Bird and Metal Hero

Chapters

Prolog: Morbus ignis
Dolor ex cinere
Avis cum volans negato
Mater draco; magni et potentes
...Et nunc Dash, cum quadam omnia confusio infusa est
Adhuc exciderat capite albi equo

Prolog: Morbus ignis

Morbus ignis.

It was a nice cool, crisp morning with the wind gently stirring the tops of the trees as the sun began to break over the horizon when Scootaloo left the house, her mother had been sleeping in and her father, the police chief, was working the graveyard shift and wouldn’t due back home until about the time school started.

“I’m going, mom!” she yelled as she left the house, not really listening to the groaning moan that came in reply — she would later come to regret this, but such is life.

Trotting along Ponyville’s roads toward her destination, Scootaloo saw that the streets were a less crowded than usual, she shrugged it off as it being up and about earlier than was normal for her.

She and the other Crusaders had a project due for school, compilation of hiking journals over the past two weeks, and they were going to meet up at the schoolyard a little early to finish it up before class.

There was only one stop before school: the Carousel Boutique, where Sweetie Belle was living with her sister while their parents were away. The reason for the slight detour was obvious if you’d ever seen Sweetie Belle in the morning… she often needed a little extra motivation to get up, and Scootaloo didn’t trust her to remember that she had to be at school early.

When she arrived she pounded on the door, hoping that Rarity had gotten her up already… but then, Rarity also was a heavy sleeper. After a few moments of silence, Scootaloo tried knocking again but nothing happened. The third time she knocked there was the sound of some movement inside and a painful sob.

“Go away… I’m closed today.” Rarity’s voice came back, obviously strained with pain.

“Um, Rarity… it’s Scootaloo,” she called back through the door, “I’m here for Sweetie Belle.”

There was that painful sob again, followed by Rarity’s voice, “I’m sorry dear, we’re both quite ill today…”

Scootaloo stepped back in surprise, how would their project do with only Apple Bloom and herself? Taking a calming breath, she went over the list of what they had to finish before turning in their compiled trail-journal… it should be doable with just the two of them, she thought as she sighed in relief, though it probably would be cutting it close time-wise.

If she galloped to the school she might have a few minutes to get everything set-up before Apple Bloom arrived… yeah, that sounded like a good idea.

* * *

Celestia woke to her morning ritual of preparing to raise the sun, and a few minutes later she stepped out onto the balcony — only to be greeted by the moon still hanging in the sky. It looked like Luna had been slacking, and she made a mental note to talk to her sister as she lowered the forgotten orb herself, taking a breath and then braking the dawn and starting a new day for Equestria.

Having started the day, she had a few minutes before breakfast, enough time to search for her truant sister… who happened to be in her room, the first place Celestia looked.

When she opened the door she was greeted by the sight of the younger alicorn sprawled in bed fidgeting spasmodically every few moments. She looked awful, covered in sweat and raggedly breathing, as her mane and tail draped across the bed like dead snakes.

“Luna… are you alright?” Celestia asked, concerned over the disturbing sight.

Luna made a moue as she opened her eyes, revealing bloodshot cyan eyes that locked with Celestia’s own for an instant before they shut again as a wave of pain racked her body.

Even as the spasms rolled over her little sister’s body, Celestia saw it enveloped in red and black flames.

“Luna!” Celestia screamed, watching the flames devour her sister, “No! LUNA! NO!”

* * *

Scootaloo quickly found herself in the schoolyard and pulled the journals out of her saddlebags to get to work on compiling all their notes and adding a summary, the summary itself being graded for spelling, grammar, and construction just like a book report would.

Scootaloo wrote several sentences and then hesitated a moment wondering about other words for ‘plan’ and turned to ask Sweetie Belle — who wasn’t there. She sighed and continued on; it was probably for the best, as then they’d likely get in an argument about how to spell ‘machination’ or some other ridiculous word for “plan” that Sweetie Belle would have suggested.

A gust of wind blew a few the pages of the notebook closed, over the one that Scootaloo was working on and brought what could have been the smell of smoke off in the distance. Scootaloo didn’t care about that too much, if it she had indeed smelled something, it was too far away to be of any real concern…

* * *

The smell of smoke greeted Big Macintosh as he opened the door, stinging his nose and making his eyes water. ‘Great, burned breakfast.’ he thought, as the noxious fumes billowed out of the open doorway.

Looking in the kitchen he was surprised to find there was nopony there and the smoke was not coming from the kitchen, but further on in the house… he stood stunned for a half-moment before a cough and moan came from Applejack’s room and he leapt forward to check on his sisters.

The smoke got thicker as he made his way down the hallway to his sisters’s rooms and, when he heard a cough from Applejack’s room, didn’t hesitate in bursting through her door and scooping the mare from her bed before jumping through the window.

Applejack lay on the ground, collapsed in a drained heap of flaccid flesh, groaning, coughing, and for a few moments Big Macintosh thought that the coughing was growing weaker before she sank into rhythmic breathing.

Big Macintosh grunted once before running back into the burning house; Apple Bloom and Granny Smith were still inside!

* * *

Ahuizotl howled in pain as he clutched his prize to himself, grasping the ovoid Mystic Sphere to his stomach with the hand terminating his tail as well as the two at the end of his arms — his very organs were afire, a wellspring of eternal agony which, in his last lucid moment, he ascribed to the wretched curse that the ancient civilization had placed to protect its treasure — just as his body burst into red and black flames imparting tremendous heat into the sphere before it rolled away from the pile of ash that had once been Ahuizotl.

As the elliptic-sphere rolled down the steps of the ancient temple it wobbled from side to side, as if filled with a life of its own, as if it truly minded the abrupt jarring each step made but was powerless to stop its downward decent. Eventually though, it ran out of steps and rolled down a small hill and into small pothole in a tangled and overgrown path.

Hours later the silence was broken by a voice, “Trixie does not like being lost.” it said, before a bush rustled and revealed a mare wearing a tattered cape that had once been liberally covered in stars and moons, but now seemed only to serve the purpose of attracting limbs and debris from the forest.

True to its new purpose of hindering progress, the cape caught on another branch of the bush as Trixie turned away and tried to proceed along the path, but it released with a suddenness that caused Trixie to stumble, a rear hoof connecting with the Mystic Sphere that had been lost.

“What… is it?” Trixie asked aloud as she bent over to examine it, seeing the soot-covered ovoid, which shuddered as she looked at it, finally cracking open to reveal a ridiculously large-headed baby dragon that blinked its maize-golden eyes at her before unfurling its small red and black wings.

“A… a dragon? The Great and Powerful Trixie is quite confused.” Trixie said, stepping away from the small creature, who seemed to be regarding her with a special and slightly unnerving intensity.

“Why are you even here?” Trixie asked the small figure, shaking her head back and forth. Who knew where dragons nested? It wasn’t like she’d covered that in Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns, for the two semesters she’d been able to attend.

There was a moment where the dragon and mare solemnly regarded each other before the dragon broke it by lunging forward and wrapping arms, legs, and tail around her forehoof and let out an almost chirping sound.

“Why are you latching on to the Great and Powerful Trixie!?” Trixie screamed as she reared back and bicycled the air with her forehooves, trying to shake the little creature off.

* * *

Twilight didn’t feel well, it was horrible: her limbs felt weak, like they were covered in stone; her viscera felt like they were being incinerated, even as her skin felt like it would freeze; her eyes felt like they were being scraped away by eyelids that had suddenly become sand; and her breath felt like fire in her nostrils.

She tried to call out for Spike, but the young dragon seemed to be in the same condition — Twilight was vaguely aware that she should be worried, but the waves of pain were unrelenting and kept her from all but the most basic of thoughts… most of all she just wanted it all to stop.

She looked back at the basket that Spike slept in and saw him jerk as if startled before he burst into red and black flame — Twilight’s observation turned to horror as the blaze consumed the basket, turning into the more mundane and familiar yellow and orange lounges as it found new fuel to consume besides her former Number One Assistant.

* * *

Cheerilee was surprised to find Scootaloo sitting alone outside the schoolhouse before she’d arrived. If anything she would have thought that her two friends, Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle, would have been with her.

It was obvious to the teacher that the orange pegasus was trying to cram in as much as she could into the notebook before she had to turn it in — they’d obviously not listened when she’d reminded the class not to leave compiling their group notebook until the last moment — Cheerilee smiled at the remembering how she’d put off a lot of homework when she was small, too. Who would have guessed that one day she’d be doing an entire class’s worth of homework?

“Hey there Scootaloo!” Cheerilee said, as she pulled the keys to the schoolroom from her saddlebags, she couldn’t help but smile and ask: “Why are you here so early?”

Scootaloo jumped at the unexpected address, having been absorbed in trying to finish their summary. — “H-hi, Miss Cheerilee! Um, I, uh… was working on our project.”

“What about Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle? I thought you three were working on this together.” Cheerilee said, prompting the young filly to answer.

“Sweetie Belle’s sick today…” Scootaloo said as the wind shifted to bring the clear smell of smoke to their noses, “and I don’t know where Apple Bloom is, she should have been here already.”

When Cheerilee smelled the smoke she began looking around for the source, feeling a sense of dread as she spotted several flickers of light in the residential section of Ponyville. The realization of that there was a conflagration that could destroy Ponyville was underscored with the ringing of the bells on the fire-trucks as the ponies from the fire-station leapt into action — Cheerilee felt a wave of dread as she considered that it might already be too late.

Author's Note

Sorry about the numerous POV shifts in the prolog, but when a quarter of Equestria's inhabitants spontaneously combusts it's difficult to show w/o so many characters — yes; there are more that are dead, and you probably won't like some of who dies and who survives, but they were determined by coin-flips.

Dolor ex cinere

Dolor ex cinere.

Discord still felt terrible, even the tuft of his tail hurt, but it was better than yesterday when he could hardly even move. At least it seemed to be getting better.

Despite the lingering tiredness in his muscles he had decided to see Fluttershy as they’d planned the month before and he was looking forward to seeing his friend… he knew that he could rely on her kindness and company to make him feel even a little better… though he felt a pang of regret at the time that he’d faked illness to see if she really did care, the memory of the human story of The Boy Who Cried Wolf echoing in his mind and carrying with it a faint and nameless dread.

As Discord crested a hillock he caught faint smell of smoke and caught a glimpse of black smoke rising in the distance, right in the direction of Fluttershy’s house. The dread that had been stalking him morphed into terror as he got closer and closer to the pegasus’s cottage.

When he crested the next knoll, his terror became reality as he laid eyes on the burned out hovel, still smoking and smoldering… despite the weariness that had made a home in his muscles, he pushed himself to a gallop. He had to see if Fluttershy was ok.

He didn’t even notice when he trampled the charred skull of a once white rabbit.

* * *

Peter White, collapsed tiredly into his chair and unconsciously reached up to his ear to squeeze the earlobe between his thumb and the first knuckle of his forefinger… only to be stopped by his hoof brushing the side of his head. It was odd that the old nervous habit had never gone away in the eighteen years since he’d been transformed into a pony.

Thanks to the training he’d had before that he was one of the most qualified fire-ponies in the world; though investigating the causes of fire was admittedly less glamorous than his brother’s job as police detective in Santa Barbra.

He eyed the stack of papers —notes really— which were taken of the almost thirty separate house fires in Ponyville. Ponyville proper, he reminded himself, not really wanting to think about the possibility of the outlying country homes.

These weren’t even preliminary reports, though there were eyewitness stories that these fires were Spontaneous Pony Combustion and that people, ponies, had just burst into flames — the Element of Magic, apparently, was one of them.

He shook his head and wearily grabbed three that corresponded to houses in the same neighborhood, he might as well get to work on the preliminary reports.

* * *

Nurse Redheart collapsed onto the couch in the lounge. Despite being dead-tired and sick, the hospital had needed her — the burn ward was stuffed past capacity, overflowing into the maternity and psychological wards. The hospital was so full that there were no visitors allowed now, and so many burns that Nurse Redheart would have been glad to see a compound fracture or amputation… anything but another burn.

The tsunami of burn victims had started and then just kept coming and coming, the young the old, the fit, the slovenly, everyone, it seemed, had been burned.

There was a start and a jerk from the couch opposite as its occupant woke from a restless sleep — “Ah, miss Redheart… it’s only you.” Dr. Horse exclaimed, looking at once too awake and too tiered.

“Doctor, you need to get some sleep.” the nurse replied, closing her eyes and sinking deeper into the lumpy couch.

“I, I can’t… thank you anyway, nurse.” Dr. Horse said, rolling off the couch and forcing himself back to his patients… normally he’d let the nursing staff take care of things, but they were swamped, the entire hospital was swamped, and everyone who could needed to help out.

His first stop was the children, several were in bad shape and probably wouldn’t make it… the worst was Pound Cake who had apparently been sleeping next to his sister when she’d combusted… even if he lived, the poor pegasus might never fly again, not with his right wing so badly burnt.

For a moment Dr. House wished that he had human surgeons on his team: the extinct race’s hands had been marvelously adept and their medical knowledge had actually propelled Equestria’s own medicine multiple decades ahead in just a few short years — but he might as well wish for the regeneration-tanks and bio-builder droids of humanity’s science fiction for all the good it’d do him.

No, it was best to keep himself firmly rooted here, concentrating on these problems… even if the strain and exhaustion made thinking a chore — he couldn’t just let his patients down, not when they needed him.

Dr. Horse grabbed the chart on the door and began looking it over and comparing it to what he saw of the small colt — maybe some insight would give him a better chance to survive.

* * *

Discord found himself standing in what had once been Fluttershy’s living-room, charred, burnt things littered the floor, the leg of the sofa, an arm from a chair, the metal frame of a small table that evoked images of a blackened skeleton… the lamp that he’d broken and then re-modeled into one depicting himself seemed oddly fine, despite that the fire had consumed the lampshade and cord… ‘Stupid lamp.’

‘I’d rather have Fluttershy.’ Discord thought to himself as the desolation washed over him. ‘Oh, Fluttershy…’

“Discord!” A voice broke into his grief, behind and over his shoulder… Rainbow Dash. “I always knew you were no good! What did you do to Fluttershy?”

“What. Did. I. Do!?” Discord’s vision went red as he was enveloped in a rage that he’d never before experienced, so intense that his vision seemed to take on a two-dimensional aspect in addition to the red color… the pegasus hovering behind him was holding all of his attention right now.

“Answer me Discord!” Rainbow Dash demanded, thrusting a hoof at the Draconequus and utterly oblivious to the rage she was inducing with her accusation.

Discord had never killed anyone, life was a sacred thing that itself was full of pleasurable chaos — but at this particular moment he actually considered imposing order on Rainbow Dash, the decay of death was one of the most orderly things in the universe; something that Celestia and Luna had never understood but was always clear to him — he raised his talon to snap it and…

With a supreme force of will, prompted by memories of Fluttershy and her friendship with his tormenter, didn’t kill the pegasus that was tormenting him. Instead, the snap sent Rainbow Dash flying, falling, into a rather large snow-drift that had appeared.

“Cool off!” the Draconequus snarled at the now-prone form of Rainbow Dash before sharply turning around and storming away… he was going to take his own advice before he did something he’d end up regretting.

In the snow-drift, Rainbow Dash finally pulled herself into an upright position. She tried flying, but for some reason it just wasn’t working — she ran a forehoof through her main but nearly jumped at the strange sensation. Her forehooves looked different, they came to a point like some sort of fin rather than a hoof.

‘What happened?’ she asked herself, stumbling forward and catching herself on the not-forehooves… Rainbow Dash felt a sinking feeling asa she realized that it was probably some sort of transformation-magic.

‘What did he do to me?’ she thought to herself, wondering what sort of terrible monster it was that Discord had turned her into.

* * *

Pinky Pie felt terrible, and it had nothing to do with the illness that had swept over the inhabitants of Sugarcube Corner, it was a sad, depressing feeling that ate at the pit of her stomach… she should have tried harder to help with the twins instead of collapsing in her bed last night… if she’d helped Mr. and Mrs. Cake then maybe Pumpkin wouldn’t have died, maybe Pound wouldn’t be in the hospital.

The trash can of burnt items was rapidly filling up and it looked like Mrs. Cake was going to need some help cleaning up the soot-trail on the wall and the black spot on the ceiling over the crib.

While the Cakes didn’t feel lucky, they had been fortunate that Pound’s wails had woken his father, who had noticed the smoke and ran into the bedroom with a fire-extinguisher. The quick action was probably all that saved the young colt’s life, even though the colt’s ultimate condition was still uncertain.

‘Yeah,’ Pinkie sniffled, ‘I should have helped them out more.’

“Pinkie,” Mrs. Cake sounded like she had just finished crying, and her eyes looked like she could have filled her wash-bucket with tears, “could you help me?”

Pinkie Pie felt her breathing catch and her eyes begin to well up with tears, she forced a smile anyway as she replied, “Sure Mrs. Cake, what do you need me to do?”

“I’ll need some help moving the crib.” the elder mare replied, sounding monotone… and not the emotion-hiding monotone of Pinkie’s elder sister, but the soul-eating deadness sort of monotone.

“Yeah.” Pinkie said as she swiped her wilted mane out of her eyes.

* * *

Dr. Horse paused before he entered the next room, the mare inside wasn’t his special somepony, but he’d be lying if he said that he wasn’t interested in here. The confectioner inside was truly delightful, but he didn’t want to be the one to break the news that her best friend and neighbor, Lyra Heartstrings, had died and that it had been the fire started by her combustion that had injured her.

‘Bon Bon, you’re too kind to have this sort of thing happen to you…’ he thought as he steeled himself to go inside and assess her condition — as much as it disturbed him, he’d have to discharge her if he could, the hospital simply needed the room.

“Bon Bon, are you awake?” the Doctor asked, looking at the chart more as a prop than actually reading the information.

“Doctor?” Bon Bon queried, recognizing the voice of the handsome doctor she’d been eyeing lately, almost deliriously, “what happened? I don’t remember anything.”

“Ah, you were caught in a fire… the volunteer fire-ponies rushed you here,” the Doctor explained, or tried to — there had simply been so much going on that it was merely the most likely thing.

“Ah… I don’t feel… how bad is it?” the mare asked, concern coming off her voice.

“We’ve done all we can, but you’ve suffered from smoke inhalation, some minor burns, and a concussion. You should just go—” the doctor cut himself off before saying ‘home’, it was likely that the mare was homeless now… so many houses had either burned down or been rendered unlivable from fire-damage.

“Doctor?”

“Ah, sorry… I was just thinking about discharging you.” The Doctor scratched the back of his head, feeling like he should do something for the mare. “You know, I’m going to be stuck here at the hospital for the next few days and my plants need watering, and the food in the fridge needs to be used before it goes bad… I know we’re hardly more than acquaintances, but I’d really appreciate it if you could take care of those for me.”

The doctor’s sudden change in behavior struck Bon Bon as quite odd, though she was quite glad about the offer to stay at the doctor’s place… maybe she could use something she saw there to strike up a conversation with him later. ‘After all, all good romances start with a conversation.’ she thought.

“Of course I’ll help you, doctor.” She smiled at him.

Avis cum volans negato

Avis cum volans negato.

Cheerilee sighed as she collapsed in her bed. Fortunately the odd location of her house, on the outskirts of town, had saved her from becoming homeless… and the soft bed was more than welcome after helping the fire-ponies and everyone fight the fires.

While it should have felt rewarding to have the fires all under control now, she felt empty inside — emotionally drained, hungry.

She pulled herself from the bed and trudged into the kitchen thinking of how she would have liked to have been able to see her students today, but the fires had been more urgent. The damage to the homes and families though… that could easily interfere with getting the school-foals back into classes.

She pulled a piece of cake out of the refrigerator and started eating it, wishing instead that she could just collapse into her special somepony’s forelegs and be held… well, that was impossible since she really didn’t have a special somepony.

Sighing, she made her way back into her bedroom, alone… save for the piece of cake that was being rapidly devoured.

* * *

Scootaloo jerked awake, the nightmare of seeing Ponyville aflame had once again been present; there was something disturbing about being confronted with the loss both in the waking world and the dream-world.

The unease was exacerbated when Princess Luna hadn’t shown up for any of the nightmares… but, given how many ponies were in Ponyville who had experienced the fires, it was quite possible that the Princess of the Night was simply overwhelmed with the number of nightmares to take care of.

Helping Cheerilee and the volunteer firefighters had felt exciting an kind of good, but it was tiring and they’d worked until long after Scootaloo was ready to collapse. Then the small orange pegasus made her way to her home where she met the smell of smoke still lingering in the home.

A frantic rush through the house and she finally found her parents bed, or rather what was left of it: the metal frame and a pile of ash. The stone floor and wall had apparently been enough to contain the fire… but all Scootaloo could see there was where her mom had been trying to sleep in when she’d left in the morning.

Scootaloo gasped and pulled herself out of the memories and back to the present. She didn’t know where her father was, and she’d been looking for him but none of the police-ponies seemed to know where he was… but then they were dead tired from working with the firefighters to put out the fires and none of them knew much about what anyone else was doing.

The hospital hadn’t had any record of him, and neither had the town-hall which had been hastily converted into a shelter for the uninjured ponies unable to return to their homes.

It was then that Scootaloo saw something quite strange: a bird trying to crawl around on all-fours like some sort of pony… and it even had what looked to be rainbow-colored hair.

The sight was so stupid, so silly, that Scootaloo found herself loudly laughing at the absurdity of the scene.

“What are you laughing at? Huh?” the penguin growled, and in an awfully familiar voice…

“Uh, Rainbow Dash? Is that you?” Scootaloo asked, blinking at the bird as if that would cause it to disappear.

“Who else is this awesome?” the bird replied, before shaking its head and remembering that it had been transformed by a horrible beast into what was probably an equally hideous form, “No, don’t answer that.”

“Discord zapped me…” Rainbow Dash explained to the stunned Scootaloo, “and if you wouldn’t mind, I gotta go see Twilight about this.”

“Eh, yeah…” Scootaloo said unsteadily, she had no idea where Twilight was, and Rainbow Dash was still too big for her to carry. There was a brief moment before the orange pegasus got an idea and motioned to her scooter, “Get on!”

* * *

Rarity woke feeling surprisingly refreshed, all things considered. It was a good morning, though somewhat late and with the smell of smoke hanging in the air… but no, no reason to start feeling grumpy! A real lady would handle life with grace and poise.

She looked towards Sweetie Bell’s room and considered waking her, but the little filly had been just as sick as Rarity yesterday, so it would probably be best to let her sleep in.

After a quick breakfast and getting made up to meet the day, Rarity spared a perfunctory glance at the calendar and was suddenly reminded that the inter-library loan on the definitive book on traditional Saddle Arabian clothing was supposed to be here today.

Rarity felt her smile grow as she made her way outside, heading over to Twilight’s… only to be confronted with a scene of destruction. It was as if some small, angry child with a magnifying glass had decided to turn his attention upon the town… assuming the townspeople were ants or the child a giant, of course.

Everywhere she looked se could see another burned home. It was dreadful, as she made her way across the town she noticed the few ponies out today looked like they hadn’t slept in a week, and when she got to Twilight’s she felt herself in a bit of a daze, like none of this was real and she was walking in a dream… she knocked on the door and Twilight answered, accompanied by the town’s resident cowpony.

Both Applejack and Twilight looked like they’d been crying…

“Oh, my dears, whatever happened?” Rarity heard herself asking, still in her daze, as if outside her own body and merely observing what was transpiring.

Applejack glanced over at Rarity and answered in a hoarse voice, “Apple Bloom’s dead and Granny Smith is in the hospital along with Big Mac… he ran in to save her, but they were both hit with a falling rafter when he was coming out.”

Rarity was about to comfort Applejack when Twilight added her own tale to the relating.

“I saw Spike die… he just suddenly caught fire and burned up.” Twilight said, “it was like those strange stories of Spontaneous Human Combustion that we read about back in Canterlot… well, I wasn’t supposed to, but the human history section seemed more fun at the time —” Twilight looked absolutely devastated as a single sob interrupted her story, “— Spike wanted to know if it was something wrong with their fire-breathing organs that caused it.”

Rarity couldn’t think of anything to say, all this was coming on too quickly… Sweetie Bell’s friend and Spike, both dead? The town burned half to the ground? What else could happen?

“Hey Twilight, Rarity!” a voice called, interrupting the three friends as they congregated in the entrance to Twilight’s house.

They all turned to find that it was Scootaloo bearing down on them with her scooter… except there was a passenger onboard — a penguin with what looked like rainbow hair.

“Well?” the penguin asked, crossing its flippers? wings? in a most impatient, and familiar, manner.

“Is that you Rainbow Dash?” Applejack asked, eyeing the apparently talking penguin… it’d be just like her to be on a cloud somewhere throwing her voice and pulling a stupid prank.

“Of course it’s me!” the penguin said, as if astounded that anyone wouldn’t recognize her.

“I found out who did all this! I caught him red-hoofed, and then he did this to me!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed, waiving he flippers around for emphasis.

“Who are you talking about?” Rarity asked breaking the confused silence that intruded after Rainbow Dash’s outburst… apparently she wasn’t going to explain until asked.

“It was Discord,” Rainbow Dash said, “He was at Fluttershy’s looking at the ashes that remained… he even crushed Angel Bunny’s skull… who would do that except the killer?”

“Rainbow Dash, did you perhaps tell all this to Discord?” Rarity felt herself asking, almost seeing the pieces of the puzzle fall into place before the former-pegasus could answer.

“Of course I did! He heeds to know that he can’t fool me!”

“Rainbow Dash,” Twilight interrupted as the penguin threatened to wind up into a bit of a spiel, “do you think that maybe you made him mad saying that he killed Fluttershy?”

“Why would it make him mad? He did it!” Rainbow Dash pushed on, headstrong as ever… and, as her current predicament clearly showed, not considering the consequences of her actions.

As Twilight and Rainbow Dash got into a slight argument over her stubbornness and lack of foresight Rarity’s eye was drawn to a bruise on Scootaloo’s shoulder.

“How did you get that, dear?” Rarity asked, indicating the oblong discoloration.

“A ladder fell over and hit me when we were fighting the fire at Diamond Tiara’s… it was her dad trying to get to her room, but that’s where the fire started, she was already gone.”

And at that moment everything became real: Fluttershy. Spike. Apple Bloom. Diamond Tiara… the dam of numbness that had been holding back her tears and sadness broke.

Rarity turned and ran, even as she cried, not even noticing when she kicked a pile of soot.

* * *

Sweetie Belle yawned once and rolled over yet again, the sunlight streaming in her window indicated that it was probably time to get up — after all, that meant that it was early afternoon. She pulled the blankets over her head and then, when a particularly annoying songbird decided to start singing outside her window decided that it was indeed time to get up.

Rolling out of bed and tumbling to the floor in a cascade of blankets, she exited the bed in her customary manner… one that her sister would no doubt find “appalling” and earn her a scolding. It didn’t matter much, anyway, because she made her bed before her sister ever thought to look in on her.

Sweetie Belle grinned at herself in front of the mirror Rarity had placed in the room and thought that she looked as good as she felt… which was encouraging, because that sickness had been terrible… but that was over now.

‘I can’t wait to hear what Apple Bloom and Scootaloo have been doing!’ she thought to herself, there was a flash of guilt over not being up to school yesterday, after all there had been a project that was due.

After bounding down the stairs, into the kitchen, and devouring a piece of cake left in the refrigerator, Sweetie Bell was ready to go find her friends. Just as she was about to get to the door it swung open and Rarity stepped inside the boutique.

Sweetie Belle found herself gaping at her older sister: halfway up each leg was the black of ash and soot… and her eyes were red and poofy, like she’d been crying... ash-dust having found the trails and made two dark vertical trails beneath her eyes.

“Oh, you’re up Sweetie Belle.” Rarity greeted her little sister woodenly, like she was too exhausted to care about much. “Where are you going?”

“I’m going to go see Scootaloo and Apple Bloom!” Sweetie Belle said, unsure whether to be excited over the prospect of seeing her friends again or concerned about what caused her sister’s appearance.

“Oh, Sweetie Belle…” Rarity’s voice caught, choking on some unnamed sadness.

“What?” Sweetie Belle asked, feeling her excitement drain away.

Rarity looked down at her little sister, wondering if she should tell her or let the filly find the bad news herself… no, it wouldn’t be good to withhold that from her, it’d only make her feel betrayed when she found out that Rarity hadn’t told her.

“Apple Bloom’s dead.” Rarity said, wanting nothing more than to throw herself into dressmaking, to have something to do other than think about everything that had happened. “So is Diamond Tiara, and Spike, and Pumpkin, and the Mayor, and a lot of ponies.”

“What!?” Sweetie Belle interrupted between ‘Spike’ and ‘Pumpkin’, “No! It’s not true, Apple Bloom’s not dead.”

There was a moment of silence as the two sisters regarded each other before Sweetie Belle broke off and ran out the door calling back that she didn’t believe Rarity.

Author's Note

The spontaneous combustion of a quarter of Equestria's inhabitants is pretty rough -- I hope I'm capturing the impact on the characters well enough. :applejackunsure:

In any case, I hope the next chapter is a bit less heavy... so I'm planning on doing some Great and Powerful Trixie! in the next chapter.

Mater draco; magni et potentes

Mater draco; magni et potentes.

Trixie plodded along the path through the subtropical landscape, it would be a while before the terrain and the climes dried out… it would be a while before she could make it back to a place where the rail-system could take her to the pony she knew had experience with a dragon… Twilight Sparkle.

She wasn’t sure how she felt about returning to Ponyville… or the little dragon latched on her foreleg. Hopefully, she would know how to get it off.

“Cheep!”the dragon chirped up at her, as if it understood that Trixie was thinking about him.

“And what is the Great and Powerful Trixie going to do about you, little one?” the unicorn asked, talking more to herself than the hatchling.

“Cheep!” the dragon replied, blinking his golden eyes at her.

Trixie found herself staring into those eyes, sighed, and thought, ‘I can’t just keep calling you “little one”, can I?’

Looking at the red and black leg-hugger she was reminded of the time she’d joined up with a carnival… she’d stayed long enough to make enough to buy her cart, and one of the workers there, an ash gray stallion named Brian who had once been a human introduced her to the human game played on a red and black board with little red and black disks.

‘What was that game called?’ Trixie thought, before the answer came like a lightning bolt and she remembered, ‘Checkers!’

“The Great and Powerful Trixie has decided that your name is Checkers.” The pony declared to the hatchling.

The hatchling replied with another “Cheep!” and seemed to snuggle into her leg.

* * *

Sweetie Belle was nearly to Sweet Apple Acers before she calmed down enough to blink the tears from her eyes. She never would have believed that Rarity would have been able to say such cruel lies — there was no way that Apple Bloom could be dead… there just couldn’t.

She drew up short and slowed to a trot as the sight of the burned out farmhouse came into view: there were only two walls left standing and a bit of the roof desperately clinging to the two walls, just as a piece of the second floor did.

Sweetie Bell found herself staring at the wreckage that had once been her friend’s house, one lone picture of Applejack and Big Macintosh holding a small bundle that was Apple Bloom hung on one of the remaining walls and for an instant the sunshine and birdsong seemed a cheerful and contrasting counterpoint to the sorrow and tears that Sweetie Bell felt.

After some indeterminate amount of time, she found herself wandering down the road from Ponyville sniffing as the tears dried on her cheeks. She didn’t care where the path led, just so long as it wasn’t back toward the burnt reminders of her friend, of her home, of her sister’s cruelty.

* * *

“I’m sorry miss, you can’t board the train with an unregistered animal.” the pony in charge of boarding the train explained.

“You have got to be kidding me.” Trixie said, “The Great and Powerful Trixie must be let on, she must return to Ponyville.”

“Yeah, well the Mighty and Terrible Phil cannot let you on.” the pony indicated himself, “There’s no way I’m going to put my job on the line allowing you to board with an unregistered animal.”

Trixie ground her teeth in frustration, the impact of humanity on Equestria was not all good… importing the ridiculous bureaucratic rules and applying them to the transportation system was one of them. Sure it was mostly non-intrusive when the pony was traveling without any luggage, but as soon as there was any carry on or checked luggage things got really bothersome really quickly… something about it being a relic of the Transportation Security Administration from the United States.

“Please, I’ve got to find a way to get it off, and the only pony I know with personal experience in dragons in Ponyville.”

“Oh, well, why didn’t you say so…” Phil asked, before shaking his head, “the answer’s still no.”

“What, but?”

“I will not let you on this train,” Phil interrupted with a grin, “no matter how much you may complain.”

“It is my job, I will explain,” Phil continued, wincing as he finished the line with, “so I’ll say it again.”

“I would not let you bring a knife, I will not let you bring your strife,”

“I would not let you board our train, with an animal… that’s insane.”

“I would not let you bring a goat, I would not let you bring a pig,”

“I would not let you bring a dog, no matter how much you did…”

Phil trailed off a moment, searching for a word, then mangling “beg” to rhyme with pig.

Trixie had, by this point, found herself facehooving and saying to herself, “The Great and Powerful Trixie has a Great and Powerful headache.”

“I would not let you bring a monkey, I would not let you bring a… donkey?” Phil continued, “I would not let you bring a cat, not even if you were a pony-bat.”

Trixie turned and made her through the town, perhaps at the next one she’d find someone more reasonable than Mighty and Terrible Phil… in any case, it would be hard to find somepony less helpful.

* * *

Doctor Horse found himself waking up in the lounge, again. This time, however, it wasn’t because of nurse Redheart inadvertently making noise and waking him, but due to her purposefully waking him.

“Doctor, there’s been a change in Pound Cake’s status…” Nurse said, urgency in her voice as she shook the doctor awake, “You wanted to be alerted…”

The doctor stumbled to his feet, “What happened?”

“He’s awake.” Nurse Redheart explained, smiling, “the grafts seem to be going better than we expected, too.”

“That’s good news,” Doctor Horse replied, wiping the sleep from his eyes. “I’d better go see him.”

Minutes later, after washing his face and pouring himself a mug of coffee, Doctor Horse walked into the room that housed the young Mr. Cake.

“Hey there, little guy.” the Doctor greeted, looking at the grafts and especially the burned wing. The way the grafts were taking there gave him some hope that the foal would possibly fly again… not a large chance, but not negligible either.

It was good news. The best in days, really… and it reminded Doctor Horse why exactly he’d become a doctor.

* * *

“I’m sorry ma’am, but you can’t board with an unregistered dragon.” the young mare said, nodding toward the reptile hugging Trixie’s leg… at least this time there wasn’t any rhyming.

“I see.” The Great and Powerful Trixie muttered, dead-tired from the walk to the town. “Thank you for your help.”

Trixie made her way off the platform and dragged herself into an alleyway, where she swayed tiredly as she prepared herself, gathering magic… and then disappeared in a flash of light, only to reappear on the roof of the second-to-last car on the train. She hunkered down, repressing the urge to let out a triumphant laugh, and waited for the train to start its trek across the landscape.

* * *

Scootaloo had been hoping to be thanked by Rainbow Dash, but instead only found herself ignored, then came the news that Apple Bloom was dead.

Sure, lots of ponies were missing, lots dead… but Apple Bloom? Spike? It was so unfair! First her mom, then Diamond Tiara, now Apple Bloom and Spike!?

She found herself getting angry as she sped along on her scooter, flying by the few pedestrians in Ponyville’s streets. She didn’t know where she was going, just that she had to go. It was the only thing that she could think of to do, and so she did it.

When she found herself passing the playground she suddenly remembered the school-yard taunting of Diamond Tiara and for a split moment took her eyes off of where she was going, looking back towards the schoolhouse… when she returned her attention to the path in front of her it was too late to avoid hitting a piece of debris that had probably fallen out of somepony’s load of wreckage as they hauled the remnants of ruined homes away.

Scootaloo was thrown from her scooter and landed awkwardly on her left foreleg before smashing face-first into somepony’s door.

She lay there for several minutes before the tears began to well up in her eyes and, maybe a minute later, overflowed to run down her cheeks — everything hurt, and not just her leg.

* * *

As the train neared Ponyville, Trixie allowed herself to smile; her rival would definitely know what to do about the dragon that enveloped her foreleg in its absurd little death-grip.

Seeing the landscape turn to the familiar outskirts of the town the magician saw a small unicorn filly, white with a pale dual-colored mane of mulberry and rose, apparently running from something… oh well, it wasn’t any of the Great and Powerful Trixie’s problem, now was it?

Gathering her magical energies again Trixie teleported herself off of the train, only to find herself rolling into a clump of bushes and trees at a rather high speed.

Bruised and battered, but not broken —the Great and Powerful Trixie could never be broken— Trixie extracted herself from the foliage and brambles and made her way into the town.

* * *

The crash of something against her door woke Cheerilee with a start, after pulling herself from her nice warm bed —which she could have sworn had been enchanted, or perhaps had some sort of electro-pony-magnet embedded in it— to investigate the sound, opened the door to find a crying Scootaloo falling into the doorway.

“I, no, what happened?” She asked the little filly.

The orange pegasus in her living room didn’t answer, but cried and sniffled in a manner that just tore at her heartstrings, only emphasized by the limping as Scootaloo righted herself and got up.

Scootaloo wanted to answer but found herself choking on the words, she wanted to talk but it just wouldn’t come — all that came was a choking sob and more tears… accompanied by more snot that threatened to run off her face as freely as the tears did.

“Come in…” the school teacher said, seeing that one of her students desperately needed to be comforted and found herself hoping that she could for the poor child’s sake.

* * *

Though he would never admit it to anyone, Shining Armor would always look on the Day of Fire with mixed emotions, the horror of a quarter of Equestria’s citizens disappearing in magical flames balanced against one of the happiest moments he could recall.

It was when one of the younger guards burst into flames while singing a truly horrid rendition of a human song… terrible because of who that young stallion was and how he was using the human’s song. It was none other than the punk kid who was trying to put the moves on his sister: Flash Sentry.

Seeing that little shit burst into black and red flame had almost been worth it!

Shining Armor took a calming breath, it wouldn’t do to let people see the sheer bloodlust and maniacal laughter the mere thought of Flash Sentry’s death brought on. It also didn’t help that the song he’d been “singing” was still stuck in Shining Armor’s head.

“Flash… …ah-aaaah!

He’ll save every one of us!” still echoed in his ears.

Author's Note

Yes, Shining Armor now has this permanently embedded in his head:

...Et nunc Dash, cum quadam omnia confusio infusa est

...Et nunc Dash, cum quadam omnia confusio infusa est.

Rainbow Das folded her wings, upset at losing the argument with Twilight. How was she supposed to know that Discord wasn’t responsible for Fluttershy’s death? He’d been right there at “the scene of the crime”, and “caught red-handed”, right?

She wasn’t convinced she was wrong, but she did need to ask Twilight a favor and it wouldn’t be conducive to argue with her friend — ha! “conducive” used in a sentence… ‘Aw, crap… I’m tuning into an egghead.’

“So… Twilight…” Rainbow Dash began, “Do you think you can change me back?”

Twilight, for her part was caught flatfooted — she’d expected Rainbow Dash to argue more.

“Um, yeah. Let me get…” Twilight trailed off as she turned to a bookshelf and began browsing, before pulling one down with a smile and a shout of glee “Transformation, Transmutation, and Transubstantiation!”

The young alicorn opened the book and began searching, rapidly finding the section that she was looking for.

“Ok, Rainbow… stand over there.” Twilight said, gesturing toward the middle of the room before double-checking the text.

A few seconds later, her magic gathering at her horn, ready to be unleashed flew toward her penguin friend, Rainbow Dash, and enveloped her for a second before reflecting back and hitting Twilight Sparkle right between the eyes and knocking he across the room.

“Twilight!” Rainbow called out, waddling as fast as her webbed feet could carry her across the room, “Are you alright?”

“Yeah,” Twilight said, shaking herself off, “I’m fine…”

“Um, Twilight…” Rainbow Dash interrupted, pointing at her friend, “Maybe not.”

Looking down, Twilight discovered that she was now a purple alicorn with green spots, and not a nice green, but a green that looked like something had eaten a cow-pie, drank a banana milkshake, did fifty jumping-jacks and then vomited… well, without the texture, of course.

“I don’t know if I can undo this…” Twilight said in an emotionless voice as she found herself shuddering at the sight of the spots, they really were that bad.

* * *

Peter White, finished the last preliminary report of the house-fires with an audible sigh of relief; they would have to be passed on to his juniors for the full investigation by that was mostly just confirming the preliminary reports.

He raised a hoof to scratch the back of his neck as he mulled things over; given his two assistants and the amount of work involved in confirming the reports, they ought to be done in two or three weeks, barring unforseen circumstances.

He brought his hoof down with a wince as his horseshoe had pinched a bit of his midnight blue mane when he was scratching.

He shrugged, gathered up his clipboard, quill, ink and paper and headed back to the fire-house to stow the preliminary reports in his desk, take a quick shower and get some rest… he was not looking forward to the next day, where he would have to interview those whose houses hadn’t burned down but had witnessed a pony’s immolation. — That was going to be hard.

After taking care of his accouterments, he stepped into the shower hoping that he’d be able to wash all the soot out of his forest-green coat. It was perhaps the greatest irony of his transformation that Peter White’s coat was excellent at hiding the black of soot.

* * *

Muriko opened the door to check on the princess, while the Crystal Empire hadn’t been hit as hard as the rest of Equestria simply due to the non-flammable nature of their crystal architecture, the loss of a full quarter of her ponies had been devastating to Princess Mi Amore Cadenza.

“Ah, Princess…” Muriko said, announcing her presence, “It’s Muriko.”

Steeling a look inside, Muriko saw the princess sitting at her desk, poring over the reports. Again. It wasn’t good that she was doing this to herself, Muriko knew, but there wasn’t much of anything she could do to divert the princess’s attention away from the constant reminder that a quarter of her subjects were no more.

“Yes, Muriko…” the princess answered, looking in her direction and meeting her eyes.

Her eyes were red and bloodshot from crying again; there were bags under her eyes indicating a lack of sleep; her normally well-groomed and styled mane hung in a disheveled mess… but the thing that truly tugged at Muriko’s heartstrings was the look of supreme sadness that seemed to have taken up residence in her face.

“You shouldn’t punish yourself…” Muriko started, ‘but what else is she going to do, she’ll feel like she’s failed all her subjects.’

“I know,” Princess Cadence said, trying to give a reassuring smile, “it’s just that I can’t seem to keep my mind off of the reports as they come in.”

Muriko nodded, thinking, ‘What you need, princess, is some distraction…’

Muriko smiled as she remembered something, the princess had once said ‘later’ when Muriko offered to share some of her anime… it was from before she’d been turned into a pony and, honestly, was the only part of her life as a human that she’d kept.

“Princess, do you remember when you said you’d watch some anime with me?” Muriko said, “Well, I can’t think of anything better to take your mind off of all of this!”

Cadence nodded and, sighing, set the papers on the desk — her subject, and friend, was right: she needed something to take her mind off of the current state of things, if only for a moment.

“Yes, that sounds fun…” Cadence said, hoping that the human entertainment would be enough to distract her for a while.

* * *

Doctor Horse felt almost like smiling as he trotted up to the doorway of his house, it had been days since he’d been inside his home… it would be good to sleep in his own bed instead of one of the couches in the lounge.

He tossed his keys on his dresser as he entered his room, letting out the biggest sigh as he fell into bed. All was quiet and as it should be… until he belt movement next to him.

Rolling over he found himself face to face with Bon Bon who was grinning in a slightly creepy manner.

“Welcome home.” was all she said, and Doctor Horse found it to be fine enough, but the surprise at finding her in his bed was… surprising.

“Ah, oh boy.” He herd himself say, just before nervousness enveloped him.

‘How could I have forgotten about Bon Bon?’ he asked himself, sweating nervously.

“I… wasn’t expecting you here.” Doctor horse said, clearing his throat slightly.

“Oh, but I thought you asked me to come and keep an eye on your place…” Bon Bon said, looking down and idly tracing a hoof across the bed in a lazy manner.

“Yes. Well, I…” Doctor Horse found himself gulping when Bon Bon fluttered her eyes at him, “I wasn’t expecting you in my bed.”

Bon Bon frowned, sitting up, “Then I’m not welcome here?”

“I didn’t say that.” Doctor Horse said as he grinned.

* * *

Twilight Sparkle grunted in disgust as yet another spell-book proved useless for removing her green spots… oh, sure, she was keeping an eye out for anything that could help with transforming Rainbow Dash back into a pegasus, but there really wasn’t much she could do there without somehow undermining the chaos-magic protection Discord had put on the transformation.

Celestia had once told Twilight that she had some spells that would work on discord and she was feeling foolish for not considering the other way: that Discord might have methods for dealing with pony-magic.

“Can’t you hurry up, Twilight? I’m scheduled to do cloud busting this afternoon.” Rainbow Dash asked, idly flipping through one of the discarded books in the pile. She wasn’t reading it, she just had to do something with her wings? Flippers? ‘Seriously, what are these called?’ Rainbow Dash though caustically at her new forelimbs.

“I don’t think I’ll be able to undo this by then.” Twilight replied, looking through the index on an encyclopedia of transformation-magic. “You should tell your backup.”

“Yeah, I’m sure Derpy’ll be so reliable!” Rainbow Dash muttered to herself before deciding that Twilight was probably right and waddled right out the door.

* * *

Shining Armor stepped out into the track where the palace guard was wont to practice their physical training and saw that his timing was impeccable — they were just getting ready for their exercises and, from the look of things, it was a cardio day.

He let his gaze sweep over the assembled group before settling on the buttery-colored unicorn with a light gray mane, he was the sort who gloried in the physicality of his body, the sort that mares drooled over, and it was all due to his determination in that area as evidenced by the cutie-mark consisting of a whip and a barbell.

Shining Armor paused a moment, there was something that he’d forgotten about this particular pony that he just couldn’t pit his hoof on, well besides his name escaping him… he shook his head and walked over, intent on joining the rest of the squad as they exercised.

The PT-leader used his telekinesis to key a human audio device and an up-tempo song came bursting from the speakers and they were off: running in place, jumping-jacks, starbursts, “two-hoof hops”, and whatever else the PT-leader decided to throw their way.

Though, to be honest, Shining Armor would have been a bit happier if the song didn’t get stuck in his head… who knew how long he’d have Eye of the Tiger stuck in there.

“Thank you for the great work-out.” Shining Armor panted, wishing he remembered the unicorn’s name.

“You’re welcome, Prince Shining Armor.” the PT instructor said, gathering up his equipment and loading it into a wagon.

“I’m sorry…” Shining Armor began, embarrassed by what he was about to ask, “I’ve forgotten your name.”

“It’s Stephen.” the unicorn replied, “Stephen Hawking… I know, it’s not as quite as catchy as the named you native ponies have.”

“Ah, no…”Shining Armor began, “I just have trouble remembering names in general.”

There was a moment of awkwardness between the two before Shining broke the silence, “What were you before your conversion?”

“I was a physicist of some renown.” Stephen replied, shrugging his shoulders, “When the opportunity came to get a new body came I took it… when I was a human, I was confined to a wheelchair and couldn’t even talk, so conversion seemed like a good deal to me.”

Shining Armor nodded, but couldn’t help asking, “If you were a physicist as a human, why aren’t you one as a pony?”

In reply Stephen levitated the wagon over the wall and presumably to its place, “That’s why.”

“I don’t understand.” Shining Armor said, still looking at where the wagon had descended.

“Magic. Magic’s existence makes all of my prior work meaningless.” Stephen laughed, “Plus, if I was still working in physics I wouldn’t get to enjoy this new body as much.”

Shining Armor nodded, it made a certain kind of sense — if someone’s whole field of study were instantly turned upside down, then maybe it was better to do something radically different, and if one who was lame found himself suddenly healed it would be natural to walk, and run, and jump.

* * *

“…and that’s what happened.” Scootaloo said, finishing her story.

Cheerilee smiled as she poured another cup of hot chocolate for her young visitor —it wasn’t like at the schoolhouse, but it would do— and her eyes flashed green for a brief moment.

‘No, you have to be careful.’ Cheerilee warned herself, ‘Only a little sip, you can’t fill up on just her.’

Scootaloo smiled as she sipped at the hot chocolate — Miss Cheerilee was the best teacher ever!

* * *

Shining Armor made his way to the bedroom he shared with his wife, still unable to get the songs out of his head. It was mildly annoying, but at least he could relax with his wife and maybe find his attention diverted elsewhere.

When he opened the door he saw several boxes on the floor near the foot of the bed where a chest had been moved and a human TV and DVD player were being set up by one of his wife’s personal assistants… Dameko, or some other odd human name.

“Done!” the assistant said, jumping away from the television.

“Ah, Shining Armor, you’re just in time to join us.” Cadence said, patting the bed beside her as Muriko pushed a chair alongside the bed for herself.

After setting a chair up for herself Muriko turned her attention to one of the other boxes, rummaging around, before holding up one box triumphantly.

“Let’s start with this!” She said with barely contained glee, putting the first disk in the player the opening came on:
Big-O! Big-O! Big-O! Big-O!

Big-O! Big-O! Big-O! Big-O!

Cast in the name of God, Ye not guilty!

Shining Armor felt his right eye twitch as the song buried itself into his head, and as he buried his head into the pillows… the three songs still playing simultaneously.

Author's Note

The Big O opening theme:

Eye of the Tiger:

Adhuc exciderat capite albi equo

Adhuc exciderat capite albi equo.

Sweetie Belle finally slowed her gallop into a fast trot after tiring out, it had taken a while, but it had happened. She looked around at the landscape and found herself unable to enjoy the beautiful weather and the pleasing vistas… She was just so upset with her sister, and the more she thought about it the more betrayed she felt.

‘I’m never going back! Never!’, she resolved to herself, ‘But, I… where should I go?’

She faltered as she realized that there really was nowhere else for her to go. Except, she recalled always wanting to go see the continent: North America… it was the closest to Equestria and, from what she had heard, was really a wondrous new world.

It would be… realization dawned on her as she contemplated actually going to America, ‘An adventure… a real adventure!’

Quickening her pace she paralleled the tracks, knowing that they would eventually lead her to Baltimare, she remembered her parents talking about the shipping from Horseshoe Bay to the continent, a city the humans had named Los Angles…or, if she couldn’t find a ship going there, then she could fins one bound for Seattle.

‘Yes, I’ll definitely find a ship going to America in Baltimare!’ she thought to herself, before losing herself in the half daydream of imagined adventures.

* * *

Celestia found herself staring into space as the nobles and ministers presented their reports; it seemed that the fires had claimed a quarter of the population at random. The Minister of Finance and Prime Minister both were engaging in a lengthy and worried debate about the economy… all well and good that the two should be able to immerse themselves in their jobs, addressing the serious matters…

But the Solar Diarch, now monarch, could not help but wallow in sorrow over her deceased sister.

While she was distressed and saddened over the reports of her subjects, the loss of her sister dwarfed them all… and, when she found her mind wandering there she felt an immense and consuming guilt: the personal loss of her sister should not so overwhelm the loss of her subjects but…

‘“The heart has its reasons which reason does not know.”’ Celestia thought to herself, an apt saying which came from an old, long-dead human on the other end of the world.

‘I cannot allow myself to become paralyzed by unreasonable guilt.’ Celestia thought as she turned her attention to the statesmen in the current meeting by sheer force of will.

After a few minutes listening to her ministers, she found her mind again wandering to Luna, and how after she’d waited a thousand years she’d finally seen her sister again.

* * *

Raven shied away from the meeting, she had no desire to interpose herself between the two ministers in the middle of their debate, but she didn’t leave.

The reason was simple: Celestia.

As aide to the princess she was worried over how she had been acting in the bast few days. The loss of her sister had to effect her more than she let on, and the demise of a fourth of her ponies, too — yet the princess seemed determined to show nothing, instead burring herself in her duties.

It was almost too much for Raven to bear, seeing the Princess, someone she considered her friend, in this state… yes, she’d lost her brother and mother, but her brother was involved in mining and her mother had been stricken with Luscious-Tyranid Disease, invariably fatal and incurable… and Raven was a hypocrite.

She felt herself flinch at the realization, she had been, and was currently, avoiding mourning them by wholly immersing herself in her role as the Princess’s aide — and that made her feel guilty and another wave of sorrow for the Princess.

‘No! I’ll help the Princess and then take care of myself…’ Raven thought to herself, determined to not only get through these hard times, but ensure that Celestia did as well.

Raven began by looking at the listing of the Princess’s vassalage and putting together a schedule which would allow Celestia to take two months away from everything except raising the sun.

* * *

“…so, in conclusion, due to our missing members all the pegasi in Ponyville are going to have to put in overtime every week for the next six months, at least.” Fire Streak summarized.

“Yeah!!” Bulk Biceps shouted in agreement, earning odd stares from everyone in the Ponyville weather team.

“Well, I’m glad that someone is excited.” Somepony stage-whispered sending a wave of laughter through the assembled pegasi.

“That’s enough.” Fire Streak projected across the cloud-bank that they had assembled for their emergency meeting. He couldn’t help but sigh, it wasn’t as if the other Wonderbolts weren’t doing the same thing all over Equestria, but it certainly different than the normal Wonderbolt fare — and given the severity of the crisis, unless the other nations attacked Equestria the Wonderbolts would be directing weather control operations until everypony could get back on their hooves. “We all have jobs, and we know what we have to do — Dismissed!”

Bulk Biceps was tempted to throw in another ‘Yeah!’, but the atmosphere just didn’t feel right this time. Usually he was enthusiastic and upbeat about life, the universe, and everything… but lately there was a gloom-cloud dampening everyone’s spirits, “raining on the parade” as the humans used to say.

Sure losing so many friends hurt, and it was only proper to mourn them, but to allow that sadness to consume one’s soul… well, that was just a horrible thing to contemplate and he would do everything in his power to be a beacon of cheer and enthusiasm to those around him, to include his attitude about work.

He found himself lost in thought as he made his way down to the solid earth below… it wasn’t that he couldn’t fly, it was just that the sort of thinking he was doing lent itself better to having the Earth firmly under one’s hooves.

Eventually he found himself in Ponyville’s park and it made him feel better to see several ponies taking their foals out on a walk… it was confirmation that things really could return to normal.

Though there was something odd there, a penguin with odd, multicolored feathers that looked kind of like eyebrows was looking upward — apparently craning its neck upward to look up at Rainbow Dash’s house — though come to think of it, something about that penguin reminded him of Rainbow Dash.

“Oh, horse-sh—“ the penguin, who apparently was Rainbow Dash, said, stopping as several gasps and drew her attention to those who were strolling along with their foals, looking at her as if she had bitten the head off a kitten at a middle-school talent show.

”…apples, I totally meant horse-apples.” Rainbow Dash corrected with a nervous laugh that quickly turned into a defeated sigh.

Bulk Biceps was thoroughly confused by all this. How, for instance, had Rainbow Dash become a penguin? Was it another of Twilight Sparkle’s spells? While the purple pony was pretty reliable, there were times when she was a little… flaky. — And Bulk Biceps could totally see how the recent event could bring that out, not just in her, but anypony.

“Er, ‘scuse me miss.” Bulk interrupted, “But do you need some help?”

Rainbow Dash turned and glared at the white musclebound pegasus, “No. No, I do not.”

And with that Rainbow Dash waddled away from what could have been the start of a wonderful romance… but, then again, she’s never been that good about seeing those sorts of possibilities.

* * *

Shining Armor tried to ignore the songs that constantly ran through his head, their infectious beats rhythmically playing off one another until they threatened to consume him… and, by sheer force of will, it was working.

At least he told himself that it was working. The ponies around the palace might have disagreed though.

“Er, why am I here?” Shining Armor asked the assembled ponies in front of him, obviously in some sort of meeting.

“Er, my prince… isn’t that question a bit on the, er… philosophical side?” General Spear Head asked, wondering why the prince would bring it up in the middle of the report on the Crystal Empire’s military strength. On the other hoof, though, it could also be some of the legendary, mythical sense of humor he’d heard about. Of course, the problem with legendary things is that they’re often mythical.

“Yes. Yes, you’re right…” Shining Armor took a moment to look at the pony addressing him, especially the rank insignia on his uniform, “General.”

“Very good, sire,” one of the other generals — a General Discharge — said, continuing with his presentation by unrolling a huge map with markings all over it. “As you can see, there are significant losses along the western border; while the ratio of casualties to survivors is the same as the rest of the empire most of the third and sixth battalions were wiped out. Combining the two, we would have only three companies.”

“Do it.” Shining Armor nodded, then indicated several of the forts that lined the western borders of the Crystal Empire, “Put them here, they’ll be in charge of the upper reaches, consolidate the units originally assigned to those into the other forts on the border.”

“Yes, my prince.” General Discharge nodded, marking a few notes on the map. “I believe that concludes my readiness report.”

“Excellent.” Shining Armor said, nodding. “What about the Eastern Front?”

“All quiet on the Eastern front, my prince.” General Discharge replied, wondering for a moment why that phrase sounded so oddly familiar, yet off.

“Good, then we can reduce the seaside garrisons along the Eastern front to half strength, that should give us several hundred ponies to address the shipping problem. We cannot let the colonies fall.”

The generals nodded, the problems were well-known at this point, and the human world had plenty of space… the problem was that the human world also had danger, in the forms of predators and generally uncontrolled weather, and inconveniences like weeds and huge swathes of non-arable and semi-arable lands — if the colonies had lost a quarter of their population like the rest of Equestria, then the resultant stresses could cause their collapse and doom the rest.

The Generals nodded, nopony really liked leaving the Eastern seaside undermanned, but the truth was that it was the least likely spot that any of the other Equestrian powers would attack — the ocean between Equestria’s east coast and the west coast of North America was awash with shipping between the colonies, which had attracted pirates, which in turn had prompted the institution of regular military patrols by the Navy and, close to shores, their air forces.

* * *

The meeting had run long, mostly due to the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance getting into a ‘discussion’ on how to handle the economic aspects of the nation — while the plan seemed both very sound and very thorough now, it had taken quite a while for them to iron out the details… but it was exhausting.

Which is why Prince Blueblood sighed in relief as he entered the guest chambers that had been set aside for him in the castle, he felt tension melting from his withers.

That tension rushed back with a vengeance when a knock sounded from the door, followed by an entreaty, “Prince… Prince Blueblood, could I speak with you a moment?”

He found himself frowning at whomever was knocking at his door, torn between his desire to relax and what were likely his duties as part of the noblesse… shaking his head vigorously, he reached out with his magic and opened the door and was mildly surprised to see the white pony who served as his aunt’s aide… her name escaped him even as he recognized who she was.

“Ah… yes?” Blueblood enquired, consciously avoiding having to use her name even as he raked his brain trying to remember it. “What might you need?”

“Well, Prince Blueblood, as you likely saw your aunt is in need of our help…” Raven began, suddenly unsure of how to go about proposing the plan to the prince.

“She did look rather…” Prince Blueblood paused for the barest of moments as he stumbled for the right word, “despondent. Dispirited, I mean.”

Raven nodded, “I believe that we can lessen the princess’s duties to the point where the only obligation she has to meet is raising the sun and moon…”

Using her magic, she pulled her plan from her binder and floated it over to prince Blueblood.

As prince Blueblood scanned the plan Raven found herself compelled to explain her reasoning, “I think that she needs time to properly mourn Princess Luna…”

“Ah, I see.” Prince Blueblood replied, continuing to read the schedule of responsibilities.

It was an excellent plan, despite the increased workload by much of the aristocracy, but nothing overly strenuous.

“I find myself in agreement with you…” Blueblood said as he stamped the plan with his seal and floated the plan back to the aide. “I think that may just be what aunt Celestia needs. Take these to the secretariat and have them distribute copies to the rest of the nobility.”

Raven nodded, taking the plan back and returning it to its place in the binder. As she turned to leave the prince interrupted her.

“One question, before you go… if you please.” the Prince said.

“Yes?” Raven asked, resisting the urge to push her glasses up as the prince stared at her.

“What is your name?” Blueblood asked, knowing it was the only way to avoid waking up at three in the morning suddenly remembering the name.

“Ah, it’s Raven.” Raven said, mildly surprised at the question.

“Well, Raven, thank you for taking care of my aunt.” Prince Blueblood said, nodding a farewell as he shut the door and retreated into the privacy of the rooms.

Author's Note

Sorry about the delay; I got a little demotivated and distracted; hopefully regular updates are on the table, but I can't make any promises.