r537p

by MagLocal

Rating: everyone
Tags: Adventure
Length: 5561

The Mane Six are tasked with the mission to save Equestria from annihilation by someone only known as "the Redactor."

Princess Celestia called Twilight Sparkle and her five closest friends to Canterlot. The matter was urgent: someone only known as "the Redactor" sent the Princess a letter. The Redactor promised that Equestria will be destroyed. No piece of land will remain. None of it and its habitants will remain "except in the memories of the six."

This was their job: to stop the Redactor once and for all.

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2014-10-04 04:10:02 UTC

Their Going Hence

Open the doors did and in ran the six best friends to the final hallway of the royal castle, Princess Twilight Sparkle leading the rest. On the walls were stained glass windows of skies and space beyond. On the far end of it was the throne where Princess Celestia stood in front of. The doors closed.

"What is it, Princess Celestia?" Twilight Sparkle asked.

The look on the ruler's face was not a happy one. Celestia clearly had not called her and the rest of the Harmony Bearers for a light purpose.

"Is there another bad guy to kick out?!" Rainbow Dash spoke up.

"Yes," Celestia began, the tone of her voice being solemn and serious. "But this force is much more powerful than what you have encountered before." She looked beyond the ponies and to the door. It was closed; two pegasi guards were there. "Guards, you have to leave for a while. This is a very serious matter we are talking about."

They nodded and left.

"Ya' must be real serious about him," Applejack said.

"I should be," Celestia replied.

"Does he plan to take complete control of Equestria?" Rarity asked.

"He plans even worse."

Fluttershy gasped.

"Ooh, is he going to take complete control of Equestria using parties?" Pinkie Pie quipped. "If he is, he's not so bad! We're all going to have parties in every single place in Equestria! Everypony's going to smile when he comes into Equestria and—Do I have enough balloons for—" and was stopped short by a hoof from Applejack.

"He does not plan to take complete control of Equestria," Celestia explained. "He plans the complete destruction of Equestria."

Everypony else gasped at the revelation. "Then he's even worse than Tirek!" Fluttershy said shakily.

"Yes, he is, Fluttershy," Celestia said. "No one knows his true form except those who meet him, and those who meet him never return to tell us of what he looks like. Althoug he has not done anything to us in the past...he surprises me. Not even I and Luna know many things about him."

"How did it all start?" Twilight inquired.

Celestia's horn glowed and a scroll appeared in front of her. "A week ago, on a normal day, this letter suddenly appeared before me." The letter hovered to Twilight and it unscrolled itself.

"'Celestia,'" Twilight read out loud, "'you do not know me. This letter will be suspicious to you right away and it should be. Let me be cruelly honest to you, Princess. I am going to destroy Equestria. No one but your six standbies will survive. There will be no trace of the precious land except in the memories of the six. You, Luna, Cadance—almost everyone you know, including you, will die. To make things worse for you, your carcasses will be gone. No one but those six friends will remember you. Everything that your kind has touched shall be wiped away. The land itself shall be gone; I'll just replace it with another kind of land and no one shall know. Everyone else will live on deceived, thinking that Equestria is just a myth, an element from fiction. As I have mentioned before, your six friends will survive the obliteration. I will give them special treatment, however. They will suffer. Understand this riddle and be afraid until you die: "They will live and think on what is true to them, and some of those whom they had known before shall cry. Later, they will forget them. The six shall bang on the doors when they want to escape. They will not." Tell me on how it is not a good riddle. At least I called it a riddle. Now, farewell. From, the Redactor.'"

"What do you notice about the letter?" Celestia asked.

Twilight looked again at the letter's crudely-written words. "It looks like he was rushing while he wrote down the letter. Was he in a hurry?"

"I do not know."

Inside, Twilight Sparkle became a little afraid.

"After I read the letter," Celestia continued, "another scroll appeared before me." Another scroll magically appeared in front of her. "It was from the same person."

The scroll unscrolled itself like the first and Twilight read it out loud. "'Dear Celestia, I almost forgot to give you one last chance to defeat me, although I think it is not much of a chance than it is of an opportunity to show that will lose along with the rest of your ponykind. Send your six former bearers of the Elements of Harmony to the tree marked with the number five hundred and thirty-seven. There I will go to meet them. Do not even intend to go with them, for I will remove you if you even take a step out of Canterlot. Worry about them all you want; they have been under my power for centuries and you do not know it. This shall be my last letter to you. Farewells from the Redactor.'"

"He's so horrible," Fluttershy managed, still visibly afraid of the Redactor.

"What's he thinkin', thinkin' he can just rustle us up?" Applejack spoke up.

"Yeah!" Rainbow Dash yelled, flying up to the air. "No one's going to destroy Equestria as long as we're still here!"

"Whoever this Redactor is, he is not going to annihilate our precious Equestria!" Rarity shouted, stomping a hoof on the floor.

"He's rude!" Pinkie Pie yelled. "Didn't you see how rude he was? He didn't even say 'Please!'"

"Pinkie!" Twilight interrupted. "You have to take this seriously! If we all fail, you'll probably not make jokes or parties anymore."

The party pony frowned. Then she smiled again. "I can have parties with just the six of us! At least it won't be just me going around the ruins of Equestria!"

Celestia smiled, too. "Pinkie, always being Pinkie." Her smile disappeared. "But now is not the time for partying and celebrations." He looked at the six ponies in front of her. "This letter may be just a very dark prank, but until that is proven, you are truly Equestria's last line of defense, its last hope. I'll bring you to the chariots and from there, you will be brought to the border of the Everfree Forest. From there, you are on your own."

"Why can't you go with us?" Fluttershy asked. "And with Princess Luna, too?"

"You heard what the Redactor wrote. I won't take a step outside of Canterlot. You do not want to return here only to see me no more."

There was silence.

"Is there anything more concerning you?" Twilight asked.

"Just..." Celestia hesitated. "Just be safe. Remember all that you have learned about friendship. All of you. I will notify the Luna and Cadance about your leave." She paused, taking one long look at the ponies.

"Remember the friendship," she repeated.

The six ponies nodded.

"Then let's go," Twilight told.

And all of them left.

-

Six flying chariots, led and pulled by pairs of pegasus guards, landed on the strange outskirts of the Everfree Forest. The trees looked dark. A horrendous creature might just jump out and scare them—there is the fear of that in the forest.

The Mane Six stepped out of their seats. The pegasus guards unroped themselves and followed behind them.

"Well, this is it," Twilight said. She turned to her friends. "We have to stick together, work as a team, and resist the Redactor's attacks to pull us apart. The fate of Equestria dpends on us."

"What about the tree?" Fluttershy asked.

"It is the tree with the number five hundred and thirty-seven," Twilight replied. "Five-three-seven. All we have to do is find a tree marked with that number."

"But how are we going to find one specific tree in the midst of all these trees?" Rarity whined dramatically.

"Ooh, here it is!" Pinkie Pie shouted, bouncing up and down as she pointed at one tree. "I found it! I found it! What do I win?"

"Let me check!" Rainbow Dash said. She flew to the tree and floated around it. The tree looked like just any other creepy tree in the Everfree. Its bark was dark. The large leaves drooped as if they were trying to gently touch the ground. Taped on the trunk was a piece of paper.

The others trotted to it. The guards still followed.

"What does it say?" Applejack asked.

Twilight saw it. What was written was very small but she knew what number it was. She did not even have to squint.

"Is it the number?" Fluttershy asked, still scared of the Redactor. She had all the right to be scared. Completely destroying Equestria was a horrible thing for one to do. The Redactor even threatened to "remove" Celestia if she made a step outside of Canterlot. No one knew what he meant by "remove" but it was not a light-hearted threat.

If it was that tree, she had to fight with her friends against someone worse than Discord or even Tirek. But a tree with a paper note on it would sooner stand out. So she became more afraid inside.

-

On the balcony, Princess Celestia stood, gazing towards the Everfree Forest. She could not see it; it was too far away from here. But she worried.

Could she fight against the Redactor? She did not know what he looked like. Did he even look like a pony? Then again, she did try to fight against Queen Chrysalis—but she failed on her own. She was a Princess with much magical power, but the Redactor—what did he want? What would he gain from destroying Equestria? The Princess, despite her thousands of years alive, could not remember having wronged a pony or any other creature known as the Redactor.

She did not want to see her little ponies—especially her faithful student, Twilight Sparkle—be blasted away by an unknown villain. She almost cried at the thought of it, thinking of them breathing their last breaths at the hoof of the Redactor. How would they be done? Smashed to death? Sent to outer space? Frozen then broken?

"Remove." What did he mean by that? Would he somehow usurp her place? And then what? Princess Luna would surely know of it and so would Princess Cadance. Or maybe he would try to kill her. But where was he? And that was another problem to solve. Could he turn invisible at whim? Could he be right beside her right now?

Celestia turned around and checked with her eyes and magic. No one was really there.

But the word was still there. "Remove." Why not "destroy" or "kill" or "annhilate" or "defeat"? "Remove" sounded very much ominous.

She thought back to her ponies. Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Twilight Sparkle—they can save the day once again. They always had. Even when they were against Discord; it was a close call. If the Redactor shall fall by a close call, then it shall be so, the Princess thought.

Then she was right outside Canterlot. It just happened. It jarred her that in one second, she was just standing on a white, tall and decorated tower balcony of the royal castle; in the next, she was just standing outside the white, tall and decorated gate to Canterlot. She was now outside Canterlot. She was surprised. The royal guards on the wall were surprised, too, but they dared not to question her.

"Don't panic," Celestia assured. "But tell the rest of the stationed guards to be on full alert. Bring in also some of the reserves to further defend Canterlot."

"Is there an incoming threat, Your Highness?" a unicorn guard asked, sounding concerned

"Yes," she replied seriously. "There is."

Then the unicorn quickly faded away from existence.

Celestia gasped. In all her centuries of life, she never saw something like this. Her magical senses told her that the guard did not become invisible nor did he teleport to someplace else. He was truly not there anymore.

The rest of the guards present were alarmed but tried their best to stay in their places. One guard was sent to warn the others.

But under the wide gate was a creature. He wore a professional-looking suit, his mane was well-combed, but he was not a pony.

The Princess walked to him. "Are you the Redactor?"

"Why—yes!" the creature replied cheerfully. "I'm the Redactor spelled with a capital 'R'; I'm the threat your nobody spoke of."

The guards rushed to tackle him. They vanished away before they could touch him. The Redactor stood there still, brushing the imaginary dust off his suit.

"I thought you would meet the—"

"Little ponies, Princess?" the Redactor interrupted rudely. "After this, of course."

"What did you do to the royal guards?" Celestia asked sternly, putting a hoof on the ground.

"I removed them," he replied, moving his furless...hands animatedly. "I like mathematics. When you subtract, you remove, so that what I did. I made math easier for you."

"Do not play word games with me, Redactor!" she said as she became angrier.

By now, citizen ponies were going to the scene. They had never seen such a creature before. They had also never seen the Princess so angry in such a long time. The "Redactor" a threat, she said? But the ponies only watched from a "safe" distance.

"'Word games?'" the Redactor repeated. "I can subtract. What is fifty-seven minus fifty-seven? Solve that!"

"Zero," the Princess replied.

All the watching ponies cried out in pain as they quickly faded away.

"See!" the Redactor exclaimed. "That's a beautiful mind you have in there!"

"Stop!" the Princess commanded.

Princess Luna and Princess Cadance appeared beside Celestia in their own magic royalty. All three of them were not happy at the Redactor.

"So, you are whom my sister has spoken of, are you?" Luna said.

"And if you are planning to destroy this place," Cadance added, "then you'll have to go through us first!"

And they were not happy. Only the Redactor was. He still smiled.

"You see," the Redactor started, "what I did to your little ponies was not merely death. I removed them. I removed them from existence. They used to be, not they aren't. They simply don't exist anymore. They do feel a severe amount of pain before they completely fade out. Do you want to feel that?"

And with that, Luna and Cadance faded away. Celestia mentally flinched at the fading screams.

Celestia looked to her left and to her right. Inside, she was panicking. After Nightmare Moon, Discord, Queen Chrysalis with her changelings, King Sombra and Tirek, would she finally meet her end at the hand of a small creature who had a smile on her face? But her sister and her niece already met their ends at such a hand.

She angrily blasted a magical beam at the Redactor. She kept firing it. The beam continued on and on, going to the Redactor. Finally, she was exhausted and the beam was no more.

But the Redactor still stood there smiling.

"That's nice of you, caring so much for your relatives to the point that you wanted to destroy me because I just so happened to 'kill' them. Of course, your time is running out and you made a horrible mistake at not following my letter by taking a step out of Canterlot."

"You brought me out of Canterlot!" the Princess shouted.

"Yes," the Redactor said. "I did. So...?" He shrugged. "You still took a step out of Canterlot. I'm afraid I'll have to remove you."

"You won't!" she whined.

The land around them vanished almost instantly. They were left standing in black nothingness.

"Do you want to know how I'm going to destroy Equestria?" the Redactor said, walking closer to Celestia. "Like this. Let that sink into your mind. In every store that disappears, on every grass field that disappears, on every dirt road that disappears, in almost every house that disppears, there are ponies with a life who then end their life in much pain before they go into the non-existence I sent them to. That is right. Everypony will face that same fate and you are not exempted." He pointed to her. "Old and young, poor and rich, earth pony and pegasus and unicorn—it doesn't matter. I shall remove Equestria and all who live in it."

"Why?" Celestia asked. Inside, she thought of defeat and loss. This was her final loss. In less than ten minutes, she has lost everything but herself...and—

"I didn't forget those six ponies, though," the Redactor said, having ignored Celestia's question. "They are different. They are special. They are better than you!" He spat at her.

She charged up her remaining magic—but there was not any.

"I also removed your magic," the Redactor told. "Back to your six ponies, however. Do you want to know why they are better than you?"

Celestia did not want to answer. Surely, the close call might arrive. Soon. Sooner. Somewhen. Later. Hopefully now.

"It's because you aren't real."

Then she faded away in an instant, screaming. Her scream then faded away also.

-

"Five-three-seven," Twilight read out loud.

"Come on, Redacto-guy!" Applejack teased. "We don't have all day."

"I guess we'll have to wait for him," Fluttershy said. "But...if he comes here, I'll also stand with you girls."

Rarity nodded. "And we'll stand with you," she told.

"Who wants a last-minute group hug before fighting the meanie?" Pinkie Pie asked with her arms open.

Her friends looked at her strangely.

"Come on, Pink!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed while she flew to her and hugged her.

And the other four joined in the hug. In the dark Everfree Forest, these ponies hugged. It was a bright and encouraging moment.

"Awww!" the guards let out. And they faded away.

"Wait, where are you going?!" Twilight shouted in panic.

"No cheating."

Almost everypony left jumped in surprise.

"Who's there?!" Applejack yelled.

"Are you the Redactor?!" Fluttershy inquired in fear.

"If you are the Redactor, what do we get for a right answer?" Pinkie Pie shouted. "And on a side note, stop making others go away like that! We'll be sad that we'll never see them again!"

"That's true," the voice replied; everypony left looked here and there warily. "It's true that I'm the Redactor and it's true that all of you will be sad that you'll never see those guards again."

"And what about their parents?" Rainbow spoke up.

"And their brothers and sisters?" Rarity added.

"At least they'll have less bills to pay." the Redactor replied heartlessly happily. "With less ponies to take care of in the house, you get to pay with less bits. You should be proud of me that I helped your finances."

"But to reduce your bills at the expense of your family's lives?" Twilight shot back. "Do you even care for the lives of these ponies?"

"Not really," the Redactor said bluntly. "I only care for your lives because everyone else is dead."

Everypony gasped.

"Wait just a minute," Rainbow interrupted, "are you bluffing?"

"You want me to show you?"

"Show me," Rainbow answered brashly.

"Rainbow..." Twilight groaned.

The Redactor cleared his throat. "Well, since you wanted to see the proof..."

Fluttershy shakily took a step back.

And it was gone.

The six ponies were bewildered at the new environment which was no environment but nothing and black for miles and miles. They were standing on nothing but a black floor. Panic was in them but they stuck together. Perhaps the Redactor would finally appear in this void.

"Found ya'!" Pinkie yelled. She pointed towards something. Someone.

He looked like no other creature they had ever seen before in Equestria. Bipedal, only about twice as tall as a normal pony, not as hairy or furry as most others were,  and wearing a set of professional clothes. He would be out of place in Ponyville, in Canterlot, in the Crystal Empire and in the Everfree Forest. He was almost foreign to Equestria, if not to this world, too.

But his form did look very familiar to Twilight. The Redactor was just less colorful than the others she had seen.

"Are...you the Redactor?" Fluttershy asked hesitantly.

"Yes!" the Redactor replied with a happy face. "You're Fluttershy, orange is Applejack, rainbow one is Rainbow Dash, pink's Pinkie Pie, violet or lavender is Twilight and the frozen smore's Rarity."

"How dare you scoff me with such indignity!" Rarity whined.

"As if you truly deserved any dignity from me," the Redactor mumbled loudly. "Actually, you deserved more dignity than your sister."

"What do you mean?" Rarity was scared of the answer.

The Redactor walked a few steps back. He snapped his fingers and a rectangle of special glass appeared in front of him. The ponies were astonished by it but they kept their serious calm.

"And what is that for?" Twilight asked.

"It's the screen that will show you what happened to your family and your other friends and the rest of Equestria." The screen lit up in white. "If you can take that much."

The screen showed various fillies and colts sitting on little wooden chairs in the schoolhouse as they listened to Cheerilee teaching something about the basics of Equestrian government. Cheerilee taught and the occasional pony would raise a hoof to ask a question. The three Cutie Mark Crusaders were there—and Applejack, Rarity and Rainbow Dash watched them intently.

"What'm I supposed to be watching out for again?" Applejack said. "An' did ya' hurt Apple Bloom?"

"I hope you did not harm Sweetie Belle!" Rarity told.

The Redactor laughed. "I'm the villain here so what would you expect? Just look."

Then, the walls faded away. Cheerilee immediately stopped the lesson and told her "little ponies" to run after her. The wooden floor faded away, the little chairs and the small tables faded away, and a filly faded away. Then a colt faded away. As they faded away, they screamed. The screams were curdling and painful to hear. The six ponies gasped in horror as, one by one, the young ones vanished, never to be seen again. Even Cheerilee faded away, her scream not being forgotten.

The grass was fading away. The trees were fading away. The sky and the clouds were fading away. Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle ran as fast as they could in their vain attempt to outrun the fading into nothing. The fact that they faded away—and screamed—together did not give the six any peace.

"Apple Bloom!" Applejack shouted desperately, reaching a hoof out to the screen.

"Sweetie Belle!" Rarity shouted likewise.

"Scootaloo's a goner!" Rainbow yelled. She turned to the smiling Redactor. "What have you done?!" she said, pointing a hoof at him.

"I removed them from existence," the Redactor answered. "I'm sure you must be so happy."

"Well, we're not!" Fluttershy spoke up.

"And we will do our best to stop you!" Twilight told boldly. "For Equestria and for friendship!"

"Equestria's already gone, miss." The Redactor's grin grew bigger.

"How can you—"

The screen then displayed Princess Celestia, Princess Luna and Princess Cadance on one side and the Redactor himself on the other. Luna and Cadance faded away—their screams were there, too.

Twilight felt like crying. "Do you even have a shred of care for us?"

"Pay attention," the Redactor grunted.

Celestia looked slightly panicked. Then, she fired a magical beam at him. But it didn't hit him. It just went on and on but it never hit him. The Redactor stood still through it all, still smiling and not having any fear or panic. Then the beam was gone. Then almost everything in view was gone. The Redactor rambled on. Then, Celestia faded away. She was screaming but her scream faded away with her. And only after that did the screen turn off from its display of horrible events.

The ponies surrounded the Redactor. They gave him no way out. The five shouted at him accusations on top of accusations. And they were right in their minds. Coldhearted, if not heartless, to the point of killing thousands and tens of thousands of animals; dangerous and an obvious enemy; irreformable and unkind; smiling at the despair of others; the worst of his kind, if his kind was even that—

"Stop!" Twilight yelled.

And then the rest of them stopped and looked at Twilight. "Come on, Twilight!" Rainbow complained.

"Rainbow, we're not going anywhere if we're just going to keep telling him the things that he is. What we need to do is to ask him questions."

"You've got to be kidding me," the Redactor flouted. "I can remove all of you in an instant and I can do it right now, and you think of this great idea of interviewing me? How's asking a couple of questions going to defeat me?"

"Stop it, Redactor," Twilight said. "You also have to cooperate."

"You didn't turn Discord into stone by asking him questions," the Redactor said. "Nor did send Tirek away by conducting a Q-and-A session with him. You're being too analytical, Twilight."

Applejack grabbed him by the arm. "Co'perate with Twilight, will ya'?" Applejack said.

"Like it's that easy to do that—" the Redactor turned around "—when you can do this!'

And then he reappeared outside of the circle.

"Cheater McCheater!" Pinkie Pie hollered.

"Really?" the Redactor answered back. He reached out his hand. "Freeze!"

And everypony froze. Everypony except Twilight Sparkle who was mouth open as she looked upon her friends who did not make a move. And then—was she getting tired? Wait, it's my—

"Magic," the Redactor completed. "I did tell you not to cheat. You can not skip this. You will have to listen to me very carefully because I will tell you what is truly going on here and there."

Twilight gulped. She had the right to do so. The Redactor had shown much more destructive power than Discord or Tirek had had. And then there was his talk of removing—

"Only six other people are actually real people," the Redactor told her.

"Wha—What do you mean?" she stammered.

The Redactor bent down to the pony's level. "You are a real person, I am a real person, your five other frozen friends are real persons. The rest? They are controlled by either other real people or by complex machinery."

"What?" she said. "If what you're saying is true, then that means...that means my parents aren't really whom I thought them to be!" Tears were forming in her eyes. "My...parents...not..."

"And that is the same for your beloved Princesses." He smiled. "They did control the sun and moon. Just not the real sun and moon. And even the food and water you consumed. They were food and water. Just not the real food and water. The Princesses themselves aren't real, too. Neither was the world you lived in."

"Then tell me where I have been all these years!" she clamored and sobbed. She grabbed his body. "Tell me what's real through all these years!"

"Years?" the Redactor repeated. "How old are you?"

"Twenty-two..."

"Because it hasn't been twenty-two years. It just felt like it was years and years. Do you want to know how long you've actually been here in Equestria since you've been born?"

Twilight sniffled and sniffed.

"About eight hours."

"That does not seem to make any sense at all!" she shouted.

"What fun is there in making sense?" the Redactor recalled. "I am like Discord in some ways. I am much worse than that silly draconequus. But it makes sense that it would seem insensible to you. At first. But you should stop crying."

But she kept crying. Almost everypony that she knew was not real? It was an unacceptable idea. They looked, felt, acted so real. The world was so real—too real for it not to be real. How could eight hours feel like more than two decades? If what the Redactor said was all true, then all that she had seen and heard and felt up until now was nothing but a mere illusion successful in keeping its own act. How horrible it would be for this deception to be true! She felt like she could break down any minute. But her friends...

"Let me just cut straight to the point and say that this is not the real world."

I'm dreaming, then, Twilight concluded in her head while she loosened her grip on her tears. Reality: what was it really to her?

"A long dream. You see, you weren't born a pony. Your species was that of mine: human. You are a mother of a son and wife to a nice husband. You lived in an OK house for some years. Actually, you're thirty-three years old. You had a good enough childhood—not perfect; just about good enough. You went to school and finally ended up with a master's degree in theoretical physics—which is ironic, considering that, as Twilight Sparkle, you studied magic very fervently. After that, you fell in your love with your would-be husband, married him so he graduated to being your current husband, and then—" he looked here and there as if to emphasize something "—your normal life for the past few years. Until you started thinking yourself to be Twilight Sparkle.

"And where did that come from?"

"I am not real!" Twilight cried out miserably.

"A cartoon," the Redactor answered bluntly. "And to think you are the analytical pony, the researching pony, the most reasonable of the main six. You, out of all the ponies, are emotionally wallowing at the 'fact' that Twilight Sparkle is not real but only a piece of fiction. Remember all the past villains you've fought before." He stood up. "Where's your friendship power?"

The pony looked at her friends. Still frozen; still unresponsive. She was almost like them in her sadness as sadness turned into disgust and as disgust turned into anger.

"Not able to do it because you need your friends," he stated. He walked around her. "What is it, Twilight? Has rationality gone off the deep end for you yet?"

"No!" she yelled. "Neither will friendship go!"

"There you go. Now go fight me with whatever you have."

She immediately galloped at him. A headbutt was incoming. Yet, Twilight was blasted away from her sprint, landing on the black nothing.

"Did you believe what I said about you, Twilight?" he asked.

"Not a single word," she said as she picked herself up, being all the more confident and stronger inside.

"So you believe you really are Twilight Sparkle?"

"Yes," she replied proudly. "And also, everypony is not controlled by someone nor a simulation. The world I have lived in for my entire life—and not eight hours—is real. The world you're telling me of either does not exist or is in an alternate universe. Or maybe it is out there in outer space. But I'll stand here and I'll stand by my word that what you've just said about me, my friends and my world is all a lie!"

Then, the rest of her friends were unfrozen.

Twilight's hopes went higher. She stomped a hoof on the nothing."And together, with my friends and the magic of friendship, we will defeat you!"

The other five ponies rushed to her side. Their eyes were watery, too.

"We are going to bring Equestria back!" Twilight shouted triumphantly. "We've saved Equestria more than once, and we can do it again!"

"Yeah!" everypony else shouted.

The energy of it all was exciting. Filled with a passionate hope, they were ready to take the Redactor on. There was no plan...yet. The Redactor may have removed Equestria out of further existence, but somehow, they were going to bring it back. They were able to see through the lies of the Redactor. No lie, no matter how convincing, would get them off the belief that almost everything that they had experienced was real. Their parents, their Princesses, their siblings, their friends, their places—they were all real. They just needed to go back.

This was it. The most villainous of all villains that the ponies had ever faced before. As they charged at the Redactor, according to the plans that they had mumbled into their ears right in front of the Redactor himself, victory was within their reach. And here it was. Closer. Closer. It was getting closer. As the steps were completed, friendship would rule and the Redactor would finally learn, although through the hard way, that friendship is—

-

Twilight opened her eyes. Up there was a white, tiled ceiling.

She felt different yet familiar. She examined herself.

Many clothes on. No pony fur. Two hands with fingers. Sitting on a chair. Not a pony at all. Despite the complications, she curbed her own surprise. Back in this strange world she was.

Or was she? Her skin was of a light shade of brown, not of the gray and light mulberry color that she was used to seeing on herself. Had he changed my coat color, too? she thought.

She looked around. The square room was small and was covered with white tiles. The chair she was sitting on looked awfully normal. There was a door in the wall she was facing. It looked like an ordinary door.

The door opened. The Redactor was there.

"Thought friendship was magic, huh? I'll tell your child."