Episode 214: A Long Night in Equestria

The old chamber was saturated by the uneven cries for what Platinum read as several minutes before Chrysalis seemed to just... compose herself. Like a sculpture being remodeled, or perhaps just a cracked window being taped over, Chrysalis stood, back straight, head held rigidly high as she wiped her face with one hoof that had not quite ceased trembling. She kept her back to Platinum and Ocellus, but Platinum heard the Changeling Queen’s uneven breathing slowly returning to normal before Chrysalis tilted her head to give Platinum a look glazed with uncertainty.

“Your timing is atrocious. I could have used your assistance much earlier.”

Platinum felt a strange bubble of a laugh build in her throat, but kept it from fully escaping as she shook her head in wonderment, “You’re the one who went off delving into some hidden death-trap maze with a pack of children, without doing anything to notify me first. Be glad I arrived when I did, otherwise you might still be locked in battle with... whatever it was you were fighting. What was that?”

“Paintings,” Chrysalis said, kicking one of the larger ice chunks of the frozen constructs of enchanted paint, watching it bounce down the short stone stairs with a look of satisfaction and unease in equal measure, “Imbued by powerful magic to come to life and annoy me to death with some inane ‘test’ of my character. Hmph! The nerve on that alicorn!”

“The alicorn that is technically your past self?” Platinum pointed out, to which Chrysalis flicked her tail and stomped a hoof with raw indignation.

“That’s besides the point! I’ll not be made a fool of, even by myself! You must at least understand a little of how that feels, given I’ve seen no love lost between yourself and your Reigai.”

Truthfully Platinum could not deny that. The Reigai version of herself was a walking reminder of things Platinum preferred to forget about herself, both the good and the bad, which led to her present circumstances. Yet she was feeling all the more keenly that perhaps past reminders of what one was could, and should, be used to reflect on what one could be. If one cannot look upon one’s past self with honesty, how can one know at all if your present self still needs work? Perhaps a little more self reflection would have spared Soul Society a lot of trouble, and her son some heartache, even if his life would have remained in danger.

She favored Chrysalis with a frank look, “It’s true, my Reigai is annoying, because she reminds me of my mistakes. I won’t tell you how to feel about your past self, Chrysalis, but as a friend I’ll offer the advice that it’s worth consideration as to why your past self gets under your skin.”

“Ugh, don’t go trying to give credence to this whole silly ‘test’, Platinum. I...” Chrysalis’ face did a scrunched up, snout wrinkling, eye twitching spasm before she dragged the words from her throat, “...thank... you for your help. That’s not to say we’re ‘friends’, but you are a useful ally. Now, before I feel any more need to smash my skull into the nearest blunt surface until I’m blissfully unconscious, I’m going to retrieve my Relic, and finally get what I deserve. Power. Authority. My hive back under control.”

Ocellus laughed, to which Chrysalis shot a glare at the younger Changeling, “What’s so funny, child? You should be running scared by now, not giggling up a storm at your soon to be reinstated Queen!”

Ocellus, head bent, one hoof holding her sides, smiled as she looked up, “S-sorry, heheh, it’s just you looked like simply saying ‘thank you’ to a friend was physically painful for you.”

Another eye spasm from Chrysalis as she snorted and turned away, examining the sarcophagus and experimentally pushing on the lid with her hooves as she talked, “It was. I have never once believed in all of that ‘friendship is magic’ foolishness the ponies spout non-stop, like sewage from a pipe! I only acknowledge Platinum because she’s proven a hundred times more capable and loyal than my own offspring!”

Ocellus, still not trying to flee, instead trotted up, watching as Chrysalis struggled to get the sarcophagus lid open, which was not being very cooperative at all. The little Changeling’s clear, crystal blue eyes never left Chrysalis, as if searching, “I’ll point out I helped a lot in getting you down here. Also, friendship isn’t foolish. It’s made our hive strong. That’s what you care about, right? Power? Strength?”

“Auuuuugh!” Chrysalis threw her hooves up, then ran them through her pockmarked, dull green mane, “I do not need a tiny tot giving me armchair psychology! Is this the part where you tell me ‘Oh, there’s good in you somewhere’, ‘Oh, just let friendship into your heart and all will be well’, ‘Oh, you don’t need power, Queen Chrysalis, because friendship is power’?” She made a retching, throwing up noise, gurgling deep in her throat before stomping a hoof again, rather petulantly before going back to trying to shove open the sarcophagus lid, “Not! Happening! Not in a million years! I’d rather be turned to stone and cast into the middle of the deepest ocean than ever admit that... that I need help... ugh... stupid... heavy... lid... Platinum, this lid is very heavy.”

Platinum coughed lightly, glanced at Ocellus with a small, barely visible smile, then proceeded to help Chrysalis by planting her own hooves alongside the Changeling Queen’s, and they both together were able to finally inch the exceedingly heavy stone lid away to reveal the sarcophagus’ contents. Chrysalis pointedly avoided Ocellus’ own smug look by peering into the sarcophagus, her tail twitching.

“I’m not sure why I wasn’t expecting bones, but I wasn’t,” said Platinum, dusting off her chest. Quite a bit of dust, probably containing some bone, had kicked up from the opening. Inside was an alicorn’s skeleton, well preserved, draped in a dress of fine, black cloth that was nearly transparent. The skeleton’s hooves were clasped over her chest as she lay on her back, holding a golden torc with a jade stone embedded in it, which still shone with immense luster despite the fine layer of dust on it.

“So, this is what you’re after? One of these Relic thingies?” Ocellus asked, peering in with naked curiosity. Chrysalis swatted lightly at her with one wing, not really doing much than brushing Ocellus’ pink head frill.

“Yes. Don’t touch. Mine.”

“Would it even do anything for me if I did take it?” Ocellus replied innocently, but Chrysalis rolled her eyes.

“Don’t play dumb with me, child. You could steal it and thwart my plans. I should deal with you, but you’re more useful alive as a hostage for our escape. Which reminds me, Platinum, didn’t you cross paths with two other annoying little children on the way here? I sent two back for... um... reasons...”

She didn’t want to admit it was largely for Fuller and his sister’s safety, because it wasn’t. They would have just gotten in the way. Useless kids. The fight with the paintings would have been that much more annoying if she’d had to look after those two as well as Ocellus. Or rather ignore them! Yes, not ‘look after’. Ignore. Annoying children.

Platinum scanned Chrysalis’ face, with a faint glint of amusement in her eyes, as if she was able to pierce Chrysalis’ well veiled thoughts. Chrysalis was equally baffled and consternated by the fact that Platinum seemed to be able to glean just what she was thinking, and even worse, it didn’t bother Chrysalis nearly as much as it should have!

“I did. Fortunately for you, I was once a Soul Reaper Captain, and remaining unseen was not difficult for me. Still, a good move on your part to send those children back, Chrysalis. For their sake.”

“Pfffuggggl!” Chrysalis made a noise somewhere between a raspberry and a gagging choke, “I did it because they would have likely just caused me further trouble. Now, time for me to get my glamourous Relic and ascend to a new height of power and soon-to-be revenge!”

Chrysalis growled under her breath and reached out to take the torc. It was surprisingly light in her hoof, especially for gold. Was this even gold? Now that she was touching it, while it had the color and luster of gold, it was so light, and pliable, almost more like the resin she and her children used to build their hives and cocoons. Yet this gold resin was much more durable and easy to bend by comparison. She flexed it a few times, amazed at the construction. Was it this way due to the magic of the Relic, or was there more to it than that?

“It’s pretty,” Ocellus said, to Chrysalis’ grunt.

“It's useful. As a Changeling you should know that appearances are a tool, nothing more, used to help you get what you want. Now then, time to test it out.”

She slipped the torch on, after a moment taken to dust it off. Once it was settled around her neck, she stood there, eyes closed. A minute passed, and Platinum and Ocellus kept staring at her. Platinum coughed, and Ocellus shuffled her hooves.

“Is... is it broken?” asked Ocellus.

“How am I supposed to know!?” Chrysalis said past clenched teeth as her hoof poked at the torch and its jade gem, “Come on, damn you! I went through all those stupid puzzles, traps, and trails, now you give me my power boost right now! On! Power up! Relic Morph! Henshin! Domain Expansion! ...Bankai?”

Platinum put a hoof to her face, “It occurs to me that we haven’t exactly the foggiest notion of how to actually make a Relic function, do we?”

“Ggggaaaaah! I did not put myself through this torturous experience just to be toyed with by a hunk of jewelry that thinks it's better than me!” Chrysalis shouted, smacking the torch with her hoof multiple times, “You hear me, Laverna!?”

“Look, Chrysalis, if this place tested you, and let you have the Relic, then I’m sure it will work in due time,” Platinum said with the kind of soft tone a mother might use with a particularly ornery child. Chrysalis was a bit too busy raging to really notice or care, but she did stop hitting her Relic and glanced at Platinum, who continued, “For now we should just be glad to have acquired it. We need to leave, quickly and quietly.”

“I am well aware of that,” said Chrysalis with a slightly snippy tone, “Those children might blab to Thorax about this place, so we’d best be gone before the King of Fools comes poking his nose down here. This one-” she gestured at Ocellus, “-I can wrap in a cocoon to buy us some time. She’ll get out eventually, the clever little grub, but not before we’re well away from the hive. Then, once I work out how to make this dumb necklace give me power, I shall return in my full glory!”

“The King won’t just let you take over,” Ocellus said plainly, a surprising amount of firm resolve in her voice for such a small child, looking up at the towering Chrysalis, “None of us will. You’d be better off just going away, and maybe thinking about what Laverna said. There’s a chance for changing for the better, even for you-”

“Bleeeggh! That’s my nausea voice, child, in case you were wondering. Why would I need to-” she made air quotes with her hooves and spoke in a mocking, high pitched imitation of Ocellus, “-‘change for the better’ when thus far I’ve done perfectly fine as I am... what? Stop looking at me like that!”

“Like what?” said Ocellus with a flat stare.

“Like I’m not doing perfectly fine! Like I’m a hot mess! Which I’m not!” Chrysalis yelled, wings buzzing, “I’ll have you know I have been doing great since I left this hive! I’ve even joined a cadre of powerful, otherworldly allies who shall plunder this realm of magic, and help me get my vengeance upon all who deposed me! Hahahahaaaaah!”

Platinum coughed, loudly, interrupting Chrysalis’ attempts at maniacal laughter. Chrysalis paused, looking over her shoulder, “What? Can’t you see I’m in the middle of a rousing bout of derisive laughter at the expense of a young child?”

“Putting aside the immense psychological implications of that sentence I do rather need to tell you something. Something I was waiting for a good moment to bring up, but considering you seem more interested in arguing with a child about your moral compass or lack thereof, I’d better just say it.”

Platinum cleared her throat and shuffled uncomfortably for a moment before saying, “Before I came down here, my exceedingly powerful spiritual senses picked up a number of disturbing things in the vicinity of our base. Your Hollow counterpart has betrayed us, brought her entire legion of Arrancar to Equestria, and by now may well have finished killing everyone back at Hitsuyo-Aku. No doubt, once that’s done, she’ll start looking for you, and me, and probably be keenly interested in devouring both of us. Especially you. So... yeah...”

Everything drooped upon Chrysalis as if gravity itself had doubled upon her like a dark wave of shadowed terror. Her mane, her wings, her hooves, her head, her very being slumped and went so pale the pitch onyx of her chitinous hide grew to a more ashen gray shade. She literally felt as if the bowels of the Equestrian stone beneath her hooves were crumbling open to swallow her whole, only rather than darkness awaiting her in those depths, it was the laughing, psychotic face of her Hollow counterpart, jaws open wide to slurp down her soul.

“...aaah...aaah...aaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH-”

Thorax ensured the cell ‘door’ was firmly shut closed by powerful enchanted resin. Beyond it, in an oval cell room of fairly comfortable stone, with some moss beds, the two that he and his brother had found spying on them in the Badlands both sat. Neither the young colt or filly had offered any resistance, once captured, but had shared several meaningful looks with each other as Pharynx and Thorax had dragged them back to the hive. They hadn’t responded to any questions, clamming up almost instantly after being caught. They didn’t match any description of regular travelers to the hive, and none of the ponies visiting at the moment knew who they were.

“Make sure they’re both fed, but be careful with them,” he told the two guards posted on either side of the cell. The guards saluted, looking more excited to have something to do than worried the two tiny ponies might try to escape. Thorax remained concerned. His instincts were telling him this pair weren’t what they seemed, even if the most logical explanation was that two visiting foals got lost and stumbled upon him and his brother training.

“We just gonna keep them in there forever?” asked Pharynx as Thorax trotted out into the corridor beyond the main prison room, a place the hive had barely had any use for since Chrysalis had been banished.

“Of course not,” Thorax said, “I’ll contact Princess Celestia tomorrow morning and see if anypony in Equestria has posted any missing foal reports.”

“You ought to let me interrogate them,” Pharynx said, eyes narrowed, “You know there’s something up with them, brother.”

“No, I don’t ‘know’ that, I just suspect it, and so do you. I’m not about to let you rough up two foals in our kingdom based on pure suspicion. This isn’t the days of Chrysalis anymore, Pharynx. I thought you understood that.”

“Well,” Pharynx looked away, wings fluttering, “That may be so, but there’s also danger out there, with those extradimensional invaders. Don’t like taking chances. Not with the hive’s safety.”

“Relax,” said Thorax, “I understand how you feel, and appreciate how protective you are of us, but chances are this is just...a... huh...” Thorax tilted his head, a distant sound ringing at the edge of his senses.

“Do you hear someone screaming?”

“No, I... huh?” Pharynx now tilted his head as well, listening intently, “You know, I kinda do. Like some unbelievably panicked scream of utter terror and despair. Weird. Wonder where it's coming from?”

Night strobed with flashes of blossoming explosions and cutting swaths of light. If the citizens of Klugetown hadn’t figured out that all Tartarus was figuratively breaking loose on their town’s front doorstep before, they certainly were getting the message now. Despite Firefly and Sombra’s best efforts, stray Cero beams and Bala spheres were detonating at random amid the tightly packed buildings, sending rubble, and sometimes people, tumbling to the ground. General confusion and panic was setting in as hundreds of residents started grabbing personal belongings and rushing from their homes, heading in the opposite direction of the booms and flashes stemming from beyond the north wall.

In that smooth patch of desert north of Klugetown, dozens of craters already scared the area as a single pegasus and unicorn did all in their not inconsiderable power to halt a small army of soul devouring entities from another dimension from turning Klugetown into their buffet.

Mobility was Sombra’s ally, the soot black of night mingling with the jets of ink shadow that bled from his very being. He delved ever more into the magic of his origin, the might of the Umbrum, and let it spill forth from his horn, his eyes, his very living shadow. Some part of his mind and soul did fear he was going too far. It’d been a blessing the Crystal Heart had made him wholly a unicorn upon his rejection of his Umbrum nature, but even that artifact of immense power couldn’t truly sever that connection or remove what he was. Drawing upon that magic of darkness and shadow in full may well have unforeseen consequences, but at the moment he needed it to be a shield against a greater darkness, keeping Klugetown’s citizens as safe as possible.

He flitted and slipped through the pools and shifting wall-masses of shadow he’d conjured, making his body little more than a barely seen flicker of motion and green eyes in the night. Blades, spikes, sharp protruding curves of scything black, all rose and struck from his conjured darkness at the fiends in white. Arrancar, supernaturally fast and strong, danced amid his weapons of shadow. Most had invoked names to their Zanpaktou, transforming their bodies in as many ways as Sombra’s imagination could conjure, and even when his magic struck home, it was no small feat to damage these Arrancar’s steel hard bodies.

One was wrapped in cords of bone that shaped around her like a thorn bush, which she slashed with like extending whips. He evaded in and out of his shadows as these thorn branches of bone white pierced sand and shadow around him, and he retaliated with a thick forest of needle thin shadow spikes that tore into the Arrancar’s torso. Yet, still alive, the Arrancar laughed past bloodied lips and several thorns shot off of the branches encircling her arms, the thorns glowing bright red as they fell around Sombra’s location and exploded with infernos of searing light.

He felt some of that light burn his hide, and he flowed backwards through his shadows, encircling a dome of blackness around him. Another Arrancar, huge yet lopsided in is form, with one giant arm of bulging white flesh protruding from a body encased in coarse, dark red fur, slammed the ground and nearly upended Sombra, like catapulting someone by pushing down one side of a trampoline. Sombra turned himself in mid-air, directing blasts of burning shadow out from the dome at this ten foot tall brute, which tore chunks from the Arrancar’s massive arm, but not before a sonic punch cracked into him and sent him hard to the ground.

Dizzy with pain, he melded with the shadows beneath him and flung a circle of cutting swords of darkness around him in several intersecting patterns. He didn’t see the brute go down, but felt the impact of limbs being severed hitting the sands and heard the Arrancar’s screams as they fell. Yet even as one went down, a barrage of ruby Ceros impacted the landscape around him, flinging him from his shadows as more of the cackling horde came at him!

Hot blood from a wound on his scalp obscured his vision, but he still let his horn bathe in darkness as he summoned up a flood of shadow he shot upwards in a wave at the descending Arrancar, engulfing two of the three in crushing darkness that left them rag dolling backwards. The third, however, was faster, buzzing into existence behind Sombra with a distinct hum of noise as she drew back an arm. It was the thorny one, covered in her deadly white branches, and several of the branches coiled together into a spike she stabbed at Sombra’s back. He flickered into shadow, side stepping like a dark after image, but even so he’d been a moment too slow to fully escape, and felt the bloody impact as a piece of his right flank, near the shoulder, was torn free.

“Your blood smells good! Bet your souls will taste even better, like black liquorice!” the Arrancar said, smiling wide, despite blood dripping from her mouth from the wounds in her stomach Sombra had already given her.

Sombra did not deign to respond to the Arrancar’s taunting. Besides, he hated black liquorice. Red all the way. Ironic, perhaps, but true. He spun around, conjuring a pair of large shadow blades that he sliced at the Arrancar from both the left and right simultaneously. She stepped back from the twin blow, her form vanishing with that buzz of high speed motion, and struck back with a hefty thrust of her thorn spike. Sombra altered one of the shadow blades into a shield, absorbing the spike like a piece of pitch black pudding, holding it fast while he struck with the other blade. The magical sword of focused darkness and void pierced spiritually enhanced Hierro skin, and the Arrancar cackled, having used her free arm to take the blow. The arm came off, but she didn’t seem to care, and Sombra saw the glow of blood red coming from the shadows encasing her other arm; she was charging a Cero!

“Boom, boom, goes the edge pony!” laughed the Arrancar, but just before she detonated her Cero on Sombra at point blank range, she was rammed into by a flying object going at several times the speed of sound.

The Arrancar was spun around like a corkscrew and drilled across the sands, and having lost focus on controlling her Cero, it explode on top of her in a pillar of incinerating red. Shielding himself from the blast, Sombra glanced at Firefly, the high-speed object responsible for launching his foe like a crash test dummy.

“I had that under control.”

“Oh, of course you did, I just love kill stealing,” Firefly said, voice breathless as she raked her cannon skyward, and fired a long, hefty blast of violet energy that cut across the night and knocked several flying Arrancar out of the sky. She added in a salvo of missiles from the hatches of her Fullbring armor, which exploded around them amid her Dragoon drones firing a stitching lattice of beams against half a dozen Arrancar that had been chasing her, forcing them to briefly fall back.

Sombra could tell Firefly was battered by the battle thus far. Her dark purple armor sparked with a dozen cracks and fractures, and blood seeped from several stab or claw wounds on her extremities. The human turned pegasus still flapped her wings with vigor, however, augmented by the mechanical wings overlapping them from her Fullbring as she glanced back at Sombra, “How many have you downed?”

A half second of thought and he said, “I’ve definitively defeated six so far, I believe. Several more maimed, but probably not dead”

“Great. I’ve taken out seven, for sure, and a couple more too wounded to keep fighting. Just leaves... too many, hah...”

The situation wasn’t tenable. It hardly needed to be said. They hadn’t taken out half of the Arrancar that had come so far, and both were already injured and draining of stamina quickly. To make matters worse, Sombra suspected he’d spotted at least one or two of the foe sneaking past him and Firefly during the melee, getting into Klugetown. There wasn’t anybody in there that had a prayer of stopping these beasts, at least as far as Sombra knew.

If only he had a free minute or two to cast a spell to message the Princesses. But the Arrancar weren’t about to let up. He and Firefly were being slowly surrounded, the Arrancar wising up to how dangerous the pair were, approaching like a pack of wolves getting ready to pounce upon wounded but still formidable prey. He imagined they only had a few seconds before the pack of Arrancar, at least still thirty strong, would pounce.

“Well I can hardly let the score stay as it is,” Sombra said, surprised at his own capacity for levity given how likely it was that this was the end of the road, “I must represent my fellow Equestrians, after all.”

“Hah, fine by me, I love a competition!” Firefly said, hefting her cannon with one hand while extending the hilt of her energy blade into her left palm and lighting up the potent, purple beam sword, which illuminated the salivating faces of the hungry Arrancar that were surrounding them, “Loser owes the winner drinks afterward!”

Both of them were coated in strobing red light as several of the Arrancar around them began to charge and aim Ceros, casting everything in bloody shades. Sombra smiled wanly, his horn adding a cast of extra darkness to the scene as it blossomed with fresh shadow, “How about I make it fair, and give you a leg up?”

He sent spiraling arms of shadow flying upwards, and each shadow wrapped itself around the multitude of Firefly’s Dragoon drones, turning their edges into sharp blades of void and empowering their forms with the essence of dark magic. Firefly blinked in surprise, then returned his smile with a vicious grin, “Dragoons; Full Burst!”

They both moved together, just as multiple Ceros barreled forth upon their position. Firefly shot straight up with a crack of broken sound barrier, while her Dragoons spiraled around her with waspish speed, firing down upon the tightly packed Arrancar. Each beam, while remaining a lance of purple light, was now edged with darkness, which appeared to enhance their penetrative power as several Arrancar were pierced through bodies or limbs.

Explosions ripped apart the ground in an inferno, but Sombra had already slid forward through shadow to raise a cluster of slashing shadow-claws around him, grasping one Arrancar by the face and smashing them around like a loose sack to be flung into one of their brethren. Other claws cut hardened Heirro skin, bleeding several, even as they snarled with feral glee and cut with either Zanpaktou, or smashed with powerfully transformed limbs from Resurreccion. Sombra was caught in a rocking field of animalistic claws, bludgeoning fists, and cutting blades of bone, and only his insubstantiality and constant shadow movement kept him alive, if not unharmed.

Cuts accumulated on his dark hide, until the black fur was slick with blood. Even so he dashed and cut, slashed with shadow and threw beams of darkness in every direction. Anything to injure or outright take out another Arrancar, anything to slow them down, even for just a few more seconds.

In the sky above Firefly fought with equal fervor, her Dragoons forming a dark tempest of beams around her. She stabbed with them, their now dark magic enhanced edges turning the drones into effective rams that speared through flesh. Her cannon barrel was melting hot from constant discharges of thick, violet beams, even as the sky became a maelstrom of Cero beams firing up to seek her. She dodged one, two, three such beams before one became impossible to evade. She cut at it with her energy sword, bending and deflecting the tide of scarlet death. Doing so left her open to another Arrancar blasting at her from behind with Bala, this one transformed into a Resurreccion that gave the female Arrancar four stark white bat wings and a helmet of bone shaped like a one-horned demon. The Bala fired from the bat Arrancar’s wings, and as they flew the projectiles split and became pairs that strung traces of energy between each bullet. Upon impact these projectiles wrapped around Firefly like bolas, clamping down her legs, one of her wings, and her cannon arm.

“Aw crap!” she yelped, cartwheeling in the air as she directed her Dragoons to form up in a wall behind her, unleashing a focused salvo of shots at the Arrancar as she tried to maintain her place in the air.

The bat-like Arrancar was able to slip past a number of the Dragoon beams with Sonido, but Firefly focused enough of them upon that space that one beam struck home and diced a wing off. All it took was that split second for the remaining beams to pound that Arrancar out of the sky and into the ground, but having focused her firepower upon one foe simply left Firefly open to others to move in. She, still wrapped up by these strange energy bolas, had only one arm to defend herself with as two more Arrancar came at her from two different angles with Zanpaktou swinging in wild arcs. Her energy blade slashed left and right, parrying as best she could, but one of the Arrancar, a big muscled brute of a man, simply spun with the momentum of her parry and planted a kick into her that sent Firefly streaking down to the ground.

The rough impact sent sand flying up, and Firefly coughed as Sombra appeared next to her, covered in blood, both his and that of the Arrancar, as his own opponents chased him down. He used a shield of shadow to block the claw of a crusstacean-like Arrancar, while slashing with several weapons of darkness at those that came at him from the sides. One charged at his back, but Firefly, managing to snap free of the energy bolas after a moment of pouring power into her armor, rose and cut upwards with her own blade of light, drawing a deep cut on the Arrancar’s chest and forcing them to leap away.

“How we doing back there?” she asked, gripping her energy blade in both hands as she stood with her back to Sombra’s. She’d lost her grip on her cannon somewhere and it lay out of reach, about twenty meters away.

“Splendid,” Sombra replied, breathing hard, his magic waning as he did his best to keep his shield and shadow blades conjured. “You?”

Both were now struggling to keep the Arrancar back, who were picking at them with fast hit and run moves, slashing and retreating, throwing Balas from a distance while letting their fellows slowly erode the pair’s stamina. Despite their losses, it was like the pack of Arrancar were enjoying themselves, all smiling and laughing like children at play. This was turning into less of a fight and more of a pack of animals playing with their food.

Between the two of them they’d taken out half of the pack, but it was clear both Sombra and Firefly were running low on energy, both magical and spiritual.

To make matters worse, while it was difficult to sense things clearly with the conflicting reiatsu of so many Arrancar in close proximity, even Firefly couldn’t miss the fact that the Reigai of Zecora’s spiritual pressure had... vanished, while Chrysalis’ was still very much present. So, that fight was over, and Chrysalis had won. Which meant nothing good for them or Klugetown, or Equestria at large for that matter.

As each wound accumulated on her, Firefly thought of her daughter. Even so, running wasn’t an option. She might have been able to successfully flee if she really just booked it at full speed. She doubted any of these Arrancar would be able to catch her if she really focused all her remaining power on running away. But she wasn’t going to do that. Even if she never got to see Rainbow Dash again, leaving behind this mess for her daughter to clean up, Firefly couldn’t bring herself to turn tail and run.

She wasn’t sure if it was her own blood, Sombra’s blood, or one of the Arrancar they’d cut down, but either way a wet patch of sand caught her armored boot and Firefly went down to one knee. Seizing upon the opening, an Arrancar with needle-like claws in his Resurreccion form rushed in, sharp fingers stabbing together like a spear aimed for her chest.

“Shelter and restrain; Asa no Yuki!” (Morning Snow)

Something white and glittering flitted above like the wings of a sparrow, and a gust of freezing snow blanketed the Arrancar that was about to skewer Firefly. In an instant the Arrancar froze in place, locked down in frost. Firefly looked up to see a form in black robes flip over her and land nearby, spiraling a trail of white cloth that was tipped with an edge of rattling white kunai blades.

“Redheart!?”

The Reigai of Lieutenant Redheart didn’t immediately respond, flicking her Zanpaktou in its Shikai form around to create another gust of freezing snow from the chiming kunai blades at the end of her white cloth. Arrancar jumped back, avoiding the sheet of snow which froze the sands they’d stood upon. Before the Arrancar could mount a fresh attack, other forms appeared from the rushing winds of Flash Steps. Other Reigai, the carbon copied foot soldiers who wielded standardized Zanpaktou, still fought with ferocity as they threw themselves at the Arrancar. The male Reigai used identical sickle blades that shot crescent waves of spirit energy that carved blood arcs into Arrancar, while the women struck with bamboo spears that jetted out burning oil that lit up the night with both light and screams. While not individually powerful, there were still plenty of the soldier Reigai, survivors of the initial attack on Hitsuyo-Aku, numbering perhaps thirty or forty, and with the element of surprise the Arrancar were forced back, if only for a minute.

And into a trap set for them as chemicals mixed into the sands in a specific and highly volatile combination detonated like high-powered, reishi-based nitroglycerin bombs. Most of a dune exploded in a blaze of green, blue, and yellow chemical energies that incinerated three or four Arrancar at once.

Behind Sombra and Firefly a voice coughed, “Tch, hardly worth my time, really, but I’ll collect my payment in body samples when this is all said and done.”

“You...” Sombra said, eyes narrowed, as the young Starswirl Reigai cracked a chiding grin as he shouldered the giant gunbai style war-fan that was his Zanpaktou.

“Yes, I! Me! Brilliant in both tactical planning and timing. Be grateful. No, really, be grateful, because I want payment in the form of knowledge for saving your lives. Its the only thing I considered among Redheart’s incessant arguments as we fled for our lives.”

Redheard, sighing, cut a glance towards him, “My Captain gave her life so that we might live in turn, but also so that we might choose what to do with those lives. I won’t dishonor her by abandoning these people she wished to fight for, to make amends for our use as pawns in this tragedy befalling this realm.”

“So drearily serious,” the Reigai Starswirl tapped his massive fan on his shoulder, “My residual fondness for Zecora’s sense of duty compelled me to give you aid this time, but once we’re done here I intend to make full use of my freedom! A whole land of mysterious magic to explore and study is not something I’ll forsake lightly.”

“Well, shit, I don’t care why you guys are here, I’m just glad you decided to come,” said Firefly, catching her breath while warily eyeing the remaining Arrancar. The pack had fallen back, their numbers dwindled to around ten, and clearly no longer eager to go on the attack now that the prey was no longer so easy.

Sombra, as if remembering something, turned towards Klugetown, “There were some that got by us, into the town! We-”

“Taken care of!”

The new voice came from a form strutting out of the gate, yawning loudly. She was... somewhat dressed in loose disarray, as if her Soul Reaper robes were hastily put on. She also swayed like a drunkard, and one could smell the alcohol coming off her from hundreds of meters off. All starred, and Firefly looked especially shocked yet amused, to see the Reigai of Captain Platinum stumble forward with a reddened face and still trying to get her robes on straight. She held her Zanpaktou loosely in her right hand, its Shikai form dripping ice. Behind her, a form scrambled along nervously, a tall, rugged looking humanoid cat with brown fur, a well groomed fringe of blue mane on his head, and emerald green eyes, wearing a fine red jacket.

“Helloooo!” the drunk Reigai Platinum said, waving, “I have saved the town! Hiccup! Which is good, because it's a nice town, and I like it, and it has the bestest drinks! Tell them, Clapper-”

“Capper, ma’am,” said the cat man, and Platinum’s young Reigai giggled and patted his head.

“Yush, Capper, cute Capper. So fluffy and warm.”

“Ahem, yes, well,” Capper slowly peeled her hand off of his head and gave the rest a nervous half smile, “I don’t fully get what’s going on, but this lady came in early this evening, wanting to see the sights. I, being the upstanding gentleman of the night that I am, showed the nice lady around. Including the best drinking holes. Never seen a woman pack away that much drink in one night... well, anyway, when everything started exploding and these nasty characters showed up in the streets attacking folk, she, well... pulled out a magic ice sword thing and just went to town.”

“I kicked their asshess! All of ‘em!” Platinum declared, throwing an arm around Capper, “Because I’m the besthish! Better’n that stupid Celestia who’s sooooo damn good at everything! But not toooonight! ...Hi, Starswirl... what’re you doing here? In fact... why are Arrancar here... and why is the world spinning?”

She fell face down in the sand, and began to snore.

“Well, I’m glad she’s alive, at least,” said Firefly, rubbing her head, “Guess this explains why she wasn’t in the base when it got hit. But she’s going to be useless if Chrysalis comes after us next.”

A sullen look struck her face as she looked to Redheart, “I’m sorry about Zecora. I wish I’d stuck around to help her fight.”

“It may not have made a difference other than ensuring your own death as well, and this town would have been short a critical defender,” Redheart replied, but there was a weight of loss to her voice as she clutched the cloth of her Zanpaktou in a tight, white knuckled fist. She looked to the other Reigai, the foot soldiers having formed up in a defensive line around them, facing the Arrancar, who had retreated even further away. One by one, those Arrancar turned and vanished into the night, clearly no longer eager to attack a town that had too many defenders left standing that could hurt them.

“It seems they’ve lost their stomach for violence once the odds no longer favor them,” Sombra said.

“They’re running to their Espada, who I hate to say it still packs enough punch to possibly take on all of us,” Firefly said with grave weight, going to retrieve her beam cannon from where she’d dropped it. Capper, the cat man, looked at her with his emerald eyes growing wider in the night.

“You mean there’s more of those things out there!?”

“A lot more, and being led by a nasty customer who’s more powerful than all of her brood put together,” Firefly said in a shamed, guilt ridden voice, “And they wouldn’t be here if not for me and my friend.”

“That is true,” Sombra said with neither vitriolic judgment or false comfort, but rather than simple, honest frankness of someone who knew exactly what Firefly was going through, “And we may yet need to shed more of our blood to set that wrong to rights. That having been said...” he lit up his horn with shadows that contained a faint, green tinge as he wove a spell, “I’d just as soon shed their blood more than our own to fix this problem.”

“Hmm? What might you be doing?” asked Starswirl, giving the magic Sombra was weaving an examining look, stroking his chin as he walked around the stallion.

“What I’ve been trying to do all evening... send a message.”

Chrysalis had found one of her spare dresses in the rooms she’d claimed in Hitsuyo-Aku, and got cleaned up and dressed in record time, just enough to find a pack of her drone children skulking back onto the base with heads hung low and many of them covered in wounds. She’d smelled the blood well before she saw them, and now confronted them in the junction leading to the elevator that connected the base’s surface tower with the substantial subterranean section.

“I see, I see,” she said, nodding her head with almost absent minded ease as her children rapidly babbled over one another to explain what had happened at the nearby Equestrian settlement. “So the Reigai regained a little backbone and ruined your night out? I’m sorry to hear that, children.”

“It wasn’t just the dumb puppets, mom!” cried one, “It was that annoying shadow pony and the flying pew-pew lady with the wings! We bled them over and over and they just wouldn’t die!”

“You gotta go out there and kill them for us, mommy!” shouted another, “Beat them, cut them, rip them to pieces!”

General nods and murmurs of bloodlust and vengeful agreement sounded from the battered, wounded pack, but they all went silent and still at a single look from Chrysalis. She had a perfected look of motherly disappointment that it could cut harsher and more completely than anything she could do via her Zanpaktou. Her voice was similarly a perfectly pitched dip of disappointed sympathy, “Aww, my poor, poor children. That’s not how this works.”

Throats gulped and feet shuffled, heads bowed, and more than a few quickly muttered pained apologies. She cut those off with another look and knelt down to peer at her children with her lips becoming a pointed smile, “Mommy loves you all very much, but that does not mean I chew your food for you. If you bit off more than you could chew, then you should learn from the experience and find softer prey, more suited to you. Now, because you’ve wasted mommy’s time, I do need to punish you-”

Wails, more cries of ‘Sorry mom!’ ‘We’re so sorry!’, but she simply raised her hand to silence all of them, “It won’t be harsh. You just have to go to bed without supper tonight, while your brothers and sisters feast. The Equestrians will be coming here soon, so this little house is going to move. Once it does, you all will help clean up and make things comfortable for when daddy comes with all of his friends. Many chores for all of you, and no supper until mommy says so.”

There were many pained looks, but also relief, for it was a relatively light punishment, and they knew a chance to eat and feast would come again soon. They all quietly thanked her and shuffled away to their rooms. Chrysalis stood and frowned, a slim finger tracing a line across her jawline, “Hmm, ten... twenty minutes or so before the Equestrians mobilize? Teleportation is so finicky. Oh, I wonder if it’ll be Celestia or Luna? Both! That would be fun, but it’ll have to wait.”

She walked off down an adjoining corridor, making her way towards the chamber with the Crossgate.

And she didn’t see the tiny, barely an inch tall figure scuttling along in the corner gloom of the hallway behind her.

Discord strained. He hated having to put forth effort to get anything done. Effort was for the mortals. He wasn’t into sweating. Yet sometimes the needs of the moment made even the mightiest lower themselves to the pauper’s arena, and Discord was gloved up and ready to box. Mixed metaphors aside, it did take just about all of his focus to make use of even the tiniest shred of his chaos magic, what with the big metal toothpick of anti-magic nestled somewhere between his gallbladder and lower intestine.

Wait... did he have a gallbladder? What was his biology, anyway? He got sick, so he had to have biology. Nope, best not to think about it right now. Thinking ‘logically’ about anything was counterproductive to using chaos magic. Pinkie Pie would be stellar at it. If he ever had to choose a successor to his magic, she was on the short list. Twilight’s poor, rational head would likely explode into a pile of flaming confetti if she ever tried to use chaos magic. Pinkie Pie, though? Total natural.

So what was he doing with the small sliver of chaos magic? How was he even using it? Medium-length story recap made less medium-length, interrogation and captivity at the hands of less than friendly Arrancar had left him injured and bleeding, and just a tiny bit of that blood that splattered outside of the constraining force fields keeping him prisoner in the depths of this fortress. That tiny bit of blood, a piece of himself, had also contained a small mote of his chaos magic, no longer being suppressed by anti-magic.

Now he couldn’t do much with this tiny mote of magic. But even a little chaos magic could still go a long way.

So he’d manipulated the blood with a snaggle toothed grin, and from the tiny drop of blood, rising like a macabre creation from a horror flick, was a miniature, inch tall, chibified Discord. This absolute little gremlin of a Discord was only nominally under Discord’s direct control, but he could give it basic commands with a thought, and see and hear through its senses.

“Go forth, Diminutive-Discord...” he whispered to his creation, and the little guy, quite unseen by the Arrancar guards who were standing watch over his prison chamber, had scampered away.

Now this tiny Discord, making little gremlin grunting noises, skittered along the hallway edge, following the Hollow Chrysalis. Discord himself had to keep his creation on track, all but shouting in its non-existent mine every time it got distracted by a long discarded coin, paper clip, or errant crumb of candy long gone stale and moldy.

“No, bad Diminutive-Discord! Stop trying to eat that eraser! Follow her, blast it, she’s getting away!”

The miniature master of chaos paused with a tossed pencil eraser half stuffed in its drooling mouth and looked at Chrysalis striding further away, turning down a junction in the halls. Spitting out the eraser (most of it, anyway), it twitched and capered its way at high speed to catch up, skidding around the corner. A few more twists and turns left it following Chrysalis into a truly vast room. Split by a bridge of steel going over a lowered portion, like a large work pit, Discord saw through his creation’s eyes that this was likely the nerve center of Hitsuyo-Aku. Most noteworthy was the towering yet near dead looking tree bearing the oddest of fruits, pale and skull shaped.

Across the bridge, a long platform area housed the workings of a technological structure, pylons supporting arcs of crackling blue/white power that formed a continuous plane of energy that looked ready to burst open into a portal at any second. Waiting for Chrysalis at a tall, black metal obelisk with a control terminal attached to it were several of her Arrancar children.

The Diminutive-Discord crept close enough to listen while hiding behind the coiling length of a power conduit.

“Get the Crossgate ready,” Chrysalis told the cadre of her children, “Time for a little home relocation.”

“Yes, mother!” said one, going to the controls, “But where are we going?”

As the Arrancar spoke they were already pressing buttons on the obelisk terminal, and the flat plane of energy opened up to show a cycling series of images, all of them Discord recognized as different parts of Equestria. The images flickered by swiftly, some showing towns and cities, others mountains, forests, or jungles. With a snap of her fingers, Chrysalis said, “There!”

The images stopped flickering, the Arrancar at the controls looking back at her curiosity, “Here, mother? But there’s nothing here. It’s a dead, empty place.”

“Ohoho, my child, that is where you are wrong,” said Chrysalis as she licked her lips. Discord felt his belly grow cold, and even his miniscule mimic shuddered, as he could see that the place shown in the portal’s image was a familiar wasteland of barren rock and shrubs. The Badlands.

“It’s not empty at all,” Chrysalis said, “I sense her, even through this portal. Hahah, oh, this night just gets better and better. Lock in the location, my children, and begin the transfer process. We have a long, wonderful night ahead of us.”

It didn’t surprise Flash Sentry to still see light coming in from the window of Twilight’s room on one of the upper floors of her castle. He’d just finished doing a quick patrol of Ponyville’s surrounding environs, his Flash Step making the whole process nice and swift while his spiritual senses let him keep a keen lookout for any unusual threats. By now the Princesses had established an effective series of wards that were keyed to Hollow reiatsu, and while the wards couldn’t function as shields due to the time constraints needed to create something of that caliber, the wards would serve as highly effective tripwires to raise alarm in case an Equestrian settlement was approached by Hollows.

It’d been many hours since communication had been lost with Sombra, and tension remained high. Flash knew that Princess Celestia and Luna weren’t sleeping any more so than Twilight was, and Princess Cadence had teleported back to the Crystal Empire to coordinate new defenses there with her husband. High above Ponyville, the Treasury hovered, the ancient seapony battleship acting as both a comforting and protective presence for Ponyville, but also a dire reminder that danger was looming on the horizon. Flash had been aboard earlier to go over anti-Hollow tactics with Tempest Shadow and her crew, including the two sirens, Aria and Sonata, who were eager to come to grips with their new powers as Inheritors.

Between that, and helping Twilight and her friends train with Announcer earlier that day, Flash was pretty bushed, an aching weariness settling into his muscles. He’d even fit in a meditative training session with his Zanpaktou, working towards the elusive acquisition of Bankai, which still felt distant to him despite his own Zanpaktou’s encouragement.

In many ways, the Lieutenant of the Thirteenth Division, far from home, felt as unsure of his ability to contribute as ever... but despite that he was oddly content and his fears felt muted. He suspected much of that had to do with his growing bond with a certain purple alicorn mare whom he found himself drawing strength from. And just as she supported him, he wanted to support her, so he brewed up some coffee in the castle kitchen and carried it up to her room, using one one to carry the mug of coffee while he used a hoof to softly knock on her door.

He heard her talking, beyond, and the door opened under a gentle glow of her magic. Flash entered her room, and saw Twilight looking into a crystal ball that rested on the desk by her bed, her voice now clear as she finished speaking to someone presumably being linked to her via the ball, “-I understand, Torch. Celestia has already dispatched the Wonderbolts to your location, and they’ll help with the search. Please tell me if you find anything else.”

The gruff and booming voice of Torch spoke back from the crystal, and Flash caught a brief glimpse of the giant dragon’s face, “Those pegasi of yours better be quick! I’m not sleeping until I’ve torn down every inch of these mountains and found my darling Ember! Oh, and that Spike fellow, too, I suppose. But mostly Ember! Ooooh, my dearest, sweetie-pumpkin-scale, where could you have gooone!? I’ll roast whoever’s taken you, I swear it!”

The crystal went dark, and Twilight sighed heavily, turning tired, shadowed eyes towards Flash. He managed a small smile, but it was a strained one as he brought her the coffee, which she accepted with a silent nod of thanks. Holding it with her magic, she downed half the mug in one go, and shivered. He put a wing around her, on instinct, and she returned the gesture. After a moment of looking at her staring at the floor, he said, “No sign of Spike or Ember, yet?”

“Actually, yes,” Twilight said, but given her expression didn’t perk up, Flash surmised the news wasn’t good. He was prepared to hear the worst, but what Twilight said got his mind thinking, “Torch’s search party located the site of an obvious battle on the side of a mountain right around where Ember and Spike were searching for Nidhogg. Claw marks, broken up terrain, all the signs and tracks of a scuffle between two large dragons. There were also some unusual elements to the site, portions of the mountainside reshaped or broken away, some in the rough approximation of a dragon’s tail... specifically Spike’s. However, there’s no sign of how the battle ended, and no tracks leading away. Torch’s trackers say it’s as if the combatants just vanished into thin air.”

Flash didn’t know what to make of the weird rocks shaped like Spike’s tail, but they dealing with Dragons from the Beast Realm, “If I had to guess, I’d say the strange signs indicate the use of Anima. I don’t know much of anything about it, just that it’s what Beast Realm natives use as their unique power. Spike, if he’s an Inheritor to a Beast Realm Dragon, probably used it on instinct.”

“That would make sense, but it hardly makes me feel better,” Twilight said as she leaned into him and put her head on his shoulder, “I shouldn’t have let him go. No matter how big he’s become physically, Spike is still a child. He had no business going off to track down someone dangerous like this Nidhogg.”

“I think it would have hurt Spike to be benched, or treated like a kid,” Flash replied carefully, “I may not have known the guy long, but he seems like he cares a lot about you and the others. You really think he would’ve been happy to be told to sit behind and do nothing?”

“No, but... but he’d be safe. I’ve always wanted to keep Spike safe. I’m responsible for him. He’s my...” Twilight paused, as if searching for a word, “...my friend. But he’s more than that, too. A little brother, maybe.”

“Family, I get it,” Flash said, “Nobody would blame you for wanting to keep him out of harm’s way. I’m just saying that you shouldn’t blame yourself for this, or get your head twisted up over what you should or should not have done. From the stories I’ve heard, he’s put himself in danger plenty of times to help you and the gals out, and been a big help more than once. Again I ask you, even if you told him to stay in Ponyville, would he have listened?”

“...Probably not. He’s gotten to that rebellious teenage phase, I think,” Twilight said, “Still doesn’t change that he’s missing, along with Ember, and I have no idea where they are or if they’re okay.”

Flash’s mind had been mulling that one over, using what limited knowledge he had of the Beast Realm. Perhaps if he’d been part of the diplomatic corps or science division, he’d have had more detailed information. However, his Captain was Celestia, who was half born of that realm. A little bit of information had trickled to him from what bits and pieces his Captain knew.

“Look, I can’t say anything for sure, but if it looks like at the location of the fight that the dragons just vanished, then there’s a strong chance that Nidhogg managed to open a portal back to the Beast Realm. It’s never been super clear to us Soul Reapers how Beast Realmers travel from realm to realm, but if its anything like Hollow Garganta or our own Senkaimon Gates, then its entirely possible to take people, even unwillingly, through them. So while I wouldn’t call off the search, I’d lay my bet that Ember and Spike were captured by Nidhogg and taken to the Beast Realm.”

Unease and not a little desperation entered Twilight’s eyes and voice, “If that’s the case, how do we get them back?” But before Flash could even answer her question, he saw the gears turning in her eyes, the bright orbs going wider as she whispered to herself, “Wait... my portal to the human realm changed when everything exploded... and we know it doesn’t lead back to your world anymore, but instead to somewhere else. Could it be linked to the Beast Realm?”

“I think we’d need to do some investigation first to find out, but if it does, then it might be possible for us to send a party through to look for Spike and Ember,” said Flash, his words seeming to galvanize Twilight to move as she gave him a quick peck on the cheek and quickly downed the rest of her coffee before moving towards the door. Flash followed her quickly, barely able to keep up with the pace of the determined Princess.

“You’re planning to go through right now? Tonight!?”

“Of course not right now,” said Twilight, passing through the chamber with her and her friend’s chairs and table, the centerpiece of the whole castle, “I’m going to get the girls together, first. It’d be crazy to go alone into a whole other reality we know nothing about without supplies, planning, and rest.”

“Okay, Twilight, I get that you want to go to Spike’s rescue, but if I can bring up one point?”

She halted, looking at him in a manner that brought Flash up short as he held up a hoof in a placating gesture, “L-look, just going to suggest that maybe talk this over with the other Princesses, first? You and your friends are, like, the front line defense for Equestria right now, and if you all left, that’d basically strip this world of a lot of magical firepower during a time when literally any day the Hollows might invade in force.”

“I know that, Flash, but this is Spike. He’s in trouble. He needs us. He... he needs me. I can’t just abandon him when he’s in the clutches of some horrible dragons from another dimension!”

He took a deep breath, approaching her slightly shaking body and held her with both wings this time, pulling her into a hug that she didn’t resist. He could still feel the raw tension in her body, the shaking urge in her frame to take action. He understood it. He just needed to get her to calm down and think things through. Looking her in the eyes, he spoke with warmth, “I know. You’re not the kind of woman, er, mare, who’d leave a loved one in trouble. You’re one of the bravest and most compassionate people I’ve ever met, Twilight. But you’re also the smartest, and one of the most practical. So I’m just asking you to tap into that for a second, and ask yourself how you can help Spike, and also still be ready to defend Equestria?”

There was a war between heart and reason that played across her face, lips trembling as she wavered back and forth between the desires of her heart and the practical logic of her brain. Yet even as those two forces fought, they also started to work in concert, shifting together as the pain and conflict on her face turned to deeper thought and consideration.

“I... need to first establish that the portal does lead to the Beast Realm. That will take a day or two of testing. In that time frame, we’ll either have to assume Sombra is captured or... lost, otherwise he’ll contact us again about the location of Starlight Glimmer’s base of operations. If, or when we’re ready to use the portal, I can lead a team Celestia and Luna agree on. It doesn’t have to be everypony. Just a small team, enough to get Spike and Ember out of captivity. Me, you, perhaps Rainbow Dash for her speed, and Fluttershy for her affinity with animals. That will leave Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Applejack to shore up Equestria’s defenses while we’re gone, not to mention Tempest with the Treasury.”

“See?” he told her, hugging her tighter as he felt her body calm down and loosen its tension, “All you have to do is think for a second, Twilight, and you can work it out.”

“Yeah... thanks for slowing me down for a second. I really needed it to just... think it through,” she nuzzled him, “You really balance me out.”

“Just doing my duty as your... uh, what is the word here? Coltfriend? Stallionfriend? Both sound kinda weird-”

She leaned up and gave him a soft kiss, only a brief touch of lips before pulling away, “Let’s just go with ‘special somepony’. Now, I still need to get ahold of Celestia to let her know what our plan is, and then-”

“Twilight, are you there?”

“GAH!” Twilight and Flash both let out cries and nearly tripped over each other as Celestia’s large, floating head appeared in an ethereal wash of magical gold light in the center of the chamber’s table. Celestia looked down at the two ponies on the ground, tangled up with one another in a rather suggestive position, and her face colored red with a small, embarrassed smile.

“Should I call back, give you two a couple of minutes? I mean, really Twilight, in your castle’s main chambers of all places?”

“NO! We’re fine! We were not doing anything!” Twilight said in a storm of pure flustered distress as she clambered up from the floor alongside an equally red faced Flash Sentry, “Now, what’s going on?”

Celestia’s expression switched on a dime, its levity vanishing to be replaced by a look of marble seriousness, “Right, I suppose this is not the time for jokes. I finally received word from Sombra, a full message, containing a report on what has been happening. It is... dire, Twilight. Very dire.”

Celestia relayed the news of events that had transpired thus far in the Bone Dry Desert and Klugetown, both Twilight and Flash Sentry’s faces growing more horrified by the moment. By the end of it, Twilight was breathing heavily, while Flash had a wing around her once more.

“Do we know for sure how many Arrancar the Chrysalis from Earth has brought?” Twilight asked, and Celestia shook her head.

“Sombra and Firefly estimated hundreds, possibly more than a thousand. They only held at Klugetown due to the assistance of those Reigai, and it's unclear if they can maintain that position for long. It is also unclear how fast Arrancar can travel, or when we can expect the bulk of Chrysalis’ forces to hit Equestria’s settlements. I was hoping Flash Sentry could provide some insight, given his greater experience with Hollows.”

Flash swallowed past a dry throat and said, “Arrancar behave differently depending on the group. This is the Second Espada’s horde, so if they’re anything like her, they’re not going to be subtle about what they do. They’ll go for the largest and nearest population centers they can find. They might circumvent smaller villages in favor of bigger cities, but that’s not a sure thing. Arrancar are as fast as Soul Reapers, and in some cases a good bit faster, so they can cover a lot of ground in a short time. I wouldn’t be surprised if those wards you set up didn’t start getting triggered before daybreak.”

“That is what I feared to hear,” Celestia replied, the image of her head flickering, “Luna and I have done what we can to prepare our defenses, but I had hoped to have more time. Even if Luna and I go immediately to Klugetown to try and strike at this ‘Hitsuyo-Aku’ where Chrysalis is, that’d leave us unable to go to whichever cities are struck by her horde. As it stands, depending on how many populations are threatened, we’ll need every possible defender ready to teleport to the sites of crisis in order to avert a disaster.”

“To make things worse” said Twilight, shaking her head in bitter anger, “We only had time to ward most of our towns, not all of them, and some of our allied kingdoms lack such wards at all. Appleoosa is lacking wards, the Changeling Hive doesn’t have them either, and I haven’t had time to go to Mt. Aris to ward the hippogryphs, and that’s not even much further than Klugetown is!”

“If I may, Princesses?” Flash asked, nervous as he drew their attention, not unlike having to speak up amid a meeting of Captains, “Appleoosa is the southernmost town in Equestria, right? I think I saw that on the maps I’ve studied. I’d say there’s a strong chance it’ll get hit, but probably not by a large group, most of whom are going to go for your big cities. So send me and the Treasury alone to Appleoosa. The rest of you, Princesses, and Twilight’s friends, can split up between any warded town that gets struck.”

Twilight looked at him with stark worry, “Can you and the Treasury handle so many Arrancar on your own? Even a ‘small group’ of them might still be dozens!”

“I’ve seen that ship in action, and its weapons are strong enough, I think,” said Flash, “And Aria and Sonata aren’t exactly weak with those Inheritor powers they’ve gained. We can probably handle a couple dozen Arrancar, but if its more than that, Appleoosa isn’t heavily populated, so there will be room on the Treasury to load up civilians and evacuate. You can’t really do that for a big city like Manehattan.”

“You make a strong point, Flash Sentry,” said Celestia, “I ask you also do what you can to protect, and if need be evacuated, the tribe of buffalo that inhabit the area. Sheriff Silverstar will know where the tribe makes camp.”

“Sheriff Silverstar...? Huh, fitting,” Flash said, thinking of Captain Sweet Cider’s Lieutenant, “I’ll make sure to do that.”

“Alright, but this still leaves Mt. Aris and the Changeling Hive undefended,” said Twilight, “I mean, sure, Thorax and Pharynx and pretty strong, and the Changelings have been doing okay protecting themselves, but if a bunch of Arrancar show up in the Badlands...”

“In the case of Mt. Aris I believe I will contact Sombra and see if he can coordinate with Klugetown’s locals to evacuate to Mt. Aris via the airships docked in Klugetown. If the Reigai remain cooperative, they along with Sombra and Firefly can serve as a bulwark against attack both en route to Mt. Aris, and if the hippogryphs are attacked.”

“Good thinking,” Twilight told Celestia, “And we really just need one pony who can use magic to message us a warning if the Changelings are attacked...”

A loud yawn came from one doorway as a mane frazzled, tired looking Trixie trotted by, looking over with bleary eyes to ask, “Hey, who used up the last of the coffee? Because I just spent the last fifteen minutes searching everywhere for it and can’t...” She blinked at the scene again, sleep vanishing as the unkempt magician who looked as if she’d just literally woken up now noticed the giant floating head of Celestia, “Oh! Oooh! Um, am I interrupting something? I was just, uh... sleeping over... with Starlight... and it isn’t what it looks like! We’re not dating!”

Another yawn, this time from Starlight Glimmer as she wandered in as well, “Hey Trix, what’s the hold up on coff...ee?”

Twilight, Flash, and Celestia all looked at the pair of unicorn mares, then back at each other.

“I think we’ve just found our Changeling Hive team,” Celestia said, to which Starlight Glimmer and Trixie both gave a perplexed look, speaking at the same time.

“Huh?”

Author's Note

Klugetown may be saved, but Equestria as a whole is under threat, with the Changeling Hive next in the sights of the Second Espada. Equestria's defenders must spread themselves thin to cover all possible places the Arrancar might strike, so how will they fare when battle is joined? Find out next time! Maybe. Unless I switch back to the Beast Realm, but in terms of timeline I should probably focus on Equestria for a bit (although might be a good moment to check in with Spike and Ember).

As always thank you for reading, folks, and I highly appreciate any and all comments, questions, or critiques!' Till next time!