The Return of Harmony Redux

Chapters

Prologue- The Return of Chaos
Ch. 1- A Day in the Life (of an Apple)
Ch. 3- The Rise and Fall of The Equestrian Empire
Ch. 4- Feuds Over Fritters
Ch. 2- Twilight Sparkle's Neverending Search for Advil®

Prologue- The Return of Chaos

The full moon was shining ever so brightly over a vast expanse of the Amazon River Basin. From afar, it appeared as if there was nothing but an endless canopy of trees, stretching as far as the eye could see. Unseen jungle birds squawked and hollered late into the night, and in the midst of all the dense, steamy fog in the air, a cacophony of mating insects let loose with the most lonely of songs, or perhaps a warning of things to come.

A lonely cricket, quite measly in size and ignored by all the others, sadly and softly rubbed it’s legs together on the rainforest floor far below, a quiet little chirp- chirp- chirp emitting from its body for nobody to hear but itself.

Suddenly, a large metal boot of some sort quickly and quietly ended the poor cricket’s life in the span of a heartbeat, squashing the little insect as it’s callous owner hurried along the rainforest floor, probably unaware and uncaring that he or she had just taken a life. Indeed, a small group of such figures dressed as the cricket murderer were running along the forest floor at top speed, each of them carrying a heavy payload of personal weaponry, including shiny rifle- like ones on their backs.

The figure in the lead, the cricket killer, who appeared to be a man possessing a large build and whose face was covered by a black balaclava matching his fatigues, suddenly ran behind a tree; his right hand came up, motioning for the others far behind him to stop, and with expert precision each and every one of the black clad figures following him disappeared into the dark green foliage. Right after they did so, a small patrol of heavily armed soldiers walked by where they all hid, seemingly unaware that the group was even there. After they were long gone, the cricket murderer signaled for the others to get moving, and the small team stealthily resumed their running through the mists of The Amazon Rainforest.

The ninja- attired team soon came upon a large rock cliff, covered over in millennia of vines and jungle overgrowth; the cricket killer scanned the top while the others waited behind him.

“Should be there,” the bane of all crickets simply and quietly spoke, pointing to an almost unnoticeable crevice in the cliff hundreds of feet above. “Alright, people, time to start climbing,”

The team of ninjas all took out a small black pistol with a wheel attached. They fired them together, and long ropes of steel shot out and firmly held onto the crevice’s ledge above. With a push of a button, the ropes started to retract and the ninjas plus their cricket- killing leader scaled the cliffs with seemingly much more ease and strength than one would expect from ordinary human beings.

After reaching and entering the tiny crevice one by one, the ninja team slowly began to slide through a very old, very twisted crack in the Earth; water began to seep more and more through the walls around them, and the sound of mating insects and birds began to be replaced by the steady, low rumbling of a running water source nearby. The ninja commandos continued scooting downwards until they at last came upon a large, cavernous opening, a limestone cave naturally carved out by the Amazon’s river waters. The inside of the cave was pitch black, and the ninjas could hardly see anything beyond their faces until they broke open long glow sticks that illuminated a small pool of water beneath them.

“Ok,” the leader spoke again, “this is where things get a little… wet. PALADIN helmets on, everybody,”

The other ninjas nodded, and then each of them began stripping off their black fatigues to reveal tight- fitting, armor- like suits of metal and plastic- like composition under them, all of them a uniform black as well.

The leader himself willed a segmented, black metallic helmet with a glowing visor to shutter over his balaclava like the others, and when everybody was suited up and ready, he nodded as they all began diving headfirst, through hundreds of feet, into the icy black freshwater pool below.

Underneath the surface, the ninjas began swimming in their PALADIN armor with ease through a narrow, twisted underwater cave, their visors glowing and some sort of holographic projectors on the leader’s wrist brilliantly guiding the way. After quite a long time, the leader was the first to emerge from the water’s surface, and he looked around at another, seemingly identical dark cave around him. The others resurfaced as well, and the leader raised his wrist as a line of light reached straight up through the waterfall feeding the pool and beeped as it arrived at what appeared to be rusty, crisscrossed metal bars blocking the waterfall’s flow.

“Up there,” the leader indicated, “should lead us straight to the ventilation core systems. Van Mara, is the ‘precious cargo’ secure?”

“Relax,” a feminine voice from a slender PALADIN- clad ninja scoffed, and then removed a small backpack she was carrying and knocked on it; the container inside the backpack made a distinct clanging sound. “It isn’t like I just stuffed it into some spare Tupperware, or anything.”

“Well then, miss genius, how about unlocking the gates for us, hmm?” the leader replied as if he was slightly incensed by this cocky young member of his team.

The female ninja simply saluted, although she might have been smirking in her helmet. She proceeded to open up another bag slung across her shoulder, inspecting its contents. When she was satisfied with what she saw, she lightly touched her left wrist and it beeped, emitting a long, mint green ribbon of light that wrapped around her right wrist like an elegant glove. She raised her hand and the bag she had just inspected started to glow green from within as a large number of black metallic balls began to lift up from inside and float in a ethereal, green- lit ring around the female ninja.

With a casual flick of her entwined wrist, the ninja sent the balls all flying towards the grill on the waterfall, and they all stuck in another ring around its edge. The ninja flicked her fingers, and the grill exploded in a bright flash, vaporizing almost entirely, sending a large gush of strengthened water flow and molten metal everywhere. This time, the ninja really did smile in her helmet, quite satisfactorily at the leader, who only shook his head.

“Alright, now let’s get up there. It’s a long way to the ventilation core,” he muttered.

After another long while, the ninja team emerged out of water yet again into a long, long room carved into the mountain itself. There were ancient canals of freshwater lining the walls, and what looked like an enormous, rusty old stovepipe sticking out from the middle of the floor up to the ceiling.

“There’s the old Equestrian ventilation core,” the leader turned to the cocky young ninja, “Van Mara, do your magic.”

The female ninja nodded as she removed a rather large canister from one of her satchels. She crossed the room and stuck the tip of the canister against the stovepipe like device; with another wave of her light glove, the tip activated and a drill- like protrusion penetrated the metal wall with ease; the ninja waited a while before a green light appeared on the container she was holding and beeped.

“Are you absolutely sure this is going to be effective?” a male ninja to her side asked her a bit nervously.

Van Mara sighed. “Yes, for the last friggin' time, this nerve agent is extremely effective at less than 100 parts per million, courtesy of your very dead but still very friendly neighborhood Equestrians,” the green light blinked twice and beeped, and Van Mara left the container sticking there, satisfied. “The base personnel should all wake up feeling rested and quite refreshed within 3 days.”

“Well, please try not to kill too many people tonight, alright Van Mara?” the leader responded. “We’ll be needing many of those valuable warm bodies inside of that outpost later.”

“Right away, sir, of course, sir,” Van Mara mocked saluted again as she brought her left wrist, and a small holographic display on it, to her helmeted face. “Alright, my EGO’s telling me that the gaseous mixture has just started to penetrate their retrofitted air vents… initiating lockdown procedures, oh, let’s say, right about… now.”

Van Mara pressed a finger on her EGO and it beeped once. Suddenly, though, the entire room started to go off in alarms and flashing lights, and any door in the immediate vicinity was suddenly sealed up by a second, heavier metal door over it.

Nearby, inside of an elaborate underground military base, soldiers and scientists looked up in surprise as the base sirens and alarm lights started to go off. A robotic voice soon began playing on a loop over the speaker system:

“Attention, attention all base personnel, quarantine protocols have been activated, quarantine protocols are now in effect… please stay in your designated work area, and remain calm until the quarantine has been lifted… attention, attention…”

Suddenly, the vents started to emit a funny smell that strongly resembled that of pomegranates, and the base personnel started to choke and reach for their throats, coughing. The soldiers and scientists started to panic and, gasping for air, they all ran towards the closed doors and bulkheads, pounding on them in a frenzy to open, all to no avail. Soon, all of the personnel throughout the entire base started to collapse to the ground, having been rendered unconscious by Van Mara’s potent nerve agent.

Near the ventilation core, Van Mara checked her EGO again. “Checking base personnel EGO vitals now… scrolling, scrolling… ok, that should be the last of them. Nobody’s home… well, so to speak...”

The leader also smiled within his helmet. “Good job, missy. Alright, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, Echo, go collect the unconscious base personnel and secure them. Looks like we got ourselves a whole lotta hostages here, people!”

The group of ninjas all whooped and cheered, patting themselves on the back. The cricket murderer smiled wider.

“Alpha team, you’re with me. Let’s finish what we came here to do…”

Van Mara and three of the other ninjas nodded before following the leader out of the ventilation core room. The five of them made their way through an endless grey and brown underground labyrinth, twisting and turning every which way; the entire time, however, their leader led them on without even glancing at his EGO, as if he knew the place by heart.

“Um, sir…” the nervous male ninja who had previously annoyed Van Mara started to speak up as they walked, “…is it safe to open up our pals yet? My mask and helmet are both really suffocating me…”

The leader rolled his eyes in his helmet. “Van Mara?”

The female ninja checked her EGO and nodded. “Yup, the gas has completely dispersed into the filtration system. Should be clear from here on out,”

The leader nodded to the nervous ninja. He willed his helmet open and took off his balaclava underneath, revealing his bare face; the cowardly ninja sighed happily. Suddenly, a bright spear of blinding blue light struck him in the chest, sending sparks and smoke flying outwards. The ninja screamed, falling backwards to the ground. Alpha team jerked their heads to see a group of olive green PALADIN- clad soldiers firing silver laser weapons at them on full automatic from the other end of the hall. The leader grabbed his fallen subordinate and Alpha team jumped behind a corner to hide.

“Goddammit, Van Mara!” he yelled as he pulled his comatose teammate out of harm’s way. “YOU SAID THEY WERE ALL KNOCKED OUT!!!”

Van Mara snatched her silver weapon, similar in design to the ones of their enemies, off her back and fired down the hall in return. “Well, I don’t know if you noticed, GI Joe, but there’s a WHOLE LOT OF FUCKING PEOPLE ON THIS GODDAMN BASE!!! Besides, you'd somehow forgot to tell me that they’d be armed with pals and FUCKING LIGHT RIFLES!!!”

The leader took a light bolt to the shoulder and screamed out in pain. “Well, missy, you’re the genius here… IMPROVISE!!!”

Van Mara fired a few more rounds before sighing. She calmly waved her glove of light and three more little black balls flew out. She flicked her hand towards the enemy soldiers and the balls all flew forward, exploding on contact. The armored soldiers all screamed as they were thrown about, exotic energy ripping through their pals and killing them. When all was still, Van Mara slowly got up, walked on over to the site of her massively destructive actions, and let out a long, low whistle.

“Sir, I'm not entirely sure, but... is this what you meant by improvisation, sir?” she mocked military respect, and her leader just shook his head and walked past her, followed by her other teammates, each giving her a wide berth of space, as well as the previously shot lackey, who was now struggling to walk properly without groaning and cursing.

“Goddamn, Van Mara… leave some for the rest of us, why don’tcha…” the leader of Alpha team muttered sarcastically and a bit morosely.

The cricket killer walked over to where a valiant soldier who had somehow managed to survive the bombs was struggling to reach his Light Rifle; it had been thrown clear away from him by the blast. The leader of Alpha Team simply and gently kicked the weapon further out of reach, and then bent down over the dying warrior; with his EGO- equipped hand, the cricket killer pressed the forehead area of his enemy’s helmet, shuttering it open. He came face- to- face with the twisted countenance of a bloodied officer, a man who was gasping for breath and staring daggers at the leader of Alpha team.

“You… you…” the officer grit his teeth, “…you won’t get away with this… I can promise you that…”

“Well, I’m sorry to inform you, Colonel Clarke…” the leader shuttered his own helmet open before pulling off his balaclava to finally reveal his face. “…but it seems as if I already have.”

Colonel Clarke, even as he began to get woozy from losing so much blood, turned even paler from surprise. “…Will? I- I- Iron Will Armstrong?” he shook his head. “N- no… it can’t be… You’re supposed to be d- dead…”

Iron Will sighed, his face seemingly contorted in mixed emotions and a lot of added wrinkles. “It didn’t have to be this way, Isaac. Now, you all put up a helluva good fight, but trust me, it’s over… I'm sorry,”

Colonel Clarke was still shaking his head. “No, no, no, you don’t understand, Will. I…” he started to cough up a prodigious amount of blood. “…I know why you’re here. I know what you came for.” He was staring at Iron Will with the most intense eyes, even as he drew in a death rattle. “Don’t do it, Will, don’t do it… you don’t know what you’re dealing with,” he turned to stare at Alpha team, “none of you do...”

Van Mara scoffed as Iron Will lowered his head and spoke in a softer tone. “Things’ve changed, Isaac… the world is… such a strange place now. Different than what you and I are used to,” He looked back at Colonel Clarke. “A man has got to survive, somehow… doesn’t he?”

“Don’t do it… don’t do it… don’t do it…” Colonel Clarke never stopped repeating, never took his gaze off of Iron Will, even as his heart finally became very still. Iron Will let out a very heavy sigh before he closed Clarke’s eyes for the last time with his hand.

“Sir?” one of Alpha team said after a silent moment, “we really need to secure the artifact now.”

Iron Will slowly sighed again, and then got up, nodding. “Alright. Let’s head to The Chamber.”

Alpha team swiftly made its way down the hall towards a large pair of thick, electronically padlocked vault doors. Iron Will simply nodded to Van Mara, who fiddled with her EGO before waving her light glove over the doors; they unlocked and opened up on their own. Alpha team strolled inside to find a bare marble chamber, empty of any artifact save one horrifying one: in the middle of the room stood a large statue made out of stone, depicting a horrendous serpentine creature- it appeared to be a mismatched hybrid of a dragon, a horse and many other different creatures, each of its limbs and body parts taken from a different animal. The horrible monster itself was frozen in a ferocious roar, its limbs stretching out in agony over some ghastly treatment. On it’s base was a single, simple sign: DANGER- LEVEL 1 ARTIFACT. UNAUTHORIZED PERSONNEL IN THE CHAMBER WILL BE REPORTED IMMEDIATELY AND WILL FACE THE APPROPRIATE CONSEQUENCES FOR ANY ACTIONS TAKEN WITHOUT PRIOR APPROVAL.

When the member of Alpha team who took a surprise Light Bolt saw the creature’s visage, he quaked in his PALADIN and gulped hard. “So… this is what we came for then, is it?”

“Aw, come on, he doesn’t bite,” Van Mara joked as she inspected the artifact. “Hmm, although, I do admit that my ancient Equestrian history is a little rusty…”

The cowardly member made an unconscious squeal, and Iron Will rolled his eyes again. “Van Mara, will you please just do your goddamn job?”

Van Mara smirked, and then took off the backpack containing the “precious cargo”; she opened it up and removed a silver suitcase. Opening that, she looked to find an extremely tiny glass vial, stopped with an ornate gold cap; what looked like a swirling miniature rainbow- colored galaxy rested within. Van Mara checked to make sure the vial was secure, with no leaks.

“Alright, General, one unit of pure, pharmaceutical grade Harmonic Energy, as per requested… wow, it still feels kinda warm, guess ‘cus it just came fresh from the factory in Equestria… hmm, kinda like the world’s most expensive organic milk,” Van Mara gazed thoughtfully at the little galaxy in a bottle.

“Just hurry up and activate the artifact, will ya?” Iron Will was getting more and more tired of the vicious genius’s breezy jokes by the second.

“Ok, geez, all work and no play… I get it, General,” Van Mara winked at him in her helmet (not that he noticed), before she stood in front of the statue with the vial in her hand. “Alright people, this is probably gonna get messy… I suggest that you all find some space and, if you feel so inclined, start saying some Hail Mary’s, too. Otherwise, everybody shut up the fuck up, starting right now.” She turned to the cowardly ninja, “Yeah, you’re probably gonna wanna shutter your helmet up there too, buckaroo...”

The member yelped in fear and took her advice. Alpha team held their breaths in as Van Mara took a step in front of the statue and a deep breath in as well. Winding her arm like a major league pitcher, she carefully cocked her hand back and threw the vial right at the artifact’s center. The tiny bottle flipped through the air in a graceful arc before smashing to bits on the stone surface of the monster, releasing all of its Harmonic Energy all at once.

Suddenly, the chamber was engulfed in a large, explosionless flash of bright rainbow light. Alpha team covered their pal visors as a nova right in front of their eyes began to expand outward, almost threatening to engulf the lot of them. It began to subside, however, as a fiery red energy at the nova’s core began to consume the initial blast and the rainbow star began to fade, feeding into what looked like a tiny sun before them all. The statue itself began to disintegrate into what looked like flying black ash until it formed a neat, compact cloud. The cloud then began to coalesce into a specific form, a human one: first, bones were formed, then the fleshy parts, and as skin began to coalesce a human figure became animated in the insidious looking nebula, one writhing in infinite pain and agony.

“Yeesh,” Van Mara muttered to herself in disgust as she watched a fully- grown man get put together in front of her, naked and screaming. “Mazel tov...”

The shrieking man was finally covered in the last bits of ash which formed a dark grey business suit, brown loafers, a yellow dress shirt and, finally, a red tie covered in tiny white polka dots; as the fiery energy around him faded right along with it’s whooshing and gusting, Alpha team was very awkwardly confronted by what looked like a middle- age Caucasian man screaming and hollering in great pain and suffering; his outline even seemed to be smoking a little bit. To be honest, nobody really knew exactly what to do at that point.

“AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” the newly formed man continued screaming in seemingly boundless misery, reaching with flailing hands for his neck, “AAAAAARRRRRRGGGGgggggggghhhhhhhh- oi!!!!” he cracked his spine with visible gusto, “hundreds of millennia will give you such a crick in the neck!!! WOOOO!!!!!”

Van Mara just turned and stared at Iron Will, who seemed just as confused as she and the rest of Alpha Team was.

“Oh my God…” suddenly, one of the two members of Alpha team who didn’t really say much until that point spoke up in reverent awe and confusion, “…oh my God, it’s… John de Lancie.”

The other, much bigger but also formerly silent member turned to him. “Who?”

The smaller ninja turned to him, a look of annoyance hidden by his helmet. “You serious? John de Lancie? You don’t know who he is?”

The bigger ninja just shook his head dumbly, provoking a scoff from his teammate.

“God, you are such a dumb shit… John de Lancie? He played Q in Star Trek: The Next Generation? The other Star Trek shows too? Stargate SG1???” the smaller ninja fruitlessly attempted to jumpstart a spark of memory in his comrade, but the bigger ninja merely continued to shake his head.

“Nope… never heard of him.”

“Aw, come on dude, the man’s like a genius or something!!!” the smaller ninja replied exasperatedly, but then snapped his fingers. “Oooh, oooh! I know! You’ve seen him on Breaking Bad… the junkie girl who the guy from Malcolm in The Middle lets choke on her own vomit… remember her father? The guy who caused those airplanes to crash?”

“Oh yeah, him!” The bigger ninja finally began to nod, and the two ninjas laughed together, nodding. “I remember that guy! Ooooh, he’s such a good actor-“

BLAM! BLAM!

Two gunshots rang out as two bullets struck the two ninjas in the chest; they gasped, their PALADIN armor fizzling, and they both fell to the floor, fearfully grasping at their bodies to make sure that they were indeed alive. Both of them looked up with trepidation to see Van Mara standing over them, holding a smoking pistol. She shuttered her helmet, whipped out her dirty red and blond hair, and playfully grinned at the two.

“Next time,” she coyly whispered, still smiling, “that’ll be two Light Bolts... capiche, assholes?”

“Yes, Ms. Shimmer,” the bigger asshole replied, scared out of his wits as he shuttered his helmet open.

“Of course, Ms. Shimmer,” the smaller asshole was shaking and sweating as he opened his helmet, too.

“Lucia, please refrain from killing any members of our own forces,” Iron Will stared venomously at the two idiots on the floor after shuttering his helmet open again, as well. “For now, at least.”

Ms. Shimmer just smiled sweetly at Iron Will, as if she had just been caught by her father stealing cookies from the cookie jar when he had specifically ordered her not to beforehand. “Oh, come on now, General… I’m not a monster…”

“Riiiiight…” Iron Will dismissed that, and immediately turned back to the two hapless henchmen on the floor. “Get up, now.”

The two idiots immediately followed suit, and all of Alpha team stood to face the newly constructed human being before them. Surprisingly, it seemed as if the man didn’t even notice them at all, expert mercenary strike force clad in black as they were, but was instead continuing to stretch and groan, his eyes closed, a soft mutter escaping his lips every few moments. Iron Will motioned to his team and they all genuflected before the strange newcomer who seemed to be ignoring them.

“Hail, Lord Discord! Archduke and Emperor of Ancient, August Equestria, Noble, Supreme Commander of The Forces of Chaos,” Iron Will bent his head down in a formal Equestrian gesture of respect, “we humbly and reverently bid you greetings, my lord.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Lord Discord waved a hand, eyes still closed. “Be with you in a minute,”

Alpha team, still on their knees, turned to each other with renewed looks of confusion on their faces; Iron Will blinked rapidly a couple of times in response to Discord’s shooing, but then decided to press again. “Your Majesty, it has been a very, very long time since you were unjustly imprisoned by The Crown. Much has changed… allow us to introduce ourselves, we are-“

“Jesus Christ, would you just lay off a minute?” Discord frowned, eyes still closed. “I’m downloading every last bit of data from every last network, server and computer on the entire planet… like you said, I’ve been out for quite a while, so if you reeeaaally don’t mind… hmmm, ‘John de Lancie (born March 20, 1948) is an American actor… He has been active in screen and television roles since 1977, and has been featured for several recurring roles on American television series’… well, well, well, not a bad- looking stallion, if I do say so myself… you know, I must say, these Googles and Wikipediae you all have now are really just, well, fantastic,"

Alpha team just stared at each other again. Then they waited, still on their knees, in silence for Discord to finish downloading information on pretty much, well, everything that he had missed in the past hundreds hundreds of thousands of years.

“My lord…” Iron Will pressed again, growing more and more impatient by the minute.

“Shhh!! Shhh!!! I’m just about done learning everything I can about the modern world!” Discord tightly shut his eyes, as if he were in deep concentration. “Oh my… oh my, well, your pornography sure has advanced a lot over the years… well, oh my, what’s this now? Why, madam, whatever are you going to do with that now, I wonder?”

Iron Will sighed. “Your Majesty, there are many important matters for us to discuss, so if you’d please-“

“Wait!” Discord suddenly looked disturbed. “Now, wait just a minute… what is the deal with all this ‘spam’?”

Iron Will sighed again. “Lord Discord, please,”

“All done!” Discord’s eyes finally popped open and he smiled. He looked over Alpha team and chuckled, “well, well, well, aren’t we all looking very traditional this evening. So, what can I do ya for, hmmm?”

Van Mara glanced at Iron Will again; he pressed on, regardless. “My lord, as I’ve said, much has changed since you were imprisoned…”

“Yeah, yeah,” Discord snorted, “well, I can see that, Einstein. Equestria gone, then back again, 'ding- dong, the witch is dead'… soooo, what is it you want from me exactly, General Armstrong, is it? Or do you really prefer- hahaha- ‘Iron Will’, General?”

Iron Will blinked a couple of times, unnerved that Discord already knew who he was. “Well, my lord, as you now know, the remnant governments of Equestria have banded together to claim your land as their own…”

“Yes, yes, these United Nations I've heard so much about…” Discord smirked. “…And tell me, Big Willie Style, just why aren’t you feeling peachy keen about that then, hmmm?”

“Your Majesty, my people and I don’t believe in the United Nations,” Iron Will gestured to Alpha team, “a power as great as Equestria’s shouldn't be in the hands of those whom we believe to be unworthy of possessing it.”

Discord laughed heartily. “And of course, you’re the only ones worthy of possessing such a power, am I right?”

“No, my lord, you’re the only one," Iron Will bowed his head in reverence. "There can be no one else, surely...”

Discord cocked his head in amusement. “Really? So, My Travelling Wilbury, you came all the way out here to the desiccated remains of my once most glorious residence, risking life, limb and charges of treason against your country- why, exactly? The goodness of your great, big iron heart?"

Iron Will smirked as well, knowing full well what Discord was getting at. “No, Your Majesty, we just thought that a great and powerful leader, such as yourself, could use a little help with readjusting to life in Equestria… that you could use people whom you could trust and depend on to serve you admirably… people with a lot of resources and power in a brave new world, as it is,”

Discord smirked back, gesturing with a twirling motion. "And, of course, in exchange for this brave new world, as you put it, you and your little cheerleading squad would like me to give you..."

"Everything else," Iron Will locked eyes for the hard sell.

Discord started to ponder that over out loud as he paced the Chamber, not really caring in the slightest that the others could hear him:

“Well, with all that’s changed with the world, it’s good to know that some things haven’t… you know, I guess you never can have too many friends, or cronies for that matter… just look at all the countless Red Shirts that Star Trek went through in the span of a few decades…”

Discord turned back to Alpha team and grinned. “Sure, why not? Oh, what is it that a once very idealistic and now long dead princess kept on telling me? ‘Keep your heart open’ and whatnot… so that’s just what I intend to do, General.”

Iron Will smiled; he bowed as he got to his feet, and the others followed his example. “Thank you, Your Majesty, thank you, you surely won’t regret this.”

“Alright, great!” Discord clapped his hands together. “So where are we going, anyway?”

Van Mara turned to whisper in Iron Will’s ear: “Are you sure about this?”

Iron Will frowned at her, and Van Mara frowned right back. Suddenly, Discord literally appeared out of thin air between the two of them, leaning casually on Van Mara’s shoulder.

“You know, Miss ‘Shimmer’, they say that trust is the first foundation of a healthy relationship. The second is caring. I just learned that from a Kindle eBook written by a very distinguished pony living in a place called Los Angeles,”

Van Mara gently and respectfully dropped Discord’s arm from her shoulder before giving him her fakest smile. “I’ll try to keep that in mind, my lord,”

Discord smiled at her. “See that you do! Oh, also-“ he snapped his fingers and a beautiful, sparkly bouquet of exotic blue flowers appeared in his hand; he gave them to Van Mara. “-These, my dear, are Star Lilies, very rare... quite extinct now but a personal favorite of the old princesses. You know, there’s an old Equestrian saying: “give a Star Lily to a beautiful gal, give a whole bouquet to a beautiful lady”... since I really don’t see either anywhere in the immediate vicinity, I thought that maybe you should have them instead. You liiiiiike?”

Van Mara just took the flowers without saying anything. Discord smiled, clapped his hands again, and started walking out of the Chamber, humming a random song as he went. Alpha team followed closely behind him, still a little confused.

“Your Majesty, come with us, we have much to discuss…” Iron Will tried to explain, even though he was trying to keep pace with Discord.

“That we do, General, that we do… hmmm- hmmm- hmmm- hmmm- hmmmmmm, hmmm- hmmm- hmmm- hmmm- hmmmmmmm,”

Van Mara rolled her eyes, and Discord grinned toothily at her.

"Do you like it? I just learned that song a few minutes ago… truth be told, it really, really annoys me to no end, but for some reason I can’t explain, I just can’t seem to get it out of my head… hmmm- hmmm- hmmm- hmmm- hmmmmmmm, my little poooonyyyyyy, aaaaaah- aaaaaaah- aaaaaaah- aaaaaaaaaaaaaaah….”

Author's Note

Aaaaaaaaand we're back! :pinkiehappy:

Thank you to everybody who was so awesome to the first one, you really inspired me this time around. Thx!!! ^-^

EDIT: Fixed a minor chronological error in this chapter; as stated before, Equestria is less than half a miilion years old

Ch. 1- A Day in the Life (of an Apple)

THE RETURN OF HARMONY REDUX

It wasn't going to be just another ordinary day for Abigail Bethany Smith.

She looked out of the window next to her; sure enough, the featureless desert landscape far beneath her didn’t change at all, but Abigail didn’t mind: she was really only, in fact, staring intently at her own reflection, in more of a scrutinizing rather than a vainglorious way. Abigail was still very young, indeed; she looked over her shoulder length, straight red hair tied up, as always, in her favorite pink ribbon; her translucent, big amber eyes, currently scrunched up in a half- frown; her smooth, blank, pale skin which, unlike that of her older siblings, held no freckles of its own. Abigail sighed, thinking about her family again; it really did seem like they used to be a very tight- knit group, but ever since her sister got into Lord knows what, her brother disappeared into black ops, and her parents, well… well, it just seemed like they used to be a lot more tightly bonded than they currently found themselves at present.

“The rain in Spain falls mainly on the planes… lalalala… The rain in Spain falls mainly on the planes…” Abigail turned her head across the aisle of the plane to see a beautiful young woman muttering to herself in the aisle seat on the opposite side of her row; Abigail frowned.

“Um… actually, it’s supposed to be plains, not planes,” another young woman fitted with expensive- looking cat eyes glasses meekly corrected her chanting companion.

The beautiful girl turned to her friend with an irate look on her face. “And what's the difference? I mean, they sound exactly the same… they’ve got planes in Spain too, don’t they?”

The cat- eyed girl lowered her head, almost as if she really wanted to avoid being seen by anybody else, right then and there. “Yes, of course… I’m sorry, Diamond Tiara, it won’t happen again…”

“Well, good...” Diamond Tiara scoffed and closed her eyes again as if she was resuming her zen meditation. “The rain in Spain falls mainly on the planes…”

Abigail knew it wasn’t very polite to laugh at total strangers, so she suppressed a giggle and tried to face out the window again; however, to her surprise, she heard a distinct snort and quite a few chuckles coming from the passenger next to her. She turned to the person in the aisle seat by her side to see another young woman, about her age, dressed in navy blue cargo pants, a plain white tee, and sporting bright pink- dyed, short, spiky hair; Abigail’s flying companion had her face buried in a Rolling Stone magazine, Abigail's own older sister and her best friends ironically on the cover in a staged publicity photo under the bold title "THE REAL MANE SIX- An Exclusive Interview with The Heroes of Equestria"; the other girl was chuckling to herself in quite an audible manner, but fortunately it didn’t seem as if Diamond Tiara or her little friend even noticed, as Tiara herself kept on religiously repeating her mantras. Abigail raised a brow again, but said nothing as the plane continued on its way.

“Ladies and Gentlemen,” a young, pleasant male voice came over the loudspeaker as flight stewards and stewardesses began checking on the passengers and lighted signs came on, “this is your pilot Thunderlane here again… we’ve caught some unexpected tailwind, and will be landing in Canterlot International Airport 20 minutes ahead of schedule… please fasten your seatbelts, stow your tray tables and carry- ons, and return your seats to their upright positions... we will begin our descent shortly, thank you,”

With a very audible sigh, Abigail fastened her seatbelt; after all, this was what she came for, wasn’t it? Abigail half- expected an answer, but she found herself with no one else to confide in save her lonely little ol’ self; the plane just kept on heading toward its destination.

The rather normal jet plane landed on what appeared to be a wide, ancient runway of some sort on the outskirts of the equally ancient city of Canterlot, its engines dying and the plane itself coming to an idle stop. The cabin door's stairway came down and Abigail was the first person to emerge, a ragged old backpack slung over her shoulders. Abigail smiled and gasped in awe as she took in a panoramic view of The Old City from the ground; it was truly amazing, even in all her engineering and architectural courses, she never could have imagined that such a place really existed outside of all of the pictures and videos that she had seen; spires upon spires of gleaming gold, white stone cupolas and towers streaked in elegant royal blue paint, flags and banners reflecting every color of the rainbow… it was almost too much for her to take in at once.

“Woooaah… now, ain’t that somethin’,” she whispered to herself in wonder.

Suddenly, Abigail felt someone push her quite rudely out of the way; Abigail was about to shout “hey!” when Diamond Tiara walked quickly past her and down towards the tarmac, followed by her companion carrying multiple suitcases and bags of luggage.

“Excuse me, press coming through,” Diamond Tiara informed Abigail without even looking at her.

Abigail frowned at the reporter, who had pushed her way down the plane’s stairway to the ground towards a waiting camera crew on the tarmac below.

“Is everything ready?” Diamond Tiara asked the crew as her companion had somehow managed to drop their luggage off somewhere else; she was now diligently applying make- up to the cranky reporter.

“Yes, Miss Tiara, we got your eggo call from the plane, ready when you are,” the skinny and nervous- looking cameraman replied, raising a futuristic looking device on his shoulder and aiming it.

“Good,” Diamond Tiara cleared her throat before facing him with a smile.

“Recording in five, four…” the cameraman counted down the rest with his fingers before pointing to Diamond Tiara; a red flash on his camera turned on.

“This is Diamond Tiara with Holo Free Equestria News,” Diamond Tiara began her broadcast, “continuing HFE’s special report on the immigration issues still plaguing the colony. It has now been over a year since the world at large first encountered, or I should say re- encountered these miraculous, lost remains of an ancient human culture, and much has changed as humanity struggled to come to terms with extremely advanced and, as the now infamous Nightmare Incident has shown, potentially dangerous ancient technologies, as well as a paradigm shattering re- interpration of who we are as a people, and what exactly New Equestria is supposed to mean to us all.

Some have taken Equestria’s re- appearance as a shining beacon of hope, that one day mankind’s current problems can and will be solved without any further suffering and bloodshed inflicted on the planet; others have notably interpreted the reappearance of Equestria as the first sign of the coming Apocalypse, one of many foretold in The Book of Revelations, with Equestria’s pony symbology representing the future conquest of Earth by the very minions of Perdition itself; among the former, tens of thousands of war refugees from the surrounding African countries, the Middle East, and many other war- torn, failed states around the world have flocked to Equestria’s remnant territory in order to escape persecution, starvation, disease and death on this beckoning, mostly uninhabited land. However, these refugees are now currently finding themselves beset with a lack of housing, medical care, food and infrastructure, and the United Nations are still struggling to provide sustenance and buildings for the refugee camps as more and more desperate people from across all national borders, a real survey of the entire human population, really, arrive to occupy this land every day.

However, not all of Equestria’s immigrants are working to contribute to it’s extremely worrisome population problems; some have come to make the country a better place, and indeed, to make the entire world itself a more advanced, civilized place to live in. I myself have just returned to Equestria on a plane full of them after reporting in Addis Ababa: fresh, eager young faces ready to take on the challenges of both the ancient and modern worlds, some of the most brilliant, most capable minds our entire species have to offer. Here’s one of them now, let’s try to get some first impressions from Equestria’s future…”

Suddenly, Diamond Tiara and her camera crew turned towards Abigail, who was still standing at the doorway of the jet plane, carrying a single backpack behind her held by the straps in both hands like an elementary student on the first day of school; a look of complete horror was on her face. Diamond Tiara’s companion looked annoyed, and silently motioned for the confused young girl to come down and give her two cents to the camera. Reluctantly, Abigail disembarked the plane and walked up to them.

“Yes, hello, miss,” Diamond Tiara herself was a lot more civil when she was being recorded, “what’s your name?”

“Um… Abigail, Abigail… Smith,” Abigail was extremely uncomfortable giving interviews to the press, and it showed on the news emitter feed; ‘ABIGAIL SMITH’ immediately popped up in bold letters superimposed over her; she frowned.

“Welcome to Equestria, Abigail… I’m guessing this is your first time here, like most of everyone onboard, correct?”

“…Sure.”

“And just why have you come to the UN’s brand new colony here, I wonder?” Diamond Tiara was looking thoughtfully at Abigail, but she distinctly got the feeling that the news reporter was just trying to create some filler or something.

“…Um, well, ta be perfectly honest, mah sister already works here n’ she asked me if I might-“

“Cut,” Diamond Tiara’s companion suddenly spoke out, motioning for the cameraman to stop recording, which he did. The companion sighed, shaking her head. “No, no, no, this won’t really work. I can barely understand what she’s saying, her Southern American accent is way too thick…”

Abigail just stared daggers at her; she thought to herself, quite furiously: mah accent’s WHATNOW?!?!

Diamond Tiara looked pensive. “Hmmm, well, is there any way that we can maybe put an Alicorn Tongue Effect on her in editing, Silver Spoon? Or at least, some subtitles?”

Abigail choked on her own indignant response to that as Silver Spoon shook her head.

“Well, we could do that, but you did just introduce her as one of Equestria’s “most brilliant, most capable minds”, and to be honest, Tiara… well… she just doesn’t seem to be the right fit for the segment,”

Oh, you have GOT ta be kiddin’ me, why, you pretentious little bi-

“Hmmm, I guess you’re right,” Diamond Tiara straightened her hair as she concluded. “Let’s move on to the next one, then.” She turned to Abigail and saccharinely smiled, “sorry about that, you’re free to go!”

Abigail was speechless, and she sputtered as a camera crewperson led her away from the shot, still very pissed and indignant.

“Alright, let’s see what we have next…” Diamond Tiara scanned the door for the next passenger debarking the plane.

The Rolling Stone- reading, formerly chuckling young woman with shockingly pink hair casually made her way down the stairway carrying a large duffel bag on one shoulder; She looked entirely uneager and uninterested.

“Start rolling,” Diamond Tiara motioned to the crew, “excuse me, excuse me, miss!”

The pink- haired girl stopped at the bottom of the stairs as Diamond Tiara came up to her, smiling. “Why, hello, miss, welcome to Equestria, we’re doing a segment for HFE News, interviewing newcomers to the colony and getting their first impressions. Would you care to give us a few words for a minute? We just want to let people see some new faces in the country and get some initial thoughts on this brave new world. Is that ok?”

The pink- haired girl gasped and seemed to blush, reaching for her heart with one hand as if she was extremely shy; she smiled, and then nodded, indicating that she felt extremely honored to be on HFE.

Diamond Tiara grinned back. “OK! So, tell us, what is your name and why did you travel all the way to Equestria? Are you involved with The Initiative in any way, perhaps? Please, let the world know,”

The pink- haired and extremely humble young woman giggled sweetly, and then leaned straight into the camera, smiling: “…No comment.”

The HFE news team all stared as she smirked at them before walking away with her duffel bag. Diamond Tiara and her lackey/producer Silver Spoon gave her the dirtiest of looks as she left, angry that she had wasted their time and footage. As the camera caught her, still recording, leaving the shot, ‘NO COMMENT?’ appeared superimposed over her body.

Diamond Tiara sighed in frustration. “Cut… just cut the damn footage, Featherweight…”

The pink- haired girl was still chuckling as she walked over to a large cart on the side of the plane and began picking out the rest of her luggage. She heard some very accented cursing and turned her head to see Abigail, a proverbial storm cloud over her head, muttering to herself angrily as she tried to free a bag from the cart in frustration.

“Hey,” the pink- haired one asked, “you alright?”

“I’m- hnnngh!- just peachy, thank you,” Abigail responded quite curtly, still in a bad mood from being so embarrassed only seconds after arriving in Equestria.

“Well actually, Peachy’s over there giving her 5 minutes of fame to Diamond Tiara,” the pink- haired woman gestured to where the HFE reporter was having more luck with a bubbly auburn- haired young woman who was the next to emerge from the jet. “I’m guessing she’s telling them about how she let her fellow sorority sisters choose her pony name before graduating from some East Coast Ivy League school.”

Abigail giggled at that, her storm cloud dissipating somewhat. “And you know that, how?”

“Aw, you’ve met one, you’ve met 'em all,” the pink- haired girl grinned back before chucking Abigail lightly on the shoulder. “Seriously, though, don’t let Diamond Tiara or Silver Spoon get to you, I’ve found that it’s best to just ignore them and find something else to look at… sort of how you handle pop- up ads,”

This time, Abigail laughed out loud this time, shaking her head. The pink- haired one walked up to her spot on the cart and took her stuck bag in both her hands.

“Here, lemme help you with that,” she pulled the bag and it came free; Applejack smiled gratefully as she took it.

“Thank ya kindly there, um... Miss…”

“-Scootaloo, Scootaloo Cruz,” the pink- haired one introduced herself as she shook Abigail’s hand when it became free. “A pleasure meeting ya, Abigail,”

“Nice ta meet ya, too, Scootaloo,” Abigail smiled back at her. “Y’all ken jus’ call me Apple Bloom, don’t have ta go pronouncin’ my name all proper like, now,”

Scootaloo raised a brow. “Apple Bloom, huh? So, just like Peachy, you’ve already picked out your pony name too?”

Apple Bloom frowned. “Um, pony name?”

“Yeah, it’s sort of a tradition here in New Equestria,” Scootaloo explained, “the ancient Equestrians sort of had kinda generic, New- Agey kinds of names, so it’s kind of a thing to get a new Equestrian name when you come here. For example, my mom is the only one who really calls me ‘Katie’, at least now,”

“You mean… you’ve been here before?” Apple Bloom cocked her head quizzically.

“Who, me? Yup, just got back from The States on a bit of leave, but you could say I’ve been around the block,” Scootaloo explained.

Apple Bloom nodded her head. “Well, the whole pony name thing sure explains the names of all of Applejack’s friends… still, I’ve been called ‘Apple Bloom’ all mah life, sure enough as mah sister’s been called ‘Applejack’ all throughout hers, so-“

Scootaloo dropped every single last one of her bags on the tarmac, her eyes as big as dinner plates. “…Applejack. The Applejack? Applejack is your… sister,”

Apple Bloom started to blush; she had totally forgotten that she now had to hide that little fact from most people, lest trouble really brew for her. “Ummmm…. sure?”

“Applejack. The Mane Sixer,” Scootaloo shook her head. “Well, I guess I should’ve known, Abigail Smith…”

Apple Bloom laughed. “Yeah, Granny kept gettin’ us mixed up when we were kids, so we became her two little Apples. I actually should be heading over yonder ta Ponyville, the whole reason I’m here’s ‘cus Applejack asked me ta come…” Apple Bloom gathered up all of her bags and prepared to leave, smiling at Scootaloo. “Well, I better find a taxi or somethin’, I heard it’s quite a long way to the new Sweet Apple Acres. It was really nice meetin’ ya, Scootaloo…”

“Hey, wait!” Scootaloo stopped her from leaving. “I got a car… well, a UN truck that I’m fond of, and that nobody really seems to be missing, so… why don’t I drive you over there? It’s actually not that far, they rebuilt the town pretty close to the city limits... oooh, I’ll buy us some beers on the way!”

Underneath Apple Bloom’s ginger red locks an alarm- well, multiple alarms- started to go off in response to that. “Umm… it was really nice meetin’ ya n' all, Scootaloo, and I’m, um… flattered, really, but I really don’t, um… swing that way?”

Scootaloo just gave her a frown before she caught onto Apple Bloom’s little misunderstanding and started to laugh really hard. “Hahahahaha, oh my God, you thought that I- because I offered to buy you a beer and- aaaah, good times,” Scootaloo wiped a tear from her eye; she saw that Apple Bloom was staring at her funny, so she started to explain: “-um, haha, Apple Bloom- no, you see, another tradition here in New Equestria is to offer any newcomer you meet a welcoming gift… the traditional gift, as current rules decree, is ‘a choice between either a free beer or an afaan- oromootin- maal- jedhama’,”

Apple Bloom blinked rapidly. “A beer or a what now?”

“Weeeeell… you’re really not supposed to tell the person upon giving them the initial choice, ruins the fun later on, buuuuuut… an afaan- oromootin- maal- jedhama is a very, very tall hookah, stuffed all the way to the brim of the bowl with the highest- quality hashish available... at the time,” Scootaloo elaborated.

“…A hookah. Filled entirely with hash.”

Scootaloo nodded, quite seriously. “Everybody involved gets one,” she held up a single finger.

Apple Bloom pretended to think for a moment. “Hmmmm… well, shoots, ya know, I think I’ll just go with the beer, thanks,”

“Eh, suit yourself,” Scootaloo winked playfully. “Hey! I know a good place in the city, I’ll take you over there now, and then we’ll head over to Sweet Apple Acres. Sound good?”

“Ok… thanks,” Apple Bloom was still a little unsure if Scootaloo was just being friendly, secretly harbored amorous intentions, or really only cared about her because she had an incredibly famous sister. “Oh, wait! I’m not even 21, so that probably won’t work…”

Scootaloo laughed incredibly heartily, slapping her new friend on the back. “S’cool, neither am I in America!”

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

Apple Bloom and Scootaloo, after driving a bit, made their way into a quaint- looking pub called The Galloping Gallon located inside the city of Canterlot. Inside, Apple Bloom found a bunch of happy- looking patrons, laughing and talking with each other, all enjoying drinks (many of which Apple Bloom was pretty sure were invented in Equestria) in what looked like any other traditional English public house sitting in the middle of any other recolonized Equestrian capital city.

“Hey, Berry Punch!” Scootaloo threw down a fake ID and greeted the bartender with a grin. “Two beers, non- American, bottled… I’m feelin’ extra generous today,” she winked again at Apple Bloom. “And how about some snacks while you’re at it, huh?”

The bartender just looked at Scootaloo in a very tired way over the bar counter. “Scootaloo, for over six months now you’ve been coming in here, buying drinks, and every single time you give me that stupid fake US passport that says your real name is ‘Carmen Sandiego’… for the last time, I’m not an idiot…. So, on your tab, again?”

“Yes, on my tab again, please…” Scootaloo blushed a little as Berry Punch fulfilled her order, embarrassed to have been schooled in front of the newcomer like that; Apple Bloom smiled at her as she was handed a bottle of beer.

“Why, thank you so much, Ms. Sandiego,” she joked as she took a sip; Scootaloo shrugged.

“Hey, a girl’s gotta drink, right?” was all that Scootaloo replied as she grinned sheepishly and took a sip as well before offering her bottle in a toast. “To new beginnings, and, what’s that line from that old movie, ‘the beginning of a beautiful friendship’?”

Apple Bloom grinned before clinking her bottle to Scootaloo’s. “Play it again, Carmen.”

Scootaloo giggled and took another sip; Just then, a beautiful young woman joined them at the bar counter near where they were sitting, although she didn’t sit in a stool herself; she was about their age, with smooth, pale, nearly translucent skin, big, bright emerald green eyes surrounded by long, luscious lashes, and gorgeous black, very nearly purple tresses coiled in little curls around her head without looking excessively frizzy. She smiled at Berry Punch, who smiled back warmly.

“Why, hello, Sweetie Belle,” Berry Punch greeted. “The usual?”

"Two sarsaparillas this time, Berry, and a blue cheese salad to go, if you’d please,” Sweetie ordered from her in a very high- pitched, girly voice. “I’m eating lunch at my desk today… the director sure has been awfully busy lately!”

“Awww, I’m sorry to hear it, babe,” Berry offered sympathetically. “Two sarsaparillas and a blue cheese salad, to go… here, have an extra bottle, Sweetie, on the house. Don’t work too hard, now, sugar,”

“Thanks, Berry!” Sweetie Belle beamed. “See ya later!”

Berry bid her a fond farewell, and Sweetie Belle collected her order and headed for the door. Before she left, however, Scootaloo spotted her and grinned.

“Speaking of friendships… YO, SWEETIE BELLE!!!” Scootaloo put down her beer and called out to her, loudly.

Sweetie Belle was walking along, humming, almost as if she was on an idle screensaver, when she turned around to look who called her; when she saw Scootaloo she smiled brightly and started running over.

“SCOOTY- SCOOTS!!! You’re back!!!!!” Sweetie Belle answered warmly and hugged the other girl; they both laughed happily. “I thought I wasn’t going to see you until after I was done working!!!”

“Yeah, the plane caught a tailwind and I arrived early, just got into town,” Scootaloo answered as she released her friend from the hug. “I met somebody on the plane with me! Sweetie Belle, this is Apple Bloom, Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle,”

Apple Bloom shook Sweetie’s hand politely and smiled. “Nice ta meetcha, Sweetie,”

“Likewise!” Sweetie Belle almost seemed as bubbly as Peachy was.

“Lil’ Apple Bloom here,” Scootaloo smirked at Sweetie, “just so happens to be Applejack’s little sister.”

Sweetie Belle jumped high at least a couple of times in the air as her eyes widened and she let out a squeal that seemed bigger than her lungs themselves. “Omigosh, omigosh, that is SO AWESOME!!!”

Apple Bloom frowned, so Scootaloo started to explain: “Sweetie Belle here, lil’ Apple Bloom, just so happens to be Rarity Belle’s little sister.”

Apple Bloom looked at Scootaloo, and then back at Sweetie, who was still grinning like a maniac. “Oh… so you mean-“

“That both our older sisters are like the very bestest, bestest best BFFs in the entire universe?! Like, TOTALLY!!!” Sweetie Belle began trilling and gasping. “Omigosh, omigosh, like, I never, ever thought I'd run into any of Rarity’s friend’s sisters out here, I honestly can’t BELIEVE IT!!! Omigosh, like, you know what they say about ‘never having too many friends’? Well, it’s, like, totally true!!!” Sweetie Belle suddenly took Apple Bloom’s hand in hers, prompting the Texan to stare at Scootaloo again with a frown. “Oh, we’re gonna do everything together: we’re gonna go shoe shopping, bike riding, interpretive dance-- um, dancing, non- interpretive dance- dancing, hot yoga, eating various delicacies, and um… grocery shopping, other stuff too, for sure!!! You know there’s some pretty good clubs right here in Canterlot, world- class, at least that’s what I heard… oh, we’re gonna have the bestest time two sisters of two bestest best friends in the entire universe could ever HAVE!!!”

“………” Apple Bloom replied.

“Sweetie Belle, girl,” Scootaloo took her hands away from Apple Bloom’s and into her own. “Breathe, breathe, breathe…”

“I’m- gasp!- sorry, sometimes I- HUUUH- get so excited I feel like I could just- cough- BURST!!!” Sweetie Belle was trying to explain in between hyperventilated breaths. “GAAAASP… It kinda gets hard to breathe, though. Nice to meet ya, Apple Bloom!”

“I’m truly sorry about that, and… it’s nice ta meetcha, too?” Apple Bloom tried to answer in one neat little package.

Sweetie Belle, interestingly, had never stopped grinning with authentic joy, even when her lungs threatened her with total collapse. “HUUUUUUUUH- a pleasure!”

Apple Bloom turned to Scootaloo. “Uh… is she gonna be ok?”

“Ah, Sweetie Belle ain’t no powderpuff, she can handle it… ain’t that right, girl?” Scootaloo just laughed and patted Sweetie on the shoulder; even though she was still gasping for air, she smiled and nodded.

“Okaaaaay, well… um, it was really nice meetin’ y’all, really, and I can’t thank ya enough fer the beer, Scootaloo, but, um… I really need to get ta mah sister’s, seein’ as how she’s expectin’ me, n’ all,” Apple Bloom put down her still full bottle and began to get up.

“Yeah… yeah, you’re right, we should probably get driving,” Scootaloo put down her fully emptied beer bottle on the table and got up as well.

Apple Bloom heard more alarms going off in her head. “Ya know what, Scootaloo? I ken probably jus’ get a taxi from here, it’s… it’s really no big deal, hahaha,”

Scootaloo pat her on the shoulder again. “You’re absolutely right, it is no big deal… so I’ll just drive you there myself!” she winked at Apple Bloom. “Don’t worry, the way I drive, I’ll have you there in like, half an hour flat, an hour tops. Noooo problemo! Hey, Sweetie Belle,” she turned to her friend, who seemed to have regained her ability to breathe again, “I gotta drop Apple Bloom off at her sister’s, you up for a little road trip?”

“Sure!” Sweetie Belle squealed happily, almost as if she had entirely forgotten about the precarious few minutes that had passed beforehand.

“Wait- don’t you have, like, some sort of job to do?” Apple Bloom frowned at her.

Sweetie Belle just stared at Apple Bloom like she had no idea what she was talking about; then she suddenly clapped her hands together. “Oh, yeah, I totally forgot! I was just gonna file a whole lot of papers today, because Director Everstar told me before I came to get lunch that she really needed to take a nap… she explicitly instructed me not to bother her for, like, 'at least sixteen hours'… wow, I really can’t believe I didn’t remember that! I should be good, then,” she smiled again.

“Well, girls, that's awfully kind of y’all, offerin' ta take me yerselves, the both of you, but…” Apple Bloom nervously stammered as she unconsciously started to head for the door.

“Great! Then it’s settled!” Scootaloo smacked the table. “Yo, Berry, one for the road!”

“…You know what, we should probably start driving, like, right now,” Apple Bloom tried to interrupt her designated driver's efforts at getting intoxicated.

“Yeah, you're totally right… Berry, nevermind, put it in the fridge!”

Oh thank God, Apple Bloom prayed silently, hoping that when she got to her sister’s place, things would be a little better and more normal than they were currently going for her.

“Yaaaaay!” Sweetie Belle clapped her hands together, “road trip!”

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

Applejack was having, by all accounts, an extremely shitty and very unusual day.

“Applejack, please…” Rarity begged her best friend, tears nearly in her eyes.

“Dammit Rarity, not now,” Applejack growled back.

“But Apppppplllllleeeeejaaaaaccckkkk….” Rarity let out one of her signature canine- stunning whines, “I really, really need your help!”

“Rarity, can’t ya see that I’m currently havin' some serious problems of mah own?!” Applejack snapped, for a split second taking her attention off of the pair of Equestrian- made binoculars she was using.

“But Applejack, I really, really need another case of your Cinnamon Apple Bear Claws, darling, this is an emergency,” Rarity tried to get her friend’s attention again. “I have a VERY important client coming to see my new line, and he absolutely insists that your pastries are the best he’s ever tasted! Applejack, PLEEEEASE,”

“Goddammit, Rare!” Applejack snapped again at her friend, “Could this maybe wait until after we’re done here?!”

“HEY!” Applejack’s EGO suddenly crackled to life; Applejack soon found herself dealing with both an irrational, stressed out Rarity and the voice of a very pissed- off sounding Rainbow Dash. “Oh, I’m so sorry, I hope I’m not interrupting anything important,”

Applejack sighed, heavily. “I’m real sorry, Rainbow Dash, it’s Rarity again, she… won’t stop bothering me about Bear Claws,”

“Well, unless you both wanna become midday snacks for an extremely ravenous, maneating horde of parasprites, I suggest that you, I don't know, SPRING THE FUCKING TRAP RIGHT NOW!!!”

“Roger, Dash… activating the Light Net unit,” Applejack pressed her EGO and resumed looking through her binoculars again.

“Buuuuuuuut Appppllllllleeeejaaaacckkkkk!!!!”

“DAMMIT, RARITY!!! NOT NOW!!!!! And for the last damn time, PUT ON YOUR ARMOR!!!!!”

Rainbow Dash frowned at her emitter console in her cockpit as Rarity’s voice seemed to be begging Applejack to get to baking, and Applejack’s voice kept on arguing back. “The hell- ?”

“Is something wrong?” Twilight Sparkle asked from the co- pilot seat in the back.

“I really have no friggin’ clue,” Rainbow Dash replied. “Ok, we’re coming up on the swarm now… the Light Net should fire as soon as those little bastards cross the sensors… God, I seriously hope this works…”

Rainbow Dash and Twilight were flying in The Filly Flash, a converted Shadowbolt fighter jet painted light blue and outfitted with an extra seat in the cockpit. The Filly Flash screamed through the air on afterburners as it struggled to reach a large, ominious black cloud of small, spherical fly- like creatures looming over the last stretches of The Everfree Rainforest and heading straight for Sweet Apple Acres.

Down on the farm, Rarity grabbed Applejack’s arm and stared at her, her hair extremely frizzy and her eyes glazed over in the sort of general malaise that only the genius possess and the insane lament. “Now, you listen here, Abigail Jacqueline Smith, and you listen good… when Ralph Lauren eats a Bear Claw in your boutique, and he says that he absolutely adores it, you always, always have those Bear Claws on hand for him, always, understood?”

Up above, Rainbow Dash tried to maneuver her advanced warplane as Applejack and Rarity continued to argue over her console emitter.

“Goddammit, Rare, I will bake you SO MANY BEAR CLAWS if you just leave me alone, right now, SO HELP ME GOD!!!”

Twilight Sparkle frowned as she listened in. “Wow… things really don’t sound too good down there, do they?”

“Well, things really don’t look so good up here,” Dash replied darkly, sweat covering her brow, “we’re here,”

Twilight looked out of the bubble canopy to see the hideous cloud of killer insects flying right under them. She gulped hard, knowing what was coming up very, very soon, and the exact probability it had of working successfully.

Below the swarm, a miles- long strip of metal beeped as the parasprites crossed it; suddenly, a large screen made of light shot out over the insects, large metal balls tying the ends down before dropping back down to Earth; the swarm was stopped dead as the net balls activated thrusters and began flying, wrapping the net tighter and tighter around them.

“We did it!!! WOOO!!!” Twilight shouted rapturously; it seemed as if Plan B wouldn't be put into effect, after all, which made her extremely happy.

“Um… think again, fearless leader,” Rainbow Dash pointed out the cockpit to where a small, coherent group of parasprites had escaped the Light Net and had continued on their way towards Sweet Apple Acres.

“What’s going on?” Applejack asked from the emitter. “Did it work?”

“Negative, AJ, some of the little fuckers got through,” Dash sighed.

“Well, shit,” Applejack cursed, “How long ‘til they reach Ponyville?”

Dash calculated that on her console. “Um, it should take them at least 5 minutes to reach Sweet Apple Acres and 45 minutes to get to Ponyville… AJ, I think you should activate the evacuation signal, this is cutting it dangerously close for the people in town… and where the hell is Pinkie Pie?!?!”

“Don’t know,” AJ responded, “but I’ll get everybody ta Canterlot, starting now. Are y’all goin’ to Plan B?”

Rainbow Dash stared at Twilight who sighed very heavily; it looked as if they were going through with Plan B, after all.

“Yes Applejack, I think it’s time for Plan B,” she responded reluctantly.

“Alright, sugarcube… good luck, then,”

“Thanks Applejack… I’ll need it,” Twilight sighed again. “Ok, Dash, just… get me close. I’ll do the rest…”

“Roger, oh fearless leader,” Rainbow Dash saluted as she banked The Filly Flash steeply downwards; the fighter then stopped to hover right above the remaining parasprites, matching its speed with theirs.

“Alright, I can do this, I can do this…” Twilight breathed in deeply as she closed up her PALADIN helmet. “I can do this… right, Rainbow Dash?”

“Um, sure Twi, yeah… you’re The King of The World, King Kong ain’t got nothing on you,” Rainbow Dash pressed a few buttons on her console. “Ok, opening up the canopy now- get ready,”

“Right… I can do this, I can do this… I mean, how much harder is this than The Nightmare Incident, right, hahaha?”

“Get ready,” was all that Dash replied as she shut her own helmet. She opened the cockpit canopy, and an intense wind whooshed through. Twilight threw a steel cable over the side and, still repeating “I can do this”, started to slowly climb over The Filly Flash and down the cable, inching ever closer at high speeds towards the parasprites below.

“I can do this, I can do this… HOOOOLY SHIIIIT!!!!” Twilight was suddenly jerked hard to the right; the parasprites had suddenly banked in another direction, and The Filly Flash banked in turn to keep up with it.

“RAAAAAINBOOOOW DAAAAASH!!!!” Twilight yelled into her helmet communications system angrily as she was tossed about like a rag, “WAAAAAAATCH IIIIIIIIIT!!!!”

“Sorry, Twi,” Dash communicated to her, “the parasprites must’ve seen an animal or something… we gotta keep on ‘em!”

“Ohhhh… I think I’m gonna be sick,” Twilight hung on for dear life, swinging wildly back and forth, as the fighter caught up with the cloud and settled over it again. Twilight’s vision became less blurry, and she saw that Sweet Apple Acres was fast approaching in the distance beyond the cloud; time was running out...

“Ok, Twilight, now or never!!!” Twilight heard Rainbow Dash shout from her helmet.

“Right…” Twilight activated her horn, and a glove of spiraling purple light entwined her right hand. She aimed the device at the parasprites and charged it full of energy. “…here we go…”

Twilight emitted a strange, phasing energy from her horn, and it projected straight into the heart of the parasprite horde in pulsating waves. Twilight concentrated with all of her might but soon found that, no matter how much energy she put into it, she just couldn't slow them down in the slightest; frazzled and exhausted, she gave up, panting hard as the glow on her horn died.

“Well… in case you were feeling curious, Rainbow… it turns out I can’t do it,” she glumly informed Dash.

“Dammit, Twilight, we’re out of time! They’re gonna reach Sweet Apple Acres any second!” Dash scolded her.

“Well, I’m SORRY, I just can’t do it! It’s not like I have any other magic tricks up my PALADIN!!!” Twilight shouted back in frustration.

“Hey, you were the one who messed with the parasprites in the first place!!!” Rainbow argued back before switching to a terribly performed and mocking Twilight Sparkle imitation. “’Oh, Rainbow Dash, it’s all so simple, really, all we need to do is apply some fancy- schmancy Equestrian know- how, and all the parasprites in the Everfree will stop eating Applejack’s crops in a jiffy- ipso facto, quid pro quo!!!’… hey, hey, it worked… they’re not interested in the food anymore!!!” Rainbow Dash sighed as she unconsciously fingered her joystick trigger. “Siiiiigh… and it’s also not like you accidentally made them to be, gee, I don’t know, nearly indestructible or something… somehow,”

“Well, excuuuuse me!” Twilight was getting snippily irate. “I’m sooooooo sorry my current job description entails genetically manipulating a species that I know absolutely nothing about, using advanced technology that I only kinda know nothing about!!! You know,” she waved her inactive horn at the cockpit, “sometimes this thing just has a mind of its own!!!”

“Girls? I just wanted to say that I’m really, really sorry about all of this…” Fluttershy’s voice suddenly popped out from all of their emitters, her actual whereabouts unknown. “If I didn’t keep that single parasprite at my cottage, which somehow reproduced asexually after I gave it a bath and fed it after midnight last night… awww, but it was just sooo cute, with it’s big, glowing eyes and soft, gentle purring…”

“NOT NOW!!!” Rainbow Dash and Twilight both yelled at her at the same time.

“Eeep!- sorry, guess this is a bad time,” Fluttershy apologized before cutting off her transmission.

Rainbow Dash shook her head as she tried to reach Applejack again on her emitter. “AJ, things are going to hell up here, the swarm’s about to reach you any second now… did you evacuate the town yet? AJ? Applejack, come in,”

“Goddammit, NO Rarity,” she heard Applejack still arguing with Rarity over the emitter, “there is no way in hell I’m helping you build a non- parasprite ravaged replica of Ponyville in order ta fool Ralph Lauren when he gets here! What’s the matter with you?!”

Twilight sighed as she hung on for dear life from a moving fighter jet over a swarm of carnivorous mutated insects. “I really, really, really should have listened to my mother about GMOs… siiiigh… well… it’s all over now...”

Suddenly, Twilight jerked her head towards her eggo on her arm as an emitter transmission displayed the words “EGO SYSTEM OVERRIDE” and began playing what sounded like digital polka; in addition, a very cute, totally pink cartoon pony also popped out from her EGO, happily prancing around in the air before winking assuredly at Twilight.

“HEEEEERE SHEEEE COOOOMES TOOOO SAAAAVE THE DAAAAAAAY!!!!” Twilight heard Pinkie Pie brightly sing along with a refrain in the polka over the transmission, and she smiled tiredly and gratefully.

Suddenly, some sort of crazy flying contraption dropped out of the sun, shooting right towards The Filly Flash and the parasprite swarm. In its pilot seat sat Pinkamena Diane Pie, dressed like some sort of steampunk enthusiast, or maybe just a very imaginative Snoopy, complete with goggles, vintage leather helmet and a fluttering silk scarf; she grinned in a Rainbow Dash- esque, Devil- May- Care way as she fired her thrusters and headed straight into the heart of the parasprite swarm.

“Pinkie Pie, where the hell have you been?!” Rainbow Dash angled The Filly Flash out of the way for her.

“Sorry, girls!” Pinkie spoke into her EGO, “I figured out how to stop the parasprites on my own, but it took me some time to get Plan P ready!”

“Plan P?” Fluttershy found the courage to speak into her EGO again. “But we never discussed a Plan P…”

Pinkie Pie giggled, even as she headed into a cloud of monstrous insects ready to devour her. “That’s because the P stands for ‘Pinkie’, silly filly!”

The parasprites below sensed Pinkie’s presence (and her polka) and, discovering a ready source of fresh meat flying right at them, began to all hungrily climb up to meet her. Seeing death staring her right in the face, Pinkie Pie giggled again quite happily and pressed a button on her cockpit console. The bottom of her crazy contraption opened up, and what appeared to be a speaker system made entirely out of brass horns shot out, aimed right for the parasprites. The horns suddenly projected her digital polka in a tight, coherent beam of sound energy, right into the parasprites about to eat her; the swarm stopped dead in their tracks, their big multifaceted eyes widening, and they seemed spellbound by the homemade MIDI music. Pinkie hovered around the horde as she continued to enchant them, checking to make sure that they were completely under her control; when she was satisfied that the day had been saved, she floated her crazy contraption down to the ground, her speaker system automatically angling to ensure that the parasprites stayed enchanted and obediently following her Leonardo da Vinci- esque helicopter thingy.

Pinkie Pie’s crazy contraption came to a rest right at the boundary between the Everfree Rainforest and Sweet Apple Acres, the parasprites bouncing happily in a tight line behind it. A floating, waiting robot near the ground obediently took out the speaker system, still playing, from Pinkie’s aircraft and carried it towards the big Light Net holding all of the others; Fluttershy suddenly ran forward in her PALADIN and began talking to the little creatures:

“Bad parasprites, bad…” she scolded gently, even though they bounced along and seemed to be ignoring her, “…trying to eat people is very, very wrong, you’re all old enough to know that, shame on you…”

Nearby, The Filly Flash dropped a very nauseous Twilight Sparkle on the ground, where she shuttered her pal helmet, stepped off of the cable, and tried in vain to walk straight; Rainbow Dash got out of the cockpit and shuttered her helmet as well, sweating profusely underneath her PALADIN armor; from the direction of the farm houses, Applejack ran up, outfitted in pal armor too, followed by a very manic- looking, frizzy- haired Rarity still dressed in normal clothing.

“…Look, all I’m saying is, keep an open order throughout the entire year, that’s all I’m asking… maybe, just maybe, you could keep all of the Bear Claws stuffed in a silo!” Rarity was still muttering.

Applejack just shook her head as she walked over to where the other Mane Six were resting on their haunches, quite worn out from the whole escapade which, surprisingly, seemed to have just passed by Rarity's attention in its entirety.

“Y’all alright?” AJ called out to the others, who all nodded but groaned tiredly.

“Oh yeah, hehe… I mean…” Rainbow Dash was still trying to catch her breath. “…Doesn’t shit like this happen to us, like, roughly every week or something?”

Applejack just grinned and shook her head again.

“Oh, thaaank you, Piiiinkie Piiie,” Twilight slurred a bit as she hugged her vivacious little genius friend, “Forrrrrrr- ahem- for a second there, I thought we’d really bought the farm… haha… please excuse the bad pun, I’m very, very dizzy right now,”

Pinkie laughed with genuine mirth, almost as if Twilight was a professional stand- up comedian. “Oh, Twilight! If you all had listened to me from the very start, none of this would’ve even been a problem! Of course parasprites have an innate fondness for music… it soothes the wild beasts, ya know!”

Twilight cocked her head. “But… how did you know that?”

Pinkie Pie shivered a little before shrugging happily. “Just a lucky guess!”

Twilight blinked a few times, but then decided to brush that off as just another “Pinkie moment”; after all, she had learned better over time- oh, did she ever… Twilight still remembered, with a distinct chill, all of the bee stings…

“Well, anyways, thanks again… with Fluttershy and your Pinkiebots' help, I’ll be able to reverse the genetic changes I’ve made and turn these things back into ordinary, albeit still troublesome, pests… I’ll definitely have to study them further before trying anything like that ever again… OW,” Twilight frowned and grasped her head, which had finally stopped spinning, only to gift her with a brand- spankin’- new migraine. “…Um, say, Pinkie… you wouldn’t happen to have any Advil on that crazy contraption of yours, would you?”

Pinkie shook her head. “Nah, sorry… only Aspirin,”

“I loathe Aspirin…” Twilight muttered under her breath in disgust as she clutched her aching temples.

Right then and there, Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle walked up to The Mane Six; Apple Bloom was looking upon the entire scene in absolute, total confusion: there were multiple strange machines about, most of the Mane Six looked like they had just been through a battle, and one of them was even scolding a group of what looked like big marching insects as they followed what looked like an enormous robotic party balloon playing some sort of MIDI polka, leading all of the little bugs into an ENORMOUS net made entirely out of light and containing a far larger number of said bugs who were also swaying in time to the happy beat.

“Does anybody else want the other half of my Twix?” Sweetie Belle asked nicely, seemingly not caring about the absurd environment that they now found themselves standing in.

“Oooh! Oooh! Me, mememe,” Scootaloo raised her hand and hopped in the air, seemingly not noticing the scene around them, either. Sweetie Belle gave her a Twix bar, and she proceeded to munch on it quite happily as parasprites continued to bounce past her.

“What in the world…” Apple Bloom breathed, her mind stopping completely for a lack of understanding what she was looking at, exactly.

Applejack looked over to where her sister was standing. “Apple Bloom?”

Apple Bloom turned around and threw out a big grin. “APPLEJACK!!!”

“SIS!” Applejack shouted right back and ran up to hug her; they both laughed happily together.

“The gates were unlocked, but you weren’t home…”

“I’m mighty sorry I couldn’t pick ya up from the airport, sis, as you can see, I got a lil’ tied up here,”

When they let go, Apple Bloom frowned as she looked over Applejack’s battle dress. “…Um, is everything ok?”

“Oh, this? Pssst yeah,” Applejack waved her hand. “Jus’ getting’ rid of some crop pests… nothing’ doin’,”

Apple Bloom watched as insects the size of softballs marched to digital polka in military precision past her. “…Those don’t really look like regular ol’ crop pests ta me, Applejack…”

Applejack scoffed again. “Aw, nothin’ yer big sis can’t handle… so, what about you? How’re you, lil’ sis? How’s college going?”

Apple Bloom smiled, stealing glances at the parasprites every so often. “Good, good, mah classes at UCLA are goin’ real good… sooo… um, you said y'all needed mah help on some, uh-” she cringed as the last polka sound, a resounding cymbal crash, played out, “-architectural n farmin’ problems out here?”

Applejack tsked and hugged her sister again. “Awww, lil’ ol’ Bethany, goin’ off ta college n’ findin’ her place in the world,” Applejack sniffed. “Ma n’ pa’d just… be so proud of ya, sis,”

Apple Bloom looked very uncomfortable, but only for a second; she smiled again at Applejack when they let go again. “Yup, they sure would be, hehe… soooo, about those problems…”

“Aw, don’t you worry ‘bout that fer now,” Applejack dismissed, her arm around her sister’s shoulder, “wha’s important is that yer here, Apple Bloom! Let’s get ya settled down firs’ before we really start gettin’ down to the bones of it, ok?”

“Ok, thanks,” Apple Bloom smiled.

Applejack smiled back. “Well, let’s get ya introduced properly here… why, here’s Doc Fluttershy rite now!”

“Applejack, so I’ve talked to the parasprites, and they’ve agreed to attend bi- weekly rehabilitation sessions in addition to the gene therapy… I told Twilight but she didn’t look like she was in the mood to-“ Fluttershy had walked up, talking, but stopped immediately when she saw Apple Bloom. “Oh! I’m so sorry, I didn’t know that you were busy… I’ll come back at a later time…”

“Nothin’ doin’, ‘Shy!” Applejack laughed. “Fluttershy, I wantcha ta meet mah little sister, Apple Bloom,”

“Oh, hello, Applejack’s told us so much about you,” Fluttershy shook Apple Bloom’s hand gently. “She’s also shown us all of your baby pictures, too… you were just sooo adorable in diapers!”

Apple Bloom frowned. “Thank you… kindly?”

“And this here is Rarity… I know, I know, you already know all their names, but I’m jus’ so proud ta be showin’ ya off is all,” Applejack joked as Rarity walked up to them, muttering to herself, her hair still sticking up.

“Applejack, darling…” Rarity spoke to her friend, “…now, I know this might sound a little, em, crazy, but… what if we took thousands of Bear Claws and spelled out ‘Welcome, Ralph Lauren’ on the runway when his plane landed at the airport? I mean, that would impress him, right? Surely, it would,”

“…Um, so this is Rarity… Rarity, Apple Bloom…” Applejack tried to continue her introductions.

Rarity turned to notice Apple Bloom standing there; she cleared her throat and patted down her hair, straightening out her rumpled clothing as she smiled and extended a hand. “A real pleasure, darling, Applejack’s told us so much about you. How’s school coming along, dearie?”

“Great, great,” Apple Bloom smiled. “Just great, thanks fer askin’… it’s nice to meet you, as well,”

“And this here is the one and only Rainbow Dash!” Applejack continued as Dash walked up, drinking heavily from a bottle of water, a towel around her armored neck. “Dash, this here’s mah little sister, Apple Bloom.”

“Heeeey, ‘sup?” Dash greeted. “Nice to finally meetcha! Hey AJ,” Rainbow chuckled and elbowed Applejack playfully, “some day, huh? Man, that was almost as bad as the time we both almost shot each other in the face, hahaha! I mean, am I right? Am I right? Awwww, you know I’m right,”

“Skittles-- ex- nay, ex- nay!” Applejack reminded her irately and tilted her neck at Apple Bloom.

“Yeah… well, nice ta meetcha, kid! I gotta go put The Filly Flash away, maybe clean her up a bit. Stay frosty!” Rainbow Dash bid farewell, grinning.

“Thanks… you too…”

Applejack sighed, shaking her head, and tried to smile again. “Um, so this here is… siiiiiigh… Pinkie Pie… Pinkie Pie, Apple Bloom…”

“Oh, hi!” Pinkie Pie greeted brightly as she walked up and shook Apple Bloom’s hand, her Snoopy Sopwith Camel outfit stowed safely back on her crazy contraption. “You must be Bethany, Applejack’s little sister. She’s told us so much about you!”

“Hi… yes, it’s a real pleasure, Pinkie,” Apple Bloom replied.

“Oh, I really do hope you enjoy your stay, you’re sure to meet so many wonderful new friends and have so much fun while you’re here!” Pinkie cooed. “Well, I’m off to get a bite to eat and take the rest of the day off. So nice meeting you, Apple Bloom! See you around!”

“Thank you, Pinkie, it was nice meetin’ you too,” Apple Bloom bid farewell as her sister gave Pinkie Pie a funny look for some reason.

Why, she seems like the most normal one yet, if you ask me, Apple Bloom thought to her self.

“Um, well… ahem, that was Pinkie Pie… I think… and last but not least, a woman who needs no kinds of introductions, Dr. Twilight Sparkle!” Applejack gestured to Twilight who was still sitting on the ground and clutching at her temples, groaning. “…Um, Twilight? You ok, sugarcube?”

“Huh? What?” Twilight looked up at Applejack and squinted. “Why is it so bright?”

“Twilight, this here’s Apple Bloom… ya know, mah sister?” Applejack reminded her of the context of the conversation.

Twilight blinked a couple of times in the sun. “Ohhhhh, right, right…” she slowly tried to get to her feet, but when she fully stood up she ended up wobbling and falling, prompting Apple Bloom to catch her.

“Woah!” Apple Bloom exclaimed as she held Twilight up, “You alright there?”

“Yes, yes I am, ummm… Apple Bloom is it?”

“Yes, it’s a real honor n’ a pleasure ta meetcha, Dr. Sparkle, mah sister’s told me all about you,”

Twilight smiled but immediately looked very serious for a moment. Still squinting, she grabbed Apple Bloom by the shoulders and looked her dead in the eye, her face coming within inches of the younger girl’s. “Apple Bloom,” she whispered, quite softly and hoarsely.

“Um… yes?” Apple Bloom would be lying if she said that she didn’t feel a bit apprehensive at the moment.

“Do you have any Advil on you? Like, right now, at this very second?”

“Um…” Apple Bloom’s brain froze again, shortly after it had worked so hard to restart itself. “…What?”

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

Discord hummed another random song as he slowly waltzed around with himself in circles all over his old throne room. Oh, it felt so nice to be back; Discord remembered how his black and red high- backed throne, which he had crafted for himself out of nothing, had been placed on that stepped platform, all those millennia ago; alas, Discord was reluctant to bring the old girl back, at least for now… somehow, with all he had planned, it just didn’t feel right... at least not yet…

“My lord,” Iron Will walked into the room and addressed him, “your chariot awaits.”

Discord stopped humming and dancing with himself. “Any word from the UN yet, General?”

“Just the same old line: release the hostages, evacuate the outpost, and surrender ourselves to their armed forces,”

Discord chuckled to himself. So... they really didn’t know what he had in store for them...

“Shall we go, Your Majesty?” Iron Will asked.

“Yes, Willy, let’s,” Discord hopped down from the throne platform and started to follow Iron Will out of the throne room. “Let’s all take a trip down to sunny olde Equestria together, shall we?”

Ch. 3- The Rise and Fall of The Equestrian Empire

Twilight thought that she heard traditional African drums playing as she drove up to Genzebe Zecora’s workstation, so she checked again; no, she finally decided as she turned off the engine, no African drums… just the sound of my head being murdered right in front of my very own eyes, that’s all, just... business as usual…

Twilight sighed as she exited the UN jeep and looked up towards Zecora’s workstation; she had seen the world- famous archaeologist’s Deep Immersion Stratigraphy Research Station, or “The Hut” as it was better known as before, but Twilight had always felt awed by the sight of the truly amazing, extremely beautiful and entirely brand new scientific marvel deep within the boundaries of the Everfree Rainforest; there Zecora’s Hut stood before her, a saucer shaped disk of metal supported and raised up by what appeared to be five enormous living, growing Coco de Mer palms attached right to its sides as well as a millennia old, indigenous Baobab tree sprouting right from its center. Twilight walked up to the Baobab, where there hung some sort of jerry- rigged lift, and got in the contraption, raising her EGO to her face after she had secured the gate in order to hail the scientist working above.

“Why, the stars shine so brightly for others to see, so who at my workstation could this now be?” Twilight heard Dr. Zecora answer her hail in what sounded like a traditional Swahili proverb, although the Alicorn Tongue always rendered the doctor’s foreign speech into what sounded like, to Twilight, plain old English with just a hint of an Ethiopian accent of some sort.

“Zecora, it’s me,” Twilight answered back into her EGO, “um, The Director said you wanted to show me something?”

“Why, Twilight Sparkle! Oh, yes, but of course,” Zecora brightly greeted the young physicist. “Miss Everstar called me today, after all, I really do hope you forgive this old horse!”

Twilight giggled as the lift began to rise, bringing her up into the saucer- shaped treehouse high above; the bottom opened up and the lift passed right on through it, bringing Twilight into the lab itself. Twilight smiled in wonder at all of the sweet, sweet juicy science that Dr. Zecora had at her disposal: screens upon computer screens of rapidly streaming data with emitter images superimposed over them; multiple tanks where Zecora would test materials by immersing them in strange, magical brews for weeks at a time, tanks that always looked a lot like cauldrons to Twilight; lastly, her eyes fell upon a small, cluttered living area and a bed, hanging over which were various objet d’art from her native homeland and the surrounding African countries. The good doctor herself was standing by an emitter screen next to one of the Coco de Mer palms going right through the structure, analyzing some type of igneous rock, staring intently at the emitter data, and shaking her head. Dr. Genzebe Zecora might have been getting on in years, but Twilight had always thought that she looked remarkably young for her age, with the sleek, toned body of a much younger woman who clearly knew how to take care of herself (certainly not Twilight Sparkle’s), deep steel- blue eyes largely uncovered by wrinkles and still possessing a certain mischievous spark; full and sensuous lips possessing a spirit in kind with her eyes; smooth, unblemished skin the color of the crust on a crème brûlée and short cropped, jet- black raven hair tinged with the only true signs of her age, a few streaks of grey and white here and there along her head. She turned to Twilight, smiling as the lift doors opened to let her fellow scientist out.

“Why, my Dear Doctor Sparkle, how you really do roam,” Zecora greeted in person as Twilight walked up to shake her hand, “All over strange paths to my cramped- little home!”

“Ok,” Twilight laughed, “now I know you’re just screwing with me, Zecora.”

Zecora laughed heartily at that: “Dr. Sparkle, now, you know Swahili is not really my cup of tea, and besides,” she suddenly switched back to her more natural- sounding native Oromo, “what’s the point of living if you can’t even have a little fun every now and then, hmmm?”

Twilight shook her head, still laughing as she massaged her temples. “Yeah, me having a migraine and having to stop my jeep every few kilometers ‘cus of Fluttershy’s newly installed “Manticore Crossings” is not really what I’d call fun, Genzebe… I mean, why aren’t you just in The West Castle with the rest of your department?”

Zecora smiled as she lovingly stroked her hand over a living Coco de Mer trunk next to her. “Twilight Sparkle, this is what I do; I mean, what better way could there be to really understand these machines our ancestors have most graciously left us than living right here in ‘the thick of it’, as one would say, learning and studying up on all that one could about this ancient, forgotten, and dare I say quite enchanted country as it really was, long before The Civil War brought about humanity’s Fall from The Garden?” Zecora sighed, not in sadness but in some sort of incomprehensible longing restrained only by the eons that had passed long before her. “I know this all may seem like a strange new place and a ‘brave new world’ to you, Dr. Sparkle, but for me this is…” she smiled knowingly, “…home.”

“Well, true as that may be,” Twilight’s head seemed to be beating with African drums again, “you’d literally have to be crazy to work here…”

Zecora laughed heartily. “Well, Dr. Sparkle, 'since I now find myself in good company then, yes, everything turns out OK in the end!'” she shook her head. “Really, Twilight, what would you have done if The United Nations had called you out of your very cushy retirement to work on all of this?” she motioned to her glorious Hut all around her. “I mean, Dr. Heartstrings is only one pony, after all, and it really seems as if my favorite student has now settled into her new life as “The Brand New Daring Do”, as Time Magazine so very pithily put it,”

Twilight giggled at that. “Yeah, good ol’ Lyra, heeheehee… you know, she says Bon Bon’s taken a real liking to The Big Apple, and they both send you their… regards…” Twilight immediately stopped smiling as a new wave of pain and nausea hit her square in the eye; Zecora frowned with worry.

“Dr. Sparkle?” she asked, touching her shoulder, “Are you feeling all right?”

“… Huh? Yeah, just the migraines again, Zecora…” Twilight offered a sheepish smile and Zecora nodded in sympathy. “…Um, so Director Luna said that you wanted to show me something about the Level 1 Artifact at the Amazonian Outpost?” Twilight asked the talented archaeologist before her.

Zecora nodded sagaciously. “Yes, yes… tell me, Twilight, have you ever heard of the Draconequus statue before?”

“Only what I read in the old Equestrian Codexes… isn’t it supposed to just be, um, a statue of some ancient Equestrian tyrant, or something?”

“No... unfortunately, it’s not just a statue, Twilight…” Zecora sighed, and then moved over to a large emitter display in the lab. “…here, come… I want to show you something…”

Twilight came over as Zecora activated the emitter; suddenly, Twilight found herself face to face with another ancient Equestrian historical record coalescing right before her eyes.

“These, Dr. Sparkle are, as far as we know, the very last holographic transmissions ever recorded by the Elements of Harmony before they went dark, transmissions that tell us of the very tragic rise and fall of the infamous, dreaded and much maligned Emperor of Equestria… however, I feel as if a tale as big as this needs a more, ah, proper way to tell it, as it were…”

Suddenly, Zecora switched from her native language to one that Twilight vaguely remembered hearing before- it was an extinct Ethiopian language that she herself couldn’t quite remember the name of, but, according to Rarity, it had been the original language of the Ethiopian Bible; in front of the archaeologist, the emitter streams coalesced into the likeness of a fancy chamber room; inside, Equestrians dressed in what Twilight thought looked like Victorian British clothing, only more stylized and colorful, were crying and mourning over a bed holding two still figures, both dressed in fanciful, ornate, and more traditional Equestrian garb; on the left lay a very dignified looking stallion colored as black as night itself, with twisting, flowing, curly blue locks of hair that sparkled with multiple little constellations of brightly shining miniature stars; beside him lay a graceful mare, much paler in color than her counterpart, with a mane resembling the sunrise itself; her brilliant multi- colored hues fluttered in the wind around her even as her royal likeness lay there in the chamber, still and unmoving; her arms were crossed over her chest, just as her sable mate's were as he lay there next to her; the two stately figures lay in obliviousness as the surrounding ponies wailed and cried over their bed in collective sadness and desperation.

“In the very last days of Equestria’s reign,

When Ponykind littered the stars on their wings,

The Elements’ influence started to wane,

As Canterlot lost both its Queen and its King…

As Equestrian royalty, nobles, and high officials all mourned the deaths of their much beloved monarchs, Twilight noticed, for the very first time, two rather young fillies standing there at the side of the bed; the taller, older one had the same sort of multicolored, ever- flowing mane as The Queen and the shorter, younger one had the very same star- speckled blue field as The King; both little fillies looked to each other in uncertainty as Twilight herself gave Zecora a funny look; the archaeologist simply and silently returned her gaze with a thoughtful one of her own as she continued to narrate the ancient Equestrian tale playing itself out in front of them both:

“The heirs of the throne, they were not ready yet,

Too young to be leaders in such a grim age,

And so they were given the duty, instead,

Of bearing The Elements, lest favor fade;

The Crown, then, itself would go to another,

An Alicorn thought to be quite weak and bloodless,

And in such a way, it is told, the queen’s brother

Did find himself turned into good King Harmonius…

Twilight watched as the scene shifted to show a rather anxious- looking, rather ordinary stallion standing right in front of her; his top hat was removed from his head and a crown was placed on top, the weight of the object seemingly weighing down unbearably on the very reluctant monarch; he looked all around him as all of the noble ponies in the throne room politely clapped for him, every last one of them looking every bit as anxious as their brand new king...

“But bloodless and weak do not good monarchs make,

And sinister forces, they schemed and they planned,

'Til gentle Harmonius, a kingdom at stake,

Was plagued by secession, as blood freely ran…

The scene changed again to show what looked like a single section of some sort of no- man’s- land; Twilight’s stomach turned in protest as she found herself looking upon a long battle line of ancient Equestrian warriors clad in golden armor preparing to be assaulted by waves upon waves of opposing warriors whose suits of armor were painted in all sorts of colors except gold; above the battlefield, ancient flying Equestrian war machines and fighter planes from both respective sides fired brilliant Light Bolts at each other, engaged in a very fierce struggle of their own; every so often, gigantic explosions sent raining debris down over the warriors’ heads below. Twilight watched as more colorfully painted Equestrians charged towards their golden- clad brethren, screaming and firing, falling as they were gunned to death or blown to pieces with exploding shells landing all around them…

“FOOOOOR THE BAROOOOONNNNN!!!!!” A Rebel Equestrian yelled as he ran up, killing two Loyalists with his Light Rifle as he did; his scream soon changed pitch as a Loyalist ran him clean through with a Light Pike, stopping him cold; suddenly, another Rebel charged up to his position and severed the pikeman’s arm clean off with a Light Glaive of her own as the Loyalist reached up for his grievous wound, screaming uncontrollably as well...

Another Rebel was shot in the chest multiple times as she ran up to the Loyalist Palisade, a sort of barrier made completely out of light, gasping and grasping for the edge to climb over; right then, a High- Yield Gravity Shell landed right at her feet and exploded; her body fell against the barrier, slump, her hand still locked in a death grip around the Palisade edge; all around her, the pitched slaughter continued, unabated…

“As brother killed brother, and sisters did fall,

Harmonius, saddened, on Elements called;

In spite of intentions, or tears that he shed,

Oh, how he believed the gods left him for dead…

Twilight’s heart was still racing in her chest as the scene changed once again to show Harmonius kneeling in a private chamber before what looked like a miniature, colorful, swirling constellation before him: The Elements of Harmony. His hands were clasped in prayer, and his eyes were severely reddened from hours upon hours of crying to himself in misery.

“My Lords,” he addressed The Elements reverently, “My ponies are suffering and dying… all Equestrians everywhere are suffering and dying… my family… my own Queen and my foals, they’re… they’re all…” Harmonius squeezed his eyes shut as he shuddered, fresh tears falling onto the marble below. “…My Lords, why do You not answer our prayers in our time of need? Why do You continue to make us suffer so, from this never ending pestilence and strife? Surely, we have done nothing to deserve this, we have done nothing but try to please The Lords On High… we have only ever strived to serve You, to follow what You Yourselves hath commanded of us… My Lords, why do You still afflict us so? Please… say something, anything,”

The Elements only continued to pulsate in a gentle hum and a slow orbit in front of Harmonius’s face; his melancholic expression soon turned entirely bitter and quite dark as his teeth began to grind tighter and tighter in his mouth...

“Speak, damn You- SPEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAK!!!!!!!!” Harmonius bellowed out in fury, choking on his own tears as he broke down both mentally and emotionally from all of the strain that he now found himself under; he began to sob quite pitifully with his head in his hands as The Elements continued to say nothing, to give no advice to their extremely frustrated subject and creation.

Slowly, Harmonius raised his head, a sorrowful look playing again on his tear- soaked face. “My Lords, please forgive this old fool… we- we do not know what we are saying, please, we beg of you, forgive us… we know, Our Lords, of course we know that ‘tis a most grievous sin to be… ungrateful for all of the miraculous wonders that you have bestowed upon your children, but… if You could only help us, for we now find that our needs and our desire for salvation grow more and more dire, with each passing day… if You could only save us now… I know, I know, we are nothing but a ravenous, greedy horde of depraved sinners in your eyes, Our Lords, but… if you could only gift us all with a little bit more of your grace and presence…. Please, I'm begging you, please...”

It could've been due to his continually miserable state of sleep deprivation, or perhaps Harmonius was really starting to lose his mind in earnest; regardless, he could've sworn that he had just heard The Elements whisper his name out loud as he groveled there in front of them, all alone in the chamber; Harmonius quickly looked around, breathing hard, but he soon found that there were no other sounds to be heard in the room save a gentle whirring and humming emanating from The Lords On High Themselves; Harmonius sighed heavily, looking down towards the floor again.

“If… if none of You shall even deign to help your own ponies, Our Lords…” he muttered in complete abjection and despair, “…then… then I guess I know what I must do…”

Twilight watched as the scene changed again to show the king planning something on emitters with ancient Equestrian scientists and doctors dressed in lab coats standing all around him; Harmonius was yelling and gesturing, arguing with the top minds of the country about something which they were desperately trying to dissuade him from putting into action; Harmonius, however, appeared resolute in his machinations, and his royal advisors finally nodded, relenting to the will of the king.

“The King, fair and gentle,” Zecora continued her narrative, “was, in fact, quite the thinker,

And soon he devised such a plan as to tinker,

With forces and powers- he knew not the risk,

Of Elements, Harmony, taken and twisted…

Twilight watched as Harmonius lay on an operating table, the chest over his heart exposed by surgical implements; The king, still very much alive and screaming, was subject to the immense torture of having his own still beating heart removed from his body as a golden, misshapen heart glowing with a fierce, bright red energy was implanted in its place; as soon as the false heart was safely inside of his chest, the emitter consoles being monitored by the ancient Equestrian doctors began to emit loud, urgent warnings, and they all began to panic; suddenly, the implanted heart’s glowing reached a fevered pitch shortly before it fired a fiery ring of energy that spread in a shockwave all around the operating room, killing everyone else besides the king, who was quickly enveloped in an enormous, protective bubble of light; when the shockwave subsided, the likeness of Harmonius, who, as it turned out, had actually been quite distracted from all of the commotion by the sudden, engaged examination of his own body, turned around, smiling maniacally and in genuine glee, either blissfully unaware of or simply unsympathetic to the dead scientists who now littered the entire room; the previously gaping hole in his chest was now covered up by a glowing, jagged scar resembling a curled- up dragon spiraling into itself, the wound itself rapidly fading in brightness as Harmonius was completely remade into something far beyond a mere Alicorn king...

“The False Heart of Chaos, inside him, was born,

With all of vast Time and of Space at command;

But poor King Harmonius, gentleness scorned,

Was driven mad, for he could not understand…

Harmonius stood before his country, a very changed pony indeed; he smiled as vigorous clapping rang throughout The Main Castle's entire courtyard, his holographic visage bearing down with some sort of maniacal glee upon his own intimidated citizens; the very air itself was being intermittently punctuated by sonic booms emanating from squadrons upon squadrons of red, black and gold fighter jets zooming over the crowds in expertly held formations far overhead; nearby, a professional brass band played a rousing, jingoistic tune behind the emboldened monarch as he spoke into what appeared to be a microphone placed on top of a podium draped in the brand new Equestrian royal colors.

“My fellow Equestrians,” Harmonius began his speech, “for far too long has our beloved country lived in fear of imminently ignoble attacks stemming from treacherous barbarian warlords and their mutinous armies waiting, right outside these very gates of our fair kingdom, to kill and enslave all of your sons and your daughters as soon as they get the chance…” various murmurs and jeers began to issue from the crowd, “…for far too long have your mothers and your fathers, even lil’ ol’ granny too, cowered under the bright, big stars up above in fear of some horrible alien invasion perpetrated on us by foreign empires filled with strange beasts and CRYSTAL WEIRDOS!!!”

The mob assembled there in the courtyard suddenly roared out loud in a vicious frenzy, holding blazing torches and portraits of their king aloft as they did; Harmonius smiled; blood was in the water…

“Brothers and sisters, Children of the Elements…” Harmonius continued to speak, heavy- lidded, entirely lost in a sort of dark and convoluted haze stemming from both the adrenaline coursing through his veins as well as his own grotesquely distorted, wholly content, and supremely self- satisfied hubris. “…For far too long have we prayed to gods who do not hear our call, who do not even care that we are all falling dead, everyday, in droves, who never even gave us the time of day, really…” he began to mumble to himself in insanity as the crowd began to quiet down and slip into a nervous, unsure murmur.

“…Well, fillies and gentlecolts, those days are long over, in case you haven’t noticed… because right now we take back our Elemental Land from the heathens, RIGHT NOW we make THEM fear the next imminent attack, and RIGHT AT THIS VERY MOMENT we go forth to enlighten every nefarious warmongerer who lusts after this nation with a Light Bolt, to warmly welcome every non- pony degenerate who wants just the same with a spear through the HEART!!!” Harmonius roared as the crowd went wild again; some of his more rabid followers were already beginning to chant his new nom de guerre out loud, over and over again. “RIGHT NOW, MY BROTHERS AND SISTERS, I AM THE ONLY DEALER IN TOWN WHO CAN GIVE YOU WHAT YOU WANT THE MOST- I GIVE YOU YOUR GRACE!!! I HAND YOU BACK YOUR SALVATION!!! THE ONLY QUESTION HERE IS, FOLKS: DO YOU WANT THEM BADLY ENOUGH?!?!”

Rabid screams of ecstasy filled the air, along with red, black and yellow balloons. “ABANDON HOPE, ALL YE WHO OPPOSE US,” Harmonius smirked as he paused for effect, “CHILDREN OF HARMONY- YOUR BRAND SPANKIN’ NEW LORD IS HERE!!!!”

Harmonius raised his hands up into the air in a show of force and victory and all of it, well, nearly all of it, exploded in the most orgasmic display of lights and explosions that Equestria had ever seen before in over 10,000 years of recorded history; the band struck up another patriotic tune.

“HAIL DISCORD!!!” virtually the entire crowd, including the very sick, the infirm and even some of the little kiddies present there, too, all began to pump their collective little hooves into the air and chant: “HAIL DISCORD!!! HAIL DISCORD!!! HAIL DISCORD!!!”

Lord Discord smiled as he posed for more flattering holographic captures; in the crowd below the proud new Emperor, Twilight squinted to find a minority of ponies who did not cheer and who, instead, looked very, very worried about this brand new, entirely unprecedented regime change; they turned to themselves and started to intently discuss this troubling new turn of events, but Twilight couldn’t really hear them above all of the tumultuous cheering for “The Glorious Foundation of Our New Model Equestrian Empire”, or so it was written over and over again on silken banners throughout the entire castle courtyard in elegant, fanciful Equestrian Script…

“…That power used wisely helps all Ponykind,

But power abused doth make all of Man cry…”

The scene soon changed to that of a peasant mare crying and bowing down to the ground in complete emotional devastation; the rebel- occupied city in front of her was being blown to smithereens as imperial dirigibles draped in red, black and gold dropped hundreds upon thousands of Gravity Bombs upon enemy troops and noncombatants alike; the peasant screamed out loud in frustration.

“For Elements’ sake, stop, STOOOOOPPPPPP!!!!” she cried out to them over and over, again and again, but the bombing continued on before her, unabated; it was almost as if the war machines themselves were actively refusing to listen to any of the desperate mare's own heartrending pleas as she continued yelling out to them in complete and utter vain. “You’re killing innocent ponies, you bastards- YOU’RE KILLING MY FOALS-!”

The peasant heard a low, ominous growl before she slowly turned around, shaking; something behind Twilight’s point of view suddenly ran up to attack her, and the mare let out one last shriek of horror before the enigmatic monstrosity reached up and went right for her jugular; Twilight turned away from the emitter, trembling slightly; when she opened her eyes again, she found that Dr. Zecora had stopped the transmission and was now silently and patiently waiting on the younger, shuddering scientist before her.

“Are you absolutely sure that you're ok to go on, Dr. Sparkle?” Zecora asked in her native Oromo, her eyes calm but betraying just a hint of worry for her younger colleague. “I must warn you, the very last of the ancient Equestrian historical records that we have are not very pretty, to say the least,”

“No, it’s ok, really, it’s just my head again…” Twilight tried to brush that off and act a little tougher, “… please, continue,”

Zecora nodded, starting up the historical records again.

“And so it was that a cruel king built his empire,

Stretching its reach over Earth, over yonder;

The hollers of anguish, dissension grew higher-

Lord Discord, he sent both The Bearers to wander…

The scene changed again to that of another agitated mob, years later, shouting and jeering as a line of red, black and gold armored soldiers pushed what appeared to be a random assortment of peasants against a Canterlot wall; the poor souls all seemed to be mostly wailing and protesting their inevitable, impending doom, but, on closer inspection, neither the ponies in the crowd nor the imperial firing squad really seemed to be paying them any real attention.

“Ready!” an imperial officer dressed in Lord Discord’s colors signaled with his hand and a line of Light Rifles went up.

“H- Hail Celestia and Luna, full of grace…” one of the peasants began to pray in fear,  “…The Elements be with ye…”

“Cowards!” another peasant against the wall, an elderly stallion, yelled at both the firing squad and the angry mob gathered before them, “Dishonorable dogs!”

“Blessed are ye amongst marefolk, and blessed is The Kingdom… The Kingdom of Your F- F- Father, Equestria…”

“Murderers!” Somepony in the crowd shouted and threw a bottle.

“Traitors!” another pony added quite viciously.

“You brutalized and persecuted us over our loyalty to the Empire, and when our mares and stallions tried to resist you peaceably, you tortured and slaughtered them wholesale…” the old pony squeezed his eyes shut as bitter tears fell to the ground. “…What choice did we have?! Tell me… WHAT CHOICE DID WE HAVE?!?!”

“Cutthroats!!!”

“Loyalist Loonies!!!”

“Burn in hell, fanatics!!!”

“…But you shall all bear witness; oh, believe me, you shall all see,” the elderly peasant opened his shirt up to reveal a rather large tattoo on his chest, one of the sun and the moon intertwined over the old Alicorn royal crest. “As it is foretold by The High Priest, ‘The Sun and The Moon shall both one day return to this most accursed land, restoring Peace, Justice, Harmony, and The Rightful Rule of The Very Deathless, Immortal Elements Themselves’…”

“Aim,” the imperial officer commanded and all of his soldiers obeyed; one even took aim at the symbol of the insurgency tattooed right on the old pony’s chest.

“Holy Daughters, B- B- Bearers of Harmony, pray for us sinners, now and… and upon the hour of our d- d- deaths…” the praying peasant whimpered quite miserably to herself.

“Lord Discord,” the elderly peasant spat on the ground with disgust, “be damned… Long Live The Sun and The Moon!”

“… S- So Shall It Be.”

“Fire!”

A volley of Light Bolts soared through the air; The Sun and The Moon both fell to the earth, smoking, right along with the peasants.

“The Pony Plague unchecked, their spirits degraded,

The citizens soon turned on those they most hated,

While dreaming of peace and their glorious past,

They waited ‘til Sun and Moon flew home, at last…

Twilight watched as the scene changed yet again to that of a gaudy, ornate throne room somewhere within a grand, luxurious castle; enormous braziers of incense were steadily burning in front of great, stately fires within cauldrons, and a rather delicate golden screen blocked any view of the royal throne itself. Twilight heard the sounds of a battle echoing in the distance as a bloody, wounded imperial soldier ran up, gasping, trying to prop himself up against the wall; he bowed his head in reverence at the ornate screen before him obscuring The Emperor.

“My Lord… My Lord, it’s the- huuuh- Loyalists… they’ve breached the castle’s… defenses- cough… they… they’ve-“

Suddenly, the imperial soldier shouted out as a single Light Bolt shot right through his armor, killing him; he fell to the floor as golden clad Loyalist insurgents ran into the room; their leader raised a rather large Particle Cannon at the golden screen before him, ready to assassinate The Emperor right there on the spot.

“Lord Discord!” he growled, the cannon on his shoulder glowing brighter and brighter with each passing moment, “Go to hell, you monster-“

Suddenly, a long, arcing, spurting stream of highly energized plasma shot right out from behind the screen, completely obliterating it; the Loyalists all screamed in pain as they were each covered in highly charged ionized gases which melted through their armor with the greatest of ease, setting them all on fire. As they shrieked and rolled around on the floor, Lord Discord stepped through the remains of the screen, dressed in the finest and most colorful of silk adornments, a greatly augmented crown now perched precariously on the top of his head; he laughed in genuine mirth as he watched real live ponies suffer an extremely horrible fate right before his eyes. Lord Discord raised his right hand, very, very slowly-

The stained glass in the ceiling above him abruptly exploded as a single Alicorn warrior flew down to meet him; she was a beautiful young woman, just a couple of years older than Twilight was now, dressed in an elegantly crafted, stunning white suit of armor with lightly filagreed, tasteful gold trim all around the edges; her ever- flowing, luxuriant locks of long, voluminous hair sported all of the colors of the light spectrum, sparkling as it swept to and fro in the brisk, biting night wind; her great, white metallic wings fluttered behind her as she landed, a brightly glowing golden horn over her right hand poised to strike and a ferociously determined look playing across her big, bright pink eyes.

“DISCOOOOORD!!!” she bellowed out to him from across the throne room.

Discord chuckled at first, shaking his head and then sighing as if he were dealing with nothing more than a petulant child.

“Well, well, well…” he started to leisurely stroll around the burning throne room, “… you know, if somepony had actually told me that I’d actually live to see the day when both The Sun and The Moon rebelled against God Himself…” he smiled warmly at the glaring female Alicorn, “… well… I probably would’ve just called them silly, to be honest…”

“Dear uncle…” The Princess of The Sun looked straight at The Emperor and pleaded, “… please, for Elements’ sake, just take a look around you… do you not see for yourself all of the grievous suffering that The Heart hath wrought upon fair, wondrous Equestria? Can you not see its heinous and entirely horrible evil for what it truly is with your very own eyes?!”

Discord stopped pacing and took a long, hard look at his own throne room; all around him, his very spacious and once very ornate royal audience chamber was currently and hopelessly being engulfed in the very flames of his own utterly depraved hamartia; everywhere he looked, the badly scorched, horribly burnt bodies of his once living fellow ponies littered the floor all around him, still smoking; Discord turned back to his beloved niece with an almost dopey expression on his face, shrugging quite innocently in the process.

“Nope..." he merely replied, shaking his head, "... all good from where I’m standing."

The Princess of The Sun grit her teeth and sadly bowed her head, shuddering violently in deep despair; burning hot tears fell from her eyes in memory of the kind, sweet, gentle man that her uncle used to be, a man who had only wished to make her laugh by producing a beautiful bouquet of Star Lilies from his hand every time that he saw her smiling little face, almost as if by magic…

“Then, I suppose…” The Sun Princess sighed quite heavily, indeed, knowing full well what was about to happen next; she looked up with renewed determination as she charged her golden horn full of energy and shuttered her white helmet closed. “… That this madness must come to an end… one way or another…”

Discord smirked, cricking his neck.

Outside, Lord Discord’s entire castle situated in the middle of the primeval Amazonian Rainforest completely exploded, all at once; up from the mushroom cloud in its wake flew two shining stars locked in a fierce mid- air battle, one bright yellow, the other bright red; they both cris- crossed over the night sky at supersonic speeds, striking at each other every so often, letting off multiple, enormous explosions several megatons worth of TNT in magnitude every time that they managed to make contact...

At first, The Sun Princess seemed to be holding her own quite well against The Spirit of Chaos, but little by little Discord began to put her on the defensive until, eventually, she began to slow down and take more and more damage from him; The Princess of the Sun soon found herself floating high upon the night air on fluttering, ailing wings, her helmet shuttering open as she gasped, clutching painfully at her extremely bruised and battered body; Discord floated nearby, unaided and seemingly unscathed, cruelly mocking his valiant but beleaguered adversary in his own utter depravity.

“Oh, my dear niece, oh, how sweet,” he laughed in jest, “You know, it really is so very heartwarming to find out that, after all these years, you still don’t even have the guts to kill me…” he grinned malevolently.

The Sun Princess glared daggers at him as she charged up her horn again.

“One way or another, Discord- THIS ENDS NOW!!!” she roared, making a rapid series of complicated sigils in front of her chest with her horned hand; suddenly, six multicolored pinpoints of light appeared in a vibrant, flashing ring all around her, gathering potent, ferociously humming Harmonic Energy within themselves with each passing moment…

“The Sun was no fool; The King couldn’t be saved,

His false Heart had eaten his goodness away,

And seeing her chances of killing him slim,

She called on The Elements, sealing her kin…

The Elements of Harmony sparkled to life before The Sun Princess gathered them all in front of her and fired an enormous, powerful blast of multicolored light; Discord was struck full on, and he watched, disturbed, as all of his silken finery began to melt away within the unbearably blinding spectrum of Harmony running through the very fiber of his being, his very body itself transforming into something far more restrictive, something far, far heavier…

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!” he screamed out loud in rage and frustration, belatedly and quite uselessly bringing his arms up in an effort to protect himself from the Harmonic Blast; alas, they unwillingly froze there by his sides, unmoving. “NOOOOOOOOO-“

When the blast had subsided with a strange, prodigious phasing sound heard in its wake, a very heavy, solid stone Draconequus statue depicting the very essence of Lord Discord himself fell, quite unceremoniously, to the bottom of a vast crater where his formerly glorious residence had once stood in defiance to the rest of the world; it landed quite gently and embedded itself in the primeval Amazonian mud with a very soft thud, still smoking all along its outline; Discord's fierce, serpentine eyes glowed brightly for only a moment before fading entirely into the darkness.

The Sun Princess, still rasping and clutching at her sides, gently floated down on her battered white wings, finally coming to a rest on the mud near the statue; as she hit the dirt, she abruptly collapsed on her back entirely, still coughing extremely violently. Suddenly, legions upon legions of silver- clad warriors began to rain down from the night sky all around her; joining them was The Princess of The Moon, now a teenager clad from head to toe in royal blue and jet black armor, landing with great force and gasping in horror as she watched her older sister fall to the ground; she began running up to her in distress.

“No, no, Elements, no…” she began to cry, shuttering her helmet open, “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!”

The Moon ran over to where The Sun lay, mortally wounded and gasping for air; she slowly bent down to prop her dying sister’s head up and stroked her hair with the most tender, loving gentleness.

“L… Lu… Lulu?” The Sun fought to speak as The Moon cried for her.

“I’m here, ‘Tia, I’m here,”

“… Oh, Lulu…” The Sun tried to laugh, but immediately began coughing up a lot of blood instead. “…S- S- Seriously, n- now… you’ve r- really got to w- w- work on your t- timing, sister… this is just g- g- getting… ridiculous…”

The Moon laughed at that in spite of all of her stinging, streaming tears and her uncontrollably runny nose. “You jest? You dare to jest when you're lying here, looking like this?” she grit her teeth and shook her head, sobbing, but The Sun only smiled and lovingly caressed her younger sister’s soft, cool mane.

“T- T- The E- Elements…” The Sun tried to explain, even as she was shivering, “… g- g- go to you n- now, Lulu, th- they’re your responsibility from n- now on, a- a- all right?…”

The Moon shook her head violently. “No ‘Tia, no... now, you listen to me, you are not going to die, you hear me? we’ll get you back to Canterlot and fix you right up, sister, you’ll see, you’ll see…”

The Sun looked The Moon straight in the eye, almost as if she immediately disregarded that. “… W- Whatever happens, Lulu, you m- mustn’t let them… ever go d- dark… whatever happens, n- n- ne- never l- l- let The E- Elements go d- dark, or… a- a- all is lost… d- d- do you understand? A- Always… k- k- keep your heart open… a- a- always,”

As The Sun began to cough up more blood, The Moon tried to ease her back into a more comfortable position. “Please, ‘Tia, please just try to rest… we’ll get you back to Canterlot soon, we swear it, dear sister, we swear upon it…”

The Sun’s gaze began to wander across the very stars themselves as she realized that it was finally time for her to slip beneath the horizon; still, she let a tiny, sad, nostalgic smile play across her lips…

“Would you… do me o- o- one last f- favor, si- sister?” The Sun asked innocently as The Moon began to openly wail; she nodded, anyway. “Would you, maybe… s- s- sing me that old lullaby that our nanny used to s- sing for us at b- b- bedtime? Oh, I w- would be ever s- s- so delighted to hear it again, just one m- more t- t- ti- time…”

“Oh, come now, ‘Tia, thou knowest full well: 'tis quite beneath the Alicorns to sing the traditional songs of nomadic Earth Ponies,” The Moon tried to joke in the face of certain death as her older sister was always apt to; however, she soon found it to be an extraordinarily difficult thing to attempt on her part.

The Sun genuinely lit up upon hearing that, giggling a bit in spite of her serious condition. “Here, I’ll s- s- start…” she immediately began to sing, very softly, as The Moon listened in. “… ’When you’re r- rife with d- devastation, there’s a s- s- simple explanation, you’re a… t- t- toymaker’s creation, t- trapped inside a crystal… ball…”

“… ’And whichever way he tilts it, know that we must be resilient, we won’t let them break our spirits as we sing our silly songs’…” Luna sniffled, smiling a bit as she remembered the last time she heard that particular tune. "... You know, ‘Tia, I do believe the bards of Equestria shall forevermore sing your praises, dear sister, leaving me most likely to fall to the wayside into…“

The Moon stopped speaking when she looked down; The Sun had fully set in her arms; her full, luscious lips were slightly parted and caked in dried blood; her dull pink, lifeless eyes were staring up towards the brightly shining stars far above.

“…’Tia?” The Moon called out to her older sister in the very softest of whispers; The Sun made no reply in return.

All around The Moon, the elite silver- clad Loyalist guard began to openly weep, shuttering their helmets open and touching their faces, genuflecting in the deepest gesture of reverence for their fallen monarch.

“The Sun…” the leader of the Pegasi warriors sobbed, lovingly gazing over the solar princess’s body with a broken, heavy heart, “… The Sun is Dead,”

“The Sun is Dead!!! The Sun is Dead!!!” the silver- clad Pegasi behind him all began to openly wail in devastation, bowing their heads and spreading ashes over themselves as they began to passionately beat their own chests.

“…’Tia?”

“But The Moon Still Lives… By The Elements,” the Pegasi leader realized out loud, “…Long Live The Moon…”

“The Sun is Dead!!! Long Live The Moon!!!” all of the Pegasi minions present began to exalt The Moon, prostrating before her, “The Sun is Dead!!! Long Live The Moon!!!”

Although her fanatical army began to worship her as a living goddess, The Moon honestly didn’t even seem to notice; she had just stopped crying for her sister, leaving only dead, hollow eyes that gazed into The Sun’s own before her soft, gentle fingers finally closed them shut for the very last time.

“Your Highness,” the leader of the Pegasi addressed The Moon, “Lord Discord is vanquished, and The Sun is now gone… My Lady, you are now Queen of Equestria…”

The Moon continued to stare at her cold, lifeless sister, her head lowered down; she didn’t move or speak; all around The Sun’s body, Each of The Elements of Harmony began to materialize out of the air in a ring and slowly drop, one by one, onto the dirt below them in the form of lifeless jewels, almost as if they were all crying out their very essences in honor of the sacrificial Alicorn before them; before Twilight, the last emitter records in all of Equestrian history began to go dark, appearing fuzzier and fuzzier as The Elements each became dormant…

In the distance, explosions continued to rock the rainforest, and the Pegasi leader looked around fearfully before addressing The Moon again. “My Lady, Discordian forces still control most of this continent, it is not safe for you to be here… My Lady?”

Luna grit her teeth, her head still lowered; all around her, the Pegasi army continued to sing her praises on high…

“The Sun is Dead!!! Long Live The Moon!!!”

“Your Highness?” The leader asked again.

The Moon looked up into the distance as The Elements continued to fall, one by one, and go dark; her eyes were no longer crying tears, but were instead burning with the darkest fires of an infinitely deep hatred, her entire countenance twisted in despair, madness and a malevolent, violent rage springing forth from within…

“The Sun is Dead!!! Long Live The Moon!!!”

“My Lady? We must go now, please…”

They shall all pay… The Moon thought to herself, still gently cradling The Sun’s body as The Elements of Harmony each fell to the earth; Discord may have been gone, true, but there were still those who had dared to bring war to Equestria in the first place, all of those egregiously insubordinate, evil ponies who had caused so much suffering to all of ponykind, all over the entire planet…

“The Sun is Dead!!! Long Live The Moon!!!”

“My Lady?”

…By The Elements, The entire Moon was shaking; her thoughts were livid and tense, …I shall make them pay, even with my very last breath… even with my last, I shall never stop until I show them all the very contents of their NIGHTMARES THEMSELVES…

“THE SUN IS DEAD!!! LONG LIVE THE MOON!!!!!”

Twilight watched as the very last Element of Harmony winked out and the transmission ended; Zecora sighed, shaking her head in a very world- weary way similar to Dr. Heartstrings herself.

“Yes, power used wisely helps all Ponykind,” she finished up her story,

But power abused doth make all of Man cry;

And likewise, pure love makes the world whole again,

But hatred, in turn, brings the world to an end.”

Twilight was silent for a moment before speaking again:

“So... that’s it?”

Zecora smiled gently. “That is it, Dr. Sparkle.”

Twilight looked down and blinked. “So… The Sun and The Moon were both…”

“The extremely distant and quite legendary Alicorn namesakes, at least semantically speaking, of the extremely powerful and quite influential Everstar sisters themselves,” Zecora nodded. “As you can probably guess, such revealed information has simply done wonders for our current geopolitical climate over the past year…”

“… And everything about Lord Discord, all the myths and stories about this ancient Equestrian deity of chaos…” Twilight felt a distinct chill run through her entire body, “… they’re all true?”

“Well, only so much as The Elements of Harmony themselves were actually gods,” Zecora went on to explain, “however, all of the stories about Lord Discord, his depravity and his terrible powers… well, you might say that they all have a tiny grain of, ah, truth to them…”

“Oh man…” Twilight sighed, rubbing her temples again, “that is certainly not good. Oh man, that is definitely bad jujubes… well,” she stood up to leave, shaking Zecora’s hand as she did.

“Thank you so much, Genzebe, as always, it was a pleasure… siiiigh, you know, between all of these migraines and the research I now gotta to do, I really don’t think I’m even getting a single wink of sleep tonight…”

“Well, here’s hoping otherwise… as always, Twilight Sparkle,” Zecora kindly winked at her, “you are always welcome back to my cramped, little hut, as it were,”

Twilight giggled as she re- entered the lift, in spite of all of the enormous pressure weighing down upon her and all of the constant, insistently pounding pain inside of her head. “Thanks, Zecora… Goodnight!”

As Twilight was about to press the button, Zecora walked over and leaned on the gate. “Um, Twilight… aren’t you forgetting something?”

Zecora pulled out a small cotton pouch and shook it in front of Twilight’s face, grinning; the younger physicist sighed at the older archaeologist.

“Really? You’re still gonna try and pass that stuff off on me?” she placed her hands on her hips, pouting. “Oh come on, Zecora… you know how much I absolutely loathe herbal tea…”

"‘What doesn’t kill your taste buds only makes you stronger’, Twilight Sparkle…” Zecora laughed, handing over the tea pouch to a very reluctant Dr. Sparkle. “… Or do you really need me to say that again in Swahili?”

“Fine, ok, you win… thanks again,” Twilight smiled politely as she accepted Zecora's gracious gift. “Goodnight, Dr. Zecora,”

“Sweet dreams, Dr. Sparkle,” Zecora waved as the lift began to descend, “until next time…”

Twilight exited the lift at the base of Zecora’s workstation and promptly returned to her jeep, pondering over all of the many historical records and emitter diagrams that she would now have to go over back at Development in Canterlot in order to make sense of it all. Twilight worriedly frowned as she got into the driver’s seat and strapped herself in; The Mane Six had definitely gone up against psychopaths who clearly thought themselves to be living gods before, but… an actual living god himself?

“Why, hello there, Sunshine… quite a beautiful night out, wouldn’t you say?” Twilight’s exact doppelgänger cheerfully greeted her from the passenger seat as she thoughtfully gazed up at the stars above, prompting Twilight herself to scream out loud in shock and surprise.

“Good Lord, how many times?!” Twilight angrily scolded herself as she reached up for her rapidly beating heart, “How many times have I specifically asked you NOT to “go ghost” on me?!?!”

“Sorry,” Twilight’s very own copycat sheepishly grinned at her, shrugging her very own shoulders.

“Man, oh man… this day…” Twilight darkly grumbled to herself, throwing Zecora’s herbal tea in the backseat before vigorously rubbing her own eyes. “So… what is it you want from me this time, Smarty Pants?”

Smarty Pants looked down and sighed. “Well, actually Twilight, I… I came here tonight to warn you…”

“Lemme guess...” Twilight squeezed down on her own eyelids as hard as she possibly could, “…ummm, this particular warning wouldn’t happen to be about a very cantankerous old Equestrian Emperor, now would it?”

Smarty Pants chuckled. “As always, right on the money, Miss Sparkle…”

“Yeah, and, as always, Smarty, your timing is just impeccable… Dr. Zecora just told me everything I needed to know about Discord,” Twilight added.

“I know…” Smarty Pants sighed heavily before looking intently at her counterpart. “…Twilight, listen to me, you absolutely must be very, very careful in dealing with Lord Discord, please… He’s entirely violent and dangerous and, this time, Equestria and The Mane Six may just be biting off a little more than they can chew…”

Twilight snorted, dismissing that with a wave of her predominant horn- wielding hand. “Well… Lord Discord may think that he’s just all that and a bag of chips, but-“

“Twilight, I’m serious,” Smarty Pants huffed impatiently, “trust us, we’ve been watching that particularly tyrannical fiend for a very long time now, and you’ve gotta believe me, Discord is unlike any villain or adversary that you or The Mane Six have ever encountered before…”

Twilight gazed up at the stars, deep in thought. “Smarty, I wanna ask you something… um, why couldn’t you just talk to Discord when he called on you in the first place?”

Smarty Pants thought for a moment before responding. “As we told you once before, Twilight Sparkle, regardless of what the ancient Equestrian thought of us, we are most certainly not gods of any sorts… there are certain, um, laws that we must abide by, just as your own poor little aching body must obey certain laws regarding things such as gravity and the electromagnetic force… for instance, we’ve already told you that we cannot freely give life and health, except during that sole, rare circumstance when The Elements are intimately bonded to their newly chosen Bearers for the very first time, just as we absolutely cannot take a life…” Smarty stopped, thinking back upon The Nightmare Incident of the previous year, “…well, at least nothing actually living to begin with… now, as we’ve said before, it is extremely difficult for us to interact with your kind unless you’re made to feel comfortable and are given safe, familiar surroundings… the once good and now past Equestrian King, bereft of all that he once held dear, decided for himself that he had stumbled upon “The Terrible Secret From Beyond The Spheres” long before he had even bothered to reach out to us…”

Twilight thought about that. “Did he?” she finally asked Smarty Pants in all earnestness, “Did Lord Discord really discover “The Terrible Secret From Beyond The Spheres”?”

Smarty sighed again, quite visibly rolling her eyes this time. “No, Twilight, Discord is a madman… however, sometimes… sometimes, when a person thinks that they’ve lost everything that they have, everything that they hold most dear, that person may unknowingly give away what precious little goodness they have left when they should actually be treasuring it with all of their heart…”

“Well, why didn’t you just stop him, then?” Twilight gestured to her counterpart, “I mean, you Elements made The Heart of Chaos- well, in a way- why couldn’t you all just disassemble it like you did with Nightmare and all of her Shadowbolts?”

At that, Smarty Pants turned her gaze towards the western horizon, scanning continents and whereabouts unseen to the young physicist. “Of all the sentient beings throughout all of existence, Miss Sparkle, none are as impenetrable, and, dare I say, incomprehensible to us as Lord Discord himself… I must warn you, Twilight, we honestly don’t know what the old dragon is planning to do this time around and, frankly, it worries us to no end…”

Twilight laughed heartily. “Well, I’ll tell you what we’re all planning to do… how about a nice, big, fat, juicy beam of friendship magic right to his stupid face,” she turned to Smarty, still laughing, “Hahaha, I mean- Element, pleeeeeaase- ?”

Twilight looked to find that her Element of Harmony had vanished from the passenger seat; she blinked a couple of times in confusion.

“Tell me, Twilight Sparkle,” Smarty Pants suddenly spoke from Twilight’s other side, leaning on the jeep door and scaring the crap out of the young scientist yet again, “Do you honestly believe that you and The Mane Six really have what it takes, deep down, to defeat Lord Discord on your own?”

“GAAAH!- Hey! What did we just talk about?!” Twilight jumped as she scolded her doppelgänger yet again.

“Twilight, I’m being serious here…” Smarty frowned. “… Do you really believe in The Mane Six? Do you really believe that, if everything you loved and ever held dear was stolen away from you, just like that-“ she snapped her fingers- “ –in less than an instant, that you could still find the courage to go on, regardless, to do what you knew, in your heart, was really right in the end?”

“Look Smarty, do you think that we could maybe talk this over back at the library, or something?” Twilight groaned as she rubbed her temples again. “Hey, I know! I’ll even brew us up a fresh batch of my finest Jamaica Blue Mountain secret reserve, my treat! Huh? whadduya say there, ol’ buddy ol’ pal?”

Smarty Pants giggled, shaking her head. “Yeah, right… nice try there, Sunshine…”

“Eh,” Twilight chuckled a bit as well, “well, it was definitely worth a… shot?”

Twilight turned to find that Smarty Pants had somehow vanished into thin air, unnoticed yet again; she sighed, feeling extremely exasperated, confused and quite a bit fatigued.

“We do sincerely hope that you enjoy your tea, Miss Sparkle, and please… just do us all a favor, alright?” she heard the fading, disembodied voice of The Element of Transformation speak to her from afar as she started up the jeep, “… Always keep your heart open… always…”

“Yeah, yeah…” Twilight scoffed, “… say, here’s a thought, why don’t you tell me that again in Swahili… who knows, it might even stick better…”

Twilight shifted her gears, heavily sighing to herself as she prepared for another long, tedious drive through the very heart of Manticore Country itself.

Ch. 4- Feuds Over Fritters

Apple Bloom was, by all accounts, having an extremely shitty day herself.

“Apple Bloom!” Applejack called out to her younger sister as she marched up the stairs, another proverbial storm cloud hanging over her little red head.

“Abigail Bethany Smith!” Applejack called out again in exasperation, “Hey- I’m talkin’ to you, lil’ lady!!!”

“I know,” was all that Apple Bloom replied as she made her way into the upstairs hallway, still frowning, followed closely behind by Applejack herself.

“Apple Bloom, if you’d just wait one goshdarned minute-“

Apple Bloom promptly slammed the door to the guest room in Applejack’s face before her sister could even enter.

Applejack fumed under her hat for a minute before responding: “Now, that is the EXACT OPPOSITE of waitin’ one goshdarned minute, lil’ lady!!!”

Apple Bloom was strangely silent from inside the room; Applejack jiggled the knob a couple of times, only to realize that the silly little filly had probably locked it from the inside; she groaned, knocking on the door as lightly as her anger and frustration would possibly allow her.

“Apple Bloom, honey, would ya please open the door fer yer big sister? Please?”

“Go away!” Apple Bloom’s shrill little voice sounded extremely muffled by, ironically, the highest quality applewood available anywhere in the world, “I don’t wanna talk ta you right now- I HATE you!”

Applejack sighed as she banged her head on the highly polished fine- grain wooden door before her, hard.

“Well…” Apple Bloom went on to elaborate, “I- I don’t really hate ya, them’s some awful strong words ta put out there, n’ all, but…” Apple Bloom groaned in frustration. “Oh- GO AWAY, APPLEJACK!”

“Sugarcube, sweetie,” Applejack attempted to coo her sister into submission, “Let’s… let’s just open up this door n’ talk about this a lil’ more, alright? Honey? Baby? Honey pie? Sweetie pie?”

Applejack heard her sister let out a loud, defiant sigh; a few seconds later, the expertly crafted guest room door clicked before opening up; Apple Bloom was glaring at her sister, who only grinned back as innocently as she possibly knew how to. Apple Bloom rolled her eyes and let her sister into the room, walking back to the dresser by the window and sitting down. As Applejack walked inside, Apple Bloom crossed her arms over her chest, sat up as straight as she possibly could in her chair, and tilted her head to Applejack, raising an eyebrow to indicate to her big sister that she was, indeed, ‘Lord Almighty Pissed’ as Pa had always jokingly put it…

“Awwww, HELL no- awwww, no, no, no,” Applejack glowered, pointing her finger straight at her little sister, “Don’t you dare do it, missy, don’t you dare go- awwww, SHIT,”

Apple Bloom abruptly turned around to face the wall with her back to her own older sister, prompting Applejack to sigh out loud in a very tired way; after all, she herself had seen this particular battle tactic many, many times before…

“Apple Bloom- git back here!” Applejack grit her teeth in anger and frustration, “Apple Bloom- you git back here RIGHT THIS INSTANT, lil’ lady!!!”

Apple Bloom refused to answer her sister as she sat, entirely still and motionless, facing the guest room wall; indeed, even the most fickle sculptor alive would’ve absolutely beamed with pride upon seeing the rather irate young redhead’s silent, immovable likeness.

“Alright, I git it, I git it… LAP Mode has been activated n’ whatnot…” Applejack let out a long sigh, cringing slightly. “…LAP Prohibitions are now… siiiiiigh… in full effect…”

Apple Bloom’s dainty little lips curled upward into a slight smile, even as she continued to sit facing the wall.

“Lookie here, lil’ sis… I’m sorry, alright?” Applejack apologized, “I jus’… lost my head fer a second, that’s all… let’s jus’… let’s jus’ talk this over, alright, sugarcube?”

“Lost yer head? You lost yer head?!” Apple Bloom narrowed her eyes at Applejack before turning back around to face the wall again; to add, in Applejack’s mind, insult to injury, Apple Bloom quite spontaneously and quite sarcastically began to imitate the stereotypically despondent, melodramatic Southern Belle:

“Why, ta even dream of it," Apple Bloom swooned, "mah very own flesh n’ blood, kicking me outta her most stately mansion, leavin’ mah very fortunes up to none but the cold, bitin’ December winds n’ the very pitilessness of the stars themselves…“

“-Alright, Scarlett O’Hara, now hold yer horses,” Applejack butt into her sister’s soliloquy, “first of all, it ain’t even winter yet, n’ second of all, If I’m kickin’ ya anywhere, lil’ lady, it’s either back ta UCLA or back home ta Sweet Apple Acres!” Applejack blinked a few times. “… Um, the other Sweet Apple Acres...”

Apple Bloom pouted. “But Applejack- !”

“- Save it, missy, ‘cus I already heard it all before!” Applejack cut her off as she rubbed her own aching temples à la Twilight Sparkle. “I already told you, Apple Bloom, there is no way in hell I’m a- jus’ gonna let you drop right outta school like that! And ta think-“ Applejack quickly and quietly reigned in her temper, ever mindful of the LAP Prohibitions still in effect, “- to think that’chu jus’ up n’ expected me ta play accomplice to yer lil’ bout of grown- up deliquency, is just so… so… so… SO…” Applejack finally tested out one of Fluttershy’s meditation techniques right there on the spot, “… goshdang- diddly disappointin’, is what it is… sayin' the very least…”

Apple Bloom looked defiant. “Applejack, the world’s changin’ mighty fast… magical mystery cities are poppin’ up all over the place like daisies, mah very own sister thinks that she can jus’ go off n’ play Wonder Woman- I mean, who are GI Joe n' I ta try ta stop her, am I rite?- but I’m jus’ expected to stay stuck all by my lonesome’s at college, actin’ as if everythin’s jus’… jus’… business as usual?!”

Applejack blushed, tipping her stetson forward. “Well, I… I- I can't honestly say that I know what ya mean by that, lil’ sis… I mean, shoots, Wonder Woman... heck, I ain’t even that good with a lasso…”

Apple Bloom cleared her throat quite pointedly. “Oh, really? Oh- that’s rite, big sis- I’ve really, really, really just been- well- fixin’ ta catch up with ya, n’ seein’ as how I got the perfect chance right here, right now… so, um, Applejack… jus’ how has yer year been treatin’ ya so far, hmmm? Do ya find it ta be a little… adventurous at times, maybe even a little… titilatin', perhaps?”

Applejack didn’t say anything; she merely scrunched up her nose and stared right up at the ceiling.

“Applejack?”

Applejack thought for a moment before responding; eventually, she shrugged her shoulders, deciding to play it cool:

“Um, well… nothin’ doin’, really… I mean, ummm, ah just up n’ got me a brand new wheat thresher fer mah South Field, so I'm guessin' that’s somethin’… cost me quuuuuite a pretty penny, too- hoowee, I tell you what-”

Apple Bloom simply raised another eyebrow at her older sister.

“OKOKOK, alright Apple Bloom… ya really wanna know why I don’t want ya stayin’ here wit’ me???” Applejack finally told the truth, at long last, “it’s because, your horribly irresponsible bouts of collegial truancy aside, it just ain’t that safe fer ya ta stay here, alright? There, I said it- ya happy?!” Applejack sighed, readjusting her hat brim in the process. “Now, Apple Bloom, I don’t exactly know what’s been goin’ on wit ya lately, jus’ plannin’ on droppin’ outta school like that, but I love you, lil' sis, and, ya know, livin’ here ain’t exactly one big hoe down after another, it just ain’t, alright? It’s jus’ plain dangerous livin’ here in Equestria, sugarcube, n me askin’ ya ta help me out fer a couple weeks out of the school year is one thing, but…” Applejack grit her teeth and looked down, “… you askin’ me ta have ta worry ‘bout ya, jus’ like I gotta do, day in and day out, fer dang near everybody else that I care about here is jus’… well… it’s jus’ too damn much fer me ta handle on my own, ok?!”

At that, Apple Bloom looked quite guilty and embarrassed to have thrown such an ostentatious, showy temper tantrum. “Applejack, you know I love you, too big sis, but… I mean- why you always gotta be so alone, anyway?” she looked up with her big, doe- like eyes, “The way I figure it, if I was livin’ here wit you, you wouldn’t have ta be, now, would you?”

“Apple Bloom,” Applejack sighed heavily; her mind had already been made up long before dinner had even finished. “Now, I already told you, I said no. I’m sorry, lil' sis, but that’s just the way it’s gonna be… I’m sorry,”

Hurt and dejected, Apple Bloom turned back to the wall, pouting. Applejack shook her head, her hands on her hips, staring at the back of her sibling’s fuming, little red head.

“Well…” Applejack muttered, trying to make any kind of small talk that she could possibly think of, “… I see you’re still taken ta wearin’ that ragged ol’ ribbon on top- a yer head…”

“N’ I see that you’re still taken ta wearin’ that ragged ol’ hat on top- a yers,” Apple Bloom responded without even turning around; Applejack laughed at that, running a hand over all of the wrinkles and soft spots all along her favorite old Stetson. Sighing to herself softly, Applejack walked over to her pouting little sister and began to stroke her ponytail where it collected under a faded pink ribbon tied very neatly into a pretty little bow.

“Goodness, ya know, I can still picture that day in mah mind, almost like it was yesterday, or somethin’… Mama tyin’ that scrawny lil’ thing to the oak tree in the backyard, all in order ta-“ Applejack chuckled, still caressing her little sister’s mane, “- ta get lil’ baby Apple Bloom ta stop cryin’ so damn much…”

Apple Bloom smiled as well, fondly lost in memory. “’Tie the pinkest ribbon found around that old oak tree… back before she knows it, back before the stars she sees…”

Applejack sniffed as her heart became flooded with many, many long- ignored memories and emotions of her own; she sadly smiled as she petted her younger sister’s soft, ginger bangs, longingly gazing up at the big, blue evening stars brightly twinkling at her through the guest room window. “Eeyup… Only bright pink, absolutely nothin’ less fer Mama’s prettiest lil’ baby girl…”

Apple Bloom looked back at her older sister, a melancholy expression of her own on her face as she gently stroked the hand stroking her own hair; suddenly, though, she smiled brightly as she jumped up from the chair, forcing Applejack into it; Apple Bloom took her older sister's hat off, placing it on the dresser with one hand and picking up a rather large hair brush in the other.

“Awww sis, come on, now…” Applejack muttered, chuckling as she wiped away tears. “You serious?”

“Not really, although I really do believe that the condition of yer hair might jus’ be a mite serious,” Apple Bloom joked as Applejack cracked up in laughter.

As Apple Bloom undid her older sister’s own hopelessly tangled up ponytail, Applejack slowly removed her grimy old work shirt, exposing a simple, gauzy white cotton camisole underneath; Apple Bloom frowned as she noticed something entirely new sitting on her sister’s right shoulder for the very first time…

“Um, Applejack…” Apple Bloom inquired, “… is that a tattoo?”

Applejack, realizing what Apple Bloom was referring to, touched her own right shoulder and smiled gently; inked into her skin were what appeared to be three bold, bright red apples arranged into some sort of pyramid.

“Oh, that?” Applejack smirked, “Why, that there’s mah very own cutie mark, lil’ sis…”

Apple Bloom frowned again as she gazed over Applejack’s beautiful little personal symbol. “Yer whatnow?”

Applejack grinned at Apple Bloom, looking at her over her own shoulder. “You know, right after The Battle of Canterlot was over, there were a whole lotta survivors who thought it best ta just up n’ leave the place, almost as if they jus’ wanted ta, I don't know, forget that the whole damn thing ever even happened… well, me n’ the gals had other plans, ourselves, mind you…” Applejack sighed, squeezing her eyes shut, “…I… I can’t tell you, lil’ sis, I just can’t… tell you how difficult it was, actually deciding to stay here in the end, but… siiiiiiiiiiigh, here we all are, I guess…”

Apple Bloom stroked her sister’s hair in loving support as she continued.

“Well, anyways, Pinkie Pie got this here idea from the characters on her show, how each of them had this sort of magical Equestrian version of a horse’s quarter mark, some kinda symbol that represented what each horse was all about n’ whatnot, n’ what they had, um, experienced… well, it wasn’t long before she suggested that we all sort of got real “cutie marks” of our own, as she called ‘em, all ta help bring us closer together, ta help us get over what we all went through together fightin’ that damned Nightmare Queen… well, sure enough, it wasn’t long before all the rest- a the survivors took ta doin’ the same… now, mind you, not everybody actually decided to get ‘em right on their asses, obviously, but… I don’t know… I guess, in a way, we were all jus’ tryin’ to do the same thing, ta feel closer ta each other n’ ta show the whole world that, “hey, we’re all still here, we’re all jus’ gonna be, well, right as rain, ya hear?”…” Applejack began to chuckle, shaking her head, “… well, not too long after that, cutie marks sort of became a rite of passage fer pretty much anybody comin’ ta stay here in Equestria, I guess, sort of a way to say that you had something kinda interesting ta tell about somethin’ that happened to ya, right here in the old country, and that, um, you really belonged here, I guess…”

Apple Bloom ran her fingers over Applejack’s cutie mark in awe.

“I can’t imagine, Applejack… I can’t imagine what y'all must’ve gone through, just in this past year alone,” she softly whispered, still running her fingers over her sister’s cutie mark. “… Everything’s changed now... the world’s just... so different than what it used to be, ain’t it? But you’re still here, big sis… ain’t cha?” Apple Bloom kindly smiled into her sister’s eyes, “You’re still here, Abigail Jacqueline Smith, you made it… you belong here, and you did it standin’ strong on yer own two feet, jus’ like Ma n’ Pa woulda wanted ya to- you beat that nasty old Queen n’ you really… found out what you were really made of, now, didn’t you?”

Applejack sniffed; Apple Bloom went on.

“Applejack, you know how much I love you… how much I care about n’ respect you, that I pretty much never looked up ta anybody else in this whole entire world ‘cept mah very own big sister, herself… but Applejack, come on, I ain’t a baby no more… why won’t you let me find my own cutie mark for myself? Why won’t you just’ give me a chance ta, I don’t know, find out what I’m really made of deep down, too? Applejack, why…” Apple Bloom wiped a tear from her eye, “…why in tarnation do ya gotta be so goddamn alone all the time… I mean, why, big sis… if’n y’all can help it, that is?”

Applejack covered her eyes as she began to cry, very, very softly; Apple Bloom just hugged her as tightly as she possibly could as the two Smith sisters finally stopped arguing with each other, if only for a little while…

Applejack eventually dried her eyes, sighing quite heavily to herself again as she did so.

“Alright… fine.”

Apple Bloom gasped, holding her sister at arms length, a smile wider than Pinkie Pie’s plastered all over her happy little face.

Applejack shook her head as she began to laugh again in earnest. “Yeah, alright, Apple Bloom, you can stay here, there’s jus’ two conditions ya gotta follow first if yer gonna be livin’ under my roof, ya hear?”

“Anything, Applejack, anything,” Apple Bloom hugged her older sister repeatedly in gratitude, “Oh, thank you, big sis, thank you!”

“Alright, well…" Applejack giggled a bit at her sister's extremely eager- beaverish, can- do attitude, "... first of all, you definitely better get yerself some sort of job or somethin’ ‘cus there sure as hell ain’t no free rides at Sweet Apple Acres, sugarcube…” Applejack blinked again. “… ummm, y’all know what I’m tryin’ ta say…”

“Of course! And the second thing?”

“Please, fer God sakes…” Applejack elaborated further, cringing again slightly as she did, “… do ya think you could maybe cut it out with the whole Scarlett O’Hara bit while yer stayin’ here? Dammit girl, ya know full well how it jus’ creeps the livin’ bejeezus outta me…”

Apple Bloom laughed heartily before tightly but lovingly squeezing her big sister in a hug. “You got a deal!”

She sighed to herself quite happily. Well… Apple Bloom thought, maybe this here trip wasn’t such a gigantic, enormous waste of mah money, after all…

Applejack smiled contently to herself as well as she hugged her little sister back.

Ya know, Applejack, she thought to herself, maybe, JUST maybe, this might not turn out ta be such a horrible n' completely stupid decision on yer part, after all… still... might be kinda nice havin' more than jus' one lil' ol' Apple on the farm...

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

Iron Will stood before all of Canterlot, the ancient Equestrian capital city still glowing very faintly in the distance, even as the moon itself began its very slow, very long descent below the horizon. He had never thought that he would ever live to see the old city again, here like this, in all of its glory and splendor; not too long ago, he remembered, it had been his sworn personal duty to oversee the very security and protection of all of Equestria… and now…

Iron Will sighed; yessireebob, these sure were strange times to be had, indeed…

“Oh, come on, Free Willy,” Discord beckoned and Iron Will turned from the wide, panoramic mid- air view of Canterlot through the viewing ports in order to face him. “If you’re going to just stand there all night looking incredibly dour, then you just know that your beef wellington’s going to get all soggy and ruined…”

Iron Will turned back to the viewing ports. “Thank you, Your Majesty, but I really must decline…” he trailed off as he stared intently into the darkness. “… Never did have much of an appetite before a serious engagement, myself…”

Discord sighed as he shoved more fancy, exquisitely delicious entrées that he had made himself entirely by hand onto a long, elaborate dining table on board their airborne vessel, dressed himself in a simple white cooking apron over his business suit that read “Kiss Me at Your Own Peril”; lit candles and fresh flowers adorned the entire length of the table, and somewhere, somehow, soft, elegant chamber music was playing.

“Oh, Willy… now, however will you beat all of those big, scary army men out there unless you get a little strength n’ vittles in you, my boy, hmmm? I mean, after all, you are what you eat, and so forth…” Discord suddenly turned to Sunset Shimmer and smiled. “… More lemon tarts, my dear?”

“Of course, My Lord, definitely!” Shimmer gleefully replied through an entire mouthful of Discord's sumptuous cooking, sitting at the dining table and looking rather elegant in a stunning evening gown as she gorged herself silly on The Emperor's new dishes. “… mmmmmm, you know, I must say, Your Highness, the white truffle porcini risotto was really quite excellent… however, do you think that you could maybe bring out some red pepper flakes when you can, Your Majesty?”

“For you, dearie, anything,” Discord smiled as he poured her another glass of wine, winking, a cotton towel actually draped over his arm as he did so; Iron Will sighed, shaking his head.

“Goodness gracious…” he muttered to Sunset Shimmer as she continued to feast like a queen, “… well, aren’t you just the proverbial pig in a blanket all of a sudden…”

“Hey,” Shimmer simultaneously shrugged and shoveled what looked like, to Will, nearly an entire lobster tail into her mouth with a fork. “Girl’s gotta eat, ‘m I right?”

At that moment, the cowardly Diamond Dog from Alpha team walked into the dining chamber, bowing before Lord Discord as he did. “Your Majesty, the packages have all been delivered… everything is ready to go, just as you’ve commanded,”

Lord Discord smiled, flinging his apron over his neck. “Good, good… why, thank you, anonymous lackey, I really don’t know what any of us would even do here without you,”

The cowardly Diamond Dog bowed and scraped again as he left the room; Iron Will sighed quite heavily as he turned back to face Canterlot; Discord walked up behind him, patting Iron Will on the shoulder in high spirits.

“Oh, come on, Willy, relax, after all, the night is young, now, isn’t it? Well, at least younger than me… enjoy it…” he toothily grinned at the very grim general before him, “… I mean, here we are, aren’t we? Right upon the enemy’s gates, as they were, the opposing forces completely unaware of anything even remotely suspicious going on in the area, our vessel cloaked in the very latest Equestrian stealth technology, The Elements of Harmony themselves blind to our very presence…” Discord sighed as well, but quite contentedly. “… I mean, talk about your lucky stars…”

Iron Will simply grit his teeth, conflicting emotions welling up all of a sudden in his heart; had he really made such a terrible mistake in coming out here, after all?

“Lord Discord?” Sunset Shimmer momentarily stopped eating as she frowned at a plate of green pasta before her. “Um… none of this has any pesto, right?”

Discord clapped his hands and chuckled. “Oh, that’s right, you said that you were absolutely, positively, deathly allergic to pesto… why, whatever was I even thinking?” he slapped his own forehead; Sunset Shimmer simply put down her dinner fork and stared at him as he turned his attention back to Iron Will.

“Like I said, Willy, relax…” Discord patted the general’s shoulder again as he looked out over all of his lucky stars. “… Tonight, we eat, drink and, I suppose, act incredibly merry, and tomorrow, at dawn…” his sinister little lips curled up into the most devious of smiles, “… we storm the gates.”

Ch. 2- Twilight Sparkle's Neverending Search for Advil®

Squeak. Squeak. Squeak, squeak, squeak…

Luna Everstar sat at her desk in her Canterlot office, diligently squeezing a small blue stress ball over and over again.

A knock issued from the door and Luna’s hand became very still; she narrowed her eyes.

“Who is it?” she hissed suspiciously.

Her office door opened and in walked Twilight, cleaned up from the previous trouble with parasprites and dressed in her favorite pair of jeans and an untucked purple button down shirt. “You said you wanted to see me Director Luna… um, is this a bad time?” Twilight noticed that the director was looking a little worse for the wear; one of her eyes steadily twitched as she continuously handled her stress ball.

Luna cleared her throat before motioning for Twilight to come in. “No, Twilight, of course, please, sit down,”

Twilight closed the office door behind her and sat down in the chair facing Luna’s desk; as soon as she did, though, the door opened up again and in walked Sweetie Belle, smiling quite happily; Luna’s stress ball suddenly found itself 1/6th of its original size in less than a fraction of a second.

“Hello, Director Everstar, I’m back from lunch!” Sweetie greeted brightly. “I also finished filing the city zoning ordinance reports, but I just can’t seem to find the box I left them all in now that I’m done...”

“Sweetie Belle, hello,” Luna’s left eye was twitching uncontrollably as she smiled. “That sounds great, just great... now, Sweetie, didn’t we talk yesterday, multiple times, about knocking when you came in? Also, if I’m not mistaken, didn’t I also tell you before you left for lunch that you could just take the rest of the day off? As I recall, didn’t I specifically tell you to leave this building, entirely, for at least sixteen hours… preferably twenty- four?”

Sweetie just giggled. “Oh, I know, you were so nice to give me the day off today, ma’am, but then I thought about you working all by yourself without me, still feeling awfully sick from eating all of that bad snipe meat last night, so I decided to use up my vacation time to help you recover as best you can… ooooh, here!” Sweetie presented Luna with a very warm bottle of sarsaparilla, “this is for you, I always find that the sugar really helps me feel better when I get really dizzy, too!”

“…Thank you, Sweetie,” Luna took the warm sarsaparilla.

“No problem! You, know, Director,” Sweetie Belle looked down and smiled, her hands folded gracefully in front of her waist, “I just wanted to tell you again how grateful I am for being given this job in the first place. It’s just such an honor and a privilege to be working with you, ma'am, and I can’t thank you enough for giving me the opportunity,”

Luna looked upon her warmly. “Of course, Sweetie, it’s the least I can do for your sister after all that she’s done for Equestria,”

Sweetie Belle cocked her head and made an “awww” sound. “Well, back to my desk! I really should find that box of reports before somebody throws them all away. Call me if you need anything, m’am!”

“Of course,” Luna nodded, “See you soon, Sweetie.”

Sweetie cheerfully waved goodbye before leaving and closing the door; as soon as it was shut, Luna jumped up from her desk and grabbed Twilight by the shoulders, her face coming within inches of the younger woman’s; her eyes betrayed whole mountains of madness beneath each of them.

“Help me,” she whispered in a low, desperate and quite pointed tone.

Twilight just sat there, Luna’s hands on her shoulders, and blinked. “…I’m sorry?”

Suddenly, the office door opened up again and Sweetie Belle stuck her head back in; as soon as she did, Luna immediately let go of Twilight’s shoulders, returned to her normal position, and squeezed her stress toy over and over again...

Squeaksqueaksqueaksqueaksqueaksqueaksqueakysqueak- squeak- squeak it went as it tried to hold onto its structural integrity; Luna was doing her breathing exercises and staring very intently at the office carpet.

“Ooooh, sorry, forgot to knock again!” Sweetie Belle just giggled. “I just wanted to let you know, I found that box, ma’am, but for some reason it was filled with all of the other reports I misplaced last week instead… also, would you like some coffee, or anything?”

“No, Ms. Belle, that will be, um, quite enough for now, thank you…” Luna looked up and tried to put on a smile again, even as all of her body’s energy channeled itself into the little blue stress ball in her hand.

Sweetie smiled and nodded before leaving again; as soon as she did, Luna turned back to Twilight:

“…For the love of God, you absolutely MUST help me to get rid of her, I am BEGGING you, Twilight Sparkle, please,” she pleaded again with the young Unicorn scientist.

“…Um, I really don’t think Rarity would be very happy about that,” Twilight responded. “You know how much she loves her little sister-”

“Do I look like Rarity Belle to you?!” Luna snapped through grit teeth before sighing and calming herself, somewhat. “…Siiiiigh… I honestly don’t know how Dr. Belle puts up with her, I mean, I’m barely holding on as it is with Sweetie… she’s such a kind, thoughtful, sweet girl, really, and Lord knows that she tries, hard, but…” Luna ended in a sort of animalistic growl.

Twilight chuckled nervously. “Come on, Director, I mean, she can’t be that bad…”

Luna gave Twilight a look that made her blanch slightly. “Oh, you have no idea… earlier today, I sent her out to make one copy, ONE simple little copy, and, not five minutes later, she returned to inform me that she had somehow managed to destroy all of the working copy machines in the entire city of Canterlot in the process… I mean, what am I supposed to do with that, Twilight Sparkle, just what am I supposed to do with that, exactly?!” Luna didn't appear to be making a point; instead, it sounded to Twilight like she was actually asking the question in earnest.

Twilight thought that it would probably be a good idea to change the subject when she could. “Ummmm… Luna? about the reason why I’m here…”

Luna cleared her throat again and gave Dr. Sparkle some personal space, a good foot at least. “Of course, Twilight, ahem, please excuse me…” Luna tried to smile again, but her little blue stress ball was still being brutalized by the surprisingly fierce grip of her hand.

Luna neglected her ball long enough to touch her EGO; her desk emitter lit up and began displaying information and schematics about some other ancient Equestrian site in another part of the world.

“Two days ago, The United Nations lost contact with the ancient Equestrian outpost located deep inside of the Amazon River Basin; yesterday, The UN received an emitter message from an international group of terrorists informing them that they had taken control of the outpost and were now holding the majority of the personnel working there hostage,” Luna explained.

“My God,” Twilight responded, quite shocked.

“The UN has decided that, for now, it would be an unacceptable risk to storm the outpost, given how much collateral damage would undoubtedly ensue in either a conventional assault or a by- the- books rescue attempt...”

“But… who are those people?” Twilight asked, watching holo clips in the air of what looked like black PALADIN- clad ninjas holding hostages in front of the camera and forcing them to read statements.

“Professional mercenaries working for an enigmatic international criminal organization that the UN has been tracking for nearly a year,” Luna explained as the relevant data and images popped up on her emitter, “from what we know, they seem to be drawn from the most politically and economically powerful, not to mention unscrupulous, elements on the entire planet… their main goal seems to be controlling as much Equestrian knowledge and technology as they possibly can, for whatever purpose… for lack of a real name, the intelligence community has gotten used to calling them ‘The Diamond Dogs’,” Luna clarified.

“What, like… is David Bowie The Sovereign, or something?” Twilight threw out offhandedly, and Luna frowned at her as she often did when Twilight wasn’t firmly entrenched in “Serious Mode” and The Director herself was; Twilight grinned back apologetically.

“Need I remind you, Dr. Sparkle,” Luna continued sternly, “that the Amazonian Outpost is one of the few Equestrian sites in the world with an actual Level 1 Artifact on its premises? And also, that lives are currently at stake here?”

“Yes, of course… sorry, Madam Director,” Twilight looked embarrassed; she also felt, surprise, surprise, another migraine coming on. “Please… continue,”

“Quite unexpectedly, the Diamond Dogs seem to be making no demands, and they’ve asked for no sorts of ransom… all they’ve asked is that UN military forces keep from storming the complex. To be honest, Dr. Sparkle, the US government has had very little luck in digging up a whole lot about The Dogs over the last year, although we seem to have been successful in identifying a few of the key players in this current drama unfolding right before us as we speak…”

Luna pulled up a new emitter image and Twilight’s heart froze; she didn’t think that she’d ever forget, let alone forgive, the very familiar man whose image now towered over her in her chair, not in her entire life...

“Oh, you have got to be kidding me…” Twilight muttered in disgust as a whole lot of old emotions sprang up from deep within her, suddenly appearing alongside something that she could only describe as the purest aura of pain in the general whereabouts of her own forehead region. “…Oh, Good Lord… not him again…”

“Yes, I’m sorry to inform you, Dr. Sparkle, but it looks as though General Iron Will Armstrong is very much alive and, unfortunately for everyone’s sake, very much a major player for The Diamond Dogs now that he’s been on the run from military justice for over a year,” Luna pulled up the last known pictures of Iron Will on her emitter, images of him discussing matters with a Somali warlord. “As you know, in order to save face in front of the other Security Council Members, The US Government's report on The Nightmare Incident to The UN purposefully left out a couple of minor details in its entirety: mainly, that General Armstrong did indeed survive the Shadowbolt attack on Canterlot, and also that The United States was finding it extremely difficult to track, let alone capture, their very own rogue general. That knowledge is, again, known only to you and the other Mane Six, along with the President, myself and a few other key personnel throughout The Equestria Initiative.”

“Ohhhh, and just how is President Celestia doing these days?” Twilight asked as she performed her now familiar temple massage on herself, curious to find out about her favorite teacher and trusted mentor’s current state of affairs, but also kind of wondering where the nearest bottle of Advil was, as well.

“Well, apparently Twilight Sparkle, there is a world beyond Equestria, or so I’m told…” Luna could smirk exactly like Celestia could, on occasion.

“Hahahaha, that was a joke,” Twilight replied as she continued to squeeze her temples.

God, could it actually be possible to get TWO simultaneous migraines at once, sort of like a… migraine à trois? was the pressing issue that she was actually concentrating on at that very moment.

“…Yes, well… anyway, my sister seems to be quite all right at the present moment, current state of affairs with the Amazonian Outpost aside,” Luna continued.

“Good… Gooooooooood… Gooooooooo-”

“Twilight Sparkle, are you all right?” Luna frowned as she continued to watch Twilight rub her aching head and moan in quite audible (not to mention quite visible) misery.

“Huh?” Twilight snapped to attention, blinking. “Oh, I’m so sorry, Luna, I’ve just been having the worst migraines ever since I quit drinking coffee… you know, GERD and all, Fluttershy’s orders… hahaha, um, speaking very generally in the direction of the field of medicine, buuuut… you wouldn’t happen to have any Advil in that desk of yours, maybe, would you? Maybe? Please?” Twilight finished up in quite a different place than where she originally intended to be.

Luna sighed, clutching her predominant stress ball- squeezing hand with her other hand. “Unfortunately, I do not, Twilight, just Aleve, I’m afraid… siiiiigh… bottles upon bottles of Aleve… would you care for a 2- pack, perhaps?”

“Um, I think I’ll be ok, for now, thanks…” Twilight politely responded.

Oh, you’ve got some Aleve, do you? Then you’ve got NOTHING she thought to herself quite impolitely.

“Well, Iron Will is not the only Diamond Dog associate you may remember, tell me,” Luna pulled up a picture of another person on her desk emitter, “do you recognize this woman?”

Twilight squinted at the next hologram; a very pretty young woman, about her age, popped up, with long, wavy dirty red and blond hair and a smile that was just a little more than devious; Twilight just shook her head.

“Sorry, Director, I don’t,”

“Really?” Luna raised a brow. “Because she was in the same class at Harvard as you and Dr. Belle,”

She pulled up a Harvard graduation photo next and, sure enough, Twilight was standing there, complete in her mortarboard, gown and that ratty old pair of prescription Wayfarers that she had thought, at the time, made her look so much cooler, giving her less- than- warmly- received Sophie Freund Prize speech along with a very innocent- looking, younger version of the woman in question, smiling sweetly as she sat nearby, hands frozen in eternal applause for the prodigious, more talented upstart before her; Present Day Twilight squinted to also see both Celestia and Luna standing there in ceremonial gowns as well, the future POTUS looking very proud of her favored pupil but the future Director of Canterlot displaying a sort of unchanging dourness to her facial expression, even as she was clapping; ironically, Twilight also discerned the blurry likeness of a slightly younger, then much less stressed out Rarity sitting in the background behind them all, as well.

Twilight frowned again at the new woman’s visage. “Hmmm…. Well, I’ve always been quite bad with names, Luna, you know that…”

“Well, this one just so happens to be Lucia Van Mara,” Luna continued, “One of Celestia’s prized former political pupils, she graduated summa cum laude right behind you, Dr. Sparkle,” Luna continued pulling up more images and data regarding Van Mara as she spoke. “A former CIA agent, she was codenamed ‘Sunset Shimmer’ and, indeed, Van Mara used to be very highly regarded by the agency, one of their top agents, in fact; however, she and her operative cell were officially disavowed by the service after they viciously tortured a suspected terrorist insurgent to death… the CIA later found out that the man had been, quite unfortunately, nothing but a completely innocent civilian,”

“Good God,” Twilight muttered in horror as she looked over the relevant data and the entirely gruesome autopsy photos of some very unfortunate third world farmer who had clearly been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“Yes, well, Sunset Shimmer would’ve known that had she done just a little more scrupulous intelligence work on her part, which is one of the many reasons that the CIA eventually decided to cut her loose, not to mention the fact that Shimmer has sundry other, oh, let’s say, altogether violent and troublesome tendencies of her own, as bright and as skilled an agent as she was,” Luna finished up on Sunset Shimmer, who was posed over the emitter in various disguises and shown working in far flung places all around the world, in many instances armed with rather large automatic weaponry. “At any rate, her fellow operatives were recalled to the states pending a congressional hearing, but Shimmer herself managed to escape American custody and, along with our favorite little general and the former military commander of Equestria, Iron Will, seems to have been sheltered and protected by the Diamond Dogs in exchange for the commission of her very valuable, albeit very bloody skill set.”

“Well,” Twilight laughed, quite unexpectedly, “Summertime Shimmer may think that she’s just all that and a bag of potato chips, Director Luna, but she’s never gone up against The Mane Six before, now, has she? I mean, I don’t really mean to toot my own horn here, Director, but- coooome onnnn-“

Luna sighed and shook her head. “I’m sorry to inform you, Dr. Sparkle, but it appears as if The Mane Six will be sitting out on this particular government mission, at least for now,” she informed Twilight, whose jaw dropped.

“…What?” Twilight looked somewhat peeved. “Why, exactly?”

“Unfortunately, Twilight, knowing what it does about the current situation, The Security Council has unanimously decided that it would be entirely unacceptable to risk The Elements of Harmony in an unnecessary manner,” Luna responded matter- of- factly. “Thus, The UN is instead sending in a team of trained American intelligence agents to infiltrate the base and rescue the hostages, operatives who are already quite… experienced in dealing with international situations involving Equestrian technology…”

Twilight violently shook her head in protest. “Oh no, no, no, no, Luna, no, anybody but him, pleeeease,”

Luna sighed. “I’m sorry, Twilight, but it would seem as if your brother is simply the best person The UN could find for the job, at least according to The Security Council he is. He also has the armed combat experience outside of Equestria that we need for this particular mission, unless you have some other jungle warfare anecdotes of your own that you’ve somehow forgotten to tell me about?”

Twilight looked down. “Well, maybe if you had just asked…” she responded sarcastically, of course. “...Still, I don’t see why you have to keep putting Shining Armor Sparkle in mortal danger every time The UN needs a photogenic James Bond stand- in for one of their little errands outside of the colony,”

“Unfortunately, Twilight Sparkle, that’s not too far from the truth…” Luna sighed, shaking her head. “… however, regardless of what my subordinates think of me- well, except for Sweetie Belle, I suppose- I am most certainly not “The Princess of The World” and The United Nations are most certainly not as amenable to my will as both you and Celestia would like to believe... I’m sorry, but Agent Sparkle will be the lead on this mission, that’s just the way it is, The Initiative just doesn’t have the leeway to say otherwise this time around,” Luna offered her a sympathetic but still characteristically grim look of support.

“Then…” Twilight frowned, “…why did you even want to speak with me in the first place?”

“Twilight, you and your friends are still the world’s premier experts on dealing with Equestrian technological mishaps, just because you won’t be rescuing the hostages yourselves this time around doesn’t mean that The Initiative doesn’t need your help,” Luna explained further, “I want you to analyze the situation, Dr. Sparkle, research all that you can about the Level 1 artifact at the Amazon Outpost, and then get back to me as soon as you're able to… give me everything Shining Armor needs to fix this very unfortunate situation before it really has a chance to get out of hand,”

“Understood, Madam Director,” Twilight nodded in earnest seriousness, “I’ll do everything I can to help you and my brother get this sorted out as quickly as possible.”

Luna nodded as well. “Good, Twilight, that’s what I was hoping to hear… I’m sending you over to the new Head Archaeologist’s workstation, I think Genzebe should be able to give you a sufficient primer on the Level 1 artifact at the outpost, this Draconequus Statue…”

Twilight sighed, very quickly touching her hand to her forehead. “Do you, um, think that you could maybe send me somewhere where they have Advil instead, Director?”

Luna leaned forward in her chair and gave Twilight a cool, calm, collected look. “Well, Dr. Sparkle, you did win the Sophie Freund, so you tell me… innocent lives are still hanging in the balance, at this very moment… so, Doctor… what do you think?”

Twilight sighed, massaged herself in a feeble manner, and nodded again.

“Ok, ok, geez, Luna… I’ll get right to Zecora’s, then… happy?”

Luna just smiled at Twilight; her stress ball’s brutal treatment suddenly took on a calmer, more even rhythm in its movement.

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

Apple Bloom had spent most of her life on a farm, but she still couldn’t help but feel a certain measure of awe as she took a leisurely stroll alone through the fields of the new Sweet Apple Acres. It wasn’t exactly Canterlot, but Apple Bloom still felt like she was squarely on another world; all around her, what appeared to be android- like automatons encased in brass parts performed all the work normally done by humans in the field, harvesting the fruits and vegetables, watering the plants, and cutting back any invasive weeds. Apple Bloom watched as a bright brass man handed a basket filled with apples to a waiting, hovering brass robot in the air who then took the basket and flew up to one of many large zeppelin- like drones flying high overhead that were temporarily holding all of the collected bounty until they were dropped off in storage at the other end of the property.

Applejack walked up and put her hand on Apple Bloom’s shoulder, her grin now assuredly much brighter than that of the setting sun behind her; Apple Bloom smiled as she turned to her.

“Wow, sis, jus’… wow,” Apple Bloom giggled a little as she motioned to the almost fantastical scene playing out right in front of their eyes.

“Pinkie Pie designed ‘em,” Applejack explained, still grinning. “Part of, as Twilight calls it, “a bold new experiment in agriculture without people”, or somethin’… eeyup, that there’s the biggest bumper crop that I’ve ever laid eyes on, I tell ya what, but I promise you, lil' sis, I'm a- gonna get every last one of those apples off- a these here trees this applebuck season, all by myself, even if it kills me...” Applejack swore, looking quite serious, indeed.

Apple Bloom looked at her sister as she cocked her head. “So, things really are gettin' pretty bad around here, huh?”

Applejack sighed heavily, the weight of what felt like the entire world resting upon her shoulders. “Yup, The UN is running outta of all them food rations currently sustaining the camps, ‘tho they keep promisin' they’ll send more, reeeal soon… no two ways about it, sis, if I don’t get all a’ these crops harvested before they all get ruined, there’s a reeeeal good chance that a whole lotta families n’ their lil’ ones gonna starve before the next season comes in, n’…” she sighed again, feeling quite fatigued just talking about it, “well… we jus’ can’t let that happen now, can we?”

Applejack noticed that Apple Bloom was staring up at her, looking extremely worried about the grave responsibilities that her older sibling was now in charge of; Applejack, not wishing to worry her little sister any further, smiled again and tried to laugh, “hahaha, yup, mah very own Sweet Apple Acres, right here in Equestria, all by mah lonesome… ya know, growin’ up, I never thought I’d see the day when Big Mac’s lazy ass wouldn’t have ta get up so dang early n’ cranky too, if I ken recall, all ta plow them fields as much as he possibly could before sunrise…” she gestured to all of her mechanical laborers, “…who would’ve thunk it, honestly?”

“Oh, Applejack, you’re not all by yer lonesome anymore, remember?” Apple Bloom smiled again as she hugged her older sister. “Ya got me now, big sis!”

“Only ‘til yer next semester starts, remember that,” Applejack laughed as she tousled her sister’s fiery red mane; Apple Bloom just smiled back in return. “Well, supper’s about ta get cold, what’say you n’ me head in ta eat now, alright?”

Apple Bloom nodded as Applejack led her towards the farmhouse, her arm still draped around her younger sister’s shoulders; Apple Bloom was no longer smiling as she began to feel a little conflicted inside, thinking to herself: oh no, oh no, oh geez… jus’ HOW am I gonna tell her now?