Chapter 1 - Broken Peace

written by Fire Soul and Samantha Sprocket

Chirping. That was the only thing that Twilight awoke to so early in the morning. Her heavy-lidded eyes slowly opened and closed a couple of times before simply shutting and staying shut for a good long while. To Twilight, it only felt like a few minutes of sweet, sweet unconscious bliss.

She awoke with a start, her eyes shifting left and right before squinting hard, the sunlight beating hard on her face. The sun was already high up in the middle of the sky!

"Noon?! SPIIIIIKE!" she called out, clearly upset.

There was no response.

Confused, she called for him once more and still, he didn't answer. She got up out of bed quickly and peered over at her standing mirror. Bed-head and a mussed-up tail. She must've been tossing and turning in bed again, she'd been having such odd dreams.

She'd been dreaming of flying, soaring through the air with all her friends, surrounded by luxury and danger all at once. She felt carefree and happy, yet paranoid and very worried all at once while she looked through a massive window that took up an entire wall in a room she'd been standing in near the end of the dream.

Still, like all dreams it seemed to slowly trickle out of her memory the longer the day went on. She grabbed a small piece of parchment and levitated a quill and inkwell over, writing down what she remembered of her dream while she made her way downstairs. She didn't know why, but this last dream, like some of the dreams of flying she'd had the last few nights, felt very important.

She rolled the parchment up and set it down on her study table along with the inkwell and quill she'd been carrying, then turned towards the kitchen and pushed the door open, figuring she knew just where her assistant was likely to be. It was lunchtime after all.

She was correct. Spike already had his little apron on and his claws were busy cooking up some food for them both. Or rather, he was busy making Twilight some food now; his was already done and on the table, a simple bowl of gems, served up like cereal. She had no idea how milk could make a difference in the taste of something like a precious stone, but it wasn't worth saying anything about. Spike was the one with the omnivorous taste buds.

"Oh, hey there Twilight! Didn't hear you wake up," he said, pointing to the clock on the kitchen wall. "We missed breakfast today, so I'm throwing a pretty big lunch together, starting with some cereal for me and some oatmeal for you!"

"Why did you let me sleep in so long?!"

Spike looked at her, confused. "Uh, because you had 'Catch up on rest' written in on your checklist for today....? We started doing this once a week about a month ago, remember? You thought it would help with all the problems you have with freaking out about small things all the time."

She thought back to the previous day, her mind racing still from the panic caused by thinking she'd completely screwed up an entire day's plans because of Spike's lack of attentiveness. Of course, as the memories came rushing back to her, she realized she had nothing to panic about at all: she'd planned to sleep in, it was just so out-of-place with her usual need to get as much as possible done, she'd almost forgotten about it completely!

"Oh! Right, I remember that now....well then! I'll just go get ready and everything, you keep on making breakfast. I'll be back in a few minutes!"

"Well it's almost done, so don't be too long!" he called out to her as she headed back out of the kitchen.

Twilight went straight back upstairs, taking her time in the bathroom. A quick shower, brushing her mane until it was looking as good as it always did, and she'd brush her teeth after breakfast, not to mention a quick scan of her body, first visual then magical....no oddities or abnormalities, yup! She was ready for the day!

Twenty minutes later when Twilight showed up in the kitchen again, Spike was just finishing his cereal, and a bowl of oatmeal was sitting next to where he was sitting, waiting for her. He got up to clean his bowl up, and Twilight couldn't help but laugh.

"Geez, Spike! Don't forget to chew your food!" she teased, causing the dragon to chuckle. "Why're you eating your food so fast?"

"Eh, Rarity said that she wants my help with making some dresses this afternoon....ugh," he said, resting his hand on his stomach. "The oatmeal smelled a little odd while I was making it, but I gave it a taste-test, it seems alright."

Twilight took her seat, her magic taking hold of her spoon and picking up a nice big glob of her hot breakfast. No sooner had she brought it near her lips though, than Spike had interrupted her meal.

"DON'T....!!!" he barely managed to shout out to her.

Twilight jumped in her seat as her assistant stumbled down from the stool he was using to reach the sink, a pained look on his face as he stumbled over to the table and jumped up to grab the spoon from her magic, throwing it and the bit of food on it to the floor.

"Spike?! What're you-" she said, gasping when he grabbed her bowl and threw it as hard as he could on the floor, the bowl shattering into pieces and sending the oatmeal all over the ground. "What in the world's gotten into you, Spike?!"

The little dragon doubled over and clutched his stomach, brought to his knees by the pain he was feeling. When he looked up at her, she could tell that something was very wrong, she could see it in his eyes. She rested a hoof on his back while he coughed a few times, the baby dragon cringing and groaning loudly.

"Suh-something's wrong....with the food, Twilight....!" he wheezed out, coughing a couple more times. "Augh....! I-I think it's....like your ninth birthday-HHLK!!"

He didn't get to say anymore as a heaving noise gave way to a complete purging of his stomach contents. What horrified Twilight about it the most, however, was the distinct sight of something that almost looked to be acid, bubbling and sizzling alongside an unhealthy amount of blood.

Her ninth birthday. Just mentioning it brought back a torrent of memories that she wasn't prepared for. She could feel herself beginning to hyperventilate, her eyes locked on Spike, seeing that he was reaching out to her and trying to speak to her, but she couldn't hear him. She was shaking like a leaf.

Just as quickly as the panic attack reared its ugly head however, Twilight thought back to her youth and used what she'd learned to help her silence her nerves and rely on her favorite tool: logic.

Now that she had her head back in a proper state of mind, she wasted no time in grabbing him in her magic and laying him on her back. "Spike, I'm going to teleport us to the hospital!"

He nodded and braced himself as they popped out of existence, their bodies zipping across the aether and popping back into existence a short ways away from their destination. Twilight immediately broke out into a gallop, her rapid breathing and shrunken pupils giving away just how panicked she really was, despite managing to stop her panic attack.

She threw the front doors of the hospital open hard enough to shatter the glass in the automatic doors, the nurse watching the front desk screaming in surprise along with a few ponies in wheelchairs. Twilight cringed at that, but didn't miss a single beat.

"Please, you h-have to help him!" Twilight shouted, her eyes already tearing up as she turned to the side to let the nurse see Spike. "I-I think he's been poisoned!"

The nurse nodded and quickly called a doctor over, Spike groaning loudly in pain and curling in on himself while wrapping his arms around his stomach.

Twilight was trotting in place when the doctor showed up, a young-looking unicorn stallion with a white surgeon's mask covering his face. He had a lovely azure-colored mane and tail with a chocolate brown coat of fur, a noteworthy contrast. She couldn't believe how calm he looked! She felt anger rising as he walked over with a smile.

"Alright Lady Sparkle, what seems to be the problem?"

"I think Spike's been poisoned! He ate his breakfast, then he suddenly felt horrible and was in a lot of pain a couple minutes afterwards!" she said, her breathing frantic like her mind.

The doctor nodded a little and looked to Spike while the nurse placed him on a stretcher to help carry him into the back.

"So, you believe he has food poisoning then?"

Twilight's mouth hung open, but then she realized how it sounded. She shook her head quickly. "He was vomiting blood!!"

The doctor's demeanor changed almost instantly. "Has he eaten anything at all this morning?"

Y-yes he....oh, Celestia, I can't....!" she whimpered out to him, collapsing to her knees on the floor in front of the doctor.

The doctor leapt into action immediately. "Nurse Redheart, I'll need your assistance! Prepare to pump his stomach," he said, turning his attention to Twilight. "Miss Sparkle, we'll contact the authorities, please be here when they arrive. However if you plan on running home, do not, I repeat do not eat anything else from your home until we know what exactly Spike ingested."

Twilight nodded quickly, forcing herself to her hooves and shakily trotting along with the doctor while he ordered a couple of nurses to grab various medical equipment. "Doctor, when he vomited, th-the poison was in his vomit too, and it was bubbling and making this-this sizzling noise, it sounded like some kind of acid, but I don't-"

"What?!" he almost shouted, his eyes wide with what almost seemed like terror.

He quickly pulled himself together, turning back to the nurses. "Alright, this takes priority, get him to the room and start pumping his stomach NOW!!" he shouted, the nurses quickly sprinting down the halls to prepare a room, one nurse pushing Spike along on a hospital bed. "Nurse! Tell the others to also prepare for surgery!"

He turned to Twilight and placed a hoof on her shoulder. "Miss Sparkle, you were right to get him here as fast as you could. If it really is acid then it needs to come out immediately," he said, taking a breath. "A dragon's insides are tougher and more durable than a pony's, but acid is acid."

"A-alright! How do you know that about dragons?"

"After I realized that we had a dragon living in Ponyville, I requested whatever information the Royal Library had on dragons so I could at the very least theorize on treatments for most common illnesses," he said, smiling a little before turning away and galloping down the hall towards where the nurses took Spike. "My name is Quick Cure, we'll talk more later!"

Once the doctor disappeared through the swinging doors leading to the emergency room, she slumped down in one of the seats, utterly defeated and, oddly enough, exhausted. It was barely the early afternoon and hadn't been more than an hour since she'd woken up, but already it felt like she'd pulled an all-nighter. The thought of trying to lay down and sleep where she sat crossed her mind, but she knew if she did that she'd screw up her sleep schedule entirely. Spike wouldn't appreciate that.

"Spike....!"

She barely felt it hit her before she began to cry, the overwhelming sensation of anguish and emotional pain at the thought of her companion being in horrible agony eating away at her and tearing her down like it almost had twice prior. She almost instantly began shaking uncontrollably, her entire body trembling to the point that she looked as if she may have been getting electrocuted, the mare curling inward and breathing semi-rapidly, the entire situation far too real and too close to home for her to be able to cope with it for long.

She buried her face in her hooves and let the tears and the panic attack and the memories hit her unrestrained. She immediately failed to care about her presentation or her composure, turning herself and laying on her side on the seats, the tears soaking her fetlocks and the seat beneath her head as she bawled and hid her face in her forelegs, cupping them around her muzzle.

It wasn't much longer before she managed to completely exhaust herself into a fitful sleep, nightmares clawing at her psyche for all of the few hours she was asleep. The few police officers that Ponyville had arrived and awoke her from a nasty nightmare, having plenty of questions as to the specifics of what happened.

The pair spoke with her quickly, gathering as much information as they could (which was very little) before turning to leave. Twilight made one request though: while they were out, she asked them if they could tell her friends Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, Applejack or Fluttershy to gather the others and get to the hospital.

It was only a half-hour beyond that when Twilight was united with her closest friends in all of Ponyville. She took the time to explain everything to them even as the sun began to lower closer to the horizon. Seeing the sun going down surprised Twilight; she didn't think she'd been sitting there that long!

"Wow....what time is it?" Twilight asked, looking for a clock.

Pinkie came prepared with her saddlebags, whipping a clock out of one of them. "Oh, it's about 4:30 in the afternoon."

"I've been sitting here almost four hours?!"

The panicked look on Twilight's features alarmed all of them, with Fluttershy stepping forward first.

"N-now, come on Twilight, everything's just fine-"

"Everything is NOT fine, Fluttershy! Spike, he's-"

"-doing just fine, Lady Sparkle," Quick Cure said while stepping through the swinging doors, cutting her off. "For the moment. I must speak with all of you, this is very important."

Twilight was up and walking alongside the stallion immediately, the entire group walking quickly down the hall while the doctor spoke.

"We managed to clear the acidic poison from his stomach, but not before it did some serious damage....we had to open him up, which was no small feat I assure you," he said, frowning and lowering his head, a sad frown creasing his lips while his ears flattened against his skull. "We had to remove a lot of scales while he was under sedation, after we pumped his stomach."

They all gasped very loudly, with Rarity almost fainting at the thought of Spike's shiny, handsome scales being forced from his body. Oh, how painful that must be for him! Twilight wasn't sure whether or not she'd be able to handle seeing him in his current condition.

"However, Lady Sparkle, the....well, it managed to eat away at his stomach enough to put several small holes in it," he said, cringing at the look of pure horror on their faces, especially Twilight's. "That was the reason we had to remove his scales and open him up, we had to carefully rinse the internal organs near his stomach to clear away any food, any of the poison, and any of his own stomach acids. We had to keep adding and sucking out water for hours to thoroughly dilute all remnants of the poison to the point of its acidity reaching a non-lethal level to his body. His body will clear out any remnants we somehow didn't get, on its own."

Twilight took a moment to breathe, a small amount of relief washing over her. "S-so, he's going to be just fine?"

"Well, that's what I wanted to talk to you about. First though," he said, stopping in front of a door leading to an Employees Only area. "The nurse told me that the toxicology report is done. I hope I'm wrong, but...."

They watched him step into the room only for maybe ten seconds before coming back out, his eyes scanning over the sheet for only a moment before a disappointed sigh left him, his eyes clenching shut.

"I was afraid of that....Erosia."

"U-um....what's that?" Fluttershy asked, lightly fluttering in the air just next to Rainbow Dash.

Quick Cure removed the pair of rectangular glasses he had on, his downcast expression turning to one of conviction as he looked over at the group of mares. It was only then that Twilight realized that his dark-colored, azure mane and beige-spotted, chocolate brown fur made him look much younger than his size said he was, though she was only guessing. Perhaps his age could explain his dedication to his work?

"Erosia is an enchanted poison that behaves more like an acid, truthfully. It's illegal in Equestria, due to how easy it is to accidentally poison someone with it," he said, his gaze wandering over the six mares. "Erosia is a poison that starts in powder form, created by crushing up a mix of Poison Joke and a very rare plant found only in the Griffon Kingdoms."

"To keep it simple, Erosia is completely harmless until it's ingested, and a very small amount is all that you need to guarantee a very painful end for someone. The poison remains inactive until it comes into contact with a creature's stomach acids, at which point it goes active and begins to eat away at your insides. Once it makes a hole or two in your stomach, death is almost completely assured unless you get medical attention immediately and you know exactly what's ailing you. Otherwise, the 'poison' will move on to eating its way through your other internal organs while the doctors scramble to figure out what's wrong with you, and you'll almost always die before they ever figure it out. We aren't trained to look towards illegal poisons when searching for a sensible explanation for someone's rapid decline and death."

They all gasped and covered their mouths with their hooves. Fluttershy looked the most shocked and disturbed by such a thing even existing in the first place, let alone their little Spike suffering through it.

"Th-that's so awful...." Fluttershy said, on the verge of tears. "Who would ever want to use such a terrible thing on somepony?!"

"Someone that wanted their target to have an almost assured death before they could get help," he said, looking grimly directly into Twilight's eyes. "Lady Sparkle, you're lucky to say the least. If you both had taken that poison in, you would've been in far too much pain to get yourself or the young dragon here in time to save either of your lives."

Twilight was shaken upon hearing that, and so were Rarity and Fluttershy. The yellow pegasus appeared to go pale at that realization while Rarity's eyes went as wide as Twilight's were, the fashionista covering her mouth with a hoof again.

Twilight was visibly trembling, her forehooves crossed over each other while she sat back on her haunches, her gaze focused on the floor while the gears in her head spun at mach speeds. Then the obvious occured to her.

"Wait, that's not necessarily true! Spike and I weren't eating the same things for breakfast, so I might've been fine!"

"Yeah! An' why in tarnation wouldja go an' say somethin' like that when y'know all it'll do is upset 'er?!" Applejack asked indignantly.

Quick Cure cleared his throat and slipped his glasses back on. "Sorry. Sometimes I get lost in the facts and let the situation elude me," he muttered, looking to all of them with a serious expression. "I used to be a combat surgeon. Bedside manner isn't exactly a necessity when doing rapid-fire surgery on wounded soldiers in the middle of a battle."

Rainbow Dash tilted her head in confusion. "I don't get it! Combat surgeons only see action when there's, yanno, lots of battle, with all the fighting and explosive magic getting launched all over the place and stuff, spears stabbing ponies-" she said, mimicking all sorts of motions as ways she thought ponies might wield such weapons. "-and griffons and all sorts of dangerous creatures....but we've been at peace for the last two-hundred years, and that little spat with the griffons two-hundred years ago can hardly count as a 'war'."

The doctor nodded to her, smiling. "Yes, thankfully we've had excellent relations with our neighboring kingdoms, the zebras easily being the most friendly and courteous of all our nearby companions. However, they aren't usually the ones we wind up in conflicts with these days," he said, frowning. "Surely you know what terrorism is?"

Pinkie's hair bloated up like a balloon for a moment, then popped nice and loud, swishing around as if air were being spewed out of some non-existant hole until her perky pink mane was flat and lifeless, much like how her face lacked any humor whatsoever.

"Terrorists are evil ponies that don't like how things are under the rule of Princesses Celestia and Luna, o-or they don't like the state of our economy, or they just hate Equestria and want to see it burn so that some other country can be the dominant nation...."

All of Pinkie's friends stared at her for a brief moment, the thought of 'how'd she know all that?' hitting them for an instant. Twilight shrugged it off a moment later however, the others joining her a few seconds after that.

Terrorism was common knowledge, and was regularly brought up in the Canterlot Tribune with reports of recent activities from various cults gathering money that would likely be used to fund future attempts to dethrone the Princesses, destabilize the economy, assassinate several high-ranking officials to send Equestria's military into chaos, and a multitude of other things that the Royal Guard was constantly watching out for so they could put a stop to any of these horrible activities.

Quick Cure cleared his throat. "Yes, well! Recently cult activities have been rather constant, getting criminals across the borders as payment for services rendered, illegal goods smuggling, that sort of stuff is something a lot of the more serious cults have dabbled in, such as the Cult of Discord," he said, frowning and shaking his head. "Cult activity is the main reason a lot of these border skirmishes have been going on."

"Wait, what?" Twilight quirked a brow at him. "How do you know that?"

"I keep in contact with old friends from the Royal Guard. Anyways, some cults like the Cult of Discord and those working with the Cult of Discord have been doing a lot of sabotage, inciting brawls and tension between our soldiers and the soldiers guarding the griffon's side. It's been leading to a lot of skirmishes that've thus far resulted in about two-hundred griffon deaths, on estimate, and fifty pony deaths. As an estimate, I should say, I can't know the exact number, and that estimate's from about a week ago."

"....You are remarkably well-informed, sir," Rarity said calmly, a small smile gracing her lips. "Why do you have such potentially sensitive information?"

He looked all of them over, then smiled. "Well, you're the Elements of Harmony, you're all technically affiliates of the Royal Guard. Plus, Lady Sparkle's technically royalty, so I suppose I can tell all of you," he said, smiling more. "I'm on a month-long leave from the Equestria/Gryphini border, but I'm not the type to just sit back and relax, I enjoy my work too much. So, I came back home to volunteer to help at Ponyville General. Turns out I'm the most experienced surgeon here!"

Twilight just nodded to that, then blinked. "Wait, if you're the most qualified surgeon in Ponyville, what-"

"I'm twenty-seven years old, and I've got a Doctorate's Degree in Pony Physiology and Functionality."

Applejack whistled in appreciation. "Wow, that's a whole lotta fancy schoolin' right there! Don't degrees fer medical fields take like two t' three times as many years to study everythin' ya need to study?"

"Took me seven years to get my Doctorate. Would've taken eight, but I busted my flank to take a few extra classes every year until I eliminated year eight entirely from my curriculum." Quick said, walking down the hallways towards Spike's recovery room.

"I don't know whether or not you all want to see him at the moment, his wounds from the surgery are still fresh and fairly bloody....he doesn't look too good to say the least," he told them, frowning when they all looked like they were beginning to tear up, save for Rainbow Dash, who put on a front of immovable toughness. The somber look on her face, however, gave away how she was feeling beneath that mask. "He's heavily sedated as well, so until the sedation wears off, he'll be out like a light. If you like, I can send someone to get you all when he wakes up?"

Twilight and the others took a moment to talk about it, words being exchanged in near-silence between them before they all came to the same conclusion. While Rarity seemed to have the time as well as Fluttershy, the others had jobs to get back to, and Twilight had to both watch over the library and talk to the authorities about what happened.

It was decided then that Rarity and Fluttershy would keep him company for some time, and the others would wait for when he woke up.

Rarity and Fluttershy approached the doctor, nodding to him. "We'd definitely appreciate being notified. Fluttershy and I will stay to keep him company though, for now. Even if our little Spikey-Wikey isn't awake right now, I'm sure he's very scared. He should have somepony there the moment he wakes up!"

Twilight nodded to the doctor, forcing a faint smile. "We really appreciate your diligence, doctor. I....I don't know what would've happened if a doctor without knowledge on dragons had been the one to work on him."

"Just call me Quick Cure, if you please," he said to Twilight, turning and walking down the hall away from them. "Do be safe, Lady Sparkle. A poison like this isn't common, even outside of Equestria. Something like this would cost somepony hundreds of bits just for an ounce of it. Whoever used this....they wanted one or both of you to suffer terribly before you died."

Quick Cure waved goodbye to them while continuing down the hall, leading Rarity and Fluttershy to the room they were keeping Spike in. Fluttershy was already crying by the time they pushed the door open.

Laying on the bed was a small purple-scaled dragon with those tell-tale green spines atop his head that ran down his back, the clean pure white cotton sheets covering his body from his toes to his neck, his head the only part of him currently visible. Various tubes and lines for medication ran under the sheets from their respective bags, the medicine dripping down from one line to another through a drip feed.

Fluttershy did what she did best and went over to the unconscious form of their favorite baby dragon as swiftly and as silently as she could. She gently petted over the top of his head and along his spikes, repeating the motions over and over again while leaning in close to him, gentle words of encouragement whispered into his ear from Fluttershy's sweet, timid voice.

Rarity sat there next to Fluttershy, her eyes never once leaving the baby dragon they'd all come to love and enjoy having around. His constant earnest attitude and need to please anypony and everypony had earned him the trust of all six of them.

For Rarity though, it was different. For Rarity, he constantly volunteered to assist her, the pitter-patter of his small, bare feet in her boutique a common and welcome sound these days. He was always trying to find an excuse to be around her, any excuse he could come up with to give him a reason to help her work on her dresses.

She valued his judgment and his opinion, of course, but most of all he was a quiet, and very helpful companion, keeping track of her supplies and her tools while she focused entirely on her work, only speaking up when something seemed to need extra attention to him or if she needed to bounce ideas off of him to get a second opinion on things she was not one-hundred percent sure about.

He was her little Spikey-Wikey.

He also had an intensely strong crush on her.

He would also outlive her by eons.

It was for these reasons and the fact that he would always be her itty-bitty, favorite baby draggy-waggy that she had never even entertained the possibility of him becoming her beau or her coltfriend or anything of that sort. Sure, perhaps when he got older she could maybe take the inexperienced young dragon to her bed, but that would just be leading him on....well, if he still had a crush on her by then.

Yet, with him laying there, wounded and in pain, sedated and unconscious, all because he was Twilight's savior....all because he had eaten first and saved her from a terrible, brutal fate, a slow and painful death....she couldn't help but think of him as a knight in shining, scaly armor. Not just for her, or Twilight, but for all of them. The little knight in shining armor, watching out for the Element Bearers.

It was a more flattering title for him, and it was the truth: he was always there for them. When Discord had broken them all, twisted her up inside and made her a greedy, selfish monster of a pony, and Twilight had lost all her faith in all of them, Spike was there to deliver the friendship reports to restore Twilight's faith and give her all she needed to restore their memories, make them remember who they were.

When the Crystal Empire returned and Princess Mi Amore Cadenza put her life on the line to save the previously enslaved Crystal Ponies, Spike was there alongside Twilight, keeping her company and giving her a companion to rely on while she hunted down the Crystal Heart.

Then, when Twilight made a single mistake and got trapped by Sombra's dark crystal magic, Spike became the deliverer of salvation by snatching up the Crystal Heart and rushing down to Cadance and the others and giving the Crystal Heart to the newly-appointed Crystal Princess.

Rarity leaned in close and gave the little dragon a nuzzle, smiling a sad, worried smile even as the little dragon seemed to calm and smile a little himself the moment she touched him. She moved a chair closer to the side of the bed and Fluttershy did the same, both of them sitting on either side of him to make sure he had a friendly face to see upon regaining consciousness.

This wasn't good.

The guardsponies moving about her library and her home had her concerned, right alongside the yellow tape the Ponyville Police Department was erecting. Now, the last two things, namely the yellow tape and the police, Twilight could understand. The Royal Guard? That one initially had her thrown for a loop.

Then she remembered that she was the Faithful Student. Celestia's protege. Then it all clicked into place. It clicked even more into place when she realized who was inside of the library at the moment.

As the guard posted at the door opened it for her, she almost didn't comprehend the tall white pony standing in the middle of the room, several Royal Guardsponies walking in and out of the door to her kitchen. They were systematically throwing out every single food, utensil and what-have-you, every item being loaded into a bag along with many others and then carried outside, another empty bag taking its place.

"Puh-Puh-what?! Princess, what's going on?"

Twilight's outburst distracted her mentor from the current activity, namely, keeping the guards moving at a steady, efficient pace while at the same time sending out orders for replacement food for every single thing that came out of the pantry. Needless to say, the local grocer was going to get some serious business from the royal treasury, alongside the flea market.

"Ah, good evening, Twilight! It's good to see that you're okay," she said, walking briskly up to the much smaller unicorn and giving her a hug, complete with the perfect plumage of her wing. Twilight returned the hug mostly on reflex, a faint smile the only sign that the show of affection had influenced her. "Please, is Spike alright?"

Aaand there went that vague smile, gone as quickly as it came. Twilight hung her head and nodded slowly, frowning. "Y-yes, he's okay now Princess....but, before I got him there, it was just....I was so scared, and he was....!"

Celestia sat down next to her and pulled her close with her forelegs and her wings, enveloping the crying unicorn with a full-body hug the likes of which many would pay hundreds of bits to receive. "Ssshh....shh-shh-shh....I know Twilight, I know...." she shushed her, a wordless attempt to soothe the lavender mare as she let out another surge of sadness and fear from deep within. With Twilight's head leaning against her chest, she sat there reflecting her student's sadness, the sound of her sobbing protege within her grasp driving her to tears as well, though she cried in silence. "I could never forget that day. Just let it out, Twilight."

And she did. She stayed there with the Princess and cried until she had no tears left to shed on the whole subject. A full hour passed by the time she began to calm down, the emotional agony of both seeing Spike dying right before her eyes combined with the memories of her past too much for her to bear all at once.

As the food obtained by the guards got piled up next to the kitchen door and the bags of thrown-away food got taken outside, Twilight began to become more calm and collected. When she finally finished her tears, she smiled weakly up at the Princess and backed out of the larger mare's embrace.

"I-I'm sorry, Princess. I just....thinking about what happened to Spike, it must've been so horrible...."

Celestia nodded to that. "Oh yes, I've felt such a poison before, and I've removed it from myself as well," she said, frowning. "It's very, very painful, and the method of removal is extremely unpleasant. Well, perhaps not if you do it to yourself, but performing it on someone else...."

"What do you mean?"

Celestia just smiled. "Let's just say that it imposes the caster's magic aura upon the recipient in the process of searching for and isolating the poison so it can be forcibly removed. Permeating a pony's entire body with your magic...."

Twilight just shuddered at the thought. "That's....that's like a molestation of your very being."

"Indeed, since magic touches a living being's soul the moment you cast it upon someone. A shame Ponyville General doesn't have a Magister on-call, such a procedure could've been used to save Spike immediately while he was unconscious."

She just sighed and shook her head. "Actually, I reviewed the local specialized help in Ponyville a while back when the Mayor needed help deciding whether to build some new condominiums, or to dedicate the area to more standard residential buildings. I suppose I should suggest some more expensive housing, huh?"

"That would be best," Celestia said. Then a thought occured to her. "Though, Ponyville is likely so rustic and so full of happy and accepting ponies because it it has so few rich ponies and nobles living here. They tend to shy away from the countryside."

"Still, a Magister in residence here would be a nice addition to the town. This place is so devoid of magic users aside from me, it'd be nice not to feel so alone out here sometimes," she said with a weak laugh. "Besides, the town could benefit from a magic healing specialist."

"Among other things," a new voice said from behind Twilight. "Good evening Twilight, I came as soon as I heard. This is absolutely dreadful!"

Celestia stood up straighter when she realized that Mayor Mare was in the room with them, the sudden intrusion causing Twilight to spin around to greet the mare in charge of the town.

"O-oh, good evening Mayor! You know what happened then?"

"Oh yes Twilight, and you truly have my condolences. Don't worry though, your replacement food will be paid for by the town's funding!"

"Oh, that will be unnecessary madame Mayor," Celestia interrupted, smiling. "This is being taken care of by the royal treasury, it won't be a problem."

"....Oh! Well, alright then," she said, bowing to the Princess. "With that taken care of, I must get right to the other reason I came here. Will the Royal Guard be assisting the local police in searching for the pony that poisoned all the food in Twilight's kitchen?"

Twilight's eyes went wide. "Wait. 'All' of the food?" she repeated, turning to Celestia with legitimate fear in her eyes. "ALL of my food?! Th-they had enough of that poison to use it on all of the food I had in stock?!"

"Sadly yes, Twilight....why? You seem surprised by that."

"Th-th-the doctor, he said that the toxicology report labelled the poison as something called Erosia-"

"What?!"

"Yes!! A-and he said that the poison's illegal in Equestria, and that it's really rare and expensive! Oh my goodness, if they managed to get that much of it that they could get it in every bit of my food, then....th-then....!"

Celestia acted immediately with this new bit of information, looking far more serious now compared to before. She swiftly made for her student and embraced her once more, her wings surrounding her on all sides, enshrining her in the Goddess's divine embrace, warm and soothing.

"Ssshh, Twilight, don't let yourself go there. He is banished, he could never ever reach you again," she muttered to her in that serene, quiet tone that was so much like the tone of voice she used to address her subjects en-masse. "This was not his doing. I will not deny that the method is similar, though on a larger scale, but it cannot be him. He hasn't a clue where you live, almost nopony knows where you live outside of Ponyvillians."

Twilight looked up into her eyes, already crying a little, but she was at least calm compared to the trembling, broken-down mess she could've become. Celestia nodded to her with that constant serene smile, slowly releasing Twilight from her embrace before speaking up again.

"Twilight, you are now under the supervision of the Royal Guard. You must go everywhere with no less than four Royal Guardsponies acting as your bodyguards. If they say that something is wrong, you listen to them. Is that understood, Twilight?"

She shivered and nodded quickly to her mentor. "Y-yes, Princess....!"

"Mayor Mare," Celestia said, stepping past Twilight to speak to the Mayor directly. "Let us return to City Hall. I will need your assistance in reviewing the town's residents, first new, then old. We'll work from there."

As Celestia said that, she walked past the Mayor at a semi-brisk pace, heading towards the door. The Mayor turned quickly and followed.

"Y-yes, of course Your Majesty!"

Both mares were gone quickly, leaving Twilight sitting there in the middle of the library, the sudden realization of how extreme this attempt on her life was making her library feel that much more sinister, her gaze wandering over her books, wondering which one of them may have some kind of trap spell placed upon them to make them explode and take her face off, or cause the bookshelves to collapse atop her and crush her completely.

Without Spike around to quell her paranoia, her mind ran rampant. Then it hit her.

"W-was that their plan?" she mumbled, sniffling a bit and wiping the tears from her eyes. "Take Spike away from me, s-so I lose my focus and get hung up on every little thing? So I lose track of my schedules and checklists?!"

She almost jumped out of her skin when someone cleared their throat behind her, the mare spinning around to be face-to-face with one of four Royal Guards, all dressed in standard Royal Guard armor rather than the normal Night Guard armor for all guards that work late nighttime shifts.

"Hello Lady Sparkle, we've been ordered to keep an eye on you and the library while you're within it. Please, do continue your night as if we were never here!"

"Oh! Uh, h-hi there....well, that shouldn't be a problem, since, uh....I used to live in the castle and had to deal with this sort of thing all the time, so...."

"Er....Lady Sparkle, are you alright?" one of them asked, frowning a little.

"I...." she started, looking down at the floor for a moment before looking back to the four of them. "Yes, I'm fine. For now," she muttered, looking to the kitchen. "Look, just go and help them clear out the kitchen. I'll....well, I'll be upstairs if you need me."

With looks of concern all around, the guards left Twilight to her own devices and went to do as she told them. It wasn't like she wasn't going to be somewhere safe, in a place where guards would be going in and out of the building constantly. It would be nigh-impossible for an assassin to get to her where she was now....right?

Either way, Twilight went up to her room and unceremoniously flopped into her bed. She didn't care about the fact that she hadn't brushed her teeth. She didn't care about the fact that she was somewhat sweaty from running at a full sprint earlier in-between teleportations to save Spike's life and hadn't taken a shower to clean herself up yet.

No, all that mattered to her in that moment was how very appealing the bed looked, and how nice it would be to close her eyes, go to sleep, and wake up in the morning with all of this having been a terrible, horrible nightmare. Some part of her deep down, however, told her that this would not be the case.

That didn't stop her from going to sleep and giving it a shot.

Author's Note

Well, here it is finally, everyone! The first chapter of Harmony on the Winds, a joint project between myself and Samantha Sprocket, a new face on the fanfic writing scene, though that's mostly my fault since I coaxed her into doing this with me.

Not much to say just yet, aside from the fact that I'm the one that's mostly doing the writing aspect of this, and she's assisting me by proofreading and being the one that I bounce my ideas off of, and she bounces her ideas off of me so that we can both come up with an excellent direction for the storyline. Don't get it twisted, though: Samantha's just as skilled at writing as I am! Don't let her fool you, either: this story would NOT have happened without her input.

Hi there! Samantha Sprocket here! This is my first time having something posted on this site. While I didn't have much of a role in these first few chapters, my work will start showing up later on. Fire Soul is the real mastermind behind most of this world. I'll put in little quips and such at the end of each chapter to give my thoughts and thanks, so keep an eye out for me! Anyways, I hope you enjoyed the first chapter of our co-authored story!