is it that I’m shrinking and you’re not?” I asked.

David shrugged. “Eventually I’m going to end up on all fours. That should put me at about pony height. Spike stands on two legs though.”

I looked at him. “For someone who was freaking out this morning, you seem to be taking these new developments in stride.”

David laughed. “The way I see it, even if I didn’t ask for this, this is still a crazy opportunity. Think about how many scientists would kill to be in my position. This whole situation has never happened before. At least, I don’t think so. That means I’m one of the first. It’s almost as prestigious as walking on the moon. Almost. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got work to do.”

“What work?” I asked.

“I’m making a record of this process,” he said, turning to sit down at his computer desk next to the TV. “I’ll put it on my blog.”

I snorted. “Do you really think anyone else will take it seriously?”

David shrugged. “At worst, I’m ignored or ridiculed. At best, I become the world’s most renowned Photoshopper, and who knows, maybe someone else who needs will be able to find it and use it.”

The notion caught me completely by surprise. Up until now, I hadn’t considered that there might be others out there experiencing the same things. “What makes you think there are others?” I asked him.

He rolled his eyes. “Come on, do you really think it’s a coincidence that we all just happened to turn into ponies exactly on our birthdays? There’s like a .000000000000000000000000862% chance of that happening. This was no freak of nature event. Something’s causing this. And if it’s theme seems to be MLP, why should it settle for just creating a few background ponies? Why not make the Mane Six as well?”

I tried to wrap my head around the conversation. “You’re talking as though there’s some higher power behind this.”

David shook his head. “Not a higher power, just a sentient force,” He looked away, his face thoughtful. “Probably not the government. Even if they could transmogrify people, they wouldn’t turn them into kids’ show talking ponies. Besides, transforming on our birthdays is just a bit too poetic for the government. It was probably something from Equestria.”

I raised my eyebrows. “Something from Equestria? As in the actual, straight-from-TV, Hasbro Equestria?”

David shrugged. “Sure, why not? If we are turning into the ponies from Equestria, doesn’t that kind of prove the existence of Equestria in the first place? And if it does, what does that say about how this change started? Or more importantly, who started it.” he said, looking at me pointedly.

I held up my hand to stop him. “Don’t get carried away,” I said. “I can see your point about this all starting in Equestria, but I think it’s a little too early to start speculating on who or what caused it. Now you’re just letting the series finale get to you.” David reluctantly nodded and then turned back to his computer. Who wouldn’t let the finale get to them though? It had been the most bizarre, messed up ending to a children’s show he’d ever seen. Discord had teamed up with Celestia, in order to defeat a monster, but when the opportunity came, he’d disposed of the goddess and gone on to take out Twilight, thus disabling the Elements of Harmony. Twilight...

I broke out of my thoughts, very much surprised to feel a tear running down my face. No. I refused to believe that Discord had done anything. First of all, it was ridiculous to assume that just because Equestria might be real, all the events of the show were as true as history. Secondly, if it was true, if Discord was behind this... How did one fight against a god? I shook my head to clear it. I wouldn’t let myself get carried away. It was one thing to form a theory. It was another to imagine primeval spirits were working against you.

While David busied himself with his blog, I worked on making the house more pony friendly. I went around and removed the door knobs off of the doors. They didn’t close fully, but now they could be opened without one having to eat metal. I also went around attaching ropes to things with small handles, so that they could be opened more easily. I knew it was busy work, we weren’t planning on making this our base of operations, but it was something to keep my mind off of the changes I could feel happening. David interrupted me several times in order to take pictures of the changes and monitor how they were progressing. So far, the only new thing was the continued solidification and coloration of my hair. By the time I was done around the apartment, it was about 2 o'clock. David was still working on his blog, so I decided to go and take a nap.

As I got to my room and shut my door, I suddenly collapsed under an intense pain. It felt like someone on the inside of my head had a hammer and nails, and was trying to pound their way out. The pain continued, throbbing unbearably for a few seconds, and then subsided. Standing weakly, I grabbed a mirror from off of my desk and examined myself. Nothing had changed. Tentatively, I examined my mind. I could sense something different, a crack in my mind. I wasn’t sure what it was, or how I could even sense it, seeing as my consciousness had no physical presence or sense whatsoever, but I could feel it. Something in my brain was uneven, displaced. There was a crack.

I shook my head, trying to clear it. Demonic pursuers, a crack in my mind. It was all nonsense. I just needed some rest to clear my head and get things back to normal. Well, as normal as they had become over the last few days. With this in mind, I went to my bed and fell asleep.

I awoke to a stinging pain. The phone on my table told me it was 4 o'clock. I got up and tried the shake the fog from my mind. The pain had stopped. Too tired to ponder these events, I got up and made my way out of my room, closing the door behind me with my tail. I passed through the living room and on into the bathroom. I went to the toilet and tried to drop my pants. Severe resistance. I tried again, harder this time. They wouldn’t budge. Clearing the last of the sleep from my brain, I turned to look behind me.

There, emerging from a ripped hole in my jeans, was a purple dragon’s tail, spiky end, spines, and everything. The purple continued a few inches up the rest of my back, before returning to my normal color. I stared at the tail for a full minute. I tried moving it. I twirled it in a full circle. It felt as though my back continued on past where it should have. The sensation was almost disturbing. I tried twisting it. I could twist the end almost a good 360 degrees around without even touching it. I could feel senses in every part of the tail, from the base to the tip. I had been sleeping on my back. Bending my tail must’ve been what had woken me up. Still getting over the sight of having a tail, I finished using the bathroom. As I stepped up to the sink to wash my hands, I looked into the mirror. I nearly leapt through the back wall in shock. It took me a couple minutes to come to grips with the fact that the image in the mirror was me.

My hair was gone. It had turned completely green, melded together and was now standing up right, unmistakably Spike’s trademark spines. I felt along my neck down towards my back. The spines got progressively smaller, until they were nothing more than bumps as they reached my back. “Okay, so still some growth left to happen there,” I said to myself. I reached up and tried to bend one of the spines. It bent, but with resistance, much like trying to bend one’s ears.

Speaking of ears, I took a look at mine. With my hair gone, they were very noticeable. And no longer there. In their places were two light green fin-looking appendages. Seeing as I could see no other ears anywhere, I assumed they were my new ears. I snapped my fingers. I could still hear just as good as before, if not better. How did these things work? Did they pick up vibrations like a regular ear? I shrugged. As long as I could still hear, it didn’t matter how they worked. All in all, my reflection looked crazy. I was looking at a bald guy with lizard eyes, green spines on his head and two fins sticking off the sides. The whole image looked way more natural on a dragon than it did on me.

I examined myself more closely. Was it my imagination, or were there subtler changes as well? My eyes looked bigger, and my head looked rounder. It might have been the result of losing my hair, but I wasn’t completely sure. I tapped my chin with my fingers, and was surprised to receive a sharp poke. I looked at my fingers to see that my nails had grown considerably past the tips and that the ends had turned purple and pointy. I checked my feet and found that the same thing had happened there as well.

I let out a deep breath. I knew that all these changes were coming, but seeing them all happen now kind of overwhelmed me. It felt like my body was betraying me, like I was losing the one part of me that most made up my identity. The only parts of my face that still resembled my original look were my nose and mouth. I felt irrationally sad. My entire life was being twisted around and I had less than zero say in the matter. Whatever was responsible for this had a lot to answer for. Dismissing these thoughts, I left the bathroom.

I left to find David in the living room playing video games on the TV. My eyes widened again. I really needed to stop doing that. It was going to make them sore. However, here, I couldn’t help it. David’s normally bright red ginger hair was now completely dark brown. A full-blown Doctor Whooves mane, complete with tan brown ears sticking out the top. As I watched, one of the ears twitched in my direction, picking up the noise of my footsteps. It was weird to see, almost as if the ear belonged to a complete stranger, not my roommate.

“Is Shane back yet?” I asked David.

“Nah,” he said turning to look at me. “He’ll be back in a couple of hou- Woah! Holy-” David jumped back, thrown off by my wild appearance. ”Man, you barely look human anymore!”

“Thanks,” I said darkly.

“Sorry,” David winced. “I didn’t mean it like that. I just thought that since you were going to be the most humanoid of all of us by the end of this thing, you would change pretty little overall.”

“Well, I guess not,” I said trying to change the subject. “What are you doing?”

“Just playing some video games, you know, while I still have some fingers to play them with.”

A genuine smile crossed my face. “That’s right, huh. I'm going to be the only one left with thumbs.”

David scowled. “Don’t rub it in,”

I started snapping my fingers. “What’s that? I can’t hear you over the sound of me snapping my awesome fingers.”

David smirked. “Well, I know at least one thing I have that you don’t.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“Another six inches,” David said, standing up to prove it.

He was right. I’d shrunk another six inches in my sleep. “Argh!” I yelled. “At this rate, I’ll be a hobbit by breakfast tomorrow!”

David sat down, going back to his game. “Well, if you find any demonic, powerful jewelry, you know what to do with it.” I picked up the second controller and sat down next to him

Shane returned at about 10 o'clock, coming in and putting his keys away. He had his hood up, and as he removed it, I could see why. His hair, like ours, had transformed fully into a colorful mane, and Shining Armor’s hair, with its alternating patterns of blue, wasn’t very good at hiding the pure white pony ears on the top of his head. “I see you’ve been having the same day we’ve had,” I said.

“Not even close,” Shane grumbled. "I can’t tell you how many close calls I’ve had. From being interrogated by a couple of teens on how I dyed my hair, to putting my hood up just before a cashier noticed my new white ears. Do you have any idea how weird it feels to have your ears dissolve and then materialize on the top of your head?!”

“Not really,” I said. “I slept through it.”

“I do,” said David, raising his hand. “It’s pretty crazy.”

Shane pulled a bag out of his pocket. It was a bag of fast food. He looked strangely intent. “Here,” he said, offering some chicken nuggets to David. “Have some.”

An unconscious look of revulsion passed over David’s face. “No thanks,” he said.

“Are you sure?” Shane asked, waving the bag in front of him.

“No, please, I’m good.” said David. He looked a little green.

Shane sighed. “That’s what I was afraid of,”

“What?” I asked.

“The changes are becoming mental too,” he said. “On the drive back home, I was eating a cheeseburger. I had to spit it out and I nearly threw up. We’re showing an aversion to meat.”

I took a chicken nugget and popped it into my mouth. “Tastes fine to me,”

“Says the omnivore,” replied Shane.

David was thoughtful. “I don’t know,” he said. “The changes could just be physiological. Real horses aren’t vegetarian because they want to be, but because that’s how their bodies work. Ponies are probably the same way, so it’s just our bodies telling us that we can’t eat that food any more.”

Shane looked slightly mollified. “Anyway, could you guys help me with the-ahhh!” Shane fell to his knees, clutching his head.

David and I ran over to him. There, sticking out of the direct center of his forehead, was a small, stubby, white unicorn horn. I patted him on the back. “Congratulations, buddy,” I said. “You are now one of the world’s first unicorns.”

“What?!” he cried, his hands flying up to feel his head. He sighed. “And so the change continues, I suppose. It’s funny. Every time something else changes, it shocks me. Yet, I tell myself ‘I knew this was coming, I should have expected it.’ But it surprises me every time.”

I awkwardly tried to console him. “Hey man, this is new for all of us. If there wasn’t any shock, I’d worry about that more.”

Shane shrugged and got up. “Anyway, can you guys help me get the stuff out of the car?”

I spoke up. “Actually, we should probably wait and leave the stuff in there until we know where we’re going. Why move stuff around if we don’t have to?”

“I was under the impression that we had no idea what we were doing,” Shane said. David quickly brought Shane up to speed on our Equestria-is-real theory including David’s blog and the possibility of others like us. “Alright, so what does that have to do with what we do next?” Shane said.

“Well, that all depends on how this happened.” David said.

“Not really,” I interrupted. “Whether or not it happened maliciously, or Twilight-misusing-magic, or some cataclysmic arcane event, our best option is to try and contact someone from Equestria.”

We all sat there, contemplating that sentence. “Does anyone else feel like we just proposed summoning an alien spaceship?” asked Shane.

“Kind of,” said David. “It’s weird to think that it might all be real. That they all might exist, the mane six, Celestia, Spike, Ponyville. It might all be real, and because of what’s happened to us, we might be closer to them than any person on Earth has ever been. It’s a little mind blowing.”

“So, how do we contact someone from Equestria?” Shane asked, getting back on topic. “It’s in an entirely different universe, most likely. Although, if there is the possibility of others out there like us, maybe the government’s found them already. We could reveal ourselves and see.”

I held my hands up. “That seems like a last ditch option to me. Let’s explore our other possibilities first. We do have the Internet after all. That could be a big help. Besides, even if we don’t get found out by the government, others might, and that will probably be a big story.”

“If the government doesn’t cover it up,”’ said David.

Shane laughed. “Look at us, talking like a bunch of conspiracy theorists. I think it’s time we took a break for dinner. We have a pretty solid plan. Set up a base of operations, monitor the Internet, and try and find a way to contact someone from Equestria. Sound good?” We both nodded. “Good. Now let’s get dinner going.”

“What are we eating?” I asked.

Shane smiled “Spaghetti, a fork-essential food. If magic is going to take away our fingers, we’re going to spit in her eye while she does it.”

We got dinner ready and spent a good hour eating dinner, talking and laughing. Shane entertained us by managing to levitate a few small objects around the room. We spent a while speculating on the workings of magic. We concluded that it was probably based on thinking certain thoughts a certain way, since that seemed to trigger the magic and it would explain the need for magic textbook. We also concluded that we had been up for too long and were starting to feel it. We weren’t usually this tired, but we guessed that we were worn out from going through so many changes. Shane cleaned up the dishes using his magic, breaking quite a few plates in the process. Afterwards, we headed to bed. Maybe this whole thing wouldn’t be so bad, I thought, drifting into unconsciousness. It was certainly a change of pace. Plus, it pays to have good friends by your side.

I awoke at 8 o'clock the next morning, and began my new habit of checking myself for changes. The first thing I noticed was that I seemed to have lost nearly a foot in height. I measured myself at about 4 foot 2 now. Great. Spike was supposed to be about 3 feet high, seeing as he wasn’t quite as tall as the usual 4 foot pony. The next thing I noticed was that my toes had turned completely into claws. My feet were about halfway through the purplization as well. I examined my claws. Same thing there too. Well, at least I still kept my thumbs.

A thought struck me. If Shane had gotten his magic last night, then maybe... I grabbed a piece of paper off of my desk and tore a scrap from it. I grabbed a pen and tried to think of what to write. I shrugged and wrote Hey. I pictured Shane’s room firmly in my mind and then ignited the scrap. Instead of crumbling into ash on the floor, the scrap turned into a wisp of grey smoke and shot under the crack in my door, presumably on its way to Shane’s room. It worked! Smiling, I imagined the scrap appearing on top of sleeping Shane, maybe getting stuck in his nose or something. This was even more fun, and annoying, than texting a sleeping person. I ripped the paper into shreds and starting writing and sending them, one by one, in short intervals.

Hey

Shane

Hey

Listen

Shane

Hey

Listen

Shane

Hey

Listen

Hey

Shane

Before I could get any farther, though, I was interrupted by a large cramp that ran through my stomach. With an almost gag-like reflex, I belched and a wisp of smoke appeared, rematerializing into a scrap of paper. It was followed in quick succession by seventeen others, each with a word on the back.

Peter,

Stop

Sending

These

Will

Make

You

Burp

The

Dictionary

One

Page

Time

“Stupid unicorns, no sense of humor.” I grumbled, leaving my room. As I left, I heard some weird noises coming from the kitchen, thunking noises. I entered to see David, walking around and making breakfast. Walking around, on brown hooves. I stared at him. He saw me.

“Yeah, I know, pretty crazy,” he said. “The noise takes some getting used to. But at least I don’t have to buy shoes any more, right?” I agreed and sat down to breakfast

The day passed pretty easily. The three of us played games, for the most part, and kept updates going on David’s blog, which had about all of 5 views and no comments. We documented the progression, which came, slowly but surely. We also talked about where to set ourselves up. Shane and I suggested using a forest, since ponies could live off of the land much more easily than humans, but David vetoed that idea, saying that we’d need WiFi and electricity to monitor the internet. It wasn’t until about 7pm that I finally had a viable idea. I looked over at Shane. “Hey, why don’t we stay at Kate’s place?” I asked. Shane looked nervous.

“I’d actually kind of avoided telling her about this for now.” He mumbled.

I stared at him. “You’re turning into a cartoon pony and you didn’t think your girlfriend deserved to know? What were you going to do, hide from her for however long it takes to work this out? Haven’t you seen the movies man? This sort of thing never works.” Shane shuffled a bit.

“Besides, we need a human on our side,” I said. “Especially one with such a good set up. Didn’t you say when we met her that she lived in a kind of rural area of town? With a few acres of woods adjoined to her backyard? It’s the perfect base of operations!”

“I guess you’re right,” Shane said, sighing.

David started packing up his laptop. “Well, now that that’s settled, let’s get going,” he said.

Shane turned to him. “Right now? Are you crazy?! What, are we just going to show up on her doorstep, ‘Hi, we’re turning into ponies, can you take us in for a week or maybe a month or two?’ I have to call and explain things first.”

I looked up at him, a hard task to manage, seeing as I was now 3 foot 8 to his 6 feet. “What, you’re going to call her and convince her that you are 1, turning into a magical talking pony and 2, not crazy? Good luck with that. Trust me, the easiest way is going to be to show her.”

I could tell that Shane was still very nervous. “Shouldn’t we wait until tomorrow?” he asked, grasping at straws.

“Dude, I’ve got dragon arms!” I said, waving my arms which were purple up to the shoulder. “You’ve got white back hooves up to your knees! Tomorrow, we may be full ponies, and I don’t see how two ponies and a three foot dragon are going to drive a car.”

Shane sighed, defeated. “Alright, let’s go,” he said. He stuffed his hooves into shoes, grabbed his keys and we trekked outside, David carrying his laptop under his arm. As we got to his car, I noticed the groceries in the back. “Oh yeah, I’d forgotten about those,” I said. “What stuff did you get?”

“A lot of things,” he said. “A lot of carrots, apples, celery, you know, pony/human neutral foods. Saddlebags, easy open water bottles, lots of water, juice mixes, books on horse first aid, hatchets, rope etc. Basic survival gear. I figure ponies could do pretty good in the wild.”

I nodded approvingly, and made to get into the passenger seat. “Oh no, Junior,” said David, smiling. “You’re too small to sit up front.” I rolled my eyes, but got in the back seat. It probably wasn’t the best idea for anyone to get a good look at me, the way I looked now.

The drive wasn’t too long, about fifteen minutes. On the way over though, I thought about what we were doing. I really hoped Kate would help us out. It was a big risk, letting anyone in on this. I wasn’t worried that Kate would rat us out, but what if this was all too much for her and she wouldn’t let us stay? What I’d said before was right: we didn’t have much time left to use the car. Once the change was complete, it’d be nearly impossible to use without severely drawing attention to ourselves. If Kate wouldn’t take us in, where else would we go?

We pulled up to her house to find that all the lights were dark. “Hmm... Is that normal?” I asked Shane.

He shook his head. “She did say that her parents were in town, the last time I saw her. I hope they’re not still here.” We got out of the car. Shane pulled his hood to hide his hair, ears and now rather prominent horn. “Hide by the garage,” he said. “If it’s her parents, I don’t want them seeing you two. David could hide his ears and hair with a hood, but dragon eyes are a hard thing to miss.”

I rolled my eyes. “I think the abnormally large blue eyes will be enough to suggest that something is off.” I said. Shane ignored me. We hid in front of the garage, peeking around the side so that we could see the door.

Shane walked up and knocked on the front door. There was a long silence. Shane spoke. “Maybe she’s not-” There was a sound of movement behind the door. “Never mind,” he said. We could hear the sound of someone fumbling with locks on the other side. Whoever, was opening the door, they were having a hard time with it. After a few more seconds, the door finally opened to reveal... Princess Cadance.