Last chants for the slow dance

Wings beat frantically against the blue night as Twilight flies, using her teleportation to augment her travel. Her bookish muscles cry as they push to the limit.

She blew it. Twilight doesn’t dare look behind her. Celestia probably knows everything now. She is probably chasing after Twilight.

Twilight has become an experienced flyer but that is still no match for the mighty wingspan of Celestia. She has to make it back to her basement lab first. She can only see enough in the moonlight to know she’s heading in the right direction. Even with her short range teleportation, it will take a while.

Fluttershy leads Rarity into the library to show her. As they pass Spike’s body the unicorn seems hardly surprised and makes nebulous sympathetic sounds.

In the basement Rarity sees the giant arcane drill working in the center of the room.

“I knew it. That conniving whore.”

Rarity gives a cursory examination of the machine, rifles a bit through the notes on the corner desk. She seems to understand some of the magical detailings or at least acts like she does, occasionally tutting and squinting.

Fluttershy doesn’t say anything and isn’t sure if she should be. So she patiently sits by the stairs and waits for it to be over. Rarity will figure out what to do and everything will be fixed. Twilight will be in trouble for what she did to Spike and life will get better.

After a while, the unicorn announces, “You just sit there, Fluttershy, and I will be right back. This will soon be finished,” Rarity assures and departs.

It sounds good to her ears. Some lint is loose so she pushes it back in.

A long twenty minutes pass before Rarity comes marching back down. She is magically lugging several jugs of gasoline and begins pouring them around the room, upending one whole jug on the drill. It continues uninterrupted as the liquid seeps through its cracks.

“Rarity,” Fluttershy squeals out of her stupor, “What are you doing?”

“Why, Fluttershy, I should think that apparent. This is a wretched machine, the work of an unholy demented mind, and it must be purged as all vile things. With fire.”

As much as she wanted Rarity to deal with it, this isn’t what she was expecting. “You could have at least asked me,” Fluttershy complains.

“I could have done a lot of things. I chose none of them.”

Fluttershy opens her mouth but does not reply. That sounds like something she would say and she thinks maybe they have something in common.

Rarity lights a match and drops it.

The unicorn stands grinning a bit too much at her work so Fluttershy takes a step away. Fluttershy decides that maybe it is not something they have in common. Maybe that is her problem, that she does not have enough in common with other ponies. It feels too late.

Fire quickly jumps through the gasoline network.

Rarity notices her expression. “Don’t worry, dear, we’re stopping her nasty scheme.”

Twilight’s lab had needed to be destroyed but this seems rash and overly destructive. And Rarity had seemed to have little delay jumping to arson. She wonders just who was responsible for the market fire last spring, then scolds herself for the thought. She needs to trust Rarity.

She asks, “I don’t mean to doubt and know you know more about magic than me... did the notes indicate fire would stop it?”

“Not particularly.”

Flames surround the machine now, cutting off access. It is consumed by the blaze, but appears to continue its work despite. It looks grim in the blaze and the blue swirls seem to draw them in.

Fluttershy can’t help herself and says the things she wanted to before but did not. “But you didn’t even turn it off and we don’t know what will happen if it breaks. This is not good, I mean worse than before. Spike said Twilight was messing with quantum waves—”

“The poor dear,” Rarity interjects at Spike’s name.

“And this sounds really fragile. There could be a bad reaction to the fire.”

“And that will be bad for Twilight.” Rarity’s eyes are fixed on it.

It’s getting hot. The fire is consuming the rest of the room but still the drill whirs in a distorted pitch. “I think that is enchanted metal. What if the fire doesn’t even stop it?”

“The library will burn and Twilight will cry for her precious princess books.”

She should not have told Rarity.

The room is soon engulfed and they retreat from the basement.

Rarity can’t help but laugh at the thought of Twilight’s reaction when she gets back. Her little plan ruined and all her possessions destroyed in the crossfire. Some princess she will be then. Maybe she’ll even abdicate her position to Rarity!

Rarity was not expecting tonight to be so eventful, and could almost kiss Fluttershy for bringing this to her. But she is not going to do that.

The pegasus is leading her to the front door when a thought catches her.

Rarity stops. She thinks of the official crown Twilight is always forgetting. What are the chances she even took it to Canterlot with her? There will not be such a great opportunity again and it would be such a waste. She puts a hoof to her mouth, contemplating the idea.

“Rarity, I don’t think it is safe to be in here any longer.”

“I am sure you think a lot,” she says. “You just keep on going and I will soon be out.”

She lets Fluttershy out the door, then quickly searches the main room. Nothing but books on the table and shelves. There’s only a little time before the fire leaves the basement.

Running up the stairs she frantically rifles through Twilight’s nightstand and the bins under her bed. All she sees are more books. Where is that infernal tiara? There is simply no way she would have remembered to bring it, she never does. Rarity has to find it!

She ransacks the dresser to no avail.

Pinkie Pie is watching the library tree go up in flames, flickering stark in the darkness. She’s been partying all night and was about to bake some early early morning cookies when she saw the bright blaze from her window.

She sits on the roof of Sugarcube Corner with candy piled around her. Munching on a bag of M&Ms, she rests on her haunches and nervously watches. Her body has been tingly all week and just wants sugar to make it go away.

This seems like a worst-case scenario. She hopes Applejack isn’t responsible for this. Friends don’t hurt each other like that and they are all good friends. They just need a few parties and everything will better. Just eat a few more pieces of candy.

Other ponies are starting to leave their homes to watch the scene, so the fire ponies should be here soon. She hopes there’s no one burning alive in there.

“At less teeter totter inside is Canterlot.”

That was funny. She meant to say, “Twister is on can’t.”

Huh. There it is again.

Pinkie can’t feel her left side and her mouth isn’t moving right. The candy drops from her hoof. It feels like there’s spider webs in her brain. It hurts.

The orange glare of flame is suddenly too bright and she has to close her eyes. She closes her eyes and sees nothing but the flame. Not even the stroke can stop her from knowing.

This fire has been burning for too long, she thinks as she lays down.

Twilight is nearing Ponyville when something doesn’t look right. There is a huge glow in the night, like a giant fire. Her heart can’t pound any faster. Something really big in the middle of Ponyville is on fire.

Applejack is barely out the door when sees a fire in the distance. It is in the direction of Ponyville.

“What the hell, another town fire? This must be the work of Twilight!” Applejack says to herself. She doesn’t need Applebloom to tell her that.

With no time to lose Applejack breaks into a gallop. The poisoning must not have been quick enough so Twilight resorted to arson. Applejack has to save the townsponies from her corrupt clutches.

It is what she feared. That is her library on fire!

No! Her stomach flips and she nearly plummets to the earth. She feels faint pains for her books but all that matters at this point is the drill. Once she collects her distilled magic, just a tiny vial, she can undo everything.

If this is Spike’s doing, she swears she is going to skin him alive.

Ponies crowd the road spectating. They move away a bit as Twilight swoops into the scene. Her neighbors’ eyes perch on her.

She lands a ways from the tree. She can feel the immense heat radiating off and Twilight wastes no time casting a heat protection charm, then teleporting inside.

Smoke clouds the air and she stumbles forward coughing. Everything is lit glowing orange and the shelves around her are ablaze. Looking up and through the haze she sees Rarity coming from upstairs, running towards her. Wearing her crown.

“Twilight, dear! I tried to help but it grew too quickly. I am trapped!”

Twilight gets moving. She shoves Rarity out of the way and breaks for the basement. She jumps over Spike’s burning body—apparently it wasn’t him—and marches down the stairs.

As she descends, she hears shrieks that the fire quickly consumes.

Down below it’s even harder to see, smoke clogs the air and furnishings are coated in flames. Twilight is sweating. Even though she is protected, it’s still incredibly warm. She has to teleport out her drill and hide it somewhere and everything will be fine.

Everything quakes violently. Twilight pushes through the fire and sees her machine working, the spinning bit giving off harshly lit blue streaks almost like lightning. It’s sucking in flames and building.

She didn’t even consider the risk of triggering a reaction! She won’t be able to simply turn it off like this, with the risk of a meltdown. So much active energy here it’s impossible to calculate the consequences. Incomprehensible. A catastrophic failure could obliterate the greater portion of the solar system, maybe beyond. For once Twilight realizes the gravity of what she’s been meddling with unsupervised in a residential basement.

There’s too much energy buzzing around and her drill is tapping into more, she has to pull it from the magical fabric! Immediately Twilight goes to the panel on the side, twisting dials and recalibrating to carefully recede the bit. The light is piercing and getting brighter. She tries desperately to recall her formulas. The drill is deep in quantum particles and elemental magic, she has to maintain some kind of equilibrium.

If she can just ease it out carefully, she believes it’s still possible to fix this.

Fluttershy is watching. There are many other ponies now but none of them saw her running out. Rarity hasn’t come out. It is probably her fault and she doesn’t know if she is okay with that. She didn’t know there was any lower for her to go.

Suddenly a bunch of ponies around her look up and whispering breaks out. Twilight swoops down from the sky and Fluttershy ducks her head, hoping Twilight doesn’t see her. Apparently she doesn’t and the alicorn disappears into the building.

Fluttershy’s panic reaches a crescendo. This shouldn’t be happening. Somehow Twilight has found out and there’s no hope. She does not know if Twilight will be able to continue her plan but Fluttershy should not be here.

She turns around, and runs into Applejack.

“Oof.”

Unaffected, Applejack says, ““Finally a pony I can trust!” Applejack gives her a hungry look. “Fluttershy, what’s going on here? Burning her own house—what is Twilight up to?!”

The farm pony is not looking very friendly. Fluttershy doesn’t know why she has to be so afraid of those she is closest to. “Um, I can’t talk about that now. Bye.”

She steps to the side. Applejack blocks her path. “Hold up! Tell me what is going on.”

“It’s Rarity! It’s Twilight! She built this terrible machine to take over the world!”

That interests Applejack just as much as it did Rarity. “Some terrible machine? Like, a weather machine?”

“It’s a magic drill. It’s evil so Rarity had to burn it down!” she spews, feeling little control over her mouth.

“That’s it then, that must be how she messed up the rain, she drilled into the sewer system! That slippery rascal!”

Her head shakes quickly in refutation. “She is doing bad things with particles.”

“What does that have to do with the weather?” the farm mare asks blankly.

Fluttershy looks back at the burning tree. She is first to admit she does not know much about ponies, but Twilight is definitely very angry and nothing good will happy to the ponies she sees when she emerges. “I wouldn’t know. Applejack, it’s not safe here and everything’s gone wrong. We have to go,” she pleads.

“Damn right it isn’t. You don’t understand—Twilight’s been bribing the weather team and poisoning the town.”

“Nopony is safe...”

“That’s why I am going to teach her a lesson about meddling with my farm.” Applejack takes an angry step toward the library.

“She is in there. The best thing is to go. You can tell Princess Celestia! Let’s just leave!”

“No. She’s messed with the bull and I am the horns.”

Fluttershy watches her leering at the blaze. Applejack does not seem concerned with her any more and Fluttershy does not have any words to convince her.

As fast as she can she runs, leaving behind Applejack and Rarity and Pinkie and even Twilight.

“I assume this is what has kept you so preoccupied the past year?” Celestia steps out of the flames.

Twilight whirls around. It’s extremely loud down here between the fire and the machine but Celestia’s voice cuts through everything.

“Celestia!” she hisses, eyes scanning wildly. All is chaos and she can see nothing beyond the ring of smoking inferno around them. “No, stay back, you can’t touch this!”

“We were having such a great night... After all the things I’ve done for you, you disappoint me.”

“No!” Twilight repeats, backing up against the console. “Go away! We don’t have time, I have to fix this!” She shields her machine.

Celestia takes another menacing step. “I don’t understand what this is about, but it is over.”

“You fucking perfect princess!” Twilight shouts. “The only thing over is you, and you’re too stupid to understand it! Too stupid to notice not everypony wants to be one of your pets.” Her voice is raw with unrestrained emotion. Everything was in her hoof and somehow it’s all gone so wrong.

“Pets?” A wavering sneer forms on the other alicorn’s mouth. “I’ll let you in on a little secret. I’ve been poisoning Equestria, dosing it with enough radiation to soon put out all mortal life. None of those wretches could compare to you, Twilight. But even you’ve betrayed me.”

Twilight stares with open mouth as... tears form in Celestia’s eyes?

The buzzing grows frantic and shrill, the aura starts pulling in purples and hellish maroons. Twilight can’t spare any time, she has to shut it down.

She levitates her flaming desk and hurls it at Celestia, then spins to the panel.

Celestia effortlessly dodges, closing on Twilight. “What went wrong, Twilight? I put on In The Air Tonight for you! You were the best of ponykind—so faithful, so industrious. Like this little thing.” She brushes Twilight aside and puts a hoof on the drill.

“I need to get to the controls!”

Celestia continues, “Only you could have built something like this under my nose... It was just the two of us, Twilight. You were my shining star.”

The tall princess fills her vision and Twilight roars. “No! You only liked smothering me! Even as a princess, I was only there to be pushed around. Your hollow friendship! I hate your stench! You have no idea how long I’ve detested having to indulge you, only waiting for the day to end you.”

Celestia’s voice is pained. “...And just how did you plan to do away with me?”

The drill is in critical mode, it needs to be dealt with now or never.

“The demiurgic,” Twilight finds herself saying, staring in awe. Even on fire, her machine is beautiful. “With this, I’ve touched the magical essence of reality—the force that brings the universe into being. You were playing with radiation, but the work I’ve done here is the triumph of all that has come before! I‘ll be a true god and ascend to divinity.”

Their plans lay bare in the air between them. Their eyes lock and in that gaze they know each other again.

Celestia’s eyes shine in the glow of the fire.

Celestia wrenches her tearful face into a grin. Her hoof pounds a control knob. “No heaven waits for you, my dear.”

A primordial wave brighter than the sun erupts and Twilight is not even ash.

Applejack is standing so close to the burning tree it hurts. The heat billows and she squints in pain but refuses to give.

Fluttershy may be a coward like always, but she is not. That stupid alicorn always lording over everypony, making her late for cider season and making her fail the farm. She’s strong! When Twilight gets out of there, she’ll show her what happens when you mess with an Apple.

Applejack readies her rope so she can subdue Twilight until proper authorities arrive. Then it occurs to her Twilight can just teleport away.

Her ears are assaulted by a screeching bang. The tree library bursts and Applejack never looks up.

Fluttershy makes it to the edge of Ponyville, lungs wheezing and running harder than ever in her life. Tears she thought were gone coat her face.

She hates herself and the things she never did and the things she was. All her life only letting things happen and waiting for something good. For so long she told herself she should have never lived. For so long she was sinking in the dark. She blamed her friends for leaving her there, never once did she step out.

One step she is near the light, two she is gone.