A History of Friendship Is Magic

The dragon did not look happy. Awakened from a deep sleep in its cave, it now stood near the top of a mountain flexing its wings. Every so often flames erupted from its mouth as it took in its new surroundings. “Mist, I thought you said that there couldn’t be dragons here!” Amber was now in a terrible state of fear, and the other ponies weren't doing much better. “What do we do?”

“How am I supposed to know! I didn’t think dragons could be here!”. Emerald recalled another small memory; a long time ago when she felt younger, a news reporter announced the story of how a dragon colony had left the dragon planet and flew into space looking for a new home. “They can be here. They must have flown here through space from the dragon planet when a group of them migrated. That was a very long time ago...”

“Thanks for the history lesson, but what are we going to do?”. This came from Rain Cloud who was flying backwards and forwards above the group nervously. Another roar came from the dragon, and it started to beat its crumpled wings. Slowly at first, the dragon managed to lift its colossal weight from the mountainside, and once it was airborne it circled the mountain searching for the source of the disturbance.

Once the dragon began to fly, the ponies stopped worrying and started to run. Still attached to their elements, each one floated near to the ponies in their auras as the ponies galloped across the blackened earth of the crater. They did not stop at the edge, and continued their stampede across the grassy plain where they began their journey. Only did they rest once they had crashed into the forest and lay down in exhaustion. Away in the distance they could hear the dragon still roaring and belching fire. “Do you think we’re safe?” Amber was terrified at the thought of the dragon roaming the skies just above the relative safety of the canopy. “I’m sure we’ll be alright for the moment”, Morning Mist tried to comfort her, but another roar made Amber jump and hide behind a nearby bush. Mist turned and surveyed the rest of the group who were huddled together trembling in the centre of the trampled clearing. A sudden realisation came over her as she frantically looked around the clearing. “Midnight?! Where’s Midnight Sky?!” The whole group suddenly jumped up and searched the nearby bushes calling his name. “He must be back on the plain, don’t worry I’ll go and find him”, Rain Cloud darted upwards through the canopy as the other ponies shouted after him to wait. “No, stop! It’s too dangerous!” but Rain Cloud ignored Mist’s cries and flew onwards. He flew at top speed through the sky whilst searching the floor beneath him.

Eventually he found Midnight Sky on the opposite side of the crater galloping towards the mountain where the sleepy dragon was still flapping its great wings. Rain Cloud flew into a dive and landed in the path of Midnight Sky. “What are you doing!” he cried out as Midnight skidded to a halt in front of him. “Where are you going?” Midnight Sky looked down at his hooves and kicked at the floor. “It’s dangerous here! What if the dragon sees us? We need to move! Come on!” Rain Cloud began to push against Midnight to get him moving. “No!” Midnight exclaimed as he shoved Rain Cloud away. “I woke the dragon. This was my fault. I’m going to fix it.”

“Oh so you’re going to walk up to the dragon and then what? Apologise and then become friends again? Think about it Midnight. That dragon will kill you!”

“It’s the only choice I have... Let me go!”

“What do you mean the only choice? You should have run with us! If we kept moving we could have left the dragons territory by now.”

“No Rain Cloud. I picked one of the bad elements. Emerald said it herself, and I woke the dragon up with it. This is what’s best for all of us.”

“No! I won’t allow it!”

“Move aside Rain Cloud.” Midnight could feel something building up inside of him like when he first touched the element. “No!” Suddenly Midnight released his grip and a dark blue wave erupted from the end of his horn. It struck Rain Cloud on his side and he flew back through the air before landed on the ground, unconscious with his wing scorched by the heat of the wave. Midnight Sky was shocked at what he had done. He quickly ran over to where Rain Cloud lay and began to shake him awake, but to no avail. “Oh no. What have I done?” he tried shaking harder as tears began to run down his face at the sight of his friend lying broken at his hooves.

At the sound of the magical outburst, the dragon high above them began to fly down towards the two ponies. Luckily for Midnight Sky, its attacking roar snapped him back into the moment, and he ran towards the mountain drawing it away from Rain Cloud. The dragon released a torrent of fire towards Midnight Sky, but he was galloping fast enough for it to miss. Behind the scorching wall Midnight glanced at Rain Cloud before he was obscured by the flames between them. At least he was safe from the dragon. Midnight ran on, eventually reaching the slopes of the mountain, but the dragon was still in pursuit. He managed to pull himself up the steep slopes, jumping behind boulders and outcrops in order to stay away from the frequent bursts of flame. Back in the clearing, the other ponies were getting worried. Rain Cloud had been gone for a long time now, and they could hear frequent roars in the distance. After convincing Amber to come out of her bush, they cautiously pushed their way out of the forest. In the distance they saw the dragon circling the mountain belching its fire frequently onto the rocky slopes. Morning Mist gasped, “They must be up there! The dragon is trying to kill them! Come on everypony, we have to save them!” The four ponies broke out into a full gallop directly towards the mountain.

Once they were near the base of the mountain, Amber noticed the body of a pony lying on the ground in the distance. As they approached, Emerald let out a gasp and ran forward, “Oh no! Its Rain Cloud!” The other ponies gathered around as Emerald put her head down to his blackened chest. “Its alright, he’s alive, but injured. He should be fine”. All the ponies let out a sigh of relief, and Rain Cloud began to stir. “E-emerald? Is that you?”

“Yes, it is. What happened to you?”

“It was Midnight. Be careful!”

“Midnight?”

“Yes. He used some kind of magic to hit me.”

“Where is he? What about the dragon?”

“He said he came as a sacrifice to save us from it. He said that he got a bad element.” The ponies looked at Rain Cloud in shock as he stood up and painfully flexed his burnt wing. “What are we going to do?” Amber asked quietly, still looking up in terror at the dragon. “We must go after him”, Mist decided. “He doesn’t know what he’s doing. Come on! We don’t have much time.” The five ponies began the climb with Emerald and Amber supporting Rain Cloud, who was still in pain. As they climbed, Emeralds memory of her past life grew, and the events leading up to the creation of the elements were quite clear now. The only thing that confused her was the name ‘Dr. Hopkins’, which she remembered frequently, but did not know who it was. She now knew what the other five elements were; the opposites of the elements of harmony: unfaithfulness, dishonesty, evil, spite and greed. Despite this knowledge, something didn’t quite match up. The element that midnight had touched was a deep magenta in colour, and the bad elements did not have colour, but were varying shades of grey. Also, the actions of Midnight were not those of a pony touched by anything evil, as he was willing to sacrifice himself to save his friends.

As the ponies neared the summit of the mountain, they caught a glimpse of Midnight in the distance who was peeking out from behind a large rock. The dragon had lost track of where he was, and now began circling high above again searching for him. Midnight took this opportunity and broke out into a gallop across the mountainside, heading directly towards the dragons cave. All of the other five ponies all called out at once: “Midnight! Stop! Come back!” Midnight must have heard them, since he turned to the group hiding behind a boulder and slowed down slightly. Then, as he turned back, Midnight tripped over an outcropping rock and fell to the ground. Emerald and Mist both jumped up immediately and helped him to his feet. “This is madness! You have to stop now!” Mist was not happy at all. As Midnight began to form an answer, it was pierced by a scream of “Dragon!”, from Emerald.

The dragon had seen the three ponies standing in the open and began to fly directly at them, building up a jet of flame inside its stomach to scorch them out of existence. Emerald Leaf, Midnight Sky, and Morning Mist stood frozen on the mountainside as the dragon pulled back its head and opened its huge jaws. The wave of fire erupted from the dragons mouth and engulfed the three ponies as Amber, Rain Cloud and and Rose Bud stood watching helplessly from behind their boulder. An immediate shock hit them as they watched in horror at the roiling sea of flames that washed over the spot where their friends had been standing moments before. Amber began to whimper softly, and buried her head into Rose Bud who was standing strong and silent, but his face showed an expression of deepest sorrow that words could never capture. Rain Cloud looked on in disbelief, and was about to turn away from the fire when he saw a glint of colour amongst the  flames.

The dragon seemed satisfied after the flames had crashed down upon the ponies, and beat its heavy wings until it reached the peak of the mountain where it sat, surveying the lands below. As the smoke cleared, Rain Cloud could make out a purple shimmering in the distance where the ponies had been. Intrigued, he left the other two to their sorrow, and carefully picked his way over the blackened rocks. As soon as he realised what the purple shimmering was, he let out a shout of joy, “Amber, Rose Bud, come quickly! It’s a miracle!” The two ponies quickly rushed forwards to join Rain Cloud. “Look! They survived!”. The purple shimmering began to falter, and suddenly it dissolved into the air. Midnight Sky collapsed at their hooves, and a very shocked Morning Mist and Emerald Leaf stood behind. “How...?”, began Rain Cloud, but stopped when he saw that both Emerald and Mist had no idea either. “Come on, we have to get back to safety”, Amber said whilst looking cautiously up at the dragon. “It’s not over yet if he sees us”. They carried Midnight to behind one of the larger rocks and he slowly awoke, despite looking completely exhausted. Rain Cloud begun, “Midnight, why don’t you tell us what in the hay is going on? How did you do that?”

“I...I don’t know. It just sort of comes from within. When I get angry or scared it just happens, like when you touch something hot you draw your hoof away without thinking.”

“But that means you can do magic! That’s amazing! It must have been because of the elements!”, exclaimed Amber.

“Amber! You’re a genius!”, Emerald began. “When the other five elements were joined together in the explosion a sixth must have been created. That sixth is magic!”

“So you mean it isn’t a bad element?”

“No, Midnight, you have a very special element that I’m sure you can use for good.”

By now Morning Mist had regained her composure, and realised once more the situation they were in. “I don’t mean to be rude, but there is the small matter of the massive fire breathing dragon that wants to kill us all sitting on the top of the mountain!” The ponies all looked at each other for an answer of what they were going to do next, but nopony spoke. Then, an unexpected voice broke the silence. Rose Bud, the large, gentle colt begun in his deep but quiet voice, “I have an idea.”