"You've made your choice, and I've made mine," I said. This was it. The final seconds to change my mind were slipping away, but I felt renewed confidence as I stepped over to Twilight and grasped the knife in my own hand, taking it from Shiny's magical grasp. I knew what I wanted to do, but actually doing it was so much more difficult than I could have imagined.

I took a deep breath. "Celestia..."

Tears were running down Twilight's face. Luna was glaring at Celestia so furiously that I was sure that Celestia would simply keel over dead. Celestia only continued her glaring. She seemed to do that a lot.

"You wouldn't dare," she said again.

In that moment, I made the difficult decision.

"You're right," I said, taking the knife away from Twilight's throat. All three princesses stared at me in shock, including Celestia. Whatever she expected me to do, it certainly wasn't this.

"You're right," I repeated, stowing the knife into my backpack. "I wouldn't dare. I wouldn't dare kill Shiny. I wouldn't dare kill Twilight. I wouldn't dare to harm any of you."

I walked up to Celestia and got in her face. I stared her right in the eyes and growled out my words to her. "I wouldn't dare become the monster that you all see in me. Now tell me something, Celestia. You were willing to sacrifice Twilight simply on the principle of not cooperating with a 'monster' like me. Who is the real monster here?"

I grabbed the Element of Truth before backing off and walking over to Shiny. Other than a bloodstain on his neck, he was completely fine. I let out a small sigh of relief before turning to address the princesses again. "I won't become a monster to get your promise, Celestia. I'm sick and tired of having to manipulate others. If you are going to help me take down the cult, then that's great. If you aren't, then stay out of my way."

With that, I walked over to the dungeon door. "Shiny, stay here and guard the princesses. Ignore everything they say. I'll be back."

He bowed me, and I stepped outside of the dungeon. I looked around. No one was there. Good.

Finally, the emotional stress of the situation caught up with me. My head spun and I simply collapsed on the spot, falling to the ground and sobbing silently. That had been so much more nerve-wracking than I had expected it to be. It would have been so easy to spite Celestia in that moment and simply kill Twilight. Hell, I didn't even need to keep Shiny around after getting Twilight's promise.

I didn't give myself a very long self-pity party. There were things that needed to be done. I needed to have a plan to get out of here. So far, I didn't even know how to get back to the surface. It was time to remedy that lack of information, and there was one pony who seemed to know everything around here.

I got up and brushed myself off. It was time to go find Lyra.

Luckily, I didn't have to search very far. As I approached the hallway leading to her personal study, she came heading right towards me.

"Hello, Master," she said, bowing. Big surprise, there. "Is there something I can do for you?"

"Yes, actually," I said. "I was wondering a bit about the caverns themselves. Could you explain some more about them for me?"

"Of course, Master. Would you like to walk with me to get some food while we talk?" I shrugged, gesturing for her to lead on. "The caverns themselves are ancient. They were created a thousand years ago by the Prophet of Man, who was the first user of hate magic among ponykind."

"Who is this prophet guy anyway?" I asked.

"We don't really know much about him. Like I said before, we only have some books and scrolls from just over a thousand years ago that were about the fall of Discord. They were written by a mysterious pony who simply vanished after predicting your return."

Return... implying that I was here before. I remember her saying that last time. What was I doing in Equestria at the time of this "fall of Discord" anyway? Too bad I can't ask Lyra. That would blow my cover like nothing else would.

Lyra continued talking as we navigated the twisting hallways. "The caverns themselves were hollowed out with the prophet's great power and dark magic. He used the crystals to fuel his magical might, making himself ridiculously powerful. I don't know the specifics about how he did it, but from the writings he left behind it seems like he just magically dug up the ground."

I feigned disbelief. "What? No secret entrance? No magical wards? Just a hole in the ground?"

Lyra chuckled. "Pretty much. I was kinda expecting more the first time I stumbled into these caverns, but that's really all there is to it."

Perfect. Now I know that getting out of here is as simple as finding the exit to the surface. I'd better go back and start planning this out with the princesses. The sooner we can figure this out, the better.

I was just about to say goodbye to Lyra and head back to the dungeon when we walked out into the main cavern where easily over a hundred other ponies were going about their business. Unsurprisingly, they all stopped and bowed to me as-

Wait. No, they weren't bowing to me. In the split second before they all rose, I noticed something was off. The ponies were all bowing just to the left of me.

They were bowing to Lyra.

It made sense. Lyra was the one who brainwashed all of them, so naturally they would defer to her authority over mine. The other times that they had bowed to me were without Lyra nearby. To them, I was just second in command. If Lyra found out that I'm not who she thought I was, they would follow her lead and turn against me.

I bid Lyra a hasty farewell over my shoulder as I turned and sped back to the dungeon. We needed to make a plan, and we needed to make it now.

Looking back, I don't know why I was surprised when I walked back into the dungeon and something had gone horribly wrong.

A crowd of about thirty ponies filled the room, each of them fully armed with some of the worst equipment I had ever seen. The armor was rusty and missing pieces in some places, and their swords were so dull that I doubted- wait, why was that so familiar?

Oh no. No, no, no, no. It can't be. It's not possible. Sure enough, I recognized the pony who had Shiny in a hold and was smacking his head into the floor. It was hard to forget the hourglass ass.

"Stop!" I yelled, and they all froze. "Shiny, stop struggling. Hey! You over there, leave that backpack alone! Timebutt, how did you get here? What are you even doing out here?"

Timebutt let go of Shiny, but kept an eye on him. "It's a long story that isn't mine to tell," he said, looking over his shoulder and nodding to someone in the group. A moment later, a figure stepped out of the small crowd.

A dragon. Spire? Spine? Spite? I couldn't remember his name, but it was foolish of me to forget about him this whole time. Of course he would realize that Twilight was missing and try to find her. Still, how did he manage to get here?

As he was about to speak, I noticed something and put up a hand. "Hang on a sec." A small group of ponies were hacking away at the chains holding the prisoners down. "That won't work," I said, shooing them off. I approached Twilight first, kneeling down and grabbing the cuff around her hoof. She flinched at my touch, but I couldn't really blame her for doing so.

I wasn't so sure about what I was doing, but it would certainly work better than trying to just smash the chains. This required precision and power. In my last dream, I had been moving objects around with my magic. What if I used that here?

I slowly began letting magic flow into my hands, getting used to the feeling. It was an unfamiliar experience, but it came as naturally as breathing. Just another thing I was re-learning how do to, I guessed. I took a deep breath and pulled on the cuffs. A moment later, I was rewarded with the sound of screeching metal and the cuff snapped apart.

I wonder what else I could do with this if I had time to experiment. Unfortunately, there was still more to do. I quickly set about snapping the other cuffs on Twilight, and she immediately ran over to her dragon friend.

"Oh, Spike," she said, giving him a massive hug. "I'm so glad you're alright."

"You're welcome," I muttered, turning to Luna. She regarded me warily as I snapped each of her cuffs, and then silently stepped away as I approached Celestia.

"Listen, Celestia," I said, lowering my voice so that only she could hear. "Like it or not, we need to work together. Right now, none of you have your magic. I don't know how to get rid of those crystals, and we don't have the time to figure it out. I do have magic, and I can use it to protect your ponies when we escape. I'm going to set you free now. Don't make me regret this." With that, I snapped the cuffs.

I stood up and looked her in the eye, and she stared back. For a moment, she hung in indecision. I'm sure she would have liked to order all of the ponies to attack me at once. In such a small space, I probably wouldn't have been able to win that fight. Thankfully, she simply turned and walked over to Luna, who regarded her sister with a cold glare.

Spike got out of Twilight's embrace a moment later and walked over to me. "Hold up," I said, stopping him once more. "I know you don't trust me right now. Unfortunately, we do not have time to debate trust. We need to get out of here as soon as possible. However, before we do anything else I have to know how you ended up here. How did you manage to get the militia into a sealed room underground in the middle of a forest?"

Spike's frown told me that he didn't like the way I had brushed him aside to speak, but he didn't make any remarks about it and instead answered my question. "Well, I had guessed that Twilight's disappearance had something to do with you. On the assumption that Twilight would be near wherever you were, I just tracked your location with a celestial detection field and used a teleportation spell on an old scroll I found."

"What!?" shouted Twilight, rushing over and grabbing Spike by the shoulders. "You did what!?"

He did what? He must have been speaking a different language because I didn't understand any of that.

Spike shrugged her off. "Calm down, Twilight. I've watched you do it hundreds of times. It was easy."

She shook him furiously. "Teleportation is not easy! More importantly, it is extremely dangerous for a baby dragon!"

I laughed. "Twilight, be real. This is a dragon we are talking about. I doubt that there is anything within a hundred miles of here that could harm a single scale on his body." Wait, how did I know that?

"He's just a baby dragon!" Twilight said.

"Dragon," I said, already having forgotten his name, "how old are you?"

"14," he replied.

I cocked an eyebrow at Twilight. "Teenage dragons, even particularly small ones like him-"

"Hey!"

"-are practically indestructible. Nothing short of another dragon will be able to harm him at this age."

Twilight opened her mouth to retort, but never got a chance. The door to the dungeon swung open and three guard's jaws dropped at the crowd of ponies. In that moment, I acted quickly and shouted the first thing I could think of.

"You didn't see us! Turn around and leave!"

They blinked and stared at me, as if unsure for a split second. Then the magical compulsion to follow my orders kicked in. They looked around in surprise, evidently unable to see any of us.

My relief vanished when the lead guard turned and yelled back down the hallway. "The prisoners are gone!"

Timebutt leaped into action, headbutting the leader and knocking him out cold. Two other ponies from the militia followed suit and took down the effectively blinded cultists.

"Nice word choice," said Luna. I'm just going to pretend I didn't hear that.

"Twilight, you need to wake up your friends right now! We have to go!" I said.

"I can't, I don't know how!"

I sighed in exasperation. Why could nothing ever be simple? "What do you mean? I thought you were an expert on magic."

Twilight indignantly glared at me. "I am an expert on magic. The problem is that you are the one who is powering the spell keeping them unconscious. The only reason I'm awake now is because I was the original caster, so the spell didn't have its full effect on me when you sent it back."

"What's this about a rebounded spell?" asked Luna. Celestia sent her sister a sideways glare for a split second. It was so quick that for a moment I failed to realize what had just happened. Why does she hate me so much? I understand Twilight and Luna's averse reactions to me, but Celestia's pure hatred of me is completely irrational. Even talking to me sets her off.

Twilight's response brought me out of my thoughts. "I cast a knockout spell to hold him until you woke up, but he somehow sent it back at me. All of us fell under the spell's effects."

Luna frowned. "This is troubling."

"Please tell me that you know how to wake them up," I said to her, crossing my arms in frustration. "Carrying them out will slow us down and get us all killed... or worse."

She shook her head. "The magic used in a spell like this is complicated. You are the source of the energy that is powering the spell. If we cannot figure out how to stop the flow of magic from you to them, then they will stay this way until you no longer have the energy to power the spell."

Suddenly, an idea came to me. "What if, instead of stopping the flow of magic, I simply reversed it?"

Twilight scratched her chin with a thoughtful look. "What, like a magical siphon? I suppose that it could work, but how do you plan on... oh, I see."

"See what? How are you to drain energy from a pony? Direct energy transfer is one matter, but magical siphoning is only a theory," said Luna.

"Actually, it works," I said. "Not only have I done it before, but you were the one who was drained. That's probably why you and your sister have been asleep for so long. If the same principle applies here, then it should be simple to awaken your friends, Twilight."

"Hurry, then," said Luna. "I fear we have little time."

Nodding, I approached the five sleeping ponies. Bearers of the Elements of Harmony. Six in total. I quickly shook my head, clearing out a nagging suspicion that I had been trying not to think about. Focusing on the task at hand, I stood next to the sleepers and held out my hands. I thought back to the feeling I experienced when draining energy from Celestia and Luna after our fight. I focused on the feeling of absorbing power from the dark crystal when I fought Shining Armor. Gradually, my hands began to glow with a soft light and I could feel my energy reserves being bolstered.

The shy one was the first to stir. She gave an adorable yawn, then stretched before finally opening her eyes. They closed with a quiet "eep!" a second later, her face disappearing behind her mane. Oh well, can't really blame her.

Applesnack woke up next, immediately jumping up and shouting, "What in tarnation is goin' on here?"

The purple-haired marshmallow stirred immediately afterward, with Rainbow following close behind. Both could only gawk in confusion at their surroundings. That left only the pink demon. A split second later, she sprung upwards and fixed me with a piercing glare.

"I hate cliffhangers," was all she said. I decided not to think about that, as it would probably result in brain damage.

"I don't have time to explain, but pay attention and you'll probably figure it out. We leave as soon as the militia is prepared. Be ready."

Leaving Twilight to talk to her friends, I slung my backpack over my shoulders and pushed my way through the group of militia over to the door. There, I turned and faced them. Horrible thoughts about everything that could go wrong immediately jumped to the forefront of my mind. Hopefully, I wasn't about to doom them all.

Hmm... maybe that wouldn't be such a bad thing. I could ditch them here and use them as a distraction. It would be easy to find my way to the surface without them. The group would only slow me down.

It was certainly an appealing thought. It would be incredibly easy. I looked at them all and reconsidered. That's when I saw Celestia glaring at me again. It reminded me of why I was in the dungeons in the first place. No, I won't become the monster she sees in me. At the very least I don't want to become more of a monster than I already am.

"I don't know how much you all have gathered about our current situation," I said, raising my voice to get everyone's attention, "but it isn't looking good. There are hundreds of magically empowered fanatics out there who are likely to attack us the moment we step outside. The only way out of here is up through the caverns. Stay as close to me as you can and don't stop running."

As one, the group turned and looked at Timebutt. He eyed me warily for a moment, then gave the princesses with a questioning look. Celestia didn't react at all. Twilight looked to Luna to make the choice. After a moment's hesitation, she nodded to him. Timebutt turned to the militia and said, "You heard him. Pegasi, stay grounded for now. Don't take to the air unless you have to. Earth ponies, take the lead with the human. Form a wall and keep the group together. Unicorns, stay on the edges and the back of the group. Save the magic for defense only, and don't wear yourself out."

While he was talking, I had equipped myself for combat. The ponies had armor and weapons, even if they desperately needed repairing. I dug around my backpack for my knife, but instead found a different weapon. I pulled out the little black object that I didn't recognize before and thought back to my dream when I had killed Alvar. Of course I had taken his weapons and put them in the backpack, but the only thing I had used up to now was the knife.

The gun. From what I had seen of the technology here I could assume that I held the most powerful physical weapon in the world. Unfortunately, remembering what it was and remembering how to use it were two completely different things. Even if I could figure out how to safely use it in the short amount of time left, it was probably not a good idea. I wanted to free the cultists from the brainwashing magic, not slaughter them all.

I realized that there was another option that I hadn't been considering. My hands were still glowing with magical light from the excess energy absorbed from Twilight's friends. While my knowledge of my own powers was extremely limited, it would be safe to assume that I was quite gifted in magic. Using magic as a weapon would be significantly less lethal than using the knife or gun and it would also allow me to experiment with my power to see what I could really do.

Leaving both the knife and gun in the backpack, I gestured for Shiny to come over to me. "Master, what is going on?" he asked.

"We are setting the prisoners free and escaping to the surface. Don't ask questions, just follow my orders. Do everything you can to keep them safe and to stop the other cultists from hurting them." For a tense moment, I didn't know if he would follow through with it. Thankfully, he saluted me a moment later and then went to the back of the group.

Maybe this won't turn out too badly after all. Who knows, I might just put all of the cultists in a coma. I seem to be very talented at that.

"Ready?" I asked the assembled group.

"Wait just a minute!" shouted the rainbow one, dashing up to me. She jumped in the air, probably in an attempt to hover in front of me and look me in the eye, but forgot about the crystal wing restraints and fell flat on her stomach. Instantly, she jumped back up as if nothing had happened.

"I'm not going anywhere until you explain just what the hay is going on here!"

I resisted the urge to hit her. As satisfying as I was sure it would be, it wouldn't help to be fighting each other while trying to escape. "Look, I get that you want an explanation. I would too if I woke up restrained in a cave with no idea how I got there. Unfortunately, there is no time for explanations. We can move right now and have a chance of surviving. If we sit here and all have a great chat about how we're feeling, we will either die or become slaves. Your choice."

Thankfully, she didn't seem to be in the mood to cause trouble. After shooting me a glare, she stalked over to be with her friends near the back of the group.

"There is one last thing you should be aware of before we head out there. You will probably recognize some of the ponies here. They may be your friends or co-workers or whatnot in the outside world, but here they are not. Their minds are not their own anymore." Ripples of unease went through the assembled ponies.

Taking a deep breath, I turned and grasped the handles of the dungeon door. I pushed and the door swung open. Instead of the army I had assumed would be lying in wait, I was greeted with a wall of darkness. Not literally, but I'm sure they could have done that if they wanted to. Timebutt stepped next to me and peered into the dark hallway.

"Crap," he muttered. Turning to the militia, he shouted, "Anypony with torches, light 'em up. Unicorns, focus on keeping us lit. Follow the human's lead."

Oh yeah, I never told them. "Actually, I have a name. Call me Tom."

Twilight's white friend - God, that was racist - stared at me with a look of horror. "T-T-Tom?"

I groaned and rubbed my temples. I was not in the mood for drama. "Yes, I am Tom. Thomas, if you want to be formal."

She let out a sigh of relief. Rainbow rolled her eyes and gave the white one a light smack on the back of the head. They both immediately turned and began arguing. Ignoring them, I turned and looked back into the darkness.

Maybe there was something I could do about it. Reaching into my shoe, I pulled out a match. With a slight sense of alarm, I noticed that I only had a few left. That would have to be addressed later.

I took a deep breath and focused intently on the match, building up power and releasing it the way I had done before. This time required more precision than before, however. I couldn't just summon a massive fireball. I needed to keep it controlled.

With a loud pop and some hissing, a miniature sun burst into life directly above me. After making sure my head wasn't on fire, I let out a sigh of relief. The moment I relaxed, the sphere disappeared. Damn. I don't have enough matches to be able to afford to lose one whenever my concentration breaks. There has to be some other way of getting a fire started.

My eyes scanned my surroundings, looking for anything I could use as a substitute for matches. My eye caught on the light coming from the lantern held in Timebutt's jaws.

"Can I borrow a bit of fire?" I asked. He raised an eyebrow at me and set down the lantern.

"Uh, sure. I guess. How do you 'borrow' fire?"

"I dunno."

He rolled his eyes, but opened the lantern and pushed it in front of me. Taking a deep breath, I concentrated every ounce of my mental power onto the flame inside and reached forward to touch it. Immediately, a gout of flames burst out and scorched my arm.

I swore and jumped back, trying not to let everyone see just how much that hurt. Thankfully, my regenerative powers kicked in a moment later and the flesh on my arm knit itself back together. I also noticed a considerable drop in my magical energy and the glow around my hands was significantly weaker. I seriously cannot afford to keep making mistakes.

Timebutt coughed pointedly. "If you plan on getting yourself killed, do it after you help us out of here."

I closed the lantern and gave it back to him. "Forget it. I'm leaving it up to you all to keep us well lit."

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly as he picked up the lamp and nodded to me, waiting for me to move.

Here goes nothing.

"Sister, something is bothering me."

"What, Luna?" Celestia snapped.

"Why did Tom-"

"Don't let him get to you with that name nonsense. He's a monster, first and foremost."

"Fine. Why did the monster not just summon fire with a spell?"

"Why should I know?"

"Don't you find it odd that the same monster who almost swathed Equestria in flame can't even cast a simple fire spell?"

"It's been thousands of years. Maybe he's out of practice. More than likely he's trying to fool us."

"I don't know. Twilight said that he claims to have no memory of his past."

"And you believe it?"

Luna let out a sigh. "I don't know what to believe."

"No, this can't be right," I muttered as we slowly made our way through the dark halls.

"What's that?" asked Timebutt.

"All of the cultists are just gone. These caverns used to absolutely flooded with them, and I don't think that a few escaped prisoners would cause them all to run away and disappear."

He shrugged. "I don't really care. I'm just happy that they're staying out of our way. Makes things simpler for everypony."

While his voice held a tone of confidence, I couldn't help but notice the way he continually swept his gaze all around us. As much as he wanted me to think that he was not concerned, it was obvious we were thinking the same thing: we were walking into a trap.

There was simply no other explanation for what was going on. Nobody randomly turns out all the lights and vanishes without a reason. I doubted that, with all their power, the cultists would run away when faced with a poorly equipped militia and a few powerless prisoners.

To my great surprise, we wandered the caverns for a full hour with nothing happening to us. Turning a corner, I saw a faint light shining down.

"That can't be the exit, can it?" one of the ponies in the militia asked.

"Looks like it," I said.

"So... that's it? We just walk out of here nice and easy?"

Timebutt snorted and let out a dark chuckle, but otherwise didn't respond. At the same time, I heard a loud clanking from behind us. Looking back, I saw Derpy struggling with her armor that seemed ready to fall apart at any second. I almost had forgotten that she was a part of the militia. A moment later, I saw another familiar face approach her and help to fix her armor. It was the nurse, Clockwhack. No, that doesn't sound right. Clockwork? Yeah, that's better. I didn't know he was part of the militia, too.

Turning back around, I noticed that we were ridiculously close to the exit. I suddenly felt an odd chill and quickly came to a stop as the thoughts I had been ignoring bubbled to the forefront of my mind. It's perfect. Too perfect, just like everything that's happened to me so far. The cultist conveniently decided not to immediately execute Twilight and her friends when kidnapping them. Twilight's little dragon just so happened to find some way to teleport himself and the militia directly to us, forcing us to leave immediately. The exit to this cave is completely open to us, and nothing is stopping us from leaving.

"You've gotta be kidding me!" I heard Rainbow yell as the group came to a stop behind me. "What could you possibly be waiting for?"

"I don't like this," I said.

"Yeah, right! I think you're just leading us into a trap," she said, separating from the group and trotting over to the cavern exit..

"Come back!" shouted Twilight. "You don't know what kind of traps are there!"

She only rolled her eyes and continued walking right out of the cave. A few of the militia, unable to believe their eyes, tentatively made their way over to the edge of the cavern. Gaining confidence, the majority quickly followed suit and left me standing there, dumbfounded.

After a few moments, I tentatively walked up to the edge of the cavern. Nothing bad had happened so far. Taking a deep breath and tightly closing my eyes, I stepped outside and braced myself for the worst.

Nothing happened.

I opened my eyes slowly and cautiously looked around, hardly able to believe my incredible stroke of luck. It had worked! By some stupid luck, the militia showing up with oddly convenient timing had allowed us to escape completely unharmed. For once, everything had turned out okay.

"Has anyone seen Derpy?" said Timebutt.

My blood froze.

"I saw her for a second right when we spotted the exit, but I'm not sure about after that."

"Derpy? I'm not sure."

"I swear she was right behind me not one minute ago."

I pushed my way back to the front of the militia and ran up to him. "Timebutt-"

"It's Time Turner," he growled under his breath.

"Alright, Timebutt. Just as we approached the cavern exit, I saw Clockwork helping her with her armor near the back of the group."

He frowned, chilling my blood even further. "Who?"

"Clockwork. He works at the hospital, but I didn't know that he was part of the militia."

"Tom, are you sure who you saw?"

"Absolutely," I said.

"Princesses!" Time Turner shouted. "We have a problem!"

"What's the problem? Why is that so bad?" I asked, panic rising in my chest.

Time Turner looked at me oddly for a moment before answering.

"Clockwork has never once volunteered for the militia."

I think my heart stopped beating for a couple seconds. From what sounded like a great distance away, I heard Luna say something. Then Twilight. Celestia, too, but with a harsh tone. I heard all their voices, but none of their words got through to me.

The one pony who seemed to care about me was missing and possibly dead or worse. I had failed my only friend in this world.

I felt my heart beat once more. Then again. Then another time, faster. It picked up speed until I felt a scream of pure rage burst from my throat, and I turned and stomped back towards the entrance to the caverns. The assembled militia scattered like ants as I picked up speed.

In a flash, Luna was running next to me and shouting. "Stop! Can you not see that this is a trap?"

"I don't care!" I roared back, blindly lashing out and shoving her to the ground as I ran into the cavern. Inside, I turned and saw the assembled group running to me, probably to stop me. That wouldn't do at all. I refused to allow anyone else to be put in harm's way because of me.

I reached upwards to the cavern ceiling and tapped into the remaining magic I had sapped from Twilight's friends. I felt a powerful tugging sensation in my gut, as if all my organs were twisting themselves into knots. As smoke rose from my hands, I brought them down sharply before turning and continuing to run into the dark cavern. Behind me, I heard rocks crumbling and falling. Ponies yelped and fled the cavern exit as it sealed itself behind me. I didn't care about any of that, as I had only one goal in mind.

Kill Clockwork.

Shining Armor blasted the rocks with his magic to no avail. "Master! Wait for me!"

Twilight stood some distance behind him, silently crying as she watched her brother madly attack the solid rock. Luna shook dirt off her dark crystal laden wings before wrapping one around Twilight and guiding her away. The militia looked to Time Turner for directions. Time Turner looked to Celestia, as he had no idea how to carry on.

Celestia drew herself up, still managing to look commanding in spite of the situation. "Let us retreat to Ponyville. We must prepare the town for the even of an invasion from the cult and the human."

"What about Captain Armor?" asked Time Turner.

"Restrain him and bring him with us. Be careful, he is not himself," Celestia said.

With a curt nod, he turned and motioned for a few of the unicorns to follow him. As they approached Shining Armor, Luna gently pushed Twilight and turned her away. "You don't need to see this, Twilight," she said. Twilight nodded and let out a heavy sigh, hanging her head as Luna guided her away from her brother and back towards her friends.

Celestia watched all of this with a detached look. She cared for her little ponies, of course, but she had more important issues to worry about right now than comforting them. Above all else, there was one goal that she needed to accomplish before it was too late.

Kill the monster.

Author's Note

This feels kind of disappointing. I think I could have done a lot better on a lot of different parts here, but no matter how many times I rewrite it I still feel the same way.