Misalignment of the Heart

"Never thought ah see the day." Applejack continues to read one of many papers nailed to the front of town hall.

"But why is it only effecting unicorns?" Fluttershy, to her right, speaks up. "Don't we all use magic?"

Applejack hesitates before turning her head to give reply. "We could go ask Twi, but that girl done been cooped up in the Castle of Harmony trying to figure all this out. Any y'all gone and checked up on Pinkie at the local?"

"Went and tried to cheer her up earlier." Rainbow dredges out in her raspy voice, "She's holding up okay, though. Should of seen her when one of the nurses went and tried to separate her and Pumpkin Cake again." with an partial smirk. "Pulled out the party cannon and pointed at the door."

"Poor thing." Fluttershy whispers out with subtle heartache, "But you didn't see Rarity?"

"Um, no?" Rainbow opens one eye wider, "Haven't seen her since the other day, why?"

"Come to think of it, ah haven't either." Applejack shifts her sights between her two friends with growing worry, saying not another word with her hooves talking through brisk speed towards that which rests on the outskirts of town. Followed by the heavy thumping of wings overhead and subtle wisps from behind, she takes on an even greater stride into full gallop as purple and white roof and trim slides into full view. Going into a slide, she nearly collides with the door muzzle first before that which lacks the friction of hard ground crashes right on through.

"Ya okay there, Rainbow?" Applejack casually asks with her casual trot inside, to the casually upside down buried in cotton and nylon.

"I think I landed on the pin cushion." Rainbow speaks in abnormally high pitch that cringes in pain, "Or the cat!"

"Ah! Opalescence!" Fluttershy darts through the doorway without a door, "Oh my, are you okay Opal?"

"Smooth as always." Rainbow shifts her tangled weight to flop back upright, her muzzle turned as she wiggles her rear a bit with scrutiny, moving ever so slightly to the rapid clench and rise. "Yep! ow Needles it ow is!"

"Now who in Equestria would barge in and make such... oh." Rarity, having come to the behest of the utmost step look down, makes abnormally slow reaction to the shambles of her once sparkling showroom. "Um... I...."

"Sorry to barge in like this Rarity, but we were all a mighty bit worried bout ya." Applejack quickly attempts explanation after rapidly looking back and forth to all of the cluster and mess, and finally back up. "Don't worry none, we won't up and leave till we make it right, okay?"

"Ow..ow ow ow... See? She's fine, geez." Rainbow's eyes narrowing in on that of fine and delicate handling. "Tweezers?"

Fluttershy attempts several mumbles, eyes moving all down before back up, muzzle rapidly shaking in kind.

"Hey Rarity." Applejack starts to get a bit unnerved, "You okay there, sleepy girl?" Taking notice of the look of exhaustion she forces out an encouraging smile in the hopes of coaxing her down farther. "Ah think Rainbow might be needing some of yer delicate handling."

"O-oh, yes yes." Rarity shows more hesitation, to the grabbing notice of now all three, with her first hoof taking their descent through groggy misstep, lunging forward in fumbling tumble onto that of much softer than expected landing. "My heavens.. Applejack?"

Fluttershy abandons tweezers and needles to fly up and give hoof to that of worried apple farmer, helping prop back up that which cannot find enough to mask the look of utter exhaustion. Adopting further worry, she takes notice of wobble as hooves take their slow descent.

"You look like crap?" Rainbow shows less than subtle approach, much to the disapproving look of her other two friends in company.

"I feel fine, deary. I'm just a bit under the weather is all." Rarity continues her approach, only to do little to prove her words as anything but heavy understatement. Letting her eyes drift down, she slowly cranes her neck to take hold of abandoned tweezers on the cluttered floor. Ignoring or taking no notice to the questioning triple stares, she merely moves alongside to better align. "Rainbow dear, you need to hold still!"

"Nah-uh. You're bobbing and weaving!" Rainbow scoots forward and then around to give proper face, "Why aren't you just using your magic?"

"I afraid..." To which she hesitates. "It is no matter. I shall not have one of my friends linger in pain just because of something silly."

Dropping the tweezers, she catches them in her light blue magical hue for but a moment before her eyes begin to water and the sharp inhale of breath causes the magic to throw the object hard enough to imbed into one of her manikin. Shrinking back as if scolded like a foal, she is far too quickly surrounded by those seeking to give comfort, only to rise her frightful reaction to new levels with an high pitched scream and cower.

"Rarity!" Three unified call to their friend, having gone from concerned to downright scared with their normally smooth mannered fashionette pony extraordinaire appearing in such an state of horror. With tears beginning to form and fall, two push aside past reaction to give full comforting embrace while Rainbow remains on high alert, spinning around in attempt to find invisible threat.

"Rarity, c'mon old girl, speak to us!" Applejack tries to give a little shake through her embrace, "What's wrong?!"

"They won't leave me alone!" Rairty begins to cry even harder as she struggles to wrap her forelegs around something, or anything, that they can reach. "I can't understand them but they keep screaming, and wailing!"

"Hey I don't hear anything!" Rainbow, the hairs all the way to the upper base of her tail from her neck standing up on end. "If somepony is playing a joke it's not funny! Especially if you're hurting my friends!"

"My magic." Rarity, still shivering, attempts clarity that she herself lacks in understanding. "I-It started l-last week. I was hemming late one night and I heard a whisper. Then another, and.. something... oh.. I don't even want to describe it!"

Rainbow eyes flare as wide as they can, "We need to get to the castle! If Twilight is using her magic then she might be in danger!"

"Well we can't leave her here alone." Applejack scrunches the bridge between her eyes, "Please don't fight me on this."

"Fight you on waaah!" Rarity nearly screams in surprise as Applejack doubles about to her side, slides underneath, and raises up in order to carry her heavily under the weather friend. "Applejack, I can...!" Only to tap the underside of her hoof on orange hair, "..thank you later, somehow."

"Alright then!" She grins to an expected battle already won, "C'mon, we need to hurry."

"No! I don't want you to do it. What happens if something goes wrong?" Spike, putting all of his weight into pushing Twilight back with both hands to her chest, "At least have the others be here in case you need help?" Looking up with wide pleading eyes, "Please, Twilight?"

"Spike I can't.. I can't keep concentrating.. with.." She shakes her head almost violently as severe sleep deprivation causes her eyes to flutter, her irregular breathing from constant agitation serving little in the way of hopeful plea. "We have to find out what is causing this before it spreads."

"It's already spread!" Spike cannot impede his mouth with his claws before his words betray his intentions.

"Spike. Spike, listen to me." She cranes her neck down with her muzzle touching and then nudging up along his cheek. "I will be fine, okay?"

"How do you know?" He almost pulls away, but settles with lingering to the touch with arms now crossed.

"Because I have you here with me." Her words, while true with intent, carry with them the hint of abnormal deception at the behest of growing desperation, and hesitation to what would only further stand against her dangerous attempt. "All I'm going to do is teleport, okay?"

"Constantly, for a minute?" He idly shakes his head, "Whatever is attacking you and the other unicorns means business and you want to try and force an connection, to find out what you already know? That it's not friendly?"

"Ponies are getting hurt, Spike." She struggles to form proper approach to concerns she herself reserves to the back of her mind, "Something touched.. No, something tried to grab hold of Pumpkin Cake when her magic manifested and she teleported across the room."

"But what if something gets a hold of you." Spike once more intertwines his talons.

"That's why I'm doing this." She avoids eye contact as she moves through large double doors into her personal research chambers. "That's exactly what I'm hoping for. If I can at least find out what, and where, this is happening then I can at least move forward. All I've been able to do is guess and assume, at every corner, and I have to know if this is our fault."

"What do you mean, your fault?" He rushes to catch up and get inside before overly heavy doors slide shut with an riveting vibration, locked through click and spell, of latter causing visible fluttering in Twilight's eyes as she appears to be in strain, "Twilight?"

"W-when an unicorn teleports they use the same stream that all ponies use for magic." She rapidly shakes her head with her breathing returning to it's calmer flow, "Starswirl always surmised that when we teleported, we were really visiting another place for but a moment."

"But nothing has ever started attacking for going there before, right?" He does his best to copy her movements as wards and tall but thin rods are erected and placed in an particular pattern already made out on the floor. "So how could you even think it's your fault?"

"Our fault." She nearly whispers, but just loud enough still. "When we fought Tirek, and the Tree of Harmony bloomed and we became whatever we became, we released a lot of magical energy. Not even including that at the time, I still had the magic of all Alicorns concentrated inside."

"I still don't think..."

"The girls and I may have torn the barrier that kept all of this from ever happening!" She begins to put more emotion in her voice, or borderline anger. "And if so, we may also be the anchors not only keeping it open, but sitting back while it continues to spread to those around us."

"Twilight.. c-calm down..."

"Last week, when Applejack bucked an apple tree, she heard a scream that nearly scared her to death! Fluttershy so far hasn't heard anything but Rainbow swore last time she moved clouds she heard whispering. I'm not sure about Pinkie but Rarity would have to be suffering, too."

Spike, rushing over to try and get her attention through waving his arms rapidly, hunkers down a bit with eyes shifting all about.

"Princess Celestia and Princess Luna have both dispatched guards to all cities to locate any disturbances elsewhere, only to come back entirely empty hoofed! That means the tear is either centered here in Ponyville which makes it our fault, or anchored through each of us which still makes it our fault, if not even more!" Stomping her hoof into cracking marble tile, "We've been placed in quarantine and all of it may be our fault!"

Her anger continues to rise, blinded to all around her now hovering above, teetering on her wrath or compassion. With her teeth clenched tight, she parts her lips to show her ire with eyes narrowed focused to nothing but sparing the same, her wings flared and horn set in blazing glow. But as just as sudden, ire becomes pain, white flashes forcing her eyes shut and her legs to buckle down in sharp agony. Growling once more in anger, only to be swallowed in her squeal of pain, she continues to shift until crashing fully to the floor in one final numbing flash.

"Open this gosh durn door, yea hear?!" Muffled yells somehow squeeze past the solid metal doors, along with that of violent thuds repeated over and over, finally coupled with even more until the doors begin to bend at the outer hinges. "Twi! Spike! Answer me!"

"Applejack!" Spike staggers over towards the door, pressing his forehead against the metal to try and get his voice through. "Twilight's hurt! She was going go try to find out what's happening but she accidentally activated it and I think something attacked her!" His talons digging into the metal door as his own emotions drive him backwards, "Get away from the door!"

"Ya said get away from the door?!" Applejack yells back in frantic confusion, muffled yelling quickly turning higher in pitch with the gold plated metal beginning to smolder with flicks and crackles, heat vapors smoldering up. "Aw crap. Get away from the durn door!"

As gold melts down the middle, that of far lesser purity crackles and pings, letting that of much larger and heavier succumb to it's own lopsided weight, crashing down towards the ponies waiting off to the side outside. Reserved for only an moment at the surprised spectacle, they all fly or leap inside, last but not least that of straight maned Pinkie Pie who drops the package of thank you muffles mid leap to the sight beyond.

"Twilight!" They all rush to down and out Alicorn, already being held sniffling baby dragon.

"I tried to stop her." Spike mumbles.

"What do you mean stop her?" Rainbow tries to push her way past the others who block her view of whom she needs for answers.

"She.. she thinks it was when you all fought Tirek. That when the Tree of Harmony merged with all of you that it caused something to tear, and she was distraught over what happened to Pumpkin Cake and tried to force contact with whatever is doing this!" His words brings further shock and conflict, in particular to that of teary eyes party pony, who without hesitation slides down and pushes her muzzle underneath.

"Pinkie?"

"We need to get her to the hospital." Pinkie calmly makes in statement, in an almost toneless voice that does little to calm the nerves of the others. "There's special stuff there keeping Pumpkin Cake from using magic. Let's go."

"C'mon Spike!" Rainbow cranes her neck down to grab hold of rattled but determined baby dragon, giving careful swing up and over onto her back in what would be surrogate in nature, but warded in afterthought. "Ow! Careful digging in back there, dude!"

"S-sorry!"

"Ya both better git with it!" Applejack yells back as she leaps right back out and over still smoldering golden doors, having pushed into full gallop past their Harmony Table in order to try and keep up with streaking pink, nearly dropping an shrieking Rarity clinging on for dear life.

Their gallop, from the outskirts of one end of town to the far side of the other, thankfully forces them into tunnel vision less they see the dawning of hope across many a muzzle twist and distort into reservation and fear. Heroines, and to an far off empire an hero, are unable to hear the voices calling out in concern or slow down for those who make short gallops to catch up, they themselves not able to stop their hooves from wanting to lend aid to those whom have given it all too often. Until one is barely able to get muzzle to muzzle to shaken fashionette.

"Rarity!" Lyra calls out with an scared voice. "What happened!?"

"We.. l-listen Lyra! Don't use your magic! Okay?" Rarity's abnormal disposition causing Lyra to lose speed with an expression deepening into sadness. Rarity continues to look back as Lyra continues to drift behind, "Please listen..."

"Don't worry Rarity, old gal. We'll get on through this, together!" Applejack snorts in contempt to anything otherwise. "And ah say when we done found them varmits hollering and scratching something fierce, we give em what for!"

"Applejack?" Her reply bringing back one green eye in stare, "You're hearing it too?"

"Only when ah'm bucking." She softly states, returning her forward stare on far forward pink streak. "Ah didn't wanna worry none so ah haven't told anypony. Ah think mah brother knows. Ain't let me into the orchards for several days. Big fella was sly bout it least."

"Sly?"

"Said he had ah big date coming up and needed the extra working." She chuckles, "Ah figure he made sure to make it so silly that ah would get it and not fight him over it."

"You still fought him over it, I'm sure."

"He had ta throw me in the hog pit!" She forms an ever more seldom genuine smile to the contradicting aghast from farther back. Taking heed to the disappearance of pink through small double doors, she adjusts her gallop in case of impeding traffic in from out. Finding none, she rears up after an subtle hop to push them open with both front hooves, going wide eyed to the shriek quickly muffled behind after closing. "Crap."

"Nurse Redheart!" Pinkie bypasses front counter top in order to get almost muzzle to muzzle, "Twilight's like Pumpkin Cake!"

"What do you mean..." Redheart's head tilts with an scrutinizing stare in attempt to relate visual injury, "Code pink!" Her bolstered statement bringing additional nurses and one in white garb. "Doctor Horse! We have another afflicted by magic induced trauma."

"Take her to the room farther down from the other two. We will have to section that part of the hallway off but nonetheless, see to it!" Doctor Horse turns to the mare and stallion nurses, to which they quickly but carefully relieve that of unconscious princess from worried company, whom he adopts an expression of sympathy when forced to stand in their way as they all attempt to follow. "I'm sorry, but you must wait."

"No way!" Rainbow, still acting as surrogate carrier, is reinforced by screeching talons pulled in tight. "She needs us!"

"You need to let us get her to that point." The doctor attempts to further approach what already appears as anything but. "But we, too, need your help. I need to know what happened to the exact detail before she fell into her current state. Each and every one of you needs to accompany an separate practitioner and give every detail you can remember."

Rainbow snorts, ignoring all of the other unseen muzzles of compliance with her neck craning ever so slowly to the side. Holding it there for a few moments, letting the erratic breathing fill her now pivoted ear, before turning back to the doctor. "He's staying with me. Trust me, you want him to. Last thing that got in the way of helping Twilight were two huge golden doors. Were."

With no words to argue, only an slow gulp and nod, do each of them section off into adjacent registration rooms.

"Hello?" She calls out to nothing at all, and also, towards anything that might listen through the endless white expanse. She cranes her neck, pivots her ears, and scans with her eyes in all directions in hopes of finding stable ground. With an gentle huff, she closes her eyes to concentrate, to the slight change of nothing at all. With tension closing her eyes even tighter along with the further stretching of her wide spread wings of feathers, she clenches her teeth until nearly out of breath.

"Hello."

Her eyes flare open to the sound, her sudden influx of air suffocating her surprised cry into an pitiful squeak. Rearing back with both front forelegs flaring up and down, she is forced to take a few steps back on instinct to try and not fall over, to little success. Squirming about on her back, she rolls over and comes back onto her hooves to give wide stare towards that of roan stallion, of the same given in return.

"Not that I don't mind the view, but you should not be here."

"W-who are.. where are.." She fumbles her words, still riled to the surprise. "This makes no sense! I hadn't even entered.. oh no." Her breathing begins to increase once more as she literally jumps back from the stallion. "What do you want with us?"

"You know you don't look it, but you must be rather strong. We all died as soon as we got this far inside." The stallion looks up and down, left to right, to take in all that stands before him. Quirking his brow to just below the neck, "You really should put on some clothing, young lady."

She looks upon the stallion up and down, "I won't be tricked, even if you look like an stallion. I know you've been stalking us through our magic somehow and doing horrible things in the process." Giving her stare an eventual glare. "I've come to let you know that we won't stand for it, any longer. If you wanted to contact us, you didn't have to attack an innocent foal to do it!"

"Stallion?" He begins to chuckle after an short pause, "Oh, so that's how you see me." Taking in another pause to the rather apprehensive stare slowly shifting into an glare before nodding to himself, "Perhaps an explanation would serve us both better, I must say."

She continues her glare, lifting an foreleg with her weight shifted backwards. "What do you mean, how I see you?"

The stallion begins to trot as he speaks, of around and around the rather offset and twirling in place Twilight as she refuses to relent her eyesight off that which has given her no choice otherwise. "You see, right now you're just inside the realm that I would regretfully now call home. How you got here and how you're able to withstand being turn asunder may be one in the same, actually."

"I came here because I needed answers in order to help make things right again." She lowers her intense stare, but still highly reserved. "But if you're not the one attacking us then why meet me here?" Dropping her guard but an tiny bit, "You not what I expected to find."

"You must be the reason the portal became stable." He focuses on nothing as he continues his trot, ignorant or careless towards the complete shift in expression of slowing twirl. "We never considered in your own defense you would make the door fit for even a king. "

She slows into an standstill, hunkered down with her tail moved to run alongside her left hooves, back to front. She lets her muzzle drift down, eyes softened to the thought of being the cause of such trauma, lifting it with an abnormally slow blink. "We didn't mean to."

"I believe you." The stallion stops his trot to just before Twilight. "But he will not, so easily."

"There is another with you?" She slowly drifts her head left and right. "I don't see anypony."

"Any... oh, I get it." He returns an dry chuckle. "But you would have to look behind you to find him." Raising his brow to the spectacle of Twilight turning her head backwards, "You know, you make a better you when you're not trying to act like someone else?"

"What do you mean by that?" She quickly turns her back to face the now smirking stallion. "You're not making fun of me, are you?"

"I'm warning you, actually." His smirk erodes into an more serious expression. "I am but an grounded remnant. An memory." The stallion looks directly into her widening eyes. "Time has stopped moving for one such as I, but the same cannot be said for any of you."

"Then can you help us?" She moves forward, more sudden than intended.

"An decision can only be made by those who have yet to reach it." He remains stern even against the almost pleading reflection.

"But I don't understand!" She vents frustration from her confusion and concern. She begins anew just as the white expanse begins to crack and flake like snow, revealing an ever haunting red and black haze underneath. She pushes herself to grasp what her eyes refuses to ignore until the subtle but ever growing encore of whispers and scratches causes her ears to close down on themselves.

"What he may decide, I do not know." The stallion, like the white expanse, begins to crack and peel away, much to the utter horror of the only audience. "Nor from you, should he decide to venture back into the fray to continue once more that which you so brazenly took for granted."

"But I don't know what you want me to do!" She yells in desperation to the seemingly impending destruction.

Her words vibrate out, causing an cascade that ripples throughout and sheds all that impedes the answer to her question. Frozen in forward stare even as the small glowing tear behind her emits an vibrating hum, she lets her mouth hang open to the droves of monsters attacking without relent. Protected inside, her mind grabs hold and clings to her senses in quick knowledge of what has thus far kept her and her world spared.

"I want you to choose what's most important to you." The sword glimmers brightly to each word, finally encompassed in it's light entirely before Twilight is knocked back through the tear without notice. "For even against an entire world, he will do no less the same."

Her head would explode in pain, had the numbness not dulled both the pain and her senses. With eyes still closed, she begins to move her her entire body, flashes of recent events causing her no time to linger. But struggle as she may, she cannot help but feel as if nothing has changed. She once more shifts her forelegs, of an tingle and ache at the bend, but nothing more. She opens her mouth to speak, to call out through her ever increasing anxiety to whatever appears to bind her in place, her eyes fluttering rapidly as they fight any incursion of stinging light.

"...." She continues to try and speak, to crackle and squeaks of what should be the low hum of her voice. Of her senses, only that of hearing appears to ring closest to it's truth, having taken in the light click and creak of an slowly opening door.

"Rise and shine Miss Sleepyhead!" Comes the distinct high pitched voice of an overly cheerful Pinkie Pie. "Oh... you didn't get to eat your get well cupcake again." The voice fluctuates a bit, "But don't worry, I brought you another just in case!"

"Miss Pinkie Pie." Another, unknown but feminine voice hinged on an sympathetic tone. "You know you cannot be leaving food around the room like this. It attracts ants and flies. I'm sure she'll understand if she.."

"When." Pinkie states in an uncharacteristically drastic change in demeanor, "When she wakes up, I want her to know that nopony forgot about her." The clops end near the hospital bed. "Ever. Never ever ever ever!"

"Would you at least let me take some of the deflated balloons from three months ago to clean up the clutter?"