How Friends May Fall

How Friends May Fall – Part 10

Of all the officers that could have found her. Of all the officers that she could have stumbled upon. Of all the officers that she could have encountered, it had to be the Lieutenant Mane. Twilight cursed her luck as she slowly stepped backwards to distance herself from the approaching stallion.

“I asked you a question, miss Sparkle.”

She had seen the Lieutenant bear a frown on his face before, but never had she experienced it like this before. It felt as if his amber eyes penetrated her mind. As if he was trying to peer directly into her subconscious, to find the answer for himself.

Twilight closed her eyes and shook her head. She knew what was going on here. The Lieutenant was surely just trying to intimidate her into staying put. But she wasn’t going to let him do that. She had to escape before more officers arrived, and she had to do it now!

She halted her steps backwards, and braced her hind legs as the Lieutenant continued to move closer towards her, trying to ignore the Lieutenant’s immovable gaze. All this time, he hadn’t even blinked a single time. Or at least, she didn’t think he had. With a deep breath, she forced all thoughts out of her mind, and focused on a single thing.

“I’m glad that you settled for the easy way.” said the Lieutenant, as a smile crept on his face. “I was almost worried that--”

Moving as fast as her legs could carry her, Twilight burst into a full gallop past the Lieutenant, taking as many corners as she could to make him lose her trail. Yet, her untrained body couldn’t sustain the gallop for long; Not after all the running she had already done today and the stress that was still pushing on her body.

“You can’t escape me, Sparkle!”

The Lieutenant’s voice and hoofsteps rapidly began to catch up on Twilight, and she could hear multiple guards moving towards the Lieutenant’s position. He was deliberately trying to get as many guards to her as possible, so she couldn’t escape again. Yet, as hard as Twilight tried, she simply couldn’t run any farther.

As she stopped in place and panted for breath, she could see the Lieutenant moving around the corner, closely followed by at least five guards. Too worn out to gallop any further, she attempted to canter to the other side of the hall, only to witness three more guards coming up the stairs.

“Restrain her!” shouted the Lieutenant, as he and the other guards sped into a full gallop towards Twilight.

Looking around in panic, she tried to find another way out. But she didn’t have time to check all the doors around her, and there was no way for her to get past all these guards. Even if she used magic to push the guards on one side away, the guards on the other side would catch up and seize her.

Wait… Magic!

Closing her eyes, she focused all of her remaining power in her horn.

“She’s trying to teleport!” shouted the Lieutenant. “Get her, before she--”

With a bright flash of light, she teleported as far as she possibly could.

Her surroundings had gone completely quiet, with the exception of a soft breeze blowing past her ears. She couldn’t hear any hoofsteps anymore. She couldn’t hear shouting or even murmurs anymore. Just the wind.

As she opened her eyes, she found herself sitting on a concrete floor. There was no ceiling, and there were no walls; Just a dark-blue magical barrier surrounding the platform, the night sky being only faintly visible through its surface. Instead of teleporting outside of the building, she had only teleported onto the roof. The barrier must have been blocking her spell from reaching any further.

She didn’t know what floor she had been on before, but it was a large and tall building. With any luck, she wouldn’t be found here for at least an hour or more. With a sigh, she laid down on the concrete and stares into the night sky, as far as she was able to see it. Even though her spell had only taken her so far, her body was exhausted from running all the time with so little rest. Even though she had been out for a long time before, her hallucinations hadn’t exactly been restful.

It was difficult for her to stay awake. She needed rest so badly… But she couldn’t afford to go asleep. Even if she had the time, the hallucinations would just leave her restless once more. Undoubtedly, this was the cult’s way of draining her resistance. Tearing at both her physical stamina and her mind at the same time to overwhelm her senses.

All the more of a reason that she had no time for rest.

Taking a deep breath, she got back onto her hooves and slowly stumbled towards the staircase that lead back into the building. There were no noises coming from downstairs, so she assumed that at least the top few floors were safe areas. She slowly made her way towards the top floor to investigate; It was as good as choice as any. It was unlikely that she would find a way out all the way up here, but she could as least try to find a map of the building, or hide from the guards for a while if they began to search through the other floors.

This floor however seemed deserted for now, with the exception of one lit laboratory near the floor’s entrance. As she snuck closer towards the windows, she could hear a voice coming from within. The voice sounded familiar, but it was too soft to tell whom it came from.

She slightly raised her head, and peered through the window into the library. The voice had come from Doctor Whooves; the same doctor that had spoken with princess Luna before. He was alone in the library, apparently writing down some data in his notes while muttering to himself. Twilight recalled him mentioning that he was the head researcher of his floor. Surely he would know a way out of here, but how could she convince him into telling her?

Suddenly, the doctor glanced into Twilight’s direction. She quickly withdrew her head from the window, and hid herself behind the surrounding wall.

“Hello? Is anypony there?”

She could hear the doctor’s hoofsteps leading towards the doors into the laboratory. There was no way that she could get away in time; Not without making too much noise. No, there was only one way to get out of this situation.

“Who is--”

As soon as the doctor walked through the door, he was jumped by Twilight and knocked on his back. She immediately pinned him down, and focused her magic through her horn.

“D-Don’t hurt me! Gua--”

“If you call for the guards, I will hurt you.” said Twilight, trying to sound as menacing as possible. “However, if you cooperate and answer all of my questions, you can leave unharmed.”

The doctor nodded silently, with an expression of fear upon his face. Twilight felt sorry for the poor stallion, but she didn’t have another choice. It was either this, or be captured by the guards.

“I need to get back to Ponyville as fast as possible.” she said, aiming her horn towards the doctor’s face. “How do I escape this place without being caught by the guards downstairs, and how do I get back to Ponyville from there?”

“Without the assistance of guards to use a chariot, you can’t use the portals within our hangar downstairs.” replied the doctor softly. “However, we have smaller, pony-sized portals in our test area. They are highly experimental however, and--”

“How do I get to them?”

“There is an elevator leading directly towards the test area in every head researcher’s office. But you can’t get in without any head researcher’s key!”

“Aren’t you a head researcher?”

“N-No! Of course not! I’m just a regular, everyday--”

Twilight moved her horn closer towards the doctor’s face, and conjured some sparks.

“YES! Yes, I’m a head researcher!”

“Good. Where can I find the head researcher’s office?”

“There is one on every floor. If you let me go, I’ll lead you there!”

Twilight narrowed her eyes, and slowly stepped off of the doctor. However, she kept her horn aimed towards him as he stood up from the floor.

“Lead ahead. Don’t make any funny moves.”

The doctor turned around and walked towards the corridors, Twilight following close behind him. She kept her horn aimed towards him, but she stopped channeling her magic. It required everything she had right now to mask her fatigue. Even just conjuring those sparks had taken almost everything she had left, and just keeping up with the doctor right now took a lot of her remaining strength.

As they walked through the hallways, Twilight began to wonder what to do next. Although escaping here was still her first priority, how was she going to help her friends? How could she defend them from the hallucinations they might get, while she was having them herself as well? Especially with her body and magic worn out like this, she almost began to feel like her efforts were futile.

Yet, she couldn’t hold on to those thoughts. The more she began to doubt her decision, the more her thoughts seemed to slip away. She couldn’t tell for sure what was driving her to do this anymore. Was it the worry? The rush of escaping? Perhaps something else? All she knew was that she just couldn’t stop now.

“Here is it.” said the doctor, taking a key out of his pocket and opening the door next to him.

“Okay. Let’s go.”

“W-what? I lead you to the elevator! Why won’t you--”

“I never said that I would let you go once we got here. I need somepony to help me with operating those portals you mentioned. And besides, the moment I let you out of my sight, you’re just going to alert the guards.”

With a sigh the doctor walked into the room, Twilight following close behind him. It was a messy place, with papers, books and other materials scattered everywhere. It looked like the place hadn’t been cleaned up in months.

The doors of the elevator were on the other side of the room, in-between two empty bookshelves. But instead of buttons, all it had was a keyhole.

“So, you were planning on just leaving me without the key?” said Twilight, glaring at the doctor.

The doctor merely swallowed, and turned his eyes the other way.

“Just get to it. The sooner I’m out of here, the better.”

Once more the doctor took his key, twisted it in the keyhole. The doors of the elevator opened, revealing a small elevator in the wall with just two buttons inside. The top button was flickering, yet the bottom button gave off a continuous red light.

“How are we both going to fit in that?” said Twilight.

“I suppose we could both stand on our hind legs…” replied the doctor, with an uneasy tone in his voice.

Twilight nodded, and walked inside the elevator. Standing on just her two hind legs placed a lot of pressure on her legs, but she held out well by leaning on the elevator wall. The doctor then moved into the elevator as well, apparently much more at ease then Twilight with standing on just his hind legs.

The doctor pressed the bottom button, and the elevator doors closed. To Twilight’s relief, the elevator seemed to move almost completely without making any noise. The loudest thing she could hear was the elevator music, which itself had been mute outside of the elevator doors before.

“We keep the elevators mute, so nopony knows when certain head researchers are in the test chambers.” said the doctor.

“Why would that be important?” asked Twilight.

“Our test projects are often top secret, and each head researcher has a different specialization.”

“What’s yours?”

“The scientology of time and space.”

Twilight remained silent for a moment. As interested as that topic was, there was one thing she wasn’t certain of…

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Hm?”

“I just kidnapped you, and I’m forcing you to help with my escape. So why are you making small talk with me in the elevator?”

The doctor remained silent for a moment, lost in thought. He seemed to be pondering out something himself this time, as if he wasn’t sure whether or not to answer that question.

With a sigh, he turned his towards Twilight, and looked into her eyes.

“I’ve worked on the portals myself, and I know how they work. So if you truly have to use them, then you’ve kidnapped the right guy to help you. However, do you know what those portals actually are?”

“Well…” said Twilight, with an uncertain tone in her voice. “I assumed that they have something to do with teleportation spells.”

The doctor shook his head.

“The portals itself are rifts in time and space. Very difficult to maintain, even more difficult to configure the right way, and at the moment almost impossible to be considered reliable.”

“What do you mean? Don’t they work?”

“They work, but they aren’t specific. We’ve managed to narrow down the location to where it teleports you to a mile radius, and the time in a period of four weeks. In other words, you can go to Ponyville with the portals, but it’ll literally teleport you in a random position. You could end up lodged inside of an object or in-between two flat surfaces, which means that your body would be instantly crushed to pulp. Or you could end up a mile in the air and fall to your death. You could even end up being buried underground with no way out. In other words, there is a significant chance that just using those portals could kill you.”

“B-But what about the portals in the hangar?” said Twilight, a hint of doubt sounding in her voice.

“Those portals are much bigger, and are thus easier to configure. And once they were configured the right way, they were never closed again. The pony-sized portals downstairs are much harder to configure correctly, and we have to set the specifics right each time we open it.”

The doctor narrowed his eyes, with a slight expression of worry appearing on his face.

“It’s not too late to change your mind. Are you certain that you’d rather take such a risk, instead of staying here with us? Our scientists and magicians can help you, I promise.”

“….B-But… But what about my friends?”

“I... don’t know the specifics surrounding them. Sorry.”

A soft beep sounded though the speakers that played the elevator music, and the doors opened before them. They found themselves in a large room, almost as big as an entire floor, completely covered in white tiles on the floor, walls and ceiling, with just one single door on the opposite side of the room leading elsewhere. All kinds of different pieces of equipment were scattered in different parts of the room, some of which Twilight had no idea what they were meant for. However, a few piles of equipment away from the elevators, she noticed three different pedestals standing right next to eachother with archways mounted on top of them; Just big enough for an average-sized pony to fit through.

“That’s them.” said the doctor, noticing Twilight’s interest towards the pedestals. “Those are the portals we have made. Unfortunately, we never got the first two to work.”

As they walked over to the portals, Twilight took a closer look at the faulty ones. Like most of the equipment in this room, they were dusty and gray; They seemed to have been here for quite a long time. The newest one however seemed very well maintained, and was coated in chromatic white paint. The console next to it however was, like the rest, poorly maintained and dirty. It must have been used for the previous portals, as well.

“You guys sure aren’t janitors.” said Twilight.

The doctor just coughed, and began to type in some codes on the console. Twilight couldn’t understand a thing of all the codes he typed in, but she hoped that her earlier intimidation had worked. She depended on him to get home; He was easily able to sabotage her this way, if he was able to either see through her lies or willing to take the risk.

“Done.” said the doctor, backing away from the console. “I hope you’ve got enough some juice left.”

“Huh? What for?” asked Twilight, turning her head towards the doctor.

“You can’t just open a portal with some codes, you know. I can only set its destination. In order to actually open the portal, you’ll have to channel enough raw magic energy through the frame. The frame will convert the magic energy into Chronometric energy, and will then use it to manifest the portal. However, it will rapidly drain the energy, so you must get through the moment it opens.”

Twilight felt an aura of dread overcoming her as she turned back to the pedestal. She only just had regained enough magic energy to conjure those sparks, but that couldn’t possibly be enough to even fuel the machine, let alone open the portal. It seemed like she really was stuck.

“What’s the matter?” said the doctor, a frown slowly forming on his face. “You seemed to eager to use your magic before.”

“W-Well, um…” stuttered Twilight.

As Twilight looked at the machine again, trying to think of a way to get out of this situation. Without her magic, she couldn’t take on an adult earth pony stallion.

“You… You stopped channeling those sparks while you were following me through the halls…”

Twilight turned her head back towards the doctor, whose face had turned into a furious expression of anger.

“You don’t have any remaining magic, do you?!” he shouted in anger, ready to pounce Twilight.

“Good. That means that I won’t have to do this the hard way.”

Twilight and the doctor turned their attention towards the door, where the voice had come from. In the door opening they saw Princess Luna, bearing a calm yet annoyed expression on her face.

“I knew that you would try to make your way over here, Twilight.” said the princess, as she walked towards the duo.

“But you’re not getting any further than this.”