The Creation of Harmony

Chapter XXXIX: Greater Love Hath Nopony Than This

"Go, go, go!" the Doctor cried out as he galloped by Twilight and her friends, "Close the Gates! Don't let Lwsyffar escape!" He galloped into the TARDIS, leaving the doors open behind him. Derpy followed closely behind. The light on the top of the blue box lit up and the box began to fade away, making its distinctive strange grinding whooshing noise until it had fully vanished into the air.

Twilight looked left and right, checking that her friends still had the energy to use the Elements of Harmony. She was slightly panicked. Throughout her time here in the Pre-Classical Era, she had been hearing from Starswirl and other learned individuals about the Arglwydd, whose true name she now knew. He was the single most feared and despised being in the history of three kingdoms. As far as Twilight knew, he was the first great villain, the first of the many who disrupted the balance of the world, such King Sombra and Nightmare Moon. She looked at the menacing eyes in the darkness before her and did not want to see the face that bore them.

"Okay, girls. One last thing and we finally go home. Let's send all these monsters back where they belong and be sure they stay there."

The other five silently nodded. They were eager to finish this adventure and return to their lives in 21st century Ponyville. The ground shook once more as the Arglwydd took another step to freedom and then another.

Twilight closed her eyes and concentrated with all her might, putting all her strength into her Element one more time. The jewel in her crown jingled and then glowed. Her eyes shot open and shone, as did Applejack's, Rainbow Dash's, Rarity's, Fluttershy's and Pinkie's. Slowly the six's hooves left the ground and they floated into the air. Their eyes brightened more and more and the air was filled with a high-pitched hum as the Elements of Harmony powered up to banish away the hordes of Third Age ponies, the constellation incarnations and the Arglwydd.

Starswirl the Bearded solemnly watched the six rise up and shine above the plateau. His greatest worry for the past month was finally coming to pass. It was finally going to end. But then, as he watched, what he saw put a horrified expression on his face and he fainted.

The light from the Elements and their bearers' eyes flickered, faded and died out. Twilight and her friends stayed up for only a moment afterwards and then fell straight down onto the jade floor.

Twilight stood back up, rubbing the back of her neck. The fall made her body ache for a while, but it was nothing compared to the shock of what she saw before her. She gasped. She said nothing as there were no words to express the terror she felt right then.

Rarity got up, quickly brushed any dirt off herself and saw the terrible sight. "Oh dear..."

"Not good..." Rainbow Dash said.

"Hey!" Pinkie angrily shouted, "What gives?! Why are they still open!?"

A deep malevolent laugh came from the darkness and echoed through the mountains. The tremors in the ground became stronger with each step the Arglwydd took. Pebbles on the floor jumped up and boulders on the slopes of what remained of Mount Dechrau broke free and rolled down. Some of the guards and soldiers around who were very nearly out of strength tumbled over as the ground shook beneath their hooves and claws.

When the shaking stopped, a great cloud of smoke burst out from the darknesss. Then, while he gave a long, deep growl, the Arglwydd moved his head out into the light. The flesh on his long narrow snout had completely decayed, leaving behind bone and fangs. His snout had a row of three horn coated in gold. A quarter of his fangs had fallen out, letting his constantly wandering forked tongue slip in and out from behind his malicious grin. Inside his mouth there was still some of the flesh and muscle and veins. Unfortunately for the inhabitants of the world, his fire-breathing organs were still intact. The brightness of his white scales had dulled through his millennia of imprisonment. His snake-like eyes were more or less unharmed, though the surroundings of his eyes were not as lucky. His eye lids had rotted away, making it impossible for him to blink and making his impeccably steady stare tremendously intimidating. The inability to blink seemed not to affect him though, as he was little more than a living corpse after wasting away in the depths of Tartarus. His face bore many battle scars, the most distinct of which were a set of four claw scratches across the right side and a single long scar on his left side from the crown of his head, through his eye and down to his cheekbone. Where his head met his neck, he had a wide grand frill of horns, two of which stuck out longer than the rest and grew out together from the center of his brow ridge, almost appearing like a single U-shaped horn. The frill also was coated in gold.

He inhaled, smelling the open air of the Earth. It was the sweetest smell he experienced in two-thousand years, despite the smell being that of smoke, ash and death mixed with the flowery scent emitted by the magic of the Elements of Harmony. He spoke with an aged voice that was always accompanied by a faint hiss that emanated from his throat. He spoke in ancient Drakish, rather than the more prominent dialect of classical Drakish, so only learned dragons and those who have been on the TARDIS understood him.

"Lord Lwsyffar hath come once again unto the Earth! And by His fire, He shall have vengeance!" He raised his face up towards the sky and let out a burst of white fire that reached out for a mile into the air. The flame was so enormous, that it could be seen from Equites and Rhinopolis.

While the Arglwydd was doing this, the noise of the TARDIS came again, this time behind the Twilight and her friends. The blue box faded in and out, each time in becoming more and more solid, until it fully materialized with a light thud. Doctor galloped out from the TARDIS with his proper sonic screwdriver, followed by Derpy. He looked at the dragon and then at the distressed faces of the six ponies. He began, "Okay, I was worried this would happen. When I give you the signal, use the Elements to make a shield around this half of the plateau! I configured the TARDIS extrapolator shielding to encompass this area and just need to activate it once we're ready. We need to get everypony we can into this area for safety. In the meantime, use the Elements to restrict his movements. Whatever you do, don't let him hurt anypony!"

The Doctor galloped off and went all around the edge of the plateau, calling out to all the dragons and Hoofricans who remained to gather around the six. He tried to keep them calm, but at the same time emphasized the urgency of getting to the safety of the plateau.

Meanwhile, the Arglwydd walked out from the darkness. His long neck, led by his head, winded through the air, like a snake, as he observed his surroundings. The rest of his body followed and also bore a serpentine form. He was the largest dragon to ever live, and his shoulder height reached up nearly to the top of the entrance of Tartarus. His front legs were withered, but still was twice as muscular as the average dragon's legs. His gold-coated claws were twice the size of Princess Sapphire's head. If his eye sockets were not occupied, a full-grown rhinoceros could have crawled through. He had only reached the point where his wings were only starting to reach the light when he had to stop.

He sensed something amiss. He sniffed the air in front of him with his bone nostrils and discovered the magical shield that was inches from the tip of his snout. He turned his head and looked at the six ponies who were holding up that shield. He chuckled. Just as before, meek little ponies dared to face him.

He said to them, "Very well, Lwsyffar shall wait. He hath awaited two-thousand years for this day. He can wait but a short while longer."

"Is it traditional for Drakonian royalty to speak in the third person?" Twilight said to him.

"Oh ho, the little one understandeth Lwsyffar's words! He shall give thee the courtesy of an answer: 'Tis a tradition that He created. Tell him then, little one, hast His tradition endured?"

"Nope. Sorry to disappoint!"

"'Tis no matter," the Arglwydd said as he turned his head around, followed by his neck and body. As he continued, he climbed onto the rock into which the Gates were built. "To what end are traditions for when there be no world for them to be carried on with. How unfortunate that Lwsyffar shouldst be bound to that pest alicorn and destroy the Earth. His command leaves the Arglwydd with naught but an empire of dust."

Twilight and her friends watched his every move. Starswirl stood beside them, ready to contribute his own magic to hinder the Arglwydd.

As the dragon, coiled around the rock outcropping, the rest of his body emerged from the dark of Tartarus. All over his long slender body were large patches where his scales had fallen off, revealing the soft black skin underneath, and in some the skin rotted away to expose his dried flesh. His wings were tucked up against his body. The edges of the skin forming the wings were frayed and the skin itself bore many holes and tears. By the time his tail came out of the darkness, his head had fully circled the great rock. His tail ended in a whip of black hair. He breathed fire on the black hair, setting it ablaze. He whipped his tail at the six ponies and it cracked fiercely, making the ponies' ears hurt. The crack of the blazing whip also let out a brief burst of white flame. His fiery tail was the Arglwydd's personal favorite torture weapon when he reigned over the world. He climbed up the rock, wrapping his body around it, and rested his head on the peak. He was content to wait until the ponies exhausted themselves from holding up the magic shield against him. Like a snake, his greatest asset was his patience, his ability to wait for the perfect moment to strike, and strike hard.

Meanwhile, the remaining dragons and Hoofricans gathered behind Twilight and her friends. They were surprisingly few.

In the fight against the hordes, nearly all the gazelle were slain and the survivors fled. Only three of the zebra shamans were left and of the rhino alchemists, only Golden Lead and Pyro managed to stay alive. Half of the soldiers at the base of the mountain survived and climbed the slope to join the others. Only one of the Royal Guard remained, but he was not much to account for, as he was overcome with grief. He kneeled down by one dead body. He was grieving for he failed his most sacred duty. The other Hoofricans around joined him and all together they mourned the death of Emperor Bluehorn. Golden Lead, whose horn broke in half, knelt by his head and wept her tears onto his face. She reached out and slowly closed his eye-lids.

"He was a good emperor," she said, "He wasn't perfect, but he was better than his parents. He had ideals... And still his reign was so short-lived..."

"At least he ended it well," Pyro, who suffered from many bite marks along his side, said, as he too wept but also put his leg around his sister's shoulders to comfort her, "He wasn't just better than his parents. He was better than the past five-hundred years of emperors. He ended the war. He brought peace. And he died fighting for that peace. There isn't a more honorable death than that."

"But still, he could have done so much more. We need a leader like him to take us through a time of peace. All everyone knows in our generation is war."

"Then we'll just have to trust that whoever the Baraza za Wawakilishi is going to pick a good successor for him. The Gods can't allow a single individual to be responsible for too much good or he'll be seen as a god. You told me that yourself, sis."

"Yeah..." Golden sniffed as she stood up, letting the zebra shamans do their work with the Emperor, "You're right. And whatever happens, the worst is behind us. All there can be now's a bright future."

The zebras chanted prayers over the Emperor's body and sprinkled sanctified river sediment over him, as decreed by ancient tradition. The head shaman suffered from a gash on her front right leg and she used her blood to paint a star, the symbol of the afterlife, on the Emperor's forehead. Lastly, she took off his golden diamond-studded crown. Once it was safe to leave the plateau, the first priority of all of Hoofrica was to bring the Emperor's body back to Rhinopolis and hold a royal funeral.

The dragons too had their share of sorrows. Out of the one hundred dragons of the Royal Guard, only twenty remained. A quarter fell while fighting the hordes while the rest fled as soon as they realized that the Arglwydd, the stuff of their childhood nightmares, was coming. All of the royal family survived, but they were not free from injury. Comet's wings were both broken and twisted in terrible positions. The burnt side of Ruby's face was now accompanied by a severely bruised side. She also bore bite marks all over her tail. Sapphire suffered from a broken front right leg, her first battle injury. Amber's beautiful wings were ruined, as the rotten ponies bit and tore away at them, leaving the patterned skin in tatters. The prince and princesses gathered around their mother, who suffered the most. Her injuries were not particularly severe; she had a gash down her face, bite marks on her legs, and holes in her wings, but the strain on her body finally triggered the effects of old age and at five hundred two years old she could not endure.

"Children," Ember said as Comet, Ruby, Sapphire and Amber gathered around her with the utmost worry on their faces. "My time is coming..."

"No it's not mother," Comet retorted, "You shant die here. You accomplished something neither grandmother nor great-grandfather could achieve. You cannot stop now."

Ember replied, "I knew a wingless dragon who survived the Great Northern Desert for a hundred days and returned without so much as a scratch on him. The following day, he died drowning in Purpura Lake."

"But this is different," Amber joined, nuzzling against her mother's cheek, "You saved lives today! King Thiessen will grant you life for doing so."

"Death spares no one, my dear. I am five-hundred years old. I've already lived longer than most dragons. 'Tis not right for anydragon to evade death for too long. King Thiessen has decreed that it is now my time."

"But we still need you!" Sapphire said, embracing her mother by the neck as she began to weep, "You must rule Drakonia as she begins an era of peace. You must."

"Oh, Sapphire, Sapphire, daughter of mine. That is your burden to carry now."

"What?"

"You are my heiress, Sapphire. You now must sit upon the Drakonian throne and wear the crown on your head."

"But what of Comet or Ruby or Amber? Surely they are more suited for this. They have seen the world. I've been in my chambers watching the egg for all my years. And even with that I am clearly unfit. I failed my one duty and threatened the whole of the world. I cannot-"

"Shhh..." Ember stopped her. She reached out and held Sapphire's chin. "You are not a failure. If anything, through your mistake and how you dealt with it you have proven how worthy you are of bearing the responsibility. Besides, 'twas Comet and Ruby who convinced me to choose you, and I wanted to choose Ruby. I see now how much wiser they were than I."

Smoke began billowing out of Ember's nostrils and she coughed out more smoke. The four fires in her belly had been extinguished. When the billowing stopped, Ruby blew at the smoke, dispersing it high into the air. When she looked back down, the life had gone from her mother's face. Ember passed on with a tranquil smile. Silently, Ruby reached out and gently closed her eyelids. Despite her attempt to fight it, a single tear streamed down her cheek. She took the platinum crown, adorned with a diamond, a ruby, an emerald and a sapphire, from her mother's head and gently placed it on her younger sister's head. She then waited a moment and began discussing with her siblings the arrangement of the funeral.

The Doctor and Derpy watched the two kingdoms mourn the deaths of their leaders. The Doctor was no stranger to grief, but what agonized him the most was that their grief was only going to be followed by more sorrow. He knew what the next few decades had in store for each of the three kingdoms and the future was not a smooth road through a flowery field. He also felt awkward at that moment, as there was something he needed to do, but as he was surrounded by mourning, it was far from proper. It would have been outright disrespectful and unfair. Nonetheless, he had to do it now or risk losing the chance to do it at all. He had already taken too long to do it. Should he have failed to do so, he would defy the laws of Time and make history tear apart and violently implode simultaneously.

He held his sonic screwdriver in his right hoof and turned to face Rainbow Sword's body. He sat down and set to work pushing a multitude of buttons and at times shaking the screwdriver. Once satisfied, he stood back up and pointed it directly at Sword. He pressed the main button and the screwdriver's blue tip lit up and it gave off its high-pitched hum.

The screwdriver was put under great strain by its task, forcing sparks to burst out from its sides, until finally, Rainbow Sword shot his eyelids open and breathed in quickly and deeply, as if he had just barely escaped drowning. He quickly got on his hooves and clutched his chest. He looked back and forth in a panic, observing his surroundings. He saw the opened Gates and the Arglwydd and briefly gasped. He looked at the dragons and Hoofricans around him and was utterly confused. He was speechless for a few moments before he asked the Doctor, "What happened?"

The sound of his voice pulled a gasp out of Starswirl and Dash's mouths. Forgetting about the task at hand, she turned around and saw the old comrade and distant ancestor standing alive and well. The others turned and were also pleasantly shocked at the sight. Everypony beamed and galloped over to Sword to hug and nuzzle him with words of joy and relief, a sharp contrast from the mourning of the others.

This was the moment of weakness the Arglwydd had waited for. The giant dragon quickly raised his head up from the rock and opened his mouth wide to unleash a great spiraling column of white fire at the ponies. The fire burned through the air at incredible speed and took the ponies off-guard.

The four royal dragons, however, were quicker to react. Comet, Ruby, Sapphire and Amber all turned and breathed green fire to counter the white. The two infernos clashed in the air, with terrifying brilliance. For a moment, the fires pushed against each other at an even standoff, but before long, the Arglwydd gained the upper hand and pushed the four dragons' fires back.

This was when the zebra shamans decided to help in the fight. In unison, the three zebras took out small woven sacks of magical powder and tossed them into the white fire. As the sacks flew through the air, they shouted out the incantation, "Kufumukana!" The sacks went into the fire and exploded, forcing the flames to disperse, leaving a thick cloud of smoke.

Taking the brief opportunity, the Doctor shouted to Twilight and her friends, "Now!"

The six concentrated with all their might and, fast as they could, erected a spherical magic shield around their half of the plateau. Unlike before, the shield was visible as a great big pink bubble.

The Doctor entered the TARDIS and hastily manned a series of controls and smashed his hoof down on a big blue button. The TARDIS gave off a deep hum as it went to work reconfiguring the extrapolator shielding into the same shape as the shield the six created. The Doctor then relaxed and sat down, his back against the console. He let out a long sigh of relief. With the combination of the shields, the Arglwydd had no chance of harming them and the six did not need to put so much effort into defending against him.

From his seat, he shouted out in the midst of heavy breathing, "Twilight! It's alright now! You can take your minds off of the Elements and magic and stuff for now! Phew! The extrapolator shield and the Elements' shield should situate and arrange themselves in unison with each other's energy waves and therefore act as if they were one shield and the signal from the TARDIS will maintain the shape and integrity so long as the wobbly lever stays up."

As he sat there, he looked towards the door and saw Twilight, Applejack, Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy, Pinkie, Derpy, Starswirl and Sword pop their heads in to see him.

The Doctor began to get up on his hooves and Sword was the first to speak, "So, as I was saying: What happened?"

"Oh, well, that's simple. No offense, but you were dead. And now you're not dead." The Doctor went over to Sword and patted his shoulder. He then pulled at one of his ears to make sure the cells still maintained enough structural stability for a living organism to survive on. He continued, "The Master used the nanobots in your body to stop your cells. So, it was simply a matter of making the nanobots un-stop your cells and voila! Molto bene! You're alive! I just needed to get my sonic screwdriver back. This wooden piece of rubbish would never do for something that complicated." He took out his improvised sonic screwdriver and threw it off to a random corner of the TARDIS. He held up his proper screwdriver and gave it a kiss.

The Doctor stepped out of the TARDIS and looked up at his hoofiwork. He admired the great pink bubble through which waves of blue rippled beautifully.

"So what in the hay do we do now?" Applejack asked, "We still got to close up them Gates."

"One problem at a time, Applejack," the Doctor replied.

"But there ain't no other problem. That's the only problem we got left."

"Oh, there are lots and lots of problems to worry about. There a hundred thousand billion of them out there. How to boil an egg from thirty paces away, for example. Although, personally, my biggest problem's always been-"

"Doctor!" Derpy stopped him from going on any further, "We need to concentrate on shaving the mold!

"... did you mean 'saving the world'?" Rarity asked.

"Oh! Right. Yeah, what she said."

The Doctor answered, "Well don't look at me. Ask Twilight!"

"What?! Me?!" Twilight was taken aback and looked back and forth between the faces that turned to her. "How am I supposed to know what to do?"

"You've read the Legend of the Blue Box haven't you?" the Doctor replied, "You know happens now."

"I was just a little filly when I read it. I hardly remember the vast majority of that epic!"

"Well then, good thing we have the TARDIS back." The Doctor reentered the blue box and beckoned for Twilight to join him, "Come, get in! You tell me where the epic's archived - the Starswirl the Bearded Wing, I'd expect - and I'll do the rest. Allons-y!"

Twilight did as the Doctor told her. Derpy also tried to enter the TARDIS but the doors closed and her face slammed into the instructional poster on the left door. She fell backwards onto the ground and rubbed her nose. She then watched as the TARDIS began to dematerialized. She then hung her head low in dejection, saddened that the Doctor left without her.

A second later, the TARDIS noise came again and the blue box rematerialized on a spot five feet North of where it dematerialized. When the Doctor came out, Derpy immediately galloped over and gave him a tight hug.

"Oh, no. Don't tell me I messed up the timing. How long was I gone?"

"Only a second."

"Then why are you acting like you haven't seen me in a year?"

"Because I missed you!"

Twilight exited the TARDIS levitating a very long scroll in front of her face and frantically reading through it. Her eyes darted back and forth across the paper as she searched for any clue as to how the Gates were closed. Clover the Clever, the author of the Legend of the Blue Box, was not known for his factual reliability since he wrote of events that he himself did not experience, but he managed to get the main details correct enough to be a worthwhile source of historical knowledge. Speed-reading through the epic brought back some of Twilight's memories from when she was a filly studying Pre-Classical history in preparation for her magic school entrance exam. It amazed her to think that for all this time whole time the story was about her and her friends, though Clover the Clever gave them slightly different names.

"AHA!" Twilight cried out as she pointed with her hoof at one of the lines in the scroll, "I think I found something!"

The Doctor, Derpy, Starswirl, Sword and the other five gathered around Twilight, anxiously listening for a possible solution. Everypony vied to get a good view of the text from over Twilight's shoulder.

"It says here," Twilight continued,

"'The wicked dragon, the Arglwydd, bringer of death, wrapped his body in coils round the mountain. The wretched corpse, dread of a million souls, let no light from either Sun, Moon or stars unto the ponies within. Though in safety from the Arglwydd's malice, the ponies thereon stood trapped in darkness darker than the Night. Hear me, for I say now was when they vanquished the wicked dark of the wicked dragon. One hero stood among them, a hero was the greatest though she was the smallest. Here was the one to whom all of the living owe their gratitude, for she averted the End. The Gods granted on their sacred chosen the strength to do as she did. She stood before Tartarus without fear and without hesitation to act as the Earth was in need of. Defying all sense of self and setting aside the fear of Pale Death, she took up the Elements of Harmony and..."

Twilight hesitated. She furrowed her brow as she silently read ahead. The excited smile was gone from her face.

" Is something the matter?" Rarity asked.

Twilight took a moment before slowly answering, "You're not going to like this..."

"What is it?" Pinkie joined, "Who uses the Elements to beat the bad guy? Ooh! Is it me?"

"Trust me, Pinkie. You don't want to be the hero in this... It says, 'She took up the Elements of Harmony and, leaving her comrades in her trail of dust, she galloped forth unto the great abyss of Tartarus. She so loved they who she bade farewell to for the final time. This noble pegasus gave of her own life to save those of whom she loved and those to whom she was but a stranger. In her act of altruism, the dark of Tartarus filled with the radiance of the Elements. Whereon, the abyss drew back into its depths all the evils it held captive.' And it goes on about how everything from Tartarus gets sucked back in and the Gates close."

Nopony spoke for a few moments. The closing of the Gates took a truly drastic measure. Now they had a new problem: who will be the sacrifice?

"Well, better get going then," the Doctor casually said as he held out his hoof, "The Gates can't wait forever. Give me the Elements."

"What?! No!" Twilight reacted, "Nopony's going to sacrifice themselves for this!"

"We have no choice, Twilight! Now that we've read the text and gained foreknowledge, we fixed the events there into our timelines. Somepony has to take the Elements and walk into Tartarus."

"But we ain't gonna let you do it!" Applejack said.

"I'm not going to let anypony die when it could have been me!" the Doctor replied, "I won't allow it!"

"I'll go," Twilight said, "I'm connected to Magic, the central Element. If any one pony's going to do it, it has to be me."

"No!" the Doctor quickly responded, "No, no, no, no, no, no, no! You can't do it! Not you! You have a future. You're destined for great things, Twilight! Things that are fixed points in time. If you die now, those points will be altered and time will rip apart and I'll have a huge mess on my hooves."

"Then I'll do it!" Dash stepped up.

"Not you either! You have a great destiny too! None of you six can do it. You all have a future that can't be averted without damaging the Time Vortex. And you too, Starswirl! You have a spell you need to work on and end up never finishing, so don't even think about it!"

"What of me, then?" Sword asked.

The Doctor curtly replied, "You're Rainbow Dash's ancestor. So, no."

Nopony had anything else to argue with against the Doctor. There seemed to be no choice. Once everypony quieted down, Fluttershy took the chance to make her attempt at discouraging the Doctor. "But, um, it said in the epic that the hero's a she. And she's supposed to be a pegasus. And well, um, Doctor, you're a he and an earth pony."

"Details, details. A few minor words can be altered."

"Then maybe one of them dragons or rhinos or zebras will step up to help us," Applejack rejoined.

"I will not have somepony else take a fall that I can take!" the Doctor insisted, "And besides, the pony part is not a minor detail. If it ends up not being a pony, then Clover the Clever will have less reason to write it, since a pony isn't the hero in the end, and he may end up not writing it at all and that'll result in a paradox. Now, give me the Elements!"

When the six hesitated, the Doctor impetuously reached out and grabbed Twilight's crown. When he held it in his mouth, the crown rapidly heated up and began to sizzle. The pain took the Doctor by surprise and he let go, yelling, "Ouch!"

Seeing the Doctor's baffled face, Twilight said, "Princess Celestia told me that there are some ponies who are forbidden from using the Elements, or even from touching them. The Elements kind of have a mind of their own and what they hate more than anything is a murderer. They'll fight off anypony who's taken a life. The Elements will do anything it takes to stay away from a killer. That's why when the Princesses or when we use them, we don't kill. That's why Nightmare Moon was banished to the Moon and Discord was turned into stone instead of simply being destroyed."

"But I have perfectly good intentions," the Doctor replied, "I'm trying to save the world!"

"Doctor... It wasn't an ordinary reaction the Elements had against you. They're trying to keep you away at all costs." Twilight silenced him. His weak point was now being attacked. His shameful past.

"Doctor," Starswirl began, "Thou hast taken a life before? Thou hast killed?"

The Doctor didn't speak. He simply looked down with his eyes and slowly nodded. He hated to admit anything from his past that was against his moral code, but nonetheless they were true.

"How many have you killed?" asked Sword, his curiosity stirred by the thought that the Doctor had once used violence against somepony.

The Doctor sighed. He needed a moment to compose himself before answering. He looked off towards the Arglwydd and then the Gates as he spoke, his face the most solemn anypony had ever seen it be. "Billions... I've killed billions. I've destroyed entire worlds. I even annihilated my own species and my own planet in order to end a war... Blimey, I suppose you lot are much better at peacemaking that I am, given that... I try to be better. I try to save lives, but somehow I often see myself taking more than I save. Sometimes, I'm not even sure who the villain really is. Me or my enemies... Hm. Queen Magia was right. The Master's a reflection of myself."

Nopony knew how to respond to the Doctor. He had just told them of a side of himself that they never knew and never could conceive. They stood there looking at him and each other.

Despite the disheartening confession, their final problem still loomed over their heads. The Doctor could not so much as touch the Elements, and destiny prevented the rest from losing their lives that day. They seemed to have no options available to them at all.

Finally, after an agonizing minute of uncertainty, a little voice spoke up. "I'll do it."

Everypony turned to see who it was. It was Derpy.

The Doctor immediately tried to protest, but Derpy stuck her hoof in his mouth to stop him.

"I never killed nopony," she said, "And I want to help save the world. 'Cause if there's no world, then muffins will never get invented and the Universe will blow up because there won't be anything good to eat! And, well, I guess it'll be okay if I die today. When we first met, you told me there wasn't anything important about me at all, so if I die now, it won't matter and nopony can tear up time. Um, am I right? Does it work?"

"No! Of course not!" the Doctor said after pushing away Derpy's hoof.

"Why?"

"Because... Because..." the Doctor realized that he had no convincing answer. He stomped on the floor and simply said, "Because I won't let you!"

"Bet you a bucket of blueberries they'll let me," Derpy said, indicating to Twilight and her friends. The six did not say anything. They simply, looked down, unable to speak or meet Derpy's eyes, which was an impossible task to begin with as they never looked in the same direction. In response to their silence, Derpy cocked her head and smiled.

She approached Twilight and reached out for the crown that laid on the floor where the Doctor dropped it. She placed the crown on her head and then gave Twilight a hug.

While hugging Derpy, Twilight said, "I... I-I'm sorry, Derpy..."

"Don't be sorry! The Doctor said you've got a whole big important destiny to look forward to! How cool is that?"

"Yeah... pretty cool..." Twilight felt awful as Derpy pulled away from the hug.

The Doctor watched Derpy go to Applejack to take her Element and he went over to stop her, but Starswirl and Sword walked up and stood in his way.

"I am sorry, Doctor," Starswirl said, "But we hath no choice. Only she, according to thine own criteria, is suitable for this task."

"I'll figure out another way, I promise!" the Doctor pleaded, "She doesn't have to die!"

"And how long shall that take?" Sword replied, "How long do we have before the Arglwydd tires of waiting for us and decides to wreak havoc upon the rest of the world? We are fortunate he decided to do as he is doing now, rather than flying off to set about having vengeance against us all. Are you willing to take the risk by waiting?"

"I will if it means saving her!"

"We cannot allow that, Doctor," Starswirl said, "I am sorry, but there be larger matters upon our hooves."

The Doctor could see he had no way to argue against them. After a moment of furiously looking back and forth between Starswirl and Sword, he galloped forward and tried to push the two out of his way to stop Derpy from taking the Elements. Sword stopped the Doctor, tackled him and held him down on the floor. The Doctor struggled to break free and stretched out his hoof towards Derpy as he called her name. Starswirl then cast a spell and encased the Doctor's hooves in ice stuck to the floor. The Doctor tried to free himself, but his exertions came to nothing.

Derpy walked over to him, carrying all six of the Elements of Harmony. It pained her too see him in such emotional agony. She knew that what pained the Doctor the most was to see his companions suffer, but he did not understand that what pained Derpy the most was to see the Doctor, her only friend, suffer. The pain was mutual.

She knelt down to be closer to eye level to the Doctor, who was forced to stay laying on the floor. She looked into the Doctor's tormented eyes and tried to make her eyes go straight so that she could make some semblance of eye contact, but to no avail.

"Derpy, don't do this," the Doctor begged, "Please, don't You don't have to. We'll find another way."

"Sorry, Doctor, " she said, "but I don't think there's another way. So I just have to go. But before I do, I want to say, thanks. Thanks for everything. I never knew there could be so many flavors of muffins in the Universe and they're all so good. I can't ask for anything better than that. So thanks. Oh, and thanks for showing me all of time and space. That was pretty cool too! But yeah..."

Derpy nuzzled up against the Doctor's tear-soaked cheek and continued, "I remember when we first met. I got fired from the post-office for delivering the Mayor's mail to a crime boss in Manehatten. It made me sad, because I was out of a job for the third time that year. I was hiding and crying in an old abandoned house outside Londerby when a Weeping Pegasus tried to get me. Then you showed up told me not to blink. And me and you used my eyes so that we could watch the pegasus while running away and then we tricked it into looking at a mirror. After that you asked me what I was doing there and I told you my story. And then you asked me to go with you in your blue box and time-travel and all that stuff. I still remember everything from that day. It was the best day of my life. All the days we had together were the best days of my life. And now..."

Derpy closed her eyes and let a pair of tears escape to stream down her snout. She stood up and continued, "Now I guess the best days of my life have to end..."

Derpy turned her head towards Tartarus and stared at it for a moment. That eternal blackness was to be her prison forever. In there she would rot away and never would death relieve her of her suffering. She would become a walking corpse like those that the Master let escape. Though it was not quite a death in the literal sense, she might as well have died. Derpy, that odd, dim-witted, blonde-maned grey pegasus, would die and a monster would come into being.

She took a deep breath and walked forward to meet her doom. She passed Starswirl and Sword, who lowered their heads, too ashamed to look at her. Starswirl took off his hat to show her the deepest respect. As she passed by, Starswirl, while looking down, said to her, "Queen Nox once wrote, 'Greater love hath nopony than this: to give up one's life for the sake of one's friends.' Know that thy deed shall not be forgotten, milady. If the world is just, thou shalt be forever remembered for this."

Twilight, Applejack, Rarity, Pinkie, Fluttershy and Dash also could not bear to watch Derpy make a sacrifice that they could not. They all knew what they truly felt about what it took to close the Gates. They knew that the truth was they did not want to sacrifice themselves to save the world. They were willing to risk their lives for their cause, but they were not willing to outright face an absolutely certain death for it. They offered themselves simply because they did not want to appear cowardly. Then the Doctor gave them a justification for their reluctance. Derpy also could have used the Doctor to avoid the duty at hoof, but she chose not to. She was stronger than they could ever be.

Twilight realized that that was why they failed to close the Gates. The friendship she and her friends had was powerful, but not enough. It took the power of absolute selfless love, a love that extended even to those one ought to hate. Derpy was far from an adored citizen of Equestria and she owed the ponies of the world nothing, since they gave her nothing but disdain. And yet, Derpy was willing to give her life for their sake. As the eight ponies watched her walk, they each began to weep out of shame.

As Derpy reached the center of the plateau, the edge of the combined magical and extrapolator shield, she drew the attention of the Dragons and Hoofricans. They took a moment to stop mourning and see what she was up to. She looked as if she was going to confront the Arglwydd.

The Arglwydd also looked to the little pegasus that stood at the edge of safety. She seemed stupid enough to walk right into his grasp. Her crawled over the peak of the outcropping and lowered his head by his long neck halfway down. He stared at her menacingly and licked his lips. He was ready to finally have his first kill in millennia.

Derpy stood still for a minute. She needed to muster the courage to commit to the task. She heard the Doctor call out her name once more, begging her to stop. She turned around to see the eyes of everyone around but the ponies focused on her. She thought maybe she should say a few words of farewell.

"Well, uh, it was nice meeting everypony -er, I mean, every pony and dragon and camel and rhino and zebra and gazelle and warthog. I had fun, I guess. I'm happy I got to meet some of you and spended time with you fighting zombies. Too bad it has to end..."

Derpy tried to keep her composure as she spoke. The other ponies, though unable to look her in the face, thought that she at least deserved to have their ears. As they listened, the tears welled up in their eyes. Twilight grit her teeth and whispered to herself, "I'm sorry, Derpy. Forgive me."

Derpy continued, moving her eyes all around to see everyone, as they would be the last of the living she was to see.

"It's okay, though. It's no biggie. I'm sure you won't even notice I'm gone. I'll just be another pony you saw and never saw again. I mean, a lot of ponies never really liked me anyway. Most of them kind of hated me, or at least didn't want to have anything to do with me. At school, all the fillies made fun of me and even now, when I'm all grown up, I still see people pointing and laughing, even though they try to hide it. But there are some ponies who don't laugh at me. They think I'm stupid and want me to just shut up and stay shut up, and when I don't shut up they get angry. I think it's because they don't like my voice or my eyes or my name and they want me to go away..."

She let out a quiet whimper as she gave in. Tears streamed down her snout and cheeks, creating damp lines across the fur of her face. She grabbed her mane and blew her nose on it. Then she used her leg to wipe her eyes, only to have more tears come through.

"I... I just know what went wrong. So, I guess I'll everypony what they want. I'll go away. Nopony will see or hear me ever again and, plus, I get to save everypony's lives, so that's good. I know you're all glad I'm doing this and I know nopony's going to miss me..."

The Dragons and Hoofricans now realized what she was about to do and murmurs rippled among them. The Arglwydd was also stirred by this, but he was confident he could stop this one little pony from doing whatever it was she planned to do. Out of respect, none of them spoke. Some took off their helmets and gave her a nod of appreciation. The Arglwydd remained silent as he found Derpy's misery amusing.

"Before I go, I just want to say sorry for all the times I messed up, or broke something, or dropped something, or ruined somepony's plans. I didn't mean to do any of those things. It was an accident. I... I'm sorry."

She paused. She turned around and looked at the Arglwydd's fearsome face. She squeaked in fear and took one step back. She was about to take another step when she stopped herself. She took a deep breath, allowing some tears to stream into her mouth, and exhaled loudly. She breathed in again and quickly glanced behind her. Through her wet eyes, she looked straight at the Doctor. She knew he hated goodbyes, so instead she quietly said, "Allons-y."

She walked forward and passed through the combined magic and extrapolator shield. As the Elements of Harmony passed through, the pink of the shield rippled away, leaving only the blue behind.

Having had enough of the entertainment, the Arglwydd opened his mouth and blasted white fire directly at Derpy. The blaze engulfed her and went on to strike the shield behind her. The Dragons and Hoofricans averted their eyes, certain that the pony met her doom. But as the fire dispersed, it revealed Derpy standing completely unharmed in a circle of melted jade. The Arglwydd tried again, breathing an even hotter fire, but nothing changed. The fire did not singe a single hair on the pony.

Derpy had her eyes closed as the fire was so bright, but when she opened them, she saw the frustrated and bewildered face of the Arglwydd. She looked down at the melted floor and then behind her at the Elements of Harmony. She saw the jewels growing brightly and heard them giving off a high-pitched hum. The Elements, strengthened by the power of Derpy's selfless love, protected her from the Arglwydd.

Derpy turned her face forward again and continued walking towards the darkness of Tartarus.

The Arglwydd lunged his head forward and snapped his jaws around Derpy, but his teeth merely passed through her as if she was nothing but air. He tried again and again, but still Derpy, protected by the magic of the Elements, walked on right through him, like a ghost. The same happened when he swiped with his claws.

The Arglwydd was genuinely afraid. This was powerful magic he was facing, more powerful than anything he had dealt with before, and perhaps powerful enough to banish him into Tartarus once again. Terrified of the little pony, he uncoiled his body from the rock and flew as fast as he could away to the East, towards Mount Inferno. His body waved in the air like a snake in water as he set out to at least do some of his work to destroy.

Derpy walked on until she reached the edge of the darkness. She stared into its infinite emptiness for a few moments. She did not dare to look back, for fear that she might falter upon seeing one more time what she was leaving behind, and fail to carry out the task.

She took one step into Tartarus, and the ground and air inside was colder than the Arctic. The cold made her recall the adventure she had with the Doctor in the North Pole during Hearth's Warming Eve of the year 3013 A.E. They discovered an Ice Warrior trapped in a glacier and helped him rejoin his race on a far away planet.

She took another step, bringing her head into the blackness. The dark was such that she could not tell by sight whether or not her eyes were closed. It reminded her of facing the Vashta Nerada in the largest library in the Universe and how terrified she was of the moving shadows.

Finally, after a few more steps, her whole body entered the darkness. She did not know what to do next, but she trusted the Elements of Harmony to do their job.

Through the pitch black darkness, the jewels of the Elements began to glow. They grew brighter and brighter, driving away the darkness and revealing a flat white floor. Despite the great brilliance, the space was still black all around, as there were no walls for the light to illuminate, only emptiness.

Then a ribbon of pink light emerged out of the Element, Kindness, and flew in circles around Derpy. Then a ribbon of blue came from Laughter and also circled around the grey pegasus. Then Honesty and Loyalty released their ribbon of light, followed by Generosity and, finally, Magic.

As these six ribbons circled all around Derpy, the Elements of Harmony suddenly let out hundreds of light ribbons of every color. Greens, yellows, browns, turquoises, limes, violets, cyans, ambers, golds, silvers, and a host of other colors all circled Derpy. The ribbons went faster and faster until she was enveloped in a rainbow-like semi-sphere. Then the sphere shrank until it briefly became little more than a speck of light before bursting out, with a loud bang, in a radiance that engulfed the entire entrance of Tartarus.

The whole opening on the great rock was filled with a blinding light, which was divided in the center into two colors: blue and pink. Everyone standing on the plateau shielded their eyes from the brightness.

Then, a powerful wind began blowing into the light as Tartarus began sucking its prisoners back in. Everyone grabbed on to what they could - the TARDIS, the edge of the plateau, boulders along the slopes and each other - to keep themselves from succumbing to the wind.

From the East, there came the sound of a long desperate roar as the Arglwydd was the first to be pulled in by Tartarus. The great dragon grabbed onto a mountain peak that was not harmed by the opening of the Gates and he flapped like a flag as he held on to his freedom, until the peak broke off and he was sucked in, returned to the depths of his eternal prison.

Dark clouds then appeared in all horizons, rapidly approaching Mount Dechrau. Soon, countless screams, wails and shrieks were heard as the remaining hordes made their return to their captivity. Clouds of decayed ponies flew over the mountains and over the many plateaus surrounding the entrance of Tartarus. Despite the fact that a third of them were taken down in the fight around the entrance, they were still numerous enough to blot out the stars and the eclipse. Everyone ducked their heads as the hordes were sucked into the depths, hopefully never to emerge again.

When the last of the corpses were taken in by Tartarus, the winds stopped and the great metal wall that was the Gates began to reform. Grey crystal-like metal crept up from the ground and glistened in the light from the Elements. Up from the bottom, the Gates came back into being, blocking the light as it rose. When the Gates were half formed, the light was blocked enough for everyone to uncover their eyes and watch Derpy's final work.

Finally, the very top of the Gates were completed and Tartarus was sealed away once more, with Derpy and the Elements inside. Silence fell.