The Devil's Toys

Twilight Sparkle was reading her newest book on transmutation theory when Celestia teleported into her room. The unicorn had just had a long day and had been planning on reading a little before going to bed. Instead, she ended up staying awake half the night and was now exhausted.

"Princess Celestia! What are you doing here?" Twilight shouted.

"Oh, I see that you are already awake." Princess Celestia responded. "I'm afraid there's a problem of great urgency."

"Problem? What kind of problem?"

"It'll be easier to show you." Celestia proceeded to teleport them without any warning.

"Gah!" Twilight cried out in surprise. "What... is that?" She stared at the strange creature trapped inside a magical bubble.

"That is what I'm hoping you can help us with. This creature and many others like it attacked Baltimare this evening. According to witnesses, they came in some sort of large flying craft that launched objects like this one"—she indicated the abduction capsule next to the prisoner—"at the city. When they landed they began to spew some sort of gas that grabbed ponies and trapped them as it solidified."

Twilight gasped. "That sounds terrible!"

Celestia nodded. "It was. Had my sister not stepped in and stopped them, many ponies might've... truth be told, I'm not sure what would've happened. I've never seen anything like these creatures or the objects their ship dropped."

"Speaking of Luna, why didn't she come get me? She is the one in charge during the night."

"The craft these creatures came in managed to injure her before she forced them to retreat. She's currently recovering from the attack."

Twilight walked over to the creature to get a closer look. It was small and gray with large, soulless eyes dominating its face. It currently stood on four short, thin legs, though it seemed designed to stand on two. Even as Twilight watched the creature straightened to a two-legged stance. It pointed a small silver device with a glowing green core strapped onto one of its front limbs at her. The device fired several green bolts that dispersed harmlessly when they came into contact with the magical energy field.

Twilight backed up a step, startled by the sudden attack. The alien attempted to take advantage of this by mentally assaulting the pony, but the magical prison once again foiled its plans.

"Did it just use mind magic?" she asked.

"I believe it did," a troubled Celestia responded.

"But mind magic's been outlawed ever since your rule began! No records of how to perform it still exist!"

"That doesn't appear to have stopped this creature from learning how to use it."

"I'd better start figuring out what these things are right away then!"

"As much as I want to get to the bottom of this, you're too tired to work on it right now. You need to get some sleep."

"But Princess—"

"No buts, Twilight. You've been up all night, so you can't work effectively right now anyway."

Twilight sighed. "Fine. But I want to work on it first thing in the morning. I don't like not knowing anything about a threat to Equestria."

"Of course." Celestia looked at one of the guards. "Take Twilight to one of the guest chambers and make sure she's not disturbed."

"At once, your highness," he replied, and then gestured towards the door. "Right this way."

Twilight followed the guard to the nearest guest chamber, where she immediately lay down on the bed while he took up watch outside.

I sure hope I can solve this before something else bad happens, she thought as she drifted off into Luna's domain.

After several days of studying the creature and looking over everything in Canterlot's libraries and archives, Twilight Sparkle had finally come to the conclusion that its species had never been present in Equestria before this encounter.

"Have you made any progress?" Celestia asked as she walked into the room where Twilight was observing the creature.

"As a matter fact, I have," Twilight replied. "I've determined that whatever this creature is, it has never been seen in Equestria before."

"If it hasn't been seen in Equestria, then where is it from?"

"I have a theory about that. Do you know what direction their ship left in?"

"Luna said it fled straight up."

"Just as I suspected." Twilight turned to face Celestia. "I believe these creatures are aliens from another planet."

"You mean they're not even native to Equus?"

"Assuming I'm correct. They could just be from a part of the planet we haven't explored yet, but I doubt it." Twilight suddenly remembered what had happened to Princess Luna. "How well is Luna recovering?"

"According to the doctors, she's almost ready to resume her duties."

"That's good news." Twilight paused for a moment. "Do you think I could speak to her? I have a few questions that might help me with this project."

"She should be up for it. I'll come with you."

"OK." Twilight and Celestia began making their way to the medical wing. They had walked about halfway there when a deafening explosion shook the castle.

"Oh my Celest—gosh!" Twilight yelled. "What was that?"

Celestia didn't even notice Twilight's slipup. "That came from the medical wing! My sister could be hurt!" She teleported without a second thought.

"Princess!" Twilight quickly teleported after her.

As she exited the teleport, Twilight quickly noticed several things. The medical wing's roof was missing. There was fire everywhere. Multiple dark shapes were raining green flames from the night sky. And the royal sisters were battling a taller version of the creature they had captured.

Well, its height wasn't the only difference. For one thing, it was wearing red robes and some sort of headdress. It also had four arms and was hovering just off the ground. And most importantly, while the first creature couldn't do anything about the magical bubble it was trapped in, this one was holding off two alicorns. Actually, it was beating two alicorns.

As Twilight froze in awe of the fearsome struggle, a chilling voice burrowed its way into the minds of everypony nearby. "Submit!" it commanded. While the full force of the voice would surely have convinced anypony to obey, the wielder was currently too occupied with defeating the alicorn sisters to use it to its full effectiveness.

It did weaken the Princesses, though. As an unmoving Twilight continued to stare at the scene, the attacker mentally subdued Celestia and Luna. Once the sisters ceased resisting, swirling pink and purple strands of light immediately enclosed all three combatants. Soon the lights faded away to reveal only empty space.

Twilight watched the objects in the sky fly away and began to weep. Her mentor, who was one of Twilight's closest friends, and the sister of that mentor, whom Twilight had helped redeem, were both gone, quite possibly forever.