Ace Sparks had once been unemployed, when he was, he thought it was boring, a waste of his time, but how he yearned to go back to those times again. Now he was fleeing everything he had known, everypony he had known. Suddenly, Ace's train of thought was lost, because he heard a bark in the distance.
Ace galloped at full speed into a forest, the barking becoming more frequent and louder.
He soon heard the barking getting closer, until he saw wooden creatures with green glowing eyes.
Timberwolves. Three of them.
One of them dived at him. Ace swung his hoof at its face, breaking the side of its snout, redirecting it into a tree. Suddenly, a second timberwolf bit into his flank. Ace cried out as a chunk was taken out of his left flank. He used a kindling spell on the timberwolf, it whimpered and howled as it ran away, still burning until it fell over in the distance. The third looked at the remains of its pack and ran away.
Dark red blood was sticking to his Black coat. He was now aware this is the Everfree, due to the strange creatures. Ace was in a puddle of his own blood, every movement he made was agonizing. Ace held the wound closed with his horn and fled to a cave. The cave he was in was at a vantage point, from there he saw Twilight's library burning down, little white specks of what he assumed were papers. to his right, he saw Celestia's castle crumbling down off its mountain, probably crushing ponies below it.
The entirety of Equestria was crumbling around him, he hoped it was a dream, that he would soon wake up.
Unfortunately, it was NOT a dream.
He looked up at the sky in the distance, a light blue blur was flying across the sky, only to disappear suddenly into a black cloud, could it have been a feeble attempt to make a Sonic Rainboom? He no longer cared, no Rainboom could fix this. Not even Celestia herself could. He
wondered who could have been responsible for this anyway.
He looked closer at the clouds, they certainly weren't clouds, they were ponies. Ponies, all had black coats, as if they were one of the same. Ace thought he read something like it somewhere in a book, what were they? changelets, changelogs, chainlinks? Changelings. Thousands of them. Whoever that poor soul was who tried to fix what had been broken must've been killed or eaten. Either way, they never got away.
He thought of the countless ponies being killed or dying every second that ticked by.
He figured he should try to fix this, some way, somehow.
He stood up, he started cantering with a limp.
He struggled down the hill halfway, tripped and started to roll, by this time he lost focus on his wound, it opening and getting stabbed by rocks and twigs and covered with mud. He was knocked unconscious by a rock.
He woke up with somepony over him, looking at him. "Are you alright?" she inquired, "You tumbled quite a long way down."
Ace replied: "Well, just watched Equestria as we know it fall apart. so I'd say probably not." She paused a moment to take that in.
"You're lucky I found you when I did, you could've easily bled out with that wound there." Ace looked at his flank, it being stitched up now.
"What did you come into the Everfree for anyway?" He asked the purple alicorn.
"I was falsely informed that one of the elements of harmony was in here."
Ace looked around. He was not in a hospital, but a hut.
"What's an alicorn even doing in a hut?" He asked.
"Well, a zebra used to live here, but I doubt she'll be coming back." She answered despondently. Ace thought for a moment.
"Did you write a book?" He asked. She smiled
"Many."
"Is your name Twilight Sparkle?"
"Yes."
"Well I think your friend died trying to create a sonic rainboom."
"What?"
"Rainbow Dash, she died."
"H-how?"
"She flew right into a swarm of changelings."
She had a look of hopelessness in her eyes.
"Maybe we should go and find the other four, if we band together, we could go look for Celestia."
Her face lit up, then returned to how it was before.
"It's pointless now, we can't fight them without a good aviator, maybe we should just give up."
"You're an alicorn. You are an heir to the throne if not a princess already. Are you sure you want to give up on your subjects?"
"You know what, you're right."
They set out into the forest, galloping through thicket after thicket.
They made it out, they closer they came, the louder the screaming.
When they arrived what they saw was horror. Colts and fillies trampled by a stampede of ponies. Sweet Apple Acres was in shambles, all of the trees felled. Screams of ponies getting torn apart by the swarms. Fluttershy came galloping towards Twilight, tears streamed down her face.
"Twilight! Everypony is screaming and dying and killing each other! You have to help us! Please!"
Twilight was shocked by the chaos around her. Ace had to think quickly before they too got trampled.
"Fluttershy, you have to help us if you want to be helped. Do you know where Celestia is?"
"No."
"Then please help us look for her."
"A-alright."
The three fled the scene, and galloped all the way to Canterlot.
Canterlot was near abandoned, aside from a tall white figure.
Twilight recognized her immediately.
"Celestia, help us restore Equestria, we need you to! Celestia...?"
Celestia stood still, emotionless.
Then she spoke.
"I could've stopped them. I don't know what happened."
"That doesn't matter now. What matters is we might be able to salvage this."
They went to get the rest of ponyville.
With time they gathered all the ponies they could. Gordon Freemane, Octavia, Vinyl Scratch, Aloe, Lotus, Rarity, Barney Ironbuck, Soarin, Rumble, even Button Mash. Together, they fought the changelings.
Ace couldn't see what happened, he was focusing on fighting.
He plowed through their forces, bucking and stabbing his way to drive them off.
When they were driven away, the losses were heavy, but they had won.
They were free to rebuild their once beloved and thriving world.
Author's Note
This was my first story, hope you enjoy! 