My Little Pony: Third Gear

Chapter 2B: Heart of Light and Dark

When the team started to arrange the components for Turbine-3, Gearhead noticed that there was a growing hubbub in the streets. Taking a look through his glasses, Gearhead zoomed in to see that somepony had raised pennants and banners all around the city’s main streets, and especially in the plaza around the palace. Zooming in further revealed this to be the work of the Elemental Six, so they had to have found something about the city’s ancient defence system. And it had something to do with some sort of festival.

“What do you make of that?” Gearhead asked the nearby ponies, nodding toward the city center.

Those around him took a moment to stare or compose their thoughts, and then somepony blurted, “it’s the Crystal Fair!”

“Crystal Fair?”

“Yes. It used to happen every year. The Fair raised our spirits, so we could power the Crystal Heart.”

“To power it? The Crystal Heart must be a powerful Artifact.”

“Yes, and King Sombra said he hid it where nopony’d ever find it. To think that your friends found it so easily..!”

Despite the dread in the pit of his stomach, Gearhead suggested working in shifts so his crew could enjoy the Fair as well. So Lattice and the other bosses divided the group into smaller teams and gave them a timetable to follow. Each group would be small, and they would rotate quickly to avoid disturbing either the workflow or the festivities.

Gearhead clicked his communicator on. “Gearhead to all points. Has anypony heard of a powerful Artifact called the ‘Crystal Heart?” He asked softly.

“A what now?” Pinkie Pie’s voice called.

“Oh no,” Twilight said.

“Rainbow Dash here with AJ. Yeah, I think we’re in trouble here ‘cause the Crystal Ponies keep mentioning it.”

“My team says Sombra hid it where no one would find it.”

“Yeah, that’s what the librarian says,” Applejack said. “Twilight, you didn’t by any chance..?”

“I just carved it out with my magic. Could you girls keep the Crystal Ponies entertained while I go look for the real thing?”

“That’s my specialty!” Pinkie said.

“Thanks, girls. Really. Gearhead, what’s your progress?”

“We are assembling Turbine-3 now.”

“So three quarters done already?”

“We will still have to calibrate and charge, but we are nearly at the point where we can do that.”

“Good, because I don’t know how much longer Cadence’s shield can hold out.”

That was something else that Gearhead had noticed: with the shield surrounding them, Gearhead had had plenty of opportunities to establish a running reading. In regards to Twilight’s question, they were in better shape than they would have been if they had arrived a day or more later by train. While Armour and Cadence could not use their new Contract powers all the time, their power nearly became cubed for the few minutes when they did, and did not decrease in any way compared to normal levels. When they deactivated the mana transfer loop, Armour was able to rest and recover a bit, however Cadence’s levels started to decrease slightly again.

“We should be fine for some time yet,” Gearhead said. “I will keep an eye on the shield while I lead the construction of the Array. You worry about the Fair and the Heart.”

“Given what we’re facing right now,” Twilight said, “that sounds like a plan.” The others agreed, and then signed off. “I’m taking Spike with me. Twilight out.”

* * *

In order to convert part of the palace into a combined condenser and control unit, Gearhead had to go in and see what they would need, before he could ask the mining team for any further metal or gemstone resources.

Unfortunately he could not simply leave the build team to survey the palace while they put the finishing touches on Turbine-3. Fortunately they now had the process down to a fine science, or a precise art if that was your preference. The part of the process that took the longest was refining the turbine’s unique components.

Gearhead found a set of rooms in the central tower that would be perfect for the control center. “Why hesitate?” Armour asked. Gearhead had sent one of the build members down to the balcony where the royals were watching the Fair, to ask the new prince to come up and take a look. Before agreeing to do so, Armour and Cadence had reactivated their Contract magic to reinforce her already-flagging strength.

“Do any of you know what these rooms are designed for?”

“I would just as soon assume they were additional guest or servant quarters,” Armour said.

“Sorry, Gearhead.” Lattice rubbed the back of her head, embarrassed.

“You do not need to apologize for not having regained your memories,” Gearhead said. The other Crystal Ponies brightened at that.

“I can’t see any reason you couldn’t use this space as the central module,” Armour said, looking around. “Nothing in here jumps out as being particularly unique or vital.”

“I just think that if the palace is part of the defensive array together with the Crystal Heart, altering it could affect its functionality. Do we dare take the chance?”

“I think the issue is more daring not to take the chance,” Armour said. “I’m making an executive decision as one of the senior officers on duty: dare to do it. And let me know if you need anything else,” he said, leaving to return to his wife’s side.

“Aye, sir,” Gearhead said, knocking off a quick salute. “You heard the prince,” he said, turning to the others. “Our first step will be to integrate the walls separating the chambers into the ceilings or floors. Next we can put in the particle wiring, miniature condensers, and the terminals. The ceiling here, and the floor in the floor above us will be required in the main condenser unit.”

“Yes sir!” The Crystal Ponies chimed. They got right to the first task. While they did that, Gearhead wrote out a list and gave it to Snowbelle to take to the miners. The new list of components included copper and other metals, a good number of them more common than not. Gearhead would mix them into alloys, to create the relays and pathways the particles would use in powering the whole array.

“But I don’t understand,” Twilight’s voice suddenly came through Gearhead’s earpiece. “What happened? How could I fail?”

“Twilight, Gearhead. Can you hear me?”

“I... I can hear you, but where are you?”

“Twilight, it’s Applejack. What do ya see?”

“It’s the Throne Room back in Canterlot Castle, but... I’ve failed. At everything.”

“Twilight, Rainbow Dash. How’d ya get back to Canterlot so fast?”

“I... huh? I don’t remember. I don’t even remember leaving the Crystal Empire. But that would mean...”

Gearhead brought up everypony’s locations by looking for their communicators’ signals. “Twilight, Gearhead again. I have your signal as coming from below or near the Throne Room here in the Crystal Palace.”

“Then I’m not really in Canterlot? Wait, could your equipment detect me at this range?”

“You are correct: even now I am using the turbines and the Wind as nodes to expand the sensor and communication range.”

“So talking like we are now,” Fluttershy said, “wouldn’t even be possible if Twilight was in Canterlot. Which means...”

“Ah, I’m okay now. Spike came down to get me. There’s a powerful illusion-type trap over the door. Give me a moment.” Twilight clicked her channel closed.

“It’s a good thing all that was just in her head,” Applejack said while Gearhead started to help the Crystal Ponies.

“Yes, but an illusion so complete must be incredibly powerful,” Rarity said. “If we underestimate Sombra’s traps any further, it could be more dangerous than anything else we’ve faced before.”

“Makes sense he’d set traps to stop anypony from getting near the Heart,” Dash said.

“In that case, should we send anyone to go help Twilight out?” Fluttershy asked.

“We each have our appointed tasks,” Rarity said, “even if it’s just to provide backup for the prince and princess.”

“Right! So lets trust Twilight and Spike to do their part, while we do ours,” Applejack said.

“By the way, is anypony else kinda getting thrown off by holding a conversation without actually seeing each other?” Dash asked.

“Kinda, yeah,” Applejack said.

“It’s very useful though,” Rarity said.

“And cool!” Pinkie said.

“I think it’s like being like a telepath,” Fluttershy said. “I’ve always wondered what it was like to speak like this.”

“Except it’s not truly mind-to-mind, like the battle link Luna helped us build,” Rarity said.

“It’s still more like what Gearhead and Snowbelle do than anything else we could experience,” Fluttershy said.

“Yeah, just not as fast,” Dash said.

“Back,” Twilight said. “Spike confirmed it for me: the trap over the door showed whoever looked into it after opening it with Dark Magic their worst nightmare.”

“Why would anypony want to use Dark Magic?” Pinkie asked.

“I needed to do it to reveal the staircase down here. Princess Celestia showed me how.”

“Did it hurt?” Fluttershy asked.

“It kind of gives me a headache, but otherwise I’m fine. Besides, I had to use Light Magic to open the door properly. Or I think it’s properly. I’m having a hard time telling whether or not it’s another of Sombra’s traps.”

“Why, what’s through that door?” Dash asked.

“More stairs. A lot more. This could take awhile.”

“Good luck, Sugar Cube.”

“Thanks. Twilight out.”

“Speaking of how long things could take, how’re we doing on everything else?” Dash asked.

“I think I’m starting to run low on materials for the traditional hats booth,” Rarity said.

“I don’t think I can hold off these Crystal Ponies’ curiosity for much longer. It’d take just one of ‘em to figure out this ain’t the real Crystal Heart. But at least Princess Cadence seems to be hanging in there.”

Gearhead enlarged the sensor take on Cadence’s shield. “She is holding the defences at 72%.”

“That’s great!” Dash said.

“To tell the truth, if the integrity goes below 52% Sombra could force his way through, causing the shield to fail. So there is much less room than you would think.”

“Then I hope it doesn’t fall,” Dash said.

“But just in case, it wouldn’t hurt to wrap things up: even I can’t keep this party going on forever!” Pinkie said. “Whoa!”

“Wait, Pinkie, what’re you--!” Gearhead could not see what was happening, but apparently Pinkie was roving around cheering ponies up. It was a pretty good plan, except she seemed to have wandered closer to where Applejack was covering for the fake Heart, and stumbled. So then of course, the Universe at large would have the Heart become uncovered.

“Oh, thanks! That was a close one,” Pinkie said.

“What happened?” Gearhead asked.

“Pinkie almost knocked the Heart from its stand, but some Crystal Ponies caught her as they were walkin’ through. Odd, I didn’t see where they came from. The palace? So that means...”

“They are members of my crew, come down to enjoy the Fair. I set them on rotation.”

“Well, that was lucky,” Applejack said. “I just hope it continues to hold.”

“How long until you’re ready up there, Darling?”

“We have a fair amount of work to do up here, and then we need to synchronize the turbines and charge the condensers. I would say we have about two more hours.”

“You think the princess’ll hold out that long?” Dash asked.

“We can hope,” Gearhead said. In truth it was too difficult to tell, since the shield rose and fell in strength. It was only as strong as it was because of the Contract. If the group had arrived by train, the shield would have probably already fallen by the time Gearhead completed Turbine-3.

Once the conversation with the others was over, and everypony returned to her own task, Gearhead used his Geomancy to help dig out the small troughs in the walls and floor for the power lines and relay points. The team had worked to flawlessly reconfigure the three rooms into a single cylindrical module.

Minutes later Snowbelle returned with the components for the conduits and the computers, and Gearhead directed six ponies from the build team in their installation. He wondered whether his manapool would have held up so long if it had not grown so much. It was just one more thing for which to be thankful.

On the other hoof, Cadence’s strength was beginning to flag more quickly now, and she and Armour were obviously having to activate the Contract more sparingly: Over the past half hour or so, the shield’s strength had varied from 68% with the Contract active to 59% without it. Any additional stress would surely compromise it to the point where Sombra might attempt an incursion.

Naturally, that was when the fake Heart got knocked from its pedestal, and the Crystal Ponies took notice immediately. Gearhead did not want to rush his team and compromise the quality of their work, but soon they might not have much of a choice. He watched them put up the last section of monitoring crystal on the curving wall, and then turned his efforts to connecting the last terminal to its respective conduits. The sooner they got the system online, the better. That is, unless Twilight finds the real Heart soon, Gearhead thought.

“Guys, I think I’ve finally found it,” Twilight’s voice said. “It’s here!”

“Alright, Twilight!” Dash said.

“Now all you’ve gotta do is bring it on home,” Applejack said.

“But be careful,” Fluttershy said.

“After all this time and effort – oh no!”

“What?”

“It-krz-trap! I-zrt-eag-ktz.”

“What’s going on?” Pinkie asked. “Did anypony understand any of that?”

“Something is interfering with the signal,” Gearhead said, “but if there is a way out, Twilight should figure it out in a few moments.” Gearhead and a pair of Crystal Ponies secured the terminal in place, and then he walked over to a wall with a small socket and plugged in his dagger by its pommel to provide the system with a starting charge.

“Should we send help now?” Fluttershy asked.

“Interference rising in the vicinity of the Throne Room. I am not getting a signal at all from Twilight’s earpiece now.”

“I’ll go check it out,” Applejack said. “Rarity, you and Pinkie hold down the fort.”

“Oh joy,” Rarity said flatly in contrast to Pinkie’s loud “yippee!”

Gearhead used Read to make sure everything was connected the way it was supposed to be. “Let us start the system up,” he said to the Crystal Ponies around him. Just as he had instructed them earlier, they pressed and released the three-button combination required to start-up each of the five consoles. The control center came alive with cool white and blue light, so Gearhead sheathed his dagger and took his place at the central console.

“It is time to begin configuring the array,” he announced to the others. “Control relays will not yet be in place, so team members standing by at each turbine will have to use the built-in manual controls. Turbine teams, do you copy?” Fortunately while Gearhead had waited on some parts, the mining team had provided him with the material he needed to create three more earpieces. He set them to a secondary frequency, and had Snowbelle take them out to the teams of three waiting at each turbine. Only the team leaders would get a communicator, but at least this way they could coordinate properly.

“Turbine-1 copies and is ready,”

“Two is ready,”

“Three good to go.”

“Go on initial activation at 20% capacity on my one-mark,” Gearhead said. “Acknowledge.”

“Acknowledged,”

“Waiting for your one-mark,”

“Ready,”

“Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Mark!” The instruments showed each turbine coming online. Now came the tricky part, where they had to match output levels on all three turbines. Fortunately, Gearhead still remembered how Twilight had helped him to come up with a method for synchronizing his twin cores.

“Gearhead, it’s Applejack. There ain’t no stairs or door in here!”

“They must have sealed shut when Twilight triggered the trap. If you could figure out where in the city she is, you can try to help her,” Gearhead said.

“On it!” Dash said, and Gearhead could picture her flying off to search for their missing friends.

“One, decrease power two percent. Two, increase power by one percent. Three, increase power by 15%.” All three teams acknowledged. After that, the only further adjustment was minor.

“Turbines show as matched,” Lattice said.

“Lock it in,”

“Locked at One,”

“Locked at Two,”

“Locked at Three,”

“Locked at Central.”

“Configuration is complete,” Gearhead said. “Well done, teams. You can come in now. As for us here, it is time for us to spool the turbines up to full. Set output to charge all condensers.”

“Set,”

“And, activating.” Gearhead tapped the command, and two and a half seconds later, the large condensers in the floor and ceiling began to glow slightly. “Now we wait.” Hopefully not for long, he thought, seeing Cadence’s shield at 56%. And we still have not heard back from Twilight.

With the shield down to 54% strength, and still no word from Twilight, it seemed clear to Gearhead that the city’s best course of action would be to prepare for battle against Sombra. Currently he, Snowbelle, and the Elemental Six were the only defenders of significant strength the Crystal Empire possessed, thanks to the fact that Cadence was nearly exhausted, and Armour was staying by her side. Sombra’s only known defeat had been at the hoofs of the Royal Sisters, so it only made sense to prepare as much strength as was possible.

“Computer, Config-4.”

“[Acknowledged.]”

“What was that?” Lattice asked.

“I am simply preparing for battle,”

“So then, should we try deploying our defences early?”

“It would be ideal if we could wait for the condensers to charge fully, but realistically I do not know if we have the time for that. We need to be prepared, in case our airspace is breached before we can raise our own shields. Keep an eye on those levels.”

“Yes sir,”

“Rainbow Dash, Gearhead. Have you had any luck tracking Twilight and Spike down?”

“Not yet,”

“I’m so sorry,” Fluttershy said.

“Um, I had her join the search,”

“That is fine, and a good call given you can sweep the whole city from the skies.”

“And you couldn’t have just tracked Twilight’s location like before?”

“Their location jumped when they went through the door, and the trace never caught up. Now I am not receiving any signal at all from Twilight’s communicator, so it cannot be done from here.”

“You gonna join us?”

“No, I have to monitor the Central Condenser.”

“Shouldn’t you be able to use whatever’s interfering with the signal to track Twilight’s location?”

“Excellent idea, Dash. But just in case, please keep looking.”

“Roger that! Rainbow Dash out.”

“We’ll be okay, won’t we?”

“That is the plan, Fluttershy. Good luck.”

“Ah, thank you.” And she also clicked off.

Gearhead would bet that the source of the interference was more dark crystal or cloud matter, similar to what they had encountered on the flight to the city. If he looked for similar signatures throughout the city, he should be able to find Twilight, and then vector the Pegasi in on her to give her whatever assistance she needed.

“Gearhead, the condensers aren’t charging at the same rate as before, and we can’t sense some of the palace’s crystalwork anymore,” Lattice said.

“There must be some impurities present now. Perhaps that is what is interfering with Twilight’s efforts. There, we have them on the sensors. It is not an exact match, but it looks a lot like Sombra’s work,” Gearhead said, comparing the readings.

“King Sombra? Is he back?!”

“That is what we are here to defend against,” Gearhead said.

“[Alert: City shields integrity at 50% and compromised.]”

“Looks like fight time is coming early. Computer, time the stabilizer’s launch from Silver Wind so it can dock with me when the reconfiguration completes.”

“[Acknowledged.]”

“Are you going to go out there?”

“I am, so set the array’s activation to 'Wide Purge Mode,' please. It looks like the charge will not go much higher than it is now.”

“Will 75% be enough?”

“Not for full function, but we know that Sombra does not like the light particles. The more we can slow him down, the better.”

“[Alert: City shields have failed.]”

“Please activate the Alicorn Array.”

“Yes, sir!”

“Thirdson Gearhead, Twin Engine. Heading out,” Gearhead trotted out of the room’s door, and headed down toward the nearest window. By now, regardless of the fields being deployed by the turbines and the condenser, Sombra was exploiting Cadence’s exhaustion to breech the city limits. Gearhead wanted to have a response prepared.

“Quattuor Magnae Spiritus invoco. Veni Spiritus Lumenet undecim ducenti. Colligite et efficiamini mei ensis. Tardes enim maxime triginta secondis.” Now, unfortunately, Gearhead had only 30 seconds to deliver the blast, or he would lose the spell completely. But he had every faith that Sombra’s ego was large enough that he would show himself without any hesitation.

When Gearhead flew outside, he realized how correct he had been in his estimation of Sombra’s self-image, if not his powers: there were dark crystal towers rising everywhere, and Crystal Ponies were fleeing everywhere in their panic – except for those whom the former-king approached closely. Then they could only tremble in terror. And as their fear and despair grew, as marked by the loss of shine in more and more of the Crystal Ponies’ coats, the more powerful Sombra grew. As he rode on an extending crystal pillar, his shadow body swirled more tightly around him, revealing his armoured physical body.

Sombra was far from the only game in town now: Gold, silver, and white particle fields were opening up to wrap around the city from all sides. Above and behind Gearhead, a tower of light as thick as the Central Condenser unit was firing into the sky in order to deploy its particle field from above. Gearhead looked around long enough to see that some of the dark crystal that had been eroding the palace’s bright facets had already been shattered.

Gearhead could not help thinking that Sombra made the perfect target. He locked on with his bladecasters and compressed some of the particles stored in his chest condenser before rearing up to give his weapons a direct line-of-sight on the target. “Malleus Lux,” he said as he fired, and was both surprised and pleased when the bright blue-white of his spell merged with the turquoise particles. They streaked so quickly toward Sombra that they shattered three magi-sonic barriers, and he did not have time to evade. The blasts knocked him from his pillar, but the Dark Unicorn quickly recovered.

“Surprise, Horn-head,” Gearhead said, charging in with his weapons in sword mode. They crackled against the black pike that Sombra was suddenly wielding. With a roar, Sombra pushed Gearhead back a few meters.

“I am surprised, given you’ve decided to challenge me without even as much power as your little airship. If you wish to join my crystal slaves or die, I’ll happily grant that request.”

“Sorry, I am not here for that,” Gearhead said. Somewhere above him, Spike called out. Sombra heard him, and suddenly his expression became both angry and hungry. Gearhead fired several quick shots into him, and then flew in with a double-cross slash. “I shall, however, be your opponent.”

[Warning: Stored particles at 60%.] Gearhead promised himself to keep that in mind even as the different fields mixed and shimmered around the city. According to his HUD, the particle field was at 190% and rising, but the threat was already inside. “Computer, acquire Link.”

[Processing...] Even if the Twin Engine was too busy with the reconfiguration to generate new particles, the Alicorn Array was producing plenty of them, and at different purity levels, all higher than Gearhead’s standard. Using the Link function would draw those particles into the Twin Engine’s condensers, but the Array would be unable to restrict and eject the invader.

“You dare to continue to interfere?”

“Of course,”

“Then you are a fool,” Sombra launched a vicious wave of dark crystals at Gearhead, who flew to evade some of them. Others he had to fend off with his bladecasters and Geargem Dagger, but the ones that nearly got through clashed up against his defensive magic, and then his particle shield.

[Warning: Stored particles at 30%.]

“Let us make it count,” Gearhead brought his bladecasters in front of his chest condenser again, and charged up for another shot. Sombra elected to ignore him, and tried to use his dark crystals to shield himself while he launched toward Spike. Gearhead was right there, however, unleashing his shot into Sombra’s left flank and knocking him down again.

“Good news, youngling: I’ve decided to kill you,” Sombra said as he got back up.

[Warning: Stored particles at 5%].

“Now would be a really good time for a trick or two,” Gearhead said.

“[Alert: Stabilizer inbound].”

“Such small tricks won’t work on me,” Sombra grinned.

“This one is not exactly small, considering it means that one of my earlier preparations has nearly completed.” The cones at Gearhead’s sides swivelled into position, and whined to life. The system immediately purged the remaining stored turquoise particles so they could be replaced by the golden and blue ones now being produced.

The cores switched again, so they were facing directly behind Gearhead, and the stabilizer swooped in at high speed. So it would not risk breaking his back, Gearhead flew up ahead of it. The stabilizer transformed from Flight Mode to Docking Mode, and the pylons connected directly to both cores. Gold and blue energy lit each of the four wings, which extended from behind his shoulders, before seeming to be expelled from the tips as though to make them even longer. Two of those wings carried enhancile bits for the bladecasters that attached to both sides and gave them their tips.

[Twin Stabilizer online and ready].

“Just in time, too,” Gearhead muttered. “We will not need the Link anymore.” He came around in time to fire a withering salvo at Sombra, who had chosen to take the opportunity to try to get at Spike again. This time instead of letting Gearhead flank him, he used his magic to fly and met the younger challenger polearm to blade. This time Sombra did not push Gearhead back.

This time as well, Gearhead did not let up simply with one round of attacks. He turned and came around again, slashing or stabbing when he got close, and firing when he was further out. He attacked so much more thickly now compared to before that Sombra clearly did not have the time to consider going after Spike again. And yet the Unicorn was chuckling.

“You think you can defeat me with just that much power?”

“I am flattered that you think I might, truly. But that is not my purpose. Before I reveal it, though, please do answer a question of mine.”

“Oh? You seek knowledge even in the midst of battle. That is respectable, if foolish. Ask, then!”

“I will. Have you ever trapped any Ice Dragons in the vicinity of Canterlot?”

“Ice Dragons?” Sombra looked past Gearhead’s shoulder, to where the latter sensed Snowbelle approaching.

“I see. Yes, I did. But it only worked with that foolish dragoness because of her greed. So, where is she now? Dead, I’m guessing, because otherwise she would be taking care of her own. I’m right, aren’t I? You’re angry, aren’t you?”

“You are wrong about my mother,” Snowbelle said softly. “She loved us, all my brothers and sisters and me. Now I am the last one to carry her legacy, and everything she did to provide for even one of us. I know, because I shared time with her. So you cannot turn our affection into fuel, Sombra. All the same, I have a message for you from my mother.”

Snowbelle grew slightly in size even as she inhaled, and then she unleashed a tightly-packed snowblast. Sombra sneered as he dodged it at first, but Snowbelle continued to track him, and Gearhead resumed firing. Sombra encased himself in a spiked ball of dark crystal, and then used another pillar, striking the ball to launch it into the air, in Spike’s direction.

“OverBoost,” Gearhead growled as he flew after his opponent.

[OverBoost Mode activated. Operational time limit: 120 seconds].

“Keep it on the HUD,” Gearhead said as the particles covered him from head to the tip of his tail. He got ahead of Sombra’s ball, unleashed blasts from his top and bottom railguns, turned, and executed six quick slashes before looping out of the way and flying to get ahead of it again. This time he slashed it two more times as he passed it, and then he went back to firing mode and charged up as much as he could before stopping in Sombra’s path again. The blast peeled the shell away along the lines he had cut earlier, leaving the Unicorn exposed. Snowbelle was there instantly, blasting him with her breath attack and sending him plunging back down to the ground.

Sombra never made it to the ground, twisting on the air to land on another of his pillars. Gearhead was there an instant later, pressing his opponent with slash after slash. “Even this much power will fail you,” Sombra said.

“Oh, but like I was about to say, I am not out to defeat you, Sombra. After all, I am just the distraction.”

“Distract--?” Sombra seemed to finally realize what Gearhead was admitting to, and he returned his attention to Spike, but only for a moment as Gearhead shot him again.

“Just the same, I am not a distraction you can afford to ignore.”

“That goes for me as well,” Snowbelle said, swooping in to attack with her claws even as she passed Sombra. She flew away just as soon as she felt Gearhead’s warning, so Sombra completely missed her in his retaliation.

A small field of particles came down from directly above Sombra and wrapped around his left foreleg. Another took his right foreleg. The Unicorn roared, as if burned. “It looks like the Array’s restriction program has come online,” Gearhead said. “Next is ‘ejection.’”

Sombra stared at Gearhead.

“It is why the field matters even though you are already in the city. So prepare to say goodbye to every Crystal pony, Sombra.”

Except that that was when a massive wave of Light Magic energy of multiple colours hit. If the particles stung Sombra, this had to be pure agony. Gearhead watched in sheer fascination as cracks spread, and then Sombra seemed to shatter, not even leaving any shadow behind. There were some pieces of him being flung away, however the particle field around them all tended to seek these out and destroy them.

“Scan for residual Dark Magic energies,” Gearhead said. “Return the stabilizer to the Wind and back down from the Boost if we are clear.”

“[Scanning...]”

While Gearhead waited, his clock continued to count down on his OverBoost. He did not have to wait for long before it deactivated, the stabilizer detached, and even the Array’s shield began to lower into passive mode. “[Scanners and nodes report 0 Dark Magic energy signatures detected. Area is clear of threats.]”

Gearhead breathed a sigh of relief, and after he flew up to retrieve Twilight from the tower where she had watched everything unfold, he led Snowbelle in making a quick landing. In looking around, he saw that all of the dark crystal that Sombra had raised had been purged.

Gearhead was surprised to see that Cadence and Shining Armour were standing in the plaza with renewed vigour, but he was more surprised to see that everypony, even Spike, had somehow gained crystaline forms. Rarity, he noticed, was in a state of pure bliss showing her mane off.

“Oh, I wonder why you didn’t get a crystal form too, Darling. Still, I love what you’ve done with your mane.”

“Pardon me?” Gearhead was confused, since he had not done anything, until Rarity held up a small mirror. He saw that instead of a single turquoise streak, he now seemed to have three. One was on one of his longer bangs, which hung down to frame the left side of his face. The second one ran from the top of that streak along a lock of hair there, directly across the top of his face to the right. The third streak ran straight back, and repeated more thickly in his tail.

“I think it suits you,” Fluttershy said.

“Aw yeah! Now you look more your own speed,” Dash said.

“If this happens every time you douse yourself in particles, you’ll have to watch out before you get more green than red,” Twilight winked.

“For my part, I am wondering if your crystallization is permanent. Because as of now, you may be harder and sharper than some of your furniture.”

“The book didn’t say anything about this,” Twilight said. “But it didn’t mention a lot of things. I’m just glad it’s all over, even if...”

“Don’t worry, Twilight: I’m sure Princess Celestia’ll let you take another test,” Spike said. He got a whack upside the head from Applejack for his troubles.

“It’s alright, Spike, even if the Princess doesn’t give me another test. We still accomplished everything we came for.”

* * *

It was clear even before they took off that the crystallizations were not permanent. What could not be clear, until after they landed at Canterlot Castle, was what Princess Celestia would say to Twilight as a result of her performance in the Crystal Empire – which Gearhead thought was more of a city-state, and with Cadence permanently installed as the Crystal Princess and Armour at her side, it was now part of Equestria.

It turned out that Princess Celestia was pleased with Twilight for finding a solution to her problem that did not put the Crystal Ponies at risk. With the Crystal Empire saved, the others congratulated Twilight on passing a test of character and ability, rather than a paper test of percentages or pass/fail results.

Their business completed, the friends boarded the Silver Wind again, and Gearhead flew them home. He would have to fly the ship backwards through the launch ramp in order to stow it away again, but that was a small thing compared to the journey on which he was about to embark.