Crusade at Midnight Castle

Chapters

Strategy
Acquisition
Diplomacy
Sortie
Objectives
Improvisation
Armistice
Advance
Disarray

Strategy

Three small figures in completely inconspicuous big hooded cloaks regarded what had once been a tree.

“Land sakes,” whispered Apple Bloom, staring at the library's ruin. “It's still burnin'?”

The smouldering skeleton of Golden Oaks Library creaked high above her and the other Crusaders, blackened branches clawing at the sky. An unscheduled rainfall had turned the ground around it to a black slurry of mud and charcoal, mirroring the sky above. Smoke billowed up from the patches of flame that had persisted days after the fact of Tirek's victory.

“All that souped-up magic that went into the blast must be doing it,” Sweetie Belle piped up. She drew back her hood and tapped her chin with a hoof. “It's a … ooh, Twilight gave it a name, I remember, it's a … a …”

“A pain in the flank, is what it is,” said Scootaloo, the filly frowning at the nearest patch of ever-burning flame. “Just as well we're wearing these damp old things. We don't wanna catch fire while picking up books. That'd be the most undignified way to go ever.”

“Come on, girls,” said Apple Bloom, stepping forward into the ruined library. “Mind your step.”

The three carefully sought their way around fallen branches and patches of fire, emerging into the former interior of the library. Puddles of ash and sodden paper carpeted the floor, bookshelves lay collapsed or face-down, and several of Twilight's personal effects lay scattered on the gnarled wreckage of the staircase.

A few books remained intact, albeit marred by water or soot on their covers. Apple Bloom shrugged off her cloak with a sigh, spread it out across the floor, and placed a book upon it. “Let's start gathering. Don't look like there's enough to keep us workin' for long, though. Tirek really did a number on this place.”

“Thaumic autoperpetuating exothermic reaction!” Sweetie Belle briefly looked immensely pleased. “I remember Twilight discussing it right by that – by the stump...” Her smile dipped. The tree stump that had pulled double duty as a lectern had been blasted into fragments. The last book to have sat upon it, Sagittarius's Lives and Times of the Magos-Princeps, lay face-down on the damp floor, the paper inside now nothing but a wet grey smear.

“Hey. You alright?” said Scootaloo, sidling up to her.

“...yes,” came the low reply, which had more than an hint of sniffle.

“Well, come on,” said Scootaloo gently, draping one wing over Sweetie Belle's back and pulling her in for a hug. “We've got a whole bunch of books to liberate and take back to the clubhouse. Once we've read them, we can make things even alrighter.”

“...I guess.”

“That's the spirit! Come on. We're the Cutie Mark Crusaders. Even if everything's gone to heck, we can still -”

“A 'whole bunch of books' meanin' twelve?” Apple Bloom's voice punctured the moment.

“What?” said Scootaloo.

“I was pickin' them up while you two were talkin'. There's twelve here that ain't destroyed. Maybe a couple more scattered outside. Sweetie Belle, could you mosey out and see if there's any?”

“Sure!” The little unicorn's voice was still a little choked. She turned and cantered back out, leaving Apple Bloom and Scootaloo alone. Silence hung thick and uneasily in the stillness of the library. Scootaloo wandered over to one of the fallen bookcases and tried to prise it up off the floor with her hooves. Simultaneously trying to peer underneath for any intact books added an extra dimension of challenge.

“This ain't gonna work,” said Apple Bloom softly.

“Well, if you'd come over here and lend a hoof -”

“No, this. This whole plan. It's … infeasible. Downright infeasible.”

“It is with that attitude.” Scootaloo stepped away from the fallen shelves and whirled on Apple Bloom with a glare. “Don't you care?”

“Don't you ever imply I don't care about freeing my sister and her friends!” Apple Bloom snapped. “But this isn't gonna cut it. We're not gonna find a manual on how to defeat Tirek here, especially after ...” She gesticulated with a hoof, taking in the scorched remains all around them. Something unseen disconnected from something else with a creaky and somewhat forlorn splintering sound.

“You don't know that! There could be something.” Scootaloo, her whole body shivered, turned away and repeated the words to herself. “There's gotta be something.”

There came no reply. A sharp gust of wind whistled past the library's charred edges. There were a lot of sharp gusts these days, spilling down from storms building up over the Everfree forest. Storms which, a week ago, a fit pegasus team would have had no trouble dispersing.

But now the forest's foliage was creeping out from the forest's boundaries. From the distant shape of Canterlot, crimson light fell from the palace's windows and cascaded down the mountainside. The days and nights lurched abruptly from searing midday to blackest night, when the sun and moon weren't left ignored and hanging in the sky. Few lights were lit, with the magical reservoirs that powered them sputtering dry. And storms were building over the Everfree.

It was night-time right now, and the blank disc of the moon sat alone in the starless blackness. Apple Bloom shivered and looked up. Past the edges of the library, she could see the town hall and the flag-pole jagging from its top. A slash of red splayed out in the wind, black stylised horns in its centre.

“Maybe there is something, but I doubt it,” whispered Apple Bloom. “Not sayin' we shouldn't try, no matter what, mind you.” She turned to where they'd entered and called out, “Any luck, Sweetie Belle?”

“Found a couple!” Sweetie Belle leaned around the corner, two battered-looking books wobbling in a telekinetic grip. “Did you find anything more?”

“Nothing yet.” Apple Bloom gestured for Sweetie Belle to come over. “Pass them over. I'll get them in the cloak and we'll take them back to the clubhouse. If there's nothing in them …”

“We'll come back. Search harder.” Scootaloo made one last token effort at raising the book shelf and gave up. “But yeah. We'll read these first.”

The books were passed over to join the others, and Apple Bloom carefully folded the cloak over them. A length of rope was wound through loops running around the cloak's outside, and tightened to close the cloak tight and hide the books from view. “I'll pull first,” she declared. “T'ain't as many as we were hoping for. On the bright side, at least you get to keep wearing yours.”

The cloaks, so the reasoning had gone, would keep them inconspicuous while they made their way to the library. If nopony saw them going there, then it followed that nopony would be waiting to see them leave with their precious cargo.

Nopony in Ponyville would stop them, of course. Nopony in Ponyville now did much of anything. But Tirek's servants often cut sharp and distant shapes travelling through the clouds. None of the Crusaders knew what would happen if they had cause to fly down. None of them were keen to find out.

It was a long and winding route back to the clubhouse under cover of darkness, and a struggle to heave the cloakful of books up into it. A candle was lit to provide light to read by.

Soon, Skylark's To the Black Ocean and Back in Fifty Days joined a pile which had been read and found useless.

Daring Do and the Legend of the Diamond Crown soon followed. So did Maestro's The Proper Care of Violins and Associated Stringed Instruments and Literal Minded's The North and Why You Shouldn't Journey There. The candle burned cold and Sweetie Belle, exerting the full might of her current magical strength, just about managed to light another.

Mating Habits of the Common Breezy bounced off the window sill and joined the pile, as did Etymology: A History.

“This is hopeless,” said Apple Bloom, her voice listless. “I'm already halfway through my pile, and none of what's left looks even slightly relevant.”

“Keep reading!” hissed Scootaloo, the exclamation competing with a yawn that involuntarily escaped her. She shook her head in a furious burst of effort, forcing her eyes to stay open. “Sweetie Belle, you got anything good?”

“No,” came the very small reply.

The thought came to all of them at some point in the hours that followed: Twilight should have been here. Twilight with a library at her back was the closest thing to unstoppable, and could have summoned the right book from memory alone.

But Twilight had fought Tirek after he'd captured their older sisters and the other Element Bearers, and at one point in the storm that followed – whether amongst the lightning that had clashed and slammed together amongst the clouds, or amongst the toppling mountains in the distance, or in a sudden cunning motion in a parley on the ground – Twilight had been captured as well. Twilight had lost.

Now red light came from Canterlot, and three little fillies hunted against hope for anything amidst a dwindling pile of books.

Eventually, Apple Bloom lifted the last book in her pile – Complete Biographies of the Zebrican Princes - as the sun was grudgingly rotating back into place past a shroud of clouds, and heaved it away. She glanced round at Scootaloo. “Anything?” she asked, without much hope.

Scootaloo, by way of response, kicked away Arcane Physics for Dummies. It was her last book as well. “No,” she muttered.

They both looked towards Sweetie Belle. The little unicorn sat with her last book before her as well, unopened. The Tales and Fairy-Stories of Old Equestria.

“Come on,” said Apple Bloom gently. “Get it over with.”

Sweetie Belle drew in a breath, and opened the book at the contents page.

Her gaze suddenly sharpened. The descending edges of her mouth straightened, tautened. One hoof carefully flicked through page after page.

“What are you doing?” said Scootaloo. “That's not reading, that's -”

“Come have a look at this,” said Sweetie Belle. Something strange trembled in the tone of her voice. Her hoof gestured at the pages lying open before her. “Come read this.”

The title on the page, Apple Bloom and Scootaloo saw when they rushed over, read The Downfall of the Tyrant Tirek By Firefly the Bold; or, Rescue at Midnight Castle.

***

“Well, don't that beat all,” said Apple Bloom in tones of direst confusion when the last page had been turned. “Where do you think the pony that first wrote this heard about Tirek?”

“Because they must have done it back in the day, they must have defeated him!” squeaked Sweetie Belle, light dancing in her eyes. “They beat him, and they must have wrote down how, and this is how! That Rainbow of Light must be what they called the Elements of Harmony, and they had a kooky old creature in the woods that knew how to get it, and they brought this … weird other creature along from somewhere else, and they took him down!”

“It all makes sense!” said Scootaloo.

“It surely doesn't,” said Apple Bloom. “This is a fairy story. It never happened.”

“It's a fairy story that knows about Tirek! It's all about how to defeat him. What more do you need?” Scootaloo was all but hovered off the ground with the rate her wings were buzzing. “Okay, yeah, there's obviously going to be loads of made-up stuff. But I bet there's truth under it all. Look, it mentions Dream Valley. That's a real place. And Firefly comes up all the time in lots of stories! Some of what she did had to be real!”

“Mentionin' a real place or ponies don't necessarily make it -” Apple Bloom floundered and then rallied. “I could make up stuff that mentions Ponyville or you, but that won't make it real.”

“Put it this way,” said Scootaloo more quietly. “Do we have many other options? Any other leads?”

“I … guess not.” Apple Bloom tried to strike one more valiant blow for sense in the universe. “But look, even if it's true, it mentions using this Rainbow of Light, which I'm guessin' was the Elements back in the day. We ain't got those.”

“No, but in the story, they picked those up from the old creature in the woods. We've got a mysterious pony who lives in the woods. Maybe Zecora can give us a lead?” Sweetie Belle's expression was … happy. It was a change of pace ever since Rarity had been taken and her parents had lost their cutie marks.

Apple Bloom said, aware that her and common sense's battle was lost, “We also don't have any of these … how do you pronounce it? Human creatures wandering around near Equestria. Or the continent. Or the world for that matter.”

“Well, that's the point,” said Scootaloo. “We're not going to find one nearby.” Her smile was a white semicircle in the fading candlelight. “We just have to send our most daring pegasus off to fetch one.”

Acquisition

Elsewhere, past strange twists and skeins of space-time, a blue-green planet orbited a young star. Magic only had a tenuous hold here, in this gnarled patch of the universe, and so this planet's inhabitants had had to like or lump the laws of physics for the most part. Giant lizards had walked there once. Mammals had followed in their wake. One particular group of social ape-descendants had hacked into the strange alchemy of possessing both a developed cortex and opposable thumbs, and were serving their stint as fleeting Lords of All Creation.

Down a quiet street in a quiet city, under a sheet of light drizzle, one such ape-descendant trod a familiar path back to his flat.

He walked steadily, casually, absently toying with keys in his pocket as he walked and bobbing his head to music emanating from little earpieces.

He was alone under the glow of streetlamps. He felt secure. He knew this part of the city, these streets, this nice pocket of a mostly safe area in a city that didn't deserve its grim reputation, by and large.

He was safe. So very, very safe.

Back in Equestria, Tirek sat upon his throne. His forelimbs dangled over its front, his hands rested upon its arms, his horns scraped the ceiling of what had once been Celestia's throne room. Was now his throne room.

Great marble plinths rose from the floor, two rows of three each leading down towards the room's great door. Columns of fire flared up from them like arterial spray from a wound, painting the vastness of the throne room with a flickering carmine light. The stained glass windows seemed to jerk and dance past them, their former pictures replaced with pictures of Tirek arising triumphant from Tartarus, Tirek casting the Pretender Princesses into Tartarus, Tirek assuming rightful possession of the world's magic, Tirek crushing all who stood before him, et cetera.

All those who had complained about the pains and responsibilities that came with rulership, Tirek felt, had clearly not been doing it right.

A faint knocking came from the far door. Tirek glanced down at his newest steward. “Go and let them in.”

The little dragon, his eyes red from weeping and lack of sleep, his purple scales lustreless, glanced blankly up at Tirek. “Wh – what was that?”

“I said, suffer.”

Tirek reflected, as the casual outpour of magic on his part made the dragon whelp convulse and retch on the floor, that operant conditioning had yet to fail him as a process for ultimately producing obedient minions. Spur or whatever his name was would learn.

It would, of course, be trivially easy to open the door himself. But one hardly became a king to do every job for all of one's subjects. Besides, one should never pass up a valuable teaching experience.

Once the whelp had stopped shuddering on the floor, Tirek leaned down. “Attend more closely in future. Obey immediately. Shake that fatigue out of your brain.” Knocking came from the door again. “Go and let them in.”

The dragon slowly rose and staggered down the room's length, finally reaching the door. After a few moments of jumping up and scrabbling desperately at the handle, he finally found a grip and managed to heave the door back a scant few inches with all his might.

An alicorn, or the grey shell of what used to be an alicorn, stepped through once the door was wide enough. Twilight Sparkle kept her gaze downcast. Her steps were slow and plodding, her wings were held tightly at her sides, which trembled with exertion. The washed-out, grey colours of her coat soaked up the room's red light. The dragon's eyes followed her with mute pleading.

“How is the Crystal Empire, princess?” purred Tirek. “Do riots run through the streets? Do armies march south with my death on their lips? Or is all quiet?”

“All is quiet,” murmured Twilight, her voice scraping past the very edge of audibility, her gaze still directed at the floor. “No riots. No armies. Peace. Ponies getting by as best they can.”

“Good,” said Tirek, drawing out the word. “A peaceful nation is a good nation. A good nation where ponies know their place, live their little lives, and can leave greater affairs to greater beings. Wouldn't you agree, Twilight Sparkle?”

Twilight looked straight at the floor.

“Say, 'Yes, King Tirek.'”

“Yes, King Tirek,” whispered Twilight Sparkle.

Discord's curious mind-warping magic was wonderful for pacifying ponies of the proper temperament, Tirek felt. He gestured at a plinth. “Very good. Back to your cell, then. You've had a hard journey.”

Twilight plodded over to the plinth, where iron bars glistened into existence across its marble surface. They parted for her, letting her step through into the cell underneath the plinth before melting shut once more. The marble flowed back over the bars, affording one last glimpse of the alicorn sitting down and staring at one corner of her cell before the bars were covered entirely, as if they had never existed at all.

Tirek drummed his fingers on one arm of his throne before glancing at two other plinths on the other side of the room. Marble peeled back from iron bars, and two pegasi stepped out. Rainbow Dash's vivid mane and coat had turned all the colours of dishwater, and there was almost no colour to Fluttershy at all.

“Princess Twilight's done her duty. Time for you two to do another ranging while she rests,” said Tirek. “Rainbow Dash, fly south. Criss-cross Neighvada and the Appaloosa territories. I trust you won't have any problems cracking down on any Equestrians who may be contemplating dissent?”

Rainbow Dash laughed, a brief and bitter laugh. “No.”

“Fluttershy. Dearest Fluttershy, rather. I won't subject you to the same physical demands as Rainbow Dash, so you'll just fly around Ponyville and the Everfree border. I do expect you to be … creative with any dissidents. Should you find any.”

Fluttershy's lips peeled back from her teeth, and her mouth twitched upwards at the edges. “Oh, I can be very creative.”

Bless Discord's magic, bless it muchly. Tirek smirked. “On you both go, then.”

He had no need of scouts either. Where he wished to look in Equestria, he saw. And he saw no significant dissent anywhere of importance. But if you had servants at hand, it was only right to use them.

The two pegasi took flight out of the throne room. Tirek leaned back into the shadows of his throne and glanced down at the little dragon. “You'll open the door for them once they return, of course. But you may rest in the meantime.” Let no one say he couldn't be magnanimous.

The little dragon vaguely nodded, his weary expression falling into something rawer as the words sunk in. He trudged over to the plinth holding Twilight and tried to nestle himself up against the wall as best he could. Tirek heard faint noises that were half-begs and half-sobs as he subsided into sleep. As if the occupant would be able to hear him.

Tirek sat on his throne, and considered the world to have been put to rights again. Equestrians everywhere had lost their destiny. He would let them share in his.

“This is insane.”

“And the crowd jeers as Apple Bloom the total cynic does her best impression of a broken record,” muttered Scootaloo. She was limbering up, trotting in a circle and rotating and flexing her small wings.

“You can't just fly to somewhere we don't even know exists in a few minutes like Firefly did. You don't know where you're going. You're not going to just bump into a magical portal amongst the clouds. You can't fly high enough to reach the clouds even if there was!”

“And the crowd goes wild!” said Scootaloo, turning to face the expanse of the wide-open field next to the clubhouse. “Wild as Scootaloo takes the field, prepares to be awesome, and proves Apple Bloom the total cynic wrong.”

“Let her try, Apple Bloom,” ventured Sweetie Belle. “I think it could work. We've done slightly stupider things before, haven't we?”

“How in the blazes are you even going to bring a human back here if you find one?” Apple Bloom's torrent of reasonable objections had become a kind of modulated screech.

“Hey, in the story, Firefly could just carry it on her back with no problem. I'm guessing it'll be no bigger than a Breezy, tops.” Scootaloo eyed the field's far edge. “Don't be blinded if I shed too much awesome doing this.”

“When you come back down in a few minutes dog-tired and damp, I ain't going to be even slightly sympathetic!”

“I'll be sympathetic,” offered up Sweetie Belle, eternal mediator. “But you're going to come back with one, I know it!”

“'Course I will! Wish me luck, though I won't need it.” Scootaloo scuffed the ground with a forehoof, angled herself along the ground like a long-distance galloper, and then lunged forwards into a run.

Long sessions with the enthusiastic coaching of Rainbow Dash had put the lie to the notion that Scootaloo was incapable of flight at all. She could become airborne, with a great deal of effort and a few conditions.

One of which was a decent run-up.

Several minutes later, Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle were still watching Scootaloo pelt down the field, her wings angry blurs at her side.

The minute after, a small orange pegasus shape began to slowly lift above the tree line, her wings sheets of pure orange indistinctness. Scootaloo turned in mid-air to deliver a last jaunty salute, and then buzzed up into the sky.

“Good luck!” yelled Sweetie Belle.

“I blame you in advance,” muttered Apple Bloom.

Magic, in a sense, is all about bidding probability to go screw itself. It is improbable that fireballs should fly forth from a unicorn's horn. It is improbable that heavier-than-air pegasi with a relatively small wingspan should achieve flight, or that an earth pony can survive blows that would shatter a respectable mountain. Magic has its thumb on the scales, and those things happen.

Magic, according to some of the more demented unicorn researchers, has a sense of humour and a flair for the dramatic. The results of this can sometimes be indistinguishable from one-in-a-million chances just happening once in a million times and sticking in ponies' memories, but the researchers seem convinced.

Even in the all-encompassing high-magic field that permeated Equestria and its local universe, it was still decidedly improbable that a small pegasus filly, all but freezing her wings off and all but rasping her breaths in and out with effort, should hit that exact confluence of matter, energy, and wild magic that pushed her out through one pocket of space-time and into another.

It was even more improbable that it would send her where she wanted to go.

But magic's regard for probability can be expressed somewhere between a shrug and putting it in a headlock. These things just happen from time to time, more than they should.

On a blue-green planet orbiting a young star, an ape-descendant pulled out his ear pieces and twisted his key in the door of his flat.

A movement at one side caught his attention, and he turned his head slightly in its direction.

A small orange pegasus that had come plunging down from the lower troposphere slammed into the side of his head, and all of his sensate world turned to ow pain darkness pain pavement pain darkness darkness sleep.

“Owwwww,” managed Scootaloo, after she'd recovered some of her senses and checked with her tongue that she still had all of her teeth. “Ow, ow, ow.” She bit down on the expressions of pain – what would Rainbow Dash think if she were watching? - and twisted her head around where she lay, taking in her blurry surroundings.

She was on a street; night's dark blanket stretched overhead past the overwhelming glare of tall street lamps. A section of the street rose on either side, out from ranks of buildings. Stationary metal machines, all different colours, rested along the edges of the lower section of the street. It was like Manehatten, expect the buildings weren't so tall and the machines were totally unfamiliar.

On the ground next to her, some strange biped was sprawled flat – about twice the height of Scootaloo at the withers while standing, if she was any judge. Its arms – ending at hands and opposable thumbs, like Spike or a minotaur or Tirek – were stretched out on either side, its legs splayed at awkward angles. Different sections of different-coloured clothing covered its body from the neck down, over its long limbs and torso. A brownish mane sprouted across the top of its head, and ran down along its chin and under its nose, framing a flat, monkey-ish face. What looked like a broken pair of spectacles lay on the ground beside it. Its eyes were closed.

“Humans!” whooped Scootaloo, struggling to her hooves. “I knew it! I knew it! Just like the story. Eat it, Apple Bloom! I told you! Hah!” She leaned down towards the human. “Hey, you hear me? I knew you guys existed!”

The human responded with a faint stirring of breath in the base of its throat that sounded distinctly wet. A thin line of blood was trickling out one side of its mouth. Its eyes remained closed.

It dawned on Scootaloo that she'd slammed into it exceedingly hard, and that she wore her helmet on her scooter in order to avoid her own head slamming into things exceedingly hard. Nothing good happened to the ponies who went through that sort of thing.

“Um,” she said. “You alright?”

“Gchk,” replied the human, which was probably just another exhalation rather than actual communication.

“Sorry about that,” she said, trying to force a laugh into her voice. “Didn't know where exactly I was going. My flight was kind of confusing for a few seconds there. Maybe you fly? You might know what it's like.”

“Gchk.”

Its chest was rising and falling, albeit gently. It was still breathing. That was a good sign. Scootaloo rallied.

“I'm from Equestria, and on solemn behalf of the ponies there, we need your help as we did very long ago. As Firefly came for Megan in the days of old – say, are you Megan herself?”

“Gchk.” On consideration, this human didn't much look like the yellow-maned one in the story's illustrations. Maybe it was a descendant. Or a friend. Or something. There probably weren't that many humans, they might all know each other.

“Well – whatever your name is, Equestria is in mortal peril from the tyrant Tirek. I ask, nay, verily I plead, that one of your mighty kin stand alongside us once more as we throw him down and restore harmony and freedom to Equestria! What say you, bold human, bold ally and friend?”

Scootaloo was exceedingly proud of aping the language of a typical school play. The human, however, seemed supremely unappreciative. One hand feebly twitched. “Gchk.”

This was not going on Scootaloo's list of Most Promising Negotiations. She sighed and said, “Look, we're kind of in the thick of it back home, and you're not … um, all there at the moment. Would you mind if I just took you back somewhere where you can recover and get your mind back together? I can explain everything to you along with my friends. Play your cards right, you might even go home with a prince or something. I forget exactly how it all worked out in the story.”

“Gchk.”

“...Taken as a yes. Come on, then.” It was at that point that Apple Bloom's last objection came back to haunt her.

There was, luckily enough, a strip of brown material like the dried hide of a cow around its waist. Scootaloo chuckled at the grim unlikelihood of the idea, and then unbuckled it with some difficulty and some judicious kicking and rolling-over of the human. She could secure it around … where? Its neck? A hand?

A foot. That seemed easiest and least likely to damage the human.

Scootaloo, through some adroit twists and knots, managed to tie the belt around the human's foot and secure it around her own midriff.

This alien street, empty as it currently was, was a excellent run-up zone.

It is supremely improbable that a small pegasus filly struggling to bear an unconscious ape-descendant several times her own mass should be able to …

You know how this goes.

“No,” said Apple Bloom, simply and starkly as the shape of the encumbered pegasus grew in the sky. “No.”

“She's back!” squealed Sweetie Belle with pure delight. “And she's got a human!”

“I refuse to believe this is happening before my own two eyes. No. This has no right to have happened. This has no right to have worked.”

“Can't you be happy? We're doing like the story says. We're going to take down Tirek and save our sisters and get our cutie marks if we keep doing it properly!” Sweetie Belle was all but dancing on the spot. “I could burst!”

“I live in a sensible universe and this ain't happening. I live in a sensible universe and this ain't happening.” Apple Bloom seemed to be progressively shrinking in on herself. “I live in a sensible universe -”

“H – hey, gals,” wheezed Scootaloo, her sides a solid lather of sweat, her eyes unfocused as she swept down through the air towards them. “Look ... look what I b-brought back.”

She descended, somehow managing to keep the movement controlled and bouncing the trailing human's head off the ground only twice or thrice. She alighted on the grass before the clubhouse, wheezing in breath after breath, her legs trembling. The human sprackled face-down and insensate behind her. One complicated shrug on Scootaloo's part undid the belt connecting her to the human, and she staggered a few steps forwards.

“You did it!” said Sweetie Belle, rushing forwards and wrapping Scootaloo in a hug. “You brought one back! Is it Megan? Her mane seems different than what the story says.”

“Think it's some ... someone different. Made you -” Scootaloo's gaze drifted until it fell in Applebloom's general direction. “Eat … words. Hah.”

Then she collapsed unconscious.

“We should probably get her some water,” said Sweetie Belle after a few hesitant moments.

“And get her into the clubhouse,” said Apple Bloom, gesturing at the human. “We don't know who might be watchin'. There's surely some attention going to be comin' our way, sooner rather than later.”

Diplomacy

Transporting a human into the clubhouse came with its own set of physical difficulties. Between the three of the Crusaders, once Scootaloo had been roused and force-fed the better part of a bucket of water, they were able to handle the weight. But the long limbs flopped everywhere and tilted the weight seemingly at random, and there wasn't a rung the human's forehead didn't like to bounce off with every opportunity it got.

But they managed before long. A small wooden chair was capable of supporting the human's weight, but their unconscious frame refused to stay upright in it. After the fourth time a hollow thunk rung out from where the human's head made contact with the floor beside the chair, Apple Bloom lost patience. “Tie her to it,” she declared, making for a coil of rope on the floor. “That'll keep her upright.”

“It might not be a her,” said Scootaloo. “They don't look much like Megan from the pictures. And I think that's a short beard on their chin.”

“Beards don't prove it,” objected Sweetie Belle. “Girl mammoths have beards. Girl goats have beards.”

“Mammoths don't count. They're all hair. But … yeah, fair point about the goats. I still don't think it's Megan herself. Bet you it's a boy.”

“Done.” Sweetie Belle turned back to Apple Bloom. “Could you take their clothes off? That's how you can tell for certain.”

“Girls, it ain't done to abduct strangers and take their clothes off while they're unconscious,” said Apple Bloom, somewhat indistinctly past the rope between her teeth. She pulled on it, tightening the ropes binding the human's torso to the back of the chair. Satisfied, she spat it out. “In fact, I fix to cover her up further. Pass me over a cloak. We'll wanna cover her in case any spy comes a-peekin' through the window.”

“Good thinking!” Scootaloo tossed over her cloak, which was in turn draped over the human. No response came, and the Crusaders settled down to wait.

“This … this isn't some sort of crime we've done, is it?” ventured Scootaloo after a few still moments. “Kidnapping a human, tying them up, covering them in a musty old cloak … this isn't animal cruelty or anything like it, is it?”

“Nope! Animal cruelty only applies if the species isn't sentient. Otherwise, it's just regular cruelty,” chirped Sweetie Belle.

Silence descended, heavy and smothering.

“...Which we're not doing.”

“Well, that's a relief,” sighed Scootaloo. “I wouldn't want to -”

“Hnnk,” came a muffled voice from underneath the cloak. The round shape of the human's covered head shifted gently from side to side. “Rrng?”

“They're waking up!” said Sweetie Belle. “Oh, this is exciting, this is exciting!”

“Take the cloak off,” said Scootaloo, her eyes bright. “Let's talk to them!”

“Hold your horses,” said Apple Bloom, trying and failing to not smile. She stepped up to the edge of the cloak. The human was definitely moving underneath it.

“(Wha – where am I? Someone? Where am I? Anyone?)” came a series of strange noises from beneath it, unintelligible to Apple Bloom. She tilted her head slightly to one side, and then shrugged and pulled the cloak right off with her teeth.

Pale blue eyes stared down from out of a face that was largely one massive bruise. The human's gaze flicked around the room, finally alighting on Apple Bloom. The filly offered up her most charming grin. “Howdy, stranger!”

“(I … what in the hell?)” said the human. Apple Bloom was caught short by the speech again. It was speech, there seemed to be some amount of structure and variation in it. But it emerged as a strange series of high yips and exclamations from high in the creature's throat that she had no point of reference for.

“What's your name?” she ventured, painting on a brighter smile and leaning closer.

“(What – what are you?)” The human leaned back in the chair, their eyes widening by the second.

“I'm sorry, um … Yrr? That's a mighty queer name, if you don't mind me sayin'.” The sound at the end of their speech might not have been their name, and Apple Bloom struggled to pronounce it, but it was all she had.

Her smile fritzed, and then she whirled back to Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle. “How did Firefly do it?” she hissed. “Was there a special potion she had to drink to speak their language or something?”

“I … no, there wasn't.” Sweetie Belle looked perturbed and trotted closer. “Excuse me? Can you understand me?”

“(...you're a unicorn.)”

“Um. Parlez-vous Fancé?”

“(I'm being spoken to by a unicorn. I haven't even had to drink anything.)”

“Where did you learn to speak Fancé?” said Scootaloo.

“I don't, I just know a few phrases. Rarity thought knowing some of it would be good for me. Not all that important right now! Do you know what she's saying?”

“He, bet you bits on that. And, ah …” Scootaloo screwed up her face as she racked her brain for memories of Cheerilee's foreign language lessons. “Hablo Asiniol?”

“(I'm not saying this isn't a surprising novelty as far as dreams go,)” Yrr muttered, “(I just don't see why it has to involve my arms being tied and my face feeling like someone took a hammer to it.)”

“Emergency Crusader meetin',” said Apple Bloom, scooping up the cloak again with a hoof. “Now.”

Outside the clubhouse, three fillies did a lot of very hushed yelling.

“Scoots, your human is defective!”

“You want to sprout wings and go get another one? Be my guest!”

“Don't shout,” whispered Sweetie Belle, making hushing motions with her hoof while glancing up at the clubhouse's window. “You'll scare her if she hears.”

“(Why is this cloak over my head? What's even happening?)”

“He's already hearing it!” said Scootaloo. “And he's making noise as well. We'll have to shush him if we want to take him anywhere.”

“Well, we can just ask her to keep it low -” said Sweetie Belle.

“How? We can't speak to him.” Scootaloo paced and muttered. “We'll have to gag him. Maybe we can take it off after a while once he gets the idea.”

Apple Bloom sighed. “This was the worst idea. Basically, the worst.”

“Oh, stop nay-saying!” snapped Scootaloo. “All I've heard from you is complaining. 'Ooh, Scootaloo, humans don't exist. Ooh, Scootaloo, you shouldn't go off and recruit one. Ooh, Scootaloo, you shouldn't gag this one that exists and which you recruited, I like being found and foalnapped by Tirek's spies.'”

“You're darn right I complain about fool ideas! We shouldn't have brought her here at all. Now we're going to have to leave her here while we go off and think of some other plan, since we can't even say 'Hi there, let's storm Tirek's castle!' to her.”

“We can still go off and do that. The castle bit. We can still take him with us.”

“That's unethical!”

“It ...” Sweetie Belle looked up at Apple Bloom, a note of pleading in her eyes. “It's the story, Apple Bloom. It's how Firefly did it. We need a human with us. And then we need to visit everywhere else before we take down Tirek. That's how it has to go.”

Apple Bloom's aggravation simmered down to a low boil, and her withers slumped. “Just ain't right to spring some weird demon-centaur thing with nearly all the magic in Equestria on a poor creature who ain't expectin' it. We can do something else.”

Sweetie Belle looked away. “We don't have anything else.”

Silence, not for the first time, fell.

Scootaloo spoke first. “Well, we can try to speak to him. We can do our best. And if we can't do that, then we're not the Cutie Mark Crusaders.”

Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle glanced at each other. Sweetie Belle offered up the ghost of a grin. Apple Bloom sighed. “Aw, what the heck. We've done stupider things.”

“Darn right we have!”

Three fillies trotted back into their clubhouse. Apple Bloom whipped off the cloak again, leaving Yrr exposed once more, the human blinking and staring wildly. He opened his mouth to speak

“Hush now,” said Apple Bloom, placing a hoof on his mouth. “We got somethin' to say. Might be you won't understand it – we'll talk loud and clear if that helps at all – but it's got to be said.” She stepped back into line with the other Crusaders and cleared her throat.

“We don't know if you're Megan of old or not. I'm suspectin' you ain't. If you're not, then you gotta know that a long time ago, longer than pony historians can say, there was an evil king called Tirek. He hurt ponies, he transformed them, he didn't care about them. One time, a brave group of ponies living in their valley were attacked, and they decided to take him on once and for all. For the good of everypony. Everyone.”

“But they needed help,” said Scootaloo. “So the swiftest and bravest and awesomest of them all, Firefly, flew out to find some. She found one of you guys, a human. Megan.”

“So she flew back with Megan, and together with the other ponies, they marched to Tirek's castle through thick and thin. There were sea-ponies and near-drowning and a Moochick who gave them a magic rainbow,” said Sweetie Belle. “And it was tough, and they needed more help from someone on Tirek's side, but in the end, they did it! They imprisoned him in Tartarus thanks to Megan and their rainbow.”

“And that was that for ages,” said Scootaloo. “Equestria grew out of Dream Valley and the other pony tribes that came from the North to settle down there, and a whole bunch of boring history happened.”

“But it's all gone wrong again,” said Apple Bloom quietly. “Tirek's back, and he's winnin'. He's captured our princesses, all our cities, all our magic, all our -” Something caught briefly in her throat. “- Our big sisters. They were wielding the rainbow again, you see? The Elements of Harmony. Or they were. There was a box as well, and they gave the Elements up. I'm not sure what was going on exactly.”

“We need to take him on before it's too late,” said Scootaloo. “We've still got our magic about us. He only drained anypony with a cutie mark of theirs. We're all that's left. And we need to take him on right.”

“We need a new Megan,” whispered Sweetie Belle. “Please help us.”

“We're the Cutie Mark Crusaders,” said Apple Bloom. “Right now, we've got no big sisters at home waitin' for us. We're never going to get a cutie mark, and if we do, it'll just be sucked away by Tirek. But if we can fight Tirek, beat him proper, then we can get all these things back. And save Equestria as well.” She extended a hoof. “What do you say? Crusade at our side?”

Yrr looked at them levelly.

“(Oh, thank the gods,)” he said abruptly. “(You've stopped whickering. Look, I suspect there's some sort of language barrier at play here. Strange thing to have in a dream – for all this doesn't feel like one – but hey. What can you do?)”

“Was that a yes?” said Scootaloo.

“We'll have to hope so.” Apple Bloom stepped behind Yrr and tugged on the ropes behind him with her teeth, undoing them. “Stand up, Yrr. We've got a long walk ahead.”

Yrr stood. “(This is a dream, and I'm in control,)” he murmured to himself. “(This is a dream and I'm in control.)”

And with that, he bolted like a startled rabbit for the doorway.

Apple Bloom was too taken aback to cry out, but reflexively lunged forwards after him. Yrr's arms flailed as Scootaloo flapped up at him. “No, wait!” she cried, to no avail. Yrr managed to flail and whirl his way right past her in the close confines of the room, and staggered towards the door.

Sweetie Belle had stepped back towards the doorway and stood in it, her horn pointing up at Yrr and her eyes wide and terrified. “No, please, please don't run away!” she cried. Magic unconsciously flickered around her horn. “Just stay, help us!”

Yrr, looking down at Sweetie Belle from a point twice her height at the withers, stopped. His eyes flicked from side to side, from windows to wall, his mind racing behind a discombobulated-looking exterior, options in the weighing.

In that split second, instinct alone driving her on, Apple Bloom galloped up to Yrr's side, spun to put her back to him, drew her rear legs back, and bucked him in the leg as surely as if she was trying to topple an oak. Yrr's knee buckled to one side and he fell with an agonised wail.

Screaming from all corners followed.

“No! Why did she try to run?”

“You broke the human!”

“(AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRGGHH-)”

Apple Bloom stood stock still. “Um,” she said. “Um. Shoot.”

Sortie

Late in the morning, dawn finally rose in the sky, as if it were an afterthought. Red light struggled to break through ranks of grey clouds that dominated the sky. Rain swept down in light sheets, punctuated by distant rolls of thunder.

It was good dramatic travelling weather for some young heroines and their alien ally. Under the cloud cover and with many furtive glances skywards, they cut a direct line from their clubhouse to the Everfree Forest. The scattered buildings on the outskirts of Ponyville and the orchards of Sweet Apple Acres passed them by, lying cold and empty.

“Comin' home soon, Granny and Big Mac,” Apple Bloom whispered. “Don't you fret now.”

She took the lead, knowing the trails they would need to take to reach Zecora's house. They passed under the looming canopy of the Everfree, into that gnarled maze of roots and tangled branches and a thousand staring eyes just out of the corner of their vision. Apple Bloom glanced from side to side, picking up on anything that looked familiar, and saw the correct trail. “This way,” she said, ushering the others on.

Sweetie Belle came just behind her. She stopped briefly, gritting her teeth as sparks spat from her horn. A steady green light flared into existence from its tip, giving them light. She hurried after Apple Bloom, trying and failing not to stare at every moving shadow around them as she did so.

Behind them came Scootaloo. Her pace was affectively casual, her gaze as straight ahead as an arrowshot. She held a length of rope between her teeth, which she used to lead Yrr along.

The human was bound and gagged. A stiff splint covered his knee, and by now only little anguished meeps were elicited whenever his weight came down upon that leg. A crutch hastily whittled by Apple Bloom had been shoved under his shoulder and awkwardly pushed down through the ropes at his side.

“Really sorry about the gag,” she had said to Yrr as she'd whittled the crutch. “But we don't know how to tell you to hush in your own language, and you're kinda doin' a lot of screamin' and cryin' right now. Not your fault, and I'm real sorry.”

“Mmch!” Yrr had retorted, whose gaze at that point had already taken on something of a thousand-yard quality. The subsequent walk from the clubhouse and into the Everfree had done little to help that. Scootaloo turned around every so often to make sure he was keeping up or to help him up whenever he tripped over a root and fell into a puddle, and each time his pale, drawn expression indicated his soul was undergoing a slow and torturous death.

But Equestria's fate couldn't wait for his knee to get better, and so on they marched. The winding trails in the Everfree led further into darkness and the strange ghost-lights that haunted the deep forest. Pale blue spectres passed between the trees on their side in a flash, will-o'-wisps on the prowl. Eyes blinked from alcoves and holes in trees.

The Everfree was quiet, Apple Bloom tried to feel entirely relieved to note. Aside from the odd rustle from undergrowth as little creatures darted through, the distant sound of a rushing river, and the occasional crash as Yrr introduced himself to a puddle face-first, serenity ruled. No predators came blundering out from bushes, nothing screamed or keened in the night. It was if they'd all found somewhere better to be.

Apple Bloom didn't finish that thought, and ploughed on as the forest grew thicker about them. Branches whipped at her side and clawed at her back, with water continuing to patter down from on high. Shadows further along the trail sharpened as Sweetie Belle's light neared them, and Apple Bloom groaned as she saw the familiar shapes of thorn bushes.

“Hold on a moment,” she called. “I'll try and clear these so we've got a space to move through. They're growin' something fierce this year.”

She briskly broke away stray branches with her teeth and bucked sections clear as best she could. As the filly worked, Yrr glanced at the small foal-sized space being created, looked down at his knee, and plaintively whimpered as no happy future presented itself. Digging his heels in to try and resist the journey only succeeded in netting him the worst of both worlds when the Crusaders pitched their combined efforts into dragging him through the gap.

“We'll make it up to you, I swear,” said Sweetie Belle to the scratched and prone human, who now seemed to be having a staring contest with the Abyss. “Just ... please help us make it easy on yourself. Please?”

“Don't talk to her. It ain't going to work,” said Apple Bloom wearily. “Zecora can patch her up once we're at her place. I think I know where to find it from here.”

After a short walk, they came to the side of a river that cut right through the forest. Ferns dotted with little glowing insects sprouted along its sides, dragonflies and kingfishers swooped over its burbling surface. Even reflecting the angry, half-hidden light of dawn, it was a breath of fresh air after the claustrophobic forest.

“Rest here?” said Sweetie Belle. “I wouldn't mind a drink from the river.”

“Yeah, we'll take five. Knock yourself out. It's running and clear, so it should be good.” Apple Bloom turned to Scootaloo. “Take Yrr's gag out. He might want a drink too.”

Scootaloo shrugged and flapped with some difficulty up to the back of Yrr's head. A firm tug in the right place undid the knotted rope between Yrr's teeth. He coughed and licked at the edges of his mouth, rubbed raw by the hemp.

“Knock yourself out, big guy,” said Scootaloo, pushing at his back. “You must be as thirsty as a horse. The river's safe.”

“(Where are you taking me, you wee psychopaths?)”

“Ri – ver,” enunciated Scootaloo. “The thing filled with water over there. See it?”

“(Braying in my ear doesn't answer the question, you demented wee equine!)”

“Creator's quill, you can take a human to water ...” muttered Apple Bloom. “Give her a push. Sweetie Belle, show her it's alright.”

Sweetie Belle sipped from the river, chirped,“Yum!” and turned back to Yrr with a hopeful expression. Yrr hesitantly stepped forward, and the Crusaders heaved a collective sigh of relief at what appeared to be their first successful act of cross-species communication.

“(Aye, very good,)” Yrr muttered. “(Keeping me alive for as long as possible, are we?)” Reaching the water's edge, he attempted to crouch by bending his good leg alone and keeping his bad leg straight as he stretched it out. This inevitably turned into an ungainly tumble forwards, followed by a yelp of pain as he fell prone and both his legs and the crutch splayed out at spectacular and painful angles. He wriggled, achieving little with his arms still bound.

“(Bugger it,)” he said after a few moments, and writhed his way towards the water. He plunged his face into it, and the sound of enthusiastic gulping followed.

Sweetie Belle watched his face go below the surface, and grinned suddenly.

“Oh no!” she called out, raising one hoof to her forehead. “Our poor human is drowning! Woe is us! If only there were somepony nearby who could come in our hour of need and deliver us from -”

“What in the hay are you doing?” Apple Bloom tilted her head ever-so-slightly to one side as she regarded Sweetie Belle.

“Sea-ponies!” said Sweetie Belle. “They have to come along at this part and save the human and maybe one of us. Then they'll later help us get into Canterlot.”

Apple Bloom let her jaw hang open for a moment before shaking her head. “No, no … that's … no. There ain't no sea-ponies left around anymore, unless there's still a couple on the other side of the continent. And we wouldn't need them to get into Canterlot anyway. It's landlocked. It's about as landlocked as a city gets.”

“I … well, I know,” said Sweetie Belle, slumping and scuffing a hoof. “But the story says -”

“Story does say it was kinda dumb luck,” admitted Scootaloo. “They needed the seaponies' help for how they took on Tirek. We won't. We're fine.”

Yrr continued to drink the river in relative peace. Sweetie Belle looked down at the ground and crooned, “Shoo-be-doo, shoo-shoo-be-do,” to herself. The forest whispered around them, and the river stirred.

“Beg your pardon!” announced a purple sea serpent that exploded from the river then, waves of water cascading off his back and from his orange mane and moustache. “I couldn't help but overhear singing!”

“(JESUS CHRIST!)” The human didn't manage an outright backflip away from the river, but it was a good attempt. The Cutie Mark Crusaders whirled to face the serpent, various expressions of shock and exclamations arising.

“Oh, I really do beg your pardon if I interrupted anything,” said the sea serpent. Arms at its side rose into a contrite position. “I've just always been something of a musical connoisseur, and indulging that's always been very hard considering my circumstances out here. I do apologise for my forwardness. Please, ignore me if I'm being ungraciously forward, I wouldn't blame you at all -”

“Oh, no, that's alright,” said Apple Bloom, trying to control her thunderous heart rate. Now that the initial shock had run its course, there wasn't much to be frightened about. The sea serpent didn't look all that terrifying on closer inspection. The elegantly coiffed mane and fabulously curling moustache were working against it. “Glad you, um, approve of the singin'.”

“Oh, 'approve' undersells it. A new voice and a new group of ponies by my river are always a delight.” It leaned down towards Yrr, curiosity alive in its expression and serrated teeth gleaming in a smile. “You don't appear to be a pony, though. How do you do? I commend your hair.”

“(This is it. This is how I die. Kidnapped and crippled by tiny horses and eaten by a river monster.)” Yrr struggled to his feet, maintaining eye contact with the sea serpent. Something had broken behind the mad calmness of the human's demeanour, and he babbled serenely on. “(If any of you wee beasts survive, lie to my family. Tell them I died well.)”

“And a good day to you, too,” said the sea serpent hesitantly. “I must say, that's an unfamiliar tongue.”

“Say ...” Recognition's cogs were turning in Apple Bloom's mind, and she stepped past Yrr to face the sea serpent. “You, ah, wouldn't have come across a group of six ponies a few years back, would you? Did one of them give you her tail?”

“Why, as a matter of fact, I did indeed,” said the sea serpent, turning to Apple Bloom, its eyes now positively glowing with interest. “A wonderful and generous gesture, for which I've yet to repay her in full. How did you guess?”

“Well, as it so happens, the one that gave you her tail?” Apple Bloom hooked Sweetie Belle closer to her with an embracing hood. “This one's older sis. And my older sis was there as well, saw the whole thing. She said you were quite the character.”

“Did she? Hah! Deserved, no doubt, I was throwing quite the fit at the time.” The sea serpent leaned closer with a conspiratorial wink. “But it was a well-deserved one. Took me positively ages to grow my moustache back out to a beautiful and symmetrical extent again. Regardless, if you're all kin or friends of the six I met, then let me count you as friends as well.”

“Glad to let you do so! I'm Apple Bloom. This is Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. And this here … I think her name's Yrr, but I ain't so sure about that.”

“Also, she might be a dude,” interjected Scootaloo. “But I'll be honest, our points of reference are kinda mixed.”

“Ah? Well then, I'm very pleased to meet all of you. What are you doing out here, and may I lend my assistance in any way?”

“Honestly, we're just out here to meet a friend. Zecora. A zebra that lives here. Maybe you know her?”

“That I do.” Solemnity found an awkward home on the sea serpent's face. “I've heard stories from her. Awfully disturbing stuff. Something about some monster called Tirek running rampage over Equestria. Eating magic, stopping the sun and moon in their tracks – I've been feeling the effects on the tide all the way up here! Do you know any more about -?”

“We do!” said Sweetie Belle, subsiding as the others glanced quickly and nervously in her direction. A series of glances followed, couriers for a brief battle of wills between the three, before Sweetie Belle turned back to the sea serpent and cleared her throat. “We .. uh, that is to say, me and the other Crusaders … we're going to stop Tirek. We found this story that described how other ponies did it once. We're going to follow their example and save Equestria. And our sisters, Tirek captured them too.”

“Gracious!” The sea serpent leaned down, a frown playing about its features. “You are awfully small, you appreciate? Surely if there are adult ponies still around, they should be the ones -”

“They all got their magic drained,” said Scootaloo. “They're not going to be able to fight Tirek any time soon. It's only us left in Ponyville. Only us. But we know what we're doing – kinda.”

“Well … if you need my help, anything at all, then consider it merely the repayment of my favour to the generous pony who helped me so long ago. Is there anything I can do?”

“Nothin' that's comin' to mind, if I'm honest,” said Apple Bloom after a moment's hesitation. “At the moment, we're just tryin' to find Zecora. Then I suppose we'll walk on to Canterlot from there. Heck of a distance, but we'll manage. We'll have to.”

“I see. Is this 'Yrr' a vital part of beating Tirek?”

“We think so.”

“I see. Do you usually let her out of your sight? It seems dangerous to do, if you're going overland in the Everfree.”

“Out of our sight? I don't -” Apple Bloom glanced to either side, and then whirled round. There was no sign of Yrr, nothing but a distant and ever-distanter galumping through the forest at their backs.

“Flying feathers!”

Back in the forest, Yrr ran. Or at least, he stumbled.

Stumbling away was the main thing, stumbling to could come later. Right now, he had a wide expanse of open forest before him, which he intended to put as much of between himself and the twisted little horse-creatures and that river-monster as possible.

Roots tripped him up and slammed him into the ground or against the sides of tree trunks, and a manic energy drove him each time to struggle upright with nothing more than his entire flopping, bound body. Dull waves of pain pulsed upwards from his knee, making advanced thought and planning all but impossible. Flee, flee, said the ape instinct at the back of his mind. He broke his skin open on bark, caught and twisted his ankle more times than he cared to keep a track of, and let it all accumulate into one great full-body ache. Adrenaline and fear could carry him past that. The prospect of being inevitably sacrificed to the river-monster or whatever else the little horses had in store gave him wings on his back and a fire in his gut.

He crashed out of the forest and into an open clearing. Wan sunlight, tinted the colour of rust by the cloud-choked dawn, beat down upon his shoulders and face. He turned to face the forest he'd emerged from, eyes skittering across anything that seemed like it might move to reveal a horse-creature, still pacing backwards all the while.

Something came crashing down to the ground at his back, and he spun to face it, his heart rate once again spiking to something measurable only with notation.

Before him, having come flying down from out of the sky, there stood a pegasus. They were bigger than the other one, their withers on a par with Yrr's own shoulders. Their mane was the colour of roses with all the life bled away, their coat was as grey as ash. Their eyes, however, were huge and turquoise, and disconcertingly serene.

Yrr stood stock-still, unsure of whether this represented his inevitable messy demise or an uptick in his fortunes.

Fluttershy, meanwhile, just let herself smile at all the pleasing prospects that ran through the grey corridors of her mind.

“Why, hello,” she said, her voice shifting down to its lowest, gentlest, and kindest pitch. “I've not seen one like you before.”

“(As I told your compatriots before they broke my kneecap,)” stammered Yrr, “(There's a language barrier at play here, so you might be wasting your breath. Like I'm doing just now.)”

Flutteshy stepped closer, careful to keep her eyes wide and intent upon Yrr. “We don't get many bipeds around these parts. Are you a minotaur? You don't have any horns, though.”

“(...Stand back. I'm ready to defend myself. How, I'm not exactly sure, but -)”

“Come here,” said Fluttershy in the most soothing tones her vocal range allowed. “I'll tell you something interesting about bipeds.”

Yrr, with obvious great reluctance, stepped that little bit closer. Something in her demeanour had rubbed off on him. Fluttershy trotted up, her movements unhurried and non-threatening. For the first time, Yrr's heartbeat dropped to something measurable by science.

“(I hate today so far, I'm not going to lie,)” he whispered to himself.

“The thing about a bipedal gait,” said Fluttershy, stepping up until she was at Yrr's side, “The thing is that your kidneys just dangle where anypony could reach them.”

And with one smooth, unhurried, non-threatening movement, she slammed the edge of one hoof right up under Yrr's ribs. The human didn't scream, didn't recoil. He just slumped to the ground, a low hiss of agony escaping his mouth as he tried to not throw up. Another hoof slammed out and into his stomach, knocking him windless to the ground. He writhed feebly and choked for breath as Fluttershy loomed over him, her turquoise eyes narrow and bright against the grey of her face and her mouth contorted into a sneer.

“Poor lost thing, left alone and tied up out here with nothing to do but pray for mercy.” Her sneer sharpened and she drove a hoof into Yrr's crotch. He did throw up then, his arms uselessly struggling within the ropes and his hands clenching into fists.

“How's the praying working out for you?” Fluttershy rose another hoof over Yrr's face, hovering until she was sure she could drive it down onto an eye.

“You get away from him!”

From the bushes, a small orange miracle the size and shape of Scootaloo emerged, wings buzzing like motor blades and raw anger in her eyes. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle crashed out from behind her, stepping into the clearing with similar attitudes.

Flutterhsy looked up and smiled her sweetest smile. “Oh my. Applejack's little annoyance, Rarity's little hindrance, and Rainbow Dash's sad little cultist. I was wondering where all of you had ended up. What are you doing out here with this creature? Something of interest to King Tirek, perhaps?”

Scootaloo took in a deep, steadying breath. “This … this isn't anything. And Fluttershy, we were there for Discord, I know it wasn't you that just spoke. Just remember the real you, remember -”

“No thank you. I'd rather have a little fun right here.” Her hoof descended onto Yrr's throat, pressure building until he began to wheeze. “What's this creature?”

“We … we ain't sayin'!” Apple Bloom took an indignant step forwards. “Stop hurtin' her!”

“Keeping quiet? Alright.” A malevolent smirk reasserted itself. Her hoof pressed down further, and Yrr began to grow purple. “What bit of this creature would you like me to break first? One of its arms? Its teeth?”

“Get away from him!” Scootaloo started forwards again, and Fluttershy casually kicked Yrr's bandaged knee. The human paled and moaned with what little breath was left to him, and Scootaloo stopped in her tracks.

“Explain,” said Fluttershy. “Or I start getting creative, girls -”

Past the tree cover on the clearing's other side, a figure detached from the shadows. Yellow eyes gleamed within the darkness of a cowl. The figure raised a hoof, a small object gleaming within its grasp.

The hoof lunged forwards. The object arced through the air, becoming a small ceramic sphere in the murky light of day. It tumbled onto the ground behind Fluttershy, and suddenly blasted outwards with a flash of light and peal of thunder. Fluttershy yelped and tumbled forwards off of Yrr, who seemed barely sensate of what was happening. The Crusaders jumped backwards, reflexively shielding their eyes.

The glow faded, and out of it, a familiar zebra strode. A hoof dipped into the cloak's recesses, and emerged with another ceramic, this one painted a vivid red.

“Oh, and you join the party as well,” snarled Fluttershy, turning to face Zecora. “Where were you hiding, old witch? Not that it matters much. I can bring Tirek to devour your magic as well. Maybe he'll give you to me to play with.”

“A threat, is it? I offer one in turn.” Zecora raised the red ceramic, her eyes under the hood boring straight into Fluttershy. “Depart this place forthwith. Depart or burn.”

“You wouldn't hurt me. You're much too meek for -” Fluttershy started, a confident sneer emerging from her shock.

Zecora threw the ceramic at a point just left of Fluttershy. It impacted the ground in a sudden column of flame, making Fluttershy jump aside and crisping the coats of the Crusaders with its proximity. Another flew into Zecora's grasp in a split-second.

“Foals at your back and a hurt creature before you. This is nothing like the Fluttershy I once knew. I'm an evil enchantress, you'll recall if you try. If you want to test me, come forward and die.” Zecora absently tossed the ceramic and caught it as it fell. “Fly away home, cruel little minion. This isn't yet Tirek's dominion.”

Fluttershy edged backwards. Her teeth bared, her eyes narrowed to mere slits. “Tirek will come,” she hissed. “I'd like to see what your little potions will do then!” Her wings spread, and she flew up into the air, wheeling away in the direction of Canterlot and vanishing past the tree line.

Apple Bloom hadn't even realised she'd been holding her breath until she released it in one mighty heave. Before her, Zecora pocketed the ceramic and trotted up to the mercifully-unconscious Yrr. With the air of a detached physician, she poked him with a hoof.

“Zecora, I ain't going to lie, that was the single best timing – or one of the single best timings – I've ever been blessed by,” Apple Bloom suddenly babbled. “That was – well -”

“Mostly a lie. My first red ceramic was real, my second fake. Supplies are very low, and I'm not exactly on the take.” Zecora glanced over Yrr and heaved a sigh. “As happenings go, this is hardly a fine feature. Why are you here, and what is this creature?”

“It's … kinda a long story. We'll tell it, and we were hopin' you could help.”

Zecora arched one brow. “I'm hardly surprised, but I'll try to lend a hoof. Come with me.” She turned on her heel. “We'll discuss it under my roof.”

Objectives

In the dark and strange-smelling confines of Zecora's hut, three fillies cautiously sipped at cups of steaming tisanes, a zebra washed her hooves in a bowl of water, and a human lay sprackled over a table at the side. He stared happily up at the ceiling with pupils the size of the night sky, utterly unresponsive to the world. None of the Crusaders knew what exactly had been in the paste Zecora had pushed down Yrr's throat, but it was darned effective. He hadn't screamed in apocalyptic agony once, even when Zecora had slammed his knee back into place and jammed a needle of strange reddish wood into the flesh just above it.

Zecora had listened to the story so far as she'd worked, her impassive expression betraying nothing. She'd kept listening as the tale continued and wound down as she'd washed her hooves. She finished, briskly drying them off on an old cloth, and then turned to the expectant and silent Crusaders. Sad weariness etched lines around her eyes.

“You extrapolate from a dusty old tale? On it hinges whether you succeed or fail?” she said softly.

“I know it sounds strange, Zecora,” Sweetie Belle started.

“We all know it pretty well,” Apple Bloom said.

“You're not helping!”

“But it's worked so far,” Scootaloo hastily interjected. She gestured at Yrr, who was currently serving as a table for several empty cups that gently rose and fell on his chest. “Humans do exist, and I found one. If one part's true, the rest has to be as well, right?”

“I do not know if this is a human, so I cannot say. But even if so, it wouldn't tip the other factors any way. You expect me to be a … Moochick, to pull out some surprise, but I tell you now, I have no Rainbow, Light or otherwise.”

Zecora turned away from the Crusader and examined the red wooden needle where it protruded from Yrr's leg, the fabric of the clothing there cut away. Reddish veins radiated from and bulged out of the skin in a scarlet spiderweb, clustering thickly around the mangled-looking knee. From inside the knee, worryingly organic creaks and squelches sounded and the knee shifted internally from time to time.

“But it's not – I mean, we didn't think you'd have the exact one in the story, not really,” Sweetie Belle babbled, hopping down off her chair and cantering up to Zecora's side. “It's – it's got to be the same pattern, though, right? You're the smartest, mysteriousest pony we know; you've got to know some way to take down Tirek.”

“Methods and objects I know of, which could help in such a task,” said Zecora slowly and quietly. “But each is beyond your reach, more inaccessible than the last. Balefire's recipe is locked away in the Zebrican Library, and its defences and guards are beyond legendary. The Black Spear could slay Tirek outright, but it was lost in the ocean depths beyond all sight. And Starswirl's last notes were scattered north of here, in the Eldritch Wynd. Nopony who yet lives has or ever will make that find.”

“Well, then, we don't go out of our way for those.” Scootaloo rose to her hooves where she sat upon a battered old bed at one side of the hut's main room. Her eyes were wide and desperate as she stared around the hut and up at the looming masks and shelves; she was all but shouting. “You've got to have something here! A potion that can act like a Rainbow of Light or Element of Harmony, or an old weapon locked away, or -!”

“Peace under my roof.” Zecora whirled upon her, her expression sharp, and Scootaloo reluctantly subsided. The zebra turned back to Yrr with a sigh. “I have nothing at hoof. Bare shelves, my dwindling supplies, my hide and little more. The breakthrough you seek just isn't something I store.”

Silence fell over the hut then, broken intermittently by the burble of the great cauldron in the room's centre. The fire at its base was dying, becoming little more than a thin pool of embers.

“I am sorry – truly I am – that I cannot give you what you seek,” said Zecora. “But I do have an offer for you, though all else may seem bleak.”

Apple Bloom looked up, her expression guarded and weary. “Let's hear it.”

“On the morrow, I will leave this place, cross the sea, and – reluctantly – return to Zebrica, the land of my birth,” said Zecora. “You three could come with me, to be safe for a time from this hell on earth -”

“What?” yelped Scootaloo. “You're saying we should just jump ship?”

“Tirek is a foe who all rightly dread, but beyond the sea his grasp does not yet spread. He cannot be fought, no matter that our cause be just. All we can do is run away, and run away you must. It isn't right that foals should fight a war. You would only perish, and what for?”

“We got family here, this is our home!” said Apple Bloom, slamming down her cup and leaping down from off her own seat. “We're never going to walk away from it. Not ever. I'll never walk out on Granny Smith and Big Mac and Applejack.”

“Is it your family's reaction you fear?” said Zecora. “What do you think they'd tell you to do, were they here?”

“I … they'd not want to see me be a quitter!”

“Be a quitter? They love you, and they'd forgive. Don't you think they'd want you to live?”

Apple Bloom opened and shut her mouth, her face screwing up, and then turned to face the wall. “Coward,” she hissed, her voice raw. “You're a coward. We're not cowards!”

“If I had a weapon with which to slay Tirek, I'd be using it myself,” said Zecora, her tone even. “No matter what, I will not imperil your health.”

Sweetie Belle looked up from her cup. “So we've come all this way for nothing?” she said, something broken in the tone of her voice and cast of her expression. “You're not going to help, and we came here and got Yrr hurt for nothing?”

“The human's hurt has at least vanished. A sanguine thorn saw that safely diminished. Take it back to its home. Let it be where it wants to roam.” Zecora regarded the now-healed knee with a faint nod, and yanked out the piece of wood. Yrr still smiled vacantly up at the ceiling. “Before you leave, there's something you should collect. A powder of my own creation, to quickly undo the opoid's effect.”

Scootaloo thrust out a hoof. Zecora regarded it, and then plucked down a little sachet from a high shelf with her teeth. She dropped it into Scootaloo's hoof, and the filly plucked it away without a word.

“You don't wish to run, and I understand. However, my offer will continue to stand,” Zecora said quietly. “On the morrow when I leave, I'll pass by Ponyville and speak to your kin. If they agree you three should be safe, then coming with me will be no sin -”

“Don't you dare!” screamed Apple Bloom as she rounded suddenly on Zecora. “You'd dare to try and take us away, you're not a friend, you're – you are an evil old witch!”

Zecora stood silent in the face of the onslaught. Sensing the moment of their departure, Scootaloo leapt up and pulled at one of the ropes that still looped around Yrr's chest. He had enough motive instincts remaining to stand upright off the table rather than slide to the floor, but just swayed dreamily where he stood. Sweetie Belle trudged over to beside Scootaloo, the floor fixing her attention.

“Believe me when I say I am sorry, Apple Bloom,” said Zecora. “But you cannot ask me to help you build your own tomb.”

Apple Bloom kicked the door of the hut closed behind her, and angrily stalked some distance away from it, furiously swiping at her eyes with her hoof. Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle stumbled after her, Yrr ambling in their wake.

“You okay?” said Sweetie Belle.

“I'm fine,” spat Apple Bloom. “Walk out on the Apples. Hah.” She took a steadying breath and turned back to the others. “So what now? We got to re-plan.”

“We … we can go find one of the things she mentioned. That Black Spear or … or Starswirl's notes. What the hay's the Eldritch Wynd anyway?”

“Horrible stretch of forest north of the Everfree, infected with the bad sort of wild magic. It eats explorers. All of them.” Apple Bloom spun in place. “Come on, help me think. I'll show her, old foalnappin' doubter.”

“What's there to think about?” said Sweetie Belle, her voice far too subdued. “The story's gone wrong. We were wrong all the time.”

“No,” started Scootaloo. “Not necessarily.”

“But she was our only -”

“No, she wasn't!” Scootaloo rounded on Sweetie Belle and seized her by the withers. “Think! Who else is a really smart pony we know, who's solved all sorts of problems?”

“Mayor Mare?”

“...Think harder.”

Sweetie Belle's face screwed up. “Twilight?”

“Yes! She's our Moochick. We were just barking up the wrong tree when it came to Zecora. It's Twilight we've got to go to. Heck, she was the one fighting Tirek, remember? Of course it's been her the whole time. If anypony knows how to take him on, she knows.”

“Not that I'm fixin' to dampen what sounds like it could have the roots of a markedly better plan,” interjected Apple Bloom, “But she lost to Tirek, remember? She's captured. She might be like Fluttershy was, all … Discorded again. How are we going to get our hooves on her”

“They managed to break themselves out of being Discorded when it happened the first time, didn't they?” Scootaloo drew away from Sweetie Belle and paced in a tight little circle. “And I'll bet you anything Tirek's got her and the others in Canterlot, if he's not currently sending them out on spying missions.”

“We can free her. And Rarity! And the others.” Sweetie Belle's expression lifted up from studying the ground, and her earlier zest gleamed once again in her reddish eyes. “And they'll know where to get a Rainbow of Light or how to re-activate the Elements of Harmony!”

“This is actually something slightly resemblin' a sensible plan,” Apple Bloom said. “Of course, breakin' into Canterlot and freein' them will be a mite tricky. And what are we going to do with Yrr?” One of the human's eyes had regained some focus, and was spending it all on following the movements of a butterfly in the still morning air.

“Keep him with us,” Scootaloo replied firmly. “We're still following the story, so we still need a human. At least it's not going to hurt him to walk now. And if we just let him stay on the effects of Zecora's powder a little longer, then we won't need to gag him again yet.”

“I suppose we're still facing the same problem as before,” said Apple Bloom grudgingly. “Gettin' to Canterlot's quite a stretch, it could take us nearly the whole day. We'll be plumb tired and sore even before we have to do any rescuin'.”

Silence prevailed once more as the Crusaders considered the problem. Sweetie Belle punctured it with a squeak that could have shattered glass. “I've got it! It's brilliant!”

And a short while later, three fillies and a human stared (or drooled vacantly) up at a sea serpent, whose purple head dripped river water.

“Why, yes,” said the sea serpent. “There is a river that flows all the way to the base of Canterlot. Joins up with this very one a short way to the south. Why do you ask?”

Within Tirek's throne room, Fluttershy bowed. She held the position for a few moments before a great voice boomed, “You may rise, Kindness. Do tell all.”

Fluttershy drew in a breath, and did exactly that. Spike could only feebly murmur, “No, please, stop talking to him,” once before Tirek absently made him drop convulsing and whimpering to the ground.

Once she had finished without interruption, Tirek rubbed his beard. “Well, well,” he remarked. “One woods witch slipping through the net is no great surprise. She can be attended to in short order. And I suppose I'll have to arrange something with regards to foals who haven't yet received their marks or greater magic.”

“What about those three? And their creature?” said Fluttershy.

“The latter rings familiar,” said Tirek. Magic flurried briefly around his vision with one casual gesture from a huge hand, and clouds rolled in the sky outwith. Sunlight jabbed down through them, scouring, seeking …

… finding.

A serpentine smirk crawled onto Tirek's face and stayed there for some time.

“My word, doesn't history repeat,” he purred. “Not perfectly in this instance though, I feel. Where do they even get these things?”

“Give them to me. Let me take guards and flush them out and put them to blades,” said Fluttershy in a hoarse whisper. “Please, I need it.”

“Patience,” said Tirek. “They're on their way to us, with nothing about them that poses any sort of risk, and they are now always in my sight. Why spend effort hunting them? Let them come, and when they do, we welcome them. Let them stand in my presence. I shall assess the mettle of this human. I comfortably anticipate disappointment”

“And after? And after?” Fluttershy's gaze alternated between Tirek and the patch of ground before his front hooves.

“Then, if any of them are left, you get to be creative again, Kindness. Teach more of your old friends new tricks.”

Fluttershy's smile sharpened.

Amidst the stone rubble at Tirek's hooves, nestled amongst other familiar pieces, there was something that looked very much like a fragment of curling horn.

And in a quiet hut deep within the Everfree, Zecora watched her fire die. The bubbling of the murky liquid inside the cauldron had long since petered away. The place was beginning to feel cold again for the first time since she'd moved into it.

The masks on her walls stared down at her. They weren't meant to offer judgement – that was a function of other spirits who had their own totems – but they were meant to act as reminders. What of, depended largely on the situation.

For one thing, there was the encounter with Fluttershy. Tirek now knew she existed and where she was. Would she last until tomorrow? Would she last for so much as another hour? The ashes offered no answers, and the whisper of the wild Everfree wind against her walls was for once an irritating distraction rather than a soother.

She would have to leave quickly. She could sleep rough with the forest as quiet as it was. Sleep, fetch the Crusaders in the morning, and then back to Zebrica for the life she'd left behind, albeit made significantly more difficult. Not that she'd retract the offer.

But, of course, she was fooling herself if she thought the Crusaders would actually be at their homes. Zecora loathed self-deceit, particularly when it happened to her. Fillies made of the same stuff as the older Elements of Harmony absent anything resembling adult sense wouldn't stop just because the spooky old zebra in the woods said it was a bad idea.

Where were they now? She knew the answer and felt a cold coil of dread in her gut at the thought. It was out of her hoofs, beyond her ability to intervene, she had no choice but to let them go …

Self-deceit. There was always a choice. Only the certain consequences of one of the choices held her back.

Down one road, she ran out of this hut and across the sea. She might have family back home who were still alive, and one day when her mane and muzzle were grey, she might be able to look at herself in a mirror again.

Down the other road, she ran out of this hut. And what followed would end … well, she doubted it would be anything good, per se.

Zecora stood and turned away from the ashes. “Hell's bells,” she muttered to herself.

From around her hut, from shelves and hooks and from old boxes that had never been opened and which lay under her bed, she retrieved what she'd need. Flasks, ceramics, her fine and beloved cloak with all the useful inner pockets. Rope. A crossbow and bolts. An old set of four seven-league shoes, suitable for cross-country.

Canterlot was almost directly south, if she remembered correctly.

Author's Note

I'm not personally religious. But the experience of writing Zecora dialogue has left me sympathetic to the notion there may be a Devil.

Onwards!

Improvisation

Rain slashed down in iron-grey sheets. Thunder roiled and lightning flashed. Wind drove across the palace's sides, which didn't help Zecora in the slightest.

“Just bloody well let me through, you impediment, you,” she muttered to herself, a crowbar held in her teeth. She balanced on the ledge of one of the upper-storey windows, a solid rectangle reinforced front and back with iron bars. She worried away at its edge with the crowbar, and tried not to look down at the cobblestones a bone-liquidising distance below.

The old seven-league shoes had borne her all the way to the farmland below Canterlot before finally combusting. It had been a slow creep across the open countryside and a hard scrabble up the mountainside before she'd finally reached the unobserved edge of the city proper, and the sheer wall to be climbed after that had been a bitter icing on the dung cake.

But she'd ascended the wall, had crept through the streets, and had finally climbed the side of the palace itself without being spotted once. Let any Collegium-trained Zebrican mare half Zecora's age do that. She wasn't going to be defeated by a window at the last hurdle.

A gust swiped at her with an alarming strength, catching Zecora's cloak in an almighty billow, and she fought to keep her footing. The crowbar fell from her teeth, tumbled just out of range of her hoof, and vanished off the window ledge.

“No, of all the luck!” Zecora breathed out heavily as the crowbar clattered far below. “...Control. I'm not stuck.”

She turned back to glower at the window. Did she have any good corrosives at hoof? Nothing at this distance that didn't have the risk of corroding her as well...

A purple claw poked up on the window's other side, jumped up to fumble at a latch, and swung it open inwards. “Hey,” said Spike.

The little drake's face was haggard, his body was thin, but as he looked over Zecora, a purely delighted smile spread over his face.

Zecora paused. “...You, Spike, I'm very glad to see. But how did you behold me?”

“Tirek sent me out.” Spike waved a claw in the direction of one of the towers that sprawled out from the palace. “I, uh, went to Twi and I's old dorm. Almost like home again. Looked out the window and saw somepony with black and white stripes come over the city wall. I guessed where you were going. You here to take on Tirek?”

“Against sense telling me otherwise, yes. I'm not as yet sure how, I must confess.” Zecora stepped through the window and into the unlit stretch of corridor.

“Eh, good enough for me.” Spike regarded her. “You know where to find the throne room from here?”

“Not exactly, in all truth. The way, I'd hoped to sleuth.”

“Take me on your back.” A fire had been kindled in Spike's eyes. “I'll show you. I can even help you in.”

The ape's hand tightened into a claw, seized hold of the fur on Tirek's leg, and pulled. Yrr rose, and a pained hiss escaped his lips as his paltry muscles bunched with effort. He staggered upright, bipedal once more. Tirek's leg was near, and while one hand may be briefly caught up in the fur and his other one was useless even past the pounding tides of adrenaline, he still had a serviceable set of teeth.

Tirek, who watched the ponies before him go through the motions of his inevitable victory, was distracted by a mild tickling sensation on the lower half of his lower leg.

His attention, his will, his focused onslaught of magic were all briefly turned away as his gaze descended to Yrr flailing and gnawing at the thick hide of his shin.

And in that instant, Applejack crashed back to the ground with a pound that echoed around the room. Shuddering, she opened red-rimmed eyes, and they were the green of fields in spring.

The very air shivered. Apple Bloom looked up at Applejack through a vision wet with tears. “A – Applejack?”

She was immediately swept into a hug. Orange limbs held her close. “Never,” whispered Applejack. “Never, ever. Not if the whole world was screamin' for it. Never.”

There came an un-ladylike groan, and to their side, Rarity slumped against the side of her cell. Her coat shone once more, and when her eyes opened, they were the brilliant blue of the sky. “I … oh, stars,” she murmured, and reached out for the smaller unicorn before her. “Sweetie? Sweetie Belle? Please, I wouldn't … ”

Whatever chain-reaction had been started, whatever weight had been lifted from everypony's withers, the effect was spreading. Rainbow Dash's mane and coat now lit up the room once more, and her gaze refocused upon Scootaloo. “Oh cripes,” she muttered, her expression briefly horrified beyond words. “Squirt, ignore everything I just said. You – you know I wasn't myself, right?”

Colour breathed back through Fluttershy's body, and her previous unsettled glare settled into wide-eyed terror. Her gaze swept from the other Element-Bearers to the Crusaders to the base of Tirek's throne, and a low and tremulous sob escaped her. Pinkie Pie blinked, shook the grey off herself in motes, and her renewed pink self blinked around in surprise. Twilight Sparkle's gaze lifted from the floor, and colour slammed back into her like a shockwave. Her wings flew open, her eyes stared wildly.

“Squirt?” ventured Rainbow Dash, edging closer, her face fraught with concern. Scootaloo trembled before her, her gaze averted. “Please, you gotta believe me -”

Without any further urging, Scootaloo looked back to her, a smile breaking out past her mask of tears even as she took a step back. “I do,” she said. The smile was painted on that little bit wider. “H – heh, why break a good habit?”

Around from them, Rarity trotted cautiously closer to Sweetie Belle. “Sweetie?” she ventured, before gingerly wrapping her little sister in a hug. “You know I'd never hurt you. Never turn away from you when I was thinking straight.”

“He said they were under fire?” said Sweetie Belle.

“What?” said Rarity. She peered at Sweetie Belle's distracted expression.

It was an expression that, in the past, had heralded numerous mark-acquiring crusades. Explosions had followed that expression. Near-death experiences, diplomatic incidents, and heightening blood pressure on the part of caring elder siblings had trailed in that expression's wake. Sweetie Belle was furiously cogitating, and nothing good could result. “Under fire?” she murmured.

A melodious burst of laughter shattered their concentration, and everypony there turned to see Tirek, the source of it. He sat still upon his throne, still watching Yrr. The human's attacks upon Tirek's leg had barely slowed; he now seemed to be half-climbing, half-mounting it as he scrabbled his way up towards the knee with two pinioning legs and one functioning arm. He keened with the struggle.

“(I commend your diligence. Less so your sense,)” Tirek purred in the alien intonation. “(I have other things to do than indulge you. Do you want to remove yourself or be removed?)”

Yrr advanced another inch up Tirek's leg in a berserk flurry of motion, scarcely seeming to have heard.

Tirek shrugged, and gestured to the guards standing before the main door. Arrows were nocked, bows creaked, and arrows flew at Yrr in the space of a heartbeat.

One arrow missed. Another carved a red furrow across the side of Yrr's neck, and he hissed with pain. Another slammed into one of his legs, which kicked briefly and then flopped useless. He slid down the part of the leg he'd scaled so far, leaving two other arrows to snag his hair as they whistled past overhead.

The last arrow punched into the small of his back, and then he fell for good. His whole body contrived to twist as he crashed back to the floor. A breathless scream rasped out of his throat. One arm flailed out, like the limb of a pinned beetle.

It caught the golden box resting before the throne. The box skidded out across the floor and towards the plinths.

Scootaloo's gaze zeroed in on the box. She glanced around at the recovering Element-Bearers, and broke into a straight gallop at it. Her wings whirred to give that extra impetus to her charge. A quarter of the way there, half the way, it was almost within her reach, her hood grazed across the surface -

“I think not.”

Tirek voice boomed out as he brought one fist down on the arm of his throne. The room shook, the fires built and built and all but screamed with fury, and a great red force came down like a hammer blow upon the Crusaders and Element-Bearers. Their limbs were locked, the air boiled in their lungs, their eyelids were propped open as if with iron bars. Scootaloo couldn't so much as tremble where she stood, her hoof resting on the fire-dappled surface of the golden box.

“I see I'll have to be more thorough with Discord's magic next time,” said Tirek. “Before that … a certain and instructive end to this foolishness. Guards! Aim for the little ones.”

The blank-eyed guards, still standing in a neat line by the door, drew out a second volley of arrows and notched them to their bowstrings.

Hearts hammering, the Crusaders and Element-Bearers could only watch as the arrows were pulled back on the string. The bows raised, becoming black arcs in the incandescent light of the chamber.

The door exploded.

The guards stumbled back as shrapnel and streams of emerald fire slashed out from the pony-sized hole that had been bored through the door's centre. Before they could react, a small clay sphere flew through the hole and shattered at their hooves in an eruption of light and thunder. They stumbled back, disorientated, and in that opening, a cloaked pony leaped through the hole. Flaming splinters clung to and flew from their ragged cloak in flaming arcs, striped hooves clopped on the stone, and a drained-looking baby dragon flopped and wheezed on their back.

Tirek's gaze rose sharply towards them, his attention and will lifting like a suffocating weight from the backs of the Crusaders and Element-Bearers. “What is this further insolence?” he growled.

Zecora tipped her head back, shrugging off the hood of her cloak. A crossbow's grip was held between her teeth, and the crossbow's point rose to point towards Tirek's throat. Her grip tightened, and the bolt thrummed across the distance in a flash.

Quicker than chain lightning, Tirek rose from his throne, and the crash of his hooves hitting the floor made the palace tremble. One great hand blurred around to casually flick the bolt out of the air. A seething halo of blood-red magic built around his other hand, and he flicked it straight at Zecora with a bellow of “Enough!”

Zecora flung herself forwards to the ground, Spike tumbling down beside her. The magic slammed straight into the door with mountain-shattering force, blasting away the door and the wall around it in a cavalcade of thunder.

Unseen past the chaos, unhindered by crushing force, Scootaloo kicked the golden box behind her. It rolled across the floor towards the plinths.

Prone on the floor, unnoticed, the final piece of the puzzle slotted into place for Sweetie Belle. Soft green light gathered around her horn.

“Sweetie, you have been so brave, so, so brave,” murmured Rarity, lying just above her and shielding the little unicorn with her own body. “But you have to run. The others and I can buy you time -”

“Hush, Rarity. I'm concentrating.”

Probing green lines of magic carefully split off from the aura accumulating around her horn. Wavering with all the strength a filly's magic could muster, they snaked towards the tops of the plinths and plunged into the bellowing fires there.

Above them all, Tirek loomed like a stormcloud. He stepped forward and the shock of it sent cracks running through the stone floor.

“What must I do to you before ponykind learns to kneel?” He flicked a hand to one side and Spike was sent flying into a wall; he collided with a bone-jarring thump and lay still. “How much suffering do you want to take?” He flicked the same hand in the opposite direction, and the dazed guards were sent tumbling off towards the other wall. Zecora lay alone on the floor, and looked straight up at Tirek without hesitation.

“I lay upon you a witch's curse,” she spat. “Come on, weak king. Do your worst.”

Red magic seized her and hurled her up to Tirek's eyes. She struggled like a pinned insect, while huge black-and-white eyes bored into her. “Gladly.”

“You sure those'll do the trick?” came the small and unheeded voice of Apple Bloom.

“Maybe. They're what I found.”

“Yes, they're the keys we need. Step aside and let us get to them, girls. I'm not sure what'll happen when we open the box.” That was the bigger and significantly more heeded voice of Twilight Sparkle.

Tirek looked down. Before him, amidst strewn rubble and between the blazing plinths, the six Element-Bearers stood with a motley collection of red-hot keys pressed into the keyholes surrounding the golden box. To one side, the Cutie Mark Crusaders looked up at him with a certain grim satisfaction.

With only a slight gingerness, the six turned their keys in the locks.

Tirek just about managed to scream before the rainbow hammered out.

Armistice

Twilight Sparkle trotted up the long stretch of winding stairs that led to Celestia's private office. The violet light of dusk lit her way, streaming in from the curving windows cut into the stone alongside her.

The sun fell in a gentle and controlled descent, the skies were clear of all but the highest clouds. Canterlot's weather teams had celebrated their newly-acquired freedom and destinies only briefly before putting them to purpose. Outside, in the rest of the palace, in the city, in Equestria, there was rebuilding. Ponies everywhere were releasing their breath in the space that peace permitted.

Reaching the final doors at the head of the stairs, Twilight cleared her throat and knocked. “Princess Celestia?”

“Come in, Princess Twilight.” The doors swung in, and Twilight entered the office. The whole room was a confusion of paper and upturned furniture, lit by floating magical lights. Behind a desk that looked as though it had benefited from a hasty repairing trick, Princess Celestia herself rose tall and serene. Quills were borne aloft and etched ink lines and signatures onto whatever piece of paper was floated in close. A small fragment of stone horn rested on the desk.

Behind, the strange ape-creature the Crusaders had brought along – Yrr, if she'd heard the explanation correctly - flopped in a chair. A golden aura covered it, and it appeared blissfully dead to the world. Only the brief rise and fall of its chest indicated it was still alive.

Celestia looked up to greet Twilight with a tired smile. “One thing I neglected to tell you about becoming a princess, Twilight, is the paperwork involved. I understand that it will seem immensely tempting to set it all on fire as it winds your way. For order's sake, if not that of your own sanity, don't do so.”

“Heh. I, um.” Twilight looked down at the floor. “... I wanted to talk to you about that, princess.”

“Then talk to me about it.” Most of the quills lowered and Celestia stepped out from behind her desk.

“I … lost to Tirek. You've heard enough by now, about how I fought him. Even with all the alicorn magic, I couldn't … I just … I shouldn't be a princess. You know that, I don't have what it takes -”

The last quill descended, and erupted with blazing-golden sunlight as it embedded itself into Celestia's desk. “Put aside this line of thought, Twilight,” Celestia said sharply. “I saw much from Tartarus, Tirek granted me that mercy and curse. I saw you fight with more courage and skill than ever could have been asked of you. The whole fight was on a knife's edge. It could have easily swung to your advantage, or produced a stalemate between the pair of you. A loss by the skin of your teeth doesn't make you unfit to be a princess. No more than it would have made Luna or myself unfit, had we been in your position.”

Twilight's gaze lifted. Celestia gently propped her head up with a hoof. “Look at me and quell your doubts. Tirek is locked away once more, and you and your friends were still vital in the final tally. You have nothing to be ashamed of, Twilight.”

“I guess I wouldn't -”

“... Just say yes, dear. If you're still in a suitably self-flagellating mood, I'll let you help me with the restoration of the palace records. And with renewing contact with our outside neighbours. Tirek's capacity for bookkeeping wanted. We can discuss your other new duties as a Princess of Equestria later.”

“I'll help with the restoration, happily.” Twilight's expression brightened.

“Tell me of your friends. How are they dealing with events?”

“My friends? Well, ah ...” Twilight gathered her thoughts. “Zecora's alright, and making herself at home in the royal tea cellar. Spike and I spent a good long while with one another before he went off to bed. Applejack's with Apple Bloom. They're both in the palace gardens right now, or they were when I left. Hugging, a bit of crying, lots of talking. They're helping each other just fine. Rarity took Sweetie Belle to bed a hour back. The little thing was dead on her hooves with all that magical outpour. Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo took to the skies. I think they're on a cloud somewhere south of the city. Too far away for me to see clearly, but hugging and talking were definitely involved. Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy -” Twilight's voice faltered. “A lot of hugging, with Fluttershy the main recipient. She's picked up a rough few days of memories, more than the rest of us. We'll help her pull through.”

“Good.” Celestia nuzzled Twilight, a quick and affectionate gesture. “Stand close by one another. The time after strife is always when it's needed most. I know.”

“We won't let each other down. I promise. Though … I did have another question or two.”

“Ask away. I have a whole night to deal with other matters while Luna holds court.”

“What are we going to do with them?” said Twilight, pointing with a hoof at Yrr. The human barely stirred. “I mean, what is it? The girls called it a human.”

“That is their proper name. An artefact from a story of old, but one I know to hold true.” A sad smile passed across Celestia's face as she turned to regard Yrr. “I had … word from one who was there. In the days from which the old story itself was built.”

“So it wasn't just an old pony's tale? But what you told me was markedly different from what the story says.”

“My version was … nearer the truth. The story itself is what it is, a fairy-tale for foals. A story based on times that were more complicated and vicious and harder to live through than what those today can appreciate. But it became a lesson to foals as well. Tyrants exist, but tyrants can be beaten. With a little ingenuity, and a little looking outside the box, and a surfeit of courage, there's no obstacle that can't be overcome. We learned it the hard way, back before the alicorn magics were unlocked and Discord walked the earth.”

“And there was a human back then as well?”

“Yes,” said Celestia, her sadness turning to wistfulness. “Yes, there was.”

She stepped closer to Yrr, and angled her horn down at him. The golden magic surrounding the human brightened and clustered around the points where it had been injured. Wounds and cuts closed shut, bruises melted clean away. Yrr didn't stir.

“There's so little we know about your kind,” Celestia murmured. “Few venture beyond the mirror, and those who successfully fly to find you are but one in every thousand thousands. Maybe you know Megan herself. Maybe you don't. I don't even know if she still lives where you hail from.”

She leaned down and kissed Yrr on the forehead.

“But if she is among you and you know her, let her know that she is remembered,” Celestia said. “Let her know that she is still loved. By all of us that passed, and by those few that remain. One day, we will walk by her side in Dream Valley again.”

Celestia waited until Twilight had left the room before she turned on the small stone horn that rested on her desk. “No talking? Shyness, is it?” she said.

“I don't do shy,” muttered the horn. A mouth had appeared on its side, and little arms and legs sprouted out from it to heave it up to a bipedal position. “Wonderfully diverse as my nature may be, that doesn't quite fall within it. Not by a long shot.”

“Ah. There must be another reason for why you've not broken words with Fluttershy yet. Ashamed to look her in the eye, perhaps?”

The horn, which had grown and shifted to take on something of a more draconequi countenance, sulked as he sat on the desk. A small thundercloud built over his head to accent the effect. “Well, she – I can't imagine why she – bad choices were made, I apologise, shut up.”

“Apologise to her. Give her the comfort of knowing that she didn't actually kill you, or that anypony can really destroy the magic of Chaos. That's eating her from the inside-out right now, and you're remarkably well-placed to give her peace of mind on the matter.”

“Hang on a second,” said Discord. He manifested a large magnifying glass and peered closer at Celestia through it. “It almost seems like you're trying to guilt-trip me.”

“And here I was being at my most subtle.”

Discord slinked back. “Give me something to postpone the moment. Please? I don't want her to be unhappy, heavens forfend, but there'll be awkward crying and I might start crying and a continent might get flooded and the seas will foam raspberry icing and you know exactly how this song and dance goes.”

Celestia stood silent.

“Well,” she said. “There is something you could do on the side, though I don't imagine it would take you long.”

Their gazes turned in unison to the recumbent Yrr. Discord leaned forward and sniffed at him.

“I'm getting a broad piquance of the Virgo Supercluster,” he said. “With hints of the Local Group, and a subtle infusion of Milky Way. Ooh, I do like a good old-fashioned hunt.”

“Once he's safely home, we can discuss other means of atonement.”

Later, elsewhere in the castle, it was far past the bedtime of three young fillies, who each neglected to give much of a damn about the matter.

“What do you think, girls?” said Apple Bloom.

The darkness of the throne room had been cleared, and the replacements for the shattered stained-glass windows were already being crafted. Along with a new one, the glowing blueprints of which hung suspended against the black sky.

Three fillies, a unicorn, an earth pony, and a pegasus, galloped up towards towards the imposing figure of Tirek, who rose roaring out of the top half of Canterlot's palace. Their expressions were bright and unafraid, and what looked like a lanky biped loped at their backs. Auras of rainbow magic surrounded them, shrouding them in light and power.

After a while, Scootaloo said, “I think it's an excellent start.”

“You think this is what being heroines feels like all the time?” said Sweetie Belle past a yawn, smiling but unsteady on her hooves. “Going through all the confusion, all the pain, not knowing if you'll lose or die but keeping on going anyway even when it seems certain – and then seeing everything you saved, and knowing that makes it worthwhile?”

“Heck,” said Apple Bloom, “Let's find out.”

“Pity we didn't get to say goodbye to her before the princess sent her home, though,” said Sweetie Belle. “We really had a whole bunch of apologies to get through.”

“Don't sweat it,” said Scootaloo. “He's probably in good hooves.”

Finally, elsewhere at that same time, an ape-descendant stirred in his sleep. He'd been having the damndest dream, and there was probably a story or two to be extracted from it if he could scrabble around for a notepad in time.

He opened his eyes. Utter cold slapped across his senses.

The absolute worst day of Yrr's entire life resumed in high gear as he boggled at a star-studded expanse of hard, black vacuum. He felt his body being cradled by something with claws, and tilted his head back to behold the grinning head of a dragon-goat-demon chimera thing.

“Salutations, my dear fellow!” chirped Discord. “I'm not exactly sure which of the planets around here is yours, so it only makes sense to check them all. Scream if you think we've found the right one!”

Thus it was, even if the sentence's meaning was somewhat lost, that Yrr managed to successfully scream himself inside-out during the break-neck descent to the cold surface of Eris.

Luckily, it was utterly trivial for the magic of Chaos to put his organs back in each time.

Advance

Traveling down the river on the back of a sea serpent was a novelty for the Crusaders. Water sprayed across them as the serpent undulated his way through the water, made cold and clammy in the meagre day. The constant lurching set heavily-armed butterflies flapping in their stomachs, and made them cling on for dear life to the back of the sea serpent's mane or each other.

The sea serpent was silent, due to the human held carefully between his jaws. At the journey's start, Yrr had been set astride the sea serpent's back, and had fallen off and been rescued half-a-dozen times before various patiences had frayed. Yrr seemed uncomprehending of his situation; he stared serenely up at the sky with a blessed absence of gorm.

The river wound through the Everfree, dark trees and grasping roots pressing in at brief points and snagging at manes and tails. The river widened and the trees drew back, becoming lighter. Mountains formed a omnipresent backdrop, dark and looming under the clouds. At one point, where the river bent sharply, the sea serpent simply turned towards the side, heaved himself and his passengers out of the water, and clambered across the thin bend with his hands, crushing small trees under his bulk before flopping back into the water on the other side. Apple Bloom glanced up briefly, and caught sight of a great glittering shape on a mountain just before them.

Canterlot. They were close.

The sea serpent settled into the relatively straight wind of river that led to the waterfalls cascading down the mountainside. Their view of Canterlot was unimpeded now, and the Crusaders drank it in. Red light flickered out past the great windows of the throne room, sending shadows skittering down all the way to the landscape below and painting the white stone and marble of the city around it crimson. Past the looming underside of the city, the tiny figures of lance-wielding guards appeared along parapets and atop towers.

“Shoot, didn't think about the approach,” said Apple Bloom. “We'll get spotted for sure.”

“Too late to worry about that now,” said Scootaloo quickly, too quickly. “We can get dropped off quickly and run for cover.”

“They should have already spotted us,” said Sweetie Belle uncertainly. “But … it doesn't look like they're doing much.”

It was true; even as they approached, the guards remained still at their posts. No alarm bells were rung, no shouts rang out. They advanced on Canterlot in a tense silence, the air in their lungs threatening to choke them as they waited for an outcry that never came.

“They were guards, a while ago,” Apple Bloom said hesitantly. “At least, that was what their cutie marks said they were good at. But now Tirek's got their marks. He's stolen what they were. Small wonder they ain't doing their job.”

“I wish that didn't make sense. But why still have them stand around?” Scootaloo frowned up at the nearing sides of Canterlot.

“For show?”

“I guess. Or maybe as a back-up.”

“Brace yourselves,” interjected the sea serpent, spitting Yrr out of his mouth and into the water, where he quietly vanished with a splash and a few ascending bubbles. The steep mountainside was nearly upon them, and the first waterfall was all but hitting the air in front of their snouts. Apple Bloom could feel the tickling spray from it. “I'll take you up all the way to the river beside the city gate. Hold onto the back of my coiffure with your teeth, and don't let go. Incidentally, can humans breath underwater?”

“We, uh … we don't rightly know.”

“Ah.” The sea serpent hesitated, and then shrugged. “No sense in chancing it by leaving her here then, I'll take her up at the same time.” He dipped his head back into the water and, after some rummaging, found Yrr. The human flopped between the serpent's teeth once again, contentedly sneezing out water.

“Rrgh?” said the sea serpent.

The Crusaders nodded, and shuffled forwards so that they all had a firm grip on the serpent's hair. “Rrgh,” they solemnly echoed.

The sea serpent swept through the waterfall before them, the water briefly coming crashing down upon their heads and leaving whatever dry parts of them had escaped the journey thus far utterly sodden. They passed, coughing and spluttering, into the thin dry alcove between the sheet of water and the rocky mountainside, where the water-eclipsed light shone down with an eerie radiance. The serpent looked up with a critical expression, rose out of the water, set his hands into suitable grips on the rock, and started to climb.

The river journey had been bad enough, but it was all Apple Bloom could do to not toss her cookies right there and then as the line of travel lurched decidedly towards the vertical. Sweetie Belle squeaked and pressed hard into Apple Bloom's side, her eyes screwed shut. Scootaloo whooped with glee, which Apple Bloom considered to be the absolute wrongest reaction to the situation. The world tipped on its side, every motion of the sea serpent sent the world crazily swaying, and only gripping the scaled body beneath her with all the strength her legs could muster meant she wasn't dangling by her teeth from the hair alone.

On the edges of her vision, the great hands of the sea serpent clawed up at the rock overhead for any viable hold, pulling the whole massive frame up in one massive heave every time it found one. Inch by inch, they were getting closer to that impossibly far-off screen of water feeding down into the falls – but the going was getting treacherous, the serpent's pace getting slower and more cautious.

About halfway up, the serpent's grip closed around a crag in the rock. The rock broke loose, and for one horrifying moment, the serpent's whole body lurched halfway in freefall, and all that flashed through Apple Bloom's mind were the inevitable shrieking plummet -

But the serpent's hand quickly closed around a sturdier spur, and they quickly steadied. For a long moment, they simply hung there underneath the waterfall, their jackhammer heartrates slowing.

A red drip landed on Apple Bloom's snout. Wiping it away, she looked up and saw it was coming from the limp Yrr, down from where his upper torso and upper legs poked out from either side of the serpent's mouth. The serpent's grip must have tightened briefly, and the litany of curses that went through the filly's young and impressionable mind then was only slightly diminished when she noted that the human was still breathing.

It was an age before they started climbing again, and an aeon before they finally broke above the surface of the waterfall. They emerged into the river flowing before the main gates of Canterlot Proper. The drawbridge was down, the portcullis of the gatehouse stood open.

Not a guard was to be seen, standing under the shadow of the gates or over the gatehouse's parapet. No ponies were nearby, passing along the path or bridge. They were alone at midday before the gates of Canterlot.

The sea serpent heaved himself over to the gatehouse's bank, where he spat out Yrr and rolled to let the Crusaders hop off. “Oh dear,” he said, his eyes widening as he noticed the puncture wounds blossoming across Yrr's chest and thighs. “Oh dear, oh dear, I do most sincerely apologise, I hope she hasn't expired ...”

“I think she's alright,” said Apple Bloom, leaning in close and studying the rise and fall of the human's chest, the continuing look of docile benevolence and peace with the universe on their face. “Don't think you got anything vital, and we can stitch her up later. Deeply indebted to you for takin' us up here.”

“Merely a small favour owed to a pony who was generous to me once. And with such a hoped-for outcome, how could I have refused in any circumstances?” A worried frown passed over the serpent's face. “You will all do your best to stay safe, won't you? I wouldn't have wanted to merely ferry you to imprisonment or worse.”

“We're safe, I promise,” said Sweetie Belle. “This is the part where we take Tirek down a peg and let our sisters go. Next you hear of us, we'll be inviting you as a guest of honour to the celebrations.”

“Well, I suppose I can look forward to that. But … look, I'll sun myself in this little stretch of water for a bit. If you ever need to make a quick exit before the day's passed, then come running out. I'll be ready.”

“We hear you.” Scootaloo glanced around from where she was poking Yrr to his feet. “We'll be fine. But thanks for the offer. I'll make sure Rarity knows you remember her. She can pay you a visit sometime soon.”

“I'd look forward to that.” The sea serpent ventured a thin grin before disappearing back below the water surface. “Stay safe, now.”

He became a blurred, glittering stretch of purple under the water. The Crusaders turned in unison to critically regard Yrr.

“...Can we actually stitch her up? I don't think any of us have needle or thread,” said Sweetie Belle.

“We'll find some in Canterlot,” said Scootaloo. One wing lifted, revealing the little sachet Zecora had given them. “Do you think we ought to wait until then before giving him this? I suppose we don't want him trying to run off through the streets either.”

“Yeah. Keep it close for now. We'll pop it down her throat when we need her to start thinking again.” Apple Bloom ushered them through the open portcullis. “Come on. We need to think about how we're going to get to the palace.”

“Stick to side-streets. Move quickly and quietly. Steal spy-suits if we see any,” suggested Scootaloo.

“Throw a blanket over Yrr and say she's a cabinet we're moving,” said Sweetie Belle. “A cabinet for Tirek, so ponies don't question us.”

“Varying degrees of sense in those suggestions there. I'll say we should -”

The portcullis slammed shut, and the three whirled to face it just as a mare's voice called out from behind them. “King Tirek requires you in his presence.”

They turned, and before them stood a unicorn mare, clad in the golden armour of Celestia's Dayguard. Behind her stood five other unicorns, a mare and four stallions, all clad in the same armour, all their expressions unfocused and bleary.

Their horns glowed with a sickly and dull red light, something on loan from Tirek's own magic. In meagre red auras, bows were held aloft at their sides, arrows already notched to the strings.

The bottom dropped out of Apple Bloom's stomach and a thousand carefully-devised plans fell away in shards. She was aware of Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle drawing closer to her. By reflex, she found herself barking out, “Well, he can require us all he likes, but that don't mean he's going to get us. Why's he want us, and how did he know we were here?”

“King Tirek requires you in his presence.” The mare – a captain, judging by the purple highlights of her armour – shifted the positioning of her bow. Her glazed expression flicked over each of them, from Scootaloo to Apple Bloom to Sweetie Belle to Yrr, standing still and unconcerned in the back.

“You ain't answering my questions! And I ain't going to comply until - !”

The bow was raised before Apple Bloom could blink, the arrow was pulled back on the string before Scootaloo could shout out a warning, the arrow flashed out before Sweetie Belle could scream. The arrow punched through the meat of Yrr's upper arm, the head jabbing out through the back amidst a fine red spray. He swayed with the impact, a brief and confused murmur escaping him before he settled back into befuddled amiability.

Apple Bloom whirled to him, and back to the expressionless guard.

Against the red stain spreading down Yrr's sleeve, defiance was scoured away. The five other guards raised their own bows, the glinting arrowheads angled at the trembling Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle.

Defiance died with barely a whisper.

“King Tirek requires you in his presence,” said the mare.

Through the streets they were frogmarched, dull-eyed ponies watching them at every turn. Every window was shuttered shut, every door was closed. The odd foal stood lonely at a street corner, from time to time a lone adult would plod down a street. There was no chatter, no trundling wheels, no airships or pegasi teams jostling for space in the sky. The long-promised storm building up over the Everfree was coming their way at last, and its distant thunder and their own hoofsteps were the only noises around.

Eventually the palace loomed before them, red and simmering under the darkening sky. The Dayguard marched them in through the great front door, up a curving flight of stairs, and along vast and echoing corridors. It was as silent in the palace as the city without.

Eventually, they reached the door that Apple Bloom recognised as leading to Celestia's ... the princesses' ... the throne room. It swung open into darkness, and they were ushered in.

Two great plinths rose before them, one at either side of the vast and pitch-black room. Small scarlet flames rose from them, lighting only a small radius about each one. The stained glass windows that should have let in light from one side were blacked-out, the end of the hall was lost amidst choking shadow. The guards trotted in briskly at their backs, and slammed closed and locked the door behind them. They settled into ranks before it, barring any exit.

“Shoot,” whispered Apple Bloom. “Shoot, shoot, shoot.”

“Why did they bring us here? What's here?” said Sweetie Belle.

“Tirek, I'd guess,” said Scootaloo. She peered towards the far end of the room, trying to hunt for any shape amidst the unnatural shadow, and saw nothing.

The steady sound of blood pattering to the ground from Yrr's sleeve was a brief distraction, and after some quickly exchanged glances, Scootaloo drew out the little sachet. “Sorry about keeping you in the dark for a while,” she muttered, “But I think we're going to need you as bright as you get in about a second or two.”

Standing upright on her hindlegs for a moment, she was able to tear open the sachet and toss the contents into Yrr's open mouth. He reflexively swallowed, and his eyes closed for a moment.

His eyes opened again, a faint frown spreading over his face.

Then the accumulated sensations of a healing kneecap, bite wounds from a sea serpent, and an arrow to the arm all began to register at once, and Yrr's face went through several interesting contortions as horrible, horrible consciousness dawned. The hand on his good arm wriggled feebly in the direction of the arrow-stuck one.

“(Ah! Arrrrgh!)”

“Boy,” said Sweetie Belle dolefully to herself. “We really badly suck at taking care of humans. It doesn't hurt too much, does it, Yrr?”

“(Aaaaaaarrrrgh!)”

Flames sprouted out of the darkness, arising from a second pair of plinths that revealed themselves. The Crusaders turned to face them.

Above the fire, distant and impossibly high eyes of darkly-glowing unlight centred with points of pure, shining white looked down.

“Step into the light, Crusaders,” came a voice deeper than ocean trenches. “Let me see my sworn enemy in glorious detail.”

Disarray

The red fires built and built, becoming great spluttering columns that filled the throne room with heat and blazing light. Firelight danced off the distant and massive shape of King Tirek, at ease in his stone throne.

A little golden box rested between Tirek's forehooves at the throne's base. Apple Bloom's gaze flicked to it, before her attention rose. And rose.

Tirek's lower half and legs were the size of any respectable building, black-haired and dense columns of sheer muscle. Two Yrrs piled atop each other's shoulders wouldn't have risen to the level of his knee. His vast hands rested on the arms of his throne, and were clad in gauntlets of black steel that ran all the way to his shoulders. Tirek's horns ascended until they all but scratched the impossibly high ceiling. Fire flared into existence between them, a orange sphere that broiled in the gap like the beacon of a lighthouse.

One of his fingers flicked upwards in a come-hither gesture. What felt like a wall slammed into the backs of the Crusaders, and they stumbled forwards to the second row of plinths. Yrr, who had subsided into discombobulated gibbering and weeping as he fumbled at the arrow in his arm, was bowled over and forcibly rolled along the floor beside them.

“Hmm,” said Tirek, stroking his beard with one hand as the Crusaders righted themselves. He snapped his fingers and two last plinths erupted to life. Now the heat was hellish and the light was all but blinding. “I must say, you all don't look like much from where I sit. Certainly not more impressive than your sisters.”

“Where are our sisters?” spat Apple Bloom. She rose to her full height and glared straight up at Tirek, her orange eyes locking with Tirek's monochrome own. “Where are you keeping them?”

“Safe and sound, where I can keep an eye on them. It's more than I can say for some of their former associates,” Tirek spread his arms wide. “If you wanted to come and join them, you only had to ask sooner.”

“We ain't here to – wait, what do you mean, 'former associates'?”

Tirek's lips flickered upwards at the edges in a mockery of a smile, and one hand waved at the ground at his forehooves. Stone rubble lay strewn there, all but reduced to powder with a few recognisable chunks here and there.

A fragment of curling horn. Scattered pieces of stone antler. Pieces of wing, talon, paw. Part of a long face with half of a staring eye.

Apple Bloom looked, saw, and forced down an urge to dry-heave. Next to her, Sweetie Belle failed to force the same urge down. Scootaloo whispered, “Oh, skyfire.”

“I won't pretend that Discord and I were the closest of allies,” said Tirek. “I imagine that were he still in a position to comment, he'd quite agree with that statement. With all his magic mine, giving him to a competent servant for sport's sake was no great loss. I hope you three are taking the right lesson from this.”

“I …” Apple Bloom tore her eyes from the stone chunks and looked back up at Tirek, trembling and not caring that she was doing so. “...I think we just learned another reason why we've gotta stop you.”

“Tsk. Wrong lesson.” Tirek leaned forward. “I suppose I ought to thank you three, though. I'd neglected to consider those ponies too useless or stupid or immature to have yet gained their cutie marks.”

“Oh, sure,” hissed Scootaloo. “Just make it personal. That'll make us go easy on you.”

“Perhaps you ought to be isolated. Raised in camps en-masse, until your marks set in and your magic is sufficient to make consuming it worth the bother.” Tirek shrugged. “Something to ponder. Problems exist to be solved. In some cases, they hardly present much effort. You're lucky that I'm willing to give you an easy solution to yours.”

“What do you mean?” said Sweetie Belle, still staring wide-eyed at the remains of Discord.

“When the stars are right, I am prepared to be something resembling merciful. You may walk away from this throne room. You won't have to hear from me until your cutie marks develop. I'll even let that serpent you rode in on live.” Tirek's smile sharpened. “You shouldn't have left him right next to the city, next to me and my soldiers.”

“Don't you dare hurt him!” Sweetie Belle looked up, her eyes simmering green slits.

“Oh? Would you stop me?”

“We could,” declared Apple Bloom. “Maybe we don't look like the biggest ponies around. Maybe you've seen scarier things in your day. But we're the Cutie Mark Crusaders! We hang close! And we don't give up!”

“We found the story of how you got your tail kicked the last time.” Sweetie Belle took another step forwards. “We followed the story. We've got a human and everything! Tell him, Yrr!”

“(What the hell is going on?!)” shrieked Yrr.

“You heard him! We've come a long way, and like hay we're gonna give up now.” Scootaloo looked straight up at the fire, her feathers bristling. “Do your worst!”

For a moment, Tirek's expression held. Flat, unmoving. His lips pulled back from his teeth.

“Well,” he said with a magnanimous sigh. “So long as I can say I tried. Bring out your great weapon. Come forward, human. Let's see if Megan's spine was a common trait.”

He flicked his fingers, and Yrr spun off the ground and flew over towards Tirek, as if some great force had simply come down and seized him. Yrr wriggled in mid-air, wide blue eyes staring straight into Tirek's own.

“Put her down!” yelled Sweetie Belle.

“Curious. You don't seem to be manifesting any sudden destructive magic. I perceive no Rainbow of Light in your pocket. There's not even anything to devour in you.” Tirek twiddled a finger, and Yrr slowly and helplessly rotated. His legs kicked up at the ceiling. “Are you about to burst free of my hold with one mighty bound, human? If you are, do so sooner rather than later. There are other things I have to do today.”

Yrr coughed. His gaze acquired a vague focus.

“Can you even understand me?” Tirek tapped his chin, and then produced the same strange series of high barks. “(Can you understand me now? Clean out your ears.)”

“(Go ...)” Yrr's rotation completed to leave him vertical once more. “(Go f-)”

“(Slap yourself.)”

An aura of simmering crimson magic seized Yrr's arrow-stuck arm. The arm bent upwards at the elbow, provoking a scream of pain from Yrr as the arrow shifted. An instant later, his own hand slapped across his face with a retort that was heard from the other side of the chamber.

The next instant later, the hand came back the other way, a back-handed bruise-dealer. Yrr's head spun.

“No, stop!” Scootaloo shouted. “Stop hurting him!”

“Just put her down!” Sweetie Belle cantered forward, only to rebound off an unseen wall of force at the third set of plinths. “Stop hurting her, please! Please!”

Yrr's arm rose again and lunged sharply inwards to drive his own fist into his stomach. He bent over in mid-air, a thin hiss escaping him. Tirek gestured, and Yrr was flung to one side of the room. He bounced off the wall with enough force for the sound of it to echo throughout the room, and was flung to the floor at Tirek's hooves. A crack rang out as he landed on his side.

For the next moment, Yrr trembled on his side, his face turned away from the Crusaders. One arm, his only good one, scrabbled feebly at the floor. No sound came from him but a tremulous rasping for breath.

The Crusaders charged forwards, and the same immovable and unseen force blocked them. Tirek made a quick shove-off gesture, and sent them tumbling back to the middle of the room.

“This is not a story, little blank flanks,” said Tirek. “Do you have some other surprise to spring on me? Or will we bring this matter to a conclusion?”

“I … you ain't beaten us yet!” Apple Bloom said the words, and felt them turn to ashes as soon as they left her mouth.

“You'll find I have. Your human lies broken at my hooves. The artifacts that were your realm's only hope lie under fire. And your sisters, the Element-Bearers ...” Tirek's smile was now poisonous. “...Let's see what they think of your chances, shall we?”

He snapped his fingers, and each of the fire-crowned plinths surrounding the Crusaders peeled open.

Stone and iron bars parted, and the Element-Bearers stepped forth.

Twilight Sparkle spoke first, and her voice was as hollow as a crater. “You shouldn't have come, girls.”

“Twi!” said Apple Bloom, whirling to face the alicorn. Twilight's mane was washed-out, her coat was grey, her gaze didn't lift from the floor. “You ... you ain't Discorded as well, are you? We can help you, we can snap you outta -”

“No,” giggled Fluttershy, who trotted at a slow and measured pace towards them. Her face was a snarling mask, her words dripped with sweetness. “No, you really can't. But it might be funny to watch you try. Go on, beg. Clutch at our hooves. Weep.”

“Who's there?” said another peeking out past her cell door, a unicorn with a coat as pale as bone and a thistle-coloured mane that hung down around her head. “They can't have my room. They can't have it. There's things there, it's mine.”

“Rarity!” Sweetie Belle turned on the unicorn. Her eyes glistened and a smile hovered on her lips. “It's me, it's Sweetie Belle, I'm here to rescue you!”

“No!” Rarity slammed a hoof on the ground before Sweetie Belle, making the little unicorn jump backwards. “You won't trick me away! I know what you want, I know what everyone wants. Why should they get it? Take what's mine and I'll kill you. Get away!”

“But … Rarity, it's me.” Sweetie Belle curled in on herself, trembling before Rarity. “I'm your sister, remember?”

“I don't care what you are!”

“You're all disturbing us,” growled a new voice. Pinkie Pie stalked out of her own cell, her ears flat and her coat and mane the colour of stormclouds. “Do you think you're being funny? Do you think you're doing anything other than getting us annoyed? Don't you think you all ought to leave? Or whatever gets rid of you.”

Scootaloo, whose mouth hung open, glanced around in mute desperation until she sighted a familiar figure. “Rainbow Dash! You're awesome, you're loyalty itself, you're … you remember, right? You can snap out of it, right?”

Rainbow Dash's impassive expression slid into a sneer.

Scootaloo kept talking. “Come on, listen to me. Please remember, snap out of it, you … you have to, you're as good as my big sister, and I'm your -”

“You're nothing to me. And whatever you think I am to you, keep kidding yourself if that floats your boat.” Rainbow Dash turned her head aside. “Stop buzzing, you're giving me a headache.”

Scootaloo didn't shrink in on herself, didn't tremble. A soft whimper escaped her, and that was all.

Apple Bloom, her vision misting and her delicate scaffold of hope down in rubble, sought about for the only bright pillar holding her up. “A – Applejack?”

The farmpony held herself steady. Her gaze flitted from point to random point, and her face was contorted in a awkward smile. “Everything's going to be alright, Apple Bloom,” Applejack said. “Don't fret none. Leave Tirek be. Everything's going to be fine.”

Deep and melodious laughter came from the throne then.

“Well?” said Tirek. “You've had your chance to plead. Anything else you'd like to venture? You could try running, for all the good that might do you.”

Apple Bloom closed her eyes, aware of Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo instinctively looking her way. In the darkness she found no answers, and opened them again, glaring up at the distant and misted form of Tirek. “Apples don't run. Neither do Crusaders.”

“Very principled. Let's see what that gets you. Let everypony see what that gets you.” Tirek gestured, and iron bands of force seized shut around the Crusaders. Their limbs were trapped, no matter how they strained.

“Applejack,” said Tirek, “Kindly step forwards and kick Apple Bloom to death.”

Silence came crashing down across the throne chamber. The Crusaders' hearts hammered in their chests, and even the grey Element-Bearers managed to blanch. A flare of vivid green rose in Applejack, and her teeth bared. “R -rot in Tartarus, you sonuva broodmare.”

“In time, perhaps. But let's leave my mother out of this. Step forwards.”

Red magic pulsed around Applejack's limbs, and whatever paltry colour was left in her coat diminished further. The green of her eyes faded until they were a mere tone away from grey. One of her legs rose, trembling as it did so, and came down. A step forwards.

“Step forwards. Pretend she's a tree in one of your orchards. You can lie to yourself about that much.”

“A … Applejack?” managed Apple Bloom, in a voice so small she struggled to hear it herself. “Sis?”

“No,” whimpered Sweetie Belle, “No, no, no, no, no.”

Applejack drew in a deep shuddering breath and took another step forwards. Her hoof came down with a crash. Tears were welling up in her eyes. “It ain't gonna hurt none, Apple Bloom. It ain't gonna hurt.”

A low murmur came from the side. Rainbow Dash regarded the scene with a frown. “This … this isn't right,” she said. Some hint of flame had returned to her eyes. Twilight's head had lifted from the ground, and she watched with a pensive frown.

Another heavy step forwards. Some war seemed to be waging within Applejack; the mare's eyes flickered between grey and green like the churning of a fire. Her next step was heavier. “Ain't … ain't gonna ...” she murmured. Tears rolled unfettered down her cheeks.

“No,” slurred Rarity, her own expression creasing with horror. “We … protect our own, we -”

“Applejack!” blurted out Apple Bloom, her vision blurring and her heartrate hammering and her voice unsteady. “It … it's gatherin' season back at Sweet Apple Acres. You know gatherin' season? Lots of green branches, apples just danglin' down off them, all ready to be bucked clean into baskets. The big special wicker baskets, that ya keep in the cobwebby corner of the barn. Big Mac'd be out clearin' the West Orchards, and you'd be ploughin' though the East like the workhorse you are. Remember? And you'd take a break when you were plum tuckered, and sit back with cider with maybe a couple of your friends, these ones right here, and you'd watch the sun comin' down over the hills and that's what you love more than anything else! You gotta remember who you are! Please remember!”

Applejack loomed over Apple Bloom. Her forelegs rose, trembled, and the red binding them fast blazed like lava. Green rose in her eyes like a flood. Tirek snarled and waved a hand. Magic energies cascaded out in a torrent, and all of Equestria's magic, all the magic of Chaos itself, all the power of all the alicorns, all came unbridled and hammering down upon Applejack's will.

Her legs rocked in mid-air, and Applejack screamed.

At one end of the throne room, an ape-descendant was pre-occupied with trying to rise past the pain. Yrr had not been having a good day. He didn't expect it to get better, inasmuch as he could still form expectations or plan ahead or think of anything much beyond the pain in his torso and arm and ribcage and knee and head and everything.

The world was bloody mist, a red-soaked haze that didn't deserve consideration. The thinking human was being scoured off the surface of his mind by pain and terror. The mindless inner ape was rising with a vengeance, screaming for fighting or flight, whichever was handiest. There was a enemy before him, a vastly overpowering one whose head he couldn't even crane up to see. There was space all around him, but no doors, no exit, nowhere that didn't have an enemy in front of it.

He slammed his good hand into the floor in a frantic effort to rise. His leg, the one from which dull waves of agony still pulsed, convulsed with pain and he fell back with a furious sob. The pain built, his heartrate drummed in the black corners of his mind, and the ape screamed for release.

From somewhere behind him, amidst the warbling white noise, there was a scream, piercing and desolate.

It was – resembled a horse's whinny. But there was something human about it, something that begged for action. For help. The thinking human reeled from the pain enclosed in it, and the ape looked around in sharp concern, heedless of the source.

Aid the tribe, death to enemies, escape all pain, aid the tribe, death to enemies, escape all pain...

The human closed his eyes. The ape opened them. Blue eyes stared wildly, casting their gaze to all points around them.

There was an enemy's black leg within grabbing distance, a handhold to grab and rise from and savage, to bite and claw to the finish. They were near, an immediate mortal threat, and what apes did to enemies at hand was this; they lunged.