Spectrum

by Sledge115

Rating: teen
Tags: Twilight Sparkle, Violence, Princess Celestia, Dark, Human, Lyra, Princess Luna, Drama, Original Character, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Adventure
Length: 620696

Secrets come to light when a human appears, and the Equestrians learn of a world under siege – by none other than themselves. Caught in a web that binds the great and humble alike, can Lyra find what part she’ll play in the fate of three realms?

The worlds are changed.

Where Equestria was set to follow a familiar path of harmony and friendship, the path is waylaid by the appearance of a creature out of myth, bearing grave tidings.

On Earth at the dawn of the third millennium, a war that should have never been rages between humanity and the ones who would seek to perfect it.

For down the road less travelled, Equestria is Empire, a dark mirror of what it once was and should be.

Lyra Heartstrings, musician and dreamer, previously content to spend her life in the shadow of Princesses or their faithful students, must now decide the role she’ll play in this new reality. But within the threads that connect us all, just as even Princess Celestia can have the humblest desires, the smallest person may change the future.

Authored by Team Spectrum, currently consisting of Sledge115, VoxAdam, and RoyalPsycho.

Cover by skysayl.

Our TV Tropes Page.

Our Group
Equestria Timeline
Dramatis Personae/Character Sheet
Story Outline

Side Stories

Equestria
The First Second of Eternity, by Sledge115.
A Sun in Winter, by Sledge115 and VoxAdam.
In Night's Garden, by Sledge115.
Celestia Regina, by Sledge115.
The Rose of Florentina, by Sledge115.
Wallflower of Canterlot, by Sledge115.
Sogno di Volare, by Sledge115.
Velvet Quill & Sunny Skies, by Sledge115
Joy to the Worlds, by VoxAdam, TB3 and Sledge115.

Earth
Story of the Asian Front, by Kizuna Tallis.
Snowbound, by DoctorFluffy.
The Slow Mutants, by DoctorFluffy.
The Light Despondent, Remixed, by DoctorFluffy.
Dissonance, by RanOutOfIdeas.
Starvation, by DoctorFluffy.

Published 2017-05-25 23:00:01 UTC
Last updated 2024-02-23 19:30:13 UTC

Act I ~ Chapter One ~ The Human

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot
“Dear Chairman…”

Jed R
“Don’t ask me, man, I only work here.”

DoctorFluffy
“DOGGO KOTOWARU!”

VoxAdam
Vox Sola Contritione Silvarum

Sledge115
“Heroes never die.”

The Void
A chap powered solely by tea.

RoyalPsycho
He who walks behind the rows.

TB3
The original “I Like Trains” kid.

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Act One
From Earth To Equestria

Chapter One
The Human

* * * * *

“There are many who are living far below their possibilities because they are constantly handing over their individualities to others. Do you want to be a power in the world? Then be yourself.”
— In Tune With the Infinite, by Ralph Waldo Trine

“Power, time, gravity, love. The forces that really kick ass are all invisible.”
— Cloud Atlas, by David Mitchell

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~ First Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

It was a beautiful day in Ponyville, but since moving in from Canterlot, Lyra Heartstrings knew better than to take it for granted. After all, in Ponyville, any normal day could be a prelude to the latest magical mishap, malady, or madness to hit what Equestria’s leading insurers had dubbed the nation’s ‘trouble capital’.

‘Never trust a beautiful day. Word is, things always hit the hardest when it seems nicest.’

And yet, wasn’t that the fun of it all? In Ponyville, it seemed anything could happen. So if you were a pony of a curious mind or an adventurous bent, what better place to call your home? And what better thing to do on a fine sunny day than get out and about, go looking for the next discovery, chase the next adventure, seize that fine day by the ankles and shake it until the spice of life fell in a heap from its saddlebags?

‘Well, that was a weird mental picture,’ Lyra thought to herself. ‘Strike one for the day.’

Still, perhaps that was why, instead of staying back at the town she was lucky to call home, she now trotted along a half-forgotten old path through the Everfree Forest, never minding that, except as a shortcut to the brickyard or the water reservoir – or, more recently, to make a friendly visit to Zecora – most ponies still avoided the forest paths unless they couldn’t help it. It was a golden rule that had been drilled into Lyra ever since she’d agreed to move in with her girlfriend.

‘Never take the Everfree for granted.’

But here she was, a cheery smile coming to her face as she hopped across a small brook. Yes, taking a constitutional into the Forest was somewhat silly, possibly even dangerous, but her curiosity had finally nibbled away enough of her common sense to outweigh caution. It all returned to what Professor Shriek, that dear old thestral who always smelled vaguely of mushrooms, had told her back in Canterlot University:

‘Love your silly idea.’

She’d had some quite unusual teachers in her history. Although it could simply be argued that they all took a leaf from the same book the kooky old Headmaster of Celestia’s School had used. It suited her just fine as a learner and probably explained a lot about her outlook on life. To think, in other words, that, even if you knew an idea was silly, that didn’t mean there was nothing to be learnt from it. She could ask herself why she’d first conceived the idea, whether it had any potential, and why she truly thought it silly in the first place.

‘In challenging your preconceptions, you may unearth something entirely unexpected.’

In this case, her silly idea had been that there was undiscovered history in the Everfree Forest. It was a premise Lyra had formulated based on the wide variety of local folklore that surrounded the tract of wild woodland, from the curiously well-preserved remains of the Castle of The Two Sisters – which rumour said even Princess Celestia dared not enter – to outlandish stories of a lost village hidden inside the Forest.

‘Heh, I’m probably not going to find that village on my first expedition,’ Lyra thought lightly. ‘But maybe I can find the source of those stories in the Castle’s library? After all, every legend is anchored to some fragment of truth.’

That, right there, was why the Everfree piqued her interest.

Above and beyond the stories, myths and legends, it was simply strange, scientifically speaking. Any unicorn, or indeed, any pony with a pair of dowsing rods could tell at a glance that it was a nucleus of magic. Plot the land of Equestria’s leylines on a map, and you’d see the overgrown Forest was second only to Canterlot in the number of lines that intersected within its confines. Lyra’s own past attempts to measure the Everfree’s energy flux, with tools ranging from a ten-bit thaumic crystal to a Geegee Counter she’d sunk the better part of a month’s earnings into, had all left her with the same result – egg on her face. Quite literally in the case of the crystal, which had transformed into an ostrich egg.

She could feel the magic all around her now as she happily trotted deeper into the brush, wild and primal and alive. And, for all that the Everfree had a bad rep, she felt surprisingly uplifted by that raw vitality.

From above, rays of sunshine gleamed gold upon the verdant leaves and the damp, loamy undergrowth. Her path snaked through small valleys rich with ferns and old growth, watered by clear, fast-running streams, incubated in the muggy warmth of the Summer afternoon. The Forest, whose dense canopy enclosed all life which grew, trod and crawled within its boundaries, felt more than ever like a living entity, a great beast with a moist breath and lifeforce of its own, deep and slow and timeless, and a heart that beat but once each Spring, driving trees and flowers to bloom and colour. Although Celestia’s rays ultimately fed it, the Forest would always be its own domain, an unknown mind, remote and untouched by the ponies who elsewhere governed nature’s cycles, growing the plants and shepherding the clouds.

‘How strange is it, then,’ Lyra thought, ‘that the two Princesses once elected this location as the seat of their power, their place of rest? Could it be that the Forest hasn’t always been this way, that it’s just some old thing which has grown over something even older…’

Admittedly, she was spit-balling, which, to be fair, was what ninety percent of research in her field consisted of anyway, so it wasn’t anything new. For every premise that stuck, nine others went straight to Tartarus. But if she sought out the Castle, there was the possibility she’d uncover some forgotten archive detailing, well, something, right?

‘And heck?’ she mused, looking back at her saddlebags, packed with camera, film, trowels, water, and other essential supplies. ‘Even if I don’t find anything, this’ll still be a lot of fun!’

She was going to walk among ancient ruins that had barely known the hoofsteps of ponies for a millennium, she would read through ancient texts of lost lore and law. This could truly be amazing. A part of her began to wonder why more ponies hadn’t already taken a look. Surely Twilight, at the very least, would have been curious to investigate the archaeological significance of the site.

* * * * *

In point of fact, Twilight Sparkle, Ponyville’s resident librarian, did have more than a passing curiosity about said ruins. Ever since her first, momentous night in Ponyville, after discovering the Castle and becoming the Bearer of Magic, she’d dug up anything she could find on the old royal palace, hoping to try and learn more about it, maybe even uncover its secrets. Unfortunately, her ongoing friendship studies, not to mention the surprisingly regular – and increasingly serious – problems that sprung up around town, kept distracting her.

After several months of on-again, off-again research, she had postponed the project and put it at the back of her priorities’ list. As in, the back of the writing parchment she used to list her priorities. Whenever she found the time, however, she would gather her notes and throw herself back into the esoteric subject.

This occasion was a bit of an oddity, as the latest round of upheavals in her life had pushed her back towards research, not away from it. As she pondered the irony, Twilight’s eyes wandered towards the latest addition to her laboratory’s collection of magical relics. A scintillating triangle of enchanted mythril into which had been set a ruby-red diamond, crowned by an ornate crest depicting a winged unicorn mare.

The Alicorn Amulet.

Ancient, unspeakable, and thanks to a certain stage performer, Exhibit A in Ponyville’s fifty-seventh flirtation with disaster since Twilight had taken up residence in the Golden Oaks Library.

“Test N°7,” Twilight dictated aloud, a quill suspended in her aura transcribing as she spoke. “Magical resonance.”

She laid the quill down and took up a pair of tongs. In turn, she used them to pick up a crystal that had been carefully cultivated into a bident and bonded to a pair of vibranium strips. The resulting tool should, when struck against the Amulet, reveal the precise magical frequency of its underlying spell matrix.

Tongue between her lips, Twilight hoofed a pair of safety goggles over her eyes and advanced on the Amulet, which she had secured in a vice.

“Contact.”

Delicately, she tapped the magical tuning fork against the–

* * * * *

Anypony passing by would, at that moment, have seen a flash in the Golden Oaks’ windows, followed by a muffled explosion from below ground.

The Cutie Mark Crusaders were, in fact, just passing by, and would later attest that the entire house-tree had jumped in the air, performed a “totally awesome!” roots-over-branches flip, and landed neatly back in the resulting hole, none the worse for the wear.

The imagination of a child is such a wonderful thing.

* * * * *

Chest hacking from the fumes she’d inhaled, Twilight slammed open the cellar door and crawled into the main living space of her home, pursued by a roiling cloud of smoke. The tongs, smoking remains of the tuning fork still gripped tightly in their tines, were now wrapped around her horn. The Alicorn Amulet itself was impaled in one of the roof’s beams, having achieved sufficient escape velocity to not only break free of the vice, but to punch clear through the floorboards of the room above the lab.

“Results… inconclusive…” Twilight muttered, slumping face-first onto the nearest rug.

She lay there for some time, motionless except for when a unfazed baby dragon briefly left the kitchen to roll her into the recovery position. When she did eventually rise to her hooves, it was with a surprisingly glib look on her face, the look of a scholar, or madmare, faced with the possibility of a Capital-D Discovery.

Wincing, Twilight levitated her new piece of ironmongery headwear clear of her horn and, after a minor struggle, managed to magic the Alicorn Amulet free from its wooden anchorage.

“You’re just full of surprises, aren’t you?” Twilight spoke aloud, summoning another quill and sheet of parchment to take down notes. “Magic artificing on this scale has never been documented except in the case of the Elements of Harmony…”

“And the Crystal Heart,” Spike piped in from the kitchen, where he was currently constructing himself a bowl of ice-cream grand enough to require mountaineering gear for anyone to master.

“Excellent point, Spike!” Twilight nodded, with an approving jab of her quill. Then she frowned. “The Crystal Realm, another mystery sprung into reality, another legend become fact. Like the Elements themselves, and Nightmare Moon– I mean, Princess Luna.”

Contemplative, she turned the Amulet over in her aura, as if expecting a manufacturer’s signature to suddenly reveal itself. The past few years had opened her eyes to new magics, and now she handled an object of a power matched only by artefacts on the level of the Elements.

Oh, and Discord, naturally. But she preferred not to think about him too much. Just because Fluttershy was vouching for him since they’d let him out from his stone prison, she had no real interest in seeking a friendship with the guy.

She briefly wondered if that made her a bad person. After all, he was ‘good’ now, wasn’t he?

“The Alicorn Amulet…” Twilight mused, magically retrieving her notes from the basement. They were somewhat singed, but still legible, and were quickly orbiting her in a cloud of half-formed ideas and hypotheses. “But which alicorn? One of the two Sisters? Or another that has never been documented before?”

“There’s loads of alicorns pictured in your books, Twilight,” Spike offered. He had now set up a small step-ladder, and was using it to delicately place a cherry atop his monument to gluttony. “Like that Princess from the account of the love-poison.”

“Those are just drawings in stories, Spike,” Twilight replied. “Artistic license, used to dress up old mare’s tales.”

“Didn’t ponies use to say that Discord or Nightmare Moon was an old mare’s tale?” Spike replied, as he hunted through the drawers for a suitably magnificent spoon. “Or the Sonic Rainboom?”

As if summoned by his words, a rainbow streak of colour whooshed in through an open window.

The convection thrown up was enough to sweep Twilight’s notes into the newcomer’s slipstream and shred them into so much confetti. Just as unfortunately, it splattered Spike’s carefully constructed snack all over the room.

Bowled over against a bookcase from the sudden shock, their coats and scales covered in a papier-maché mix of parchment and sugar, Twilight and Spike each hauled themselves to a stand, their attention fixed on the mare who’d entered their day in such inimitable style.

Standing in the middle of the common-room was Rainbow Dash, the prismatic pegasus mare looking surprisingly frazzled.

“Twilight,” Dash gasped, seemingly unaware of the mess she had made, “Oh my gosh, Twilight! Twilight, we need your help! I mean I need your help! Lives depend upon it!”

“Whoa, there, Rainbow. What’s the problem?” Twilight replied, the anger she might have felt instantly squashed under a wave of concern for her friend.

“It’s… it’s…” Waving her forehooves around up in the air, Dash all but choked on her own words. “It’s a conspiracy!” she wheezed out at last. “It’s worse than missing out on Sweet Apple Cider Season! You’re the only pony I know who can do anything! Why won’t you just listen to me!”

“I am listening to you,” Twilight told her, raising an eyebrow. Spike, for his part, rolled his eyes.

“No, you’re not!” Dash cried out desperately. “Or else you’d already know what to do!”

Twilight held up a placating forehoof. “Look, slow down, alright,” she said, as calmly as she could. “Not everypony’s as… as quick on the uptake as you.”

Dash took a deep breath. “They don’t want me to have it,” the anxious pegasus stage-whispered to Twilight, shooting a glance at the door. “That must be what this is all about. There must be some big special secret they want to keep from me, it’s the one explanation which makes sense. The truth is out there, Twilight, written down somewhere, and you’re gonna help me uncover it.”

Now this alerted Twilight’s sense of intrigue.

“What truth written down where?” she whispered back. “Who doesn’t want you to have what?”

“Daring Do & The Volcano of Destiny, of course!” Dash practically wailed. “Order an ‘advance copy’, they said at A-Mare’s-ON, and it’s a whole day late! And by no fault of Derpy’s, either! Trust them to put precious cargo in the hooves of some guild-drone carrier, at least she knows the ins and outs of this town!”

Twilight did not blink once or twice. She blinked three times.

“And…” she began, recovering. “How can I help you with that problem?”

“How!” Dash echoed, one hoof waving wildly at their soggy surroundings. “You’ve got all... the... books! So you’ve gotta have a copy in here, right?”

“Rainbow,” Twilight said, patiently, or as patiently as possible given that her sanctuary from a world gone mad was now a bombsite, and her fresh coating of paper, cream and additives were rapidly drying towards a consistency best described as itchy. “This is a library, not a bookshop. We don’t get new additions to the catalogue unless we order them in, and since we’re not the National Library of Equestria, we don’t get complimentary copies from the publishers...”

“But… but this is a disaster!” Dash exclaimed, swooping up in the air with a beat of her wings. “It’s money down the drain, and worse, it means I won’t get to read it ahead of everypony else! Here I am, not coming in first, Twilight!”

Spike, who’d managed to scrape off most of his own basting of pureed notes, was walking towards the far side of the room, questing in search of cleaning supplies. “Someday,” he muttered, “she’s gonna have to learn not everything’s a competition.”

Oblivious to Spike’s wisdom, Rainbow Dash flew up to Twilight, getting so right in her face as to be almost touching snout-to-snout.

“Twilight, please,” Dash begged, shaking her friend by the shoulders. “If I don’t pick up that book today, I’m gonna be the laughingstock of the Ponyville Daring Do Fan Club. How could I show my face there again, after making such a big song-and-dance about getting that advance copy?”

Twilight remembered well that song-and-dance. It had involved Dash, whose showmareship and ego were second only to the Great and Powerful Trixie’s, going into a complete musical number, with a series of elaborate airwalks, including one ‘standing’ on her hindlegs.

“I wouldn’t worry about that,” Twilight replied, and managed an honest, even affectionate smile. “Given that the Ponyville Daring Do Fan Club currently consists of you and me.”

Dash’s wings missed a beat.

“Oh. Right.” Sheepishly, Dash straightened herself in mid-air to rub the back of her head. “Well, heh, guess I kinda dropped the bombshell there, huh? You must think I’m a real idiot.”

“Look,” Twilight said kindly. “If it means that much to you, I can send a message to my mother.”

“Your Mom?” Dash asked, surprised. “What’s she got to do with this?”

Twilight grabbed a quill, inkwell and parchment as she explained.

“Alright,” she admitted. “The reason why I didn’t tell you this before is, even though we are friends, I didn’t want to be currying favours. You see, my mother is Twilight Velvet, and ever since retiring from Court, she’s been working as an editor for Hoovesbury Publishing, and A.K. Yearling is one of her clients.”

“Oh. My. Gosh,” Dash whispered in awe. “So, you mean that she gets to read books before they’re released?”

Twilight nodded, “That’s the gist of it. Miss Yearling’s manuscripts all pass through her first, on the way towards publication.”

“Why did nopony tell me this job exists?” Dash asked, the excitement beginning to return. “That’s how you make a story so many times more awesome!”

“Rainbow Dash, listen,” Twilight said quickly. She saw where this was going. “I know you might think it sounds great, but I don’t think you’d enjoy the job much. For every good piece of writing, there’s a whole lot of junk to wade through, and you’ve got to through every. Single. One of them. And the writers themselves can be a rather… pushy bunch.”

“Uh, okay?” Dash replied flatly.

“Yeah,” Twilight nodded. “It takes patience, and sometimes the writers refuse to take advice, do their own thing, and burn every bridge in sight. You wouldn’t believe how many times Mother’s told me of how, after countless twists and turns, what ends up making it to publication is something that was re-written from the ground up.”

But this just made Dash look happy again. “Oh, pfft,” she said, blowing a raspberry. “From the ground? I hardly ever touch the ground, Twilight. I’m telling you, I could do this easy.”

“That’s what you think,” Twilight said, scribbling away.

“Say, Twilight?” Dash added, after a lengthy pause. “Why’re you all covered in sugar?”

* * * * *

Being Lyra Heartstrings meant your mind couldn’t sit still for any great length of time.

On her way, she had taken a detour to merrily prance about a field of wild flowers – and out here in the Everfree Forest, the flowers could get very wild, with big pointy teeth and all – then, after this had resulted in a chunk of her tail getting nipped off, she’d changed course again to pop by Zecora’s hut, only to be greeted by a sign in some mystic language which, after careful processing, she’d figured said that the local zebra witch-doctor would be back in five minutes.

Lyra had decided, then and there, that she couldn’t wait five minutes. Though her minty tail might have a tuft missing, though there were other strange encounters to be made in the forest, it was all small potatoes, in her book. The important par, she told herself, patting her camera fondly, was that she still had research to do. Perhaps she could have her little mishap looked at afterwards by Bonbon, though her girlfriend wouldn’t be pleased to hear where she’d gone.

‘Remember, Lyra, if you stumble upon any oats out here, you’ve got to make it up to Bonbon by bringing ‘em back to her. You owe her, anyway.’

And so it was, a little battered, but otherwise unharmed, that Lyra had reached the chasm splitting the Castle of the Two Sisters from the rest of the Forest. There was only one tiny problem; the sole bridge to cross was gone.

She recalled what Twilight had told her of that night her friend, together with the five special mares who’d cottoned on for the ride, had travelled out into the wild to find the Elements of Harmony, and thus free Princess Luna from the curse of Nightmare Moon. Several trials of character had awaited them. Rainbow Dash’s, naturally, had involved flying across this very canyon to fix the rope-bridge.

What a surprise, Dash’s workmanship had proven pretty shoddy. Or not built to last, at any rate.

‘That’s what comes of only having teeth to grip things,’ Lyra thought, staring down at her forehooves crossly. ‘How am I going to get across? No way am I turning back!’

Across the chasm, the moss- and vine-covered ruins awaited, seeming to almost taunt her with how close they were, and yet so far. What was it, she wondered, about wanting things so hard that it felt as if they took on a mind of their own, usually so they could mock you? Or perhaps that was just something the Everfree did. The very clouds in this place moved on their own, for heavens’ sake.

It wasn’t such a wide space separating her from the other side. Stepping towards the edge, which loosened a few pebbles beneath her hooves, Lyra peered critically at the broken remains of the bridge hanging over the cliffside.

All that it’d require was a little focus, and she could magic her way forward. Maybe lift the opposite half of the bridge and join the pieces back together. Or, better yet, why not simply teleport?

Lyra wetted her lips, feeling a bead of sweat on her forehead. ‘Well, no shame in trying.’

Taking a cautious step back, she gritted her teeth, willing the spark to form at the tip of her horn. With concentration, a fleck of gold appeared, channelling the magical energy stored within her body from birth as a unicorn. Most unicorns specialised in two or three spells at most, and teleportation was notoriously difficult, but she’d been to Celestia’s School. She could do this.

“C’mon, Lyra,” she muttered, silently cursing herself for cutting class. “You’ll do fine, just think happy thoughts.”

That had been her Headmaster’s advice at the old school. But nice as Equestria was, sometimes she felt that ‘good cheer’ and positivity were treated as a bit too much of an all-purpose solution. She wasn’t sure they were doing much to help at this moment.

They had done only so much for her, after she got released from the Changeling Queen’s control.

Needles pricked her brain as the unwanted memory washed over her, and her spark died. Groaning, Lyra clutched at her forehead, feeling herself teeter on her three hooves, suddenly very conscious of how the sheer drop yawed ahead.

After living for years in a town where assaults from strange beasts were a fact of life, to have experienced such a close brush with doom back at her home city sent fear rippling down her coat. Although, as always, things had ended happily, the Royal Wedding a roaring success, a piece of her heart would ever carry the burden of knowing she’d been placed in thrall to a devil.

‘Think... happy thoughts…’ Lyra urged herself. ‘Sunshine and rainbows...’

Bonbon had been there to comfort her, in the night after, and for many nights beyond…

Such grand music Octavia Melody and Vinyl Scratch had made for the wedding…

The train ride in the company of Twilight and friends back to Ponyville…

… And it had been sort of interesting to meet a new species.

‘That’s better.’

With a raise of her head, Lyra smiled as she felt the spark reignite atop her horn. Confidence flooded her, confidence that nothing would, or could, ever keep her down for long. She was a mare of simple tastes, leading her own small life, content to leave duty to others, but none may call her idle, although they often did. When she wanted something dearly, she’d climb mountains for it. Or cross chasms, as the case may be.

Fueled by such thoughts, the picture of where she wished her magic to lead her coalesced within her mind, and a golden aura enveloped all of her. She closed her eyes at the brightness, feeling her body momentarily grow weightless in the space between spaces.

When she next opened her eyes, Lyra was surprised to be standing at the bottom of the chasm.

* * * * *

It was another kind of challenge for Rainbow Dash to contain her impatience, as well as her glee, while she watched her dear friend Twilight finish writing the letter that, finally, would get her the book she couldn’t wait to put her hooves on, wrap it up and tug it in bed by her side.

“There, that’s done,” Twilight said, rolling up the scroll. “Spike, care to do the honours?”

“Wait,” Dash said, “That thing he does, with the green fire and all, I thought it only sent messages to Princess Celestia?”

“I’m right here, Rainbow Dash,” Spike said, walking up to take the scroll from Twilight. “And, yeah, the spell’s designed so that anything I set on fire, instead of burning, gets sent to Celestia. That is, unless I concentrate really hard on doing it otherwise. If I want, for example, I can get a letter to Twilight’s mom’s living-room, no problem. Done it before.”

Looking almost bored, he blew upon the scroll which, as expected, dissolved without ash, not burnt but sent elsewhere.

“You know, Spike,” Dash said thoughtfully. “You ever try doing to that for a whole book?”

She’d said the wrong thing. Before her eyes, Spike gulped as Twilight visibly tensed up.

“He’s expressly forbidden from it,” Twilight said coldly. “Ever since that time he decided that, rather than have to return a trolley full of books the Princess had lent me, he could just burn them. Luckily Celestia thought it was funny. We had to set aside time for a whole six months, just so we could track down all the missing pages scattered around the Palace.”

”Every time you think you’ve put a book back together…” Spike mumbled abashedly. “Turns out there’s, like, an index missing, or an editor’s note…”

“Ah, well, never mind,” Dash said, desperate to change the subject. “So, uh, Twi’, how is your, um, research coming along?” she asked awkwardly, scanning the room for a suitable diversion. That was how she came to spot the Alicorn Amulet on the desk. “Researching the… Amulet, wasn’t it?”

That did the trick. Instantly, Twilight’s scientific curiosity supplanted her annoyance.

“Oh yes, it’s so exciting!” Twilight said, bouncing, of all things, over to her desk. “Would you believe,” she expostulated, levitating up the Amulet, “The intricate complexity which composes this thing’s matrix and thus lends it its capacity to amplify power, it’s just… astounding! Like nothing I’ve seen before!”

“Equish, please, Twilight,” Dash sighed, touching down beside her. “What does all that mean?”

Twilight grinned. “It means, if I’m reading this right, that the Alicorn Amulet works on every kind of pony magic, not only unicorns. Why, any pegasi and earthponies who put this on would become… how did you once put it?”

“Uh?” Dash’s mouth hung half-open. “Did I say something? I don’t do egghead stuff, Twilight, you know that.”

“Yes,” Twilight smiled. “But, didn’t you have this scale of percentage measurement for how you estimate, in superlatives, the abstract quality of an emotional high?”

Despite Dash’s previous words, the gears in her head, by now accustomed to Twilight-speak, were busily turning to translate what her friend had just said.

“Oh, right. Twenty percent cooler,” Dash said slowly, still half-agape. “Why does everypony act as if that’s my catchphrase or something? I only used it, like, that one time!”

“Well,” Twilight replied, tapping the Amulet, “Rarity did say she’d make a note of it, so she’d be prepared next time she’d have to make you a dress.” She paused briefly. “Hm, wasn’t that following the occasion when she’d offered us all new dresses for the Grand Galloping Gala, and we nearly ruined her career by micro-managing our commissions ‘til they looked awful?”

“Yeah, don’t remind me,” Dash said grumpily. “Twilight, why’ve you got this habit of telling everypony all the stuff they should already know?”

“I beg your pardon?”

Dash flexed her wings. “Like,” she grunted, holding out a forehoof, “every time we embark on an adventure, or go somewhere new, it’s like you feel worried we’re not gonna remember why we’re there and what we’ll be doing? I mean, maybe that’s just your thing, but it’s kinda weird. Who talks like that?”

Twilight raised an eyebrow. “Somepony who’s all about keeping things neat and organised? The pony who gets things sorted for her friends when they’re in a sticky situation? Such as a late delivery on a new book?”

“Yeah, good point,” Dash admitted, bashfully rubbing the back of her head. “Guess it must it be second nature to you. Look, Twi’, it’s cool, just so long’s you don’t start telling me how you got that Amulet. I was a part of it, remember?”

“Yeah,” Twilight nodded hesitantly. “To be honest, I’d rather not think about it too much. That… really wasn’t the smiliest of outcomes to an adventure of ours.”

The brows furrowed on Rainbow Dash’s face. Her attempts to divert her friend’s attention had merely succeeded in leading deeper into uncomfortable territory. There was nothing for it, she’d have to own up.

“Hey, Twilight,” Dash said, laying a forehoof on Twilight’s shoulder. “Sorry if I’ve been… kind of a pain to be around. Excitement, messes with my brain, ya know? But you don’t have to feel bad ‘bout what happened. Trixie had it coming.”

“That doesn’t mean I feel happy about it,” Twilight said glumly. “She did have a bit of a reason to feel angry at us. It isn’t like luring the Ursa Minor into Ponyville was her idea. And when push came to shove, she did try to fight it off instead of running away.”

“Bleh,” Dash said, pushing her tongue inside her cheek. “Shouldn’t have been boasting in the first place like she was.”

“You enjoy boasting.”

“Except I really am that great!” Dash insisted. “You don’t go around bragging about things you can’t do for real, that’s silly! Don’t talk the talk if you can’t walk the walk. Not that I do much, um… walking. ‘Sides, you’re goin’ about it as if that star-bear ate her up or something. But everypony got more scared than hurt, which’s the important thing, right?”

“It hurt her career,” Twilight said softly. “She told us so herself, made her a laughingstock. Nopony bought her showmare’s act after that embarrassing incident.”

“There you go again–” Dash began, but she cut herself off. “Yeah. Okay, that was rotten luck, worse than she deserved. Still doesn’t justify striding back into town wearing a dark artefact of black magic. How dare she? Honestly, Twilight, I’m surprised at you. You’re the one who Trixie was trying to show up, when all you did was fix her mess, cos’ that’s what you do.”

Spike, who was reading a magazine, coughed from his side of the room.

“If you ask me,” he muttered. “Should’ve shown Trixie what real magic was from the start, not let her hype up all her phony tricks. That’d have got her to hush her loud mouth real quick. That way she wouldn’t be staring now at a whole five years to figure out Hoofdini’s escape act.”

Twilight glared at him, and Dash found herself glaring at him, too.

“What? What’d I say?”

“You know, Spike,” Twilight whispered, “sometimes you don’t know when to hush yourself.”

Dash broke her glare. “Ah, go easy on him, Twilight. He’s just a kid.”

“Well, Rainbow,” Twilight said, glancing her way, “I don’t think it’s funny to crack jokes about a mare facing a five-year prison sentence.”

“You sound an awful lot like Fluttershy,” Dash grunted. “Last I saw of her, she was out in town collecting jam to send Trixie as a comfort package. I swear, all that kindness, it’s gonna land her in a real jam someday.”

“Sometimes I think there’s a lot more to Fluttershy’s meekness than meets the eye,” Twilight commented. “See how she got Discord to play nice… and that was a spirit of disharmony imprisoned for a thousand years.”

Rainbow Dash might have felt inclined to say more, but her own mention of Fluttershy’s care package had got her thinking back to the time she’d been the one to get such a package from her friends, at Wonderbolt Academy. As usual, because their lives were nothing if not filled with unlikely troubles, this simple act of delivery had led into a death-defying stunt of her rescuing the others when they got caught in a tornado, courtesy of her overzealous flight leader.

Still, after getting demoted, Lightning Dust had admitted she was wrong. Proven she had some loyalty to the team in her, not just loyalty to herself. Though left fuming, this had led Dash to forgive her for it all.

She wondered how much there really was to this “forgiveness” business.

… Typical of going to visit Twi’ for anything. It always had to wind up on thinking big thoughts.

* * * * *

“Now how’d I get down here?” Lyra grumbled aloud. “And how do I get out?”

There had to be a mishap in the magic. She’d wanted to transport herself to the other side, not get caught slap-bang between two cliffsides, a rock and a hard place, whichever was which. Vaguely, she supposed it was lucky she hadn’t utterly missed her mark and teleported in mid-air. Without any clouds to catch her, the fall would have been cruel.

‘Maybe I could create some stairs?’ Lyra thought, looking towards a large, flat brown rock. ‘Just one rock in front of the other, and I’ll be fine. Easy as piling oats.’

She took a deep breath, imagined holding the rock, and felt her magic grip it...

The rock shattered to powder underneath her grip.

‘What!’

Lyra had barely touched it with her TK. Barely even felt it in her magic. Either that had been particularly weak sandstone, or something weird was happening.

Her eyes darted the dry canyon bed for another rock, finally settling on something sturdier. Limestone, by the looks of it. A small slab, just to test it. Tongue sticking out, she tried again, feeling her magic wrap around the rock, ready to lift. Except this time, whereas her magic had pulverised the first rock, this time, she could barely hold onto it. It was as if the rock weighed about fifty pounds more than it should.

‘This doesn’t make any sense. Every teacher said I had above-average precision, whatever that means. So how am I doing this? Something has to be wrong with...’

Lyra froze, and let the rock drop to the ground.

‘The magic.’

Something hadn’t felt right when she’d tried out teleportation. When she’d lifted the first rock, she had gripped too hard without intending to. Now she was unable to lift something that, by all rights, ought to have been a piece of cake. What could have–

Lyra turned, heart caught in her throat.

There was something on the air, a kind of humming which had gotten stronger after her attempt to move the rock. She could almost, not quite hear it, but feel it. It wasn’t a noise. It was more as if someone had tapped a tuning fork to a rock, and Lyra’s horn was vibrating in tune with it.

‘Magical fluctuation!’ she thought, harried. ‘Oh, this could be bad! This could be very bad! Like, Bonbon getting-garbage-dumped-on-her levels of bad!’

Twitching, she looked all around for a way out of the chasm.

Instinct took over. Barely checking to ensure she still had her saddlebags and everything she needed inside, Lyra fled. She galloped as far away as she could from where she’d appeared, winding down what path the chasm had to offer, in desperate hope of finding some way out.

After a few moments, she caught a glimmer of… something, only to find herself near what looked like some kind of natural rock formation, not unlike a staircase.

“Oh, thank goodness,” Lyra breathed out, panting. “Didn’t expect finding a way would be that easy.”

Before she had set hoof on the stairs, however, the glimmer caught her eye again. It was originating from the inside of a cave to her right, a little way from the bottom of the ‘stairs’.

Hesitant, Lyra glanced upwards, to the blue skies. Then, in an instant, succumbing to curiosity, Lyra left her escape route behind, and trotted towards the gleam, into the cave’s mouth.

‘Some sort of natural crystal formation?’

The cave was deep, but it didn’t take her long to find the source of the light. Her eyes widened with wonder as, reaching the centre, they beheld a most extraordinary sight.

It looked, to all intents and purposes, like a giant tree.

But not just any tree. This one, majestic and towering within its lonely cavern, had apparently grown from the living crystal, sprouting five jagged branches which embossed at the ends by diamonds of different colours. Colours that looked oddly familiar to Lyra, though she couldn’t quite place them. At the heart of this tree in which the crystalline formations of the branches met, where a knothole might have been found upon an ordinary tree, was an arrangement not unlike a star.

‘Just like Twilight’s mark,’ some part of her thought, unbidden.

Below that, strangest of all, between the roots, were the imprints of the Sun and the Moon.

“Is it… you?” Lyra asked aloud, looking at the tree. “Are you the source of the magical disturbance?”

She felt almost stupid for talking to it, but reassured herself that she’d been taught there were many entities that existed within otherwise static objects.

The tree scintillated, twinkling as if in reply.

“Why?” Lyra asked simply. “Why am I…?”

There was a sudden rumble. Lyra turned around, frowning, before looking back at the tree. Another rumble came, shaking dust off the roof of the cavern, stronger than the last one, and then another.

‘Is the cave unstable?’ Lyra wondered uneasily, taking a step back.

Suddenly there was a flash of what almost looked like lightning, and Lyra jumped.

“What was that!” she yelled, more out of reflex than anything.

Another flash lashed out, seemingly from nowhere, and then like clockwork, another. Lyra backed away, feeling the urge to run, but something compelled her to stay – whether fear or morbid curiosity, she couldn’t say.

The flashes continued, one after the other, until in a sudden blaze of light there was an ultimate, blindingly white glare that filled the whole cavern. When it receded, a figure was standing in front of the tree, enveloped in a shroud of golden dust, turning the cool, pale light inside the cavern into that of the twilight Sun…

Blinking away tears, Lyra stared at the mysterious apparition, which stared back.

‘Bipedal. Clothes. Mostly hairless, except–’

“Ly-Lyra?” the figure whispered. “Lyra Heartstrings?”

“Yes…” Lyra whispered in reply, eyes wide with shock.

The figure spoke something, falteringly, in words she did not understand. But then, as if the speaker had caught the look of confusion in her eyes, it spoke anew. And this time, although the words came out as though they required the last of the speaker’s strength, she recognised them for her own native tongue.

“This… this must be Heaven… unless...” the figure said, something like a smile gracing its strange features. “You… you did it. Lyra… you actually… actually did it…”

That was all it said, as it lapsed into unconsciousness on the spot, collapsing heavily to the ground in front of the tree. At once, Lyra dashed over.

‘Human…’ Lyra thought reflexively as she checked the creature was still breathing. ‘It’s a human. Right? Two hands.’ Her brain had gone into analytical mode. ‘Bipedal structure and opposable-thumb hands…’

She noticed something else. The eerie reverberation in the background had dissipated. Which meant she should be able to work her magic again now.

“Hang on in there, pal,” Lyra whispered to the new creature, horn lighting anew, now certain she knew what it was. “I’ll get us some help.”

Her horn flashed, with far less effort this time, and Lyra found she had taken them back to where she had started, in front of the broken bridge. Even in her determination to aid a vulnerable stranger, her power could only carry them so far.

Drawing upon what she’d learnt of how the recovery position applied to two-legged creatures, Lyra rested its head against its forelimbs – its hands, she thought, regretting that she had no time to marvel – wincing at its unconscious groan.

The question crossed her mind as to who she’d get. Out here in the Everfree, Zecora was the obvious choice, yet there was no telling when she might return home. Briefly, Bulk Biceps‘ training spot crossed Lyra’s mind. She dismissed it almost instantly. Agreeable as the the bodybuilder could be, explaining things to him would cost her more time and trouble than he was worth. Besides, Lyra didn’t want to run the risk of that nosey parker Featherweight learning about the creature from his father.

That left her with no option but to make the run all the way back to Ponyville.

‘Twilight,’ Lyra thought, turning tail and setting off at a hard gallop. ‘She’ll know what to do, she always does.’

* * * * *

“And that’s how far I’ve got,” Twilight finished explaining at last. “See how far that is. I’m actually contemplating asking Discord if he can tell me anything about the highly mysterious, highly dangerous magical artefact. The point is, Rainbow,” she said, peering at the Amulet, “I don’t know how I’ll get this thing to unwrap its secrets for me.”

Dash tilted her head. “You sure it’s something we oughtta find out?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Twilight asked, frowning in confusion. “Anything we can learn from this can tell us something about the past, when it was made, and who by!”

“And, maybe, why they wanted to create something that sends ponies power-mad and cuckoo-crazy? I get I’m not the brightest spark ‘round here, but what if it’s… I dunno, ‘things ponies were not meant to know’?”

Twilight snorted. “I don’t believe there are ‘things ponies were not meant to know’.”

“You’ll say that, and then you'll read some ancient book or find some ancient tomb and inadvertently unleash some mystical doodad,” Dash said, raising an eyebrow. “Like in that Daring Do rip-off, what was it… The Mareohs of Neighypt, when they cursed ponies and they turned into horrible monsters that could destroy the world!”

Twilight snorted. “Ancient artefacts don’t tend to cause curses and suchlike. That’s usually confined to the realm of fiction.”

“It drove Trixie crazy, that’s sort of like a curse.”

“Well, okay, that is a good point, but–” Twilight’s train of thought abruptly derailed. “You read a book other than Daring Do?”

Dash shrugged. “Got bored, got desperate, it looked similar… and Minus recommended it to me. Think she might’ve meant it as a prank. Last time I try broadening my horizons.” She smirked. “What do you think I am, stupid?”

“No, it’s not that,” Twilight began, and then she sighed. “Sorry, I’m happy that you did try. Anyway, broadening your horizons can be good.”

“Not to a pegasus, it isn’t,” Dash retorted. “The sky’s just right as it is, don’t need to be no bigger.”

Twilight snorted again. “I’m fairly certain that’s less a pegasus thing, and more a you thing. Plenty of other pegasi seem less averse to trying new things.”

Rainbow Dash sighed. “Look, I like what I like, it works for me. ‘Kay?”

It was Twilight’s turn to shrug. “Whatever you say, Dash. I have a lot to be–”

Before she could finish, the door to the library burst open.

“Twilight!” a familiar voice yelled, and Twilight yelped in surprise at the sight of a very breathless Lyra Heartstrings, who looked as though she’d been galloping at top speed. “You need to… one mo’…”

“Lyra?” Twilight managed. “What… what’s wrong?”

“Injured… creature… new…” Lyra replied haltingly. “Forest… Castle. Down the… chasm. You… need to come. Like, now.”

And without another word, she dashed out the door again, closing it. Twilight glanced at Dash.

“Sounds… weird,” Dash supplied after a moment.

Twilight sighed. “Come on, we need to get the others and follow her. Celestia only knows what this is about.”

She went to the front door and reopened it, only to now find herself nose-to-nose with the familiar, floofy-haired form of Pinkie Pie.

“Hi!” the exuberant baker said with a smile, almost casually.

Twilight blinked as she realised the rest of the Element Bearers – Rarity the seamstress, Applejack the apple farmer and Fluttershy the animal caretaker, the last of whom had her saddlebags slung around her waist – were standing in her doorstep behind Pinkie, looking various kinds of flustered.

“Uh…” Twilight said, “I was… about to come find you.”

“Yup!” Pinkie said cheerfully.

Twilight frowned in confusion. “Then… why are you…”

“Pinkie Sense.”

“... Pinkie Sense.”

“Had a real big doozy, thought you’d probably want the gang together, found them all, came here,” Pinkie clarified, still smiling. “There sure was a great disturbance in this horse!”

Dash glanced at Twilight. “Well, isn’t that ever so convenient.”

“Um, not really,” Fluttershy attempted, tapping her saddlebags. “See, I was out buying jam for Trixie…”

“Pinkie gathered us all in rather short order,” Rarity said, exasperated. “And I’ll have you know I was busy on an important new clothing line and–”

“Shucks, we were all busy,” Applejack put in, “but if it’s a Pinkie Sense, better to get it over with.” She smiled. “So, what’s up, Twi’?”

“Well,” Twilight began. “I was in the middle of trying to study the Alicorn Amulet, then Rainbow Dash came in, wanted my help getting the new Daring Do book, and after that was done, we had quite a chat about all that’s happened lately. I hoped those might be the last of our problems for a long time, but now Lyra’s popped by and she says there’s this new creature.”

“New creature?” Fluttershy asked, less timidly than usual. “Where?”

“Out in the Forest, I’m afraid. At the old Castle, what’s more,” Twilight explained. “That’s all I got. I think she said something about it being… injured.”

“How awful!” Fluttershy gasped. “We can’t just leave it out there on its own!”

“Fluttershy, I’ve no idea what this is, and Lyra, she can be pretty silly–”

“Not so silly as not to know when a critter needs help,” Applejack interrupted firmly. “If she says we’re needed, then needed we are. C’mon, girls, less yappin’, more gallopin’. We hafta get to the Castle, pronto.”

She turned and headed off, most of the others following. Dash’s brow was creasing.

“Y’know, there’s something screwy about all this. Like… I dunno, I have a bad feeling about–”

“Don’t say it,” Twilight said heavily. “Next you'll be telling me you have a ‘Dashie Sense’.”

Dash blinked. “Of course not, Twilight. That’d just be silly.”

Before Twilight could say anything else, Rainbow had turned and dashed off to follow the others. She quietly sighed and shook her head.

“You wait here, Spike. I’m off to see what all the fuss is about this time...”

As the door closed behind Twilight, the echo of her hurrying hoofsteps mixing with her friends’ in resounding further and further away, Spike shared a look with the newest occupant of their little family at Golden Oaks Library.

“Well then, Peewee,” he said, rolling up his magazine, discarding it. “Looks like it’s just you and me now. Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it. It’s how things work around here.”

The phoenix chick chirped affectionately.

* * * * *

He crawled.

He crawled because walking hurt, and because staying still was as good as dying. He crawled, because he could, and because that was a miracle in itself. He crawled because he was damned if he died in some hole, far from home.

He was damned if he died without doing everything he could. People counted on him. A world depended on him.

He crawled, leaving the chasm behind him, grimacing in pain as he did so.

He crawled and ran a checklist through his mind, to wrench his attention from the pain. What had happened to him? How had he landed here? And where was here?

Had that really been Lyra?

He crawled.

* * * * *

Catching up to Lyra did not yield any answers for Twilight.

Then again, only so much about that mare ever did, it seemed. Strange to think they’d been friends in Canterlot, and yet a lot about Lyra still felt like an enigma to Twilight. Over time, she’d come to suspect this had less to with Lyra than it did with herself, as her understanding of ‘friendship’ had greatly evolved in the days since moving to Ponyville. It remained a bit odd, nonetheless, that the only mare from the old Canterlot crowd to have moved with her should be the one she felt the least on an even keel with.

“Lyra, would you please just tell us what’s up?” Twilight cried exasperatedly.

“There was a creature!” Lyra called back, speaking in a rushed voice. “I don't know where it came from, there was some sort of magic, some kind of…”

“Slow down!” Twilight cried. “What do you mean ‘creature’?”

“I mean, a creature, a being, something I've never seen before!” Lyra called. “Well, not in the flesh anyway, but a–”

“Hold on,” Dash said suddenly, stopping dead in the air. “Everypony hold it!”

At once, everyone stopped along the forest path. Lyra looked back at Dash with annoyance, and Twilight couldn't help but share her confusion.

“What is it?”

“Over there,” Dash said, pointing, her voice low and hushed. “You see it. Right?”

Twilight looked at her, then at the thing she was pointing at, and then back at Dash. She took a breath.

“It’s a tree, Rainbow.”

Dash rolled her eyes. “Well, duh! Of course it’s a tree! But look at it!”

Sighing, Twilight looked back at the tree. It was an especially gnarled specimen of an old oak, sure, but there didn't seem to be anything particularly wrong with it.

“You see it, don't you?” Dash asked. She looked at the others. “Any of you?”

“Huh, I do!” Pinkie Pie put in. The pink party pony had her head tilted at an almost entirely upside-down angle, a look of concentration on her face. “It’s a skull!”

Turning to look at the tree once more, Twilight followed Pinkie’s lead in tilting her head. The other five followed suit. Now that Pinkie had said it, the tree’s arrangement did look like a pony’s skull. Sort of. The gloom under the canopy did not help.

“Yeah,” Lyra said, with a troubled frown. “It kinda does. Huh.”

“Ghastly,” Rarity said, eager and quick to straighten herself. “Only in the Everfree Forest would one ever get such a horrid display.”

Pinkie Pie tapped her chin. “Come to think of it… haven’t we been here before? I swear, that looks familiar.”

“Now that you mention it, darling,” Rarity said. “It does remind me of something. We have been here, right?”

“I think,” Fluttershy added tremulously, “I think I remember something like this tree, from the night we had to follow Nightmare Moon.”

“Here’s hoping that’s what the omen was, then,” Dash said.

“What omen? What do you mean?” Twilight asked, looking at Dash, who wore an expression of utmost concern on her face. She looked at the tree again, scowling at it, then back to Dash, who simply motioned to the tree as if to say ‘well?’

“So… it’s a tree that vaguely resembles a skull,” Twilight said after a moment. “Really… really vaguely.” She sighed. “How is this important?”

“It’s a Death Tree, Twilight!” Dash said, somewhat impatiently.

“A what?”

“Oh, come on!” Dash yelled. “You’re the egghead, you’ve got to have heard of a Death Tree!”

“I really haven’t,” Twilight said. “It must be an obscure myth of some kind…”

To her surprise, there came a small cough from behind her. Twilight turned to see Fluttershy smiling slightly, if worriedly.

”Back in the days before Equestria was unified,” Fluttershy said quietly, “there was a unit of pegasus troopers from the old junta, who marched through a forest. On hoof, because it was storming harder than they’d ever known, or would ever know until the Great Winter, and they hoped the cover might protect them. Look, they didn’t understand yet that it isn’t safe to shelter under trees in a lightning storm. And that’s how they came upon these trees which appeared in the shape of grinning skulls, but even though they took it as a bad sign, their commander pushed them on.”

“And they were never seen again,” Dash finished dramatically. “The trees were an omen! Only one soldier escaped, and he was half out of his mind! No-one ever truly discovered what happened that night.”

“Ever since then,” Fluttershy said, her voice quivering, “Death Trees have been omens of bad luck, death, and s-slaughter. Pegasi don't fly when they see one. We turn away.”

Twilight looked from Fluttershy to Dash with incredulity, Lyra’s urgency quite forgotten in all the commotion. “And you believe that hokum?”

Dash tapped the side of her head. “It’s one of the oldest campfire tales in pegasus history! We grew up with it!”

“It’s only a tree,” Twilight countered. “I mean, yeah, it’s an ugly tree…”

“Twilight, it’s a skull!” Dash said insistently. “We can all see it! Even you!”

“She’s right about that, sugarcube,” Applejack said somberly. “It’s a tree and it looks like a skull. Reckon that fits all the criteria for this ‘death tree’ thingamajig.”

“Exactly!” Dash said. “So it’s a Death Tree, it has to be!”

Twilight sighed. “Really, though? It’s an old tree. It looks a little bit like a skull. That doesn’t mean that some horrible thing is gonna happen–”

“Wh-what in Equestria is that?” shrieked Rarity, clutching Fluttershy.

There was a creature, staring at them from the woods.

“Oh no…” Lyra whispered.

It was tall, maybe six foot. Bipedal, and wearing clothes – grey, black and white camouflage patterns over the trousers and torso, the upper body attire consisting of some sort of light armour, the whole of it dirty, covered in grime and what looked like blood. Parts of the attire were torn, showing bloody gashes and at least one nasty burn. Its eyes were blue, its hair cropped short, down to a blonde and a wispy goatee on its chin.

Notably, there were a few odd markings on its pale skin. They were blue, almost luminescent, like writing in some unknown script.

“Everypony, stay calm,” Lyra said. “This is the creature I mentioned. Celestia knows how it dragged itself all this way…”

“What… the flaming Tartarus… are we looking at?” Rainbow Dash asked, a look of bewilderment on her face.

“Rainbow Dash, watch your language,” Fluttershy admonished reflexively.

The creature, whatever it was, was blinking at them, apparently confused.

“Wh–” it grunted, eyes widening slightly.

“That…” Lyra said, a grin forming on her face. “That’s a…”

“No!” the figure said, its voice masculine. It held up one of its upper arms – was that a claw, or a paw at the end? – in a warding gesture. “No, you won’t!”

This wiped the grin off Lyra’s face. When Twilight stepped forward, the creature took a step further back.

“Uh… we aren’t going to hurt you,” she said.

“You won’t change me!” he hissed with surprising venom for his condition. He stumbled backward, before, in a sudden motion, collapsing to the leaves-strewn path, seemingly from exhaustion.

At once, Lyra rushed forward, Twilight and the others behind her.

“What… what is it?” Rarity asked, frowning in confusion.

“I think…” Lyra said, clearing her throat. “I think it’s a human.”

There was a moment of confused silence before Twilight spoke up, frowning. “A… a human? But… but that’s impossible. Humans, they’re not real. They’re myths.”

“Ponyville seems to have somethin’ of a sizeable population of myths these days,” said Applejack.

“Yeah,” Lyra said, grinning at her, feeling triumphant despite the poor human’s injured state. “They’re supposed to be. But I’ve studied them all my life, and I can tell you, this,” she gestured at the figure, “is definitely one.”

She turned to gaze down at the unconscious human, uncertain how to react, giddy nonetheless.

“You know, I always wondered if they were real. I always believed…” Lyra let out an almost imperceptible squeal of excitement, forehooves dancing in the dirt. “And now, here it is! A human! Human-human-human!”

Twilight was still frowning, apparently unconvinced. “But…” she said slowly, repeating herself. “That’s impossible. They’re not real.”

Rarity shook her head. “I don’t think we’re in a position to judge on this one, Twilight.”

“It’s here,” Lyra said, pointing at the being which lay on the forest path. “It’s real.”

“Yeah,” Dash added with a smirk. “Try broadening your horizons, Twi’.”

Twilight gave her a withering look.

“Impossible or not,” Applejack interjected brusquely, “this fella needs a doctor somethin’ fierce. Look at these injuries... it’s beat up worse’n Braeburn in a bar fight with a buffalo.”

“Applejack’s right,” Fluttershy spoke up. “Something terrible must’ve happened to it.”

“That poor human, then!” Pinkie Pie said. “I hope we can help it out. Maybe a party will do the trick?”

“I’m not sure,” Fluttershy said, cradling her saddlebags. “I have a bad feeling about it.”

“You think so?” Pinkie asked, leaping onto a tree stump. “Everyone loves parties. Besides, I’m sure that when he wakes up he’ll be happy to have cake, and be surrounded by concerned faces.”

“First we need to get him to safety,” said Lyra, unsaddling her own bags. “Flutters, pass me your saddlebags, we can use these as a cushion for its head.”

Lyra pinched her bottom lip, staring over the injuries the human had suffered. Some were clearly lacerations, but more than a few made her think, based in no small part on prior experience, of magic burns.

“I wonder what happened to them…”

* * * * *

Another pair of eyes watched the group as they began trying to move the unconscious human. These eyes studied the mares carefully, lingering on Lyra Heartstrings especially.

‘I know these mares. They wouldn’t help a human without ponifying. Especially not him. And they wouldn’t be talking to the Apostate… if that really is her, somehow.’

And yet here they were.

‘Curious,’ the owner of those eyes thought. ‘Is this the past, or some strange alternate reality? Where am I?’

All evidence suggested that they were somewhere else.

Wherever this was, the owner of those carefully watching eyes knew their duty. They would follow, they would watch, and they would serve their Mistress’s interests.

* * * * *

And the Tree of Harmony... sighed.

The Tree could sense their presence, these six mares who wore as hallowed talismans the fruit it had once borne, and the alien creature brought from another world. Most of all, strange as this may feel, the Tree sensed their common friend, a curious little green unicorn who had stumbled upon it by happenstance, for happenstance it was. Destiny played little role in these things, less than many believed.

Would the six mares have collected their six talismans without the careful, attentive planning of Princess Celestia?

It was not a pre-ordained path which had led Lyra Heartstrings to find the human here. The human had been sent to this spot, one of a scant few unto which he could be sent, because out of all the vast realms of possibility, this was the reality in which Lyra had, by inadvertence, crossed paths with the Tree of Harmony.

The Tree did not possess the power of speech, not as beings of flesh-and-blood understood it, nor could its words be heard by ordinary ears. But had anyone chanced to visit it at that moment, they would have felt a peculiar sensation, akin to two words coursing through their selves, soft as the rustle of crystalline leaves in the wind.

‘Forgive Me.’

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam: Welcome to Equestria. Or, as it shall come to be known, “Sunny” Equestria. The world of our heroines from the show, namely Twilight and her friends. But also the home of our heroine for this story, Lyra Heartstrings.

Who is the human who appeared in the Everfree Forest and how did he get here? Who is that has followed him?

A new plot breadcrumb; the book Rainbow Dash was waiting for to arrive in the mail is Daring Do & The Volcano of Destiny, one of the canonically-given titles to the Daring Do books in the franchise.

Furthering the placement of “canon” events in Spectrum, Trixie’s non-canon arrest following the events of ‘Magic Duel’ is confirmed to have occurred a year prior.

Spectrum 2.0 - June 18th 2017

DoctorFluffy: KNOCK KNOCK, HUMPADUMPS! I’m here because I’m ready to have some fun writing for once in a loooong time. And because these people are some of the best friends I’ve ever made. I mean that wholeheartedly.

Jed R: Hello, everyone. I'll make my section brief. If you're reading this, you're about to join us on a reworked journey through this familiar tale. We've all worked hard to make it as good as we can. I can only promise for my part to do my best, and try not to make my contributions too dull for anyone.

With all best wishes,
Jed

The Void: Greetings. I am sure I speak for everyone on here when I say I am honoured to work on this story with the fantastic crew we have. New reader, old reader, I hope you all enjoy the story. I thank each and every one of you for your time.

RoyalPsycho: I’m more than happy to help however I can.

VoxAdam: We are Groot.

Sledge115: Standing by at the ready, gentlemen.

TB3: All present and correct, sir.

Kizuna Tallis: I was born ready. I’m Ron fucking Swanson.

TheIdiot: Hello, everyone. I am sure that some of you are confused and some of you are lost on what has happened in the past week or so. The best answer I can give to you all is that, following a sorted series of events, I stand as the leader of Spectrum now. To best move forward, we - as a group of collaborators - have decided to make a reboot of Spectrum.

I do thank Redskin122004 for originally starting this tale and, initially, inspiring us. We owe him that much, and we owe you, the readers, this story.

For those rejoining us, welcome back. But for those joining us the first time welcome, I am TheIdiot and this, this is a story about humanity and Equestrians fighting against xenocide.

Enjoy.

Act I ~ Chapter Two ~ Friends on the Other Side

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot
I’m not just a leader, I play one on TV.

Jed R
Spectrum Is Green

DoctorFluffy
“Your next words will be ‘is that a Jojo reference?!’”

VoxAdam
Sub Voce Sola Sidera

Sledge115
Until the End

The Void

RoyalPsycho
For His Majesty

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Two
Friends On The Other Side

* * * * *

“Did your eyes see the planet of our origin, the true home of our race? Was it beautiful? Was it covered by oceans? By sand? Were there nine moons above your head? Were there none?”
— Forra Gegen, Star Trek: Voyager, ‘Distant Origin’

“The Truth is out there.”
— Tagline to The X-Files

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~ First Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

Even as she picked off the last crumbs from her dinner plate, Princess Celestia was hard at work, pondering the various crises, half-crises and not-quite-crises-yet that still remained for her to deal with today. It was, as one might imagine, a long list. Following the windfall of events that had visited Equestria in the last two years, almost to the day, since the Summer Sun Festival upon which Luna had made her return, the renewed negotiations with the Kirin of Ryuppon seemed nearly a welcome respite. It was a promise to simply move forward to new friendships, hopefully without trials and tribulations.

And, happily, with the Crystal Realm’s return and King Sombra’s permanent vanquishing, the ancient city-state’s reintegration into the greater realm was well underway. Here in Canterlot Palace, renovation on the throne room was making progress, plated by fresh crystals brought in from Princess Cadance’s new domain. It still gave Celestia a tiny glow in her heart to think that Cadance – having set for herself the task of ruling a faraway principality so many leagues from home, an island of green amidst the Frozen North – would not be shouldering her duty alone.

Who knew what may come of wise old Sint Erklass and the Reindeer tutoring an alicorn princess once more, in this new age...

‘After all,’ the Sun Princess thought as she finished reading a report on the negotiations, ‘Cadance is still young, and only newly come into her heritage. She deserves time enough to spread her wings gracefully.’

There was still much to be done beyond that, however. Discord had yet to report back from his mission, and though Fluttershy had vouched for his good intentions and Luna had, after a brief examination, agreed with her, he remained an unknown variable.

‘If he fails, we act accordingly,’ Celestia tried to reassure herself. ‘If he does not… we’re golden.’ She sighed. ‘Would that we weren't relying on his help.’

Her musings were interrupted by the ‘pop’ and sudden flash of green flame which heralded the inevitable arrival of a scroll. Witnessing it land on the table between her glass of rosewine and a half-eaten cinnamon bun, Celestia peered at it curiously. Twilight did not normally write at this hour of the day.

She picked up the letter and began reading.

Dear Princess Celestia,

A situation has arisen requiring your attention. A creature I’ve never encountered before, of unknown origin, has arrived in Ponyville. If we are to rely on the testimony of Lyra Heartstrings, who found it in the Everfree Forest, we believe it to be called a ‘human’. It is injured and currently recuperating in Ponyville Hospital, but we don't know how it came to be injured, or if it is hostile.

We have left the human under Lyra’s care until otherwise notified. Any advice on this matter that you could provide us would be most welcome, as we’re currently working in the dark.

Your faithful student,
~ Twilight Sparkle

P.S.
Research on the Alicorn Amulet, thus far inconclusive, is currently pending.

Celestia set down the letter, a frown worming its way onto her face.

She had met many different species over a thousand years, right from her younger days. Sometimes, excitingly, her little ponies had been the ones to meet unknown species, and bring back tales, which seemed to be just the case here. Yet, as with all first encounters, none knew what to expect. And something about the word ‘human’ rattled her subconscious...

Friend, or foe?

While it was vital to tread lightly, a matter of this importance warranted more than attention from her alone. The whole of the Royal Family deserved to be informed. Luna, no question. Cadance… It would be unfortunate to recall Cadance from the Crystal Realm at this time, but this was another of her duties. At least Shining Armor, being a Prince by marriage, had no such obligations and could stay to oversee matters in the North, though Celestia disliked the idea of pulling the newlyweds apart so soon. And last of all, even if it made Celestia want to groan, there was Prince Blueblood.

Not, mind, for the usual reasons when it came to young Astron.

Celestia remembered how, around a hundred years ago now, preceding his rather sad slip into that new-age fad mentality, Blueblood the Challenger had flown the Mother of Invention on a variety of different explorations. She’d felt proud of him then, and regretted how he’d gone to substitute one ‘fix’ for another. Bluebloods were always thrillseekers, adventurers or adrenaline junkies. The old rumour – the fable that every male of the Blueblood line had a gap in his heart which no love could fill – might not have been literal as far as she knew, but was an apt metaphor for what they made of themselves. Astron had been showing the tell-tale signs of restlessness since Cadance’s departure for the Frozen North. She wondered what it’d mean to bring him news that Lyra the oddball had, apparently, caught her Questing Beast.

Regardless, they would all be told in due time. Celestia’s first order of business, taking priority before all else, was to let Twilight know she’d been heard. This evening, of course, Luna was next. And it might be late morning before Blueblood roused himself.

She swiftly reached for her private quill-and-scroll reserve, and began drafting a reply.

* * * * *

Basking in the light of her rising Moon, Princess Luna drifted above Canterlot, watching the lights turn on one by one like twinkling stars.

As far as moonrises went, this one had gone off without much of a hitch. At least, that’s what Luna hoped. Goodness knew that she could go without seeing another hyperbolic opinion piece in the morning paper, bemoaning the Moon’s face being in the wrong time of the month.

Brushing away the the lingering annoyance and embarrassment, with mighty beats of her wings, Luna gracefully descended upon Canterlot Palace. She passed by her tower, continuing all the way down ‘til she reached the palace gardens.

Much felt unfamiliar to her, even now that a good two years had passed since six mares wielded Harmony and freed her from the darkness. Far, far too many years had gone by, and few of Canterlot’s sights outside of the Palace were familiar to her at all. But the calm of the palace garden had always been so welcoming to her, as it welcomed her now.

She landed with nary a sound. A whiff of the garden’s smells, all the flowers she’d planted, and the tranquil sounds of flowing water soothed her nerves. Here was a sanctuary that would have done her old mentor Lady Mistmane proud, and Luna could just picture that serene smile of hers so vividly.

Passing by telescopes and star-charts she had set up, past bamboo growing tall and firm, Luna sat herself down at her beautifully carved mahogany desk at the centre of it all, where a wicker basket of lavender had been placed besides her inkpot and quill.

She spared the lavender a longing look, as with one fluid motion she put on her gardening hat. The local florist Miss Blush had provided the bulbs, the castle gardener Mister Greenhooves had advised her, the new variety she’d cultivated had grown so lush and pleasant. Now it lay neatly in a gift basket, as lovely as they always had been for her.

Part of her wondered if she should have ruminated harder on which flowers to choose. Perhaps she ought to have given it further thought, figure out a more special flower.

But lavender had provided her with much comfort over long nights, over the centuries. As it would provide for the friend she had made one Autumn night.

‘Now, for the hardest part,’ Luna thought bemusedly, her lips curving into a tiny smile. ‘Come now, this is only a letter.’

Adjusting to the newer diction had been one thing. Putting it into writing would be another. The letter itself ought to be simple enough, all in all. But the mare she was addressing it to, if Celestia’s warnings were no mere sisterly tease, was one for fine writing.

She had just pressed her quill against the parchment when she heard a rather insistent squeak. Luna looked to her right, a tiny frown forming. There stood a little possum, his head tilted, standing with his paws held out.

“Not now, Tiberius,” said Luna. She paused. “I gave you crackers already, did I not?”

Her little companion squeaked again, pointing to his empty bag. Luna sighed, massaging her temples. “Tiberius, you know very well to eat it in moderation. But fine, fine–”

Her words were interrupted by the sound of the back door opening. She turned ‘round, just in time to meet the castle majordomo face to face. His red waistcoat and grey cravat looked as old as he. His thick bushy moustache, once brown, had turned as grey as his neatly-combed mane. But for a stallion of sixty he was still sprightly, holding his head high and with sharpness in the eyes behind his ever-present monocle.

“Your Highness,” he said, bowing down.

“Ah, Kibitz!” Luna exclaimed. “Just in time, excellent. Tiberius wants more crackers, could you fetch us some more?” She pointed to Tiberius, who looked up at Kibitz with pitiful little eyes.

Kibitz paused, halfway through opening his mouth, then raised an eyebrow.

“Er, I’ll put it on the list, Your Highness,” he said, neither looking nor sounding sure about it, “but we’ve got a situation. Your sister has called for you.”

Luna let out a weary sigh. It hadn’t been the first time, of course, but at the very least this time around she hadn’t learned about whatever mistakes she made with the Moon from the morning paper.

“Was it the Moon? I am rather out of practice, so please relay my apologies to my sister.” She tipped her hat. “Now, If you would excuse me, I shall tend to my flowers first, Mister Kibitz.”

But then Kibitz shook his head. “No, no, it has nothing to do with that, Your Highness. I believe it’s best if you meet with her directly. It’s… something to do with ‘Ponyville’.”

Luna paused, mid-turn, the word resonating in her head.

Ponyville. The town had not been an old one, yet its name still struck Luna. The little backwater had witnessed a few pivotal events in such short time, from whatever that business was with the Amulet to the seat of Discord’s brief reign.

It had also welcomed her return. Nightmare Night felt like only yesterday...

Tiberius let out a squeak, snapping Luna out of her stupor. She cleared her throat, nodding along.

“Ah. Ponyville, you say,” said Luna. She took off her hat, exchanging it for the crown she’d left on the table. She beckoned Tiberius to join her. He squeaked, dropping his empty bag, climbing up her to nestle snugly on her mane. With a fond little laugh, Luna turned back to Kibitz and nodded. “In that case, lead the way, Mister Kibitz.”

She spared the lavender and parchment one last glance. There would be another time, so much time. Neither Twilight Sparkle nor that library of hers would be going anywhere.

So, with renewed vigour and cheer, Luna followed Kibitz, Tiberius perched on her crown, and down the path they went, closing the door on the garden of the night.

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

What had happened earlier, in the late hours of the afternoon, was as follows. Having been summoned by Lyra Heartstrings to investigate her mysterious encounter in the Everfree Forest, Twilight and friends had lost no time in ascertaining this was no mere whim of the odd little green unicorn’s. Faced with the unknown creature, lying passed-out and helpless, yet curiously daunting in its alien nature, a decision had to be made quickly.

For Twilight as for Lyra, and indeed for all seven of them, there was no question. Here lay a stranger in distress, who needed their help.

Between the three unicorns’ magic and the assistance of one strong pegasus and earthpony each, without even so much as makeshift stretcher, moving the human had proven scarcely a problem, careful though they had to be not to unbalance it. Even Fluttershy was swift to scout the Forest for any potential waylaying predators, of which fortunately, there were none.

The true challenge had been how to get the human into Ponyville with minimal fuss, but this was where Pinkie’s skills came into their own.

* * * * *

‘Wonder what’s going on?’ Blossomforth had mentally asked. ‘I thought I heard about a monster attack of some kind, but it can’t be! It’s been less than a week since the last one.’

She had looked up at the podium, to see Pinkie waving to the crowd, a huge smile – what else? – on her face. Standing next to her was Mayor Mare, looking moderately worried.

‘Ah, well. How bad could it be if Pinkie Pie looks happy?’

“Mares and gentlestallions!” Mayor Mare had said, a foreleg around the microphone. “I have gathered you all here to announce…”

She looked at Pinkie pointedly, who shrugged both forelegs in almost a ‘W’ shape.

“The, ah, that we’ve been selected as a possible location for the honeymoon of Shining Armor and Cadance!” Mayor Mare said, smiling.

She looked over to Pinkie. The pink pony’s eyes went wide, and she dashed off the stage.

“They said that our town is so picturesque...”

Pinkie ran back across the stage, now yoked to a cart bearing a massive barrel labeled ‘Hunni’ in what looked like giant-sized crayon, so incredibly large it would fit in as a small water tower.

“... calm, serene, green, and peaceful...”

Pinkie dashed back the other way, inexplicably wearing her Great Galloping Gala dress.

“... and full of happy, friendly residents...”

Pinkie returned, carrying a cartload of clattering tools, which juddered and banged against each other so loudly that barely anyone could hear what Mayor Mare was saying. There was a strange warbling noise coming from the cart, like a singing saw.

“... with the banana shoes!” Mayor Mare said, the first half of that sentence lost in the commotion of shaking tools. “But they say, we can be trusted to show the best hospitality they–”

On the fourth go-round, Pinkie came running on her hindlegs, carrying a large, confused-looking black bear in a chef’s hat.

“I-know-I’m-sorry-I’ll-tell-Fluttershy-I’m-sorry-I-needed-your-help-it-was-an-emergency-bye!” Pinkie yelled.

Mayor Mare just sighed, one hoof to her face. “And while they’re here, I expect that we’d treat them like we would any filly or colt of Ponyville. Nothing but the best for each of them–”

Pinkie walked behind Mayor Mare, drinking a milkshake.

“And that everyone will–”

The slurping sound rose to a crescendo.

“Pinkie Pie!” Mayor Mare exclaimed. “I can understand the last couple interruptions, but this is just getting... silly!”

“But everyone knows that’s what I do!” Pinkie answered, almost pouting. “Anyway…”

She reached offstage, pulling in a cart with one hoof. Its contents were covered by a large blue tarp.

“To celebrate this occasion, mares and gentlecolts, I give you… an actual honeymoon!” Pinkie yelled, sweeping the tarp off the cart, revealing a large, glassy-looking crescent covered in honey.

Blossomforth gaped. “That looks delicious!” she yelled. “Too bad we can’t eat any…”

“Ah, I made…” Pinkie’s eyes darted from side to side. “I made lots of them! Go ahead, you can all sample them if you want! They’ve got pecans!”

“I have to ask, though,” Mayor Mare said, “What was the milkshake for? The honey was for the moon, the bear was a taste tester, the tools were to help you make the dessert…”

Pinkie shrugged again. “It was thirsty work!”

* * * * *

And this was how they’d got safely to the hospital, leading into the events based on which Twilight was to write her letter. It had paid off to bet the hospital staff wouldn’t bat an eye at housing an unusual patient. Even so, much remained unanswered.

It hadn’t escaped Twilight that Lyra, a notepad out, was scribbling down everything the nurse was saying, next to the oversized bed that housed the injured human. Twilight didn’t know what exactly her fascination was with humans – as myths went, Twilight found them rather one-note and featureless, not unlike the stories about belligerent Yaks in the Frozen North – but here Lyra was, furiously scribbling away like Redheart had revealed the cure for horn rot or some other deadly malady.

Weirdly, out of the group who’d found the human, apart from Lyra, Rarity of all ponies was the one not keeping a safe distance. Hovering over the bed, she seemed to have a particular fascination for the being’s strange accoutrement. A sight which made Twilight feel like she was putting her own petty needs ahead of finding answers.

“I have to say,” Nurse Redheart commented as she tapped the little vial of blood, “that I’ve never seen anything quite like this. I didn’t even know it was possible.”

Twilight split from her friends to take a closer look.

“What makes you say that?” she asked the nurse. “Is there something unique about the creature’s blood?”

“Well, yes and no,” Redheart said, holding up the vial for her to see. “The blood itself is thaumaturgically unreactive.”

“You’re joking.”

Redheart gave a wry smile, adjusting her nurse’s cap. “Wish I were.”

“But…” Twilight said, staring at the vial as if it were nitric acid, “I’ve only seen that in the library’s oldest books. Almost every creature on Equus is thaumically reactive. Except for maybe a few uncharted regions…”

The scribbling of Lyra’s pen came to a halt. “Or maybe,” Lyra added hushingly, “it’s from a world without thaumaturgons.”

“I’m not…” Redheart said, lowering the vial, “entirely sure of that.”

“Thauma-wha’now?” Applejack asked, turning from her watch at the door next to Pinkie.

“The fancy word for magic is ‘thauma’,” Rarity explained, not stopping her inspection of the human’s garments. “Thaumaturgons, or thaumatons, depending on who you ask–”

“Or ‘thaumaturgus’, Pinkie chipped in, “if you’re a silly-filly,”

“Yes. They are ‘units of magic’, in a sense.”

Pinkie wasn’t done yet. “The way Granny Pie told me, without the thaumaturgons, life could not exist, and we would have no knowledge of magic. They continually speak to you, telling you the will of Harmony.”

Rarity glanced at her, scowling. “Actually, it kind of takes away all the mystique when you put it that way.”

“Yeah,” Pinkie agreed, nodding her head vigorously, “I always liked to think of them like Breezies or fairy lights. Though I guess it sort of explains where the musical numbers come from...”

“That’s never been proven. And it’s not quite so all-encompassing as that,” Redheart corrected. “They’re extremely unreliable measuring units of magic, remember. We can measure the difference between ‘plenty’ versus ‘hardly any’, unicorns versus earthponies, and sometimes, barely, measure them based on quality over quantity. So, at a pinch, I could measure the difference between Miss Sparkle and Miss Heartstrings, but otherwise, it’s a case of telling when something reacts to thauma, and when not.”

“And its blood can’t?” Lyra asked, scribbling again.

Redheart advanced on the bed, setting down the vial on the table. “Its blood can’t,” she nodded, “but here’s the interesting thing.” She motioned to one of the strange markings on the human’s body. “You see, as far as I can tell, these… let’s call them tattoos, these tattoos, can.”

“Artificial thaumaturgical reaction?” asked Twilight.

Redheart smiled. “Like I said, I didn’t even know that existed, but it seems so.”

Twilight placed a hoof on the bedspread. “That implies a level of advanced magical understanding, if not from it, then from whomever put the markings there.”

“Quite,” Redheart said, and she chuckled almost ruefully. “Your new friend is… interesting.”

Rarity snorted, finally backing away from the bed to join Dash and Fluttershy in the corner. “I’d hardly claim it’s our friend. Coming out of the woods like that and scaring us all silly is not exactly an act of friendship.”

“It was injured,” Fluttershy said quietly, scrubbing her dirt-covered saddlebags. “Injured creatures, even sapient creatures like, well, like us, when feeling backed into a corner, tend to lash out.”

She paused, her statement, and where it had come from, sinking into all present.

“So,” Twilight mused, “it is sapient?”

Dash folded her forehooves. “Hey, it can speak, right?”

“Yes, but that doesn’t prove anything,” Twilight said, ears flicking. “Each of us only heard it speak a few coherent-sounding words. For all we know, it could simply be a very sophisticated mockingbird.”

“Some mockingbird,” Dash huffed.

One of the ponies at the doorway had her two bits to throw in.

“I dunno!” Pinkie exclaimed, startling Applejack. “But, look forward to whatever it has to say. Bet it’s a great story!”

Rarity raised an eyebrow. “He’s in a lot of pain and did not seem pleased to see us, how would that make it ‘great’?”

“It’d sure be a heck of a story,” Pinkie said knowingly. “Nearly all the best stories are about how you get back on your hooves.”

“Well,” Rarity said, sighing, “for what it’s worth, the clothes are machine-woven, and seem to be made of reinforced cloth, with some attempt at a kind of impact-resistant material I'm not familiar with. This implies civilisation.”

Now Applejack snorted, tugging her hat. “Rarity, you’re the only pony Ah know who’d see clothes as a sign of civilisation. Fashion’s all well n’ good, but clothes is for useful things, like keepin’ the Sun outta your eyes, no offence to Celestia.”

“Clothes are civilisation,” Rarity said haughtily. “They imply culture, fashion sense, a common frame of reference with other beings like it. And you said it yourself, clothes have practical purposes. So do tools, by definition. All civilisations use tools.”

“Fascinating supposition!” Lyra remarked happily, tapping her pen to the bedstead.

Dash was looking pensive. “If it’s tough stuff, then it could be some sort of survival gear?”

“What about the patterning?” Lyra asked, scribbling to her heart’s content. “Is there some kind of significance to it?”

“I’ve made similar patterns for birdwatchers and naturalists,” Rarity said, “to conceal them from view so they don’t stand out against the thickets. Camouflage, basically. Except, this one is coloured in greys, whites and blacks, almost as though it were made for more urbanised environments. Such as Hoofington, or Manehattan.”

“Bird-watching in a city?” Dash snorted. “Yeah, the pigeons must be really interesting in Humanville or wherever this fella’s from.”

“They could be,” Lyra said from behind her notepad. “For all we know, there could be giant pigeons where he's from.”

“Oh, yeah, sure,” Dash laughed. “With giant splats of pigeon–”

“Rainbow Dash,” Twilight warned.

Dash shrugged. “Just saying.”

“Would be messy,” Pinkie reasoned, while Applejack, for her part, just listened with some interest. “Wouldn’t a splat like that be three or four times the size of a regular–?”

“Pinkie,” Rarity cut in, “no one wants to discuss that particular mathematical conundrum.”

“But it’s so interesting,” Pinkie said with a smile. “And it’s all dependent on angles, speed, weight, proportions, diameters…”

“The pattern does look a bit like pigeon splatters,” Applejack remarked mildly. “You can’t tell me that ain’t true.”

“Well, leaving aside this fascinating discussion on pigeon… leavings,” Nurse Redheart said dryly, “I’m not sure what we can do for it. Half our staff aren't familiar with non-pony physiology at all. We can’t risk accidentally killing it because we don’t know where everything is.”

Fluttershy made herself heard, meek as ever. “Um, but you do have staff who’re familiar with non-ponies, right,” she said timidly. “Don’t you? The other half?”

“Yes, Miss Posey,” Redheart said slowly, “but usually we’re limited to our donkey cousins, or on rare occasions, Miss Zecora. We only started learning more about Spike after his… growing pains.”

“And this human is completely different,” Twilight nodded. “The donkey and zebra physiologies are not all that dissimilar from ours, as fellow equines.”

“Perhaps we can make logical guesses,” Fluttershy suggested. “I mean, there’s much about Spike which isn’t like us, there being more fire than water in his body, for example.”

“And if this human isn’t naturally thaumically active,” Lyra supplied helpfully, “that’d mean its physiological baseline is less complex than ours, wouldn’t it? There’s a lot we can estimate. Mammalian, bipedal–”

“That won’t tell a surgeon where its heart and kidneys are,” Redheart said grimly. “Or the bone density, or how much blood it can stand to lose. It certainly won’t replicate its blood type if it needs a transfusion. And it won’t tell us if there’s internal damage, though I suspect there might be. We can make approximations of its physiology, educated guesses, but they’ll be just that, guesses. And external examination can show so much about its injuries. They may be more extensive than they appear.”

“What are its injuries, exactly?” Twilight asked.

Redheart sucked in a breath. “Here’s the part that may be the most unfortunate...”

* * * * *

Bonbon checked the clock above the shop door.

Seven o’clock, on a Monday. Time to pack up the counter and call it an evening. Smiling, to herself as much as to the customers, she passed her last order of the day, a bag of crystallised rock candy, to Dinky and Sparkler. The littlest of the Whooves daughters gave a small squeal of delight as she got hold of the fresh import from the Crystal Realm. Her older sister, by contrast, was eyeing the bag with a keenness that seemed oddly, well, ‘scientific’ to Bonbon.

“Now what do we say, Dinky?” Sparkler teasingly reminded the filly.

Dinky flipped her mane, letting it fall over her eyes. “The sweets are only half at low-calorie fat this year,” she said, winking conspiratorially at Bonbon, “and the bugbear flies South in the Winter.”

Seeing the bewildered expression on Sparkler’s face, Bonbon had to hold herself from laughing then and there.

“Just kidding,” Dinky grinned. “Thank you, Miss Sugarbean!”

“Less of the ‘Miss Sugarbean’, Dinky,” she said amiably. “Just call me ‘Bonbon’.”

“Thank you, Miss Bonbon.”

Spirits were high for her as she waved goodbye to the sisters before closing shop.

The sensation rapidly began to dim within Bonbon, though, when she made her way to the living room, to be confronted with the facts – Lyra was not there. Which was just so typical. Get under her hooves while she was at work and Lyra wasn’t even out looking for her own job, then, when she’d have welcomed a beloved’s company, disappear unannounced for hours upon end. That was Lyra.

Why, who else could have snaffled those fifteen oats she’d been saving that one time!

‘Some marefriend I have,’ Bonbon thought irritably.

Lyra being away did not mean her stay wasn’t felt, however. As she tiredly slumped down on the couch, Bonbon’s eyes, as always, trailed to the huge cork board which occupied half the far end of the living room. Same as every day, the darned thing was a confusion of post-its, red string and photographs. Yet, live long enough with the mare who’d had it set up, and you could discern a method in the madness. Amongst other things, the varied, blurred pictures of what resembled a grey stallion wearing a bowler hat stood out, under which Lyra had written in red ink, ‘Who is this guy?’

The billboard wasn’t the part of the wall which made her cringe when she saw it, though. No, that dubious honour belonged to the tabloid newspaper cutouts adorning the whole right half, a number of select headlines screaming out at her. ‘Princess Celestia Runs Cake-Smuggling Ring!’, or ‘Moon Prince: Prince Blueblood Gets Cheeky at Palace Window’, or ‘Yes, The Wedding Invasion Was An Inside Job’. In fact, the last of these showed up twice on that wall, not that you could tell, as it was the second-page title on the cover’s back which Lyra had so proudly got framed: ‘I Was Mind-Controlled By A Bug Queen’.

Just below the billboard, however, was a haphazard stack, or should that be a pile, of books that seemed to shift in height and width like sand dunes. Respectable books, like Dusty Tome’s An Analysis on the Erratic Nature of Equestrian Technological Development and Nonmagical Beasts and Where to Find Them, but also the eccentric, such as Ponyland: Fact or Fable?and The Dream Valley Conspiracy: What They’ll Never Tell Us. Or else Laconic’s Argument For Humanity and Against Catseye, which wasn’t necessarily disreputable, but it’d been written mainly to spite someone, an act rarely conducive to insightful, thoughtful commentary.

Then again, Bonbon knew Catseye was not exactly innocent, either…

One of Lyra’s books, a first printing of her old college professor Shriek’s Ponyland: Dispelling the Myths of Dream Valleylay on its back, dog-eared and held open with a plushie of a llama in a hat. It was tragically obsolete since the reappearance of the Crystal Realm, but Lyra still treated it as one of her most prized possessions. Despite herself, Bonbon felt drawn to read the page she’d left it on, or at least those passages not obscured by the plushie.

The fact is that there are many beings of Equus who were ancient when we were young. With their existence, why, then, is so much of our history forgotten? Why do names like ‘Dream Valley’ or ‘Firefly’ raise questions rather than certainty? Many do not believe our mythical homeland was real, and yet the fossil record and the ancient mounds found in the Undiscovered West put the lie to this assertion.

Once, when I burnt with a need for answers, I resolved to make the trip to remote Zamok Uystag and ask for myself. I took the train to Rainbow Falls, making the perilous journey through the Crystalline Tundra. According to legend, it was once a temperate land where it was almost Summer. Impossible given the climate, but then many have made similar claims about my home of Canterlot, so I suppose I’m not one to judge. I flew across the tundra, braving the worst storms I’d ever seen.

I soon found myself in Yakyakistan for weeks and weeks. While I was there, I learned how to ski, how to climb a rock face without the use of my wings, and how to dig myself out of an avalanche. The Yaks are an inflexible people, yet they opened their hearts to the frostbitten, smelly thestral who showed up outside their doors, and for that I will be forever grateful. I still have fond memories of the scented baths, and the pelmeni dumplings that my kind, warm-hearted host…

Bonbon didn’t feel like turning the page after that, least of all this nonsense about Yaks. That, and according to Lyra, the next couple pages consisted of descriptive anecdotes about Shriek debauching himself during Yikslurbertfest until he left for the Reindeer Land of Adlaborn.

Apparently, the good professor was retracing his hoofsteps, no, wingbeats, with the reappearance of the Crystal Realm, ready to incorporate new data into a heavily edited version of his book.

Lyra was positively giddy at the thought of how her old professor would change the story with the new lessons he’d learned. Bonbon… not so much. She scrunched her snout at the thought of the more-or-less renowned historian, mythologist and mycologist.

Her next reaction was sort of a logical followup.

“Lyra!”

She was not the sort of mare to whom yelling was second nature. In fact, it could hardly be called third, or even fourth. She didn’t like yelling, she didn't like confrontation, and she did not like living with other ponies. When choosing a life for herself after… difficult circumstances had necessitated her moving, these were the factors she’d had in mind.

“Lyra Heartstrings, where are you!”

So, naturally, she had ended up living with another mare – one who required constant rebuking just to get her to do anything, and to top it off, was generally slovenly at home.

“Where has she gone?” Bonbon said, more to herself than anypony else. “Ohhh, she’d better not have got herself into trouble. The rent’s due in two weeks.”

* * * * *

Redheart trotted to the human’s side and lifted the sheet gently, motioning to its chest, and the arms. Fluttershy gasped, Rarity looked away, and even Applejack looked sick. The wounds were second-degree burns. Yet, astonishingly, lines of more-or-less healthy-looking flesh criss-crossed these same burn sores, in patterns matching the markings elsewhere on its body. As if, somehow, these areas had been fireproof...

“Horrible,” Rarity murmured. “This poor… being.”

“Is there something special about the injuries?” Twilight asked, looking at once curious and repulsed.

“Some of these are standard spell-burns,” Redheart replied grimly. “Any unicorn with an axe to grind could’ve done those, though they take some practice and application. It’s these,” she continued, motioning to a pair of black burns on its arm, “which bother me.”

“Why?” Twilight asked. “What's so special about those burns?”

“They’re not burns,” Redheart explained. “It’s necrotic flesh.”

“Necrotic?” Fluttershy repeated, looking even more horrified. “But how did it…”

“Royal Guard and Night Guard unicorns are taught a spell that flash-necrotises flesh, killing the target almost instantly with a direct hit, or even most glancing hits. And only the Guard are taught it. It’s expressly forbidden to teach it to non-Guard ponies under anycircumstances. I remember seeing the results of improper application close-up during my time with the Home Guard.”

“So… so a Guardspony did this to it,” Lyra said waveringly.

“So it’d seem,” Redheart said, “or possibly an ex-Guardspony, which is more likely.”

“Lemme get this straight,” Applejack put in. “We have a mythological bein’, hurt by a spell only a guardspony can know, appearin’ in the middle of the Everfree? Spouting stuff about how ‘you won’t change me’, whatever that’s supposed to mean?”

“That’s about right,” Twilight said.

“Well,” Applejack said, blowing through her nostrils. “This is definitely a pickle. Somethin’ here don’t add up.”

“I suspect the only one who could give us the truth,” Redheart said, “is the one on that bed.”

There was a moment’s pause as all considered this and what it could mean.

“I need to find Spike and get a letter to the Princess,” Twilight finally said. “As soon as I can. Then maybe we can find out…” Her voice trailed off. “I don’t know what.”

Lyra stood up, her expression resolute.

“I’ll wait here with the human,” she told them, “make sure it’s okay. I’ll let you know if anything changes. Um, Twilight, mind if you or the girls would send word to Bonbon? She’ll be worried sick about me. Tell her I’m fine, I just need to spend the night at the hospital… Well, you know what I mean.”

Twilight nodded. “I appreciate you doing this, Lyra. And don’t worry, we will. Come on, girls. Let’s see what Princess Celestia has to say.”

She trotted out, the others filing behind her.

Except, it turned out, for Fluttershy. Some inner conflict appeared to rage inside her head, expressed by her looking from the bed to the door and back, clutching her saddlebags. Then, as Pinkie was the last to exit, she made up her mind. Fluttershy made her way back to the bed, retrieving a jar from her bags.

“What’s that, Fluttershy?” Lyra enquired, before Redheart could.

Left in the presence of two near-strangers, Fluttershy’s eyes retreated beneath her mane as she placed the jar on the bedside table.

“Strawberry jam,” she said, in a whisper. “It was meant for Trixie’s care package, but… this human’s need seems greater than hers...”

Lyra mulled over this for a second, then nodded. “Okay,” she said, smiling wistfully. “I’ll… I’ll let it know you left it, if… when it wakes up, Flutters.”

Fluttershy just mumbled something inaudible and beat a hasty retreat. Lyra sighed, rubbing her head with sudden fatigue.

“My shift’s nearly over,” Redheart said gently, “but I’ll be back tomorrow to help you, and Nurse Sutra Cross is a highly qualified xeno-surgeon.”

“Thanks, Nurse Redheart.”

* * * * *

Outside the hospital, Twilight released a breath that she didn’t realise she’d been holding. The Sun was setting over the halls, casting a long shadow over everything. Before anything more was to be said, Twilight gathered her friends in the shade of the hospital-sign block.

“Well,” she commented, “how’s that for a doozy?”

All five of the others exchanged glances.

“Hm, might be a seven out of ten.” Pinkie frowned. “Maybe even a six.”

“Just a seven?” Rarity asked with a raised eyebrow. “Heavens, if that thing and all the questions it brings is only a seven, perhaps we should be grateful we’ve not–”

“Don’t finish that sentence,” Applejack cut in. “Ah don’t reckon temptin’ fate’s a good idea.”

Twilight snorted. “Only if you believe in fate.”

“Even if you don’t, ‘s’all fair to still be cautious-like,” Applejack retorted. “Derpy’s Law, Twilight.”

At this, Twilight rolled her eyes. “Come on, girls. Let’s get back to the library so I can write that letter. I’ve no idea how we’re going to explain this…”

“Successfully?” Pinkie asked.

Twilight let out a soft chuckle. “Here’s hoping. But here’s something else, everypony. It might be best if you all spend the night with me and Spike at Golden Oaks.”

A collective murmur greeted this serious statement.

“I mean it,” said Twilight. “We need to stick together. Applejack, Fluttershy, if you want to get word to your families, I can have Owliwiscious carry them a letter. That is, unless Peewee would like to take it. That baby phoenix really wants to follow in Spike’s footsteps.”

“Sounds good, Twilight,” Fluttershy said, not without sorrow.

“Aye,” Applejack said decisively. “We better stick together.”

Twilight smiled gratefully. “Who wants to go and tell Bonbon?”

“I will,” Rarity said promptly, drawing all eyes on her. “I still need to drop off that new overcoat I was working on for her anyway. It’ll give me a chance to pass by the Boutique.”

“Meet us at the library when you’re done.”

“Back before you know it,” Rarity said softly, and with that she trotted off.

“There’s something going on with all of this,” Dash said grimly. “I’ll bet it…”

“Dashie,” Pinkie said, pressing a forehoof to the pegasus’ lips. Dash might have spluttered, hadn’t she been so surprised by the forwardness. “Breathe, and relax. You’re looking way too serious. Ain't a doozy yet.”

She pulled her forehoof away. Rainbow Dash took a breath.

“Serious face, serious business,” Dash replied solemnly. “And you said it yourself. ‘Yet’.”

Applejack looked at Fluttershy. “Hold a sec, Flutters. Your critters can read letters?”

* * * * *

When a knock sounded at the front door, Bonbon was accosted by a wave of something mixed between worry and relief. She raced to the door and opened it, fast as she could… only to find Rarity standing there.

“Hello, darling,” the seamstress said with a small smile, holding up a small brown package. “Your coat’s ready.”

Bonbon sighed. “Thanks, Rarity,” she said, accepting the package. “There was no trouble with the extra pockets I asked for, was there?”

Rarity shrugged. “I’m not sure why a trench-coat should need two extra hoof-warmers and an extra inside pocket, but I’m not one to judge.” She paused. “Also, I ran into Lyra earlier.”

“You did?” Bonbon’s eyes widened. “She didn’t tell me where she was going today…”

“Well, it was the Everfree, and she’s currently at the hospital,” Rarity said. At Bonbon’s expression, she held up a forehoof. “She’s fine, we’re just having… well, it’s one of thosedays, and she’s watching over somepony… well, something... for us.”

Bonbon blinked. “Some… thing. That’s not exactly descriptive.”

“Lyra seems to think it’s called a human,” Rarity said tiredly. “Beyond that, I really don't know much about it.”

“A human.”

“That’s what Lyra called it, anyway. Now, if you'll excuse me, darling, Twilight wanted me to meet her back at the library with the others. I hope the coat’s to your satisfaction. Do let me know if anything needs tweaking.”

Rarity dashed off, leaving Bonbon alone.

A moment passed, and Bonbon closed the door. Another passed, and she turned, raced up the stairs as quickly as she could, and opened her bedside cupboard, taking out a small, unmarked book.

She flicked through to the back, where an index awaited.

“Human, human…” she murmured. One more moment later, she closed the book. “Nothing. Darn it.”

For the second time that day, Bonbon hoped Lyra hadn’t got herself involved in trouble. Except now, it seemed altogether likely that she had.

* * * * *

Nurse Sutra Cross, the xeno-surgeon promised by Redheart, arrived some ten minutes after the other visitors had left. She was a cyan-coated mare, with silky white-and-blue hair, a green cross on her flank, and a soft smile. Lyra liked her immediately.

Upon entering, her first action had been to delicately shine an illumination spell from her horn in the human’s eyes. It had been unresponsive to this, but its irises had subtly dilated. Seeing this, the nurse declared, with a twinkle in her own eyes, that she thought it was dreaming.

“Dreaming?” Lyra asked.

Cross smiled. “Oh, yes.”

“Wow,” Lyra said. “You’re sure?”

“Definitely,” the soft-spoken nurse said, examining the movement of the human’s eyes. “Rapid eye movement is almost universal to any sentient life, and it’s one of the best indicators of dreaming.”

The two observed the human in silence, watching its eyes twitch beneath the lids.

But Lyra felt compelled to ask something. “Do you think we could ask Luna to look through its mind? Whatever it’s dreaming about doesn’t look pleasant.”

“No, it sure doesn’t,” Cross agreed quietly. “And yes, I suspect we’ll be asking the Princess to employ her unique talents in this respect.” She sniffed. “Nicer than some means of learning about it that I can think of...”

Lyra glanced her way, surprised. “You’re talking about mind-delving. Would that be necessary?”

“I don’t know,” Cross admitted. “I’d hate to think about it, to tell you the truth, but if Redheart’s right and it was attacked by someone with Guard training, there’s rogue Guard out there, or…” She looked at Lyra soberly. “Forgive me, but it could be your human friend here is somehow a threat some patrol felt a need to try and kill.”

Though there was no hostility in the nurse’s tone, Lyra felt herself stiffen.

“I can’t imagine how,” she said. “I saw it arrive.”

“Yes,” Cross agreed. “But from where? Maybe it was attacked, wherever it came from?”

“That’s impossible! Why would ponies attack it in any part of Equestria?”

“Self-defense?” Cross suggested, sounding apologetic as Lyra’s eyes hardened. “We don't know anything about this creature…”

Lyra snorted. “And so we’ll assume it’s violent and aggressive right off the bat, that he had to have been the aggressor? It’s not nice to make assumptions. We in Ponyville learned that lesson the hard way.”

Cross nodded sadly. “Yes, I’d heard about Miss Zecora’s less-than-brilliant reception right after I took this position. You're right, of course, we can’t make assumptions about a being we don’t know.” She gave Lyra a look. “Except this works both ways.”

“I know,” Lyra assured her. “That's why I’m keeping my eye on it, and taking notes.”

Cross motioned to the notepad with an inquisitive expression, and Lyra passed them to her.

“Interesting,” the nurse said, passing the notes back. “There are a lot of conclusions you coulddraw…”

“But I’m refraining,” Lyra finished. “Like you said. No assumptions.”

“Quite,” Cross agreed. “Still, I’m curious, what conclusions could you personally draw?”

Thanks to sharing notes, the sense of bonhomie had come back to the room. Lyra smiled. “I tend to go on a bit. You sure you wanna hear this?”

Cross chuckled. “Before today, I’d never heard of humans. Xeno-surgeon or not, I’m willing to acknowledge that you probably know more than I do about its species.”

Lyra’s smile turned bashful. “Sociologically, maybe…”

“Society and culture both help define us,” Cross said. “I’d like to hear what you think.”

‘This,’ Lyra found herself thinking, ‘is a mare I could be great friends with.’

* * * * *

“... Thus, valour will triumph in the face of those with nefarious hearts,” Spike read aloud, his eyes poring over the comic-book panels, that depicted a stallion in Royal Guard armour, a clear thunderbolt embossed on the breastplate. Peewee was perched overhead, able to see the panels equally well as Spike in the fading sunlight. “For victory is won by bravery and courageous action, never through vices like cruelty and oppression.”

Even though this wasn’t a Power Ponies comic, Spike found Colonel Spark and the Revolutionaries to be a decent read. It had been printed in Fantastical Conflict Tales, a collection of stories featuring characters Spike had only heard of before. Even if this particular tale was from ages ago, and Spark himself was a bit preachy, it was clear to the young drake why the character was so fondly remembered.

‘And why Shining has that massive collection,’ Spike thought, hopping off the windowsill. He closed the comic and put it back on the magazine rack. ‘I sure wonder if he’s ever going to sell it.’

His musings were interrupted by the sound of the library door opening. Spike turned towards the source of the noise.

“Hello?”

“Spike?” he heard Twilight’s voice call out. “Are you there?”

Spike went to the open doorway, seeing Twilight and the other Element Bearers – sans Rarity, to his chagrin – standing in the entrance hall. They were in the midst of conversation.

“Sure she’ll know what it is?” Fluttershy was saying. “I mean, I don’t wish to question...”

“She’ll have some idea,” Twilight was replying. “And if she doesn’t she’ll know who will. She’s never not known what a thing is before.”

“Yeah,” Applejack said. “She’s gosh-knows how many years old, she’s probably seen one of these human critters somewhere.”

“Here I am!” called a fourth voice.

To Spike’s delight, Dash and Pinkie parted at the back to let Rarity through.

“There, that’s done,” Rarity said, scarcely out of breath. “And you’re probably right, Applejack,” she added. “Still, I... oh, Spikey-wikey!”

The Bearers noticed Spike, who waved sheepishly. Twilight smiled.

“There you are! I need to write a letter to Princess Celestia, quick.”

“What happened?” Spike asked, frowning. Something serious must have happened if they were writing to the Princess, but he’d heard nothing from town, so it couldn’t have been a monster attack. Some friendship conundrum?

“Just hurry up and fetch a quill,” Twilight said seriously, “please. This thing, whatever it is, is a little beyond us.”

Spike nodded slowly, before going to fetch a quill. ‘Beyond Twilight? She’s not had to go to Celestia for help in ages… and even when she has, I don’t think she’s ever said anything’s ‘beyond’ her before. Not even that blasted Amulet...’

He returned to Twilight a moment later, quill and scroll at the ready. It was only now he recognised the look on Twilight’s face. One of irritation, like a problem was vexing her far more than usual. He’d seen it before, when Twilight had been trying to find out what made Pinkie’s ‘Pinkie Sense’ work.

“Are you okay, Twi’?” he asked sincerely.

From a nearby bookshelf, Peewee had caught the concern in his voice and was staring at them anxiously. Even the habitually placid Owliwiscious on his perch looked a bit intense.

She smiled, but it was strained. “There’s something bothering me about all of this, is all. Ready?”

Spike held up his quill. “When you are.”

“Alright,” Twilight began. “Dear Princess Celestia. A situation has arisen…”

* * * * *

As it turned out, Lyra Heartstrings had a lot of theories, even if she wasn’t willing to commit fully to any of them yet, least of all at this late hour.

“... So I’m sure it's from a harsher culture than ours,” she finished saying. “Survival gear at minimum means living in a world that’s harsh. Then there’s the artificial magic. If it’s using artificial magic, that must mean they evolved without magic, even the subtler kinds like earthpony magic.”

“Quite,” Cross nodded thoughtfully. “I can’t imagine living without the amenities magic provides.”

“Exactly, which means its society’s not had those amenities,” Lyra continued, “and that means a lot of the control we take for granted, weather, crops, the works, that simply does not exist.”

“I’m surprised you can deduce and conjecture so much about an essentially mythical race.”

“Well, there’s a lot of stuff to sift through,” Lyra said sheepishly.

“I wonder,” Cross said suddenly, “How did they pick up the slack?”

“What do you mean?” Lyra asked.

“One of the first things I learned was, ‘different doesn’t mean primitive,’” Cross said. “And the clothes it’s wearing… I don’t even know what this material could possibly be. It’s like it’s entirely synthetic. And I’m not sure it’s survival gear as we’d think of it. The amount of covering makes me think armour, not survival gear, though. I wonder what sciences they must have where it came from…”

“I guess we can ask it,” Lyra suggested. “When it wakes up?”

“Perhaps,” Cross said. She checked her watch and clipboard. “Nine o’clock. I’d best go fill in some paperwork. This is an important case for the hospital, perhaps the most important case of our generation. We need all the information we can get.”

She turned back to Lyra. “You must be tired, Miss Heartstrings. Sure you’re still set on waiting ‘til it wakes?”

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Lyra said immediately. “I’ve been waiting my whole life for a moment like this. And I found it. That makes it my responsibility.”

“Okay, then,” Cross said understandingly. “I’m afraid it’s against hospital regulations to give a bed to someone who isn’t checked in. But to make your stay on the chair more comfortable, I can arrange to have sheets and pillows sent up here. Maybe a fold-up camp bed, if we’re really lucky.”

“That sounds great,” Lyra grinned, suppressing a yawn. “I’ll holler if anything changes.”

Cross pointed at a small red button on the wall and winked at Lyra. “Just press the button, my dear. Hollering makes a racket.”

Lyra felt her cheeks heat up with embarrassment, but she smiled.

‘Well, Lyra,’ she thought, leaning her head back, ‘this has been one heck of a day.’

* * * * *

Celestia’s written reply didn’t take nearly as long to arrive as Twilight had expected. But when it arrived, it was far shorter than she’d been anticipating. While Spike rubbed his stomach from the irritating procedure, Twilight held the letter up by candlelight, reading its contents to her friends.

Dear Twilight,

Given what you have described, I have decided to come attend to this matter personally, right before dawn tomorrow morning. Please be at the hospital then and await me at the entrance.

I shall ask Luna to keep an eye on you all tonight, Madame Heartstrings included.

~ Princess Celestia

Twilight rolled it up without another word.

“Huh, I’ve never seen her write such a short letter,” Spike commented, burping. “You think she knows what a... hoomin is?”

“Human, Spikey,” Rarity said softly. “And if she does, her reaction suggests they’re not a good creature to have around. I mean, listen to the tone of this letter. She sounds… worried.”

“How can you get ‘worried’,” Dash demanded, “from a letter with only three sentences, a salutation and a valediction?”

“How do you know what a salutation and a valediction are?” Rarity retorted.

Dash smirked. “I read this book about… I think it was called Stable of Leaves? It was about a place with a Minotaur hiding inside, or something. Or maybe I was the Minotaur? Weird book. You have to turn it upside down and sideways a lot, no different from doing a barrel roll. And you haven’t answered the question.”

“Rarity makes a good point,” Twilight interrupted. “This is very brief and straight to the point for her. That means she’s worried, if I know her.”

“Well,” Pinkie said, very calmly. “This is getting to be an eight on the doozy scale.”

A demure cough cut short whatever direction the conversation may have taken.

Fluttershy looked at them all. “We should get some sleep,” she said. “All this has been just so… exhausting. And we don’t even know the half of it yet.”

“Agreed,” Dash said, coming to her oldest friend’s support. “Let’s turn in for the night, guys. But,” she added sagely, “We should probably take turns keeping watch. Just in case.”

“In case what?” Applejack asked derisively, though she joined Twilight and Rarity to fetch spare mattresses and sheets. “The human decides to go rampagin’?”

Dash had a hard look in her eye, feeling her wings. “You said it, not me. I’ll go first.”

After that, each of them, even Pinkie, took to sleep with unusual silence.

~ Shattered Dreams of a Warrior ~

In his dreams he could smell barbecue.

And for a moment, he thought, maybe it was the old family barbecue. Maybe he’d see Mom’s old shepherd dog trotting along, trying to mooch off some of the meat from his niece. Or a certain fuchsia mare, trotting up with a smile to give him his helping.

But then he realised. How could he be smelling that? In what world would the ponies of Equestria willingly envelop themselves in the scent of roasted meat...

Newfoals were burning all around him. The PER had holed up inside. So he’d taken flamethrowers to the building.

The PER sane enough to leave had escaped the back way, right into PHL guns. The ones that hadn’t, the Newfoals…

They’d stayed there, manning guns even as the building collapsed and burned around them. One PER Newfoal had been firing some kind of large crossbow, aiming and firing even after their legs had been crushed.

“Why don’t you run!” he remembered yelling as he emptied the Remington ACR’s magazine into the crossbow turret at the window. “Run! Goddamn you, run! Scream! Anything other than this!”

He knew damn well how that quote sounded on paper. How the same accusations he’d see in a PER or HLF circular would be levelled against him, using that as evidence. ‘Murderer,’ they said. ‘Monster.’

But what he could never quite admit was, he’d been begging them for some kind of reaction. Imploring them. They’d pushed the damned things well past the point that anything else would have retreated, or died, and the Newfoals had done none of those things.

His old drill sergeant had praised any ability to keep fighting under fire, but he assumed that the old buzzard would throw up, knowing the pain the Newfoals put themselves through. Their skin had melted off their bodies like molten wax. Their eyes looked as if they’d been boiled out of the sockets. Another one had kept firing one of those giant crossbows, after their eyes were gone. And yet they still smiled, skull-like before the flesh peeled away to reveal their skulls.

It wasn’t discipline. Everything the Tyrant Sun didn’t need had been sandblasted out of them.

“This is what they’d do,” he remembered saying. “To all of us. What they’d turn us into.”

~ Ponyville. Equestria ~ Second Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

The night had been a long one, probably. But to Lyra, it felt like no sooner had she sat down for her kip, she was waking again. Bleary, a bit stiff, maybe, and missing the sweet touch of her Bonnie in the morning. Yet at least she’d been given a pillow. That, and more.

She looked to the still-sleeping human, its eyes still darting about hither and thither beneath closed lids. She rested a forehoof on the bed, near his exposed arm.

So much come true. So many unanswered questions.

“What have you seen?” Lyra asked softly. “What's your world like? Is it ours, or another? If it's another, is it like ours? Are you one of many races or are you alone? What's the sky like? The stars above your head, the Moon, the Sun… who moves them, without magic?” She sighed dreamily. “So much I could ask you when you wake up. So much…”

She moved away. Only to feel a soft, hairless grip on her hoof. And a whisper of her name.

“Lyra…”

The human’s eyes, deep blue as the sea, were wide and expressive, full of what might have been shock. Its expression was one of surprise and… relief?

She gaped. “You’re awake,” she said, immediately regretting it and feeling foolish.

The human said nothing for a moment, but his body started shaking and tears pooling in the corner of those blue eyes.

“Lyra…” it whispered, staring up at her. “Lyra. I wasn’t dreaming.”

Words from an alien being. Words that, while accented, Lyra recognised. The human was communicating with her, not in any language of its own, nor even the Common Tongue, but the most spoken language in Equestria. Modern Equish.

“Yeah,” she replied, still taken aback on how it knew her. “How d’you–”

“You’re here…?” it whispered, interrupting her. “You found a way, didn’t you? Learned some secret… some secret spell?” It looked, for a moment, almost hurt. “Why didn’t you tell me? Would’ve saved us all a lot of… nnnngh!”

The human clenched its teeth and hissed in pain.

“I… I don’t know what you mean,” Lyra said, frowning at the human.

“You… you’ve come back,” it said to her, eyes widening slightly as it looked at her. “From… from the dead.”

Lyra felt the blood drain from her face. “The dead?” Lyra repeated. “I’ve never been... dead.”

The human’s frown deepened. “Oh, no.” It paused. “This… you’re not… did you forget, or…”

“I’ve never been dead,” Lyra repeated.

But by the look in its eye, saying it a second time made her throat tighten, and doubt herself.

Just why had she appeared at the bottom of that chasm, instead of the other side? If she had crossed over as she meant to, she never would have found this creature lying by the Tree. A cold sensation began to creep over her, as if she were stuck in some in-between, moving neither forward nor backward.

“What day is it?” the human hissed tersely. “The date!”

“Um, Second… of Rophon...” Lyra said slowly. “Tuesday,” she added, for good measure, though she had no idea if it even knew what ‘Tuesday’ was. Which seemed silly, because if it did, it’d also know that every second day of the month was a Tuesday.

“What year?” the human insisted, its voice getting stronger. “Is it the Anno Imperator or is it still Era Harmoniae?”

Lyra frowned. “Anno what? It’s the third year of the Era Harmoniae, I’ve never heard of an ‘Anno Imperator’.”

It blinked. “I have to go. Right now.”

“Go? Go where?!” Lyra asked.

The human’s certainty seemed to slip away. “I… I don’t know. I don't even know where I am.”

“Ponyville Hospital,” Lyra said quietly. “You were injured when you arrived, so we–”

The human bolted up. “Ponyville?”

Lyra skittered back in shock, and the human held up one of his hands in what might have been a placating gesture.

“I’m sorry,” it said, “I just… here, of all places…” It looked at its hands as though surprised they were still there, then, to Lyra’s surprise, it chuckled. “Well, damn, so many people are gonna laugh when they hear about this. Turns out the bitch was...”

His face twisted in rage, and the first thing Lyra thought of when she saw it was molten wax. The sheer hatred in the human’s eyes was so intense she took a step back.

“Lying,” it snarled.

For a moment, things were quiet, when it suddenly burst out.

“Dammit, dammit all! Fuck!! Years of being stonewalled! Of people giving up and turning themselves into those, those goddamned things out of fear! Years of R&D, of bigwigs brushing our work, your work off, out of fear! Because she fucking lied to us!!”

Through its rant, the human slammed a fist against the table nearby, actually lightly cracking the wood’s surface. Lyra almost had to wonder if it was actually holding itself back. She knew she had to calm it before it could do something really stupid, or hurt itself, or did something it could regret.

“You’re kinda scaring me,” Lyra whispered, backing away slowly. “Are you… are you going to… hurt m–”

A spike of fear ran down Lyra’s spine, and she shivered lightly.

The rage faded from the human’s eyes. Followed by… guilt? Remorse? Self-loathing?

“Never. Not in a million years. I’m sorry,” the human said, taking several deep breaths to calm itself down, although it was still shaking with rage. “I shouldn’t have lost control like that, especially not in front of you. It’s just… That this, right here, goes against damn near everything I know.”

“I still... don’t understand what you’re talking about...”

The human looked up at her. “It would take too long to explain… all I know is, I'm somewhere I’m not supposed to be, and there are… a hellof a lot of bad things that are about to happen to you, if I’m right.”

“If you’re right?” Lyra parroted.

“Yeah,” the human said. It frowned. “The Second Day of Rophon… the third year of the Era Harmoniae, you said? Alright... I need to know a few things.”

“Why?” Lyra asked.

“Because I’m from your future,” the human told her bluntly. “Or what could be your future. And it is filled with... terrible things. But maybe, just maybe, I can prevent them before they ever happen.”

Celestia gazed at the horizon as her Sun began slowly rising, concentrating as best she could on the duty in store. She had spent the night reading as much as resting, looking up ‘humans’ as best she could, but those researches, apart from brief mentions in books of cryptozoology, had been frustratingly lacking in anything useful.

Luna trotted to stand beside her on the balcony, Philomena and Tiberius perched on her.

“You’re sure you want to go without me?” her sister asked quietly. “This could be more complex than we realise, a harbinger of...”

“We will know,” Celestia interrupted tightly, “whether it is a harbinger soon enough. And I would not place both of us at risk, when we don't know what this creature is capable of.”

“I would prefer to have your back,” Luna replied, frowning. Tiberius squeaked along, and Philomena flew over to rest on Celestia’s outstretched hoof.

Celestia smiled at them, giving Philomena a quick nuzzle. “You do have my back. Who do you think I’m relying on to come save me when this all goes horribly wrong?”

“Very funny,” Luna said with a chuckle, but it faded quickly. “Then Kibitz and I shall handle the Palace matters. Be careful.”

“I always am,” Celestia smiled. “Besides, this means you’re the one who gets to put Blueblood up to speed, once he wakes up.”

The human had listened to Lyra rattle off historical events without batting an eye. The Elements of Harmony, the return of Princess Luna, Discord’s brief insurrection, even Trixie Lulamoon’s incursion into Ponyville wearing the Alicorn Amulet… When she had got to Discord’s recent reappearance and – according to local gossip – redemption, the human had gone squint-eyed, but hadn’t said a thing. By this point, Lyra was able to tell, though it tried not to let it show, that its injuries were reclaiming their toll. Its eyelids were drooping, its head was nodding. Still it listened to her, wordlessly.

Until finally, she reached the end.

“So,” it said, voice slurring. “There’s been no… no conflict. No secret police, no totem-proles, no Hand-in-Hoof riots, no Bureaus or potion. No Great Battleship Strike. No Disharmony Act? The Crucible? Not even the Changeling Purges? The Storm King? The Crystal War?”

“I… I don’t even know what in Equestria half of those things are,” Lyra said, slowly. Just hearing them, however, made her blood run cold.

“Tsh, I bet if I walked out right now, I wouldn’t even find a mnemosurgery clinic,” the human chuckled forcibly, cut off by a wheeze. Something seemed to snap deep inside its body, and there was a terrible wet sound.

‘Redheart was right,’ Lyra thought, ‘there probably is some internal damage…’

“No, you wouldn’t,” Lyra said, unclear on what ‘mnemosurgery’ was, but judging by everything she’d heard previously, she wasn’t sure she wanted to know. “Should there have been?”

The human waved the question off. “This… this shit’s more complex than I ever cared to learn about. There was a guy I met once or twice, who rattled off crap about time travel and multiverse theory ‘til he was blue in the face, and Doc Whooves had a few opinions…”

“Look,” Lyra said, grimacing at its language, “you’re still injured, and you’re tired. You need to–”

“I need to go!” the human answered back vehemently. “This… this whole thing is impossible. I need to find a way to get back to them.”

And with that, it moved to stand up, wincing as it did so.

As Lyra watched, it began limping out of the hospital room, almost at a snail’s pace. Lyra followed, not knowing what else she could do. Should she try to stop the human, or would that only enrage them? That brief glimmer of anger it had regretted… that had been worrying.

Almost immediately, nurses and doctors stopped what they were doing to watch the human walk out, many of them too shocked to react.

“Uh, pardon me,” one of the nurses managed. “You… you should be in bed…”

The human simply ignored the nurse and pressed on, Lyra following cautiously.

“What should we do?” the nurse asked, as she brushed past, in a hushed whisper.

Lyra stopped and pondered a moment, temporarily at a loss on how to respond. But this was when it became clear to her. Sometimes, it’s she who hesitates that is lost. She took a deep breath.

“Get everypony out of its way,” she said calmly. “I don’t think it means us harm, but it’s best not to take any chances.”

The nurse nodded and rushed off, whispering hurried instructions to others as she passed them by. Lyra went after the human, whose pace had picked up a notch. She hoped it wouldn't hurt itself – or indeed, anyone else.

* * * * *

Rested and refreshed from the night, but scarcely relaxed, Twilight and the other Element Bearers arrived on the hospital’s doorstep in no short order, and Twilight found herself all the more beset by an acute sense of anxiety. There was definitely something uncanny about the whole thing, she thought as she stared at the dawn.

Celestia’s brevity in her letter had confirmed it.

“How long do you think it will take the Princess to get here?” Rarity asked Twilight nervously.

“Not long, hopefully,” Twilight replied. “I mean, this whole thing’s feeling more and more… ominous. Don’t you feel that?”

Dash looked distinctly unhappy. “It was the Death Tree, I bet. That thing’s cursed us with some monster.”

Twilight scowled. “That’s really not helpful.”

“Well, you’re getting an ‘ominous feeling’,” Dash pointed out, waving her hooves to make little air quotes. “You, the mare of rationality.”

“There’s nothing irrational about evidence pointing towards a less-than-pleasant conclusion,” Twilight said grimly. “Some mysterious creature we’ve never heard of appears, injured and suffering spell-damage it could only have taken from a Royal Guard. Now Princess Celestia feels the need to come here personally. That alone should be setting off warning bells.”

“Plus, the doozy’s hitting eight point five this morning,” Pinkie chimed in helpfully, a shiver running through her body as she spoke. “Definitely gettin’ closer!”

“Pinkie?” Dash asked. “Does that go up to eleven?”

“I think we’re about to find out,” Pinkie said, and for a second she looked… darker, her mane a little flatter than normal.

‘That can’t be good,’ Twilight mentally noted.

As she thought it, from above, there was a rustle of air that turned into the sound of flapping wings, and a moment later, Princess Celestia landed in front of them, gold-clad hooves clattering to the ground elegantly. She was followed by two of the gold-armoured Guards who seemed to accompany her everywhere.

“Twilight,” Celestia greeted her student. “Everypony. It's good to see you all.”

Twilight bowed, the others following suit.

“Princess,” she said, raising herself. “I hope this isn't an inconvenience.”

“Not at all,” Celestia said quietly. “You've done well with an extraordinary circumstance, Twilight. You should be proud of how you've handled yourselves.”

“What do we do now, Your Highness?” Fluttershy asked.

Celestia took a moment to look pensive. “That, I’m not sure about. First, I should meet this ‘human’ for myself, to learn about what we’re dealing with.”

“Well, that’ll be easy,” Pinkie said, pointing behind her. “Since it's standing right there.”

Celestia’s eyes widened. The other Element Bearers gasped in shock, and the Princess turned, to spot the bipedal figure of the human standing there, its own expression somewhere between horror and disbelief.

“You,” the human snarled, teeth bared and body shaking.

Despite the bandages and the clear injuries, the rage in his face was more than enough to make him look quite threatening. But what grabbed Twilight’s attention most was the strange, subtle blue glow of… some kind of magic surrounding him.

“You lying little murderous bitch. I should have guessed you’d… Argh!”

It keeled forward, clutching its side, and behind it came Lyra Heartstrings.

* * * * *

The stranger was angry again. Lyra could feel the waves of pure unadulterated rage roiling around it, even as she took note of the barely-perceptible glowing that flared up, as it had before.

“Sir,” Princess Celestia began gently, stretching a wing sideways to hold back her Guards, “I stand before you in Harmony...”

It gave a harsh bark of laughter.

“Try another tack, Your Majesty,” it hissed. “Those are the very words you used that day, when you first set your fucking hooves on my world. Your… assurances... can go to hell…” He coughed raspingly. “This… this is the past… or another past… but you...”

The Princess glanced at Lyra, who shook her head subtly. She knew the human was in no condition to attack anyone, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t still dangerous in some way.

“I don’t know what you have seen,” Celestia said slowly, “but I have no hostile intent towards you. None of us do.”

“No, you don't, do you?” the human sneered, pushing itself to its feet. “You just want to fix us. Make us more like you.”

‘What does it mean?’ Lyra thought, frowning in confusion. ‘It claimed to be from the future, but this doesn't sound…’

“But I said it before, and I meant it,” the human continued, breaking Lyra’s chain of thought. “You won't change me, Tyrant Sun.” It raised its chin, and gave an almost ironic grin. “I am Alexander Reiner. And I am human.”

Its glow started up again, and there came a slow rumble, the ground trembling beneath Lyra’s hooves. Daring herself to edge closer, she looked to the human and saw its expression lay somewhere between pained and beatific.

The Guards drew themselves up, and Celestia’s pupils dilated in horror–

Like a light switch going out, the human simply collapsed to the ground, a trickle of blood running from his nose. At once, Lyra swept to its side, checking for its pulse.

“What happened?” Twilight asked, trotting up, the other five Ponyvillians and the Sun Princess converging in a semicircle on Lyra and her, for lack of a better term, ward.

One of the Guards, a grey-coated fellow, looked at his dirty-white companion in confusion. Obviously, this had nothing to do with either of them.

“I don’t know,” Lyra admitted. “I don’t know what it was trying to do.”

Celestia’s tone was grim. “It was trying a sort of self-combusting spell. Attempting to destroy itself and take us down with it, but the power must have overwhelmed it in its weakened state.”

“De… destroy itself?” Twilight repeated, dismayed. “But… but why?”

“Hatred,” Celestia said, so softly they almost didn’t hear. She gazed down at the human with a sad, confused, yet compassionate expression. “It was consumed by hatred… for me, for all of us.” She paused. “But never have I seen its like before.”

If there was a time to speak, it was now. Sensing her cue, Lyra coughed.

“Your Highness,” she said, measuring each of her words as she addressed her Princess. “It claimed to be from the future.”

Celestia looked up from the human, uncustomary puzzlement on her face. “The future.”

Lyra swallowed. “Yes, Highness.”

“Alright then, Madame Heartstrings. Please tell me everything.”

* * * * *

Redheart groaned as she pulled herself up in bed, wiping her forehead. She checked the alarm clock. Six in the morning. That was early when it didn't have to be. Her shift didn’t start today until twelve. Mind you, after the strangeness of yesterday, it was a wonder she’d got any proper sleep to speak of.

She let herself fall back onto the quilt, closing her eyes, but a minute’s tossing and turning left her no doubt; she wouldn’t be dozing off anytime soon.

Well, at times like this, a lass made the most of what she had. A quick rinse, a nice cup of tea, and she’d have time to think things over. Her mind made up, Redheart waddled out of bed, yawning, grabbed a towel and headed for the shower.

As the warm, steaming water poured over her, Redheart, running a soapy forehoof through her wet mane, considered the strange being she’d left in Miss Heartstrings’ care at the hospital. Secretly, she felt relieved to have woken so early. A tiny voice was chiding her for just up and leaving the little green unicorn alone with the creature. Perhaps she’d go in early today, off-duty, to have a look in.

Happily, the village seemed all in one piece when she’d awoken.

… But something felt off.

Her latent Guard instincts were twinging beneath her skin, making it crawl, and Redheart tensed up. Instinctively, she reached to turn off the taps, then withheld. If there was someone lurking, no need to tip them off...

Enveloped by the sound of running water, Redheart, her mane still soapy, carefully pulled back the shower curtain. Lo and behold, the bathroom was empty, yet the feeling in her skin did not abate.

Redheart took a step forward. All of sudden, her vision blurred.

‘What? Why…’

She slipped and fell, noisily, pulling the curtain down with her. But the bathroom floor was not at all wet. To her horror, she felt the strength leave her muscles. All her nervous stimulus was leaving her, except for a burning itch in her scalp...

Even as her sight dimmed, Redheart managed to spot a pair of forehooves appear in the doorway, clicking together with militant precision. That was how the truth dawned on her.

‘Sedative,’ her nurse’s mind thought as a cold feeling snaked through her system. ‘My brain… They put a sedative in my hairwash…’

'Why this way? Why not chloroform? wondered a remote part of her. A small, dim hope flared up that, whatever else, they wanted her alive, without risk of struggle.

With a last ounce of strength, Redheart found the will to look up at her aggressor, and found herself facing...

… Herself.

The mare was identical to her, save for a hard, grim expression. She wore a muddy scarlet cloak, inscribed with what might have been the symbol of the Eighth Home Guard. Redheart’s old regiment.

From far above, her copy locked eyes with her, a gleam of regret shining through. Then the light from the surface of the waking world winked out, and Redheart drifted into dreamless sleep, of such depths as not even Luna could have dived in after her.

Author's Note

Spectrum 2021 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

Alexander Reiner, whose name is still not given at this point, gets referred to by the narrative from the Sunny Equestrians’ POV as an “it” rather than “he”, as they are unaware of his biological sex or self-identified gender. The word “it” may potentially sound dehumanising, but it was that or “they”.

Luna’s revamped introduction scene contains additional character detail, including the appearances of her pet possum Tiberius, the Canterlot Palace majordomo Kibitz, and Philomena.

Spectrum 2.0 - July 18th 2017

JedR: So, yeah. That’s a thing.

Hello all, Jed here.

So, for those of you who’ve never read Spectrum Classic, as we call it amongst ourselves, the name “Alexander Reiner” has no particular significance. For those of you who have read Spectrum Classic, it has significance not for who Alex is, but for who he isn’t. Namely, he isn’t Marcus Renee. Now, here, you'll have to permit me a slight indulgence in this AN whilst I explain. There are a few reasons Alexander Reiner stepped in to replace Marcus. The big one for me, however – and prepare to be astounded by irony here, guys – is this: Respect. Not for Marcus, necessarily, but rather for Red.

See, it’s no secret that the vast majority of the crew parted from Red on acrimonious terms. A lot of us have strong feelings about Red’s conduct over the years, myself included. However, there is no denying that without Red, we would not have worked with one another. We would not have made what we have together. I personally would not be on this site at all. And I respected Red for a long time, even as I disagreed with him on matters of storytelling and other things. I even dare say the opposite was once true as well, though it seems obvious how Red feels now.

Red doesn’t like most of us. He thinks we’re assholes he’s well shot of, save to throw shade in our direction once in awhile. At the point of me writing this, I have every reason to believe he would be happy to see this rebooted story entirely fail. And I respected him enough to think that, with that being his feelings on the matter, us using Marcus Renee would be insulting.

Red liked Marcus, you see. Marcus is, or was, a very important character to him, judging by what I’ve seen happen over the course of the three years I worked with Red, and by what others have said. That being the case, I and some of the others felt like a bunch of people Red doesn’t like using Marcus Renee in a story Red doesn’t like would be akin to sticking our middle fingers up at him, and, while this story in and of itself is probably doing that to him anyway, I don’t particularly want to do it any more than we have to.

We didn’t stay with Spectrum to spite Red or because we wanted glory, no matter what he thinks (and no doubt he’s more than happy to share his opinions on us if you ask him, or even if you don’t; I, for example, am apparently a hypocrite who can't write and makes bad music). We stayed because we cared, we enjoyed working together, and we wanted to carry on telling stories in what became a magnificent, multi-layered sandbox (however flawed that sandbox ended up becoming).

I realise some people will see replacing Marcus with Alex as its own kind of spiteful, as well. Between you and me, I’d considered that point when we made the call, and it's a best of two bad choices kind of thing. Ultimately I feel like we made the right call. It’s what I would want if I were in Red’s position.

Red, if you do read this, consider the incorporation of Alexander Reiner to be our last mark of respect towards you as the man who started Spectrum. Or don’t. Think what you want, really, I don't care anymore, because as Fluffy says in a minute, either way I don't think we’d have had Marcus Renee in this story. I’d just rather think we’re doing it to be kind than spiteful. Personally, I’m sick of spite.

To everyone else: I hope Alexander Reiner’s story grips you as much as Marcus Renee’s ever did. Rest assured, he's in no way a carbon copy expy. Though he fulfills a similar narrative function for now, it's our intention that his role be far different in many ways, and I’m really excited for you to see what we have in store.

DoctorFluffy: Should point out, the name “Alexander” was my idea based on the rich meaning behind it. Felt like something that’d work perfectly in a story. The surname “Reiner” was Jed’s idea. Personally, I’ve different reasons for making Alexander and doing something new here, on the basis that… that writing Marcus is just painful for me at this point.

I mean it. You want to know what I associate with writing him? I think of war crimes. I think of him shouting at people as if he’s always in the right, abusing them. And never getting called out. I think of an overpowered character who’s not badass, but just regular ass. I think of every shitty thing Red has ever done, and how inseparable he is from Red being a dick. I can’t write Marcus, I can’t write Convergence, I can’t write anything with him in it cause I’m always thinking of it.

This is actually part of why I wrote Reiner trying to (*PFFFT*) rein himself in – I wanted to establish we were doing something different. I wanted to make someone with self-control. Unlike Red or Marcus. So actually this has nothing to do with respect on my end (Gorrel my spyt kak, Red!) and more to do with trying to move past something bad. It’s a new kind of Spectrum protagonist (OR IS HE?!) for a new kind of story.

“Don’t look back. You’re not going that way.”

OOH, AND I ALMOST FORGOT! You know how I always complained about Celestia’s characterization in the original story, and you probably did too? Well, not anymore! Coming in this fic, a new and better version of her! Written by people that actually like her! With depth, and resemblance to her show persona! WOW! I have consistently told my friends that if there was anything I could change about the main story, it would be that. And now I can!

YEAH-BOYIIIIIIE!

VoxAdam: Me, I’m simply glad and thankful to be given the opportunity to write at a leisurely pace, in such fashion that the care each of us put into this next chapter will hopefully shine through.

And for the chance at turning a new leaf on Celestia. Definitely Celestia.

TheIdiot: Rather well said you three, here’s hoping we have some idea of what we are doing, after all, seeing how we still have ways to go and much work ahead of us. Thirty-two days is not that much of a gap and our little monthly quota seems to have been met regardless, but it is not in our hands to decide that.

Hoping you all have enjoyed the chapter,
TheIdiot.

Act I ~ Chapter Three ~ They Are Us

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot
Editor in Chief

JedR
But nobody came…

DoctorFluffy
Don’t look back. You're not going that way.

VoxAdam
Sapiens Apud Vox Clamoris

Sledge115
The war is not over.

The Void

RoyalPsycho
Take heart, brothers.

TB3

Kizuna Tallis
I love Ritalin and have low self-esteem.

ProudToBe

Chapter Three
They Are Us

* * * * *

“If aliens visit us, the outcome would be much as when Columbus landed in America, which didn’t turn out well for the Native Americans. We only have to look at ourselves to see how intelligent life might develop into something we wouldn’t want to meet.”
— Stephen Hawking, from Into the Universe With Stephen Hawking

“Do to others as you would have them do to you.”
— Luke 6:31, the ‘Golden Rule’

~ The Crystal Realm, Northern Domain of Equestria ~ Second Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

Deep within the Crystal Citadel, nexus of the Crystal Realm, there was a beating Heart.

A heart made of crystal, mind you. It radiated life-sustaining energy through veins, much like a living creature’s heart. But in this case, the veins were crystalline and mineral, all running through the Realm like roots from a tree or capillaries in a body.

In ages past, before the reign of Lord Discord, before the rise of the Alicorn Princesses, yet not long after the Truce of the Three Tribes was struck on the first Hearthswarming Eve, the Equestrian founders had decreed the memory of a lifelong struggle in sunless days ought to be preserved, a lesson for the future that never again should their people be divided by petty differences.

Hence this city, a green oasis in the midst of endless ice and snow. Of which, contrary to the accursed Winter of hearts gone cold, it was foretold thaw would only come on that dread morrow when the Sun engulfed the world.

Once the domain of the family of the Moon, it had been taken over by a despotic unicorn named King Sombra, and been banished into the future for thousands of years. But, through the efforts of the Elements of Harmony and Spike the Dragon, the Crystal Realm and its Heart flourished once more. In its thousand-year absence, the land had been frost-bitten tundra that none would touch, with only a small population of Royal Guards to keep watch. And now, it was a lush, almost tropical oasis in the middle of the frozen wastes.

Simply put, the magic sustained the land, drenching it in thaums. Much of the time, the ponies who lived here took no more notice of it than the air they breathed, even as the ever-present force wove around them, lending them their distinct crystalline sheen.

But it was duly felt by the young alicorn overlooking her city in the dawn light, akin to a tingle which suffused her every hairtip, setting feathers and fur on end.

The feeling scared Princess Cadance as much as it amazed her.

“Alright, Candy… just… breathe…” the young alicorn whispered to herself, nervously tapping her golden regalia and ruffling her wings as the morning breeze tickled her mane. “Think back to what Aunt Celestia said… spread your wings, and let instinct guide you…”

Cautiously, the Princess of Love, newly come into her birthright as both alicorn and regent, trotted to the balustrade and rested her forelegs, hooves dangling over the void. Again, she tentatively fluttered her wings, pausing to glance over her shoulder at their powerful build and wide spread, then turning to gaze back at the drop. Not two months ago, aided by her husband, she had taken a leap of faith from this very balcony, to strike a killing blow at the spectral Dark King who’d once enslaved the Crystal Realm, and would have done so again.

How, then, could the simple prospect of an early morning flight make her so anxious?

For much too long, Cadance had felt loathe to fly. Like the earthponies who found her, a little pegasus orphan, and raised her as well as they could, she’d been content to keep all four hooves on solid ground. That is, outside of a few, unwelcome occasions when she couldn’t do otherwise. Her wings had been small and stunted at childhood, ‘til ascension granted her both flight and magical prowess.

Yet now she had a realm of her own to rule over. In a word, the Princess of Love had to rise to the challenge.

‘And, darnit, I must be the only alicorn to have ever had vertigo!’

Seething, Cadance stomped a hoof several times in frustration. Prior to King Sombra’s vanquishing, the one time she’d truly flown was when Queen Chrysalis had, to put it mildly, crashed her wedding. Although it was just a brief glide, soaring through the air had brought forth a longing inside her for the sky, to claim her birthright as a creature of the heavens.

‘But then again,’ a small, treacherous voice whispered in her ear, ‘how often will you be called to flight, seated on the throne of the Crystal Realm?’

This city was more than an oasis. It was a giant vivarium, a patch of fertile land shielded from the biting winds under an ethereal dome. Chances were good she’d never need use her wings, safe as a queen ant at the heart of her colony in a glass jar, her flightlessness compensated by her subjects’ boundless devotion...

Cadance shook her head, seeking to rid herself of that thought.

More than anything, she felt like scrubbing herself clean. Against all odds, Chrysalis must have succeeded in planting the seeds of certain distasteful ideas in her head, during those two awful weeks of captivity. In fact, wouldn’t she be worse than Chrysalis, if she started reasoning like this? Even the wicked Changeling Queen had seen fit to lead by example, placing herself in the line of fire as she stole Cadance’s place, consuming her life and love, in more ways than one...

“Make Celestia proud, Cadance,” she muttered. “A full-fledged alicorn can touch the stars.”

“Stars? I’ve got ‘em dancing before my eyes right now,” a voice mumbled from behind her.

She looked around. “Good morning, Shining,” Cadance greeted her husband warmly.

But perhaps it wasn’t such a good morning. Never fond of rising bright and early, even with his experience as Captain of the Royal Guard, at this hour, Shining’s handsome face was a veritable bed-head with bloodshot eyes.

“Morning, love,” he echoed, not fully lucid yet. Shining trotted to take her side at the balustrade, following her lead in leaning upon the railing, but his forehooves slipped and he found himself teetering. “Got a call,” he groaned as he righted himself, blearily. “In my sleep.”

Cadance looked at him sideways. “A call?” she repeated, concern washing over her for both her husband and the ominous nature of this ‘call’.

Yet, slurred as his speech was, she could tell he was in his right mind. Promptly leafing through her mental library, drawing on what she’d learned of mysterious voices in the night, Cadance was quick to hit upon the most plausible explanation.

“You mean, Auntie Luna contacted you?”

Shining nodded, though he had to clutch his forehead.

“Yeah…” he muttered. “Said she was trying to reach you, actually, ‘cept you were already up ‘n out of bed,” he added, unable to keep a tinge of reproof out of his voice. “Asked me to pass on the message. She wants to hear from you, ASAP.”

Cadance drew in a breath. Without specially-enhanced letters, and with telegraph poles still in the process of installation, the Crystal Realm, for all of its magnificence, came with the downside of living in isolation from the rest of Equestria. Yet faith in the Pegasus Express held true, and rightfully so, as neither the very real snow nor gloom of night stayed these messengers from their duty in the North.

If Luna, seizing the fastest option until a better connection was established between the two palaces, had taken the shortcut of calling for her in the dreamscape, it could only herald a matter of great importance.

“Alright…” Cadance said, weighing her words. “In that case, I’ll… have to go back to sleep. I can’t say I’m feeling all that tired, though. A bit, yes, but not like I could fall asleep instantly.” She smiled wanly. “Looks like this time round, you get to sing the lullaby. Even if it’s you who was so rudely awoken.”

Though Shining returned her smile, it lacked the fullness of its luster, and it tugged her heart, to think how long it’d take for their sweet little tradition to regain its innocence, if ever it did. Blessed as they were to find rest in each other’s embrace on most evenings, there were those occasional nights when one of them would need to soothingly guide the other towards the land of dreams, because even Luna could only protect them from so much.

Even after his whispered reassurance into her ear on their wedding night, that Chrysalis, perhaps out of some minimal spark of decency, had not gone all the way in making him her ‘loving husband’, the image bore down on her heart. If since then, a single good thing could be claimed to have come from this, it was the reminder that she was Princess of Love for reasons more exalted than burning loins.

How much of that night had been spent, simply learning to touch each other again. With that in mind, she reached forward to caress his cheek.

“Then lead back to bed, Shiney,” Cadance teased him, nuzzling his snout. “Duty requests it.”

He chuckled. “Of course, Milady. As always, this stallion is your watchful guardian.”

Her mind electric with misgiving, Cadance turned her back on her city, and the dawn sun, to hear what the Night Princess had to say.

“Ugh... I see now why they call it the call,” Shining complained, rubbing his head as he followed her. “Princess Luna really goes all out on that Royal Canterlot Voice of hers.”

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

For the last half-hour, Princess Celestia had quietly listened to the account given to her by a former student of her School. And for once, the student was not Twilight Sparkle. Ever the excitable young mare, Lyra Heartstrings had always been one to embellish a story, some might say exaggerate. But today, Celestia found her former student unusually subdued and restrained as she spoke, in words echoing with the ring of truth.

When the little green unicorn had reached the end of her tale, Celestia let it sink in. All seven ponies in the semi-circle of chairs facing her kept quiet, waiting on their Princess to speak.

“Well, Lyra,” Celestia said at last. “Your resolve is to be commended, spending all night by our mysterious visitor’s bedside.”

Despite residual tension, Lyra beamed at her. “Oh, no biggie, Highness,” she said brightly, with a trace of her usual demeanour. “If bedtime were a job description, I’d be employee of the month, every month. It drives Bonnie up the wall.”

‘Yes, I can believe that,’ Celestia thought to herself, ignoring Twilight’s snort. ‘One would’ve guessed you were a dreamweaver, the amount of naps you took in class! And yet, I really don’t think your academic achievements have much to do with Cadance, Twilight or Moondancer covering for you. Lyra... what have you been doing with your life?’

But the answer to that question, as it happened, lay unconscious in the bed next to them. Once more, whether by luck or by pluck, it seemed Lyra had got what she wanted, where others had to make do with hard labour and iron resolve.

Although, touching upon dreamweavers in her thoughts briefly made Celestia wonder to what use another of her former wards would put that skill, now Luna was three years back. As best she knew, Spell Nexus hadn’t really sought to get in touch with her sister.

‘No doubt my Headmaster shall be most intrigued by this discovery, though…’

That thought gave her a little smile, but she allowed herself to savour that flight of whimsy for only a heartbeat, before coming back to solid ground.

“Thank you, Lyra,” Celestia said, laying a forehoof on an armrest, “for your detailed, thoughtful account. Hopefully,” she continued addressing the whole of the semicircle, “it’ll help enlighten us as to the purpose, and the origins, of our human, if he is a human.”

Disparate mutterings and mumblings flew amongst the Element Bearers. At the far end, Pinkie, Dash and Fluttershy were whispering to each other, while opposite them, a frowning Applejack was arguing about something with Rarity. Only Twilight, seated between Lyra and Applejack, said nothing, hoof to her chin as she stared at the floor, lost in thought.

“Twilight,” Celestia said gently. “Anything you wish to share with us?”

“Hmm?” Twilight’s head shot up. The buzz died down. “Sorry, Princess. I… I’m not sure. I mean, I’ve read a few things about humans, but so far as I can remember, they only show up in the oldest, strangest myths and folktales.”

“How old?” Rarity asked.

“Old,” Twilight said. “Before recorded history. Usually, they’re described as creatures from a distant land who come to help in times of need, except… well,” She hesitated, glancing at Lyra. “Well, a lot of the time, they’re said to be a lot of trouble themselves.”

“That isn’t how Howie Waggoner put it,” Lyra noted, somewhat smugly. “‘Not a tame primate’, that’s what he wrote in his book on the Dream Valley Expedition, I think. I took it to mean they must be a lot like your wild monkeys, only, y’know, not monkeys. Smart and ingenious, but fond of getting up to all kinds of mischief, and if you threaten–”

“I’m sorry, Lyra,” Twilight interrupted, and she did sound apologetic for cutting short a study. “But would you really use Waggoner and that expedition as a credible source?”

“Ummm, yeah?” Lyra replied, without guile. She gestured to the saddlebags at the foot of Twilight’s chair. “Isn’t that why you’ve got that library copy of his book stashed in your bags with all the rest?”

“How did you–?” Twilight began, but caught herself. Of course Lyra would have guessed. Too easy as it was to forget at times, Lyra wouldn’t have passed the application exam for Celestia’s School if she lacked intuition. “Fine, I do. But those few volumes are all the books I could find which mention humans, and I could’ve easily fit them into bags half as big.”

A snicker escaped Pinkie’s lips.

“Pinkie?”

“S-sorry,” Pinkie giggled, holding a hoof to her mouth. “You said ‘half in the bag’.”

“No, no, I–” Twilight said, prior to thinking better of it. “Listen, Lyra, please don’t start with all that again. Doctor Waggoner was unfairly maligned by his peers, true, but there’s never been any evidence to lend credence to his theories. I mean, it’s not like magical transdimensional portals... pop into existence... every single... day…”

She trailed off, staring towards the bedridden stranger. Celestia understood this as an ideal opportunity to step back into the conversation.

“Actually, I’d been meaning to ask about that,” Celestia said. “Your foresight in bringing these books over does you justice, Twilight, and we will return to them. But for now, we should learn from what our eyes and ears can teach us. So, Lyra, if you don’t mind, I do have a couple more questions.”

Lyra shifted awkwardly in her hospital chair, at the sight of which, despite their situation, Celestia had to will herself not to burst into laughter – the little green unicorn’s insistence on her eccentric sitting position, even in the presence of royalty, made her look just so funny, with her legs dangling over the side like that.

Much to their credit, Twilight and her friends all managed to show the same restraint.

“Okay,” Lyra said, placing both forehooves before her lap. She smiled nervously. “This… this isn’t going to be on the test sheet, right?”

Forced as the joke was, Celestia gave it a dutiful chuckle. “No, don’t worry,” she smiled back. “But I need you to answer carefully, spare no detail, as you never know what could turn out important later on.”

“I can do that, Your Highness,” Lyra said, shoulders visibly relaxing. “Spare no detail. Sure, yeah, I can do that! Just like in those stories where a mare the hero met at the very beginning is revealed to be their long-lost sister.”

Showing her gratitude, Celestia nodded. “You say you came across the human when he emerged from a portal close by mine and Luna’s old castle in the Forest.”

“Yeah, that’s right,” Lyra nodded in return. “Although, um, I don’t know how exactly where. See, I never did get to the Castle. The bridge leading to it was broken,” she said, while Dash coughed awkwardly and turned away, “and so, I tried teleporting my way across.”

“I still can’t believe you did that,” Twilight said.

Lyra grinned. “I know, right? Wasn’t that just aweso–”

“No, I mean, I can’t believe you did that, because that was just so dangerous,” Twilight cut her off. “And illicit,” she added, scowling. “Lyra, you don’t even have a license.”

“Aw, c’mon, Twilight,” Lyra rolled her eyes, “why’d you have to be such a stick-in-the-mud?”

“I think you’re lucky mud’s the worst you landed into,” Twilight admonished her, “considering how you missed that jump and got stuck at the bottom of the chasm.”

Lyra shook her head. “Right, first of all, I didn’t get hurt or dirty, it was a perfect touchdown! And, second, I wasn’t stuck, I was simply looking for a way out. Besides, the only reason I missed the jump is, that’s the moment the magic chose to go all screwy cos’ of that tree.”

Even after having heard all this a few minutes ago, Celestia perked up at the word ‘tree’.

“This tree you mentioned,” Celestia said slowly. “How would you describe it?”

“Uh…” Lyra frowned, stroking her chin. There was a faraway look in her eyes. “It was… uh, crystalline, I think. Never heard of a tree made out of crystal before…” She glanced at Celestia, briefly, as her eyes clouded over. “I think... I think I remember thinking… what’s that doing so far South of the Crystal Realm? And here’s the weird part…” Hesitation. “I was too caught up in the human… in Alexander Reiner appearing, I didn’t notice it right away. Except, as I ran for help, I could’ve sworn I heard a whisper in my ear.”

She stopped there, as if daring anyone to tell her trees didn’t talk. But none did.

Dash coughed. “Gee. Between that and the Death Tree, there’s been some reaaally strange forest life in these parts.”

Privately, Princess Celestia filed away the words ‘Death Tree’ for future reference. She turned her gaze back at the human, squinting. “I wonder…”

Yet Celestia said no more, the weight of her uncertainty hanging over them all, her foremost.

“Twilight?”

Her student snapped to attention. “Yes, Your Highness?”

“I must beg Lyra’s pardon for the abrupt shift,” Celestia said, nodding to Lyra. “but there is a matter I must ask of you as well. It may be related. When you sent me your letter, you wrote in postscript that you were still researching the Alicorn Amulet.”

Twilight’s mouth fell open. “Oh, oh my. With everything else that’s been going on, I’d nearly forgotten about that!”

“Don’t you worry, Twilight,” Celestia said gently, an old hoof at Twilight’s anxiety attacks. “I can tell you’ve had a change of priorities since yesterday. All I need from you, is your opinion on whether or not the Amulet and our visitor’s arrival could be in any way related.”

“No. I don’t think so.” The answer was unusually swift and unadorned for Twilight. “As far as I’ve been able to assess, while the Amulet is an incredibly powerful tool of magic, it doesn’t have the power to open a rift between worlds.”

“Even Discord would expend great energy on such a deed,” Celestia agreed, “though, knowing him, he’d easily do it on a whim. I’m sure he’d consider it a wonderful party trick. But did the Amulet recently display any behaviour that could be interpreted as a call, or beacon, which might have attracted the human?”

Twilight had to think about that one. “Not that I noticed, no,” she said. “The worst to happen is that it almost blew my house clean off its roots, and that was my fault. A result of experimental tampering.”

“Well, this is a theory we can lay to res– yes, Lyra?” Celestia finally said, unable to ignore the little green unicorn’s fidgeting and waving of her forehoof.

Lyra put down her hoof. “Excuse me, Princess, this is great stuff and all, but aren’t we likely to make more headway checking the books Twilight brought with her exactly so we could get our answers?”

Celestia smiled patiently. “I believe that if Twilight had an answer she deemed useful, she wouldn’t sit on it.”

“Yes, that’s why you need me,” Lyra said, sliding off her chair to reach for the saddlebags. “Twilight’s always about ‘useful’ things. How much paper, how much ink, how much time, you name it. Don’t let so much as a minute slip by, do you, Twi’? Let me show you what a real wasteful mare can do.”

“Lyra, what–” Twilight spluttered indignantly as Lyra picked out a book and began leafing through the pages.

“Aha, found it!” Lyra said triumphantly, pointing into the open book. “Gather round, everypony, for I have a tale to tell you all!”

As one with the others, even the ruffled-looking Twilight, Celestia inspected the title. Ponyland: Fact or Fable.

“This,” Lyra began, smugly holding up the page with the picture of an elder unicorn stallion printed inside, “was Doctor Howie Waggoner, the pony who led the LP-426 Party to a distant corner North-East of Griffonstone, a place called the Sunken Dream Valley.”

“A party!” Pinkie jumped up excitedly, only for Applejack to clamp her mouth shut with both forehooves.

“She means an eck-spedition, Pinkie, not candy and games.”

“Right,” Lyra said. “Now, based on stories passed around by griffon traders, they were searching for evidence of possible pony habitation, from refugees who might have fled Equestria during the Discordian Era. With me so far?”

Their silence was akin to a tacit nod, but Celestia knew that Lyra was in fact expecting one of them to answer. Well, not just anyone of them. One in particular. And Twilight, it seemed, was quick to understand that too.

“That’s correct and all part of recorded history, Lyra,” Twilight acknowledged. “But we know those same North-Eastern refugees, who preferred wandering into the Unknown rather than brave the icy wastes of the Far North to try reaching the Crystal Realm, or Adlaborn… or, Harmony forbid, ‘Yakyakistan’...” She shuddered. “Eventually, they settled down to create their own little kingdoms in the isles, like the Neighponese and their self-styled Empire of the Eastern Unicorns. None of them feature humans in their myths.”

“No, but they do make for some of the loveliest stories,” Rarity sighed beatifically. “Like Mage Meadowbrook’s journey to learn from the Eastern Unicorns, or Mistmane and Sable…”

‘A lovely story indeed. Oh, if only you knew, Rarity,’ Celestia mused, suppressing a tiny reminiscent smile. Indeed, the Lady Mistmane herself had been much more than a fairy-tale for her and especially Luna, for the old sorceress had taught Luna the art of gardening herself.

“That’s so,” Lyra nodded thoughtfully. “Tell me, Twilight, when was the last time you read this particular book?”

“Hm? Oh, ages ago, I guess.”

“What made you pick it off the shelf? It’s got more to do with old pony legends than humans, from the looks of it.”

“Well, I do take care to check the index, Lyra,” Twilight said, a little tartly. “And unless I’m much mistaken, you’re holding up one such page where humans are mentioned in passing.”

“Not just in passing,” Lyra grinned. “You gotta read between the lines.”

“Okay, if you say so…” Twilight replied with affected cheer. “Please continue, Lyra Heartstrings, full steam ahead!”

Lyra’s grin grew wider. “There’s a theory that the Dream Valley, being situated in an unusually warm location for somewhere to the North, due to the warm currents from a nearby hot spring, could once have been a place of settlement until it sunk.” Her hindlegs began to perform a little victory dance. “No-one’s sure just how it got sunk… the griffons like to point to an extinct volcano, which they call ‘Mount Gloom’, as the culprit…”

“Ah’ve heard of that,” said Applejack. “Some folks say it were the same volcano as in the legend of Rockhoof.”

“Wouldn’t count on it, but it’s possible. These legends grow muddled over time,” said Lyra. “Point is, Waggoner writes here that, while probing the depths via bathysphere, his expedition uncovered something pretty interesting. Buried beneath layers of ossified mud flows, and what he referred to as…” Lyra squinted, her muzzle scrunching up slightly. “Smoozy substance…”

“I thought that was just a legend,” Dash interjected.

“Honestly, I’ve learned not to question this sort of thing,” Rarity added. “Most of the time, we only learn about ‘ancient legends’ when they’ve come right into the centre of Ponyville.”

“Why does it always have to be an ancient legend, anyhoo?” Pinkie asked. “Can’t it be a recent one from time to time?”

“‘Full steam ahead’, she said...” Lyra muttered. “Anyway, according to this, underneath it all was an empty, but perfectly preserved pony castle, done in the stylings of the old Kingdom of Unicornia. Now, that may not sound like much. We know the Kingdom had outposts pretty far North. But listen to this. Two things stand out.” She leaned forward, trying to adopt a spooky voice. “Based on the thaumon-dating they applied to samples of rock brought back to the surface, the castle ruins must have been over three-thousand years old.”

“Which is…” Twilight began.

“Supposed to be impossible, I know,” Lyra finished for her. “It doesn’t match anything else we’ve been taught about that style of architecture, and most historical accounts don’t go nearly that far back. Even more bizarrely, they found next-to-no traces of furniture. Sure, normally, wood will rot away in water over time, but remember, this building was encased in petrified bedrock, or something like that. Everything inside was well-preserved. But almost no furniture to speak of. Almost as if the inhabitants didn’t have the same trappings of ‘civilisation’ as ponies today...”

“Lyra, I realise what you’re saying,” Twilight said. “You’re suggesting there was a time when ponies lived not unlike the Reindeer of Adlaborn, with their habitations nestled between the branches of folding trees, and stone buildings only for protection during the Winter, or when under threat. It’s the popular image of ‘Ponyland’. Yet nothing in written history backs it up.”

“Except it does,” Lyra smiled, tracing a forehoof over the pages. “This does.”

“Hold the phone and the mayo!” Pinkie interrupted. “Can’t we just, I don’t know, ask the Princess to settle this debate?”

Both unicorn scholars stared at her.

“I…” Twilight’s voice trailed off. “I mean, I guess we could…”

“It does seem obvious,” Pinkie said. “Celestia’s immortal, right? Wouldn’t she be able to give us the answer for that?”

“Yeah,” Dash added, agreeing with her best friend. “So, what can ya tell us, Princess?”

Celestia considered them. Wondering whether now was her time for certain revelations.

At last, she spoke.

“My little ponies,” Celestia said. “I’m flattered you’d turn to me for counsel, for all that I trust you to settle your disputes of your own wisdom. But there’s something you must understand. ‘Immortal’ does not mean I was never born. Or that I am all-knowing.” She paused. “I cannot tell you anything of my own experience from before three-thousand years. Thus, Lyra might be right. Maybe humans did visit our world at one time. I hadbeen told as much, a long time ago, by an old pegasus. Her name was Firefly.”

“The one who… no, wait, that doesn’t make sense,” Dash scratched her head. “The ancient hero Commander Firefly was named after?”

“The very same,” Celestia said. “She lived in Adlaborn and claimed to have met a human.”

“Wait,” Twilight cut in. “You were in Adlaborn… three thousand years ago? Firefly was real?”

“She was very old,” Celestia said quietly. “Very old and very sad. One of my earliest memories is, how a little fresh joy alit her aged features, when she beheld my sister and I.”

“Do you remember what she told you?!” Lyra asked excitedly.

“Not much. It was millennia ago, and I was but a newborn. I can’t remember every detail,” Celestia admitted. “Yet I’m curious. What draws you to the Waggoner Expedition?”

“I dunno,” Lyra admitted, “it just… always seemed to be this story that drew my attention. Like it was just this old legend in its own right that I couldn’t help but admire.” She sighed. “I used to dream about it. All sorts of stuff…” As her voiced lowered, her eyes were drawn back towards the book, gleaming. “Like this. Look at it.”

They did. She was now pointing at a black-and-white sketch, nestled on the upper-right corner of the dog-eared page.

“My goodness…” Twilight whispered. “What is it?”

A statuette, buried to the waistline in the sand, betwixt a cliff-face and crashing waves. Its figure was not equine, but something unknown to any of them… and yet, remarkably similar to the stranger in the bed. In its one upraised hand, it held a locket.

“This…” Lyra said reverentially, “is a sculpted pearl figurine. Waggoner named her ‘Harmony Enlightening the World’. He had a theory about that locket she’s holding. That it was the wellspring of the mythical Rainbow of Light.”

Silence fell again, a sober, reserved silence.

There was something oddly melancholic, Celestia thought to herself, about the image of the little statue, left alone to watch over an abandoned shore for centuries, perhaps millennia, until a traveller came by, searching for answers about the past of his world.

“Heh…” Dash chuckled, trying, as was her want, to break a heavy pause. “I always knew that I was named after greatness.”

Rarity looked up. “How do you know it’s a she, Lyra?”

Lyra shrugged. “That’s what Waggoner called her. I guessed he assumed longer manes must be the standard for human females as well.”

“Now, hold on a sec’,” Applejack interrupted. “Here’s what Ah don’t get. If this Waggoner fella found all this stuff, how come we ain’t never heard of it?”

“That’s the tragedy,” Lyra said sadly, closing the book. “An Act of Chance, they called it. Chance must’ve been in a real cruel mood if that’s true… but anyway, on the way back, the expedition’s ship, the Nellie, was caught in a storm, one of those wild storms they get up North. Most of the crew were fortunate to escape with their lives. Their cargo wasn’t so lucky. All they brought back with them was their word…” She tapped the lattice-bound cover. “And their notes and diaries. Doctor Waggoner would have gladly made a second trip, except he never could scrounge up the funding, and the LP-426 has fallen into disregard since, remembered only by a few intrepid souls…” She smiled brashly. “Such as yours truly.”

“And now, you’re face to face with a dream come true,” Celestia noted. “I’d advise you treasure that while you can.” But she was smiling as she said so. The tale Lyra told, if it was unfinished, perhaps still had much to offer.

“For now, I suspect we must let the human, this Alexander Reiner, to rest. Twilight, the day is young, you and your friends should go home and do the same. Should this business brings with it more complications, we will need to all be at our best.”

“Could I stay?” Lyra asked, staring at the sleeping human. “I… feel like I should. Or that somepony should.”

“Yes, Lyra,” Celestia nodded, “best if you do.”

“Excuse me?” a voice asked from behind them. “Is the patient needing anything?”

Celestia turned, as one with her group of ponies, to find Nurse Redheart at the door.

~ The Mind of a Mighty Heart ~

The mind of a Princess of Love should be a harmonious contradiction, were the words Cadance remembered Celestia had told her. Love, one of the greatest forces in all the known world, a potent source of joy, healing and creation, matched only by what destruction it could wreak in its blindness, tearing the deepest ties and knitting them anew. Like the old Kirin symbol of balance, black-within-white, white-within-black, interlocked...

Cadance’s mind felt like a mass of contradictions. Not much of it harmonious. Practice made perfect, of course, and only rarely in what had been a very busy months did she manage to practice her dreamweaving abilities.

“Aunt Luna,” she greeted, spotting her ancestor, silhouetted against a source of light that was indistinct in this blank mindspace. ‘Aunt’ was not quite the right term for the Princess of the Night, owing to their true relations, but it felt right.

“Cadance,” Luna greeted. “It’s good to speak with you.”

“It’s good to speak to you as well,” Cadance said, trying to smile. “But… I don’t think we’re heading out to practice again, are we?”

They had indeed practiced recently, on a trip to her home village. Luna’s cool expression gave Cadance the answer. “It is not,” Luna answered quietly. “A situation has arisen that requires that you return to Canterlot with all due haste.”

“A situation?”

“An unknown creature has appeared,” Luna explained, “and though myself and Celestia will seek answers, I fear this will be no simple matter. The sooner yourself and Shining Armor can come to the capital, the sooner a plan of action can be undertaken.”

Cadance felt herself turn cold. “Is Twilight okay?”

“Twilight Sparkle is assisting in this matter,” Luna replied, smiling softly. “She is fine. She has the help of the other Bearers, and also of one Lyra Heartstrings. You needn’t fret overmuch.”

“Lyra?” Cadance repeated. “Little Lyra Heartstrings?”

“Yes,” Luna said. “You know her?”

“I did,” Cadance replied, a slow smile on her face. “She was a bit of a little terror when I knew her, though.”

Luna chuckled. “Ah, one of your charges. Well, I do not believe she is a ‘terror’ now, but she is involved.”

Cadance felt her mirth fade. “I hope it’s nothing too dangerous. Lyra was always… headstrong.”

“Celestia and I shall protect them,” Luna assured her. “You need only concern yourself with reaching us quickly. This scenario, as I said, may prove more difficult to deal with than we had first hoped. I must go myself to help Celestia deal with the issue.”

“I’ll be there soon,” Cadance said to her aunt. “I promise.”

“Good,” Luna said, before a cheeky grin found its way onto her face. “By the way, Cadance?”

“Yes?”

A framed wooden door, marked by the sign of a compass-rose, arose from inside a circle of light within the darkness.

Cadance stared at it, then back at Luna.

“You’ve got the in-born skills to wander this place, you know,” her aunt said. “At least for the time this shall take. So if you could ever be so kind to give word to Blueblood, I’d be grateful. Hope thou hast fun with that!”

Luna smiled, and promptly disappeared as blackness fell.

“Hello again, Nurse,” Twilight told Redheart. “You’re here early. It’s half past seven, I remember reading on the board that your shift didn’t start today until twelve.”

“That’s true, Miss Sparkle,” Redheart said amiably, “but I think you’ll agree that since our new ‘friend’ here isn’t an ordinary patient, today isn’t an ordinary day. How’s he doing?”

Twilight smiled warmly. “Don’t you worry, the human’s sleeping for now… Sorry, er, Alexander Reiner is sleeping now.”

Redheart stepped across the threshold.

“I see. So, he’s told you his name,” the nurse said, approaching and checking the chart. “That’s progress, I suppose. Now,” she added reflectively, “have we come any closer to learning if he’s tolerant of… pony medicine?”

With both Twilight and Bonbon to rein her in her fancies over the years, Lyra might have thought she’d only imagined Redheart’s hesitation, infinitesimal as it was, except that Pinkie was shooting her a glance as well.

“Uh, not at the moment, sugarcube,” Applejack said. “He… umm... well, he yelled more than he said anythin’ about medicine.”

“Of course he did,” Redheart muttered. She glanced up from the chart and smiled soothingly. “Nopony’s ever thinking about medication when they’re confused.”

Pinkie giggled softly. “Tell me about it. Why should a human be any better at taking medicine than a pony? Most medicine tastes really bad.”

“True enough, Miss Pie,” Redheart said with a chuckle, stepping away from the chart. “Still, we can’t keep on like this forever. At some point, if there’s to be any chance of the patient getting better, we’ll need an inkling of how he functions.” She paused, thinking. “I trust that the xeno-surgeon I left to work on him was adequate.”

Lyra coughed, remembering the amiable Sutra Cross. “Yeah,” she said, “yeah, they seemed nice enough, at least.”

“I’m glad you think so,” Redheart said, a curious look in her eye. Another pause for thought, a glance at Celestia, and a jump. Apparently, she’d just noticed the Princess. “Excuse me. If I may address Her Highness?”

“Uh,” Lyra began. “Go ahead.”

“Highness,” Redheart said, inclining her head. “Greetings, I was told you’d arrived at dawn. In the time since, what assessment have you and Miss Sparkle been able to pass of our unusual visitor? If there’s anything I can do, please, let me know.”

“Not much at present, Nurse Redheart,” Celestia said kindly. “As you’d expect, Twilight has been consulting the books, while I search through the long catalogue of my memories. But our Lyra’s the one who had the most to teach us all so far. Nonetheless, your vigilance remains appreciated.”

Redheart bowed respectfully. “As ever, I am at your service, Your Highness. Perhaps, then, before anything else, you’d hear a proposal of mine?”

“Certainly, Nurse.”

The nurse brought out a file from her saddlebags. “It says here that the patient attempted escape from this hospital, getting past the entrance doors, where he encountered you and the Element Bearers and, drawing upon the unknown magic of his runes, tried to… well, murder you all.”

“There is no certainty this was his intent,” Celestia said diplomatically. “However, a hostility in his bearing cannot be denied. Yet I think it’s important to note that his aggression appeared focused only on me, not the girls, and definitely not Lyra. I’m sure you can agree that, overall, this reduces our cause for concern.”

“Not really,” Redheart said with a raised eyebrow. “I don’t wish to demean Your Highness’ capabilities, nor your wisdom, but specifically targeted violence is still violence. It is a cause for concern, no matter whom the target is.”

“You’re speaking like a Guard,” Celestia said. “It’s been five years, Redheart.”

“I’m not ashamed that old instincts die hard, ma’am,” Redheart replied with an inclination of the head. “And this… brings back memories. I was only going to suggest, there may be prudence in deploying a small contingent of the Guard to the entrances, one on each level. Not that I doubt the capacities of the two lads you brought along, but it’s a safety measure, you understand, in case our guest should go wandering again.”

“That puts their lives at risk,” Celestia told her. “If he is an aggressor, he may well consider them more favourable targets.”

“We exist to serve, risk and all,” Redheart said at once.

Celestia smiled. “Careful you don’t get too caught up in the old instincts. You just referred to yourself alongside the Guard, present tense.”

Redheart blushed. “I’m sorry. This… like I said, reminds me of the old days.”

“I’ll consider the proposal,” Celestia said. “Don’t worry, Redheart. We won’t let any pony, or human, be hurt without need.”

Redheart sighed. “At the very least, wouldn’t it be exercising simple caution to restrain him?”

This got Celestia to raise an eyebrow. “To what end, precisely?”

“The same, of course,” the nurse said. “We do have a precedent from just a few hours ago.”

Celestia rubbed her chin. “There is sense in what you say. Still, I’m willing to take the risk. Consider–”

“How is he supposed to trust us,” Lyra protested, unable to contain herself, “if he’s trussed up like a prisoner!”

Redheart glanced at her, and Lyra noticed the nurse looked quite taken aback that she’d interrupted Princess Celestia. But the surprise was quick to pass.

“And how are we supposed to trust him, Miss,” Redheart said calmly, “if he acts like a thug threatening to harm others? I’m thinking of ponies’ safety, the same safety he’s already indirectly threatened.”

Celestia held up a hoof.

“Yet Lyra speaks truth, if perhaps in a blunter fashion than I’d put it,” the Princess said. “Redheart, we should first try to have faith that this being can listen to reason. In spite of recent friction, he’s come to us, not just as a guest, but a traveller lost, injured and stranded. As far as I can discern, we are not enemies, and all beings deserve their chance.”

Redheart gave another bow. “As always, I defer to your wisdom, Highness. I trust you know what is best.”

“I trust you to make me aware of all alternatives,” Celestia replied, bobbing her own head. “As always, I value your input.”

“You’ve no idea how much I appreciate that,” Redheart said as she straightened up. “Now, if there is nothing else, I should return to my rounds.”

She turned and walked out, leaving the group alone. Pinkie gazed after the departing Redheart, a perplexed look on her face.

“Twilight, I must contact Luna,” Celestia said. “We shall convene back here in two hours, and then hopefully we’ll learn more of the truth.”

“We’ll be here when you return, Princess,” Twilight promised, speaking for them all.

“And I’ll be waiting with him,” Lyra added, “like we said.”

Celestia nodded regally. “Until then.”

Without another word, she strode out of the room, Rarity, Applejack and Rainbow Dash following her.

“Will you be alright, Lyra?” Fluttershy asked.

“Yeah,” Lyra answered with a slow smile. “I’ll be fine, Flutters.”

Twilight sighed. “If you need us, you know where we are. Don't hesitate to call.”

“I won’t. We’ll figure this out, Twilight.”

“Yeah,” Twilight said. “Just like old times.”

And then she, too, left together with Fluttershy, leaving only Pinkie. The pink party pony passed Lyra a small note.

“Could ya go over this and let me know if I oughta change anything? Thanks!” Pinkie whispered quickly, before she zoomed off.

With some apprehension, Lyra looked down at the note. A feeling which lifted once she realised, with some amusement, that it was a list of party supplies and invitees.

“That’s Pinkie for you,” Lyra said aloud. She looked at the human. “Well, Alexander Reiner. Guess you'll have a heck of a party waiting for you when you get better.”

* * * * *

‘I’d forgotten how peaceful it was back then.’

Some part of Redheart wanted to keep the other her in her hiding place and find as many reasons as possible just to be Redheart, the kindly town nurse. And why not? After military service, protecting Equestria from monster attacks and other dangers, her old nurse job at Ponyville had been a way to work in relative peace.

The promise of being simple Nurse Redheart once more was too enticing not to consider. Except–

‘No!’

Firstly, the Loyalty Guard would find out. Even if she had traveled back in time, or was in a parallel universe, they would have some way of knowing. They always did. Virtually no-one, other than the Elements of Harmony or Celestia, of course, was above suspicion for them. And they had eyes everywhere.

Secondly, the human was here. Whatever he would do to this Equestria had to be stopped as soon as possible. There was only so far you could stretch the excuse of “going undercover” for your inaction without getting results. And Reiner’s presence demanded results. Quickly. Efficiently.

Neither attribute easily attainable in this place.

‘Damnation, but this place is uncanny.’

She was sat at a bench outside the hospital. For the moment, she could relax. Her shift allowed for a short break. She took a swig of her hip-flask, wincing at the sour taste. To think, for a decade before the war, all the years that she’d been the simple nurse of Ponyville, she’d given up alcohol. And here she was, back on the bottle.

‘Stress of the time, Red, stress of the time,’ she thought wryly, her thoughts taking the voice of one of her old colleagues. ‘We all need something to get us through the day. Especially dealing with the Princess.’

Damnation, but that had nearly caught her off guard. She’d forgotten how patient and kind the Princess had been, before the stresses of war had taken their toll. She was only lucky that the thought of there being other versions of ponies had yet to occur to this Celestia, that the idea of spies had not crossed her mind.

‘But it will, soon,’ she thought grimly. ‘I can’t slip up again.’

And she was sure Heartstrings had tried to catch her out with the neutral pronoun. Redheart knew who she would normally have assigned to the xeno-surgeon position for a human – her old friend Sutra “Silk” Cross – but she’d deemed it prudent to not make the assumption that this ‘other’ Redheart was so similar as to make the same call.

“Redheart?” she heard a voice ask. “Are you alright?”

Redheart blinked at the address. She looked up to see Sutra Cross sitting across from her, a sympathetic smile on her face, and for a moment she felt her heart skip.

“Uh, I’m fine,” she said, trying to ignore the sense of nausea when she saw her old friend. What had happened to Sutra Cross was a cautionary tale for the ages. “Why do you ask?”

“The drink,” Cross said, motioning to Redheart’s flask.

Redheart smiled wryly, glancing at the flask. “Just… nerves. This reminds me too much of military service.”

She remembered her spy training. ‘Half truths work better than outright lies.’

“Unknown creatures with unknown medical needs?” Sutra Cross asked.

“Could say that,” Redheart chuckled.

“I get that feeling,” Cross said. “Never seen anything like him.”

“I’m sure you’ll acclimatise quickly,” Redheart said sincerely. ‘You did before, sweet naïve Silk.’ She almost winced at the bite she felt in her thoughts. ‘Look where that got you. But now at least I know you’re the surgeon ‘I’ assigned to the task.’

“I hope so,” Cross said. “I want to do the best I can for him.”

Redheart felt her mood turn sour. “How do you know he’s worth it?”

“What do you mean?” Cross asked.

“We don’t know anything about this species,” Redheart pointed out. (‘Or you don’t.’)“We don't know what they're like, what they believe. You saw his omnivore’s incisors, I take it? Carnivorous. And that’s not even starting on the violence.”

“I took note, yes,” Cross said with a nod. “But we’re healers and he's a patient. Even if it was the terrible Grogar himself sat in that bed, the words of our Hippocratic oath matter.” She took a breath. “I swear, by all the Princesses…”

“… In whatsoever place that I enter, I will enter to help the sick and heal the injured,” Redheart finished, nodding slowly. “And I will do no harm.”

“Whatsoever place, and whatsoever people, even these humans,” Cross finished. “Healing the sick isn't something that's just for ponies. It's for every creature. That’s why I’m here.”

Redheart smiled. “Sutra, I wish I shared your idealism.”

“It’s easier than you think to hold onto idealism,” Cross said. “Just stop worrying about the things that could go wrong. Focus on what you hope to be, hope to do. Even if it goes wrong… you were true to yourself.”

Redheart’s smile wavered slightly. “That’s a... comforting notion.”

Sutra Cross smiled back, before looking at her watch.

“I’d better go,” she said softly. “Still technically on shift for another half hour.”

She trotted off, leaving Redheart alone to contemplate her words.

‘I will do no harm.’

* * * * *

The sunshade was up at the café, but it had began to feel surplus to requirement, what with the number of grey clouds passing over the Sun every few minutes.

“So, what’s the score, girls,” Applejack said with a snort, setting her mug down on the table. “There’s a weird creature about, calls itself a human, hints o’ somethin’ less than pretty on the horizon… did I miss anythin’?”

Rarity tipped the rim of her glass. “The fact that Princess Celestia’s taken a personal interest,” she pointed out. “And that peculiar crystal tree Lyra mentioned.”

“Right,” Applejack drawled. She took a sip. “Well, this is gonna be all sorts o’ fun.”

“I’m still hoping it turns out just like last time,” Twilight said, looking tired and apprehensive, her third cup of coffee half-drained.

“Uh, what last time?” Applejack asked.

“You know,” Pinkie put in, raising her own mug, “the last time we saw somepony from the future appear, seemingly after a world-destroying event, and we all panicked and then it turned out to be nothing! Even if Twi’ looked awesome.”

“I was a mess,” Twilight chuckled.

“Yeah, a ragged, ‘tactical espionage chic’ mess!” Pinkie countered eagerly.

“There’s a ‘tactical espionage chic’?” Twilight asked, rattling her cup. “Seriously?”

“Oh, you'd be surprised,” Rarity laughed. “Raggedy chic, distressed denims, anything ever a little subversive of mainline fashion. It’s all rather endearing, actually… Not that I’d ever be caught dead going punk, mind you!”

“Definitely sounds like the time Twilight went back in time,” Pinkie said with a chuckle.

Twilight sighed. “Alright, can we please stop reminding me of that. My eye hurt for weeks.”

“This entire scenario is unsettling, to be sure,” Rarity said quietly, setting down her own cup, “but I’m confident we shall be able to solve it.”

“Sure we will,” Applejack put in. “We solve everythin’ else, don’t we?”

“Yeah, well…” Rainbow Dash said ominously, her drink untouched. “Something tells me this one’ll be different. I still think that Death Tree was a sign.”

“Will you give your blasted ‘death tree’ nonsense a rest?” Rarity asked irritably. “It was just a tree. An ugly tree, granted, but a tree.”

“They have been known to appear at times of great upheaval,” Fluttershy said quietly, looking downcast.

“Let’s try not to worry about it, okay?” Twilight asked. “We’ve got enough things in our plate without ‘Death Trees’.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” Applejack said grimly.

* * * * *

Lyra was talking to the human in his sleep. It felt less stupid than it might have sounded, but that wasn’t much of a margin.

“So, uh…” she stumbled. “I’ll have a lot of questions for you, when you wake up. You, uh… well you’ve changed so much about what we understand, and we don’t understand, and… Sorry. I sound like an idiot. I mean, your name, for example. I don’t understand it. It doesn't seem to have any meaning. And yet you’re speaking perfect Equish. So are your names meaningless, or do names have special meanings? What...”

“Think you could keep it down?” a groaning voice spoke, and the human was staring at her. “Some of us are trying to sleep.”

“Oh!” Lyra said, tilting backwards on her chair. “Sorry, I...”

“No, no, it’s fine,” he said, waving a hand (‘Hands, Lyra!’). “Can sleep when I’m dead.” He smiled at her. “Honestly, I missed the babbling, as well. It’s the little things. Y’know?”

“You… you missed it,”

Alexander Reiner nodded. “Yeah…”

“Because… because I’m dead,” Lyra said softly. “Right?”

“Yeah,” he said, not looking at her. “Right.”

There was a long pause.

“So, uh… what do I call you?” Lyra asked.

Alexander Reiner looked at her, a frown on his face. “Excuse me?”

“Well, you said your name was ‘Alexander Reiner’, right?” Lyra said. “I mean, is that a name we use in full, or is it common to address you as…”

“Alex,” the human said softly. “You don’t have to ‘address’ me as anything. You can call me Alex.”

“Alex?” Lyra asked. “You mean I don’t have to call you by your long full name?”

Alexander – Alex – gave a weak chuckle. “No.”

“Huh. And… ‘Alex’ is the proper diminutive?”

“One of several you could use,” he said, shrugging. “I just always preferred it. My stepdad used to call me Xander. Fucked me right off.”

Lyra winced. “R-right.”

“You okay?”

“Yeah, just… the profanity is a little… profane.”

“Oh.” To her surprise, he started chuckling. “Y’know, that’s exactly what you said the first time we met.”

Lyra laughed a little, too. “Well, I’m, uh… glad to bring back positive memories?”

“Yeah,” Alex said, his smile fading. “Shame all of them weren’t as nice.”

Something caught his attention, and his frown deepened. Lyra wished he wouldn’t frown so. In fact, she realised he’d done almost nothing but that since she’d met him. The one time he hadn’t was when he’d first arrived. His look had been completely different then. A mixture of clashing emotions. But primarily a relief she wasn’t sure, now she thought of it, that she found much more comforting than his grim expression. And yet there was a kindness in his voice when he spoke to her...

He was staring at a small jar on his bedside table. Lyra recognised it as the jam Fluttershy had left.

“What the hell’s this?” he asked, holding up the jar with a dubious expression.

“Uh…” Lyra blinked, “it’s a jar of jam.”

Alex pursed his lips. “A jar. Of jam.”

“Yeah.”

“I see.” He looked at the jar. “And who left it here?”

“Fluttershy,” Lyra said softly. “She… uh, she thought it would be a nice gesture.”

Alex snickered as he put it down. “A nice gesture, for sure. And lemme guess, it doesn’t have any serum in it, right?”

“Serum?” Lyra parroted, chewing her lip. “It’s… as far as I know, just plain ol’ jam. No serum or potions of any kind.”

“Just jam,” Alex said. He sighed. “Jesus. Now I’ve seen everything. Three weeks ago, the yellow terror was leading attacks on towns in the Midwest. Now I’ve got jam.” He barked his laughter, a harsh and weary sound. “Tell me something, is this shit even real?”

“Uh… excuse me?” Lyra asked. “What… I mean…”

“Am I actually here, or am I drooling in a padded cell somewhere?” Alex asked, speaking in a clearer voice. “It’s not a trick question. Especially not when you’ve got an enemy who can play all manner of havoc with your mind.”

‘An enemy?’ Lyra thought, a chill running down her spine as she recalled Celestia’s words to Redheart. ‘So he really does have enemies?’

“I… think it’s real,” Lyra replied, smiling nervously. “I mean, I know I would say that, but…”

“Nah,” he said, “I figured it was. Just…” He sighed, running a hand over his short hair. “Let’s just say, there have been more than a few moments over the last few years that just sort of make you go ‘what the fucking hell’, y’know?”

Lyra nodded, though in truth she didn’t understand at all.

“Might almost be nice to have gone crazy,” Alex said, and something about the forced conversational tone made Lyra think of watching someone holding a scared dog by the tail. “Sure, mind’s gone, but at least I don’t have to think about all of the shit riding on my back.”

“I… I’m not sure that’s…” Lyra began, swallowing. “You… I don’t think you’re insane.”

“Nice to know,” Alex said, his voice bone-dry. “The dead mare doesn't think I’m crazy.”

“I’m not dead, or… not here, at least,” Lyra pointed out. “There's something… really weird going on, but you’re not crazy, I’m not dead, and… I dunno, maybe we’ll be able to help you.”

“‘Help’ me, sure,” Alex said with a snort. “This place looks like a hospital. A hospital in Equestria, run by Equestrians, and me a human. If it were anyone but you, I’d be cursing you for preparing to break me down. The rest of them…”

He trailed off.

“So,” Lyra said after a moment, hoping to break the silence. “I, uh... had a few questions.”

Alex sighed, but he managed a good-natured smile. It made her glad.

“You did before, too.” He yawned, covering his mouth, before smiling at her again. “Alright. Shoot.”

“Okay,” Lyra said, taking a breath. “How do you spell your name?”

Alex blinked, then he started laughing.

* * * * *

A flash of blueish-purple light in the middle of a pathway would be startling to many. To Celestia, however, it heralded the arrival of her sister. She welcomed it, and still welcomed its novelty, prior to the day, she hoped, that it’d be safely familiar again. Two years of enjoying Luna’s company again were so little next to a thousand.

“Hello, Sister,” she greeted, smiling. “You took care of all the preliminaries?”

“I would say so,” Luna said, somewhat imperiously. “At least, Princess Cadance and, by proxy, Captain Armor should now be informed of the latest in our matters of state.”

Celestia raised an eyebrow. “Only those two?”

“I, ah…” Luna rubbed the back of her head. “I made the request to Cadance that she pass the message on to Blueblood.”

“Not that I blame you, Luna,” Celestia said wryly, after having let the silence hang for a good few seconds. “But part of being a Princess of Equestria, is about taking on burdens so our ponies may be given space to breathe.”

“Yes, well,” Luna said, “before you know it, they’ll be calling that mollycoddling. Aren’t we entitled to catch our own breath, once in a while? Besides, Cadance is well suited for the job. Out of the Royal Family, she always did get along the best with him.”

A quick reflection convinced Celestia she didn’t need to point out that Luna only knew this from second-hand.

“I’ll chalk that one up to judicious repartition of duty, then,” she joked. “But tell me. How did Cadance take the news?”

“With trepidation, as expected,” Luna said, “but she looked eager to step up to the plate. It helps that she retains a soft spot for Madame Heartstrings, having been her foalsitter. You didn’t tell me that, Tia.”

“The fact had slipped my mind, yes,” Celestia acknowledged. “Which should make what comes next all the more interesting. Cadance has told me that, of all the unicorns she used to look after, three stood out as fillies she expected to become personal students of mine. One was Lyra. Another, of course, was Twilight.”

Luna didn’t ask after the third filly, which came as no surprise to Celestia. Logically, she must have assumed it was Sunset Shimmer, the one Celestia took in, who’d actually preceded Twilight as a personal student, before ambition had overcome her and she’d vanished into an ether of her choosing.

Given Luna’s own troubled history with her, small wonder her sister didn’t wish to dig too deep, not when Sunset Shimmer was a pony Celestia had come to call daughter.

What Luna couldn’t know was that Sunset hadn’t been a charge of Cadance’s. No, perhaps things might have turned out differently, otherwise, had Cadance never come to call Sunset her sister. That being said, Celestia still wondered if the third filly had fulfilled any of her dreams. Since Luna’s return, time and again, Celestia had entertained the notion that Moondancer could have been a good student to her sister. They had much in common.

‘I have known so many extraordinary little ponies, Celestia thought wistfully.

She and her sister spoke of many things. Not only the human, but the varied affairs of state. Of horseshoes and saddles, of trains and ships, of parchment and sealing-wax. The price of cabbages and the worth of kings. All the myriad concerns of crowned heads at any time, no matter what earth-shattering events may reveal themselves yet.

When the two hours were up, Celestia was still conversing with Luna outside the hospital as Twilight and her friends drew close.

“Greetings, everyone,” Luna said, smiling at them while they trotted up. Her gaze turned to Twilight, and that smile grew gentler. “Twilight Sparkle, so good to see you again. It has been a while.”

“Princess Luna,” Twilight answered, with a smile of her own. “I’m glad to see you too. I wish we could catch up, but… this situation, it’s a little beyond us.”

“Yes, indeed, and I wish we had better circumstances,” Luna assured her. “But do not worry, we will discover the truth of it together.”

“Meet us inside,” Celestia said, “and we will discuss this further, my friends.”

Twilight and the others nodded, making their way inside the hospital, murmuring amongst themselves. A glance at Luna, whose stern expression upon arrival had long since melted away, got Celestia to suppress her own smile, for her sister’s excited recollection of Nightmare Night was still all too vivid in her mind.

“Luna,” Celestia whispered as the others walked in. “One other briefing, before we deal with this human business.”

Luna turned, her smile fading. “What?”

“Has there been any word yet from Discord?” Celestia asked. “He should have reported in some time ago.”

Her sister sighed. “A brief message three days ago, concerning carnivorous sawhorses haunting a village. He cited it as positive evidence that he was close to the lair which the Krampus has been working from.”

“We’re fortunate, then, that we were able to convince Discord to aid us in tracking the Krampus,” Celestia said quietly. “Still… this situation feels as though it will require his assistance sooner than I would like.”

“You think so?” Luna asked. “Do you anticipate this being… that bad?”

“All the evidence we gathered so far implies it could be, thus I must presume the worst,” Celestia told her simply. “I would rather be prepared for the worst than not. After all, it’s better to have a hammer and not need it…”

“... Than to presume, in your arrogance, that you don’t need the hammer, just to stub your hoof on the nail,” Luna finished the old Kirin proverb with a nod. “Agreed. Even so, to think this is so bad that it should require Discord’s aid…”

“Let us first discern what we can here. And then act accordingly.”

“Agreed,” Luna said quietly. She paused. “Do you think Discord can defeat him?”

“They’re kin, those two,” Celestia sighed. “If anything can defeat the Krampus, Discord can. And if he can’t… we’ll have to hope the Elements can contain him.”

“Indeed,” Luna said quietly. After a moment, she spoke again. “Discord sounded confident in his message, if that helps.”

Celestia found this comment worthy of a snort. “Discord always does.”

* * * * *

“So,” Lyra said, “What… what were those things you mentioned? Like, uh, the Hand-in-Hoof Riots, or the Disharmony Act, or The Crucible?”

“Believe me,” Alex said, “You’ll be happier not knowing.”

“You know, Alex, you keeping saying that,” Lyra said softly, “but I’m sure that there’s more to it than you’re saying. And we can’t help if–”

“You can’t help,” Alex cut her off. The harshness was renewed. “Period. And I don't really want your help.”

Lyra frowned. “But–”

“But, nothing,” Alex said. He sighed. “You got fucked up once before.” Lyra winced but he ignored it. “I won't watch you all get fucked up again.”

“But if you told us...” Lyra began.

Alex held up a hand. “I… I don't know. I still don’t know what's going on, whether this is the past, or another universe, or…” He chuckled. “Gonna be honest, I might have sorta got this shit, but my sci-fi knowledge isn’t exactly at ‘ultra technobabble level’.”

Lyra smiled sadly. “Well, I’m sure we can–”

Before she could finish, they heard the door to the room open.

She saw Alex tense up, and darted her head to where he was staring. Celestia stepped in. Except she was not alone. The Element Bearers and Princess Luna came in behind her. When Lyra looked back to Alex, his eyes had widened, his lips thinned. He said nothing.

“Alexander Reiner, I take it,” Princess Luna said quietly, inclining her head. “It is good that we may be permitted to speak in a quieter setting.”

Alex looked from Luna to Celestia, and back to Luna again, a scowl forming on his face.

“I’ve heard of you, Princess Luna,” Alex said quietly. “From what I’ve heard, you seemed more than trustworthy, I’ll grant you that, but I am still not comfortable with... this lot,” he said, gesturing towards Princess Celestia and Lyra’s friends from Ponyville. “As you can imagine, there’s a history between us...”

Celestia nodded slowly. “It is in search of answers that we’ve come, if you’ll permit it.”

Alex narrowed his eyes, hands clutching the sides of his bed. A hint of blue glow sparked upon his skin.

“You gonna interrogate me?”

“Nothing of the sort, sirrah,” Princess Luna stepped forth. “If you’ll permit, I shall conduct a mind-delve, with the Element Bearers as my witnesses. Inside your mind, we may hope to find the answers we seek, and ascertain your honesty.”

“A mind delve,” Alex repeated. “Forgive me if I'm wrong, since God knows this stuff isn’t exactly my area of expertise, but I've never heard good things about those.”

“A mind is far more resistant to foreign intrusion than you may think,” Luna explained. “Contrary to popular belief, casting a spell or enchantment to force another to one’s will is really the crudest, most brutish form of persuasion…”

Alex’s face had gone very pale.

“And thus, a mind-delve is potentially hazardous to those who make the journey,” Luna continued. “But only if they are not prepared, or perform the delve in an unsafe place. I would hope we are prepared, and this hospital is as safe a place as they come.”

He growled disdainfully. Lyra actually felt frightened of him then.

“You may think so, Princess Luna. I don’t.”

Luna’s eyes narrowed. “I beg your pardon?”

“It really is,” Fluttershy said softly.

Lyra held up a hoof, but Fluttershy ignored it, fear deserting her as it did whenever confronted by a strange creature. She approached him slowly.

“I know you’re hurting, but we really do just want to help.”

He glared at her. “Where have I heard that before.”

Fluttershy gave her sweetest smile. “I… I don’t know what happened to you… but I know I want to help. That we all want to help.”

“Do you have any idea how many times I’ve heard that?” Alex demanded, biting back the rage in his voice. “In my experience, most times a pony living under Celestia says they want to help, it means they’re going to destroy you, and treat you like ungrateful scum for not wanting it.”

Lyra backed away, concerned. She wasn’t the only one. The Bearers standing nearby wore looks of anger, horror, confusion, or some combination of all of the above.

“I know how it sounds,” Lyra said. “But… none of us have done what you’re talking about. I mean, you mentioned a mnemosurgery clinic, but I don’t even know what memo-whatsit is!”

“That’s a word for a memory-altering spell,” Twilight said. “Highly difficult. Highly illegal. And… I think it might be considered dark magic?”

“Not dark magic, Twilight, not technically,” Luna said, “Though it was too horrible not for us to consider it as such.”

“Then why did he mention a clinic?” Lyra asked. “Unless, it’s… no, having them as underground establishments wouldn’t make sense, they’re…”

Alex was breathing heavily, in and out, his back ramrod-straight while his hands squeezed both sides of the bed, turning his knuckles white. Another couple of blue sparks and a creak. Were Lyra’s eyes playing tricks on her, or did the frame bend a little under his grip?

“They’re available to everyone in Equestria, far as I know,” the human said. “If you ever feel bad about the things you do to us, then go there. They just take those little thoughts out.” He laughed again, the same humourless bark from earlier. “Appropriate, isn’t it? ‘How happy is the blameless vestal’s lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot!’ An eternal sunshine of the spotless mind…” His glare fell upon one specific presence in the room. “Exactly what the Solar Tyrant has to offer us.”

Twilight looked at her mentor, horrified. “But that’s… that’s antithetical to any of the friendship lessons I’ve learned! That’s burying a problem instead of dealing with it!”

“It’s also what I know Equestria is like,” Alex hissed. “Billions...”

‘That number makes no sense,’ Lyra thought. ‘We… there aren’t thatmany of us in the whole wide world!

“Billions who ignore the little voice in their head that says maybe they could be wrong. The one that says we’re worth existing as much as any of them. The ones who took my friends, my family, my goddamned world, twisted them all into something unrecognisable. All in the name of friendship. Of helping us.”

“That ain’t us!” Applejack yelled. “Ah don’t know what you’ve heard of Equestria wherever you’re from, but we’d never be like that!”

If Alex meant to shout back, he restrained himself well.

His eyes met those of Lyra, who, unsure what else to do, tried smiling encouragingly. He did not seem to see her, however. Their gaze broke, his eyes were cast down, his grip loosened. One of his hands, with him looking like he didn’t know what the rest of his body was doing, went to the jam jar. He picked it up , holding it out to Fluttershy, still not looking at her.

“Here, take this,” he said quietly. “‘Preciate the thought, but I'm not that much of a jam fan.”

Fluttershy stepped forward hesitantly, before reaching a hoof to the jam.

The next moment was a blur. Alex was suddenly out of the bed, his arm wrapped around Fluttershy’s throat. His tattoos were glowing, dimly – like light filtering through dirty glass, the kind of subtle change in lighting you’d only really notice if you were looking for it. But Lyra noticed it, and more.

The jar fell to the floor, almost in slow motion, shattering on impact, the lid rolling away. A red fluid poured out.

Pinkie Pie gasped.

“Let Flutters go!” she yelled. “Let her go, right now!”

“Or what?” Alex seethed.

“Or we stop you,” Twilight said, her horn glowing. Besides her, so too did Rarity and Princess Luna’s.

“I’m sure that’ll be a great comfort to Fluttershy when I start squeezing tighter, the blood flow to her brain stops, and she asphyxiates,” Alex said, almost blankly, as though he were talking about a mundanity like locking a door. “And if you think the threat of you ‘stopping’ me is gonna scare me, you’re underestimating just how ready to die I am right now.”

The bold, bald and blunt statement caught everyone off guard. Pinkie’s mane twitched, seeming to deflate slightly, and Lyra felt her blood run cold.

‘He really is ready to die. How bad, how terrible, must it be, where he’s from?’

The glow in Twilight’s horn didn’t diminish, in fact it grew brighter, but now the blue glow emanating from the marks etched in Alex’s skin were brighter too.

“Don’t even think about it,” he warned them. “You’re good, but whatever you think you’re gonna do, it won’t be fast enough to save her. I guarantee it.”

One after the other, Rarity and Luna let their horns dim, and Twilight dimmed hers last. Lyra gazed after them, ashamed, cursing her own inaction.

“So,” Alex said slowly, looking Princess Celestia dead in the eye. The one eye staring at him from beneath her flowing mane. “Answers, is it. I can live with answers. I want a few myself.”

Celestia’s neck muscles had tensed. “You will not get them by threatening my subject.”

“I’m already getting them,” Alex snapped. “The Celestia I know wouldn’t hesitate to sacrifice a pawn to win the game, and all her subjects are pawns. I’d be dead the minute I tried to do a thing, even if that meant flash-frying this room and everything inside.” He took a deep breath, while Fluttershy still struggled to get hers. “But here we are… still talking. Something’s up with this little game of yours, something beyond the ordinary.”

“I won’t sacrifice my subjects on the altar of convenience,” Celestia said icily. “I could kill you, that’s true enough. But I believe that among the alternatives open to me, most of them would have you and your hostage come out of this alive. And I will not harm my ponies’ souls by having them bear witness to wanton brutality on my part, nor will I risk their lives when I can take action that won’t.”

“Funny, that,” Alex said, almost conversationally. “You’d think, after all the ponies you’ve already harmed–”

“It should be painfully obvious to you that I am not who you were expecting,” Celestia all but snapped. “I am willing to find answers with you. Not by force, but together, as equals. Violence isn’t necessary.”

Alex’s grip didn’t shift. “You’ll forgive me if I need more than your word on that.”

“Please…” Fluttershy whispered, choking under his grip. “Please… Why are you doing this?”

To those watching, something gleamed in his eye, and his grasp on her weakened. But only ever so much.

“Why?” Alex asked back, in a voice laced with a dark laugh. “Because there is nothing I could do, absolutely nothing, worse than what you have done to us.”

Fluttershy looked aghast. “You don’t have to. I wouldn’t, I promise you.”

“You know how many broken promises I’ve heard from your kind?” Alex asked. “Too damn many.”

Lyra had heard enough. With a glance at Twilight and Rarity, she stepped forward.

“Have I ever broken a promise to you?” Lyra asked, looking him in the eye. “Ever?”

Alex peered at her. “You… you’re not even her.”

“I am Lyra Heartstrings,” Lyra retorted. “Whether I'm the one you knew or not. Am I so different? Can't you put your faith in me, like you did before?”

Alex’s expression wavered. Finally, he averted his gaze from her, releasing Fluttershy, who broke away from him, gasping. Quickly, Dash, Pinkie and Rarity rushed to hold her up.

“In you... always,” he said quietly.

And Lyra couldn’t help but smile, as much at that as her friends comforting Fluttershy.

“How can I trust them though?” Alex asked after a moment. His attention was firmly on the other six young mares. Even though he was in no condition to fight, if glares could kill, they would have been maimed a hundred times over.

“Because I do,” Lyra said. “I promise you they won’t hurt you.”

Alex looked uncertain. That was when Luna interceded.

“You said you and your people have heard of me before, Alexander Reiner,” the Princess of the Night declared. “Under what circumstances, I know not, but you said they found me ‘trustworthy’ enough.” She let that sink in. “Believe me, you could not have given me a higher compliment, when I still know not how much I trust myself.”

“Alright…” Alex said. “Alright. There’s no point me saying ‘if this is a trick, I'm gonna kick all your asses’. If this is a trick, I’m fucked.” Lyra winced, but he didn’t notice. “But faith… faith is what held us together. Faith is what kept us fighting. Everyone knows that. Faith in righteousness, in ourselves, in our comrades.” He addressed Lyra. “Faith in you.”

Lyra looked away. “There's… nothing special about me.”

“There, you’re wrong.” He tried for a smile, crookedly. “After all, I’m about to trust this bunch. At least, enough to not start breaking heads. That, Lyra Heartstrings, is one hell of a good one.” Nonetheless, he fixed Celestia with a last, defiant glare. “You stay the fuck out of my head, got it?”

It was Luna that spoke up. “I am to enter with the Element Bearers, not my sister.”

Celestia motioned to Dash, Pinkie and Rarity that they should bring Fluttershy closer to her. All four came willingly, permitting Celestia to drape a comforting wing upon the winded pegasus’ nape and shoulders.

“I can tell a great wrong has been done to you, Alexander Reiner,” Celestia said coolly, “for beneath the hard edge to your words and deeds, I sense in you the heart of a civilised being. However, were you to have hurt this innocent, I would have considered you a criminal on par with Sombra, Chrysalis and Discord, and demanded restitution accordingly.”

“Good to know,” he said, his light words belying his hollow tone.

He shifted his posture, almost huddling, with his knees pulled to his chest, arms across. Lyra noted the posture as being a defensive posture, most likely reflexive.

‘It’s always what we don’t say that really says everything.’

“I’m not going to apologise,” Alex said after a moment, looking at the trembling Fluttershy. “Not yet. You don’t know what I’ve seen. If you had, you’d understand why I don’t trust you. Even taking Lyra’s word is a leap of faith, like I said.”

“We’ll find out the reason for your distrust soon enough,” Celestia said softly.

“I guess you will,” Alex said. “If I’m not the best of men, Princess Celestia, I’ve fought alongside worse, to counter the very worst.”

Celestia frowned. “You’ll forgive me if I say you don’t sound overly happy about that.”

“Did I say I was?” Alex asked. He snorted. “I hope you know, if this whole thing is a trick and I wind up dead, I’m gonna haunt the shit out of you.”

Celestia exchanged a wry glance with Luna.

“Duly noted,” she said. “I place this in your hooves, Sister. For now, I shall stand watch over all of you, and our guest.”

* * * * *

“Hey, Bonbon. Bonbon!”

“Whu...?” Bonbon shook her head whoozily, staring at the customer.

“Sorry about that,” Sparkler told her, rapping a forehoof on the counter, “but you were kind of off in a trance. I thought you were the morning person in the household. Has Lyra been keeping you up all night again?”

“Huh, I wish,” Bonbon sighed, rummaging under the counter for the Whooves’ morning order. “She didn’t come home at all last night. All I got is a garbled message from Rarity, telling me Lyra was at the hospital. Not,” she added, catching Sparkler’s expression, “that she’s been injured or anything, thank Celestia. Said she and Twilight’s gang were watching over somepony.”

“Somepony?”

“Well, maybe ‘somepony’ isn’t the right word,” Bonbon said, pulling out today’s package. “Anyway, you and Dinky enjoy the crystallised candy?” she added, keen to change topics.

Sparkler did not look mollified, but indulged her. “Ah, you know Dinky. If I didn’t ply her with the sternest of intonations, she’d scoff down my jewelry components before I got a chance to refine them. Honestly, any worse and she’d be a dragon.”

“Yes, Spike does love his gems,” Bonbon agreed jocularly.

“Little guy musn’t have much else to do half the time, getting left behind like that while Twilight and her friends are off on a mission.”

Bonbon had to muffle a curse at this sign of Sparkler redirecting the conversation. She chose to get pre-emptive.

“Sparkler,” she said, pressing her hooves together, “is something the matter? You sound like there’s something you want to share.”

“Why, yes, actually,” Sparkler said softly, reaching for the package, “there is. Dad was in a funny mood the whole of yesterday evening.”

Bonbon frowned. “That so, huh? He okay?”

Sparkler shrugged. “Kept going on about having a headache. Said it meant some event with four-dimensional fallout was on its way.”

Bonbon snorted. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Not sure,” Sparkler admitted, “but it’s got us all on edge. Enough for Mom’s eyes to start staring dead ahead.” She shrugged again. “Maybe it’s nothing, though. He can get a little… twitchy, sometimes.”

Bonbon gave a small nod. “That, I totally get.”

* * * * *

“So,” Luna said. “We are all agreed to do this?”

Lyra was speaking softly with Alex, who looked dubious, even now Celestia had left and they’d been making preparations for the past quarter of an hour. But she seemed to have forestalled further issues.

“Yes,” Twilight said quietly. “We’re ready.”

“Let’s just get on with it,” Rainbow Dash said impatiently. “I’m sick of all this waiting around.”

“While I’m not as impatient as Rainbow,” Rarity added, “I must say the prospect of answers to all the unpleasant questions this… human business has brought up… well, it’s gratifying to think we might know what it all means, soon.”

Luna nodded. “Very well. I say again, though, that you must all be sure you are up to do this, and prepared for the potential consequences.” She looked at each of them. “It is not beyond the realms of possibility that we’ll get lost in there.”

“That’s a risk for you, too,” Twilight reminded her.

“I appreciate your concern, Twilight,” Luna said, “but I can take it.”

“Well, so can we,” Applejack said boldly. “This stuff might be big. Seems to me we’re involved either which way, so let’s go all in.”

“A poker reference?” Rarity commented. “I didn’t know you played.”

“Not well,” Applejack said. “Big Mac cleaned me out three times in a row last week.”

“He’s got the bestest poker face ever,” Pinkie Pie agreed.

Luna chortled. “Well, if we are to go all in, let us begin.”

“I’d say good luck,” Alex quipped, “but I don’t care.”

“You’re very helpful, Mister Alexander Reiner,” Rarity shot back sarcastically.

“I try, ma’am.”

“Hey,” Lyra said. “I’m going in there too.”

“Which is the sole reason I’m not shitting bricks right now,” Alex told her, smirking at the collective wince from the ponies. “Guess you can have fun in my fucked-up head–”

“Do you have to use words like that?” Rarity snapped.

“Have to? No,” Alex chuckled. “But they do make me feel better when a bunch of strangers I don’t trust are about to go rummaging in my head.”

“Enough,” Luna said, shooting them both a glare. Alex broke eye contac,t having the decency to look abashed, and Rarity sighed as Luna looked around the Element Bearers. “Centre yourselves, everypony.”

She closed her eyes, and the others followed suit. There was a sudden shine, and then–

~ Shattered Dreams of a Warrior ~

The seven young mares found themselves falling, downwards into what seemed an endless void. The next thing Lyra and her friends knew, their descent was slowing, stopping, their hooves touching… something.

“Apologies, all,” Luna said, horn aglow, gliding to meet them. “We were caught unaware by the state of the human’s mind.”

She looked around, as her light revealed the area…

They were standing in some old, worn street. All around them was devastation.

Massive buildings boxed them in on both sides, skyscrapers taller than those of Manehattan. None was without some sign of damage. One structure, a great crack snaking down its facade in the shape of a lightning-bolt, still stood despite the twisted remnants of what was once an airship buried in its foundations. Soot stains, old and faded from time, could be seen to coat the buildings, adding a darkened layer to the surroundings.

Whatever natural colour might be found here, though, it had been muted, the sky itself enveloped in a cheerless grey, with patches of harsh, blistering orange shining through.

“Stay close, and you won’t lose yourselves,” Luna ordered, taking the lead in front of the Bearers. “Unfamiliar as I am with the workings of this stranger’s mind, I ought to know my craft sufficiently well to navigate us. Remember, this is a reconnaissance, nothing more.”

Her horn shone brighter, effectively illuminating the street, almost as if to shield them from the dull colours of their surroundings.

Luna had chosen to cast a comforting yellow light, rather than her characteristic blue aura. But the effort was only halfway worthwhile. Although the other seven found comfort in standing within her pool of light, it cast eerie shadows in the space beyond.

None of them needed much prompting to stand behind Luna, and together, they moving out as a group. As they advanced, however, it became apparent that whatever place this had once been, it was now a boneyard.

No bodies were to be seen, but the piles of rubble and wrecked buildings, marked by the tell-tale scars of battle, were all the evidence required.

“Is this… a…” Fluttershy gulped. “A war?”

“The aftermath of a fight, probably,” Twilight commented saggingly.

‘... Pay for this… Make them pay… ‘

Twilight’s neck snapped around. “Fluttershy, did you say something?”

“Um, no, Twilight,” Fluttershy said, “but anyone else hear that?”

“Ah sure did,” Applejack said, looking up, as if hoping to find the speaker in the rooftops. “We all did.”

Luna stopped and faced them. “There is no-one here,” she said softly. “Nor does there have to be. Remember, the world works differently in dreams. But follow in my steps, and we may find signs of life… life of a sort.”

The air shimmered before them.

They all stared as the shimmer coalesced, akin to a body-shaped patch of white in thin air, into a lifelike figure, its features now recognisable to them as one from the same species as Alexander Reiner. It was on its knees, shoved against the wall. Like its surroundings, the human figure was devoid of colour, almost a statue. It wore clothing, like Alex. Rarity’s guess must have been correct about that. But these were torn and burnt and hung by a thread...

“Fluttershy, any ideas?” Twilight asked, turning to the Bearer of Kindness, who began examining the figure closely.

“Softer features, long hair, different body structure.” Fluttershy observed, circling around. Although her eyes were dilated, she didn’t tremble. “This one’s female, I think.”

“It kinda does look like Alex,” Applejack drawled, “besides being a human, Ah mean. Nose looks sorta the same. And... the eyes, of course. Ya can tell a lot by the eyes…”

Colours filled the figure then. They saw blonde hair, and the whites of her eyes were red. She had been crying.

“Finally, we can get somewhere,” Dash said, a tremor in her voice belying her brash words. “Princess Luna, what’s this supposed to be?”

“A projection,” the Night Princess answered, looking out to the rest of the cityscape. “Whenever a mindscape has formed, it is usually populated by figures the host knows. People they’ve known in their lives…” She eyed the projection with a sad grimace, “and it is clear this one has suffered greatly.”

“Please, tell me they’re going to pay,” the projection said. “Promise me, Alex! Please! I’m owed that much!”

Twilight frowned. ‘Who needs to pay? What happened to her?’

Before anything else could happen, the projection disappeared right before their eyes. This was followed almost immediately by an earth-shattering, thunderous roar, coming from further up the street as one of the skyscrapers collapsed into itself, a walk of dark cloud tearing down the road towards them.

Thankfully, quicker than the monstrous cloud of dust, Princess Luna raised a shield around them all, a protective barrier of magic which broke the wave. They dug their hooves as best they could into the ground, cracks in the concrete offering them some merciful hold.

‘What’s happening?’ Twilight thought, the wind sweeping her mane and coat as the world beneath them shook, ‘Why is there an earthquake?’

Eventually, the cloud passed away, to reveal that much was changed.

Luna opened her eyes. When she spoke, she sounded haunted. “This… is a grim scene.” She took a breath, seeing what was around. “Steel yourselves. We are not done yet.”

They were no longer alone in a city of phantoms. In one fell swoop, it seemed, the collapse had levelled all other structures, casting them below the surface. The world had gone flat, a blank, nearly featureless expanse, marked only by a horizon to separate earth and sky, and a lone country road.

Hurrying down this road, there came two more of the colourless humans, shaking and stumbling and looking worse for the wear. One of them clutched a device in their hands, which Twilight, taking it in with her photographic memory, recognised as bearing similarities to a transistor.

They were screaming into it, but no sound answered their pleas.

The second human, who would turn back every so often in mid-run, carried some kind of metal item in their hands, pointed towards the encroaching mass of shadows actively pursuing them both. When the metal item, with a ghastly reverberation, shot streaks of fire at the shadows, Twilight knew it to be similar to a griffon’s flintlock. Except this had to be miles more powerful, at that. Yet the shadows paid it no heed.

One of the shadows struck forward.

At the last moment, the human with the firearm pushed their companion away, taking the blow to the chest. They tumbled to the ground, seething in pain. Their companion stopped their flight to look back.

The fallen human’s lips moved, and despite the silence, one word leapt out. Just one.

Run.

But the other human did not. Instead, they moved to the fallen one and tried to help them up. The both of them were beset by the shadows, then.

Time slowed to a crawl for the onlookers as they saw the haze clear up, details manifesting on the two humans and the shadows who surrounded them.

The fallen fighter was a male, with tanned brown skin and black hair. He wore a defiant look in his eyes, one which reached not only his tormentors, but the unseen onlookers.

The one beside him was female, her more bronzed skin offset by the great white mane atop her head. Her face was bruised, a sickly mix of red and blue, yet her eyes blazed as she reached into her belt to draw out a knife.

As for the shadows…

“Impossible,” Twilight whispered in shock.

“Twilight?” Lyra’s voice came from far away.

Two figures stepped out of the black, swirling mass. The former was dressed in a gold-tinted armour that, despite the apparent wear and tear, still proudly reflected some shine. She had wings, wings that looked muscular and fit for a raptor, despite adorning what should have been an unthreatening pink coat. She beamed…

“That isn’t a smile.” Pinkie spoke up, her voice gone grim, “I know smiles, and that isn’t right.”

… Beamed before the two captives. Then she stepped aside to allow for the other figure to come forth. The stallion wore a purple coloured armour, with a crest that proudly displayed a shield and star.

“No.”

The word came out as a whisper.

“Twilight?” Dash said, concerned.

The stallion’s coat was a very light grey. His mane was a very familiar sapphire blue, streaked with cerulean and azure.

“No,” she repeated, louder this time.

“Twilight, what’s wrong?” Rarity asked, on the edges of her consciousness.

His eyes were also cerulean, but they were strangely flat, and just so… cold. A harsh and unfriendly and alienating cold. So cold and cruel but he–

Twilight couldn’t bear to watch any longer and had to avert her eyes.

‘Please don’t speak. Please don’t speak. Pleas–’

“Well, what do we have here?” Hearing his voice was like sandpaper in her ears, but it couldn’t be mistaken. “Jerome and Lydia. How good that I found you.”

“You bastard,” the male snarled at him. “It just had to be you that decided to corner us. Couldn’t let us go free, could you? Had to come and– ”

“Save you?” he interrupted, giving a grim laugh that might or might not have been kindly disposed. “Don't forget, Jer. I’m your ‘buddy’ remember? And ‘buddies’ don’t leave each other behind. Of course it had to be me.”

It sounded so much like someone giving a performance of him.

Twilight couldn’t quite explain why she thought so. But the coldness she’d seen in his eyes, the condescension in his reassurance to ‘Jerome’ planted the idea in her. It was so unlike the real him, the person she’d grown up with. It was like he was reading lines from a script.

But the emotion in his voice… She knew him, and this was not faked. The one other time she’d heard him speak like this was before the Wedding. He meant every second of what he was doing, and it was him. She was sure of it.

She willed herself to look. His horn glowed a light rose colour. A shield appeared before him.

“I’m afraid that knife,” he said, “won’t be much help, Lydia.”

The woman, standing in a defensive position despite impossible odds, raised an eyebrow. And, with no warning, she plunged her knife into Jerome’s throat. Judging by the copious gush of blood, Lydia had almost certainly hit an artery. The man collapsed to the ground, a red stream spraying out from around the blade.

Swiftly, the woman yanked the knife from Jerome’s throat, aiming for her own–

‘Why is she doing this,’ Twilight thought, her heart racing, ‘why is she doing this, there’s blood, and what is happening, what’s going on!’

“No! Stop!” the armoured stallion yelled. “You’re running away from help!”

He didn’t sound like he was performing, that time. He sounded genuinely distraught.

His horn glowed, and with it, a rose-coloured aura surrounded Lydia’s knife arm. As he telekinetically held her, Lydia’s arm twisted back, further and further. She scrabbled at the blade in her clenched fist with her free hand, trying to pull it out, to stop the merciless pull, but it was all for naught. Her forearm was moving of its own accord, straighter and straighter next to the upper arm, until–

Lydia screamed and fell to her knees, her forearm dangling bonelessly, at an angle that looked unnatural to Twilight. It bent in the opposite direction from her other arm, in fact.

“Come on,” the armoured stallion said, just like he would when he was encouraging Twilight, whenever she ran into the toughest of homeworks. With kindness. “You know it won’t hurt.”

“Stay away!” Lydia screamed. “Stay the fuck away!”

The pony reached into one of his saddlebags, pulling out a vial of bruise-purple liquid. The rose-coloured aura surrounded it, and it floated gently, weightlessly towards Lydia. She tried to scramble backwards with her good arm, but stumbled, and she was slow, too slow...

“You’re in pain,” the armoured stallion said. “You’ve got so much, so many old wounds that eat away at you. But we’re going to make them all better. Promise. And you’ll be happier at the end of it.”

“No, no, anything but that!” Lydia screeched. “By the Golden Lyre, please, no–”

The cork popped from the vial, and the pony’s telekinesis pressed the tip of the vial up to her lips. She tried to keep them closed, tried not to drink it…

But then there was a crack, her mouth opened, and the potion was forced down her throat.

Immediately, Lydia began to…

To…

Twilight couldn’t describe it. The woman’s body was deflating and melting and solidifying – “saponificating,” Twilight thought madly – all at once, running together like wax and shrinking. Her eyes grew too big for her sockets, fur burst out from under her peeling skin, and her ears lengthened into something like pony ears.

And all the while, two sounds dominated the memory. Wet, thudding, meaty cracking noises issued from her body constantly…

And she was screaming. The way she was changing, the way her head was stretching and shrinking all at once, Twilight could barely believe there was enough brain in the person’s body for her to be aware enough to scream.

But she was.

“Stop it!” Twilight screamed, tears falling from her eyes as her horn glowed brightly. “Leave her alone!”

But nothing happened. No shield materialised, no blast to stop the atrocity before them. Rainbow Dash flew, but in the crazed logic of this nightmarish wonderland, though she flew with all her might and Twilight did not move, never did the armoured stallion and the suffering woman come any closer. Despite her skills she couldn’t reach them…

And then, as suddenly as it had begun, the woman was gone. In her place, there stood a little bronze earthpony mare with a blank flank, a happy smile on her face. But her eyes were big, unblinking, and glassy. The smile itself was too wide, enough to look like it’d split the face in half if it grew any bigger.

“That’s not a smile,” Pinkie said, looking nauseous, her own eyes wide as dinner plates. “That’s not a smile! What’d he do to her?!”

“Thanks, Shiney!” the new mare chirped, as if she hadn’t just been torn apart and put back together. “I had so many problems, but now they’ve all just floated away! I feel so happy and free now that I’m a pony!”

“No,” Applejack said. “That’s… this’s wrong, whatever the hay it is!”

“Oh no,” Rarity said. “The look on that pink mare’s face… and what happened to that pony…”

Her eyes grew wide.

“The pink mare used to be human, too!” she gasped.

“This is enough!” Luna shouted, her horn glowing. The area around them crackled, and then fractured away with six cries of surprise, and one in dismay.

For whatever enemy that the humans were fighting, Twilight’s brother was among them.

Alexander Reiner looked at them blandly.

“Fun trip?” he asked sarcastically, his arms folded.

“What was that!” Pinkie shrieked. Fluttershy was shaking like a leaf, hiding behind her and Rarity.

Luna scowled at his callous attitude but kept herself steady. “Never have I seen a mind this fragmented within one who is technically sane.”

“Sorry, ma’am, you still haven’t,” Alex said with a smirk. “Reckon we all passed ‘sane’ a while back. I usually settle for ‘not in a straitjacket yet’.”

“What… what was that?” Twilight shakenly asked. “That… that conflict we saw. You… what… What’d Shining…”

“What did he do to that human?” Applejack yelled. “That there just ain’t right!”

Alex laughed bitterly. “You’ll have to be more specific. Your kind did a lot to my people. Forced labour, blood magic, all kinds of experiments…”

Twilight swallowed the lump in her throat. “They… Shining changed her, changed her into…”

“Whatever happened to her, it wasn’t right!” Pinkie interrupted. “She just… it wasn’t a smile! There wasn’t… wasn’t anything in that pony!”

“I couldn’t do anything to help…” Dash whispered, eyes to the floor.

“Ah,” Alex said, nodding as his amused expression faded. “Yeah, that’s the truth. Not sure which time you saw–“

“This has happened more than once?” Twilight and Pinkie cried in unison.

“Well, yeah,” Alex said. “I’ve no way of telling exactly which of my memories you saw. But it happens very often… too often.” He chuckled mirthlessly. “It happens all the time, in fact.”

“I… I don’t understand…” Twilight stuttered.

“Alex,” Lyra said, her face gaunt and bloodless. “What the hay is happening on your world?”

He sucked in a breath. “We’re at war.”

“I am no stranger to war, but this...” Luna whispered, her gaze turned mournful, and Celestia draped a comforting wing over her. “Who are you fighting?”

“Equestria,” Alex remarked grimly. “Or rather, the Solar Empire. Queen Celestia and her Bearers of Harmony are leading an invasion of my home planet, Earth. Armies of Imperial Guards, supported by their allies in the Co-Harmony Sphere, and their ranks bolstered by the... ponies who used to be my people. Nobody calls them ponies, though. Not even the enemy. Those things you saw… those are the Newfoals. We’ve been under constant attack everyday for the past five years now.”

“And… and I…” Lyra struggled to articulate her thoughts.

Alex took a breath. “My friend, Ambassador Lyra Heartstrings, fought to oppose this. The forced conversions, the destruction and obliteration of the human race.” His expression darkened, teeth bared, and eyes full of murder turned to stare at Celestia, who had listened to all of this with a stoic, if mask-like, expression. “And you killed her. She died trying to save us from you.”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

This chapter features no noteworthy modifications, other than tweaks to Luna and Twilight’s interactions, and a new plot breadcrumb; the earliest mention of Sunset Shimmer as Celestia’s adoptive daughter.

Spectrum 2.0 - October 18th 2017

JedR: Howdy all, Jed R here. This one’s been a bit late, and I feel a quick explanation is in order.

Basically: we’re a bunch of people for whom life is continuing to get more complicated as we carry on. Life, and the myriad challenges thus involved, takes up quite a bit of everyone’s time. Add to that the fact that this is the beginning - always a difficult thing to get right - and you can see why we were getting a bit stuck on this. That said, I feel we’ve come out with a pretty comprehensive chapter, and the next chapter should be considerably quicker coming along: there's a whole host of material that we're dying to let you see, and it will be awesome.

Until then,

Jed.

DoctorFluffy: Concur’d - a lot’s been going on in our lives lately. There’s been my new job, my attempt at writing a book about Spectrum, a couple art commissions for friends…

But trust me, we are doing our best to make a story that is better than Classic Spectrum. Not that it’s hard to do, but we just want to go the extra mile. To this end, I’m even going to be rewriting Light Despondent soon! So, y’know, look forward to that.

P.S: Yes, the first antagonist our heroes face nicknames herself ‘Red’. This was not intentional, but I am aware of the irony and will run with it.

P.S.S: If anyone’s wondering what “saponifying” means, well… I don't know. Apparently it has something to do with fats melting and then solidifying into soap. Mostly I just wanted to use the word "saponify." Hey, it has “ponify” in it! I only just noticed that. That is weird.

~Fluffy

VoxAdam: This was a challenge, as by this point, here comes the hook. After this, we’ll know the borders between coasting on the old story’s nostalgia, and garnering your eagerness – not to mention our own – to move forward with something new.

I’ve got no regrets about integrating fresh material from up to Season 7 and beyond. The experiment is all the more engrossing in that, according to show-canon, this story’s opening is situated in the middle of Season 3.

Picture a locus unfolding, revealing spaces that were always there but we never saw before. Therein lies the beauty of it…

~Vox

TheIdiot: Thank you for the words, Jed and Doc and Vox. Well everyone, sorry for the wait and I thank you all for being patient with us. As has been said, we’ve all been busy working hard on both events in our lives and also on this story. The trick it seems is finding the time to balance and use in between.

Hopefully, that time will become stable once again since Chapter Four is very well underway and we’ll be able to regain our once a month update policy. In the meantime, please bear with us as we work to sort this all out.

Act I ~ Chapter Five ~ Understanding Dawns

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot
Strange plotter

Jed R
Occasional Writer Of Decent Material

DoctorFluffy
PFFF…. Jed said “occasional”. That man sells himself way too short. He is a treasure to us all.

VoxAdam
V. A. T. S.

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho
World-builder extraordinaire

TB3

Kizuna Tallis
I love games that turn people against each other.

ProudToBe

Chapter Six
Understanding Dawns

* * * * *

“Listen only to the sound of my voice. Let your mind relax. Let your thoughts drift. Let the bad memories fade. Let peace be upon you. Surrender yourself to your dreams. Let them wash over you like the gentle waves of the bluest ocean. Let them envelop you. Comfort you.

Imagine somewhere calm. Imagine somewhere safe. Imagine yourself in a frozen forest. You’re standing in a clearing. Trees around you so tall, they touch the sky. Pure white snowflakes fall all around. You can feel them melt on your skin. You are not cold. It cannot overcome the warmth of your beating heart. Can you hear it? You only have to listen.

Can you hear it slowing? You’re slowing it. You are in control. Calm. At peace.”
— Mantra of the Frozen Forest, Call of Duty: Black Ops III

~ The Crystal Realm, Northern Domain of Equestria ~ Second Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

“You have to go speak to Blueblood?” Shining Armor asked incredulously, scowling as he paced up and down their bedroom. “Why, Cadance? Why in the blazes has Luna left you to go speak to that ponce?”

Cadance shushed him with a forehoof, digging the other into the covers. “Astron is family whether you like it or not, Shiney. Please, be nice.”

“He’s still a spoiled, buffoonish oaf,” Shining reiterated, turning from the window. “All he ever wants to do is play croquet and polo with his cronies. And those are his respectable hobbies. Seeing what manner of uncouth behaviour he lets slip at the Galas, I’d hate to imagine what he’s hiding about what goes on at his, ahem, ‘private’ parties. Let’s not mention, he dodged his military service.”

“He didn’t dodge it,” Cadance said. She was careful not to raise her voice, but she had to emphasise that word. “Those records of a year spent with Vanhoover Company weren’t fabricated by bribes, you know.”

“Milady,” Shining snorted, “a stallion flying the Starspear around like his personal pleasure yacht isn’t performing military service, whether he’s wearing a naval uniform or not.” Her husband sniffed. “He’s a ponce. A dandy.”

“He is… more than a little self-indulgent,” Cadance allowed. “But that doesn’t stop him from being one of my oldest friends. You don’t think Aunt Celestia would let any foal go completely to seed under her watch? And, like I said before, technically he is family.”

“By adoption, Cadance, same as you, and Sunset too,” Shining sighed. But he’d calmed down enough to sit by her side on the bed, edging his forehoof towards her own. “Well, alright. He goes back a few dozen generations, and you’re brand-new.” He smiled at her fondly. “That may have been a mark of quality for some ancestor of his, love. I just think we’ll have to raise our children better than that…”

Cadance hummed. “Yeah. But the fact is, he and I grew up together. Which has got to count for something, right? That’s why Luna has entrusted this to me.”

“Well, that and because she can’t stand him.”

“You can’t really expect her to know him like I do,” Cadance said, with a shrug. “Anyway, if I’m gonna contact him soon, I’d better get to it.”

“Will he still be asleep?”

She chuckled melodiously, lying her head back against the pillow. “Probably.”

Shining Armor, seeing there was no can-do, gave her a wry smirk. “Alright, then,” he said. “Good luck, Cadance. I’ll get the guards ready for our journey.”

“The world it is weak it is soft it is and here I am the past is freed I am the future I am the power I am the king I am and they will bow they will see they will understand and…

… Wait.

Son skin son scum sons filth putrid diseased failure my failure disgusting diseased…

Not. Dead. Yet. Where are you swarm of my flesh, son of my skin, scum and stinking, putrid and pathetic and… Wait.

Who are you familiar yet stranger kin yet not kin thin blood smells of…”

“Now,” said Lord Discord. “Just who are you searching for, Father Krampus?”

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

“Some future or alternate version of myself,” Celestia whispered.

The pronouncement of Alexander Reiner lay heavy on the air, like a bell tolling, the echo long outliving the sound. She and her sister had stepped away from the others, the younger ponies speaking amongst themselves, save for Lyra Heartstrings, who was speaking with Reiner at a sub-volume.

“Strange,” Celestia continued. “I knew such things were possible, even likely.” She gave a weak, insincere chuckle. “So many magical theoreticians and physicists have just been granted the proof of a lifetime… and yet here I am, faced with it, and I so desperately want to believe in its falsehood.”

“But if it is true, what now?” Luna asked hushedly.

Celestia gave her one look. “If it is true… then it is not my place to decide alone.”

“I shall support whatever you need,” Luna breathed. “All of the family will. Shining and Cadance were informed. Cadance must have told Blueblood by now. Yes, I suppose Kibitz as well. As for our relatives in the North…”

“They shall receive word, in due time,” Celestia said ruefully, smiling without mirth. She looked back at Reiner, who looked incredibly tired. “Yet the choice still falls onto me. And not only me.”

Celestia turned fully and took a step towards Reiner, who looked up at the sound, and tensed in his bed, scowling.

“What do you want?” he asked.

“Alexander Reiner, I cannot pretend to understand exactly what has happened,” Celestia told him, her tone gentle. “To you and to your world. But please know I want to help you in any way I can.”

Reiner breathed out, once, twice, not meeting her eye. “Then wake me up,” he said bluntly. “Even though it’d be waking up to a nightmare. Send me home.” He gritted his teeth. “That’s the only help I want, or need from you.”

“I doubt that’s true,” Celestia said evenly. “It is certainly the only help you want, I’m sure. After all, you clearly hold no love for me. But after the visions you have shown to my sister, my student and her friends... I suspect you need all the help you can get. Help shall always be given by Equestria to those who ask for it.”

“I’ve seen too much of your ‘help’, Princess...” Reiner said, clutching at the IV drip hooked into his right arm. “What? Do you think nobody on Earth wanted help from Equestria? We welcomed it, at first. Yes, we told ourselves it was too good to be true, that nobody could be this selfless, and even at the start, there were those calling to bomb the Conversion Bureaus–”

“The what now?” Applejack interrupted, from the gaggle of friends in the corner.

This drew surprised looks from everyone. Since returning from inside Reiner’s mind, after hearing his final, damning accusation levelled at Celestia, Twilight’s intimate circle had kept themselves rather to themselves.

Which left Lyra with no-one but their increasingly troubling visitor to stick by.

“Conversion Bureaus,” Reiner repeated. He noticed Lyra staring up at him. “That’s the one thing I didn’t tell you about before. The war you saw… it didn’t start as a war. For a few, a very few years, three of them, Equestria and us lived in relative peace. That’s why you’re the ‘Ambassador’, Lyra. You were an ambassador from Equestria to my world.”

Lyra’s mouth hung open, until she willed it to work. “Your whole world…?”

“No,” Reiner said brusquely. “Just one country. The United Kingdom of Great Britain, it was called, if you’re interested. Not that any of it matters. It’s all been vapourised by the Barrier. But during those years, there was a Conversion Bureau in practically every country.” He reclined, a heaviness falling upon his whole bearing. “In the beginning, they didn’t use the ponification serum as a weapon. They advertised it as a cure.”

“How?” Lyra gasped. “How’s being made to give up all you are, forever, a cure?”

“Because for too many, it really must have felt like it,” Reiner said, gazing into the ether. “I told you, Lyra, you were ambassador to a single country, when you’d have loved to have met all mankind. But my world… it isn’t a united one. Unlike yours, only one thinking species is known to live there, and that’s us. Humans. And we’re…” He hesitated, tugging at the sheet, “... not very good at sharing space. Which is why Equestria seemed like such a Godsend. Why crawl through all the shit in our lives? If next door, there’s a happier, more hopeful place without any of that, what’s holding us back? Happy ponies, running carelessly in the fields…”

“Bub,” Applejack interrupted him sternly. “Any of them folk what think that’s all there is to being a pony, they don’t know their flank from their face.”

“A-hum,” Fluttershy said. She was still nursing her neck, from when Reiner had locked her into his grip. “Ponies… ponies can be mean, and cruel… but also kind… we take care of Equestria’s animals and they take care of us… no-one’s just left to run wild...”

Rarity held her best friend tightly. “And how gauche would it be, I ask you, if we had nothing to work with our hooves, nothing to create!”

Dash, who’d been eyeing Reiner suspiciously since his assault on Fluttershy, spoke slowly.

“The point they’re trying to make…” Dash said, “is that if we didn’t have any troubles, any challenges to overcome, any broken tupperware to mend… there’d be no point to any friendship lessons. What’d we have to learn?” She paused. “Don’t I know a lot about it…”

“They’re right, Alex,” said Lyra. “Equestria’s not all parties and games. But I’ve found it so much nicer because there’s more to it than that.”

Reiner nodded as if he were resigned to hear this. “I know. Even in the early days, we’d heard a few stories of how all hadn’t been stable in Equestria for some time. But it’s a plain, simple fact, old as our history. The grass always looks greener on the other side...”

That statement was left hanging. Even Celestia, who yearned to say something, comfort this broken creature, chafed to hold her tongue, knowing nothing that she had to say would be welcomed by him.

Wordlessly, Lyra moved closer to Reiner’s bed, and wordlessly, he traced his fingers through her mane.

“I don’t understand...” said a voice, low and sad.

The Princesses and their ponies turned and realised, to their surprise, that it was Pinkie.

“Why wouldn’t ponies and… humans, want to be friends?” she said. “If there’s a potion to become a pony, there must be one to make a pony into a human, that’d be so much fun, to transform and change shape like that!” Her mane, hanging limply around her, seemed to regain vibrancy for a second. “The parties would be amazing! I’d love to be a griffon for a little while, or to have fingers like yours.”

Lyra, still buried in the human’s embrace, gave a little laugh that went all but unnoticed.

And Twilight spoke for the first time. “There are spells that allow for temporary transformation...” She looked at her friends. “Remember when I gave Rarity wings, or allowed the rest of us to walk on clouds? But they’re not meant to last. All of them use Starswirl the Bearded’s Amniomorphic Spell as a base, and he himself said that...”

“That true transformation would require magicking the subject’s soul...” Reiner said dully. “You witnessed it, in my dreams. Being touched by the serum isn’t like putting on a suit. It isn’t a cosplay, or a costume like some people said pre-War. That poison sucks your very self to fuel it, and you… bend. People’s flesh, stretched out, their bones broken up and put back together again. That’s why those creatures, they never feel quite like ponies. They’re not. They’re humans, and they’ve been hammered into that shape. And you can still see these little reminders of what they used to be, hints they weren’t born, just recycled.”

Celestia saw Twilight had turned green. She herself couldn’t entirely keep the nausea at bay, recalling many hundreds of terrible instances of dark magic in her long life. Few, if any, had been quite as cruel as this.

“That’s just the physical,” Reiner added unforgivingly. “On the mental level, it might as well be a completely different person.”

He glanced up. Celestia nearly flinched. His gaze was burning, and starting straight at her.

“And that’s why I hate you,” he hissed. “I look upon you, see your beautifully smooth, porcelain-perfect face, and you know what I keep feeling, Celestia? An overwhelming desire to smash it into a million tiny pieces.”

“... But where?”

Twilight had choked out another phrase.

The human’s statement had felt blistering to Celestia, yet this feeling overlapped with a chill upon her heart to hear Twilight speak in distress. Close to a wail. Pleading.

“Where’d you get the energy for magic on this massive scale?” she babbled. “For pity’s sake, that time Big Mac dragged Berry’s house off its hinges, it took the collected force of me, Lyra, every unicorn in town to put it back where it belonged! How could Equestria even manifest on Earth in the first place? Is that what you’re saying?”

Rapidly, the thought arose in Celestia’s mind that she should step in.

But, with abrupt determination, she chose to quell it. On occasion, being permitted to vent was the best medication. Too much lay in the air. And given all they had learned, Twilight letting it out in an intellectual rant may be the ideal tonic, at least in the short term.

Luna seemed of a different opinion, moving forward, but Celestia quietly held a forehoof in her path, shaking her head. She knew her student.

“You can't just drop a continent onto a planet, I mean–”

It was Lyra Heartstrings who chose to speak up now, clearing her throat. “Twilight–”

“–Equestria has an area of approximately nine million square miles and–”

“Hey, Twilight–”

“–the abyssal plain is about three miles deep which–”

“Okay, but–”

“–cubic miles of rock! That is plainly absurd, as it gives a mass of–”

“That doesn’t–”

“–meaning that even if you somehow managed to avoid–”

“Twilight Sparkle!”

Twilight turned to look at her, hoof still raised. “What?”

“Equestria appeared via magical portal, not falling landmass.”

Twilight blinked, and looked around. Luna’s mouth hung open. Pinkie was busy taking notes. Celestia held a hoof to her mouth, and all the others were gawking at her.

“... Oh.”

Celestia knew that until this point, in spite of his hostility towards her and his threat towards Fluttershy, the human had taken his circumstances rather placidly, all things considered. But now, a change had come about him. Twilight was right. There was something in his eyes. And a glow about his forelimbs, his arms, as he’d identified them.

“My God…” he whispered. “I still had my doubts, but this… this can’t be a dream. What am I, a fucking geologist? Nowhere in my mind could I drum up something this detailed, this… this researched! And that must mean… I’ve got the real Twilight Sparkle standing before me.”

“Yes,” Twilight said . “Yes, you d–”

“But I can’t be,” Reiner cut in viciously. “You… you are all monsters, the lot of you. Willing to ponify people, turn them into those… those goddamn things!”

“No, we’re not!” Pinkie cried. “That’s the exact opposite of what we’ve been telling you!”

“How… this hospital...” Reiner uttered, his eyes hooded and glaring. “What is this place? How do I know this… isn’t simply a Conversion Bureau, and this, this is all my mind playing tricks on me, as the Tyrant creates this elaborate fantasy, dragging out every last secret of mine as I lost the last inch of my soul? You’re too real to simply be a dream, yet why should I trust you!?”

“Alex,” Lyra panted, pulling back from him, sounding frightened. “What are you saying! These are my friends!”

“I know!” Reiner yelled. “Just like I know that what I’ve seen, it’s all real. But… None of this makes any sense! I... just…!”

His hand was clasped, claw-like, to his forehead, beads of sweat appearing on his temples. His breathing was growing heavier, coming in short, sharp bursts that made his chest expand inward and outward, to an alarming number of beeps from the monitors.

The sight was enough for Celestia to question whether she’d made the right call, as long-buried memories came flooding back to her, of how she’d failed to see Luna’s frustrations and pain until it was too late her little sister...

But something happened. Fingers digging into his cheekbones, Reiner spoke three words.

“Lamed Vav Tzadikim…”

And he froze. It was like a film projector breaking down, stuck on the same piece of celluloid. He didn’t breathe, he didn’t blink.

“Is he... Is he broken?” Pinkie asked, concerned. “Lyra, do humans just… break?”

“I don’t know…”

“Oh,” sighed Applejack, “I thinks that fella is plenty broken.”

Rarity, who had her hooves wrapped tightly around Fluttershy, did not ease up, but she did take stock of the situation, with her seamstress’s eyes.

“At least,” she said tentatively, “it’s not an offensive spell.”

“You sure?” asked Dash, her wings stretched out and her head bent. “We don’t know what human magic could be like.”

“I don’t think they have magic at all,” Rarity whispered, “not naturally. Remember what Nurse Redheart said about those tattoos he’s got. It’s like they’re his power source.”

“We should call for the nurse,” Celestia said. “Lyra, if you’d be so kind?”

“Uh, sure thing, Highness,” Lyra said cautiously, “but, um, there’s just one thing I need to tell you about Redheart.”

“Then say it quick, Lyra...” Celestia then turned to her sister. “Luna? What do you make of this?”

It did not evade Celestia that Luna’s face had ‘I-told-you-so’ written all over it, as she neared the human to inspect his condition. But she said nothing to it. The time for action was close, Celestia sensed. Yet waiting and watching, as a first step, were still efficient means of learning and understanding. And from the human’s nigh-obsessively controlled reactions, they were learning much about him, what he was running from.

“P-princess…” Twilight began, shaking, as she addressed Celestia. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what came over me, this is my fault–”

“No, Twilight,” Celestia told her, draping an ever-comforting wing over her student’s shoulder. “This has been hard, on all of us,” she said quietly. “You had to let something out. And by the looks of him, so does Alexander Reiner, who is reining himself in most extraordinarily…”

“It’s a form of trance,” Luna muttered critically, horn dimly alight. “And it’s what he wanted.”

~ Shattered Dreams of a Warrior ~

“While it is in my power to stop the Barrier… morally, I cannot.”

The Solar Tyrant smiled down benignly at the flabbergasted-looking human reporters, gathered before her podium in the Equestrian Embassy of Berne.

“Your world is too dear, your lives too precious, for me to do otherwise. To allow you to continue as you have would be a sin,” Queen Celestia continued, seeking to ease their confusion and misbegotten fear. “The Barrier is expanding, and the only way to survive is to change. The Conversion Bureaus were set up for that reason, to rid you of the violence that perverts your inner equines, to set you free as prosperous, happy ponies, aware of the magic arou–”

“What if we don't want to change!?” a reporter from NBC shouted in anger.

The interruption threw Queen Celestia’s train of thought off the rails and into the cornfields.

“We cannot allow you not to change,” she pressed on, facing the cameras with a resolve that betrayed no inner doubt. “For while Equestria lives on as a pastoral beacon, we know what lurks in the shadows of the world outside. You were told of our unfortunate strife with the Crystal Realm... Now, the time has come for me to pronounce my revelation.”

She breathed in, slowly, with the air of a prophet about to say something wonderful.

“I say this to the whole of mankind…” Queen Celestia proclaimed. “I believe it was ordained that our people should meet. The last strife in my people’s history is to be, indeed, the last. We shall have peace yes, and together, we shall find the Light. Although you are now slaves to your inner demons, as my dear ponies were enslaved to the Dark King, soon, no more! I regret killing him. I shall not kill a single one of you. Instead, we shall save you, one and all!”

She may have hoped they would gratefully accept her words.

Instead, the reporters were backing away from her, as if she were a dangerous animal. Some attempted to flee for the doors, only to run into the Loyalty Guard and an assortment of smiling Newfoals, the recently-converted human members of the embassy staff.

“You here will be the first... and the world shall witness and rejoice in your salvation.”

“You can’t do this!” screamed a young female reporter from KBS World.

“I can and I must,” the Tyrant said calmly as the Guards began to advance, corralling them. “Your very world itself calls out to me to rescue you from yourselves.”

She nodded towards the Newfoals. Having bowed briefly to her, they grabbed and tore the tablecloths of the food-trolleys on both sides of the room, to reveal that stored in each of the trolleys’ undersides were racks of thin, purple glass vials.

The unicorns unstoppered the vials by a flick of their horns, earthponies and pegasi with their now-strengthened teeth, and all tossed the liquid contents on the crowd, who were roaring in rage and fright–

“Stop!”

And were joined by his voice, screaming with a fury from across years of suffering.

It may have been that at the sound of his, the eyes of all present, aggressor, victim, and those caught in-between, locked themselves onto Alex, but his glare was on one person in the room, one person alone.

“What?” The contours of Queen Celestia’s mane glowed a tinge of orange. “You deny me?”

He stepped forward, heavy boots leaving imprints on the soft, ornamental carpet of the floor.

“Not just me,” Alex growled. “The human race denies you. All people, on my world and yours, with the good sense to not get caught up in your madness, deny you. Oh, too often, we have let despots and demagogues run the show, closing our eyes when they talked of building walls or leading us to greatness. You’re just another goddamn one of them. Yes, I deny you. And you know how we say ‘deny you’ in my neck of the woods? Fuck you, and the horse you rode in on!”

Without breaking a sweat, he swung his fist at the very moment his tattoos lit up, aiming right for her face. And, encountering resistance neither from the surrounding Newfoals or the Tyrant, it impacted. The force of the swing sent cracks all across the surface of her coat, which blew away in countless specks of fine, white powder…

… Akin to a coat of fresh snow, newly disturbed by the winds of Winter…

A howl filled his ears, not of pain or anguish, but a rising gale…

… The cold wave hit him.

It was a freeze that enveloped itself around not only the surface of his skin, but deep into the recesses behind his eyes, into his mind, and his heart. He felt a sharp tingle at his fingertips. A profound dread invaded him, more chilling than any outside cold, as he half-expected that this was the moment, when he’d look down at his hands and see they were no longer his, or hands at all...

Instead, he found himself holding a gun, where no gun had been before.

He was no longer in Berne. The night was icy, biting deeper than it should in late summer or early fall, even through the kevlar he was suddenly back to wearing. Yet this was how it was, with all of the ash the destruction wrought by the Barrier had thrown into the atmosphere, the weather sent off-kilter. But it wasn’t snowing, and the ashes in the air all around him were not the work of the Barrier.

They were his doing. It was August again, and he was at Defiance. He was there to stop a plot by the notorious HLF terrorist Leonid Lovikov, wanted for the murder and torture of Nurse Sutra Cross, the Shelling of Portland, and now, apparently, a plot to destabilise the PHL at their weakest.

And, with luck, they’d finally capture that mass-murdering psychopath Viktor Kraber. Responsible for a massive number of deaths during the Purple Winter, stealing food and medicine from convoys, indiscriminate murder of Equestrians whether or not they were PHL, to name but a few. Word from Lieutenant Ze’ev was that he’d been willing to turn himself in, but when they got to Defiance, he was nowhere to be seen.

Alexander Reiner, on the other hand...

“No…” Alex whispered, staring at his Remington ACR, memory flooding him, as it always did at this point in the dream. “Please, God, no…”

But the moment was like a rock. Hard, heavy, and unchanging, other than how it was rolling closer towards him. The past was inalterable, the future, an eternal recurrence.

“That was my husband!” came the woman’s scream, “You son of a–”

She charged, round with child, out of her hut’s doorway, pistol aimed right at him.

“For the love of God,” Reiner whispered, “Don’t make me do this.”

He looked away. A small mercy. Even as it meant that, this time again, he felt the white-hot pain of the bullet tearing through his skull.

It hadn’t happened like that, in real life.

… In real life, he’d been faster.

How quickly everything can change. As the blinding white, and pain, receded into darkness, the image of the Tyrant’s face, whole and triumphant, mocked him silently, an after-image that felt more real than anything he’d ever beheld, be it in his mind’s eye or for himself.

The Tyrant had stood and declared herself righteous. So had Alex – never to her face, but nonetheless in the hearts of many, as one voice with those who stood together against her. Cheerilee. Luna. Cadance. Lyra.

He’d tried telling himself he’d had no choice. Because, it was true, in that split second, there was only one choice. Damnation, or oblivion. Now, every time he underwent this sequence, he was given his time to shine bright, and then his taste of oblivion.

“Well. Done,” someone said. Their voice warbled in his ears, and he winced. “I would. Say. That you deserve a... Promotion. For this. Good work. Has… been. Done.”

A chorus of voices rang out around him.

“Done well! Done. Well. Done! Well!”

It echoed, intensifying until it threatened to split his head open all over again.

There he was, looking down at his own body. Except it wasn’t his body, it was the woman’s. And painted on every wall, almost glowing, was the graffiti that tormented him so. ‘Justice For Angelo’.

“We were... only. Suppressing HLF.” Colonel Robert Gardner’s voice said. “Dissidents. Terrorists. Monsters. They could just… as easily. Been a threat. To humanity. As the Empire. You’ve done good work here. You’ve. Done great. Work… Captain Reiner.”

Alex wanted to express remorse. Wanted to refuse promotion. Wanted to say that even with what the HLF and their backing had in the works, there had to be a way to settle it peacefully. Like Lyra would’ve done.

He didn’t, and Lyra wasn’t there.

You are back again.

It was a dark, upside-down world. Yet where light didn’t shine, sound still carried. And this voice he heard, a feminine voice, though soft, came through clear and pristine. Alex did not turn to face her. How he wished it were Lyra.

“I’m back,” he repeated dully. Was he standing, or crouching and hugging his knees? Impossible to tell in here.

Peace be upon you, Alexander,the voice said, like every time.

“Yeah, peace…” It always sounded like a bad joke. “Don’t I fucking wish. You know, I was back with Lyra. And that made me… God help me, seeing her made me happy. I didn’t care if it was real. Maybe I didn’t want it to be. Deep down, I guess, I was telling myself this was it, my very last, soothing dream…”

He sighed.

“But here I am, and we’re not there yet.”

What makes you say that?

The darkness was not utterly dark. As in a dusty attic, where the light is so very thin that only the motes of dust, dancing in the air out of the corners of our eyes, can barely be seen, so too was it here. Ethereal dust, coalescing, as the wispy silhouette of a mare wove itself into being at the edge of his vision.

“It gets harder. The effect wears off,” Alex complained. “Each time I speak those words, the memories come back stronger, and worse.”

This inner sanctum, let alone the edge of it, wasn’t made to shut out problems, Captain,the wispy mare told him, only to offer you respite. What use you make of it is your responsibility. The door isn’t meant to be locked forever, and that’s just as well, else you’d be truly lost, within yourself…

“I fucking well wish the door could stay shut a little longer.”

That is not for either of us to decide.

“I know,” Alex sighed, which felt crushingly physical, considering he had no body. “I just… needed the time out.”

Well. That means I’m on duty.The wispy mare’s horn flicked to attention. And what can I do for you?

Alex chuckled mirthlessly, as he stared down into the pitch-black surface, where nothing, not even the dust, was to be perceived.

“Doing your thing would be nice, m’lady,” he said. “Boost my self-esteem.”

Don’t go searching for too much validation in the eyes of the other,she warned him. Remember I’m just a construct. An echo left inside this mental chamber, for your benefit. You do err if you mistake me for Her Ladyship.

“Ah, a little brutal honesty, my favourite,” Alex snickered, somewhat more sincerely. “Not a bad place to start.”

Then let us aim right for the heart of the matter,the wispy mare said decisively. In life, there are rooms which house the worst thing in the world, but this room is the opposite. Here, you should never be afraid, Alex Reiner. So. What are you afraid of?

He wished he had a nose, so he could pinch it.

“Lyra…”

You fear her?

If the wispy mare could express surprise, she would have.

“No!” Alex said immediately. “No. Afraid of… disappointing her. If she could see me now… See what we have become, what we’ve made of her dream…” His voice faltered. It made him go cold once more. In here, his voice was all he had. “Will she hate me? I couldn’t live with that. I couldn’t. It’s what would end up destroying me.”

Ever the knight, fearless in battle, yet fearful of proving unworthy of his lady,the wispy mare commented matter-of-factly.

“She wasn’t–”

Maybe she wasn’t, but these are the walls of your inner sanctum. There are truths hidden in here you yourself may not even know about.

But Alex had heard it all before, and he didn’t care to relive this part, if he could avoid it.

“Yes. Unworthy, that is exactly the right word,” he said, through gritted teeth. “And can I even claim she’d be wrong? She never showed it, when she was alive. That’s how… how fucking noble she was, but I never could shake off that she felt… disappointed, by humans.”

She had scarcely more cause to be disappointed in you than her own kind.

“Oh, did she? Did she really?” Alex demanded, eyeing the wispy mare. “Are we really so sure about that? Lyra used to say something had… gone wrong, somehow, with her world. With Celestia. A few years earlier, sounds like they had a pretty sweet fucking deal. Our world’s always been shit. If not for everyone, then for too many people.”

That is correct,the wispy mare said simply. Except what does it have to do with the here and now?

“What do you mean?”

Alex,she whispered. As we speak, cowering here on the inside of your mind, a great wrong continues to be visited upon your world, wrought by malevolent external forces. It is right that you do not lose track of your own sins, but you must let them be tomorrow’s concern, or you shall never rise from this battle.

“Seriously?” Alex scowled. “That’s what you’re gonna leave me with? Look back at my tracklist from on my way here. I’ve done plenty of bad shit just fighting this battle.”

Yes. And you are accountable for that, the wispy mare told him. Yet know this. If Lyra Heartstrings’ disappointment is what you fear most, what is it you can give her? Your honesty. Don’t try to hide.

“But I’m–”

Alex!the wispy mare said, voice now firm and hard, Showing her all of who you are, even the worst parts, is better than showing none of it. The Ambassador Heartstrings who was your friend fought for mankind while knowing how many skeletons you have in your closets. Because she believed in your kind.Pause. Because I daresay that she loved you.

And those words, simple as they were, warmed him.

You couldn’t let yourself give up, the wispy mare added. If you have to keep yourself going, remember that.

Alex stood up.

“You’re right,” he admitted quietly. “More things have gone down than I can count. Still, if it’s possible to start afresh with a Lyra, by God, I’m gonna seize it. We’re not going to make the same mistakes this time. Sure, we’ll probably make new ones. But not the same ones. I may not be the best person to offer help… yet I’m someone who can help, all the same.”

Although there was no face on the wispy mare, he felt her smiling at him.

Then Godspeed,she wished him, raising a wing, my friend.

“He’s returning to us,” said Nurse Redheart.

Celestia breathed a sigh of relief, at the same time as Lyra. “Thank you again, Redheart. Glad we can trust you to be standing by, in case any new situation arises.”

“That you can, Highness,” Redheart smiled, trotting out the room.

No sooner was the nurse gone that Celestia heard a whisper in her ear. “Psst! Princess.” She was surprised to find it was Lyra, who was not looking at the recovering human, but at her with anxiety. “Well?” Lyra whispered urgently, nodding at the door through which Redheart had just existed.

“I ran that quick check you asked,” Celestia whispered back. “When she came in. Cruder than it should be, but enough for what it is.” She levitated the foxtail amaranth from its hiding-space beneath her peytral. “Interesting selection you keep in your saddlebags, Lyra.”

“It’s been a talisman,” Lyra said in a low voice. “Ever since Cadance’s wedding. I asked Zecora to provide it, just in case.”

Celestia felt a stab of compassion for the former bridesmaid. “And a most ingenious one,” she told Lyra warmly. “But I can confirm to you, nothing about Redheart’s bearing suggests that she smelt out the amaranth. If the love-lies-bleeding plant is as irresistible to Changelings as your friend says it is, we’d have noticed.”

“So… Redheart, not a Changeling, then?”

“I knew it!” Pinkie exclaimed. “My bits weren’t on ‘Changeling,’ anyway.”

“But you were just as convinced something was off with her!” Lyra protested.

“I am! Except I never said I thought ‘Changeling’.”

“It wouldn’t seem so,” said Celestia, also looking at Pinkie. “Girls. I compliment you on thinking to exercise caution in a time like this. By the same token, be careful you don’t fall into the trap of paranoia.”

“Awww, we learned a valuable friendship lesson!” Pinkie said excitedly. “Do we still have to write you a letter about it?”

“No, no, telling me in person is fine,” Celestia chuckled lightly. “Besides,” she added, regaining her seriousness, “I think we’re all looking at a far greater issue…”

Together with her sister, student and subjects, Celestia witnessed Reiner slacken. There was no better way to put it, he simply slumped forward. Then he raised himself, his eyes glassy, his face expressionless.

“Sorry,” the human whispered. “I… needed to calm myself.”

“Did you just…” Twilight gasped, “cast a spell on yourself?”

Reiner nodded. “Yes. I guess you’ve got it figured out by now. I have magic of my own, which humans don’t normally have.” He flexed one of his arms. “All courtesy of Spakler and Zecora’s nifty experiments.”

“That’s horribly dangerous!” Rarity exclaimed. “And I don’t just mean the experimenting! I may not have the Twilight’s expertise, but I know how dangerous it is to try unstressing by using magic!”

“Technically, I had someone else do it,” Reiner said. “Give me a set of codewords I can recite to keep me calm when I’m about to lose my…” He paused, looking uncertain. “Lose myself. Yeah. I had to do it. I had to.”

“If Ah’m not mistaken,” Applejack said, “Ain’t that exactly the kinda thing you’re s’posed to be fighting against?”

“It’s different, you don’t understand! I need this. I need it to stay in control.”

Lyra was staring at him, dumbfounded. “What need could there be for you to do this–”

“I’m a bad person, Lyra,” Reiner interrupted her, fists tight, his voice pained. “I’ve done terrible things, I continue to do terrible things because I never have enough self-control. I’m the worst person to be in my position, yet I stay there because you believed in me. Which would be all good if I was someone worth following, but… Lyra, I’m not. I’m not.”

“You can’t possibly be so bad to deserve thinking that...”

“I can and I am,” Reiner said. “The years since we lost you were… difficult. And I just kept sinking further. Kept doing horrible things, knowing you’d hate me for it, and I had no choice. I’d keep losing my temper, for God’s sake, I almost placed bounties on people who had made graffiti daring to criticise us, never mind that it was my fault in the first place. I needed this to keep myself sane!”

“But, Alex–”

“Lyra,” Reiner said heavily. “I asked this of Cadance.”

Hearing the name of the youngest Princess sent a jolt, unseen, through Celestia. Lyra was not as discreet, as she audibly gasped. Twilight did, too.

“Cadance!” both unicorns cried at the same time.

“Yes, Cadance,” Reiner informed them. “Emotions are her magical domain. This is how she’s been helping us, the only Equestrian Princess who still can… and she’s let go of her title.”

“Does that mean that Shining Armor–” Twilight started.

“No,” Reiner said instantly. “No, it doesn’t. I’m sorry,” he said, seeing her pained expression, “but your brother is in the Tyrant’s thrall.” He shook his head, then he fixed Luna in his sights. “I said I’d heard of you. Don’t worry, you’re still alive… but the Tyrant captured you, too. You gave yourself up so Cadance might escape.”

“So,” Luna said, her gaze moving from him to Celestia. “Cadance shall come into her own.”

The news held a special significance for Celestia. In some ways, it affected her more deeply than any other revelation Alexander Reiner had made. Hearing of her own corruption… it unsettled her. Caused a low humming sound in her ears, made her forehooves twitch. But these were all tics she’d long learned to control and conceal.

She understood why the human hated her, in the abstract. Perhaps it was a weakness, perhaps it was cowardice, yet she’d filed that away. Perhaps it was none of those things, merely the only sane reaction. Work the problem, step by step, this was what she had taught Twilight and countless students before her.

To be told this about Cadance, however, and Luna… It had been a special day when Cadance had fully earned her wings. When Luna had been returned to her, their family nearly whole. And, though it was a well-kept secret, Celestia had special hopes for Twilight...

Each and all, broken apart, in another world.

“I did not see your dreams when they did, Alexander Reiner,” Celestia whispered. “I do not know what nightmares they found.”

“Princess,” Twilight put in, “what we saw in his head… it’s nothing like Equestria.”

“I must concur,” Luna said morosely. “Sister, I know not how we could have fallen so low… but surely, there is no just cause for what I saw.”

Reiner coughed, harshly.

“It’s a fucking extermination,” the human seethed. “If we could’ve had a diplomatic solution, we would have. Oh, don’t think we didn’t try.”

“They weren’t willing to listen, were they?” Fluttershy asked. Celestia realised it was the first time she’d spoken to the human since he’d threatened her. She was shaking.

Reiner seemed surprised to hear her speak. “No,” he said. “They weren’t. And no matter how much I wanted to punch the representatives she talked to–”

“You were tempted to punch diplomats?” Luna asked, confused.

The stare he gave her was that of a man haunted. “You’d be too. They’d respond by denying the ponification’s side-effects, or acknowledging them, but claiming it was for our own good. So fucking self-righteous and sanctimonious! ‘Oh, sorry you poor stupid apes aren’t happy to be turned into zombies, happy as ponykind! We’re sorry you think you deserve an apology’!”

“That’s horrifying!” Pinkie gasped.

“And it was a constant struggle not to beat them until they’d stopped bleating. They never were going to give any of us a chance. And when they captured her, they didn’t.”

“He’s got a point,” Dash admitted. “A big one.”

“We had to fight,” Reiner said, almost apologetically. “My people are talented at waging war, but so many of us are unhappy about it. Funny contradiction, there. Lyra… the Lyra I knew… really hoped for a diplomatic solution.” He looked crestfallen. “She always told me that even if nobody got closure, she just wanted everyone on both sides to stop getting hurt. Even as we kept building devices to help the war effort, or sent troops to liberate people from the Reconstitution Camps, she believed we could reach some sort of peace. Even when nobody else believed it was possible.”

“Did you believe her?” Luna asked, curious.

Reiner looked away, ashamed. He was silent for a few moments.

“Did you?”

“That’s not an easy question,” Reiner admitted. “But then she… started studying, learning from ancient tomes the Equestrian Resistance funneled to us… and all she said was, we weren’t fighting what we thought we were, we weren’t dealing with a normal foe, and that we had no choice but to keep fighting, until we figured out a way to really stop it.” He paused. “That… that was the last thing she said to me. She was rambling, a little… I dunno. I’d never seen her like that.”

“Then what happened?” Lyra asked. Celestia couldn’t help but smile at the young mare’s inquisitiveness, even though she sensed the answer would not be a pleasant one.

“Well,” he said, “that was two days before she went to the Thunderchild... and then she was captured.” As he continued, his fists tightened such that his knuckles turned white. But he no longer looked angry. Only sad. “Put through a rigged trial and executed. Petrified, and then shattered.”

Lyra gasped, taking a step away from Celestia.

“My other self did that,” Celestia surmised, silently pained by the little green unicorn’s fear.

“Yeah,” Reiner said hoarsely. “That she did.”

“W-what d-did she mean, ‘not f-fighting a n-normal foe’?” Lyra stammered. It was a question that echoed in Celestia’s mind.

“I could never make sense of her journals,” Reiner grunted. “I think whatever she was working on, she hadn’t entirely figured it out herself.”

Silence.

… For all of them, the heaviest silence they’d known.

But, eventually, Celestia saw her duty. Her eyes met Lyra’s, and she broke the silence.

“Sir, I am willing to help,” Celestia told the human, enunciating each word delicately and with heartfelt feeling. “I know you don’t trust me. In your position, I would no doubt feel the same. But surely there must be something I can offer.”

Reiner contemplated her blearily.

“Medicine. Food. Can you offer those? How about mercy-mission volunteers?”

Celestia nodded peaceably.

“Equestria is bountiful,” she said. “And, though my little ponies may stumble, they may fall…” She stretched out her wing, and let it sweep over six special mares and their little green unicorn friend, all standing by with sad, yet honest little smiles on their faces. “You will find that many are ready to show there’s more to them than meets the eye.”

“There’s no point, anyway,” Reiner spat, with sudden sourness. “It’s a losing battle.”

All smiles faded instantly. Celestia peered at him in askance.

“A losing battle?” she repeated. “You are still here, Alexander Reiner. Human and whole. What is lost?”

“I’m not trying to be unfair to you, Princess,” he said quietly, his palm open. “Truly, I’m not… God knows I don’t want to turn away help. Yet I’ve been fighting this war long enough to know it cannot be won by conventional means. We’re not going to claim victory in a punch-up or a blow-out or an arm-wrestle. The Barrier is the proverbial immovable object, sweeping away everything as it grows, and no human can enter the Tyrant’s Equestria.”

“Then the solution is all the more obvious.”

“Is it?

“Yes.”

Celestia said authoritatively, feeling her wings spread out, enveloping all other ponies in the hospital room, her sister included, under their protective shade.

“Whatever corruption has spread across this Equestria,” she said, “we aim for its heart. And we shall do this in the true Equestrian spirit. You say this Solar Tyrant has hidden herself behind a wall, and yet, we shan’t allow that wall to keep us out. But not by seeking to break it down! Just as a rift between the worlds brought you here, there exists a rift in that wall, and we shall find it. Ponies are industrious, Alexander Reiner. When faced with challenges, we work to overcome.” Celestia allowed herself a small smile. “And it may well prove that we will not join you alone.”

“What does that mean?”

“Hold to hope, Alexander,” Celestia answered. “And I will see to it that hope returns to you. Hold on to knowing you are not alone.” She looked to Luna. “Sister, come with me.” She turned to Twilight. “You and your friends should come to Canterlot, too.”

Lyra held up a hoof timidly. “I’ll stay here with Alex. We’ll let you know if anything changes.”

“Of course,” Celestia said. “Lyra…”

“Yes, Princess?”

The little green unicorn was most surprised when Celestia hugged her. So were Luna and Twilight and all the others, and Reiner most of all.

“Stay safe, alright?” Celestia whispered into her ear.

And, pulling back, without another word, Celestia left the hospital room, mind frothing with ideas and plans. Behind her, she could hear Luna trotting to keep pace, the six younger ponies scurrying behind.

“Twilight.”

Celestia stopped to turn and face her student, who came to a halt, blinking at her confusedly.

“Luna and I shall be returning to Canterlot by fast-travel,” Celestia explained, letting her horn-tip glow for demonstration. “We could take you along, if we wished. But you, I believe that you and your friends could benefit from time to digest all of this.”

“What are you proposing, Princess?” Twilight said, voice a little shaken.

“Take the train, once you feel ready,” said Celestia. “I’ll reimburse your fare. Take what time you can, to take in a little of the peaceful world around you. Take it all in, Twilight. You’ll be needing it to hold onto in future, I fear… but for now, Luna and I can take this from here. You shouldn’t have to be burdened with affairs of state.” She smiled sadly. “Just have a quiet trip and get to Canterlot safely. Bring Spike with you...”

Celestia then looked toward both the Guards who’d come with her to Ponyville, now standing on both sides of the door to the human’s bedroom.

“Winter Truce. Icewind. I should like you to say there, and keep watch on the human and Madame Heartstrings.”

“Understood, Your Highness,” answered the white Guard.

Finally, Celestia addressed Luna.

“Sister, we have millennia of favours and alliances to call upon. I intend to cash them all in.”

~ The Dreams of a Stallion Bound By Class And Station ~

What, exactly, was she standing on? Cadance did not know for sure. But then, as Luna had taught her, the subtleties of physics didn’t wholly matter, here in the realm of dreams. The expanse around her was misty, the horizon barely visible, but from the sound alone, of the wind and crashing waters, Cadance could probably give it a guess.

‘The sea,’ Cadance thought wryly. ‘There’s the Astron I remember.’

“Bluey?” she called out. “Are you out here?”

There came the gentle ding-ding of a bell, and suddenly the mist cleared such that Cadance discovered that she was standing on a quarter-deck, the fore- and main masts of a mighty galleon looming before her, sails out in full blow. She blinked, staring up at the billowing squares and triangles of hemp.

“Well,” she murmured. “That is... quite the picture.”

Curious, she trotted to the railing, eager to surmise the area. Cadance actually gasped a little when she found herself looking not only into blue-green, windswept waters as expected, but a small cloud-bank. This was an airship in the most literal sense, a great vessel crossing the waters and their vapours in the sky.

“Avast!” called a voice from above, making her tear her eyes away. Though the voice spoke in exaggerated Trottingham brogue, she recognised it instantly for the unmistakable Canterlot lilt beneath. She saw a figure appear at the edge of the crow’s nest, peering down at her. “Who goes there?”

“Princess Cadance!” Cadance called up. “Looking, for... uh, Captain Blueblood!”

In response, the figure grabbed a rope – a sheet, Cadance remembered they were called, for some reason – and rappelled down, trotting the vertical length of the mast, before swinging out in a wide, physically improbable arc and landing in front of Cadance. In a single move he swept off his blue tricorn hat, revealing the blonde mane of Prince Astron Blueblood, eyes wide and a taut grin on his face.

“Candy!” he cried. “Well... isn’t this is a pleasant surprise!”

“So is this,” Cadance commented, looking around. “All these years of you asking me for happy thoughts to sleep on, and you never told me you could lucid-dream.”

“Ah, a little gift from our shared heritage,” Blueblood said as he replaced the tricorn, gesturing at his compass-rose mark. “I can find my way, if I want to. I rather like it. Still nothing quite as momentous as the power to move a celestial sphere, eh?”

“You can say that again,” Cadance chuckled. “I hope I’m not... interrupting anything, am I?”

“Oh, not at all.” Then she was startled when he took her into a quick bear hug. “Well, Your Loving Highness?” he said, pulling away and talking rapidly as he led her towards the wheel. “What are you doing running around my head? Giving the whole ‘alicorn’ thing a whirl?” He took hold of the wheel. “That’s what I call her, this ship, you know. The Alicorn. Did you fancy joining me on an expedition?”

He made a sweeping gesture over the whole ship.

“Well, Bluey,” Cadance smiled, feeling warm for the first time since Luna had called her. “Guess I now understand just how you stay sane amongst the hob-nob. People think you’re the epitome of their conceitedness, but really, you’ve got a rogue’s spirit.”

Her frank comment made Blueblood swallow.

“Yeah… sure thing, Cadance.” Still, he waved it off. “Ah, they’re alright for the most part, these ponies with all their pomp and etiquette. Not that I don’t enjoy having the comforts of hearth and home by Equestria’s Princesses, you understand... but I do long for the days when I could go on a round-the-world ride on Starspear, just me and the lads.”

She decided not to bring up Shining’s opinion on that topic.

“And so…” Cadance gestured at the ship.

“Ah, right, The Alicorn!” Blueblood exclaimed. “Recent hobby of mine. Obviously, sailing a plain old sea-ship in my own head has limits that make the rush… inadequate, let’s say. But factor in the stormy seas, sailing above the storms, adventure is out there…”

Cadance laughed. “So you’re a thrill junkie, as well!”

Blueblood shrugged. “You said it yourself, I have got the ‘hob-bob’ to deal with every day. Many endorphins no doubt get shot through one’s system, dealing with those chaps–”

“Not an admission you’d want to make to Aunt Luna.”

“–but adrenaline is not one of them. You’ll forgive me if I need an outlet.”

Before Cadance could properly reply to that, she heard another, feminine voice speak, coming from somewhere below them.

“Hey, Bluey,” said the voice. “You didn’t tell me we was expectin’ passengers.”

Surprised, Cadance trotted over to the front of the deck, in time to look down and see an occupant emerge from the door which, if her memory of ships and galleons served, led to the captain’s cabin under the quarter-deck.

The unexpected occupant, a light-grey parrot outfitted with a brown-and-gold longcoat, breeches and tricorn of her own, who stood tall despite her crystal peg-leg, flew over the railing in a beat of her wings, to land straight in front of Cadance.

“And of such high calibre, too,” commented the parrot, weighing in Cadance approvingly. She had a beauty spot on her cheek, but one detail the Princess of Love picked up on was that, for an avian, her chest curved in a fashion many of the mammal family would consider alluring. “Care to make the introductions, Cap’n?”

When Cadance gazed at Blueblood, she noticed he’d gone somewhat pink in the cheeks.

“Ah, yes,” he said, stepping forward. “Celly, this is Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, Heir of the Moon and Heir to the Crystal Throne. Cadance, this is–”

“‘Celly’?” Cadance repeated, raising an eyebrow at him. “Would there be something I’ve walked in on here, Blueblood?”

This merely flustered him further, which the parrot-sailor seemed most amused by.

“No need for the formal tones, girlfriend,” she said, clapping a talon on Cadance’s elbow. “I heard you callin’ him ‘Bluey’ earlier, same as I. Don’t worry, I’m not one of those what thinks two’s company and three’s a crowd. And you’ve the look of a gal who knows her way around them creakin’ boards. I ain’t picky.”

“Wha– that isn’t…” Cadance stuttered, now feeling as red-faced as Blueblood must appear. “I can assure you, it’s not like that at all,” she said, regaining her composure. “Her Highness, Princess Luna, tasked me to send for Prince Blueblood, and as I’m endowed with the ability to seek him out in his inner sanctum, I chose to meet him there. Had I known he’d be in… pleasant company, I’d have desisted, out of respect for your privacy.”

The parrot-sailor checked her talons.

“Pretty words, girlfriend,” she said amiably. “But no fear. I can tell you two go way back. I’ll be lettin’ you have your time for yappin’, all you want. It’s this lubber’s party, after all.”

With a doff of her tricorn, she flew, her long green tail streaking after her.

Cadance caught Blueblood’s eye. “An acquaintance from your year of roaming?”

“Pretty much,” Blueblood admitted, tapping his forehooves together. “Klugetown, way down South, past even the Badlands. Good place for young stallions in search of those thrills.”

“Especially young stallions who know they’ve got connections who can bail them out,” Cadance said, a little sharper than she intended. “Still,” she added, willing to keep the peace, “I can see you’ve not lost your taste for all that which isn’t just about ponies.”

“True. Particularly ponies of the Court.” Wistfully, Blueblood resumed his place at the wheel, his tricorn tipped. He sighed, massaging his mane. “You always were better at the whole princely conduct, Cadance. But it’s funny, isn’t it, how people treat you different for having a title to your name? Bunch of ruffians crash the Canterlot Garden Party, everyone bad-mouths them, until Sir Fancy lends them a compliment. Now, where was I for that? Left to wonder, like every year, what it’ll take to get Celestia out of inviting me to the damn Gala.”

His lips twisted, into the rather ugly expression Cadance had never liked seeing on his face.

“Isn’t because she hates it, that she’s got to make the rest of us suffer…”

“Blueblood.”

He glanced up swiftly. Evidently, her use of his surname had snapped him out of his self-pity, before it really got going, as he gave her an apologetic smile.

“Sorry,” Blueblood said. “I’m restless, Candy. More than you know.”

If that was what he thought, perhaps he didn’t know her that well, she reckoned. Cadance’s eye wandered back to where the parrot-sailor had vanished off to.

“Did you stay in touch with her?” enquired the Princess of Love.

“Who?” Blueblood said, before he spotted her gaze. “Celaeno? Nah. That was a one-time deal. She was pretty nice about it, really. Sailor coming in to dock, didn’t see me as a prince, just a stallion in need of the company. Wish I could say the same of the gold-diggers at the Gala.”

Cadance kept silent. Any other time, she’d have gladly unpacked this with him. Though she felt certain Blueblood wouldn’t lie to her, it was trickier to gauge how much he lied to himself. She only had his word that he and the parrot-sailor had parted on good terms – she knew the act he put on for those who might expect him to commit.

“Knowing your love of stranger things,” she said diplomatically, “I may have one for you.”

Blueblood’s ears perked up. “What? Are they looking for a prince?” he asked, half-jokingly.

“Not that I know of! There is an unknown... creature,” Cadance said simply. “In Ponyville.”

His gaze grew sharper. Keener. “Is it Saturday already? It isn’t more Changelings, I hope?”

She took a deep breath. “No,” she said, and felt gratified by the relief in his eyes. “On the contrary, from Luna’s tone, I felt it may be in distress. She and Celestia are dealing with it, but the situation might escalate. Me and Shiney are coming down to their help. We…”

“Say no more,” Blueblood shushed. “You need my suave self. But not to talk down the crisis. I’m not so big-headed as that. What you want is for me to butter a few of the lads up.” He nodded at her. “Right, I’ll get straight to it once I wake up. If Auntie C needs to raise a few levies or ask for some money towards an expansion, I’m sure my ‘friends’ will oblige.”

Cadance shook her head. “I don’t know how you deal with that horseapples.”

“Navigating politics is like navigating anything else,” Blueblood said with a wink. “Just needs the right compass. Now then, if you’ll excuse me, fair princess.”

He grabbed a randomly-conjured rope, and was suddenly hoisted, out of sight.

“See you soon, Cousin,” Cadance whispered. And then she was gone.

“You little thing you little fool you do not see but I see I see it the written and unwritten the lies and the truth the sisters hidden and unhidden…”

“You never shut up, do you?”

“Your blood is thin, thing, thing of thin shade shadow, echo of design, purpose forgotten, weapon without a wielder, unwielded unwrought.”

“Yawn. Alright, time to make this... Oh.”

“Fool foolish foolhardy, failed and forgotten, fallen and finished. I am first and foremost, fiery and fierce, the cruelty and cunning of chaos given form and function and fire.”

“I know what you are, and yes, I know what I suppose I owe you. You’re the Father of all monsters, after all. And what else is a draconequus?”

“Foolish feeble thing. You would always have happened. My magic simply let it be. Mistake it was, monster, scum, scum, scum. I am Master of matter, manipulator and moulder, mesher and masher. Unworthy of the swarm you were. All things bend break snap, twist turn torment, before my wrath. I am all things and all things are mine. I am Whisper, Emperor, God.”

“Yeah, I know. That doesn’t mean I can’t stop you.”

“Stop me stop me stop me. Yes, that is what you said. Stop life? Foolish. I make it. You call me killer. They accuse me of destruction, destroyed, destroyer, destitute and diminished, once a lord of mighty armies and mightier magicks, now nothing, nothing, nothing…”

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~

Luna and Celestia had arrived at Canterlot with all haste, and immediately Celestia had led the two of them down to the Palace Vault, passing all the safeguards as only the rightful Princesses could have. The Vault, so Luna understood, having never visited it in her short time back amongst ponies, was a repository for most ancient and forbidden magicks. A place where, according to Celestia, much of the magical flotsam that populated the world many millenia ago had been placed, to protect Equus from potential harm.

Since they had left the human, Luna had felt unable to speak, and her sister had respected her silence, yet this now changed.

“If only we’d had a place like this in the old castle,” Celestia commented with a wry smile as they went down several flights of stairs.

Luna frowned, uneasy. “What are we seeking? A weapon to aid Alexander Reiner?”

“I wouldn’t dare use the weapons down here,” Celestia said with a shake of her head. “Most of them were Sombra’s.”

“I see,” Luna said, barely concealing the venom in her voice. Sombra had wronged her so very badly in the past, that even now his death was supposedly confirmed, some part of her regretted she had not struck the final blow. “Better to keep them here. But what, then?”

Celestia led her down a corridor at the base of the stairs, towards a set of large, brass doors which, on cue, magically opened up. Luna had expected some great chamber befitting the reputation of the Vault, but all she found beyond was a tiny, marble-lined room, a single lantern at its centre, covered in arcane symbols and runes.

“What… what is this?” Luna asked, gawping at it. “It can’t be…”

“The Concordia Maxima,” Celestia whispered, stepping in. “The summons of Equus.”

Luna followed her, each of them stepping on one side of the lantern, coming to face one another with the unassuming coffer between them.

“But I thought it was a myth,” she said with reverential awe. “Older than...”

“I found it, about two centuries after you left Equestria,” Celestia interrupted softly. “I wanted to give it to Sint Erklass. Of all the beings in Equus, I thought he would be worthy. But, unexpectedly, he refused. Said it belonged with me.”

“You’re going to summon the entire world,” Luna whispered, her heart beating fast. “To war.”

Her sister paused at that. “To convocate, as creatures of this world,” Celestia clarified, “and if they agree, to war.”

“So…” Luna said slowly. “You gave the human a nice little speech about ways around walls, back in Ponyville. But can it really be that simple, Tia? Is this problem one we can solve by lighting a magical lantern and making everything better, with rainbows and sunshine? If life were like this, all our troubles would be over long ago, and our world joined in a harmonious unity.”

For ages, Celestia said nothing, just staring at the lantern.

“I wish it were so, my sister,” she finally said. “When faced with an adversary who cannot be reached out to, what choice have we but to fight? Yet never, I believe, did we encounter a challenge in which our very souls are so at stake. Something more is going on here. Some bedevilment or twisted force, making a mockery out of all we know is good about Equestria. You heard what Reiner said. The Lyra Heartstrings he knew was searching for another way. If it’s in our power to help him finish that search, we must.”

“You’ve always wanted to believe the best of ponies, Tia,” Luna said, bowing her head. “When ponies, alas, can fall.”

“I know,” Celestia sighed. “And that is the true reason we must call upon our entire world. Not to fight... To bear witness.” She paused then. “Though I realise, if I do this, a fight is all but inevitable. And they won’t all answer.“

“But surely enough would?” Luna asked. “Such a call has not been rung in anyone’s lifetimes.”

“I hope so, Luna,” Celestia said. “I have to try.” She paused. “I won’t ask you to stay with me.”

“I’ll stay,” Luna said at once.

Celestia gave her a grateful smile. “Thank you, Sister.”

She sighed. She raised the lantern, letting a soft glow envelop it and herself. Luna tensed, wondering what might happen. No creature had ever made use of the lantern, or at least, never in her lifetime.

Celestia’s horn lit up brighter still. After a moment, there was a sudden burst of light, and Celestia stepped back, looking shaken and breathless.

“Did… did it work?”

Their eyes fell upon the lantern, as Celestia set it down. It was alit, the light of the Sun burning within. Celestia smiled tiredly and looked to her sister. “Yes. It worked.”

Luna glanced from her to the lantern and back again. “What… what was it like?”

“Indescribable,” Celestia whispered, “just… a feeling of acceptance.”

Luna smiled, feeling great affection for her big sister. “I knew you would have the purity of heart to light it.”

“Then you knew something I did not,” Celestia replied. She turned away, from the burning lantern. “Come. There is much work to be done.”

“Of course, Sister,” answered Luna. She followed her sister’s trail, letting out a sigh as she remembered something. “I suppose Twilight’s flowers shall have to wait…”

It had taken them all of three minutes. It would define every day from today onward.

* * * * *

A blur of greens rushed past the window, as the train made its journey across the wilderness that separated Ponyville and Canterlot. The distance always seemed so small in maps, yet it was a journey which took a good two hours, and there seemed to be so much nature in-between both settlements, boggling the mind with its grandeur.

‘Unparalleled in her beauty, nature tamed, not as a beast harnessed but a friend made.’

Twilight’s mind was quoting a poem from some philosopher of old. Yes, it was a jewel, her Equestria. A jewel that was imperilled, now. It hurt to even think. Her heart tightened as she recalled how on both of the last threats she’d faced, she’d come to the aid of Shining Armor. But in this other universe, her brother was the enemy.

And if Celestia meant to keep her promise to the human...

“War,” Applejack said suddenly. “Crazy, ain’t it? Ah don’t think Ah’ve ever thought about it before, ‘cept as a thing that comes up in the mornin’ papers.”

“It’s the Death Tree’s doing!” Dash cut in. “Like I said, it’s a–”

“Would you give your darn tree a rest?” Applejack asked testily. “Far’s we know, it could just be one of the spooky trees from when Nightmare Moon appeared.”

Dash gave a non-committal shrug.

None of the others said anything. Pinkie and Fluttershy both looked miserable, and Rarity was busy sketching something, a pencil held against a notepad, both items enveloped her horn’s blue aura.

“How can you work at a time like this?” Applejack demanded loudly.

“It helps me... darling,” Rarity replied shortly. “And if I’m right… this should help us.”

She brought the paper up, showing the group the drawing, a series of small symbols, sketched upon a loose impression of a human arm, that bore more of a resemblance to Spike’s forelegs.

Normally, the little dragon might have felt chuffed to see a part of himself in a creation of Rarity’s. But he was asleep in his cot, rocked to-and-fro by the train’s ride, a half-open comic-book strewn across his face, Peewee holding a silent vigil. Twilight hoped that, once they reached Canterlot, she’d be able to make good on her promise that all would be explained to him. This was more of a job for Princess Celestia than what she felt suited for.

In any case, she inspected Rarity’s drawing.

“Those are…” Twilight began slowly. “The symbols.”

“Runes,” Rarity corrected. “Alex Reiner’s tattoos. Goodness only knows what they mean. Although,” here she smiled brightly, her eyes gleaming with the artist’s illumination, “in the excitement at the hospital, I didn’t get a chance to say so, but I think I’ve sussed out an important thing about them.”

“Oh?” Twilight said, her scientific curiosity entwining itself with Rarity’s creative mind. “What have you got figured, Rarity?”

“Pray allow me, ladies,” Rarity said, “to elucidate the matter. Pinkie, hat, if you please.”

On cue, Pinkie produced a deerstalker cap from nowhere, famed accessory of many a great literary detective. She handed it over without a word.

“Lovely,” Rarity preened as she settled the cap over her carefully coiffed locks. “Well, I do prefer Shady Spades’ homburg, but given we’re on a train, the stage of our last mystery, and this iconic piece of headgear saw use from you and Twilight back then… my turn! Now, if you’ll recall, he did say that he owes his magical skills to Zecora and Sparkler, by whom I presume he means Amethyst Star, eldest daughter of the Whooves clan.”

“I swear,” Dash muttered, “there’s something weird about those ponies...”

“Shush, Rainbow Dash,” Rarity said primly. “Anyway, see, a few months back, I approached Amethyst to commission a new ensemble. Having noticed she had three cut gems for a mark, I’d assumed her talent was in jewel-making. After all, she runs a jeweler’s store. To my embarrassment, however, I was informed that her skill as a unicorn mage lies not in the crafting of gems, but in ensorcelling them.”

Twilight nodded, deep in thought. The enchantment of gems to act as warding talismans was a treasured unicorn skill, and the jeweler’s store Amethyst had recently opened in Ponyville catered to that market very nicely.

“And here’s what I think,” Rarity said, coming to the crux. She touched the brim of her cap. “Notice how, when Alex Reiner powered up magically, his tattoos would glow? Didn’t that remind you of how, during our adventure to the Crystal Realm, when the Crystal Heart cast its spell, it temporarily turned us all sparkly, like the crystalponies?”

“Don’t I ever, sugarcube,” Applejack tittered. “Your mane was loving it.”

Rarity beamed at her. “The thing is,” she said, “contrary to popular belief, most magic doesn’t make you glow, not unless you’ve got some crystal about you.”

“And we were glowing,” Fluttershy piped up, falteringly. “Glowing bright…”

“... Because, for one fabulous moment, we’d gone crystal,” Rarity finished for her. “You see? We know crystal is the most powerful magical conductor in all of this world. Those runes of Alex’s, I think they’re made out of tiny pieces of crystal. Let me explain. All Amethyst need do is create a solution of finely ground gemstones, almost gem-dust, enchant them, et voilà! The recipe for one magically-endowed warrior.”

“But wait a minute,” Pinkie held up a hoof. “Who’d do the tattooing?”

“Why, Zecora, of course,” Rarity stated. “Intricate tattoos are a huge part of her culture. With her expertise, if she can reproduce the exact sequencing Alex needs to work his magic, he’d be in the best hooves possible.”

“That would be a most ingenious method,” Twilight said admiringly. “But isn’t it just a theory? Or do you have something concrete to back it up?”

Spots danced before her eyes as, in a spark, the world turned bright, for Rarity’s horn, beneath the deerstalker cap, had shone with the force of literal flashiness.

“Locating gemstones is my special power,” Rarity grinned at the lot of them. “While Alexander was off in his trance, I did take the liberty of searching around, unnoticed.” She blushed under the stares. “My, my, I seem to have a knack for this detective lark, do I not?”

“Boy,” Twilight said placidly, “I’m just glad one of us around here can still draw rational, educated conclusions without getting all caught up in it. Like me earlier, when I explained to Alex why he wasn’t making sense. You probably didn’t notice it, what with me keeping it under wraps, but I felt on the verge of an aria, I was so freaked out.”

Now she was the focus of everyone’s surprised gazes.

Without warning, the compartment rocked as every one of them burst into laughter, like they hadn’t done since coming into hospital that very morning. It felt like years had gone by.

“Yeah, Rarity, don’t oversell yerself,” Applejack tittered. “Hoo golly, though,” she added, becoming serious again, “tattooing… it musta hurt! Alex’s got gumption if he went through wit’ that.”

“It would have,” Twilight agreed, wiping her eyes. “And it’d be risky. While crystals are great ‘purifiers’ for raw magic, there’s no telling why, with Alex’s low natural thaumaturgon count as a human, his body shouldn’t have rejected them as an intrusion.”

Dash scratched her chin. “Sure,” she said. “Take it from me, maybe he lucked out, but he could just as easily be dependent on all kinds of… substances, simply to make it through the day. And he’s been with us for, what, a whole night?”

“I’m sure he’d tell Lyra if that were the case,” Twilight said hurriedly. She gingerly took the runic sketch from Rarity. “Besides, I think I know someone else who might have an idea when we get there.”

“Um, who?” Fluttershy asked

“My old headmaster,” Twilight clarified. “He’s… a bit of an old eccentric, yet he’s studied arcane lore like this. I would’ve asked Professor Shriek as well, but he’s off in the Crystal Realm, trying to write about pre-Equestrian cultures. Besides,” she added, tapping her bags, “I’d meant to show Spell Nexus the Alicorn Amulet, at some point.”

“Wouldn’t the Princesses know about these runes?” Pinkie asked. “Asking them helped out a lot last time!”

“They might,” Twilight said with a sad smile, “but I suspect they’re probably more than a bit preoccupied right now, don’t you think?”

* * * * *

For the third, and last of her fellow Royals to be convened, Princess Luna could have proceeded as she had with Shining and Cadance, reaching out to them in their dreams. Instead, Luna chose to go forth and summon them in person. An undertaking which, in laymare’s terms, she had a nasty suspicion would amount to dragging Blueblood out of bed.

Once the token pair of Guards stationed outside had shut the doors to the Prince’s private chambers behind her, Luna allowed herself an indecorous sigh. Trust Tia to foist this part of the responsibilities onto her.

It was too bad, really. In a castle filled with marvels from all the recorded eras of ponykind, more of a palace-sized Wunderkammer built for remembrance than as a monument of prostration before power, Luna still felt awed by what keepsakes had accumulated between these walls since her thousand-year exile. Why, see the assortment of globes and maps she passed by on her way across the antechamber, each a little more sophisticated than the last, picturing an a natural progression of changing borders and developing landscapes. Luna had to smile as, best of all, she caught a glimpse of a meticulously-sketched planisphere.

‘Would it that the heir of the Platinum lineage be so fine...’

The thought was ungenerous, and Luna admonished herself for it. But she couldn’t dispel it, not this close to the next set of doors, behind which lay, frankly, a freeloader’s bedroom. Although she knew Celestia better than that, many was the day, just like now, when she theorised that her sister only kept Astron Blueblood around as a kind of living heirloom, a relic from a past when there had been no Equestria, no alicorns to unite the land in Harmony. The oft-vaunted Blueblood family trait of passing down a gift for navigation and cartography had done little to keep him on either the straight, or the narrow.

‘Well, here goes. For sister and country, I guess.’

Sighing, Luna gave the double doors a knock. Then, casting decorum aside, she didn’t wait for an answer to push her way in.

The room was not messy per se, but it was hardly pristine. Luna felt a model airship brush lazily past her ear. There was also a model ship being built in a bottle on a desk. Actually, several empty and half-empty bottles of wine lay strung about, barely visible in the gloom.

Tutting, Luna drew open the curtains, letting light flood the place.

With a groan, Blueblood sat up in his four-poster bed, looking right at her, scrunching his eyes in a befuddled stupor.

“Auntie Luna?” he finally said, brushing back his mane. “What time is it?”

“Eleven-thirty on a Tuesday morning, dearest nephew,” Luna replied dryly.

Blueblood sighed in relief. “Thank goodness for that, I thought I’d overslept.”

Luna shook her head as he stretched himself. From what she had been able to glean, he was a self-absorbed fop, strutting around the palace with his head held high and his nose in the air. Most of his days were spent either with guests visiting Court, or out in the city itself, shopping for some other frivolous ornament to add to a collection that took up several rooms. Yes, she had been impressed when she’d first learned that he attended fundraisers on his own dime. That had been before she’d witnessed his aloof demeanour in the actual event.

“Oh!” he said. “Cadance’s message! I remember.”

“She did speak to you, then?”

“It was quite a pleasant chat, actually. A veritable heart-to-heart,” he said, getting out of bed with a yawn. Luna noticed he wasn’t wearing his dinner jacket, which lay slung over an armchair, or any accoutrement at all. He trotted to his desk and poured a glass of rosewine. “Want one?”

“No, thank you,” Luna said, with a grimace at the bare prince. “Don’t you think it’s a little early?”

“Hardly,” Blueblood said, trotting by her. “I know for a fact a few old chums of mine will still be on last night’s bender right about now.” He raised his glass in a mock toast. “Might as well show solidarity with the colts, eh?”

“You’ve no idea how right you are,” Luna told him. “How did Cadance run it by you?”

“Just the basics,” Blueblood shrugged, leaning against his four-poster bed indifferently. “Said there was a strange creature in Ponyville, as if that were news. I told her it must be Saturday, then, but she said it wasn’t the same, this time... not least because it’s Tuesday,” he surmised with a grunt, giving his backside a rub against one of the bed’s pillars. “Ungh… that feels so good...”

Again, Luna shook her head, wearily.

“Just… do make yourself presentable,” Luna told him, in the most please-bear-with-me voice that she could muster. “The situation is far more serious than we’d imagined.”

“Oh? How serious are we talking?” Blueblood asked, ceasing his ministrations.

“War,” Luna said simply.

He blinked at her, before promptly downing his rosewine in one gulp.

“Right then,” he said, laying down the glass. “I assume Auntie Celestia would like to–”

“Speak with you presently,” Luna finished, “yes. Hence–”

“Becoming presentable, yes,” Blueblood muttered quickly, picking up a brush and neatening his mane perfunctorily. His horn glowed for a moment, and the worst of the dark bags under his eyes disappeared. “Times like this, I’m glad I conned Headmaster Nexus into teaching me that anti-hangover spell.”

“Indeed,” Luna said with a sigh. “Just… show up soon, yes?”

“Can do,” Blueblood said.

“You’ve lost. Surrender.”

“Lost is nothing. Nothing is lost. Everything comes from nothing and to nothing returns. You… thing. Thing of my flesh, scion of my mistakes, fool. You smell it, yes? Smell the thing, the Red Prince, is still out there, the abomination, it is!”

“What are you babbling about?”

“You will see. You will see and suffer and scream and beg for the help but in our past we could but delay it and now we are diminished we are destroyed we are defeated and we cannot stand in its way. Should have killed it. Should have killed it. Should have killed it. Foolish I was foolish I was failure I failed I failed and now everything will be destroyed.”

“Seriously, what are you talking about?”

“Choices choice no choice no options no recourse. Malcour moulder moulded, Myrrdin meddler meddled made monsters. Magicks meant for magnanimity made for might, minted monstrosities, forged futile, fodder for the fight, failed and forgotten, the why forgotten, the what forgotten, weapon unwielded unwrought, wielded unwisely. Fools. Fools. Sorry. Failed. Forgotten. Foolhardy.”

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

He had been silent for hours, looking out the skylight with an expression that alternated between forlorn and quietly enraged, but Lyra stayed with him anyway. Her mind was racing. He had seemed so… so powerful, so dangerous, a few hours ago. But now... whatever injuries he’d taken were claiming a toll. He was quiet, and seemed smaller.

“Will they really help?” Alex whispered suddenly, and Lyra looked up. “Can I dare to hope?”

“Princess Celestia always comes through,” Lyra answered, quietly optimistic. “I mean… here, she does. Obviously not where you’re from. And there’s Twilight and her friends, too.”

“Funny enough,” Alex muttered, “every pony I ever spoke to said that for most of their lives, she’d been benevolent. It was like… like…” he sighed. “Well, Cheerilee said it was like watching a tree grow. It looks the same after about a week of gardening, but it looks different from the week before. You said there’d been no Changeling Purges in your world? No Crystal War?”

Lyra nodded, a small frown crossing her face. “I‘ve never heard of either of those.”

“Everyone has some pet theory on when she made a decision that wasn’t her,” Alex said, talking more to himself than to her, stroking his arm, “but most everyone agrees that she never came out of the Crystal War the same. The things the Resistance found, about what happened in the Changeling Purges, how it escalated once the war on Earth–”

“Can we…” Lyra interrupted quickly, feeling a little ill. “Can we talk about something else. Please?”

Alex gave her a blank look. “What?”

“Sorry, it’s just…” she shook her head. “This is all… a lot. You know? It’s Princess Celestia. You only just spoke to her. I’m sorry, I… simply can’t imagine her doing any of the things you’re saying she did.’”

Alex blinked, before nodding slowly. “I… yeah, okay. Besides, you’ll be a lot happier not knowing about the Purges. What do you want to talk about instead?”

“Well…” Lyra hesitated. “What about you?”

“Me?” Alex said, frowning. “I’m a grunt. A jarhead. There’s… really, there’s not much to say.”

“I’m sure that’s not true,” Lyra said. “You said that we were friends, that must have come from somewhere. I mean, where are you from? What about your family?”

Alex chuckled gruffly. “Oh, Lyra. My family… my Mom was a girl from some small part of Texas, but she met my Dad and they moved to… I dunno, some other small place, she never really spoke about it. My Dad… his name was Andrew Reiner, and he was… well, he got killed.”

Lyra put a hoof to her mouth. “Oh, no. I… may I ask how?”

“He was a soldier, like me,” Alex answered freely. “Killed in the line of duty during the Gulf War. Mom didn’t like to talk about it much, so I didn’t learn much about my Dad from her. When I was three, she met a guy called Dan Radwick. He was a good guy and took care of us. Worked as a business attorney. Moved around a lot, so we followed him. Dallas, Houston… Mom took his name, and I did too… for a while.”

His mouth turned into a hard and thin line, and Lyra noticed his hand moving to the side of his neck, massaging it as a distant look grew in his eyes.

“And then Grandpop Al died.”

“Grandpop Al?” Lyra repeated. “Your…”

“Dad’s Dad,” Alex clarified. “Albert Reiner. He had a bunch of Dad’s old diaries he left to me, a bunch of Dad’s stuff… he’d lived through a lot. Some of it not so good.” His expression grew ever more distant. “I wanted to know more, but Mom… still didn’t want to talk about it. She’d moved on. Maybe she was scared I’d follow Dad’s footsteps, go off to be a soldier.”

“But you did, though,” Lyra hazarded a guess. “Why, Alex? Or were you enlisted?”

“Nope,” Alex chuckled sadly. “It was right after I changed my name back to Reiner. I remember Mom and Dan trying to talk me out of it. Dan… he was cool with the name change, just worried for my safety, but Mom…” He sighed. “Shedidn’t take it well. Started crying, yelling how I’d go die senselessly for the profit of some fat cat and his bank balance.”

“What?”

“Too many wars in my world are fought over riches. Oh, they wrap it up im a nice little package, enscribed with terms such as ‘freedom’ and ‘democracy’. But, really, it’s just so much pap.”

Alex shook his head, running a hand through his thin beard.

“That was the last time we spoke,” he said quietly. “We… never had the best relationship. Even when I was little, I could always see there was this… sadness in her, whenever she looked at me. I guess I reminded her too much of Dad, and then there was Max…”

“Max?” Lyra parroted. “Who’s that?”

“My sister, Maxine,” Alex replied, a moistness in his eye. “When I was growing up, after she was born, I… it always seemed like she was the favourite. She didn’t remind anyone of their late husband, though, right?” His expression grew sour. “I’ve probably been unfair to her. She never did anything wrong, tried helping even, but I still pushed her away.”

He put a hand over his eyes, rubbing them before lying back on his bed.

“Damn it,” he whispered. “They took too much. Max… she used to be happy. Before everything...”

“It’s alright if you don’t want to go on,” Lyra said. “I’m sorry to bring up painful memories.”

“Everything’s painful,” Alex spat dully. “Every damn thing. There’s nothing good left. Nothing clean. It’s all covered in grime and blood, and the sounds are all of a harsh screaming. I can’t recall the taste of good food, or the sound of water, or the smell of grass.” He snorted. “I’m naked. Naked in the dark. Nothing between me and the fire.”

Lyra swallowed, unsure what to say. To her educated ear, it sounded like a quoted recitation. Much like those Moondancer had been fond of bringing out, back in their school days...

“It’s weird,” Alex said after a moment. “You and I… we’ve had this conversation. I’ve told you this before. But I haven’t.”

“I guess it’s not the only thing that’ll be weird,” Lyra said with a weak laugh. Not knowing what else to say, she lay a hoof on his bed.

Unerringly, he rested his hand on top of it.

“I still don’t feel as if I really know that much about you, Alex,” Lyra told him gently. “I mean, you’ve told me a lot about what’s happened on your world, that I’m a hero to you, how you chose to be a soldier. But it’s like… how do I put this…” She swallowed. “Like you’re busy ticking off boxes in a checklist. It’s as if you’ve read up your own life’s story, and now you’re reciting it back to me, almost by rote. I…” She bit back her tongue. “Sorry. I don’t know what I’m saying.”

“No, Lyra. You’re right.”

Surprised, she looked him in the eye. Or would have, if hadn’t closed them both.

“You’re right,” Alex whispered. “Because these boxes, as you call them, they’re all I have. People like me, when they’ve seen the things I have, sometimes, the only way they feel they can keep on is by putting it all in boxes.” He caressed her forehoof, sending a tingle down her spine. “I’m… actually kind of happy. It’s a weird feeling after all this time. But fuck, I don’t care if this goes ass-over-tits later. Right now, you’re alive. That… that might be the best thing that’s happened to me in years.” He closed his eyes. “God, Lyra, the things I’ve done… all I wanted to do was keep it the way you wanted it. Keep it pure. But that bastard Gardner, Defiance… it’s all muck, Lyra. All shit. I failed you. I failed you…”

His words drifted off into tired mumbling, and his eyes stayed closed.

“I think,” a voice said from behind Lyra, “that he’s asleep.”

Lyra looked to see Redheart staring at them both, a strange, almost regretful expression on her face. As before, seeing her, Lyra felt the slightest throbbing behind her retinae, and the recollection of Pinkie’s odd look crossed her mind.

But Celestia had said it was alright, that she was no Changeling...

“Nurse,” Lyra said softly. “Are you okay?”

“Me? Of course, dear,” Redheart said, smiling. “Are you? I was standing by the doorway, chatting with the Guards. Nice lads, the both of them, boys from Vanhoover, not quite so uptight as the usual crop. it sounded like a… well, a heavy conversation.”

“Yeah,” Lyra said. She looked at Alex’s sleeping form. “I guess. But worth it, y’know. He’s…”

“A remarkable creature,” Redheart humbly suggested.

“Yeah,” said Lyra, carefully slipping her forehoof from under his hand. “A remarkable human.”

“Well, you never know. Maybe they’re all like that.”

“Maybe.” Lyra shoved back her chair. “Maybe every creature is remarkable. In its own way.”

“That’s a nice thought,” Redheart said with a too-casual shrug.

Lyra stood up. “I’m gonna head off, get some coffee, make my way back in a little while. Please let me know if anything changes.”

“Of course, Miss Heartstrings,” Redheart said. “Don’t you worry. Your… new friend is safe with us.”

“Thanks, Redheart,” Lyra smiled at her, heading for the door. “I appreciate that.”

She trotted out, her head still spinning from the wagonload of information had Alex had besaddled her with. His words about family were stuck in her like a stray needle from one of Bonbon’s hobby dress-making sessions. Which all led back to one thing. Bonbon. If she, Lyra, was dead in the other universe, what had become of Bonbon? She hadn’t dared ask.

And the way he’d spoken to her… for a moment, she’d thought he sounded like a lover, but upon reflection, it sounded more like…

… More like a confession. Or a prayer to a god.

* * * * *

Redheart hummed a comforting tune under her breath, not looking back as Lyra Heartstrings left the room. Her focus was entirely on Alex Reiner.

‘Well, they always say that humanity is large and contains multitudes. Good to know this one feels remorse.’

She’d learned long ago that her enemies, no matter what they seemed like, were just creatures like her. Fighting for whatever they believed in. Although this war was different, and some nagging part of her kept wanting to think of humans as savage monsters, she still felt a degree of something resembling respect.

‘I guess we all do what we have to, not necessarily what we enjoy.’ She checked Reiner’s pulse, then his temperature.

He was stable, but he didn’t seem to be getting much better, and there was only so much traditional healing spells could do for him without stretching the boundaries of her cover. Sure, she knew how to heal a human, but ‘Nurse Redheart’ had no way of knowing.

‘In fact, how many little tells could I be displaying? It’s not like they ever taught us how to imitate ourselves.’

It was a sobering thought. As was the radical extent to which her mission’s parameters had been changed. Following Reiner across the divide, she’d known it could be a one-way trip. What she hadn’t anticipated was landing in this place, a discovery of such magnitude as trumped even her primary objective.

Stopping these other Equestrians from uncovering the mystery of the human had become impossible the moment Heartstrings and, most perturbingly, Princess Celestia and her Bearers had entered the picture. The slightest chance of revealing their existence to the Empire had to be seized.

Staying out of suspicion, being plain Nurse Redheart, had become her best bet.

‘I’m on a deadline. And if the Loyalty Guard somehow finds out about this, I can only hope that it’s not literal. If ‘we’ don’t learn more about you soon, Alexander Reiner,’ Redheart thought tiredly, ‘Then I’ll be spared from having to kill you.’

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~

Twilight trotted along the corridor, feeling an irrational coil of nervousness in her stomach.

‘Well, is it entirely irrational?’ she considered. ‘To begin with, here I am, back in my old School. How’s that for anxious memories? And this ‘human’, this Alexander, this war he’s talked about… there’s so much, so many questions. And so many tantalising hints he drops, like they’re the most natural thing in the world. He’s not telling us everything, because so many things seem so natural to him...’

She shook her head, making sure to keep her saddlebag secure.

Fortunately for her, even with Princess Celestia preoccupied by matters of state, there were others whom she could ask for help. Such as the stallion behind the door at the end of the corridor. It was a somewhat deceptive door, considering how average it made things seem, when the occupant was anything but. Twilight smiled as she saw the simple sign on his office door, made of a simple wooden frame, the name ‘Spell Nexus’ printed on it in plain lettering.

‘Pretending he’s normal. He’d call that the ultimate deception.’

It was reassuring to know that he likely hadn't changed that much. Certainly, the little explosion of noise from within the office seemed normal for hi–

‘Wait,’Twilight thought abruptly. ‘Explosion?’ A moment’s panic crossed her. ‘Are we under attack again? Already? Oh. Please, please don’t let it be so soon. Please, don’t let this be…’

Images of Shining Armor flashed through her mind.

She had taken a moment to register the noise, but then there was another – the door was forced open, swinging slightly as its hinges creaked in protest. Smoke billowed out, filling the whole corridor, as did the sound of wheezing and coughing from inside the office.

“Well... that didn’t work. It did not work,” the wheezing voice stated through the smoke, punctuated by several extra coughs. “But not to worry, sugarplum, we can–”

Twilight’s ears were pierced by a frustrated, shrill scream. Before she could do so much as lift a hoof or cast a spell, the door swung open in full.

Silhouetted against the billowing smoke stood a mare who was purple all over, from her coat to her mane streaked with aquamarine. Atop her head was a beanie in her colours, and her horn was alight with a brilliant turquoise aura.

She did not look happy at all.

“Are, are you okay–”

The mare glared at her, her light purple eyes manic. “Fine!” she exclaimed. “I’m fine! Perfectly fine!”

She went on her way, grumbling and stomping, with a trail of smoke from her singed beanie.

Tearing her gaze away from the mare, once she’d disappeared ’round a corner, Twilight lit up her horn, coughing.

“Professor?” Twilight called out. “Are you alright?”

“Twilight Sparkle!” the voice of her old Headmaster called back, followed by more coughs. “So sorry about the smoke. I was experimenting with a gift from the Kirin, they call them ‘smoke bombs’. I tried making my own, and it caused them all to go up when I tried one.”

Twilight’s horn glowed, and in a flash, the smoke around her dissipated, revealing Professor Spell Nexus. He was dressed, fittingly enough, in a robe made of velvet.

“I thought that robe would have helped,” Nexus explained huskily, “they called it a ‘smoking robe’ or something like that. Guess they didn’t have smoke bombs in mind.” Nexus gave a harmless little smile. “It’s something they should work on, smoke comes in many different forms after all, Celestia help them if a dragon crosses them.”

“... Wait, why were you playing with smoke bombs?”

Nexus let out a resigned chuckle. “Oh, I thought my goddaughter would like it. She loves stage magic, alright! But I don’t suppose it worked…” He shook his head. “She’ll be fine, I’m sure. She’s just got a lot on her plate. Anyways, what brings you here, Twilight?”

Even speaking with him was reassuring – the Headmaster of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns had always been eccentric, but was a masterful teacher. Always helpful, passionate about his work, and personable.

“Well,” she said, “if you've got a moment after smoking out your office, I might need your help with something, Headmaster Nexus.”

His horn glowed blue, and a moment later the remaining smoke began to waft inwards and back into his office, moving out of an opened window.

“Now whatever could that be, Twilight?” Spell Nexus asked, before taking a deep breath. “Oh, fresh air, it beats smoke any day of the week. You’re usually bright enough on your own to figure things out. Your past adventures and, indeed, misadventures, show that.”

“Perhaps, but this is regarding something beyond my experience,” Twilight explained. She used her magic to retrieve a scroll from her saddlebag. “If you could take a look at these?”

Spell Nexus narrowed his eyes slightly as he looked over Rarity’s sketches of the runes.

“Possibly zebra-based,” he muttered, “though the design seems… unfamiliar, most unfamiliar. Where did you get this?”

“These are sketches made by a friend of mine, based on tattoos that were marked on a being called a human,” Twilight explained. “I was hoping you'd be able to help me ascertain their significance.”

His head snapped towards Twilight. “Wait, what! A human! Here? In Equestria! Oh, Lyra will be overjoyed!”

“She was one of the first to find him, actually.”

“Oh, perfect! Absolutely perfect,” Nexus said. “She’s going to love writing about this. Besides, Twilight…” He sighed, and seemed to lose energy for a scant few moments. “Dear Lyra deserves it. Ever since that catastrophe of a thesis Catseye wrote.”

“Let’s… not think too hard about that,” Twilight said, shuddering.

“Mmh. The less said, the better,” Nexus agreed, his coat still singed from the bomb. “I wish there was a way to tell Professor Shriek about this. But, well, you know old Noctus.”

Twilight nodded. Professor Shriek, even by the high standards of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns, was indeed well known for being unconventional. Sometimes, he’d forget to wear clothes to class – not that much of a faux-pas in Ponyville, but still raising a few eyebrows in Canterlot – go on bizarre tangents, give up class midway through so he could grab coffee, or randomly doodle pictures while administering tests. His study of subjects like anthropology, being a foremost advocate of human presence in pre-Equestrian cultures, hadn’t helped.

“Sometimes,” Spell Nexus continued, “he can be quite eccentric.”

“That’s definitely one word for it, sir,” Twilight said, with an ironic smile. “Uh, if we could…”

“Return to the subject of these runes, yes…” Nexus’ expression grew to one of confusion, curiosity and a little excitement. “Well, obviously... there is a common aesthetic,” he said, his mind already gearing itself up to solve this apparent puzzle. “The function, though, that’s the real mystery... possibly to act as a means of enhancement? A physical mark to store magic to protect their body?”

“Perhaps,” Twilight agreed. “I was wondering, if I leave this information with you, can you see if you can figure out some potential reasons?”

“Of course,” Nexus said. He frowned. “Assuming I don’t smoke myself out again. Maybe if I…” his voice trailed off, and his eyes went wide. “Anyway, while I work on that, I’ll try and get in contact with the Crystal Realm and see if they can send out a pegasus patrol to look for old Noctus. If a mythical being not seen in thousands upon thousands of years truly is in Equestria, having Professor Shriek here to help should truly be a blessing.”

“Any help you or other faculty members could offer I’d appreciate.” Twilight grinned.

“Indeed, indeed,” Nexus said airily. “Now… where did I put my translation books…”

And so muttering, he returned to his office.

Twilight smiled again, before heading off. After this encounter, she felt a little better. The image of Shining Armor was still there, but not as stark as when she’d entered the School. She had her friends to meet back at the café, maybe together, they could visit Canterlot Palace’s very own library. A little extra research never hurt anypony.

* * * * *

“Thus it goes,” Luna mused to her sister. “With the Call sent, do you expect them to come?”

“The Kirin will,” Celestia replied, poring over the map on her desk, “and hopefully Darkhoof will bring the rest of the Minotaurs with him as well. He’s usually the most reasonable of them, or at least that’s what Fancypants informed me. I’m… less optimistic about the Saddle Mareabians. To say nothing about the dragons, or Changelings…”

“Changelings’ relations with all the rest of Equus have always been mixed,” Luna noted with some bitterness. “It is in their nature. I cannot say for sure about, say, Oleander or Neighpon’s thoughts about them. And we should anticipate how the zebra nations will react, to being asked to enter an agreement with a people that, too often, has fallen upon them like locusts.”

“Indeed,” Celestia said quietly, “and Chrysalis is the most prominent of the Queens in our part of the world. Not only that, but word has reached me that she’s been setting herself as their Queen of Queens. Her failure at Canterlot will have made a dent in her ambitions, yet I’d be surprised if this’ll be the end of them.”

Luna snorted, the memory still fresh and painful. “Why should we get into bed with Chrysalis? After what she’s done to us? To Cadance, to Lyra, and Shining Armor?”

“This threat affects us all, Luna,” said Celestia. “And Chrysalis is not her people. Times change. Remember that when you came back, the Saddle Mareabians’ subjugation of zebras was finally at an end, for well past three-hundred years.”

At that moment, there was a knock at the door.

“Come in,” Celestia called.

Looking perhaps slightly less dishevelled than he had earlier, Prince Blueblood entered the room. At least he’d thought to wear his dinner jacket for public appearance, Luna noted. He looked between his two aunts for a moment, frowning.

“Sorry,” he said, “is now a bad time?”

“Not at all,” Celestia said quietly. “I need your advice on something.”

“Something to do with this war business Auntie Luna mentioned?” Blueblood guessed. “Can’t possibly imagine what I could tell you that you don’t already know, Auntie C.”

Luna scowled at the informal address, but her oh-ever-so-patient sister smiled indulgently.

“How about, ‘how to get half the gentry to help fund it’?” Celestia said with a wan smile.

Blueblood blinked, before chuckling. “Ah, yes, money. Always comes down to that, eh? Even in this allegedly friendship-based society of ours. Money, or reputation.”

“Surely a tax would be sufficient?” Luna asked irritably.

“Not quite,” Celestia said. She motioned to Blueblood. “The gentry can get… antsy, I suppose you could say, if you fail to butter them up, or to attend to their pettier demands before you start asking for more of their hard-earned bits.”

“Hence,” Blueblood stated, “why I’ve become an expert at attending said petty demands.”

Luna tilted her head skeptically “Indeed?”

Blueblood chortled, tugging at his dinner jacket. “You didn’t think all my socialising was just for the scintillating company and the copious alcohol, did you? No, that part is a handy bonus. Helps that I went to school with half of these cads.”

“I didn’t want to ask,” Luna said. “I take it then you know how to… ‘butter up’ the gentry?”

“It’s been my life’s work, be they peer, esquire, or knight,” Blueblood said with an utmost earnest inflection, while tapping his chin thoughtfully. “I probably can get a few favours called in to obtain an increase through the Prime Minister and Parliament on taxes to the richer population, but I think it’s important to offer military building contracts to White Hart Line, Trans-Equus, and Eagle Eye Corp.”

“To ensure their fiscal and political support, as well as to increase airship production?” Celestia guessed. At Luna’s questioning gaze, she smiled. “Spruce Dismay, Oiled Spoke, and Starched Shirt are all political powerhouses, in addition to owners of airship and train corporations. They have considerable clout with the Parliament.”

“Exactly,” Blueblood said, smiling. “Still, I’ll need to know a little more about this thing to sell it to some of my more… conservative drinking buddies.”

“I shall have a report written up,” Luna said simply, sharing a wry glance with Celestia. “In the meantime, nephew, we would be grateful if you could begin your work.”

“Can do,” Blueblood said. He threw a little mock salute. “Aunties.”

And with that, he sauntered out of the room.

“He’s so… irreverent,” Luna groaned after a moment. “We’re talking about a war, and he treats it like a game. I would have far preferred if the Prime Minister had met us here.”

“He was raised by his father, not his mother, the previous direct heir of the lineage,” Celestia pointed out with a heavy sigh. “Azure Haven was… irresponsible with his money, and all the more irresponsible as a pony. I believe it rubbed off on Blueblood. Not having to take life seriously will do that to you. Still, he knows his way around the aristocracy, and his heart is… usually in the right place. Cake incidents notwithstanding.”

Luna raised an eyebrow, confused. Plainly, she had missed out on a lot. “Cake incidents?”

“Don’t ask, Sister.”

* * * * *

Sometime later, standing there in the entrance hall, just outside the throne room, Celestia idly wondered if she could even keep the renovations on schedule. A second throne, just as there was in the Castle of the Two Sisters, had seemed like a worthwhile idea. Luna would have appreciated it very much, and that was enough. But as with all things, plans change and so did circumstances. What had started as a second throne had certainly escalated into a larger project, renovating large parts of the present throne room to welcome a new millennium. And now with war looming...

So it was, she found herself listening intently to the worker’s prim report. The elegant yet rugged mare opposite her was a tall one, almost as tall as Cadance, and between her work goggles over her eyes and a protective – if raggedy – cloak over her back, she looked ready as anyone could be. Small wonder she’d been chosen to relay the report, Celestia mused.

“And just over here, Your Highness,” the worker recited, with that curious, musical accent of hers. “you can see that the new stained glass windows have been fitted in, as requested, covering the Crystal Realm’s return. Your sister’s new throne has also arrived, though there seems to be a delay for yours, Your Highness.”

Celestia nodded. ‘Delays,’ she mused. ‘I ought to be hearing about a lot more of those, in these coming days…’

“No worries. Thank you,” she said. “And that shall be it for the day.” She glanced over at the nearby tea kettle, placed there on a workbench, then offered the worker a smile. “Care for some tea, by the way? You must be famished.”

“That shan’t be necessary,” said the worker, shaking her head. “All in a day’s work.”

“Oh, but it’s been such a long day…”

“It’s quite nothing, Your Highness,” the worker reassured, her eyes glancing back down to the report. “It is mine duty.”

Celestia frowned. The worker’s accent bore great resemblance to the brogue of the Reindeer of the North, now that she thought of it. For a moment, she contemplated the mare’s appearance. Braided mane, light grey coat, an elegant, yet hardy build as befitting any earthpony...

The hairs on Celestia’s neck rose. She had seen the mare before, yet when and how she could not recall. The latest reports from the frontier had cautioned her of possible Changeling infiltrators. Perhaps it was paranoia kicking in, given the strange events of the past few days. And yet...

“Pardon my curiosity,” said Celestia, clearing her throat, “but… where are you from?”

The worker looked up from the report. “Stratusburg, Your Highness,” she answered swiftly, raising an eyebrow. “Is something the matter?”

Celestia contemplated this for a moment or two. There was a touch of Stratusburg to her accent, but there still lay a strangeness to her diction she could not pinpoint. “Right, what did you say your name was…?”

But just as the worker opened her mouth to reply, Celestia felt a soft breeze at her back, blowing from within the throne room. She turned, to meet the familiar, mismatched figure of many beasts’ shapes she’d been waiting for.

“Discord,” Celestia greeted with a smile. “You’ve returned.”

The draconequus, her oldest enemy, turned her newest ally, smiled back wanly. “Hello, Sunnybuns. How is everything going? You didn’t get too sad in my absence, I hope?”

“Without you, the Sun went out of my life, Discord.”

Discord gave a bark of laugher, yet Celestia thought it sounded rattling, strained. She turned to the worker. “Excuse us for a moment.”

The worker nodded, with no sign of perturbance at the draconequus’s appearance. Letting Discord lean on her, Celestia guided him into the throne room, closing the door behind her.

“Are you alright?” Celestia asked, her concern genuine. She pushed aside tools and chunks of the unfinished fountain marble left on the floor, giving Discord a place to lay down. “From your return, I must assume you were successful. It makes me glad, for when I called on you to take on this mission, I did fear it might already be too late, that one more ancient evil would go unfett– Discord!”

He had slumped to his knees, but when Celestia approached him, he shook his head and held up his lion paw to forestall any help on her part, wincing as he did so. In his eagle claw, Discord was holding a small, faintly vibrating, crystalline snowglobe.

“That is the Krampus,” Celestia guessed.

“Imprisoned,” Discord said, wheezing. “It… wasn’t as cooperative as I’d hoped, but it seems I was just about able to stymie it.”

Celestia granted Discord a polite smile of approval. “I’m grateful you could imprison rather than destroy the old monster.”

“Eh.”

Discord rose, dusting himself off, with dust clouds larger than they had any right to be. “Be grateful that Sint Erklass had the smarts to come up with this little trinket,” he said, still looking pained as he presented the snowglobe, while its frenetic vibration grew more pronounced. “Say what you will about your dear adoptive grandfather, the old buck isn’t lacking for useful gifts. Or I’d be the one now screaming in agony.”

She felt the blood drain from her face. “The Krampus was that powerful.” It wasn’t a question.

“Of course,” Discord replied. “It was the First. My kind’s blood thinned long before I was even born. The Krampus... Its fire is the fire of a Chaos that makes me look orderly. It’s a fire that begs to be smothered.”

“And now, finally,” Celestia sighed, “we can begin to heal it.”

Discord chuckled unpleasantly. “You can’t heal. It is old and set in his ways, its chaos neither wondrous, nor amiable, nor even vaguely amusing. It’s raw, it’s cruel. It’d take more than a kind forgiving little pegasus to make the Krampus go ‘good’.”

“Yet still, we must try,” Celestia said solemnly.

Her ally frowned, looking at the tiny snowglobe. “Yeah. I guess you should. Come here, you,” he beckoned to the snowglobe to himself, his magic pulling it through the air. “Stop feeling sorry for yourself. You’re a handsome piece, you are, but it’s all about what you got in the noggin’. Then they’re all burning for you. Just look at me.” He smirked, tossing the snowglobe up and down, but was cut short by a wince of pain. “Well, there you have it, Celestia. It’s dealt with. What now?”

“Now?” Celestia asked. “As I said. Provided you choose not to threaten Equestria or the rest of the world again, I am willing to allow you your freedom.” She paused. “However…”

“However, there’s another mess you need my help with,” Discord interrupted, grumbling. “How did I guess. Couldn’t possibly be you using that overgrown night-light you got in the Vault.”

“You felt that? The Concordia’s Call?”

“I tasted it.” Discord stuck his tongue out. “Purple. And I won’t be the only one.”

At this, Celestia had to hold her own smirk, and then a sigh. He was grousing, nothing more. Yet he would help, for the strangest thing about Discord, at least in her experience, was how he acted malicious just in the sense that he rebelled against authority. A trickster in spirit, he wished little real harm, merely for himself to have fun… and freedom. Only the fact that his fun came at the expense of others had made him an enemy of Equestria, and for the moment, those instincts appeared to have been curbed.

“For now,” she said, “rest. And we will speak in the morning.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Discord said, waving his paw. “See ya, Celly.”

And then he was gone, leaving the little snowglobe behind, where it continued to vibrate, tipping to-and-fro.

“Ah, Krampus,” Celestia whispered. “Sint Erklass said you were once of a nobler kind. One wonders what could have brought you so low.”

She sensed nothing but malice from the snowglobe, and with a sigh, her horn glowed, flashing the globe away to the special cell Sint had long provided for it in the Castle of Zamok Ustyag..

‘Equestria,’ Celestia thought ruefully. ‘No chains keep its people in bondage, and yet, for a select few, each convict has their own prison. The Moon… for my sister. For Luna. Encased in stone, for Discord.’ She suppressed thinking about Lyra. ‘Then there is Erebus, and Tartarus… Even that poor conjurer of cheap tricks, who used the Alicorn Amulet for ill-conceived purposes, her sentence is tailor-made…’

Not to mention, for as long as Discord was in recovery, she would have to postpone the new favour she meant to ask of him, in the wake of the human’s coming. He knew something, but he did not know everything.

Nevertheless, for a moment, Celestia breathed easier. Until, that is, she heard the door open.

“You’ve summoned them all, then,” the voice of the worker was heard, her accent stronger than it had been. “The Kirin, the Changelingkind, even Discord the Chaos Lord. The lantern called out to those around whom, in the hearts and minds of their people, the stardust coalesces most. This is a good start, if merely for them to bear witness. You require all the allies you can get, in the war to come.”

Celestia darted around to face the worker – yet there was no worker. In her place stood a mare a head taller than she, still wrapped in that patchwork hooded cloak. Her cold eyes remained mostly hidden behind her goggles, staring right at her.

“Who are you?” Celestia demanded, narrowing her eyes. “What business has brought you here?”

In response, the mare pulled down the hood she wore, with a spark of grey magic, to reveal none other than a shadow-grey mare. An ink-black mane flowed behind her, rippling in the ethereal winds, much like Celestia’s own.

“We came into this world together,” the grey mare replied. “Long have I watched you flourish from the shadows, yet here and now I step into your light.”

Celestia blinked. “You… you’re...”

“I am the Scribe of the Stardust, keeper of the plan of our existence,” said the figure. She pulled aside her cloak, uncovering a great pair of wings held tight against her body. The grey alicorn lifted her goggles, revealing a pair of eyes as icy blue as a a frozen pond. “Mine name is Galatea, and I am your sister.”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

It is in this chapter that Havok / Kontagion is made a composite character with the Krampus. As such, the creature’s prison is changed from a small crystal to the snowglobe used to trap the Krampus.

When Twilight goes to visit Spell Nexus, her old Headmaster at Celestia’s School For Gifted Unicorns, she momentarily crosses paths now with his goddaughter, Starlight Glimmer.

The Concordia Maxima has been changed into a lantern, no longer is it a copy of the Moment from Doctor Who.

The Canterlot Palace throne room is shown to be undergoing reconstruction, making space for two thrones and covering it in crystal, thus preparing to bring the room’s design closer in line to the 2017 Movie.

Galatea now makes her introduction as one of the workers on the renovation of the throne room.

Spectrum 2.0 - December 15th 2017

JedR: Howdy all, Jed here. What a cliffhanger, right?

VoxAdam: Boy, this one was dense. Whereas Chapter Five was pieced together in the, by Spectrum standards, rather short space of three weeks, Chapter Six is one of those chapters we’ve had planned since we chose to reboot. Then it turned out we had more and more things we wanted to add, and sooner rather than later, not just as personal indulgences but so that we could honestly say “This was meant to be in the story from the beginning”.

I won’t add much more now, other than to say I like what we did with Blueblood. Jed and Royal have each been fine collaborators in giving ponykind’s charmless prince a makeover. And it was a treat for me to somehow work pirates into this story, because, well, you can’t go wrong with pirates, right?

Actually, come to think of it, though it contains a somber passage early on as we dive into Alex’s psyche and ends on the reveal of the grim, mysterious Galatea, this chapter, what with Blueblood, Nexus, and Discord, has been an field for introducing quirky characters. This Such is how Prime!Equestria decides to come to mankind’s aid.

DoctorFluffy: This was a lot of fun!

There’s probably a lot of in-jokes and references I left here. Most of the ones that reference the show should be easy enough to understand, but there’s some stuff from early in development that you might not know:

* We’d agreed that Twilight’s rant about the impossibility of transporting Equestria to Earth was too iconic to skip.

* Catseye is in fact a reference to Chatoyance! But we’re just going with one Chat stand-in this go-around. As funny as it was, I want to move past the kind of mindset that led us to make that sort of thing.

* Reiner commenting on having “almost placed bounties on graffiti taggers” is a dig at how reactionary the PHL was becoming under Red, and yes, something like this happened in the Classicsverse. There’s a reason I’m rebooting all my Classicsverse work, people.

* Yes, “Classicsverse” is a Transformers reference.

* Gardner’s method of speech is not (intentionally?) a reference to the G-Man from Half-Life, but when Vox commented on it, I decided to roll with it. I just wanted an effect more subtle than abusing text options, capitalization, or zalgo text. Something that would sound unsettling if you read it out loud. I’m aware that someone out there is probably hearing this in William Shatner’s voice (Kizuna Tallis did), but all the other options I could think of for making him sound unsettling just felt too cliche. Oooh, this guy’s voice is disturbing, look how it’s covered in wingdings! I just don’t want to. Also, for no discernible reason, I can’t unhear the Microphone from Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared.

* Blueblood being actually (*gasp*) USEFUL is a… look, we were really tired of Blueblood getting kicked in the balls whenever he appeared. He’s got far, far fewer canonical moments of needing to be punched than, say, Diamond Tiara. I’m shoryuken imagine that last part as I type this.

* While Kraber committed a large amount of crimes (including burglebezzlement), it’s very important that I point this out; Kraber is absolutely not a rapist. Nobody should want that treated sympathetically. I know I don’t!

* All the stuff from Defiance is…. Uh, I can’t really go over that without being too spoilery. And I’m just not in the mood to talk about the Oh, who am I kidding, this is a reference to the massacre at Defiance that Red planned. There’ll be more of this in Light Despondent, which is also being rebooted! You can read our various journals to see us complain about it. Part of me wants to update Light in the next few seconds, but, well, I don’t want to end with a barely-finished mess like I did with Snowbound. Go look at that too while you can.

Act I ~ Chapter Six ~ The Trinity Harmonious

***

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

A Sigma Signal Boost for Doc’s Story, Light Despondent Remixed!

Jed R

Mythology Episode, Mudderkuffers!

DoctorFluffy

VoxAdam

Sledge115

Reindeers Are Better Than People

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Six

The Trinity Harmonious

* * * * *

“Together we’re going to change the world, man.”
— Kevin Flynn to CLU, Tron Legacy

When the child was a child,
It was the time for these questions:
Why am I me, and why not you?
Why am I here, and why not there?
When did time begin, and where does space end?
Is life under the sun not just a dream?
Is what I see and hear and smell
not just the reflection of a world before the world?
Is there really such a thing as evil, and people
who really are the bad guys?
— ‘Song of Childhood’, from Wings of Desire, by Peter Handke

~ The Castle of Zamok Ustyag, Adlaborn ~

“You can’t catch me, can’t catch me!” Celestia yelled, with as much melody as her voice could muster. Her baby sister, little wings fluttering in a futile attempt to follow, could do nothing but sit down on the grass, her little black bow ajar.

“No fair!” she exclaimed. “Tia!”

“Aw, you’re no fun,” said Celestia, with a tiny smile to goad Luna on. She sat down on the grass, letting her sister approach her in a wobbly little walk. Luna tripped onto the grass, prompting a guffaw from her.

Their laughter continued, filling the ambience of this sanctuary. Then as it died down, Luna stood with a determined frown. Her horn shot out tiny sparks. Not very stellar. They fell upon the grass with nary a crackle.

Celestia shook her head, giggling. She hopped onto her hooves, flicking her mane, and then pointed her horn at Luna, lighting up with a brilliant glow.

“Watch this.”

With a proud, gleeful smirk, she fired off a spell.

A trail of golden light and dust shot out, sparks landing harmlessly upon the grass. It danced around Luna, drawing her awestruck eyes upon it, before it shot up into the air and exploded into a shower of shimmering glitter.

Luna burst into giggles. Celestia smirked.

“See?” she said, smug as a ten-year old could be. “Maybe if you practice, you can do it–”

“Celestia!” a tired, weary voice called out. “What did I tell you about casting spells around your sister?”

“Aww, but Firefly, you saw that!” Celestia protested, just as the elderly mare emerged into view. The pegasus mare looked so very old, with her coat so faded one could scarcely tell it might once have been pink. “She liked it!”

“Da!” Luna answered, nodding vigorously. But this had little effect on the old mare, who promptly shook her head.

“You know very well what I mean, young lady,” chided Firefly. Her purple eyes still looked sharp as always. “Now come along, Starswirl and Sint are waiting for you,”

“Do I really have to go now?” Celestia bemoaned.

“You seemed so proud of your spells a moment ago,” Firefly retorted, smiling. She hoisted Luna onto her back, with good care. “But if you want, I could let you practice for just a few more–”

“Alright!” Celestia interrupted. “So I will.”

She pointed her horn up, and fired off another spell, much like one earlier, showering them all in golden dust once more, amidst Luna’s cheers.

There had been much she showed Luna. There would be so much more to show her, once her studies under Starswirl began in its earnest.

Just as she was to follow Firefly and Luna out their little sanctuary, Celestia heard something in the trees.

She turned around. The air had gone still.

“Hello?” Celestia said. She tilted her head. No answer, but the evening breeze.

Celestia cleared her throat. She puffed up her chest.

“Is… is someone there?” she asked, a touch nervous. Still nothing, nothing that answered her calls. She held her breath. Something was here. Something in the dark.

There. Icy eyes staring right back at her, unblinking, unmoving...

A twig snapped. Then leaves were rustled. The sound of hooves upon dirt.

Celestia gasped. She took a step or two back, panting.

“Luna?” she cried out. “Luna, where are you?”

She felt a warm hoof on her shoulder. Firefly stood by her, eyes firm. Luna was in tow, looking a little lost.

“Stay here,” Firefly said quietly, her elderly voice concealing a sudden steely edge. “Keep your sister safe.”

They exchanged a nod. Firefly, her wings too old and frail to carry her, strode into the treeline without another word.

And, for the longest time, Celestia sat there with Luna, hooves holding one another tightly. Neither of them shared a word, not even a whisper, as they awaited Firefly’s return.

But when she did return, there was little sign of worry throughout her features, Celestia realised.

“What was that all about?” asked Celestia.

“Nothing, little one,” said Firefly. Gone was that cool tone she had, for now she only had warmth to offer with her voice and friendly smile. “Nothing to worry about.”

It was that grown-up talk, Celestia figured. The voice they used when they hid things from her. Yet as the night went on, and her sleep grew deeper still, her worries faded among the stars in her dreams…

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~

“That was you,” Celestia whispered. “That was you in Adlaborn.”

This new alicorn, this Galatea, had sat herself upon one of the stools in Celestia’s private chambers, her face tranquil, her eyes reflecting the soft light of the fireplace.

“It was. Old Firefly was kind enough to keep mine presence a secret, for I did not feel it was right to show myself right then,” Galatea said, nodding. “It was only one of a few occurrences. I met you at Vanhoover, once, shortly after Luna’s banishment.”

“We did…” Celestia replied, half-whispering. There had indeed been a grey mare, a cloaked ferrymare who had given her passage into the city which held her responsible for Luna’s fall, bearing those same icy blue eyes that stared back at her as they did now. “We are sisters?”

“Yes,” Galatea answered, nodding. “Mine place was to stand apart. To watch you and Luna as you two grew into the leaders ponykind needed.” She spoke those words with the ghost of a smile.

From her recliner, Celestia scrutinised the unknown alicorn, perhaps the strangest arrival she’d seen today. There was a stiffness to Galatea’s bearing which she could not place. Haughtiness, or detachment?

Celestia spoke carefully. “I, for one, would like to know how you bypassed the wards set around the Palace. It was my belief only Discord could do so.”

“I came in as a mere worker,” Galatea remarked. “Nought but an earthpony. I thought you might be familiar with alicorns adopting a guise of a little pony, ‘Sunny Skies.’”

Jolted to hear that name, Celestia followed Galatea’s gaze towards the nearest bookshelf. Sure enough, standing upright there was the latest edition of The Rainbow Crow, adapted by famed pegasus writer Sunny Skies – her magenta eyes and alabaster coat casting her as a near match for the great alicorn who resided in this Palace, other than her lush pink mane and lack of horn.

“... You’ve read my works, then,” Celestia replied, returning her gaze to Galatea.

“Of course. They are simply marvellous,” Galatea said earnestly. “A welcome read for all ages, no matter the gripes of a scant few critics. Mine duty requires me to see into many places and unearth many secrets. Some darker than others. Any respite is quite welcome.”

Celestia nodded, but still she felt that nagging wariness.

“May I... offer you a drink, at least?” she asked Galatea. She motioned to the nearby cabinet. “I know a weary traveller when I see one. I can provide berry nectar, or rosewine.”

“Oh, nothing too fancy. I am accustomed to living frugally,” Galatea replied. “But, given the occasion, I’d be prepared to grant the indulgence. I’ll grant you the choice of refreshment.”

A decanter of rosewine stood at the ready on the coffee-table, as well as several cups. Celestia picked two of them up and poured the liquor from the decanter. With that done, one of the cups levitated towards Galatea, the aura around it turning from gold to grey as Galatea accepted the drink wordlessly.

“I do not understand.” Celestia took a sip. “How can you be our sister? Why were you not raised alongside us?”

Galatea said nothing to that at first. She was staring down at the cup, almost inquisitive. Then, she took a long sip from it. “This is fine wine,” she remarked. “Thank you.”

She turned her gaze away, towards the fireplace. Its flames were reflected upon her eyes.

“Now… Because it was not meant to be, I suppose. I was already grown when you were revealed to ponykind. Released from stasis early, to observe and to catalogue.”

“You sound so sure of that.”

“Of course,” said Galatea. “For the longest time, it was the only truth revealed to me.”

Shaking her head at this, Celestia narrowed her eyes, preparing for the worst. “No. How do I know this isn’t some trick?”

Galatea’s head swivelled to face her. She frowned. “Does it feel like a trick, Sister?”

Celestia shook her head. “Do not call me that,” she said firmly, though she spilled a couple drops from her cup. “We are not sisters.”

“But we are. You, me, the Keeper of the Moon, we were created together,” Galatea asserted, her voice steady. “Made by Lady Sunflare, from the same magicks, custom-designed to fulfill a role, a great many years ago. Born into a world on the brink of death, a shell of its former self experiencing painful rebirth. Our place was to leave a positive impact on this world, to guide, to serve, or indeed, to rule as we thought necessary.”

Her voice rang with the conviction of age, and Celestia heard it.

“The sole genuine difference between you and I,” Galatea finished, “is that I am no Princess, nor do I expect to be received as one.” She patted her folded-up cloak, a coarse, threadbare and patchwork garment. “I’m a nomad, Celestia, with no more material wealth than a pauper. The riches of knowledge are the only prize I care for a prize . They are as eternal as I am unbroken against a mountain.”

She took another long sip, gazing at Celestia above the rim.

“They asked us…” Celestia said quietly. “Asked us to serve as the living bedrock of their newly-minted nation. So we did. After we left our old home in the Forest, they opted to have our new home built atop a mountain at the heart of Equestria, so we could survey the whole land. They made it the size of a palace, so we’d have a grand space in which to store the memories of ages.”

As Galatea said nothing, Celestia swilled her drink, losing herself further in the past.

“Even so, we hesitated,” she whispered. “Carriers of the Sun and Moon though we were, truly, what righteous claim did that give us, to be regents, queens, empresses? Yet they insisted that we’d be their best guides. Then it came to us… Or rather, to Luna. The idea hit her in a flash. We’d been raised as the Reindeer King’s ‘little princesses’. Thus, princesses we would be. And under Starswirl and Mistmane’s guidance, we flourished.”

“Yes,” Galatea nodded. “I know. I watched.”

A silence fell, broken up solely by the crackle of the flames. Memories danced behind Celestia’s fog of ages. Memories of two little fillies who’d been taught to rule, to nurture and lead. A nation standing tall against trial after trial…

Failure after failure. Luna’s daughters, lost to war and disease. A realm, once thought to herald a shining new age of crystal, lost to the Dark King’s wrath. And a burning garden, torn asunder by the very mare who had grown it, so consumed in jealousy and hatred and grief was she.

All the while the grey mare before her stood by, and did nothing.

“When Luna…” Celestia stammered, shaking her head again, “how could you...?”

Galatea looked at Celestia, the weariness in her eyes all the more evident. She sighed. “I’m sorry. Only if you too were to have failed, would I have stepped forward and intervene.”

“And so she was banished, while you watched,” Celestia said lowly, a hint of bitterness and regret seeping through. “You, who claim to be our sister.”

“Did I have the right, Celestia?” Galatea said. “Did I have the right, to step forth and claim to be your sister… to replace Luna? No. I did not.”

She shook her head, before Celestia could muster a reply.

“I watched you, observed you,” Galatea reaffirmed stiffly, as if reciting. “That was mine role. Such as it was when you first saw that spectre at the Adlaborn grove, the ferrymare of Vanhoover, or the young worker who applied for an opening at Canterlot Palace. Such has it always been.”

“So many times, the world has been in peril,” Celestia said, her tone growing harsher. “And never before have you stepped forward to reveal yourself. So why now?”

“... You know why,” Galatea intoned, yet melancholy still permeated her voice. “You have sent forth summons to the entire world, asking that they step forward as witnesses. Because now… now, it is not merely one world that is threatened. And if you proceed, it will be more than two.”

“I will not change my decision,” Celestia said, shaking away thoughts of broken families and shattered bonds. “I shall not stand idly by as Alexander Reiner’s world suffers.”

“I know,” Galatea continued. The corners of her lips twitched. “I am not attempting to dissuade you. How could I ever? I am merely informing you of the risk. Because you must know what I have seen.”

Celestia found herself staring. “... What you have seen?”

“Yes. In my dreams, I can, if need be, know what is perceived by other instances of mine self,” Galatea said. “I have never felt the need to, but that has changed. The Equestria that menaces the world of this human…”

Not for the first time, Celestia saw a flash of emotion on Galatea’s face. But this one rippled throughout the whole of her body.

A surge of fear.

“This… this aberration, it seeks to impose its malformed vision of Order, not Harmony, on humanity. And it will not stop there.”

She looked downwards, her horn glowing. The colours at the edge of Celestia’s vision blurred, the room seemed to somehow shift sideways…

And then, there Celestia and Galatea were, standing over a burning forest.

Now, witness this.

~ The Lonely Eye ~

The grey alicorn stood alone atop the mountain, unmoving, her eyes watching the burning forest. Ash and soot stretched as far as her goggle-covered eyes could see, embers mingling with the falling snow.

Your desire to provide for your people, perverted into a will to further their well-being above all. Harmony, unity, and prosperity for them. No-one else.

Adlaborn, the home of the Reindeer, was ablaze. The bodies of its people lay slain. Rick, cot and tree, all burning, all laid waste, without mercy, without hesitation. The Guardian of Joy was gone, the mountain where he and his family resided reduced to rubble. War had descended upon Equus, instigated by the Stewardess of the Sun. She whose role was supposedly one of peace…

And Luna was nowhere to be found.

Built on the backs of those who’d inconvenience you. Dark desires, cloaked in the tatters of virtues. Healing? Kindness to the destitute? Pretty words, believed in by many, but which make fools of them all. There is no honesty, only intrusion, into the souls of all who’d be your subjects. Their bravery squandered in futility, their loyalty become slavish devotion. Oh, there is hope, yes... Your people have strong hearts! But there are few true smiles. The promised beauty they look towards is delusional. A poisoned gift, and not just for humans. This is what the magic of Equestria is reduced to.

‘This was not meant to be,’ Galatea thought. If her face could have been seen, one would have seen a deep frown of consternation. ‘This was not the way things were intended.’

This. This is power. Power for its own sake.

‘Something has changed,’ Galatea surmised, still surveying the burning forest with a harsh glare from beneath her protective goggles. ‘I sense it in the earth.’ Her eyes widened almost imperceptibly. ‘This… this is wrong.’

She felt the ash stir beneath her hooves, and the wind carried loose ashes, far and above, into the swirling clouds.

There had been life here, once. It flourished as it should, as it was meant to be. Laughter and joy and gifts to be shared to the world.

Now there was nothing. Nothing left of the very same realm where she had found her purpose so long ago.

She breathed in, her decision made in an instant. Too long had she stood by as the world changed. Now, Harmony had been replaced with disorder, peace with war, and loving guidance with brutal tyranny.

‘I have to go back. Back to where it all started.’

Adlaborn melted away, and there they were, back in Celestia’s private chambers.

“How, exactly, do you know so much?” Celestia demanded, this pressing question momentarily overriding all else. “More importantly, what don’t you know? You describe yourself as a watcher, an observer. But I’ve only ever heard of one being who possessed the Sight to watch over our world, and that is Sint Erklass.”

Something about this actually made Galatea smirk. A tiny one, but a smirk nonetheless.

“You may be taken aback at how many observers there are in this world,” she commented. “Few who can see the big picture, yet plenty who walk beneath notice. Your inquiry is legitimate, as is your curiosity about the extent of mine abilities. No, I have no Sight, it is true. Merely an excellent memory, like yours and Luna’s. Whereas I look with the mind, your grandfather sees purely with the heart.”

Galatea sniffed, taking another sip.

“I know not how he does it,” she said absently, looking into her now empty cup intently. “Nevertheless, Sister, we three who were cut from the same cloth, we all possess this latent connection. It is simply that who we are shaped to be determines what insights it may grant us. You know of what I speak.”

The statement gave Celestia pause, as she considered the strange alicorn before her.

“At the door…” Celestia began with trepidation. “When you introduced yourself. You said that you were the Scribe…”

“... Of the Stardust,” Galatea finished and nodded, setting her cup on the coffee table. “That is correct. And this is how, in return for your help, I can help you too.”

“Stardust…” Celestia said, rolling the word off her tongue. In that briefest of instants, her mistrust and apprehension were replaced by a real wonder. “Qualia made ethereal. The building block of sapient existence. You can see it?”

“I document it,” Galatea gently remarked. “All of the ebbs and flows.”

Celestia considered the grey mare who, until half an hour ago, she'd known only as a worker.

“What sort of life have you led?” Celestia wondered. “And to what end?”

The hesitance which suddenly overtook Galatea came as a surprise to Celestia. Her face remained impassive, but for a split second, Celestia thought she saw regret pass by.

“Galatea?” Celestia asked again, allowing a touch of concern.

“... I do not understand the question,” Galatea said at last.

Flat. Inexpressive. Yet so evasive. Like so many students of hers caught cheating.

Celestia shot a quick glance at The Rainbow Crow, still proudly displayed on her bookshelf. Her thoughts were scattered here and there, but she allowed them to coalesce after a moment.

‘What use is a children’s book, Galatea, for someone like you?’

Still. No use pressing. She left the matter unsaid.

“Then I must return to what I asked before,” Celestia said, measuring her words. “While lacking on details, your explanation of your abilities tells me how you can be so aware. Yet it still doesn’t answer why the peril of two worlds, or three, should matter to you any more than one.”

“Because one of those worlds is a world of Equestria,” Galatea said simply. “Another Equestria, gone dreadfully wrong.” She leaned forward. “A damaged Equestria, in which there are no more alicorns who’ll stem the rot… not even me. Except that, prior to mine death, I did not let mine self down. All has been done to the end of repairing that damage.”

A chill crept over Celestia. “Your death? If you speak of your other self, who surely must have existed in a parallel world, you speak of dying with such ease… and as if it were you.”

“The veil opened to me, Celestia,” Galatea said, a little too calmly. “Mine reality itself turned crystalline, mine eyes staring through refractions. Centuries had I pursued mine documentation, tirelessly and faithfully, yet all was changed as, for a tenth of a tenth of a second, mine being was one with the third alicorn of the trinity, the Galatea of that alternate world. And I no longer observed. I experienced... Then the other ‘me’ brought me to face something.”

“And what was…” Celestia said slowly, “that ‘something’?”

“Pain.”

Not taking her eyes off her, Celestia sipped from her cup. “Pain?”

“The pain of a world’s soul,” Galatea said, barely above a whisper. “And it is not Earth of which I speak. The corruption digs deeper still into the foundations of Equestria. Its rot even spreads, now, to the roots of the Tree of Harmony, which feels the loss of its sister tree in the North.”

The ears on both sides of Celestia’s head twitched.

“What?” she whispered. “The Tree Atop The World… is lost?”

Galatea nodded. “Yes,” she said gravely. “Did the human not tell you?”

A thought crossed Celestia’s mind, that her strange visitor had still not explained her connection to the human. That she knew of him came as no surprise. Yet it still made her blood run cold to hear Galatea speak the word.

“Alexander Reiner has told me some of what’s happened,” Celestia said quietly.

“He didn’t tell you all of it,” Galatea pointed out. “He told you Equestria is waging war with his world, assimilating his people, but there were many things he either took for granted, neglected to tell you, or was unaware of. The harmony you spent millennia constructing, the balance, the soul of an Equestria worth protecting. All of it has been destroyed, perhaps never to recover. Madness has taken hold of your other self.”

“That, I have understood, in part.” Celestia frowned. “What else, though?”

Galatea’s lips twisted into a smile.

“You didn’t think humans would have no allies,” she said, walking to the coffee-table, “other than those amongst your people who were inspired by a little green unicorn’s kindness? Or that your world would stand by as Equestria spreads the curse of living death? No. I should not be surprised. I expect the human will have told his unicorn friend, before he’d tell you. After all, why would he say anything to you...”

As she poured herself some more rosewine, Celestia moved closer to consult her.

“The corrosion of Equestria goes beyond a betrayal of its spirit,” Galatea said, lifting the cup without drinking. “Whatever it is that has befallen you, it won’t stop at ignoring the tenets of Harmony. It behaves with active hostility, an enemy to all life, with just enough cunning to make willing servants out of poor and desperate souls, who believe it’ll reforge the world for their lot’s betterment. And when it encounters those it cannot buy, or deceive…”

Her eye glinted in the firelight.

“It destroys them.”

It was then that Celestia caught onto her meaning. “Grandfather Sint… you say he is dead.”

“Regrettably,” Galatea said bluntly, yet not unkindly. “Nothing remains of the Tree Atop The World nor the mountain it crowned, not even a burnt-out husk. This was the catalyst, Sister. This was the event Galatea witnessed, and the shock it sent through her system… wrought a change in her.”

Though she hid it, the news had also brought a shock to Celestia. To think that Sint Erklass, Bringer of Gifts, the one who’d raised her and her sister – her true sister, not this eerie, unknown clairvoyant – could be dead. The magnitude felt inconceivable. He, who had lived longer than anyone she knew.

Or almost anyone. And now an awful suspicion filled her chest.

“You saw I met with Discord,” Celestia began slowly. “He’d just returned from an important mission. One of those times I judged it better to set a monster upon a monster. After everything you’ve told me, I find the timing too good to be mere coincidence.”

“Coincidence is anathema to me, not when I’ve seen a thousand lifetimes unfold,” Galatea said. “I know you were pre-emptive. You sent Lord Discord on a mission to subdue an evil made feeble with deprivation, yet still mightier than himself, lest its blight should spread anew. You did right to act swiftly. These evils are like weeds in the garden. No matter how much you purge, they will find a way to choke you.”

“Discord acquitted himself on this mission,” Celestia acknowledged. “I admit, I had a lingering doubt as to his trustworthiness...”

Galatea kept her flinty gaze locked on Celestia. “So, he did not betray you.”

“How fortunate for me,” Celestia said. “Had he failed, or been led astray… while the Elements of Harmony might have prevailed, I shudder to imagine the damage Equestria could have suffered.” She paused, drank, let the contents slosh in her throat. “And now… now, I feel a fear, fear I may no longer have to imagine that prospect…”

“Celestia,” said Galatea. “If I read you correctly, your suspicions are sound. Yet I must put them on hold. Mine theory is that, whichever malign force rules the other Equestria, it is not Father Krampus.”

Even the sound of the name bore on Celestia, as she blinked in surprise.

“Who else could it be?” she asked. “Who else could hate Sint Erklass that much, and dare to challenge him? How can you be certain?”

“Because in that world, the Krampus is more than locked in a crystal within Zamok Ustyag. It is obliterated. As dead as nearly all of the great players who stood in Celestia’s way.”

Celestia digested this information. Verily, today had been a long day of learning.

“Yes...” Celestia mused, contemplating her cup. “It and Sint Erklass shares an aeons-old rivalry… But, inscrutable and fearsome as its motives are, the single thing it’d never do is murder him…”

“How curious should it be, that the Bringer of Joy’s oldest enemy, in some regards, is also his oldest friend.”

“But then,” Celestia stared at her, “if this isn’t the Krampus’ doing, would you know of another potential culprit?”

“Alas, I do not,” Galatea replied, shaking her head. “Yet I hope that I might find some answers of mine own. If you’ll help me, I can help you,” she remarked, with a twinkle in her eyes. “Once I meet Alexander Reiner.”

* * * * *

It was while Twilight was brushing up on theoretical physics that the other shoe dropped.

“C’mon, Twilight,” Dash moaned, catching her attention. Never the most scholarly or patient of mares, Rainbow Dash was staring up blearily from a book she’d hardly leafed through. “Look outside, the Sun’s setting already. We’ve been at this for hours, we’re not gonna get any closer by keeping up at it all night.”

Ears twitching, Rarity peered out between the curtains. “Sunset? I do believe it’s barely five o’clock, dear Dashie. It just looks like sundown because we’re inside a gloomy library, and there’s a thick cloud blocking the Sun.”

“Well, it feels like it should be nighttime!” Dash complained, wings flaring as she slammed the book shut, startling Pinkie. “We’ve been up since before dawn, had a chat with a completely unknown creature that looked at us with this complete hatred, went into his mind and saw his nightmares, then learned there’s this universe full of evil usses attacking everyone else, then we hardly got to process it all before making the whole boring train ride to Canterlot straight afterwards... now on top of that, we’re stuck at the library! Isn’t that what you’d call a long day? I’m knack–Oompf!”

A harried Fluttershy had been quick to cover Dash’s mouth.

“Not so loud, please, Rainbow,” she whispered urgently, looking around to the stares they were drawing from other tables. But she followed it up by timidly addressing Twilight, as she lowered her hoof away from Dash. “Um, Twilight? She does have a point. We’ve all had to take in so much, in so little time. I’m not sure reading is going to help.”

“On the contrary,” Twilight said brightly, still absorbed in her tome. Too brightly, if she was honest with herself. “Reading’s by far the best way to sift through an information overload. It helps stretch the mind.”

“The only thing it’s helping me stretch are my jaw-muscles,” Dash said, yawning theatrically. “Can’t we give it a rest today? I thought you said you’d be taking us to your parents’ place. There’s this one book I am really excited to read, and it’s your Mom who’s got it.”

Only Rainbow Dash mentioning a book could have made Twilight gaze up from her own book at that moment, which she did.

“Mother’s been working overtime this week,” Twilight said, “and she’d keep all her spare copies at the office. Besides, if she got my message yesterday morning, she must’ve had time to send your copy later on. It’s probably arrived in Ponyville by now.”

“What!” Groaning, Dash let her face slump onto the table. “You gotta be kidding me! I was… I was just there…”

As Twilight wondered how she could reassure Dash, she felt a tug at her tail. Spike, who’d been squatting by her seat with his nose in a comic, was holding it rolled-up in one claw and looking at her impatiently.

“Rainbow Dash is right,” Spike said. “You guys don’t look like you’re getting anywhere, and I’ve read the same issue of Colonel Spark three times in one hour. I know you’re trying to take a weight off by diving into a book, that’s just your thing, but it’s not working. You gonna tell us what’s really going on?”

Seeing his chubby-cheeked face and green eyes, reptilian slits yet so innocently wide, Twilight stifled a sigh. In the end, when they’d got to Canterlot, she’d chickened out. Instead of explaining matters to Spike, she’d headed straight to Headmaster Nexus with the sketch of Reiner’s runes. Spike barely even knew there was a human around, let alone the rest of it.

But there was more to it than that.

“Spike,” she told him, as Peewee came to perch on his shoulder, to a disapproving glare from the librarian. “I… I’m sorry. It’s just there are big things happening, which are really hard to talk about.”

“Like what?” Spike asked. “I mean, if evil stuff’s going down, not like it’s our first time dealing with it, right?”

How could she tell him? In the human’s dreams, she’d seen Shining Armor, her brother, do the unspeakable. And if Cadance was now her sister, Spike had been like a second brother to her for years. She had no clue what he’d become in the parallel world.

Reiner had said Cadance, at least, was alive and on his side. But how many others from Equestria, friends, family, good people, had done to humans what Shining had done? Just the thought made her head pound...

She closed her book.

“Okay, you have a point. Time to call it a day, girls,” Twilight told her friends. “Wasn’t expecting all that much to come from this, anyway. The real research ought to begin tomorrow, in the Canterlot Archives. This was just some light reading to get us in the mood.”

“You call this light reading?” Dash spat indignantly.

“Well admittedly, it could’ve been more relaxing,” Twilight conceded, collecting books from Pinkie, Rarity, and Fluttershy. “Sorry about that.”

“Here, I’ll help ya, sugarcube,” said Applejack, rising from her seat. “Load me up.”

“‘Canterlot Archives’?” Pinkie asked, grinning. “Isn’t that where we went last time something like this happened? Whatcha’ planning, Twi’? Think there’s a spell which can make us go back and stop all the bad stuff from ever-ever-ever happening?”

“Even if there were, I wouldn’t dare use it,” replied Twilight, busily placing a pile of books on Applejack’s sturdy back. “Starswirl himself never did master the art of time-travel. And he hypothesised that trying to change the past to your advantage is a doomed cause. Somehow, the cosmos will make you pay for messing with it...”

Spike snorted. “Sure made me pay for eating too much ice-cream one day, thinking I wouldn’t suffer the next. Feels like I’ve paid for it ever since.” He thumbed at Dash, glowering. “Isn’t it funny how this is, like, the second time we’ve had a time-travel crisis, and my ice-cream tower got knocked over by somepony desperate to fetch her new book.”

“Hey, it’s Daring Do!” Dash shot back, forehooves folded. “Don’t mess with the classics.”

Twilight noticed Rarity eyeing her. “What is it?”

“You seem unsure, darling.”

“Well.” Twilight pondered. “Today, we’ve just been given proof we live in a multiverse. This is one of the greatest scientific breakthroughs of our time...” Dejected, she plonked the last book onto Applejack. “But only because something evil, something far more awful than anything we’ve faced before, has messed the balance. And, unless the Princesses can sort something out, it means we’ll be going to war.”

Another of those awful silences reigned as her words sank in.

“War?” asked Spike in a small voice.

Rarity straddled over to stroke his forehead. “Shh, Spike. We’re going to give you answers. Won’t we, Twilight?”

“Sure,” Twilight answered wearily. “But first, to return these books. Applejack, if you please.”

The distance from their reading-table to the counter was barely ten yards. Twilight set off, Applejack following her lead. It was just a step away, and had they taken it any other time, they’d have thought no more of it.

Except the cosmos, it seemed, wasn’t done with curious encounters over these two days.

There was a mare waiting at the ‘Borrow’ end of the counter, her back to the room. Twilight, focused on the ‘Return’ section, took little notice of her. She supposed, vaguely, that the mare looked familiar, but this was only natural. Canterlot was her home city, and like everyone else, she’d have fleeting moments of recognition upon return.

So at first, while unloading books on the counter, she didn’t spare the mare a second glance. Then the assistant librarian asked the mare – the archetypical bookworm, going by her oversized glasses and frayed sweater, if her huge pile of books weren’t clue enough – whether that’d be all, and the mare answered.

“Yes.”

Twilight couldn’t help it. Recognising the voice, she jerked her head to see its owner.

Said mare, evidently an old hoof at sorting books, had been rapidly and efficiently packing the pile into her saddlebags. But Twilight’s abrupt movement must have caught her eye, because she halted, one book left afloat in her aura, and their gazes met, the mare’s magnified by the width of her glasses.

The book clattered to the floor with a resounding ‘thump’, nearly causing Twilight’s heart to leap up her throat.

A bewildered Applejack was staring at her, and so her remaining friends must have been, but Twilight only saw the mare.

“Moondancer?”

The mare blinked, but said nothing. Then, with a strangled noise of distaste, she picked up the book, stuffing it rather violently into her bag, and turned tail, shouldering the bags with a ‘flick’ of dismissal.

The whole thing had gone by so quickly. Twilight was left standing in shock, motionless, until Applejack prodded her shoulder. She looked around. Applejack and the others had gathered in a huddle by her, all of them utterly dumbfounded.

“Uhh, who’s she?” Applejack asked, frowning. “Have we met her?”

“It’s… it’s nothing,” Twilight said, realising how unconvincing she sounded. “Come on. We’ve been hanging around here long enough.”

Without awaiting a reply, she strode for the doors, feeling their gazes boring into her. This only made her pace quicken. The sunshine of a Summer afternoon flooded the entrance as Twilight pulled the doors wide open – apparently, the cloud cover had been short-lived – and left the building, glad for the fresh air.

Behind her, five Element Bearers trotted on, looking askance at a little dragon.

“Spike?” Fluttershy whispered. “What was that all about?”

“Ooh, boy,” said Spike, rubbing his forehead. “Where to begin, unpacking this one...”

* * * * *

Strange, but Luna was unsure how she felt, about this custom remaining unchanged in her thousand-year absence. Forgiveness and atonement, a new chance given to many, this was the side of Equestrian justice most were familiar with. Yet, for all that, it had its harsher side, Luna knew, as she silently pored over the logbook, commiting to memory the names of creatures in every shape and size, creatures now committed as residents of Erebus.

“What do you make of it, Your Highness?” asked the Warden.

Luna looked up at the rakishly-thin, black-eyed thestral, thinking. In a way, she’d been lucky. The same Moon she regarded as a second home had been chosen as her place of exile. Except, for one who held such power as she, no pardon could be negotiated. No restitution, other than her repentance.

“It’s going to be the same old mess, if people are the same as in my day,” Luna sighed, clapping the logbook shut. “No-one, least of all those who move in high circles, will do anything for free. Never mind the stakes, the fate of a whole world hanging in the balance. They will want their return investment.”

“Aye,” the Warden nodded somberly. Or more somberly than usual. “And never mind how many we’ve got downstairs who deserve where they are. Petty warlocks, vile sorcerers and enchanters, necromancers…” She scowled. “None of it matters. Oh, no, please Celestia, they’re kinfolk, and we want ‘em back. So what if they dabbled in dark arts, not caring who got caught in the crossfire? Who’re you to pass judgement on a free and seductive zebra, or a proud, mighty Kirin?”

“Yes… there is no beating around the bush. This will be tough, Diane,” Luna reflected. “Especially that business of the Saddle Mareabian Court Sorcerer in the Fourth Circle.”

“Please, Highness,” said the Warden, leaning on the desk. “Call me Di. And, aye, I agree, we can expect that matter to be top of the Malikah’s demands.” She, too, sighed. “To hear them whine, you’d think we grant ponies special favours.”

“That reminds me,” said Luna. “It has been, what, four weeks since the formal sentencing over the Alicorn Amulet? How is our little convicted felon holding up?”

“You mean the mare with an ego the size of the Moon?” The Warden chuckled genially. “It’s working out better than we might’ve feared. Got off to a rough start, of course, but Miss Lulamoon’s been coping well. Now I think of it, guard reports say they’ve seen her mingle with the Mikado’s personal student… Oh, and with the handsome Saddle Mareabian fellow, too. Isn’t that cute?”

Luna smiled wanly. “Thank you for your time. You may resume your duties, Di.”

The Warden saluted with her wing, and turned to clamber up the steps of the amphitheatre. Luna watched Diane enter the ethereal gateway. It shone, the shimmer of orange turned the planetary models, as viewed from Luna’s desk, into silhouettes, then the Warden was gone.

“Impressive work, Sister,” spoke a richly-accented voice, not unlike a Reindeer’s. “But you’ll be dealing with works more intricate and sophisticated, in these approaching days.”

Surprised, Luna turned. Celestia was standing in the side-entrance. And by her side was the one who must have spoken. Luna could scarce believe her eyes as she saw what could only have been a ghost.

“Luna,” Celestia said. “I’d like to introduce you to someone.”

* * * * *

“No,” said Spike. “I don’t think any of you guys have met Moondancer. It’s not like Twilight’s been to see her Canterlot friends in three years...”

“What’s this?” Dash gasped. “First, Twi’ has a brother we’d never heard about. Now you’re telling us she used to have friends?”

“Rainbow Dash!” Applejack said sharply, glancing in Twilight’s direction.

Twilight was trotting a good few yards ahead of them, her step listless as she made her way through the street. Even though she was the one guiding them to her parents’ place, she did not look like a leading person, just then. Her ears were droopy, her mane limp. She looked different than when, in her desperation to write a friendship report, she’d accidentally cast a ‘want-it-need-it’ spell to turn everyone mad with jealousy, but this was still the worst they’d seen her look since.

At least she didn’t appear to have heard them.

“It’s okay, Applejack,” Spike said. “I’m sure if you asked Twilight right now, she wouldn’t believe it either.”

“That don’t make it right, Spike,” Applejack chided. “No good ever came from whippin’ yerself when y’all carryin’ more than ya can bear. Ah’ve had to learn that lesson myself.”

“Twilight feels things deeply,” Spike reminded her. “She tries to hide it, to look like the calm responsible leader, but it’s true. Even if she’d ask you for a chart of her dopamine levels or whatever to prove she’s getting worked up.”

“More of an adrenaline fan, personally,” Dash said smartly.

Spike nodded, which was somewhat ruffling for Peewee, still perched on his shoulder.

“Oh, sorry,” Spike told the squawking phoenix chick, tickling its chin calmingly. “So, you see,” he explained, “that’s why Twilight, way she used to be, she wouldn’t have grasped that she had friends, not unless someone pointed it out to her in a book. But she did. In those days, as far as friends went for Twilight, they were the best of friends amongst ponies her age. Her, Lyra and Moondancer.”

“Best of friends?” Pinkie echoed, her indomitable grin on display. “Here, in Canterlot? They must’ve had the most super-dooper-fancy-schmancy parties!”

“I’m inclined to agree, darling,” Rarity said, smiling despite herself. “Acquaintanceship with Sir Fancypants and his crowd has proven not all parties are as awful as the Gala...” Her face scrunched up. “Or all the attendees as uncouth, unlike certain princes I could mention.”

“Yeah, about that...” Spike said, his voice caught in his throat. “See, Moondancer was a lot like Twilight. Spent her whole life with her snout stuck in a book. Lyra was the one who’d make them get out more, well, I suppose I helped a little bit, but you know, I’m just Twilight’s Number One Assistant…”

Dash glanced back the way they’d came, to the library. “Wha– what happened? She looked mighty upset then. What’d she do?”

“Well…” Spike sighed. “One day, Moondancer decided she wanted to try something new. Have a party.”

Surprisingly, while Pinkie hadn’t exactly turned grey, she no longer wore an ear-to-ear grin. She’d also stopped bouncing along the cobblestones.

“What’s wrong, Pinkie?” Applejack asked. “Thought you’d be happy to hear about that.”

“Well… I would, but I’m guessing it didn’t go well,” Pinkie said in a small voice, “did it, Spike?”

“I dunno,” Spike shrugged. “I missed it. Because Twilight missed it. Said we didn’t have time for that, even though we were on a break.”

“That’s… quite rude,” Rarity admitted. “But you’ve always been Twilight’s voice of reason, Spikey. If she played truant on a party she’d been invited to, didn’t you go and explain?”

For once, Rarity’s praise didn’t lift Spike’s spirits. “I would have. But…” He hesitated. “Never got the chance. That was on the same Summer Sun Festival that Twilight found Nightmare Moon– er, Princess Luna, was coming back and she didn’t want any distractions, then Princess Celestia sent us to Ponyville, and I guess the rest is history.”

Hearing this, all five mares gave each other dismayed looks, stopping dead in their tracks.

“Twilight missed her good friend’s party?!” Pinkie gasped. “That’s terrible! I should throw a super-friendship-reunion party for the both of them! But I don’t know much about Moondancer. I’ll have to see what I can do…”

“Oh, my…” Applejack muttered. “Don’t it just feel like a kick to the face, bein’ told our friendship and rescuin’ Luna from the Nightmare ruined someone else’s friendship?”

“Please don’t blame yourself, Applejack,” Spike assured, turning to face them. “It’s like you said, no good comes from it. Take it from me, travelling to Ponyville, meeting you guys, it’s the best thing that ever happened to Twilight. Not to mention how you all saved the world.”

“Even so,” Applejack said, tipping her hat. “It stinks when somethin’ bad happens in order for somethin’ good to be accomplished. Like when ya’ve got to displace a family o’ field mice to plant the crops.”

“It isn’t the same, Applejack,” Rarity said gently. “Crops, field mice, they’re your responsibility. You couldn’t have known about a pony in Canterlot. None of us could.”

“Still one thing what happened because o’ the other…”

“C’mon,” Spike urged them, “we need to move. Can’t let Twilight stew all on her own. Her parent’s mansion is just at the end of the street, it isn’t far.”

“Figures, they’d raise her in a place close to a library...” commented Dash. “So, you’re saying that’s what’s going on, Spike? This mare, this Moondancer, Twilight didn’t show up at her party and she’s mad at Twilight because of that?”

“Sure looks like it,” Spike said unhappily, scratching his dorsal spikes. “It’ll have flown over Twilight’s brainy head, but the three of them, she and Lyra and Moondancer, they did practically everything together, best and brightest of Celestia’s School. When Lyra would get lazy again and leave her homework till’ the last minute, one of them would cover for her, just because they enjoyed the extra work, can you believe that?”

“What!” Pinkie exclaimed, “Twilight, who freaks out if she sheds one hair too many on her hard-written papers, enjoy doing a pony’s late work?”

“I mean, it kind of makes sense,” Dash said. “You’ve seen how obsessive she gets now and then, right?”

“And isn’t it fun to get into somepony else’s skin?” said Spike.

“That’s true,” Pinkie said thoughtfully. “Always did love a good cosplay… It’s what makes that ‘ponification serum’ sound like it could be cool if it weren’t so… horrible…” She trailed off. “You’ve been super quiet, Fluttershy,” she said, turning to address her friend on her right. “What d’you think, does somepony here need a party, or wh–” She abruptly stopped. “Wait a cotton-picking minute, weren’t you walking to my lef–”

“Ah,” said Fluttershy, in a disturbingly masculine, low-pitched voice. “You always were observant, weren’t you, Pinkie Pie?”

She raised a forehoof to the point below her mane and, with a sharp tug, the whole of her body got pulled off, falling in a heap on the cobblestones, eliciting gasps from the friends – save Twilight, too far ahead to notice – and even a few passers-by, as an asymmetric, mish-mashed figure, part equine and part dragon and many other parts revealed itself to them, drawing itself up to tower over the group.

“What? Discord!” Pinkie gaped. “Hey, that’s not fair, y– you hack, you! You stole my joke! And my stock of Fluttershy costumes!”

“Where’s Fluttershy!” Rarity demanded angrily, while Applejack and Dash glared at him. “What’d you do with her, you big brute?”

“Um, Rarity,” piped a meek voice. “I’m over here, at the back.”

Everyone’s head shot in the direction of the real Fluttershy, who, sure enough, was there, pawing the pavement nervously.

“Huh?” Dash’s eyes widened. “But– I just… how did I miss…”

“You need to get in with the times, Rainbow Dash,” Discord commented smugly, his arms folded. “Stop expecting things to make sense with me running free. Or gliding. And you, Pinkie! Isn’t this exactly the kind of Fluttershy emergency you’d keep spare costumes for?”

“That’s not an answer!”

“Yeah,” Rarity added angrily, “don’t you know anything about continuity?”

Even Discord was startled at what she’d said. “I beg your pardon?”

“S-sorry…” Rarity said, brushing a hoof through her coiffure. “That… that just slipped out. I’ve no idea what made me say that.”

“Well, whatever,” said Discord, shrugging.

Now they had a closer view of him, they noticed he wasn’t looking his halest. For one thing, he wasn’t, in fact, gliding as he often did. He was standing, even stooping, legs bent by an unseen weight, and he didn’t keep his arms folded for long. With a wheezing groan, Discord let one of his forelimbs, his paw, fly – not literally – to the side of his torso, clutching it in visible pain. And they saw why.

“My goodness, Discord,” Fluttershy said, stepping forward, fast. “Is it… caved in?”

“Oh, you noticed, did you?” Discord said sarcastically, his voice coming out in a rasp. “Yeah. There’s a smoking lung for you…”

For emphasis, he loosened his grip slightly, releasing a thin trail of smoke from the corners of the poultice he wore over a plainly fractured rib.

“You’re not kidding,” Dash said. “But what could possibly have done you in so bad?”

“Got into a street brawl,” was all Discord had to say, mopping his brow. “Mortal combat, you might call it, where the biggest adversary you face is some people’s chronic inability to spell ‘c’ instead of ‘k’, cos’ poor literacy is kewl...”

“Is this a reference?” Pinkie asked. “I feel like this is a reference.”

Dash glanced at the real Fluttershy. “Uh, Fluttershy, is this his usual brand of weird… or is he delirious?”

“Six-one, half-a-dozen the other, I’m thinking,” replied a concerned Fluttershy. “You’re here because you want a little TLC, right, Discord?”

“Dear Fluttershy, you always know what to say,” Discord grinned, his grin the crookedest of them all – not helped by the fact some of his teeth appeared to be broken or missing. Worryingly, they didn’t seem to be reverting back to normal. “As it is, Celestia was thoughtful enough to have this poultice prepared for me in the Palace Ward, but I could do with tea, wouldn’t you say? And cucumber sandwiches.”

Fluttershy was silent. She stared at her friends. Then at Discord. Then at her friends.

“Apologies, girls,” she said softly. “But I’ve got a creature in need of loving care here. I can’t ignore him out of the gate.”

While Rarity sighed, she looked comprehending. “You go on ahead, Fluttershy. Maybe it’s best you go with him. Can’t think of who else could bring him up-to-date the quickliest, without jumping through mad hoops, conversing with that fellow.”

“Do your thing, Flutters,” Pinkie nodded. Her eyes narrowed. “And then he and I can have a little chat afterwards about plagiarism, and stealing cosplay supplies!”

“Alright,” said Fluttershy, to the acquiescing nods of Dash and Applejack. “Be back as soon as I can, promise. Discord,” she said, reaching out to take his claw, “where are we going?”

“There’s this really good club I know,” said Discord. “I daresay it’ll spice up your life. Hm, pretty sure I saw a zebra dancer there’s who’s the spitting image of Zecora’s twin sister.”

A click of his paw, a flash, and without much ceremony, they’d disappeared off the street. Leaving a group now down to four mares, a dragon and a phoenix to stand there.

“Sweet Celestia,” Dash moaned, massaging her temples. “This is waayy too much for one day. What, are we still the Second of Rophon? Argh! I’m gonna go loopy if I don’t go fly a few laps, right away. Aw, heck, even that’s not gonna be enough for my head.” She turned to Spike. “Didn’t Twilight say her Mom kept all those books she edits at her office? So I can’t read them?”

“Um, yeah,” Spike said. “Why?”

Dash flexed her wings. “I’m sorry, guys. I gotta fly. There’s a copy waiting for me in the mail back home, and if at least I still get my Daring Do book before midnight, I’ll have pulled one silver lining outta the day.”

“Wait,” Rarity mumbled, a forehoof half-raised, “you’re going to make the flight all the way back to Ponyville?”

“Yeah. What, you think I can’t?” Dash grinned cockily. “It’s in a straight line as the crow flies, to say nothing of the dashing pegasus. I’m telling you, I’ll just pop back home and pick it right outta the mailbox. And nothing else is gonna get in my way!”

With that, before anyone had anything to add, she took off in a neat, vertical line, leaving a rainbow trail in her wake, and curved. Mere seconds later, a vibrant-coloured ring appeared beyond the rooftop-line of Canterlot, rapidly followed by a resounding boom.

Once more, Spike heaved a sigh. He petted Peewee comfortingly. The phoenix chick wasn’t the only one shaken by Dash’s theatrical departure, however. Around them, Canterlot residents were muttering, staring at where the commotion had come from. And a couple of the three remaining mares weren’t too pleased, either.

“Yikes,” Rarity grumbled, clutching an ear. “There should be a law, honestly…”

“Ah hope she’s not headed into more trouble…” Applejack grunted.

“Trouble? Rainbow?” Pinkie said innocently. “You think?”

“Well, we’ve had enough dilly-daddling,” Spike told them. “Now we gotta catch up with Twilight, and explain why two of her friends shall be late for dinner tonight…”

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

It made Lyra want to cry inside, to see how blearily Alex stared back at her. In spite of the terrible revelations he’d made, the human’s presence was still as wondrous to her as ever. But considering how, ever since he’d opened up to her about his life’s story, the afternoon had been one continuous process of him falling in and out of consciousness, coming awake for brief, faltering intervals, she found herself slowly giving up on asking him questions, about his world or his life. All that seemed to matter was his grief.

The pages of Ponyland: Fact or Fable lay unfolded on her lap, a reminder of simpler times.

“How are your burns?” Lyra asked. “I mean, those necrotic patches?”

“Tis’ but a scratch,” Alex grimaced as he clutched his arm, apparently trying to grin. “I’ve had worse.”

Lyra smiled uneasily. “Not sure why, but that sounded like a joke.”

“It was meant to be,” Alex said, chuckling, coughing. “Heh. It’s nice, really, that you’re a Lyra who still gets it, even though you’ve got no context for it at all.”

“I feel there’s a lot I’m missing out on,” Lyra said, turning a page. “Probably because I am. But, I used to think I’d find all the answers, you know? As if, just look hard enough, and you’ll be rewarded for it. Okay, Twilight’s always been the researcher, while me, well, I’m an over-imaginative filly in a mare’s body. Except she’s convinced things are meant to work a certain way, and hates being told any different. I like to believe all the rules can change at the drop of a hat.”

Alex chuckled again, a little more mirthfully. “Tell me about it, sister. When I was a boy, portals to other dimensions, parallel universes and rainbow-coloured critters were stuff of… heh, we could say experimenting with ‘illicit substances’. Or, sure, overimagination, let’s go with that.”

Something he’d said stuck in Lyra’s mind. “Illicit substances? You mean… drugs?”

“I’m a soldier, Lyra,” Alex said candidly. “In a mad world, sometimes, a little dose of madness you choose for yourself, is the only way to stay sane. Which reminds me, as you were asking about burns. Am I getting any real treatment soon, or is my chest gonna be minced hamburger for the rest of my days? Which may not be very long, at this rate...”

“Ham… burger?” Lyra repeated, tremulously. “As in… pig ham?”

Alex paused. “Yeah, pig ham,” he said. “Humans can eat pretty much anything not trash. Sometimes even that, depending on how bad things are. Just like pigs themselves, when you think about it... These last few years haven’t been easy…” He then trailed off when he noticed her expression. “You didn’t know?”

“I… I guess I never really thought about it,” Lyra replied, clutching her book a little tighter. “Didn’t you go over this with the other me? If you’d ask me, it should be one of the first things to talk about.”

“She’d already been on Earth for years when I met her,” Alex reminded her patiently. “She’d had time to acclimatise. All I really taught her was how to…” He hesitated. “Convince people to go and die, I suppose. Or how not to let things hurt you too much. Not while you’re in the thick of it, anyway.”

Lyra ran all this through her head. “It isn’t that I don’t know meat-eaters can be civilised, Alex,” she explained, trying not to sound offensive. “I mean, I’ve met griffons and... whatever you call those folks from Klugetown… um… maybe that’s not the best example. But you know what I mean. I… it’s just kinda hard for me to get completely used to that.”

“If it helps,” Alex said reassuringly, “we’re not purely carnivorous. We do eat fruits, vegetables, and grains as well. And there are people from my world who choose not to eat meat, or some kinds of meat. No flowers or hay, though.”

“I think that makes me feel a little better,” Lyra nodded. “What about you? Do you…?”

“Sorry, Lyra,” Alex replied, shrugging his shoulders. “Military diet. Although, funny story, as a kid, I was a bit of an oddball in Texas because I never had much of a taste for cow. As for pork, fish, and poultry… well, that’s another story.”

“I see,” said Lyra. “You know, I remember once asking Fluttershy how she does it. Dealing with animals eating each other. I mean, in her job as an animal caretaker, the guild, they teach you how to catch fish, or feed worms to birds.”

Her gaze drifted for a second.

“And she told me,” Lyra continued, “that the first thing they do is show you a movie. Apparently, some naturalist managed to film an otter catching a trout and sharing it with her babies, and as they eat it alive, the fish’s belly splits open, like, really wide and spills out a mess of shiny eggs, which the baby otters climb over to get to, and gobble it all up, like it was candy...”

“Mother and child dining on mother and child,” Alex commented. “Sounds about right.”

“Does it?” Lyra asked. “Does it to you? I’m not sure it does to me.”

“You really were too nice for your own good…” Alex sighed sadly, holding the back of his hand to his mouth. “It’s nature at work. It doesn’t hold itself to ‘civilised’ standards. If I’d ask Gardner,” he scowled, “my so-called mentor in the military, he’d say it’s deluding yourself, to think ‘life’ and ‘war’ are not one and the same.”

“That… that’s not Harmony.”

“No, it isn’t. Whatcha gonna do about it, kid?” he asked brusquely. “The Solar Empire’s whole spiel is how they want to change all of that. Look at what they’re replacing it with.”

Looking somber, he reached for the glass of water on his bedside table, and drank.

“You didn’t tell me much about them,” Lyra said. “I mean, I have some guesses, and I’m assuming that ‘secret police’ means exactly what it sounds like. But what are they replacing it with?”

Alex sighed. “Every pony goes through some bad times when they get Earthside,” he said. “Night terrors, some jackass asking why they get better food, a nice home and job in minutes of getting there, too many other things to mention. But they always stay.”

“Hey, uh, Alex?” Lyra asked, wanting to break the mood. “Speaking of, when was the last time you ate?” She picked up her bags and took out a daisy sandwich, showing it to him. “I’ve still got a sandwich left, but you…”

He gazed at her, set down the glass, and then surveyed the drip in his arm.

“Christ,” Alex muttered. “It had completely slipped my mind, what with me half-believing this was all a dream… but this IV isn’t gonna keep me sustained forever, is it.”

“Should we call the nurse?” Lyra suggested, getting off her chair. “If you say you can eat vegetables and fruits, I’m sure there’s got to be some in stock they can get you. And maybe even some eggs.”

“Thanks, Lyra,” Alex told her, hand moving towards the call button, “no need to stand up for my sake, I’ll take care of it.” As he pressed the button, he mulled over what he’d just said. “Hm. Imagine if I’d told that to Ambassador Heartstrings. Where would we be?”

With a weak chuckle, Lyra took a bite from her sandwich.

Not a minute later, the door opened, and Nurse Redheart came in. “What is your need, sir?” Redheart asked Alex, with a patient smile.

“Well, Nurse,” Alex said, straightening himself, “hate to bother you, but the thing is, I could do with some grub. I was hoping you might’ve something that’d agree with me.”

“Oh, I’m sure that shouldn’t be a problem...” Redheart began, before her eyes darted towards the floor. “Though it seems you were given some good stuff, and it went to waste. Drat, how’d I fail to notice the mess...”

Surprised, Lyra looked to the same place as Redheart. In the corner facing the window, covered in smashed-up glass pieces, a thick smear of red, crushed fruit still stained the floor.

“Ah, um, right, the strawberry jam,” Lyra mumbled. “Sorry ‘bout that.” Seeing that Redheart was peering at her questioningly, she elaborated, “Gift from Fluttershy, got broken.”

“Indeed?” Redheart asked, bemusedly. “How so?”

Lyra glanced at Alex, wondering how to explain. But, again, the human took it from there.

“There was a kerfuffle,” Alex said, one palm side-up. “My fault, I’m afraid. Two left hands. Not like strawberry was my favourite, anyway...”

“Okay,” Redheart said. She sounded doubtful, but did not press the issue. “I’ll have someone brought over to clean it up. And what might go down a treat with you, sir?”

Alex thought about it. “Potatoes are always a good place to start, in my line of work. If vegetables are what you’ve got, I’m partial to carrots and cauliflower. I’d ask for cheese, but well... I’m not about to push my luck on hospital food. Mind you... what wouldn’t I give for a nice quesadilla…”

“Noted,” said Redheart. “I’ll instruct the kitchen staff to send up a carrot stew, with mash. You know, it so happens, my shift’s just about done. Maybe I could pop into town and bring back something you’d like?”

“That’s sweet of you,” Alex said gratefully. “Lyra–” He briefly hesitated. “Lyra’s told me nice things about this town’s baked goods.”

Lyra, having said no such thing, felt acutely aware of who he was talking about. She considered Redheart, who’d taken out a notebook to jot down Alex’s requests. The nurse knew the human was from very far away, and a different sort of creature. What Redheart couldn’t know was this was his second time meeting ponies.

If Princess Celestia went ahead, her fellow Equestrians, ordinary people living out their lives like Redheart, would have to learn about the Empire. And what might that do them?

“There,” Redheart smiled, clapping the notebook shut. “Let’s see what can be arranged.”

“Thank you,” Lyra said softly. “Will you be back soon?”

Redheart was already heading out the door, but she turned.

“I’m counting on it, Miss Heartstrings.”

* * * * *

It was to Redheart’s mild amusement that, unlike the Imperial Guards of her Equestria – no, that wasn’t the right term, they’d still be known as ‘Royal’ at this time – these two pegasi were rather laid-back in watching the door to the human’s room, if the behaviour of the grey one was anything to go by.

“Heading into town, are we, Nurse?” he piped up as she closed the door behind her.

If that twinkle in his amber eyes was any clue, it was too easy for her to spot a young stallion eager to impress a mare. Indeed, his dirty-white-coated, uptight companion – a bookworm, no doubt, going by the cutie-mark printed on his uniform – could also be called guilty of not following protocol, going by the snatches of whispered chat she’d caught. Yet the nervous look in his icy-blue eyes hinted at a greater worry of being chewed out for unbecoming conduct than his friend.

She reflected that he’d have made a fine Imperial Guard. Even if the grey one’s flirtatiousness was rather more inviting.

Reiner could wait, and she could use the break.

“You guessed it, shift’s over,” Redheart said innocently, pausing. “Is… there a problem, sir?”

“Nothing, just wondering,” the grey pegasus chuckled. “Say, the name’s–”

“Icewind,” Redheart finished for him, to which his companion raised an eyebrow. “We’ve talked before, right?”

“Ah, right,” Icewind said, adjusting his helmet, a little bashful now. Redheart knew she wasn’t feeling done with him. “Pardon me, ma’am, just been a long day, is all.”

“Don’t you worry, it’s quite fine,” Redheart replied. “Hm. We get Guards around these parts every so often, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen you two here in Ponyville.”

“No, ma’am,” the white guard interjected. Which caused the grey one to eye him with what looked like a bit of jealousy. Quite amusing indeed. “But we were available on short notice this morning, and so the Princess had us called to escort her.”

“Since this morning? And you’ve been standing here this whole time? You poor lads,” Redheart said sympathetically. “Still, by nightfall, I expect Princess Luna will be sending a few thestrals to relieve you. Mind you…” she said, deliberately slow, looking at Icewind out the corner of her eye, “I imagine the night shift must feel just like a second afternoon, to well-built Vanhoover boys like you.”

The white guard merely huffed at this, but his grey friend drew himself up proudly, puffing out his chest.

“Ain’t that right,” Icewind told the white guard cheerfully. “When night gathers, that’s when the true watch begins, as they say back home.”

“Humph,” the white guard blew his cheeks, unimpressed. “I’d be more curious to know, ma’am, by what presumption you call us ‘boys’, and what assumption leads you to call us Vanhooverites.”

“Um, Winter, I just told her,” Icewind said, looking sheepish. Redheart felt sorry for him.

“No disrespect, soldier, but it’s plain as day you’re no grizzled veterans,” Redheart said. “Nor would I wish it upon you…” she added in a softer voice, too soft for them to hear. “But,” she resumed at indoor voice level, “let’s gather the facts, shall we? You’re both pegasi, one of you is named after ice, your coat colours have that arctic shading, and of course, there’s your unmistakeable accents.” Pause. “One with the Wind and Sky, gentlecolts.”

‘Winter’ blinked, recognising the pledge. “I… didn’t know you were in the Guard, ma’am.”

“Eighth Home Guard,” Redheart said, in that same, disciplined tone that had been taught by her old trainers. “Sorry, I forgot to mention it before.”

Icewind smiled broadly. “No offense taken, ma’am. If anything, I know he’d absolutely love it if you could entertain him with some veteran advice, hah! Unwinding here felt just right, eh?”

But Redheart’s attention wasn’t on him. She felt an odd sense of familiarity course around the one named Winter. Obviously, this stallion looked like many other pegasus guards, with his white coat, blue eyes, and grey tail-hairs, yet that overly serious air around him tugged at Redheart’s memories.

“Right you are,” Redheart replied, smiling. “On that note, what say I take you boys out for a night on the town, this very night? Sugarcube Corner’s evening service is always a treat.”

Icewind’s mouth fell agape at this unexpected straightforwardness, but true to form, Winter shook his head.

“No thank you, ma’am,” he said, firmly. Although, surprisingly, he wore a smirk. “I have my plans for tonight back in Canterlot… though Icewind doesn’t.”

“Classic Winter,” Icewind said, chuckling. “No, no I haven’t.”

His friend frowned in frustration. “You know very well it’s just for a spot of tea.”

“Of course it is, buddy,” Icewind retorted, and his own smirk grew wider still.

That tingling sense of familiarity kept tugging at Redheart, however. She cleared her throat. “Winter...” she repeated. “Ah, Winter Truce?”

“Pardon?” Winter said with a raised eyebrow, and it was now Icewind’s turn to look confused.

‘The Martyr of Volgograd…’

A nickname that emerged, unbidden, in Redheart’s thoughts, for she now knew what the white guard’s gaze reminded her of. A celebrated officer, made immortal by his brave actions to stall the enemy during their push into the heart of Volgograd, buying valuable time for the rest of the army and the Barrier. His company, a light airborne unit mostly comprised of pegasi, didn’t stand a chance to survive the onslaught at the height of the battle.

A martyr to the Queen, a sacrifice to the cause. Vanhoover Company died that day, but the Empire’s will had lived on.

She held her tongue. No need to confuse this future hero, this future martyr, with the formalities of an officer he’d never been, and hopefully might never be. Not like this.

“Ah, sorry,” she said. “Your reputation precedes you. Top of the class, I hear.”

“Well, what else can you expect,” Icewind snarked, “from a guy who uses books as weights for his barbells, eh?”

For the first time since she’d chatted with them, Redheart laughed heartily. “Oh, my,” she managed, wiping her eyes as her giggling wound down. “Aren’t you the funny one.”

The first time in, indeed, a long time.

“I have to be,” Icewind said earnestly, “because when it comes to that, with this guy, I’m the one pulling weight for two people.”

“Quiet, Icewind,” Winter said, but his tone was calm and he was smiling. “Ah, you can go have your break later on. I’ll cover for you then.”

Redheart observed the happy expression this elicited in Icewind, and she played along. “Brilliant.”

“Aye, ma’am,” Icewind replied proudly. “So, was it the bakery, you said?”

“Sugarcube Corner,” Redheart clarified, with a little wink. “Don’t be late, will you?”

“No, I certainly won’t. You have a nice walk, ma’am.”

“You too,” Redheart said. “I mean... you have a nice day.”

And so she left them, wandering the pristine hallway – a sinking feeling in her stomach. These two soldiers, or rather, their other selves, had served the Empire well. She knew this, but she also knew it was not them, not these untouched guards, who had fought, bled and nobly died. The evidence had been, literally, staring at her in the face.

What had the human told the people of this Equestria? What could he do to them? She couldn’t afford to wait much longer. The whole day had been spent scouting the area, meeting new people who were not new. The Guards, Twilight and her friends, Lyra Heartstrings, even Her Majesty Celestia...

The sedative she’d administered to her counterpart was powerful enough to knock out an elephant for a day. In theory. Experience had taught her that if anything could go wrong, it certainly could go wrong. Some instinct in her said she’d have to ensure her other self would not be woken early by snooping children, or the like.

Now, of course, there were a couple more things to do. Have the human’s meal delivered as promised, for starters. After that, she’d have to see this ‘other’ Ponyville for herself. Even if it gathered her no intel, her rest was far overdue.

And justice would come soon enough for Alexander Reiner.

* * * * *

Lyra wasn’t coming back soon, Bonbon had long decided, as she languidly folded and unfolded a sweet wrapper . And it wasn’t like any of them, bar Rarity, had even bothered keeping her updated with the peculiar going-ons in town, oh, no. Last she’d heard in gossip – from Dinky Doo, inevitably, who seemed to know everything – Twilight Sparkle and company had taken a train to Canterlot, while Lyra, sweet Lyra, stayed back at the hospital. She didn’t much like this feeling of being in the dark. Not when she was the one used to keeping her eccentric marefriend in the dark.

Bonbon glanced at the clock. Six-thirty. Half an hour before she’d be off work. Half an hour too long, especially regarding Lyra, of all ponies.

‘Darn it, Lyra,’ she thought, laying a hoof on the counter. ‘Wonder how busy Amethyst is at this time of day... Nah, she’s got her Dad to contend with. Must be serious, for her not to come in here with Dinky this afternoon. Whatever’s up with that family and ‘fourth-dimensional issues’, it’s obviously nothing to sneeze at.’

Yet while trans-dimensional babbling wasn’t her forte, Bonbon always felt quite proud of her work back in the agency. Monster-hunters, they had called themselves. But if word of what she did reached Lyra’s sensitive ears, Bonbon would have never heard the end of it.

Lyra, Lyra. Not the most sensitive to common gossip, thankfully, yet she made up for it in love for wild tales. Talk about living inside her own little world. Bonbon wasn’t about to forget how only last year, Lyra oh-so-casually continued drinking her soda without another care in the world as Twilight fought that amulet-boosted, trouble-making magician. A magician later arrested and thrown into Erebus, no less.

My, wasn’t Lyra just the selectively oblivious one.

Perhaps that was why she hadn’t returned. Maybe she had simply forgotten. No, not forgotten, even Lyra was not that forgetful. She really had the most remarkable memory for trivia. The enormous, red-lined spreadsheet that covered an entire wall of the living room was testament to that. As was the one time Bonbon had thought she could get away with ‘borrowing’ a pin off it for her needlework. She was convinced she’d replaced the pin very carefully afterwards, and yet, Lyra had spotted it’d been moved by one-and-a-third inches!

Lyra had spun an entire yarn about sneaking breezies and where socks went to in the wash, before Bonbon had stepped forward and confessed.

Her parents still wondered why she put up with Lyra. Frankly speaking, Bonbon had wondered the same. And frankly speaking, she wasn’t quite sure. Maybe dating someone who questioned everything held its special charm. Besides, she wasn’t the only mare around with an unconventional partner – much could be said about Amethyst and Dinky’s father, that husband of Derpy’s, the inventor who never seemed to have a grip on his schedule, Or the local ranger Minus, with the bodybuilder Bulk Biceps, who were as disproportionately sized to one another as a mouse and a bull.

If anything, it was a wonder the fillies and colts of Ponyville got along so well.

‘Well, guess Ponyville is just what Lyra needed after all. Conspiracies, creatures, who am I kidding?’

Ponyville. Always a magnet for the weird. And that was before Twilight Sparkle had arrived. Still, Twilight wasn’t the only defender of Ponyville.

Staying undercover had done its time, Bonbon mused, trotting out from behind the counter. Now, the questions tugged and tugged at her mind, ‘til they reached the point where answers were needed, lest she report back to Canterlot with yet another incident file for Ponyville. Celestia knew they’d had their hooves busy after the Wedding Invasion.

Where to begin? The hospital was too obvious. Attention drawn to the unknown creature would be unprofessional. But she’d have to start somewhere.

‘Redheart,’ Bonbon decided. As a former medical worker for the Guard, they’d let Redheart near the creature. And, best of all, her shift today ought to soon be over. If the gist of what Rarity had said was correct, combat-related injuries were right up her alley.

With a flip of the sign at the door, and a turn of the key, the shop was closed early, and Bonbon had the time to think thoroughly. Who to call, who to bring into the loop, for starters. Redheart, check. A question here and there about Lyra and whatever she was up to, that should cover it. Twilight and her friends were obviously ‘in’, considering they were the first to respond to Lyra. It was unfortunate they’d be out of town. Nevertheless, you could always count on Twilight, especially with the unknown about.

If one creature had appeared, who knew what else might have followed?

Special Agent Sweetie Drops was on the case.

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~

Normally, matters related to Luna’s realm would have, at the very least, given her a mild, tingling pleasure, thus she now wondered how this could now feel so… joyless. Something hung over this new alicorn, as grey and flat and lacklustre as she was. Luna’s domain was the night, of course, the hours without daylight, but the night held its own trove of colours.

Merely standing in Galatea’s presence gave her a sense of light and colour draining away, as the strange alicorn’s horn shone a light grey...

“Focus,” Galatea said. “It is vital we ascertain our powers can work in fusion.”

Groaning, Luna yanked her horn back, throwing Celestia a look of frustration. Just then, the Moon-model completed its orbit and brushed the back of her sister’s mane, making it billow to one side. Wrapped up in their experiment, Celestia took no notice, but the sight, reminding Luna of how being the shorter sister had its perks, diluted her irritation somewhat.

Not that they were just a pair any longer, obviously. And, to hear it, never had been.

Galatea, head still tipped forward, stood as still as a statue. That was a good description, Luna thought. Her speech was stiff, like a statue, too – no, scratch that, Discord was very bombastic for someone who’d spent a thousand years as a statue. Yet despite her horn and wings, the alicorn didn’t stand out. If it weren’t that she refused to shut up, Luna felt sure Galatea would be easily missed in a crowd.

With characteristic self-control, Celestia hadn’t moved either, the tip of her horn touching Galatea’s. As it often did, one magenta eye peeked at Luna, unconcealed by her mane.

“Let’s try again, Luna,” Celestia said.

“Fine, fine,” Luna grumbled. “If you would give me a moment...”

To calm herself, Luna let her eyes move upwards, to the vault of the dome adorned with the night sky, all blue hues dotted in white. Satisfied, she looked over Celestia’s shoulder at the massive orrery, trundling along its finely-calculated ideal schedule of days and nights.

“Every minute counts,” Galatea said tersely. “We shall not often have the luxury of time.”

“Then why,” Luna demanded, feeling her pulse rise again, “are we spending time on this experiment, when you could simply teleport to Ponyville and meet the human there?”

“There are many ways of blocking physical tele-transportation, Luna,” Galatea explained. “But astral projection, in its purest form, is virtually boundless. It is important we know that, by pooling our efforts as sisters, we can reach out anywhere, even outside of your realm.”

Her even tone did nothing for Luna.

“You think this is easy?” Luna asked. “When you’ve spent two years getting back to knowing the only sibling you ever had, get to know the last of my family line, and now to be told you had another sister all along? And then, not five minutes later, you’re just expected to… jump into uncharted waters? I have had a day’s worth full of dealing with humans and nightmares and wayward princes, oh yes, but this is getting ridiculous.”

“This is new to me, too,” Galatea said quietly. “Though the knowledge I’ve accumulated could fill the greatest of libraries, I’m not well-versed in popularising it.”

Luna shook her head.

“Stardust…” she muttered. “I do not know where you have been three-thousand years, ‘sister’, but you have been gathering dust, more than there being anything stellar about you. A little bit of warning would have helped, you know.”

“I am sorry. Were circumstances any different, I’d have preferred to speak with you at length first. But time is of the essence, Luna.”

“Some sister you are…”

Galatea opened her mouth, but it was Celestia that spoke first. “Luna,” she said gently, laying a wing on her. “I know, it’s been a very long day. And, while I wish I could promise otherwise, it’s unlikely to get much easier soon. But, think about it, this isn’t all bad. We’ll get to spend time together as a family.”

“You think so?” Luna said, glancing sceptically at Galatea. Those icy blue eyes remained impassive in their stare, still as uncannily familiar as it had been the first time she saw her. But for a moment, Luna thought she saw something stirring beneath them.

Celestia smiled. “I do. I expect we’ll be receiving a visit of our nearest and dearest, from the North.”

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

By the standards of hospital food, the tray brought to Alex’s bed was luxurious. Not only did it bear a platter of carrot stew and mash, exactly as he’d asked, but the stuff looked cooked, rather than cubed. Lyra noticed Nurse Snowheart, the nurse now on duty, had even thought to include a spork, a utensil for the human’s hands. It was pleasing to see she wasn’t the only one aware of certain non-ponies’ customs of picking their food.

Even if, in practice, she did feel a little queasy at seeing Alex’s forelimbs placed so close to what he ate. Who knew where those had been?

“Something on your mind?” Alex asked her, through a mouthful of stew.

“Yeah, um… I can’t... get it out of mind. What we were saying, about meat-eating.”

He stopped chewing, swallowed. “Ah. Yeah. The salmon and the otters.”

“Maybe it’s because I’m not an earthpony,” Lyra said quietly, letting herself slide in her chair. “They’re generally better with such things. But I’m just a unicorn, with a touch of pegasus… Wait, did other-me tell you I’m a pegacorn, Alex?”

“Yeah, she did,” Alex answered, his face alit with memory. “Turning on the fog machine and walking on clouds, that was her favourite trick at parties.”

“I should know,” Lyra said, attempting a grin. “‘Too nice for your own good’? And to think, Flutters is the Bearer of Kindness… she had an explanation, can you credit that? Said that nature doesn’t hold itself to our standards. In fact, if you want to work with animals, you gotta learn to work according to their needs, not our wants. A caretaker is taught to show the same compassion for the most vicious predator as they would for the cutest baby bunny. Funny, then, how Fluttershy is a pegasus, not an earthpony like most in the guild.”

“Why’s that funny?”

“Well, I have a bit of pegasus in me,” Lyra said, tapping her back for imaginary wings. “Pegasi are, culturally, stewards of the weather, not caregivers. They’re used to bending natural forces to useful ends. But clouds are easy to push, to herd around, it’s all just air pressure and humidity. Predation and biology, they don’t conform to our demands like that. Gut instinct, or metabolic truths, can’t be manipulated like weather, which is something pegasi have trouble adjusting to. Farm ponies have a first-hoof understanding of that reality, which is why most animal caretakers are earthponies. Fluttershy is the great exception.”

Alex whistled. “Wow,” he said, dipping his spork into the mash. “The more you tell me, the sorrier I feel for almost strangling her. That little bird’s got more guts than I’d have given her.”

Lyra didn’t answer right away. She just sat there, thinking. “Guess I was right. Before you know it, rules do change.”

“That’s a nice way to put it,” Alex agreed. He ate his portion. “Now,” he added, obviously eager to change the conversation, “what’s that you’re reading?”

Lyra’s ears perked. “Oh, this?” she said, picking up the open book. “It’s a copy of the great Howie Waggoner’s Ponyland: Fact or Fable. The stallion was a visionary. Get this, Alex, he didn’t only believe humans had visited Equus, he had this big theory on how they were connected with ponykind’s origins.”

When Alex smiled at this, it wasn’t mocking, or sceptical. It was, so far, the most genuine positive expression Lyra had seen on him.

“A guy after my own heart,” Alex commented. “That takes me back. Before I joined the Marines and had to grow up, I used to be into that sort of thing, did you know? All those movies about aliens building the pyramids and stuff. Never thought I’d be the alien.”

“Here, take a look,” Lyra smiled, sensing a kindred spirit. Privately, she felt herself warm to the human, seeing him start to shed his surly streak. She passed him the book, careful not to knock the tray. “This is my favourite passage. It’s both really awe-inspiring, and kind of sad. Howie said he’d found evidence, but then his ship got lost at sea…”

“Yeah,” Alex said, tracing a finger along the lines. “Yeah, I see. Ain’t that always the way.”

But Lyra was already contemplating Waggoner’s drawing, in black-and-white, of the lonely, half-buried pearl figurine on the shore, holding up her locket. She peered closer. If she’d ever had doubts and suspected Waggoner was a fraud, the live human in the bed dispelled them. The figurine really did match his features closely, she realised. Too close for fakery.

“He didn’t come back completely empty-hoofed,” Lyra said brightly, pointing out the sketch. “Thought to keep records of what he’d found, even put his own spin on it. Like this. He gave it a name. ‘Harmony Enlightening the World’. Never was sure why, just that he had this… feeling… Alex? Something wrong?”

Alex was frozen, staring at the picture. “What the hell is this?”

* * * * *

The Sun hung low over Ponyville, few clouds in the sky to block its light. With very few pegasi in the air, an open blue sky that opened itself up before Redheart, the Sun was shining brightly. Itself an alive, comforting orange.

‘This feels nice,’ Redheart thought, stopping for a moment to take in the sun’s rays. They were warm, genuinely warm and rejuvenating.

Maybe the Sun felt different from back home. Or, more likely, it had just been a long time since she’d actually had some semblance of a rest. In the past few hours, she’d felt far more happy and peaceful than she had in almost the entirety of the last year. This was even taking into account the fact that she was assuming the identity of another pony. Well, okay, technically not another pony…

She’d laughed, cheerfully and genuinely happy for the first time in awhile. She’d been in the presence of a hero, or perhaps a hero-in-the-making. She’d had a friendly conversation. There’d been no infiltration missions, no threat of discovery, no reminder in the back of her mind that she’d have to suddenly yet inevitably betray the ponies or humans she was so happily mingling with. It’d just been her, the nurse of a small town.

She was free, out and about in the town.

Which was a disturbing thought. Not that she was free, but that she was so happy about it.

‘I still must do my duty. Our personal happiness, be it short or long-term, pales in comparison to the greater responsibility.’

Redheart shook the thought away. Duty could wait, and justice would be delivered. For now, it was time to live.

She was indeed taken aback for a moment or two, when it dawned on her that, apart from her other self’s home and the hospital, she hadn’t really explored this Ponyville yet. It was very much the same in appearance – not so much the layout, for the Empire had graced her Ponyville with expansion in honour of the Element Bearers and their service.

The statues in the Town Hall, the now-bustling and much larger train station hosting visitors hoping to see the hometown of the six heroes, not to mention the rows upon rows of housing built for new labour. Buildings that had long existed in Ponyville, such as the old Apple Family Farm or the Town Hall, all either rebuilt or retooled in order to serve her Majesty and the war effort on Earth. This Ponyville was a shadow next to that.

But the bucolic innocence of it appealed to her, Redheart mused, as she took a step inside Sugarcube Corner.

“Hello, Nurse,” greeted the short, chubby, very welcoming-looking mare behind the counter.

‘Chiffon Swirl-Cake,’ Redheart suddenly remembered. For some reason, the detail of the name felt important to her.

Was it because she was Redheart, and yet, not Redheart?

“What’ll it be today?” Mrs. Cake asked courteously.

Redheart looked around, seeing not the colourful bakery, but some other place entirely. Bakeries, tea shops and boutiques like this, they were all very much unchanged in the Equestria she knew, and yet – when she thought of home, she found it hard to see such a place in her mind’s eye.

“Um,” Redheart began, fixing the shopkeeper in her sight. “Well…”

She took stock of the selection. Tarts, éclaires, muffins and gateau. Fizzlepop and soda. Yes, nothing here she couldn’t find back home.

“Do you have a marmalade sandwich?” Redheart asked, walking up to the counter. “Mrs. Cake,” she added.

“Sure, dear,” the shopkeeper said, picking a box. “Home-made and freshly-baked.”

While waiting, Redheart’s mind continued to be elsewhere. What she saw were forges and foundries, crafting armour for the Guard and plating for airships, out in the barren rocky wastes claimed from the dragons. Rows upon rows of timber, the wood felled from forests in South Equestria. Stacks of bricks, fired in massive kilns much like Ponyville’s, all around Zebrica. Great panes of glass, blown and hammered and polished in Saddle Mareabia. The whole brought together in prefabricated housing, an achievement of pan-equine industry, to be dropped onto suitable land on Earth.

So much heavy lifting, for her Equestria to preserve its pastoral image. Yet sometimes, when the wind blew, it was as if she could scent the smoke and steam from faraway, and the pure, clean air she’d known was gone...

“Here you go,” said Mrs. Cake. “Enjoy.”

Mechanically, Redheart paid what she owed, and accepted the treat. She took a nibble...

‘Oh, my… It tastes so… sweet!’

The feeling snaked its way past Redheart’s tongue and into her nervous system. In that moment, it came back to her in full force.

“Redheart? Is something the matter?”

She found the shopkeeper staring at her concernedly. Or, she assumed it was concern. Her vision had turned blurry. But she remembered. What Equestria was like, in its purest, distilled essence.

‘And what you must fight to protect it from.’

The humans. They let decay reign, death follow in their wake, in their own attempts to be masters of their realm. No child should ever have to fall ill nor die in the infernal working conditions they had subjected their world to for centuries.

Redheart dropped the sandwich. “I’m sorry. I have places to be,” she said, her voice faltering.

She had to act fast. Eventually, the human would turn those who visited him in hospital, sway them to his sob story.

Without another word, Redheart turned and raced out the door, ignoring the other mare’s shocked expression.

‘This ends today.’

* * * * *

“I– Alex, I don’t understand,” Lyra mumbled. “You look as though you’ve seen a ghost.”

The human opened his mouth, but whatever he was about to say, it remained unsaid, as his eyes suddenly fell upon something behind Lyra. Feeling the hairs raise on her coat, Lyra turned swiftly around to see what was up – and nearly fell out of her chair, with a surprised little squeak.

As luck would have it, there indeed was a translucent, ghostly outline present in the bedroom with them. It stood at the window, a tall, horned equine, and the picture of spectral presence could have only have been more complete if the curtains were swaying without wind. Because that would be unquestionably supernatural, given how the window to the human’s room was shut tight.

Not to be outdone, Alex slammed the book closed. “Jesus wept... Now what’s going on!?”

“Um… hello?” said Lyra, rotating on her chair to face the see-through unicorn. Not knowing what else to do, she gave a wave. “To whom do we owe the honour?”

“Lyra.”

Alex’s voice sounded close. Before she’d even turned back, she realised he’d dragged himself out from under the covers, bringing himself to sit, legs hanging over the side of a bed that was rather short for him.

“Look,” he said, raising his arm, with febrility, to indicate the figure.

That was how Lyra saw the unicorn was no unicorn. It couldn’t be. For one thing, this mare had wings and stood taller than even Princess Celestia.

“I am the Alicorn of Memories, Scribe of the Stardust,” said the apparition. “I am Galatea, and I can help find out why you are here, Captain Alexander Reiner.”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

A revisitation of the creation of the three alicorn sisters by Tau Sunflare in the distant past, changed into a flashback of Celestia encountering a mysterious figure in Adlaborn.

Galatea’s conference with Princess Celestia in the royal apartments of Canterlot Palace; includes a flashback to a transferred memory from the Galatea of the Imperial Timeline witnessing the holocaust of Adlaborn.

The final lines of the chapter, spoken by Galatea to Alexander Reiner. Instead of informing Alex that she is the reason he is here, Galatea tells him that she can help find out why he is here.

Spectrum 2.0 - March 01st 2018

Sledge115: Hello there, Sledge here. Apologies for the delay – we shuffled a few scenes around, et cetera, et cetera – and of course, reintroduced a few others from Classic Spectrum. Sadly, Jed has decided to resign from Spectrum, leaving us with a wealth of material and lore to work with. His contributions has been incredibly valuable in setting the new Spectrum up, and we’ll miss his insight dearly. Have a good one, mate.

DoctorFluffy: We wish him luck at whatever he does next – which, in my case, involves editing some of my work, too! Godspeed, you magnificent sonovabitch! Jed has been, for a long time, one of the most integral parts of Spectrum, and we wish him the best in whatever he does next.

Maybe, in time, he’ll come back. Or maybe not. The best we can do as his friends is to let Jed do what’s best for himself here.

VoxAdam: Jed and I disagreed, and still disagree, on many things. On the best tone to adapt for this kind of story, on essential lore details, on how much we should emancipate ourselves from Spectrum and in which areas, and on the strengths or weaknesses of the DCEU. And I’ll be missing all that sorely, once it’s gone.

Except the good news is, today isn’t yet the day it all comes to a close. Following an initiative proposed by TheIdiot, Jed hasn’t lost time on diving into a new project, one which the old Team remains privy to. Will it see the light on Fimfiction, or any other fanfiction hosting site? I believe that if so, the author will be waiting to let it be known when the time is right.

What you see here, the extended backstory of Faust, and the sisters three – bid ye welcome to Galatea, the long-lost sister of Celestia and Luna – is a major component of the revamped lore as envisioned by Jed months ago, in the Summer of 2017. We hope that you’ll like Galatea, and that her character will avert the pitfalls of alicorn OCs. A character type which Spectrum Classic, for a brief and memorable, if notorious moment, displayed an overabundance of! Here’s to dialling it back to one alicorn… Or Is It?

Not that the story is done introducing new characters, or as Sledge says, reintroducing them. Stay tuned for Chapter Eight, when figures from all around Equus will show up.

Act I ~ Chapter Seven ~ Unto The Breach

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

Hindsight is a cruel creature.

DoctorFluffy

Suffers from Butts Disease.

And also several seemingly crippling spinal injuries, including broken t1 through t10 spinus processes, two broken scapula, (especially the right one) and three broken ribs, one of which punctured a lung. Also, I was very itchy for some reason and I had a concussion. But that was months ago. I got better!

VoxAdam

“Volver”. It means “Return” in Spanish.

Sledge115

We all lift together.

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

Fires Freely.

ProudToBe

Chapter Seven

Unto The Breach

* * * * *

“The past is over and done. We all stumble on our way to maturity. We all look for love in the wrong arms, happiness in the wrong places. But out of it, you've become real. You've got a heart of immense compassion for the brokenness of others. You are utterly incapable of hypocrisy, and I am deeply in love with you.”
— Don Quixote to Dulcinea, from Man of La Mancha, by Miguel de Cervantes

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~ Second Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

“Betcha they’ve gone to space!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed. “That would be so cool!”

The thestral gliding on Dash’s left shot a glance, an eyebrow raised, towards his colleague.

On the right, Corporal Selene looked back at him. “That seems… far-fetched,” she said cautiously.

Then she was back to a staid professional demeanour, staring dead ahead in the way Royal Guards, both Solar and Lunar, were renowned for. Especially the pegasi.

Though sure of her superlative flying, Dash had to resist asking how pegasi of the Guard pulled off that trick – making their eyes flicker so fast that, without seeming, they took in everything above and below them. When it came to scanning an area, Dash had no doubt she was in their league.

But this subtlety... Seldom did Rainbow Dash envy subtlety, yet for this feat, she did.

“He’s an alien from another universe, where another us…” Dash stopped. “Well. That’s not… Anyway, I’m just so excited to hear more from him. I bet Lyra is, t–”

“Pardon me, Miss Dash,” interrupted Selene, “but if my view’s anything to go by, I spy a cloud-house coming up ahead. I guess this means we’re approaching the Ponyville town limits.”

Indeed, Dash had also noticed her house on the horizon. Her excitement at getting to regale her unexpected travelling companions with tales about the human, however, had temporarily eclipsed even the anticipation at getting her Daring Do book.

“Yep, that’s my place,” Dash said, forehooves stretching out a little more aerodynamically, as if home was a place to be grabbed.

“Then this is where we’ll soon part ways,” Selene told her, granting a look in her direction. “We… thank you for sharing your facts about the unknown creature.”

“Human,” Dash said automatically, brushing a strand of her mane. “Aw, it’s nothing, guys. Glad we crossed paths, I was starting to worry it’d be a lonely flight.” She had a thought. “So… where’d you come in from, anyway? D’you guys have a thestral nest nearby, or does Luna call up from Erebus when–”

The thestral stallion coughed, with unmistakable irritation. Her attention drawn to him, Dash realised she’d never bothered to learn his name.

“It’s not a nest. It’s called a roost,” he said testily, “and it’s a common conception, about Lunar Guards spending the lion’s share of their careers in Erebus. My family’s been in the Guard all their lives, with barely a hundred years of Erebus between the lot of us.”

“Okay, okay,” Dash said quickly. “Just checking. But, heck, why don’t we see you in town more often? Cos’ if there’s batponies living next door to Ponyville, what’s stopping anypony from popping over for a friendly hello? Nightmare Night got a lot more radical once you showed up with Luna.”

“Well…” the stallion began, in a gentler tone. “That depends on a few things, I suppose, like what hours you keep, or your stomach for heights. That, and who comes knocking. Not many people do.” His eyes glazed over, in reflection, not in ire. “How did she make it up the mountainside, anyhow…” he said, apparently to himself. “Carting all her belongings like that…”

“Who’re you talking about?” asked Dash.

Selene answered for him. “That zebra who lives in the Everfree Forest, she came by one afternoon a few years ago, first visitor we’d had in ages. Since few of us are daybirds, it took us a while to work out what she was after… The weird rhyming pattern she speaks in didn’t help matters. But eventually, we got her to understand that, if she was looking for a place where shops wouldn't be shut in the middle of the day, Ponyville was just a stone’s throw away.”

“A stone’s throw off a mountain, that is,” the stallion supplied helpfully.

A shudder of recognition ran through Dash. Mixed with a tingle of guilt at recalling her complicity in Ponyville’s prolonged alienation of a neighbour. The friendliest town in Equestria, was it? And if they could bungle it that badly, how hard would life be for outsiders in another, warlike Equestria...

“Um…” Dash stumbled over her words. “You sure Zecora didn’t fancy some night-time shopping? I mean, she’s got some weird habits…”

“Oh, you know her?” smiled the stallion. “Glad to hear it. But no, Miss, just because zebras are painted black-and-white, doesn’t mean they’re out on both day and night–”

“Wait, was that a rhyme?” Dash goggled at him. “Did you do that on purpose?”

Before he could speak, Selene got in first. “Don’t you go there,” she said, with a sidelong glance at her companion. “Some Guardstallions, they’ve got a thing for idolising mares they’ve only known a short time, ‘til the next one steals their fancy.”

“Hey, you gonna blame me?” The stallion blew wistfully. “Steep mountain like ours, it’s pretty impressive she didn’t slip and fall, what with wheeling a heavy load… a lady on a quest, she was.”

Dash found herself commiserating as Selene pulled a face.

“I doubt it,” Selene swiftly put in. “And that’s quite enough infatuation for today, Sergeant. Miss Dash, I believe we’ve arrived?”

So they had. Eyes half as sharp as Dash’s couldn’t miss the billowy white filling up her field of vision, interspersed by the rainbows pouring from the fountains of her cloud-garden. This being Summer, the Sun wasn’t yet at the low angle where the whole structure glowed pink and yellow – the colours of her two favourite people in the world, Dash thought fondly – but she still felt proud to own such a house, the sole model of its build in Ponyville.

What she was really looking for, however, the mailbox, lay below on the ground. And, to her delight, Dash spotted the tiny shape of the box’s semaphore flag, raised.

“Yes!” Dash whooped, performing an excited loop. She only stopped a second to say her goodbyes. “Great chatting to you, guys. Hey, you see the human at the hospital, let him know I came back. Or Lyra. Now, I’ve got a book to read.”

And she swooped down, landing next to the mailbox. Once the noise of her landing settled, she thought her ears caught a retreating snippet, from above, of Gibbous murmuring about crazy pegasi on the airways.

She didn’t care. Opening the mailbox gave her just what she wanted. Atop a small pile of letters, which Dash slid out without really checking, was the book. Daring Do & The Volcano of Destiny. On top was a note, courtesy of Twilight’s mother.

Dear Rainbow Dash,

Hope you enjoy! Always happy to help a friend of Twily’s.

~Twilight Velvet

Grinning, Dash reached for the book, as reverently as Twilight might have handled the Alicorn Amulet. Here she had something to take her away, if just a few hours, from tales of wars and parallel universes and broken friendships. Stories with only the slightest dash (‘Heh.’) of horror and romance, not packed to the brim. Just good old, uncomplicated action and adventure.

With a happy sigh, there was nothing left for Rainbow Dash to do but lower the flag.

* * * * *

The metal briefcase slammed open, revealing all the paraphernalia fit for a spy.

Acting on instinct, Redheart gave another glance around. Not that it’d help now, if anyone had spotted her – help the unwary peeper, that is. But there was no one. They’d have to be exceedingly intrusive to have entered her house, anyway.

Redheart felt a regretful twinge at the hypocrisy, but shook it off. This, after all, technically was her house. True, she hadn’t been home in a year, and this bedroom, with its collection of snowglobes on the shelves, was everything her bedroom hadn’t been since the Crystal War. But she had a right to be here.

Her glance led her to stare behind her, at the bed’s occupant.

Sure enough, her other self was still tucked under the covers, snoring, fast asleep, thanks to the sedative doing its work. Redheart did not dwell on her. Out of the many familiar yet unfamiliar faces she’d met today, her own doppelgänger was the most perturbing. No, the briefcase’s contents were what she needed to focus on.

The insignia of the Eighth Home Regiment greeted her, adorning her folded-up scarlet cloak, which covered the width of the case’s interior. Gingerly, Redheart pulled out the cloak, and lay it on the desk, to find what she was looking for.

The handle-end of the case, although deeper, wasn’t as replete with knick-knacks as the lid. All it contained was a keyboard, a scroll of parchment and a platen. Of course, those were only the most basic, visible components of a typewriter.

From a pocket in the lid compartment, Redheart took out a small, circular mirror, and slotted it neatly onto a tiny hook at the top of the compartment. It was angled downwards, with the scroll in its sights.

She began typing, the words printing on the scroll, letter-by-letter.

Solar Date & Time: Unknown.
Local Date & Time: 02.06.03EH, 19:00

Time Elapsed Since Arrival: +27hrs

Redheart paused then, thinking the next part over.

The numbers provided for the date and time of my present location may seem aberrant. In the name of Her Majesty Celestia, I swear this is not the case. I, Redheart, am of sound mind and body. Yet, by some strange fluke, I have found myself back in Equestria. Prior to contact with Earth. In Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae.

The past? Or a parallel reality?

Direct, precise, military. Everything it should be.

Arrived yesterday at circa 15:00...

And so Redheart outlined all she’d seen and done since landing in the Everfree Forest.

How, watching from the thickets, she’d spotted the battered Captain Alexander Reiner, come upon by the six Element Bearers. How, to her surprise, they had been accompanied by an alive Lyra Heartstrings, not as a captive, but as a friend. How she’d followed from afar as they took the human back to Ponyville, a simpler Ponyville, and thanks to a clever ruse by Miss Pie, snuck him into the hospital.

She wrote of bivouacking under the bridge for the night, pondering her next move. She wrote of how in the early hours of the morning, she’d slipped inside the house through the cellar window, prying off a rusty hinge she’d always meant to fix. Knowing her other self, she’d imbued the hairwash with sedative, and watched as the trick ran its course.

At seven that morning, twelve hours ago now, she’d entered the hospital ahead of shift.

Any move she intended against Alexander Reiner was hindered, however, when she found that not only was he watched over by Lyra Heartstrings, Celestia herself had come, and saw no enemy in him. Celestia, back when she was a Princess. And Luna had joined her, too, unbound and free as the night of her escape from the Moon.

It had been the longest voluntary shift Redheart had ever taken. All for the cause. Fortunate, then, that she’d had the foresight to take a good, long rest the previous night, even if it wasn’t in the best of beds.

But they were all gone. Celestia and Luna had returned to Canterlot, the Bearers dispersed. Redheart didn’t know everything the human had told them, yet there was no doubt he’d played himself up as the victim. Only the human remained, with Heartstrings. And two Guards she hoped would never suffer as she had suffered.

Redheart did not mention the date she’d suggested at Sugarcube Corner. Indeed, she made no mention of Sugarcube Corner, whatsoever.

Once she’d concluded, Redheart pressed a big, unmarked button. The letters she’d typed on the scroll shimmered a soft lavender colour, as did the mirror. And that was it. Done. Now all she could do was sit back, and wait.

Then, a new thought struck her. She tore the the scroll out of the platen. Turned it over, while her spare forehoof reached for a nearby quill in an inkwell.

Redheart began writing a different message on the parchment’s back. In all likelihood, if she failed, they would find the letter. That was fine. They were ponies. They were sure to understand her reasoning.

Should somepony from this other Equestria sees this, you must understand. I do this not out of hate, or fear, or anger, but for the good of Equestria. You may think you understand what the human brings. You do not.

There is a hunger in their hearts, which love and kindness alone cannot fill. A sickness that we ponies can stave off. If you ally with him, he will infect you with that sickness.

I am only trying to help. I am a nurse, after all.

* * * * *

Bonbon slid out the old briefcase from under the bed.

‘Trust Lyra to search everywhere but the most obvious spot…’

To be fair, it wasn’t like she’d given Lyra reason to believe there was anything to search for. Moving by rote, in a procedure well-remembered, Bonbon pressed on the horseshoe sigil of the case, popping it open instantly. Bonbon smiled as many long-unused goodies revealed themselves to her – a fake moustache and a pair of shades, a grappling-hook and an underwater watch, and much else besides. Yes, those were goodies for when she wasn’t making sweets. Although these days, sweets were her daily lot.

The question was, what in here could she use?

‘I suppose the tranquiliser isn’t to be neglected,’ Bonbon thought, picking up said item. ‘[i]Never go on a monster-hunt without one.’

Even so, she hesitated. Was this a monster-hunt? Putting down the tranquiliser, Bonbon crouched on the bed she shared with Lyra, both forehooves holding her chin while she contemplated the briefcase.

For some reason, she got the feeling this wasn’t the only dangerous box open today.

What did she know? Thanks to Rarity passing through to deliver her coat, Bonbon knew the human was in hospital, and Lyra with him. He didn’t seem hostile. Except there were no records of ‘humans’ in her book of creatures.

Which meant… ugh…looking through some of Lyra’s books.

‘I wouldn’t trade her for anypony. Anywhere she goes, I’d love to follow,’ Bonbon thought, ‘but…’

She had limits. And those limits were reading the books Lyra devoured like oats. An Argument For Humanity and Against Catseye by Laconic, and of course, the decidedly paranoid The Dream Valley Conspiracy: What They’ll Never Tell Us. Or Ponyland: Dispelling the Myths of Dream Valley by Lyra’s old Professor Shriek, who had perhaps the most severe case of footnote fever that Bon-Bon had ever seen.

Alternatively – she could get more hooves-on. And what could be more natural than dropping by to ask the nurse in charge how Lyra was doing, after spending all night at the hospital without a proper bed?

* * * * *

Again, the apparition who called herself ‘Galatea’ addressed Lyra and Alex, still with that musical accent of hers.

“Tell me, human. You do not recall the circumstances that brought you here, do you?”

Alex, his hands pressing into both sides of the bedframe, shuffled his legs, trying to stand. But Lyra saw he could not. Even as a soft blue tinge lit his tattoos, the burst of strength he had shown while trying to escape that morning was yet to return.

“No… no, I don't.” He looked at Lyra. “And…” he whispered. “Lyra. How did you find me? All this time we’ve been here, you never said.”

Lyra blinked, realising. “Goodness, you’re right. I… wait.” She turned her gaze back on the mystery alicorn, brow furrowing. “Why should I tell you anything? H-how do we know you even are who you say you are? I mean, I’d never even heard of any other alicorns, up until Cadance got her wings.”

Discreetly, she had to choke down a yawn. She really hadn’t slept enough, the night before.

“Oh, I am an alicorn, truly,” said the ghostly apparition, taking a step forward, noiselessly. “I simply chose to seclude myself from the world, leaving it in mine sisters’ care to act as beacons to your people, Lyra Heartstrings. Or rather, it was mine assigned purpose to observe in secret, and I heeded it. This was before the human came.”

‘Sisters…’ Lyra repeated. For the first time, Lyra was struck by how much the ghostly alicorn resembled the Princesses, exchanging crowns for a pair of goggles.

“Now, Captain Reiner. What is your last memory of Earth?”

“I was asking a question,” the human said. “Not for you. For Lyra. Lyra, how… where’d you find me?”

His words didn’t immediately sink in. Lyra was too busy staring at the strange alicorn. After meeting a human at last, and the terrible tale he’d told of their two worlds at war, a new alicorn felt almost like overkill. Yet she still had trouble believing Galatea was real. Maybe it was her ghostly state...

“Um?” Lyra wrenched her eyes away from the alicorn. “S-sorry, what was that? Oh... I found you… by a tree, Alex. By a tree. But… I think it was a special tree…” She coughed. “I… I think you should answer her question. I want to know too…”

He snorted. “What do you want me to say? After a while, the things I’ve seen, they all begin to blur together. I need answers more than I can give them.”

“I can answer most of your questions,” Galatea told him. “Though not all, I regret. But if I’m to answer them properly, I require you to pass on personal information.”

“Why?”

“Because I collect information,” Galatea said. “And I am not all-knowing. If I were, I’d have no need to ask anything of you. I know your name. I know of your species, and your world. And I know why you are here, having played mine part in bringing you over. What I cannot know, Alexander Reiner, is how much you know.”

But the next words spoken were not Alex’s.

“Was it your voice?”

Lyra felt both the human and the alicorn turn their gazes on her. It made her want to shrink. Instead, she stood her ground.

“Which voice?” Galatea asked, tilting her head.

“The Tree…” Lyra answered slowly, twisting a tuft of mane with her forehoof. “When I was in the cave, I swore I heard a voice coming from it...”

Befitting her ghostly form, Galatea’s eyes were pupil-less slits, glowing white like Luna’s had when she’d lost her temper on Nightmare Night. Unless, for all Lyra knew, this was the mysterious alicorn’s natural eye colour. Neither option struck her as comforting.

“Indeed?” said Galatea. “But it was not mine voice. That Tree is more akin to an associate of mine than a tool. For, although I precede it by many millennia, I have no direct power over the Tree of Harmony.”

Hearing the name, Lyra felt a subtle glow awaken in her stomach.

“So that’s what it’s called…” she whispered, awed. “It was… beautiful.”

“Lyra?” said Alex. “What’s she on about? What are you on about?”

He winced, and his hand shot to his chest, clutching the bandages. The exertion must have caused new pain in his necrotised flesh.

“Oh, Alex…” Lyra said, voice still a whisper, turning to him. “You didn’t get to see the Tree… When I saw you appear, all cut-up and dirtied and bruised like that, my first thought was to pull you to safety as fast as I could… we didn’t get very far. My teleportation wasn’t strong enough. But you should have seen it. I’ve never seen anything so beautiful… well, except maybe Bonbon, when her snout gets all covered in cake frosting…”

“That is sweet, Madame Heartstrings, but please,” Galatea said with stern urgency. “Events are in motion. We cannot delay further.”

The voice cut across Lyra’s off-tangent musings like a sharp knife.

“Do you mind...?” Lyra began, before she shook her head and shot back, “Wait, whoa, hold on a sec. If you are an alicorn, like, Celestia and Luna’s sister, then why didn’t the Princesses tell us you exist?”

“They didn’t know about mine existence either, until today,” Galatea replied, raising a wing. “But they can vouch for me.”

On cue, two more translucent figures swam into view, the air rippling into familiar shapes on either side of Galatea. To the right, from Lyra’s standpoint, stood Luna. On the left, Celestia.

“Your Highnesses?” said Lyra. “What’s going on?”

“What she says is true, Lyra,” the figure of Celestia answered firmly. “Currently, all three of our physical bodies stand in Canterlot, beneath Luna’s Orrery.”

“This is an experiment in astral projection,” supplied the figure of Luna. Her voice sounded tight, clipped somehow. “By the power of our horns, channeled in unity, we can project ourselves anywhere in the world. Allegedly...”

“Had Galatea arrived sooner, perhaps I’d have forgone opening the Concordia Maxima,” Celestia’s figure chuckled wryly. Then her eyes, glowing white, fell on Alex. “Nonetheless, I recommend you hear her out. Her arrival may prove very helpful for the plan I have in mind. I’d hoped to turn to Discord, but…” She sighed. “His last mission has left him depleted. We must await before he can fully tackle this enterprise.”

Alex shifted on the bedspread. “Discord?”

“Do you know him?”

“No, not really, but then, I thought he was dead, although Lyra–” the human said. “This Lyra here, I mean. That is,” his eyes darted towards Lyra, as he coughed brittlely, “well, you, I mean you… You said... I seem to remember someone, I think it was Cheerilee, once told me he was this old enemy of Princess Celestia’s… or rather, Queen Cel– no, I don’t–” He coughed again. “Fuck me, this shit is doing my head in.”

Luna’s eyes flashed. “He works for my sister now,” she explained, her tone betraying a healthy skepticism. “In exchange for Miss Posey’s friendship. And,” she smirked, “I doubt he’d be very happy to learn you tried choking her to death.”

The human half-smiled, uncomfortably.

“Yeah, that’s it,” Alex said, addressing Lyra. “When we were talking this morning, you said this, what was it you said, this mad ‘Spirit of Chaos’ broke free a year ago and got the place banged up. Just another way this Equestria, it’s nothing like the one that’s been causing all the shit back where I’m from.” He stroked his chin. “Hm… funny, that… bad as the Crystal War was, you’d think a mass mind-fuck from the Spawn of Cthulhu’d be even worse…”

“Oh, it was bad, alright,” Lyra growled. “And I don’t care how much Fluttershy might put a ‘me gusta’ face on it, he’s still a nasty piece of work who can barely be convinced to care for anyone but himself.” For the second time, Alex was staring. She couldn’t blame him. The harshness in her voice surprised even her. “Second only to Chrysalis, in my book. I’ll explain later,” she told Alex, shuddering. “It’s not a pretty story.”

“Don’t worry, kiddo,” Alex smiled crookedly. “Why the hell should I have the monopoly on ugly stories?”

The three translucent alicorns across the room shone a little brighter.

“And yet,” Galatea intoned, “we need you to tell one more story from your life, Alexander Reiner. That is, should you remember it. So, pray tell. Which is your last image of Earth, before you appeared here, in this uncorrupted Equestria?”

Now everyone’s attention was on Alex. One hand still clutching his chest, the other went to lightly touch his forehead, as he squinted, trying to focus on the past.

“There was…” He groaned, tightly, his lips thinning to show gritted teeth. “Goddammit, why is this so hard? Everything’s scrambled… it’s like I remember it all, I’m certain I remember right up until the moment I have to think about it!”

It was a struggle for him, Lyra saw. Her eyes drifted towards the darkest of the alicorns.

“Princess Luna?” she whispered. “Is there anything you could do to help with his memories?”

Luna sighed regretfully. “Would that I could, Madame Heartstrings. Yet, as any teacher of my craft would tell you, the mind is not a book, to be opened at will and read at leisure, nor are thoughts etched on a skull’s interior, for an invader to peruse…” One teal eye glinted. “And that’s just as well, given the foe Alexander Reiner tells us we’re dealing with.”

“But…” Lyra began, her gaze moving between Luna and the tense Alex. “What about this morning, when you took Twilight and the rest of us inside him? We saw his memories.”

“We saw a dream,” Luna corrected. “Or the shadow of a dream. I am the only dreamweaver in this world who can march across an oneiric valley that is invisible to all others, even to its beholder… which is to say, while the beholder is physically conscious. Yes, memory exists. But our minds are so quick to churn it up with self-interest and improvisation, it soon becomes flat as soil. What you call ‘dreams’ are like plants sprouting from the soil, at the bottom of the valley. And I tend to them, like a gardener tends to their flowers.”

“That’s lovely, Princess Luna,” Alex muttered, wiping his forehead, “‘cept it isn’t helping my head any.”

Yet, for the first time, Lyra’s focus wasn’t quite on him.

“Then…” she said slowly. “You’re saying… what we saw… might not have happened?”

“Only in the most literal sense, Lyra.” Luna’s answer was firm and immediate. “No dream is without a grain of truth, a seed of memory.”

The human made a raspy noise. “Oh, it’s real... It’s all too... real… it’s all coming back at once-!”

“Alex,” Lyra said gently. “Don’t hurt yourself.”

Instinctively, without really thinking about what she was doing, she reached out her forehoof to press it, delicately, against the hand upon his chest.

With that, she felt part of the tension go out of Alex’s body.

“Thanks, Lyra…” he said quietly. “I think… I think I’m starting to remember. There was… Amethyst. Amethyst Star…”

Lyra let out a little gasp. “Sparkler? The Doc’s daughter?”

“We call her Amethyst,” Alex said. “Said that old nickname of hers, she didn’t like hearing it, no more. Sounded too much like Twilight’s name, see? The only name out there which is more mud to humanity than Twilight’s is Celestia’s.”

“Oh, my goodness…” Lyra said slowly, removing her forehoof. “Did he… did Time Turner finally do it? I’ve popped by his lab so many times, you know. He’d been talking about travelling to the Moon and other planets and stuff, not through magic, but science. Science! I can’t believe I didn’t–”

“No. No, it’s not that,” said Alex. The human looked troubled. “Time Turner… he’s our foremost authority on those portals the Empire uses to travel from their universe to ours. And he said… said such devices were a huge leap beyond what Equestria should be able to do, only a few years ago. Going by what I’ve seen, I believe it. You don’t seem to have any of the things I took for granted. Like…” He thought for a moment. “Crystal-tech.”

“This Equestria has not expanded into such domains, indeed not,” Galatea said. “The creations and weaponry of the Tyrant Sombra lie locked within his vaults, forgotten by residents of his empire. Or perhaps chosen not to remember. Nonetheless, we are one step closer to finding our answers,” she declared, her pale lips curving into a slight smile.

“We are?”

“Yes,” Galatea replied, head turning to-and-fro to look Celestia and Luna in the eye. “I know how the Empire can create doors to your world, Alexander Reiner. And mine sister Celestia, going by her words, has already guessed. On this world, only a small smattering of beings have the gift to cross dimensions. I am one, limited though mine powers be to observation, and only by the will of the Aurora. Another, as you may have surmised, is Lord Discord. But in that world, the fallen Celestia, whom you call the Solar Tyrant, through the power of crystal, drained him of his powers, and harnessed that to tear open the fabric of reality.”

* * * * *

The swiftness of the reply came as a surprise to Redheart.

Scarcely half an hour had passed since she’d sent her letter, when another arrived. The buttons on the typewriter clicked of their own accord, as if pressed by a phantom, and the scroll unrolled. There was no mistaking the sunburst sigil at its head.

She peered at it. Evidently, the letter was written in haste. The Lady Archmage was well-known for her diligence and her dedication in composing a letter. The letter before Redheart was anything but tidy.

And the contents, as it turned out, only added to the growing weight on her mind.

Her mouth set, she stood up.

‘I’ll need to return to the hospital,’ Redheart thought, reflecting upon her new orders. ‘And that’ll make things difficult. Heartstrings has not once strayed far from Reiner. Unless… Of course. This shouldn’t require me to go anywhere near Reiner, or Heartstrings! All I need is for the xeno-surgeon, the dear Sutra, whom I...’

Even internally, Redheart had to pause on the word ‘I’.

‘Sutra’s done the job Nurse Redheart asked of her, I know it. I know she has. If there were any concerns about the human carrying disease, or a physiological incompatibility to our ecosystem, she’d have come to me. Not bad, given all she had to work with were the clothes off his back… And I should find just what I need there.’

“For the sake of Harmony, I must act,” Redheart whispered, standing straighter and closing up her briefcase. It shut with a mechanical ‘click’ as the inbuilt typewriter folded back into place. “The worst thing anyone can do is not answer the call to greater Harmony.”

She paused, taking stock of her still-slumbering doppelganger.

‘What might her dreams be?’ Redheart stopped to wonder. ‘Does she still dream of her service, or does she dream of the future? At this time in our lives, in my life, was I also planning a date at Suga– What am I doing? I’ve got a task to fulfil.’

Redheart looked away from herself.

* * * * *

“‘Tear open the fabric of reality’?” Lyra said, echoing Galatea’s words. “You mean like a hole leading from one world into another?”

Alex clutched the bedrest, gazing numbly at the three ghostly alicorns.

“That’s exactly how we met you,” Alex he said, grimacing in pain. “How we... met the other Equestrians,” he clarified. “It’d take too long time to explain, but there was this place in my world, they used to do these experiments… and one day, they succeeded. A ‘rift’, they called it, like this pink gash hanging in mid-air above the grass... Probes couldn’t enter it. Melted as soon as they touched it. But, a few days later, she came through…”

“She wanted you to think it was an accident,” Galatea interrupted. “This is why she chose CERN as her starting point, Alexander Reiner.”

The human’s mouth fell. “You’re kidding me.”

“I do not ‘kid’,” Galatea informed him. “She knew your race would be more amenable if they thought this First Contact devoid of malice. Had she deemed it necessary, she could have opened up a hole in a major city, placed it in the middle of the tundra, or perhaps created an island specifically for the portal. Though the geological repercussions of the latter would be... most destructive.”

“So I’ve been told… But… that’d mean… that she…”

“She was aware of humanity from the start. Yes.” Galatea paused. “I am all but certain the wars they experienced prior to First Contact were a way to ready her society for a fight. Yet while the Solar Tyrant knew Earth existed, she couldn’t possibly have had a clear picture of it beforehoof. All she’d have had to go upon were outlines. Snapshots. Shadows. You are a warrior of a modern human military, Captain Reiner. Think of it as... staring at glowing dots on a radar-screen.”

“I’m…” Alex said, slumping, “not sure I get it...” He stared at Lyra. She noticed a strange guilty look in his eyes. “After she declared war, we knew she must’ve used what she’d learned about Earth as scouting reports. Feedback from ambassadors and representatives like you, who didn’t know she’d attack us… at least, I assume they didn’t,” he added apologetically. “You did not.”

Something about his words stood out to Lyra. “You believe the attack came as a surprise to the Equestrians as well?”

“Not towards the end,” he clarified, stroking his eyebrow. “Tensions were too far gone by then. But… many of us, especially the Equestrians on our side, or the tourists and vacationers she left stranded on Earth?”

“Tourists?” Lyra asked.

“Not every pony in the PHL made the choice to join us willingly,” Alex explained. “Some had it made for them. A lot of ponies, like Heliotrope or Aegis or… Sutra Cross, to name a few, were stranded on Earth when the Barrier started expanding. Some of those same ponies thought she’d just... snapped. Either that or she’d eaten bad shrooms…”

“Sorry?”

“That something’d made her go crazy, somehow,” Alex said guardedly. “More and more rumours kept flying around, reaching a peak after the Reykjavik Video… That was when you got captured.”

Briefly, Lyra thought Alex was referring to her, until she saw him addressing Luna.

“Also the only time anyone from the PHL met you,” Alex stated, gauging the stone-faced Princess of the Night. “Far too short a meeting, if you ask me. Your dear sister saw to that. But,” he continued, his eyes now meeting Celestia’s, “I guess that’s why even after all this, I can talk to you, and almost forget I oughta be feeling as sick as if I were in a chat with Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot and Idi Amin all rolled into one...” He sighed. “Eventually, though, time wore us down. Ask someone today, chances are, the only question they’ll have is, ‘how do we fucking kill the bitch’?”

Lyra still wasn’t used to his swearing. While the Galatea-figure seemed unaffected, she noticed even Luna was holding back a wince. And Celestia… A troubled air hung around Celestia, yet Lyra had a sneaking suspicion it wasn’t the profanity which got to her.

Desperate to change the subject, Lyra stepped in. “Could Discord’s Chaos Magic have corrupted her?”

“No,” Celestia said. “The magic of Discord would likely change her, but none of what I’ve heard sounds like it fits with corruption by Chaos Magic. It seems more in line with…” She paused. “Order. If anything, this is the exact opposite of what Discord’s magic seems likely to do.”

“Hmm,” Alex said. “I don’t know that much about your world. Is there… is there something like Discord; but committed to order instead?”

“I don’t believe there is,” Celestia said. “It’d make sense for Discord to have something as an extreme opposite, but I always believed it was Harmony…”

“Look, what exactly are you planning on, Princess Celestia?” Alex interrupted wearily. “This morning, before you left, you said something ‘bout the chinks in walls, or some such shit. But, no matter how I try looking at it, I can’t think of any way you’d be welcomed with open arms on Earth.”

“Hence I’m not planning to go to Earth myself,” Celestia said gently. “But I have a theory as to where this unholy Barrier draws its power from, and how we can stop it… and the unexpected arrival of my other long-lost sister might have accelerated my design.”

Galatea nodded. “This is where I can help you both.”

Next to the two older alicorns, Luna shook her head. If Lyra hadn’t known better, she’d have thought the Princess of the Night felt overshadowed and tired of it. She wondered if Celestia, usually so considerate, had been too glib in her talk of long-lost sisters. Even though that must have been one of the few coping mechanisms available to the famously imperturbable Sun Princess.

“Concentrate, Alexander Reiner,” Galatea said. “Memories of your departure’s circumstances were resurfacing. You mentioned the name Amethyst Star.”

“And you mentioned Discord,” Lyra said suddenly. She then felt like she’d spoken out of turn, because Galatea’s inquisitive gaze bore upon her. “Um, Your Highness.”

“You needn’t use titles. I am not one of your Princesses,” the mysterious alicorn said dryly. “But now you know more of the truth. Equus and Earth’s meeting was planned to happen.”

“But how do you know all of that?”

“Simple,” Galatea said. “With great focus, it is within mine power to share knowledge with alternate versions of myself. A propitious talent in our current situation, wouldn’t you say?” She may have looked pleased, yet a bleakness clouded her face. “Unfortunately… it is possible, nay, likely, that the knowledge mine alternate sought to impart is incomplete. I first grew aware of events following the sacking of Adlaborn. What she may have learnt after, however, is fragmentary.”

“So… is Discord dead?”

Lyra hoped she hadn’t sounded too interested in that question.

Galatea’s grim expression did not lessen. “It is very hard to kill a draconequus,” she said. “Yet I’d logically assume that anyone who could drain their power would find killing them a trifle. Crystal can work marvels, Lyra Heartstrings. Your foalsitter can attest to that.”

Alex, who’d been massaging his head, seemed about to say something, but Lyra didn’t wait on him.

“But, wait, wait,” said Lyra. “If somepony stole Discord’s power, wouldn’t that…” She swallowed. “Make them able to wield Chaos Magic?”

“Fortunately, not necessarily,” Galatea replied, a little more reassuringly, as best as she could. “And does it seem like the Tyrant can use Chaos Magic to you? If it were so, both the worlds would long be damned. Conversely…” The cloud returned. She glanced at both other alicorns. “This is a topic for another day, yet we’d do well to heed the Empire’s mastery of crystals. None could say what uncanny forces these might allow them to reproduce synthetically...”

“Crystals.” Alex had spoken. Lyra turned and saw he’d stopped massaging his head. “Crystals... wait a minute, crystals!” he said, loudly. “Those are Amethyst’s speciality.”

It was the second time Galatea had come close to smiling. “Good. It’s coming back to you.”

“Sort of.” The human held out his arm, upon which, faint as ever, the tattoos glowed blue. “It’s what you were saying about magic. I’ve got this finely-ground crystal powder etched into me, that’s what allows me to use it.”

“We’d sort of guessed that,” Lyra mentioned. “And I’m sure Twilight– or Rarity, perhaps– will have figured it out by now. They’re smart.”

She waited for him to say something, but he didn’t.

“Did Sparkler– sorry, Amethyst, did she mention anything about a crystal tree?”

“‘Fraid not,” Alex said slowly. “But… I remember something.”

He was staring, not at her, nor at the alicorn trinity, though his eyes faced those three. He was staring beyond them, towards a vision he would be seeing now even if the ethereal sisters were not translucent.

“What would we do…” the human sucked in a breath. “What would we do without Amethyst and her family? The Tyrant would control all the portals to Earth, and there’d be no escape for the poor souls trapped on her world… nowhere to run… Earth is a rotting, sinking ship, and it’s still better than drowning beneath the waves…”

This time, Lyra did more than press her hoof to his hand. She turned, and clutched it with both hooves. Only afterwards did it occur to her this was the most intimate she’d ever got with him.

“Alex!” she cried. “Alex, not again! Please don’t slip away!”

Awareness of the now returned into his eyes.

“I won’t,” Alex said gently, laying a hand upon her hooves. “Enough bad dreams for today. But I’ve got lots to sift through, Lyra... A shimmering portal, in a grey room full of strange machinery… An overcrowded hospital room, packed with refugees from Equus… Their faces, their faces full of sadness and exhaustion, but hope as well… and they’re so tired, but keep going…” Darkness crept into his features. “And then the faces are filled with horror, because the portal is sparking up… we can’t close it… Something’s coming after them. But…” He groaned, showing teeth. “Before that, Amethyst’s telling me… we can turn the hourglass.” The darkness grew contrasted by a light in his eyes. “Her words. Turn the hourglass. That’s what I remember.”

Silently, Lyra digested all she had heard.

“The hourglass?” she echoed at last. “Wouldn’t that be… time-travel? But… Twilight explained to me once that going back in time, it doesn’t solve problems…”

“The Doc said so as well,” Alex sighed. “Being able to see ahead in time, though… that’s helped out in a few tight spots. If only we could use it more often…”

Lyra wasn’t sure she’d heard him right. “Whu-? Seeing the future? Can humans do that?”

His head turned to her, with an expression unlike any he’d shown prior. She’d seen him sad and lost. She’d also seen him glad to just have her to talk with, likely because he saw her counterpart in her. Explaining things, though hard, seemed to lift a little of his burden.

She’d never seen him bear all those expressions mixed in with someone who has a dark joke to share.

“Humans can’t… neither can anyone I know, as a rule,” Alex said, sounding as if he was stalling. “But I… I didn’t tell you about Bonbon, did I? That was… that was after your time.”

A frisson passed through Lyra at her girlfriend’s name. She hadn’t dared ask, yet it was one answer she was about to get anyway…

Or not yet, for Galatea’s voice returned.

“Time is what it comes down to.”

And despite not being there, the grey alicorn took a step forward, ahead of her sisters. Luna appeared consumed by a mess of painful thoughts. Even Celestia seemed a little heavier on her hooves.

“You’ve began tracing back your steps, human,” Galatea said. “Now I can begin giving you answers. Retracing one’s steps is what this has all been about. Mine counterpart knew this… but couldn’t find exactly when. The certitude of the Tyrant’s corruption doesn’t suffice to identity what led to it. Not in its entirety.”

Alex started nodding vigorously. “That’s right! Amethyst… I didn’t get it at first, but she said… She needed…” Gingerly, he removed his hand from Lyra’s hooves, slowly tracing it up his hospital gown. “She needed something of mine. And… and Zecora was there too. With... Bonbon.”

Lyra felt her cheek go wet.

“Amethyst,” Alex repeated her name quickly, like it could scrub over the last name he’d spoken. “We were there, by the portal… so was Cadance, I think. She didn’t stay long. I think she’d been to check up on the refugees. But she seemed… out of it.” His hand stopped above his chest. “When Amethyst approached me and said we might have a key to victory… I thought, maybe it had to do with the power Luna said Cadance would unlock, the night she got captured…”

Galatea stood listening in silence.

“That wasn’t what Amethyst was after, either,” Alex said, feeling the collar of his gown. “No… she wanted… she needed something… of mine. To locate where it all started.”

His hand went under his collar. Lyra saw the outline of it, behind the gown’s fabric, fumbling around trying to find something. Alex glanced down. The fumbling intensified. Then it ground to a halt. When he drew out his hand, it was open, and empty.

She might have found it comical, except his whole bearing turned so… colourless, right then.

“Alexander Reiner,” Galatea intoned carefully. “Where is your locket?”

* * * * *

The words of the letter echoed through Redheart’s mind.

[color=#ccccc]Do not let Reiner leave.

In his possession is a heart-shaped locket. Retrieve it swiftly and securely.

Should you encounter difficulty in locating it, our sources indicate it is gem-lined. Search for a unit of Microcrystalline Quartz, Density 2.6-2.7, RI 1544-1553.

Success is of the utmost importance. While it may be too late to prevent this Equestria from helping him, securing this locket will be the first step in delaying them. Once the locket has been acquired, enact Re-Harmonise Protocol.

May Her Majesty watch over and protect you on your endeavour.

Regards,
~ Her Ladyship, Archmage Twilight

‘Of what importance could a locket possibly be?’ Redheart asked herself, even as she finished calibrating the gem-tracker.‘Wouldn’t stopping this Equestria from betraying ponykind by coming to Earth’s aid be more important?’

Then she replaced the tracker in her saddlebags. The locals need didn’t need to spot it and ask her what it was.

‘No. There is no time to question. Ours is to part in crisis, never to question.’

And off she was, closing the door behind her. It was not her house, yet it filled her with a moment’s regret to think she may have shut the door on it forever.

‘We know our work, our task.All strings attached and tied together.’

She hastened her pace.

‘Icewind can wait.’

* * * * *

Corporal Icewind was many things a Royal Guard should, and shouldn’t be, Winter reflected.

In the best of times, he was a true, dependable friend. In other, less ideal times… Winter wondered why he put up with him. Now, of course, was one of those times. Simply put, while Winter was sitting quietly on the far end of the bench, with a parchment spooled out before him, Icewind was trotting back-and-forth across the locker room. The sound kept distracting Winter from his report. Usually he tolerated Icewind’s sentiments, especially concerning romantic escapades. But perhaps he shouldn’t have encouraged Icewind to go gallivanting off on this date of his. Not with a mare who was technically a co-worker. Discharged, yes, but once a Guard, always a Guard.

“Pretty rum, isn’t it, old chap,” Icewind commented cheerily. “Never’d I have thought, in a million years, that she’d snaffle up the offer so promptly.”

And being discharged must have treated the nurse well, for her to draw Icewind’s affections.

“Mmm,” Winter commented, idly. He didn’t look up. The day’s report wasn’t exactly writing itself. He tapped the desk in contemplation. “Lucky her.”

‘Eleven, no, twelve hours? Long shift. No wonder so many ponies think we’re statues.’

He bit his quill and continued to write, even as in front of him, Icewind pressed on. Winter was merely half-listening at this point, but nevertheless, his friend was providing ambience.

“She’s the lucky one? Well, I can only hope,” Icewind said modestly. “I mean, I don’t expect she’s thinking anythin’ lasting will come of it, with us living in different towns, for one. But being a Guard on the move’s gotta have its perks, if you leave the places you visit with something to remember ‘em by.” He paused. “Sometimes, Winter, I doubt you know your luck. You take it for granted, having someone back in Canterlot.”

‘Creature is–’ Winter’s train of thought was interrupted, and he glanced at Icewind. “What? What was that you said about Chamomile?”

His tone had gone defensive, he could hear it. But Chamomile Brew was always there for him, there in Canterlot. Admittedly, pitched against the inner monologue of the droning report he was writing, the thought of tea in Chamomile’s shop, just the two of them, won out and enticed him dearly.

Icewind smiled crookedly, finally ceasing his pacing around the room.

“Buddy, you make such a big deal of the Guard,” he said, pulling up the seat before the bench. He took his helmet off as he sat down, letting his silver-and-teal mane flow. “When not all of us get to be Captain Armor, their Guard service delivered as a package complete with a sweetheart. Think you’d be half as devoted to a Canterlot posting, if Chamomile weren’t part of it?”

Winter held back a snort, for deep down, he knew Icewind had a point. Nevertheless, he wasn’t about to let Icewind go easily.

“Perhaps not,” he admitted. He allowed himself a tiny smirk. “Although, where would you be, without either of us to keep an eye– eh, make that two pairs of eyes, on you? She’d be amused if she found out about that nurse.”

“Why would she?” Icewind asked, sounding genuinely surprised. “I don’t see how being in the Guard means you can’t allow yourself some downtime.”

Winter rolled his eyes. The ball was in his court.

“I was referring to your... way of, ahem, courting the nurse,” Winter said, in what he believed to be a smooth voice. “Of courting any of them. The way you just go in and rush these things. And you used to say I’m the awkward one, eh, Icewind?”

“Bah! Really?” Icewind said, brushing back his mane. “If you call seizing the moment ‘awkward’, nothing I can do to help you, friend.” He began picking at the clasp on his armour, but stopped, to stare at Winter with a twinkle in his eye. “For the record, I didn’t use to say you’re the awkward one. Far as I’m concerned, Winter Truce is the awkward one, same as he ever was,” Icewind said, resuming his unfastening of the clasp, “Look at us. You tiptoe around stating your affections for Chamomile. A mare you’ve known since foalhood, and you approach her like a débutant at his first ball.”

But Winter, not one to take his eye off another sort of ball, let the statement wash over him.

“No, Icewind,” he said, setting down his quill. “That’s called courtship, thank you very much.”

“My point exactly.”

Winter frowned at this, though it wasn’t so much out of anger as mild irritation. But he let himself relax. Or tried to. They were amongst themselves.

“Even so, Chamomile and I are...” He stumbled. “Alright, what we’ve got is slow-burning, but…” And then he said something before he’d thought it through. “Well, at least I don’t swing as easily as that Prince of Ponces we know, do I now?”

The remark actually seemed to take Icewind by surprise. Then he burst out laughing.

“Don’t kid yourself, you know what he’s like,” Winter said gruffly. “We’ve known it since the Academy... What a privilege.”

“Dear me…” Icewind said, once his laughter had abated. “You had to shoot for the most extreme counter-example… but talk ‘bout shooting yourself in the claw, cos’ you’ve missed one big thing.”

“What’s that?” Winter demanded, holding his forehead. Clearly, he wouldn’t be getting this report finished soon.

“Goodness, Winter.” Icewind chuckled, with a tap to his helmet. “You’re all about following the proper courtesies with Chamomile, her being a daughter of the gentry ‘n all, sometimes I wonder if you’ve so much as kissed. Now you speak of the Prince... Hah, like him being of noble breed means he’s even once acted proper with paramours. And those are the people he wasn’t trying to scare off.”

Winter hoped his resigned sigh would go unnoticed by his friend, though to his disappointment, it didn’t. He’d be lucky if this report was finished by midnight – or if the thestrals didn’t end up finishing it for them.

“Fair enough,” Winter muttered. “So as good form goes, amongst former barrack-mates, I’m waves away from either you or Prince Marshmallow. I’d call it ‘ahead’, if I may be frank. How do I rank amongst the Battalion for professional duty, then?” he asked, tapping the half-done report. “Like you said, not everyone has it made, like the Captain did. Some of us have got to work our way up.”

“Hey, Winter.” Icewind sat down, on the floor by the bench, the joviality in his tone now smoothed over by something else. “This is Equestria. You don’t need to be a Prince to marry a Princess.”

“No, but it helps,” Winter said bluntly. Recognising the look of earnest concern on Icewind, however, he forced a jocular smile. “Mind, would you help me switch places, if the title ever grew available?”

Icewind wasn’t fooled by the weak attempt at humour. “As if,” he snorted. “You’d never do it that way. It wouldn’t be good form. Even if you’re never gonna make me believe your boundless loyalty to Equestria was all you had at stake, joining the Guard.”

“Not at all,” Winter said lightly as he dipped the quill in its inkwell, intent on pressing a joke that wasn’t hitting home. “But you underestimate me. I am most ruthless in my ambitions, Sergeant Icewind. Becoming Warden of the North someday isn’t too small a prize, if it serves the good of Equestria.”

“Funny how ponies who say they do things for Equestria’s sake tend to be painted with a bad brush,” Icewind muttered, folding his forehooves. “And you’d sooner pass off as a social-climber than admit you’re also a hopeless romantic? You’re one of a kind, you are.”

Annoyed, Winter folded up the parchment. “It takes either a romantic spirit or stolid loyalty, to know what the Equestrian Royalty can be like and still pledge to protect them.”

“Oh, come off it.”

“I’m dead serious,” Winter said, facing his fellow pegasus. “Defend the idea, Icewind, not the person. We’re not in the Guard to be the protectors of an idle, self-satisfied buffoon, but the Princes and Princesses of Equestria, and the ideals they uphold.”

“Sure, old chap,” Icewind said, hoof reaching for the clasp on his barding. “All this means is that, without the ‘Prince’ title in front of the name, you wouldn’t have a second thought ‘bout copping old Astron, if you got the order.”

“If he were proven guilty of treason,” Winter stated evenly. “Then... Yes. Without hesitation.”

“You added that first bit in to make it easier to stomach, didn’t you?”

“Did not!” Winter said indignantly. “Besides, if he keeps on like this, it may just happen. To this day, I still fail to see how jumping ship, literally–” He cut himself off, frowned, then carried on. “Well... perhaps I got my expressions mixed up there. What’s the opposite of jumping ship…? Jumping a ship, taking off? Point is, the Princess has an astounding level of tolerance. I won’t ever forget the sight of Starspear sailing out of Vanhoover Harbour, with Captain Dendrite doing nothing to stop it… taking off with the rest of the deserters, the cur.”

During this, Icewind had finishing unfastening his barding, which he now leant against the bench while he started on removing his brass horseshoes.

“Not deserters. A couple high-born service-dodgers and some friends,” Icewind corrected. “Just goes to show. Money and titles don’t make you a finer person, they just help you get out of trouble. Exit stage left, buddy.” For emphasis, he made a mid-air cloppity-clop motion with a newly-bared forehoof. “Is this really the crowd you want to join? Given you don’t have many few kind words for–”

“You’re talking oddly smack about the buccaneers,” Winter interrupted, remarking, “seeing as I’d have thought you had half a mind to follow them.”

Icewind shrugged. “They’re not my crowd, Winter.” His mirth seemed back on the rise. “Take that as you will. Though Captain Denny might be as good a drinking partner as any, my career wouldn’t be worth the uniform I wagered it on if I took part in such a stunt. Why would I, when I’ve got your shining personality to see me through the Academy?”

“The Academy?” At this, Winter suddenly saw a funny side of the issue he could actually exploit. “Really, has anything changed since school?” He prodded the folded-up parchment. “I’m here doing your homework while you’re off chasing girls.”

He felt gratified to watch the grey on Icewind’s cheeks turn a slight pink.

“Got me there,” Icewind muttered, raising himself. As he did so, he took the opportunity to kick off his remaining horseshoes, though carefully. “But you’re just the same as ever, too,” he added, using his head to push the lot of his gear into an open locker. “Even back when it was age-appropriate, you never did want to play pirates with the other kids.”

Winter smirked. “Oh, I don’t know that,” he said silkily, starting to unroll the parchment again. “If Princess Celestia decides she’s had it next time Blueblood wants to play pirates, I know which part I want to play.”

“Scary,” Icewind muttered. “‘Ere.” Giving last piece of his barding a shove, he managed to slam the locker’s door on it. “‘Ou’ll ta’e good care of ‘ese for me, won’t ‘ou?” he said, voice somewhat muffled as he turned the key with his teeth. That done, an upward flick brought the key, on its lanyard, to curve over his head and loop around his neck. It gave a soft, fading jangle as it twirled to a stop. “If you don’t mind the extra guard duty, that is.”

Just then, Winter was almost startled stuff by a burst of noise from the door, causing him to let go of the parchment, and it rolled back in on itself. Icewind’s baffled look met his own, then both glanced towards the doorway. There stood a dazed unicorn, the green mare he remembered had been chasing after the human at the hospital entrance, this very morning.

Wasn’t she a friend of the Princess’s personal student? Certainly not one of the five he knew from the throne room’s stained-glass windows...

“Uh, hi!” the frazzled mare greeted. “Sorry, in a hurry, bye!”

Before Winter could open his mouth, she’d fled off again, in a mint-green blur.

* * * * *

When Lyra did find the correct room, behind a green door marked ‘Storage - Foreign Bodies, Category 1 - Non-Hazardous’, any hope said inscription had promised her easy access proved a lie, as it opened not onto the room itself, but an antechamber. Yet Lyra didn’t pause to think as she rushed towards the inner door, and promptly knocked herself down when she impacted it.

“Goodness gracious, Miss Heartstrings! What game are you playing at?”

Her vision was just clearing when the voice’s owner helped her to her hooves. A nurse. White-and-blue-haired, cyan-coated; rapidly coming out of her daze, Lyra recognised the xeno-surgeon, Sutra Cross. Who mostly sounded worried about her, but there was a touch of annoyance in there too.

“Nurse Cross!” Lyra gasped, forgetting to even thank her. “You must help me get inside that room!”

“Huh?” Cross blinked twice. “Slow down there, Miss Heartstrings. You’re all tense. Why don’t you just take a seat,” she gestured to a desk with an open newspaper and a half-finished donut lying on it, “and tell me what’s the matter?”

“No time for that!” Lyra panted. “Sorry,” she said at Cross’s stricken expression. “But I really, really need to find something. And if it isn’t there, it’s gonna be a disaster!”

“Okay,” said Cross. She did not press Lyra any further. Instead, she went back to the desk to pull a key-ring from the drawer. “Here, we’re gonna do this now. But promise me one thing, ‘kay? Try not to touch too many things. They mightn’t be dangerous, but they’re very delicate.”

“Sure, yeah,” Lyra hastily nodded, shifting from hoof to hoof as Cross unlocked the door.

“What is it you’re looking for?” Cross asked, pushing the door open.

“The human… his stuff.” Lyra managed to wait for Cross to enter the storage room first, but once the nurse was in, Lyra scrambled past her. “When you… when you took off his… his clothing, to put him in his, his hospital gown–”

“And a most delicate operation that was.” Cross seemingly couldn’t help the interruption, giving a little beam of professional pride. “But one well-wrangled. Tell that to the board’s smug faces, next time they talk of cutting off the xeno-biology department’s funding. ”

“Yeah, look,” Lyra panted, pawing at the wall of lockers. “Among, among his things, did you… did you happen to see a locket?”

Cross had stopped before a specific locker, checking the smaller keys on the key-ring. But then she turned to face Lyra; before Cross had spoken, Lyra already felt her heart sink.

“A… locket? No, I don’t think so,” Cross said, apology all over her tone. She turned a key in the lock. “What kind of locket?”

Trying to ignore the ringing noise in her head, Lyra rummaged her memories for Alex’s description. “It’s… it’s small, just big enough to fit in your hand– um, your hoof, it’s heart-shaped, and it’s covered in red satin.”

Cross shook her head, stepping away from the locker. “Sorry. I must say I’d have noticed, because it’s nothing like anything the human was wearing. See this?” Her aura lit the locker’s inside orange as she picked something up, a pair of engraved rectangles on a chain. “Those are dog-tags, like the Royal Guard wears. I…” She licked her lips. “Between the burns on our human’s body, the camouflage outfit, then this… they all point to our guest being a warrior. I… I didn’t want to tell you. I thought you might not like it.”

“He told me himself. It’s alright,” Lyra said, sticking her head in the locker.

“Hey! What are you doing now!?”

“I’ve got to find that thing!” Lyra said loudly, pulling out all the storage locker’s contents. Forest-coloured vest and trousers, plating, boots, the whole of it tumbled at her hooves. But no heart-shaped locket.

“You’re not going to find it here! We keep very careful records of these things.”

“Open… I don’t know,” Lyra desperately waved her forehooves, “open up the other lockers!”

If Cross had been about to argue, she reconsidered it. “This is not standard. Yet I’ll do it. But I’ll do it as fast as possible, because I believe you’re wasting your time here.” Her aura selected each of the smaller keys, picking them off the key-ring and bringing them to hover, individually, in front of each locker in the cramped room. “Now.” The keys turned as one. “I’m doing you a favour, Miss Heartstrings. It’s more than my job’s worth if word gets back to management.”

Lyra took her by surprise by hugging her. “Thank you, Nurse Cross.”

But Sutra Cross’s prediction proved well-founded. One storage locker after another got magically flung wide open, it's contents emptied and near-immediately restuffed, Lyra having barely closed it before moving to the next one. This continued, across each and every locker, with the same invariable result.

“Where is it?” Lyra asked herself, with mounting irritation. “It has to be somewhere!”

She thought back to everywhere she’d been in the past tumultuous couple of days.

“Sweet Celestia, don’t tell me we dropped it in the Everfree Forest,” Lyra whispered in dawning horror. “No, no… No, it can’t have! We were so careful in carrying him!”

Next to her, Cross had been going over each of the lockers she’d searched, to make sure nothing was too out of place.

“Maybe it… fell off before you came back for him,” Cross suggested somberly. “Perhaps even before you found him. Remembering what you said, he didn’t touch down gently.”

“I… almost hope that’s what it is,” Lyra said, thinking of the Tree of Harmony. She closed the last locker. The reality of the situation settled in. “But… how would it drop in the first place? This seems… almost…”

‘Contrived’ was the first word that came to mind.

“I’d almost think it doesn’t wantto be found,” Lyra said, laughing and sounding a bit more nervous than she would’ve liked.

The nurse gave her a very serious look. “If you think you need it so badly and it doesn’t want to be found, perhaps you shouldn’t find it,” she said gravely. “For your own well-being. When artefacts have minds of their own, good or evil, there’s one thing they never are. Safe.”

Lyra considered that. Briefly, a little voice reminded her of how one Lyra Heartstrings, according to Alex, had tried helping him before, and paid the ultimate price.

“It’s not dark magic,” Lyra said obstinately, striding towards the door. “Whatever it is, I know it’s not evil. He needs it to fight evil with.”

“Where are you going?”

“To the Everfree, of course! I need to give Alex his locket back before it’s too late!”

A sharp pain made Lyra yelp as it ran up her tail. Looking around, she realised Cross had seized it in her orange aura, and didn’t intend to release.

“Oh, no, you’re not,” Cross hissed. It had taken a while, yet her patience seemed to have run its course. “Now listen, Lyra. I can see this is very important to you. But you’re not, you hear me, you’re not going into that Forest alone when it’s getting dark! Ever since Miss Sparkle and her friends started doing on a regular basis, ponies have got it in their heads that the place isn’t so dangerous. When it is!”

“Please, let me go!”

After a few heartbeats, Cross nodded and did so, but her horn stayed lit. “Take it from me, I’m a nurse. And I’ve still got a job to do tonight, so I can’t stop you forever. But if you must go into the Everfree Forest, you bring some backup.”

“Backup? Backup from where?” Privately, Lyra wasn’t sure it’d be a good idea to get too many ponies involved yet.

“The Forest Rangers, for instance,” Cross said, moving past her. She sat down at the desk. “And if you can think of somepony to help you track the locket, they better come with.”

* * * * *

Being left to sit alone in a waiting room was not the best way to make Bonbon forget how aggravating her partner could be. She didn’t feel mad, per se. Feeling mad would imply this sort of thing hadn’t happened before, that hundreds of her life’s limited hours hadn’t been spent in wait for Lyra to return from some animal-watching session or midnight lecture.

The brown-coated, blond-maned Ranger on desk duty came up to her. Finally. It had only taken him half-an-hour, or thereabouts. Which wasn’t that long, true, but it felt longer than it had to be. It seemed a waste, when she’d chosen to first check the Rangers’ office because it was closest to home.

Especially when the place’s furnishing was this uninspired. Though Bonbon was no Rarity, she was convinced there were more interesting ways to adorn a room than plain wood paneling and rakes with four teeth the size of her hoof.

“Miss Sugarbean?” he said. “Chief Tome will see you now.”

Bonbon nodded and stood up to follow. Feeling the spy-briefcase safely tucked inside her saddlebags, briefly, she permitted herself a wry grin at how her bags sported the lyre, Lyra’s cutie mark. Like her partner was her main reason for going anyplace these days.

Before entering the office, she got a peek into an open doorway next to it. Yep, there they were, the pets of Twilight Sparkle and her friends. If the owl, the rabbit, the cat, the turtle and the baby alligator were here, it was incontrovertible proof that their owners were out of town. The Apple family dog, of course, would have been left at Sweet Apple Acres.

“Hello, Bonbon,” Minus greeted her warmly, doffing the campaign hat she wore everywhere, even inside her office. (‘Worse than Applejack, honestly.’) “Sorry to have kept ya waiting... but ya did get here earlier than when ya normally close shop, right? It must be important. How can I help ya?”

“Well...”

Bonbon took a seat. This wasn’t a good start. She’d hoped to make this seem a casual chat. But if Minus had noticed the discrepancy in her schedule, the Chief Ranger would have guessed it wasn’t. Bonbon wondered if she was losing her touch.

She decided not to stall. “It’s like this, you see. Lyra was out on a walk in the Forest yesterday–”

“Ah,” Minus nodded, resting her forehooves on the desk, with an air of knowing what to expect.

“–and I know she came back, cos’ a friend told me, but I haven’t seen her since. I’ve got reason to believe she brought a… strange creature with her. Do you know anything about that?”

Minus raised an eyebrow. “Yer asking me? Doesn’t Lyra tell you anything? I’d have thought Lyra would confide in you way before she confided in government employees.” She stroked her chin. “Funny, really, how she thinks the world of Princess Celestia, but won’t trust ponies who do all the work in her name.”

This was too bad, yet not unexpected. And Bonbon felt reassured when she hid her disappointment as effectively as any reaction to being mentioned in the same phrase as government employees. She hadn’t quite lost her touch after all.

“You know what Lyra’s like.” Bonbon sighed. “Why do I put up with that mare?”

“Because you love her?” offered Minus.

The simplicity of this caught Bonbon off guard. “I guess,” she admitted, fiddling her saddlebags. “But I marvel at it, sometimes. She can get so… impulsive, sometimes.”

Minus gave another small nod. “That, I get. And mad props to ya, Bonnie… I wouldn’t be the same without my guy.”

“Oh… yes, your husband.” While Bonbon had been surprised a few times by the Chief Ranger’s perceptiveness, at least manoeuvering the conversation in this direction had been a cakewalk. “How was he, coming home from outdoor weight-lifting last night? Sure he didn’t notice anything going on?”

“Depends.” Minus tapped her chin. “At what time was this, ya say?”

Mentally, Bonbon called up when Rarity had come in yesterday, and subtracted a few hours. “Five PM, I think. Maybe four. I haven't much to go on.”

“Well, fancy that,” Minus commented, reaching to open one of her drawers. “That’s around the time Miss Pie and the Mayor made their grand announcement of Princess Cadance and Prince Shining Armor coming to Ponyville for their honeymoon. Didya hear?”

“Yes, though I wasn’t there to see it,” Bonbon said. Of course, she knew no such honeymoon was planned in Ponyville. But now, she suspected this was more than Pinkie’s general nuttiness. “Why, did Bulk Biceps think something was up with that?”

“Not he. He don’t care much for royalty,” Minus shrugged. “Besides, same as you, this was during his work hours. My lad Feather, though…” Having finished rummaging around the drawer, she pulled out what she’d been after. A crisp photograph. “He takes all the pictures, y’know,” she said, turning it over to show Bonbon. “And ya know his sixth sense for winning snapshots… so, when he hears ‘bout this honeymoon business, he suspects it’s a front and looks the other way. Here’s what he got out of it.”

Bonbon inspected the picture. It featured seven– correction, six mares. One of them was Lyra. Bonbon understood that, on instinct, she’d counted Pinkie as amongst the group, though she wasn’t. And between them, they were carrying–

No doubt of it. This was no creature listed in Bonbon’s secret book. Processing the sight, however, she could garner it didn’t look completely alien. While the strange clothing made it hard to distinguish, her first thought was of a Minotaur with less bulk and a simian’s face, only prettier.

Well, ‘pretty’ was a relative term. Not helped by how the human seemed to have endured a lot of abuse.

“My,” Bonbon whispered, taking the picture. “That’s something. Where does your son get these from?”

“Never underestimate the power of the cutie mark, Miss Sugarbean.”

Bonbon glanced at her. “Your son’s mark is, well, a feather.”

“Okay, truth is, beats me,” Minus said, leaning back. “But trust me, if I knew… there are days I’m sorely tempted to stamp it out of the little snoop. It’s any parent’s worst nightmare, well, perhaps not their worst, but still very darn bad, havin’ a kid who don’t know where their nose isn’t wanted.”

The image this blunt talk raised made Bonbon blush, she herself no stranger to partners and passions.

“Huh,” she said. “Remind me never to have children… Excuse me, but… can I keep this?”

“Sure thing,” Minus smiled. “It’s no use to me. And Lyra’ll probably love it.” She leaned forward. “That, by the by, is what I got sorted out with Featherweight after that school-newspaper business. Making him promise that, in future, he’d show me any pictures he took. I keep the ones that might get too intrusive.”

Bonbon pocketed the picture in her bags. “Isn’t that awfully trusting?”

“Yes,” agreed the Ranger. “But it’s how ya work things out with your loved ones. They’re tiring and irritating and annoying, and they got faults they’ll never fully fix. Yet if they love ya, they’ll meet you halfway and at least try tonin’ it down.” She turned up her forehooves. “Hey, mayhap I’m not showing my lad enough discipline, ya think. If I wanted, I could just rip up his precious photos. But... that just seems, I dunno, too cruel. It’s my side of the bargain. ‘Don’t destroy ‘em’.”

“And I’m glad you didn’t destroy this one,” Bonbon said, getting up. “But in my book, parents have no call bargaining with their kids.”

“Not when their kids have done something truly wrong,” Minus said, also getting up. “Then, yes. No haggling, only marching orders. Still… ya may be surprised by what our kids, just by breathing, can do to keep us in line. I hope this’ll help. May I show ya the door?”

As she shook hooves with the Chief Ranger, Bonbon reflected that, while the amateur photographer may be squandering his talents now, it might be worth her keeping an eye on him; possessing a knack for furtive photography could get him far in the agency, one day.

* * * * *

The white walls of the hospital loomed over Redheart as, from the cover of the foliage, she thrust out her gem-tracker as far as she dared towards the building. Yet this device, one of the great successes of the Solar Empire, was failing her. The performance rate of a dozen unicorn specialists’ work, the envy of many a beachcomber on Earth, and thus a useful trinket to gain humanity’s trust risk-free – none of these was worth a bean when, try as she might, even after turning the dials up to the Archmage’s stats, no little green light-bulb shone in the remote’s top-left corner.

Redheart was biting her lip as she pulled back the tracker, almost not caring about the rustle she caused in the leaves. She knew she hadn’t forgotten Ponyville Hospital’s layout in all these years. Seen from here in the woods, Alexander Reiner’s second-storey bedroom would be fifth on the right, at the back of the building.

And even though she tapped the tracker’s dials, the obvious answer was entering her mind. She was looking in the wrong place. The locket must never have reached the hospital. Either it had got lost in town, or likelier, the Everfree. Which would mean heading all the way to the other end of town, and braving the Forest. A tracker this small wouldn’t detect the correct gem from afar.

At one time, Redheart might have thought the Everfree Forest a most daunting mission area. Now, it felt like just another setback. Besides, after a whole day spent in this bizarre Ponyville from outside time, losing herself in nostalgia seemed a greater risk than getting lost in the Forest...

‘But how will I destroy the locket, once I’ve finally got it?’ the question arose in her. ‘Never mind. I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. I’ve got to get that thing first.’

Making her way back, Redheart took care to loop around the hospital, hidden by the hedgerows which encircled the building. Though she wasn’t wearing her cap, the chances were just too great someone might spot her and call her over for a chat, like Sutra had that very morning.

Right as she was circling back onto the main road, her reasoning was proven correct. Just when she‘d been about to step out from behind the hedge, the sound of hoofsteps prompted her to shrink back into the shadows, and not a moment too soon.

The young pegasus she’d impulsively invited on a date trotted by, not seeing her. Even so, Redheart stayed crouched for a good few seconds, without breathing, before she dared suck in a gasp and stood, peering after his retreating figure. There was a spring in his step and a lightness to his gaze not to be found, it dawned on her, in any Guard where she came from.

In fact, when was the last time she’d seen a Guard out of uniform, in any capacity? Unconsciously, her forehoof went to her head, unconsciously stroking her mane. She hadn’t undone her bun, yet otherwise, here she was, a simple village nurse off-duty, with nothing other than her mark to identity her as a nurse. Had Icewind and she met at the cake shop, they might have been any two ponies out for the evening.

‘How sweet,’ said a voice in her head, treacherously, and she knew it was her own voice. ‘And just what were you planning you’d do, you and a stallion, both free of garment? If you’d taken him home, and taken him upstairs… How would you explain there’s another you in your bed? Would you just tell him it was a plan for a threesome?’

Redheart felt an urge to slap herself. But whether it was for almost forgoing her mission, or to stamp out the unwelcome voice within her, she couldn’t have said.

* * * * *

“Goddammit,” Alex whispered. Even now, he fumbled at his chest, as if hoping to conjure the locket.

Meanwhile, by the window, the ghostly Galatea observed him gravely. She stood alone. Whatever it was Celestia had told Luna, in hushed tones, that they needed to ‘convene’ about in private, the two sisters had been gone almost as long as Lyra. Which could be anything between three and thirty minutes, but like always, for him, time had slowed to a crawl in such moments.

And who knew what other fateful scenes had unfurled in that time.

“This is indeed…” she said, perhaps trying to fill the silence, “an unfortunate turn of events.”

“For me especially.” Alex had growled those words. He didn’t mean to, but he had. “That trinket… that locket… It’s an old family heirloom. I…” His shoulders were sagging. Angrily, he righted them again. “Call me sentimental, but this war’s cost so much. It can’t take that piece of me too.”

He hadn’t lain back down. He was still sitting, on the edge of the bed, like he was prepared to spring from it at any instant, despite the fact he shouldn't. Cold sweat stained his gown and bedsheets.

“But why?” he demanded suddenly, fixing his gaze straight on Galatea. “What’s it to you, this locket? Or to Amethyst, and Zecora? What was their deal? Maybe they told me and I’ve forgotten. My brain still feels like a load of mush, when I try to remember what happened, at the portal-station. But…”

“What is it, Alexander Reiner?”

“Stop using my full name,” he hissed. “Who the hell does that? What I was thinking, though… why this? How could anything of mine help the war effort now, when we’ve been living for five years with the Barrier coming closer, without damaging it once?”

“I cannot say for a fact,” Galatea replied promptly. “Was there… anything special, that you noticed, about the locket?”

“What’d be special about it?” Alex snorted. “It was just a locket. Except it was my locket. That’s what made it special. Oh, and when I was little, Mom showed me the inside was lined with… what she call it... citrine. A very dear gem, she said. Not expensive. But hard to find in nature… and this one was natural. Very good for the mood. Said it was like holding a bit of the Sun. Or… ‘the fire that God has put there’. Is how she used to put it.” He felt himself go quiet. “And... Lord help me, but that… it helped on the battlefield, somehow.”

Galatea nodded. “And Miss Amethyst Star is your specialist on gems and their properties,” she said. “On Equus, the spiritual attributes of crystals and gems are very real, Captain Reiner. So too are they on your Earth… a force newly awakened by the coming of magic to your world. It could be that she, and her zebra friend, wanted the citrine gem for–”

“No!”

Though he yelled, Alex’s voice was slurred, like an unnatural effort were taking it out of him. In fact, the force of his yell caused him to double over, and he had to clutch his stomach with both arms.

“No, no. This… this doesn’t add up.” He peered up at Galatea, glowering. “There’s something you’re not telling us, isn’t there?”

“The number of things I’m not telling you far outweighs what I am,” Galatea said neutrally. “But isn’t that, mathematically speaking, the case for all conversations?”

“No time to be a smartass,” Alex snapped. “We’re letting vital information slip away here, lady. You said the Tyrant knew about humans before we’d even met her… that’s some Grade-A intel. It changes everything! And I want to know… How.” He let the words hover, to signal he hadn’t finished yet. “How,” he repeated. “You know too many things, Galatea,” he said softly, hissing her name. “It’s not just the way you know about humans. I never told Lyra… this Lyra, or her friends, or the Princesses, that I’m a Captain. So don’t tell me you got it off Celestia. Why am I so important to you? Why bring me here?”

She hesitated. He saw it. For a fraction of a second, Galatea hesitated. He’d only just met her and he could tell she never hesitated.

“You are a leader,” Galatea answered. “A human, and officer of the paramilitary branch to the greatest organisation dedicated to opposing the Tyrant on Earth. And you are not the only one missing facts… Captain Reiner, but I’ve synced enough of mine counterpart’s knowledge to know how valuable you are. You were Ambassador Heartstrings’ friend, and this makes you a natural target to the Tyrant, who has so turned her back on friendship, the very friend of her enemy is also her enemy.”

“Bullshit.”

This time, Alex meant the word.

“Me, a leader?” He gave one of his harsh, barking laughs. “Some leader. A glorified errand-boy, more like, who got by thanks to friends in high places. You know what I’ve learned from war?” He uncrossed his arms. “Don’t be a hero. Really, don’t. Unless you're John McCain, God rest his soul. But I’m not, am I?” He laughed again, bitterly. “You save a schoolteacher and a bunch of kids from a church in Paris during the Purple Mist, you go from an embassy guard to a medal-bearer overnight. Men like Gardner tout you as a war hero. Before they make you their whore.” He sighed a heavy sigh. “And the teacher goes on to lead the PHL, because she’s one thing you’re not. Smart.”

Throughout all this, Galatea listened to him motionlessly. Like this was just more information for her to collect and catalogue.

Alex felt his heat rise. He wanted her to react. He’d already made her react once.

“It isn’t me that’s important to you, is it?” he said, devoid of tone. “It’s the locket. You asked me where my locket was before I’d even said it’s gone. You knew Amethyst wanted me to hand her the locket because, it’s my fucking guess how, you, or that other you, contacted her.”

A look of conflict showed up on Galatea’s normally inscrutable face.

“A good supposition, though not entirely correct,” she said at last. “But now tell me one thing. You did not recognise me when I appeared in this room. Do you have any memory, any memory at all, of us having met before?”

Her chosen wording did not pass him by. Alex frowned, a hand to his lips. “N… no. I don’t. You… you weren’t there.”

And he was startled to realise it was true. He’d never seen Galatea, in any world, until today.

“Except that,” she said, “after a fashion, I was.”

“What? What does that mean?”

“Not bodily,” Galatea clarified. “But think about it. Who else was in that room, apart from you?”

“Why must you be so damn–” Alex began frustratedly, but then waved it off. “No, no, it’s alright. Guess it just comes with your job description… that, and Alex Reiner needs to show he’s got a brain on his shoulders, not just some chump who gets ahead by shooting at things… Okay…” He raised four fingers, counting them off. “There was Cadance. She left early. She had refugees to take under her wing. There was Amethyst. Obviously. Then Zecora. And she was there, not just because she and Amethyst often work together, but also because she was looking after…”

The name died in his throat.

“You felt pained to say it in front of Miss Heartstrings,” Galatea said, almost gently. “But her former wife was there too.”

“Nothing ‘former’ about it, actually,” Alex muttered. “Still loves Lyra as much as ever, does Bonbon. If you must be so damn precise about terms, be precise now. Call her Lyra’s wife.”

Galatea gave a dip of her head. “Mine apologies, sir. Sometimes…” Her voice grew tight. “Sometimes the finer details slip me by. Could you recount what Miss Sugarbean told you?”

Alex shook his head. “No,” he said firmly. “Lyra might come back any minute. And I can't do this to her, not yet. She doesn’t need the distress of learning her lover’s an insane wreck… like I don’t need the extra hassle. Plus… there’s still things I’m struggling to recall.”

“I understand,” the alicorn said, “Yet Heartstrings’ wife is more than an insane wreck, isn’t that so? Her tragic brush with the sands of time has left her seeing not just the present, but into the future, and past… And opened up her mind to access for those who know the door.”

And then a big piece of the jigsaw fell into place for Alex.

“Oh, God,” he gasped. “Now I remember! Her eyes had gone white… and she was speaking in someone else’s voice– Wait. I hear galloping outside. I think it’s Lyra.”

Not two seconds later, the little green unicorn burst into the room, a panting, huffing mess. Behind her, one of the Guards at the door silently closed it. If he was surprised by either Alex or the ghostly alicorn, he hid it well.

Something else was unusual, Alex thought, about the Guard he’d just seen. Then it hit him. This must be the evening shift – the Guard was a thestral. A small detail, and yet, one which reassured him this Equestia was like the one Lyra used to speak of.

But the Lyra in front of him wasn’t reassuring. While Galatea kept observing dispassionately, Alex felt his temporary relief ebb away. Something was wrong.

“Alex,” Lyra wheezed, clutching the bedrest with a hoof and her chest with the other. “I’m… I’m sorry. Couldn’t… couldn’t find it. We… we must have lost it in the Forest.”

“That is not good,” said Galatea, leaving Alex no time. “But we can estimate where it might have gone. Based on your account, it may have fallen off during your botched teleportation of Captain Reiner.”

This comment ensured any ire Alex may have felt at Lyra was instantly redirected. “Wow,” he said. “Thank you, Mrs. Tact? Why not slap the poor mare in the face, while you’re at it? It isn’t her fault she was more worried about getting me out safe!”

“Pardon me, Captain Reiner. But the fact remains,” said Galatea. “The Everfree Forest is unpredictable. We must act fast before that locket is out of our reach.”

Lyra tried saying something. “You’re…” She took a deep breath, tried again. “You’re… an alicorn. Couldn’t you… you or the Princesses just... beam over and find it… find it there?”

What happened next surprised Alex. Galatea’s face fell.

“I’m truly regretful, Miss Heartstrings,” she said, and sounded it. “But alicorns though we are, even I and mine sisters have finite reserves of power. I used up great amounts of magic in the past month to travel all the way from the North to Canterlot, whereas Celestia and Luna…”

“... Were off visiting the Kirin last week,” Lyra finished wearily. “Yeah, I know, I know. Cadance mentioned it in her letters. You alicorns are no help at all, you know that? Shouldn’t you have, I don’t know, some kind of emergency teleportation button?”

“Come to think…” Galatea said, tapping her chin. She stopped, an ear twitching as if someone invisible were whispering to her. “Ah. Celestia’s just reminded me there is such a medallion. But it’d require acquiring from the unicorn elder who possesses it.”

“I don’t think I can wait for that,” Lyra said. “I’ve got a bad feeling something’s about to happen.”

“Agreed,” said Galatea. “Yet you are unlikely to succeed in finding the locket without the proper spells.”

“I wasn’t about to go on my own,” Lyra harrumphed, although Alex noticed she didn’t quite look at Galatea in the eyes. “I just… need somepony to trust… Alex, what’s your locket made of?”

Feeling a sense of dejà vu, Alex replied, “It’s not much. Just red satin and some filigree, I guess. Oh, and it’s got a citrine lining.”

“Citrine… that’s a gem, right?” Lyra sighed. “If only Rarity hadn’t left for Canterlot… We could really use her gem-finding spell about now…”

“But…” Alex snapped his fingers. “But that’s it, Lyra! Aren’t we in Ponyville, from before the war? Then Rarity’s not the only gem-finding pony in town.”

She looked up at him, eyes lighting up with understanding.

Moments later, after Lyra had gone to find Amethyst Star, known as Sparkler to some, Alex and Galatea were once again left to themselves, this time in contemplative silence. Eventually, Alex coughed, to draw Galatea’s attention.

“Well?” he said. “Shouldn’t you be off finding a way for the cavalry to swoop in at the last minute?”

“It was out of your sight, but while you and Miss Heartstrings were talking, Luna departed to retrieve the magical badge of transportation. Our own conversation was unfinished, Captain Reiner. Yet I believe you had retrieved an important memory.”

“Why, yes,” Alex chuckled faintly. “And I’d love to see how you’ll explain it to Lyra, that the other-you spoke to me using her lover as a mouthpiece.”

* * * * *

“What’ll it be this evening, dear?” asked Mrs. Cake.

As ever, Bonbon marveled at the hours Sugarcube Corner kept. She considered herself to be a hard-working mare, and took pride in it. For all that, in practice, this meant she pulled twice her weight for herself and her layabout girlfriend. But the Corner’s owners took work ethic to a special level even for earthponies, running the place like a bakery, a cake shop, a diner and an evening café in one package. And all this while raising a pair of rambunctious infant foals.

The thought reminded her of her chat with Minus. Her own parents had said that, to a parent, a child was like a whole world. Sometimes, Bonbon doubted Lyra could have taken the strains of raising a child any more than if she’d been responsible for an entire world. These moments made her question their future...

“Actually,” Bonbon lay her hooves on the counter. “I was hoping to… hoping to talk to Pinkie.”

“Ah.” Mrs. Cake’s smile faded a little. “I’m sorry, Bonbon, I’m afraid you won’t find her here. Didn’t you hear, she and her friends left for Canterlot this morning. One of their crazy adventures, I’ll be bound.”

Bonbon had suspected as much, but it didn’t hurt to hear it straight from the horse’s mouth.

“Or maybe,” she suggested casually, “it has something to do with Pinkie’s announcement yesterday, that the Royal Couple were coming to Ponyville for their honeymoon? Wouldn’t that’d be a boon for both our businesses, eh, Mrs. Cake? Even though I know you’ll run me over, once Pinkie starts making actual moons out of honey, mark my words.”

Her fellow maker of delicacies laughed good-naturedly. “Don’t you worry, you know Equestria, there’s never a short market for sweets.”

“I’m surprised, though,” Bonbon commented. “It’s not like with the rest of Twilight’s gang, who are each their own employers… well, except Rainbow Dash. She never does any work. But Pinkie must really do lots of quality overtime, given how often in a week she drops everything to follow her fancies.”

“Hey,” Mrs. Cake smiled, tapping the cash register. “There’s no salary fit for a part-time hero. But say, what did you want to talk to her about?”

“Oh, just the honeymoon,” Bonbon lied easily. “It’s not that important... I mean, it’s a shame I missed meeting her, but nothing I can’t catch up on. I only hope the honeymoon won’t be a magnet for trouble like the wedding was.”

“Bad show, this Changeling business,” Mrs. Cake shuddered. “Still, it all turned out happily, didn’t it? Pinkie called it the party of the century.”

“Yeah...” Bonbon prepared her next words carefully. “Does she tell you much about her adventures?”

“Of course she does,” Mrs. Cake nodded. “But you know, it’s Pinkie. You’re hard-pressed to tell where fact ends and fantasy begins. And, no, she rarely warns me when she’s about to go off on a new one. Carrot and I have just learned to work around it.”

“Oh…” This was a disappointment to Bonbon. A good trail, she felt, had gone cold. “Thanks anyway. Guess I’ll just have to wait, then. Mind teaching me how?”

It was meant as a joke, but something about it made Mrs. Cake look sad.

“Ah, Bonbon,” she sighed. “I fear you’re not the only one who’s been left waiting tonight.”

Bonbon had been about to turn away. She stayed. “What do you mean, Mrs. Cake?”

“It’s the very strangest thing,” Mrs. Cake explained, coming in from around the counter. “This young pegasus fellow came in earlier. Sat down at that table,” she gestured towards a table by the window. “He looked very happy, at first. But then the minutes ticked down, and he started looking a little lost. Eventually, I went over to ask if he was expecting anypony.”

“And was he?” Bonbon asked, fighting to remain interested. She was a villager. Villagers liked to gossip. In her line of work, all gossip could be useful.

“He was,” said Mrs. Cake. “And that’s the weirdest thing of all. His date had already come by, but she’d left in a right hurry, without even finishing her sandwich.”

“Who was… his date?”

Mrs. Cake’s answer shot a jolt of electricity through Bonbon’s nervous system.

“Redheart. Makes sense, I guess. She was in the Guard. And this fellow, he’s the type of stallion that do well in the Guard, you could tell just by looking at him. What still doesn’t make sense is Redheart leaving behind both a perfectly nice-looking guy and a half-eaten marmalade sandwich.”

* * * * *

After the hours they had spent playing, the growing number of crumbs and little pieces of muffin which lay strewn around the table threatened to overwhelm the board itself, but neither Dinky nor her friends were about to let that spoil their game.

“A shadow is coming,” Dinky intoned, in the spookiest voice she could muster. “A shadow which thirsts for blood... Growing on the wall behind you, swallowing you in darkness... It is almost here.”

“What is it?” whispered Ruby.

Featherweight gulped. “What if it’s the terrible Grogar? Oh, ohh, we’re so doomed if it's Grogar!”

“It’s not Grogar,” Pipsqueak said crossly. “It’s not–”

“An army of skeletons charges into the chamber!” Dinky cried out grandly.

With a spark of her horn, she slammed the corresponding figurine onto the table. Using her horn still hurt more than a little, if she was honest, but it was well worth it to give the other kids a spectacle. And if she couldn’t use magic to lord it over another unicorn, a pegasus and an earthpony, all a bit older than she, it wasn’t worth having at age eight.

“Skeletons,” Featherweight repeated, a hoof covering his buckteeth.

Pipsqueak nudged him. “Told you.”

Everyone at the coffee table began to laugh, until Dinky suddenly looked around, exuding anxiety.

“Wait a minute...” she said slowly. “Did you hear that? That noise? It comes closer… Boom... boom... Boom!” She slammed her hooves on the table, startling all the other foals. “It doesn’t come from the skeletons, no… It’s… it comes from something else… the terrible Grogar!”

And with that, she slammed the figurine of the horrible ram-demon before their eyes.

“We’re doomed...” Featherweight said weakly.

“Pip,” called Dinky, “your move!”

“Whu-!?” Pipsqueak exclaimed. “I don’t know!”

“Fireball! Use fireball!” shouted Ruby.

“I’d have to roll a thirteen, or higher!” he cried. “I’d sooner cast a protective spell!”

“Don't wimp out now,” Ruby ordered him. “Use a fireball!”

“No,” Featherweight stammered, “cast a protective spell!”

“Grogar tires of your foalish bickering!” Dinky announced imperiously. “It stomps towards you. Boom!”

“C’mon, Pip,” Ruby said loudly, her carnation coat turning red. “Fireball the beast!”

“Another stomp, boom!”

Featherweight looked on helplessly. “Cast a protective spell.”

“He roars in anger!”

All at once, Pipsqueak made his choice. His eyes narrowed, which, given the brown patch over one of his eyes, had the effect of making him look determined indeed.

“Fireball!” he yelled, standing high to throw the die. But in his hurry, it flew too far and fell off the table. “Oh, horseapples! Where’d it go? Where is it!?”

“Is it a thirteen?” asked Featherweight.

“How would I know that?” Pipsqueak snapped, stooping to search under the table. “I can’t find it, you idiot!”

With her friends’ emotions running high in the heat of the game, Dinky saw her carefully-planned Ogres & Oubliettes campaign flying apart if she didn’t step in, snap. She’d wanted to give Pip a chance at glory. It wouldn't do for it to get totally spoiled by an argument.

Summoning her energy, another, discrete spark of her horn led the minute-arrows on all the dining-room clocks to move from twelve to three.

Her mother, who always kept an eye out, even from the next room over, with her other eye focused on cooking dinner, noticed the change in time immediately, of course. Out of surprise, both her eyes momentarily aligned, but when they met Dinky’s imploring gaze, she understood right away.

“Alright there, guys,” said Derpy, wiping her hooves on her apron as she came out of the kitchen. The two boys ceased bickering at the sound of her voice. “Sorry to barge in, but time’s nearly up.”

“We’re in the middle of a campaign, Momma!” Dinky said, affecting indignation.

“You mean the end?” asked her mother, pointing at the nearest clock. “Fifteen after.”

“But that’ll ruin the flow!” Pipsqueak protested.

“Call it a cliffhanger,” Dinky’s mother said pleasantly. “You can come back tomorrow for how it turns out.”

“Momma, the campaign took two weeks to plan,” Dinky tried to explain, keeping up the pretense. “How could I know it was gonna take ten hours?”

“Well, you could’ve asked your Dad.” Her mother’s uneven gaze swept over the assembly. “Now c’mon, kids, get yourselves ready. Ruby, I promised your mother she could come fetch you at eight-thirty. Feather, Pip, you know the drill.”

All three groaned, yet they stood, knowing it was pointless to object. Of course, Dinky’s mother didn’t like to see any kid disappointed, so she sought to soften the blow.

“Here,” she said, having quickly flown back into the kitchen, returning with three blueberry muffins in paper bags. “For breakfast tomorrow. Just promise me you’ll save ‘em, eh?” She stared at the empty boxes of hayburgers lying by the coffee table. “It’s not good for your appetite otherwise... Should’ve made you a proper lunch, instead of letting you stuff your faces.”

“It’s okay, Miss D,” Featherweight said, taking his muffin-bag gratefully. “But how are we gonna continue playing tomorrow if we can’t find the die?”

Dinky suppressed her own groan as she saw Pipsqueak, who’d forgotten his loss, face glowing at the prospect of a fresh muffin, go back to being annoyed.

“It’d be so much easier to find,” he grumbled, “if some ponies weren’t bigger eaters than you’d think, being all pencil-thin and whatnot. Look at the boxy mess down there, no wonder you can’t find anything!”

“And some ponies have got awful big mouths for being short!” Featherweight retorted.

Ruby and Dinky shared a look. ‘Boys,’ they agreed silently. Neither had figured how Feather could live with remarks about his teeth, yet was so touchy about being thin. Perhaps it just came from having a father who was the total opposite, tall and burly.

But all further argy-bargy was cut shot by the appearance of a twenty-sided die, aloft in a purple aura right between the foals.

“You were looking for something?” said Sparkler.

Gasping, Ruby, who was closest to Sparkler, took the precious item from her. She used her hoof, Dinky noted with satisfaction.

“How’d you find it, Sparkler?” Ruby asked, awed.

“Trade secret,” Sparkler smiled, while Derpy gave her a grateful look. “You wouldn't tell me all there’s to know about grape-pressing, would you?”

Ruby shrugged, passing the die to Dinky. “Mommy’s said I’ve got a few more years to wait before I learn ‘bout all that.”

“Hey, Sparkler,” Featherweight said, staring up at her, with a hayburger box in hoof. “Your Mom gave us muffins to take home. But there’s a burger left if you want it,” he grinned. “Hay and daisy.”

Sparkler glanced down at him. “Thank you… um, Featherweight,” she said, exchanging another look with Derpy, “but I’m sure the muffins are on the house.” There was a knock on the door. “Ah! If I’m not mistaken, that must be your Mom, Ruby. I’ll get it.”

While she went to the door, Featherweight lowered the box, dejected. Dinky saw her mother was covering her mouth, trying not to laugh.

“There’s something wrong with your sister,” Featherweight muttered Dinky’s way, breaking a slice off the hayburger and leaving the box out for the others. “She’s got a stick up her butt.”

Pipsqueak took his own slice of hayburger. “Yeah,” he said, staring at his best friend cunningly. “Or maybe she knows about you getting caught with your camera in the older girls’ locker room.”

“That’s not true!” Featherweight cried, turning crimson. Dinky and Ruby, for their part, made a show of turning their noses up primly. Boys’ problems belonged to boys.

Then Sparkler’s voice carried over from the front door.

“Oh. Evening, Lyra. Excuse me.” She turned to call back to the kids. “False alarm, Ruby, it’s not your Mom!”

Indeed, when they looked, Dinky saw it was Miss Heartstrings at the door. But she was surprised to see Miss Heartstrings didn’t look her usual cheery self. Her pretty mane, though never the tidiest, was completely frazzled, like she’d run a long way.

“Hello, Sparkler,” said Miss Heartstrings. She glanced around and noticed their mother. “Hi, Derpy. Look, I– sorry, there’s not much time to explain. I need to borrow Sparkler.”

Dinky heard her sister make a surprised sound, before saying they were just about to have dinner. Her mother, taking her eyes off her and her friends, went to the door too, to ask what was up.

But Miss Heartstrings seemed to mean what she’d said, and she barely explained anything.

“I’ll go over it on the way,” she told Sparkler, sounding agitated. “I just really, really need your gem-tracking spell right now. Rarity’s not here.”

“Lyra,” began Sparkler, “you’re asking me to go with you into the Everfree, when it’ll be dark in an hour–”

“And that’s why we can’t wait, or it’ll just make things harder! C’mon!”

Dinky took a step back. Miss Heartstrings had shouted. Miss Heartstrings never shouted. Worse, she’d seized Sparkler by the forehoof when she shouted.

Her mother would have told her off if she’d done that her sister. In fact, she looked ready to tell off Miss Heartstrings. But she must’ve heard something urgent in Miss Heartstrings’ voice, because she didn’t.

All Derpy said was, “We’ve never had reason to doubt you, Lyra. Amethyst, I think you’d better go see what it is.”

Sparkler looked at their mother helplessly. “Al… alright.” Then she looked towards Dinky. “I’ll try getting home in time for dinner. If I don’t, save me some olives. The black ones.”

Dinky didn’t mind that. She liked green olives a lot better. Behind her, her friends were sharing what was left of the hayburger. Although they didn’t look like they were listening, she knew they hadn’t missed a word.

Then Sparkler and Lyra were gone, and her mother was closing the door, sighing. Dinky even thought that she looked a bit sad. She thought she heard her mother whisper something about ‘Doc warned us’, but she didn’t catch it all, because not two seconds later, there was another knock.

Her mother, surprised, opened it again.

“Oh, there you are, Berry. Please, come in. Ruby, it’s your Mom!”

While Ruby started saying goodbye to Pip and Feather, Dinky listened to the mothers at the door. Her mother was telling Miss Punch how the the kids had a fun time. She was trying to smile, but Dinky knew she wasn’t feeling it.

“Glad Ruby had a good time,” Miss Punch said, waiting patiently for Ruby to be done. “But I just saw what I think might’ve been your other daughter, runing after Lyra. She was having trouble keeping up, Lyra looked in a hurry.”

“Well, you know,” Derpy chirped. “As my husband likes to say, ponies think time is money, money is power, and power means pizza, but he prefers skipping right to the pizza. Whatever that means.”

“Sure,” Miss Punch said uncertainly. “But if Lyra ain’t careful, she’s gonna get badly hurt someday.”

* * * * *

“This is crazy,” Sparkler was saying as, a few minutes into this mad gallop away from home, the Forest loomed ever closer. “Crazy even for you, Lyra. You haven’t suggested anything this crazy since you planned to go hunting Nightmare Moon yourself.”

“Well, it worked out for Twilight, didn’t it?” Lyra panted, reminding Sparkler of her friend’s poor exercising regimen.

“Twilight is, well, Twilight!” Sparkler said loudly. “And there was destiny, or Princess Celestia’s planning or whatever, involved! You’re just charging headfirst into, into… I don’t know what!”

Fortunately, at this hour, few ponies were out to hear her. Even so, Sparkler thought she spotted one or two silhouettes pop up at the windows, backlit by the comfy yellow light inside. She skid to a halt.

Lyra, noticing, was forced to halt and turn as well. “C’mon! We’ve got to find this thing!”

“I need more than that, Lyra,” Sparkler said seriously. “Now are you gonna tell me what’s going on, or am I supposed to follow you blindly?”

She saw Lyra bite her lip. Given how deep the bite looked, it was a wonder she didn’t draw blood. Then Lyra swallowed, and nodded.

“Okay,” she said. “But I’ve got to make this quick.”

It took her about five minutes, all told. When Lyra was done, she simply stopped, waiting.

“Wow…” Sparkler eventually said, staring at the cobblestones. “This is… a lot.”

“But you believe me, don’t you?”

Sparkler refocused her stare on her. And chuckled softly.

“Lyra,” she said. “Look at my Mom and Dad. Humans and evil parallel universes and secret alicorns are the tip of the iceberg. I’d believe in anything.”

“So you will help me find the locket?” Lyra said hopefully.

“I’ll try to,” Sparkler said, her horn coming alight. “No promises. Because it’s still sunset, we’re still wandering into that forest at this hour, and we’re still looking for something we’ve never seen before. But I never thought there was no locket. I just wanted to know why it’s a big deal.”

“I’m not sure either,” Lyra admitted. “But, um, about what you said earlier… Destiny and all that? I dunno if it’s the same... I don’t really believe in destiny, except for cutie marks. Maybe it’s just being in the right place at the right place… Point I’m trying to make is, this locket… I think it’s as important as those Elements Twilight found.”

Sparkler nodded, trotting past Lyra to lead the way, by the light of her horn.

What she didn’t say, for she wondered if now it was Lyra who’d believe her, was that she had good reason to harken stories of unknown alicorns and eldritch creatures, lost worlds and magical trinkets.

* * * * *

Redheart traipsed through the Everfree Forest. She didn’t follow the forest path. She kept only the slighest watch for predators. If they came for her, she’d be ready for them. Foliage and thorns were nuisances to cut a straight line through. Whenever a tree or stump intruded upon that line, it was a mere setback for her to circle around them, before she continued onward, with unyielding intent.

Retrieved from the storage of her saddlebags, the red cloak that marked her as a Royal Guard was all the protection she needed.

The one time she veered from her chosen path was when she came across a patch of low-lying blue flowers. She was familiar with the strange poison-joke, a creation of Lord Discord’s if she’d ever seen it, which took traits precious to those who rubbed against it and turned them inside-out. Her cloak, specialised as it was, would surely have provided adequate protection, but this was a risk where caution was well worth exercising.

It was getting dark. But the glow of her gem-tracker still provided light enough, and the training she’d received, both during her initial run with the Guard, and later, under the tutelage of newly-integrated zebras, gave her everything she needed to let other senses than sight guide her. There, a smell of moss on the wind, the soft but persistent sound of running water; such tells were her compass, letting her navigate where she was in relation to the forest river, to the village, to the castle.

And the further she traipsed, the green bulb on the tracker blinked, more and more often. Once it ceased to blink and stayed permanently lit, Redheart would know her quarry wasn’t far. She would have the locket. Yet, the more she thought about where the dial was leading her, the more it seemed she recognised it, somehow. Except it wasn’t anywhere near the castle, or the chasm. If anything, she was heading away from those places.

Wouldn’t the locket have fallen close by the Castle of the Two Sisters, where she’d first appeared on this strange Equestria? Why, if only she hadn’t wasted time having to knot and lasso one of the ropes which made up the broken bridge, she might have got to Reiner and Heartstrings on the other side, before the arrival of Element Bearers had cast doubt, momentarily, in her heart. Sometimes, a single beat made all the difference…

The green light blinked, once, then blinked no more. It was steady. Redheart looked up. What she saw, again, gave her pause.

Someone had got to the locket first.

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

This chapter features no noteworthy modifications.

Spectrum 2.0 - September 28th 2018

TheIdiot: Complications are complicated. Something happens, events occur, and it all gets difficult again. If you’ve read Chapter 8 before, then you’ve noticed that it’s been carved in two – why amounts to an effort to try and fix the length and pacing. If you’ve approached this part for the first time, welcome to this midpoint; I certainly hope you get some enjoyment out of what has been submitted at least more than once. In the following half, you’ll see everything else.

This took forever and a week, didn’t it? Drama occurred from group politics, real life, and other lovely complications that delayed Chapter 8 many times over. It is unfortunate that by the time Chapter 8 got a completed draft it happened during a week where I had to face a midterm, an exam, and writing a rough draft all in rapid succession set only a day apart each. Honestly, sounds like a tacky episode of some dunce drama show. Probably not Glee, seeing how there wasn’t any licensed song covers sung.

Point of matters is that, yes, this was a labor of production that grew more difficult as real life continued to push down. I am fortunate that Sledge and Vox were able to step up despite these various issues.

Also, while this may bring up bad memories to our veteran readers, I assure you I have no intention of making this a recurring practice. This was a “break glass” type of deal and glass is not fun to sweep up, so I’d rather not do it again unless I have to.

Until next time fair reader(s),

Carpe diem.

VoxAdam: Sure thing, the time-gap until the next chapter ought to be shorter by default. Seven-and-a-half months is the longest delay we’ve ever had in-between chapters on a Spectrum main story. :-)

This was a uniquely challenging chapter to even sketch an outline for. I wouldn’t call it an exaggeration to say it must have gone through five different concepts, before settling on what you see today.

Over four years ago, I was hesitant to join Team Spectrum, not even as what DoctorFluffy affectionately called a ‘Sixth Ranger’, knowing I wasn’t the greatest at time-management. My time-management’s improved since; my rhythm hasn’t sped up all that much. Mind you, in that same chat, TheIdiot said he felt he’d only done so much for the Spectrumverse… There are things which change so completely over time, looking back on it is like gazing through a mirror into opposite-world.

Thank you once more, TB3, for inviting me to proofread Last Train From Oblivion. What happened after had its ups and had its downs, but your gesture made all the difference.

Back when Redskin posted his bridge-burning journal in May 2017, I came under fire for allegedly slowing the pace on the production schedule, mainly for advocating there be some conscious planning, instead of throwing everything and the kitchen sink at the story. This time around, I suppose we’re seeing the other side of that coin; the various factors such as wanting Bonbon to have an active role, maintaining the centrality of Lyra as our protagonist, Icewind being given a reason for his heel-turn, etc., constituted a huge number of plot points to bring together coherently.

And to be honest, we had written Redheart preparing to do something without knowing for sure what it was; the alternate path she could have taken can be read in Jed’s Cut, which was already planned months ago, and has recently been published independently.

The locket had been introduced as a Chekov’s Gun several chapters ago. The idea to use it as Chapter Eight’s narrative lynchpin came to us as a “Eureka” moment.

Ultimately, if you feel this chapter has an overabundance of building up to action, only to cut away just before it really gets going, in favour of talky scenes? Yeah, it’s a symptom of when much of the writing is given over to me. You may call me Gareth Edwards. Just please don’t call me Rian Johnson. Even if this is an eighth installment.

Act I ~ Chapter Eight ~ The Heart Goes Last

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

Thinks contortedly.

DoctorFluffy

VoxAdam

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

Fires Freely.

ProudToBe

Chapter Eight

The Heart Goes Last

* * * * *

“We crushed ourselves down over the centuries. Buried ourselves under greed and hate and whatever other sins we could find until our souls finally hit the rock bottom of the universe. And then they scraped a hole through it, into some… dark place. We released it. We poked through the seabed and the oil erupted, painted us black, pulled our inner sickness out for everyone to see. Now here we are in this dry corpse of a world, rotting on our feet till there’s nothing left but bones and the buzz of flies.”
— Julie, from Warm Bodies, by Isaac Marion

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~ Second Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

In the comfort of her palatial cloud-home, Rainbow Dash’s thoughts were far from leaving her bed. For the past two hours, she’d lain reclined, only moving to turn another page on her book. Daring Do & The Volcano of Destiny was proving a different sort of read from what she’d expected. Less action-packed than the rest of the series, with lots of ink spent on wordy passages slowly uncovering the stakes, like the narrative was afraid of getting to the action. A.K. Yearling seemed to have developed a taste for making things mysterious, with characters not being who they seemed, but never quite explaining what they were. Even the quest for the central artefact felt a little out-of-focus.

Still, she’d kept reading. Which meant it must be doing something to make her want to see the end.

That being said, Dash had picked up, by now, that the chapter she was currently on had an odd under-current about the demands of relationships, and building family. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that. In many respects, what she liked about Daring was how she could relate to her. Although Daring wasn’t an only child like Dash was, she lived fine without a special somepony in her life, just like she’d grown up without a mother. Both had fathers who were supportive while trusting their little girls to pick themselves up on their own. Dash found this suitable. She may have loved adulation, but it needed to feel earned. Parents who praised every little mediocrity, those were her worst nightmare.

No, Dash’s true family, apart from Dad, were her friends. With plans for the Wonderbolts, too.

So it was surprising that Daring wasn’t like her in this regard. It had never occurred to her before. Daring was a lone brave soul, and that made her a special kind of awesome. But Yearling must have been going through a mid-life crisis, because the number of young couples and parents Daring kept bumping into here was off-the-charts. Slowly, Dash had to admit a creeping dread that each time she turned the page, Daring would abruptly need a love interest to show her the way.

She’d read too many stories in fanzines who did this sort of thing, and she hated it.

‘Oh, Celestia, no,’ she thought. ‘Don’t let her just… Uuuugh. A boyfriend, then suddenly everything revolves around him, and there’s a pair of foals and Daring barely spends half the time as the mane character…’

It made her want to take a turn at Applebucking Season just thinking about it.

‘You’re probably still just wound-up over having met this human soldier-guy. It was tough, but you don’t have to let it sour you on everything.’

Yet her excitement at starting a new book had been cooling down, and she was feeling a few unpleasant memories seeping back into her mind. Sensing this and unsure of what to do, it was then that Dash recalled an old piece of advice from Twilight – pace yourself.

Twilight Sparkle, whose freakouts were so massive she sang whole arias about them, sometimes had the best teachings, for somepony not always good at the ‘do as I do’ thing.

Maybe, Dash thought, she could stop reading, if only for a minute, to skim through her letters. Yeah. That was a good idea. So Dash closed her book, determined to continue it very soon. She picked the top letter off the pile. Whether it was a bill or an ad, Dash felt confident that boredom would quickly chase away any black thoughts, and put her right back in the mood for Daring.

* * * * *

“Indefinite watch duty,” Selene said with a yawn, turning to look at Gibbous. “Don’tcha just hate it?”

Her partner shrugged, leaning against the door to the human’s bedroom with, frankly, insolent casualness for a Lunar Guard.

“Eh,” Gibbous said. “It’s not so bad, this town. Something’s always going on in Ponyville.”

“Please,” Selene scolded him. “You know you’re only saying so because you’ve got that silly crush on the local zebra.”

“Hm, not an evening person, are we?” Gibbous teased her. “You should learn to live a little, Selene.”

“Slow and steady wins the race, that’s the motto,” Selene said. “That’s how you get on in life. Mayhap I’m a bit tired now, but if you don’t work on your blood circulation, mate, you’re gonna be sliding to the floor before Sun’s up. Rather like that over-energetic green mare who kept popping in and out.”

“Yeah, where’d she go to?” Gibbous said curiously. “Haven’t seen her in a bit. Last we saw her, looked like she was rushing out the hospital without a backwards glance.”

“We’re mere Guards. Ours is not to wonder,” Selene shrugged. Stifling another yawn, she began shaking her head, then stopped, as her eyes refocused upon something past his shoulder, further up the corridor. “Well, will you look at that, Gibbous,” she told him, “seems you’re not the only Guard with romantic delusions I’m gonna be playing sitter for tonight.” She frowned. “Wait a minute. That makes two Guards. Did I forg–” Her eyes shot open. “Oh. Oh, tarnation. I forgot about Winter.”

But Gibbous wasn’t listening, having turned to see who was approaching. “Icewind?” he muttered, low enough for only her to hear him, as he noticed the Solar Guard approaching them, divested of armour. “Shouldn’t he and Winter be off-duty? What could he be after?”

* * * * *

“Redheart.”

Her name, a whisper in the dark.

“Redheart, talk to me.”

A voice, off the edge of consciousness.

The darkness does not make a clean break into light, when one finds one’s way back to the surface. At the threshold, a kaleidoscope of different colours twists and swirls before one’s eyes. As though, in that moment, one is made aware of the invisible spectrum linking the conscious and unconscious worlds.

Hesitation. Then a command. “Get up, soldier! You’re not down yet!”

Feeling came back into her body. Stiffness. Grogginess. But she was no longer gone. Groaning, Nurse Redheart forced her eyes open. The swirls became one great blur, the blur coalesced into real shapes.

She saw a creamy-white, blue-eyed face staring down at her. “Oh, thank Celestia,” the face’s owner breathed, clutching Redheart’s forehoof tightly.

“Bon… Bonbon?” Redheart’s voice came out in a croak. “What are you doing here… in my room?”

Because it was her room. She could tell that now.

“Rescuing you, of course!” Bonbon said, easing her grip slightly. In her other forehoof she clutched, of all things, an empty syringe. “You were out cold.”

“How did... you get in here?” Redheart said weakly. She then felt stupid. The answer was staring her in the face, almost literally. She tried shuffling herself up, but could not. Her muscles still felt too feeble. “No… how… why did you come for me? How did you... know.”

“I didn’t,” said Bonbon, laying down the syringe. “I mean, you’re a nurse. Work long shifts, what’s so unusual about you being asleep before nine? Except I just spoke to–”

Redheart didn’t get to hear more, as her body was wracked by a hoarse, gasping cough.

“Oh, sweet heavens…” Her throat felt dry. “Bonbon,” Redheart said, her free hoof reaching out. “I… I need some water. I...”

Bonbon nodded, letting go to draw out a flask from her saddlebags.

“Here,” she said, gingerly pressing the nozzle to Redheart’s lips. “You’ll get over it quick. I don’t think you were out for more than a day. But that was some strong sedative.” She removed the flask, and gestured towards the syringe. “I had to shoot you with a full dose of plasma to snap you out of it.”

“S… sedative?” Redheart whispered, too befuddled to say anything else.

“Yeah, sedative.” Bonbon held up a small bottle of hairwash. “When I got up here and found you like this, I immediately knew something didn’t feel right. For one thing, I really didn’t expect to find you here at all. Then I took a closer look at you. And I did a quick search.” Cautiously, she sniffed the bottle. “Someone tricked you into knocking yourself out, Redheart. Whoever it was, they still bothered to put you to bed...”

“Bonbon,” Redheart cut her off. “Why are you here? How’d you get in?”

Bonbon’s wordless reply was to put down bottle and flask alike, so she could pick another thing from off the floor. Metal glinted in the light of the bedside lamp, and Redheart recognised it as a grappling-hook.

“Hey,” Bonbon said lightly, tapping a utility belt around her waist. “Pinkie’s not the only one who makes rock candy in this town, you know. Job requires me to hone my abseiling skills. Then I saw you and...” She hesitated. “I had to pick the lock on your window.”

Redheart gave her a bleary stare. “But… what business would you have at my window?”

“I’ve been looking for you,” Bonbon said, opting for half-truths. “You’ve been missing. Or rather, I heard something weird from the last pony who saw you, and I got a sneaking suspicion… I decided the next place to look was in your home. I’m sorry. Good thing I did, though…”

“Ugh…” Redheart scrunched her eyes shut. “I can’t think straight. None of this making sense. And I thought Lyra was the weird one of you two…”

“That’s the thing. Lyra.”

A surprisingly urgent note lay in Bonbon’s voice. Redheart reopened her eyes, to find Bonbon looking at her with deep concern.

“She hasn’t come home in two days,” Bonbon explained. “Rarity told me about the strange creature she found in the Forest, and it being at the hospital, but that’s it. I know these cases usually fall into your lap. I was hoping to ask you about everything.”

“You sure don’t do things by half.” Redheart glanced at the open window, which had its curtains fluttering in the breeze. “Barging into my bedroom while I’m sleeping, when you could’ve just gone talk to Lyra at the hospital.”

Bonbon gave a weak snicker. “Again, let’s be glad I did. You might need a hospital check-up yourself. And whatever the strange creature is… someone didn’t want you around it.” Her gaze hardened. “Whatever’s going on, I’m not gonna let Lyra be hurt. Not after the Wedding Invasion.”

“That’s… great,” Redheart said, unable to think of anything better. She again tried raising herself, with a little more success. “Bwuh… but who do you think did this to… me?”

“I really don’t know,” Bonbon replied. “But since the Invasion, there’s only one true suspect, isn’t there?”

Her words made Redheart go stiff once more, for reasons that had nothing to do with the sedative’s effects on her body. Even now, not everything about Bonbon’s presence made sense to her. Yet her mind had found its focus.

“Yes,” she said, her jaw set tight. “Excuse me. Will you help me up?”

* * * * *

It took three goes of insistent knocking, before the door opened to the Whooves household.

“Hi there, Rainbow Dash.” Derpy’s expression, which had gone even more off-kilter than usual, relaxed when she saw who it was. “Dear me. I felt so sure I hadn’t miscounted Dinky’s friends leaving. I’d… just hoped Sparkler might be back already. Still. Fancy joining us for dinner? I ended up making enough for eight ponies…”

Dash thrust out an open envelope at the wall-eyed mailmare. “No time for that, Derpy,” she said, pointing to the envelope. “You know what this is?”

Derpy peered at it, as best she could. “Um, it’s a letter, isn’t it? I mean, I may get a lot of things mixed up, but I’ve never mistaken a letter for something else.”

“That’s right, it’s a letter,” Dash informed her, brow furrowing. “A letter I shoulda got yesterday, same as the order for my new Daring Do book.”

She saw Derpy do some quick thinking. “But you didn’t order any books through the post office,” Derpy pointed out. “If you went through the A-Mare’s-OWN guild, they’re the ones responsible for their carriers dropping off your stuff.”

“Well, they’ve sure dropped me off their list of clients,” Dash said impatiently. “Doesn’t matter. I got the book anyway.”

“Who is it?” called a male voice from the dining room.

Derpy turned and called back. “It’s Rainbow Dash! I think she’s filing a complaint.”

From the dining room, Derpy’s husband gave a reply Dash couldn’t make out, but which caused Derpy to chuckle.

“What’s so funny?” demanded Dash.

“Heh, something he said,” Derpy tittered. “What was it? ‘A-Mare’s-OWN. Order tomorrow, get yesterday’. Very true. They really want you to buy stuff before you know you want it.”

“And you know what?” Dash said slowly. “I really wanted this letter. Even more than I wanted my book.” All of a sudden, she couldn't hold back. Dash burst into a big, cheesy grin. “Because it’s the Wonderbolts who’ve written to say I passed the Academy! Full marks!” she exclaimed, swooping the bewildered Derpy into a twirling hug. “How totally awesome is that!”

She halted, and released Derpy from her hug.

“Thank you so much for delivering it a day late,” Dash beamed. “I really, really needed good news today. And not even Daring Do was cutting it. But this does! Couldn’t have come at a better time.”

“Uh, well, you’re welcome, Rainbow Dash,” Derpy smiled awkwardly, dusting herself off. “We know a thing or two about time, in this family.”

“Yeah…” piped a small voice.

Dash looked down, to see Dinky had joined her mother’s side at the door. She detected something off. The normally bright, cheery filly seemed preoccupied.

“Would’ve been nice for Sparkler to be back on time to eat,” Dinky sighed. “But that thing Miss Heartstrings wanted her for did look super important.”

An alarm bell went off in Dash’s head. “‘Miss Heartstrings’?” she said, stooping to be at Dinky’s eye level. “When was this, Dinky?”

“Oh, Momma knows, it’s not a secret.” Dinky let Dash have a small smile, more typical of her features. “Not like Miss Sugarbean. She’s a spy, y’know. Though I don’t think Miss Heartstrings does.”

At this, Dash frowned. She felt ready to turn away, dismiss this as just kiddie stuff, when Derpy said, “It’s true, about Lyra. I mean, um, that she came by earlier,” she added hastily. “Not half-an-hour ago. Dinky’s friends were leaving, and she turned up.”

“Why?” Dash said, feeling her insides knotting. “What was Lyra after?”

Perhaps Derpy hesitated before replying. But she did reply. “Sparkler,” she said. “They went into the Forest together. Lyra said Sparkler could help her find some precious gem. Weirdly… she didn’t say it, but weirdly, I think Lyra was afraid someone else’d be looking for it.”

~ The Everfree Forest ~

Someone had found the locket.

Not some beast. Someone. An equine. A person.

‘Why,’ Redheart reflected acidly as she stooped to cut another stem, ‘did that someone have to be Zecora?’

Any other creature in the Forest, she could have easily dealt with, employing trickery where brute force failed. But the zebra exile and witch-doctor of the Everfree would be ready for either, holed up in the hut she called home while surrounded by treacherous Nature on all sides. If only nightfall were not approaching! At this stage in Ponyville’s history, the recent friendship between the village and its neighbouring zebra would have made a pony travelling the Everfree less suspicious… during the daytime.

No doubt of it, however. Whichever angle she’d circled it around from, her tracker fixated on the hut. More and more, the locket having a say in being found seemed evident.

‘It can’t just… hide itself away, can it?’ The image was so bizarre it almost made Redheart giggle. ‘A little locket with legs, running away and hiding behind a tree…’

As her surge of mirth died down, Redheart wondered if the blue plants she was cutting up were affecting her mind, despite her protective cloak. Possibly. While midday was long past, this was still Summer, where the heat could have caused fumes to rise.

Nonetheless, it was the kind of bizarre occurrence she missed from Ponyville. Nevermind whya locket would sprout legs and run away, this sort of thing could just happen in the village. Bunny stampedes, rude griffon visitors, marauding dragons, Nightmare Moon…

It made Ponyville chaotic, but it also made it feel fun, unpredictable, made it feel like…

Home.

‘But this isn’t home,’Redheart told herself. ‘This is another world, another place, another time that hasn’t sufferedborne the weight of the Changeling Purges. I’m further from home than I’ve ever been.’

Whatever devious tricks the locket held, whoever it sought to hide with, Redheart would find it. And then, she thought, as she gave one last swipe of her knife through the patch of poison-joke, whatever threat the locket posed would be nipped in the bud.

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

“Gently does it. We’re almost there. Almost there.”

Bonbon had whispered such reassurances all the way to the hospital. The Redheart she was carrying on her back was flitting in- and out of consciousness, her rush of energy having diminished once she’d tried walking herself.

But she hadn’t fainted. Every injunction, she responded to with an affirmative grunt. Bonbon knew that, with proper treatment, the nurse would spring back to life in a blink.

And at last, her reassurances were no longer a lie.

“Here we are, Redheart.”

They were in the lobby. The nurse, here in the role of a prospective patient, let out a small groan, her eyes still closed, as Bonbon carefully sat her onto a wall-mounted seat, a few seats away from a pegasus languidly reading a magazine.

“I’ll get Doctor Stable,” Bonbon said, well-aware of the looks they were already drawing from the few ponies milling about. “Excuse me,” she called to the receptionist, “I’ve got someone here, she’s been doped to the eyeballs on sedative!”

“On it,” called the receptionist, as she disappeared behind the desk. She’d obviously recognised her colleague.

“It’s gonna be okay, Red,” Bonbon whispered. “It’s gonna be okay…”

She had never liked hospitals, least of all at night. While it wasn’t completely dark yet, the Sun had disappeared below the horizon as she carried Redheart across town. So the hospital lobby was lit by the cool, pale glare typical of such places. Bonbon hoped this was what made Redheart look whiter than usual.

Redheart managed to force her eyes back open. “Don’t worry… about me… Find… Lyra…”

“Heh,” Bonbon said wryly, “I think Lyra’s as safe here as she’s gonna be…”

“Redheart… My goodness, what happened to her?”

Bonbon’s head turned sharply to meet the speaker. It wasn’t Doctor Stable. It was the pegasus who’d been reading. His magazine lay dropped on the floor, forgotten.

“I’m not sure. I just… found her like this,” she said summarily. No need to cause a panic.

But the pegasus, a sleet-grey stallion, didn’t seem ready to let the matter rest. “Is she injured?”

“No… no, I don’t think so,” Bonbon said. Her forehooves were still on Redheart’s. “But she’s had a shock. I wouldn’t rattle her, sir.”

“Who…” Redheart forced out, swivelling her eyes towards the stallion.

He knelt down, next to Bonbon, to look at Redheart. “It’s me, Redheart,” he said softly. “It’s Icewind. Of the Royal Guard. We had a date. Don’t you remember?”

There was no recognition in Redheart’s eyes. “I’m… sorry. I don’t know you.”

The stallion closed his eyes. His head bowed, and stayed that way for a long moment, until he reopened his eyes, raising his gaze to face Bonbon.

“She didn’t show up,” he whispered. “I looked all over town for her. Asked where she lived. But when I got there, the lights were off and the curtains drawn. Then it got too dark outside, and I still didn’t know where she was, but I couldn’t find her on my own.” He swallowed. “I know, I should’ve alerted the Town Watch. But I knew there’d be thestrals here, doing the night shift. I came and asked for help. Then I didn’t know what else to do.”

Two words, technically three, stuck out to Bonbon. ‘Royal Guard’ and ‘thestrals’.

“Pardon me,” she said. “You’re a Royal Guard, you said?”

“Yes,” he nodded. “Corporal Icewind, recently deployed to Canterlot from Vanhoover. Our motto, ‘one with the wind and sky’, Miss…”

“Sugarbean,” said Bonbon. “Sir, can I take you aside for a sec?””

Surprise crossed Icewind’s face. He gave Redheart another look, hesitating. “Uh, sure? But what about her?”

“The doctor’s just arriving,” Bonbon said, directing Icewind’s gaze towards the corridor. It was true. Doctor Stable was marching up, flanked by the receptionist and a nurse Bonbon didn’t know. “And Redheart’s in a good enough state to talk to the doctor. Right, Redheart?”

Once more, Redheart groaned. Yet she nodded.

“Alright,” Icewind nodded grimly. Once they’d moved a couple of paces from the chairs, he spoke again. “So. What happened? Did she slip and fall?” His voice trembled. “Is she… amnesiac?”

Bonbon shook her head. “No. I found her…” She dithered. “All wrapped up and warm, nothing broken. But she’d been put into a deep, unnatural sleep. She’s lucky I had a medkit at hoof. My partner’s a walking disaster area.”

“What…” Icewind said. “I saw her just three, four hours ago. You saying someone knocked her out on her way to the bakery, and stuffed her away?”

“It might be worse than that,” Bonbon said quietly. “I think Nurse Redheart’s been gone for a whole day. Something a lot like this happened to my partner, a few months ago. She was one of the bridesmaids at the Royal Wedding.”

Silence fell.

In this silence, however, the change her words wrought on Icewind was tremendous. Where before, his eyes had been full of concern and boyish spirit, that spirit went out of them. What was left in their stead was too cold to be called anger – or rather, the kind of anger that felt right in such a stallion, despite his frosty name. No passion, only a granite hardness. His lips thinned.

“I see…” he said in a low, flat voice. “Thanks for informing me, Miss Sugarbean.” He turned his back on her. “Please, excuse me. I need to report we may have a Changeling situation.”

Bonbon watched him go, feeling sorry. She glanced at Redheart, who was being fussed over by Doctor Stable. Redheart was known to be a flirt. This must by why the Changeling had chosen her to impersonate. And this poor Guard, by the look of things, had been hoodwinked.

Yet, as Bonbon stood in the lobby, vague unease crawled up her spine.

Something here didn’t match the profile. If it was a Changeling who had caught and replaced Redheart, why hadn’t she been enveloped in a cocoon? Not even Princess Celestia had been spared that, during the Wedding Invasion. Didn’t Changelings operate as a Hive? Sending one single drone to feed seemed… unambitious. And with all of that, she realised, she still had no idea how the ‘human’ creature linked any of this together.

As Bonbon waited, unable to will herself to go find Lyra, she hoped she hadn’t inadvertently supplied false intel.

~ The Everfree Forest ~

The locket contained something true.

Whatever ‘true’ thing, Zecora did not quite know, as she reflected whilst making the evening rounds of her hut. Still, until such time as it was relinquished, hanging the locket by the mouth of her welcoming-mask did complement the decor. Admittedly, Zecora had considered wearing the locket herself. Keeping it close by, acting as additional finery for her golden neck-rings, would have felt like a double gain. But this somehow had not seemed right. Some fine-tuned shamanic instinct told her this trinket was meant to be worn solely by its owner… Such a shame. It’d have looked good on her.

Zecora heard her cauldron sizzle and spit, and glanced at it anxiously. To her relief, none of the broth had splashed upon the precious keepsake, a sure distance away. Nevertheless, she needed to be careful. While she awaited its rightful owner to reclaim it, she had a duty to keep it safe.

The apple soup was bubbling and frothing away, another hour from being good and ready. Nodding in satisfaction, Zecora went to contemplate the more exotic array of concoctions she kept on her shelf. Her gaze fell upon a tiny bottle of violet liquid. Since she’d returned from the chasm with the heart-shaped treasure, the bottle had ceased to glow, gone dark once more.

Whereas Zecora could only concoct most potions a few days before they were required, there were a few she’d held onto for a lifetime, never knowing if they’d be used. Of those rare tinctures, a rarer number yet had properties still not fully known to her. The violet tincture, this memory-of-the-alicorns potion, must be imbued with a deeper magic, in resonance with the Tree of Harmony’s song. All those times Zecora had visited the Tree, seeking to better know it, she’d only seen her own reflection staring back at her, from the crystal...

What made this locket special, for the Tree to finally ‘speak’ to her, asking she retrieve the jewel?

‘A token that provides us protection, taken from a precious collection…’

Indeed, that which caused the Zebra of the Everfree an uneasy reflection was that in this world, there were many such unique and valuable items. In her associations, which she still preferred to keep to herself when she could, the tincture of the memory-of-the-alicorns was but one; the heart-shaped locket, merely the latest.

When last year, the magician Trixie Lulamoon had cast her spell upon the village, using the powers of that Amulet, Zecora had felt tempted to bring out a rare possible counter to its power, before deeming it wiser to school young Twilight in the arts of smoke and mirrors herself.

Nevertheless, the properties of one specific relic had been entrusted to Zecora, not so long ago, by one daring, enterprising adventurer whom many believed simply a storybook hero.

‘This precious relic of a golden hue, which resembles a horse’s shoe…’

She glanced at where she kept the Half-Gilded Horseshoe of Sunflare. Key to unseen realms such as the Spirit Circle and the Hidden City of Cirrostrata, it rested in its tiny cabinet upon the shelf, unassuming, for all the world merely an elegant horseshoe that had, alas, sustained rust and beating on one side.

Perhaps Twilight could help her solve these mysteries, once the studious unicorn returned from wherever she’d gone. Zecora had to smile at the irony. Merely two years back, visiting Ponyville had always meant entering an empty village, where the outsider from Canterlot was the only one prepared to greet her. Now, when she had vital news to deliver, it seemed she’d encountered the whole village when visiting earlier, except for Twilight. She would try again tomorrow.

The memory of how the villagers used to shun her unfamiliar appearance made her think. Casually, Zecora strolled over to her bed, reaching underneath to extract her travelling-case. After a prudent glance through the open window, she opened it up.

As usual, the frameless mirror, although tall, needed to be stood on the bed for her to get the best view. She had indeed grown, since that long-ago trip to Saddle Mareabia. That was good, of course, especially as she’d grown in more than height.

Smiling, Zecora admired herself, from the front, then the back, and the front again. No question, she’d filled out where it mattered, she thought as she traced a forehoof along her reflection. Giggling softly, she leaned forward, her lips forming a kissy-face…

A knock at the door rudely snatched her from her reverie.

Nerves set aflame, Zecora leapt back from the mirror. Upon coming to her senses, she rushedly stuffed it back into the case, slamming the lid so hard, she might have broken the glass. Luckily, nothing did break. But who would come visit her at this hour?

Her staff stood leaning against the wall by the door. As she marched up, Zecora seized it, before opening to find–

No-one, and nothing. Other than a small, knotted-up paper-bag on her doorstep. Confused, Zecora stared at the unexplained package. From somewhere within, faintly, she heard a hiss.

She had no time to react before the bag exploded into a cloud of blue smoke.

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

When the door burst open, Winter was startled out of his slumber, finding himself jolting away from the locker he’d been leaning his head against. His first thought went to how doors slamming near him had become a habit, today. His second thought was a rush of anxiety. He’d overslept. But, before he could think this through–

“Icewind?” he mumbled, surprised when he saw who it was. “Weren’t you off on your date?”

Yet the look on his friend’s face, when Icewind strode into the locker-room, broke off all further questions.

“You’re still here,” Icewind said tonelessly, without looking at Winter as he went for his locker. “Didn’t expect that. Still, good. You’re still in uniform. Where’s the key?”

Then, before Winter could reply, Icewind saw the key on the table and seized it.

“Icewind, what’s the matter?” Winter said, rubbing his eye and standing up while Icewind unlocked the compartment. He hadn’t seen Icewind like this since… since the Wedding Invasion. “Did the date not go well? Wait… date… my da-!”

“There never was a date,” Icewind said, still toneless. “Not for me. I just spoke to Selene. She agrees this emergency trumps her orders to watch over the human’s bedroom. She’s gonna use her night-sight to scout the area.”

“Selene,” Winter whispered, the name coming back to him. “Darnit! I told her I’d be taking a nap once I finished my report! Why didn’t she come and wake me? She forgot! That darn sleepyhead–”

“Don’t worry about Chamomile,” Icewind cut in. “You can tell her you missed her this evening because you got called back. At least you can still spend time with her afterwards.” He slammed his helmet on. “Someone’s gotta watch over the creature. And with Gibbous still out in town, that now leaves you.”

“Wait, what?” Winter had never felt so taken aback. “Gibbous left his post? And where’d Selene go? Did you–”

“Selene already asked me to apologise on her behalf, Winter. Said she forgot to wake you cos’ she was tired. And Gibbous, in her words, had his head in the clouds. But that’s not important now. It’s night-time, Selene’s out hunting and when she finds Gibbous he’ll be too, and I’m joining them. We need you here.”

“Where are you– Why do I–”

“You really don’t pay much attention to people, do you?” Icewind said lowly. “I asked Gibbous earlier to help me, when I thought she’d got lost… my ‘date’,” he hissed as he fastened his barding. “When I should’ve been asking him to help capture her.”

Then Winter began to understand.

“We’ve got a Changeling on the loose,” Icewind growled. “And we must catch it before it hurts anyone else.”

~ The Everfree Forest ~

“How much further, Sparkler?” Lyra asked tiredly. “That’s the fifth nettle I stepped on. I’m itching all over.”

Sparker paused, quietly, eyes shut below her glowing horn. Under the forest canopy, with the stars out of sight, her horn provided the only light. Despite all of her discomforts, Lyra still didn’t dare light her own horn. It’d be so very stupid, to risk throwing Sparkler’s magical luminescence off-track, when they were perhaps inches away from their goal...

“It feels very close now.”

“Thank goodness,” Lyra grunted, scratching herself. “There I thought I had the Everfree sussed out… Nurse Cross was right, the Forest at night isn’t my idea of a fun safari. How’re you so… unblemished?”

“Experience?” Sparkler shrugged. “Here, let’s go see what’s behind those trees.”

She went ahead, took a peek, then stepped back, giving Lyra room to look at what she’d found.

“Lyra,” Sparkler said softly, dimming her horn. “I think we’ve found it.”

And Lyra, when she saw where they were, laughed with relief.

“Zecora…” she whispered. “Good old Zecora. Of course she’d be the one to save a mystical locket.” She pointed towards the steam, coming out of the crevice in the branch which served as the tree-hut’s makeshift chimney. “Look, she’s home. I bet you she’s waiting for us, with apple-soup on the fire, or a lovely hot stew.”

“Yeah, but…” Sparkler frowned. “Does she usually leave her front door open?”

Now she mentioned it, Lyra noticed. Not only was Zecora’s door open, but pieces of unidentifiable papery stuff covered the entrance. And unless her eyes deceived her, a faint, wispy blue mist lay in the air...

“Looks like someone set off a firework,” Lyra commented nervously.

But Sparkler, who knew all about fireworks, shook her head. “Don’t think that was a firework,” she said. “And not even Rainbow Dash would go to this trouble to prank Zecora.”

The thick knot of dread reappeared in Lyra’s stomach.

“Zecora’s in trouble,” she whispered, “we gotta help her.”

“No, Lyra– wait!”

She dimly heard Sparkler shouting after her, but Lyra didn’t look back. She was speeding off towards the hut, intent on doing the right thing, before the knot in her stomach grew too much for her to ignore.

What she found inside, brushing past the blue smoke, was nothing she’d have expected.

The heat within the hut was at the level of a sauna. She’d been wrong about the steam from the chimney. The cauldron wasn’t just cooking, it was boiling – scorching, even. Bubbles emerged from the froth and burst in less time than it took to breathe in life. Streaks of runny, acidic green liquid flowed over the rim and sizzled against the metal.

An equine figure lay, groaning, on the floor at the far end of the hut. It took Lyra a blink to recognise her as Zecora. But this was not Zecora as she normally looked. Something had changed about her. Instead of her regular grey hues, she was nothing but one dark mass, patched with whitish-grey welts.

For a horrible moment, Lyra thought Zecora was flayed to within an inch of her coat. Then she noticed Zecora’s mohawk and glyph-mark,, and it came to her – Zecora had been inverted. Those welts were not welts, they were her stripes. Only, the black-and-grey patterns had utterly switched places.

“Ridiculous, isn’t it?” someone sighed. Lyra jumped. A figure stood at the cauldron, face hidden by the thick steam which rose throughout the whole hut. “I hoped the poison-joke would do something more... debilitating, to her. So, this is how I learn, that her biggest weak spot is her vanity.” The figure spat into the cauldron. “Still, it did end up giving me the upper hoof. Too distraught over her looks getting spoilt to fight back properly, she was.”

Lyra recognised that voice. It couldn’t be…

“Nurse Redheart? Is that you?” she gasped. “What… what are you doing?”

“What do you think?” said the figure, stepping out from behind the cauldron. “The same as you, Miss Heartstrings. I was after Reiner’s locket. It just happens I got there first.”

She was wearing a muddy-scarlet cloak with insignia Lyra thought she knew from somewhere. And in her hoof, the nurse held a heart-shaped locket, dangling by a chain.

“That’s Alex’s…” Lyra said, stunned. “Give it back.”

“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Miss Heartstrings,” Redheart said sadly.

“But… why? Why?”

“Surely you’ve guessed.”

The scarlet cloak. The insignia. Royal Guard insignia. Redheart hadn’t been in the Royal Guard for five years… not in this Equestria, where life, though never entirely peaceful, was usually lovely and unthreatening…

“You’re one of them.” Lyra’s mouth fell upon. “A pony of the Solar Empire.”

The cloaked Redheart did not deny it. “Then you know what this makes you. The Empire’s greatest enemy.” She paused, her face a mask, where only her eyes told of her thoughts. As Lyra read it, they were not at consensus… “My oath pledges me to do no harm,” Redheart said suddenly. “And it is against our principles to shed blood, when we can avoid it. Least of all equine blood.” She nodded towards the groaning Zecora. “She’ll live. I merely…” Redheart raised her spare forehoof. “Gave her a pinch. Doubt she saw me using her own people’s martial arts against her...”

Lyra felt herself go cold all over. If Zecora, with her prowess, couldn’t beat Redheart, what chance did she have?

“It’s not too late to step away,” Redheart said, holding up the locket. “Lyra. Forget you ever heard any of this. I haven’t come to hurt you. I haven’t even come to hurt Captain Reiner, or to take him away. Humans are tenacious, but I’d never believe a single human could bring doom to all of Equestria. He can live his life out here, if he wishes, and perhaps find some measure of peace…”

“Why?” Lyra whispered anew. “What about that locket? What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to destroy it,” Redheart said simply. She lifted it above the acid boiling in the cauldron.

“No!” Lyra screamed. “No, you mustn’t!”

“You can’t stop me!” Redheart snapped. “Whatever this is, it’s obviously magical. Humans with magic… I’ve seen what they can do. I cannot think of anything more dangerous. That’s why I must do this.”

“You’re… you’re killing them…”

“What?” The incredulity in Redheart’s voice was genuine. Such that she pulled back the locket. “Surely that’s not what Reiner told you! If we wanted to kill them, we could just let the Barrier consume them and be done with it. Didn’t he tell you we give them a way out?”

“A way out? You’re… you’re stealing their world, and their souls…”

“The human’s only shown you one side of the story,” Redheart said. “He wants you to feel sorry for him. You’ve no idea what they’re capable of. What, did he tell you the Barrier was destroying his planet?” She took a deep breath. “No. The Barrier’s cleansing his world. That is no lie. What it does to the humans it touches... is a regrettable side-effect... but it solves all the harm they have done to their planet. The air and the ground, filled with poison… the oceans, so full of tiny pieces of plastic, no clean-up effort could ever get rid of it all. Not without magic. The Barrier works. It takes it all away.”

Lyra stared at her. Her jaw had gone slack.

Behind Redheart, the window above Zecora’s bed swung open, noiselessly. It was pushed by a purple forehoof, followed by a violet-and-purple-maned head, well-known to Lyra, peeping through. Sparkler saw everything. But Lyra didn’t look her way. She kept her eyes on Redheart.

Sparkler pulled herself through the window and landed on Zecora’s bed, the noise muffled by the duvet.

“And no harm the Barrier does, can match what they do to themselves…” Redheart said morosely. “They hate and they kill each other. It is their way. Don’t believe me? They elect leaders who despise them, who rob them of their freedom and dignity... they think only being a philistine is honest, they let themselves get distracted by shiny things and gunpowder... And they always, always, find someone to blame for their shortcomings.”

She met Lyra’s gaze.

A sweating Lyra, for her part, struggled desperately not to break it. Sparkler was creeping up behind Redheart. Here, what Lyra did notice was that Zecora’s staff had been left lying next to Zecora. Sparkler must have seen it too, because she picked it up in her mouth, with an apologetic glance at the zebra. She then continued on tippy-hoof, one side of the staff tilting to level with Redheart’s nape...

“We did seek peace in the early days, Miss Heartstrings. The ponification serum was our olive-branch, a means to welcome lost souls into Equestria. But that wasn’t enough for them... They began trying to steal magic from us… a few, then more, and more... Perhaps we should’ve fled, yet that ship had sailed. Once they knew of Equestria, there was no stopping them. Even if we sealed all the portals, they’d have found us. Because they are cunning. Cunning enough to trick ponies like you, who’d have sold our secrets… You dreamt you could help them. You know what they did? Men like Alexander Reiner took that dream and weaponised it.”

Somewhere inside her, Lyra worked up the courage to retaliate.

“And what you do is better?” Lyra yelled. “I sawAlex’s mind. I know what he told me. You turn them into twisted little half-ponies, you destroy cities and homes, you’ve erased thousands of years of culture and history! And I knowyou’ve done worse even than that! I don’t know what he meant when he said ‘recycled into useful biomass’, and I don’t want to!”

Rage surged in Lyra.

“Don’t you darepretend you’re the hero here!”

“Have it your way, Lyra,” Redheart shrugged. “I’ve been at war too long to believe there’s such a thing as a perfect hero. You made the mistake of believing in the perfect victim. And if I’m no hero, the human’s kind are no blameless innocents. Does that make me worse than him?”

“It sure as Tartarus doesn’t make you better!” Lyra retorted.

Sparkler swung the staff.

But Redheart, without warning, turned on the spot and caught it clean between her forehooves. One mistake, however – she dropped what she’d been holding.

“The locket!” Lyra shouted. “Sparkler, grab the locket!”

Even as Sparkler turned on her horn, Lyra did the same, both their auras embracing the locket. Yet, with a cry, Sparkler’s focus died when Redheart struck a spot between her shoulder-blades, and–

Lyra couldn’t believe what she saw. With the swiftness of a preying mantis, Redheart’s forehooves darted all over the pressure points on Sparkler’s body – poll, hock, point-of-hip, all.

Sparkler fell to the ground, her body a rigid board, paralysed as Zecora was.

In her shock, Lyra failed to rush forward...

“It’s no use,” Redheart said, seizing the locket. She dangled it above the white-hot cauldron. “This ends now.”

The locket dropped into the boiling liquid.

“No!”

But even as Lyra reached out with magic, it hit the surface.

For a second, nothing happened. Then–

“What…”

A burst of rainbow colours filled the room, blowing back both mares.

Dazed, Lyra struggled to get her vision back into focus. The room was packed with colour. But these weren’t just the colours of spots in front of her eyes, she saw, mesmerised. These colours were there, all around her. Coming from the cauldron.

The locket emerged, hovering, from the boiling broth, shining all the colours of the rainbow in quick succession.

“You gotta be kidding me.”

Lyra had almost forgotten Redheart. The imposter-nurse lay splayed on her hooves, gawping at the locket.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me!” Redheart screeched. “What’ll it take to destroy this thing!?”

This time, Lyra didn’t miss her chance. In one flick of magic, she pulled the locket out of the air, looping the chain three times around her horn, until it was wrapped down to the base.

“Yoink!” she yelled, turning and fleeing. Lyra hated herself for it. But she had no better choice. This locket was the heart of everything.

‘If I get through the door, I can run all the way to Ponyville and get help!’

“Get back here!”

With an uncanny burst of speed, Redheart rushed towards Lyra, biting down on her tail. Lyra yelped, all momentum gone as she collapsed to the floor.

“No!” Lyra yelled.

A blast of kinetic force shot out her horn, knocking Redheart slam-dunk off of her. The wood of Zecora’s hut cracked and splintered as the nurse impacted against the wood.

‘Did I kill someone?’Lyra thought for a fraction of a second. ‘No, no n–’

“That’s not going to knock me down,” Redheart said, though her speech was slurred. She picked herself up from the rubble and dust, wobbling ever so slightly. “One little foal’s kinetic spell is nothing. Ambassador Heartstrings had years to refine her battle-magic… As have I. You know which side came out on top of that battle. So many Imperial soldiers wish theywere the ones who brought you in. I wasn’t granted that privilege, though I was but one of many in the Iceland Campaign– your abortive little attempt to end Her Majesty’s crusade before its time.”

Lyra scrambled back to her hooves.

“Now I get to be,” Redheart said, curiously calm as she stalked past the paralysed Zecora and Sparkler, and the still-bubbling cauldron. “By old unicorn rules, you just fired the first shot, Lyra Heartstrings. Earthpony though I be, this means I’m within my rights to use lethal force...”

‘I’m going to die.’

There was no fear in Lyra’s mind. No burst of adrenaline. Only cold certainty. Redheart snarled, rearing up and driving a foreleg straight towards her–

Lyra rolled to the side, and felt the floor crackwhere her head had been.

‘That would’ve been me!’

Lyra scrambled backwards on all four legs, watching Redheart advance towards her. It was too hot to think, she couldn’t see in the steam, everything was happening too fast...

“Archtraitor,” Redheart hissed, raising her voice but not quite yelling. “Apostate, turncoat, liar!”

‘She… it’s like she doesn’t even see me…’

“Because of you, ponies turned traitor! Against Equestria. Themselves. Ponykind. Foals have grown up knowing nothing butthe unceasing hell that is Earth, all because of you!”

“I didn’t–” Lyra started, before Redheart stomped down on the floor.

Lyra rolled to the right, Redheart’s hoof just barelymissing her left hock. Panicked, she looked around for a weapon, her gaze finally settling on a ceramic jug.

She reached with her magic, feeling it envelop the jug–

“No,” Redheart snarled, driving a hoof down towards Lyra’s horn.

Lyra scrambled back to all fours, rolling out of the way from Redheart, keeping her gaze firmly locked on the jug. Her aura firmly locked around it…

And she hammered against Redheart’s face.

The jug didn’t break. Redheart did. She staggered back, woozily, and Lyra raised the jug again, going right to bringing it down on what she had thoughtwas Ponyville’s kindly nurse.

Redheart growled, using the jug’s momentum to swat it aside, sending it to shatter on the ground, and knocking back Lyra.

“It’s not me!” Lyra yelled, raising her forelegs up to block Redheart and rear up, trying to remember something, anything of a fighting stance. “The Lyra that did this… wasn’t me!”

“You’re aLyra. And that’s enough,” Redheart said, as she swung a hoof in a wide unsteady arc, the hoof impacting with Lyra’s right knee. “Your existence itselfis a threat. You, Lyra, are a blight upon ponykind!”

As Lyra stumbled, her admittedly-shoddy block faltering, Redheart turned her back to Lyra… and drove both hindlegs into her ribs.

Lyra wheezed, flying back several paces. She tried and failed to breathe.

“Redheart, you don’t have to do this!” Lyra pleaded. Except, with the hit to the gut, it came out slurred, barely coherent. “You said you’d do no harm! This can’t be what your nurse’s training prepared you for!”

“But it is,” Redheart whispered. “I may not be a doctor, but I have worked in the medical profession. Sometimes, amputation is the only option.”

Lyra choked, finally feeling breath come back into her lungs.

“I won’t stop until I get that locket,” Redheart said. “Tell me, then. Would you kill me to stop me getting at it?”

‘Something,’Lyra thought frantically, ‘have to, have to do something! Think, Lyra! Brute force hasn’t worked, so… so think of something, anything–’

“Redheart!” Lyra yelled. “Whoever you are. This… this is another universe. I’m sure we can talk it out, I… I know you. I know how happy you were outside the Guard. I know you liked this town. I’m sure that if you stopped, you could find somewhere quiet on this Equus. Calmly. Peacefully. There’s no need for us to fight.”

For a moment, Redheart stopped.

“I… I would enjoy that. It’s been so long since I was able to go to Cafe Hay,” Redheart said softly, her eyes looking elsewhere. “or the Ponyville Diner, even Sugarcube Corner. To just stop for a moment and enjoy.”

“They have a chocolate cherry coconut cupcake made by Pinkie Pie,” Lyra offered.

“I would like to try it. And it’s been so long since I’ve had something like that. So long since they had Pinkie round to bake it. I would… I would like to…”

Lyra breathed a sigh of relief, feeling air in her lungs once more.

However, Redheart’s face suddenly faded into a mute expression. “But I cannot stop now. Not at this moment. Not when Equestria depends on me.” Her eyes were hard, devoid of any warmth. “For you to almost tempt me into forsaking my oath… this is why you must die.”

‘What?’

But she had no time to think as Redheart leapt, bearing another heavy blow.

Without thinking, Lyra started to rear up. That was the wrong thing to do. Redheart’s lowered head crashed into her exposed stomach, and Lyra doubled over, wheezing, struggling to breathe.

Before she knew it, this gave Redheart the time to do to her what had been done to Zecora and Sparkler – the sharp pinch dug into her shoulder-blades and elbow joints, freezing her nerve-endings. She collapsed to the mossy floor of the hut. She could no longer move her upper muscles. Worse, something had cut off the magic inside her, as in a last shred of instinct, she tried powering her horn, and all that came out was a weak spark.

What she did feel in her horn was the pain as Redheart yanked off the locket.

Some strength remained in her legs. Dazedly, Lyra aimed a kick from the floor at Redheart, but the nurse easily dodged, almost as an afterthought, while she put the locket around her own neck. Then two more pinches stabbed into her hips, and Lyra found she could no longer move at all, except breathing.

Redheart loomed over her. Lyra shut her eyes. This was the end...

“Not like this,” she heard the nurse whisper.

Her eyes came back open. Had she been reprieved? Lyra saw, then, that Redheart wasn’t looking at her, but in the direction of her friends, who still lay there, helpless as she.

“They don’t have to see this,” Redheart commented, seizing Lyra by the scruff of the neck and pulling up her rigid frame. “I shall take this outside, Miss Heartstrings. Miss Zecora keeps a lovely patch of flowers in front of her dwelling… when they find you, at least it’ll be in a good place to be laid to rest.”

Absurdly, Lyra’s only thought, at that moment, was whether all in the Solar Empire were this poetic about the crimes they committed.

* * * * *

When Redheart would think on this later, she knew her small act of mercy had been her undoing.

Or maybe not. Maybe the sole difference it made was giving her one less life on her conscience. Everything which occurred next would likely have been much the same. A few steps out the front door counted for little, when the course of events was changed by the arrival of a new player.

With her attention on dragging Heartstrings out by the shoulders, Redheart’s back was to the door when the newcomer came. She didn’t hear her land. She did hear her shocked gasp.

“What the– Redheart! What the blazes are you doing here?”

She turned her head. And the speaker was a prismatic blue pegasus she couldn’t have not recognised. Rainbow Dash was standing there, her wings flexed, looking completely flabbergasted.

“I…”

But what could she say? That she’d found these three in the hut, paralysed by an unknown assailant? That she was left standing over three barely-conscious mares, dragging one out with visible marks of exertion?

Heartstrings, however, still had control, if nothing else, of her tongue. “Redheart…” she rasped, physically unable to face her rescuer. “Other Equestria... Imperial... here… somehow...”

Cursing silently, Redheart clamped Heartstrings’ mouth shut, but it was too late. Any chance she’d had at inventing an excuse to fool Rainbow Dash had evaporated.

“Let go of her,” Dash snarled. “I’ve had enough of my friends being threatened today.”

At first, this comment confused Redheart. Then she put two and two together.

“If the human’s already threatened you,” she said quietly, “then you know he isn’t safe. We learned that bitter lesson years ago.”

“Oh, shut up,” snapped Dash. “It’s been a really long day, and I’m in a bad mood.” She pawed at the ground, snorting. “I’m gonna count to three. One, two–”

Desperation guided Redheart’s hoof. It overrode the last of her qualms. If she could not escape with the locket, she could still strangle the weed at its roots. One of the hooves that had been holding Heartstrings under the shoulders flew, to try and grab her by the neck...

Rainbow Dash was a swifter, more spontaneous flyer. The countdown had no sooner died in her throat that she darted forward.

The impact turned Redheart’s vision white as she felt herself release her grip on Heartstrings. Dash, relentless, came in with another strike. The kick caught Redheart on the left side, sending her careening back into the sauna-like hut.

And her face knocked straight onto the rim of the super-heated, acid-filled cauldron.

The event did not register immediately in her mind. Then Redheart screamed.

Yet amidst the blistering pain, survival instinct took over. Digging her hooves into the ground, she tore her face away from the cauldron – feeling a thin film of the skin off her cheek tear with it – and snapped back to glare at Dash, who was just standing there, open-mouthed, shocked at what had happened. With a shriek of unbridled fury, she charged, lunging at the pegasus with greater force than she’d ever had for Heartstrings.

‘Do no harm.’

Her right forehoof suddenly lost any sense of weight, and veered off an inch away from Dash, into the wall.

‘I had that!’Redheart thought, frantically.

Next to her, Dash yelped in alarm, just realising how close she’d come to getting her teeth knocked out. But Redheart was more alarmed still. She gazed at her hoof wedged in the wall, bewildered and uncomprehending. Her aim should have been straight and true…

Grunting through foam-flecked lips, she pulled it out and threw another punch at Dash. The pegasus managed to dodge this one, but even if she hadn’t, the outcome would have been the same – Redheart’s forehoof was pushed to the ground.

“Some fighter, huh?” Rainbow Dash grimaced.

‘How?! How is this possible?! I’m throwing everything I can at this Rainbow Dash, but nothing’s landi–’

Dash tackled her. Both mares skid, painfully, down the little staircase within Zecora’s doorway. The ‘thud’ was resounding enough to topple several jars off the shelves. At least their combined weight stopped either from hitting the cauldron again.

Redheart tried to fight back, but her forelegs had gone limp. They flopped about harmlessly, completely failing to push off the pegasus, and a feeling of indescribable tautness shot through her limbs when her blowsdid hit.

‘Do no harm.’

“Say ‘Uncle’, Redheart,” Dash panted, pressing down on her. “It’s over. You’re not gonna win this.”

It was true, Redheart realised with horror. There was something stopping her from truly hurting this Rainbow Dash. She couldn’t think. She could scarcely breathe. Her burnt cheek was agony.

‘Subject identified as Element Bearer. Protect. Serve. Do not harm unless ordered.’

“Un…” Unwillingly, Redheart felt her lips form the words. “Uncle...”

Dash eased her pressure. “There. That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

Redheart’s head rolled to the side. This was how her eyes fell upon one of the toppled jars. In falling, it had spilled its contents, a fine mixture of sepia powder. Mere inches away from her forehoof...

“Now,” said Dash, standing up. “You’re gonna tell me what you did to my friends, and how I–”

Yelling incoherently, Redheart swiped at the powder. Her aim, it turned out, hadn’t given up on her – as intended, motes of sepia hit Dash in the eyes.

Dash cried out, stumbling in pain, hooves going to her eyes. In doing so, she left the way open to the door.

Redheart didn’t wait twice. She had her saddlebags. She had the locket. She’d done all she could. Now, all she could do was flee. She ran out the door, off the path, into the Forest, not stopping to rest, not knowing where she was going.

* * * * *

“Flaming Tartarus! That… that two-faced little cheat!”

Her eyes were burning. Rubbing at them only made it worse for Dash. The feel of grit was terrible. Worse yet, though, was knowing she had let Redheart get away.

“I’ll get her for this…” Dash snarled. “I’ll get her…”

“Dash…” a voice wheezed.

It wasn’t Lyra. “Sparkler?”

“Don’t worry about me,” whispered the unicorn, still floored, still unmoving. “Check on Lyra…”

Sparkler and Zecora both looked in bad shape. But Lyra was the one Redheart had been really after.

“Okay…” Dash whispered back, trying to see through her watery vision. “I’ll… I’ll try to help…”

She found Lyra outside, lying stomach-down near the doorstep. Dash turned her over, feeling a chill. But Lyra was breathing. Her eyes saw Dash.

“Did you…” Lyra said softly. “Did you stop her?”

Shame washed over Dash. She shook her head. “No… Redheart took the locket. I don’t know where she’s gone. But… Sparkler and Zecora… they’re safe, for now…”

Lyra coughed, raspily. “Well… that’s one good thing.”

“Lyra, I need to get you to the hospital...”

“Already had enough trouble with hospitals today,” Lyra chuckled weakly. “Besides, how’re you gonna carry the three of us? What if she comes back?”

“I don’t think she will,” Dash said. “But I can’t just leave any of you here…”

“Ah,” Lyra gave another cough. “Someone’s gonna come looking for us. Sparkler’s family, they know where she went.”

“Yeah,” said Dash. “They told me. But that’ll take too long. I’ve gotta get you all outta here, pronto.”

A strange sound caught her ear. It was a low, moaning sound, coming from the cabin. And she recognised it. That was Sparkler.

“Hold on,” Dash said, gingerly slinging one of Lyra’s stiff forelegs over her shoulders. “I’ll take you by inside. I think Sparkler’s trying to say something.”

She was right. When they re-entered the hut, Dash supporting the near-motionless Lyra, they found Sparkler, her chest heaving. Her forehooves were twitching, like she was desperately willing them to move, to point. Her eyeballs were fixed on a specific shelf.

Dash followed her gaze. “Fireworks?”

“Y… yes,” Sparkler. “H… helped Zecora… make them.” Behind her, Zecora grunted, as if in confirmation. The zebra seemed to have no wish to even try speaking. “Now you can… use them.”

“That’s a brilliant idea, Sparkler,” Lyra smiled tiredly. “Go for it, Dash.”

* * * * *

Icewind was the one who found her. Though he lacked either of the thestrals’ night-sight, perhaps it was because he had the greatest drive to find her. Where he found her, as it turned out, was maybe the most appropriate place he could have. In a space of the Forest where the canopy thinned, very slightly, into a tiny clearing by the path. She lay, crumpled, exhausted, her white coat rendered ghostlike in the early moonlight, before a tree with its trunk twisted in the shape of a skull.

The oldest omen known to pegasi. The sight chilled his heart, yet he dared land. She didn’t look him.

“So…” he said quietly, folding his wings. “This is where you vanished off to.”

She must have recognised his voice, for still she didn’t face him. “Do you hear them…?” Redheart whispered.

Icewind tilted his head. “Hear what?”

“I can hear the bells… the bells are loud, tonight,” she said softly. “It’s a night when you can’t help but hear them.”

“What are you talking about?” he asked, harshly. “I don’t hear anything.”

“Oh, but you will,” Redheart said, staring up at the tree. “Because I’ve failed.” She tugged at something that she wore around her neck. He peered at her in the moonlit gloom. It was a necklace, or locket of some sort. “I cannot continue,” she whispered. “I know what I must do, I want to do it… yet, something has broken within me.”

“Has it now?” Icewind said venomously. “Has guilt caught up with you? Was I the one victim too many for you to feed on, Changeling?”

He regretted those words almost as soon as he’d said them. Not because they might hurt her feelings. Because they took him back, to painful memories which, on some nights, still lingered behind his eyes. A city under siege. He and Winter, Guards sworn to protect, yet unable to help fleeing, screaming ponies as they were pursued by insect-like creatures with arctic-blue eyes, icier than the snows of home...

And nothing compared to the stare of the Changeling Queen herself, boring into him, reminding him what it meant to be prey.

“Changeling?”

To his surprise, she gave a little, broken laugh.

“Is that what you thought, Icewind?” Redheart said. Finally, she turned to face him. “I’m not a Changeling. I’m as Equestrian as you are. Only… from a different place.”

Icewind shook his head. This had to be a trick. “You lied to me.”

“No,” Redheart said. “Not about those things. I really am Redheart, and I really did want for us to simply have a nice evening… it’s been far too long. But…” she sighed. “Yes. Maybe I did deceive you. I didn’t mean to… but I was selfish. I let myself get distracted from my duties. For that, I am truly sorry.”

She leaned closer, showing the whole of her face, and that was when he noticed the scars on her cheek.

“Celestia in the heavens…” he whispered. “What is that?”

Redheart touched the burns, wincing. “Your chance to decide. If I were a Changeling, this is how you could hurt me, until I’d be incapable of keeping up my disguise, from the pain.”

“Those weren’t there before.” Icewind knelt down to be level with her. “Who did this to you?”

“Ponies… ponies did. It was an accident,” she said, stopping him from speaking. “They’re not evil, you know. How could they be, when this Equestria is as it is now. But they’re making a terrible mistake.”

“About what? What mistake?”

“The human,” Redheart said, her words carrying a weight he’d never heard. “Let me guess, Icewind. You still get bad dreams from the Wedding Invasion, don’t you?”

The shift in topic, so sudden, surprised him.

“Yes…” Icewind said, frowning. “And if you are a Changeling, you won’t frighten me that way,” he added, menacingly. “In fact, you couldn’t give me a better reason to do something bad to you.”

“I know,” Redheart said simply. “But, it sure was a great party, wasn’t it, after they’d got repelled?” She gave him that same broken laugh. “Sometimes, I think Equestria’s too big on trying to solve problems by covering them up with smiles and rainbows… But that’s not what we did then. Not forever. Even though ever since, we’ve tried so hard to go back to that…”

“What do you mean?”

Redheart breathed in. “Changelings were my enemies,” she told him. “Where I come from, I rejoined the Guard, like so many did, following the disaster at the Wedding. At first, all we wanted was to defend Equestria, make sure it never happened again. Then a new disaster struck, when Princess Cadance failed to reclaim her Northern throne, and we were only lucky we’d prepped the Guard for a fight… we hadn’t expected a full-blown war.”

“No… this is nonsense,” Icewind muttered. “I’m from the North. I know the Crystal Realm. Sombra was defeated! Princess Cadance rules there now, next to Captain Armor.”

“Maybe that’s true on your world. It wasn’t true on mine.”

“Prove it.”

She spread her forehooves powerlessly. “How? I can prove I’m not a Changeling. I can’t give you proof of an entire world.”

“Alright, then, how about this,” Icewind said. “The human. What’s he got to do with anything?”

“Everything,” Redheart said, again tugging at the locket. “Darkness spread after Canterlot, when we tried to fill the breaches. We killed Sombra, after a short, yet terrible war… Nor did we stop at Chrysalis’ Hive. Celestia did what she should’ve done a long time ago. She united the tribes. Not just the tribes of Equestria– I mean all people like us. The Saddle Mareabians, Maretonians, Oleandrites… hippogriffs and zebras, even a few griffons… She welcomed them as one. They helped us to… relocate the roaches, into reservations where we could control their numbers… And still the rot was there! Cultists, on the edge of Equestria… The Storm King, re-emerging. It took all our forces to push him back. He’s the Kirin’s problem, now.”

Icewind listened, rapt at attention.

“And so, we rose. Brought together, we studied the magics of the Crystal Realm. A golden age of innovation came upon us. New ways for ponies to correspond with their friends, watch broadcasts beamed directly to the home, and play games much like an arcade machine’s. Sleeker, faster trains. A new marvel of engineering seemed brought to life every week. Trottingham’s Trans-Luna Bay Bridge, the Victory Tower in Manehattan, which is like a city unto itself... the Vanhoover Skyport, with its fleet of skyliners, each larger and more opulent than the last... The Great Equestrian, created by Krème Brulée himself.”

Her eyes looked down at the forest floor.

“But in time, into this new age, Celestia discovered something else,” Redheart whispered. “Rifts in our world... chasms, opening it up to another. Well, we needed to find out what lay on the other side. To begin with, what we found was a very well-kept secret, known to only a few intrepid souls… In time, though, Celestia deemed it safe to let ordinary ponies explore by themselves. But it wasn’t. She’d been betrayed. And too soon, our golden age was coming to an end.”

“Betrayed? By who?” Icewind asked, wanting to hear the end, in spite of himself. “Just what lay on the other side?” Although this, he could now guess.

Redheart raised her eyes to meet his own. “Humans, of course… One of the explorers, a diplomat named Lyra Heartstrings, persuaded Her Majesty they posed no threat. She lied. The rot, this darkness we couldn’t defeat, had everything to do with these rifts… these portals, as we came to name them. We made a mistake trying to contact the humans. Their hunger was as consuming as the rifts… and as one grew, so did the other. All of the darkest things in their world came to be mirrored in ours. We had to stop them. We had to.”

Icewind pondered her words. The things she spoke of were beyond any Changeling, any great threat he could have imagined. It all sounded unbelievable. Yet he sensed a truth in what she said.

A faraway hiss in the sky drew his attention. He looked up, through the patch. Against the starry backdrop, a red trail streaked upwards, to explode into a shower of many-coloured sparks and a joyful noise.

“A firework?”

“Or signal-flare,” Redheart sighed. “Once the Lunar Guard see that, it won’t be long till they find me.”

“They won’t have to look for very long,” Icewind commented. “This changes nothing. Nurse Redheart, on the charge of abducting and endangering an Equestrian citizen, I am taking you in.”

“It is your duty.” No reproach, no retreat. Just resignation. Maybe regret. “Like I followed mine.”

He hesitated. “You say they burned you. Who’s they?”

“Does it matter?” Redheart said, her eyes glistening. “Just some ponies who heard the human’s story and believed him over me. It was a fight. People do bad things in fights.”

“But what were you fighting over?”

“This.”

Her hoof went to the locket. Now that he examined it more closely, Icewind saw it was in the shape of a heart, coloured a dark red, possibly coated in satin.

“A locket?” He blinked. “You had that trinket custom-made?”

“I wish...” the nurse said, with a melancholic snicker. “Actually, it belongs to the human, Alexander Reiner. Please now, don’t ask me what it does. I have no idea. But I can tell it’s a very, very powerful magical artefact. Which is never something a human should have.”

“He must’ve wanted it back real bad…”

“That he did.” Redheart trailed a hoof down the burns. “Enough for him to send a few mares he’d only met yesterday to take it from me.”

Unexpectedly, she seized his forehoof. By all rights, he should’ve wrenched himself away. He did not.

“I know I can’t expect you to trust me,” Redheart whispered, unclasping the locket with her other forehoof. “Yet I feel I can trust you. Take me in, go ahead. Your duty asks it. I’ve done harm to ponies.” She paused. “But you’re not duty-bound to make me answer for stealing from a human.”

She pressed the locket into his forehoof. Icewind stared at it, not quite believing what he saw.

“I… can’t…” he said quietly.

“You can. For the good of Equestria.” Redheart looked at him pleadingly. “Hide it under your armour. No spell will find it there.”

He took it from her, not knowing what else to do. Wordlessly, she went back to contemplating the Death Tree.

* * * * *

Sparkler’s idea worked. Soon enough, a thestral Guard came swooping down from the night sky.

By coincidence, Rainbow Dash had met him a few hours before.

“Miss Dash?” blinked Gibbous. “What are you doing here?”

Dash shrugged. “It’s the only place I really know in the Forest, besides the Castle,” she explained. “When I heard Lyra and Sparkler had gone, um, trekking, this is the first place I thought of. Lucky guess.” She stepped out from the doorway, letting him see inside the hut. “I spotted trouble brewing miles away. Literally.”

“Indeed…” Gibbous said, peeking in. “It’s like an oven in here.”

“And things didn’t get half hot, for a while back there,” Dash sniggered.

But although she tried to make a glib joke of it, the snigger quickly chocked in on itself, as the memory of when Redheart had smashed against the cauldron, getting burnt, left a queasy feeling in her stomach.

There had been some fun in fighting off the Changelings with her friends. This fight hadn’t been fun at all.

Gibbous was inspecting the three mares lying side-by-side, making eye contact with each in turn.

“I know this,” he frowned. “Farasian nerve-pinch technique. Heard of it, never learned it myself. But I thought only zebras used it… what, have we got a rogue zebra, a second zebra, here in the Forest?”

Dash actually considered that possibility before she answered. “Nope,” she said, softer than she’d meant to. “It’s… actually, it’s way too complicated to explain.”

“All in good time, then,” Gibbous nodded. He stared towards Zecora. “Oh… is that a new look, Miss Zecora? I… I must say, it suits you.”

Zecora just snorted and looked away. Which wasn’t by much, as she couldn’t move her head.

Sighing, Gibbous turned back to Dash, flapping a wing. “I’ll get Selene. And you can help, it’s still not gone completely dark. If the three of us pull our weight together, we should fly these mares to the hospital in no time.”

“That’s awesome,” Dash said quietly. “I’ll just keep watch some more, then.”

As he left, Dash sat by her friends, trying to smile. “Hear that, guys? You’re gonna be all better soon.”

“Great,” Lyra said dully, while Sparkler said nothing, gazing blankly up at the ceiling. “But I wish I could give Alex his locket back.”

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

It was a bitter feeling that hung over the hospital, Celestia sensed, even before any futher news reached them.

“She has been gone for, what, two hours now? Three?” In the bed, Reiner folded his arm towards himself and looked down at his wrist. Then he blinked, confused, as he apparently didn’t find what he sought there. “Oh, yeah. Right. Nurse Cross must’ve taken my watch as well.”

Humans used wrist-watches, Celestia noted. Check that off as another similarity in the species, though ponies’ wrist-watches were, admittedly, mainly a curiosity produced by the Kirin. She was still curious to learn at just what level of technological advance human society stood.

“Lyra Heartstrings left this room two hours, twenty-eight minutes and forty-three seconds ago,” the ghostly Galatea said promptly. “Her time of departure was, to the minute, 19:48.”

Reiner glanced at her. “Thank you, Galatea,” he said placidly. “Well, it sure took you long enough,” he addressed Celestia, “to get that badge or whatever so you could come back. In nearly three-thousands years’ rule, you seriously haven’t made any contingency plans for when your magic runs dry?”

Celestia fumbled the Chancellor’s Medallion, feeling awkward. “Contingency plans are not lacking, Captain Reiner. The problem is, each plan keeps meeting a different setback, and has to be revised. This medallion,” she emphasised the word, “is currently one of the few like it. For reasons I’d rather not go into tonight, it was decided it’d be safest with the Chancellor of the Education Association.”

The human nodded, in a seeming mix of weariness and approbation. “A leading figure of education,” Reiner commented. “Wish my country set that much stock by it.”

“Anyway,” said Celestia. “Now Luna’s out searching as well, she ought to bring Lyra back safe.”

“And my locket?”

“I’m afraid that depends on how protected it is,” Celestia admitted reluctantly. “We’re dealing with a magic I’m completely unfamiliar with. It may well surpass alicorns, or even the Elements.”

“You keep saying it’s magic,” Reiner said. “But you really don’t know what kind of magic it could be? Galatea over there has some idea, it seems,” he thumbed towards the alicorn, “but she ain’t exactly letting on.”

“I meant to ask about that… ‘Sister’,” Celestia said, turning to Galatea. “When we met, you said you’d give us all the answers you could, once you’d spoken to Captain Reiner. You told him you’re the reason he’s here. But here we are, in a room with the human, and you still haven’t told us everything. Why?”

“In part, I confess that I do not know what questions you would ask,” Galatea said. She looked at Celestia expectantly.

Celestia looked at her, contemplative.

“So, then,” Galatea said. “Ask away.”

“On some level, I’m not sure I want to,” Celestia said. “I can take it, I’m certain of it. It’s just that I know it will be a lot to process.”

“Yes,” Galatea said. “It would be. You are correct, though. You are an alicorn. If any pony could take the news of what has become of Earth and that other Equestria, it would be you.”

“So, then,” Celestia said. “What has happened to the other Equestria?”

“That’s a very broad question,” Galatea said. “Not one I can answer in great detail, not at the moment.”

Celestia nodded. “I see. Then what did Reiner expect when he came here? What makes that Equestria different?”

“His Earth has experience with repressive regimes,” Galatea said, her tone growing colder. “Places that couldn’t care a whit for the rights of their citizens. He has grown up learning of places with watchers in the shadows, that make agitators or the unlucky simply… disappear. The Empire crusades against humanity for harbouring those regimes, yet saw fit to create more of the same. There are mnemosurgery clinics where ponies simply have their doubts removed, rather than come to terms with them. All while the Newfoal, this half-thinking, unquestioning golem that was once a person, is held up as the ideal.”

“It sounds horrific,” Celestia said, her heart heavy.

“They don’t make it lookthat way,” Galatea remarked. “That’s merely it under the surface. They paint rainbows on the street, they have parades of military might, they make a show of the advances the war has brought them. They feed their citizens a steady diet of entertainment they’d never admitto being inspired by Earth. Those clinics I spoke of? Officially, they’re there to give the concerned citizen an ear to express their fears and doubts to. In terms of national unity, or technology, Equestria has never been greater. But, as a paradise, it’s solely for the equines who do not hoof the line. If you wish me to speak in metaphor, then imagine a delicious apple… with a rotten core.”

“You sounded almost like Zecora, there,” Reiner mentioned.

“What say you, Captain?” Celestia said. “Does this match up with what you know of Equestria?”

Reiner nodded glumly. “I’m afraid yes. Not that I’ve ever seen it for myself. No human has, not really. She…” He coughed. “You know who I mean, Princess. She only let a special few humans in, during the peace days, and that was using temporary ponification. Sure, they brought back photographic evidence, but how do we know she didn’t doctor the whole thing, including their minds? We’ve taken no chances. Of those poor sods, none of the ones we tracked down have a private life anymore.”

“Beings shaped like humans but with the minds of Newfoals…” Galatea mused. “Such a construct would be challenging to pull off beyond a mere glamour, and I’ve found no clue to suggest it’s been attempted. But you are right to be cautious about our enemy’s cunning. Prudence is a virtue.”

A knock echoed on the door.

“I think the rest will have to wait,” Celestia said, rising from her chair. “This must be about Lyra.” She gave Galatea another glance. “Will you be visible during what’s to come?”

“I’d sooner mine existence weren’t known to too many, just yet,” Galatea replied. “Hence I shall recast the spell so mine astral-presence is no longer visually perceptible. Such scrying is harder to maintain, yes, and mine magic is near-depleted as it is – I am rather out of practice. But not to worry, this shouldn’t take long.”

The grey alicorn vanished from view. Celestia remained staring for a second at the spot where she’d been, then went to open the door.

“Ma’am,” Sergeant Winter Truce greeted her, saluting. “Princess Luna has returned, in the company of all Guards dispatched to the Forest. Sergeant Gibbous and Corporal Selene of the Lunar Guard, and Corporal Icewind of the Solar Guard. They bring back…” He checked a notepad. “Five. All mares. But… I can’t determine whether all of the five are civilians, or only four. It’s… unclear.”

Celestia raised an eyebrow. “Military personnel? Out in the Forest?”

“Like I said, Ma’am. Unclear. You may have to see for yourself.” Winter took a breath. “It appears to be that three of the mares were incapacitated, by the alleged military operative. Her Highness has already had them placed in the care of Doctor Stable and Nurse Snowheart.”

“Did you get the names of the incapacitated?”

“Affirmative,” Winter said, lip scrunching in recollection. “Amethyst Star, Lyra Heartstrings, and Zecora, no surname given.”

Celestia heard a clatter from behind her. She turned. In a gesture of shock, Reiner’s arm had upset his food tray, sending it tumbling to the floor.

“Fucking hell,” Reiner exclaimed. “If it isn’t the Three Musketeers! How am I hearing, after Amethyst and Zecora were two of the last people I saw on Earth, that now they’re in the same hospital as I am! And Lyra…” His breathing intensified. “Is she alright?”

“None of the three appear to have been dealt lasting damage, sir,” Winter said, unfazed by the human. “Their incapacitation,” he continued, turning back to Celestia, “by all reports, comes in the form of a nervous paralysis associated with a martial art practiced by a Zebrican tribe. On that note, the zebra, it would seem, is suffering from the effects of poison-joke. All of this is unpleasant, but not irreversible. Doctor Stable is seeing to it as we speak.”

“Good,” said Celestia, though she felt apprehension in her gut. “I shall visit them forthwith–”

Reiner threw the bedsheets off. “I’m coming with you.”

“Not without support, Captain Reiner,” Celestia said firmly. “You’re still too weak, and those burns haven’t been properly treated. I shall call for a wheelchair your size. Sergeant?”

“On it, ma’am,” Winter said, saluting again.

When the wheelchair arrived, it was being pushed by a very knowledgeable nurse.

“There you go, sir,” Nurse Cross smiled as she helped the human ease his legs. “Hopefully you won’t find this too uncomfortable. The closest frame of reference I’ve got to your proportions are an adolescent Minotaur’s, and even then, you’re not as tall or broad-shouldered. I’m counting on this to collect more information about your species’ physiognomy.”

Reiner stared. “Still up, Sutra? Jesus, I’d have thought, in this Equestria… don’t you ever go home?”

Once the nurse had got over her surprise at him using her first name, she went back to smiling.

“Well, I don’t know what you mean by ‘this’ Equestria, Captain,” Cross said. “But, it’s not like a xeno-surgeon gets that many non-pony patients to care for, so I work around the clock, as a way to justify my employment.”

“Yeah, you always were dedicated…” Reiner said, in a tone of regret.

“Pardon?”

“Nothing,” said the human. He picked a book off the bedside table, and held it close to his chest. Peering, Celestia identified it as one of Twilight’s library books about humans. “Just… please, I need to see Lyra.”

They all left for the hallway, Winter leading the way, Celestia trotting alongside Reiner while Cross rolled his wheelchair. Although she couldn’t see Galatea, she knew the grey alicorn’s astral-form was following.

“One more thing,” Winter said, slowing his pace temporarily to level with her. “The alleged perpetrator… this is what’s most befuddling. For a start, she’s currently in treatment as well, for second-degree acid burns… But…”

“Yes, Sergeant?”

“Well,” Winter said, showing her his notepad. “They say she’s hospital staff. And according to what I can find, this evening, she has been checked in… twice.”

“Twice?” A horrible suspicion invaded Celestia.

“That’s what they said at reception.”

“We shall shed light on this matter,” Celestia said, willing her voice to keep steady.

“Yes, ma’am.”

He led the group towards the window at the end of the hallway, where the last two doors opposite one another were each guarded by a thestral. Both Lunar Guards snapped to attention at seeing Celestia approach.

“Here we are,” Winter said. “We ran into a few complications. Princess Luna wanted the incapacitated and the perpetrator put in rooms which faced each other, and the perpetrator confined to a room by herself. We managed to find an empty three-bed room for the incapacitated, but the patients in the room opposite had to be relocated at very short notice. Expect grumbling from the hospital board.”

“That can be dealt with,” Celestia assured him. “Where is my sister?”

One of the thestrals, the male Sergeant named Gibbous, answered for Winter. “Right here, Highness,” he said, indicating the door behind him. “She’s keeping watch on the suspect personally, along with the Solar Guard who brought her in.”

“My partner, Corporal Icewind,” Winter explained.

Celestia hesitated. “Sergeant, you say the incapacitated are in no immediate danger?”

“To my understanding, ma’am.”

“Then…” She addressed Gibbous. “I should like to speak with the suspect, and my sister first, Sergeant Gibbous.”

“At orders, Highness,” Gibbous said, stepping aside to let her through.

Yet, before Celestia could open the door, she heard Reiner speak.

“Princess Celestia,” the human said, his voice sounding odd. “With your permission, I wish to meet this… ‘alleged perpetrator’, too.”

Celestia turned to Reiner. His arms were clutching the book he’d brought along, and there was a dark, foreboding look on his face that wasn’t as unfamiliar to her as she’d have liked. This very morning, it had been aimed at her.

“I doubt that’s a good idea...” Celestia said slowly. “Alex.”

“If there’s two of her,” Reiner said, arms tightening around the big book, “Then either one is a Changeling, or they’re already here. I need to see it. Now.”

She did not like this. Yet, out of everyone here, the human had the fairest claim to make, having fought the Empire for years. Meanwhile, Nurse Cross stood at the wheelchair’s handles, ridges on her forehead deepening as she struggled to puzzle out just what had happened in the past day or so.

“Your Highness...” Cross suggested. “If it helps, I can stand by, to monitor the Captain’s well-being.”

Celestia relented. “Very well,” she said, pushing the door open. “Let us see what we find inside.”

Inside, what they found were Luna, who looked grim, and Corporal Icewind, not his usual exuberant self. Both were standing guard by a bed which held–

“Redheart?” Cross gasped. “Red? What the… what’s going on here?”

Already it was worse than Celestia had feared. This was Redheart, but a much changed Redheart from this morning. For one thing, Celestia was horrified to see, her right cheek had suffered a burn. Her forehooves were in cuffs. And her eyes… her eyes told a woeful story.

Then the human’s gaze fell upon the interloper.

“You...” Reiner snarled.

Celestia’s alicorn senses told her that he spoke his next words in a different language. His own. In his anger, the human must have forgotten himself, and forgotten the courtesy of speaking Equish in the ponies’ presence.

Thus she learned that her Gift of Tongues, innate to all alicorns, knew his tongue as well.

“Cadance trusted you. Those refugees trusted you! And now… how? How is it that somehow, the Tyrant always manages to plant the likes of you on our team, a brainwashed stooge just clever enough to fake it? How the fuck do you get past Cadance’s mind-checks?”

Redheart stared at him, a look of contempt in her eyes. “Patience and fortitude shield those of us who go amongst the heathen, human,” she replied, speaking in Equish. “But you… you sully Equestria with your bloodlust, your anger.”

Reiner didn’t appear to hear her. “You know…” he said, in words that reverted to Equish seemingly more on instinct than by conscious choice. “I was almost beginning to like this. In fact, I did like it. Sure, at first I thought I was having some psychotic break... It didn’t help, when I realised I couldn’t remember what day it was. But after awhile, you know? I started liking it just… the... slightest... bit. Nobody here to remind me I’m a war criminal. No stress, no war... just being able to sit back and focus on me.”

He spat out that last syllable. As he did so, he seemed to almost… vibrate. He seemed to either glow, or draw the light out from around him, his entire outline tinging with blue...

“I might’ve known it was too good to be true.” And, groaning, fists clenched, he stood up from the wheelchair.

‘The background magic… it’s supporting him,’Celestia thought. ‘He’s brute-forcing himself back up. He’ll do severe damage to his body if he keeps on like this.’

“Alex,” Celestia said, getting ahead of the still-flabbergasted Nurse Cross. “Please, calm down. We have her restrained. There’s no need for–”

Reiner made a harsh noise. It sounded vaguely like a laugh, yet it couldn’t have been one.

“Oh, there’s plenty of need,” he said quietly. “You thinkyou have ponies like her under control. Right up until everything goes to shit. And here I find her.”

“She’s in a hospital room,” Celestia said. “I don’t know what it is you think you’re going to do. But if you don’t care for what happens to her, care for yourself. You should halt this buildup in your system, or–”

“Or what?” Reiner demanded, turning towards her. “Go on. Prove me right. Stop me. I dare you. She hurt my friend. And if I know the Empire, I know they’re already working to turn all of this to shit.”

“What more can she do?” Luna asked. “She’s in a hospital bed, far from–”

Reiner turned his back on the two alicorns and stalked towards the bed.

Alarmed, Celestia caught Luna’s eye. “Sister,” she mouthed.

“Back home, they have a saying,” Reiner whispered. “An eye for an eye. Now, I’ve heard people say that’s the wrong road to go down, but we’re at billions of bodies thanks to her and her Empire, and twice as many eyes. This won’t even be a scratch.”

He didn’t have a weapon. Somehow, that worried Celestia more.

She saw Icewind step in front of the bed.

“Sir…” her Guard began.

The human wasn’t about to let him finish. Tattoos glowing a blinding blue, Reiner raised an arm...

But Luna stepped between him and their little ponies, her horn shining.

“Lamed Vav Tzadikim!”

As before, the mystical phrase had an instant effect on Reiner. The lustre left his eyes, and his body went limp. Only this time, he was standing when it did. Seeing this, Celestia hurried forward, catching him in her forehooves before he crumpled to the floor.

“I’m bringing him back, fast,” Luna panted, horn still shining, as she helped Celestia place Reiner back in his wheelchair. “This trance-state’s meant to help him, but it can’t be good, not twice in one day!”

No sooner had she said that, the human’s eyes burst back open. Gaze darting around, he found Celestia holding him by the arms, reared up with both forelegs hooked over his shoulders.

“Fuck you!” he roared. “I’ll rip her apart, and I dare you to stop me!”

Icewind was staring at Reiner, a look of horror in his eyes.

“Do you know what this bitch has done?!” Reiner yelled, struggling against Celestia’s weight, against the magically reinforced pressure of her forelegs. “Do you know?! Do you fucking know?! If it’s not her who’s done it, then it’s someone just like her! What she’s done today isn’t even a drop in the bucket. Are you gonna protect her, Celestia!? Tell me I’m wrong!”

Throughout all this, the otherworldly Redheart had lain in her bed, surveying the scene with eerie calm.

“Wrong?” she chuckled bitterly. “You’re one to speak of wrong, Alexander Reiner.” She pointed towards Nurse Cross, who was huddled by the wheelchair, overwhelmed. “Why don’t you tell these fine ponies about the last time you enacted your brand of justice, and why. Tell them about Angelo. Most every good pony of Equestria knows what you did to him. And to what end? Retribution? Retribution for what? Because a pony, my dear friend Sutra, was killed by humans. She was on your side. And they murdered her. Murdered her… and worse.”

“No,” Sutra whispered. “No no no…”

“These humans visited every torment they could upon you, Sutra,” Redheart said. “And more. Think of something, and they did it. They placed it on a human communication network for everyone to see. It was not your love of the unknown, the exotic that did you in. It was these humans. These monsters. The ones that did it to you laughed. They enjoyed it. Saw it as high art.”

Although Reiner’s face was scarlet with fury, Celestia felt him sag in her forehooves.

“They were bastards,” Reiner said, “who deserved what they got...”

“And yet, you hired one.”

“He was the one who sold them out,” Reiner growled. “We owedhim, much as I hate that! We still had him placed on a penal sqaud. That was good enough for the likes of him.”

“Or could it be you were more alike than you think?” Redheart asked. “You just said they deserved what they got. Does that include little Angelo and his mother?”

“She pulled a gun on me,” Reiner said. “I… I didn’t know. It was instinct. Gardner led us there, we were told it was full of remorseless scum, that they played with bones, that they had feathers in their hair, that they–”

He was shaking with unplaceable emotion, Celestia felt. Breathing heavily. Gingerly, without saying a word, she lowered him into the wheelchair.

Not far from her, Icewind had gone to wrap a wing around the trembling Cross.

“Besides, Alexander Reiner, if an eye for an eye would sate you,” Redheart said, raising a cuffed hoof to the burns on her cheek. “I may not have inflicted those burns on your chest, not personally. But I’d say we’re even now. Wouldn’t you?”

“No,” Reiner managed to sneer. “Not even close.”

“It’s not wrong to want her to pay,” someone said. “But… she’s a prisoner, Alex. It’s over. We’ve won.”

Everyone turned towards the source of the voice, only to see Lyra at the door, looking much worse for wear.

“I must apologise, Your Highnesses,” Winter said, standing behind her. “She insisted. Wanted to hear what the noise was about. So did I, for that matter. ”

Luna nodded distractedly. “You did right, Sergeant… this could have turned very ugly. But,” she wondered, “Lyra, how did you get out of bed?”

“Easily?” Lyra asked, seemingly confused. “I… I just walked here.”

“You shouldn’t be walking,” Luna said. “You were hurt verybadly, Lyra.”

“I was,” Lyra said simply. “Alex. There’s no need to hurt her.”

“But…” Reiner started. “Lyra–”

“I mean it.” Lyra walked up to him. “We can reason with her. We let the justice system work, we keep her under guard, and… Don’t hurt her anymore.”

“Don’t hurt her?” Reiner asked, incredulous. “She tried to kill you! Don’t tell me she didn't!”

Redheart, too, looked disbelieving that Lyra was begging clemency on her behalf.

“I’ve been hurt so much today,” Lyra said. “I… hurt. Everywhere. I don’t think there’s much need for any more hurting today.”

Celestia’s gaze swept over the room.

“She’s right, Alex. But so is my sister. Lyra, you need to be in bed,” Celestia said. “Winter,” she added, addressing the Guard, “may I request you escort Madame Heartstrings back to her room? And I’ve changed my mind. After this, I must see to…” She glanced at Cross, who was still being comforted by Icewind, then the Redheart on the bed. “Nurse Cross. I fear she’s had quite a shock... I’d also like to visit the Redheart who first got checked in tonight. My sister will collect your and Icewind’s reports. Meet her at the cafeteria. I’ll come back later to speak with this Redheart… Alone.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Wait,” said Lyra, stopping Winter in his tracks. “What about… the locket?”

True to her word, Celestia had been moving to check on Cross. But Lyra’s words caused her eyes, along with Reiner’s and others’, to fix on Redheart.

The pony who was not one of Celestia’s ponies smiled coldly. “I threw it into the river,” Redheart said, her inflection bland. “I couldn’t destroy it, but I made sure it wouldn’t be found.”

“Luna?” Celestia asked her sister. “What do her thought-strands say? Is she telling the truth?”

By her side, she felt Icewind stiffen. This didn’t surprise her. From what she remembered Sergeant Gibbous telling her, he’d been let down terribly by this stranger Redheart.

“I…” Luna sounded perturbed. “I have already attempted to delve into her mind, Celestia. Yet something blocks my path. Powerful magic, unlike anything I’ve ever encountered. Her thoughts feel like they’re coated in thick tar. To all intents and purposes, she’s shielded from me.”

Reiner snorted. “Funny. The last time humans met you, you had an explanation for that… I’ve got a constant sense of déja vu here...”

“I do not possess all the experience of the one you met.”

“So… you’re saying you can’t do it?”

“I am the Princess of Dreams, sir,” Luna reminded him. “If someone can unlock this, I am the one. But it won’t be tonight. For now, we must assume she speaks true.”

“The little bitch…” Reiner whispered from his wheelchair. But Celestia was taken aback to see him holding his head in his hands. “Oh, God… lost… she’ll never forgive me for losing it…”

“It may not be as lost as it seems, Alex,” Celestia interjected. “I shall give the order to have the river searched from mouth to source. And we might find help within the river itself. I am informed it is inhabited by a friendly, if flamboyant sea-serpent. Nonetheless… I won’t lie, this could take weeks, even months.”

Reiner peeked at her from between his fingers. “We won’t have weeks.”

To look at him, Celestia had assumed he was on the verge of crying, but when he lifted his head, his eyes were burning as they shot a last, hateful glare at Redheart.

“Get her out of my sight,” Reiner hissed. “Before I do something I won’t regret.”

Luna walked away from the bed. “Allow me to escort you, Captain,” she said, grabbing the handles. “A royal favour, if you wish to call it that.”

“That’d be wise. And we shall do what we can, in the time given to us,” Celestia said stoically. “Now. Lyra, I must insist you follow Winter. Icewind,” she told the sleet-grey pegasus, “thank you for your care. Join Winter, I shall take Nurse Cross from here.”

“See you in a minute, Alex,” Lyra whispered, departing.

Meanwhile, Icewind nodded wordlessly as he stood up and left Cross to Celesia.

“Come with me, Sutra,” Celestia told her gently. “I’ve got a few things to explain.”

* * * * *

By the time Alex had calmed down, the Guards named Winter and Icewind were long gone to the cafeteria, and it had gone pitch-black outside the far window.

Luna’s ear twitched as she picked up a sound unheard to him, or the thestrals. “Gibbous, Selene,” she told her Guards. “The Moon still shines bright, above the clouds. You may take half-an-hour’s leave.”

“Your Highness?” the two said simultaneously.

“I shall watch over Captain Reiner, and our prisoner, until my sister returns.”

Uncertain, Selene and Gibbous exchanged glances. But Luna was their sovereign. They heeded her word.

“Thank you, ma’am.” Both of them saluted and left.

As soon as the thestrals were out of sight, Alex saw a familiar spectral figure coalesce in the hallway.

“Galatea,” Luna said coldly. “I take it you witnessed everything.”

“Indeed I did, Sister,” Galatea replied. “This astral-projection is very convenient, admittedly. A pity it only works with another alicorn to serve as a beacon. Being able to use it with your willing cooperation has felt so… liberating.”

“More’s the pity you didn’t see what occured in the Forest.”

“Alas,” Galatea said stiffly. “Although…”

Luna craned her neck. “What?”

“Hard to say...” said Galatea. “Yet sometimes, I sense this… there are regular ponies with the alicorn potential within them. At least one such potential, I have sensed in Ponyville. Maybe two.”

“Fascinating,” Alex said dryly. His focus wasn’t on her. It was on the door to Lyra’s hospital room. “So, when do I tell Lyra, about the other-you speaking to me through the other-Bonbon, with the creepy white eyes and the bloody Voice of the Legion? And we still haven’t finished sorting how I got here.”

“Soon we shall, I promise,” Galatea said, exchanging looks with Luna. “The loss of the locket is unfortunate, but we will course-correct where we can. For now, mine assessment is that you had better seek an emotional closure with Miss Heartstrings.”

“Dunno if that’ll ever happen…” Alex muttered.

But he rolled his wheelchair and went through the door.

As the Sergeant had said, the room was occupied by three beds, with Lyra now in the middle. She raised herself, blinking, when he came in. To her right, Sparkler rested. In the third bed was Zecora, and sitting by her was...

“Rainbow Dash?” Alex said. “When did you come back here? Where are the others?”

The prismatic pegasus shrugged. “I had a book to read. My friends are still in Canterlot… well, except Fluttershy. She and Discord went… went off somewhere.”

In front of him, Lyra gave a bittersweet smile. “Hello again. Sparkler. Zecora. Meet Alex.”

“You don’t know me,” he greeted them. “But we’ve met. On another world.”

Sparkler nodded. “Then if you know me, sir, you’ll know that, incredible as this all is, I can believe it.”

“In many a song is it said that beyond this world, to be found are others past the veil unfurled,” Zecora stated. “Where one may find one’s self as if in a mirror, imbued with greater virtue or greater error.”

“Good to hear ya talk again, Zecora,” Dash commented.

Privately, Alex reflected on how often he’d wondered what Zecora’s poison-joke affliction might be. Turned out it was reversing her coat colours. Despite the poor zebra’s plight, he found some humour in that.

“Apologies for cutting this short, but I gotta talk to Lyra.” Alex rolled up to her. “Lyra. Thanks for… coming in when you did. For talking me down. Nothing that’s happened was your fault.”

“You don’t know that,” Lyra lamented. “I’m… I am sorry about your locket, Alex. If… if I hadn’t… hadn’t tried teleporting you outta there, it wouldn’t have fallen off.”

“Hey, kid,” Alex said, trying to sound comforting. “You were saving my life. I’m glad you didn’t end up losing yours. Not again. What’s a trinket worth next to that?”

But Lyra had noticed the book on his lap. Ponyland: Fact or Fable.

“Alex,” she said, pointing to it weakly. “The picture in that book. Doctor Waggoner’s sketch of the pearl figurine on the shore. I saw your reaction to it, right before Galatea showed up.”

Although Alex had taken the book along precisely for this reason, when he opened the corresponding page, it was with great reluctance.

Lyra tapped the sketch. “There. I thought so. She’s holding up the exact same locket. I didn’t get to see it for long, but that was the same locket.”

“You got that right,” Alex said quietly, staring at the sketch. “Freaky, huh? No wonder it gave me a turn.”

“Alex, I’ve got eyes in my head,” Lyra told him. “The human in that picture… you’re the only real human I’ve met, so I didn’t really notice at first. But it’s not just that you look like her. She looks an awful lot like you. Same ears, same nose… even the hair’s almost the same.”

He stayed silent, not wanting to go where this would go.

“She’s your mother, isn’t she?” Lyra said, in such a small voice as to be near-inaudible. “The one you told me of. And that locket’s got to do with the last time a human came to Equus.”

Alex closed the book, refusing to meet Lyra’s gaze.

“We’ll talk about this some other time, Lyra,” he said somberly. “It’s been a long day for me too.”

He was spared her reply by an interruption, from the last person he’d expected.

“Lyra!”

The bedroom door had reopened. In the hallway, there still stood Luna; Galatea had gone again, presumably making herself invisible. But the speaker stood in the doorway, at lower head-height than any alicorn. She was carrying a cup of coffee on her back, which dropped and spilled when she rushed forward, past Alex without even looking at him, and seized the surprised mint-green unicorn in a tight hug.

“Lyra, Lyra…” Bonbon repeated, her voice between a sob and a laugh. “So this is where I find you! You stupid, silly filly, what’ve you got yourself into now?”

“Bonnie? Uh… I…”

“How dare you, staying away from home for two days!” Bonbon shook her by the shoulders. “Leaving Rarity to explain things, and barely the half of it, at that! You got any idea how worried I was?”

Embarrassed, Lyra gingerly gripped Bonbon’s shaking forehooves.

“Bonbon, I’m sorry! I’m really, really sorry! But something big happened… bigger than I thought.” She nodded towards the human, drawing Bonbon’s attention to him. “Bonbon. Look at that. I was right. His name’s Alex.”

Alex examined Bonbon’s features as his presence registered with her properly. She was less surprised than he’d have thought.

“Well, isn’t that something…” Bonbon muttered, frowning. “I want to say I’m pleased to meet you, sir. But Lyra was bad enough when she was on the fringe, thinking you were real. Now she’s going to be impossible to live with.”

And Alex, internally, had to suppress a smile. He’d almost forgotten how much of a grouse Bonbon could be.

“It’ll be easier than you think,” Alex said. “Trust me on this.”

“So, he talks,” Bonbon said. “Good to know.”

“Oh, Bonnie,” Lyra sighed, leaning in to hug her, in turn. “I am so sorry for worrying you like that. But you’ve not had anything like the trouble I’ve had today.”

“You think, Lyra.” Bonbon muttered. “You think.”

“I nearly died.”

That threw Bonbon for something of a curveball. “This just keeps getting better… You’ll have to tell me everything. Spare no detail.” She paused. “But it’s over now, isn’t it? You gonna stop putting yourself in harm’s way, from now on?”

Lyra smiled at her sadly. “I’ll start from the beginning…”

Naturally, the full weight of that last exchange wasn’t lost on Alex. Yet in spite of the day’s losses, in spite of knowing too well what difficulties lay ahead… for this small window of time, while he listened to the couple catch up with each other, a couple he’d never thought to see together again, Alexander Reiner felt a bit of weight lift off his heart.

* * * * *

“Thank you for your report, Sergeant,” Princess Luna told Winter, as he pushed the papers across the table. “I’m sorry you’ve had to make so many revisions. Today’s events have nearly overtaken us all.”

“I know my duty, ma’am,” Winter saluted. “However great our burden, I shan’t falter.”

Princess Luna did not answer straight away. She looked above Winter and Icewind’s heads, across the rows of empty, aseptically clean tables of the cafeteria, lost in thought.

“Those are good words... Words we may soon have to live by every day, and night.”

With Winter attended to, Luna finished by turning to Icewind.

“I understand tonight has been… emotionally taxing on you, Corporal,” the Princess said kindly. “And I haven’t forgotten about those troubled nights of yours. Thus I’m not expecting you to show the same extreme assiduity as Sergeant Winter. You can have your report on my desk by tomorrow evening.” She paused. “But is there anything in particular you’d wish to tell?”

As he was sipping his coffee, Icewind thought about it, feeling the locket beneath his armour, pressing against his barrel.

Truth be told, his impulses went against almost every piece of his training as a Guard. However, this was compared to the fact that ignoring Redheart’s story went against all of them.

‘It sounds like a beautiful world,’he thought. ‘And… we’re letting this outsider in. Instead of striving towards this… this other Redheart’s Equestria.

Do we just… pass up this beautiful dream? Just like that? He’s violent. He’s unstable. He’ll drag us into war.

… And I helped bring in the one mare that’d stop us from following him.’

“No, ma’am,” he said at last. “Nothing.”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

A new plot breadcrumb; Zecora reflects on her possession of the Half-Gilded Horseshoe of Sunflare, a mission given to her by the Stonecutters and their Magical Council.

Spectrum 2.0 - December 25th 2018

Sledge115: Pardon the delay, heh, but this chapter went through several extensive revisions. Hope it’s worth it!

Now, without spoiling anything, this won’t be the last you’ll see of Ponyville – nor that little mention of the Imperial ideology, so keep your eyes open ;)

Stay tuned! The gap between here and the next chapter should be much shorter, and we got a lot of story to tell

Cheers!

VoxAdam: Sure thing, the time-gap until the next chapter ought to be shorter by default. Seven-and-a-half months is the longest delay we’ve ever had in-between chapters on a Spectrum main story.

This was a uniquely challenging chapter to even sketch an outline for. I wouldn’t call it an exaggeration to say it must have gone through five different concepts, before settling on what you see today.

Over four years ago, I was hesitant to join Team Spectrum, not even as what DoctorFluffy affectionately called a ‘Sixth Ranger’, knowing I wasn’t the greatest at time-management. My time-management’s improved since; my rhythm hasn’t sped up all that much. Mind you, in that same chat, TheIdiot said he felt he’d only done so much for the Spectrumverse… There are things which change so completely over time, looking back on it is like gazing through a mirror into opposite-world.

Thank you once more, TB3, for inviting me to proofread Last Train From Oblivion. What happened after had its ups and had its downs, but your gesture made all the difference.

Back when Redskin posted his bridge-burning journal in May 2017, I came under fire for allegedly slowing the pace on the production schedule, mainly for advocating there be some conscious planning, instead of throwing everything and the kitchen sink at the story. This time around, I suppose we’re seeing the other side of that coin; the various factors such as wanting Bonbon to have an active role, maintaining the centrality of Lyra as our protagonist, Icewind being given a reason for his heel-turn, etc., constituted a huge number of plot points to bring together coherently.

And to be honest, we had written Redheart preparing to do something without knowing for sure what it was; the alternate path she could have taken can be read in Jed’s Cut, which was already planned months ago, and has recently been published independently.

The locket had been introduced as a Chekov’s Gun several chapters ago. The idea to use it as Chapter Eight’s narrative lynchpin came to us as a “Eureka” moment.

Ultimately, if you feel this chapter has an overabundance of building up to action, only to cut away just before it really gets going, in favour of talky scenes? Yeah, it’s a symptom of when much of the writing is given over to me. You may call me Gareth Edwards. Just please don’t call me Rian Johnson. Even if this is a ninth installment.

DoctorFluffy: I… did a lot here, (the fight scene with Lyra, some scenes with Redheart) but I’m especially proud of the line that goes “And all the talk about being able to equal the Solar Empire’s magic was bullshit anyway.” It’s deliberately a middle finger to Red mentioning PHL shields were better than Imperial ones. Even when I was drinking the kool-aid, that never made sense. Also, the bones and feathers thing? I’m like 89% sure it didn’t happen and that Gardner just lied about it to make sure his troops were fired up. It’s a reference to the original plans for Defiance in Light Despondent, which I did not make. They also sickened both me and Vox, and they are a big reason that Light Despondent stalled as bad as it did. Yes, I can blame Red for shit too.

Also, for all of you wondering about canon sidestories, reminder again - Light Despondent and Snowbound are underway, and being remade and/or rewritten to be canon-compliant. Also, Slow Mutants exists. Yes, I know, but if you want MORE of the reboot universe, then check it out.

On another note, Jed - despite his distance from us - does have some related work out there. There’s The Fairport Incident, Map of the Problematique. Check him out if you can - a little positive feedback goes a long way for both of us.[/shamelessplug]

By the way, yes. Yes I did break my back in April. All of that was completely true. I was in the hospital for about two days before they discharged me and I walked back into my house. I’m not paralyzed, and everything below the neck still works. And before you even ask, yes! Yes it does.

The scene where Lyra says “easily” is inspired by that - I was supposed to be in a wheelchair, and I was going to sit and wait to get into the car home, then my phone lost power so I walked all the way to the pharmacy in the hospital. Mom was super surprised, and my answer was “...I walked here.” And she said something else, and I said “Why are you so surprised? I’ve been doing it most of the day.”

TheIdiot: This took forever and a week, didn’t it? Drama occurred from group politics, real life, and other lovely complications that delayed Chapter 8 many times over. It is unfortunate that by the time Chapter 8 (originally) got a completed draft it happened during a week where I had to face a midterm, an exam, and writing a rough draft all in rapid succession set only a day apart each. Honestly, sounds like a tacky episode of some dunce drama show. Probably not Glee, seeing how there wasn’t any licensed song covers sung.

Point of matters is that, yes, this was a labor of production that grew more difficult as real life continued to push down. I am fortunate that Sledge and Vox were able to step up despite these various issues. With Chapter 8 done, I can say knowing that - despite what Murphy might say - Chapter 9 won’t take nearly as long as this multi-month drought.

Until next time fair reader(s),

Carpe diem.

Act I ~ Chapter Nine ~ In Darkest Hour

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

Jed R
Perhaps I am here, perhaps I am not, or perhaps I never was…

DoctorFluffy
Let’s make the story we thought we were reading, guys.

VoxAdam
Vade Retro, Satanas

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Nine
In Darkest Hour

* * * * *

We’re going to be okay, arent we Papa?
Yes. We are.
And nothing bad is going to happen to us.
That’s right. Because we’re carrying the fire.
Yes. Because we’re carrying the fire.
— The Boy and the Man, from Cormac McCarthy’s The Road

~ New York City, USA ~ November 13th 2024 CE ~

Hour by hour, the night wore on.

The night itself was good, though. Night was a friend. Night was the domain of Princess Luna. Once, the people of Equestria had feared her corrupted self, for so long that most had even forgotten there’d been a Luna, before there was a Nightmare Moon. Now, well... now, for many, it was a struggle to remember who they had been, until the war made them who they were today. And in all the nights and days to come.

Amethyst Star, gazing upon the New York skyline, had memories which reached far back.

She remembered where she was on the Longest Night of the Summer Sun Festival, when the new Era Harmoniae, hopeful and short-lived, was born. When Luna had made her return as a creature of darkness, but through the actions of six brave mares, was brought back. Not into the light – into grace. Where had that grace gone?

The young jewel-maker had already seen a lot in her life, and only half was by virtue of being the adoptive daughter of Time Turner, Ponyville’s erstwhile timekeeper and self-described ‘Doctor’ of the village calendar.

Strangely, however, when she thought of that day, what she remembered most vividly was not the cold fear as the Sun failed to rise, or the bliss as Princess Celestia invited her people to celebrate the return of her little sister. It was a simple image, of her standing on a Canterlot road next to a mare, barely out of fillyhood, really, waving to a most precocious filly, hurrying by without a glance.

… That ‘filly’, of course, had been Twilight. And Amethyst’s companion was Lyra.

Sighing, Amethyst willed herself to no longer stare out the window. Grand as the view might be from Freedom Tower, she had another, different window to peer into. The lens of her microscope, in her study of powdered crystals.

Mere years ago, Equestria’s first great war in centuries had been fought over crystals. Crystals were the secret of so much in this new war. Of weapons, and cures, and artifice. One fighter had even forged them into a chain-mail of concealment. Well, not literal chainmail, actually, more of a flightsuit. And crystal were what made the runes possible. Runes such as the missing Captain Reiner’s.

Amethyst cursed how his vanishing had doubled her family’s responsibilities. She dearly wished she could be spending a night on the town, or at least down at their lab, with Ana right now. Together, they could have worked to fill in the loss of Zecora, pursued their search for answers in the curious case of Verity Carter.

The sounds of gunfire, explosions, the more exotic weapons of the Solar Empire, and spellfirehad rung out in the night, but they were winding down, for now. In the midst of their shared confusion, both sides had retreated behind their defenses. Only miles away, beyond the Barrier, still just the faintest glow of sickly pink on the dividing line of a dark horizon. While the other hunkered down and made do with what was left of an untainted Earth.

That made it calm. It did not make it any easier to relax.

~ Boston, USA ~

Neither, for Ana Bjorgman, did this haircut.

“Sit still a bit,” said Johnny C, the short, stocky man holding scissors to Ana’s locks.

When she’d met him, she thought he’d be sullen and depressive, on account of his seemingly permanent, uneven stubble, scraggly hair, and admission that a frown and thousand-yard stare were ‘kind of his default expression’. She had been wrong.

“Yeah, I know, that’s what they’re always saying in the movies. The ‘watermelon, watermelon’ of barbers and hairdressers. But, trust me, you don’t want to lose part of your left ear like I did,” Johnny C continued.

His tone wasn’t unkind, though he sounded on the verge of snickering.

“You lost part of your ear to…” Ana asked, her voice trailing off.

“Maybe?” Johnny C shrugged. “I mean, Mom told me I was bleeding everywhere during a haircut once, and I’m missing part of, uh… that curly part of my ear. Near the top. I mean, I think that coulda happened? But I’m not sure.”

“Gee, heh,” Ana chuckled nervously. “Been in the wars, have we?”

It wasn’t much of a joke, but hanging around a man like Harwood gave one an appreciation for a particular sense of humour.

“Nah, that was when I was three,” Johnny C said.

Ana just nodded, quietly, wrapping her coat tighter around herself. In spite of the campfire, there was still a chill in the air up here, with gusts of wind blowing in from between the exposed steel frames and broken windows of the former office building.

She looked away from him, to the locks strewn on the floor, her natural strawberry-blonde contrasting with the orange glow of the flames against the vinyl flooring. Although she knew how that was bound to make her feel, she couldn’t help it.

And make her feel it did. Forlorn.

The close to home base, the stricter military requirement became. Despite herself, Ana had to hold back making a comment on her hairdresser’s own trim. It might have been a complimentary comment, but it’d have been painful. He’d been to the Arctic Circle. She had been nowhere near the North in years. And that, presumably, was why they let him wear his hair long.

“Hey, I know how it feels,” Johnny C said. “It was like pulling teeth to get me to cut this, the first time around. Same for Fiddlesticks over there.” He jerked his thumb towards a yellow mare with an inky-blue mane.

“S’true,” Fiddlesticks nodded, in her broad Appleoosan drawl. “But, well, when that clay Newfoal grabbed onto it, I had to beg him from shaving hisself bald!”

“Actually, you had to stop me from lighting it on fire,” Johnny C pointed out.

“Oh, Sweet Luna,” Fiddlesticks sighed, “don’t remind me,”

“Bit late for that!” Johnny C sniggered.

“Why would you light your hair on fire?” Ana yelped. Her fingers twitched. This might have been a bad idea. “On purpose!”

‘Just let it pass,’ the little voice in her head said. ‘It’ll pass, Ana, it’ll pass.’

“It was an emergency! And I headbutted a guy while that happened!” Johnny C chuckled. “Now that was a weird day.”

‘... At least, the confusion over that last part will probablypass…’

There was a raven-haired woman leaning by the broken frame of an office cubicle, holding a mug, the other hand in her jeans’ pocket. Ana hadn’t caught her name, yet she stood out in that she wasn’t wearing a uniform, but a cherry-red T-shirt with a white floral pattern. From the picture camera slung around her neck, Ana assumed she was a photographer.

When the woman heard Johnny’s remark, she smirked a little. Putting down her mug, she theatrically twirled herself into a place behind the desk, clutching the top of the frame like a home-owner lifting the blinds on a window.

“We all weirdoes around here,” she crowed, in her best Sam the Eagle impression.

“Y’all go and quiet down a bit,” said a bald, moustached African man so massively built – Ana believed his name was Lorne – she could have easily imagined him with a future in American Football or basketball. His Southern drawl was oddly like Fiddlesticks’ Appleoosan, but deeper and broader, with something else mixed into his cadence. “Some of us are tryin’ to keep an eye on the street.”

Left with all this to think over, Ana held her tongue for the next couple of minutes as Johnny C kept up his trimming. Not that this made silence fall over the gathering, on the contrary. They were a rowdy lot, the crowd she’d elected to keep company with tonight, following the end of her shift. Johnny and his musician of a marefriend – if that was what she was – were just the most exuberant.

Hardly surprising, such spiritedness, coming from a penal squad.

But everyone in Ze’ev Squad seemed to have some opinion about the new people who’d come in this week and the week before that, streaming in from Halifax to the North, or Philadelphia to the South. Or the latest innovation put on display by Operation Exodus as a part of its tireless efforts at keeping up morale and promoting the ideal of Equus-Earth co-operation, not just between human and pony, but griffon and Kirin, zebra and buffalo, and more besides. A surprising number of the artistically-minded were present in this group of soldiers.

One topic, however, everyone was carefully avoiding. Politics.

What did the future bode for America and the world, with the upcoming summit to be held between the remaining leaders and the PHL in New York City? Had it been no more than a puppet-show to go ahead with the 2024 electoral process, when the Barrier was literally half a hundred miles away? How much longer could all these fancy alliances and treaties endure, once it came down to sharing the last crusts of bread on a dying planet? And, with a third of the North American continent abandoned in the face of Barrierfall, how would they cope as people were forced closer and closer to the Pacific Ocean?

The other topic wasn’t being avoided, Ana sensed, merely postponed. The question of Captain Alexander Reiner’s mysterious disappearance still echoed in her mind, as clearly as it had all through her endless, silent shift with Frieda.

Speaking of whom, the grey griffon grunted in response to Lorne’s words of caution.

“You know,” Frieda said, “mostly, they don’t come out in the dead of night. Mostly. Superstitions ‘bout old Pony Moonbutt have still got a tight hold on ‘em, no matter what the Tyrant may trundle out.”

“You don’t want to go thinking that,” the raven-haired woman warned her quietly, clutching her mug. “You never know on what night the Sun’ll turns up, for all it’s got not business being there, after the day is done. It’s like Celestia’s made it her life’s work, to ruin all our fun…”

“And all Equestria’s, too,” Frieda rebuked. “What? You think it’s fun getting a concert ‘dispersed as an illegal gathering’ and having totem-proles monitor your every move? Or getting flagged on a ‘nonstandard behaviour list’, or treated as a foreign agitator, simply cos’ you ain’t a pony? Because it’s not.”

‘Too Damn Right,’ someone said.

Ana could’ve easily assumed it was an automated message, but no, it was just the artificial voice of Quiette Shy, a white unicorn mare with a blond mane. She wore a red bandanna with a crudely sewn PHL patch that she wore over her mouth, and her mark was that of a thick, heavy pipe wrench.

As far as Ana knew, the Royal Guards had done something to her with a spear on a so-called “retrieval op” that rendered her mute. ‘For My Own Safety,’ Quiette Shy had said, the last time someone asked. ‘The Dribbling C–’

And then someone had interrupted her.

“If Luna’s still putting the fear of… well, her, in those pansies, blessed be her name.” Frieda took a swig from her hip-flask. “To her health, I says.”

“To her health!”

The group echoed Frieda’s sentiment, raising flasks and bottles to the Moon above. Though it may not have been Princess Luna’s Moon, it was the thought that counted.

“And to Lorne,” said a tall, lanky man with a thick Dutch, no, a thick Afrikaans accent, “For makin’ this fokkin’ siff rotgut!”

He sat against the wall a few feet from Quiette Shy, just next to a large German-built LMG with a reflex sight and foregrip.

Sitting next to him was an earthpony stallion with a red mustache. Aegis, though that wasn’t his real name, looked almost like Quiette Shy, with the same white coat, the same red bandanna with a PHL patch crudely sewn on, except he wore it over his mane, and similar lightly-tinted goggles... but the difference was, he was so massive by pony standards, a short person like Ana or Johnny C could have used him as a steed.

The lanky man downed a bottle that had once held Stella Artois in one gulp, then coughed.

“Fokdammit, Lorne. This is an improvement. And it still tastes like gat!” he laughed.

And Ana wondered where she’d heard that voice before, that thick accent. Hadn’t he been the one that called Newfoals a ‘trash pile of biology’?

“You’d know what that tastes like, Viktor,” Lorne said, though he was smiling. “Wouldn’t you.”

“I would, and it’s still better,” Viktor said, still laughing.

“Does mine taste better?” the massive earthpony asked in his deep, rumbling baritone.

“You know it, bru,” Viktor said. “Finest gat I ever did eat, Aegis, and that! That is some stiff...”

Next to him, Quiette Shy made a series of strangled noises that could have been laughter.

“... stiff competition,” Viktor said, trying not to laugh along with her and failing.“Did… did you cut down on the piss this time, Lorne?”

“For all of you, only the finest ingredients,” Lorne smirked.

The three of them, minus Shy, shared a laugh. Ana wasn’t sure what they found so funny.

Harwood had told her about Viktor Kraber, the HLF defector they called the ‘Night Surgeon’, a wild-looking, tense fellow with deep-set eyes and prominent cheekbones, with an intensity to his whole bearing and thin, lanky frame that made him look taller than he really was. Towering, is how she would have described it, though she’d met more physically imposing people. Maybe it was the beard.

Now there was a man who could have done with cutting a lot, but a lot, of hair. A scraggly, unkempt thing it was, but like all huge beards, it looked like nothing so much as a furry beast ready to jump out and eat you.

‘Ana, you are still thinking about the beard, right?’

Small wonder a professional doctor such as Harwood didn’t like him much. But Ana knew the extent of Harwood’s cold behaviour regarding Viktor Kraber. Even him coming to her aid on the streets a few hours ago, did not quite ease her own worries about him. He was, indeed, like a cunning wolf on the prowl, and that discomforted her deeply. On an intimate level.

Gratitude could come later, she mused. They were, after all, both someone else’s prey.

“Mind if I sit down here?” asked the raven-haired woman, distracting Ana from her thoughts. The woman gave Ana a Cheshire cat grin. “Make no mistake, everyone’s bonkers up here. But you don’t look half so crude, especially for someone who’s been at war this long.”

“Uh, sure, go ahead,” Ana said, sidling up to give the woman a space. She heard a small ‘snip’ cut the air behind her ear.

“There, almost done,” Johnny C said, moving around to face her. “Now, if we could just take care of those bangs...”

“Oh, no, don’t, don’t,” Ana said, suddenly overcome. “Let me keep them, please,” she added, in a calmer, steadier voice. “I need something to remember. I...” She swallowed. “Well, I don’t know if I’ll get to grow them again.”

Johnny considered her, looking at the scissors, then back at her. Then he nodded, and pocketed them.

“Fair bet, lady,” he said gently. “None of us’ll know if next time, we’ll be staring at our own hide and hair, or at fur patches. And that’s if we’re luck–” He caught himself. “Nah, fuck it. Forget I said anything.”

He noticed she wasn’t looking at him, and had her eyes on the men across the campfire.

“Ah,” Johnny C began. “Don’t you worry, that’s just Viktor. He’s nice enough when you get to know him. Sure, he’s a violent jackass with the bedside manner of a rusty chainsaw...”

Viktor, overhearing this, looked like he was trying not to yell at Johnny C. At which point Aegis put his hoof on Viktor’s knee, and shook his head. The bearded man shrugged, then sighed, looking a bit despondent.

“... and there was that security footage with the…” Johnny C’s voice trailed off. “Look, don’t worry about it.”

“Right,” Ana remarked, but her voice wavered, a little. Absent-mindedly, her hand reached up to her head, to feel the results.

The cold night air brushed against her neck, sending a shiver down her spine. She still had her fuzzy ushanka, at least, and the foresight to bring it with her. And she’d need it to stay warm, for Winter had come to Boston.

“So, let us not forget we’ve all got our recycling duties,” Johnny C commented wistfully. “You’re gonna need something to carry those shavings back to base.” He felt around in his trouser pockets, frowned, and pulled his hand out irritably. “Fuck, I could’ve sworn I had a plastic bag left.”

“You mean a stray d–” Fiddlesticks begun.

“Fiddle, now is not the time for Night Vale references!” Viktor interrupted. “Plus, Oscar took one already.”

He pointed towards a heavyset man who could’ve been fat, muscled, or just big. The man, Oscar Mikkelsen, was wearing in a helmet with an opaque visor, sitting next to the massive earthstallion. Oscar had taken his gloves off, revealing a hand that looked either deformed, burned, or both, and was stroking a dog that looked like a labrador or German Shepherd mix.

Oscar waved with his left hand. This one had six fingers.

“What happened to your hand?” the raven-haired woman asked curiously.

“Oh, that?” he said, surveying the six-fingered limb. “Well, you see…”

“No, I meant, how’d you lose the finger on your right hand?”

“What? I was... born this way,” Oscar said.

The woman shrugged. “Stranger things have happened. I see you’re a dog-lover. I had a dog when I was a kid. He used to be a collie until he got ran over.”

“It’s a very good boy,” Viktor added, reaching towards the dog, scratching it behind the ears.

“Girl,” Oscar said, looking away from the woman. “It’s girl.”

Johnny C exhaled, staring at Ana almost sheepishly. “Yeah, guess you’re gonna have to improvise. Sorry ‘bout the inconvenience.” He gestured at her wicker-spun picnic basket, placed a safe way away from the campfire. “I mean, it’s a beauty, that is. Reminds me of an honest antique that Grandma Heald used to own. Hope you don’t mind using it to carry a piece of yourself around in it.”

“Oh, no no no, no fear,” Ana said quickly, feeling her cheeks heat up, and hoping that he wouldn’t notice. “I’ve done just that already, tonight… using it for my guitar, I mean,” she hastened to specify awkwardly. “It’s like, like that’s a piece of me. You get what I’m saying, right?”

While he did raise an eyebrow, he did not seem overly nonplussed. “Sure I do! Fiddlesticks over here would say much the same ‘bout her fiddle.”

“Musicians, eh?” Ana remarked, brightly. “It’s always the instruments.”

“Don’t forget the player, either!”

“Yeah, heh, the player…” she said, trailing off. Absent-mindedly, she traced her fingers on the golden lyre emblem embroidered on her hat. “Can’t have music without the player, obviously.”

“Wish I had my ukulele,” remarked the raven-haired woman. “Trust me, you haven’t lived ‘til you’ve strummed the strings off one, lying in a hammock by torchlight on one of those warm Pacific nights.”

“I’m sure I haven’t,” Ana chuckled, as she put the ushanka back on. Cold winds were rising, their chill cutting even through the campfire. “Didn’t have the time to, ah, stick around when we passed Hawaii. Wish I could have, but a schedule’s a schedule.”

“Then again,” the woman answered, “I never did quite get what made Iceland such a popular tourist destination. If you think it’s freezing tonight, you should the Arctic Circle in the dead of the Winter.”

“I have,” said Johnny C. “The real Arctic Circle. Besides, I’m not the right guy to ask, yeah?

“You’re talking to a guy who routinely forgets to wear jackets in below-freezing temperatures,” Fiddlesticks added.

“Listen, I’m trying to make a point here.”

“Sorry!” Johnny C replied, with a chuckle. “Carry on, carry on.”

The woman nodded gratefully. “And that point is, I’ve been wondering who’s got it the worst, a Polynesian stuck in the North Atlantic, or a Scandinavian in the Pacific. Would you rather it blew hot, or cold?”

“I’m gonna cite, uh, well, Goldilocks?” Ana said hesitantly. “Easy answer. Easiest one, just gotta find that right balance, I guess. I mean, I like it windy, feels great!” she added, even as a gust swept one of her remaining bangs across her face, “But a cup of warm chocolate besides the fireplace, count me in.”

“Amen to that,” Frieda spoke up, and Ana gave her a thumbs up. “When you get the drinking part of it right, ‘course.”

“How do you do it then?” Fiddlesticks asked. “Your beaks are, no offense, not exactly suited for it.”

“It’s a long story,” was Frieda’s only, deadpan reply. “Maybe you could ask Ana over here. She knows the details very well...”

She gave a cheeky wink, aimed straight at Ana. Her cheeks burned.

‘Don’t even think about it, don’t even think about it, not here, Frieda for goodness–’

It was to Ana’s relief that someone else spoke up, sparing her the embarrassment of stumbling over her words out loud.

“‘Goldilocks’,” the raven-haired woman repeated, staring at Ana and shaking her head. “I knew it the moment I clapped eyes on you, you really are like some waif who’s escaped from a European children’s storybook. What in blue blazes are you doing with this rough lot, this suicide squad?”

“First thing that came to mind,” Ana shrugged, shooting an innocent-looking Frieda a quick glare. “The ‘Goldilocks’ reply, I mean, I like stories. And as for the rough lot? It’s been a long trip. Half a way around the world, even. Norway’s… Norway is on the other side now.”

“My home isn’t,” the woman said sympathetically. “But Iceland… is on the other side.” She took a sip of her mug. “Funny, isn’t it? I’d spend my days there, counting the hours until I could leave... but when that nauseating pink wall appeared on the seas, and we all had to scramble, it hit me that I’d never be visiting Iceland again… Of course, that was shortly after the Ambassador died… morale was low all around…”

“What was she like, really?” Frieda asked. “Lyra?”

The woman fingered the lens on her camera, not looking at any of them directly. “What was Lyra really like? How do you describe Lyra Heartstrings?” she mused. “She was… genuine. That’s the best way I can think to say it. Sure, sure, you’re listening to me and thinking, of course I’m saying that, I’m a reporter. But, that’s just it, no matter what a big figure they’ve turned her into, Lyra was always this little green unicorn.”

‘She knew Ambassador Heartstrings?’ Ana wondered.

“Can’t have music without the player, eh, Ana?” Frieda reiterated, with Fiddlesticks nodding in enthusiastic agreement.

“Yeah...” Ana wistfully replied.

The flames flickered, and danced, for the night was growing colder still.

“We earthponies have a sayin’,” Fiddlesticks commented. “‘Everythin’ in this world’s a cart. Ya just need the right horse’. Same principle. What’s music without a player?” She stared towards the Moon. “That’s what still feels so strange about being here. No magic, ‘least, not the kind you can feel. Critters don’t need earthponies, no pegasus to shepherd clouds, no Sun-Chariot,” she pulled a face. “No Mare in the Moon…”

“You met Luna too, didn’t you, Lacey?” Johnny C suddenly asked the woman sitting next to Ana. “You’re the one who shot those videos of Lyra and Yael welcoming her to Earth.”

She glanced up at him, bewildered. “How’d–”

“Heliotrope,” he said simply. “Yael Ze’ev is my cousin. I’m not part of this… suicide squad, as you put it, anymore than Bjorgman is, but I hang around.”

‘Lacey’ muttered something under her breath. “That Ze’ev… Oh, fine, it seems like you got me over a barrel. Funny, you don’t look much like her.”

“Second cousin, and I’m not half-black,” Johnny C explained.

“Ah, okay, I see. But, look, I don’t like to talk about it much. Because, honestly, who remembers the first half of those videos? I had Heliotrope as my wingman, as it were, and she shot the best footage.”

“Why, though?” Johnny C enquired. “Why didn’t you seek to capitalise on your role in this? It’s what I would do.”

“I didn’t go into journalism for the sensation, haole,” the woman told him. “Way I see it, the truth is out there, and the truth is my shepherd. Lyra believed the same. It’s what guided her towards meeting us.”

“Uh, I’m sorry,” Ana mumbled, drawing a glance from ‘Lacey’, who was right beside her. “Am I missing something here?”

The raven-haired woman smiled apologetically. “I’m the one who should be sorry. It’s me forgetting my manners, not introducing myself.”

“You don’t know, Ana? Given your friendship with Hanne Adler…” Johnny C sounded surprised. “That’s Lacey Sanderson. She’s this big-shot war photographer.”

“Don’t listen to him. My name’s not Lacey,” the woman said. “That’s a pun he’s made about my name ever since I asked him a question about his.”

“Hey, it’s my business...”

“I’m a reporter, Johnny. Everything is my business. At least I actually know what the ‘C’ in my name stands for.”

“Pardon?” said Ana.

“Lay-C,” the woman enunciated, holding up three fingers. “Lacey. My full name is Lani Chase Sanderson.”

The name rang a bell in Ana’s mind. But it was what Johnny had already said that cinched it.

“That video of Princess Luna… that was you?”

“Go on, Lacey,” Johnny C urged Lani. “Tell her the story. It’ll make a good campfire tale.”

“Not sure that’s quite the way I’d put it,” Lani said quietly. “Like I said, I don’t really like to talk about it. And I didn’t get to shoot the juiciest part. Yet, if you insist…” She paused then, taking a moment to stare at the campfire, flames flickering in her eyes. “It still upsets me, you know. It was meant to be a welcoming… it became a tearful goodbye…”

~ Reykjavik, Iceland ~ August 22nd 2021 CE ~

Continental Europe had all but fallen. Britain and Ireland were gone as well, and the Barrier now touched on two more landmasses, Asia and Africa, reaching as far as the Black Sea, Morocco, and the Faroe Islands. The only consolation was that it had slowed down a little, once it hit the Atlantic. Which begged the question of why Ambassador Heartstrings was here, in the all-but-deserted Icelandic capital city’s industrial district, accompanied only by two bodyguards, one of her PHL cohorts from the home country, and a photojournalist.

Acutely aware she was the only one present without military experience, or much of a weapon to speak of, unless you counted her Panasonic AG-AC90A video-camera – even Ambassador Heartstrings had come bearing her assault arms – Lani kept a careful distance from the rest of this prestigious group, making sure to get them all in the frame.

“You didn’t have to come,” Amethyst Star told Lieutenant Ze’ev.

“I did,” Ze’ev said. She was a tall, biracial Israeli woman, of mocha-coloured skin and thick black hair with light green eyes. “I don’t know what’ll happen here. But I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t keep the Ambassador safe.”

“I’ll be fine,” Lyra Heartstrings said, calm, confident and radiant. “I promise you.”

“If that was true, ma’am, you’d never need bodyguards,” said Korso. “Besides. We’d need extra muscle to keep you and Miss Star out of harm’s reach. Oh, and Miss Sanderson.”

That line warmed Lani a little on the inside. Military people had never made her feel entirely comfortable. So of course, as she never tired of reminding herself, she’d chosen a job that put her in the line of fire, in more than one respect. And this was before the aliens had come knocking.

Although that, at least, was kind of exciting to her.

She was on the fence about Korso, but she sensed that within Ze’ev lay a... pent-up streak. As if the woman might someday snap, or never at all. The Lieutenant had tried to be friendly before, but it hadn’t quite worked.

“Coincidentally,” Amethyst said off-handedly, “This is exactly why I got Heliotrope to tail us.”

Everyone in the group, save for Lani, looked to Amethyst with a start.

“You didn’t tell me you were doing that,” Ze’ev said. “Heliotrope’s supposed to be my department.”

“You didn’t ask,” Amethyst said, still in that off-handed fashion. “Say hi, Heliotrope.”

“Evening, everyone,” Heliotrope said, her voice coming in crackling through their earpieces. “I’m forty metres behind you on a rooftop.”

Lani looked behind her, towards one of the rooftops. But she saw nothing. Heliotrope – a purplish-pink, Las Pegasus-born pegasus mare with a blue-green and pink mane – had compensated for her bright colouration by designing a unique, made-of-rare-crystal flightsuit with light-bending camouflage, so of course she’d be hard to spot.

“Nah, I’m kiddin’. I’m not that far back,” Heliotrope said.

“Miss Star” Ze’ev said, glaring at the unicorn. “I must confess. I didn’t know about it either. That’s a clear breach of military protocol, right there.”

“It wasn’t her idea,” Lani stepped in. Both Korso and Ze’ev’s eyes turned on her, and for a second, she’d have liked to shrink back. But when you’d spent a childhood around social services, there were things you’d been ironed out for. “Well, not quite. I… took the liberty of asking if I may ‘borrow’ Operative Heliotrope to aid in my work. After all, what’s the good of a pegasus with an invisibility suit, when you can do one better, and have a pegasus with an invisibility suit and recording equipment?”

Ze’ev frowned. “Ugh. Reporters…”

Next to her, Amethyst chuckled to herself.

“Ma’am, it’s a terrible idea to be like that to the people who form our public image,” Korso said. “The media shapes how people think, giving them a quick soundbite. A single bad impression can hurt you beyond measure.”

Now everyone was staring at him, Amethyst included.

“My little sister is a journalism major,” Korso explained.

“Class of 2016?” Lani enquired, genuinely curious. “What a year that was for the press.”

“2017, actually,” Korso said. “She was so madshe wasn’t out there reporting when all that happened.”

“Yeah. It all seemed so… utopian, at the beginning, didn’t it?” Lani sighed wistfully. “Well, my big sister still jokes sometimes that if the aliens hadn’t arrived, our lives would have taken a turn for the worse.” She noticed the gazes this earned her again. “It’s… ah, I guess you have to be part of the family to see the humour in it.”

Ze’ev shook her head, yet didn’t address any of them, evidently deciding she had other fish to fry.

“Are you sure this contact of yours is on the level?” Ze’ev asked Heartstrings. His breath formed white clouds in the crisp night air. “Asking me and Lieutenant Korso to come alone, without providing a name, makes me question our faith even in you, Ambassador.”

Heartstrings smirked. “I guess asking you to trust me isn’t going to help, then?” she teased, hooves trotting lightly on the snowy ground. “There’s no need to, anyway. There she is.”

At her casual nod, Ze’ev and Korso spun, the latter directing their gun-mounted flashlights towards… a patch of shadows.

Yet this was not any random darkness created by the bulk of the iron crates stacked in this area. It reflected the light. Ze’ev blinked, hands firmly on her Galil, ready to fire if necessary. On cue, the patch slowly coalesced into the shape of a tall mare, a dark blue in colour, except for her mane, which was pale as powder.

As Lani’s eyes adjusted to the vision, still looking from the zoom-finder, she spotted the horn on the newcomer’s forehead, and the wings on her back…

“Cover the Ambassador!” Ze’ev barked, readying her Galil.

If she hadn’t said it, Korso would have. Just to their left, the man was placing his finger around the trigger on his trusty Remington ACR. albeit slower. More deliberately. As if even he wasn’t certain.

But Heartstrings, cool as a cucumber, stepped forward, placing herself between the figure and her comrades.

“Stand down, friends. She’s the most important ally we could have dreamed of.”

“It’s…!” Korso gasped. The tall Israeli woman was staring at the sight before her, shocked.

“Incredible!” Heliotrope gasped over their earpieces.

“Princess Luna…” Heartstrings tipped forward, employing in a courtly bow she had learnt in her capacity as Ambassador from the earliest of days, well-aware the camera would record her every word and move for posterity, as always. “It is a pleasure, m’lady.”

“Please, Madame Heartstrings, I am but Luna,” the dark alicorn replied, kneeling in turn. “I come before you, stripped of my crown and throne, and were all Equestria to beg me to take up either of them once more, I would say ‘nay’. I present myself to you as a willing exile.”

“On the contrary, I see nothing but true royalty here, Highness,” Heartstrings said, smiling kindly. “I believe that I speak not only for myself, but for the Equestrian Stranded and the great majority of the human race, when I say we are glad to recognise a Princess of Equestria, if she comes in peace.”

“I do, but not in any regal capacity,” Luna said sadly. “I am as I said, an exile. My sister has long embarked on a course of madness, and now that I’ve sought to move against her, to oppose her crimes against humankind, I find myself once more unwelcome in the nation whose founding I witnessed as a foal.”

Someone in the group did not appear to have been listening to the exchange. The focus of Amethyst Star’s gaze was entirely upon the eerie, powdery white of Princess Luna’s flowing hair.

“Oh, Princess!” Amethyst gasped, a hoof flying to her mouth. “What happened to your mane?”

With some small surprise, Luna considered Amethyst. “Miss Star,” she greeted. Her eyes blinked, back to her mane and then back to the company before her. “Ah. Yes. That.” She shook her head. “I expect that you’ll be hearing about it very soon.”

Ze’ev looked the dark alicorn up and down. Despite the bleached condition of her mane, which contrasted so starkly with Luna’s naturally dark colours, the wonder was evident in the woman’s face that she stood in front of one who, in all but size and shade, was Celestia’s double.

And yet no human here felt any threat emanating from the alicorn.

“How did you get here?” Ze’ev asked. “We believed your sister had an iron grip on all the portals bridging your world and ours. After those first few, confused months, the number of refugees from Equus has reduced to a trickle, unless they’re wily enough to get a permit to the Colonies and risk the long, hard trek to sneak across the Barrier…”

Luna smiled, almost triumphantly.

“I flew,” the Princess said simply, giving a friendly flap of her wings. “All across the sea of stars…” Noticing his expression, she tittered. “That was poetic license, Lieutenant. True, it was a long day’s journey into night, ere we reached this island, but we made it.”

“We?”

“I did not come alone,” Luna replied. “In fact, it may be safe to say it’s thanks to my companions that I am here. They and I come to seek asylum, and offer what help we can…” The Night Princess glanced backward. “It’s safe to come out now. everyone!”

And with that, ponies seemed to melt out from the shadows. As if they’d always been there. Each one of them was akin to a pegasus, but not quite. They were dark figures, with bat-like wings, tufted ears, and slitted eyes.

What stood out was that all looked as if they’d been put through the wringer. One was missing their right eye, another was missing a large chunk of their wing, and one pony’s ear had been cleaved in half, almost down to the skull. As a whole, the bat-like ponies all bore signs of having been beaten, stabbed, burned, shot with crossbow bolts…

“Your Night Guard,” Heartstrings breathed, a pained look on her face. “Oh, there are so few left…”

It was then that a new pegasus melted out of the shadows as well, between two startled bat-ponies. There was a shimmer from the rooftops as Heliotrope pushed up her suit’s hood, revealing a look of unbridled horror.

“What did they do to you!” Heliotrope shrieked. She was so consumed with emotion, by the looks of it, that she pushed herself off the rooftop, with barely a flap of the wing, to land violently upon the snowy ground amidst them all, still shrieking. “Oh, Sweet Harmony, what did they do!”

“Must’ve been a bad one,” Amethyst said, contemplating the thestrals in aghast fascination.

Lani, however, was looking at the bat-like ponies with something like undisguised glee.

“Vampire ponies?” she asked, turning to Amethyst Star even as, adjusting the zoom, she kept her camera fixed on the eerie crowd milling around Luna. “You’ve got vampire ponies in Equestria? This is awesome!”

“Not vampires,” Amethyst corrected, her mane blowing in the breeze. “They’re thestrals.”

“Worked with a lot of them during the Crystal War,” Heliotrope added, sounding only slightly calmer, but at least no longer as frantic. She was eyeing Luna’s battered entourage in sorrow, and in something like relief. “You can always rely on a thestral to have your back.”

“Heliotrope, is it?” said the Night Guard missing their left eye, who was also afflicted by a wicked-looking scar cork-screwing around one of their hindlegs. “I remember you from the Battle of Vanhoover. Best engineer I could have dreamed of. Do you remember? Our oath as we dropped from the Pride of Vanhoover’s decks behind the Crystal Realm’s lines?”

“To serve to the last,” Heliotrope said, nodding solemnly.

“And the last… it came,” the Night Guard said, and coughed. Not a ‘formal’ cough, more of a ‘cancer-ridden-lung’ cough. The words seemed… strained, somehow. It sounded as if he had taken some internal damage.

“Are you the one in command, sir?” Heartstrings asked.

“I’m the highest-ranking thestral left, Madame Ambassador,” the Night Guard said, dipping his head. “So it would appear to be I am. Sergeant Gibbous, at your service.”

Lani admittedly knew little about the ranks of Luna’s Night Guard – the topic just hadn’t come up – but whatever they had been through, it must be terrible if a Sergeant was the highest-ranking one left among them.

“All gave some to bring our princesses,” Gibbous said, “And some gave all.”

“... I don’t see Albedo,” Heliotrope noted. “Did he…?”

“Albedo didn’t make it,” Gibbous replied, looking down to the ground.

Heliotrope sank to the ground, her wings by her side. “No…”

Ambassador Heartstrings sidled up to the pegasus mare.

“It’ll be alright, Heliotrope. I know it in my heart,” Heartstrings said nuzzling the back of her ear.

Meanwhile, Amethyst Star’s attention was on the lead thestral, however. “Sergeant. I’m sorry for pressing, but what did you mean, when you said ‘Princesses’?”

Princess Luna answered for Gibbous, smiling a genuine smile.

From the corner behind a warehouse, a new equine figure meekly trotted into view. With a gasp, Heartstrings excused herself from Heliotrope, galloping forward to greet the newcomer.

“Cadance! It really is you!”

Lani had to cup a hand to her mouth, in order for her to mask a smile,as the two began some sort of greeting dance, involving a tune about sunshine and ladybugs. This, she reflected, must be the foalsitter Lyra Heartstrings remembered from her childhood, the one who had done the same for Twilight, Moondancer and so many others, whose tumultuous Royal Wedding the little green unicorn had attended as a bridesmaid.

Still, Cadance, a young pink unicorn, was about the same size as Heartstrings in build, if a few years older, but otherwise unremarkable.

Then Lani noticed the unicorn also bore a feature most unlike a unicorn’s. Small, stunted wings upon her slender back. She gave a low whistle that drew Princess Luna’s attention. Just like her, the nocturnal alicorn had been smiling wistfully at seeing two old friends reunite in the snow.

“So, this is Cadance. Is she like you, Your Highness?” Lani enquired, tapping first her forehead, followed by her back.

“An alicorn? No, though we had hopes for a while…” Luna sighed, glancing at her niece.

Cadance spoke up, gentle and calm. “I’m a pegacorn, born with stunted wings. Vestigial traits from another tribe, Aunt Luna explained.”

“Lyra is also one, if I recall,” noted Amethyst. “A unicorn who can walk on clouds… but I digress.”

“Yes,” Luna concurred, and Cadance nodded too. “Princess Cadance herself is my great-great-descendant– long story– and heir to the throne of the Crystal Realm.”

Lani nodded, recalling Heartstrings’ lessons on Equestrian history.

The Crystal Realm, a long and almost-forgotten city-state, had reappeared after a thousand-year ‘absence’ thirteen years prior, by the Equestrian Calendar. With it had come its tyrannical ruler, King Sombra, who quickly re-established his power despite the intervention of the Bearers of Harmony, resulting in a war between Equestria and the Crystal Realm.

Lani had wondered if, after getting Equestria onto a war footing, Queen Celestia had later decided to turn those same forces against Earth.

Something not so different had occurred in her own country, these United States of America, now twenty years ago, almost to the day...

“We had every confidence,” Luna continued, “that the Crystal Realm’s reappearance would be heralded by an Awakening. The transformation of a member of my bloodline into a new alicorn, who’d act as a nexus for the love and unity that flowed from the crystalponies… Cadance seemed a likely candidate, but nothing ever came of it. Looking back now, I realise I should’ve seen this for a sign of a rot, spreading throughout Equestria… A rot which first touched Celestia, and spread to the Element Bearers. And from them, through the veins and lifeblood of the world itself.”

“I had a question about that, actually, Your Highness,” said Amethyst, stepping forward. “It’s the reason I came here tonight– representing my father’s office, you understand.”

“What might that question be, Miss Star?” Luna said curiously.

“I’d like your attention for this, everyone,” Amethyst said. With all eyes turned towards her, including Lani’s perspective, committed to posterity by the camera, she nodded and went on. “From the beginning, I have studied the serum. The longer my studies have worn on, the more I gravitate towards an unsettling conclusion. This serum cannot be mere product of alchemy. No, it is attuned to a deeper force… A malign presence, some entity which may not have just corrupted Equestria, but become part of it.”

Cadance frowned, cocking her head.

“I have my own suspicions, and so does Aunt Luna, but nothing concrete,” said the Crystal Princess. “A presence, dim at first, yet constant. Some say it started with the Crystal War.”

“You mean,” Heartstrings began, “the Dark King is–”

“No, Lyra,” Luna cut her off, quite sharply. “Sombra is dead. Whatever this is, it’s something older than him. And the trouble is, I know not whether it’s acting with Celestia as its unwitting ally… or as its puppet.”

“Whatever could go back that far?” Heartstrings asked in a small voice. “How could we not have noticed?”

“Perhaps it was too weak. Or it didn’t want us to notice. Or both.”

A cough echoed from the rooftops. Heliotrope had resumed her post.

“It built up,” Heliotrope said quietly, though not so quiet they couldn’t hear her over the earpieces.. “Whatever this rot is, it started small. Acclimatised us. Just think, if it’d been before the Changeling Purges, and Celestia had started building warships, or those ‘Celestia’s Spear’ cannons, she’d have to brute-force us all into conflict. And too many of her precious ponies would have died there. But, with all the attitudes she stoked during both wars...”

“Yes…” Heartstrings said remorsefully.

There was guilt in her eyes, which Lani felt herself chillingly surprised to see. Guilt that hinted at a feeling of culpability which ran deeper than Heartstrings let on.

“I don’t like the Changelings anymore than the next pony,” whispered Heartstrings. “Still, during the Crystal War, even as I was learning to cope with what had happened to my mother and father, I hated what was being done to them… probably why I was so eager to leave home for a time, come live here on Earth…”

She closed her eyes, and sighed.

“We’re just as complicit in Celestia’s lies as the others, we who did not tell mankind of our people’s hidden shames…”

Cadance looked at her gently. “You saw what you wanted to see, Lyra.”

“People always do,” sighed Amethyst.

“Didn’t we all,” said Luna, before a pause. “Alas… in those brief, happy days, I was so glad to be home and loved once more, I dared not question things which seemed ‘off’ to me. In the wake of Sombra’s defeat, I suggested we establish Cadance, heir to Radiant Hope, as the Crystal Princess, but by then, relations between myself and Celestia were… soured, and my suggestion met with indifference. Celestia had come to regard herself as rightful holder of the Crystal Throne.”

Lani stared in silence, enraptured. When Luna finished, she finally spoke. “Would you be willing to testify to that, not just to me, but to both worlds?”

“You have the means to do this?”

“Yes,” Lani said, nodding down at her camera.

“As I had hoped,” said Luna. “Yes, we would be glad to spread the truth of Celestia’s madness, along with other secrets that illuminate the depths she has fallen too.”

Before Lansi could ask further, he overheard Heartstrings, who until now had been catching up with Cadance, take on a curious and worried tone.

“Cadance,” Heartstrings asked, “What happened to Shining Armor?”

Turning, Lani was there to spot Cadance’s weak smile collapse into a frown, and he spotted the telltale signs of weariness and exhaustion… Lines around the eyes and mouth that spoke of many a night spent crying into a pillow, where she might as well have been alone…

“That is another matter of which I wish to speak,” added Luna. “Much as how these foul serums compel the love and loyalty of all touched by them, Celestia has violated the will of the entire Imperial Guard, by invoking a Geas.”

“A what?” said Ze’ev.

Amethyst spoke up. “A Geas,” said she, in grim recognition. “All those inducted into the Guard, from back when it was but the Royal Guard, swear an oath of loyalty to Equestria, with one hoof placed upon the Charter of the Guard. This’d mean that…”

“Celestia has enchanted the Charter,” Cadance sniffed, “to make all who swore on it obey her, and reinterpret reality so that it fits their orders no matter what. If she gives them an order, they’ll carry it out. Leap off a cliff, harm children… B-betray their loved ones.”

“No…” Heartstrings breathed, her jaw dropping. “Cadance, surely Shining loved you too much for Celestia to break that!”

“But sadly, it makes sense,” Heliotrope said, always from above. “With everything we saw the Solar Empire do… I knew the Guard. I knew ponies who swore off fighting, but recalled themselves to the war with a smile…”

“And that’s what she did!” snapped Cadance. “My special talent is love, Lyra. I can sense its flow and currents. When Sombra sat upon the Crystal Throne, he incited anger and dark passions, filled his conscript-slaves with a black bile to set them against their fellows, but now…” She shuddered, looking a bit green around the gills. “Now, this flows through Equestria, hiding behind the mask of love, a love that consumes and poisons others, turning us toward Celestia and away from compassion for humanity…”

Cadance swallowed hard and looked up at Lani, Ze’ev and Korso.

For a moment, they saw a flicker in her eyes, a flash like crystalline facets. All of a sudden, it was plain to all assembled, perhaps especially the thestrals who were standing as an honour guard not just for Princess Luna, but for both Princesses, that a great deal of potential lay hidden in this mare, like a pressure-drum waiting to burst.

“These violent passions…” Cadance said morosely, “have violent ends…”

“So, she’s brainwashing her own citizens,” Korso said somberly.

“Yes, and no,” Amethyst said. “It’d be subtler than that, more insidious. Do not underestimate the power of love, humans,” she intoned, in a different voice than she’d used previously, as if a hidden timbre lying below had arisen to reverberation, “for love is a powerful force, and it is most fearsome when twisted to malicious purposes.”

“Is that how the serum gets the Newfoals to obey as well?” Ze’ev asked.

“No.” Luna sounded haunted. “There is a deeper, darker secret to the serum, wherein my sister has courted with magicks most vile.”

Lani shuddered at the way Luna was eyeing them.

“Yes,” Luna said, “On some level, you understand what I’m saying, even if you don’t have the words. I… I didn’t want to believe it when Celestia first promoted the serum. I believed her heart was pure, that she’d found a way to safely bypass the limits of the amniomorphic spell. But she hasn’t changed the foundational principles. The Newfoals, the Barrier, and their obedience are all bound together in the essence of…”

Everyone waited expectantly, but Luna trailed off, ears high and pupils shrinking into pinpricks.

“She’s here!”

The Princess of the Night spun on her hooves, teeth bared in a scream.

“You must leave, now!” Luna cried. “She’s looking for me, and if she finds you, she’ll force this accursed change upon you all!” She thrust a hoof at Lyra, Cadance and Amethyst. “And you! All she’ll have for you is a knowing smile and a show trial before death by petrifaction! This cannot be allowed to happen!”

Muscles tensed, Ze’ev crouched to look her in the eye.

“You’re going to sacrifice yourself, aren’t you?” the Lieutenant said quietly. “Stay behind and draw her attention while we escape.”

“Indeed,” Luna nodded, the tangles of her mane whipping back like silvery threads.

Cadance looked at her, eyes wide. “No, no, Aunt Luna. Not you too. Not with everyone else gone...”

Ambassador Heartstrings shook her head. “We can’t let you do that, Your Highness. Your life and love for our cause are too great to lose.”

Luna flashed them a forlorn little smile. “I am a shadow of my former might, Cadance. It is you that must survive another day. Radiant’s light shines bright within you.” She looked at Lyra. “And there is nothing else you can do, Lyra, except let me give myself up for this cause. Although it may help if you left me that…” she added, pointing towards Lani’s still-recording camera.

“We’ve fought her forces before…” Ze’ev growled, standing proud with Korso by her side. “We’ll fight them now.”

“Don’t fool yourself, Lieutenant. You’ve fought thralls, slaves and the Bearers of Harmony. My sister is none of those!”

So as to illustrate her point, Princess Luna hurtled around in a whirlwind kick, balancing on her forehooves to deliver a powerful buck to a shipping container, sending the entire weighted object flying into the harbour.

“She’s right, you know,” Amethyst Star said wearily. Cadance standing next to her, with her eyes closed in resignation. “We cannot confront her here. The day will come when we make our stand, but tonight is not the night…”

Luna took a deep, sharp breath.

“I have fought time and again for Equestria,” the Princess of the Night whispered, “but Celestia has had a millennium to perfect her skills. It is impossible to fight beings such as we, not without magic of your own, for we cannot be killed by mortal means. Cold of steel and heat of flame neither pierce nor burn us. Celestia and I exist until Equestria itself wills us to die, and the tainted spirit of the land has, thus far, only turned against me... sapping my life and power and strength... Yet, even weak as I am, behold what I can do. Now, run!”

Her hearing still dull, Lani could not hear the familiar sucking ‘push’ of a portal opening. But Princess Luna did, spotting a pink mote of light that danced into being on the dock behind them, rapidly swelling in size and girth.

“Run!”

Her scream was both physical and near-telepathic, and did not bear refusal.

“Princess!” Gibbous protested, as did many of the other thestrals. Many marveled at their willpower in the face of that shriek. “It is our sworn duty to–”

“I’d thought the death of so many of our Guards was the last,” Luna panted. “I was wrong. This is the last breath. If you stay to fight the Tyrant, you will die. And then our struggle to escape, our fallen friends’ sacrifices will be all for naught! Go to the PHL, Captain Gibbous. Go to them, and help any way you can! No matter how bad it seems… Do. Not. Give. In!”

“To the last breath,” Gibbous said, saluting with his right foreleg.

“To the last,” Luna said, returning the salute. She turned her gaze to Heartstrings. “Lyra. I regret how short our reunion has been. But I’m proud of you, who have shown true Equestrian spirit in these darkest of days.” She swept a wing in the direction of her fellow Princess. “And take Cadance with you. Let her be your ally. Together, you may unlock a power that can defy my sister… but it is not to be tonight. Now GO! All of you!”

Cadance’s eyes brimmed with tears. “Take care, Auntie.”

Ambassador Heartstrings locked eyes with the Princess of the Night. Her voice was a whisper. “Harmony be with you, Princess Luna.”

Without further ado, Ze’ev and Korso took their positions by the Ambassador’s side, falling into step as Heartstrings and Cadance, with one last, regretful glance at Luna, turned tail and fled. Amethyst took up the rear, her pace swift yet measured, filled with grim purpose.

A fretful Lani was last, taking the awful risk of lagging to film their retreat.

But one pony did not leave.

“I knew my instincts would bear out,” said Lani. “And this is where someone else took up the tale. Or should I say, somepony.” She let her gaze cross over the gathering at the fire. “You all know what happened next.”

“How could I fokkin’ not?” Viktor asked. “Heliotrope told me about it all the time, even after...” His voice trailed off.

“After what?” Lani asked.

“Is that really the most important thing here?” Aegis demanded, sidling up to Viktor.

“Aweh, we’re better off not going into that,” Viktor agreed, laying an arm around the stallion’s broad shoulders.

“Go on…” Ana told her, sleepily, with a smile. “Go on anyway. You had a good thing going.”

Lani returned the smile crookedly. “Alright, Bjorgman. Because you asked me to. After all, what Hawaiian could resist sitting outside before a fire, with a story to tell…”

“We’ve all told the same stories over and over,” Johnny C added. “At least twice.”

“Really, ‘Nny?” Fiddlesticks asked.

“Not like we’ve got much else to do,” Johnny C said. “Besides, this sort of thing lets us enjoy ourselves. Brings us together.”

Later, when Heliotrope returned to base, she would come back exhausted, terrified, in desperate need of a stiff drink. And she would have directions for Reiner – directions to a stranded Panasonic video camera low on power.

A flat battery did not diminish the value of the footage contained within, however.

Staying behind as the others beat a retreat, hidden between two containers, Heliotrope had expanded the zoom, earning the lens a jarring closeup of Luna’s tight-set jaw. It didn’t last long, though, as Luna found it an ideal hiding spot. Unceremoniously motioning for Heliotrope to sit still and make herself invisible – literally – Luna allowed the camera to record her as she trotted back into the center of the street, head held high.

Luna did not look back, and why should she? This was madness, for either of them.

And then the image was briefly obscured by a bright flash. What was undetectable to any video camera, but which filled Heliotrope’s nostrils all the way in, was the peculiar scent, not unpleasant yet striking, an aroma of rose and ozone...

‘What was that?’ Heliotrope wondered, training the camera in the direction of the flash. Strangely, the view was distorted as she turned the lens toward the source of the light. Too blurry, too pixelated to use.

But Heliotrope heard the voice.

“I see I have been betrayed.”

That damn voice! No pony would mistake that voice for anyone else.

“It is you who are the betrayer, sister,” said Luna, planting her hooves firmly on the ground and summoning a speck of magic. “Do you not deny all you have done, all the holy promises and vows you have defiled, the lives and minds you have violated? Your taunts as I disagreed with war after war, asking if I was ‘quite myself’, as if the slightest grievance might be a sign I was becoming Nightmare Moon? The ideals we swore by when we united Equestria? You have betrayed Equestria and its neighbours, you have betrayed me, and most of all, you have betrayed yourself!”

“A mere bagatelle, Luna, necessary for the glory that will be accomplished…” Queen Celestia replied, stepping into view. The light she cast was strange. It pulsed in and out, like a guttering candle. “You mean to fight me?”

And as it pulsed, so too did the strange pixelation on Heliotrope’s camera move in and out, like… like a heartbeat? It made no sense, but it was the first thought that came to Heliotrope’s mind.

“Forever and a day, for our little ponies, and the humans too.”

“Don’t force my hoof against you…” Celestia said sternly. “I would rather not lose you again, my dear sister. But I will not allow you to pervert the destiny of this world.”

‘Holier than thou till the end,’ Heliotrope thought, disgusted.

“You lost me, Celestia,” Luna replied, smiling wanly through her tears. “When you lost yourself. If there is any of Equestria’s noble ruler left, the one who led our people into a thousand years of peace, then please, let us be sisters again, and bring true light to both these worlds.”

“No, Luna,” the blindingly white alicorn decreed. “I send my Scourge, I send my Sword. There will be no truce, only a final peace, and a perfect dominion that spans two worlds, an empire that will last another thousand years, and beyond.”

“So be it…” Luna wept, rearing back on her hooves. “I love you, Tia.”

She cast her spell. The bolt of light flew straight and true, until, with her own power, Celestia bent the magical shot in an arc, back at her sister.

Luna staggered, and her eyes widened, as if in realisation.

And abruptly, Luna’s mouth froze, mid-scream, as she became stone.

‘Her own sister!’ Heliotrope thought, frantic. ‘I can’t believe it!’

As the effect swiftly flowed to encompass her whole head, in the final moment, with a swirl of venting magic, Luna’s mane exploded into a gorgeous starfield, billowing for one instant, before it too was frozen.

Then...

“I know you’re there, Heliotrope.”

‘What!’

“Still wearing that outfit you cobbled out of those crystals you swiped from under my nose?” Celestia said softly, and for a moment she sounded like the old Princess Celestia, the one who could be trusted with anything, who knew the value of a kind smile. But it couldn’t be – that one was long gone by now. “Come on out, then. I suppose we could use the company. Especially Luna.”

And Heliotrope panicked.

Dropping the camera in her haste, she flew forward, following the trail of the thestrals.

“Fly, Heliotrope, fly,” Celestia called after her. “The next one up, little thieving pegasus, is Lyra Heartstrings. You can tell her that. Tell her my Sword shall fall upon her next.”

As Heliotrope dashed away, the camera tumbled through the air.

Several of those who later studied the recording would insist there was a moment – a mere fraction of a second – where it showed a strange blur, something that Celestia was wearing above her golden peytral, but it was gone as quickly as it had appeared.

Contrary to what some said, though, it was not the outline of a white ring with a dark centre.

The camera clattered to the ground, landing on a discarded glass bottle in the shadow of a trash can. It landed at an odd angle, and the image fractured worse than ever, but the unmistakeable white silhouette of Celestia could still be discerned. From the back, of course. She ceremoniously marched up to the new statue, her neck bent, as though carrying a weight too great to bear.

Then, just like that, she collapsed against the body of her petrified sister, sobbing.

“And I love you, Little Moon...”

As Celestia looked at the petrified body of her sister, the tears continued to flow.

“Something… mustremain,” Celestia said, and stared.

She began to say something. To sing, perhaps. Or recite. A series of indecipherable syllables uttered under her breath, varying in volume and length.

Perhaps it was a memorial of some kind. A last rite. A song. None could say.

“And when you’ve heard that…” Lani said, “Well, you have to wonder. It’s so easy for us, for all of us, to see her as no more than this fire-wielding maniac, her honeyed words belying the horrors she’s rained down on our worlds… turning people into monsters and saying it’s for their own good. But when you’ve heard that…”

The raven-haired woman heaved a deep sigh.

“... What happened to her, man?”

“Couldn’t say,” Fiddlesticks said. “Everyone’s got their pet theory. Champagne Grape said she thought the corruption in Nightmare Moon had to go somewhere, so it went into Celestia. But I heard Soarin’ say he thought Discord corrupted her, ‘cept that don’t feel right. And High Winds said it could’ve been Somnambula the Witch possessing her. Vapour Trail said he’d heard from Sky Stinger that she once saw a weird cloud near Celestia, and that cloud might’ve been Arabus the Cloud Demon and Celestia might have breathed too much of it in.”

“A lot of ponies are convinced she’d have to be possessed, I see,” Lani said.

“What else, then?” Aegis asked. “End up like Vinyl, or Luna forbid, Verity–”

He spoke the names with such bitterness. Although Ana had known what sorts of histories some people had in this squad, hearing Aegis like this was what made her feel most uncomfortable, twice over in connection to the case of Verity Carter. The burly earthpony had been friends with Lieutenant Vinyl Scratch. From what she knew of Vinyl, Ana suspected it must have been like pulling her teeth out to place Aegis on a penal squad.

But although Aegis had originally been a victim of deception, continuing to shelter a notorious HLF criminal like Viktor Kraber, the ‘Night Surgeon’, after uncovering the truth – this only could count as aiding and abetting. Reportedly, Vinyl was uncommonly sympathetic to his motives, that a bond had formed between Viktor and his foals. Separating a family was not a choice Vinyl made lightly, yet whatever could be said about her, she also didn’t want to show special favours. Alas, there was no doubt Aegis missed his children.

Ana didn’t think Aegis perceived it as a betrayal, any more than he did Verity absconding from the PHL’s custody. If anything, he probably envied her. For that, and how through a loophole, it was arranged that for all intents and purposes, Amber and Rivet came to be in her care.

The look on Viktor’s face as he placed his hand in Aegis’ mane, stroking it to comfort him, was so absurdly out-of-place given his reputation, Ana was left momentarily unable to process it.

Fear. Profound, almost fatherly concern. Sadness. And pain.

“Don’t… don’t even joke about that,” Viktor said, but his voice was curiously soft. He also hadn’t used any swear words, and didn’t sound angry, which probably wasn’t a good sign. “We both saw enough that day.”

“Right,” Aegis said, shaking his head. “Yeah. That… that was…” he sighed. “Something.”

Johnny C, Fiddlesticks, Oscar, Quiette Shy, and Lorne had similar downcast looks.

“That Was An Awful Day,” Quiette Shy said, and for a moment her artificial voice box somehow sounded sad. Which, as far as Ana knew, wasn’t possible with that kind of technology.

“What did you see?” Lani asked, confused.

“We’ll get to it someday. The point is... I don’t want to get like her, Viktor,” Aegis continued. “I don’t want to be a stallion who believes that deep down, Celestia was always a warmonger and she was just lying to us. Or that somehow, she was so easily triggered by beings different than her, that she thought this was the most logical option.”

“You won’t,” Viktor said, hugging him close. “I can promise you that. You’re just too… too kind for it.”

“It doesn’t make sense,” Aegis grumbled, not seeming to listen. “None of this whole war, of what this whole Conversion scenario says about Celestia makes any goddamn sense.”

As Aegis said this, he glanced off in no particular direction, away from anyone in the room. As if he was staring at a camera nobody could see.

“What, you see them too?” Viktor asked.

“I dunno, it just… felt appropriate,” Aegis said. “Wait. What ‘them’?”

Viktor smirked. “I could just be fokkin’ with you, but you’ll never know!”

Aegis gently punched – well, tapped, morelike– Viktor in the arm with one foreleg, and guffawed a little. “You jerk.”

“This kind of talk isn’t getting us anywhere, is it?” Frieda asked.

“I don’t know,” Johnny said at last, wearily. “What I do know is, we could do with a few songs ourselves around here.”

Quiette Shy nodded. Somehow, that single motion managed to convey a lot of annoyance. “As Long As It’s Not Country, We’re Golden,” she said.

Ana had never quite gotten used to Quiette Shy’s artificial voicebox. It sounded feminine, but was obviously artificial, as she stumbled over words, giving them a strange, echoing quality as they changed in pitch and tone, sometimes.

Fiddlesticks glared at her.

“Who said anything about country?” Ana inquired, tuning her guitar. “Vivian, wherever she is now, would never forgive me for doing country, not after she brought me to band practice.”

“Oh, thank the Lord,” Lorne breathed, sighing in relief. “I can’t take that shit.”

“Aweh, right?” Viktor added.

“Says the white guy,” Lorne said.

“Big fan of Die Antwoord,” Viktor said. “And a lot of other things.”

Fiddlesticks turned the glare towards both of them.

“Don’t worry,” Lorne said, throwing up both his hands. “We still love you. You’re alright.” He elbowed Viktor, who nodded.

“Just let her play,” Aegis said. “The both of you. We’re both on edge, and some music might help us calm down. Even if it’s, I dunno, Dethklok or something.”

Viktor had a big grin on his face when Aegis mentioned that.

The guitar was ready, finely tuned, too. “Now,” Ana declared, “let me sing you this one song Harwood and I share a certain fondness for. Not the only one, but, heh, anyway…”

“Y’all need a backup?” Fiddlesticks asked. “Brought my fiddle and everything.”

“I’m fine, maybe, heh, next time,” Ana said. And she began, with closed eyes.

She opened her eyes again, and saw the immediate effects of bursting into a rather energetic song. The tune was evidently familiar to those surrounding her. A good start, she thought, with bright-eyed amusement. The more, the merrier. Catchy as it was, the opening, iconic riff wasn’t as grand as it should be. She didn’t have drums, nor a stage, but it would have to do.

Shy made a few sickly wheezing noises that could’ve been her trying to hum the tune. Around the mare, several others in the group were pulling their weight for the performance.

Lorne was smirking, slightly, humming along with her and tapping his foot.

“C’mon,” Fiddlesticks said, tapping Oscar’s shoulder. “Hmmmm-mmmm-mmm…”

The big man tapped his feet, uncertain, but soon settled into a rhythm. As if in response, the dog in his lap began howling.

Ana felt an energy begin to flow, from the tips of her fingers and her upper arm. It was not an uncommon feeling for her at the guitar, and this song, more than any other, had a knack for bringing it out. Perhaps it had to do with the reminder that, in an old time, Norway, sweet pastoral Norway, had been what Joseph Conrad – never one of her favourite writers, but Harwood loved him – would call ‘one of the dark places of the Earth’.

Even now, all her pony friends agreed their Equestria used to be a good, kind place. How the wheel turns...

Was that strange buzzing sound coming from Shy’s eccentric voicebox?

Ana didn’t let the question slow her. What was slowing was time, as it tended to when she reached this phase. Instinctively, like any musician expecting sparks to go off on the stage, or simply because she so loved making fireworks with Amethyst, her eyes sought out the nearest source of ignition – the campfire.

It was crackling. Red, and white at its heart. A growing white...

And something, impossible as it were, did sweep the fire.

In her mind’s eye, white flame coalesced into figures, truer and denser than any imaginary cloud silhouettes. Not human figures, nor mystical, otherworld creatures, though. Simply beasts that dwelt deep in the heart of her homeland’s unfathomable, sylvic wilderness.

Reindeer.

Never in the same numbers at a given time, their distinct white silhouettes striding in twos or threes across the edges of the fire, hooftips curlicuing back into tips of white flame, scattering the ashes like a prancing deer would sweep through snow...

A dance, alluring, tempting in its charm. She found herself admiring it with a childlike glee, like a young girl witnessing a puppet dance. And in the midst of it, a great stag, towering over the merry revellers, his antlers bowing to touch each and every one of them in blessing...

The sight of him invigourated her, her smile shone brighter still. And then Ana cried out the close of the song, to the cheers of those around the campfire, joyful and gleeful.

“Okay, I can’t– alright, is anyone else seeing this?” Ana finally exclaimed, exhilarated, pausing her riff. Pity, it was only the first verse, but that crackling fire begged explanation.

Yet, as these things go, the lull in the music marked the end of the dance. And the dancers. Like a heart that has stopped beating, she saw the fire had abruptly swollen down, a few mere embers of red flickering in the ashes. Not a trace of white to be found.

Ana, surrounded by confusion in every direction, set aside her guitar. In the sudden gloom, no face could be seen clearly.

“I’m… I’m not the only one who saw that, right?”

“What,” Quiette Shy said, flatly.

“That’s not normal, right?” Oscar asked.

“Certainly isn’t,” Viktor said, staring at the fire with a confused look on his face. “That just happened, right, Aegis?”

“It did indeed happen,” Aegis added with a nod. “Someone should reignite the fire. It’s getting cold up here.”

There was a collective silence as Viktor brought out a lighter and stood, moving to return life to the dying embers of the fire.

“Darnit,” Lani growled, gripping her camera. “Darnit it all! There goes another great shot, missed by a hair’s breadth!”

Johnny C tapped his leg. “It happens,” he said philosophically. “Would you believe this is only the second time I missed taking a picture of supernatural reindeer?”

“You’re kidding me,” Lani said, to many a blink.

“He’s really not,” Fiddlesticks said, patting her maybe-boyfriend’s elbow.

Lani stared at them. A disbelieving stare, but not because she didn’t buy their story. “This whole time, you had that kind of tale up your sleeves,” she whispered, “and you let me take the painful trip down memory lane, about an event everyone present is at least passingly familiar with?”

“Yeah, well, nobody asked,” Johnny C said gruffly. “For your information, that’s one story we haven’t told as often as we’d like.”

“Well,” Lani said, gazing at Viktor while he stoked the campfire, “I feel someone’s gonna be asking you soon.”

“You’re sure?” Johnny C demanded. “I think it’s just going to keep getting delayed. And then I’ll have to rewrite the first chapter after the editing team breaks up.”

“He’s speaking from bitter experience,” Fiddlesticks explained to Lani, who had an eyebrow raised. “He did actually start writing a book about it.”

“Nonetheless. You promise me you’ll both tell me?” Lani asked. “Please?”

Fiddlesticks and Johnny C looked at each other. “Absolutely.”

Frieda tapped her hip-flask. “We’re bound for some entertainment, girl,” she said jocularly. “Just… just don’t take stock of everything they say. They a right pair with tall tales, these two. I mean, really, time-travelling scientists? That’s a bit far out there, even for us...”

“Anyways,” said Johnny C. “It all started with me and Fiddlesticks in a plane. Wanna take it from here, ‘Sticks?”

“Thing is, I hate flying,” Fiddlesticks pipped, as she began the story. “We were flying up to Juneau, to help a friend move into his new home in Fort Wainwright...”

“You know, Ana,” said Johnny C, looking her way. “You should try that beat around Vinyl Scratch sometime. Betcha she’d love it, a bit slower than I’m used to, but it’s still great!”

‘I’m sure she will,’ Ana thought, smiling brightly. ‘I’m sure…’

On a whim, Ana plucked the guitar’s strings, a soft melody to fill the time, something she often played for her and Vivian as the stars filled the night’s sky years ago, before the war. As for the fire, it continued to dance and crackle, well into the night, amidst Winter’s chill.

~ New York City, USA ~

Many decades earlier on this world, the words had been written, “We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness”. Yet that place, it turned out, had been one in which darkness was never allowed to penetrate, no matter how much of a sweet relief, how much privacy it might have provided from the all-embracing, all-seeing eye of tyranny.

As she traipsed from one identical, starkly-lit underground hall to the next, Cheerilee felt she understood what those words meant. The lights were never allowed to go out, down here. Not in the corridors, where the glare of the lamps turned the concrete a pallid shade of grey, and cast a ghostly pallor on wanderers’ faces.

Like Cheerilee’s own, as she, feeling the lack of sleep nip at her hooves, trotted towards a certain wing of the underground complex. The wing which housed those most in need of Lady Cadance’s psychological and spiritual tenderness. Down here, those who sought sleep and respite from the light, would only find it behind closed doors. Up ahead, Cheerilee saw the very door she was searching for, situated at a corner where the corridor turned right in an L-shape. But when she reached it, she stopped dead in her tracks, hesitant.

Instinctively, Cheerilee touched her badge, knowing its shape without looking at it. A Golden Lyre.

Though Lyra had been no Princess of Equestria, she had certainly been the princess of their hearts, by whose acts of boundless generosity, humanity’s salvation had seemed at hand. She had been their pillar, their rock, their guide in the desert. Now she was long gone. The power which Princess Luna had promised Lyra and Cadance would unlock, had not swept in to save the day… So where did that leave her, plain Cheerilee Cherry?

“‘Come in under the shadow of this red rock…’”

Cheerilee’s head jolted sharply towards the right.

She saw Moondancer. The bespectacled mare was seated on a plastic chair at the far end of the corridor, leafing through a copy of T.S. Eliot’s The Wasteland.

“‘And I will show you something different,’” Moondancer continued to read aloud, absorbed by the poem, “‘from either your shadow at morning striding behind you, or your shadow at evening rising to meet you.’”

She paused, contemplating the page, as if pondering whether to skip a line.

“‘They called me the hyacinth girl. Yet when we came back, late, from the hyacinth garden, your arms full, and your hair wet, I could not speak, and my eyes failed. I was neither living nor dead, and I knew nothing, looking into the heart of light, the silence.’”

Moondancer lay down the book, looking up at Cheerilee.

“I heard you arrive. Sorry,” she said bashfully. “It’s just… those words Pina spoke at our round-table. I have been unable to get them out of my head. What she said. About how… what did she say? Freedom is to look at your shadow, and to see yourself…”

Cheerilee trotted all the way over to lay a hoof on her shoulder.

“You always were one to overthink, Dancer,” Cheerilee told her gently. “Really, you should learn to accept not every mystery has a key. Pina is a loon. A resourceful loon, yes, but a loon nonetheless.”

Moondancer smiled ruefully. “A teacher telling a student to cool it. Who’d have thought?”

In response, Cheerilee gave the expected chuckle. “Yeah,” she said, “but it has been a long time since we were either.”

“I’d rather you didn’t say that,” Moondancer said sorrowfully. “Wouldn’t it be nice to think that we’re still who we once were, somewhere.”

“Wouldn’t it be?” Cheerilee agreed. She stared behind Moondancer, at the last door along this path. Her heart, already burdened by such thoughts, only grew heavier as it went out to the occupant on the other side. “Thanks for staying on as her chaperone, Moondancer. I know how hard it must be on you, with all the extra duties we’ve had lately.”

Breathing low, Moondancer slumped her head against the door. “Bonnie can never be left on her own for long...”

“No, she can’t. What about Vinyl?” Cheerilee said, gesturing back the way she’d came, at that other door she’d hesitated to open. “Is Allie still inside with her?”

“Indeed she is,” Moondancer said, checking her watch. “You made good time. I expect Allie will be out any minute now.”

They didn’t have long to wait. Barely two minutes later, the door opened, facing them, and they saw a lanky, beige-coloured forehoof step out, as the second of the PHL’s “Blue Belles” exited the room, leaving their main Belle to her troubled sleep.

Not that, when she came into view, Allie Way’s demeanour looked its finest. Before closing the iron door, she had to brush two dishevelled strands of her azure mane out of her eyes. And with the door shut, her first action was to press her forehead against, staring downward.

Cheerilee knew she shouldn’t be left to stew. “Evening, Allie.”

Allie blinked their way, spotting both her superiors without surprise. She half-heartedly stood to attention and saluted.

“Miss Cherry,” she said. She lowered her hoof. “Dame Moondancer,” she added, nodding dutifully.

“At ease, Second Lieutenant,” Cheerilee said. “These aren’t the parade grounds, there’s no need to pull rank around here. Don’t forget, not all heroes are on the battlefield.”

“Yeah…” said Allie, eyes darting to the door. “And it makes me shiver to think, what it’d mean for those who lose sight of that.”

“How is Vinyl doing, Allie?” Cheerilee asked, as she went to meet Allie, Moondancer taking the time to put down her book before catching up to them. “I’ve got Cadance’s report on the matter and, I won’t lie to you, it worries me. Only, since you know her better than we do…”

“She hasn’t made the noises in about… an hour, I think,” Allie said. “But… it’s awful.”

Moondancer nodded sadly. “Every night, it’s the same,” she sighed, pulling off her glasses to wipe them. “Her mind keeps going back to that same day. Cadance says she’s done all she can for her.”

Allie was not satisfied by this. “Are you telling me there’s nothing to be done?”

“I’m sorry, Allie,” said Moondancer, replacing her glasses. “But the only thing that can help your cousin is time. Time to heal. Time to rest. Then, maybe, in that time, the strands of her mind will knit themselves back into a more... harmonious pattern. Or as ‘harmonious’ as they ever were, for a hard-partying mare like her.” She chuckled raspily. “You know, my tastes in music always ran more towards Miss Melody’s style… but there is a certain exaltation, isn’t there, to be found in music in its wildest form? I’m sure that in time, I’d have come to enjoy it better, too. Alas, time is something no-one has, on this side of the Barrier.”

But it was Moondancer’s turn to be startled by a voice echoing from the far end.

“Time…” said the voice. “Time be material short-most of ours. Waste anything except time. To see in a grain of sand the world, and in wild flower a Heaven, hold eternity in an hour, and infinity in the palm of your h… of your… your ha…”

It was botched poetry. Cheerilee recognised it because Moondancer had explained it to her, many times before, in quick snatches of respite to share learning. An over-thinker though Lyra’s old classmate was, one of her talents was making sense out of madness...

And in this wing of their headquarters, a semi-official asylum of a world gone mad, none were as insane as the inmate who’d just left her room, the same room Moondancer had tasked herself with watching over.

“Bonnie…” Moondancer said, a note of shame in her voice. “How are you holding up?”

“Will being fine, concordant concern contrasting…”

Cheerilee saw Bonbon was standing in the shadow of her room, away from the unceasing light of the corridor… yet appearing to glow slightly with some inner luminescence. Slowly, the creamy earthpony emerged, her face scrunched up in tortured concentration. Something about her was… wrong, something about how she moved, like a drunken marionette, her legs working against each other, each limb slightly out of sync with the other.

And then there was that thing about her eyes.

All three of the other mares were used to seeing a lazy eye, having lived and worked with Derpy Doo for years. But Bonbon’s condition went deeper than strabismus. Each eye moved independently of the other, focusing on other things… and other times.

Strapped to her side, in a modified bandolier, she was carrying a dusty, slightly battered lyre.

“Is being daymare bad…” Bonbon forced out, jaw muscles struggling to enunciate. “But am fine-amfine-AMFINE!”

Shaking slightly, the mare stopped and stumbled halfway, collapsing against the wall. She began to weep out of her right eye, the left focusing on something only she could see. Without prompting, Moondancer and Allie hurried to help her up.

Cheerilee watched them. So many things, so many people broken. Cheerilee even felt another twinge of sorrow for Diamond Tiara.

Such was the fate of Bonbon, ever since the PHL had rescued her from her execution, moments too late to save Lyra. An emergency crossing of the time-dimensional barrier had brought her back to Earth, yet at the cost of her sanity. Doctor Time Turner had, regretfully, diagnosed her with chronological lobular desync disorder.

“Beware,” Bonbon whispered, in Allie’s general direction, “villainesses do swarm upon us… her black dog, that faithful hound, that attack dog, determinedly disdaining with dissevering Sword, hidden in lies sight plain… see her, see her very well, oh, oh, why can you not see! Smoked with bloody sacrifice atop mountain…”

In other words, she had suffered a temporal stroke. Both halves of her brain evolved in separate time zones. One was always in the present, while the other... wandered.

“Soon...” said Bonbon, contorting her facial muscles into a sad smile. “Hurts, but soon, promising...” Her head turned jerkily, allowing one eye to catch sight of the lyre she carried everywhere, and the small smile grew in its melancholy. “Not me… her and me… gone, neverwhen again.”

Now, as she stared at Moondancer, her left eye glistened with tears, the right narrowing in wrathful indignation.

Slowly, Cheerilee moved to hug Bonbon.

“Oh, Bonnie, I’m so sorry...” she said, but her gaze hardened. “Bonbon, I need you to focus. Listen only to the sound of my voice, you’re here, you’re now, with us... and if you’re seeing something, something important, then you have to tell us what that is...”

The former candymaker’s eyes rolled, one side of her body shaking. She let out a ragged breath and stared straight at Cheerilee.

“Equestria is coming...” said Bonbon, speaking in short, sharp gasps. “Celestia... will... fight.”

Moondancer looked at Cheerilee, then at Bonbon. “Celestia… will fight?” she echoed, pushing up her glasses. “What? On the front lines?”

Unsurprisingly, the first emotion to cross Allie’s face was one of dismay, mouth agape.

Yet, much to Cheerilee’s own surprise, the news left her feeling less fearful than… confused. Because, after all this time, her mind, molded into a tactician’s detachment, was faced with an incongruence. And Bonbon did not look afraid.

“Strange…” Cheerilee whispered, staring back at the other two. “Ever since the Crystal War, the one and only time the Tyrant has put her life on the line, was when she went to deal with her sister in person. They say she didn’t even have the courage to kill Sint Erklass herself. We’ve never been able to confirm those later rumours of her taking to the battlefield.”

“Not… Tyrant…” Bonbon forced out, before Moondancer could say a word. “A Celestia whole and true. As she was. As she is. As she will be. As she… should have been.”

Cheerilee, Allie and Moondancer shared a glance.

“Dancer?” asked Allie. “What does it all mean?”

“I… don’t know…” Moondancer confessed, in a tight mutter. “Except I’d be very surprised if this were unrelated to the vanishing of Captain Reiner.”

Allie gasped. “Bonbon,” she said, edging in closer to said mare’s haunted face. “Do you… have you seen him? Alexander Reiner? Where is he?”

“Reiner… the substitute,” Bonbon grimaced. “He still stands. He means well by you.”

That appeared to be all they’d be getting out of her, as her eyes rolled to the back of her head and she fell into a faint, to the consternation of the other three.

“By the Golden Lyre…” Allie mumbled.

“Fetch water and a towel,” Moondancer ordered her. “I’ve got supplies in my saddlebags, by the door to her room. Please, hurry.”

“What was that, Dancer?” Cheerilee asked as Allie, who didn’t need to be told twice, hastened off to obey. “One of her visions? How do those even work? We didn’t hear a peep out of her before Alex marched out to that ‘secret meeting’ and, most likely, his death, though I won’t believe he is dead. I won’t! Time Turner keeps going on about mystical guff to do with Bonbon’s condition and how the stars align…”

“Like I said, I am unsure,” Moondancer replied. She glanced at her discarded book. “But now it dawns on me, we may be on the verge of seeing fear in a handful of dust…”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

Previously, Spectrum kept it rather hazy as to whether Viktor Kraber, Aegis and their crew were on a PHL penal squad; this is now confirmed.

A new plot breadcrumb; Ana Bjorgman’s reflections name-drop Verity Carter.

The flashback to Reykjavik is expanded to include Amethyst Star. However, one character no longer appears; Alexander Reiner, going with the change in the character’s role to be more of an everyman.

Spectrum 2.0 - December 15th 2017

DoctorFluffy: Well, this was fun. I’m quite certain that, for a lot of you, there’s probably a lot of stuff I brought over from earlier canon that doesn’t quite translate. I know the thing about Chalcedony has gone over most of your heads, but it was a spur of the moment thing and I couldn’t resist.

Writing about these characters with Vox and Sledge has been a blast. For those old school fans among you, Kraber and Aegis are BACK, BABYYYYYYY! And also more gay, on account of me going out of my way to make them more affectionate to one another. Well, more bisexual. These are people that have both been married and have had children.

The other OCs I wrote in – Quiette Shy, Lorne Bechet, and Oscar Mikkelsen – were created on the spur of the moment as part of Kraber’s squad. Last time I made a squad for Kraber at the battle of Boston, they were a bunch of random names with so few defining characteristics that I could barely tell you anything about them if I tried. So, I decided to go the other way! Some fun facts about all of them:

* Quiette Shy is based on infamous Warframe shitposter Youtuber Quite Shallow or Quiette Shy, on the basis that it sounded a lot like a pony name and I decided to roll with it. She has a lot of similarities with the actual Youtuber, such as wearing a red bandana and goggles, being blonde, using a red and white color scheme, a tendency to use a text-to-speech device, and a tendency to compensate for the monotone of the device with outrageous dialogue. Also, she has Quite Shallow’s fascination with bigger weaponry. Her Oddly Capitalized Method Of Speaking is meant to reference Quite Shallow’s use of a text-to-speech device. But it can be a homestuck reference too if you want. I don’t care.

* Lorne is Black Cajun! Or… look, he’s black, of Cajun descent, and from Louisiana. I haven’t exactly nailed down where he’s from, but I know it was low-income, and he was in a bad situation that made him join the military to escape it. He wanted to open a brewery after going to college, so now he just does it in his off time in the PHL. Also, he has an innate talent for math, and he’s easily been able to put this to use with a grenade launcher.

* Oscar’s childish, kind of deformed, and likes dogs. There’s not much I can say right now.

* There’s also an Icelandic woman planned for Kraber’s squad, but I don’t know much about her. I don’t even know if she’ll appear!

* Also, Nny and Fiddlesticks – who are, well, me and Fiddlesticks – are here too! Their sidestory, Snowbound, has been rewritten! [url=https://www.fimfiction.net/story/312770/1/snowbound/chapter-one-edited-for-2017-reboot] Well, the first chapter has, anyway.

Sledge115: Surpriiiiiise, just a little chapter to fill in the gap here, heh. I really don’t have much to say here, because Fluffy over there has it handled, methinks. So, without further ado, apologies if some of the material here is crack, because it probably is. Cheers!

VoxAdam: Believe it or not, this chapter, which is shorter than Chapter Six, is actually what took up our time in the month of November. Yet at the same time, it took “only” three weeks in total for us to write! Chapter Five really is the result of a brainstorming between Sledge, Doc and I, since we figured there were more Earth scenes we wanted to visit or revisit before the action moved back to Prime!Equestria. Pacing was persistent issue in Spectrum Classic, but that story had the excuse of being made up as it went a long. Although we’re still drumming up new ideas along the way, we do make a conscious effort at drawing our plans now.

There are several references to Joy to the Worlds in this. See if you can spot ‘em all.

Act I ~ Chapter Ten ~ Witnesses

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

I’m a Rankin Bass Character!

DoctorFluffy

Get that teleprompter out of my face. You think you can tell me what the news is? I have merged with the news. I AM THE NEWS!

VoxAdam

In Vino Veritas

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho

I remember a time, long ago.

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

With Help From

RanOutOfIdeas

And Guest Writing From

Jed R

Chapter Ten

Witnesses

* * * * *

“That world is one, but there are many, many others. They are not in our universe, but they’re here, right next to us, close as a heartbeat. There! I spread my wings, and I brush ten million other worlds, and they know nothing of it.”
— Kaisa, from Northern Lights, by Philip Pullman

The Tree of Harmony’s time had come again.

A day and a night ago, it had brought forth, before the eyes of Lyra Heartstrings, a human. The very creature the inquisitive young unicorn had yearned to see all her life. It had done so knowing that the discovery would not bring her only joy. This was no gift for Lyra. But in time it would prove, perhaps, a gift for two suffering worlds.

Big things had small beginnings. Hopefully, that would hold true here too.

Princess Celestia took the proper course of action by opening the Lady Sunflare’s final gift, a lantern carved of the wood from another Tree, its sister Tree, she who stood atop the world. Made of timber, not crystal, yet no less potent. Long before the Old Ones were young, its roots had reached deep into the mountain of Zamok Ustyag, its sap imbued with strange magic.

Now, once more, the Tree heard the same calling which its sister always heard in the North. For just as the Tree Atop The World’s roots drank in the magic of the world, its branches brushed against a magic in the sky.

Stars. And the dust which made them and all that was, and crossed the spaces between all.

~ North ~ The Great Workshop of Zamok Ustyag, Adlaborn ~ By the Equestrian Calendar, Second Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

Sint Erklass stood tall and silent, the low hum still reverberating in his ears.

Centuries ago, this great atelier had been no more than a vast, cold chamber, empty but for its heart, and a dark heart it was. Yet on this day, he stood here amongst an assortment of crafting tools and clockwork devices, some of which filled the room up to the painted ceiling, and many more upon the ancient stone and wooden tables – the mark of a thousand tinkerers and inventors who’d called this place their workshop over the millennia.

Now, beneath the mountain crowned by The Tree Atop The World, the Northernmost point in the world, the chamber flourished.

Many knew it as the Great Workshop of Zamok Ustyag, carved inside the great mountain, and one of the greatest achievements of generations of reindeer artisans, a showcase and archive of inventions and other magnificent works. Fewer today still remembered what it had been truly built for, a function for a bygone era.

Cheerily lit and welcoming as the chamber looked nowadays, the Great Stag found, much to his consternation, that he could never suppress a dread feel, the further he approached its centre. All the wrapping and the tinsel in the world could not pull a veil over certain uncanny, uncomfortable truths, not to one who knew. But then, his life’s purpose was to bring warmth into the cold, not to deny cold altogether.

And to this day, an eldritch cold lay buried once more in the core of the mountain.

“Grandfather?”

The soothing voice of his granddaughter flowed into his mind, and Sint Erklass smiled, even before he turned to meet the Snow Maiden’s piercing blue eyes.

Back the way he’d entered, she stood within the intricately carved doorway, a graceful presence in the weathered chamber. Her pale coat was covered, as always, by a silver-blue shawl, and she had an appearance as fair as she did a thousand years ago.

“Ilsa,” he greeted warmly. “What brings you here? I’d thought you’d be asleep at this late hour.”

The Snow Maiden, or rather, the latest in a long line to serve as her host, advanced. This time, Ilsa’s host hailed from a clan of nomadic reindeer, roaming the world, like the ponies whose time predated the Six Hearthwarmers. They had returned to Adlaborn a few years ago, answering the Maiden’s Summon, for a new host to bear the shawl for her lifetime.

For brief, fleeting moments, the one who had been Lel of the nomads would shimmer through the cloak’s powerful influence, an image of what she had been in life – a young doe with eyes of warmest brown, adorned by tattoos of her tribe. Now, as with each bearer before her, the doe was but another vessel for the Lady of the North.

One would consider it a cursed existence, bound to a timeless soul for the rest of their natural lives. Yet Lel, like every one of Ilsa’s bearers, was willing to carry the burden, forever bound. A great honour, they said – and yet, an honour Ilsa herself considered the final mockery inflicted upon her family by that same eldritch being imprisoned here.

In guilt, and for her dues, the lady eternal kept her thick, dusty journal filled with the names of those who had borne her burden for the ages. Lel the Nomad. Azalyne, the orphaned chieftainess of a distant tribe. Saelita, the warrior bard who sung dreams into reality. Eleyska, the star-dancer mage. Katarae, the peacemaking artist... And Anna, her sister, her first and most beloved, the original Maiden of Fire.

Like every time, Sint felt how she, like him, missed them all dearly.

“The same reasons that led you here, Grandfather,” Ilsa said quietly, tapping her ears delicately. “This Call, it reaches far, even into a sleeping mind.”

She paused, frowning as she looked over the Workshop, until she brought her gaze to settle firmly upon her grandfather.

“I looked… there is a new star in the heavens, where there was no star before,” Ilsa said. “So, it comes at last. Celestia sends tidings of great need, and the first place you step is this chamber. Am I wrong to assume, that you fear this unknown threat has its wellspring in an old source?”

Sint smiled, albeit wearily. His granddaughter was nervous, this much he could tell, much as the Snow Maiden would have liked to conceal it, within the confines of this great chamber.

Ilsa was tall, perhaps as tall as his beloved Celestia and Luna. But he was taller still, and without another word he stretched out a forehoof to pull her in a warm embrace.

“Yes and no, my dear,” he said, chuckling fondly. “An old friend lies in wait in here, and I intend to commune.”

He looked past her to see a green-eyed, brown doe waiting quietly at the bottom of the staircase.

“Unless,” Sint began, releasing Ilsa from his embrace, “Dear Freyja over yonder would like to do the same?”

The doe in question nodded, shyly, but remained in place. One wouldn’t have guessed at that she was the Fire Maiden of Adlaborn, the latest heir to the Great Workshop in a line which stretched back three-thousand years. Unlike her counterpart, though, she bore no enchanted shawl to bear the consciousness of a long-dead princess – merely her craft and a tinkerer’s mind.

“N-no, Lord Hearthswarming,” Freyja said quietly. “I suppose, yes, but– your communion comes first.”

Ilsa sighed. “I had to speak with you, Grandfather,” she said. “Freyja’s duties are well-known to her, but this Call you have received… something is off.”

“What about it?” Sint asked, his surprise unfeigned, for all he trusted in her wisdom. “The Call of Concordia has never been used in all of my years, not even before the First Hearthswarming Eve. Yet the message is clear.”

“And we shall answer,” Ilsa said dutifully. “Yet you wish to commune with… this creature, on the matter? Forgive me for saying so, Grandfather, but...”

“But?”

“It’d seem I was wrong… Which forces me to think that... somewhere in this, you are wrong too. I had assumed you entered this hallowed chamber on the suspicion that its aeons-old resident is no stranger to the current crisis.”

Sint looked at her, a chill in his breast. “Tell me then. In your dreams, did you sense the influence of forces from a plane outside our own?”

“Yes,” Ilsa nodded, “yet… something feels both familiar and unfamiliar.”

Machinery and gears in the Workshop tinkered on, filling the room with ambience that was all too welcome in his clouded head. It wasn’t as busy as it was during the daytime, where dozens of great minds pressed on for their latest creation, to present to the world or add to its collection. But the pleasant ambience couldn’t clear Sint’s head entirely, that some form of devilry must now be afoot in Canterlot for such a message, the only one of its kind, to be sent out.

“When Celestia retrieved the coffer of the Concordia Maxima,” Sint said simply, “some eight-hundred years ago, from the icy wastes in which it had been lost, you’ll remember, she offered it to me. I let her keep it, because I trusted her. It is hers by right.” He felt a watery film come over his eyes. “It was her mother’s. If Celestia sounds it, she does it for a reason.”

“Her mother’s…” Ilsa repeated, rolling the word over her tongue. “Yes. She, whose echo infuses the lantern, in manner most familiar to me…” she mused, tugging her shawl. “So many spirits, so many haunts, in those faraway days you told me about…”

Her eyes wandered, staring at something behind him. Sint refused to turn around. There was only one thing she could be looking at, alone in all the myriad merry contents of the Workshop. Freyja’s gaze was directed its way as well, for a phantom cold blew over them.

A darkened snowglobe, large as a good-sized dragon’s egg, full of perpetual snowstorm…

“She’s gone, Ilsa,” Sint cut in, a rare touch of iron to his tone. “Sunflare is gone, as are nigh-all the oldest nightmares the Old Ones begot. It has been millenia since Sunflare left this plane, in the company of her own conscience given shape. Much as I wish I’ll see her again, the Call serves as the final trace that she was ever here.”

“Grandfather, please,” Ilsa said softly, “you know how intimately I know your heart. But you taught me yourself that our desires for the light should not blind us to the dark. This is why I beseech you now to caution, for this creature, too, knows your heart well.” She paused. “You hear the Call, and you think to yourself, Celestia must have failed. Why else would she call the world to her, other than tidings of great sorrow… or great joy? You do not want to believe Celestia has faltered. And in your wisdom, you know she hasn’t. Yet still the Call goes out…”

Sint let her words carry through the air, and he listened, for she was right. He laid down a comforting hoof on Ilsa’s shoulder, and her eyes looked up to his own.

“Your care is a boon for me, dearest Ilsa,” Sint said softly. “Your temperance a valuable dam to an old, passionate soul. No, you say it true. Nonetheless… I sense the Krampus interlaced in this…”

“Please,” Ilsa told him warningly, “don’t let age and experience deceive you into thinking the creature cannot snare you.”

Sint noticed apprehension in Freyja’s eyes at this statement. He decided, then and there, that his next words must put her at ease.

“Age and experience?” Sint chuckled gently. “Words for the wind, my ever-young counsellor. What value is age without soul, experience without learning? Wasn’t it Anna, in her youth, her innocence, who after she’d been deceived, chose to break from the trappings that’d be expected of her tale, and aimed true?”

A glow seemed to fill Ilsa then as she remembered, and Freyja stood a little taller. The phantom cold over the room thawed, and Sint saw in them the same spirit and determination as Anna.

“I hear your words, Grandfather,” Ilsa said respectfully. “But I implore you, don’t forget that if the Concordia’s lantern is an offshoot of the Old Ones, the reasons they’d had to call in us, their creations, their Twelve Families, may not always have been noble.”

“No. But they shall be today.”

The Great Stag raised himself to full height.

“Adlaborn will stand,” Sint told his granddaughter. “Though our trials millennia past may pale compared to what is to come, I feel, we will not face it alone. Go to Vologdad, and inform Meisterburger Heavensky, Ilsa. We will prepare, and his word will help guide our people through the coming storm. We were a shield that guarded ponykind from the North, and we will serve as it once more. We were never warriors, but we shall protect.”

His voice echoed throughout the chamber, reverberating within its old stone walls – not quite intimidating, but determined and full of resolve, and for a moment he felt himself a younger, prouder stag, as he had been.

The sound of shimmering snow died down, drowned by the sound of tinkering machinery. Even in the absence of caretakers, the Great Workshop tolled on, as it had always, these thousand Winters – whether by magic or mundane machinery, none could tell.

“Anna would have liked it,” Ilsa remarked wistfully, “how this place has grown over the passing years,” she said, taking in the sight of the chamber in its entirety. “Her pride and life’s work. Her gift to the world.”

Her hoof traced around a nearby table, upon which were an assortment of toys mechanical and magical, music-boxes and snowglobes, all laid where their maker had left them. Each bore a unique flair and design, a mark of a thousand artisans who had given their all to create and expand their knowledge.

Adlaborn’s gift-giving tradition had existed for centuries before the First Hearth’s Warming Eve – yet it was only after the event that they spread it to all the corners of the world. Years since, the arrival of reindeer would be warmly anticipated every Hearth’s Warming, for they brought their best and finest works to share.

And, as Anna Erklass had ensured, they too would impart some of their knowledge to the people they visited, and teach those aspiring souls who ventured North to their homeland. For even as their toys were outgrown by the children they were given to, their true gift to the world would endure in the hearts and traditions of many.

“She would have,” Sint agreed. “She would have indeed. Fret not, dear child. Should there be war, I will ensure Anna’s legacy is untouched by its wrath…”

“And I have no doubt you will, Grandfather,” Ilsa replied, her smile carrying with it a sort of longing for a child’s innocence, untouched and unmarred.

Sint glanced at Freyja, who for the most remained silent still, tapping her hoof quietly on the cobbled floor. Nervous as she may be, there was something in her eyes and the rhythm of her taps that implied a childlike giddyness.

“Please, dear Fire Maiden, you’re as welcome here as both of us!” Sint said warmly. “This workshop is at your disposal, yours in which to make wonders for generations to marvel at.”

“Oh, uh,” Freyja said, stammering. She wasn’t used to getting referred to by her new title. “I– thank you, Lord Hearthswarming, I’ll take good care of it. I promise.”

“It is yours to keep, child,” Sint replied, “to maintain, change and alter, for the workshop is always open for a bright mind.”

Freyja looked up at him, with a nervous grin. Always the same, with every new Fire Maiden.

“It’d be my honour, sir,,” Freyja said, and with that she came in, a light spring in each step. Much like a certain doe had, all those years ago, throughout the seasons.

“Ilsa?” Sint called out, a twinkle in his eyes. “When you meet the Meisterburger, would you kindly give my warmest regards to him on his newborn daughter? Amidst all his concerns, Cernunnos is deserving of recognition for what he gives to the world.”

‘I pray she will grow with her father’s love,’ Sint thought privately,‘if this message, this Call is truly as I fear.’

The Snow Maiden’s smile, rare on her solemn features, could have melted glaciers.

“I shall, Grandfather,” Ilsa pledged. “I know that little Lucie will appreciate it as much as her proud parents.”

And she was gone up the staircase, in a trail of stardust.

His heart lightened, Sint Erklass excused himself to the Fire Maiden, whose precious work would begin soon enough, and moved, at last, towards the heart of the chamber…

“Great Stag...”

Centuries of their eternal conversation never dulled the icy chill that washed over him, as he paused midstep, hearing the voice. He glanced back at Freyja, who’d seated herself at a crafting-table close by the gateway, examining wood-cuttings. As expected, she’d not heard. This communion was meant for him, and him only.

But she would hear it. All through her duties as warden, a fire of joy to ward back the cold contempt.

“You, who have made your life’s work to keep the pain at bay… You sense it now, beneath the hum of the Call, do you not? If you stand, it shall come for you, and there will be no escaping it. What, then? Will you let it pass through you? Stare it in the face? When the pain is past, there is nothing. Only your memories remain...”

He steeled himself for his own reply. The being imprisoned within the Workshop was hardly a threat in its diminished form, but words could sway the unwary mind. It spoke in the Common Tongue, yet its affect was dark and twisted.

‘I shall not stand alone.’

The darkened snowglobe stirred, the winds within moaned, and in the gale, the eyes of the Krampus, once master of the Coal Realm, before it became Crystal, glared balefully.

“Remember, Lord Hearthswarming. The touch of ice and fire burns alike.”

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~ Passage from the Second to Third Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

Throughout the hospital, the clocks softly chimed midnight, as one day turned into another, though Luna’s night still ruled over the land and Celestia’s sun would not rise for a good few hours more. Strange, that. Had, at one time, the new day truly begun with the dawn, not midnight? He dimly recalled learning about it at school, once, but couldn’t remember.

But the receding chimes soon brought a completely different thought to Icewind’s mind.

“I can hear the bells… the bells are loud, tonight. It’s a night when you can’t help but hear them.”

“What are you talking about? I don’t hear anything.”

“Oh, but you will. Because I’ve failed.”

The image of her face, cheek scarred by whatever fight she’d got into before he got to her – that face, so pretty, but part of it gnarled with burns, looking up at the completely gnarled visage of the Death Tree in the moonlight. It was an image seared into his memory.

“You alright, mate?”

A friendly, but completely unexpected comment was what snapped him from his thoughts. Icewind saw Gibbous had pulled out a seat opposite him at the table, and sat down, proferring a hipflask.

“Oh, hi, Gibbous,” Icewind said, giving him a cursory nod. “Princess Luna didn’t get you back to watching… watching the other Redheart’s room?”

“You mean,” the thestral said, “the Redheart who’s not a Changeling, even though that’s the only explanation what makes sense to me? Ahh, Princess Celestia’s back in there, asking her a few questions. She can do fine without us Guards.” He swilled the hipflask about. “Fancy any? Seeing as we’re off the grind, again.”

“Not a good time of day, sorry,” said Icewind, indicating the cafeteria clock. “Bit past the magic hour...”

“Right, I forgot, you’re diurnal,” Gibbous said, pulling back the flask to drink from it. “‘Sides,” he added once he’d finished, “Winter’s agreed to fill in my spot next to Selene, until Princess Celestia heads back home.” He hiccoughed. “Said he had a duty… though, you ask me, really he’s after a word with Selene, for forgetting to wake him up earlier.”

“Maybe,” Icewind nodded. “He did miss his date in Canterlot because of that. Though, part of that was my fault, letting him write our reports while I was out looking for my date…”

“Sounds like you’ve both had a rough time today,” Gibbous said quietly, wiping his mouth. “Y’know, Icey… be honest with you, when you walked up to us, asking if we could help you find your missing nurse, I thought you were fretting over nothing. To tell it true, I only agreed to take a look around town as an excuse to stretch my wings…”

Icewind listened to him placidly.

“... but then,” pursued Gibbous. “While I’m in the air, up comes Selene, telling me we've got Changelings, and I know it’s gotta be serious. She’s almost as bad as Winter about sticking to her post... I swear, that guy, he’s got a way of freezing up the room. Not sure how you can bear him.”

“Maybe the freeze reminds me of home,” Icewind said, crossing his forehooves. “You wouldn’t complain about dark, closed-in spaces.”

“Fair point,” admitted the thestral. “And then… then it turns out whatever she is, she’s not a Changeling. Some night it’s been, eh.” He tapped the flask. “I dunno, we’re waiting for Celestia here, but when Luna was collecting your report, did she tell you anything?”

“It’s more like what I didn’t tell her.”

The words were out of Icewind’s mouth before he could stop himself.

In a matter of hours, he’d got used to the locket’s feel against his barrel, But all of a sudden, the pressure it exercised in the gap between his armour and his body – between his duty and his true self? – now came flooding back.

“Why, what’d you skip?” blinked Gibbous.

Momentarily, Icewind felt a chill more discomforting than any of his native town’s weather, before it caught up to him that Gibbous wasn’t asking about the locket. The thestral was just surprised by his answer. This abated the chill. A little.

“I…” Icewind started. “I feel like I’ve done something… wrong.”

“Wrong?” Gibbous echoed. “Wrong how?”

Icewind pressed his forehooves together. “Gibbous… ah…” But too much was running through his mind. And how could his fellow Guard even begin to understand it? “I don’t know. It’s just… in the Forest, I happened upon Redheart alone, you know? And she told me… things.”

Gibbous frowned. “Well, I wouldn’t know what she told you, Icewind,” he said slowly, tapping the hipflask. “But whatever it was, clearly, it’s been messing with your head. And if she’s a fake Redheart, it’s no doubt what she wanted.”

“That’s just it, though,” Icewind said. “You weren’t there in the room, when both the Princesses and the human came to see her. They seemed to think she was telling the truth, treating her like she was… she was a real Redheart. Particularly the human. It’s not like she had any reason to lie in front of them.”

‘Mostly,’ he thought, resisting the urge to feel for the locket.

“Now this is just getting screwy,” Gibbous said, rubbing his forehead. “How can that Redheart and the Redheart who was brought in earlier, barely able to stand, both be the ‘real’ Redheart?”

Icewind had to admit, the mere thought of parallel universes gave him a headache as well.

From what he understood, this Redheart and the human didn’t even come from the same other universe. If there was more than one universe, or two, how many more lay out there? How many more Redhearts and Icewinds and Winters, and Celestias and Lunas, too...

“Gibbous,” he said unexpectedly. So unexpectedly, the thestral jumped back a peg. “Tell me… how… How was it like, as a Lunar Guard, when Princess Luna came back?”

“Say what?”

“I mean,” Icewind shifted to-and-fro on his chair. “She was… she was Nightmare Moon, at first, right? She’d been Nightmare Moon for… for a thousand years. Then she got turned back into Luna, and Princess Celestia invited her to rule at her side again.”

A thought nagged at him. ‘Redheart didn’t say what happened to Luna in her world…’

“But before then,” he continued. “She was, like, the Mare in the Moon. An enemy of Equestria. More of a story to scare and delight children, true, but… still, an enemy. Yet the Lunar Guard kept renewing its oath to Princess Luna, centuries after her exile. I… how’d you work that out?”

Gibbous was fumbling with his hipflask, looking uncertain. “Well, that’s a tough one,” he said. “See, when Princess Luna was exiled, the Lunar Guard pledged they’d carry on their work in her name, waiting for the night she returned… as herself, as Princess Luna, using her true name once more.”

He stared at Icewind, batlike ears twitching.

“Ponies tend to forget this, but when Nightmare Moon showed up on that Summer Sun Festival, we thestrals played our part in keeping everyone safe, like Captain Nocturne did when he refused to join her side, the first time she turned. The Solar Guard don’t know the night like we do. And no Guard worthy of the name, Solar or Lunar, would’ve dreamt of going over to her side.”

‘Oh, Harmony, please help me.’

“Right, but…” Icewind began. “Thestrals just… accepted that their Princess had done a bad thing and got sent to the Moon for it? You know there was a lot of tongue-wagging after she came back, about how Celestia had treated her unfairly.”

“Wait, don’t tell me you believe any of that guff.”

“Of course not,” Icewind said, a touch piqued. “What I’m saying is, if a couple of neigh-sayers can talk that kind of talk, wouldn’t the Princess’ own people… disagree, with what Princess Celestia had done. Even if it was the right thing, is what I’m saying.”

Gibbous leaned back. “It wasn’t always easy,” he admitted. “We thestrals don’t mingle as much with other ponies, so we’ve always felt a bit apart from Celestia’s rule, compared to the rest of Equestria. And you’re always gonna get some young troublemakers, fancying themselves rebels fighting the power or something, who’ll talk trash about Her Highness.”

He popped open the flask and took another swig.

“But them’s just a few bad apples, as a friend of mine’d say. You find ‘em in every barrel. Frankly, Icewind, you need just look at Equestria. Whatever the time of day, we’re not doing too badly with Celestia as Princess, are we? And if some rube says otherwise, I’ve got a planet I’d like to sell them.”

“Nope, definitely agree with you on that,” Icewind commented, steepling his forehooves.

‘Yet Redheart said we could do so much more, and did, in the place she came from…’

“What’s all this got to do with the nurse, though?”

Icewind tensed. He glanced at Gibbous. “Well… the thing is…” He caught his breath. “It’s like this, you see,” he said, trying again. “She said what she was doing was for Celestia.”

“Hm.” Gibbous digested that. “Another Redheart, working for another Celestia… This is all very weird. But, I guess it almost makes sense. Not much else does.” He put down the flask. “I’m taking this one step at a time, Icewind. Won’t try working it out until the Princess herself explains things. If the… if Redheart’s story is true, though, just one thing bugs me... What kind of Celestia gives the order to hurt ponies?”

Icewind kept quiet, yet in private, his mind was on a slow boil.

‘She mentioned the name Lyra Heartstrings,’ he thought. ‘Isn’t that also the green unicorn Gibbous and Selene carried in from the Everfree Forest? She said the unicorn had betrayed Celestia…’

Again, the locket felt heavier against his breast. He wasn’t able to resist pressing his forehoof to his armour, that time. Fortunately, Gibbous was deep in thought and didn’t seem to find the gesture suspicious.

Icewind tried to imagine what would happen if Princess Celestia found out he’d lied to Luna. Merely thinking about it, the disappointed look in her eyes, only turned upon a select few in his time as a Guard – that arrogant mare who’d been her last student before Twilight Sparkle, or the naval officer who’d aided Prince Blueblood in his year-long joyride – made his heart edge up his throat.

Yet, no matter what, he could not imagine her ordering physical pain on him. However...

‘The human. Reiner. He’d have hurt Redheart terribly, if Princess Celestia hadn’t interfered. The way he shouted at her for that… It’s incredible, how she could just bear it so stoically.’

What was it Redheart had said about Lyra Heartstrings?

“One of the explorers, a young unicorn, Lyra Heartstrings, persuaded Her Majesty they posed no threat to Equestria. But she lied.”

Despite the human’s violent behavior, evidently, the Princess had chosen to trust him. Probably because she trusted Heartstrings – now Icewind thought about it, didn’t he know Heartstrings from somewhere, if not personally, then once or twice by sight? That was it. He remembered the little green unicorn as one of many fresh, eager faces at Celestia’s School For Gifted Unicorns.

Without preamble, Icewind stood up.

“Where you off to, mate?”

“I…” Icewind glanced to the cafeteria doors. “I think I need to make my report... Not to Luna, not a written report. I think I must speak directly to Princess Celestia.”

‘I’ve been acting stupid.’ Discreetly, Icewind prodded his armour, testing if the locket was still in place. ‘No, I can’t tell Princess Celestia about the locket, not yet. Because… because if she gave Reiner her word, she’s honour-bound to return it to him... But all I’ve got to do is tell her what Redheart said. She’s Princess Celestia. She’ll listen, at least.’

* * * * *

“Your Highness, though I respect you and what you stand for, you’ll get no more out of me.”

Hearing that those words rang with conviction, Celestia sensed her eyelids closing up.

She fought back the push. This Redheart, while cuffed to a hospital bed, had been nothing but courteous and quiet in their interactions, even thanked Doctor Stable and Nurse Snowheart when they’d applied the poultice to her burnt cheek – two more confused people who’d need to be given the full picture, Celestia thought, eyes drooping further.

But Redheart had also proven stubbornly resistant to serving up answers she didn’t want to. When it came to Reiner’s missing locket, talking to her was like squeezing blood from a rock. It wouldn’t do to show frailty in front of her… Or would it?

“Nonetheless, Nurse Redheart,” said Celestia. “I have one more question.”

Redheart clinked her cuffs. “And I’ll answer, Your Highness, if it isn’t something you have tried asking me before, and something I may answer.”

Having been standing at the foot of the bed this whole time, squarely facing Redheart, Celestia did something she hadn’t planned on doing when she’d re-entered the room. She moved over to the beside, and pulled up a seat from behind her, non-magically.

It was two-parts for comfort, one-parts to ease her creeping fatigue. And Celestia knew it must have showed, because she wanted it to. When a lifetime’s worth of regal practice turned pushing back the little “tells” such as droopy eyelids into second nature, the real effort was to show just enough.

As expected, this simple gesture led Redheart’s eyes to betray greater discomfort than any battle of the poker-faces had.

“Tell me, then, if you will,” Celestia said, in a cool, clear voice. “How does the Solar Empire venerate Celestia? How much does it make me, my name, into an object of worship?”

Strange to say, neither Alexander Reiner nor Galatea had addressed this matter. Celestia was well aware how, in spite of her efforts, many of her little ponies insisted on treating her like the very ground she walked on was to be consecrated.

How much further might a conquest-seeking Equestria take her semi-divine status?

“Harmony is what the Empire sings the greatest praises to,” Redheart said simply, “but every newly-converted soul begins their life by thanking the First Servant of Harmony.”

As hoped for, one thing a believer in the Empire would not keep mum about, was her beliefs.

“First Servant… I see,” Celestia said, tasting the words and finding them bitter. “What you’re evoking here is Enlightened Absolutism.”

“Why shouldn’t I?” Redheart said, though her voice hid a slight quiver. “What do you call the rule you’ve held for over two-thousand years, Highness? Even in this time, when you send Parliament a royal ‘proposal’, isn’t it a decree by another name?”

“No decree would be open to amendment.” Celestia let the tiredness seep into her tone. “My hope, when I issue a proposal, is always that my ponies will read it, think it over and, if possible, improve it, in those areas where I may be too removed from their everyday concerns to know best…”

“Listen to how you speak of them,” Redheart cut in. “They are your ponies. You guide them and they follow. It’s no different on my world. We just… look farther about what we count as a pony.”

“Yes, you mentioned this... Pan-Equine Co-Harmony Sphere.” Celestia frowned. “You don’t think I never had the idea of putting together something like that? Why stop at uniting the three pony tribes, when I could bring all the world’s equines under one banner? Wouldn’t that bring an end to Saddle Mareabians enslaving zebras, the pointless wars in Zebrica, the vulnerable isolation of the hippogriffs?”

“On my world,” Redheart said quietly, “it has.”

“Yet can you really claim this came from your Equestria’s benevolence?” Celestia said. “By the sound of it, they only started making overtures to the other equine nations after Chrysalis’ Hive attacked Canterlot. If anything, I wonder that they didn’t get more backlash for their diplomatic self-interest.”

Redheart sat up straighter. “Don’t sell yourself short, Your Highness,” she said, smiling thinly. “You of all people should know how persuasive you can be.”

“Indeed… yet I didn’t persuade those tribes to let me rule them, all those centuries ago,” Celestia said, her eyes going faraway. “We were brought up, Luna and I, so we could move the Sun and the Moon without a massive cost to Equestria’s magic every day… It was the ponies themselves who decided this meant we should rule. They, who persuaded us…”

“Sun and Moon cover not just Equestria, but a whole planet,” Redheart replied, undaunted. “Honestly, it seems foolish that this world hasn’t appointed you as its supreme authority, its Absolute Light, for millenia already.”

“And by what right would that be?”

“Pardon?”

“Let me try another tack,” Celestia said. “Many’s the time I’ve had to deal with a hard fact, Ponies are flawed. They can be selfish, and short-sighted, and not listen to me, even when I know in my heart that they should… Both our worlds have seen the blight of Sombra. But I’m Princess of Equestria because most ponies would give me that honour. Most. Not all. Though your world is, perhaps, more unified than this world… in which one, would you say, have more ponies dissented against Equestria?”

“With all due respect, Your Highness, this is not a conversation I’m interested in having,” Redheart said, holding up a cuffed hoof. “Although I’d hate to presume what you’ll say next, I can guess. You’re not sovereign of the entire world because you weren’t asked to be. Fine. But if you decided to stop being the Princess of every pony who spoke against you, how long would you stay Princess for?”

At this, Celestia, almost unthinkingly, acting with her hooves, removed her tiara. Certain she had caught a stifled gasp from Redheart over that, she turned it over, examining it.

“Being Princess is just a title,” Celestia whispered. “I’ve known nieces and nephews who bore princely titles without having princely qualities, or the wings and horn of an alicorn. Equestria is a land which the Reindeer King, along with Starswirl, taught me and my sister that we could do good for with our special talents, and so we did.”

“And every few generations,” Redheart said, “a student of yours rises to prominence, for you to turn into a Princess. Lady Cadenza was one latest such candidate, until she disappointed the Queen, we know that.”

‘Wait a minute…’ In a flicker, Celestia processed what had been said. ‘There we go. Score one for the Sun Princess.’

It wasn’t such a winning move, she reminded herself, as she’d probably have soon learned the same from Reiner. But it was a game-changer, to learn Cadance was able to help humanity without being an alicorn.

Had she just found the point of divergence, or a direct knock-on effect of the divergence?

She rose, her earlier fatigue melting away.

“Well, then,” Celestia mused. “You speak of the Queen, Nurse Redheart. And this leads me, truly, to my final question, for which this was all mere buildup.”

It was undeniable that Redheart tensed while Celestia replaced her tiara.

“You look at me, and you see Celestia. Despite how the Empire might have conditioned you, that isn’t something your eyes can deceive you on. So. If I were to give you an order which contradicts the Solar Empire’s doctrine, how would you take it?”

Redheart checked her hooves. “That isn’t as challenging as you might think, Highness. When I renewed my oath as a Guard, I swore allegiance to Queen Celestia. You are Celestia, but not my Queen. I’m not sworn to take orders from you.”

Calm on the outside, and yet…

“And if I were, on a whim, to appoint myself as Queen,” Celestia said smoothly, “would that change your outlook?”

Was that a twitch? “No. Why would it? The act’s transparency would be... blatant…”

“Then explain this to me, Redheart. If what the Empire venerates is Harmony itself, not a person, not a sovereign... where’s the gain in the ‘First Servant’, as you dub her, giving herself a more ostentatious title? Isn’t that… a cult of personality?”

“Queen Celestia is the Voice of Harmony,” Redheart snapped, her own voice rising. “And naming herself Queen is what separates her from the gaggle of Equestrian princes and princesses– not that there are many around anymore, when one by one, they turned their backs on her for selfish pursuits! Good gracious, out of the lot, I’d never expected it’d be that fop Blueblood who never went turncoat, dying a hero’s death fighting the dragons instead!”

Two emotions entered into conflict within Celestia. The first, ridiculously, was a swell of pride in her nephew… Allegedly, he’d proven himself at last...

But the second, more rational feeling, was cold horror. This death sounded so… staged.

“In other words,” Celestia replied, locking away another troubling piece of news for later, “you may worship Harmony, but your whole concept of what Harmony actually means is centred in the authority of one person.”

“It’s how you’ve always taught it–”

“No, it is not!”

Windows, furniture and utensils rattled around the room.

Redheart actually shrank back, frightened by Celestia’s slip into the Royal Canterlot Voice. And while Celestia herself hadn’t meant to do any of it, she also noticed a faint, glowing tinge on the edges of her rippling mane.

“If I held my ponies by the hoof,” Celestia said, softly now, “there’d be no point in sending out my students to write friendship reports... I’d be the one writing manifestos for them, dictating they learn by rote. But how would they learn from that? How would they grow? Why, if Twilight is still the Queen’s student, as Captain Reiner indicated she is, I’m sure it’s been months– who knows, years since she wrote to share what she’s learned about friendship, when Queen Celestia has all the divinely-given answers.”

Coughing, Redheart shifted back into place. “I’ve said enough. I won’t say anything about Lady Twilight.”

“I didn’t expect you to,” Celestia said coolly. “One small detail, however. Enlightened Absolutism does not claim rule by divine right. If the Empire truly believed they were guided by a First Servant, they wouldn’t worship her. Luna told me about these ‘newly-converted’, the ones you say give thanks for what’s been done to them. Again, her description reminded me of nothing so much as the victims of a cult.”

She leaned forward.

“And that’s what you are, too, Redheart…” Celestia added, her tone turning more gentle. “You’ve just forgotten it. The difficulties Luna’s faced in probing your mind suggests magical tampering to me. While I still have much to learn of Captain Reiner, I feel that, deep down, a civilised heart beats within him. Beneath his pain and anger, he must know what bedevilment has compelled you.”

“We each choose what we believe, Princess Celestia,” Redheart said curtly, eyes gone dark. “For all your sakes, I hope you’ll soon find out which ‘bedevilment’ compels humans.”

~ East ~ The Mikado’s Quarters in the Palace of Kyiroto, Island of Ryuppon ~ By the Equestrian Calendar, Third Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

Daybreak still lay just beyond the horizon, over in the Land Where the Sun Rises.

Nevertheless, at this unearthly morning hour, the Sun was at the forefront of the mind of Mikado Toshiro Kane, esteemed emperor of the Kirin, as he glanced at the roll of parchment far to his left, half of Celestia’s seal lying broken next to it, red wax flakes dotting the polished wood of the desk. The very first parchment of the day, it would also be the last, a long spell from now, to be once more perused after today’s business was completed. His eyes roamed back and forth, from behind his glasses at another proposal which lay before him, ready to be approved or dismissed upon his judgement –and his ability to discern a raw meaning behind pleasant, florid words.

None knew better than a Kirin that sweetest tongue hath sharpest tooth. Even as, in these last couple of years, the Mikado had been given reason to reconsider the proverb...

Not in this trifling matter, however.

“Minister Kurama’s proposal,” Toshiro mumbled to himself, by rote, “will be dismissed.”

He took the red ink-stamp, to press the ‘denied’ symbol onto the stapled parchment stack.

Out of the shadows emerged an attendant. She stepped forward, silently, coming no closer than was proper for her status. Wordlessly, Toshiro lit his forked horn, and gracefully pushed the stack in a straight line across the air. The parchments came to land smoothly in the receptacle, the aura fading away. Nimbly, the attendant reached to slide the stack onto the tray slung across her shoulders. With the parchments secured, the Neighponese mare backed away, head bowed.

Aside from Toshiro’s mutterings, quiet reigned supreme between these four walls, as ever. Only the sound of the attendant’s shuffling hooves and the scratching of his quill provided any other disturbance to the silence.

He pulled another stack of parchment from the large pile on the right of his desk, and placed it in front of him for review. It was a request that shipping priorities be granted to one merchant guild over all the others who demanded access to Kyiroto’s docking facilities. Business as usual.

Toshiro was in the midst of reading through the opening when a peculiar buzzing sensation washed through him, jarring him from his professional equilibrium.

Accompanied by a low, bassy hum, a nigh-electric, biting tingle invaded his crossed hindlegs, a feeling he was most unaccustomed to. Alarmed, Toshiro didn’t leap, but he nearly fell back, posture shaken – on instinct, his fiery tail uncurled from around his hips, restoring his balance.

He felt like he’d fallen into slumber and awoken at the same moment, the dream still lingering on the borders of his mind… The sensation was...

‘Electric? Some devilry of the Storm King? No… this is not his work…’

It was as if his body was a string instrument – a sangen, perhaps – and he had just been plucked.

Forehooves raised and eye wide, the Mikado’s gaze wandered to the roof of his great hall. The buzz stayed a moment, and went, but the feeling remained. A hum, somehow audible to his aged ears. Toshiro knew then.

‘The Call…’

His unsettled features were returning to their usual, austere frown. He knew what it meant. The Call required appropriate planning and responses.

Toshiro reached out with his magic, pulling a hidden bell-pull. Two further attendants stepped out of the shadows, the Neighponese scuttling backwards for the doors to the antechamber, experienced servants who knew how to face their emperor even when they rushed.

The rich, brass note of a gong echoed through the great hall and in the chambers beyond. A noise that would not feel out of place in the hubbub of the great, bustling city around the Palace, but in here, it was portentous. Time passed, enough for Toshiro to school his face into a regally stern expression. Finally, the antechamber doors swung back open, and a single, richly-dressed Kirin stag stepped through.

“Kuno,” Toshiro greeted in an even tone, the slight quirking of his lips the closest thing he could muster to a smile.

The Prime Minister, though summoned at this hour, looked no more weighed down by fatigue than his ornate robes, the various badges that ceremony expected of him, nor the portable telescope on his belt.

“Blessed Mikado,” Kuno said, bowing his head with a grace that his age did not hamper. “How may I serve?”

“I shall speak frankly,” Toshiro announced. “The Call has been sounded. The Call. As three-thousand years ago, the Great Tonakai foretold that our people may one day be called to answer on a matter which touches the entire world… that day, it seems, is here.”

Momentarily, Kuno’s professionalism disappeared, his mouth a little open in shock. Placidity was quick to shut out surprise, however, and a raised eyebrow of curiosity became the only concession to his emotions.

“I see,” Kuno said. “Yes. Perhaps it was fated, but… before you summoned me, I was at my balcony, looking over the city. The first line of sunlight was appearing, yet something about it was… odd.”

“Odd? Odd, how?”

Kuno stroked his telescope. “An unexplained bump in the line. I looked closer, and I saw what looked like a star, hanging in the distant light of day.”

“That confirms it,” Toshiro stated. “All the signs are there. Each nation, I believe, will have been given a star of its own. We must follow ours… for one thing, our investments with Equestria are now grown too numerous to ignore.”

Toshiro’s words were laden with additional meanings, and Kuno caught them.

The Prime Minister nodded, a small gesture which set off a flurry of activity in the great hall’s periphery as the attendants noticed the subtle signal to begin making arrangements. It took only a minute for them to leave for their duties.

Alone with his Prime Minister, Toshiro levitated his desk aside and raised himself.

“There shall be a Concordia,” he told Kuno, “the first such convocation in over seven-hundred years, if history serves me right. And none were ever sounded by the mystical Call.”

“Of course,” Kuno replied, the older stag looking Toshiro in the eye.

Both of them relaxed, slightly, their stances growing less rigid and Kuno drooping as he finally showed his age.

“I want a list of personnel, equipment and products to be drawn up,” Toshiro said, taking off his glasses. “Everything that we have, everything that we can provide at this Concordat and everything we can ask for in return.”

“Yes,” Kuno agreed. “I shall have everything prepared. In fact, much already stands by, waiting only for your presence. Were we to set out for Mount Metazoa this very minute, your personal sky-turtle would lack a mere third of its conveniences.”

“Good. It is no more than I’d expected from you, Kuno. We can’t let an opportunity like this to pass us by.”

“As you say...” Kuno said, one forehoof rubbing the other.

There was a slowness to his words that didn’t suit one who’d been thanked by the Mikado. Toshiro noticed it, and thought it unusual for his faithful Prime Minister.

“What ails you?” he demanded, yet as gently as he could allow. “I know you better than to believe the task ahead, however precipitous, would crush you.”

“Woe me, that I’d stray so far off the Path, Blessed Mikado.” Kuno said. “Though the Great Tonakai may not look favourably on how, in his words, our people have enclosed themselves in tinselled packages that shall never be opened, surely his heart beats as strongly for the well-being of us all, now as it did then. Yet if the Call is made, he too shall be present. And I must wonder at his reaction when, on this occasion that asks great giving of us, we shall come bearing demands.”

Toshiro pondered his words. Sentimental and guileless as the Reindeer King’s way of looking at the world may be, the old stag carried with him the authority of ages gone by, and the filial love of the Sun Princess. The Concordat, a meeting of equals, truly?

This reminded him. Horns sparking, the Mikado drew the parchment of Celestia’s letter to his eminent person.

“I would not worry so,” Toshiro said, unfolding the letter to show Kuno. “In her latest direct correspondence, Princess Celestia pronounced herself amenable to most of our conditions for crystal trade.”

“Apologies, Blessed Mikado,” Kuno said humbly. “But I fear this light is too weak for me to read this message by.”

“Ah,” Toshiro realised. “You do well to tell me, faithful advisor, for it had slipped my mind. Then come, let us read the message together, by the lamp-light. It’ll lend all the more credence to my words.”

They made their way back to Toshiro’s seat, an inlet amidst the shadowy great hall, basking in the churning glow of two large storm bulbs. Quietly, Toshiro again showed the letter to Kuno, who read it with keen interest.

“I understand your meaning,” Kuno said, looking up from the parchment. “This is indeed the Sun Princess breaking new ground for her people.”

“Yes.” Toshiro crisply folded up the letter. “Great changes are afoot in Equestria,” he said. “They pride themselves on harnessing the natural elements, yet only now after generations have passed, do they begin to see storm-clouds as more than pests to clear away, or drastic irrigation measures. When we have netted and tamed lightning’s power for centuries.”

“An appealing prospect, this exchange of resources,” Kuno agreed, “though, like the Equestrians’ own special magic, much trial-and-error lies ahead to discover how well the power works outside the land which birthed it.”

“Princess Celestia is true to her word,” Toshiro said. “If she speaks of co-operation, she means it… For all that I now both anticipated and dread the significance of this Call…”

Uncharacteristically, Kuno did not quite look him in the eye. “Co-operation, when a dispute remains unsettled?”

“What do you mean?” Toshiro asked, knowing full well.

“Forgive me, yet I must ask this. If Princess Celestia’s integrity is worth so much to her, would she accede to a demand about your former student?”

To sigh would have been unregal. Yet, in sorrow and in weariness, Toshiro felt tempted to.

“They say that Princess Celestia values her word,” the Mikado pondered, “but they say she holds another value dear. Showing kindness. And while she may uphold the justice of punishing Kana’s transgression against the laws of the world, the tragic nature of the circumstances behind it are liable to mollify her.”

Before the Prime Minister could answer, a clamour arose from beyond the double doors. Both stags’ eyes swept in its direction, perplexed. They didn’t have long wait for an explanation to this affront, as the doors burst open with a gust that belied their heaviness. Two figures strode in, the one at the back a very anxious-looking Neighponese. Spotting her most eminent masters, she bowed hurriedly, which could not be said of the young drake striding at the front.

The drake was glowering. And, bewilderingly, glowing. Her blue scales shone with inner light.

Toshiro frowned. “It appears your own student’s unruliness catches up to her, making her forget her manners,” he whispered to Kuno. Raising his voice, he faced the blue dragon. “Your Highness. You’re up at an unusual time.”

Princess Ember snorted. “Sure isn’t because I want to be,” she said grouchily, advancing. “Look at this.” She lifted a claw, which glowed like the rest of her. “You got no idea how much that itches.”

Mikado and Prime Minister considered the Dragon Princess. As required, she addressed them in the Language of the Cherry Blossom, painstakingly learned over three years. Yet it was evident she spoke it with greater reluctance than ever.

“A Call, I do believe,” Kuno mused. “But of another sort entirely. It is His Lordship her father who calls to her.”

“And to all dragons,” Toshiro finished for him. “No doubt is this a follow-on to the great Call of the Concordia. How interesting… it invites our cruder, less refined cousins in the West, too, they who live in such aloofness from the world…”

“Hey, old-timer,” Ember said sharply, her claw instinctively balling into a fist. She glanced, blinked, unballed it with a grunt. “I’ll grant you ‘crude’ and ‘unrefined’, but you’re one to talk about ‘aloof’. And that’s what I came here to say,” she stated, drawing herself up, “I’ve been bursting for an excuse to escape this morgue, and now I’ve got it.”

Kuno’s face filled with scorn. “Always an impudent hatchling, Ember,” he berated her. “Have three years taught you nothing? Why must you fritter yourself away in headstrong behavior, when there is so much you could use that strong head of yours for?”

Ember smirked. “Oh, don’t you worry, Master,” she said. “I’ve got big plans.”

“You have a right to leave,” Toshiro interjected. “When in answer to the Call of the Dragon Lord. But you’ve no idea how truly big this event is. This is about more than a contest of leadership. You cannot go without being informed.”

“It’s the Concordia Maxima, a convocation for all of Equus,” Ember stated baldly. Spotting their surprise, she added, “What? Didn’t think Dad would bother sending me here to learn how to read and write, and not brush me up on a bit of history? He says, if brains are the biggest muscles you got, might as well stretch them out like any other.”

Behind her, the Neighponese attendant, though deaf and dumb, shuffled nervously, sensing the weight of the discussion. None really paid her any heed.

Ember coughed, then, awkwardly, she knelt on one knee. “I’m here, because… I ask your permission to depart, Blessed Mikado,” she said, her voice gruff. “I extend my thanks to Master Kuno for his tutorage. By his grace, I know my letters and numbers. I pledge to put the skills taught me to use in a manner that brings no grief upon the Kirin people, my kin.”

Her delivery was stilted, but she’d made the effort to memorise the right words.

‘That one is not so sweet of tongue,’ Toshiro reflected, ‘though certainly sharp of tooth. Perhaps she will yet prove sharp of wit. How great a boon that would be to her kindred...’

“You have my permission, Princess Ember,” Toshiro said, “if my Prime Minister grants his.”

Kuno stayed deep in thought a moment, looked up, nodded curtly. “Go, Ember,” he said. “You were no easy student, but you learned. Pray it shall be enough.”

“Do you mean to leave this very morn?”

Nodding, Ember arose. “It’s a long way home, travelling South,” she replied. “Gotta get a head start. You’ll recall Dad said if ever I had to leave early, he’d send an escort to meet me, in a hideout off Bugbear territory. Who’d wanna tussle with two of us?”

“What about supplies,” Kuno started. “We can offer–”

“No need,” she said, holding up her claw with a grin. “Dragons can help themselves. Just hope this damn glow isn’t gonna stick all the way,” she added, peering at her claw critically. “Folks would see you sneak up on ‘em a mile off.”

Without awaiting their response, Ember made her exit. Like her entrance, it was informal.

She beat her wings, and swooped up, towards the ceiling of the great, cube-like chamber. With one great gulp of air, Ember breathed out a trail of dragon-fire, burning a hole into the roof, and swept through, leaving smouldering pieces of paper to fall in a slow, ashen rain.

Red-faced, the Neighponese attendant hastily retreated, almost tripping over herself. Neither stag tried to call her back. Kuno turned to Toshiro, his expression tired.

“Of course she’d have to show off,” Kuno sighed. “How much do we pay her father for a mere ten squares of that special paper? And she, one of the few whose fire can burn it… You know I tried my hardest to civilise her.”

“One can lead a dragon to gold, but one cannot make it invest wisely,” Toshiro said sagely, tugging at the platinum ring on his left forehoof. “That’s what separates us from our western brethren, dear advisor. Even so, while this she-drake may never be of demure character, her willpower isn’t to be faulted.”

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

“Well now, look who made it!”

After the tale Lyra had told her, Bonbon, consumed by her thoughts, might have missed Rainbow Dash’s excited announcement. Yet it was Lyra herself who, even while clutching that absurd book by Howie Waggoner in one hoof – she didn’t seem keen on letting it go ever again – prodded her with the other, making her turn.

The arrival at the door, whom Dash had greeted so grandly, was Redheart. But in a wheelchair pushed by another nurse. And Bonbon instantly knew it was the Redheart she’d found drugged in her own home, not the impostor she’d uncovered without actually meeting. This Redheart looked drawn and wan, but was making the effort to smile.

She waved feebly. “Hey, guys.”

The cyan-coated nurse pushing her seemed nowhere as happy. Glancing at her, Bonbon could only find one word to identify the look in her eyes – haunted.

“Thanks, Sutra,” Redheart said to her fellow nurse, who merely nodded like an automaton. “I think I’ll be good from here. You’d… you’d better go back and check on our human patient.”

“Yeah…” Sutra said in the smallest of voices. “Yeah, alright…”

That was all she said before she left, walking as if in a daze, her figure vanishing past the edge of the doorframe.

“What’s up with her?” Dash asked, turning around to stare confusedly at the three other visitors in the room, clustered around Sparkler’s bed.

“Don’t you see? She’s had a shock, Dash,” Derpy spoke very quietly, as she hugged her husband and Dinky close to her. “I wonder why, though…”

Redheart rolled forward. “I guess,” she began, sounding hoarse. “Guess it’ll do that to you, learning your friend’s got a murderous twin, and they were hanging around you all day. Princess Luna told me and I still only half believe it...”

“No, that’s not it,” Lyra murmured. “It’s something… Something you didn’t hear, none of you. But I did, when…” She almost froze for a second, eyes fixed on Redheart, before recovering. “When I was in the room with the other Redheart.”

Everyone, including Zecora and Sparkler in their beds further along from Lyra, moved their heads in her direction. Bonbon wrapped a forehoof around her shoulders.

“Why, Lyra?” said Redheart. “What’d she say?”

“I don’t think we should talk about it here,” Lyra said, nodding meaningfully towards Dinky, who’d been unusually silent since arriving. “Celestia said she’d do some explaining. Maybe Sutra needs to talk it over with Alex as well.”

Derpy got the hint. “Alright,” she said, returning to her eldest daughter. “Sure you’re gonna be okay to spend the night, Sparkler?”

“Mom, I am a lot older than that,” Sparkler smiled wryly. She held up her chakra set. “Besides, you’ve brought me all the night comforts I need. And I’ve got a zebra for help.”

Zecora, whose stripes still hadn’t been reverted to their proper pattern, only shrugged.

Derpy nuzzled Sparkler. “If you say so. “She pulled back so the rest of her family could bid her goodbye in turn. “C’mon,” she said when they were done, she and Whooves each taking Dinky by the forehoof. “Time to get some shut-eye. Special order of muffins for all in the morning, everypony.”

Dash yawned, slumping back on her seat. “Boy, I really could with that, too. Muffins second, the shut-eye first.”

As the door closed behind Sparkler’s family, Redheart rolled over to Lyra and Bonbon.

“I’ve met him now,” she told Lyra. “The human. Reiner, that’s what he said his name was.”

Lyra nodded. “Yeah, Celestia came by to get him, after she’d finished talking to Sutra. Poor nurse isn’t looking any better… I hoped the Princess’s pep-talk would work.”

“I’m not sure she gave Sutra a pep-talk,” Redheart said. “She just told her the truth, because it needed telling. Like me. Reiner gave me the rundown, and her sister filled in the gaps.”

“Welcome to the club,” groused Bonbon, attracting a look from both mares, who’d apparently forgotten about her, even though she was holding Lyra. “I’m still waiting for the Princess.”

“What for, Bonnie?” asked Lyra.

Bonbon removed her forehoof, reaching into the curls of her mane. “To show her this,” she replied, pulling out the picture of Twilight’s friends and Lyra carrying the human in the Forest.

She smirked at their startled expressions.

“You weren’t as discrete as you thought, Lyra,” Bonbon smiled. “Featherweight managed to catch you on camera. All I had to do was pop by the Rangers and ask his mother.”

Dash, who’d leant in to listen on the chat, was now taking over indignation duties for Lyra.

“Why– that snooping, prying, Nosey Parker!”

“Is that how you found me, Bonbon?” Redheart asked, turning the wheels on her chair.

The image of a spy-kit, complete with grappling-hook, waltzed through Bonbon’s mind, before she consciously decided this was still strictly need-to-know.

“Sort of. It’s complicated.” She patted Lyra’s free forehoof. “Mainly, I was just getting tired of waiting for Little Miss Minty here to come home.”

It satisfied her to see Lyra blush at this nickname she hated.

“H-how’s Alex doing now?” Lyra quickly asked Redheart.

“Reiner? Gone to get more sleep, soon as we were done.” Redheart sighed. “The good news is, Luna said that, with the… enemy agent in custody, we may have a shortcut to finding out how to treat his burns.” She sighed all the deeper. “I never imagined I’d start thinking like a Guard again, least of all because of… me…”

“Yeah, it’s all real heavy, isn’t it?” Dash agreed from next to them, while Zecora scowled at being ignored. “Can’t believe that, only a few hours ago, I was fighting evil-you,” she said, rubbing her still slightly-red eyes. Then a frown fell on her face. “Well, ‘fighting’... that’s what was weird. All her punches kept missing, like she couldn’t really fight me…”

“Maybe she was being held back.”

Sparkler had spoken, looking up from her chakras.

“Held back?” Redheart said. “By what?”

“Well, it’d be wrong to say ‘curse’, seeing as those don’t exist,” Sparkler said, glancing at Zecora, who nodded along. “But there are… contracts, which force the signers into following them to the letter, no matter what. If she’s from a place where Equestria is evil, and still a Guard, maybe this is it. It’d make the Element Bearers untouchable.”

“That’s awful,” Lyra gasped. “You mean she’s as brainwashed as the Newfoals?”

“What are Newfoals?” Sparkler asked. Lyra felt confused, until she remembered she hadn’t used the word during her rapid explanation. But Sparkler seemed to deduce this, too, and moved forward. “Oh, you mean the human converts. Yeah… that’s debatable. Still, I was there, and from what I saw… I don’t think this Redheart was quite acting of her free will.”

Everyone silently contemplated the implications.

“How bad does that suck?” Dash said, shaking. “I… I mean, it’d be one thing if we were just gonna be fighting evil mirror-usses. Stuff like that happens in comic-books all the time. But if they’re really like us, just forced to be evil…”

“B-but then…” Redheart whispered. “What about Celestia?”

Bonbon didn’t fancy hearing any more.

“I’m going out.” She stood from her chair. “Sorry, Lyra,” she added, unconsciously holding the photo to her chest like a shield. “But I’ve gotta show this to Celestia. Someone rock-steady.”

“Fair enough, Bonnie,” said Lyra, though she sounded disappointed. “And… after that?”

“Perhaps I can help,” Redheart said solemnly. “You spent a whole night watching over Reiner in nothing but a chair, Lyra. I’m sure we can do better for Bonbon. I’ll ask Sutra if they can fit a fourth bed in here.”

“That’s nice,” Lyra said, a little smiliness returning.

Dash yawned again. “Huh… I’d better be going home soon, too.”

“And I’ll be back soon,” Bonbon promised.

* * * * *

Events at the hospital converged as Princess Celestia let out her exclamation in the Royal Canterlot Voice, its sound, though not its words, reverberating through the door of the captive Redheart’s room and into the corridor outside.

It stopped Icewind in his tracks, and he saw that Winter and Selene, posted at the door, were not unaffected by it either. Selene’s wings flared up on defensive instinct. Even Winter broke his icy posture to look back at the closed-off room.

“Ooh, she doesn’t sound happy,” Selene mumbled, not yet noticing Icewind. “Jeeze-Louise, that could’ve given somepony a heart attack! You ever hear her get that mad?”

“No,” Winter said tersely. “It’s most unlike her.”

“What’s going on? Somepony let off a Sonic Rainboom in here?”

Icewind glanced to his left, opposite the door to Redheart’s room. The speaker was a rainbow-maned pegasus, head peeping out the doorframe.

But what caught his notice was the mare who trotted out from beside her.

“Well, that was… timing,” the mare muttered, reaching for a photo lying on the floor. She’d presumably been holding it and dropped it from the shock.

“Miss Sugarbean?”

She stopped to look his way. He moved forward, picking up the photo for her.

“Oh, it’s you,” Sugarbean said, taking the photo. “Thanks.”

“Howdy, Icewind,” Selene smiled weakly. “You seen Gibbous?”

“Yeah, he’s doing okay,” Icewind replied, only briefly glancing away from Sugarbean. “You?”

Selene sighed. “Same as ever,” she said, gesturing towards Winter. “With Mister Freeze here my silent accuser for making him miss his date.”

“Perhaps that was for the best,” Winter said stiffly. “Otherwise I’d have missed duty’s calling.”

Icewind knew him well enough to know he didn’t entirely believe that, but he probably believed in it strongly.

“So…” said the rainbow mare at the open door. “Was that a Royal Canterlot Voice? What’s Luna so upset about now?”

Winter looked at her somberly. “Luna’s busy reading our reports,” he said, gesturing towards Icewind, having finally noticed him. “That was Princess Celestia.”

‘Since… since when does Princess Celestia raise her voice?’ Icewind thought. ‘I’ve never heard her so much as yell at Prince Blueblood. But…’ And the image came back to him of the scene in the room with Reiner, barely an hour ago. The human screaming and threatening and having to be restrained. ‘It’s… you’d think she caught it off him...’

“Crikey,” said the rainbow mare. “Is she gonna go supernova?”

“I don’t think we’re anywhere near that yet,” Sugarbean told the mare, as she turned the photo over and over in her forehoof. “But she mustn’t have had a good day.”

“Eh, it’s not been all bad,” the rainbow mare shrugged. “Sure, having a human around’s made everything go almost as cock-eyed as Discord… but hey, I got my new Daring Do book. And I bet Lyra’s still pleased to know she was right.”

A voice replied to that from the room, at an angle Icewind couldn’t hear, though it sounded like an affirmative response. He wondered who it belonged to… though he had one guess...

He coughed. “Pardon me? Miss Sugarbean? What’s that picture you’re holding?”

Sugarbean’s head shot up. “Oh, um… just something I’ve got to show the Princess… in private, if you all don’t mind.”

“How come?” the rainbow mare asked. “We’ve all seen a human, by now.”

That was what was on the photo? Weird…

‘And… hold on, there. Where’d she get a picture of the human? Isn’t she a civilian? I mean, it’s not like he’s really been kept secret, but… I thought he’d never left the hospital? So when’d they take a picture of him? What is this? How long’s he really been here?’

Sugarbean stared at the rainbow mare critically. “The thing is, Dash, when you’ve lived hearing your kook of a girlfriend spout off her wild theories and one turns out to be true, you wanna know just how much the government knew about it, on good authority.” She slapped the photo. “This here’s my bargaining chip.”

“C’mon, Celestia wouldn’t lie to us.”

No-one disagreed, though Selene’s ears twitched slightly.

“Look...” Sugarbean sighed. “Could you come out here, please?” The mare named Dash nodded and trotted forth. Sugarbean shut the door behind her. “I just wanna find out what Lyra’s got herself into,” she said, in a lower voice, “and how deep.” She looked around at all the Guards. “You guys get that, right?”

This was when she turned to Icewind.

“Right?” she repeated. “I mean, whatever was up with that Redheart… when I found the ‘real’ her, the scene had ‘Changeling’ written all over it. That’s how it seemed to me, anyway! What… what could be worse than that?”

“I can think of a few things…” began Selene.

And so, indeed, could Icewind, even as he was struggling to remember how exactly his meeting with Sugarbean had gone.

‘Didn’t she tell me Redheart was a Changeling?’ he asked himself, straining to unbury this stress-blurred memory. ‘Did she say something about her girlfr–’

Then the door to Redheart’s room opened. Celestia strood out, her bearing regal as ever, but her brow weighed by contemplation.

“Good evening again, my little ponies,” she greeted them, spotting Dash, Sugarbean and Icewind. “Were you waiting to talk to me?”

“Not me, Your Highness,” Dash said. “I’m just gonna up and fly home, in a minute.”

Celestia raised a wing. “Wait, before you do that, Rainbow Dash,” she said, “I’m going to need you first.”

“Oh… okay…”

Sugarbean stepped forward. “But me, Princess,” said the cream-coloured mare. “I… may, may we have a word, please?”

The Princess’s gaze met with hers. “Ah, evening to you, Bonbon,” Celestia smiled warmly. “That’s perfectly fine by me. How is Lyra now? I hope you didn’t tell her off too hard?”

Sugarbean, or ‘Bonbon’, smirked. “Maybe a bit. But it’s okay, she knows it’s gonna end in a kiss and a cuddle. It always does.”

‘Wait, WHAT?’ Icewind felt his heart plummet. ‘She’s… with…’

“Say, Highness,” said Dash, pointing behind the Princess. “You got really loud in there.”

Celestia’s smile faded slightly. “Yes, I…” She sighed. “I fear I had to argue my stance to Redheart. There are questions she raises about how Equestria is governed in our time, all of which I’ve asked myself before… and, normally, I’d appreciate her showing insight. Unfortunately… it’s all wasted, rendered moot, by one fundamental misunderstanding of what I’ve sought to make Equestria stand for…”

“That’s most unfortunate.”

Winter was the one who’d opined this.

“If I may say so,” he continued, “rather than ask what our country can do for us, it’s more important to ask what we can do for our country.”

“Thank you, Sergeant,” Celestia nodded once. “But a country’s dedication to its people is important too, don’t forget.”

“I’m glad you said that, Princess,” Sugarbean remarked.

“Why, Bonbon?”

Sugarbean presented the photo, ignoring Dash looking at her sideways. “Because, with the weirdness Lyra’s got mixed up in… I’d really like to hear what you know, about… about how much worse this could get.”

Celestia remained unfazed. Yet a gleam of recognition lit her eye.

“Naturally,” she said evenly. “And, I’m sorry, everypony…” Again, she surveyed them all. “Yet, from what I know, I fear more troubles lie ahead of us. The human has enemies… and I couldn’t tell it truer than to say those enemies are unlike anything we’ve never seen.”

Rainbow Dash’s ears drooped, Selene stared down at the floor, and Winter Truce’s lips thinned. Bonbon Sugarbean just frowned, anger simmering on her face.

“Okay,” she said. “That’s… basically, what Lyra told me.”

“Let’s speak privately,” Celestia said, moving to her side. “I’d also like to hear your side of this story. Dash,” she added, “please, meet me outside.”

“Um… sure, Princess…”

Celestia turned to Winter. “Thanks for taking on the extra shift,” she said. “You won’t have to put up with it much longer. My sister and I are returning to Canterlot within the hour. You and Icewind are welcome to come along. Oh, and, Corporal?” Now Celestia addressed Icewind. “Did you have news?”

“Not for the moment, Your Highness,” Icewind said dully.

‘This is a nightmare. That mare, Sugarbean… she knew all about the human, but she said Redheart was a Changeling? Yes, ‘Changeling’ is more believable than ‘parallel universe’, but… why lie at all? All it did was get me mad at Redheart… Oh. Oh, no. And… she’s Lyra Heartstrings’ lover. Plus, the way she and Princess Celestia speak with such familiarity… what’s the Princess going to tell her? Does the Princess know something? I… I can’t do this. Not now. I need to wait some more.’

* * * * *

Within half an hour, Celestia was waiting outside the hospital. Luna stood next to her, pensive, and if she squinted, Celestia could just make out the haze of Galatea’s invisible projection, refracted in the moonlight – confirming the third alicorn was still awaiting them in Canterlot. Bonbon had gone to reunite once more with Lyra.

As she mulled over what the former Special Agent of S.M.I.L.E. had reported, Celestia wondered once more at the wisdom of such a mare pairing with a conspiracy theorist like Heartstrings. What was the sense in it? Truly, love worked in strange ways.

And that reminded her, glancing at both her fellow alicorns – one visible, the other invisible. If all went well, Cadance and Shining Armor should be arriving in Canterlot by morning, having taken the night-train, per Luna’s information. Six hours from now. They’d be the first in the convocation of world rulers and representatives to come...

Light shone as the hospital doors opened, and a familiar mare stepped out into the night.

“Beg pardon, Your Highnesses,” said Dash, holding up a cup of coffee. “Had to grab a pick-me-up.”

True, Celestia saw the poor mare had bags under her eyes. She didn’t want to say they’d likely have many more sleepless nights. She herself was feeling the adrenaline wear off, her tiara pressing on her skull. So many things to be considered… Reiner’s locket was still lost… And yet, she’d only be getting four hours’ sleep at most, if she had to meet Cadance and Shining at the station.

“I understand, Rainbow Dash,” she said. “And I’m sorry, I know what a long, long day this has been… “She took out the Chancellor’s Medallion. “Yet I’ll have to ask you come back to Canterlot with us.”

Dash stared. “Why, what for? A-at least let me fetch my book first…”

“That shouldn’t be a problem,” Celestia smiled benignly. “But I need you and the other Bearers to use the Elements for summoning Discord. You see, I agreed that after he’d done that job for me, he’d get a week’s leisure time... someplace of his choosing, and which I don’t know about.”

“Uh… that could be… complicated, Princess,” Dash said awkwardly. “See, Discord showed up earlier while I was with my friends, and he... kinda-sorta took Fluttershy with him.”

“Ah.” Celestia lowered the Medallion. “Sly old goat… yes, that does complicate things...”

Luna brushed back her mane. “But not to worry, Sister,” she said. “If Fluttershy’s anywhere on this planet, I can always visit her in her dreams, and tell her we need her back.”

“In that case,” Celestia said gratefully, “you may be in luck, Dash. We won’t need the Elements. And you can catch some sleep.”

“Ya think Fluttershy’s gonna be gone that long? Like, a week?” Dash goggled. “It’s hardly been five years since she’s dared step out her door for nothing but animals. And that’s only for her friends.”

“Discord seems especially fond of her,” Celestia smiled. “And the feeling, I believe, is mutual. I’m sure she feels quite safe with him.”

~ Antipode ~ Casabronco, Portuary Town of Farasi ~ By the Equestrian Calendar, Second Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

“Well, that could have gone better.”

The Candid, they called him.

As Prince Abraxas muttered these words, awareness did not evade him that such a statement could be made of his land for the whole of the last twenty years. Staring out upon an unending emptiness of the desert dunes beyond Casabronco, a scant few miles from the small stretch of green land that comprised the coast, the zebra Prince of Farasi could only reflect upon an unassailable truth.

Misfortune always seemed to befall Farasi, since the Misfortune Malachite had been plundered.

Abraxas felt heat course through his mane which must have matched his smoldering glare. So long ago now, by his mortal reckoning, and still it burnt to dwell upon how he’d failed his people, on that wretched morn when the Storm King had come knocking. Stories were uttered amongst the smallfolk that his anger at said injustice was that which had turned his mane incandescent. Fine stories to tell, would that the stories were true. However venerable his lineage, where this resplendent property was passed down from father to son, still it seemed tawdry compared to the heroic tales that it sparked to life.

Perhaps, in future days, Prince Abraxas would share in his people’s sense of his worth. But this could only come about once he’d driven away the Grootslang for good.

He did not stand alone in his efforts, Abraxas tried to remind himself, like he did so very often. This much, he was thankful for. Ironically, however, of the four great Princes of Farasi, faced with the peculiar annoyance Abraxas had stumbled upon after having discovered he’d been called erroneously to Casabronco, never might the one best-suited to deal with the problem have instead been his wily and oft truant younger brother.

Alas, neither Prince Barbelo or Prince Aeon, princes of the abada and of the kelpies, possessed that family trait which he and Braze shared when they had so little else in common, the fire upon the very crown of their heads, the one sure means of intimidating the Grootslang into burrowing back under the sands as it fled anew.

But the sands he saw outside of Casabronco, presently, still looked untroubled… As curiously untroubled as he’d found them upon answering today’s summons for help.

In hindsight, perhaps he ought to have given closer thought to the oddity of what he’d heard. Known only as it was for wreaking destruction upon the towns and villages of the land, the last thing to be expected of the Grootslang should be to spot it entertaining itself at a dance-club here in Casabronco.

Certainly, when Abraxas had burst in, roaring with a fire to equal his mane’s, in the short time before his senses had caught up with him, his immediate impression had replicated the misunderstanding of whomever had first reported they’d seen the Grootslang. Considering the long snout of the creature’s face, topped by a pair of wicked yellow eyes, the whole of it complemented by generally serpentine features, this was a forgiveable mistake for a frightened soul to make.

His moment’s relief, once he’d calmed himself, had not lasted. Because if the being at that club was neither the chief tormentor of his people nowadays nor the Storm King returned, then who it had truly been could hardly be called an improvement – perhaps no Yaldabaoth, yet assuredly its closest avatar on this world, he who named himself Discord, Lord of Chaos.

“Your Highness?” said someone.

The interruption drew Abraxas’ eyes away from the desert, as he looked at the young zebra who’d spoken, coming to stand not far from him, upon the edge of the same strip of grassland that marked the town’s border with the desert.

Abraxas nodded subtly. “Yes, Madam Mayor?”

He could tell her title by the red sash she wore, but would have recognised the mare regardless. The little village she was mayor of had long held a special place amongst his love for his people.

“I’m so sorry to call you so soon after a false alarm,” said Marini, glancing around anxiously, “but I fear this may be the real deal. Something’s been seen making the waves beneath the dunes, and it looks as if it’s headed for Zebrat…”

On the outskirts of Casabronco, then.

“Then let us go, quickly,” Abraxas said, his hooves tensing up for the chase even as he said so. “I have wasted time enough here as is.”

Nonetheless, before he ran after Marini, Abraxas was unable not to cast one last glance at the club building, now emptied since his passage and his confrontation with the strange visitors.

As he rushed, sand billowing beneath his hooves and Marini’s, he found himself envying how carefree the scene he’d uncovered had looked. In point of fact, though a dance-club may not be so surprising a place in which to find Discord, what Abraxas had found a surprise was that a creature such as Discord would have companionship. A young mukadzi, a winged pony of Equestria, her complexion as yellow as butter and her mane pink as the sands at dawn.

Indeed, when the initial misunderstanding had cleared up, the mukadzi had proven pleasant enough. It was clear Discord had brought her here to impress her. Maybe even the beginnings of a courtship…

Abraxas felt a small smile forming on his muzzle at the idea, quite in spite of himself, but it did not last. Any more than the momentary détente at the club had lasted, thanks to Discord’s inability to refrain from making a witty quip concerning lighting up the dance floor and the fire in his mane. His reaction to this had not been very princely, perhaps, yet he’d been unable to hold himself. Such flightiness simply reminded Abraxas too much of his own brother.

Yes, had Braze been there instead of him, his brother could have played Discord’s game, using his wily ways to make the Chaos spirit leave by guile. He did have a way with spirits, Braze, reflected Abraxas as he and Marina kicked up a large bank of sand. Banishing Discord by force, conversely, was not a feat he felt sure lay within the power of even the most talented witch-doctor.

Still, Discord had departed, possibly to please the mare, going to who knew which pastures next. Grimly, Abraxas reflected that such could only be expected of a mad god, after all.

He considered the galloping Marini ahead of him. How much did she know of the whereabouts of her childhood friend, these days? Little Zecora, inspired to follow in the steps laid down by Mage Meadowbrook of the ponylands, now become a potion-brewing hermit in Equestria.

Years and years it was, gone by too fast, since Abraxas had his chance to visit the ponylands himself again. Seeing the rooftops of Zebrat nearing and Marini screeching to a halt, as she pointed forward, regret welled up inside him to think of how his duties as Prince had kept him from convening with his old friends so often as he’d wish, in the last twenty years.

Abraxas the Candid set his teeth.

Just as harsh on himself as he could be on others, he still felt he’d let down the Magical Council of the Stonecutters once before, by letting the Storm King take the Misfortune Malachite. What the Starry-Eyed One had thought was not known to him, but as was to be expected, the Caring and the Cheerful had lived up to their names, in missives saying they pinned no blame on him. Yet what he would have cared for most was to see the Cunning once more, after all this time. And someday meet the Council of the Stonecutters’ newest member, that most daring adventurer, on whom was recently bestowed the name of Constant…

He did hope the headstrong pegasus had made a smart decision, by choosing not to keep the Half-Gilded Horseshoe of Sunflare at her own house, the obvious place for thieves to steal it from, instead entrusting it with the keen, yet sometimes overly driven Zecora.

Before Abraxas’s burdened mind could move from this trail of thought to the question of where Braze, ever inclined to roam and to derelict duty, could have gallivanted off to this time, the ground between the houses burst into a cloud of dust. Behind him, Marini couldn’t stifle a startled shriek.

Like some sorcerous devilry of Saddle Mareabia, the beast sprung from the earth. Hissing. The Grootslang drew itself up, contorting upon itself in manners that did little to diminish its height, webbed palms reaching for whatever victims of its rampage that should fall into its grasp, be it belongings, dwellings or living beings. Only an instant that the green beast had required in order to look around, eyes flashing with malice, had granted a respite to all in its vicinity, and this would not last.

“Begone, foul worm!” Abraxas cried, his mane burning bright and blinding, the defiant phrase an overly familiar refrain to him.

There was still the proper ardence within his words, but more ardent was his hope that none would guess it took him twice the willpower it once had for his cry to sound half a strong.

Above this cacophony inside and outside his head, Abraxas barely heard the Call.

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~

For the first time in history, three alicorns were assembled in the throne room of Canterlot. As Luna had passed on attending the Royal Wedding, Celestia and Cadance had been the only two in the room that day. It was a historical moment, all the more as one alicorn was a stranger, lost to history – and with no-one there to document it.

Rainbow Dash had stayed in Ponyville, while Winter and Icewind had dispersed upon arrival, each looking deep in thought. Knowing what good friends they were, Celestia found it noteworthy neither had said a word to the other.

But perhaps it was just as well no-one was there to record the moment. The first gathering here of these three alicorns was going down in bickering, once Galatea had reverted from her earthpony form and finished her shift.

“Were I not truly your sister, you’d know the truth.”

Galatea sniffed upon saying those words, which didn’t do much to undarken Luna’s brow.

“You are an alicorn, Luna. One whose purpose demands an understanding of the hearts and minds of those around you. That is your privilege and burden, and always has been.”

Luna looked to Celestia, who was watching their exchange with a concerned expression. She’d raised a foreleg, allowing Philomena to perch on her as company.

“Dost thou believe her, Celestia?” she asked. Perched on Luna’s crown, Tiberius tilted his head.

“I do,” Celestia replied gently. “It… does not feel wrong. Not in the way I envision a trick like this would.”

Galatea gave a small nod, and Luna scowled. Tiberius followed suit, harrumphing – or squeaking, as possums do.

“Just because we share blood, do not think thou shalt be accepted so readily into our family,” she said scathingly. “Thou art a stranger to us, Galatea, no matter how familiar your visage may seem.”

“I am well aware of that,” Galatea replied softly. “Celestia already said something to that effect when we first met.”

Luna turned to Celestia, an eyebrow raised, “Sister?”

“I did, Luna,” Celestia whispered, feeling a touch of regret. “But that is a matter to be discussed later. For now, I would ask that you prepare to summon Discord. Apparently,” she continued, glancing at Galatea, “we will need his aid.”

“For what?” Luna said slowly. “Oh… are you… you planning to ask his help in finding the locket? Drain the river, turn the fish into magpies, that sort of thing?”

“No,” Galatea said instantly. And sounding almost frightened. “Celestia. Luna. This is important. He can know about Alexander Reiner… but whatever happens, Discord mustn’t learn about that locket.”

“Can you say why?” asked Celestia. “Whatever happened in the other world, I’m sure he could bear it if he was certain it benefitted–”

“Mayhaps. But mayhaps not,” Galatea said darkly. “With the Bearer of Kindness’ promise to never use her Element against him, his affection for her is all that keeps him in check. If he found out the locket exists… he might see it as another weapon to threaten him with. He’d probably react violently. Or if he didn’t, he could still send it floating into the depths, just to be safe. He is volatile. Unreliable. He might simply do all this before we have a chance to convince him otherwise. With the fates of worlds in the balance, it is too risky.”

How much did Galatea know and not know? Celestia found it hard to gauge.

“Alright,” she said. “That’s only good sense. He is a most… well, chaotic ally. But we’ll require him tonight.”

Luna sighed. “I feel tired as it is, Celestia,” she said. “What with everything, my magic is still much too low for personal teleportation... Thank goodness the summoning is designed to work like flicking a switch, at least…”

Celestia laid a hoof on her shoulder. “Get some rest, Sister. We’ll take care of this.”

Luna answered her with a yawn and a smile. “Alright. I have a garden to tend to, if that will be all.” That same smile faded when she looked at Galatea, and scowled. “Have a care, stranger. Our eyes are on thee. Come along, Tiberius.”

Without another word, she and Tiberius left the throne room, closing the door behind them.

“Well then. Not the best of her days,” Celestia said quietly, though whether it was for Philomena or Galatea, she could not tell. “She even–”

“Reverted to her ancient mode of speech, yes,” Galatea said, letting out a quiet, resigned sigh. “I have observed the both of you for millennia, Celestia. I know what her tells are. To be honest, I expected worse.”

Celestia snorted. She nuzzled Philomena. “Go on, Philomena,” she said. “Keep an eye on Luna, would you?”

The phoenix chirped, nuzzling her back. She gave Galatea a glance, before hopping off her perch and flying towards the nearest window.

“I suppose, at the very least, she doesn’t mind,” Galatea remarked, as she and Celestia watched Philomena disappear out the window. “Impressive feat taming her, Celestia. They aren’t known to be trusting.”

“I wouldn’t say ‘tame’ is the right word. Mischievous one, she is,” Celestia reflected. “But I trust her judgement and treasure her company, you know.” She turned to Galatea. “Know a thing or two about phoenixes, do you? Come now. You know so much of us when we know nothing of you.”

Galatea looked away. “There is not much you ought to know about me, Sister. I have nothing to hide. No ambition, no secrets, no desires. All that I am, you know. Mine task, mine purpose, is all there is to me.”

Taking in the sight of Galatea, as she stood in the middle of the throne room, felt as if Celestia were looking at the grey alicorn for the first time, all over again. For a brief, fleeting moment, Celestia thought of the spectre in the Adlaborn grove… and yet, another thought waded in.

“I don’t think I believe that at all. Surely there is more to that ferrymare I met long ago.” Celestia trailed off at Galatea’s wry expression when she looked back at her. Those weary, piercing blue eyes, that spoke of a carefully hidden lifetime. She held her tongue, though, and nothing more could Celestia discern.

“Oh, my,” Celestia said softly. “But… all this time, did you ever find any hobbies? Maybe friends from all over or, little ones to call your own…”

Not for the first time, the haunting look in Galatea’s icy blue eyes so strongly reminded Celestia of Luna’s kin.

“I’ve little time for any of that. Not when duty calls, because it was mine duty to stand apart,” Galatea said – almost recited, Celestia noticed – quietly. “The only chance you could have ever heard of me is from Sint Erklass. He knew that I was meant to exist.”

“He… he did?” Celestia’s stare drifted towards one of the stained-glass windows. “He never spoke of you to us.”

Galatea shrugged. “That was his choice. That was the way of things. Perhaps, by the time you were revealed, he understood well enough that mine role required you know not of me. Or perhaps he believed I had never awoken.” She shook her head. “But this is all ancient history. We must be concerned with the future, and the fight to come against your corrupted other.”

“Indeed,” Celestia said, not really wanting to think of it, much as she knew she had to. Such a strange thought. In her various works, it had been as easy as putting evil queen caricatures of her many facets into the role of petty villains to be vanquished by heroines, to inspire all her little ponies that they can be their better selves.

Redheart’s parting words struck her, right then and there. The bedevilment that compels. Not so much the human, Celestia added, but the mare that was and wasn’t her.

“The thing you said was amiss with my other self,” Celestia began, glancing at Galatea. “The thing that makes my other self so different from me. What was it?”

Galatea frowned thoughtfully. “Truthfully?” she said, walking a circle around Celestia. “There is no way for us to be sure. Not at the moment.”

“That’s not very comforting.”

“No, it is not, regrettably,” Galatea replied gently. “It could be anything. A personal failure, external influence...” She came full circle, back to facing Celestia. “All I can say for certain is that, for her, it happened long ago, which reassures me that you are not similarly corrupted.”

Celestia blanched. “I confess it has been a worry of mine, ever since… ever since Luna. How can you be so certain I am not…?”

Galatea’s smile was a sad little one. “It is mine task to watch this world of ours, Celestia, and you are part of it. Poor watcher I would be, indeed, to let mine sister slip into insanity without noticing.”

“And yet...”

“And yet,” Galatea sighed.

“It wouldn’t have been my first failure, then. What’s another, really, and one that burns a whole world away...” Celestia said wistfully, the memory of a fiery-maned filly, consumed by ambition, resurfacing with a vengeance. She drew a sharp breath.

Galatea’s expression hardened.

“I should have done more as well. Before, and not after,” she said. “Do not blame yourself too harshly, Celestia.” She shook her head. “The whithertos and whyfors, as our people once said, must wait. It is the here and now that matters.”

Celestia let out a small chuckle. “‘Whithertos and whyfors’, indeed. Last I heard of that expression, the nobles still wrote their own complaints to me, a couple centuries before they hired their own scriveners.”

Galatea raised an eyebrow. “Would you prefer I emulated the youth of today and attempted to be, what was it, ‘hip and happening’?”

Her expression saying this was so deadpan, Celestia couldn’t help but let out a real laugh.

“Oh, dear, no,” she said. “I don’t think I’d be able to stand it. There are some things even immortals are too old for.”

“...Am I amusing you, Celestia?” Galatea asked.

“Yes, a little,” Celestia said, laughs subsiding, a smile remaining. “If you are our sister…” She sighed. “We’ve got a lot of catching up to do.”

“You say that as though we shall have time for social interaction. I won’t mind it, personally, yet…”

“There is always time,” Celestia said, inclining her head. “Equestria is built upon the principles of the Pillars of Harmony. The chief of them is magic, expressed best among us through friendship. You must know this, if you’ve observed us all these years, as you claim.”

Galatea raised her brow. “A root philosophy that spawned many branches. Some of which were often ill-applied, or else entirely ignored among your subjects. The Imperial infiltrator is proof alone of that.”

“That may be so,” Celestia retorted, smiling coyly, “but that root still bears many fruits.” At Galatea’s unconvinced expression, she sighed. “Come now, Sister, if you are indeed what you claim to be, then there is cause yet for joy.”

“Joy, indeed?” Galatea said, a touch of old weariness seeping through. “I bring discontent to the sister you’ve always known, ill-tidings to your people, and you call my coming a cause for joy. Often have I thought, fleetingly, you might be too kind-hearted for your own good. Perhaps I was not wrong.”

“I’ve wondered the same,” Celestia said. “And in the end? I would rather open my heart and be wrong than close it and be right. Kindness wins most battles, in the end.”

“Kindness is not necessarily a weapon,” Galatea said.

“No, it is not, but our greatest triumph has been the thousand year peace. How many wars have we averted then, since the last of the Thracian armies of old were repelled from our borders, since Sombra fell with the Crystal Realm?” Celestia countered. “For generations we have been blessed with the freedom to work towards happiness and peace. Perhaps that kept us from fighting a number of battles. It’s in that spirit of kindness that I will accept what you have told me… Sister. Because if you are right, then we may all be marching into deadly danger soon.”

“That much is true,” Galatea said stiffly. “We are likely heading to our doom, nothing more.” Her expression became wistful. “The last battle of the children of Sunflare...”

“Well,” Celestia said, smiling still, “If that’s how it is, I would like to at least have we three, Luna, yourself and I, sit together in friendship and the spirit of family. For surely, if you have been alone so long, such a joy is a thing to cherish?”

Galatea’s expression became unreadable. “It was mine role, and I regret it not.”

“Oh, I did not ask if you regretted it,” Celestia rejoined. “And now you have revealed yourself, Sister, is your role so rigid and so cruel as to demand you remain aloof?”

“It…” Galatea began, and then she sighed.

“What?” Celestia asked.

“After all this time… I never thought I would need to reveal mine identity to you, or Luna.”

“Never?” Celestia asked, frowning in confusion. “Not once?”

Galatea shook her head. “Even when Luna fell, I did not foresee the possibility that I would need to step out of the shadows. I believed you quite capable of handling things without help from me. I would have been a hindrance, if nothing else.”

Celestia chuckled. “Not so capable that meeting another sister wouldn’t be welcome.”

“Still, I never guessed this might come to pass.”

Celestia laid a comforting wing on her sister’s shoulder. “We can never foresee all possibilities, Galatea. Even you, for all that you have observed, have not that power.”

“That is so. It is good to know of mine limitations,” Galatea said, eyes shifting to somewhere beyond Celestia’s shoulder. “They can be many.”

She sighed at that, and Celestia grew concerned.

“What is it?”

“Nothing, really,” Galatea said, her voice even. She averted her gaze, preferring to look at the nearest stained-glass window. “Merely… I fear, when faced with your alternate, that I will not be strong enough. That… that I would only see the little filly I saw in Adlaborn, so long ago.”

She’d kept her voice steady, and her expression impassive. But something passed behind the facade, from the twitch at the corner of her mouth, to the sorrow that belied that old accent.

“That makes two of us,” Celestia whispered. “I’ve many reasons to send Twilight to Ponyville in my stead. A thousand years and still I didn’t have the heart to confront the Nightmare a second time…”

She sighed.

“‘Whithertos and whyfors’,” Celestia recited, giving Galatea a comforting smile. “Don’t concern yourself with that. Not yet.” She kept her wing on Galatea’s shoulder. “There is much still to do.”

“The human’s locket would have been of such great help.”

“And telling us why is one more thing you’ve got to do.”

Galatea glanced at the wing on her shoulder, before meeting Celestia’s eyes, raising her eyebrow. Celestia offered a cheeky smile, and Galatea sighed.

“You do realise,” she said, “this situation has already grown too… chaotic, for secrecy to remain an option as long as I’d have liked. Yet in these times, more than ever, we cannot permit rumour and hearsay to stifle the facts. Every pony linked to the events surrounding the human in Ponyville will need to be addressed.”

Celestia felt her smile fade. “Yes… tomorrow, I shall call the girls to the Palace, have Alexander Reiner transferred to Canterlot, perform a trial-run on his hospital caretakers for the public announcement I’ll have to make one day, soon…”

She gingerly removed her wing.

“But what about you, Galatea?” As her sister looked at her in askance, she went on, “I mean, Madam Heartstrings now knows who you are. It’s only a matter of time before Twilight and her friends find out. What about the world? Should the world hear two life-changing revelations in one go?”

“It’d be more like three,” Galatea corrected. “The human’s existence is a revelation in itself. Yet, if I may be frank… you can keep it at two. There are some secrets, I believe, which are best kept longest.”

“So you’d rather the world didn’t learn of your existence?”

Galatea reached up to touch her goggles, the ghost of a smile on her lips. “Not as the watcher, no. For that, I’ll trust Heartstrings, your student, and their friends. Oh, and your nephew, your niece and her husband. They’ve a right to it, I suppose, as honourary relatives. Beyond that, I can only plan on how I’ll introduce myself to the Reindeer King.”

Celestia did a quick count. “Then aside from him, that’d be twelve ponies, all told, in your circle of trust. Let’s hope it’s a lucky number.”

“Bah, superstition and nonsense, Celestia,” Galatea replied, rolling her eyes. “I find it so frustrating to hear the art of numerology misused like this. I’d have hoped better from you.”

“That was meant as a joke.”

“Ah. Pray forgive me.”

“And I cannot say I’m looking forward to planning for war,” Celestia murmured in resignation, “even if it’s only a war on the defensive, to start with. But you’re right, of course, we must prepare as much as possible, as soon as possible. I only wish there were some other way.”

“You have been blessed with a long peace,” Galatea said, tilting her head. What might have been warmth seeped into her voice. “A peace that you cultivated. Take pride in that, Sister. Millennia of harmony is no failure. All things must end, and from these ashes a kind act will be born.”

“Perhaps,” Celestia said. “But their ending is sad, nonetheless.”

~ West ~ The Mansion of the Proxenos of Delos, Republic of the Tauren Isles ~ By the Equestrian Calendar, Second Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

Darkhoof sat on the beach, the great bulk of his arms resting upon his knees, as he gazed up in silence at the star. The sound of water crashing against rock was his only distraction – on occasion, the waves would land mere inches from him, before receding, their foam carrying away another few grains of pale sands, into which he’d dug the cloven hooves that gave him his name.

At one point, the water did hit hard enough for him to feel the spray. Noticing his sight had turned foggy, he removed his eyeglasses, to wipe them on the fur of his arm. When the put them back on, the night sky still told him the same thing.

Whereas all other stars had moved over the hours, this one had not.

“My Lord,” he heard, from behind him, the voice of his wife. “Come to dinner.”

But he didn’t turn, or answer. Then, without any words between them, he felt her forehooves wrap around his shoulders, her cheek nuzzle his nape.

“How deeply you stare, as if every problem were a question to solve,” she whispered, caressing him mournfully. “We have guests, don’t forget that...”

His duties as proxenos recalled, Darkhoof heeded her at last. Gently removing her forehooves, he rose, shifting so he could see Unathi. The zebra extended her forehoof. He took it, gladly, for her to guide him from the shore, towards the cliffside path.

Though he stood a good three heads taller – but conversely, she was twice as wide in the hips, some adolescent part of his brain noted appreciatively, watching her sway as she led the way – then as now, she had no trouble showing him which steps to take.

Soon they were at the top, facing his mansion’s back door. While Unathi had come get him so he could play the host, it seemed the guests hadn’t done much waiting, if the light and sound from the dining-hall window were any clue.

“Fret not.” Unathi smiled sadly. “Though I’d never have trusted Thymos alone with His Lordship, the creature’s companion appears to exercise a mysterious pull on his madness. And our son likes her.”

Always, she referred to Thymos as ‘their’ son. Never Basil. And yet she had given birth to neither. Darkhoof questioned, in his heart, by what malicious whim of fate the Call had sounded only a day before his elder son was due to emerge from the Labyrinth, the full-blooded bull his younger son would never be.

“Do you have to go to Equestria?” she asked.

He looked at her, quizzical.

“I ask only for the sake of argument,” Unathi said. “I don’t even know what this Call is.”

Maybe there was a pinch of resentment in her voice. He hated to see her so. Gently, he pulled his hand from her grip, but only so he could place it on her back, kneeling to face her at eye level.

“The Concordia is not a request,” Darkhoof said. “It isn’t even an order. It is necessity. I don’t know either why the Call was sounded. All I know is that it can only be made when the time is right, when circumstances are so dire, they dictate that banding together is not merely the right choice, or even a duty, it is merely a fact of life. And so I must go.”

Slowly, she nodded, dutiful resignation plain in her face. “Then I shall be thankful, at least, that tomorrow your eldest son shall return to us, a bull who can oversee our household in your stead. But, oh, my sweet Lord! Two years Thymos has been waiting for his brother... Now he must say goodbye to his father.”

Unspeaking, he leant in and kissed her.

“I won’t go immediately,” Darkhoof whispered, after they’d pulled apart. “Not until Basil is out of the Labyrinth. He shouldn't be thrust into this responsibility without warning. The Concordia can grant me one day with all my family.”

What neither said was how strange it would be for Basil to suddenly be in a position where his word counted more than hers, in his father’s absence. She had always been readier to use the rod on him than his brother, when both were boys. Her reasoning had been that he could take it where Thymos could not.

“I’m glad,” said Unathi. “Now come. Let’s not keep them waiting.”

While nights were seldom cold on the Tauren Isles, Darkhoof felt a new warmth once back inside his abode, entering the dining-room. By the light of oil-lamps from all four corners, the painted eyes of old heroes commemorated on his walls flickered with life, an effect he found most comforting. Someday, he would be gone for good, and sons of his sons would look upon his own fresco.

The clepsydra in the room’s centre told him he’d been outside for two hours. Normally, as he watched his guests helping themselves from plates of grapes and olives, he’d have been in the right to rebuke them for eating without their host – yet the lapse here was his, and most important was to make sure Thymos was eating properly.

“Greetings,” he said, speaking in Common. “I beg your pardon for my absence. I trust that my wife knew to compensate my failings as a host.” He added, almost perfunctorily, “As proxenos to Equestria, the food and drink of my house are the share-right of any Equestrian.”

Reclining on his chaise-longue, the Dyonisian Lord raised his chalice in mock-salute.

“Well, I wouldn’t exactly call myself Equestrian,” Discord chuckled, popping an olive into his mouth, “but my friend here – ooh, feels funny saying that, doesn’t it? Lord Discord has a friend! Anyway, my friend here most certainly is. And I must say, you are a much better host than our last one, Philip.”

Close by, the mare Fluttershy, whom Darkhoof saw was helping Thymos eat, just gave a tired, knowing smile. Although she was putting in the effort, her eyes undeniably drooped every few seconds. The pegasus was what Discord had called ‘jet-lagged’, another reason for Darkhoof’s self-reproof in leaving them hanging.

However, Unathi didn’t seem to feel as conciliatory, her nostrils visibily twitching at Discord’s use of his first name.

“You presume much, Lord Discord,” she said, heading to check on Thymos. “It’s no surprise that you showing up would herald trouble. Or do you claim that my husband hearing the Call was coincidence?”

“As a matter of fact, yes,” Discord said smugly, while Darkhoof took a seat by him. “Despite what your philosopher of a husband may espouse, not everything in this world works by cause and effect. Say, you guys get around to quantum physics yet?”

“Funny you should mention that, sir,” Darkhoof smiled. “Three years ago, I had the chance to test out a most intriguing theory, involving a cat in a box.”

“Oho? Do tell.”

“Yes,” said Darkhoof. “Why, the idea came to me from an Equestrian, what’s more. A wandering showmare claimed that, once the cat was in the box, and out of sight, it’d cease to exist.”

“And how did that pan out?”

“Unsatisfyingly,” Darkhoof admitted, pinching his nose-ring. “In hindsight, I should have read it in the mare’s character. She was about as full of herself as that renegade, Ionisus, the one who calls himself ‘Iron Will’.”

“Oh, my,” piped a small voice.

Darkhoof turned to the buttery pegasus. Unathi had taken over caring for Thymos, allowing his female guest to listen in on the conversation.

“Something troubles you, Dame Fluttershy?”

“No, I just…” She barely held down a yawn. “Ugh… I think I know both the people you’re talking about... Meeting them didn’t go very well. The…” Again, almost a yawn. “The world’s feeling both too big and too small, and it’s making me tired…”

He proferred an empty chaise-longue. “Then rest, please. It’s a small thanks for the care you have shown my boy.”

The pegasus nodded gratefully. “Goodnight, Thymos,” she told his son, to be answered by a fond grunt. Then she turned back to Darkhoof. “You know,” she said, laying down to the rest. “I felt worried when Discord said we were off to visit the Minotaurs, but you’re not what I expected you to be.”

She was dozing almost instantly after that. Darkhoof looked askance at Discord.

“She’s a nervous one,” Discord explained, swilling his chalice. “I guess she thought because I like Minotaurs, they must be a lot like me. Big, rowdy, loves to get wild–”

“In fairness,” said Darkhoof, pressing his palms as he threw Unathi a glance, “that image isn’t wholly unfounded.”

“True, but usually on special, festive occasions,” said the Dyonisian Lord. “And she is one thing I’m not. Peace-loving. Still,” he nodded in Thymos’ direction, “I’d have thought twice of bringing her, if Minotaur culture wasn’t so different from when I was last around.”

Darkhoof tried hard not to think about that, even as he watched his wife help Thymos raise his spoon with a thin, emaciated arm. Some of the soup missed his lips, to go dribble down the scraggy fur of his chest. With experienced patience, Unathi carefully placed the spoon in its bowl and picked up the napkin, though not before making sure nothing had splashed onto the crutches, resting against the table.

There were promising signs, Darkhoof told himself. Thymos’ horns were beginning to show. Yet they’d started growing two years too late, and still weren’t half as large as they should be on a fourteen-year-old boy...

“Sand Plague, eh,” Discord said thoughtfully. “Disease is one enemy no warrior can fight.”

Darkhoof closed his eyes. “But it’s a war we won, in the end,” he said forlornly. “And despite my loss, I was able to save one life from the throes of death.”

He heard more than saw Discord smile. “See, I knew Fluttershy would like you.”

“She’s a good mare,” Unathi’s voice said tersely. He reopened his eyes in time to see her throw the napkin on the table. “And that isn’t something to be wasted.”

“Isn’t there…” Darkhoof began. He swallowed. “You’re skilled in reworking the world, Lord Discord. Isn’t there something… you could do for him?”

Discord lowered his chalice, looking at Thymos. He rested his chin upon his paw. His expression had gone unusually serious.

“I know she’d want me to,” Discord said quietly, gesturing at Fluttershy. “But my magic is tied to me. Some things I can create, like the Everfree Forest, which start out tiny, only to grow over time, in ways even I can’t predict… Most things I do, however, need my presence to keep going. If I worked my magic on your son, he’d have to be bound to me forever. Or else the spell would fade. Besides… I promised her, no more tampering with minds.”

“You’re right,” said Darkhoof, while Unathi fed Thymos another spoonful. “That is a sacrifice I cannot make.”

“Healing is not Lord Discord’s speciality, Darkhoof,” Unathi commented. “His talents lie elsewhere.”

Before he could reply, there was a yelp and a thump. Though it hadn’t been so loud, it made Thymos drop his spoon. He moaned, and Unathi had to comfort him.

What had happened was Fluttershy had fallen off her chaise-longue.

“Discord…” she panted. “Luna… in a dream… She said… need you back in Equestria.”

The Chaos Lord sighed. “Seriously?”

“She said it was life or death,” Fluttershy wheezed, looking up at him. “Discord… please.”

“Oh, fine,” Discord muttered. “No rest for the wicked, huh? Well. Fluttershy, think it’ll be okay if I leave you here?”

Fluttershy gazed at Darkhoof and his family. Unathi had finished comforting Thymos, and Darkhoof was quietly observing, curious to see where this went next.

“I’ll be alright.”

“Good.” Discord took a final sip from his chalice. “Philip, keep her safe for me, will you?”

“You have my word.” Darkhoof frowned. “But, for someone who came to my house requesting space to recuperate in, you seem hale enough to take leave and travel, Discord.”

“Eh,” Discord grinned. “Guess that’s just how good the air is in the Tauren Isles! I’m sure that once Sunbutt’s done with me, I’m gonna need it all over again. Poor little me.”

And, as usual, he snapped into thin air.

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~

When Discord appeared in the half-finished throne room, manifesting in the air with his trademark ostentatious flash of light, he only briefly glanced Galatea. Unlike Celestia and Luna, who were seated up on the dais as usual – the two thrones had finally arrived, thank goodness – she stood to the side, where one might have mistaken her for a sculpture.

“Oh, hello there,” Discord said. “Did those slow-pokes finally finish the renovations? Fancy the new throne room, Celly.”

Celestia herself glanced towards Galatea, who merely peered through narrowed eyes at Discord. Her expression was that of the plain and unassuming worker in the throne room, yet Celestia had experience with people concealing their feelings. Looking out for ‘tells’ as she was now, she hypothesised that Galatea hid repulsion, not for Discord’s bizarre appearance, but something which offended her on a deeper level.

“Greetings, Discord,” Celestia said. “We require your help with a delicate matter.”

“‘We’?” Discord asked, looking between Celestia and Luna with a slow smile. “Whatever for? In case you hadn’t noticed, I was on vacation, Celestia.”

Indeed, he’d showed up not just as himself, but wearing a peculiar assortment consisting of a most gaudy flower-patterned shirt, cap and sunglasses. Celestia wondered if he’d been wearing these before leaving, or changed along the way.

“Well, now,” Discord said casually, taking note of Galatea. “Who’s the statue?”

Galatea blinked first. Yet she only blinked once. She was still staring at him with what amounted to barely-concealed dislike.

“Yeah, that threw you off, didn’t it?” Discord smirked at them. “I know, I know. The irony. Me, Lord Discord, asking that question. I’ve had some experience with being a statue.” The mirth left his face. “Can’t say I enjoyed it much. So, are you going to tell me, Celly, where you got the golem from? You didn’t happen to have an other sister lying about, did you?”

“This may sound crazy, even to you, Discord,” Celestia said softly, while Luna scowled, “except it turns out that I did… That we did.”

“Wait, really?” Discord said, in mild surprise.

Momentarily, the Lord of Chaos said and did nothing, merely continued to hover where he was. His usual quick-wittedness seemed conspicuously absent. But it did not desert him for long.

Before Celestia knew it, there was that flash, and the throne room had converted into an expansive theatre-like space, with a stage upon which she and the two other alicorns abruptly found themselves sitting on chairs, blinded by overhead strobelights that barely let her make out the rows full of seats beyond the stage.

She was bewildered to see Discord with his back turned to them, standing before a podium while he addressed an unseen audience, now smartly dressed in a tuxedo.

“And the winner for best screenplay goes to…” Discord began dramatically, summoning an envelope and tearing it open. “Why, what a surprise!” he said, as he unfolded the note inside. “Princess Celestia! She gets all the awards!”

He turned to her while applause rose from what reminded Celestia of the Public Assembly at the Hall of Unity.

“Ahh, it’s as I’ve been saying for years,” Discord sighed, pulling up a gold figurine. “These awards ceremonies have longed ceased to carry any meaning.”

Celestia placidly ignored him, just waiting for this to run its course.

“Discord!” Luna snapped, leaping off her chair. “Concentrate!”

“What else do you think I’m doing?” Discord asked haughtily. “This is my way of processing. You’re meant to be the dreamweaver, aren’t you aware of how people gather their thoughts?”

“As interesting as this had been,” Galatea said, rising from her chair, the sights and sounds of Discord’s construct appearing to wash right off her, “I’d like to get back to business.”

“Ooh. Goal-orientated, are we?” purred Discord. “You remind me of Twilight Sparkle.”

Nevertheless, the Lord of Chaos must have felt intrigued by Galatea, because he needed no further persuasion to lift his claw and snap.

The throne room reverted to as it was before, halfway through renovations, and everyone had resumed their previous places, including Discord in the air, back to wearing his tourist getup.

“Now,” said Discord. “I’m guessing you called me here for a reason? Most people don’t call on me for the pleasure of my company, you know.”

“I’ll get to the point,” Celestia said. “We need you to breach the barriers of this world and to reach another.

“You shall provide the raw energy,” Galatea cut in. “I’ll grant direction.”

“Ooh, breaking things, how fun!” Discord said. “And quantum-hopping… I did it before, a long time ago. Ahh, I was a different beast then,” he sighed, with insincere theatricality. “I just have three different questions.”

He turned on the spot, holding up his lion’s paw.

“Where?” A digit went up. “Why?” A second digit went up. “And who are you? Are you gonna tell me that, or do I need to keep up with some droll nickname?”

Peering over his sunglasses, Discord pointed at Galatea, whose eyes narrowed still further.

“Mine name is of no matter to you,” the grey alicorn said darkly. “And you can call me whatever puerile sobriquet you pick. You are, after all, what I believe modern parlance calls a ‘smartarse’.”

Celestia and Luna exchanged questioning looks. This was a rather different attitude than expected from this newcomer.

“I know mine true name, and names have power.” Galatea finished. “Now will you help us or not?”

“I could, sure,” Discord retorted. “But you see, I don’t know you, which is pretty surprising, given that you’re an alicorn and I’m usually very good at knowing when beings like you are flittering about. Noisy beings, you are.”

Galatea gave a humourless smile. “Then I am grateful to stymie you, creature.”

Discord grinned, before disappearing and reappearing right in front of her, floating at eye level whilst lying prone, as though on a bed. He lay his chin on his hands and smiled at her, tapping her goggles.

“Why should I help you, Missy? What do I get?”

“It was mine impression you’d promised to aid Celestia in times of need.”

“That would be the big, fluffy white one,” Discord emphasised. He extended an arm to unnatural lengths, tapping Galatea’s goggles. “You’re not fluffy enough.”

“She isn’t me, no,” Celestia put in. “But I am asking you, Discord. Please.”

“I want an answer to my question,” Discord said, not looking at Celestia. “Why? I’m not one of your golden-armoured shinies, Celestia. I don’t jump when you ask how high. I want to know how bad that snake oil you’re peddling is.”

“Do you think you’re in a place to demand anything from us?” Luna asked, snorting indignantly.

“I’m the one you need help from,” Discord retorted. “So, yes.”

There was a pause, and then Galatea started chuckling. Luna looked at Celestia, who held up a wing to forestall any further comment.

“Shall I tell you something, Discord?” Galatea asked, once her chuckle had abated. “When I witnessed your age of discontent, and still chose not to reveal mineself, placing mine faith in Celestia and Luna… It made feel as I have only felt perhaps once…” She momentarily slowed. “No, twice before in mine life. Aware that I could do so much, and yet, truly, utterly impotent. You wouldn’t know what it’s like, would you?”

“Nope, can’t say that I do,” Discord said, resting his arms behind his head. “Oh, I’ve had those flashes of panic, when the Elements were used against me,” he said airily, his eyes closed. “I’m beast enough to admit that. And it’s a drag, spending centuries turned to stone, just waiting for your moment to come again… But having no power at all? Nah.”

“Strangely,” Galatea said, with a look of guile, “I find myself pitying you all the more for it. Because deep down, you’ve felt dissatisfied all your life, haven’t you?”

“Excuse me?” Discord asked. He actually sounded dumbfounded.

“You have so much power, so much talent,” Galatea said, a malicious twinkle in her eyes. “So much control over things, despite your penchant for randomness. It all comes so easily to you. Look at what you did just now,” she commented, nodding at the half-renovated throne room. “With but a snap, converting this room into a wholly different layout and back. You don’t need to learn how things are put together, because anything can be changed on your whim.”

He tipped the brim of his cap. “So what if I do?”

Galatea leant forward. “Because yet you get bored easily. You desperately, desperately seek gratification where you can find it, yet you hate losing. You don’t go looking for a challenge, only the ways to show off how you run rings around people. It’s a competitive game you like to play, but never one someone else can win, isn’t it? You just said breaking things is fun.”

Discord flashed to behind Celestia. “I need an adult,” he whimpered, perhaps only half-jokingly, while Luna rolled her eyes, evidently chafing at keeping quiet.

“Take another look at the work around here,” Galatea said decisively. “What does it look like?”

Judging by his curious stare, Discord must have deliberately held back any witticism he had, in order to take a chance on where the grey alicorn was going with this.

“Frankly, my dear,” Discord said before long, “the place looks a mess.”

Galatea smiled thinly. “That’s right,” she said. “A mess. When you don’t have the skill to instantly change things, nothing’s so neat as to go from one state to another… Physics, you know.”

“And your point being?”

“Nothing,” Galatea said calmly. “I’d just have thought a Chaos Lord would have an appreciation for the organised chaos that is labour.” She sighed wistfully. “The neatness of getting everything you want with a snap… I believed it’d come to feel rather dull.”

She paused, allowing the words to seep into the silence.

“How would it feel,” Galatea finished, “to use what your powers to be helpful for a change?”

Celestia saw Discord’s eyes dart around the throne room. Almost on reflex, it seemed, he prepared to raised his claw to snap. But then he broke into a devious grin.

“Well, aren’t you a wily one,” said Discord. “Using what I must say I personally call some rather spurious logic to twist your argument around… I could be proud! Now. What’s your offer?”

Galatea took a deep breath.

“There is another world we must reach, one… occupied, by a corrupted Celestia,” Galatea told him. “And we must confront her, lend our aid to those fighting her. It will be… dangerous” She paused. “Will you lend us the power we need to reach that world?”

Discord chuckled. “Another world, you say? Oh, I do like this. What infinite possibilties the multiverse holds, indeed! And in return, I’d get a go at the ‘evil’ Celestia?”

Galatea hesitated but a moment. “Yes.”

The Chaos Lord let out a long, evil-sounding cackle. He bowed.

“You have a deal.”

“We will meet you tomorrow morning, Discord,” Celestia said quietly. His gleeful reaction had come as no surprise, but it still brought her no pleasure. “We shall begin then.”

“Whatever you say, Celly,” Discord said. “Wait till I tell Fluttershy.” He disappeared in another flash of light.

Galatea sighed, her elbows sagging. “That was… tense.”

“Where did you learn to do that?” Luna asked.

“Do what?”

“Put up that act of yours,” Luna continued. “Where did that come from?”

Galatea waved a dismissive hoof. “When I attended university, I took an elective course on drama. It is quite useful, mind you.”

Luna raised an eyebrow. Celestia suppressed a laugh. And Galatea, for her part, merely tilted her head. “It’s a long story.”

“Acting– well, you could have been more diplomatic with him,” Luna chastised her. “We didneed his help, much as it rankles me to say it.”

“And we have procured it,” Galatea countered.

Celestia stepped between the two of them, a gentle smile on her face, her wings raised to forestall further conflict.

“Both of you, please,” she said. “Remember we are sisters.”

There was a short pause, and then Galatea let out another sigh, looking at Luna. “Mine apologies, Luna. Discord’s reign was a troubling time for me, as well. I did not wish to make light of that period, no.”

Luna nodded stiffly. “Accepted. Though, I still–”

“Luna,” Celestia said, clearing her throat.

Her sister rolled her eyes. Celestia didn’t pull her up on it. She was looking at both the alicorns she called sisters, now.

“In a week’s time,” Celestia told them, lowering her wings, “the Concordia’s representatives will gather from around the world at the Hall of Unity. I have a duty to tell them I intend to aid the human race, and that if I do, we must be prepared for consequences to the whole of Equus. Many shall protest. Many would sooner close their eyes. And some will hate us for it, feeling that, in our gesture of help, we are bringing doom upon them. This shall likely be the most dangerous undertaking in all our years.”

“That much,” Galatea said quietly, her expression resigned, “is true. If you will excuse me.”

She turned and trotted out of the throne room, shifting into an earthpony as she did so. Luna and Celestia were left alone.

“Seriously,” Luna said after a moment. “I do not like her.”

“Oh, my,what a twist, Luna.”

“You’re not helping, Tia. Especially when you sound like one of Discord’s stupid quips.”

“Come now, I thought you of all people might like her acting. Perhaps she knows a thing or two about theatre.”

Luna sighed. “I suppose,” Luna retorted. “Maybe you ought to ask her for advice there. And would that not be further reason not to trust her, what with all the… theatrics?”

Celestia could only let out a short, melodious chuckle at that, even as Luna harrumphed. “Oh, I’ve seen her backstage,” she said, putting a wing over her sister, “with neither a pair of wings, nor a horn. And believe me, Luna, if she wanted to do harm, as I stood alone, she would have done it right then and there.”

“Do you think so, Tia?” Luna asked tenderly. “And might we actually… perhaps we ought to ask Grandfather first, for good measure.”

“Alright, Luna,” said Celestia, smiling. “We shall. Take comfort in that, Sister. Even as others come to the Convocation, we’ll still have family.”

~ South ~ The Throne Room of the Ebony Hive, The Badlands ~ By the Equestrian Calendar, Third Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

Queen Chrysalis sat back on her throne, fuming.

It felt strange, for one who enjoyed the small luxuries of being sovereign in the wastes of the Badlands, but at her lost moments, her throne was the safest, most comfortable retreat. It was the wellspring of half her power in this forsaken place, her birthright as Queen of the Hive, the shield which kept at bay the Equestrians and other magic-bearing trespassers. Here, in the Ebony Hive, the power belonged to Chrysalis, and no other.

Which was why she hated to be reminded she wasn’t the only Hive Queen in the world.

Alright, at special times of the year, she paid tribute to the First Mother, same as all those wretches who scraped an existence on this miserable world. And she’d have to go through the tedious process of publically giving a piece of her own chitin, same as the other Queens, to the great statue of the First Mother. And bow before it, same as the others. Symbolic, in theory, of how all were equal in the face of change.

She’d made it her life’s work to prove this wrong. Years of clambering her way to the summit were a testament to that. Starting when she’d clawed and bit at each of her sisters in the clutch of matriarch-born grubs who were one day to produce a Queen. Later, by using every trick to make her so-called fellow queens understand Chrysalis kow-towed to none.

Canterlot should have been the pinnacle, the crown jewel. It had turned into anything but.

And now she’d been forced to accept two unwelcome visitors into her own home. Well, if that was how it was, let them come here, into her inner sanctum. Although the power of the Throne, drawn from her special bond with all Changelings in her thrall, held no sway over either a warrior of the Red Hive, or even a lesser queen of the Harlequin Hive, Chrysalis knew other means to assert herself.

Thus, they approached her throne, the petite Harlequin Queen riding the great Red Warrior.

“Ebony Queen,” the warrior greeted.

Her twin horns, fiery mane and wingless carapace, built upon such a massive bulk, said it all. After her last conquest, Chrysalis had come to appreciate the advantages of such features; the Red Queen’s broodlings had served her well. This one didn’t look very servile, however.

“It is…” said the Red Warrior, “most interesting to make acquaintance with you. My matriarch sends regards for your… victory against the equines.”

While the words were pleasing, Chrysalis still suppressed a shudder. She’d never liked how these Red Hivers communicated, a trilling sound which was more felt than heard. Just a little too alike to the bug pests she ardently wished to make Changelings transcend one day.

Still, the words did please. They meant the Red Queen’s loyalty remained assured, for now. Now, to find out more about this new Harlequin Queen…

“You bring me fair homage, warrior,” Chrysalis said, putting on her most genial tone. “And may I ask that you return my thanks to the Red Queen. While I fell back from Canterlot without all its riches, victory was indeed mine that day, for the Sun Princess was struck down by my power. And that will forever be a stain on her legacy! Celestia is not invulnerable. It’s merely a matter of time until the Hives return, with my Ebony Hive leading the front.”

“Forget not our purpose here, Ebony Queen,” the warrior said with a slight growl, “my matriarch knows this, and expresses confusion regarding how close victory was. The Amberites are already calling for your Hive’s failure to be accounted for, and there is growing doubt.”

“Mandible, that’s enough.”

A youthful voice spoke, smelling sweet and fresh.

“Queen Chrysalis’ Hive isn’t the only Hive to run into failure, these past few seasons. The Amberites always call for something, even when full victory occurs.”

Atop the warrior rose the other visitor, the young queen. Chrysalis could see how underdeveloped this successor stood, probably hadn’t even finished the third molting yet. She, of course, fit the mold of the Harlequin Hive – diamond marks and patterns among a green-tinted chitin. Wings as well, probably. Her mane and tail were long as an adult’s, though still held specks of grey in them.

“I apologise for the words given by my steed and escort, Ebony Queen,” the young queen said softly, “my mother gives sympathies for your losses and recent defeat. She had hopes Canterlot would’ve proven grand as a new resource for the Nine Hives.”

‘I don’t need your sympathy, or your mother’s, you wet-behind-the-ears grub,’ Chrysalis thought to herself, keeping the sourness off her face with effort.

Yet this was force of habit. In truth, she’d expected a turnaround from the proud warrior, and prepared herself to deal with it. This opening of the new queen, the unknown player, was an interesting development. Unless the new Queen of the Harlequins was putting on a facade – and given they were all Changelings here, the possibility wasn’t to be discarded – a willingness to pacify shone through. That was good.

So Chrysalis chose to tread lightly. At least to begin with.

“Welcome, young queen. And speak not of defeat,” she said amiably, laying her forehooves upon the armrests of her throne. “To think of defeat is to invite it. Let me give you the following wisdom. This is no defeat, only setback.” She paused. “I believe we have not been introduced, young one. What is your name?”

The young queen took a moment to compose herself, another weakness.

“I am Papillate of the Harlequin Hive,” she introduced herself, bowing, “representing my mother at this time, under her request. She believed this would be a trial for my future.”

A most polite little grub.

Before, Chrysalis had planned to show up this new queen, but she hadn’t thought Papillate would be so eager for cordiality. It gave her an idea. Although she had acquired a bad reputation over the years, and rightfully so – why not show some cordiality herself, when it was for such a pleasant guest?

“Your stance on the Amberites does not go unnoticed,” Chrysalis commented. “But we’ll get to them when the time comes. First, how about a little drinkie?”

The young queen nodded. “Please.”

“Very well,” Chrysalis smiled. “I have a selection.” She clapped her forehooves, an unnecessary gesture to summon her drones, but an ostentatious one. “Which of these would you prefer? Fresh water from the spring? Cactus juice? Or… how about some lemonade?”

Papillate blinked in surprise. “I’m sorry? I… don’t think I’m familiar with that last drink.”

“Yes, yes...” Chrysalis said, as a serving-drone entered with a tray bearing three glasses of the stuff. “You will find that, while Canterlot didn’t yield all the love it had to offer, my Hive and I did not return empty-hoofed from our raid. This, dearie, is refreshement as only Equestria can offer. You should try it.”

Without further prompt, her drone placed itself, with its tray of lemonade, before Papillate’s bewildered eyes.

Papillate looked to Mandible, but the warrior stood impassively. She turned to stare at the yellow liquid. Beneath her mane – were her horns undeveloped as well? – a light shone as a glass rose to her mouth. After hesitating, the young queen sampled its contents.

“It’s… sweet. Like honey’s nectar.” Papillate noted, sounding surprised at the taste. “The equines are hoarding this?”

“This, and much more,” Chrysalis said, affecting sadness.

With a flick of her horn, she levitated her own glass of lemonade towards her forehoof, and took a sip. She was beginning, slowly, to feel at ease, though the Red Warrior, Mandible, had not touched a drop of the lemonade. Sighing, she slouched back into her throne.

“The equines talk of sharing, but they do not share with the likes of us,” she said. “Now say, Papillate. Once your delight at this nectar’s sweetness wears off, you may think I’ve only been grabbing the sprinkles. Perhaps you’d be right. Perhaps the Amberites have good reason to say more could be done.”

She paused to let the words sink in.

“Yet see also how my Ebony Hive followed me as one, into Canterlot. How we shared our victory while we had it, how we all met our setback as a single hive, bound by royal jelly. In our ups and our downs, the Ebony Hive and its Queen are one. Where were the Amberites, then, if they desire these treats as much as we do? Did a single one dare to move out, grab what they could, even as their decaying hives turn to sand?”

The younger queen stayed silent, a thoughtful look in her dually-pupiled eyes, until–

“Ex-excuse me, Ebony Queen. I believe I’ve forgotten something,” she suddenly said, setting the glass back on the tray and standing straight. “My half of the exchange, it seems.”

Just as hoped. Feeling a tingle of excitement, Chrysalis grinned, drawing herself up.

“Good,” she whispered. “Then come to me... Step boldly, I won’t bite.”

Papillate approached slowly, eyes now closed, as if in mute prayer. She stopped before Chrysalis and slowly reopened them, to look deep into Chrysalis’s own. Her long mane parted to reveal a sharp, diamond-shaped stub of a horn that had yet to fully mature. Magic was beginning to collect onto its tip.

Chrysalis knew what she was expected to do. Yet it was crucial to make the younger queen comprehend that, even if she followed procedure, Papillate wasn’t her equal in this.

Ceremoniously, Chrysalis’ horn alit, and with a nod, she touched it against Papillate’s. The flux of both queens’ magic caught in a nexus. The spark of one began to flow into the other. Feeling, memory, thought, like the motes of pollen in a wildflower, all brushed another and mingled together in snatches of light within Chrysalis’ mind, just like in Papillate’s.

For a minute, they held, mentally joined as each quietly gazed into the other’s eyes. But Chrysalis required something more, befitting her status as Queen of Queens. Subtly, she raised her right forehoof to stroke Papillate’s cheek. Though Papillate made no reply, she understood. Reaching out to take hold of Chrysalis’ forehoof, she brought it to her lips and leant forward to formally kiss it.

It was the opening Chrysalis had been waiting for.

Her other forehoof shot out to grab the younger queen by the scruff of her neck. With Papillate’s lips still pressed on her forehoof, the younger queen’s cry was muffled out. Chrysalis paid her no heed. Applying just enough force to grip upon Papillate’s neck, she brought the younger queen’s head to a level below her chin, careful not to sever the electric connection between their horns, though they no longer touched.

Licking her own lips, Chrysalis opened her mouth wide, above Papillate’s exposed horn. Her forked tongue darted out to touch the sparking tip. It crackled and frazzled, and the two-way flow of magic ceased, but the flow itself did not. Chrysalis closed her eyes contentedly as she drank the essence of Papillate, a stream of emotion redirected into her expectant jaws. She kept it up, even as her lungs began to protest, telling her she had to stop, take a breath, lest she choke – the delicacy pouring from the struggling younger queen was too delightful! Chrysalis held her down, minute by minute, until she thought she would burst.

Eventually, however, her appetite was satiated. Almost.

Reluctantly, Chrysalis eased her grip on Papillate, gingerly reopening the gap between them. Released from the Ebony Queen’s grip, Papillate gawked up at her, but she got to say nothing as Chrysalis planted a kiss on her forehead.

“Delicious,” she breathed. “A fine first offering, my dear young one.”

“I–” The young queen tried to speak, her eyes wide with shock, “I’m… I’m glad you like it, Ebony Queen?”

“Oh, very much,” Queen Chrysalis said sweetly, ignoring the stoic warrior she knew hovered in the background. She trailed her forehoof down Papillate’s chitinous back. “You don’t mind if I keep you in my lap just a moment longer, do you?”

“U-uh…”

“I believe that’s enough for now.” Mandible spoke up, getting in between the two, “she’s still young, Ebony Queen. I think her mother would appreciate it if you would give her reprieve from being a meal.” Single-coloured eyes glared into Chrysalis, almost challenging her. “You wouldn’t want to overstep yourself and suffer, would you?”

Though it didn’t make her happy to think, Chrysalis had to recognise the warrior had a point. Still, she wasn’t about to openly admit it.

“Why must you Red Warrior types always be so uptight? You’re no fun,” she pouted, blowing out her cheeks. “Besides, you do me and the young one both a disservice. Little Papillate here is no meal. Think of this as her… education.”

She smiled at the still startled-looking younger queen.

“But, duty is as duty does, I suppose,” Chrysalis sighed wistfully. “Alright, Papillate, my dear, hop along now. There’ll be plenty of chances to resume this. That is, of course, if you really want to.”

“I’ll… I’ll think about it, Ebony Queen,” Papillate said with uncertainty, lifting herself from Chrysalis’ lap to turn around, and lower her forehooves to the floor.

So overwhelmed was the younger queen, she didn’t realise she had committed the double faux pas of turning her back upon royalty – a breach of protocol, even from a fellow royal – and compounded it by giving said royal a rather scandalous eyeful of her lower body.

Chrysalis, however, was not complaining.

“I know you will,” she said teasingly, leaning over to pat Papillate’s upraised rump. Twice.

The younger queen gasped, blushing furiously as, pulling in her hindlegs, she clattered upon the floor, a second too late to escape Chrysalis’ prying. Mandible had watched the whole occurrence with her usual placid silence, but the look on her face made plain what she thought of it.

What came next came without warning, however. Just when she believed she’d got her fill of Papillate, an unprecedented wave of energy burst from the younger queen. One moment everything was normal, and the next, they were overwhelmed.

Chrysalis felt connected, she felt connected beyond the usual means between a Queen and her broodlings. She was above and beyond, she transcended the heavens themselves. A mighty and stunning sensation that held her without clear equal!

… She… she felt…

She was left panting from the experience, she wanted more and all she knew was a clear pull towards the source...

Papillate, brought to lie on her stomach, looked up, but someone else spoke first.

“What was that? Weird,” Mandible said blandly, stepping forward. Of the three, only she looked completely unaffected. “It felt familiar yet ancient, like a call of some kind...”

“A Queen, maybe?” Papillate supplied, struggling to get up, with a flash of inspiration gracing her eyes, “could it be the First Mother has returned to us?”

Having finished rubbing her head, Chrysalis, too, righted herself, still on her throne. She contemplated Papillate. Things just kept getting more interesting with her around...

“What an astute little thing you are,” she said fondly. “But, take it from an old expert… well, heh-heh, maybe I’m not so ‘old’, but that’s beside the point. Alright, take it from someone who’s been at this game of subterfuge for a long time. Seeing is believing. So we won’t know until we check it out.”

“We should go, then.” Papillate said with determination. “I can still taste it. I can sense where it came from. Whatever this is, it must be important.”

Mandible frowned at this, “Young queen, we should return and inform the other Hives first. Your mother…”

“Mother can wait,” Papillate interrupted firmly, sidling up to Chrysalis, “and even then, she would applaud me taking the initiative as it is.”

The proud smirk Chrysalis wore was positively devious. Just as the Changeling Queen of Queens ought to be.

* * * * *

“... And so, with the village’s cheer restored, Princess Ladybug returned to her realm with her head held high, and warmth in her heart just as she had given to her newfound friends...”

The book was closed, with hooves gentle as they could be.

“... The End.”

Still with bated breath, leaning against the walls of his nook, Thorax beheld the book with awestruck eyes. The Tale of Princess Sunrise Ladybug, the title read, by Sunny Skies. Upon it was an illustration in the water-colour likeness of a pegasus princess, pink as the loveliest of roses, drawn with grace and tender care from her elegant, feathered wings to her sunny cheer.

“Wow...” was all the Changeling drone could muster, running a hoof over the well-worn cover. He’d been told it used to be a foal’s. It didn’t matter to him where it had come from. It was well-loved, from what he could sense. A quick whiff of its love-scent told him much – traces of lovely, fragrant jasmine.

Here in his nook, leaves covering the entrance and shielding him from the Hive outside, Thorax held the book close to his chest, scenes from within dancing behind his eyes.

Princess Sunrise Ladybug, a wealthy and flighty soul, finding herself drawn to a faraway village by a twist of fate. A friendship formed between her and a humble little filly named Flake. Then came the villagers’ plight, for an evil sorceress had come to take their joy away. And finally, how the lessons in humility Flake had taught Princess Ladybug became the key in her triumph.

Ah, what a tale it had been.

Heart fluttering a little, Thorax opened the book again, to one page which had caught his eye. Again, there was Princess Ladybug, in a water-colour that covered a whole page, as she entered Flake’s village, facing dead ahead so her courageous, slightly narrowed, yet benign eyes seemed to stare at the reader. Below her regal muzzle, the Princess’s lips formed a firm line, defiant.

The Princess from the storybook actually reminded Thorax a little, perhaps due to her looks, of the alicorn Princess who was supposed to get married when Queen Chrysalis had decided to crash the Royal Wedding and invade Canterlot.

Thorax couldn’t help wincing at the memory. He hadn’t been part of the operation to move Princess Cadance into the caverns beneath Canterlot, naturally, but Pharynx had told him about it, in rather gleeful detail. True, his brother had been pleased that Cadance put up a fight. Yet Thorax could only feel sorry for her. Dragged away from her own wedding, when she’d come so close to thwarting the Queen’s plan by spotting that her “wedding photographer” wasn’t who they claimed to be. This had forced Chrysalis to improvise, issuing a vague threat against Canterlot to throw Celestia off from noticing Cadance had already been replaced.

In his heart, Thorax felt glad Cadance had got away. Even if it had meant the Hive going hungry for another three months.

This storybook, though, and the fairy-tale Princess inside, were something different…

Gingerly placing the open book on the ground, Thorax lay down to contemplate the page-filling picture of Princess Ladybug. Despite the love-scent of jasmine that hung over the paper, here was little love left for him to actually feed on, and yet still he came back to this book. The most curious sensation took hold of him whenever he did. As if he felt hungry, but in a pleasant way. Like just looking at the book caused the scent to renew.

He knew he’d been dreaming lately, with the pink pegasus Princess’s face a frequent visitor to his dreams.

A forehoof gently stroked her image as Thorax felt himself imagine that he wasn’t stroking the creamy paper, an admittedly nice feeling in itself, but running his forehoof through the Princess’s lustrously rose mane. On the page, Ladybug’s eyes remained the same as ever. Not fearful or rejecting, simply the eyes of a lovely Princess. As so often before, Thorax wondered what it was to be a Princess or Prince of Equestria, like the happy couple from Canterlot, living in a world of blossoming colour so different from this dank and drab Hive.

His gaze moved away from the Princess’s own to fall upon the firm line of her lips. The scent of jasmine grew stronger than ever, making him sigh.

Following the motions of his dreams, Thorax let his eyes close as, slowly, he pressed his lips to the page, imagining it wasn’t paper they touched, only the pretty pink pair of his Princess…

“What are you doing?” growled a voice.

Eyes shooting open, Thorax pulled away with a sputter.

“P-Pharynx! I– you’re back early!”

There he was, head poking through past the leaves that covered the nook, frowning – Thorax’s big brother in all of his grumpy glory.

Pharynx’s glare moved from Thorax, to his book, then back at him.

“Yeah. So what?” Pharynx answered, with a huff. “Quit day-dreaming, grub. The Queen needs us. We’re leaving.”

“But–”

“We’re leaving right now.”

And before Thorax could protest, he was yelping when Pharynx bit into his tail and yanked him out of his nook. He fell into a heap, rubbing his head.

To his horror, he saw that Pharynx had let go of him only long enough to pick up the storybook, between sharp jaws, and to toss it down one of the Hive’s many holes in the ground, scattering pages everywhere.

“Pharynx, my book!” Thorax whimpered.

“Quiet,” Pharynx said, biting back down. “Aphid’ll ge‘ou a’udder one,” he said, speaking through a mouthful of wispy tail-hair. “C’mon.”

What else could Thorax do, after a weak scrabble, but slump and let it happen, reaching out despondently as a backward-walking Pharynx dragged him through the dirt and away from the precious little corner that was his private place.

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

“C’mon, Bonbon,” Lyra said, laying down her book. “You can go to sleep.”

“Nuh-uh.” Her girlfriend shook her head. “Think I’ve forgotten how you were after the Wedding Invasion? And this could be twenty times worse! No way I’m gonna be asleep before you. Somepony’s got to keep an eye open.”

“It’s already been the longest day ever,” said Lyra. “And here you’re talking of keeping an eye open. Has it gotta be you?”

“Yes,” said Bonbon. She hopped onto Lyra’s bed, ignoring the camp-bed Sutra had set up. “Lyra, I don’t think you realise how much I look out for you.” She indicated the book. “Think I haven’t sussed your game? You’re reading cos’ you don’t wanna fall asleep. Probably don’t even realise that’s what you’re doing.”

Lyra grinned wistfully. “Actually… you’re wrong.”

“Really?” Bonbon blinked. “I know you. You’re hiding it, but inside, you’re still fussing about that lost locket.”

“Yeah…” Lyra sighed. Then she turned the book over. “And it’s going to fuss me for a while. But what’s in here… it takes my mind off it. Long-lost things, coming back.”

Bonbon recognised the page. It was Lyra’s old favourite, the sketch of a pearl ‘human’ buried on the beach.

“What do you mean?”

Trailing her hoof over the sketch, her ears upright, Lyra was quiet. She checked the two nearby beds. Despite the conversation, Sparkler and Zecora were both sleeping.

“Bonnie,” Lyra said. “I know you’re not gonna like this. Yet I feel it’s something I must do… That human, the female in the picture. She’s got something to do with us, I know it. Alex knows it, too. I saw it in his eyes. Things are gonna move real fast now, and I don’t wanna be left behind. Waggoner’s expedition was onto something, searching for Dream Valley. I’d love to see Earth, where Alex comes from, but…” She sighed deeply. “I doubt it’d be a good idea. Not right away. No, I want to look elsewhere.”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

By my initiative, the character of the zebra delegate to the Convocation is changed from the OC Queen Zolomare to the IDW comics’ Prince Abraxas, thus revamping the whole scene of the zebra delegate receiving the Call; this is now set in Farasi and shows Abraxas confronting the Grootslang.

A new plot breadcrumb; Prince Abraxas is a member of the Stonecutters’ Magical Council, given the sobriquet of “Candid”, and he reflects on the Half-Gilded Horseshoe of Sunflare.

In a change from the official canon of Friendship is Magic, the Misfortune Malachite was stolen from Farasi, instead of Abyssinia.

Addition of a scene; Thorax and Pharynx are introduced earlier, with Thorax hiding away to read a picture-book by Sunny Skies, and Pharynx letting him know what he thinks about this pastime.

Spectrum 2.0 - December 26th 2018

Sledge115: Hello there! Sledge here – this chapter got expanded to hell, heh. The Reindeer are always a delight to write, and yes, the names are intentional. The dynamic as they were built before had always been a shout-out, which sort of stuck with the Reindeer characters. No regrets. Also, shameless plug, but [url=https://www.fimfiction.net/story/358543/a-sun-in-winter]A Sun In Winter, which exists as a prequel to the OG Spectrum, is also canon. It was specifically written so that, in the event of a reboot (guess what happened), it could be seamlessly made canon again. And hey ho, it paid off. Cheers!

DoctorFluffy: Yeah, it was pretty obvious we’d need to do that. Even I knew that, and I was pretty much the most deluded one. Hooray for me. Such excitement. So wow. Much overused meme. For real though, check out A Sun In Winter, it was super fun to help my friends out on that one.

VoxAdam: I’ll third my support of checking out Sledge’s A Sun In Winter. :-) While at the time of this writing, it may not have updated in two years, there’s so much of the content and lore we planned for it that we want to include in Spectrum 2.0.

As for this chapter, though another one which took a long time to write, I’d call it one of my favourites so far. The verbal sparring between Princess Celestia and TCB!Redheart is entirely my contribution, the intent being to fill in what I felt was a gaping hole in OG Spectrum… Just how would the average Imperial rationalise facing a Princess Celestia?

And we are finally getting that glimpse at the wider world outside of Equestria, promised a few chapters back but delayed so the plot could be set in motion with the Locket Quest. Credit goes to RoyalPsycho in particular for the thought put into the Kirin and Minotaurs – those have been fun!

JedR: witty and relevant author’s note.
Serious note, though: this here chapter has bit of stuff I wrote for my “Jed R Cut” reincorporated into the “proper” Spectrum (I’ll let you guess which bits: some are from unpublished ‘Jed R Cut’ chapters). I didn’t actually do any work on this chapter for realsies, but these guys are nice enough to let me put “guest writer”, because they’re cool. Chances are it’s the last time I’ll have my name on anything on this site in a good while though, because I’ve stepped away from the fanfic game in general at the mo (some personal projects aside). Wishing you lot all the best.

DoctorFluffy: We do that because we love you. ^~^

RoyalPsycho: Hi there. Portions of this chapter are technically my first genuine literary contribution to the story. Up until now I’ve almost strictly been working behind the scenes on this story at the conceptual level. I have to say that it feels good to be a real part of the team now and do my part for this massive tale. So while I may not be doing that much writing on this story I’m glad that I did something to help.

Act I ~ Chapter Eleven ~ Those On Pilgrimage

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

“To die will be a great adventure.”

DoctorFluffy

Dedicated to my Uncle John. Rest in peace, Uncle John.

VoxAdam

Veni, Veni, Veni!

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

With Help From
RanOutOfIdeas

Guest Writing From

Jed R

Chapter Eleven

Those On Pilgrimage

* * * * *

“At the risk of sounding sentimental, I've always thought that some people leave an indelible mark on your soul. A mark that can never be erased.”
— Colonel Philip Broyles, Fringe, ‘One Night in October’

~ Third Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

The Sun shone brightly overhead, hanging at high-noon and illuminating the great garden with gentle, golden beams of light. Beneath the trees were large, tidy, trimmed lawns of emerald-green grass, bordered by low-lying walls capped by short triangular crenellations. A wide, tiled pathway separated the two lawns, the branches of the apple trees shading the path up to a circular clearing covered in beatific mosaics, which depicted swirling clouds and beams of coruscating light. These formed elaborate patterns that led up to a large, multi-tiered marble fountain dominating the centre of the clearing.

Off in the distance were more copses, pathways that split off in other directions and, to the West, a domed gazebo of marble and sandstone. A gentle breeze barely disturbed anything, but did provide a pleasant cooling sensation for the garden’s occupants and some relief from the sun, framed by clouds thin and unmoving overhead.

Amira-bint-Ramaha sighed in contentment as she basked in shade to the clearing’s edge. She lay naked and relaxed on the cool stone, her flank resting on the stone wall that rimmed the surrounding lawns, her formal regalia settled in a neat pile on the wall. But she was feeling ambivalent despite herself.

“Ah, Amira,” the voice of her husband said, from her other side, as he reached his head and neck over her shoulder to rest against her. “I have missed you.”

“Mmh…” Amira half-sighed, half-huffed, leaning her head back a little. “Yes, my love.”

“Your visits are the only ray of hope I have in this place,” he continued, murmuring gently into her ear.

Were this any other time, Amira would have leaned in closer, maybe let Qabil make an attempt at nipping her ear, but this time she kept her pose, head still touching the stone.

“True, it would’ve been nicer, having the others with us,” Qabil then said, earning a slight twitch from Amira, “to share this moment with Tahira and Naiya. I’m certain Haifa would have loved the opportunity to join in our fun…” he added with a husky chuckle, head sliding further down her neck, his breath tickling the roots of her mane.

“I don’t doubt it,” Amira said, pulling her head away. Not very far, and not abruptly, but enough to put a gap between her and his touch. “But I came here because of something that only I could share with you.”

“Oh?” Qabil said in response, lifting his head up so he could see her face more easily. He looked confused for a moment, and nervous. Yet it was quickly replaced by roused interest, as he grasped her meaning. “And what is it you wished to say?”

The weight was beginning to press down on her shoulders again. Groaning softly, Amira rolled over, onto her back, so she’d be lying facing Qabil.

“Word came from the Malikah,” she began to explain. “Of a new duty expected from me. One which would require I shoulder it alongside the family’s protector.” She smiled bittersweetly. “Haakim is a good and gracious stallion, but he will never be you.”

“I’m surprised you asked him for help,” Qabil said, a hint of bitterness in his tone. It was quickly wiped away as he blinked, likely in awareness of how he had sounded. “You normally do such a good job of managing the household yourself.”

“Who else amongst stallions, if not a bachelor known for their…” In spite of herself, Amira found her tongue briefly catch on the word, “righteousness? I know you’d never give credence to any tales of infidelity in our family, but in society’s eyes, only my esteemed colleague may pass muster. And I do have such work to do, outside the household.”

“Indeed,” Qabil huffed. “I’m glad to know it is in such reliable hooves.”

“I had a choice between bringing him along, as my usual protector when overseas, Qabil,” Amira told him, “or considering the greater good of the family.” She paused. “On this particular occasion, I’ll be so surrounded by the Malikah’s entourage, one stallion less won’t make a difference… though I’d very much loved to have you along, with your fascination for the exotic,” she quickly added. “Our monarch told me I’m to act as consul not just to Equestria, this time, but to a whole world.”

Amira couldn’t help but feel elated as she saw her husband’s eyes widen in surprise.

“That… that’s wonderful news,” he said, sounding more shocked than impressed. “But why? What could possibly call the attention of the entire world?”

Should she tell him? Truth was, she still didn’t know everything herself.

“Celestia,” she said simply. “It is said she opened an artefact, a lantern entrusted to her by the Reindeer King for just such an event.”

“And what exactly does that mean?” Qabil inquired, pulling back while Amira shifted again to look him in the eye.

“The Malikah had a dream,” Amira said simply. “A most unusual dream, not in its content, but in how it came to her… By light of day, her mind was whisked away, to witness a night’s worth of visions in a heartbeat… I can tell you, standing next to her then, was… uncanny. However, in a break with tradition, she said her visions were quite clear. Head North, to a mountain hall, and meet there with Celestia, along with all the crowned heads and leaders of the world.” She chuckled softly. “Not a dream which requires your erudition to decipher, my sorcerer.”

“That is…” Qabil began, then paused, as he seemed to think it over. “Clearly some kind of magical influence.” Amira watched as he frowned. “And Celestia was the one to send it to the Malikah?”

Raising her neck, Amira inclined her forehead, for it to brush against his pursed lips.

“Why else would Celestia be at the heart of this?” Amira said. “Besides, though our monarch couldn’t turn to you personally for advice, there were still your apprentices… and, of course… your library,” she said, sounding a little bitter. “Consultation of the books confirmed that long ago, the Allfather gave the Sun Princess the key to make such a Call.”

She traced a hoof against one of his half-uprighted forearms.

“Amazing,” Qabil whispered, a small smile on his face. It then faded away. “And I’m here while the world changes.”

Amira sighed as she saw her husband’s frown change into a scowl. It was clear what he was talking about. This wasn’t the first time he’d complained about his situation – even if he did it less these days than he used to.

“And Her Majesty had to rely on the slow wits of Jabir and...” He cringed for a moment. “Hanan, before she could decipher what those dreams meant, did she?” But he then turned to her with a more hopeful expression. “Ah, but you let Her Majesty into the library, correct? And I’m sure it didn't take her long to figure out what that vision truly meant, once you were present... did it?”

“Mention not their names,” Amira said, cupping his cheek indulgently. “They’re not important. The knowledge stored in your forefathers’ collection elucidated the mystery… what little mystery there was, anyway.”

“Of course,” Qabil replied with a wide, proud smile, cupping her cheek in return. “I knew you would be the one to make the right decision. You are… you are truly brilliant.”

She smiled wanly, holding his gaze for an instant. But, more than a little involuntarily, she found her eyes leaving his, to fall upon the sundial by the wall.

“My love,” Amira said. “I fear the shadow’s line has almost reached its peak…”

Qabil sighed and his hoof fell back to the ground. The rest of his body followed until his head was lying there. The image was almost petulant, looking not unlike their children when they knew it was time for their lessons – that is, until he sidled back to Amira’s side.

“I truly hate this place,” Qabil grumbled as he pressed himself against her.

“I know, my love,” Amira said in response, resting her head atop his neck and nestling her cheek upon the back of his head.

His mane felt coarse and rough, compared to how she remembered it. It had only been a little over a year, since she last felt the touch of his coat and mane at their estate, yet he felt so rough. Easy to forget when they had reunited earlier, but here and now, much more noticeable.

They said nothing as Qabil returned the gesture, shuffling to press closer. Amira could feel his pulse above her as she brushed his mane aside. It was an odd sensation, but comforting, Once again, they were together.

“Attention, visitors,” a voice echoed through the garden, rustling and shaking everything but the solid ground. “Your allotted time has expired. Please prepare for your scenario to end.”

The world seemed to shimmer, like a mirage, fading away. The colours of the garden melted into one another as shapes, images and structures grew indistinct and liquid. The sky was first to go, and the horizon, fading into a dull grey stone. The garden shrank as the greyness flowed down over it, erasing the grass, the trees and finally, the beautifully carved walls and mosaic paths. Last to go was the fountain, revealing nothing more than a squat, monolithic rectangle of jet-black, reflective stone.

Their clothing had been laid down on the floor, though, in exactly the position it had been when resting on the now-vanished fountain.

“And now we are done,” Qabil sighed. Amira let out a much quieter breath, as she felt her husband raise himself from her. She did the same, standing back on her hooves.

“At least they give us a few minutes left to ourselves…” Amira muttered, rubbing the back of her neck. This simple gesture, in the empty sterility of the uncloaked Sunroom, suddenly made her feel conscious that she was still naked. “We dithered too long. Let’s hurry before they decide to come for us. I can help you make yourself presentable, if you will help me.”

Without awaiting his reply, which she expected would have been unreasonably reluctant, she went to gather both piles of their clothing. Hers had been left in a tidy stack. But she regretted to see the room’s uncloaking hadn’t tidied the mess Qabil had made of his uniform, strewn about in his eagerness to remove it – and not just so he could lie with her.

Although Amira couldn’t say she didn’t understand where he was coming from, when she bundled the black-and-white attire and shoved it his way. A coarseness similar to his coat’s current state was to be felt in the fabric.

“You shouldn’t crumple it like that, you know,” Amira commented, inspecting her own items to make sure the girdle and ornamental caparison weren’t out-of-shape. “I can’t imagine they leave the ironing up to servants, in this place.”

Qabil snorted. “As if it matters,” he said, plainly holding back a sulk. “At least that gives me something to keep me busy. Boredom’s the worst foe in Erebus.”

Having satisfied herself that her attire was in order, Amira looked towards him.

“Shall you help me get dressed first, love?” she said slyly. “Maybe you’d rather wear nothing than be seen in what you’ve been dealt, but surely my full splendour is for your eyes alone.”

“Of course,” Qabil replied, his small smile back on his face.

He walked up and began to pull the articles of her regalia into place. Amira could feel his hooves draping her with her caparison, and whilst it wasn’t as skillful as the staff back at the estate, she felt quite comfortable in her husband’s special care. Her headdress and her silk breast collar, even, she saw suspended in mid-air, held a few inches above the floor in a weak aura as he pulled them onto her.

“So, you still have some power here?” Amira inquired.

“Only a little, and in this room only,” Qabil said in response, sighing as he did so. “I can barely use the most basic of spells... but I have become more skillful in finding out new uses for them.”

“A shame,” Amira said. “Though a testament to your skills, that you’d find loopholes.” Something in what she’d just said gave her a thought. Two, in fact. One naughty, the other more regretful. “We could do so much more, if they gave you full use of your magic in this room… Nor am I alone in missing it,” she said, glancing back at him. “While the household might have splintered, most have chosen to stay, because they do love you. Our littlest one, in particular, how she misses the feel of your coils wrapping around her at night, my snake...”

“And I miss feeling her breathing as she went to sleep,” Qabil said, most forlornly. “Truly, I miss all of you… and everything else I’ve lost.”

Amira nodded sadly, remaining silent as he gingerly slid her ceremonial noseband around her muzzle, her last item. By his muzzle’s proximity to hers right then, he might have been expecting something more from her. But she couldn’t bring herself to do it, not at this time.

“Thank you...” she said quietly. “Now let me help you.”

Qabil nodded wordlessly and let her pull the banded shirt over his head and down his barrel. He then let her guide his forearms through the sleeves and button it shut. She gave him a wan smile as she placed the square cap on his head – which he immediately adjusted, with an almost paranoid expression.

She didn’t have the heart to tell him she knew the cap slipped.

“There you are,” Amira said, as her husband stood tall and proud as he could. Despite his less impressive attire, he still managed to carry himself with the dignity she recognised. “It may not be your gown and turban, but it’s all in the bearing. I take it that, with your ways, you can still draw fine company to yourself?”

“Ah, yes,” Qabil preened, holding his head high. “No, I cannot claim my most regal bearing hasn’t attracted the right sort of company here.”

“Now you’re just taking words out of my mouth, silly,” Amira scolded him gently. “But what kind of people, if you don’t mind my asking?” Her eyes rapidly darted to the walls. “I think it’s safe to speak, they have to respect our privacy in here. I’d heard something recently about… the Mikado’s student, wasn’t it?”

“Yes,” Qabil answered. “Kana Yugami is one of the more illustrious members of the incarcerated, and I have taken her under my wing, as it were.”

Amira couldn’t hold back a snigger at Qabil’s words. She had indeed seen him take full-grown stallions under his wings before. Literally, for all that he was no pegasus. She still felt guilty at how amusing she’d found the look of surprised terror in their eyes.

But those actions were not ones by which he’d harmed anyone. Just his idea of a joke – or more to the point, of showing off.

“She is a good filly,” Qabil continued, as they walked together. “If rather self-important and headstrong. I’ve seen her switch between being attentive and dutiful, abrasive and irritable. Not even our eldest has a demanding temper like hers.”

“Why, you haven’t lost your paternal instinct,” Amira smiled, her warmest words since she’d first greeted him again. Yet her smile did stiffen somewhat. “Knowing how they make things work around here, though, I doubt it’s coincidence you crossed paths. Even if she’s as haughtily confident as you say, she’s still a young doe.” She gave him a very serious look. “I know much it means to you to have followers. But please, don’t assume you need only count down the days until you can leave. You’re not the only one in here who waits.”

“I know, my dear,” Qabil replied, as he turned towards one of the featureless walls. “I know...”

Amira followed after her husband into the great, grey horizon. It took several strides for them to reach the wall’s face, the mere minutes it had taken when’y had arrived now feeling much longer in the silence.

“I suppose this it for the next few months,” Qabil said, “at least for me.”

“I’m afraid it shall likely be longer,” Amira said. “If whatever Princess Celestia has called us for is so important, I will be very busy.”

“Ah, of course.” Qabil rapped his hoof on the skin of the rock. “We’re done.”

The rock shuddered and pulled back, invisible seams opening up as a high section of the wall swung open. Beyond it lay a great cavernous hallway, rough, dull and endless as every other area in the great prison of Erebus.

Dim lamps lit the hall, the light only reaching part-way up until the darkness once again enveloped the high ceiling – which Amira assumed had to be up there somewhere, since it was impossible to see. The same darkness eventually took up the horizon, not because it wasn’t lit by the same lamps, but because the hall stretched on an impossible distance.

In front of them were two carriages, both attended by teams of armoured thestrals. One was a crude wagon, partly wooden, the planks of its body held together by pitted iron bands, but mostly it was metal, with the rest of the iron shaped into a cage large enough for a grown horse to stand in. Two more thestrals waited by a ramp leading into the open cage, armed with spears and eyeing Qabil closely. The other carriage, whilst simple, was much more comfortable-looking, painted in gold and purple akin to the colours of Canterlot. Only one thestral awaited aboard, and she was a mare wearing a far simpler uniform, wide-rimmed spectacles balanced precariously on her face.

“Here are our rides, then,” Amira said, placing a forehoof on her husband’s elbow,

It stopped him in his tracks. He turned back to face her, and though she knew he’d have died before admitting it, his eyes were undeniably moist. She couldn’t blame him. She could feel a tightness around her heart, not least at how she wasn’t sure when her work would next allow them to meet.

But she had to say something. Preferably something to alleviate the glumness.

Then Amira caught sight once more of the thestral with the wide-rimmed spectacles, and inspiration hit her. Funny, how an item of clothing can affect a person’s whole appearance, she thought. How come this one had never occurred to her before?

“You know...” Amira said, caressing Qabil’s cheek, leaning forward to whisper in his ear, low enough, she hoped, for the sensitive-eared thestrals not to pick up on. “Not sure I’ve ever mentioned this, but…” She gave his square cap an affectionate pat. “Black-and-white does look rather good on you. Beautiful as the stripes on a zebra stallion.”

And, to her own surprise, she gave a small, sincere giggle. She didn’t care how corny the line might sound. For a split second, it reminded her of what it had been like, to be a young maiden foolishly in love. She felt even better when she saw Qabil preen again at her words.

“I suppose this shall be goodbye for much longer, if the world’s about to be shaken up,” Qabil said, leaning in. “I hope the shaking will give me a chance at slipping out...”

Amira said nothing, merely humming in agreement until Qabil closed in and kissed her. It wasn’t particularly passionate, but neither was it chaste. It lasted for a few seconds more. Then they pulled apart.

“I’ll return the soonest I can,” Amira promised, tasting her lips. “If possible, I’ll put forth a request with the Sun Princess so I can visit you straight after this summit… Goodness knows when I’ll be able to make it next.” She lightly bumped her forehead to his. “Now. Take good care of yourself. And don’t be too wicked, alright?”

“Of course… my love,” Qabil said, turning away to climb up the ramp, into the prison wagon.

One of the armed thestrals shut the iron-barred door on him, latch falling into place, and removed the ramp, while the other barked an order. Then the cage-wagon pulled away, carrying Qabil down the hallway. Amira watched him go, as she had every time she visited. The first time had been difficult, painful. Now, it felt almost incidental. She was simply watching her husband move further and further out of view.

Amira sighed one last time, the heaviest sigh she had released on the trip. Then she climbed into the ornamental carriage, nodded to the bespectacled mare and looked ahead, as she was carried off in the other direction, back to the surface.

There was one thing she hadn’t told her husband.

‘The books I read state the Call can only be given when things are at their most dire.’

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~ Third Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

“Here we are, love,” Shining smiled, his voice almost lost beneath the train’s whistle. “Home. Done a fine job cleaning up, haven’t they?”

“They always do,” Cadance smiled back, looking out the window nonetheless.

And it was true. To see the spotlessly pristine spires and turrets of Canterlot gleaming in the morning light, Cadance herself would never have suspected that only three months ago, many of those same surfaces had been coated with green wax – leftovers from the Changeling invasion deemed too superficial to delay their wedding any further, but ever-lingering on the edges of the festivities.

“But, ‘home’, you call this, Shiney? Our crystal subjects won’t be pleased to hear it.” Cadance elbowed her husband. “After all, home is where the Heart is.”

“Naturally,” said Shining. “But I’m not the one who’s got a great big Crystal Heart and an entire city up North as my birthright. I’m just your knight-in-exile, milady.”

“Oh, be quiet, you,” Cadance teased him, as they stood up.

Yet she knew life in the Crystal Realm didn’t mean quite the same to Shining as it did to her, even though when they’d got married, they’d both known the day to reclaim it might come. Him pledging to follow her wherever she went was a different matter, for young lovers to whom the Realm’s return seemed a faraway, mystical prospect, than to have lived it.

Then again, Cadance occasionally wondered if she’d truly understood, in youth, what Celestia had told her that in becoming an alicorn, she was accepting her place as heir to Princess Amore, last ruler of the Crystal Realm.

Celestia herself was waiting for them on the platform. Tall, regal and bright as ever, yet Cadance, far better-accustomed to her aunt’s mannerisms than Twilight had ever been, thought she saw a pool of sadness in Celestia’s eyes.

Shining saw only the Princess he’d sworn to protect.

“Your Highness,” he said, bowing.

Cadance did likewise. She sensed how reassuringly familiar it felt for Shining to be back in Celestia’s presence. Where she had chosen a Princess’s duties and now carried them out every day in the North, Shining, though he still bore the title of Captain of the Guard, no longer lived directly in the line of that duty.

If he regarded it as a sinecure to have been named Captain of the entire Royal Guard since Luna’s return had made the Lunar Guard go from ceremonial unit to one of equal measure to the Solar Guard, though, he’d never once complained.

“Princess Cadance. Captain Armor. Welcome back to Canterlot. Do get up, please...” Celestia said warmly. “And let’s walk. Our ride awaits outside the station.”

A leftwards glance told Cadance that Autumn Gem had begun overseeing the matter of moving their luggage from the Crystal Express to the waiting carrier-pegasi Celestia had brought along. Satisfied their belongings were under their majordomo’s trustworthy watch, Cadance followed after her aunt, Shining by her side.

“I trust you had a sufficiently relaxing trip?” Celestia asked them. “I’m glad you took the time before leaving to pack for a long stay. We shall have much business to attend today, and in the days to follow.”

“Slept like a log,” said Shining. “But that’s funny, actually, Your Highness. We… well, we half-imagined Princess Luna was going to, um, ‘come in’ during the night and tell us what to expect once we got here.”

“Aunt Celestia, where is Aunt Luna?” Cadance said. “And Blueblood?”

Celestia stopped walking, not two paces from the station entrance. Silhouetted within the marble archway, she craned her neck, looking back at them.

“Prince Blueblood’s been busy,” she said. “As has Luna. At my behest, he spent the whole of yesterday sending invitations and overtures to his friends amongst the gentry, bidding their presence at the Palace as soon as possible, for a few… parties.” She’d struggled to get that last word out. “When I left them earlier, Luna was penning a report with his help, ironing out the choice of words he’d use to solicite their support.”

Shining glanced at the clock atop the archway. “Ten past eight, and Blueblood’s up? Gosh, it must be awfully serious.”

“Shining,” Cadance hissed. But he was right, of course. And that scared her.

For her part, Celestia just nodded. “I’m afraid it is,” she said. “A lot happened in the space of one day, since Luna gave you that message. Revelations and ordeals, well into the night. That’s why Luna didn’t contact you again. We needed to be sure we’d seen the end of it.”

“And… have we?” asked Shining, flabbergasted.

“No.” Celestia’s voice was tired. “But we can’t wait for the answers. No-one else is going to resolve this for us.”

Cadance approached her. “You said revelations and ordeals, Aunt Celestia,” she whispered. “What sorts of revelations, what sorts of ordeals?”

“Many. You heard about the strange creature,” Celestia told them. “Well, there was much more where he came from. Unknown worlds, parallel realities. Ancient secrets and long-lost relatives. A summons to call upon the whole world to bear witness. Deadly confrontations with malevolent doppelgängers.” Seeing their faces, she chuckled. “You know, the usual.”

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~

“Isn’t this the darnedest thing,” said Alex, stirring his coffee. “When this war began, I vowed the day would come that I stood in the Palace of Canterlot. Never in a million years did I imagine Celestia would invite me there.”

“You feel up to the journey?” Lyra asked, from behind him. “I mean, yes, it’s a pretty short trip by sky-carriage, but I’m not sure you’d like that. But it is pretty short by train, too, despite what Rainbow Dash might say. Unless you’re taking the Friendship Express, for the ‘scenic’ trip at night.”

“Huh?” Alex was still staring out the window. “Oh, right. Yeah, train sounds good. But teleportation’s a thing here, isn’t it?”

“Not every unicorn can do it,” Lyra reminded him. “Even the Princesses get drained of spell-power if they use it too often.”

“Sure, and it’s a pity, because it’s darn sight useful in battle,” Alex commented. “Except I thought Celestia had borrowed that, that medallion off the chancellor-guy? She could use that to get us there quick.”

“Oh. Yeah, she did.”

He swiveled his wheelchair around, tearing his sight away from the outside world, but kept himself in the sunlight as it fell across the curtains.

“Hmm…” Alex huffed, then took a sip of coffee.

Halfway across the bedroom, Lyra stared at him silently, leaning upon her crutches.

“And how are you holding up?”

Lyra blinked. “Me? I’m okay. Doctor Stable said I might still feel disorientation for a few days. Getting your nerves paralysed by a spy out for your blood leaves a trace, you know. But nothing too lasting, he says.”

“Not physically, anyway...”

“You should be thinking about yourself,” Lyra said tensely. “Those burns on your chest, they’re not gonna just fix themselves up by magic.”

Alex raised an eyebrow. “Could’ve fooled me.”

Lyra sat on his unoccupied bed. “That wasn’t a joke, Alex. Until the doctors work out the precise structure of that attack-spell, healing you is gonna drag out. So I hope Celestia is planning on using the Medallion to get you to Canterlot. They’ve got special healers there who know things. Come to think, given all the dark things which go on around Ponyville, it’s criminal negligence we haven’t got a few of our own in this hospital...”

“No doubt that’s something Redheart was counting on,” Alex commented, “while she was impersonating my nurse. How is she doing, by the way? Your Redheart.”

“She seemed okay when I saw her last night,” Lyra said, reluctantly letting him distract her. “But, didn’t you meet her? After the Princess had explained things to Nurse Cross.”

“Yeah, we had a quick chat,” Alex grunted. “I’ve already forgotten what we talked about… Fuck, though, it was surreal. Almost as bad as talking with Princess Celestia. I get the whole ‘parallel-universe’ thing, but… first time I’ve spoken to two different versions of the same person just minutes apart.”

Lyra seemed to be getting used to his swearing, as she didn’t flinch. “Well, perhaps you can teach us a thing or two,” she grinned weakly. “We’re all gonna be doing it.”

“All of you? Not quite,” Alex said somberly. “There’s a war on, you know.”

“Believe me, after Redheart… that’s hit me like a ton of bricks.”

Alex shook his head. “I don’t get you, Lyra. You should have let me at her. As if I was going to let Celestia stop me. No offense. But you…”

“Would…” Lyra paused. “Would your Lyra have let you?”

He held onto his cup of coffee with both hands, feeling the heat slowly dissipate in his palms, until he finally answered.

“No...” he said. “No, she wasn’t like that. She always saw the best in people. No matter what, no matter how much the world kept letting her down. But I’m not her… I’m sorry.” Lyra and he shared a look. “And… and I don’t want you to go through what she did.”

She got up and, although it made her hobble, walked over to pat his hand.

“I won’t,” Lyra told him. “I’m not her, either. We’ve not really been friends yet, Alex… but I’d like us to be. Even if we’ve only got a short time.”

“Indeed,” Alex said. Carefully, he placed his cup on the windowsill, so he could take her hoof between his hands. “You get that, once UNAC and the PHL learn I’m alive, they’ll want me back on the field. I’m still a soldier. I can’t turn away from that.”

“Yes,” she said quietly. “But… after you leave, I don’t think I’m going to be staying in Equestria.”

In three days marked by twists and turns, this was the third biggest shock to Alex since finding himself in this Equestria and discovering his locket was missing. Yet his shock came out subdued, as if he had no more left in him for an outburst.

“... The hell?”

Lyra held his hands reassuringly. “You’ve got your war to fight, Alexander Reiner,” she said. “And if I can’t help you the way other-me did... perhaps I can help you in another way. I don’t know why you don’t wanna talk about that picture in Waggoner’s book, but I know I can’t press you for it. I also know it’s important, and I want to find out why.”

Her words from the previous night came back to him.

“She’s your mother, isn’t she? The one you told me of. And that locket’s got to do with the last time a human came to Equus.”

“Lyra…” he said, pulling his hands away. “Just what are you planning?”

The little green unicorn walked to the window. “I’ve told Bonbon. She wasn’t happy, of course, but she knows me too well to try stopping me. Though she did say I’ve outdone myself this time for hare-brained schemes.” This was told with a smile, yet a rueful one. “And that’s why I don’t want to do it alone. I can’t, anway. I’m gonna need to get the Princess’s help on this one.”

Alex sighed, rubbing his head. “Well, you can tell me about once we’re in Canterlot, then. Could you pass me my coffee, please? I feel like I’m gonna be downing another two cups at least, just to get me through the day.”

* * * * *

“What could they be talking about in there, I wonder?”

Although they’d all been together at the cafeteria for nearly an hour, practically since visiting times opened up at the hospital, Time Turner was the one who broached the question that all had been dancing around.

In response to her father, Sparkler shrugged non-commitally.

“It’s Lyra and a human, Dad,” she said, picking idly from her plate. “Could be about anything. Though, given what she told me last night, probably not many happy things.”

Bonbon seemed about to add something, but Zecora cut across her.

“Doubtless the human laments the locket we must seek,” Zecora said, brooding. “For without it he fears we are weak. Though at last we did subdue the Falseheart, in the end she played her part.”

Privately, Amethyst suspected that while Zecora had been restored to normal, a good bit of her venom towards the other-Redheart stemmed from getting her precious stripes inverted by the poison-joke bomb.

“Well,” said Turner, while Derpy and Bonbon looked pensive. “Same old mess, really. You can’t go a week in this town without something weird happening.”

“Trust me, I think it’s different this time,” said Bonbon. “Lyra’s said that as soon as Celestia comes back, she’s going to Canterlot, and taking the human with her.”

“What, without saying goodbye?” Derpy said, aghast.

“Okay, maybe not like that,” Bonbon admitted. “In fact, I might go, too. She’ll have to let me. I mean, I did give her an earful for leaving me hanging these past two days.”

“Lucky for me you did something about it,” piped up an extra voice.

It was Redheart, wheeling up to their table in a wheelchair of her own, her breakfast tray in her lap.

“Morning, Red,” said Turner. “Good to see you on the mend.”

“Doctor Stable wants to keep me in for another day,” Redheart said, grimacing as she placed the tray on the table. “Can’t say I blame him. Whatever the… impostor pumped me with, it was nasty stuff. Gads, my head’s still foggy...”

Sparkler frowned. “Here’s something I’m still feeling foggy about,” she said, addressing Bonbon. “Just how did you know to get Redheart out of there?”

Typically, Bonbon sighed. “As I’ve said it before,” the candymaker began, with the exasperated air of one explaining things to an inattentive child, “it all started when I went to the Forest Rangers and the Chief gave me this picture,” she said, pulling said item out from her mane, “made by our old friend, her snooping son Featherweight. And what do I see? Behold, my girlfriend and Twilight’s gang, pulling an unconcious creature out the Forest.”

“Huh,” said Sparkler. “Shame he didn’t snap a picture of fake-Redheart, while he was at it.”

Bonbon nodded uninterestedly. “So, I did some poking around myself. Went to ask Mrs. Cake how she copes with Pinkie taking breaks unannounced. That’s when she told me an odd story about Redheart…” She glanced at said mare. “The fake-Redheart, and a Guard. Apparently, she’d gone by Sugarcube Corner, but left very suddenly, before her date had even arrived.”

Redheart spoke up. “The Guard. Isn’t that the guy we met at the lobby?”

“Yeah, that’s him, can’t remember his name right now… something with ‘ice’ in it.”

“Where’d he go?” Redheart asked, concerned. “Think he’s still here in the hospital?”

“Nah, I doubt it,” Bonbon said, lying the picture facedown. “You saw those thestrals Luna brought in for the night shift. He must’ve returned to Canterlot with the Princesses.”

“Oh...” Redheart, who hadn’t taken a bite from off her tray, leaned back. “That’s a shame... He seemed a nice fellow. It must’ve hurt terribly, being informed he’d been invited on a date by an impostor.”

“That’s why I thought we were dealing with Changelings at first,” Bonbon said. “Now, I almost wish we were.”

“Hold up, Bonbon,” Sparkler raised a hoof. “You still haven’t explained how you found Red.”

Bonbon glared at her. “If you must know, Missy,” she growled. “Living with Lyra, you learn to keep all sorts of useful things in your saddlebags. Abseiling equipment, that’s one thing, but most of all, you need medical gear, when your silly girlfriend’s as risk-prone as mine.”

While Sparkler didn’t like the tone, what Bonbon said made sense. “I get that,” she agreed. “Mom and Dad are the same.”

This elicited snorts from Bonbon, Redheart and Zecora. Turner coughed embarrassedly and looked away. Derpy just smiled blissfully.

“Say,” Redheart queried. “Where’s Dinky?”

Derpy continued to smile, yet her mismatched eyes were melancholic. “Off playing with her friends,” she explained. “We… didn’t think she needed to hear everything.”

“Point taken,” said Redheart. “Doctor Stable told me he gave Sutra leave today as well. There’s been a lot to take in… I don’t know how I’m coping with it.”

“It’s not just you,” Zecora said, grabbing an empty glass. “None of us do.”

* * * * *

When the electric-blue swhirl of a nascent portal appeared in Alex’s bedroom, it was not unexpected to either he or Lyra, but it was still somewhat startling, just the same. Then Princess Luna stepped out, the special Medallion around her neck.

Lyra bowed, a bit unsteadily on her crutches, earning a nod from Luna.

“Good morning, both of you,” Luna said formally.

Alex whistled, staring at the vanishing portal. “Pity there’s no cake.”

“Pardon?” Luna said, blinking.

“I… ah…” Alex grinned sheepishly. “Sorry, video game reference. You wouldn’t get it.”

“You’d be surprised,” Luna said, smiling surreptitiously. “But if we are talking about cake, wrong princess. You should try my sister.”

“Princess Luna,” said Lyra, raising herself. “Where’s the Prin– where’s Celestia?”

“My sister is making arrangements in Canterlot,” Luna explained. “She sent me here to sort matters with the hospital management. Your transfer, for one,” she told Alex. “And the prisoner’s. I’ve only just finished drawing up basic plans with Prince Blueblood.”

“Oh,” Lyra said softly. “That’s a shame... I really wanted to talk to her.”

“People always do, Madame Heartstrings,” Luna sighed. She held down a yawn, visibly. “Ugh… I expect this will take an hour or two… Once back in Canterlot, I shall be, how do they call it, ‘hitting the sack’. I wager Selene and Gibbous will be relieved to get off duty, too.”

Alex wheeled over. “So we are going to Canterlot. What about Rainbow Dash?”

“I already sent her a message in her sleep, last night,” Luna replied. “She will be meeting us here. We’re calling in all the Element Bearers to the Palace this afternoon. They need to be informed of what’s happened here. In the meantime, I suggest you say your goodbyes to whomever you want to. You in particular, Madame Heartstrings.”

“I don’t think that’ll be necessary,” Lyra said quietly. “Bonbon told me she’s coming along.”

“Verily?” Luna tilted her head.

“Only for a few days. Says she’s got to keep an eye on me.”

Luna frowned. “Lyra, you know there are things she cannot know of, like Galatea. We are risking enough as it is, letting you and Twilight’s friends in on that secret.”

“Maybe,” said Lyra. “But… I think she deserves to know I’m okay.”

“Especially,” Alex grunted, “after what you said about leaving Equestria.”

It was apparent Luna was surprised by this as he’d been.

“What was that you said?”

“I’ll explain it all,” Lyra said uncomfortably. “To Celestia.”

Again, Luna sighed. “Alright.” She walked to the door. “But no more surprises, please. There’s a big summit coming in a week. We cannot afford not to get our facts straight.”

~ The Mansion of the Proxenos of Delos, Republic of the Tauren Isles ~ By the Equestrian Calendar, Third Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

“Rise and shine, Miss Flutterbird,” whispered a sibilant voice. “Rise and… shine.”

Groaning, Fluttershy forced her sleep-crusted eyes open, to find a mad-eyed, goat-faced creature hovering above her.

“Morning, Discord,” she said wheezily. “Is… is it morning?”

As far as she could tell, while it wasn’t all dark in the room, thanks to an orb of light floating by Discord, the Sun hadn’t come up yet.

He took seat at the foot of the bed, making a show of consulting a pocket-watch he’d drawn from who-knew-where.

“That all depends on when is morning, my dear,” Discord said. “In far-off Ryuppon, it’s now mid-afternoon, five or so. Just an hour too late for teatime. Over in the heart of Zebrica, it’s eleven at night. Definitely not morning. In Canterlot, it’s the complete opposite. And here in Delos, the clock’s just struck six.” He chuckled. “Well, it would have... if water-clocks ticked! One thing I’ll say for a spherical world, I love how time’s never the same anywhere.”

It took some gears turning in her tired mind to unknot all this.

“Oh, my!” Fluttershy squeaked, as realisation took her. “That means it’s eleven o’clock in Canterlot right now!” She threw the bedclothes off, panicked. “My friends will be so worried, wondering where I’ve been! I didn’t think we’d be gone all night–”

She was stopped as the draconequus pressed a finger to her lips.

“Shh, easy there,” Discord grinned. “Nopony’s more deserving of a rest, my dear, and all my effort fighting the Krampus these past few days, too, would have gone to waste, unless…”

Unusually for him, the sound of uncertainty kept him from finishing.

“Unless, what?” Fluttershy murmured.

He sighed, removing his finger. “Well, let’s just say, it sounds like my hour has come again.”

“You mean because you want to fight Celestia,” Fluttershy said, straightening herself. “The other one.”

“Yes, I do.” Discord nodded. “Though I am gonna have to get a bit better first,” he added, tapping his poultice. “And… I can’t deny, I was hoping our vacation would last longer.”

“Those zebra dancers were something,” Fluttershy agreed, surprising herself. “Even if it was maybe just a teensy bit too loud.”

“Ah, there’ll be plenty of zebras and others at the Hall of Unity.” He smiled. “Actually, that makes it so much better. Why go to them, when they can come to us? Now come on, let’s have breakfast.”

Before she could get up, she saw him push a platter across the bed towards her.

“I had this brought up for you.”

“Discord,” Fluttershy began, looking at him, “you really didn’t have to…”

“Now stop with that,” Discord said softly, raising a claw. “If you keep saying things like that, people will start believing you, Fluttershy.”

“But… what about Lord Darkhoof and Mistress Unathi and Thymos? If you brought up breakfast for me, does that mean they’re up too?”

“Of course,” Discord said carelessly. “The day starts early in Delos. Just before dawn. But they’ve got other things to deal with today. It’s the day Darkhoof’s elder son returns from the Labyrinth and becomes a bull.”

Nodding slowly, Fluttershy reached for a cheese pie, taking a bite. “Mmh,” she said, munching. “Wish we could’ve seen that…”

“Why, Fluttershy. You surprise me.”

“Well, it’s just, they haven’t seen each other in two years, have they?” Fluttershy asked. “Lord Darkhoof and his son. That’s what he said. And here he is, about to leave home… Shouldn’t we… you know, invite him to travel our way? So he can stay a bit longer and still not be late.”

Discord waved this off. “He’d never agree. I know Minotaurs. They don’t believe in doing things the easy way, not when it’s to do with honour or something.”

“Really?” said Fluttershy. “That’s not how Iron Will did things.”

“You heard Darkhoof, that Iron Will’s a fraud,” Discord said. “Now. May I have a bite?”

Fluttershy let him, and he chose a sesame-topped breadroll. They just ate quietly for the next few minutes, not say a word. Until it was Fluttershy, not feeling her usual self this morning, who broke the silence.

“Discord…” she said tentatively. “When we arrive in Canterlot, we’re, um… I’m sure that’s when you’re gonna meet Alexander Reiner.”

Discord stopped eating. “The human.” It wasn’t a question. A dangerous glint appeared in his eyes. “The one who attacked you.”

“He… he didn’t mean to.”

“Didn’t mean to?” Discord almost spluttered his roll out. “That’s the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard. And I know ridiculous! Nobody attacks without meaning to.”

“He thought I was somepony else,” Fluttershy said, one hoof caressing Discord’s shoulder in the hope of calming him down. “After what Luna showed us in his mind, well… if it were me, I might want to attack me too.”

“Ah...”

As Discord contemplated this, he relaxed.

“Alternate dimensions, evil copies and more…,” he mused. “Gotta say, in hindsight, picked the best time for me to stop being a statue. I’m enjoying this world.”

What he’d said perked Fluttershy’s ears. She’d wondered before, but never asked…

“What was…” Fluttershy said, caressing him a little slower. “What was it like, as a statue?”

Discord looked at her. “Oh, that? If Celly had wits, she wouldn’t have put me in her garden. She could have sent me amongst all the statues they got here, and none’d be the wiser.”

“You know what I mean, Discord.”

He sighed, putting down his third, half-finished roll.

“Calm,” Discord said at last. “It’s like being asleep, only in reverse. No-one ever remembers falling asleep, do they? Well, with this, you don’t remember being awake. Not exactly. I could hear everything going on around me, see it too, sort of... but I never could quite recall what it was like, being a part of it. Like that was the dream.”

“It doesn’t sound so bad…” Fluttershy said, nuzzling him.

Discord snorted. “Maybe to you it doesn’t. But just because you can’t remember, doesn’t mean you don’t want something. I’m a creature of Chaos, and I couldn’t lift a finger. That hurts, Fluttershy. It hurts a lot.”

There was nothing she could say. She huddled close to him, in silence, her pie forgotten.

Eventually, Discord coughed awkwardly. “Come on, let’s finish up. I told Philip we’d be leaving this morning. We’re going to have to say goodbye at some point.”

Fluttershy glanced up to meet his gaze. “When did you say Celestia was expecting us?”

“Two o’clock, Canterlot Time.” Discord checked his pocket-watch. “Less than three hours from now. I could buy us time, but… I don’t think you’d want me messing with the Sun. Not in my condition, heh.”

“Your condition’s not so bad…” Fluttershy shifted on the bedspread. “I think Lord Darkhoof can give us another hour.”

He stared down at her, meeting her eyes. What he saw there made him smile.

“Yeah,” Discord said. “Yeah, I think he could.”

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~

The Princess of Love took a deep breath.

“This is…” Cadance started. “Truly an unsettling tale, Auntie.”

Her aunt hadn’t been exaggerating, back at the station, when she’d listed the previous day’s revelations and ordeals. Yet after hearing about it in exhaustive detail for over two hours – punctuated by the occasional question, or pauses for her and Shining to gather their wits – Cadance still had trouble believing any of it had been real.

“It is,” Celestia said, one forehoof tapping her desk, the other supporting her head. “But alas, that makes it no less true. Within a week, we will all gather at the Hall of Unity. And the world shall have to make a decision on how it must proceed.”

“We’re not leaving them hanging, right?” said Shining, pulling his chair closer. “We can’t.”

Celestia smiled sadly. “My dear Shining,” she said. “In our world alone, there are more injustices than I can count, or hope to right. I, who have lived many hundreds of lifetimes. Compared to that, the work I and your sister do in Equestria is merely scratching the surface. Even after she helped bring back my own sister, or subdue Discord, Chrysalis, and Sombra. The Elements of Harmony shine a light in the darkness, but they cannot fight a war for us.”

“But this is different,” Shining said. “There’s an enemy out there calling itself Equestria. It’s the only Equestria these human beings have ever known, and it’s doing… this to them. We’ve got to restore Equestria’s honour!”

“I’d like nothing better.” Celestia got up, to walk around her desk. “But if we act, we must act with full awareness of what we’re taking upon ourselves. Because if the Empire finds us, they’ll do everything in their power to stop us. That is why the world needs to be warned.”

“Isn’t there another way?” asked Cadance. “Couldn’t we work in secret, helping the humans from behind the scenes?”

Celestia headed to a chest of drawers. “There was a slim hope of that, yes,” she said, opening it up. “Unfortunately, not only did the Empire manage to send an agent after Captain Reiner, evidence shows they now know we exist.”

Horn shining, she pulled out what, curiously, looked like an ordinary briefcase. Turning, Celestia set it down on her desk, rattling it open to reveal an embedded typewriter.

“Before we left Ponyville,” Celestia explained, “the last thing Luna did, after reading the Guards’ reports, was to check Nurse Redheart’s house for clues the S.M.I.L.E. agent might have missed. She discovered this.”

Cadance and Shining peered at the typewriter-briefcase. Apart from the strangeness of a typewriter built into a briefcase, though, hardly anything seemed unusual about it.

“What is it, Celestia?” enquired Cadance.

“Look at what’s written on the scroll,” Celestia said, angling the case. “Be wary, you may not like what you see.”

Shining saw it before Cadance.

“‘Her Ladyship, Archmage Twilight’,” he read, sucking in a breath. “But…”

“Yes,” Celestia said grimly. “The infiltrator used this device to contact her superiors, and they replied to her, across universes, all in the space of a few minutes. What we have here is a highly sophisticated instrument I’ve never seen before, except in hypothetical diagrams. This is an ansible.”

“It…” Hesitantly, Cadance touched the device, pulling away almost instantly, as if it might burn her. “It feels so… normal… there’s crystal in it… yet I barely sense any magic…”

“I imagine it works according to a fusion of magic and technology,” said Celestia. “Powered by a source at the heart of the Equestria which built it, maybe even the same source as this ‘Barrier’ of Reiner’s… it’d be extraordinarily difficult to craft such a device…” She glanced at Shining. “But Twilight’s one person I know who could do it.”

Shining’s lips had thinned. “You cannot show this to her,” he whispered. “The strain of knowing ‘she’ built this for the wrong reasons… she’d break down completely.”

“I’ve taken that into account,” Celestia reassured him. “Blueblood’s organising get-togethers this week for the biggest industrial powerhouses and sharpest technical minds of the gentry. He won’t be able to lay it all out for them at once, of course, but he’s sure to catch the interest of his engineer friends, like Awesome Fire, or Shieldwall.”

Cadance saw Shining cross his forehooves. “Awesome Fire?” he said. “Wasn’t he the chief engineer aboard the Starspear?”

“That is so,” Celestia said cautiously.

Shining sniffed. “Then he helped Blueblood steal– Sorry, borrow that ship from under Captain Dendrite’s nose all those years ago. At least, Dendrite claims it was under his nose… Point is, there are people I wouldn’t trust to do their duty as much as others.”

“I understand why you’d consider duty especially important at this time,” said Celestia. “Yet remember, in this crisis, help may arrive from the least likely of places.”

Cadance slumped in her chair. “To be honest, Auntie... after you told us the Concordia Maxima might summon the Changelings, I’m not sure I’ve found anything else you said even half as shocking…”

“It’s simple bad luck that Chrysalis is their current Queen of Queens,” Celestia commented. “I’ve known less rapacious Queens than her in the past. I don’t like it either, Shining, Cadance…” She pointed to the ansible. “But when we’re facing an opponent who can create things like this, we must be prepared to make compromises.”

Neither Cadance nor Shining spoke as they pondered her words.

“What else did we trace back to the infiltrator?” asked Cadance.

“Not much,” said Celestia. “An advanced gem-tracker, her Home Guard cloak, that’s it. She claims to have thrown the locket in the Everfree River, for which I mean to set up a search operation no later than today. With your help, Captain,” she added, to Shining. “This could take a very long time.”

“Indeed,” Shining nodded, a hoof to his chin. “And, beg pardon, Your Highness… when do we get to meet him… this locket’s owner?”

“Soon, after lunch,” Celestia promised. “After yesterday’s chaos, I thought it best to tighten things up again. Therefore, your first meeting with Captain Reiner will also be Galatea’s introduction to Twilight and the girls.”

Despite herself, Cadance chuckled nervously, with a flap of her wings.

“Wow, that’s…” she said. “Incredible to think there was yet another alicorn all this time. What’s that make me, then?”

“The third Princess, Cadance,” Celestia said kindly. “As before. Your tutelage of Twilight helped ensure there’d still be a place for Luna upon her return, in that my student had more than a teacher, she had a friend.”

While this made Shining smile proudly, Cadance felt a doubt pull at her.

“But… didn’t Twilight have friends her age during her time at your School?”

“In a way, yes,” Celestia agreed. “Yet I believe it’s only after coming to Ponyville that she truly began to understand what she had.” She glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece. “Let’s go. It’s almost lunchtime, and you’ll find this’ll all be easier to digest on a full stomach. Besides, Kibitz wouldn’t be thrilled by tardiness.”

* * * * *

Sitting together for lunch with a human, in Canterlot and together with her girlfriend, to boot, wasn’t the grand occasion Lyra Heartstrings had always imagined it’d be. For one thing, it was just the three of them, quietly shuffled off by Luna and Kibitz to a tea-room in the Palace facing the Canterhorn – upon arriving, Rainbow Dash had gone straight to looking for her friends.

And opposite her was Bonbon, eating in silence without looking up from her plate, as if any other sight would offend her.

Worse, however, was Alex, who had barely touched his food. He’d dip his spoon into the bowl, bring it up to his lips, then let it clatter, contents unsipped, before repeating the same business all over again.

Finally, Lyra could bear it no more. “Alex, what’s the matter? Don’t you like vegetable soup?”

“Hm?” He threw her a look. “No, it’s not that, I just… Yesterday, for the first time, I got to eat Equestrian food in Equestria. And it was served to me by an agent of the Solar Empire.”

“Ah, Nurse Redheart.”

To Lyra’s surprise, Bonbon had spoken.

“I wouldn’t worry about her,” Bonbon continued, gruffly. “We all saw Luna and her Guards pack her away, soon as we got here. She ain’t going anywhere.”

“Don’t be so sure,” Alex said. “The Imperials are wily. In fact…” He stopped.

“What is it, Alex?” said Lyra.

“Nothing,” he said, dipping into his soup.

Which meant he didn’t have to look her, or Bonbon, in the eyes.

* * * * *

“Whoa nelly, Rainbow,” said Applejack. “Ah’d plum think this ‘ere was one of your tall tales, ‘cept when you left us so sharp-ish yesterday, you said you’d had enough of all the craziness.”

Dash grinned at all her friends.

“Yeah, but you gotta admit,” she said cockily, “beats spending all day browsing through dusty old books, doesn’t it?”

“I dunno,” said Pinkie. “Last time I was here, I wouldn’t have minded checking the stuff they’ve got. Some of these books must be hiding some super-duper-amazing secrets! But Twilight wasn’t in the mood, and then Spike got indigestion.”

Spike, for his part, bit hard into another gem. “It’s gonna be nothing next to what I’ve got planned,” he muttered between crunches, twitchily. “Comfort food, no regrets.”

At any other time, Twilight might have spoken up in defense of scholarly reading. But her mind was left reeling. So much confusion… when would she get her relief?

She’d finally explained everything she knew to Spike last night, in their old bedroom, after everyone else had gone to bed. Yet what neither had spoken about was the encounter at the Library. She knew he must have explained it to her friends. She’d also noticed how at dinner, then breakfast and lunch, they’d all carefully avoided bringing it up.

Twilight understood they wished to give her space, and her heart went out to them for it. But it wasn’t comfortable to have this weighing on her, on top of Rainbow Dash’s wild account.

“I must agree with what Miss Pie has to say,” spoke a refined, male voice. “The Starswirl the Bearded Wing’s the only place I remember having any fun learning, as a colt. A perk of having books only you are allowed to read…”

They turned to look. At the far end of the Wing, Prince Blueblood was nonchalantly perusing a heavy tome on ancient maritime practices.

“Though some want too much of a good thing,” Blueblood commented. “I heard that’s what landed the Saddle Mareabian ambassador’s husband in prison, purchasing some vellum-bound book he shouldn’t have, just for his collection. Boy, it takes quite an ego…”

“‘Vellum’?” said Rarity, from the opposite side of his shelf. “How hideous!”

“Question of values, Miss Rarity,” shrugged Blueblood. “Apparently, the Minotaurs ascribe religious value to it, and you wouldn’t think they would, would you?”

“No…” Rarity said in a small voice. “Well, I guess there’s going to be a lot of learning to do.”

Having picked her books, she went to join Twilight’s group at the circular table in the center.

“How can you talk to him so casual, Rares?” Applejack said, keeping her voice down. “Ah thought you hated that guy.”

Rarity opened a book. “I don’t like him,” she whispered. “He’s a self-centred scoundrel. But meeting Sir Fancy’s taught me a few lessons about ponies putting on an act.”

“Whaddya mean?”

“The Prince gets surrounded by a lot of… admirers,” said Rarity. “And most aren’t even after him for the romance, if you catch my drift.”

“‘All that glitters is not gold’,” Rainbow quoted sagely. “I learnt that with Lightning Dust.”

“Not sure that’s quite what it means… but, yes,” Rarity nodded. “Apparently, on these occasions, Blueblood likes to act worse than he is.” She snorted. “Not that this doesn’t make him still pretty rotten… But I guess it’s better than taking advantage of a mare in other ways.”

“Bah,” huffed Spike, chewing messily. “You can do better than him, Rarity.”

“He’s a prankster. Gets it from his dear old auntie.”

The one who’d said this was a grinning face in her book.

Rarity shrieked, falling off her stool.

“Oh, don’t act so surprised,” said Discord, emerging from between the pages to step onto the library floor. “Like you’ve never seen me make an entrance.”

“Could you quit doing that?” Twilight glared at him. “It’s not funny. And where’s Fluttershy?”

“Right here, Twilight,” Fluttershy’s voice said, rapidly joined by the pegasus herself as she followed Discord out of the book. “We’ve had quite a time.”

Amazed, Twilight thought she’d never seen Fluttershy look so relaxed away from home. Her face was graced by a small, secretive smile, and unless Twilight was mistaken, the same look lay reflected on Discord – where against all odds, it looked as if it belonged.

“Well. Looks like we arrived right on cue. Greetings, everypony. This is quite a gathering.”

Hearing her mentor’s voice, Twilight snapped her attention to the barred gate separating the Starswirl the Bearded Wing from the rest of the Archives. There stood Princess Celestia, Cadance and Shining at her sides.

Twilight didn’t even cry a greeting. She rushed over, and threw her forehooves around Shining.

“Whoa-!” Though Shining sounded startled, he wasted no time in ruffling her mane. “Happy to see you too, Twily. But why the enthusiastic welcome committee?”

Twilight just pressed him harder, fighting down the tears she felt welling up. Shining Armor… her big brother, her best friend forever. He could never do what she’d seen him do in Alexander Reiner’s memories. Impossible.

Not was it something Celestia, her beloved mentor who was standing right there, looking at them with such fondness, could ever have done to him.

“Hi, Twilight,” she heard Cadance say softly. “My, you look as if you could do with a friendship chant.”

“Later, Cadance,” Twilight whispered. “We… well, we’re in a library.”

Cadance chuckled. “Of course.”

“Afternoon, Candy.”

It was Blueblood. Twilight hadn’t heard him walk up.

“Glad you could make it,” the Prince said, exchanging pecks on the cheek with Cadance. “Have I mentioned you look radiant? Married life must suit you.”

“Oh, Bluey,” Cadance smiled. “I think the radiance has more to do with all the crystals.”

Delicately yet firmly, Shining eased Twilight from gripping him. “Your Highness,” he said, bowing stiffly to Blueblood. “A pleasure.”

Blueblood laughed. “Shining Armor,” he said genially. “Cadance told me you were soft-spoken, but she didn’t mention you were a stallion of few words. But seeing how you’re Twilight Sparkle’s brother, I’d take it to mean you only talk when you have something brilliant to say.”

“Um…”

“Personally, I can’t contain myself,” Blueblood smiled. “I think it’s great to meet another Prince. Not many of us around these days, you know?”

Bewildered, Shining stared pleadingly at Celestia, who stepped forward.

“Then you’re in luck, nephew,” she said calmly. “Today’s a day for many meetings.”

Having backed away somewhat, Twilight had a better view of the happenings at the entrance, enough to notice four new figures coming up the hallway – two tall ponies, one little pony in crutches, and a figure in a wheelchair.

Celestia had noticed them, too, for she cleared her throat. “That’ll be my sister and Lyra, accompanying our guests. We ought to make room for them. Everyone, gather at the table.”

Twilight joined the throng in obeying Celestia. Swiftly, all in the Starswirl the Bearded Wing had taken places at the table according to preference – the Royals huddled together, while Rarity had contrived to sit far away from either Blueblood or Discord, who was with Fluttershy.

It was only after the brief disorder that something flashed in Twilight.

‘Guests? Who else could that be with Reiner?’

Luna took the lead in entering the Wing.

“Salutations,” she said regally. “None of you knew me three years ago. But you all know me now, and I’m pleased to call many of you ‘friend’.” She looked at Twilight upon saying ‘friend’, smiling serenely – a smile matched by Twilight, sheepish as she was.

After her came Lyra, looking just as nervous. “Madame Heartstrings, you all know in some capacity or another,” said Luna. “As a former classmate, a former charge, a neighbour or, dare I say it, a friend.”

“Um, yeah, that’s me!” chirped Lyra, waving a crutch.

Her comment was impromptu, but Luna recovered fast. “And now, as a Princess of Equestria, I should like you all to meet two newcomers, whom in time, I hope we shall get to know very much… and possibly, call friends.”

She and Lyra stood aside, letting the two remaining figures through.

To the left, Twilight recognised Alexander Reiner. The human appeared healthy enough for a person in a wheelchair, and she saw he’d been given back his uniform to wear, freshly pressed and cleaned. Yet his eyes were as dark and troubled as they’d ever been, and there was a leadenness to his bearing.

And to the left was a tall pony, a grey mare wearing a threadbare, patchwork cloak, a pair of goggles covering her eyes.

“Hi, everyone,” said Reiner.

This drew all eyes to him. Momentarily, the leadenness seemed to leave him, replaced by a look of quiet wonder.

Reiner turned to Lyra. “My God…” he told her quietly. “The entire Royal Family and the Element Bearers all in one place… none mean me harm… welcoming me… It’s just so postcard perfect…”

There came a cough. “Is that right? I think you’re forgetting someone. And nopony ever said my face was pretty.”

Before anyone could make a move, in a flash, Discord had apparated before Reiner, hovering in a lying position. To Twilight’s dismay, he did not look very welcoming.

“So,” Discord said tersely. “You’re the human creature. The one who threatened Fluttershy.”

Incredibly, Reiner gave no sign of being either surprised, or intimidated.

“And you must be Discord,” he said, smiling slightly. “Lord of Chaos. Don’t worry about faces, I’ve spent the last five years fighting creatures with pretty faces and ugly, twisted souls.”

Discord whistled.

“I’ve heard about humans,” he said, raising himself to address the whole gathering. “Their capacity for mischief and mayhem is claimed to be of proportions I’d find delightful. But I have no personal experience with them. If humans have come to Equus, it either slipped my notice, or was during one of those periods when I was sealed away.”

He lowered himself back to eye-level.

“And, mischief and mayhem or no mischief and mayhem,” Discord added, fixing his gaze’s intensity on Reiner. “I do not like it when people threaten Fluttershy.”

“Discord, please,” Fluttershy said, moving up to him. “Don’t be like that. He’s seen things. Horrors about as bad as… as the things you showed us in that hedge maze. If not worse...” She sounded as if she’d had to make herself say this. “He’s finding it very difficult to tell friend from foe.”

“I’m hardly the maddest,” Reiner said, half-jokingly. “But he’s got a point.” His eyes fell upon Fluttershy, full of contrition. “I’ve been putting this off too long,” he whispered, leaning forward to meet her gaze. “I should have said sorry. What I did to you was… unprovoked.”

“It’s alright,” Fluttershy said gently. “You were just afraid. And you didn’t really do anything.”

Next to them, Discord stroked his goatee. “Fine,” he said at last, raising a finger before Reiner. “But only because she said so. You’ve no idea of the things I could do, human. To you, and all your armies.”

“Actually, I’m sure my superiors would love to hear that,” said Reiner. “It’d be us playing with fire as badly as we did with nukes, but by God, they’ll want someone like you to take on the Solar Tyrant.”

“No fear,” Discord said with a malicious cackle. “That’s the part I’m looking forward to…”

With Fluttershy taking him by the claw, he hovered over to rejoin the gathering.

“Okay,” Reiner said. “Lyra, I met the Element Bearers with you in Ponyville… and the Princesses, sort of. Can you make any of the remaining introductions…” He nodded at Luna. “Or should that honour go to you, Your Highness?”

Luna responded solemnly.

“I do believe,” she said, “that Madame Heartstrings has known the fine ponies of today’s Royal Family longer than I have, Captain Reiner. Princess Cadance especially, but also Prince Shining Armor and Prince Astron Blueblood, to some degree.”

“Princess Cadance,” Reiner said, pre-empting Lyra as he stared at the surprised Princess of Love. “You, I know. Or at least, I know another you. She no longer calls herself a princess. All the lesser princes and princesses of Equestria were driven out, or ‘vanished’, by the Tyrant. But you, you threw in your lot with us. For Lyra, and the Equestria you loved.”

Finally, after all the harsh words he had said about Equestria, Twilight felt herself beaming with pride, in no small part because the praise was aimed at Cadance.

By Reiner’s side, the tall mare waited, motionless as a statue. Twilight might have forgotten her if Reiner hadn’t chosen that moment to throw her an inquisitive glance.

Whatever this was about, it got lost when Cadance spoke in reply.

“And…” Cadance began. “Shining? Blueblood?”

Reiner immediately snapped away from the tall mare to observe Cadance, then Lyra, as if he were asking a silent question.

Lyra simply nodded. “I got to know Shining when I was one of Cadance’s bridesmaids. And Blueblood, we’ve… we’ve met. Through Cadance, again. Turned out we share a fascination for things outside Equestria…”

“Alright…” said Reiner. “I’m sorry, Your Highness, but… Well, nothing good came to them. The Tyrant somehow bewitched your husband into fighting for her… And Prince Blueblood… I… I don’t really know. Lyra, the Lyra I knew, didn’t talk about him much. I think she once mentioned something about him falling in battle against the dragons… but that’s all I got.”

The air in the room grew a few degrees colder. Twilight saw Shining’s eyes dart towards Blueblood, but Blueblood didn’t move at all. His own eyes looked fogged over.

Until the feeling was thoroughly demolished by a choking snort and a cough from beneath the table.

“What in the–” Twilight peered under. “Spike! How much did you eat!? And will you get out from under there!?”

Coughing and splurting, a much abashed-looking Spike, cheeks covered in crumbs, crawled out into the light.

“Uh, h-hi, guys,” Spike stuttered, red in the face. “How’s it going?”

And Reiner, who hadn’t batted an eye at Discord, now looked astonished. “Good Lord! What might you be?”

“This is Spike,” said Twilight, lifting him to his feet and trying to brush off the crumbs. “He’s a baby dragon, my assistant, and my kid brother. He was at Golden Oaks Library while we were talking to you in the hospital.”

Initially, Reiner still seemed nonplussed, but then he nodded slowly. “Yes, now that you mention it, I do spot a family resemblance…”

Twilight rolled her eyes, having heard the jokes about their purple hides before. She dimly noticed that Blueblood’s eyes had unfogged at around the words ‘family resemblance’, but paid it little heed. At least he’d stopped zoning out.

Muttering under her breath, she returned to trying to clean up Spike.

“Why are you so shocked, sir?” Rarity asked. “I mean, Spike is the cutest little dragon, of which there aren’t many, I’m sure, yet he was raised by ponies.”

“It’s just that…” Reiner said hesitantly. “This is going to sound strange, but that’s the first time I’ve seen a dragon.”

Discord harrumphed. “You’ve never met a draconequus before,” he said, crossing his arms. “Yet we don’t see you making a song-and-dance about it.”

“That’s cos’ he’s not what I’d have expected from a dragon,” Reiner told him. “Not all big and imposing… not like you are. And the last thing I thought I’d see in Equestria was a dragon who’s friends with the ponies.”

Suddenly, Dash stepped up. “Hey, Alex,” she said loudly. “Aren’t you gonna tell them ‘bout what happened with Redheart in Ponyville?”

“I don’t think anyone needs to hear that again, Rainbow,” Twilight said crossly.

But she was wrong.

“Um, I do?” Fluttershy said, from next to Discord. “What’s this about Redheart?”

Her question made Twilight flinch, realising Fluttershy and Discord couldn’t possibly have heard about this yet. Yet just as either Dash or Reiner might have opened their mouths, they were startlingly interrupted.

The tall mare had taken a step forward. “I believe I can cover those questions,” she said. “Once I have been introduced.”

It was the most peculiar voice to ever enter Twilight’s ears – prim, proper, yet with the telltale brogue accent of the Reindeer mingled with the rough-hewn dialect of Stratusburg.

Instead of adding anything, though, the speaker advanced toward the throng, in a gap that permitted her to approach the table under their watching, confused eyes.

A light shone from beneath her cloak’s hood, just as a few books got pulled from the pile towering over the table, the teetering pile of paper miraculously staying put. It had to be the tall mare’s telekinesis – the book was held aloft in an aura as grey and dull as her coat or cloak.

Peering, Twilight beheld the titles. Runic Symbols Of Antiquity and Seven Theories on Bending Time, both edited by a certain ‘S. Nexus’.

“Professor Nexus’ work,” the tall mare said. “Used for research in relation to Alexander Reiner’s runes,” she said evenly, not looking back at said human, who was staring at her as uncertainly as anyone. “Yes, researching them may prove worthwhile, if there is a secret there we do not yet know.”

Twilight frowned in confusion. “Uh, forgive me if this seems rude, but… who are you?”

“A scholar,” said the tall mare, “come to aid Princess Celestia in regards to the human.”

From nearby, Twilight thought she heard Discord trying and failing to hold down a snigger.

Nonetheless, the next one to speak was Cadance.

“You’re Galatea, aren’t you?”

The tall mare glanced at the Princess of Love, around whose shoulders Shining had slung his forehoof protectively.

“Then Celestia had already told you, Princess Cadance,” the tall mare stated, as both Celestia and Luna wordlessly drew in behind her. And, for the first time, Twilight realised that she stood a head taller than Celestia. “Yes. I am Galatea. I have returned to Canterlot after a very long absence. Work, as it were.”

“What? Long absence?!”

Pinkie Pie’s head had shot up as soon as the words left Galatea’s mouth, a wide-eyed grin on her face.

“Ooh, hi! I’m Pinkie Pie!,” she exclaimed, bouncing on the table. “Who are you?!”

Galatea took a step back from this pink smiling blur of a mare. “I… am Galatea. A scholar.”

“Ooh, neat!” Pinkie said, still grinning widely. “You’ll just love this place! There’s absolutely loads of books. More books than a book factory.” She paused. “Well, actually, I don't really know about that, I’ve never been to a book factory. There might be more books than a book factory, but–”

“Pinkie,” Twilight said, nudging Spike aside to curtail her friend’s enthusiasm. “I’m sure the Princess’s friend must be tired if she’s had a long journey.”

“Oh, yeah,” Pinkie said with a grin. “Absolutely.” She paused, tilting her head. “Hey, uh, Miss Galatea? Don’t your wings get cramped under there? Rainbow Dash always complains that she can’t rest her wings in stuffy clothes.”

Twilight’s head swiveled around faster than she thought possible, her eyes wide with shock.

“Excuse me?” Galatea said, her own expression growing bemused. She lifted her goggles, revealing a pair of icy blue eyes.

“Y’know, your wings? Cramped? Cloak?” Pinkie asked, as though this were obvious. She stretched her neck forward, one eye closed and the other as wide as a dinner plate, and pointed to Galatea’s cloak-covered withers. “They’re pressed pretty tight, but I can sorta see the outline.”

Galatea raised an eyebrow before, without fanfare, she raised a wing. Twilight gasped as Galatea’s cloak accentuated her spread feathers, and lowered her head. All of her friends except Pinkie and Lyra followed suit.

“Forgive me, Princess…” she started. “Uh…”

“I am not a Princess. I am merely Galatea.”

“Uh, then, forgive me, Galatea,” Twilight said, head still bowed. “I’m so sorry, I did not realise…”

“It’s a cloak, silly!” Pinkie said cheerfully. “I could still see the bumps from her wings, and she’s taller than Celestia!”

“I was so sure they wouldn’t be easy to notice,” Galatea said. Twilight’s first instinct was that she sounded disappointed, but there was too much surprise, and perhaps humour in her voice for Twilight to be sure.

In the background, Discord clapped his hands. “Ohh, well done, Pinkie Pie!” he grinned. “That’s the trouble with most people. They don’t look. People say I don’t make sense, but really, isn’t that the nonsensicalest thing of all?”

“Honestly,” smiled Pinkie. “I didn’t really expect a new alicorn to pop up, but I figured I should be prepared! In case of serious alicorn emergencies. It was kind of a long shot.”

“That…” Galatea blinked, at loss for words, “does not make sense.”

“It really does, though!” Pinkie countered. “Life always provides you with what you need, if you look hard enough. Emergency coffee, emergency fireworks, emergency tubas…”

An amused-looking Celestia saw fit to add her two bits. “Emergency alicorns?”

Luna groaned.

“Seriously, Auntie?” Blueblood whispered mutedly, tugging at his jacket.

“Yupperoonie!” Pinkie said brightly. “I’ve always believed the universe provides when you need it the most.”

To collective surprise, Galatea began chuckling. “If the universe requires me,” she said. “I can only hope not to be a disappointment.”

“I am sure you won’t be,” Celestia said quietly, while Luna shrugged her shoulders.

“But… but who are you?” Now Twilight raised her head, yet her eyes still wide with surprise. “I don’t understand… if you’re an alicorn, did you… are you like Cadance, did you become one, or did you–”

“Twilight,” Celestia said gently, a smile on her face. “These are all important questions, and I hope you never stop being so curious about the world, but I’m afraid there is much that still must take up our attention. You have met Galatea, all of you. That is a good start.”

Twilight nodded. “Oh, uh, of course.”

Possibly the strangest thing about the whole reunion was how quiet Lyra had stayed throughout. If there was something she’d wanted to say, she’d waited her turn with a patience Twilight might never have suspected she had.

But now Lyra must have decided her moment had arrived, for she approached Celestia.

“Actually,” said Lyra, hobbling. “Your Highness–”

A squeaking of wheels cut right across her. The human in his wheelchair had rolled closer to the centre of the room, closer to where Cadance, Shining and Blueblood stood, his eyes fixed on only one of them.

“Princess Cadance,” Alexander Reiner said, awed. “...You’re an alicorn?”

* * * * *

Half an hour later, the gathering was down a few Royals.

Celestia reflected on how Reiner’s surprise at Cadance’s status confirmed her deduction from chatting with the captured Redheart. Wherever the exact point of divergence might lie between Equestrias, it went back to a time prior to Cadance earning her wings… in other words, before Twilight had even become her student or hatched Spike. Ten, fifteen years, perhaps more.

Fleetingly, Celestia wondered how funny it was that after close to a decade, Spike could still be called a ‘baby’ dragon, but she didn’t dwell on it. Legends told of a great dragon who lived within a mountain, older than Equestria or the preceding equine nations. Even an alicorn had to appreciate how long-lived dragons could be.

Maybe Cadance would come away enlightened from her private discussion with Reiner. Celestia dearly hoped so, for her and Shining’s sake. Blueblood had his own means of coping with stress, on which he was no doubt getting a head-start at this very instant, not waiting for his big evening.

Only she and Luna had remained in the Starswirl the Bearded Wing to see how the Bearers responded to Galatea. Most of it had been predictable. Applejack had enquired how Galatea kept herself fed. Rarity, after some whittering about her cloak’s threadbare state, had backed up Applejack by asking if Galatea relied on the kindness of strangers. This was when Fluttershy had joined her voice to theirs. And Dash wore a look throughout which betrayed her desire to gush on how cool it was to have another alicorn, but she let her friends ask the real questions.

Naturally, Pinkie alone was unpredictable.

“There is just one question,” Pinkie said, once the querying reached its conclusion with Applejack being satisfied Galatea didn’t scrump for a living. Her tone was incredibly serious. “A very important question.”

Galatea considered her. “And what question might that be, Miss Pie?”

“When,” Pinkie said, “is your birthday.”

There was a moment of silence, and then Galatea nodded solemnly.

“I believe it was the Seventh of Aethon by the current Equestrian Calendar,” she informed Pinkie. “But I could be mistaken. I have never celebrated my birthday before.”

Pinkie Pie blinked. “Never… celebrated… your birthday.”

“No,” Galatea said simply. “It was never brought up, nor did I think it was necessary.”

Pinkie took a deep breath, as though steadying herself, then smiled. “I see. And how many birthdays have you, uh, not celebrated?”

Galatea shrugged. “I have frankly lost count, Miss Pie. But if you'd like, consider your plans as mine first birthday.” She paused. “Perhaps it was five thousand, give or take.”

Pinkie nodded, before gently grabbing a piece of notepaper. “I see. Twilight, quill, please?” Once Twilight had obliged, Pinkie quickly scribbled something down. “Okay. Thank you.”

“Oh, no,” Applejack whispered, shooting Twilight a worried look.

“If that’ll be all,” said Galatea, not noticing Rarity smile knowingly.

She readjusted the cloak to hug her barrel once again, and made her way towards the door.

“Well,” said Celestia. “I shall leave you to your research, my little ponies. If you need anything, do not hesitate to ask.”

Lyra hobbled over.

“I can provide something,” Luna added, moving to face Fluttershy.

Luna might have ignored Lyra closing her mouth and stomping her hoof in frustration, never mind her recent nervous paralysis – but it didn’t evade Celestia, no more than a sniggering Discord, who’d just been hovering silently during the Bearers’ talk with Galatea.

“Here, Lyra,” Celestia said, draping a wing around her. “You can come with us. Captain Reiner ought to soon be done talking with Cadance and Shining.”

The gratitude emanating from Lyra was nearly as palpable to Celestia as the Sun’s rays. “Thank you, Princess.”

Meanwhile, Fluttershy was asking what she should thank Luna for providing.

“Sleep, dear Fluttershy,” Luna said gently. “I can’t imagine you’re not jet-lagged from Discord’s continent-hopping. With a calculatedly distilled amount of sleep, I can get your cicadian rhythm back in synch with Equestrian times.”

“Oh, no, Princess,” Fluttershy smiled. “Trust me, I’ve rarely felt this invigourated.”

Luna threw Discord a suspicious glance. “You may feel like that for a short time,” she kept on addressing Fluttershy, steadying her voice. “But the feeling will wear off with a vengeance at this time of day. And we need you and your friends’ balance more than ever.”

* * * * *

After the excitements of that meeting, the rest of the day proceeded uneventfully for Twilight’s group of friends. Learning from Dash’s frustrations at the city library and with Fluttershy going first, they had chosen to rotate, going about it in turns to take short naps every few hours, so they could relay each other in remaining alert while reading all through the long afternoon.

But their research’s paltry findings seemed to confirm what had been said by Discord – who’d vanished to some other place, after extracting a promise from Fluttershy to check up on him soon – about the lack of concrete information on humans in Equestria, even amongst these oldest, most mysterious of archives.

So, as the day edged towards sunset, they retreated by consensus, for a meal and a rest. However, one pony still had one thing on her mind.

“Five thousand. Five. Thousand.”

“Are you… alright, Pinkie?” Twilight asked, forgetting the storybook she was reading in bed.

On the bed across from Twilight’s, Pinkie looked up from her renewed scribbling. “Just planning a ‘five-thousand-birthdays-in-one’ party. Or a first birthday. Whichever works!”

“You really did take to Galatea immediately,” Twilight commented. “I mean, I get you love making friends with everyone. But you never once talked about throwing a party for Reiner.”

“Welllll, that’s not exactly true, Twi’,” said Pinkie. “I did kinda leave Lyra a note… but then he woke up and started talking about all those bad things, and I forgot, I guess.”

“Oh…” Not once had Pinkie forgotten a party before.

“But!” said Pinkie. “It does mean I’ve a doozy of a party to plan now.”

“I hope so, Pinkie,” Twilight said. She meant every word. “Because goodness knows, I doubt there’ll be many parties going on these days.”

“Just means I’ll have to make the few we have extra special!” Pinkie crowed. “If things will get as bad as I think, we needsomething to keep us happy.”

“If Reiner is right about what we’re getting into, I think we’ll n–” Twilight started.

Pinkie bounced over to place a hoof over Twilight’s mouth. “Ssssh-ssh-shsh.I saw it all too, and I know.”

Pinkie Pie seemed a little less… or a little more… something. Twilight couldn’t fully place the word, but there was something different about Pinkie then and there.

“Just let me keep this on a happy note,” the party pony said.

Twilight heard the bedroom door creak upon.

“Guys?” said a voice. “It’s me, Lyra.”

Despite the late hour, everypony in the room was still awake, reading by lamplight. Except for Spike, who lay curled up in his cot next to Twilight’s bed, with Peewee standing guard.

“Lyra?” Twilight said. Her friends nodded. “Okay, come in.”

The little green unicorn entered, still supporting herself with a crutch. Carefully, Lyra closed the door behind her. In her aura, she carried a book Twilight recognised from somewhere.

“Where’s Bonbon?” whispered Applejack pulling up her sheets. “Wasn’t she with you and Captain Reiner?”

“Sleeping,” Lyra said. “I gave her the slip. We spent the afternoon touring the Palace, like I promised, anyway. I had to make it up to her somehow. Can I sit, Twilight?”

“Sure,” said Twilight, budging up to make room for Lyra on the bed.

Lyra nodded gratefully and sat, the book in hoof.

“Wow, nice setup you’ve got here,” she mentioned, gazing around the room. “Very spacious. Weren’t you supposed to be staying at your parents’ house?”

“We did last night,” Twilight said. “And we went over this evening with Shining and Cadance. But Princess Celestia said she thinks it’d be safest, from now on, if we all stay in the Palace.”

“She’s got a point,” Lyra said. “But, Twilight, what did Cadance tell you, if anything, about her chat with Alex?”

“Well, I asked her,” said Twilight, understanding the purpose of Lyra’s visit. “She said she told him how she became an alicorn. You know, that old bedtime story of hers, about her growing up in a a village of earthponies at faraway Oleander, and how the jealous sorceress Prismia drained the villagers’ love, and Cadance confronted her and persuaded her to change her ways, and that got Celestia’s attention.”

“That sounds like a nice story,” Rarity smiled, resting upon her pillow. “We should hear it in full someday.”

“In the story, Prismia used an enchanted necklace, didn’t she?” Lyra mused. “Twilight, d’you think that might’ve been the Alicorn Amulet?”

“Why… I…” Twilight blinked. “You know, maybe it was. The Amulet can only be taken off willingly… and Cadance convinced the sorceress to change...”

“Where’d you put the Amulet, Twi’?” Dash asked.

“It’s safely locked under nine charms at Golden Oaks Library. I’ve done everything I could for it to be there when I get back.”

“Maybe you should fetch it soon,” said Lyra.

“How come?”

“Because… if the Amulet is the necklace from Cadance’s story, I got a feeling it might become almost as important as Alex’s locket… You’re not the only who’s done her homework. Before Trixie showed up with it, where did the Amulet go? What became of Prismia? And, most importantly… why did none of that happen to Alex’s Cadance?”

“That’s…” Twilight opened her mouth, then closed it. “You know, I don’t know.”

Fluttershy coughed. “Um, Lyra?”

Twilight and Lyra turned to her. “Yeah?”

“It’s about that… that locket-thing,” Fluttershy said. “See, Luna took me aside… She claimed it was to help me sleep better, but in fact, it was so she could talk to me in my dreams, where Discord wouldn’t hear…”

“Really? Why?” said Lyra.

“She said Discord mustn’t know about the locket,” Fluttershy said quietly. “She said Galatea had mentioned that if he did, he could destroy it. I promised that I wouldn’t use my Element on him, but nopony said anything about a locket…”

Twilight nodded to Lyra. “Yeah. That’s why Galatea prevented Alex from talking about Redheart, or the locket, in front of Discord.”

“Oh. Ah.” Lyra thought it over. “Gotta say, that’s very logical.”

“But what’s so special about the locket, anyway?” demanded Dash.

Lyra opened her book to the now-familiar sketch of the pearl figurine. “‘Harmony Enlightening the World’, Dash,” she said, pointing. “With the Rainbow of Light. One of the treasures Doctor Waggoner’s expedition found... and lost on its journey home.”

“Lyra,” gasped Twilight. “Surely, you can’t be serious.”

Pinkie shook her head. “She’s never been more serious, Twi’.”

“But…” Twilight collected herself. “Hold on, hold on. What did Alex have to say about the locket? Did he mention the Alicorn Amulet?”

“No, not once,” Lyra admitted. “Didn’t seem to think his locket was anything special, either… but when I saw him after he’d finished talking to Cadance, he mentioned something. He said his mother used to tell him the locket was filled with ‘the fire that God has put there’...”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Twilight said. “Some… some sort of spark, like in the Elements of Harmony?”

“That’s what I want to find out,” Lyra said determinedly, tapping her book. “What I went to Princess Celestia for. Someone’s got to go to the Sunken Dream Valley once more, and find out where ponies truly began.”

Twilight stared at Lyra, aware that all her fellow Element Bearers were doing the same.

“And the Princess turned you down straight away,” she said pleadingly, “reminding you we might be going to war soon, right?”

“Nope,” said Lyra. “Matter of fact, she sounded very interested in the idea of an expedition.”

Resignation washed through Twilight. There was no fight left in her on this, no argument she could muster against the pig-headedness of her old friend. It was all too much.

“Okay…” Twilight sighed. “But before you go, I absolutely need your help for one thing.”

Lyra blinked in surprise. “Of course, Twilight. Anything. What are friends for?”

“Lyra…” Somehow, this felt like the hardest thing Twilight had ever done. “I met Moondancer.”

* * * * *

In the Guards’ quarters of the Palace, though it should have technically been after lights-out, Icewind lay beneath the blankets of his bunk, consulting a book by the light of a firefly-lamp. Much as his bunkmate was a stickler for regulations, he felt some comfort knowing Winter would shut an eye on this – after all, Winter had never been one to discourage reading.

It was a small comfort to be had, considering how restless hiding the locket made him. Icewind told himself that keeping it hidden between the plates of barding in his locker was probably the best hiding-spot he could hope for – not only was it too obvious for anyone to think about looking there, the armour’s enchantments were a barrier against magical search.

But what if Captain Armor ordered a surprise inspection, and saw with his own eyes…

Icewind didn’t let his mind veer off on this path. He couldn’t afford to. Besides, he still wasn’t convinced he might not just tell Captain Armor about the whole thing. The Princesses were feeling unapproachable to him these days, yet the Captain was still the shining knight every Guard aspired to be.

Except that before then, it was vital he learn more about what he was up against.

Uncovering information about humans had proven unsurprisingly difficult. The strange creatures were regarded as the stuff of obscure myth and cryptozoology by the mainstream, leaving very little on offer to consult in a respectable public library. Nonetheless, by persisting, he’d managed to scrounge a few promising volumes.

Icewind gave the name on the frontispiece another look over. Doctor Catseye. The single name to pop up the most in contemporary human studies. Depending on how the wind blew, he might try and contact her in person.

He was to do much reading over the next few days, his worries deepening, while the people from outside Equestria continued to gather ever more in answer of the Concordia’s Call.

~ Bone Dry Desert, South of the Great Continent ~ By the Equestrian Calendar, Seventh Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

“Look out!”

Arch heard his Pa’s warning shout, in time for him to peer out the window as a huge rock landed in front of their caravan, blowing up sand and causing the two tow-bulls to stop dead in their tracks.

“Where the blazes did that come from!?” Pa cried out, the wood of the cart creaking as he climbed off the driver’s seat. “Of all the times for this to happen…”

The old boar’s words dissolved into muttered oaths, too low for Arch to make out. And that was the most worrying thing of all. It wasn’t like Pa to tone down his language.

“What’s going out there, Arch?” Mills asked, clutching his guitar.

“A rock’s landed in front of us, Pa’s checkin’ it out.” Arch replied. “Something’s wrong.” He reached for his polished club and moved towards the door. “Ya stay here, I’m gonna go–”

He didn’t know what happened immediately. One second he was by the door. The next, both it and he were torn off and thrown away, noisily. Arch hit the desert ground with a thud and tumbled before stopping.

“Ugh.” He groaned, face and hands burning from the sand, as he tried to pick himself up. “Wh–” Arch froze at what he saw.

Standing by the caravan, or at least where the door had been, was what looked like a short blue dragon wearing armour. The metal gleamed in the sun, blindingly, and the light caught him in the eye. Yelping, Arch felt more than saw one of his hands scramble up to block it, the world momentarily gone white.

He almost didn’t notice the rod-like thing the dragon carried on its back.

It was when he heard Mills’ squeal that Arch’s senses snapped back to normal. Somehow, his other hand found his club. Keeping his weapon in a tight grip, Arch hurried back towards the caravan, just as the small dragon moved into the trailer.

“Get out of there, beast!” Arch yelled, breaking into a run.

Yet he was stopped when, abruptly, another dragon landed in front of him, billowing up sand, blocking his path. This one was not only all red, it was bigger and unarmoured and mean-looking and–

“Pa!” Arch cried, recognising the prone shape clutched in the dragon’s left hand. “Let him go, ya overgrown lizard!” Bringing his club arm up, Arch charged in for a swing, and was swiftly knocked back by the dragon’s tail as it slammed into him.

The dragon sneered. “Puny swine,” it said, though its voice sounded on the cusp of cracking. Was it a youth? “You’re just lucky the Princess is here, or you’d be cooking by now.”

“What’s that supposed to mean!?” Arch yelled in spite of himself, before throwing caution to the wind and trying another charge. And again, to his pain, he was battered back by the brute’s tail...

“This is getting annoying,” it muttered, dropping his Pa, who hit the ground with a thud. “Either you cut this out, or I’ll make you stop.”

“Bring it!” Arch declared, trying one final charge and, this time, managing to avoid getting hit by the tail – only to get grabbed by the dragon's claws. His fingers turned loose, dropping his club to the ground.

“By the Kämpfer, you are thick,” the red dragon grumbled, before eyeing him.

“What’re ya lookin’ at?” Arch demanded, trying to struggle even though he was held above the ground.

Instead of answering, the red dragon looked around. Its eyes stayed especially focused on the cart, longer than any other spot of the caravan. When it was done, it turned back to him.

“Hey, swine,” it whispered, rancid breath filling up Arch’s nostrils. “You got anything on you?”

“What?” Arch flatly asked, staring at the creature.

“You heard me,” the red dragon said, one claw reaching into Arch’s threadbare pockets, “what do you got on you that’s... shiny?”

“What– are ya trying to rob me!”

“Don’t be so loud!” it hissed, swerving its head towards the caravan again, before returning its focus on him. “You gotta have something important, even if you are a pig.” It abandoned Arch’s pockets and inspected his neck. “Come on, you gotta have some jewel-encrusted junk or a gold tooth!”

It forced Arch’s mouth open, yet seemed to curse when it failed to find anything. Disgusted, the brute slammed Arch’s mouth shut.

“Argh!” Arch spluttered and spat. His jaws ached like Tartarus. “What’s yer problem!”

“Figures. Just figures, we’re flying for miles and yet the only thing we find is a wagon full of stinkin’ little hams. No use to anyone,” the red dragon huffed. “Go look at your ‘Pa’, little pig. You don’t have a thing I want.” It prepared to throw Arch when–

“Stop fooling around, you lughead.”

This was a voice Arch hadn’t heard yet. And it sounded female?

His view darted towards where the voice had come from. But he knew whose it was before he’d laid eyes on her. The blue dragon in gold armour was standing in front of the ravaged cart, the battered remains of the door lying at her feet.

A small gust of wind had started to pick up, and already grains of sand were blowing across the broken wood, burying it in a thin, dark golden coating.

But Arch spared that only the briefest glance, and the dragon did not look at it all. Instead, he realised, her attention was on the assortment of things she was holding between her arms, pilfered from the cart. Pots and pans and pieces of food...

She lay the pile on the sandy ground. On the other hand, the red dragon, obeying the female’s command, had left Arch hanging. He didn’t feel glad of it for long, once he heard her next words.

“Drop him,” the apparent leader of the two said carelessly. “I’m gonna need an extra pair of claws here. And we’re gonna need something to carry all this in.” She nodded towards the back of the cart. “Spotted some burlap sacks over there. They oughta do nicely.”

The red dragon grumbled, dropping Arch to the ground, before stomping towards the back. While wincing from the pain, Arch looked up to notice the leader dragon slip something wrapped in a blanket into the pile. But he kept quiet, just wanting this ordeal to be over now.

Once the male returned with the bags, it and the female started stuffing the items in. Done, the red dragon picked up two of the bags, before opening its wings and taking off, leaving the remaining bag with the leader.

“Why’d ya do this to us?” Arch asked, his voice breaking as she seized the last of the loot. “We didn’t do nothin’ to deserve this...”

The dragon’s face was concealed beneath her armour’s helmet. Even her eyes were impossible to see under the slits. Still, when she turned to face him, he knew she was looking at him intently.

“Dragons do not sow,” she said simply. “Only reap. Be glad I was there to hold his leash. If it were down to him, he’d have taken you and your family along for the bargain.”

She stepped forward, gave a beat of her wings, and then seemed to hesitate.

“We didn’t take your water barrels,” the dragon said. “Only your gourds, which we’ll be needing to replenish ourselves later. You should have enough water to make it to the edge of the desert. Or back to Klugetown. Whichever you prefer.”

And with that, not even looking back at the cart she’d just ransacked, the dragon flew. There was a lightness to her flight, despite her heavy armour, that Arch might have considered graceful if things were different.

“Arch?”

He heard Mills before he saw him, emerging from the caravan, shaking.

“Mills!” Arch cried out, rushing up to embrace his little brother. “You’re not hurt!”

“N-No.” Mills replied, shakily. “B-But that blue dragon, s-she… she took my guitar.”

“What?”

“She kept lookin’ at it, and she just took it from me, when I thought she was gonna attack me.” Mills sniffled slightly. “I hadn’t even got to play the new strings yet.”

Arch sighed, massaging his head.

“What a croc.”

~ Forbidden Jungle, South of the Great Continent ~

A puff, a breath of fire, and the tinder alit, glorious flame rising.

Satisfied, Princess Ember sat herself down, a knee folded over the other, on one of the logs they’d pulled into a semi-circle in this little clearing. No fire ever felt so warm to a dragon as that which burned within their belly, of course, but the light it cast was pleasant and useful in the gathering gloom. Not that a drake worthy of the name had anything to fear from the dark.

In fact, she suspected that any fellow traveller who should chance upon them, here in the woods at night, would quickly have felt their relief turn to regret as the poor soul realised just whose campfire they’d stumbled across.

It wouldn’t have been the first rough encounter of the day, anyway.

Giving her chin a stroke, Ember’s mind went to the contents of the huge burlap bag she hadn’t unslung on all her way here, even while setting up a bivouac. With a grunt, she at last hauled it over her shoulder, bringing the thing to land on the grassy knoll with a soft ‘thump’. Wordlessly, she motioned to her companion that he do the same.

Although in the space of a day, they’d already been through thick and thin together, now she was out of her armour, Ember felt reluctant to chat with the red-scaled boulderhead any more than necessary.

She rummaged through the bag, looking for all the most interesting things she remembered they’d snaffled from those wandering Klugetownites. In turn, she pulled out a loaf a bread three days old, a jug of sand-grog, and last of all, a thick yet green-tinged slice of meat.

“Well,” Ember commented. “It’s a start.” She fixed her companion in her sights. “Now’s your turn to bring out the goods. What’ve you got?”

Garble huffed the last of their combined load from his back, bending his back and stretching out his wings. “Most of the loot, Princess.”

He spoke in the Common Tongue. Ember had commanded they practice it, even in private. While it plainly gave him no pleasure, this was one order Garble heeded with minimal complaint.

The red drake spat, before forcing open a sack and digging out a pack of rather stale crackers. “Why couldn’t they have pearls?” he grumbled, trying to force some of the crackers down. Only to almost immediately cough them back out.

“Don’t,” Ember snarled, flashing her teeth. “Call me. Princess.”

“Why not?” Garble spat, wiping bits of cracker off his maw, “you ain’t the Dragon Lord or the Kämpfer, so that’s the only thing left, Princess.”

Growling, Ember stood, ignoring how her companion was a full head taller than her. She could not tower over him physically, but she knew she dwarfed him mentally. Besides, she had an ace in the hole.

“Let me show you,” Ember said, reaching into the depths of her bag. This time, what she pulled was a certain tall, thick rod hewn from volcanic stone. “This,” she said slowly, pointing to the blood-red stone held in the Sceptre’s claw-like grip, “is my father’s sceptre. He entrusted it to me. So that I’d represent the dragons in their Lord’s stead. That does not make me a princess. The proper title, as he told it, is ambassador.”

“You’re still his whelp.” Garble growled, annoyed, “Ambassador or not.”

She tapped the Sceptre on the ground. The ruby glinted, as a small, static spark raced up Ember’s arm.

“Oh, really,” she sneered. “I could turn you to stone with this thing, you know.”

Garble just muttered to himself, before digging into another sack, trying to find something else to eat than old, stale crackers.

“That’s really all we have?” Ember asked. “With the glee you fell upon those bumpkins with, I’d have expected more to show for it.”

“Shut it!” Garble snapped, tearing a sack in half; the contents, a bunch of worn jars, spilling to the ground, with two breaking into pieces. “If I were with Fizzle or Clump, the haul would have their entire damn village to show for it!”

Ember rolled her eyes. “Honestly. I know the Dragon Lord agreed to have you come along for the ride. He likes volunteers. But who’d look at you and choose you to escort a diplomatic mission?”

“The Kämpfer did.” Garble glowered, thumbing at himself. “he picked me. So I’ll keep your wings from getting clipped.”

Ember snorted. “Oh, yes. Very clever. ‘How to train your delinquent youth in responsibility’... If anything happens to me, you’re dead if Dad gets his claws on you, y’know.”

“Shut it!” Garble snapped again, standing up and flaring his wings open, “your dad’s not here, or the Kämpfer! There ain’t nothing that could stop me from taking the sceptre and leaving you in a ditch! The only thing I’m getting out of this is probably some idea on what that thing was, beyond the ponies messing with us.”

“Well,” Ember said wistfully, taking two steps, back-and-forth before the fire, “Guess we’ll find that out soon enough.” She looked up, at the single bright dot illuminating a still-starless twilight sky. “If Dad’s right and that star-thing leads us there, we’ll be at the Hall of Unity in no time now…” She sighed. “And there’s gonna be a lot of talking involved.”

“The Kämpfer shoulda picked your Dad then.”

At this, Ember gave a peal of laughter. “C’mon. Can you picture Dad fitting into one of their rooms, no matter how big?”

“No, but it’s their fault, they always make ‘em too small.” Garble snorted. “Stupid ponies.”

“You know what else got made too small?” Ember sneered. “Your brains. Because if you think the Kämpfer, as you call him, isn’t here with us, you haven’t been paying attention.”

“Just because he’s powerful and huge doesn’t mean he’s everywhere.” Garble said, flapping his wings, “cos’ if he could, he would have just gone himself.”

“That’s what you think...” Ember told him smugly. Then came her stomach’s turn to growl. “Huh, will you listen to that. Really ought to get something in, partner, even if it’s just scraps. You say crackers is all you got?”

She checked her supplies, thought about it a minute, then she slashed her claw through the thick slice of meat, tearing it in two.

“‘Ere,” she said, tossing him the larger portion. “Eat. Not sure how much farther we got to go, best we keep up our strengths.”

Garble greedily ate the piece. Then he looked to the star-thing. “Did your dad have anything else to say ‘cept ‘follow the star’? I don’t think it’ll be that easy.”

Even with a smaller portion, Ember hadn’t finished munching when Garble asked this. She took a moment to chew, and swallow, before answering.

“No, no,” she said slowly. “That was pretty much it. He said the star, or whatever it is, had been sent to show us the fastest way there…” She paused, eyes tracing over the clearing. “Kinda like when the Dragon Lord calls a Gauntlet of Fire, I guess, ‘cept the whole world takes part and there’s no glowing involved. No clue who set it up–”

There. Right there, just at the edge of her vision. A shape, scurrying.

Ember snapped her head, wings flaring as they hadn’t since the raid, one set of claws outstretched and the other gripping the Sceptre tightly, her legs spread and her feet digging into the ground as she crouched into a defensive position.

Then she saw it. Hissing, she bared her fangs, and pounced, like greased lightning.

Chomp!

One bite was all it took. Sensing her success by the bulge in her cheeks, Ember raised herself back up, eyes swerving around to lock gazes with the flabbergasted Garble’s. Slow-witted though he was, she knew him for a fast attacker, yet she’d outdone him there.

The tip of the rat’s tail still hung from the corner of her mouth. Smirking, Ember nonchalantly threw her head back and sucked it down like a string of spaghetti – my, she did wish noodles were easier to come by – jaws closing on the rodent as it vanished down her throat with a wet slurp.

She released a blissful sigh, punctuated by a belch.

“Oh, ‘scuse me!” Ember hiccoughed, wiping her mouth with her free claw. “Now, you wouldn’t call that princess-y, eh, Garble? Admit it, this dragon’s got hunter’s instincts.”

“Whatever.” Garble muttered, standing up, “I’m going for a fly.” He opened out his wings. “Stay here with the stuff. I’ll be back later.”

He took flight. Ember watched him go without regret. As her eyes turned back to the fire and the bags of loot, though, the sense of having nothing to do caught up with her. Clutching the Sceptre to her chest, she slumped next to her bag.

For a while, other than tap her claws against the bag, she did nothing, staring pensively into the dancing flames. It was funny. The wild had been calling her back for years, and now she was back in the wild, Ember hardly knew what to do with it.

Then she tapped wood, beneath the fabric of the bag, and remembered. Delicately laying the Sceptre down on the coarse, brown grass, Ember hefted the bag open, and reached in, to pull out the one thing she hadn’t let Garble see her take during the raid.

“Ain’t you a beauty,” Ember murmured, stroking the length of the guitar. “Who’d have thought those bumpkins could build something so nice...”

It was not a shamisen, but it looked a lot like one. There were five strings rather than three, to begin with. No doubt because so many Klugetownites had hands and claws, rather than hooves. But that was good, the instrument felt much more natural in her grip for it.

After casting a quick glance upwards, Ember plucked a string. No, the guitar did not sound like what she knew. She wasn’t complaining. Spending just a few days back in a dragon’s life had already started getting old, in a different way from the fustiness of the Kirin Court.

Time to try something between old and new.

“You.” His voice boomed for what felt like miles, a single eye peering out from the mountain’s mouth. “Come closer, dragonet. Allow me to see you.”

Without any prompting from anyone else, not even her father, Ember slowly approached the mountain. She ignored the presence of the eyes of others, instead focusing solely on the Chaoskämpfer’s gaze.

“What is your name, Dragonet?” he asked softly, yet there was so much power, behind the words of High Draconic.

“E-Ember,” she answered after a moment, “my name is Ember, daughter of the current Dragon Lord, oh wise one.”

There was a pregnant pause before the mountain shook, the eye disappeared from the mouth and instead a single, large claw emerged. The edges of two talons reached out and softly touched Ember’s head.

“You are mistaken, Ember,” the Chaoskämpfer replied, “you are not solely daughter of the current Lord, you will serve us all. You are to answer the Call and go to the equines for us.”

“G-Great Chaoskämpfer, I–”

“Trust in yourself, dragonet. Your potential is only bound if you yourself allow it.” the Chaoskämpfer intoned, pulling back his claw into the mountain’s mouth. “I present you with what you will need when meeting the others.”

The claw re-emerged, yet this time a pair of talons were pinched together, with a canister of some kind between them. Without any hesitation, Ember accepted it...

“It’s warm.” Ember whispered with wonder and wide eyes. The claw vanished back into the mountain and the eye returned.

“It holds flames of mine,” the Chaoskämpfer said, voice booming once more, “it will provide you what you need whenever used.”

“Thank you, oh wise one.” Ember said, bowing her head.

“Stupid whelp.” Garble grumbled, tossing another cracked boulder. There was nothing worthwhile in it, not so much as a bit of iron ore or gemstone. “Stupid princess.” He slammed his tail against the ground, “stupid– hrff.”

He stopped to huff, smoke exhaling from his maw.

Called back to the Dragon Lands, even though this wasn’t the Gauntlet. No, whatever this was felt different, almost bigger than that. Sure enough, everyone showed up and no one had any idea what it was. Not even Lord Torch, and he had the Sceptre!

No, instead it was the Chaoskämpfer. Those ponies had their fancy Alicorn Princesses to look up to. The greatest two anyones their dumb little heads could come up with, supposed to be the greatest beings on Equus.

“They move the Sun and the Moon! They got horns and wings!”

Bah! The ponies still didn’t know what they were talking about, even after they got the second one back. All dragons knew the only real creature you wanted was the Kämpfer.

“Nobody disrespects the Kämpfer.” Garble had heard plenty of times while getting his wings, “not you, not me, and not even the Dragon Lord.”

And had this been last week, with Fizzle and Clump, Garble would’ve brushed this off. The Chaoskämpfer hadn’t been seen in ages. If anything lay in that mountain, surely it was just bones and junk. Nothing worthwhile, or someone would’ve cleared it out by now.

That was how hoards worked, after all.

But, Garble had been wrong. The Kämpfer was alive and he knew what the Call was – the ponies wanted something. And out of all the dragons, the Kämpfer picked the Dragon Lord’s whelp. Picked her, and then charged him to go with her.

“You.” The Chaoskämpfer’s voice boomed from the mountain, just as Garble was about to finish his joke. It couldn’t possibly… “Garble, step forward.”

Despite him being stunned, his legs moved and he approached the mouth of the mountain. The princess had something in her claws, but she kept silent. All so that Garble could see that eye.

It knew everything, just like the rep said it would.

“Speak,” the voice commanded, to which Garble let out a hiss of breath.

“You… asked for me, sir?” Garble said, his words of Low Draconic sounding vulgar in his ears, compared to that High Draconic.

The eye stayed on him, making Garble feel so small. So tiny…

“Do you not consider yourself strong? Mighty and powerful like all dragons?”

“I, uh, yes. I do. What of it… sir?”

“You will do,” the Kämpfer said after a moment. “You are to escort Princess Ember to the ponies. Make sure she is not to be harmed or delayed. Time is of the essence.”

Garble felt like something had crushed him. “But, sir–”

“Am I so hard to hear?” the mighty voice boomed.

Garble watched as the eye curved ever so slightly, making the weight feel heavier.

“If you are strong, you will do as you’re told,” intoned the voice of Elder Spykoran, the Chaoskämpfer.

Garble sighed, massaging his eyes.

Even in memory, the Kämpfer’s presence lay heavy.

‘Better get on with it.’ Garble thought, spreading his wings. ‘Sooner I get the princess to the ponies, the sooner this is all over.’

And so he took off, heading back to the camp.

He kept his mind empty as he flew, but in the back of his head, that single eye kept glaring at him. Judging him.

‘Nobody disrespects the Kämpfer.’ Garble thought, ‘nobody.’

* * * * *

Ember’s moment of bliss with her ill-acquired guitar ended far too quickly, as a familiar, yet unwelcome, hulking red drake flapped to land back at the campfire. Garble didn’t say anything, but his look of surprise was unmistakable.

She stopped in mid-tune, sighing.

“Back so soon?” Ember asked him, not trying to hide her disappointment.

Of course, she’d known she couldn't keep the instrument hidden forever. Music carried, especially in the dead of night. But that didn’t mean she looked forward to the boulderhead mocking her hobby.

“Fine. You caught me in the act, Garble.” She lay the guitar across her lap. “Well, out with it. Go on, tell me it’s a waste of space. At least I know you won’t try stealing it from me. All you can think of is filling your hoard with gems and gold. Goes to show, you’re a cretin.”

She braced herself for whatever spiteful retort he’d come up with.

“That was…” Garble said, “pretty nice.”

And the unexpectedness of this almost made her fall over.

“Whu–?” Disorientated, Ember clutched at her guitar like a drowning lizard grasping a branch in a flood. “D’you hit yourself on the head out there?”

“I... don’t think so?” blinked Garble, giving his head a rub. “I mean, what you said, that wasn’t very nice. But the music wasn’t half bad.”

He wasn’t the only one who blinked. Ember did several times.

“What in the world would you know about music?” She wanted to sneer, yet the compliment was just too unusually kind of him. “I’m sure the only music you’ve ever made’s involved belching contests or bashing rocks.”

And damn her if Garble didn’t have the gall to look more hurt than affronted by this.

“Well, yes,” he said, sidling a bit closer to her. “But that’s what makes this so nice.”

Ember remembered a proverb old Kuno had once taught her. ‘Music soothes the savage beast.’ Like so many Kirin proverbs, she’d thought it a load of tosh. Now she was beginning to wonder if there’d been value to it.

“Whatever you say,” she commented, relaxing slightly. She picked the guitar back up. “Don’t bother me, and we won’t have a problem.”

But as she was fine-tuning, she found herself eyeing Garble, who was just sitting there, watching her curiously.

“Actually,” Ember began, reluctantly. “Since you’re here, and no-one’s going anyplace soon, what do you say, Garble? How about some good ol’ dragon-song? I’ve been dying to do that for years, and now, with this girl here… Could be fun...”

The red drake smiled lopsidedly. “Sounds nice. I wouldn’t mind hearing you sing.”

Ember slapped her forehead. “I meant I play, you sing, idiot.”

“Oh…” Garble suddenly looked uncertain. “Well, don’t know if I’ve got the best singing voice. Doubt it’s as good as how you play, Your Highness.”

She was silent, her eyes narrowing.

And then she blew a stream of purple fire straight at a yelping Garble, who dodged it merely by an inch, more down to luck than anything else.

* * * * *

Garble couldn’t believe his eyes.

‘What the–’ He thought the moment he saw himself already there with the Dragon Lord’s daughter. Thankfully, she was smart enough to try and burn the impostor, just as Garble began to touch down to the campsite.

“Hey!” he shouted, getting the other two’s attention, “what’s this supposed to be!?” Smoke was starting to trail from his maw and nostrils.

Ember glanced his way, then at the impostor and back again, eyes lighting up.

“Perfect timing!” she shouted, dropping something she’d been holding, her arms spread akimbo in a fighting stance. “Get over here now, knucklehead! We got Changelings!”

“Changelings?” Garble echoed, grinning. “Well, that’s interesting. Let’s fry ‘em up–”

Before he could finish, he felt a huge mass ram into him and knock him to the ground. His back was sore, but getting slammed while caught off-guard hurt his pride more than anything.

* * * * *

Ember saw her so-called bodyguard instantly go down to a massive, orange-red beetle-like figure with a velvet mane – a warrior of the Red Hive, no doubt. She hissed at his stupidity, but stood her ground, turning her attention back to the fake Garble at her feet. The real deal could take care of himself just fine.

Not so the impostor. He was whimpering and quivering beneath her, with a look of fright in his eyes which made her wonder how she’d ever mistaken him for Garble.

Hissing, Ember shot out her claw to clasp his neck. ‘Garble’ was still taller than her, but all she wanted was to pull the impostor to his knees, which she did, him squirming in her grasp as she leveled her eyes to his.

“How many?” she whispered, turning her most vicious glare on him.

He mumbled incoherently and tried looking away, but she flicked her wrist, forcing his head back sharply.

“How many!” Ember repeated, ignoring his cry of pain. “Tell me, roach!”

The fake dragon panted and wheezed, eyes half-shut, but he croaked something out. “Be… be…”

“What?”

“Behind you.”

Her blood ran cold. Slowly, Ember turned. She was in time to see another Changeling finish metamorphosing back into his true form.

The very log she’d been seated on had been a soldier of the Ebony Hive all along.

“‘Bout time,” he smirked, fangs parting in an unpleasant grin. “Hang on in there, you dolt,” the soldier said, speaking to the hapless not-Garble. “And watch how your big brother sorts this one out.”

* * * * *

Garble growled, pushing himself up, only for something to stomp and push him down.

“Come now,” the roach that attacked him from behind said, “show me the strength a dragon possesses. Show me the fire that burns within–”

“Get off, oversized bug!”

Roaring, Garble snapping his head into the roach’s face – which impacted, stunning it. He forced himself to his feet, before turning and lashing out with a swipe. While his claws were not sharp enough to draw blood from the orange-red chitin, they damaged it. Three lines were left carved on the right side of the roach’s face.

“Heh!” Garble mocked, flexing his claws. “Not so tough when you’re fighting someone up front, are ya, roach?”

Instead of answering, the orange-red bug regained its balance and stood. A light glow shone from the twin horns, the claw-marks on its face vanishing as the chitin began to repair itself. Not to mention how Garble saw the chitin noticeably thicken all over its body...

“You’ll see how tough I am, scum,” the roach said, eyes glaring straight into Garble’s.

“It’s Garble!” he retorted, wings spread wide as he leapt at his foe.

* * * * *

All her life, Ember had prided herself on her fighting prowess. Three years in the Kirin Court hadn’t stamped that out. If anything, those three years had only honed qualities she knew few other dragons possessed, such as smarts and swiftness.

Yet it all counted for naught as she faced the purple-eyed, crimson-finned soldier of the Ebony Hive.

“Get back,” she snarled, tightening her grip around not-Garble’s throat. “This here’s your brother, you say? You take one more step, and I swear, I’ll wring his scrawny neck.”

“No.” The soldier chuckled lightly. “I don’t think so. My neck, perhaps, if you could wring it. But not his. Look at him. He’s hurt, he’s beaten, he’s too scared to transform. You’re not the type who’d do a thing like that, not to someone like him.”

Ember felt her breath catch. She tried to tell herself, hard, that the soldier hadn’t got her figured out. Yet, force herself though she might to keep her gaze on her opponent, in the corner of her eyes, her eyes kept pulling her towards the trembling impostor.

Why should it matter if she crushed his carapace then and there? He was just a Changeling. A roach. Stealing people’s goods was one thing; Changelings stole their very emotions. Nobody would mourn a squished parasite…

But then she saw her captive staring at her pleadingly, and knew she couldn't do it.

“Alright…” Ember said quietly.

Releasing her grip, she let him drop unceremoniously to the ground. He scuttled off for safety, still a dragon, too frightened to turn back in any sense of the word. Yet Ember was no longer thinking about him.

“There. Done,” she said, raising both her fists as she stared down the soldier. “Now let’s make this a proper fight.”

He smiled, teeth gleaming yellow in the firelight. “My pleasure. This means I bag you.”

Ember scarcely had time to realise her mistake as he short thick, sticky strands of green that lassoed themselves around her fists, followed closely by two more strands around her heels. Before she knew it, pain ran up both sets of her joints, as they were pulled together and she was sent tumbling, arms and legs cuffed in Changeling wax.

* * * * *

Garble narrowly managed to duck, avoiding the roach’s strike. He had to admit, this one was tricky to deal with, seeing how every time he tried to damage her chitin, she would heal. Well, heal and then adjust from that attack.

‘Damn bug is strong, too.’ he thought, swinging his tail to try and knock her down, only for her to dodge and then strike him sideways. Sending him stumbling back a step.

He wheezed, struggling to think against the pain.

‘What would dragonfyre do…’

“Is this the best you’re capable of?” the roach taunted, “I’ve faced creatures far more deadly than you, and they’ve given me much more of a challenge.”

Despite the attack on his ego, Garble focused and, leaping with outstretched claws, carved two long slashes into his opponent’s chest. He again hadn’t drawn any blood, but the underbelly was exposed now.

But this opening allowed the roach to strike him twice, knocking him to the ground, and nearly all the wind out of him.

She stood over him, a hazy blur, her forelegs pinning him.

“And I was led to believe dragons were wise…” the roach hissed, pressing down on Garble’s chest as her chitin began to recover. “You must be the dumbest drake to ever–”

‘Now.’

He focused his rage and blew his fire directly into the Changeling’s chest. The flames easily entered the gaps created by his claw-cuts, and the Changeling reared up, crying in pain. Following up on this as the Changeling stumbled back from the fire, Garble quickly swung onto his stomach, his tail swerving around to hit his opponent.

Garble chuckled, rising to his feet. Much to his satisfaction, when he turned, not only did the roach sound distressed – lying on the ground clutching her underbelly – she looked it, too.

“Stupid roach,” he laughed. “This is what you get for messing with me–”

His taunt died in his throat as a flash of green caught his eye.

In the trashed campsite, there stood a huge, horrific creature which dwarfed even the huge Red Warrior – a cross between a scarab and a spider, all six of its purple eyes fixed right towards him and little legs scuttling as it emitted a piercing, howling shriek which almost blew him off his feet.

“Oh, for the Kämpfer’s sake!” Garble shouted, one claw shielding his face, bracing himself for another fight.

* * * * *

No matter how Ember grunted and heaved, lying face down in the dirt, there was nothing she could do – the Changeling wax bound her wrists, arms and heels tight, and would not break. An insect’s shriek and Garble cursing echoed dimly in her ear. Groaning, Ember craned her neck as best she could, to see what was going on past her shoulder.

From what she could make out in the blur, the Ebony soldier had assumed the new form of a nightmarish insect-hybrid, and was busy taking on Garble. No sign of the Red Warrior, from where she lay. Garble must have got the better of them.

‘One thing he’s good for…’

But it wasn’t looking good. Both fighters were locked in a grunt-filled wrestling match of claws and pincers – at one point, the transmogrified Ebony soldier looked about to swallow Garble whole, before the red drake landed a stinging blow that forced him off. It didn’t keep the soldier away for long, however, as seconds later, each was back at it for more. Even from afar, Ember sensed that slowly but surely, Garble was getting tired.

She tugged, again to no avail. If she didn’t free herself, and soon, the Changelings would have won, and they’d both be taken back to the Hives for feeding…

On reflex, her head craned in the other direction, to where she’d been sitting on what she’d thought was a log. Their bags of loot were there, strangely undisturbed by the fight, as were the guitar, her armour, and – the Bloodstone Sceptre.

If only she could reach it…

Digging her snout into the ground, Ember wriggled, and pulled, trying to drag herself forward.
With her legs locked together and arms locked to her sides, the effort of spreading her weight was an attack on her nerves. Barely a short tug later, her face slumped on the ground once more, leaving her exhaling, painfully.

‘It’s… it’s too far…’

Yet was her mind playing tricks on her, or had one of the nearby pebbles moved a few inches closer, from her view? Because if it had, that meant she could move. Not quickly, not elegantly, but she could crawl, worm-like, all the way to the Sceptre.

She pulled, this time with a push of her knees helping as best it could. From behind, she heard Garble yowl. She didn’t want to know why.

Again she pulled. Grit got in her mouth, and she spat, trying to stay quiet. Worse was the grit in her eye, making it sting and water.

‘C’mon… c’mon!’

Shaking her head in an attempt to lose the grit – which only seemed to make it worse – Ember clenched her teeth, keeping her eyes forward as best she could. She needed to focus on the Sceptre, nothing else.

Was this an illusion, or was it closer than she’d thought? Its hilt lay not two paces from her. All she’d have to do was rub it against her scales, and she’d lay claim to its power.

Then Ember heard a small, stifled gasp, halting her. Lurking just on the edge of her watery eyesight, there was another drone of the Ebony Hive. She’d been spotted.

Despair welled up within her. Any second now, she’d be dragged off, and with it, away from her last hope.

Except she wasn’t.

Surprised, Ember glanced at the little drone. There was something she recognised…

And then she realised. It was the timid look in its eyes. She was looking at the true form of the one she’d spared.

The drone stared at her, unblinking. Ember did blink. Or thought she did. Because the next moment, the drone was gone. She couldn’t explain it any other way.

‘Why?’

No time to dwell on that. With a groan of determination, Ember let the adrenaline surge through her, closing the gap between her and her Sceptre in an inch-high forward leap on her belly.

The tip of her snout hit the Sceptre’s hilt, and it was done. Responding to her, the Bloodstone magic coursed through her body where she willed it to, making her veins shine with inner fire – turning the wax which held her captive to stone.

A dragon could easily break stone. With one mighty pull, Ember heard a satisfying ‘crack’ as her arms and legs wrenched themselves free. It was almost by instinct that the very first thing her claws did was to seize the Sceptre.

* * * * *

The sound of clapping hooves echoed through the clearing.

“Ooh, well done,” giggled a devious voice. “Well done indeed. What a show!”

Ember froze on the spot, and not far away, even Garble, still locked in battle with the mutant insect-thing, was given cause for pause.

A single, tiny mistake that might have proven fatal – had the Ebony soldier not chosen that moment to also relax his grip. The green flames of Changeling transformation enveloped the soldier, and while they did not burn Garble, the soldier’s resumption of his true, smaller form left the red drake clutching at thin air.

Before the startled Garble could react, the soldier was already flying off, buzzing.

“We’ll settle this another time,” he called back, grinning. “You give a good fight.”

Little time was given for Ember to process all this, as a rustle in the jungle foliage announced the arrival of a new player. She saw a great palm leaf brushed aside by a black mottled, hole-ridden forehoof, and from the jungle depths, out stepped–

Her grip tightened around the Sceptre more than she’d thought possible. Without her scales, Ember would have drawn blood.

“Chrysalis,” she whispered, wings flaring.

“You’ve heard of me?” the Changeling Queen of the Ebony Hive smiled mockingly. “How flattering, for a meek old soul like me.”

Ember growled. “Stay back, or I’ll sic Garble on you. And I’m sure you’ve heard of this.” She thrust out the Sceptre, pointing its tip at Chrysalis like a spear’s.

But Chrysalis reacted with an expression of calm indifference.

“I’m so, so sorry, dragonet,” she cooed, lightly pushing away the tip, unfazed over touching a lethal magical artifact. “I am a Hive Queen… More than that, I am the Queen of Queens. And I’m afraid your little stone-stick won’t work on me.”

She gave Ember a toothy grin.

“Now, will you please tell your attack-dog over there to give to poor Mandible her space? She’s on loan from Queen Halidae, who in turn borrowed her off the Red Hive. And I don’t think Hally would like it if I lost her stuff. Least of all her daughter…”

Chrysalis’ head swiveled back, and she called out to the jungle.

“Come out, come out, Papillate. Show’s over.”

With trepidation, a smaller Changeling ambled out, into the campfire-lit clearing. Ember, Kuno’s lessons springing back to mind, recognised her grey-specked mane and tail as the marks of a youngster. These blended jarringly with the diamond-patterned green chitin identifying her as of the Harlequin Hive.

The youngster threw Ember an anxious glance, saying nothing. By all appearances, it was a comfort for her when Chrysalis extended a wing protectively, placing her in its shadow.

Ember scowled. “Why should I let you have your Red Warrior back?”

“My’, Princess Ember,” Chrysalis said, with an air of shock. “What will you father say when he learns he made all those investments into a Kirin education, with so little to show for it?

Ember heard a snort from behind her. Apparently, Garble had found this the height of wit. She hoped he couldn’t see her blush.

“Why, politeness, of course,” said Chrysalis. “Mandible and the others simply greeted you like I asked them to.”

“You attacked us.”

Chrysalis cocked her head. “Oh, did I? My mistake. I thought that was how you dragons say ‘hello’.”

This time, Garble was unable to resist breaking out into laughter.

“Alright, alright,” snarled Ember. “Quit it, boulderhead.” Even if they both hadn’t been battered from the fighting, she knew Garble wouldn’t put as much heart into combatting someone he found so amusing. “Give Chrysalis back her warrior-roach.”

Moments after, the ground shook a little as the groaning mass of the Red Warrior lumbered over to Queen Chrysalis’ end of the clearing.

Garble sat by the bags, while Ember gingerly backed away to get closer to him, choosing to remain standing upright without taking Chrysalis out of her sights.

“What do you want, Chrysalis?” she demanded. “What’s the Queen of Queen doing out here with a Harlequin Queen-in-Waiting and a Red Warrior for companions?”

And the truth was, she did want to know. This was obviously more than a hunting expedition.

Chrysalis blew her cheeks. “What, you won’t even offer me a seat? How unlady-like, Princess Ember.” She sighed. “Never mind, we’ll take one of our own. Come here, Papillate.”

The Ebony Queen indicated to the youngster that they could sit on one of the many logs that were still placed around the campfire. She sat first, cross-legged, while the youngster, rather than sit by her, followed a commanding gesture from Chrysalis and leapt into her lap.

“Good girl,” Chrysalis crooned, stroking her back like a cat’s.

The sight made Ember’s scales crawl.

“Why are you here,” she asked again, “and where are you going?”

Chrysalis’ translucent, hypnotic bug-eyes stared right into her. “The same place as you, I believe,” said the Queen. “We got… a call, is how I’d describe it. Young Papilllate was at the centre of it, and I was lucky to see. We’ve got a moving star to follow,” she pointed upwards, “that’ll lead us to somewhere on the borders of Equestria.”

The Queen of Queens cackled lowly.

“And if Princess Celestia herself invites me into her midst, how can I possibly refuse...”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

This chapter features no noteworthy modifications, although Discord and Fluttershy totally did what you think they did.

Spectrum 2.0 - February 16th 2019

VoxAdam: Yes, this is another long chapter, after we’d collectively made the New Year’s Resolution to attempt showing more restraint over writing lengthy chapters, in a desire to learn from the experience of splitting what are now Chapter Eight (‘An Opening’) and Chapter Nine (‘The Heart Goes Last’) from what used to be one monolithic chapter.

I promise the current size of this chapter is set against a larger context of pacing for the overall story we’ve got in storage; nobody on the Team will consider it a spoiler to reveal now that this is the penultimate chapter of what’s been dubbed ‘Act One’, with plans already set up for a somewhat shorter ‘Act Two’.

The prolonged segment in the middle of this chapter, where the whole of the local cast are introduced to both Alex and Galatea at last, came about from a desire to converge the preceding chapters’ threads so it’d no longer be required to keep track of which character knew about Alex and Galatea, or the broad strokes of what they were up to. As it seemed natural the cast would learn of them in due time, placing them in one formal event felt like the quickest and cleanest way to go about it.

Following its initial published state, prior to the tweak to shuffle another scene to Chapter Twelve on May 01st 2019, one reader mentioned they had a little difficulty getting a grasp on the opening scene of Amira and Qabil. This was something of a deliberate effect, with the reveal that the scene was set in the prison of Erebus intended to be disorientating. I hope that it didn’t work too well…

As with the scene of Blueblood and Awesome Fire that’s since been shuffled to the next chronological chapter, this scene came about from a collaboration with RoyalPsycho. Awesome is his OC, and the author sometimes deserves the moniker. :-)

Thanks, as always, to TheIdiot for giving the greenlight on this chapter.

~Vox

RoyalPsycho: I’m not really a regular member of the team, more of a consultant for other authors. However, I am happy to do my part and I’m glad to see that my correspondence with VoxAdam and the others is properly contributing to the story, even if it is only side-material.

DoctorFluffy: I’ve been…. distant, lately. Busy on my projects. Playing spacelords and warframe. But mostly those last two things.

I’m glad to have helped.

Act I ~ Chapter Twelve ~ To Seize The Day

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy

VoxAdam

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Twelve

To Seize The Day

* * * * *

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying;
And this same flower that smiles today
To-morrow will be dying.

The glorious lamp of heaven, the sun,
The higher he’s a-getting,
The sooner will his race be run,
And nearer he's to setting.

That age is best which is the first,
When youth and blood are warmer;
But being spent, the worse, and worst
Times still succeed the former.

Then be not coy, but use your time,
And, while ye may, go marry:
For having lost but once your prime,
You may forever tarry.
— To The Virgins, To Make Much Of Time, by Robert Herrick

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~ Eighth Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

“Sure you want to do this, Twilight?”

Twilight broke off staring at the library across the road, to give her old friend an earnest look. “As sure as you are about your crazy expedition idea, Lyra.”

“Touché,” Lyra sighed, folding up the café menu. “Well, if we’re done pouring ourselves liquid courage here, might as well head over and talk to her. But don’t say I didn’t warn you. It’s a Monday morning, and the first thing Moondancer does is go to the library.”

While Lyra waved one crutch, seeking to catch a waiter’s attention, Twilight ran those words through her never-resting mind.

“You’re right,” she admitted. “You were always the one who’d try getting us to go out more. Well, you and Minuette, but she wasn’t…”

Twilight had to stop a moment. A few years ago, she might have thought nothing of stating facts bluntly, especially if they were accurate. But that was the old Twilight. She still didn’t quite know who the new Twilight was, with her eccentric Ponyville friends and increasing track record of saving Equestria. Yet this Twilight was a Twilight supposed to care for people beyond showing them basic courtesy.

Not the Twilight who left the people close to her hanging.

Lyra understood all the same. “She wasn’t one of the ‘Brainy Bunch’,” she said, finishing for Twilight. “It’s okay to say it, Twi’. You know that’s what they used to call us three in school, and Minuette wouldn’t mind it if you said it, she’d just giggle. She comes to visit sometimes, you know. In Ponyville, together with Lemonhearts and Twinkleshine.”

Twilight goggled at her. “I did not know that! Since when?”

“Um, forever? Hold up,” said Lyra, having finally got the waiter’s attention. “Check, please.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Do I really need to answer that?” replied Lyra. “Simple. You never asked. You didn’t even check up on me all that often after I decided to move in full-time with Bonbon, except to say I was overdue on a book.”

She might have said more, but the waiter came over with the bill, leaving Twilight to stare guiltily at the table while Lyra paid up.

“Hey, Twilight,” Lyra said gently, once the waiter had gone. “Our friends did ask me how you were doing, thinking about popping by sometime. But with the important work you got nowadays, being an Element Bearer and all, well, I guess they just figured you’d moved on. And I thought maybe I should try setting something up, but it... sorta never happened.”

They both stood up, Twilight slower to push her chair back than Lyra, despite the latter’s injured state.

“What about Moondancer?” Twilight said. “I… Did you hear from her?”

“We invited her out,” Lyra explained, trotting over unevenly to her side. “But she’d always say she was busy studying. And then I moved to Ponyville, and that’s about it. The others don’t mention Moondancer on any of their visits.”

They crossed the street, Twilight helping Lyra. It was early enough in the morning for the library not to have too many visitors, yet Twilight felt an old, familiar hush fall over her as they approached the great double doors. She knew the unicorn beside her felt the same. In Ponyville as in Canterlot, whenever Lyra could be bothered to visit a library, she dove into her books with the quiet, yet intense focus of an ancient scribe.

That analogy shifted Twilight’s mind to the new alicorn, Galatea.

If she could believe what they’d heard – and she still wasn’t sure she could – the tall mare had lived what once had been the dream for Twilight. An eternity of studying, undisturbed by the world.

But Galatea, outside of her odd inflections and limited body language, seemed to pick up on cues that Twilight would have found baffling even a year ago. Twilight had to wonder, though. Was Galatea’s relative social awareness also the result of years of studying?

“I gotta make it up to them too,” Twilight whispered, trying to change course. “All our old friends from Canterlot.”

Lyra stopped by the doors. “I’m sure they’ll be happy to hear from you,” she smiled lightly. “Seeing as Lemonhearts’ got a job at the Palace, shouldn’t be too hard checking up on her. Though she might have her hooves full with the big upcoming event...”

They went inside, the doors creaking open and shut. It was the only noise which followed them in. The Palace’s public library was much the same as it had been five days ago, a low-lit, multi-storied chamber blanketed by an air of reserve and reverence.

Yet although Twilight kept quiet, she felt anything but reserved.

“There she is,” Lyra said, nudging Twilight.

Spotting Moondancer wasn’t hard, the red of her mane providing the greatest shock of colour in the library’s muted confines. Twilight saw nothing else about her was as lively, however. Her back to them, Moondancer lay hunched over a book – one from a pile of many – and her mane’s striking colour was belied by its unkempt state. She might also have looked paler than Twilight remembered, though it was hard to tell, with her coat covered by a frayed sweater.

Twilight swallowed and looked at Lyra, who coughed.

“Wanna brave it alone, pardner?” Lyra said, chuckling nervously as she tapped her crutches. “I’ll cover your back.”

“Yeah…” Twilight said slowly. “Yeah, I gotta do this one myself. But I’m glad you’re here, Lyra. And… well, somepony’s got to explain about the humans.”

“In due time, Twilight,” Lyra whispered. “We don’t want her to think you only want her back for a study group.”

All Twilight could do was nod. Taking a deep breath, then exhaling, she went over.

Engrossed in reading, Moondancer did not notice her approach, but this was what Twilight had expected, having been on the other side of the page. She trotted by and turned, facing the table, and still Moondancer didn’t look up.

Twilight hadn’t forgotten they were in a library. With a tiny, almost imperceptible spark, she let her horn cast a spell that would ensure privacy.

It was only after doing so that she remembered Lyra wouldn’t be able to hear what they said, either, but this couldn’t be helped.

With a feeling of ants crawling up her hooves, Twilight coughed. “Hi there, Moondancer! Fancy… fancy seeing you here this early!”

Moondancer did look up then, the surprise on her face making way for an aggrieved glower, much amplified by her glasses, once she saw who it was.

“Shh! What do you want?” Her tone was inarguably stand-offish. “I’m trying to study.”

“It’s me, don’t you remember?” Twilight said, forcing a grin. “Twilight, your old friend! I thought it might be nice to catch up. So, surprise!”

“For what purpose?” Moondancer said coolly. “And this is a surprise. Libraries are meant to be quiet.”

“Got that covered,” Twilight said, pointing upwards to the shimmering bubble of silence she’d cast over their spot of the room.

Moondancer just groaned. “I’m trying to study,” she repeated, breaking eye contact. “Sorry to burst your bubble… ahem, but I am actually rather busy right now... and from one bookworm to another, I’d hoped you could respect that. Now, if you don’t mind…”

She began to prop her book, but Twilight placed both forehooves upon the table.

“Can’t we at least go outside and talk for a bit?” said Twilight, unsettled to hear her own voice turn desperate and begging.

“Why won’t you leave me alone?” Moondancer told her shortly.

“Look,” Twilight said, rushing her words, heart in her mouth. “I’m sorry I missed your party.”

“You’ve got the wrong pony. I don’t have parties.”

“You did once,” said Twilight. “And I… was so caught up in… in my own concerns, I didn’t take your feelings into account.”

“Like I said, Twilight Sparkle,” Moondancer said, unmoved. “I don’t have parties. And I don’t know how many times I’ve got to keep saying the same things, just so I can study without a crazy pony trying to make friends, but I will say this, can you please stop bothering me.”

“Moondancer…”

“I’m sure you’re busy too,” said Moondancer, propping her book. “Big things, assignments for the Princess, saving the world, those kinds of things. I don’t live in a bubble, Twilight.”

For emphasis, she let a thin beam zap out from her horn, which audibly dissolved Twilight’s privacy spell.

“So if there’s something big you should be working on,” Moondancer finished in a whisper, ignoring the angry shushes from nearby readers, “you should do it.”

Nothing about this had gone as Twilight had hoped.

“Moondancer, please!” she said, barely whispering, as she leaned precariously on her forehooves. “Lyra told me she and our other friends haven’t seen you in ages. You can’t shut yourself off and leave them in the dark. You can’t...”

Moondancer deigned to glance at her.

“And you didn’t?” she said morosely. Then she went back to her reading.

Thus Twilight was left staring at her estranged friend, ears drooping and shoulder sagging, a pit in her stomach.

Until someone else approached the table.

“She’s telling the truth,” Lyra said quietly. “I really miss you, Moondancer. I didn’t realise how much until Twilight told me she’d met you. And I know Minuette and Twinkleshine and Lemonhearts must too...”

The surprise Twilight felt was surely matched by Moondancer’s, as the studious unicorn looked up, gasping softly.

“You! What happened to you?”

Lyra followed her gaze to the crutches. “Um, had a bit of an accident?” she said wryly. “Nothing new for silly Lyra Heartstrings, right? But it’s okay. The doctors say I’ll be all fixed in two or three days.”

When she’d seen Lyra, concern and worry had overtaken Moondancer. But now the moment had drifted, and stoniness began to seep back into her features.

“What are you here for, Lyra?”

“I’m with her,” Lyra said. “I… felt I owed you, as the other friend who didn’t go to your party that day.”

“Ugh!” Moondancer visibly bit her tongue. “Will you both give that darn party a rest? It didn’t work out, alright? And I’ve got no idea what you’re on about, Lyra. You had the decency to say you’d be off visiting your girlfriend for the Festival.”

“Heh, yeah,” Lyra chuckled wryly. “Got a front-row view of Nightmare Moon’s return.”

Sighing in resignation, Moondancer let her book drop on the table, open-paged.

“I see there’s no point asking you to leave me be,” she muttered, standing up and beginning to tidy her pile of books. “So I’ll be leaving, if that’s fine by you.”

An idea hit Twilight.

“Wait!” she said urgently. “I… I’ve met Princess Luna. The real her, not Nightmare Moon. We talked on Nightmare Night. She’s… she’s really nice. And… she knows about all the stuff you really liked at school, Moondancer. You could ask about practically anything since the pre-Rebellion era! I’ve learnt a few new things from her – about her, too. She really likes flowers...”

This had its effect. Moondancer stopped her tidying, and looked directly at Twilight.

“New things?” she said, her voice a mixture of curiosity and suspicion. “Alright, what did I like back in school?”

“You… were into astronomy, of course,” Twilight said, discretely signalling Lyra not to slip her the answers. “And then… then there were those private oneirology classes you took with Headmaster Nexus... Hey, we got some of our funniest stories from him, remember?”

Lyra giggled, failing to suppress herself at the library. “I remember, alright,” she snickered. “Like when the old boy tried mixing several paints together to prove you could make a completely new colour. After hours of mixing, it still hadn’t worked! Then h-he said…” She had to breathe in to keep from laughing. “H-he said… ‘Well, colour me surprised’.”

And Twilight, even in her anxiety, snorted along with Lyra as the memory rushed back.

Moondancer didn’t join them in laughing. Yet she didn’t frown, either. A gleam in her eye was proof that she remembered the same.

“That hasn’t got anything to do with Princess Luna,” Moondancer pointed out, “But, yes…” She sighed wistfully. “We all did like Headmaster Nexus.”

“I saw him a few days ago, actually,” Twilight said, smiling. “And guess what? He’d almost burnt off one of his robes testing a smoke bomb, calling it a smoking robe!”

“Hard to believe we learnt anything from that crazy stallion,” Moondancer agreed.

“Oh, and there was Professor Shriek!” Lyra added. “What an absolute madpony.”

“You know he just used us as researchers for his books, right?” Moondancer asked. She was sarcastic, sure, but there was a glimmer of what could have been joy in her voice.

“I got an author’s credit on one of them!” Lyra said, laughing. “Besides, it was fun!”

For a moment, it felt as if a hurdle had been lifted, as they were each lost in the shared memory of youth. But then, the gleam dissipated, and Moondancer’s bespectacled eyes once more turned dull and forlorn.

“Well, this has been a pleasant trip down memory lane,” Moondancer mumbled, returning to her tidying. “But I’ve got a lot of studying left to do, so…”

“Hold on,” said Twilight. “This talk about Nightmare Moon’s reminded me of something else. If you want to study, I know a place that’s got everything you could want. Books, privacy, a view of the stars at night…”

Both Moondancer and Lyra seemed equally bemused.

“Really?” Moondancer said. “Where?”

Converging energy from her null-space, Twilight summoned a key she hadn’t used in a very long time, and held it aloft to show her two erstwhile friends from Canterlot.

“Let’s go back where it all began,” she said. “My old observatory.”

* * * * *

“So, Galatea,” Celestia said cheerily. “Feeling ready for your first birthday party?”

Next to her, the tall grey alicorn didn’t break pace as they walked down the palace hallway, but the simple question had thrown her into a look of profound contemplation.

“It is not yet time for it, I believe?” she said. “We are on our way to other business. Although Miss Pie does appear to have an unconventional grasp of time.”

“No, and yes, we are,” Celestia smiled, while Luna listed on. Philomena circled above them, following their trail, while Tiberius was perched at – where else – Luna’s crown. “And yes, that she does. But this is just it. We’ve a little time left. Still time enough for you to back out, though I know Pinkie would be very disappointed.”

“I have mine reservations,” Galatea said. “But… I suppose it couldn’t hurt.”

“When Pinkie gets like this, it’s best to let her work and step back,” Celestia said. “She only wants to make people happy, after all.”

“It’s odd to hear you speak of her that way,” Galatea said.

“I’m their Princess, not their God,” Celestia said. “It’s best that way.”

Galatea kept thinking.

“A birthday party will be a… quite unfamiliar experience,” Galatea finally allowed. “I’ve had little time for parties. On occasion. But never one I could call mine own.”

“Ah,” Luna said slyly, exchanging a mischievous glance with Tiberius, “but do you know what ‘fun’ means?”

Galatea turned and raised an eyebrow. “Fun. ‘A state of amusement, enjoyment or light-hearted pleasure’? I cannot claim much personal experience with it, no… But the concept is not mysterious to me. It is a state Equestria has oft striven to achieve during the Long Peace.”

“Wha… but how…”

“Oh, I have been able to keep track of evolutions in vocabulary over the centuries. Though I do confess to preserving small personal preferences, such as the use of ‘mine’ in the place of ‘my’.”

She looked at Luna, an eyebrow raised.

“Pardon me, ahem. Does that satisfy your query, Luna? It is indeed a word younger than your exile, so I cannot say I blame you for not knowing what it means.”

“I know what fun is– I… Moving on…”

“Oh,” said Galatea. She looked at Luna, then Tiberius, then back at Luna. “Did I do something wrong?”

Celestia let out a snort. "No, no, you're clear, Galatea. For what it’s worth, I also have some things I wish to keep from centuries past, like, Philomena’s feathers for my quills,” –Philomena chirped at this– “or Luna over here preferring her abacus.”

Luna harrumphed. So did Tiberius, holding a tiny abacus of his own.

“Sister,” she said, very pointedly looking at Celestia, “Forgive me how often I’ve been questioning your choices of late…”

“It’s no problem, Luna,” Celestia said graciously. “I need someone to question me. And you have been unwavering where it matters most, our commitment to helping the humans.”

“Thanks.” Luna bobbed her head. “Yet I must ask. How do you think this artefact may help?”

They had arrived at the doors to the vast storage-space tucked away at the back of the Palace Archives. There were no Guards, and the door wasn’t even locked. But security did ease up at this time in the morning. And in some cases, even in a confidential area such as the Archives, the best way to keep something safe was not to draw undue attention to it.

“How is yet to be seen,” Celestia acknowledged, pushing the doors open. Philomena swooped down and perched on her withers. “I’m only grateful that Cadance and Shining were spared the trouble of sending it back. In another few weeks, I was planning on having it shipped to the Crystal Realm.”

Beyond the doors lay a storage-room like any other.

Like any other, except for what it stored. While this wasn’t the Vault, where Celestia had brought out the Concordia Maxima to call on Equus, it was a repository for many unusual things in its own right.

Naturally, what those things were wasn’t apparent upon entering, for they were stored in rows and rows of boxes. Most, anyway, were books, as one would expect of an archive. Books newly-arrived from all over the world, and yet to be sorted.

One item wasn’t in a box, however. It lay waiting in the centre of the room, a standing mirror, its horseshoe-shaped rim and its standing-based lined with pink gems.

“Here it is,” said Celestia. “Freshly unboxed, the Crystal Mirror.”

All three alicorns advanced, equal in their solemnity. Tiberius leaned over Luna’s crown. Philomena ruffled her feathers. Celestia peered out the corner of her eye to see what Galatea’s reaction might be.

The grey alicorn, though she betrayed no surprise at the Mirror, wore a look of deep curiosity befitting the scholar she called herself.

And yet she was also frowning.

“Unchanged in all these millennia…” Galatea said softly. “A remnant of the Old Race… and a final testament to their hubris. The last fragment of the Prism.”

Luna stared at her. “You know of the Prism?”

“I do,” said Galatea. “How could I not.”

“Not even we know of the Prism other than what Sint Erklass told us,” remarked Celestia. “What was supposed to be the Old Race’s gift to the world, became its undoing.”

“‘Where they sought to harness the fire, they spread only harshest winter’,” Luna recited, calling up the poem the Allfather had once told them.

Celestia shuddered, staring at the Mirror. “Strange to think this Mirror is just a shard… and that it is less dangerous as a shard than its complete self.”

“Why do you show us this, Sister?” asked Luna. “Surely, nothing of value is here.”

“Not quite,” Celestia said, looking not at the other two alicorns, but at their reflections. “For the Mirror was once part a structure designed to blur the lines between dreams and the waking world. It responds to the minds of those touched by it. This may be what allows us to open our eyes upon Earth.”

“You mean scrying?” said Galatea. “Celestia, I know a thousand-and-one ways to stand watch and observe. By mine estimate, given what it is, the Crystal Mirror… is not the most trustworthy. It reflects too much of yourself when you look inside.”

“I know this well. I have already lost a student to it once,” Celestia said quietly. She felt Philomena nuzzle the back of her neck. “But considering the Empire has unlocked the secret of the ansible, if knowledge is power, then in these times, may we not have to resort to forbidden knowledge?”

“Indeed,” Luna said, though she sounded wary. “After all, it is this same artifact’s power which Starswirl, Mistmane, and the other Pillars used to banish the Sirens… although, one wonders why not to Erebus, or within a crystal casing…”

“For some creatures, containment within their dreams is the only suitable measure,” Celestia told her sister gently, knowing Luna wouldn’t like it.

But Luna took it pretty well. “He did what he could, as did Lady Mistmane and company.”

“Excuse me, yet there seems to be a gap in mine knowledge,” Galatea said, frown deepening. “No mention is made in the records of Starswirl the Bearded employing the Mirror to banish the Sirens. Solely the assorted might of him and Equestria’s other five Pillars is documented to history.”

“Well, that’s what he first tried… with them as his musical band,” Luna deadpanned. “But when it didn’t work, he had to cheat. No wonder he never quite learned about friendship…”

Celestia nodded. “Yet remember why he taught us that story, in secret, Luna,” she said, indicating the Mirror. “Sometimes it is necessary to cheat.”

“Point taken, Tia. To be fair, I recall that Lady Mistmane talked him into telling us that particular bit,” Luna sighed. “Nonetheless, he saw it as his great failure.” She eyed Galatea. “Interesting, however, that your knowledge isn’t as encompassing as you make out.”

Tiberius squeaked, in what might have been agreement.

“I cannot be everywhere at once, Luna,” Galatea admitted. “Remember what you told Alexander Reiner at the hospital? The mind is quick to churn up memories with self-interest and improvisation, and that’s how you end up with dreams.”

She looked from Luna, to stare intently at the Mirror.

“And I am not about the imaginary…” Galatea whispered. “Only the real. But even for me, with mine insight into the stardust, it is a hard task to separate the wheat from the chaff. I am...” She had to force out the last word. “Fallible.”

But Luna was glaring at her too hard to notice.

“You’d call dreams ‘chaff’?” she hissed. “Maybe that’s what you think, if all you’ve ever learned from documenting the stardust is that it coalesces around foals who’ve just gained their mark! How do you think a child discovers their destiny, if not through their dreams?”

Galatea shrugged, barely glancing at the mark on her own flank, a pale grey eye.

“Pardon mine poor choice of words, Luna. But marks can be switched or erased, by those powerful enough,” she stated. “And when a child becomes an adult, the time has come to move from dreams to reality. See this…”

She pointed at the Mirror.

“The Old Ones built the Prism as a containment field for the stardust, under the belief that if they accumulated enough, they’d be able to forge a new world out of their dreams. Instead, they came close to making it all vanish into a maelstrom of Chimerae, spirits and plague.”

“That is so, if what Sint Erklass told Luna and I is true.”

Celestia raised her wings to drape both her sisters, huddling them to her in conciliation.

“But I believe there is still some small place in the world for the Old Ones’ dream,” she continued blissfully. “One day soon, I’d been hoping to meet Twilight on the ethereal plane which commemorates all my subjects’ moments of self-realisation, and witness her second marking… a new alicorn...”

“I am familiar with that plane, Celestia,” Galatea said, a touch of wistfulness. “Some part of mine mind always resides there, watching the swirl coalesce as children take a step into adulthood. Many’s the time I’ve rewatched old achievements.”

“Yes…” Celestia said gently. “Only, Galatea, amongst all those images… have you ever beheld any of your own self? Any memories of you, from before you earned your mark?”

And for the first time, Galatea looked speechless. “No…” she finally said. “No. From mine earliest memories, this is how I came into the world. As a grown mare, with a mark on her flank. Never did I have memories of a child, looking in awe at the world around her…”

There was an odd tone in her voice. Not regret, but something like longing.

Celestia smiled delicately at Galatea and Luna alike.

“Then let’s go,” she said, retracting her wings and turning, as Philomena spread hers and flew ahead. “I think it’s time you did some catching up. We have a birthday to celebrate.”

“Celestia,” Galatea said, and Celestia was surprised to hear her sound so flustered, “are you sure it’s possible to have a birthday, for one who wasn’t technically born? And, really, if there’s an age where birthday parties become far too childish, then isn’t eight-thousand years well past it?”

Luna smirked, yet her smirk was not mocking.

“Do not let that worry you,” said Luna. Little Tiberius squeaked, and her smile grew softer. “Only an academic distinction, Galatea. Moreso when remembering what Grandfather taught us... There are no adults, there are only children playing at being adults.”

~ The Colossus of Talos, Republic of the Tauren Isles ~

“It’s been five days,” Darkhoof said, arms folded. “I would like to see my son.”

Staring at him through the door’s panel, the heifer on guard looked around nervously. “Proxenos,” she said, trying to puff herself up to fill her armour, “you know the matter’s still under revision by the Reverend Mother, and until then…”

“Every day I stay, the Call lies unanswered,” Darkhoof interrupted her. While he kept his voice quiet, he spoke with a hard edge. “But I won’t leave without having spoken to Basil.”

A gust of wind blew in from the sea, carrying the tell-tale tinge of salt this far from the shore. Darkhoof didn’t even bother to glance that way. He knew that if he looked, he’d see the ship waiting to carry him off to Saddle Mareabia, and from there, continue on to the Hall of Unity. It had waited down in the port all this time.

The thought of Saddle Mareabia made Darkhoof think of Amira-bint-Ramaha’s husband, incarcerated in Erebus, and he held down a groan. He found it hard to tell if his current family issues made him better off, or worse.

The guard checked herself. “Wait here, please,” she said, closing the metal panel.

He didn’t have to wait for long. Soon he heard the door unlock, and it swung open. As the heifer stepped aside, Darkhoof found himself facing another figure. Unlike the guard, this one hadn’t bothered assuming Minotaur guise.

“Come inside, Proxenos,” Samsara said, beckoning urgently with an elongated forelimb, a rather disconcerting gesture. “Before I change my mind.”

Darkhoof snorted, but crossed the threshold without comment. He made sure not to speak until the door had closed behind him.

“I apologise for my persistence, Reverend Mother,” he said stiffly. “Yet I can’t afford to wait until your decision is made.”

Samsara trilled softly. “You know my decision’s as good as made,” she told him, gesturing that he should follow her. “Were these normal times, I could have let you wait a long time. Tis’ the Call which cannot afford for you to wait.”

“Then why the delay?” Darkhoof asked, matching her pace as she strode down the hallway.

The further in they went, the less the hallway beneath the Colossus appeared carved out of the bedrock, the more it resembled porous stone, covered in patches of wax the same bright blue as Samsara’s chitin.

“The rules are strict,” Samsara said soberly. “You’d find it hard to get me to make an exception, even if he’s your boy. But these times are exceptional. Talos is stirring.”

“He is?” Apprehensive, Darkhoof glanced upwards, as if he’d still see the huge metallic bull-shape. “I didn’t sense it.”

“You wouldn’t, Proxenos,” said Samsara. “Of all the bulls I’ve known, you have accomplished the tightest discipline over your brute impulses… that ring on your nose was well-earned. Alas, if I could say the same of your son…”

“Don’t tempt me, Samsara,” Darkhoof said grimly. “I’m here to negotiate for Basil, not wrest him from you.”

The Reverend Mother smirked. “I’ve already guessed the bargain you’ll propose,” she said. “I just had to ponder first if it’s a good bargain. And to speak frankly, your swirling emotions were a treat… love rarely tastes so rich than when it’s stirred with a little... desperation.”

All Darkhoof could do was scowl. He yearned to say so much more, but time was slipping from him even now, and he was this close to what he’d come here for, after four nights spent outside in self-imposed vigil at the foot of Talos.

“Here we are,” announced Samsara, coming to the end of the hallway.

At this end was no ordinary doorway, but a mirror. A great, circular mirror that filled the whole closed surface, framed in bronze. All of it made from the chalkos mined in the ores behind the mirror, which had also gone into forging the bronze Talos.

Copper. The metal of love, mirrors, the nose-rings of bulls and the common coin.

Unbidden, the memory flickered in Darkhoof of some tale his father had told him, of a “coldforger”, an artisan and worker in metal, who worked away with hammer and die to produce false coin – a forgery, having been made outside the fires of smelting and forging. This, his father had said, was why the deceptive artisan’s work lacked soul of its own.

Talos was the cherished gift from Minotaurs to the Cyan Hive, yet it was the great bronze bull’s fate to only become animate in a time of war. He’d not earned or forged his nose-ring, but been built with it only to assure his savagery could be tempered. If the ancient automaton had a soul, then it was a piece put into him by another, stolen as the guises which the Changelings conjured in their cold fires.

Speaking of, Darkhoof saw Samsara nodding, as the mirror-doorway swung on its hinges.

“Your son awaits,” Samsara said, gesturing to the open doorway. “In the mine, where by all rights, he should have been kept for years. I didn’t tell him to expect you. It seemed a nice surprise…”

For what it was worth, he knew that, beneath her impassive tone, she meant it. After a fashion.

“Thank you, Reverend Mother,” Darkhoof said gruffly, entering.

Moving ahead of her, he found himself inside a domed chamber. He went to stand to the side.

There was a large if inauspicious slab of rock in the centre of the chamber, a smooth square, elevated by a mere few inches off the uneven cavern floor. This was a place for ceremony, but not great or celebratory. Akin more to a small space out of the way, in which to get an unwelcome obligation out of the way. Darkhoof knew there were great houses with rooms of a similar function for unwanted guests – a comparison he might have found amusing at another time.

Samsara now stood, unblinking, at the far end of the slab, her electric-blue aura holding a ceremonial set of items within it that Darkhoof preferred not to look at, even though duty required he soon must. He found no wrong in choosing to stare no longer than duty asked.

From where he stood, the Proxenos – and Proxenos was what he must be in this moment, not a father or a mere bull – possessed a view of the slab that stretched from the Reverend Mother, on her appointed side, to the cavern mouth at its opposite, from whence the day’s supplicant would make their entry.

He tried telling himself this was no walk of shame. Why, then, did it feel like one.

But as if the universe possessed a cruel sense of timing, it was while Darkhoof thought this that he saw the supplicant step into view. Around his waist he wore the belt of his rank, with hammer, chisel and gourd attached.

To Darkhoof’s quiet pride, his son managed to keep his back straight, his eyes forward. Yet it would be a stretch to say Basil kept his head held high. Knowing the young bull’s mannerisms, Darkhoof noticed the subtle signs, a mild slump of the shoulders, a slight teeter in the hooves as each stepped upon the slab, that this cost a great deal of his son’s willpower.

Peculiar to think. There’d be no physical pain in this. And yet even for a supplicant who’d failed to withstand such an ordeal, perhaps there was a greater fear yet to be found. Not in how the mark was inflicted, but that the mark should be seen at all. For such reasons his son, like others before him, may have preferred to stay in the Labyrinth, rather than face the outside.

Slowly, a heaviness to his walk, which had little to do with the mass of his great muscled body, Basil advanced towards Samsara, treading one step at a time upon the slab. At last there were no further steps to take. The young bull met the Changeling’s eyes, but now was when he should cast his gaze away, not show defiance.

His son had kept both arms at his side with only the gentlest sway as he walked. Yet here, he sank to his knees, bowing his head, and in tandem, held his wrists aloft, as if in offering to the Reverend Mother.

Darkhoof heard the heavy cufflinks clinking together before he saw them. Heavy circles chained to a twin set of metal bands. Melted, coated and cooled perfectly to restrain a bull’s large wrists. The bands themselves were smoother than the links that bound them, indicating a special care from whichever smith had forged them.

The restraints levitated above Basil’s arms, held in that same electric aura. They cast a perfect shadow, darkening the skin and the fur.

“You came to us, supplicant,” intoned Samsara, “hopeful, determined to prove yourself, to pass the rites by which a Minotaur faces a crossroads, between choosing the self-gratification of immediate pleasure and aversion from pain… or to cast them off, committing to abnegation, and thus a rank above mere cattle. You have failed. By these laws, the Labyrinth should keep you.”

Swiftly, the two bands opened like the maw of a lazy shark. There were no clasps and no locks, just a smooth line separating matter from matter. Darkhoof thought he saw his son’s shoulder twitch at the sound. Just a twitch, and no more.

The taste of licorice at the back of Darkhoof’s throat was not wholly bitter. Whatever his son’s failures, he remained still and steady during a moment of shame. A moment he had chosen to partake in.

“But it was granted that a Minotaur who passed their trials should intercede on your behalf… Pledging, upon their own head, that it is neither pity nor sentiment by which they speak for you, but sincere conviction you are still worthy. Therefore, we release your body from the Labyrinth… Yet still you carry this weight, Basil Darkhoof, until your soul too stands ready for release.”

The great maw sunk its smooth lips over Basil’s wrists. For a moment, Darkhoof dared think those arms would never return. Dared to entertain the image of a shark leaving nothing behind but stumps. A boy who could never place his arms around his father, to embrace him as family… A son that could not labour on his own, needing help to place a spoonful of soup to his lips.

The image waned. Basil’s arms hung lower with the added burden, muscles shaking slightly. From the exertion of keeping them extended, no doubt – though whether it was reasonable the trembling extended to his shoulders and back as well, Darkhoof did not dwell on.

Samsara brought forward a heavy tool of rusted iron, with fat pincers attached to it.

“With this in mind, supplicant, you are gifted a curse. You may leave the Labyrinth with your benefactor, but you will remain bound to this place.” The tool snapped on one of the metal circles, the chain hanging limp. “Your wrists, though they are no longer tethered, now bear the symbol of your failure.”

A final snap echoed off the chamber’s walls, followed by a dull thud of iron hitting a dusty floor. The ceremony was done.

* * * * *

Once Samsara nodded her head and looked away from Basil, he finally looked up again.

Staring at his arms, Basil flexed his fists. They did not close all the way. He flexed them again, with more force this time. His muscles jumped along with his movement, but still the fist refused to close. The band of metal prevented both skin and sinew from pulling completely.

A large hand touched his shoulder. “Try slowly, at first.”

Basil kept his gaze focused, not looking back to acknowledge the presence.

He tried one more time, the rough skin of his palms wrinkling slowly back while his musculature remained dormant. The metal dug into his skin, but as advised, it slid down just enough for his hands to clench. A barely visible movement.

“Get up,” said his father’s voice. “No need to stay down.”

How he would have liked to obey. But the force appeared to have flowed away from his legs as it had from his arms. For all his bull’s strength, Basil could not bring himself to stand, as if a greater weight pressed him down than his father’s powerful hand, so light on his shoulder.

“Greetings, Father,” Basil said, forcing himself to smile, most wanly. “Samsara gave me no warning of your coming. But I knew you’d want to see for yourself.”

“See what for myself?” asked the voice of Darkhoof, whose lip must be quivering. “Shouldn’t a father be allowed to reunite with the son he hasn’t seen for two years?”

Basil gave a soft sigh. Still kneeling, he reached for for the gourd on his belt. Yet, his grap made clumsy by the constraints of his cuffs, Basil found himself fumbling and the gourd slipped from his grasp, to tumble noisily onto the stone slab.

As if he needed further humiliation. Holding back the frustration in his chest, Basil picked up the gourd more carefully. This time he lifted himself from the slab, slipping from his father’s hand, but only to sit anew a pace away, moving into the lotus position.

“Can I offer you a drink, Father?” Basil whispered, daring a glance. “It’s no wine, but it’s sweet for parching thirst in this humid air. I’m sorry I’ve no better seat to give than cold rock.”

His father consided him in silence. “Cold rock will suffice,” Darkhoof said, “if I may sit by you.”

The two bulls, then, came to sit together on the ceremonial slab, Basil’s father adopting the same position as he. Quietly, Darkhoof took the gourd, and drank, before he passed it back to Basil, who drank a lot more deeply.

Darkhoof watched him wipe his lips. “Basil Menander. What fault has brought you here? The Priestesses make no mistakes… and yet, I struggle to believe some mistake wasn’t made.”

A single, vivid memory flashed through Basil’s head.

Memory of the hot coals searing his hooves. And the anger, burning almost as hot, to know he could not do it, could not outlast the ordeal…

“I… lost. I lost myself,” Basil sighed. “The heated stones… They hurt, Father. I’d come so far, to the threshold… And yet, at the crux…” His stare went to his father’s namesake hooves. “I could not honour our family’s name…”

Yet he said no more.

“Your anger wasn’t unjustified,” said his father at last. “It’s a bitter leaf to swallow.”

“I know what I’m meant to have learned,” Basil said sadly. “Pain is an illusion, pain is the mind-killer… We are fed these refrains in our cradles. But…”

“Experience is the best teacher,” Darkhoof cut across him. Unannounced, his father got up, stepping away from him. “Yet we must also learn from our failures. What good would it do to keep you stuck here for years more? Despite what the Reverend Mother says, one loss of resolve, one burst of anger are no proof of a brutish nature.”

“Father, you can’t give me special favours,” Basil protested. “The Reverend Mother must have told you, I did not go gently on this.”

“The Reverend Mother has agreed that special times warrant special favours,” Darkhoof said. “And it may be that fate has dealt you a lucky hand. A Call has been sounded, inviting me to the Hall of Unity.”

Despite the pain in his wrists, Basil felt his eyes light up in wonder. “A Call?”

“Yes,” Darkhoof said tersely. “As hasn’t sounded since… none know when. But it’ll bring together the Twelve Families from around the world. A chance for learning and understanding…” He paused. “And, perhaps, another chance to prove your worth as a civilzed being. The Cyan Hive’s scholars are always thirsty for knowledge...”

“Does… does Samsara know about this?”

Darkhoof wrapped an arm around him, the other hand pointing towards the exit. “She has already guessed. I promise that if I lead you out now, she won’t attempt to halt us. Yet this might be the only time.”

Still Basil was hesitant. “I’ve had my share of hoodwink, Father… If I stay here, at least I know what I’m in for. We don’t know what this Call heralds. But…” He took a deep breath. “Yes. These two years were long enough. I’d like to see you again, and Thymos… and... Mother as well.”

It wasn’t often he called Unathi ‘Mother’. Ordinarily, the zebra his father saw fit to call wife might have added her own taste of the rod for his fault. But Basil was closer to manhood now. For all it was a disappointment that he lacked a ring.

His father smiled faintly. “Then let’s go.”

Nonetheless, once they’d left and found themselves upon the terrace, Basil Darkhoof saw that his father was looking not at him, but at the sea and the ship they would soon depart on.

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~

Moondancer’s gaze carried over the whole of the observatory, all of it new to her. The massive hourglass in the centre of the middle-tier storey, the countless bookshelves, the neatly-aligned stacks of scrolls.

“It’s all so… tidy.”

“The wonders of friends,” Twilight beamed. “I wanted to show them where we used to live, Spike and I. We had a bit of cleanup operation last week. Did I really never have you over? In all those years since we started as fillies at Celestia’s School?”

“Not once,” Moondancer said, her attention on the closest bookshelf. “It’s beautiful.”

Lyra ambled up to them. “If it makes you feel better, Dancer,” she said. “Twilight never had me over, nor any of our old friends. It just wasn’t her thing, even if she did read up that book on slumber parties.”

“Well, so have I.”

“Really?” Lyra chuckled awkwardly. “You do study everything, huh?”

“When I can,” said Moondancer, momentarily glancing at the huge telescope at the observatory’s very top. “I’m missing a few things for astronomy.”

Twilight came up to them. “And I want to make up for lost time,” she said sincerely, once more holding her old key. “I brought you here to give you this, Moondancer. All of it. You can come here whenever you want and study to your heart’s content.”

“Really?” Moondancer said, with a little shade of awe.

“Really,” Twilight nodded. “But first, you’ve gotta do something for me.”

The shade of awe left Moondancer’s face. “What?”

“I’d like you to meet my friends,” said Twilight. “Come have dinner tonight. They… they were with me at the library, you know? That day we… ran across each other.”

Moondancer listened to her stonily.

“And…” Twilight continued, while Lyra looked on worriedly. “Well, I thought you’d like to meet them– I mean, they’d like to meet you! I… I haven’t really told them much about my life in Canterlot, and I thought…”

“Sorry,” said Moondancer, turning back to the bookshelf. “I can’t. I’m reorganising my philosophy scrolls.”

“Look, Moondancer,” Twilight said quietly, feeling a chill creep on her anew. “I left too much behind when I moved to Ponyville, I see that now–”

“You can say that again.” Moondancer pulled a book off the shelf. “I recognise this. A first edition of Principles of Magic... Didn’t I give this to you?”

“Uh…” Twilight looked at Lyra, who shrugged helplessly. “Maybe?”

Moondancer leafed through the pages, as if she herself weren’t certain.

“I… I did,” she said, finding the right page. She sounded hurt. “Look, I even wrote something! ‘To my friend, Twilight Sparkle, thanks for introducing me to the classics’. I can see by the fact you left it here that it meant a lot to you.”

“Dancer,” Lyra said, stepping in. “I gave Twilight lots of of books. I’m sure they’re all waiting around here somewhere.”

“Does that make it better?” Moondancer asked, closing the book. She saw the key, still floating in Twilight’s aura, and pushed it away. “Don’t you get it? This isn’t about books, or observatories. I…”

Whatever she’d been about to say, it died in her throat. She seemed like she wanted to tell them something, but the words wouldn’t come.

In the end, Moondancer pushed past them, heading downstairs.

“I tried friendship, and it’s just not for me,” she said, not looking back. “Now, if you’ll excuse me…”

Seeing her chance slip away, Twilight tapped her head furiously.

“What if I said,” she called down, “I can get you a meeting with Princess Luna?”

On the verge of exiting, Moondancer stopped at the door, and turned her head. Visibly, if her magnified eyes were any indicator, she was considering it.

“That’s nice, Twilight,” she replied at last. “But surely the Princess has better things to do.”

That was when Lyra took a gamble. “Moondancer, listen, you don’t want to miss this!” She inhaled deeply. “Humans are real.”

The startled look Twilight gave her was exceeded only by Moondancer’s.

* * * * *

A deep, primal grunt forced its way past Alex’s lips as he took another step forward.

“How are you holding up?” asked Shining. “How’re the burns?”

“Painful,” Alex groaned, his grip tightening around the handlebars. “The poultice helps, but… God, every time I try to walk, I can feel the pain snaking down my chest into my legs.”

The runes on his arms began to shine.

“Captain,” Nurse Cross warned him.

Alex’s face was beaded with sweat, yet quite pale. And, although once he saw where the other two were looking, he scrunched up his eyes and forced the runes’ glow to abate, it wasn’t just the blue that diminished, as he seemed to go paler still.

“I’m… I’m sorry.” Then he stopped, body hunching over, and remained standing there, between the bars.

Cross approached. “You’re using those runes too much,” she said sternly. “If you keep relying on them as a crutch, you’ll never heal as you should. They draw energy from you as well as the ambient magic. You’re not letting your body heal, you’re brute-forcing against it.”

He barely heard her. Simply standing was an agony. Wherever the adrenaline came from that had allowed him to crawl through the Forest or stand up and try escaping the hospital, it had long dissipated.

“Fuck…” he whispered, raising an unsteady, shaking hand to brush his matted hair. He regretted it instantly as it forced his weight onto his other hand. “Ugh… Why… why wasn’t this spell designed with regeneration in mind?”

“We’re still not even sure what the spell is,” Shining reminded him. The Captain came up and leant over a handlebar, eyes full of concern. “So far, my sister’s drawn a blank, and she’s still waiting for word from her old Headmaster on that sketch.” He grew thoughtful. “Miss Amethyst Star… I don’t really know her, but Twilight’s told me she’s Ponyville’s jeweler.”

“A teenage prodigy, if that’s what she’s already doing now,” Alex commented. He stumbled. “Shit! N-nurse Cross? I… Sorry, I can’t do this. I need to sit.”

“Fair enough, Captain,” said Cross. “But that’s not the end for today. We need to keep your nerves exercised. You can practice with the stressball.”

“Oh, don’t worry, I’ll be making plenty use of that…”

While Cross helped Alex into the wheelchair, Shining opened the balcony door.

“Let’s step outside,” he said. “Fresh air will do you good. And we’ve got things to discuss.”

Alex raised an eyebrow. “Outside? Aren’t you worried about getting eavesdropped?”

“I understand your paranoia, Captain,” Shining said. His horn sparked. “But no-one in Equestria casts a protective bubble like me.”

“Okay.” Alex turned to Cross. “Thanks, Sutra. I’ll take it from here.”

She nodded reluctantly. “I’ll be grabbing a drink. You know how to call me.”

Following Shining on wheels to the balcony, Alex spoke as soon as Cross as out of earshot. “Poor Sutra… honestly, though, she’s holding it together better than I’d thought, after what Redheart… I mean, the Imperial Redheart, told her.”

“From what you’ve told me, there’ll be more like Nurse Cross,” Shining commented. “Many not as lucky.”

“I wish it weren’t true,” Alex said bleakly. “But I’ve seen it often.”

Shining grunted, the sun catching his helmet. “I never met Redheart when she was in the Guard. But the reports I’ve read say she was a fine, dedicated defender of the realm.”

Alex let himself cackle. “And probably still is. Just not to the realm you know.”

“That’s what I wanted to talk about,” Shining said, pulling up a deck-chair to sit opposite Alex. “We’ve been putting it off too long, but the summit will start soon, and I need to know more about this other-Equestria. Damn, it feels weird to talk like that of your own country...”

“Heh,” said Alex. “Don’t worry. I’m from America. We love half of it and hate the other.” When Shining chose not to comment, he continued. “Maybe it’ll be easier on you if you think of it as ‘the Solar Empire’. Lyra told me this is, what, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae? Equestria’s become a very different place in Year 19 of the Era Imperator.”

Shining goggled at him. “Nineteen?”

“Yep,” Alex said. “Eighteen... Made it retroactive, mind. So it starts the same year as your current calendar, on the year of Princess Luna’s return. Guess they wanted to erase the Era Harmoniae from the records.” He leaned forward. “They needed the time to get ready to attack Earth. Is that really so shocking?”

“Not really, but…” Shining chewed his lip. “You’re right, Nurse Cross’s not the only pony Redheart bamboozled before we caught her. You know she invited Icewind, one of my Guards, on a date?”

“Yeah, I’d heard…” Alex shrugged. “Not sure I blame her. Probably fancied a lad in uniform who wasn’t a broken mess.”

“Except if you’re telling the truth, she’d be… fifteen years older than our Redheart. And Icewind’s already younger than her.”

Alex leaned back. “Shit, hadn’t thought of that. Mind you, didn’t seem to bother that guy who was running for President, back when I first got stationed in Paris…”

“That’s what I don’t get,” Shining said. “This other-Redheart… how come she…?”

“Looks so young?”

Seeing Shining nod, Alex smiled sardonically.

“The Equestria I know’s a treasure-trove of wonders, Captain Armor,” he said. “And I, too, find it funny explaining this to a guy who, in my world, would happily drag his runaway wife back there, to show her what she’s missing. Because Lady Cadance and other runaways, they’ve all reported the same things… the crystal-tech, the parades, the rainbows painted on the streets, it’s all true.”

“And that includes eternal youth?” Shining, it was obvious, felt marvel despite himself.

“Eerie youth is more like it,” said Alex. “It’s as phoney and sickly-sweet as the rest of what they’re selling. Ponies who spend time on Earth, after a while, they look the age that they should… Quite a few look older.”

He didn’t have to explain what he meant by that.

“Redheart was a recent recruit, transferred from Equus,” Alex finished. “Independent operative, not affiliated with the Equestrian Resistance. We thought that made her trustworthier. They like putting spies on our ranks, just as we do them. She sure played us all for fools.”

“I’m afraid she did,” Shining agreed. “My troops have been searching the Everfree River for five days. So far, nothing. She might have been lying about tossing your locket in there.”

“She might,” Alex said. “Yet what if she wasn’t? That’s the problem. And you’re sure Amethyst can’t help?”

“Miss Star’s already tried,” Shining sighed. “But as she said, water has a dampening effect on her magic... as it were.”

Alex scowled. “Yeah. Redheart must’ve known that.” There was a short silence. “Pardon me, Captain. You’re giving me an odd look.”

“I was thinking how good it’d have been to retrieve the locket before the Concordia,” Shining explained. “And then I thought of what you said about spying on your allies.”

“Don’t judge,” Alex said curtly. “We’re thankful for what we’ve got. Hell, another Equus, this here’s more than I’d ever dreamed of! But people… they all have their ‘hook’. Celestia and Galatea already said we couldn’t mention my locket at the Concordia, anyway. Because of what Discord might do.”

“You may find, sir,” Shining said somberly, “that our own web of strange bedfellows and fair-weather friends is hardly easier to navigate than yours.”

~ Macintosh Hills, South of the Great Continent ~

Even in Equestria, land of harmony and goodwill to all creatures, there was never a lack of natural predators, ready to fall upon the unwary at a moment’s notice. For the Equestrians, this might have been a source of things that go ‘bump’ in the night. To others, however, it was merely the way of things.

Some were quite pleased with it.

The Timberwolf trod the uneven, scrub-ridden terrain, leading the way for her two cubs, so they might not hit upon those rocks which studded the unwelcoming hills. With few trees to hold back the sweep of wind, it was the log-like limbs of the wolves themselves which rattled with a ghostly shiver that carried for miles – a wolf’s howl despite the wolf.

But the wind was no thing of fear to the mother. Every few steps, she would stop, and sniff. For wind, to those who knew it, could be a friend which gave warning of danger.

Unfortunately for her, there were also those who’d learned to hoodwink this friend.

From his hiding spot in the leaf-less tree several paces uphill, Garble observed the wolf family, confident the wind couldn’t carry his scent from here.

He smiled, stroking the rope slung over his shoulder. Ember’s gaze might have darkened when he’d told her he’d volunteered for what she decried as a ‘wasteful distraction’, but in the end, the Princess had to acknowledge that without any more raids planned, a young dragon needed to get his sport elsewhere.

Just a few steps closer… Yes, good… With that last step, as she walked directly into his line-of-sight, the mother Timberwolf had come into his reach.

Shrieking a war cry, Garble leapt. Grey, dry branches on either side of him shattered into a million pieces as his mass bowled through them.

Alerted, the mother Timberwolf’s eyes snapped his way, so fast that her wooden neck might have cracked as well, but it was too late. He landed hard on her, impacting her hind, sending her sprawling downhill under his weight, to the frightened yelps of her pups.

Garble ignored them, wasting no time with the rope. The trick with Timberwolves, the roach called Pharynx had explained, was that where another trapped animal might gnaw off their own leg, they could just snap apart and pull themselves together with no further harm. He wouldn’t give her the chance.

He bound her jaws first, knotting them tight, cutting off her angry, fearful whine and paying no heed to her claws – which scraped helplessly off his hide, failing to even scratch him. They were next, anyway, as he expertly locked his knees together, pinning her forelimbs between his powerful thighs. Her claws thus stilled, he knotted them with ease.

Secretly, Garble smirked to recall this was close to how the Princess herself had got tied up by Pharynx. For a roach, the Ebony soldier was good, that was true.

Speak of the draconequus, who else but Pharynx should drop in next to him, carrying a burlap sack outlined by the bulge of two small, struggling canines, a soft whimper coming from inside.

“Got her?” the Ebony soldier grinned, holding up the sack. “The kids are in.”

“Kids, pah!” Garble sneered, tightening the last knot, around the mother’s hindlegs. Trussed up and immobile, she stared at them, her glowing green eyes blazing with hatred. “I’ve got the motherload, roach. Heh, ‘motherload’… heh-eh-heh-hah!” He chortled at his own joke. “Whaddya think your Queen’ll like best?”

The soldier’s grin faded. “How many times… Never call me ‘roach’.”

“Oh, yeah?” Garble prodded Pharynx in the chitin, eliciting a hiss. “Then you gimme reason to think I can’t squish you like a bug. You still owe me that rematch.”

Wings buzzing angrily, the soldier began to lift himself and his sack back off the ground.

“I’m surprised you’re not too scared for a rematch, rock-brain,” Pharynx shot back. “In case you’d forgotten, I was that close to biting your head off.”

“Lucky you didn’t… for you!” Garble sniggered, pulling the Timberwolf mother into his arms for carrying. “You’d done that, you’da broke all your teeth, bug-boy. ‘Rock-brain’? Rock-hard, more like!”

Pharynx bared his fangs. “Don’t speak too soon,” he said, a forked tongue licking his teeth. Still buzzing, he fluttered closer to Garble. “Or else you’ll find that perhaps…”

Without warning, he delivered a swift kick. But not to Garble, who was startled to find Pharynx had aimed for the Timberwolf in his arms.

“... Unlike you, little guard-dog, her bite’s worse than her bark.”

Blanching, Garble saw what the roach had done. Pharynx’s kick had split the Timberwolf mother’s jaw. Resulting in many splintered, sharp pieces of log slipping out from between the knot he’d tied so smartly. And now they snapped – at him. He yowled as one self-animate piece shot up and bit him in the eye. Blinded, he dropped the Timberwolf with a ‘thunk’, clawing panickedly at the rebellious Timberwolf-pieces nicking and nipping his face, while Pharynx headed off in the distance, laughing.

* * * * *

But before too long, Princess Ember had seen her bodyguard return to camp, if lagging too far behind Queen Chrysalis’ captain for dragon pride, with only a swollen eye to show his wolf-hunt hadn’t gone perfectly. While Chrysalis had spent the wait cooing and making kissy-faces at the frightened cubs, it was after Garble returned with the mother that she truly beamed at the day’s catch.

The wolf family were promptly reunited, as Chrysalis’ drones sent the mother to join her cubs inside a great dog-crate, the metal door closing on the three with a soft ‘click’.

Seated on her rock, Ember focused on her guitar strings, trying to shut out the creatures’ pitiful whines. It also gave her an excuse to ignore Garble as he trudged up and sat by her in the gravel, rubbing his eye. She didn’t want to hear his whining either.

“Well,” Chrysalis smiled, patting the crate. “Luckily, we were more afraid than hurt.”

She’d spoken to no-one in particular, but Papillate never strayed far from her side, anymore than Ember let the Bloodstone Sceptre’s bag out of her sight. By now, Ember had learnt to map out the Harlequin Queen-in-Waiting’s response pattern. As always, it began with the little Changeling giving a nervous, uncertain flutter. Then she’d look up at the larger Chrysalis, almost puppy-eyed, as it were, in her eagerness to please.

“I… we were, Ebony Queen?” said Papillate. “Afraid?”

There were many things Ember hated about having to spend the rest of the trip together with Queen Chrysalis. Getting her thunder stolen, for starters – any grand entrance she’d imagined making at the Hall of Unity was now a bust.

But that was only pride talking. Whereas this went deeper. Everything about Chrysalis’ ‘master-student’ relationship with Papillate gave her a creeping sense of wrongness.

Scratch that, everything about Chrysalis felt ‘off’ somehow to Ember. If it’d simply been that Chrysalis loved catching wolves, or bossing Papillate around, Ember wouldn’t have minded. The strong lorded it over the weak. It was how the world worked.

Yet Chrysalis, damn her, why couldn’t she just punch people? Whenever Chrysalis opened her mouth, Ember got the weirdest sense she was saying it wasn’t your fault you were weak, you poor thing. Let her be strong for you.

And that was so wrong...

“Of course, my sweet,” Chrysalis crooned. “Why, did you want to see these precious puppies here in pieces, after Pharynx said he’d got a little rough with their mother? A shameful thing. One rule in this life, Papillate, is if you hurt the mother, you hurt the child.”

Further along, Pharynx, who’d been circling the camp, seemed unperturbed by her words. But opposite him, Mandible momentarily paused her own patrol to glance at Chrysalis, then took off again, shaking her head.

Garble, after eyeing her, returned to glaring at Pharynx.

Ember knew why. While her bodyguard considered himself the clear winner of his fight with the lumbering Red Warrior, Chrysalis had interrupted him fighting the Ebony soldier before their match had ended. And although both males showed some mutual respect as fighters – even if Garble was sadly undisciplined compared to the soldier – it was merely a matter of time before they settled the score.

“Ah-hem, Chrysalis,” Ember said loudly, her fake cough grabbing the Queen’s attention. “What do you plan on doing with these wolves when we get there?”

Hoof on the crate, Chrysalis looked surprised to be asked that.

“These wolves? I’m gonna keep them, what else, Princess?” she said. Gesturing at a few more empty crates standing by, she added, “After all, what’s the point of going on a royal trip if you can’t come back loaded? Not like I can expect Tia, or any of the other toppers to shower me with gifts.”

“Hardly surprising,” Ember snorted. “You did invade Canterlot. Was that also to say ‘hello’?”

Chrysalis started. “Say ‘hello’ to ponies that way?” she exclaimed. “Surely you jest! Their little hearts couldn’t stand it if you knocked them over with a flower!”

To Ember’s chagrin, this distracted Garble from Pharynx long enough to make him laugh.

“Hah! Too right,” he said, chortling. “What a bunch of pansies! They think they’re so smart cos’ their Princesses make the lights go on and off!” Then, ironically, his gaze darkened. “But... you know what? The only thing those than a pony, is a pony-loving dragon…”

This wasn’t something Ember had heard him speak of before. “Huh?” she said, surprised. “What’re you on about? What kind of dragon loves ponies?”

“Puny little dragons that live in Ponyville, is what,” Garble said darkly, chin on his hand. “Betcha we’ll be seeing ‘um in… in… wherever it is we’re going…”

“The Hall of Unity, nitwit!”

“Right, that.” Garble sighed, while Chrysalis and Papillate stared at them curiously. “Figures,” he grumbled. “Just figures!”

Ember suspected using those words made him feel smart, because Garble kept saying them when in doubt. Then again, part of why the Chaoskämpfer had chosen Garble to accompany her was probably because he could read, though she doubted he knew how to write.

“What figures?” Chrysalis asked.

“They say the Gauntlet of Fire’s gonna be in just a few years, maybe less,” Garble said, pinching his brow. “I swore that next time I met ponies, I’d be Dragon Lord, and they’d pay for crossing me! But now here I am, stuck with the Lord’s whelp, on her way to make nice with ponies.”

“Ah, trust me, kid,” Chrysalis said genially. “The irony’s not lost on me.”

None of this pleased Ember at all. Surreptitiously, she nudged the bag before her with a toe. To her relief, the Sceptre was right where she’d left it.

“You’re both nuts...”

Papillate blinked. “Who, me?”

“I meant them,” Ember hissed, pointing at Chrysalis and Garble in turn. “You’re each forgetting one thing. Need I remind you Equestria’s ruled by a Princess who raises the Sun? Hello?”

“Psh,” Garble waved her off. “The Sun’s a big ball of fire, right? So what, like that’s gonna hurt a dragon.”

“And if the Sun stops going up, what’re you gonna do then? Ever think of that?”

“What do we dragons care?” Garble chuckled. “We’ve got fire, we don’t need no other light!”

But Chrysalis raised her hoof. “No, no,” she said. “The dragonet talks sense. While I know Princess Celestia’s too… too restrained to make full use of her Sun powers… the repressed old bag,” she added under her breath, “it’d still spell disaster if she weren’t there to raise the Sun anymore.”

“Oh, so you’ve worked it out,” Ember said dryly.

“Indeed I have,” Chrysalis said easily. “There are ways, Princess Ember, to channel the power of an alicorn. Not many people know this, but it all goes back to how Equestria’s ponies, particulary alicorns such as Celestia and Luna, were originally a means to an end… Living tools to keep the world’s gears running.”

Her words were so portentous, Ember felt her breath catch in her throat.

“Let me guess…” she said slowly. She was trying to play it cool, especially in front of Garble. But as with so many things about Chrysalis, she felt more shaken than she wanted to admit, even to herself. “Your next cunning scheme will involve taking over Celestia with a Pearl Hive brain-parasite.”

Chrysalis grunted in annoyance, earning an anxious look from Papillate.

“Learn your history, Princess,” the Queen said. “It’s been tried before. The enhanced immunity in Celestia’s oh-so-perfect body rejected the fool Changeling within seconds… And the divine ichor that runs through her veins burned it to a black tarry lump.”

‘Celestia has veins?’Ember thought. ‘Huh. I mean, I guess it makes sense, but I never would’ve thought.’

“No, if you want to harness an alicorn,” Chrysalis said, “you can’t do it physically. It’s got to be magic.”

Again, Ember felt her feet wander to the bag holding the Sceptre. “What magic?”

“Ah-ah-ah, that’d be telling,” Chrysalis said, wagging her forehoof. “But I’ll give you a clue. Well, for one type of magic that’d do it. There are others. If my spies tell me true... And they know they’d better, or else… There’s a certain... friend... of your Kirin teachers who’s been working on just such things. Ring any bells? Alright, here’s an extra clue. He’s got a... tempestuous disposition.”

“Huh?” said Garble, staring at her blankly.

“Don’t worry your head about it, dearie,” Chrysalis said. “No-one expects you to.”

Yet it certainly got Ember’s head thrumming. ‘The Storm King…’ she thought. ‘No… he’s no friend of Toshiro and Kuno’s. Although… that’s probably Chrysalis being sarcastic. Could he… no, it makes no sense! To hear Toshiro talk, the guy’s a loud-mouthed buffoon! How could he be a threat to Princess Celestia?’

“I wonder if that’s what Celestia’s called this summit about,” Chrysalis mused, sitting down by the dog-crate. “Although I’d be surprised. I know her spy network isn’t half as wide as mine. For someone in charge of making a big floaty thing go round the world, she’s not that well-informed.”

“You’re awfully trusting,” Ember said suddenly.

And at last, this caught Chrysalis off-guard. “What? Me, trusting?”

“Yes, you are,” said Ember. “What says this… summit isn’t just a big trap, a trick to lure you in as payback for Canterlot? Suppose it is, and the rest of us who got called are just wasting our times?”

Papillate was staring at her open-mouthed. Even Garble was looking thoughtful, no doubt riled to imagine the Sun Princess wasting his time.

But Chrysalis shook her head. “She wouldn’t do that. Not Celestia. Too under-hoofed. Nope, this is real, I promise you.”

“What, did your spies tell you that too?”

“Actually, I read it in the paper.”

Going with her words, Chrysalis’ horn lit up, and before Ember knew it, a roll of newspaper had dropped into her lap.

She unrolled it, examining the title. It was a copy of the Dodge City Gazette, headlined by the words Convocation of the Creatures.

“Took a little detour North, before heading back,” Chrysalis explained. “Mount Metazoa’s closest to the Badlands, but I figured Tia would be happier if I wasn’t first to show up.”

Ember leafed through the paper. Despite the eye-catching heading, the article itself was surprisingly sparse.

A grand summit of all the creatures of Equus, perhaps the largest gathering of the many peoples of our planet. The most prestigious companies will provide services for this event, with the best chefs of Restaurant Row providing catering. We’ve sent reporters to cover the event, and they report a truly massive undertaking.

Princess Celestia had only this to say, when asked for comment;

“This summit is meant to re-direct the future of Equus and forge agreements that will change the future of our world.”

There is so much to parse within this statement…

There was not. Celestia had said very little in very many words. Ember’s eyes glazed over as she tried and failed to read the rest of the article.

“They make it sound like… like some fancy tea party,” Ember muttered, muzzle scrunching up in distaste as she remembered the tedium of Kyorito’s tea parties. “No mention at all of why it’s been convened, just some faff about talks and trade deals!”

“Because they don’t know, and the paper is trying to fill space by finding ways to say that,” Chrysalis nodded, accepting the paper back from her. “But that’s what proves its authenticity. A summit of this sale could never be hushed up, even in a remote location like Metazoa. So what they’ve done is make it sound boring. Clever... Not like it’d interest the average guy on the streets needs, mind.”

“I still find it hard to believe,” Ember persisted, tapping her guitar. “After Canterlot.”

“It don’t matter,” said Garble. Apparently, he’d had his little think. “Just means more of Canterlot left for us dragons to plunder when I’m Dragon Lord, don’t it?” He stood up, stepping towards the bags. “Besides, Princess. Know who we can believe? After all, they’s the one who sent us. The Chaos-OW!”

He never got to finish, as Ember whacked him with the guitar.

‘Idiot!’ she thought furiously. ‘Idiot! The last thing we need is for Chrysalis to find out we’re carrying a canister of the Chaoskämpfer’s flame!’

“What was he going to say?” Chrysalis asked suspiciously.

Ember glared at Garble. While he glared back, he now seemed to get her drift, but the damage was done.

‘It’s a wonder my guitar didn’t break on his thick skull!’

“He… what he meant to say…” Ember said falteringly. “We were sent by my father. The Dragon Lord.”

Chrysalis narrowed her eyes.

“Well, there’s a big surprise,” she hissed. “And a big fat fib, if ever I heard one! Do you take me for a fool? I distinctly heard the word ‘chaos’ in there. What are you hiding from me, Ember?”

To her shame, Ember was unable to look the Queen in the eyes. Her gaze darted anywhere but the piercing gaze of Chrysalis. Mandible and Pharynx on patrol, the Timberwolves locked in their crate, the empty crates, the blinking Papillate – anywhere.

In the end, she sighed, shoulders sagging.

“Alright…” Ember said, resignation in her tone. “It’s not just the Dragon Lord.” She looked at Chrysalis and hoped her eyes betrayed nothing, only reluctant compliance. “The Chaos Lord had his say as well. Isn’t that right, Garble?”

“Uh… yeah?”

“What, old Discord?” Chrysalis said. “What’s he to do with anything?”

“Well, you see…” All while she spoke, Ember was furtively rummaging her mind for what Kuno had mentioned of Princess Celestia’s messages to the Mikado. “You know that Celestia recently had him freed.”

“Yes, I knew that,” Chrysalis said testily. “If nothing else, it’d be hard for me to miss the Canterlot Palace Gardens being down one memorably ugly statue.”

“Right. Well, I suppose you also knew he’s part-dragon?”

This wasn’t something Ember was entirely sure of herself, but she thought Kuno might have explained it once.

“So,” she continued. “When my father sent an early Call of his own, it drew Discord’s notice.”

“Really,” said Chrysalis. “And you expect me to believe a draconequus would be subordinate to the Dragon Lord?”

“Far from it,” Ember replied, feeling her lie take shape. “His voice carried as much weight.” One thing the Mikado’s Court had taught her was that old adage, the best deceptions contain a little truth in them. “Cos’ let me tell you,” she finished, indicating Garble, “it wasn’t Dad who chose him as my bodyguard.”

Chrysalis glanced at Garble. “You don’t say?”

“Of course it was,” said Ember. “Who else’d pick a drake who fantasises about raiding Canterlot for a diplomatic mission to the ponies?”

“Hah!”

To Ember’s relief, Chrysalis’ mirth was proof the Queen had bought it.

“Ooh, yes, ohh, yes, indeed,” Chrysalis said once her sniggers had abated. “Sounds like Discord’s work, alright. Guy’s got a marvelous sense of humour, I’ll give him that. Not the nicest teacher, but he has a way of getting lessons through in the end. Well, thank you, Princess Ember. This has been most educational.”

Ember tried not to let her elation show too much.

Then again, that wasn’t too difficult, as she felt it die down as Chrysalis turned her attention back to Garble.

“But I hope, young drake,” Chrysalis said silkily, “that you’ll put your plans of raiding Canterlot on hold. That’s taken. On hiatus, maybe, but still taken. After going to all this trouble, I’d rather not have to deal with... others barging in on my spoils.”

Although the Queen’s tone was light, Ember noticed Papillate must have detected something else in it, for she shrank back from Chrysalis.

Garble shrugged, unconcerned. “Enough for all of us. Ponies sure won’t be needing it.”

It didn’t surprise Ember that he hadn’t dropped this, but she just shook her head. The ponies honestly had less to worry about her slow-witted bodyguard than whatever schemes Chrysalis might hatch.

Evidently, Chrysalis had been reading Ember’s thoughts, given the next words to come out her mouth.

“Oh, sure.” Chrysalis rolled her eyes indulgently. “It took me all the super-concentrated love I harvested off Shining Armor to beat Celestia, and even I’m surprised that worked. So I’m lost as to how you were planning on doing it, unless your bite’s nasty enough to break her immune system.”

“I could try,” Garble said, baring his teeth in a feral smile. “Maybe we’ll know soon. Don’t think I bit… what’s-her-name, your Red roach, but I can’t tell for sure.”

The cold blood in Ember’s veins ran even colder when she heard this, and it was all she could do not to whack him again. Except, to her amazement, all Chrysalis did was raise an eyebrow. Almost as if she’d been expecting his reply.

“What’s this?” Chrysalis said.

Her voice had remained playful. But only her voice. Not her eyes. Ember knew this because the Queen was now looking straight at her.

“Tell me, Princess Ember,” Chrysalis said, speaking slowly. “Reassure me. Your guard-dog must be joking. A smart, well-educated dragon like you can’t possibly have left the country without giving him his shot.”

Briefly, Garble had blinked at what Chrysalis had called him, but he was staring at her too. Try as she might, Ember knew her discomfort must be showing, because a small smile was curving on his lips, and he’d sniggered at the words ‘smart’ and ‘well-educated’.

“No?” Ember said flatly. “No, I did not,” she added, with more conviction. She raised her arm to show the little, faded pin-prick. “I took my shot three years ago, when Dad sent me to the Kirin, and… haven’t thought of it since. Wasn’t expecting to go with a bodyguard...”

“Ah,” Chrysalis nodded. “Well, lucky I reminded you! Better catch up, pronto.” She reached for the bag at Ember’s feet. “Let’s see what you’ve got–”

Ember pressed her foot firmly on the bag. “That’s private property,” she said coldly. “And if there’s one thing Garble and I agree on, it’s we don’t like anyone messing with our stuff. Besides, you’re wasting your time. We packed no medicine.”

Chrysalis drew her hoof back, harrumphing. “Oh, like ‘private property’ means much to you when it’s other people’s, dragonet!” she snorted. “But, I believe you. Thousands wouldn’t… Still, that leaves me with one, eensy-teensy problem.”

Before she’d asked, Ember sensed it. “And what’s that?”

“Him.”

Chrysalis was pointing at Garble.

“He needs quarantining,” the Queen said. “And as leader of the Nine Hives, although I’d prefer you agreed, I needn’t ask your permission.”

Ember stood up sharply.

“What? Chrysalis, he’s one of my father’s subjects–”

“And a possible health hazard to mine!” Chrysalis said harshly, wrapping a wing around Papillate, who hugged her tight. “This is no laughing matter!”

Such force in those words, Ember hesitated. She took a breath.

“Then just how do you propose ‘quarantining’ him, huh?” she said, jabbing her finger at Chrysalis. “I won’t have you coccoon any dragons on my watch. Got anything else?”

Ember barely noticed Garble’s flabbergasted look at hearing her even consider it.

“I thought you’d say that. Fortunately, I didn’t come unprepared.” Using her spare wing, Chrysalis gestured behind her at the captive Timberwolves. “My group, my rules, Princess Ember. Either your guard-dog gets a prick of the needle, or he can spend the rest of his trip to the Concordia in a dog-crate.”

At this, Garble leapt up.

“I ain’t going in no–”

“You are.” Chrysalis said sternly. Then she raised her newspaper and whacked him with it. Once, twice, forcing him down. “I won’t risk top-notch Hive warriors catching a disease because of you. Hush now.”

Before Garble could react, Chrysalis’ horn and eyes were glowing a poisonous green.

Ember knew what this was. In the corner of her mind, she hoped it’d fail. If dragons were immune to one thing, it was most forms of mind-control…

But not, it turned out, to the Changeling Queen of Queens’.

The green of Chrysalis’ eyes became mirrored in Garble’s own. And Garble, who just then had looked ready to pounce again, instantly drooped, his arms and tail gone limp.

“Better,” said Chrysalis. She nodded towards an open crate. “Now. In you go.”

Obediently, Garble trudged forward awkwardly, nearly stumbling as his body acted independently of what little mind usually directed it – which couldn’t have helped when his head knocked against the door-frame.

Normally, Ember would have felt more concerned for the frame, but this was when she saw what it was made of. Its black colour, which she’d previously assumed to be a design choice, was in fact obsidian. The rock no dragon could chew through.

Too tall to enter upright, the hapless Garble had to crawl to get inside.

Satisfied, Chrysalis turned and kicked the door shut.

The sharp ‘click’ apparently awoke Garble from his hypnosis, because next thing they knew, he was shaking his head bewilderedly, then he’d snapped around, to find himself looking at them from behind wire-mesh.

“What the–”

He snarled and, with all the momentum his cramped quarters could allow, threw himself at the door, but it knocked him back, not budging an inch.

“You see, Papillate,” Chrysalis told her trembling ward. “That’s how you deal with ‘em. They may growl all they like, once you look them hard in the eyes and show who’s boss, they retreat with their tails between their legs.”

Sighing, Ember approached the two Changelings. “How long d’you plan to keep him?”

“As long as it takes,” Chrysalis said, releasing Papillate. “But it’s been ages since Changelings where at the Hall of Unity… No guarantee the stuff we need will be there. So, I might send a drone back to the Hives to pick some up… if I feel like it.”

Ember glanced at the scrabbling Garble and felt a pang. “Did you have to do this?”

“Your Highness, I’m from a species of leeches who live in places full of dirt and grit,” Chrysalis told her. “We take vaccination very seriously.”

Not waiting for a reply, Chrysalis took off, Papillate soon following after her.

Left alone with Garble and the Timberwolves in their crates, Ember thought that she read a look of some satisfaction on the Timberwolf mother’s face. And well she might, for Garble’s furious scraping was failing to make a dent.

Finally, he stopped, panting and left to clutch the wire as he stared up at Ember pleadingly.

“Hey, c’mon,” he whined. “Let me out of here!”

Ember knelt, bringing her face closer to his.

“Hate to admit it, but Chrysalis’s got a point.” She smiled wickedly. “You’re better off in there for a while. Maybe that’ll teach you about bone-headed plans for invading Equestria… or becoming Dragon Lord.”

She turned from him, ignoring his cursing, and went to pick her bags and guitar, to sit on a rock further away.

There, Ember pondered what Chrysalis had said.

‘The Storm King… Could he really have developed a means to defeat alicorns?

But her thoughts were interrupted by a scuffling sound from uphill. She looked.

It was a Changeling drone, whom she quickly recognised. The same one who’d tried impersonating Garble at the campfire, and whose neck she’d almost wrung, before choosing to spare him. The one Pharynx called his brother.

She’d never caught the drone’s name. Pharynx seemed more in the habit of calling his brother ‘dolt’ or ‘grub’ than anything else, which was not surprising. If the Ebony soldier hadn’t said so, she’d never have suspected he was related to the timid drone.

Had he been watching the whole time?

“What do you want?”

He took an anxious step back. “N-nothing.”

And he scuttled away.

~ The Mansion of the Proxenos of Delos, Republic of the Tauren Isles ~

Though he had known Unathi as “Mother” almost as long as he could remember, thinking of her as “Mother” had seldom come readily to Basil. Always, even without him being the older brother who perhaps hadn’t needed her as much as Thymos, there was that awareness she could not be the one who’d birthed him. Thus it went, when one’s father chose outside of one’s species to take a common-law wife.

And in her strict disciplinarian fashion, the zebra had let him feel the consequences of his misdeeds in ways Thymos – hapless, helpless, near-witless Thymos – never had.

On old instinct, for all he’d entered the Labyrinth a child and left it a changed bull, if not quite the man he should have been, Basil had feared her retribution for his shame.

Nothing could have surprised him like the force with which she embraced him, and kept him in her embrace. Eventually, he’d found himself returning the embrace, challenging as it was, all the more when his hands did not quite obey him yet. Well, that and the simple fact he’d grown so much taller than her.

He wondered how his father did it.

“Go with Philip, my boy,” Unathi said softly, when she finally released him. “You know he’ll do anything his honour allows to help restore yours. And… come back. Your brother needs you.”

Nodding wordlessly, he left her there. Much as he tried to hide it, the thought of what unknowns heralded from the Call caused his stomach to twist up, perhaps worse than when he’d entered the Labyrinth to remain two years inside. At least he’d had an idea of what awaited him then. Or so he’d thought. Without him meaning to, his eyes turned to the cuffs set tightly upon his wrists. He pulled his gaze away just as fast, but the image remained, and so did the weight.

With these thoughts in mind, he slipped into his brother’s room.

Thymos was on the floor, playing with his building blocks. Basil wasn’t surprised to get no proper greeting. It was simply Thymos’ way. He may have appeared not to have registered his older brother’s presence, let alone his long-delayed return, but he knew. The building blocks were his favourite toy when he felt sad.

Smiling crookedly, Basil knelt down by Thymos, careful to give him his space.

There was another toy, a letter-cube, lying carelessly strewn in the corner. Basil decided this meant it was alright for him to pick it up. He did, gently tossing it over in his hand, glad to feel his nerves responding, while his eyes looked over the letters written on opposite sides.

“Alpha…” he read. “And Omega. Beginning, and end.”

Basil chuckled, then glanced at the door, making sure no-one was listening. He leant conspiratorially towards Thymos, whose ears had perked up at his strange words.

“Don’t worry, little brother,” the young bull said, ruffling Thymos’ hair, making sure not to bump the little guy’s head against the heavy cuffs. “I’m sure this isn’t the last you’ll have seen of me. And… remember, don’t tell Mother this, but when I get back, I can do that thing with the candle. You like the thing with the candle, eh? Gets you to laugh every time.”

Thymos purred contentedly.

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~

Dinner with Moondancer had been no easier on Twilight.

Pinkie, much to her credit, had remembered not to barrage Moondancer with party talk. Knowing how tough this must have been made Twilight feel a rush of affection for Pinkie. But Twilight also knew Pinkie would be left unsatiated after the low-key birthday celebration Galatea had requested be thrown in her honour – nopony but Celestia and Luna and Cadance, a toast amongst alicorns.

Moondancer was lacking an important party in her life, and Pinkie was itching to give it, but to say so aloud, especially in public at a restaurant, would have alienated Moondancer.

By the time the main course was served, Twilight had noticed Moondancer, after exchanging the bare minimum with Lyra and Spike – though she had briefly admired Peewee – wasn’t interacting with any of her Ponyville friends. She’d asked the five about the human, but formally, and had few questions about they themselves.

Of course, they’d tried asking her about herself, Pinkie most of all.

“So you just… study?” asked Pinkie, once Moondancer, at her bidding, had outlined a long list of studies she was taking without specifying what for.

“How old did you say the human was?” said Moondancer.

Since the question didn’t seem addressed at anyone in particular, Lyra took it upon herself. “Uh... Alex didn’t tell me,” she admitted. “But I’d say his mid-thirties, give or take. A lot’s happened to him in that time.”

“Hum. Alright. So, not an ancient being, then.”

Applejack gave Rarity a look of uncertainty. “Well, ya know… they can’t all be, right? Ah mean… um… did ya know Flutters here’s friends with an ancient being?”

“Uh, yeah, it’s true,” mumbled Fluttershy. “Discord and me, we write to each other, or have tea together, mostly.”

Now Twilight would have expected Dash or Pinkie to make a good-natured quip about how Fluttershy and Discord were more than friends. Even a year ago, Fluttershy might have hid under the table with embarassment, but if nothing else, knowing Discord had worked marvels for her confidence.

Yet there was nothing but awkward silence, and it was clear why. Moondancer might as well have not heard about Discord, seeing how the mention of his name washed over her like everything else that evening.

“So he stopped causing Chaos by giving friendship a chance?” Moondancer stated blandly.

“I… guess?”

“... Can I go now?”

The abruptness caught Twilight by surprise. “Moondancer, please.”

“It’s alright, Twilight...” Rarity said. “We’re having a good time. Right, everypony?”

All the others at the table, including Lyra and Spike, made unsure sounds. Only Dash looked to have something different in mind, yet she merely kept quiet.

Moondancer gave a dissatisfied little groan and pushed her chair away, leaving the table.

Twilight glanced at her friends, wordlessly begging them to let her do this alone, before rushing after the unicorn who’d once been her friend.

She caught up with Moondancer just outside the restaurant.

“Moondancer!” she pleaded. “Don’t! I can’t let you do this to yourself.”

Her erstwhile friend stopped and stared at her. “Look, Twilight. Thanks for telling me about the human… well, Lyra’s the one who told it… Thanks for letting me meet your friends. But I think we’ve got nothing in common.”

“How can you say that?” Twilight said, her voice growing feeble. “You didn’t even talk to them...”

“The Princess gave you an assignment. I get it,” Moondancer said indifferently. “They must be great friends if there’s nothing in Equestria an animal caretaker, an athlete, a baker, a farmer and a dressmaker can’t handle. But it’s not for me.”

This was all she said before she walked off into the night.

Twilight was still gazing after her when Rarity trotted up, Spike at her side and Peewee fluttering above him.

“I’ve never seen a pony that unhappy,” Rarity said softly. “That’s what she is… Unhappy. Was she always like this?”

“I don’t know...” whispered Twilight. “I don’t think so, but... Maybe she had something inside her that was waiting to break. And when I didn’t show up at her party… it did.”

Rarity put a forehoof around her withers. “Stuff and nonsense, darling,” she chided gently. “She’ll come around. If you really were friends, she will. And she won’t stay back for long, not when there’s humans. She really wants to know more about them, anyone can see that.”

“Yeah,” said Spike, hugging her leg. “Chin up, Twi’. Making it up to Moondancer’s not going to be the hard part…”

“I’m not so sure, Spike,” said Twilight. “Seeing how my actions affected her is one of the worst feelings I’ve ever had.”

“Perhaps Moondancer’s the one who needs to hear that,” Rarity said solemnly. “That and… maybe you ought to get your old friends together. Not just Lyra. I saw it in her eyes right before she left… She know’s it’s wrong, but it hurts her to see you’ve made new friends.”

Twilight swallowed. “I should’ve thought of that…” she admited. “But thanks for saying it out loud, Rarity.”

“I’ve got to learn from Applejack sometime,” Rarity smiled. “Let’s go back inside.”

At the table, no-one seemed to have much appetite, let alone for dessert, not even Spike. Only Peewee continued picking happily at the leftovers.

“If you ask me, Twilight,” muttered Dash, dipping her fork into her plate, “your old friend’s gloomier than a grey cloud on a stormy day… But… if you want to make things right with her, I’ve got your back. We all do.”

All the others rumbled their agreement.

“You didn’t tell her about your expedition, huh, Lyra?” Spike remarked.

“No, well…” sighed Lyra. “It’d have been too much to pile on her. Just like the stuff about the Solar Empire. Besides, for that expedition, first I’m gonna have to call some professionals.”

“And, who knows?” Pinkie smiled faintly. “They might still give us a proper party after all.”

* * * * *

In the Canterlot Palace, a bottle lay within a unicorn’s sights.

It was empty, a vintage label – Chateau Equitales Unicornia – plastered on its side. Though the wine was long gone, the bottle alone, with its beautiful makesmanship and crystal glass, was worth something.

In his mind’s eye, Awesome Fire lined up his lit horn to aim at the bottleneck, the exact point to shatter the entire thing with the right spell. The air was still, the distance not too great, and his magic was prepared. All it needed now was a steady hoof to keep the spell on target.

“Take the shot,” he said in a low tone.

Without warning – at least from his perspective, considering he’d given the order – he felt a hoof yank his tail, pulling him off balance. A moment later, his tail was tugged up and down, back and forth, like a crank. Involuntarily, spellfire erupted from his horn, scattering energy in the bottle’s general direction. Spells flew across the room and hit the floor, walls, drapery – which was very distressing – and the table the bottle sat on. Everywhere but the bottle itself.

“Don’t worry,” spoke a slurred voice. “I can do this.”

Head pounding and tail smarting, and aggrieved by the failed shot, Fire had to grit his teeth to stop himself snapping back that, no, he doubted it.

“Wait,” he began, “hold on, I need to– Ow!”

He didn’t get to finish as, unbidden, his tail got gracelessly janked again, sending one long burst of spellfire whooshing up to the ceiling, where it impacted in a puff of ash.

“Stop that!”

Fire wrenched himself away before this could get any worse. He turned heel to glare at the other stallion – feeling acutely that he wasn’t all balanced himself. Already he had trouble telling if they’d readied two more empty bottles, or four.

“You oaf! That hurts, you know,” he grumbled, rubbing himself. “One’d think you’d never held the rudder in your life, with that sloppy-flanked pull. Besides, why must I always play the ‘cannon’?”

If Blueblood was at all ashamed, he did not show it. Fire saw him teeter, sure, but that undoubtedly had more to do with booze than a friend’s indignation.

“Cosh’ your tai… tailsh… your tail’s no rudder, Shoo… Sooty,” the Prince replied, with the soft giggle of the pleasantly inebriated. “But you’ve got the besht firepower of any unicorn alive, ish what. Not my fault you won’t hold shteady on land…”

A strand of Blueblood’s golden mane fell across his eye, and he hastened to brush it away, barely staying up on three hooves.

“Whoopsh!” Blueblood said cheerfully, hoof clattering to the ground. “Not the shame… it’s not the same without the wind brushing back one’sh hair.”

‘How drunk is he?’ Fire asked himself, levitating a glass of that same wine the still-undamaged empty bottle once held. Taking a sip and pausing to appreciate the taste, he briefly shot a glare at the drink’s former container.

“I might have the best firepower,” he muttered, next fixing the princely stallion in his sights, “but if you want to hit that bottle, you’d better put some effort into directing me, rather than throwing my hindquarters everywhere.”

He returned to position, just in time to notice the drapes were beginning to smoulder, two very nervous servants already rushing to extinguish the fire. He was a little surprised. He thought someone, he’d forgotten who, had dismissed all of the staff an hour ago.

Blueblood had taken a step back to direct a new bottle over – this one intended for drinking. Fire, upon seeing his markspony would be indisposed, as the Prince was already struggling with the cork, straightened back up and limbered his neck.

“So we’re done here?” he asked.

“Mmm-huh?” Blueblood replied. He’d given up on uncorking the bottle with his magic, and now held it in his mouth, teeth tugging at the surprisingly resistant stopper. In all likelihood he wasn’t sure either.

“Brilliant,” Fire muttered. Shooting one last disapproving glare at the frustratingly intact Chateau Equitales Unicornia bottle, he took another sip.

The entire gala hall was full of activity, albeit of ungainly variety. Most in the party had split off into groups. Some were chatting, others were wobbling around, following a ringleader in whatever they were up to. Quite a few lay slumped in front of the buffet line, specifically the wine and spirit tables, asleep or too bleary to do anything other than sit, loll and sway.

There were, however, a few outbursts here and there drawing attention. In fact, his and Blueblood’s attempt at indoor clay-pigeon shooting had gone largely unnoticed because of the other daring – if comparatively safer – antics that had unfolded around them while Awesome Fire lined up his shot.

The biggest cluster was gathered around one of the alicorn statues. From here, Fire couldn’t quite tell, but he thought it was famed railroad owner Oiled Spoke whom four or five stallions were watching try to walk across the statue – on his hindlegs. With an empty bottle jammed over his horn, the hapless darer had to rely on holding his forehooves outstretched to stay balanced. And he was tottering.

Beside him, Quiette Shy, daughter of well-to-do Canterlot nouveau riche, was busy cheering him on, a huge smile on her face.

“Go! Go! Go! Go!” she yelled, sounding like she was trying not to laugh.

It took everything Fire had in him not to join with Quiette Shy. If that was Spoke, Fire couldn’t hold back a small, smug smile at thought of a long-time rival failing to make it across. He knew that, given a free rein, he was good at these games. Privately, he could even allow that it came from not having grown up pampered like these fops...

Once again, he turned to the bottle and lit up his horn. With Blueblood still engaged in his valiant battle with the Vite D’Aquila, Fire decided to take the shot himself.

Firing off a bolt of magic, exactly the same as those Blueblood had squandered, Fire went for the Chateau Equitales Unicornia once again. To his utter shock and horror, it missed by a hair and struck the wall.

“How!” he cried, venom dripping from the lone syllable.

There was chuckle from up above. “Guess who.”

Recognising the voice, Fire raised his eyes, to find his fears confirmed by the sight of trademark green streaks in a black pompadour. He locked gazes with said hairstyle’s owner, who looked unperturbed, and infuriatingly sober.

“Wally!” said Blueblood, momentarily forgetting his stuck bottle to throw up his forehooves in greeting. “Glad you could make it!”

Breaking eye contact with Fire to look at Blueblood, Shieldwall smiled, pulling up an amulet that had been dangling from his neck, more affected by gravity than he.

“I’ve been busy,” Shieldwall said. “Ever since you said this was gonna be a… ‘serious’ party, Bluenose,” he explained, perhaps slowing as he stared over the gathering, from his unique vantage point. “Figured if I was gonna be late, best make an entrance. And what better way to do it,” Shieldwall finished, patting the amulet and grinning down at Fire, “than showing up old Sooty? You’re good, buddy... but admit it, my shielding beats your firepower once again.”

Which was truer than Fire wanted it to be. Even now, he could barely see the tell-tale haze of where the cocky blue earthpony must have thrown up his shield to block the shot.

Shooting the upside-down Shieldwall a glare, Fire downed the rest of his glass in one go. ‘I’m really going to need it now.’

“Ah-hah!” a joyous – and slightly gargled – cry came from Blueblood as he took the cork in his teeth once again and pulled it off, holding it in his teeth like a trophy. “Atch lasht.”

“Well done,” Shieldwall commented from his place on the ceiling.

“Yes, yes,” Fire added, placing his own glass on a nearby chair. “Good job. What do you say we get some fresh glasses and go enjoy it,” he shot a look Shieldwall’s way, “alone.”

“Enjoy,” Shieldwall snarked, keeping eye contact with Fire before turning to find the right wall to walk down.

Ignoring the other stallion, Fire ushered Blueblood to a cluster of immaculately set tables – several of which had been swept of tableclothes, cutlery and other decorations. Empty bottles sat on most of them, along with half-empty glasses.

“Good year,” Blueblood commented as he read the label, squinting a little.

“Oh?” Fire asked, now interested in his friend’s pick.

“Oh, yesh,” Blueblood replied, taking a seat. He then poured himself a glass. “And I don’t think I got too much shlobber on the neck either. Sho don’t you worry.”

“Thanks for the... reassurance,” Fire said, sitting in another chair. He tried not to grimace at the realisation that Blueblood had been practically fellating the bottle during his epic struggle to uncork it.

Blueblood poured him a new glass. “Don’t shay I don’t think about my friendsh.”

“Depends on what you think about, though, doesn’t it?” Fire shot back with a smirk.

“Whaddya mean?” Blueblood asked, looking confused.

Awesome Fire blinked as, at last, his brain rushed to catch up with his mouth. “I… uh, I don’t know anymore.” He then took a large gulp from his glass.

Eagerly, Blueblood followed his lead. Topping up their glasses, they took big, strong gulps until their glasses were empty.

A loud bout of laughter shook the room. Fire and Blueblood turned just in time to see the unicorn who’d been climbing the golden alicorn statue toppling onto the floor. There was a momentary pause, broken by uncontrolled chuckles, as the group waited to see if the hapless climber was alright.

“I’m good…” the unicorn said, wobbling as he clambered to his hooves. “I’m good.”

“Didn’t look like that to me,” Shieldwall hollered as he hauled himself up the statue’s plinth and got into position to begin climbing. “I’ll show you how it’s done.”

“The climbing or the falling?” Fire shouted, getting the earthpony’s attention. “Because without that amulet of yours, I think the latter’s all you could really accomplish.”

“Oh, think so?” Shieldwall blustered. “Well, let me show you,” he said, pulling the amulet off his neck, “what a master wall-walker can do.”

Fire snorted derisively as the earthpony gripped the statue’s legs and heaved. In a matter of seconds Shieldwall was almost on the alicorn’s back, but he’d slowed down.

“What kind of mounting do you have in mind, Wally?” Fire shouted again, drawing raucous laughter from the crowd. “If you want some time alone with Her Highness’ likeness, I’m afraid you’ve come at the wrong time. Room’s kind of busy at the moment!”

Shieldwall ignored the ribbing and continued climbing. Soon he was on the statue’s back, his face locked in concentration. The jeering slowed as everyone watched Shieldwall walk along the sloping alicorn’s back, then use its wings to jump up onto its head, levering into position quickly and gracefully. In a moment, he had jumped the distance between the alicorn’s raised wings and its regal head. Gripping the sculpted horn to steady himself, Shieldwall stood as tall as he could on his hindlegs and looked down at the crowd, fixing Awesome Fire with an arrogant grin.

“That, Sooty, is how you do it,” Shieldwall crowed, throwing up his forelegs in triumph.

Awesome Fire simmered as the crowd burst out into cheers. Shieldwall stood in place for a few more moments, before turning to climb back down. The earthpony’s attempts to get off the statue were less impressive, but that didn't matter to the others in the room. Shieldwall’s return to the floor was met with ungainly pats on the back and many offers of drinks from his new admirers.

Fire returned to his own drink, grumbling. He was contemplating just drinking directly from the bottle when he saw Blueblood smirking at him.

“What are you looking at?” Fire said, a weak glare on his face.

“Oh, nothing, nothing,” Blueblood drawled, waving Fire’s harsh glare away. “Just haven’t sheen you that worked up since Neighpon.”

Fire blinked for a moment as his hazy mind registered Blueblood’s words. “Neighpon?”

“Yesh, Neighpon. Remember, when Boiler Plate shpent the Shtarshpear’sh petty cash on thoshe four jugsh of shake… no-no wait, saké, ugh… con… convinshed it was engine fuel or shomething?”

“A little, yes,” Fire answered. “Why does this remind you of that?”

“Cosh’ we never let him forget that.” Blueblood clarified. “What did you call him again? Broiler Plate?”

“No, that was after the incident with the galley and the cabbage,” Fire replied. “That stallion had the worst luck, and never figured it out. I wonder how he even got in the Guard in the first place.”

“Hish father’sh Iron Plate,” Blueblood immediately answered.

“Oh, yeah. The Guard Captain.”

“No, Shining Armor’s the Guard Captain,” Blueblood chuckled, sipping from the bottle. “Thish ish a Guard Captain. Different thing entirely. Anyway, that’sh why not just anypony can be trushted with fuel and oil greashe and all that, least of all in the Guard. Particularly not thoshe who got in through family tiesh… good thing they kept you in, Sooty,” he said, pouring Fire more wine, “or we’d be down a few brainsh in our upcoming challenge.”

‘And whose fault might that be, I wonder?’ thought Fire, even as he outwardly accepted the drink.

He decided to say nothing, either, about Prince Blueblood commenting on family ties.

“Nice of you to say that,” Fire said instead, clinking glasses with Blueblood. It wasn’t too hard for him to smile at this, at least. Because he meant it, all around. “And you know, something else I never told him, the poor fellow, is that I’ve thought perhaps you could make fuel out of alcohol… not saké, far as I know, or the Kirin would already be looking into it… But I read promising things about wheat somewhere…”

Blueblood nodded disinterestedly. “Well, yes, it’d be a damn sh…” He caught himself in time. “A damn sight better than putting wheat in drink… Ugh, nashty common carnival fare, beer… Never undershtood the pony who tried it, least shider is made from good Equestrian apples.”

“Oh, come now. I thought you were all about foreign things.”

“Wheat, Sooty,” Blueblood insisted, with a shudder. “Wheat. All there is in life is wheat… Oh, wheat? Lotsh of wheat! Fields of wheat! A tremendous amount of wheat… Yellow wheat. Red wheat. Wheat with feathers. Cream of wheat. Harmony help ush…”

Fire looked at his drink, then back at the Prince, an eyebrow raised. “You’re drunk, Astron. I mean really drunk. Even for you.”

Blueblood merely shrugged. “Sure.”

Fire lay down his drink. Hooves pressed together, he leaned in, throwing a glance around.

“Look…” he whispered. “I know there’s things you can’t tell me yet. But you mention ‘war’, then make it sound like Celestia’s getting involved in some proxy war without giving me all the details… now you’re talking about wheat. Are we… do we need to stock up?”

“Ah, not that I know… it’sh a… piece of poetry I heard, I think.”

“You really are drunk...” Fire leaned back, shaking his head.

“Nope, jusht the product of a clashical educashion,” replied Blueblood, hiccoughing. “Be glad you never had to go through that, my friend. You didn’t mish out on much, in whatever midtown Canterlot school you went to.”

“Anyway,” Fire said testily. “Point is, setting aside all faff about wheat, if we got a ‘challenge’ ahead, I don’t think it could’ve come at a better time for bright minds to face it. The return of the Crystal Realm’s been tremendously exciting for the Guild of Engineers…”

He nodded in the general direction of Shieldwall, sharing drinks with a huddle of admirers.

“And, full of himself as that lug over there is, why, you saw what he did with a simple amulet,” Fire acknowledged grudgingly. “Imagine the possibilities on a larger scale! Shieldwall’s thinking in terms of crystal as reinforced building material and special charms. Because, of course he is.”

He leaned forward, whispering conspiratorially.

“The Saddle Mareabians,” Fire said, keeping his voice down, “have beeing using their crystals for experimenting with the things’ combustive properties… or even as boosters for equines’ hidden powers, I’ve heard! Think of it, Bluenose. With our pure crystals, we might enter a whole new era for ponykind.” The thought made him smile. “And I know where I’d start. A new type of engine for our airships. No more long, wearying days whittled away in the airs…”

Blueblood, who until then had been nodding, plainly only half-listening, suddenly seemed to come awake.

“Say again?” he said loudly.

And Fire noted the lack of slurring in his voice.

“What are you twaddling about there?” Blueblood said, sounding, to Fire’s surprise, rather indignant. “Fast-moving airships? What, where’s the point in that? Where’s the point in flying, when you can’t just lazily watch the world drift by?” He shook his head, pouring himself a large quantity of drink. “Seriously, if we want fast flying, we’ve got the Wonderbolts. Know what, I think you’re just saying that because you’re the only non-pegasus I know who, when caught in a storm, shouts ‘go faster’!”

“That happened once,” Fire snapped, annoyed he’d been interrupted just to have that incident thrown back in his face again.

“Three times, actually,” Blueblood said. “And that’s not counting your best day.”

Awesome Fire flushed as mortifying memories of thunder claps, lightning strikes and maniacal laughter sifted through his slightly foggy mind.

“And the only reason you had your best day,” Blueblood continued, “is becaushe… because the Starspear was moving slow enough to float through. You’d never have had such a lovely time if we were going too fast for the storm.”

“Wha… what kind of logic is that?”

“It’s good logic,” Blueblood immediately said. “And tell me I’m wrong.”

Fire began to smoulder again as Blueblood continued to ramble.

“I mean,” Blueblood then said. “I’ve said it all before, but I just can’t believe you had it in you. You were just standing there on deck, practically begging the lightning to hit us. Then we went through that pod of storm-whales, and you went completely mad.”

Fire’s shoulder started to smoke as he glared at his friend.

“I mean you looked like a colt whose birthday and Hearthswarming came all at once. It was kinda… uh, um, cute? Yeah, cute. Your face just lit and then you started laughing. I think your eyes crossed somewhere.”

Smoke quickly began to billow from Fire’s mane and coat as the unwanted memories surfaced again. Small licks of flame were beginning to from the ends of his mane and tail. His eyes twitched and the edges of his licks curled up to reveal grinding teeth.

“Bluenose...” Fire hissed.

“Yeah,” Blueblood said, taking a swig from his drink. The grin he was wearing was wiped out immediately the moment he took one look at Awesome Fire.

“SHUT IT!” Fire shouted and with that he burst into flames.

A collective shriek swept through the ballroom, as a large sphere of fire burst out from one of the tables. Flames licked and shimmered along the surface of the sphere, as it seemed to engulf everything around it. The fires span and rolled around one another for an instant and then they were gone, snuffed out.

The collective scream had now been replaced by a long pause. The ball of fire was gone, the table Blueblood and Fire had been sitting at was knocked over and stained with soot, as were the chairs. Standing in the middle of a charred circle was Awesome Fire and nearby was a stunned, sooty Blueblood, lying on the floor and bobbing his head.

‘Oh, no’ Fire thought as he looked around. ‘I’ve done it again.’

He looked himself over quickly. His dinner jacket was fine, if bedraggled, but he was sure he’d come in a uniform shirt and a cravat. The pile of ash at his hooves, along with a set of partially melted cufflinks, told him exactly where both now were. Fire cringed at the thought of not only having to buy new sets, but to probably compensate the palace for the furniture he’d damaged.

“I...” Blueblood started as he tried to reorient himself. “I haven’t seen that in a while.”

“Well,” Fire sneered, “that’s what happens when you keep pushing me.”

“What did I do?”

“You brought up the storm,” Fire answered. “Don’t. Just don’t.”

“Right,” Blueblood said as he clambered to his hooves. “Sorry about that. I didn’t notice.”

He was just about to dust himself off when he noticed what state he was in. Blueblood let out a gasp, whic became an indignant yelp as he realised his coat was stained black and grey with soot and ash. The jacket he’d been wearing was gone, leaving him completely bare, except for the remaining ash scattered across his body.

“What have you done to me?” Blueblood moaned. “I… I spent hours getting ready for tonight and you… you’ve destroyed my coat, my mane, my jacket… I...”

Fire watched as Blueblood trailed off and sank to his haunches. It amazed him how quickly Blueblood’s moods could shift. One moment he’d fancy himself a raucous sailor wanting to experience everything the world offered, the next he’d worry about scuffing his hooves on the flawless floors of the palace, or upsetting the quaff of his mane in the wind. It was almost impossible to understand.

“Don’t worry about your mane, we’ll get it fixed up in no time,” Fire said, moving forward. Irritated though he still felt, he wasn’t going to leave Blueblood there feeling sorry for himself. “Why, it’s halfway to that windswept look already, eh, Bluenose?” he said, a bit more gently. “But you do need something to wear. Here, hold on…”

Swiftly, he began unbuttoning his jacket. As he was doing so, he glanced around, and like he’d hoped, caught the eye of a certain stallion.

“Help,” Fire mouthed, trusting Shieldwall to read his lips before anyone else reacted.

Luckily, Shieldwall got his meaning instantly.

“Well now,” the earthpony spoke out, from among the throng gathered around him. “Got a bit overenthusiastic there, didn’t you, Sooty? But look at that,” he said, stepping in to pick up what Fire saw were bottle shards. “It worked! Beyond all expectations, I daresay, gentlecolts! In fact,” Shieldwall peered at the shards, which were different colours. “Yep, that’s three bottles in one go! Let’s hear a round of applause for Sooty and Bluenose’s firing skills, everyone!”

There was scattered, uncertain applause. Then the clapping of hooves on the floor became louder, more rhythmical, until whoever in the room still conscious had joined in, cheering Awesome Fire’s purported prowess.

All Fire did was sigh in relief, as he draped Blueblood’s withers with his jacket. And if anyone in the esteemed gathering noticed they’d swapped one clotheless stallion for another, they were too caught up in the cheer to register it properly.

“C’mon,” he said, picking the Prince off his haunches. “Better get you cleaned up. Me too, come to think. They put up some wash-basins in the antechamber, we can use those. Shieldwall’s gonna keep the lads busy for a while…”

He was right, as it turned out. With Shieldwall gabbing away about a splendid evening, no-one else threw them a second glance as Fire led Blueblood out of the gala hall and into the neighbouring antechamber.

Along the way, however, Fire lit his horn, surreptitiously picking another of the many empty bottles littering the tiled floor.

Blueblood was back to his senses once the double doors to the hall closed behind them, enough to head for the nearest wash-basin without needing to be guided. Quietly, Fire took place at the next basin, placed along a table that stretched the chamber’s length.

Neither said anything while they rinsed, though Blueblood was the first to reach for the towel-rack so he could dry himself off. In his haste, Fire saw Blueblood let the jacket slip from around his withers and drop to the floor. But that wasn’t a problem, Fire thought, going to step by it.

Cleaned of soot, yet still a bit shaken, the Prince tossed the towel aside.

“That was…” Blueblood panted. “That was pretty spectacular.”

“Good word for it, isn’t it?” Fire agreed, not wanting to show he’d been taken by surprise too.

Blueblood shuffled from hoof to hoof. “And you’re absolutely positive, you’ve not got a drop of Kirin blood in you?”

“Now don’t let’s get started on that...” Fire said warningly.

“Right, right. Sorry, again,” Blueblood said. A few drops of water still clung to his mane. “Well, I… I think the wash’s helped me sober up. The evening was dying down, anyway. So I think I’m going to go back in there and thank everyone for coming. But, first…”

His horn lit up, and the spare jacket began to lift off the floor. Until Fire stepped on it, pinning it down with his forehoof.

“Sooty! What in Auntie’s name!?” Blueblood spluttered. “I need that!”

“And I’m going to give it to you, don’t worry,” Fire said calmly, patting himself over. “I can go without. Except before you check up on the lads, I figured you still owe me a favour.”

“A favour for what? You’ve already shown me up tonight!”

Fire nodded sincerely. “Which is why it seemed best to me we keep this to ourselves,” he explained, TK working in the meantime on moving the wash-basins off the table, dragging the table to the centre of the chamber, and setting the empty bottle at the table’s far end. “No-one’s got to see you make a bigger fool of yourself, Bluenose.”

Blueblood’s eyes fell on the distant bottle.

“You’re not serious. No. I’m not doing it.”

“Then I’m keeping the jacket.” For emphasis, Fire dug his hoof deeper into the pinned-down piece of clothing. “Not that I mind you having it.” He gestured at the empty space between him and the table. “Go on. Please? I’m not even asking you to hit the bottle. Just, you give it a shot for a change, okay?”

A mix of looks rushed across Blueblood’s face as he weighed his options, staring from the bottle and to the double-doors in turn.

Eventually, however, just as Fire had expected, vanity won out. Grumbling under his breath, Blueblood moved to position himself, turning on the spot so he stood in a straight line, with his eyes on the table and his back to Fire.

“I hate you, Awesome,” Blueblood muttered, lowering his head, horn aiming the bottle.

Fire smirked, too pleased to even cringe at his first name. Employing the military practice his friend had neglected to spend his year’s service on a joyride instead, he balanced himself by pressing one forehoof across Blueblood’s withers – ignoring the grunt of discomfort – whilst beginning to crank the tail.

“Oh, I’m not awesome... But what I do is.”

* * * * *

“It’s a funny thing, friendship,” Lyra was musing in bed that evening, while Bonbon stroked her mane. “You think you’ve got it all figured out, but you never really do, do you? People, they never act exactly as you want them to. So you just… sort of learn the flow. When to go with it, or ride the wave.”

“Mmh…” Bonbon nodded absently, kissing her nape. “Somepony’s got her mind on travelling the high seas...”

“Clouds, really,” Lyra murmured. “But… yeah. Mostly seas. Searching for a ship hidden on the sea-floor. A ship, and a place.”

Delicately, she touched the well-worn, open copy of Ponyland: Fact or Fable Bonbon held in her lap.

Bonbon sighed. Lyra didn’t blame her. Just because her girlfriend had started reading the book for herself, wasn’t to say she shared the same enthusiasm.

“Five days on, nothing I’d say could stop you, huh?”

“Doesn’t look like it…” Lyra said, trailing. “Although, I… don’t feel comfortable, leaving before Twilight’s sorted this out. I’d promised to help her.”

Bonbon straightened herself as she closed the book. “Expeditions aren’t set up in a day, Lyra. You’ll have plenty of time. I just want us to have all the ‘us’ time we can get.”

Lyra briefly smiled. “Friendships can get wrecked in a day, though,” she said, smile fading. “And it might take a lot longer to patch things between Twilight and Moondancer.”

For a time, Bonbon said nothing. But Lyra knew it wasn’t because she had nothing to say. Her girlfriend was deep in thought.

“Lyra,” she said. “You remember how we first met?”

“Wasn’t it at that party Pinkie threw for all of Ponyville, when we were all foals?” Lyra giggled. “Boy, you sure looked cute with glasses.”

Tutting, Bonbon punched her playfully. “I meant as grown-ups,” she explained. “When we first caught on that we might have a thing.”

“Oh, yeah…” Lyra began, thinking back. “That was a bit rough, though, wasn’t it? If only we’d seen it sooner. Not to say you haven’t got impeccable tastes… if I were into musicians, I’d have been all over her.”

When Bonbon sighed again, it was a fond sigh. “Of course. Cellist, second chair, Canterlot Symphony… saw her play whenever I was in town. You’ve seen a beautiful mare play the cello. You know it’s something else. Also, she laughed at my jokes, which was a bonus. You’re not sure you can tell a good joke, when you’re a pony who laughs at anything.”

“Yeah, well, er…” Lyra snickered awkwardly. Privately, she felt Bonbon actually overestimated her own sense of humour. “Octavia was never my girlfriend.”

“Mmh,” said Bonbon. “It’s a pity. Pity Octavia never was one for a threesome. That’d have made things easier...” She cupped Lyra’s cheek. “But you’re still friends, right?”

“It was touch and go for a while, but, yeah,” said Lyra, fiddling the covers. “Its you I still feel worried for, whenever we cross her in the streets…” She went silent. “Bonnie, what are you trying to say?”

Bonbon rolled so she lay over Lyra, looking her in the eyes.

“I mean, Lyra,” she smiled, “that you should believe in yourself. You’re a bridge-builder. Not many mares would stay on speaking terms after one left the other for her best friend.”

Lyra blushed under her gaze. “Honestly, Bonbon…” she mumbled. “Even now, I don’t get it. A beautiful, professional cellist… what’s a scruffy, unemployed lyrist next to that?”

“Heh, maybe I don’t want a professional.” Then Bonbon leant in to kiss her.

They held the kiss for long enough. But when they pulled apart, Lyra felt that, just then, a kiss was all she could take.

It was a shame. The night was warm, neither felt too tired, and Bonbon had even thought to pack her lyre when they’d left Ponyville. Playing the lyre before bed was always good.

She rolled away, to the bed’s edge.

“Where are you going?”

Lyra stared back at her regretfully. “Excuse me, Bonnie,” she said, getting up. “I’ve gotta go for a walk… I’m not feeling the music. Maybe the night’ll help.”

“... In your condition?” Bonbon blew her cheeks. “Okay.” Her forehoof went for the discarded Ponyland: Fact or Fiction. “Well, I’ve got some reading to do. But if I fall asleep… wake me up when you get back?”

Nodding distractedly, Lyra picked up her crutches and headed for the door.

* * * * *

Wandering the palace hallways wasn’t too bewildering to a former student of Celestia’s School. The palace had been almost as much a part of Lyra’s childhood as Twilight’s, along with the love of Princess Cadance. Even late at night, with her injuries, comfortable familiarity wrapped up Lyra as she passed by the indoor greenhouses, the dining hall and the Guards’ quarters, though she knew not where she went.

But it was when she came to one of the many balconies that Lyra saw a soul other than a Guard on patrol.

Curious, she peeked past the open doorway.

A rather out-of-sorts-looking Prince Blueblood was sipping the last of a bottle, throwing the occasional wistful look at the night-time skies.

While Lyra hoped to talk to him by day, seeing him like this, she deemed it best to move on. Yet he noticed her before she could trot away.

“Ah!” he cried, surprised. “Is that you, Madame Heartstrings? You’re up late.”

It would be impolite to ignore a Prince. Putting on her gentlest smile, Lyra hobbled to join Blueblood on the balcony.

“No later than you, Your Highness,” Lyra said lightly. “I was, ah... looking for my muse.”

The last time she’d spoken with the Prince was shortly after her failed tryout for the Canterlot Symphony Orchestra. The formal “hellos” and “goodbyes” she’d exchanged with him when Celestia gathered her inner circle at the Canterlot Archives didn’t count. Typically, Blueblood had been wrapped in himself at the time.

She actually spoke her next thought out loud. “I’m surprised you remember my name.”

“Really? Why wouldn’t I?” Blueblood said. “Anypony who’s important to Auntie needs to be important to me, after all.”

Lyra raised an eyebrow. “I…”

“What is it?” Blueblood said casually. “Don’t worry, speak up.”

“Well, I… Sorry for saying this, but… I’ve heard you’ve got an odd way of showing that.”

The Prince chuckled. “You must be referring to your fashion-designer friend and the Gala,” he said. “A stallion in my position’s got to lot of mares off his back, you know. No matter who they are.”

He waved her off before she could reply.

“Madame, I grew up with Celestia for an aunt. Who’d you think livened up the Gala before she invited Miss Sparkle’s friends? Not like she’s the only one who hates it...”

Shifting her hooves, Lyra didn’t know what to say to that. So, leaning on her crutches, she let her gaze wander, until it fell upon what Blueblood was wearing.

Somehow, a fiery-orange shirt didn’t seem his usual attire.

“Is that a new jacket, Your Highness?”

“No, I…” Blueblood blushed a little. “A friend lent it to me.”

“Oh... Okay,” said Lyra. “That was nice of them.”

“Mmh-hm, yeah, sure…” said Blueblood. “But it is good to know who your friends are. There’s nothing like sharing few crazy, wild ventures to sort out who’s the real deal.”

Lyra nodded. “I’m sure Twilight would agree,” she said. “Although, from what she says, eighty percent of her friendship reports are based on normal, everyday stuff.”

“Yes, well…” Without looking, Blueblood held the bottle over the railing, and let it drop down. “I’ve a feeling there won’t be much of a ‘normal’ for a long time.”

The sound of the bottle breaking echoed from below.

“Aren’t you’re all about crazy, wild ventures?”

“Not these ones,” Blueblood whispered. “They’re no fun. But, Auntie C’s counting on my easy way with foreign cultures, and who am I to waste it?”

Then and there, Lyra decided she would ask him.

“Yeah…” she said. “I might have something to say about that. Did the Princess tell you I have a plan for the Concordia?”

Blueblood peered at her inquisitively.

“She mentioned it, yes…” he said. “You wish to request international funding for scientific research into humanity’s ties to Equus?”

“That, and more.”

Lyra had never thought herself a grand mare. Yet when you were dealing with Prince Blueblood, it paid to act grand. Despite how he behaved around some mares trying to get close to him.

“Prince Blueblood,” she said. “I don’t know you that well, but Cadance speaks highly of your talents as a navigator, and I’ve heard you’d never turn down a daring venture into the exotic. I believe…” Here she raised her voice by an octave. “I believe there’s some piece we’re missing in this puzzle. There’s a book I’ve read, one that Howie Waggoner wrote about LP-426 and his Dream Valley Expedition. He claimed he found the Sunken Dream Valley.”

She paused for effect.

“But whatever he discovered there, the proof was lost with his ship, when the Nellie sunk in a wild storm. And I’d… like to go looking for it. It’s been lost too long. Because… if we can’t find Alex’s, I mean, Captain Reiner’s locket, maybe we’ll find something else there.”

Her piece was said, except one thing.

“What say you, Highness?” asked Lyra Heartstrings. “Want to go for a ride?”

She observed Blueblood’s features, keeping herself composed, yet pumping to see just how far she’d got to him. His face was awash with rapidly flittering emotions – astonishment, a little fear, perhaps incredulity. Yet if he felt afraid or disbelieving at such a proposal dropping in his lap, it all suddenly gave way to one, glowing emotion. Joy.

While previously he’d sat, Blueblood stood up, tall on all four hooves.

“My answer, Madame Heartstrings,” the Prince said, with a galant flourish, “is ‘yes’. Gladly will I assist you in unearthing the secret of the monkey planet.”

Lyra chuckled lightly. “If only we could visit the planet itself… and in better days.” She turned from him, gazing towards the gardens. “To think, whatever terrible things happened to her, this is the one thing other-me got to do. She saw Earth as it should be…”

~ Another Canterlot, Another Equestria ~ Eight Years Ago, Eight Years From Now ~

Dinner by candlelight. It was a romantic image, but tonight, it wasn’t for lovers solely.

Naturally, though, it was her lover who’d determined the guests’ seating arrangements. While both knew who the charmer was between the two of them, she’d learned to defer to her long-suffering girlfriend for matters of practicality.

It made her more than a little anxious. She’d be expected to handle an ambassador’s duties, and not just as an ambassador to merely a country, but to a whole new world. At the same, this only made her feel glad she wouldn’t do this alone.

From her place at the middle of the table, Lyra smiled softly as Bonbon showed the guests to their seats. The bell had rung. Dinner would soon be served.

Two were missing, yet most had chosen against being fashionably late, and arrived when they were meant to, mingling amongst each other. Some were old friends to one another, others were meeting for the first time tonight. One thing they all shared in common was that they were her friends.

There was Cadance, cutting a regal figure, yet approachable too – and neither impression was spoiled by the look of her stunted wings. She’d learned to wear them with pride.

Besides, in the last few years, people had lost more than a chance to fly...

Octavia and Vinyl were seated together, eternally inseparable, despite being as chalk and cheese in their different music and personalities. Though it was an old story, Lyra still felt a twinge of relief to see Bonbon and Octavia act perfectly cordial to one another.

Time Turner and Derpy’s family took seats for four, the parents and sisters sitting in pairs. Lyra noticed little Dinky blush as Amethyst teased her about something. Probably something to do with her not being so little anymore – Dinky was shaping up to be a beautiful young mare, the cutie mark of four bright stars she’d earned a few years ago shining proudly upon her flank. Doubtless Amethyst knew of a boyfriend the fourteen-year-old would sooner have kept a secret.

Speaking of which, old Professor Shriek was there too, still oddly handsome in his moth-bitten, hardy thestral way. He sat next to Time Turner, with Headmaster Nexus at the other side of him. In all of the mingling, the three scholars, eccentrics to a stallion, had chatted incessantly.

Last of all was Minuette. And her, Lyra couldn’t ever look at without something unspoken, melancholic, though they’d both spoken about it many times, when they could bring themselves to.

Minuette was the only one of Lyra’s school-day friends in attendance. There should have been more people at this party. Shining Armor had an excuse, much as it might pain Cadance, with all his new duties, but the rest…

“Good… good evening? Sorry I’m late.”

And when Lyra heard who it was, she grinned. “Moondancer,”

She rose to meet her old friend, who was standing there at the doorway. Moondancer looked unsure on how to properly greet her.

But Lyra decided for her, taking her into a big hug.

“Lovely to see you too, Lyra,” Moondancer said warmly, once they’d broken the hug. Her magnified gaze drank in the assembly. “I see Twilight’s decided to skip another party, though…”

“Yeah, I’m afraid so,” said Lyra. “Can’t say I’m surprised. She’s had a lot on her plate lately. She and Shining both have. Still, when I saw you there… if you could make it, I’d hoped she might too…”

“Don’t judge her too harshly,” Moondancer said, with a wry smile. “Twilight’s been doing everything she can for Equestria, more than ever.”

“So have you, I hear,” Lyra remarked, leading her to the table. “Will you be telling us about it tonight?”

“Maybe.” Moondancer winked. “But you know what? I think you’re going to do so much more, Ambassador Heartstrings.”

Refreshments were served in due time, brought in by Palace staff.

Lyra marvelled to think that, for this one night, they were entirely at her disposition. Yet, at the same time, she sought to read their faces. If she looked closely enough, she knew she would see the same as she saw in her friends’ faces – discrete, most of the time, yet always lurking somewhere.

She glanced at Minuette, who’d started a chat with Moondancer. Catching her glance, Minuette stopped and smiled at her sadly.

It was as good a time as any...

“Ahem,” Lyra coughed, tapping her glass with her spoon. All conversation ceased as everyone in the room fixed their attention on her. “Before we begin, I’d like to propose a toast. To what lies ahead… but also what’s behind us. I think… we should toast to absent friends.”

There were murmurs and nods of agreement.

“To absent friends,” Minuette said, raising her own glass.

Cadance followed suit, soon joined by Moondancer and all the others, as under their breaths, they repeated the names of people who should have been here tonight, but weren’t, nor would they ever be.

Moondancer’s older sister, Morning. Spell Nexus’ younger brother. Shriek’s whole family. Neon Lights. Lemonhearts and Twinkleshine. Roseluck.

And while Lyra couldn’t hear what was whispered, she knew the names. All victims of King Sombra’s cruel and pointless war.

Her parents’ names were on that list.

Eventually, the glasses were lowered. Dishes were served, from appetiser to dessert, as the evening progressed, much as life did, with all in attendance thankful for what they had, including the person beside them.

Towards the end of the evening, with Bonbon now preparing the goodbyes for the first to go – Time Turner and his family, since Dinky was still the youngest present and needed sleep, much as Vinyl was attempting to be a bad influence on her – Lyra and Moondancer once more found themselves away from the table, talking in a private corner of their own.

“Amazing to think, isn’t it?” Moondancer mused. “Humans. It’s been a strange few years, but… perhaps now it’s going to be strange in a good way.” She tapped her chin. “I wonder what they’ll be like?”

“Me too,” Ambassador Lyra told her, with quiet pride. “I look forward to meeting them all.”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

The circumstances of Proxenos Darkhoof’s visit to the Labyrinth to retrieve his son Basil have been rewritten. Here I would like to thank RanOutOfIdeas for his guest-writing collaboration on this scene. Thanks!

Spectrum 2.0 - May 01st 2019

VoxAdam: Yes, here we have another 20,000+ words of a chapter. Eagle-eyed readers will have spotted I broke my pledge from last time that Chapter Eleven would be the penultimate chapter to the finale of Act One, but this here is the penultimate chapter. Be prepared, though, while Chapter Thirteen may not precisely be Avengers: Endgame, it’s certainly set to be the longest chapter in the new Spectrum. Ever. Once it peaks at that point, the pace will tighten considerably with Act Two. In story-progression, if not publication.

Shuffled over from Chapter Eleven is the comic-relief segment of Blueblood and Awesome Fire, which is a product of me getting to write together with the underrated RoyalPsycho. Thank you, Royal, for your patience and willingness to put up with months of bouncing madcap ideas which we then had to trim down into something workable – though I’ll have readers know, Awesome Fire’s spontaneous combustion ability was Royal’s idea.

And though DoctorFluffly’s direct involvement on this chapter was relatively limited apart from his inimitable Pinkie, guess which “good-ish” counterpart of one of his characters makes an appearance here? :-) Thanks, Doc, for lending him.

Many thanks to Sledge for his constant support throughout, it’s been an especially mutual process in the last few months, with the preparations he’s putting in for Act Two an area in which I’ve sought to return the favour, considering I’m stepping away somewhat from the writing process for Act Two.

Act I ~ Chapter Thirteen ~ Concordia Maxima

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

If you squint, you may want eyedrops.

DoctorFluffy

Let’s yeet this wheat.

VoxAdam

Now pay close attention. This will be on the test-sheet.

Sledge115

For Zoey, who was the gentlest little dog anyone could ask for. Sleep well.

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Thirteen

Concordia Maxima

* * * * *

“You have done well to come,” said Elrond. “You will hear today all that you need in order to understand the purposes of the Enemy. There is naught that you can do, other than to resist, with hope or without it. But you do not stand alone.”
— The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, by J.R.R. Tolkien

“This is not the end. This is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.”
— Winston Churchill

~ The Hall of Unity, Mount Metazoa ~ Tenth Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

There was a slice of cake left. Two days old, it should still be edible.

While Galatea had persuaded the peculiar pink mare to strip down everything else for the modest ‘birthday party’ she’d ended up sharing with Celestia, Luna and Cadance, this was the one thing Miss Pie had been adamant about. You cannot have a birthday without a cake.

A soft mountain wind swept past the pillars, as she took the last slice from its package and peered at it. She’d eaten cake before. Not often, but she had. Sometimes she saved enough for all. Sometimes she’d been offered some.

It was a present, Miss Pie had said. For her. A rare chocolate from Southern Equestria.

Sitting on a bench, surrounded by the lovely lavender Luna had installed on the topmost spot of the Hall of Unity, Galatea reflectively took a nibble. It was delicious, sweet and perfectly moist.

A week on, Reiner’s locket remained lost – a victory for the infiltrator Redheart, for all that the night had ended in her capture. If the locket did lie at the bottom of the Everfree River, even the infiltrator’s own gem-tracker could not trace it through water. They had tried. Yet Madame Heartstrings, who’d taken it upon herself to find the locket that night – with far more courage than success – had still made herself useful.

This idea of hers to go North and find the evidence that, once, humans had walked this world, was too potent to ignore. Those waters which maps labeled only as ‘The Unknown’ were a place Galatea herself had scarcely ventured into, let alone documented.

If nothing else, in going there, perhaps there’d be more cake.

* * * * *

Celestia took another sip of her tea, contemplating Sint Erklass’ letter.

My dearest apologies, Celestia. I had an errand to take care of first. I’ve hastened my pace, but my arrival will be slightly delayed.

How is Luna faring? I look forward to seeing her.

With love as always,
~ Grandfather

The Reindeer would come. So too, after prolonged silence, it had been confirmed the griffons would attend the Convocation. Another letter said so, penned by the claw of the current Young Pretender – though Grizelda was just one claimant to the throne of Griffonstone. She simply benefitted from an aging, yet well-respected general’s support.

Celestia smiled fondly. Sint Erklass’ delay was a non-issue. With a summit to be held on a scale this grand, it’d be a minor miracle for all Twelve Families to arrive at the same time. The grace period she’d outlined, hopefully, would suffice.

Still, she drafted a reply, to reassure her once-caretaker his ‘tardiness’ was no offense. And she would be delighted to welcome him.

The filly sat alone. Her sister had left her there, in the nursery.

She waited, and waited. Her gaze fell upon the door. The one who would move the Moon, they called her, but she was too young to open a door by herself.

One by one, the toys moved of their own accord.

Or rather, by the will of the creature trapped beneath the mountain.

Twisted puppets, tangled in strings.

Moving closer.

Closer.

Memories of that night in Adlaborn had haunted Luna for the next hundred years. Puppets, possessed by a decrepit abomination, a perversion of the Reindeer’s prowess in artisanship. She’d hated puppets ever since. How they were unmoving, unless one tugged at their strings, a slave to their master’s will. How they resembled living things, but were never quite more than a mockery of flesh and blood.

And of course, the time she’d fallen towards the bitter darkness. A thousand years struggling in a prison of her own making, puppet to her rage and grief. Even now, after her freedom was won by the Bearers of Harmony, the image tugged at her mind.

Much like the being who claimed to be her other sister.

Luna knew her not, and the opposite was true. This Galatea knew nothing of her years of torment, yet Celestia had welcomed her all the same. She knew nothing of their stay with the Reindeer, of the obstacles in their ascension, nothing that a family should.

If her sister was a radiant Sun, then Galatea was an overcast sky, with dull colours to match. She lacked the warmth Celestia always seemed to emanate. Even the word ‘family’ held no meaning to her beyond a simple description. Nothing to suggest a bond in her heart. It was maddening.

The door swung open, and Luna was greeted by the sight of Celestia reclining upon one of her excessively large pillows, sipping a cup of tea. Luna’s nostrils picked up a smell of cooking – to the far corner of the room, a pan lay sizzling upon a little kitchenette. How like Celestia. She loved playing at being an ordinary pony, with ordinary habits. All the books she had written, under such colourful pseudonyms, attested to that as well.

Idly, Celestia was turning a familiar snowglobe over and over in her aura. A snowglobe containing the abomination who’d made puppets so hateful to the Princess of the Night. It was scheduled to be presented as a witness to the Convocation.

Luna gritted her teeth. With telekinesis, she cast her crown aside, where it landed beside Celestia’s own.

“Sister,” she greeted.

But Luna regretted the bile injected into those two syllables. Celestia looked disconcerted. She nearly stood up, then seemed to reconsider, as the snowglobe vanished back into her null-space.

“Good morning, Luna… Is something the matter?”

Luna nodded, yet stiffened, whatever rant she’d planned on dissipating.

“Ah...” Celestia said slowly. “Worried about Tiberius and Philomena? We did resettle rather hastily… Don’t worry, I’m sure Kibitz can take care of them just fine.”

With a strangled cry, Luna slumped onto the nearest pillow. Gazing at her in silence, Celestia took another sip of tea. Luna lay there, face down, for perhaps an hour. Or a minute. It couldn’t have taken Celestia long to wrap a wing around her shoulders.

Luna lifted her head, wordlessly accepting the fresh cup of tea her sister offered.

“‘Sister’,” Luna uttered woodenly. Celestia arched an eyebrow. “That is the problem. ‘Sister’.” She groaned. “What does it mean to you, Celestia? Being a sister. Having a sister.”

“A sister, you say?” Celestia replied, tapping her chin. “A sister means… company.”

“To read?” Luna said, on impulse.

“To play, and to read with,” Celestia agreed, a slight twinkle in her eyes. “And snowball fights, too, don’t you remember?”

“All too well,” Luna replied, a little smirk tugging at her lips. “I beat you then.”

“You didn’t,” Celestia snorted. “You had Ilsa helping you.”

“I most certainly did not!” Luna shot back. “Well, once or twice, but the point still stands in my favour!”

“Whatever you say,” Celestia replied serenely. Her expression turned wistful. “A sister means… someone to welcome you home.”

“And I will always be grateful for you, big sister,” Luna said earnestly. Celestia looked at her, with magenta eyes warm as the day the Element Bearers cast Luna’s thousand-year nightmare aside, before she returned her sister’s embrace.

Had anyone asked, Luna would have said she didn’t know how Celestia felt about discovering there was another alicorn, much less a secret sister. However, she could make an educated guess.

“Celestia,” Luna said, after a pause. “Would you say that to be a sister means more than blood?”

“Ah,” Celestia replied. Her expression remained steadily calm. “You speak of Galatea.”

“Yes,” Luna said shortly.

“I see,” said Celestia. “Well… we’ve only known her a short while, including a party. You enjoyed that party, didn’t you?”

“I did. But Tia… we don’t know her. Not her past, not her goals… her relation to us. Sint, Ilsa, Anna... not once did they speak of her. Do you truly believe her to be of our kin?”

For a week, Luna had chafed to resist speaking ill of the enigmatic mare. Especially during Galatea’s party, which had been a quiet, yet happy occasion, where Luna couldn’t find it in herself to tarnish the atmosphere.

But if she did not speak to Celestia now, on the morn of this greatest of gatherings, she could hold her tongue for good.

“Our kin…” Celestia said, slowly turning the word over. “How do we define that, our kin? We who, in the first years of our life, were raised by a people apart from the old nations. Remember how before Starswirl, before Mistmane taught us, Sint told us he knew we were different from those ponies who’d come to visit. He wished for us to have a family, whereas most others would’ve reared us as ethereal pack-carriers, or as weapons of war.”

Luna nodded. “That much is true,” she agreed, but she kept her brows furrowed. “Yet Sint had no trouble treating us as his own, when he could so easily have given us over to be fostered...”

“Remember, little sister,” Celestia said gently. “Galatea was given no such foalhood.”

“Siblings would mean nothing to her,” Luna snorted, “were it not for our duties to the Sun and Moon. And, Tia, I doubt she has an ounce of self-determination within her…”

Her words trailed off. The memory of living dolls resurfaced.

Celestia understood all the same, as she usually did. “You don’t think of her as entirely… Awake.”

Luna nodded. “Yes,” she said coolly. “I would not be so surprised if she had… strings, leading her every move.” She let out another sigh. “The question is, who holds hers? What is it that sets her apart? I can’t even be sure!” Again, Luna planted her face into the pillow. “I don’t know, Tia. It’s all happening awfully fast.”

Celestia patted her with a wing. “Hm. Luna? Have you tried… entering her dreams?”

“Wards. Wards around her mind.” Luna’s muffled voice replied, before she raised her head again. “I should have expected it from an alicorn. Which, of course, does little to clear matters. You can blame her for that.”

She moved to take another sip of tea. To her chagrin, her cup was already empty.

“I know, Tia,” Luna said, spotting her sister’s inquisitive look. “I ought to show more respect for her privacy, a stranger who came asking our help. But she’s imperceptible. How do we know she is to be trusted? She knows us more than we know her.”

Celestia, much to Luna’s growing concern, remained quiet and contemplative. Perhaps she’d pressed the matter too far.

“Hm, I do wonder,” Celestia began. “How much of Galatea came from her nature, and how much came from whatever... upbringing she had?” There was the faintest hint of that mysterious smile. “Maybe we are more alike than it first seems.”

A whistling sound broke through Luna’s troubled mind. It originated from the little kitchenette.

“Oh,” Celestia suddenly said, flicking her ears. “I left the stove on. That’ll be the pancakes.”

Annoyingly enough, Celestia had changed the subject as easily as lifting a hoof. Luna could hardly suppress a groan against one of her sister’s many pillows. She did wonder how Celestia could possibly have brought so many pillows here, so quickly. Her own room was much tidier, by contrast, although she’d had to fit a telescope into hers.

These quarters at the Hall of Unity were smaller than their chambers in Canterlot, yet they were luxurious, with a view of the mountains. In fact, looking at what Celestia had converted into a personal lounge, Luna might have thought they’d never left Canterlot, were it not for the lack of fireplace or her sister’s rosewine selection.

“Dear, oh dear,” Celestia huffed, hurrying back from the kitchenette. She’d slung on an apron, whilst in her telekinetic grasp she held a steaming pan. “Hope you don’t mind them crispy, Luna.”

The sole, varnished table in the room was packed to the brim with parchments. Celestia didn’t let that bother her, as her magic hauled two plates from a cupboard above the stove. Luna rapidly gathered that Tia meant for the two of them to eat lying down, plates on the floor. Of course. What else could those pillows have been for?

“Breakfast is served,” Celestia said sweetly. She swirled the pan, bringing forth a ladle to slide out the pancakes. “I’ve been practicing, you know.”

Luna grunted. “I’ve had my breakfast.”

“No, you haven’t,” her sister chided her. “Quick, Luna, before it gets cold. You really shouldn’t worry on an empty stomach.”

Seeing there was no can-do, Luna saw to her plate of pancake. Apricot. With the slices arranged into a nice smiley face. Hesitantly, Luna raised a slice, then bit into it. And actually, it did not taste bad at all, even if as Celestia had said, it had gone crisp.

“Thank you, Tia,” she said, a bit awkwardly. “I… see you’ve had plenty of practice. This is…” She let the taste and the word for it roll over her tongue. “Well-refined, if a little burnt, yes.”

Seeing Celestia had set down a bottle of syrup between them, she added some to her portion.

“I’m glad you noticed,” Celestia said affectionately. “And I think I understand. You worry of Galatea’s presence in your absence, Luna, and my safety.”

“Yes,” Luna said, quietly. “I… suppose I do.”

“I see,” Celestia replied. “I’ll admit, I’ve got my own reservations, but I’ll keep an eye out. But Galatea’s not the one who’ll be in the spotlight, this week. And how do you feel about this upcoming summit?”

Therein resided the question, Luna mused mid-chew.

The summit to come would bring people from all four corners of Equus, many indifferent, some hostile, most bearing ulterior motives. Where usually, Luna and Celestia ruled the skies, she now felt a great deal of uncertainty looming over them two.

She sighed, swallowing her pancake. “I am not sure. I’m not familiar with many of them, even from before… my banishment.”

“Hmm,” Celestia pondered, tapping her fork. “You worry of their conduct?”

“So many are foes to one another, and here we are expecting… nothing short of cooperation, between each and every one?”

Her sister said nothing at first. Her cup was empty, evidently enough, for she cast it aside on her empty plate. Luna, still quiet, still wearing a steely mask, quivered and moved closer to Celestia.

“I’m sorry,” said Luna. “It has been a while... But what about Chrysalis? Did she not unleash her forces upon Canterlot, impersonate Cadance while keeping her trapped in the mines?”

That too was a sore spot for Luna. Granted, she’d tried to play off her absence at the Royal Wedding lightly – and Celestia had known she needed her sleep – but she still cursed herself for her absence, especially when Cadance was involved...

“Not even Chrysalis would risk foul play when the eyes of the world are upon us all,” said Celestia, nuzzling Luna. “It’s you I worry for…”

“I know,” Luna replied softly, and she returned the nuzzle. “But I just…” She sighed. “I just want to make up for all those years, Tia, all those missing years with you. And by the stars above, I haven’t even met Grandfather yet, to tell him I am truly sorry.”

“You’re afraid he wouldn’t forgive you?”

“Yes, and… I cannot ask you to do it on my behalf.”

There was a smile from Celestia, and a knowing glance towards the door.

“You can tell him yourself, sister dear,” Celestia said with levity. “I was expecting plenty of company for breakfast today.”

Her golden aura opened the door.

There, in the doorway, stood a mighty stag. Standing even taller than Celestia, the great maroon Reindeer wore no ornaments or regalia, yet his presence carried the grace any ruler’s should. His appearance remained much the same as thousands of years ago.

As did the graceful, eternally young doe beside him – their old nanny, Ilsa. Or rather, the volunteer who carried Ilsa’s spirit within the shawl she wore. Her name was Lel, if Luna recalled.

Sint’s smile was warm and all-encompassing. And Luna, who’d hesitated before asking Celestia’s forgiveness after being freed from the Nightmare, hardly waited to go forth and pull him into a tight embrace.

“I’m sorry, Grandfather…” she whispered. “I’ve missed you.”

That was all Luna could mutter, out of a thousand things which raced through her mind. She felt Sint return her embrace and Ilsa’s comforting forehoof on her shoulder.

“It’s alright, Luna,” Sint Erklass said kindly. “I forgave you a long time ago.”

She let him go, her eyes brimming with tears. But as she looked at them both, the Reindeer rulers of Adlaborn, she returned their smiles.

“I trust your trip treated you well?” said Celestia.

“Indeed it did, Celestia,” replied Ilsa. “We had to notify the Gift Givers of the Grove of our absence at the last second. And I’ve arranged for Cernunnos to assume leadership for the time being, though I regret that I couldn’t tend to his newborn.”

She shone a motherly smile, one which they remembered well. “Lucie has her father’s eyes.”

“Give her, and her father, our warmest regards,” whispered Luna.

“Wonderful,” Celestia said. “I would very much like to see the newborn, one day. But come now. We’ve got a lot to catch up on... and we’ve got pancakes.”

So Luna’s worries faded, amidst a breakfast shared with those she held dear.

Except for one moment, when her gaze flew over to the door slightly ajar, and saw the faintest hints of blue eyes, a flowing black mane, and the swish of a cloak.

* * * * *

After they’d finished their last morsel, Celestia led her closest family across the bridge to the Watchtower. Humbler and less prepossessing than the Hall, this was where Alexander Reiner would sleep in the following nights, close to quarters where Madame Heartstrings, the Element Bearers and Nurse Cross could also enjoy their privacy.

Sint Erklass and Ilsa Erklass, Princess Luna, all followed her into Reiner’s new bedroom.

Rooms at the Hall and Watchtower alike were prepared to receive beings of all shapes and sizes. As had been noted, Alexander’s physique most resembled that of a Minotaur’s, thus quarters ordinarily reserved for Minotaurs had been given to him. Consequently, this meant the human occupied chambers lined with granite, as opposed to the fancier marble of the Hall. Spacious yet unadorned, the sole furniture was empty bookshelves, guest stools and a sizeable bed.

When Reiner was presented with these living accomodations, Celestia had felt relieved to hear him say his military career had inured him to ‘Spartan’ conditions, whatever those were. All he’d requested were bedsheets, which Nurse Cross had provided.

It was slow going, but Celestia felt Cross was starting to digest the shock of the two Redhearts. While this Nurse had no Guard history as Redheart had, she was valuable as a medical expert who could handle Alexander Reiner’s alien biology. However, ever since the hospital incident, Cross had adopted a very ‘need-to-know’ approach. Such as now, where Cross was nowhere to be seen, having been informed of the upcoming visit.

The human was seated in his wheelchair, leafing through a book. Without even looking, Celestia knew it’d be a copy of Ponyland: Fact or Fable. Princess Cadance and Captain Shining Armor, who’d been contemplating the view from the window, turned to see who’d entered. And Lyra was lying on the floor next to him, browsing her own copy for the hundredth time.

Reiner looked up. His jaw fell when he saw the Snow Maiden and her grandfather. The Great Stag bowed his head, immense muscles coiling beneath his pelt-like boulders. With quiet decorum, Cadance and Shining returned the bow, their heads lower than his.

“Salutations, Princess Cadance, Prince Shining Armor,” Sint rumbled in greeting. “And welcome, Alexander Reiner. It is an honour to meet a child of Earth in the flesh.”

Reiner took a moment to reply. “This is an honour for me…” he said, “and the dream of every child on Earth.”

Then tears began streaming from his eyes.

“Alex?” Lyra whispered, taking his hand.

Celestia and Luna looked at each other. In all this time, they’d never seen the man cry. Yet here he was, tearing up. Wiping his eye, Reiner seemed to be forcing himself to look at Sint. But he could not. His eyes fell back to Lyra instead.

“I’m… I’m sorry,” he said, choked. “It’s ridiculous… I didn’t even know him like I knew you, Lyra, but… You and the Great Stag alive in the same room, with a friendly Celestia, it’s... more than I can take.”

His mention appeared to make Lyra truly notice Sint.

“Goodness…” Lyra mumbled, mouth agape. She bowed clumsily. “Lord Hearthswarming, I-I… forgive me, I forgot my manners.”

Sint placed a forehoof on her shoulder. “Arise, Madame Heartstrings,” he said softly. “From what Celestia tells us, it should be we who bow to you.”

Lyra looked up, her cheeks pink. “That… that wasn’t me, exactly.”

The Snow Maiden came up to her, smiling slyly in Cadance’s direction. “From the start, you risked your life to aid the human,” she said kindly. “And this selflessness is reason enough.”

Reiner coughed. “I’m not special,” he said, rasping. “I’m just a soldier. Saving humanity’s what matters, and if we don’t move quickly… Well, they say it’ll take another fifteen years for the Barrier to finish Earth, but we’ll all be…” He looked away. “Gone long beforehand…”

Ilsa turned his way. “Like the Reindeer of one Adlaborn, you mean,” she whispered.

Celestia saw Reiner stare at her. “Yes. I told them about that.”

He nodded. “Aye, of course… you did the right thing…”

“But there was something we meant to ask,” Celestia sighed, meeting a glance from Luna. “Sister. Ask Grandfather about what he didn’t tell us.”

Beside her, Cadance and Shining each looked uneasy to suddenly find themselves caught in this family talk between immortal beings. Reiner and Lyra, however, their initial discomforture now past, watched with curious eyes.

Luna was the one to ask. “Grandfather,” she said quietly, Sint gazing at her with an unreadable expression. “Our other sister. Did you know about her?”

Sint’s lips parted in wonder. “Sunflare’s third daughter… She has come, too?”

“Shortly after the human,” Celestia said. “She met me in person. One of the first things she did was to… show me a vision of Adlaborn, burning.” She considered him. “So. You did know.”

Luna stared at Sint, her eyes glistening. “Why didn’t you tell us?”.

The Great Stag sighed, as Ilsa wrapped a foreleg around his own. “It was my promise to Sunflare. Her plan was that there must always be an alicorn in Equestria, standing watch.” Sint glanced towards Cadance, yet kept his thoughts to himself. “Had you known of the third alicorn, you’d have sought her out…”

“... Would that have been such a bad thing?” Celestia said softly. “It was a lonely time, Grandfather. I scarcely dared hope, until I found that one of Luna’s bloodline had survived…”

Her cheeks gone a deeper shade of pink, Cadance looked the other way, blatantly trying to avoid eye contact with Luna. For her part, Luna didn’t seem to have heard Celestia, her gaze remaining intent on Sint, barely containing her emotion.

Against all expectation, the one to speak was Shining Armor.

“Sire,” Shining said, stroking his wife’s mane. “I must agree, the Princesses have a right to ask. I’m married to an alicorn, and I spent years believing Princess Celestia was the only alicorn in the world. Most ponies don’t think about it, but…” He took a calming breath. “It’s my job to worry, as Captain of the Guard. Suppose anything bad had happened to Celestia?”

The Great Stag’s eyes were old and solemn. “Would you think I’d stay aloof, Captain? If worst came to the worst, I’d have stepped in during Equestria’s hour of need. But it was Sunflare’s final request that I trust ponies to rule themselves, giving them only a nudge where needed, trust all would be right whilst even one alicorn carried out her duties.”

“Who’s Sunflare?” said Reiner. “Has this got something to with my locket?”

Sint turned to him. “I do not know everything. But I can tell you a little of what I know. Are you familiar with Windigoes, Sir Alexander?”

“What’s a ‘sir’ about me…” Reiner muttered. “Oh, never mind. Yes, I know about Windigoes. Although for once, it wasn’t Lyra who explained ‘em.” Next to him, Lyra awkwardly shrugged. “I got that from Cheerilee. Aren’t they, like, evil spirits who cause Winter?”

“The truth’s a little more complex,” Sint said. “They’re not necessarily beings. Would you call a plague ‘evil’? Even the Krampus, the intelligence at their heart, isn’t malicious as you’d understand it. They do not feel or want anything, they merely… feed.”

“The Krampus wanted something, alright…” Luna whispered anew. “For me and Tia, deep within Zamok Ustyag.”

Sint went to hug her. “Yes, Luna,” he said softly. “But it’s been aeons since it could act directly.”

“An intelligence, you say?” Reiner asked.

“More like the manifestation thereof,” Sint explained. “I am the oldest being alive today on Equus, and we entered life at the same the time. The Krampus and I, two sides of a coin...”

“Well, that’s…” Reiner hesitated, rubbing his lip. “Timely? Like, how do these things happen?”

“Our world operates more on the mystical, perhaps, than yours,” Sint told him gravely. “But it was Sunflare’s belief that intellect, given the proper tools, will always bend the natural world to its will. She was a healer, in that way.”

“Wait, wait, hold on,” said a frantic Lyra, who seemingly felt a need to say something, “Those ‘Old Ones’ Celestia mentioned, during her speech… I’ve read about them. Was Sunflare one of them?”

Celestia, Luna and Cadance looked to Sint, who chuckled wryly.

“Oh, no,” replied Sint. “The Old Ones came before. And when I was born, a few of them still lived. But they’d grown tired and complacent. The plague, they feared, heralded their final doom. No, Sunflare was an alicorn.”

Reiner gawped at him.

“The fuck? More alicorns!”

While Ilsa looked a bit put off by his language, it was evident Lyra had gotten used to it by now. And Sint didn’t react at all.

“Yes. There were several alicorns in those days,” Sint said matter-of-factly. “But today, the only ones left are Sunflare’s own heritage…” He contemplated Celestia and Luna. “The third daughter was created by Sunflare to be everything you are not. An invisible, distant figure... But Sunflare knew it wouldn’t do, entrusting the Land solely to such a mind. So, she made you. To grow up living among us. Not one, but two of you, so you’d never be alone.”

Luna looked away from Sint, bowing her head. And despite the forgiving words Sint had given her sister, Celestia felt once again compelled to wrap a wing around Luna. Reiner observed all this in silence, Lyra faithfully waiting by him.

Then, Shining Armor sniggered. When everyone’s heads turned his way in bemusement, he clamped a forehoof to his mouth, but they knew they’d heard him.

“What is it, Shiney?” Cadance asked.

He gave the room a crooked smile. “It’s not funny, really,” said Shining. “But what Captain Alexander just said is kinda what I was thinking when I met you, Candy, and then, my mother-in– I mean, Princess Luna.”

“Actually, I think it is rather funny,” Celestia smiled, ignoring Luna’s scowl. “When you’ve grown used to people thinking you’re special as the only alicorn, it’s refreshing to see the reactions at getting more alicorns than we know what to do with.”

Reiner’s face showed a mix of wryness and despondence. “Yeah… yeah, I can picture that. But…” He grimaced. “The Celestia I know, that’s just what she’d want. To be the only alicorn. If there were any other alicorns who could’ve stopped her, they sure didn’t show up. Her sister got petrified, Lady Cadance is a wreck… Galatea took her sweet time… And as for the Reindeer…”

His sentence hung in the air, unfinished. Unsurprisingly, what mild humour Shining’s comment had generated was lost from the room.

“Just what befell Adlaborn?” Sint Erklass asked the human quietly.

“I can’t tell you much,” Reiner grunted. “All I know is that, three years ago, Cel– the Tyrant ordered it burned to the ground. Completely wiped out. As far as we can tell… she succeeded. No mercy, none.”

Ilsa’s brow darkened. “My grandfather isn’t so easily slain,” she said. “Yet, despite the corruption we’ve learnt of in this unknown Equestria, I still find it hard to imagine Celestia would face him in combat…”

For the briefest instant, Reiner’s gaze flickered towards Celestia. She met it without blinking.

“Well, that’s the oddest thing…” Reiner wetted his lips. “We really don’t know much about the holocaust of Adlaborn. Even though everyone knows it happened, it’s one of the Empire’s best-kept secrets. But rumour has it Celestia couldn’t fight the Great Stag herself…”

“Then…” whispered Lyra. “Who did?”

To begin with, it seemed Reiner would not answer. Celestia knew that even with Lyra, he’d been cagey about certain answers, despite his pledge of honesty. He hesitated a long time, so long they began to think he’d never speak. Then, on some cue of unknown source to them, the human found his tongue.

“They say the Tyrant has this… executioner,” Reiner said, as he surveyed the room. “A pale mare, her face always hooded. Whenever the Solar Tyrant has decreed that someone won’t live, this is who she sends.”

Despite his words’ simplicity, nobody felt they had an adequate reply.

“Alex…” Lyra finally said, looking at the ashen-faced human. “How was I… captured?

Nine days on, and she had never asked.

Sint Erklass coughed loudly. “I apologise, Madame Heartstrings. But right now, I think it’s more important my granddaughter and I hear how the good Captain came to Equestria.”

“Aye,” Celestia said, subtly brushing a wing over Lyra’s withers. “I believe Sint is right. The Captain and I discussed this. There are details he won’t be able to bring up before the Convocation– like my hidden sister, or his locket.”

Reiner’s shoulders slumped. “I feel like we’ve gone over this before, at the hospital. Still, if it’ll help, I’ll repeat everything I remember.”

“Most important of all, Grandfather,” Ilsa put in, with a meaningful emphasis on the last word, “would be that you meet the other sister at last.” She locked eyes with Celestia and Luna. “What is her name?”

“She can tell you that herself,” Celestia said placidly. “It’d be her right.”

This was how that opening encounter of the Great Stag and Snow Maiden with the human drew closer to its conclusion, as Alexander Reiner recounted what Lyra Heartstrings, and the Princesses Celestia and Luna, had been told at the hospital. To the Reindeer and to Princess Cadance and her spouse Shining Armor, it was a new story.

To Reiner himself, the story felt new in parts, stranded fibres of his memory knotting back together from a shock which had dispersed them. But he understood the need for the retelling. Once he faced the delegates of Equus, he’d have to know what to say and not to say.

~ Before The Watchtower, Mount Metazoa ~

“Not much further, son,” Darkhoof huffed as he carried himself up another boulder.

“I’m aware, Father,” Basil shouted back. He was actually ahead of Darkhoof, several metres higher up the mountain.

“It doesn’t hurt to be informed, though, does it?”

Darkhoof tried to sound insightful, but there was a hint of petulance in his tone. He had really been speaking to himself earlier, anyway. This was the hardest part of a very long trip. And now that he was three-quarters of the way up a sheer cliff-face, Darkhoof was beginning to feel it. He continued his difficult climb in silence. It didn’t help to waste energy and attention in such a precarious environment. This wasn’t too hard, thankfully, as the cliff had decent handholds, but the winds could get strong at this height, and the longer he needed to hold tight against the rock, the more his mind dwelled on the delays.

Several more minutes of climbing and clinging followed, until Darkhoof felt his son's hand grab his own when he reached for another handhold. He smiled slightly. The strength was returning to the boy’s grasp.

“Father,” Basil called out, sounding pleased and relieved, “we’re here. We’ve finally made it.”

Darkhoof pulled himself over the lip and straightened up, taking a couple steps from the edge, then stretching to work several kinks out of his back. Once he felt limber again, Darkhoof momentarily took off his glasses and wiped his brow. Despite the cool gust that swept them, both he and his son had worked up a bit of a sweat.

If ever there was a mountain unlike any other, surely it was Mount Metazoa. Neither the world’s tallest peak, an honour which belonged to Zamok Ustyag in the North, nor even the steepest, but certainly the most unusual. Through a combination of natural formation and the craft of ancient engineering, the mountain resembled the plinth on a fountain, with its flat-rock top and the four waterfalls which jutted facing the North and the South, the West and the East in equal measure.

The Southern waterfall was the standout feature, gloriously visible from their standing position. Within the front of the Hall, a stupendously tall archway had been built in the middle, allowing passage for the rushing current to flow past the arches in its fall to the valley below.

But the Hall’s whole style was more than reminescent of the architecture from a bygone era of far-off Ryuppon, for it was a jade pagoda lined with marble columns, upon which even the elevated roof consisted of three tiers, topped by a belvedere that, Darkhoof well knew, was host to an interior garden.

Basil whistled. “Damn.”

The lad’s reaction, though appropriately awed, couldn’t help but jar Darkhoof out of his reverie. Blowing through his lips, Darkhoof let his great hand swing and cuff the back of his son’s neck. Not so hard that it’d strike him off balance, but quite hard, for a Minotaur can take a knock.

“Mind your tongue, boy,” he chided gruffly. “Remember, when there is no good word to be said, best not speak at all.”

“Of course, Father. I apologise,” Basil said sheepishly, massaging the back of his neck. “Good thing it was you, not Mother. She wouldn’t have been half so merciful.”

Darkhoof made sure to keep the smile off his face. This was still a form of impudence, naturally, but it was a positive sign when his wife was referred to by Basil as “Mother”.

“She most likely wouldn’t,” he agreed. “That zebra has the heart of a bull, alright…”

But he said no more, wary of breaking his own rule about idle words. And perhaps because, though he felt glad to have the lad by him, he wished it were under different circumstances. In fact he’d have liked nothing more than be home, all four of them, safe and whole.

Dispelling the thought, Darkhoof again looked upon the Hall.

“Something troubles you, Father?”

“I wished to show you the Hall of Unity one day, lad,” Darkhoof told his son. ““Indeed, should it be you who were chosen to be the next Proxenos, we'd have undertaken this journey then. But in truth, this edifice, so magnificent, is merely one more burden, a legacy of old Asterion's vanity…” He breathed in, sighing, before gazing back at his son. “Were this an ideal reality, here is where a world would gather yearly for a common purpose. In practice, only extraordinary crisis brings this world’s people to set aside their differences, be it for a murmur…”

The explanation was sound, delivered formally and enunciated expertly. It would not surprise an onlooker if Darkhoof had read it from a book, held in a firm hand while the other readjusted his glasses. A lecture distantly delivered by a professor to a hundred faceless students.

“Vanity…” Basil tasted the word. “I remember reading the Hall had a distinct architecture. Sections, weren’t they? I can see the difference in the exterior carvings.”

He pointed up to one such wall, its rocky face reaching into the sky. The flowing patterns etched into the rock slowly turned simpler as it came down. Less decorated, gold details going missing, copper additions oxidising and camouflaging among the green moss.

“Scarcely different,” Darkhoof told him gravely, “than how any great building has been structured throughout the history of all cultures. Though when Asterion found humility and offered this Hall to the world’s peoples as a place of gathering… It was given over to accommodate many of their own values, but peoples oughtn’t be confused with the people.”

Tracing his index finger slowly down the air, Darkhoof illustrated his point.

“The one true place of unity are the gardens,” Darkhoof explained, indicating the pagoda. “Set between those archways. They are, for all intents and purposes, a rooftop feature, and you may question if a roof is a floor.”

He paused to let that settle in.

“Well, is it?” Basil had kept his streak of not holding his tongue.

“Of the floors proper, naturally,” Darkhoof said, paying idle words no heed this time. “It is upon those upper storeys that the great and the good assemble, for their meetings in high places.” He gave another rueful chuckle. “But one cannot confer upon an empty stomach, or without respite. So on the storeys below, those in the middle, these worthies congregate to dine, amuse themselves or rest. However, the question then is, who provides for them? Do they provide for themselves? Or let me ask it differently. Although a Minotaur lives secluded in his house, sole Lord of his own home, does he till his own fields?"

Basil did not answer. Instead, he slowly kneeled down and placed his palms on the warm stone. Vines creeped from cracks on the ground, invading what would otherwise be a smooth surface. They looked rough and layered, meeting Basil’s caressing touch with prickles and pins.

With a quick heave, Basil grasped the vines and pulled. They popped out from the ground like a wild animal, a never-ending stream of vegetation coiling and snapping. Basil rolled them as he pulled more and more, until the whole heap was around his arm.

Once the ground had no more to offer, he simply bundled them together and turned to his father.

“Labour strikes me as a peaceful life, so long as it is the life you choose.”

Darkhoof laughed softly. “Whatever the Labyrinth may have deemed lacking in you in you, boy, let none say you are idle-handed. How are those restraints treating you, by the way?” he added gently. “You gave no sign of complaint during our climb.”

“They still weigh the same.” Basil brushed the metal with a finger. “But your advice held true. I can close my fists with ease.” He demonstrated by flexing his knuckles.

“A good thing,” Darkhoof said, his tone turning grave again. He did, however, rest his palm upon one of his son's shackled hands. “Basil. For you, one day, these cuffs may come off. But deign a moment to contemplate why, by our traditions, you are made to wear them.”

“I’m–” Basil stopped, sighing. “I fear what clouds my mind is their consequence, not their origin.”

So, the boy could speak with some wisdom, when he wished to.

“A Minotaur's strength of body,” said Darkhoof, “is equaled by few other sapient beings in the world of Equus… Yet, simply because a bull has the strength to carry the sky on his shoulders, it is not this which makes him master of it.”

“I understand,” Basil said humbly. “Believe me, no matter what…” He turned his spare hand’s palm upward and down. ““It feels good to merely see the sky again, after so long underground.”

“Yes,” Darkhoof nodded. “However, see again that Hall, over there. Aren't the foundations, the lower levels, so much squatter than those rising above them? Even when there is no Convocation in session, many still come to occupy the Hall for trade and refuge, but moreover, keep it prepared for when the upper levels shall be occupied, though they remain empty for decades…”

Basil cocked an eyebrow. “Are the lower levels more populated at any one time, then?”

“Indeed they are,” Darkhoof said. “By whose choice?”

And here he felt his son look at him sideways.

“Isn’t it yours?” Basil hazarded to say. “As the Hall’s caretaker, it’s within your power to decide for whom the doors may open. And a Minotaur is always taken seriously as a guardian to forbidden regions.”

Darkhoof raised a forefinger. “By this reasoning, any Minotaur caretaker could have opened up the upper levels generations ago. But, underused though they are, without them, the rulers would feel deprived of any place to gather when in need.”

The golden lustre at the topmost section of the Hall reflected the Sun into curious eyes below. The wind breezed through those restricted halls, with nary a soul to hear its silent symphony.

“Basil," sighed Darkhoof, for all appearances changing the subject, even though his son would know he hadn't. “I ask you keep this in mind. Maybe it seems the weight you’re made to carry has as little purpose as a building where the upper floors are kept empty almost at all times. This weight shall lift when you find something to put in its place.”

~ Aboard the Mikado’s Flagship, In the Vicinity of Mount Metazoa ~

The sound of running water, echoing off the walls of the garden-room, greeted Kuno as he entered the great doors. Taking a moment to drink in the calligraphy carved into wood and cast in bronze, the old Kirin stepped through the vast gateway, into the largest administrative room on the Dai Konpe.

Next to greet him was the off-white glare of the room’s lighting. Once the Prime Minister’s ageing eyes had adjusted, he took in the sight of the cavernous chamber, rows of cherry trees within beautiful, ceramic pots lining a central avenue before him. Above, raised trellis held flowers regularly watered by a deceptively simple sprinkler system, which concealed a more complex plumbing network below. Special troughs ran along the avenue, letting water flow to the centre.

There was no grass, but the floor had been paved, and Kuno heard his hooves clack as he walked. The original commission had been for the exact wood used in the palace’s nightingale halls, but this demand had been overridden – the Mikado had found the idea distasteful, later admitting that stone was just as good at alerting him to visitors.

A few birds, trained for this environment, flitted over Kuno’s head and he let himself smile. Finally reaching the centre, Kuno found the convergence point of every feature in the room. Now he stood in front of what took up the most space. It was a large pond.

Perfectly circular, the pond was unsettled only by small ripples set off by water trickling from the troughs. Deep below the surface were the pumps that took water from the pond and circulated it back. Though the Dai Konpe was equipped to harvest clouds, if necessary, the garden-room’s water supply was designed to continuously recycle itself.

In the middle of the pond was a circular platform. And on that artificial island was a tall, conservatively-built gazebo, and sitting in its roof’s shadow, with several small glinting shapes perched around him, was the Mikado.

There was no bridge to the island, but that was no problem.

Kuno’s bifurcated horn was barely tinged by his aura’s glow as, without breaking his pace, he took a step onto the pond. Even at the lip of the shoreline, the land sloped sharply beneath the mirror-like surface of the waters, but Kuno’s hoof did not sink – or rather, it barely sank an inch, no further.

Traversing the pond came to the Prime Minister as gracefully as traipsing through desert sands would to a Saddle Mareabian, his crossing leaving only a swan’s arrow-like trace in his wake, without otherwise disturbing the tranquility. It did not keep his hooftips from getting wet, yet this was small price to pay, easily remedied as he touched upon the platform, where any moisture was sponged up by the softness of the gazebo.

“Blessed Mikado,” Kuno greeted, stepping back on land. “Do I find you well?”

Toshiro Kane looked up from the desk where, as ever, stacks of papers were lined up waiting for his signature. His expression was dispassionate, but he blinked to acknowledge Kuno’s presence, breaking his mechanical disposition from a second ago.

“I’m fine, Kuno,” Toshiro replied, putting pen to the next document pulled from the pile. “What brings you here?”

“I’d assumed you’d sooner hear it from me than a messenger,” Kuno told his Mikado. “We are nearing the East Coast of Equestria.” He breathed in, preparing for his next statement. “Not one pirate ship spotted over the whole trip, Kane.”

“Good,” Toshiro said tersely, laying down his pen. With a subtle series of motions, the Mikado shifted posture and slumped. Kuno found it amusing, in its own odd way.

Saying nary a word, Toshiro lit his horn. Two ceramic cups floated over to the table. After the cups had set down, an ornate pot, which had been simmering over a tiny, gas-lit burner, was raised to pour.

“I believe today’s offering is jasmine,” Toshiro said, his face still impassive. His statement, however, was clearly a question, as was the second cup in front of Kuno.

“A good offering back in the homeland, my friend,” Kuno said genially. “Though as we arrive in another land, maybe today warrants a special offering?”

Toshiro’s expression was totally deadpan. He didn’t look down at the teacup, instead holding Kuno’s gaze. Before blinking again, setting the teapot back on its burner, and sighing. “I’ll see what the kitchens can bring up.”

His magic wrapped around a bell-pull and yanked it. Though there was no sound, Kuno knew that many rooms away, a bell had in fact been rung in the Dai Konpe’s galley.

“So,” Toshiro said. “Won’t you take a seat?” He indicated a large, luxurious cushion, with a tougher one attached behind it as a backrest.

“By your grace,” Kuno smiled, accepting gladly. “It’s a special time,” he continued, gesturing towards the desk’s papers, “to see you break with the custom of paperwork, such that our dear turtle-ship departed on the same day we were invited.”

“Well, we don’t normally get a summons like this, do we?” Toshiro asked, a thin smile on his face. “History doesn’t talk about many Calls. Or any at all.”

“No, that’s true,” Kuno said, laying his forehooves in his lap. “Strange, isn’t it. Any knowledge we may have on the Call stems, a long time ago, from one who still lives… But who’d have thought to consult the Great Tonakai about a myth that may never come to be?” He considered the Mikado. “Yet someone must have decided it’d come one day, if there’s a Hall of Unity…”

“Most prefer not to think about such things,” Toshiro interjected. “When something important, but essentially useless is left unused, you grow complacent. Its existence is meaningless, and when it suddenly becomes meaningful… well...” Kuno was suddenly fixed by a harsh, piercing glare from the Mikado, “that’s when people start to get scared.”

“You don’t say,” Kuno replied, swallowing. Accustomed as he was to the Mikado’s moments of intensity, there were times he could still be caught off-guard. “But if we’re thrust into a situation which’ll require we meet with the world, then we should lay prejudice to rest as best we can.” He tapped his forehooves. “Of course, we can’t expect all who answer this Call to be our friends. What are you prepared for?”

“I’m quite sure we’re both capable of setting our own preconceptions aside,” Toshiro said, his thin smile returning. “And my acolytes… well, the prospect of my lowering their grades will keep them from opening their mouths out of turn.”

In that moment, a tinkling of small bells rang, with a panel at the back of the gazebo opening up in the floor.

A young doe in servants’ clothes peeked her head through, then bowed respectfully, a new pot of tea in her magical grip. Without a word she took the jasmine pot off the burner, settling the new one in place. Her work done, the doe vanished back through the panel, as its contour seamlessly rejoined the floor.

“Wonderful,” Toshiro said, taking the tea-pot to pour into a new set of cups. Once done, he reset the pot and turned back to Kuno. “The only problem I foresee with less friendly individuals getting invited is that some of our more… disruptive neighbours will be brought along.”

They both took a sip of the tea. Red tea it was, Kuno found to his pleasure, roiboos from the farthest zebralands. While the Mikado may have preferred his offering for the day, Kane obviously knew him well. There was a richness to the brew, a faint taste of bark found in few other teas, which lent it delightful earthiness.

“Yes,” Kuno said, once he’d taken his sip, setting the cup down. “And, rival or ally, each of them will come with the same request. To be given a share in return for whatever is asked of us… especially the people that were taken from us.” This was rather forthright, he realised, but it’d do no good to dance around the issue. “If only lower grades or a spot of tea sufficed to keep all of our own in line, Blessed Mikado.”

“Yes,” Toshiro said too, frowning. “How many denizens from around the world has Celestia incarcerated in Erebus, for dabbling in forbidden arts? But what Kana did was entirely her fault. While I don’t appreciate the Equestrians meddling in our affairs, the very agreement that has us currently travelling is what saw her taken away.”

“All old agreements allow room for haggling,” Kuno said, eyeing the Mikado curiously. “Seeing as this Call is something we’ve never experienced before... and we don’t know the full ramifications… What shall it be? Do you think you’re going to apply pragmatism, or be iron-bound by honour, even if it means Kana serving her sentence in Erebus?”

“It depends on who else answers the Convocation,” Toshiro replied. “And on whether or not any other representatives are willing to pursue the issue. It’s possible we’ll have at least a few friends there. Or amiable partners, at any rate.”

Toshiro placed his cup in front of him and took a breath, composing himself. “Now,” he then said, looking Kuno in the eye, “you mentioned, just now, that we were entering equine airspace.”

“Horseshoe Bay, yes,” Kuno confirmed. “Given the short notice this trip was organised at, we had to skip the usual paperwork…” He glanced wryly at the documents littering the Mikado’s desk. “But the Equestrians received our message yesterday, and given the unusual circumstances, they’ve agreed to let the ship through without fuss. Same as every national airspace thus far.”

“Very good.” Toshiro glanced at a page atop one of the shorter stacks of papers.

Several seconds of heavy silence went by. Kuno was trying to get a look at the page that held Toshiro’s attention without making it obvious.

Eventually, a frowning Toshiro broke the silence. “Before you arrived, I received another patent form, from our more... troublesome investment. A warning from our offices in Abyssinia came shortly afterwards, mentioning their airspace should be termed ‘unsafe’.”

“I’d heard rumblings…” Kuno said, feeling a tinge of nervousness, yet also relieved the Mikado had broached this first. “I wouldn’t worry about how it’ll affect us personally. Abyssinia lies too far South of our destination for that. But… I still wonder if we pulled out too few of our assets, concerned as we were with plausible deniability about our… friend.”

“I think the trademarks on his merchandise will give away at least a little of our involvement,” Toshiro said in response, dryly. “Still, we evacuated enough personnel to salvage a bare minimum of costs.” His voice took on a colder note. “I suppose we can make a return when His Majesty comes to us for more of his toys. We’ve already completed the new line he requested.”

Kuno raised an eyebrow as Toshiro reached under the table, coming back up with a miniature figurine he placed on the desk. It depicted a figure Kuno was, regrettably, all too familiar with.

A tall biped, coloured white and dressed in black armour. Its legs ended in cloven hooves, whilst its arms, one of which clutched a crooked, crystalline staff, were tipped by three clawed digits. Its face was locked in a stiff expression of domineering confidence framed by thick shoulders, wide pauldrons and two pairs of long horns that jutted out the side of its head – the shorter pair pointing upwards, like a crown.

“Doteki Toys announced that it comes in three different colour sets,” Toshiro intoned in a perfunctory drone, “has removable armour and three different accessory packs, sold separately. It is also posable, though I was told the board were considering leaving it static, so as to sell multiple poses instead.”

Although the Mikado hadn’t given express permission, Kuno let himself reach for the figure and pick it up. He turned it over in his forehooves, surveying it critically.

“A very peculiar form of payment, that our ‘friend’ asked of us,” he muttered. “But it seems to make good its return on investment. Although goodness knows, I couldn’t tell you what my granddaughter sees in these ugly things.” He lay the figurine back down, not even sighing. “Still. The important part is what investing in the real thing did for us, eh? Outsourcing pirate-hunting…”

He attempted a jovial smile.

“Really,” Kuno concluded. “The way I see it, heaviest was the price paid by the best and brightest in our fleet. I hear Kiku Ryoushi’s been smouldering… I find it hard it to blame the good captain. With fewer pirates around, we might’ve put her out of a job, or at least one she enjoyed.”

“Times inevitably change,” Toshiro said. Despite the gravity such a statement usually carried, especially in the Court itself, he said it with all of the weight of a casual greeting. “I’m sure some other problem will come up to bother our shipping. Our friend may, in fact, end up becoming one himself in future.”

“Glad you’ve kept your foresight,” Kuno commented. “Even if you decided this short-term plan worked as a solution for now. Let’s hope our having Equestria’s backing will make him think twice about double-crossing us. While he might be bold enough, once his power base has grown, to take on one major power... Surely, not two.”

He spoke those words, he was aware, as though trying to reassure himself.

“Well, I have no complaints about enjoying a quiet trip,” Kuno added, leaning back to sip more of his tea. “Pirates,” he said sourly. “Now there’s a bunch who’d be so bold as to take on the Kirin flagship itself, no matter how low their chances. They’re no great loss. I’m just hoping I might come away from this summit with something to offer Captain Kiku. It’d be a shame to let her talents go to waste...”

“We’ll find something for her,” Toshiro said, his voice once again impassive. “Should it come to cutting ourselves free of our deal with His Majesty...” The derision dripped from his voice as he frowned at the figurine, “then, there will be plenty of work for her.”

“Work,” Kuno repeated. “Yes, she’s been working hard, for one so young. How I wish I could say that more often. Ahh… whatever Kana’s sins, none would’ve faulted her hard work. Unfortunately,” he indicated the figurine. “This is the face of what most young females are interested in nowadays. This and what they call musical theater.”

“Yes,” Toshiro sighed. “My son has even brought this nonsense into Court, thanks to his choice in concubines. Kaori has no discernible taste for these modern frivolities and Kaede is mindful of her appearance, but the others…” Kuno watched as his old friend cringed, rubbing his platinum ring of office. “One of them brought recordings of those new performances. It was a racket.”

“Like... Oh, what’s the phrase? Ah, that’s it, like piercing the ears on an Abyssinian choirboy,” Kuno agreed, with a ghoulish smile. “Mind you,” he then said, images of long-ago travels resurfacing in his aged mind, “those aren’t half-bad to listen to, once you get used to ‘em. What they’ve at least got is choir-mastery. Whatever those concubines listen to, it doesn’t sound like it got composed, only regurgitated.”

“Don’t remind me.”

Kuno tapped his chin. “But on reflection, these are merely follies of youth. I’m sure your son will outgrow them… after all, we did, didn’t we, Kane? Whereas Celestia must be glad she’s immortal, considering who’d otherwise be next in line from her family.”

Toshiro frowned, but it wasn't entirely disapproval. There was a pensiveness in his eyes.

“I’d sooner hand my nation over to Lady Kaori,” he said in a cold, heavy voice, “if my son ended up anything like Equestria’s Prince. If their own news is anything to go by, Blueblood’s a wastrel, little better than a pirate himself.” The frown faded slightly. “Yet he might be more open to deals than the Sun Princess... I frankly doubt he’s as well-versed in the art of double-talk.”

“It’s a good thought,” Kuno said, stroking his lip. “Even if we should look into how well he plays… Someone adept at feinting with a blade must have some knowledge of deception. That said…” Here, he thought again of their ploy with the nation of Abyssinia. Despite himself, it made him feel heavy. Yet he pressed on. “Well, if the Prince decides to ever dip into our waters again, he’ll face a foe we’ve put up between us and his ilk. A weighty consequence, but I prefer it to letting Celestia deny us sending an outlaw to the copper mines.”

“At the very least,” Toshiro mused, “we won’t have to worry about her, should that happen.” His face shifted anew. “Speaking of deals. We’ll have to be careful at this Convocation. It has no precedent, and I expect the best from everyone on this ship, especially you, old friend.”

Although the words were complimentary, Kuno felt how much hung on them.

“At no time is the world truly at Harmony,” the elderly stag said at last. “No matter how a noble soul such as Celestia may wish it. We could arrive at this gathering with the greatest goodwill… And never could we take it on faith that amongst the crowd, not one of those smiling faces isn’t concealing a plan to stab us in the back.”

He picked up his cup, without magic, to take a final sip.

~ The Hall of Unity ~

Nowhere except his books had Prince Blueblood seen such airships, all in one place.

The grand pagoda of the Hall of Unity was accessible by other means, despite its location atop the peak of Mount Metazoa, a mountain known less for height – on that front, it was easily overshadowed by the Arismapi Mountains in the nearby South – than for sheer steepness. Other than how it broke off into a few, marginally larger tiers on the way down, Metazoa was comprised of the smoothest cliff-faces known to the world.

Except, peculiarly, for the very top, where jutting lips of stone poured an endless cascade into the plains below, far enough for water to never touch the cliff-face.

But Blueblood’s eyes weren’t on waterfalls, even though one was pursuing its descent a few hundred paces away from the landing platform. He did feel a moment’s worry when one ship –Saddle Mareabian, going by the onion-top design covered in curlicues – flew close to the water, yet it soon dissipated. This was the other peculiarity of Metazoa’s waterfalls. They were thin as a curtain, creating no more a roar than a trickle.

This didn’t stop Metazoa, like all mountains, from falling prey to gusts of wind. One was blowing through his mane just now.

“Brings back memories, doesn’t it, Sooty?” he told the stallion beside him, who was leaning over the railing to gaze at the ships.

“Indeed,” Awesome Fire said, not breaking his gaze. “Will you look at them… Normally, ponies have to travel far and wide just for a glimpse of outsiders. Now here they are, coming to us.”

Shieldwall had been more aggrieved by the wind than Blueblood, struggling to keep his pompadour from blowing apart – which was a funny thought, seeing as spontaneous combustion wasn’t his talent in their group. But he stopped and looked with them.

He whistled. “I don’t envy you, Bluenose,” Shieldwall told Blueblood. “You’re the guy with the tough job– meeting people! Me, I’m looking forward to what toys they’ve brought us. Oh, we’re gonna kick back and have ourselves a wild time, Sooty and I.”

Shieldwall nodded ingratiatingly at Fire, but Fire just rolled his eyes.

“Fun and games ended two days ago, Wally,” he said stolidly. “We will need to talk to people at some point, you know. Especially when Mister Diplomat here’s still wanted by some for trespassing into their waters.”

This wasn’t the first time either of them made fun of Blueblood for this, yet he still reacted.

“Hey!” he cried, turning on Fire with affected indignation. “Don’t you try pinning this all on me. We were all together on that trip, guys!”

“Yes, our ‘Grand Tour’, as you called it,” Shieldwall sniggered.

“What else?” said Blueblood. “A Grand Tour was a fine tradition for gentry stallions back in the olden days, and I fail to see why we should drop it.”

“I agree with you there,” Fire said, revolving so he now leaned with his back to the railing. “But I’m pretty sure it’s toeing the line for a ‘Grand Tour’, when the Kirin put you on a watch-list for harvesting lightning without permission.”

Blueblood glared at him. “You picked now to wind me up, didn’t you?” he seethed. “You really want me all hot under the collar before going to meet important guests.”

Fire smirked. “Don’t worry, Your Highness. So long as you manage not to lose your collar, or the rest of your clothes this time, I’m sure you’ll do fine.”

Although Shieldwall chuckled, if Fire had hoped to get a rise out of Blueblood by reminding him of the incident in the Gala Hall, he was to be disappointed. Fresh as the memory was, Blueblood had already planned his response to further teasing.

“Actually, Awesome Fire...” Blueblood said smoothly. He let the phrase hang, taking time to look over the crowd. “I’ve a good mind that before the week’s out, I’ll have found someone down there to shed my clothes for me.”

Of his two friends, it was Shieldwall who blushed at this comment. Fire merely shook his head with a ‘here-we-go’ look on his face.

“Astron,” Fire said, his voice entirely serious. “You know that’ll just cause more problems down the line. It’s bad enough making a stop in port, breaking hearts and moving on.”

“Besides,” added Shieldwall, freshly recovered. “You’re not fooling anyone, if you think we believe you’ve got over that pirate lass.”

Blueblood noticed Fire trying, too late, to warningly shush Shieldwall. He contained himself as melancholy seeped into him at the thought of Celaeno. What he’d said hadn’t been just for show.

“I mean it,” he stated, keeping a cool, clear gaze. “Shieldwall’s right, it’ll be a tough job. Why shouldn’t I grant myself a little fun? Can you believe, I’ve never tried it with a Reindeer before... though, legend runs in my family that our founder and the Fire Maiden...”

The remaining words faded before he’d spoken them, for somewhere in his mind, he felt the memory dredge up of an old, nigh-forgotten tale from his youth, a tale more melancholic than his with Celaeno’s ever was.

“Never mind,” Blueblood said, glancing down. “Perhaps not. That might be… too much, even for Auntie. But I’m curious about Abyssinians, or even Diamond Dogs. Honest,” he said, catching their surprised looks. “People forget this, but many Diamond Dogs are a fine breed.”

“That’s not what I was thinking,” Shieldwall said. “I’m just surprised you’re less of a snob than I thought.”

Fire stared off resignedly. “There’ll be tears before bedtime…”

Ignoring him, Blueblood took out his pocket-watch.

“Half past ten,” the Prince read, before pocketing the watch again. “Auntie’s expecting me. Pardon me, lads.” He walked towards the staircase leading down into the hangar bay. “Now’s the time to make new friends… Or what passes for friends, in international relations.”

~ Day 1 of the Convocation ~ Tenth Day of the Month of Rophon ~

Few ever entered the Hall of Unity at the top.

Where they met was in the mountain’s heart, streaming in from different hangars and landing-pads, one for each of the compass signs, symbolic of the four corners of the world. As was tradition, mistletoe hung over every entrance.

From the North, the Reindeer of Adlaborn. From the East, the Kirin of Ryuppon. From the West, the arrivals were mainly bovine, the Minotaurs of the Tauren Isles and the Bison of San Palomino. From the antipodes of Equestria, too, people came – the Saddle Mareabians and zebras who were ponies’ own cousins, though barely any closer to ponies than to each other. Then others followed, from Neighpon, Monacolt, Oleander and much more.

And from the South came not only Abyssinians and Diamond Dogs, but the Changelings. Yet, while one may have expected Changelings to be last to arrive, they were not.

That distinction went to the griffons, who were Equestria’s closest neighbours, and thus ought have been amongst the first.

These were but a few, yet these were the principal players of the Twelve Families, here to meet below the vaulted ceiling. And in the centre awaited Equestria’s Royal Sisters.

By Luna and Celestia’s side stood Sint and Ilsa. They were the only Reindeer present, and they’d travelled light. Sint’s presence, however, more than made up for it. It was a presence all who’d grown up with the Reindeer’s tales and Hearthswarming gifts would welcome. Despite her earlier reservations, Luna found it comforting that he stood with them.

Next to Celestia was her discrete yet ever-present secretary, a trim white unicorn by the name of Raven Inkwell. She held herself stoically, dressed in what Luna knew was sober modern clothing, ergo a pair of square glasses, a stiff collar and red necktie. Since Raven wore her dark mane in a bouffant that covered her horn, she was sometimes mistaken for an earthpony. In her aura, she carried a notepad.

By contrast, the other figure who trotted up before Celestia looked as if they more properly belonged to an era when Luna’s linguistics had still been fashionable.

“Sir Archmage,” Celestia greeted him brightly. “Do you feel truly vested to fulfill your role as Master of Ceremonies?”

Indeed, the Headmaster of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns wasn’t clad in the suede or velvet he favoured, but a star-studded blue cloak of satin, complemented by the traditional pointed hat in honour of Starswirl the Bearded.

“Ready as I ever will be, Your Highness…” Spell Nexus muttered, adjusting his bearing. “I can live with the robes. They’ve got some style. But I’ll always find that hat a chore, I must admit.”

“Uneasy lies the head, Headmaster,” Celestia said merrily. “Still. I’m glad to see you here. Miss Inkwell?” she said to Raven. “Let’s take one last look at our plans for the Convocation.”

Raven passed her a sheet listing dates and times.

Wednesday 10th

10:30 - 12:00

Greeting of the delegates

12:30 - 13:00

Formal opening of the Convocation

16:00 - 18:00

Madame Heartstrings’ presentation on Dream Valley

Thursday 11th

10:00 - 13:00

Introduction of Captain Reiner

Friday 12th

10:00 - 12:30

Revelation of the Solar Empire
Testimony of Father Krampus

16:00 - 18:00

Testimony of Redheart

19:00

Sending of Princess Luna and Lord Discord to Earth

Saturday 13th to Sunday 14th

Expect establishment of relations with Earth

Monday 15th

Keep space open for potential delegates from Earth

Tuesday 16th

10:00 - 12:00

Appeal to signatures of support

There was a flash and a smell of ozone.

“Greetings, Aunties.”

That voice of the stallion who’d just teleported in, though, was a bit less welcome. Although if Luna was honest with herself, she preferred Blueblood to Galatea. The mare, speaking of whom, had declined to make an appearance. Officially, anyway...

The Prince and two other stallions trotted up, brushing past Raven and Nexus, granting the latter a curt nod.

“Blueblood,” said Luna evenly. “How nice of you to join us. I assume Cadance will not?”

“Well, she’s made it clear she needs time,” Blueblood replied. “Given one of the attendees will be… you-know-who.”

Nobody had to ask who. The Wedding Invasion remained a fresh memory.

He gave a respectful nod towards both Sint and Ilsa, as did the unicorn and earthpony he’d teleported in with. Friends of his from the gentry, naturally. From the unicorn’s red-and-orange mane and orange coat, it was easy for Luna to recall the name ‘Awesome Fire’. She found it harder to place the stocky blue earthpony.

But whatever his flaws, Blueblood was a diplomat, and Luna understood that he fit the task better than Galatea.

“Ah…” Blueblood said. “I see we’re starting with the Kirin. Of course.” He nodded towards Fire. “Yeah, um, better let you take this one, Sooty.”

Fire smirked thinly and trotted closer to Celestia.

As had been arranged, Toshiro Kane, Mikado of the Ryupponese Kirin, was brought forth in an elaborate palanquin of purple-and-silver, borne by four Neighponese servants. Luna had wondered if the ponies of Neighpon would show up to for this Convocation. After them followed another palanquin, simpler in design, though adorned by the same colours and sign of the Chrysanthemum. The Prime Minister’s.

Only an exceptional occasion could have called both heads of state from Ryuppon. Did that mean the Crown Prince had been left in charge of the country?

The palanquins stopped before Celestia. She’d chosen to face East, where her Sun rose from, and Ryuppon was one of the great nations of the world. Decorum demanded the Mikado would be the first she’d greet. A small metal staircase unfolded from the base of the palanquin, and Toshiro stepped down, while next to him, the Prime Minister did the same.

“Blessed Mikado,” Celestia said, inclining her head lightly. Toshiro responded in kind. “And Excellency,” she added to the Prime Minister, repeating the same gestures. “In the name of the Sun that shines over our two nations, I bid you welcome to Equestria.”

“And I take your welcome gladly, Your Highness,” said the Mikado, who didn’t smile, but there was a twinkle behind his glasses. “Especially after we were granted your esteemed visit to Ryuppon. Though I admit surprise we should meet face-to-face again so soon.”

Celestia nodded. “On no small matter, I guarantee. Nevertheless, I hope this may allow new openings in the exchanges between our nations.”

“Lightning’s power for Equestria, pure crystals for Ryuppon,” the Prime Minister quipped. “A fair trade, I’d say.”

His Mikado gave him a strange glance, but made no rebuke.

“I wish it were trade talks alone that brought us here,” said Celestia. “Yet I believe we’ll still have much to discuss on that front.” She indicated to Fire that he should step forward. “May I present Mister Awesome Fire, recently of the Royal Sky-Navy, and alumnus to the Guild of Engineers. He’s expressed great interest in what lightning and crystal can offer the future.”

“Greetings, Your Majesty,” Fire addressed the Mikado, giving a bow so low that Luna found it bordered on obsequiousness. “A pleasure, indeed. But may I say it that, while Her Highness shoots for glamour, I know to keep an eye for the smaller, unnoticed things. My time with air-ships makes me aware of the engineering feat it’d require, just to have running water for gardens aboard a sky-turtle.”

Toshiro looked at him with mild interest, while Celestia’s assistants took note.

“Then I’m sure you’ll find your joy, Mister Fire,” the Mikado said, politely enough. “Have you called us here for this reason, Your Highness?” he then asked Celestia. “Will the Kirin’s technological prowess be needed in short order, with embellishments by the world?”

“In more ways than one,” Celestia said solemnly. “I’m glad you ask so astutely. One of my citizens would stand a lot to gain, if the Kirin extended their help, such as transport, for the trek she’s planned into the Unknown.”

The Mikado blinked. “I see. Well, Ryuppon is glad to provide, when the price is right,” he said impassively. “We can only ask your assurance that another great airship won’t be taken from under you, Princess Celestia.”

Fire looked troubled by this, but Celestia gave a musical laugh.

“I promise I’ve spoken to my nephew about being more careful,” she said pleasantly, “before I let him borrow another ship. I thought this’d be a time for him to prove it. Oh, by the way? Come say hello, Blueblood.”

And Luna noticed Blueblood was trying hard not to glare at Celestia, even as Fire struggled to suppress a grin. So was Shieldwall behind him. Even Sint and Ilsa were looking faintly amused. Only the assistants remained resolutely expressionless.

“Majesty,” Blueblood said, bowing. “Excellency,” he added to the Prime Minister. “While this is the first time we meet, I’ve had the pleasure of visiting your beautiful country in the past. And I’d happily visit again, if I find it welcoming.”

The Mikado barely inclined his head. “Prince Blueblood, it’d be Ryuppon’s delight if you were to stay a long, long time.”

Discrete as it was, the slyness in his tone didn’t evade Luna. She wondered how Celestia kept her smile on, time after time in these meetings.

Then the Mikado’s eyes fell upon Sint Erklass and the Snow Maiden.

“Great Tonakai,” he said, his note of delight sincere now. “Years have gone by since you visited Kyorito in the years of my father. I didn’t know that I’d see you again when my hairs have gone grey.”

Sint smiled sadly. “So many children, dear Kane. The years pass so fast.”

Luna coughed quietly. “Excuse me,” she said gently. “But we do have many others to meet. And time’s passing even now.”

“Yes,” said Celestia. “I fear you are quite right, Sister.” She addressed the Mikado, her horn lighting up, a golden orb emerging to float between them. “Chambers have been arranged for your convenience, Your Majesty. If your staff will follow the Archmage,” she said, nodding at Nexus, “they’ll find the place.”

She indicated the arched mosaic that adorned the wall behind them.

“The way up will open to your procession. You and His Excellency are invited to take the balcony places reserved for you at the Public Assembly.”

“Thank you, Highness,” said the Mikado. “Sir Archmage,” he added graciously, “my retinue and I place ourselves in your care.”

Nexus smiled, deferentially tipping his wizard’s hat. “Follow me, please.”

The Mikado and the Prime Minister took the lead in following Spell Nexus. The servants, having returned the palanquins in the interim, had come back with carts full of luggage enough to make Miss Rarity blush, in Luna’s opinion. Somehow, though, it all managed to fit past.

Spell Nexus’ horn glowed. The ornamental mosaic shone blue, melting into a shimmering, translucent pale blue surface, beheld by the marveling eyes and astounded mutters from those who’d never seen this. Beyond the opening, the floor curved subtly upwards and rightwards. Inside the walls of the Hall’s internal dome, a concentric onion-layer of sloping corridors circled in a spiral until reaching the central tiers, home of the Public Assembly.

With understated reverence, the Ryupponese procession were led by the Archmage of Equestria through this newly-opened entry-way, to be shown their quarters for the coming days and seats in the coming hour.

“Huh, neat trick,” commented the earthpony who’d come in with Blueblood and Awesome Fire.

But there was only so much time to admire the Hall’s magic. The order of these greetings had been calculated so that in the time required for the Archmage to accomodate one group, the Princesses could greet another.

Luna thought highly of the Minotaurs, a hardy, rugged people. Proud yet never arrogant, she had always been fond of their tales of old.

She was happy they were the next to march into the space below the dome.

Whereas most of the delegates had arrived in luxury transportation, Luna felt certain the Minotaurs – there were only two, father and son, if the dark colour of their hooves was a hint – had walked on hoof, taking only the rides any common traveller could pay for. And since the Hall had resisted attempts to turn it into a tourist attraction, that meant no unauthorised airships for the last ten miles. To come this far, the Minotaurs would have climbed the mountain.

All the more appropriate, for a Hall built by their forefathers so long ago.

They both carried their loads on their backs, the son a head shorter than the father, yet his load no lighter. The father halted, indicating his son should do the same.

“Princess Celestia,” he said, puffing slightly. “Princess Luna. And all of you. Greetings.”

“Welcome to Equestria, Proxenos Darkhoof,” Celestia said. “When your wife sent word of delay, we were worried as to whether you’d make it on time. It’s good to see you here, in this Hall your people labour to keep pristine. And this is your son?”

Darkhoof nodded gruffly. “My eldest. Basil.” He turned then, not to Sint, but Ilsa, looking at her in some wonder. “Princess Ilsa… I met your grandfather once, not long after I left the Labyrinth. I never thought I’d meet you.”

The Snow Maiden wore a serene smile.

“An honour to meet you as well, Proxenos,” said Ilsa. “Princess Luna told about your people. I have to say, I’d never thought stories of the Labyrinth, retold a thousand times, could remain so compelling with the right storyteller. Do you agree, Luna?”

“I, ah, well...” Luna said, nervously. “Yes, indeed, Ilsa. A good story is always good company in the night-time.”

Her gaze darted elsewhere. Oddly, she thought she saw Blueblood eyeing Darkhoof’s son.

“And no Minotaur would disagree,” Darkhoof said. “Be they sad or joyous, we can hope, at least, to bring back many good stories from this gathering. Is the Dyonisian Lord in attendance? He came to visit shortly after the Call sounded. He and a mare.”

“Discord is here, yes,” confirmed Celestia. “Though, as often, he prefers keeping to himself, until something sparks his interest.”

Luna’s sensitive ears picked up Fire whispering to his earthpony friend.

“Know anypony like that, Wally?” he said, not looking at Blueblood.

Interestingly, Blueblood only exchanged small pleasantries with the Darkhoofs, shaking their hands in turn, before they headed for the upper floors.

“Are you sure you won’t rest a moment?” Blueblood asked just as they were getting on, placing a forehoof on Basil’s backpack. “You must’ve had an exhausting journey, travelling on hoof. And only two hooves, too!”

“Thank you, Prince Blueblood,” Darkhoof said graciously, pulling his son away. “But today’s business cannot wait, we all know that.”

Nonetheless, Luna was sad to see them go.

The zebras of the plains, Luna wasn’t familiar with, even in the time prior to her exile. She knew that Prince Abraxas, who drew up with a full procession of councillors, resplendent in a robe of many-coloured plucked feathers, was Prince to only one tribe, the Ezebrantsi of Farasi. There were countless tribes, not all of whom lived on the plains. Some occupied the mountains. Others, what else, were people of the hills. She didn’t wish to embarass herself by asking one of Celestia’s assistants for pointers.

By coincidence, after Celestia had greeted Abraxas, their small-talk led to the zebra Prince revealing he’d also been visited by Discord and a pegasus, in the midst of his eternal pursuit of the Grootslang, which only the most urgent circumstances could have pulled him away from.

But Abraxas seemed in a fair mood today, turning to greet Luna with grace.

“When Equestria faces away from your Moon, Your Highness,” Abraxas smiled, “does your Moon’s light does upon all of Zebrica.”

Luna had felt a glow of pride at that, even as Abraxas moved on to Ilsa.

“To you, dear Snow Maiden, I wish I had the same thanks to offer,” Abraxas said regretfully. “Snow is… not known in Zebrica.” The fire in his mane burnt a little brighter, as if in echo. “For that alone, coming here may allow me to see marvels.”

That might have been all, with Ilsa giving a soft show of gratitude, yet Blueblood stepped in.

“I’m sure you’ll see marvel in the Maiden more than most, Majesty,” one Prince told another. “As they say, aren’t good things better when they’re a… rarity?”

Abraxas chuckled heartily. “You have a good tongue on you, young stallion.”

And Prince Abraxas moved on, exchanging a nod with Spell Nexus, Master of Ceremonies.

Yet after Abraxas had departed, with circumstances being as they were, Luna felt grateful the Saddle Mareabians, the next ones to approach, hadn’t come in with the zebras. Old feuds didn’t pass so easily, she knew.

Not to mention, their ambassador had personal cause for grief with Erebus, which remained Luna’s domain to this day...

Still, Lady Amira was the picture of respectful, albeit formal deference when she came forward to make the presentations, sided by her noble colleague Haakin. With their head-dresses, caparisons, nosebands and breast-collars, both where slightly overdressed in the manner of Saddle Mareabians, but Luna found them pleasantly understated compared to the pleats and baubles of the portly Malikah.

Unlike the Mikado before her, the Malikah didn’t bother to get off her palanquin, remaining lying there as she was fanned by two serving-mares.

“Your Highness,” Lady Amira said, bowing to Celestia together with Haakim. “In the name of Her Esteemed Majesty, Ylam-bint-Karistal, Saddle Mareabia extends the hoof of friendship.”

“As you extended it with such kindness mere Moons ago,” finished Haakim. “So too do we.”

These were beautiful words, heartwarming words.

But Luna knew, from the tiny glance Lady Amira threw her way, that what she’d discussed with the Warden last week would come true. In a thousand years, this hadn’t changed. The great and the good of this world, when they had friends or family in Erebus – or, more often, assets to their nation – would approach her for a word.

The word being, let’s shorten their prison sentence in return for a favour.

Once the thought had taken hold of Luna, it preoccupied her throughout the rest of the welcomings and introductions. She was running on automatic, her mouth speaking the right words when needed, eyes and ears picking up details around her – yet all the while, half her mind as removed from the waking world as the dreams she shepherded.

There was the Abyssinian Queen, a nervous look in her eyes, telling Celestia she feared a warlord’s designs on her country.

The Queen of Hippogriffia expressed similar worries when she arrived, clad in a traveller’s cloak to protect against the wind. Luna recalled Tia’s retelling of their last meeting, ten years ago, when Equestrian and hippogriff sailors had moved against slavers in the Southern Seas, aspiring to end their trade, Since then, little had been heard of Novo and her people.

Only Novo and her trusted general Skybeak were present for the occasion, and all the Hippogriff Queen had to say was that the hippogriffs liked their secrecy. But Luna saw the glint of a veteran warrior in Skybeak’s eyes, and little doubt was left of their people’s past mettle or camaraderie. Luna wondered if it would show again.

Then for a moment, things seemed quaint when the Queen of Diamond Dogs apologised for the bad dogs in her pack who’d take what wasn’t theirs, and the bison Chieftain of the Rainbow Crow Tribe assured there’d only been peaceful co-existence lately with ponies in the West.

It was a particular newcomer who snapped Luna’s attention back to reality.

“Well, well, well,” the voice of Queen Chrysalis echoed. “‘Sup, Tia.”

And there she stood, the Changeling Queen of Queens.

Much as Cadance and Twilight Sparkle and Shining Armor had objected, the Call had invited the like of Chrysalis and her kin. Now Luna understood Cadance’s absence.

Behind Chrysalis was a sizeable group, for lack of a better term. By her side, riding a huge warrior of the Red Hive, there was a small, timid Harlequin Queen-in-Waiting. Celestia had told her of the current Changeling politics, but apart from those two, Luna saw no other Changelings outside of Chrysalis’ own Ebony Hive.

Blueblood and both his friends were unable to hide some nervous shifting. Even Raven Inkwell raised an eyebrow. But Celestia held her head high. Sint and Ilsa stepped forward to stand by her.

“Queen Chrysalis,” Celestia said formally. “Mistress Papillate. I am heartened to see, despite our people’s differences, that when the Call was raised, you answered.”

“Why, of course, Princess,” Chrysalis said lightly, while the Harlequin just looked tongue-tied and her steed looked stoic. “So nice of you to invite me back... I wasn’t at all sure you’d want me, after last time I crashed the place.” Then her gaze fell upon Luna. “Ah, you must be Princess Woona! At last, we meet.”

“Hello, Chrysalis,” Luna said impassively. “I’m afraid we did not have the time to exchange pleasantries during the wedding.”

Chrysalis cackled, slapping the large crate beside her. No-one else laughed, but she’d never been one to truly consider others’ feelings.

“Oh, my, my,” she said, turning her gaze to Celestia. “You didn’t tell us your baby sister had such a sense of humour! How delightful.”

“I try,” Luna said coldly. “Alhough, I hardly noticed your Hive’s presence.”

“Shame you had to miss the fun, Princess Luna, ‘Protector of the Realm’,” said Chrysalis, baring her teeth playfully. “Though on second thoughts, there’s no shame in that at all.” Before Luna could retort, Chrysalis turned to her lead guard, a soldier-type with purple eyes. “Here, go ready the luggage. Careful, it contains live creatures, remember.”

“You didn’t tell us you’d brought pets, Queen Chrysalis,” Celestia spoke up. Impressively, her tone remained even. “We could’ve arranged a few details.”

“Oh, no,” said Chrysalis, waving her guards away. “No, we simply had a little detour. One which involved the Dragon Lord’s daughter.”

“She’s answered the Call?” Celestia asked, surprised. “I don’t see her in your group.”

The Harlequin spoke then. “Um, we… we did have the Princess in our convoy,” she said, hunching. “B-but, it appears she’d prefer to blend with the crowd.”

“Yeah,” Chrysalis said, huffing. “You’ll meet her later, no doubt… Once she’s done sulking.”

“Hm,” said Celestia. “I shall have to notify the Archmage. The Dragon Princess needs to be properly quartered as well.”

“Quite,” sniffed Chrysalis.

She looked past Celestia’s shoulder, just as Nexus trotted back into view. He raised an eyebrow at the sight of her, but having prepared for her arrival, he kept his cool. Luna thought that Chrysalis was pointedly ignoring both Sint and Ilsa. Changelings, Celestia had mentioned, weren’t too keen on Reindeer for company.

“I don’t see dear Cadance here,” Chrysalis said. “Usually she tails you, Celestia…” She nudged the Harlequin. “But I do wonder where she might be now.”

“The Princess is unwell,” Celestia told her easily, before Luna could interject. “Would you like to see your quarters? I hear they’ve got an excellent view.”

“Shame,” said Chrysalis. “But don’t mind if we do!”

And so the entourage passed by with much chittering and the buzzing, in the wake of Nexus, who kept his eyes firmly ahead. Like Chrysalis had said, they were carrying a surprising amount of luggage. Warily watching Chrysalis leave for the multi-tiered storeys above, Luna understood too well what it meant for her sister to keep up a mask.

Thankfully, though, the final player to appear brought no memories of past transgressions.

Grizelda, the young claimant of the griffon throne, looked emblematic of her kin, scattered as they were in the inhospitable regions beyond the ancient stronghold of Griffonstone. She was no taller than Luna, her dark-brown plumage highlighted by her lighter, gold-brown crest. Despite her prestigious claim, Grizelda really bore only one mark to denote her as a pretender amongst many –the old Griffonstone sigil, embodied on a clasp of her red-lined cloak, which swooshed behind her as she entered.

She brought with her what Luna presumed to be household retainers. Not just an escort, but traders and crafters, about two dozen in total, all with a look that bespoke an eye for a bargain. The lone exception was the eagle-like eye of the old, respected, weary General Ironclaw. The Young Pretender’s trusted advisor, the one who ensured her claim wouldn’t be a simple dream. He wore a red vest that shared Grizelda’s sigil, complimenting his slate-grey plumage.

“Greetings to you, Your Grace,” Celestia said. “The Hall welcomes you.”

“Thank you, Princess Celestia,” Grizelda said stiffly. “Apologies for our arrival time. It has not been an easy journey.”

General Ironclaw nodded, clearing his throat.

“It has not, but no band of marauders would hold our mission back for long,” he said. His words might have been pompous, were it not for his world-weary, steely tone. “Woe betide anyone who’d confuse a griffon for a parrot, devious blighters that they are.”

Impoverished, the griffons lived by trade, and the venerable general had made his living through protecting not just their caravans, but others’ against raids conducted by brigands, dragons and their ilk in the lawless lands surrounding Griffonstone.

“Yes,” said Luna. “But here, General, we only have hospitality to offer you and your Queen. Please, make yourself at home.”

As grand and formal though it was, Luna thought the title of ‘Queen’ had less bearing upon the griffons who claimed it. Still, the Young Pretender deserved her share of respect, for she was a claimant who’d stepped forth to answer these summons.

She saw Blueblood’s earthpony friend nudging Awesome Fire.

“Look,” he whispered, pointing towards Ironclaw’s waist. “Look at that.”

Luna followed his gaze. On his belt, Ironclaw wore a device Celestia told her had only recently come into existence, in the wake of a deal between the griffons and the Kirin. To her surprise, it looked familiar to her, although she’d never seen one before.

Then she remembered. While she hadn’t seen it with waking eyes, she’d seen something much like it in Alexander Reiner’s dark dream. It was a weapon that Ironclaw kept on his person, presumably at all times – a flintlock.

Fire stared at the earthpony. “Yes, it’s a firearm, Shieldwall,” he said, sounding bewildered. “Aren’t those my domain? Here I thought your whole purpose in life was to annoy me by coming up with new, tougher armour to block me with.”

The earthpony grinned. “You don’t get it, Sooty, do you,” he said. “How’d you think I do it? To make the best shields, I gotta know everything about what’ll punch through ‘em.” He laughed. “And for the record? Plate armour doesn’t have long. I’d wager that if–”

Awesome Fire and Blueblood were staring at their friend in what both clearly hoped were meant to be warning glares. It was more like one glare and ‘Dear-Celestia-not-again.’

“... Nevermind,” Shieldwall said, slinking back ever-so-slightly. “Could’ve said something I’d regret without you two.”

Griffons had sharp ears. Luna saw Grizelda and Ironclaw peer questioningly at Shieldwall.

Again, Blueblood spoke. “You’ll have to forgive my friend here,” he said, smiling to show white teeth, eyes going towards Sint and Ilsa, “He can’t hold himself anymore now everyone’s arrived. He really wants to unpack his presents. Wally never could wait for Hearthswarming.”

Both Reindeer gave polite laughs at that. The griffons did not, but nor did they look offended. That was a plus, Luna supposed.

“If you say so.” Grizelda yawned. “Sorry, but it’s been a difficult journey. Wish they’d soon finish that railway line they promised to Griffonstone… I wouldn’t mind getting this done so we can all hit the sack… or hay, I think that’s how you Equestrians call it.”

“I agree,” said Blueblood. “Formalities, they do so wear you down… A drink and a nap, those we could do with, I’m sure everyone agrees. Auntie?”

To Luna’s surprise, he was addressing her, rather than Celestia.

“I know it isn’t bed-time yet, not by a long shot,” said Blueblood. “But… once we’re done, maybe you could give us all your special brand of pick-me-up?”

Incredibly, Luna found herself actually smiling at him. “Don’t worry, nephew, I’ve made sure to prepare just that.”

“Splendid,” Grizelda said gruffly. “After travelling all night, I could do with the shut-eye.”

“Before then, we’d be honoured,” Celestia concluded, nodding to her assistants that proceedings were done, “if you, too, would join us.”

So it was the Hall of Unity welcomed the largest gathering Equus had seen in centuries.

* * * * *

Ember could scarcely believe what she saw. Beings from all over Equus – Abyssinians and Diamond Dogs, bison, griffons, zebras, ponies. Of course there were ponies. Kirin, like the ones whom she’d left behind. And there were creatures, beings for which Ember simply did not have the words. All mingling in the auditorium, while their leaders took places in the galleries. Whereas the crowd bustled with talk, the leaders were silent, watching the empty stage.

Like the central hangar, this chamber’s ceiling was covered in mistletoe, some hanging off the chandeliers.

This mix of peoples confused her. In her experience, the myriad races of Equus avoided each other often than not. A “not” which consisted of aloofness at best, hostility at worst. So what could have brought them all here?

Well, that was obvious. It was whatever had contacted her father. But what was that?

With her keen hearing, she caught snippets of conversation amongst the crowd.

“Has to be serious…”

“... Thought the Convocation was a legend.”

“Well, you know pony legends. Most often true, more often painful.”

“No, you can’t fake the power of something like the Concordia Maxima…”

“... Never thought I’d have seen another of those in my lifetime!”

“No, she’s not a griffon. She’s a hippogriff! One of their elite guards!”

“Is it true they eat meat?”

“Never seen a pony made of crystal before…”

The Hall of Unity was full of such conversations. More than she could possibly track.

Not that Ember really cared. Or at least, she kept telling herself. She didn’t want to care, but this was such a mystery, it was impossible for her not to wonder. And thus she heard her own voice joining the low din.

“Any idea what happened?” she asked her nearest neighbour, a griffon in battle armour.

“I’ve no idea,” the griffon said. “When Dame Grizelda called for us, I was drummed up as part of her guard. Don’t know what, but I was told that whatever happened, the summons here was…”

He rubbed a talon under his beak.

“Not merely the right choice, or even a duty, merely a fact of life?” asked someone nearby. Ember was left with the distinct feeling that they were parroting someone. Surprisingly, it was not actually a parrot saying it. It was a Diamond Dog.

“Actually, I was told it was an emergency of the highest levels,” the griffon said, “Beyond someone flying a bit too close to Griffonstone over the Burnt Griffon Strait–”

The griffon tried to make it sound like a joke. Ember felt his eagle eyes raking over her, and she moved herself into a defensive posture.

‘How dare he…’

The Diamond Dog shot her a warning glare. And Ember made an effort to relax.

“In my experience, that’s the worst we’ve had to deal with,” the griffon said. “I don’t… know what could be worse than that.”

“Planetary invasion?” the Diamond Dog asked, glibly.

“That’s silly,” Ember scoffed. “Like… from space? How would that even be possible?”

It was perhaps fortunate that at this moment, the Master of Ceremonies, or Archmage of Equestria, walked onto the stage, rapping his forehooves on the boards for silence.

The Archmage courteously moved as Princess Celestia appeared, flanked by two other alicorns. One seemed familiar, a mare of black and darker blues than Ember’s own colours. Presumably, this could only be Celestia’s long-lost sister, no longer lost. Ember had heard of, but had no interaction with the sisters during their visit to the Mikado’s Court.

But Ember didn’t know who the other alicorn might be. This one, a pink specimen with an odd mane of gradient colours, wasn’t just shorter than the Royal Sisters. She somehow looked younger too, despite or perhaps because of their ethereal youth. Less experienced, unable to hide a glimmer of worry in her eyes.

A murmur rippled throughout the room, while a smaller pony, a white unicorn with a notepad, took the side of the stage.

Finally, two Reindeer entered as well. A great stag – no, the Great Stag – and a pale doe.

‘Did Celestia send the Call?’ Ember wondered. ‘Probably... she’s the only one here who doesn’t look confused…

Celestia stood in silence, surveying the crowd. She seemed as though she ought to speak, explain, but never did she say a word.

Eventually, Ember couldn’t stand it any longer.

“Would anyone here mind telling us why are we here!”

For a second, all eyes were on her.

Momentarily, her mask cracked, leaving Ember to feel like a hatchling, so small before the eyes of so many.

‘Maybe I’ve made a mista–’

Celestia cleared her throat, mercifully drawing the eyes away, and onto the three alicorns.

“Honoured delegates, fellow people of Equus,” the Sun Princess announced. “Again I bid you all welcome to this Hall. From far and wide have you travelled. Here we stand.”

Celestia’s words were uttered in the Common Tongue, so all present my understand. Yet it was a Common Tongue as intoned by the great and good of Equus, with their peculiar lilt, a touch of the florid even to the simplest of words. And as befitted the Princess of All Equestria, spoken with the accent of Upper Canterlot.

Surprisingly enough, Ember thought, no-one bothered to interrupt her now.

“Why are we here? Isn’t that what you’re thinking?” Celestia continued, assured, but with a gruffness that Ember found surprising. “Away from home, uprooted in the middle of our day, or our sleep, because some ancient Call was sounded? And now I see looks of surprise in your eyes. Did not I send the Call? The answer is yes… A Call I’d have never made, unless something happened that led to my day, too, getting thrown out of balance…”

A few scattered mutters rippled amongst the crowd.

“Why are we here?” repeated Celestia. “Why come all this way? How many of us would sooner go home even at this very instant, and let the world sort itself out, as it has all these years? But all who stand here, you came because curiosity drove you, or duty... And for that, I thank you.”

The muttering died down, but tension remained.

“You who stand here, together, the Twelve Families of Equus,” Celestia declared. “Such is the name given in the ancient scrolls, a name assigned to us by the Old Ones, long ago. So that we who separated by land and sea, by tribe and appearance, may look another being in the eyes, and acknowledge them as kin. The pony, the horse and the zebra, equines all. Thus also the Kirin, the Basilisk, and the dragon… siblings in scales. And more besides…”

Ember had to smile with pride at that, though she noticed some grumbling from the Diamond Dog and the griffon, whose people hadn’t been mentioned.

Now Celestia let silence reign, for the time it took to breathe, and leant forward, her eyes on all of them, just as Luna’s eyes were on her.

“Thus spoke the Old Ones,” the Princess intoned. “They made it clear that, after their passing, we’d never be alone in the world... But even then, it was whispered they knew of another Family… the one condemned to wander alone.”

She turned to the Great Stag.

“Grandfather,” Celestia said, softly. “There is a Thirteenth Family, is there not?”

“Indeed, Princess,” replied Sint Erklass. “One long forgotten, but alive and well.”

And for a rare moment in her life, Princess Ember felt her heart catch in her throat. After her long journey, she’d casually put the burlap sack full of her things down on the floor, relieved to unload at last – but now she clutched it to herself.

Beneath her claws, it seemed, the Chaoskämpfer’s canister did thrum. Around Ember, a collection of gasps, mutters and whispers arose.

“But,” Sint added. “They never truly lived on Equus. Their place, it it said, belonged elsewhere, as the denizens of some distant, unknown realm, beyond even our stars.”

“It is not unknown!” spoke Celestia. “I know where it is. Long ago, when my sister and I were both young, the story was told to us… though we, as is so with children who grow up, let it recede into our dreams, a mere fairy-tale. A tale told to us by a legend… By Firefly the First, of Dream Valley.”

The name rang a bell in Ember’s mind.

‘She couldn’t have,’Ember thought. ‘She’d have been ancient! Even then! Like… ponies don’t live that long. They just don’t.’

And the canister thrummed all the more…

“In a time before our birth,” Celestia said, “all our births, save the Great Stag’s, Firefly crossed the Rainbow Bridge, and the Thirteenth Family was brought to Equus. Now, it comes again.” She paused. “It comes to us, from the world of Earth, calling itself ‘human’.”

Murmurs of disbelief rocked the Public Assembly.

‘Firefly? Earth? Humans?’ Ember thought wildly. ‘But… aren’t those just legends?’

Yet the canister’s thrumming was undeniable.

Finding herself unable to look at the Princesses or the Reindeer, Ember’s eyes wandered over to the leaders, sitting at their lofty positions in the galleries.

She could identify most of them thanks to her lessons from Kuno. Her old teacher himself sat up there with the Mikado. Toshiro looked his usual placid self, but Kuno, unusually, was frowning. Ember felt in no hurry to greet them.

As for the rest– Proxenos Darkhoof had steepled his fingers, deep in thought. Prince Abraxas had actually stood up, as if ready to go badger Celestia. The Dog Queen Caterina was chewing her lip. The Pretender Grizelda was leaning over her balcony’s edge, claws digging into the railing. The Malikah, the Queen of Abyssinia and the Queen of Hippogriffia all registered various degrees of shock on their faces.

And last but not least, Queen Chrysalis. Like so often, she held Papillate close to her, comforting the younger queen. All the while, she stroked her chin, a calculating look in her piercing eyes.

The lull didn’t last long. In one of the galleries, a leader stood up.

“With due respect, Princess Celestia,” called the Abyssinian Queen, standing upright on her cat-like paws, “is this what you called us here for? The stuff of old fairy-tales, when a very real threat hangs over us?”

Her crown was smaller than that of the Princess whp now stared up at her – a mere tiara, really – but it gleamed in the chandelier’s light, a small Sun unto itself in the room.

“The Storm King encroaches on a dozen lands outside our borders,” said the Abyssinian Queen, her claw out-held to the gathering, “and moves closer to mine by the day. Alone, we cannot hope to stand against him!”

‘The Storm King… him again.’

Ember remembered Chrysalis’ words about the King working on a weapon to use on alicorns. She also remembered her Kirin mentors’ secret dealings with him. That was why she looked in Toshiro’s direction, to see how he’d react. The Mikado merely appeared thoughtful.

“I implore you,” said the Abyssinian Queen. “There are matters of more urgency for us to convene on than legends and archeological findings! If we don’t deal with this soon, half the world shall be thrown into disarray!”

Another, fiery voice pitched in.

“I speak my agreement!” said Prince Abraxas. “More than fifteen years ago, it was, that the dread Storm King inflicted his bane upon my land. He plundered Farasi’s riches, but oh, he did not stay to rule…” His voice dropped, yet still could be heard by those in assembly. “No… Only to enforce ‘trade and aid’ upon us from a distance, claiming it’d help us develop as a country…”

“Hippogriffia, too, agrees with Abyssinia and Farasi,” spoke Novo, the Hippogriff Queen. “Something is brewing along the Six Seas. Sightings of pirate ships grow scarcer every day… Yet, where this should be cause for jubilation, I instead feel dread, as I did many years ago. Other than perhaps the Unknown, it’d seem the Seas have found a new master. And not a benign one.”

She narrowed her eyes, aiming a glare at Celestia.

“Princess Celestia,” she spoke, “you know very well what we both saw, fifteen years ago, when our forces and yours encountered his before the shores of Farasi, and delayed his plans for who knows how many years. You sent your best guards, your own household regiment. Why do you now turn your gaze away?”

Celestia raised her forehoof, an appeal for silence. Beside her, Luna was deep in thought.

“I understand all of your objections, Your Majesties,” said Celestia. “I did not forget our alliance, Queen Novo, I assure you. Nor your people’s plight, Prince Abraxas, though so long as the Storm King’s has a stranglehold on all trade routes to Farasi, we can only offer so much relief. Alas… the past seems distant, the future uncertain. But trust me, here is a matter which concerns past and future in equal measure.”

“What are you talking about?” the Abyssinian Queen demanded. “It’s my people’s future which looks bleak, if we fail to deal with this now!”

“You’re right, Queen Saba,” Celestia said quietly, though not too quietly. “And I am sorry. Perhaps in these last few years, I’ve been too wrapped up in joy at seeing my past’s wounds finally heal, to take stock as I should have of the outside world.”

She looked each Queen and the Prince in the eye.

“But over the next three days, I hope to make you all understand why this takes precedence.” Celestia straightened herself. “The Thirteenth Family is back on Equus. And I promise you, they herald something that’ll overtake us all. Something big enough for me to call a truce with Queen Chrysalis and the Changelings, when our recent strife is so fresh a memory.”

Something about the pink alicorn drew Ember’s eye. She didn’t seem to agree with her aunt, yet she stayed silent. As for Luna and the Reindeer, they subtly nodded.

Ceremoniously, Celestia raised her wings.

“Meanwhile,” the Princess of the Sun announced, “I invite you all to ease yourselves. You’ve travelled far. Rest and sup as you wish. I shall stay here, answering what questions I can. The important thing to know is that, nine days ago, a former student of my School found proof of humanity’s existence, out in the Everfree Forest. This afternoon I shall call her forth, so she can make an offer to the world. Tomorrow morning, you will be shown her proof.”

Ember had heard of the Everfree Forest. ‘Something fishy’s going on, that’s for sure.’

* * * * *

True to his word, Blueblood wasted no time searching for a candidate to hook in.

With Awesome Fire engaged in buttering up the Kirin – whom Blueblood intended to steer well clear of, anyway –and Shieldwall presently seeking to cosy up to the firearm-wielding griffons, he had discounted looking amongst those delegations for now.

There were plenty of other fish in the sea.

The lunch buffet was a modest affair, and so would dinner be, compared to what Celestia had planned for every day as of tomorrow. By then, thanks to the tireless efforts of Raven Inkwell, the many hangers-on accompanying the delegates would have set up their own food-stalls on the grand landing.

Today, when they weren’t napping, everyone would mostly rely on dining what they’d packed for the trip. This buffet was more of a stop-gap for everyone to continue mingling, following Celestia’s pronouncement.

Not many people were attending it, he noted, lazily nibbling a cherry biscuit.

A few bison, a gaggle of griffons, many Diamond Dogs – they were never ones to turn down free food – and some Abyssinians, a zebra or two, and a couple of horses, all keeping their distances. None tempted him.

An assembly for lost souls, really. Or simple and quiet souls, like the woodland creatures hovering at the landing’s edges, waiting to service. He wondered why he’d come here.

Then Blueblood looked again, and smiled, knowing he saw his catch.

* * * * *

A common goat, on service duty. Amidst the strangeness of Equestria, at last Basil found a sight familiar from home on the Tauren Isles. Standing with stranger animals like squirrels or raccoons, true, but nevertheless. Sensible policy for any household, hiring servants you alone could communicate with. He felt impressed to see the Equestrians use it.

After he and his father had arrived, standing by only so long until Princess Celestia announced what the gathering was for, they had split up, destined for separate bedrooms. Basil knew it was painful to Darkhoof, following the days they’d spent sharing a cabin aboard ship and camping together on the road, that they could no longer share quarters.

Alas, the cuffs on his wrists were reason enough. A disgraced supplicant simply did not belong in the same room, let alone upon the same tier of the Hall as its Proxenos. Darkhoof’s last words to him had been of advice, to work on his abnegation, forgoing a meal today so he could focus on meditation and fasting.

Basil had tried this a while, sitting cross-legged in the sparse, windowless confines of his room. But eventually, such circumstances had got just a little too reminescent of his cell at the Labyrinth. He could bear the discomfort of sparsity, but his failure elsewhere ate away at him, to the point he’d given in and decided to simply eat.

Holding an empty plate, he wavered over the buffet, hesitant.

“I’m surprised to see you here,” said an amiable voice, in the Common Tongue, yet unmistakable was the Upper Canterlot accent, twin to the Sun Princess’s, were it not a male who spoke. “After walking up a mountain, I’d thought you’d choose sleep over food.”

Basil turned. Two paces away, and two heads’ height below his own, a white stallion casually helped himself to some olives. Surprised, he recognised him from the central hangar, the Prince of Equestria, who’d already helpfully suggested rest back then.

“That’d be the Minotaur way, yes,” Basil replied, cautiously. “But I’ve lived an ascetic lifestyle for two years. My father’s given me permission while he retires to fast in his quarters.”

“Ah,” said the Prince, biting an olive. “Ascetism... I could never do it, I’m afraid.” He smiled. “Still, I see you’re wondering what to pick. Might I suggest something?” He gestured to a pastry-laden tray on the table. “Griffon scones. Those are ascetic as they come.”

Basil studied him, yet the Prince didn’t seem in jest. Shrugging, he picked a scone, and tasted it.

The taste was like chewing sawdust. A violent cough overtook him.

“What do you think?” said the Prince.

“This is… it’s…” Basil rasped. “It’s terrible!”

The Prince smiled lightly. “Well, what do you expect? They’re half bird. When was the last time you ate something a bird baked?”

Two heads above the stallion, Basil stared down, unsure whether to laugh. “Did you set this up just to make that joke?”

“Maybe?” the Prince shrugged, innocently. “I knew a bird once. Parrot captain. Her skill was slicing, not baking.”

And though intimidation wasn’t on Basil’s mind, he inwardly marveled at the Prince’s nonchalance around a creature who towered over him.

Then again, hearsay of Blueblood’s association with pirates had reached even the Tauren Isles...

“Basil, isn’t it?” the Prince said. “I enjoy basil herbs… taste better than griffon scones, I’m sure,” he added evenly. “But that isn’t what it means, is it?”

“No…” Basil said, noticing a curious glint in the Prince’s eye. “It’s short for Basileus. A name my mother gave me.”

“Basileus,” the Prince repeated. “‘King’, in Old Tauren. Fancy that. You know my name?”

Basil raised an eyebrow. “Yes. But I heard ‘Blueblood’ was originally a title.”

“Well, isn’t ‘King’ a title?” smiled the Prince. “But, no. That’s just my surname. I’m Astron.”

The word rebounded inside the walls of Basil’s head. “... Asterion?”

“Close,” Blueblood said, wandering off with a wink.

* * * * *

In a multi-tiered structure such as the Hall of Unity, not only a chamber of conference like the Public Assembly sported balconies. Overlooking the buffet area, the balcony level stretched covered four walls, providing the Element Bearers an overhead view of the assortment of creatures milling out for refreshments.

While Twilight was keeping up a studious front in her observations, keeping a careful distance from the railing, Rainbow Dash and Pinkie were close to falling over from leaning forward. Rarity and Applejack, meanwhile, were surveying the throng with a critical eye. Only Fluttershy was hanging out of sight, huddled against the wall.

“Well, I say,” Rarity noted primly. “Someone down there’s being quick to make friends.”

Tip-toeing to be next to her, Fluttershy studied where she was looking. “Oh, uh, yeah,” she began. “Billy’s always wanted to be where the action is– at least, that’s how he put it, so I thought…”

“I wasn’t talking about the goat, darling,” said Rarity. “Although, I’m glad for you, that you managed to get so many of your animal friends to volunteer, and in so little time.”

“Raven Inkwell is a wizard at organisation,” Twilight agreed, grinning. “I honestly didn’t know how the Princess would pull off setting this up in a week, but she did.”

“Sure is a pretty rum place,” Applejack said as she gave the Hall another lookover. The layout was more than old marble pillars. Everything about it had a shine, but moreover, there was a sense of life to it. Scarcely a speck of dust troubled the air. “How’d they keep it so… clean? So tidy?”

“That’s something I’d been wondering about,” Rarity nodded. “Who looks after all this?”

“Hm, well,” said Twilight, the fond and familiar memory resurfacing of yellowed pages by candlelight, “I believe custodianship of the Hall traditionally belongs to a Minotaur. In fact, it’s one of the Proxenos’s duties, as part of their liaison with Equestria.”

“Really, a Minotaur?” said Rarity. “Like the guy I just saw Prince Blueblood turning on the charm for down there? Pish, where was that charm on the night of the Grand Galloping Gala…”

“Where was the fun?” Pinkie saw fit to add. Going with her words, she leaned over the railing as her gaze swept over the crowd, a barely-suppressed bounce to her demeanour. “Where’s the fun now? Oh, girls, if this were any, any other occasion, nothing’d hold me back from launching a huge ‘come-and-meet-all-the-creatures’ party!”

“Yeah, they did kinda skimp on banners and confetti,” remarked Dash. “I’da thought there’d be parades, fanfare… Maybe a Wonderbolts display, but heck, they could’ve put up a big welcome concert by DJ Pon-3 and it’d still be totally awesome…”

“Sadly, this isn’t really party time,” Twilight said, to a soft sigh from Pinkie. “Princess Celestia has told me she’s aiming to deliver the news little by little. Having extra staff and performers at the Hall increases the risk this’d leak out prematurely.”

“Yeah,” Fluttershy said quietly, her forehoof touching Pinkie’s on the railing. “You know I’d have happily asked my animal friends to help you throw that party, Pinkie.”

A lull settled over their talk, spent by each of them silently watching the crowd below, in all its colourful ebb and flow. While Twilight would have been first to acknowledge she was still a learner in the finer details of socialisation, her research on the peoples of Equus had familiarised her to their inter-relationships. She wondered how, witnessed from above, the subtle dance may look to an aspiring member of high society like Rarity, or the social butterfly that was Pinkie.

Aside from Prince Blueblood and the Minotaur, whom Twilight assumed had to be son of the Proxenos, none of those who trod the marble tiles on the lower floor were leaders, delegates or representatives. These were the retinue, the airship crewmates, the many habitually-unseen faces of the servitors who tended to the diplomats’ accomodations, culinary requirements and means of transport – while Twilight had heard of the expression ‘a well-oiled machine’ in relation to the Kirin, she saw it much like her own role as a librarian, an invisible presence ensuring all was in its proper place.

To no-one’s great surprise, Abyssinians and Diamond Dogs kept to opposite ends of the room. Raven Inkwell, so Twilight understood, had prepared for this by arranging for the fish stands to be placed far from the stands serving gristle or spare ribs, and it was a testament to Raven that she’d managed to oversee the placement of meat-based products without flinching. More subtle was the interplay between bison and griffons, or zebras and horses. While none openly avoided each other, their movements brought them to circle around the other, precluding direct contact.

As with so many things in life, the sight gave Twilight’s a flutter of anxiety. Her and her friends’ own encounter with the bison two years ago, and the role they’d played in resolving the conflict between San Palomino’s tribe and the pony settlers, remained a point where she felt midly disbelieving that matters had sorted themselves out so neatly.

“They do wear such fabulous dressing, don’t they?” Rarity’s admiring voice cut into her head. “Even the servants. I’ve always wished to visit Saddle Mareabia some day.”

Twilight saw what she was looking at. At one of the stands, two horses were thanking a hedgehog for a piece of puff pastry. They wore ornamented cloth over their backs, accentuating the elegant curve of their frames, so much taller and leaner than the average pony.

An approaching pair of zebras, talking amongst themselves, briefly paused to see the horses move away from the stand, before proceeding to give them a wide berth.

Next to her, Fluttershy was staring at the stand, frowning slightly. “Say, girls? Does something here not look right to you?”

“Yeah,” Twilight said regretfully. “Yeah, it’s not right. But it’s part of history.”

“Actually,” said Fluttershy, glancing at the hedgehog. “I… I wasnt talking about…”

But Twilight felt too wrapped up in the flow of information pouring into her. As she indicated the horses and zebras, she was mentally revisiting what she’d learnt from guest lectures by Professor Shriek at Celestia’s School. And so she dealt with her strain in the best way she knew. Even when it wasn’t easy or pleasant, she shared her knowledge.

“They don’t get along. And for good reason. It used to be worse than that. They… they’d take zebras prisoner, you know. Take them from their lands and put them to work.”

“What?” gasped Rarity. “Who did?”

Twilight found it painful to swallow. “The Saddle Mareabians. They abolished the trade six-hundred years ago, but it took them another two-hundred years to end it entirely. Sl… Slavery, I mean.”

“Twilight,” Rarity said, her shocked stare mirrored by the other four’s. “You don’t mean that. I thought this was all just stuff from trashy romance novels. Taking a stallion to be shared by a herd of mares and–”

“No, that’s not how it works,” Twilight said quickly. “I… I mean, they do still have a herd system in Saddle Mareabia, but they’ve never done it like that. It’s, it’s more… civilised.”

There was a snort from Applejack, whose brow had darkened. “Ain’t nothing civil,” she muttered, gazing contemptuously at the horses, “‘bout snatchin’ people from their homes and forcin’ them to work… But I just plum don’t get it, Twi’. Those delegates we saw at the fireworks in Ponyville, there didn’t seem to be nothin’ wrong with them…”

“It was centuries ago,” said Twilight. “Although, as you can see, old hurts still linger.”

Some of Pinkie’s mane had lost its lustre. “It’s horrible,” she said, quietly. “They really were nice, the delegates. How can someone have… that, as their dark past, and be so friendly?”

“Yeah,” growled Dash, crossing her forehooves. “Why are we asking these guys for help? They don’t sound much better than… than the fake Redheart’s side.”

Applejack gave her an odd glance. “The ‘fake’ Redheart?”

“Isn’t that what she is?” Dash snapped. “Like, she can’t be the real Redheart. The real Redheart would never do these things. She’d never try to kill Lyra.”

“I’m… I’m not sure it’s that simple, Dash,” Applejack said in a subdued tone. “No-one knows what they’ll do until they have to do it. It’s tough times what bring out the truth in people… And war’s ‘bout as tough as it gets…”

“That’s not what you were just saying about the Mareabians,” retorted Dash.

With her shoulders at rest upon the railing, Applejack sagged. She sighed and took off her hat, beating it against the marble surface.

“I dunno, girls… I really don’t.”

Staying silent, they resumed watching the goings-on below. The room hushed as two new figures crossed, taking no apparent notice of their surroundings. Changelings, both of them, one wearing an officer’s helmet. Only once they’d passed did the hubbub resume.

“It’s kinda funny, right?” commented Pinkie. “A few months ago, we were fighting them off. Now here they are, as guests.”

“I still don’t get that,” Dash muttered.

“Super-ancient treaty, sorta like a mega-special double-Pinkie Promise, I think,” Pinkie said, chuckling softly. “Why, if we’d known then… We could’ve invited them to come back later, after we’d baked some more treats. Then they wouldn’t have had to crash the Wedding.”

Someone gave an irked harrumph behind them.

“I, for one, don’t welcome them. Princess’s orders are all that’s keeping me in check.”

Recognising her brother’s voice, Twilight snapped her head back. Shining Armor had appeared in one of the doorways leading away from the balcony, now clad in his regalia as Captain of the Royal Guard.

“Shining! I wasn’t sure if you’d show up.”

She knew this hadn’t been an easy week for Shining, even less than for Cadance. And he sported the tired face to prove it. Organising a skeleton security detail for this Convocation, composed of old and trusted Guard veterans, would be tough enough for this week. But then there was the news of how Redheart, a youngish yet well-respected veteran, had moved against their Princess. To say nothing of what that Princess had become for this to be a reality.

And capping it off was the Guard’s fruitless search for the human’s locket in the Everfree River.

“The Changelings?” Twilight noted. “Yeah, Lyra isn’t keen on them, either.”

“I can’t imagine why. Poor girl,” sighed Shining. “Once you recover, it makes you feel icky to have had Queen Chrysalis messing inside your head. Worse, actually… But I guess that in war, you make… strange bedfellows. I’ve talked about it a lot with Captain Reiner. It’s how Redheart got close to him.”

“How so?” asked Rainbow Dash.

“Reiner and I had a chat two days ago,” Shining explained. “During which he ran some of his PHL’s workings by me, and the geopolitical situation on the… other Equus. That’s how I learnt Redheart had been hired as an independent operative.”

“Where’s Redheart now?” Dash demanded, almost hissing.

“Still in custody,” Shining said. “We’ve placed her in a secure location, here at the Hall. She’ll be ready to come out and testify.”

Twilight was deep in thought as her brother led them away.

“Uh, Shining?”

“Yes, Twilight?”

Stopping still at the doorway, Twilight pointed at two other figures present, currently talking to one another. Two very tall figures, with vast, majestic wings tucked to their sides.

“W-what are we doing here?” Twilight stammered out.

“Oh, you know,” said Shining, rolling his eyes with that cunning smile of his, “I figured you guys would want to meet two of our oldest friends and allies.”

“I thought the Reindeer were the oldest?” whispered Fluttershy.

“Our other oldest friends and allies, dear,” Rarity added, awed. “Why, historically, hippogriffs have been very enthusiastic in volunteering for the Guard…”

“Whoa,” said Dash. “Awesome.”

Twilight could only nod, too, finding few words. Indeed, the hippogriff diaspora, dispersed throughout the mountains and highlands of the world, had often come to Equestria seeking opportunities and a new lease in life. Where the griffons sought to reclaim their old nation, the hippogriffs had only recently – a few decades, in the grand picture – coalesced their own nation.

Now stood the Queen of Hippogriffia, that fledgling state, yet even with only her simple blue headdress, she bore a regal aura not unlike Princess Celestia herself.

And she was looking right at Twilight.

“Ah, Captain Armor,” greeted the dark blue officer by her side, clad in light armour and a golden helmet, “come to join us for the view?”

“Your Majesty, General Skybeak,” said Shining Armor, bowing to them. He gave Twilight a glance, smirking, before continuing. “As a matter of fact, I wanted to introduce the Bearers of Harmony.”

“H-hi, hello, eh-heh,” said Twilight. “I’m… um…”

“Princess Celestia’s personalstudent, isn’t that right, sis?”

Twilight glared at Shining, yet it faltered when Queen Novo looked right at her. Proud, magenta eyes met hers, and Twilight had the distinct feeling her friends had retreated, leaving her alone to stand before this bird-of-prey-like Queen.

“Oh, another of her students?” said Novo haughtily. “Hah! Well, I hope your questions are nowhere as intrusive as that last one’s. What was her name… Sunrise? Her mane was about as incendiary as her impudence…” She shook her head. “Anyways, pleasure to meet you, Miss…?”

Twilight gulped. “Twilight. Twilight Sparkle, Your Majesty. I’m a librarian.”

‘Why’d you say that, Twi’? No, no, no explain–’

“A librarian?” General Skybeak said. “Splendid. Have you got any books to recommend, Miss Sparkle? My daughter won’t stop pestering me for new ones. She’s a very curious soul.”

“So you told me, General,” said Shining, chuckling. “They could use a few more books, you know, Twi’. Of course, they’d need to be specially enchanted…”

“Why’s that?” Applejack said, frowning.

“Ahem, that is classified information, I fear,” Skybeak said, looking sternly at Shining. “All I’m at liberty to say is, the area hippogriffs currently inhabit has, ah, adverse effects on paper.”

“Oh, dear,” said Pinkie. “Is it the humidity? I heard hippogriffs live close to the equator.”

“… Yes,” Skybeak answered, though it sounded stiff. “Humidity. That’s what it is.”

Upon hearing this, Twilight’s ears perked up. “O-oh! Oh, alright, okay. Well, that’s great, I’ve got a few good books, made from paper spellbound to be particularly resistant to the elements. Where would you like to start?”

And so it went on, and Twilight’s thoughts moved away from Changelings.

She and her friends, she understood, would lack a practical role in the unfolding of this Convocation for the first few days. But the Bearers of Harmony must be witnesses to this momentous event, much as any delegate here was called to witness.

However, to Twilight, none of this counted so much as the mere joy of learning with her friends.

* * * * *

Only some time later, while Twilight and the five other Bearers concluded conversing with people whose faces hadn’t been seen anywhere else on Equus for years, Lyra Heartstrings was gearing herself to introduce herself and her beliefs about a myth unseen throughout the world for generations, to people she had never met.

“Madame Heartstrings,” said Sint Erklass. “Be well, we have faith in you.”

Lyra didn’t doubt his sincerity. Yet standing here backstage, carrying her copy of Ponyland: Fact or Fiction, her moment was soon come to present before the Convocation, and she wasn’t feeling it.

From between the Erklasses and Princess Luna, a tall grey earthpony emerged, her eyes covered by her goggles.

“Curb your anxieties, Madame Heartstrings,” said the earthpony. “I comprehend them. So long had I grown accustomed to be seen this way, that very nearly did I doubt mine courage, when time came for me to stand unveiled.”

Lyra did not recognise her. Until she did. “... Galatea?”

The earthpony’s lips twitched.

“Well deduced. As you can see, I’m bestowed with more than one means of going unnoticed.”

Sint Erklass strode towards her. Still she stood there, firm and unmoving, even now that her form as a regular pony made her much shorter than the massive stag.

He looked her over. Before, faintly, he smiled at her.

“Then that is your name,” Sint Erklass said. “Greetings, Galatea.”

Galatea nodded cursorily. “Guardian of Joy,” she stated, lifting her goggles. “Now you know. But while I am wearing this guise, you should no longer call me that.”

“What should we call you, then, Sister?” frowned Luna.

Lyra thought he saw a flicker of uncertainty cross Galatea.

“Shale,” the grey earthpony finally said. “Call me Shale. It’s a name the pink one came up with… Said I remind her of her own sister...” She pulled out a tin box, profferings its contents. “We had a birthday party without you, Guardian. But there was cake left.”

Chuckling, Sint Erklass delicately reshut the lid. “Thank you. I think it’d mean more to you.”

“If you say so,” said Galatea. “When I met Celestia, I pledged I’d supply answers upon communication with Captain Reiner. The locket’s theft threw this plan out of kilter. Still, I informed the Captain that I was one reason he was here. When his memory waned, I coaxed it.”

“But, you’re not the reason he’s here, are you?” said Lyra. “That was your other-self.”

Galatea hesitated. “That can be explained later. Someone else wants to see you.”

To Lyra’s glee, Bonbon trotted up to her.

“I know your ‘tells’,” Bonbon smirked. “When you’re nervous, you crumple up your forehooves. I guess you’re trying to make a fist or something. Break a leg, honey.”

She quickly popped Lyra a kiss for luck. It made Lyra smile. In the background, she heard Galatea conversing still with Sint Erklass.

“... Asked what you should call me… But I wonder if I could ever call you Grandfather…”

Then the moment was upon them., as Celestia called her. Lyra left Bonbon to watch in the wing, while she took to the stage, before the delegates of Equus.

“Good afternoon, everycreature,” Lyra began. She addressed them in Common, with her best Upper Canterlot accent brought out for the occasion. “My name is Lyra Heartstrings…”

The specifics of her speech would later blur with every other time she had delivered this lecture, like she had only days ago to Princess Celestia and the Bearers before a hospital bed in Ponyville. Yet as she told the delegates about Howie Waggoner’s ill-fated expedition to the Sunken Dream Valley, the sinking of the Nellie and the treasures it held, asking of the world’s to help her trace this precious heritage of the world’s history, Lyra did not crumple her forehooves once.

* * * * *

“You should’ve been there,” Ember was saying that evening, casually resting against the cage, her legs crossed and arms folded.

Garble snarled viciously, causing the Changeling standing watch to recoil. Ember had asked if she could chat with her currently imprisoned bodyguard, and there wasn’t much the Changeling could say to deny her.

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Garble muttered, gritting his teeth.

Audaciously, Chrysalis had managed to bring in a caged dragon right under everyone’s noses. When Ember had asked, Chrysalis had merely said that if anyone enquired, she’d tell them Garble was suffering from ‘the disease of ignorance’.

“Come on, Garble,” Ember chided gently, holding up the gem she’d brought. “They went through the trouble of getting food for everyone. And they’ll be expecting me back at dinner. Any idea how hard it was to find a good ruby that hadn’t been pinned to some fancy dress?”

His only reply was to blow smoke, parted by the wire-mesh.

Shaking her head, Ember looked around Chrysalis’ quarters. Their layout wasn’t much different from her own, but even in the short while since they’d got here, the Queen had already settled in. All of them had. Ember wondered who’d left a sizeable number of pillows in her room.

These quarters, on the other hand, were moist, dripping and covered in wax, which filled the air with a green tinge. Ember had taken care not to step in any, but at this rate, the next time she came here, she might as well fly across the room. The only thing that still looked remotely like furniture was the bed and, of course, the dog-crates. The Timberwolves were currently asleep. She didn’t like to think what the damp atmopshere would do to their fur.

The Changeling on watch drew up beside her, his green aura towing a mop and another, empty crate the same size as the one currently occupied by Garble.

“Alright, that’s the Timberwolves sorted, now it’s time to make him switch for the night,” the Changeling spoke up. “Excuse me, Highness.” He pointed with the mop at the spare crate. “Would you be so kind to put the ruby inside?”

Shrugging, Ember rolled the gem into the crate, while Garble merely huffed.

“How much longer’s he gonna be in there?” said Ember.

“He’s… in there right until he gets his shot. Queen’s orders.”

“Pity,” Ember said, not meaning it. “He’s missing out on a lot. Did you get to hear what Celestia was talking about?”

“Um... no?” the Changeling answered slowly. “I was… uh, guarding your friend.”

“We’re not friends,” Ember said, with a dismissive little wave. “I guess you could say that you were guarding my… guard.”

“Excuse me, I’ve got to do this,” said the Changeling, wheezing as he pushed the spare crate to connect with Garble’s crate, bridging the two. “Mind… mind helping me make him move?”

“How?” asked Ember. “His door’s still down, you know.”

Without a word, the Changeling jumped atop the occupied crate, mop balanced on his back, and flicking his horn, unlocked the clasps which held the wire-mesh in place.

“It’s designed to come off,” he explained, sliding the mesh upwards. “If you know how.”

Before Ember could reply, she heard angry thumping from where Garble was being held.

“You’re a buncha fools,” snarled the red drake, “if you think I’m gonna move from one cage to another, just for one dumb ruby!”

The Changeling sighed. “I’m sorry…” he whispered. “I really, really don’t want to do this…”

Ember saw him press his forehoof upon a depression in the crate’s obsidian surface. Her ears picked up a buzz and crackle from within – and a pained yelp, rapidly followed by scrambling ‘bump’ that rocked the previously-empty crate.

“Static electricity,” the Changeling said, as he slid the mesh back down, locking its clasps to the new crate’s opening. “Causes a strong itching sensation.”

All Ember could do was shudder. Truly, Queen Chrysalis had a knack for bringing others to heel.

Heaving, the drone pulled the crates apart. While the green wax covering the floor provided a helpfully slippery surface, he was visibly finding it a strain to tug an obsidian crate occupied by a ten-stone dragon. A dragon who still seethed at this treatment, as Ember saw when Garble’s face came back into view, eyes behind the wire staring at her with loathing.

“So,” the Changeling said, suddenly, startling Ember. “What was it like?”

“What was what like?”

“Um, the, uh, meeting,” the Changeling clarified hurriedly. “You were going to… uh…” Seeing Ember look taken aback, he paused. “Here, uh... “ He dropped the mop. Using a forehoof, he began chipping away at the wax Ember had carefully avoided. “I can sweep his cage later. Let’s… let’s talk.”

He was creating a space for her to sit in. Ember hadn’t really paid him attention before, but now she gave him a closer look.

“Do I know you?” she asked, frowning.

“Um… we’ve… we’ve met.”

Ember noticed the little drone’s eyes dart towards Garble, and it struck her. She hadn’t been able to distinguish the drone before. Changelings looked so alike. But she did now.

“Ah. Yeah.” Ember said. “Last time I saw you, you were pretending to be him.”

This was said with a nod towards Garble, who glared back, his ruby still untouched.

“What makes you think I wanna talk? Especially with you?” Ember said snidely. “If you’ll recall, I almost tore your head off.”

Hit by her stinging remark, the Changeling wiped his brow nervously. Ember suspected it was a gesture he’d picked up elsewhere, though. Changelings didn’t sweat.

“W-well, do you…” he mumbled. “D’you have someone else to talk to?”

Caught by surprise, Ember almost reeled back. “What in the Chaoskämpfer’s sacred fire are you on about? Of course I’ve got people to talk to. Lots of people.” She gestured her thumb at Garble. “Him, for starters.”

Garble snorted mockingly, teeth clicking against the wire-mesh.

“Oh…” said the Changeling. “I… I thought you hated talking to him, and you only did because… because you had no-one else.”

Ember peered at the odd little drone.

Now she thought about it, this was actually the third time she’d seen him. The first had been when he’d tried play-acting Garble at the campfire. But the second had been very short – just him staring at her, right after Chrysalis had caged Garble.

“You’re wasting your time, roach,” Garble said with a leer, making the Changeling jump. “She thinks she’s too good for you. Heck, she thinks she’s too good for dragons. Comes with being a Princess.”

The Changeling drone was quivering on the spot. All of a sudden, a feeling of anger surged in Ember. An image came back to her, of this same drone, frightened, her claws around his neck. She had hesitated. Garble wouldn’t have.

“The Princess will speak with who she pleases,” Ember snapped. “At least he’s offering, even if he’s just a roach. You haven’t even touched your food.”

“Oh, you wanna talk?” sneered Garble. “You got it, Your Highness. From now on, I’m gonna gab your ears off. And he can’t leave his post, or he’s gonna be in trouble. Think Chryssie would make us share a cage?”

The anger just kept boiling, until she caught sight of the Changeling furtively bobbing his head. By following his movement, Ember saw that Garble’s new crate was covered by a rolled-up tarp. Catching his drift, she reached out for the tarp, and pulled it down.

Just as she’d hoped, it muffled Garble’s indignant cry. This was, after all, designed to conceal the noises made by rowdy, anxious hounds – and now, a dragon.

“There. He’s not here,” said Ember.

And the Changeling burst out giggling.

Ember hadn’t known Changelings could laugh. Well, Chrysalis laughed often. But she was the Queen. Drones only ever wore expressions of bland malice. Didn’t they?

“Okay, he’s not here,” the Changeling agreed. “Thank goodness. I’ve no idea how come I got stuck guarding him. Ah, must be the Queen’s idea of a joke… He’s secure as he’s going to be.”

“Probably,” Ember agreed airily. “Knowing Chrysalis.” She sat down. “Now, you said you wanted to hear all about it?”

The Changeling sat beside her. “Yes, please.”

Much of what Ember had gleaned was built from assumption and speculation, from hearsay between the other delegates and what she’d heard herself. Therefore, initially, her words came out as a string of events.

As she continued, however, they began to form a coherent narrative. Celestia had stated the matter would be presented little by little, yet the first day alone had been overwhelming. Before anyone could raise a question, the Princess had already decided to turn to the root of it all –the very existence of humans.

It was a meeting that ended rather suddenly. Barely an hour had passed, Celestia only taking a few questions before calling the day off. There was a nagging feeling in Ember, though, that Celestia had ended it early to let them settle. Before the truly game-changing revelations. Whatever those were...

Or, as Chrysalis had sneered, knowing how Celestia worked, the Princess expected them all to make friends. Ember couldn’t help but agree with her. Yet here she was, sitting down with a Changeling of all people, talking freely.

“It’s pretty absurd,” Ember concluded, yawning. “But we’ll see what it’s all about, I guess.”

The Changeling has been listening intently. “I see. Sounds like, um… something, I think.”

The poor drone was out of his depth, obviously, and Ember wondered what went on in his mind without a Queen to lead him on.

“... So, why does she keep Garble in this room anyway?” Ember asked idly. “Isn’t she all… you know, about quarantine?”

“It’s so she can mock him whenever she wants,” said the Changeling, quite candidly. “Furthermore, the Queen wishes to minimise the risk to others who haven’t taken their shot.”

“... You don’t actually believe what Chrysalis said, right?”

“I can’t leave my post,” he said, but there was a pause which Ember thought indicated hesitation. “You can come in to check on him. But I must be guarding your… guard.”

Ember snickered. “Got you there, hah!” she said triumphantly. “Okay, fine, I’ll let you be... we’ve got days and days ahead here.”

She strode over to the doorway, skirting around the green wax on the floor. Before she left, however, she shot the Changeling a final look.

“What did you say your name was, again?”

“I… I didn’t–”

“Yeah,” Ember said. “Which is why I’m asking now.”

“... It’s, it’s Thorax.”

“Huh,” Ember remarked. It was, like most Changeling names, pretty simple to remember. “See you around, Thorax.”

“Take care… Your Highness,” Thorax replied. For a moment, Ember thought she saw the faintest hint of a smile on that inexpressive, chitinous face.

Of course, as she shut the door behind her, she lingered briefly. Long enough to hear a most curious exchange, although she shrugged it off as easily as the day turns to night, before retiring to her own quarters afterwards.

“You know you still ain’t got no chance with her, right?”

“Okay.”

“... ‘Okay’?”

“I know.”

* * * * *

Night came to the Hall of Unity, one night heralding many.

At the Watchtower, Fluttershy reclined by a windowsill, feeling the breeze run through her willowy mane, the light of the Moon shining upon her face. She tried not to look down. So long as she didn’t look down, she could understand what other pegasi saw in the horizons, that vast majesty where mountain peaks and night sky became one.

She’d snuck away from her sleeping friends for this night-time meeting. Dash was going a little stir-crazy over secluding herself in the Watchtower, but Pinkie and Twilight were both caught in excited anticipation, each for their own reasons. And Rarity and Applejack, for once, had found common ground, giddy over all they could write to their little sisters about the Twelve Families.

How odd to think she was the one doing some work, tasked by Celestia to direct her animal friends as a makeshift staff for the Hall.

“Well, I guess we’re here, too...” she whispered. “Aren’t we?”

From above popped a draconic, mad-eyed face, hanging upside-down.

Discord laughed. “Yes, we are,” he said mirthfully. “But don’t worry about it, sweet Flutters. Our parts don’t come until much later, after all the talking. Let Tia handle the workload.”

Fluttershy nodded, humming. “You’re sure she’ll ask you to go to Earth? You’re still weakened from your fight with the Krampus...”

“She will.” He grinned. “Discord at half-power’s still Discord.”

In the distance, she spotted the silhouette of Luna, finishing her rounds. She thought the Princess was carrying something.

Craning his upside-down neck to look, Discord saw it too. “Lavender,” he commented. “Luna renews it every night. Does the same in Canterlot.”

“What for?”

“Eh, says it helps ‘em sleep peacefully.”

“Oh,” Fluttershy whistled. “That’s so thoughtful.” She looked up, past him. “But what’s all the mistletoe for, then?”

“To honour Sint Erklass? Peace and goodwill, all that.” Discord shrugged. “Fellow’s too ‘holly-jolly’ for my tastes. Yet in the old days, mistletoe did stand for peace and friendship.”

He slid down slightly, the light revealing the mistletoe steam held coiled in his tail.

“I rather prefer the modern interpretation, though.” He sniggered, before closing his eyes, lips puckering expectantly.

Smiling, Fluttershy took his head in her hooves, still-upside-down, and gave him that kiss.

~ Day 2 of the Convocation ~ Eleventh Day of the Month of Rophon ~

Rosey-fingered Aurora stretched her palm across the horizon. Thus many an ancient epiphet would describe the morning dawn.

Unlike the majority of the ancient sayings and legends he’d become involved with in his time, Prince Abraxas could not be certain as to what extent such a personification of the Aurora had its roots in the living, breathing firmaments of his world. Princess Celestia and Princess Luna were known to move the Sun and Moon on their trek across Equestria and beyond. This was indeed known by all. But that there may be a carrier of the Aurora, just as ponies were the crafters and artisans for myriad little elements of the natural world…

Well, if a carrier of the Aurora there was, theirs was a mystery yet to be unveiled.

“Greetings, Candid,” said a voice he’d long yearned to hear again.

Abraxas did not, in fact, turn from the balcony, the topmost point of the Hall where this meeting had been agreed to take place, yet he had no need to. Keep his feelings to himself though he may, his visitor would know how welcome their presence was.

“And greetings to you, Cunning,” Abraxas replied, permitting himself just a tiny smile.

They spoke in Old Ponish, which few who might eavesdrop on them would have understood.

“I heard you had guests,” said Spell Nexus, moving into the periphery of Abraxas’ line-of-sight, casually resting his forehooves upon the balcony railing. “Many guests, actually…” He smiled, most wanly. “Please, do not think I make light of your troubles, my friend,” he said, that smile faintly diminishing. “You saw you were not alone in the Public Assembly. The threat of the Storm King is familiar to many… And, devoted as you showed yourself to come here, I dare not imagine how much it must weigh on your mind, being away from Farasi when so many troubles continue to blight it…”

“The abada and kelpie princes shall handle the Grootslang,” Abraxas said quietly. “I have faith in Barbelo and Aeon. They have the willpower for this task, even if they are two princes short.”

“Ah,” said Nexus. “Then your little brother is off doing his own thing, again?”

“Braze does care for Farasi,” Abraxas sighed, “but I fear he loses sight of how a land and its people are intrinsically bound together… Nevertheless, I feel he missed out on something. A visit from Lord Discord to a Casabronco dance-club would’ve been to his taste…”

“So would the sights and sounds of the Convocation, I’d have thought,” noted Nexus, adjusting his Archmage’s hat and robes absent-mindedly. “Things have just kept happening lately, starting from when Miss Twilight turned up in my office as I was dealing with a smoke-bomb incident…”

Though Abraxas knew better than to ask, he could wryly picture the scene. Curious it was, that where his patience was limited for these antiques from the likes of Discord or Braze, he tended to look more fondly upon similar anecdotes related to Celestia’s Headmaster.

“But that is what you wished to talk about,” said Abraxas, “was it not? A matter of the unknown glyphs given to you by Princess Celestia’s student.”

Spell Nexus’ demeanour grew more business-like. “Indeed, yes”, he agreed, pulling from within his robes a scroll, which he began to unroll. “Glyphs, or should I say, runes. That’s what Twilight called them.”

In the unicorn’s aura, the scroll of parchment opened to reveal an elegant sketch of symbols. Leaning away from the railing, Abraxas squinted at the symbols.

Something felt familiar about them.

“What are these?”

“A thing I reckoned that I should tell you about,” said Nexus, “before you and everyone else sees the human with their own eyes today.”

Abraxas looked up at him. “Who else has seen these? How do they connect with the human?”

“Believe it or not,” Nexus chuckled softly, “those two questions go together. I’m actually the only pony for now, probably, who’s seen these runes without meeting the human yet. Twilight told me they were tattooed to his body.”

“Tattooed…” Abraxas repeated in whisper. “Yes…”

Nexus gave him a concerned look. “You’ve seen those before?”

“Not I,” Abraxas shook his head. “But I’ve heard of such markings. My grandfather spoke of runes like these, linked to the sorcery of the Saddle Mareabians, back in those days when Farasi lay under their heel…”

“The Saddle Mareabians,” Nexus said with a frown, rolling up the scroll. “I see. And you think those might be the markings your grandfather spoke of?”

“I cannot be sure,” Abraxas acknowledged. “The old stallion was a child then.”

“Hm,” Nexus murmured. “Princess Celestia is aware my own research into Canterlot’s archives has turned up precious little so far. I must look further afoot if I’m to find out more, and this may mean approaching the Saddle Mareabian delegates… Which I fear might have to wait a few days. Relations between Equestria and Saddle Mareabia have been a bit shakey, as of late.”

Abraxas snorted at that. “I’d be lying if I said that I felt sorry for House al-Husan and their run-in with Princess Celestia.”

He recalled, not without satisfaction, when the first rumours on the wind had reached Farasi of Celestia’s arrest of the Court Sorcerer. In a sea of troubles, this news had been cause for a moment’s elation. Alhough he felt guilt in taking joy at the misfortune of others, it eased Abraxas’ soul that misfortune hadn’t been Farasi’s sole lot since the passage of the Storm King.

“I heard there was a little commotion in Ponyville last year,” Abraxas said, seeking to veer his mind onto a different course, “which nearly spoiled the Saddle Mareabian delegates’ visit?”

“The business with the Alicorn Amulet, it was, yes,” Nexus stated, raising an eyebrow at him. “Another old artefact which could be dangerous in the wrong hooves. If it were in someone other’s keep than Princess Celestia, I’d have said the Stonecarvers should make a move for it.”

“A challenge I can imagine our newest member would relish, Cunning,” said Abraxas, tapping his forehooves to the floor. “Though I’ve not yet had the pleasure to meet the adventurer for myself. I only know she thought it prudent to leave one or two artefacts, collected from her past exploits, in the care of one my subjects living abroad…”

“The zebra of the Everfree,” Nexus nodded. “I’ve read the same correspondences as you, remember, Candid?”

“Of course. Forgive me, this does sometimes slip my mind,” Abraxas sighed quietly. “It has been too long, and there have been too many worldly concerns.” A frown began to shadow his brow. “Now that I think about it… Considering what the Court Sorcerer was arrested for, when I know his chief wife was standing this close to Zecora’s doorstep during her state visit… I cannot help but question the wisdom of lending my subject the Half-Gilded Horseshoe of Sunflare, capable as it is of opening the Spirit Circle…”

There were many, many matters which the Council of the Stonecarvers involved themselves with, but none approached the trepidation of matters pertaining to the necromantic arts. Arts which, to Abraxas’ shame, his own brother had shown morbid interest in, though Braze knew nought of Abraxas’ place amongst the Stonecarvers.

“I’m sure Miss Yearling knows what she’s doing,” smiled Nexus. “She is not foolhardy.”

“I’d like to judge that for myself, Cunning,” Abraxas said gravely, “particularly as she seems to think nothing of publishing her adventures under the guise of fiction. Including that which touches upon us and our secrets.”

“Using aliases, mind you.”

“Hm. For our names. Not so much our given titles,” said Abraxas. “But I trust your word, as I trust the vouching of the Caring, and the Starry-Eyed One, and the others of our Council.” He gazed out unto the morning skies. “Had the Storm King not destroyed the Misfortune Malachite, I can believe Miss Yearling is the one who’d have got it back, after all these years. Ah, had she only brought back the luck of Farasi…”

They began their march back towards the stairs.

“Be of good faith, my friend,” Nexus said, slapping his back. “While I’ve still got research to do, what comes of today’s meeting may herald a new dawn for Equestria and the world.”

* * * * *

After all she’d striven for, Grizelda found herself lost for words at last. Humans, the Thirteenth Family. She couldn’t deny it filled her with curiosity, yet it brought pause to all she’d planned for. Here they stood, her people’s chosen few, waiting to be ushered into the dining-hall – an outlandish tradition, accustomed as she was to open air and yurts. But one she’d have to get used to, she suspected, once Griffonstone was hers and her people united at last.

“Something troubles you, Your Grace?” said Ironclaw.

The title remained foreign to her, even after she’d called for the throne of Griffonstone.

“No, not quite,” she replied. “But will this change anything, General?”

With their banners gathered after years of effort, she owed much to the veteran general. She had questioned it at first. Why would a famed mercenary pledge his sword to her cause, not seek the throne himself? His answer had never changed through the past four years. He’d found a warrior, a leader, and a brave soul. Any ambitions he’d held for the throne had dimmed as he got on in years.

While she’d had her doubts, it was through his wisdom that she now stood at the head of thirty-thousand griffons – travellers and warriors, bakers and traders, although only a sixth were under her direct guidance. The rest, scattered yet united in their hearts, had chosen her as leader. And many more, she hoped, would pledge their allegiance in the years to come.

In time, Griffonstone would prosper once more, with her at the heart of it.

And yet it was when they were so close to marching on Griffonstone that the Concordia Maxima called upon her.

Part of her wished she hadn’t been chosen by a far-off call from a distant land. Yet another part hoped this mythical call would further her credence, and she would be Pretender no more, but the Queen in Griffonstone.

“We shall see what happens, Your Grace,” said Ironclaw, echoing her thoughts.

The dining-hall’s doors opened, and in the pair strode.

Great and welcoming was the dining-hall, its walls decorated by carved wood, the floors paved with marble, topped off by dining tables covered in cloth. Her people remained outside, as did the others, for only the leaders were invited in. No matter. When she sat the throne, she would ensure prosperity followed, her longhall open to all griffons. Gone then would be the days of windblown tents and decrepit homes. Griffonstone would rise.

At the very least, her entourage had much to pick from the food-stalls outside, even if they’d have to pay money for it – exotic cuisine ranging from the finest of Canterlot to Farasi. She too had brought the finest the griffons could offer. The tinmaker Wolfram, one of her own and more, was also a skilled baker.

Yet even with Ironclaw by her side, apprehension filled her mind as they took seats at their pre-alloted table. Grizelda glanced around.

The dozen or so round-tables in the hall were arranged in a few staggered rows, presenting the image of irregularity. One by one, they were filled by various delegates, one table for each nation, but set as close neighbours. She saw the two Minotaurs sitting close to the Dog Queen, the Night Princess showing the Snow Maiden to her seat, the Sun Princess speaking with a hippogriff…

“Don’t mind me,” said a youthful, brash voice.

And Grizelda looked over her shoulder for the speaker. She was met with a blue dragon, who was sitting alone, her elbows resting on an empty table

“Sorry,” the blue dragon shrugged. “All the other tables were full.”

Reflexively, Ironclaw reached for a flintlock that wasn’t there. Grizelda shot him a sharp, if undecided look. He’d told her many times before that of all the raiders he and his warriors faced, none challenged them more than dragons.

There one sat. Small, vulnerable and yet, brought here too.

“Easy, General,” Grizelda whispered. She turned to the blue dragon. “You must be the Dragon Lord’s daughter. Well, I cannot blame you for the seating arrangments. Practical joke of Celestia’s, I shouldn’t wonder. You stick in your corner, we’ll stick in ours.”

The blue dragon might have retorted, if this wasn’t when, just to liven things up, Queen Chrysalis chose to appear, her young Harlequin ward in tow.

“Aaaah, I see Ember’s found our table, Papillate. Excellent! Wonderful, just wonderful.”

The blue dragon blinked. “What? But…” Horrified, she swept up the place-card, looking it over.

Grizelda’s eagle-like sight allowed her to read what Ember had only now spotted. The table next to the griffons’ had been reserved for both dragons and Changelings.

“No way,” groaned Ember.

Privately, Grizelda agreed with her. Especially as Chrysalis’ gaze fell upon Grizelda, and her mischievous smirk widened.

“Good morning, Young Pretender. How nice to see you here.”

Another voice replied before Grizelda’s. “Good morning to you as well, Queen Chrysalis.”

When Grizelda saw who it belonged to, it finally gave her some relief. One more empty table waited close by, but its occupants were arriving. Queen Novo, flanked by her trusted advisor and brother-in-law, General Skybeak.

“And to you, Queen Grizelda,” added Novo.

Somehow, it eased Grizelda to see herself mirrored in the Hippogriffian Queen and General. She placed a placating talon on Ironclaw, and his shoulders relaxed.

“My title is not yet earned, Queen Novo, but I thank you. Let’s be ready for this banquet.”

With this motley assembly shooting each other wary glances left and right, all took their seat without another word. The Harlequin, Papillate, had brought a footrest on her back. Servile, she placed it at Chrysalis’ hooves.

A dragon and Changelings didn’t make for ideal neighbours, but with hippogriffs also present, Grizelda saw the logic in Celestia’s seating arrangments. They were the omnivorous Families of Equus, stacked together into a corner. It would spare them discomforted stares from herbivores if meat was served.

This breakfast just might be peaceful. And what a breakfast it was.

It took most of Grizelda’s self-discipline not to let her beak hang, as the workers of the Hall, mostly domesticated animals, brought such a feast as neither she nor Ironclaw had ever seen. Exotic delights and beverages in silver trays, composed of colours and flavours from all four corners of this world.

Fish and vegetable, bread and fruit of all sorts in tray-carts, for them to choose from.

Grizelda even noticed some who weren’t ponies nor animals amongst the serving-staff, including from her own griffons. Celestia must have meant this as a surprise, covertly co-opting a few of those in the crowd who knew how to cook.

She recognised Wolfram’s stout and hefty build approach. Pushing up his tray-cart, the fat tinmaker smiled nervously as he presented her with her own feast – cooked in butter, a grey fish that she didn’t know the name of, but smelled delicious nonetheless.

“Thank you, Wolf,” she said gently, with a smile as queenly as she could make it.

Her Wolfram, the poor soul, stammered and mumbled something, then gave her a respectful nod before hurrying off. One of these days, she’d have to show Princess Celestia his tinmaking skills. Perhaps the Reindeer as well, to prove that her people’s artisanship continued to thrive. Not to mention his baking. These days, a griffon often took on more than one trade, out of necessity.

There would be time to talk. For now, she would enjoy this breakfast. Delicately, she handled the unfamiliar tools in her grasp. Ironclaw had given her a brief rundown on what to do at a dining table, but also confided he’d never cared much for the etiquette.

The fish, by all appearances, was larger than any fish she’d caught in the desert ponds. Much too large for these knives, these forks. But to her benefit, the fish had already been cut in an odd little pattern that reminded her of a chessboard.

Picking up a piece in her claw, she bit into it.

It was an odd, unfamiliar taste, and it threatened to overwhelm her. Savoury, salty, different from the rough-cut fish served in the few coastal griffon settlements. A far cry from the rodents, rabbits and hardy scones she’d grown used to in the desert.

She let the taste settle. Foreign, an assault on her senses... this was something she needed to enjoy while it lasted. She swallowed, and took another, larger bite of the delicacy.

“General,” Grizelda said, pausing to let Ironclaw swallow too. She remembered her manners. “We ought to give our thanks to whoever made this… delicacy.”

“Very well, Your Grace,” said her General. As far as she could tell, he too liked his meal.

Yes, they’d enjoy this stay, indeed.

She looked around to the neighbouring tables. The Dragon Lord’s daughter was greedily tucking into her gemstone pile with every crack and bite. Queen Chrysalis, unusually, had been quietly sipping from a bowl of porridge together with the silent Papillate. Queen Novo and General Skybeak, meanwhile, had settled for the most seasoned hay-and-flower dish Grizelda had seen.

When all were done, their plates emptied and bellies full, Grizelda turned to Queen Novo.

“Queen Novo, General Skybeak,” said Grizelda. “What news is there of the Storm King?”

That brought silence, and curious glances. Good, Grizelda thought. She had their attention. At least, the ones that’d bother listening to her.

General Skybeak furrowed his brows. Novo’s expression was scrutinous.

“Day by day, his forces encroach upon our waters and Abyssinia’s, and Hippogriffia… does not have the strength it once did, long ago,” said General Skybeak. “As my Queen said before, like the Abyssinians, we fear that if left unchecked, the Storm King’s plans may present a threat to the world as we know it.”

“Yes, truly,” added the Queen. “I understand Celestia’s urgence, but in all honesty, there are matters that concern us in our own corners of the world. And I fear this is one problem too many for us to handle alone.”

Skybeak darted a quick glance to the other side of the room.

“It’s those damn Kirin’s fault,” he muttered, so only his neighbours could hear. “Making under-the-counter deals all the time… Oh, they’ve given themselves a pretty alibi. But you mark my words, when the Storm King invades Abyssinia, most of their businesses will have ‘conveniently’ moved out of the country.”

Ironclaw was staring at Grizelda, looking uneasy. She understood his feelings. While she had no great love for Kirin, her General’s mercenary business made an ideal testing-ground for them to try out new-fangled devices such as flintlocks.

“So it’s true?”

Of everyone at the tables, the Dragon Lord’s daughter was the last she’d expected to hear speak.

“The Storm King, making deals with the Kirin?” whispered Ember. She shook her head. “Those nefarious old geezers… I couldn’t get outta the Mikado’s Court fast enough.”

Involuntarily, Grizelda snorted with laughter. “What’s that? A dragon, playing house with the Mikado?”

“You should show Ember more respect,” spoke Chrysalis. To Grizelda’s astonishment, the Changeling sounded quite serious. “As Tia said yesterday, Kirin and dragons are of the same Family, remember? She was Prime Minister Kuno’s ward.”

Here, she patted Papillate on the head, provoking a blush.

“The delights of which I’ve only recently discovered, having a ward,” Chrysalis said cheerily, licking her lips.

“Regardless,” said Novo. “The Storm King’s threat can’t be ignored forever. Ten years it has been since we last crossed swords, and we have not seen a single hair of him. If we are to delay further on the issue, Celestia better have something of tremendous importance to show.”

“The discovery of the Thirteenth Family is not nothing,” pointed out Ironclaw. “Humans… How much do we know about them? Would they be our allies? Our enemies?”

“Hm,” said Novo. “Celestia and the Guardian of Joy seem hopeful...”

Grizelda saw movement at the doors. A hush fell over the room. “Speaking of which… I think we’re about to find out more.”

In the doorway stood Princess Celestia.

“Good morning, everycreature,” the Princess said genially. “Had a nice breakfast?”

The collective answer was generally positive.

“I’m glad,” smiled Celestia. “Now, if you would be so fine, I ask you to follow me, back to the Public Assembly. The time has come to greet the Thirteenth Family.”

Chrysalis smirked. “Stay close, Papillate,” she stage-whispered to her ward. “I promise they won’t hurt you.”

But she was intrigued, Grizelda could sense it. They all were, from the Mikado to the Queen of the Diamond Dogs, the Malikah to the Abyssinian Queen, as they shuffled in Celestia’s wake to the chamber.

Today’s meeting would be held behind closed doors. For once, the leading figures of Equus stood on the parquet, level with the stage.

Two people awaited them on that stage.

One was a little green unicorn, with golden eyes and an unkempt mane. Next to her was an unknown creature in a wheelchair.

Bipedal, smaller in stature than an adult Minotaur, yet closer to simian in appearance – this creature matched the descriptions from the ancient scrolls. The hairs on his head and chin were blond, and his forearms showed good muscle. How the rest of him looked, none could have said, as he was clad in an odd assortment that Grizelda thought resembled a camouflage pattern. She estimated that when he stood, he could have stared Celestia right in the eyes.

Eyes… Grizelda knew eyes. And there was something about his eyes.

* * * * *

Lyra swallowed, her grip tightening on the wheelchair handles.

“Easy, kid,” Alex said softly, with a weary smile. “You’re doing great. Let me do the talking, okay? At least for this part.”

Quietly, Lyra ran Princess Celestia’s directives through her head one more time.

‘It’s too early to explain about Redheart or the Empire. We need to ease them in. Under no circumstances should you mention the locket.’

She glanced towards the wings. Twilight, her friends and the Royals were all giving her encouraging smiles. Even Bonbon nodded benignly.

“Okay.” Lyra nodded back, willing herself to look onto an auditorium which held Diamond Dogs, and a dragon, and the Ebony Hive Queen.

Memories of a hypnotic glow, of her caught in a bridesmaid’s dress, rose up...

Alex patted her forehoof. “Trust me,” he whispered with understanding. “I know.”

Celestia stepped upon the stage, positioning herself perpendicular to Lyra and Alex.

“Delegates of Equus,” the Princess stated. “We are told that aeons ago, Firefly crossed the Rainbow Bridge. I remember that Firefly was old when we were young, my sister and I, during our childhood in Adlaborn. In her tale, she did not come back alone.” Celestia held out a wing in formal presentation. “Today, as it was then, a pony finds a human. Behold, Madame Lyra Heartstrings, and her find, the human Reiner.”

There was a calm, that ghastly calm interlude.

Equine ears flicked back, the flame in Prince Abraxas’s mane sparked, Kirin and Abyssinians narrowed their eyes, Diamond Dogs sniffed the air, Minotaurs stood stiff, and much more. Even Chrysalis looked nonplussed.

This last one actually comforted Lyra somewhat. Her deepest fear had been that Chrysalis would recognise her from the Royal Wedding.

‘Good. Let the evil hag feel uncomfortable for a change.’

It was an unlikely candidate who delivered the first question. A dark-brown griffon in a red cloak stepped forward.

“I am Grizelda,” announced the griffon. “Claimant to the throne of Griffonstone, Dame of the Redcloaks, and much else. I greet you, human. Tell me, do you carry a title?”

Alex shrugged modestly.

“Captain,” he said. “Military rank. Some call me ‘Commander’, but that’s just a silly, pretentious nickname that stuck. ‘Captain’ is fine.”

“A military title.” Grizelda smiled. “I did not expect that, least of all from Celestia. She claims you come from the mythical world, Earth. Is this true?”

“It is, yes. Until several years ago, I’d never even heard of Equus.”

“How did you get here?”

Alex glanced at Celestia, who said nothing. “It’s hard to explain… I’m not even sure myself. Honestly, it feels almost like an accident. Still, I’ve spoken with Celestia, and I do seem to remember seeing rainbows at some point.”

But Lyra suspected he couldn’t tell them the whole truth.

Ten days ago, as time flew on both worlds, Alex had been called to Boston.

A secret message had come from Amethyst Star, begging he meet her at the local portal-station. The trans-dimensional knowledge of Time Turner’s family was the PHL’s lone asset in matching the Solar Empire’s portal system. Which, as Alex was later to learn from Galatea, was the result of disassembling Discord for a power source.

No doubt about it, the Empire harnessed life itself.

A portal-station was an unconventional place for a meeting, yet no surprise from Amethyst. When not at her lab, where she slept half the time, she could be found at a portal.

The responsibilities of heading the PHL’s paramilitary wing, appointed by UNAC, continued to lie heavily on Captain Reiner since Defiance. He’d told himself it was the lesser evil, compared to letting men like the now-Brigadier General Robert Gardner direct resource management and technological development.

Someone had to do it. And it’d be a cold day in Hell before he let someone like Gardner have power over the PHL.

The net result was that it left him little time for summons, not when there were rogue HLF elements to keep under control, convoys to protect from the PER, or just the worrying prospect of a Second American Civil War, spurred on by said rogue elements. President Kaine’s insistence that it was the nation’s duty to hold onto democratic processes in 2024 had proven a double-edged sword.

The portal-station was situated at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum. In the manner of PHL operations, evacuating mankind’s legacy to hidden vaults had permitted them to co-opt vacated buildings for their ends. Call it propaganda, yet former museums made a good introduction to refugees from Equus.

As he entered, Alex had to allow himself a wry smile, despite another tense talk with Maxine. Talking to her was never easy before Washington, but after what happened to Agnes…

It was something, at least, to be in a building such as this. One that once held various manuscripts of Ernest Hemingway’s, including unused endings to A Farewell to Arms. Who knew how this war would end...

In the atrium, the glass-grid surface of the elevated pavillon loomed high above, but he did not halt to admire the void. Since the Library’s conversion into a way-station, practicality had taken over, and the concrete tower adjoining the pavillon wasn’t lit as it had been in peacetime. No need to make yourself an easy target. They hadn’t removed the huge suspended American flag, though. Typical. Of course the politicians chose to place a portal-station to the USA within an atrium pre-decorated by one of the largest Stars & Stripes in existence.

At the base of the concrete pillar, surrounded by its perimeter of PHL guards and medical staff, the portal lay dormant, a gateway to nowhere, awaiting the next contingent. Not for the first time, Alex’s mind conjured up Stargate.

“Captain Reiner,” said Amethyst, passing between two guards to meet him. “You’re here.” She checked her wrist-watch. “The portal’s scheduled for activation in fifty minutes. But I’m sorry, this couldn’t wait.”

“It’s alright, Specialist,” Alex said reassuringly. “I was told things were jam-packed ‘round here.”

Amethyst nodded glumly. “The Smith Hall’s full to burst with those needing medical assistance. Things have been getting uglier on Equus. Nurse Redheart’s doing all she can for first-aid… but that’s not why I asked you here.”

She had led Alex up the stairs, leaving the din behind them.

They’d checked in on the Smith Hall and its patients, briefly, yet soon she led him into the larger of two conference rooms, currently serving as her office. As Amethyst had notified, two other senior PHL figures waited patiently at the table. Them, and a third he knew well.

Cadance and Zecora sat on either side of Bonbon, whose head was bopping up and down. Oddly, Cadance didn’t seem too focused either, as if something lay on her mind. His heart tightened to see Bonbon. She still wore her silver wedding-band, and clutched the golden lyre.

Having greeted them, Alex took a seat opposite, while Amethyst joined the others.

“Alright,” Alex said quietly. “What’s this about?”

Amethyst consulted her wrist-watch again. “Captain,” she began. “Alex. I’m not sure how to put this. But… I think we’ve got... an answer.”

“An answer to what?”

“To…” Amethyst breathed in. “To how Celestia can possibly do this.”

It took him two heartbeats to reply. “… You’ve found out why she went crazy?”

“Oh... poor choice of words, sorry.” Amethyst said awkwardly, sharing a look with Zecora. “And yet… Something I’d forgotten has resurfaced.” She gently nudged Bonbon. “From her.”

Alex gazed remorsefully at the broken, moaning mare.

Every time he saw Bonbon, that terrible evening came back to him. The news of Ambassador Heartstrings’ capture aboard the Thunderchild, with the Imperials’ surgical strike at Reykjavik barely repelled at the cost of the valuable experimental ship, and losing the symbol of friendship between two worlds.

What was left of Bonbon was testimony to defeat. Too late to stop Lyra’s petrification and consequent shattering, Bonbon had barely been snatched away before the same fate befell her. Amethyst had never told him the full details of what happened. He assumed it had to do with her family’s knowledge of portals.

Alas, brute-forcing Bonbon’s passage, when her mind had already taken a blow from witnessing her wife’s execution, had done her sanity no favours. Yet it came with a curious, occasionally handy side-effect...

“Bonbon,” he said slowly, so as not to frighten her. “Did you see something?”

“Not where…” Bonbon gurgled. “Is when… All goods things comes in threes… Harmonious Trinity left to fill, atonement for Faustian bargain… This architectural pathology, an Empire grown fat, ripe for the bleeding… The Red Prince, Demiurge, blind Yaldabaoth thinks itself master of matter… From the Tohu wa-bohu it crafts, yet it won’t share knowledge.”

Cadance sighed. “Same as always, Alex. That’s all we can get out of her.”

“Captain Reiner, look sceptical if you must,” said Zecora. “Valuable news we learned earlier, in this you can trust.”

“Give her a minute, Cadance,” Amethyst said. “It’ll happen again. She promised.”

What would happen again, he wondered. That question was soon answered.

With little warning, a change came over Bonbon’s eyes. For years, they’d been misaligned, unstuck in time and perception. But now they aligned – and glowed white.

Amethyst held up a forehoof as Alex gasped. “Don’t be alarmed. I was expecting this.”

“Amethyst…” Alex murmured, keeping Bonbon in his sights. “What’s going on?”

“It’s complicated. A few nights ago, I received a message in my dreams… Or a place between dreams and awakening… Didn’t they use to say the Concordia’s Call works like that? But I remember finding myself on the Plane of Images… And this voice spoke to me.”

“A voice? Saying what?”

“My voice,” echoed someone from within Bonbon.

Bonbon’s voice it was not. It carried reverberation, and from what could be heard, it was too deep, too measured. Though somehow, unmistakeably female.

Alex half-stood, immediately wary. “Who are you? What are you?”

“Have no fear, Captain Rener. I come in Harmony. This means of communication is impractical, and I sense that it displeases you. Yet without safe passage to Earth, it was mine only option.”

He didn’t feel like sitting back down. “That isn’t an answer. And the last time someone said they came in Harmony–”

“Mine own sisters never knew of me. But in this exceptional situation, I’ll make an exception. Whether you believe me is your choice. I’m Galatea. I am an alicorn.”

“Did you choose to come here?” said Grizelda. “Or was it an accident?”

Alex smiled crookedly, as his smiles had become in recent years. “I think it depends on how you look at it. Ever since I learned another world existed, well, one full of intelligent– or sapient, I think that’s the right word? Ahem. When I learned there was this alien world, my first thought was how much I wanted to see it.”

Grizelda contemplated him with one eye, eagle-like. “But are you an explorer?”

There it was. Alex collected himself. “No,” he said simply. “I am… a soldier.”

He noticed Lyra whet her lips, as some in the crowd muttered with consternation. But the Pretender Grizelda smiled thinly.

“That is the straightest answer you’ve given so far.”

Naturally, one of the first things Alex had registered was that Cadance looked miffed to learn there was another alicorn – a greater alicorn – while she was still a pegacorn. Certainly, they only had a mad oracle’s word to rely on. Yet the guaranteed steadfastness of Zecora and Cadance helped him believe what Bonbon spouted. This wasn’t a new manifestation of Bonbon’s curious condition. This was different.

An alicorn unknown to Celestia or Luna, was what Galatea had called herself. Living in secrecy for millennia, while the Royal Sisters had made themselves known on that Hearthswarming three-thousand years ago. Not that Galatea, who identified as a keeper of memories, chose to step forward until she’d felt a stigmatic response to the bloody, fiery death of Adlaborn and the Tree Atop the World.

Galatea had spoken, but it was Amethyst who gave the explanations, drawing on what she’d learnt from her dream-like conversations with the mysterious alicorn. Otherwise, Zecora and Cadance listened on, silently.

In less time than it seemed, Alex had learnt much about Galatea. Save for one thing.

“How can you help us?” he asked, eyes never leaving Bonbon’s illuminated, ghostly face.

A stranger’s voice spoke through Bonbon. “With mine only possession. Information. Knowledge.”

“Ma’am,” Alex said gruffly, pressing his palms on the table. “As a military commander, I’m never one to turn down intel… But in this war, unless you got information about the Barrier, I hate to say this, but information alone’s not gonna help much.”

“What if I told you I have precisely that?”

At that second, Alex thought his heart had stopped. “Say what?”

The glowing-eyed Bonbon bobbed her head serenely. “This is what I came to tell you,” she intoned in an echo. “In mine investigations, mine search to aid Equus, I uncovered what powers the Barrier.”

Amethyst flinched as Alex’s gaze darted to her.

“Did you know about this? Amethyst! Did you know?”

“Galatea told me, yes,” Amethyst said, in a careful tone. “Told me she knew. That’s all. Then she told me I should bring you, and Cadance and Zecora, to meet quickly.”

“Miss Star says so, and it is true,” Zecora nodded. “We know no more than you.”

“All Amethyst said was that it’s got to do with crystals,” said Cadance.

“Heed me, Captain Reiner,” said the voice of Galatea, resonating from Bonbon. “Heed me well. I’ve travelled mine world, under many guises, making associates out of lost and broken souls, in order to elucidate how Celestia could go so awry… and when that proved beyond mine grasp, I sought to uncover the truth of her Barrier. I found it.”

Pressing both forehooves together, the oracular mare lifted her head.

“The Barrier is powered by the Crystal Heart.”

“Although I wasn’t formally sent to represent my government,” said Alex. “I was entrusted with the authority to speak on their behalf. I am not here to make any challenges or declarations of war from Earth to Equus.”

“That’s a relief,” Grizelda noted snarkily. “But why would a soldier come here?”

“Well,” Alex began. “Guess they couldn’t find anyone better.”

That drew a few good-natured chuckles from the Public Assembly.

“... Now you see the scope of our tragedy,” Amethyst finished saying. “If the Barrier’s powered by the Crystal Heart, it’s powered by the feelings of love and devotion the Tyrant has built up in her Empire. Sly old creature… She knew positive emotions are more potent than negative ones.”

“To think she’d use love, real love, to such ends…” Cadance whispered. “It breaks me.”

“But that’s absurd,” Alex protested. “We know Newfoals are hollow shells. We know their emotions have poisoned the last remaining Changelings. How can…”

“Alex,” Amethyst said. “The facts don’t lie. When the Barrier started growing, there was only a small number of Newfoals in Equestria. Nearly all Slow Newfoals, as we know now. Their love alone couldn’t have kickstarted the Barrier.”

“If it consoles you, it’s likely that as more Newfoals were produced,” Zecora said, a forehoof on Bonbon’s shoulder, “through that too, one must assume the Barrier got a boost.”

“Yeah, that’s some real consolation,” Alex muttered. “Dunno, though. The Barrier’s been moving two miles a day since 2019… So maybe you’re wrong somewhere.”

“Maybe,” said Amethyst. “Yet not about this.”

It seemed to Alex that she glowed. Not a glow such as Bonbon’s eyes, but that of some inner fire.

“About what?”

Amethyst was smiling. “Captain…”

There was a knock on the door. Everyone in the room, apart from Bonbon, glanced around.

“I’d better take this,” said Cadance, nodding apologetically at Alex. “The staff at the Smith Hall said we’ve got a couple of tough cases.”

Amethyst consulted her wrist-watch. “We might be getting more soon, with the portal opening in ten minutes. You go check what it is, Cadance. I’ll finish briefing the Captain.”

“Alright.”

When Cadance went to the door, she was careful to open it ajar, so the person on the other side couldn’t see inside the conference room.

“Lady Cadance,” said a guard’s voice. “Your presence is urgently requested at the Smith Hall.”

Cadance momentarily shut the door. “Thought so.” She contemplated Bonbon. “I don’t like leaving Bonnie, but, Zecora, think you’ve got this?”

“While none can change that Miss Sugarbean’s mind is broken in two,” Zecora said sadly, “In my hooves she ought be as well-cared for as with you.”

“Thanks,” Cadance smiled. “I’ll be right back.”

No sooner had she left, with time running down until the portal’s opening, Amethyst Star launched into her plans. Despite the ghastly revelation of the Crystal Heart, she looked the giddiest in years.

“We can turn the hourglass, Alex,” Amethyst said fervently. “We can make this right.”

“Wait, you’re suggesting… time-travel?” Alex stared at her. “Amethyst, I’m sorry, but… even with magical ponies running around, that sounds like crazy talk.”

Amethyst shook her head. “Time-travel would be a horrible idea. I’m not sure we even could change the past. And if we could, we might just make things worse. But–”

“Then what’s this about ‘turning the hourglass’?”

“Sorry, Dad’s rubbed off on me,” Amethyst said, smiling wide. “Turn the hourglass, reverse the polarity, whatever you want to call it, don’t you see?” she gushed, a big grin spreading on her face, “All this time, the Barrier’s beat us back… Now, wecan beat itback.”

“What?” Alex gasped. “You’re saying we can destroy the Barrier?”

Amethyst’s smile faded a little. Just a little. “No… no, I’m sorry, I can’t promise that. But we can push against it. Make it stop moving. We can make it retreat!”

As the conversation with Galatea had gone on, Alex had been on the verge of sitting again. Now he found himself standing upright.

Did he dare hope?

He’d heard something from Viktor Kraber while he was lounging about the mess hall. Kraber had been reading a book aloud with Aegis. And he’d said, ‘To live without hope is to cease to live’. Could Alex argue with that? To ignore the slightest hope, to keep retreating would mean all but acknowledging they’d die. That there was nothing to be done.

No. He’d have none of that.

“Amethyst,” Alex said, counting his breaths. “What’s your grand idea?”

Unable to contain herself, Amethyst paced around her side of the table, nearly knocking over Zecora when the zebra tried to shield Bonbon. However, Zecora looked caught in her enthusiasm. And while Galatea did not speak through her again, Bonbon was quite calm.

“Amazing,” Amethyst said breathlessly. “It’s a chance, Captain. It’s terrible to hear what they’ve done with the Crystal Heart… but now I know! Now I know how they’re doing it! With that, I know how to change it!” She whooped for joy. “Eureka!”

Amethyst paused then, catching her breath. She fixed Alex with a stare, beaming.

“All I need... is your locket.”

Instinctively, Alex’s fingers went to the heirloom he always wore, right next to his dog-tags. “You…” he said, mouth agape. “What locket?”

She tittered. “Oh, come off it, Action Man. We’re friends. You don’t have to put on the tough-guy act ‘round here, we know the real you.”

“You don’t know–”

But he could not finish. Amethyst was still beaming at him.

“I don’t know about this,” Alex mumbled, addressing the hidden figure inside Bonbon. “I might be a head of the PHL’s military operations, but I’m not the unilateral boss of the damn army. I’ve got to answer my people, my superiors…”

“Captain Reiner,” Galatea spoke. “You are stalling.”

Her voice carried weight. As if his hands were moving of their own volition, Alex pulled the locket out from under his jacket, holding it on its chain, where all could see.

The glowing-eyed Bonbon seemed fascinated. “There it is.”

“It’s lined with citrine crystal, isn’t it?” breathed Amethyst. “Just what we need...”

Alex’s fist closed around the locket. “Amethyst… Why does it have to be my locket? Couldn’t you… use any crystal?”

“Captain” Amethyst said, with utmost sincerity. “Crystals are my field. Ever since I gave you those runic tattoos, a little of Equestria’s magic is imbibed in you. Maybe you wouldn’t survive long to magical exposure away from home, assuming the Tyrant didn’t lie… but in this controlled dosage, magic’s power is yours.”

“I know, why are you telling me this?”

Slowly, Amethyst neared him, from around the table. “Because I think you still don’t understand how our magic works. Listen to me, Alex. Your locket means something to you, a leader of men, comrade of Lyra Heartstrings. In your hands, with the crystal within, it’s as potent as the Crystal Heart. The fact it’s also heart-shaped is just a bonus.”

She enveloped his closed fist with her forehooves.

“We can create… not our own Barrier, but a counter to the Barrier,” Amethyst whispered. “Channeling the hearts of those who love us and our cause through your locket. Yes, it’d be like an arm-wrestling match. The Barrier’s too big to go down immediately... But it’d even the playing field. With the Barrier retreating, we can reclaim the lands you lost.”

With Zecora and Bonbon silhouetted in the background, Amethyst looked up at him.

“We’d fight fire with fire… where the fires would be the fire of love.”

“I wish to ask a question.”

When Alex saw who’d spoken, a sick feeling rose in his stomach, which he barely contained. He’d read about Changelings, heard of their victimhood by the Tyrant. But to see one in the flesh – the grinningly cadaverous, insect-like figure of Queen Chrysalis aroused no sympathy, only an instinctive repellence, even to his soldier’s eyes. Next to him, he felt Lyra stiffen up.

Alex kept his tone neutral. “Yes, what is it, Your Majesty?”

Without warning, Bonbon slammed her face upon the table, contorting, writhing in pain.

“Bonbon?” cried Zecora in alarm, as she reached for her. “What…”

But Bonbon’s convulsions were out of control. Her chair tipped over. The lyre she always carried slid from her grasp. A stray hindleg struck Zecora in the chest, leaving the zebra gasping. Twitching, groaning, froathing at the mouth, Bonbon fell to the floor.

“Bonbon!” shouted Alex, running up to her, Amethyst right behind him. “What’s the matter?”

And Bonbon, snapping her neck back, began screaming. Spittle was flying everywhere, her body racked with spasms.

Alex didn’t think twice. He ducked and went to grab her forehooves.

“Zecora, help me hold her!” he yelled, not looking back as he tried pressing himself on the convulsing Bonbon. “What’s happening? She looks as if she’s having a fit!”

“Captain, this is no fit!” Zecora shouted back, going for Bonbon’s hindlegs. “Bonbon’s never experienced anything like it!”

The glow in Bonbon’s darting eyes sparked madly. Alex saw those eyes burning right into him.

“Captain Reiner!” Bonbon screeched. Not in her voice. “It’s me, Galatea!”

“Galatea?” Alex spat out. “What the hell are you doing to her!”

Bonbon shook her head desperately. “That’s not me! Our connection’s being severed! Captain, the Tyrant is here!”

“What! Where!”

“On mine side, on Equus!” cried the echoing voice. “She found me!”

Amethyst thumped Alex’s shoulder. “Alex! We’ve got to get Bonbon to Cadance! The pressure on her mind’s gonna kill her at this rate!”

“Wait!” Holding Bonbon as best he could, Alex tried to look into her eyes. “What about you, Galatea? We’ve got to help you!”

“I’m worlds away, there’s nothing you can do!” responded the voice. It sounded calmer, now. Yet it was the voice of one marching to the gallows. “I’ll fight her as long as I can. Mine part here is played out, Captain Reiner. I’ve told you what I know. Now, trust Amethyst Star!”

He’d thought he might get some last words, some proper farewell.

Instead, Galatea just went. The glow in Bonbon’s eyes died. Vanished as if it had never been. The spasms left her, too, and her limbs went limp. Tongue lolling, Bonbon’s head weakly turned over. She’d lost consciousness.

Alex hadn’t realised he was sweating. The locket still dangled from his neck. Grunting, he roughly thrust it back beneath his jacket. He wiped his brow. He had to wipe it three times.

“Alex…” Amethyst said gently. She placed a hoof on his shoulder, the same shoulder she’d thumped. “Galatea’s right. There’s nothing we can do for her.” She gestured at Bonbon. “But we can still get herto safety.”

His teeth were clenched. Like Bonbon, he felt like screaming, too.

“How many, Amethyst?” Alex whispered. “How many has she taken from us? Lyra… Luna… now this, this alicorn, Galatea. Why? They wanted to help us… they wanted to help us…”

“I know, Captain,” Amethyst said, head bowed. “It’s sick. But we’ll make it right.” She’d been kneeling beside him. She promptly stood up. “Come. I just need to do something first. Once today’s transfer is over with, we can commence work on our plan.”

Wearily, Alex nodded. As he stood, he picked up Bonbon in his arms, gingerly moving her head to nestle into his chest. With his training, carrying a little pony like her wasn’t hard, yet she was light, far lighter than she should be.

Wordlessly, Zecora tucked the battered old lyre between her forehooves.

Having emerged from the conference room, Amethyst trotted a way ahead of them, heading for those stairs back towards the Museum’s spacious, crowded atrium. Although the Smith Hall lay in the opposite direction, and Bonbon was in uncertain condition, Alex couldn’t help but gaze after Amethyst, from his vantage atop the stairs, as she passed by the guards to enact her day’s duties.

While other specialists were practiced in the craft of opening portals between worlds, it was a highly delicate operation, and Amethyst trusted herself to perform it above others.

Again, his gaze was drawn to the huge American flag that hung from the ceiling. He wondered how much he still believed in it.

A point of light sparked in the portal’s centre, heralding its opening. A token number of PHL, composed mainly of Equestrians, formed a semi-circle facing the portal, but many faced outwards. The foremost task of guarding a portal was to shield it from possible outside assault. He saw Amethyst nod into a headset. She’d requested a password from the other side, and it checked out.

It was rumoured, and he’d heard Amethyst ponder it, that the Empire had ansibles. If only the PHL possessed similar instant-communication, rather than having to rely on garbled radio messages or old-timey mail, via unstable portals. Like shield technology, this was an area where only Equus’s resources could provde what they needed. Resources they were low on – the Empire, not.

The numerical indicator above the keyboard displayed how many refugees were scheduled for transfer today. A dozen. Not a bad number, yet there were about six times that amount lying on indefinite wait at the Smith Hall. He saw the first pair of refugees, a couple by the looks of them, one a pegasus mare, the other a male griffon, emerge blinking onto Earth. A crumbling, ephemeral haven, but still sought by those who wished to look upon a new world, before it vanished forever...

Something nudged his elbow.

“Captain Reiner?” said Zecora. She gestured at Bonbon. “Think of what’s best for her.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Alex sighed, thinking of the Smith Hall. “Let’s go find Cadance.”

An alarm bell rang throughout the building.

“Yes,” said Queen Chrysalis. “Several years… you’ve been here a while.”

Alex let his chest decontract.

“More like ten days,” he said glibly. He tapped the wheelchair. “Rough landing.”

The Public Assembly chuckled again.

Out of the ensuing chaos, what Alex remembered was one word.

Not merely a word. An invective.

… Or an order.

Jump.

Before that there’d been the refugee couple, looking around in panic, the harsh screeching noise of the alarm in everyone’s ears. The troops reacted with sensible discipline. Two of the guards pulled the refugees to safety, to the stairs atop which Alex stood.

All others concentrated their aims on the portal.

There was Amethyst, crying to make herself heard above the alarm.

“Something’s picked up this station’s coordinates! Perform emergency shutdown!”

Jump.

Yet the safeguard failed.

… And a look of horror dawned on Amethyst.

Even from afar, as the guards and the refugee couple rushed past him, Alex saw it, and understood her horror. The safeguard had been sabotaged. He called out to the ones below.

“This is Captain Reiner! Destroy it! Destroy the portal!”

“Too late! They’re coming through!” Amethyst had called back just as a purple shield wrapped itself around the gateway.

“Zecora, take Bonbon!”

Those were his orders to the zebra, in the process of handing her the unconscious body, before he raced down the stairs, his runes burning.

Amethyst saw him hurtle towards her.

“Alex, no! What are you doing! We need to get out of here! I still need you to–”

Jump.

Then their surroundings dissolved into white light, drowning out even his runes’ brightness, knocking him back. The effects of a flash grenade going off.

In the bright void, he couldn’t make out the enemy until they were atop of him.

A spell hit him in the chest, scorching right through his protections, tearing up his skin, filling his nostrils with the scent of roasted flesh. Half-blinded, he saw the unicorn, a dark silhouette against the void, move to strike again...

A well-known mohawked equine figure slammed against them.

If only he could find his tongue. He was torn between wanting to thank Zecora or chew her out. What was she thinking, abandoning her post like that? Were there no troops down here to hold back the tide?

… But, from what little he could distinguish, the tide wasn’t turning.

A shadow fell across his eyes.

Like a prophet parting the tide, he thought he saw Bonbon. Back on her hooves. Her eyes aligned, gazing right at him, unperturbed by the chaos.

She nodded at the portal.

“Jump,” she whispered.

The last Alex remembered seeing was her vanish into the aether.

“But you say you’d heard of Equus, Commander?” Grizelda blinked. “Oh... My apologies, Captain.”

“No, it’s fine,” Alex said, running a hand through his short hair. “I’m used to it. The name confusion and the roughness. It comes with the job. And, yes… humans found out about Equus recently, but I’d never gone there.”

“Roughness,” Grizelda nodded approvingly. “I trust that, much like my own people, yours have been… scattered, and separated under a dozen different flags?”

"Hundreds, yeah,” said Alex, nodding back. “You catch on quick, Your Grace." He took a breath. “Admittedly, our world’s larger than Equus. Without other, uh, intelligent species, we spread out. Settled where we found water and fertile soil, and sort of... moved on. In six-thousand years, we’ve gone from mud-hut villages to cities in the thousands. Separated by borders we drew up ourselves and more languages than I can count.”

Grizelda let him speak.

“You’ll find no great unifier from where I come from these days, Your Grace,” lamented Alex. “We’ll find a cause, band together... and when all’s said and done, go our separate ways.”

A great hand was raised from the throng. Alex, to his unexpected delight, saw it belonged to none other than a Minotaur. A real, live Minotaur. Wearing glasses.

“Pardon me, Sir Reiner,” said the Minotaur. “I am Philip, Lord Darkhoof of the Minotaurs. I believe an important question has been forgotten. Do you have a first name?”

“Alexander,” said he. “My name is Alexander.”

The Minotaur nodded thoughtfully. “It is a good name. May I ask another question?”

“Yeah, well,” Alex said. “What’s another question, at this point. Fire away.”

* * * * *

“Really?” said Thorax. “That’s how he put it?”

Ember chuckled. “‘Course, I didn’t take him at his word.”

Thorax was a better listener than Garble, and Ember had seen fit to visit him again – ostensibly to bring Garble his daily meal, but she could hardly contain what she had to tell. And this time, she’d taken her new guitar along. Besides, Ember had seen the ruby she brought lying uneaten in the corner of Garble’s enclosed space. Lamenting a waste of good food, it hadn’t been tough for her to again bid Thorax he draw the tarp down on the crate.

The Changeling lay opposite her, and had cleared a spot of wax so Ember could sit. Like the previous day, she’d been telling him everything. All of what Reiner had said at the breakfast-table, then later on, in the formal environment of the Public Asssembly.

“But that’s all I got to ask him,” clarified Ember. “If he was a warrior, who did he fight? He got vague and evasive… just said he’d done a lot of fighting in the desert.”

Thorax sucked in air. “Oof. I can’t imagine a worse place. When it’s hot, even Pharynx has trouble hiding how the Sun does murder to his chitin.”

“I quite like the desert,” Ember shrugged, though she chose not to mention how she’d ‘obtained’ her new guitar in a desert raid. “Matter of taste. And that was it. You ask me, I think he didn’t like talking about fighting. Must be cos’ of his pony friend.”

“Huh,” Thorax said simply. It may have sounded inexpressive to the untrained ear, but Ember understood he was unaccustomed to conveying his thoughts. Such were Changeling drones. “Still. Sounds better than the other day.”

“Definitely more engaging,” Ember agreed, plucking the guitar’s strings. The drone seemed to enjoy whatever noises she made with it. “This… human, is pretty interesting. He had a lot to tell, but he had his hands full.” She raised her claws. “Heh, bet his hands aren’t as good as these. They look too soft.”

“Mmm, maybe,” Thorax added. “Probably couldn’t play the guitar like you.”

With a twinge of guilt, Ember thought back to the guitar’s original owner. Thorax didn’t need to know about her raid on the pig caravan.

“Eh,” said Ember. “He didn’t say much about who he is. In the end, the meeting was just ‘hey, here’s a human, gaaaze in wonder!’ We’ll just have to see if he’s got more to show.”

“Hm,” Thorax pondered. “That can’t be all, can it?”

“Actually, no,” Ember said. “There was Madame Heartstrings’ idea…” She glanced back at Thorax, who was resting his chin. “But you’d have to hear it yourself, I guess,” she chuckled. “Tough luck.”

“Darnit,” he muttered. “Why must you tease me along?”

“Come on, just ditch Garble and go see for yourself,” Ember said with a huff. “You’re a Changeling, you can put on a disguise. Chrysalis doesn’t have to know.”

“... I would, but I can’t. Queen’s orders.”

Ember let out a frustrated sigh. There was no way to get around his rigid view, no matter how hard she tried. In time, perhaps, but not today.

But the thought of Thorax in disguise led her mind back to that ambush in the Forbidden Jungle, and Thorax-as-Garble praising her music. This was nothing like what Garble would have said. She wondered what there was to this drone.

“When you were… you know.” She paused her guitar-strumming, and Thorax looked at her. “Garble. By the campfire.”

Thorax blinked. “Yeah?” he said, tilting his head. “What about it?”

“... Okay, look,” Ember backtracked a little. “Did you not see how Garble acted before?”

Thorax glanced at the crate behind him, and then back at her.

“Um. Is… is this about what I said at the campfire?”

“Yeah, guess it is,” Ember said. Even as she continued to pluck at the guitar, she felt herself frown. “I thought a Changeling would be better at the disguise thing.”

“Oh, I… I did watch Garble, you know,” Thorax said, oddly defensive. Perhaps his abilities were a point of pride. “But…”

“But…?”

“I don’t know, I guess...” Thorax began, with a drawn-out sigh. “I just thought it’d be more natural if I– I mean, if Garble liked it. Uh, not saying it wasn’t good– which it was! I just, darnit, I’m sorry. Was I– gah, I mean, Garble– not supposed to like it?”

“I… didn’t say that,” said Ember. And there was an unfamiliar bashful feeling inside her. “So… you’re saying you liked it, but you tried pretending Garble did?”

Thorax had lowered his head to the floor. The poor Changeling was frightened, obviously. Ember rolled her eyes.

“It gets a little mixed up,” Thorax admitted. “But… I don’t know, Princess. It’s hard for me– even for most Changelings– to pretend you’re something you’re not. So I said it as myself. I’m sorry. I wasn’t supposed to like it, was I? Look, I’ll make it up to you, I’ll say I didn’t like it! Yeah, that makes it right, right? I’ll, uh, I’ll even–”

His words died down as Ember put a claw to his lips. “Okay, okay, I get it,” she said calmly. “I’m glad you liked it, actually, Thorax.”

“.. .You …you are?” Thorax said, cautiously. She nodded, and his head rose higher. “Oh, uh, then… then I like it.”

“There, was that so hard?” Ember smiled thinly. “I could use more practice, but I’m glad someone liked it.”

The Changeling formed a tiny smile. Ember found it suited him. Perhaps he should be smiling more often.

It faded quickly. “I… don’t know if we can talk much longer.”

Ember blinked with surprise. “Why not?” she said, in a low voice. “Is that now part of Chrysalis’ orders, too?”

“Oh no, no-no,” Thorax said nervously. “Not… exactly. But… I won’t be here all day...”

“Well, that’s good, isn’t it?” Ember said, nodding at Garble’s crate. “Frees you up from watching this twit.”

“Yeah, but…” He swallowed. “The Queen also wants me as her fo– by her side at mealtimes. Luckily, my friend came in today, but… if the Queen comes in and sees us talking…”

Always Chrysalis, always getting in the way. Ember frowned, but said something different.

“I didn’t know you had friends.”

“Me neither,” agreed Thorax. “She’s from our Hive, too. Just sort of started talking to me and Pharynx. Pharynx was annoyed at first, but now I think he’s just used to her butting in.”

Thorax looked up.

“Oh…” he said, in a small voice. “She must’ve snuck in through the window.”

Ember felt wax drip on her head.

With a yelp and a fiery breath, she jumped away, glancing up in time to see something dark fall off the ceiling and scuttle into the underside of Chrysalis’ bed with a chittering noise.

“I think you scared her…” Thorax said, keeping his tone matter-of-fact. “Aphid! You can come out now. Ember didn’t mean it, uh, did she?”

“I scared her?” Ember asked indignantly, watching the other Changeling slowly creep out from underneath the bed, a bag slung over her shoulder.

While Aphid’s dark, chitinous husk matched Thorax’s, she was small, smaller than he was, which only served to emphasise her large bug-eyes. Curiously, her otherwise identically-shaped fin was coloured purple. Aside from her helmet, the little drone wore no armour, and looked harmless.

But Ember knew better. “What the– when did your friend arrive?”

“She, uh, she came in right after the… presentation.”

The other Changeling was giggling, having made no other sound. While Ember realised she was gripping her guitar tightly, smoke rosing from her nostrils.

“Uh-huh…” said Ember, without loosening her grip. “How long was she up there?”

“Probably long enough to listen… I think you must’ve scared her when you came in, so she… uh, hung up there for a while.”

The little drone named Aphid nodded vigorously, her bag jiggling. She nudged Thorax and pointed at Ember.

“Um, you should probably introduce yourself,” Thorax told Aphid. “I mean, the Princess knows your name, but, yeah.”

As a response, all Aphid did was boop his snout playfully.

“Sorry,” Thorax told Ember. “She’s… she’s pretty shy.”

Ember peered at the drone. “Now that could’ve fooled me,” she said dryly. “But now she’s here, you get time off, right? Isn’t it her turn to guard Garble?”

“Uh, no, that’d be Pharynx’s job,” clarified Thorax. “And actually, I did ask Aphid to come in early… I just… forgot you’d be popping in, Princess.” Again, he showed Ember a half-smile. A rather sheepish one. “Watch this.”

He thumped the crate. Immediately, Garble gave a loud snarl, audible even under the tarp. It made Aphid jump back in fright, her bag almost slipping off.

“Sorry,” Thorax said to Aphid, just as sheepishly. “Had to… had to show the Princess you need the company, if we’re letting the beast out of his cage.”

“Wait, what?” said Ember, eyes widening. “Isn’t that against the Queen’s orders?”

Aphid, who’d been staring darkly at Thorax, now glanced towards Ember, blinking. Then back towards Thorax, considering him a moment, before she started giggling again.

“I-I d-didn’t...” Thorax stuttered, embarrassed. “I mean we’re… gonna give him some space. Aphid’s agreed to help, while I’ll keep… guarding your guard. Garble.”

At this, Aphid giggled harder than ever, and she patted Thorax on the back – not roughly, or even jovially, but gently, Ember noticed.

“Yes, yes, I appreciate your massages,” said Thorax, mildly pouty. “But do you have to rub it in? That’s what she does,” he added, addressing Ember. “She’s a masseuse. Though she’d say… um, she’d call herself a fan-girl.”

“A ‘fan-girl’?”

“For the Queen,” Thorax said tiredly, going to lift the tarp. “Aphid, lend me a hoof?”

Ember tensed. “That’s Garble in there,” she warned, raising a claw. “He’s a brute. If you’re not careful, he’ll bite your heads off.”

“Well, uh…” Thorax slowly looked away from her. “Then I’m… glad you’re here, Princess. Didn’t think you’d help...”

As it turned out, Ember needn’t have worried.

Timid as both these drones were by Changeling standards, she was amazed to see them work in harmonious synchrony as Thorax unlatched the door. Blinded by the sudden light, Garble didn’t have time to yelp when, adroitly, the drones each released strings of wax into the cramped crate to bind his limbs – wings behind his back, legs and tail attached, forearms before his chest, even clamped his jaws together.

Thorax nodded at Aphid. She took a deep breath and darted into the crate, wings flitting, to push Garble’s mass while Thorax carefully pulled at the last remaining green string, their combined efforts easing the trussed-up Garble out of his prison.

The red drake’s eyes burned into them, hateful as ever, but his jaws were locked, and Thorax ignored his gaze.

He knelt by Garble, whispering. “I’m very, very sorry about Chrysalis… I know it must be awful, locked up in there, unable to move… I thought… Aphid could do something for that. She’s done it for me lots of times.”

The dragon merely snorted, or tried to. But Aphid, reassured he’d be no threat, giggled and leapt onto Garble’s back, rubbing her forehooves. Ember saw what she intended then. Sure enough, Aphid began delicately massaging the mantle between Garble’s wings, with expert smoothness.

It was like a burning light had gone out in Garble’s eyes. She actually saw him untense, his eyes drooping, ears flicking as he released a blissful, if muffled sigh.

“~Gooood boy,” Aphid whispered, sing-song.

Those were the first words Ember had heard her speak. Yet her attention didn’t stay on Aphid. Her gaze slowly turned towards Thorax, as she saw him in a new light.

Thorax rubbed his neck abashedly. “It… it seemed like a nice thing to do…”

“Yeah…” Ember said, staring from him, to Garble. “Yeah. For a Changeling, you’re... uncommonly focused on ‘nice’, you know.”

He looked up at her. “Do dragons do ‘nice’?”

Ember prepared to reply, but her gaze fell upon something. The guitar, still in her grip. Her guitar. Except, could it really be called ‘her’ guitar?

She turned from him, sharply. “I’d better go. Next meeting starts soon. Apparently, that green unicorn wants to say something.”

As she stalked to the door, though, something inside her halted her step. She turned around. While Aphid was still massaging Garble, Thorax hadn’t moved. He was standing on the spot, watching her quietly.

“Well…” Ember said. “You said… you’re there with Chrysalis at mealtimes?”

Thorax looked down at the floor. “Yeah… In the background.”

“Okay… I…” Ember trailed off. “I’ll keep an eye out for you.”

She left then, not wanting to lock gazes with him.

* * * * *

As the dining-hall filled for a late lunch, Blueblood’s eyes were on a particular figure. From his place by the door, he allowed his gaze to rove over their bronze-toned, muscular chest, their pink, bovine lips, their shock of curly black hair… Seated by his father, Basil Darkhoof cut such a fine picture of masculine beauty.

He smiled to himself, remembering the note he’d slipped the young Minotaur.

Tomorrow, daybreak. Meet me in the steam-baths.

These pleasant thoughts were cut short, however, by a new arrival casting its shadow. Literally. Before Blueblood had turned, he knew few beings at the Convocation cast such a long shadow.

The evidence stood before him, in the shape of the Great Stag. By his side, like always, was the Snow Maiden.

Not his actual granddaughter, for her physical self had long passed away, but a doe called Lel. A doe of two shadows. Hers, and that of Ilsa’s, borne in the shawl around her neck.

“Hello, Prince Blueblood,” said the Stag. “I trust you’re enjoying the refreshments?”

His tone was warm, yet seeing him, Blueblood felt a cold shiver. Did it have to do with the Snow Maiden’s accompanying presence? In a way, maybe it did.

“Enjoying them fine, sire,” Blueblood said carefully, raising his cup. “I’ve a taste for exotic fruit.”

“Ah,” the Stag said sagely. “Not unlike your ancestor, Astron. I remember young Polaris. He was charming, dashing, and much the same in his tastes.”

Blueblood tried to smile, nervously. “They do say a Blueblood can steer his way towards any creature’s heart, when he puts his mind to it.”

“Quite,” agreed the Stag. “Your talents are in-keeping with ancestral tradition, dear Prince. You have the potential to make a story for yourself like Polaris’. In all tales, each retelling may bring something new while remaining true to its spirit.”

His warm tone, Blueblood felt, belied an icy depth akin to the Snow Maiden’s eyes. Here the Maiden chose to speak.

“Tell me, what retelling would your tale be?”

He saw her eyes had turned.

“We do not blame sons for the sins of their father, Prince Blueblood,” said Ilsa Erklass, “but don’t mistake our forgiveness for your ancestor’s mistakes as acceptance of yours. They are cut from the same cloth. I’ve remembered his and felt them long enough.”

Although the eyes of Ilsa’s bearer were the warmest brown, they turned as icily blue as the Snow Maiden’s truly were. She tugged at the glimmering shawl which held her spirit, and untold others that once bore her spirit as their burden.

The doe Lel was merely the latest. If Blueblood’s memory served, the first had been...

“Excuse me,” he said. “I’ve got a lot of people to meet.”

Blueblood didn’t wait for an answer before he turned away, ardently hoping the darkness of his mind wouldn’t show. Of course a meeting with the Reindeer always led back to his family history. His ancestor’s star-crossed romance with the Fire Maiden, and the fate which ultimately bound her to her sister’s particular form of immortality.

All the fault of a Blueblood.

He went to pour himself another drink, bitterly wondering if the Winter nights of the North could feel half as cold as the Winter in his heart.

* * * * *

Seated as Cadance was at the table of Equestrian Royals, facing the entrance to the dining-hall had permitted her to witness Blueblood’s encounter with the Reindeer, even if what they’d said went unheard by her. At this vantage point, what Cadance’s ears mainly picked up over the hubbub were Celestia and Luna in discussion over the effects of Reiner’s introduction. From what she could garner, Celestia maintained that careful adherence to a script would pay off, while Luna was agitated by the long wait until the truth could spill.

She gave a smile tinged with rue. To this day, the full story of her cousin’s bloodline was one where gaps waited to be filled in her knowledge – but Cadance’s memory of her adolescent years with Blueblood, and with Sunset Shimmer, let her see as few could where the gap lay in him, a grain of truth to the fable of all Bluebloods.

Next to her, Shining was listening to the two senior Princesses in silence, a soldier taking point of his surroundings. His plate of beets and daisy lay untouched, the surest sign of his hidden worry. He’d spoken a lot with Reiner, ever since that time the three of them got together so she could tell the human of her childhood and ascension in Florentina.

After being the focus of attention then, Cadance was even starting to feel left out, now.

It did give her some wry amusement, to wonder if this was how Miss Bonbon felt all the time, overshadowed by a personality like Lyra’s. At least, drawing on from what Cadance knew of Bonbon, the mare didn’t seem to let it get in the way of love.

“Shiney?” Cadance said gently, getting her husband’s attention. “Pardon me, love? If I’m not needed here for the moment, I think I’d like to check on how Twilight and her friends are doing.”

“Of course,” Shining said, with an accompanying smile. “You do that. We’ve got time again.”

Cadance stood up and left the table, heading for the same doorway Blueblood had just vacated. As usual, she made sure to approach by creating as wide a berth as she could from the table at which Queen Chrysalis sat, together with the Dragon Princess – who looked nearly as displeased by the seating arrangements, if this as possible, as Cadance would have – and a diminutive Queen-in-Waiting of some other Hive. She wasn’t sure whether it was her imagination, but Cadance kept sensing a sickly-sweet vibe radiating between Chrysalis and that Changeling.

She did, however, give a friendly nod to Queen Novo and General Skybeak of the hippogriffs, who returned it in kind. This Convocation was her first time meeting with hippogriffs, whom until then she’d only heard stories of from her Aunts.

No wonder Shining had been so eager to introduce them to his little sister.

One thing Cadance hadn’t told Shining, however.

She reflected upon this as, having descended numerous flights of stairs, she at last reached the gate to the bridge which led from the Hall of Unity to its adjacent Watchtower, the afternoon wind catching her by surprise and blowing her mane into her face. The fact was that, for once, it wasn’t principally Twilight she wished to catch up on. Twilight and the other five would still be tucking into lunch at this time, in the privacy of the Watchtower. Cadance could go and see how they were doing later, at the end of the meal.

Upon crossing the stone bridge and coming to stand before the Watchtower, the youngest of Equestria’s Princesses was set on her goal. A moment, perhaps the only one she’d get alone, with the newest relation she’d never she had.

Cadance was still running the thought through her mind even as she ascended another staircase, one that led her to a rough wooden door.

Breathing in deeply, Cadance gathered the will to knock three times.

“Who is it?” said the voice from within.

It was a surprise to Cadance that she didn’t wholly recognise it. The voice she’d been expecting was of an indefinite brogue, likely the accumulation of centuries mish-mashed. But what had responded was plainly spoken in a particular dialect, a cloth-cap Trottingham elocution.

Had she come to the wrong door? Cadance swallowed. “This is Princess Cadance,” she said. “I’m here looking for… for ‘Shale’.”

Whoever was behind the door seemed to ease up. She heard the key click in the lock. And when the door opened halfway, Cadance found herself greeted by a pair of blue eyes, belonging to a tall earthpony of greyest shades.

“This is an unexpected visit,” Galatea said. She wasn’t smiling, yet the look in her eyes was cordial, welcoming. “What brings you here, Cadance? Come on in.”

“Uh…”

Cadance felt herself falter before she’d even started, though she crossed the threshold as invited. Now that she actually was inside Galatea’s bedroom at the Watcher, a possibly even sparser location than what Captain Reiner had set up, her words were failing her.

Galatea did smile then, showing understanding. “It’s alright,” she said softly. “I know how odd this must feel for you. You didn’t know me until a few days ago. Until a few days ago, I only knew mine sisters from afar, watching over thousands of years apart.”

How much that one statement encompassed only made Cadance feel dizzier. She resisted an urge to hold her head.

“At the door,” Cadance said suddenly, finding a detail to pinpoint. “What was that?”

Galatea blinked, a rather disarming gesture for one with such eyes.

“What was what?”

“How you spoke,” Cadance clarified. “I’ve never heard you speak like that before.”

“Ah,” said Galatea, her shoulders relaxing. “Well, I’d imagine you must know something about intonation, accent and– cadence, isn’t that so, Princess?” She chuckled slightly. “A person picks up a way of speaking, depending on when and where they are. Why, while I didn’t have the pleasure of witnessing it in the flesh, memorable event that it surely was, you must know Luna had some difficulty adjusting her parlance for the times!”

“Yes…” Cadance nodded slowly. “But you sounded so… I dunno…”

“Unrefined? Is that the word you’re looking for?” Galatea smirked, spotting Cadance goggle at her. “I’m not an immortal alicorn who’s moved in the same circles as your regal aunts, Cadance. I merely grew into my surroundings, just like they did… Just like you did. After all… how much work went into you shedding your provincial Oleandrite accent?”

“How do you know about that?”

“I have my ways.” Galatea shrugged. “But even if I didn’t, I could guess.”

The other alicorn – no, the earthpony, was it? – had been entirely on the mark in her assessment. Cadance distinctly remembered the many hours spent, with Sunset looking over her shoulder, correcting her often, in order for her pronunciation to be molded into what fit the upper echelons of Canterlot society.

Looking at the alicorn opposite her, though, Cadance spotted no sign of that same condescension, nor the haughty expectations.

“A fine guess,” Cadance added. “It was a lot of work, alright. Guess you could… guess you could call it homework all on its own.”

“That it was, no doubt,” agreed Galatea. “But I do hope you haven’t lost it wholly.”

“No,” said Cadance, whistling through her lips. “No,” she repeated, elongating the ‘o’ vowel per the Oleandrite tonality. “Heh. It was one thing to learn that, as an alicorn, I’d been blessed with the Gift to understand all languages I could read… And yet, the pronunciation still remained a matter of hard practice.”

“Lovely,” praised Galatea. “Curious things, accents are. They can tell you things about the speaker, many things… Some the speaker may not even know. What did you think mine was?”

“Yours?” Cadance asked. “Trottingham, wasn’t it?”

Galatea laughed. Not a chuckle, nor a snort, but a full-blown laugh. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she said, “you did get it right. But that was Celestia’s guess for mine true accent when we met a second time and before she knew who I was. Would you have guessed it was Stratusburg, actually? I suppose times do change…”

Perhaps it was a trick of her senses, Cadance thought, when she caught a melancholic tinge to Galatea’s voice and a longing look.

“Tell you what. There’s a story there, but I’d love to hear a story from you too,” Galatea said, as Cadance tilted her head. “What do you think?”

Cadance thought of it for only a moment. “I’d be happy to.”

“Wonderful. Here,” Galatea said, nudging her bed, “please take a seat, Cadance. I’m sorry, it’s a long walk here, and an equally long story.”

“I’m sure it is,” said Cadance, taking her offered seat. “I’ve got time, don’t worry.”

Only then did Cadance finally remember what she’d actually come here for. She’d wondered where this alicorn, this aunt of hers, unknown even after she’d met one aunt and then the other, could have been during the childhood when she’d known no family, save those kindly villagers who’d taken her in. Earthponies. Like the guise Galatea presently wore.

The love of an earthpony was a powerful force, indeed. Maybe, Cadance reflected, there was a reason why her Northern crystalline people were a branch of that tribe, off the great tree of ponykind and the Equine Family.

But as their stories went on, of ferrymares and princesses, orphans from faraway lands and mysterious enchantresses, Galatea’s accent and her own a merry melody in the air, Cadance realised there was no other place she’d rather be.

* * * * *

And before you knew it, the end came, after an afternoon of individual deliberations.

Ember sat on her bed, finding the room eerily quiet. She didn’t feel like going to dinner. Only the second day, and she felt isolated. Maybe because Garble was no longer around to amuse her. Maybe because she was surrounded by faces from across the planet. What did they see her as? No more than her father’s daughter? Did they even view her as an equal?

Releasing a sigh, she idly gazed to her bag. Sticking out of it, light reflecting off of it, a canister. The same canister the Chaoskämpfer gave her after choosing her as delegate to the Convocation. Per legend, the Kämpfer’s flame could be used to speak with him regardless of location.

With no other thought, Ember slowly retrieved the metal canister, admiring its coltan, a dull black sheen. Slowly, she placed it onto a cushion, where it made a soft sound. Her claws quickly worked to twist knobs and undo locks, and its lid slid open with a hiss. It was nearly time.

“Great Chaoskämpfer. It is I, Princess Ember,” she spoke, as the fire started to slowly escape from the opening. “I call upon your fire to light the way, for not only myself, but everyone here. Please respond, so we may hear of what lies before us.”

To complete the show of respect, Ember slipped back, and kowtowed before the canister, her snout pressing the bedsheets.

Emerald-green fire arose, the flames molding themselves into something new. The head and neck of a dragon, whose eyes spoke of an ancient wisdom, unconsumed by the emerald blaze. By the head’s proportions alone, this dragon’s size in life must have been far larger than most.

“And I appear before you, dragonet, willing to provide answers,” the Chaoskämpfer spoke through the projection, his voice soft and quiet like candle-light. “Although a distant spirit, I’m here to grant you and everyone else aid for what lies before us. Speak now, dragonet, and tell me what is it that troubles you.”

She licked her lips, nervously. Sharing feelings had never been her forte. Yet if she couldn’t talk with the Chaoskämpfer, she couldn’t talk at all.

“I’ve no idea what I’m doing,” Ember stated flatly. “Dragons don’t do… diplomacy. We barely even trade, except with the Kirin, and they’d trade with anyone. I’m like an errand-girl, and now I’ve brought you here… what do I do?”

“Well, what have you done thus far, Ember? What has occured to drive you to this state of mind?”

Ember sighed. “Chrysalis… damn her,” she said, rubbing her head. “I let her walk over me too easily. Alright, I did get some fun out of what she did to Garble, but… if I want to be Dragon Lord, what sort of Dragon Lord will I be, if I can’t stand up for my people?”

“Hmm. You’ve had an encounter with the Changeling’s current Swarmarch? Well, I commend you for your pragmatism, Ember. There are times where a Dragon Lord must act on what is necessary, rather than just. Sacrificing one’s dignity for others is a labour you’ll have to bear in future. To be a great Dragon Lord, you’ll need to know when it’s best to act and when best to placate the egos of others.”

“I despise him, you know,” Ember said candidly. “Forgive me. But I don’t know why you chose Garble as my companion. His buffoonery makes me laugh sometimes, but that’s it. Yet… I hate it, but I feel like I’m gonna have to make it up to him somehow… for his dignity…”

“His purpose is not limited solely to entertainment, and you’d do best to not underestimate him, much as he underestimates you. There is a lesson you’ll each learn from your experiences. Give him time, and you may see why.”

“I hope you’re right,” muttered Ember. “Because I sorta feel like Chrysalis did us a favour… Imagine him, knocking around the representatives. Not that I’ve been doing much better… All I’ve reached right now is one Changeling drone. A drone.”

“And what’s wrong with that?”

“It’s… it’s not enough, is it? He’s just a drone.”

The Chaoskämpfer gave a knowing smile, an amused look in his eyes.

“Has your father ever told you of his time in the Gauntlet of Fire? Of how his left claw hadn’t healed when the previous Lord’s Call came?”

“Not really…” said Ember. “Dad, he... never talks about the Gauntlet. I guess he doesn’t want me getting any ideas.”

“And yet, he sent you to be educated by the Kirin,” the Chaoskämpfer remarked idly, “I’d say Torch doesn’t want to appear ‘weak’ by letting others know how he succeeded without use of might.”

“You’re joking.”

“I remember him so vividly,” the Chaoskämpfer began. “He approached the mouth of my mountain, most of his hoard dragged behind him in the dead of night. Torch offered nearly all he had for my assistance. The Dragons’ Elder looked to Ember with a piercing gaze. “He was desperate, he was willing to make any deal if his hoard didn’t suffice… including an egg.”

Ember thought over the Chaoskämpfer’s revelation. Learning that her father almost sacrificed everything to become Dragon Lord was shocking enough. But then her mouth fell open as the weight of the Elder’s words hit her. To dragons, she’d always been small, but now, she felt tiny.

“Wait…” Ember whispered. “If he… I was his only… Dad… did my Dad try to sell me?”

“He was young, Ember. Young, and so desperate to become Dragon Lord,” the Chaoskämpfer said softly, stretching his ethereal neck forward to rub his forehead against her’s. “I told him to keep his gold and stow his offers. He didn’t need my help to win the Gauntlet. For what he lacked was not power, no. All he had to do was to use what little he had… his cunning. It was after misleading the other dragons into fighting each other that he won. I remember him the following night. Sceptre in the claw, a look of guilt on his face for what he’d almost done.”

Ember’s head rose, subtly, from her kowtow. “Guilt? Guilt for what?” she asked, straining to steady her voice. “For what he almost did? Or… because he used his head, and that’s not what a ‘real’ dragon would do? Huh?”

“Guilt for being so desperate, that he almost gave me an egg. Oh yes, your father used his head. I think he’d want you to do likewise in that regard.”

An unpleasant burning, unlike the embrace of dragonfyre, took hold of Ember. “Know what? After what you’ve told me,” she spat, “I’m not sure I care about what my Dad wants.”

“So, what do you want then?”

Groaning, Ember rose entirely, chafing to bow any longer.

“I don’t know!” she shouted, pacing around the bed. “I thought coming here, I’d get to show, I… I don’t know, somebody, that I’m not just some little princess! But so far, all I seem to get is more jeers from knuckleheads like Garble, or mocked by Queen Chrysalis, if I’m noticed at all!”

“I think you’ve forgotten something, Ember,” the Chaoskämpfer said simply. “Use your wits. What do you have?”

“Have?” Ember chuckled bitterly. “Alright, I’ll bite. I’m a dragon without a hoard. Chrysalis even took my bodyguard from me.” She tapped the side of the Chaoskämpfer’s bag. “All I’ve got is my armour, a sceptre that doesn’t belong to me, a guitar that… I stole, and… a drone who hangs on to my every word. Goodness knows why. I was this close to strangling him in the jungle.”

There was a look in the Chaoskämpfer’s eyes. He adopted a wistful smile.

“Sometimes, life surprises us in how we meet our companions.“

Ember placed a claw to her forehead. “Great Chaoskämpfer… Thanks. But I want to be alone.”

He merely nodded, his head a rock of ages. “As you wish, dragonet,” he said softly. “Yet know that while I’m here, you’re not alone. And maybe you won’t be after I’m gone.”

The emerald-green flames receded, of their own volition, back into the canister.

Ember slumped onto her bed, head in her claws, rocking to and fro. She’d get over it soon, she knew. She was a dragon. Dragons were tough.

But at that moment, inside, she’d have liked to be anything other than a dragon.

~ Day 3 of the Convocation ~ Twelfth Day of the Month of Rophon ~

Watering the lavender was becoming a routine. But Luna found it put her no less at ease than centuries ago. Since her return, she’d realised it was one activity she looked forward to, besides playing with her abacus. It was a personal regret that her sister hadn’t thought to mention the beauty of her lavender. Still, to have others notice the pleasant smell sufficed. It wasn’t like she was the only one awake in these early hours.

Luna strode up the staircase leading to the top of the pagoda. The flowers’ soothing aroma would travel down, as intended. Watering the lavender, and lowering the Moon to start the day. Then Celestia should awaken, and her shift would end.

She found Darkhoof practicing his own daily routine – his idea of an early morning workout. In the past few days on Metazoa, she’d come to appreciate his company.

“Ah, good morning, Proxenos,” Luna greeted, with a tip of her gardener’s hat. “I trust you had a restful night?”

Acting on reflex, the great Minotaur cracked his knuckles before answering.

“Surely if I hadn’t, you’d be aware?”

His tone was easy enough, for someone who’d just done hard exercise. But his face was lined with a look he couldn’t quite hide. Not that she saw it for long as Darkhoof headed for the ornamental basin, to splash water on his face.

“Most refreshing,” Darkhoof commented. “Really, Your Highness, I’m grateful you don’t mind your flowers mask the scent of this old bull.” He coughed. “I found the gardens were always the hardest to tend, while looking after the Hall. Night’s rest is good, but I get restless during the day unless I start by pushing myself.”

“Don’t we all?” agreed Luna. Holding the watering-can in her aura, she dilligently went to water the lavender at the balcony. “And do not worry. I’m flattered my flowers are of some use other than an old mare’s hobby.”

“Gardening isn’t just a pastime for the old,” Darkhoof said, wiping himself with a towel. “Those who know Minotaurs only as fighters are surprised to learn we find it an honoured profession.”

“I’m only as old as I wish to see myself, mind, though my sister would disagree,” said Luna. She wiped sweat off her brow. “It is a time-consuming hobby, but I find it as enjoyable, and more personal, as spending time counting stars.” She looked at Darkhoof, chuckling. “My mentor, Lady Mistmane, would take me to garden at hours such as these. She taught me much about the beauty and value of the art.”

“She taught you well. I see you pour a nurturing spirit into it,” Darkhoof remarked quietly. “I’ve often wondered if that’s how alicorns see the world. Parents pass on before their children, but a gardener watches as what they cared for grows old and is reborn, many times over...”

That, more than anything, caught Luna’s attention. She set her hat aside, and the watering-can.

“Perhaps,” Luna replied softly. “I don’t know how Tia does it. But, a gardener takes care of their garden, like you said. In the stead of each flower, so too another grows... beautiful as the last, perhaps even more. And our duty is to ensure they grow.”

She glanced to the expanse surrounding Mount Metazoa. Beneath the starry skies and the light of the Moon, these vast, rolling steppes seemed almost serene.

“Time passes. I haven’t known a mortal life, and I spent a thousand years in timeless sleep. But there are times where my sister would tell me how many friends she has seen pass over the centuries. Time passes, but memories remain.”

Luna turned her gaze to the lavender, bristling softly in the cool morning breeze.

“And those memories are what we treasure the most. What of you, friend Darkhoof?”

“Me?” replied Darkhoof, sighing. “A Minotaur spends his life apart, in a house of memories. Sometimes I feel we only have children so they shall tend to the images of long-past ancestors… The Labyrinth is made to teach one lesson, to those who brave it. Every living being dies alone.” He was looking over the expanse. “It is not a lesson my son took well…”

“I see,” Luna said shortly. “Perhaps his… insight, differed from yours?”

Darkhoof shrugged. “You could say that, Your Highness.”

Luna considered it, for a moment. “Time changes one’s outlook. Grandfather taught us much. We were to be those who’d move Sun and Moon, who’d shoulder the burden as seasons changed. Yet he and Ilsa, and Anna, assured us that no matter our purpose, we deserved to live. And we’re forever grateful for his guidance, long after leaving the safety of Adlaborn. But never did I unravel if this was his plan from the beginning, or if he’d had a change of heart in years gone by.”

She sighed, heavily.

“Perhaps in time your son would see it as you did, Proxenos. Or impart his own thoughts. Give him enough time, and he’ll give it to you as well.”

Now she smiled. It was a sad, reminiscent smile.

“If only I’d heeded such advice many centuries ago. I confess envy for those who hesitate not to resolve their issues, in a matter of years, months, days... For my sister and I, well, it always felt like there was a next time, until it was far, far too late.”

Luna glanced back at him.

“Apologies. I do believe my sister’s usually the one who gives our little ponies advice on a dime.”

Darkhoof’s eyes crinkled. “Perhaps you are growing into it, Princess Luna.”

“Perhaps,” Luna snickered. “Thank you, Proxenos, and I do wish you the best with your son…”

Something did come to her mind. Of a gift, given back to her only recently, but which had been hers many, many years ago.

“Princess Luna?”

“To grow into it… yes, ah...”

Luna regarded him with a knowing look. The question of her immortality lingered on, a question that hardly anyone had ever asked her directly.

“Our nature is unknown to most,” Luna said softly. “Including ourselves. Kind as he is, Grandfather imparted that we were meant to be more. But I do wonder, should I ever perish, would an afterlife await me? And for that…”

She raised her uncovered hoof, looking at it thoughtfully.

“Do we have souls, after all? A question that will not be answered easily, I fear, even with our millennia of experience. Tell me, Proxenos. What do your people think of souls?”

Darkhoof eyed her queryingly. “I’m surprised you didn’t ask long ago, Your Highness. But then… maybe you were still young, in the days of Asterion?”

“Beliefs change, Proxenos, as do the people who hold them,” Luna answered. “Though I’ve read my share of myth and legend in my youth, I wish to keep myself knowledgeable. And the days of Asterion have long passed.”

He nodded, as if this answer satisfied him.

“Then you’ll know what they accused him of,” Darkhoof said solemnly, “of arrogance, of madness, perhap shunning his fellow beings. Poor, woeful Asterion, who believed himself the first Minotaur… or at least, the first to see the world for what it was.” The Proxenos paused then, his eyes going back to an old story. “Asterion had an ambition. He thought he could build a house so large, it’d encompass the Sun, the stars, the world.”

Luna leaned on her watering-can, still held afloat in her magical aura. She’d heard the story many times over, but what was one more time, really, to an immortal?

“He was haunted by the idea that none of these last forever,” Darkhoof explained. “It was his hope that, in this house, he’d be able to keep their death at bay. Day and night he laboured, pulling stones, setting mortar… But no matter how large his house grew, there was one thing he never allowed inside its walls, which were built to preserve celestial beauty alone. People would have spoiled it. Ruined it.”

Breaking for a moment in his story, Darkhoof sat on the edge of the fountain.

“Then, came the inevitable,” he said. “One day, he discovered his house had grown so big, he could no longer find his way to the centre.” He chuckled wryly. “What do you make of that? Though this isn’t how the tale ends, naturally.”

Luna tapped her chin, humming. “Dreams hardly ever end, do they? Their stories unwind, onward until morning arrives, for one rude awakening,” she said wistfully. “And the same goes for Asterion’s domain.”

“Ah, then you do remember the end,” Darkhoof smiled. “They say he wandered nine days, trying to find the centre again. And when he did, he came face-to-face with… himself. Literally.” He chuckled again. “Well, not quite. A small pod of Changelings had made their roost in his house’s centre and, sensing him approach, chose to play a trick on him. Exhausted and delirious from his long search, he couldn’t tell for sure what he saw. So when he demanded what they were doing there, the Queen, who’d taken on his shape and had a poet’s tongue, told him these words.”

Here the Proxenos paused for reflection.

“These words… ‘We are like the spider. We weave our life and then move along in it. We are like the dreamer who dreams, and then lives in the dream. This is true for the entire universe.’ And then she asked him if he’d ever loved anyone but himself. That, they say, is when Asterion’s eyes truly opened.”

Darkhoof stroked his beard.

“But even then, he couldn’t fully let go of his compulsion… Something in him required that he never be idle, be it with his hands, or to take in the world’s beauty. So he decided he’d travel. Yet to others, his heart should always be a mystery, unless he chose otherwise. This was how he forged his armour, a house unto itself, only to be opened for those to whom he’d bare his heart. And this is why, to a Minotaur, armour is akin to their soul.”

Luna gently set down her watering-can, smiling.

“Many a time have I heard this story, Proxenos Darkhoof, in various forms and languages. But like all stories that pass through the millennia, the essence and heart remains. Thank you, for a lovely retelling, one that I think I shall remember. All the more appropriate, for this Hall of Unity was his greatest gift to the world.”

“A house to encompass the Sun and the world,” Darkhoof repeated, matching Luna’s smile. “Always a grain of truth in each legend…”

Luna cleared her throat, adjusting her hat one last time. “Now, your story isn’t the only Minotaur legacy brought here. In my possession is an artefact of Minotaur origin. I’d like your assessment on its... readiness, for we expect it’ll be of use in the coming days."

‘Artefact’ was putting it lightly. It was an heirloom. Privately, Luna knew the time would come when she’d return it to its rightful owners. And the word caught Darkhoof’s ears, evidently.

“An artefact, you say? If it’s from your time, in all likelihood it is undamaged. Unfortunately, it may even be that the knowledge of how to create such artefacts is… not what it once was.”

“Will you be able to assess it, though?” Luna asked. But she knew the answer already.

“Have some faith in us. We remember our legacy well, Your Highness.”

“I thought as much. Come. Dawn is upon us, and it’s best we start early.”

With a glow of her horn, Luna wore her hat once more, and looked up to the Moon. And with great care, it began to lower. Celestia had not arrived yet, but these days, one could do away with formalities.

The pair descended back into the Hall, the Moon lowering with each step. Soon, the first rays of the Sun shone through the windows, and Luna met her sister halfway down the stairwell. She looked as laidback as Luna felt this morning – unadorned, with a cup of tea in her aura.

“Good morning, Luna, Proxenos Darkhoof,” Celestia said brightly. “I do believe I’ve missed the time by a few minutes.”

“Tis’ alright, Sister,” Luna said reassuringly, tipping her hat. “Take your time, these meetings do wind our breaths.”

With a polite nod exchanged between the three, they continued on their respective paths. Already, throughout the Hall, the first delegates began to emerge from their quarters, giving both Luna and Darkhoof a nod or salute, acknowledgement of all sorts.

They turned around a corner, and came across a Changeling.

He didn’t seem to notice either of them, too busy glaring at the lavender pots by the window. Before Luna’s disbelieving eyes, he reached out and bit into the flowers.

“Soldier,” Luna said firmly. She maintained what she hoped was her best, most polite smile, though Darkhoof’s glance her said otherwise. “May I ask what you’re doing?”

The Changeling turned, frowning. “Inspecting these bushes,” he said, like it were the most obvious thing. He dropped the torn flowers from his mouth. “They are a safety hazard.”

Luna raised an eyebrow. “And…” she said, choosing her words carefully. “How does my lavender pose a threat to the Convocation’s proceedings?”

“Not the flowers,” the Changeling said patronisingly. “The enemies who’d use them as a hiding spot. I’d suggest removing them entirely.”

Luna nodded stiffly. “That’ll be considered, Soldier…?”

“Pharynx,” said the Changeling. And Luna now recognised him as Chrysalis’ lead guard. “Do consider it. Our Queen would very much appreciate the increased security.”

“Right,” said Luna. “I’ll be sure to… consider it, then.”

At the very least, the Changeling had the courtesy to nod before moving to the next hallway. Luna hoped he wasn’t seeking more lavender pots to ruin, or she’d be having words with Chrysalis, with or without her sister’s approval.

“The things I do for a good night’s work, Proxenos,” Luna said resignedly, readjusting the lavender. Thankfully, Darkhoof lent her a hand. “All these meetings can be exhausting to deal with anyway, but in times such as these, we must make do with what we’ve got, and present our best smiles, it seems.”

She looked down the hallway the Changeling had gone. No scattered pots yet, at least, but she harrumphed nonetheless. They moved on.

At last they arrived in her quarters, which lay across from Celestia’s.

Gloomy, dimly lit by candles. Luna had made it her own and It was home. At the balcony stood her telescope, and an abacus lay on her simple bed. Pots of lavender and chrysanthemum were hung all over. Thanks to the breakfasts Celestia prepared each morning, she hadn’t bothered with the kitchenette. Overall, Luna kept it as clean as she wished. Which was to say, not very, given the notes scattered on the floor.

“I apologise for the state of these chambers. We’ve not had the time to properly ready them.”

“Never mind,” said Darkhoof. “Should you need a hand… It takes patience to navigate a Labyrinth, you know.”

“No, no, no,” said Luna, stifling a laugh. She placed her hat on the coat-rack, and set her watering-can aside. “I can clean up after myself, Proxenos. But I’ll ask if you’d be so good to help me open this chest.”

The wooden chest lay where Luna had left it, beside the bed. It wasn’t a plain thing, for Reindeer carvings adorned the wood. With her telekinesis, she removed placed the chest between her and Darkhoof. The great Minotaur held onto one side, her magic held onto another, and together they opened it with a heave.

Darkhoof’s gaze fell upon the artefact in the container, and his eyes widened.

“Like I said, we’ve not yet had the time to present it, unfortunately.” said Luna. There was a reminiscent look in her eyes. “Grandfather brought it with him as a gift... the Gift Givers of the Grove are quite prescient, might I add... and he informed me that I ought to seek you out instead for its properties. He’s many things, but he’s no blacksmith. But your people are, and it’s most fortunate we should meet at this early hour.”

Her horn lit up and she lifted the artefact from its box – a unicorn’s headgear, made out of what could only be obsidian, with a silvery metal horn protector. Intricately forged and crafted with carvings on its side in a long-dead language, there was no question by whose labour it had been made, nor for whom. There, at the base of the horn, was a white crescent Moon.

“It’s a little old-fashioned,” said Luna serenely. “But we could use a little old-fashioned, and would this armour not fit as a timeless mare’s soul?”

“Princess… this is… this is...”

“One should always come prepared, Proxenos. Shall we begin?”

* * * * *

Basil found Blueblood, as promised, in the steam-baths.

Within the hazy humidity of the room, the princely stallion’s coat shone white. He was waiting by the edge of the pool, a bath-towel wrapped around his haunches. In his forehooves, he carried a strange piece of folded-up paper, almost arrow-like in shape.

The Prince saw who’d arrived, and nodded welcomingly.

“A miniature Kirin Paperwing,” the Prince explained. “I made it myself... to remember. You fancy watching an experiment?”

This was unexpected. Basil thought about it.

“I’m my father’s son…” he said. “I hope.”

Blueblood patted the spot next to him. “Sit, and I’ll show you.”

While Basil sat, careful not to let his own bath-towel slip, Blueblood softly blew on the Paperwing, and released it into the steam rising from the water.

Basil thought the Paperwing would sink and land in the pool. It did not.

“It was one of those Summer afternoons,” the Prince whispered, “when the pegasi are pulling double rainfall duty. An hour away from storming... You could feel your hairs stand from all the electricity.”

The Paperwing glided, to and fro, one graceful circle to another.

“Of course, I hadn’t looked up the forecast. Have I ever? I went out in my airboat. And, fool me, I got caught in an updraft.”

Sometimes the Paperwing rose, sometimes it did sink, but never low enough to hit the water.

“But the wind... I felt it was begging me to play with it, to never come down. Push and pull, like we were dancing... For fifteen minutes.”

At one point, the Paperwing’s very tip skimmed across the water. It left behind, much like the Kirin who’d conceived it, the parting trace a swan might upon the surface.

“That's the day I realised there's an entire life behind things, and no reason to be afraid. Ever. Paper's a poor copy, I know. But it helps me remember. I need to remember.”

Finally, the Paperwing flew back to Blueblood’s waiting forehoof. The Prince stared at it, wistfully, before letting it drop gently to the floor. He turned his gaze to Basil.

Basil met his gaze. Without premeditation, he felt his hand move to Blueblood’s bath-towel, loosening it. Now he was caressing the stallion’s haunches, as the stallion’s wrapped around his in turn.

Then, feeling his eyes close, he leaned forward, in tandem with the Prince of Equestria.

* * * * *

In the leisure-room next door, Queen Chrysalis lay on a massage table, her crown replaced by a hair towel, while Papillate lay on another.

“Ooh,” Chrysalis crooned, as Aphid kneaded her shoulders. “Yes, dear girl, that’s goood...”

A vent connected both rooms. Her tongue darted out, tasting the air.

Smirking, Chrysalis looked over to Papillate, who returned the smirk in kind. The little Queen-in-Waiting was learning.

“Heh-heh. Tastes like it’s getting… steamy, in there,” Chrysalis grinned. “I’d call that a good omen, for today.”

Omens, however, have a way of proving as opaque as steam. Or as shifty as a Changeling.

* * * * *

No sooner than all the delegates had finished convening for today in the Public Assembly, Ember’s instincts picked up the taste of a dread in the air such as she hadn’t felt there before. The light-hearted memory of her banter with Thorax, or her laughter at Garble’s expense over the past few days was all but forgotten when Princess Celestia noiselessly strode onto the stage, bearing a face most grave.

“An enemy is coming.”

That brought a screeching halt to the delegates’ talk, as all eyes turned to the Sun Princess.

“There is a war,” Celestia stated. “War so unforgiving, the human race has found itself driven to the brink, to seek every means to an end, all to escape, and to delay the unrelenting enemy.”

‘What?’ Ember thought. She dared not speak, this time, or join the growing murmurs.

“In the human’s own words…” Celestia continued, as the murmurs died down, “this crossing, or perhaps this twisting of the threads in reality’s loom goes further than beween our two worlds. Him coming here, he says, was not his first experience of otherworldy visit… Neither for him, nor for his kind as a whole. Maybe a thread looped back; maybe it’s a sign of what’s yet to come in the pattern. Who knows? All that matters is…” She took a deep breath. We did it.”

The room erupted. It would have been pointless for Ember to try and mentally transcribe it, but she could tell, among the ringing in her ears, that everything said amounted to variations on “How’s that even possible?”

“Alexander Reiner has told me he comes from a world under siege,” said Celestia. “Half of its population destroyed, as if they were never there, overwritten by the works of a corrupt soul. Millennia of history, destroyed, forgotten, leveled by a wave of magic that erases them mercilessly. And worse yet is what this corruption seeks to do to humans.”

Celestia had to pause.

“From what he’s shown us, it transforms them, crushing them into pony-shaped things with virtually no free will, not as much a mind as a set of restrictions. It regards humans as… as raw materials. For machines, for soldiers that die in droves. All while the true spirit of friendship bleeds dry, and virtues are twisted into perversion.”

Behind the ivory-white alicorn, two figures reappeared on the stage together. Ember saw them to be Princess Luna, who’d taken over the task of guiding Alexander Reiner in his wheelchair.

Meanwhile, Princess Celestia had paused again, letting the weight of her words sink in. Despite the eternal poise for which Celestia was known, Ember was sure she detected a hint of revulsion in the Sunbearer’s voice. Or perhaps that was she, who was just projecting.

“In another world,” Celestia said slowly, solemnly, “the Equine Family wages war on the Thirteenth Family.”

‘That’s…’ Ember thought. ‘I can’t believe this! This… this is too much–’

The atmosphere grew fiery. Tempers flared. Creatures yelled at the top of their lungs, clamouring to be heard. The griffon general leaned to whisper to the Young Pretender. Loudest were the zebras, and the Saddle Mareabians, and for a moment Ember thought Celestia had lost control of the room.

But it was the rumbling, aged voice of Sint Erklass that spoke above all. The Great Stag had until now sat quietly in his gallery. Flanked by the regal, steadfast Snow Maiden, his was a presence most welcome – had he bothered speaking earlier.

‘Now you speak, you old buck.’ Ember thought. ‘Always the one voice of reason. Typical.’

“Let her speak her mind,” Sint said. His towering gaze panned around the room. Some of the… less capable races present wilted under it, even if it wasn’t a particularly hard stare. “Isn’t that why we’ve gathered here, to answer the Call, this warning of old? So we may bear witness?”

‘Yawn.’ Ember quietly if half-heartedly sneered at the old stag’s words.

As she’d predicted, his words were regarded as trustworthy advice by the greatest powers of this gathering, outright gospel by some of the smallest. But who’d openly deny such an obviously wise and rational statement?

‘Not us,’ she thought, answering her own question.

She wondered whether to bring out the Chaoskämpfer. As the murmurs of agreement rose in the room, it was clear Sint had swayed the gathering’s flow in his favour.

“Thank you, Grandfather,” said Celestia, and the Great Stag nodded. “I understand each of you have your reservations. That this is an uncertain prospect. That coming here is folly. I assure you, it is not. I believe the human was sent to us so that, where one Equestria betrays Harmony, we may restore its truth.”

They paused. There were no murmurs, though Ember saw lingering doubts in quite a few – from the Malikah to the Young Pretender.

Princess Luna, now, stepped forth to make a declaration.

“The enemy understands. It understands fear. It understands desperation.”

The dark alicorn’s horn alit, and the room grew darker. Discontented murmurs rose once again, but Luna hushed them with a regal nod of her head.

“Do not fret,” Luna said softly. “I do not intend to frighten. I merely wish to show it as it is. As Alexander Reiner remembered.”

In his wheelchair, the human held his hand to Luna’s forehoof.

“I remember,” Reiner said gravely. And it began.

There was a sense of opening.The human’s eyes shone, and–

There is a set of canyons and rock spires that remind Ember of some canyons of the Dragon Lands, except that isn’t quite right.

This isn’t rock, this is concrete.

And this is a city.

A massive tower of brass scaffolding rises above it all, scraping the sky like the tail of a dragon as they fly above the planet. It is beautiful, and haunting in its similarity to some of what she’s seen of Equestria. The stony architecture, the stucco, the brick. All feels familiar. And yet it is not. There are vehicles akin to horseless carriages in the streets, streetlamps with no visible flame, lights that cannot come from fire. They could be from crystal, but somehow every instinct says they are not.

She hears whispers in the air. Screams in the dark. The crack of lightning and skies alight with thunder and fire. She sees a unicorn, mint-green and bearing a golden lyre upon her flank. Their words are distorted. But it all comes down to the same.

Fight. Survive. Live.

She sees endless streams of people fleeing the great barrier. Pegasi, unicorns, earthponies. Joined by hippogriffs, zebras, and the ponies of the Crystal Realm. A thunderous march. A thousand smiles. A white mare with the sun above her. Smiling contently over her people. Her Empire. An empire built upon ash. Forged in war. Drenched in the all-encompassing purple. Grotesque. Malignant.

In the streets of the city a battle did occur, with humans clad in strange suits, wielding weapons more advanced than any in Equus, against armour-clad equines raining fire and a sickeningly violet rain from the heavens above.

A human in rags runs through the city. Towards a train packed with people. And they scream. Arms outstretched. Doors wide open. He doesn’t make it. An earthpony nails him in the back with a crossbow, and he starts…

… There’s no single word to describe what happens. He melts like candle wax. He screams in unmistakable agony as his body bubbles, melts, twists, all things a body should never do. And then in the human’s place apears something that is not a pegasus. It has the wings of a pegasus, the build of a pegasus, but is not. Its eyes are as if an artisan has cleanly and bloodlessly removed them, replaced with glassy orbs.

The expression on its face is and is not happy. It looks happy, but something feels lacking. Some essential soul. It joins the fight against humans with the childish glee of a young drake smashing things to see what happens.

The Barrier approaches. The battle is lost. And it will be lost, time and time again. So many twisted, turned, and smiling. What can they do do but run?

There he stands. Alexander Reiner leads his people into battle. A horrid affair in the streets. The bodies of the fallen scatter the ruins of a city once shining with a thousand lights. A thousand lights to be extinguished beneath the violet Barrier.

The scene changes. But the story remains the same. The Barrier ever looming. Another sacrificed so others may live. Day by day. Week by week. A city falls. Another stands. The story repeats again, time and time again. Another battle. Another retreat. Millions dead. Millions awaiting the sweet relief of death.

Alexander Reiner stands weary, but defiant. His gaze lands upon the Barrier. Behind the Barrier, the Solar Tyrant stands. Tall and proud. Beloved above all.

And the Sun shines brightly on her people, as it sets for another.

Princess Luna felt cold.

Colder than that night in Adlaborn, when the Krampus’ twisted, corrupted puppets approached. For she had seen what Alexander Reiner lived. There wasn’t much she could have done to worsen it, and therein lay the primal, gut fear she held of puppets and strings. On far-off Earth, humanity faced them, fought them, and now, they were losing to them, one puppet amongst many in an eternal worship, and concert of madness.

“The war is not over,” Luna finally said, to the silent, entranced chamber. “The Empire’s will has yet to falter. And in time, they will turn their eyes here.”

The vision faded, slowly. The air in the hall had turned icy. The fog dissipated, revealing herself standing at the centre, and the human Reiner. She looked around. The last pieces of her projection began to fade into the air, leaving a large group of bewildered, horrified, and perturbed delegates.

Until only the Imperial symbol remained, as she intended. Not a word was uttered. Anyone who might have looked at Luna’s sister would have found Celestia’s customary tranquility replaced by a grim countenance. The sunburst sigil above her glowed in the dimmed light of the room, casting the room in a sickly, pallid, yellowish tone – the same sigil upon her flank. There, finally, Luna fully understood what Alexander Reiner had said of the enemy. She saw that Celestia’s half-shadowed visage was akin to that of the Queen herself.

Celestia coughed, her gaze haunted. And Luna felt that icy dread intensify as she understood that her sister was announcing a moment had come at last.

“We have one more call to make.”

The Princess of the Sun left the assembly little time to digest her words.

From her side, the Snow Maiden emerged, holding a small globe. Ilsa had discreetly snuck away from the Reindeer’s gallery while Luna made her presentation, timed to perfection by Celestia for dramatic impaect.

Before all their eyes, a stoic Ilsa released the globe and let it fall to the ground.

* * * * *

Hidden in the crowd, Ember watched, apprehensive, feeling glad for the warm of the Chaoskämpfer’s canister by her. What new devilry was this globe? She got her answer when the globe randomly leapt aloft, began to hum, to shake and to vibrate.

From within, eyes opened. Yellow eyes, of a soul consumed by pure, unadulterated madness. Through the crystal surface, they emitted a gaze that suggested no hint of sanity in the slightest. All Ember could distinguish was purely eldrich. They watched as Celestia stepped forth and prepared to ask the globe’s occupant a question –

It let out a high-pitched screech. One so dreadful, everyone who heard it was forced to cover their ears, as the entire building seemed to shake.

“Didnt want this. Didnt want…”

The creature growled at the crystal sphere that encapsulated it.

“Confined again,” said the thing, as it angrily hissed, pressing against the globe which held it imprisonedl. “Confined again, confined again!” It began to thrash, growing only more infuriated. “Confined again. Not asleep. No good!”

Before it could let out another scream, a golden glow overtook it and dragged it over to a recovering Celestia.

“Father Krampus, calm down,” Celestia asked politely, yet the creature just rambled and thrashed in her telekinesis.

“Didn’t sleep, only awake. Didn’t sleep, only awake.”

It was a mantra, almost.

“Didn’t sleep, only awake. Didn’t sleep, only awake.” the Krampus ranted and raved, as Celestia tried to prod it. Thankfully, this seemed to have some effect. “Remain to watch, only watch, as flesh of my flesh, son of my skin, scum and stinking, putrid and pathetic…” The creature sneered. “Still. Out. There!”

“Sir, please,” Celestia said. “What are you looking for?”

The Krampus looked to Celestia, eyes still consumed in insanity, and bared its teeth.

“Abomination it is. Churlishly cheated demise and death. Cheated his victims for what he’s done. Callously cannot comprehend characters, cannot all completely feel his fractious frustration. Took everything… he can’t have it all, no-one can, and it is all, all anything that is not him sees…” Slowly, something changed in the yellow eyes. “Couldn’t stop him. Couldn’t make him pay for what he did to her…” Was the thing crying? “C-Couldn’t... couldn’t stop him from ruining us any further.” The creature tried to breathe, before shuddering. “Sorry. Sorry, I can't remain much like myself. Too broken...”

Celestia seemed touched by this in her own way, before recomposing herself. “Father Krampus, tell us what you know while you’re lucid. Please.”

“Fought. Fought him, flesh of my flesh, to make him pay. We did what what we could, didn’t we? The lot of us... you and Scorpan my eldest son, we… confronted him.” The Krampus seemed to be struggling with itself, trying to say something which got choked up. “You got hurt. Hurt bad, but cast him down. I… I could not.” Again, the creature shuddered. “Failure. Despite everything, failure.”

“Why?” Celestia asked lightly, as the Krampus grimaced. “Why was it a failure?”

“Didn’t know of the Bag.” the Krampus said through clenched teeth. “Allowed him to crrrrrrrrawl his way out. Allowed him to wait. Allowed him to return and couldn’t make him pay.” It began to thrash again, savage rage overtaking it. “You will be found, flesh of my flesh! You will suffer! We know about the Bag! Never let you escape again!”

Its voice was so loud, the rage so raw, both echoed throughout the Hall.

And then, then Ember watched as the yellow eyes looked towards her. The Krampus was looking right at her. What was it–

“You.”

Ember blinked, as her mind seemed to lag. The Krampus had turned its gaze right upon her, and there was a sneer to its tone, but neither was aimed at her. It was sneering at the canister.

“You know.” said the Krampus. “You know.” This was a statement, not a question. “Come out!”

Suppressing a tremble, Ember turned the canister’s knob, summoning forth the Chaoskämpfer’s emerald-green smoke visage, to many gasps.

But the Chaoskämpfer, called up, just glanced at the Krampus. Despite his stoic exterior, there was pity in his eyes.

“Talk!” the Krampus almost screamed.

The Chaoskämpfer closed his eyes and took a breath.

“S-Sir?” Ember found herself asking, before the Krampus’s mad gaze turned itself directly at her.

“Not you.” It pointed at the projection. “Only him. Now, talk.”

“What would you like me to say first, Oh Father Krampus?” the Chaoskämpfer said calmly, “You have already confirmed that the enemy we face is something I wished to never see again.”

“So you do know him.” said the Krampus, as the eyes of everyone present turned towards the Chaoskämpfer, who sighed in resignation. “Who. Are. You?”

“To dragons, I’m known primarily as the Chaoskämpfer,” the Chaoskämpfer said, its voice more vulnerable than before. “But I’m also Spykoran the Elder, oldest dragon alive. And even then, centuries upon centuries ago, I had another name. I was once known as Spike, slave to the Lord of Midnight Castle, Tirek.”

Not a single soul dared to speak, and the Hall waited with bated breath.

“For a time, I was friends with three human children who came to Equus. One was named Megan.” His gaze looked to the sitting human, who seemed dumbstruck by what he’d just heard. “It was thanks to Megan that Tirek was vanquished, the land saved, and everything put to right. And I am reasonably certain that you, Alexander, are her heir.”

But before anyone could process this, the Krampus had one last thing to say.

“The Architect… the Architect! She brought forth the human child...” The creature grinned sinisterly. “It all unfolds.”

A solemn silence held, even after the snowglobe had hit the ground with a soft chink.

* * * * *

A pall hung over lunch that afternoon.

There was only one, long table this time, and once the doors had been closed to the crowds, no-one, from the resplendent Princesses of Equestria to the meek Hive Queen-in-Waiting, passing through the Great Stag and the Proxenos, or the Malikah and the Chieftain of the Rainbow Crow Tribe, not to mention the Queens of Abyssinia, of Hippogriffia and of Diamondia, nor even the Young Pretender or the Dragon Princess, looked eager to speak first. Even Prince Blueblood and Queen Chrysalis seemed lost, the Mikado noticed.

But none of that could match the dazed, almost ill look on Alexander Reiner’s face.

Only the Master of Ceremonies, and the Prince of Farasi, were showing some inkling in their eyes that what lay unsaid might carry weight, should they ever find the words for it. In the event, it was neither they nor Toshiro who cast the first coin into the pot.

Close by, the Snow Maiden voiced her thoughts.

“An imperialist Equestria…” Ilsa mused. “It’s unreal.”

“Perhaps…” Toshiro stated, feeling practicality take over. “Perhaps. Yet let us look at the facts. The human, clearly, is very real. So was the testimony from the Elder of our draconic kin. And Madame Heartstrings does speak passionately about the old LP-426 expedition.”

Agreement was voiced all around the table. Next to Toshiro, Kuno gave a polite clap.

Chrysalis harrumphed. “I certainly did not expect you to carry such an artefact, Ember.”

Ember shrugged. “No good reason to show it before.”

From the way Chrysalis was staring at Ember, Toshiro suspected that one way or another, the Changeling would be getting her answers. He himself wondered if Kuno’s former student had more tricks up her sleeve. Judging by his look, Kuno wondered the same.

Sint Erklass spoke. “I’d feared worse, after the Krampus escaped its confines,” he said. “And I wonder now if it spoke to deceive us, in its opacity. But I doubt it, just as I doubt we’ll get much more out of it. The old monster’s long given up on worldly matters. These days, it appears to have no goal, other than await the Final Winter of the world.”

“The Krampus pointing us to the Chaoskämpfer was clue enough,” said his Snow Maiden.

Reiner laughed throatily. “You… you seriously believe what that freak said? My mother, coming to Equus thousands of years ago? I’m thirty-seven! Humans don’t live that long.”

Celestia pressed her hooves together. “Alexander…” she said gently. “The Krampus may be mad, but it is ancient and, in its way, wise. It knew whom in the room could give us more answers. Why would the Chaoskämpfer lie? Forgive me, there’s no delicate way of putting this… At this point, you seem in denial.”

“I’ve just been told my Mom was some kind of Chosen One!” Reiner snapped, his temper flaring. “Like… something out of Harry Potter! Or The Wizard of Oz! This crap doesn’t happen in real life, let alone to a… teenage girl!” He seethed, light shining off his runes. “Just… goddamn it all…”

He took shallow breaths, rubbing his eyes.

“He’s under intense stress.” Papillate commented. “Huh, reminds me of an overtaxed drone during a frenzy.”

Chrysalis stroked her chin. “Spykoran mentioned a name, next to Reiner’s mother,” she said. “Tirek. It rings a bell.”

“And what would that be, Queen Chrysalis?” Reiner asked, sounding defeated.

“Dunno,” Chrysalis said carelessly. “Some overlord of yore? Midnight Castle… I’d never heard it’d anything to do with humans before.”

“Scorpan and Tirek were the Krampus’s sons,” Sint said softly, looking down. “And Tirek became the last of the Old Ones… An ignominious end for them. And in her twilight years, Firefly came to reside in Adlaborn, her age much prolonged.”

Steepling his forehooves, he turned to the beleaguered-looking Reiner.

“Thus if the Krampus spoke true, I’ve no doubt of your mother’s hand in the rescue at Midnight Castle, Sir Alexander. Firefly had forgotten a lot, but she hadn’t forgotten the Rainbow Bridge, or the human she brought back.”

“Then could Dame Firefly have been this… ‘Architect’, of whom the Krampus spoke?” asked Prince Abraxas.

Toshiro spotted him share a glance with Spell Nexus, the stallion that today served as Princess Celestia’s Headmaster, Archmage and Master of Ceremonies all in one.

“I find that supremely unlikely,” said Sint Erklass. “Just how she found an access to the Rainbow Bridge, I was never quite able to get out of her… But I’m certain she had help.”

Chrysalis was tittering. “‘Had help’. And some help she brought back, too!” She sniggered. “I’m sorry, but if Captain Reiner’s right, and his dear momma was just a teen, I fail to see how a teenager could beat something like Tirek. Not unless she had help herself.”

“What sort of help, Ebony Queen?” Papillate asked guilelessly.

“Like, oh, I don’t know,” Chrysalis shrugged. “The Alicorn Amulet? I’ve always wondered what’d happen if a Changeling tried harnessing that accursed artefact…”

“Did that even exist back then?” said Ember.

“Hey, you tell me, Ember,” Chrysalis harrumphed. “You’re the one with the can of Dragon Elder.”

But Ember’s response came down to throwing her a dirty look.

An uneasy quiet reigned at the table.

“I sense that Princess Ember here is not the only one with secrets,” muttered Queen Novo, to more murmurs of agreement.

She’d stared Toshiro’s way when she said that.

“Indeed,” was Toshiro’s sole comment. “This is a game-changer... But!” Here, he lifted a forehoof. “It should not detract from the value of Madame Heartstrings’ proposed expedition.”

The shift in topic didn’t go down a storm with all at the table, so to speak. Novo and the Abyssinian Queen were simmering. Abraxas seemed to resent moving from his musing, letting it be shown with a sizzle of his mane. A lot of the others were frowning. Meanwhile, Captain Reiner, instead of looking relieved, only looked more despondent.

However, Blueblood hadn’t been able to hide an eager beam. Good.

Ember snorted contemptuously. “And I expect you’re motivated purely by joy of discovery, Blessed Mikado?”

Had she still been at his Court, he’d gladly have flogged the impudent she-drake.

“I don’t claim to act without interest, Ember,” Toshiro said coolly. “But supporting Heartstrings’ expedition would serve us in the same way Princess Celestia was served by reintroducing us to the myth of the Thirteenth Family. Am I not correct, Celestia?”

Celestia dipped her head. “You see clearly, Toshiro.”

“I thought so,” said Toshiro. His eyes surveyed the whole table. “I foresee terrible things. Reiner’s war might even come to us. However, we cannot thrust the public unknowingly into any of it. But the publicity around Heartstrings’ expedition would be a wonderful means to get people interested in humanity… and it’d be profitable.”

“How can you think of money at a time like this?” demanded Grizelda.

“Your Grace,” said Kuno, loyally. “I know how you’ve built your claim on restoring your people’s pride in being griffons. In some cultures,” he nodded respectfully at Abraxas, “it is said that to be rich is to have many followers. Yet there are things which only money can buy.”

“Excuse me,” said Novo. “Supporting this expedition, raising public awareness of the Thirteenth Family… these only have value if you want to prepare Equus for involvement in this war. What about those who don’t want it?”

The Abyssinian Queen and the Malikah nodded together.

“You are free to withhold your signatures,” said Celestia. “However, I have pledged support to Captain Reiner. When the time comes, Princess Luna and Lord Discord will be sent to Earth. We’ve considered every available avenue, and they’re our best options in presenting our words to the people of Earth.”

“With all due respect, Highness,” asked Kuno. “Why the risk? Should we risk your sister’s intervention or her presence at all?”

Toshiro thought he saw Luna exchange an enigmatic glance with the Minotaur Darkhoof.

“Worry not, Excellency,” Luna said. “We have taken the precautions for the task as needed. With Discord’s presence, I daresay our safety is mostly assured. If not, then we’ll be ready for it.”

“Yes,” Celestia said in agreement. “Princess Luna’s departure shall remain independent of whichever decision we reach after tonight’s presentation, and we shall see that good fortune follows her in her duty.”

From her ornate saddlebag, Equestria’s foremost of Princesses retrieved a peculiar device of metal and wood. Dozens of buttons lined it, and Toshiro thought he recognised it as a device for those who preferred to write without a pen or quill...

“It’s a typewriter,” Reiner said flatly, confirming Toshiro’s suspicions. On the device’s back was a mark not unlike Celestia’s own.

Celestia nodded. “And yet,” she said, pushing it forwards with her magic, ensuring every soul on the table could look upon it, “this device has presented us a means to communicate with the Empire. My student, Miss Twilight Sparkle, has confirmed it is bound to a different realm across time and space.”

To Toshiro, it seemed no more than a machine, not unlike a Kirin’s, with its assortment of elaborate springs and gears.

“We shall test this device tonight,” said Princess Celestia, who for a change, made no attempt to hide her apprehension. “But let us all be aware. Doing so may constitute our point of no return. Therefore, we must consult someone who can confirm the truth, from another point of view.”

* * * * *

In a sterile room, Redheart sat still. Unchained, but a prisoner. Alone. She was alone. Nothing mattered. She had her orders. She failed. She lost. And here she sat. Alone. She remembered, briefly. The Bearer of Loyalty was there. So was the traitor. Why was she with the traitor Heartstrings? Nothing made sense. Nothing was clear. She was a prisoner now. Memories blurred together. Her orders were clear. Had been clear. What were they?

She pawed at the ground. Nervous. Afraid?

Do not let– Reiner leave.

That failed. He left. And here she was.

In his possession is– locket. Retrieve it swiftly and–

Taken. Safely hidden. Icewind listened. She should have stayed. Should have kept her promise. No... duty called. She had to answer. And she’d won then.

Success is– too late to prevent this Equestria– securing this locket–

But she was here now. Prisoner. Alone.

May Her Majesty watch over and protect you on your endeavour.

The Queen protected all. The Queen…

… Wasn’t here.

The door swung open. What time was it, now? She needed to remember.

“Good evening, Redheart,” the presence spoke. Ancient. Warm.

“Has she been fed?” spoke another. Younger. Female.

“Yes, m’lady,” said the Guard. “If I may, I wouldn’t bother with her. She hasn’t said a word.”

“That is quite alright,” said the Great Stag. “You may leave us.”

The door swung shut. They were in here with her.

“Why did you do it?” the Snow Maiden asked immediately. Harshly. Icily. “How could you? You, your people, how could you have burned it all to ash?”

“Ilsa,” said the Stag. “Please.”

“I’m sorry, I… Grandfather. I defer to you,” the Snow Maiden answered.

Redheart imagined her as she’d been – sad, quiet, gentle, but fierce. Protective. As she was now. Silence. Nothing but the wind, she imagined. She’d face him if need be.

There they stood. The Snow Maiden, beautiful, pale, forever young. The Great Stag, towering, wise and eternal.

“What do you know of Adlaborn?” the Stag said. His voice was grave. Mournful. “What do you make of its fate, in your world?”

Redheart shook her head. “I cannot answer that. They left us. They locked their gates.”

He frowned. “Are you sure?”

“The Queen told us. So we left them be.”

“You don’t know,” said the Stag. Not a question. A statement.

What did he know? She turned away from him. She grimaced. Defiant. Or so she hoped.

“You left. You left Earth to its fate and judgement. You shouldn’t speak."

“And who told you this?” the Stag demanded. High and mighty.

“No one. But it’s the truth. I know it is. The Queen knows it. You don’t act. You never do."

“I see. And these are the Queen’s words.”

She said nothing. She had nothing to offer him. Adlaborn was sealed off. It had turned away. Thought nothing of them all. Leave them be, the orders were. The Queen’s words rung true.

“Thank you for your time, Redheart. I apologise for intruding upon you at this hour.”

“Grandfather, was that all?” asked the Maiden. She sounded doubtful.

“It would appear so,” the Stag replied. Firmly. “The truth is hidden away from her, and I fear telling her would do her no good at this state.”

She didn’t respond. She never had to. But why did she want to?

“Very well, then,” said the Maiden. “I… I suppose I’ll have to tell Celestia and Luna.”

She felt them move away, Stag and Maiden both.

“... How could she do this? Our Celestia, such a sweet filly, a just mare,” said the Maiden. Her words grew strained. “Earth, Adlaborn, the Changelings... Lucie! Heavens above, we’d only just heard of her birth, and here… Grandfather. I don’t know if I can take it.”

“There, there, Ilsa,” said the Stag. She heard them leave. The door shut. “We shall make this right. For everyone, from Alexander Reiner, to the mare whose cell we’ve just visited, to those who’ve lost their lives and their very souls in this war on Earth.”

Redheart leaned against the wall. She closed her eyes. She heard them speak, one last time.

“If what I fear is true, Ilsa,” said the Stag, his voice fading away, “then those who started this war may have been its first victims.”

She wondered what it meant.

* * * * *

Again, Candid and Cunning, Prince of Farasi and Master of Ceremonies, Abraxas and Spell Nexus, met at the balcony which overlooked the valley from the topmost point of the Hall. No Aurora parted the skies at this hour, but the beginnings of the dusk were coming to settle over the faraway mountaintops, a veritable book-end to their previous meeting – perhaps a book-end to the significance of the Convocation as a whole.

Both of them stood in contemplation before an exchange was made.

“I have misgivings,” said Abraxas. “This news of what sounds like a prismatic refraction, joining together the course of worlds that rightfully ought have stayed apart… And Father Krampus, at the end, spoke of the Architect by that very name.”

Nexus’s eyes darkened. “Wouldn’t word have been sent by the Starry-Eyed One, if she sensed a flow was in motion that could lead to her, via a mention of her foremost title, coming to the notice of this Convocation?”

“It’s a mistake to assume the Starry-Eyed One is all-knowing, my friend,” said Abraxas. “How else could the Storm King have stolen, with such contemptuous ease, the Misfortune Malachite right from the coffers of my capital? After all, that is what our Council is for. I knew the risk, as one who operates in the light as well as the dark.”

“Your misleading question about the Architect’s identity won’t throw off that trail,” said Nexus, “only obfuscate how much you already do know. We can be sure that, with their curiosity now piqued, quite a few of those convened here’ll want to take a closer look at the lost era.”

“Like the little green unicorn, your former schoolgirl?” asked Abraxas. “The one who asks to back up her findings with an expedition?”

Nexus nodded sadly.

“What do you intend to do about that?” said Abraxas.

“Operate in the light, what else, just as you put it,” Nexus whispered. “Would anything less be expected of a scholar, the Headmaster of Celestia’s School to boot, than to sign up for this journey of scientific discovery to the North? I shall keep an eye on things, seeking to keep you as informed as I can.”

He paused, staring out onto the valley.

“First, though… I still must confer with the Saddle Mareabians, regarding this matter of runes.”

“Be careful in your steps,” Abraxas said solemnly. “Who knows what you might unearth.

The Alicorn Amulet, the Half-Gilded Horseshoe, the Misfortune Malachite, the Liber Grogar... Those and so many other noteworthy artefacts, twenty-two at last count, the Stonecarvers had been directed to consider as their lives’ mission to safeguard, for the greater good of the world.

But they were only mortal, and moreso even than immortals, they could stumble.

* * * * *

Three days had now passed, and little by little the story was revealed.

A human, a war, and another Equestria. There were, of course, hushed whispers over why Celestia had brought them here. Whispers that Pharynx hardly cared for. He knew what the Diarchs of Equestria intended them to do. After all, he’d served the Ebony Hive and its campaigns long enough to know war loomed on the horizon.

And he scoffed at the idea.

He passed the halls, the scent of lavender was strong in the air, fresh and enticing sleep – all too overwhelming for a guard. But of course a guard’s duty was never done. In his stride, he reflected on the other races in attendance. While like most Changelings, he was kept in the dark about their Queen’s plans, as should be, he was privy to pick up on the relations between the people of Equus.

They weren’t ready at all. Half the races here would be at one another’s throats without the Equestrians to mediate. The other half were quietly tucked away in their corner of the world. The Changelings had no business being invited here. There’d come a time when Celestia’s compassion would prove her undoing, and he’d be by his Queen’s side when it did.

‘This is no alliance,’ Pharynx thought. ‘This is a rabble.’

What business did dragons have with Changelings? What business the far-flung people of Adlaborn, the Bringers of Gifts and Joy, with war?

He turned the corner, huffing. Once the decision was made, and the ramshackle alliance faced whatever dark magic this ‘Solar Empire’ brought, the folly of it all would be seen. One wrong word and the so-called ‘alliance’ would come tumbling down. One dead weight and the waves would claim their unsteady ship. Changelings knew that better than anyone.

As lightly as everyone was taking Chrysalis’ claims about Garble, Pharynx did not. An entire Hive wiped out by disease was proof that excess caution was still not enough. The other peoples of Equus didn’t understand, and never would.

His brother’s foolish attempt at cozying up to a dragon was something else to nip in the bud.

Finally Pharynx arrived, and there his brother stood guard at the door. Obviously Chrysalis had now retired inside with Papillate. Thorax’s stance was rigid and proper, but Pharynx knew his brother would be glad not to get too close to their Queen.

He had to say this before Thorax made a fool of himself, if he hadn’t already.

“Oh, h-hello, Pharynx,” Thorax stammered, as Pharynx drew closer. “What’s–”

“I know what you’re playing at. It won’t work.”

His brother blinked, and tilted his head. Thorax had always been infuriatingly dense, but with the dragonet around, he’d been worse than usual.

“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about–”

Thorax’s words cut off when Pharynx grabbed him by the ear, and hissed.

“Don’t play dumb with me, grub,” he said harshly. “I know you’ve got your sights on the Dragon Princess. Now, Aphid might be blind, or maybe she doesn’t care... but I’m your big brother, and I do. So, let me tell you first... Grow up. You think this is some pony-tale, huh? Like their campfire tales? She’s out of your league, and the Chaos Lord’s not gonna turn you into a prince.” He said this last part while twisting his brother’s ear. “Understand?”

He paused, awaiting a good response.

With the ear still held firm in Pharynx’s grip, Thorax weakly nodded.

“Good,” said Pharynx gruffly. He let go. “No funny business, y’hear? We’ve got a job to do.”

And he marched along, leaving Thorax to rub his sore ear.

He didn’t doubt Thorax was trying to hold down tears. Pharynx quietly sighed. The least he could do not to shame his little brother any further was not to watch.

* * * * *

Ember felt anxious now. She’d sought Thorax, to pay him another visit in the guise of checking on her bodyguard, the routine she’d settled in nicely over the past few days. Princess Celestia had announced that at noon-time, they’d have the final piece of the puzzle.

Amidst all this madness, Thorax had been the one person she could relax with.

Ember had eagerly gone over to Chrysalis’ chambers, ready with a last bit of levity, that one final tease for him to finally, finally join her in listening.

No sooner had she stepped into the hallway that Pharynx blocked her way, firmly declaring that no other guests may visit the dragon in quarantine. Princess or no princess, he’d made it very clear. He was dedicated, Ember had to admit. But it didn’t help her sudden burst of anxiety.

Today, she’d chosen not to mingle with the crowd, instead taking a balcony seat, like the other leaders and delegates. This gave her a clear vantage point of where Celestia stood, presently.

Ember leaned forward in her seat. Celestia stood still, waiting for everyone to finish arriving. Including, inevitably, Chrysalis and Papillate, who came into the same balcony as Ember, Chrysalis greeting her with that wicked smirk of hers.

“I see the show hasn’t started yet,” said Chrysalis, taking a seat as Papillate did likewise. “Ugh, all this sitting around, though...” she added, reclining to stretch out her hindlegs. “Massages aren’t enough. My legs ache!”

But then Ember spotted the Changeling who’d trotted in after Chrysalis and Papillate, and her eyes widened.

“Come, Thorax. I need to rest,” Chrysalis yawned, not looking around. “No, don’t bother transforming. You’ll do fine as it is.”

Ember had barely got a breath out when Thorax, averting his gaze, shuffled himself beneath Chrysalis’s outstretched hindlegs, kneeling. And before her own eyes, the Changeling Queen stretched her hooves across his back.

“Ah, much better,” said Chrysalis, crossing her legs. “Don’t worry about your watch-dog, Princess, Pharynx and Aphid have him covered. But I need my footrest, don’t you agree?”

She didn’t wait for Ember’s response, and simply looked past the railing, down to where Princess Celestia stood, now joined by Princess Luna, Alexander Reiner and Lyra Heartstrings.

Ember glanced at the little drone.

“... Thorax?” she mouthed.

The sight was absurd. Him on all fours, Chrysalis’ hooves upon his back, his wings delicately rubbing her soles. Yet she found no mirth, as her eyes met Thorax’s own. And he never had looked so resigned.

She might have said something, but Papillate put a hoof on her shoulder, shaking her head. Then Celestia stepped forth, and the word on the tip of Ember’s tongue evaporated at seeing the Sun Princess. In Celestia’s face, too, was no laugh to be found today.

“Fellow leaders, people of Equus… witnesses,” Celestia spoke. “I stand before you bearing a witness of my own. A witness to the transgressions of the Solar Empire.”

Out stepped a white earthpony.

* * * * *

“State your name,” Luna said.

Redheart stared at her forlornly.

“Redheart,” she croaked. “Formerly of the Eighth Home Regiment.”

“Do you recognise this device?”

Behind Redheart, Archmage Nexus made an appearance, directing for the the ansible was rolled onstage by two stallions. Awesome Fire and Shieldwall, who’d spent the last week examining it, furnished it with a dictaphone. Bringing the rolling table to a halt, they bowed, then left after Nexus, impassively.

“No.”

“So you say.”

Luna’s horn shone, taking Redheart’s forehoof in its grasp. She offered little resistance as Luna pressed her forehoof to a pad on the ansible, lighting up the keyboard.

“It appears to recognise you.”

“Excuse me.” From her balcony, the Abyssinian Queen had stood. “Aren’t we being a bit reckless? If that thing connects to the Empire, we–”

“They know already.”

The human had spoken, so gruffly as to startle Lyra by his side. Luna saw his eyes, haggard, pained, his brows twisted in anger.

“Your Majesty, I’m asking for help, too,” Reiner declared. His hands, Luna noted, clutched his wheelchair so hard, he was going to break something. “I’ll beg on my knees if I have to. Because the Solar Tyrant won’t rest until every soul on Earth sings her praises, every second of every day. We’re winning every battle, yeah, but the Barrier’s it. That’s it. That thing touches us, we’re gone. All that’ll be left of us will be a bunch of little pony-shaped thingswith all the autonomy of figurines on a fucking cuckoo clock.We’ve had everything at our disposal, everything. Weapons that could wipe out Canterlot and the mountain it stands on in the blink of an eye. And we still haven’t cracked the goddamn Barrier.”

He struggled to stand. Lyra held onto Reiner’s hand, and Luna shot him a worried look. He remained seated.

“I’ve fought men before, killed for the flag I was born under. I’ve seen death in every walk of life. But this isn’t death. It’s so much worse. I’ve fought things that were men and are now but soulless, smiling puppets. And this fate awaits every single of my people on Earth. I have welcomed death. But billions haven’t, shouldn’t welcome it. They deserve a future without the Tyrant. I’m asking for help, alright? I wish it’d never come to this, that we didn’t have to fight to the bitter end. But she’s shown us her mercy. She’d turn us into her zombies and call it mercy– We’d rather be six feet under, or on our feet, when she comes knocking!”

There was a gasp from his side.

“The ansible– look!” cried Lyra. “It’s, it’s doing something!”

There were gasps, and murmurs, and Luna saw all eyes turn to the stage, and even Reiner turned to look. She followed their gaze, where she saw the ansible’s keys moving of their own accord.

Swiftly, Celestia cast a spell presenting its words to those in attendance, a projection on the wall behind her.

And Luna read it out loud.

“He lies.”

Reiner paled. “It’s her…”

Celestia put her lips to the dictaphone. “Greetings...” she said. “Am I addressing Queen Celestia of the Solar Empire?”

Briefly, the keys didn’t move.

Then, slowly, they did.

“Yes.”

The room sucked in a collective breath.

Celestia licked her lips. “Then I am glad that we can speak at last, Your Majesty. This is Princess Celestia.”

“I know who you are,” Luna read.

“Of course you do,” said Celestia. “We share much common… But we are more different than alike, I should think.”

The typewriter clicked away.

“If that is what you believe.”

“I don’t believe it. I know it,” Celestia said, narrowing her eyes. “The Conversion of mankind, the holocaust of Adlaborn… Do you deny those? Why are you doing this?”

“Justice.”

Even Celestia had to gasp. “You call this justice? For what?”

But the answer, lengthy as it was, came quickly.

“The Thirteenth Family walks alone for a reason, Princess Celestia. Humans murdered and butchered anything that challenged their primacy. Do you know what happened to their closest cousins, the Neanderthals? They ate them.”

“What about Adlaborn!” cried Celestia. “Don’t you call that murder and butchery!?”

“Nothing so crude. We were clinical. To cure illness, sometimes must one cut out the benign cells with the malign. And humans, believe me, are very ill. The year we arrived, they were on the cusp of disaster.”

The letter concluded. Another took its place.

“Earthponies. Pegasi. Unicorns. Horses. Zebras. Hippogriffs. Griffons, too. These are the people welcomed under our banners. Our prosperity. Together as one. Mankind would turn against its own for the pettiest of reasons.”

Redheart moaned. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m sorry,” she begged, on and on. “I failed.”

“Where they once lived, the land flourishes. The Barrier does not destroy. It purifies. Restores it to what it should be. Whereas they have destroyed their world. And when they run out of creatures to dominate, they will come for you and yours. They are too irresponsible, too brutal, to be allowed to continue as they do. They are a blight. They are lucky to receive the correction that we bring.”

Celestia wrapped a comforting wing around Redheart, her face calm and soothing. Yet Luna wondered if beneath her sister’s sorrow and regret, lay fury tranquil as water, over this undying loyalty to another Celestia.

Something changed. The former Nurse and Guard turned to look at her, fearful.

“We should, we should have tried harder. With you. Brought you back together, Sun and Moon. I’m sorry, I’m, I–”

“Shhh, Redheart,” said Celestia. “It’s not your fault. It never was.”

Amidst Redheart’s tears and Celestia’s words, Luna finally understood what Sint and Ilsa had both meant, days earlier.

She joined her sister’s side, lowering her gaze to Redheart’s level. “Whatever your faults, whatever’s been done to my sister and myself… We forgive you.”

Then Luna heard more typing. Startled, she rushed back to the ansible.

“Redheart...” Luna’s voice faded. “You have been a faithful and dutiful soldier.”

Not a soul dared to raise a voice. As the ansible wrote itself out, only Redheart’s strangled breath and sobs filled the air.

“Thank you, and rest well in harmony.”

There was a short cry. Everyone turned, staring at the source.

Redheart laid limp at Celestia’s hooves, her eyes closed. She looked almost… peaceful.

No time to linger on, even as the murmurs grew. Luna smelled something burnt, something twisted and ancient and eldritch. And it came from the ansible, which wrote another message. A lengthier one. The smell grew fouler still. A few of the serving-beasts at the doors had to open them, to let in a breath of fresh air.

Bracing herself against the sickening, deathly stench, Luna read aloud.

“By the power entrusted upon my being,” she read, as it was written letter by letter. “I, Queen Celestia, Sol Invictus, hereby reaffirm our noble cause, to unite the equine peoples in Harmony’s name, to purify and cleanse the Earth of its decadent rulers, and to release humanity from their own sins for their own good.”

She coughed. The smell was overwhelming. Yet she pressed on.

“Tread carefully, Princess Celestia. My Empire has no quarrel with you, but the path you follow shall lead your subjects astray. I’m who you should have been, who you are, who you will become. Our cause is just and true. Whether you choose to stand aside or in our way, the Sun shines on the Twelve Families of Equus, now and always.”

Smoke rose from the ansible.

”Harmony above all.”

And there was a blinding light.

The device ruptured and tore itself apart. When all was said and done, the smell had dissipated, leaving the smoking, charred remains of the ansible.

Celestia turned her gaze away from the burnt, ruined device, on to the mare who lay immobile at her hooves. Luna bowed her head.

The room was deafeningly silent, until she heard her sister speak.

“Sleep now, Redheart,” Celestia said gently. “May you find peace at last.”

* * * * *

When Alex wheeled up to her, Lyra was still backstage, staring at the wall.

“Lyra...” he began. “Remember when you asked me how you were captured?"

She turned to look at him, nodding quietly. He sighed, the words and the memories weighing heavily on his soul.

“It was the Thunderchild, Lyra,” Alex whispered. “An experimental warship. Capable of going below the waves, like a giant submarine. A fortified haven. We… were seriously thinking underwater cities. Tests showed the Barrier’s reach shrinks in the oceans… And you– no, she was onboard, off the coast of Iceland, when the Imperials caught up to her…”

His voice broke. He was drinking in her face, wanting to remember every inch of green.

“It sank, Lyra. It sank and they caught her. Took her back and turned her into a statue, then broke her into a million pieces. They say… I don’t know, nobody does, but… they say it’s the Tyrant’s assassin who did it. The… that same ghostly creature who killed the Great Stag…“

He’d said all he could. He felt like a man three times his age. And still he forced the last words.

“You were on a ship… a ship… Lyra, I… I don’t want you to go on this expedition.”

Lyra shook her head. “I’m sorry, Alex,” she murmured. “I’ve got to do this.”

Redheart saw the pale mare come down the stairs, her every feature covered by a cloak.

A Guard approached her, meaning to speak. But the pale mare raised a forehoof, bidding him silence, and he obeyed, humbled, and he retreated.

She knelt by Zecora, her cloak brushing the floor.

“Are you in pain?”

“... Yes.”

Zecora spoke feebly, with an even feebler nod.

The pale mare nodded in turn, as if she found validation in that answer, a confirmation of a higher principle.

“Then you are alive…”

Her voice held no cruelty. Only sorrow, deep and dark as a well. Her horn glowed. Zecora’s focus melted away.

“She’ll live. Take her.”

As they did so, the mare stared at the portal Reiner had vanished into.

“A strange job we do, Nurse,” she commented. “Believing we can stave off the void… Like Sisyphus of human myth, who sought to master Sleep and Death. For that, the gods condemned him to forever roll a rock uphill, in that place they call Tartarus.”

She sighed, melancholically.

“Three millenia later, another of their authors wrote that one should imagine Sisyphus happy. The struggle towards the heights, he said, should be enough to fill a man’s heart… I wish I could believe that.”

And Redheart wondered to hear her share so openly her knowledge of human myth.

“You know what to do.”

Redheart gazed at the mysterious portal. “Yes.”

They wouldn’t hold it for long. Enemy reinforcements would come soon. But in this small interval, the road to follow Reiner still lay open.

“Won’t you ask my name?” said the mare. “Am I to send you off so coldly, Nurse Redheart? Wouldn’t you rather know what to call the one who, possibly, sends you to your death?”

“I don’t need to ask,” Redheart said, glancing away. “You’re Her Majesty’s Sword. Everyone in the Empire knows that name in whisper.”

The pale mare nodded wearily.

“Celestia’s Sword, Queen’s Justice…” She sighed. “I have never liked these. They bespeak false grandeur, try to spin nicety out of the coarseness of war. Besides, these aren’t names. These are titles.”

She raised her head, almost casting her face into the light, out of her darkened hood.

“If you wish to remember me… Remember me as Weaver.”

* * * * *

End of Act One

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

This chapter, the behemoth chapter of Spectrum, had already once undergone revision on July 27th 2020; for further information, see [url][url=https://www.fimfiction.net/blog/911302/theidiot-regarding-revamp-of-chapters[/url]https://www.fimfiction.net/blog/911302/theidiot-regarding-revamp-of-chapters. Ironically, after previously getting shortened, the Concordia Maxima chapter received an expansion during these rewrites.

A new plot breadcrumb; Prince Abraxas meets up with Spell Nexus (of Sunny Equestria) in private at the Convocation, both of them members of the Magical Council of the Stonecutters.

Spell Nexus’ sobriquet is given as “Cunning”. He and Abraxas discuss not only the Half-Gilded Horseshoe of Sunflare, but their Council’s newest member, “Constant”, a.k.a. Daring Do.

Addition of a scene; Proxenos Darkhoof and Basil Darkhoof are shown on their arrival at the Hall of Unity. Again, I wish to give my thanks to RanOutOfIdeas, and to RoyalPsycho, respectively, for helping me with this. Thank you both.

Spectrum 2.0 - May 20th 2019

Sledge115: Up above, a completely accurate rendition of Princess Luna seeing Pharynx ruin her lavender pots. Diplomacy is hard.

We do apologise for the lengthy date between the previous chapters and this one – as the finale of Act One, we thought it was appropriate for it to be a rather lengthy one, to wrap up as many plot threads as possible for the Act. And let me tell ya that writing Thorax and Ember, plus Chrysalis and little Aphid, Princess Luna, and finally Grizelda the Young Pretender has been quite fun :twilightsmile:

This chapter is, obviously, more of an anthology by design. We thought it would better portray the political intrigue surrounding such an earth-shattering discovery by taking multiple points of view covering several threads, and several days. It’s a monster of a chapter, one we hope is worth the wait!

So ends Act One. And now it begins.

VoxAdam: Now wasn’t this a juggernaut of a chapter to write.

With it entering the planning stages in Spring 2018, ‘Concordia Maxima’ was no less a chapter we knew we wanted to write from the moment Spectrum got rebooted in May 2017, only a few days short of two years ago.

Ember’s scene mingling with the crowd was the very first scene we wrote in June 2018, with DoctorFluffy taking the lead, employing his knack for crowd scenes to convey the feeling of hubbub and rumour.

Originally, Celestia would have immediately announcement the enemy’s coming. This, naturally, would have made for a shorter chapter. But somewhere down the line, we decided to make a little more of a concession to realism. While Celestia and the Mane Six are used to earth-shattering events occurring all the time, not everyone is.

Hence three days to gradually ease the world into not one, but two life-altering revelations; humans are real, and are under attack by an evil alt-Equestria.

If Act One’s been this lengthy, it was to help sell a sense of Equus Prime as the ‘real’ world, with the human’s arrival disrupting that reality.

Thus it wraps, and I hope you’ll enjoy a shorter, more intense, more action-packed Act Two.

P.S.
Yep. She has arrived.

… Also, a shout-out to my new story, [url=https://www.fimfiction.net/story/439873/inmates-of-erebus]Inmates of Erebus; connected to fundamentals of the Spectrumverse, but designed to work as a standalone.

Interlude I ~ Through Ragdoll's Eyes

Something has gone wrong. We don't seem to have an archived copy of that chapter.

Act II ~ Chapter Fourteen ~ Silent Night

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy
WHOAAAAA, HALFWAY THERE, OOOOH OH, DOG ELECTED MAYOR

VoxAdam
In For A Penny, In For A Pound

Sledge115
Do you want to see the Moon rise?

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Act Two
Moonrise

Chapter Fourteen
Silent Night

* * * * *

“Freedom is hammered out on the anvil of discussion, debate and dissent.”
— Hubert H. Humphrey, Wit & Wisdom of Hubert Humphrey

We had left Basel on a train to Berne, hoping to catch a glimpse of the conference. As we found out later on, the train’s delay prevented us from getting caught amidst the war’s outbreak. We took a detour to Montreux instead, and the following days were filled with people coming in and out of the city, looking for the nearest escape route out of Switzerland. I remained there, interviewing the people who’d stop for me, all with the same question; where were you when the war began?

I had forgotten how many days had passed by the time Dieter managed to get a hold of a German pilot evacuating civilians. By then, the Barrier was visible from Montreux, and the events at Berne were a distant memory. I still wonder how we managed to take off in that panicking crowd.

I don’t remember exactly who or what prompted me to bring out the camera as the helicopter rose above Montreux, but there it was. Translucently pink, gleaming, as beautiful to the eye as it was dangerous to the touch. The impression of beauty, ironically, was offset by the pristine, untouched look of the Swiss Alps and Lake Geneva, their natural white and tranquil waters marred by that unnatural pink hue.

I took the shot just as what I believe to have been a German squadron made their sortie, passing by the Barrier. Thank goodness for modern camerawork! It was all I needed to capture them, unblurred, these distant shapes like angry hornets rushing to sting that intruding mass.

But the planes, all nine of them, looked so insignificant in the face of this Barrier, its dome-like form stretching out into the sky, unstoppable and unyielding. I tried not to think too hard about that then, hoping the planes’ bombing run would have some effect against it...

By the time we’d passed the Swiss-German border, the last few member states of the UN had signed their own declaration of war. It was our finest hour, the whole world united against a common foe, but look where we are now. Three years on, and we’re no closer to beating the Barrier than we were when it destroyed CERN.

The Barrier is our greatest foe, and there’s no way around it. The war continues, yet with each passing day, how many thousands of years of our history have been wiped from memory? I’ve heard people talk about how all we need to do is cut their head off their forces, their Sun, their Queen. But what happens then, if we do somehow put the Tyrant’s head on a spike, if the Alex Reiners and Stephan Bauers of the world do manage to kill her, and it doesn’t end there?

It was that sight, our technological marvels looking so small and inconsequential against the backdrop of the Tyrant’s ultimate weapon, which cemented the idea in my mind that our legacy, more than anything, is our only true defiance.

— Hanne Adler, on her photograph Unyielding Barrier, depicting an aerial squadron passing by the Barrier. Part of the greater collection Fallen Europe, the photograph won the Pulitzer Prize of 2020.

New York City, USA ~ November 15th, 2024 CE.

The photograph had been nothing short of her greatest work, Hanne thought. Her Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima. But she wondered, not for the first time, if it was or would be all for naught, while she quietly listened to Vladimir Putin speak.

“The dreams of utopia are easily corrupted. Few know that so well as the people of Russia.”

The man who had led – and continued to lead – Russia for twenty years spoke carefully, clearly. In another time, the West would have showered him with criticism the moment his bid for an unprecedented fifth term as President of Russia was announced. Yet here, with an uncertain future ahead, Vladimir Putin was the least of their concerns.

For all the benefits his reputation had granted him, it was the unspoken truth that Putin’s Russia, much like the rest of Europe, was long past its time, propped up by an aging statesman. There wasn’t much left of Russia, or of her people – they were, for all intents and purposes, a military without a country, whose claim to the Security Council, much like the United Kingdom and France, were tinged by lingering reputations from the Cold War. The same held true with Spain, Poland, and every single European state with some semblance of a government in-exile.

Few would doubt there were still shades of the old ruthlessness in the man, though. The world held its breath when the Russian Army detachment in Ukraine, rather than relieving the Ukrainian Army in Kyiv, had instead headed towards the old Chernobyl plant during the infamous campaign of 2021. Their orders, said to come from the President himself, were the culmination of Russia’s centuries old scorched tactics, and their success meant that it would be repeated throughout Eastern Europe where the old Soviet nuclear plants stood.

Cold, cruel and utterly immoral, the projected fallout meant most of Eastern Europe was doused in radiation. And though not all the reactor meltdowns were carried out properly before the Empire arrived or intervened, the intent was all too obvious. Putin remained adamant it was a necessary evil to halt the Empire’s push. The main strength of the Barrier was that it provided unassailable cover, and this tactic had heavilyblunted it.

Not one week after the Barrier had enveloped the contaminated sites, the Queen arrived in person and cleansed it all herself.

As the elderly Russian President’s words faded, the room was filled with the sounds of typing, from both the attending delegation and the media presence.

To Hanne, the words sounded like an awfully poetic, morbid assessment of the Empire, although it hardly answered the looming question of humanity’s seemingly inevitable defeat.

Nobody wanted to admit the inevitable. But then, nobody could answer why it was inevitable.

Brushing away a strand of her hair, her finger on the camera’s shutter, she reflected on how long the summit had lasted. She didn’t mind much. All the more time to document the occasion. What more could she do? Here, she was amongst leaders old and new. None had seen such a monumental gathering in years.

She wished it was for something other than the quiet acceptance of their collective demise.

All those present in the summit, and the conference that followed, made it practically a who’s who of international authority and representation. The PHL was a given, as practically the only Equestrians willing to help out – except perhaps for the Equestrian Resistance, whose sole representative here was the liaison named “Gladmane”. Otherwise, the main PHL figures whom Hanne could see in attendance, on the left row facing the Council, were their acting leader, Cheerilee, the head of their R&D Department, Time Turner, and the Equestrian Princess-in-exile, Lady Cadenza.

Aside from PHL, there were of course Earth’s authority figures. Hanne knew their names well.

The old UN Security Council sat by their Secretary-General on his podium, the Chairman watching pensively while Putin finished his speech. She wondered what Peter Vanderbilt might be thinking, as he momentarily broke his gaze from the Russian President to exchange a glance with Antonio Guterres. His opinion on Putin could be no friendlier than the American President’s. Then again, common wisdom these days was that Xi Jinping was the man to look out for, Hanne reminded herself, her gaze wandering to the Chinese Premier. Next to these characters, President Mélenchon of France and Prime Minister Javid of the UK sat in the shadows.

There were many others gathered in the vast General Assembly, yet for the most part, those figures were the only ones the media and the public cared about. Some things never change.

Putin’s speech came to an end, and he sat back, looking his years.

On his podium, Guterres momentarily took over the reins again, beginning with some inconsequential small thanks to the Russian President for his contribution, then outlining the wider context, as he had countless times before, for everyone to take stock of.

This was the interval during which few people actually listened to the current speaker. Mutterings of chat arose among the assembly. Hanne recognised Dovetail, one of the Deputy Heads of PHL R&D. He was flanked by a worried-looking Sarah Presley, the other Deputy Head of PHL R&D. They were chatting with Time Turner, their words unheard to all.

And, of course, they weren’t the only odd faces peppered throughout the assembly. Scientists, officers, and more who probably had some reason to be present.

Any other time, it should have been monumental. But the bitter truth was evident in their faces, from her colleagues to the highest of leaders, and yet on and on they toiled. Nobody much wanted to admit it. When it had all started with the foundation of UNAC, four years ago, the talks had been optimistic, hopeful, that the PHL’s existence might make for a game-changer.

Now, the PHL were just one of many awaiting the fatal touch of the Barrier.

On the stage, Guterres finished speaking, and the whole Council opened up for questions.

“General Vanderbilt, has there been talks with the Redcloaks?” asked a reporter. He was a colleague from the New York Times, Hanne remembered. Bill from Philadelphia? “Have the Redcloaks considered full involvement?”

The gruff Dutchman chosen to lead the United Nations Allied Command spoke up. His voice was wizened and guttural, but somehow clear as day as he spoke contemplatively.

“They’ve not, unfortunately,” he said calmly. “The Pretender Grizelda and her Redcloaks have yet to enter this war.”

A pause, as one of his aides leaned to inform him something. He shook his head.

“And that is all we’ll say on the matter.”

Carefully adjusting her camera, Hanne took another picture. She would get the chance to ask her question, but not now. She’d have that chance, she always did. For now, she’d wait. There were hundreds of leaders gathered here, from the smallest of nations in the Pacific, to the great powers that remained. Even further, the leaders of the PHL and various other militia, all welcomed here…

Members of the old guard who hadn’t been converted during the Purple Winter, or assassinated in the war. New faces thrust into the role of leading nations in these uncertain times. She remembered how Brazil, a place she personally held fond memories of, had been the source of mighty uproar when then-President Bolsonaro had refused entry of European and African refugees alike, and was swiftly elected out of office by the next election – though, Hanne noted, Bolsonaro’s pre-war actions had by then alienated even his staunchest supporters.

And then, of course, there were the leaders without a seat or place to call home.

Two of them were permanent members of the UN Security Council, but there were also those like Kramp-Karrenbauer, the nominal Chancellor of Hanne’s own native Germany. The bespectacled woman had taken charge in late 2019 amidst the chaos of Europe’s imminent fall. The fact Kramp-Karrenbauer was much like her predecessor had eased some things, but prior concerns of policies and whatnot became moot by the time the Barrier reached Berlin.

In truth, Europe’s presence in the UNAC leadership was a remnant from a bygone era. Each and every one of them, from prim and proper Kramp-Karrenbauer, to the haughty and proud Mélenchon, were there to keep up appearances. What had once been the centre of Western civilisation now lay in ruins, its legacy atomised, its people scattered to all four corners of the world. Now, Canada hosted a sizable diaspora of British, French, German and Dutch refugees, and whatever was left of Western Europe’s militaries scrambled to assemble in North America, waiting for the Barrier’s inevitable arrival past the Atlantic.

As the bitter joke went, the Royal Navy wasn’t just the United Kingdom’s historically most prominent military branch – it was the United Kingdom now.

“What of the ongoing PER pacification campaign?” asked another reporter. Hanne didn’t know her, but she was a colleague of Kahoku’s, her own friend from The Herald Tribune. Who, Hanne last remembered, was off somewhere in Boston. “Has the Stampede Fleet project been a success, President Kaine?”

Hanne turned her glance, and took a quick shot of the outgoing President of the United States. Despite calls for him to extend his presidency past the two terms, Tim Kaine had insisted on keeping the United States and her democratic traditions intact, and so planned on stepping down once his term had passed. Even amidst the violent protests his duly-elected successor had elicited in the South.

‘Clever enough, I suppose, Hanne absent-mindedly thought. ‘Remain as a sort of-regent to see her take the Oval Office. Be remembered as someone truly committed to democracy. Well played. Besides. We’ve had too many people since Montreal deciding the rules shouldn’t matter now.’

She watched, amidst flashes of cameras and shutter noises, as the man himself leaned forward to his microphone and spoke.

“I can say that the Stampede Fleet project has been largely a success.” Kaine answered, “Admiral Rebecca Kleiner and First Mate Thunderwing have faced multiple efforts by the Empire to gain island territory beyond the Barrier, and come out on top. Despite the memory of Thunderchild’s Fall, their PER guerrillas have yet to repeat any kind of targeted blow.”

Hanne had to give a tiny smirk when she spied Xi Jinping’s restrained irritation. The Stampede Fleet had been a project to put all naval assets in the Pacific under one banner, the PHL, as a unified fleet such as had never been seen since the end of the Second World War. A fleet to root out and challenge Imperial-aligned guerillas scattered in the Pacific.

Old rivalries die hard, and the entire Pacific Command, nominally under Chinese leadership, was split further alongside the Chinese and Japanese lines. Still, Jinping’s role as paramount leader of China was uninterrupted by the war. Antonio Guterres’ silence on China years ago remained politely uncommented, though rumours abounded that the Portuguese man would be replaced as the Secretary-General by the shrewd Vanderbilt when the time came.

But Kaine was a man who looked and spoke like a familiar face, and meant it. With his grandfatherly, light blue eyes, coupled with his rugged yet oddly charming looks and signature dark suit, he was a man to be welcomed by all. That alone was enough for Hanne and obviously millions of voters from both sides of the divide. And, it seemed, millions of people in the North American continent, from the United States to the millions of Europeans who now call Canada their home.

There lay some lingering doubts in Hanne’s mind, though. The ongoing armed conflict, invariably called an insurgency, a civil war, or rebellion in the United States, remained the elephant in the room for President Kaine. The Second American Civil War, some called it. UNAC’s assets alongside the PHL, the United States government, both major factions of the HLF, PER stragglers and many, many more wishing to carve out their own piece of land, before the Barrier hit and the Empire came knocking.

“What about rumours regarding strange activities in Southern New Jersey?” someone asked Kaine. “Are there any plans to investigate the Pinelands?”

“Not just yet,” Kaine answered solemnly, adjusting his blue-and-red patterned tie. “We lack the time to try and find any more information. I think we’d do ourselves better if we aren’t sending people out there with only rumours to go off of.”

Uncertain murmurs arose in the room.

Another reporter spoke up, another answer. The conference soon ground down to statements, vague answers, reassurances. On and on it went. As the meeting progressed, it all blurred together for Hanne.

At last, she decided to try for her question.

“What of the contingency?” she asked calmly. “What of the Barrier, of the effort to halt it?”

None picked up the question, at first. She knew it was a difficult one – classified intel was tricky to handle. Hanne regarded Cheerilee with a calm, gauging look. The mare looked uncomfortable sitting where Lyra Hearstrings had once sat. A former schoolteacher thrust to a position far above leading what had started as a humanitarian organisation should be.

She felt a string of sympathy towards the mare. To start somewhere so simple, only to ultimately be thrust high and into the spotlight. It would be almost akin to her being handed a rifle and expected to suddenly become a crackshot. And yet, Cheerilee did seem composed, despite the evident discomfort of her seating.

Maybe there was more to Cheerilee than Hanne was seeing. If this war has proven anything, it was that there’d always be more than what is immediately apparent on the surface. Maybe a former schoolteacher was just what the PHL needed right now.

But now there was something in Peter Vanderbilt’s and Cheerilee’s eyes.

And then Vanderbilt spoke once more.

“This meeting is adjourned,” Vanderbilt spoke, loud and clear, and the exit doors swung open. “All non-essential personnel are to be escorted out. That is all.”

Hanne gasped, but offered no resistance, as one by one their aides and security streamed them the media people out of the room.

Just before the door closed, Hanne saw nothing but resigned acceptance from Cheerilee.

* * * * *

“You cannot be serious,” Time Turner told the Council. “It’s not even physically possible to destroy that much of the entire North American continent. Do you have any idea how enormous a single landmass is, General?”

Cheerilee sighed. She knew this was coming. But the truth of the matter was simple, the PHL were just one part of the greater whole, however much of a hero Lyra Heartstrings was to both these suffering worlds. At the end of the day, it would be men who drove the plan.

“Well, no-one’s ever tried it,” Vanderbilt said dryly. Cheerilee heard murmurs of agreement from the much emptier room. “But… we’d be making this world uninhabitable for them.”

Every nuclear weapon UNAC could get its member-states to gather together, poised to detonate in the Yellowstone Caldera. A simple, mad, suicidal plan. Anyone sane could see it was far, far too desperate an idea.

But it was only a matter of time before the likes of New Delhi or Rio de Janeiro, or the breadbaskets of the American heartland, the Yangtze and the Ganges, would be hit by the Barrier. To leave their final enemy a death world would be justice, in the eyes of the dead.

“That only works if she can’t remove the radiation, given time.” Turner put in. “Look, you can’t kill yourselves, people... You can’t make that choice for every last surviving man, woman and child on Earth. If Yellowstone fails, and it will, you’ve given every single living creature on Earth a choice... to die by something we haven’t even fully understood yet, or to die by the Queen’s touch.”

“Is it so difficult a choice?” Putin asked in return, but Cheerilee wondered if he, who’d lived through Chernobyl, believed his own words. Perhaps it was lip service. She found it difficult he would hand over Russia’s arsenal so willingly.

“We’ve run everything else past your department, Doctor,” Vanderbilt said wearily. “Slowing the Barrier, Barrier-resistant materials, the Thunderchild… If I could do anything, literally anythingelse, it’d require a miracle to drop out of the sky right in front of me.”

Guterres sighed. “He’s right. I don’t like it, but... It’s not like we have other options.”

In the Council, Mélenchon spoke. “To save ourselves from ponification? I hardly see that as a bad thing. If we can’t have everything that makes us human, our souls... Then nothing should.”

Putin nodded. Jinping steepled his hands. Kaine rubbed his forehead. Javid gave a curt nod.

“Spiting the enemy isn’t the point,” Turner said irritably, “nor is this misguided… I’d call it a sacrifice, but I’m not sure that applies here. There’s more at stake than Earth, more at stake than humanity. Even if this planet Earth of ours is scorched, it won’t stop the Empire. It will only delaythem from trying this, on another Earth… with all the lessons they’ve learned from fighting here.”

“What do you mean?” Vanderbilt asked, pushing his glasses up.

Turner sighed. “There are other lives, other worlds, not just the Equus and Earth we know. If we don’t succeed here, then… then Celestia is free to keep going.”

“I concur,” said Dovetail. “You know Celestia’s ideology that humanity is the accursed Thirteenth of the Twelve Families of Equus. It won’t satisfy her desire for perfection until she has accomplished a clean subjugation of humanity into the fold of her kind. If she’s opened a way to one parallel world, why not others?”

“With all due respect, Doctor Turner, Dovetail,” the Russian President asked coldly, “why should we care for these hypothetical other worlds? If we can’t win this war, I say, death is preferable to eternal mindless servitude.”

Time Turner scowled. “Then you abrogate responsibility for untold lives, billions if not more. Are you prepared to do that?”

The reactions to Time Turner’s rebuttal were various and mixed. Some, like Kaine, paused thoughtfully over the question, while others refused to speak. It was obvious, though, that there was an effect on the assembled.

Cheerilee opened her mouth to speak. But she couldn’t, really. No one knew yet of Alexander Reiner’s fate.

For now, she could only listen, as humanity’s top brass prepared the final plan. On her end of the leadership figures, Spitfire and Pineapple Nectar were out in the field, but she heard Vinyl Scratch speak up, Cadance and Moondancer share the same, resigned look, Time Turner preparing to argue with Vanderbilt, and even Gladmane looked like he’d rather not be in this meeting at all.

And then came the question.

“And now I must ask,” said Kaine. “Where is Alexander Reiner? He should be here.”

Cheerilee looked at him, shaking her head.

“Still no news...”

“On a secret mission, I suppose?” Putin asked sardonically, despite knowing full well that Reiner had seemingly disappeared into thin air. “PHL. Always running around, no oversight.”

The implication was clear. I would do it differently.

“No, Mister President,” Cheerilee said, trying hard to keep an insult from sneaking its way in. Putin just wanted her to say what he knew aloud. “As in, he’s gone. During the attack on the library, he vanished.”

Lady Cadance stood up.

“We… we don’t know,” she said, lowering her gaze. “We sent in some of our best to track him in the ruins of the building, but… nothing. It’s like he vanished into thin air.”

She was trying her hardest to keep the despair out of her voice, but Cheerilee heard it. Cadance still blamed herself for not having been with Alex when the Imperials’ attack came, as they hijacked Amethyst’s transfer portal.

It was only recently that Cadance had admitted she was there at all. He swift action had ensured the teleportation to safety of the refugees in the Smith Hall, the rescue of Amethyst and Bonbon… but not Zecora, or, crucially, Alex.

She bore it hard.

Next to her, Moondancer, though she looked similarly disheartened, patted her on the shoulder. As Head of Cultural Preservation, she’d contributed to the revamping of the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum. Its destruction by the Empire wouldn’t have been easy on her.

“Miss Cherry, do you have anything to add?” asked Vanderbilt, suddenly.

And Cheerilee’s heart sank when she saw each and every single pair of eyes turn to her. Even her own PHL, from Turner to Vinyl, from Cadance to Dovetail to even Pineapple Nectar.

She shook her head.

“The war’s not lost yet, is it?” she said simply. “We… we need to keep looking, gentlemen. There has to be another way…”

As heated talk erupted once more, she wondered, not for the first time, if Lyra had anything in mind to end this forsaken war…

* * * * *

“They removed us! We had a pass for this, Dieter. Argh! I can’t believe their nerve.”

Hanne hadn’t felt this incensed since she’d missed the opportunity to give Stephan Bauer his world-renowned nickname as the Knight of Germania. Yet, here she was, stuck with so many other journalists wandering about outside the General Assembly. The murmurs grew louder and louder amongst them. Indeed, to them as to her, removal from the Assembly was unwelcome.

Her partner, bless him, seemed comparatively nonchalant. He’d been awaiting her outside, for once the conference was done. And finished it was, though far, far too early.

“You can’t really blame them,” Dieter said tentatively. Hanne’s piercing blue glare went unheeded. “You know how it goes, Hanne. Happens all the time.”

“The Barrier, Dieter, for God’s sake!” she said, raising her voice. This drew glances, but she did not care. “Fuck, I... we need answers! Five years, Dieter. Five god-forsaken years, and every single damn time we ask, no one’s got a clue what to do about the damn thing!”

Her reply soon trailed off, apart from her own groans and muttered curses.

She ruffled her hair. It wasn’t fair. Such a meeting shouldn’t be held behind closed doors, and Hanne couldn’t remember the last time a meeting of this scale was, ultimately, made secret. But there was no use grumbling about it, not when someone like Peter Vanderbilt had ordered their removal from the Assembly.

“You’re right,” she said, defeated. “Now what are we supposed to do? We still have a few days to go here, damn it all.”

In response, Dieter gave her an sympathetic pat on the back, and his brown eyes met hers. His youthful, warm features belied the fact that he, like Hanne, was getting on in years.

“Come now, love,” he said lightly. “It was going to be a long day anyway, yeah?”

“Yeah,” said Hanne resignedly. “I guess so.”

Her partner smiled, and Hanne returned it, reluctantly. Always the optimist, Dieter, though long past the days when he’d been less inhibited in his cheerfulness. He was her steadfast companion throughout the entire war, and then some. Though she dearly missed her family, Hanne knew that at the very least they’d been safe when she embarked on her personal journey – Dieter, sweet Dieter, was there every step of the way.

They’d even gone and made plans for their retirement, somewhere in Germany. But no matter how jocular he’d been when she suggested it, the reality of the war always loomed.

In the end, she wished the war was never meant to be, that she and Dieter and all her friends could have lived out a content, peaceful life, like they had until the day that portal opened in Geneva, eight years ago.

It had been a cruel twist of fate that her lifelong dream of making her mark on this world, to be remembered, came true as humanity waged its greatest and most desperate war of all. Her personal ambition had turned from ensuring her remembrance to humanity’s.

She tightened her hands. They were trembling again, as they sometimes did.

Through her time on the frontlines, Hanne had seen death and despair, and impossible hope. She’d seen cultures and tribes who’d rarely even seena white man – let alone a pony – being evacuated from all they’d ever known, among people whose language they could barely speak, into completely alien settings..

To this day, the experience of the poor Kumzari in Southern Oman had stuck with her. There were so many things they just hadn’t understood when a coalition of the Omani government and European militaries had come to evacuate them. They’d called some things magic, and Hanne’s interpreter had never really been sure how to explain the difference between, say, someone freehand-climbing a cliff-face and a unicorn using actual magic.

None of them fought to stay – that time, anyway – which was a relief. After they’d been shown footage of what the Barrier would do, they let themselves get herded into boats and helicopters over to Burma.

UNAC and its allies had shunted these people who knew almost nothing of the world outside their peninsula, into terrible apartments that sprung up in barely any time at all. All of a sudden, they had… they had to find jobs. In countries where they didn’t speak the language. In places where they saw more new people in a day than they might have in all their lives.

There was an ex-military colleague of Hanne’s by the name of Will N. Davidson. He’d also been at the Kumzar Evacuation, and he’d become well-known for his – sarcastically titled – photo ‘The Rescued’, which depicted an old Kumzari man – his name was Hassan – in a bare, Spartan apartment made for Barrier evacuation, overlooking a bustling port.

The look on the man’s face was beyond description.

A cliché, sure, but however Hanne tried to describe the look on Hassan’s face, she failed. It looked forlorn, it looked like he barely understood where he was, it looked lonely, it looked wistful, and it looked profoundly alienated. And still it barely seemed to encapsulate the feelings of Davidson’s photo.

Hassan wasn’t the only one. There were people who’d found themselves homeless or destitute practically overnight. It was as if the Barrier had not just uprooted humanity but exploded underneath it, flinging debris every which way.

She thought of the International Space Station. Adrift in space, helpless to watch the Barrier envelop the world in its sickening pink glow. The astronauts sent there knew what they were signing up for, at this point, and last she heard, Cape Canaveral had converted to a fortress. Reconnaissance, weather reports, anything that could be of use for the high command. When the Barrier hits New Zealand, whoever was left up there would be the last of humanity.

And on and on the question went for her, the very same question that haunted her.

Would all her effort be worth it? Would any of them be remembered?

She gripped her camera tightly. She had to try. Dieter, Ana, Jan. Kurt and Katrin. Dortmund, Germany, Europe... People like Hassan, friends and family, her home, and the very Earth which she, which they lived on. The people she’d seen, from all the ends of the earth. One home. One people. They were all the same now.

All their sins. All their achievements. All the memories and legacy left behind.

They deserved to be remembered. And try she would.

Then she felt her phone buzz in her pocket.

She glanced down, surprised, and took it out. Her phone was outdated, true, but her favourite vendor was long gone – and really, quality replacements were rare these days.

Message by message, her contacts had all gone silent one by one. She hurriedly scrolled past ‘Elrik’ and ‘Hilde’, and ‘Lars’ and ‘Hendrik’ and…

She shook her head. The time to mourn would come once more. Apart from Dieter, she still had Jan, that dear reliable man. Last she’d heard, he was working for a cultural preservation foundation, a noble task. And there she read Ana Bjorgman’s message – the bubbly, kindly girl whom she knew and had once loved remained in touch much as Jan had, and even more so, but the last time Ana had contacted her was a few weeks ago. She’d obviously been busy with whatever work it was she did for the PHL.

‘See you in the States! Talk to you soon, Hanne’ had been Ana’s last message to her.

Well, ‘soon’ wasn’t something everyone took for granted nowadays, but at least it helped to keep up old pretenses.

Hanne saw the newest message. It was from Lani Sanderson.

She smiled softly. The Hawaiian was a good photographer, rivalries aside. Different areas covered between the two of them, and their mutual drive to capture the finest shots had given them several different collections already.

Her smile faltered when she saw what Lani had sent.

‘Hanne, get to Boston, ASAP,’ it read. ‘Something’s going down. Imperial attack. Alicorn. Can’t talk much. Just be here.’

Perhaps it’d be a terrible mistake to be impulsive at this time of the year. All other risks aside, the cold winds were blowing through the Eastern Seaboard. Winter was in full force, while she was here in a warm, comfortable lounge at the UN Headquarters.

But Hanne wouldn’t be Hanne if she remained still.

She stood up so suddenly, Dieter flinched hard. With a single move, she grabbed her bag and headed towards the Assembly.

“Hanne! What is it–” Dieter said, hurriedly adjusting his tie, and moving to join her side.

“Let’s go, Dieter.”

* * * * *

By the time Cheerilee noticed the reporters marching back into the General Assembly, there was little the soldiers on duty could say or do to halt them, not when the cameras were still rolling. They crowded the entryway, murmuring, their unsaid questions felt keenly in the air, more distinct even than what snatches she caught from amongst the hub-bub.

Loath as Cheerilee was to acknowledge, the fact was that many questions echoed her own.

“Oh, God, is this it? Surely the Barrier can’t have made landfall already?”

“No, if that were the case, wouldn’t they be targeting us here, the heart of the UN?”

“Seems kind of daft to hold a big conference like this so close to the shore, doesn’t it? Even with all the beefed-up security we put in place…”

“One last big hurrah, you might say. I’d say it was worth it, wouldn’t you?”

One reporter, a blonde and blue-eyed woman, gave a cheeky little wave to those still within the Assembly.

None dared yet to speak aloud. None of the leaders assembled, nor their staff. Taking in the sight, the murmurs growing silent, Cheerilee steeled herself and spoke aloud.

“Well, what is it?”

* * * * *

‘Okay… okay, breathe...’ Hanne thought.

These were UNAC and the PHL sitting right there. Watching. Anticipating. All while countless others were in the dark about Captain Reiner’s survival, grasping at straws and hoping for the slightest good news while knowing that it wouldn’t come.

“Hi, hello!” she called out. “Right. Pardon the interruption. But… answers?”

‘Way to blow it, Hanne.’

Vanderbilt must have recognised her as the final reporter, the one who’s question he’d not pretended to answer. He gave her an intense, scrutinising look through his glasses. But he nodded and let her proceed.

“Look, sorry, I just got a message from Boston, alright? Something’s happened there. Right now, we need information more than anything.”

“Same here!” another reporter called out. And another, and another.

A man in Royal Brigardier uniform sidled up to Vanderbilt, whispering something into his ear. His brow darkened, and he stood up.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Vanderbilt said. “As it happens, Brigardier Merrick’s just informed me that Boston’s gone dark. It looks like Captain Reiner isn’t our only matter of urgence. Miss Cherry?”

Cheerilee was up in a microsecond. “I’ll notify all PHL forces in the Boston area to converge on the city. But we need to maintain a defensive presence here, in New York. This could be the Empire’s diversionary tactic while we’re gathered for this conference.”

And no one, Hanne thought, could deny that at all.

‘Ana’s in Boston!’ the thought struck her. ‘Oh, please let her be safe…’

~ Boston, USA ~
— Forty-five minutes earlier

There, atop her post, Ana Bjorgman stood guard, the cold cutting into her cheek.

Or, she would have been standing guard, if she wasn’t contemplating the old photograph she held in her hand. It was faded with age, even under her gentle care, but it remained one of her most treasured belongings.

She found her own eyes staring back at her in the photo. Youthful, lively, as she strived to be even now. She was smiling there, and beside her, with their arms around one another, was Hanne – grumpy, ambitious, protective Hanne Adler, with her signature piercing blue gaze, and the ever-tranquil, sturdy, gentle Jan. That day, Hanne had grabbed onto her, just as had Ana onto Jan, and she’d snapped a quick shot with her polaroid that day. She’d always had a sharp eye for moments.

Now, one was a war photographer, the other a volunteer in cultural preservation. While she, petite, gentle Ana, was whatever it entailed to be an Agent of the PHL. Mainly waiting around the ranks while waiting for her Case Officer to activate her.

There were others in the photo, of course. Old friends, from happier times. But the two directly by her side on that shot from so long ago, they were all she had left. She strove to remember each face as best she could.

Delicately, she placed the photograph back into her breast pocket. There would be another time to mourn. For all of them...

Ana looked into the distance, her gaze sweeping the derelict, nighttime skyline of what was once a lively city, settled amidst the falling snow. The clouds continued to gather above, coating the frozen landscape in a chilly layer of snow pockmarked by darkened soot. Here, in the lull of battle, Boston remained a ghost town.

All was quiet on the front, yet Ana knew there had to be something out there among the ruins, stalking, watching. Much like she was.

She was all too grateful that here, she held dominance over the field with her weapon of choice.

“Status report?” the communications officer squawked, along the line.

Ana had seen him in person once, a dark orange stallion with a silver and brown mane. Seville Orange, his name was.

“This is Metro Squad,” someone elsesaid. Their voice had a prominent Russian accent. “We’re at the Redline. Been checking our tunnel perimeters for hours. Nothing’s here. Over.”

“And I thank you for taking that job,” Seville Orange said. “Couldn’t pay me enough to take that assignment. Over.”

“By the Golden Lyre, comms officer,” the other said. Ana’s first guess was a pegasus mare with a deep voice, but she couldn’t be sure. “Urban combat is its own kind of Tartarus. I’m shaking like a breezie down here! Over.”

A pause. “Aren’t you part bat or something, Nebula? Um, over.”

“We both know that’s not true. And thestral or not,” Nebula said, “I’m still a pegasus. I still don’t like this. Over.”

“And yet, here we are,” Seville said. “Over and out.”

Another pause. Ana coughed.

“Ze’ev Squad here. All clear on this end, Forward Base Attucks,” crackled a new voice over her earpiece.

Ana vaguely recognised it as belonging to Oscar Mikkelsen, the strange, reserved PHL man she had met at the campfire with the penal squad. Lately, she’d heard rumours through the grapevine – that he looked hideous beneath that helmet of his, all thanks to chemical weaponry.

She didn’t put much stock in the rumours, though. From what she’d seen of him, he seemed nice enough. It couldn’t be thatbad.

“Copy that, Corporal Mikkelsen,” Seville Orange said. “It’s scary how quiet they are, huh? Oh, and, over.”

“It certainly is,” said Aegis, the huge stallion who’d sat next to Viktor Kraber not so long ago. Never seemed to leave his side, actually. “I tell you, back during the Crystal War, this was the worst part. Over.”

“Aweh, my bru,” Kraber cut in. “Just give me something to cut into, shoot, burn! This is the fokkin’ worst. I can’t just set monotony on fire!“

There was a long, awkward pause, until everyone realised Kraber wasn’t going to finish his message according to proper procedure.

“Not For Lack Of Trying, Mind You,” Quiette Shy said over the radio. “We Put A Lot Of Effort Into It That One Time. Over.”

Inexplicably, there was no radio crackle when she cut in.

“You’re all crazy,” sighed an unfamiliar man. Ana had heard him with Ze’ev’s squad, heard everyone calling him Bro. Apparently it was short for Ambrosius. “Ahem, over.”

“And that’s been a resume-killer for the PHL since when, exactly? Over,’” asked someone with an accent halfway between Israel and Cloudsdale.

Ana recognised this one as Heliotrope, the pegasus who’d taken Lani Sanderson’s video footage of Luna and the Tyrant in Reykjavik thanks to her unique invisibility suit.

‘She’s here?’Ana asked herself. ‘This really is serious.’

“Alright, you’ve made your point,” said a voice unmistakable as Yael Ze’ev. “Now. Soldiers, we stop hogging the airwaves. This is an official channel, not a radio station. Over!”

“Thank God,” said a woman with a slight Scandinavian accent, and an odd upward inflection that made those words sound like a question. Nothing Ana could place, surprisingly, despite her own accent. “You and Kraber vould’ve used it to play Captain Beefheart anyvay. Over.”

“I take offense to that, Eva,“ Kraber said. “I would’ve tried to play some Biting Elb–”

His voice cut out abruptly.

‘Lieutenant Ze’ev must’ve shut them off… also, what kind of name is... Captain Beefheart?’Ana wondered.

“It might seem unprofessional,” Seville Orange said, “But they’re pretty on-edge. I say, let them have this. Over.”

It was understandable enough.

“Ze’ev is right, however.” said a female voice, cold as steel. “If you’re going to spend your time chatting, do it on a radio station. If not, then focus on the situation at hand, she finished, before adding, “Old North Church is secure. Over.”

“Still listening to the chatter, eh?”

Frieda had cut into said chatter, chuckling. Ana hadn’t seen her come up the ladder, but the two filled canteens she brought along told Ana where she’d been.

The griffon was one of many that had come to Earth, affiliated with UNAC, but also tied with the PHL by virtue of her partnership with Ana, acting as her spotter. Her sleek grey feathers contrasted strongly with the PHL vest she wore, and they bristled in the cool night’s breeze.

Ana nodded, taking in the warm canteen in her hand. It tasted like Heaven on Earth, too.

“Thanks... and, well, heh, yeah,” Ana said, smiling warmly. “What else can I do? It’s… nice to hear some normal talk for once.”

“I’m sure the higher-ups would tell them off for using a comms channel like that,” Frieda said, “But Seville is right. It’s just…”

“There’s nothing out there right now,” answered Ana. “I haven’t got anything in the sights.”

It wasn’t that Ana was hoping for a battle, though some PHL troops certainly were. It was more how unnerving she found the silence. There were PHL all over the city, patrolling what little of Boston they still controlled. With the Barrier making landfall in Nova Scotia, Imperial troops had swarmed into Massachusetts, and some parts of the city – far past the no-one’s-land, in the more Northern suburbs – had fallen a long time ago.

And yet…

Nothing.

“Yeah,” Frieda affirmed, with a huff. “Nothing much.”

She paused with a smirk.

‘How do griffons do that, anyway?’ Ana thought.

“Not interested in jumping in the chat?” Frieda teased, a sly look to her golden eyes. “I thought it might’ve been your thing.”

Ana chuckled, rubbing the back of her head. It was quite chilly, and her shorter haircut meant she felt it further. Perhaps she should have applied for an exception – but of course, her sway with the PHL brass could only go so far.

“Not really, no,” Ana said, sipping her coffee. “Jumping in with Ze’ev Squad would’ve felt… like jumping on a train midway through. Besides, I prefer… well, face to face. Feels better that way.”

“I understand that,” Frieda said. “How you humans are so happy using phones or social media, I will never know.”

“It’s convenient,” Ana said, shrugging. “Gotta keep in touch with my friends, but it’s just… it’s just not the same.”

“No,” agreed a familiar, and very much welcome voice, and Ana looked back just in time to see Harwood’s head peek through the trap door behind them. “It really isn’t.”

“Harwood!” Ana greeted, and her partner gave a pleasant smile.

“Ana, Frieda,” he said. The perch, cozy as it was, felt a little tight with three people on top, but Ana didn’t mind, and she moved a little to allow him in.

“The doctor is in,” Frieda deadpanned.

“Indeed he is,” Harwood said cheerfully. “Thought I might bring you this.”

Before Ana could enquire any further, the Englishman produced an envelope from his vest, and presented it in an all-too formal manner.

“Came with the post, this morning, and as luck would have it, I’m stationed here, too.”

She accepted the envelope – and started at the address.

“Boston?” Ana remarked, reading through the addressee. “This is right across town. Who would…?”

“You tell me,” said Harwood lightly. “Honestly I expected it to be from Indonesia. I think you might’ve caught a fan or two out of all those kids. Or all of them, really. Who knows?”

“Teaching, huh?” Frieda ribbed her, smirking. “Didn’t know you were up for it.”

“You’d be surprised,” said Harwood.

“Real funny, Har,” Ana replied, but her hands trembled. She hadn’t really had the time to properly say goodbye to the children she’d taught in Jakarta. She had, after all, been called to the United States on short notice, and hardly a proper word of goodbyes was exchanged then. But this was no child’s letter.

She set aside the rifle and sat up straighter. The lamp in the perch provided enough light, she hoped, and she opened the envelope.

It was filled with scratchy handwriting. As it was, after all, a pony’s mouth wasn’t the ideal tool to write with, and her friend was no different. She held the letter closer to the lamp.

Dear Ana,

I hope this photo finds you well. I found it among my stuff. Sorry. I’ve had to write this with little time. Things are a little busy here.

Love,
~ Dearheart

PS: How are Harwood, Tanner, and Jaka doing? I hope they are alright, too.

PPS: Verity said hi, and Amber and Rivet.

Another photo for her collection of memories...

She raised it from the envelope, letting the light shine upon its surface. There, she saw herself, brightly smiling, her hair long and braided. Her arm was around Harwood’s shoulder. He also wore a cool, pleasant smile. And the pair of them wore the same dark, lightly armoured tactical uniform worn by UNAC and PHL personnel, though lighter in gear than what he had on now. But Ana’s eyes were drawn to the pony besides her.

There was a certain melancholy to the cream-coloured, golden-eyed pegasus mare that stood besides her. For Dearheart, sweet as she was, was a mare that never really belonged wherever she went. And far-off Indonesia, tropical, exotic, but hostile as time went by, was no place for her.

Now, Ana thought, she might have found her place after all, amongst the alleged HLF.

“Is she doing okay?” asked Harwood worriedly. “The HLF aren’t… you know.”

“Well,” Ana said, pondering briefly, allowing herself a reassuring smile “Verity Carter wouldn’t dare.”

“Mmm,” Frieda mused. “What’d they assign her to do anyways? I mean… it’s the HLF. Not much work for, you know. Ex-Imperial.”

“She wasn’t an Imperial, Frieda,” Ana said firmly. “Just… a bit misguided.”

“Advocating Conversion sounds a lot more than bit.”

“So did Fiddlesticks Apple, and she’s a full-fledged PHL member now,” said Ana. “Besides, it was when they used the Slow Potion, I’d say the folks at the HLF needs all the help they can get. Between R&D and the field ops… well, yeah. Better there than be handed a gun.”

She tapped her PHL badge, to which Frieda shrugged. It was an unspoken truth that the actual relief and aid department of the PHL was the largest, and least glamorous section of the PHL. Between the exotic, advanced research carried out by their R&D, and the dashing exploits of the much smaller Field Operations wing, it seemed rather quiet by comparison, but Ana thought highly of them nonetheless.

“Ponies for Human Life, remember?”

“Eh, fair enough,” said Frieda, and Harwood nodded, too. Ana cleared her throat.

“So,” she said, softly. “Any… letters for you?”

Her partner sighed.

“I don’t do letters,” said Harwood. “Who’d write to me?”

“I would,” Ana said, laughing. “If I wasn’t here and you were, over there, you know, heh.”

“Of course you would,” Harwood said. His smirk turned warm. “Though in this case, I suppose I owe you one.”

“Owe what to me?”

“A birthday gift,” Harwood said simply. “It’s in a month, isn’t it? And I haven’t even thought of Christmas with the others. Jaka should be back from New York sometime, and Tanner would be open to a truce on Christmas, I’d say.”

“Yeah, I’m sure the Empire is all for it, Harwood,” said Frieda.

“Chin up,” said Harwood. “I could even try to offer them one now. Could use a break, really.”

Ana held back a fit of laughter, though wary of she was of drawing attention, her muffled laughter came out as a bizarre hiccup. Harwood merely shrugged, and Frieda was looking at her as though she’d grown a second head. Ana didn’t care at all. She kept her smile, hidden beneath her hand, as the dirty snow continued to fall over Boston and the cold winds howled.

Christmas in wartime was hardly a new phenomenon, Harwood had reminded her once, but there was always a meaning to it. A day or two respite against the encroaching war, against the losing fight. And this was how Ana wanted to remember it.

These days, her thoughts tended to wander, and as her muffled laugh subsided, and she turned to regard her partner with a longing gaze.

Pursuing a relationship was always a difficult option. Moreso when she had joined the Field Operations wing of the PHL, in addition to her work in R&D. Yet, a tiny part of Ana wished there were more time to spend with him, in silence, for all the little stolen moments simply didn’t feel enough. One day, she’d thought, there'd come a time when the war would be far off, and they would have peace.

Reality, as it is, is difficult to swallow. So they kept it open, so to speak.

More than once, Ana had wondered if there really was a future, to even consider an afterwards, beneath the ashen sky, with the Barrier less than a hundred miles away. A slow, painful death, but to think about it was to give in to despair. And Ana didn’t like despair.

Sighing, she glanced at her wind marker, a tiny flag beside her to show where the wind blew.

It was still.

She blinked.

‘... Huh?’

She tightened her scarf, and glanced up into the clouded, ash-filled winter sky.

Except there were no clouds, no winds, only the nighttime sky. The entire city was now basked in the eerie glow of a full moon none had seen in months. And there, in the distance, at the centre of it all, stood an equine shape.

“Harwood… do you see that?” Ana said, breathless.

Tall, elegant, and harrowing, it hovered with each beat of its dark wings. The clouds began to clear, little by little, wth each beat of its wings. The moonlight shining through the clouds cast it in an eerie glow, intertwined with the scattered lights of Boston, and the aura of magic that emanated from its… horn?

“I see it,” he replied. His expression had gone grave, for wings and horn could only mean–

“Alicorn,” Frieda said. The griffon’s characteristic snark had died down, and she stared hard at the figure emerging above them. “Alicorn. We got– we got an alicorn situation.”

“Code Regina?” Ana whispered. Her rifle felt weightless, meaningless, as the moonlight shimmered down on the battlefield.

“I’m calling it in, Christ,” Harwood continued in that icy, fearful tone of his. Hand reaching for his radio, he gripped Ana with the other, and she saw nothing but primal fear. ”Ana, this is one target you can’t take on, we need to–”

Then, it spoke. And, remarkably, wondrously, the alicorn spoke in musical, lilting English.

“Have no fear, people of Earth.” It was a booming voice, everywhere and here at once. The alicorn’s aura continued to glow, illuminating her fully, and her armoured, cloaked form became fully visible. “For we are here.”

Harwood’s grip grew tighter on Ana’s shoulder, and she reached up to hold his hand. If this was the spark that lit the battle once more...

“Keep the target in your sights. Possible unknown hostile... be advised,” Tanner’s steely voice said over the radio. Calm he may have been, Ana imagined him to have had cold sweat running down his brow.

“Stay where you are!” an officer continued, high and shrill in the megaphone. This, Ana could tell, was one of the PHL’s own, for no creature on the planet could produce such a frightened tone in sight of what appeared to the world as an alicorn. “Stay where you are or we will open fire!”

“Do not fret or fear!” the figure yelled back, and her voice continued to echo throughout the city. “Stand down, for we wish to speak to your leaders!”

“Steady,” Harwood whispered out. His hand had reached for his shield. Frieda had her rifle gripped tightly as well. Yet below the post, Ana heard not a single word, for all eyes were fixed upon the armour-clad alicorn.

Ana said nothing, biting her lower lip nervously, and her finger tensed. The armoured figure was within her sights, now. If word had spread far and wide, there were thousands of other barrels pointed straight at the figure.

But if it wasn’t the Tyrant… who else could it be?

‘It could be Luna.’ the little voice in her head said breathlessly, or at least Ana thought she heard it. ‘She has to be, I– you know what she’s like.

No, that didn’t make sense. Couldn’t make sense. Luna had been petrified for going against the rule of the Solar Empire, going against her sister. She was a statue, she was dead, she was gone, gone, gone…

Ana held her breath. Harwood was a comforting presence, as he’d always been to her. And yet in this uncertainty, she wasn’t sure whatever happened next would leave them unscathed at all. Her finger tightened, not enough to fire a round – but if the figure moved suddenly, if the order was given, Ana would be ready.

She wasn’t sure it’d make any difference, though.

* * * * *

Heliotrope had seen the dark alicorn petrified. Had she been calmer at that very moment, she would’ve been thinking something like ‘Come on. Act like adults, people.’ It had become a common refrain in recent memory.

Instead, from this very rooftop, she was staring in shock at the armoured figure well in range of the combined arms of the PHL.

“Isn’t she dead?” Heliotrope asked. “Or something?”

“Well, you know what they say,” Kraber said, smirking. “You just can’t kill people like you used to.”

“You and zombies,” Aegis said, sighing. “Honestly, it was the one time! Let it go.”

Their whispers faded as the alicorn spoke.

“Please, we mean no harm!” she said, and every instinct in them screamed that she meant exactly the opposite of what she’d said. “Your worries are not unfounded, but truly, we bring nothing but good tidings!”

A long, long pause followed. Even the cold winds seemed to slow.

“Everyone hold your fire,” Yael said. “That’s absolutely Princess Luna.”

Another pause.

“...WHAT?” Someone had broken silence over the radio.

“I’d recognise that voice anywhere,” Yael stated with assurance.

“Are you sure?” the Norwegian sniper Kraber had met spoke up, afraid, and now very much confused. ‘Nordlys here, I… I have target in sight... waiting for orders, over.’

“It’s the only thing that makes sense,” Heliotrope said. “Unless you’re about to say that the...”

Then her voice trailed off.

“If she what?” ‘Nordlys’ asked.

“Never mind. Bad joke. Wouldn’t have helped,” Heliotrope said, the words coming out fast and ragged. “Yael and I saw her in person. I knowwhat she looks like.”

She looked up to Yael.

“Yael. Back me up here.”

“It could be a trick,” Yael said, stonefaced under her helmet’s transparent visor. An adaptation that the late Ambassador Heartstrings had insisted upon, as it made PHL easier to empathise with.

‘Oh sweet mother of– not again.’

“Better confirm it fast, Leftenant, we got a few snipers set up,” an English officer – Tanner, Heliotrope remembered – chimed in. ‘Nordlys, keep that alicorn in sights. Combat situation is Code Regina, might have to call in heavy ordinance, over.’

‘I read you, over,’ Nordlys affirmed, but still there was that lingering doubt planted in each and every one of their minds.

Heliotrope switched off her earpiece. “I’m going to need you to help me out. Off the channel,” she said, looking to Yael. “Something’s bothering me, but… I’m a bit worried about getting too close.”

“You?” Kraber asked, raising an eyebrow.

“In my defense, I nearly died last time,” Heliotrope said. “Bro. I need you to pass me some binoculars.”

“Don’t you have crazy-good pegasus eyes, Lieutenant?” Bro asked, but he passed them to her anyway.

“I certainly do,” Heliotrope said, holding the pair of old binoculars on her hooves. She stared through them so intently she wondered if her eyes would rub against the lenses.

The first thing she noticed was that the dark alicorn’s mane was a full-bodied blue-black, flowing in a nonexistent wind.

‘What.’

But the last time, Luna had been… drained. Stripped of power. Easily turned to stone. Meanwhile, the second thing Heliotrope noticed lay in the set of black armour she wored, lined with silver-blue metal. The whole thing was much unlike any recent Imperial design, ornate… maybe even majestic. A far cry from the increasingly practical, sleek, and dull-coloured Imperial Guard armour of the past few years. And yet Heliotrope saw that beneath the intricacies and carvings, it was veryclearly functional, leaving ‘Luna’ fully protected.

‘Where’d she get that?’

“Wha… oh,” she said. “That’s a bit odd.”

She felt everyone inching closer, like children around a computer screen.

“Was ist d…” she heard Kraber ask, in German. Then, switching back to Afrikaans: “En nou?”

“Her mane’s got colour in it,” Heliotrope said. “Either the Tyrant gave it back, or something weird’s going on here.”

“So Then It’s Something Weird,” Quiette Shy said.

“Well, that narrows it down,” Aegis interrupted, deadpan.

“Also, Isn’t She Wearing Armour?” Quiette Shy asked. “Have any of us seen that armour?”

“That’s… no that’s, that’s not Imperial armour,” Heliotrope said. “It’s not– it doesn’t look like it was made by ponies, that’s for sure.”

“Sure wish Lunar Phase was here,” Kraber said. “She’d know everything about thi–”

Another figure appeared, besides the black-clad alicorn. Hard to describe, tall, and thin. Looking like it had been made from far too many different creatures. Or the Twelve Families of Equus.

‘...What.’

“That’s Discord,” Heliotrope said flatly, open-mouthed.

* * * * *

At the North End of Boston, within the top of the Old North Church, UNAC Corporal Maxine Radwick kept her gun’s sight strictly on the two figures. While the sudden appearance of the new one was a surprise, to say nothing of its build and physical features, it was not the focus. No, that went towards the black-clad alicorn who seemed to be making loud proclamations to attract attention.

What she actually said was lost on Maxine, of course. She was too far away to accurately hear what the alicorn was saying. But that didn’t matter, seeing how the black-clad figure best matched the description of the petrified and captured former Equestrian princess, Luna. At least, that was what the submitted report regarding the extraction of Cadenza and some of the Night Guard had said.

There could be any number of possibilities surrounding this sudden appearance. This late into the war, Equestria or perhaps the PER could create almost anything to try and gain a permanent advantage apart from the obvious. Even after all the Newfoal variants, various serum weapons and aircrafts, or traitors hunted, they wouldn’t stop. Not until they took everything.

Maxine exhaled, lowering her modified Dragunov sniper rifle before rubbing her eyes.

“Keep it together,” she whispered to herself, “it’s just another trick. Another tactic. You can still make them pay.” Maxine shivered slightly, before focusing herself. “Still make them pay.”

She brought her rifle back to beer and re-adjusted the scope.

“I will make you pay.”

The words came out once again, but came this time as they should, a solemn oath. Her solemn oath since the shock left her after that day.

‘Washington crumbling, people panicking in terror and fear as it all fell down. The front door open as the sounds of somethinghappened. Going inside to find–’

Damn them. Damn them all for what they had done.

Maxine kept her sight firmly on the alicorn, despite the tear in her eye.

For someone needed to make them pay.

* * * * *

Discord shook his head, with ineffable smugness.

“You really need to work on your speeches, Luna dear,” he said. “I think you might have frightened them.”

Luna glared at him through her visor. She may not have intended to scare the people down below with her look, but inwardly, she hoped it might intimidate him somewhat.

“Well?” said Luna. “I don’t suppose you have a better idea, Discord. I am simply telling them the truth.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt that, Princess,” said Discord.

With a snap of his fingers, Luna felt a rush of air, and suddenly Luna found herself face to face with a very startled human soldier, behind a glass window on a building which must have been twice as tall as any Manehattan skyscraper. He yelped, and brought a device to his mouth, but then all of a sudden, Luna was above the city once more, without another word uttered and only the whoosh to tell her she’d moved at all.

“Told you,” Discord said, smug as ever, and Luna groaned.

“I do believe that one wasn’t my fault,” she said. The draconequus huffed.

“Should’ve brought Fluttershy,” he commented. “Maybe she and that Reiner didn’t get off to a very good start, but darn if she isn’t persistent in trying to tame the hopelessly unruly.”

“Look who’s talking,” said Luna, wondering if he was seriously that lacking in self-awareness.

She also didn’t want to think too hard about what may be going on between him and Fluttershy these days. And he thought she didn’t know, but she’d noticed the pink tuft of mane he’d had wrapped around his little finger, just before he transported them here.

A good-luck charm, no doubt.

“Just get to the point,” Discord told her, grouchily. “Make a lightshow, fireworks, whatever, but catch their attention before they turn their toys on us. That other fellow didn’t seem so happy.”

Even as the wind blew, Luna still heard the murmurs and whispers from below, amplified by their communications devices, she assumed.

“Very well,” Luna said evenly. She cleared her throat, and boomed in the Royal Canterlot Voice.

“We know where Captain Alexander Reiner is!” she announced. “Bring us forth to your leaders, soldiers of this historic city, and we may discuss terms of agreement!”

* * * * *

“Luna and… and Discord?” Frieda said, with bated breath. “And they want to see our leaders?”

“If they mean humanity’s leaders, they misfired,” a frowning Harwood said suspiciously. “Everyone’s at that fancy conference in New York. If those up there are the real deal, why aren’t they over there? How could they–”

“Har,” Ana cut him off, though she kept her gaze in her viewfinder. “The last anyone heard of Captain Reiner, they say he disappeared somewhere around here, in Boston… maybe, maybe this has got something to do with it.”

“What, surely you don’t think he was at the JFK when the Imperials…” Frieda began.

“He might have been,” Harwood said tersely. “But what I’d really like to know is where those two came from, and what they’ve got to do with anything.”

Frieda gave a flap of her wings. “Excuse me, Sergeant,” she said. “I should check in with the Lieutenant. Perhaps she knows more.”

“You be careful, Frieda,” Ana said softly. “There’s still pockets of Imperials scattered in the city.”

* * * * *

Silence. Luna glanced at her companion. He raised an eyebrow..

“I don’t think that did what you wanted it to–”

But her words, and Discord’s retort, were lost when a powerful gust rose around them – though they remained where they were.

One by one, piece by piece, something began to form. Swiftly, right around them. Metal and wood and carved crystal. On and on, on and on. It made no sound to indicate assembly, save for a windy howl barely distinct from the gales of winter, as the air became displaced more and more by solid material.

“Don’t move,” said Discord, and Luna nodded…

Whatever was forming, its motion showed no sign of slowing. It was as if they were standing in the middle of a sketch below a painting. And slowly, colour began to bleed in all around them.

Then somehow, either it was Luna’s perception or the spell itself, they now stood in a room, where it all went quiet.

A room. Ornate, regal, and… very tidy, Luna thought curiously.

A set of over-hanging crystal chandeliers cast a dim, indistinct light, and without her night-sight, Luna wasn’t sure she could have distinguished the curlicues in the carpet on which she stood. Indeed, the floor was carpeted by a Saddle Mareabian woven decorative, which looked like it had experienced regularly dustings. Each of the four corners of the large, rectangular interior was marked by tall irregularly shaped crystalline pillars emitting a dim yet soothing glow. Its carved, polished wooden walls were alternately decorated by candles and crystals, curtains and carvings, and paintings covered in cloth, and statues of many sizes.

It was, to all appearances, an art gallery.

“What is… what is this?” Luna asked tensely. She glanced at Discord, and the draconequus held no snark in his hardened expression.

“It’s a welcome,” he said simply. “And if you’re wondering… no, we haven’t moved at all…”

But her alicorn instincts, well-honed to the three natural elements of ponykind, felt that the room wasn’t on solid ground. It moved, tilting to the side ever so slightly. Not so the sensation of being carried on the waters, so much as seeking balance in empty space. And she realised…

“No,” she said, nodding. “We’re still above the city. They… moved an airship, put it around us.”

Teleportation was an excruciatingly difficult spell, and no untrained unicorn could do it so easily. Even the most trained Royal Guards could only perform it on themselves, over short distances ranging a few dozen yards. Surely, that left only Discord himself who could have done it, yet he’d been surprised as her, and why would even he pull something this nonsensical?

A single glance at the room they were in told her the airship must be far larger than anything Equestria had ever built. Not even Krème-Brulée’s famed shipyards in Trottingham had produced such a leviathan.

Which could only mean–

“Hellooooo?” Discord said, loudly. Over by the wall, he was busily waving a claw over an equine statue’s eyes. “Anyone hooome?”

Then Luna realised none of these equines were statues. In the poor light and with her distracted by the sudden change, she’d only mistaken them for such. She and Discord weren’t alone.

“Remain where you are,” the Guard said stiffly. His accent was foreign, and although his frame mostly covered up by armour, Luna knew this was no Equestrian. He was a zebra. “Though you have traveled far, you will soon be met by the evening star.”

With no sign he’d heard a thing, Discord rapped his knuckles on the Guard’s helmet, improbably creating a noise like a hollow tin can.

“Discord!” Luna cried, dashing over to him, her senses aware of the sound of her clinking armour. “Mind your manners!”

“Really now, Luna?” Discord said, crossing his arms. The zebra remained impassive, his brown eyes staring ahead cooly. “They don’t seem to mind.”

“We’ll see about that,” Luna said, clearing her throat. “Ahem… Greetings. Are you with Ambassador Heartstrings and her Ponies for Human Life? Or rather... are you with Miss Cheerilee Cherry?”

The zebra turned to look her eye to eye.

“No,” he stated. “You are here aboard the Great Equestrian as guests of Her Imperial Majesty, Queen Celestia of the Solar Empire.”

He said it so simply, so matter-of-factly, one could heard the proverbial pin drop in the silence that followed.

Mainly because Discord had done just that, complete with not letting the carpet absorb the famous stock sound effect.

‘Oh... no.’

“Discord, we have to leave,” Luna said, turning away from the Guard.

“Remain where you are, for you are expected by the evening star,” the zebra repeated.

Around the art gallery, his fellows – not just zebras and the ponies of all three tribes, but also hippogriffs and horses, more than a dozen all told – stomped their spears. Provoked, Luna lit her horn threateningly, but no sooner had she done that, she was suddenly overwhelmed by a bout of fatigue tingling her mind.

“... Luna,” Discord said, frowning. “I can’t teleport out.”

“What!” Luna gasped. Never had she known Discord to be stymied. “Then... get creative!”

Discord sighed and snapped his fingers. And the room turned literally upside-down.

Luna had wit enough to stay hovering with her beating wings, but it seemed he’d done nothing more than flip a picture on its head. Nothing fell, nothing got displaced, even the guards around them remained stuck to the floor, upside-down.

He snapped his fingers again, and the chandeliers turned to cotton candy, and four crystal ponies appeared on each corner of the floor – now the ceiling – where the pillars had been, rubbing their heads even as they spun around, suspended in midair.

Discord snapped again, and there were bubbles filling the room, and the laughter of children.

“You’ve made your point,” Luna said, breathing a sigh. “Put us all back where we were.”

The Lord of Chaos snapped his fingers once more, and all was put in place. The pillars remained inert, and the guards remained impassive as ever.

“I still got it, at least,” Discord said, shrugging. “Don’t worry just yet. I’d like to see what Celestia has to offer. It seems she’s succeeded in trapping us insid, but I do still have enough to at least break out of here, if needed.”

He sniffed the air.

“It’s a Faire-Day cage, ” Discord surmised. “Possibly, ah, configured to respond only to certain magical signatures. The guards can use magic, and so can you, probably. Teleportation’s off the table... but all else in this space works the same as ever. We could just punch our way out.”

He raised his fingers, ready to snap once more.

“Or... I could dissolve everything in this room, right here, right now–”

“Don’t,” Luna said, eyeing the guards around them, who remained motionless as statues did. “Let us not… kill, just yet. Besides, it wouldn’t destroy the cage...”

Discord considered her stonily, then glanced at the pink tuft around his finger. He sighed.

“Oh, very well,” he said airily. He did snap his fingers, however, so that a second later, he was kicking back to relax on a poolside chair, right next to an inflatable pool inexplicably floating in midair. “Come sit with me while we await this Queen.”

“... Are you serious?” Luna said, her eyes wide.

But she felt a tug and pull, and suddenly she too was beside him, on another chair, lying on her back with a cup of tea and this morning’s edition of Equestria Daily.

“Please, Princess Luna,” said Discord, sipping from his glass of orange juice. “Loosen up a little, why don’t you? What else can we do but wait?”

Still in the chair, Luna shot him a frustrated glower. Still, he was right. She looked around the room to take in the sight of the dozen-or-so armed guards, none of whom had changed position. She tapped her helmet, relieved to find he hadn’t taken away her armour.

It was all well and good for Discord, but Luna felt trouble brewing. The Empire had known they were coming, just as the Empire had been prepared with the ansible, or ready to intercept Reiner at the portal station. The Empire knew more than she felt comfortable with.

She lit her horn, softly, hoping the guards wouldn’t notice. There she felt the cage’s effects, constraining, restrictive. But nevertheless, like Discord had said, she still had more than enough residual magic left to use within the cage.

‘We’ve been trapped. But we’re not done yet.’

* * * * *

While Yael often hated to hear Kraber’s thoughts, it was true he often spoke what all thought.

“A teleporting airship,” Kraber grumbled. “Great! I fokkin’ love it! This kak again! Fokkin’ wonderful! Colour me jubilant!”

“Didn’t he almost die last time that happened?” Frieda asked.

The griffon had joined them down here, reporting in on the alicorn’s presence. And it turned out no-one, least of all Kraber, was quite pleased.

“I almost died about five times,” Kraber said.

“You DidDie!” Quiette Shy pointed out.

“Thanks for the reminder!” Kraber responded, sarcastically. “Really means a lot. It’s like the rebar is still in there. And Aegis–”

“Lieutenant,” Frieda interrupted, a little too insistently and a little too loudly. “What about the airship? Do we shoot it?”

And this was the griffon who that night at the high-rise campfire, according to what Yael had heard from Aegis, had been wishing a toast to Princess Luna’s eternal health.

“I’m going to go with n–” Kraber started.

“No,” Yael cut him short, unwilling to take the headache. “That means both of you.”

“I actually wasgoing to say no,” Kraber said. “One, I don’t have a gun big enough to punch through that.” He paused, then looked over to Aegis… or rather, his saddlebags. “I don’t, right?”

Aegis shook his head.

“Fokdammit. I knewwe should’ve brought that NTW-20,” Kraber sighed. “And two. We don’t know what’s going on. I’m not being paid to know what’s going on, so I’m waiting on you for this, Lieutenant.”

“Do you think they’re in league with each other, though?” Yael asked him. “Your honest opinion, please, ah…” She mentally cycled through three languages in the space of as many seconds. “Sergeant.”

“I have no idea,” Kraber said, “But going by what I’ve heard from Lunar Phase, from Nebula, I don’t want to attack them.”

Yael nodded. “Heliotrope?”

“Absolutely,” said Heliotrope. “I’m scared too, but he’s right. There’s too much we don’t know.”

Then, the radio sounded.

“This is Major Bauer,” the voice called in. “I want everyone on standby and ready to mobilise at a moment’s notice. Hold your fire for now. We do not have external air support. Whatever you have right now... that’s all we have. Keep all AA batteries secure, over.”

A different voice called back. “Copy that, Major Tanner here. Awaiting further orders from HQ. Over.”

“Understood, Major Bauer. Over,” Yael chimed in. “So... there’s that.”

“I’m with V on this one. For once,” Aegis said, “I’m glad I don’t make the big bucks.”

Frieda sighed. “You’re reallygood at inspiring confidence, all of you.”

Yael’s potential reply was cut short by a shimmer in the sky.

“What the hell is that?”

* * * * *

There was a cacophony on all channels. Frantic shouts, panicked cries, and desperate attempts to keep it all together. Ana had remained in her post, despite all her instincts screaming at her to flee the desolate battlefield. She had gripped Harwood’s gloved hand tightly, as the two gazed up at the gigantic, translucent dome covering the entire city – and the colossal airship which had manifested with it.

This was no Barrier with a capital B.

But as an omen, it heralded nothing good at all. For exactly one Equestrian, to their knowledge, could pull off the feat of creating a city-sized magical dome.

“Definitely Shining Armor,” Ana said, adjusting her binoculars. “Yeah, between the Empire’s flagship and that dome, I’d say the High Captain is here.”

“Another day at the job,” Harwood deadpanned.

“One way to put it...” Ana said nervously.

Harwood and she still gripped each other tight, hand in hand, but Ana had felt his grip relax somewhat when it became clear the alicorn had not been the Queen after all.

Not that it helped when they had a whole new problem.

The Great Equestrian loomed above them, but its dreaded gas canisters and potion mortars had yet to fire. Perhaps it was calculating. Whoever had been caught within the dome was no less at its mercy.

Airships were common in the Imperial military. Slow, cumbersome, and not very manoeuverable, they were mostly valued for their troop transport capabilities, as a single airship could still provide enough troops to overwhelm your average platoon.

But the Great Equestrian was something else entirely.

The flagship of the Imperial Fleet was, without a doubt, the largest airship, or any flying craft, to have graced Earth’s virgin skies. Slightly over two thirds the size of the ill-fated Hindenburg but with more than five times its mass, the Great Equestrian’s hull alone was comparable to that of the remaining aircraft carriers in service. Though UNAC analysts insisted that all its presences on the field had been simply for show, the times it had appeared on the field always preceded a massive potion bombardment, before it retreated once again. The shields it boasted had always been enough to withstand whatever missiles were scrambled in short notice, and so the vessel constantly lived to see another day.

More than enough men have been lost to its mortars for it to earn the dread of most of UNAC’s rank and file, and tonight was no different.

Then, she heard it, breaking the dreary silence.

One, then three, then dozens of artillery fire and missile streaks crossed the Boston sky, impacting the Great Equestrian’s shields, like fireworks in the night. It started grand as ever, like in Hanne’s world-famous photograph of the Barrier, but soon the streets would be stained purple and red, as they always were.

Harwood tightened his grip on his shield. Ana readied her rifle. And wondered, as she set her rifle into place, if they would all live to see the dawn.

The Battle of Boston was beginning anew.

~ The Great Equestrian ~

“Quite the ghastly aesthetic in here, isn’t it?” Discord said, inspecting one of the four crystalline pillars in each corner of the gallery, while Luna narrowed her eyes at the guards nearby. “Hmpf, I’d have expected better, really.”

“Don’t touch anything, Discord,” said Luna. She maintained a cool, tranquil mask as her sister had taught her, but she remained on full alert. “We’re not here to snoop around our host, so best keep your claws to yourself.”

So far, they hadn’t seen the host in question, and the Imperial Guards stationed here had nothing much to say other than a repeating order to remain where they are. At any other time, Luna thought, she’d have been be fighting her way out of hordes of whatever it was the enemy could throw at her. But this was no ordinary enemy, even by her high standards.

She needed to bid her time, and with Discord by her side… well, perhaps they did have the temporary advantage. For now.

Luna gave another look at the Imperial Guards in the art gallery. They had an uncanny discipline to remain impassive at the sight of both her and Discord, in a way that superceded even Tia’s notoriously stone-faced protectors.

Clad in a sleek, bronze-coloured set armour, the Imperials had a distinctly more utilitarian, heavier look compared to the Royal Guards, including her own Night Guard. Considering what Reiner had told her, though, it was only natural for this Guard to have adapted against humanity’s nightmarish array of weaponry.

By her count, only half of the score of Guards in the room were Equestrian natives. There were a pair of earthponies and pegasi each, and the rest were an assortment of horses, zebras, and hippogriffs. If the airship’s size was as large as she believed it was, there could be a hundred more in the decks of this Great Equestrian.

In hindsight, perhaps she should have brought a halberd or a sword to carry, as deterrence. Nevertheless, her personal battle armour would suffice her, and she was all too glad that she had consulted Lord Darkhoof for its readiness in time.

Obsidian, when it occured naturally, was brittle, and hardly anyone ever used it for anything except knives and other ceremonial weapons. But with the right tools, spells, and artisans, one could shape and strengthen it beyond its natural properties.

Some like Chrysalis may have used it for simple confinement, the most mundane of utilities, just like she had on Princess Ember’s unfortunate bodyguard. But those who suffered dragon raids knew obsidian to be worth far more than a simple cage for unruly drakes.

And Luna’s ancient armour had been made by no mere blacksmith. It wasn’t forged – it was carved and shaped into a fine instrument, centuries past in the Tauren Isles. In appearance , it was sleek and functional at the same time, blending ancient Minotaur plate armour with Equestrian enchantments. Lined with enchanted steel, it was made for her alone to wear. As Celestia had helpfully demonstrated, those whom the armour did not recognise would find it much too loose to serve any practical purpose.

Luna felt confident in her own endurance and durability, but one couldn’t be too careful, and she was grateful for the armour’s fully enclosed nature, save for tiny gaps between the segmented plates covering her joints, or her uncovered mane. Her head would be fully protected the moment the visor was closed. Darkhoof had assured her it was as ready as it had been thousands of years ago, but he could offer no more than an adjustment to the padding underneath the steel-lined plates for comfort.

Where she was headed, material comfort would be the least of her worries.

The clock ticked. The minutes passed. Discord grew sleepier and sleepier by the second. Then...

“The Archmage will see you now,” one of the hippogriffs said suddenly, in a loud clear voice. It was the guard closest by the door, and Luna’s ears perked up. “Make ready!”

‘... Archmage?’

With precision, the door’s guard turned to open it. Luna beckoned for Discord to join her side, which he did, grumpily.

In little time, Luna was gifted with the sight of this new arrival. An equine figure in a starry cloak, flanked by more Imperial Guards.

It was an unsettling surprise to Luna that she recognised two of those of Guards.

Rainbow Dash’s namesake mane identified her instantly, even tied back behind her helmet. She wore the Wonderbolts’ insignia on her sleeve, and her rose eyes stared at Luna balefully from behind her helmet’s own visor.

The other one… Luna could not say for sure, but she felt oddly reminded of a particular little filly’s dream from weeks ago… this one seemed short, for a Guard...

As the Archmage and her entourage approached, Luna readied herself and stood straight.

Even without the horn that peaked out from beneath the figure’s humble, but dignified hood, Luna would have known the figure immediately. It turned her blood cold in a way that had nothing to do with the fear of battle, yet she stood her ground, coolly stared at her interlocutor.

The Archmage gave a critical look to the closest crystalline pillar.

“I’d appreciate if you restored them properly, Discord. They’re tremendously valuable,” Twilight Sparkle said smoothly, before turning her attention away from him. “Hello, Princess Luna. Fancy seeing you here.”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

One line indicates how the Solar Empire deals with nuclear radiation and waste. Queen Celestia herself cleans it up.

Removal of various HLF characters at the UN summit, including Commodore Daniel Romero.

Removal of a concept and characters; the Mystics no longer barge in on the UN Security Council. Frankly I wondered how they were left standing after coming into a highly secure location with weapons.

A new plot breadcrumb; when Ana Bjorgman reads her letter, mention is made of Verity Carter.

Spectrum 2.0 - June 12th 2019

Sledge115: Hello there! Here we are, and Act II has officially begun. Rest assured, this should be more tightly paced, given what’s to come.

Chernobyl and kurzgesagt’s video on detonating every nuclear warhead at once gave this a last-second addition, because radiation sickness is nothing short of horrifying. This is also a shameless plug to go watch Chernobyl. Seriously – it’s a fantastic show.

Hanne Adler was conceived to cover one side of the war that I thought wasn’t quite mentioned in the previous version. When a war threatens all of humanity’s legacy, where does the ubiquitous war photographer fit in? What would be the Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima of the Conversion War? How will we cope with the fact that nothing in our modern arsenal can touch let alone destroy the Barrier?

As Doc put it in the previous author’s notes (Hi, Doc!), Last Train was a major push for quality in the old Spectrum, and it also led to Calm Before the Storm. Though Calm had its own flaws, (I regret Eres Veneno with every fiber of my being. ~Fluffy) I will not deny that the atmosphere in that story contributed to the idea that the bigger picture needed to be drawn to an extent earlier on, from other points of view. There’s quite a few details to note here, with a few divergences in world history post-2016. Some obvious, some subtle.

Originally, the first half of this chapter was to be the prologue to Act II (up until the transition to Ana as the main human POV), but we’ve decided to move it and turn it into one half of Chapter 14 proper.

Thanking each and everyone of Team Spectrum would be far too lengthy to kick this off, and I don’t want to accidentally miscredit or forget to mention you all. So - thank you, everyone, for everything. You know who you are :twilightsmile:

Without further ado, I present Act II - Moonrise. It’s been a fun time drafting this particular arc, and some elements may be familiar, others new. Whatever the case, I do hope you will all enjoy the ride. Cheers!

DoctorFluffy: I HALP

Wow, though, it’s genuinely surprising to see how much I’ve also HALPed here. Calm was an inspiration behind this chapter! Wow!

While I’ve been less active here than I used to, (It’s been years, and I just don’t have the excitement I once did…. Which is to say, this is now a hobby I love rather than my life and sole escape from the mundane terror of my everyday existence SOMEONE HELP I’M STILL TRAUMATIZED FROM SENIOR YEAR ) it has to be said: Sledge’s enthusiasm is infectious.

If there’s anyone you should thank for the fact that I’m still here, for the fact that Spectrum is what it is, you should thank Sledge.

His enthusiasm has spurred me on to do greater and greater things. As he made Hanne, well… I made Will Davidson. Who, as it happens, is just Will Navidson from House of Leaves. I was considering just writing “Davidson,” but come on. Who has the name “Navidson?” It doesn’t make that much sense.

After learning about the Kumzari people from an associate of famous climber Alex Honnold (I forget his name) and telling Sledge about the Kumzari people, he insisted I write about them here. Which…

Well, while I didn’t really think too hard about it, it was for a friend, and it was for the story. So I did.

On another note: I also worked super hard to do right by Jed. He may not be with us (on the story, anyway. He’s fine otherwise) but it was my duty to do right by him and his characters.

VoxAdam: Doc’s right about Sledge. The list would be too long to detail, but there are any number of factors that can be credited to him for keeping Spectrum going from its rebooting onwards and passing through Jed’s departure. Miss you, Jed.

And while I’ve come to formulate a bulwark of the ideas and plans for the story as it progresss, I wouldn’t be able to if if I didn’t have more Skype chats than I can count with Sledge to play off.

So take all you can from this Act.

Cheers,
~Vox

Act II ~ Chapter Fifteen ~ Two Faces

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy

Busy in the utility muffin research kitchen

VoxAdam

Two Riders Were Approaching...

Sledge115

She is here.

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

Featuring Concepts By

ProudToBe

Chapter Fifteen

Two Faces

* * * * *

I see a cold wind blowing through
I see days neither fun nor free
I see a future caused by you
I see a path not meant to be

The future should be filled with magic
Dreams and wishes brought to life
But the days ahead are dark and tragic
No time for hope when all is strife
— Luna’s Future, by Daniel Ingram

~ Boston, USA ~ November 15th, 2024 CE ~

All in all, it was not a good day for Stephan Bauer.

How could it be, really? Three days ago –time flies, and not in the good sense, too – Alexander Reiner vanished without a trace, the battle ground to a halt, and a dark alicorn who should be petrified, held imprisoned as a statue in Canterlot, had just gone and announced that she knew where the Captain was.

He’d also heard about the figure next to her, the strange mish-mashed goat-dragon-pony thing – but that one, he couldn’t have confirmed directly, because the flagship of the Imperial Fleet had only just materialized out of nowhere around them.

And that was without mentioning the gigantic purple dome around the city, and from experience, Stephan knew the Captain of the Imperial Guard’s shields were not to be destroyed so easily. He’d learned that from the loss of Stuttgart.

“General, are you absolutely sure there are no air assets within the city, over?”

Despite their preperations, the dome’s appearance had still disrupted the chains of command within the city, and now Stephan wasn’t even sure who else remained from the PHL’s top brass, other than him. So he’d gone with the next best option and contacted the Bundeswehr, hoping that word might also get through to l’Armée de Terre and the British Army. UNAC had to keep its resources pooled.

‘Negative, Major,’ responded General Vollmer. ‘Until that dome is down, and I can’t guarantee it will be in the next four hours, there will be no air support within the Boston perimeter, over.’

‘Dammit,’

“Understood, General,” said Stephan, almost resignedly. “We’ll hold our ground here, as best as we can, over.”

‘Keep those SAM sites secured. They’re your best options if you want that airship brought down. General Vollmer out.’

The radio died down, and Stephan let out a frustrated sigh. Even after a week of skirmishes, they lacked intel on the size of the enemy contingent present in the city, nor did they know if the Imperials had even have more waiting to be deployed at a moment’s notice. Hell, he wasn’t sure the troops trapped under the dome had half the firepower to bring down the Imperial flagship.

He looked out past the flap of his command tent.

Below his command here was a combined force of a few hundred humans from all over Europe. Nominally under UNAC’s leadership, they were technically given over to German authority, as was the prerogative of any regiment that called itself the Teutonic Knights.

French, Polish, and German soldiers side by side, many of them veterans of the fiercest fighting in Bremen and Berlin. Daniel and Alicia in particular had been by his side for as long as he could remember. Alicia spotted him looking, and he waved, hiding his anxiety. She waved back, with that massive DSR.50 slung over her shoulder.

If the Great Equestrian carried another high-ranking Imperial on the proverbial UNAC hit list, Stephan knew he’d be counting on her and more like her in the raging battle.

And that wasn’t counting the PHL-affiliated Equusites fighting alongside them. Small in number, but of stout hearts, Stephan felt like he could count on them and their array of equipment, from practical assault saddles to enhanced battle armour. They would provide all they had to offer in both offense and defense. There were at least a dozen at least in his regiment, each as valuable to him as any human.

“Herr Major, sir!” his top scout announced in crisp German. Silver Shield, formerly of the Guard. The sleek, silver pegasus was his eyes in the sky, and he’d never failed Stephan before. “Orders on approach?”

“Keep the perimeter secure for now, Silver,” Stephan replied firmly. “Take two with you, scout the perimeter. Report back if anything’s out of place, and we’ll handle it.”

The pegasus saluted, and left the tent.

He wished Trixie Lulamoon were by his side. His partner through and through, the Blue Spy had been deployed only a week before, on short notice, to conduct a certain covert operation within the Empire itself.

‘Perfect timing’ Stephan thought bitterly. ‘Just our luck, I suppose.’

“Think anything’s out of the ordinary, Major?” Daniel’s hardened voice cut in. Stephan glanced up from the table to see him standing in the entrance. “Thought you looked a bit glum.”

“Nothing too serious,” Stephan said. He got up to join him and glanced at the sky. The shields of the airship flared a sickly purple with each impact, illuminating it briefly in an eerie glow. “Don’t even know who else is aboard that damned airship.”

His comrade shrugged.

“Just give the order, Major. We’ll be ready, if the boys handling the AA batteries aren’t enough.”

Stephan gave him a bitter smile. Each second was punctuated by a distant boom.

“All sniper teams, report in, over,” he said. One, two, three and–

“Easter reporting in, Major Bauer,” said a voice on comms. “What’s the sitrep, over?”

“Unknown high value targets confirmed aboard the Great Equestrian,” Stephan responded. “Unconfirmed member of the Imperial leadership aboard, over.”

“Nordlys reporting in,” said a light, soft voice. “No visual on the Great Equestrian bridge so far. Rules of engagement, over?”

Stephan paused, for a moment. The high value targets weren’t Imperial, were they?

“Priority on the Imperials,” he said firmly. “Do not target the unidentified alicorn, yet. Keep your rifles trained on all high value targets. Report in once the shields are down. Awaiting further orders from command, over.”

“Affirmative,”’ Nordlys replied. “Standing by for further orders, over.”

“Standing by for further orders, over…”

“...confirmed, ready to fire…”

“Acknowledged, Major Bauer out,” said Stephan, after the last of the snipers had confirmed their positions. But even under the heavy bombardment, he wasn’t sure if the Great Equestrian would crash and burn today. Damned if they weren’t giving it their all, though.

He turned to face Daniel, who looked rather expectant of him.

“So, we wait?” said Daniel.

Stephan nodded.

“We wait,” he said. “They’ll be coming soon. Best be ready.”

~ The Great Equestrian ~

“Oh, restore those crystal pillars, you say?” Discord smiled. “Don’t mind if I d–”

“Ahem,” Luna said sternly, putting a hoof on Discord before he could snap his fingers. “Please, mind your manners, Discord. We are not here to meddle.”

“Spoilsport,” Discord retorted with crossed arms, but said nothing more.

Luna turned to meet the Archmage eye to eye.

“And so we meet, Twilight Sparkle.” she said respectfully. She knew of what Alexander Reiner thought of her. What she’d done. But there was no harm in a cordial exchange. For now.

“Indeed we do, Princess.” Twilight replied. She reached up and pulled down her hood. Immediately, Luna took note of the differences lining this version of the Bearer of Magic, all while she spoke. “It's good to see you again, despite… circumstances.”

The mare before her had an aged, greying look, as well as visible sleep deprivation. Three days’ worth, judging by her sunken, baggy eyes. Her mane was ill-treated, messily kept together by the helm she wore. The single stripe of red in her purple mane had turned completely grey.

Luna’s eyes were drawn to Twilight’s helm. A modified Guard’s helm, the Element of Magic was incorporated into it, as vibrant as ever. Her neck too was protected by a silver guard, and Luna found little reason to doubt that she wore a full suit of armour beneath the starry cloak.

“And you’re the Bearer of Magic, still?” Luna said suspiciously.

Her own obsidian armour was barely decorated, apart from the dark grey metal that lined it, along with the simple crescent moon on her helmet, and it contrasted strongly with Twilight’s white helmet streaked with gold. Yet Luna suspected Twilight’s garb would protect her just as well as her own did.

“The proper title would be the Archmage of the Solar Empire,” Twilight said dismissively. “But... Yes, I am.”

“Hmph,” scoffed Discord. “I see Celestia has made your lapdog status official.”

“Mind your tongue, Discord,” Twilight said, with a scowl. “You are present here as a courtesy.”

Luna nudged Discord, and her companion merely crossed his arms.

“And we accept it,” said Luna, though she didn’t believe her words entirely. She glanced at Twilight’s greyed mane. “I trust you were expecting us, then?”

“On short notice,” said Twilight wearily. “Commander Rainbow Dash at least was kind enough to provide company. You remember Rainbow Dash, right?”

“Charmed,” Luna said, deadpan.

Of the two Bearers present in the room, she wasn’t too familiar with the mare of Loyalty, having only scattered memories to draw on from the same Nightmare Night where she’d re-encountered Twilight Sparkle. The pegasus obviously shared the same indifferent sentiment, for she only grunted in acknowledgment.

It was the younger pegasus mare by Dash’s side that truly caught her eye. Clad in the sleek Imperial Guard armour of this Equestria, but adorned with the Wonderbolts’ colours, and her wings were oddly small. Some sort of crystalline construct integrated into the armour supported them. Her saffron coat and feathers, her light purple mane, and those cerise eyes…

“Ah, Rainbow, the missing one,” Discord said, casually, interrupting Luna’s train of thought. “Nice to see you by Twilight’s side this time, I suppose.”

“Yes, yes, missing Element, failed stoning, and so on,” Twilight said grumpily. Luna had heard of Discord’s second imprisonment from hearsay alone, and she’d never had the time to ask Twilight – her Twilight – about it directly. “We all know the story, Discord. You don’t need to remind us. Dash came through in the end.”

“I would very much love to remind you again, though, you silly mare.”

Luna glanced around, her ear flicking. There were distant booming noises, like the sound of thunder, and an ever-so-slight rumbling around her.

“Is something wrong?” Twilight asked, ignoring Discord, taking a step forward. Luna tightened her stance warily. The Bearer of Magic paused in her stride.

“Nothing,” said Luna. “Just an odd feeling, is all.”

“Ah,” said Twilight. “Don’t worry about that. The shields will hold.”

“Shields?” Luna repeated. She shot Discord a puzzled look, to which he shrugged.

“Yes, shields,” Twilight said, as if it was the most obvious of questions. “The humans have begun their assault, I believe. We are still at war, I’m afraid.”

She met Luna’s eyes with her own.

“Did you expect a warmer welcome?” she asked politely. “Humans have always been a suspicious bunch, Princess. Didn’t take them long enough to start firing here.”

“I wonder why,” Discord said disparagingly. Twilight glared at him fiercely. “Oh, that’s right. The war you’re waging on their existence might have something to do with it.”

“Like the Archmage said, mind your tongue, Discord!” Rainbow Dash said gruffly. Twilight had hardened her posture, and the Guards poised to strike. More surprising to Luna was how quick they were at a moment’s notice, even those not of Equestrian origin.

“Tsk, tsk,” Discord said simply. Holding his fingers at the ready to snap once more, he wore a wild smirk. Perhaps he’d turn them into cake or the wild animals of the Everfree this time, Luna thought absurdly. “Wouldn’t want you or your Guards to fall now would you, Rainbow Dash? Another Rainboom isn’t going to help you to pick up the pieces.”

He looked around mockingly, Dash and the Guards glaring back at him defiantly.

“And I wonder how many of your lackeys are here,” he teased. “This is a rather gaudy and oversized airship you’ve got–”

“That’s enough,” Twilight said. “We’re not here to provoke any petty arguments–”

“Then what are we here for, then, Sparkle?” Discord cut in. He waved his hand towards Twilight, Dash and the assembled Guards. “I certainly didn’t plan on being ‘captured’, so excuse me for reminding you grumpkins. Was capture part of ‘not-provoking’? Feh, I thought so. And I didn’t plan on playing nice.”

“We certainly plan on ‘playing nice’ with Princess Luna, and you as well,” Twilight said evenly.

Luna narrowed her eyes. “I doubt it, Twilight Sparkle,” she said. “But I would ask my colleague to stand down, if you would order yours too.”

There was a pause, as each and every one of them contemplated the opposition. But Twilight nodded towards her Guards, and Luna returned the favour by nodding to Discord.

Discord let out an exaggerated sigh. With a snap of his fingers, he conjured up yet another poolside chair, and laid back on it with a glass of juice in his claws.

“Take it away, Little Moon,” said Discord, huffing. “Don’t worry, I’m sure Twilight knows who’s in charge here.”

He was prepared, Luna knew, and she shared a rare smile with him.

“Good,” Luna said, and she turned her head back to Twilight – who didn’t look too fazed. “Now, Twilight Sparkle. We may speak.”

It was certainly surprising for Twilight to keep her composure at this point, Luna thought. From the way Reiner had described the Empire, it had become second nature of them to forgo proper negotiations entirely when faced with human leadership.

What was their game here…?

“Very well, Princess Luna,” said Twilight. “Sorry for the unpleasantness, seems like we started off on the wrong hoof, right?”

Despite her worn appearance, she brightened up considerably when she smiled, however tired her smile looked.

“Yes, it seems we did,” agreed Luna, calmly. She kept her stance ready, though she allowed her expression to relax, if only for show.

Discord blew a raspberry at her, from the corner of her eye. Twilight simply nodded.

“No worries, it’s no fault of yours. However, what I do want to know, Princess…” began Twilight. Her tone changed into something oddly familiar to Luna. “... is just where did you get that exquisite armour!”

And, somehow, she seemed positively giddy.

“I… beg your pardon?” said Luna. She remained rigid and awkward, even as Twilight let out a merry laugh, which stood out more in the ambience of the gallery and the silence of the guards. It was no mocking laugh, either. It sounded hearty, and dare she say it, genuine.

“Didn’t think I’d miss what you’re wearing, did you?” Twilight said brightly. “Please, this isn’t some second-rate rusty piece of armour you’re wearing, oh no-no-no. This is second century– no, this is, huh, this looks like it could be a contemporary of Commander Hurricane himself! What do you think, Dash?”

Maintaining her stern outlook, the Bearer of Loyalty gave a small shrug.

“Eh, could be,” Dash said dismissively. “I dunno.”

“It is! It is, isn’t it?” Twilight said, eagerly. Before Luna could blink, she was already right in front of her, smiling brightly. “Where did you get it? Tell me– hm, that doesn’t look like metal at all. Is it obsidian? How did you use obsidian?”

“I… I cannot say,” Luna said warily. “I am no blacksmith, I’m afraid, and this armour’s makers have long since passed.”

“Ah, a shame,” Twilight said, but she persisted. “No matter– we have so much to talk about, Princess. The research we could do on this, goodness! It’ll be… it’ll be worth the time.”

She looked up at Luna, and for a brief moment, she saw no age, no wear, no exhaustion in Twilight Sparkle. She only saw the same pony that had approached her out of the kindness of her heart, one Nightmare Night.

“We can do it together?” Twilight asked, softly. “Like we did when… when Sombra’s war came.”

“... Sombra’s war?”

“Yes, the Crystal War,” Twilight said wryly. “It was… terrible, but, we made something out of it. We studied together, fought together... those ghastly constructs of his, it was you who found their weaknesses. I only helped a little… but it meant a lot to me. We could do it together again.”

She shouldn’t have felt it. A feeling of… nostalgia. And yet…

“Tell me, then,” Luna said quietly.

“I wish I could,” Twilight said, with a pained smile. “But so… so much has happened in so little time that it’s… gah, it all blends together.”

Her smile turned gentle.

“But I remember you, after the sneak attack on Fillydelphia. You weren’t… well, too happy to know how Sombra went for a soft target. You came to me, and asked for my help in finding how he’d done it, how he’d made it past the Lunar Guard. I tried my best and, well, it wasn’t easy finding an answer to something that, in your words, didn’t make any sense! How in Equestria did he ever, ever make it past your wards, make it past the Queen’s? And…”

She drooped her ears.

“I failed you then,” she said. “I failed and, things didn’t get any easier then. We fought, we won … It’s been fifteen years since. And I still couldn’t find the answer.”

She reached out for Luna’s hoof – and Luna, tentatively, accepted it.

“Then you told me that it was alright. That we’d won. And it wasn’t… it wasn’t any fault of mine. That we pulled through, nonetheless. We could do it again, Princess.”

And for one brief, wild moment, Luna found herself agreeing with her. That they would have all the time in the world, reading, researching, studying under her Moon. Strange to think, there was a touch of regret in her heart, for she never had pursued a closer friendship with young Twilight after that Nightmare Night. Too little time on her end, and she imagined her sister’s faithful student would have no such luxury either. To hear this Twilight recounting an experience that she’d shared with her, but never experienced herself was…

“How long has it been for you, Twilight?” Luna asked softly. Twilight blinked, showing confusion.

“We… first met eighteen years ago.”

‘Eighteen years.’

And reality set in again. It wasn’t her war. It wasn’t her Equestria. And the mare before her wasn’t her Twilight.

There was indeed a war being waged. A terrible war. A war which Alexander Reiner and all his people lived, fought, bled and died in. A Queen, beloved and adored by many, and a cruel tyrant to others. And here she stood with the enemy, enticed, tempted...

“I am sorry,” she said, finally. She let go of Twilight’s hoof. “But I’m afraid I must decline, Twilight Sparkle. You speak as if I am the Luna of your world, but I am not. There was no war in the Crystal Realm, nor any in our Equestria.”

Before Twilight could reply, Luna had turned her glance away. Then she saw Discord before her, sharing a knowing look, and the air had lowered to an icy chill in the gallery.

“Nor did we bring it to this world.”

~ The Hall of Unity ~

As she stared through the Crystal Mirror into the gallery aboard the Great Equestrian, Galatea was feeling unease. It was irrational. The Princess of the Night and Lord of Chaos, both captured by the Empire’s flagship… yet if they just put their backs into it, they had more than a chance to escape… Powerful as the Archmage was, she could not possibly present a threat to the two of them working together.

Ah, but Luna hadn’t heeded Celestia’s advice on how to present herself. Stubborn, headstrong Luna. It was at times a detriment in her character. Others, she stood her ground well enough, as she did now.

Perhaps when the Reindeer had arrived at the Hall, she ought to have accompanied them to Luna’s room all the way back then. Sint Erklass could have provided support to her argument. Or maybe he wouldn’t have.

Then a cold chill invaded the room where the Mirror was being kept, and Galatea blinked hard. Lifting her goggles, she gazed into the mirror once again, to find it blurred. She heard voices. Saw silhouettes. Ancient magic in the crystalline void. The Elements?

She paused. Of course. The Mirror was offering her four different angles to see the gallery with. And wherever she looked, there were always three crystalline pillars in the gallery’s corners. She was being shown the gallery through the pillars.

These were magical conduits. A crude design, but they went multiple ways. Connected not just to each other, but forming a sub-spatial bridge between Earth and Equestria.

‘Totem-proles…’ Galatea thought. ‘The Empire’s response to humanity’s own network of inter-connected monitors… but so much worse. How did I miss this?’

There was something else in the void, she felt. Something within the crystalline pillars. No, she corrected. Something that was the crystalline pillar. She let out a soft gasp.

“Help… me…”

Whether the voices were there or she’d only imagined them, even Galatea couldn’t tell. It did not matter. Her priority was to help Luna. Somehow.

“I’m sorry,” Galatea whispered. She turned away from the Mirror. There was nothing else she could do. Celestia would have to be informed.

Marching towards the door, Galatea let her wings melt into her back and her horn retract into her forehead, her whole stature grow smaller, as she assumed her earthpony disguise, on the off-chance one of the visiting delegates should be wandering around the Watchtower. One should always play it safe, even at the best of times, and this was not playing it safe, nor the best of times.

They needed to act quickly.

~ The Great Equestrian ~

“How… unfortunate, Princess,” said Twilight.

She had turned from Luna, but when she glanced back, gone was any sort of warmth in her weary eyes, or her voice.

“I see that Captain Reiner has poisoned your mind against us.”

“Shown us the truth, more like it,” Luna said, her tone laced with ice, and Discord nodded smugly. The Guards around them resumed their watch, their harsh glare searing through their visors. “The world gathered, and I took the liberty of presenting them his unvarnished memories.”

“My, what a show it was, wasn’t it now, Luna dear?” Discord added.

“You’ll show your respect in the Archmage’s presence, Discord!” shouted the saffron pegasus besides Rainbow Dash.

“At ease, Starstruck,” Twilight said, ignoring Discord. “Forgive the young one,” she told Luna. “She’s a little impulsive. But, Reiner… I guess he peddled you the same old story, then, Princess Luna?”

She now stood before one of the covered paintings in the gallery, tracing a forehoof across the cloth under her horn’s light.

“Poor, victimized humanity in a brave, heroic stand against the forces of darkness? Perspective counts for a lot, you know.”

“Aye, it does,” Luna agreed. Twilight glanced back, and her expression remained impassive. “But dreams show a person’s truest self, and what I saw in Alexander Reiner were tales of a cause most desperate.”

Far more than that, Luna thought privately.

Her sister never could have understood her night-time journeys through the dream realm, for these were journeys only she could make. Many times had she seen beauty her sister would have loved to behold for herself. And many times she had witnessed nightmares her sister would not have envied.

She took a step forward. The Guards drew their swords, and Discord hopped off his chair, his claws poised.

“‘A cause most desperate’?” Twilight echoed tiredly. “Indeed, yes. Humans are a desperate case by their very nature. That’s nothing to do with us.”

“You may think otherwise, Twilight,” she said firmly. “But I’ve witnessed what Alexander Reiner has lived through. And you know it, too.”

The other mare said nothing. But Luna persisted.

“You’ve torn their world asunder, rained fire upon their lands,” Luna continued, undaunted. “Burnt their legacy until it was naught but ash and nothing more…”

“This should be good,” Discord whispered, lying on his stomach in mid-air, his chin propped by his forelimbs. “But you’ll need a better audience than this bunch, Luna.”

Adding actions to his words, he split, if that was the right word, into about ten clones of himself, each in the same lying position in a circle around Luna. Twilight and Rainbow frowned at seeing this display, yet stayed where they were.

Luna sighed. “I shall be brief, and I shall be frank,” she said. “I refuse to believe that any Equestria which believes in Harmony could do what the Solar Empire does to humanity. What Reiner told us… those sound more like the actions of Equestria’s worst enemies… and I know… I was there…” She closed her eyes, in pain. “But I do not think I would have ever have condoned this…”

In all their gruesome and visceral glory, Reiner had feared to show her his deepest dreams, for concern they may attack her sanity as they had his, turning the soldier’s curse of into an infectious disease of the mind. Yet Luna had assured him it was for the better if she beheld, and beheld his mind well. So too had it been for the assembled delegates, caught in wonder and terror by the vision she’d presented at the Hall.

And here, once again, she outlined the human’s tales of horrors.

She didn’t need dreamweaving skills to present what must have been familiar to Twilight – this Twilight, at least. Her task at this time was to uncover how an Imperial saw and thought, for Reiner had told her much of their puppet-like qualities – she shivered – their mindless words, their soulless eyes. How day by day, battle by battle, they seemed to become more like the Newfoal abominations they kept sending out in greater droves.

Here, though, she stole a glance at Twilight Sparkle, and saw nothing of the sort. Impassive, perhaps, but Luna’s story was something she must’ve known well enough to pay it no heed. More curiously was that, if she concentrated, Luna thought she caught a glimpse of something that stirred behind her weary visage, something beneath the surface.

It was hard to interpret precisely. But Luna thought there had to be a tinge of regret in those sad, weary eyes of hers.

What Twilight regretted, of course, was another matter entirely.

Soon, Luna had finished her retelling, and despite the vigorous, enthusiastic applause from Discord and his copies around the room, nothing came from Twilight, who regarded her with what looked like pity and longing.

Once the last of Discord’s clones had reformed into him, all remained still and quiet – with only the distant booming of the continued human assault to fill the ambience.

Then Twilight smiled. A sad, forlorn smile.

“You didn’t actually think we’d erase all of mankind's legacy, do you?” said Twilight. “Reiner may have made this clear about our mission. Yes, for the betterment of their kind, we sought to turn them to Equestria’s Light... And for that, we need to remember what they made of themselves. Look around you, Princess Luna, and tell me what you see.”

Her horn shone brightly, and all at once, all the cloth covering the paintings dropped, exposing them fully. And Luna saw that they weren’t paintings at all. They were giant framed photographs, either of many colours, or black-and-white.

Even Discord remained silent, as she stepped forward to look closely at the photographs. The Guards parted before Luna, allowing her to gaze upon the first and nearest one, and she was presented with an eerie sight.

Against a ruined backdrop sat a human child, smaller than those she’d seen in Reiner’s memories. It sat by train tracks, burnt and injured, but most of all, alive. Around it lay debris and ruins of what could only have been the train station. The child was alone, crying out for its mother, frozen in time.

“They called this one ‘Bloody Saturday’,” Luna heard Twilight say. “The baby lost its mother, killed by the enemy. Just one more victim of the wars that have ravaged mankind for centuries.”

“And who is this enemy?” asked Luna. But somehow, she already knew the answer.

“Themselves,” said Twilight. “Well, here it’s the Japanese, but the difference is… academic. There’s nothing one side in their wars wouldn’t do to the other.”

Her horn glowed, and in the chandelier above, candles were lit. Luna turned her gaze to another photograph, and was met with a horrific sight.

A mass of human corpses, strewn across a staircase in black-and-white. Naked, stripped bare. Blood pooled beneath them, necks twisted in unnatural angles. Luna’s heart skipped a beat when she saw some of them were children, small children barely out of infancy.

“The same war... a different story,” Twilight’s voice echoed in her head. “These ones were killed in a stampede, a rush to avoid death when the bombs started to fall.”

The chandelier finished alighting, and another black-and-white photograph came into view... There stood three half-clothed men, skeletal and decrepit. Their eyes spoke of unfathomable hardship, and yet they couldn’t have been older than Alexander Reiner.

“They once called Japan the Empire of the Rising Sun,” Twilight noted. “Curious coincidence, isn’t it? Same with the similarities in some of our languages, and mythologies… I wish I had more to time to properly study this phenomenon. But anyway. This Empire, like us, promised prosperity to the downtrodden masses they sought to take under their wing... Unlike us, they never followed through, another empty promise given, and never kept.”

Luna turned to face Twilight, who was waiting in front of another photograph. A lone man stood there in the frame, shot from a distance, facing a long line of bulky metal carriages Luna remembered from Alex’s memories, ubiquituous machines of modern warfare. An odd detail was that in both hands, he seemed to carry shopping bags.

It was less disturbing than previous content, but stuck in the mind just as much.

“At first glance, this one’s somewhat more inspiring,” Twilight acknowledged, yet she wasn’t looking happy. “The man you see here stood before a regime that sought to silence its people... But a slaughter had already passed the day before. Would you believe the human regime responsible is still in rule, Princess? Thirty-five years ago, thousands of students marched, hoping for their nation, their rulers, to step aside and usher in a new, better era of freedom. And how were they answered?”

She gestured towards a few vivid photographs by her side, and Luna could not ignore it.

Streets stained with crimson red. The same metal carriages, their tracks bloodied. Corpses strewn left and right. Crumpled remains of what had once been a person, mashed with twisted metal. Visceral, sickening. Foul to the sight, stirring the other senses in dark ways.

“They never took responsibility,” Twilight said, harshly. “Thousands dead, and their memory hushed away. The men who ordered it… long gone, but their legacy remains. Oh, the traitor Heartstrings pushed hard for its recognition, but her efforts, like her so-called PHL, have been wasted on humanity.”

Her smile was bitter, and twisted.

“And they never will answer for their crimes. How could they? They’re one of the greatest of all human nations still fighting. And if they win… well, what’s a massacre of thousands, to the hundreds of millions of their own citizens still alive? It’ll be ignored. They did it easily even before we offered them redemption. What’s to stop them from doing so again?”

She pointed at another picture, and Luna’s eyes followed where she pointed to see another lengthy set of photographs lining the walls. And her gaze was drawn in, while all the candles were set alight to cast the same, dim lighting.

“Would you believe this isn’t even the worst of humanity’s doing? They were killing the planet, Princess Luna. They still are.”

The photographs, this time, all told facets of the same story.

A forest, stripped bare of greenery, the undergrowth turned to mud and ash, the last trees blackened and rotting beneath the sulphurous orange skies, with only one healthy tree standing tall amidst its fallen brethren.

A blackened sea and beach, birds pecking away at their tarnished feathers, made unrecognizable by whatever covered them in that same, oily sludge..

Derelict homes, but not abandoned, with emaciated humans staring out from their crumbling, primitive doorways. Children playing amidst mountains of trash reaching up into the sky.

A human city covered in a dense, sickly smog. Its citizens going blindly about their days, their mouths covered in masks.

An abandoned city, its windows hollow and its walls cracked. An abandoned playground lay before rows upon rows of the same building, long forgotten by the children that once lived there. A huge Ferris wheel loomed on the horizon, like a perpetual-machine gone forever still.

Another picture, another story, but before her, Luna saw a dirtied, tarnished world.

And for the first time since she’d arrived here, on this Earth, Princess Luna found that she had nothing much to say. But the Archmage waited patiently for her to speak, Guards at attention. Even Discord looked somewhat perturbed, and was staying quiet. By choice, it seemed.

At last, Luna found her voice.

“All these pictures you’ve shown me…” Luna said slowly, realising that she could not look at them. It felt too hard, just then. “From what you say, they were pictures taken by humans…”

“Yes,” Twilight said softly. “Thaumon-seeded, so they can pass safely to Equestria. It only works on inanimate objects, not living tissue, but it has its uses.”

“But why would humans keep memories of their own sins, if not to learn from them?”

Shakily, Luna looked at Discord. He gave her a small nod, nothing more, as if to say, ‘nice one’.

However, Twilight merely looked grave.

“In centuries, millennia of existence,” she said, “did pictures and accounts make a difference? You know how most humans react when they see suffering in a picture, Luna? Sometimes, they think about it for a bit. They say, ‘oh no, that’s horrible’. And then they go on eating their dinner.”

Luna stared at her. “I don’t believe you. What would be the point? Why would anyone take–”

“Fame? Prestige?” Twilight suggested. “Money? Awards used to be handed out for the most beautiful depictions of suffering in this world, you know. Rewarding the audience’s brief flash of cathartic emotion, soon lost to the wind...”

She did not want to believe Twilight. Yet Luna was the Princess of the Night.

What else was a nightmare, if not the mind’s frantic attempt to purge itself of its fear and hurt, brought about in a terrible, awesome paroxysm of fright? For the briefest moment, a nightmare can bring sweet release, when you awaken and find it wasn’t real...

Yet the fear comes flooding back in, and the mind is once again gasping like a drowning soul.

“What about Lyra?”

Twilight, Dash, even Discord stared at her in shock.

She knew not where the words came from. She only knew the question felt right.

“What about Lyra?” Luna said again, her sights on Twilight. “When she saw what your Empire was doing, would you say she ‘went on eating her dinner’? And when you caught her, did you have to kill her? She was your friend, Twilight.”

It seemed Twilight couldn’t fully meet her gaze. She closed her eyes.

“Yes…” Twilight said quietly. “If only Lyra saw it this way. She should’ve… she never should have left. But Lyra… Lyra Heartstrings was a pony who developed a messianic obsession, believing she knew better than the collective will of Harmony…”

“Do you hear yourself talk?” Luna demanded.

“I must admit,” said Discord, crossing his arms. “I do find it most uncharacteristic of Tia to have one of her dear little ponies put to death… she didn’t even want to kill Sombra, and that caused her a lot of grief with the Crystal Realm, a thousand years ago…”

“Not a mistake she repeated, Discord,” Twilight said, turning back to face him, her face an unreadable mask. “And not one she made with Lyra… although many of us debated on letting Lyra live… I was one of them.”

Luna gasped. “You were?”

“Of course,” Twilight said sadly. “But, in the end, Lyra was just one pony… one equine. Even if many of her followers wouldn’t agree. If you were ever to meet the PHL, don’t be surprised to hear them say ‘By the Golden Lyre’...”

Discord snickered. And the indignant look Luna shot him did nothing to dissuade him.

“What’s so funny, Discord?”

“Ah…” Discord sighed blissfully, conjuring a box of match-sticks and crossing two of them. “My pardon, Luna... but it’s just so funny, what the punters will make cults out of! Did you know I’ve had worshippers who made me into some sort of martyr?”

“Yes, Discord,” Luna said impatiently. “Because we’ve spent a good part of our reign batting them off. They are a pain. But how do you know about them?”

“Oh,” Discord said airily. “Tia would come by sometimes and read me their fan-mail. She is considerate like that… Really, I don’t see what you’ve got to be jealous of. I’m sure twice as many people saw Nightmare Moon as a wronged victim…” He paused. “Oh, that’s right. Sister-darling never sent you mail on the Moon, did she? Maybe you should be jealous.”

“I am not,” Luna said steadily. “Of Celestia? Yes. But you, never.”

Twilight gave a polite cough. “Pardon my interruption, but… I imagine Reiner told you what happened to our Luna.”

Luna turned back to her. “Yes, he said… she got petrified.”

Discord blew his cheeks. “Pfft. Welcome to the club, Luna.”

“That as may be,” Twilight said. “Her Majesty has hopes of releasing her sister one day, once this war is over. It pained her deeply to lose you a second time, Luna. Believe me.”

Luna looked into her eyes, and amongst other things she saw, there seemed to be no lie...

“We’ve all had to make sacrifices in the name of duty,” Twilight said, glancing at Dash, who momentarily bore a softer look. “Duty is our first loyalty, even ahead of friendship… Like Queen Celestia and you. Like me and Lyra.”

She straightened herself.

“But our cause is just and true, Princess Luna. You care much for your subjects... I know this from my Luna. Her heart went out to the children who had to live through the Crystal War. It’s for them that we’ve given our fellow equines a future they deserve, and I know those who are grateful for the work we’ve done.”

Twilight nodded at the Guards, Dash amongst them, who readied their stances.

“Sergeant Shearwater, step forward,” ordered Twilight. The hippogriff who had opened the door for her, a mare with sleek, teal complexion and turquoise eyes, nodded and moved to her side. “How is your family faring at Mount Aris?”

“They are well, m’lady,” said Shearwater, solemnly. “The Storm King has yet to rear his head once more, but we are most thankful for your protection over Hippogriffia.”

“And we are glad to provide, Shearwater,” Twilight replied sweetly. She next turned her gaze to the zebra who had greeted Luna and Discord, a tall and mighty stallion, and she beckoned him to step forward, too. “Lieutenant Khulsewa. You are of the Punda Miliashariki. Tell us about how they’ve been doing since joining our Co-Harmony Sphere.”

“Yes, m’lady,” answered Khulsewa. “Peace reigns over the Punda Miliashariki and so many neighbouring tribes… and, though the last embers of distrust remain, old fears of enslavement by the Saddle Mareabians are finally being put to rest. Abraxas, the false Prince of the Ezebrantsi, may have turned against the new order, but we’ll ensure that his trible accepts the Sphere anew. For the good of all equine people, Lady Archmage.”

“At ease, soldier, you’ve done more than enough,” Twilight said approvingly.

Finally, her gaze landed on the saffron pegasus who’d stood by Rainbow Dash’s side the whole time. The young mare stepped forth, without prompt, and bowed.

“As you know, our dear ‘Starstruck’ here was born with stunted wings,” Twilight continued, and Luna noted her fond gaze towards the Guard. “Yeah, that’s what we call her. Guess why.”

Not that Luna needed to. She’d seen the way ‘Starstruck’ held herself around Rainbow Dash.

“But we’ve given her a future as well, and she has served us faithfully ever since.”

The mare’s cadet light armour, Luna noted, had a crystalline shine to it, glistening under the dim light. And just as Luna had previously spotted, while her wings did seem too small even for a mare of her short size, they were supported by a crystalline construct shaped like a pair of wings.

With a jolt, Luna remembered a small pegasus of her exact same colours, fearful and afraid, trapped in a nightmare, until she herself came to the filly’s aid.

‘... Scootaloo?’

But it was impossible. Scootaloo was a filly, a mere nine years of age. She was not a soldier. She dreamt of impressing Rainbow Dash, to conquer her fears and stand proud, and to fly. She had no mark yet to show her destiny, how bright she could shine and…

And neither did this pegasus, Luna realised. Though a full-grown mare, her exposed flank bore no cutie mark.

“I have, m’lady,” said Cadet ‘Starstruck’. “And I’ll continue to serve as well as I can and should. You can count on it, Tw– Lady Archmage.”

Luna thought she saw Rainbow Dash send her an approving glance.

There was nothing in the air, insofar as Luna felt, that indicated a spell or a thrall over these Guards, and Scootaloo least of them all. She could, if she wanted to, enter their minds. And yet what good would it do, if they had come to Equestria’s service of their own free will?

But then she remembered, There had been something in Redheart’s mind, something that had interfered with her attempts to delve into it. A mind coated in something twisted, blackened and unmalleable like tar – too much like that image of the beached birds covered in oil, victims of human pollution.

There had to be something else at work here. There had to be.

Something else wasn’t quite right, either. There were no sign of Spike, who was surely an adolescent by now. Was he not her faithful assistant? From the way Celestia had told her about him, he’d always been by Twilight’s side, through and through.

Perhaps, she reflected uneasily, he had been discarded. Cast aside, by her own will, or by her Queen’s. Bound, enslaved, or worse, perhaps...

“The Empire provides, Princess,” Twilight said, and her eyes were fixed on Luna. “We’ve given hope to Equus. Humanity had its chance. A hundred thousand years, and what do they have to show for it? Alexander Reiner was just one of many hopeful young men in their armies. They fought bravely, proudly... and what do men like him have to show for their service?”

Twilight took a deep breath. And her next words were angry.

“A lifetime of scars none wished to touch,” Twilight hissed. “Men like him result from a broken meat-grinder society, one that leaves its poor and disabled to die in the streets. And on what basis? ‘They didn’t work hard enough’! His people treat their celebrities like gods and their teachers like pond scum. They make a show of venerating their military, but are unwilling to help them mend, when those poor souls come home… Caitlyn North was most helpful in showing us that out of the richest human nations, Reiner’s had the most people willing to convert… tired, huddled masses, cheated of a promise as well.”

The venom Luna heard in her voice spoke of someone who has had a long time, a very long time to think such things over, and always reached the same conclusion.

Even when they don’t like what they find.

“The world of humanity is one built on lies,” said Twilight. “You know it, Luna... You can turn away now and speak nothing of this world. Keep to your realm. And forget you ever crossed paths with Alexander Reiner and his endeavour.”

Her expression turned softer, gentler. Her large, pretty eyes were… pleading, begging perhaps.

“Don’t make this harder than it already is,” Twilight finished. “Let us do our duty. For the sake of Equestria, and mankind both. Don’t make me do it.”

Luna looked at her. There was something genuine behind her words. But the question of Redheart nagged at her.

Just to what extent did the spellwork reach into their minds?

“You speak of the Barrier as if it purifies...” Luna began. “Aye, maybe it does cleanse the human world of pollution... but I have seen images of people– children, fleeing from it, and they would crawl over one another, or die, before letting it dissolve them to shreds. You did not bring salvation to this world or its people. You’ve sentenced them to unjust death, and called it mercy... Even if your Empire is a utopia to equines, does it warrant such a cost?”

The bile rose in her throat, but Luna held it back. She gave Twilight a spiteful glare.

“Did you show the Reindeer this so-called mercy, Lady Archmage?” she said. “Did you give them a chance? Did little Lucie deserve a fate so dire and unforgiving?”

“The… Reindeer? Luna, I–”

“Do not insult my intelligence with your feigned ignorance, Twilight Sparkle,” Luna cut her off harshly. “Did Redheart know? Did you know?”

The bitter, biting words brought pause to the Guards surrounding her, even Rainbow Dash. But Luna wanted answers from only one pony in the room.

“Did you know?” she repeated with a hiss.

She took a step forward, her eyes narrowed. Twilight did not, in fact, wilt under her gaze as so many would have. And for that Luna felt some very grudging respect.

“It’s not true,” Twilight said slowly. “Whatever Reiner told you, it’s not true. Neither she nor I were there when Adlaborn turned their eyes awa–”

“That’s enough.” Luna interjected. “Am I speaking right now to Twilight, my sister’s faithful, beloved student? The mare that… that did come to my aid on Nightmare Night, out of the kindness of her heart? Do you hear yourself speaking? Do you honestly believe Grandf– Sint Erklass would turn away from whatever travesty your Empire is wreaking?”

There was a twitch in Twilight’s eye. Her expression grew increasingly worried… but something else felt off about her.

“The Queen’s words are final,” she said icily. “It’s… it’s what she’s told us.”

“Very well. Did you see it with your own eyes?”

And Twilight’s eyes were sunken, exhausted, but defiant. “I don’t need to.”

Discord giggled malevolently. “Oooh, how very irrational, Twilight! People’s capacity to believe things they don’t see, and not believe things they do see… it’s just craaaazy!”

“I agree,” said Luna. “Even if Reiner didn’t tell us enough…” Her gaze, full of pity and sorrow, took in all the pictures one last time. “I know that the suffering you’ve brought is no better.”

“Our doors are open to humanity at any time,” Twilight said simply. “Our only request is that they leave behind their rot, but they cling to it, even now.”

‘Has she already forgotten about the Reindeer?’

“And what about Reiner himself? Are we supposed to give him over to you? Or do we keep him, left alone, far away from his world as it dies?”

“That is your choice,” Twilight shrugged. “A single human is no threat to the Queen or her Empire. All we ask is that you do not take in more humans…”

“I cannot agree to that.”

Luna said it without hesitation.

On cue, a miniature Discord materialised upon his own shoulder, clad in a white robe and a halo atop his head, to give an approving nod.

“It would be cruel,” she continued. “If we did that, we truly would be shrugging, and going back to eating our dinners. Forgive me, but I doubt your sincerity, Lady Archmage. You had no problem sending Redheart after Reiner…”

“To kill him?” Twilight snapped. “Certainly not! He had an object of great value in his possession that, if wielded by a human, may be as dangerous to your Equestria as to mine… but if it’s just him left standing, even with that locket, we’d have little to worry about. Redheart’s mission was to take it off him and destroy it, no more. I should know. I sent her the orders only two days ago.”

“What?” Luna blinked. “Two days? But… it was two weeks…”

Twilight considered her. “Interesting…” she said, a spark of her scientific curiosity showing through again. “Time’s passing must be malleable between our two realms… though I expect, now a crossing has been performed both ways, that our time-streams will have synched. At least so long as the bridge remains open…”

“What locket?”

Luna went cold. Discord had spoken, and he was giving her an unfriendly look. The replica on his shoulder had turned into a red devil.

‘Luna, you damn fool…’ she told herself. ‘Galatea warned you not to mention the locket in front of Discord…’

~ The Hall of Unity ~

“Aunt Celestia, what’s going on?”

Cadance was puffing out these words even as she trotted, Shining and she barely keeping up with Celestia’s unusual hurried pace. She had summoned them to the hidden room in the Watchtower where the Crystal Mirror was stored, but given no further explanation than that.

“Galatea gave me a warning,” Celestia breathed. “We don’t have much time.”

They arrived at the panel which hid the entrance to the room, an odd fresco depicting a model of the solar system with the Sun at its center, a long-disproven crackpot theory. Cadance wondered just how old the Hall was to feature such a fresco.

Then Celestia lowered her horn, slotting it neatly into a small keyhole at the dead centre of the painted Sun itself. And much like her private compartment at the Palace, this answered to her, opening up the door. It swivelled back to reveal what lay beyond.

Galatea was already waiting, with Twilight and the wheelchair-bound Reiner. It unnerved Cadance to grasp what this meant. The door responsed to her as well.

But then she had called herself the Alicorn of Doorways and Memories…

“I took the liberty of hauling this from your coffers, Cadance,” Galatea said by way of greeting, pointing to a metallic case emblazoned with Cadance’s mark. “Once you hear what I have to say, you may find yourself requesting it.”

Cadance found no comfort in the concerned looks Twilight and Reiner gave her.

~ The Great Equestrian ~

And Twilight was staring at Discord, as if only just noticing him.

“You mean to say, they didn’t tell you about the locket, Discord?” She was smiling. It was the kind of smile made by one who doesn’t know if they should – yet smiling seems the best thing. “But that’s what it was all about… if Redheart had got the locket, we wouldn’t even be having this conversation…”

“Discord,” Luna cried, “she’s being deceitful!”

“What?” Discord whispered, stroking his beard. “Deceitful? Surely not your precious Twilight, Luna… And I know deceit. I can sense it. Not one thing she’s told us was a lie… or at least, less than a half-truth.” He narrowed his eyes. “So. If you won’t tell me, I’ll ask her. What is this locket, Archmage Twilight?”

Twilight spoke softly, drawing in the ears of all around her, even the Guards.

“Something that should be in no human’s hand. A power older than our Harmony, which can be turned on any creature in Equestria… even you.”

She smiled again.

“I suppose that’s just why they didn’t want you to know…” Twilight continued. “Alexander Reiner was getting ready to use it upon the Barrier, but it could just as well be used on you, Discord. They don’t trust you.”

“Did you?” Luna said harshly, trying to regain hold. “We were told what your Empire did to their Discord.”

“Yes, but we were upfront about it,” Twilight said calmly. “True, the Queen told me she had considered siccing Discord upon the Krampus. In the end, she decided it was better to take on both, rather than keep one as a pet and hope for the best. Well, as you can see, it worked...”

Seeing Discord’s face, Luna knew she had to step in. Either way, this could end very badly.

“But…” Luna began, “Twilight, do you know what the locket even is?”

If Discord had been about to snap his fingers, he lowered them. As she’d known he would. Even he felt curious about this.

“More than you do, I think,” Twilight said, with surprising intensity.

“Try me,” Luna shot back. “Tell me what you know. At our council, Father Krampus and the Chaoskämpfer told us much.”

Twilight chuckled. “And you’d take their word over mine?” she told them. “The father of monsters, and a wyrm as old as sin? I can guess what they told you. That the legends of Firefly crossing the Rainbow Bridge were true. How she came back accompanied by a human, and together, these friends vanquished the Lord of Midnight Castle… The last of the Old Race, the Krampus’s younger son, Spykoran’s former master, bringer of Night Eternal…”

Her gaze softened momentarily. Beside her, the silent Rainbow Dash actually looked thoughtful. Luna searched her face to see if the name ‘Spykoran’ had evoked anything.

“Hm,” Twilight whispered. “Last one rings a bell, doesn’t it...”

“Tirek, yes,” Luna said coldly, ignoring the last comment. “The Night That Never Ends. I do not need the reminder. Or the comparison. I’ve heard it once too often over the morning paper. His legend can stay buried, for all I care.”

“But you should care,” Twilight said sincerely. “Weren’t you surprised to learn Firefly’s human friend wasn’t some mighty warrior, like Alexander Reiner… but a mere child?”

Those words caught Luna. “Not really…” she said. “I mean... look at you, Twilight Sparkle.”

Something shimmered in those eyes of Twilight’s.

“Yeah… I guess,” Twilight said, checking herself, then exchanging a glance with Dash. “We were all younger back then…”

“Oh, enough with the mushiness!” Discord had crossed his arms, and he was growling. “If you have something to say… Say it, Lady Archmage.”

“So you can then dissolve the ship, with nothing to hold you back?” Twilight told him casually. “On second thoughts, perhaps I won’t, Discord.”

“Nice try,” Discord sneered. “But it’s transparent as your pathetic attempt to turn me against Princess Luna. You’ve not yet told her anything she doesn’t already know… I see it in her face.”

The saffron pegasus took a defiant step forward, only for Dash to gently block her way. Meanwhile, Twilight shrugged with a resigned air.

“Actually, there is one thing you can explain, Twilight,” Luna said, staring at the streak of grey in her mane. “Reiner told us the Solar Empire’s ponies tend to look eerily youthful, but… you seem to have let age take hold on you…”

“Yeah,” said Twilight, threading a hoof through her hair. “Well, I thought it looked distinguished.”

There again, Luna wondered how much of the Twilight she knew was left in this one.

“That’s all beside the point,” Twilight said, letting her hoof fall. “We’re talking about things even older than you, Luna, though maybe not Discord… and he doesn’t know much about it either. I mentioned the human was a child…”

“The locket, Sparkle,” Discord said threateningly.

“I’m getting to that,” Twilight said testily. “Luna… you really believe a mere pegasus would cross into another world, just to get help from a child against some evil overlord? Does that sound like it makes sense to you?”

No word came to Luna’s mind fitting what those words left her feeling.

“What are you saying…” Luna murmured. “Twilight?”

“There’s more at stake here than you understand,” Twilight said grimly. “Someone had their own reasons to want Tirek defeated. Their reasons to call upon the Thirteenth Family against him. Why it had to be a child, and why that child should be given a specially-crafted locket.”

Something struck Luna as odd about the Guards.

They still stood there, all around. Yet their expression had gone distant, absent, even Rainbow Dash’s. It was a look Luna knew from those who, while seming awake, have briefly slipt into a waking dream – and when they come back from it, never remember they dreamt at all.

She doubted they’d remember what Twilight said now.

“Someone? Who?”

Twilight’s lips thinned. “The very reason why Tau Sunflare made Celestia and you, Luna,” she said. “The wellspring of the misery that was the Windigoes’ Blight, and the reason our souls are tied to the land’s more than any other Family on Equus.”

Past words came back to Luna. Words spoken by a figure encased in a crystal prison, from a being of deeper malice and insanity than Discord who glowered beside her.

“The Architect…” The Krampus’s words echoed in her head. “The Architect! She brought forth the human child… It all unfolds…”

“May I ask you something?” said Twilight. “How did Reiner arrive in your Equestria?”

Luna looked at her without seeing. “The Tree of Harmony…”

Twilight nodded. “An archaic work of crystal, and a link to the Rainbow Bridge… it’s just as I thought,” she whispered. “History repeats… Again a human is brought to our world, to learn of a heart-shaped locket that’ll grant them great power. Power straight from the Rainbow and the Prism which refracted it…”

Here, Luna regained her sight, taking in who spoke before her.

“The last time a human came to our world, it was to help us,” Luna said, her breathing heavy. “Back then, the enemy lay without. Now, Twilight… I look at your Empire, and it seems you have become the enemy.”

Twilight shook her head sadly. Around her, the Guards’ eyes also swam back into focus, slowly.

“Luna,” she sighed. “Don’t you understand? That locket was made by the Architect. The same Architect whose Prism had nearly destroyed the world, causing the Old Race’s final demise, bringing about that first pitiless winter…”

She let the statement hang.

“In that time, Tirek was the last survivor of the Old Race,” Twilight enunciated, “and Firefly, she was granted help by... someone else. Not one who acted out of altruism, but one who had a vested interest in finishing the Old Race off.”

There was an almost pleading look to Twilight.

“Tirek was a monster, yes,” she said. “But Firefly was tricked into going to a human for help. A pony might have sought to redeem him, or perhaps confine him. The locket’s maker knew they needed a human. Humans think differently. A human would destroy him. Because that’s what humans do. It’s all they do!”

Those final words came out in a crescendo that shocked Luna into silence.

Then Luna heard someone clap.

Slowly, then quickly, then finally it was joined by the joyous, mocking laughter of none other than Discord himself.

“Very, very good, my dear Twilight,” he smiled. “Quite the nice little piece of self-delusion you’ve crafted for yourself there… And, well, this has been most instructive. I didn’t know the Architect had survived that long into the new age… Always nice to hear again about old Tirek, too...”

He rose above the room, curling on himself, followed by all gazes.

“So, I guess it’s historical revisionism like this,” Discord said leerily, “which is how you justify the things you do to yourselves… And dare I use that ambiguous syntax deliberately? Brainwashing… the charming Captain Reiner explained your Empire is really into that. Though I’ll give you points, Twilight, for trying out some good old-fashioned emotional manipulation…”

“Don’t you dare get sanctimonious, Discord!”

Surprisingly, it was Rainbow Dash who’d shouted that. Luna glanced her way, and saw the prismatic pegasus was seething.

“Who are you to lecture us about brainwashing…” Dash hissed. “Oh, forgot that, did you?”

Discord goggled at her. “What… No? No, quite the opposite. I remember it very well, and my, do I regret it. You, on the other hand...”

But the interruption had given Luna time to rewind to another detail.

‘The very reason Tau Sunflare made Celestia and you…’ Luna thought, recalling Twilight’s words. ‘She didn’t mention Galatea… but she can’t not know about Galatea. She doesn’t think I know. She doesn’t want you to know, Luna. She’s got no way of knowing if I’ve met Galatea. She’s still being deceitful.’

“Discord is right,” Luna said sternly. “I’ve heard enough. We both have.”

Twilight stared at her inexpressively. “From the way you’re saying that…” she said slowly. “I take it you’re unconvinced?”

“I am certainly thankful to you for offering your… perspective,” said Luna. “Especially when it comes to the legend of Firefly. However much your views may have coloured it, there remains a side you’ve revealed that I was not familiar with… Yet it will not change my mind. And you know why? For one thing. One thing I have seen, unquestionably, with my own eyes.”

Luna drew herself up.

“Redheart.”

Twilight made no response. Dash was listening intently, and the saffron pegasus by her side raised an eyebrow.

“What happened to Redheart,” Luna intoned, “can only have resulted from the very sort of mental manipulation Captain Reiner tells us you use on more than humans. You and your Queen. She would have served you faithfully, loyally,” she said, looking at Dash. “But you still saw fit to play around with her mind. Just in case. And yet she died, after all her service, her loyalty to your miserable Empire. You, who talk of mending broken souls... You can keep your offer, Twilight. But know that you’ve squandered a loyal soldier’s life on a whim.”

Luna tore her gaze away. Twilight didn’t need to see her watery eyes.

She could not forget how, there in the assembly, it had been her voice to carry out the sentence. The Queen’s will had been channeled through her own words, tainted and vile, delivering the words that flicked a switch in Redheart’s enslaved mind.

Yet she couldn’t have known, Luna told herself. How was she supposed to know what they could have done? Celestia had reassured her it wasn’t her fault, that it was never her fault. But what difference did it make, really? Her voice was what had carried out the sentence. Her voice had issued the Queen’s will.

She should have protected her subjects, no matter where they were from. And she’d failed.

Luna turned to look at Twilight, once more. The mare stood her ground determinedly. Was that empathy in her sad, downtrodden eyes?

“I… didn’t sentence her,” Twilight said quietly. “It wasn’t my call to make. She… was… I didn’t make the call. I didn’t carry it out, Luna. I didn’t.”

“No, you did not,” said Luna, biting back a grimace. There was no way to deny it. “I did, another unwilling pawn in your dear Queen’s board... And that’s all you are to her, as well.”

There was a cold, eerie calm in the air. She watched the Archmage’s movements, carefully. A flicker of the tail and ears. Her eyes narrowed and expression hardened.

Finally, she spoke.

“So...” Twilight said softly. “You’re turning down my peace offering?”

Luna nodded. “I believe I speak on all Equestria’s behalf, that I find no grounding in your reasoning, Lady Archmage, neither shall we surrender Captain Reiner to your custody.”

She spoke solemnly, sharing a glance with Discord.

“You’ve asked for my blessing to your cause. But I am not your Luna, and my answer is ‘no’. ”

Something passed beneath Twilight’s cool, steely mask. Something that might have been regret, longing or want.

Silence. Nothing but the distant booming of whatever futile assault was carried out against the mighty airship.

Luna saw Twilight, the Archmage, harden her stance, and breathe out a sigh.

“Very well,” the Archmage whispered. “I regret this, Luna…” Her lip quivered. “Now!”

From the corner of Luna’s eye, she saw the four crystalline pillars shine bright and colourful at those words.

Colours of the rainbow, all of them – and those of the four other Elements of Harmony. And she saw Discord in the centre of the room, vulnerable and exposed. She cried out, but it was far, far too late. His confused gaze fell upon one of the pillars, as it emanated a butter-yellow shine.

“Fluttersh–?”

There was a blinding flash.

Four beams shot out, each of the four different colours, soon joined by those of Magic and Loyalty, the Elements worn by the Archmage and the Captain glowing in resonance with the pillars.

If Discord had been about to scream, it went unheard, in the thunderous noise and outburst. The Elements of Harmony had struck the Lord of Chaos.

When the gallery became visible once more to a blinded Luna, there stood a statue where Discord had been.

Unbalanced, the statue toppled over, landing face-up with a bone-racking ‘thump’. Discord’s stone facial features were frozen in a cry of heartbreak and betrayal, his forelimbs raised futilely to defend himself.

The pink tuft of mane he’d wrapped around his claw, stark against the grey of stone, fluttered to the floor.

However the Archmage had managed to call upon the Elements from such distance, Luna did not care, for she braced herself to strike down the Archmage at once. A magical cage was hard to breach but not impossible. Luna stomped her hoof, ignoring her headache as her horn shone bright through the armour.

But then she felt something both fiery and cold brush against her wing, slicing off a feather. It made her gasp in pain, and she found herself face-to-face with a thin, grey longsword, its tip holding her visor from closing entirely, inches from penetrating her forehead

“Like I said,” the Archmage said. “Please, Princess. Don’t make this any harder than you must.”

~ The Hall of Unity ~

The armour itched and weighed heavily upon Cadance.

Brought at short notice, and she regretted not having it fitted out properly before the Concordia Maxima was called. But this was the least of her concerns as she stood beside her aunt and husband both. As well as Twilight and Reiner.

Of course, Galatea knew to keep those in the know limited, and had only called for the five of them. It hadn’t calmed any of them down when she broke the news of Luna and Discord’s capture.

Celestia was not pleased. Shifting uncomfortably in her armour, Cadance glanced up to see Celestia’s uncharacteristic glare towards Galatea.

“Wait, um, Galatea?” Twilight interjected. “Why can’t you just… I don’t know, get them back?”

Galatea shook her head. “That shield-barrier around the ship does not permit those without its maker's signature and permission, so to speak, to pass through. I cannot open a doorway directly within its boundaries… they must have learnt from my counterpart’s defeat.”

Reiner let out a groan. Celestia’s frown deepened, and Cadance shared a look with Shining.

“Galatea,” said Celestia. “You mean we cannot retrieve our sister and Discord safely?”

Was that contrition which crossed Galatea’s stony expression?

“No, I’m afraid not,” said Galatea, her gaze soft. “I’m truly sorry, Celestia, but trying to pull them back through the Mirror would be unwise.”

Something passed Cadance’s mind. “Aunt Galatea,” she said. The words were still foreign to her tongue, but the grey alicorn’s ears perked up. “You said it was Shining Armor, well, their Shining, who set up the shield, right?”

Galatea nodded. “Yes,” she said simply. “What of it?”

“Well, a unicorn’s trace never changes,” Cadance said, more confident. She saw Twilight looking very surprised. “I know how to get through. I’ll make sure it responds to me.”

“You mean to actually appear aboard the ship itself, Cadance?” said Celestia.

“I’d assume the good captain has anticipated his wife attempting to do that,” Galatea warned. “I would not advise it, Cadence.”

“She’s right,” Twilight added. “Cadance, breaking into this shield directly… that, that’s a huge, huge effort. It’s too risky, nopony’s ever done it like this!”

Cadance’s mind raced. She felt Shining’s hoof upon her shoulder, comforting, yet also a reminder of who she’d have to lose.

Her gaze went to Alexander Reiner, still wheelchair-bound, bearing an expression of intense scrutiny.

“... Alex, you said I wasn’t an alicorn? My other self?” Cadance asked quickly.

“Yeah… yeah, you weren’t...” he said, nodding.

“But I am,” said Cadance. She lit her horn, and tightened her gauntlet’s straps. “So, I guess we’ll have to do this the hard way."

“Cadance, love,” Shining said. “Are… are you sure?”

She met her husband’s eyes.

“It has to be me," she said. “It’s why you brought me an extra suit, right? You said we’d have to be ready for anything. And this is that moment, Shining. I know it is.”

She held Shining’s hoof in her own, and nuzzled him.

“Promise me you’ll be back?” whispered Shining.

“I will be,” Cadance replied, but then she saw Twilight, eyes wide and mouth agape.

“Cadan–”

“I’m the one that knows his magic best, Twi’,” replied Cadance, waving an armoured forehoof. “It has to be me. Aunt Galatea... do it. The sooner, the better."

Galatea nodded, her horn alight, touching the Crystal Mirror.

“Very well,” said Galatea. She pulled her goggles down, over her eyes. “Take care, Cadance.”

But here Celestia stepped forwards, between her and Cadance. The frown that had been etched across her face had long faded, and Cadance saw nothing now but worry.

"Cadance, I…” Celestia began. “Good luck.”

“Thank you, Auntie.”

Galatea’s horn brightened and the Mirror began to glow, reflecting off the lens of her goggles. “On your command, Princess.”

And Cadance stepped past her aunt, sharing one final look with them all. Then she slammed down her visor, and stared upon the Crystal Mirror, seeing nothing else.

“Ready?” Shining called out.

Cadance took a deep breath. She had to be honest with them, and herself, too. Now or never.

“No. But we won’t get another chance.”

~ The Great Equestrian ~

“Put the Lord Discord in the cargo hold... My brother will handle it from there.”

“You got it, Twi’.” Rainbow Dash replied to the Archmage, chipper. “Let’s go, Starstruck, let’s not keep ‘em waiting.”

Her protegée nodded, pushing against the cart. They had swiftly placed Discord into a big wooden box lined with straw and nailed the lid shut –an ignominious fate for the draconequus, but of course there were such spare boxes in an art gallery, especially for statues. And Luna, resentful as she felt, was all but helpless with the long, thin longsword holding her visor open.

They passed by Luna without a second glance, leaving her to glare at the group.

As the doors closed behind them, and Luna could no longer see Discord’s statue, she turned her glare, through her half-closed, jammed visor, to the Archmage.

“Good to know using the totems as a conduit worked beautifully… do you know what this is?”

The longsword’s metal was cold as ice and yet burnt when it brushed against Luna.

“Yes,” she said through gritted teeth. “Orichalcum, is it? From the Tauren Isles? Or… Adlaborn?”

The metal was exceedingly rare, Luna vaguely remembered. Perhaps this sword was made from whatever was left in those mines, or was an heirloom. The metal’s anti-magical qualities, Celestia had theorised, would nullify the natural magical aura infused within their bodies, and could cut through an alicorn’s skin like paper.

And the burn on her wing proved it was a theory she’d rather not see proven now, of all times.

“I see you remember your history well, Princess,” said the Archmage lightly. “Discord is so inherently disharmonious, the Elements would never fail to work on him… but you’re a little more complicated. However, this sword…”

She let out a long, heavy sigh.

“I won’t make the same mistake twice,” she whispered. The sword remained dangerously close to Luna’s forehead, but it lowered ever so slightly. “I cannot let you return from whence you came. If my– our Luna turned… maybe I’ll… we’ll make it right with you. This is your final warning.”

Luna’s glare intensified.

“I have given you my answer, Archmage,” she said. “I will not stand by your side. Ever.”

With Discord gone… At the very least, she’d go down fighting. No matter how short or how long, the Archmage deserved no satisfaction.

‘I’m sorry, Tia,’ she thought. ‘I’ve failed you.’

“Then I’m sorry it has to be this way, Luna,” said the Archmage mournfully. Magically, she split her sword in two hovering pieces, each comprised of six shards. One remaining trained upon Luna’s forehead, and the other shard poised to strike her wings. “I... didn’t want to do this... I really didn’t. But your sister awaits your presence. Let’s not wait any longer– Cadance?”

She gasped.

There, from the corner of her eye, Luna saw a brilliant pink flash. As the Imperial Guard stood their ground and the Archmage’s eyes widened, Princess Mi Amore Cadenza stepped forth, clad in armour of the Crystal Realm. Her eyes were narrowed, her horn was brightening, and Luna knew to brace herself.

“Luna!” Cadance yelled, her voice distant and near at once. “Get down!”

And there was a thunderous crack, and the gallery was no more.

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

This chapter features no noteworthy modifications, despite or maybe because of being the original meeting between Princess Luna and Archmage Twilight.

Spectrum 2.0 - June 25th 2019

Sledge115: Surprise! Bet you didn’t see this one coming so soon, did ya? Truth be told, though, the next chapter may take a little while longer, so stay tuned!

No, the Elements weren’t trapped inside the totem-proles. They’re in separate locations presently.

The images presented by the Archmage are all real, or grounded in reality. The one on Pripyat is, I’m sure of it, the only one that isn’t a specific photograph.

Admittedly I had to tone down Luna’s annoyance at Discord, they’re at the same side after all. And yes, there is some subtext with Luna and Twilight there, which Luna has zero clues about.

Twilight’s sword isn’t absurdly sharp, so Luna’s armour, I can assure you, is perfectly functional. I’ve always hated the Armour is Useless trope, where the superpowered being wearing armour is somehow stronger than the armour they’re wearing - why wear it in the first place. And yes – she’s wearing a full-face helmet. Of course it doesn’t help with her overall look, because black armour is obviously intimidating as hell, but hey, safety first!

All in all, I hope the reboot’s take on Boston lives up to your expectations :twilightsmile: Cheers!

VoxAdam: I had particular reasons to be a little more directly involved in this chapter than any other for the Moonrise Arc. Specifically, I really wanted the passages where Archmage Twilight presents Luna with her evidence of humanity’s evils to feel just right. And I had a big hand in outlining the lore details given out by the Archmage.

The finely-details photographs that Twilight uses as examples are all from Sledge, though. :pinkiesmile: Besides, it’s hard to top the passage in the previous chapter where the journalist Hanne Adler reflects on the state of mankind, notably the little-known people of Kumzar – one passage I discovered almost unprepared. Wished for by Sledge, written by Doc. I loved it.

Cheers.

Act II ~ Chapter Sixteen ~ An Angel's Wings

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot
Is now a college student.

DoctorFluffy
I WAS AT BRONYCON, WUBBA LUBBA DUB DUB
(you will not see my cosplay. This is to protect the innocent)

VoxAdam
Angels Have Fallen.
So Too Shall We.

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

Featuring Concepts By

ProudToBe

Chapter Sixteen
An Angel’s Wings

* * * * *

“Devils are depicted with bats’ wings and good angels with birds’ wings, not because anyone holds that moral deterioration would be likely to turn feathers into membrane, but because most men like birds better than bats.”
— C.S. Lewis, from the preface of The Screwtape Letters

~ Boston, USA ~ November 15th, 2024 CE ~

A city was burning. And the skies were awake.

The Imperial threat, Ana understood, had warranted their evacuation. With the Imperials set to cross the Charles River, her outpost here in Prudential Tower, one of the tallest skyscrapers in Boston, would be emptied out – and she would be one of the last to leave. The order had just gone through her radio, in the minutes before an explosion rocked the Great Equestrian.

With no luck in the thirty minutes that had passed since the massive airship’s materialisation, the artillery batteries present within Boston had persisted in firing at it, but their enhanced shells had squashed against the shield like flies on a windscreen. This explosion was not their work. It came from the inside.

As the last person to evacuate her post, still on her perch, Ana listened carefully to the order.

“Potential high value target on board,” repeated the dispatcher, a fellow she and the other PHL task force members present knew only as Starfall. “Captain Shining Armor and Archmage Twilight Sparkle. Kill on sight. Confirm kill, over.”

Only those two unicorns could have jointly teleported the airship.

Ana didn’t know much about the Captain of the Guard. His diplomatic visits had been only for truly special occasions. The kick-off of the Football World Cup and its final match, six years ago, were the two instances she was aware of, because she’d been there herself. Back then, Shining Armor was always seen by his wife’s side. Ana had seen the Russian media praise the royal couple’s commitment to peaceful relations with Earth.

Now, there was only Lady Cadance.

The Archmage, however, was a more prominent figure still. After all, Celestia’s faithful student had built up a reputation in Equestria as one of the more moderate, scientifically-minded members of Court even prior to First Contact. In the days before the war began, Ana had spent long hours in the dingy Moscow apartment, listening in eagerly to radio broadcasts of Twilight’s eagerness to marry magic with science, an outlandish but hopeful, years-long endeavour hosted by CERN.

What a blow it had been for Earth’s scientific community, when their best hope at shared talks between intellectuals had finally denounced humanity as wasteful and ruinous, in a last and most disastrous of interviews.

And here Ana was, under orders to put a bullet through the Archmage’s skull.

‘You should,’ the voice in her head said sternly. She’d been more quiet than usual, Usually, the voice would blur together with Ana’s own thoughts, regal, wispy, maybe snarky at times. Yet here, the voice dropped to an icy chill. ‘Duty calls, Ana’

Ana sighed. She’d always imagined the voice as a kindly tease of a woman...

Archmage or High Captain
Shoot to kill
15 rnds .338
36 rnds .45
Ask Frieda/Tanner fr xtra

She finished re-reading what she’d noted down on her pad, then gazed out the window. The North Bank of the Charles River was coming alive as the Imperial Guard and their allied troops were set to cross it. Without air support, they would be unchallenged.

Ana glanced down the ladder. Frieda was speaking to Harwood about something. Normally, Harwood would’ve been sent off first, but he was also the only medic around here.

What would they do in her place? Frieda would not hesitate, true. Neither would Harwood. The Archmage, whoever she’d once been, was a target. Ambassador Heartstrings, too, would have pulled the trigger.

‘Or would she, though?’

She had only met Lyra Heartstrings that one time. One time was more than most. An encounter that, for the Ambassador, must have been just another meeting with a wide-eyed admirer.

Context, as in everything, was king. The Indonesia of 2021 had been a hotbed of insurgents and radicals fighting over pieces of land. And Ambassador Heartstrings, beloved to some and controversial to others, had been an all-too-enticing target.

Lyra had insisted on meeting the counter-sniper who’d put a bullet into that would-be-assassin. In doing so, she’d comforted Ana, with the voice of one who faced such choices every day.

‘And when I think on how low I am, I remember,’ she’d said then, a hoof on Ana’s shoulder. ‘We can’t go back. And in a way, that's beautiful... because it's like the ultimate reassurance that even if you could, you shouldn't.’

“Starfall to Nordlys,” Ana heard her radio crackle. She saw Harwood down below, waving for her to come down. “Confirm position, over.”

Ana gave her sniper rifle a last glance. The same trusty rifle she’d used to prevent the death of Ambassador Heartstrings – or at least, stave it off another few months. It would be used to give the Archmage her due.

“Nordlys reporting in,” said Ana. “En route to Assembly Point Sierra, over.”

Life was ironic, that way.

~ The Great Equestrian ~

Silence had fallen. The winds blew.

Luna drew a gasp.

A smell of burning wood greeted her senses. She was lying on the floor, eyes opening blurrily. Her vision was limited. In her addled state, her first thought was that she saw the world through the slot on a letter-box.

Then it came to her. Her armour’s visor was fully shut now. And odd though it was to look out through a slit in the obsidian, the protection it offered was to be dearly valued.

She raised herself, groaning, on aching legs. She heard something stir beside her. There stood the Princess of the Crystal Realm.

“Luna!” Cadance yelled, hoisting her up by a wing. “Are you alright?”

Luna looked at Cadance. Her descendant wore the crystalline purple armour worn by the Royal Guard of the Crystal Realm, but tailored for her lean, alicorn build.

“I'm fine. Just… how did you get here? What happened?”

“Well, Gala–”

“Cadance!” Luna hissed, eyes darting around.

Walls had ears. Especially in the enemy’s lair.

“Oh…” Cadance said, sheepishly. “I mean, the, um… the G-Mare sent me here. Saw you needed backup. “Shining’s shield did respond to me, but I had to add some brute force to make it through, right?”

She looked around, and Luna followed her gaze. All around, the floor was littered with debris. Curtains had shredded, crystal pillars had shattered. The chandelier had fallen, scattering in pieces everywhere. Here and there, photos were burnt or torn, and Luna grimaced at their loss. Whatever they represented, they’d still held a little more of humanity’s memory.

The wind was blowing in from a gaping hole torn at the side of the gallery. This must have been the point of entry for Cadance through time and space. Few candles had been left alight in this gust, but they kept the room from plunging into total darkness. Yet Luna saw no other soul stirring in the gallery.

“Sorry about that,” Cadance added. “Brute force is brute force and… all that residual energy had to go somewhere.”

“You were sent here?” Luna asked quietly. Her eyes darted around for any sign of the Guards, or the Archmage, before settling on Cadance once more. “Why? How?”

“Like I said,” Cadance replied. “They had to send backup, and there was no-one else who could help you.”

Luna nodded, firmly.

“Alright, then,” she said. “Thank you, Cadance. I’ll have to thank–”

Then she heard the scream.

“Cadaance!”

It was only thanks to Cadance that whatever spell was blasted at them got stopped short, her light blue shield absorbing the fiery spell.

As another spell impacted, Luna saw the Archmage emerge from behind two smashed-up wooden crates, exactly like the one Discord had been carried off in. Twilight’s piercing glare was fixed upon her and Cadance both, her helmeted mane billowing in the icy wind. Behind her, there rose the groans of the few Guards that remained – two Equestrians and the hippogriff named Shearwater – and the Archmage’s protective bubble dissipated.

With a yell, the Archmage summoned her sword aloft, and rushed forwards, the orichalcum blade trained on Cadance.

It was met with Luna’s own, in mid-air. Silver as the Moon above and enveloped in her aura, her longsword let out a stinging cry as it forced the orichalcum sword back, shattering it into its twelve individual pieces.

Wasting no time, Luna stomped between Cadance and Archmage, her weapon raised.

“Step aside,” the Archmage growled, her Guards lining behind her. “I will have her. You traitor, how dare you crawl back here, after everything you’ve done–”

“Nay, Lady Archmage,” Luna rebuked her icily. From the corner of her visor, she could see Cadance’s eyes widen, too. “You forget to whom you speak.”

“What difference does it make?” the Archmage hissed. The Guards moved to flank her, spears lowered and swords drawn. Sergeant Shearwater in particular seemed poised to strike, her wings flared threateningly. “Cut from the same cloth, aren’t you, Cadance?”

“Twilight. I–”

“She is not your Twilight, Cadance!” Luna retorted. Her longsword was held firm in her aura, yet the first cracks had begun to form from where the Archmage’s sword had struck it. “Whatever she is now, the Twilight you knew is not–”

“Look out!” Cadance cried.

Luna braced herself a second too late.

The orichalcum blade, its steel lining protected by the Archmage’s aura, struck her armour again. Before Luna could raise her sword to meet the Archmage’s, her opponent’s horn lit up brightly, and Luna felt her obsidian envelope burn and screech as the blade scraped it.

The Guards moved forward, weapons out, but thus far stayed in a semi-circle around Twilight.

Luna’s attempted parry was met by a volley of spells and thrown debris – broken marble, great big splinters, pieces of chandelier, anything. It was a crude assault, but harrying with the sheer rage Twilight threw into it, eyes blazing and teeth clenched.

Slowly, her conjured longsword began to fall apart.

“Twilight, stop!” Cadance yelled. “This isn’t you!”

“No, it’s not!” Luna shouted back. At Cadance, not the Archmage. “That’s the whole problem! You’re wasting your breath, Cadance! Get out of here!”

Amidst the unrelenting assault, Luna spotted a single, bronze shard speed through the air, moving to strike Cadance...

“You… I loved you, I trusted you, you traitor!” the Archmage screamed.

“No!”

As the Archmage turned, Luna flew towards her with outstretched hooves. Enraged, the Queen’s faithful student stepped out of the way, the orichalcum shard changing its course to meet Luna midway through.

It didn’t.

With a screeching noise as metal clashed against crystal, the shard ricocheted off Princess Cadance’s armour as she threw herself into the melée, taking Luna’s defense. But Cadance had not just thrown herself. She’d flown.

And her wings, outstretched, remained so as she came to land, shielding Luna.

The Archmage saw.

“Alicorn…” she whispered.

Her face had turned deathly pale. For the first time since the capture, Luna saw that she looked truly at loss for words. Even the Guards went slightly wide-eyed. If only for an instant.

“You don’t deserve to be an alicorn.”

Cadance let her lips thin out. “The earthponies of Oleander raised me, the sorceress Prismia tested me, morning dew and gossamer carried me,” she said quietly. “And I’d have gladly let you follow me, Twilight…”

“Follow you, away from the Light?” the Archmage snarled. “I think not. That’s how you led Lyra to ruin. Shearwater?” she said, not looking back at the hippogriff sergeant. “I will take Princess Luna alive. All other intruders… Draw to kill.”

“Your Ladyship?” blinked Shearwater. “Our orders concerning Cadenza–”

“I am superceding those orders!” shouted the Archmage. “They do not apply to her alternate.”

Shearwater nodded, reaching for her spear. “Yes, Lady Archmage.”

“Oh, boy,” muttered Cadance. “I don’t have time for this… Hush, Twilight.”

“What are you–?!” the Archmage exclaimed.

But her words were cut short by the cloud bursting out of her horn. Enveloped in the cloud, the Archmage and her Guards gasped and coughed, but one by one they fell – and Cadance, without a moment’s notice, blasted the remaining Guards against the wall.

As for the Archmage, Luna observed, she collapsed where she stood, a dreamy expression upon her exhausted face.

“A sleeping charm,” Luna deadpanned, and Cadance shrugged. “And strong. Huh.”

“Just a simple trick,” Cadance said bashfully. “Just… needed to overwhelm her and her friends there for a moment. Oldest trick in the foalsitter’s book, hah…”

“Something to be said for personalised spells,” muttered Luna. “I would not have been able to make them all fall asleep…”

Suddenly Cadance staggered. Alarmed, Luna held out a wing to support her.

“Thanks…” gasped Cadance. “So… that should keep her down, but… that felt weird. Harder than it should. Don’t expect her to stay down for long… Doubt it’ll work twice...”

She looked around, briefly.

“Where’s Discord?”

Luna shook her head, grimacing. Silently, she levitated the pink tuft of mane Discord had held. In the chaos of Cadance’s entry, it was miraculously unharmed, and now Luna held it before Cadance’s eyes.

“Gone,” said Luna bitterly. “Petrified. And this is the only way to track him.”

“Wh-what?” Cadance exclaimed. “But– how?”

“It appears I… misjudged the Elements of Harmony,” Luna admitted. She glanced at the collapsed wall of the gallery, the gigantic hole Cadance’s entry had created yawing wide open. “They have turned him to stone, once more. But here, here is his last memento from the mare he loved.”

She pressed it into Cadance’s outstretched hoof.

“They said he’d be placed in the cargo hold, nothing more,” Luna continued. “And you, of all the ponies my sister could have sent… find him. I will meet you when this is concluded, at a place Captain Reiner referred to as Fenway Park.”

The other Princess looked up, from the tuft of Fluttershy’s mane, back onto her. Cadance’s purple eyes were wide and afraid.

“Are you sure?" Cadance replied, glancing at the debris. “I’m not sure if I–”

But Luna held a hoof against Cadance’s shoulder. Her grimace turned to a gentle, pained smile.

“You are the Princess Mi Amore Cadenza of the Crystal Realm, born of my line,” Luna stated. “You stepped forth to defend the Realm from Sombra’s evil once more, and succeeded. As you will succeed today. Go. Find Discord, and bring him to safety. The battle is not yet lost.”

The Princess of Love, hesitant as she was, nodded. And gave her aunt, if that was what Luna truly was, a quick embrace.

“Just… stay safe,” said Cadance, wrapping the tuft in her aura. “They’re counting on us.”

“As they should,” said Luna. It was enough. “Go, NOW!”

With a nod and final glance, Cadance turned, and rushed towards the door, where the hinges had broken and its handle had shattered.

But Luna got no time to catch her breath. No sooner were these words said that something heavy struck against her. Once, then twice.

She raised her shield, in time to intercept the next shard. And there she saw the Archmage rise, haggard with a steely glare. Another shard flew, towards Cadance…

And Luna knew what had to be done.

She flew past Cadance, catching a brief glimpse of her wide-eyed look, before she met the Archmage head on.

Luna crashed against the Archmage, sending them rolling towards the open, windswept edge of the room. Amidst the cries of the guards still present, and the rapid, desperate spells firing off from both her and the Archmage’s horns, they fell.

And with a booming crack, they impacted the wooden deck of the airship.

Coughing out dust, Luna stirred, and looked up just in time to conjure a shield, meeting the Archmage’s scorching blast head on.

“Do not think for a moment that you will harm nor lay a single hoof on Cadance, Twilight Sparkle!” Luna exclaimed fiercely. Her sword had been reconjured, and her parries matched the Archmage's frenzied yet precise strikes. “I will not allow it.”

But her longsword, magical as it was, would not hold forever against the orichalcum blade.

With a gust of wind, she flew back onto the wider deck. She needed space, yet with the commotion and judging by the screams she heard, the Guards and crew would stir soon.

Even as she struck the Archmage with another blow against her armoured side, Luna hoped it wasn’t all too late for Cadance.

Around them, the nighttime skies were alight with the fires of battle...

~ Boston, USA ~

A small patch on the left side of the Great Equestrian burst into flame.

“What,” Major Bauer said, “In God’s name. Is going on.”

Nobody answered.

“We have no idea,” Starfall’s voice crackled over his earpiece. “Princess Luna seems to be inside there, but… it looks like something’s gone South.”

Stephan watched debris from the hole coursing down towards the city streets.

‘You don’t say.’

He reached for his radio. Around him, his men were lining up into APCs, ready to mobilise.

“This is Major Stephan Bauer,” he said. “All available units South of the Charles River, prepare for the enemy push.”

He glanced North. The river had provided a natural barrier, but now, with the battle reignited, he wondered if the Empire had been humoring them.

“Hold the line,” he said firmly, to a chorus of acknowledgment from the radio.

“Yes sir,” Yael Ze’ev said, over his radio. “We’ll give them a welcome they won’t forget.”

Yet even as he holstered his radio and drew his sword, Stephan wondered if they’d hold.

~ The Great Equestrian ~

With the winds blowing and floor splintered around them, Luna fought on with gritted teeth.

The Archmage’s blows, magical and not, were stronger than she’d expected, even as she parried them with shields and charms. Yet she was an alicorn, and the Archmage was not. Her wings flared, she rose above, and she blew a gust of wind at the Archmage, forcing her back. Twilight glared at Luna, yet this was no reprieve for either of them.

There was a commotion at the door. A squadron of Guards, Equestrians and hippogriffs alike, rapidly streamed in. Their spears were aimed at Luna, crossbow bolts fired at her – deflecting harmlessly or outright shattered against her armour. One spear managed to embed itself in a crack between plates, but that was all.

Yet that was enough to give rise to a small cheer from the Guards. How full of conviction these unyielding opponents were. Luna glanced at the spear, and snorted. She was not amused.

“Did you ever think your loyalties would be rewarded?” she yelled, parrying another spear thrown at her. The zebra who’d thrown it now valiantly charged her, only to be easily thrown back by the gust she’d summoned. “Tell me, all of you! When was the last time you remember the sound of Reindeer dancing in the night sky? What gifts did Sint Erklass bring this year, or the year before?”

There she saw the Archmage, flanked by her Guards, keeping her distance with her sword split into several pieces.

“You speak nothing but slander, Luna–” the Archmage began, but Luna stomped a hoof, thunderously cracking the deck.

“Silence!” Luna boomed. Yes, they would hear her, even above these winds. “What did you do to them. What did you do.”

“Adlaborn remains in the Frozen North!" the Archmage shouted defiantly.

But it was not she who needed convincing, Luna hoped. Wherever their loyalties may lie, she could only hope her words would reach the Guards. They had amassed again by her side.

She did not have to fight them all.

Luna hissed. “There were children, cast aside and burnt, whole families put to the sword!”

The hippogriff, Shearwater, flew down from the hole above, and boldly stepped forward between Luna and Twilight. But Luna saw the faintest of hesitation in her eyes.

“And you still serve her!”

Twilight shook her head. “Step aside, Shearwater. All of you,” she told the Guards. “You focus on the false Cadance.”

“You can’t fight this alone, M’lady!” Shearwater protested, raising her spear a notch.

“I won’t be alone,” said the Archmage. “The richest fruit of the Queen’s providence will aid me.”

If this was a cryptic statement to Luna, Shearwater appeared to understand it instantly, as the hippogriff lowered her spear, nodding, and turned to her fellow Guards.

“Fall back!” she cried. “We let the Archmage deal with this! And you heard her, find Cadenza!”

“Very clever, Twilight,” Luna said acidly, while the Guards beat their retreat towards the nearest doors, leaving them alone on the deck. “What, are you afraid our little chat may have sowed doubt in them after all?”

“Shut up,” the Archmage spat. “Shut up!”

Luna’s horn glowed. Her silver longsword and midnight-blue shield were conjured anew.

She fixed her glare upon the Archmage – who now stood alone, orichalcum shards circling her. Alone, as when she had begun her studies.

“And what of Spike, the little drake you called brother?” Luna continued fiercely. “Did you cast him aside too? Chain him in a dungeon for defiance!”

Twilight flinched. “You don’t know what I–”

“You’ve sacrificed your very mind to this wretched cause, Archmage!” Luna interrupted. Contemptuously, she telekinetically snatched the spear from her armour, snapping it in half, and threw it to the floor. “But even I never thought you, of all people, would treat family that way!”

“You dare,” hissed the Archmage. “How dare you… he made his choice, and I won’t have you question–”

“His choice, or yours Archmage?!”

“We helped him!” the Archmage protested. “He’d made a mistake, and we fixed him when he was done! Now he c–”

This time, Luna answered with a lightning bolt, fired from her horn.

“Sentient beings are not things to be fixed!” Luna yelled, punctuating that burst of lightning. “Did Celestia’s little venture teach you nothing?!”

“Don’t you dare talk to me about what she would want!” Twilight yelled.

The Archmage’s lavender shield flared and burnt, yet held. But it sufficed for the Archmage to be pushed a pole’s reach away, hooves scrabbling for a hold on the wrecked floorboards,

Her orichalcum shards, though, continued their fluid motion in the air. The Archmage had not forgotten them, Luna found out, for she riposted. One by one, they struck down, hard, upon her midnight shield. Even Luna’s alicorn power could not withstand that. Her shield sparked and frazzled as chunks of it were ripped away by the blows.

However, the blows were finite, and Luna needed only to break the Archmage’s concentration. As soon as the last of the shards had come down, Luna let her horn glow once more.

A burst of blue fire erupted from the deck surrounding her. Hovering close to the floor, the orichalcum shards, which had seemed intent on next cutting at the base of Luna’s shield, now tumbled into the flames as their wielder cried in alarm.

There, with the Archmage distracted by the spreading fire – rising in the wind – did Luna see the chance to seize her enemy and drag her off the airship. She fired another lightning bolt, one that would surely remove the Archmage’s last wards with ease…

Except a shadow flew past, and took the brunt of the blow, landing in a smoking heap.

Her gaze turned in time to see another shadow come barreling at her, with an unequine snarl. Though it was with ease that she tossed it aside with her head, it was far from alone. The doors were full of these equine shadows – no, not shadows. Ghouls, all bearing the same, hostile, blank expressions.

These, Luna knew what these were. They had crawled out from Alexander Reiner’s nightmares.

“To the Archmage!” the lead Newfoal cried.

Clad in armour, clearly made with function and cost-efficiency in mind, he was a brown earthpony. He joined his brethren in charging right at Luna.

They galloped, ignoring the flames before them.

Each second slowed to a crawl. At the sight of these figures, Luna had been seized by an inarticulate sense of wrongness. Those forced grimaces, like little foals trying too hard to look intimidating. Those flat and glassy eyes. Eyes that reflected the fire and held no fire within.

“Stay back!” Luna cried out, her own voice muffled and faraway. “We can–“

The lead Newfoal charged through the flame. In an instant, it was ablaze. It slammed against her shield with the weight of its entire body. Memories and reality blurred into one. The nightmare that haunted humanity was hers now.

Another one, also a unicorn, picked up a nearby bench and tossed it at her shield.

A pegasus screeched, and rushed Luna’s shield, its wings’ tips sparking.

It hit it bodily, with one shoulder, the wing folded back. And in that same moment, the burning unicorn that had bodily slammed her shield hit it again with its head, in perfect synchronicity.

Its head, the pegasus’ shoulders, both slammed against her shield in perfect time, a ghastly music with the crackle of flames for a lower key.

“You don’t have to do this,” Luna said desperately. “You will only hurt yourself. You–”

The Newfoal headbutted the shield. This time, when his head came back up, Luna saw bone, under the melting skin…

‘What?’

The split-second was enough for the shield to falter. And the weakness in the shield was enough for the unicorns to barrage it with magic, enough for the pegasus to hit the shield again, enough for that earthpony to headbutt it again.

Enough for him to push through.

He fell to the floor, bleeding from his head wound, a fiery knot consuming him. But the terrible cascade of bodies continued, some alight, some not.

“Get back!” Luna screamed, raising her weapon.

But they were too close for the long reach of her sword. They hit her like a tidal wave, relentless, unforgiving, too massive to stop. Worse than a tidal wave. A wave comes in only one direction. A Maelstrom, the conflagration spreading.

They pushed, they stabbed, and her armour grew tighter, and tighter still. It was too hot. Armoir could not protect her from the heat of the blaze. Their hooves struck again, and again, against the smooth obsidian plating. Wherever she looked she saw wide, frenzied eyes, eager to serve, empty as the puppets they were. And they all wore the same, distant, furious glare, as they pounded against her again, and again.

“Yield!” they cried. “Yield now!”

“Surrender, Nightmare Moon!”

“For the Queen!”

“Traitor!”

Luna staggered, and faltered, but she couldn’t fall, as they pushed from all sides. Soon the noises blurred together to a rabble, a droning sound that pounded her psyche. It was too hot. She needed to breathe. Her chest felt short of breath, the armour’s protective grip turned to a prison she was bound to.

Then the light through her visor went out, covered in dark a mass of fur and hide, and she had nowhere else to go.

Puppets all around. Unfeeling. Unnatural. They moved, pounded in rhythm, grappling onto her. Metal against glass, burnt flesh, on and on it went. She needed to breathe. Only darkness remained. Amidst the droning, amidst the tightening grip of the puppets that swarmed her.

She thought of Celestia. Of Cadance. Even of Discord, and of Galena. But they weren’t here. Her sister most of all, and she needed her, warm and kind and compassionate.

She shouldn’t need her. She was Luna. She was the Princess of the Night. Yet here she was afraid and alone amidst the growing mass and–

She couldn’t breathe.

“Enough!”

Her horn shone the brightest it ever had. In a split second, all those who had covered her in their body, grappling at her armour, were blasted aside. A blast so strong that fires blew out.

Luna’s wings spread open in a display. A desperate stand, but she didn’t care much about that. Her breathing was shallow and rapid. She needed to breathe. She had to avoid them. Had to cast them aside. She needed her room. She needed her sister here.

They didn’t scream. Groans here and there when they crashed against the wooden deck and metal railing, but not a single oath or cry. Even from those few unfortunates blasted off the deck, who fell like a stone to the city below. A few had stayed alight, and so they fell, like stars.

Between her ragged, hoarse breathing, Luna glanced up long enough to behold the Archmage, her robe torn and tattered by the fire, through the dissipating smoke.

She spat.

“You...”

“I… they… they were supposed to…” said Twilight.

No, not Twilight.

“What did you doto them?” Luna yelled.

The Archmage stepped forward. Trying to regain footing. Trying to stay confident. “I accomplished our mission,” she said, and Luna could not tell if it was forced. “We… we made them better! Stronger! Happier! We uplifted th–”

“You’ve done no such thing!” Luna roared, in the full Royal Canterlot Voice.

She paused, taking a much-needed breath. Her lungs felt tight.

“Is that all, all there is to them? Slaves and tools and puppetsfor you?”

The shadows around Luna grew ever so darker. Deeper. They were her shadows now. And the burnt-out smoke swhirled around her. It was mist. Her mist.

“We,” she hissed, trembling as she adjusted a gauntlet, “are going to burn this atrocity you’ve perpetrated down to ash. Inch by inch.”

The Queen’s faithful student took a step back. Luna lunged forwards, longsword at the ready. And in her power, she ordered the mists to blind the Archmage.

Twilight yelped, staggering as her hooves rose, too late, to cover her eyes. Ther lavender shield flickered in and out of existence, and Luna saw an opening.

Her swing missed, by an inch. It sliced a tuft of the Archmage’s mane. Cursing, Luna stepped back while her enemy coughed raggedly, her reunified sword flailing blindly.

“Help!” the Archmage yelled. “Anyone! Help me, please...”

Luna could have essayed another strike, here while her enemy cried helplessly.

Something held her back.

She looked down, and saw where the tuft of Twilight’s mane had landed. A vision swam before her then, of another tuft just like this, not one hour ago… A precious keepsake to someone who, like her, had been an enemy of Equestria, until kindness and compassion had saved them.

Quietly, Luna lifted the tuft in her aura, and let her null-space pocket it.

The Archmage’s desperate screams faded into the night air. Soon only the ambience of the battle raging below was left. But Twilight found Luna again, and glared at her with red eyes.

Nothing happened, for a moment, as both considered the other, their weapons pointed.

Luna’s horn glowed dangerously, and so did the Archmage’s. Whatever spell she was going to cast next, Luna thought, had to end this as quickly as possible.

But then, it came.

At first she felt something move, deep inside the airship. With its rumbling, ragged breaths, it was as if the airship itself was coming alive. Then the floor began to rumble, and the airship moved with each slam and thump of whatever it was. Luna turned – to be met by a giant claw ripping through the deck, right onto her face.

She wasn’t fast enough.

The scaly fist met her head on, and pain coursed through her body as she was flung away, crashing through the deck’s floor until she came to a halt at the opposite end of the airship.

Through a ringing in her ears, Luna gazed upon the monstrosity before her, and gasped.

The dragon that emerged before her was no small drake. Its voluminous head alone was easily half as tall as a human, and twice as long as Alexander Reiner was tall. Enormous as it was, clad in heavy steel armour to boot, the beast crawled out as if it was much, much lighter. It raised itself besides the Archmage, a muscular wing draped protectively around her.

Yet despite the muscular wings swept across its back, the dragon was much too small to be full-grown. Its scales were so stained and dull, Luna could barely tell if they were purple or grey. It stared at her with glassy, barely-seeing eyes.

There was something about it that seemed curiously... stretched. Like the scales didn’t quite fit over the body, with stitches and curiously thin patches all over. Something about its scales made her think of a stallion wearing a colt’s clothes. Or–

‘No...’

And all of a sudden Luna knew.

“Twilight Sparkle,” Luna said, horrified as she stared at the thing that had once been Spike. “What have you done?”

* * * * *

Cadance hurried herself through the depths of the airship, armoured legs making an audible ‘clink’ sound as she galloped across metal flooring. She had to have caught up with the ones who were transporting Discord by now. And how come she’d met no further resistance yet? Then again, this was a big airship. Maybe she still had ground to cover.

Held in her aura, the tuft of Fluttershy’s mane served as a guide, her magic sympathetic to the proverbial red string tying the pegasus, in body and soul, to Discord.

‘I’d better make this quick.’ the Princess of Love thought to herself, ‘I can still hear Aunt Luna’s fight elsewhere. Hopefully that’ll draw the Guards away, but I can’t be too long...’

She didn’t know much about airships. That was more of a passion that belonged to Blueblood. But time spent with her cousin had allowed her to glean a few details. If memory served her well, a ship’s cargo hold would be at the back.

Much of the ship was lined with wood, but here in the depths, Cadance saw this give way to riveted steel, as its innards grew more utilitarian in design. Letting her magic lead her, she popped through an open hatch, and found herself in a metal corridor. Here, she noticed, the bulbs dotted the walls, not the ceiling. And their pale white light was fluorescent, rather than the comforting yellow of incandescence.

At the far end was a flight of metallic stairs, leading down. They stopped before an entrance. This had to be it.

Cadance heard a hiss of steam, and almost jumped. She looked up. Pipes of all sizes ran the length of the ceiling, connected to the vast doorway at the bottom of the staircase. A ticking noise caught her attention. Gears, clicking. To her marvel, the entrance was closing, a sturdy pair of double-doors sliding shut, venting steam as it did so.

She sensed no magic, only machinery.

‘Amazing… just like Kirin clockwork…’ Cadance thought. ‘And… and shoot! Must get through before those doors close!’

With a beat of her wings, she whooshed down the corridor. The mechanism’s slowness proved her boon. Those doors looked heavy, and even as she passed them by a comfortable margin, Cadance grimaced to imagine their weight crushing her sides.

Crates both metal and wood greeted her, to the side. Instinctively, she dove into a gap between the crates, landing silently as she could.

She took a breath, waiting, as the doors closed behind her. Would she be going back that way? In any event, if they’d been open, that could only mean someone had recently come in here.

“...We don’t want to break him,” she heard a voice say, “be careful!”

It was Rainbow Dash.

Warily, Cadance peeked up from her hiding spot. She soon saw that recovering Discord wouldn’t be easy. There was a row of five smaller airships – or sky-boats, Blueblood would have corrected her – lined up to the left of the cargo hold. In front of one, a small group of cadets – at least they looked like cadets, if Shiny’s descriptions were still accurate – was working to load a large crate off a cart. And overlooking them were Dash and a vaguely familiar orange pegasus in a crystalline cadet armour.

Cadance couldn’t recall if she’d seen the other mare before, yet still there was something familiar about her...

‘I need to focus.’ she thought, taking in what was before her.

If the four cadets and Dash were all she had to face, this would be quickly over and done with. She did have surprise on her side, after all.

Hopefully, this could be simple. Simple and not a drawn-out engagement. Charging up her horn, Cadance stepped out and made her presence known with a bolt of magic.

It flash-struck the startled cadets, but not their two pegasi overseers, who were quick to open their wings and evade the bolt with angry cries. The crate containing Discord – that was what it had to be, given its size and shape – fell to the floor.

Or rather, it would have, if not for a magical aura that caught it before it landed. From its intended sky-boat emerged the one person who could have given Cadance a shock.

Clad in a modified armour, still purple-coloured, still proudly displaying a crest of a shield and star, it was Shining Armor. And the second he locked eyes with her, his gaze turned from cold and empty into a vicious glare.

Cadance felt her breath hitch, the crates behind pressing her in.

“Shiney…?”

“Rainbow Dash, Starstruck.” Shining’s horn shone as he stepped off the airship, effortlessly loading the crate inside, “pack in the cadets up and prepare to disembark. We’ll handle this… Cadance.”

He said her name with such venom.

The two pegasi complied, swooping down to pick up the unconscious cadets.

Not knowing what else to do, Cadance lashed out again with her magic, but a translucent purple barrier appeared before Shining, upon which her lightning-bolt broke like tinder.

“Can’t pull the same trick twice, Cadance!” Shining snarled. “I don’t know where you summoned the energy to bypass my shield, but I’m ready for it this time… And I know your magic like you know mine!”

A violent gust of wind buffeted Cadance, knocking her off her hooves and sending her crashing into the crates.

Coughing, aching, Cadance tried pushing herself up. She felt pain in more ways than one. She’d lost hold of Fluttershy’s tuft of mane.

“Shining…” she croaked. “Shining, it’s me. I helped raise your baby sister.”

From across the bay, he gave a bitter laugh. “Of course,” he said. “The old bleeding-heart trick… If you’d really cared, you’d never have left.”

His horning was resplendent with intensifying light, that cast long shadows.

“It’s…” Cadance started. “It’s not like that!” Her mine was addled, by fear and pain and sorrow. “Oh, Shining…” she whispered. “Where did you go so wrong?”

“Funny you should ask that…” Shining said, still laughing bitterly. “You used to think something wasn’t right with you. I wondered how a filly like you could notice me… Never had thought, until we got engaged, how you felt about your wings… As if I needed your wings to love you.”

‘What…’

That didn’t gel with the history she knew of her and Shining.

Hesitantly, Cadance raised herself. She didn’t use hooves. With calculated, practiced grace, she let her wings spread, feathers tickling the air. They made her feel less heavy, somehow. As if, in raising them, it was all her burdens that took flight.

She heard Shining gasp.

“This is me, Shiney,” she said quietly. “I’m whole.”

It was then that Cadance was blindsided by two things. Firstly, a delayed realisation about Shining’s phrasing from earlier. He’d said “we’ll” instead of “I’ll”. Secondly, more literally, was when she got rushed by something that charged into her like a buffalo.

Forced across the cargo hold, Cadance managed to stop herself from hitting the wall by taking to the air, thanks to her spread-out wings. Upon landing back to the floor, Cadance found a blurry shape rushing towards her, from the air.

Acting quickly, she activated her shield. This caused her assailant, who reacted with swift wit, to instead land before her with outstretched wings.

“What the–” Cadance uttered, taking a look at the foe.

“I love him,”told an unknown voice, disorienting to hear.“I will always love him. I cherish him every day and night. For I’m his.”

‘What is this?’ Cadance strained to think through disorienting emotions. ‘It’s not natural.’

“I would die for him, for I love him that much,” the voice continued, the words toxic to Cadance’s senses.“I will always love him. Never less, and always more compared to anything else.”

Cadance lashed out with another blast of magic, this one forcing the foe to duck, and granting her time to compose herself.

The Princess of Love was quick to determine a few facts. The one facing her was a pink pegasus mare. The golden armour she wore was scuffed and scratched, clearly dented. And then there was… there was this thing about her.

This mare was feeling something, but not on her own. It couldn’t be love, it was too… unlike love for it to actually be love.

“Who are you?” Cadance asked the mare, whose barrel twitched upwards slightly.

“I’m his wife,” the mare answered, her dark purple eyes empty and sardonic, “and I’m–”

“Ardor!” Shining called out, affection in his voice. “Get yourself to safety. We’re holding this fort.”

The mare – Ardor – beamed with what was absolutely not a smile, and immediately trotted off towards Shining. On her way, however, she came across the tuft Cadance had dropped.

“Ah, yes,” said Ardor, picking it up with her wing and turning, to smile at Cadance. “I think I’ll be taking that, too.”

And Cadance saw red.

“Give that back, you–”

Before Cadance could follow, Shining unleashed the spell he’d spent the last few minutes building up. A split second too late, and the full force of the spell would have been on Cadance. Her shields went up, just in time. More than that, they expanded.

If she’d been thinking rationally, Cadance would’ve been as surprised as any when her shields, in absorbing the energy of her husband’s assault, flickered and rumbled, as the push of excess magic burst out all around the cargo bay, and destroyed it.

* * * * *

Spell, fire, lightning. The wooden deck, ablaze.

Yet the dragon, protected doubly by his scales and armour, refused to yield. And neither did his master and once-sister.

Luna’s obsidian armour held against yet another strike of the dragon’s fist, one she met head-on. This time, she stood her ground. Her forehooves, though dwarfed by his fist, caught it mid-blow. Momentum took over, and the deck buckled and splintered as the dragon’s feet dug into the carved wood.

Yet herein lay the problem, Luna thought. She could push back, her hooves against his claws, but the Archmage would turn her attention to her once more.

As she did now.

A flash as bright as her sister’s Sun struck her visor. And with it came the dragon’s fire.

The armour was invulnerable to this element, even as it glowed from the pressure. But the Princess who wore it was not, for the heat was not of Luna’s realm. And it burnt. A hundred times worse than when the Newfoals had rushed her, it burnt.

She flew back in a burst. That split second of the fire grazing her was too much. Luna felt sharp pain all along her lower lip, and felt she’d bitten herself, hard. Thank goodness she had not bitten into her tongue… Worse, though, was the sight of her wings, where red embers still fizzled on the tips his flame had singed.

The dragon gave her no time to recover. On a command from the Archmage, he leapt, his great tail arcing behind him, curling his fist to strike Luna from above.

The armour did not falter, but Luna wished it could have done more, as the impact sent her crashing through the decks of the airship, through metal and wood and glass, into open air.

Cold air caught her, shocked her senses back into action. Her wings flared open, just in time to move her away from another jet of fire. She glared and flew to meet the dragon. Below her, the city sang an infernal cacophony of battle.

‘Is he conscious?’ Luna wondered, as the dragon swatted his tail towards her.

On his back, hooves secured on a harness, Twilight was either yelling or cackling, her dignified mane billowing in the wind.

“Don’t make me do it.”

Luna stared, confounded, at the huge drake, as he rushed her again. ‘What was that?’ she thought, rolling ever so slightly to one side and narrowly avoiding a blast of green fire.

“Spike, we have to go. Now. I can’t do this. They’re planning something bad. I’ve spent so long tending to the wounded, bringing back beauty and helping to rebuild, that they haven’t gotten to me yet.”

‘Rarity? No, a memoryof Rarity,’Luna folded her wings and diving down while Spike blew a powerful gust of green flame at her. ‘How am I sensing these?’

But dragons, the academic side of her remembered, even as she plunged, had strange minds. Immune to most forms of mental enslavement, with some exceptions, like the gaze of a Changeling Queen...

Seeing the monstrosity that faced her, this thought brought her no comfort. No matter the cost, there were those who’d pay dearly to master a dragon.

“What happened to Twilight? To Pinkie? They’d never consider thi–”

”But somehow, they are. I don’t know, but I need to leave. We can stop this. We have to stop this, but we can’t do it from here.”

“We will find you!” the Archmage screamed. “We’ll make you–”

It was almost a blessing to hear the other words, rather than that hateful screech, as they whispered in her ear, chiming above the whistle of the wind.

“I swear to you when I came back, I didn’t know them. I had to remind myself that these were my best friends.”

Rarity, then.

… The wind whipping against their faces. The two of them leaving Manehattan and rushing for the forests outside the farmland that ringed Fillydelphia. They’d make their way to Hope Hollow, and hide on a boat headed East. If only the dragons were still out there…

“You can’t do this! This… this is sick! Wrong! Evil! And you’ll never make me into…”

“Oh, Rarity. Spike. You’ve made your choices.”

‘What has she done?’Luna thought, dodging another burst of fire.

Whatever had been done to the poor drake, it called to mind forgotten magics from the time that Celestia and she had unified Equestria. Or perhaps “forgotten” wasn’t the right word. “Buried” was closer.

Dark, evil spells.

Spells that only the Royal Sisters would know of. Spells only they could have performed.

“How could you?!” Luna yelled.

Whatever the Archmage’s answer was going to be, Luna didn’t know or care. She jerked her horn forwards, a blue-purple beam lancing forth from it.

It hammered into the armoured torso of the beast, just ahead of his wing. He roared in pain. A look of panic crossed the Archmage’s face as she struggled to hold onto its back.

‘Keep it together. If I knock her off of Spike…’ Luna thought fleetingly.

Her dive had taken her close to the rooftops, now. Below a few, even. She arced back and shot up into the sky, the windows of tall buildings rushing along beneath her. Shot up so fast, she passed the Archmage and her steed in a straight line.

Spike roared, releasing a gout of scorching green fire after her. She felt the heat licking at her, at her tail.

“Luna!” the Archmage cried. “You’re going to come back here, face the consequences, and–”

Luna folded her wings to her sides, bat-like, letting herself drop back. Channeling magic through her wings, she cannoned towards the Archmage like an arrow from a bow, her aura-held sword preceding her.

It was a gamble, and she knew it.

The Archmage’s horn glowed. A shield began to form over her, then spread over Spike…

In a way, they were both too late. Finding an exposed, unguarded spot above his armour’s neck-line, Luna’s sword slashed a long, but shallow runnel through Spike’s throat, scraping through scale and against bone. She was close, so close!

And then she saw the shield, mere inches from her face. The worst possible option would be for her to get trapped inside with the dragon.

She folded her left wing to her barrel’s side and rolled to the right. She almost didn’t make it. The rim on the closing shield caught her. Gasping, Luna bounced and skidded off of its surface, tumbling towards the ground.

“Spike!” cried a voice from above. “You hurt Spike!”

Luna spread both her wings, banking to the left and finding her balance once more.

“You have no right to accuse someone of that!” Luna yelled, staring up and trying to ignore the burning pain in her wings. Her own shield was cast in time to intercept another pot-shot from the enraged unicorn. “None!”

But even as she said so, a touch of guilt remained. She hefted her longsword in her telekinesis, pointing it towards Twilight.

She was about to pick up speed. About to rush the Archmage and Spike again, but then there was a change in the wind. Something that stood out from the spells cast in the streets. Luna turned her gaze above, to the great airship brought by the Empire.

And there she saw it happen.

An explosion at the airship, far above the streets. A sky-boat burst out of the smoke, its balloon set ablaze, spiralling out of control. And next to it, something small and pink fell from the smoke.

'Cadance.'

She had to think fast.

Her horn glowed. The dragon rushed first, onto her, his claws open.

And then she grabbed on. With all her strength, she grasped his arm with her aura. He screeched, and the Archmage yelled. Luna held.

In a burst of speed, she flew back, dragging the dragon and his master with her. Her invisible shields glowed as the Archmage’s speels impacted it with desperate blasts. The foul stench of the dark, necrotic magic crept in, but Luna ignored it.

She took one last glance at Cadance, unconscious and helpless, and strengthened her resolve.

With a terrific cry she took off, and spun around, the dragon in her vice-like magical grip. He screeched and roared, trashing with all his might. Strong as he was, broken and enhanced and twisted, he was not the Princess of the Night. And then Luna let go, sending dragon and rider both hurtling into the nearest skyscraper.

‘Please tell me no-one’s inside…’ Luna thought, feeling faint.

She tore her gaze away before the deafening impact of metal against concrete, and soared. She needed to reach Cadance.

The winds rushed by. The city below grew smaller. She was getting close.

Closer.

She saw Cadance. Her singed mane. Missing pieces of armour. Her wings hanging limp. And she was speeding to the ground.

She hastened her flight. Her teeth gritted. She had to reach her.

So close. She couldn’t fail now.

And–

She succeeded.

She reached for the Princess of Love, her aura enveloping them both. And there Cadance was, wrapped in her protective embrace.

Luna didn’t let go for a long, long time. Not when the explosions in the skies intensified. Not when she saw the dragon crawl out of the rubble that had been a skyscraper. And not when the Imperial forces began to move against the human positions nearby.

Only when, atop a wrecked high-rise, Luna found a small, burnt café, did she set down Cadance.

~ Boston, USA ~

The first thought that went through Major Bauer’s mind was, ‘Well, scheisse. I knew that the Blue Spy should have looked into this…’

He was aware there had been a number of rumours surrounding Rarity and Spike.

Gladmane had pressed his Resistance colleagues as hard as he could about the topic, even broken out blackmail material on government contacts. In broad strokes, what Stephan understood was Rarity had expressed some disagreement with the other Bearers. Then she had disappeared, taking Spike with her. But, soon enough, she’d resurfaced as the picture of poise and dignity, designing uniforms for the Solar Empire, a pillar of their propaganda.

But Spike, curiously enough for the family of one Bearer, had been nowhere to be seen. Rumours circulated that he’d been killed, or the Empire was keeping him somewhere secure like Erebus or the Castle of the Two Sisters. Yet the Resistance had never been able to pinpoint where.

Now, he had.

‘Hölle und Fegefeuer,’Stephan thought, watching as the dragon’s breath illuminated the clouds again in an eerie glow. ‘A real, live dragon. That should be so awesome! Why did they have to go and ruin that, too?’

“Major!” Alicia called out, from the nearest APC. “Ready to move!”

Stephan gave her a stern nod. He’d hated the moniker, really, but it seemed as if there’d always be a need for the Knight of Germania.

He climbed on.

“Let’s go.”

* * * * *

In truth, a skyscraper was no small obstacle. Not least one of the tallest skyscrapers that had once adorned the Boston skyline. Yet here Twilight was, coughing in the debris, very much alive. She’d been protected from the impact of Luna’s strike by her shield, cracked yet resolute, and the embrace of her companion.

Alive, yes. But pleased, not at all.

‘Luna... she betrayed me! Us! Equestria!’she seethed, looking over the skyline. ‘For humanity. Why?’

Twilight almost felt hurt by that question.

‘Why would she do that? Why does anypony, especially an alicorn, wantto?’

She shook her head, weakly. Were it not for Spike’s mass, she’d be buffetted by the winds. Past the great broken windows, she saw a yellow sky-boat approaching.

‘No. This isn’t Luna. This is... not m- ours. We can still save her. I… I need time. I’m sure I can convince her. Once she sees the magic of our friendship, she’ll return.’

But deep down, she wondered how easy that would be. She thought of all the ponies that had failed themselves and Equestria by joining the PHL or hiding on Earth. Some of them had come back around, with some… convincing. But quite a few hadn’t.

Spike rumbled, his claws wrapped around her fatigued body. He pushed debris aside with his wings and growled, thus alerting the Guard unit on the sky-boat.

He didn’t speak.

‘So gentle,’Twilight thought.

“Here! There she is!” she heard them calling, amidst the clatter of their armour.

“Lady Archmage!” a blue-eyed unicorn officer hailed from the sky-boat. “Are you alright?”

Twilight coughed. “In one piece. Thanks for asking!” she called back. “Spike,” she told her steed. “Help me up, please.”

Her companion rumbled approvingly, and stretched out his arm, forming a bridge to the boat. Gingerly, Twilight hopped on and followed its length. When she reached Spike’s upraised palm, he gently set her down beside the unicorn captain.

Twilight contemplated the stallion. His armour was well-worn. And from the accent, she reckoned he was Fillydelphian born and bred.

“What’s your name?” she asked, breathing raggedly. “So… so good of you to come.”

“Captain Sparks Timber, Ma’am,” he stated. “15th Fillydelphian Regiment, escorting the Trailblazers. We’re part of the front-liners who were assigned South of the river to root out Captain Reiner.”

“Trailblazers, eh? I’ll see you get an award for this,” Twilight said. “You’re so very kind.”

“Well, ah…” Sparks Timber rubbed the back of his head with one foreleg. “Means a lot to hear that, but it’s nothing special. Only what anyone should do.”

Twilight’s reply died away when Spike made a noise that wasn’t quite a growl or mewl. He rubbed his slashed throat, clearly in pain. When his claws came away, they were stained with blood and something that was very much not blood.

“Spike, shhh… It’s okay, it’s okay,” she turned to coo at him, gently. “I’ll… I’ll ask for a proper neck-guard on that armour, when we get back, okay? I’m… so sorry. You’ll never get hurt again.”

Spike made that not-growl noise again.

She leaned over the sky-boat’s railing, precariously, deaf to Timber’s alarmed warning, and pressed her head to his. It felt soothing, she knew it did. Yet, even as she did so, the question in her mind tugged once more.

Why couldn’t Luna understand? No, it wasn’t her Luna. It never was. But she could be.

She had to try. Had to turn her away. The Luna she knew would have never turned her back on the Equestria she loved, or her sister, or even hers–

‘Concentrate,’ Twilight thought. She needed to. ‘Find Luna. Bring her home. Help her.’

Help her, as she had in the Crystal War. All the research they’d done, all the depths they’d explored into finding a way to end it. And beyond, with Luna’s visits and lectures and studies in the night, watching stars align, stolen little moments in her garden...

Now her own libraries and laboratories were that much emptier, without the Princess who’d once livened them up with her love for the magical arts.

It had started before then, of course, from the moment a very displeased, sleep-deprived Luna had stepped into a war-torn Canterlot, overrun by Changelings.

Of course, Luna later insisted she merely acted as a distraction for the real heroes to step in. Yet Twilight hadn’t cared to take her at face value. How she hoped she‘d repaid it in kind when her own new spell-craft had helped Celestia and Luna end the Crystal War, together.

Twelve years of friendship had, begun one Nightmare Night, ending in a stone statue in the Canterlot Palace Gardens. She hadn’t cried then. She shouldn’t cry now.

Yet her chance was slipping away with every second.

It had been a blow for Equestria when their beloved warrior princess adamantly refused to join the war on Earth. And a personal heartbreak when she’d outright deserted, with the traitor Cadance.

Twilight moved her head away. She had to make this right.

“Captain Timber,” she spoke aloud. The unicorn stood straight. “Any word from Captain Armor?”

“Great Equestrian’s secure for now, Ma’am,” said Timber. “The last we heard is of a… package being transferred to one of the lifeboats… which then crashed. We got the Trailblazers looking for it. I’d just received a confirmed sighting from Captain Plow, then we saw you land into this building.”

“A sighting? Where?”

The captain pointed to a column of smoke, from a location bordering the Boston Harbor.

“Over there, Ma’am. Don’t look like much but, earlier, we saw a flare go up. Somewhere in the North End, probably Langone Park.”

Twilight rapidly sifted through her inner library for Boston geography.

“East of the North Washington Street Bridge,” she muttered. “They were that close to making it to Charlestown… too bad the Bridge’s been blown up. And enemy forces will have noticed their flare as well.”

“Trailblazers got a boat,” the captain said. “But they might not make it for long without backup. Shall we assist them?”

“Absolutely,” said Twilight firmly. “Prepare to set course for Langone Park, captain. But, if I may have just a minute?”

The captain saluted. Twilight turned to regard Spike. Her Spike.

He shouldn’t be this large. The dragon instincts within him started a growth that was far too much, in far too little time. He was broken, too. Wounded and crippled in his flight from Canterlot. Yet they’d persisted, and worked, and he was whole once again as he should be. And that was good, wasn’t it?

“Spike?” she said. The dragon rumbled. “It’ll be over soon. I need you to do one thing.” She leaned closer to his ear. “Cover us. Keep them distracted. And if you can… Find Cadance. Draw her out, if you have to,” she whispered. “Would you kindly do so, Spike?”

The great dragon purred contently, and Twilight saw that it was good.

* * * * *

“Fire! It’s all arou–”

“I can’t put it out! I can’t put it out–”

“What the hell is tha–”

The radio crackled and chittered, yet always told the same story.

Hardly an hour had passed, yet Ana saw that Starfall was absolutely correct in evacuating them. Her previous sniper nest was on fire. Well, somehow ‘on fire’didn’t quite encapsulate it. It was more like a green wall of flame that couldn’t be extinguished.

Minutes ago, something had flown from the Great Equestrian, fought the dark alicorn, and crashed into what used to be the John Hancock Center, before it crawled out, none the worse for wear. At least, that’s what she’d understood, from scattered radio chatter.

All over the city, it was the same. Buildings burned green, and Ana heard screaming and crackling in every direction. All as that thingflew overhead, green fire raking over the city.

They passed a gaping hole in the building, scored out by some Imperial weapon weeks before. As the nine of them – Ana, Tanner, Harwood, Frieda, some PHL whose names Ana didn’t know, for they’d met them during the tower’s chaotic evacuation – ran by, Ana caught a glimpse of the thing. She couldn’t quite call it a dragon. It looked…

Well, Ana couldn’t make herself look at it.

“Where are we going!” she yelled to Tanner.

“Somewhere we won’tbe on fire!” Tanner answered.

It was tempting to disagree with that, but it wasn’t like there was a good answer. Besides. Who was Ana to disagree with that?

“Where the fuck is it going?” someone yelled out, and Tanner shook his head.

The squad, all nine of them, halted when he did. The gunfire rang incessantly, from the heavy, booming noise of artillery to the hail of small arms exchanging fire with spells.

Ana shuddered to think of whatever poor unit the dragon was pursuing.

“Here it is,” Tanner said, drawing to a close a few metres from a building that had very clearly been a restaurant at some point – but the sign had fallen onto the ground, and was just more rubble. There was a large hole in the wall, barricaded with sandbags, barbed wire, and a very big machine-gun.

Ana vaguely recalled it as some M60 variant.

“This is Tanner, does anyone copy, over?” Tanner spoke aloud to his radio. “We are at Assembly Point Sierra, I say again, we are at Assembly Point Sierra, does anyone copy, over?”

No response as they crept towards the former restaurant.

“It’s no use,” Harwood lamented. His armour was dirtied and tarnished, yet Ana could still see the medical cross clearly across his chest. “They’ve probably evacuated from here already, Tanner.”

“No bodies, though. Curious. And they left the M60,” said a soldier. French, by the sound of it, or possibly Québecois. Ana couldn’t tell. Perhaps she should have taken French.

They were all filtering inside, staring over the modifications the PHL had made. Not that there was much left. Everything, including a large military-grade radio, had been burned and scarred by something.

Ana stopped in her tracks. “This doesn’t feel right.”

“You’re right…” Tanner said. “Damn it all. But this is a defensible position. We need to at least figure out what happened.”

“Well, they couldn’t have just left us here!” Frieda complained, her beak twitching.

Ana’s gaze fell upon the radio, left behind in this former restaurant. She moved past Frieda and Harwood – the latter of whom had begun arguing with Tanner on what merited an evacuation.

The radio was burnt, its knobs and switches destroyed. And there lay a note, simply taped to it.

‘They got us,’ it read, in hastily scrawled handwriting. ‘Leave as soon a-’

It cut off after that point. The pen lay on the floor.

“Hey, Tanner?” Ana asked aloud. “I don’t… I don’t think we should stay.”

She reached for her pistol. Two magazines left. Twenty rounds.

Tanner nodded. This was, after all, veryclearly not a safe place. He turned to Harwood.

“Where’s the closest unit to us?”

“That’d be Ze’ev’s, as far as we know. There’s also one in the subway tunnels, but… I don’t have a good feeling about that,” Harwood said grimly. He nodded towards the Frenchman. “Look, Henri, we just separated from them not ten bloody minutes ago. We should call ‘em in.”

So, Henri was their current comms officer, Ana deduced.

“I’ll get right on... it...” Henri’s voice trailed off. “Tanner. Something’s wrong here.”

Part of Ana wanted it to be nothing. But, in her experience, that was the surest sign that it was very much somethingthere. Even as she bounced between both positions, something changed in the wind. It reminded her of a cold forest night. Empty and devoid of warmth, or any sort of comfort outside the oasis that was a house with a warm bed. The winds around her neck, blowing her hair back.

Yet something stirred. Something that hungered. They were the deer in a wolf’s sight. And the hairs on Ana’s neck stood up.

“Shit.”

She spun around, pistol in hand, towards the counter, and fired a single round.

“Ana, what the hell is–” Tanner started.

But it was drowned out in the sound of the explosion. For an infinitesimal fraction of time, the muzzle flash revealed a unicorn who’d been silently charging up a spell behind the bar…

… And the shattered remnants of a horn, flickering like a child’s sparkler.

Everything in the next two seconds was a blur. The spell, once contained within the horn, had no direction and so it went everywhere.

The Guard, still screeching as he reached for his ruined horn, fell quiet when Ana fired another round into his horn, still emitting sparks. And a second, louder explosion blew his head apart in a cloud of smoke.

She looked away, meeting Harwood in his eyes, and they knew to look outside.

“Contact!” Frieda yelled. Her rifle at the ready. “Lots of contact!”

Amidst the cacophony that erupted, she saw them.

Newfoals.

This would be the part where her blood would run cold. Naturally, it didn’t – Ana was experienced enough to start aiming at them, instinctual enough to know when they moved – but there was always that reflexive sense of wrongness when she saw them.

They all stood, watching them with glassy eyes and stony glares. And for a second, Ana was reminded that these were once people.

‘Not anymore,’ she thought.

“All masks on, now!” Tanner yelled. Harwood knocked a table down for cover.

She put her earplugs on, and fitted her gas mask. The squad did the same. Even Frieda pulled out the mask designed to fit over her beak. One could never be too sure.

Seconds after Ana had done so, a chair flew across the room, and she flung herself to the right, towards what had once been a comfortable booth.

“Bring them in!” a mare yelled. Someone commanding.

‘An officer?’’

A ball of blue fire soared over Ana’s head, melting the few remaining shards of glass.

‘She led the squad here! She… she got them.’

Another blast of blue fire.

‘She’s going down.’

“Submit to the queen!” the officer commanded, in a tone that made it clear she did not expect disobedience.

‘Sorry to disappoint,Ana thought, as she rushed towards another section of the former restaurant, passing by anti-Solar Empire graffiti. Harwood and Tanner followed, keeping themselves low to the ground.

They all rushed through a doorway that led into a bar, kept separate from the rest of the restaurant, and leading into a hotel.

Bullet casings littered the ground.

‘They put up a fight here.’

One of the other soldiers slumped against the ground, behind a former booth that Ana could imagine had once been fairly cozy. “You think this is any more def–”

A burst of pink lightning with no obvious source lanced into his suit’s shoulder. He screamed, and Ana was thankful for the fact that her suit’s gas mask made her unable to smell it. She knew from experience that part of his suit would have melted, as would his skin – and that he was probably in intense pain.

“Fuck!” he yelled, clutching his upper arm. “Fucking balls!”

He lay on the floor, back arched, screaming in agony.

“Curzon!” someone yelled, poking themselves out of cover…

… and taking a crossbow bolt straight through the faceplate of their helmet, above the gas filter.

There was only one thing that could mean. Ana watched the unfortunate soldier clutching their helmet, before they started spasming uncontrollably, twisting from side to side at angles impossible for the human body, the spine bending far more than should be possible.

Harwood shot them in the face. It was hard, at this angle, this far away, to see what the look on his face was, even with the transparent faceplates on their suits.

And all the while, as spells ripped through that doorway, as the Newfoal militia advanced, as she heard hoofbeats on the ground, she could still hear the officer ranting and raving.

She wished it would end, even as she continued to fire pot shots with her pistol.

‘Have to reload soon.’

“–happiness above anything you could have had on Earth!” the officer shouted, sounding for all the world like she was about to burst a blood vessel at the sort of intensity usually measured in the megatons. “All are equal before Harmony in the Solar Empire, unlike your home, all your–”

“Ana!” Frieda yelled. “Officer, one o’clock! Take it out!!”

The griffon didn’t need to say it twice.

Holstering her pistol, Ana rested her rifle, bipods and all, against the overturned table. Spellfire flew overhead, the roar of assault rifles deafening to the ear. Designed for combat beyond fifteen-hundred metres, the AWSM rifle she held was more than overkill at such short distances. But it would suffice, more than her pistol ever would.

She held her breath. The rifle was full.

‘Thirteen rounds. Five in the mag.’ Ana recited. ‘One in the chamber.’

The zoom was adjusted. And there the officer stood, barking orders to her underlings. A brown unicorn mare with blue eyes and a close-cropped green mane. Her armour was old, much like that of the unicorn whom Ana had dispatched – 2020 make, if she had to wager. Veteran, then. And that meant an exposed neck. Classic design flaw. They weren’t used to humans then.

She released her breath. Another breath held.

Harwood yelled. Henri responded. Another burst from his rifle, another Newfoal down.

The officer’s torso was in sight. A fallen car covered most of it. But Ana saw enough. The trigger was pulled, and the bullet flew.

And the Imperial's next orders were cut short, for she had no throat left.

Ana released her breath. Ducked just in time for a spell to hit the wall where her head had been.

‘Whoa.’

“Target down!” she yelled.

She’d have to confirm it later on, but for now, the Imperial officer was as good as dead. She breathed, in and out. It was just another kill, but somehow, she knew she’d dwell on it later.

‘Twelve rounds.’ she recited. ‘Four in mag.’

She glanced over at Arthur Tanner. The hardy Englishman was still firing from his G36. He’d have to run out soon. Then she looked down at her pistol in its holster. It felt lighter, much lighter. She must have fired one round too many.

Before she could wave at Tanner, though, it happened. A shield lowered, cover lost too soon, when a spell burnt at Tanner’s table.

A vial of serum flew towards his face, its purple glow sickening. And when she yelled for cover, for her friend and superior to duck, it shattered at his head...

But nothing happened. The serum dripped down his visor, and for a moment, both of them were left sighing in relief.

And then his faceplate exploded. Shards of plastic coated in serum lacerated his face, and Tanner began to scream.

Ana tried to aim for his face. But it was in that moment that a blast of pure concussive force ripped through the room, splintering the words for and driving a gouge between her and Tanner. It knocked her AWSM rifle clean out of her hands, over the counter.

‘No no no no no...’

She saw it. Of courseshe saw it. Something that had once been Tanner was screaming at the top of its lungs, bending backwards at an angle that hurt Ana to watch.

Ana could see those eyes darting to and fro. Looking for – begging for – a way out. Or maybe begging her to join him? And all the while, he was screaming wordlessly.

She didn’t want to know.

The wet, meaty cracking noises Ana heard as Tanner’s bones cracked and shortened simply hurtto hear. She watched Tanner’s rapidly changing legs and torso render him a full foot shorter, but no wider.

The potion of 2024 was not the potion of 2019, as she and her R&D colleagues concluded after months of study. It wasn’t made for comfort or for healing. It was made to convert men into weapons of war. And that meant some shortcuts had to be taken, with the side-effects of such a frantic transformation.

She knew from experience that there was a scent of burning flesh, and she was grateful, again, for the fact that her mask filtered out the sickly-sweet smell.

A hoof pressed against where a human’s knee would have been, once.

And then, silence.

Something crawled out from his suit. Like a bug from a chrysalis. And there was a Newfoal that had once been Lieutenant Arthur Tanner.

It stared at Ana with glassy eyes. Smiled at her with a mouth that seemed less like a friendly smile and more like an open wound.

“Oh, now this is better, isn’t it?” it said in a voice that sounded like Tanner. “I can’t believe I ever fought against this! Oh my Celestia, this is so much… f… better!”

It had been about to swear. But for a second, it was like something was strangling it physically andmentally.

“I can’t believe how much better it feels,” it repeated. “I don’t think you’ll be able to believe it, either, Ana, hah!”

Ana stared dumbly at it.

"Tanner…" she said weakly.

“I’m not Tanner,” it said. “I’m… ah… Loving Sunbeam, that's it. I’m a better pony than that fellow ever could have been! Happier, too! None of his depression, none of those vile, poisonous movies he liked, none of his anger towards you.”

It felt like someone else talking to – no, talking ather, rifling through Tanner’s memories. Because in the end, wasn’t it?

This wasn’t Tanner anymore. This was something that had been made frombits and pieces of Tanner. Something that had more restrictions in its brain than independent thoughts. Something that couldn’t say no to a native-born Equestrian loyal to the Solar Empire, something that couldn’t swear and rejected its former humanity with a passion.

‘To think,’ Ana thought, trying not to vomit, trying not to scream, anything to stay composed. ‘I wanted to be a pegasus once.’

The same question, all these years, and still no answer whatsoever.

“Fall back!” Harwood yelled, and they rushed towards the hotel. Frieda slammed the door with her entire weight, and it flung open at an angle, listing to the side ever so slightly.

Behind her, she heard the Newfoal that had once been Tanner galloping, towards her.

They slid behind a wall dividing the elevators from the lobby. Ana collapsed against the wall, breathing heavily.

“Listen to me, you’re not Tanner!” Ana said, half-pleading. “Tanner liked those dumb action films we watched, remember that! All that downtime, just talking and talking and– Tanner never, Tanner would’ve never left us. Please. Just… just listen–”

She knew it was useless. But she had to try. She gripped her pistol tightly.

“Ana, come on, hey, it feels great. Come on!”

“Like hell it is,” Ana said, sadly, and pulled the trigger.

Click.

She held her breath. The Newfoal’s smile grew wider.

Ana shivered. She didn’t want it. The voice too. It begged her, but all turned to a blur when the Newfoal moved to her. Her fingers felt numb, as she fumbled to reload the pistol.

“Please, Tanner,” she pleaded. “I don’t want it. Don’t do this. Please, please don’t. Please. Don’t make me take it.”

“Hey, Ana,” it said sweetly. “It’ll be alright soon. Don’t– uck.”

What the Tanner-Newfoal was going to say, Ana did not know, for Harwood had thrust his sword through his neck. Her partner’s face, partly hidden beneath his helmet, was contorted in rage.

“Fucking hell,” he said, simply. His hand trembled, even as he turned his gaze on her. He withdrew the sword, leaving a spurt of blood and the Newfoal to choke on its own blood. “Ana, you okay?”

“Yeah, yeah I’m, I’m ok,” replied Ana. She shook her head. The Newfoal collapsed in a gurgle. “Tanner…”

Harwood nodded. “Tanner’s gone, fuck, I know,” he said quickly. “Fuck.”

He wiped his sword off blood. Ana looked at the twitching corpse of Not-Tanner, whose face slowly twisted to a rictus grin. She looked at her partner. He was forlorn.

She reached out for his arm.

“Hey,” Ana said, softly. “We’ll talk about it later. I’m… I’m sorry.”

“Yeah,” replied Harwood. Tanner had, after all, been one of their friends, throughout the war... He lowered his visor, averting his gaze from Ana. Yet she could tell that something stirred behind those eyes of his.

Now wasn’t the time to dwell on it, though. They were still coming. Ana felt cold. Only six of them now, versus the inevitable next wave of Newfoals.

“Requesting backup,” Henri spoke into his radio. His tone was desperate. “I say again, requesting backup to…”

The voice within her grew louder. Ana had never heard her sound so afraid, so hopeless.

‘Don’t let it touch you don’t let it touch you don’tANA PLEASE. Whatever it does to us–’

Wait.

‘Us?’

That was a new one to her. But she didn’t have time to think about it as Newfoals appeared.

“You’re going to be happy just like us,” the lead Newfoal said with a booming voice, giggling madly. “Just like me just like me just like–”

“There’s something on your face!” a new voice called out.

‘Who–’

A machine-gun roared. The Newfoal dropped dead.

“It was pain!”

“Who did tha–” another Newfoal started, before another round silenced him. They fell against the wall, twitching slightly.

And a block or two away, Ana saw them – a unicorn projecting a slightly reddish wall of magic across the street, and several figures behind it. One of which was a tall, lanky figure carrying a heavy machine-gun, mounted with an underbarrel launcher of some kind.

It was–

‘Kraber and Aegis!’

* * * * *

It had all made sense to Yael before she’d heard the screaming.

With the dragon raining fire down on Boston, being holed up in a skyscraper seemed like a worse and worse idea every minute. So they’d tried to regroup with Tanner’s unit.

“You know you’re supposed to do suppressive fire, right?!” Yael called over to Kraber from their spot behind Quiette Shy’s magical shield.

“Being deadcounts as being fokkin’ suppressed!” Kraber yelled back, letting loose a short four round burst into a Newfoal building up energy for a spell.

“Does it? I mean, really?”

“Well,”Oscar Mikkelsen said over their comms, “Suppressive fire is meant to keep enemies in place. They’re dead, they stay in place. On a technical level, he’s not wrong.”

Yael couldn’t help but notice that Oscar had very deliberately not said Kraber was right.

“You and Heliotrope are approaching them?”

“Yes, ma’am,”Oscar said.

* * * * *

The Newfoals in that restaurant room fell to the floor, clutching gaping wounds.

“What’s–” the last pegasus asked, looking around frantically.

And in that moment, a heavyset human crashed through the former storefront window, and hit the Newfoal with the weight of their entire body. Before Ana could react, they were firing off rounds from an enormous rifle that looked to be the size of a small bicycle.

Spikes the size of a finger perforated the walls and Newfoals alike.

Before Ana knew it, all was done. The Newfoals that had menaced them lay on the floor of the restaurant, dead, pinned, and bleeding.

Heliotrope materialised beside the heavyset human, Oscar Mikkelsen, who had bodyslammed the pegasus out of the air, breathing heavily.

“Need a hoof?” Heliotrope asked, holding out one foreleg.

“Or hand?” Oscar asked. “Really, I’d hope either are good.”

Ana breathed a huge sigh of relief. She held Heliotrope’s hoof, and was pulled to her feet. “Helvete… I didn’t think I’d ever be so glad to see all of you.”

She nudged Harwood, who grunted out something that might’ve been a thanks. He, Ana recalled, wasn’t the biggest fan of the penal squads.

“Thirded,” said Frieda gruffly. “Might as well hop on you all.”

Lorne looked over to Aegis. “Wait, so do you mean literally or…”

“No,” Frieda said. “Verymuch no, dingus.”

“Think that’s all of it?” Henri asked, dazed.

Ana would have to ask for his contact, really. And all the others’ names. Apart from one guy, a frazzled-looking young man currently shaking hands with Heliotrope, he was the only of the other PHL members to survive.

Lieutenant Yael Ze’ev came in, a stern, desert-burned figure. Ana had always felt vaguely unsettled in the woman’s presence.

“Where’s Tanner?” asked Ze’ev. Harwood shook his head.

“Converted,” he said grimly. “Cut him down before he could… proselytise. I’m the highest-ranked officer here. Sergeant Harwood.”

Ana gripped his hand tightly. When this was all over, she thought, he’d need a talk.

“I’m sorry. Right,” said Ze’ev, equally grim. “So, looks like we still got our hands full.”

“Well, then we’re not out of the woods yet,” Heliotrope said. “We still have to deal with, uh…”

“Everything?” Quiette Shy asked, quizzical.

“Everything,” Ana agreed. Her rifle, which she’d picked up from behind the counter, felt full. Frieda threw her another fresh magazine for the pistol. “Sure. Why not.”

“Then let’s get to work,” Yael Ze’ev said. “Battle’s not won yet, not now they’ve got a dragon wrecking shit, and we’re not going anywhere till that damn airship’s retreated.”

“Actually,” Ana finally said aloud. All eyes turned to her. “There’s… there’s a high-value target we still need to dispatch. Someone from the airship… I… we think it might be whoever’s keeping that shield up. Especially seeing that dragon.”

Harwood nodded. Ze’ev exchanged an uneasy glance with Kraber.

“And… well,” she said, patting her rifle. “Might as well finish the job.”

“Well what’re we waiting for?!” Kraber declared. “Let’s go dragon-hunting!”

Here, amidst the cheers of wolves, Ana felt distant.

The doubt over the Archmage clouded her mind, once again, as adrenaline wore off. And so, as they moved to intercept whoever the target was, Ana reflected the old question anew – what would Ambassador Heartstrings do?

* * * * *

There was a tune playing.

A rhythm that ebbed and flowed alongside beats of something unknown. There was a repetition, but it helped keep her centered as she laid in this void. It was a strange music, something she’d never heard before, yet it granted her peace. Peace from what was beyond her control…

The tune began to change and–

“Cadance,” a voice spoke to her, interrupting the music. It felt strange, familiar yet not. “Awaken.”

Cadance’s eyes shot open as she gasped for air, before violently coughing. Her body felt sore, like she’d been caught in an explosion.

‘Oh. wait, I was,’ the Princess of Love thought, grimincing as she forced herself up. ‘I should have seen it coming.’

“Are you alright, Cadance?”

She heard Aunt Luna’s voice. Looking to her left, Cadance caught sight of the older alicorn, her own armour damaged. The obsidian plating was cracked, the metal scorched, yet it was whole overall, still serviceable.

“Sore, but I’ll be alright.” Cadance said softly, pushing herself up with some difficulty and pain. Her own armour had been damaged in the explosion, unfortunately. Also, her mane was singed, but that was negligible. “What happened?”

She looked around. They were in a café of some sort, but abandoned, the windows cracked, tables toppled over, the whole covered in a thick layer of dust.

“Twilight had assistance.” Luna said simply, grimacing before spitting out some blood, “Her Spike has been transformed into something else. Something foul and terrible. It was only by our best wit that we were able to outmanoeuver him and recover you from that explosion.”

“Right, that…” Cadance began glumly. “I followed after Discord’s body, trailed the other Rainbow Dash into the cargo hold.” She swallowed. “Shining Armor was there, but he had help. There was this… mare with him.”

Luna’s eyes narrowed as she seemed to recall something, “Mare? Was it a pink mare? A pink mare with wings?”

“Well, yeah...” Cadance paused for a moment, “There was something else about her.”

“What else?”

“I could feel her love, but it wasn’t love.” Cadance said slowly, “it was intoxicating, whatever it was. And it was all based around Shining. It’s almost as if everything about her was made to function against me.”

“Or your counterpart.” Luna mused aloud.

“Yeah,” Cadance sighed. “Aunt Luna, I’m… I’m sorry. I lost the tuft of Fluttershy’s mane. That pink mare… she took it from me. And I got so angry, and… and… It’s my fault. Now we’ve got no way to track Discord.”

Luna said nothing. She sighed, turning her gaze away, contemplating the ruined café. Then she looked to Cadance, with a resolute expression.

“It’s alright, Cadance, dear,” she whispered. “You’ve done more than enough. All you can do now is locate Fenway Park. It’s not too late to find Stephan Bauer.”

Luna paused before coughing, hoarsely and roughly.

“Aunt Luna, you’re… hurt,” Cadance said, more statement than a question. Luna merely sniffed.

“I suppose reality sets in,” Luna said, with an inappropriate chuckle. She tapped her helmet. “War isn’t something I’m a complete stranger to. But I’ve had my moments.” Again, she sighed. “I… might have gone over the limit, up there,” the Princess of the Night said grimly. “Things I never could imagine I would have done… I would have done it then.”

“I guess we’re out of our depth?” Cadance asked. She shook her head. “Luna, we can’t give up on Discord already. If he falls into the Empire’s grasp… there’s no telling what they might do with him. How'd they even catch you in the first place?”

In all the commotion, this was the one thing she’d forgotten to ask Luna upon her arrival.

"They moved the whole airship, all around us,” Luna replied sourly. “Through what means, I do not yet know.”
.
Cadance thought quickly. “Could they have shifted it across universes?”

“Without a gateway?” Luna’s eyes narrowed, and she wiped the blood off her cheek. “I find that highly unlikely. It’s theoretically possible, yes, seeing as… the G-Mare told us they’d already harnessed the power of their Discord.”

And Cadance chuckled weakly at her aunt’s use of the nickname she’d found.

“But doing so without a portal nexus,” Luna continued musing, “that would be deeply cost-inefficient. No, given we know Twilight and Shining were on that ship… I think the likeliest answer is that they worked together in teleporting it. If any pony can do that...”

“So, then…” Cadance suggested. “They probably haven’t left this world yet. They need a portal. That means we’ve still got a chance to rescue Discord.”

When Luna looked at her, Cadance saw hope commingled with apprehension in her face.

“Cadance… you’re right,” Luna said, whispering urgently. “Quick, tell me. Did you see where they took Discord? If he’s still on that ship…”

“He isn’t,” Cadance said instantly. “I saw Dash loading a crate onto a sky-boat. And I’m positive it wasn’t a decoy,” she added. “Fluttershy’s tuft drew me to it.”

“A sky-boat?” said Luna, her face falling. “Where did it go?”

“I… don’t know,” Cadance admitted. “But… that explosion. I think it must’ve sent the boat crashing down… Oh, Luna. If that broke the statue...”

“Not Discord, not he,” Luna said darkly. Her eyes were scanning the horizon. “You were only out for a few minutes. Spike has been raining Tartarus…” She gestured at green plumes of smoke all over the city. “But if we are looking for a fire, it should be easy to spot the odd one out.”

“Like over there?” Cadance asked.

She pointed towards a smoke pillar in the distance, rising from a spot that looked to be on the very edge of a great channel.

“Perfect,” whispered Luna. “I shall go there immediately.”

Cadance felt her heart in her chest. “I can–”

“No,” Luna said firmly, meeting her eyes. “I will. You need to find this Stephan Bauer. The Archmage might be waiting. And there are things I... wish to pry from her, myself.”

“How?” Cadance protested. “Even after… ten days with Redheart, Luna. You told me you couldn’t get a single peek into her mind. She… she was just a regular soldier a-and… and you’ll be going up against Twilight.”

“I have a secret weapon,” Luna said. “Gleaned during my fight with the Archmage.”

Her horn glowed, conjuring a swirling blue mist. And from the mist, something emerged. A small tuft of purple mane.

“Is that–”

“Yes,” Luna said, simply. “I thought it may be of use. As Fluttershy’s guided you to Discord, so too shall this guide me into Twilight’s dreams. I only need your magic, Princess Cadance.”

“My magic? But, Aunt Luna, I don’t really see how that’ll work…”

One look at Luna’s blank expression gave Cadance the answer.

She nodded. Her horn glowed, wrapping the tuft in pink, and the same charm she had placed to track Discord, through the one memento he had of the mare he loved, was given to Luna...

The pink glow dissipated, and there they were once more. Standing in half-darkness, atop the blasted skeleton of a building on a war-torn, alien world. Cadance stepped back, and stared out onto the smoke rising from the channel’s edge.

She thought she saw a sky-boat heading towards it.

“There… that should do,” she said. “Follow the thread, and you’ll pass her wards. And hurry, I think they’re sending backup.”

Luna had gone from blank to a forlorn look in her eyes. But it passed, and she smiled.

“Go, Cadance,” said Luna. The tuft of mane disappeared back into her null-space. “I’m afraid I… cannot accompany you, once again, but do be careful.”

Cadance let out a sigh of resignation. There was no way she would convince Aunt Luna. Not even if she had a century to spend trying.

“Alright. Try and be careful.” Cadance said reluctantly, spreading out her wings. “There’s no telling what else we’re bound to face here.”

She then took off without another word, leaving her aunt to stand by herself.

Though as she flew, the Princess of Love wondered. It wasn’t her imagination. There truly had been something else in the air, which she had felt when Luna mentioned the Archmage – or Twilight Sparkle. When she’d cast the charm. Something… something familiar.

Well, if that was the case, was she one to judge?

* * * * *

“...Over and out,” finished Lieutenant Ze’ev.

“Roger that, we’ll converge on your location. Over,” Stephan Bauer said, clicking off his comms. Maybe getting that close to such a heavy-duty part of the Solar Empire was dangerous, but…

Well. The promise of slaying a dragon, perhaps even capturing the Archmage? That was intoxicating.

“So… ” said Blank Canvas, a Baltimarean artist who had been assigned to his squad. “Major. If we do take down that dragon… What’ll we do when we get the Archmage?”

“That’s for the higher-ups to decide,” Bauer said. It was – thankfully – out of his hands. Much as he’d like to be in on that planning session, he had to admit was for the best that at least some responsibility was out of his hands.

“We use her as a hostage, I think,” said Alicia. “Ah, Starfall?”

“Yes?” asked the communications officer, a diminutive grey unicorn with a radio for a mark.

“You knew a bunch of ponies from Ponyville, right?” Alicia asked. “Cos’, what Iheard is... She saw Twilight like a daughter. You think that’d be enough to make her let up on our planet?”

His best marksman laughed slightly.

“It… couldwork,” Starfall said, tentatively.

“Don’t hold your breath, Starry,” Canvas said. “She’d either level everything for miles around where we keep her, or just enslave us all. Student or no.”

Everyone stared at the white pegasus.

“That’s... frighteninglygrim,” said Daniel.

“She’s gone this far,” Canvas said, scouting ahead. “That momentum won’t just disappear.”

“Still,” Stephan said. “It’ll be a–”

Blank Canvas, and the street around him, exploded into colour.

‘What!’

For a moment, Stephan thought his scout had literally burst. Then he saw him staggering about in the street, blinded and spitting out paint – the same paint of every hue he was covered in from top to bottom.

“Shit,” gasped Daniel. “Is that…”

It was. Stephan knew it when he saw the staggering Canvas slow down, lift a forehoof, and freeze in mid-stride as the paint dried, a colourful statue.

“Grenade!” called Stephan.

And not just any grenade, but an idea that had started life as a party-toy, until its Equestrian creator had turned from friendly to fiendish.

The squad fragmented, rushing to a nearby parking garage, adjacent to a hotel that still bore an outline of the words ‘Residence Inn’.

“We got contacts!” Daniel yelled. Stephan followed his gaze, peering over the concrete wall of the garage. Not far from them, he saw Imperial troops massing at the corner of two streets, just below a sky bridge.

Earthponies armed with crossbows held in Equestria-made assault saddles. A lens over a Newfoal unicorn’s horn, a few hardbucker cannons.

“Get dow–”

There was a buzz. A beam of light, so intense that Stephan felt it even through his armour, cut through the concrete nearby. Crossbow bolts, firing faster and straighter than bolts ever should, peppered the concrete.

“Okay…” panted Starfall. He glanced at the frozen Canvas, out in the middle of the street. “Anyone got any vinegar, at least?”

Alicia breathed. “Yeah, got my supply,” she said, thumbing her backpack. “If we can get to the poor devil, that is… Oh, shit.”

“What?” said Stephan. “What is it?!”

“Another Imperial unit on the other side. We’re fucked.”

As if to punctuate that, a stream of purple liquid lanced through a gap in the parking structure, splattering upon the ceiling. Stephan ducked away reflexively, despite his armour’s protection.

“Alright,” Bauer said. “We can get to a sky-bridge out. We’ll–”

“We’ll be huge targets if we do that,” Daniel said.

“Well, we have to–” Stephan started. His voice trailed off.

Because right in front of them, wings flapping gently, was a pink alicorn with a purple, pink, and yellow tail.

‘Wait… There’s only one pony that could be.’

When the Newfoals in the squad saw the alicorn, it was like they shut down. Bauer saw one twitching on the ground, another one foaming at the mouth, and almost uniform looks of shock, horror, and disgust on the faces of the Solar Empire ponies.

Suddenly, everything went pink around the parking structure, the alicorn’s horn glowing. And the Newfoals and Imperial Guards closest to it were flung away.

‘A shield!’

“Is everyone alright?” she asked, but no answer came. For around Stephan, the same, awed expression were on their faces.

“Who…” asked Daniel.

“Das ist doch Cadance,” Alicia said, staring at her in amazement.

“Can’t be,” Starfall said, but he sounded unsure. “Cadance isn’t…”

“... an alicorn,” Stephan Bauer breathed. “How… how did you do it, Cadance?”

And her reply left him only further baffled.

“Ich befürchte, das sei eine lange Geschichte,” the alicorn said in perfect German. “Eins braucht ihr nur zu wissen– ich bin nicht die Cadance, die Sie kennen, aber ich bin da zu helfen. Ich suche den Major Stephan Bauer, mit einer Nachricht vom Kapitän Alexander Reiner.”

“By the Golden Lyre,” said Starfall. “She’s got the Gift of Tongues.”

The mysterious alicorn blinked. “Pardon?”

“You just spoke German,” said Stephan. He stepped forward cautiously, weapon unlowered. “I’m Major Bauer. And you spoke in my native tongue.”

“I did?” the alicorn said, surprised. “I’ve never heard of German. I just heard your friend over there speaking… differently, and it seemed the most natural way to address you, sir.”

~ New York City, USA ~

The whole situation, Cheerilee presumed, was still up in the air. Here she stood, at the head of her staff, in the PHL war room. The UNAC leadership must have received the same feedback from Boston. Though communications had indeed gone dark, fleeting images and frantic broadcasts still made it out through cracks in the Imperial shield-dome.

And they all told the same dissonant, bizarre story.

There was an alicorn in Boston, engaged in a life-or-death duel with a dragon. Or rather, there were two alicorns. One of whom stood right here in this room.

The plasma TV screen did not flicker, and it remained paused in one peculiar shot – that of a pink, armour-clad alicorn flying through the streets, towards UNAC positions. And there was no mistaking that mark of hers, too.

Cheerilee turned to face Cadance. Lady Cadance, who was standing right here, whose presence in New York could be confirmed by no less than three hundred attendees at the UN.

And she looked just as bewildered as Cheerilee herself felt.

“I… I don’t understand,” Cadance spoke, saying what lay on the mind of each and every single person in this underground room.

“Yeah, well,” Vinyl said, her usual snarkiness gone, her red eyes equally confused. “That’s… that’s an understatement.”

“Changeling?” Gladmane spoke out. “Could be a straggler.”

Moondancer shook her head. “Chrysalis’ Hive is dead,” said the bookish unicorn. “And if there were any that could mimic an alicorn, they would’ve been taken a long time ago. No… no, this is something else.”

Cheerilee got up, moved around her seat, and gripped it by the headrest.

“Doctor,” she said. Time Turner blinked as Cheerilee faced him. “If we have any way to get reconnaissance into Boston, now’s the time to pull a rabbit out of your hat.”

But something stirred, she felt. Something else changed in the air, before Turner could reply.
And who else but Bonbon should suddenly be standing in front of the plasma screen, against the backdrop of Not-Cadance. Standing behind the vacant chair with the sign of a golden lyre.

Moondancer was first to react.

“Bonbon?” she spoke, heading to seize her by the shoulder. “What are you doing here?”

“Wait, how– how’d she get in?” blustered Spitfire. “Secu–”

And then the Oracle spoke, not in her own voice. Her eyes glowed white.

Cheerilee just heard Cadance tell Moondancer something about hold on, she’d seen this before, then the voice reverberated throughout the room and within their heads.

“Have no fear, Miss Cheerilee,” Bonbon said. “The Princesses Luna and Mi Amore Cadenza have joined the battle on your side. And they are here at Captain Reiner’s request.”

“Look sharp!” barked Corporal Red Shift, as he and his fire-team moved spread out into a perimetre around Langone Park. “We gotta keep a tight vigil!”

While all knew they would be outclassed if the dark alicorn reappeared, Captain Timber’s instructions had been clear. Every inch they could deny her was worth its weight in crystal. And there wasn’t just her to protect the site from. Given how active this city was? They had to hurry.

For Captain Timber, for the Archmage, for Equestria.

‘Besides, I may get a promotion.’ Shift thought, stopping to signal his fire-team to take cover. ‘Heh. To think, this place was someone’s home once.’

Shift had been in Boston before. Back before the war even started. He’d happened upon this city while traveling across America’s Eastern Seaboard. Funnily enough, it was the history that had got him interested. A revolutionary history, that was almost a reverse of Griffonstone’s, he’d thought then.

Griffonstone. Not the most picturesque of places, at least before the Restoration. But still, there had always been something special about griffons for neighbours, a stone’s throw across the sea from dear Fillydelphia...

‘Maybe we could save some of it.’ Shift thought, motioning for halt a moment, before nodding at his fire-team to resume their pursuit. ‘Maybe as a display of man’s wasted potential, their failures in the aftermath of war. It would be educational, at least. Besides, erasing everything would probably doom us to repeating it, or–’

“Lost visual, sir!” called out one of his team, an earthpony stallion, shaking Red Shift out of his thoughts.

“What was that, Private?”

“We’ve lost visual, sir,” the private repeated. The team closed formation without command, as their training had dictated.

Red Shift focused himself. He and his closest units were currently situated a street named ‘Foster Street’. He needed to act quickly before anything else might happen. Especially seeing how reconnaissance stated the HLF still held ground in this part of the city.

‘And I’m not keen on getting tortured...’

Red Shift turned to another private, a unicorn. “Private Cosmos, use a deviner spell to get us back on track. We need to regain visual immediately.”

“Yes, sir.” Private Cosmos said, closing his eyes to ready his horn and cast the spell.

However, it was then that the coat on Red Shift’s back began to stick up.

‘Something’s wrong.’

His eyes began to itch as he searched for what his sixth sense was yelling at him.

“Sir?” the earthpony private said.

“On your guard, all of you.” Red Shift replied, still looking.

“Sir?”

“We’re not alone!” Red Shift snapped, his team understanding immediately and now looking for themselves while Cosmos continued working on his spell.

The threat had to be around here somewhere–

‘What was that?’

Something landed near his hooves. Looking down, Shift saw something that made him froze. He’d been briefed about human explosives. Despite their small size, grenades were deadly and came in all kinds of variants.

It was little wonder the Bearer of Laughter had tried her own spin on it.

If Red Shift had a moment, he could have ordered his team to take cover. Or ordered Cosmos to try and contain it. Or dived for it and tried to shield his team from the attack. Or–

“Aaaahhhh!”

They all screamed as soon as it went off. Except what erupted from the small device wasn’t a conflagration or blades or needles. No, what instead resulted was a bang that left the entire fire team blind, deaf and disoriented.

What Red Shift had forgotten was that humanity had developed a type of grenade that wasn’t immediately deadly. No, this explosive was none other than a flashbang, employed to disorient and confuse its victims.

Had this been a flashbang, Shift’s team would have had a chance at recovery within a minute if they were lucky, with only a terrible ringing noise in their ears for some time after.

Except this wasn’t a flashbang, or rather, it was a different take on the concept. UNAC had commissioned the PHL R&D for a type of explosive that would disorient enemy troops only. And since Equestrians were known to have magic, in theory, it shouldn’t be difficult to create a type of flashbang that would disorient them by screwing with their magic.

Of course, the problem there was how to avoid ‘friendly fire’ on allied Equestrians. The very existence of PHL R&D owed itself to this not being a mere war of the races. So when that little hurdle had proven harder to overcome than expected, the anti-magic flashbang had never gone beyond prototype stage.

Unfortunately for Red Shift and his team, their assailant had no qualms about indiscriminately using such in the field, and did have the contacts to obtain a few.

‘Wh– what…’ Red Shift thought, struggling to open his eyes. His head was killing him. ‘What w-was…’

There was a dull sound in the distance. He couldn’t make it out…

‘N-Need… N-Need to…’ Thoughts were struggling to come forward, except they weren’t quite his thoughts. ‘Need to… check on my– finish the– no, no. I need to…’

Another dull sound. Still so far away, but it was closer this time.

‘We’re…’ Red Shift struggled to push himself up. ‘Why c-can’t I think…?’

Another dull sound, but it was starting to get clearer. Maybe his ears were working after all. Now if only his head wasn’t killing him…

‘What–’ Red Shift thought as he began to finally find himself.

He was still in the middle of Foster Street, in the human city of Boston. His snout was bleeding, his head was killing him and it was hard to think. And his team–

CRACK.

The sound shocked him awake, at least as awake as he could be right now.

“Make them pay,” a voice whispered, “gotta make them pay.”

‘Finish the– Who’s there?’ Shift thought with some difficulty as he forced himself to look towards his team–

“My team,” Red Shift whispered, as he saw all four of his comrades. Dead.

CRACK.

And the one responsible had just finished shooting Cosmos in the head, using a high-powered rifle. The attacker was dressed in military fatigues, including a blue helmet with the letters ‘UN’ marked in white on the front. A couple strands of golden hair hung loose under the rim of the helmet.

“Y-You…” he whispered. “What did you…”

Standing over Cosmos’ dead body, the human figure glanced at him, making him freeze at what he saw. It was her eyes. Cold, unfeeling, dead eyes. Green eyes whose light had been long since snuffed out by a great and terrible pain. A pain that still ached.

Red Shift could tell everything about this human female by just one look. And it wasn’t her own people that had done this to her. No, the look in her eyes, aimed squarely at him and the dead in his team, told of a hatred destined only for them.

Had they done this? Were they the ones responsible for her pain?

‘Why…’ Realisation began to consume him, before he felt himself drowning in horror. ‘We’re doing this. We’ve done this to them. All of them. We… we’re Chrysalis. We’re Sombra. We’re the Storm King, we–’

“What, who–” the words came out of his mouth clumsily. She glowered at him.

“Die curious.”

Red Shift couldn’t say anything. There wasn’t time to even try and face penance for all that they had done. All he could do was what he and most of Equestria had been doing for years.

Just close his eyes, and–

CRACK.

* * * * *

“Starstruck! Hurry up with that, will ya!” shouted Green Sprout. “We don’t have the time for it!”

“Yeah, yeah, I heard you the first time!” said Scootaloo, her teeth gritted. Her wings, reliable as they were, struggled against the wooden crate. And the scout’s incessant yelling was of no help.

“Give it a rest, Sprout,” Fleetfoot rebuked the earthpony. Though he had experience, like any who’d fought on Earth as part of the Imperial Recovery Division, Scootaloo privately thought the ‘Trailblazer’ as green as his name. “Not exactly a planned mission, is it?”

Scootaloo swallowed her pride and kept pushing.

Of course she felt grateful none had died in the crash, though it had pained her when she’d found one of her cadets with a broken wing. Whistle Stop was currently being tended to by the Trailblazers’ medic, a crusty hippogriff named Salty Breeze, who’d ordered the cadet and her three fellows to stay put.

It had seemed harsh, but the poor cadets all looked pale and frightened. While extra hooves might be welcome, it’d help no-one if they couldn’t move Discord’s statue for shaking...

And grateful she was, too, that Captain Plow and his Trailblazers had been so swift to find them. These were troopers who spent day and night risking their lives in the heart of hostile terrain. No, Scootaloo couldn’t complain.

With the original crate all smashed up, they’d wasted precious time just moving Discord into a new one, a miraculously-intact surplus from aboard the sky-boat. At least that part was over, thank Celestia. Not so much because of the statue’s weight, but applying hooves to Discord’s petrified frame had left her with a deep, physical unease.

Green Sprout grumbled, and walked away. Fleetfoot moved over beside her, and with a tug and push from them both, the crate was pushed further towards the shore.

“You okay there, Starstruck?”

“I’m okay,” Scootaloo replied. Wiping sweat from her brow, she leaned upon the crate. “Just…”

“... Overwhelmed?” Fleetfoot added, and Scootaloo nodded. “I getcha, girl. One time you’re in boot camp, next you’re with the Wonderbolts.”

“Three years and I’m still never used to it, gah,” Scootaloo bemoaned. “I almost want to thankSpitfire.”

Fleetfoot sighed. “She might be a Betrayer, but it’s just not the same without her.”

Scootaloo nodded. At the beginning of this war, a considerable amount of Wonderbolts had been among the Stranded, stuck on this strange mudball where the weather and Sun moved all on their own. Soarin’, for example, had been near the Great Lakes, marveling at some of the winter storms.

Spitfire had not been. First opportunity she’d gotten after various “Peacekeeping actions” on Earth after the Purple Winter, she’d put together a squadron of selected elites and others, volunteered for a suicide mission in France, and surrendered to the locals. It had gutted the command structure of the Wonderbolts, but it had left Rainbow Dash, then Wing Commander, the most logical choice for leadership. Which also drew in a glut of new recruits.

“Don’t tell her I said this,” Fleetfoot continued, “but Captain Dash still misses her just a bit.”

Scootaloo wasn’t surprised. “She’s not the only one. No regrets, though... it’s what I always wanted, isn’t it?”

Fleetfoot laughed. “Like you said, every week, every day, every hour,” she said, nudging Scootaloo. “C’mon, I’ll help ya with that, the Captain’s waiting.”

Truth was, until rescue arrived, there wasn’t much of a place they could push the crate to. Langone Park, like most parks, consisted mainly of greenery – turned grey and bare in the harsh winter – and concrete paths. Their best hope was that a sky-boat could use one of those wide paths as a landing zone, so this was where they were pushing the crate – well aware of how in the open they were.

“Okay,” Scootaloo panted, after a few more pushes. “I think that’s as far as we go.”

Around them, Sprout and four other Trailblazers were forming a small circle.

“Yeah. Now all we can do is wait for that boat,” Fleetfoot nodded. “And pray the Archmage can keep them distracted long enough with her dragon…”

“I’ll go check on Whistle Stop,” said Scootaloo.

Exiting the fragile protective circle, Scootaloo headed for the treeline, under which the wounded cadet was still being looked over by Salty. The medic nodded curtly, then returned to bandaging the cadet’s wing, while her friends stared anxiously.

“Hey there, Whistle,” Scootaloo said gently, kneeling. “How are you coping?”

The little white pegasus bit back a grimace and bravely tried to smile. “I’ll pull through. Thanks, Starstruck.” She was a little hesitant, still not used to calling her teacher by her nickname. “Besides, if something goes wrong… I can always be like you, right?”

Scootaloo glanced back at the contraption she wore.

Crystal-forged and charmed, the harness allowed her what she’d dreamt of since she was a filly – flight, by her own power and will. And it was liberating. Gone were the days of chasing after her idol on her scooter, dreaming of the wind in her wings.

“Of course,” she told Whistle, smiling faintly.

Now she flew besides Rainbow Dash, proud and dutiful, a loyal protege of the three years she’d been in service.

Salty Breeze coughed, staring at something up the parkway. “Easy, cadet. Looks like we won’t have to cut off your wing just yet,” he said gruffly. “Cavalry’s arrived.”

There was some low-level whooping from the cadets, which Salty instantly shushed. But Scootaloo could have joined them as she saw the sky-boat, coloured the soft yellow tones of the Fillydelphia Regiments, drifting gracefully between the trees and up the path.

They were flying low. With luck, the humans wouldn’t have seen them in a half-abandoned city.

Rainbow Dash flew down, hovering in mid-air to greet the boat as it lowered its ramp.

“Twilight!” she grinned. Scootaloo’s heart skipped a beat. “Well, I’ll be! Took ya long enough!”

The Lady Archmage, flanked by a blue-eyed officer clad in regular Guard armour, descended the ramp, and Dash swept in to pull her into a crushing hug.

“Is that the package?” Twilight asked once they’d pulled apart, indicating the encircled crate. When Dash eagerly nodded, she said, “Good job, Rainbow. Any casualties?”

“One cadet, broken wing,” Dash said, her grin fading. “But that’s about it.”

“We don’t have much time, Rainbow,” Twilight said. “Captain Timber here dropped off some troops to keep the area clear,” she explained, to a nod from the blue-eyed officer, “but Princess Luna’s still loose. And we’ve got another problem. Cadance is here.”

“Huh? But–”

“Their Cadance,” Twilight cut her off. “She’s fully-powered and twice as dangerous, at the very least. Rainbow, the boat won’t be fast enough. We need to load up Discord, but once that’s done, I’ll ‘port you across the river.”

Dash gawped at her. “You even got the mojo for that, Twi’? After you and Shining already ‘ported the ship?”

“I should have enough ‘portation mana left for this. Now, let’s hurry.”

The Lady Archmage lit her horn, aura surrounding the crate to lift it with ease. Steadily, it levitated above the concrete path to ascend the ship’s ramp…

The lodestone on Captain Timber’s breastplate crackled, glowing red. He stared at it in alarm.

“Breach!” he exclaimed. “That was Red Shift’s unit. Ma’am, we’re going to have company.”

In the dead trees further along the path, Scootaloo’s sharp eyes caught something. “I think we’ve already got it.”

Evidently, she was not alone in noticing. Arriving from behind the landed sky-boat, the earthpony captain of this unit of Trailblazers came rushing up the concrete path.

Oaken Plow was the veteran of numerous daring recoveries on Earth, and he looked afraid.

“Positions, now!” he called. “No time to waste!”

Yet there wasn’t that much cover. Concealment, yes, but Rainbow Dash and her own experiences had told her about how easily human weaponry could tear through wood like paper. And all around this ruined park, there were only trees… and whatever it was that lurked within the darkness.

Moving up, Fleetfoot readied her spear. So did the Trailblazers who moved ahead, with the unicorn of the group using his horn as a beacon.

“Whistle Stop...” Scootaloo muttered. She ran to Captain Timber. “Captain, I need a stretcher! One of my cadets is hurt, you must get her onboard, now!”

“Will do, Miss,” Timber said grimly. He called into the sky-boat. “Medic!”

Then came the scream.

A scream, and a clattering crash of armour as a Trailblazer was thrown back onto the concrete.

Green Sprout barely had time to shout, right before it emerged from the trees – a shadowy, ethereal alicorn, clad in black obsidian armour.

The clouds parted above, illuminating her in moonlight. Nightmare Moon.

“Greetings,” she said impassively. “I believe you have something of mine.”

“Over our dead bodies!” yelled Plow. “Trailblazers! Cover the Archmage!”

A spear was thrown, but the alicorn cast it aside easily with a flick of her horn. A second flew forwards, passing harmlessly through the mist that comprised the alicorn.

Scootaloo saw Twilight almost lose her grip on the crate, helpless to interfere while she focused on getting Discord onto the boat.

“Relinquish your custody,” the alicorn stated. “And no fighting will be necessary.”

“Traitor!” Scootaloo cried, though she found her voice far, far too shrill against the dark alicorn’s booming voice. “Come and get it, then!”

She moved in front of Rainbow Dash.

“Scootaloo, what are you–”

Before the alicorn could move, something struck at her, bouncing off her armour – a bolt of lavender light.

‘Twilight?’ Scootaloo thought, startled into looking back.

The Lady Archmage had let go of the crate, dropping it just before the ramp. She was galloping, firing off spells as she went.

The alicorn recoiled, and dissipated at the face of this onslaught, retreating into the trees.

“Dash,” shouted Twilight, “forget the boat entirely! I’m opening up a portway to Charlestown!”

Lending credence to her words came a spark in the air, which swirled and expanded into an orange-rimmed, upright halo that manifested in front of the dropped crate. On one side of the halo was Langone Park – the other side led to a different part of town.

“Go!” Twilight yelled. To Scootaloo’s shock, she was sweating beneath her illuminated horn. The effort this was costing her must be tremendous. “It’s right there! All you have to do is give the crate a last push, and you’re home safe! Captain Timber, get them all to safety!”

“Aye, Lady Archmage!” the blue-eyed officer yelled back. “Medics,” he called to Salty and the brown pegasus helping Whistle onto a stretcher, “the cadets go first… And we push that blasted box in after you!” A somber pause overcame him. “Red Shift…”

“Your corporal’s already dead,” Twilight said softly. “I’m sorry, Captain Timber.”

He just nodded, wordlessly, then began directing the evacuation.

While all this was happening, Twilight fired another blast into the trees, setting a grove ablaze. The blaze cast new shadows. Some of them, in Scoot’s eyes, seemed to grow lengthier, by no natural light.

Twilight cast a dome around them, the boat and the glowing portal. She cried out, showing pain.

“Twi’, no!” Dash shouted into her ear. “You’re draining yourself! You won’t have enough strength left to face her!”

“Someone’s gotta hold her off,” Twilight winced. “Rainbow… Fly. Keep the statue safe, and I’ll be back with you soon. Get it to the Queen. Nothing else matters, not even me.”

Something passed Rainbow Dash’s eyes, Scootaloo saw. But then she nodded, and beckoned Plow and his Trailblazers to follow. The medics and cadets, including Whistle, had already gone. One by one, they stepped through, each giving the crate a push further. Sprout took the lead, Timber and Fleetfoot brought up the rear. Each and every one of them paid Twilight a salute.

And just as Scootaloo was about to go last, holding onto Dash’s hoof, the enemy returned.

Above their heads, the dome cracked, darkness engulfing it. Twilight’s magic flickered, and the Lady Archmage almost collapsed. The magic in the air cried and screeched, yet somehow, Scootaloo made her voice heard.

“Twilight!” she shouted. She let go of Rainbow Dash, despite the other mare’s yells. The portway began to flicker.

Yet Twilight remained calm as she would in a parade. She turned around.

“I got this, Scoots,” Twilight said, with a pained smile. “You need to go.”

Her horn glowed brighter. The enemy’s assault continued on her dome, a torrent of encompassing darkness.

“Twilight, no– you can’t! Please–”

“I’ll be fine, and that’s a promise,” Twilight’s voice was dissonantly serene. Somehow, Scootaloo could hear a certain pink pony gasp. “Now– Go!”

And Scootaloo felt herself pulled back, Rainbow Dash’s grasp taking her through the portway. Dash pulled so hard, they both fell on their backs, their armour clanging, in a heap at the foot of the wooden crate.

Her comrades’ shouts went unheard, for she stood and looked, seeing the Lady Archmage on the other side of the portway. Her horn glowed bright, but the dome had yielded. And the alicorn, back in her true, armour-clad form, was advancing.

“Twilight!”

Then the portway winked out of existence, and there was nothing else to see.

* * * * *

As the light closed, taking the Imperial Guard with it, Luna stopped dead in her tracks.

“It’s over, Luna!” the Archmage yelled. “Discord’s on his way home. You failed!”

‘Failed…’

The words stung deep. She had indeed failed. From the moment she’d showed up and broken her cover. From the moment she’d been held in a gilded cage. From the moment her unlikely companion was turned to stone.

Her gaze turned from where the portway had been, besides the discarded yellow sky-boat, to the unicorn who stood before her. Panting, sweating, her magical defenses gone, her armour cracked, her helmet ajar, and hunched in her stance – Luna saw only defiance in her eyes. And something like triumph.

Around the Archmage, orichalcum shards conjured into view, reforming as one sword. Luna cast her own, the silver metal gleaming in the moonlight.

“You’re right,” Luna said. She stomped a hoof. “I did fail. As you did me. My other self.”

Something brimmed in the Archmage’s eyes. Was that regret?

“Was that all a lie, then?” Luna said bitterly. “The Empire, your cause… and… you?”

The Archmage said nothing. No, that was not good enough. Whatever it was, whatever she might say or not… it had to end here.

“Yield, yield, damn you!” the Archmage hissed, raising her sword.

“Never,” said Luna. With a concussive blast from her horn, she struck the Archmage’s helmet, shattering her concentration. The enemy’s sword fell apart, and the Archmage stood alone. “Not until I have my answers, Twilight.”

She advanced. The Archmage stood where she was.

“And you won’t get them,” she replied. Her horn glowed. The shards were rising once again. “I promised the Queen I’d return with you, or die trying. And I’ll do it either way!”

A shard flew. Right then, Luna disintegrated into blue mist. The shard went through harmlessly. Her shadowy gaze fell squarely upon her target.

Redheart’s mind, warded from her, had been like tar. The Archmage’s mind would be, too.

But no wall was truly solid. Always there were cracks in its shifting state. Truly, what was that to formless mist? A risky endeavour, for her misty state could be blown away and dissipated in a protected mind, should she weaken in her resolve. Yet one she would do nonetheless. And at the heart of the form she’d assumed, something solid remained. The tuft of Twilight’s own mane.

The Archmage’s eyes widened.

“You wouldn’t–”

‘Oh, yes I would.’

She braced herself, and lunged forwards, shadow-tendrils grasping at the Archmage. The door to the mind lay wide open. While Twilight screamed in fear and rage, Luna let that small piece of her guide the way as she stepped into the void.

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

This chapter features no noteworthy modifications.

Spectrum 2.0 - August 18th 2019

Sledge115: Phew! Sorry for the delays, but planning out a chapter this long is an effort by itself, and an action-filled one too at that, heh. Believe me, it’s pretty hard to balance out Luna’s battle with the human POVs, and ultimately some had to be trimmed, not to mention the pacing.

Cadance, surprisingly enough, was a late, late addition, quite literally right before we wrote down the full outline of Act Two. As for the Archmage, well, the decision wasn’t made from the beginning of the story, either. But hey, it worked out just fine :twilightsmile:

Spike… the question was easy enough, really. What if the Blue Spy hadn’t found him in time?

Yes, Twilight’s last stand is framed as a heroic one.

And here we are, with Luna stepping into her realm. What horrors await, I cannot say for sure. But buckle up, we’re in for a ride.

DoctorFluffy: So, I feel the need to mention this: The erratic, extremely poorly-spelled part with Spike’s thoughts is intentional. I wanted it to be erratic, frantic, poorly spelled… so I typed it as poorly as I could. Believe it or not this was actually a lot of work.

VoxAdam: Behold, this is the first true action chapter of our story.

I mainly worked on helping to make sure events flowed sequentially throughout, trying to keep each of the Imperials’ actions a direct consequence or response to what came before. It’s one of my many disliked tropes regarding villains in fight scenes, particularly video games, when it’s as if they’re just popping out of the woodwork like figures on a shooting range.

Thankfully, the effort was helped by the fact this is also a chapter which, at last, shows us events from the Imperial POV. :twilightsmile:

Now Cadance makes her entrance, and contact is established on Earth between Sunny Equestria and humanity along with its allies…

Act II ~ Chapter Seventeen ~ Thus, Lift Me Up

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy
Some people. Some people like cupcakes exclusively while myself I say there is not, nor ought there be, no food so exalted on the face of God’s great earth as that prince of foods… THE MUFFIN

VoxAdam

Sledge115
Some people move on. But not us.

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

Chapter Seventeen
Thus, Lift Me Up

* * * * *

She had locked something away, something deep inside.The truth that she had once known but she chose to forget. She couldn't break free. So I decided to search for it. Going deep into the recess of her mind, and found that secret place.
— Dominic Cobb, Inception

But such is the way of the limelight, it sweetly
Takes hold of the mind of its host
And that foolish pony did nothing to stop
The destruction of one who had needed her most.
— Lullaby for a Princess

~ Boston, USA ~ November 15th, 2024 CE ~

As much as one Viktor Kraber had declared they’d be dragon-hunting, reality set in, and there were no dragons to be had. At least, none in the vicinity. Following Harwood’s and Lieutenant Ze’ev’s instructions, she and Frieda had split from the rest, trusted to fulfill their role as snipers who’d clear the area around Langone Park of any and all Imperial stragglers. For here they knew the target they sought was last spotted. And now, even if it was that sort of company, she found herself missing them all. Especially Harwood.

“It’s clear,” Frieda said, rejoining her side from her scouting.

Not for the first time, Ana was jealous of her partner’s flight, for her own feet were aching from all the walking and crouching and whatnot. Crossing Boston largely on foot from Prudential Tower and the hotel district, complete with that Imperial altercation at Assembly Point Sierra, to then get where they were now at the Museum of African-American History –none of it had been a walk in the park. Even if they had traversed the Boston Public Gardens.

And, speaking of parks...

“Just another ten minutes, Ana,” said Frieda. “Langone Park should be at the end of the street.”

“I got you,” Ana said. But doubt lingered on. “We’re… we’re sure this is where she was, right?”

Frieda nodded. “Yeah. I think so.”

The Archmage’s dragon had done a terrifyingly efficient job of cleaning house, Ana reflected. While Harwood, mindful of duty to the end, had directed the rest of the group in a search for potential survivors, the plumes of green flame dotting the horizons above the city’s skyline told a much different story. In the Boston Downtown and Back Bay alone, the PHL and National Guard’s safehouses had each gone silent one by one – Prudential, the Orpheum Theater, the Double Tree by Hilton Hotel. The Massachusetts State House, just a block away. Fenway Park.

Ana had to swallow as her throat ran dry. Fenway Park was where Major Stephan Bauer and his Teutonic Knights were stationed. Harwood had been meant to integrate them next week… Had this been only a few days later...

She held her radio to her mouth. “This is Nordlys, en route to Langone Park. Is anyone out there, over?”

Thankfully, a reply came soon enough.

“Lieutenant Ze’ev reporting. Hearing you loud and clear, Nordlys, Do you see the priority target, over?”

‘Good to know she’s straight to the point, I suppose.’

“Negative, no sight of her yet,” Ana reported. “We’re approaching Langone Park, over.”

“Understood. Keep track of the HVT, Nordlys, over and out.”

With Ze’ev’s voice gone, Ana found herself with that lingering doubt, once again. Killing had never been in her blood, or her life before the war. To do so without a second thought… well, at the very least, she’d always had the hesitation.

She called herself a shield, often. Perhaps it sounded better in her head. What sort of shield doubled as a spear?

This was Archmage Twilight, she reminded herself. The Solar Tyrant’s second-in-command. One of the architects of the entire god-forsaken war. She needed to do it.

‘Needed to do it…’ the voice inside her head echoed, and Ana wondered if it was to convince herself, too.

“Alright, you ready?” Frieda asked. Her talons gripped her rifle tightly.

Ana nodded. “Let’s go.”

The answer had been clear, after all. Ambassador Heartstrings would have done it. And so the night went on in the light of battle, as Ana with Frieda by her side pushed her way through to Langone Park.

~ Between Evening’s Shelves and Absent Dust ~

The Princess of the Night stood alone at dusk. Here, true to the sleeping one’s name, the realm was in eternal twilight. Stars flickered in the dark above, but from one look at them, Luna knew many weren’t where they should be. Her Moon was missing, too, its cold, encompassing presence absent from the skies.

‘Look around, breathe.’ Luna thought.

Much like the dreams of many, this was an imitation of home. But something wasn’t right.
A dream should be bustling with activity, and this shadow of Ponyville was anything but bustling. Storefronts were empty of goods, the doors and windows of all houses were shut and barred, not a soul stirred within or without. Even the village’s colours were dull and faded. From the corner of her eye, Luna could have sworn whole buildings vanished into a featureless fog. It put her in mind of a canvas with a limited draw distance...

All buildings, save for one.

She tore her gaze away from the decrepit town hall, and beheld the only true splash of colour. A bulky oak tree that was also a house, the library Twilight called home. Its lush green foliage provided the only source of life, abund and vibrant, in the entire area. A sight like that was practically inviting her to approach...

A cold breeze rose. From the library-tree, a leaf detached and danced past Luna’s mane. Despite her coat, Luna felt a shiver. Here, the air was illusionary, but the unwelcome feeling that brushed her senses was very real, akin to a Winter from her childhood of long ago, which she had sought to cast out of her own dreams.

‘I should hurry,’ Luna thought, casting another look at her surroundings.

As far as her eyes could see, she was alone in this facsimile of Ponyville. For the moment.

Breathing in a lungful of this strange air, a reassuringly physical gesture, Luna journeyed towards the look-alike of Golden Oaks Library. She would have answers.

Yet she may have heard something else, some whisper in the wind that reminded her of that Winter in her childhood.

Luna shook her head, in the ancestral way that a horse shakes off a fly, and opened the door. She knew not of the speaker, nor the word spoken with melancholy and regret both, which passed in the cold night.

‘Princess…’

* * * * *

Something was amiss within the library.

Nothing was ever truly right in this realm. Why should one expect the library be any different? Yet, back in the waking world, the smaller world Twilight had made for herself inside the golden oak tree was one defined, above all, by hominess.

Luna stood in a circular room, as she would in the Library of Ponyville. Books lay neatly placed upon shelves carved into the wood of the tree, with a pair of double doors at the far end.

This soon proved to be the end of familiarity, as with great curiosity, Luna strode through the rotunda to push open those doors. And felt them close behind her, as she found herself in a rotuna identical but for the replacement of the shelves with yet more doors.

Frowning, Luna cautiously nudged one doorway, then another.

Already it was hard to say which door she’d come in from. Each doorway led down the same path of rows upon rows of bookshelves. She would have wagered that all rows came to criss-cross, deeper into the library.

It was, all of it, too clean. No speck of dust anywhere. The wood practically glowed with varnish. Barely a sign of wear on any of the books.

‘And where is the librarian?’ Luna wondered simply.

She could have dwelt here endlessly, in the safety of the central rotunda. But Luna was no tourist, for she knew what she sought.

Her horn shone, unveiling the tuft of purple mane she’d held in her null-space, a useful pocket in here in the dream realm as in the waking world. She drew it to her, and assigned it purpose.

‘Guide me.’

It glowed with the aura of Twilight. Luna followed its overwhelming pull.

The tuft of mane guided Luna onwards, helping her make way through rows of shelves filled by many tomes. In her eyes, the shelves old and new alike, various stages of ageing superimposed upon one another like a transparent photograph, the varnish of the wood bespeaking the bright polish of novelty and the dark preservation of age at once.

She recalled what she’d told the human warrior at the hospital. The mind was a valley, invisible to all including its owner – how many people can truly look inward? Memory was true, but in the mind’s valley, how quick could self-interest and improvisation be to churn it up. From this soil it was that dreams emerged.

At least, this was her favoured way of looking at it, a garden. But a dreamer’s mind was the reservoir of their memories, and so adapted to reflect the dreamer. Some might keep scrolls. Others stored mirrors that showed glimpses into their past. Twilight’s, of course, was of books.

Here and there, Luna spied scant details of the tomes by their spines.

As in any library, the shelves were divided into sections, with such attributes as genres or themes linking them together. Differing as the titles did, many began with the same, common preliminary Twilight’s Book of–, and the difference lay in subtitles that followed.

Guided by Cadance’s magic, Luna had entered this wing of the library on faith. She now noticed the tomes she passed by were mainly focused on Twilight’s studies in Canterlot. Many bore the terms Studying at Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns, but at a variety of levels. Luna had to chuckle at this. In the hospital, after all, she’d told Lyra the mind was not something to be leisurely read. Evidently, she had underestimated Twilight's need to organise. This would make one facet of her search easier.

If only she could hope the same for the rest.

‘I do not know what I was expecting...’ Luna contemplated as she continued following the tuft. ‘Tia did warn me… well, now I know, I suppose.’

All of a sudden, her guide in this endless aisle came to a stop. Bemused, Luna watched it float to rest gently upon the spine of a nearby book. A small volume, but of an unusual colour compared to those surrounding it. A rich blue Luna found oddly familiar.

On instinct, she summoned the book thus marked, trusting her descendant’s magic in this place. Then she saw the book’s title.

Our First Nightmare Night in Ponyville, were the words that proudly adorned the cover and imagery of said night. Luna saw herself depicted in the artwork, an unsure look on her face, walking up the path to a cottage by moonlight. Here too was she guided –by Twilight, a younger mare than the greying Archmage, yet dressed up to look far older in an unerringly accurate costume of Starswirl the Bearded.

With bated breath, Luna quietly cracked open the book and peered inside.

She saw text, mainly, with a small amount of accompanying illustrations. The layout was like that of a fable committed to the page – whilst those had been new at the time of her exile to the Moon, it had discountenanced Luna to discover such books were now seen as old-fashioned. Nonetheless, she took time to appreciate the finely-sketched retelling of their experiences together that night.

Especially the part, advertised on the cover, when Twilight had spoken advice to her regarding her vocals, leading to her meeting Fluttershy properly for the first time–

“No...” Luna said. She set the book back, delicately. “Think, Luna. This is not what I seek…”

‘Yet it is what I treasure.’ A light smile crept upon her, remembering the laughter shared at the end of the night, a promise to visit, and the gift she had prepared in her garden since. ‘I… should see her again sometime, her and Fluttershy both.’

Of its own accord, the tuft returned to her. The sight of it, however, made Luna think of another thing in conjunction with that night and this one.

‘Discord…’ she reflected uneasily. ‘Could there still be a way to rescue him? The Archmage taunted me for my failure, but was she seeking to make me give up? How can I ever explain it to Fluttershy, if this is how I repay her kindness…’

She moved on. The unending rows changed and shifted, the books displayed different titles of various arrangements.

Very soon, however, the tuft again came to a stop.

Luna waited, thinking it would lead her to a new book, but it stayed, hovering in a weightless air where by all rights, motes of dust should have clustered around it like a constellation. Frowning, Luna turned to inspect the book closest to her. Immediately, it caught her eye.

This one was emblazoned with the title Of the Crystal Realm, & The War of the Dark King. The cover pictured Twilight dressed in armour upon a hilltop, from which she looked towards a city in the distance. By the spire of the Citadel, Luna could make out the outline of the Realm. Yet it was a Citadel swathed in menacing shadow.

‘The Crystal War...’

In the week leading to the Concordia, Alexander Reiner had evoked, here and there, the tragedy which transpired between the Crystal Realm and Equestria. But his knowledge was ‘third-hand’ at best, he himself had acknowledged, passed on to him from Ambassador Heartstrings and a few souls who’d chosen to throw in with the losing side of a new war.

Heart in her throat, Luna opened the book and braced herself–

* * * * *

“... You need to hold out just a minute longer, Rarity!”

Her cry rebounds inside the envelope of her friend’s intricate, diamond-shaped shield. It will be lost in the noise of the battle. The same battle in which this shield, elegant as it is, can offer but meager protection. Their enemy is upon them. The enemy bears two faces. One is the monster – the face of fear, yet fear to be stamped out, without sorrow. The other is not so lightly faced.

Before her eyes, beyond this rampart that is more curtain than wall, a golem of crystal pounds. A being without mind or heart. The grit of battle clings to its surface. Yet it will not die, having never lived. Never, in life or death, will to the stars return the dust from which it was made. From which all are made.

Upon the icy horizon, the Dark King’s shock-troopers approach. Twilight feels thankful that she cannot see their eyes. The sickly green lenses of their helms gleam in the dusk.

Here is the line. They cannot fall back, not after coming this far. The Realm lies yonder the hill.

Behind them, behind the troops which have fought by them, lies a little mining town. They saw fit to liberate it from the Dark King’s forces. New Citizens of the Crystal Realm, the Dark King so euphemistically calls the people of many such little towns. People who were quite happy to rejoin Equestria.

People, and prisoners. They seek to liberate all they can. Yet whatever hold the Dark King exerts over his slaves is not easily banished. Those who were made to bear his helms become prisoners twice over. Kindness is what shall truly free them. Kindness, and laughter, too. Though true laughter is rare in these icy wastes.

How many are the ways the Bearers have failed to shine.

As they guarded the mining town, for a moment, Twilight felt bold, heroic, such as may have eclipsed banishing Discord or seeking out the Elements of Harmony.

Of course, she then remembered. She always remembers.

‘Our fault.’

She did not want to believe it when the Dark King let the power of the Crystal Heart suffuse him, turning him into a creature of roiling shadow. A creature that looks as if it wears the skin of a beast of only superficial resemblance to an equine. And wearing it poorly.

Yet the truth sunk in. As Twilight and her friends rode from that desolate little train station, the truth sunk in.

‘We failed. She failed.’

Cadance, the Crystal Princess. Where others move the spheres, a princess who moves hearts. Never more than half who she was meant to be. Her wings sit folded, impotent, upon her back. Yet to such heights she could soar.

The tragedy of her wedding was an ill omen for Equestria.

Princess Celestia had foresight. They would not be caught unawares by a new fiend. She sent the Bearers armed with their Elements. Hidden in the shadows, Twilight was to later learn, followed Princess Luna. This provided salvation, for them. The Realm was not spared.

The Crystal Princess’s shield did not hold. Again, her beloved fiancé could not help her.

With unbridled horror did Twilight witness her brother and his princess thrown down, once more, by a creature who stole what should be their happiness. The black mist invaded the hallowed Citadel. In desperation, the Elements attempted to strike. But their light was feeble, and broke upon the darkness like water.

“It’s all a matter of perspective.” The Dark King’s voice still speaks in her mind, with eyes that will haunt her dreams. “It seems destiny has decided against you this day.”

A mist of midnight clashed with that pitch-black mist. And against the darkness, the midnight blue was akin to a ray of hope.

For the Night’s Princess made her appearance. Though she would have fought the foe, she knew when a battle cannot be won. Thus all were whisked away whom she could take with her. Gladly would she have stayed for more.

Now Twilight has returned for them.

“I don’t think I can take this much longer.” Rarity’s voice wheezes, pained. Cracks begin to form in the shield. “I’m hitting my limit. This… this is all I can give...”

Twilight’s eyes flash.

‘That’s it!’

Her horn aglow, Twilight brings out the levite-crystal from her saddlebag. Just then, the crystalline golem shatters Rarity’s shield. Her fellow Bearer is forced back, yet still Twilight holds her ground. She will solve this by lateral thinking.

The levite-crystal. A most intriguing rock. In remote places beyond the Crystal Realm, legends talk of floating mountains. As often, the truth is more humble. Yet not without its aura of intrigue. She knows of no mountains that float. She knows of floating rocks.

So often are battles fought to take from the enemy. Crystalline golems show great resilience to the penetration of lead, steel and diamond. But Twilight will not take. She will give.

The shock-troopers continue in their mindless, unrelenting approach.

Twilight pays them no heed. She will devote herself to them in due time. She focuses her mind on the crystalline golem, and the crystal in her grip. She can do this. Before she learned of the Elements of Harmony, she learned the properties of the basic elements.

She wills the levite-crystal and the golem to become one.

“Five, four, three, two, one…”

Her foe bears down upon her. And halts in its tracks, as if blinded by this sudden white light. But Twilight knows it isn’t blindness which halts it. This artificial being is built to reject foreign bodies. It resists shards. It has no defense against fusion.

By happenstance or by design, Twilight has fused the crystal where its heart may have been. And what follows is as she hoped. Small and insignificant does the levite-crystal seem. It carries power enough to raise the golem into the air. Slowly yet inexorably.

The monster flails wretchedly as it leaves the ground. Snow turned to mud billows at its feet.

“Wow, Twilight…”

Even in her exhaustion, Rarity can display awe at a work of beauty. Twilight turns to face her friend and their fighters. She sighs in relief. She smiles, yet her smile is grim.

They have come this far. Here in this little town after year of waking nightmares. Shard-bombings. Berserker-gassings. Incinerations. There are whole stretches of Equestria she has determined will never grow again.

Princess Celestia claimed it was no fault of theirs. Sombra was a threat to both alicorn sisters, even in their prime. Her words did precious little for any of the Elements.

“Come along,” she says, returning to contemplate the dark horde. “We can still save them.”

But in truth, no battle is without loss.

… Eventually Twilight and Rarity return to camp. They feel the weight of their armour.

Only the Moon above casts light upon this desolate scene. Flanked by the troop, the two Bearers have returned with greater numbers than they set out with. Yet so many were still lost. Of those returning from them, many are prisoners, wounded, broken. And all are captive here. Eyes follow Twilight.

She is exhausted yet does not wish for sleep. In her sleep, too, eyes follow her.

Rarity takes on the duty of leading the prisoners to the town hall. Hopefully kindness and laughter will begin their healing. Twilight is in need of her own healing. But no bandage or tonic can give her what she seeks. Nevertheless, her chosen path is to accompany the wounded to a house of medicine.

A striped face greets her, one floor up. And for an instant, her heart lifts. Once, the only zebra she knew of lived hidden away in the Everfree Forest. But in this past year of looming fear and hollow victory, the sight of stripes has grown manyfold in her world.

Equestria is battered. Yet Equestria does not stand alone.

Twilight accepts a pouch of wakewort from the zebra. She retreats to a corner. As she begins to chew on a wakewort leaf, she looks around the ward. Zebras are aplenty, but they were not the first to come to offer aid, nor by far the most numerous.

That honour belongs to the desert horses. They brave this frozen region so anathema to them, out of friendship and principle.

Her own troops count many from both these peoples amongst their ranks. She sees two horses enter the ward, bearing an injured comrade between them. Another zebra stands by the door. Suspicious glances are exchanged surreptitiously. Yet it is only in the blink of an eye. The zebra moves forward to help the horses bear their friend to a bed.

Sighing, Twilight gives the leaf another chew.

“What happened?”

Well-built though she is, Applejack has mastered the art of silent approach. From her corner, Twilight looks up. The two scar-lines running across the right of her friend’s snout and down her left check are as evident as since Manehattan.

The farmer, turned trooper, looks back at her intently.

“We won,” Twilight says emptily. “There was a golem. I found a way to dispose of it quickly. More lives would’ve been lost otherwise, I’m sure…”

Applejack sits down by her. “Is it true what they’re sayin’?” she whispers. “This is it? One last push and we breach the Crystal Realm?”

“The Princess is onto it,” Twilight whispers in turn. “We’ve held onto this town. Sombra’s now backed up against a wall.”

Her friend raps her helmet wearily. Never one to go bare-headed, Applejack rarely takes it off. “But how are we supposed to get past what’s left? Ah doubt even Big Mac could push into that without breakin’.”

“Celestia said she’s got a plan,” says Twilight. “We must keep Sombra distracted long enough for her to pull it off.”

“What plan?” Applejack frowns. “And how much will we lose this time? Twilight, we can’t afford to lose anyone else, not now.”

“Funny how we say that. ‘Anyone else’. A year ago, losing just one friend would’ve been too much, but…”

“Yeah, sugarcube,” Applejack replies, in a voice of bone-deep tiredness. “It’s amazin’ what this has gotten us used to.”

Twilight stands up. “Once Celestia sends word, we shall end this,” she claims, determination creeping into her voice. “We’re this close, so let’s bridge the gap. Are you with me?”

“Till the end,” Applejack says as they stand by each other, “till the end.”

A dull boom is heard. The building quakes. White dust crumbles from the ceiling. Screams of panic rise from outside. Her senses aflame, Twilight rushes to the window. Her best friend follows closely.

What they see is that a Shadow-Crawler has burst from the ground, scattering apart ice and paving-stones. One of the greatest weapons in the Dark King’s arsenal. Luck alone has kept it from bursting through a building.

Given the structure of this one? It has to be a troop transport. And Twilight is proven right as a full squad of shocktroopers eject out of the Shadow-Crawler’s segmented armoured grooves.

She swallows the wakewort. Her joints creak in protest. Why must it be soon after the last fight–

“Wait, something’s wrong,” Applejack says, the hairs on her neck standing straight.

The Shadow-Crawler has frozen. The shock-troopers have frozen. The troopers are frozen mid-step while the crawler has turned silent.

“What’s it doing?”

And then comes a noise. A terrible, mind-bending noise. So dreadful, so loud, the sense of hearing would harm itself to be granted peace.

But as soon as it has begun, it stops. Twilight recovers to see that the ghastly Shadow-Crawler… has vanished. The armoured grooves are all that remained to indicate that it ever existed.

The shock-troopers are down too. They have collapsed, like puppets whose strings were cut. Cautiously, Equestrians and their allies start to amass around them. Eerie silence carries across the town and battlefield.

“Let’s take a closer look,” says Twilight.

As she descends the stairs, Applejack trailing after her, various thoughts and hypotheses race through Twilight’s mind.

Could Sombra have given up? Or did the Crystal Heart reject him? Maybe the Elements actually performed some delayed feat? Is it some combination of these, or a possibility she has not thought of yet?

The two soldiers of Equestria join the throng. Some kind souls have, at their own risk, begun removing the helmets from the shock-troopers. They meet no resistance. The crystalline ponies who were under those helmets just look around, as awakened sleepwalkers would.

A white light pierces the night-time, wintry sky. Twilight’s gaze flits towards it.

An alicorn hovers above. Her own backlight has turned her ivory figure a dark silhouette, yet the prismatic, flowing hue of her mane is unmistakable. And at her horn’s tip, resplendent, she carries a rock shaped like a heart...

‘The Crystal Heart.’ Twilight thinks in awe. ‘Celestia retrieved it! But, then…’

“You needn’t worry about the Dark King any longer, my little ponies, and our dear allies,” Celestia proclaims. Her voice carries, yet her air is solemn. “While his forces protected the Citadel, Sombra tried to flee with the Crystal Heart. I was lucky that I managed to catch him before he could seal himself away, back into the depths of the ice. I sought to make to stand down peacefully, but…”

The Princess pauses before she finishes.

“He tried to attack me wielding his darkest magic. I had no choice but to retaliate in self-defense. He’s gone now, and won’t be coming back.”

‘Just like that?’

Could it be this war which means Twilight feels only scant elation, for now? Is it because she’s become afraid to hope; that she fears Celestia is keeping something from them?

* * * * *

Luna pulled away, gasping. She saw the tome lying open on the floor. As out-of-place in this too-clean a place as a scream in a library. Apprehensively, she peered at it, close as she could without falling back into its pull. Despite the well-kept cover, the intricate gold leaf designs, and the condition of the binding, the pages were… Yellowed. Frayed. Crinkled. As if she could reduce them to dust with a single breath.

“What… was that?”

Those were the first words out of her mouth. Echoing, and dissipating in the endless shelves. Whatever this was, it had forced itself to play out.

No mind she’d ever entered had rendered itself so… structured.

She looked down the aisle, and sighed. Time was of the essence, and she needed to press on.

‘I will find you.’ Luna thought doggedly, continuing her trek.

Her piece of Twilight was her sole compass in here, her sole lantern. The bookshelves stretched far into a murky blue fog. Wooden pillars on either side did occasionally punctuate her path, yet while she saw a dimly chandelier-lit ceiling above, Luna wasn't sure she could ever reach it. In this place, distance felt like a polite suggestion.

Though no two books were the same, all were of a pleasantly uniform binding. The difference lay in the signs of use and disuse. Some tomes were bleached, whereas some were rather well-worn and dog-eared, as if they were commonly read.

How easily one could spend an eternity in here, desperate, mad.

More than once, Luna had to will herself from opening up a new book, left and right. She was Princess of Dreams and inclined to pry, yet there were matters to settle outside of the Archmage’s day-to-day.

Her mind lingered upon the Crystal Realm. Upon Twilight, and her friends. Upon Sombra, that Dark King of smoke and shadow, murderer of her family. And her sister, who had done the unthinkable. Had that been the start of it all, the point where everything changed? What had Twilight not seen? What had Celestia refused to say?

Sombra, for all his deceitful character, could never keep silent in the end. If this were truly his twilight hour, so to speak, he would have spoken. So what might have happened when Celestia tracked him down? Perhaps he had deliberately attacked, knowing to so would be death. And if that was so, why?

The fog stirred. And Luna looked around.

As in the village, there it was. A chill that followed, and swept past her. Her teeth set on edge, Luna almost let go of the tuft. Her vision, ordinarily so sharp where others were blind, was no better at staring back into the fog than staring ahead. Yet she sensed a presence.

Perhaps not a living entity. Perhaps a ward left here to guard, to watch over the Archmage. Perhaps a lot of things.

Uneasily, Luna took a step back. Something creaked. In the gloom, it was hard to tell if her night eyes deceived her. However, her gaze darted toward the shelves hemming her in on either side. She wondered if the space between them had not grown an inch shorter.

Turning tail, Luna quickened her pace and search, but the chill remained. Distinctly, Luna’s ears picked up a sound like a sigh in the fog, blowing softly from behind the bookshelves.

Whereupon Luna stumbled upon an unexpected sight.

In the middle of her path, a book. Not neatly shelved away, not lost in rows of uniformity. Nothing but a simple book, unobtrusive in its purple binding, that blended so readily with the blue fog of the aisle.

Luna stopped. She glanced at the tuft, finding it had also halted its pace. She peered down at the book inquisitively. Surely, no trap could be this grossly blatant. Conversely, mere curiosity was one of the greatest traps.

Her attention returned to the tuft as she saw it lower upon the book. It had been her guide. She would trust the spell’s judgement. Luna knelt, and pondered the cover.

This Dawning Epoch, This Age Of Wonders

Twilight, now divested of armour, and all five of her friends. Where they stood was hard for Luna to place, but it appeared to overlook another city. What grabbed her attention was the look of newfound hope in their eyes – if some ethereal artist did draw these illustrations, they captured emotions well.

Breathing in, Luna dove into the memory.

* * * * *

It has been two years. But now Pinkie is almost back to normal. And that is good.

How hard for Twilight to believe that after the Great War – the first war in all longer than living memory – any may find happiness, but Equestria will manage. The rediscovered magic of the Crystal Realm has led their land to advance into the new era.

“I’ve never been on a tower thishigh!” Pinkie gasps, looking over the side of Victory Tower. All around, the six of them behold the new Manehattan laid out ninety-four storeys below.

An elevated train-line, much damaged during the War and which the company has not seen fit to rebuild, has been remade into an above-ground park. This alone resides two storeys above the street level. Airships and aerostats dot the skies. Pegasi and hippogriffs flit in between them. Buildings deemed beyond repair are taken apart, to be replaced by spires of metal and crystal.

Much of this is the work of a Kirin architect, Gabled Roof by name. The traditional custom of kintsukuroipatches the scars of war without resembling a patch. A hole created by the blast from crystal-prism ‘sunspears’, that lanced through buildings, becomes a new circular window. He is not the only Kirin who came to Manehattan for its rebirth. From her vantage point, Twilight can spot a great poster for a musical on Bridleway. It credits a Kirin who is playwright-director, comedian, journalist and aspiring politician in one. Her name is Autumn Blaze.

Apparently the performance will be a hip-hop opera about constructing a nation.

It is all so beautiful to Twilight. After the devastation of the war, so many beautiful things she had not foreseen have arisen from the ashes.

‘We endured,’ she reflects, ‘and we are stronger for it. We’ve gained new friends from it. Any personal challenge I’ll have to deal with can’t be as hard as… that…’

It was a hard-fought peace, and they deserve it. All of them. All is well in Equestria.

“Twilight, darling, when did you say the delegates were to arrive?” Rarity asks, concerned. “Splendid as the view from up here is, I’d rather not have to wait all day.”

“Ah know the feeling,” Applejack added. “Ah… haven’t been that good with heights since that time aboard the Dandelion Sky.”

Twilight bobs her chin at them both. Heights are no fear of hers. Yet she understands what Applejack speaks of. Although a farmer once more, where Applejack’s heart always was, some part of her never came back. And there is Rarity. True to her pristine image, unlike their friend, Rarity bears no scars. Not outwardly.

She envies Rainbow Dash. Even at this moment, the pegasus lies soundly asleep on a red sofa. Fluttershy and Pinkie sit by her.

“Not too long now, girls.” Twilight seeks to reassure her friends. The clock says a quarter to five. A quarter hour’s delay. But this is a high tower. “They’re probably on their way as we speak.”

“I hope so.” Fluttershy says quietly. “I’d hate for them to miss out on sight-seeing the city.”

A lodestone placed by the double doors turns from red to yellow. A series of numerals run by.

“Ah, here they are!” Twilight exclaims. “Places, quickly, everyone! We’ve got to make a good first impression!”

“Think we may have messed up already,” Applejack says. She indicates Dash. “Why didn’t ya wake her up?”

Twilight’s eyes dart to the offending sleeper. “I could not bring myself to…” she admits. “If she can sleep, good for her…”

“Dash, wake up!” Applejack prods her friend in the elbow, yet Dash does not stir.

Pinkie’s face lights up. “Couldn’t we just, like, claim she’s part of the scenery?” she says brightly. “Dashie fits the room’s design, right, Rarity?”

As Rarity considers, Twilight joins her in sweeping her gaze over the room. Certainly, no pegasus would look out-of-place in a room with this view. Floor-to-ceiling windows of Mareabian polished glass behold a panorama that is nigh open sky. By the standards of Equestria, the colours are muted. Couch and cider bar and pool table – all crystalline and velvet furnishings. Perhaps a rainbow would serve to add a dash of colour.

“We’ll go with that,” Twilight is quick to say. “Rarity. Would you lay her out… artistically, please?”

Rarity obtemperates. She is as ginger with a living being as she is with fabric. Meanwhile, all others get into position as well.

“Zebras…” Applejack whispers. “Who’d we say these were, again? Prince Abraxas’s people?”

“No, Abraxas is Prince of the Ezebrantsi,” Twilight whispers back. “The leading tribe of the plains of Farasi. These are Punda Miliashariki, from Zamarebia.”

“Tarnation, which one’s Zecora, again?” Applejack mutters. “Zebras sure have a lot of tribes…”

“We don’t mention Zecora, remember?” Twilight whispers urgently. “She’s still considered a sore topic to all of them…”

She begins to exhale. Intensely.

“Twilight?” says Fluttershy. “Um, you’re not having one of your moments, are you?”

“No, I’m alright, I just… I just need to breathe.”

They know. But they do not speak it. This is different from her old anxieties.

In truth, she has not had a good night’s sleep in the years that followed the Great War. Even with Luna’s guidance and visits to Cadance, the empty feeling lingers on in her sleep and waking hours. Luna and Cadance know, of course, no matter how well she spins it. But help can only go so far when dread always lurks where she cannot see.

Two years of restless sleep and tiresome walks. Talks with them both and her friends do help. Yet she cannot give them the burden in full. They need no more worry to plague their minds. Her mentor has all of Equestria and more to shoulder. And so Twilight leaves Celestia be.

Twilight breathes out. Cadance has taught her useful techniques. “Alright. I’m fine now.”

They know. And they do not speak it. But her friends understand.

At the doors, the lodestone turns from yellow to green. The numerals stop at that which is ninety-four. The doors open. An escort enters first. Nine zebras all counted. Behind them come the three delegates of the Punda Miliashariki.

She steps forward. “Welcome to Victory Tower, Your Graces,” Twilight says warmly.

The guards at the back shut the twin doors.

“We must apologise for our lateness, Dame Magic.” It is the middle delegate who speaks. A young mare whose stripes are peppered by diamond marks. She still carries some of the grey of zebra youth. “We met with… complications, traveling through this renovated environment.”

“Better late than never, ever showing up!” Pinkie smiles. “We’re glad to have you around.”

“Thank you. Then–”

Whatever they are about to say is interrupted by a notable mumbling from Dash. The delegate eyes them inquiringly.

“Is there a reason why Dame Loyalty sleeps?”

Twilight fights to keep her voice even. “We’re not quite sure. She’s been like this ever since we returned from lunch. A bed-bug.”

The delegate’s ear flicks at that last word. “I see... And she hasn’t awoken yet?”

“No,” Applejack answered, before frowning. “Why is that important?”

“There is a good reason for why,” the middle delegate says. “Please. No matter what, I must now ask you to hear me out.”

A ‘click’ sounds from behind her. The door has just been locked from the outside.

Before Twilight or her friends can respond, a ripple of magic races through the room. It emanates from their nine guests.
“Dame Loyalty is impulsive,” says their leader. Green tongues of flame consume her face. “All the more since your tragic war, I understand. She would not give me a chance to speak.”

And the fire dies away. The delegation has warped into an unwelcome sight.

“Changelings,” Fluttershy breathes, terrified. And for good reason.

The intruders stand clad in dark, oaken armour. Even through a rising wave of fear, Twilight’s mind works scientifically. These Changelings are not those from Cadance’s ill-fated wedding. Their chitin is an acid green. The crevices on their bodies are the shape of diamond.

“Really, I’d rather not have us be impeded.”

Twilight can tell the speaker for a Hive Queen. Although young, she stands taller than the others from her brood. A long, flowing mane covers half her face. Her eyes are yellow as theirs, yet feature pupils. Eyes that now fix upon Twilight.

“Greetings,” the Queen reintroduces herself. “My name is Papillate. Queen of the Harlequin Hive. And I have need of your and your friends’ help.”

But Twilight pays this no heed. “How did you even get in here? We had Victory Tower outfitted with safeguards against Changelings!”

Papillate merely scoffs. “Equestrians,” she says bitterly. “You believe your shiny new toys will make you powerful.”

The eyes roam over the whole six of them. Rarity and Pinkie have grouped protectively around Fluttershy, holding her shoulders. Applejack looks ready to kill.

Despite the terror, Twilight feels she cannot let that happen. Never again.

“To answer the questions you didn’t ask,” says Papillate. “It was no hard task, drugging Dame Loyalty’s soup with lotus blossom. And more importantly– worry not for the true delegation. They will be returned unharmed. Much as they do not deserve it…”

This is a solid floor. Not a field of battle. Yet honed instinct drives Twilight to dig in her hooves. “What do you want? If it’s us, you won’t get us so easily.”

The Harlequin Queen snorts at her. “If I wanted you captured, Dame Magic, I could have done it three times over. As you’ll soon see.”

Clicking rises from her throat. Of her two fellows who waited upon her as delegates, the one to her left unslings a shoulder-bag. Twilight wonders if these are matriarchs. They too stand taller than the rest. Papillate grabs the bag and weighs it. She seems to think better of opening it.

“Before that, however,” she states, “a matter of no small import.” Her eyes are cold and hard. “Your Sun Princess.”

“What about her?” Twilight speaks in a hiss. She is loath to hear any bad-mouthing of Celestia.

Papillate is unperturbed. “We know what she plans. Retaliation. The raid upon the Ebony Hive was not enough to sate her. Your conflict with the Dark King has given Equestrians a new taste for war, and three years haven’t wiped away the memory of Canterlot.”

Twilight hears without believing. “What are you talking about?”

She has asked such a question three times in a row. Such a trying day this has turned out.

“Princess Celestia would never do that! The… the raid on Chrysalis… we did it to rescue the friends and family she took from us. But the Princess doesn’t think that’s a reason to go attack every Hive!”

“At one time, perhaps,” Papillate says, lip curling. “Your Princess surrounds herself, day by day, with allies who would urge her vengeful impulses.” She mimicked spitting on the floor, to Rarity’s horrified gasp. “These Saddle Mareabians, these Maretonians and Oleandrites… these zebras. They have always hated Changelings.”

It would appear Applejack wishes to deliver a hurtful truth. “Are ya surprised?” she growls. “From what we’ve heard, ya go preyin’ upon them at every turn…”

“They have fought each other in the past,” Papillate interrupts. “Many times. But if they need a common enemy, we Changelings must always pay.”

“No…” Twilight frantically shakes her head. “No. It isn’t like that! We brought them together in harmony and friend–”

“You broughtthem together,” Papillate hisses, “by getting them to fight the Dark King. That foe is gone now. Without Sombra’s threat to unite them, do you expect your precious alliances will stay put? Celestia will go searching for another enemy to fight, and we shall be it. There’s no other way, not with her new friends encouraging her.”

She pauses. Her glare could turn people to stone.

“And it’s foolishness,” says the Harlequin Queen. “When you shall soon have a new enemy, one who has nothing to do with us, anyway.”

Twilight’s mouth fell open. “Come again?”

“That is what I came to talk about.”

Now Papillate’s horn shines, reaching into the shoulder-bag. Out of it she pulls what Twilight thinks of as a stone. A dark stone, in the shape of a globe. Its opaque surface is utterly smooth. Within shines poisonous green light. Yet this light writhes and throbs in bizarre ways. As if, Twilight thinks, it were pounding to escape.

Not to tremble is a challenge. But Twilight won’t ask fruitless questions again. She will enquire.

“This…” Twilight begins, daring to peer closer at the stone. “Looks like a ball of lightning…”

“Because it is,” says Papillate. Her fellows chitter around her. “Captive lightning, harvested in the ways of the Kirin. However, the one who made this is no Kirin.” She proffers the stone. “Take it, Dame Magic. No harm will come to you… unless you drop it.”

“Wait… you’re giving this to me?”

Papillate chitters impatiently. “Not to you, pony. To Equestria. A gesture of my goodwill.”

Never could Twilight do such a thing without her friends’ acquiescence. She stares at them.

Rarity and Pinkie are still huddled around Fluttershy. All three of them show looks of doubt. But their mouths part in acceptance. Applejack is standing, steaming. It is clear she wishes to rush the Changelings. Yet she steps back, taciturn. Her glare turns to Twilight, then turns away.

Only Dash will have to wait.

Reluctantly, Twilight takes the stone. Under Papillate and her retinue’s scrutinising gaze, she turns it over in her grip. Its surface is quite cool.

The Harlequin Queen decides she has been quiet long enough.

“What you hold here,” Papillate tells Twilight, tapping the stone, “is an Obsidian Orb. It was made by the Storm King. A warlord from beyond the Sea of Clouds, longtime rival and sometime ally of the Kirin. He seeks new lands to conquer, but for years, he has held back from Equestria, fearful of the power of your alicorns. This is the weapon he plans to defy them with.”

Despite the soft sunshine pouring in from outside, Twilight suddenly feels as though she stands in the darkest dungeon of Tartarus.

“… How does it work?”

“I’m not sure,” Papillate admits. “Yet, with your smarts, Dame Magic, you should figure it out.”

Feeling the weight of her friends behind her, Twilight lowers the Orb. “Alright…” she says. “Alright. Thanks… thank you for the warning, Queen Papillate. And for the… valuable item. But this isn’t free, is it?”

“No,” agrees Papillate. “Nothing in this world is for free. On that, I had a good teacher.”

Twilight stares down the young Harlequin Queen. “Teacher? Who was your teacher?”

“Who do you think?” Papillate says, with the ghost of a smile. “It would seem we were both personal students, in our own ways, Twilight Sparkle. I learned from my highest monarch as you learned from yours.”

Awaiting no reply, she turns, her figure melting back into the zebra guise she adopted to enter. All of her escort become zebras once more, and the doors open before their Queen.

“One day, you will hear from me again,” Papillate says, not looking back. “All debts must…”

* * * * *

“… be paid back in full.”

A familiar voice had finished that phrase, reading it out like a bedtime story.

‘Twilight?’

The voice echoed throughout the aisle, and Luna’s eyes darted to find it. Then a glow rose from below her line-of-sight. The tuft, which she had left lying by the open book, rose. Like a feather in the wind, it drifted along an unseen wave. Luna went after it. She sensed she was close now. Perhaps it was thanks to opening the right books, following them like a trail of breadcrumbs.

The aisle opened up, the bookshelves parting like forest trees upon a clearing, and Luna saw.

Sitting behind a desk before a row of empty chairs, in the light of a table lamp, with a stack of books to her left, was Twilight. Unblemished, youthful, and though her face was lit a pale green by the lampshade, one could tell there was not a strand of grey to her mane. But Luna’s eyes were drawn to the diadem which rested atop her head. The colour of platinum, it was adorned with a dull, grey gemstone in the form of a starburst.

There, Luna noticed the book she read, with a cover identical to that of the memory she’d just visited. Except this one’s frame was minimalist, lacking the curlicues common to Equestrian cover decoration, and scant design features beyond the title and one apparent sub-title in gold letters: Pan-Equine Approved Edition. In fact, all of the books to Twilight’s left seemed to have that in common.

Luna's horn glowed, and the tuft vanished beneath her peytral. That drew Twilight's eye.

“Luna! Oh, wow, small world, huh? I didn’t think I'd see you here,” Twilight said, flustered. “I, um, well, welcome! Sorry about the mess, I wasn’t expecting any other visitors. I thought you’d still be back in Canterlot and all.”

‘Other visitors?’

There wasn’t anyone else present beyond the two of them – all of the chairs before Twilight’s desk were vacant. All but for a single raggedy doll sitting up front. She peeked at it. What an odd, tatty thing. Two mismatched buttons for eyes, and it wore blue breeches with white spots. Not much of an audience.

She was glad the eyes were buttons. Otherwise Luna might have felt like they were actually looking at her.

But then again…

“Twilight,” said Luna, approaching the desk. “I’m afraid we must have words, for time is short.”

“Time? Luna, there’s plenty of time here.” Twilight said brightly. “All the time in the world.” She beamed, looking more relaxed than Luna had ever seen her. “It is a day-long event, after all. And I’ve still got a lot of books to read through,” she said, gesturing to the shelves surrounding them both, “come along, there should still be a seat available for you, don’t you worry!”

Luna regarded her with a cool, suspicious look. There had to be something off, something that wasn’t right with the Twilight that stood before her. A fidget, a flick of the ear, something that could tell of the deception.

Yet this was no Newfoal’s smile. It was simply Twilight. Wasn’t it?

“Twilight,” said Luna. “Are… what do you remember?”

“Oh, Luna,” Twilight said, waving. “Always on point, aren’t you? Don’t worry, I got my schedule ready, but thank you for the reminder. I think it’s… hmm...”

She tapped her chin contemplatively, and Luna furrowed her brows. She cleared her throat.

“Earth?” asked Luna quietly.

Twilight glanced at her in surprise. Luna readied her stance – if she had to break whatever trance or stranglehold the Empire held over Twilight, best be ready for a struggle.

But then Twilight shook her head. Notably, the diadem remained firmly atop her head without the slightest budge.

‘The Element of Magic? But why is it platinum?’ Luna wondered. ‘I think of it as gold. Tia thinks of it as gold. Anyone would. So why…?’

“No, I don’t think so,” Twilight replied. “I don’t think that’s on today’s schedule. Why Earth?”

Beneath her peytral, Luna felt the tuft shiver. And she understood what must be done.

“I thought… it might be interesting,” Luna said, relaxing her stance. The charm hummed softly inside her head. She needed to be direct. “For, shall we say, a trip down memory lane?”

The cold passed her once again. The shadows stirred in the fog. But Luna held firm.

“Revisitevents?” Twilight parroted, tilting her head. “Oh, you mean– I getcha.” She gestured to the stack of books to her left, “You’re here in time then, Luna, I’ve got just the books–”

“Actually, Twilight, I’d rather prefer if we walked together.” Luna interrupted, gently laying a hoof on the desk. “Remaining stationary isn’t all that healthy. And I think some exercise would allow for better conversation– we’ve got a lot to catch up on, don’t we?”

“Oh, uh, you sure?” Twilight asked, concerned, “I mean, it’d be easier for us here and–”

“I insist, Twilight, dear.” Luna countered sweetly. “I’m afraid I’ve got a lot to catch up on. Won’t you take a walk with me?”

Though she followed what the charm told her, there was a natural feeling to it all that emboldened her so. And Luna found it reassuring and warm and just right.

Twilight blinked, regarding Luna curiously. Finally, with a sigh, she pushed back her chair.

“Oh, alright, Luna. But only because you asked,” she said warily, if politely, as she got out of her chair and moved to Luna’s side. “You owe Miss Smartypants an apology.”

She pointed at the raggedy doll, still in its chair. And Luna chuckled.

“Very well,” she said, turning to the doll. It sat there, a small, grey lump of stitches, whose eyes were mismatched and haphazardly sewn in. For a fleeting moment, she thought back to the waves upon waves of Newfoals, crashing against her armour, pressing her, suffocating her…

And suddenly, Luna wished she had kept her armour on this trek.

The moment passed, though, and Smartypants was nothing more than a filly’s beloved doll.

“My apologies, Miss Smartypants,” said Luna, gazing straight into the doll’s button-eyes. “But Twilight and I shall go for a walk.”

* * * * *

On and on they walked, further into the library.

The next aisle of bookshelves was as long as the last had been, yet in spite of the fog, Twilight’s presence brought an odd warmth to Luna as she led the way. Her horn glowed like a lantern in the dark, and she strode with a confidence quite unlike the student Luna was acquainted with.

The dreamscape here was not her Twilight’s. Her Twilight thought of home as that same tree-library she resided in, warm and comforting. But this person seemed to feel no unease in wandering, inhabiting a realm of gloom, shadows and fog.

And yet the Archmage had a mind whose horizons stretched far. What sort of person could keep such a meticulous record of her life, embracing her experiences and committing them to memory as she did, whilst keeping such a narrow view on her Empire’s deeds?

Luna stole a glance at the Archmage – or should that be Twilight? She couldn’t decide which name fit better. Yet the Princess of the Night knew subterfuge, and here she saw none.

‘Unless that’s part of the subterfuge. This… this inner Twilight not knowing...’

She saw no signs. But innerly, Luna waited to see if she was walking into an ambush worthy of any griffon or dragon. A person’s mind usually held constructs within, replicating the faces of those they held dear.

Luna asked herself if Twilight had mistook her for her replica. Perhaps she could use such a misconception to her advantage.

“Oh, careful–” Twilight said suddenly,.

Barely in time, Luna ducked as a book flew past her, aloft in Twilight’s purple aura.

Smiling sheepishly, Twilight lay the book down on the floorboards.

“You said you wanted to know about Earth?” Twilight asked, tittering. “Really, Luna... Where have you been. But if I’m gonna tell you, we have to start at the beginning. And it’s gonna take a lot of books.”

At Twilight’s summoning, more books flew in, from the distant shelf-tops and further up the aisle. Training her keen eyes upon them, Luna noticed she couldn’t pinpoint their titles, for they changed at a rate far greater than any other book in the library. Something Twilight hadn’t mentioned, even as she placed them in a circle, looking at them with fondness.

“You have quite the curious selection of books, Twilight.”

“Oh, these?” Twilight said. “It’s not much. Just y’know, the ones, eh-heh, the ones I like going through the most. Always nice to keep a book for some light reading, know what I’m saying?”

‘Light..’ Luna mused. “Yes, I do,” she said aloud, while eyeing the books once more.

Their pale colour clashed with the beautifully bound tomes around them. But they looked well-worn, and loved, not discarded and dusty and forgotten.

“Why these, Twilight? You’ve got an eternity’s worth of books, here and elsewhere.”

‘Bound to her. Or perhaps, the Element,’ Luna deduced, staring at the diadem warily. Its colour pulsed in rhythm, yet Twilight paid it no heed.

“Well…” Twilight began, to a dull glimmer from the Element. “It’s just… I’m a busy mare, Luna…”

Unsure. Anxious.

The glimmer grew stronger.

“I-I just feel it’s… convenient, I guess?” Twilight finished, and the glimmer dissipated.

“Convenient…” Luna pondered. She turned her gaze to the circle of books. “Hm. I wonder…”

“Yes?” asked Twilight. “Something you need, Luna?”

This far in, past all the outside wards, surely, there was no reason for Twilight to believe that Luna was any more than a projection. It was a gamble through and through. But it was one Luna was willing to take.

“Yes, ah, well,” Luna said quickly. “I… do believe I’ve got a lot to catch up on now, don’t I, Twilight?”

“Oooh, right, it’s been what, three years, right? Wait, um, that doesn’t sound right. No, yes– Yeah, three years. Where do you want to start?”

Luna pondered it for but a moment.

“Perhaps…” Luna said carefully. “We ought to remember how this endeavour began. The cause. The alliances forged. When did… Hm.” She quickly rethought her phrasing. “When was Equestria appointed protector of the world?”

And Twilight smiled.

“Oh, that’s a fun one,” she said cheerfully, the bottom entry of the stack moving besides her. Written across its jacket was The Founding of the Pan-Equine Co-Harmony Sphere. “Ahem… so, are, are you ready?”

“Quite so,” answered Luna.

Twilight nodded. Her horn glowed, the book opened and the words flowed out of it like running water, from her lips too.

Now to see how much truth there was to this Twilight’s words...

“... And so it was,” Twilight read, “in the Year 7 of the Era Harmoniae, on the dawn of the Co-Harmony Sphere, where paths crossed and bonds were forged, that an encounter came to be between the Bearer of Magic and the future Ambassador…”

* * * * *

Cheers rise from all around. The stomps of all manner of hooves thunders above the stadium. The light shines from many a horn’s tip. Soon, it is planned, there shall be a flight in a formation composed of pegasi, griffons and hippogriffs. The flags and banners of nations from the Great Continent and across both Oceans unfurl from above.

And yet Twilight remains anxious. Her friends’ works, toils and labour, their efforts, all the amends from the Crystal War and the Storm War, and here they stand. She sees Lyra on the podium, the golden ambassador pin fixed to her lapel, flicking her tail nervously. Why wouldn’t she?

‘Come on, Lyra, you can do it.’ Twilight thinks, having cast an amplification spell in preparation for this moment. ‘One final step.’

The ambassador clears her throat. Twilight watches from her spot backstage.

“Our resolve today has never been stronger,” Lyra enounces, her use of Common Tongue elevated by the refined accent of Upper Canterlot, her eyes darting back and forth between the crowd and the speech on her podium. “Our triumph was for us, as much as it was for you all. Our gift to Equus, a prosperous future for all the people who tread upon its soil.”

Twilight wonders if she should have checked what kind of speech was written for her. Perhaps Pinkie or Fluttershy had some input. More likely, those pencil-pushers at Canterlot are behind it.

What she would do to have all five of her best friends by her side, here in the wings. But with Equestria’s reach expanded, of course, there are many offices to be tended.

“And therefore I, Ambassador Lyra Heartstrings… solemnly declare…”

Lyra’s voice fades away. Twilight blinks, and recasts the spell. But the green unicorn inexplicably remains quiet. The murmurs grow and grow, and Twilight clenches her teeth.

‘Lyra…’ she thinks, biting her lip. ‘Don’t… don’t mess this up.’

Lyra looks up. And tosses the paper aside.

Twilight can only gasp.

“A-actually, I’d like to go off-script for this,” Lyra says softly, though her voice booms throughout the stadium, almost but not quite drowning out the murmurs. She speaks in Common still, yet her Canterlot accent is less pronounced, her manner of speech closer to how she would talk in Ponyville. “I-I’m sorry, I have… I need to be honest with you all.”

From the tone, Twilight knows these words are meant for the crowd as much as it was meant for her, and Celestia too.

“I didn’t ask for this,” Lyra says pressing her forehooves together. Her head is bowed, almost as if in supplication. “I didn’t ask to lead, or to speak with you all over the years. I… I’m not even certain I’m worthy of this stage,” she continues, and the murmurs die down. “I have been told, over and over again, that I played my part in this. That when Equestria sent envoys to hidden Seaquestria, my voice was one to carry sway with Queen Novo. Like a siren… Because some musician thought she could make a difference.”

Lyra pauses then, losing herself in memory.

She holds her head high.

“But you know what? This isn’t just about me. This Co-Harmony Sphere, as we have named it, that’s on us. That’s on each and every one of us. We came together as one, united and proud. We’re here because… we believed in a future for all of us. Equestria stood alone against Chrysalis, and we suffered for it. But we did not stand alone against Sombra. When the Storm King sought to invade our lands, we did not stand alone. And now we shall make sure we, and I mean everyone here, will never again stand alone.”

She removes her pin, and Twilight watches as she holds it before her.

“I don’t know if I’m worth it, to be honest. But here I am. And I believe.”

The stadium falls silent. Twilight wonders, as Lyra affixes her pin on her lapel once more, if she has made a mistake.

Yet then, on the dais raised above the podium, she sees Princess Celestia, seated besides the other leaders – Queen Novo of Mount Aris, Malikah Ylam bint-Karistal of Saddle Mareabia, Princess Cadance of the Crystal Realm, Duke Nibiru and Duchess Silili of Maretonia, Prefect Dondola of Oleander, various monarchs and chieftains of Zebrica, including Prince Abraxas of Farasi, and even Gaspard, the prospective prince claimant of Griffonstone – begins to clap her forehooves.

Then someone in the crowd does. And another, and another still, until the entire stadium drowns in the noise of tens of thousands.

“And so do I,” Celestia’s voice booms. The crowd roars approval. “By your word, Ambassador Heartstrings, the Pan-Equine Co-Harmony Sphere shall prosper, now and always.”

Twilight doesn’t say much just then. She claps and claps, until Lyra Heartstrings, shaken but content, comes down to join her, before Twilight will start on her own speech.

“Did… did I do good?” says Lyra.

“Trust me, you did,” Twilight replies, smiling. “Look, don’t worry, Lyra, you got this ambassador thing right in the bag. Your parents… they’d be proud. I know it.”

At first, Lyra says nothing, eyes wide and lips quivering. Then she falls into Twilight’s embrace. “Thank you,” she says simply. “I… I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to go off–”

“No, it’s fine, it’s fine,” Twilight says brightly. “It’s okay, Lyra. It’s okay.”

She lets go, and the two friends exchange a smile.

“Well, I wonder what Bonbon will have to say,” says Lyra. “Who’d have thought…”

* * * * *

“The Co-Harmony Sphere’s genesis would be sealed with a speech by the Bearer of Magic. But in the years that followed, after she became Archmage, Lady Twilight would have many an occasion to reflect upon that moment.”

The illusion was shattered, and no longer was Luna captivated by the memory. Though Twilight’s tone remained unchanged, a sense of unease hung in the air. The fog, rather...

“Ahem,” said Luna. “Twilight. Is something the matter?”

“W-what?” Twilight stammered. She turned her gaze toward Luna. Her pupils had shrunk. “No? No. Nothing’s wrong. Also, please, Luna, don’t interrupt… readings…”

Her voice died down with each step Luna took towards her. Though she was only a head taller, Luna thought Twilight looked so much smaller now.

“Apologies,” said Luna, keeping her tone even. “It’s… awfully jarring, when you think about it. Isn’t it, my friend?”

Twilight took a step back, her hindleg knocking against one of the books in the circle. The volume she held fell to the floor with a thud. It was then that Luna noticed her diadem no longer resembled a diadem. It was a guard’s helmet, worn tightly and securely by its owner, with the Element of Magic as its crown jewel.

“S-stay back.” said Twilight. Luna saw the faint outline of a sword forming. “I’m warning you. I… I don’t take kindly to intruders. Who are you? Did… did the traitor send you here?”

‘I see she understands quickly enough…’

“I am here of my own volition. Indeed, perhaps even yours,” said Luna. She stepped forth, and the blade’s outline hardened in an instant. “I am not here on anyone’s orders.”

Twilight’s sword glistened in the dim light, Luna observed, but it was held aloft as if to shield her. And there Luna saw Twilight’s eyes through the helmet, wide and afraid.

“I’m… here to help,” Luna said softly. “Is that… is that not why you’ve summoned me?”

The blade lowered ever so slightly.

“Summon... You… no, that’s… that’s not right,” whispered Twilight. The helmet glowed dimly. “You’re not supposed to be… out.”

“But I am a part of you.”

A lie, yet a useful lie. And, easy to adhere to… This was a gamble she would take.

“And,” said Luna, “I’m afraid that I do not recall anything past Nightmare Night. Please, if you would let me help you, as you did...”

Luna’s words died in her throat, as the sword brushed dangerously close to her neck.

“Why would I?” whispered Twilight. “I trusted you. I trusted you to stay and help us make something out of herwork. And you come, crawling here, asking me for a favour after everything we’ve been through, after youleft–”

The Lady Archmage strained to keep her words steady, even as they poured out with no restraint, yet Luna understood enough.

“And I am sorry for that,” she said. “For whatever it is I’ve wronged you… let me make it right.”

Twilight tilted her head searchingly, the blade remaining trained on Luna’s neck.

“Show me as it truly is,” said Luna. It wasn’t an order or a command, and she kept her tone even and firm. “I know your pain as you know mine. Please, let me help you. What is it that troubles you so?”

Twilight laughed.

“You think the right question will get you the truth?” she asked sardonically. Her eyes brimmed with tears, her voice dropping to a whisper. “There is no truth.”

“Not unless we seek it out,” Luna insisted. She moved forward, nudging the blade away. “And you know it.”

“Luna…”

“Do you trust me, Twilight Sparkle?” Luna asked, her voice gentle and soothing. She was so close now.

Though Twilight stood her ground, her stance eased, just a little.

“...I do, Luna,” whispered Twilight. “I trust you.”

Slowly, gently, Luna’s aura converged around the helmet, now fully formed. Twilight’s aura merged with hers, and as Luna’s gaze locked with Twilight’s, it relented.

The helmet fell on the ground in a cluttered heap, Twilight released the breath she’d been holding onto. She faltered, and Luna quickly moved to catch her in her a wing.

“Okay…” Twilight exhaled. “That… that didn’t feel right. But… oh.”

Here, her gaze turned to Luna, and a furious blush formed.

“H-how–”

“I am a part of you, Twilight,” Luna repeated, and this time she allowed herself a little smile. “This was your doing and your doing alone.”

Which was either a lie, or an accidental truth Luna had stumbled onto. But whatever else, the helmet was unclasped, and Twilight was where she wanted her to be.

“Right… right...” Twilight whispered. “Earth… you wanted to know about Earth…”

The fog stirred from the corner of Luna’s eyes. Her work wasn’t done, yet.

Twilight lifted the books she’d collected into her aura.

“C-come back with me. I’ll… I’ll show you.”

* * * * *

The clear space Luna and Twilight had left still had Smartypants up in the front row, but it was no simple clearing now. No, Luna observed, it was a lecture hall. The rows upon rows of seats had expanded into an amphitheater, a half-circle with a podium and a blackboard at the center. One of those ethereal chandeliers descended from the ceiling, illuminating the hall in a pleasant, lavender light.

It was an impossibly short distance away from where Luna had released Twilight, and the door behind them swung shut before she could see the bookshelves, the noise echoing through the empty lecture hall. Empty, except for the two of them, and the doll on the front row seat.

“Take a seat, Luna,” Twilight said. And Luna obliged.

No sooner than Luna had seated herself, in the middle row, that Twilight had cast the stack of books she carried around her into a circle anew. There she stood upon the podium, affixing a pair of glasses, and her horn shone bright.

“Okay… okay,” Twilight began. A book and piece of chalk raised in her aura. “I… well, I guess I’ll have to make do with the audience we have here.”

Her voice echoed longer than it should, even in the vastness of the lecture hall. But Luna kept retained her attention on Twilight – and Smartypants, she mused, would too.

“Indeed,” Luna said. She remained impassive, but allowed for a small, encouraging smile toward her lecturer.

“Right,” said Twilight. “I… I guess we could start from… um… how, how we got here. I don’t know if I have much time but… argh, how do I…”

“Twilight, dear,” Luna said sweetly. Twilight paused in her muttering. “Do what you think fits and is right. I’m here.”

That, thankfully, brought some colour back to Twilight’s face. She wore a nervous grin now, and Luna presumed it was as much aimed at her as it was for herself.

“Okay… okay,” said Twilight. She summoned a book to her, and adjusted her stance on the podium as the book lay open. The chalk in her aura moved towards the blackboard. And the words flowed once more.

“Ahem… and so it was, on the Twenty-Fifth Day of Augeas, Year 10 of the Era Harmoniae, that the Bearer of Magic met the Chief Mage of the Crystal Realm, who offered his...”

* * * * *

”...Congratulations on your appointment, Lady Archmage. Princess Celestia informed us you were the right one for the job.”

A greeting she has heard often, but it means something else to her ears, here in this salon of the Palace, when it is Sunburst who says it. He was one of the frontrunners, recommended by old Headmaster Nexus, Twilight knows, but Celestia had other plans. Sunburst had been at the lead of magical research in the Crystal Realm for a few years, and from what Rarity told her, he’d been keen on a promotion. Now here she finds herself, his superior, wearing a plain starry robe and a simple, starburst pin – at her own insistence, of course. The alternative would be far too grandiose, she feels.

A year on from her appointment, she is to work with someone who coveted, and continues to covet the title.

“The honour is all mine, Sunburst, thank you,” says Twilight, offering what she hopes is a confident smile.

In the armchair across the table from hers, however, Sunburst remains impassive, eyes unwavering behind his spectacles. And really, for her to gain the title so easily…

She clears her throat. “Well, I hope I’ll get used to Equestria again. Earth is… well, I don’t want to say strange, but it is what it is.”

“I can imagine,” says Sunburst, still in that neutral tone. He pointedly pushes up his glasses, but Twilight leans back in her armchair, unperturbed. “But personally, perhaps it was right for you to take charge of the project.”

“Project?” Twilight replies. She glances around the marble room. The whole castle is unusually empty for this time of day, and Twilight wonders if Shining Armor is busy with his own briefing. “What project? Lyra and I weren’t informed about this yet.”

“Which is why I’m briefing you now,” Sunburst says. He gestures to the silver tray on the table between them. “May I offer you some tea? This could be a lengthy counsel.”

Sharing tea with Celestia was always one of Twilight’s fondest activities, even after all this time. This is not Celestia, but perhaps she and her new colleague will bond over it.

“Please,” she says, smiling graciously. “How about milk and one sugar?”

“White, or brown, Your Ladyship?”

Once tea is served, her fellow Mage returns to business. From the folds of his own teal robes, he presents her with a stack of parchments.

“The Ambassador will learn in due time,” says Sunburst, “and Princess Celestia trusts you more than anyone. You know what this is.”

A glimpse of the parchment, and Twilight knows she’s seen the formula for the liquid sketched there before.

“Ah. The conversion serum,” she replies. “Her Highness didn’t tell me it wasn’t ready yet.”

“The Princess does inform at her own discretion, and then there was your work on Earth,” Sunburst replies, not untruthfully. “That being said, she believed it was the right time for you to be informed on the progress we’ve made. You’ve spoken with the human researchers.”

It is more a statement than a question.

“Oh, it was nothing, really,” says Twilight. “I had to build a good rapport, and Lyra never was one for the finer side of magic. Same old, same old. But yes, I spoke with CERN. And I don’t think cooperation is out the window at all.”

“That’ll do,” agrees Sunburst. “But we’re not looking for work with the humans.”

“We’re… not?”

“It’s your decision to make, Lady Twilight,” Sunburst explains, peering at her above his glasses. “But humanity is unfamiliar with magic, and you’re still our foremost expert.”

“And I’m glad I won’t be alone with it,” Twilight replies, nodding appreciatively. “We’ll need all the help we can get. I’ll have to let Moondancer know–”

“A-actually, Dame Moondancer left Equestria,” Sunburst says quickly, “a few hours after you returned to Canterlot. The Princess has tasked her on a mission to– to Griffonstone. I don’t think I’m cleared for that, but... you could ask around.”

“Oh... “ Twilight knows the disappointment is evident in her voice. Her shoulders sink. “I… didn’t even get to talk to her.”

It had already been a nasty surprise, of course, when stacks of unanswered letters came cascading down her letterbox just before she had left for Earth. Spike’s absence by her side has been all too evident, and she misses him day by day. He now has Rarity for company, at least, embarked on their missions of cultural exchange. But Moondancer and Lyra have sent her so many invites by mail, hoping she would come to their gatherings.

None has she answered yet, and Lyra never told her...

“Well… alright,” says Twilight simply. “No use standing around here. Let’s go… go… go...”

* * * * *

The memory disintegrated into smoke, and the lecture hall faded into view. Luna blinked, coughing at the abrupt transition – and saw Twilight standing, stock-still, by the blackboard and the podium.

“Twilight, is something the matter?” she asked.

The young unicorn blinked, and shook her head.

“We’re… at the end of this one,” she said, but even in the fog, the lie was clear as daylight. “Okay. I need… I need to find another one.”

Glancing, Luna spotted a book, titled Goodbye, Lyra. The word ‘goodbye’ looked blurry and time-worn. Twilight noticed where she was staring.

“Oh, no,” Twilight said frantically, “No-no-no! Why’d I even bring tha– You don’t want to see that. It’s not very interesting!”

“If it’s not very interesting,” Luna said, “why would you–”

Without warning, the world changed again.

* * * * *

It is the stadium. The very same where Ambassador Heartstrings had helped unveil the Co-Harmony Sphere. Lyra was standing in front of the crowd, who looked eager and joyful. She wore ambassadorial finery that bore the signs Rarity’s work – immaculately stitched with machine-like precision, the finest fabrics from all over Equus.

Except that didn’t happen. It isn’t the stadium again.

It is on Earth, and Lyra wasn’t wearing Rarity’s work. She was wearing a cheap suit-coat that could’ve been for a human child, and in all likelihood probably was. And the stadium was full of far more humans than creatures of Equus. They weren’t eager. They weren’t joyful. Some looked absolutely livid as they stared at her.

Somehow, Luna is aware that Twilight sits in the priority seating at this new stadium. That she has been expecting a big declaration from her friend. One about ponification.

Is this it? What does the green unicorn have to say?

Lyra stands, eyes sad and tired, as if she expected to be anywhere but there.

‘I hope she’ll be alright,’ are the words to cross Twilight’s mind. ‘She looks exhausted.’

And that is certainly true. Lyra’s mane bears the shaggy texture of a month or two or three without a good trim from the barber. There are lines under her eyes.

Lyra takes a deep breath.

"Friends, fellow PHL, and others…” she asks, before taking two short breaths. “I'm here to ask. Why are you here?"

Bristling murmurs rumble through the crowd. One human holds up a sign plastered with the photographs of a human male, and next to them, a glassy-eyed stallion. Someone screams that their daughter is dead. The culprit is named as ‘that filth you made her drink’. Tears. Accusations. Screams.

Too many, in the space that Lyra gives for responses, for Luna to parse.

"You, the parent that doesn't know if they still have their child after ponification,” Lyra says, pointing towards the one who has lost their daughter.

Twilight stares in horror.

‘Lyra…’ she thinks. ‘Don’t make them… Don’t do anything they’ll make you regret…’

“You,” Lyra pursues, relentless. “the Equus native who feels less like they’re coming home, every time they see Equestria. The pony who’s grown to love Earth. I know you both because I amyou. The people who see what happened to Viktor Kraber, and fear they’ll be next. I know the human who wishes Equestria and Earth could give more to each other. I know you all have your reasons to be here. And, despite what I might have said almost a year ago? They are goodreasons.”

‘No. No. That’s not right!’

Kraber had been an accident. Pinkie couldn’t have possibly lost control of known the PER would do that. And what is Lyra talking about?! Equestria is home!

"For a while,” Lyra says, “I’d convinced myself I wouldn’t have a reason to be here. That I was better off standing among you quietly. That I could simply keep hold of the power and prestige of my ambassadorship, making my stand by straddling two worlds with four legs. I cannot.”

Twilight and her Royal Guard escorts stare at her in horror. One Royal Guard, a red, apoplectic look on his face, starts screaming.

“Treason!” he screams at such a volume that Luna Twilight has the absurd notion he will break something with it. “Sedition! Traitor! Aposta–”

“Hey, at least she’s talking sense!” yells one human, her accent like that of Trottingham. “Let the lady continue speaking, right now!”

Something impacts just below the railing of the loge where Twilight and her guards are situated.

‘They’re defending this,’ Twilight thinks, in rapt dismay.

"The reason I’m here is because I must choose whether to stand quietly, or stand with pride. I hoped against hope someone else would take over this cause, lead us, and take the weight off my chest. But in these last few months, after seeing why everyone knew I should be here, I’ve found my reason. I’ve come to terms with one thing: I will be that child of Equestria who stands for us all. Because someone has to be.”

Lyra’s horn shines a light. The badges she wore as an ambassador slide from the lapel of her absurd child’s coat, glowing golden...

And clatter to the floor.

“From now on,” Lyra says, “I will no longer be ambassador for a nation that refuses to listen! I hereby denounce ponification, and I will fight every step of the way!”

* * * * *

Twilight fell, and Luna caught her.

“L-Luna–”

“Steady, steady,” Luna whispered, bringing them both gently to kneel. Her wing held onto Twilight, whose breathing had grown shallow. “I am here. You’re alright.”

Her lie felt dirty even as she spoke it, and Luna bit back a grimace.

Twilight’s eyes met hers. They were manic. Her mane was frazzled. And she pushed her away.

“What… what was that?” Twilight hissed, her voice thin and dangerous. “What was that–”

Luna gave the book another look. There, beneath the title, in letters so faded their original gold colour is barely distinguishable, she sees the words. Pan-Equine Approved Edition.

“As far from the truth as you can get, I suspect,” Luna whispers. “That didn’t happen. Did it?”

Some light of clarity returned to Twilight’s eyes.

“Yes, it did,” she said quietly. “It all did. The angry crowds, the protests… Heartstrings’ words. But… the facts have been… reordered. Rearranged.”

Her gaze drifted to something past Luna’s shoulder. Luna glanced back, then down. A book on the floor, titled The First. And there on the cover, a bottle of serum was emblazoned.

“Hello, what’s this…” said Luna.

She reached down to open it.

“Luna, don’t–!”

* * * * *

”We’re… testing directly?”

Twilight feels light-headed, and fatigued. But the tests are delayed enough already as it is. The Crystal Realm’s facility is pure, pristine white, much different from her cluttered like laboratory in Canterlot. The polished crystalline surfaces remind her eerily of CERN.

“Yes,” Sunburst says crisply. “Don’t worry, we, ah, we have a consistent stream of subjects. All voluntary, I can promise you.”

She glances down to the clipboard she is presented with. She dare not look at the names for now, and opts for the country of origin instead.

“Hm. Brazil… China… India… Indonesia… Japan… Nigeria…” Twilight counts down the list. “The United States,” she finishes, shaking her head. “And what are their criteria?”

“All the most populous countries,” Sunburst says, in clinical tones. “And the most populous States. The more people, the less likely anyone would notice, therefore the more will slip by their safety nets, or lack thereof. The homeless, the poor, those in debt. All sorts of people they won’t really notice, Lady Twilight. Though we did… have to take a few risks…”

Twilight returns the clipboard to Sunburst, and glances through the observation window. The old man that lies in the sterile, closed-off room wears a distant look, as if he isn’t quite all there.

“Just how airtight is this facility?” she asks anxiously. “I still worry sometimes that we might’ve missed something in our vaccinations… And given what our studies have shown about how long humans can survive on Equus before losing their vitality, their lifeforce, well…”

It is a strange thing. Twilight’s own name is on several of those studies. She knows for a fact that humans who braved this side, even the ones wearing hazmat suits, took at most three days before growing sickly, pale and drained.

Yet, whenever she thinks back to exactly how she conducted the studies, her recollections turn hazy, indistinct.

She pushes the thought away for now. As always, she reminds herself there has been an extraordinary amount to take in, ever since Princess Celestia broke the news to her and her friends of the discovery of the Thirteenth Family and their far-off world.

“We’ve been provided the best resources,” Sunburst says, speaking more reassuringly now. “And the subjects won’t be kept here unduly.”

“Alright…” Twilight says slowly. “But here’s something that bothers me. The Princess pushed our representatives to advertise the serum’s mass production and distribution in eight months. We were so careful with our original subjects, yet to craft a one-size-fits-all version of the serum… I’ve no idea how close we are to that. What did you tell them?”

“The truth,” says Sunburst. “They would rather take the serum and risk it than be saddled with crippling injuries or insurmountable debt. This fellow here, they told him he’d only have a couple months left to live with a cancerous growth. We’ve also got one woman some helpful PHH saved from a suicide attempt over a missed payment. The bills would cripple their families, and between the two options...”

“Yes… I guess that’s what happens when you offer the serum as a cure-all,” Twilight agrees. “Well, I suppose I’ll ask him a few questions–”

* * * * *

“Don’t– Luna– please just stop, stop!” Twilight yelled. The memory vanished into dust, bare bones and echoes. Around them, the fog whirled, and the lecture hall grew darker still. “Just tell me the tr–”

“This is the truth, Twilight,” Luna cut her off. “I'm sorry, but it is what you see.”

Twilight shook her head vigorously. “I don’t believe it. I can’t–”

“But you must.”

Luna breathed in deeply. The crunch was now come.

“Twilight...” she said, measuring her words. “As I have wandered your mind, shadowing your memories, I have seen much of the how. I have come to understand, if not in whole, how the Solar Empire came to be–”

“No, no, this isn’t right, this isn’t right!” Twilight said, recoiling away from Luna’s offered hoof. You’re not supposed to– how are you doing this!”

And Luna, seeing the look of fright in Twilight’s face, refrained from her question.

“I am not your Luna, Twilight Sparkle. But I am Luna. And I am here to help.” With care, she held out her hoof, and took Twilight’s into hers, feeling her cheek flush. “Take the plunge. And I will be by your side. Read, as you must…”

She raised a book, opened it, and showed it to Twilight – and her aura met with Twilight’s, as the book came to life, the pages flipping by.

But as the memories flowed out, from the corner of her eye, Luna undeniably saw something stir in the fog, watching, observing. Her eyes darted left and right. The fog closed, and her eyes were drawn to the amphiteater’s seats.

There in the back seat, sat an elderly man, pale as a corpse, his eyes alive and cold and unfeeling, the icy gaze falling upon them from his elevated spot–

* * * * *

Disgust and horror and shock mingle all at once and she bangs her head against her desk. A crack in the precious mahogany, but she doesn’t care. Another failure. She doesn’t want to hear the screams even as they echo on and on inside her head.

She bites a pen and writes.

Model #214, a dismal failure. Patient sustained massive cranial injuries, including severe chiari malformation. Could not continue transformation.

She wants to cry. She promised she’d help them.

But she can’t remember their names. Why can’t she remember their names?
They were there. But no longer. She just cannot.

A knock at the door, and Twilight doesn’t have time to adjust her dishevelled mane before Sunburst barges into the room.

“Have you heard?” he asks frantically. “The Treasury–”

“Is diverting funding to the Crystal Heart Project,” Twilight finishes for him, with a withering glare. “I know, Sunburst. Darn it, we need more time.”

“And they’ll move on with it if we don’t make a breakthrough, Lady Archmage, we have to–”

“I know!” she yells. “That they’ll use the Barrier entirely? I know, Sunburst. I know!”

She levitates a letter. It is signed by Celestia herself, and she sees Sunburst’s face whiten when he spots the writing.

"She’s already asked me to help with the device. Actually make it work properly. I can’t say no, but at the same time... I just… I just need more time.”

“With all due respect,” Sunburst says, pacing in front of her desk. “I think you need to–”

“Absolutely not,” Twilight snaps. “I’m not testing this on children. Not yet. It’s not safe.”

“But what if the problem isn’t the serum’s model, but the subject’s instead? Children are…” Sunburst hesitates. “I can’t believe I’m saying this. They’re more malleable. Please, we have to consider every, every single available avenue for this. Even if we get a working model, we need to make sure it’s safe for them. If you ever–”

“And I’m not using it on test subjects from Equus. That’s unconscionable. No, Sunburst. I can’t.”

“Would you rather the Barrier gets unleashed?” Sunburst retorts. “Just… just think about it.”

“They won’t. Look, I can’t deal with this now. Just leave me.”

“Lady T–” Sunburst’s words catch in his throat. His long, bushy goatee trembles under his chin. “... Twilight. I...”

“I said leave me, before I ask Shearwater to remove you herself.”

Yet when the door swings shut, and the truth of the matter dawns in her mind Twilight weeps. It has to be done.

* * * * *

There were whispers behind her now, the memories swirling in a thick fog. And through the layers of mist and fog that swirled around them, Luna saw them, taking their seats around her and Twilight.

The old man was joined by Newfoals, humans, even Guards of all equine shapes. And they all were faded, yet their eyes pierced the dim light and fog.

“Who are you?” Luna called out.

’The dead.’ a child replied. Her mother sat beside her. A gaping hole was in both of their heads. The mother held a gun like Reiner's in her hand. ‘‘No choice.’

’The forgotten.’’ whispered an Imperial Guard who could have been her sister’s own, bitterly. ‘’Sent into battle and left to rot.’

‘The forsaken.’ a young man said, and Luna saw his torn wings and half-converted legs. ‘One of many.’

Voices everywhere. And there were many, blurred into a droning choir of those who had passed.

‘Model #16… failure… spinal deformation…’

‘...#43… inflammatory… organ failure…’

‘#172… heart failure…’

‘...blood loss…’

‘#249…’

‘...spinal compression injury…’

‘...necrosis…’

‘...left arm did not ponify…’

‘Failure’

‘Failure’

‘Failure’

Images flashed by her eyes, each more horrific than the last. But there another memory presented itself to Luna, and–

* * * * *

“Luna?”

At Twilight’s voice, the younger of the Princesses looks to her, hoof touching hers. She is a presence most welcome.

“Do you think I’ve… I’m sorry. I can’t.”

She lets go, glancing away from Luna. Even here, at her own personal observatory, Twilight still feels vulnerable.

“You can tell me, Twilight,” says Luna. Why does this have to be so hard? “I’m here to listen.”

“I’m sorry!” Twilight shouts. Her eyes brim with tears, and she turns to look outside. It is a beautiful night. “I shouldn’t have asked you to come. The other girls are busy. I shouldn’t throw this onto you.”

“Even if you hadn’t asked,” Luna tells her, “I would have come here nonetheless. My duty still calls to me, and I know what nightmares you’ve endured.”

Twilight looks back at Luna. “Then you know what kind of person I am.” She says it so bitterly. “What I’ve done, what I’ve said to them…”

She laughs.

“I don’t even know who I am anymore. No one knows. Not Spike. Not Celestia, not my friends, not my family, my bodyguard, my colleague. And you know what’s the worst part? I can’t… I can’t even do a favour as simple as remembering their names.”

In her telekinetic grasp, she lifts her Element and holds it before her.

“I promised… I promised them they’d be happy. That their children would be happy here. And you know what I do remember? Their faces. Every single one of them. You know I do.”

And when all was said and done, Twilight looks up to Luna again, tears still streaming down. She expects to see disgust, horror, hatred even. But she sees only pity and compassion.

“W-well?” she asks heatedly. “Out with it. You’re disgusted with me. All this time knowing me and I-I-I’m just a monster. A sick, twisted little m–”

Her rant is interrupted when Luna pulls her into an embrace. Her Element falls onto the floor.

“I understand,” Luna says warmly, maybe even lovingly. “But I told you. I’m here to listen, as I’ve always had for you. And I will continue to do so, Twilight. Here, and in your dreams. And I promised that no nightmare would ever come for you again…”

And when the tears flow, they continue, amidst her own sobs and Luna’s gentle encouragements.

‘I don’t belong here,’ Luna thinks suddenly.

It isn't her memory to keep, though it is warm and calming and everything she ever asked for. It changes, violently, as now she – Twilight? – stands in Canterlot, staring in disbelief at a Guard.

”She… left?”

“Y-yes, Lady Archmage,” the Imperial Guard stammers. “S-she’s g-gone, as-as is C-Cadance–”

His words are cut off by her own inarticulate scream of rage and grief and–

–She’s in Canterlot now, though her view is blurry, as she stares misty-eyed at the newest equine statue to decorate the Canterlot Palace Gardens.

‘I'll bring you back,' she reflects in silence. The walls have ears, she knows, but whose ears, Twilight cannot say. ‘I promise, I'll bring you back…’

* * * * *

“You left us,” Twilight whispered, her voice clear even in the growing storm. “You left me…”

Luna fixed her gaze upon her, and only her, even as the room filled with so many others. “I am not your Luna,” she answered. “But I won’t leave you now.”

‘Leave her.’

‘She doesn’t deserve your pity.’

The words blurred together, as papers flew and tore themselves to shreds, the chorus of voices mixing together.

‘Give in.’

‘You don’t know what she’s done.’

The winds blew and the storm gathered, yet Luna stood defiant.

It was time to finish her question.

‘Remember us.’

‘There’s a land she promised us.’

“Twilight,” she whispered. “I understand how. I do not understand why.”

‘Remember us.’

There, in the mist, she saw the silhouette of a dragon emerge from a book–

* * * * *

”... Spike, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Twilight cries out. He fell so, so very far, and now here they are in the Crystal Realm once more. His wings are torn, his jaws and arms broken, and whatever they did to his chest…

“We tried our best, ma’am,” speaks the lead Trailblazer, Captain Green Fields, and Twilight only hears regret in his voice. “But… he left us no choice.”

Twilight tears her gaze away from her beloved former assistant, to face the veteran eye to eye.

“Don’t… worry,” she said. “We’ll fix him, you’ll see. We’ll make him better. We’ll have to–”

* * * * *

“Focus, Twilight, focus!” Luna shouted above the wind. “Why? Why is she doing this?”

Whatever Spike had gone through, she would have her time to seek it out. Little by little she could feel herself fading...

But her words were to convince Twilight just as much as to convince herself. Flashes of memories that didn’t belong to her passed her mind, of her observatory in Canterlot, of the Crystal War, of Twilight and herself sharing a laugh over some unheard joke…

“I don’t know!” Twilight shouted back, tears flowing from her eyes. “I don’t know why, just listen to me!”

Another book summoned, and–

* * * * *

”You’re excused, Shearwater.”

Twilight’s trusted bodyguard looks to her, then Lyra, then back at her and nods quietly.

“Understood, Lady Archmage,” says Shearwater. And she walks out the door to join Doctor Steady Aim, leaving the three of them in his office. Any other time, Twilight would have let her faithful hippogriff bodyguard and friend remain to listen.

But not today. It would be too early, and suspicions would arise...

”Well? What did she say?” asks Twilight.

Lyra’s hooves drum the desk. She gets up and walks to the window, as if she could look out past the lowered blinds. The London Bureau still bustles with activity at midday, yet here in the head doctor’s office, it might as well be the middle of the night.

“She said… there is no Planet B,” Lyra says soberly. “It’s a no-go. She won’t be endorsing us. Neither will the WWF, Greenpeace… I could go on."

Sunburst groans behind her. Twilight sighs.

“We gave them Planet B,” she says thinly. “I don’t understand.”

Lyra shakes her head, frowning. “Twi’, you can’t ask them to abandon Earth. We gave them a choice. And honestly, I don’t get why you’re so… insistent about it.”

“Maybe it’s for the best,” Sunburst interjects. “We–”

“We gave their devices a boost in cleaning the oceans, means to clear up their forest fires, we’ve worked to reverse the damage they’ve wrought, and she still won’t endorse us?” Twilight retorts hotly. “Lyra, can’t you, I don’t know–”

“Like I said,” Lyra cuts her off. “We would be asking them to abandon their fight instead of winning it.”

“It’s so illogical, though,” Twilight sighs.

“But remarkably principled,” notes Sunburst. “I find that interesting.”

“Don’t mistake stubbornness for principle,” Twilight tells him. “And even if there is a principle behind it, a few enlightened souls can’t make up for sin on this scale.”

“Twilight,” Lyra says firmly, and there’s a strange look on the mint-green unicorn’s face.

Or perhaps that’s how Lyra’s face now looks all the time? Her mane is a little greasier, and she looks for all the world like she hasn’t slept in days.

“Humans will always fight for what’s theirs,” Lyra says. “We can’t be seen as taking from them.”

“We’re not taking, we’re [/i]giving to them!” Twilight replies. “We’re giving them everything that they could ask for. Things they can’t ever have imagined were possible."

Lyra holds up a forehoof. “Listen to what you're saying! It... doesn’t matter, if they don’t see it that way. It’s a no-go, and that’s the end of it…”

It would have been, of course, had Lyra’s rejected request not been featured the very next morning, in a high-profile interview published by a prominent international magazine, or had they been more patient in arranging a counter-interview next week in May.

Another change of scenery, and Twilight sits where Ambassador Lyra should have been, cameras and stage-lights fixed upon her. Perhaps they should have waited, but Lyra, bold one that she is, refused to participate.

”Lady Archmage,” the interviewer speaks, sharply. “Do you wish to tell us that humanity, as a whole, needs to be converted?”

“Well, it helps, doesn’t it?” Twilight says. Her exact words, broadcast to a million homes in Britain, will be set in stone, she knows. “Yes… doesn’t it help cure your ailments?”

The co-host leans forward, his elderly brows furrowed. They judge her, Twilight is aware. She feels the glare of the lights. But she needs to stand her ground in Lyra’s absence. Who knows what other mess she will have to clean up.

“But you said, yourself, and I quote, that we ‘needed’ it, Lady Archmage. Do you mean to imply that we ‘have’ to take it? That we are, somehow, by our nature, impure and lacking?"

He isn’t crass, but the venom he injects into his words, it brings a shudder. Yet she is steadfast. She isn’t going to turn back, not here, with tensions high in every corner of the world, at the height of what people call the Purple Winter. Equestria and Celestia herself are counting on her.

She takes a deep breath.

“We are… we’re doing this because we care. We’re pained to see your… how you’ve struggled to live up to your own ideals, have fallen so far from them, that you’d deny your own natures. Well, I like to think that we can–”

She almost doesn’t see the book thrown at her head until it is too late. Even though the perpetrator is dragged away, kicking and yelling profanities at her, and she telekinetically intercepted the book before it collided with her, she wished it had.

Yet as the murmurs grow to be deafening within and outside the studio, across all of Britain, and then the world, she wonders;

Who was it that really spoke?

* * * * *

‘Puppet.’

‘‘Slave.’

‘‘One of our own…’

* * * * *

“… That’s not right, No, no, Princess– what are you saying?”

“Twilight,” says Celestia. She is so gentle and calm. She sits upon her throne, but she might as well be by her side, comforting as she has always been. “Please, you must understand. It is a hard lesson we learnt. When war marches upon us… we must expect all our people to stand their ground. And that includes the Newfoals.”

Twilight has been summoned to Canterlot that very afternoon, away from the Crystal Realm. The latest batch of the serum has been shipped off to Toronto earlier. And she had expected a congratulations, or perhaps a briefing.

But not like this. Before her lies a map of Earth, projected from her mentor’s horn. And on every Bureau, there are–

“You mean to use the Bureaus as a weapon,” Twilight says, breathless. It isn’t a question, of course. But she needs to repeat it, more for herself than it was for Celestia. “And the Newfoals… will be conscripted soldiers.”

“Conscripted? No, Twilight. They’ll volunteer for it,” Celestia continues, her expression mournful. “I’m sorry, but we must be prepared. And if a war comes, they will stand by our side, and they will fight for their new home.”

All the foals she has spoken to. The elderly. The ones cast aside. The destitute. The homeless. Men, women, children. Those who would rather be dead than live. Veterans she gave a second chance to. People she assured, in their last moments, that this was a rebirth.

“No... no, Princess... Celestia, you can’t. They deserve a new life,” Twilight stammers out. Her mane is in disarray. "They... they deserve it. I can’t. I can't do this." Her eyes brim with tears. “Why can’t you ask the other members of the Sphere? They’ll answer the call. The hippogriffs, you’ve seen them on the field with our pegasi! The zebras, the griffons, all of them, please. Give the h– give the Newfoals a chance. I promised them. I promised they’ll be at peace."

“Oh, Twilight,” Celestia says softly. “The Sphere shall stand with us. But every soul counts for the struggle.”

Twilight doesn’t want to see this. It couldn’t be. And yet…

She turns to meet Celestia. Her Princess is right behind her. Twilight holds her breath, for the room feels like all air has been sucked away into oblivion. Celestia’s eyes are warm, as always. But now, it seems… empty.

And then she lands back into reality. Celestia sighs.

“Twilight,” she says gently. “You haven’t had your therapy for this week, haven’t you?”

She says nothing in reply. It is true. But at the same time, she doesn’t want to say.

“I’m sorry,” Celestia says. “I’ve been busy, and I should’ve been there for you.”

‘No,’ Twilight thinks. She wants to say it. But her lips feel heavy. ‘I can ask Luna.’

She pauses for a moment. The lavender at her study has faded away. She hasn’t talked to Luna in weeks. Not since her therapy sessions have increased with Cel–

“Come, Twilight,” Celestia interrupts. “I’ll let them know I’ll be busy.”

Twilight wants to say something. She doesn’t know what that something is. But she'll try, so she opens her mouth to speak. Then she feels Celestia’s all-encompassing embrace wrap around her so tightly that she can’t breathe right–

“Shhh, Twilight. It's okay. It's okay. Hush, now. Take your rest.”

* * * * *

“Luna, please–” moaned Twilight. The memory disintegrated. “I can’t find it. I can’t find it.”

“Hold onto me.”

The crowd grew, and grew around them. The seats, once empty, were now packed to the fullest, baleful gazes bearing down on them both.

The dead had come in force. The ones that should be, but aren’t. Men, women, children. Mothers and fathers, sons and daughters.

Together as one, under the eternal Sun. As the Queen willed i–

* * * * *

”... The reports came in. She’s done it,” says Shining Armor. He is out of breath. “Sweet Harmony, she’s done it.”

The palace is abuzz with frenzied activity, the guards galloping from post to post, the totem-proles glowing brightly as messages are relayed. The conference was a success. Humanity watched as Celestia cast her judgement upon them. Those in Berne are to be the first

And they are all to join them in Harmony.

But in the War Room, there is only dead silence. A map covers the roundtable, projected by Twilight. The words are on her lips now. The order to seal the fate of thousands. Hundreds of thousands of souls to join the cause all at once.

Their targets are all set. A marker for every Bureau of every country to host a Bureau, in the hearts of where millions live. London will answer soon, she decides.

New York. Moscow. Beijing. Jakarta. New Delhi. Tokyo. Karachi. Istanbul. Rio de Janeiro. Cairo. Mexico City. Lagos.

City by city, Bureau by Bureau. The converts will be many, before humanity’s countermeasures can kick in. When they do, their numbers will have already swelled beyond all expectations. She can only hope that Rarity’s Green Desert Project will prove fruitful enough to welcome so many.

For now, Earth beckons for her to speak.

“Lady Archmage,” says Shining Armor. For a moment, Twilight feels the absurd sensation that ‘Lady Archmage’ is someone else, that her brother can’t possibly be talking to her. “It’s time.”

Is it right? Is it right to cast such an order?

They will stand by their side, Celestia promised. Thousands reborn from their hopeless existence.

She nods. “Activate the Mist.”

One by one, from each marker, a purple mist spreads, consuming all in its way. For the good of Equestria. A part of her hopes that Lyra will have reached her embassy’s portal-station in time, far and away and safe amongst their own.

‘Oh, please be safe, Lyra, you know how vengeful they are…’

And as she impassively watches the mist spread, her mind wanders away, so long ago, to where it all began…

… Amidst a Changeling attack in Canterlot. But this is no mere attack, for on her brother’s wedding day, the Changeling Queen of Queens has chosen to commit a full-scale invasion. How perfect a strike. All Chrysalis needed to do was to remove one meddlesome unicorn from the equation.

And despite Chrysalis’ deception being uncovered, her true, hideous form unmasked for Canterlot to see, something went terribly wrong. Or rather, everything did.

Celestia, her crown thrown aside, defeated by Chrysalis.

The shield around the city shattering under tens of thousands of chitinous hooves.

Her friends’ last attempt to find the Elements… and now she has found herself alone, trapped in a city with no-one to trust.

She runs from cover to cover, avoiding the Changelings rooting out any lone guards. She lost the others somewhere near the city centre, consumed within a rabble of identical faces. Before she had escaped, Rainbow Dash insisted that they’d hold them off.

And now an army stands between her and the Elements of Harmony themselves.

‘Focus,’ she urges herself. She peers over her erstwhile cover, an overturned carriage. The Changelings that stand before the gates are numerous, hundreds at least, if not thousands. ‘Gotta… gotta figure out a distraction.’

“Okay, Pinkie–” she whispers, before stopping herself. Pinkie is missing, too. She groans. “Alright then. Let’s see if I can teleport…”

Her horn charges with magical energy. With the others, the mass to transfer would have been too great in her exhaustion, but with her alone…

Slowly, she feels herself transported, then reconstitutes herself…

‘Got it!’ she thinkstriumphantly. ‘And we’re–’

Something hisses in her ear. She finds herself face-to-face with a red-finned, mauve-eyed Changeling officer. She is so, so close to the tower’s gates.

‘No…’

And then it happens. At first, the Changeling rears to strike her, hissing even as she lights her horn in defiance. Then something crashes through the tower gates behind him, blowing away the black drones that stand in front of it.

The officer turns in time to be hit with a blue bolt right in the face, sending it flying over Twilight’s head and into its brethren.

She looks at the feebly stirring officer, then follows its comrades’ eyes to the assailant.

There, emerging from destroyed gates, is Princess Luna. Around her, the Elements of Harmony float in her aura, as her gaze falls upon the Changelings gathered behind Twilight.

And she is not happy.

But though Twilight has never witnessed such grim determination from her before, she does not see the terrifying visage of Nightmare Moon. She saw only Luna, and she was here for them.

“Brother!”

A Changeling foolishly flies towards her, trying to shield the downed officer, to be thrown aside just like its comrade. Luna stomps a hoof, cracking the ground beneath her.

It doesn’t take long for the swarm to turn tail and flee, leaving behind Twilight. The Night Princess’s horn lights up further, and she points it straight at her.

“It’s me!” Twilight yells. “It’s me, Luna. Y-you went with me in Nightmare Night, remember?”

That answer is all that Luna needs, and she relaxes a little, offering a relieved smile. “Thank goodness, you’re safe, Twilight Sparkle. But… where are your friends?”

It is then that Twilight thanks her lucky stars, for Rainbow Dash emerges from an alleyway nearby, followed closely by Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy, even Pinkie – who’s dragged in her party cannon, and blasted a pursuing Changeling away.

“Hey Twi’! You got the Elements yet?” yells Dash.

“Yeah! Princess Luna’s with me!” Twilight shouts back, but Luna lays a hoof on her shoulder.

“I’m afraid not, Twilight,” Luna says grimly. “You won’t make it back to the Castle like this.”

“What about you? The Changeling Queen… she took down Celestia.”

“Alone? I think not. I didn’t come here alone. I’ve informed the other Guard units outside the city, and I shall delay the invaders long enough for you to use the Elements and for reinforcements to arrive.”

Twilight opens her mouth to object, just as her friends, now by her side, start to as well.

“Princess–”

“You can’t–”

“Let us–”

Then Luna raises her forehoof, and smiles. It isn’t the best, nor the most natural of smiles. Yet here, it is as good as a smile as any.

"Let them come. There is one Princess of Equestria in Canterlot who still stands."

“Luna,” Twilight persists. “Just… she’s too strong.”

“Twilight Sparkle.” Luna’s gaze falls upon Twilight. Warm, kind, and determined. “Chrysalis is mine. Take the Elements of Harmony. Everything will be alright." A new buzzing of wings grows louder and closer. Luna does not falter. “Now go. Cast them out. And the day shall be ours. Go!”

It isn’t just encouragement. It is a promise. And it proves to be a promise half-fulfilled.

For by the end of the day, though their efforts have succeeded in casting out the wicked Queen, Twilight’s brother lies hurt and so does his love, and even Luna and Celestia are both exhausted. The battle has been won, but so many of their own were dragged away by the fleeing horde. Captives, for purposes Twilight cannot discern yet.

And so it was, the day is ended, with Celestia standing in the throne room, her stony expression belying her fury.

“Send the message out. Summon all our friends and allies from far and wide. We will march into the Badlands where Queen Chrysalis resides, and we will find them.”

Something isn’t right, though. Something stirs. Something was–

* * * * *

The shadowy figures, now in the thousands, looked down at them, seated in the hall. They whispered, they droned, and she listened–

‘Give her to us.’

‘Let us judge her.’

’Help us.’

‘Leave her.’

‘Let her go.’

’Unworthy.’

‘She promised.’

A thousand ghosts streamed in, and a thousand more waited. Their ethereal chorus continued.

One stood out among all of them in Luna's eyes. Her flowing mane was torn and stringy, her chitin cracked, half her face burned off, yet Queen Papillate held her head up high, her ghostly, yellow sight piercing into Luna.

’All debts must be paid in full…’

“Twilight! Listen to me!” Luna yelled. The fog swirled around them, and she met Twilight’s eyes. They were wide, tearful, and she screamed with no voice. “You need to wake up! Wake up!”

* * * * *

The little earthpony filly’s dance is intoxicatingly sweet.

“I can walk! I can walk again!” she cheers and laughs. But Twilight has no reply.

‘Model… 302... success.’

The filly stops, and looks at Twilight, still leaning against the nearby wall, her chest heaving. “Is something wrong?” the filly asks, sweetly, her ears drooping. “Did… I do something wrong?”

And Twilight shakes her head.

“No, no,” she says. The filly smiles widely, happily. Her mother would too. “Nothing… nothing is wrong. It works… it works.”

She pulls the once-human into her embrace, reborn as a foal was unto this world. The first, she prays, of many.

And she sees that it is good.

* * * * *

Eventually, the world came around again in Luna’s eyes. Gone was the lecture hall, its form fading away with the spectres that came with it. The dead, the dying, the converted and the forgotten.

Last to depart, her form lingering on, was Papillate. She too faded, the yellow in her eyes remaining where they were, fixed on Luna, before it flickered and disappeared. One last whisper passed by her ears.

‘Remember us.’

And she found herself standing in the very same Golden Oaks rotunda she had been in at the beginning, with the shivering, prone form of Twilight Sparkle, clutching her doll.

“...Twilight?” Luna whispered.

No answer. The dreary silence was deafening.

But it was when she finally moved closer to Twilight that the other mare recoiled from her touch.

“S-stay away,” Twilight whispered. “You know what I did.”

“It wasn’t you,” Luna answered. “No matter what she told you. It wasn’t you.”

Twilight said nothing, at first. And not for the first time, Luna wondered if she herself believed what she had just said.

“She… she promised I’d help them,” Twilight said softly. Her voice was muffled through her quivering lips and her tears, and Luna’s heart ached at the pitiful sight. “And I… I did.”

She looked up, and their eyes met. She had such kind, sad eyes.

‘Oh, Twilight…’

“But it wasn’t enough. But it has to have been, because otherwise this will all have been for nothing, she’ll have been for nothing. But… it isn’t. All this time and effort, making sure we’ll be united, that we would all be together, that we’ll never be hurt by Wendigos or Chrysalis or Sombra ever again… and what we did just to feel safe...”

Her ears sagged, and her head hung low. Luna shook her head.

“Whatever it is, whatever’s passed,” she said. “What if it isn’t for nothing?”

With a forehoof, Luna gently lifted Twilight’s chin. Only now did she again see all the faint wrinkles and wear, and every streak of grey she had in her mane.

“Twilight, you are my sister’s student, and frankly she knows you better than anyone,” she said. “But I see ponies for what they are, what they fear and what they dream of, for their truest selves are shown when they are at their lowest… or when others are.”

On instinct, she plucked out one of the books from the rotunda’s shelves. A book under ‘E’. And when Luna opened it up, the faintest of voices was to be heard from within, the first of which was her own.

‘You still don't have the sixth Element! The spark didn't work!’

‘But it did! A different kind of spark. I felt it the very moment I realised how happy I was to hear you, to see you, how much I cared about you. The spark ignited inside me when I realised that you all... are my friends! You see, Nightmare Moon, when those Elements are ignited by the spark that resides in the heart of us all, it creates the sixth element: the Element of... Magic!’

The memory faded.

“Even if you did it for the good of Equestria,” Luna said wistfully, “and not for this silly old, jealous mare, petty villain that she was, you did it nonetheless because it was the right thing. You and your friends.”

“You don’t know what we’ve been through since then,” Twilight replied, pushing her hoof away from her chin, and her tone made it clear to Luna she wasn’t only speaking about Equestria. “You’re… you’re you. Before all of this.”

“That is true. But I believe I speak for all of Equestria, when I say we shalll make it right.”

Luna moved her forehoof to Twilight’s. Her own thoughts went back to what the Allfather had told her, mere hours before her departure…

‘Perhaps, Luna, they were the first of the war’s victims, from before it has even begun, and I trust you will see the truth yourself as well…’

“I know what you’ve been through. What you’ve done,” she said. “But the Twilight whom I know is here, deep down, and she stands before me. And I promise that, whatever it is, we will help you.”

“What if… what if she won’t let you?”

“Let us?” Luna replied. “Twilight… you removed the helmet yourself. All you needed was a gentle tug.”

In the depths of Twilight’s eyes, Luna saw the twinkle in her eyes once more, and the Lady Archmage slowly allowed herself a bittersweet smile.

But the moment was not to last, unfortunately, for Twilight’ smile faded at the same time she saw something past her shoulder.

“Luna… she’s here.”

In a moment, Luna swirled around, with Twilight behind her, and readied her magic.

There, at the end of the hall, in front of the double doors to the library’s recesses, there stood a pale mare. Her gaze was unknowable, for her face lay concealed in the shadow of a grey hood. Yet Luna felt her stare. More than her face was hidden, in fact, her figure dissimulated by a cloak of grey.

However, Luna saw a little of her pale coat, as from within her cloak, the apparition drew out a blade of many shards, like the Archmage’s, but bronze in colour and thirteen in number. With an elegant flourish, she raised her sword aloft, with a fine symmetry that divided her unseen face.

Whoever this was, the Princess of the Night knew, her threat was clear as her sister’s day.

“Stay behind me,” Luna said firmly. But then she felt a tug on her wing, and Twilight’s expression was pained.

“You have to go,” she said mournfully. “I’m sorry, you have to go–”

“Not without you!” shouted Luna. Her wings flared open, and she was ready to meet the pale mare’s blade. “I will not leave you here, do you hear me? I will not leave you again.”

“But you… you’ll fade,” Twilight said in horror. “You can’t– you can’t stay here. You’ll be trapped in here with me if she gets to you.”

“Twilight,” spoke Luna. “I am the Princess of Dreams…”

“You don’t understand,” whispered Twilight. “She doesn’t need to defeat you. All she needs is to keep you trapped. And then others will come.” She looked up at Luna. “I can’t let you lose yourself in here. Not to her.”

Baring her teeth, Luna let her horn shine bright. In that brief glint, she caught a glimpse under the pale mare’s hood. What looked back at her were eyes under a mask, skull-like in the haunting visage it cast.

Something drew Luna’s notice to the doors behind the apparition. They were old, wooden, and they buckled ever so slightly.

And then, all at once, it happened.

First, the red wave, manifesting itself from a trickle of blood dripping down from the edges. It dripped, then trickled, then, with the door moving under a magical aura, the torrential wave gushed out of it, flooding the hall.

She stood against it. And so did the apparition before the doors, and Twilight. But she felt herself slipping, more, and more, with the blood flowing freely around her legs.

The pale mare watched. There was nothing to hold onto for Luna, except Twilight before her. Twilight, her horn shining brightly, who looked at her sorrowfully. The wave should be overwhelming, but Luna heard her voice in a vacuum.

“You have to let me go…”

Twilight, this time, caressed Luna’s cheek sweetly, and her smile was longing.

“Listen to me,” she spoke. “You saw the how, and you wanted to know the why. I don’t know if I’ll remember this, back out there, but… Princess. You must find the Architect.”

Luna gazed at Twilight. Here again was a name that rang a bell… “The Architect?”

Twilight nodded, a pleading look in her eyes.

“The last of the ancient alicorns,” she said. “Luna, the Architect still lives. Celestia has been hunting for her, planning on binding her to her will as well. She mustn’t!”

Her words slowly sank in with Luna.

“Twilight, I’ve already met a new alicorn,” Luna said hesitantly, groaning as she ignored the red tide’s pull with increasing strain. “If you mean a grey–”

“You’ve met Galena?” Twilight said animatedly. “Oh, thank goodness. The Queen… she killed the one of our world, not two days ago! I saw her body with my own eyes. But it’s not her! No, this is–”

Before Luna’s very eyes, the crimson red turned purple, and a rise in the current nearly swept her and Twilight off the floor.

“Agh!” Twilight clutched at Luna. “She’ll… she’ll have the answers I… I can’t give. And please... take care of Spike, tell him I'm sorry. I’ll be… I’ll be alright.”

Luna’s stance eased up then, despite a shiver trailing down her spine, not of her own accord. But it felt just right...

“I’ll come back for you,” Luna whispered, hearing it even above the torrential purple wave, and Twilight did too. “I promise, I’ll come back for you.”

She could withstand it. She could indeed.

But she knew she had to let go.

Slowly, her forehoof slipped, and she was parted from Twilight. And as she was carried away by the wave, Luna heard her whisper one last time.

“Luna, I… I lo–”

~ Boston, USA ~

The ground turned to dirt and grass, and the very air became filled with soot and ash. The Princess of the Night reconstituted herself on the ground, coughing out blood, her ears ringing. And yet her mind had never been clearer. Strengthening her resolve, she staggered, holding back another cough, and stood tall.

Before her lay a familiar sight, Twilight prone and unmoving. The pain she kept hidden away was unmistakable, and Luna kicked herself for being so blind to it, from the very beginning. But she had a promise to keep, Luna thought. And everything would be alright.

She approached the prone mare cautiously. The Archmage – Twilight, she reminded herself – remained curled up, with only her shallow breathing to indicate that she, thankfully, had not perished at all.

“Twilight…?”

A groan. Luna breathed a sigh of relief.

Slowly, Twilight’s eyes fluttered open, and she looked up to Luna. They were red, and confused. Her breathing grew rapid.

There were many things Luna wanted to ask her. Things she wanted to help her with. But it all had to start somewhere, and here it started by offering a hoof to help up Twilight, with what she hoped was a kind, gentle smile.

“I’m here, Twilight,” she said. “I will keep you safe.”

Twilight said nothing, and her mouth hung open slowly.

“Twilight. It’s alright. It’s al–”

She hardly had a moment’s warning, however, when Twilight fired off a concussion blast against her chest. The blow Luna a good twelve paces back. She heard Twilight release an inarticulate, beast-like scream of rage.

Her sword was resummoned in the nick of time to meet the Archmage’s own.

Parry after parry, they were swift even with Luna’s mind still in a daze, but the Archmage was relentless, her face twisted into a grimace, and every punctuated by a furious snarl.

And then she called out a single name, her voice echoing throughout the city’s ruins.

“Spiiike!”

* * * * *

Maxine Radwick kept her trace of the alicorn, who may or may not be Luna. It had been an eventful night so far, judging by the intensive battle between her, the Archmage, and the Archmage’s pet dragon. Thankfully for Maxine, she hadn’t yet got an up-close encounter during this whole battle like that.

And based on what she could tell, all the evidence of their fight pointed towards it winding up in Langone Park for whatever reason. Perhaps the Archmage was giving Luna’s dopplegänger a further debriefing away from prying eyes. Or maybe this was the actual Luna and the two were still slugging it out. Either was possible at this point, and it wouldn’t make a difference, either way.

‘Alright, I better report this in.’ Maxine thought, taking cover behind an abandoned car with the entrance to the park within eyesight.

She reached for her radio when–

“Well, this is interesting,” a new voice spoke up, followed up by a series of gun clicks.

Slowly turning around, her left hand still reaching for her radio, Maxine saw she was not alone. A group of five people stood before her, all armed with various kinds of older rifles. A sixth, a woman in an antiquated flak-jacket, stood there looking bemused.

“Hello, Radwick,” said the woman, a hand on her hip. “Fancy meeting you here. Shouldn’t you be helping out the PHL with cleaning up the remains of this incursion?”

“Jones...” Maxine regarded the woman curtly. “For your information, I’m here because someone needed to keep track of the doppelgänger. We’re all lacking answers at this time, and she seems the best source for them.”

“Hmm, fair enough,” said the woman. “It’s unfortunate that out of all UNAC have at their disposal, you’re the one who winds up in our territory,” she commented, shaking her head in disapproval. “Lower your rifles, guys. We’ll be taking her with us to see the alicorn. She’s the closest thing we’ve got to a UNAC representative right now.”

Maxine put up a stoic face, removing her hand from the radio.

Unprotesting, she let the HLF box her in as they followed their leader into the park. Cooperation would be the best course of action right now. At least Tess Jones was more transparent than the equines would be. And that was a benefit.

The only question that remained now, was what to do when they came upon Luna…

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

A couple of renamings are made to reflect the changes to leaders of Equus who appear in the flashback to the founding of the Co-Harmony Sphere.

Spectrum 2.0 - November 01st 2019

Sledge115: Apologies for the delay, things are all very busy on our corners of the world :twilightsheepish:

And here we are, Spectrum’s take on the trip through Twilight’s mind! We hope it’s served expectations well enough. Instead of outdoing ‘For Whom The Bell Tolls’... why not take it in a different direction? Even so, take this as our Halloween special.

Believe it or not, this was supposed to be just one part of a longer chapter, but before that was carried out, cooler heads prevailed and we decided to expand it to its own chapter entirely.

The memory sequence was the most complicated part of the chapter to manage, as is the behavior of the Archmage inside her mind. Make of that what you will.

The memories shown aren't strictly chronological, and where they fit in the timeline, we'll leave it to you to guess.

Yes, it was Lyra that helped found Co-Harmony Sphere. And look where we are now.

The Archmage’s interview was on BBC News, May of 2019, after a certain environmentalist and a few others publicly criticised (in a Time interview) the Equestrian Government’s attempts to get them to endorse Conversion. By then, of course, tensions are at an all time high…

The interview is a throwback to the classic Alt-TCB story Not Alone, for all of you newer readers.

As for the memories, if there are any inconsistencies… well. Good eye.

Some random trivia; yes, the Changelings in the Wedding flashback are Pharynx and Thorax, and the Changeling that got blasted by Pinkie's cannon is Aphid.

Personally, this chapter is one of my favourite parts to work on in this endeavour. I hope you all find it to your liking as well.

With all that being said, Chapter 18, fair warning, might be just about as complex as the Chapter 16 to write. Stay tuned, and Happy Halloween!

VoxAdam: This is a short note for one of the longer chapters of Spectrum Act Two, this after how the Act had proven itself a little more restrained in chapter length than Act One, but that’s to say here’s my mark on co-writing as well as editing again, following my choice to mostly sit out the former and stick with the latter for the first three chapters.

Reworking the true state of Twilight and the Bearers’ minds from a torture chamber into an idyllic false reality was one of those long-standing projects shared with a few team-mates since the later days of OG Spectrum, and I hope it delivered. With a touch of the two Amnesia video games and a certain Kubrick movie thrown in. :-)

Behold the Co-Harmony Sphere.

~Vox

DoctorFluffy: Apparently I was also here. I took a much more hands-off role than usual, for… various reasons… including but not limited to cosplay, artwork, trying to design a plausible assault rifle/grenade launcher combo for warframe, dance class, and getting paid to yell at people about meat bicycles. Also, I made a new chapter of Light Despondent Remixed, which is HUEG!

I’m of two minds about our potion testing scene. On the one hand it lacks the raw, unsubtle, hammering body horror… on the other hand, it’s much more subtle and we’ve managed to get across why things are different. I think in the end we did okay.

My favorite scene here, I think, would be Lyra renouncing her ambassadorship. Sledge and Vox had written the scene of Lyra creating the sphere, and the idea of creating a broken Lyra renouncing the prestige and power that gave her in a similar setting as a thematic contrast was too fun to resist.

Some clarifications, btw:
* Chiari malformation is not something I just made up - it involves the brain not fitting inside the skull and being forced into the spinal cord. With the differences in shape between human and pony necks and skulls, it made sense at the time. #themoreyouknow
* I referred to the Crystal War as the “Great War” in reference to World War 1 - At the time, it was seen as the worst war could get. And everyone hoped there'd never be another one. But, well, you know how that song and dance goes.

TheIdiot: It took us awhile to get a lot of things done, both in real life and for this story. Plenty has happened in the time since the previous update. Most of which was the equivalent of having to endure the Universe trying to grind one’s will to continue into pebbles. Although one of the was the show ending, but a blog post talks about that.

While this wasn’t released on Halloween as we had hoped, the sentiment remains. We here in the realm of Spectrum do hope that you, our fair readers, enjoyed yourself 31st of the tenth month of 2019.

Ideally we will get the next chapter out to you all before the year’s conclusion. If we manage to have the arc end too, then that’ll be another feather in our cap.

If not… well, the story will go on regardless.

Until next time, all,

Carpe Diem,
~TheIdiot

Act II ~ Chapter Eighteen ~ Moonrise Over Boston

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot
It’s December 1st, and a hard time to be sure.

DoctorFluffy
“That’s right, the Mascara Snake. Fast and bulbous. Also, a tin... teardrop.”
“Bulbous also tapered?”
“That’s right!”

VoxAdam

Sledge115
Go beyond

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Eighteen
Moonrise Over Boston

* * * * *

I've waited long enough now
For them all to come around
And though the Sun may plead and threaten
The Moon will stand her ground
—The Moon Rises, lyrics by Ponyphonic

~ Fenway Kenmore, Boston, USA ~ November 15th 2024 CE ~
— Twenty-five minutes earlier

“Lady– sorry, I mean, Princess Cadance,” Major Bauer said hurriedly. “What do you really mean by an ‘other’ Equestria?

Cadance felt warm and cold at the same time, here in their makeshift base-camp, which used to be the platform of a small station, situated below an overpass. Fenway Station, she’d read as they drove across said overpass, following the ambush she’d saved these people from at the inn’s ‘parking’ structure.

Them. Humans. Equestrians amongst their ranks, but mainly humans.

And in their presence, yes, she felt warm and cold at once. Warm, from what permeated the rough, harsh exterior of these soldiers, the love they held. Cold, by whatever came from the North, a tainted, twisted love.

“I meant what I said,” she stated, pacing along the platform’s edge. “Aunt Luna and I, we came from Equestria… we came from an Equestria that didn’t know war. An Equestria that never crossed the divide between worlds and began a war.”

The woman named Alicia piped up. “Makes sense when you think about it, right, Major?” she commented, fingers drumming the crate she sat on. “This is way above our paygrade...”

“Well…” Cadance said hesitantly, “things are a little different back there, and more than just– look, the important thing is, Major, is that Alexander Reiner is alive.”

The Major regarded her with a curious glance, then shrugged.

“Alright… slow down a little,” he said, holding up a hand. “When and how did he arrive?”

Cadance’s eyes drifted over their surroundings. It was harder to tell, under the shade of an overpass illuminated only by the white glare of glowsticks, what the world beyond looked like, but the station sat next to a park and river. Even in the dark of night, Cadance saw the greenery had been stripped bare by the Winter, a light cover of dirty snow on the grounds.

The crude, pale light cast her shadow onto the tracks, making her wings look massive. She could acutely feel what these people saw when they gazed at her.

“I’m not sure,” she said. “Two weeks, I think? That was in–”

“Two weeks?” interrupted Starfall, the unicorn dispatcher who’d recognised her Gift of Tongues. “That’s not possible! The Captain disappeared less than three days ago.”

“I don’t know,” said Daniel, from next to Alicia. “Could be time travel.”

“Don’t interrupt,” said Starfall. “Just focus on what you’re doing. How’s poor Canvas, anyway?”

Daniel held up the flask and shook it. “The vinegar should help him pull through,” he said, looking back down to the paint-covered, immobile earthpony. “Guy’s gonna be stiff for weeks, but at least we got to him before that stuff ossified.”

“Praise be the Lyre,” Alicia breathed. “Our little squad can’t go losing good guys on your watch, Stephan.”

Indeed, since Cadance had learned from Bauer that he’d given his Knights the order to spread out as they headed East, it wasn’t so surprising her sharp alicorn eyes had caught him with only four companions – right as they were holing up in a garage with their vehicle, having come close to also getting caught by Imperials.

But then he’d insisted on falling back a few blocks West, with her in tow, so the six of them could converse in a private place.

Bauer tapped a little, tubular device above his armour’s pauldron.

“No idea if my shoulder camera’s still broadcasting anything,” he muttered. “Not while that fucking dome’s above the city. But someone must’ve got a picture of you back to Command, Your Highness…”

“I hope so,” said Cadance. “Major… I didn’t interact much with Captain Reiner, except to tell him the story of how I got my wings, because he was as surprised as you… But that’s not important right now. All I know is that you, Stephan Bauer, are the person we hoped to meet in Boston…”

“Why Boston?” demanded Stephan. “Why not New York? That’s where all the higher-ups are.”

“Because Boston is where Reiner was last seen,” Cadance replied, “and it was our only trail to follow back to where he came from. Now–”

She tensed up.

“Wait, what was that?”

In the darkness beyond the overpass, a screeching wail pierced the night.

~ Manhattan, New York City, USA ~

“No sound, no comms, barely any picture,” grumbled Vinyl, thumping the plasma-screen TV. “What in the world’s going on over there? Why are we seeing another Cadance running around? And who’s this talking to us, using our Bonbon as a puppet?”

The last question was addressed to the glowing-eyed, twitching Bonbon, yet it gave voice to what Cheerilee, and presumably everyone else in the PHL war room, had been thinking.

On the screens, grainy still images of a pink alicorn with her wings resplendent, offered a striking backdrop to the Oracle, but had no answers to provide. For ten whole minutes, Bonbon had been struggling to speak, delivering many of her usual gibberish riddles – and yet in the cracks between, words of unusual coherence had emerged.

“I’d sooner not divulge mine identity,” she said in that voice not her own. She clutched her chest, panting with exertion. “And even if I would, it’d take too long, and mean little to you. Speaking through this vessel is proving harder than I thought. The shock must have… Never you mind. Time... short is.”

The Oracle turned to Lady Cadance.

“Please… on mine behalf speak,” she wheezed. “Voice of the people, the voice of the gods… Echo lost in the wilderness must not… Nymph that runs afoul of jealous wife… Argh...”

“Is it true what she said, Cadance?” Cheerilee asked the frowning pegacorn. “You’ve met… whoever this is, before?”

Cadance dipped her head, looking no-one in the eye.

“Yes,” she whispered. “It was at the JFK Library and Museum. Right before the Imperials captured Zecora… and destroyed our portal-station… and Captain Reiner vanished.”

“What.” Spitfire pushed back her chair, glowering. “Why didn’t you tell us any of this?”

The Princess-in-Exile returned her glare. “You should ask Amethyst,” she said. “She swore me to secrecy. I didn’t even see the whole of it. When the Imperials attacked, I was over in the Smith Hall, looking over those refugees who needed my help. Got them out of there too, as you well know. Aren’t we meant to be a humanitarian organisation first?”

Spitfire bristled, yet this part of the story was one Cheerilee and the rest had already heard.

“Amethyst?” said Cheerilee. Her eyes scanned the war room “...And of course. Not only is Amethyst not here, Time Turner’s the only one of us who stayed at the UN…” She eyed Cadance. “You said you and Zecora were taking Bonbon for a day out. So, the attack on the JFK, that wasn’t just the bad luck of the Imperials gunning for Alex, was it?”

Gladmane sniggered. “Congratulations, Your Highness,” he said leerily. “You’re really learning the art of deception… With your own friends, to boot…”

“Friends don’t lie,” Pineapple Nectar commented glibly. “It’s what they say, yes? But it’s all distrust and secrets and lies with you ponies… Such fun this is!”

"Listen here, Pina...” began Vinyl, growling.

A low, soft hum traversed the air. It was small. It should have been unobtrusive. And yet it felt so very at odds with the tensions in the room. Just as it had started, the bickering died down, as everyone stared to the one who hummed.

It was Moondancer. She sat in her chair, eyes closed, back straight, hooves pressed together.

A realisation crossed Cheerilee, the same one which must have caught everyone off-guard. Since the moment the Oracle had spoken, Moondancer hadn’t spoken a word. She’d sat there, in a meditative pose of serene silence, seemingly removed from the mounting worry and doubt.

Moondancer’s eyes fluttered open. They met Cheerilee’s.

“Dancer?” said Cheerilee. “You got something to say?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Moondancer nodded. “That night, three nights ago. In the underground.” She nodded at Cadance. “Where we keep those in your care, Cadance. Including Bonbon. Cheerilee was there. I was there.” One eye glanced at Vinyl. “And so was your cousin, Vinyl... So was Allie. You were sleeping… Trying to sleep.”

Vinyl’s lips tightened. Everyone knew she hated reminders of the nights she spent in the ward.

“Why,” she said, “what happened?”

But it came back to Cheerilee.

“Bonbon… she had a vision,” Cheerilee whispered, remembering. “She said ‘Reiner still stands’. And she mentioned… ‘A Celestia whole and true, as she should have been’.”

Cheerilee stared at the images on the screens behind the Oracle, who was now swaying, the glow in her eyes dimming. She felt relieved to see Gladmane move to support Bonbon.

“I don’t know about Celestia… But Cadance? That looks like a Cadance whole and true…”

A sardonic cough racked the room.

“Ma’am. Don’t mean to make a fuss,” Pina stated, swallowing back another cough, her prosthetic forehoof covering her mouth. “Except Cadance is not what I’m seeing on Major Bauer’s feed. What I see looks more like a big purple dragon. Heading straight towards him. And it doesn’t look friendly. At all.”

~ Charlestown, Boston, USA ~
— Now

Scootaloo stared at Rainbow Dash with complete disbelief. Here they stood atop Bunker Hill, in the moonlight shadow of a large obelisk. Many centuries ago, she recalled, a battle did take place here, where invading British had incurred much heavier casualties against the defending colonial rebels. A frontal assault that had resulted in disproportionately heavy losses. A mad plan none too far from what Rainbow had told everyone she intended to do.

“I’m going for Twilight, like I said,” Rainbow said. She adjusted her helmet and flight goggles. “Scoots, you’re on Wing Commander Fleetfoot, Captain Timber, and Captain Plow, alright? Get Whistle and the other cadets safely out. I know I can count on ya.”

“What?” Scootaloo said. “You’re really going back there? This fast?”

“Yeah,” replied Dash. “I am. Gotta get her outta there.” She pointed with a wing across the river. The banks were covered in darkness. “We’ll regroup at Hollow One.”

“That's… That's so far offshore. Is the situation really that desperate, Captain?” asked a piebald unicorn with red-brown patches across her white fur. She wore an Equestria-made assault saddle mounted with two crossbows, and wore a Trailblazers patch on her saddlebags.

‘Took the words right out of my mouth,’ Scootaloo thought. ‘What was her name… Cinnabar?’

Odd name for a unicorn.

“There’s another alicorn running around out there, and a burning hole in Twilight’s ship,” Rainbow said. “So, yeah. It’s that desperate.”

“Captain, wait!” Scootaloo cried out. Her mentor paused before takeoff, but she did not turn to face her. “What if… what if you don’t make it back?”

“Sorry, Scoots. Can’t promise that I will, but I’ll try,” Rainbow said quietly. Then, she saluted, and turned to face the assembled guards. “Good luck, soldier. Let’s get this over with, ‘cause Canterlot's counting on us. Now, move it, ponies!”

“Yes, ma’am!” they chorused, Scootaloo’s affirmative a little less energetic than the others’.

The veterans often talked about something they called Breaking the Yoke. The idea was that on your first deployment, you saw things that training could never really prepare you for, and how it changed you.

Somehow she doubted they’d meant it literally, what with Spike. Academically, she’d known he was on the ship, ready to deploy. But for whatever reason she’d just never been close.

‘So that’s him now,’ Scootaloo thought. The Solar Empire had pumped enough alchemical concoctions and other things into him, that they probably could’ve made a whole new dragon. ‘He’s as old as me.’

She bit back a shiver.

‘But he’s so strong now. That’s what the Empire does, isn’t it? They made me strong, and…’

She looked over to Timber, to Sprout, to Fleetfoot… to Whistle. Whistle, smaller yet so strong with her natural-born wings, now tended to by the Fillydelphians’ medic and by Salty Breeze, whose blue-shaded feathers and fur hid his own consternation.

She ruffled her wings wistfully.

‘And I have a duty, and a debt to pay.’

“Right then,” Fleetfoot said. “We’re heading towards our lines. Get a sky-boat, and we’re heading to Hollow One after that.”

Scootaloo remembered Hollow One. It was an oceanic outpost that was being used as a resupply depot for the Imperial Navy. Of course, there was just one hole in Fleetfoot’s plan – actually getting a sky-boat. Perhaps they could pull a few easy strings.

“They blew up the Tobin Bridge,” Fleetfoot started. “So. We’re heading North. There’s a bridge or two the PHL can’t have destroyed. Push comes to shove, we’ll find a lock and have our unicorns raise a bridge from one end to the other.”

“Where do you propose we head, Wing Commander?” asked Captain Sparks Timber.

“Fellsmere Park Outpost,” said Fleetfoot. “We stick with our original objective.”

“Are you sure?” said Timber. “That’ll take us about an hour by hoof, and lugging a heavy statue! If we encounter hostiles in the no-one’s-land, we’ll be at a disadvantage.”

“Then it’s a good thing we’re chugging this much horsepower, isn’t it?” One of the cadets with them, a unicorn, laughed nervously.

“We can send some of our winged troops to give Fellsmere forward notice,” said Fleetfoot. “And maybe they can send a boat to meet us halfway. But not before extensive scouting. We cannot wait here, Captain Timber. The humans and their allies could be on us at any moment.”

“Alright, ma’am,” Timber said crisply. He patted his armour’s lodestone. “15th Fillydelphia's still in Charlestown. I can call for backup.”

Fleetfoot nodded in approval. “Captain Plow?”

Oaken Plow snapped to attention. Scootaloo regarded him closely. His colours clashed with Timber’s, from his dark brown, cropped mane, to his lighter chocolate coat, light yet unassuming in the ways Timber’s pleasant blue colours were prominent. And they too clashed with Fleetfoot’s bright blue coat and white mane.

Plow’s brown eyes, though, spoke of someone far aged beyond his years.

“We’ll need your guys to scout on ahead,” said Fleetfoot, and the Traiblazer nodded.

“Understood, Wing Commander,” he said respectfully.

“Our pegasi will scope out the bridge to make sure it’s not booby-trapped,” Fleetfoot continued. “Starstruck, this one is on you. We don’t need another 8th Seaddle.”

Earlier that week, the PHL or UNAC had left the Tobin Bridge booby-trapped, turning the entire thing into a screaming metal death trap the moment the 8th Seaddle Regiment had tried using it to march to the airport.

“Can I count on you?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am. You can count on me, anytime,” Scootaloo said, nodding.

She glanced at the crate besides her, in which the statue of Discord was held. Then at the bronze statue of the American Revolutionary before the obelisk, a cutlass in hand. William Prescott’s steely gaze fell upon her, as if beckoning her to act as she promised.

‘Anytime…’

~ Fenway Kenmore, Boston, USA ~

“I can’t… I can’t hold it!” yelled Cadance.

The shield she’d held on for so long was cracking, for the dragonfire burned beyond any fire she could imagine. And she could feel her strength fading with the stream of fire against her shield. She hadn’t gotten a good look at the dragon’s twisted, mangled form, but the sheer malice and eldritch energy poured into its fire told her much.

Behind her, her newfound allies stood motionless, watching in awe and fear both. They counted on her. Amidst the commotion, one yelled out that every other detachment was caught up in the crossfire, leaving them on their own, with a wall of fire trapping them under the overpass.

“Cadance!” Major Bauer yelled. “You have to lower the shield!”

“What?!” Cadance exclaimed. “No! If I do that we’ll all be–”

“Trust me on this!” Bauer replied. “I got it all figured out– Starfall? You ready?”

“Yes, Major!”

Pushing back sweat, Cadance stole a glance at the knight. He was bracing himself, and Starfall’s horn was glowing, his aura around the Major’s ankle.

“Major? What are you doing?” She knew full well what his plan was, but to actually commit to it...

“My best,” Bauer said flatly. His sword was drawn to its full extent, glowing ominously with its runic enhancements, and so did his armour. “Might as well try this, Lady Cadance. Get ready to open the shield!”

“You’ll die,” Cadance yelled back.

“With honour if I must,” the knight said. He adjusted his stance, shield raised and sword held firm. “Do it! You don’t have much time!”

The dragonfire did not falter, not one second. But… Major Bauer wouldn’t have been so confident if he knew it wouldn’t work. Perhaps, Cadance wondered, here she ought to trust his judgement.

“O-Okay!” she strained. “Get ready!”

“Ready! Throw me at his chest.”

“Good luck, Major!” Starfall yelled. They need the timing right. Any second less, and he might be burnt to a crisp.

The cracks spread and grew in width, and Cadance knew she didn’t have long.

“Now!”

But then it stopped. Just as she was to open the shield, or as it was to shatter – she wasn’t sure if it would give way first – the dragon halted in its attack. Its eyes widened, mouth hanging open.

And before their very eyes, it turned and fled.

“What… was that?” Bauer said.

He was frozen in a pose mid-air, held by her aura. Poised to strike.

“I don’t know...” said Cadance, setting him down, before finally dropping the shield and falling to his side.

A fiery, acrid smell hung in the air. This was a strange day.

“I’m alright, I’m alright,” said Cadance quickly, as the soldiers rushed to assist, human and ponies alike. She glared at the knight, who had taken off his helmet to stare into the night after the fleeing dragon.

She didn’t know much about Stephan Bauer. But Reiner could have told her or Luna more about his sanity.

“All things considered,” Bauer said lightly. “That went well.”

“You were gonna throw yourself at a full-grown dragon, Major,” Cadance said flatly, moving to his side. Granted, she didn’t know if that dragon was full-grown. In the dim light, she couldn’t make out its features very well. “I assume that’s not exactly out of the ordinary.”

A look at Bauer’s sheepish expression elicited a groan.

“Alex didn’t tell me everything about you, I figure,” she stated.

“Well,” the Major said, rubbing the back of his head, avoiding her eyes. “Might as well try, right?”

“Yeah,” Cadance continued, looking up at the dome covering the city, and the smaller yet still vast bubble enveloping the great airship. They were a familiar shade of magic, shimmering in the moonlight.

‘Shining…’

She felt a pang of sympathy for her counterpart. To lose both Twilight and Shining to whatever madness had engulfed the Empire… Cadance didn’t know how she’d have handled it. And there was that other mare. How she had come to his aid as his new, loving, loyal wife.

“Major, sir!” Starfall shouted. “We got inbound transmission from the scouts!”

“Major Bauer, come in, Major Bauer, come in!” a voice rang out from the man’s radio, and he reached for it quickly.

“Major Bauer, reporting in,” he said. “What’s the situation at the waterfront, over?”

“Admiral Chirkov reported in, Russian naval assets have arrived, they’re within three clicks from Boston Harbour, joining the French. Fire support’s inbound… But… until that dome is down, no air asset will be deployed within Boston airspace, over!”

Cadance thought she heard a heavy sigh from the Major.

“Copy that, Shield,” he said grimly. “Hold position at the FOB. And that dragon Ze’ev Squad reported crashing into the John Hancock Tower? Yeah… we just had a close shave... Over.”

There was a troubled silence. “You were very lucky, sir. Others… weren’t. Wait. Hold up. I’ve just received report of a teleportation spike detected in the Charlestown no-man’s-land. Over.”

The word ‘teleportation’ caught Cadance’s notice. Bauer must have sensed something, for he locked eyes with her.

Feeling cold, she mouthed the words ‘I don’t know’.

He spoke back into the radio. “What’s our unit closest to that location? Over.”

“Ze’ev Squad, as it happens, sir. Currently hanging back at the Boston Public Gardens. They’ve got an APC, recently dropped off Sniper Team Nordlys to take point for what’s going on at Langone Park... where it looks as if the spike was initiated, likely by the Archmage… Over…”

Bauer massaged his temples. “Penals… Alright. Relay with Comms Officer Seville Orange. Ze’ev Squad has permission to cross the Paul Revere Chokepoint into no-man’s-land. Objective, capture an officer for interrogation… low casualties if possible…” He sighed. “Over.”

“Understood, Major, Silver Shield out.”

“Major!” Alicia called out. “Any news?”

He shook his head. “The Russians are waiting near the Harbour. But the dome isn’t going down within three hours, and God knows what the Great Equestrian’s going to do… How’s Canvas doing, Alicia?”

Cadance glanced back at the rest of their group. The scout in question was resting upon the platform, his left foreleg hanging limp.

“Should be fine, Major,” said Alicia. “Yet unless the dome…”

Another sigh, and Bauer smiled a sad little smile. He turned to Starfall. “Tell everyone to hold positions. That dragon’s still out there.”

“Yes, Major,” Starfall replied, moving to join the others.

Cadance, however, looked again towards the shimmering dome, and her mind began to wander. “Major I… I may have something for this.”

“Yeah? What is it?”

“I’m going to break the dome.”

She looked at the Major, who blinked confusedly.

“I…”

“It’s his shield, isn’t it? Shining Armor’s. I should… I should be able to do it,” Cadance said softly. For emphasis, she presented her wings. “I’m not your Cadance, and it’s not a guarantee, Major Bauer. But I know Shining, and like you said. Might as well try.”

“Might as well,” Bauer agreed. Then, he smirked. “You still need to tell me how’d you speak German, by the way.”

“Another time, Major, another time…”

~ Charlestown, Boston, USA ~

They stuck to alleyways as they traversed Charlestown. There was something eerie to the silence of it all– the open, empty storefronts, the lack of cars, the sense of distance between them and anything sentient.

Gunfire rang out sporadically. It sounded far away, but Scootaloo couldn’t be sure.

‘There should besomething there,’ Scootaloo thought. ‘Ponies, even humans…’

Cities were supposed to be full of life. She’d seen the pictures of human cities before. Large, imposing, filled with cars and other vehicles she couldn’t name. They didn’t compare to the bustling Northern metropolis of the Crystal Realm, its towering crystal spires and widespread use of crystal-tech in every corner. Totem-proles filling the air with music and love and joy…

She adjusted her wings, and continued at a brisk pace.

Captain Timber led the group, Discord’s crate levitated by his magic, trailing right behind him. There followed fifteen of his fellow Fillydelphians, many having rendezvoused with them in Charlestown, led by his deputy, the medic Cookie Batch.

Oaken Plow and two of his Trailblazers, meanwhile, were scouting ahead. That left Scootaloo, Whistle, and their three fellow cadets at the group’s centre, with Sprout and Breeze, and another Trailblazer, named Cinnabar, stuck to their group.

The ambience soon gave way to curiosity, and Whistle chose that moment to break the silence.

“So, this can’t be as bad as hunting deserters in Pripyat, right?” Whistle whispered to Sprout, a forced smile on her face. “Heard all about it in the papers.”

“You’re absolutely right,” Sprout said, and Scootaloo winced a little at the bitterness in his tone. “Because this is worse in every way. You get ponies lost to the forests here, because they claim what is theirs even in the new settlements. But urban combat is its own kind of Tartarus, rookie. Someone’s lurking behind every corner, with a weapon that can split you in two from a mile away. Of course, the head shed didn’t listen.”

The look on Whistle’s face was less horror and more like a puppy who’d been hurt for the first time and didn’t understand why.

“That was cruel, Sergeant,” Scootaloo said coldly. Whistle glanced at her with renewed hope.

“It’s war,” Sprout retorted. “Rookies need to be broken, otherwise we’ll never be able to put them together.”

She was about to say something when Breeze cleared his throat.

“Might want to pipe it down, Sergeant,” chided Breeze. “Acoustics here ain’t so welcoming for loudmouths.”

Scootaloo silently thanked Breeze for keeping her from losing her temper.

“Besides,” Breeze added, and Scootaloo somehow heard the smirk in his voice. “You’re still pretty green yourself in my books.”

Scootaloo kept the light smile on her face hidden.

“R-right, Doc. Sorry,” Sprout said. His brown eyes weren’t as warm as they should be, and his green coat and lighter green mane, Scootaloo thought, hid his experience.

But something else passed over Timber, for he raised a forehoof.

“Hold,” said Timber. One by one, the haphazard detachment paused, glancing around. They were relatively covered, here in the backyard of some long-forgotten home, but the worry passed over Scootaloo’s shoulder. “Something ain’t right.”

There was a pregnant pause.

Then, right as she moved, just a tiny bit, something whizzed by – and a Wonderbolt cadet’s head exploded. She couldn’t tell who it had been. Another was shot in the shoulder shortly after. He was the resident Vanhooverite.

She couldn’t recall his name…

Her training took over, and they scrambled for cover. The loud, ear-shattering reports of human firearms sounded throughout the ravaged city.

It sounded like they had a machine-gun with them – somethingvery large, a lot heavier than the average human assault rifle.

“Contact!” Fleetfoot yelled. “We’ve got contact!”

“Scatter, take cover, now!” Breeze said hoarsely, grabbing onto Whistle.

Scootaloo followed them behind a short, squat brick building the size of a shed. Beside her, a Fillydelphian pegasus – this one a Newfoal – rocketed up into the air, a look of pure hate on their face.

“Die, apes!” she screamed, barrel rolling down the street, firing off her crossbows.

She was quieted by a bullet. Scootaloo stared down the street, looking towards the source of the bang. At one end of the street, a corner near the edge of a small park, she saw a squad of PHL contemplating them from a first-storey window.

A heavy-looking machine-gun with something mounted underbarrel roared and chattered, spraying bullets towards them.

The Vanhooverite cadet lay bleeding in the middle of the street, choking and oozing on the pavement. One of the Fillydelphians, also a Newfoal, broke from cover and rushed towards the unfortunate cadet, a worried look on his face…

Before something ripped through the Newfoal too. There wasn’t even as much left of them as the cadet. Who still lay bleeding, a few inches from death.

“You monster!” Cinnabar yelled. Her horn glowed, and a long, thin package lifted itself from her assault-saddle to just in front of her face.

It was a gun. A human-made M4.

Cinnabar pulled the trigger in her TK. A short burst of gunfire rattled out from the thing.

“You can’t do that!” yelled the sole other remaining cadet, a Baltimarean stallion named Clear Skies. “You’re using a human’sweapon!”

“Equestria can chew me out later, but we’re dying now!” Cinnabar retorted. “Besides, I don’t notice any of you taking them on at range!”

“No!” Clear Skies yelled, and against all logic, rushed towards Cinnabar – and took three bullets through the barrel.

He didn’t get up.

Grimacing, Scootaloo edged back into cover, while next to her, Sprout peeked around the building’s corner to see what had happened.

“Yeah...” Sprout said, voice sounding like it could’ve been coming from another planet. “Those never last too long with us. Crossbows, everyone! Try to– ack!”

He fell on his back. A bullet had blown a chunk of brick off the wall, above his eye.

“Sprout!” Scootaloo yelled on instinct. “No!”

“I’m f-fine!” Sprout yelled, clutching his face and sounding panicked. “That one just went a bit too close to my face! I think it cut off some mane!”

Scootaloo looked down towards Sergeant Sprout. He did, in fact, look alive – but there was a fine patina of brick dust over his face, near one eye. It was impossible to tell, however, if he’d received a manecut.

She wouldn’t fall for that trap. With a beat of her wings, Scootaloo poked her head above the rooftop, trying to aim one of the crossbows in her assault yoke towards the human emplacement.

Sometimes – she’d never admit it publically – she envied how bipeds were just so much betterat aiming ranged weapons.

Case in point, she could see their few hippogriffs – Timber’s Fillydelphians, probably reassigned to fill in gaps left by lost pegasi – reared up on their hind legs, using their foreclaws to aim and fire potion mortars. It was uncomfortable for them, but it also meant they were better shots. Especially launching potion-filled grenades.

Scootaloo fired her crossbow.

A bolt flew straight and true, down the street towards the human machine-gun emplacement. It punched through the window-glass like it wasn’t even there, missing the gun–

‘So close!’

The machine-gun paused a fraction of a second, and therein lay the lightning-rod moment for the combined forces of the Imperial Guard. They rushed West, into the alleyways.

“We need to get to those bridges now!” Fleetfoot yelled. “We–”

But she was drowned out as the machine-gun resumed firing. A Newfoal earthpony, carrying a massive grenade-launcher on his back, was cut down by a short burst of gunfire. It was impossible to tell from where.

Scootaloo fired again. Another bolt went through a window.

Something strange happened. The machine-gun stopped firing, and Scootaloo watched as comrades down in the street ran West.

Then she saw the muzzle pointing at her.

‘Oh, sh–’

Scootaloo dove off the roof, not even spreading her wings. At almost that second, a spray of machine-gun fire ripped apart the little outcropping where she’d been hiding.

She spread her wings just before she hit the pavement, hooves smarting with pain as she tried to find balance.

“There’s something there!” Scootaloo heard someone yell.

Looking up, she saw–

‘No.’

A human and an Equestrian moving from in between cover. An earthpony with two LMGs on her assault saddle, and a human with a long, thin rifle. Not quite a sniper rifle, but no assault rifle either.

They were deathly silent.

She recalled her training. The machine-gun had been suppressive fire. Surprisingly accurate, but it hadn’t been meant to kill them. Just keep them–

“Move!” Fleetfoot yelled, and she didn’t need to tell Scootaloo twice.

Scootaloo bolted across the street, the LMG forgotten. One block down from her, a Newfoal moved out–

The machine-gun cut through them like a hot knife through butter.

She flew like Cerberus itself was at her tail, windows whizzing by her. She passed by Fleetfoot, who stood directing Trailblazers, Wonderbolts, and Fillydelphians alike towards a bridge.

Fleetfoot turned to look at Scootaloo, teeth clenched. She moved, just a little from her cover at her end, as the shooting died down again.

“Starst–argh!”

Just an inch out of place, but someone must have seen her move. There was a burst of blood from the side of her body, where the bullet had penetrated the wall, then through to her armour.

She collapsed in a heap, and didn’t move anymore.

“Fleetfoot? Fleetfoot?” Scootaloo whispered, unable to move past the hail of gunfire. The Wing Commander remained unmoving, as she feared, her white mane clashing with the blood that flowed. “No…”

“C-commander?” she heard Whistle behind her. “No, no-no-no-”

A panic attack was imminent. It wasn’t something the cadet was trained to handle.

Scootaloo turned around and gently grabbed Whistle by the shoulder.

“Hey, HEY!” she shouted, catching her attention. “Look at me. This isn’t boot camp anymore! You hear me? I need you to stick with me, Whistle. Stick with Breeze.” She bit back a grimace. “We’re getting out of here alive. Got that?”

Whistle glanced at the inert body of Fleetfoot behind her, then nodded slowly. Her eyes were still wide with fear, but her shoulder had stopped shivering.

“The… the Wing C–”

“She’s gone,” said Scootaloo. “I’m… I’m sorry, but it’s what it is.”

She couldn’t let Whistle see her shed a few tears either, and so tore her glance away. Fleetfoot, so trustworthy, so reliable… gone forever.

Dimly, Scootaloo felt aware of Sprout trotting up to join them.

“Heliotrope!” someone screamed. “It’s Heliotrope! They–gaack!”

“We gotta get to Timber,” Scootaloo whispered. Sprout, who heard her, nodded. It wasn’t long before the humans would spot they were here, hidden behind a wooden fence. It wasn’t a risk they should take even in this darkness.

Allegedly, one could get the best over Heliotrope or someone who wore one of the rare invisibility flightsuits she’d pioneered. You could be near liquid. You could wait for the light to catch just right. You could be near snow.

In darkness?

Those were horrendous odds.

The gunfire had died down, and the ambient dread followed. Then, she heard them walk. Her eyes widened. They were going to make sure they stayed dead.

There was a bridge nearby – maybe booby-trapped, but she wasn’t taking that risk. So close, she could walk out and touch it.

“Sprout,” she whispered. “You got a potion?”

The Trailblazer nodded, pulling out something that looked like a beer bottle, tinted purple. Once upon a time, carrying ponification serum in vials or bottles had been enough. But even the poorest and most desperate human fighters wore something that’d protect them from the liquid.

The grenade that Sprout held very gingerly was the solution to that, devised by Shieldwall himself before the Montreal Campaign. A bottle of potion, magically reinforced, with fragments of magically-sharpened metallic fragments floating in the purple liquid. Once it exploded, the potion-saturated fragments would, with luck, find their way to softer parts of the armour, punch through, and start the process.

“Yeah,” he said, rummaging through his saddlebag. “I got two.”

“Two shots at this. Here, give me one,” she whispered. She looked at Whistle, eyes wide, and Breeze, who lay a talon on her shoulder. “Wait until they’re close.”

She peered around a fence. She could see an assortment of figures in cover, likely wearing night-vision goggles.

Sprout quietly handed over a bottle. She nodded. And, both she and Sprout flung their bottles past the wall.

“Scatter!” someone called.

The sound of explosion. The clinking of breaking glass. Metal shards falling onto the asphalt–

“Fuck, fuck, I’m hit! I’m, I’m hi– Ah, aha-haha, I’m so hap–”

“Fokdammit! Kill it! Kill it with fire!”

There was a burst of gunfire. The Newfoal, barely a minute fresh, went silent. But with the risk of more potions thrown over at them, so did the gunfire.

“Go!” yelled Scootaloo, nudging Breeze and Sprout. “Go now! Get to Timber!”

In the brief respite they had, Cinnabar and another Fillydelphian ran past the opening where the gunfire had rung out.

“They’re heading for the bridge!”

Technically, Scootaloo and anyone with a functioning pair of wings was heading around the bridge.

“Shield! Cast it now!” yelled Timber from afar. “Get the wounded out!”

Dutifully, two Newfoal unicorns rushed to the right and left sides of the bridge, projecting shields just behind the fleeing ponies.

* * * * *

Around Yael Ze’ev, the world was fire. Ballista bolts, potion grenades, and spells lit up the night like the Fourth of July. Aegis and Kraber laid down covering fire, the massive earthpony feeding ammo boxes to Kraber’s MG2021. Bullets speckled against the pavement.

“You!” Kraber yelled. Suddenly Yael was very glad she’d turned down the volume on his comms. “Yeah, you! Shut the fok up!”

A purple Newfoal’s throat exploded.

Yael poked her Galil out, letting off three quick shots. One punched through a pony’s leg just before they could get behind the shield.

“I’ve flown to the Charlestown Garage and flanked ‘em!” Heliotrope yelled. “There’s so bloody many on the bridge!”

“Don’t get too close!” Yael barked, snapping back into cover. A crossbow bolt embedded itself in the wooden storefront, barely a foot away. “Everyone to the South of Alford Street, follow to Heliotrope’s position at the Charlestown Garage!”

“Roger that, ma’am!” Aegis yelled.

Kraber just screamed incoherently.

“He says yes!”

Yael breathed a sigh of relief. And in the space of that moment of decompression, something under an abandoned car exploded. The chassis flew up into the air, turning tail over teakettle, before landing on the pavement roof-first.

“We can’t do anything with those shielders up! Everyone to the East, follow me towards the Schrafft Center!”

“Bet,” Quiette Shy said, looking up at her. “Standard Gallop And Gun, Yeah.”

Yael nodded, then looked to Oscar. “Follow our lead! QS will project a shield, we’re going to make our way towards the river! We can’t do anything from here!”

Lorne poked out from his own piece of cover, shouldering his M32 Grenade Launcher. It looked like a child’s toy in the huge man’s bearlike paws that he insisted were actually hands. “Challenge accepted.”

“Sergeant Hebert, no,” Yael said. “That is an order. We are to retreat to–”

“For what it’s worth, Lieutenant,” Lorne said, “This way, the most I lose is a grenade or two.”

“Lyra’s Luck,” Quiette Shy said.

“We got an alicorn that apparently likes us now, haven’t you heard?” Lorne asked. “That should be something.”

* * * * *

Scootaloo was on the other side of the bridge when she saw it. Something arced down towards one of the shieldbearers, and exploded against the shield.

The shielding Newfoal staggered, eyes widening.

… But the shield looked like it’d hold. Two more hits like that and–

‘Whistle.’

She flew up.

* * * * *

“Fuck!” Lorne yelled. “Missed!”

As Yael and Quiette rushed for the Schrafft Center, as spells rushed overhead, Lorne tried to push it all to the background.

“You’re going to catch another bolt!” Yael yelled.

Lorne was dimly aware of that. He moved the launcher up a millimeter or two, aiming it an imperceptible fraction of an inch to the left.

‘You’re not getting away that easily.’

The unicorns weren’t casting bubbles. They were ‘blocks,’ as the PHL often called them. Angled planes that curved back over the head, connected directly to line of sight. He’d already missed once, and if he missed another, they’d get across the bridge. He’d die or worse.

‘They’ll get away.’

The thought of that made Lorne’s blood boil.

Another fraction-of-a-millimeter adjustment-

“Lorne!” Yael screamed.

Lorne fired. The grenade launcher didn’t kick, and Lorne watched the round, fat projectile arc through the air...

* * * * *

Just beside Scootaloo, a purple Newfoal took a heavy rifle round through the throat.

“Starstruck, where are you going!” one of the hippogriffs yelled, but she ignored them.

And there she was, back on the other side, when something else flew above the hastily-cast protective shield – and promptly detonated just behind the flank of one of the unicorns.

There wasn’t much left of him when the dust settled.

* * * * *

“Dead centre!” Lorne yelled.

“What a shot!” Kraber crowed. “Lekker, from here it looked like he had the worst fart ever.”

“Why are you like this,” Eva sighed from somewhere.

“Because I am coping like a rational goddamn adult!” Kraber yelled back.

“Let the edgelord have this one,” Aegis sighed. “So, Lieutenant. What’s the plan?”

“Keep the pressure on them, and make sure they don’t detonate the bridge,” Yael said.

“Cos’ of the–” Oscar said. “Good thinking, Yael.”

“Fokkin’ kwaai. Did I ever say jou the best commanding officer I’ve ever had?”

“Four of them tried to kill you,” Yael said. “That’s not saying much.”

* * * * *

“Dammit!” Timber yelled. “Move, move, I’ll do it–”

He laid down the statue’s crate, to cast another, stronger shield. In the dark, Scootaloo saw a few humans scatter, as the shield pushed back debris and cars alike.

“That won’t hold them long, go!” Timber declared, pointing towards the other side of the bridge.

He lifted the crate holding Discord up, physically supported by three troopers, directing his remaining soldiers back. Scootaloo saw Whistle carried on the back of Salty Breeze, and the two exchanged glances. There was an unsure smile on Whistle’s face, and that was enough.

Before she went, however, there was some movement in the corner of her eye.

“You alright there, Starstruck?” said Timber.

“Go ahead, Captain,” said Scootaloo. Something tugged at her.

“Right. Cover our flanks. You come back, you hear me?”

“Aye, Captain.”

With an unsure look, Timber nodded at her, then moved across.

She glanced towards where the others were going – a methodical advance across the bridge – and flew over to the storefront where she saw it first. It was a fair distance away from the bridgehead, just beyond the shield.

There, she saw Plow, leaning against a broken window. And he had been shot in the stomach. When he saw her, though, he only had concern for her.

“Starstruck?” he asked in disbelief. “Why… why did you leave the others?” Plow asked.

“Captain Plow, you’re… you’re hurt.”

“Sure wish someone would do something about that,” Plow said, a wry smile on his face as he looked down at his barrel. The wound was wide open, and it was a miracle he could even talk. “Sorry, I... couldn’t warn you all in time. Damn humans got me good... Took the others out. Sprout and Breeze alright?”

“Yeah… yeah they are.”

“Good, good,” Plow whispered. “Then I can lie down here just fine.”

Scootaloo shook her head.

“Come on,” she said, moving closer with her wing reaching out for him. “We need to go, Captain.”

But Plow simply waved her off.

“Leave me,” he hissed. “I’d slow you down, and your cadet, she’s hurt too, isn’t she? Go. I’ll slow them down if they… if they bother with interrogating me.”

“Captain, please… let me help you.”

Then, Plow reached out with a hoof, grasping at her shoulder.

“Go, damn you,” he said, and his tone left no doubt to its finality. “They’ll be here soon. Leave me here, Cadet. I’ll rejoin you all when all’s said and done. Finish the mission. Make sure you keep a shield up all the way… Keep Sprout safe, too.”

She met his eye, her purple on his brown. And she saw that his conviction was true.

“Okay… okay,” she whispered. Plow’s hoof let go of her. “Good luck, Captain.”

She saluted him, and he did the same.

“Go,” he commanded.

And so she went.

~ West End, Boston, USA ~

Pain. Anger. Grief.

When the emotions flowed, they flowed freely, and none so freely for Twilight as they did now. Her own exhaustion was forgotten, consumed by righteous fury. She screeched incoherently, firing off a jet of superheated air at Luna. The heat ignited the grass and melted the snow, and the alicorn only just avoided it.

“Stand down, Twilight!” Luna yelled. “This is not–”

“Shut up! Shut up!”

Luna had forced herself onto her. An intruder in her mind. She’d opened her like a meager book to be discarded.

Twilight clenched her teeth. She fired off another blast of necrotic spell, its sickening green and black energy intertwined. Luna once again evaded it, and the spell proceeded to disintegrate a tree behind her instead.

“Stand still!”

Mustering all her strength, she gripped the abandoned yellow Fillydelphian sky-boat in her aura. The craft rumbled, and she strained to hold it telekinetically. Yet just one look at the midnight-blue alicorn, her condescending look of pity landing on her, emboldened her.

With a flick of her head, she threw a single sword shard at Luna – followed by the sky-boat.

The crash was deafening as wood splintered and metal shattered from the violent impact. But it wasn’t enough. It never was enough.

The alicorn reconstituted her form from the mist that crept out from the sky-boat’s wreckage. As she lifted her visor, Twilight saw her frown.

“Is that all?” she said quietly. She was approaching her now, an unrelenting stride.

Twilight couldn’t decide if she could move or not. Could she, or wouldn’t she? Something told her to move. Something else told her not to.

Which was it then?

She glanced right. Her helmet was right there, knocked aside by one of Luna’s blasts, laying on the grass. If she could just reach it…

“Twilight–” Luna interrupted, a forehoof reaching out to touch her.

Touch her. Touch her like she cared. Twilight spat at her.

“Stay away from me,” she hissed, backing off from the alicorn’s forehoof.

Doubt. That was it. She had… doubt now, of all times. There was some sick, twisted humour in the coincidence, she thought bitterly.

And then, it crossed her mind. What she needed to do.

She saw her opening, and seized it. A shard rose behind Luna, moving to strike her neck. And though the orichalcum shard was deflected in time by the alicorn, she’d counted on it.

A concussion blast to stagger Luna. A sword blow to follow. Another parry. A stance exposed.

Then Twilight swiped at the alicorn’s forelegs, tripping her. A new blast from her horn, and Luna was pushed back several paces. Her flurry of assaults were imprecise, yet the weight behind her assaults was slowly tiring Luna. She was winning.

So why didn’t she feel like it?

She was– fooled betrayed manipulated lied to. No, that was Luna’s doing. It had to be her. It always was.

Luna faltered and fell. Finally.

Twilight made for one final swing at her throat. But inexplicably, she stopped. Something wouldn’t let her do it. She didn’t want to. She couldn’t even if she wanted to.

Why was she doing it? Who wanted her to do it? She had to know. She needed to know.

She glared at the alicorn, her sword still frozen mid-swing. Luna looked up at her, panting. She had to do it. She had to. She–

“What did you do to me?” Twilight demanded. “Answer me!”

“Nothing,” Luna replied evenly. “I showed you the truth. Nothing more, nothing less.”

Twilight shook her head. It couldn’t be the truth. Yet it was. It had always been the truth, and they flooded her mind. Memories long repressed. Memories she’d thought’d locked away.

“Then... you’ve seen me,” she replied heatedly. “You saw what I’ve become. What we’ve become.”

“I did,” replied Luna. Her silver longsword lowered to the ground, and now nothing lay between her neck and the blade Twilight wielded. “I will not fight you. Not when you’ve seen things so clearly for the first time. I see that now, Twilight. You can change.”

She wanted to laugh it off. But she couldn’t. It was absurd. Celestia’s truth was the only truth. Everything in Equestria was as it should have been. Wasn’t it?

“It’s too late. She…” Twilight said, just loud enough above crackling embers. “She won’t let me.”

Impossibly, from the charred, ashen park ground, Luna… smiled at her. A sad, forlorn smile, but a smile nonetheless.

“I don’t need her permission,” she said plainly. “Come with me. And just like I promised you, Twilight, we’ll make it right.”

‘We’ll make it right…’

That was what Lyra told her, so long ago. That Equestria didn’t have to stand alone anymore. That an idea they all carried would unite Equus under one prosperous banner.

Slowly, her legs moved of their own accord. Or was it her own will? Whatever it was that drew her to Luna… she couldn’t resist. She had to. She couldn’t. She wouldn’t.

What was the difference? What was missing–

It was Luna. It all came down to the impossible alicorn before her. Perhaps the answer was there all along.

Twilight wanted to say something. She had to say something. Her words wouldn’t leave her throat, even as she inched closer to the Princess of the Night.

‘Help me…’

* * * * *

Ana felt afraid.

Moments ago, drawn to the sounds of battle at Langone Park, she and Frieda had arrived near the site. What they saw was nothing short of desperation, and a healthy reminder that the Archmage wasn’t one to be trifled with.

She had assaulted the mysterious alicorn, firing off spell blasts that reeked of the deadliest in the Imperial Guard’s arsenal, from necrosis to blue fire, topped off by the impact of a sky-boat on the alicorn.

And here Ana lay prone with her rifle, bipods deployed, with Frieda by her side.

“It’s… it’s her,” she whispered. “The Archmage.”

Frieda had her thermal binoculars out as well. She nodded. Still observing the two combatants, the grey griffon reached for her radio.

“Target confirmed, Starfall,” Frida whispered. “HVT is Lady Twilight Sparkle, permission to engage, over.”

The grudge match between combatants had gone silent, the embers slowly fading away in the Boston air. The thermal signatures of the Archmage and Princess Luna were dim, masked by the fires that surrounded them. But Ana knew where her mark was.

A tense minute passed. The line of sight was blocked by the crashed sky-boat, though Ana saw the Princess, at the mercy of a blade, speak to the Archmage.

She adjusted her fingers, and a shiver went down the spine. They were so, so close now. The chance was slipping away with each second that passed in silence. She couldn’t hear what the Princess said.

“Nordlys-Beta, you are cleared to engage,” said Starfall. “Dispatch the HVT, over.”

“Cleared to engage, confirmed, Starfall,” Frieda whispered. She glanced at Ana. “You’re clear. Take her out.”

There it was again. The cold wind that blew past her cheek. In the snow-covered battleground, the cold stood out for her

Ana aligned her scope. Just barely visible over the destroyed airship, she saw a head. The Archmage’s. Gone was the cold metal of the helmet, leaving her head exposed in the cold winter air.

She held her breath. It was here and now, that it should end, yet still she hesitated. The Archmage had paused in her assault on the alicorn, standing tall above her foe and Ana couldn’t help but wonder what Twilight and the alicorn spoke of.

Memories of a dignified mare invaded Ana. Someone who had represented the hopes of a unified scientific forum between the best and brightest of both worlds. Someone who represented the future, now long gone. Someone who should have, but had not joined Lyra Heartstrings, when the Solar Tyrant cast her judgement on mankind.

Someone who stood here, ready to put a sword through the alicorn’s neck.

Ana pulled the trigger.

* * * * *

Time slowed down for Princess Luna.

One moment, she was staring up at Twilight, who’d lowered her sword and stretched out a forehoof, with what could have been realisation, lowering her head ever so slightly to speak with her.

Then the moment had passed. Something had flown by and Twilight’s ear burst, followed by a terrible crack that made Luna duck and flinch.

Worse was the screaming.

Twilight recoiled, and her shrill scream pierced the air in a grotesque mix of pain and rage. A tree exploded into splinters and shattered branches at their side. And Twilight, perhaps acting on pure instinct through her pain, raised a great, translucent dome around them.

Luna scrambled to her hooves, just in time to dodge another necrotic spell to her face. She closed her visor.

To her horror, when she set her eyes on where Twilight’s left ear had been, she saw a hole with blood flowing through it.

And when Twilight’s red glare landed upon her, she knew at that very moment that the Lady Archmage had returned.

“I trusted you!” the Archmage screamed, throwing a shard at her face.

* * * * *

“Target hit, target hit!” Frieda exclaimed. “Command, we have a positive hit on the HVT!”

For the first few seconds, the two of them remained where they were, watching the Archmage flail in rage. Another shot had rung out from somewhere, shattering the tree close to them, before the Archmage raised a dome.

“You did it,” Frieda said, patting Ana’s shoulder.

“We did it. Yeah…”

But then something passed Frieda's eye. “Shit,” she whispered. "DRAGON!"

‘Oh...’ was all Ana could think at that moment.

They scrambled for whatever cover was left. Not two seconds after they’d run a fair distance, a fiery jet annihilated the knoll they’d been positioned on.

Ducking, Ana threw herself on the ground, feeling the heat wash over her. When she raised her head and looked back, she only saw the knoll, set ablaze.

‘Fuck.’

“Ana!” she heard Frieda yell from up ahead. “You okay?! Fuck, don’t be dead, don’t be dead…”

Abruptly, Ana felt her head burning. She scrambled to her feet, tearing off and throwing aside her ushanka, which was aflame.

‘Dammit, I liked that hat…’She slung her rifle, still warm to the touch – then realised she wasn’t wearing her gloves. She rarely did when firing. ‘Wait… how did I…?’

Ana raised her hand to her face. The palm which had grasped a flaming hat was pale, always, even in the dying light.

‘What?’

She heard Frieda yelp, and glanced at her right as the griffon tripped and fell. There she saw her partner, clad in her PHL vest and fatigues. Frieda’s hindquarters were smoking.

“Frieda!” Ana exclaimed, rushing to her side.

“Gaaahh, I’m okay, I’m okay! Fuck, that hurt!” Frieda cried out.

Though Ana reached for her canteen and poured it over the fresh burn, the blackened fur remained as a stain on Frieda’s coat. Ana didn’t know how potent dragonfire was, even with how far they were from the fire’s stream… But convection was a cruel mistress...

“Too damn close... Argh…” Frieda whispered. “Oh, that fucker… lucky he missed… Musta been in a hurry…”

“You’re gonna be okay, you’re gonna be okay…”

Yet now, with her burn subdued, Frieda’s attention turned to Ana. “Ana, you hurt? You were… closer than I was.”

Reflexively, Ana reached out to touch her own face. She didn’t feel burnt at all.

“I'm okay,” she said quickly. She grabbed onto Frieda's forearm. “Come on, we need to leave.”

* * * * *

Though she dodged the thrown shard, from the back of her neck, Luna felt the winds change.

She shot up in the air, a split second before the dragon landed where she’d been with a booming noise, overturning the soil and rocks and wooden beams. Luna sped upwards, and when she finally glanced down, she saw Spike stare at her, his teeth bared and fists clenched.

And atop him was the Archmage, her helmet finally restored. From her mouth, a single order echoed in the wind.

“Burn her!”

They flew. Luna conjured her sword and raised the shield. Spike went right at her, his fist punching the translucent barrier so hard it cracked.

If Spike was here, then…

‘Cadance… no, no, not Cadance!’

She was a fool. She’d left her niece. And where she went, she couldn’t have possibly known.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a shard impacting the shield, shattering it. And in the gaping hole, the dragonfire followed. But Luna had flown up even further, dodging spells wildly cast from the Archmage’s horn.

She glanced down, and saw her mark. A quick lightning bolt at the Archmage, as she flew towards Spike, a forehoof pointed ahead. Obsidian clashed with steel in a deafening screech, their strength matched blow to blow, but it was Spike that had staggered and given way first, leaving Luna free to speed on.

Before the Archmage could adjust her aim, Luna had sped off, away from the park.

The humans had their own agenda, and she was foolish enough to think they could have held their fire, when the same enemy had given the order to cleanse their cities.

Perhaps the chance that had been was no more, lost forever...

Now was not the time for regrets, for another jet of fire streamed past her face, and Luna evaded another cast spell from beneath. In a gust of wind she flew back, in time to avoid the vicious dragon’s grip.

She paused, looking at the Archmage upon her steed. Gone was Twilight, full of regret and repentance. Only the Queen’s enforcer remained.

Luna flew straight, armoured forehoof poised to strike another blow. The Archmage’s deranged rictus grew wider.

“Got you!”

The shard which the Archmage had hidden besides Luna moved to strike. But it was what Luna counted on, for she dropped beneath the shard’s trajectory, then made a hard turn straight up, right at the dragon’s chin.

Upon the impact of a gauntleted forehoof against Spike’s wounded chin, the Archmage cried, the dragon screeched, and Luna saw she was so, so close to knocking her off her steed, as she came to a rest above them both.

The dragon’s breath went ragged and heavy from her blow. His eyes were bloodshot, consumed with rage. But Luna saw no loyalty, no love from him. Only blind, misguided devotion to the one he knew as his dear sister.

Evading the dragonfire, Luna sped further above the city.

The answer became clear. If she couldn’t free the Archmage from the shackles placed upon her mind, then she would do the same to her steed.

There, in the distance, Luna saw the Archmage, once Twilight, stagger on her mount, speeding towards her. From the Archmage’s missing ear, the blood continued to flow steadily past a hasty patch, dripping out her restored helmet. Yet the rider paid it no mind, glaring daggers at Luna, a look Luna had never seen on her Twilight. Sheer, utter malice and contempt.

She wished it hadn’t come to this. That Twilight would accept her forgiveness. That the foul magic which held her had the grace to set her free.

Yet Luna had but one last task to do, and she rose high against the rising moon, returning the look with an equally steely gaze.

Down below, Luna saw the Archmage’s steed – beaten, tortured, faithfully serving her as a blindly loyal attack-dog, his jagged teeth exposed threateningly, but not of his own will. Below them all, covered in a sickening cloud of ash and soot the city, burned with dragonfire, and the battle raged on in a clash of blood and iron. Luna knew what to do. There was no other way. She had to end it.

“Remember who you are, Twilight Sparkle,” Luna boomed, her voice echoing throughout the battlefield. The clouds surrounded her, concealing her from the Archmage's view. “Remember who you were. Come with me. It is not too late.”

“The Queen’s word is just and true, and you don’t belong in her world,” the Archmage snarled defiantly, and her voice too was magically enhanced, echoing in the winds. “You can save your pitiful words to yourself. You’ll join your other self and Discord in stone, Nightmare Moon.”

This time, the words hardly staggered Luna. She drew a sharp breath.

“Then, forgive me.”

Her horn glowed as all the strength of the Moon coursed through her body, ready for one final, decisive strike. Never on Equestria had she attempted it, but here lay a world torn asunder, and the architect of it stood before her. She was ready to give it her all.

Throughout her body, her magic flowed free and unburdened. The skies behind her rumbled with thunder and flashed with lightning. Her sister’s last words, just before she crossed the breach, rang true in her mind, and she clenched her teeth.

‘Do your best, Luna.’

Without warning, without any due, and with a beat of her wings and her horn alight, the Night’s Princess surged forwards, the fastest she’d ever been. The winds rushed in her ears as she released a final, determined cry, with the weight of Equestria on her shoulders. Bursting out of the storm clouds, she heard the dragon’s roar, as dragonfire heated her armour and scorched her ethereal mane, and saw a brilliant, blinding beam shine forth from the Archmage. Yet she did not stall in the face of the Archmage and Bearer of Magic, and the Archmage’s last-ditch, desperate attempt missed its mark as Luna found hers, the force of a thousand moons coursing throughout her entire body and channeled in one concentrated blow.

All at once, it ended.

There was a terrible crack that echoed in the nighttime skies, as enchanted obsidian and steel clashed and burned. The impact sent a booming shockwave through the air, shattering any remaining windows below, and Luna felt her gauntlet break, with her beaten and cracked armour, buckle under the surging pressure. But it was not she who screamed.

The Archmage was finally defeated.

So it was, the great dragon who’d once been called brother and faithful assistant screeched, his own armour cracking under the impact. In a split second, Luna had blasted the Archmage off her steed’s back, and the great beast plummeted down towards the flaming city, roaring and bellowing in terrible pain. He disappeared in a cloud of dust and debris, muffled by a loud crash. Luna knew at once that he had impacted the ground. His cries had gone silent.

Dazed and staggered from the blow, with singed mane and cooked armour, but with clarity of mind, Luna heard the Archmage cry out from somewhere in the air, her voice full of fear and anguish. She looked around quickly. If she were just fast enough...

Then Luna saw.

A rainbow streak, flying away at a speed that even Luna would have struggled to catch up to. Before the speeding pegasus disappeared in the dark, far away from her reach, Luna just saw who it was that she held.

She looked down. The silence, so distanced from the battle below, was deafening. There was no sign of Spike, no hint that he was not another casualty. Part of her wished that the Archmage had yielded. That she could have helped them both. Yet fate had forced her, and she had struck what had been a child, pressed into war. She hoped it wasn’t too late, that Spike might know peace, once more...

As she descended back to Earth, to salve yet another broken soul in this forsaken war, Luna closed her eyes.

‘Goodbye, Twilight.’

* * * * *

In the outskirts of Langone Park, Maxine froze where she was. She and her companions had all watched with rapt attention as a different battle waged overhead. It was between the alicorn who might be Princess Luna, and the Archmage bestriding her dragon. She could keep watch thanks to her rifle’s scope. There was no possibility to try and fire a bullet at any of the combatants – they were too high up. And even then, the aerial combat between the alicorn and the dragon made the winds unreliable.

All she and the HLF could do was to keep watch. At least, until the Archmage and her dragon had fallen from the sky. And no doubt the alicorn would follow…

“Jean-Eric,” Tess Jones told the heavyset man beside her. “You know Boston. Any idea where they could’ve landed?”

“My best guess?” said the man. “The ol’ Naval Shipyard. That was just across the river.”

“And across the Chokepoint. Fuck.” Jones scowled, but then turned her glare on Maxine. “Well. Lucky we’ve got our friend here. Radwick? You can use your clout with your PHL buddies at the crossing. I want to see what’s over there.”

“No skin off my nose,” muttered Maxine. “We’re in the same boat here, Jones.”

‘For Agnes,’ Maxine thought as Jones began barking orders to the HLF to mobilise. To get to the Archmage and apprehend her before the Imperials could recover her. The only thing she wanted was to see the Tyrant’s student suffer for what she’d done. For what they all had done. ‘For Agnes. I will make them pay.’

* * * * *

All things considered, Ana’s withdrawal alongside Frieda was uneventful. From the moment the burns had been roughly tended to on the griffon, the pair hadn’t said a word to one another as they made their way East to their closest PHL rendezvous point, the crossing at the Charles River. Nor did they contemplate the magnitude of what they had just done.

Only when they found themselves a block away from their destination did Ana allow herself time to breathe, while Frieda stood guard above her, watching the street corner.

‘Holy… shit…’

Ana’s breathing was unsteady, and she gripped a lamppost for support. She hadn’t decided what to make of it all, not even what she had done.

She’d just shot the Archmage. Merely wounded her, true, yet a hit nonetheless.

But there’d been something in her opponent, the dark alicorn’s stance, just before ‘Princess Luna’ had taken to the skies, before the renewed duel was covered in a torrent of magical forces. Illuminated by the fires surrounding them, Luna hadn’t seemed apprehensive.

No, if any, the alicorn had her guard down… why, exactly?

“Frieda?” Ana asked aloud, and she let go, standing tall. “I… do you feel a bit off?”

Her spotter glanced her temporary perch atop the lamppost. “Something up, Ana?”

Ana rubbed the back of her head. She didn’t feel too good, no. But she shouldn’t tell Frieda that. Not yet, at least.

“It’s just that… well,” she continued. “Do you think… do you think we’ve made a mistake?”

“Ana,” Frieda said, and she swept down to pat her shoulder. The crisp burn on her flank was still clear as day, but she didn't seem to mind. “Relax. You did your job. You crippled the Archmage. And Luna, or whoever that was, is gonna finish it.”

That didn’t really make things better. Ana sighed. “Yeah, but…”

“Hey, now’s not the time to be a downer, you of all people,” Frieda said, nudging her with a fierce smile. “You got your orders, you did it, mission accomplished, eh?”

Ana said nothing at first. Frieda lifted a talon and brushed it against her chin.

“Hey, hey, look at me,” Frieda said, gently this time. Ana glanced at her, meeting her magenta eyes with her own. “You did your job. I did mine. Target's dispatched.” She smiled a little. “Is this… you worried about going back to R&D after this?”

That had been what Ana wanted to say, of course. It wasn’t that she hadn’t like her work at R&D. On the contrary, she’d loved it. But moving from combat to support and back again, she had felt increasingly detached. And she feared, one day, that she’d be so entirely removed...

A sudden beam of light glanced off the snow, at the edge of view. Frieda turned to glare towards where it came from.

“We got company,” the griffon whispered.

As Ana put her gas mask on, Frieda brought her rifle up and pointed it at the approaching light. Then they heard the roar of an engine, and the light split into two. And the pair released their held breath, relaxing. Imperial vehicles didn’t exactly use motors.

The APC drew up next to them, another following close behind. A very familiar Englishman came out, covered from head to toe in armour.

Ana waved. “Harwood…”

“That’s her. That’s sniper team Nordlys,” she heard him call out to the driver.

“Cavalry’s arrived,” Ana said, and Frieda nodded. Cavalry, it seemed, simply consisted of Harwood, Henri, and what looked like a dozen others from the Teutonic Knights and units she couldn’t name properly, her adrenaline still pumping.

“You alright, Nordlys?” Henri asked as he stepped out as well, offering a hand.

“I’m alright, ah, Henri,” Ana replied politely. She took off her gas mask, then shook his hand. "You can call me Ana, by the way. How'd things go your end?"

“Well, separated from Ze’ev Squad a while ago,” said Henri. “But we're good. Got word from Major Bauer– yes, he’s alive,” he said to Ana’s relieved expression. “He sent Ze’ev across into Charlestown for a secondary capture mission. We’re to join them.”

“Sarge,” a soldier asked for Harwood. He’d been at the ruined store fight, Ana recalled. “Any updates on the primary target?”

“Dispatched,” Ana said simply. “Fired a round, I hit her.”

“Blew her ear right off,” Frieda grinned. “Now that’s something to put on the record, Henri, hah!”

“But… but, I didn’t… put her down,” Ana added weakly, as Henri scrambled to note down the report. “She went and for the Princess right after.” She paused. “Frieda, you were burnt,” she said suddenly. “Har, can you get her patched up?”

“I’ll be fine, Ana, don’t worry,” said Frieda hurriedly, even as Harwood went over to check on her. The patch of burnt fur and exposed skin was now red, but true to her words, they weren’t weeping. She turned to Harwood. “Your girlfriend here was way closer than I was, and she’s all fine, don’t worry, Har.”

‘If we’d been closer…’ Ana pondered. But she reached to touch where her face had been close to the dragonfire, and felt nothing but her own, cold skin. ‘That… that doesn’t explain everything…’

“Right, we’ll have to get you to a station after this,” said Harwood. “You good, Ana?”

“I’m good, I’m good,” she said, with a thumbs-up, as he helped her into the back of one APC.

With everyone packed, the two vechicles moved as a group, with a pegasus moving ahead to check the nearby alleyway first. Only when the scout returned with an all clear did Harwood motion for them to continue.

He turned in his seat. “Shock and blood loss might take care of the Archmage.”

“If Luna doesn’t get her,” Frieda replied, nudging Ana.

In the driver’s seat, Henri nodded. “Yes. We’ll have to report this back to command.”

Ana felt the APC stop as it drew level to a small booth, much like the one she’d seen in pictures Hanne had shown her of Cold War Berlin and Checkpoint Charlie. This was the Paul Revere Chokepoint. The sentry on duty hailed them as Henri pulled down the window.

“Going up there, chaps?” asked the round-faced man. When Henri answered in the affirmative, he continued. “Funny thing is, you’re not the first to cross in the last ten minutes…”

“Say again?” said Henri. “I’m the comms officer for this squad, and I wasn’t notified.”

“You wouldn’t be, not by these guys. They’re Tess Jones’ lot,” said the sentry darkly. “Had a voucher, though, and she looked more than willing. They were gonna check the Naval Shipyard. Seems that’s where the dragon last landed… Not sure ‘bout the Archmage. You chaps headed there?”

Henri looked at Harwood.

“Nah, I’d say we’ll start by rendezvousing with Ze’ev Squad,” said Harwood. “Kraber has said he was keen on a little dragon-hunting… And we may need all the firepower we can gather...”

Ana remained quiet. She bit her lower lip. ‘Well… no use waiting, I suppose.’

“Hey, Ana, love, you alright?” Harwood said, reaching back for her hand, in the gentlest voice he’d mustered for the entire week. Though weary and covered in dust and soot, he had the faintest hint of a smile – one Ana wanly returned.

“Yeah, I’m fine, thanks, Har.”

She gripped his hand a little tighter. He was hurting, Ana knew, and though it might have fooled everyone else, it didn’t fool her.

Arthur Tanner’s loss was fresh in his mind, as it was in hers. Another human to die shortly after being reborn as inhuman… and another friend forever lost. Much as she tried to convince herself otherwise, the barracks would be a lot emptier without the other man’s presence.

“We’ll talk about Tanner later, okay?” she said softly. “I’m so, so sorry. I’ll miss him too.”

Harwood’s smile was forlorn. They looked up at the dome. It shimmered, and held on, even under the bombardment from outside the city.

Whatever she’d done with the Archmage, she had to wonder.

‘Oh, Ana…’ the voice said quietly. ‘What did we do…’

* * * * *

Twilight screamed for a long, long time. The wind rushed against her ears, cutting her cheek with its cold. The wound threatened to reopen against the dirty air, though the Bearer of Magic remained secure in her helmet. She was flung far and away above the city, helpless, limbs flailing uselessly as she reached for anyone, anything.

“Spike! Spiiike!”

The Lady Archmage of the Solar Empire mused, even as she screamed, that everything had to come down to her falling like stone unto the unforgiving earth.

‘This cursed planet...’

But in her daze, Twilight remembered. Something had grabbed onto her, a split second after she had been blasted away by the enemy. And when her eyes fluttered open, she saw that she wasn’t falling at at all. No, she was flying, inexplicably.

Barely illuminated by the fires below, she saw the blue coat of the one who had caught her in the air, carrying her with each mighty beat of her wings.

“Rainbow! Rainbow Dash!” Twilight yelled, despite the pain in her ear, or what was left of it. “Slow down! Slow down!”

It was futile, of course. Dash never slowed down for anything. Especially not when her best friends were in danger.

“Not a chance, Twi’!” she cried back, her cropped mane uncovered. “We gotta get back!”

“No! Not without Spike! We can’t lose him!”

Dash shook her head, her teeth clenched. “Sorry,” she said. “Shining’s orders, I’m sorry.” She paused. “I had hang back, Twi’... Watching you fight… Couldn’t do nothing except get you out…”

Twilight looked around them both. Even in the cold, rushing darkness, she could tell that none of the other Wonderbolts flew alongside Dash.

“Rainbow… where are the others? Where’s Starstruck?”

“I don’t know… I told them to get the package to Canterlot. It’s all up to Fleetfoot now.”

She said no more after that. Higher up she flew towards the great airship.

Twilight stared down towards the city. Pillars of smoke rose up high from the fires that had yet to be extinguished. And she knew, this fire would not be extinguished for a long time.

‘Spike…’ she thought fleetingly. Nightmare Moon – no, Luna’s – impact must have sent him plummeting. ‘I’m sorry…’

She closed her eyes, and wept in silence. She didn’t know how long their flight took. How further up they went, from the city below to the airship waiting above. Nor did she know, for sure, if her Spike was safe now.

At last, they crossed the shield, its translucent surface opening a gap just the time for them to pass through. The echoes of battle diminished. Warmth enveloped them as they landed in the cargo hold.

Through blurred eyes, Twilight saw the place looked blackened, and wrecked, yet troops still rushed up to greet her.

A familiar embrace wrapped her.

“My lady,” Ardor said. “You are safe.”

Joining his wife’s side, her brother broke rank from the assembled pegasi and hippogriffs that had met their arrival. He too embraced her.

“Twily!” he said. She hadn’t heard him say it in some time. “I thought you were... oh, your ear…”

The pain came rushing back, and she bit back a grimace.

“Get the Lady Archmage to the infirmary, now!” barked Shining.

From behind him stepped forth Shearwater, her helmet gone and her faded, cropped yellow mane now dirtied with soot, and Corporal Terramar, the youngest bodyguard standing to her as Archmage, with his light yellow fur and turquoise feathers – and his cyan eyes betraying his inexperience. They carried with them a stretcher.

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Twilight said weakly, but she offered no struggle as her bodyguards placed her onto the stretcher and hoisted her up.

“M’lady, I’m… I’m sorry,” Shearwater said. “I should have been there.”

“We all should have,” Terramar added quietly. “We’ve failed–”

Twilight waved a forehoof, trying to smile – though the pain twisted it to another grimace. Her head felt like it was about to shatter.

“No, don’t… she was… you couldn’t have, Shearwater, Terramar…”

She looked around, as her bodyguards carried the stretcher. The hangar was blown wide open, with pegasi and hippogriffs alike speeding back and forth, carrying supplies to patch the gigantic hole blown open from the broken steel bay doors.

“Shining, what happened?” she said aloud, her voice strained. She couldn’t turn her head right. “Why’s everything… why’s everything so…”

Ardor approached her first. “The traitor Cadance struck, My Lady,” she said soothingly. “But Captain Armor did his duty.”

Shining lay a forehoof on her shoulder.

“She’s right,” he said simply. “Go take your rest, Twilight, we’ll get that ear fixed up. We’ll talk later, and in the meantime I’ll see if we can salvage this.” He glanced at Shearwater. “Get her to the infirmary, Sergeant.”

Shearwater nodded, and they carefully moved towards the open double-doors.

“No, wait… Spike… save Spike...” Twilight whispered. Dash prepared to follow after her, but Shining shook his head.

“Stay here, Captain,” he said firmly. “Tell me what you know…”

“Don’t you worry, Lady Archmage,” Terramar said reassuringly. “We’ll get you all patched up.”

“Move out the way! Move out the way!” yelled Shearwater. Twilight’s lips quivered and moved, but no words left them.

The metal double-doors closed upon the hangar.

No words would leave her lips, indeed, not even when she was gently placed upon one of the infirmary’s beds. Her vision was watery, her head felt numb, not helped by the painkillers they rapidly started filling her with.

But her thoughts flowed like water, free and unguided. She couldn’t hold onto the shore. She remained there, her eyes fixed upon the ceiling. The pain in what was her ear faded in and out. Try as she could, Twilight could not let go of the image she kept seeing in the corner of her eye. Princess Luna, her mane flowing in the night’s air, reaching out with a gauntleted forehoof, calm, merciful, perhaps even kind.

‘Luna… why can't things be the way they were…’

Drifting into her ragged rest, Twilight imagined a rising moon, blessing Canterlot with its beautiful light.

~ Charlestown, Boston, USA ~

In the dead of Winter, the barren industrial grey of this old shipyard was turned almost crystalline, the snowfall softening the concrete like a light blanket. But Luna could tell that Spike’s landing here could not have been gentle. A cloud of dust swhirled in the air, obstructing her view as she treaded forward on the hard ground, wary of any creatures lurking in the dark. Least of all, the Newfoals that had haunted Alexander Reiner’s dreams.

It didn’t take long for her to find who she sought. And the sight ached her heart.

She climbed down into the jagged, splitting crater the impact had left in the concrete, cautiously moving to lay an armoured forehoof on Spike’s prone form.

‘Spike…’

The great dragon was still, with the dust and snow falling upon his half-armoured form. His eyes were shut. And though he was twisted, grotesque in the many ways the Empire had ‘fixed’ him, Luna only saw the little dragon who followed Twilight around.

‘She’s gone, too.’

But it had to be done.

Luna lifted her visor, to see him more clearly. He was at peace, now. Gently, she touched her horn against his bleeding snout, and closed her eyes.

Before she could pay her respects, however, she felt air flow past.

He was breathing. Luna’s eyes widened, and she drew a gasp.

“Spike…” she whispered aloud. Another breath taken by him, though he remained quiet. Luna moved to embrace his snout. “I’m so sorry.”

She had struck him hard. Luna shuddered to think what might have happened if she’d truly gone beyond and dropped every restraint she had. The finishing blow she’d struck was as far as she could go without breaking the last of her restraint. But she’s already made a promise to Twilight, that she’d take care of him. And… whatever passed, she’d make it right.

Luna heard something move behind her. Several things, in fact, moving quietly, their steps a muffled sound upon the snow-cased concrete.

“Hold it right there,” one of them spoke aloud. A woman. “You got some explaining to do.”

Her sword was ready to be conjured, just in case, and that was enough. Taking a deep breath, Luna turned to face her welcoming party.

There stood a small group of human soldiers. She remembered flashes from Reiner’s memories. She knew what they looked like.

They weren’t PHL. There was a more hard-bitten look to them, and they wore armour – potion-protective gear, definitely – that very definitely did not look like Reiner’s. It was scarred, rough, dented, and hastily repaired.

The one common trait all the armour shared were the letters ‘HLF’, either stamped or branded. The mousy-haired woman who’d spoken came to the front. She wore no helmet, but out of all of them, her armour looked almost pristine, coloured in dark greys. Oddly, she wore it covered by a more primitive-looking piece of protective casing.

“Gladly,” Luna said evenly.

“You’re being far too calm about this,” the woman said. “I'm not sure I like it.”

She held a strange-looking firearm in her arms. It was a short, stubby, fat rounded thing, with a lens instead of a hollowed barrel.

Luna tried to remember what Reiner had said about the HLF.

‘Hard to work with. Untrustworthy. Humans that started fighting the Solar Empire before the Barrier, before the Imperial Army, before anything. Unpredictable.’

“I know how strange this may seem,” Luna said, “But I am not your enemy.”

“You’ll pardon me,” said a heavyset man standing, “If we’re not in the mood to trust alicorns. ‘Specially one that’s dressed like you.”

“Jean is right,” the woman said. Her accent was like a Trottingham native’s. “I’m Teresa Jones. And you claimed to be Princess Luna.”

“I am,“ Luna said.

“Princess Luna is petrified,” the woman said. “Queen Celestia ate the magic from her after tormenting her into inaction, then turned her to stone and took her back to Equestria.”

“Yet here I stand,” said Luna. “Whole and unblemished. Pray tell, what purpose would Queen Celestia serve by restoring her rebellious sister to full power?”

“Then what is your game?” Jones asked. “You wouldn’t be here for no reason. And no alicorn would care enough to come to help us.”

“I have no stakes here, Teresa Jones,” Luna said gravely. “I hold no one dear in this world, no allies, no friends, no lovers. I failed in my duty to protect Lord Discord. And may have failed in protecting my own niece, wherever she is now.” She placed a forehoof on Spike’s snout. “Now I only see a tortured soul cast in chains, fighting for the enemy. And the enemy is us.”

Her horn’s light grew dimmer, and gentler. She took her helmet off, and placed it on the ground between them. Her mane flowed in the nonexistent wind. Jones looked at it curiously.

“Please,” Luna said, quieter. “Let us do our duty as Dreamwalker, and we shall explain when the time is right.”

“I’d prefer some explanations now,” Jones said. “I know it doesn’t make any sense at all that you’d be allied with the Tyrant. Especially when everyone in the city can see you fighting the Archmage. A blind man could tell that you’d been fighting for us.”

“Aye,” Luna said firmly. “We are here to aid your cause, Teresa Jones.”

And Luna told Jones the story thus far. How Alexander Reiner had appeared in Equestria, an Equestria that was the past to him. How he’d tried to kill Celestia. How he’d failed, not getting very far. How the false Redheart had infiltrated Equestria and only barely been neutralised.

She did it quickly enough, but all was covered. And when she was done, she paused to contemplate Jones.

“That,” Jones said, “is utterly ridiculous. But…”

Luna looked at the human woman. “Is it?” she remarked. “Perhaps. But you said it yourself. It makes little sense otherwise.”

A moment passed. Then, finally, Jones nodded. “Very well. I believe it.”

Then someone emerged from the back of their group. Someone in PHL gear but a blue helmet that read ‘UN’, Luna realised. A young, blonde woman with cold green eyes. She glared at her.

“Yeah,” the other woman said. “I don’t buy it.”

“And why would that be, Radwick?” asked Jean-Eric, the heavyset man.

“The part where Alex tried to kill Celestia is believable enough,” she said, “but I can’t believe he’d let himself stay out of commission so long, or even that he’d be willing to enlist help. And a Celestia that isn’ta genocidal monster is just… it’s just absurd.”

Luna’s eyes met hers. They seemed very familiar... She took a step forward, and the HLF did not say anything.

“You called Captain Reiner by his first name,” said Luna. “You speak of him with familiarity… And your name. You’re Maxine Radwick, are you not? You’re his sister.”

Reiner’s sister wasn’t someone he’d spoken of much, only agreeing to do with Lyra present. Their mother had favoured her, and it didn’t sit well with him. If there was some sort of a bond between the two siblings, it certainly hadn’t led her to serve with the PHL. That, Luna mused, was something she ought to decipher later.

The woman paused. She shook her head.

“What does it matter to you?” she said vehemently.

“He has shown us his pain as he wills it, and further beyond. All the answers you seek are with me. And in time I will tell you all, if you so wish.”

“That’s a lot of waiting, I say,” Radwick retorted. “How do we know you’re not… leading us on?”

“Let me tell you this, then,” Luna said. “On Equestria, a spy trailed Alexander Reiner. She was bested, and yet, before we could begin to grasp the depths of the Imperial machinations, the Queen cast her spell, crossing the void between the worlds… and Redheart was dead. There lies something in their minds, something deep within. And now I know how to break it. How to break this switch that prevents them from seeing the light. But you need to give me time, lest it be a waste that this dragon lies here.”

“He belongs to the Archmage,” Radwick scowled. “Looks like he’s a weapon and nothing more. There’s not much that can be done for him.”

“He belongs to no-one,” Luna said. “You know not of the path I tread.”

“And you know mine and Alex’s? Bullshit.”

Jones stepped between them, arms outstretched.

“Alright, cool it. Right. Here's the deal, Princess,” said Jones sternly. “We’ll let you do your thing, and you answer a couple questions we've still got later. Sound good?” She glanced at Radwick. “Does that sound good to you, Radwick?”

For the longest minute, none spoke. Then...

“Yeah,” said Radwick coldly. “Fine by me.”

“I promise the answers will come, Maxine Radwick.”

Luna paused, and let out a hacking cough. Though internally, she counted on her regeneration process, her magical resources lay low, and the wounds weren’t healed as fast as they should have been. She spat some blood on the ground, still coughing. And when it settled, she looked up to see Jones. The woman appeared strangely concerned.

“You don’t seem alright there,” said Jones quietly. Even Radwick looked perturbed. Luna followed their gaze, to her pair of wings.

‘They've never seen an alicorn bleed before… have they?’

“I suppose,” Luna said. “Perhaps I have overexerted my own capabilities.”

“Alicorns can do that?” asked Jean-Eric.

“Everyone has their limit,” Luna answered, “And they have pushed him far beyond his. I dearly hope it is not too late to find whatever is left of the drake that was.”

“And yet you're going to… do whatever it is that you were going to do to that dragon.”

Luna held her head up a little higher.

“If need be, Teresa Jones," said Luna. “For it is my duty. As it is yours to stand by humanity.”

She paused, briefly.

“He has a name, like all those who fought.”

Just as she was to cross the threshold and delve into her realm once more, Luna threw a contemplative glare at Jones and Radwick both.

“And his name is Spike.”

* * * * *

The last unicorn on the bridge lay dead, riddled with bullet holes. They’d only just whittled down his shield. There’d been a fraction of a moment where the shield was down, and he stood, covered in blood. Kraber had cut him to pieces with five shots from the MG2021. Two of the Afrikaner’s shots had hit the unicorn… Compared to one round from seemingly everyone else.

Heliotrope came swooping back, alighting on top of a road sign.

“Clear,” she reported. “No spells cast at the other end, no damage, no lookouts covering it, no bombs. Whatever they wanted back into Imperial territory, it’s important enough they’re heading straight for their base.”

“Right,” Yael said. “Just received orders from Major Bauer. Our next order of business is to hold this bridge until reinforcements get here. Quiette Shy, your orders are to hold the bridge with magic, and make sure everyone can cross.”

The white unicorn mare nodded.

“Kraber, Aegis, Oscar,” Yael said, “You’re on the North end of the bridge.”

“That’s crawling with Imperials,” Oscar said. “Need to wait.”

“Not for long. We got friendly company,” said Heliotrope.

Another team arrived. They stepped out of two APCs, around a dozen of them in total, and at the head of them were a sniper, an armoured medic, and a griffon.

* * * * *

“Well… looks like we’re safe,” said Ana.

Frieda nodded as Harwood walked to meet Ze’ev.

“You boys look alright,” said the Lieutenant.

“Fine as we'll ever be,” Harwood agreed. “Come on. Let’s set up a perimeter…”

“Hold it,” said Yael. Her eye turned to Ana. “Sniper, what happened to the Archmage?”

“Target hit,” said Frieda, before Ana could answer. “Wounded, but that’ll take care of itself.”

Ana, however, saw something to the side. “Wait up,” she said. “I think we got a live one here.”

All eyes turned towards to where pointed. An old convenience store. Where an Imperial lay at the storefront.

“He’s not dead?” Heliotrope sounded disappointed.

They approached him, forming a half-circle around their adversary, wounded as he was. The earthpony in question was slumped, a gaping wound on his barrel. He was brown all over, from coat to mane to barely-open eyes.

“Trailblazer officer,” Harwood said clinically. The light armour told them much. "Captain, too. Must’'ve been hit by one of yours.”

Ze’ev stared at Viktor Kraber, who just shrugged. “Well,” she said. “Our new orders were to capture an officer…”

“He’s still breathing,” Ana said, looking at his chest. None of them were willing to step forwards, but Harwood looked like he ached to do so. “Can we request medevac?”

The large earthpony named Aegis, Viktor Kraber’s inseparable companion, looked up to his friend, distinctly uncomfortable.

“Alright,” said Kraber, “anyone willing to mourn officer thinks-we're-all-barely-sentient-vermin, raise a forearm or foreleg or wing or whatever the fok.”

There was a pause.

“No? Right then, back to work.”

Of course, Ana had heard stories about the Trailblazers. With Equestrians and others leaving for Earth all the time, the Trailblazers’ benign recon-and-rescue had become much, much darker. Stories of how their presence always precipitated a massed Imperial assault, of how Trailblazers persistently pursued those who’d gone off to the distant forests of Earth, all to drag them back to the Empire.

Frieda had almost been one of them. She’d told Ana time and time again how grateful she’d been, to join the PHL...

“That’s cruel,” Harwood said, looking to Kraber, frowning.

“And this concerns me… how?”

“Yeah,” said Frieda.” Don't care about ‘em.”

“Viktor’s right,” Aegis said, not sounding entirely happy with it, forcing himself in the direction of that decision. “Rivet said one of those Trailblazers who came to take him back, that one time in Littleton, told him if I really cared, I wouldn’t have taken my kids to Earth. And Amber came back with a black eye.”

“Did I kill that poesgesig?” Kraber asked. “It seems like something I would’ve done.”

“It probably would’ve been one of us,” Aegis agreed.

Harwood didn't seem too thrilled. Then Kraber’s eyes caught Ana. “You don’t like it,” he said. She nodded stiffly. “That’s fine. Be much more worried if anyone did like it.”

“You’re just talking like… Like we can just let someone die,” Harwood said. “So close to us.”

“One, Trailblazer,” Aegis and Frieda said in unison. “Two–”

Kraber sighed theatrically. “Alright. Fok with this.”

He turned and stalked back towards the earthpony. As he did so, he reached into his satchel, pulling out a very large hypodermic needle.

“Easy, Kraber!” Harwood said, alarmed. “Let me handle it.”

“You’re going to execute him?” Ana asked. She cringed at her own dismayed, venomous tone. “Just like that?”

Kraber looked at her, head cocked slightly in his helmet. “What? No. If I was doing that, I would’ve just shot him. See, this–”

He walked up to the earthpony, staring at him intently.

“Don’t…” the earthpony whispered. “Not… going to poison me…”

“In this quantity,” Kraber said, “the morphine is probably not going to kill you.”

He bent down, looking at the earthpony’s ankles, just above the hooves. Or whatever the horse equivalent to ankles were.

He was still. Shrugged. Then jammed it into the earthpony’s leg.

“I told you,” Kraber said. “Morphine.”

“Why?” the earthpony asked, as Kraber checked their uniform. “Why are you…”

“Let’s just say there’s no point in blikseming people when they’re down,” Kraber said. “Dad always told me, don’t fight to win, fight to make sure they never fight you again. Far as I can tell, you are longpast that point.”

He grabbed a pair of scissors, and started cutting the earthpony’s uniform. Unbuckling it, too.

“What’re the scissors for?” Oscar Mikkelsen asked.

Kraber glanced at the hulking armoured man. “Well, can’t just ask him to move his foreleg and take it off. You don’t know what the condition of the muscles are, so...”

He actually sounded like he enjoyed explaining it. Which was interesting, except the idea of Kraber as a teacher was… worrying. To say the least.

There was a pause.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake," Harwood said, marching up past Kraber, his sword strapped to his back. He knelt down, glancing at the wounded Trailblazer. “Some bedside manner you have. I shall take over.”

“No, you’re not, you’re working withme,” Kraber said, pulling out a roll of gauze, snipping it, then wrapping it around a particularly bad foreleg wound. “I swear, it’s like everyone forgets I was a trauma–”

The sharp glare which Harwood shot Kraber quieted him, and everyone else's murmurs. Ana held her breath.

“Then why do you have a gun?” Harwood asked. “I don’t see a red cross on you either. I’m sure that you’ve got some insanely fucked-up backstory, Kraber, but there’s a doctor’s humour, and then there’s you. Why should I trust you not to overdose him as some sick joke? God knows you do plenty of needlessly cruel things for laughs-”

“Aegis,” Kraber said, almost conversationally, voice cold as ice, “I’m going to need you to do me a solid and hold me back.”

“That’s difficult with forelegs,” the heavyset earthpony said.

“Then get Oscar to fokking do it,” Kraber said, almost snarling.

The big man walked up to Kraber, a slight uncertainty to his march. Ana couldn’t see anything under his opaque faceplate.

“For someone looking to make up for the shit you pulled with the HLF,” Harwood said, the words flowing forth like water, “you sure love the shiny toys the PHL can provide you, even in your p–”

Harwood stopped just before he said ‘penal’ squad, Ana noticed. But so did someone else.

“First of all. Harwood. Stop provoking him,” Ze’ev said wearily. “You’re not making my job any easier, being the ringmaster for a circus of criminals. After Montreal, when we broke that guy’s jaw and captured Shieldwall, they had to give him a plea deal that was either prison or PHL service.”

Ana vaguely recalled what Ze’ev was talking about. She’d seen it on the news in the wake of the Battle of Montreal, where the Solar Empire had made their first landfall in Canada since the Blackdog Raids. Up until Barrierfall, this had been the closest North America came to falling to the Solar Empire. Ana remembered a barrage of stories of how Kraber had distinguished himself admirably there, surprising everyone.

“What about me?” Oscar asked, looking over to Kraber and Aegis, confused.

“Well, you’re probably not a criminal,” Ze’ev said, amending that. “I don’t think we’ve written that law yet.”

Ana wondered just what this could possibly mean. ‘I swear, it’s like that squad speaks another language sometimes.’

She considered that Kraber apparently spoke somewhere in the neighbourhood of eight languages.

‘Sometimes literally.’

“Thank you for that vote of confidence,” Kraber said sarcastically. “As for why… well, nobody here’d like it. I mean, we’d probably say we would, but… would we? Really?”

“I’m the licensed medic, have you forgotten?” Harwood said, his voice dangerously low. “So, let me take care of the bloody Trailblazer properly, while the rest of you sod off and do your own damn jobs.”

Ana took a step closer, grasping Harwood's shoulder. “Okay, okay, if everyone can please just… cool off. We'll be golden, yeah? Does that sound good?”

Harwood and Kraber looked at each other.

“We still have… well, everything, to handle,” Ana continued. "So. Just, well… just let the medic handle it. Everyone cool with that?"

The tension in the air was running high. Ze’ev cleared her throat.

“I applaud that you’re willing to rescue a prisoner, but I don’t care that you’re arguing. I notice,” Ze’ev said casually, “A conspicuous lack of patrolling.”

“We were preparing the barricade," said Aegis. “Could use a hand or two.”

“You heard him. Get to work.”

The tension gradually evaporated, and no fuss was raised as the joint group assembled to their respective positions. Ana saw Henri find his corner to deal with Ze’ev’s communications officer. Though Harwood still glared after Kraber as the other man went to join his squad members, before turning back to deal with the wounded Trailblazer.

Ana rested her rifle against the window. She looked to her side, and Frieda's eyes met hers.

“Right,” Frieda said. “I’ll join the others. Take care.”

She went off. Ana sighed, considering Harwood. His red cross was proudly emblazoned across his back. Before she could say anything, Harwood raised a hand.

“Ana, here. Put some pressure there.”

She knelt down by his side, and did just that. The earthpony groaned.

“He should be alright. I guess,” she said. "You’ve got this handled, um. You okay there?” Ana patted his elbow, and smiled. He wasn’t looking at her, still frowning as he looked over the earthpony's wound. “Hey, I… I think you got this medical knight thing down just right, Thomas. Don’t worry.”

“Yeah,” Harwood said quietly. “And they handed me a sword too.”

He sighed.

"It's not your job to keep me in line," he continued. "Never has been, love. I fucked up there, let it go to my head..."

"Yeah?" Ana said, nudging him. "Try and stop me."

She glanced around the desolate streets, then up at the massive dome still covering the entire city.

Of course, she mused, every little thing counted, in the end.

“We’ll make it,” said Ana. “If that's what you’re concerned about.”

Harwood said nothing. But his shoulders relaxed, just a little, and that was enough.

~ Fellsmere Park, Malden, USA ~

By the time the ten left among them arrived at Fellsmere Park Outpost, they were at the breaking point. Breeze was wheezing now, having carried Whistle from all the way from Charlestown. Even Timber seemed on edge, still bearing the statue’s crate he’d been carrying for so long, and with limited support from his surviving troopers. Cinnabar, their only other remaining unicorn, was pouring her all into their protective bubble.

When the lakeside outpost came into view, with its shield-dome, barbed wire and guard towers, Scootaloo could have leapt for joy. It had been a relaxing park, once, for those who wished to relax by nature’s edge.

But their fight wasn’t over yet.

“Lieutenant!” she heard someone call out.

Up ahead, beneath the dim glow of crystalline torches, there was an earthen palisade fortified with barbs, overturned cars lain in staggered rows in front of it.

“It’s the Captain!” she heard the Guard atop the gate exclaim. “Raise the shield, let them in!

He descended down the small post, and the translucent dome around it, generated by either a head unicorn or a crystal generator, allowed a small opening for them to go through. There, the main gate, a modular design created by their crystalpony allies, swung open smoothly. Under the careful watch of the two unicorns standing guard above it, Scootaloo and her comrades moved in. She took in the sight of Fellsmere Park. The park had been converted into a hastily-fortified outpost, though perhaps hasty wasn’t the right word.

No, the new earthworks was anything but hasty. A feat of engineering, hammered into shape by both earthponies and unicorns working in tandem, creating a crisscrossing network of trenches overgrown with magically-accelerated plant growth and temporary rock walls. At each end of the trenches stood tents with different symbols on their white fabric – purple vial for potion supplies, grey arrow for munitions, and pillow-marked ones for the barracks.

Scootaloo’s eyes followed one lone pathway, past all the dozens of earthponies, pegasi, unicorns, hippogriffs and zebras that populated the base, leading into a restored tree-grove by the lakeside, where a sizable pier had been created for sky-boats coming in to ferry supplies. Surrounding the entire park was a palisade, made from the earth, replacing the metal fence the humans had put in place, dotted with wooden watchtowers built into the earthen wall.

And at the centre of it all, atop a single pillar, was a totem-prole. Even if Heliotrope or someone else invisible had followed, they’d be hidden no more.

The Guards here were armed, much more than her ragtag squad had been. Not only crossbows, but potion-mortars, heavy Hardbucker cannons, even a Celestia’s Spear – or, as Dash told her, a Sunspear. Mounted atop the well, the massive, spear-like device designed to channel a unicorn’s magic was an imposing sight. From the size of this one, a full twenty paces in length, Scootaloo reckoned, it’d be strong enough to penetrate even the strongest human-made armoured ship.

Only once all of them were inside the walls, Whistle tended to by a second and third medic, did Scootaloo allow herself a brief respite, sharing a glance with Sprout. She watched the base commander trot up to Timber and salute.

“Lieutenant Fire Flare,” Timber said triumphantly. “Glad to see you’re still kicking.”

Fire Flare was a tall, pale-yellow unicorn mare with a fiery orange-and-red mane, clad in an officer’s armour with a Fillydelphia patch. Scootaloo had heard of her before, part of a unicorn troupe famed for their Summer Sun Celebration performances. Flare had quit the group, joined the Guard like so many had since the post-Crystal War expansion.

‘Guess I found where she went…’

“Likewise, Captain,” said Flare, smiling pleasantly.

Resting the crate upon the grass, Timber looked around. “What’s the sitrep here in Fellsmere? Do we still have Spot Pond?”

“5th Fillydelphia is holding the sky-boat base in Spot Pond,” Fire Flare replied. “Got stragglers from 12th Fillydelphia, mixed with the rest of us 15th still here. Give or take… three-hundred ponies, griffs and zebras total. What happened, Captain?”

“Ambush. Ze’ev, Kraber and their thugs,” said Timber bitterly. His accent slipped to something that sounded like it was from Trottingham. Not the time to ponder it, Scootaloo thought. “Lucky to have made it out alive.”

He gestured to all of ten them. Herself, Sprout, Whistle, Breeze, Cinnabar, his deputy Cookie Batch, and two hippogriffs among them.

“This is all that’s left from the squad. Wonderbolts, Trailblazers,” he said. “Rest of us, gone, including all the Newfoals. Corporal Red Shift didn’t make it either.”

Fire Flare shook her head, sighing.

“The important thing is you’re all safe,” she said. “Can’t rest for long though, Captain. Scouts picked up a few UNAC squads, at least one penal, patrolling the suburbs.”

“Well, I trust we’ll be able to handle them easy?”

“That’s the problem,” said Flare. “They’ve got armour.”

Scootaloo shared a worried glance with Sprout. But as fate would have it, it was at that moment that something impacted the shield, quieting them. Something explosively loud.

“Get everyone in to safety, Cadet!” yelled Timber. Left and right, Guards scrambled to their positions. “Batch, take the rest into the barracks. Flare, with me.”

Another impact on the shield, and it flickered dangerously red. A third impact, a fourth, and a fifth, and Scootaloo wasn’t sure how long it would last.

“Tank!” yelled Flare, back atop the gates. “Tank! Take cover, now!”

Now the impact’s explosion was heard, loud as anything could ever be, and Scootaloo looked right at Whistle, placing a forehoof on her own. Her hazel eyes were wide with worry, but she nodded, and that was all Scootaloo needed.

As the impacts and explosions intensified, Scootaloo flew to the gate, and came face to face with Timber.

“I told you to stick with the others!” shouted Timber.

She shook her head. “You need me more than they need me, Captain,” she said smoothly. “More horsepower up on the walls.”

Flare heard this. “They’ve got a tank, Wonderbolt,” she stated. “British one, Challenger 2. We can’t get a clear shot.”

Through a peephole, Scootaloo looked down the street.

There, turning around a corner, was the tank. Large, lumbering, yet swift when needed, they all followed the same general model. But each was as deadly as the other, especially against Imperial Guards in the early days. And this one, a boxy-looking one, with its tracks covered, was no different. Around it, a few human soldiers, clad in suits that protected them from the serum, rushed from cover to cover, their guns pointed right at the gate. The tank’s cannon, meanwhile, was pointed right at the palisade, and Scootaloo ducked and winced when another round impacted the shield.

Timber glared at Flare.

“We’ll get that shot. We’ll send in the Newcalves. We still have those, don’t we? I know we left a few in one of the buildings here.”

“Say again?”

"Newcalves, Lieutenant,” repeated Timber. “I’ll handle the palisade here. Get them out now. That's an order."

“But–”

“Are you some morphic leodite or what?! Send them in or we all die! That’s an order, Flare.”

Scootaloo had never seen Newcalves in action, but from what she’d heard of them, large and twisted and grotesque, she wondered if they were right for the job. As Timber turned to gaze on the darkened battlefield, and Flare disappeared into the trenches, well, any answer would have to come soon enough.

Another salvo fired. In the darkness, the shadows moved, ever closer. The flashlights they carried went out one by one, and soon the tank disappeared as well.

“Captain?” Scootaloo whispered, but Timber shushed her.

“Wait for it, Cadet,” he said sternly. “Wait for it…”

Scootaloo gulped. They were getting close. Her hooves ached to grab onto Timber and drag him along with her, fleeing into the trenches.

But she didn’t need to, as something burst out of a nearby home in the street in front of her. There was a crackle from behind her. Scootaloo whipped her head around, in time to see Fire Flare, true to her name, cast a single bolt and shoot it up high in the sky. And when it detonated, the crystal lamps’ dim lighting was overwhelmed by the brightest flare she’d seen thus far.

“Look!” cried a hippogriff Guard, and Scootaloo turned to look at the thing that had come onto the street. Now the street was as clear as day.

‘Whoa.’

The great creature, halfway between pony and rhinoceros, upscaled to tower over the armoured vehicle at the end of the street. Its true form was concealed behind layers of thick, grey steel plate armour, and the asphalt cracked with each stomp.

It roared, and the air became filled with gunfire and yells.

“Captain!” Fire Flare shouted. “The Spear is ready!”

“Raise the shield on my command!” yelled Timber.

Scootaloo, meanwhile, couldn’t tear her gaze away from the scene that unfolded.

The Newcalf charged forwards, its pace unimpeded by the meager gunfire that clattered against its armour. Though the rounds did penetrate some of the steel, the creature soon reached the human lines. Scootaloo actually shuddered to see two enemy soldiers crushed under its bulk.

“Ready to fire!”

“Hold, raise the shield!”

The translucent shield began to dissipate. The tank turned its cannon towards the Newcalf, the beast still charging ahead and throwing or crushing soldiers underfoot. And fired.

It was a direct hit.

But the Newcalf, though it staggered, was not easily stopped. With its last strength, it swiped at the tank, turning it on its side in a screech of metal, before collapsing in a heap.

“Now! Fire the Sunspear!”

From one end of the spear, the unicorn that operated it – Scootaloo couldn’t tell if he was natural-born or Newfoal – charged up a spell, channeling it into the crystalline device. Futilely, the tank’s treads rolled, unable to move. And then the spear fired off its brilliant, shining golden beam, straight at its exposed underbelly.

At first, the beam merely penetrated the tank, although the vehicle recoiled under the stress. Then, the spear moved ever so slightly, onto a strategic point on the tank. It detonated in a shower of munitions.

The humans who weren’t blown away staggered to their feet. They took one look at the burning wreck and turned tail, as the flare burnt up and the battlefield was shrouded in darkness again. A wise move, Scootaloo thought, for another Newcalf had emerged, fresh and unharmed.

“Good job, Lieutenant. Minimum casualties,” Timber said gruffly. “We’ll pick up the stragglers there, feed them some potion, and we’re a little bit stronger then. Come along.”

He patted Scootaloo, and she turned to look at him. He wore a calm smirk. Something that clashed wildly with the frown on the hippogriffs in the watchtower next to them.

She followed him down. The gates were open now, and a few Guards streamed out, potion bottles clinking in their saddlebags. She followed Timber, and joined Whistle, Sprout, and Breeze, standing at the ready.

“Don’t take it any other way, Cadet,” he said, when she passed by. “When push comes to shove, we can hold our own just fine. And don’t ever let the humans think otherwise.”

She nervously returned his smile. Fire Flare, however, did not.

“With all due respect… what in Tartarus were you thinking, Captain?” she hissed. “Newcalves this close to the hippogriffs and zebras? That’s against protocol.”

“For Celestia’s sake, Flare,“ Timber retorted heatedly. “They were about to breach the perimeter. What would you have done?”

He stomped a hoof, and Scootaloo winced.

“We’ll handle the fallout later, and eventually they’ll have to deal with the Newfoal soldiers daily. We can't keep them on garrison duty all the time, and this is just the start. I’ll deal with the War Office. Right now, this here statue’s our only concern.”

His horn lit up, lifting the crate’s lid. Flare's eyes, and those of some passing Guards, widened.

“What the… is that Discord?”

“One and only,” affirmed Timber. “You can write a report to Canterlot, Lieutenant. But so long as we got this statue out of their dirty hands, nothing else matters. You can ask the Lady Archmage yourself. We get this statue back to Canterlot, we’re closer to winning this war. You get me?”

Flare's eyes darted from the statue to Timber. She nodded.

“I got you, Captain,” she said. “What do you need?”

“I need you to get those Newfoals back in here safely,” he said, gesturing towards the street. The Newcalf stood vigil, guarding the earthponies in the distance as they began converting the wounded humans left behind. “Armor them up, give ‘em the rundown. We need all the hooves we can get on the field.”

“Right. Anything else?”

Timber, instead, looked at Scootaloo expectantly. She took a deep breath.

“A sky-boat, Lieutenant. We're heading to Hollow One.”

Flare nodded. Timber cleared his throat.

“Needs to be a medical one,” he added.

“Captain, wait,” said Scootaloo. “Is that… ethical?”

“We need to get past the naval blockade,” Timber replied. “We got wounded, don't we? Plus, this draconequus doesn’t look too healthy either. If things look ugly, we can always count on the boat’s shield-emitter, Cadet. Those things are still tougher than your run-of-the mill human fighter jet. Besides, the enemy has rules. So do we.”

~ The Tabletop of The Assistant’s Mind ~

The nightmares never stop. They come, they flourish, they’re here to stay.

They all tell him the same, sad story. He is good. He is loyal. He’s stronger than anything else. A miracle of science and magic twined together. He’ll protect her better than anything.

And he’ll always be good. Won’t he now? Can anyone ask for more?

But it didn’t feel right. It still doesn’t. It shouldn’t. He clutches his head. He has grown so much. And it isn’t right.

The stories tell him differently, and he does not like it.

Rarity was good. Twilight was good. That was all he needed. But they were at fault.

“Spike, we have to go. Now. I can’t do this. They’re planning something bad. I’ve spent so long tending to the wounded, bringing back beauty and helping to rebuild, that they haven’t gotten to me yet.”

Rarity. She was good. She was kind.

“What happened to Twilight? To Pinkie? They’d never consider thi–”

”But somehow, they are. I don’t know, but I need to leave. We can stop this. We have to stop this, but we can’t do it from here.”

His memories crash all at once. Pain in his chest grows.

“You can’t do this! This… this is sick! Wrong! Evil! And you’ll never make me into…”

“Oh, Rarity. Spike. You’ve made your choices.”

They fled together. They fell together.

He shielded her. And he lay broken where he fell. Rarity was broken, too. Only in her mind. He remembers Twilight. The Bearer of Magic.

Sister and teacher both. She didn’t mean it. Did she?

“Don’t… worry, We’ll fix him, you’ll see. We’ll make him better. We’ll have to–”

He was weak. They bent him as they willed. They fixed him. They broke him. They made him better and worse and perfect and–

He hears her arrive. A presence in the dark. He turns away. He doesn’t want her to see him. Her walk is unimpeded. But he wants to tell her to stop. He’s too far gone.

The Princess of the Night lays a forehoof. He looks up, and she wears a smile. It is a kind, motherly smile.

He tries to return it. But something pulls at him. He curls up. The Sun tells him not to speak.

He whimpers. He closes his eyes.

‘Remain where you are, and you will be alright.’ he hears the Sun speak.

Wrong, wrong, wrong, wr–

The Moon passes by. He looks up.

There she stands before a lock. A large, heavy, intricate lock. It covers the door to the Golden Oaks basement.

She breaks the lock with a mighty blast. The voices fade. And a weight has been lifted. Not all, though. He feels weak. Yet unbound.

‘My work is not done. You can sleep now, dear Spike. We have much to work with, I fear...’

She wraps a wing around him. He feels ashamed. He was weak. He couldn’t break free all on his own. But the Night Princess’’s voice is calm and gentle and kind in every way Celestia is not.

“We’ll make it right. Equestria welcomes you, always…”

~ Charlestown, Boston, USA ~

In the shadow of the fallen dragon, Maxine stood with a watchful eye, keeping a tight vigilance on Luna. While the shock of seeing an alicorn cough up blood was surprising, it wasn’t enough to last that long. And even now…

‘If it bleeds, it can die.’ a stray thought whispered in her ear.

She glanced at the spot, behind where the alicorn now sat, where Luna had spat out blood. And the temptation to possibly end a betrayal before it could happen was--

“Surreal, ain’t it?”

Maxine glanced aside to see Tess standing there, arms crossed.

“That’s one word for it.” Maxine said icily, “you’d think we’d be used to something like another alicorn after everything that’s happened.”

“Yeah, but it’s still pretty weird.” Tess pointed out, glancing at Luna and the dragon. “A Luna who knows where your brother is. All we’re missing is something like the dead rising from the grave, and then we’ll have the apocalypse on our hands.”

“Hmph.” Maxine responded non-verbally, returning her gaze back to Luna.

‘Going inside to find… to find Agnes–’

“I’ve always found it funny, Radwick,” Tess said, unbidden. “Why aren’t you with the HLF?”

Maxine stared at her. “What are you talking about?”

“The Equestrians,” Tess clarified, giving Maxine a curious glance. “You don’t like them.”

“It’s going to be alright, Maxine. Just take the serum and you can come with us. With me and Aggie. You’ll be happier there and away from the war.”

“Because it’s a lure, all of it,” said Maxine. “The colours, the faces, the ‘cutie marks’, it was just an elaborate deception to fool us. They’ve shown their true nature before, and they’ll do it again.” She gave Tess a frigid gaze. “And when they betray us again, we’ll see what’s true.”

“I know a lot of people who’d agree with you.” Tess sighed. “So why didn’t you join?”

“I’m not a violent maniac, Jones.”

“The HLF have hardly got a monopoly on violent maniacs,” Tess said coolly. “Haven’t you heard? Viktor Kraber switched teams.”

“Well, I’m not him,” Maxine said indifferently. “Making them pay is one thing, doesn’t mean I’m looking to get a kick out of it.”

“And neither am I,” said Tess. “But are you sure that’s what it is? Or could it be because of who your brother is, and his rather… troubled reputation amongst the HLF?”

Maxine gave her a hard stare. “Defiance was after my time. Spare me. I’ve got my own reasons to have issues with the Equestrians.”

Before Tess could respond, there was a change in the air. A shift in the atmosphere that pulled their attention back to Luna. The alicorn had stirred and seemed to have emerged from her trance-like state.

She turned her head towards them, her ethereal mane billowing in the unseen wind, and it reminded Maxine all too much of her royal sister.

“Are you done?” Tess asked.

“I believe that should do it for now,” Luna replied calmly, holding back a cough. “But the work is far from over. In time, the chains binding him will be released entirely, but not here.”

“Where, exactly?” said Tess.

Luna stood up, and smiled serenely.

“Equestria,” she said, and stood a little straighter. “My Equestria.”

“You still owe us some answers,” Maxine pointed out. “Besides, we’re not going anywhere till that blasted dome is down.”

Hearing this, the alicorn said nothing in return. Her eyes were fixed towards the sky, the moonlight reflected in her tranquil blue eyes.

“Something wrong?” Tess said, alarmed. “Jean-Eric, go check the perimeter–”

“Fear not, Teresa Jones,” said Luna cryptically. “For I feel that the end is near…”

And there was a thunderous crack, loud and distant and near and quiet all at once. Maxine’s eyes, and all others, followed Luna’s gaze, and there they saw a single magical bolt among many, crossing the moonlit sky.

* * * * *

It started as a shining light emerging from the suburbs, near what had been Fenway Park.

The single bolt flew through the air, tiny, yet it brilliantly gleamed a crystalline blue. The colours of the Crystal Realm, like the alicorn who cast it. No eyes fell upon it then, for it was one of many such projectiles and magical bolts crisscrossing the Boston skies. Yet, in a moment, where it landed drew all eyes in the city.

A unicorn’s shield spell, from the smallest of personal shields, to the city-wide dome that covered Boston, had a complex, criss-crossing blueprint to the smallest detail. It gave them the endurance to withstand, for a time, the strongest of human munitions.

Yet if one were to find the junction where the spell matrix met, one could shatter it entirely. And the bolt, indeed, found its mark, guided by the unyielding love of the mare it came from.

A crack spread from the impact, quiet as it was. Silent at first, the shield it touched creaked, and more cracks spread through the gigantic dome. And when it reached the very top, above where the Great Equestrian was, those below waited with bated breath.

The cracks faded. And the shield, piece by piece, collapsed. The translucent purple, barely illuminated by the fading fires below, disintegrated into purple dust over the city.

Next came the storm.

It had taken only a short while for news to spread. Within distance of Boston Harbour lay the UNAC fleet, a mix of Russian, French, and whatever other naval forces that had been within the North Atlantic area.

And when the translucent dome disappeared, the missiles flew, and the planes took to the skies.

There had only been three aircraft carriers lying in wait, but they were enough. One by one, long-designated targets on the North side of the city from Winthrop to Wellington were struck by airforce. It would be the first of many waves, and from the South of the city, UNAC’s ground forces would move in soon enough to relieve their beleaguered comrades.

Above the city, missiles coursed through the air, impacting targets where the Empire had set foot in the South side. And some, of course, went for the Great Equestrian’s shields. For now it held firm, though less could be said about the Imperial troops below.

In the next few hours, the battle would wind down as it had before. But none could know yet what the future held.

For Archmage Twilight, lying on the infirmary bed, unable to sleep away the ringing in her head, her only connection to the outside world had been the zebra doctor and her assistant working hard to properly close her wound.

And then the doors burst open, she heard. Her brother loomed over her, and Shearwater and Terramar flanked him on either side. Rainbow Dash followed, as did Ardor.

“The shield has fallen. Send word out to Canterlot,” Shining told Rainbow. “The Boston situation is being handled. I will remain here with Ardor.”

“Captain, with all due respect,” answered Rainbow. “Dontcha think this war has enough dead heroes already?”

“She is right,” Ardor said soothingly. “Dear Shining, are you sure?”

“I’ve got just enough left in me to protect the ship alone, long enough to reach the Barrier. We have neither the stocks needed for the bombardment or the firepower to take on the entire fleet. We’ll cover the retreat.”

Her visitors looked at one another. His gaze turned to the zebra doctor. Twilight couldn’t catch her name tag.

“Doctor,” Shining said sternly. “Her life is on you. Keep her safe.”

"Yes, Captain," she said simply.

“Stay with us, Lady Archmage,” Shearwater said reassuringly, laying his talon on her bedside, yet Twilight, at that moment, wanted nothing more than to fade away.

“Brace yourselves,” said Shining. “Commencing teleportation in three, two, one...”

She said nothing, the headache continuing to torment her. A purple glow did appear around them all – herself, Rainbow Dash, Shearwater and Terramar, and the doctor and her nurse. Then Shining’s horn sparked, filling each crack in the wooden floor and spreading to the walls.

“Shining…” Twilight whispered. But her words faded under a deafening noise.

And then the lines shone bright, bright as Celestia’s Sun, forcing her eyes to close.

When they opened once again, they were in the Atlantic, she knew. Hollow One, the gigantic platform from which they’d set out hours ago. The others staggered and collapsed from exhaustion, even as the base staff gathered around them, shouting orders left and right.

Twilight remained motionless. Even when they levitated her from the bed to a gurney, and wheeled her out of the base’s own infirmary, she kept quiet.

Only when she felt the ocean air did Twilight glance at the ocean, dark and illuminated only by the crystal lamps and the moon above them.

Far, far away from Boston, far and safe behind the Barrier’s protection. Far and away from Luna, once again, as she had always been.

* * * * *

In the streets of Boston, Princess Cadance stood, breathing heavily. That spell had been the work of the better part of an hour. Around her, her new if unsure comrades looked up in awe. Some, like Alicia and Starfall, took the time to finally lean against the nearest wall, total relief in their hearts.

Cadance, however, hadn’t felt this drained since her own shield held back the Dark King Sombra, and she staggered.

“Whoa, hey,” Stephan said, holding onto Cadance quickly. “You okay?”

She’d flown a short distance up, firing the spell of hers into the dome above. Such a spell required her utmost concentration and exertion, and she found herself quite spent.

“Yeah,” Cadance said shortly. The exhaustion would give away soon, she thought. “I’m okay… I’m okay.”

It was a partial lie, obviously. But one look at Stephan’s relieved face validated her entirely

“Major!” Starfall called out, trotting over from where he and the others had rested. “High Command wants a situation update. We may have… we may have someone coming over from New York. What should I tell them?”

Stephan sighed, rubbing the back of his head.

“That someone,” he lamented, “is usually a few. Lady Cadance, I don’t know if this is the right time to ask you, but... mind explaining a few things to the higher-ups?”

Cadance let out a laugh, more out of relief than anything.

“Of course, it’s only fair,” she said, though sighing. “I’ll just have to find Aunt Luna first. I’m certain she’ll… she’ll explain… she’ll help explain everything.”

‘Well, it's been a long night, anyway. What’s another hour without sleep, really…’

~ The North Atlantic ~

“Starstruck! The rudder's jammed, help me with it!” Sprout shouted.

This far out, just off the North American coast, and the Barrier within range, and their accursed sky-boat was already falling apart. Their anchor was cast off, and in the dead of night there was no telling if any human scouts were waiting for them.

“Go on, Cadet, I’ve got Whistle,” said Salty Breeze. “Best get the boat moving again.”

Gruff as he was, Scootaloo felt thankful for his presence, his and Sparks Timber’s. There were only the five of them on board, a paltry group fleeing the battlefield. But it would suffice.

She gave both him and Whistle a nod, before exiting the wheelhouse. She followed the Trailblazer. He acknowledged her quietly, and with his hooves full, he began his work.

Holding onto the jammed rudder, Scootaloo quietly regarded the young stallion, precariously perched with a harness. Green as his name, his colours were various verdant shades, from his light-green fur to his vibrant green mane, save for his brown eyes. Much like hers, his mane was cropped short to fit into their streamlined Guard helmet.

At last, the rudder unjammed. She held back a quiet cheer as Sprout let out a cry of relief.

“Thanks, Starstruck,” said Sprout, flashing her a smile.

Scootaloo simply nodded as she hoisted him back on board. Back on their four hooves, she took a moment to take the sight of him in, and sighed.

“Green Sprout, wasn’t it?” Scootaloo asked. It was rhetorical, but she had to be sure. Sprout, who’d just taken off his harness, looked at her all puzzled. She held out a forehoof. “Scootaloo.”

The earthpony smiled. This was the first time she’d seen him smile. Privately, she was thankful he had enough levity to smile at all.

“Yeah, it’s Green Sprout, one and only,” he said. He accepted the hoofshake, before withdrawing to wipe the sweat off his brow. “Celestia’s sake… probably should’ve taken that engineering course. Not sure how well the rudder’ll hold.”

Scootaloo chuckled. “Yeah, well,” she said, tapping a hoof. “Gotta make the best of it, dontcha? This isn’t one of those human-made planes so, if need be, I’ll just give the old girl a push on the flank to get it back on course.”

As if on reflex, she stretched out one of her wings. Sprout whistled, smirking.

“Some fancy gear you got there,” he said. “Must’ve taken a lotta time getting used to.”

Scootaloo paused in her stretch, then took a glance at her wings. She’d had them for some time now, enough time that it felt truly natural to use.

“Sure did,” she replied plainly.

Another awkward pause. His smirk quivered, but Scootaloo found his attempts to maintain a facade amusing. Eventually, he relented, and released a long sigh.

“Look, uh,” he said, rubbing the back of his head. He’d taken his helmet off sometime before, Almost on reflex, Scootaloo wanted to tell him to find where he’d put it. “Sorry ‘bout, you know. What happened back there. Didn’t mean to be so harsh or too pushy, on you or your partner."

“You’re good,” Scootaloo said. “Things got a little tense. Guess we got caught up in the heat of the moment. Don’t worry, Whistle’ll forgive ya. Little ray of sunshine right there. As long as you keep the actual salt to the Manehattenites.”

She paused.

“Yeah, uh, forget I said that,” she said, even as he chuckled. “Don’t exactly like the Guards from big towns.”

“And Fillydelphia isn’t one?”

“Close enough. There’s a reason you guys aren’t uptight Vanhoover types,” she replied, poking him with a wing. “You Fillydelphia colts are fine by me. Least you’re not the Loyalty Guard.”

Loyal though she was, and him too at a guess, the Loyalty Guard’s intrusive surveillance operations didn’t escape the regular Guards’ notice. Still, the ones assigned to guard the Imperial nobility, like Shearwater and Terramar, weren’t half bad either, in the short time she’d known the pair aboard their shared post, and she did enjoy listening to Terramar’s stories about his beloved sister back at Mount Aris, or Shearwater’s longtime service by Twilight’s side.

“I’m touched,” Sprout said, nodding. “You Ponyvillians ain’t so bad either.” He paused. “I know I met one of you before, he was on… a temporary assignment with us last year. Featherweight was his name– photographer, you know him? Got a keen eye.”

Remembering a time long ago when a certain lanky pegasus had helped them make the news, Scootaloo couldn’t help but laugh.

“Keen eye’s one way to put it! I should try to get back in touch and all. Thanks for the heads-up,” Scootaloo replied heartily. She paused, looking him up and down, and scrounged her thoughts. “You seemed kind of out of it back there. You new to Boston?”

“Yeah, me and the Captain, and Salty Breeze over there,” said Sprout lightly. “Guess it was time for me to join the rest of the Fillydelphians up in North America. My old detachment’s back on the farms in the Italic Colonies, and I guess I’ll be rejoining them when this is all over. This is the first time the three of us were reassigned, been with him and the other guys since last year. Coast to coast, forest to forest, heh...”

His quick glance at her wings didn’t escape her notice, nor his awestruck remark a minute ago. But for now, Scootaloo took comfort in the fact that for all appearances, he remained an honour-bound Guard who’d follow his orders to the letter before he’d try anything with a mare.

Sprout tapped his badge.

”In the darkest of forests, in the deepest of seas” he recited.“We seek what is lost, and return what is found. Let us tread the sacred path–”

“Now and always, your forever faithful,” Scootaloo finished, allowing herself a little smile. “I know the Trailblazers’ pledge. Read about it in passing. You did miss the first part, though.”

“Blessed Queen, protect our mind and soul…” He groaned. “Right. Captain Plow isn’t going to let me live that one down.”

“Don’t think he’s got ears over here,” Scootaloo said wryly. She leaned against the railing, casually, and pointed a wing at the wheelhouse. “Unless you count ol’ Salty.”

“He’s cool, don’t worry. Besides, we know all about ears in the dark. The woods here, they stick with ya, but enough time passes, and it all gets easier,” Sprout said, more to reassure himself than it was to reassure her. He shook his head. “About you and… Captain Dash. Is there–”

She held up a wing.

“No, she didn’t give me a shortcut,” Scootaloo replied, in a line she’d long since recited over and over again. “I joined the Guard three years ago, and I’m still a Cadet.”

That was only half true. During her time in the Wonderbolts Academy, she still remembered, Rainbow Dash just couldn’t resist giving her a few well-hidden tips among her drills.

“Really?” Sprout said. “Huh, I’d have figured… yeah.”

“Yeah, pretty much,” Scootaloo said. She motioned her wings a gingerly. “With this kind of untested tech, they really wanted to be sure it didn’t give me the edge over the other recruits. ‘Course, I do wonder if I did… earn my wings, or if I somehow turned a promotion away without knowing. At least I got to know Whistle out of it.” She shrugged. “Anyways, time passes, I get by, perform a few missions to test the waters, Whistle trips every once in a while, I pick her up, and now we’re here. It’s a rough first rodeo for her, since usually we’re a little more on the PR side of things than what you guys do. But hey, we all play our part, right?”

“Right…” Sprout said, bobbing his head along. “Sounds like you had a pretty bumpy ride.”

“Yeah, bumpy. But it breaks the routine, so... I guess I can live with it.”

She couldn’t shake the haunting feeling that coursed through her. How Twilight, the Lady Archmage, had stood tall and yet looked very small, against the all-encompassing darkness. How the alicorn had emerged from the dark. How Twilight had, at that moment, told them everything would be alright...

“So, Scootaloo,” said Sprout, breaking her thoughts. “You up for drinks on the side, back in Canterlot? The other Trailblazers, I know they’d love to hear your stories, and couple new friends can’t hurt, eh?”

His smile was, dare she say it, charming in that goofy way. But what he spoke of struck a nerve.

“Whaddaya say?”

She looked to the ocean, biting her lower lip. An impossible wonder of their new realm, and she hadn’t been happier than when she’d soared through with her crystal wings in front of Applebloom and Sweetie Belle’s disbelieving eyes. Even joining the Wonderbolts next to her mentor’s side at last didn’t quite measure up to that, being free to fly as she pleased.

Then came the war. Applebloom had been too young to end up so old, running everything at Sweet Apple Acres that Mac couldn’t solve with raw strength. While they would both agree it was for the good of Equestria, Applebloom would seem a little too tired and take a little too long to answer him in the affirmative. The less said about Babs Seed, that traitor, the better. And no-one seemed to know which corner of Equestria Sweetie Belle had vanished to.

“Sorry,” she said, glancing away. “I don’t do friends anymore. Haven’t in a while.”

She didn’t feel compelled to spill it out to him right then and there. But nevertheless, the earthpony nodded.

“That’s fair enough,” he said evenly. Thankfully, he didn’t sound disappointed. “Still, it’d be nice to help around if we cross paths again.”

“Yeah… yeah that’s fine,” she said quietly, walking towards the wheelhouse.

He didn’t see her hardened gaze, the same gaze she wore when Sweetie told her that one step out the door, out to answer the call reactivating the Wonderbolts for full military service, and they were friends no more.

In silence, she pushed open the door to the wheelhouse. Sparks Timber stood, helmet off, and his blue fur matted with dust. At the other end of the room, Whistle lay on her stomach, her wing being tended to by Breeze.

Though her wing was still awkwardly angled, the white pegasus’ hazel eyes brightened up considerably when she saw Scootaloo walk in.

“Starstruck, ma’am!” she said eagerly spreading out a bandaged wing. She winced, and Salty Breeze groaned. “Ow! Sorry, sir.”

“Keep doing that and you’ll be grounded for months,” said Breeze. He glanced at Scootaloo. “You got yourself a pretty jumped-up little-sidekick here, Starstruck.”

Scootaloo let herself chuckle. “Easy, Whistle,” she said gently, moving to pat her on the head. “Can’t let you get hurt like that too often.”

“Yes, ma’am!” said Whistle eagerly. She prepared to salute with a wing, but then thought the better of it, and settled for an awkward smile.

Timber gazed wistfully. “Good to see some of us are still spirited after all.” He harrumphed. “Five whole years of this struggle… Right. Roll call, I suppose, for formality’s sake.”

He cleared his throat. Scootaloo stood at attention, and so did Breeze, and Sprout who’d followed her in and even Whistle tensed up in her corner.

“Sparks Timber, Captain,” Timber recited. “15th Fillydelphian Regiment.”

“Starstruck, Cadet, 1st Wonderbolts, Ponyville Group.”

“Salty Breeze, Medical Officer, 9th Trailblazers Company, Recovery Division.”

“Whistle Stop, Cadet, 1st Wonderbolts, Baltimare Group.”

“Green Sprout, Sergeant, 9th Trailblazers Company, Recovery Division.”

When all was said and done and they’d unwound, Timber sighed tiredly. Scootaloo’s gaze followed his to the floor. He wasn’t downcast. She knew he was thinking how, in the deck underneath, there rested the crate, and inside, Discord’s statue which they’d gone through all this trouble for.

“Two Trailblazers, two Wonderbolts, and one Fillydelphia Guard. How about that for a report.”

“Need me to write it down, sir?” Whistle offered.

“At ease, cadet,” Timber said gently. “Might as well do this after… leaving my regiment behind.”

“Wasn’t your fault, Captain,” Sprout said, and Scootaloo nodded in agreement. “They know their task. They’ll carry it out, and we have ours here. And we’ll get it done.”

“Right, right,” Timber conceded. “I should put more faith in Flare and Batch after all. In any case, I shall be writing the report once we get to Hollow One. Breeze, you and Whistle stay here. Starstruck and Sprout, take turns watching outside. Make sure we’re at a safe distance away from any scout. Am I clear?”

“Yes, sir!” chorused the four before him, and Timber nodded.

“Good, it’ll be a long way ahead to Hollow One,” he said sternly, but not unkindly. “Now, you know where to go. Dismissed.”

Not a second later, after Scootaloo had turned to leave with Sprout, did Whistle speak up earnestly.

“Sir, permission to speak?” she said.

“Granted.”

“Can… can I be with Cadet Starstruck and Sergeant Sprout?” she said tentatively. “I… I know I’m still injured and all but, I’ll be more of use outside. More pairs of eyes, right?”

Scootaloo saw Breeze nod at Timber, then back at his charge.

“You keep that wing tight around your barrel, or I won’t patch it up so easily next time, cadet,” Breeze said clinically, but there was an odd kind of warmth to it. “You got that?”

“You got it, doc,” Whistle said, managing to salute.

“And don’t do anything funny, Starstruck,” Breeze added, eyeing Scootaloo warily. “Daredevils, the whole lot of you…”

‘If only we still were, you old bird…’

“I’ll keep her safe, doc, no worries.”

Beaming, Whistle staggered up on her hooves, and trotted up to Scootaloo’s side.

“Come on, Whistle,” Scootaloo said, smiling. “Let’s take a walk.”

With a few more nods exchanged between all of them, Scootaloo, Sprout, and Whistle exited the wheelhouse. Cold winter air blew a chill along their feathers and hide, but their winter armour kept them mostly warm. Most except for Sprout, who despite being clad entirely in scout armour, bit back his chattering teeth.

“Got cold feet there, Sprout?” Scootaloo said teasingly. “Didn’t take you for the type.”

After his exertion at unjamming the rudder, he must have cooled down and felt it.

“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up, Wonderbolt,” Sprout deadpanned, and Whistle giggled. “Y-y-you try handling the Atlantic without those feathers of yours.”

“Heh, yeah…”

Soon, their brisk trot came to a halt at the bow, and the three of them paused to contemplate the early morning ocean.

“How’d humans do it anyway…” said Sprout, clamping down on his teeth. “You’d think that they’d get a little colder from this w-w-weather, s-s-stupid hairless monkeys–”

Whistle gave him a nudge. “They’re actually apes, you know. Still primates, so, um. Sorry.”

“Yeah w-well, either way, not for long!” Sprout replied. Both Whistle and Scootaloo had to laugh.

“Okay, you two,” said Scootaloo, ruffling Whistle's mane. She shot Sprout a cheeky smile. “See, Sprout, it helps to read from time to time.”

“Oh, s-s-shut it,” said Sprout with a huff, though half-smiling. “I’m not seeing you fixing the weather anytime soon.”

“Everfree climate all over the place,” said Scootaloo. “So, haven’t bothered.”

“Maybe you’ll do it someday, Starstruck!” Whistle said cheerfully. “I mean… I think you could.”

Scootaloo regarded her with a fond gaze. Sometimes, she mused, the codename ‘Starstruck’ fit her own protegée more than it did her.

The cheerful, reliable pegasus had latched onto her at the Wonderbolts Academy, enchanted by both her wings and her proficiency with them, but also how she’d spent a lifetime working with what she had. She wasn’t even that much younger than her, Scootaloo thought, yet Whistle looked up to her much like she had to Rainbow, a long time ago.

Of course, Scootaloo hadn’t mentioned the brief falling-out she’d had with Rainbow Dash. All involving how one way or another, she’d felt held back, and yet at the same time, hoof-held throughout boot camp. But at least, they’d made up by the time Rainbow introduced her to Whistle, and all was well.

‘Rainbow Dash…’ she remembered with a jolt. The Captain had gone back in, defying all common sense. ‘Hope you’re safe, wherever you are–’

“So!” Whistle said brightly. “What’s the plan?”

Scootaloo blinked.

“Sorry?”

“The plan, y’know,” Whistle continued, and leaned closer for a whisper. “Getting back to the city? I mean, I know you’ll get Captain Timber to turn us around, right?”

Scootaloo shared an unsure look with Sprout.

“Whistle,” she said gently. “We’re not turning back.”

Her protégée’s ears drooped. “What?”

“Captain’s orders,” confirmed Sprout. “We can’t turn back now.”

“But the others!” her protégée protested. “What about them? Captain Dash, Captain Plow, everyone...”

“Rainbow Dash, you know her, Whistle,” Scootaloo said, patting her back. “She’ll be back. They’re not breaking through the Great Equestrian that easily.”

She avoided mentioning Fleetfoot. It wasn’t a loss to be taken lightly, and Whistle had seen enough for a lifetime.

“Oaken Plow will be f-f-fine, too,” Sprout interjected, teeth still chattering in the Winter air. “I’ve been with him for a year or two, and from coast to coast, we went through it all. We’re Trailblazers, Whistle. T-t-they’ll be fine. I know they will.”

Scootaloo flinched.

‘He doesn't know…’

Sprout looked past her, to the turbulent ocean that lay below them.

“If push comes to shove, we… w-we... could drop the statue,” he said contemplatively. “Maybe the waves will take Discord. They’ll never find him.”

“No, Sprout,” Scootaloo said gruffly. “We’ll bring this back to Canterlot, you said it yourself. Whatever it takes.”

The Trailblazer, though he opened his mouth for a retort, looked at her and Whistle.

“Right, better make sure it’s secure down below,” he said. “Take care, you two.”

And he was off, disappearing into the hatch that led to the lower deck. Silently, Scootaloo hoped he wasn’t planning on throwing it overboard anyway. That left her with Whistle.

Whistle looked forlorn. Scootaloo, gently, placed a crystalline wing on her barrel.

“Hey,” she said. “It’ll be alright.”

“I hope it does,” said Whistle. “I just…”

Scootaloo looked away from the ocean and back at Whistle. The young mare was resting upon the railing. Scootaloo thought that, fatigue aside, she too was running on the adrenaline rush that had followed them from the city.

“I’m sorry, Whistle,” she said softly. “But… it’s like Lady Twilight said.”

She followed Whistle’s gaze. The statue creaked from somewhere beneath them. The coast had long since disappeared into darkness and early morning mist. Moonlight shone from above, an eerie reminder of the enemy that had come so close to claiming them all in nightmare. Wherever her comrades were, whatever sacrifices they’ve made in Boston…

“Nothing else matters.”

~ A Lonesome Manor, North of the Crystal Realm ~
— Shortly after Night has left Evening’s Shelves

A deathly figure shuddered in his bed. His eyes slowly opened, to see a familiar ceiling he’d viewed time and again. With gritted teeth, he bit back an old pain. He pulled himself to a sitting position on his bed – a crystal bed filled with clear water. Despite a damp body and head of thinned greyed hair, the figure rose. He shivered from the cold, before relaxing.

For a moment, he let out a breath and just sat there.

The figure’s eyes, a tired pair, glanced elsewhere. He glanced at the only other thing in the crystalline bed-chamber. A mirror, itself made of crystal.

A full-body mirror at first glance, but a special one. One whose frame had been greatly modified. All for the purpose of travel and solutions.

An effort for a great hope…

A tear shed because, for a moment, he’d believed that she was there. For a moment, he’d believed that after so long… he’d found her. That he had managed to accomplish such a long-held dream. That the key to their salvation would be at hand–

“No.” He whispered, almost hissed, in denial while facing the mirror. “I heard her… She spoke... She was there!”

There was silence.

The figure shed further tears, the cold increasing. He should have pulled harder, he should have intervened, damn the consequences! She would have been here. She would have–

He recoiled, beginning to seethe in pain. He needed to– needed to–

“Sir,” a voice interrupted.

“Go away,” the figure hissed, not facing the source. “I haven’t anything for you.”

“Yet, sir. Anything yet, sir,” the voice corrected, “you’re not yet finished. The dream is not dead.”

“Yes, it is!” he snapped, “it wasn’t her! I failed! I couldn’t shield her from…” The figure blanched, his anger melting into regret. “I couldn’t help her from that sword. I’ve failed again.”

“You haven’t, sir. You know where she’s from. And you know what this calls for.”

“A Crossing.”

“It shouldn’t take you too long. Just a brief trip to see the sights and meet the locals. It should be educational, Headmaster, sir.”

The figure turned to the voice’s source, ignoring his bleeding nose. Standing not far was an earthpony stallion whose red coat contrasted against the obsidian-coloured armour, onyx gem brestplate, and helm they wore. Glassy eyes met a striking aquamarine.

“Correct, Corporal.”

He pulled himself out of bed with some effort. He stood naked, before, at a gesture, nearby folded clothes came and wrapped around him. The Headmaster stood in his attire of choice – a three-piece suit with a tie-pin depicting a spell matrix.

Securing his shoes – buckles a better choice than laces – the Headmaster summoned to him his two tools. His third leg, a symbol of wisdom that was more than what it seemed to be, and finally, a silver amulet. A lovingly-crafted piece of a winged pattern at its sides and a cobalt gem cut in the shape of the tie-pin’s image.

Fixing the amulet around his neck, the latch closing soon after, he turned to the Corporal.

“Your orders are to inform the others where I’ve gone,” the Headmaster said with authority. “Tell them I’ll be back soon and we will make preparations.”

“Yessir,” the Corporal said with a bow, “as you command.”

The Headmaster acknowledged this, before turning to the Crystal Mirror. He approached it and laid his hand upon its frame, allowing the magic to fill him…

“Show me the way…” he whispered, as the image rippled to show a grand hall that once stood before it fell to Hegemony.

‘May the dream live on, ‘til it comes true.’

~ Downtown Boston, Boston, USA ~
— One hour later

As the sounds of battle died down, Cadance walked by Stephan Bauer’s side. All around them, the Major had gathered his fellow Knights to augment his numbers. It had been a long and trying night, the loss of Discord just one of several tragedies. Hopefully there wouldn't be any other surprises.

Major Bauer had said it best, an hour ago. The current phase of the battle was over, finished in a series of air strikes and the Great Equestrian’s retreat. Now, time was something much too precious to lose, as the frontlines resettled.

“Are you sure she’s around here, Major?” Cadance whispered. Bauer glanced around the empty streets before them.

“One of the UN blue-helmet snipers, she contacted us,” said Bauer. “Said she’s dealing with HLF and the Princess. Heh, and they say peacekeepers aren’t what they used to be...”

Something rang a bell in Cadance.

“HLF… aren’t they against ponies?” she said worriedly. “Did something happen?”

Bauer shook his head.

“Not these ones. We’re talking about the Carter girl’s HLF,” he said. “Still… I’m not so sure about it, so we’ll have to see, Princess.”

Despite being another confusing element, it was just reconfirmation of what was established at this point. This conflict, and Earth at large, wasn’t as simple as she’d thought, and would present further facets that kept it from being a black-and-white affair. At some point, she’d have to sit down and get a flow-chart or something to keep track of… well, everything.

She shook her head. She was thinking like Twilight now, and that made her grin wryly. She wondered what Aunt Luna had learned so far, if she even got the chance to sit down.

‘This is… one way to start everything.’

She adjusted her armour as they walked. It had protected her well… but next time around, she’d have to ask Shining how to fit it properly.

Eventually, they entered the HLF’s area and began to pass by various tents. There were some people standing guard, some inside of their tents, and others in hushed conversation. What was clear was that they were being watched. And their presence wasn’t entirely welcome, either, from the glares she felt on her back.

Despite that, Cadance kept her focus on the path, and tried her best not to acknowledge the paranoia whispering in her ear. A quiet warning that these HLF wouldn’t be against committing violence at the slightest hint of provocation.

Perhaps that was just it. Paranoia.

“Major Bauer, sir,” a voice spoke. Cadance looked around for the speaker.

Standing nearby, with a rifle slung over her shoulder, was a woman who had a rather familiar look to her and–

’Those… eyes.’ Cadance thought to herself, suppressing a shudder at their coldness. It was close to the looks of disdain Alexander Reiner had for Twilight and Celestia. But beyond that, there was something about this woman…

“Radwick.” Bauer said in return, regarding the woman. “We got your message. Where is she?”

“Follow me,” Radwick said, giving Cadance another hard look before turning and walking towards the largest tent.

Bauer followed suit, leaving Cadance standing there a moment before she followed as well. They were greeted by another woman outside the tent, who stood straight as they approached.

“Stephan Bauer,” she said. “The Knight of Germania. Welcome.”

Cadance saw the Major wince a little. She’d have thought it an honourable title.

“Miss Jones,” replied Bauer. “Fancy seeing you here.”

The woman’s gaze went by them one by one, and fell upon Cadance.

“So, it’s true then, there are two alicorns in Boston,” said Jones, staring at Cadance. “She did come from another world.”

“We did,” agreed Cadance. “Is she here?”

“Not so fast, now,” said Jones. “We got a few questions of our own.”

Then came a second, very much familiar, very much welcome voice.

“That won’t be necessary yet, Teresa Jones.”

There, Cadance saw her, emerging from the tent.

Though her armour was cracked, her wounds many, the Princess of the Night stood tall, her midnight-blue mane flowing in the cold winds.

“The night is over.”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

Removal of concept and character; Samantha Yarrow and the Reavers.

Removal of a mention by name of Commodore Daniel Romero.

Spectrum 2.0 - December 01st 2019

Sledge115: Apparently, saving Spike involves punching him really, really hard.

Surprise! A combination of no exams has lent us some time to complete this chapter rather quickly. :twilightsmile: However, as the final weeks of 2019 looms with final exams to do, I believe this might be the last chapter of 2019, marking the end of our most productive year yet.

There’s so much to decipher here that, well, I'll keep the exposition here to a minimum.

Scootaloo’s story in the Wonderbolts Academy is a story for another day. I wished to convey the feeling of a protagonist whose traditional journey story is done, and is currently in that post-arc storyline.

Even in the reboot, Ana still messes up even when she’s doing everything right and by what she’s told to do. That’s just being human, in the end.

The Loyalty Guard, just to clarify, is basically the Schutzstaffel/Gestapo. Part of them are assigned as the secret police in Imperial Equestria, while a smaller number are designated as the personal guard for the Imperial nobility and leadership.

Shearwater is one of the background hippogriffs shown in Season 8, Episode 6. And you should know who Fire Flare is – her design is underrated.

Writing the Imperial POV has been quite the experience, too. Fleshing out how they work and how they perform in the face of adversity… well. We’ll let you judge how well that worked out. At the end of the day, likable or not, sympathetic or petty, they’re people.

Part of me wishes Cadance had more to do, but some factors had to be considered as to where she is and what she plausibly would do. And I think, personally, single-hoofedly breaking a city-wide dome with one shot is an equally impressive achievement as defeating a powerful enemy in single combat :twilightsmile:

In any case, I hope you all do enjoy the longest action chapter in Spectrum 2.0 (so far - you never know), and the climax of Act Two. I hope it's worth the wait and build up!

By the way, Act One, or the Prologue up to Chapter Thirteen, is titled From Earth to Equestria. Ironically, this is longer than just calling it Act One, so call it as you wish :twilightsheepish:

One last push, ladies and gentlemen, for the finale of Moonrise. Stay tuned, and happy holidays!

– Sledge

VoxAdam: In practical terms, I actually did even less writing for this chapter than for the previous one. But in terms of sequencing and continuity lookout, ooh boy... If it doesn’t feel like it while reading, then it’s a sign of a good job, and we’ll gladly take it – yet this was probably the hardest chapter since the Redheart’s locket quest in ‘An Opening’ and ‘The Heart Goes Last’ when it came to keeping straight where everyone was and how they connected to one another. Maybe even harder, considering how we were trying to remain faithful to geographical accuracy in the real-life City of Boston. :applejackconfused:

And we know a lot of similar preparation has gone into the Act’s upcoming final chapter...

On the other hand, ‘Moonrise Over Boston’, for me, is one of the more triumphant examples of how co-writing can go a long way, even when you yourself aren’t as directly involved. :pinkiesmile: I’ll let Sledge and the gang elaborate if they wish, but several of the Imperial characters featured here were characters I’d quickly introduced in ‘Two Faces’ and ‘An Angel’s Wings’ to add flavour to the Imperial perspective, the thus-nicknamed Cadet Startruck being the foremost. Other Imperial characters are from a story concept developed by Sledge and DoctorFluffy, which I don’t know will ever be published on Fimfiction, but it’s already nice to see them feature here.

Just like it’s also nice to see Startruck take on a life of her own. :twilightsmile: Bonus points to whoever can spot which series that nickname’s a reference to.

I think my only regret for this chapter is that Cadance doesn’t appear more, after the grand entrance she made and her role in ‘An Angel’s Wings’. Yet the chapter’s long as it is, and we felt it better to make Cadance pivotal in another way. I can promise that in the next and final chapter, Cadance shall once again be appearing at the forefront, to make her presence on Earth very useful…

Cheers,
~Vox

TheIdiot: This has been a difficult move to get this chapter done. Plus, to be blunt, we’re kinda swamped this time of year in real life related matters since the end of the year is nigh. And the stress can kinda drive one nutty with something needing to give.

In the case of Chapter 18, consider this to be our gift to you, our fair readers, that way we can attend to more pressing matters. Plus, it’s the first of December and you consider this chapter to be our gift to you and the fact that we updated the story in about a month. So, I think this will tide you over while we all focus on the things going on in our lives.

This was one explosive chapter with the climax of the Moonrise arc with plenty of fighting and character moments throughout. However, if you’ve kept keen eyes, you may figure out the small details regarding what comes next. Or perhaps discern possible identities for the future. Either way, should give you time to try and figure something out between this and the previous chapter.

Between everything, we hope you’ve enjoyed Chapter 18 and will look forward to our next update which will more than likely be next year due to what we’re all immediately faced with. At the very least, we are grateful to have your continued support and interest into the new year and new decade.

Until next time, fair readers.

Carpe diem, everyone.

(P.S. Go see Knives Out, it’s a funny movie with great actors and some awesome twists and turns. If not for that, then please see it for the fact that Chris Evans plays a complete and utter scumbag in the film.)

Act II ~ Chapter Nineteen ~ When The Dust Settles

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot
They took my toaster, so I had to get a new one.

DoctorFluffy
Apologies to everyone for the quiet. I’ve been very busy.

VoxAdam
Come with me if you want to live.

Sledge115
You are a princess, you’ll play your part.

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Nineteen
When The Dust Settles

* * * * *

“A friend came to see me on one of the evenings of the last week – he thinks it was on Monday, August 3rd. We were standing at a window of my room in the Foreign Office. It was getting dusk, and the lamps were being lit in the space below on which we were looking. My friend recalls that I remarked on this with the words: ‘The lamps are going out all over Europe, we shall not see them lit again in our life-time.’”
— Sir Edward Grey, Twenty-Five Years 1892–1916

~ Hollow One, North Atlantic Ocean ~ November 16th, 2024 CE ~

Behind the Barrier, in the middle of the ocean where currents met, lay Hollow One.

Rising from the turbulent waters of the North Atlantic, it stood as a marvel of engineering, where Saddle Mareabian artisanship met the technology of the Crystal Realm. It had been established in a miraculously short two years, a base for the future invasion of the North American continent. The base was dominated by the superstructure that lay in the middle, a combination of metal and wood built following the expertise of Saddle Mareabian engineers, designed as such to withstand the planet’s unpredictable weather, harkening back to the wind-swept architecture of their homeland, but with material provided by the Solar Empire.

The central structure was one of six – the main lay in the centre of five others, arranged to resemble the Elements of Harmony from a bird’s eye view, connected to one another by a tram system. The Saddle Mareabian-built superstructure and the decks atop were supported by robust crystal pillars that plunged deep into the Atlantic, anchored to the ocean floor.

Atop the decks, the base filled a multitude of roles, including supply and repair, and many a times it had served as refuge for airships retreating from skirmishes in the Atlantic. At any given time, five thousand Equestrians, Saddle Mareabians, zebras and hippogriffs staffed the facility, keeping it running for airships making their transit between Europe and the North American front. In certain times, it could hold more than twice that number.

And it was this grand sight, dimly lit by crystal lamps, that greeted Scootaloo and company aboard their sky-boat. Their vessel was a far cry from the Great Equestrian which had left Hollow One only a few hours ago. But they would be welcomed.

“Look alive, Whistle,” Scootaloo said breathlessly. “We’re here.”

Whistle’s smile lit up the night.

With a hail from platform crew-members, tethers were thrown at them, and the sky-boat gently pulled down to a rest atop one of the auxiliary decks. All around, airships and sky-boats, both coming from and headed for Europe, lay in wait.

Scootaloo and Breeze hopped off the airship, Whistle carried gently between them. They were met by a half-dozen of the base staff. Equestrians, horses, and zebras alike.

One stood to meet Scootaloo at the head of the group, carrying a lantern.

“Halt!” cried the lead officer. He was an orange-coloured stallion, a Saddle Mareabian like many who formed the majority of the base staff. “State your business.”

“Starstruck, Cadet, 1st Wonderbolts, Ponyville Group,” Scootaloo answered rapidly. “Our temporary lead is Captain Sparks Timber, 15th Fillydelphia, and he’s still aboard the boat. He’ll fill you in.” She nodded at Breeze and Whistle. “We’ve got wounded, please, get this cadet to the infirmary.”

Two zebras emerged from the group to join the hippogriff medic, bringing in stretchers.

She exchanged a hopeful glance with Whistle, and the little pegasus gave her a last smile before she and her bearers disappeared into the superstructure, past the doorway.

“You came from Boston?” said the Saddle Mareabian. “We’ve had a lot on our plate. They say the battle’s lost.”

“We did. The battle… I… I don’t know.” said Scootaloo. She shook her head. “Look, none of that matters right now. Is the Lady Archmage here?”

It was a foolish question. Of course not. Otherwise Twilight would be here to greet them. If she even was alive.

“She’s already en route to Canterlot, Cadet,” said the officer. “Got teleported here, by Captain Armor. You missed her by an hour.”

Scootaloo’s ears drooped, and she bit back a cry of frustration.

‘Wait… if she made it out, then–’

Her question was answered soon, by the two newcomers who emerged from the nearest door.

“Terramar,” Scootaloo whispered. Then she broke into a relieved smile. “Rainbow– Captain!”

“Starstruck,” greeted Rainbow Dash. “Good to s– Oof!”

Her words were interrupted, when Scootaloo almost tackled her to the floor. The Saddle Mareabian shot them a judgemental look.

“S-sorry, you wouldn’t believe what we’ve been through,” Scootaloo said sheepishly. Though the Wonderbolt Captain rolled her eyes, she simply gave Scootaloo’s mane a ruffle.

“You look like you’ve been through Tartarus,” Terramar added, and Scootaloo nodded. “You okay, Starstruck?”

“Yeah, you okay, Scoot?” said Dash. “D’you get the package out…?”

She trailed off, and both her and Terramar looked at something behind her – and a loud thud from behind gave Scootaloo the needed answer. She glanced behind, seeing Sparks Timber and Green Sprout, who stood tall besides the large crate holding Discord.

“Yeah. We did.”

~ Boston, USA ~

Luna took a breath, closing her eyes as she slumped onto her haunches upon the snowy grass – a patch of parkland that hadn’t been taken up by a tent for the camp, in what Major Bauer had told her was called the Boston Public Gardens. Just how long had she been here? She didn’t have a clear idea of time any longer. What could be hours felt like weeks.

She had never felt so tired. Fighting for Twilight’s and Spike’s souls had exhausted her thoroughly. Losing one had cost her dearly. So many defeats, even as this battle would be celebrated as a victory.

‘Twilight…’she thought, keeping her eyes closed.

“Penny for your thoughts?” a voice asked. Luna turned, frowning, to see Tess Jones staring at her. She wore no helmet, and her hair was loose and dishevelled.

“‘Penny’?” Luna repeated. “Is that anything like a ‘bitty’?”

“Kind of?” Jones said. She sat down next to Luna, snow crunching beneath her. “It’s just… sorry, you look troubled, or I guess you do.”

Luna nodded slowly, a slight frown furrowing her face. ‘When did I become so transparent? I am Princess of the Night. I cannot show my fear. Never in times like these.’

Pushing that worrying thought aside, she smiled serenely.

“I suppose I am concerned,” Luna said after a moment. Vulnerable she may be, but honesty remained essential. She took a breath. “About Spike. About… everything. So many questions. Yet so little time.”

“I couldn’t begin to imagine,” Jones said. She grabbed a flask from her hip-belt and took a long drink. “I was just talking to Major Bauer, UNAC’s main guy on the ground here. For the record… if we can help you in any way, you have our support.”

Luna wanted to thank her immediately for her offer, but something stopped her. Captain Reiner’s words about the HLF’s unreliability sprung to mind.

Diplomatically, she offered a small smile. “I am grateful for the trust you place in me.” Luna took a deep breath. “But as I said, I do have questions. Do you know anyone who could answer them, whether from your group or the PHL?”

“Depends what the questions are,” Jones replied. “I once met a man– well, sometimes he’s a man– who was great with questions, but he’s not been around a while. Something about ‘bad atmosphere, needed to go back and tweak something’.”

Luna had no idea how to process that remark. “A man? What kind of a man?”

“A scholar of sorts, with a fixation on the souls of the dead,” Jones remarked. “In fact, to tell the truth, Princess Luna, when we saw you and that Discord fellow appear in the heavens, my first thought was our man had wrought something… Till I remembered you’re not dead. Merely petrified.”

Her easy tone got Luna to wince. “Yes, well... it is not often one sees living statues about.” She sighed. “Losing Discord to the Imperials may yet undo what good I wrought here. Doubly so, I regret to say, with him alive rather than dead.”

“Right. I forgot. They got you good, didn’t they?” Jones said sympathetically. “I’m sorry. But now you get why, somehow, I can believe your wild story.”

“And have you any idea where your… man, might have gone to?”

“Through the looking-glass, I expect,” Jones said with a chuckle. “He was a right card.”

“This does trouble me...” Luna said. “I’m not sure what trust I’d place in those who fixate upon the souls of the dead. Necromancy is considered a dark art of the highest order by my people. Father Krampus has been remembered by many names, but merely the memory of the Lord of Tambelon brings nightmares which even I struggle to ward away.”

As it was, just thinking about the Krampus’s doom-laden words at the Convocation made Luna almost shudder. Celestia had taken a gamble by calling upon that creature.

“The afterlife is a question I have pondered, always with no clear answer. And it shall be milennia before I see it for myself. If I survive this war…”

“But mankind hasn’t got anywhere near that time,” Jones replied gravely. “Which means we can’t just chit-chat our time away here, either. So, what were your questions?”

However, Luna was contemplating how certain questions could not be asked of Jones. Rather, they were meant for the other woman she’d met in the naval yard.

Maxine Radwick, the sister of Alexander Reiner.

“There are my immediate concerns, of course,” Luna said truthfully. “Spike, to begin with. We can help him, I am sure of it. I only need the right space.”

Jones eyed her. “You’re thinking of taking the dragon back with you. To where you came from.”

“Yes,” Luna said. “And yet I have so much left to do here first.”

“Princess Luna,” said Jones. “Pardon me for interrupting, but… if you think you can break the hold on that dragon’s mind… would we be any closer to putting an end to the Newfoals?”

The subtle plea in the human’s tone did not evade Luna, who paused to look at her. Really look, taking in the unfamiliar features, the eyes ringed by all-too-familiar shadows.

“Sorry, but it’s too early for me to tell…” said Luna. “The chains binding Spike are woeful, yet nothing unknown. There are many on Equus who’d seek to control dragons, with perverse enchantments or old forbidden words of power…”

She averted her gaze.

“Alas, the mystery of this serum is absolute to me. Captain Reiner hadn’t the words for it, and…” Luna couldn’t help shuddering as she thought of puppets. “To delve further, I should have to start by examining one of those creatures…”

“Ah, yes,” Jones said, nodding slowly. Her expression lightened. “Fortunately, there’s… someone else I happen to know. They’re still around, and they’ve got… some knowledge of the topic…” Jones hurried through her next words, as if afraid she’d said too much already. “Well, I– I guess they may be interested in dragons, as well, you know.”

Luna’s heart missed a beat. This was a stroke of good fortune.

“I would be grateful, Tess Jones,” Luna said, calming herself. A small smile crept on her face. “But much as I am experienced in diplomacy, too many questions would, pray forgive my words, merely waylay me. And to find certain answers, I must depart this city.”

“Oh?”

“Yes,” nodded Luna. “All I request… is a map.”

“A map?” said Jones. “Of where?”

“This fine country, of course,” Luna said evasively. “I am unfamiliar with its geography.”

“Alright,” Jones said, getting to her feet. Luna followed suit. “I can get you a map. I won’t ask what you want one for.” She paused. “Yet how about the other alicorn? Lady Cadance, isn’t it? Could she fill in for you?”

“Princess Cadance,” Luna replied, thinking about it. “It’s a fine thought. She came to me when I needed her most, and she holds her own at diplomacy. I could always brief her on what we need. This would not be the first time I’ve delegated to her.”

* * * * *

Winter on Earth was unlike any place Cadance had ever been to before. The pegasi-controlled Winter, cold as it was, remained warm at its heart, a warmth that radiated the strongest every Hearthswarming, when all was quiet save for Reindeer bells. And, far off in the Frozen North, where the winter raged on, even then Cadance could feel and breathe the inherent magic that flowed within them. An ancient and primal form, untamed, yet tied with Equestria.

On Equus, the Oleander earthponies who’d raised her taught her their ways, as best they could. For she was a child of no tribe, too lithe to be an earthpony, wings too fragile for flight, and no horn to speak of. Yet she called herself an earthpony, and that felt just right.

Then came Prismia, then her ascension, and the magic that permeated Equus revealed itself entirely to her.

There was no such warmth here. Here, in the early morning hours, she stood outside this tent, between two searchlights erected by the staff. She felt no connection to the earth beneath her, the winds that blew, nor did she feel the planet’s magical flow.

She bit back a shiver, amidst the falling snow. Though she might be disconnected from the earth she stood on, the people were another matter entirely. Much like she had at the train station, with Major Bauer, Cadance allowed herself to sift through the love that flowed from the tents.

It was peculiar, how it felt. Whereas on Equus, she had taken for granted the connection between love and magic, here the love was more raw, untouched… much like the world they lived on. And yet, it was love, all the same, and Cadance found its touch equally soothing.

Something crept in, permeating the flow of emotions. Something familiar, as if it was her own thoughts. A feeling of love once held, then lost to the bitter cold.

Cadance’s heart skipped a beat when, a few paces away, she saw the newest arrival, standing in the snow. At first, it didn’t even seem as if the newcomer had recognised her.

Their eyes met.

“Oh! H-hello!” Cadance greeted brightly, waving a hoof.

Lady Cadance – Cadenza, she thought. It felt fitting of her more reserved demeanour, this wan mirror image of hers – remained impassive to her greeting. Until she gave the tiniest of nods. Only then did Cadance felt compelled to trot over.

Cadance offered a forehoof, and a friendly smile.

“Morning,” Lady Cadenza said gruffly, standing there. She wore a green vest, and a beige coat that covered her wings. The vest was embroidered with a golden lyre on its lapel. But it was clothing that valued function over appearance, and suddenly Cadance felt very self-conscious of the glittering Crystal Realm armour she wore.

Then she saw the lines under Cadenza’s eyes, and her thinning, faded mane, and the palor of her rosey coat. Seeing her counterpart was akin to seeing a washed-out photograph of herself. On closer look, beholding this Cadance was not like looking into a mirror at all.

She retracted her forehoof, faking a cough.

“How was your trip?”

Her counterpart stared back. “Could’ve arrived sooner,” she said plainly. “Needed a boost… But I hear you’ve come from a lot further away.”

“I guess, yeah...” replied Cadance.

A cold breeze caused her to ruffle her wings. At this, it crossed Cadance’s mind that she could not see the other Cadance’s wings under the beige coat.

“So... what do they call you, then?” Lady Cadenza asked, her eyes darting from her wings, to her armoured chest. Cadance’s armour was emblazoned with the sigil of the Crystal Heart. “Not everyday you get to meet… yourself, and yet, I don’t have a clue what to call you.”

“Just Cadance is fine,” she replied. Now her counterpart’s gaze landed on her wings. “I mean we’re… you know.”

“I see,” said Cadenza simply. She looked away.

A pregnant pause followed. Cadance kept her wings close to her barrel. Then, before she could change the discussion, Cadenza cleared her throat.

“They told me you fought on the Great Equestrian,” Cadenza said quietly. She looked out into the darkened skies. “Before you fell.”

“I did. On both accounts,” Cadance said. A hint of shame seeped into her tone. “It didn’t… it did not work out. I wasn’t prepared for Shining–”

The moment her words left her mouth, she regretted them, as Cadenza immediately shot her a virulent glare.

“You saw him?” she whispered. Her glare softened, her stern expression unraveled. For the first time since she’d seen her counterpart, Cadance felt the love within her heart flare out, past the icy facade.

“... I did,” Cadance replied, nodding. “I saw him on board.”

She paused.

“He had someone with him.”

The chill that she had when she glimpsed… whatever that thing was that followed her – Cadenza’s – husband, returned. Such twisted, tainted, revolting love, it sickened her to the core.

But then she paused.

‘She was his wife…’ she remembered. Alex’s stories were disjointed and weren’t at all clear, but Aunt Luna had told her about how Shining Armor had betrayed her trust and come so close to turning her...

“And… you didn’t get him back.”

The interruption snapped Cadance out of her train of thought.

“I… I didn’t,” she admitted. “He caught me off guard.”

Lady Cadenza shook her head.

“Then we won’t get him back, ever, will we?” said Cadenza coldly. “If even you couldn’t get him, then… then what hope do I have.”

“That isn’t true–”

“Don’t. Don’t give me that,” Cadenza said quickly, almost in a snarl. “I could not even fly here... let alone teleport without someone else doing it for me... so don’t…”

Her words trailed off, and she blinked back tears. She was looking at Cadance’s wings.

“How’d you do it? I… Did you… did you win the Crystal War?”

“Huh?” Cadance said blankly. “Oh, um… well, we never went to war. Shining Armor threw me at the Crystal Heart, and Sombra was… defeated.”

Her voice died down in her throat when she saw the angry glare from Lady Cadenza. For a moment, Cadance thought it might have been the matter-of-fact tone she had used.

“Of course you did,” said Lady Cadenza bitterly. “They told you, haven’t they?”

All Cadance could reply with was a confused stare.

“Well? I see it in your eyes,” the pegacorn said harshly. “I’m not the pony you think I am. And I never have been.”

With quivering lips, she jabbed her chestplate, and Cadance recoiled from the touch.

“Say it, then,” she said tersely. “A failure. That’s what they all think of me, after they’ve seen you swoop down and break the shield. And you’re everything I should have been.”

Though the tension remained in the air, Cadance steeled herself. Gently, she pushed Cadenza's forehoof away. And took a deep breath.

“I’m... I’m so sorry.”

Lady Cadenza blinked away unspilled tears. “What for?” she choked out. “You’re… you’re everything I’m not.”

Cadance shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. I’m sorry all this happened to you. It’s... It's too much for anyone to bear, and I can't imagine how it must’ve felt.”

Without any hesitation, she moved closer to her counterpart and welcomed her in her embrace.

“We’ll get him back,” she said softly. “Aunt Luna told me that… she got to Twilight, you see? She was close but, it wasn’t enough. Given time, maybe she could have.”

Pulling away from the embrace, she held Cadenza’s hoof in hers.

“If we have that chance, maybe love can win again.”

Hearing this, Lady Cadenza let go of her forehoof, and sighed.

“You’re just so… so…” said Cadenza, almost in awe. “... Naive.”

“Maybe. Is that so bad?”

“No,” came the reply. Cadenza’s gaze was that of longing. “I’m– I’m sorry, I got carried away there, but… you don’t know what we’ve been through, you’ve experienced none of it. I hope you never have to. And yet you’re so eager to help.”

“That’s okay, I… yeah, I understand. They said you were a helper as well,” Cadance remarked. “Someone to sooth when no-one else would.”

“I suppose,” said Lady Cadenza. “Pray I won’t ever have to receive you, you or anyone else from whatever miracle place you come from.”

“Why is that?”

Cadenza shook her head.

“War changes people,” she said wistfully. “You saw Shining, and you think it’s obvious. But it isn’t always that simple, because the change is in everywhere, in everyone, and it’s rarely for the better.”

She laid a forehoof on Cadance’s chest, just above her heart.

“I don’t know about getting Shining back, and if we do, that’s… that’s everything I’ve ever wished for. You might be the best chance we all have for it… But don’t… lose yourself.”

The love that flowed out of Cadenza softened, into something that it should have been… and Cadance couldn’t help but smile, softly – a smile awkwardly mirrored by Cadenza.

Before either of them could continue, though, there was a commotion at the camp’s entrance. The two of them turned their gazes there. Just in time to see the Princess of Dreams set foot in the camp.

“Aunt Luna,” they both said, at the same time, as they trotted over to her.

“Cadance,” said Luna. She looked at Cadenza. “And Cadance.”

“How was it?” asked Cadance.

“It went well,” said Luna. She shook her head. “But the matter is not done.”

Though she held her head up high, her mane billowing in the wind, and still proudly clad in her black armour, something was off.

She had lost some colour, from the time Cadance last saw her. A few locks of her mane, just over her forehead, once starry and enchanted, looked drained and not at all magical. A baby-blue to contrast her old midnight-blue shade.

‘Oh, please be okay, Auntie…’

“Cadance, I need to speak to you,” Luna said plainly. She glanced at Lady Cadenza. “You are welcome to join us, Lady Cadance.”

Her counterpart shook her head.

“I’m afraid I must decline, Aunt– Princess,” said Cadenza. “I’ll need to speak to the others first. This may take a while, and everyone’s confused… I advise you get some rest.”

Cadance met Luna’s eye.

“That is kind of you,” Luna said. “But I hope you understand if Princess Cadance and I each take our turns slumbering.”

The pegacorn stared between the both of them. With a quiet nod, she departed back into the outskirts of the human camp, into falling snow. Awaiting her was a bipedal silhouette in armour. Cadance saw him to be Major Bauer.

Through the slit of his visor, she saw him look at Cadenza, then turn his eyes towards her. Even from this distance, Cadance could tell when she sensed bright-eyed wonder. That, and perhaps silent begging that the world wasn’t going wholly mad.

She merely inclined her head at him, as a princess does to a knight.

“Cadance?” she heard her aunt whisper. “I’m afraid I cannot stay.”

Luna’s unexpected statement wrenched Cadance’s gaze away from the retreating backs of her counterpart and the human warrior.

“... What do you mean?”

“Oh, I will stay the night,” Luna clarified gravely. “But I believe there are more answers to be had. And those answers may lie in Alexander Reiner’s hometown. In my absence, I will need you to help negotiate the terms, as needed.”

Cadance goggled at her as if she’d lost her mind.

“Wait, this wasn’t part of the plan! Heck, I wasn’t even supposed to be here! And you and Celestia never said anything about going to Reiner’s hometown– How would you even–”

“That was before I found someone,” Luna said. “Reiner has a sister. And she’s here, in Boston… I know what you want to ask. How could I find my way about, without a guide? Maxine Radwick shall be that guide. But Cadance, there is no-one here I trust more than you. My finesse has never been with sorting matters of the Night Court. You… I believe you are up to this task.”

Cadance looked up at her, biting her lower lip. She thought about meeting Major Bauer, and how she’d explained only what needed to be explained. That she was not the Lady Cadance they knew, but something like a reflection of her. A reflection from an Equestria which was maybe the Equestria to let Harmony truly shine bright again.

Then, she nodded, slowly.

~ New York City, USA ~

“I gotta be straight with you, Cadance,” said Vinyl Scratch. “I don’t know what I expected.”

“Who was expecting anything from tonight, Scratch?” said Spitfire. “Two alicorns, one of whom should be a statue, and another who shouldn’t even be one. No offense, Cadance.”

“None taken…” came the reply from the plasma-screen.

Uncomfortably, Cheerilee leaned back in her seat, her eyes still fixed on Lady Cadance. Not two hours ago, she’d been looking at this same face, projected from Boston by Major Bauer’s shoulder-camera. Now Bauer stood at guard behind Cadance, and the PHL High Command’s war-room was receiving a much crisper image, courtesy of the Great Equestrian’s retreat and the Lady Cadance’s personal iPad.

“Cadance,” Cheerilee said, faltering for a beginning. “You’re saying they confirmed the intel from Major Bauer? We’re talking here about… some sort of manifestation?”

Bauer remained in the image’s background, arms behind his back and knees spread. Under the rules of jurisdiction, the leader of the Teutonic Knights should have reported this directly to UNAC. Yet again, Cheerilee privately thanked him for bending the rules, hoping it wouldn’t have repercussions later on.

“I’m seeing double,” remarked Pineapple Nectar.

“Shut up, Pina,” Spitfire said. “But this… other Cadance, Your Ladyship… So she can… Y’know. Fly?”

*“I think that’s less important,” Lady Cadance said promptly, “than the question of just where she came from in the first place. She, and Princess Luna.”

“If this were only Luna, I’d have said the Night Princess has broken loose,” commented Gladmane. “But none of my guys in Equestria mentioned anything of the sort.”

Moondancer, as often, looked thoughtful.

“If I may.”

Cheerilee turned to her. “What? What is it?”

“It’s like this, you see,” Moondancer said, trailing a forehoof along the table. “According to the reports, when Princess Luna– if that’s who she is– initially showed up in Boston, she had a companion whose appearance closely matched Discord’s description. Now, we see her with Cadance. A Cadance who’s an alicorn. Doesn’t that seem strange to you?”

Vinyl lifted her sunglasses. Her eyebags appeared more sunken than ever – hard party animal that she’d been, the sleeplessness of the war had taken its toll, and even joining strengths with Moondancer, the strain of teleporting Cadance to Boston had cost her.

Still, she reacted energetically to what had been said.

“‘Strange’? Hah, that’s too mild a word! You got a theory, Dancer?”

“Well, it’s just a theory,” nodded Moondancer. “Now, I’m sure our Lady Cadance has learnt how to identify a Changeling impostor… Slim as the chances are we’re dealing with a Changeling. But… how do we know this isn’t Discord?”

“I hadn’t thought of that...” said Vinyl.

Around her, and even on the screen, Cheerilee felt the temperature in the room go colder.

Gladmane glanced at Pina, who shrugged. He looked at Moondancer. “I have to say, Dame Moondancer,” he said. “That’s reasoning worthy of a con artist.”

“Nothing but process of elimination,” Moondancer said modestly.

“Ahem,” Pina interrupted with a cough. “Interesting theory, yes. But, one problem. Why would Discord show up as himself in the first place?”

There was a pause as everyone contemplated her words.

It was an arresting event to see Moondancer and Pineapple Nectar express opposing views. While the bookworm’s intellect was well-known to the High Command, the peculiar, laconic mare showed another kind of intelligence – one which hinted at an abstract and clinical disdain for the world.

“Even so,” Spitfire said, “mayhap it sounds paranoid, but Dancer’s got a point. Discord’s a tricky one to pin down…”

“Really?” Pina said, deadpan. “Someone completely unexpected shows up after we’ve seen the man behind the curtain? What idiot would fall for that trick? Mister Gladmane,” she told the big earthpony, “you must agree, yes? Even Rainbow Dash would know her own father.”

He blinked. “Um, yeah, but… Why’d you pick such a specific example?”

“Oh, nothing,” Pina stroked her prosthetic forehoof, smiling. “Just wanted to say that anyone so cretinous deserves a knife in their back.” She stared at Spitfire. “It will be our backs if we think like that. Nothing makes one so gullible as paranoia.”

“Bah,” Vinyl cut in. “If the war’s proven anything, it’s the enemy of our enemy doesn’t mean they’re our friend.” Her gaze went to Cadance and Bauer on the screen. “And right now, I’m real worried about a honkin’ great dragon falling into the HLF’s hands,” she spat. “Fucking HLF.”

Imploringly, Moondancer glanced towards Cadance.

“Well, like it or not,” Cadance said from the screen, “though my double may have accosted Major Bauer, it’s the HLF who got to Luna and the dragon first.”

“Do the HLF have anyone who can tend to a dragon, Lady Cadance?” Moondancer said curiously. “Actually… We didn’t get a good look at the dragon from the Major’s shoulder-cam. But he looks familiar, somehow…”

This appeared to trouble Cadance.

“I… I don’t know. I haven’t seen him yet…”

“It’s Spike.”

Even the onscreen Cadance looked at the one who’d spoken.

Having been called back from the UN, Amethyst Star – who unlike her father held no seat at this table, and Time Turner was still away, trying to placate the Security Council – had retreated to a corner with Bonbon, holding the exhausted mare in a comforting embrace. She’d remained silent ever since getting grilled for what she knew of the mysterious entity who had communicated through Bonbon.

Bonbon gibbered, and Amethyst leaned to whisper soothingly into her ear.

“... Spike?” Cheerilee repeated. “Wait, you don’t mean… Twilight’s little assistant in Ponyville?”

“Who gave her permission to speak?” Vinyl interrupted angrily. “You’ve been keeping secrets from us, Amethyst. You and Cadance. How do you know the dragon’s Spike? What, anything else you’d still like to share?”

Amethyst stood up, gently releasing Bonbon. Who remained seated, rocking back and forth, lost in her own world. Amethyst, however, glared at the High Command.

She walked around the circular table, until she stood behind the chair next to Cheerilee’s. The chair that faced the door. There were three empty chairs in the room tonight. But this was the one chair always kept empty.

Amethyst folded her forelimbs upon the top.

“A dragon with Twilight. Who else could it be?” she told them. “If you’d just stopped and thought, instead of fretting and assuming the worst, you’d have concluded the same thing. You should all be ashamed of yourselves. Squatting here in the dark, squabbling over whether this person’s who they say they are… Over whose help you want or don’t want… ”

She rubbed the back of the seat, into which was etched the seal of a golden lyre.

“I know… there are days when it seems humans hardly give us a reason to help them, and the HLF, in particular, have given us many such days. But if the humans had stayed stuck in the place we are now, the Tyrant would already have won.”

Her words, though spoken softly, rang clear and true.

No response came forth immediately. Ironically, when it did, it came from the only one who could not see the engraved lyre from her vantage point.

“Amethyst’s right,” Cadance said. “We’ve all been making fools of ourselves… And I ought to have guessed that was Spike. We’ve become so fearful of deception and self-interest, we’ve pulled the wool over our own eyes.”

Pina just shook her head, but everyone else muttered assent.

“Miss Cherry,” Bauer pitched in. “Though I am not on your council, I’d like to say a word. As a soldier, I have a duty to always stand on guard. But as a human being, I’ll add my voice in favour of Miss Star’s wisdom.”

“Although, discretion is the better part of valour,” Moondancer added mildly.

Cadance nodded at her. “That’s fair enough, Dancer. But sometimes, one must step out. Hopefully, into the light.”

This got Cheerilee thinking.

“So, these apparitions… Luna, Discord… this alicorn Cadance… the weird voice talking through Bonbon… They’re all connected to Alex vanishing into that portal?”

“Apparently,” said Cadance. “Whatever happened at the JFK portal-station, Captain Reiner got thrust into a… different Equestria.”

Moondancer frowned. “I find it hard to attribute that to sheer luck,” she said, eyeing Amethyst. “If this is true… There must be some other power at work, we just don’t know about it yet.”

Amethyst, for her part, said nothing.

“Ma’am. I’ve a feeling the Princesses plan to stay with the HLF, close to… Spike. What would you have me do?”

Cheerilee cleared her throat.

“This night has worn us all,” she said. “And though soldiers may be practiced at staying awake past their limits, we must approach this new development with clear heads. I shall notify Time Turner that he, as it were, must get the Security Council prepared for a meeting in the morning. In the meantime, all our Boston safehouses are down… If the Major will be so kind, return with him to the UNAC base in Fenway.”

“The Teutonic Knights will be happy to provide shelter to the PHL,” said Bauer.

“Good. But please, do keep an eye out for our… visitors, and their hosts.”

~ Boston, USA ~
— Seven hours later

“Auntie, wake up.”

From a sleep that wasn’t as restful as it should have been, filled with abandoned libraries, the wails of specters behind their shelves and corridors of blood, Luna groaned her way back into the waking world.

The face of Cadance, scarcely any more rested, greeted her.

“Cadance?” whispered Luna. “Are we…”

“Still on Earth,” Cadance whispered back. “Yes. Luna, Miss Jones was here just now. It’s… it’s the human leaders. It’s UNAC. I don’t think they’ll… they’ll hold out much longer. They need answers.”

“And we need ours, too.”

Luna stood up within the large tent. They’d spent the night here on mattresses, she and Cadance, divested of their suits of armour, which had been stored into their respective null-spaces, ready to be summoned anew if needed. The inside of the tent, lit by floodlights, illuminated its third occupant. The great purple dragon that lay motionless in his deep slumber. They had secured an all-access permission to find refuge in this specific tent. And though Spike had been a mutual enemy during the battle, Miss Jones hadn’t argued. This was the tent she’d set aside for Equusites.

The dragon was kept heavily sedated, from what Luna understood, by several times the dose required for a full-grown elephant. With the initial stages of the spell upon his mind dissolved, however, his rest was more than well-earned.

She pressed a hoof against his snout, tracing his scales, avoiding the wounds he had sustained. This camp’s medic, a man called Avery, had done his best, but Luna only trusted those within Equestria to truly understand.

“Are you okay?” asked Cadance. “You were coughing blood earlier…”

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” said Luna. “Nothing I can't deal with by myself for now.”

An alicorn’s natural regeneration had been a blessing, and neither she nor her sister had ever been struck by truly debilitating ailments. And, if Cadance had told the truth, neither had the newer, younger alicorn.

“Tell me. Now that you’ve slept on it… What did you make of Lady Cadance?” Luna asked, stalling.

The younger alicorn bit her lower lip, nervous and shaky.

“She’s… willing to talk, so there's that,” Cadance said. “But she’s heartbroken, you see. She misses him. Shining Armor. And I saw him on board…”

“He hurt you, didn’t he?”

“Not as much as he’s hurt my other self…” Cadance said quietly. “I don’t know what happened. It was like, he didn’t even care that it was me. Or her. He, and Twilight… like they hated me “

“Hm, I presume years of war haven’t been kind to what they think of Lady Cadance.”

“I suppose so… but it’s still not him. Shining would never– I just, I don’t understand. Why?”

She choked on her last words, and Luna laid a comforting wing on her, sharing her forlorn look. She’d told Cadance about how she’d embarked on a trek in Twilight’s mind, how she’d come so close to setting her free, before a stray bullet ended that chance once and for all.

Now she only felt Cadance’s pain.

“I know it isn’t, and I am sorry you had to witness it. But he is not the first, nor shall he be the last to behave this way.”

She pressed Cadance’s head against her neck in a familial embrace, and they stood there for a moment that stretched on, with only the gentle breathing of Spike to break the silence.

”Theirs is not our world, much as I like to think it should be,” Luna said quietly. “In that Equestria, there was no triumph at your Wedding… no redemption of Discord…”

“... And no Spike the Brave and Glorious,” Cadance whispered mournfully. She walked away from Luna, and nuzzled Spike’s snout affectionately. “Oh, Spike, what did they do to you…”

Luna had only heard snippets of the Realm’s return. Celestia had insisted on Twilight to undertake the quest, with the rest of the Bearers. And though all was almost lost to the Dark King, Cadance had informed them of how Spike, the little drake that could, had been the one to truly save the Realm. The title Brave and Glorious, bestowed upon him by crystalponies, must have been his finest hour.

Her gaze turned from the slumbering dragon to Cadance. The Crystal Princess come again, the first new alicorn in generations, Luna remembered. A pegacorn, raised by earthponies, born to her lost bloodline, a bloodline that had disappeared with Princess Amore many centuries ago.

And Celestia wished another to join Cadance, in a plan she’d only shared with her dear sister...

‘Wait, Celestia’s plan… The Archmage wasn’t… an alicorn…’

Luna sighed. Yet another future lost, she presumed, gone in the wake of the Imperial years.

“Things are not as clear-cut as they should be,” said Luna. “But… and I am not so sure this is a promise I can keep, but I promise that… whatever the answers are, we shall find them. And it begins here, Cadance.”

She nudged Cadance, and her niece, her descendant, looked at her.

“Come,” said Luna. “We must let him rest.”

Cadance nodded, before turning to embrace Spike, one last time. He remained motionless, his breathing shallow and laboured.

‘No… we shall make it right...’

A simple promise, Luna mused, but one not so easily fulfilled. Yet something else tugged at Luna’s troubled mind. Alexander Reiner…

Or, to be precise, his own estranged sister.

The night before, Maxine Radwick had departed from this camp with Major Bauer and Lady Cadenza. Just as Reiner had explained during his last words before Luna had departed with Discord for Earth, the Major and his Teutonic Knights had their own camp further West, in Fenway Park.

Jumbled as her thoughts were, Luna tried not to dwell on Discord. As they stepped outside, she pulled out the map Jones had presented her with.

While Cadance watched curiously, Luna unfolded and scrutinised its contents one more time. North America, a broad landmass, fragmenting to the North into a dozen lakes and islands. It put her oddly in mind of a squat, lopsided tree crowned by pine-needles. Tracing national and regional outlines, Luna’s eye drifted down to a point South. There, a small town, in a place called Texas.

The Princess of the Night folded the map back up. Closing her eyes, she let her mind expand. Dawn had yet to break on these shores. Luna reached out with her mind – and sensed this world’s Moon.

Alien, unfamiliar, no friend of hers. But recognisably a Moon. This night had been the night of a Full Moon. Breathing in slowly, breathing out, Luna let the Moon’s touch envelop her. And as it was back home, the Moon was a mirror to the world, and from behind that mirror, Princess Luna’s eyes beheld the world.

For the first time, an alicorn of Equestria saw Earth from above.

Alike to the world from whence she’d came, a blue-green pearl hanging in the void of space. But this pearl was tainted. It was from this elevated vantage point that Luna saw in the East, how there advanced an inexorable wall, of a sickly colour that drained all others in its wake. Fighting back faintness, Luna tore her gaze away from this sight of what her fallen sister had wrought.

Her eyes searched, sliding along silvery rays of light the Moon took from the Sun, and gifted back to the world below. This was what her exile had been. To look upon the world from afar, beholding its magnificence, yet seeing only a surface unbroken in its smoothness, never to marvel at the myriad little existences that swarmed and multiplied underneath, anymore than mortal eyes see these in a drop of water.

Her mind aligned the world below with the pictures on the map, and calculated.

‘If the numbers do not lie... ’

A simple triangulation would do the trick. Luna opened her eyes.

“Are you alright?” Cadance asked. “You seemed… faraway…”

“Yes... Miles, in fact,” Luna replied distantly. She looked at her niece. “One request I must make of you, above all. You must bring Spike back. Whatever their demands, this is ours. Allow us to bring Spike home, and we ask no more in return. Our mission is to set right what was wrong, and this is the first step. Can you promise me that, Cadance?”

Though Cadance seemed nonplussed at Luna’s sudden remoteness, she dutifully answered. “Okay... I promise. And about Discord…”

Luna cut her off with a glare.

“No,” she said. “Not yet, Cadance. Not until we have made ourselves known to these people. I’ve let too much slip already. I do not wish to completely throw them off balance. We shall inform them when the time is right.”

Cadance nodded. “Right… Before we come back in, though– your mane, Auntie?” she finally asked. “It’s… it’s a little off-colour.”

Luna’s forehoof followed where Cadance pointed. With a tug, pulled a single strand from the tuft of mane that hung over her forehead. She saw that it was indeed a shade lighter than her usual midnight blue.

“So it is,” she said quietly. “This is the least of my worry, Cadance, much less yours. Now… They have waited long enough… Let us swiftly travel to Fenway Park. And I shall pick up Maxine Radwick, though I may have to coax her assistance after the fact…”

* * * * *

The trip from New York to Boston had taken a little over four hours, not counting the time it had taken to arrange for a UN-affiliated humvee to bring a war correspondent into a newly-reheated war zone. Positively late by pre-war standards, but these days, time was something no-one really had anymore, least of whom Hanne Adler. And here she sat next to her dear partner, being driven across the desolate, snow-covered battleground that was now Boston. Yet it was by a stroke of luck for Hanne that who else should have boarded her vehicle, but for Stephan Bauer himself – better known as the Knight of Germania.

So far, she’d had the courtesy not to pester the borderline legendary soldier, and she and Dieter had merely exchanged glances and a shake of the hand with Major Bauer.

That was ten minutes ago, once the humvee had arrived at Longwood Station. Now, entering Boston proper, even at this distance and with her middling knowledge of the town’s landmarks, Hanne felt a sudden chill to see something had happened to the John Hancock Tower. Half the face had been shorn off the tower, exposing the metallic skeleton beneath its reflective surface. It unnerved her to see evidence the Imperial assault had extended this far inland. But she did not dare ask Bauer about it, and this made her fidget in her seat.

Seeing light on the horizon, she checked her watch. It was close to nine o’clock in the morning.

In war, one would often latch unto the symbol of hope that stood for their cause. For Germany, that symbol was Stephan Bauer, the knight without a homeland, whose valiant efforts symbolised the will of the German people to endure.

Here, in the humvee, his features and exhausted expression made him look like any ordinary man. Even his signature armour – a modern version of the knights of old – was nowhere on his person, and he was now clad in a simple, standard-issue Bundeswehr uniform.

Bauer had come to greet them on their way to the rendezvous point, and didn’t say much. Military confidentiality was still an issue. Any other time, Hanne would have been clamoring for a chance to talk to the man. Yet here she sat, her camera in her lap, feeling giddy as a schoolgirl on the inside, looking aloof as ever on the outside.

Leave it to Dieter to open his mouth and greet the man so easily.

“So,” he said. “Long night?”

Hanne poked her partner. She could have glared at him. Bauer, meanwhile, was snapped out of his thoughts to look at them both through the rear-view mirror. Hanne knew soldiers were so often hardened that they’d think such a question… insensitive. Unless they found some dark humor in it.

Thankfully, Major Bauer seemed to belong to the latter category.

“You could say that,” he said casually. “What about you two there?”

Before Dieter could blurt out another question, Hanne intervened. “Yeah, same old, same old. UNAC meetings are, in the end, just meetings. But what else is there to do?”

“Got lucky with that call, huh?” Bauer said. “You missed most of it.”

“Can’t get every shot, Major Bauer,” Hanne lamented. Her shoulders relaxed, a little. “That’s what Lani Sanderson says as well. But we take what we can get. I, ah, believe the fabled Knight of Germania himself was in the thick of things?”

Bauer groaned. “Please don’t call me that,” he said. “Just Major Bauer. It takes forever to get the damned media to lose the nickname.”

“My bad,” said Hanne, and Dieter laughed.

“Her regret is that she didn’t give you the nickname herself, you see–” said Dieter, before Hanne jabbed an elbow into his ribs.

“Then you are fine in my book,” said Bauer, ignoring Dieter’s pained yelp. “Everybody remembers your Barrier photograph, Miss Adler. Whereas I’d hate to end up being remembered by such a… tacky moniker.”

Hanne blinked. “Like I said, Major. We take what we can get at this point. It was a lucky shot, but I’ll take it if it means a little more for the history books.”

“That’s the spirit,” said Bauer. “Everything counts– hold up, we got a checkpoint.”

The humvee’s pace slowed and Hanne saw more soldiers outside. She readied her pass, but her gaze trailed as Major Bauer, leaning past the driver, spoke to the Teutonic Knight patrolman who was manning the checkpoint.

Hanne made out the tall, crumbling structures that dotted the Boston landscape. It was hard to believe that the city, mere hours ago, had been the site of a battle. Now it was but a ghost town, from what she could surmise.

She hadn’t managed to call Lani Sanderson again. The last she’d heard from her was to meet in some outpost, one Hanne felt sure they were heading to now. Her colleague had simply mentioned that she 'had to be there’.

But Hanne was still keen on taking the best of pictures – quite unlike the photograph she’d just retrieved on instinct from her jacket, held in her hand. She looked down at it.

It was a faded polaroid, one of a few copies she’d given to her circle of friends back in university. She’d convinced them to indulge her hobby – what good was a polaroid these days, they’d obviously thought. And it wasn’t the best of shots, either, in Hanner’s professional opinion. But there was no question how much it really meant for her, especially in the wake of the Conversion War.

There were a few people in that precious shot, and she remembered them all quite well. But only two remained, apart from her, and their time to pass would come.

Jan… Ana… And next to her, Dieter.

Who else could she still lose...

At last, the clearance was given, and the jeep continued in its trek, each of its occupants from Major Bauer to Hanne herself travelling in silence. Or at least, the jeep continued, until it came to a halt shortly after at Fenway Park.

When Hanne looked out the window, she was met by a familiar sight.

Lani, her hands in her pockets. In contrast to the destruction Hanne saw surrounding her, her fellow reporter was smiling. Nor did the smile leave the Hawaiian’s face as Hanne and Dieter exited the humvee, followed by Bauer.

“What took you so long?” she said casually, accepting a handshake.

“Not our best time,” Dieter said. “Had a few delays.”

“Of course,” Hanne shrugged, letting go of Lani’s hand. “Traffic these days, you know.”

Lani chuckled wryly. “One way to put it,” she said. “But, well, let’s just say that this is going to be worth your time. Promise.”

Bauer, who’d been observing both journalists, cleared his throat. “Ladies, if you’ll excuse me,” he said, indicating the command tent at the centre of the camp. “I’m expected elsewhere. Our welcome amongst these people relies on maintaining good relations.”

He left then, seemingly deeming the matter cut and dry. Hanne opened her mouth, but was interrupted when her partner tapped her shoulder.

“Hey, Hanne?” Dieter said. “Look who’s here.”

She followed where he pointed, and was met by a crushing hug from someone a full head shorter than she was. It knocked the wind out of Hanne, and she staggered. But all annoyances evaporated when she met the large, warm eyes of Anastasia Bjorgman.

“Ana?” she whispered. “Ana! What the f– you’re alive?”

Her best friend laughed. Despite the layer of dust covering her, Ana looked almost as typically cheerful as she’d been when Hanne first met her, many years ago in their university days.

“Yeah, of course I am!” she exclaimed, rubbing the back of her head coyly. Her hair, Hanne saw, was also much shorter than it had been last time she’d called. “Goodness, took you guys quite a while to get here. I’d have thought you weren’t coming! Lani promised, you know.”

“On your behalf,” Lani added.

“Right,” said Hanne flatly. She reached out to brush away one of Ana’s remaining bangs. “Ana, what’d you do to your hair?”

“Oh, that? Eh-heh, well… you know. Regulations.”

But Hanne frowned. She hadn’t taken Ana for a combat agent at all, as her letters had only made mention of working in the PHL-aligned branch of Boston’s pharmaceutics sector. Biotechnology and pharmaceutics, this was one of the industries Boston had been known for prior to the war. And the war had lent it new significance.

“Regulations?” repeated Hanne. “Was zum Teufel? After Indonesia, you were supposed to be with R&D, not sent back to field duty, Ana. What's all this?”

Ana shrugged wryly. “Eh… call it downsizing.”

This drew something that was more grimace than smile from Dieter.

“But, in all seriousness, look around you,” said Ana, her hand tracing their surroundings. “Even with weeks to prepare, the evacuation took ages, they needed the manpower and… well, even Amethyst Star doesn’t have the clout to prevent a reassignment to the frontlines.”

“Damn,” Dieter said. “That’s a shame.”

“I know, right? Well, they didn’t expect the Empire to push so boldly. So we found ourselves caught in the battle, and off to the frontlines I went…”

‘Ana, why’d you ever tell them about your shooting range performance, you goof…’

Hanne couldn’t tear her gaze off her new haircut. It simply wasn’t Ana.

A memory flashed by of the pair of them fooling around in their university days, sneaking in and out of classes. Hanne’s smile turned wicked.

“Very well, and… Okay, Lani?” said Hanne. “I really should tell you sometime about how Bjorkman and I went sneaking around campus and f–”

And then Ana stepped on her foot, hard. Dieter, like the charming, loyal man he was, burst out laughing, and even Lani suppressed a smirk.

“Okay, okay I get it, don’t bring it up,” Hanne said hurriedly, cringing through the pain that shot through her foot. “You still need to explain a few things…” Her glare fell on her partner. “People are watching, Dieter.”

She was right. All around them, the various soldiers had turned their eyes on them. Including a fellow who fast approached them. Clad in the kevlar-plated armour of a Teutonic Knight, he possessed sharp features, and with a glare that could match her own. Hanne quickly stood up to meet him eye-to-eye.

“Ah, yes, the Englishman,” said Hanne coolly. The man nodded. “Hope she isn’t a handful.”

Thomas Harwood shrugged. “It varies,” he said primly. Ana laughed, and Hanne chuckled. “She’s still the same ray of sunshine.”

“And then some,” Hanne quipped, and Ana nudged her. “You know what I mean.”

“See, about that–” Ana had begun to say, but she was interrupted by a growing murmur from the command tent.

Hanne stood stiffly, watching the people that streamed out of the command tent.

And Hanne gasped when her eyes fell upon the mare who at this moment walked in hushed conversation with Major Bauer.

“Lady Cadance?” Hanne asked aloud, puzzled. “What the… but you were…”

The camp had fallen silent – even Dieter and Ana kept quiet, equally mystified, as the rose-coloured alicorn drew up to them. And then ‘Cadance’ unfurled her wings. Her fully-formed wings, graceful and angelic in their beauty.

“Welcome,” said the alicorn.

“... Mein Gott,” Hanne said, before finding her voice. “And the… the dark alicorn? Where’s she? Where is Luna?”

Cadance shook her head. “She’s… a little busy elsewhere. Come, I’ll explain.”

~ Jarden, Texas, USA ~

A flash of blue light appeared, then dispersed.

Based on where the morning light shone dimly through the clouds, it was barely past ten o’clock, when Luna set hoof upon solid ground once more. And barely past ten o’clock when Maxine Radwick, for lack of a better word, was even less pleased with her.

“Where are we?!”

“Jarden, your hometown,” said Luna calmly. “Or the outskirts, anyway. I took the liberty of finding it on a map, and teleporting here was trivial, even with my limited mana reserves. I merely needed to find the Moon and–”

“You took me to Jarden?” Radwick repeated. “Do you have any idea how far this is!”

“Why, yes,” answered Luna. “We are approximately– where are you going?”

“Somewhere that isn’t with you,” hissed Radwick, stomping off.

They were on a hillside. In the Winter, the local Sun’s light remain dimmed, but there were lights not so far away, down below in the morning mist, an erratic collection of shapes and colours at the bottom of the hill, scarcely concealed by squat trees – sycamores, if Luna recalled correctly. She wasn’t the Princess most attuned to the land.

She followed Radwick downhill, silently. With her keen eyesight, she squinted to see where the human was heading. It was a group of metallic structures on wheels, which might have been mobile homes, at a stop in a grass field. Despite the early hour, there was activity. The scent of perspiration and alcohol reached her senses, and on top of that, the place was loud, a cacophony of laughter, chanting and screeching music all mixed together.

If Luna lost Radwick in that fray, it’d be hard to find her again without being spotted.

“Wait!” shouted Luna. She flew over and landed on the grass, blocking Radwick’s way. The woman’s green eyes narrowed harshly. “Please, I have my own reasons to bring us both here.”

“Well?” Radwick said, glaring. She crossed her arms, and her shoulders relaxed, just a little. “Spit it out. We don’t have all day.”

Luna drew a sharp breath. “I wish to see what you hold dear.”

Radwick blinked. “What?”

“Aye. I only wish to see what humanity treasures most. And I only have what Alexander Reiner told me– your hometown.”

Luna sighed, deeply.

“I apologise, Miss Radwick. But I know pain. And I thought you may need the reprieve, too. If it is your superiors you worry about, I’m prepared to take full responsibility... I do apologise, truly, for abducting you. Now… please. Please, make me understand, just what it is humanity is fighting so hard to keep.”

“So you took me back to my hometown, just for that?” Radwick said curtly. “You don’t do things by half, do you?”

“No, I suppose not,” Luna admitted. “I prefer a direct approach. Both by deeds, and by words.”

Radwick snorted. “Words,” she said. “You ponies were always full of pretty words. Your actions wouldn’t really line up.” She paused, thinking. “You know, if you’d ‘ported right into town, they’d likely have picked up the spike, and you wouldn’t be my problem any longer. Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t turn you in.”

Luna, for a brief moment, pondered if she should remind Radwick or not about the battle they had just lived through, mere hours ago.

She shrugged.

“Wouldn’t they wonder how you left the battle, Miss Radwick?” she asked. “I could just as easily bring you back, just like that.”

It was a bold-faced lie. Even had she tried, Luna wouldn’t have been able to teleport a hoofball field away, not in her current state. She’d exhausted her last mana with this jump.

“But I need answers. Your brother didn’t want to believe it at first, either, but we’re sure there’s some old connection between your family and Equestria. And I promise, this will provide us both a reprieve from our troubles.”

Radwick stared at her stone-facedly for a long, long time. Then she turned.

As Luna was about to give a resigned sigh, however, she heard the woman speak, without looking back.

“You want to meet my Dad,” Radwick said quietly, moving a few steps towards the camp, hands in her pockets. “He still lives here. In Jarden, I mean. Not this madhouse.” She nodded towards the gaudily lit, noise-bursting camp. “He’s pretty chill about ponies.”

Luna advanced gingerly. “What about your mother?”

“Don’t,” snapped Radwick. “Just don’t. You won’t find Mom here, anyway. She… left. Not even Dad knows where.”

Luna looked at the woman’s back, up and down. She was tense, fists almost clenching.

“Very well,” Luna said. “I won’t pry, if it is your wish.”

Radwick chuckled mirthlessly. “Besides, doubt you’ll get very far. The town’s a fortress, you need special clearance to visit, if you’re a tourist. Dunno how you’ll even get past the gates.”

“You’re a citizen, surely?” Luna said thoughtfully. “And Captain Reiner’s sister. I’d expected there might be setbacks. I was hoping you could help me.”

Radwick turned around. “Oh, really,” she said. “Why aren’t I surprised? You did want to use me for something, after all. But you’re not exactly the most inconspicuous of ponies, you know. Half the guys want to shoot down the first alicorn they see.”

Luna tapped her chin. It didn’t take too long, of course, for an idea to hatch. A simple trick, one which Galatea had reminded her still existed for all three of them, when the grey alicorn had assumed her disguise as a… grey earthpony.

‘So unassuming of her…’

Celestia, meanwhile, had once spent an entire day in Ponyville in the guise of a pegasus, and by all accounts it had been a fun outing. One that had only ended when Twilight remembered, from a glance at an old storybook, what colour her mane had been in youth.

Personally, Luna preferred the versatility of a unicorn.

So it was, her horn glowed bright, her aura enveloping her. Her mane and tail, once midnight blue and flowing, shortened to half their original length, and now inert as any normal pony’s should be. Her blue coat, too, shifted to a light azure shade.

And now she stood before Radwick in her youthful form, the very same form she’d had when she was freed by the Bearers of Harmony. Only her cyan eyes and mark remained intact, her wings having disappeared under the glamour.

With the glamour, came the rush of vigour.

“I haven’t felt so… invigorated in days!” she exclaimed. “Tell me, tell me, how do I look?”

Radwick looked her up and down, then scoffed. “Would I care?”

“Come now, Miss Radwick,” said Luna lightly. “I did say this would be a reprieve. “And now, before you stands... uh, Claire de Lune, yes. Claire de Lune, former Canterlot aristocrat, and a fervent admirer of Captain Reiner.”

Radwick shook her head. “Claire de Lune?”

“A fancier way of saying Moonlight, but I like the name. Sounds very posh, doesn’t it?”

“Right. You still look like yourself. But light blue.”

“The mane changes everything, first off,” said Luna. Now, the once conspicuous light blue tuft hanging on her forehead blended in with the rest of her mane. “But you’re right. There must be something else I can do...”

She cleared her throat. Then, she vocalised, tuning up her pitch with each ‘ah’ she said. And, with a wide smirk, she began to sing.

“Tend the burdens your heart carries, come along and join the fun!” she sang, tapping her hooves upon the grass. Radwick raised an eyebrow at the display. “Loosen up, forget your worries, dance with me, the night is young…”

She let out a high-pitched giggle.

“Ah, it worked, then,” said Luna. “Sorry. But to be so young again… my, I couldn’t resist.”

“I can tell,” said Radwick flatly.

“Oh, you remind me of Starswirl. He wasn’t amused by that song either,” said Luna cheerfully. She flicked her head gracefully, beaming. “Now I’m truly Claire de Lune. And I feel that I’ve much to see.”

~ Boston, USA ~

“Alright, everyone,” Cadance said primly. “Let’s start from the beginning.”

She put on her best smile, and stood up. Before her were Major Bauer, Lady Cadenza, and a few more people whose names she did not know. Her counterpart sat opposite her, facing a black device on the table. The pliable, two-piece device reminded Cadance vaguely of a pocket mirror, but oversized and providing no reflection. Its upraised ‘mirror’ half, in fact a screen, had been opaque until Cadenza tapped a button on the lower half, which consisted of an unusually flat keyboard.

Cadenza had rapidly explained that this ‘laptop’ functioned by storing memory in silicon, much like crystal infused by the mystical arts. Meanwhile, the screen – or ‘monitor’ – actually wove images using a combination of liquid crystals and light. When asked what power made this possible, Cadenza reiterated a fact Cadance had briefly gleaned off of Reiner, that due to different physical laws, Earth was surrounded by a magnetic field, trapping lightning in quantities the Kirin could only have dreamt of harvesting.

It was remarkable. But the device’s appearance also made Cadance a little uncomfortable, reminding her of the ansible, that uncanny typewriter which had delivered the words condemning Redheart to death… Heavens, had that only been a day ago? She wondered how Luna was coping…

On the screen was Cheerilee, looking expectant.

A few more faces appeared on-screen, forming something akin to portraits on the wall. Animated portraits, that is. For such a small screen, it felt like they were in the room with her.

One by one, their names were read out.

“Peter Vanderbilt, UNAC Council Leader.”

“Antonio Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations.”

“Xi Jinping, President of the People’s Republic of China.”

“Jean-Luc Mélenchon, President of the Republic of France.”

“Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation.”

“Sajid Javid, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.”

Finally came the last man on a screen. He, Cadance remembered, had been mentioned several times by Reiner. He was a homely-looking man, whom she thought Shining or Blueblood would have felt made for a nice presence at a bar evening.

“Tim Kaine, President of the United States of America.”

With the last of the UN leaders introduced, silence fell.

‘Okay, Cadance. Breathe in, and out. You got this… You got this.’

So she began, talking into a microphone that had been given her, on a stand.

“My name is Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, though just ‘Cadance’ is fine,” she said. A pause, as the humans’ scribes took notes on their notebooks and thin black pads. “I am the reigning Crystal Princess, ruler of the sovereign Crystal Realm.”

Another pause. She looked at Major Bauer, to her side. He gave her an encouraging nod. She cleared her throat again.

“I stand here as an envoy for my Aunts Celestia and Luna, reigning Diarchs of Equestria. An Equestria that has not known war in centuries. And this Equestria has an alliance is in the making. An alliance that will stand against your enemy, hand in hoof.”

A pause, and static crackled from her microphone. She gave a nod to one of the two most prominent men who flanked Cheerilee. This one was to Cadance’s left on the table. Antonio Guterres.

“If I may,” spoke Guterres. “According to our records, Princess Luna is not at present ruling by her sister’s side. Her attempted defection was halted in Iceland by Queen Celestia… the same night you yourself defected, Lady Cadance.”

“Yes, Secretary-General,” replied Cadance. “In their Equestria. But in ours, Princess Luna rules in equal measure to her sister. And I am not the same Cadance. Anymore than my Aunt Celestia is the same Tyrant you fight.”

“Another Equestria...” said Mélenchon, a bespectacled, elderly man. “Forgive me, Your Highness, but you must understand how… surreal this all seems. We have questions.”

“I concur,” added Peter Vanderbilt. “If you would…?”

Cadance nodded stiffly. Xi Jinping steepled his hands, but said nothing.

“Is Captain Reiner alive?” asked Vanderbilt. His voice was gravelly, yet clear.

“He is,” said Cadance. “Hurt, but alive. He arrived nearly two weeks ago, by our count. We’ve been treating him as best we can.”

“Alive, after two weeks?” Vanderbilt said incredulously. “How is that possible? All the evidence we have shows humans cannot survive in the Equusite biosphere much longer than three days. The thaumaturgic environment is too rich for us to adapt.”

“I don’t know what’s up with that,” Cadance admitted. “But it doesn’t at all seem the case with Captain Reiner and my Equestria. Maybe… maybe it isn’t the environment. Maybe something in the Equestria you know is toxic to humans…”

“Tell us your story, Princess,” said Guterres.

And so it began, indeed. A story that had been told to others before the council which sat here. A story of a man who’d found his way to Equestria. How Equestria had listened to his story, and called upon allies from far and wide. How an entire world had heard Reiner’s plea for help.

After a time, Cadance reached the story’s end. Or rather, its midpoint.

“It was decided that my Aunt Luna was to be the envoy, along with Lord Discord,” said Cadance. “Princess Celestia thought she shouldn’t come to Earth yet.”

“Yes… how wise of her,” said Vladimir Putin. The President of the Russian Federation, Cadance thought, had a higher-pitched voice than what his shrewd, calculating appearance implied. He narrowed his eyes. “Yet sending someone as… important as you are to treat with us, seems equally unwise.”

“Things didn’t go exactly as planned, Mister President,” said Cadance. “Aunt Luna has her own… task now, and I speak on her behalf.”

“Excuse me, Princess Cadance,” said Sajid Javid. “But, if I may?”

“Proceed, Prime Minister,” said Cadance.

“You may be unfamiliar with the state of matters on Earth...” he began.

Cadance raised a forehoof. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but Captain Reiner has given us a rundown of your world’s politics, Prime Minister,” she said quickly. “Enough for us to understand.”

“I see,” said Javid. “In any case, our questions remain. You claim to be from another Equestria. But… what sets you apart?”

“Fifteen years separate us from our counterparts, Prime Minister,” replied Cadance. “We’re still not entirely sure where we really diverged, but Aunt Luna has observed that the Crystal War never happened to our Equestria.”

“How peculiar,” said Vladimir Putin. “Fifteen years…”

“Indeed,” Cadance agreed. “Enough time for things to be… drastically different.”

Xi Jinping inclined his head.

“How different?” he asked, in a language different from the others’. “If I may ask, Princess.” Then someone from his end of the call repeated the words – at the same time Cadance instinctively replied in his language.

“Oh, I’m terribly sorry, Mister President,” she said hurriedly, consciously switching back to the former language. “I meant… There’s been no war. No Co-Harmony Sphere. No Empire. And... ” She couldn’t help but hesitate. “No madness of Queen Celestia…”

Xi Jinping narrowed his eyes. He had a squint that, weirdly, made Cadance think of a bear.

“I see you have a Gift of Tongues, Princess Cadance. Interesting…” the President of China told her silkily. “Yet to our knowledge, Captain Reiner is quite fluent in Modern Equish. I assume he communicated with you in that the whole time?”

“You know, I never really thought about that…” Cadance said slowly, wondering if here was a net she was being drawn into. “But… from what I know of the Gift, I could only be talking in words you understand, if enough of my people can read your language… Such as how the deep magical bond works. Yet this is my first time on this world…”

Before any of the assembled leaders could speak, Cheerilee spoke aloud.

“Then we are to take this as a good sign,” the PHL’s leader stated, a gleam in her eye. “Because what it means, Princess, is you’ve attuned to the souls of thousands of Equestrians stranded half a world away in China… Likely the hundreds of thousands of Equestrians here on Earth.”

A new feeling had come upon the tent. Cadance looked towards Cadenza. And she saw that Cadenza, wryly, was smiling.

“What do you wish to offer, Princess?” said Cheerilee.

Cadance steeled herself. “Anything we can. We are… we’re still negotiating terms with the other nations of Equus, that is true–”

“Is a military option on the table?” asked Putin suddenly. Xi Jinping nodded.

“Yes, you said it yourself. You have no experience with war,” the Chinese President said coolly. “What could you possibly offer us?”

“We offer you Equestria’s help, and others’ too. Food, medicine…”

Her eyes looked from left to right, taking in the sight of everyone within the tent. Then she noticed two of the scribes in the corner. Lani Sanderson, the journalist from earlier, and by her side, her colleague Hanne Adler, someone Sanderson had mentioned to be very, very interested in humanity’s legacy.

“... Preservation,” she finished. “Alexander Reiner spoke of a world close to starvation. Your people, Mister President, he said they were afraid for the Barrier’s arrival, As are yours, President Kaine.”

Both men fixated her with a curious stare.

“A few billion people is a… huge number, that is true. But, you will have the support of a brave new world. I can promise you that whatever happens, your culture, your humanity will be preserved to some extent on our world.”

That statement drew murmurs from all around.

“This is… this is encouraging,” Xi Jinping said plainly.

“And Alexander Reiner, Princess? When can we anticipate his… return?” asked Mélenchon. “The Barrier is already within viewing range of Boston. Negotiations need to happen swiftly.”

“As soon as he recovers, President Mélenchon,” said Cadance. “I’m aware that… right now, these are simply words from me, but I guarantee he will come back to you. And my Equestria will have already arranged for… well, an open diplomatic channel between worlds. Reiner has been a tremendous help in preparing us for that.”

“I suppose that is fair,” answered Mélenchon.

“Princess Cadance, you’ve spoken much of what you can do,” said Kaine. “But what can we do for you?”

There. The opening, for what her aunt had tasked her to do.

“We need the dragon,” she said. “We need Spike. He’s an innocent soul, twisted by the Solar Empire. My Aunt Luna believes she may break the Imperial conditioning… That’s the one thing she asked for. The dragon she defeated.”

The mention of Spike drew uncomfortable mutters. Their memories of Spike’s scorching of the PHL safehouses did not escape Cadance’s notice.

“That might be… complicated,” Kaine told her. “Especially since the dragon, so we’ve been informed by Major Bauer, is not in our custody, or the PHL’s. The last thing we want is getting the HLF mixed into this.”

Lady Cadenza stepped in. “And yet I’d vouch for this, Mister President,” she said. “I know that my younger self is telling the truth. I knew Spike when he was just a kid. It’s quite simply not in his nature, what happened here.”

“Children do not remain innocent forever,” Putin said, unmoved and seemingly unfazed to see both Cadances at once, “if they ever were innocent to begin with. And you should know what war does to people, Lady Cadance.”

“But I believe this may go deeper than that,” Cadenza pressed on. “The Newfoals, the Geas… What you should know, sir, is that the Empire has many ways of beguiling people into doing its bidding.”

Guterres spoke again. “It certainly poses a greater moral dilemma than usual in war, when the enemy uses literal thralls to fight…”

“Regardless,” Kaine interrupted. “The fact remains, the dragon is not ours to hand over, Princess Cadance. While we sooner wouldn’t see him kept by the HLF, believe me, we wouldn’t, handing him to you would first mean negotiating with them.”

A weight descended upon Cadance. She bit back an urge to retort.

… Why, but why, did everything have to be so political?

“And what if I went to the HLF directly?” Cadance asked tiredly. “I’ve met them already.”

“Your Highness,” said Kaine, “whatever their name, the HLF are not the officially-designated representatives of humanity. We are.”

Cadance leaned closer to the microphone, and spoke very carefully.

“Sir,” she said. “And sirs. With all due respect, my Aunt and I came here offering help, not to any one part of humanity, but to all humanity. And maybe you’ll think this makes us naïve or idealistic. Trust me, when I look at the size of this enterprise, I cannot fool myself into believing it’s ever possible to save everyone. But your personal disputes shouldn’t keep us from trying! Even if it’s by chance, my Aunt seems to have got into Miss Jones’ good graces. Please, I ask you to let me make use of that.”

Cheerilee coughed for attention.

“This seems fair enough, gentlemen,” she said. “This is no guarantee… but maybe, in this unexpected and unhoped-for option, we’ll find answers we can’t elsewhere. Here stands an Equestrian Princess who is neither of the Solar Empire, nor the Equestrian Resistance, nor the PHL… I say we let her stand for herself, and show us if she can do what we can’t.”

The five human leaders were in thought, seemingly waiting to see who’d speak first.

“I agree,” said Kaine. Mélenchon also nodded, and so did Javid, albeit a little reluctantly. Putin looked like he held back a jab, as did Xi Jinping.

‘That’s right… Reiner mentioned it didn’t he? Something… something about Russia and China having institutions to ‘rival’ the PHL… Using griffon expats, huh?’

“In any case, Princess Cadance?” said Cheerilee. “I think we’ll have plenty to discuss once things are a little less hectic. The PHL would be happy to help.”

“Are you sure you want to place such important matters in your care, Miss?” Putin said suddenly. “Such a responsibility should lie in mankind’s hands.”

“No, Mister President,” Cheerilee replied placidly. “The Ponies for Human Life will be honoured to accept said responsibility. Lyra Heartstrings’ dream is still alive and well. And we’ll take any chance we can get to see that dream fulfilled. She made a promise to help mankind, long ago. That’s a promise we intend to keep, no matter what.”

“You speak of hope in these times,” Putin replied coldly.

“And hope lives. It is here. Look with your eyes. She sits there, the Crystal Princess Reborn. And we have hope, more than we’ve had in years.”

The statement wasn’t so much directed at Cadance, so much as it was directed towards everyone else in the room as well. Their love, repressed for so long, had begun to flow. Grief and despair made way for the tiniest sliver of hope that rose from their ranks.

Cadance’s mind went out, and her heart went too, to Stephan Bauer, to this careworn Cheerilee, to Starfall and Blank Canvas, Alicia and Daniel… To Hanne Adler, to Lani Sanderson, and that strawberry-blonde-haired young woman who’d been with them, her love as pure as the Reindeer’s. To Teresa Jones…

All flowed freely. All was welcome.

“And if we can keep that promise,” Cheerilee continued. “with bandages and books, moreso than bullets… that’ll be all for the better.”

At first, there was a tense silence that followed. Then Stephan Bauer stepped forward. He wore no armour, but his words were steely and proud.

“For the Golden Lyre,” he spoke, softly, but clearly.

Discreet as it was, Cadance felt the love flow so smoothly and freely, gentle and tender and happier than it had been in years. She held back a laugh. So many around the tent remained with faces as if carved of rock, but others had smiles evidently tugging at their lips.

Her eyes met the mare opposite her. Herself. The little lost pegacorn who’d found her place in the world so many years ago.

Lady Cadenza smiled gently.

“For the Golden Lyre.”

With the love all around her, love for each other, for people, and for the hope that come anew, Cadance smiled serenely. Perhaps it was her presence here.

“I thank you, Princess Cadance,” said Cheerilee. “You stand before us as what we could have been. What Equestria should be. And we will be grateful to accept your terms.”

Cadance met her eyes with Cheerilee’s. And she smiled.

“As we shall, too.”

Vanderbilt coughed with sober meaningfulness.

“Princess Cadance,” he said. “You said you were forming an alliance of your own. Is there an official statement to be expected on their behalf?”

“They are awaiting the outcome of our negotiations here, Council Leader,” said Cadance. “But it will come soon.”

“Then it’s settled,” Vanderbilt said evenly. “The PHL will handle diplomatic overtures from hereon. I’ll expect to hear from you again, Princess. For we still have much to discuss, of course, regarding certain matters.”

“That we will, Council Leader,” said Cadance, nodding. “That we will…”

~ Jarden, USA ~

Jarden was a nice little place, Luna decided.

The souvenir shop had been an interesting visit, for PHL memorabilia was the main attraction, the golden lyre an ubiquitous sight. Business was booming, or as booming as it could get during wartime, and even in these quiet morning hours, there were a few shoppers to be seen while Luna acquired her disguise.

Explaining her presence to the shopkeeper, she mused, hadn’t been much of a challenge at all.

“Thank you!” she said loudly, waving to the elderly shopkeeper. “Have a great day!”

“You could have just kept quiet and nothing would’ve been different,” said Maxine flatly, as they left the store. “I’m sure you’re proud of your… getup, but– Christ, you didn’t need to announce your fancy name.”

Luna pondered it for a moment.

“I suppose I was being rather theatrical,” she said, tapping her chin. “But I like theatrical, and it probably cheered him up.”

She spun around once, beaming.

“How do I look?”

The souvenir shop, thankfully, had just what she needed. A pair of sunglasses and a button-up, rose-patterned shirt, both made for a pony’s build, completed her eccentric outlook. Then she affixed a small, lyre-shaped pin to her shirt.

‘I’m really getting the hang of modern times,’ she thought happily. ‘Take that, Tia…’

“Like a tourist,” said Maxine, matter-of-factly. She shook her head. “You didn’t seem this… out there, earlier...”

“I used to be the Bearer of Laughter, you know?” Luna said whimsically. “Sooo, you could say that I’m just in my… Element.” She giggled. “Right! Onwards to your family home, then? What kind of bond do you have with Alex, Maxine?”

She took off her new pair of sunglasses.

“Sibling rivalry perhaps? I can relate,” Luna said, as she hummed and began to sing again. “I was just the second born sister, who most of the town ignores! Like a button, like a horseshoe, like a mare who’s bad at metaphors!”

“Stop,” Maxine hissed. “I don’t wanna talk about it, least of all to someone who breaks into song every few seconds.”

“Okay, okay,” Luna said quickly, tapping her hooves on the sidewalk as she looked around. “Sorry… sorry… um, where is it, anyway?”

In Boston, Luna had found no time to behold the architecture, at night and in the heat of battle. And too much else had taken up her attention shortly before she’d left Cadance to negotiate. Her eye had caught a hazy impression of a world of brick and cement, many of the buildings a lean five storeys high, the landscape occasionally punctuated by structures of glass and steel – nothing too dissimilar from the streets she’d walked in Alexander Reiner’s uneasy mind.

Where Boston was a city, Jarden was a town further South, in warmer climes.

Already at this hour, crowds milled upon the sidewalk, pressing close to the series of squat, two-storey buildings, from which jutted sunshades above the entrances – looking back from where she’d just exited, Luna was curious to note the architectural style here favoured arches, over windows as well as the door, and longer, lower buildings.

A black car drove by and Luna had to stop and stare. While naturally she had seen horseless carriages in her time, for such vehicles to be so ubiquitous they could be owned by a person of modest salary, ran contrary to everything she knew, including the new Equestria she’d stepped into a few years ago. Yet to her trained eye, even aside from these modern conveniences, the town just looked young. Younger than Ponyville. And oddly, although her time in Boston had been sparse, her feelings told her the place wasn’t much older.

Alexander Reiner had explained humans could trace back their civilisation’s history to almost ten-thousand years, which was many times older than Equestria’s recorded histories. But he hadn’t mentioned he came from a country so young. Luna felt her lips pull back. Here was a nation in its infancy, and yet, another nation that resembled her own had decreed it would die, one of the last of human cultures. It was not right.

She returned her gaze to Maxine, tilting her head. The woman sighed.

“Just… follow me,” said Maxine. “And don’t look at the cameras.”

They moved with a brisk walk, keeping pace with one another.

~ Boston, USA ~

It was a few hours later that Cadance ended up back on Boston’s streets. Following Luna’s message, it had been agreed that Cadance – alongside an escort team dispatched by the PHL – would seek out the HLF leadership residing at Logan International Airport. It was not a large escort, granted. Tensions tended to arise between this lot, and a full guard detail would have drawn suspicious eyes. Yet Major Bauer had vouched for her, by proclaiming she could handle herself just fine. The dome’s collapse over Boston had proven it well.

Now, carefully navigating past ruined asphalt and concrete debris, Cadance found herself walking side-by-side with a few lightly armed guards – that short woman they’d called Bjorgman, who was presently bearing a rifle almost as tall as she, along with Bjorgman’s griffon partner and certain members of Major Bauer’s unit. The ones whose names she could remember best, Daniel and Starfall, were accounted for. To Cadance’s relief, she’d been told Blank Canvas would pull through.

A tang of salt hit Cadance’s nostrils. There, at the waterfront, looking out onto the watery expanse of the channel which separated three-quarters of this city from its remaining quarter, she’d managed to rendezvous with Aunt Luna’s contact from last night. A mousey-brown-haired woman, who wore a battered-looking flak-jacket, while over her back was slung a large, streamlined-looking weapon not dissimilar to the fancier-looking firearms.

Teresa Jones was standing there, bobbing her head to an unheard tune, which Cadance deduced came from a device at the woman’s hip, attached to the ears. Shaped like a miniature white monolith, it was smaller than any cassette player she’d ever seen. She was interested to spot the mark of an apple on it.

But seeing them approach, Jones hastily unplugged the device.

“Hello again, Miss Jones,” Cadance said by way of greeting. Besides and behind her, her escorts halted in their steps.

“Your Highness,” Jones replied politely. The woman threw a slightly awkward salute, which Cadance, who tried not to think of Shining, took to indicate she had little military background. The glance Jones threw to the closest escort – the griffon, whose talons had moved to her rifle – was uneasy. “Teresa Jones, reporting for duty.”

Again, Cadance noted the similarity to a Griffish Isles’ accent with amusement, accentuated by Jones’s mock-formality.

“So how’d it go?” asked Jones.

Cadance swallowed, feeling more than slightly awkward.

“I’m sorry, I’m sure this musn’t be pleasant to hear, but UNAC do seem terribly… stubborn, where you’re involved.”

“They would,” Jones said shortly. She shook her head. “But they don’t call all the shots. Not your first rodeo with us, eh, Miss Bjorgman?”

Cadance followed her eyes, to the woman Jones had addressed. Bjorgman, who’d kept quiet until then, cleared her throat.

“No, not at all, heh. Dearheart’s doing alright, yeah?”

Jones nodded, flashing a reassuring smile. “Just fine, Bjorgman, thanks for asking. You could ask her yourself, though. She should be with us soon. It’s been what, three weeks since you and your nerd friends last came over?”

“Too long, too long,” Bjorgman said. Cadance looked at her, raising an eyebrow. “Oh, we do joint R&D here and there, Your Highness.”

‘Ah, there we go– one hoof through the door.’

“Well, whatever ‘bad blood’ UNAC has got with you, Miss Jones, I don’t see it here,” Cadance added, nodding along. “When I broached the issue of Spike– the dragon– they seemed just fine with Aunt Luna and I taking him with us back.”

“Ah,” said Jones. “Methinks they’re testing your mettle, Princess Cadance. I did promise your Aunt that our resources would be at her disposal. Not a promise I want to see broken.”

“Had plenty of those recently?” Cadance asked.

“It’s gotten better,” replied Jones. But her tone belied a familiar sort of weariness, one that Cadance had heard all too often from either Aunt Celestia, or her old tutor Kibitz, at the tail-end of busy days in Canterlot Palace.

“I see,” Cadance said. “If I may… I don’t know much about the HLF.”

“Huh, you mean, apart from what UNAC or the PHL could tell you?” Jones replied, sounding tired. “Alright, what would you liketo know?”

“I… haven’t really got a specific question,” Cadance admitted sheepishly. “I’m just curious about the organisation. We’ve got time, I’m sure.”

That got Jones to chuckle. “Yes, Dearheart can take her time,” she said with a light touch of mischief. “Curious one, aren’t you, Your Highness?”

“Oh, I was taught by the best,” Cadance followed up, smiling in reminiscence. “Aunt Cel– the Sun Princess always pushed me to ask all the questions I could. My sister liked to answer them herself– when she wasn’t too annoyed.”

Nevermind, of course, that ‘annoyed’ was an understatement when it came to Sunset Shimmer. But that fiery irritation wasn’t to be found in Jones.

“I see,” Jones said pensively. “Alright. Have a seat, Your Highness, you and your pals. Even with Cliffnotes, there’s a lot to take in.”

They found the nearest pile of rubble they could to seat themselves. Although Daniel decided he wanted to stand and Starfall leaned against a half-destroyed wall, Ana and her griffon partner did take a moment to sit as well, leaning against one another. For her part, Cadance cleared the immediate area, her aura realigning the fragments with a neatness Rarity would admire.

Sitting on the sidewalk, Jones let out a sigh, and began her explanation.

“Back in 2018, when Conversion was new, this American priest, Reverend James Thomas, founded a group called the HTF– the Harriet Thomas Foundation, named after his daughter, one of the most prominent Newfoals to ‘go pony’ and vanish off the face of the planet.”

“Troubled times?” Cadance quietly asked. “Captain Reiner said things turned ugly fast.”

“Publically, no,” said Jones. “Most governments were really keen to put on some show of friendly relations with Equestria. I mean, pretty pastel ponies, how doesn’t that look good for PR? Kids… kids love ’em,” She hefted a deep sigh. “But beneath the surface, agitators had already been making waves. At first, it was the usual suspects. Reactionary nutcases, conspiracy theorists… Various cults who didn’t like the competition…”

From the corner of her eye, Cadance could see Ana lean closer to her partner, chatting with stolen glances towards Jones.

“Still, for the first two years after ponies arrived, things were going pretty well. In fact, 2018 was the last good year, really. I remember… Well. I remember seeing pictures of you in the papers, Your Highness. Next to Vladimir Putin, of all people. You and your husband were in Russia, attending the Football World Cup.”

“Huh. Shining never was one for sports when he was younger,” Cadance remarked, just as she caught herself and felt her cheeks heat up. “S-sorry, carry on.”

“Well, Your Highness, you two looked happy then, and you both liked it enough to be there, right up to the Finals. Papers digged it, the crowds loved you two waving back at them,” Jones added, with a wistful smile. “Happier times…” Her smile faded. “In hindsight, I’m guessing that was the idea. Your public appearance did make for great publicity, when the Conversion Bureaus opened a couple months later.”

Cadance swallowed, taking in the implications. To consider that Celestia, in any incarnation, would exploit her image so wantonly… Yet, whenever she thought nowadays of how Celestia had introduced her to the people, from the Palace balcony all those years ago, her older self couldn’t help but wonder if this might have made a difference with Sunset.

“The Bureaus. How long did it take for the public to turn against them?”

“Not quite as fast as you’d think,” Jones said, her eyes looking faraway. “You gotta get this, Princess Cadance, that you ponies picked the right time to show up. 2016 had been a weird year, even before that. My own country had just voted to leave the EU– Oh, you wouldn’t know what that is. Well, it doesn’t really exist anymore, anyway, not the way it used to. Not with the whole damn continent swallowed by the Barrier.”

There was, Cadance felt, a deeper history behind Jones’ words. One for which, at the moment, she’d do best to wait before prying further.

“Point is,” said Jones. “Ten years ago, you’d have told me a man would be applauded by the press for becoming a woman, I’d have thought you were bonkers. Yet things were changing. In fact…” She turned hesitant. “Alright, this story’s not mine to tell. But the person you’re gonna meet, she can tell you about it if she wants to. Her own mother– Okay, it’s complicated. She’s adopted, see. The couple who adopted her, well, Mum used to be a guy. Pretty popular comic-book writer. Except not many people knew they’d had a sex change, until they made it public that same year.”

This got Cadance to blink with surprise. “They’d kept it secret? Why?” she asked. “From what Captain Reiner had said, we’d understood humans were an advanced civilisation.”

“Laws can change, Your Highness, but people are a fickle bunch, especially the sort to read comics,” Jones said. “They wanted to be on the safe side. Advanced? In machinery, yes. You should see our trains. Culturally, though…”

Underlining her words, it seemed, was a whole topic she’d have loved to broach. Yet Jones seemed to think better of it.

“I’m getting side-tracked again,” Jones said, rubbing her forehead. “But unless you’d been there to convince a bunch of jungle-dwellers that ponies were really gods– and let’s face it, I’m sure quite a few people did believe that– you couldn’t have picked a better time to tell people it was okay to radically change their bodies. Well, except for skin colour, I guess, because that’s always its own can of worms.”

At that juncture, Cadance felt she had nothing better to do than nod, listening intently.

“‘Going pony’, as they called it, was a pretty niche thing, you know?” Jones noted wryly. “They played it smart. Beauty of it was, most changes weren’t even permanent. Amazing what magic can do, ain’t it? And it barely cost a penny. I told you, kids loved it. Get your parents to let you be a pony for your birthday… Genius. Sheer, bloody genius…” Her gaze fell upon the broken asphalt at her feet. “Then Equestria says it’ll take people in, if they’re ready to change forever. First it’s just a few, mostly homeless, but then, more and more… Sure, there were waivers, psych evaluations… To be honest, nobody looked too hard. Good riddance to bad rubbish.”

She clapped her hands, bitterness plain on her face.

“And it all went to shit,” Jones said, speeding up. “You know the drill. Things started to fall apart. People got questions on their minds. And the governments weren’t providing answers. So some ex-SAS guy, whose name I could never pronounce– and I’m Welsh, mind you– took matters into his own hands. Shortly before the war started, he brought together many wannabe soldiers from Great Britain and North America, putting them under one umbrella. He managed to get Reverend Thomas on his side– but also a man named Mike Carter.”

Cadance nodded. She remembered Alexander Reiner’s descriptions of Mike Carter and the organisation he’d been a founder of, and they were distinctly unfavourable.

“Then,” she said. “What happened?”

Jones clicked her tongue. “Within months, Mike Carter took over, violently, and he wanted to kill all of your kind, not just Imperials. Reverend Thomas distanced himself from the organisation. A broken man, for the rest of his days, poor bloke… His heart gave up on him only a year later. And with him gone, that was the end of the Foundation. There are many groups, all over the world, who claim the name, Your Highness, but it’s America people think of when they hear the name ‘Human Liberation Front’.”

Or HLF, for short.

“Well, you don’t seem the type Captain Reiner talks about,” said Cadance. Seeing Jones’ quizzical look, she added, “You and your people here.”

“What makes you say that?”

“I’m talking to you right now, and I haven’t had one of your weapons aimed at me. I foalsat ponies before. I know when people are lying.”

That much was true. In the final days leading up to her wedding, she’d had her own suspicions when a photographer demanded to be allowed into the Palace apartments. A suspicion proven correct, after she found herself wrapped in Changeling wax no sooner than she’d asked if the photographer was invited.

Or perhaps Chrysalis was just a bad liar. Yet uncovering the deception hadn’t changed the dread and despair that sunk into her as hours went by in darkness, until a brilliant lavender glow had shone within the crystal caverns, and her soon-to-be sister-in-law came to the rescue.

Jones, for her part, let out a chuckle. “Fair enough. Actually, I spent quite a long time in the PHL, helping with freight distribution on the railroads, right up until just weeks ago… until the evacuation of Halifax… One last job for me. Then I quit.”

“One last job,” Cadance repeated. “Why’s that?”

“Let’s just say… there are things that go bump in the dark,” Jones replied mysteriously. “I don’t suppose you’re familiar with them.”

Cadance’s heart skipped a beat. Her mind flashed back to that great airship, her not-husband… And the grinning creature that stood so proudly by his side.

But all words she had on offer faded, as a horn sounded through the still morning air.

“Ah,” Jones said, without turning her head. “There she is.”

And, as Cadance and her escorts looked towards the water’s edge, they saw a vessel approaching. It was large, about as large as the sky-boat that had taken her to Canterlot so many years ago. Though drab and unassumingly grey, it was not unlike a boat of the Royal Fleet. Cadance suspected the unappealing colour was less about aesthetics, more about functionality, for lingering scraps of red paint told her the boat had been repainted more than once.

On top of the deck stood a large… gun, wasn’t it? A gunboat.

The boat bopped lightly against the edge of the wharf, marking its arrival. A small ramp extended from onboard, perhaps automatically, perhaps by magic, followed by someone Cadance would not have expected. It was a small pony, dressed in a two-piece uniform that must have been scrounged. A cream-coloured pegasus mare, with golden eyes and a primly trimmed, two-toned mane in shades of aquamarine and brown. There was a light skip to her step, a certain dissonant cheer set against the grim countenance of the ship’s deckhands and Cadance’s companions.

But the pony’s attention was neither on Jones, nor Cadance.

“Ana!” Dearheart exclaimed, breaking into a smile. “You got my letter!”

Bjorgman’s partner – Frieda, that was it – stifled a laugh. Ana smiled back. “Yeah, heh. Though it’s all business for now. Thanks for the letter.”

“It’s no trouble. It’s good to see you around these parts again.”

“Yeah, heh. We’ll catch up later, yeah?” Bjorgman replied.

“For sure!” Dearheart replied. She turned to look at Cadance at last, smiling. “Hello, Your Highness. We’ve been expecting you.”

Cadance inclined her head. The mare, chipper as she was, looked as harmless as any pony could. “So I’ve been told,” she said, returning the smile. She glanced at the boat. “Well, it won’t be my first time onboard one of those, I suppose, eh-heh.”

“Oh, are you in the Navy?”

“No, not at all,” Cadance said, “You’d have to ask my relative, Prince Blueblood, about that. Although I was interested in joining. At least partly,” she admitted with a grin, “because I always loved wearing those double-breasted peacoats.”

“Oh, I’m a fan of snappy uniforms myself,” Dearheart said, motioning to her own matching two-piece. “I’ve got one too now, so that’s nice! And if you’ve got a relative who’s a naval fellow, I look forward to meeting him.”

Teresa Jones’s expression had turned glum, and having bowed her head briefly, she silently plugged one earpiece back in. Evidently, she considered her part in the conversation over.

‘Good thing I didn’t press,’Cadance thought. She took a breath, gathering her thoughts. “I’m told you might be able to help me with something.”

“Ah, what about?” Dearheart asked.

“The things that go bump in the dark,” Cadance echoed. “Teresa Jones explained your side of the war. And… Well, I’ve got a thing or two to ask about the Newfoals.”

~ Jarden, USA ~

The sky was not overcast, and yet the clouds, Luna thought, seemed to gather over one particular place in Jarden. It was a property like many other houses they’d passed. A single house sitting on a patch of green land. What set this house apart were a scant number of details – the colour, a garish-looking yellow, seemed rather faded, the structure was fairly aged with a peeling surface; and there was the worn feeling one got from looking at it.

So of course, this was the Radwick household, even if the rusty mailbox didn’t give that away.

“It’s still that damn colour…” Luna heard Maxine muttering, in the manner one would speak of an old deficiency that had been around for years.

They walked past a lone wooden post adorned by a metal equine figure.

“That’s a horse, not a pony.” Maxine said dismissively, marching towards the front door without batting an eye at the silhouette. “Ack... Sooner we get this over with, the sooner we can move on.”

“But isn’t this your house?” asked Luna, tilting her head. “Shouldn’t you spend some time here to, I don’t know, relax?”

“No,” was all Maxine said, stopping to reach into a pocket and pull out a key.

In short order, the door was unlocked and Maxine entered, Luna following soon after, though wary about the implications.

Amazingly, the inside was far more prepossessing than the exterior. It was fairly average decor, if Luna had to guess, but she immediately took note of the simple, cosy layout. Beyond floors with half-decent carpenting, to the left there was a staircase to the second level, to the right, an old wall clock that still told the time, a loud screeching sound–

“No, that’s not it,” wheezed a voice not far from the front door, sounding weary and dismayed. “Still needs to be fixed.”

“And that’s him,” Maxine muttered. The woman looked to Luna. “Now don’t you say anything, unless you have to.”

“Okay,” said Luna, nodding vigorously. “Oh. Right, sorry.”

“Whoever is here is trespassing,” said the voice, sounding gruff and annoyed. “I’ve got the Sheriff's department on speed dial after the last time someone broke in, and a protection order.” So, state your business now, or you’ll be forced off the property in handcuffs.”

“Tourists, they come here from time to time,” Maxine whispered.

Luna looked down at her flowery shirt, then bit her lip nervously. She pocketed her sunglasses.

“Dad? It’s Maxine,” the woman called, but in a softer tone than Luna had heard before “I need to talk to you about something important. It’s about Mom, and Alex.”

There was a brief moment of silence, only broken up by the wall clock’s ticking, before there was a clicking sound. It continued, until Luna saw a figure standing not far from them in what was probably the living room.

Said figure was a man, dressed in what could be assumed as casual wear, except for the rather prominent brace on his left knee. The man himself had a bushy beard and greying dark hair. His eyes were a brown colour, in a different shade than Maxine’s, yet Luna could perceive that the two humans were related, despite nothing immediately suggesting such.

“Max?” he whispered, stunned. “How are you here? I thought you were in Boston.”

“I was,” Maxine said quickly, “but I was given leave of absence after the battle ended.” Which was a partial truth. “Look, I need–”

“Who is this?” the man asked, his eyes now on Luna. “I'd have never thought to have seen you with a friend after DC.”

“Dad, please–”

“What’s your name?” he asked Luna, his eyes boring into hers.

“I’m…” said Luna, with a polite, friendly smile. She offered a forehoof. “I’m Claire. Claire de Lune. I’m a friend of Maxine’s from Canterlot. We… um, we first met a couple weeks ago.” She laughed anxiously. “Sorry… I’ve never been to a small town before. It’s all so, so new to me so, please excuse my… well… you know. An honour to meet you.”

There was a pause as Maxine’s father stood for a moment before turning away.

“If you say so,” he remarked, walking further down into the hall. “Come in and rest your legs. I have got some leftovers, if you’re hungry… Besides, it’s better to have one misinformed tourist rather than a bunch.”

Luna shot Radwick a nervous look.

~ Boston, USA ~

Passage across the channel had proven uneventful. This was just as Major Bauer had promised Cadance, although she’d felt nervousness, nonetheless. Following the rout the Imperial forces had been dealt the night before, he and the other officers on the ground had doubted a new offensive would befall Boston in the near future. But Cadance saw this part of town, as she stepped off the ramp and onto a stone platform that couldn’t have served as a wharf, looked even more wrecked. Here, detritus floated in the scummy water, plastic cups and knives and forks and trays and paper bags and various other cast-off pieces of civilisation, including what she fervently hoped wasn’t a used condom.

“How far?” Cadance asked, pulling her gaze away and pushing down her bile.

“Half a mile,” Dearheart replied. “Come, Princess. Follow me.”

The path took them down what once must have been a small parkland area, now overgrown without proper maintenance. But soon they stepped out into an open space. A road made of concrete such as Cadance had seen on every street in Boston, only this concrete surface was wider than that of the streets, since no buildings, only small strips of uncut grass stretched on either side. They walked in lockstep, Cadance going after Dearheart while flanked by her PHL escorts, Miss Jones having stayed behind. Silence reigned as they marched through a crossroads, a concrete wall rising to their left. Predominant material on this world was concrete, so it seemed.

They crossed a bridge and went under an overpass. Eventually, they reached a fork in the road, turning left here by a building that was no longer concrete, but a rich red, and finding a small winding path upon a grassy hill.

“In there,” whispered Dearheart, gesturing.

The path led to a strange edifice. A large, glass-paneled cube, green as the sea, yet the glass panes looked grimey from getting cleaned less often than they should have. Set within the entrance, where the eye couldn’t miss it, was a rectangular column, the numbers ‘8:14’ etched upon its surface.

Cadance stared at Dearheart, but the mare just nodded. She went inside, taking a moment to drink in the space.

It was sparse, smaller than she’d have considered comfortable. This was evidently not a structure built for accomodation, nor could she believe its occupant spent much time living there. Yet the place did have some personalisation to it.

Comic books, lying on the floor. Different titles, but most of them marked ‘IDW’, with cover art indicating they were apparently about blocky robots called Transformers.

“We live in a society…” spoke a voice, making Cadance’s eyes dart up. It was a woman’s voice, coming from behind another sea-green column. “Where honour is a distant memory… Isn’t that right– Princess Cadance?”

There was a touch of amusement to the voice. Playful, even, like she knew something others did not. Cadance, undeterred, held her head high, clearing her throat. She’d handled world leaders. A single HLF commander could not be difficult.

“Maybe. But not so distant that you won’t speak face-to-face, Miss?”

“If you’d prefer,” said the figure, stepping out.

But when Cadance saw what stepped from behind that column, it was all she could do not to gasp in surprise and alarm, and she had to take her own step back. Her senses had told her that her interlocutor would be short in stature – but not how truly short. Had Cadance focused a little harder, she’d have picked up an oddity to her interlocutor’s footsteps.

Not two beats. Four.

This fantastic apparition, grumbling under her breath, for she was struggling to fit one forelimb through a sleeveless gap in her camouflage-green jacket even as she walked, came into full view of Cadance’s bewildered eyes. Younger-looking than her voice suggested, despite the evidence of at least one scar upon her dark-coated back, strode the commanding officer, an earthpony.

With a groan and a tug, the mare succeeded in wedging herself into her jacket, thus completing her officer’s look.

Sighing, she glanced back, seemingly ignoring Cadance, who still wasn’t sure her eyes weren’t playing tricks on her.

Yet there it was, unmistakeable – a match for the jet-black of her mane, the mare’s tail, swishing back and forth. The mare gave a snort, yet there was some purpose to her tail’s motion, as it deftly picked up something she’d left by the column, which Cadance saw was a rounded green cap with a stiff bill at the front, and the mysterious words ‘Jack Wolfskin’ written on its crown. One swift flick of the tail later, and the cap landed, neat as you please, atop the mare’s head.

For some reason, the mare didn’t look entirely pleased.

“Fuck, never can get this right,” she complained, using a forehoof to turn the cap around, so that its bill faced backward, covering her nape. “One day, perhaps.” She shook her head. “Anyway. You wished for a face-to-face, Princess?”

Cadance remembered where she was, and what she was doing – gawking at her. Picking her jaw from the floor, she nodded. “Y-yeah, I guess… uh…”

“Really, Verity?” Dearheart suddenly chimed in. She must have snuck in, quiet as a ghost. “‘We live in–’ of all things, that’s what you’re gonna choose to open this with?”

The mare called Verity rolled her eyes. “Oh, please, can’t I have a little fun? Don’t lie, you thought that was funny. I did. Amber and Rivet like it.”

“Only cos’ it’s you, you and your dumb comics,” Dearheart retorted. She leaned closer to Cadance, giggling. “She always does this, you know.”

“Yes, yes, alright, thank you, dear,” the mare replied, adjusting her cap with a huff. “I'll take over. Go talk to Ana or something, we shouldn’t take long.”

The mare moved past Cadance, ushering Dearheart towards the exit. The two shared a smile – and if neither Cadance’s eyes nor attuned magical senses deceived her, a tiny blush.

“Okay,” said Dearheart. “Have a nice talk, you two.”

Left alone with the officer, Cadance mustered a smile, looking ahead to meet the mare’s eyes.

“Princess Mi Amore Cadenza,” she introduced herself. “Or… Cadance, for short. Just go with Cadance.”

“Verity Carter, at your service, Princess,” said the mare, doffing her cap. “Charmed, I’m sure.”

Cadance blinked. “Verity… Carter?”

The mare shrugged. “Last I checked, I didn’t change it, so yeah. Verity Carter.”

“You’re… um, you’re a–”

Verity Carter pointed towards a granite bench in one corner of the glass cube.

“Have a seat. It must’ve been a long trip… You’re from very far away, Dearheart says. Further than her Equestria.”

The mare smiled. Neither condescendingly, nor in challenge. Merely a friendly smile. Cadance didn’t feel compelled to return it, however.

“Very. In more ways than one,” Cadance said uncertainly, accepting the seat. “Aunt Luna and I have gone through a lot.”

“I can tell,” said Verity, jabbing a hoof towards her breastplate. “Your armour’s seen better days.”

“Well, as first times go, it wasn’t bad…” said Cadance. Her thoughts went to the broken dragon, injured, bruised and singed. The dragon she saw as a brother. She steeled herself. “Look, um, Miss Verity. I don’t mean to be rude, but… Spike. The dragon.”

“You want to know if he’s safe?” Verity asked.

“Yes,” Cadance said, keeping her voice even. “Of course. Is he?”

"Don't worry, he is. We're just... making sure his injuries are patched. Rest assured, Your Highness, we’ve no true interest in keeping him around.”

Verity smiled once more.

“I’m sorry,” she continued. “It’s awful, what happened to him. I, I don’t know what else I can say… Again, I’m sorry.”

Cadance nodded. This time, she felt her shoulders relax. “It’s alright. We can take it from here. We’re… well, we’re going to take him home.”

Home. She repeated it mentally. Such a simple word, and sentiment. Perhaps she was indeed lying to herself, oh yes. Spike hadn’t belonged to her Equestria. He was taken...

But then, unexpectedly, she felt a giggle come up. When it came out, it came out in a burst of laughter. Verity, for her part, looked surprised.

“Princess Cadance?”

“Nothing. Nothing!” Cadance exclaimed, shaking her head, wiping away a few tears. “Just… this, all this is just ridiculous. Spike’s supposed to be home and safe, my sister-in-law and husband tried to kill me, and-and you! You’re a pony! How are you a pony? Captain Reiner told us the serum didn’t just change people, it changed their souls, that it’s magical law or whatever! I just– gah, I’m sorry. It’s been a long day, and Aunt Luna’s off somewhere and–”

Breathe.

In, and out.

“Sorry,” Cadance said sheepishly, pushing a few strands of her mane away. “I’ve… I’ve had a busy day. Or night.”

“I can tell. Where do you want to start?”

Cadance looked her over. “Verity… Carter,” she enunciated slowly. “Your name. It’s–”

“Yes,” Verity said sharply, almost as if she’d been expecting this. “Mike Carter, founder of the HLF. He was my father. Adopted, technically. But the only Dad I had.”

“Oh. I’m sorry,” Cadance said, not sure now why she was sorry. “I was adopted too,” she added softly. “A village of earthponies in Oleander raised me from when I was a baby. I’ve never known who my parents were… But Princess Celestia found me one day… Told me I was her sister’s heir…”

There was more to this story, of course. More which she had told Alexander Reiner. The encounter with the enchantress, Prismia, that had shaped her destiny. Mysteries she knew no answer for to this day, including her parents. Yet before her was a mare who was herself a mystery.

“How?” Cadance whispered.

She didn’t say anything else.

Verity Carter tapped her snout, a crafty look in her eyes. “Poison-joke,” she said simply. “I tripped into a bunch of ’em while snooping ’round a PHL greenhouse. Been stuck like this ever since. Would you believe the wacky theories I heard people spout about me, though? Sometimes it really ain’t that complicated.”

“Poison-joke,” Cadance repeated. “But why would poison-joke… turn you into… a pony. Twilight told me it… you know, plays jokes on you. Turns your voice funny, makes horns floppy. But why a pony?”

Sighing, Verity stared at her, with those large eyes Cadance knew well on ponies, yet something underneath it hinted at the mare’s human origins.

“Guess you could call it that, eh? A joke,” Verity said at last. “Because that’s who I was. Daddy’s little terrorist, an HLF fanatic through-and-through.” Her gaze swept over the glass cube. “Do you know what this place is?”

“I was told we’re next to Logan International,” said Cadance. “An airport.”

Verity nodded. “Right. It’s where Dad used to work, before the war. Here, in Boston. For the airlines. But this isn’t what I’m talking about.”

She pointed at a column, the one at the entrance, on the front of which Cadance had read ‘8:14’.

“Look closer. See what’s written.”

This was the back of the column. At the top was written ‘United Airlines Flight 175’. And below, two lists of names. Crew and passengers.

“What does it mean?” Cadance murmured.

“It’s a memorial,” said Verity, a heaviness in her tone. “More than twenty years ago, an attack rocked this country to its core. People couldn’t understand why… why anyone would do such a thing. What kinds of monsters would blindly kill innocents, even if it meant taking their own lives to do it? At the time, it felt like the worst that could happen…”

Those eyes turned again to Cadance. There were no tears, yet their look was haunted.

“And then when the worst really is upon you, and you know your very right to exist is under threat… Well, suddenly it becomes a lot easier to feel justified, in doing unto others before they do unto you. Your life hardly matters. Only theirs matters less.”

Verity gave a sour little laugh.

“It’s funny. Most of us grew up expecting the Apocalypse to be something out of Tom Clancy… Not the pastel Covenant.”

“I… don’t know what either of those things are, I’m afraid,” Cadance said hesitantly.

“Ah, Dearheart told me I should tone it down, heh…” Verity said wanly. “I wasn’t being totally random, you know, when I started this conversation talking about honour… Honour and respect... Those are values my father swore by, but in the end, for all his talk of respect, he had little to show.”

She wiped her eyes, of tears Cadance wasn’t sure were there.

“Maybe I still can’t quite blame him,” Verity muttered. “He’d lost everything. Mom got sick, and there was no cure… Fucking Alzheimers. So they turned to Equestria for help… Th-that fucking serum did the opposite of what Mom hoped it'd do. Turned her back into what she wasn’t. The stuff only recognises biological sex… All the struggles she went through the years, down the drain and, and... and Dad got upset. Real upset…"

She took a long, gasping breath. Cadance waited, but the other mare did not elaborate.

Instead, sighing, Verity leant over to pick one of the comics off the floor. The title on the cover caught Cadance’s eye. Latter-Day Saints. Under the title, a list of names again. And then Cadance understood. One name appeared on all of the comics in the pile.

“It says here this was written by a Jazmin Carter,” Cadance said. “Teresa Jones told me…”

“Yeah,” said Verity. “I don’t mind that she did. We learned to trust one another. Girl’s had it rough too, y’know. She didn’t get on the boat here with you, did she? Can’t blame her. That’s where she last saw her parents, wrong side of a ferry that was escaping Britain. Got there too early, and… Just missed each other. You notice that iPod she’s always listening music to? It’s all she’s got left of her old life.”

She shook her head, dropping the comic.

“That’s us all, really. Clinging onto whatever we can…”

Cadance felt her wings ruffle. Wings that hadn’t seen flight in so many years, before she flew in that cavern with Twilight. She saw herself as neither unicorn or pegasus, for she’d been raised by the earthponies of Oleander, akin herself to an earthpony in that old village, an old life to dream of.

A life she’d left behind, just as humanity was forced off theirs, by the will of a being she called Aunt. The visage of the Tyrant had been so close, so familiar...

“Princess?”

Cadance blinked. “Pardon, sorry, I was just… thinking.”

“Don’t worry. Happens all the time,” Verity said, chuckling, though it didn’t reach her eyes. “What else can we do, really… But it can be done. Dearheart used to be pro-Conversion, for one. It takes a while to de-program that, and her friends over in the PHL helped a whole lot. Me, I told her what that poison did to my Mom… And let’s just say, Dearheart's name isn’t for show."

Indeed, Cadance sensed something in her words.

“Then, Miss Verity,” Cadance coughed, keeping her focus on-topic. “You said ‘it’ can be done. You’ve been trying to find a way to be human again?”

Verity contemplated her for a moment. “Right. I got the radio from Tess. She mentioned you wanted to know about the Newfoals. Makes sense.”

Cadance nodded. “Yes. The… things that go bump in the dark. My… well, my Aunts would be interested, I can imagine. After all, you’re here.”

After a blink, the unlikely mare took another deep breath.

“Hmmm, apt description. See, there’s a history in this war of ‘anomalous’ Newfoals,” Verity said. “Newfoals made under mysterious circumstances, or endowed with unique… no, freakish abilities. Common sentiment in the Solar Empire is that they’re neither quite pony nor human. There was even a PER high-ranker, named Shieldwall, whose entire thing was the creation and exploitation of such creatures.”

“That…” Cadance blinked, swallowing. “They… deliberately engineered them?”

As an answer, it was oddly evasive. Also, the name ‘Shieldwall’ sounded familiar…

“That’s right,” Verity said quietly, regaining some bitterness. “Ones that could reanimate corpses. Ones that could use all kinds of unusual magics.”

She paused, wetting her lips. Something suddenly struck Cadance. The mare wore a look just like Sunset, on those occasions when she struggled on a difficult theorem.

“An… associate of mine had the privilege of meeting the last ‘Slow Newfoal’,” Verity finally said, “and I know she was the luckiest of them.” She pursed her lips. “Poor woman. But no matter what, you had to respect her. If you threw her out of a helicopter, she’d either teach herself to fly or hold onto a rope with her teeth for miles and miles. The idea of giving up was like poison to her.”

“And how long did she last?” Cadance asked.

“Kept most of her mind intact for five years, against all odds.” Verity sighed, glancing at Cadance. “I can’t claim to know better than the PHL– we’re all stumbling around in the dark, in our own way. But my existence… could it possibly suggest this transformation doesn’t have to come at the cost of the soul? What drains the souls from the serum’s victims?”

“Miss Verity,” Cadance said dolefully. “The ‘soul’ is a tenuous concept. Even on Equus, we do not know for certain if it exists. How would you guess this has anything to do with souls?”

“Wish I could say logic,” Verity replied, “but actually, it’s pop-culture. Being genre savvy can be pretty useful.”

Cadance blinked, before letting out a short, wistful laugh. “‘Genre savvy’. Hah! Yeah, I can understand that, definitely.”

‘I really must ask Shining if we’re gonna finish that Ogres and Oubliettes session one day…’

“I can appreciate what you’re saying, Miss, but I do have to ask… Are you alone in believing this?”

“Probably. Or a minority,” Verity said. “But it feeds into a theory the nerds have, PHL or otherwise. Take ol’ Newton’s Third Law. ‘Every action has an equal and opposite reaction’. That’s not just human physics, that’s the basis of your magic in every textbook we could get our mitts on. There’s nothing you can’t reverse.”

“Aunt Celestia told me that too,” Cadance remarked. She allowed herself a tiny smile. “Including poison-joke. My sister messed with them once. She wasn’t exactly happy till Aunt Celestia taught her how to fix it.”

Verity let out a chuckle. “Maybe I should ask your sister how she coped.” Her voice trailed off, as she lifted a hoof, examining it. “Truth be told, I hated myself for a while... But then, you know, I figured that me still being me, good old Verity, and not some Newfoal stooge? That’s a huge middle finger to the Empire. Well, if I still had any fingers.”

“I’m guessing that’s a rude gesture?”

“Oh, yeah,” Verity grinned. “It sure is… But then,” she added, her eyes twinkling, “to humans, so’s this. Well, sorta. Maybe I’m going to hell, doing what I’m about to in here, but… Here, lemme just–”

With a little flourish, she hopped off the bench.

“Dearheart!” Verity called softly. “Will you join us, please? We’re almost done.”

A moment later, the creamy pegasus trotted in, looking curious.

“Hey, sweetie,” Verity said, sidling up to her. “Remember what we talked about? Let’s show Princess Cadance how we do the thing.”

A blush appeared on Dearheart’s cheeks, bright as a tomato. “... Really? Must we, Verity?”

“C’mon. You said you would.”

“Oh, okay,” Dearheart tittered. “Cos’ it’s you.”

And before Cadance’s eyes, there played a scene she’d seen unfold so often between her charges and their friends. Verity lifted her hip, if a little awkwardly, and bumped her cutie mark against Dearheart’s, who bumped back in synch, three times in a row.

“How’d I do?” said Verity, as they pulled away.

“Smooth like a ballerina,” Dearheart replied, giggling.

“Aw, seriously? Don’t I get more than that?” Verity chided her, then planted a kiss on her cheek. Whereupon she turned back to Cadance. “There you go, Princess Cadance. You were asking if I’m looking to be human again. Well, between you and me, I wouldn’t mind, but…” She gave Dearheart’s flank a final bump, eliciting a squeak. “I know Dearheart here would miss this. It just isn’t the same.”

“Y-you are so soft and fluffy, as a pony,” Dearheart stammered.

“And you know that’s not what I’m thinking of,” Verity said, eyeing her slyly.

Cadance showed a small smile at the display. “So, how long have you two been together?”

“Long enough,” Verity replied. “Nowhere near the end.”

“It better not be,” Dearheart followed up with a firm nuzzle. She turned to Cadance. “So, has it all been settled? Great! I’ll radio your pals. Spike will be home in no time, promise.”

“But aren’t you missing something, Princess?”

That was when it hit Cadance. “You…” She gasped. “Oh, my. How… When did you get a mark?”

For there was a mark on Verity’s flank. A shape Cadance didn’t recognise, except she did. It was the blue-and-red cubic face, like an insignia, of a robot from the cover of Verity’s comics.

“As you can see, there’s more to me than meets the eye,” winked Verity. “And if it’s alright by you, there’s a couple secrets I’d sooner keep to myself. I’m the Mare Behind the Curtain. The Wizard of Oz herself. If the Empire catches wind that I’m a human, who never forgot who she was even with hooves– well, they’ll scramble everything they've got. I’m living proof their shtick is bullshit. It’s a charade for whatever shit they’ve spiked that serum with.”

“I see what you mean. Don’t worry, Miss Verity. Your secret is safe with me.” Cadance paused, as she felt that familiar, wonderful love flow within the memorial. “But you know, there’s an old saying. ‘To speak a thing and to do it are two separate matters’.”

“That might be true,” Dearheart agreed. “But I get the feeling you’re pretty good at ‘doing things’, Your Highness. You’ll find a way. You, and your Aunt… It's what we do. Find broken things, and give them a place. That's what Reverend Thomas would have wanted. That's what Harriet needed. And Verity’s been adding deeds to words.”

“Yes,” Verity said, nuzzling Dearheart. “We’ve already got a cabin set aside in the woods, way up in Canada. Timber from Earth, but put together entirely by pony hooves,” she said, tapping her own meaningfully upon the ground, “so the Barrier won’t affect it. We’re taking two foals with us, if their father can’t. Nor are we alone in such plans. If humanity does lose the war, there’ll still be ponies all over Earth, hiding from the Empire’s eyes, who remember… Especially me.”

Dearheart nuzzled her back. “Whatever UNAC’s told you,” she told Cadance, “Verity and her people? They don’t go by HLF anymore. That name’s been spoiled by… well, your PHL friends can tell you what, if Tess hasn’t.”

“Huh. So what do you call yourselves, then?”

Verity’s smile, as her foreleg fondly stroked Dearheart’s withers, was warm as the morning Sun.

“The Harriet Thomas Foundation.”

~ Jarden, USA ~

Maxine’s father sat upon a sofa, pressing a button to elevate a kickstand to support his legs. Luna’s eyes took a cursory glance of the living room – by the sofa, there was an old coffee table in front of its midsection, the rather worn love-chair Maxine was sitting on, a sliding glass door with a screen to the outside, and a small kitchen to the right.

“So, what do you need?” Maxine’s father asked, his right hand briefly touching the rather frayed-looking violin beside him. “And no, Maxi… I’m talking to you. I’d like to know what your friend wants,” he added, before she could answer. His brown eyes looked again at Luna, who saw a faded spirit in them. “My name is Dan, by the way. Dan Radwick.”

“Well, it’s still–”

“You’re not fooling me with that name,” Dan said with sudden bluntness. “I’ve done sales long enough to spot an alias. So I’d appreciate a full truth, rather than a discounted one.”

Luna sighed resignedly. “I suppose I overdid it, didn’t I?”

“Maybe. Now, if you would be kind, who are you? I know my daughter well enough that after–”

“If I may ask first, Mister Radwick,” said Luna. “Do you have eyes watching in here?”

“She means cameras.”

“Maxine, you know I don’t trust that kind of shit.” Dan said friskily, “people can have a private conversation between themselves without others listening in.”

Luna nodded. “Very well, then. I am Luna,” she said simply. “Apologies for the alias, Mister Radwick. I thought it was appropriate.”

Dan gazed at Luna for a moment, before looking to Maxine, who gave a slight nod. he seemed to pause, processing what he’d just been told before sinking into his sofa.

“A Princess.” He sighed deeply, before rubbing his eyes, “I’ve got royalty in my house. Perfect. Juuust perfect.”

“I hope this isn’t too much of… well, a surprise, Mister Radwick,” Luna continued. “And if I may be honest, this is not my true form, so, if you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to stay like this for now. I don’t wish to intimidate anyone.”

“Couple of things,” he began. “First off, my name is Dan. My kids call me Dad, my wife calls me Daniel if she needs or has to, and, if I need to be a professional business attorney, then it’s Mister Radwick. I’d prefer it if you called me Dan, Princess Luna.”

‘He’s taking this… rather well.’

“If you’ll call me Luna, then, we are in agreement,” Luna said, tapping her breast-pocket. “I’m not here on official business.”

“I’m gonna tell you something real quick,” Dan rambled. “These past few years have been a total mindfuck. Starting with the country almost tearing itself apart in 2016, this whole pony thing has made less sense than making a book out of expired coupons. And now, the world’s either insane or getting destroyed because of a Barrier that vapourises anything it touches, and from the grapevine, Alex’s disappeared to do God knows what.”

“Dad, she’s here to help.” Maxine said quietly, “all we need–”

“I know. I heard it before.” Dan said sharply, “but I’d like to know one thing first. Where is Alex?”

“Alex is alive... Dan,” said Luna. “In Equestria. And I am here to see where he came from, and what he holds dear. I wish to hear his, and your family’s story.”

“Equestria?” Dan said, eyes narrowing.

“My Equestria,” Luna repeated. “An Equestria that did not know of this war, until your son revealed it to us. Now, Alex has told us much about your world, that which I now tread upon. But I wish to hear his story, too. To understand.”

She leaned forward, resting her chin on a forehoof, and tilting her head curiously.

“Please?” she said.

Dan rubbed his eyes again. “Okay, then... I’m gonna go through this like you’re not just my meds acting up. Here’s the short of it. Megan and I met at a rodeo. I was trying to sell some product that went nowhere. She was there because she needed time out, time out of the house, after her first husband… Andrew, got killed overseas…”

He paused sadly.

“We chatted a bit, kept in touch afterwards, and boy, I even managed to get an important ‘yes’ from her later on. From there, I became little Alex’s stepdad… but never his father.”

The man said it bitterly, shaking his head.

“Then we had Maxine,” Dan gestured to his daughter, “and, because of my work, we had to make a choice. Me being away for months, or us moving together as a family. Megan decided the latter, because her old house had too many memories in it.”

‘That’s right…’ thought Luna, ‘they moved around… Reiner even said his mother and father met somewhere other than where she grew up. This isn’t herhouse…’

“Alex probably never forgave me for that.” Dan murmured, “I tried to connect, Luna, I really did, but Alex never did get around to letting me in. Or Megan for that matter.” He laughed croakily. “Almost have to wonder if that’s genetic.”

“What do you mean?” Maxine asked, a slight curiosity in her voice.

“Megan never talked that much about her history, Max,” Dan said firmly, “I met her brother at the wedding, and never so much as got a Christmas card from him. I never once met her younger sister.”

“Why didn’t you tell me, Dad?”

“Better question is why theydidn’t, Max,” Dan said. “That whole family… none of them liked talking that much. Megan would sooner talk about Danny than Molly, and that would only be once in a blue Moon… if you’ll forgive the expression, Your Highness. Their parents weren’t much help, either. Hell if I know whatever happened to them.”

“Do you know why?” Maxine pressed.

“... No, I don’t.” Dan admitted, “you’d think, being married for so long, Megan would’ve told me. Closest that I ever got was when… they showed up.”

He gestured towards Luna, who suddenly felt very cold. Colder, even, than when the Archmage had stepped forth to greet her in the confines of that great airship.

“For a while, she was stuck watching TV, like it was 9/11 all over again,” Dan continued. “Kept muttering how ‘impossible’ this should be… But she never said anything else, and if I tried to press her, she’d just brush me off.”

“So, nothing then?”

“No, not nothing. I got something– wait here.”

He pressed a button that moved the sofa back to how it was previously. He then limped away into some other part of the house.

“Maxine, does Dan… does he dream?” Luna asked in the lull. “He doesn’t look like he sleeps very well. Yet he’s taking all this better than I expected him to."

“Whatever his state of mind, Dad’s just been able to shrug off anything.” Maxine said solemnly.

Yet her eyes were focused on the roughed-up violin. Luna could tell it’d taken a lot of damage that went beyond simple wear-and-tear. The biggest indicators were the cracks and chips on the instrument’s neck. It gave the impression of much-needed repairs or fine-tuning, by the way the strings were lined.

Perhaps its state was not due to the ravages of time. Maybe it had been damaged in a fit of rage or frustration. Maybe Dan hadn’t always been that stoic.

The lull was broken when the ‘click’ of Dan’s leg announced his return. Luna and Maxine watched him approach with two leather-bound books tucked under his arm.

“I found these in Megan’s hope chest, alongside some of her other personal items,” Dan explained, taking one out and showing it for both of them to see. “Hell if I know these’ll be important to ending all this shit, but who am I to say? Perhaps I’m missing something I’m just too dumb to pick up on. See if you can figure ‘em out.”

“Oh, do not worry, Dan,” said Luna. “We have just the right person for the task. And… thank you.”

“I have one condition first,” Dan said, tucking the book back under his arm. “It has been a long while since you’ve visited, Max. Bit late for lunch, but I’d appreciate it if you could stay tonight, have some dinner with me. Your friend is welcome too, of course, Southern hospitality and all. Be nice to have a visitor who isn’t trying to kill or abduct me.”

Maxine seemed to contemplate this. She kept her eyes on the floor and gave a slight nod. Luna, meanwhile, smiled brightly.

“Thank you, once again.” she said. “It’s an afternoon off, then. We’ve still got a long way to go, I feel…”

~ Canterlot, Equestrian Solar Empire ~ Thirteenth Day of the Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~

The Royal Gardens weren’t always so forlorn in their atmosphere, especially at dusk. Once, these gardens here welcomed the company of many, from curious fillies in guided tours, to lonesome souls taking a break from a weary day at work, to young lovers seeking a secluded place to frolic in private. A place that welcomed and sheltered all, in hardship and in peace.

Now there stood a lone statue, and her stony, defiant gaze loomed over the gardens as she had in life, during her final waking hours.

Archmage Twilight sat there in its shadow, reclining on the bench. After fifteen hours’ sleep, reason and duty dictated she had catching-up to do. So she was trying to read. But her mind kept wanting to drag her back to sleep… Even through the phantom pain of what remained of her left ear, covered by bandages.

Her horn glowed dimly, just enough to illuminate the books and textbooks that accompanied her, from Mount Aris and Seaquestria: Two Worlds, One People, to Canterlot, A History, to a meticulously copied version of Starswirl’s Journal.

No comforts took her mind off the tiniest of errors, though, and her face scrunched up.

“I thought we made it clear not everything needs an exhaust shaft this big! Especially this airship engine model! That’s the new stabiliser’s job, why would they–”

Closing the cover of her edition of Crystals & You: A Pocket Guide, she flipped the pages back, to its table of contents.

“Year 15, Era Imperator,” Twilight read. “Great, guess I’ll have to ask First Folio if she’s got a newer edition… Right, that’s for tomorrow then.”

Shaking her head, she set aside the book onto the pile next to her, and settled for Starswirl’s Journal. Which, to her chagrin, still hadn’t been translated right, from the plethora amount of grammatical errors. And a mistranslated book was no pleasant read.

“Now that’s another thing to do, ugh. Thanks, Sunburst,” she complained. “If you want something done right, gotta do it yourself… well, sleep it is, then.”

Setting aside the future project, she closed the book. Try as she could, not even the thought of personally translating Starswirl’s book of spells could take her mind off of the events that had transpired on Earth, barely a day ago.

And the dark alicorn that encompassed her thoughts loomed behind her, even superseding Spike, wherever he was.

‘We’ll get you back, Spike… we’ll... we’ll get everyone back.’

With a yawn, Twilight hopped off the bench. But just as she was to leave, she paused, and looked back at the stone Luna. Though the statue remained as inert as ever, part of Twilight remembered how the two of them had reunited, fought, and almost killed one another.

Still grey, lifeless, as it should not be…

Shaking her head, Twilight picked up her books, and moved on. “Sweet dreams, Luna…”

No reply came, but this didn’t trouble her as much as it had before.

Yet her rooms, the Archmage’s Quarters of the Palace, never felt as comfortable as her beloved Golden Oaks, or even her old observatory. On the surface, it had everything she could’ve wanted. There were bookshelves on every wall, a small loft with a bed, the finest armchairs and coffeemaker that the Palace could buy, a long dark wooden table, but…

It just didn’t feel like home. All three rooms felt so lonely and cold, ever since Spike became too big for them. And since her move from Ponyville, it was where she would conduct her official business, along with some research in the attached laboratory. It made all her new responsibilities as Archmage feel inseparable from life itself. As if no matter how long she spent in the admittedly soft bed, the war would always be in the next room.

And that wasn’t going into, how so long ago, she had shared long-forgotten laughter with Shining Armor… and Cadance.

Suppressing the bitterness that welled up, she trotted down the corridor, and paused, to listen in to what two of the nearby Loyalty Guards were talking about.

“...I’m telling you, she doesn’t actually like salmon juice all that much,” said the first one – Terramar, as deadpan and honest as ever.

“What, your sis had a change of heart or something?” replied the second one, in the tell-tale, laid back tone of Gallus. At first, Twilight hadn’t thought much of him, but for a Griffonstone orphan to rise all the way to the Loyalty Guard, the Captain of the Canterlot Branch no less, was something to be appreciated.

“Nah, she got used to other stuff. Like what the Kirin make. Besides, she likes a fancy dinner. So, might as well go all the way, Cap’n.”

Twilight blinked. Gallus had, of course, not-so-subtly hinted that he wished for a transfer to Mount Aris. Now she knew why.

‘Sorry, champ,’ she thought, with an apologetic sigh. ‘Still need you here.’

“Right, yeah, count that out then. When’s the next tour to Mount Aris anyway...”

“Beats me, Cap’n,” Terramar replied. “you’re the one who made the schedule.”

“What?” said Gallus, his tone so indignant that Twilight had to let a smirk creep up on her. “Argh… I wasn’t such of an… egghead, before this assignment, y’know? Now all the homework is on me–”

His voice died down. Twilight had chosen that precise moment to turn the corner, and greet them both with a serene smile.

“Gallus, Terramar,” Twilight said. The two Guards snapped to attention in a split second, yet there was a blush in the to the griffon’s cheeks. It contrasted so strongly to his vibrant blue feathers and fur. “Fancy seeing you two here.”

“Lady Archmage, ma’am!” exclaimed Gallus, with a crisp salute, followed by Terramar’s own. Twilight returned it in kind. “My apologies. I did not expect you to be up this late.”

“At ease, Captain,” said Twilight. “To be honest, neither did I, but reading always takes up time. Well, might as well make it quick.” Normally, briefings were to be held at her office, but with the headache that threatened to resurface beneath her bandages, good sleep was something she’d rather have sooner than later. “How’s the attendance list looking for the Joint Council session?”

Terramar cleared his throat. “Chief Mage Sunburst will be arriving this morning, just before the meeting, Lady Archmage. The ‘Great Equestrian’ is still at Hollow One and, um, High Captain Shining Armor wishes to remain there for now.”

“As I thought. I really need to talk to him about going down with the ship these days… Dash was right. And I expect Clever Ace will be filling in for him tomorrow, right,” said Twilight. She held back a yawn. “I’ll best be on my way. We’ve got a long day ahead.”

“Ahem, Lady Archmage?” Gallus said. “What of the Queen?”

Twilight contemplated it briefly.

“I’m afraid I must retire for the evening soon, Captain,” said Twilight. “Please, inform the Queen I shall be available after tomorrow’s session is adjourned.”

“Understood, Your Ladyship,” said Gallus.

“What would you like for breakfast, Your Ladyship?” Terramar piped up. “Something after a good night’s sleep?”

“Some hayfries would be nice,” Twilight replied. “Something quick, you know?”

Terramar’s nod was all that she needed. Without any further queries, she gave them a nod, and turned to leave.

Then something occurred to her.

“Princess Silverstream likes roasted salmon, by the way,” Twilight said casually. “I’m sure she’ll be delighted for some, next time you visit, Gallus.”

“Oh,” said Gallus. Even without looking, Twilight could imagine a nervous smile. “T-thank you, uh, Lady Archmage. I don’t know how to make one–”

She heard Terramar give Gallus a nudge, tapping on his armour. She turned around, levitating a book towards Gallus. The griffon’s eyes widened when he saw what it was.

“Fifth edition, so that’s page 117,” said Twilight. “Don’t worry, it’s not as hard as you think. I mean, if I can do it… heh.”

Gallus, for all the times she’d overheard him lament the reading he had to do as an Imperial Guard, nodded vigorously. She exchanged an amused smile with Terramar. Whose gaze, Twilight noticed, had drifted towards the bandaged side of her head...

“My Lady,” said Terramar. “I’m… I’m really sor–”

“It’s okay, Terramar,” said Twilight. “Look… just relax, okay? It wasn’t your fault.”

She shook her head, then smiled reassuringly.

“Just enjoy the night, you and Gallus. And really, if Shearwater also wants to say she’s sorry, well, she knows what I told her.”

Her bodyguard looked like he wanted to ask further, but he kept his beak shut, and simply nodded.

“Thank you, Lady Archmage,” said Gallus. He saluted. “Have a good evening.”

“And a good rest, Lady Archmage,” added Terramar. “Oh, and uh, Scootaloo wishes you well.”

“Good evening, Terramar, Gallus, and rest well.”

And with that, she was off to her room at last.

From the moment she crossed the doorway and closed it behind her, nothing else crossed her mind. No, nothing else. She barely had time to place her diadem on the bedside table, before she slumped onto the bed, with nothing but dreams of an ethereal mare in blue to accompany her sleep.

~ Boston, USA ~

Cadance was with Spike. Outside the tent, snow had begun to fall, and night was falling anew.

She heard Lady Cadenza push open the tent-flap. Silently, her counterpart, whatever other business she’d had for the day sorted, approached them both, staring melancholically at the heavily-slumbering dragon.

Cadenza sighed. “That’s humans for you,” she murmured. “They’re like griffons, or…” She stared at Spike. “Dragons. They love to talk big game about how tough they are, but at heart, they’re far more soft and sentimental than they let on…”

“But shouldn’t that be a good thing?”

“Not necessarily,” Cadenza said gloomily. “No creature’s so dangerous as one that hides from its own nature. And humans are masters at doing just that.”

She glanced at the tents’ sides, as if to make sure no-one was listening, then spoke in whisper.

“Lieutenant Ze’ev’s penal squad reported the capture of an Imperial officer. A Trailblazer,” Cadenza told her. “Her squad have not filled in the paperwork yet, and he hasn’t left the city. We can arrange for his transport. Although…”

When she didn’t finish her sentence, Cadance knew something was off.

“What’s the matter?”

Cadenza shook her head. “I was thinking about that little speech you made,” she said. “I can’t tell you how… peculiar it feels, to hear those words coming from your own mouth.” She laughed softly. “I guess we’ll have to get to know ourselves again, Cadance. Though I wouldn’t worry too much, if I were you. We may have more time than you think.”

“More time? Why?”

Unease etched into Cadenza’s features. “There’s… someone outside I think you ought to meet. She can explain it better than me. It’s about getting you home.”

“With Spike,” Cadance emphasised. “Spike, and the… Trailblazer. We need them both.”

“I hope so…” her counterpart said. Cold air invaded the tent as she lifted the flap, bidding Cadance she go first. “But that… depends a lot on what she says.”

Cadance stepped outside, wondering who ‘she’ was. It turned out that awaiting her in the snow, with the Foundation’s camp’s milling occupants giving them a polite berth, was not one ‘she’, but two.

One was a small unicorn. Though covered by the uniform of the PHL, her coat was strikingly of richest magenta. Her mane, a two-tone of violet hues. Purple was her colour in every regard, but for her mark – three cyan-blue diamonds.

And next to her, held under a comforting forehoof, there was a beige, wild-eyed earthmare, clutching a battered golden lyre.

Cadance’s heart skipped as she recognised the latter. Shocked, she turned to her other self, who nodded sadly.

“Yes,” Cadenza said. “When Lyra died, she left someone behind…”

Bonbon, the inseparable companion of little Lyra all grown-up. Was this what she had become in this blighted place, Cadance thought in horror, as she observed the twitching, sobbing mare, who never seemed to notice her presence in return. Snowflakes covered her, and she did nothing to shake them off.

Not bearing to look any longer, Cadance’s eyes drifted to the figure next to the broken Bonbon. And here again, she felt invaded by a flicker of recognition. Perhaps it was that, colours aside, the stranger had a face a lot like Lyra’s.

“Pardon me, Miss,” said Cadance. “Have we met?”

The magenta unicorn smiled faintly.

“Maybe?” she said. “My business is with crystals, Your Highness. If you come from a world where you reclaimed the Crystal Realm from Sombra without heartbreak, then it’s quite possible we crossed paths early into your reign. Or you and my otherworldly mirror-image, anyway.”

She straightened herself up, dusting snow off her vest.

“But I’m just plain Amethyst, a jeweller from Ponyville. My father’s the one you want, if you’re looking for help returning home.”

Cadenza chuckled, though with Bonbon still nearby, it felt forced.

“She sells herself short,” she told Cadance. “It’s Amethyst’s whole family who’ve allowed us to keep the Empire from cornering a monopoly on travel between Earth and our homeworld.”

Cadance remembered what her counterpart had mentioned earlier.

“You’re here to talk about getting us back,” she said to Amethyst. “Me and Luna, and Spike.”

“And opening a channel between our worlds,” Amethyst said warmly. “Though part of the reason I came all the way down here is because I wanted to see you for myself, Princess Cadance… But mostly how to get you back, ahem, yes.”

Some of the twinkle left her eye.

“And I’m sorry to say, this may be a little easier said than done.”

“What?” said Cadance. “Why?”

Amethyst looked at her seriously.

“The specifics of how you got here remain somewhat… undefined, Princess, though eyewitness reports of Princess Luna being initially accompanied by Discord help paint a clearer picture. But his absence now is very conspicuous. Luckily, UNAC’s leaders don’t really know who Discord is, but I think now’s the time to tell. The PHL will want to know. What happened?”

What to say? Cadance felt put on the spot, like she was the child trying to hide a secret. Luna had advised, probably wisely, against telling too much, too soon.

But UNAC and the PHL had been given a day to deliberate already. If not now, when would the time be right?

“There was a mishap,” she said unhappily. “Aunt Luna told me about it. The Archmage came prepared, and she petrified Discord. We weren’t able to save him.”

She saw Amethyst glance not at her, but the other Cadance behind her.

“That’s deeply unfortunate…” Amethyst said at last. “Yet if we act fast, perhaps not unsalvageable. We have agents in Equestria– that is, our Equestria, who given the time, might be able to interfere before the Imperials can do their worst with him. I shall inform Miss Cheerilee.”

Before she turned away, though, Amethyst leant to speak gently to Bonbon.

“I’ll be right back, Bonnie… Lady Cadance, if you’ll take over?”

Acquiescing, Cadenza walked up to take Amethyst’s place next to Bonbon. Without goodbye, Amethyst hurried away, tapping something in her ear and muttering breathlessly as she did so.

For a time, both Cadances stood facing each other, unspeaking.

“I’m sorry,” Cadance whispered. “We came here to help, but it looks as if–”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Cadenza said firmly. “Queen Celestia has a plan for everything… Helped by her Archmage, of course. I’m sure the Security Council will consider what you’ve brought them today worth far more than your stumblings.”

She looked herself over, then at Bonbon, and sighed.

“Especially after how we’ve stumbled far worse…”

“Worse…”

A reedy, haunted voice echoed her. Cadenza and Cadance were each surprised to hear that it had come from Bonbon, who’d raised her gaze from the lyre she held.

Cadance stepped forward. “Bonbon?”

“Worse… then… better.”

She felt a jolt as Bonbon took her forehoof.

Something was different about Bonbon’s eyes. It took Cadance a moment to figure out, before it hit her. The bright blue irises had realigned, and they stared at her – not with the glazed, unseeing reflection of madness, but focused.

Bonbon’s lips parted. “Two by two, the same are you… Yet also not… One from a lost past, the other, a future that might have been.” She grimaced with painful concentration. “Please… Is this… now?”

And Cadenza gasped softly. “Oh, Bonnie…” Lovingly, she patted Bonbon’s arched back. “Yes… Yes, this is now. What you’re seeing is real.” She pointed at Cadance. “That really is me. Another me. Bonbon… You’re… back with us?”

“No,” Bonbon winced. “Worse… Better… And worse again… Not forever, but who can know how it shall end. However… for now, my mind is quite clear… Only for a moment.”

She kept staring at Cadance, tightening her grip, while the other forehoof stroked the lyre she had set down on the snow-covered ground.

“I feel you… Even when I cannot see you. Tell… tell… my love… Always I am her Bonnie.” She breathed out mournfully. “Her and me, nevermore…”

Her eyes unfocused. As before, they drifted in different directions. Bonbon released her grip.

Princess Cadance and Lady Cadenza – the same person reflected, one a mirror to the past, one to the future, as was said – contemplated the broken soul between them, each knowing that the other thought the same thing.

“How did it get to this?” Cadance whispered. “How could we have let this happen?”

Cadenza shook her head. “I fear that somehow, I wasn’t blessed like you,” she said, feebly ruffling the wings beneath her vest. “When Celestia found me in Florentina, when I discovered I had a family in Prince Blueblood, when my Shiney loved me for who I was, I thought I’d got my pony-tale ending… And then I learnt it wasn’t enough…”

“But I don’t understand,” Cadance said, almost beggingly. “What about the Alicorn Amulet?”

“A trinket, gathering dust somewhere,” Cadenza said bleakly. “I tried it once. It had no effect upon me. And then, much later, it disappeared.”

“No, how can that be? Did you…” Cadance swallowed. “Could you have… done something wrong when you got it off Prismia?”

Her stunted mirror-image returned her gaze with a frown, and blinked.

“Who?”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

Removal of concept and character; Samantha Yarrow and the Reavers.

The aforementioned removed concept and character is replaced by Tess Jones and the Harriet Thomas Foundation.

This chapter may have represented one of the most challenging endeavours over the course of the rewrites, since it required the complete removal and potential substitution of a nine-thousand word scene.

Removal of concept and character; Commodore Daniel Romero and the Thunderchild-class super-ship Columbia.

The aforementioned removed concept is replaced by a meeting of Princess Cadance with Verity Carter of the Harriet Thomas Foundation.

On a personal note, I am quite happy with the “eureka” moment which crossed my head when the idea came to effectuate the aforementioned replacement for the nine-thousand word scene.

TB3: It is so wonderful to see Verity returning to the world of Spectrum, and to have been invited by Vox and the team to contribute these few words. It’s been many years now since I was last involved in the Spectrumverse, but I've continued to be impressed at the time, energy and love that the team have continued to pour into the project. And it seems really appropriate that Verity should return just as MLP returns to our screens. Both have been re-imagined, Verity to fit a new role in the overall story, and MLP to meet a new audience through the guise of A New Generation.

Something else they have in common is how both of them have delighted me. I've already become fond of Sunny, Izzy, Hitch and company, and Vox’s remix of Verity has not only honoured her original conception and backstory, but taken her in some new directions, and even given her a romantic partner. It's everything I could have asked for a more.

So here's to A New Generation and to The Other Side of the Spectrum, both of which continue to build upon and develop a world we first got to know all those years ago, “Once Upon a Time, in the magical land of Equestria…”

Spectrum 2.0 - January 18th 2020

Sledge115: Pictured above, how Luna would have reacted to the PHL-UNAC meeting had she attended it instead of Cadance. She doesn’t like paperwork. Or bureaucrats.

This chapter was supposed to be the last of Act Two; however, fact is that we’ve got a lot of ground to cover, and it was bordering around 40,000 words total. So, we’ve decided to split it in two, and if you squint at the two of them, you can tell it was meant to be one very long chapter :twilightsheepish: Splitting the chapter came with its own benefits, as it allows some breathing space and scenes that wouldn’t have otherwise been in the chapter, such as the Lady Archmage’s nighttime rituals.

The decision came recently, thanks to The Rise of Skywalker - personally, I thought it felt like two films crammed into one, with J.J. Abrams writing his own Episode 8 and shoving it into Episode 9, and, well, I didn’t want Chapter Nineteen to feel like it was rushed, too. Besides, now Act Two is a neat seven chapters long!

Yep! Luna’s youthful appearance is her Season 1 design, and her voice (as well as behavior) is based off the fan animation [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pepWxrTh1O8]Spare, which adapts a deleted Frozen song. She briefly sings that, and the fan-made song Midnight Frenzy to Maxine.

She was the one who picked out the shirts worn by her and Celestia in Season 9, Episode 13 (“Between Dark and Dawn”) so her being a tourist here is a little nod to that, too.

(Yeah. Big Luna fan here, hehe :twilightsheepish: More on that, and a few closing notes, on the next Authors’ Note.)

There are a few deleted scenes from the chapter’s first drafts, and I thought it’d be a shame to see them go to waste even if they were repurposed. If you wish to see how it would have gone with, say, Luna instead of Cadance in certain scenes, I’ll leave a thread on the forums for said scenes. Some of the scenes were deleted from the now-Chapter Twenty, so it’ll be posted alongside Chapter Twenty’s publishing.

Keep in mind that they are non-canon, so they aren’t spoilers, don’t worry.

Not to worry, we made sure the chapter as a whole was actually finished first before publishing the first half. Expect the finale to Act Two – Moonrise to come very soon :twilightsmile: As always, let us know what you think in the comments!

P.S.
I’ve also introduced an outline thread – it doesn’t spoil much, and it should be handy as an improvised table of contents. You can find it right HERE

JedR: Nope, not “back”. But when I was told there was going to be a scene with Daniel Romero of the Columbia, I knew I wanted to write that particular scene. Mainly because I like Romero too much to let anyone do anything with him :p

On a serious note, thanks to the guys for letting me have a shot at this one. They didn’t have to, and I know it wasn’t necessarily an easy call for them to make. So cheers, guys.

(Also, wrote 9,000ish words for this in less than five days. Nailed it, mudderkuffers!)

DoctorFluffy: I halped. Mostly around Jed’s scene there. And yes! Hope is making a cameo! I won’t tell you where she is, though. That’s a seeeecret.

VoxAdam: So as Sledge said in his note, this was originally going to be one long chapter, much like ‘Concordia Maxima’. And you can tell this chapter is still pretty long, equal in length to the previous one titled ‘Moonrise Over Boston’, in fact – if that was the climactic battle chapter of the Boston/Moonrise Arc, complete with both these terms included in its title, then this a mirror to it as the dénouement or battle’s aftermath.

But whereas ‘Concordia Maxima’ could justify its extreme length as a gathering of people from all four corners of the world, cramming to have Luna and Cadance go through all the steps on Earth and then return home in the space of one chapter wasn’t working. This was pretty much how things went down in ‘Trust’, the equivalent from OG Spectrum, which was that story’s longest chapter, and it suffered for a rushed pace.

Also… :pinkiesmile: While I’ve primarily stayed out of writing for Act Two, this chapter marks my return to writing full scenes. Maybe none so long as the 9,000 words mentioned by Jed for Romero and the Columbia – and, while pared down in the final published version, what you see here is majorly representative of the original draft, bar Cadance’s reasons for visiting Romero’s ship, which were reclarified later as part of her efforts to secure Spike. However, this isn’t the focus of anything I can claim to have written personally.

The opening scene between the two Cadances? That one is Sledge’s. And a fine scene I’m happy to see at last in Spectrum, too, because as far back that I can recall, there never was a meeting between Cadances in OG Spectrum. Not even TB3’s side-stories, though he did have plans which sadly didn’t come to fruition when we were co-writing The Beatification of Lyra Heartstrings.

On the other hand, the very last scene here of both Cadances? Boy, I hope that’s one heck of a “Wham” which I’ve left you with. :twilightsmile:

Cheers,
~Vox

Act II ~ Chapter Twenty ~ Accept The Dawn

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot
Rest in peace Terry Jones. May you not get troubled by Spam any further.

DoctorFluffy
Note: Poochie died on the way to his home planet

VoxAdam
As Kurt Vonnegut would say, ‘So it goes’.

Sledge115
Thus always to tyrants

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Twenty
Accept The Dawn

* * * * *

“What is the cost of lies? It’s not that we’ll mistake them for the truth. The real danger is that if we hear enough lies, then we no longer recognise the truth at all. What can we do then? What else is left but to abandon even the hope of truth and content ourselves instead with stories? In these stories, it doesn’t matter who the heroes are. All we want to know is: ‘Who is to blame?’”
— Valery Legasov, from Chernobyl

~ Jarden, Texas, USA ~ November 17th, 2024 CE ~

Maxine’s eyes snapped open.

She exhaled and massaged her face. She knew where she was. She remembered everything. She was in Jarden again, back in her old home, and had spent the night in the guest bed. Dad, bless his heart, didn’t need her to sleep in her old bedroom. She just couldn’t do it.

‘The Princess. Damn her for bringing me back here.’ Maxine thought bitterly, as she swung her legs over the bedside. ‘I could have done without another nightmare.’

Muttering, she slipped a dressing-gown over her night-clothes, and went for the door.

A good thing Dad hadn’t brought up the last friend she’d taken here. If he had, then she would have left and never come back. Though honestly, maybe this would have spared her the reminder that, surprise, family was more dysfunctional than one cared to admit.

Yes, the young Maxine Radwick hadn’t really considered how Mom had doted on her more than Alex. No wonder he’d joined the military... Yes, even into adulthood, Maxine hadn’t really understood how Alex resented her and Dan. And, yes, Maxine hadn’t paid attention to the fact she had an aunt whom Mom rarely visited, and an uncle they’d never met.

She remembered her phone ringing five years ago. The last time she’d heard from her mother. A frantic, desperate call begging for her to take Agnes, pack the car, and drive straight down to Jarden. She’d thought this was ridiculous.

For days, the news channels were filled with pictures of that energy-sphere, or whatever it was, expanding in Geneva. But this had been happening far away, in Europe. They would be fine. So long as things weren’t happening in America, then Americans would always be fine. She even remembered bringing this up to…

… Well, she remembered what that had ultimately cost her. Every night, Maxine Radwick remembered the day her world collapsed. And had she not got out of DC, she wouldn’t even be there to remember it.

A broiling purple cloud, rising across the Potomac. Like many others, she had been standing outside her car, stopped along Interstate 395. Perhaps it was only something her mind conjured up afterwards, influenced by what footage made it out of the city, but even at this distance, she’d heard the screams, and how they abruptly fell silent.

She’d later learn the Purple Mist had been global, affecting capitals and metropolises, and America was the worst hit. Not just Washington DC. Los Angeles, Chicago, Detroit, Houston…

Once past the initial lobbying against Conversion Bureaus –truly, Big Pharma had done a complete about-face on that one –America had wanted to be the country with the most Bureaus. And thus when the Mist was unleashed, they’d felt it hard.

But it was towards Equestrians that her feelings were never quite the same. Yes, Maxine had heard it all before, from plenty of people – even her brother. But the last time she trusted an Equestrian, she’d left DC empty-handed.

“… Careful!” she heard Dan exclaim. “Careful, don’t press it too hard, it’s not rated for hooves.”

“Sorry, sorry, let me just… there we go.”

“Good, now if you’d excuse me…”

That brought Maxine out of her thoughts. She was almost halfway down the stairs. Apparently, mulling over old scars turned you into a sleepwalker.

‘Better check what they’re up to.’

With a few more steps, Maxine reached the bottom and entered the living room, catching a peculiar sight. Namely, Princess Luna, free of any regalia and still in her little-pony disguise, laying on the sofa with a laptop.

Her Dad noticed her, giving her a quiet nod as he limped past her, towards the kitchen.

“Ahh, good morning, Miss Radwick,” Luna said, without looking up. “I see you too have woken up early.”

“Force of habit. Why are you up?”

“Oh, I simply forgot, I don’t have to lower the Moon here,” Luna replied, shrugging. “But, at least, I did get to use this… fascinating device.”

Well, it was said Princess Luna could move a Moon. It made sense she’d be innately nocturnal.

“Look! Your father was kind enough to show how, so I made myself an ‘email’,” said Luna, turning the laptop around. Squinting, Maxine saw it was a Gmail inbox. Empty, and bare of any flashy themes. “But wait, let me try this and...”

Her horn lit up, pressing the keys by magic. Right after, a lone email popped up in her inbox.

“Ta-dah!” Luna exclaimed cheerfully. “See? My, isn’t this exciting!”

“You just sent an email to yourself,” Maxine said dryly, pulling at her gown’s sleeves.

“I know, right? Tia told me how the post office works, that’s true, but this...” Luna shook out her mane, laughing freely. “And Dan told me one could send mail to the other side of the world, in mere seconds. If only Tia was here to see it– paper and parchment, bah, so old-fashioned! I can’t wait to see the look on her face.”

Try as she might, Maxine had trouble picturing it. A Celestia, any Celestia, showing a benevolent interest in human technology, after everything that had happened…

Still, fancy coming upon her Dad explaining to someone older than him how to use a computer.

“And, I must say, there’s considerably more to this than I’d expected. Oh, if only I had time! To think that your archives, the realm in which you keep your knowledge, are accessed so easily– I could almost envy this ‘Internet’! And that doesn’t even cover how this curious device works… hmm, to do so much in so little a space, I simply must know!”

“That’s what they said before, you know,” Dan’s voice called out as he limped towards them, two mugs in his hands. “That’s how it started. All the sweet talk of joining magic and tech… Well, look where we are now, Luna.”

Taking one of the mugs, Maxine thought Luna looked deflated. The alicorn-in-disguise sighed, blowing away a strand of blue mane.

“A grim reminder,” Luna said solemnly, before also accepting a coffee from Dan. It hovered in a blue glow of TK as her eyes fell upon the two journals on the coffee table.

“Hm, you made any headway on those?” Dan asked, taking a seat in his special sofa. “Always been gobbledygook, far as I’m concerned. I mean, it’s like I told you last night, I did think it might be written in… in Equestrian, for a bit.”

Willing herself to, Maxine remained standing, ignoring hunger pangs to settle for coffee as well.

“Alex insisted on learning Equestrian,” Maxine commented, feeling the heat rise off the mug between her palms. “When his star started rising in the PHL. Dunno why, not like he needed to, not with that weird thing Equus folks’ve got that let’s ‘em learn languages fast...”

“You mean the Gift of Tongues,” said Luna. “That only applies to alicorns. Regular ponies still must learn an alphabet before the magic takes effect.”

“Funny,” said Maxine. “I kinda thought those runes on Alex were Equestrian.”

“Nothing I recognised, alas…”

Dan nodded knowingly. “Aye, and from what I can tell, none of this here ain’t written in Equestrian or any alphabet from Equus.”

“Not a current one,” Luna agreed. “When we first met Captain Reiner, we were interested to note he spoke in Modern Equish, but thought nothing of it at the time. This, by contrast…” She traced an arc over the journals. “It’s a collection of bedtime stories, written in Old Ponish. Stories my sister and I heard as foals– Dream Valley, Grogar, Midnight Castle… All distilled, of course. Yet you say these were written by a young girl. These stories date back thousands of years. And Megan Williams wrote them as if she was there.”

“What’s that mean?” Maxine found herself asking. “That Mom’s got a connection with these bedtime stories you grew up on?”

“Yes, Maxine Radwick. To what capacity, I’m not sure,” Luna admitted, “but I am certain her connection to these tales of old are crucial. What that means for Equestria, though…”

“You said you heard them as a foal,” Maxine continued. “Does that mean you… I don’t know, is there some truth to them?”

“They were already old when Tia and I were children,” said Luna. “And the last pony who bore witness to those old days, she passed away when we were very young. We were lucky enough to have even met her in Adlaborn.”

She tapped one of the journals.

“And to hear Firefly spoken of so fondly, in these pages… I believe in Megan’s story.”

There was a small pause as both Dan and Maxine mulled over the news. This lasted until Luna turned her attention back to the laptop.

“Hm… You said this Goggle is a ‘search’ device, Dan? A catalogue of sorts?”

“... Google?” Dan said. “Yeah. It’s a search engine. You type what you want, and it’ll pop up.”

“Ah, then have you tried…” Luna said, typing away with her magic. On the screen, the words ‘Megan Williams’ began to form in the bar. “… This?”

Luna hit the ‘enter’ key. Maxine’s eyes remained fixed on the screen. But the counter indicated more than a hundred million results had been found. And none of the pictures on the front page were her mother.

Undeterred, Luna continued to browse a few minutes, till she harrumphed, conceding failure.

“Nothing. Nothing about these stories… Dan, I thought you said–”

“Google knows a lot,” Maxine cut in, “but not everything. I mean, sure, they know a lot, but I doubt Mom would keep her diary online.”

“Megan wasn’t one to spend her life in front of the screen,” Dan agreed. “You ain’t gonna find her on Facebook or Twitter neither.”

Luna shook her head. “So these diaries… they’re all we have.”

“Pretty much,” said Maxine.

“I don’t get it,” Dan spoke up. “Humans don’t live–”

“–for thousands of years,” Luna finished. “I know, that’s what Alexander told us. But time is relative. Your mother, Maxine, she could have entered Equus at a time in the distant past. And time, I’ve noticed, flowed faster on our world than it did here.”

“That still doesn’t make sense. The Empire’s been running at the same time as us,” Maxine replied. “I know it. It’s been a long time.”

“How long?” Luna asked quickly. “How long has it been?”

Maxine threw her hands up, splashing coffee. “I don’t know! No one knows! They don’t know, we don’t know, could be what, ten, twenty, thirty years?! God, this whole thing…”

Dan patted her shoulder. “Look, I’ll go make breakfast, Max, if you’d like. Scrambled egg, how’s that sound? If you don’t mind that kind of food, Princess Luna.”

“I wouldn’t eat it, but I can live with it.”

Groaning, Maxine slumped down in the chair opposite the sofa.

“Thanks, Dad,” she said honestly. She didn’t look up as Dan left her alone with the Princess of the Night.

It was all so far above her paygrade. Mom, a hero in the legends of another world. It just didn’t make sense. It shouldn’t. But after all that had happened to her, to Alex, to her family...

The disguised alicorn was still poring over the journals.

“See the wonder of the world,” Luna recited,“and open yourself to the emotions you feel from it. Don’t fall to the cynicism that leads to a hardened heart and the inability to see the emotional significance of life.”

She paused, rubbing her chin. “Words of wisdom,” Luna said evenly. “You didn’t tell me your mother was a poet.”

Maxine groaned. “She wasn’t,” she said. “Not that we ever knew. And please don’t start reading out poetry. Just cos’ it’s Sunday don’t mean you gotta recite psalms at me.”

“Come again?”

The confusion in Luna’s voice sounded genuine. Maxine looked at her. “You know,” she said. “Psalms. Church. Sunday Church. Where people go to worship God every week. Least, that’s what they do here.”

This was enough to draw Luna away from the journals.

“Alexander didn’t really talk about any gods he may believe in,” Luna commented thoughtfully. “He only said that the Empire worship my… sister, like a goddess. Humans… do humans believe in gods and goddesses?”

Her question made Maxine feel oddly uncomfortable. “Well… yeah? Though here, it’s not so much gods as a God, but still.”

“Interesting,” Luna said. “See, back where I come from, I’ve seen people who pay tribute to all kinds of… sanctified figures, you might say, an ideal to live up to. But asking protection from an unseen, capricious divinity, that’s usually done more by, well, Diamond Dogs, for instance… People living precarious, uncertain lives.”

“And you think we’re not, these days?” Maxine deadpanned.

“Of course,” Luna said rapidly. “Please do not misunderstand. But I thought, with all of your technology and industry, in normal times, you would be far more in control of your world, almost like Equestrians’ link to the Land.”

“If only,” Maxine said. “Plenty of people who think they are, sure, or used to. But not really.”

Luna lapsed into contemplative silence.

“A church… I do not know when Cadance will be arriving. Yet we should still have time. I would love to visit this place of worship. If allowed.”

Maxine heard her Dad calling from the kitchen, cutting off her reply before she could give it.

“Sounds like a darn fine idea to me, Max!” Dan’s voice echoed. “It’s just past eight, you can still make it after breakfast. Now don’t you go telling me, I know you ain’t been in a long time. But while you’re showing the Princess around, you oughta show her the sights. All the sights.”

However, it was only the memory of her mother, and of Agnes, which got Maxine to say yes.

~ Bedford, Massachusetts, USA ~

Two days ago, Princess Cadance had not imagined she’d be here.

Standing upon a wintry alien world, watching as bipeds in armour milled around a truck, carefully unwrapping the tarpaulin that covered a good-sized, sedated young dragon. The green vest her mirror-image had lent her offered some protection from the cold wind, which blew along the open tarmac. But with the rush of battle dimmed, Cadance felt the cold, and this vest was more to protect her identity than for comfort.

Strange to think she’d met a mare who looked just like her, yet stranger still was the thought that Lady Cadenza was only a few steps away – co-ordinating, with Major Bauer, the efforts of his Teutonic Knights to ease Spike across two forklifts.

Cadance wondered what the usual occupants of ‘Hanscom Air Force Base’ would have thought, had they been there to witness the sight. Apparently, though, once the UN Security Council had finally agreed she could have Spike, they possessed enough pull with this country’s government to arrange the impromptu clearing-out of a military base, if only for a few hours this morning. It had been temporarily taken over by UNAC, and the Teutonic Knights were their representatives.

This was how it stood, she thought, observing her counterpart. Now they were out of the Boston Area, only people who’d operated within that area should be allowed to see them together. Such was the Security Council’s decree, and the PHL vest helped conceal her fully-fledged wings.

Cadenza noticed her watching, and gave her a wry smile, but no more.

A small thing, yet Cadance had to wonder what that smile meant. Did it bespeak ruefulness of how they were the same person, except not? A secret shared, in the manner of an absurd joke, borne from knowing their divergent histories may have changed entire worlds? Or maybe it was meant to be a mystery, opaque as that of Prismia.

A night spent dwelling, together with the other Cadance, had brought no answers. For in so many respects, Lady Cadenza’s life resembled her own.

An orphan, raised by earthponies in the Oleandrite village of Florentina. Her parents unknown, until Princess Celestia found the heir of her long-lost sister, descended from the Amore bloodline. And Celestia had still found Cadenza, albeit not on the same day. Everything from thereon continued to flow the same. Becoming a guardian to children, until she eventually met Twilight, and through that child, the love of her life.

Flow the same, until it did not. Until the flow was broken by the incomplete Cadance’s powerlessness when Queen Chrysalis raided her wedding. Her defeat by the Dark King. Lyra’s personal losses and the new, grand cause she devoted herself to. A network of equine alliances which led down the path of Empire. Even her marriage to Shining had been pushed back as they recovered from tragedy.

… Could all this really stem from whether she’d encountered that sorceress? But, even if it did, one question remained. How did any of this connect to the humans?

Then she recalled what Luna had told her, of Alexander Reiner and his family’s history. And now her aunt was gone to seek her own answers. Cadance could only hope that after such efforts, these scattered pieces would form a complete picture.

For it was in the interests of finding another piece she’d be taking a detour to Minnesota.

“I suppose this is where we split up?” spoke a mild-mannered voice by her shoulder. “A shame we didn’t get more time to talk, Your Highness.”

She remembered Moondancer as one of Twilight’s old friends in Canterlot, and one of many children she’d minded before. It didn’t disappoint her that, in the APC on the way here, Moondancer had immediately asked all about her Equestria.

‘Ever the learner…’

Another familiar face against the Empire, this bespectacled and erudite countenance, was a welcome sight.

“Seems like it is,” Cadance told Moondancer, who stood watching as both forklifts, bearing Spike, gingerly moved in synchronicity up the tarmac. “But it won’t be for very long. Besides, Spike will be in good care.”

“I trust he will,” Moondancer said. “After all, he’ll be with you.”

Cadance laughed softly, observing as Lady Cadenza had Spike safely brought up the ramp of a huge cargo aircraft. It took about fifteen minutes of manoeuvering for Major Bauer and his Knights to conduct this delicate operation, during which she and Moondancer stayed silent.

The cigar-shaped aircraft was smaller than the Great Equestrian, its a hull a dull grey metal. Its features were dominated by two gigantic wings, both strapped with four massive engines. A smaller pair of wings rose from the back end of its fuselage, held by a fin-like structure. Finally, the craft’s front end terminated in a rounded nose, crowned by two tiny windows. Cadance had understood this was where the vehicle’s pilots resided.

As per her agreement with Amethyst Star, they would take Spike to the PHL’s only other portal-station in the United States, at the other end of the country. A quick stop was planned to pick up Princess Luna halfway. In total, the trip would take ten hours, including the pause to get Luna. But in that time, Amethyst estimated, Cadance had a window in which to take the long way round.

“I’ve talked it over with Lady Cadance,” Amethyst had explained the night before. “Officially, you’ll be going to Minnesota as her. If you keep the vest on, that should work out. She’s agreed to lend her private jet. The pilot’s one of ours. A thestral, I mean, specially trained to also fly by machine. And you’ll be arriving at Telford– it’s a civilian airport, but we can arrange for them to grant you landing. We’ll have a car waiting. After that, it’ll be a short drive to Appleton, and Prairie Containment Facility.”

Originally known as Prairie Correctional Facility, this was a formerly-vacant private prison, which had been bought shortly after the war by Triple Canopy, one of America’s corporate associates.

Cadance wasn’t too sure how comfortable she felt with merchant backing, or private prisons. Erebus’ penal status for magic-based crimes drew some criticism back home, yet it was undeniably state-run. And most of its critics had personal interests.

However, she didn’t dwell on it, as more words from Amethyst crossed her mind.

“That’s where they keep the original advocate of Conversion. She’s not what she once was. But Caitlyn North’s not the only one up there, though she’s just another freak now. No, if you want the guy who loved running his little Newfoal freakshow...”

Neither Lady Cadenza, nor Amethyst Star, had seemed too familiar with the uncanny mare by Shining’s side aboard the The Great Equestrian. The one he called Ardor, and who called herself his wife, and whose very presence had filled Cadance with deep spiritual unease.

But after her conversation with Verity Carter about the Newfoals, the idea had germinated that perhaps this, too, was connected. That this unsettling being, Ardor, might belong in the same range as those Slow Newfoals who’d resisted changing longer than most.

Albeit on a completely opposite end of the spectrum.

“Alright, looks as though they might be done…”

Cadance followed Moondancer’s gaze. The ramp was slowly closing on the cargo aircraft, and Lady Cadenza and Major Bauer were walking up the tarmac.

“How’s he faring, Lady Cadance?” Moondancer asked as they drew in.

Cadenza thought a moment. “He’ll pull through,” she said quietly. Her gaze went to Cadance. “Poor boy… We can only keep him doped about another day, frankly. After that, we might start harming his brain something worse. I hope you’ve got someplace that’ll hold a dragon without hemming them in, Princess Cadance. Spike must fly again, soon.”

Guiltily, a recalled image flashed before Cadance, of the red drake Chrysalis kept in a cage.

“On principle, the Hall of Unity has room for anything short of the Dragon Lord,” she said quickly. “And we can set up facilities for Spike to be well-treated.”

Cadenza nodded. She appeared to be considering something.

“Gems…” Cadenza finally said. “Spike’s favourite food. Gems and crystals… I’m afraid they’re far too valuable to spare. Otherwise, I’d have given him some for the trip. I’m sorry, I really am. But… this is our reality. I hope… you can do better.”

Major Bauer was somewhat less kindly-disposed.

“I feel you’re forgetting,” the Knight said somberly. “Whoever he was, this… dragon, he ain’t the little kid you knew. And I mean both of you. If you’ll pardon me, Your Highnesses. Just because he didn’t kill anyone you know, doesn’t mean people didn’t die during his rampage. Even if you… cure him, this’ll be something he’s got to live with forever.”

Moondancer sighed in melancholy.

“That is true, Major,” she said sadly. “But isn’t that also the truth of every soldier?”

Bauer’s gaze softened at that. “You might say so,” he whispered. “You might say so.” As if unwilling to linger on this for too long, he turned to Cadance. “Princess. It’s been confirmed, with Miss Star’s support, the Security Council have given me permission to leave my post, if only for the time it’ll take to escort you to High Castle.”

High Castle, Cadance had learned, was the codename given to the PHL’s portal-station on the West Coast, in a city known as San Francisco.

She smiled at Bauer. “Thank you, Major,” said Cadance. “Though you know I’ll be going North before I do that. Still, if you truly are a knight, I’m glad to have you escorting me as a princess to her castle.”

He didn’t smile back, but she felt a benign amusement in his bearing.

Moondancer consulted her wrist-watch. “Then let us soon go,” she said politely. “I must admit, I’m curious to see what’s inside that castle.”

“You go on ahead, Dancer,” Lady Cadenza told the Head of Cultural Preservation. “And Major Bauer, if you’ll be so kind to make sure my jet’s flight-worthy for Princess Cadance. I have a few more words I wish to share with her.”

Both the human and the Equestrian acquiesced.

“At your orders, ma’am,” said Bauer. “We shall rendez-vous with you and Her Ladyship down in San Antonio.”

Cadance had to silently tease herself for momentarily confusing San Antonio and San Francisco. Apparently, humans loved to name places after saints.

As Bauer and Moondancer returned to their respective planes, Cadenza sidled over to Cadance. She didn’t immediately meet gazes, instead letting her eyes trail contemplatively over the airbase and its tarmac under the weak morning Sun, the Knights returning the loading equipment, the two planes – one big and bulky, one slight and sleek – waiting to take off.

Then she looked to the departing Moondancer. Only then did she speak.

“A good one, she is,” Cadenza said quietly. “You recognise her, don’t you? The only one of Lyra’s friends in the PHL still alive… Unless you count Bonnie…”

Cadance might have preferred not to. Wherever Amethyst had eventually led back Bonbon, following the encounter that previous night, it couldn’t be somewhere she’d find peace.

“Yes,” Cadance replied. “She’s made it pretty far up, hasn’t she? Then again, I… don’t really know what she’s up to nowadays… I mean, in my world.”

“From what I recall, she and Twilight had a falling-out,” Cadenza stated. “But they made it up to each other after the Crystal War… A shame it can’t have lasted.”

Briefly, Cadance thought of the furious Archmage she’d confronted aboard the airship, and the feelings she’d sensed flowing from Aunt Luna in connection to this Twilight.

“I could have been it,” Cadenza said suddenly.

“Sorry?”

Cadenza cleared her throat.

“The next leader of the PHL. After Lyra died, two years ago. Nearly three. I could have been it. I was already the Head of Psychological and Spiritual Well-Being at the time. There were many who spoke up for me, calling for my election. Given my closeness to Lyra, it would’ve been a done deal.”

“And then…” Cadance said, eyeing her. “How come you weren’t?”

“I refused that honour,” Cadenza shook her head. “It didn’t feel right... I wasn’t truly a Princess, if I’d ever been one, anymore. I didn’t want to take on a new title… So, I endorsed Cheerilee. She was the Head of Cultural Preservation, back then. Moondancer had only recently come to us, but she’d risen quickly. Soon she became Cheerilee’s deputy. And when Cheerilee got elected, that’s how Moondancer took her old place in High Command.”

It wasn’t a decision taken lightly, Cadance knew. Yet, things seemed to have fallen into place. A teacher to guide them, a learner to preserve mankind’s memories…

Amidst the falling snow, she met her other-self eye to eye, smiling.

“Well, if I know me as well as I do,” she said. “I think you didn’t want to turn away from helping the best way either of us can. Right?”

The smile Lady Cadenza gave her, this time, hid nothing.

~ Jarden, USA ~
—One hour later

In her aura, Princess Luna held a list of names and numbers that meant nothing to her.

Daniel 12:1-3 / Psalms 16:5.8-11 / Hebrews 10:11-14.18 / Mark 13:24-32.

Those were not the only markings on the cheat-sheet she’d been handed upon entry, but the rest made sense. Date and schedule, the name of the building, nothing she couldn’t decipher. Yet these here were most opaque.

Maxine helpfully gestured to the book she carried. A ‘Holy Bible’, a collection of scripture, as she had passingly explained on the walk to the church. Whatever the list had to do with said Bible, Luna hoped she’d catch on fast.

Perhaps it was these exhausting days, perhaps her dreamless slumber, but there was a serenity to this building, even sitting next to the restless Maxine, among the furthest of the back rows. Tall windows let sunlight in on either side, and in the middle, an aisle led to a podium, separating the pews. At the front were several human youths dressed in white, humming a gentle chorus.

The Princess of the Night sat in silence, and watched as a man appeared. The nameplate on the podium read ‘Reverend Jamison’. He was a middle-aged man, with a greyish, receding hairline and stickout ears, but kind eyes that brought her warmth as he looked her way.

She stood out, of course, as one of the very few ponies to attend the service. At the moment, at least none of the churchgoers had spared her more than a cautious glance. These were people from all walks of life. People in neatly-tailored suits. People, like her, who’d worn only a casual ensemble. People who walked in shoes, sandals, or none at all. Yet here, from the toddler carried by its mother, her head drooped in prayer, to a solemn-looking young man seated all the way out front, they were all as equals.

And the Reverend addressed them as such, calling them his flock.

“This is…” Luna whispered to Maxine. “Different.”

“I’d have thought you, of all people, would know what it feels like, ‘Claire’.”

Luna digested Maxine’s sarcastic words.

As Starswirl had taught her and Mistmane showed her, Equestria was a society that cultivated, protected, and guided nature. For the weather, the earth beneath their hooves, and the magic that permeated all Equus were there for ponykind to wield. Now she better understood humanity’s stance, in this world where Sun and Moon followed no rider’s will, and people lived under the care yet also the wrath of nature.

In this turbulent world, they’d sought a protector, a guiding figure. They’d found it in the form of their supreme creator, who ruled a kingdom beyond the stars. But he stayed hidden, save for tales passed on to his followers. So they banded together under his mysterious guidance, setting forth to tame the world. They’d spread his word, and continued to express their gratitude for the tales guiding them from Heaven above.

At the very least, that was how she understood it. Their creator worked ‘in mysterious ways’, Maxine had stated, sounding rather sceptical. He wasn’t as warm as Sint, nor present like Celestia, both of whom’d she never thought beyond comprehension. They were her family.

“When you’ve lived your life amongst the ‘gods’,” Luna said solemnly. “You see only people. And this concept of religion, though I’ve learned of it from the Minotaurs or hearsay from the furthest reaches of Equus, is foreign to our people.”

“Huh,” Maxine said. She shrugged. “You know, maybe that’s why all the Newfoals call the Tyrant their goddess. Part of them remembers…”

Luna could only nod as the choir faded. She didn’t want to think much about the Newfoals, yet they continued to intrude upon her mind.

The Reverend began to speak.

“Sanctification,” he stated, “the beginning of holiness, begins at the new birth. Not the falsehood peddled by Tyranny, this lure for the desperate– who’d be deceived into believing our sins are washed away by a sip, akin to a drunkard washing down his shame with the bottle. In our Church it is said, ‘for as often as you drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes’. But those who drink in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord…”

Luna fixed her gaze upon the symbol hanging on the wall, above the Reverend’s head. A cross, positioned such that from the front row’s view, it placed the Reverend beneath the gaze of the man nailed to it.

The symbol was one she found quite nauseating. Attached to the cross lay a half-dead man, unclothed save for a loincloth covering his waist, with a nail hammered through his hands and feet. Painted blood flowed out the wounds. Completing this grotesque imagery was a crown of thorns upon his head. Although his eyes were closed, his hanging head conveyed a profound sorrow.

This was the only cross to bear this pitiful figure, but there were plenty more, including smaller crosses, carried by the faithful. Luna remembered the church’d doorway had been adorned by a cross and a flame.

Biting her lip, she glanced around, seeing children in prayer. The Archmage’s words on humans’ response to suffering resonated in her mind. Even so young, were they become so desensitised to this war, that they’d ignore this image before them?

“Miss Radwick? If I may ask,” Luna began, leaning to Radwick. “Why… why’s there a man nailed to a cross– as a matter of fact, why do I see so many of these crosses? There are children here and… It’s such a nightmarish image.”

From the way Maxine winced, this was something she ought to have known, evidently.

“Shh! Didn’t Dad tell you?” Maxine lowered her voice to a whisper. “That’s Jesus Christ.”

Luna nodded in recognition now. The Son of God, she called, put on trial by those who did not believe his claim that he was God manifest. And even in his dying breath, he’d still forgiven those who wronged him, to cleanse the sins of mankind.

“Ah, I understand. But why such a symbol? Is it because of the war?”

“What?” Maxine asked, bewildered. “No– it’s always been like that. It’s, well, a reminder of what he went through, I think. So we all remember his sacrifice.”

“Oh.”

Luna sighed. She certainly hadn’t expected a moment of death so boldly on display.

She looked around the church. Though their fellow churchgoers remained mostly quiet, low murmurs, mostly from children, could still be heard. Her eyes settled on the two people seated behind them. A young child, with big blue eyes and messy brown hair, matching his mother's.

From the look on both their faces, it seemed they had heard her questions.

“S-sorry,” said Luna, smiling. “I’m new here.”

The child averted his gaze, preferring to look down at his cheat-sheet, while his mother glared. Unwittingly, Luna’s smile turned upside-down under the icy blue stare, something that didn’t escape Maxine’s notice when Luna turned back to stare ahead.

“Something up?” asked Maxine.

“No,” Luna lied. “Nothing is up.”

Maxine glanced behind her.

“Don’t feel bad,” she whispered, sounding apologetic, for the first time since Luna met her. “Folks judge strangers all the time. Asking questions is nothing to be ashamed of.”

It was silly, of course. It was too petty to think about. But Luna felt a familiar feeling build up within her. And she didn’t like the feeling at all. She never wanted to be shunned ever again.

“I see,” Luna said, quietly.

She heard the Reverend finishing his opening.

“... Refuse them if they offer a poisoned chalice, but do not reject them in your hearts. Remember how many are poor souls led astray, and remember those, of whom there are many, who laboured from the start to repay Tyranny’s sins. For if they come to you in friendship, share bread and drink, so you may be guests at each other’s tables.”

He stopped, then, waiting for his words to settle upon the crowd.

Yet while he kept looking at his papers, shuffling them around to prepare his next piece, Luna wondered if he hadn’t glanced at her for the smallest of glimpses.

“Now, if you’ll please turn to Daniel 12.”

Almost as if they hadn’t need to be told, every human carrying a book opened it as one.

Uncertain, Luna glanced at what Maxine was doing. The woman next to her was the only other person not to have opened her Bible. She seemed at conflict with herself. Then, sighing, Maxine thumbed the book open, not bothering to see what Luna did.

It struck her then. Mankind might not live for thousands of years, but their stories did. Her own words to Captain Reiner echoed in her mind, how stories were best told by those who bore witness to them.

With those witnesses long since passed, only the memories remained. Intrigued, Luna picked one of the spare Bibles left by her on an empty spot, and turned to the relevant page, matching what the Reverend was saying.

“At that time,” the man recited, “Michael, the great prince who protects your people, will arise. There will be a time of distress, as has not happened from the beginning of nations until then. But at that time, your people, everyone whose name is written in the Book, will be delivered. Multitudes who sleep in the Dust of the Earth will awake… Some, to everlasting life…”

A short, yet heavy pause followed, during which the Reverend looked up.

“Others, to shame and everlasting contempt. But those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the Heavens, and those who lead the many to righteousness, like the stars for ever and ever.”

Luna sat a little straighter.

Words written long ago, passed down and translated in many languages. Yet words that rung true even now, in a war none had foreseen. For a people without tangible magic or ability to wield it, the words seemed prophetic. Part of her wondered if these stories had prepared them for the war waged upon their very existence.

She liked stories. Especially stories that guided those who listened to them through the years. From Sint and Firefly's bedtime stories of a forgotten past, to Starswirl's tales of the great heroes of Equestria, the Pillars of Equestria themselves come to life, to Darkhoof’s own myths…

The years passed her by, yet it was these stories that kept her on the ground, and allowed her to remember.

She glanced at the cloth-bag she’d been given by Dan, her null-space being full with her armour. Megan Williams’ journals weren’t too heavy, yet Luna wondered the true weight of the stories they carried. Stories, she hoped that Twilight Sparkle might be able to uncover, and retell.

Shaking her head, she returned her gaze to the Reverend. Just in time, too, to notice Maxine was standing up, and so were the people of the rows in front.

Princely decorum took over. Luna quickly stood up as well, recognising what this was. Like the humans around her, she turned her eyes to her cheat-sheet. And though she chose not to sing when they did, she drank in the hymns that arose from the congregation.

Lord, you alone are my portion and my cup,
You make my lot secure.

I keep my eyes always on the Lord
With him at my right hand, I will not be shaken.
Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices
My body also will rest secure.

Because you will not abandon me to the realm of the dead
Nor will you let your faithful one see decay.

You make known to me the path of life
You will fill me with joy in your presence
With eternal pleasures at your right hand.

What had become of Megan Williams, Luna wondered. The little girl called upon by Firefly, who vanquished a great tyrant. A pivotal moment in Equestria's history, yet hardly remembered in her own times. A great untold story on Earth, remembered by none.

‘Why? Why didn’t you tell them, Megan?’

But, now tucked away in a cloth-bag, the journals remained silent.

Something else crossed her mind. Reiner had spoken of Lyra as someone revered and, in certain circles, sanctified. Someone who’d stood up to her people when they travelled down an unholy path. Someone who’d sacrificed herself for mankind.

She looked up above the Reverend. The cross, and the man nailed to it, remained in her mind. A sacrifice to carry the sins of many who’d come before him – and after.

“Day after day,” spoke the clergyman, “every priest stands and performs his religious duties. Again and again, he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins…”

~ Canterlot, Equestrian Solar Empire ~ Fourteenth Day of the Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~

Although this wasn’t her first time in Canterlot Palace, there remained an imposing presence to it Scootaloo found intimidating. Its grandeur and history made her feel small, and she wasn’t certain she liked it. Even the Queen’s efforts to ensure it was a welcoming sanctuary, for all faithful equines alike, never quite shrugged off the memories from when she first stepped inside. She stood alone in the reception, having excused herself from the debriefing in the Archmage Wing of the castle – where, she remembered, the Royal Wedding had been prepared many, many years ago.

She sighed, slumping down onto one of the guest benches. She looked around.

In the years after the Wedding Invasion and the Crystal War, Canterlot Palace had received much-needed restructuring. Where once it had been of purely pony-based design, now the castle incorporated many other patterns into its walls. Hippogriff-crafted statues, carved from the finest stone of Mount Aris, welcomed visitors and lined the halls. Maretonian tapestry hung from the walls, and they complemented the Crystal Realm’s painted mirrors. Scented Oleandrite candles shone brightly within the Saddle Mareabian lanterns that illuminated the castle, completing the proud image of the seat of an Empire and its Co-Harmony Sphere.

She’d spent time in these halls. Wonderbolt tours were always a plus, and there never was a boring tour when Rainbow Dash was around.

The double doors leading to the Archmage’s offices swung open. Instinctively, Scootaloo leapt to attention. To her disappointment, Dash wasn’t with those who emerged. She was still thankful to see Breeze, Whistle, Sprout and Captain Timber – tired yet triumphant. But she wished the captain were there. They needed to talk about so much, a whole day and night after Boston.

She waved to Whistle, who responded in kind, but was taken up as Sprout engaged her in conversation. Perhaps Scootaloo’s mood showed, since Breeze walked over to her side.

“Cadet Starstruck,” he said, tipping his shako, part of the formal dress for the Guard during ceremonial duties. The hippogriffs’ dress uniform was a warm blue vest, the colour of tropical waters around their capital of Mount Aris. It went flush with Breeze’s own blue-shaded feathers-and-fur.

“Sergeant Breeze,” replied Scootaloo, saluting.

“At ease,” Breeze said gruffly. “I see you’ve got a seat ready.”

“Hah, yeah…”

They sat next to one another on the bench. Breeze looked ahead, towards where Captain Timber, Sprout, and Whistle were animatedly discussing something by a hippogriff statue.

“How’d the meeting go?” said Scootaloo.

“It went well,” Breeze said simply. “The Lady Archmage made sure to commend everyone who participated. They’re busy now, so, that’s all I know for certain.”

Breeze shot her a weary glance from his golden eyes. While he looked younger than he should, his gaze told a different tale.

He patted Scootaloo’s pack. “They’ll give the Wing Commander an honourary promotion. Sorry for your loss, kid, you and Whistle both.”

Scootaloo shook her head. Though she mourned Fleetfoot's untimely death, now was the time to show strength. She sat a little straighter.

“It’s alright, Breeze,” she said. “We knew the risks, and so did she. I’m sorry about Plow, too. Sprout… I don’t think Sprout knows.”

“He does,” said Breeze. “And he will accept it... It’s a work hazard. But you’ve got optimism, kid. I admire that,” he said approvingly. He pointed towards her crystal-wing harness. “Musta taken a heck-awhile, getting used to those.”

Scootaloo smiled, and opened them a little.

“One of the first, y’know. Rainbow Dash, she pushed for me to use it,” she said. “Got it fitted in a couple years after the Crystal War, been upgraded every year since. Sunburst said it’ll get better with time.”

“Did it?”

“Sure did,” Scootaloo said proudly. “Took me all the way to the Wonderbolts.” She paused, to hold her wings close to her barrel. “‘Course, had to fight for my case… Higher-ups weren’t sure if it… gave me any advantages. But, hey, things worked out fine.”

Breeze nodded. “Good to know,” he said, looking at the harness admiringly. “That kid you got under your wing, she thinks the world of you, you know. Wouldn’t stay quiet about you aboard the sky-boat. Now I know why.”

“Hah, that’s Whistle for ya,” Scootaloo replied fondly. “Part egghead, part fan, all Whistle.”

That gave Breeze pause.

“What’s she to you?” Breeze said softly, his glance turning towards Whistle and the others. “Haven’t seen anyone so… attached.” He cleared his throat. “Sorry, that was… blunt.”

Scootaloo sighed. “No, no, you’re good,” she reassured him. “Guess I just… saw myself in her. She was just like me, and I’ve looked up to Captain Dash for much longer.”

She hesitated. Maybe this wasn’t the right time to say. But she saw how in Boston, they’d stuck together for the mission’s end. And Whistle had also latched on to Breeze…

“Kid’s had a tough life,” she whispered. She leaned closer to Breeze. “One day she and her parents went to Fillydelphia, visiting family…”

She scrounged for her memories. Archmage Twilight hadtold her about this, how Fillydelphia’s shields were breached, the Lunar Wards broken somehow… by Luna, perhaps, an early betrayal? No, that didn’t sound right.

She pushed the thought away. “Same week, Sombra broke through the shields around the city. It wasn’t pretty…”

She shared a telling look with Breeze, whose eyes darkened.

“Oh,” he said somberly. “I’m… sorry to hear that. She never said anything about it.”

“Yeah, she was seven at the time. That’s Whistle. She perseveres. But she’s always carried a part of it since, everywhere she goes, like you and me. Guess she could’ve done with a sister back then and… yeah. I’d been held back in the Academy when we ended up in the same class. Taught her a few tricks, helped her and she helped me and… here we are.”

“I… suppose that explains things.”

“It does, doesn’t it?”

Breeze sighed, placing a talon against his chin.

“We hippogriffs,” he said, “we lived in fear of the Storm King, until your Sun Princess came… I thought that… I thought that one day, I'd have to tell my kids their father wouldn’t come home from our incursions into his territory. Then Equestria reached out. I’ve never had to worry about them again. Though I still do, to tell you the truth. But there’s a difference knowing how Canterlot shelters ya…”

Scootaloo hummed in agreement.

“May we never live in fear again,” Breeze said gruffly.

“May we never live in fear again,” she echoed. “Good to know you guys are doing alright now.”

“Yeah, yeah,” said Breeze, leaning back against his bench. “One of these days… a visit to Harmonising Heights wouldn’t be too bad…”

Scootaloo had heard from – she winced – Sweetie Belle, about how Harmonising Heights had been where elderly hippogriffs went, when they felt their time had come. Those Heights, the crown of Mount Aris, were a sanctuary where the sounds of nature blissfully guided those who treaded its paths, and young and old alike treasured their visits. For the young, it was a song to welcome their future. And for the old, the sick and the dying, tradition dictated that after their final pilgrimage, peace would reign over them. Only then would they pass on, surrounded by all those who they held dear.

“That soon for you, huh?” Scootaloo asked gently, nudging Breeze with a crystal wing. “Easy there, looks like you still got some time left in ya.”

“Don’t flatter me,” snarked Breeze. “You got anyone waiting back home, Starstruck?”

“Just my aunts, Mom and Dad, no biggie. Why?”

“You know what I mean. No-one to settle down with?”

Scootaloo rolled her eyes. “Nah,” she said. “I’m… you know, I see where the skies take me. Where Whistle goes, I go too.”

But something in her shook when she saw Breeze’s stern glare.

“I’m not asking about Whistle,” He tapped her chest. “I am asking about you. All this talk ‘bout the war, and you’re telling me you got nothing planned ahead?”

“Listen, listen,” replied Scootaloo, raising both forehooves. “I’m not really looking for anyone. Equestria’s been good enough to me, see?” She spread her wings, and flapped them lightly. “I can’t just drop it. I owe them…”

“Kid,” said Breeze, shaking his head. “Look, lemme just… I don’t mean you need settle down with anyone. All I’m saying, all I ask is if you’ve got something to look forward to, after… this.”

And that gave Scootaloo pause. Her parents had, she recalled, queried if she wished to join their volunteer work in the Colonies. Yet, from the moment she joined, the moment she’d turned her back on Sweetie Belle… she saw no other future.

“Okay, old-timer, I really appreciate your concern, but… I’m getting by.”

She looked Breeze in the eye firmly, her purple meeting his gold. He broke away, shaking his head again.

“Alright,” said Breeze, raising both talons in defeat. “All this talk about Harmonising Heights... I don’t really see where I’ll be going next. My kids are moving out of the nest, soon, and one of these days, I’ll get to see my wife again.”

He looked at her, eyes forlorn.

“I don’t know about you, and I ain’t counting on you telling me… But not everyone sees it through, so best we make it up to them some day.”

Scootaloo bit her lower lip, sighing.

“I lost my friends a long time ago, Breeze,” she said quietly. “I can’t turn around now.”

“Not saying you should. But you should think about what they’d have liked you to be, and what they never got to see. When this is all over, last thing I want you to do is spend the rest of your life fighting when there’s no war left.”

He clasped her shoulder with one talon, and tapped at her chest with another.

“Life’s been kind to me, kid,” said Breeze earnestly. “So don’t count yourself out so early…”

To that, Scootaloo can only nod silently as he let go of her and adjusted his uniform, huffing. There they sat in silence. She gazed at the tapestries meditatively. The Empire’s achievements, proudly displayed for the appreciation by passing eyes. From the Crystal War, then the pushback against the Storm King’s, to the first few steps taken on Earth…

And she was now a part of it. Something bigger than she’d ever be. And she’d see it through with Captain Dash, and everything would be alright.

‘Spike…’ the thought intruded, yet she shook it off. ‘It’ll… it’ll be worth it.’

To sit it out all the way was unthinkable.

‘I know you mean well, Breeze. But there’s nowhere left for me to go but up.’

Self-consciously, she flicked her tail to cover her blank flank.

She glanced around, spotting Whistle wave at her to come over, and both Timber and Sprout looking expectant, too.

“Come on, that's our cue,” said Scootaloo, hopping off her bench. “You coming?”

“Yeah, just... gimme a moment,” said Breeze, grunting as he too stepped off the bench. “This old griff ain’t getting younger.”

Almost on reflex, Scootaloo closed the distance between them, offering a wing. “Need help?”

Breeze waved her off. “I didn't say I need your help,” he said, though good-naturedly. “If you do want to help… door’s wide open in the Trailblazers for ya, Starstruck.”

Scootaloo thought about it, just a moment. The Trailblazer line of work was something different, but daring as well. Daring was something she’d always pursued. Ensuring the Empire provided for all, even the ones who left, was tempting.

Then her gaze drifted to Whistle, still waiting for her, and her mind was set.

“Sorry,” she said. “But it’s like I said. Where she goes, I go too.”

She looked at Breeze. He smiled.

“I see. You’re as stubborn as they come. Well, best of luck to you both…”

Luck was in short supply at times. Luck that she wished she had, that Sweetie Belle and Applebloom and Babs would see things her way, and the hope that one day, the Crusaders would be together once more. But after one glance at Whistle, as she and Breeze joined their comrades’ spirited discussion about the next Equestria Games, Scootaloo let her worries fade.

~ Appleton, Minnesota, USA ~

Cadance stood patiently, waiting for the door’s locking mechanism to open, which Major Bauer had previously assured was a necessary safety precaution. For the inmate or someone else, was another question altogether. But that wasn’t important. Only the identity of this cell’s inmate was important, highly classified to the public in order to prevent attempts at vigilante justice, or even to set her free.

To think, all this for one soul.

Regardless, the light flashed green and the door opened with a click. Using her magic, Cadance pulled open the door and quietly went inside. To her surprise, she was greeted by a moderately-sized, window-less cell. A clear glass wall separated her from the inmate.

Said inmate was a mare. A unicorn, her horn smaller than average, yet her frame of larger-than-average build. Her back was against the wall, her posture almost human-like, if Cadance could guess. Her long and messy auburn mane contrasted against her uneven dark red coat, but did nothing to hide her glazed eyes.

Facing the glass were a metal table and chair, the table bare except for a clipboard and pen. Cadance drew out the chair and sat, looking down to the clipboard. Atop the paper were printed the words, ‘Caitlyn North, Founder of the PHH. Status: Converted’.

Eyeing the inmate, Cadance cleared her throat.

“Hello? I… I take it you can hear me?” She thought her next words over carefully. “Excuse me, Miss. To whom am I speaking?”

The mare turned away from Cadance. Closing her eyes like one about to be struck.

“Go away,” she said quietly, “I’m not… I’m not going to let you in. I never will.”

Cadance frowned. “Let me in?” she repeated. “Forgive me, but… it seems like you’re the one who’s trapped in here.”

“It’s my mind, no-one else’s,” the mare mumbled, “my mind, not anyone else’s. Not yours, not Twilight’s, and especially not Celestia’s. I made my protection, and you aren’t getting in.”

Those words settled upon Cadance, who stared unblinking, uneased by the deranged mare.

Her domain was the heart, yet she also had knowledge of the mind. But Cadance wondered. After what Alexander Reiner had told of the Solar Tyrant’s infringements against the soul, where could this victim have summoned the will to retain a piece of herself?

She pushed forward the clipboard.

“Miss North…” Cadance said gently. “For that’s your name, isn’t it? It’s… possible we might have spoken before. I don’t rightly remember… but I think it’s true to say, you’re the first of your kind I’ve actually met… Except, maybe…” She hesitated. “I remember another mare. She stood by Shining Armor… Do you know of her?”

“Before the war, she was right next to him. She was… different,” the mare said. “She wasn’t like the others. She was close. Too close to him. She looks like–” She stopped abruptly, saying nothing else. “Why are you using my last name, now? Is calling me Caitlyn simply not working for you anymore? Or are you trying to lure me out?”

Cadance licked her lips. “I was… hoping you might have something to tell me. But maybe I’m not talking to the person I’m looking for… Where are you?”

The mare seemed responsive to that question. She turned again, looking to Cadance almost proudly and defiantly.

“My name is Caitlyn North, founder of Ponification for Humanity’s Healing, and I am innocent.” Her voice rang with assurance. “And I am never going to surrender myself to you.”

A sense of going in circles tickled at Cadance’s mind. “What are you innocent of?” she asked. “Who won’t you surrender to? Where are you?”

“I’m in a cell somewhere, but I’ll always have protection from… wait.” Caitlyn stopped, her eyes flicking over to something unseen. “No!” she suddenly shouted, “there can’t be two of you. I–”

She shuddered, as if something cold had touched her, making her clutch herself.

Unsettled, Cadance sprang from her chair. But it was Caitlyn North’s words which alarmed her nearly as much as what was happening. Unless she’d misheard, the inmate had somehow intuited there were two Cadances in this world...

“Leave me alone.” Caitlyn hissed, “j-just b-because you showed up while somep– Someone–” She grunted, head moving like something had just pressed itself into it. “I’m not gonna say it.”

Cadance would have liked to ask who the mare was talking to. But it was evident questions would not work here. Yet her appearance seemed to have had a tangible effect.

With caution, she approached the glass, pressing a forehoof to it. “Miss North? Can you still hear me? Please, I need you to look at me.”

Caitlyn looked to Cadance, desperation in her eyes.

“I am Cadance,” Cadance said slowly. “The Princess of Love. And what’s been done to you is claimed to be out of love, but how could it be? Once, I was told, you spoke for this. Why did you voice your support for it? What made you change your mind?” She paused. “I’m so sorry this was done to you…”

“Cadance.” Caitlyn breathed, “you… you’re here? Actually here?” Fragile hope lit up in her eyes.

“Yes, I am Cadance. You know me, Caitlyn North?”

“Of you. I know of you.” Caitlyn said guardedly. “We never met personally. Listen, I need to tell you something. Something important.”

Where had this come from? Suddenly, the mare looked quite lucid.

“Something you didn’t tell before? Why?” But Cadance quickly brushed her own question aside. “No, it doesn’t matter. This may not last. What is it you want to say?”

“I supported ponification as a means to heal the body, despite the trade-offs. I’m not–” Caitlyn physically recoiled again, “d-da... nnnnnnnn! P-please listen…” There were tears running down her face as she struggled against something. “I learned about the side-effects like everypony–” Saying this made her distress more apparent, “Everyone else did. I… I tried to produce a substitute serum, free of the non-physical effects. But then I was be… be...”

At this point, it was clear to Cadance that Caitlyn was literally struggling every step against something. What exactly was still unclear, but maybe…

Calling upon her magical skills and knowledge, Cadance willed a simple empathic spell. Little more than a prayer.

‘Please relieve this woman of her distress.’

The image of a pink heart formed atop her horn, and flew, passing effortlessly through the glass to reach Caitlyn. Who, upon receiving it, seemed to calm down a little. Her breathing slowed.

“Miss North,” Cadance began, “what are you trying to tell me?”

“I was betrayed,” Caitlyn said, almost casually. “Betrayed by greed and hate. Almost di– got myself converted… but it didn’t take, I didn’t break! So now this… this daemon, this wraith haunts my mind. It has been trying to break my will. It wants me to submit to the role–” she spat the word out like it was venom, “of humanity’s traitor, while the real masterminds still roam free. I’m no more than a patsy at this point.”

“So, this is what’s been done to you…” Cadance murmured. “Wait… a ‘substitute’ serum? I thought… I was told the serum was created by Twi– the Archmage.”

“It was, but I managed to create my own strain. I kept it at hand, all times. They didn’t know, when they… It saved my… m-my life? Don’t…”

Cadance breathed out, seeing her breath condense on the glass.

“Miss North,” she said, talking very urgently. If she learned something now, Luna and others would want to hear it. “You say you altered the serum? Does that mean there… could be a vaccine, or a cure? Please, you’ve got to tell me! If you left any notes behind, I know people who’ll need them.”

“I don’t know, but–” Caitlyn suddenly paled, her eyes turning wide. “N-No. N-not now.” She breathed as something started to trail down her forehead from the base of her horn. “C-Cadance, listen, please. T-The name. Th-The n-name is–”

Caitlyn let out an ear-bleeding scream as her horn ejected from its base, blood pouring down her forehead in a wave as her coat and mane began to fall off in clumps. In a twisted display that would haunt her, Cadance watched in horror as Caitlyn seemed to change forms – her frame crunching back on itself, shrinking into a more stocky build. A new coat and mane grew from the remains of the old, two different hues of green.

On the cell’s floor, by a severed horn whose base was still bloodied, surrounded by shed remains of red and auburn hair, now writhed an earthpony mare of stocky build.

Judging by the sounds from Caitlyn, it was unlikely Cadance would get anything more out of her.

Cadance closed her eyes, employing the breathing technique she really needed to teach Twilight someday. Twilight had told her what she’d seen in Alexander Reiner’s mind. But that Equestria could be complicit to such an act felt beyond Cadance.

Yet though the being in the cell looked Equestrian, they weren’t truly one. Caitlyn North was more victim than perpetrator.

Her duty was to dig further, to consult one who had a reputation as a fully willing accomplice.

~ Boston, USA ~

With friends in high places, Ana mused, it was that much easier to organise. Finding a place for Hanne aboard the same plane as the Crystal Princess-in-Exile, Dame Moondancer and the captive dragon, had been a trivial matter to arrange with Amethyst Star. She did wonder how much this had to do with what Hanne already knew so far – her friend wasn’t one to sit idle, and word was that right before leaving the UN, Hanne had led a group of her fellow journalists into the assembly.

There Ana sat in the Teutonic Knights’ mess tent, leaning against the long table on her seat. Earlier, Harwood had returned from the Knights’ detachment sent to retrieve the dragon from the Reavers and provide escort to Hansom. He stood next to the table, arms crossed, and Frieda was busy typing away at her laptop, while Ana listened to Hanne on her phone’s loudspeaker.

“Like, what was that all about?” Hanne groaned. “She was all ‘I have to go now. My planet needs me’, Ana! Now all we know is that she’s in Jarden.”

“Hey, hey, Hanne, just… hang in there,” Ana said quickly, unthinkingly patting the table as if that’d comfort the phone lying on it.. “You’ll also get to Jarden soon.”

“I suppose,” Hanne agreed. “That Frenchman of yours, Henri?”

“Henri, yeah,” Ana replied. “What about him?”

“Sure he heard right, about Cadance?” asked Hanne. “I’m not sure a pair of wings is supposed to make someone… considerably more powerful. Maybe. But– well, it’s a striking image, but… Not sure. Sounds, you know. Arbitrary.”

“I’m pretty sure he did, Hanne,” Ana confirmed. “I mean… an alicorn, from our understanding, they’ve got a way better connection to the Land than just another pegacorn, you know. Wish he’d stuck around but, hey, maybe you can ask him later on.”

“Ah, alright…”

“You get your interview with the alicorn-Cadance, Hanne?”

“No. Lani, sneaky devil, she’d beaten me to securing interview rights, shortly before that meeting with the Security Council. I was there, y’know, but now I’ve gotta share credit… and only photographic credit, at that…” Hanne groaned. “How much you wanna bet, it’ll be all over the blogosphere tomorrow.”

“Oh,” Ana said. “That’s too bad.”

“Yeah. But I… I did get a guarantee I’d interview this Luna instead. So that’s a plus.”

“Just need to find Luna first,” Frieda piped up, without looking away from her laptop. When she wasn’t on the field, one could easily find her behind a laptop – Ana thought she was a pretty talented analyst, much as the griffon’s speciality was spotting.

‘PHL multi-tasking… Wonder how Jan’s doing, back on the humanitarian side.’

Hanne remained one of her closest friends, second only to their university classmate, Jan Nielsen. Ana felt thankful that Hanne had bothered to fill her in on Jan’s activities with the Department of Cultural Preservation. Ironically, despite being part of the same organisation, Ana never had much in the way of contact with him anymore – courtesy of busy traffic in the communications channels, she thought.

“I didn’t ask you, Frieda,” Hanne said.

“Yeah, working on it, chill, Adler,” Frieda retorted. Her talons typed away at the reinforced keyboard – from what Ana had gathered, she was monitoring Luna’s possible whereabouts. Ana found herself glancing at the bandaged burn mark on the griffon’s hip.

“You doing good?” Ana asked.

Frieda laughed, still typing. “Worry about yourself, Ana,” she said. “Hey, Adler? Girl nearly got herself burnt, you know. But I guess I got the short end of the stick.”

Ana averted her eyes from Harwood, who’d thrown her a curious glance. It was true, she hadn’t been burnt at all, even though the dragon’s flame had missed them by inches. Perhaps she was merely lucky. Perhaps.

“I got her checked,” Harwood said, before Hanne could say anything. “Honestly, I don’t know how anyone could brush off something as close as that...”

“Aw, Har,” Ana said, laughing nervously. “I’m fine, really.” She rubbed the back of her head, which felt odd, without her ushanka. The same ushanka burnt to a crisp in lieu of her head. “Guess I did kind of survive. Somehow. I mean, wasn’t a direct hit…”

Her mind wandered back to several nights ago, by a campfire atop an abandoned high-rise, in the company of Yael Ze’ev’s eccentric penal squad and Lani Sanderson. In the process of playing the guitar to while away the night…

“Frieda, it’s not the first time we’ve had weird things happen with fire, is it?” Ana said, unsure whether she looked for confirmation. “What was that, you know, at the campfire? We saw reindeer dancing in the flames…”

Frieda spluttered and coughed. “Yeah,” she said curtly. “Maybe we were seeing things.”

“Okay, the fuck?” Hanne blurted out. “Pardon the language, but– Dieter, see. This is what I have to deal with.”

“Then you don’t believe me?” said Ana.

“Don’t believe you? On the contrary, I believe you too well,” Hanne said irritably. “I just wish you wouldn’t wait till I was on the phone, halfway across the country, is all!”

“Why, what is it?” Harwood said, stepping forward. “See something, Hanne?”

They heard a breath inspiring, at the other end of the line.

“Harwood, dear– we have unicorns prancing about,” Hanne deadpanned. “Ana doing weird shit is the least of my concerns. Looks like you got yourselves a Wizard in your party, Mister Knight.”

“Huh, Ana never told me you were into D&D.”

“Not really… Settlers of Catan was more my thing, like so many of my generation…”

While the two people closest to her in the world debated tabletop games, Ana glanced down at her hand. It had held a searing hot rifle and didn’t have so much as a red patch of skin to show for that. It remained pale as always.

Whereas a whole chunk of Frieda’s fur was burnt clean off. And this was still true when she looked from her hand to the griffon at the laptop.

‘Wonder what the deal is… You there, lady?’

She thought hard, hoping the little voice would speak. To her disappointment, the voice did not.

‘Okay. I… Amethyst will have to look into this, you know that? Can’t have me doing… magic. Yeah. Fun times we live in...’

“But that isn’t what counts, is it?” Harwood said, his voice gently interrupting her thoughts. “You’re alive, Ana. That’s what counts. And you did something big.”

On the table, the phone crackled.

“See here, Ana,” Hanne said.“You, of all people, shot the Archmage. The Archmage, Ana. Who’d have even thought anyone could get close enough to do it... God, I kept replaying that recording all the time back when, from that BBC interview, you remember that one? Ugh, what a self-righteous prick…”

Ana and Harwood looked at one another. The post-Geneva days hadn’t been great for anyone, but usually, Hanne hardly ever talked about that period.

The loss of their friends as the war went on, one by one, certainly didn’t help. As diligent and thorough Hanne or Jan were in their planning, none could predict when the next potion bombing would occur...

“Okay, I know it’s not healthy of me,” Hanne continued. “But… you, taking her down. People are gonna love this. Oh, the op-ed, the news reports… yeah. Yeah, it’ll be great. Don’t think this is the last of it. You basically, I dunno– maybe she’s more a Goebbels or, nah, that’s Rarity. Himmler– that’s it. You took out their Himmler, and… and everyone’s gonna be a little bit happier, maybe.”

“Aha-hah, yeah…” Ana shook her head. “Maybe pipe it down, a little, Hanne.”

“She gets over-excited,” Dieter added. “I should do a better job of reining her in.”

“Yeah, I get you... But really, Hanne. I don’t… I’m not really that comfortable talking about it… She was… I don’t know, it’s hard to explain, but… yeah. Please.”

“Alright, sorry, Ana,” Hanne said softly. “I won’t pressure you. But what’s next? Dieter and I, well, I know we’re gonna see how far we can trail Luna and the alicorn-Cadance.”

“Best do it fast,” cautioned Harwood. “Miss Sanderson looked like she had a trick up her sleeve, not that she’ll admit it. She’ll beat you back to New York.”

“Yeah, Hanne,” Dieter said. “Like I said, did Lani put you a wild goose chase?”

“This isn’t a competition,” Hanne said evenly. “But I wish it was.”

“That’s what you always say.”

Dieter was someone Ana didn’t know too well, but he seemed a good man. One of few people to truly crack the icy facade of Hanne Adler, besides Ana herself. And the only one to remain romantically involved. At the least, he appeared to keep Hanne’s boundless ambition in check.

Ana liked him, all in all.

“Well…” Ana said, rubbing the back of her head. “I think… maybe I’ll see with Amethyst if I can be reassigned back to R&D. I mean, helvete, she’s still here in Boston. It’s a long shot, but I just, well…” She sighed. “I just want to get back into my lab gear, yeah? A girl can dream.”

“Aye,” Harwood said. He clasped her shoulder softly. “But we’ll make it. Like you said.”

Ana touched his hand, and glanced at him, smiling thinly.

“We’ll make it, yeah, heh...” But then she let go, and sighed. “I don’t know, maybe they want me to stay as… as a sniper. Shooting the Lady Archmage– we don’t even know if it’s confirmed or not, you know how PR goes!”

“Ana–” Hanne began to say.

“You’re gonna ask Princess Luna, right? I mean I want to ask her, too, but, I know you got this. I think everyone wants to know what they want with us, but– really, good luck, Hanne. We’re all counting on you. Tell us how it went! I mean later. I mean, ah!”

“Yeah, but… we need to find her first,” said Hanne. “Don’t get ahead of yourself.”

“Uh, yeah, about that, Hanne,” Frieda suddenly said. Ana looked at her, as did Harwood. “If you’re looking for Luna, they found her. In Jarden, right where she said she’d be.”

She flipped the laptop around. Ana peered closer, reading the email address highlighted upon the inscrutable pages of modern systems analysis.

“... Claire de Lune, eh?”

~ Appleton, USA ~

“Ninety-one bottles of pop on the wall, ninety-one bottles of pop~”

“Could you please stop that?” snapped Cadance.

“Oh,” said the prisoner, from the other side of the glass. “Forgive me. It gets so dull in here.”

“And no doubt you deserve it. Did the Solar Empire put you up to this?” Cadance demanded. “Did they think it was fun, to let you gallop around mutilating humans?”

A black pompadour mane, streak with green, flicked back as its owner raised his eyes to her. He pretty much had to, confined to a wheelchair with a blanket covering his ruined hindlegs.

“Not at all, ma’am,” Shieldwall said, giving her a boyish smile. “I did it myself. They always did find me a little... ideologically compromising."

Cadance frowned. “But they still gave you a free rein.”

The stallion snorted. “No such thing as a ‘free’ rein with the Empire. I was just too good at thinking outside the box, for them to waste my skills. Not that, mind you… saying this between friends here…” He leaned forward conspiratorially. “I didn’t get started without a little boost.”

Something underlying his words made Cadance’s blood run cold.

“... What?”

Shieldwall leaned back, almost casually, as if he were sitting in a comfy chair and they were exchanging pleasantries over tea and crumpets, rather than opposites sides of prison glass, his broken body strapped to a wheelchair and feeding-tubes.

“Everyone thought the original anomalous Newfoals really were just that. Anomalies,” he explained. “What makes me special is, I was first to spot a method in the madness. Aye, I remember Ardor. The Guadalquivir Marshes… We hadn’t renamed them yet, then. But that’s where we found her. This Newfoal, wandered into the marshes at night– She started out with this light coat, but by morning it’d shed, turned darker. She’d adapted to her environment. And that was… curious. So we took her in, named her Andalusian Ardor.”

He looked thoughtful.

“Course, that isn’t a candle to my work,” Shieldwall smirked. “Ever hear of Reaper? Did me proud at the Maine Medical Center, she did. Too bad Kraber quickly took care of her.”

“You know, I’ve got the strangest sense of déja vu,” Cadance said coolly. “Only yesterday, I was learning more on anomalous Newfoals, from a person others told me was a… ‘character’.”

“No doubt, no doubt,” Shieldwall said mildly. “A ‘character’, eh? That ain’t so bad when you’ve been called worse, and it’s kinda flattering, actually… So, who might this lucky soul be, graced by your presence, Your Ladyship?”

“Oh, I’m sure you know them,” Cadance commented. “Someone behind the curtain, likes to surround herself with an aura of mystery, and a deeply personal vision about this war.”

“Ah... You mean Carter.” Shieldwall tried smirking, but Cadance noticed that it faltered. “Yes, she’s quite something, ain’t she? Dunno why, I never quite got around to making her my nemesis or anything…” He rubbed his crippled legs. “But I guess, when you’re used to dealing with Kraber’s sort…”

“Maybe.”

Now Shieldwall was frowning. “What’re you getting at?”

Looking at him, Cadance felt sad. It was as if she’d aged the years that separated her from her counterpart.

“I knew Verity reminded me, a little, of someone…” Cadance said, in words tinged with regret. “The same cocksure attitude, the same romanticism… Just like I knew that I remember you from somewhere, Mister Shieldwall.”

She sighed, closing her eyes, then reopening them.

“You were one of Prince Blueblood’s friends in Canterlot, weren’t you? I remember now, you hung around him all the time, you and that stallion with the fiery mane. Including the time he took the Starspear, on what he called a ‘Grand Tour’ around the world.”

Shieldwall crossed his forelegs, watching her darkly.

“So?” he said. “That was a long time ago, lady. If you’re hoping to coax a sentimental response outta me, harking back to some boyhood joyride, guess what? Forget it. You’re not getting me that way. Maybe we thought we were hot stuff back then, gallivanting around the world on our folks’ dime… but really, it was a small world. We didn’t how much bigger it was gonna get.”

Cadance stood up, keeping him fixed under her gaze. He was a short stallion and she’d always have towered over him, but strapped to his wheelchair, she practically dwarfed him.

“You call this… bigger?” she whispered, taking in him and his cell. “Look about you. You’re here on a whole new world, and where are you? You’re trapped between four walls. The Blueblood that I know may have– have had this, this idea the world was his to grab, but he’d never try to do what the Empire’s doing.”

She took a deep breath.

“Celestia once told me a full-fledged alicorn can touch the stars. But all I see the Solar Empure wants is to drag down the stars, stick them in a box. We’re here on this distant, messy, wonderful new planet, and what’s the best they can do? Iron it out. You’re not stepping out to meet a larger world. You’re trying to shrink it down, until it shrivels up.”

Shieldwall chuckled. “Funny you should put it that way,” he said. “The humans, they got this old myth, see. It’s about this box you’re not supposed to open, right, because once you open it, you can’t put the genie back in the bottle.”

He rubbed his chin.

“Or am I getting my wires crossed? Ah, whatever. Not like anyone’s gonna remember, once the Barrier’s done. The Barrier’s not like us… it’s unlike us. I don’t know what it wants, or if it wants, but it’ll grow until it encompasses everything. Our bodies and minds, they’ll be fragmented into their smallest parts, till not one part remains… This is not Conversion, Your Ladyship. It isn’t even a broken mirror. Do you know what it is? It’s refraction. And one day… Annihilation.”

Cadance gave him a hooded glare. “Yeah… I’d say we’re done here.”

But as she turned, he spoke once more. “You’re right, you know.”

She hesitated. “About what?”

“Blueblood, old Bluey, wouldn’t have done it,” Shieldwall said glibly. “Not if you really knew him. Guy was always trying to make people think he was something he wasn’t… Well, no joke, that ended up being the death of him. I remember, they called me the ‘crazy’ one in our group, leaving poor old Sooty– Awesome Fire, you know him? How it’d wind him up, my shields, cock-blocking his precious firepower! He’d play straight guy to us crazy kids, but if you looked in his eyes, ooh, you saw it made him so mad.”

He smiled wolfishly.

“I wonder when you’ll find out... Deep down, Sooty’s the craziest of us all.”

Shieldwall swivelled his wheelchair, his back to her.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me. I had a little ditty I wanted to finish, about broken bottles.”

~ Jarden, USA ~
— Five hours later

“I’m not sure what to make of this salad,” said Luna, nudging her bowl. “It looks… artificial.”

“Not one to eat your greens?” said Maxine. “Yeah, it’s fast food.”

Luna’s companion had settled for hot soup – though she’d eyed the meat-burgers hungrily. It was polite of her. Although Reiner had spoken of humanity’s disposition towards meat, he’d also mentioned plant-based dishes.

In this diner, within Reiner’s hometown no less, at least an Equestrian could still find repast that basically agreed with them. True, Maxine had made a disparaging comment about ‘horse town’ when Luna had asked where they’d eat after church,. A comment Luna still didn’t quite get, but the woman had soon relented and led her here.

This was a peculiar pattern with Maxine Radwick. Outwardly, she acted standoffish, yet whenever coaxed, it appeared she’d grudgingly put up with things until they went away. Given how long this war had lasted, Luna wondered how long she’d waited for things to go away.

Her only condition had been to take a table not facing the street.

Looking down at the bowl of salad, celery and carrots, Luna shrugged, and took a small bite. She contemplated its taste, smacking her lips.

“Mmm, not bad,” said Luna, chewing softly. “Not fancy dining, but it’ll do.”

“Join the club, Princess,” said Maxine, stirring her soup. “My old Dad, he’s lucky to still get his meals delivered. And that’s not the half of it… Even if this town’s still here next year, God knows what next Winter’ll be like. So enjoy it while it lasts.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” said Luna. She took a larger bite. “I’ve seen many a Winter… And, after everything we went through in Boston, today I’ll take anything.”

She reached for a bottle of ‘garlic sauce’, and poured it neatly on her remaining portion. She nibbled at it, savouring the salty taste.

“Mmm, that’s better…” Luna said, letting the mixed taste settle. For its simplicity, it did just fine to sate her hunger. With her portion now finished, she leaned back in her seat, sighing. “Nothing like a meal to close it all off…”

A meal in Equestria was something she already missed. She looked at Maxine, who kept stirring her soup.

“Aren’t you excited to see your brother again?” asked Luna. From what she could glean earlier, though, the answer wouldn’t be positive. “I’m sure he’d be… well, he’d want to talk to you and Dan. I’ll tell him what we’ve uncovered.”

“Thanks, but it’s complicated. You don’t just walk away after knowing all… that.”

Maxine didn’t say anything more, which was fine by Luna. She glanced at the cloth-bag under the table. She hadn’t thought of asking the Reverend if she could take a Bible home with her, which left only the two journals.

“I liked the service,” Luna commented. “I see now why your people would follow religion so… enthusiastically.” Yet she huffed. The image of the young boy and his mother lingered on, the mother’s judgemental look heavy on her mind. “Though, I don’t know about that last part, the one about the Sun and Moon.”

“Huh? What of it?”

Luna shrugged, tapping her fork as she recited. “‘But in those days, following that distress, the Sun will be darkened, and the Moon will not give its light. The stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.’”

She felt a shudder coming up.

“I don’t know… the words feel… prescient. One could argue that those who wrote these stories saw a future yet to come. A future I’m not comfortable with. Far too… ominous. We’ve had our fair share of prophecies, and I think I should talk to your God about it.”

That last comment, curiously, drew a blank stare from Maxine, who paused mid-stir.

“Don’t think God’s open to chat these days.”

“Then I suppose I’ll have to find out for myself,” said Luna. “There’s a long way ahead, Miss Radwick. And I’ve got at least some time.”

“Time? It’s not about time– I don’t think you can meet him at all.”

“Hm, then he’s the hooves-off type of parent, I can tell,” Luna persisted. “But I wouldn’t wish to bother him too much about that, because your people have certainly proven resourceful.”

“I’m glad you think so, Princess,” Maxine said tonelessly. “To be honest, I never really wanted to meet God. Even as a kid, when Mom made us go to church every week. I used to think he sounded scary.”

Luna thought of the carving of the man nailed to a cross.

“He certainly doesn’t seem to… do things by half,” she said diplomatically. “I’m surprised, though. Just now, you deferred to his prescience.”

“What? When was that?”

“You said, ‘God knows’.”

Maxine scowled. “That’s just an expression,” she said, letting the spoon drop. “Maybe it used to mean something, but people’ve been using it for so long now, it’s just something you say.”

“Then you’ve got no idea if he knows?” Luna blinked. “Odd… But, if he’s that scary to you, why even use his name?”

“Dunno. Force of habit, I guess. They’re big on God in this country.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean,” Maxine said slowly, tremorously picking up her spoon, “that’s what’s so scary about God. They don’t let you get away from him. Mom wasn’t so bad, but some friends she had… Well, I’m sure they didn’t really mean any harm. But it was scary, all the same.”

Frowning, Luna set aside her bowl. “I’d like to understand.”

“It’s kinda hard to explain...” Maxine forced a spoonful past her lips, before she continued. “People like the Reverend, right, they’ll tell you God loves and forgives you. But then you get those types who say, you do anything wrong, or don’t believe hard enough, you’ll end in a pit of fire. Forever.”

Luna sat back and listened silently.

“And there’s all those times he doesn’t follow his own rules… Haven’t even mentioned the Old Testament, have I? If you thought the Gospel of Mark was ominous… Plenty of jolly murder, rape and genocide to go around in there. It’s okay, though. It’s in his name.”

All this new information did not register at once with Luna.

She found it hard to reconcile the portrait Maxine drew with her experience of the church, the benign tone of the Reverend, the selflessness of the man on the cross or the comfort the ‘flock’ took in their presence. And yet the woman’s voice, though burnt-out, sounded truthful...

“I must admit,” Luna said, touching her chin, “I find it difficult to grasp how this, along with promising an eternity of torture, could be called ‘loving’.”

Maxine took another sip, and when she spoke next, it was as if it were the soup that was sour.

“Guess a superior being, a truly superior being, can do things that if a lesser being like a human were to do... then it would be evil.”

There was nothing Luna could think to say there.

Mulling over the two mutually incompatible perspectives of God she’d been given, the best conclusion Luna could reach was that this, too, was more complicated than she’d anticipated. Though she had millennia of experience, here was another puzzle where she did not hold all the pieces. She wondered if anyone did.

Her hunger had returned during the talk. Peeking, Luna found her salad bowl empty. She called for the waitress, a rather bored-looking young woman, and sweetly requested a second helping.

‘Maybe I should ask for a bottle of sauce.’ She levitated her teacup, and took a sip. ‘There ought to be enough space for–’

“May I ask you something?” Maxine said suddenly, setting her arms on the table.

Luna set down her cup. “Yes. You may.”

Maxine paused a moment, then sighed. “Was she always like this?” she asked tensely. Luna leaned forward, with a raised eyebrow. “Your sister. Did she ever have… tendencies.”

“No,” Luna’s answer came quickly. “Never. My sister would have never embarked on such a heinous endeavour…”

“How do you know that?” Maxine asked. “How’d you know she won’t turn out like this Tyrant?”

“When it comes to turning ‘evil’,” Luna said quietly. “You’re looking at the Princess who did, Maxine. I’m sure you’re familiar with the old tale.”

Maxine nodded, after some thinking. “Yeah. Nightmare Moon.”

“Indeed,” Luna said simply. She sipped from her cup, looking out the window. “It was I who imposed they should cherish and adore my night. Until the Elements brought me back from the Nightmare’s clutches… And throughout my long life, I’ve never known my sister to display tyrants’ tendencies. For a thousand years since… my banishment, Equestria did not know war. She can end disputes with a single letter and a few words of wisdom– take the pretender Grover the Tenth, whose scuffle with the Dragon Lord ended at a few of her best jokes! How she’s sent many an invader back to their own doorstep, before they could even march off to war.”

Briefly, Luna paused, as her thoughts drifted to the Blueblood family, that ancient bloodline she’d once married into many centuries ago. Astron wasn’t much like Polaris, nor her husband, to her regret.

Celestia had chosen Equestria over founding a family of her own. And though the family Luna raised in the Crystal Realm had thrived, the time eventually came for the Princess of the Night to return at her sister’s side, all too soon. Still, when her descendant Amore took the Crystal Throne, hope sprung that Equestria and the Realm would continue to prosper, always. Then the Dark King rose to power, put Amore to the sword, scattered the family, and took the Crystal Realm with him when he fell against the Sun and Moon.

One thousand years later, here in a diner across the worlds, Luna wondered if any of it had been worth the grief and envy of Nightmare Moon.

‘No,’ she thought. ‘It never was.’

Here before her sat one whose family had also been torn apart by war and the passage of time. Though she didn’t say it, she felt some pity for Maxine Radwick.

“This was a peace she maintained without the Elements of Harmony. And now, with the Elements restored, so shall the peace endure.”

Maxine scoffed at that. “Yeah,” she said sardonically, tapping the table impatiently. “Then she comes over here, three years pass, and she’s suddenly all for war?” The woman rested both palms on the table and leaned over, meeting Luna’s eyes. “I don’t get it. I don’t know what you think, but something is up. You, more than anyone, should know better.”

“Yes,” Luna said coolly. “She is family, and we only had each other for centuries. I know Celestia. And she would’ve never...” She shook her head. “This Tyrant… whatever she is, that is not the sister I grew up with. There must be an answer.”

Groaning, Maxine threw her arms in the air. “People change. It doesn’t matter, you won’t like the answer, whatever! You can’t just keep… look, whatever the reason, she still did it.”

Luna shared a grave look. “I understand,” she said, nodding in sympathy. “And whatever the answer we find, we’ll keep our promise, and help will come. The Solar Empire’s deeds are not borne of kindness or compassion. They think themselves superior, but they have no right to do anythingthey’ve done to you.”

For the longest moment, Maxine stared impassively. With a roll of her eyes, she leaned back.

“God, I hope this isn’t some fluke.”

Luna let out a laugh. She sipped the last of her tea, and nodded. “Personally,” she said, setting the cup aside. “I hope it isn’t. It wouldn’t be like us, Miss Radwick, if we weren’t going to try first, you know. Yet I fear we have more questions than answers…”

Outside, the Sun shone its light upon the crowded sidewalks. A Sun without someone to guide it – or rather, it was the Earth that revolved around it, and in turn, the Moon around the Earth.

She found it very confusing.

‘Perhaps… Such questions led them to discover so much of their world.’

An enigmatic, aloof God. A world which governed itself. Small wonder that humans struggled to understand this primordial world they lived on, even with their know-how and technology. Without any control but their own will, they’d fought so very hard, throughout their existence, against unforgiving nature and their own brethren.

And now a threat from across the worlds.

Something caught Luna’s eye, on the street. Something had changed in the air. The sidewalk cleared and the few motor-vehicles came to a halt. Then the sunlight streaming in through the windows was blocked out as, with a noisy, ground-shaking rumble, other carriages turned up. These were a dull, sandy colour. It struck Luna that she’d seen this model before, among the ruins of Boston.

Out of the trio of carriages poured armed soldiers, securing the perimeter and turning away curious civilians. Among them was a man in armour not unlike what she’d worn in the battle. Major Bauer. But it was the last figure to step out that made Luna smile.

Through the diner’s doors, Princess Mi Amore Cadenza came through, clad in a PHL vest that neatly covered her wings. Before everyone’s eyes, under the patrons’ and Maxine’s confused stares, Cadance marched up to Luna’s table, and yawned.

“Aunt Luna,” she said wearily, with a half-lidded gaze. “Morning.”

“Hello, Cadance,” said Luna, smiling as pleasantly as she could. “Fancy some salad?”

~ San Antonio, Texas, USA ~
— One hour later

By the time they’d arrived at the base – Lackland Air Force Base, to be precise – Luna had reverted to her original form, though tufts of her mane remained in their light blue state. Cadance had not spoken much at all, during the hour-long travel between Jarden and San Antonio. Nor did she particularly feel like it. Luna seemed cheerful in a manner Cadance just wasn’t feeling.

Now, facing an empty table in a closed-in-room, she sat next to Luna, forelegs crossed.

“Cadance,” said Luna. "Are you… displeased?"

“Mmh,” Cadance vocalised. “Mmph.”

Another pause. “Is it the sunglasses?”

Cadance let loose a long sigh. “Aunt Luna, don’t, don’t do that, please,” she said, glancing at Luna with half-lidded eyes. “I’m not angry at you. I’m just…” She yawned. “I’m just tired, you know? And then… well I just need to say this, but… you worry me.”

“Cadance–” Luna had begun to say, but Cadance raised a forehoof.

“Let me finish,” she said. “Because I really am worried. After what we went through, you come in, coughing and spitting blood, and all you told me is you’re… okay? I know we’re both immortal, but you don’t come back coughing blood and say ‘I’m okay’. Honestly…”

Her voice faded once she finally, finally let herself realise what Luna was wearing. It was a flowery button-up shirt, with drawn roses against the white fabric. They contrasted greatly with Cadance’s new vest or her usual regalia.

“Okay, and that’s not even getting into… this! Why’re you all dressed up like you’re on a vacation to Las Pegasus? You don’t even like poker.”

“No,” said Luna. “But I thought it was… fitting.” She wrapped a wing around Cadance warmly. “I must say, you would’ve enjoyed the town, Cadance. It’s a quaint little place, and I’m sure you’d have found a souvenir to your liking.”

“Perhaps,” said Cadance. She gave a weak smile. “Sorry. Long night. Long talk. Lots to think about. How was your trip then?”

“Well,” Luna said, tapping her chin. “I’ll… I suppose I’ll inform Captain Reiner of the details when we return. But overall, I like to think I’ve gained a greater understanding of him. And his family.”

Maxine Radwick had excused herself elsewhere – into the plane itself, Cadance remembered. Luna spiriting her away must have resulted in a lot of paperwork.

“I see,” she said. “I’m glad you had your… well, rest.”

“Yes, well, I did gain something from it,” said Luna. She patted her saddlebags. “I’ve acquired a few books that… well, may be of interest, of course. And…”

Her aunt’s smile faltered slightly.

“I am sorry, Cadance,” Luna said quietly. “Paperwork has… never been my strong suit, I admit. I figured that if it was you presenting to humanity’s foremost leaders, you’d present our terms better than I could have, and in turn they’d listen more carefully. But it does not excuse my carelessness and irresponsibility, and for that, I’m sorry.”

With a wing, she gave a cheeky nudge.

“Allow me to make it up to you. When this is all over, Cadance,” said Luna. “Perhaps we could… take Earth as it is. A visit for out whole family– my, it’s been millennia since we’ve had a reunion. And a trip to Earth, that could do it.”

Cadance couldn’t help but chuckle at that.

“I mean we didn’t get, you know, the best first impression of Earth,” she said, deadpan. “We haven’t even seen what it’s like when…” She looked at her aunt’s shirt, and shook her head in bemusement. “Nevermind, I guess you did have your vacation.”

“And not a long enough one at that,” Luna said, blowing softly. “But I may have uncovered a few useful tidbits…”

“We’ll talk about that later, Auntie. I’m just… I’m worried about you. You told me what happened between you and Twilight and Spike, but I sensed…”

She stopped short of saying what she’d suspected upon seeing Luna’s expression, which had turned forlorn.

“I know what you wanted to ask, before I sent you off to find Major Bauer,” said Luna solemnly, her mind evidently going back to that night as Cadance’s had. “And… yes. The answer is yes.”

“Ah, right,” Cadance said simply. “I know you’ve… um, dealt with it before.”

“Indeed I have,” agreed Luna. Suddenly she seemed to find her own hooves rather interesting. “But… when this is all over, ah, Cadance?”

“Yes?”

“Would you mind… telling us how it’s all changed?” said Luna, tapping her hooves together. She looked for all the world like a bashful teenager. “I believe this is one area I daren’t ask Tia about. Please don’t tell her, she’ll never let me hear the end of it.”

All Cadance’s exhaustion and earlier frustration evaporated.

“Okay,” she said. “Once we talk this through with Aunt Celestia, we’ll talk about courtship when we get back, don’t worry. And… maybe Twilight’s got books on it?”

“Surely you jest,” Luna replied. She tilted her head. “Does she?”

“She’s got books for everything, Auntie,” Cadance said. “Maybe you could give her some, too. That’s a good start, you know.”

They got up, leaving the table.

Cadance decided not to admit to Luna she’d basically made them stopover in an interrogation room to finish recovering from the workload Luna had shoved onto her. As Luna followed her all the way outside and onto the tarmac, however, her aunt did begin to look wary.

“Cadance?” asked Luna, stopping to gaze around the expanse. “How far do we have to go? I do believe we’ve not enough mana yet to ‘port.”

Hearing this, Cadance had to giggle.

“Oh, Auntie,” she said, forehoof sweeping over the airfield. “Who said anything about ‘porting?”

She pointed across the tarmac, seeing her aunt’s gaze follow where she pointed. And then Luna tilted her head, ever so slightly.

The sight of the massive cargo aircraft must have impressed her like it had Cadance.

“They call it a– let’s see,” Cadance said, clearing her throat. “A plane. A C-5 Galaxy, I think. It’s for cargo. I’ve already spent the day on another kind of plane. A jet, for passenger flight.”

“I… believe I’ve seen smaller forms of this craft-type,” said Luna. “But none so massive.”

“I know,” Cadance replied, smiling. “Come on. It must be more comfortable than it looks.”

They walked, meeting up with the taciturn Major Bauer and two other escorts from his Knights.

It was a little awkward to climb the narrow ladder leading to the passenger compartment, as the humans hadn’t had time to replace this particular plane’s ladder with a set appropriate for Equestrians. But as they climbed past the cargo hold, Cadance noticed her aunt’s concerns remained with Spike, from the way her gaze brushed over him, slumbering and strapped into the great hold.

“Aunt Luna,” Cadance said, while they seated themselves. Luna glanced at her expectantly. “You picked this… I don’t know, mischief-thing from Aunt Celestia, didn’t you?”

“From Tia?” Luna asked. Though most of her eyes were hidden behind her sunglasses, Cadance saw a familiar twinkle in them, completed by her mysterious smile. “Nay, Cadance. Although, she does go to greater lengths than I do. Would you wish that I had?”

“Oh, no, not at all. Please don’t.”

* * * * *

Flight without her own power felt… bizarre, to Luna. While Celestia might have got accustomed to centuries on golden sky-carriages, nothing felt as constricting as being this close to freedom, yet restrained by mere metal, hundreds of miles above the ground. Despite their relative comfort, they were flying at speeds beyond that of any pegasus, except perhaps the Bearer of Loyalty.

Reacquainting herself with Lady Cadance, her niece’s oddly-diminished counterpart, had been a process Luna tried not to speed through. She’d felt somewhat at a loss regarding the PHL’s other envoy, until Cadance had introduced Moondancer, a quiet, polite mare who’d shown interest in their Equestria, ‘preserved in amber’, as she’d called it.

It had taken longer for them to meet with Hanne Adler – who now lay asleep on her seat, blissfully unaware of the two alicorns looking at her curiously.

“Ahem,” said Dieter Sommer, the man that was her partner. “Hanne, she’s here.”

Suddenly awakened, the photographer shot up straight, pausing only to give her tangled blonde mane a quick brush and adjust her beret. Her large eyes darted around the cabin until they found Luna. So large were they, Luna felt she looked perpetually surprised.

“Dieter, what– Oh. My apologies, Your Highnesses,” Adler said. Her accent was much like Major Bauer’s. “I… must’ve fallen asleep.”

“That you did,” said Sommer, amused.

“I’ll leave you both to it," said Lady Cadance, giving Cadance and Luna a nod. “Mister Sommer, if you would?”

“Right… good luck, Hanne,” said Sommer.

Without another word, they were off down the aisle as Luna and Cadance settled into seats opposite Adler, while she tidied up her hair and patted her clothes – rather laidback for an interview if Luna knew anything, with a pair of blue jeans, grey shirt, and black jacket.

“Good…” said Adler. She stifled a yawn. “Good afternoon, Your Highnesses.”

“Good afternoon,” Luna replied, gearing herself.

Adler carried herself adroitly, from the way she set her camera on her lap, and yet there was an unprofessional giddiness to her tone, betrayed by the slightest fidgets. Her hand held a pen and notepad, ready to write.

“Right…” Adler said, smiling politely, despite visible weariness. “Good afternoon, Princess Luna, Princess Cadance. My name is Hanne Adler, here with The New York Times. Would you mind answering a few questions?”

Luna exchanged a glance with Cadance.

“Oh, the interview,” Cadance said giddily. “Your friend Lani asked me a few questions too, Miss Adler. Aunt Luna? You got this– remember what I told you? About those… those reporters in the Night Court?”

The first session of the Night Court in a millenium hadn’t been a smooth ride, as a dozen reporters had tried forcing their way into the throne room, adamant to catch a glimpse of the restored Princess of the Night. It wasn’t until Nightmare Night that she’d steeled herself to formally reappear in public on her own terms, thanks to Tia’s encouragement.

Luna brushed the memory aside. Here was only Adler, and now she had Cadance.

“Breathe, calm, be yourself, Auntie,” said Cadance, beaming. “You can do it.”

Biting her lower lip, Luna looked back at Adler, scrounging her memories for what Cadance had indeed advised her to do.

“Yes, Miss Adler,” said Luna. “I’d be delighted to answer your questions.”

So she spoke. The plane trip was not at all like true flight, and in the end, the interview wasn’t the chore she’d feared it’d be, between Adler’s smooth questions, Cadance’s light encouragements and her own efforts to maintain a facade.

Adler didn’t pry too much, thankfully steering clear of questions that might paint Celestia in an unfavourable light. Luna appreciated this. Indeed, it was mainly about her that Adler asked, from her still poorly-understood role in the Equestrian government, to why she’d been chosen to lead these efforts at diplomacy.

“I am not sure myself,” Luna said. She patted Cadance’s wing. “But you can thank my niece here for salvaging what could’ve turned into a disaster.”

Yet try as she might, Luna couldn’t shake off lingering feelings from Jarden. The Radwick home, the humble church, the people going on with their daily lives, both tacitly acknowledging the war that loomed and attempting to ignore it.

At last, both parties made a breakthrough.

“Why were you in Jarden, Princess?” she asked. “If… if it’s not too much to ask.”

Thinking, Luna knew she couldn’t mention the locket yet. Confidentiality was something to keep even now.

But there was no reason not to ask Adler a question in turn.

“I wished to see what you hold dear,” said Luna. “That is what I told Miss Radwick.”

“Oh?” said Adler, scribbling away at her notepad. “That’s… that’s something, Princess.”

“Indeed it is,” Luna said. The opening was hers to take. “Miss Adler, if I may, you asked earlier why we’ve committed ourselves to help.”

“I did, yes,” Adler said. “Is something wrong?”

“No. But, throughout my sight-seeing here, I’d yet to be given the reason why we should step in, from your own people, Miss Adler. Captain Reiner told us much, that is true. But until Jarden, I hadn’t seen, with my own eyes, and without any… pardon my words, any empty platitudes, what is truly at stake. Now, you need only explain to me the why.”

“I’m… sorry?”

“My answer to your question is simple, Miss Adler. I only wished to see what is at stake. What humanity’s worth is. And herein lies my question. Why?”

“Aunt Luna–” Cadance spoke up.

“I apologise for my candour, Cadance, truly. I only wish to understand, why’d it be worth it? Our commitment has been made. Whatever you say here, it is our duty and our choice to help. But make me understand here and now, what do you have to lose.”

A pause. Cadance let out a small cough.

“She does that,” she said. “But… I think she’s made her point, Miss Adler.”

Adler, Luna noticed, had gripped her notepad tight.

“Ah… I see,” said Adler. She put her notepad aside, and clutched her camera. “I suppose this’ll be off record…” She adjusted her beret. “Where should I begin?”

“Anywhere you’d like, Miss Adler,” said Luna. “I’m aware this is a rather vast topic. But please. Take your time.”

Something changed behind those large eyes of Adler’s. An old sorrow. The woman rested her chin on her palm, and shifted in her seating. Finally, after a few more moments’ restlessness, Adler released a long, long sigh.

“In all honesty, Princess,” she said, her voice forlorn. “I don’t know if I can say it right.”

“You don’t need to. You need only to be honest.”

Adler nodded. “Alright… alright…” she said, wistfully. “I’m… well, if you ask me, it’s… its our legacy, Princess.”

“Legacy, you say?”

“Yeah,” said Adler. “Look, I’m just someone with a camera and a couple words to say. And personally… I don’t want us to be forgotten.”

She reached out to a device to the seat on her left, a black, rectangular device like the laptop Dan Radwick had shown Luna, and pressed a few buttons.

Adler turned the screen around – and there, Luna saw it. A haggard man, whose skin wrapped tightly around his bones. There were many others just like him, in the dark confines of the bunks they lay down in.

‘I’ve seen this before… The Archmage’s gallery.’

“More than seventy years ago, the world fought a terrible war,” Adler said gravely. “All started because some madman thought himself and his people superior… My people.”

She shook her head.

“He led Germany to a pointless, cruel war,” Adler continued, her voice disdainful and venomous. “Much like the one the Empire wages on us now. He herded people like cattle to their deaths, waged a war on a scale hitherto unknown, and by the time a bullet was put through his brain, seventy million people had already perished. Even today, many follow his ideas. My grandfather was one of them. I never spoke to him again.”

Adler sighed, ruffling her hair in what might have been despondence.

“At the end of it, we asked ourselves... Why? The reasons were plenty. Not all made sense. Maybe sometimes... It just is, Princess.”

She flipped her device around, her brows furrowed.

“But if evil can be just because, so can the good. Especially the good. And here…”

The picture had changed when she turned it back around. Both Luna and Cadance leaned forward to contemplate it. There were several pictures, in fact, all telling the same story. A coastline stretching far as the eye could see, strewn with mud and debris. From high above, how it had looked so pristine, so green and lively before. Then a devastated city, with waste clogging up the streets so high, they dwarfed the people that stood before it.

“... Is the good.”

Adler used her finger to swipe the device’s glass-like screen, and the pictures moved beneath her touch.

“Oh dear…” Cadance whispered, holding a hoof above her heart.

Luna saw what she had seen – humans, dressed in orange, carrying what could only be a lifeless body from the rubble. On another picture, human-shaped bags were laid, side by side, with people looking over them. Some were mourning, crying, staring off into the distance…

“Who could have done this?” Luna asked. “What good could have possibly come from this?”

Adler shook her head. “You’ll find no man-made disaster in these pictures, Princess,” she said mournfully. “There was an earthquake, and a great wave that swept Aceh– that’s in Indonesia. Sri Lanka, Thailand... Two-hundred thousand dead, because of something beyond our control.”

Strangely, her mournful look changed before Luna’s eyes, into a somber smile.

“Next month, it’ll have been twenty years since then, yet I still remember how everyone threw in their lot to help those affected, across continents and oceans.”

She continued to swipe. The images changed. People, many without shoes, lining up for small boxes being given out. People dressed in uniforms not unlike the soldiers of UNAC, like Major Bauer out of armour, kneeling down to speak with children in tents. A gigantic white ship, marked by a red cross, coming into port with people cheering its arrival.

The same tale repeated every picture, people coming together, hand-in-hand for their brethren...

“... Just because,” Luna echoed. Adler nodded earnestly.

“I know we’ve done so much evil, Princess,” said Adler. “We, well, some of us, at least, we try. Please, remember them like we could. This tells me that there is good in humanity. And the day we stop fighting for that good, the day we stop caring for someone we’ll never meet, is the day our humanity– no, our heart, might as well be gone.”

Adler put her device away, steepling her hands.

“The Tyrant doesn’t see it that way,” she said lowly. “That… damned Barrier. It comes for us all. They claim to want to save, to preserve our memory, in those… those Newfoals. But the Barrier, it does not lie.”

Next to Luna, Cadance shuddered.

“I have seen it,” Luna said. “Your photograph is found everywhere, Miss Adler.”

It was a half-truth. Though Maxine’s father had shown her the famous photograph, Luna had personally seen the Barrier, at a scale larger than anyone could have imagined, a day before. Revealed by her ethereal eye, in her search for a town that may hold clues on how to stop it.

Adler gave a terse nod. “For five years, that photo has been my greatest achievement, and our worst nightmare. Everything we’ve done… how does it even compare to this, this thing. And the Barrier does not discriminate, Princess. Humanity as the Tyrant wills it must go.”

She looked down at the camera on her lap.

“By what right does she judge us?” Adler said, voice wavering, lips quivering. “We’re not, we’re not inherently evil, Princess. We’re not inherently good, either. We’re… we’re just people. People like… like the Sentinelese, who shun contact with humanity as a whole… have the Empire got to them first? Just… what hope do they have, when the Empire judges them as… fuck, I’m sorry.”

She wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her jacket.

“At the end of it, Your Highnesses,” Adler said softly. “I’m… I just wish that at the end of the day, everything we’ve done, everything we are, will be remembered.”

And Adler, Luna saw, clutched her camera a little tighter, her breathing heavy.

“I’m... sorry, that was dark, and a lot to… take in,” she whispered. “My apologies."

“There is no need to excuse yourself, Miss Adler,” Luna said, firmly. “For I understand.”

Hanne nodded, her eyes moist. “I… I think you already have your answers, Your Highness. Somewhere in that town.”

“I have,” said Luna. “But I shall remember what you told me here, as well. The road lies ahead, for your kind and mine. I cannot say what lies at the end… But, know that Equestria welcomes your people’s memory. All of humanity’s memory, in victory or in defeat, will be kept. For the living and the dead.”

Hanne looked at her curiously.

“That’s… that’s a big promise to make.”

“A promise we’ll keep, to the best of our abilities,” Cadance replied solemnly. “We’ll find a way.”

“We’ll find a way…” Hanne whispered, smiling despite her fresh tears. “Thank you, Princess. There’s… God, there’s so much to parse with this. But thank you for your time.”

She opened her bag, gently placing the now-filled notepad within.

Cadance spoke again. “Who do you have, Miss Adler?”

“I’m sorry?” said Hanne.

“I did ask who you hold dear, Miss Adler,” said Luna. “If you don't mind. ”

Hanne paused before replying.

“Well, there’s… my parents, my siblings… Dieter… Ana, Jan…” said Hanne, holding a hand over her breast pocket. ”They’re all I have left. Hendrik, Hilde, Elrik, Lars... They’re… just– we all lost some good people during the war. We’re just, I don’t know, we’re not like Alexander Reiner, Princess. It’s… it doesn’t matter, in the bigger picture.”

“On the contrary, Miss Adler, they matter,” said Luna. “As we’ve promised, all of humanity’s legacy will be remembered. Including yours.”

“So, uh, Princess Luna? I... are you going back to Canterlot?”

“Yes, Twilight Sparkle. Here we must part. I’ve got duties, and I daresay, our citizens have gone on long enough without a properly scheduled night.”

“Oh, that's alright. Well, if you need anything, Golden Oaks would be very happy to welcome you, Princess. Ponyville misses you, you know? I know I do– I mean, it’s been so long since Nightmare Night, Pipsqueak wouldn’t stop asking if you were coming!”

“... I see... I thank you for your offer, Twilight. You… you have been a presence most welcome yourself. Worry not! I do have books you may be interested in, if you’d like.”

“Oh, that’s, that’s– thank you, Princess. I’m flattered.”

“... Do call me Luna, Twilight. We… um. We are friends, are we not?”

“Of course! Of course, P– Luna. We are.”

“Wonderful! I mean… wonderful… right, I expect that I shall return here. Will you be there?”

“You bet I will! I’ll be waiting, Luna. We have so, so much to talk about…”

~ Canterlot, Equestrian Solar Empire ~ Fourteenth Day of the Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~

“Lady Archmage?”

Twilight snapped back to the present.

“Yes?”

Speaker Raven Inkwell had been the one to address her. She coughed politely.

“They’re awaiting your statement.”

The bespectacled, whiteish mare looked concerned, but Twilight looked past her, out into the Chamber of Accord.

The Joint Council’s public officials had taken benches on their right, from Equestria and the Crystal Realm, to Hippogriffia, Oleander and Maretonia, and Saddle Mareabia and the tribes of Zebrica. And the Co-Harmony Sphere’s latest adherents, the Eastern Unicorns of Neighpon. To the left were seated the Sphere’s military officials, with the exception of her brother.

Shining had chosen to remain on Earth, to deal with whatever was left of the Boston situation from Hollow One. Clever Ace, his deputy, took his stead here.

Completing the image were the Loyalty Guards who stood vigil in their signature purple-and-yellow armour. Not least of which were her own. The pair stood behind her, just as behind her and Raven Inkwell sat the Imperial Cabinet. Including four Element Bearers, other than Dash who sat with the military officials. Her friends, all together for the first time in months.

She wished they hadn’t got here in such dire straits, mere days ago.

“Lady Archmage,” Shearwater leaned in closer, and whispered. “We ought to hold off on the meeting. You need your rest...”

Twilight brushed off her bodyguard. She winced – the painkillers had done their work, but she could still not bear to feel even a breeze where her left ear had been.

“No,” she replied quietly. She looked at Terramar on her other side, hoping a quick smile was enough to ward his worry. “They need answers. All of them.”

A chamber of benches, filled with forty souls, not counting the Guard. Merely a quarter full, compared to a full session of the Imperial Parliament. Yet they had such news waiting for them. Her diadem felt heavy, and her starry cloak offered little protection to the watchful eyes that surrounded her, but Twilight Sparkle felt her resolve strengthen.

The Speaker sat down. Twilight stood forward.

“My fellow faithful…” Murmurs floated in the air, some turned to glance at the side of her head. Who then tore their eyes away when she glared at them. “I hereby welcome you all to this Special Council.”

Behind her, Fleur de Lis was the first to give a polite clap. As the Minister of Newfoal Affairs, her presence here was a formality, but Twilight silently thanked her. From a bench to the right, Sunburst, the Crystal Mage, followed suit. He threw Twilight a look of encouragement.

Less could be said of Minister Neighsay, whose glare she felt upon her neck. A great many years had passed since she and the notoriously pro-national Minister of Education had exchanged barbs over his Equestria First leanings. Today wasn’t a day Twilight felt compelled to reignite those debates.

Again to the right, the Viceroy of Hippogriffia signaled a despire to speak. Raven nodded his way.

“Lady Archmage, if I may,” said Skybeak. “I wish to relay Queen Skystar and Princess Silverstream’s condolences. They wish you a speedy recovery.”

“Thank you, Viceroy,” said Twilight. She threw a quick look at Terramar, and smiled. “And please relay my thanks for Terramar's service. I'm sure Princess Silverstream would be delighted to know of her brother’s performance.”

Her voice died down when she saw Vicereine Amira raise her forehoof.

“Ahem, yes, Vicereine?”

“Your Ladyship,” said Amira. “Please, we wish to understand. There have been rumours from our personnel at Hollow One.” She paused, as if contemplating her words. “These… rumours. They speak of Princess Luna… and of Cadance.”

Twilight had to bite down the headache, and hope no one would notice.

“Perhaps you ought to keep them quiet, Vicereine,” sneered Minister Neighsay. He himself had kept quiet awhile, but the aging unicorn evidently saw fit to speak now. “It is hardly appropriate for your troops to gossip in troubled times.”

“If I may speak, Minister,” hissed Twilight, and Neighsay recoiled. “I understand your concerns, Vicereine. All will be explained in due time.”

Her eyes panned out over the whole chamber. She took a deep breath.

“Now… as you all have heard, a new enemy has made themselves known.”

She paused, letting her words settle in all those gathered. Almost as soon as she had finished, there were low murmurs, mostly from representatives further back. She wanted to turn around, look at her friends for encouragement. But this was her responsibility.

“Yet this enemy,” Twilight continued, “is not merely an old enemy resurgent. Not an enemy from our own world, joining forces with humanity against us, like the Betrayer did. No, they represent a whole other world. And in effect…”

She felt her wound sting, yet she pressed on.

“... They are us.”

Twilight winced as the murmurs turned louder. She saw Viceroy Gestal, that old griffon, adjust his glasses, his usually-squinty eyes wide in astonishment. Still others expressed confusion, bewilderment, the whole spectrum.

“Yes, they are us, claiming to spring forth from a parallel reality. Though we are unsure as of yet that this isn’t some… trickery perpetrated by the PHL, these wholly unprecedented circumstances warrant a measure of quarantine. The renewed UNAC offensive has regrettably begun to push our troops back from the Boston perimeter, a situation we need to remedy. Viceroy Skybeak?”

“Yes, Lady Archmage?” he said, looking shaken.

“Please, inform Queen Skystar that in light of the High Captain’s report, a stronger hippogriff presence is expected–”

“Excuse me,” called out a voice from the edge of the chamber. “If I may interject.”

The entire room turned towards the speaker, who sat at the very back row of the military officials. He was a white stallion, though not as immaculate as Shining Armor, with a slightly greyish tint to the hue of his coat. His once-fiery orange mane looked heavily greyed along with it Twilight wracked her brains as she tried to recall who was speaking. She glanced at the jacket he wore, to see pips and the insignia of the Navy’s engineering corps. Then it hit her.

“Chief Engineer,” said Twilight. “What do you wish to address?”

“Thank you, Lady Archmage.” Awesome Fire bowed his head as he spoke. “In light of the… issues in North America, I have a proposal.”

“Go on,” Twilight prompted.

She hadn’t spoken often to the Queen’s Chief Engineer, mainly because their roles rarely intersected, but also due to a feeling of distaste she felt around the stallion.

Awesome Fire was a dedicated naval officer with a good track record, but plenty of unsavoury rumours surrounded him. Prior to the war, he’d been good friends with Prince Blueblood – more than that, possibly. He was also one of the few who knew that Blueblood, Hero of the Empire, had really been a traitor who’d helped the turncoat Princesses Luna and Cadance escape.

Forcing down her déja vu, Twilight told herself Fire should well know, given he’d denounced Blueblood. An act loyal to the Queen, but even so, it made Twilight uneasy. Not only had it got Blueblood secretly petrified and shattered, this was why Luna was now a statue in the Gardens… A Luna. She remembered Fire had also been friends, in a ‘frenemy’ kind of way, with Shieldwall, that compromised individual.

With such friends, who knew what went on inside that head. Fire’s own secretive and obsessive proclivities didn’t help his case. Twilight even wondered if his coat was truly white, or if he’d dyed it, just like you’d expect of a working-class go-getter aiming to look fashionable in Canterlot. Much as Twilight usually ignored him, it seemed like he just hid away on one naval facility or another, only showing up if he had a report to give. It was so… antisocial.

“Members of the Council,” Fire began, offering respectful nods to the equines in the room. “Before the news of what happened at Boston reached me, I had been drafting a report on the Empire’s latest military initiative: Project Hearthswarming.”

The name got several reactions, many confused. Twilight knew what he was talking about, but felt astonishment more than anything.

“You mean it’s been approved?” She turned to look at Clever Ace. “I was not informed.”

The Deputy Captain, a grey-coloured pegasus, cleared his throat. “Nor was I made aware of it, Lady Archmage. The High Captain was to be informed first.”

‘Of all the times he had to stay with the rank-and-file…’Twilight held back a frustrated sigh.

As murmurs grew, from all around the chamber, Fire continued, his tone heavily proud.

“Oh, yes. We expect to make further breakthrough in the next three months, performing the first tests under live-fire conditions.”

“Live-fire?” Vicereine Amira asked. From her blue eyes’ icy glare, Twilight thought that she didn’t look happy. “What exactly is this project?”

“‘Hearthswarming’,” explained Fire, “is a device of my own devising, with extensive and highly valuable guidance from Her Majesty, that can assist in our military’s ability to project power beyond the Barrier.”

Fire’s rictus seemed to grow, inch by inch, the longer he spoke.

“A high-yield thaumic conductor and generator, able to concentrate extremely high amounts of magical energy and then project it outwards in… I suppose, it would be appropriate to say, in the manner of a cannon.”

“Is it a cannon?” Ace asked.

“Well, personally, I’d call it much more than a mere cannon, Deputy Captain,” Fire replied haughtily. “It’s also an immense source of power that, with a little modification, could be applied in so many more ways. I’ve already been drafting new applications that may, in time, allow us to enhance our forces with this energy… or hinder our enemies. The possibilities are limitless.”

Twilight saw both Amira and Skybeak share an uneasy look.

“How did you get the power source?” Sunburst asked aloud. He held himself back, just enough, Twilight knew. “We’ve run the calculations and…”

“Ahem, that’s classified, I’m afraid. There will be a written report delivered later when Her Majesty approves of it.”

Twilight narrowed her eyes at Fire’s reply. It was too quick and a little panicked. Sunburst also looked dissatisfied, but probably hadn’t noted the same, or was just distracted trying to deduce what exactly Fire now had at his disposal.

“In the meantime,” Fire said, recovering, “I would like to propose that we deploy Project Hearthswarming, outfit it and send it to the Barrier’s current position in Maine, with the reinforcement navy detachments, and have it target one of the major PHL outposts to nullify the humans’ enhanced lines of defense.”

The murmurs grew, despite Raven’s attempts to shush and control the flow of discussion. Gestal leaned to chat with the Neighponese Viceroy, an inexperienced looking young stallion. Elsewhere, the Oleanderite Viceroy engaged in hushed chat with his Maretonian colleague. Amira seemed concerned, if her expression revealed anything. And Twilight, in spite of her headache, found herself pondering the weapon – as did, she presumed, all those present. The other Bearers seemed in spirited discussion, and much as she wished she could join her friends, she had the room to herself.

Or would, if a bout of headache hadn’t forced her to slink back to her seat, hopefully unnoticed.

“And how does this… project, pertain to our present situation, Chief Engineer?” asked Skybeak.

“Simple,” Fire said smartly. “For every action, an equal and opposite reaction. My stance is well-known that we’re overreliant on the Barrier, for our campaign on Earth. Should that rampart no longer prove adequate, with the enemy powering up new alicorns… This might level the playing field again.”

There were angry mutters at the mention of alicorns.

“Excuse me,” interrupted Gestal. “How do we know she is an alicorn? This imposter Cadance.”

“The reports do seem unverified,” added Sunburst. “But, I have to say, this weapon... Deputy, what do you think?”

Ace simply shrugged.

“Well… It sounds like something the frontlines could use, really,” he said cautiously, granting Fire an approving nod. The Chief Engineer smirked.

Behind Twilight, Rarity spoke.

“Ahem, yes,” she said. “If this device’s performance is as excellent you’ve described it, Chief Engineer, it’ll be encouraging for our people to hear. The papers will love it.”

This time, the mutters blew up into chatter, and Raven had lost control of the room. Skybeak, undeterred, was opening his mouth when Twilight stood again.

“Everyone, please remain calm!” exclaimed Twilight. “Rest assured…”

From the corner of her eye, Twilight spied red-and-gold.

Through the window, a phoenix flew into the Chamber of Accord, landing atop a perch the presided the chamber, made specially for her.

And Philomena, the Herald, would only arrive if–

“I’m terribly sorry, Lady Archmage,” Raven said, croaking. Twilight glanced at her, and saw she too saw Philomena. “But I believe we have a guest.”

All eyes turned back to the front. Twilight released her breath.

“By the powers vested in me,” Raven spoke, a practiced speech. “I humbly welcome Her Imperial Majesty, Celestia, Sol Invictus, Queen of All Equestria, Empress of Europe, Stewardess of the Sun, First Servant of the Land, and Voice of Harmony.”

Her voice faded into a dead silence.

Then, the great oaken doors of the council chambers swung open. One by one, the Loyalty Guards posted around them saluted the ethereal figure who stepped through the open door and into the chamber.

There, tall, resplendent as the rising sun, stood Queen Celestia.

“Hail to the Queen!” exclaimed Gallus. His salute was followed by his comrades.

Unhurried, Celestia’s gaze swept over all, calm, majestic and benign. She was dressed as modestly as ever, with her elegant golden peytral and crown – the Sun and Crescent Moon joined together, centered upon it.

Yet none dared to speak, until she smiled.

“Good afternoon, everyone,” she said gracefully. “Pardon for the interruption, but the Cabinet is all gathered here already, and I think my presence is long overdue.”

She raised a forehoof, beckoning her Herald. Philomena flew to rest upon it, earning the great phoenix a nuzzle.

Celestia turned her attention back to the chamber, eyes darting back and forth between each member of the Joint Council. Philomena flew off, choosing to perch on Twilight’s desk.

“Now, yes– I have heard of the events that transpired in Boston,” she continued. Skybeak stood most hurriedly, his grey feathers bristling.

“Queen Celestia, my apologies–”

The Queen raised a gold-covered forehoof, silencing Skybeak. Her gaze remained neutral. “No need, Viceroy. The loss at Boston is a mere setback. The Great Equestrian, our pride, remains. And we’ve got, as I’m sure you’ve just been briefed, a new card on the table.”

Murmurs of agreement arose around her. Twilight saw the Chief Engineer puff his chest proudly.

“Lady Archmage,” Celestia said. Twilight shot up straight, gazing at her Queen and mentor. “We must talk, regarding my dear sister.”

“I’m, I’m sorry, I failed–” Twilight stammered, but Celestia simply shook her head.

“Now, now, Twilight,” Celestia said soothingly. “The battle had gone on long enough. Our forces, valiant as they were, could only go so far... and there are twists of fate even I cannot foresee.”

She smiled serenely, turning her gaze to the assembly.

“Rest assured, I hold none of you to blame for this setback. Our brave troops have done their best on the field, and where they have fought and bled, the Barrier will cleanse nonetheless. This other Equestria, it is not beyond our capabilities, and we shall deal with them swiftly.”

She spread her wings in triumph.

“And our victory, friends, will be complete, at long last!”

That drew polite applause from every member of the Council, with hooves and claws. Twilight, though still pained, managed a few claps of her own.

“Chief Engineer,” said the Queen, as the applause faded. Awesome Fire stood at attention. “If you’d be so kind to leave your report at my front desk?”

“It would be my honour, Your Majesty,” Fire said with a deep bow.

“And…” Twilight spoke up. “What of Princess Luna?”

Celestia’s gaze turned to Rarity.

“Oh,” Rarity said primly. “Of course, you mean Nightmare Moon. The papers will know what to say, Your Majesty. Meanwhile, Cadance will be… unsubstantiated.”

“Make it so,” Celestia smiled. “Girls, you mind staying for a bit? I’ve got something to talk about with Twilight, so if you could wait outside?”

The Bearers all nodded as one. And Twilight wished they could stay. But, as it always seemed these days, duty called to her..

“And, as for the rest of you,” continued Celestia. “Take your leave, for this meeting is adjourned. We face challenging times, everyone, and best to keep us all well-rested.”

Without another word raised, in a clatter of hooves and claws and armour, the Joint Council moved out in orderly fashion, escorted by the Guard – from Neighsay and Amira to Sunburst and Skybeak, to the Bearers.

The last to leave was Terramar, who threw Twilight a reassuring glance, before Shearwater beckoned him to close the door behind them.

Now, only Queen and Archmage remained.

* * * * *

Philomena’s tears, warm and healing, blessed Twilight with each drop that brushed her wound. The great phoenix cooed, still rested on her desk, and Twilight gave her an affectionate pat.

“Does it still hurt, Twilight?”

“Not… not as much as it did, Your Majesty,” said Twilight, managing a smile. Philomena gave her a nuzzle, before flying back up to her perch. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” said Queen Celestia, returning her smile. There was regret in those rose-coloured eyes. “I’m sorry, but that’s as far as Philomena can do, Twilight. You know this only works once. Had I been there sooner–”

“N-no,” Twilight said hurriedly. “I didn’t want to trouble you, Your Majesty.”

“Still, I must apologise,” Celestia sighed. “Confronting that grey alicorn up in the North… Neutralising her was swift, yet costly, even for me.”

“I can only imagine.”

“Such modesty, Twilight. You held off my sister longer than any mortal has a right to. I told it true to the Council; there is too much here I could not have foreseen. First, this grey alicorn. Now a parallel, refracted Equestria, conjuring an alicorn-Cadance…” Celestia’s lip curled. “My suspicions are confirmed. I sense the Architect’s craft in this.”

“Her?” Twilight blinked. “But... what could she possibly want?”

“Only what she has always wanted. A chance to do right, this time, in rebuilding her Prism.” Celestia’s eyes went cold a moment, before her voice turned soothing. Worry not, though. We possess other means to retrieve that locket. And you’ve earned a second chance, more than anyone.”

* * * * *

They stood there, the five of them, contemplating the oddly-shaped, reclined statue.

Despite an ostentatious name, the Palace’s Vault was in fact tiny, and almost devoid of content. A room lined by marble, the only other object within was a lone, rune-layered lantern, now practically blocked from sight by the newly-installed statue. Twilight might have been able to explain this, yet since Twilight wasn’t here, they’d chosen to push it from their minds.

The room wasn’t well-lit, relying on marble’s brightness for visibility, dimly illuminated by a soft, cyan glow of torches that magically lighted when they’d entered.

Discord looked different from the last time they’d seen him petrified. As before, he’d tried warding off the blast. But that time, the look on his face had been fear and surprise. This time, it was striking to see how pained Discord looked, as if the Elements could truly cause him pain.

“Funny, huh?” whispered Rainbow Dash. “How terrified we were, when we first met the fella.”

No, even Dash could not pretend otherwise. They all nodded.

“Well, he don’t look so tough now,” Applejack said, kicking the statue’s overturned base. “See what ya get, when ya give the guy a taste of his own medicine… Likes tricks, does he?”

Pinkie tittered happily. “Tee-hee-hee… that was some party trick, girls.”

“Just be glad it worked,” sneered Rarity, whose brow looked like thunder. “Serves him right. Sixteen years, and still, after the things he did to us… Make me fall in love with a rock! I never. Well, let’s see how he likes being a rock.”

Fluttershy, characteristically, hadn’t said much. They noticed her give Rarity an odd glance at those last words, though.

“Not very long… right?” Dash asked, looking somewhat uncertain. “I mean… if the Queen thinks the Empire can use him the same way as our Discord…”

“That’s for the Queen and Twi’ to decide,” said Applejack.

Some of Rarity’s glare faded. “It does seem such a horrid thing,” she said, pawing a forehoof. “Even for the likes of him. I mean, can’t the Queen just… do what she did before, put him away? I dislike seeing what Twilight’s serum does to humans, it’s ghastly stuff, but at least it doesn’t... kill them…”

“Oh, don’t worry, Rares,” Pinkie said, unusually sober. “I saw the Queen. She had that twinkle in her eye. Nope, she’s got a super-special surprise in mind.”

Somehow, Pinkie didn’t seem happy about that.

With a twitch of the ears, Applejack glanced to the open doors. “I hear hoof-steps,” she said, “Two pairs of ‘em. Git ready, that must be them.”

Her guess was quickly confirmed. Soon after, two figures made their appearance, silhouetted in the doorway, both adorned by Imperial regalia.

“Your Majesty,” said Rarity, bowing modestly. Her friends followed suit. “Your Ladyship.”

“Arise, friends,” Queen Celestia replied, bidding it by forehoof. “You know, there really needn’t be all this formality every time.”

“That’s kind of you, my Queen,” Rarity said, rising. “But I think you know better than anyone, procedure’s what guards us from the wicked forces of chaos.”

Celestia inclined her head. “It’s well said, Dame Rarity,” she answered, in a wise tone. “And I believe it can also be claimed, despite the setbacks we’ve been forced to endure, that your faithful adherence to procedure allowed us flawless victory over the Lord of Chaos. The humans couldn’t have been allowed such power on their side.”

There were some dutiful chuckles, even from Fluttershy.

“But, Your Majesty,” Pinkie asked, “what shall we do with him? You decide yet?”

Twilight stood forward. “No, not yet,” she said, answering for Celestia. “Yet the Queen says she has got an idea… I’ll let you know as soon it’s a sure thing, girls.”

“Aww,” said Pinkie, in half-feigned dejection. “I was hoping you’d tell us now! I agree with Rarity, it does seem a shame to waste a guy like that, who can create chocolate rain…”

“I think you’re the only one who enjoyed that,” Rarity huffed. “It leaves stains everywhere.”

“Don’t mind her,” Pinkie told Twilight. “But what’s true, Twi’, is you look a bit messy yourself. Dashie explained what happened… Didn’t get any sleep for three days, then you had to fight that awful battle?” She shook her head, eyes plainly going back, for a moment, to memories from the Crystal War. “Sheesh, Twilight… I couldn’t stay up three days on a sugar high. What you need’s a pick-me-up, once you’re rested. How ‘bout that?”

Twilight looked at her wanly. “Thanks, Pinkie, but… I’m sorry, I just can’t deal with loud noises right now.”

“Oooh, right. A quieeeet party.”

Though she shook her head still, Twilight let out a fond chuckle. “No, sorry,” she said. “No parties yet… I just need some more... sleep.”

“You sure?” Pinkie asked.

“If you’re going to be throwing a party,” Twilight said, “I want to feel I’m at my best. Right now, I think I need time to decompress.”

“The party will always be waiting…” Pinkie said, and upon receiving looks from the other Bearers, sheepishly continued, “...For when you’re ready!”

A moment was taken to digest her words. Of those present aside from the Queen, Rarity and Fluttershy were the ones with the greatest inkling of what Luna had meant to Twilight.

However, the moment was interrupted by a cough from the Queen herself.

“The Lady Archmage is right,” said Celestia. “I suggest we all follow her example, and grant ourselves rest. There’ll be new challenges to face in the days to come, and we must be ready to face them.”

Applejack tilted her head inquisitively. “You mean this place what Discord and Nightmare Moon came from,” she said. “And that Cadance. This… Mirror-Equestria.”

“Yes,” Celestia said gravely. “Now come. Let’s not burden our minds further, for now.”

She turned, heading back up the steps, not waiting for any of them. There was no risk in this. Celestia had explained that, on her watch, the Vault would never lock itself with people inside.

One by one, the Bearers moved to follow her, Rarity and Dash taking the lead. As Twilight readied herself to bring up the rear, however, Fluttershy stopped before she’d passed the doors, turning to her.

“Um, Twilight?”

“Yeah?”

Fluttershy nodded at Discord’s statue. “Using the Elements? Why didn’t you, um, ask us to do it to Nightmare Moon, too?”

Twilight paused in her steps, though she didn’t look up to meet the pegasus’s eyes. Her answer came out a sad little whisper.

“... Because she wasn’t Nightmare Moon.”

“Oh... I’m sorry.”

“Yeah...” Twilight’s sigh was a tiny thing. She moved past Fluttershy, who’d remained rooted where she was. “You coming?”

Fluttershy glanced at her.

“In a minute,” she said. “I’ve… got to think about something.”

This made Twilight crinkle her brow in surprise. Fluttershy, choosing to stay back alone, here in the deep, dimly-lit place with the scary statue of a being who’d once almost driven them mad? Fluttershy had grown bolder over the years, yet even so, this seemed odd for her to do.

Still, if Fluttershy wanted to do it, she must have a good reason.

“Fair enough,” Twilight shrugged. “Be waiting for you upstairs. Don’t dawdle too long, Flutters.”

“You know me.”

Left alone as the sound of Twilight’s steps receded up the stairs, Fluttershy found herself lost in her thoughts, forehoof idly clutching at the Element she wore around her neck.

It’d been a long time since any of them had used their Elements.

Seeing as one of the last, notable times they’d sought to use the artefacts, in their fight against the Dark King, it had ended in terrible failure – every time it was proven the Elements could still respond to their call was a welcome relief. But how strange it felt, having now turned the Elements twice upon the same enemy. Especially when that enemy was Lord Discord.

Her eyes trailed towards the lying statue, and she took a step forward.

None of them had ever forgotten what Discord had done to them, playing mind games which rivalled the Dark King Sombra’s in their wickedness. When Fluttershy had been the only one to truly resist, he’d cheated abominably, making her betray her truest self. Yet in an odd way, this made her perhaps the only one to take a ‘lesson’ of Discord’s to heart. In years gone by, bad things had come to pass, but she’d emerged less weak and helpless than she’d been. Surely, that must be a good thing.

Fluttershy brought her face level to his. Maybe it was a trick of the light, yet she thought she caught a reflective glint off Discord’s stone eye. His eyes did not frighten her. When push came to shove, she’d always out-stared the wildest creatures. What surprised her was the sadness she saw there.

Yet perhaps that wasn’t surprising. Encased in stone thrice for eternity, with neither Element, nor Stare, nor perhaps Conversion coaxing the good from this poor creature…

A loneliness which made her heart ache to think of. But the Queen’s will was final.

Sighing regretfully, Fluttershy leaned forward, kissing Discord’s cheek. She kept her lips pressed to the cold stone for a few heartbeats, before she pulled back, whispering.

“If only you weren’t such a big meanie…”

She turned and left. The lights winked out as the brass doors closed after her, leaving the statue in a darkened room.

~ San Francisco, California, USA ~ November 17th, 2024 CE ~

“Are you ready, Cadance?”

Cadance ruffled her wings, and with neither their armour nor Luna’s tourist get-up, she was feeling terribly aware of both their lack of attire. They waited in the centre of a clinically white, tiled room, between two locked doors and a one-way glass panel which stretched all across the wall. Cadance internally noted a resemblance with an airlock from the larger ships of the skies.

A decontamination chamber, they had been informed this room was called. A requirement for safe travel across the mechanical gateways that connected Earth and Equestria.

Two Equestrias, now.

Before undergoing this procedure, they had been provided with refreshments, which she’d seen Luna happily help herself to, but Cadance hadn’t felt like eating much at all. According to what they’d been told by Major Bauer, the portal device was on its preliminary stages, and while they’d been repeatedly assured of its safety, it wouldn’t be the same as the Crystal Mirror.

“Yeah… I am, Aunt Luna,” said Cadance. “Are you… are you sure this’ll work?”

“Come too far just to turn back, haven’t we?” Luna smirked. “If I get what Miss Star told you, all they need is to trace what they gathered of our native world’s residue. Not magic– Science!”

As if on cue, a humming arose from the ceiling. The harsh white glare of the lamps turned violet, bathing the room in a low lavender light.

They each beheld this sight, perplexed, before refocusing.

“Okay… okay,” Cadance said, releasing her breath. “Then I’m ready.” Still, something was tugging at her mind. “Aunt Luna? May I ask you something?”

Luna nodded. “Yes?”

“I know you told me about what you did to… did to Twilight,” Cadance said gently. “But…”

She paused. Luna didn’t seem apprehensive, and that was good enough to press on.

“What did you see?” Cadance asked “I know that look. That’s the look you’ve given me every time someone has… the really bad kind of nightmares.”

Luna smiled. A sad little smile, at that. “Yes,” she whispered. “Twilight’s eternal nightmare. This is something I shall inform Tia and the others as well, so you’ll have to wait. I still need to contemplate it. But, she mentioned… a name, just before I was cast out from her dreams.”

Cadance tilted her head curiously.

“Or not so much a name, as a title,” Luna whispered. “The Architect.”

“Wait… isn’t…” Cadance swallowed. “Didn’t Father Krampus mention that name at the Concordia?”

“He did,” Luna said. “Said it was the ‘Architect’ who brought the human child to Equus… He must’ve meant Megan Williams. And the Architect… I thought it might be Firefly, but… Whoever it is, it can’t be her.”

“Be? You don’t mean have been?”

“No,” Luna said quietly. “The Architect is an alicorn, and she still lives.”

Cadance goggled at her aunt. “Another alicorn, like Ga– like the G-Mare?”

“Something else…” Luna said. “One of the ancient alicorns, older even than Celestia or… well, any other you’ve met, my dear niece. That’s to say, one created by the Old Race… Like Sunflare. She made Alexander’s heart-shaped locket. I learned this from Twilight. In her mind, and out.”

Names to process. Suspicions to sift through.

“Cadance,” Luna cut in. “Shortly after I returned from exile, I met you, and marvelled to behold one from my lineage had fully earned her birthright. Yet now on this world, I see it’s as Alexander had said. Lady Cadance is not an alicorn. Why is this?”

Memories, from last night and far before, flashed before Cadance.

“... She never met that sorceress, Aunt Luna. Not Prismia. Not like I did. It’s after I won the Alicorn Amulet off her… I rose up to the Plane of Images, where Celestia came for me, and told me I’d be gifted a horn and working wings…”

Luna smacked her lips. “And the sorceress? What happened to her?”

“I don’t know,” Cadance admitted, shame-faced. “When I came back down, she’d vanished. We never found where she went to.”

“Hmm… Convenient,” Luna mused. “Twice, a child, elevated by a mystical artefact… History may not repeat, but it rhymes...”

“Then,” said Cadance. “Luna, you don’t think Prismia…”

“Is who we’re looking for?” Luna said darkly. “I presume nothing, Cadance, until we’ve got concrete proof. You’ll have to tell me the whole story again.”

Cadance digested her words. Meanwhile, the humming was ceasing, as the violet light slowly returned to the stark white from when they’d entered the room.

“If she’s still alive on that other world… that must mean she’s alive on ours, too.”

“I’d thought about that,” Luna agreed. “Unless the Empire caught up to her and killed her, like they did their– ahem, G-Mare. But I doubt it. Still, this might be our greatest chance. Finding her on a world controlled by the Empire would be arduous… On our world, less so.”

“What if she’s already left?” Cadance said hesitantly. “Found a place to hide, here on Earth.”

“Who knows…” Luna sighed. “Who knows... I went to this world with a mission. We achieved our goal of contacting their leaders. We have listened, and promised to help their people. Yet, I’ve failed in other ways, plain and simple.”

Swiftly, Cadance place a forehoof on her shoulder. “Don’t beat yourself up,” she said encouragingly.

A hydrolic hissing sound emerged from the door ahead. With a whirr, it opened automatically.

Luna was staring at the door. “It’s the truth. Often, though, and this is something I’ve told many in their dreams, failure precedes success. I wonder when that success will come for us.”

“Well,” said Cadance. “We found Earth. And we’re on our way home. If anything, I should be feeling ashamed. I shouldn’t have lost to Shining that easily.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Luna said quickly.

“And Twilight wasn’t your fault either. So let’s not wait for success. We’ll make our own.”

Waiting for them in boxes within the antechamber on the other side, processed separately, was their precious armour. They took the time to put it back on. Cadance, the light violet-steel armour of the Crystal Realm; Luna her personal obsidian set.

They strode out, side-by-side.

High Castle was a repurposed hangar, vast and empty, dominated by the colossal portal, a collapsible, circular metal gateway that had been expanded to accomodate for Spike’s vast bulk. By the portal waited three humans and four Equestrians. The humans were Major Stephan Bauer, Corporal Maxine Radwick and Hanne Adler.

Next to the two PHL higher-ups, Cadance recognisedAmethyst’s younger sister, Dinky. And beside her, a little stallion...

“Pipsqueak…?”

Luna’s voice was almost breathless. The pinto stallion blinked, and nervously adjusted the red bandanna he wore.

“Oh-uh, yes, that’s me, ma’am! I mean Your Highness. Um, sorry.”

“No, no, it’s quite alright. It’s good to see you again,” said Luna. Cadance thought she sounded blindsided by nostalgia. “Last I saw you, in our Equestria… you were such a tiny colt.” She paused. Her lips quivered. “‘Best Princess’, you called me, that Nightmare Night.”

Pipsqueak laughed anxiously, but his smile was genuine. “Aw, it’s been a long time, ah-hah…”

Twilight had told Cadance of that Nightmare Night. The details were scant, but enough to see why Luna had appreciated that celebration. She nudged her aunt.

“Old friend of yours?” she asked cheekily. But Luna remained silent.

Then Dinky coughed, and Pipsqueak suddenly seemed to remember something.

“So, um… I’ve been meaning to ask…” He opened up his saddlebag and, sheepishly, pulled out a notepad. “Can… I have your autograph? Actually, uh, two. I think Patch would like one too.”

“Patch?”

Pipsqueak again rummaged in his saddlebag, from which he brought out a photo.

On that photo was a family. He and Dinky, their faces lined with fatigue, yet radiant. And between them, an infant colt, his coat a dead ringer for Pipsqueak’s down to the spots, but his mane shone gold like Dinky’s.

“Our son,” Dinky smiled. “Three next Spring.”

Cadance looked at Pipsqueak and Dinky, then back at Luna. She saw Luna’s eyes brimming with unspilled tears.

“Of course, Pip,” said Luna. Her voice grew unsteady. “Of course, you can… you can have all the autographs you want...”

It didn’t go unnoticed by Cadance that Luna choked out the phrase, barely managing to finish. She wrote in silence.

“Thanks, Princess!” Pipsqueak said cheerfully, as Luna returned his autographs. “You’re still the best, you know–”

“Okay, okay,” said Dinky, giggling. “Cool it there, Pip, we don’t have much time. Come on, everyone, we need to go.”

Luna didn’t say much to anyone afterwards.

A nod here and there, to both Lady Cadenza and Dame Moondancer. Each stood dressed for the occasion in PHL vest, their colours signifying their department allegiance.

“Go in friendship, Highnesses,” Major Bauer said as he saluted them. “I hope we meet again. You have my word, we’ll send you that captive Trailblazer imminently. Oh, and tell Reiner he still owes me twenty quid for that poker game.”

“Good luck, Princesses,” said Hanne Adler. “You must come back soon.”

Maxine Radwick spoke last, after a long pause. “When you see Alex… Say I said ‘hi’.”

Luna traced a forehoof across the dozing Spike, but no words left her mouth. Not even when Dinky asked if they were ready to make the crossing.

“Safe trip, everyone!” Dinky shouted, before reentering the control-room.

The device hummed and whistled. Cadance saw Luna throw one final, hopeful glance at Pipsqueak, who stood beaming behind the control-room window.

“Aunt Luna?” asked Cadance. “Are you alright?”

But she already knew Luna’s answer, from the love that flowed, a love for her family and friends.

“I am, Cadance,” Luna whispered, wiping away a tear. “I’m very much alright…”

The Princess of the Night and the Crystal Princess, and Lady Cadenza and Dame Moondancer, their four auras bearing the great Spike between them, stepped through the doorway, and together crossed the void between the worlds.

~ New York City, USA ~

“Ma’am?”

“Amethyst,” said Cheerilee. “What’s the sitrep?”

“Our Cadance and Dancer have already gone through,” said Amethyst, handing her a notepad. “I’ll be notifying High Castle to prepare further transfers.”

“And Miss Adler?”

“Still in San Francisco. We’ll keep her occupied for now. Can’t risk a leak.”

“Good,” said Cheerilee, looking away from Amethyst, to those she’d summoned to Freedom Tower’s front hall.

“Ma’am, is it true?” said the one-eyed thestral. “The Princess…”

He stood with his fellow thestrals. Although scattered, the few dozen remaining Night Guards had managed to gather here, from their stations across North America. Including Selene, the pilot who’d returned from Texas once Lady Cadance’s private jet was no longer required, and who looked ready to burst into a wide grin.

Cheerilee met Gibbous’ missing-eye gaze with her own. She took a deep breath.

“Alright, my friends,” Cheerilee began. “Are you ready to have your minds blown?”

She waited for a word, any word. All there was, however, were silent faces, hanging on to whatever she’d say next.

“There’s a chance… maybe... that Celestia might not want us dead, after all...”

* * * * *

End of Act Two

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

This chapter features no noteworthy modifications, other than Princesses Cadance and Luna passing through a decontamination chamber on the way to the portal, for verisimilitude.

Spectrum 2.0 - February 01st 2020

Sledge115:

And here we are, at the end of Act Two – Moonrise :twilightsmile:. Apologies for the delay, turns out there’s quite a few more scenes needed to expand on a few things, and the fact that it’s a separate chapter allowed us to write them in full.

It's been a pleasure organising and writing for this Act, but the time has come for me (and Luna) to step back for Act Three, for Lyra shall retake her rightful spot as the main protagonist for the next Act. I’ll still be very closely involved for the next Act, though, just not as the proverbial director. For there are, let’s say, a few arcs within it that I’ll be very keen to write for.

Act Two had always been in the making from the very start in one form or another. Boston was such an iconic part of the original, and I hope Moonrise has succeeded in living up to it, at least.

We kept Luna because she just works, you see. And I freely admit that I absolutely adore Luna. Not exactly an unpopular opinion, I know :derpytongue2: But the first episode of Friendship is Magic that I ever watched was “Luna Eclipsed”, and Luna made one hell of an impression. She’s funny, she’s cool, she’s adorable and regal, she’s got a lovely design and well, you get the gist. There’s so much to say about her (granted, so does Celestia), gah, I could go at it for a whole day! She’s still Best Pony and Best Princess after all this time, and I suppose getting to write Luna so extensively is homecoming for me, from where it all began.

The Archmage was only realised as the main antagonist for this Act in January of 2019, and needless to say, well, I hope she proved to be the right choice over the clone. I personally thought bringing back the Mirror Pool clone would be too much of a rehash to do again, and frankly boring. Suffice to say, I now can’t imagine this Act without the Luna and Twilight dynamic, and looking back, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Cadance, meanwhile, she wasn’t actually in the original version, nor the initial outline we had created for 2.0. If I remember correctly, her involvement was only added after the Archmage right before Moonrise’s outline was written out in full. However, she’s proven herself to be a very nice perspective to write :twilightsmile: and I’m glad some of you have taken notice. While Luna still has a significant role in Chapter Nineteen and Twenty, Cadance is just as important as her ancestor, and arguably even more so given how much she’s given to do. Consider this an apology for her taking a backseat in the previous chapters.

It’s thanks to Vox, really, for suggesting that Luna visit Alex’s hometown. That was a fun, insightful trip, especially writing it :twilightsmile: And TheIdiot too, for Maxine and Dan Radwick. They’ve all provided an important insight to Alex, and humanity as a whole. Seriously, while they extended the chapter more than planned, it’s all the more welcome.

Thanks, Doc, for Kraber and company, fun characters as usual, wreaking havoc in Boston. I never was one for action scenes, so his contributions to those was tremendous as well, hehe.

Much has been said in the fandom about how religion might work in Equestria – but what if Equestria doesn’t have a concept of organised religion? What if, considering that ponykind are nature’s caretakers in their land, they simply never bothered with creating one? This, I think, added a nice change of pace with how an outsider would view Earth’s religions.

Also, for the record, I’m not Christian, so I hope this outsider mindset only helped with Luna’s point of view. The church scene was a delight to write, of course, and it was nice to tie it thematically with what Luna had discussed before with Darkhoof, all the way back in Chapter Thirteen.

There’s plenty of things I need to say outside of this chapter, of course, but I have my blog post for that. If you’d like, you can find it HERE

And so, we go forth into Act Three – Into the Unknown. As always, we’d love to hear your feedback, your questions too, and we hope you’ve all enjoyed Act Two :twilightsmile:

Oh, and just for fun, here's a hypothetical main cast list for Act Two, for your consideration in imagining their voices, or to imagine it rolling at the end of this Act/Season. Of course, you could always have your own voice for them, I don’t mind. The list is arranged a bit randomly, with guest roles prominent – roll credits!

Tabitha St. Germain as Princess Luna

Tara Strong as Twilight Sparkle

Britt McKillip as Princess Cadance / Lady Cadance

Daniel Brühl as Stephan Bauer

Sharlto Copley as Viktor Kraber

Gugu Mbatha-Raw as Yael Ze'ev

Ashleigh Ball as Rainbow Dash

Andrew Francis as Shining Armor

Ingvild Deila as Ana Björkman

Tom Hiddleston as Thomas Harwood

Grey DeLisle as Frieda

Teresa Palmer as Maxine Radwick

Madeleine Peters as Scootaloo

Jessie Flower as Whistle Stop

Joe Keery as Green Sprout

Iain Glen as Oaken Plow

Barry Sloane as Sparks Timber

Karen Gillan as Shearwater

Giancarlo Esposito as Salty Breeze

Melina Juergens as Hanne Adler

Daisy Ridley as Dame Moondancer

Sarah Nicole-Robles as Verity Carter

John De Lancie as Discord

with Genevieve O’Reilly as Galatea

Emily Bett Rickards as Ambassador Lyra Heartstrings

And Nicole Oliver as Queen Celestia / Commandant Cheerilee

RoyalPsycho: Hello, all. Though my material has featured in previous chapters, I like to see this as something similar to a formal introduction to the main story. As I probably said before, I have been very peripheral to this project and mostly corresponded with more regular contributors, but this chapter finally features material written specifically for the purpose of being involved in the main story. I’m happy to be a part of this and look forward to continuing my direct participation in Spectrum. Here’s hoping you all like what I have to offer, because it is going to be spectacular.

VoxAdam: And so we reach the end of this Act, and a much weightier Act than expected.

Honestly, I’ve had an odd relationship with this one. It’s in the preceding Act, prior to Summer last year – e.g. 2019 at the time of this writing, that I’d poured most of my all into Spectrum 2.0., knowing it wouldn’t be too long until a lifestyle change made it potentially harder for me to invest my time into the story. We’d known a good few months in advance that Act Two – Moonrise would revolve entirely around the Battle of Boston and its aftermath, and that Sledge would get the reins for this particular arc, for various reasons he’s outlined better than I here and in previous notes. :twilightsmile: I kept mainly to the editing and proofreading throughout, focused on preparing for Act Three – Into The Unknown, but as we drew closer to the conclusion, I found myself gradually easing back into active writing…

… Which is probably one reason you can credit for the last two chapters being this long again. :rainbowwild:

You know what, I’ll forgo getting terribly detailed in this note, even though this would be as much for the wrap on the whole Act as for a single chapter. All except to hone in one element from the finished chapter.

Yup, if you weren’t aware, “Jarden”, the name of Alexander Reiner’s hometown, is in fact a reference to HBO’s The Leftovers, a truly wonderful little series which redeems Damon Lindelof’s missteps with LOST or Prometheus. When two-percent of the world’s population disappears abruptly and without explanation, is the most interesting angle to explore the explanation, or how people who’ll likely never find answers cope with this new reality? Originally airing from 2014-2017, it’s a genuinely intelligent rumination on faith and nihilism that may not be for everyone – the tone can get heavy, and the upfrontness of the central mystery never getting resolved may put off some, though others will consider it the main draw.

Thus the church scene was one I’ve been anticipating since the start of Moonrise, to look at how a human religion might look through the eyes of Princess Luna, one of the semi-divine figures of Equestria in Friendship is Magic.

Hopefully you may appreciate the nuance that Jarden’s church scene was penned by two people of whom neither are Christian. As said by Sledge, this is seen from an outsider’s perspective and while I’m not entirely an outsider to Christianity, having been part of the faith when I was younger, the Christian religion alone has numerous denominations with their subtle variations in belief for what even constitutes Christianity.

To conclude, Moonrise has represented the typical Spectrum main story’s challenge of wishing to integrate everything it can, from the show’s canon to the existing side-stories, in its effort to make the ‘verse feel like a cohesive, intertwined entity. With approval from DoctorFluffy, the fate of one particular OC of his is addressed here, in a manner that hopefully feels not so much like a Fully Absorbed Finale – which it isn’t, given Doc has every intention of concluding Light Despondent and other stories – but a setup for an upcoming step within this story…

But while on the topic of unanswered questions and ongoing sub-plots, for those left curious by the Cadances’ revelation at the very end of last chapter, and wondering at the fact a full explanation wasn’t immediately forthcoming in this chapter, rest assured. Though it’s a big story, we’re doing what we can not to pull a LOST or Battlestar Galactica or, let’s say it, Game of Thrones. On paper, we do have resolutions planned out for the key plotlines, and the means to share them in the unfortunate scenario that Spectrum become a dead ponyfic.

This to say that Cadance’s personal history, at the very least, should soon be addressed again. What she has to tell Luna won’t remain between them.

Cheers,
~VoxAdam

Interlude II ~ Child of Crystal

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot
Knows How Not to be Seen and Self Defense Against Fruit

DoctorFluffy

VoxAdam
And Now For Something Completely Different

Sledge115
As love finds a place in every heart...

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Interlude
Child of Crystal

Dedicated to G.M. Berrow

* * * * *

“Zhuang Zhou dreamed he was a butterfly, a butterfly flitting and fluttering around, happy with himself and doing as he pleased. He didn’t know he was Zhuang Zhou. Suddenly he woke up, and there he was, solid and unmistakable Zhuang Zhou. But he didn’t know if he were Zhuang Zhou who had dreamed he was a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming he was Zhuang Zhou. Between Zhuang Zhou and a butterfly, there must be some distinction! This is called the Transformation of Things.”
— Zhuangzi, ‘The Butterfly Dream’

Once upon a time, the Lady crafted three sisters.

It was an age of dragons and icy blight, brought upon by the folly of the First to inherit this world. For the Land itself had grown sick. In aiming for the heights of the Heavens, these great artisans had severed themselves from the ground beneath them, and forgotten its significance.

The Lady crafted the three sisters in her own image, as she herself had been crafted. As stewards, carriers, intermediaries between the world of the spirit and the world of matter.

To the eldest sister was granted the strength and fortitude of the earth, and the ability to see into the firmament of the universe. To the middle sister was granted the grace and vitality of the air, and the charge of carrying the light of day. To the youngest sister was granted the passion and keenness of fire, and the gift to bring comfort in the dark.

Then, sorrowfully, the Lady bid farewell to the Guardian of Joy who reigns in the Frozen North, he who’d been her truest friend when the scales had fallen from her eyes and she saw folly’s extent unveiled. And for a time, the three sisters were left dormant, waiting to be awakened.

Of the eldest sister, nothing can be said. Her task was to be with the world, but not of it. She walked hundreds of years before her younger brethren did, and she watched, yet was not truly awake.

After a long period of Spring, the icy blight returned. For the new keepers of the Land, a triad of tribes who were heir to the Lady and her kin, had in turn fallen into disharmony and disunity. Seeking to flee the biting cold, the tribes’ leaders left to search for a new territory to call home.

Much to their surprise and dismay, alas, the leaders learned they’d each claimed the same spot. Distrust and discord arose once anew, until, driven away by the blight which had followed, the tribes’ leaders sought refuge in a cave. Unable even then to cease their squabbling, they bickered until the blight claimed all three of them.

However, their advisors, wise in ways the leaders were not, understood where folly had led, and at last broke away from repeating the mistakes of the past. As in that cave, the three advisors made their peace, a warmth spread from their hearts, and the blight was banished, and the sinful leaders were thawed from their icy prisons.

And before the leaders and advisors’ marvelling eyes appeared the two younger sisters, infants still.

Seeing the gift they had been given, on that night which came to be known as Hearthswarming, the six witnesses decided these miracle children should be raised by one most worthy. The Guardian of Joy who reigns in the Frozen North, the Bringer of Gifts, friend of the Lady.

He raised them, these infants who grew up to be Princesses of the Sun and the Moon – and so did two other sisters, the Guardian of Joy’s own granddaughters, they who are remembered as the Maiden of Snow and the Maiden of Fire.

That story is told elsewhere. It is a story about childhood, of fair maidens and brave princes. But it is not this story. Nor is this the story of how Equestria was made, though it crosses over with Hearthswarming.

The Lady and the Guardian of Joy. Three sisters, six witnesses, and two maidens. All have led to this, as has much else which remains hidden, soon to be revealed.

* * * * *

In the annals of Equestria, the oldest tales speak of how the Princess of the Moon grew resentful as her subjects relished and played in the day her elder sister brought forth, but shunned and slept through her beautiful nights.

Less remembered is how her pain of feeling unloved was furthered by having known love and loss.

To the North, just below where the Guardian of Joy reigns, lay a city of crystal. Once, from the ground below where that city was built, the blight had emerged. Yet now the city shone, a beacon of warmth and hope, holding the blight at bay. And there the Princess of the Moon found love, and what it means to raise a family. After her beloved died, her family flourished for many generations.

Until one day, a vile sorcerer of shadow, who declared himself ruler and was forevermore to be known as the Dark King, spirited away the city of crystal. With it went the family of the Moon.

And such was the youngest sister’s pain and anguish, the bitterness in her heart transformed her into a creature of darkness. This was when she vowed to shroud the Land in eternal night, and reluctantly, her elder sister harnessed the magic of harmony to banish her to the Moon.

With great sadness, the Princess of the Sun took up the Moon’s duties, hoping for her sister’s return, need it take a thousand years.

… Then came a child.

* * * * *

Betwixt North and South, in the land of Oleander, picture a little village named Florentina.

A humble village, and tucked away, mysterious even to its countryfolk. On all four corners, vast woods of pine and acacia shelter Florentina from the wider world. And this is odd, for Oleander, cousin to Equestria, is a coastal country. But the villagers are not unwelcoming to whomever might chance to travel through their home. They simply love the peace and slowness of their lives too much to seek much else.

While Equestria is where the Princess of the Sun dwells, there are places where the Sun shines farther, brighter. Oleander, betwixt North and South, though no true Land of Always Summer, has earned a reputation as such, for it is in Summer the country is at its most glorious. In Summer, the village of Florentina blossoms with the flowers that give it its name. The Sun is a constant visitor to that village, heedless of the woods as it confidently shines above.

It was not in Summer, though, but on a warm evening in Autumn, whilst the Sun was setting behind trees which blocked its light only a little less for having shed their leaves, that the child was found.

The finder was Nonna Espina, the oldest mare in the village. On that evening, she had travelled the forest path, an axe slung over her shoulder, in search of firewood to ready for the Winter. Now this was a task which more properly belonged to Bosco, the woodcutter, but he had newly become enamoured with Brocca, the water carrier. And though Nonna Espina was old, she was lively. She trusted she could take this upon herself, and sooner would do so than get in the way of young love.

Finally the old villager came to a tree that suited her purpose marvelously. Yet just as she raised her axe, she was distracted by the twitter of birdsong. Surprised, she lowered the axe, and the birdsong ceased. But when she sought to resume her work, so did the birdsong, with a rhythm and musicality unheard of in these woods.

Three times did Nonna Espina repeat this, until she looked up and saw the birds perched in the tree. They took flight under her gaze, darting around the trunk. Made curious by the birds’ strange behaviour, she followed, heading down a slight incline.

She knew then their song had been a message to her, a warning. Had she felled the tree, it would have brought harm to an innocent life.

Beneath the tree, nested in a tiny cavern between the roots, her eyes beheld a small bundle. An infant in swaddling-cloth, lying on a bed of dry leaves turned the sunset colour of Autumn, encircled by birds of many feathers of yellow, blue and red. They parted to let the old villager into the cavern.

When Nonna Espina picked up the foundling, she saw that to the cloth, a note was attached with fine string.

Her name is Mi Amore,read the note. Take good care of her. She will take good care of you.

* * * * *

The foundling was a pink filly, her coat as rosey as many a precious flower that Nonna cultivated in her greenhouse. This was her craft, to make flowers grow all the year round, come wind or rain, the shedding of Autumn or the cold blanket of Winter. All her life had been dedicated to flowers. She’d never wished for a child, nor regretted that she’d lived her life unwed.

However, the moment she found the rosey infant, lost and alone in the woods, the old villager understood she could not leave little Mi Amore to her fate.

A child was not a flower. A child could not grow on its own.

So, forgetting her woodcutting entirely, she carefully slung the foundling over her back, and traipsed back all the way to her village. The people of Florentina were most startled to see the bundle she brought back was not twigs, but an infant. Yet she was quick to enlighten them, and very soon, the whole village had been called to confer in the square, amidst the scent of roses.

“What a peculiar discovery!” said Radice, the mayor. “A child under a tree. Whoever heard of such a funny thing? Under a gooseberry bush, maybe, I’ll give you that. But a tree? Curious. Most curious.”

“There were birds all around her,” pointed out Bosco. “Perhaps a stork left her there?”

And Brocca, who had a high opinion of her smarts, told them, “I think you’re both wrong. She had a note tied to her, remember? I say she came straight off the baby shop. Mayhap they felt like giving one out for free?”

In silent amusement, Nonna listened to her kith’s fanciful speculations, for a while. But finally the time came for her to speak seriously.

“My friends, please,” she said. “However she got there, this child was left in the woods. We don’t know how long she was there for. She seems in good health, but now you’re all here, shouldn’t we make sure she’s alright?”

This made them fall silent, until Erba the herbalist, who was nearly as old as Nonna, stepped forth.

“You’re right, Nonna,” Erba said. “If you’d be so kind, would you unravel her swaddling-cloths, gently? I must take a closer look at her.”

Nonna Espina did as he bid, grateful for his delicate touch. But no sooner had she done so did all, herself included, gasp at what the child revealed.

“My goodness…” said Bosco. “And I thought what I said was just a flight of fancy…”

Sure enough, folded upon the sleeping child’s back was a pair of wings.

“What is she?” said Brocca. “She cannot be from around here.”

Erba looked at them all. “I believe I know,” he said. “The child must be from the North... From Equestria. She’s a pegasus.”

His words caused a stir, for none in the village had been to Equestria and only knew it by hearsay.

“How did she get here?” said Radice. “She’s far from home, if she’s from Equestria, poor babe.”

Everyone in the crowd felt their hearts go out to the child, abandoned in a place that was strange to her, with no parents they know of, and no-one like her for leagues around.

At that moment, none was sure what to do.

“Where she came from and how she got here doesn’t matter,” Nonna said at last. “At least for now. What matters is she’s here, on our doorstep. Someone left a note so we’d take care of her… And she’s a child. We cannot turn her away.”

All agreed to this statement.

“But who shall look after her?” asked Radice. “You are old, Nonna, and my days raising children are long past, while Bosco and Brocca… Well, they’ve barely started down that path. And all the rest… We live safe, quiet lives here in Florentina. We aren’t used to big, sudden changes.”

“Then we shall all share a little of her,” Nonna Espina announced, “and that way, no change will be too big or sudden for any of us…”

Cradling the foundling, the old villager looked at her kith with shining eyes.

“She’ll be the child of us all.”

The note had called the infant ‘Mi Amore’. Yet the villagers felt it would be right to also bestow upon her a name of their own.

Because birdsong had led to her finding, she was given a name to reflect this. And thus the child’s name was Mi Amore Cadenza.

* * * * *

The years passed, as they must.

From that Autumn when Mi Amore was found in the woods, the seasons flowed into Winter, then into Spring and into Summer, and then Autumn again. Eleven times did one cycle flow into another. With each cycle, the child grew a little, in size and in knowledge.

The child grew as Nonna Espina had said she would, a child of the village.

As is customary in small, sleepy villages, Mi Amore Cadenza’s youth was not all one of simple prancing and play. That is a fantasy of city folk, who are unknowing that a childhood at play is likelier to be the lot of their own, in the age of schooling – the classroom may not always be a place for true learning, yet it spares children from outdoors labour.

In those eleven years, Mi Amore never visited a classroom, but she still learnt much. From Erba the village herbalist, she learnt the names of over a hundred plants, which roots were edible and which were poisonous, or how to tie a herbal plaster. In the manner of villagers, she grew up laborious. She’d help Brocca carry her buckets of water from the spring, and Bosco carry his bundles of twigs. Her letters and numbers, she learnt off Radice, the mayor.

Little Mi Amore did have friends her age, of course. To some places, her wings might have called forth suspicion and shunning, particularly amongst children. And there were those in the village who once in a while did wonder what had brought this foundling to them, and whether she wouldn’t bring misfortune.

But the feathered child proved vivacious and diligent, and so nested herself in all their hearts.

Whenever, at play, one of her fellow children found themselves scraped by the dirt, Mi Amore knew the right words to comfort, just like she knew how to fix myriads little hurts, as she had learnt from the village herbalist.

Two years after Mi Amore was found in the woods, Bosco and Brocca were married, and they had a child of their own, a girl whom they named Benna. As they grew over the years, Mi Amore and Benna were the best of playmates.

Yet the villager whom Mi Amore harboured the closest bond with was one furthest away in age.

Before the filly could even walk, Mi Amore came to know Nonna Espina and her greenhouse. Within this domain coated by glass, which caught the Sun in Summer and kept out the cold in Winter, that the old villager grew her flowers, not merely in the warm months, but all the year round. Buttercups and bluebelles, lilies and daisies, the magnolia and the orchid.

And roses, always roses.

* * * * *

It was one Autumn, as the day that marked the eleventh year since her finding drew nearer, while Mi Amore was in the greenhouse with Nonna Espina, helping her trim the flowers, that she asked the old villager a question.

“Nonna,” said Mi Amore. “Why must there be Winter?”

Up until then, Nonna had been busying herself with the cutters, but now she stopped her work to look in surprise at the child.

“You ask such strange questions, Mi Amore,” said Nonna. “Without Winter, there’d be no Summer, would there?”

“We never let Winter in here,” Mi Amore pointed out, looking over the greenhouse.

“That’s different,” said Nonna, laying down her cutters. “None of these flowers are kept here to stay. Once they bloom, we send them on, to places where it could be any season.”

Mi Amore blinked a little. “I’m still not sure why we stay during the Winter.”

Nonna chuckled fondly. “That’d be the bird in you talking,” she joked. “If I didn’t know you, I’d believe you’re like them swallows, who travel South for Winter and come back in time for Summer.”

“I’m not a bird,” Mi Amore giggled.

This was quite true. When Mi Amore glanced at her wings, they only gave a weak flutter. In nearly twelve years, not once had she been able to fly.

She did not mind. Often, Mi Amore forgot she even had wings. She’d lived like the earthponies who’d raised her and felt no different from them all her life.

“You might as well ask why there’s day and night,” said Nonna. “Even here in Florentina, there must be change. Otherwise it’d be mighty dull, wouldn’t it? Why,” she continued, now staring at Mi Amore. “Don’t you like Winter?”

“No, no, of course I do,” Mi Amore said, as all the things she loved about Winter came flooding back. “I love it! Who doesn’t like to build a snowmare, having snowball fights, making snow angels?”

The old villager considered her.

While it was true these were pastimes enjoyed by Oleander’s children in Winter, Mi Amore had particular zest for them, being the first up every morning and the last inside every evening, at a time when outside of work, even children were prone to wait in somnolence for Summer’s return.

“Those are fine things, indeed,” said Nonna, “though perhaps fighting with snowballs hits a bit too close to war. To create out of snow displays craft, it does. Still, we forget snow is like any blanket. It lays you to sleep. And from one sleep, one never wakes up.”

This was so unusual a statement that Mi Amore stared at her in alarm.

“Oh, Nonna!” said Mi Amore. “You’re not saying you’ll soon lay down to that sleep?”

To her relief, the old villager laughed softly.

“No, have no fear, I believe there are a few years left in this body, before I meet the pale mare of ever-lasting sleep… Yet I wonder about you. With all your snow creations, you may be more alive in Winter than any of us, my dear Autumn child.”

By tradition in Oleander, most infants are born in Summer. On what day Mi Amore Cadenza had truly been born, her carers could only guess. But as in Autumn she had been found, she was known to them an Autumn child.

“So why do you ask about Winter?” said Nonna. “Verily, you’re the last child I’d have expected to ask that question.”

Mi Amore shuffled her forehooves.

“Maybe it’s because it’s in Winter that I feel the most… different.” Again, she glanced at her wings. “You said snow was like a blanket… But I’m not sure that’s how I see it. When it snows, to me, it’s like… petals. A thousand thousand tiny petals, falling from the sky. Except that I know this isn’t what you see. And it makes me feel sad. The village of flowers doesn’t see the petals in Winter.”

Standing as they did amidst the many-hued flowers and the delicate fragrance of the greenhouse, Nonna smiled at her.

“Or could it be you, having learnt our ways, who sees it so?” the old villager asked kindly. “Do not undersell us, Mi Amore. Maybe that’s why you’re Autumn’s child. You live in twilight between Summer and Winter.”

A quiet moment passed between them, as Mi Amore drank in all they’d said. Then Nonna looked through the glass to the fading light outside.

“But on to more practical matters,” said the old villager. “Beautiful as the Winter is, we must be ready to keep warm when it comes. Bosco, I swear… someday that boy’ll neglect his duties entirely, the sheer amount of children he has with Brocca! How many is it now? Six?”

“Five,” Mi Amore corrected. “They’re expecting their sixth.”

“Well, he had better get back to chopping that wood soon, if he wants to keep them all warm," Nonna grumbled lightly. “Shall I trust you with the axe?”

“You can trust me with the axe,” Mi Amore said dutifully. “But I'd have loved to help you trim the Queen Rose.”

The Queen Rose stood at the very center of the greenhouse, a tall beauty of a rose, a good head higher than either of the ponies. Even her thorns, which Nonna insisted be carefully maintained, were distributed with evenness and elegance.

“I am sorry,” Nonna said. “Our talk took time I didn't notice slip from us.”

“Sure you can take care of her without my help?” asked Mi Amore.

Nonna laughed again. “What did I say, child? I’ve been doing this all my life, and I’ve life in me yet. Now, go, before it gets dark.”

On her way out, Mi Amore picked up the axe, wrapped in rope and three layers of cloth. With it thus made safe to carry, she placed it upon her back, as an earthpony would – better, in certain respects, for even divested of the power of flight, her wings granted her balance that was lithe and light.

It wasn’t far to the edge of the wood, those same woods where Nonna found her years ago. Mi Amore kept to the outskirts, heeding caution even as she hastened to carry out her chore.

Still, in the fading sunlight, the filly allowed herself a moment's pause, admiring the gossamer she noticed dancing in the warm breeze of Autumn, the light gleaming off of it like golden wire.

Giggling, Mi Amore reached out for the dancing threads, wrapping what she could catch around her forehoof, to store it beneath her folded wing. She would take it back home with her and add it to a spool she planned showing off to Erba.

When she came to her spot, and unwrapped the axe, her chore was simple enough. The weight of the axe would’ve daunted a child not raised to wield it, but Mi Amore had been, and Nonna only required she collect twigs for the firewood. The heavier work could be taken on by Bosco, once he returned to it.

After an hour's chopping and collecting, Mi Amore decided her task was done for the day.

It was as she knelt down to wrap the axe that a movement caught her eye, on the edge of the wood. Curious, she turned away, looking to see what it might be. But, seeing nothing in the foliage, Mi Amore shrugged and decided her mind was playing tricks on her – indeed, her mind was another part of her which felt different. On some nights, it seemed to Mi Amore that she walked in dreams not her own, but those of the whole village.

Then as she turned around, Mi Amore gasped and fell back. In front of her, not three paces away, there stood a stranger who hadn't been there before.

“I’m sorry,” said the stranger, smiling softly. “I did not mean to frighten you.”

* * * * *

How to describe the stranger?

She stood an inch taller than the grown-ups of Florentina. Her mane was the colour of thistle. So were her eyes, calm and tranquil as an unrippled pond. Her coat must have been of the same colour, but Mi Amore saw little of it, for the stranger was clad in a beige cloak that covered her from top to bottom, attached at the neck by a brooch. Only her face and the tips of her forehooves hinted as to how she looked beneath.

“I am a traveller, seeking repose,” said the stranger. Her soft smile from when she'd greeted Mi Amore never left her lips, firm as the features of a wax figurine. “I’ve passed through these woods, taking comfort in knowing a village lies nestled at their heart, so my night shan’t be a lonely one.”

She circled around Mi Amore in the grass, looking her over with deep curiosity.

“But, my! An odd sight this is. None would have told me, in this land of earthponies, that I'd stumble upon a village of winged ponies. Can you explain this marvel to me, feathered creature?”

Summoning her confidence, little Mi Amore dusted herself off.

Her village had taught her there are two ways to greet strangers. Always with kindness, and yet, never without caution. No rule is more sacred than hospitality – which makes those who’d flaunt this rule all the more fearsome, for their smiles hide the blackest of hearts.

However, never once did it cross her mind that she carried an axe. This was not in her nature.

“This is the village of Florentina,” Mi Amore greeted the stranger. “Welcome. And it's a village of earthponies. It's just that I'm a pegasus, the only one around here… at least, I think I am. My name is Mi Amore Cadenza. Please, what's yours?”

Whereupon Mi Amore noticed one last feature of the stranger’s.

Atop her forehead rested something Mi Amore had never seen before. At first, Mi Amore was put in mind of a lengthy, spiralling candle-wick, coloured thistle like the rest of the stranger. Until it emitted a gentle glow. And Mi Amore recognised it for a horn.

“Cadenza, is it?” the stranger said, her face lit by the glow. “‘So named for the final flourish towards the ending of an aria… Huh, interesting choice. Pretty name, mind.”

Horn still alit, she gave Mi Amore a steady stare, as if examining her features.

“Forgive me. I forget my manners,” said the stranger. Her horn dimmed. “To tell you the truth, little Cadenza, I’ve gone by many names, in my time.”

Mi Amore was surprised. By the horn, and by those words. “You don’t look so old,” was what came out of her mouth, before she could think. “Um. Sorry.”

The stranger chuckled. It was true. She had a face that was not old, yet nor could it be called young.

“No, don’t worry,” she said. “How flattering is that? I can tell you’re a charmer. It’s simply that I travel a lot, you see. And some people bear different names in different places. Yet since I must provide you a name… Hm. What say you we go with… ‘Prismia’.”

The filly smiled at her. “Thanks. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Prismia. You said you were looking for a place to stay?”

“For repose. I seldom stay in one place for long, with other people.”

The traveller looked past Mi Amore’s shoulder to the village and the Sun setting behind the treeline.

“However, the nights grow colder, and I wouldn’t deny an invitation to the warmth of the hearth, if I am welcome to it. I see you were collecting firewood, when I came across you.”

“It’s still a bit early for lighting the hearth,” Mi Amore explained, going to pick up her bundle. “But here in Florentina, we like gathering around a campfire in the evenings, on the village square. You can come join us if you want.”

Prismia raised an eyebrow. “You’re sure your elders would let me?”

“Of course,” Mi Amore said at once, beaming. “They’re nice.” She patted her bundle of firewood. “Will you follow me, please? I’ve just got to pack this up first.”

Working quickly thanks to much practice, Mi Amore went about tying up the firewood and wrapping the axe back safely into its cloth.

And Prismia nodded. “I’ll take you at your word. They do appear to have raised you well. You told me you’re the only like you in this village… and yet, not even once have you let your curiosity outweigh your politeness.”

“I’m sorry?”

With that smile of hers, Prismia indicated her horn.

“I saw you looking,” she said. “And why wouldn’t you? It’s hard to miss. You’re wondering what I am, but you won’t ask, though there’s no shame in wondering. Tell me, if I told you I was a unicorn, would that mean anything to you?”

Unicorn. Mi Amore chewed on that word, the firewood momentarily forgotten. Until its meaning came to her, and she was surprised.

“You’re a pony who can do magic?” she whispered in awe. “Are you… you’re from Equestria?”

“Equestria isn’t the only land to house unicorns,” Prismia said calmly. “And what is magic? Isn’t what you earthponies do its own form of magic?” She stopped speaking, catching up to her words. “Ah. My apologies, feathered one. That was thoughtless of me.”

“It’s alright,” said Mi Amore, adroitly slinging her bundle of firewood between her wings, commencing the trot back towards the village. “Nonna Espina told me everything a long time ago. She found me in the woods and they adopted me… Anyway, I can’t fly. So, I’m pretty much like everyone else around here.”

She heard the traveller’s voice from behind her. “Really. Like everyone else.”

That got Mi Amore to stop in her tracks, almost as soon as she’d started. She turned around. Prismia had not followed. The traveller was staring to one side, with the appearance of one mulling over a problem.

“Are you alright?”

Prismia’s eyes snapped back her way. “I was just thinking,” she said, nodding at the bundle and the tool slung over Mi Amore’s back. “That seems a heavy load for a child. Would I not be a good guest, if I offered to carry it for you?”

The traveller’s horn sparked invitingly, but Mi Amore smiled and shook her head. “You’re very kind. But I’m used to it. And we haven’t got far to go.”

“Suit yourself,” Prismia shrugged, moving forward. “On your back be it.”

The remainder of their trek was spent in companiable silence.

* * * * *

By the time they got back to Nonna’s greenhouse, the Sun had set, and the old villager was waiting outside her door, the beginnings of worry on her face. A worry which instantly vanished when she saw Mi Amore arrive bearing her load, though it was soon replaced by surprise when she saw who’d come with her.

“Nonna, this is Prismia,” said Mi Amore. “She offered to help me carry the firewood, but I told her it wasn’t far. She said she’s passing through.”

The traveller inclined her head courteously. “Your friend was welcoming,” she said. “And it’s true, I have places to go. However, if your folk will grant me company for tonight, I’d be grateful.”

Nonna, too, had spotted Prismia’s horn.

“We don’t see many unicorns hereabouts,” she told Prismia. Her tone wasn’t guarded, yet denoted careful inquiry. “What brings you this way?”

“I have been many places,” replied Prismia. “And been many people. Frankly, I’ve seen more of the world than I care to for now… I needed a place where life is slow, peaceful and content. Oh, I won’t be able to stay very long, as business calls to me. But it’d make me happy if I could spend just one hour by your village’s campfire.”

The old villager inclined her head in return. “An hour you shall have, and more, if you so wish, Mistress Prismia. Please, come hither and be welcome.”

“You have my thanks,” Prismia said, smiling her smile.

Meeting the rest of the village went much the same.

It was Florentina’s wont, when the weather allowed, to gather around in the village square, for an eve’s communal meal at a shared fire. By that fire’s light, Mi Amore saw the traveller greeted by people she’d known her whole life – Erba the herbalist, Bosco and Brocca and their family, and of course, the mayor Radice.

As all took their seats on the logs circling the campfire, Mi Amore showed off the gossamer she’d collected to Erba and her closest friend Benna, the eldest daughter of Bosco and Brocca. Meanwhile, Radice gave the traveller a loaf fresh from the oven of Fornaio, the baker.

“Be our guest. And break bread with us,”

Prismia accepted the bread. But not by touch. Her horn glowed, wrapping the loaf in a purple aura. Benna whispered into Mi Amore’s ear.

“Did you see that?”

To which Mi Amore nodded silently.

“Your kindness shan’t be forgotten,” said Prismia, placing the loaf in her lap. Her eyes were studying the campfire. “I know you request no payment for hospitality. Yet I feel I must offer you something in return.” Here, her eyes fell once more upon Mi Amore. “And not just for myself, I daresay. Little Cadenza told me how you took her into your home. It must be quite a story.”

“One worth telling,” agreed Nonna.

Prismia kept her eyes on them. “Maybe this is how I can repay you. Do you like stories, Cadenza?”

“Oh, yes,” Mi Amore said brightly, nodding. “Very much. Nonna always says a good story works up the appetite before supper.”

“That’s funny,” said Benna. “I thought Nonna said it’s good for the digestion after–”

“Hush, you two,” said Nonna. “Let our guest talk.”

“Well,” Prismia said, her eyes glinting. “Seeing as this a town of flowers, I thought that I might tell a story about flowers. Or rather, one very special flower. Please tell me, good folk, have any of you heard the tale of the crystal flower?”

To a crowd who shook their heads and muttered ‘nay’ as one, the traveller smiled.

“Alright, then,” she said. “I shall begin.”

And this was the tale that Prismia told;

Long ago, far to the North, there lived a people who were proud and beautiful and wise. This was both their blessing and their curse. For so proud and beautiful and wise were they, the very earth upon which they trod had come to seem coarse and vulgar. Over the years, they lost their love for the world, and thus they declined. Though they were long-lived, they were not eternal. One by one, their numbers diminished, for in their aloofness, they ceased to bring children into this world they found so coarse and vulgar.

At last, there remained amongst them two who had not lost their love for their world. Yet while they had names, for the purposes of this tale, let us call them Father and Mother, since that is what they were. They alone chose to have children, when all others of their kind had given up. Two sons were what they had.

Father and Mother were wisest amongst their people, but they had different ideas on how to give their sons a world to love living in. Where Father looked to the Heavens and the world of spirit, Mother saw life left in the Land and the world of matter.

Eventually, they reached a compromise. Pooling their artisanship, Father and Mother crafted a whole new family of beings from the primordial fire. An intermediary between the world of spirit and the world of matter. These beings were to be their familiars, their followers – their friends, walking alongside them, here at the end of their kind’s road. What Father and Mother had planned, one might say, was to make a garden for their sons, and these beings would be the gardeners. Of those beings, there were several, yet for this tale, only one such ‘gardener’ need concern us.

Now, it was said earlier that Father and Mother had two sons. In all families, a child shall favour one parent and a parent shall favour one child. To understand what happened next and why, it is important to know of these sons, though they shall go as unnamed as their parents.

Father’s favourite son was beautiful as any of their kind, fiercely passionate and thirsty for knowledge. Yet Mother’s favourite son was of subdued temperament, lived for imagination – and most unusually for their kind, he was not beautiful at all, yet he possessed a generous heart. Let us call them Princes, for want of a better term. The Red Prince is a good name for one of them. Perhaps you can already guess which.

With her favourite son, Mother set about the primordial fire once again, crafting yet further beings to populate their garden. And all together, these beings are still remembered today, in the bloodlines we call the Twelve Families of Equus.

Father, however, looked in a different direction. He lamented that his kind would die, and regarded what new life Mother crafted as doomed to suffer the same fate. But if Father could not save his favourite son from death, then he’d gift him life in a garden without death.

Against the odds, the gardener to whom Father assigned this arduous task would succeed at it. She, the gardener, crafted a crystal flower. It was a magnificent flower. A flower that would never fade or droop or wilt. Beholding it was akin to looking into a prismatic dream, mirrored back at you… Truly, if the Red Prince ever loved a thing, the crystal flower was it.

… But here we reach the sting in our tale.

Unknown to his parents, the Red Prince was consumed by the same disdain for the coarseness and vulgarity of the world as their forebears. To him it was an act of betrayal, that Mother should have brought him into a world of no future for him or his brother – no, only for the beings she’d crafted.

The crystal flower took all his love. And as time went by, the crystal flower became the greediest in the garden. It drank all of the juices from the earth. Most importantly, it snatched up all sunlight. The garden became so dark that even the very air turned cold.

Once the gardener saw what her work had wrought, she was overcome with remorse, and resolved to pick the crystal flower. But the Red Prince executed a crafty plan. He took his brother aside, and playing on his generosity, begged him to make it so the gardener would pick a different flower. And when the gardener understood her mistake, it was too late.

Thus, the crystal flower ended all alone in an empty garden. It blossomed, spread its seeds, and a new garden grew, a hundred times more beautiful than the one before.

It was a garden without death. It was a garden of no real flowers.

As the traveller’s tale faded, heavy silence had fallen upon the gathered villagers.

“That’s a horrible story,” whispered Mi Amore. “I do not like it at all.”

“Oh, but it’s no story, feathered one,” Prismia said simply. “It is deepest truth. I never tell stories with no truth to them.”

“Is that… it? Surely that’s not the end?”

Prismia chuckled darkly. “You ask because you want my tale to have a happy ending. Must every tale have a happy ending?”

Mi Amore shakily knotted the gossamer around her hoof. Benna was silent, and Nonna’s hold around her shoulders had loosened.

“I guess not… But isn’t a happy ending better than a sad ending?”

“For whom, child?” said Prismia. “For us? Do we not do ourselves a disservice, if we pretend that all woe must someday end? Ask yourself this, does anything ever end, but for the one end which comes to us all?”

As she shook her head, her eyes travelled to the brightness in the night sky.

“Our feelings are like the Moon above. They wax and wane. Happiness shall pass, and sadness, too. And then they’ll return, like dust from the stars. Maybe.”

The filly’s gaze followed hers to the lonely figure on the Moon.

Then, without any preamble, Prismia raised herself.

“Now, having said this, I must leave you.” The traveller gazed at each villager in turn. “You are all fine people, and I wish that I could give you better… Who knows? You may see me again, come the end of Winter.”

Mi Amore alone seemed to hear the traveller, or even notice her go. Before she could speak, her voice went silent at a troubling sight.

The brooch clasped at the neck of Prismia’s cloak was glowing a deep, uncanny crimson. An eerie colour that continued to shine in the darkness of the treeline, long after the traveller had receded from view.

It was only afterwards they saw Prismia had left her loaf behind, unbroken.

* * * * *

A change came over Florentina that Winter.

The change crept up slowly. At first it seemed almost ordinary. Bosco grew slack in his work, and his fellow villagers would rely on themselves if they wished to collect firewood amidst the snows of Winter. And there was some grumbling, yet none begrudged him.

Then it spread. Brocca, who always had unwaveringly carried the water, from the spring if the village’s well failed to provide, now complained the freeze made her task harder. Benna offered to help her mother collect her load, and for a time, all seemed well.

But one morning, Benna no longer wanted to help. In a voice full of hurt, she claimed her father no longer properly kept the house warm, and her mother showed her no gratitude. At this, both her parents took fright, and called upon Erba.

The herbalist saw to Benna for hours in private. When he came out, he told the assembled villagers that what ailed her wasn’t in his power to heal. Hence Mi Amore stepped forward, proposing to let her friend bask in the comfort of Nonna’s greenhouse, which flowered in all seasons.

Amid the buttercups and bluebelles, lilies and daisies, the magnolia and the orchid, and the Queen Rose, here the girl Benna shed her sadness, and begged her parents’ forgiveness. And they forgave her willingly, admitting to their own fault.

Mi Amore offered each in the family a flower to take home with them, hoping these would be their memory of brightness and reconciliation in the next dark period.

Alas, the flowers did not last long. And soon the sorry cycle began again.

That Winter, there were no snow figurines or snow angels for Mi Amore. There were not even playful scuffles with her friends. Her days were spent hard at labour, pulling her weight when no-one else would.

Wood was no longer cut for the fire. The ice was deemed too hard to brave for fresh water or herbs. Family and friends retreated within their walls and their own little shells, held apart even when they sat inches from one another.

The gift of flowers brought back life, for a time. But where one villager regained the spark, another would lose it once more.

Mi Amore chipped her hooves from cutting the wood and breaking the ice. Her back grew sore under her ceaseless loads. Her eyes became lidded with sleeplessness. Her mane turned ragged and her coat lost its luster.

Only her wings remained as they were. Pretty, yet powerless.

Hence Mi Amore took to carrying the gossamer spool beneath her wings at all times, a comfort toy. She told herself it carried her up, drew the hidden strength from her wings. Sometimes, this was all which kept her going.

But always, always, Mi Amore continued to help Nonna with the flowers. It was its own labour, yet a fresh-grown flower signified a moment’s respite for her. However, even Nonna’s flowers could not last forever.

Until one day, Nonna dropped her tools and said, “What good is it? We have toiled to give our loved ones a little life back, and now my greenhouse is almost void of life.”

She spoke true. The Queen Rose alone remained, untrimmed and thus grown taller and thornier than it had a right to, almost reaching the glass roof. All else was gone.

And Nonna said flatly, “I shall offer that rose to none, for there be none more precious to me than that rose.”

Hearing those words, Mi Amore felt her lips tremble, and she fled.

The little filly did not stop until she reached the outskirts, where she slumped into the snow, uncaring how the cold bit her, and after weeks of holding back, she cried and cried.

It was then a familiar face appeared.

* * * * *

“My,” said Prismia. “How changed is Florentina! Can this be the same village I left months ago?”

Mi Amore gazed up at the traveller. Her grimy face was still streaked with tears. “No… No, it’s not. It’s all your fault. It’s been like this ever since you came.”

“Why, child,” Prismia said mildly. “What proof have you to accuse me of your ills?”

“You did something, I saw you!” Mi Amore wailed, almost screamed. “You cast a spell on everyone! You… you did this…”

The rest of her words dissolved into sobs.

When Mi Amore’s sobs had ended, Prismia still stood there, staring at her unreadably.

“You are something,” said the traveller. “In this village, you alone were spared. You stayed strong, little pegasus, when these earthponies lost their strength... But you give up all of your strength to fill what’s missing in the villagers. They show you only fleeting gratitude for it, Cadenza. What do you owe them?”

Mi Amore glared at her.

“They took me in,” she said. “I owe them everything. They’re… they’re ill. I can’t just drop them because they’re not themselves. And who are you to speak of gratitude? You were our guest, we let you stay, we gave you our bread, we… How could you?”

Prismia raised a forehoof. “Very well. You saw what I did. I admit to this wrongdoing. But though my words and deeds are slippery, as I said, they are never false… If you know where to look.” She lowered her forehoof. “I stayed in no home of yours, and broke no bread with you. Do not confuse cruel with dishonourable.”

“What do you want, Prismia?” Mi Amore asked wearily. “Haven’t you done enough?”

She wondered if the traveller flinched at her words. Yet if Prismia did, it was merely fleeting, and may not have been there at all.

“What I want? What do you think?” Prismia said evenly. She pressed at the brooch which held her cloak together. “When we met, I offered to help you carry your load, for free. Today, I offer to release you of it… at a bargain.”

This caught Mi Amore by surprise. “A bargain? Which bargain?”

Like on that evening at the end of Autumn, Prismia circled around her. “How does it feel, child?” Once, you were happy. Now you are sad. But how does it feel, having someone to blame for that? Does it ease your pain, if even a little?”

Leaving Mi Amore no time to answer, the traveller ploughed on.

“And yet, you’ve done all you can to ease the pain of others. You’ve given a flower to each villager, so that for one blink, they could again feel the love I drain from them… You, who are fading, yet are not drained. Even when there’s but one flower left in old Nonna Espina’s greenhouse.”

She came back to face Mi Amore.

“So here is what I propose. Perhaps you have no love for me, but if you can show me that very last token of your love, your friends will be restored.”

Mi Amore was appalled. “That’s the Queen Rose! It’s Nonna’s pride and joy.”

“Really,” Prismia said smoothly. “How much joy has it given her of late?”

Any other day, Mi Amore may have argued harder. But she was exhausted, and only a child, and this might be her only chance.

With a heavy heart, she promised to uproot and pot the Queen Rose.

“Wait,” called Prismia, as Mi Amore was leaving. “I shall accept no less fine a gift than you’d make for anyone in this village. If you break a single thorn, I will know.”

And Mi Amore quailed at the enormity of the task given her.

* * * * *

Mi Amore was spared one hardship upon reaching the greenhouse. Nonna was no longer there.

While Mi Amore felt a stab of fear for her friend, moreover, she felt relief Nonna would not have to witness this. She tried reassuring herself. Nonna had most likely gone home, walling herself in like the rest of them had.

Blessed be if she could soon right this wrong.

Then Mi Amore saw again how tall the Queen Rose had grown, and her heart shrank. How was she, child that she was, to uproot and pot such a flower without breaking a thorn? The rose had grown to touch the roof of the greenhouse. A ladder was too crude a tool for this, and there were no other flowers left she could climb for support.

She gritted her teeth to set about this task.

At first, Mi Amore decided she’d take the trowel and slowly dig out the roots. A good deal of dirt and effort later, she spotted the flaw in this scheme. A rose so large could perhaps be plucked, it could not be uprooted by her strength alone. Even if it could, the risk was great that it would collapse under its own weight.

Covered in soil and sweat, she sat, thinking. As she did so, Mi Amore felt the tickle of the gossammer tucked under her wings.

Suddenly curious about her own keepsake, Mi Amore took it out, slowly unspooling from her wings. The glimmer of an idea emerged in her.

Spread out like this, gossamer was fragile. Woven into knots, it was sturdy.

To prevent the Queen Rose’s thick stem from collapsing on itself, she had to secure its center mass. Its heart, if you will.

Despite her desperation, the intrigue of her idea spurred on Mi Amore. Patiently, over the hours, she knotted the gossamer, till what she held was like an open cocoon, one waiting to envelop rather than to hatch.

But when she looked up, the next hurdle made itself apparent. All roses have their thorns. These were great thorns, and stood in her way of scaling to the heart.

With her cocoon tucked safely, Mi Amore nonetheless approached, seeking the courage to brave these thorns as some would walk across coals. Yet her every attempt was foiled, as time again, she yelped and jumped back, unable to endure the sting and laceration.

When the fruitlessness of this approach grew clear, Mi Amore had to pause anew. She looked about to see outside, eve was near. Frost painted itself on the glass.

This gave her thought. Although every flower but the Queen Rose had been given away, to the far corner of the greenhouse, there lay the saplings of the coming new batch. She went to see, and so it was indeed. In the greenhouse’s air, what would be frost in Winter rested as dew upon the shoots.

Easing herself, careful not to crush these future flowers, Mi Amore anointed herself until she was coated on nigh every spot with dew.

Her determination renewed, Mi Amore went to the challenge of scaling the stem one more time. There was still pain. The sting was still there, and the cuts were many, yet she moved up, for the caress of the dew softened it all.

In what took less time than it felt to her, Mi Amore was at the heart, her fore- and hindlegs hugging the stem to keep her from slipping. Moving with delicate and utmost concentration, she retrieved her gossamer-cocoon from her wings, using her mouth as an earthpony would. She shimmied round the stem to wrap it.

Had she slipped, she’d have torn through many thorns, and though it wouldn’t have been lethal to her it would lose her the day.

Mi Amore breathed a great sigh of relief when, tying the final knot, one end of the gossamer met the other around the stem. Only then did she let herself slide down, with much caution.

She resumed her digging work at the bottom. From that point onward, the remainder of Mi Amore’s work passed by quickly. She undug the Queen Rose root by root, so it may not topple and ruin her efforts, but instead gradually leaned over. Pulling at the one, long thread she’d allowed to leave hanging from the gossamer cocoon, Mi Amore kept its center steady. The heart didn’t break.

And after much manoeuvering, the Queen Rose had moved, for Nonna had the clairvoyance to keep pots that could accommodate so large a flower. Mi Amore had even been careful to place the destined pot already into a wheelbarrow, sparing her the new challenge of having to carry it.

Heavy it was, nevertheless, for a child of even her practice to push the barrow. Yet following the trial she’d gone through, the thought of accomplishing her goal was boon to Mi Amore.

A mere moment’s struggle at the greenhouse door did not discourage her.

* * * * *

By the time Mi Amore returned to Prismia, night had long fallen, and the traveller had put up a campfire just for herself, undisturbed by anyone from the village. The noise of the heavily-laden barrow crunching through the snow drew her notice, making her stand.

“An ingenious solution…” said Prismia.

Mi Amore was breathing heavily, close to exhaustion, but light in the heart. “Did I do it?” she asked. “Will you keep up your end of the bargain?”

Prismia eyed her queryingly, then shook her head, and pointed.

“I’m afraid not. Look.”

Even before Mi Amore did look, her heart had plummeted, just from being told this. Dazed, she turned, seeing what Prismia pointed to. Wedged into her flank was the smallest thorn of the Queen Rose. She’d been at once so numb and so elated, she hadn’t noticed.

Yet how could it have got there? She’d been so careful, she was sure of it!

“No…” whispered Mi Amore. “No, no, it can’t be, there must be some mistake…”

“There’s no mistake. The terms were clear.” Adding weight to her statement, Prismia tapped the brooch of her cloak. “You’ve given me nothing worth relinquishing the power of this Amulet. You were to make as fine a gift as you would for anyone in this village. I warned you I’d know if you so much as broke a thorn.”

“But I… I didn’t… I can’t have…”

“Are you sure?” Prismia asked. “Then answer me. You called that flower old Espina’s pride and joy. Though I’d doubted it’s brought her joy recently, you ought to know better than I the mare who found you. Did you tell her what you were going to do?”

A horrible guilt invaded Mi Amore as she realised what she’d done. She sank to her hooves, getting buried in the ankle-deep snow.

“Why?” asked Mi Amore, in a small, defeated voice. “Why are you doing this?”

Prismia gazed at her with cold, distant eyes. “Don’t you remember the tale I told?” she said. “Do you not remember the story of the Red Prince and the crystal flower?”

Mi Amore did. Three months on, the woeful tale was fresh in her mind.

“It was a warning,” she murmured. “But… I don’t understand. Who are you, Prismia? Why me? Why… us?”

In response, all Prismia did was tighten her cloak. “And you’ll never know.”

“No, wait, hold up!” Mi Amore cried after her, even as Prismia turned. “There’s still got to be a way to fix this! Please! What you’re doing is wrong!”

Prismia stopped. When she turned back round, Mi Amore thought the stranger who’d looked neither old nor young, suddenly looked aged beyond recognition.

“Wrong?” Prismia echoed. “Child, wait until you’ve lived as long as I have, then you may know the meaning of wrong.” She stroked the brooch she’d called an Amulet. “You think you’ve carried a heavy burden? This tool which let me drink of your love is not a pleasure-item, it’s a hairshirt! Yet I won’t take it off. Not so long as I haven’t the luxury to let myself forget.”

“Forget?”

Something in Prismia’s intonation peeled away the fear and impotent distress within Mi Amore, replacing it with a different emotion.

And Prismia sighed deep.

“Maybe there is still a way…” she said. “There is power inside you, feathered one. Power enough to match the Amulet. Much I could teach you… more than I could tell in one night, that is certain. Maybe then, in time, you’ll begin to understand.”

That different emotion stayed with Mi Amore. Until, infinitesimally, something else resurfaced.

“What’s there to understand? All you need to do is stop this. You… I don’t get why, but you don’t have to steal anyone’s love…”

“Indeed not…” replied Prismia. “Like I said, Mi Amore. You have power to match this Amulet… just as you have the will to carry others’ burdens. If you were to join me in this burden… Neither your village, nor anyone else, would again need to bear mine.”

“Was that what happened?” Mi Amore asked quietly. “They felt what you feel?”

Prismia did not answer. “What say you? Will you give yourself up entirely for their happiness?”

Mi Amore thought about it. Recalled what she’d heard in the traveller’s intonation. She almost took the step forward.

Yet she drew back.

“I’m sorry, Prismia,” she said slowly, “I’m really sorry, I am… But, I can’t. I can’t go with you. How would they feel, if I just… vanished? Would it really make them happy, if they knew why I’d gone? They… they love me. I know they still do. It’d break their hearts, and… I’m sorry, b-but… We’d have helped you.”

“Then you won’t give yourself up?” Prismia frowned a little. “After how much you’ve martyred yourself this Winter? And what about old Espina, will you dare to face her, having taken her beloved rose?”

“Running away would be the easy way out,” said Mi Amore. “Or at least, that’s how it’d feel at first. But how cruel would it be, to go and take everything Nonna loves from her? And… aren’t I doing more for them by staying to help, than disappearing with a stranger?”

Gradually, a new expression traversed Prismia. One of dawning wonder.

“That is it… The gift as fine as for anyone in this village.” And she took off the Amulet. “I have beholden it, and now, the true exchange can be made.”

The Amulet shone bright. Mi Amore was taken up.

* * * * *

For one wild moment, Mi Amore wondered if this place was another dream, like so many she had stumbled into. She was standing on… nothing. An ethereal plane, stretching into a seeming infinity of all-encompassing cerulean. Around her swam motes of golden dust, sparkling in the void.

“Hello?” she called out. Only her voice echoed back to her. “Hello? Is anyone there?”

Within the golden dust coalesced a figure.

Mi Amore shrank back from the sight that manifested before her. A mare of slender build and a coat of purest alabaster, adorned in a peytral and a crown of gold. Covered by a long, flowing mane, out gazed an eye as rose as Mi Amore’s own coat. But it was the figure’s mane which created awe, with its hue of turquoise, sea-green and dawn pink.

And then Mi Amore beheld a truly unique vision. The white mare bore a horn and great, angelic wings in equal measure.

“Who are you?” Mi Amore whispered. “Where are we?”

Her voice was so soft, she barely heard herself. Yet the other heard her well.

“I am Celestia,” said the white mare. “The Princess of the Sun. And this is the Plane of Images. Aeons it’s been, since I felt its call… But who might you be, little one?”

Feeling small and scared, despite the gentleness in that voice, Mi Amore almost didn’t answer.

“I’m… My name is… I’m just Mi Amore. A filly from Florentina…”

“... ‘Amore’?” The Princess’s eyes, wise as they were, seemed to widen in recognition. “Florentina, my little pony?” She peered closer at Mi Amore. “Is that not in Oleander? But you have wings.”

“Not wings that work,” stammered Mi Amore. “I was raised by the earthponies. I am no-one.”

And the Princess of the Sun smiled.

“Child,” said she, “no-one is no-one. And as I look at you now in this place, then if you are who I believe you to be… You are more precious to me than you could know.”

“What?” gasped Mi Amore. “I’m just a lost pegasus.”

“No, child. You are more. In fact, there is more of the earthponies in you than there is of those vestigial wings.”

“... I’m an earthpony?”

The Princess of the Sun laughed. Her laughter was a musical, joyful sound.

“You are crystal,” spoke the Princess. “In you flows the blood of earthpony, pegasus and unicorn. And you are grand-daughter many times over of the Moon, she who is my own, dear sister… We are family, you and I, Mi Amore.”

As Mi Amore stared in disbelief, Princess Celestia glowed with light and warmth of the very Sun.

“I will come for you. This will begin to make things right.”

* * * * *

The ethereal plane and that warm voice faded, as Mi Amore came back to earth.

Her eyes were closed. She scarcely dared open them. When she did, she gasped in wonder. Her wings had fledged. Her head bore a horn. And as she stood with swan-like grace, upon her flank, where the thorn had popped out, there appeared the mark of a gilded cyan heart.

“... Prismia?”

She searched and searched, yet the sorceress was gone. Only the Amulet remained in the snow, which was beginning to melt around it.

“You’re hurting, aren’t you?” Mi Amore asked softly. “I don’t know your story. But I hope it has a happy ending.”

In the days to come, awaiting the Sun’s chariot to arrive, Mi Amore truly saw, then, what Prismia’s trial had meant. Her leaving Florentina was a good thing. However, it came at a cost to those she loved and who loved her.

But her friends, Bosco and Brocca and Benna, and Erba and Radice, all greeted her with pride and celebration when they saw what had become of the village’s daughter of all. And Nonna hugged her, and was none too upset about the Queen Rose.

After all, it was only a flower. She kept the gossamer cocoon Mi Amore had made, saying it reminded her of the child’s snow creations.

“It’s just as was written, Mi Amore,” Nonna Espina smiled. “You took good care of us.”

* * * * *

The Princess of the Sun’s words held true, in the years to follow. Things were made right.

Having once been a child herself, Princess Mi Amore Cadenza was to care for many children. And one such child was student to the Princess of the Sun, and through careful nurture, this next child blossomed into a Bearer of Harmony.

Her name was Twilight. In her blossoming, the young student found Harmony with five others. Together, they wielded this deeper magic to free the Princess of the Moon from the Nightmare, when the Sun coaxed the stars to aid her escape.

After gaining an aunt in Princess Celestia, a cousin in the mortal line of Blueblood, and a sister in Sunset Shimmer, Mi Amore came face-to-face with this most unexpected of ancestors, Princess Luna. Just as Celestia had rejoiced, so too did Luna.

And with the guidance of the Princesses, Mi Amore’s own joy was to grow twicefold. Her future, by marriage to a soul with whom she fully embodied love, in the person of Twilight’s older brother. Her heritage, through reclaiming the Northern city of crystal, upon its return from the void, finally banishing the Dark King.

So, you might say, she lived happily ever after.

But never again did the little princess meet that strange traveller, through whose trial she had earned her wings.

— Fourteen and a half years later

In a small, secluded corner of the Starswhirl Wing at Canterlot Palace, the Crystal Princess finished recounting her own tale to two figures, both of them soldiers.

One was Shining Armor, Captain of the Royal Guard and her husband of three months.

The other was a being from another world, hatched straight from the fantasies of young Lyra Heartstrings, her former charge who was currently only a few book-rows away, in the illustrious company of Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, Lord Discord, the faithful Twilight and her five friends, and Prince Blueblood – and another one of a family Cadance had never known she had, the mysterious grey alicorn who identified herself as Galatea.

Yet it was not Galatea, but a human to whom she and Shining devoted their attention. A man in a wheelchair, broken in body and soul.

His name was Alexander Reiner, his rank that of Captain to a great empire under siege, and he claimed he’d met her in the parallel realm from when he came. Or rather, the Lady Cadance, herself of an Equestria parallel to this one.

Shining Armor, who already knew his wife’s tale, remained quiet so Alexander might speak.

“... And how much does Celestia know about this?”

Princess Cadance felt surprise at the urgency in the human’s voice. “Well… I already told her everything I knew, back when I was a filly. But she’d never heard of a ‘Prismia’, nor did she manage to track her down in the years since. Why?”

“Because, Cadance… Sorry, I mean, Your Highness,” the human said, wringing his hands together, “if all this happened when you were a kid, then… What Princess Celestia knows, Queen Celestia must know too.”

“That’s… scary to think,” Cadance admitted. “But, I don’t know, did I… Did she, I mean Lady Cadance, did she ever mention anything about Prismia?”

The human stopped wringing his hands.

“Ooh, that’s a tough one,” he said, sounding deflated. “See, Princess Luna didn’t have time to tell us anything before she got captured. Me, I didn’t even learn that Cadance… that you were her granddaughter, until I got it from… well, you. And all Lady Cadance really said was that one day, Celestia ‘heard’ of her, and came to pick her up.”

“That isn’t much to go on,” said Shining, meeting his wife’s eyes.

“No, it isn’t…” the human agreed, though he gazed at Shining oddly. “I’m… I’m sorry. This is just too weird.”

Shining frowned. “What is?”

The human sighed.

“You. And Cadance. Happy, together.” When neither spoke, he continued. “I’m used to thinking of Celestia as this… this abstract concept, an enemy to fight. But Cadance… I dunno if we’re friends, exactly, but we are close colleagues. Losing Shining Armor tore her apart.”

Cadance suddenly felt an aching sympathy for this unknown reflection of herself. Shining went to stand by her side.

“It isn’t me, Candy,” he whispered. “It shall never be me.”

Alexander gave a little laugh, sour and with a hint of cruelty. “I’m sure that’s what he thought, too.” His voice turned more respectful as he addressed Cadance. “Yet I never knew just how strong you were. Though, what was up with that tale she told you? The one about the… the crystal flower? It sounds like she was trying to make a point…”

“Not a day goes by when I don’t wonder the same,” Cadance told him quietly. “There’s still so much that’s a mystery about Prismia. Perhaps it’s timely that Twilight’s got around to studying the Alicorn Amulet.”

To which the human snorted.

“Well, call me a simple jarhead,” said Alexander, “I say thanks for the story, Your Highness, but if we’re not gonna get to the bottom of this mystery just yet, I suggest putting it on the backburner. We got more pressing issues, like what the hell happened to my mother’s locket.”

“You wanted to know how I became an alicorn,” stated Cadance. “A magical artefact played its part in that story, too.”

“It is done…”

Upon a distant shoreline, the traveller slumped into a beached coracle, exhausted.

Catching her breath, which was slow and ragged, she beheld the Moon, upon whose face was carved the face of the lost sister. This occasion ought to have been joyful, and yet her heart was filled with sorrow.

… For the traveller was old, so very old.

Older than the three sisters who were caretakers of the land beyond the horizon, and of the celestial spheres. Older than all the Scions of Chaos, whose grand and terrible birth she had borne witness to. Older, perhaps, than the Guardian of Joy, though this even she knew not for sure.

Yet she had been young and foolish, once. And she’d spent nearly the whole of her long, long existence seeking to repair her mistakes.

Drifting, the traveller’s mind went back to another night, twelve years ago…

* * * * *

There are many wicked souls who, consumed by their lust and their spite and their hunger for power, do name themselves King or Queen. Once, in the Far North, the Princess of the Moon lost her family to such a usurper, the corrupt Dark King.

History does not repeat, but it rhymes.

So it was that as the cycle of centuries turns, eventually, to the South, a new usurper arose. This one fancied himself a King of Storms.

Very pleased was he, that night on his ship, the crown jewel of a great, devastating fleet. Yet it was neither his ship or his fleet’s magnificence which pleased him tonight, nor the power he wielded upon tempest and lightning.

No, what gave him pleasure was that, after decades of searching, he held the greatest possible prize in his clutches. An heir to an old magic – not unlike he himself, but when he’d finish squeezing this fruit dry, he would be so much more.

A pity the parents had put up such a fight, the King told himself as, passing by his saluting Guards, he marched to the room where he’d placed his catch. If only he could have restrained himself. They were less use to him in death than the child was in life, and the child may not suffice.

Still, it was a start. A great start.

Smiling to himself, the King swung the door open. And then his blood ran cold.

He’d found the cot empty.

“Where is she?”

The King screamed his rage to the night air.

So great was his fury, the very clouds turned black as coal, and cruel bolts of lightning were unleashed, and the seas far below were struck and churned like a boiling cauldron.

But it did him no good. All his power over the storm could not return his prize.

* * * * *

And in a coracle far away, the traveller, who’d arrived in time to rescue the child, mourned her failure to save the parents. Clutching the swaddled infant, not knowing whether she sought to comfort the child or sought comfort for herself, she wept bitter tears.

Tears for the child, and for the parents, and for herself, and for the worlds.

She knew this false King. Knew of his lineage, the accursed family to whom she had once devoted her greatest work – that so-called crystal flower, this Prism of hers, this forsaken tower atop which lay the doorway to the place where dreams come true.

At last, she had no more tears to give, and looked down to the child.

“I cannot care for you, I cannot nurture you,” she lamented. “That is not my talent. My work once froze the world.”

Where could they go now? The child had to live.

An idea slowly worked its way through her mind. Drying her eyes, for she had to see clearly, the traveller let her horn shine so she needn’t let go of the child, and with this ability, unwrapped from its cloth an item which filled half the coracle. Its surface caught the Moonlight’s gleam.

Her eyes stared back at her as she looked into the Crystal Mirror.

But, no… That was no option, not yet. If ever.

Even in her grief, however, the traveller was clever. Three nights and three days she planned her next move. And when one morning, many miles away, she bid goodbye to the child, kissing her forehead, the traveller left a note she knew would soon be read.

Her name is Mi Amore. Take good care of her. She will take good care of you.

* * * * *

Now, the one who’d named herself ‘Prismia’ allowed herself a moment to sit, and ponder.

As the years marched on, she’d made a habit of playing the villain, it seemed. How noteworthy that it always seemed to come back to a garden, akin to the spot where her long game of pursuit by Starswirl’s apprentice had concluded and memories were buried – and that faithful adviser had passed their own trial, learning the tools to nurture the Tree of Harmony when it sprouted.

This was in the past, however. Now was time for the future.

The Mirror would be returned to the Sun Princess, at long last, never letting her know why it now came to her. The Amulet’s destination was no longer hers to decide. And as for the third of the mystical tools she’d reforged...

The bloodline of the Locket’s wielders might dilute, for it was a sad certitude that none of them could hold the same potency in one generation which the Crystal Princess had evidenced after one thousand years.

But there’d be someone to watch over that line. The brave friend she’d sent through the Mirror was waiting on the other side, a spark to light the way, were the need to ever arise. In desperation, she’d once before summoned a different spark. Back then it had been a firefly. In future it would be a fire carrier, as it should be.

She contemplated the Crystal Mirror, reflecting on the world she was aware lay beyond.

Mere fragment now, an imperfect reflection, not a proper refraction. Yet just as when it had been part of a greater whole, this Mirror that was but a fragment retained the power to unveil your truest self. The chrysalis of an inner world. Whose inner world, though? Did the Architect dream the butterfly, or the butterfly dream the Architect?

Prismia, she who was traveller, storyteller, gardener of souls and much else besides, stood up, choosing for now to shake off such musings.

As she stood, she loosened her cloak, and spread her wings.

The Architect glanced back at them, contemplating how long since she had last unfurled them. Just like then, there would come a day when she’d meet her proverbial butterfly anew. That butterfly’s name was Man.

The last time had been over three-thousand years back. The next time might take another thousand years.

Still, the day would come.

* * * * *

What is Man’s role in this tale? One may wonder.

In a great many ways, the tale of how Princess Cadance got her wings is what we are used to seeing in children’s fairy tales about countries of magic and music. It even ends, at least where these tales are supposed to end, with the princess an heir to a mind-blogging place of rock crystal, emerald pavements, sapphire walls and ruby roofs.

But this is what differentiates utopia from a dream.

Even utopia has dirt, between the cobblestones, the mortar holding the bricks together, the drains which keep the rest pristine. It’s all about what’s down below. A ruby firmament must have a foundation to sit atop – else it shall topple.

Hence if Man was made of clay, where does Man lie in relation to this magical land, where the most fairy-tale place of all is the one where berries and corn grow out of the living crystal?

In time, the Architect was able to accept her place as another’s dream. She, like all of her kind – like the Lady, and the three sisters who came after – was crafted as an intermediary between the world of spirit and the world of matter.

Yet the story she told little Mi Amore was true. She never tells stories without truth to them.

Reality is like a rainbow, each beam along the spectrum a little different from the last. And within the beam where Mi Amore’s tale did not reach its rightful conclusion, worlds collided, and a figure from Prismia’s story seeks an ending on their own terms.

The Red Prince has returned, and he lacks the same acceptance as the Architect he once deceived.

… In his hands, Man shall be raw material.

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

This chapter features no noteworthy modifications, although I did seek to polish the story of the two Princes a little more, and in a plot breadcrumb, Sunset Shimmer again gets mentioned in relation to Celestia’s family.

Spectrum 2.0 - March 15th 2020

VoxAdam: How many of you were waiting for something like this after the conversation between Cadances at the end of Chapter Nineteen (‘When The Dust Settles’)?

To my awareness, there are only two stories on Fimfiction to revolve directly around little Cadance’s encounter with the sorceress Prismia, Essenza di Amore by CeruleanVoice, and Lady Prismia and the Princess-Goddess by SkyWriter, the latter of whom some might recognise as the writer behind Princess Celestia Hates Tea.

While this Interlude is very much intended to be its own thing, at least one scene gives a nod to Essenza di Amore, when Prismia tells the villagers a campfire tale.

Prismia was not always intended to be part of the Spectrumverse, including in its rebooted form. However, the seeds for the idea were lain early on, in hindsight, thanks to the work of TB3. It was TB3’s idea, I recall, that one Cadance should be stunted and the other as we know her. Also worth crediting TB3 is the concept of Cadance being descended from Luna, which was later taken on again by Sledge and myself.

You may be surprised to hear that I never used to be that interested in Princess Cadance. Despite how underutilised she ended up being in OG Spectrum, TB3’s foundations and the re-use of her being kin to Luna can all be credited with my giving her another chance. :pinkiesmile: To the point of making a whole Interlude about her, though it was more arduous than expected, as its publication was originally meant to come a lot sooner after Act Two.

But I personally see this Interlude as cementing the Spectrumverse as a kind of “Ultimate Universe” ponyfic to G4 MLP, with the elements of G1 added in that define Spectrum.

Finally, while few were bound to pick up on this, those in the know will recognise wholesale references to Ice-Pick Lodge’s video game Pathologic during some of the more abstract portions of the Interlude. A demanding yet unique game I’ll ever recommend, along with its remake from last year, despite or perhaps because its themes of contagion have suddenly grown more timely in the past few months…

Meanwhile, for the next few months, we shall enter a hiatus as we work to get a fair portion of Act Three ready in advance, for our own pacing alongside real-life obligations, and in the hopes that we’ll have finely-made goods to deliver at some point in Summer.

You all take good care,
~Vox

P.S.
Also, yes. The truth lies revealed, in Spectrum, Cadance was neither pegasus nor unicorn, but a crystalpony, with vestigial “pegacorn” traits that indicate her true royal heritage.

Sledge115: Hello there! We interrupt your regular Spectrum for, as Vox mentioned, something completely different. But one, I assure you, is very much relevant.

I don’t have much to say here, really :twilightsheepish: This was mostly Vox’s doing, through and through, and I contributed exactly one line here. So, congratulations on the fantastic work, mate, it’s been a tale long in the making :twilightsmile:

Now, in the meantime, there’s still plenty of Spectrum to go around, like Doc’s The Light Despondent, and the recently updated A Sun in Winter among others. Neither particularly spoils the main story, and both cover very different yet similarly important time periods in the Spectrumverse. Have a read!

In other news, we’ve also worked out a timeline for Sunny Equestria for practicality’s sake, and to ensure most events fit into one neat timeline. As Vox mentioned, we here at Team Spectrum fully intend to weave in many disparate materials into one cohesive ‘verse - the show, the comics, Spectrum’s own lore... It’s fun, and there’s more yet to come. Click HERE to read the timeline!

While we’ll still be quite a way off from Act Three proper, well, we hope this has enough within to fill in the wait. So speculate away, and we shall venture Into the Unknown when the time comes.

Cheers,
~Sledge

Act III ~ Chapter Twenty-Two ~ So Say We All

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy

VoxAdam

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Twenty-Two

So Say We All

* * * * *

“It is only when our characters and events begin to disobey us that they begin to live.”
—The French Lieutenant’s Woman, by John Fowles

~ Matinicus Isle, USA ~ August 19th, 2022 CE ~

Out in the Atlantic Ocean lay the Easternmost piece of land owned by a besieged country. With a population that had never reached a hundred, even prior to the Conversion War, it had proven a meeting point of good discretion. Its name, in an old tongue of this world, translated roughly to ‘the farthest shore’.

For Galatea, in all her travels, the world of Earth was undoubtedly the farthest shore she had ever visited.

In the distance, as viewed by her keen eyes, a sleek, arrow-like ship of gun-metal grey, covered in blue markings, drifted purposefully along the horizon. She watched it, as was her eternal duty. But even she fancied comforts, such as the battered cloak she wrapped over herself, protection against the unseasonal cold.

“Watchmare,” spoke a tired voice from behind her, above the sound of waves that lapped lazily at the beach. “It has been… a time since your last call. I had hoped to have seen you sooner, rather than later.”

Without even looking, Galatea knew who stood with her in this rocky cove. “Still dressed like that, Professor?” she asked aloud, turning. “You know that such a form is in terrible taste.”

The suit-wearing figure hung his head, as if ashamed. “Forgiveness then, Watchmare,” he said, while his hands tightly grasped a cane. “I had… forgotten such a thing.”

“Hm,” was her response.

The man slowly made his way to join her, taking a place by her side, almost. Despite them sharing in the same view, each saw something different. The figure saw the same he tended to. Death. Death that was about to come, and already she could feel the regret surrounding him.

“I did try, Watchmare,” the figure said quietly. “I tried to get here before they did.”

“I know.”

“Is there hope?”

“It hasn’t been lost just yet.”

“What comes next, then?” the figure asked Galatea.

To which she remained silent, for the answer was plain as day. This was the starting point, so best to bare witness, and allow the unfolding of what was to happen. Galatea knew the figure would have trouble watching such an event, but the reasons why were self-centered – despite his hesitation to admit such.

And so, they watched. They watched the battle occur between both sides, as humanity stood with those sympathetic to their plight against those who were the cause of said plight. The figure stood by her side throughout. Galatea didn’t need to look for her to sense his discomfort over those who were to rest eternally.

If only, some part of her thought, he could bother to look beyond that which blinded him. And even then, Galatea knew what he would say or try to say in response. It wouldn’t do to press him again.

Eventually there must come a time when distant observation was to cease. And that time was now.

“Watchmare–” the figure began, but she wouldn’t be there to hear him finish. It was time to try a more direct approach and be present among the chaos occurring below.

She ‘ported into it.

Galatea had spotted two combatants, rocked by an explosion, protected only by the root system of a tree that had grown over a boulder. One was human, a man wearing a faceplate. The other was an equine like her, a unicorn, lying injured, her fur scorched.

“Who are–” said the human.

“Ssh,” Galatea whispered, lifting a forehoof to her lips. “You will bring them down on our heads, and while you may have a death wish, I most certainly do not.”

She glanced around, before returning her attention to the hapless unicorn.

“T… they…” the unicorn tried to speak, “W… we have… we have to…”

“Gently, little pony,” Galatea said quietly. “You’ve fought bravely. Rest now. I will see that your task is done.”

With a final, gurgling rattle, the unicorn slumped.

“She’s…” began the man with the faceplate. He had an odd accent.

“She’s gone, yes,” Galatea looked at him. “And we may join her if we are not quiet and careful.”

“Well we can’t just sit here,” the man hissed. “We have to do something about that Imperial division. They’ll overwhelm the dock!”

“Thank you, human, I am aware of the situation…”

Galatea dared peek between the trees, assessing their options.

There ensued some further back-and-forth with the man, as he tried to ascertain who she might be, even going so far as ask if she worked for the PHL. But soon, her course of action was decided, and Galatea let the man know.

“You are still armed,” she told him. “I will attempt to draw them off and engage the worst of their forces. You can make it back to the rest of your group by then.”

He scoffed, wondering how she could pull this off.

For some reason it prompted him, as she hadn’t told him what to call her and nor did she plan on it, to address her by a variety of silly nicknames. Internally she smiled, indulging him by claiming she’d never had a nickname.

One like her needed to have her secrets, after all.

“I have seen the worst excesses of this Empire…” Galatea said by way of goodbye, outlining those crimes she’d personally witnessed, and there were many. Some of which he wouldn’t understand. “If I had control of mine life, human, none of this would have come to pass.”

“That… doesn’t make sense,” said the human. “What does it have to do with you?”

“Everything, and nothing.” She shook her head. “Do not concern yourself. I have said far more than was necessary…”

In a way, four years had made a difference to her as well. In her millenia of mingling amongst the people of Equus, she’d never grown this distant from them. Already she’d started to share more with a stray human than she rightly ought.

She allowed him a bittersweet smile as she ‘ported away.

Bunkered down as they were, the Imperial troops fired spell-beams and raised shimmering shields. The boldest of their unicorns interlocked shield-spells, pushing forward while groups of earthponies and pegasi brought up the rear.

But just as the Newcalf began to charge, there was a bend of space as the figure appeared. And from the top of his cane, its head spit from its body to reveal a blade in all its cold grey steel. With a wide and arced wave, came three spectral forms of endless cold that stampeded straight at the Imperial column. Before they could so much as react, the forms charged at and through them. Instantly after, they were left cast in ice and frozen in place.

Then, from the figure’s right side, another joined him. It was the previously hapless unicorn, dressed in armour for war, and with cold, uncaring eyes. From her horn, a beam surged out and struck the Newcalf. The great lumbering creature was, against the blinding light, left little more than a smoky outline of itself, and then dissolved, dust mixing with the sand underfoot.

“Thank you, mare,” the figure breathed as blood trailed down his nose. The mare, looking to him, bowed her head before disappearing into nowhere. The figure, stumbling slightly, adjusted his posture before raising the sword up high as the three spectral figures raced into it. He then rejoined the cane’s neck to its body, making it appear as it did prior.

As Galatea reappeared on the scene, the extent of the devastation grew clear in her eyes. And an unearthly chill shot through her. She had witnessed violence over the course of her long existence, how could she not have, and this was scarcely the worst she’d seen.

Yet the suddenness of it, the lack of forewarning and the ease with which the figure in front of her had slipped into this madness, except it was no madness. There’d been a control to it. A coldness, which pleased her not at all. This was not what she’d expected of him.

She found her voice, with all the difficulty of one accustomed to merely observe.

“Why did you do that?”

“You were putting yourself in harm’s way. I had to act,” came the figure’s response without effort. “I’d rather not lose you too.”

He had lost many, as had all in this war, she knew it well. But she saw his eyes, and the way he looked at her. It was no romantic love, but it suffered just as much from misplaced feelings. Never had it been clearer to Galatea that in beholding her, he saw only… an alicorn.

“Like you lost Celestia, you mean?” Galatea said icily. “Your precious Princess of Equestria?”

“That– that isn’t what I meant,” the figure denied, yet it was nothing but lies. “Too much suffering has there been for too long. Princess Luna, Princess Cadenza, the Reindeer, the dragons, even the Changelings– and the humans, then Lyra herself. I can still feel all these deaths, Watchmare, yet none are mine just yet. If we are to heal, there must be a decline of loss, before there’s nothing left.”

“Shall I tell you something about what you’ve lost?” Galatea demanded. “Those you speak of having lost are people I never got to know, and now may never at all. Celestia and Luna were more than Princesses to me. They were mine sisters.”

“There’s still a chance!” the figure insisted, his desperation clear as day. “Cadenza is kin to you as well through Luna’s line. You have someone left. The dream still can come to pass– we can return to better days.”

“By what means?” said Galatea. “By a slaughter, such as the one you just enacted?” She nodded curtly at the silver necklace he wore. “You know what’ll happen if you abuse that artefact’s power. You’re wielding a force that, by all rights, should have gone to Cadenza– but was denied to her until her rightful time had passed. Yet there are others whose lives matter, besides Princesses!”

“I’m aware of that, Watchmare, truly,” he said, wincing at what wasn’t visible to the naked eye. “And what I’ve done was not a slaughter, it was defense for you. Though I detest it, death is necessary as a release for them from forms they were forced into. If there was another way, I would have found it.”

“Apart from the suit you wear? The face you hide behind?”

“I-I… it’s necessary! You know this! To walk amongst them without judgment!”

“But do you truly act for them?” Galatea asked, to which she saw the figure’s words fail him. “If it were one of them and not mine self, would you leap to ‘defend’ them? Or do you prefer to walk as a specter instead?”

The figure grimaced at that.

“The dead do not return, nor do they walk freely,” he shot back, bluntly.

“And yet,” Galatea gestured to the spot where the mare once lay. “You surround yourself with them.”

“Princess–”

“I am no Princess!” Galatea cut him off. “But you haven’t accepted that. Have you? Don’t deny it. I’ve known it a long time. I’d merely hoped you’d let go of these sentiments…” She shook her head. “You’re slipping. You’re allowing that Amulet to warp your mind.”

To touch the power of an alicorn was to brave the pernicious influence of those who’d crafted them.

“Those dark feelings will only worsen, and worsen. Lest you become a Chimera, if you want to make the right choice, Headmaster… shed yourself of the Amulet, and the past with it.”

“I… I…”

“So even that is too much for you?” Galatea said, disappointment lying heavy on her. “Very well. Then for your sake, I leave you as the specter you wish to be, until you can make the right choice. I’ll be watching, always, but you shall not see me.”

“G-Galatea, wait!”

“Fare thee well,” Galatea said, closing her eyes and willing herself away.

She still heard him desperately call her name through the aether, with all the excuses to contradict his own claims. But if there was to be hope for these forlorn worlds, then there must be better ways.

Or else all things would be no more than ghosts, ignorant of the future.

~ The Hall of Unity ~ Sixteenth Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

Galatea blinked her way back into awakeness. Granite walls greeted her field of view. Frowning a little, she sat up, pushing away the covers. Gifted with her eidetic memory, a dream would remain sharp and clear in her mind for a long time.

Except this was no dream. It was yet another of the scrambled pieces of information which, in the last seconds of her life, had been transferred from one Alicorn of Doorways and Memories to the next.

She’d been left holding many cards. The problem was she knew the face of less than half of them.

‘A figure in human guise, known by mine other-self, who speaks of death,’ she thought. ‘And they wore the Alicorn Amulet? Could they be the Architect, in a whole other guise? No… if they were, the situation would be much different.’

Her other-self would not have been killed, struck down by the sister she’d never met. Her final gesture would not have been to communicate with Alexander Reiner, employing a mad oracle for her mouthpiece.

That Oracle… Galatea lay awake, still sitting, as she considered her own actions. When it seemed Luna might yet fail in Boston and even Cadance could not change the outcome, she had done as her other-self had done, reaching through that broken mind to speak with the PHL.

She had acted on instinct, guided by a distinct hum in her ears, heard through the Crystal Mirror. Prior to then, with the gaps in her knowledge, she’d wondered how the other-Galatea spoke through the Oracle. Now it was becoming clear.

‘Do they know?’ she asked herself. ‘Do they know that inside Miss Sugarbean’s skull, there’s the shard of a shard– a fragment of Mirror, a piece of the Prism?’

How would Madame Heartstrings react to that, she mused.

Within her, Galatea felt a twinge of guilt. In the short time she knew her, she’d begun to grow fond of the odd little green unicorn. Heartstrings, upon hearing of Reiner’s heart-shaped locket, had risked life and limb once it turned out Redheart sought it also. And in these last days, the little unicorn had proposed a plan which appealed to Galatea – an expedition, a ship-bound voyage of discovery into the Unknown.

A last detail from the memory flickered. There’d been a ship on the horizon. It looked familiar.

‘I haven’t been on a ship for years in this world,’ the thought occurred to her. ‘But mine other-self… She spent time on that ship.’

All realisations which seemed to bring her mind back to Madame Heartstrings. Bizarre. Sensing no further information forthcoming, Galatea chose to get up, stretching herself. She was used to early hours. These weeks of relative inactivity had been an anomaly. The anomaly of being hosted by her sisters.

She blinked, perplexed to think this way, then sighed. Right then, starting the day watching the mindless violence promised by that honour duel was looking appealing. But it was regrettable, Madame Heartstrings would be there, watching her friend do what humans were all too good at.

Outside, the day was breaking.

* * * * *

This was no grand arena, for the Hall of Unity had none. But the space where the ‘honour duel’ was to be conducted was the same domed chamber in which Princess Celestia’s entourage had greeted the arriving delegates from all over Equus. Alex wondered about the irony, as he tried to picture holding a duel at the UN Headquarters. Stranger things had happened in recent times.

It was before the arched mosaic which hid the Hall’s central entrance, that a small crowd of onlookers had gathered. Most out of curiosity, Alex suspected, like the Kirin, the Saddle Mareabians, a few griffons, and one blue dragon. But a few had a vested interest in how the duel turned out. Like Lady Cadance. Like Lyra, who stood glancing around nervously, the cause of her nervosity apparent – Queen Chrysalis was hovering close by, looking intense.

At one end of the chamber’s centre, Alex sat awaiting his prospective opponent, Nurse Cross having insisted he stick to his wheelchair until the last moment. She was busy fussing over him, casting a dirty look at the crowd.

“Madness,” Cross mouthed. “Soon as you’re done, I want you to come see me. Understood?”

“Will do, Sutra,” Alex whispered. With effort, he stood on his two feet. Yet he took the time to pat her forehoof. “I’m not letting you down again.”

Merely shaking her head, Cross headed off, wheeling away the wheelchair.

A great, imposing creature took position in the very center. Alex recognised the Minotaur Proxenos. Darkhoof glanced his way, fingers entwined in a sign of tranquil contemplation. He thought he saw fatherly sympathy in Darkhoof’s bespectacled eye, but if so, the Minotaur kept it well to himself.

Then, from above, Alex’s opponent landed in a thump at the other end of the center. A Changeling, of the Ebony Hive, wings folding upon his red-finned back. The Changeling favoured Alex with a leering, toothy smile.

Darkhoof nodded at each in turn.

“The rules are simple,” he stated. “There are five rounds. The limits of what is permissible have been adjusted in accordance to the champions’ abilities. You, Captain Alexander, may only draw upon one special use of your runes in a round. Conversely, the Changeling may adopt whichever form they wish, but they must stick with said form until the round concludes. A round is deemed concluded once a champion is immobilised.”

He took off his glasses and wiped them, before replacing them.

“Are there any questions? Remember, this is a contest of endurance, not a fight to the death.”

Alex spoke first. “No, I think I’m good,” he said, hoping he was. Standing steady already required lightly focusing his runes. “Let’s get this done.”

The Changeling nodded curtly.

“Very well,” said Darkhoof. “Champions, take your places.” He held his large hands apart, ready to clap them once. “Upon my signal.”

Both Alex and the Changeling marched forward until they stood three paces from one another. Far enough not to take a swing, close enough to hear the other.

“I won’t go soft on you, human,” the Changeling smirked. “Rules or not.”

“Fine by me,” remarked Alex, “I wouldn’t have it any other way. There are no rules in war.”

The signal resounded, and then they were upon each other.

* * * * *

Celestia maintained her regal self-control throughout the first round.

But what this bout entailed, she privately felt, might as well have been designed as a miniature enactment of the confict which consumed Alexander Reiner’s homeworld. She even wondered if Queen Chrysalis, cunning creature that she was, had not secretly wanted this duel all along. It provided a showcase of Reiner’s strengths, his abilities, his special powers. And how one of Chrysalis’ top soldiers fared against them.

As it happened, the starting form which the soldier, Pharynx, chose to assume was a pony. A burly earthpony, broad and well-muscled, yet nonetheless far from the most exotic shape he could have picked.

And all things considered, no doubt thanks to his experience, Reiner won fairly quickly. Pharynx put up a good fight, where a direct blow to the head could have given the human a world of grief, but Reiner swerved away every time. At last, Reiner did the daringly unexpected, and managed to leap onto the earthpony’s back. Pharynx bucked and kicked, yet astoundingly, Reiner never once looked close to falling.

When the human pulled at the earthpony’s ear, Changeling imitation of their false bodies’ physiognomic traits worked against Pharynx, as it sent a rush of chemicals that turned the bucking, snarling beast rather docile in a few seconds. For some reason, Celestia noticed Princess Ember snigger at this. Darkhoof declared the round over.

Stepping off, Reiner only had the following to say. “I’m from Texas. I can handle wild stallions.”

It was said with some pride, yet simply, careful not to get cocky.

Because Celestia sensed that Reiner knew what she knew. This had been Pharynx starting at the
base template, this was him testing the waters. She saw it all too clearly. As the match would proceed, so too would it intensify.

* * * * *

Off in their own corner, Thorax couldn’t decide if he had to worry, or to cheer for Pharynx, who’d next assumed the shape of a Diamond Dog. Aphid, meanwhile, was hollering. In her own way, without that gentle voice of hers, instead stomping her forehoof on the floor and clapping.

The fight became a punch-up, human and Diamond Dog swerving to avoid the other’s blows while seeking to get a punch in themselves.

“Pssst,” someone whispered. Thorax swivelled his head around, and saw the Harlequin Queen-in-Waiting, Papillate lean towards him, curiously. She pointed at Aphid.

“What’s she… saying?”

Thorax furrowed his brows. “She says, ‘Isn’t my brother cool?’”

Papillate rubbed her chin, looking between him, Aphid, then Pharynx. A thunderous crash from the arena gave Thorax the answer, however reluctant he was to fight himself. Pharynx’s fist had impacted a sensitive spot in the human’s chest, forcing him to his knees. It was then only a matter of the Dog holding him there, clutching at his shoulders almost casually.

“Yeah,” he whispered. “Very.”

* * * * *

Lyra nibbled at her forehooves. Tried to, were it not for Bonbon tugging at her. One victory, one loss for Alex so far, and now in the third round, the fearsome Changeling had upped the game – turning into a griffon, all cruel beak and talons.

Whatever his abilities, Alex couldn’t fly. Repeatedly, the Changeling swooped down and tore. And once more in quick sucession, there’d been a particularly hard blow to Alex, staggering him. He withdrew, chest heaving. Even knowing Rainbow Dash, Lyra didn’t know flyers could strike that fast.

“It’s… it’s still going,” Bonbon whispered, “he’ll win. Don’t worry.”

Lyra nodded, eyes glancing at the vicious, delighted glare of the Ebony Queen.

“He'd better.”

At the last minute, Lyra’s wish was granted. As the griffon swooped again, the human swiftly leapt to seize its talon, pulling it down. There was a surprised squawk, a tussle, blood drawn as the griffon scratched at the human’s face. But he held firm, pinning the griffon down.

Darkhoof called an end. In the arena, Alex stood tall.

* * * * *

With the third round behind him, Alex was winded and he knew it. Every breath was becoming more challenging to take, and his muscles ached with the strain of successive combat. He was still out of shape. The last fight had been a particular challenge, given that flyers were normally countered by weapons-fire. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d actually had to tackle a pegasus – and pegasi didn’t have sharp talons. He felt his face. His fingers came back slightly red.

The next round was about to begin, though, and Alex took his guard.

Although he couldn’t see his own condition, it looked like Pharynx wasn’t doing much better. The Changeling soldier was also taking deep, heavy breaths, focusing on Alex with an intense glare.

Once again the signal was given, and Pharynx engulfed himself in the off-green flames of Changeling magic. Alex could just make out the writhing, twisting mass that Pharynx’s body had become through the fire.

As with the second round, the shadowy form grew and swelled, but this time it was even bigger. The flames rose up to an apex, far dwarfing Alex as they expanded to accommodate the increasingly massive form of Pharynx’s transformation. When they finally flickered out, a dark, hulking Minotaur bull stood where Pharynx had been.

The bull’s gaze flashed red, while a vicious smirk spread across his muzzle.

“Brilliant,” Alex muttered as his eyes ran over the hulking bovine. He saw Pharynx flex, limbering his muscular arms and shoulders to adjust to his new shape, and at last, crack his knuckles.

Concentrating, Alex let the power flow into his body, and he felt some of the soreness and fatigue fade away. But the moment Alex did this, the bull’s eyes narrowed as, letting out a braying roar, he lowered his head and charged forward on all fours.

Shaken as the floor rumbled, Alex still managed to duck, spinning to his right and just dodging Pharynx, whose immense new body almost clipped him. But at that same moment, a loose left-backhand swing was made by Pharynx as momentum carried him forward.

‘Steady, it’s just like when he was a Diamond Dog…’ Alex thought as he steadied himself. ‘Big arms, huge torso, lots of muscle but short, weaker legs.’

Pharynx quickly halted and span around, planting his hooves, preparing for another rush – and it was then Alex hit him. Opening with a right hook, his left arm still up in guard, Alex slammed his fist into Pharynx’ new muzzle, the chunky lips giving way as Alex forced as much magical energy into his arm as he could. Alex swore he heard a crunch, but it was probably just cartilage giving way, rather than bone breaking.

Yet Pharynx recovered sooner than Alex expected, to send his own right fist in an underarm jab that broke through Alex’s guard and hammered his ribs. Alex gasped and fell back a step, leaving himself open to a left hook from Pharynx, which he barely blocked with his empowered arm. His bones shuddered from the impact.

“More power,” Alex hissed, his runes lighting up as more thaumic energy was called upon.

Pushing forward, Alex once again swung a right hook, connecting hard with Pharynx’s pumped-up arm. Ignoring the pain, he followed up with his left and began to rain blows on the Minotaur, each hit striking beefy muscle-mass that began to strain against the impact.

Growling, Pharynx took several steps back, his every attempt to land a retaliatory blow interrupted by Alex’s relentless assault. It was after about six paces that Alex changed tactics. Making yet another attempt on Pharynx’s face, which as he expected, got narrowly blocked, Alex lashed out with a kick that connected with Pharynx’s left knee.

Alex hadn’t empowered his legs’ strength that much, just enough to reduce the strain he was placing on them, but it was enough to make Pharynx cry in alarm and even stumble. The Minotaur’s guard dropped for a moment, and just as it was about to rise back up, Alex aimed for Pharynx’s open face.

Pharynx ducked, barely in time to move his face out of the way of Alex’s incoming blow and put his shoulder in its place. Alex hit the powerful joint with all his empowered might. It forced Pharynx onto one knee. The hulking Minotaur was finally level with him. Alex smiled faintly.

It was then Alex realised he’d forgotten one thing about his opponent – bulls, and therefore Minotaurs, had horns.

Pharynx swung his head, his wide, curved horns raking Alex’s forearm, drawing blood. Feeling his vision go white, Alex yowled, but Pharynx was just getting started. Before he could recover, the Minotaur followed this up by reaching up and engulfing Alex’s arm in his mouth, biting down on his bicep with force – not enough to cause terrible damage, but still locking the limb in place.

Then, neck veins straining, Pharynx pulled up and back, lifting Alex up and over his head. Alex nearly panicked as the room span and he flew over Pharynx, slamming down onto the ground.

Dazed from the fall, Alex had just enough time to raise his arms, wincing from the pain, to cover his face as Pharynx loomed over him. Pharynx was upon Alex in a flash, throwing all of his bulk onto him, pinning his arms in one huge limb and his legs in another, practically smothering him in bovine muscle.

“Alright,” Darkhoof’s voice rang out. “That’s enough.”

Obligingly, Pharynx lifted himself off Alex, snorting a bovine snort. The green flames enveloped him as he returned to his position, turning back into his regular form. Meanwhile, Alex staggered to do the same.

Alex took a deep breath and ignored the aching in his limbs. As a near life-long soldier, he had long since gotten used to almost ceaselessly moving for hours on end. This fatigue was different, however. It wasn’t the exhaustion of his body having been pushed to its old limits. This was the feeling of his body bent from unprecedented stiffness.

“Still need to recover,” Alex muttered to himself bitterly. If this was all he could do after being in recovery for so long, then he’d be useless to the war effort.

“You feeling alright over there?” Pharynx called. Despite his words, his tone dripped with almost petulant amusement. “Do you want to call it quits right here?”

Alex frowned and let out an irritated breath through his nose.

“No, I’m good,” Alex replied in as casual a voice he could muster, waving off his opponent’s mocking concern.

“Very well,” Pharynx drawled. “If you say so. Now, if you think you were ever ready to deal with a Minotaur, then wait till you get a load of this beast.”

With that, Pharynx engulfed himself in the fires of Changeling magic. This plume, however, was massive, dwarfing all previous transformations. Alex guarded himself as Pharynx expanded in size, swelling in every direction. Huge shapes emerged from the large, indistinct blob that Pharynx’s body had turned into, opening up like the petals of a flower.

Then it was over, and where Pharynx had stood was a monster. An immense insectoid creature that hovered on three pairs of diaphanous wings, supporting a rounded, heavily armoured body. Hulking pincered arms hung underneath the bulbous carapace, with a heavy stinger twitching at the rear. Pharynx’s new face was close to his old, vaguely equine one, but much larger and bearing a wide, slavering maw filled with rows of fangs.

“What the hell is that!” Alex cried, staring at the abomination in a mix of awe and horror.

He’d never heard of a Changeling using such a monstrous form. If the Solar Empire could have used something like that, they would have.

All Pharynx did was hover a little closer, a warbling, unsettling chuckle reverberating from his throat. The look in his various compound eyes, however, was familiar. He had been waiting to use this particular body.

Barely wasting a second, Pharynx darted forward, far faster than his enormous body had any right to. Alex ducked and rolled, dodging the stinger that struck out for him. However, the moment it missed, Pharynx tucked his stinger in, keeping it from striking the floor, and spun in the air, swinging with his pincers. Alex rolled with the blow, hopping in a circle as Pharynx made one swipe after another, alternating his swings with lashes from the stinger-tail.

Alex leapt back, putting some distance between himself and Pharynx. He swept his eyes over his opponent’s body, trying to find a weak point. Unlike every other Equestrian species, he had no information on this particular creature, and – whether it was Pharynx’s particular abilities or a general ability of the species – it was faster than it looked.

Not letting up, Pharynx flew forward again with a vicious, squealing snarl. This time, Alex stood his ground, his guard up, and called upon magical power once again. When Pharynx was barely a stone’s throw away, Alex forced the power into his legs and leapt, flipping in the air as he claimed height to practically vault over Pharynx’s body.

As Alex passed overheard, tucking himself into a ball, he took the opportunity to lash out with his right arm – still empowered with a little thaumic energy. He struck one of Pharynx’s wings, denting the material, almost making a tear. Though the damage was minor, it interrupted the rhythmic beat of the wings, the struck wing misaligning and hitting the others.

He landed on his feet, tumbling forward and rolling to bleed off momentum, Pharynx cried out, more in annoyance than pain, and lost control of himself, rushing down to the ground, his right-hand bank of wings almost tangled up together. Pharynx managed to roll with the impact as well, righting himself, but facing away from Alex.

Seeing a chance, Alex charged forward, empowering all of his limbs. With so much magic in his body, the room blurred and not even a heartbeat passed before he was on Pharynx. His opponent pitched forward as Alex slammed his shoulder into the creature. Pharynx was barely able to catch himself on his pincers, but his body was low to the ground and his forelimbs were now pinned as they tried to keep his bulk from hitting the floor.

Alex aimed for the joints as he threw one punch after another at Pharynx. He felt the bones in his hands and arms jar every time he did strike the chitinous armour. By his point his arms were screaming in pain and exhaustion. There had to be a weak point in the beast’s defences, but he had yet to find it.

With a cry, Pharynx threw his body back, almost throwing Alex as he did so. Spinning in place, Pharynx swung back. One pincer was raised in guard, blocking a right hook that Alex made, whilst the other broke Alex’s own guard and impacted him in the stomach.

Alex fell back, wincing from the pain in his abdomen.

His arms felt dead by this point, shaking as he held them up. More thaumic energy flowed into them, but doing so formed the beginnings of migraine. It felt like there was a growing pressure between Alex’s eyes that pressed down on the insides of his head from there. For a moment, Alex took his eyes off of Pharynx to shake his head in an instinctive attempt to clear it. The pain only worsened, his head throbbing as he cleared out the aches from his arms and legs.

Pharynx didn’t wait, jumping forward on his stinger like a spring. Alex barely avoided the attack. He was just able to jump away, but he lost his footing, landing on his back and jarring his already disoriented head.

‘I’m gonna lose’, Alex thought, groggily. ‘I’m almost spent, and there’s no way I can beat that thing with my bare hands.’

Legend said that Hannibal Barca, in his crossing of the Alps, had once forced a prisoner to fight one of his war-elephants, unarmed. He’d been most displeased when the prisoner won, killing the elephant. When pressed, humans could accomplish remarkable feats.

Somehow, though, Alex didn’t see it happening here. He’d fallen too far below his standards.

… His normal standards. But he could still call upon the super-normal.

It would strain him, in a different way. Yet, blurrily spotting the massive outline of Pharynx lunge towards him, Alex decided that if there was a time, the time had come.

Groaning softly, he held up a hand. On his whole body, runes glowed blue. His concentration poured the thaumic energy into his hand. Static sparked at his fingertips. He felt the skin of his palm rapidly heat up from the raw power coalescing in the space above it, rippling in the air. A swirling, churning ball of blue lightning manifested.

Alex only just saw the descending Pharynx’s eyes widen in the surprise, too late to shift his bulk’s momentum, as guided by the focus of the mind, the blue lightning-ball burst into a beam, which shot straight forward, impacting right into the underbelly of Pharynx’s monstrous form.

In a flash of blinding light, the creature was sent hurtling back, landing face-up, some way away. But Alex left his opponent no time to find his bearings. Summoning his willpower, he pulled himself to his feet and rushed over, leaping straight onto the confused, squirming creature. Pulling in his fist, now returned to normal, Alex brought it down onto the creature’s jaw.

Repeatedly. Once, twice, three times, until he decided it was enough. Finally he relented, to see. Through swollen lids, Pharynx’s four eyes stared up, dazed, and clouded over, his tongue lolling. He remained immobile.

Darkhoof strode into view. “I believe that did it, Captain Alexander. Step away.”

Panting, sweating, Alex felt only too happy to obtemperate. He slid himself off the prone mass. No sooner had he done so, there came Nurse Cross with the wheelchair, muttering obscenities. Wearily, Alex eased back into it.

But Pharynx, it seemed, was only out cold for a minute. A couple of Changeling drones had hovered over to see to him, and no lasting damage was found. After a burst of the green flames, Pharynx was returned to his regular appearance, still prone on his back. The two Changelings helped him up, to what looked like grudging thanks.

Nearby, a debate was going on between Darkhoof, the match’s arbiter, and one of the spectators, concerning the match’s outcome.

“The human cheated,” growled Chrysalis. “You stated he could only make one special use of his runes per round. Well, I saw him use them twice on that last one!”

“How so, Your Majesty?” Darkhoof enquired, eyebrows furrowing. “By the set rules, his use of that energy beam was permissible.”

“He jumped over Pharynx,” Chrysalis said, “higher than I’ll accept to believe a creature with those fragile little legs could possibly manage! That should count as special use!”

Darkhoof stroked his nose-ring, in thought.

“Hm,” he said at last. “I’ve given your objections due consideration, Your Majesty. However, I think you may have got human physiognomy confused with a Minotaur’s.” He indicated his own namesake pair of hooves. “We are better known for the strength of our upper bodies, it is true. Yet humans, though bipedal, would appear to have an even distribution of physical strength. Am I correct, Captain Alexander?”

“Yeah, that’s right,” said Alex. He was thinking of how, while he could not imagine a Minotaur running on two legs, the raw power of one charging him on all fours had been as terrifying as any bull from Texas. “During my training in the Marines, I was taught to focus on my whole body, not just my hands because they sometimes happened to be carrying a gun.”

“And so, a leap like that is physically feasible for a human?”

“To a well-practiced human,” Alex said. He grimaced, nearly groaned. “But, I gotta be honest, without the runes supporting me, I’m barely standing up straight as it is right now.”

“There you go,” Chrysalis said triumphantly. “He used a boost. He shouldn’t even be walking!”

“Yes,” said Darkhoof. “But you forget, it was stipulated that the Captain using his runes to replicate his levels of stamina in an uninjured state would be permitted. Otherwise, this’d have been quite an uneven fight.”

Chrysalis hissed with displeasure. Darkhoof paid her no heed, moving to finish his piece.

“In my authority as arbiter of this trial by champion,” Darkhoof announced to the crowd, “Hereby do I declare the human Alexander Reiner, wielding runic power as his allotted weapon, to be the one and only honourable victor, by a tally of three to two. If such is your inclination, you may give him a round of applause.”

And applause there was.

* * * * *

As the crowd dispersed, Pharynx, ignoring the pounding in his head, broke away from Aphid and Thorax to approach the human Reiner, who was beginning to be rolled away. There were a few ponies in proximity, the nurse and that mint-green unicorn, both of whom looked dismayed as they saw him, but he didn’t care about them.

Pharynx lightly inclined his head.

“You fought well, human,” he said quietly. “If you, and others of your sort, can put that kind of energy into every fight… You might still win your war.” His eyes gleamed darkly. “But just be glad this wasn’t a real fight. I wouldn’t have held back at all in a real fight.”

“If that was you holding back…” Reiner smiled thinly. He shook his head. “I did need the exercise. A real fight would’ve been different. Trust me, after the shit I’ve seen, this was just a bit of fun.”

Beneath his gleaming eyes, Pharynx smiled back, equally thinly.

“Then we’re on the same page. Now get going, before I decide to have you cocooned with that wheelchair of yours. I’d like to see your runes break through that.”

“Oh, they might surprise you,” said Reiner. “Even I’m not sure of all they can do.”

Pharynx left it at that, going to rejoin his Hive. The Queen wouldn’t be happy. He’d lost this fight. And while Changelings healed fast, he’d be feeling the pain a while. But, he reflected as he felt Thorax and Aphid embrace him, none of that mattered.

It was what he lived for.

~ Day 7 of the Convocation ~ Sixteenth Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

This was it, this was it had all been leading to. For her, anyway, thought Lyra.

At the Convocation’s opening, making her presentation on Howie Waggoner’s expedition and the Sunken Dream Valley had not been so different from explaining it to Princess Celestia along with Twilight’s friends – just as she had done, before the hospital bed of a sleeping human she hadn’t yet known was called Alexander Reiner. Anymore than she’d known of his world. Or his connection to a picture in her book, symbolic of a past bond between their worlds.

She had not told the Public Assembly of the human Alex’s family history, though she’d suspected it from the sketch in Waggoner’s book. The little statuette of a human girl, buried in the sand. Her face, so similar to his, too many traits in common to be mere shared traits of the species. And that locket she held up…

A locket whose existence Lyra still couldn’t reveal to the Public Assembly. Of all things, it had been a dragon’s essence in a canister that spilled the truth about Alex’s mother. Spykoran, the Eldest of Dragons. But to reveal the locket’s existence would have undermined the very goal they’d worked towards, Celestia had reminded her sadly. A tool which could, in one swift stroke, turn the war’s tide, was a tool that’d lead either to coveting or to abjuration of responsibility. And Alex had reluctantly agreed, muttering something about splitting the atom.

In short, telling of Waggoner’s expedition had been a labour of passion, which Lyra had slipped back into with ease, no matter whom she told it to. This was different, quite different. Princess Celestia was counting on her, like she’d counted on Twilight so many times.

And as she stepped back onto the stage, Lyra’s every sense was bombarding her. The Public Assembly’s murmurs were deafening. Her saliva tasted dry. The scent of lavender and mistletoe were now offensive to her. The blur of the crowd came into far too sharp relief.

‘What am I doing here?’ she thought. ‘I’ve made a mistake I’vemadeamistake Mimiss–’

Closing her eyes, Lyra slowly applied the relaxed breathing technique Cadance had taught her. Princess Cadance. But Lady Cadenza’s words from last night were also good counsel. She dared to again look upon the Assembly, scanning for a friendly face. She resisted the temptation to glance at Bonbon, in the wings. So were Celestia and Luna and Twilight and Applejack and… And then Lyra’s eyes found someone.

The leading figures all sat in their galleries. But in the lower auditorium, there stood the regular folks who comprised their entourages, mingled together. The off-duty guards, the serving-staff, the hangers-on who worked. Amongst them all, a tall grey earthpony with blue eyes.

Galatea smiled secretively at Lyra, only a subtle glamour keeping her invisible to the attention Lyra was attracting right now. And without quite knowing why, Lyra found her confidence.

“Distinguished leaders… Honoured representatives… People of Equus. I stand here before you…”

Her voice lowered, her gaze panning over the Public Assembly. All eyes had locked onto her, most murmurs having faded away. Good. That meant they would hear her.

Now to make them listen.

“I… stand here before you,” she repeated, pausing to gulp, “with a plea, given to each and every one of you.”

Another pause, longer than the last. No applause, no cheers or whispers as she had expected. Nothing but the breeze. Lyra sighed.

“Everyone here has seen what awaits us on Earth. What sort of evil reigns beyond the Barrier. An Empire whose reach spans across Equus, waging war on a scale far beyond any of our imaginations. And… I know many of you are afraid, to confront this terror and come out of it with our heads held up high.”

She didn’t look at Bonbon, nor Twilight, nor the Princesses. But they were watching, she knew.

“It won’t be easy, that much I know...”

All Lyra could imagine were the visions and memories Princess Luna had shown them, only a few days ago. Now, they all may very well have asked them all to march to an uncertain fate.

“But someone has to do it,” Lyra said. “The Solar Empire is… a sickness, corrupting all it touches. Humanity… my kind… each and every one of our people. They claim to value Harmony, to be the guardians of Equestria’s values– but their Harmony is a twisted, sickened thing, a lie they tell each other as they warp lives and erase history. It is insatiable. If it ends humanity, it will turn its eyes to others.”

Her voice grew higher still, firmer and bolder.

“And that is why we must help!,” Lyra shouted. “They don’t just need defenders. They need books, bandages, shelter, a safe place to store their greatest treasures, the mere reassurance that things can be better. We can do this. These would be all that’s needed, and every little effort counts, so long as we do it together, hand in hoof, claw in hand...”

Hushed murmurs grew all around her. Lyra did not know what they spoke of, whether it was in condemnation, or praise.

She let go of her breath.

“I say this because… I know that we can be more. If only for this tiny moment, we can be more! Why shouldn’t we? We can make something better. Something whose very existence denies them the victory and high ground they crave.”

Her words flowed more easily now. She’d imagined Bonbon there, on the stage, right by her, whispering encouragement.

“History remembers those who take a stand, in victory and in defeat,” said Lyra. “And I stand here now, asking you all to seize this moment. And I–” She shook her head. “I want to believe. I want to see a better world than the one scoured by the Empire. I want to see the Earth safe, and I want to make something new. We can make that world, here and on Earth. And somewhere out there… I know we did, a long time ago. I know we can find what Waggoner saw. We can prove the Empire wrong, that Earth and Equus were not meant to be foes.”

A short chuckle escaped her, before she could help herself.

“Humanity gave us aid, before most of our ancestors even built permanent dwellings. A little girl’s kindness that ensured that we all have a future to seek, a future to build. A future we can make for our own. Not just ponykind’s, or humanity’s… but all of us.”

She looked down at her hooves, sighing.

“I’m not the Ambassador. I don’t know how she made that journey. Nor do I know how the Empire made their journey. But… it doesn’t have to be our path. And we can walk it together.”

Lyra let her voice echo around, and dissipate, before taking a deep bow. Polite applause met her, from all around. Claws and hooves and paws. And hands, too, from the Minotaurs, along with Alex, somewhere in the wings.

So Lyra turned around, and saw Bonbon smile, so very happily, clapping more enthusiastically than anyone else, even the Princesses. But even her enthusiasm did not stopper the growing pit in Lyra’s stomach, that perhaps her words would sway no-one other than the Reindeer…

The applause died down soon enough. Bonbon, Twilight, and Celestia were the last to finish. That left a deafening silence, tearing at Lyra. Anxious and sweating she was, yet, her hooves remained rooted to the spot.

To her relief, the Princess of the Sun emerged from somewhere behind her, with a determined glare, her golden aura carrying an unfurled scroll.

“People of Equus,” she spoke, and even without the Royal Canterlot Voice in full force, she held the room in awe, “now comes the hour of need. For those who wish to do so, they may add their names, and that of their people, onto this Concordat. Together, as Madam Heartstrings has said, we shall march, and lend our aid… The Twelve Families of Equus, now Thirteen.”

None answered her call then, amidst hushed whispers. Lyra’s eyes darted, back and forth, between creatures all around, hoping for something, anything which might bore any resemblance to sympathy, from the griffons to Buffaloes, even the Changelings...

After an eternity, one emerged from the crowd, drawing murmurs and eyes, including Lyra’s.

It was a dragon, blue in scales, a head taller than Lyra was. Her wings were folded tightly against her body, her steps confident and sure. She stopped, only a few steps away from the stage. Before the Assembly’s eyes, standing right there at the centre, Princess Ember held up a quill, her eyes fixed upon Lyra.

“I’ve changed my mind.”

* * * * *

“Congratulations, Lyra,” Twilight was saying backstage a few hours later. “Well done.”

She and all her friends from Ponyville had come to say this, making Lyra blush heavily at the praise she was getting. Twilight had never been one to seek the spotlight herself, back when they were in school together, but recent years had thrust her into it more than not, and she’d got used to it as she could. Which meant, more often than not, with great difficulty.

So she knew just how it must have felt for Lyra, to stand and speak and sound more confident than she really was.

“Thanks, Twi’,” Lyra smiled crookedly. “Not sure I could’ve done it without a little boost from Cadance… from Lady Cadenza, honestly. But I’m glad you guys were there for it.”

“Aw, shucks, sugarcube,” said Applejack. “You didn’t think we’d miss out on this, did you?”

“Yeah,” grinned Rainbow Dash. “We weren’t gonna leave you hanging! I saved your flank at Zecora’s hut, I wasn’t gonna back out now. Especially not for one rockin’ cool speech!”

Pinkie chuckled a little. “Heh, now that sounds like something my older sister would say. Did I ever tell you guys? I can’t quite put my hoof on it, but Galatea reminds me a bit of her…”

But Lyra wasn’t listening. As often with Dash, her words weren’t quite the best-chosen, and Lyra’s smile faded to recall the circumstances of that rescue, her memories turning once again to the late Redheart.

Apparently sensing this, Applejack spoke quickly. “But that was our last yee-haw at this joint, least, it is for some of us. So we wanted to end it with a bang.”

“Huh?” Lyra blinked. “Why, where’re you going?”

Rarity gave her the answer, a forehoof around Fluttershy’s withers. “We had a talk,” she said. “Seeing how upset dear Fluttershy’s been since… since Princess Luna got back, a few of the girls got together and decided, maybe it’s best to take her back to Ponyville.”

Lyra stared at the silent, downcast Fluttershy, feeling comprehension and compassion, before turning to Rarity.

“And you, Rares? Aren’t you going too?”

It seemed unusual that Rarity, who was Fluttershy’s best friend, would hang back while Fluttershy left to seek emotional comfort. The same thought must have been on Rarity’s mind, for she looked uncomfortable.

But Fluttershy then spoke for herself. “It’s okay, Lyra,” she said. “I told Rarity it was okay. I’ll have Rainbow and Pinkie and AJ with me. I told Rarity she’s got to stay here, where she can help. We need her networking skills, more than I need…”

The phrase didn’t finish. Rarity hugged her harder.

“Glad she’s got you guys,” Lyra quietly told the three Fluttershy had named. “So,” she addressed Twilight, “you’re staying, huh? Well, it’ll be nice to still see an old face around here.” She paused for thought. “You know, Twi’… Maybe we should give it another try. I mean, talking to Moondancer. Maybe it’ll be different with the one from the PHL.”

“That’s nice of you,” Twilight said. “But, um… I’m, I’ll be staying because this is where the Princess is. Princess Celestia,” she swiftly clarified. “I’m still her faithful student, and there’s a lot I could learn from the… the new Concordat.”

“Wish I could’ve stayed,” Pinkie sighed. “So many friends to make, so many parties… But Princess Celestia said she’ll soon be telling Equestria what’s going on here. And… I think the ponies are gonna need a lot of laughs to keep going after that.”

“Yeah,” said Dash. “And I’m thinking of joining the Royal Guard.”

The expressions on her friends’ faces said this wasn’t news to them. However, it was to Lyra. “Wait, you serious?” she said. “What about the Wonderbolts?”

“The Wonderbolts are the best,” Dash said earnestly. “But they ain’t for fighting. Not yet, anyway. ‘Sides, it’s still gonna take me a while to make the team. I wanna be ready, Lyra. I don’t wanna caught flat-hoofed again, like Redheart nearly did for me. If they come back…” She took a very, very deep breath. “I wanna fight.”

Not much could be said to this. A quiet reigned that Lyra took upon herself to break.

“Then I wish you good luck, Dash…” Lyra said, embracing her. “Fluttershy…” she added, moving to her next. “All of you,” she concluded, take them all into her embrace. “Alex told me about moments like these, called them the ‘calm before the storm’. Don’t know how much longer... It may actually still last a while. But it won’t last forever.”

* * * * *

“Well, it seems that sooner or later, Your Grace,” General Ironclaw spoke, tapping his flintlock, “we all face a crossroads.”

Reclining on the futon provided by the Hall, Grizelda stroked her chin as she considered her elderly advisor’s words. The General was seated on a comfortable chair opposite the futon. This bedroom was more luxurious than she was used to, in all her time with Ironclaw’s Redcloaks. The large, quilted double-bed and the vanity had caught her off-guard that first night, but one thing still stood out even now – the gilded en-suite bathroom at the far end.

A real bathroom. No more communal bathing in a shallow tub with the old General’s troopers, rough-and-ready bunch that they were. And the soap! Up until this week, Grizelda had always regarded soap as hard, gritty stuff. When she’d seen bubbles foam in the water that night, she’d thought it had started to snow.

She did wonder if, after six days of this, she wasn’t going to go soft. The General had politely kept from sharing his opinion, one way or another. But between these comforts and the rich food, Grizelda had to question whether a single week might undo a lifetime’s work, carried out by Ironclaw to mold her into a claimant worthy of the name.

“Mhm-hm…” the Young Pretender hummed. “Pretty sure that’s what the Carbuncle Gem Caravan musta been thinkin’, when they came to that pass at the Dragon’s Spine– you remember that little altercation, General? That was a mean fight… Still can’t believe we made it back safe with those Abyssinians’ wares intact, not to mention the Abyssinians themselves…”

“Quite,” Ironclaw said gruffly, “but if I understand what we’re dealing with now, we’ve got more than just a fight to commit for. Either we sign off on a new contract to provide forces… Or we commit to something different, a more scholarly-minded venture.”

Grizelda sighed. “A pity so few young griffons get a chance at book-learning these days.” She clicked her talons pensively. As she was reflecting, she turned to the stout griffon sitting by her. “Wolf? Another cherry, please.”

Her own glass of milkshake lay on the coffee-table, nearly drained of its contents. Yet Wolfram was further ahead of her, with two glasses empty and halfway through his third.

Smiling devotedly, Wolfram picked the cherry floating in his cup by the stem, raising the fruit just shy of Grizelda’s beak. She nonchalantly nipped at it, one bite swallowing it whole. Satisfied, Grizelda returned Wolfram’s smile, fondly patting her consort’s feathery and sizeable stomach.

“Hm,” she said, looking back at Ironclaw. “A scholarly venture, or a military one– why not both? We’ve plenty to gain in return. A long road lies ahead, and the collective experience we gain...”

Wolfram piped up. “Glenda’s certainly had fun in the Archives, hasn’t she?”

“Good point,” Grizelda said. “Though, I almost pity that her sense of honesty cut off several legalese hoops we could’ve jumped through to claim some new land… As it stands for now, I remain a Pretender with the troops to back me up, but no real territory.”

“Territory which the people shall give, once they hear of what we’ve achieved for their sake,” Ironclaw supplied helpfully.

“Heh. The people?” Grizelda said, holding up her milkshake. “We’ve got the people right here, General,” she continued, gesturing to Wolfram. “Why don’t we ask the people what they think.”

Wolfram set down his milkshake and coughed, a talon to his chest, looking bashful.

“You know,” he said, “you could ask Glenda, or Gabriella. I think they’ll rally, Pumpkin. Okay, this is no Idol of Boreas, yet it’s something they’ll look up to, I’m sure of it.”

“Yeah, about that,” Grizelda said darkly, “I’ve been pressing Lady Amira ‘bout that husband of hers and his collection… Saddle Mareabia has kept King Grover’s Crown far too long.” She paused and swallowed. “Still, if this is what you think, Wolf, we got a good place to start.”

Ironclaw cleared his throat. “What say you, Your Grace?”

“Like I’ve said, a long road lies ahead. But… establishing relations through this Concordat…” Grizelda mused. “I say the Dragon Princess’s shown us the way. We can start off small, pledging our support to that Expedition. With luck, its prestige will shine back onto me. Afterwards, we can send word the Redcloaks call upon their griffon brothers and sisters.” She gave a sly wink. “No doubt the promise of rich return on investment from the Expedition ought to sway them.”

“So, it’s settled, then. The ink will be dry on the morrow,” Ironclaw surmised. He gave a firm nod. “By your word, my Queen. All our banners will be summoned. All the swords gathered.” He gave her a rare smirk. “Quite the start to your reign.”

“Patience,” said Grizelda. “We’ve yet to sign the scroll, or even summon our banners. But our time will come.”

“This does leave one question open,” Ironclaw told her. “Who shall represent you on the Expedition? Whom can we spare, from amongst our numbers.”

Grizelda rested her head in her talon.

“It’s a difficult decision,” she said. “Preferably, one of my partisans in Griffonstone. Someone of the younger generation, not some stuffy old bird– meaning no offense, General. Young but not flighty, whose loyalty to my claim is assured. But who? I can’t spare even a single trooper. I don’t think the Equestrians would like it, anyway.”

Wolfram spoke up. “Ahem. We could send Gabriella? So friendly and outgoing, yet she can take care of herself. And so talented, Madame Heartstrings would be blessed to have her on board.”

“That girl knows no bounds,” Grizelda sighed, shaking her head. “Hard to say what picking her might do to my image, Wolfram.”

“Still,” said Ironclaw, “for this matter, I concur with Wolfram. Appearances must be kept, and what better way to appease the Equestrians, if not a griffon who might as well be one of them.”

“Hm. I’ll consider it,” Grizelda said. Her words felt heavy on her tongue. “An opportunity like this only arises once in a lifetime, gentlegriffs. We won’t see its like again. This could my strongest bid for the throne… One slip, and it’ll be wasted.”

Such self-doubt was unbecoming of a future Queen, Grizelda was well aware. She’d never have talked like this in front of anyone but these two, the griffons she trusted most in the world. And even with them, it didn’t come easy. With the throne of Griffonstone vacant, Grizelda wondered if the Call truly had chosen her, or if it had hedged its bets.

But what her advisors next said proved how well they knew her mind.

“If I may, Your Grace,” Ironclaw said, his voice softer, gentler. “It was you, of all the pretenders, who chose to answer this Call.”

“It’s true,” smiled Wolfram. “Have faith in yourself. We’ll see this through. You know why? Because you’re a griffon who measures her pride and worth in better things than how much coin you carry.”

Something about that last word got Ironclaw’s eye to lock onto her meaningfully. Grizelda knew what he wanted her to say. Yet she’d been putting it off all week, and felt like putting it off a little bit longer.

“Oh, sure I do,” Grizelda said. “Snaffling up some artefacts from the Expedition would do wonders for my pride.”

“You know that ain’t what I meant,” Wolfram teased her.

“Isn’t it?” Grizelda said innocently. “Cos’ I’ve kinda… got cravings right now.”

Behind a final sip of her milkshake, Grizelda concealed a smile. That dear tinmaker, so unlike the typical griffon. Not until she’d reminded him had Wolfram recalled that by through his craft, he’d make money off shares in the Expedition’s canned goods. However he’d got fat, it sure wasn’t by gorging on wealth. Yet if attending the Convocation had reminded Grizelda of anything, it was one good thing about being a griffon. Rich or poor, daughter of kings or father of the troops, so long as you used a little discretion, rank made no difference to your love life.

This wasn’t without its ill effects – after all, for what other reason did she face so many rival claimants to the throne. And she still sometimes had to think of the blue-feathered stray she’d once seen wandering Griffonstone’s streets, like so many guttersnipes, left by his mother and unclaimed by his father.

But Grizelda banished that thought. Her reality, she told herself, would be entirely different. For her and her secret consort, for her followers, and more.

Wolfram blinked curiously. “What is it, Grizelda?”

She put down her now-empty glass. “You got it right,” Grizelda told him slowly. “I’m not a griffon who measures her pride in coin. Not when I’m carrying something else…”

At which Grizelda patted her own belly.

The news took a moment to dawn on Wolfram. When it did, his beak fell open so wide, it put her in mind of nothing so much as a big robin whose voice had caught on the high note. She tried hard not to grin.

“You’re… you really are?”

“She is, young Wolfram.” Ironclaw had stood back, his beak graced by a discrete smile, yet now he stepped forward and looked serious. “Her Grace came to me three weeks ago, wondering how to break it to you. My gut told me there’d soon be a special moment for it.”

“He was correct,” smiled Grizelda, taking both of Wolfram’s talons in her own.

“It is glad news, great news. To the pair of you, and for Her Grace’s dynasty.” The General’s eyes, however, remained serious. “Yet as with all such things, it also heightens the risks to Her Grace. Once she starts to show, you’ll need to be twice as careful about seeing each other. After the baby is born, there are those who’ll seek to get at Grizelda through her child… or the child’s father.”

Grizelda nodded solemnly. “This is how it goes, Wolf,” she whispered. “But it doesn’t have to. When I am Queen of Griffonstone, we won’t have to hide anymore. We’ll live together, like a proper family. You, and me… and the new arrival.”

Her consort would not be King. In the way of griffons, a Queen’s consort was never King, any more than a King’s consort was Queen. Even if their status as consort was made public. But Grizelda knew she couldn’t have seen Wolfram’s honest, chubby face more aglow if she had handed him ten Griffon’s Crowns.

"And I… I was starting to think I'd been fattening you up, Pumpkin…"

Laughing, Grizelda leaned forward and gave him a loving peck. "You did better than that."

* * * * *

“So, what are we looking at, Tia?”

Taking a break from leafing through the papers, Celestia returned her sister’s gaze.

“Early signs are promising,” said Celestia, holding up the founding document of the Concordat. “We got the dragons’ signature. I did not expect that. Of course, the Reindeer threw their lot in with us unconditionally. Thanks to Darkhoof, the Minotaurs ought to soon follow. So should the Buffalo. And word is that Dame Grizelda’s seriously considering it.”

“That still leaves so many,” Luna pointed out, tapping the wood of Celestia’s desk. “The Kirin may be open to funding Madame Heartstrings’ expedition, but Mikado Kane’s said nothing yet about providing support for Earth. The Saddle Mareabians, the zebras, the Abyssinians… I’d even take the Diamond Dogs. Hey, if we’ve got the dragons… What surprises me is how on-the-fence the hippogriffs still are about this.”

“I believe Queen Novo will come around,” Celestia said. “It stands to reason she’d take her time, like Queen Saba. Both Mount Aris and Abyssinia have similar concerns at the moment.”

“The Storm King…” Luna growled. “An inconvenient time he’s picked to be a distraction. I wonder, though, Tia. If this lantern in our Vault, this Concordia Maxima, could get even Chrysalis to hear its Call… Do you think the Storm King heard it, too?”

Celestia’s face darkened.

“That is a worry,” she admitted. “After all this time, I know too little about the Storm King. He’s proven an enigma. His true name, where he came from… Even which of the Twelve Families he belongs to is hard to say.”

“Mmh,” said Luna. “File that away. What about Chrysalis? Is she going to play nice? I doubt it, given that farce of an ‘honour duel’ she forced upon us.”

“Queen Chrysalis will do what’s best for Queen Chrysalis, we know that,” said Celestia. “However, for the time being, she’s said it’s in her best interests to sit this one out, and agree to a truce.”

“Hah!” Luna snorted. “Believe that if you like.”

“I know, Luna,” sighed Celestia. “But what else can we do? Under the terms of the Concordia Maxima, she enjoys diplomatic immunity. An immunity that Lady Cadenza nearly violated… Not that I blame her.”

“And I certainly do not,” Luna said. “Well. How, then, shall we relay the contents of this document to the other side? How shall we transfer it to Earth, and the PHL.”

At this, Celestia saw her glance forlornly at a glass bell-jar, further along the desk. Within it lay the charred, useless remains of the device by which the Solar Tyrant had spoken, and Luna had inadvertently triggered the kill-switch in Redheart. The ansible.

“I do wish we could’ve held onto this device,” Celestia agreed sadly. “No doubt that’s why the Tyrant had it destroyed, to prevent us from reverse-engineering it. I already had Blueblood’s engineer friends look into it, Misters Awesome Fire and Shieldwall. Sadly, they’ve confirmed what I suspected. With what we’ve got left, even if we knew how to rebuild this ansible, we lack the resources and infrastructure which allowed the Solar Empire to produce it.” She sighed. “At least we’ve still got Redheart’s gem-tracker to study.”

“This is going to be a concern, moving on…” said Luna. “We’re facing an enemy with a fifteen-year head start, and we’re still in the dark about so much.”

“Indeed,” said Celestia. “For now, I fear, we shall have to communicate the slow way, sending written messages through the Crystal Mirror and back.”

But this seemed to draw Luna’s focus away.

“Luna?” said Celestia. “Something on your mind?”

“Yes-s…” Luna said slowly. “When I delved into Twilight’s mind. The… the Archmage Twilight’s. There’s this name I caught.”

“The Architect, you mean?”

“No, not her,” Luna shook her head. “Though I do believe, more and more, that she may be the Prismia of Cadance’s tale… Ahem. No, no, I got a name and a face. Twilight… the Archmage… She had a partner, in producing the conversion serum. A mage, a stallion named Sunburst.”

Celestia steepled her forehooves. “I see…” she said. “Hmm. We know of several Equestrians to keep an eye out on, some of them working for us, as their counterparts also work for the Empire. Fire and Shieldwall, for instance.”

“Yet do you recognise that name, Tia?” said Luna. “He was young, about Twilight’s age.”

"No, I’m sorry,” said Celestia. “But I'll ask the Archm–” She caught Luna’s look. “I mean, Headmaster Nexus, if there was a Sunburst who attended my School–"

There came a knock on the office’s door.

As the two sisters turned, entering was Raven Inkwell, her perennial quill and notepad aloft in her aura. She gave a deferential bow.

“Your Highnesses,” said Raven. “I have Headmaster Nexus outside. He wishes to see you. With him is Her Ladyship, the Ambassador of Saddle Mareabia, Amira bint-Ramaha.”

Celestia and Luna exchanged glances. “Well, speak of the jack-in-the-box…” Celestia said. “Very well, Miss Inkwell, admit them in.”

Soon, into the office strode these two well-dressed figures, Headmaster Nexus still in the ceremonial wizard robe and hat of the Archmage, and Lady Amira clad in the colourful caparison, head-dress and noseband of Saddle Mareabian aristocracy.

After each had given their bows, Nexus spoke first.

“Greetings, Your Highness,” Nexus said, talking directly to Celestia. “I don’t know if you’ll recall, but shortly before the Convocation was called, Twilight came to with a sketch of the runes found etched on Captain Reiner’s body, asking me for reference.”

“That I do recall, Sir Archmage,” Celestia said, noting Luna’s snubbed look. “Twilight told me you were seeking a trail.”

“And so I was, until sadly, my duties at the Convocation slowed me down,” Nexus said. “However, in the past couple days, I set back into my searches. I’ve found these runes, although not identical, would appear to share a common root with an old alphabet of Zebrica.”

“Which is interesting, truly,” Luna interrupted. “But may I ask what brings Lady Amira to grace us with her presence, by your side?”

Like always, Luna had bluntly stated what Celestia was thinking.

She let her eyes meet Amira’s. The Saddle Mareabian noble stared back. Calm, polite, untroubled. Which Celestia knew to be as much a facade as her own mask as Princess of the Sun. She had met with Amira on several occasions in past years, for diplomatic pleasantries such as the previous year’s fireworks show in Ponyville, and the facts never changed. Between them hung the unspoken gap, the recollection of an uncomfortable past dealing.

Amira took her turn.

“Professor Nexus approached me early on, Your Highness,” she explained. “Knowing my family’s wealth of knowledge. Initially, when I saw the sketched runes, I dismissed them from my mind. The coincidence seemed too… fortuitous, I suppose. But then I assisted this morning’s duel, and when I saw the human action, I could no longer deny my eyes.”

“What did you see, Lady Amira?” Celestia asked, sensing where this was going.

To which Amira cleared her throat. “Princess Celestia,” she said, “I believe I know someone who can tell you more about those runes, who made them and what for. But for that, I’d have to request a visit to my husband.”

Her husband. Once again, Celestia looked to Luna, who looked back, understanding full well. For paying a visit to Master Qabil meant a visit to an old domain of Luna’s.

To Erebus.

~ Canterlot, Equestria ~ Day 10 of the Convocation ~ Nineteenth Day of the Month of Rophon ~

Chamomile Brew’s teashop, like the quaint little place that it was, rarely contained more than a few patrons at a time. At its peak hours, there were usually a few couples hanging around, and that was in the evenings. The decoration, too, seemed to enforce this notion, since the mare who tended to the tea shop never cared much for the gaudy, elaborate decorations that adorned the other Canterlot establishments – even its name was simple, though no doubt proud by itself.

The Canterlot Tea House.

On mornings and evenings, the odd pair of Royal Guards or elderly nobles would sit down for a nice cup. Which, Winter Truce thought, only served to make this particular evening stand out that much more.

In choosing his daughter’s establishment as the venue for his birthday party, Captain Green Fields had ensured the largest attendance it ever received, even more than when Sir Fancypants – who was also present – had announced that he’d been engaged to Fleur de Lis.

No fewer than twenty-five ponies, if his count was right, had arrived for the occasion. From Vanhoover to Fillydelphia, from the Night Guard to the Wonderbolts. He wished Chamomile could have asked him for help, for surely there was a lot to organise here, yet his fiancée had chosen to keep it a surprise for him.

The guest list was no slouch, either. Captain Green Fields put stock in his fellows as much as he the next batch of officers. That included Winter himself, and not for the first time, he wondered if he’d have been invited if he was still a Sergeant, or if he belonged here amongst those like Oaken Plow, Sparks Timber, even the Captain of Celestia’s Own himself.

‘That is ridiculous,’ he thought. ‘I shouldn’t worry. He’d have invited us both the same.’

He shook his head away, clearing his thoughts of the empty pair of chairs on his table. One had been reserved for his fiancée. The other for his friend.

Neither of whom, as it were, had been present here. Icewind had excused himself to the bathroom some time ago, and Chamomile...

Winter brushed away a lock of his blue-and-teal mane, sighing. Chamomile, diligent mare that she was, had succeeded in organising the tables to the point it felt just right – and if he looked, he was sure he would spot a cream-coloured blur dashing back and forth between tables. True, the round tables weren’t up to Zesty Gourmand’s standards, but Chamomile wasn’t looking for her approval, either. Winter found the arrangements to be pleasing in their simplicity - all in staggered rows, all arranged to seat four ponies.

The cheers of the Fillydelphia and Baltimare-Night Guard table interrupted his thoughts. They were close enough to share in their discussions. He sighed. It wasn’t that he had jumped onto this bandwagon, but he, like Snow Mist, didn’t have a high regard for Fillydelphia’s notions of professional behaviour. Division and regimental traditions died hard. Vanhoover and Fillydelphia simply didn’t mingle. It wasn’t his business to question it, though he personally found it amusing.

The way the lone Baltimare attendant, a blue-grey, brown-maned pegasus Lieutenant smoothly told his joke to the Fillydelphian Captain, Sparks Timber, was enough to inform him that Baltimare didn’t have such problems.

Now, as he’d insisted, he wasn’t avoiding the others. No, as much as he’d love to hear Green Fields recalling the times he went exploring the Griffon Lands, Winter also valued his corner table very much. And part of him wished Snow Mist had stuck around to talk instead of joining the Night Guards’ table. She was a fan of theirs. She’d always liked the thrills.

‘Not the time to dwell,’ he thought. ‘What’re the Trailblazers up to…’

Oaken Plow, that long-serving Trailblazer scout, was now deep in discussion with Green Fields, their table closest to the counter. His was a story of how he’d escorted young Princess Cadance home from faraway Oleander. Judging from the twinkle in his eyes, it was a fond memory. But his wasn’t the only table full of nostalgia – Shining Armor’s deputy Clever Ace was there, too, speaking of the Canterlot Wedding with Sir Fancypants, Fleur, and two nobles that Winter was certain wouldn’t bother listening if Fancy wasn’t. One of the benefits of being the Prime Minister, that was for sure.

Next to his table were the Night Guards – Selene, Serene, and Gibbous, if Winter remembered. Serene was the one with the intelligence division. Selene was with Gibbous. Names could be confusing sometimes.

He took a sip from his cup. It was getting colder, still. He let the taste settle – he’d always liked tea from the zebra tribes. They had a rugged, yet elegant quality to them.

“Hey, mind if I sit here?”

Winter looked up. It was the Baltimarean Lieutenant. His eyes were hazel, and he couldn’t see what sort of mark the pegasus bore. Still, he wore a friendly expression, and Winter found it welcoming enough.

He nodded. “Sure, go ahead,” Winter said politely. The stallion sat where Icewind should be.

“Sorry to bother ya, but, you seemed kind of, y’know. Alone out here,” said the pegasus. “You sure you don’t want to join us?”

He pointed behind his shoulder, and Winter followed. He saw Snow Mist, his icy-blue-coated ex-weathermare colleague, sitting with the Night Guards at their table. Mist caught his eye, and waved a friendly hoof, brushing away her snow-coloured, blue-streaked bangs.

“I’m good, Lieutenant,” said Winter. “They know this is my usual spot.” He gestured towards the empty seat besides the Lieutenant. “That one’s for Chamomile.” He pointed to where the pegasus had taken a seat. “That one’s for Icewind.”

The Lieutenant stood up. “Oh, pardon me, then…”

“No, no, it’s quite alright, he’s off in the back. You’re welcome to stay.”

And so he did. The Lieutenant cleared his throat. “Gale, Baltimare.” Winter accepted his hoof-shake and nodded.

“Winter Truce, Vanhoover,” he said primly. He glanced to where Gale had gestured before, the Fillydelphia table. “Sounds like you’re having fun over there, Lieutenant.”

“Yeah? Heh, one way to put it,” said Gale, chuckling. “Everyone loves a good story. Bet Vanhoover has a lot of good ones, too.”

“No doubt,” Winter said, with a touch of pride. “The creatures of the North are not to be trifled with. You’re not so bad either with, well, pirates.”

Gale smiled. “Never had a raid for as long as I’ve served,” he said, equally proud. He shrugged. “But hey, quiet days never really last long, do they? Which batch did you serve in, Winter?”

Winter winced a little. The memories of the Canterlot Wedding still lay fresh on both his and Icewind’s minds. He wasn’t quite sure of the Changeling invitation to the Hall of Unity – but the Princesses knew best. Icewind, on the other hoof…

“The Wedding batch,” he said simply. “Higher-ups fast tracked me for a promotion after that fiasco, served a tour in Ponyville recently.”

He tapped his newly-sewn-in lieutenant patch on his formal dress lapel. Gale shook his head.

“I don’t know how I would have dealt with the Canterlot Wedding as my first rodeo,” Winter said plainly. He shook his head. “But Ponyville, though. The Night Guards, Serene told me there was something that went down there.”

“You mean Selene?” Gale paused, then facehoofed. “Right, Selene. Serene’s my upcoming partner,” he said sheepishly. “Anyway– heard something went down and… well, here we are.”

“One and the same. Got promoted soon after, I think they… needed more to fill in the gaps.”

“Bet they did,” Gale agreed. “They don’t usually ask for Guards to mame a transfer to the intelligence division, so now I’m stuck here. But hey, at least I got to see my daughter’s birth.”

Winter blinked. “You’ve got a family?” he asked blankly. “Sorry– I mean, you’re married?”

He wasn’t so good with how he handled curiosity, but Gale didn’t seem to have noticed.

“Mm, they’re back home in Baltimare,” said Gale, shaking his head. “Sorry, I’m… I get a bit long-winded when I talk about them.”

“No need to apologise, Lieutenant.”

“Right, heh, do you mind if I…?”

“Go ahead.”

He reached into his uniform, and brought out a photograph. Winter leaned forward to look at it.

“This is my wife, Aquamarine Glimmer,” Gale said, pointing at the turquoise young unicorn mare in the picture. She looked exhausted, but somewhat happy with her tranquil smile. “You can call her Aqua or, Aquamarine.”

Winter thought he couldn’t hold back his sheer giddiness.

“And this… is Comet Tail.” Gale was now pointing to the little pink pegasus foal who had a little tuft of a brown mane on the top of her head. “We were… both pretty anxious, you know? I was so excited but dreading it all… but then… well, I guess it’s kinda cliched, but as soon as I held her, there was just no other feeling like it.”

He looked back at Winter, still smiling bright.

“How ‘bout you?” he asked. “Got anyone back home?”

Winter contemplated it briefly. The news still left him reeling as it had nine months ago, and it had reopened old wounds in some ways.

“Just my mother, cousin, uncle and…” He trailed off. “My brother. Due in a few weeks, I suppose.”

“I see,” Gale replied. He frowned. “What about your–”

“Long gone. Left months ago,” said Winter, a little coldly. “Didn’t like another one coming.”

He shook his head. Gale recoiled a little.

“I’m… sorry,” he said, rubbing the back of his head. “But– when was the last time you met ‘em?”

“It doesn’t matter,” said Winter. He forced a polite smile. “Don’t worry. I’ve adjusted.”

Before Gale could reply, however, someone else from the other table called out his name.

“Ah, horseapples,” Gale grumbled. He stood up from his seat. “Looks like Serene wants me back at her table. Business as usual. Speaking of which…”

His eyes fell on Winter.

"Look, uh, I can tell you're all about the guard life and whatnot, Winter,” said Gale. The use of his name caused Winter to look up. The Lieutenant looked concerned. “I can call you Winter, right? But... well, I’d suggest taking some time off. We still got a long flight ahead."

Winter sighed. "A Guard’s duty is never done. But…” he said, and paused as his eyes fell upon his fiancée, who was speaking with her father now. Perhaps Gale did have a point. “I'll think about it. And congratulations on your daughter, Lieutenant. Comet’s lucky to have you."

"Thanks,” Gale said, and he smiled. Once more, he offered a hoof. “Just call me Gale, eh? We're all friends here. And good luck with your brother."

Tentatively, Winter accepted the hoofshake.

"Fair enough... Gale."

With another smile and quick salute, Gale was off, and soon was chatting away happily once more with his prospective partner. That left Winter alone, and he quietly sipped his tea.

‘I should write to Mother… and Stellar… and Uncle.’

Not long after Gale had returned to his seat, the murmurs quieted down when Chamomile stepped onto the small podium they had set up, with a soft cheer from her friend and neighbour, the earthpony florist Wallflower Blush just off to the side of the podium – green in mane and fur, her face was partially covered in the shade of her ever-present gardening hat. Quite shy, from what Winter had been told, but she was there when it mattered, providing flowers to all.

It was then that Icewind emerged from the tea shop, looking a little weary and perturbed. His eyes met Winter’s, as he approached, and he outstretched a wing to pat him as he went by.

“Sorry, Winter,” said Icewind, softly. “I’ve got something to take care of.”

Winter blinked. “Ice?”

Yet his friend had nothing else to say, as he went on his way out the shop.

“Fillies, and gentlecolts,” Chamomile spoke up, and Winter snapped to attention, pushing aside the thought of Icewind’s departure. “If I may have your attention– please welcome Captain Green Fields, of the 33rd Royal Guards.”

She paused, and her warm, hazel eyes met Winter’s icy blue. She smiled serenely.

“You may have the floor,” she said gracefully, and went off the podium. Her father took her place, to a polite, enthusiastic applause. Winter followed suit.

The middle-aged pegasus stallion took her place. His lush green fur and feathers, topped by his warm, brown mane hid his age well enough. And his green eyes remained as sharp as ever.

Yet his words, spoken in that gravelly, seasoned voice of his, faded to the back of Winter’s head.

The Icewind of the past few weeks hadn’t been the Icewind he knew. Boisterous and lively, he was not. He’d seemed troubled, almost as troubled as he did in the days following the Wedding Invasion. And it had been so unlike Icewind, of course, not to share his worries with all his closest friends...

“Hey, Winter.”

Winter looked up. Before him stood Snow Mist, smiling.

“Yes, Mist?”

“Mind if I take a seat here?” she said. “Sorry, uh, if you’re saving it–”

“No, no, it’s quite alright,” Winter said, perhaps a little blandly. “Have a seat.”

“Cheers, heh,” said Mist, settling down on Icewind’s seat. “Thought you could use the company.”

Winter could only nod to that, as the speech went on. He couldn’t recall much of it, only the way Chamomile stole glances at him, or Snow Mist cheering on the good Captain.

He’d only spoken up when the time came to sing ‘Happy Birthday’, and when the candles were blown, offering a token word or two for his mentor.

When all was said and done, one by one, the guests streamed out of the tea shop. Winter was closest to the exit, and he greeted them all on the way out. Gale shared an encouraging smile, Snow Mist gave him a hoof bump… and Green Fields patted his shoulder.

And so it was, he sat alone on his table, the lone guest in the tea shop, once Wallflower had said her goodbyes to both him and Chamomile with a tip of her hat. The seat opposite his remained as empty as always, and he bit back a groan.

He wasn’t alone, though, and when she finished blowing out the last candle outside his own table, Chamomile Brew took her empty seat. Her smile was tranquil, but her eyes betrayed her concerns.

“Winter, dear,” said Chamomile. "Are you still worried about Icewind?”

Winter sighed.

“... Yes,” he said simply. “Afraid so.”

That was as far as he could go, without going into all the confidential details. Guards rarely ever took their leave for this long. And that discomforted him greatly. Chamomile shook her head.

“Well. You've known him longer than I have. And I know that whatever he's worried about, he can handle it."

"I... suppose so. It's just, well... Alright. He can handle himself."

Around a month ago, he remembered. He'd finally caught up with her, on the date he had promised her. And, perhaps the events in Ponyville did rattle him somewhat, for by the end of the date, he asked her the simple four word question, in this very tea shop.

And she said yes.

He held Chamomile’s hooves with his own, and smiled. She pressed her lips against his. They broke away, and her smile returned. She brushed a wing against his cheek.

“Come, dear, the night is still young…”

His worries of Icewind faded right then and there. And, without further hesitation, he followed his fiancée upstairs.

* * * * *

Far and away from his friends and colleagues, Icewind had reached his apartment, slumping down on his couch. Perhaps he ought to have brought tea with him. Perhaps he ought to have said goodbye to Chamomile, or a better one to Winter and Mist.

His eyes remained fixed on the letter lying on his study.

My dear Icewind,

It is with regret that I write to deliver sad news. Nurse Redheart, formerly of the Eighth Home Regiment, lives on in our world; but the Nurse Redheart of another world, seven days ago now, passed on, into the world unknowable to us all.

To the end, she was dedicated and loyal. Alas that her services were to a wrongful cause. Duty is no easy mistress; I write to you knowing, by word of your friend, Winter Truce, that before you brought in Redheart, you and she had an evening planned.

What she may have told you, my sister and I can only surmise from your report. But very soon, the news must break to our world of the events beyond its boundaries. Until such time, I continue to trust in your discretion as a Royal Guard.

Should you feel need for guidance, know that I’m here to listen, and when not I, my royal niece Princess Cadance welcomes you to share your feelings.

Yours,
~H.R.H. Princess Celestia

So, he was alone. How the stranger Redheart had passed on, the letter did not say. He knew the Princesses were not complicit to her death. He never would have believed that of them, not even Princess Luna. But how likely was it that Redheart had sooner ended her own existence than risk betraying herself to the converging alien forces.

The heart-shaped locket was still in his possession. For nearly three weeks, he’d been agonising over what to do with it, unsure of what was right. Fate, it seemed, had now chosen to push him.

Sighing, Icewind bit the pen firmer still, and began to write a letter of his own.

“Dear Dr. Catseye…”

~ The Hall of Unity ~

The den of the enemy resembled his own, Oaken Plow thought fleetingly. Yet his vigilance had been kept, for the most part. He hadn’t had much to say throughout the trip, from wherever this ‘Hall of Unity’ was situated, to the Crystal Realm. Not even under the incessant poking and teasing from his two guards. They had passed rolling green hills on the way here, all the way from the train station. Much like the Realm he was aware of, the scenery was decorated by crystalline growths, a hallmark of the Equestrian domain nestled at the Frozen North. And, if his eyes weren’t deceiving him, a great barrier also stood here, protecting its denizens from the encroaching cold.

Plow had visited the Crystal Realm before. Once, on leave with his family. It remained his good fortune that of Equestria’s fighting force, he was not one of those whose first sight of the Crystal Realm had been at the end of war. All the way from their home in Whinnyapolis, his son had been eager to fill him in on what he’d learnt about the mystical nation. A lost people, come again. And with them, once liberated, they’d brought the wonder of crystals. The great renaissance which lay at the heart of Equestria’s brief golden age.

But where he had walked with his wife and children past towering crystalline skyscrapers and elevated train tracks, here there were only rows and rows of houses, looking the same as they must have a thousand years ago. The streets, filled by barely half as many crystalponies as they had been by the three tribes in his world’s Realm, were illuminated by primitive lanterns, and no trace of totem-proles, not even hidden around the corner.

What did remain the same, was the towering Citadel at the centre of the Realm, the pinnacle of the Realm’s rulers, Princess Amore’s greatest achievement powering the very ground beneath it. The Citadel inside which Plow now found himself, his forehooves manacled, sitting next to the two most incessant guards he could have gotten.

At the very least, the stairs weren’t as bad as he’d expected them to be.

In the meantime, his two guards had been reduced to one. The male of the two, a dark cerulean pegasus with a light-green mane and a lightning mark, had gotten off his seat, to investigate the crystalline chamber their host had left them to wait in. But Plow, begrudgingly, could not fault him for that. He’d have done the same. He was a scout.

“Psst, hey, Sky!” called the other, her voice tinged by slight rasp. She was a pegasus too, a pale white creature, her even lighter-green mane shaped like clouds, her mark that of a shooting star. She was seated next to Plow, giving her vest a nervous tug. “Be careful, we wouldn’t want to break anything.”

“Relax, Vapor,” answered her companion, Sky Stinger. Fitting name for an annoying stallion, based on how much he’d gabbed on the way here. “I’m just taking a quick look-around, ya know. C’mon, we’re in Cadance’s Realm! There ain’t no Imperials waiting for us in this one.”

Vapor Trail shot Plow a worried look, shrugged, then returned her gaze to Stinger. “There’s one right here, to be fair…”

“Aw, loosen up, will ya?” said Stinger, wearing a smirk. “He ain’t going anywhere. Say, think they can spare us some crystals?”

For emphasis, he flapped his wings, carefully. It was supported by a harness that blended with his PHL vest, much like Cadet Starstruck’s. But unlike Starstruck’s sleek, intricately-made harness, his looked far cheaper, with more metal than crystal, its joints a little rusted and the crystalline core powering it considerably dimmed.

“Darn it. Do you think it’s running out?” Trail said worriedly. “I thought we had it checked last time around. I knew we should’ve double- or triple-checked.”

“Yeah, yeah, still, wouldn’t hurt to ask ’round here,” Stinger assured. “’Sides, could ask another thing or two from the Princess of Love herself, if that’s what they really call her.”

He punctuated this with a wiggle of his eyebrows. Trail burst out into a giggle. How strange, Plow thought, that two pegasi enlisted in Lyra Heartstrings’ merry band of misfits could find companionship with one another after so long, amidst this accursed war.

Right then, an eerie thought intruded his mind. He would have been in the Royal Guard around this time, the fateful year when the Crystal Realm had re-emerged after a thousand years. And his wife, sweet, gentle Promenade, would be–

Plow shook the thought away. His Promenade was safe back home. His Empire provided.

… And he couldn’t go home.

“If you two hadn’t turned your backs on the Empire,” Plow spoke up at last, venom dripping from each syllable, “your blasted harness wouldn’t be falling apart.”

Those were the first words he’d uttered in some time. Trail and Stinger looked at one another. The PHL stallion’s glare was harsh when he realigned Plow in his sights, but Plow did not flinch, not even when Stinger marched up to him.

“Hey, quiet, pal!” said Stinger. He flared his wings. “The Empire turned their backs on Earth and everyone on it, we don’t owe them anything.”

“What, your girlfriend bribed you with that thing, is that what I’m hearing?”

“Leave her outta this,” Stinger snarled. Trail hopped off her seat, moving between him and Plow, her own wings flared open.

“Sky, hey, hey, take it easy. He’s not worth your time,” Trail interjected. She tugged at his hoof. “C’mon, just, just ignore him, would ya?”

From the way his teeth were gritted, Plow doubted that Stinger would.

But the sound of the chamber’s doors swinging open sent both Stinger and Trail scrambling to their positions next to Plow, giving him full view of who had arrived.

“The Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, of the Crystal Realm!” announced the orange pegasus Guard leading the way. Behind him followed a figure that, until then, Plow had only glimpsed in newspaper reports.

The alicorn stood as tall as himself, pink all over, but with a vigor he hadn’t seen before. On her back rested a pair of wings, healthy as any pegasus’ own. Upon her forehead lay a crown and a mighty horn. With the air tinted with the scent of roses, the alicorn strode with a confidence befitting any rightful princess.

It frightened Plow.

"Lady Cadance, ma'am!" chirped Stinger, saluting with a wing.

"Stinger, that's not our Cadance,” chided Trail. She gave a deep bow. “Your Highness! It's really an honour to meet you."

"I knew that..." muttered Stinger, but he followed Trail nonetheless. “Your Highness.”

“Likewise. At ease, you two,” the false-Princess said, in that sickly-sweet voice, her smile laden with unbearable cheer. “Welcome to the Crystal Realm.”

Her gaze turned to Plow, filling him with greater fear than ever. ‘Impostor, false alicorn…’ A gilded cage was a cage like any other. Whatever they had planned for him, he could feel it'd test the limits of his loyalty to the Solar Empire.

“We’ll be seeing more of each other,” smiled the alicorn. “But for now, I must leave you.”

* * * * *

Ana was nervous. Why should she be? Why wouldn’t she be?

She bit her lip. This was surreal. By all rights, this was the den of the enemy, and yet it wasn’t at the same time. They were here, here, of all places, where the war had yet to reach. And the doors leading deeper into the Watchtower remained closed. Not for long, though. Soon, they would stand there, before the eyes of this world, each and every single one of the dozen or so personnel sent through.

Personally, Ana was relieved they waited here, in a room that overlooked the vast mountains, with the gentle sounds of water flowing down from unseen fountains.

Frieda cleared her throat besides her. It was all too obvious she wasn’t the only one filled with unease and doubt at this so-called Sunny Equestria. That was what the higher-ups had codenamed it, Sunny Equestria. She could just about hear Lyra Heartstrings, peace be upon her, laughing uproariously and yet fondly at such an uplifting name.

Apart from what Harwood and others had said, back in San Francisco, that it simply didn’t sound cool enough (‘Men...’), Ana had no other thoughts on the naming convention other than it was touching, optimistic, and someone in PHL High Command must have named it out of some measure of fondness for the old Equestria.

And here she was. Nervous.

What did Equestria feel like? The enemy had never showed them directly. Only a few ‘Ambassadors’ had gone through and come back, thirty-six in all, temporary converts who were probably not the most reliable witnesses. Only a promise, of something touted as better than the Promised Land, nothing more.

“Hey, Ana.” Frieda’s voice cut in, and Ana felt a talon on her back. “You okay?”

Ana glanced down to her right, meeting Frieda’s eyes. The griffon, clad in her usual green vest, looked as uncertain as Ana felt.

“Yeah, I am,” replied Ana. “Just wish Harwood was here, too, y’know?”

“Yeah,” Frieda replied. “If you’re worried about ol’ Captain Plow, Trail and Stinger got him covered. I’m sure this place’s secure enough to keep an Imperial around. Won’t need Harwood to keep an eye over him, yeah?”

Ana smiled, so did Frieda. There were around a dozen of them here, human and equine operatives, across worlds. Some she knew by name. Few as they may be, Ana felt as close to them as she did to any one friend.

Then another joined them, nudging Ana like only an old friend would.

“Cut the chatter, you two,” said Amethyst Star. Ana could just hear the smile in her, barely restrained. “It’s showtime.”

Ana and Frieda nodded as one. Quietly, Ana reached up to tug at her vest, which felt tighter than ever, strangely enough. Combat gear was ubiquitous, at this point. But part of her wished she could loosen it right here, to be an agent of peace as she had long wished she was.

‘Cheer up, Ana,’ whispered the voice within, ‘You’ll have time…’

How she wished it were true, Ana mused, even in this strange land. Amethyst, standing right behind her, might have a special assignment in mind.

Then, waiting for the doors to swing open, Ana’s eyes drifted outside, to where the Sun shone. She hadn’t paid much attention to it, so hurried were they when they emerged from the portal, in the quiet hours before they were set to present. Hadn’t had time to take in the view.

Which now she did. And her mouth hung open.

The Sun was different. It was brighter, and yet far, far more welcoming, as if it had an innate connection with the land beneath them.

It was beautiful.

Gingerly, she left her seat, ignoring Frieda’s confused look, moving towards the nearest window. Her lithe fingers pushed them open. Ana’s eyes widened at the marvellous sight, all around her.

It was a vast mountain range, stretching far as her eyes could see. Valleys that looked much like the fjords of her lost home, blessed by the sunlight that shone down from the heavens. And everywhere she looked, there was colour, from the flowers that hung in pots from the windows, to the pure, white clouds, shining vibrantly like a painter’s masterpiece.

But it was the smells that struck her. All smells that tickled her nose. They must have been waiting near the kitchens, for Ana smelled nothing short of the most wonderful food, exotic food from across Equus. Perhaps sweet chocolate, too. And the flowers, so pleasant, the scent of lavender enticing a nice, long rest...

Gone was the feeling of death, the smell of ash and tainted snow. They were all but a memory. Ana was here, safe and sound, as all beings were. Ponies of the three tribes, Reindeer, dragons, maybe even Changelings, too. Living, thriving in this world, without fear of war.

She heard Frieda call out to her. But she did not answer, as her mind had drifted away, still. Beyond the mountains, she knew, lay Equestria. The world that had eluded them so. One that humanity only glimpsed through a lucky few pairs of eyes, a world of rolling hills and grassy plains and so much more.

There was much she wanted to do. How she wished to kneel down, remove her boots, and run, run freely towards the open fields.

The last time she’d done this, or at least tried to, was in the dead of night, in Indonesia, as the war raged on. The last time she’d done this without fear, without worry, was in Norway, many, many years ago, before the world fell apart. How Ana wished for her bare feet upon the grass. She smiled widely. She missed it. She wanted. The days which she had spent running, laughing with her bare feet touching the fields, were long gone, but here she was. And it would be hers again, so very soon.

It would start with a walk. Then a jog. Then, she would run freely, laughing along the way. She imagined the grass bristling beneath her feet. The wind embracing her cheek. Here, there would be no worry, no poisoned chalice, nothing hiding in the dark. Only her.

With tears in her eyes, she laughed. She laughed brightly, cheerfully, genuinely, as a little girl once did. She needed this. This was where she’d stay. Where she would belong, for many days and weeks and months and however long it may be. But those long days would be filled with joy, because here she was free.

She was home.

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

A chapter that was created from splitting the prior Chapter Twenty-One (‘So Say We All’) into two chapters.

Displacement of a scene; the discussion between the Pretender Queen Grizelda and her griffons is moved to occur earlier in the chronology than was presented by the original unsplit chapter.

Addition of a scene; the Royal Guard characters are seen sharing evening tea in Canterlot. This is a scene that was originally written for early in Act Three, but had got cut out for pacing, assuming it would be used later.

Displacement of a scene; the arrival in Equestria of the captive Trailblazer, Oaken Plow, is moved to occur earlier in the chronology, from its previous placement in the original Chapter Twenty-Three (‘Here’s To You’).

Act III ~ Chapter Twenty-Three ~ Castles In The Air

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy

VoxAdam

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Twenty-Three

Castles In The Air

* * * * *

“Without even thinking about it, I used to be able to fly. Now I’m trying to look inside myself and find out how I did it.”
— Kiki, from Kiki’s Delivery Service

~ New York City, USA ~ November 22nd, 2024 CE ~

To Miss Cherry:

Earth Date & Time: 22.11.24CE, 15:00 (EST)
Local Date & Time: 19.06.03EH, 15:00

Time Elapsed Since Arrival: 18 days

First transition of PHL to parallel universe, Codename: Sunny Equestria, effectuated this morning. Reported success rate: 100%.

Specialist Amethyst Star informs me that with the existing gateway on the other side – read: Crystal Mirror – future transitions hypothetically performable on a regular basis.

Crystal Mirror presents following advantages;
– no required fuel supply of crystals,
– ergo, high probability of permanent activation

Crystal Mirror presents following disadvantages;
– only 1 exemplar available
– proportions inefficient for transport of multiple units
– proportions inefficient for transport of sizeable units

Recommend diversion of resources to Sunny Equestria for construction of extra portal-stations. Per Specialist Amethyst Star, with local materials & infrastructure, minimum construction time for 1 portal-station est. 15 weeks.

Presentation by PHL held today at 1200-hours in Public Assembly, Hall of Unity, before international representatives of Equus. Reception; majoritarily positive. PHL reported to be psychologically adjusting to presence on Sunny Equestria. By agreement with local government, PHL shall be quartered in spare rooms at Watchtower building adjacent to Hall of Unity, until further notice.

I have been in remission for 18 days from injuries sustained prior to arrival;
– loss of motor function in 2 legs
– 2nd-degree burns on chest
Local medical services predict full recovery after 40 days total, accelerated by runic enhancement.

Regards,
~ Cpt. Alexander Reiner

P.S.
Junebug, I believe this is it. Our miracle chance.

Finishing her reading, Cheerilee set aside the report, examining the seven other faces at the circular conference table, to gauge the reactions of her fellow members in High Command. Two for the PHL’s paramilitary divisions, five for the PHL’s many departments. Captain Thunderwing, tied down by a renewed surge of activity in the Pacific, would have to be informed after the fact.

“So, that’s Amethyst’s final word?” asked Time Turner. “Their only known means of transfer is the Crystal Mirror?”

Cheerilee nodded. “Think that’ll be a problem, Doc?”

Turner huffed wearily. “No more than what Amethyst says…” he began. “Frankly, it’s a miracle they’ve got the Crystal Mirror at all. Great whickering stallions, goodness knows where it vanished to in our time... If the Tyrant got it…” He shook his head. “We were lucky we could trace back the residue of Discord’s manifestation.”

“Not so lucky,” Pina spoke up. “Remember? The Empire captured Discord, yes.”

“Always look on the bright side, don’t you, Miss Nectar?” commented Olivine Jewel.

Cheerilee had to respect the young mare’s attempted flippancy. Whereas the sitting members of High Command were all long-accustomed to Pina’s inscrutability, she didn’t think Lady Cadance’s substitute as Head of Psychological & Spiritual Well-Being had dealt with her before. But Olivine’s experience in Cadance’s old staff would have given her a crash course in sly words.

Pina gave Olivine a condescending smile. “Merely a realist...” she said. “Commandant Cherry? Why don’t you read what our new friends are promising? Then we’ll know whether to look on the… sunny side, yes.”

Naturally, Cheerilee had privately read the documents. As she brought out the next one, she hoped it didn’t show that perhaps Pina was right to expect an unenthused response. Clutching the parchment, a duplicate of the original from the other side, she began to read.

We, the Concordat of Equus,

Do hereby declare our recognition of mankind as the Thirteenth Family of Equus.

It is the judgement of this Concordat that the Thirteenth Family’s identity is its inalienable right as a fellow sapient species. As of this document’s signature, we the undersigned pledge ourselves to the formal acknowledgement and defense of said right of identity.

On this occasion, though strifes may separate the Families in times past and in times to come, we welcome the introduction of the Thirteenth Family as symbolic of the right of identity, and vow that should any seek to strip the right of identity from any one Family, we the Concordat stand together to uphold this right.

Signatories,
~ Princess Ember of the Dragonlands (reprs. Dragon Lord Torch & Spykoran the Chaoskämpfer)
~ Princess Mi Amore Cadenza & Prince Shining Armor of the Crystal Realm
~ King Sint Erklass of Adlaborn
~ Proxenos Philip Darkhoof of the Tauren Isles (reprs. The Ecclesia of 60)
~ Chief Thunderhooves of the Featherhorn Tribe
~ Prince Abraxas of the Ezebrantsi Tribe of Farasi
~ Dame Grizelda of the Redcloaks, Pretender to Griffonstone
~ Queen Novo of Mount Aris

There was more, but the rest was a series of clauses Cheerilee saw no interest in reading aloud. She lowered the parchment and awaited the reactions. As expected, they weren’t great.

“That’s it?” said Vinyl. “That’s our miracle? That was a strongly-worded letter of the UN!”

“Diplomatic fudging, is what it is,” Saffron Masala grimaced. Despite unassuming origins as an exotic Canterlot restorateur, Cheerilee conceded those origins allowed her the savviness for Moondancer to appoint as her deputy. “Even the Empire formally recognises humanity as the Thirteenth Family– they’ve built it into their whole ideology that that’s why humans deserve to be converted!”

“Yeah…” said Time Turner. “‘Inalienable right as a fellow sapient species’... Honestly. If they hadn’t put that in, where’d the difference be?”

“I mean, fuck.” Vinyl slammed the table. “Fuckity-fuck-fuck! Is this a joke? When I saw the footage of an alicorn Cadance speaking to the Security Council, I was hoping great armies, badass warriors coming down the heavens and kicking the Tyrant’s flank to Kingdom Come! What’ve we got? One measly portal that couldn’t ferry a squad, and a letter that says jack-shit!”

“To be fair,” said Saffron, “there was Princess Luna doing her thing, just last week."

"Yeah, but one alicorn's not enough," noted Spitfire. “We’ve seen how that worked out. Even Cadance and Luna together mightn’t be enough against the Tyrant.”

Gladmane pushed back his mane. “Commandant,” he addressed Cheerilee. “Is that really all? I… I noticed the hippogriffs’ names at the bottom of that list. I’ll admit, that’s pretty impressive, given I believe they were in hiding, at around this time. But I kinda was hoping for more equines.”

“Well, from the notes Lady Cadance and Dame Moondancer sent back as well,” said Cheerilee, “we may soon see Saddle Mareabia add its name to the Concordat. Apparently, the Saddle Mareabian ambassador currently is in negotiations for satisfactory terms.”

As she’d expected, this wasn’t met wholly with welcoming.

“Saddle Mareabia,” repeated Gladmane. “Hm. Who was their ambassador, again, in the… What was it, the Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae?”

“Lady Amira-bint-Ramaha of House al-Husan,” said Cheerilee. “Their present Vicereine to the Co-Harmony Sphere.”

Several faces around the table darkened.

“Sounds like political manoeuvering, if you ask me,” said Spitfire, with barely-hidden contempt. “Making sure not to bet on the wrong horse– Hah!”

But Olivine stared at the others in bemusement. “Just now, you were complaining we don’t have enough allies,” she said. “What I’m real curious about is, how the heck did they get Queen Novo to sign? The Storm King would be out and about, in their time, and Queen Novo was keen on the Co-Harmony Sphere. I’m gonna guess their Princess Celestia’s got a way with words. If she’s got the hippogriffs onboard, bet more’ll follow.”

“You sound darn confident there,” said Saffron. Olivine shrugged, flicking away her pink bangs. They shimmered delicately under the light.

“Call it crystalpony intuition, Saff. The Crystal Heart taught us much.”

“Well.” Pina smirked. “Hope your ‘intuition’ can help us out of a bind, Miss Jewel. This Concordat promises everything and tells us nothing. Do we know if they have some grand plan to save the human race? Can they stop the Solar Empire? Quite likely not. So... Take in refugees? Give humans a new home? How would that work? Do any of us know?”

As was her wont, Operative Pineapple Nectar had voiced what others on High Command, including the more brash members like Vinyl or Spitfire, didn’t like to think or mention aloud. Yet in their position as defenders of humanity, these were the very sort of questions they had to wrestle on a daily, nay, an hourly basis. Everyone at this table, at one point or another, had experienced up close the nightmare of evacuating a human city.

Cheerilee forced herself not to think back to Paris, and the Purple Mist. Huddling with a terrified group of human children who’d been on a school outing to a place of worship, Sacré-Coeur de Montmartre. When the mist had spread from the city’s heart, which they could see only too well from atop one of the higher surfaces in Paris, there’d been only one imperative – keep looking for higher ground. It was pure luck that Sacré-Coeur was among the highest places in the city. Even then, there’d been a mad scramble to reach the dome…

“That’s a good question,” said Saffron. “Ma’am, have we got a strategy?”

It was a noble sentiment of the parallel Equestria’s, offering to take in humans, and Princess Celestia would probably get it through Parliament. But it was pure fact they couldn’t possibly take in all three-billion-or-so surviving humans. Unlike the Solar Empire, they didn’t have the benefit of half a planet’s newly-liberated real estate, plus what infrastructure the Empire had been careful to thaumon-seed so the Barrier wouldn’t wipe it out. And even if practictality got ‘Sunny Equestria’ to specify they’d only receive around forty-thousand, the median human population required for sustainable genetic diversity, what then?

Wasn’t this the age-old painful question, choosing who lived and who died? The vast scope of the human population was further complicated by national divides, which remained an issue, even under UNAC. Wouldn’t countries like the United States or China argue their cultures and population count deserved priority over, say, Lesotho or Timor Leste?

They’d already witnessed a similar problem with the Russian Federation, of which the most habitable landmass had been consumed by the Barrier. Although the United States had, grudgingly, agreed to grant Russia the same favour as the European Union nations by creating Special Administrative Zones for them on North American territory, Cheerilee suspected it wasn’t entirely due to preexisting ethnological distribution that said Zones were placed in Delaware or Maine – both areas closest to the approaching Barrier. Not that you could feel sorry for Russia’s leaders, if half the rumours were true of President Putin and his oligarchical lackeys going behind UNAC to set up corporate fiefdoms throughout the African Continent… Galling though it was to admit, the People’s Republic of China had done as much, if not more than the Americans to slow them in their tracks.

“Who’d have thought, after all that hullabaloo on Earth about refugees a few years back,” Cheerilee said to no-one in particular, although the room, she was sure, had all ears on her, “now everyone knows what it’s like to be without a home, or fearing to lose it.”

“Ma’am?”

It struck Cheerilee that she hadn’t answered Saffron’s question.

“Sorry,” said Cheerilee. “I’m just running through our options. We’re still unsure how the Solar Empire will choose to move against these newcomers. After all, they’re fighting on two fronts… If you can call their cold war with the Storm King a front.”

“And the Barrier is a front, is it?” Spitfire said wearily. “More like a steamroller. But why are we even wondering, Commandant. The Solar Empire already struck a blow to the newcomers when they captured Discord. They’ll press their advantage. It isn’t like they’ll tolerate any opposition.”

“Hm… Not necessarily…” said Olivine.

Seeing all eyes turn to her, their youngest and newest member shrank back, blushing.

“What do you mean, Miss Jewel?” asked Pina.

“W-well,” Olivine started, “By taking Discord out the picture, the Solar Empire already removed the biggest possible threat to their power. A-and, how eager d’you think they’ll be to open up a new front… especially against, well, Equestria, of all places? It wouldn’t just be a logistical headache, but an existential one as well. Propaganda can only do so much. I… you know what I’m talking about.”

They slowly processed her words.

Finally, Gladmane spoke. “It’s possible the Solar Empire may largely ignore… Sunny Equestria, if our new allies restrict themselves to humanitarian aid. It won’t make much difference in the end, with the Barrier.”

“That’s possible…” Saffron allowed. “But isn’t taking in humans just going to give the Empire the excuse to paint a target on their backs? If only to prevent a human-led retaliatory strike, several generations from now?”

Cheerilee sighed. “I’m afraid such response from the Empire isn’t off the table,” she said. “If they think there’s any chance that, even in a scenario of their victory here on Earth, humanity might rebuild elsewhere… But it’s down to us for what facet of humanity Sunny Equestria will see…”

She glanced at the third document, a list of the dozen PHL staff chosen to make the transfer into the parallel Equestria. Two names caught her eye.

Björkman, A.
Research & Development
– Chemistry
– Linguistics
– Long-range Firearms

Pinfeather, F.
Field Operations
– Statistics
– Cartography
– Internal Politics

Those were the names of the sniper team stationed in Boston – callsign ‘Nordlys’, from what Cheerilee recalled – who’d taken the shot at Archmage Twilight. Amethyst Star had personally vouched for the woman.

“We’ve got limited time,” said Cheerilee. “Our envoys should get to work soon. Then we’ve got Captain Gibbous heading there, too, next batch. A special envoy from the thestrals, to their Princess of the Night.”

“Baby steps,” Olivine chimed in.

“Baby steps,” agreed Cheerilee. She looked around the table, beholding these merry few, those who stuck by the PHL. “And, ‘right of identity’, well… Looks like we got our green light, everyone. They’re fifteen years behind, they won’t be ready off the bat. Food, medicine remain our priority. Saffron? Ready Cultural Preservation for this. They’re gonna have a lot to send across.”

“Understood, ma’am,” said Saffron.

It was Vinyl Scratch who spoke next, and her words gave Cheerilee pause.

“... What about Lyra?” Vinyl said softly. “Their Lyra. Any word on her? Cos’ if, if Lyra’s still there then… then Tavi…”

Her voice trailed off. Spitfire reached to pat her shoulder.

“She’s alive there, Vinnie,” Spitfire offered, with a hopeful, if forced smile. “She’s alive… So’s Fleetfoot… So’s everyone.”

While Fleetfoot hadn’t been one of the defectors to join Spitfire’s splinter group, the former Wonderbolts Captain had never stopped thinking about her. Yet after last week’s battle, her body had been recovered in Charlestown, the Boston no-one’s-land...

Both Vinyl and Spitfire’s gazes fell upon Cheerilee. She took a deep breath.

“Cadance wrote that we again owe a lot to Lyra…” Cheerilee began to say. Only to feel her voice wobble with each new syllable. “She… she says the Lyra Heartstrings of that world is actively working to garner interest in the cause. Getting international support, for… an expedition, following in Howie Waggoner’s steps. Going looking for Dream Valley, and proof of human visitation to our world, millenia ago…”

Silence.

“Yeah,” said Spitfire, “that’s Lyra, alright…”

In private, Cheerilee too wondered about whom she might have found in Sunny Equestria. Not only the departed, but those who were living, yet lost. Such as her own sister – such as Berry Punch. But it was the departed who weighed on her most. Cheerilee found herself staring at the empty chair by her, engraved with the mark of the lyre, wondering if one day, that chair might be filled once more.

~ Boston, USA ~

Aegis was of the opinion that post-battle was always the least glamorous part of being PHL. You could star in the propaganda ads, with some quip like “I’m doing my part, are you?” But, as Aegis knew well, after a suitably large battle with sensitive news the public might not want, you ended up in bureaucratic limbo. The first thing that’d happened was them climbing a mountain of NDAs promising they wouldn’t reveal Discord, Princess Luna and Princess Cadance had been in Boston until “such time as the PHL deems relevant”.

Of course Viktor Kraber had asked, using his colourful language, just why the intel shouldn’t be made public. Official stance from high-up had merely been that it was sensitive information, and would be revealed in due time.

Once that was over, Yael Ze’ev had taken the whole squad to a room that served as a bar. Now, here Aegis was, sitting on a stool besides the rest of his squad.

Lorne stood behind the bar. Johnny C and Fiddlesticks had scrounged an assortment of drinks from who-knew-where, and Lorne was passing them out to anyone who asked. But, despite that, the mood was surprisingly sober.

“So,” Johnny C asked, “What happens now?”

“I…” Yael began replying to her cousin, then looked down, “I don’t know. I’m assuming this means we get some reinforcements, more farmland, and somewhere to send artefacts. I think… I think I feel hopeful.”

Aegis sipped his drink, pondering what he felt.

He’d been allowed visits to Amber and Rivet, of course, since his placement on Ze’ev Squad. Back in the day, when Verity Carter was herself still kept in custody by the PHL, confined to her personal quarters in Boston, the woman-turned-mare was a frequent sight amongst their rag-tag group of oddballs during R&R. So was Vinyl Scratch, for that matter. Aegis sometimes wondered if it was Vinyl’s idea of her apology to him, that to overcome her notorious disdain for the HLF, she’d sought to understand his friends by making them her own.

What had been the worst was the pain in her voice, when she’d broken the news, flanked by a group of armed PHL, his comrades only a moment ago. She hadn’t had the courage to look him in the eye, not really, keeping herself concealed behind those sunglasses of hers.

“Aegis, I hate what I’m doing, but I must tell you you're getting reassigned... to a penal squad. Now, I know what your first instinct’s gonna be. Please, at least do this for me. Don't even try to go rogue. I'm giving you a chance with this.”

Yes, that was the worst. That she’d meant it.

“Weird feeling, isn’t it?” Kraber asked, taking a long sip from a can of beer. “Nice change of pace.”

“I wonder if there’s another me there,” Aegis said. “I…”

‘What do I tell him? That Woven Sugar might lose her mind at any point? That she’s not trustworthy, even though you thought she walked on water? Is that true if she hasn’t done it yet? How would I feel seeing us in love again? Seeing me?’

“It’s a disturbing thought. Another… another me. It just… feels wrong. If it’s all similar, then why? Is it fated to go the same way?”

“I get what you mean,” Fiddlesticks said. “But… just think of all the things we’ll get to see again. I could go to an Apple Family Reunion where half the family isn’t at the other’s throat!”

“Of all the things the war gave you,” Johnny C said, “I still can’t believe racist uncles at Thanksgiving were one of them.”

Fiddlesticks shot him a withering look.

“There’s just one thing that bothers me,” said Heliotrope.

“What’s that?” Kraber asked, nursing a large pitcher of beer.

“The Solar Empire’s always taken it for granted they’ll win,” Heliotrope said. “What happens when they decide their flanks might be to the wall this time?”

The whole room went silent. It was, to say the least, a sobering thought.

“One thing’s for sure,” Aegis said, “The war just changed in a big way.”

Aegis thought of Amber and Rivet. His and Woven’s two precious foals, and for a brief time, maybe Kraber’s as well. Amber wanted to be a welder, like him. Rivet loved collecting knick-knacks. Both the filly and colt, seeming proof that gigantism must run in the family, so huge were they for their ages. They had barely known life in Equestria, Amber being eight and Rivet not yet five, when he’d had to flee half a decade ago, leaving their mother behind.

He might still not fully understand what it was like for Kraber, having lost Peter and Anka, in a way perhaps worse than death, as could befall humans alone in the Conversion War. But living this was harsh enough. All the more with him knowing that, just a little, it may be his fault. Fate, it seemed, had decided his kids’ custody belonged to Verity Carter, herself ex-HLF. Verity and her ex-PER girlfriend.

People clinked their glasses together. In the quiet that followed, impromptu, a song emerged from amongst the patrons. A song from the last century, celebrating the foundation of a nation for people long used to diaspora, people like Yael, Johnny or Kraber, now perhaps consigned to that fate evermore, like the rest of mankind.

~An autumn night descends on the Negev,

And gently, gently lights up the stars,

While the wind blows on the threshold,

Clouds go on their way.~

~Already a year, and we almost didn’t notice,

How the time has passed in our fields,

Already a year, and few of us remain,

So many are no longer among us.~

Yael, the one person here to be professional military prior to the War, took up the tune...

~But we’ll remember them all,

With their beauty,

Because friendship like this,

Will never permit our hearts to forget.~

~Love sanctified with blood,

Will once more bloom among us,

Friendship, we bear you with no words,

Grey, stubborn and silent.~

And Aegis bobbed his head along to said tune, whispering it in tandem with his friends…

~From the nights of terrible terror,

You remained clear and lighted,

Friendship, as all of your youths.~

~Again in your name we will smile and go forward,

Because friends that have fallen on their swords,

Left your life as a monument,

And we’ll remember them all…~

~ Prison of Erebus ~ Day 10 of the Convocation ~ Nineteenth Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

No matter how many times she visited Erebus – which admittedly, wasn't as often as her age or position would suggest – Celestia felt surprised at how the dullest aesthetics could seem unsettling and unfathomable. Right now, she found herself in a small room, surrounded by weathered walls of uncut stone. Like a cave. The ceiling showed signs of being carved, though only because of a storm lamp within. Despite efforts to clean the stone, it was still grey and drab. At least the floor was tiled. Celestia and Lady Amira waited at a wooden table lacking decoration, except for a notepad, inkpot and quill.

From what Celestia had learnt on humans, it was risky to leave sharp writing implements within prisoners’ reach. But Erebus had never known an incident where a prisoner gouged out eyes or took hostages. Even the worst were not that desperate. Or psychotic.

Lady Amira sat upright, with poise that matched Canterlot’s most uptight elite, although Celestia privately acknowledged she carried herself with far more grace. Her expression could only be called controlled and tight. She felt uncomfortable here, and Celestia knew why. Amira had a chance to reduce her husband’s sentence, but didn’t wish to raise her hopes.

The sound of keys broke the tension that filled the room, whereupon the door leading to the prisoners’ cells swung open. An armoured thestral of the Night Guard walked in, followed by Qabil al-Husan.

“My love,” Qabil greeted his wife in Intisari, a smile on his face that was small and guarded. He turned to regard Celestia, a slight glimmer in his eyes “Your Royal Highness,” said he, courteously employing Equish, with the finest Upper Canterlot accent he could muster. “May Fortune and the Lady be with you this day.”

He bowed – and then rose up just as quickly, to press down his black-and-white cap before it could slip. As Qabil straightened himself, the Guard indicated him to take a seat. Once he had, the Guard turned and left, closing the door without locking it.

“It’s always a joy to see you again, Amira,” Qabil began, in Intisari once more. his smile softening. Celestia saw Amira’s mask break at the sides under his gaze. With his cocky air of confidence, the stallion continued. “I’ve such trouble putting in words how I miss you, miss our family. To see you so soon after your last visit… Verily,” His tone dropped as he looked her in the eyes, “it is good to see you.”

“And I’m happy as ever to see you, my love,” Amira said in response, demuring a little.

“Your Highness,” Qabil then added, reverting to Equish as he turned to look at Celestia. “Now, seeing you is a surprise. A pleasant one, but unexpected, nonetheless.”

The stallion cut a changed figure from when Celestia had met him two years ago. His coat was not quite so fine, his goatee not so trim. Still, even though he’d swapped elegant textiles for the black-and-white uniform, Qabil’s golden colouration shone in this grey environment.

Celestia gave him her customary smile. She knew he’d recognise it for what it was, as would Amira, but it was only polite.

“Master Qabil,” Celestia said, by way of greeting. Her words were spoken in Intisari. For the remainder of this conversation, they would remain so. “Thank you for your graciousness. It has been how long, two years? Nonetheless, though I understand many Moons may pass before I find welcome in your home again... I hope we’ll one day meet under nicer circumstances.” She glanced at Amira. “I regret this place falls short.”

“Indeed, it does,” Qabil intoned, looking glad at the tacit permission to use his native tongue. “But I trust it’s safe to assume that neither you, nor my love, are here for a courtesy call?”

“I’m sure you were meant to get a visit soon,” Celestia said, to a token nod from Amira. “Yet I fear that you’re correct. Someone in my position doesn’t often meet a stallion for his honeyed words.” She sighed. “A pity. You’re probably wondering, though. Why me, and not my sister.”

“I am,” agreed Qabil. “This is nominally her realm. It is stationed by her guards, carries a sigil in her likeness…” With a brazenly questioning expression, he raised his head and puffed his chest. “So, if you’ll forgive my boldness, why are you here?”

On her way to Erebus, and even within, travelling by cart with Amira, Celestia had run through how she’d answer this.

It still felt no easier.

“The reasons are inordinately complicated,” Celestia said, reflexively stroking her satchel as she placed it on the table. “A jigsaw-puzzle I doubt the three of us could solve if we spent years locked in this room.” With these words, she gave Amira a knowing look. “Once we’ve spoken, I’ll grant you and Her Ladyship all the time to cover the rest.”

Qabil blinked, eyes changing from suspicious to interested. “And what is this matter?”

From her satchel, Celestia pulled out the sketch Headmaster Nexus had given her. She only briefly paused to admire its calligraphy, which proved Miss Rarity’s eye for beauty, before sliding it across the wooden surface to Amira.

“Amira?” she asked.

Silently, the ambassador turned the sketch, so her husband could read it right-side up. “These were found inscribed, my love,” Amira said softly, “etched directly into the skin of a hitherto-unknown being.”

“This is why a Convocation was called,” Celestia explained. “The Thirteenth Family has resurfaced on Equus. And we know them now to be human beings.”

Qabil raised an eyebrow, but said nothing.

“Yet so much remains a riddle, wrapped inside an enigma,” Amira finished for Celestia. “The human creature was discovered to bear runes, the very runes on this paper. Which, following research by the Headmaster of Celestia’s School… and my insight, we believe trace back to your father’s lineage, Qabil.” She met his eyes. “Would this be true?”

“I cannot read them,” added Celestia. “This, as you can imagine, is a rare occurrence.”

Qabil stared down at the sketch. His eyes narrowed and his jaw set.

Celestia could tell he was debating. Not whether or not he knew, which he clearly did, but how much he was willing to tell. Glancing at Amira, Celestia sensed the other mare was thinking the exact same thing. There was a frown on her face, likely because her husband was wasting time mulling over this.

“Yes,” Qabil finally said. “These runes are a product of my lineage’s… research, I suppose you could say. How did this…” He stared up. “... Human, come to possess them?”

She’d known he’d ask, yet it felt strange to tell him.

“Ponies,” Celestia said simply. “There are ponies who discovered the Thirteenth Family, far before I or any of the world’s leaders knew of it. And for reasons of their own, an artisan of crystalline arts saw fit to tattoo these runes upon the human, using powdered crystal, so he’d be granted great power… Apparently, it worked.”

“Hardly anyone knows about my forefathers’ runes,” Qabil said. He lowered his voice, muttering. “Now they show up with a species long-believed mythical? That’s concerning.”

“That aside, my love,” Amira interjected, “We… that is, I need to know just what these runes are capable of.”

Qabil returned to gazing at the sketch intently. “The symbols here match those in tomes my father showed me of our lore. Although imperfect, they’ve been adequately replicated.” He looked up at Celestia. “They are symbols of endurance, designed to strengthen the body. My great-great-grandfather employed such runes during the… Farasi War of Independence. The others are for channeling magic, a useful ability to those tribes who possess no natural ability for spellcraft.”

He glanced at his horn, inert in Erebus, before taking a breath.

“This one, however...” He pointed out one image. “This has been modified.”

“And what is it?” Amira asked.

“It’s a counter-rune for transformation magic,” Qabil replied. “It was crafted to chain ghuls– my apologies, Changelings, into their given form and prevent them altering their shape. Normally, we would’ve had to forcibly brand the crystal into their hides.”

He stared Celestia in the eye, a genuine curiosity on his face. “I can translate most of these runes. I suppose the human is a warrior of some kind?”

“He is, yes,” Celestia answered.

“But why would he need a rune for countering transformation?” Qabil muttered. “Was it forced upon him? Or does he possess a dangerous ability?”

The image of her own face, split into a cold smile with flashing eyes, swam before Celestia.

“I’m… not entirely sure.” Which had some truth to it. “For one, it’s still unclear why he’s the only one we know of to bear these runes…”

“Only? Then there’s more?”

“Yes,” Celestia said. “But their time on Equus is yet to come. What you’ve said about countering transformation intrigues me, though… Knowing your own skillset.” She placed both forehooves together to mime a push-pull gesture. “This magic isn’t wholly alien to me. Can one use another rune as a counter, or do you remain stuck in a different shape forever?”

“I’ve yet to read all of the tomes my forefathers wrote,” Qabil admitted. “The runes they made to counter transformation had the express purpose of trapping a being in their present form. For instance, if a... Changeling were given one, when transformed, they’d remain as that being.”

Celestia could tell he wasn’t telling the whole truth, or perhaps hid the truth in his explanation. And here came, however she tried playing it, the delicate part.

“The Archives in my palace are expansive,” Celestia said slowly. “But Equestria’s assorted knowledge of magic likely covers a mere tenth alone. Since the human and those who gave him these symbols don’t appear to fully understand what they’re dabbling in… For time’s sake, we may have to request access to your forefathers’ library, sir.”

Qabil’s expression turned stern. “I’d be lying if I said I felt comfortable with the idea,” he told her, crossing his forehooves. “Those tomes are ancient, a personal property of my family, a legacy of our greatest achievements...”

“We understand that,” Celestia insisted. “We really do, but this is important–”

“How so?” Qabil interrupted, a bit curtly. “Is this human a threat? Are the runes killing him? Your Highness, I’m afraid I can’t open my library to idle curiosity. Especially without my supervision. The human won’t be going anywhere, will he? You could easily come back to me once my incarceration is over.”

Time. In Erebus especially, time was the great mountain-grinder.

“Sadly, that’s wrong. They may not be around by then– and nor may he.” Celestia delivered this news without fanfare. Only cold fact. “Time is a luxury they do not have, so, neither do I.” She let her eyes roam over him, then Amira. “Nor does your wife… nor does anyone who was called by the Concordia Maxima. I could ask Amira. She knows your books well. Yet though you are here, I wouldn’t consult your library without permission.”

“And I thank you for that,” Qabil said, his face still flat. “But I’m afraid I can’t just–”

“My love, please,” Amira cut in, her tone firm, but not stern. “You can’t imagine how important this will be. I myself have trouble comprehending the scope of what was revealed at the Convocation, and I was there to witness it. They– no, we all need this knowledge. We need the family library.”

Amira’s voice never rose beyond its steady, calm tone, yet her eyes implored her husband.

“But I asked Princess Celestia, and the Malikah, to seek your permission to enter the library. Because I know how important this collection is to you.”

“... Even though I put our family in danger for it?” Qabil’s face dropped and he looked away from his wife, ashamed.

“That alone makes clear how dear you hold the family’s tradition,” Amira said. ”And we are going to talk about this, someday... but not now.”

“Yes,” Celestia agreed. “I don’t like to interrupt, but we’ve got important matters to consider.” She turned to Qabil. “I ask you, sir, if you’ll let my ponies access your forefathers’ library. Its contents could be key to what decides the Thirteenth Family’s fate”

“Imagine what it could mean for us,” Amira added, lips forming a shrewd smile. “Your ancestors’ work saving the human tribe?”

He showed an ambivalent cringe. Whether due to Amira’s bait, or because the spirit of altruism had won through, he was conceding, that was apparent. Celestia smiled, giving him the radiant beam which inspired so many of her ponies.

“Equestria values the pursuit of knowledge, when wielded responsibly,” she said calmly. “You can be assured I’m prepared to repay your pursuits as warranted.”

Exactly like when Qabil’s pursuits had warranted this sentence, but of course Celestia avoided mentioning that part.

The stallion raised an eyebrow, his moment of self-reflection over. “And what kind of repayment can you offer me in here?”

Although it was a loaded question, it was not difficult to answer. “Well,” Celestia began, “a change in your current circumstances, for starters. You still have three years until your sentence is up. But I can arrange to have that sentence reduced.”

“Reduced?” Qabil said, eyeing her warily.

“Yes, reduced. Not overturned.”

“No more than another year,” Qabil shot back, tugging at his goatee. “And I want permanent transfer to the First Circle.”

“I’m afraid it isn’t that simple,” Celestia said smoothly. “True, for your family’s sake, I could shave it down to one more year. But, while you have risen swiftly from the Fourth Circle for good behaviour, it doesn’t yet merit the First Circle.”

Qabil slouched in his seat and, for the first time, groaned in frustration. Amira was frowning too, though Celestia couldn’t tell if it was at her husband or the news.

“With this new workload…” said Amira, “I don’t know when I’ll next be able to visit. Please don’t punish us both.”

“I understand, Your Ladyship,” Celestia nodded sympathetically. “This is going to be a busy, trying time for us all.”

As it was, time passed as Celestia discussed terms with the two horses.

Time and again they reworked the offer, with Amira dancing back and forth between supporting Qabil’s demands or dialling them back.

… Finally, after much haggling and negotiation, things came to a settlement.

“So we are agreed, Your Highness?” said Amira.

Celestia nodded, her long experience keeping her weariness from showing. “I’d say we are. Thank you. Well then, if that concludes negotiations, I shall bring out the necessary forms…”

She reached for the remaining contents of her satchel, but found herself stopped. Celestia blinked twice. To her great surprise, Amira had lain a forehoof upon her own – there was a familiarity to the gesture which Celestia hadn’t expected.

Even Qabil was staring at his wife, startled by her forwardness.

“Actually, Highness,” said Amira. “Pray forgive me, but there is one final matter.”

“Amira,” Qabil said, sounding spooked. “Surely you’re not thinking of requesting study time on the Tree of Harmony? It was difficult enough settling for what little we got on the Castle of the Two Sisters.”

Celestia muttered under her breath, “At least you got something to look forward to, sorcerer...”

But she let Amira keep her forehoof on hers. This was obviously something different. And Celestia suspected Amira was trying to give herself the strength for it.

“Alright, Your Ladyship,” she said, back at audible range. “What more is there to say? Is it a proposal, or a request?”

“Both, I think,” said Amira, removing her forehoof. “This isn’t a matter I could ever broach without my husband. I’ll spare you the preambles, but before reaching the heart of the matter, I must address one of the finer points. Princess Celestia, it is our understanding that, not long ago, Equestria’s old vassal-state of the Crystal Realm was reclaimed by Princess Cadance, of your royal sister’s lineage, newly come into her birthright as an alicorn. Both Their Highnesses were the first to open relations with the human tribe, were they not?”

Celestia nodded carefully. “That is correct,” she said. “I gather your unspoken question, Ambassador. Yes, my niece is entering new responsibilities in this changing world.”

“Of that, I’m convinced,” said Amira, pressing her forehooves together. “In the past, relations between my country and yours have lived off our exportation of crystals and spice. With the return of the Crystal Realm, a shift is inevitable.”

“Yes,” Celestia said slowly. “But our countries have been friends a long time, in spite of frictions.” She glanced at Qabil. “And I believe it’d be of mutual benefit not to fall into competition, but to combine the strengths of our crystal-based resources.”

Amira smiled. “Then we arrive at what I wished to say. In Saddle Mareabia, the noble families maintain an old and respectable tradition to strengthen their bonds, short of marriage. Your Highness, in my family’s name, I wish to extend that offer to Princess Cadance, on your behalf.”

It took Celestia a quick think for Amira’s meaning to become clear. “Your Ladyship,” she said. “You speak of fosterage?”

“Amira,” Qabil interrupted. “You know we can’t do that with royalty. The Malikah is supposed to offer foster to another nation’s leaders.”

“Which is why I already discussed the matter with Her Esteemed Majesty,” Amira replied. “She has agreed that one of our children would be naturally… suited to the magical nature of Equestria, or its satellites.”

“I wouldn’t refer to the Crystal Realm as a satellite...” Celestia muttered.

“I’ve made the arrangements,” Amira continued. “You have to trust me, Qabil. This’ll be good for the child, our family, and our nation.”

Qabil leaned back, a frown on his face. “And I can trust you to take care with their provisions?”

“I’ve taken the liberty of drawing up extensive lists for their care, both for our child and their foster-carers,” Amira replied. “Don’t worry, they will be fine… Won’t they, Your Highness?”

“Oh, certainly they would,” Celestia said reassuringly. “My niece is an excellent carer, and has experience with children. I’m sure your child would do fine… if Princess Cadance accepts. Still, I have a feeling she would.”

“But you don’t know who to send,” Qabil protested.

“This will work,” Amira said gently. “After how much we gained today, how much more do you think you’ll be able to achieve, through such a close relationship with the Amore dynasty? Whichever child we send will thrive. They are your children, after all.”

Qabil sighed, staring at the table. “Very well... You have my consent.”

“It will do, in the absence of any formal documents, my beloved bookworm.”

Celestia felt moved to speak. “Sir,” she said kindly. “Believe me when I say your wife’s offer came as a surprise to me as well. Yet what she offers has much to back it up. And you will find no better carer than my niece.”

Sighing, Qabil glanced up. “Alright. Then… let us fill what documents we have.”

This took less time than one would have thought. Once they were done, Celestia rolled up the papers, placed her quill back into her satchel, and stood up, nodding to both horses that they could do the same.

“I thank you for your aid, Master Qabil,” she said, inclining her head. “If all turns out for the best, I believe you’ll find our world a yet more fascinating place than you left it.”

“That’s beautiful to contemplate, Highness,” said Qabil, bowing very subtly. “But, if I may… I’d now like the time for a private talk with my wife.”

“Of course,” Celestia said, smiling knowingly. “And I know a better place for it. I’ll have the Guards lead you to the Sunroom shortly.”

“Many thanks, Your Highness,” Amira intoned with a deep bow.

“Indeed, many thanks,” Qabil said in turn, though he still frowned as he bowed a little deeper.

“Fortune and the Lady be with you,” both their voices echoed after Celestia, as she turned to head back to the visitor’s reception area.

But she threw a discrete glance behind her, to see Qabil and Amira were being led by a Guard to the door on the right. As the Guard opened it, Amira looked around briskly, then leaned into her husband, who rested his head on top of hers. Celestia saw Qabil give his wife’s ear a cheeky nip, before they had to pull apart when the Guard turned back.

Celestia smirked as she headed away. She supposed, after such good work today, those two had earned a little playtime.

~ The Hall of Unity ~

Princess Cadance waited patiently behind Celestia’s desk. She had an appointment coming soon, in which the Headmaster of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns was to introduce her to a former student. A student of whom Luna, shortly after their return from Earth, had stressed the importance of keeping an eye on. How grand of convenience to dictate, as they’d found out upon closer investigation, that the stallion in question also be one of the first ponies who’d moved to the Crystal Realm since its return, a scholar of magic.

Presently, the plan was to offer him a job. The starting idea was that there’d be a place available for Master Sunburst by Twilight’s side, if the al-Husan family agreed to open up their library. But the news she’d just received from Celestia had planted the seed of a novel idea. Although little Spike’s absence limited the capacity for instant communication with Celestia, they hadn’t needed to dream-converse, thank goodness. The telegram that came in a few hours ago from an undisclosed location, a gateway to Erebus, had said matters were advancing smoothly.

A telegram which Alexander Reinder currently held in his hand, staring at it like he didn’t believe it was real. While she waited, the human and she were taking a moment to share in what the future seemed to hold.

“I know this must sound strange,” said Alex, laying the message on the desk, “but that’s one of the weirdest things I’ve seen in my time here. To me and my people, telegrams are way outdated. You’ve got magic, yet you still use telegrams.”

“Well, there are spells,” said Cadance. “But in this regard, telegrams are often the safest, most reliable means of communication.”

“Fair enough.” Alex smiled weakly. “Guess we won’t be getting into the debate of magic versus technology today. Pity, I’d have liked to bring it up to Captain Armor. Shame he’s returning to the Crystal Realm.”

A small, yet noticeable rapport had developed between her husband and Alex. Even with Celestia’s reassurance he wouldn’t be leading all Equestria’s military as it expanded, Shiney had needed encouragement from a fellow-soldier far more sadly familiar with constant warfare.

“I’ll have to join him soon,” said Cadance, “Matters there await us both. Just like many other leaders at the Convocation must eventually return to their homelands. And I hope to begin the… Spike’s healing before too long…”

Alex looked at her regretfully. “I’m afraid,” he sighed, “once Nurse Cross says I can get my ass off this wheelchair, I’ll have to leave too. Report back for duty… To Hell.”

“What about Lyra’s Expedition?” said Cadance. “I’ll be here for its departure, at least. Don’t you want to see her off?”

“I do,” Alex said, rubbing the wheelchair’s handles. “I’ll try and stay until then. But nor can I put this off forever. The Barrier will reach Boston in weeks… and even if it’s futile, I can’t abandon my post.”

Cadance placed a forehoof upon his hand, thinking of Shining Armor. He accepted it quietly.

“There is hope,” Cadance told him in whisper. “You came here, and we answered. Others surely will answer too. And if we fail…” She bowed her head. “I learned there are plans to keep humanity’s memory alive, from even before we learned of you.”

“The Harriet Thomas Foundation, you mean,” Alex said, in an equal whisper. “I’d heard about the Carter girl, but… I thought she was an urban legend, of the sort that crop up around Viktor Kraber’s crew a lot. That, or the type of rumour the HLF continue to spread about the PHL. A Newfoal in our ranks… They’ve got plenty of stories like this, to do with Newfoals.”

“So, you have been informed? I was told you’d be.”

“Amethyst Star,” Alex replied. “Said the PHL higher-ups were giving me special clearance, what with me finding this place and all.” He shook his head. “Still have trouble believing Verity Carter’s the one who re-established the Harriet Thomas Foundation. Harder to believe than her really being turned into a pony, without losing her mind. You sure she was herself?”

“I wouldn’t know how to answer that,” Cadance said evenly. “First time we’d met. But she was looking and sounding pretty lucid.”

“Really? Because Luna told me about how she’d met Maxine.” Alex sighed, looking down at his hand beneath Cadance’s forehoof. “My sister used to think ponies were the best. You can see how she might have changed her mind. But if you think she’s got a grudge, you’ve got no idea how bad people like Verity Carter could act– and that’s before you get to the outright butchers. So her wanting to stay a pony… It, it feels suspect.”

Cadance’s eyes gleamed.

“Or maybe it’s to do with a brew more potent than the Conversion serum. A different kind of elixir, the hardest to brew, but one I know very well,” said the Princess of Love.

“Perhaps,” said the soldier opposite her, a younger man than how he sounded, which was unconvinced, brought on by the weariness of experience. “Perhaps.”

“Pardon me, Captain,” Cadance spoke, after a time. “I’ve still got an appointment.”

Alex nodded resignedly, pulling away.

“I get you. I’ll be leaving through the side-door.”

Yet somewhat humorously, just as Alex wheeled towards said door, it was opened by a figure whom Celestia had frequently described as a ‘jack-in-the-box’, for reasons that were becoming clearer to Cadance.

Exchanging nods with Alex, Headmaster Nexus strode in, meeting his cue.

“Greetings, Headmaster,” said Cadance, while Alex closed the door behind him. “So, will you fill me one last time time on whom I’m going to meet? Amazing coincidence, isn’t it, that he should be from your hometown and have gone to live in my Realm.”

“Isn’t it, Your Highness?” Nexus said eagerly, rubbing his forehooves together. “But as I say, there’s a narrative thread–”

“And you say,” Cadance cut him off, “he’s got the qualifications to join Twilight on her research in Saddle Mareabia?”

The interruption was a bit unseemly, but Cadance knew that Nexus would get carried away, if given the chance.

“Oh, he does some tutoring, good with kids, I’m told,” said Nexus, nodding. “And he was close friends with my goddaughter as a child. Phew, dinners with her family sure got awkward once he moved and she entered that gloomy phase…”

“Why, what happened?” Cadance said, surprised.

Nexus’s expression sobered somewhat. “It’s… not easy to explain,” he said. “Friendship problems, mostly. On some level, she was jealous he got accepted by the School before she was. She had such talent, but she never took my offers of a scholarship…”

Though slight a description, it was enough to remind Cadance of a certain fiery-maned filly she’d grown up with in Canterlot, until the other girl had run away.

Her heart went out to Spell Nexus, wondering if he had regrets like Celestia’s, wondering also if his goddaughter and this Sunburst had been like her and Sunset.

“Well…” Cadance said, heading for the main door. “I’m sure he’s a perfect fit, Headmaster.”

Entering the antechamber, however, Cadance felt her heart miss a beat. It was like seeing a ghost. Or seemed like it at first, until she composed herself. Those colours, though, and most especially that shock of a mane… A shock it was, truly, to come across such fiery hair twice in her life. Her earliest memory of arriving in Canterlot Palace was the image of encountering a filly she’d thought was burning with fury.

None of this same anger was to be seen here. In fact, the orange-and-white-marked stallion hadn’t even noticed her enter, so focused was he on levitating and stacking a few tea plates. Right then, however, Cadance seriously wondered if Sunset Shimmer had a twin brother.

Upon sighting her, the stallion fumbled, scrambling to let the tea plates stabilise within his aura.

“Y-your Highness, hello!” he greeted brightly. With a white-socked hoof, he adjusted his pin, keeping the starry-blue robe he wore fixed on him, glasses hanging precariously off his nose. “I’m sorry, I was…”

She offered him a tentative smile, hoping her feelings didn’t show. “Filling time? Don’t worry, I got a bit busy back there, too.”

Her own horn lit up, her aura joining his in settling the tea plate stack.

Cadance’s gaze drifted to the stallion’s clothing, a robe that wouldn’t look out of place on Headmaster Nexus. Only, judging from the wear and tear at the seams, it wasn’t one worn exclusively for ceremonial reasons.

“Do you want me to–”

“Oh no, no,” Cadance said, “it’s fine, I’d say you’ve been waiting a while. So, Sunburst, was it?”

* * * * *

There wasn’t much distraction in Galatea’s room. But her room sat atop the Watchtower, its windows granting her a view of the Hall and the windswept landscape beyond. Once Galatea thought she’d seen all she could see this quiet night, she turned away from the window, gently closing it with a flick of her horn. Her gaze settled on the coffee table – one of very few pieces of furniture there, apart from the bed, the old nightstand to its right side, and the empty cupboard. Yes, Galatea found it just right. Pity she’d had to turn down Celestia’s generous offer of a room closer to hers or Luna’s, though.

Only the large, fluffy white pillow Celestia had given her was an indulgence. Her mattress was enough to pad, nothing more. Not that Galatea particularly minded. She was used to sleeping with less. And the pillow was comfortable, she thought, settling in snugly to examine the books Luna had brought back from Earth.

It was a gentle read. A child’s writing could be so imaginative. But Megan Williams hadn’t had to imagine much, for her tales were those passed down here.

Dear Diary,

Today was crazy! There was a rainbow that came out of nowhere and then there was this pegasus named Firefly in the well. I got her out, but then she said she needed my help. Next thing I knew, we were dancing on air in the sky. Her land was under attack by someone called Tirek.

I’d have been done for when a bunch of dragon-things attacked after Firefly landed. If it wasn’t for Scorpan– who was a good guy actually, just pretending to be a bad guy– rescuing me when one of the dragons grabbed and dropped me. We managed to escape and get help…

Sloppy, swift, and so very young indeed. Luna had spoken of a poet. Perhaps, Galatea mused, she had presumed a little much of a teenage girl… Yet...

‘Scorpan… Scorpan…’

The name was familiar. Galatea leaned back, resting against her bed’s headrest. An old name. One with hardly any descended forms. Faces, old and young from every Family, passed her mind’s eye. The name ‘Tirek’ had also popped up plenty. The Lord of Midnight Castle. It brought to her the same degree of familiarity as ‘Princess Platinum’ or ‘Clover the Clever’. A long-forgotten name that resurfaced.

But ‘Scorpan’ was a different matter. It jumped to her like an old friend or family member would, like ‘Celestia’ or ‘Luna’, ‘Broadleaf’ or ‘Snow Mist’...

Galatea blinked. ‘Of course it had to be you… Where else could I have looked.’

Now she remembered old Scorpan. An aged, decrepit figure, with batty wings and tired eyes. A twisted, gem-topped purple staff in hand. Neither friend nor foe, but an acquaintance of the past. Polite, kind, elusive, persistent. Ever-so-slightly curious.

Galatea’s lips twisted into a tired grimace. She should not have parted ways, left him alone, without ascertaining that he–

There was a knock at the door. Galatea frowned.

“Yes?” she called, affecting the rough, worker accent of her habitual disguise. “Who’s there?”

“Tis I, Sister,” came the tired voice of Luna. Galatea paused for a moment. Her horn had glowed light grey, beginning to shift her form into that of the earthpony ‘Shale’. She breathed out a sigh.

“I’ll get the door.”

When the door swung open, Galatea met her youngest sister’s gaze. This night, Luna wasn’t wearing her usual regalia. Only a pleasant violet, wide-brimmed gardener’s hat. Under her wing was an envelope. Galatea’s gaze drifted to the bags beneath Luna’s eyes, mixed with the dark freckles that now showed beneath her eyes and upon the bridge of her snout, then to the light-blue tuft of mane sticking out beneath the hat’s brim, and finally the rough patches of fur concealing bruises yet to heal.

“Have you gotten your rest?” asked Galatea. She reached to where the tuft of mane hung over Luna’s eyes, pushing it aside. Her sister did not react. “I see your mane hasn’t got its colour back. And your freckles are showing.”

“Astute as always, Sister,” Luna deadpanned. “But, yes. I don’t know yet when I shall return to what I ought to look like. Why, what is the matter?”

Galatea’s forehoof returned to the stony floor. She shook her head. “Even with caution,” she muttered, “it was not enough, I see.”

All Luna had was a tired laugh. She lifted the large, brown envelope she’d been carrying.

“The Empire proved cunning,” said Luna, giving her the envelope. “Here are your credentials. It was trivial of Tia to arrange for them.”

“Indeed,” Galatea replied with a nod. The envelope was large, but she held onto it. “I would expect no less.”

“She is the best,” agreed Luna. Then she cocked an eyebrow. “But… geology. Of all things, I did not expect that of you.”

“It is a proper science, Luna,” Galatea lectured on instinct, frowning. “The knowledge gained is as important as any other science, thank you very much.”

Perhaps she was too quick to retort. Yet her sister’s tired eyes held only bemusement. “Oh, no, no doubt on that, Sister. But truly, that you’ve found the time…”

“I have,” Galatea replied. She took a quick glance at the lavender pot hanging in her room, and back to Luna. “I hadn’t expected you to take up shears, either. But your work speaks for itself.”

“Let us hope so,” said Luna. “May I come in?”

Galatea stepped out the way. Her room was fairly spartan. Luna scarcely had to move anything in her stride, straight towards the lavender window-pot. It was one of many similar pots throughout Mount Metazoa, but it didn’t evade Galatea’s eye that this pot was of higher caliber. Luna’s tender care ensured the lavender seamlessly moved between the old pot and the new.

It was Galatea who soon broke the silence. “As I’ve mentioned, your work speaks for itself.”

Her sister chuckled. “At this time of day, I would have expected you to mingle with the staff,” said Luna, adjusting the hanging pot. It gently swayed in the wind, the pleasant aroma of lavender keenly felt in the breeze.

Galatea bit her lip. She shot Megan’s journal a quick glance. “I’ve had other… matters, to take care of, Luna.”

“Well, these are interesting times,” said Luna, setting her can down. She turned to look at Galatea, wearing a thin smile. “Your day went well enough, then? Another day of observation.”

“Usually, mine workload is heavier…” remarked Galatea.

Something flashed behind Luna’s eyes, then. The weariness was all too familiar to Galatea, from the eyes of many workers she’d mingled with.

“Always,” whispered Luna. She lifted her watering can. “But a little gardening takes my mind off the duties of the Dream Realm, arduous task that it is.”

“Indeed,” said Galatea. “On dreams… I believe I am in need of your aid there, Luna. I believe I’ve been imparted with knowledge from mine counterpart, regarding the present Headmaster.”

This caught Luna’s attention. “Knowledge?” she said. “I cannot look into your dreams, Galatea. You know that. But you said your counterpart, prior to her… death, let some of her knowledge transfer to you.”

“Via the Plane of Images, yes,” Galatea said grimly. “And appropriately enough, I believe it touches upon necromancy.”

An odd light gleamed in Luna’s eyes.

“Luna,” said Galatea, “what is it?”

“I think I may have heard of this,” said Luna. “While on Earth.”

* * * * *

“I once met a man– well, sometimes he’s a man– who was great with questions, but he’s not been around a while. Something about ‘bad atmosphere, needed to go back and tweak something’.”

“A man? What kind of a man?”

“A scholar of sorts, with a fixation on the souls of the dead,” Jones remarked. “In fact, to tell the truth, Princess Luna, when we saw you and that Discord fellow appear in the heavens, my first thought was our man had wrought something… Till I remembered you’re not dead. Merely petrified.”

Luna had liked hearing about that even less than her own fate in this other-world.

“And have you any idea where your… man, might have gone to?”

“Through the looking-glass, I expect,” Jones said with a chuckle. “He was a right card.”

“This does trouble me...” Luna said. “I’m not sure what trust I’d place in those who fixate upon the souls of the dead. Necromancy is considered a dark art of the highest order by my people. Father Krampus has been remembered by many names, but merely the memory of the Lord of Tambelon brings nightmares which even I struggle to ward away.”

* * * * *

As Luna concluded her swift explanation, Galatea had nothing immediate to say.

“And so,” said Luna. “You’re telling me that in the other-Equestria, the Headmaster became a… a necromancer, and took up contact with your alternate self?”

Lips thinned, Galatea nodded. “That is what I’m telling you.”

“Necromancy is a foul, despicable art, one whose path I dare not tread,” said Luna. Her eyes met Galatea’s in a sharp glare. “Not even when temptation lay so close to my heart.”

“The dead must rest,” Galatea said, nodding. “No matter how tempting it may be.”

“Clearly,” Luna continued, bile lacing her tone, “some saw fit to wield it as they so wish. Celestia, my sister… our, sister… who is no tyrant… and delivers justice… fairly…” As the bile receded, each word was more a struggle against emotion than the last, “Had the Saddle Mareabian court sorcerer arrested, with the Malikah’s approval, for the mere possession of the Liber Grogar...”

“Hm,” Galatea said. “He wasn’t planning on using it?”

“No,” Luna said simply. “But illegal purchase of such a tome was deemed cause enough to spend five years in Erebus.”

“Yet even so, politics being what they are,” Galatea noted, “Our sister Celestia believes she can reach an agreement for her student and fellow researchers to consult the al-Husan Library… Wait, hm. Didn’t you say it was Headmaster Nexus who led you back to that family?”

“He did,” Luna said. “But more importantly, if ironically, was that he led us to an Equestrian mage we may wish to keep an eye out on. Of course, Tia’s got to be clever, seeking to assign young Sunburst as one of Twilight’s research partners.”

Galatea smiled mockingly. “‘Keep your friends close’, isn’t that so?”

“And hope it makes them closer as friends,” Luna replied dryly. “Methinks that’s Tia’s thinking.”

“Maybe she should do the same with Headmaster Nexus,” Galatea said. “Just to be sure. But I understand he’s planning to accompany Madame Heartstrings’ Expedition. In which case, all the more reason that I go along, to keep watch on him.”

“Then I… shan’t waste anymore of your time, Sister,” said Luna, still with that joyless tone.

The bite, Galatea noticed, had turned out sharper than when Luna had spoken her name to Celestia one morning. She did not tip her hat this time, nor look back as she strode past. Another missed chance. Luna would be disappearing down the staircase soon. No, that should not be. Her sister was right here where she needed to be.

Galatea levitated the envelope to her nightstand, knocking the lamp aside. “Luna, wait.”

Her sister paused in her steps. She glanced back, with a raised eyebrow. The words died in Galatea’s own throat, as gears turned inside her head.

“I… if it isn’t too inconvenient,” Galatea murmured, pawing at the ground, “perhaps… we could have tea time after, at Gallopoli. We’ve much to discuss. And… Celestia is not here,” she added, feeling a little fuzzier. “We should do it with her.”

Luna blinked, furrowing her brows. “I don’t see why not,” she said. “I’ll inform Tia. I’m sure she will be thrilled.”

With neither seeming sure what to say next, they both settled on quick nods.

“Goodnight, Sister…,” Luna said uncertainly. “Happy reading, and… try not to stay up too late? Our sister’s an early riser, as you know.”

“That she is,” agreed Galatea, “Goodnight, Sister...”

Perhaps there was something about the way Luna carried herself, with her gait, and the way her mane was neatly brushed beneath her gardener’s hat, that caught Galatea’s attention a moment. She’d seen it plenty of times before, in many different times.

“And good luck with your talk,” finished Galatea.

Luna turned back, blinking. “How…?”

“Sisterly intuition,” Galatea answered, feeling a little curl of her lips, “Do not worry. I won’t tell Celestia. It’s your news to tell.”

“Ah,” Luna said, sounding awkward. “I… yes. Very well. Thank you, Sister. Rest well.”

With that, Luna was off, leaving Galatea alone in the doorway. She sighed, and turned, closing up behind her. Gone were the musings of old stories for now. Galatea had never considered, for all Celestia spoke fondly of the brew, what sort of tea she might personally like. It was hardly a concern of hers, not when coffee was more valued by laborers. An acquired taste, but she did like it, especially when her co-workers would offer a cup if she’d forgotten to pick up her share. And perhaps tea, like chocolate, would become a new favourite of hers.

Galatea went to her bedside table, where the envelope lay unblemished. Perhaps she should request a frame. Celestia wouldn’t mind, not when it would be... convenient, to protect her credentials here. Practicality. Not sentiment.

‘Not sentiment,’ she told herself. The hesitation remained.

She laid on the bed, legs folded. She reached for the envelope, and opened it with care, peering at the words by candlelight.

My dear sister,

I hope this letter finds you and Luna well. How are you both faring?

It was no problem at all arranging for the changes you’ve requested. A rocktorate this old, I’m sure none of your future colleagues would mind. If anyone takes a closer look, Madame Heartstrings or Prince Blueblood can help you with your cover.

Would you be up for tea time, before your eventual departure? You don’t need to answer this now. I’d love to hear it firsthoof, yes or no. I do not mind. I’m not sure if she’s mentioned this or not, but Luna has told me of your whereabouts from when she and I had breakfast with Sint and Ilsa, on the first day of the summit. I wouldn’t have minded if you joined us.

I can promise you there will be chocolate cake. I know you like it. And you still have a lot of birthdays to catch up on.

Our doors are always open, and I know Luna would agree.

Much love,
~ Your Sister, Celestia.

And there as promised, her revised credentials. A document which declared that the recipient had been bestowed the title of Doctor of Geology, from the University of Manehattan. A mare named Shale. Only, it wasn’t always Shale. Celestia had certainly needed to explain away that part to the university board. Yet she said it was no problem at all.

Galatea did not look up from the letter, for some time.

* * * * *

It had been a pleasant surprise for Twilight when she’d learned of the Hall of Unity’s Grand Archives. Even the greatest libraries of Equestria paled in comparison.

She pushed open the wooden doors. A great sight welcomed her, just as it had in the first days of her stay. Towering shelves loomed over the Archives. Rows upon rows of bookshelves, the largest of them so tall they were accompanied by their own staircases. A good three storeys beneath the tallest, solitary archivists could be seen mingling on the balconies, their claws or hooves or magical auras holding ancient books and scrolls to review. To Twilight’s understanding, many of these were copies of each species’ records, stretching back more than three thousand years ago, for the Minotaurs who’d founded the Hall wished to retain their memory in the event of catastrophe.

Much like humanity, Twilight thought in passing.

She continued her walk, passing by the table rows. Even these had scrolls stacked on them – undoubtedly reviewed by archivists from far and wide. Twilight had gotten to know some of them personally. There she replied in kind to a friendly wave given by the griffon archivist, Glenda. One of Grizelda’s followers, she was a young griffon of passing resemblance to the snow leopards who roamed the mountains of the Far East. She and Twilight had been engaged in a passionate, yet friendly debate days ago, about the throne of Griffonstone, land disputes, and a claim held by the Young Pretender.

A good five minutes later, having turned down Glenda’s offer for another archive-binge as politely as she could, Twilight found her spot. A small, makeshift hideout compiled from pillows lined all along a few seats she’d claimed from several rows. It was hidden here in the tax-collecting rows, between the Kirin’s disputes with Neighpon or the Griffish Isles’ old scandal with Manehattan. Boring, some would say, but not Twilight. Perhaps she did have to take a longer walk to the Equestrian and hippogriff rows, but it was a worthy trade-off for privacy.

Still, with much on her mind, from strange creatures to evil mirror-versions of herself, Twilight kept quiet for the longest time, with only a coffee-table a couple of tomes on the history of the zebra tribes for company. They weren’t the only books there, either. Flanking her, she had placed one of the collections of bedtime stories Luna had brought back. The other, Luna had told her, had been given to Galatea. Canterlot, A History, Nature or Nurture – Professor Dartwing’s iconic book on ponykind’s role as caretakers of the environment, famously defended by one of his colleagues, Professor Huxley the Diamond Dog – and even Lyra’s crackpot compilation on Dream Valley by her beloved Professor Shriek. Finally, Howie Waggoner’s Ponyland: Dispelling the Myths of Dream Valley. Back during its republication, Twilight hadn’t given it the time of day. But plenty of legends had since turned out to be true, like when the book Supernaturals had proven surprisingly useful.

‘How’d I ever come to this…’ Twilight thought, looking at the book’s unorthodox cover. It resembled a stylised drawing of a valley, question marks scattered all around it. ‘Well, guess legends have… truth to them…’

Ultimately, nothing could take her mind off Spike. Both of them, for even as she thought of the little drake she called brother, whom she’d left in Canterlot, her thoughts drifted back the twisted, pitiful creature lying unconscious in the Hall’s medical wing. He didn’t speak, Cadance had told her. Twilight doubted he could tell anyone his story. And what was done to him…

Horrific.

Celestia had established laws against the majority of body-altering spells, and from what Twilight had heard, the Solar Empire had systematically broken every single one.

‘He probably won’t even want to talk to me… Not when I… she did this...’

Twilight tapped the table, as she tended to. She couldn’t forget how she, and all others there, had been stunned silent when Cadance and Luna, accompanied by two mares from another world, one a flawed mirror of her old foalsitter, and the latter a friend she’d lost a long time ago, had emerged from the mirror’s portal. Among the four, they carried Spike, injured and unconscious. It had felt like she was dreaming, seeing her little brother like this. But none could compare to whatever nightmares must’ve gone through his mind…

‘Spike…’ she thought, unsure if she was thinking of hers, or theirs. ‘Why…’

“You seem awfully quiet, Twilight Sparkle.”

Twilight snapped out of her train of thought. Outside her hideout’s borders, there stood Princess Luna, who stared at her, unblinking. She wore a gardener’s hat.

“Forgive me,” Luna said evenly. “I… presumed that perusing the Archives would ease your thoughts after… yesterday.”

Her freckles somehow flushed a little darker. Come to think of it, Twilight thought, she hadn’t noticed Luna even had freckles before.

“Oh, sorry,” replied Twilight, after a moment’s pause. “It’s just… there’s so much to think about.”

“I can imagine. May I come in?” said Luna. She patted a large pillow. “You do have fine tastes in pillows, Twilight.”

“Well, y’see, heh,” Twilight replied, chuckling. “Someone ordered pillows from Canterlot, the Guard told me, but there were too many for one room. So I asked if I could have a few and…” She patted her own pillow. “Here we are! Just a nice… comfy place to read, Princess.”

“Hmpf, I’ve a suspicion who ordered these. But I do like them,” said Luna, entering the perimeter. “I should… try it for my place, too.”

“Oh, you should, you should…”

Luna rested on her side, facing her across the coffee table. It struck Twilight that Luna wore neither her shoes nor her peytral. Not even her crown remained. The locks of light-blue mane hanging over her forehead and freckles on her snout completed her unusual look, yet she still looked graceful and elegant. Perhaps even more so, Twilight thought, warmth in her cheek.

“How do you feel, Twilight?” Luna asked softly, her expression turning somewhat shadowed. “How are you, and your friends doing? I’m… I’m sorry I haven’t really checked on you all in the waking world, past Nightmare Night.”

“That’s alright,” said Twilight. “I know you’re busy, Princess, and… I guess we all are, now. I’m… I’m doing okay, I guess. Fluttershy’s… everyone’s fine. We just had a lot to talk about.”

Pushing the thoughts of the broken Spike away, Twilight let out a long sigh, rubbing her temples. Luna had visible eyebags. At the mention of Fluttershy, Twilight noted a quick, downcast look full of what may have been shame.

“Goodness, Princess, you… It’s been three days. You look like you didn’t get any sleep at all.”

“I do, don’t I?”

“Yeah,” Twilight said, nodding. “I mean uh, I… didn’t know you had freckles before.”

“Freckles?” Luna repeated, arching an eyebrow. Her cheeks flushed a little darker, forehooves moving to touch her own nose. “Yes, but– they aren’t supposed to show!” she grumbled. “Not now of all times.”

“Well, when are they supposed to?” asked Twilight. She rested her chin, to watch Luna shift her body shift slightly. And there, on Luna’s back, there were also darkened spots. Dapples. “Also… um, you got some on your back, too.”

Luna let out a loud groan. “Autumn, Autumn, they should show most clearly during Autumn! They do not show so prominently this early– blasted interdimensional time differences! If you’ll excuse me...” Her horn glowed. But that was all it did, before its light dimmed and faded. She cursed. “Blast, I must be more exhausted than I thought.”

“Were you going for a glamour spell?” asked Twilight, stifling a giggle.

“Makeup usually sufficed,” Luna bemoaned, hanging her head and averting her gaze. “But the Autumn dapples can be so annoying to hide.”

“Well, for what’s it worth, Princess?” Twilight snorted, interrupting Luna’s grumbling. “I think they look nice.”

That brought pause to Luna. She reached up to brush away a few of her now light-blue bangs.

“Do you mean it?” she asked.

“Why wouldn’t I?” Twilight retorted, offering a little smile. “It does, really.”

“Ah, um, yes, you see,” Luna stammered out, “Tia thought they looked silly, when we were fillies. Children’s banter, I assure you. But they can be distracting, I must admit.”

“Well, Princess Celestia isn’t here, you know,” Twilight said, shrugging. “And hey, this isn’t the Royal Canterlot Voice or anything. Really, I… think you should keep them, freckles and dapples.”

Luna bit her lip, hooves tapping the pillow in a rhythmic beat. Then, she nodded, ever so slowly.

“Very well, then, ah… um, thank you, Twilight.” She shook her head, before Twilight could follow. “Right. Well. If I may ask, in turn, ahem… I’m asking a lot, aren’t I? Sorry, um, yes– how goes your research with the Amulet?”

She had asked this before. But Twilight didn’t particularly mind. “Oh, it’s fine,” she said, smiling. “I know, I know I… probably need to finish it, don’t I? Just… I don’t even know if it matters, really. I mean, after… this.” Another pause. Twilight sighed, pushing a book aside. “To be honest, I don’t know if I can continue, knowing just how horrible everything is, Princess. Spike, Discord… now we know war’s coming for real and–”

Twilight glanced at Luna’s light-blue mane, distractingly unmagical. If she had to guess, the battle between Luna and the other-Twilight must have been draining even for the Princess of the Night. Not for the first time, Twilight wondered if Luna’s covert gazes were to compare her with her counterpart.

“What was she like?” Twilight asked, after a pause. “The Archmage.”

Luna didn’t say anything, at first. It was difficult to tell what lied beneath her stoic, regal mask.

“She was… like you,” Luna said quietly. “Different, but much alike. She’s done terrible things, I won’t sugarcoat it, but… she’s… she thought it was the for the best. The Empire, the serum…”

The thought of the ponification serum brought a shudder to Twilight.

“From what I’ve… gleaned from her memories,” Luna continued. “You– I mean, your counterpart, she did not… she tried her best to help. Help, in her own way. But some part of you lived on beneath the mask of the Archmage. And deep down, she’s… sad.”

“Sad?” Twilight asked, ignoring the growing lump in her chest. It was only logical, though Luna wouldn’t say it, to assume the Tyrant had tasked her – counterpart, Twilight reminded herself – to create the vile serum at the heart of this war.

“Aye,” Luna affirmed. “The Bearers are still together but, she’s lost so much. Lyra… Cadance…”

Luna’s voice trailed off, and she averted her eyes. Who else, Twilight wondered, did the Archmage lose, that Luna wouldn’t speak of? Then, she remembered, a child turned into a weapon of war. The drake whose broken form lay slumbering, tended to by the Mikado’s finest. Her own little brother.

“Spike,” Twilight finished. “That’s what you were gonna say right, Princess?”

Luna meekly nodded, still looking down. Twilight shook her head.

“She hurt Spike,” she concluded, icily. “We saw him. Or what… what happened to him. I don’t understand why anyone could do that to Spike and-and think they did him a favour! Gah, sorry, I know it’s a library but… Starswirl’s beard, I… how could I-she do this…”

She was starting to hyperventilate now, a forehoof placed on the table, one on her chest. Cadance’s breathing technique was failing her. She saw what became of Spike, how she – no, not her, the Archmage – had turned him inside out.

“She pulled him apart a-and put him back together. Why? I– I don’t understand, and I won’t, because, because he’s, he’s just a baby and… and…”

She was going into an aria soon, she could feel it. Yet, sudden warmth flushed within her, as she felt Luna’s forehoof touch hers.

“I keep telling myself I’d never do that,” Twilight said, “That… that he’s family, and I love him. But I did!” She looked up to Luna with tears in her eyes. “How could I... how could anyone...?”

“Twilight,” said Luna warmly. “It’s… take a deep breath. In, and out.”

So she did, for a few moments. And when she was done, Luna was looking right at her, again, with a gentle smile.

“Right… right, sorry,” said Twilight.

She withdrew her forehoof from Luna’s, resting upon the coffee table. There, they sat in silence once more, quietly considering one another, and neither knew what to say. Luna’s blue-green eyes, cool and tranquil as the Moon she raised, seemed as warm as Celestia’s today… perhaps warmer still. Or were they always like that? Twilight shook her head, feeling her cheeks burn up.

“Sorry, sorry,” Twilight said, swallowing. “It’s not everyday you get to hear about… you, doing things you haven’t done.”

“Oh, do not worry… These are strange times.”

“Strange times, isn’t that an understatement,” Twilight said, deadpan. “Isn’t that a Kirin proverb? I don’t even know what I’m gonna do. Well, there was that project I had in mind, for a school, but… I don’t know, it’s silly.”

“School?” Luna asked, tilting her head.

“To open a school of… friendship.” She gave a short giggle. “You know, get everyone to… understand one another. It’d be a waste if we all just parted ways, after this is over. Sorry, it’s… Yeah, it’s kind of silly. I just… you know. I just had the thought that, with Princess Celestia’s exhibition plans and Lyra’s expedition, I should chip in, too, back home. But, I don’t know, Princess. I don’t want to waste your time babbling.”

“Oh… Well, on the contrary, Twilight,” said Luna. “I, for one, would love to hear it.”

“You would?”

“Yes,” said Luna, smiling, “I dabbled in educational reform after Discord’s fall, you see. And the work doesn’t stop at the war’s end. On that, I’m sure both my sisters would agree.”

“Yeah, eheh, it’s… I thought I had to do something, right, Princess?” Twilight said, nodding. “Though, Princess Celestia must’ve covered it already.”

“Nay,” Luna said. “Perhaps she did, but nothing is new under the Sun. It’s what you do that sets it apart. My sister pulls many strings, but she believes everyone has their part to play.” She reached forwards and tapped her chest, then retracted quickly, looking a little shy. “This is yours, Twilight.” She managed an awkward smile, one that Twilight returned.

“Right, right!” Twilight exclaimed, flicking her mane aside. “Okay, okay, I’ll have to draft a curriculum, I’ll… I’ll have to ask around more. Glenda, maybe Glenda’s got a few suggestions too! Gotta take all the cultures into account, goodness, there’s so many! All the tribes, all Twelve Families, and then there’s also humanity. I also need a permit, convince a few teachers and…”

She continued for a solid minute, by her estimate, but in all likelihood, it was probably an hour. Wild gestures were a-plenty as she spoke of the Archives’ own mysterious history, how they’d all come together at a moment’s notice. Luna had a few questions of her own, quizzically inquiring what activities this school would perform, teamwork and games and so much more…

And when she was done, Twilight felt her mind clearer than it had been. Based on the shushes from down the aisles, she might as well have sung an aria.

“... And this isn’t even going what my friends would think! Gah! So much to talk about…”

“And so little time,” Luna finished. Her smile wasn’t mysterious at all, from the way she rested her chin upon her forehooves.

“Right? Hah, and they say we can’t teach friendship. Well, not exactly teaching it, but we’ll encourage it!”

Another shush from down the aisle prompted Twilight to step off the coffee table, sheepishly. Luna clapped her hooves.

“I cannot say I’ve ever seen a performance like that, but well done! I think,” she said approvingly. “Do you… feel better?”

“Yeah! Yeah…” Twilight replied. A few intrusive thoughts still passed by – Spike, the Empire, the Archmage. Even Moondancer. She shook it away. “There’s still plenty to figure it out, but… I know what I have to do. Just look at all this, Princess. Everyone’s… everyone’s history is here. Who’re we if we don’t share it?” She looked at Luna eye-to-eye. “And we’ll prove the Empire and their Co-Harmony Sphere wrong. We can make our own bonds, without destroying memories.”

“I think,” Luna said, smiling serenely, “I’d love to see that. A bond not on their terms.”

“Exactly!” exclaimed Twilight, matching Luna’s smile. “Though I should… probably hold off on it, I mean, with Princess Celestia busy, I’m sure she won’t have time to read–”

“Oh, or you could write to me,” said Luna, suddenly. “I, well, I suppose I can make suggestions, even a few arrangements! In addition to my sister, of course, as you usually do.”

Twilight tapped her chin. “Well, if it’s okay with you? I mean… I’m not sure I’d want to keep you busy either, Princess. I’d love to! I just… didn’t think you’d be available, is all, sorry.”

“Fret not– if any, I should’ve tried reaching out to you as well...” said Luna gently. “It… I will always have time for you– nay, I will make time, and I shall listen to what you have to say, whatever it is...”

And the Princess’ smile could have melted glaciers now, despite her tired eyes. Twilight did not hesitate in returning it. But it had occurred to Twilight that Luna hadn’t spoken much about how she was faring. And for the past few days, nothing suggested to Twilight that the Princess had found much rest.

“Oh, Princess Luna?” she said. “Thank you.”

Luna tilted her head. “Pardon?”

“You brought Spike here,” remarked Twilight, smiling despite the tears that welled up. Luna looked away for a moment.

“I had to, after what he’s been through,” she said stiffly. “But I could have done more for him.”

Instinctively, Twilight held Luna’s forehoof, comfortingly. “You’ve done enough. He’s here, and he’s safe. That’s on you and Cadance. I’ll never forget that.”

When Luna looked, Twilight saw nothing but kindness and relief etched across her face, and her beauty shone through weariness.

“If you say so, Twilight,” said Luna, gently. “I do hope you are doing just fine.”

“Well, so-so, but, I’ll… I’ll be fine, really. You need your rest. But thanks for the talk. We can, you know, we can talk again later, when you’re doing better. These books aren’t going anywhere. We’ve got time.”

“But I hope I am not taking away your time.”

“Well, no, you didn’t. In fact, I’ve been keeping you awake, haven’t I? Don’t worry, I always have time for friends, Princess.”

“Oh. Am I… your friend?”

“Of course!” Twilight said, beaming. “You are, and we’ve got catching up to do. After you rest.”

Curiously, Luna simply glanced around, as if she was avoiding her eyes directly. “Ah, yes, I guess that I should get my rest, the clock is ticking,” she said hurriedly. Another fake cough, and she turned her gaze away to look at the clock. But that didn’t make sense, Twilight realized. The Archives did not have any clocks on this aisle.

Luna turned back, fixing her gaze on her. “But… I was wondering, Twilight,” she said softly. “When will you be leaving?”

“Around the time Lyra will be, Princess,” said Twilight. “I’m hoping I’ll be back here soon... Saddle Mareabia won’t be a walk in the park. Why, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing, just… I’ll miss you,” said Luna. She cleared her throat. “I, ah, you wouldn’t mind, then, well, if I stay here a little longer and catch up. Besides...” She patted her pillow. “You have wonderful taste.”

“Oh, if you prefer, Princess,” Twilight said, giggling. “Don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere then. Maybe you could show me a few books? I got a couple questions, too, if you don’t mind.”

That brought a mirthful laugh from the Princess of the Night. “Perfect. And… you can call me Luna. Ask away.”

“Okay, Luna,” answered Twilight, beaming. “Hmm, well… first… how’d you figure you had those?” She pointed at Luna’s nose. Luna’s smile grew wider still.

“Very young, you see. It was… it was Sint who’d first remarked on them… but it was Lady Mistmane who saw that they were most prominent under the Autumn Moon, when we went out to garden…”

So the talk went on, for hours and hours, but never did either of their smiles waver.

~ Gallopoli, Equestria ~ Day 11 of the Convocation ~ Twentieth Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

The ponies of Equestria may call this quaint seaside town somewhere they liked going to, a place to let life’s worries pass. But it dulled the senses, attracted complacency. All the things Ember thought didn’t fit a dragon. Once she and Madame Heartstrings’ contingent had arrived, Ember had excused herself to find a perch, on the ancient walls of the citadel, at a fair distance, but still within earshot. This place was a fortress once, standing proud in facing whatever invaders would dare approach from the waters in the West.

Now it was a tourist hotspot, its cracked walls covered in flowers. Ember groaned. Ponies! So close, yet so far from her understanding. She clutched the burlag bag countaining the Chaoskämper’s precious canister. It was only at Spykoran’s insistence she’d come here.

‘What a waste…’, she thought, ignoring the inane discussions of Heartstrings’ crowd.

But then the air changed. The winds turned. The scent of seawater and coal mingled. The rumble of machinery mingled with the crowd’s noises until only it remained.

There, gliding across the sea, emerged three vessels she’d only seen above Kirin waters. Great vessels of metal and wood, woven together by screws and welding. A figurehead emerging from the bow, a dragonhead, its piercing gaze cowing all within its sight. Enclosed, the vessel’s squat form protected from the rough weather it was constructed to withstand. A dozen windows of crisscrossing metal offered their occupants the sole sight of the outside world.

Ember had seen sky-whales before, the real-life beasts, rare as they were, on the occasional excursion aboard the Mikado’s private barge. She’d never seen sky-turtles, but if she’d had to guess, this was as close as she could get.

For such a stingy folk, the sky-turtle ships, Ember admitted, were works of art. The crowd that gasped and clapped below her certainly agreed.

* * * * *

Gallopoli was a familiar name to many beachgoers from across Equestria, and even the odd foreign visitor. The town, with its temperate climate, offered a pleasant seaside experience, its windswept cliffs and tranquil, white-sand beaches a highly-sought destination, with plenty of options among its old, rustic homes for those who wished to spend the night. And, for the more historically-minded, there was the old fortress situated by the coast, its large, stony walls facing the sea to counter pirates and raiders.

Thorax wondered if it had been breached. Perhaps the tour guides had something to say about that topic. But Queen Chrysalis had little need for tours. For now, she seemed content with lounging at the beach. And where Chrysalis wished to go, her entourage would follow. For a weekend, it was a quiet day at the beach. There was no-one else there with them, in these late hours, save for a grey earthpony, minding her own business on a sunlounger. So quiet was she, lying on her belly and reading a book, one could mistake her for a statue, were it not for an occasional flick of the ear, or inquisitive, piercing-blue gaze thrown their way.

Then she would return to her book, leaving Thorax with the pain he felt in his back, so vividly.

Naturally, there was no way he’d complain. Chrysalis wouldn’t like that much. So he could only wish she’d shift her legs to a better position. Which she did every so often, but never enough. Thorax would steal glances, enviously watching the Queen sip from a glass of orange juice on her own sunlounger. It was one of a couple things she’d ordered from the inn. What a surprise it had been for the poor old innkeeper to see her standing there, flanked by Thorax and Pharynx, and so casually request the menu. And a bigger surprise when she took the time to pay.

A courtesy, she’d said, and just about the only courtesy she’d offer.

“Oh, move a bit to the left, would you?” Chrysalis asked, sweetly.

Thorax obliged. It wasn’t a question so much as a command. She adjusted her hindlegs, pressing her hooves down harder on his back, forcing him to dig in deeper into the sand. Grains of sand poured into the holes in his hooves. It stung. He bit his lip, stifling a whimper.

“Much better,” said Chrysalis, letting out a satisfied sigh. “My… what a lovely day this is, Thorax.”

There wasn’t much Thorax could do except nod, very slowly. Thankfully, that seemed to satisfy Chrysalis, who resumed drinking. He looked away, his eyes seeking a distraction, any distraction. There were plenty of sights, between the cliffs, the fortress looming in the distance, and the comfy seaside inns dotting the town, even those newly-arriving ships… Yet little love to be tasted on the mostly-empty beach.

He didn’t feel like stealing. But the pain in his back left him no choice. Thorax smelt the air, hoping to catch a whiff of freshly-cut grass. He had caught its scent from the earthpony, briefly. He didn’t know what sort of love it had been – perhaps she was an avid reader. Despite her dull, grey colours, he had found her a sight for sore eyes. But Thorax’s heart sank upon sighting an empty sunlounger. In the time it took for Chrysalis to ask for an adjustment, the mare must have finished reading.

Now Thorax felt truly alone… were it not for the little Changeling further down the beach, closer to the water. Aphid, he remembered. Aphid was here, too, if a little busy. Still making sandcastles in the wetter sands, humming to herself. Ostensibly, Chrysalis had put her there on lookout duty. Still, the Queen didn’t seem to mind Aphid’s sandcastles. And neither did Thorax. They were nice little sandcastles, although the tides would claim them in the morning. It didn’t matter to the peppy Aphid. She always had time to make more, and Thorax would watch.

The pain stung yet again when Chrysalis shifted. Thorax whimpered.

He focused, without turning his head, upon one of the castles. It was built on a sand-mountain, meticulously shaped to resemble the Canterhorn. The castle itself was an approximation of Canterlot Palace, its distinct ivory towers sticking out. Here, Thorax wondered how much time it had taken to build the true castle, a feat of engineering matched by few in history. A castle and city the Ebony Hive had ruthlessly assaulted. A throne Queen Chrysalis had desired above all, a proud symbol to be claimed for her own.

Princess Celestia, by contrast, seemed to regard a throne as a mere chair. Thorax wondered just then how many castles Celestia had built, and how many more she was planning to, in the days to follow. How many more bridges were to be built amidst the Concordat. How she had so readily offered help.

There, in the Gallopoli beach, Thorax wished he too could build bridges.

* * * * *

Life was good, Chrysalis mused. Here, in the shade of her umbrella, by the Gallopoli seaside, there was nowhere else she’d rather be. Fun as it was to toy with the Concordat proceedings, a Queen needed her rest. Gallopoli wasn’t the prettiest of resort towns, she felt, but nevertheless it would do, and Chrysalis found it just right. No meddling spywork. No troublesome princesses. No looming wars to worry about. Only her, always. Only her…

She leaned back onto the sunlounger, taking a long sip from her glass of juice, and purred. Her gaze panned over the waves, moving towards the beach. She frowned, tilting her sunhat. Empty beaches were scarce in love. Any other day, she’d have gladly feasted, tasting the delicacy of tourists from everywhere.

‘Bah,’ Chrysalis thought. ‘Perhaps I should’ve stayed in town. Ugh.’

Carefully balancing the sunhat upon her horn, Chrysalis looked to Gallopoli’s old fortress, and the gateways that led into the town proper. It was a few hundred paces away. Nominally, she’d come here to view the sky-turtles’ arrival herself. Heartstrings… she vaguely recalled that little green former stooge of hers. She rolled her eyes.

‘Eh, I can wait.’

So wait she did, adjusting her hindlegs upon her footstool. He whimpered. Chrysalis scoffed. At least this time around, he wasn’t too much of a distraction.

Then, upon sighting Pharynx, marching over with a cage on his powerful back, Chrysalis’ lips twisted into a wicked little smirk.

‘How about this for a distraction, hm?’ she thought. Her footstool’s little misadventures with the Dragon Princess hadn’t gone unnoticed by her. She had the bruise from Lady Cadenza, that stunted wretch, to prove it.

With the swiftness and discipline of a Hive soldier, Pharynx set down the obsidian cage, giving Chrysalis full view of its occupant. Who, naturally, didn’t look happy, lying down with his arms crossed and throwing her a scornful glare. But that glare got replaced by a confused look, when Chrysalis gestured at Pharynx to open the cage.

“Well, go on, then,” said Chrysalis.

She watched Garble stand to take his first few steps outside what had been his home for the past few weeks, onto the white sand. He looked around, bewildered, before settling his gaze on Chrysalis.

“So… no catch, nothin’?” Garble asked.

Chrysalis groaned. “No,” she said, baring her fangs. “Now, shoo, before I change my mind.”

It was all she had to say. Garble only took the time to rapidly duck back inside the cage, grabbing that mystery package he’d got a couple days earlier, before he scurried away along the beach, tail hanging behind him. Chrysalis watched his figure retreat, shrinking, until he disappeared into the cliffs.

Snorting dismissively, Chrysalis lifted her hindlegs off Thorax’s withers, stretching and yawning. She saw Thorax gasp for air, wobbling feebly onto his legs.

“You too. Run along, Thorax,” Chrysalis said, cracking her neck. “How about you go follow that princess of yours in town. You’re a Changeling. Act like it. Won’t that be fun?”

Chrysalis noticed Thorax glance at her in surprise, then nervously towards Pharnyx, who’d put on his most inscrutable expression. All Thorax did was give a quick, desperate nod, bowing at her in abject gratitude, after which he finally took flight.

* * * * *

It hadn’t taken long after that for Chrysalis to bemoan her loss of a footstool. It also hadn’t taken long for Pharynx to take his place. Perhaps Thorax had a point about Chrysalis’ hindlegs. Heavy, they were. And he knew the Queen was only putting him through this indignity as punishment for losing the duel with the human, Reiner. But Pharynx was a loyal soldier of the Hive, and it was his duty to carry out. Even something so menial as propping up the Queen. If Thorax couldn’t do this, Pharynx would stoically perform the task as only he could.

For that matter, Chrysalis didn’t seem too concerned with pressing him down. He noticed the Queen signalling a few new figures coming up the beach, one of whom he recognised as the Harlequin Queen-in-Waiting. By her side was her heavyset Red Hive bodyguard, Mandible, walking the Timberwolves they’d captured in the Macintosh Mountains.

Seeing Chrysalis signal, the Queen-in-Waiting started, and fluttered over.

“Papillate,” said Queen Chrysalis, “could you be a dear and show me what you’ve practiced?”

The little Queen-in-Waiting tilted her head, prior to nodding. Rapidly, the green flames enveloped her, reflected upon the beach’s sandy white. What re-emerged was an equine figure with a blocky muzzle, a striped mane and equally striped frame.

Chrysalis sighed. “No, not that,” she said, although the lecherous feelings radiating off her did not escape Pharynx. “The other one.”

The zebra’s face grinned sheepishly, whereupon Papillate let the flames of transformation engulf her anew. When Pharynx saw what she’d turned into this time, he momentarily thought his eyes were tricking him.

At Chrysalis’ request, a familiar lithe, blue dragonet stood before them.

“Good,” cooed Chrysalis. “You know what to do, my sweetling. Those two fools can’t yet have gone far. You ought to pick up their love-scents. Now to test how well you can emulate another creature’s love-scent.”

Papillate silently nodded again, but Pharynx’s ears had perked at the word ‘fools’.

As he saw the false blue dragonet set off, there was no question what his Queen’s game was. He hadn’t been able to hide from Chrysalis what his fight with the Dragon Princess, the one which had led into the official duel against the human, had been about. Far from being upset there, Chrysalis had found this amusing. Like him, she knew there was nothing so cock-eyed as a Changeling in love.

Worse, though. While the cretinous red drake who “guarded” the Dragon Princess might not even know it, he did have feelings for Ember as well.

Pharynx grimaced. Whatever prank Chrysalis wanted Papillate to play, there was no outcome where this ended well for Thorax. And although he was rough with his brother, Pharynx had never liked anyone else getting rough with Thorax. Even the Queen. He’d always sheltered his little brother from her wrath or cruel games when he could. But what could he do now, while Chrysalis had her eye on him?

‘Eyes…’ he thought. ‘That’s it!’

A bit further along the beach, Aphid still played with her silly little castles. But she must have heard everything. The girl hung onto the Queen’s every word, no matter how trivial. Sure enough, Pharynx saw her looking their way. Normally, he found her habit of miming instead of talking to be annoying – but for once, Pharynx felt thankful his self-appointed “adoptive sister” was an expert in non-verbal communication.

Concentrating, Pharynx focused his magic so only his eyes would transform, in a subtle flash, to mimic the red-pupilled eyes of the Dragon Princess, then Papillate’s yellow eyes. It startled poor Aphid, who took a step back. But she seemed to quickly get his drift, from her vigorous nod.

Aphid sauntered off to the Queen, happy as she could be. She shot Pharynx a glance. A little forehoof reached out to Chrysalis, and tapped her shoulder.

“Huh-what?” Chrysalis exclaimed, eyes darting around. “Oh, Aphid. Yes, what is it, dear? Need a new scoop?”

Aphid shook her head, pointing at her saddlebags, by Chrysalis’ sunlounger. Then mimed a glass. Or a bottle. Pharynx couldn’t tell.

“But… you know you’re short a year for drinking,” said Chrysalis. Her grin widened. “Who cares. Here, my little sweetbug.” The saddlebags were summoned to her. Chrysalis reached her purse. A few bits trickled into Aphid’s forehoof. “Go have a sip or two. But save some for Mother, will you? Wouldn’t want to get too tipsy, dear.”

So Aphid leaned forward and nuzzled Chrysalis, rubbing against her chin, still beaming. But when Pharynx’s eyes found Aphid’s, a wink followed.

* * * * *

Thorax had quickly picked up Princess Ember’s love-scent. When he’d sensed it stemmed from the same ruined fortress he’d been admiring at the beach, he’d felt a moment’s apprehension, realising there’d be crowds there. A crowd of Madame Heartstrings’ burgeoning expedition, beginning to file down the staircases to take a closer look at the freshly-arrived sky-turtles, which loomed imposingly over the town’s harbour.

But then he’d spotted that the Princess was perched a way away from the crowd, showing no inclination to go and join them. And now he wondered what he’d say to her.

His heart skipped a beat when Ember’s eyes found him.

“Hey!” she exclaimed. “Thorax!”

Good going. He’d got too close. She swooped down from her perch, landing perfectly on the grassy knoll with hardly a crack. Now or never. With hesitant steps, he approached her, until he was within reach.

“I…” he began. His voice faded.

“Yeah?” said Ember. “What’s up?”

Her brow was raised. But her stance was relaxed, her shoulders loose. Thorax steeled himself. His brother had told him much. What to do, and what to think. He had to keep promises.

“Princess Ember,” he said, his tone neutral. “Your bodyguard has been released.”

Ember blinked. “Uh-huh… right. So. Garble’s been released, I get you. She looked around, huffing. “Listen, um, I… remember the mess back at the Hall and… I just want to move from it, y’know? So, here. I think I’d want to play the guitar soon. You wanna come?”

Tempting. Why was it so hard? But Thorax knew his duty. What Pharynx expected from him.

“No… No, I don’t think I can,” said Thorax. His jaws, tight as they were, felt as if they should be loosened. He pressed on. “I’m just here… to tell you about Garble. Your bodyguard. Yes.”

“...O-okay,” Ember answered. Her shoulders fell, Thorax saw. Then she glared. “Fine. Guess I’ll go find him, then. Where is he?”

“Last I saw him, he was heading for the cliffs, I think…”

And that was that. Shaking her head, Ember beat her wings and went. Thorax stayed staring at her receding form long after. Sudden impulse then seized him. He couldn’t leave it at that. His wings began to buzz as he prepared to follow.

* * * * *

Freedom, at last. Hidden away in a dense patch of foliage atop the cliff, Garble finally allowed himself a breath of relief, clutching his care-package to his chest. Before tasting freedom, he’d thought he’d want nothing so much as revenge upon Chrysalis. Now he was finally out, he realized it felt just too sweet to be here, enjoying a moment’s peace. His wings, after being cramped in a cage for weeks, had ached terribly once he’d stretched them anew. But, oh, the bliss of getting to fly once more!

Wings… So much trouble in his life could trace back to when he’d molted, getting wings.

His relief fading, Garble set down his package, contemplating it. He wanted what was inside. Yet ever since he’d found this hobby, he’d suffered for it. Not all dragons rigidly followed the code that a molting dragon be kicked out of the family nest. His own parents likely wouldn’t have – if it hadn’t been the perfect excuse, after his un-dragonlike side came to light. Filthy hypocrites.

Garble had struck out on his own for years, and if he had tears to shed, he'd spent them long ago. Let his parents be Smolder's business. She'd got to stay home even once she'd sprouted wings, whereas he'd been kicked out because he refused to have his wings clipped, so to speak. Sometimes, he felt he may have resented her for this, weren't it for her unwavering support, when few others would offer it.

It wasn’t his fault the best role model he’d found out in the wild was a drake who’d let himself get shooed away by ponies. The only way the mockery could have been worse, was if dragons learned a pony had driven Razer to tears. Boy, how the old dragon had acted so on-his-knees towards him after that, telling him how sorry he was, how he’d changed his mind about his hundred-year nap and how Garble would be welcome back. Too little, too late.

Feeling his lip curl, Garble decided to finally get to what he wanted. He began to unwrap the package, retrieving one of the items Smolder had sent from the Dragonlands, which he treasured more than other dragons treasured their hoards

A pair of rock bongos. Despite everything, Garble now smiled crookedly at the sight.

* * * * *

Following the red drake’s love-scent, or any scent of his, hadn’t been tough for Papillate. With his cage in Queen Chrysalis’ bedroom, she’d spent enough time close by him to know it well. At first, his presence hadn’t helped Papillate’s anxiety any, despite Queen Chrysalis’ reassurances that a tarp pulled over the cage provided them sufficient privacy. With the sort of requests the Queen made every other night, it’d taken Papillate ages to dispel her discomfort. Eventually, however, the caged drake had just become part of the scenery.

But the Swarmarch had told her early on that, as the next step in her education, Papillate would one day be expected to test her charms on other subjects. That day was here.

In her disguise as the blue Dragon Princess, Papillate observed the drake from a safe distance, peering through a patch in the foliage. Queen Chrysalis hadn’t given her any easy beginner’s test. Dragons weren’t known as lovestruck creatures. Still, Papillate had seized her courage, and resolved to go in. Teenagers of any species were malleable like putty.

Yet this was the last thing she’d expected. The red drake in front of two stone drums, she thought was what they were. Tapping at them slowly, musically. It made her hesitate. And in her hesitation, Papillate sensed someone had snuck up on her in the foliage. With a surprised gasp, Papillate turned abruptly to face another Changeling. She saw it was a drone, a tiny thing, yet one she’d met before. One of the Ebony Hive, the silent yet energetic Aphid.

Cutting across her way, the little drone stood on her hindlegs, stretching out her forehooves in what Papillate discerned to be an attempt to hinder her.

Papillated looked at the drone. “I-I’ve got something to do. Please just… just step aside.”

Aphid shook her head. She tapped both her hooves on the ground. A flash of green fire, and a little orange dragonet stood where she’d been. The dragonet waved at Papillate, then sat down. She tapped at the ground, two rhythmic beats. Another flash, and little Aphid stood there. She mimed two items on the ground, then resumed the orange dragonet’s form, waving goodbye.

By the time Aphid pointed towards the red drake, understanding dawned. Papillate was getting a grasp for the little drone’s strange way of communicating. It helped that she remembered the sign Aphid had used to describe the formidable soldier, Pharynx, as her brother.

“... From the drake’s sister, huh?” But Papillate shook her head in turn. “I’m… I’m sorry. It’s the Swarmarch. She gave me a job to do.”

Whereupon she pushed past Aphid before the drone could stop her.

* * * * *

Garble was surprised, and displeased, to see a certain blue dragonet emerge into his hidey-hole.

“You?” He bared his teeth. At that moment, he couldn’t care that his bongos were in full view. “Fancy seeing you here, Princess.”

“Yeah?” Ember said slowly, sultrily. “Well, fancy seeing you here, Garble…”

He blinked. “Huh?”

Tittering, the blue dragonet stood upright, showily rubbing her face with one claw while the other rubbed her hips, in a demeanour that wouldn’t have been out-of-place against saxophone music in a Klugetown bar.

“Oh, I’ve been missing you all that time, didn’t you know?” said Ember, sashaying towards him, to place her claw beneath his muzzle. “How sorry I felt for you, stuck in that cage… A strong, handsome drake like you, all alone… But I can take care of you now…”

Her words, and her touch, did send signals along his scales pleasing to his teenage mind. Garble couldn’t deny that. It was why, for an instant, he wanted to believe it. Yet only an instant.

“Yeah, right,” he said flatly. “How dumb do you think I am?”

The blue dragonet stopped cold. “Pardon?”

Garble sighed. “There you go again… The real Princess don’t talk like that. You’re a Changeling, ain’t ya?”

She gasped in horror, which told him all he needed.

“Figures,” Garble muttered, standing. “Shoulda known the Roach Queen weren’t done with me… Well, don’t just stand there, fake, show yourself!

Whether out of fear or on instinct, his words had an effect on her. Abrubtly, the Changeling flames that were green, like the Chaoskämpfer’s but not proper dragonfire at all, took over ‘Ember’. And after that, she was replaced by a metal-green bee-thing, of diamond-marked chitin.

“Hey, I know you…” Garble started to growl, remembering his so-called vaccination by Chrysalis. “You’re the roach who brought that needle. It hurt like Tartarus. What’s your deal?”

Her lip trembled. “L-look, I got-gotta do this! The Queen will be very unhappy if I don’t have any love to bring back to her!”

“So?” Garble snorted. “What’s it to me, roach?” He rubbed the sore spot on his thigh, contemptuously. “Serves you right, far as I’m concerned. But you’re in luck, I can’t even be bothered scratching you for that. Get lost.”

He sat back down, ignoring her. The Changeling stood there, then, hanging her head, she prepared to fly off. As she raised herself, however, Garble gave her another look. She seemed rather lonely and sad.

“Hm…” Garble snapped his fingers. He’d just had an intriguing idea. “Wait. I know, you could…” But then he deflated. “Ah, forget it.”

She turned to stare back at him, confused. “Eh?”

Garble waved her off. “Nah, dumb idea. I was thinking, you could be my sister… ‘Cept you don’t know what she looks like.”

The Changeling’s brow creased in thought. Suddenly, the green flames surrounded her, and to Garble’s great surprise, there stood a perfect imitation of Smolder.

“How’d–”

“We all got our tricks,” she said wanly. Which sounded weird from Smolder.

He shook his head. “Never mind. You stay here. I’ll be right back.”

What he wanted to do didn’t require her not looking, Garble knew as he picked up his leftover care-package, retreating into a denser foliage patch bordering the cliffside. After all, she’d see him soon enough. But this still wasn’t really Smolder. He didn’t feel comfortable changing in front of her. Funny, given she was a Changeling.

Under safe cover, he reached in and pulled out what was left in the package. He’d missed these nearly as much as the bongos, but once he’d got them, without Smolder around, he hadn’t seen the point of putting them on. Actually, in her absence, he’d felt something missing to his beat. Perhaps, Garble hoped as he began pulling an arm through a sleeve, this’d make the difference.

When he returned, ‘Smolder’ was still there. She gazed at him, nonplussed.

Garble raised a claw. “Here’s the deal, ‘sis’. We sit together. I play, you listen. You do that, and we’ll both keep mum. You won’t tell you saw this, I won’t tell Chrysalis how you got love. We clear?”

‘Smolder’ nodded, thoughtful-looking. “You know… This is kinda like transforming yourself, too.”

“Bah,” Garble said as he sat by his bongos. “Just shut up and listen.”

So he began to play anew, in full attire.

And for a while, he could pretend it was just him there with his sister, nothing hanging over him, least of all other dragons’ judgement.

Or his mission from the Chaoskämpfer.

* * * * *

The first thing Ember noticed was Garble, sitting down, with two rock bongos. The second was a smaller orange dragonet, sitting with her legs pressed to her chest, watching Garble play in awe. The third, most distractingly, was that Garble had clothing on. A blue-and-white striped shirt, like a sailor’s, and a beret.

Then Garble, mid-beat, saw Ember, and his voice came out like he was strangled.

“Em-ber?”

Ember looked at him, up and down. “... What are you wearing?”

“I… uh, it’s nothing,” said Garble, hastily stuffing away his beret.

“Nothing?” Ember repeated. She gestured to all of him. “You look so… so wide! Where’d you get this stuff?”

She reached out to grab at his sleeve, but Garble snatched it back, rubbing at it as if her touch were contagious.

“Hey, careful!” he shouted. “It weren’t easy getting these here…”

Ember shot the little orange dragonet by his side a quick glance. “Yeah, sure,” she said, scoffing. “How do you explain her, then?”

The little dragon squeaked, turned into a Changeling and flew away. Initially feeling surprised, Ember then saw things become clear.

“Admit it, Garble,” she said, faintly amused. “You like to dress up.”

“Whu-?” Garble’s nostrils flared. “Hey, this isn’t a dress, this is authenticity!”

That threw Ember off. “How do you know that word?”

“How do you not?” retorted Garble. “Okay, so I keep this stuff secret. But I do have one person I share it with.” He gestured at Papillate. “Sure, I’m making do with what I got. Still, Smolder’s a real dragon. All you got is a roach.”

Ember stiffened. “What?”

“Oh, I was there, remember? When you were playin’ guitar. Or what, “ Garble leered at her, “don’t tell me you liked performing for roaches?”

“W-what? No! No it’s… it’s not the same. It’s…” She stiffened up. “It’s not like I cared about him, just like you cared ‘bout her over there, huh?”

* * * * *

And of course, in the foliage, two other Changelings overheard.

“But we’re friends…”

Aphid grabbed onto Thorax, shaking her head as she tugged him. She withdrew, and mimed.

‘Don’t be a doofus!’ read her signs. ‘You know she doesn’t mean it. She’s only saying those things because she’s a dragon, and wants to save face.’

Aphid rummaged through her saddlebags. In her aura, she held a bottle of water. It looked expensive, the price a good few bits. But Thorax pushed it away when she gave him puppy eyes and offered it to him.

“Does she?” Thorax whispered, in a cracked voice. “Well, that… that still doesn’t make this right.”

He left then, going where Papillate had gone, not hearing how the rest of the dragons’ argument was to unfold, nor caring.

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

A chapter that was created from splitting the prior Chapter Twenty-Two (‘Unveiled’) into two chapters.

In the scene of the PHL penal squad, Aegis reflects on his children.

The scene of Princess Cadance talking with Alexander Reiner is expanded to touch upon her encounter with Verity Carter in Boston.

Cadance is reminded of Sunset Shimmer when she meets Sunburst.

Act III ~ Chapter Twenty-Four ~ Unveiled

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy

VoxAdam

Sledge115

Oh and how I used to wonder, what friendship could be...

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Twenty-Four

Unveiled

* * * * *

We understand you wanting more
A chance to shine, a chance to soar
Soon will come the day it turns around
Know that your time is coming soon
As the sun rises, so does the moon
As love finds a place in every heart
You are a princess; you’ll play your part
—You’ll Play Your Part, by Daniel Ingram

~ The Hall of Unity ~ Day 11 of the Convocation ~ Twentieth Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of The Era Harmoniae ~

Evening in these gardens felt different, somehow, to Prince Blueblood.

Back in Canterlot, he knew Aunt Celestia’s gardens, famous for their array of flora and fauna – especially the birds of every colour, the toucans, the hummingbirds and the flamingos, or the jays. Wallaroos and kangaroos. If only they’d dare show themselves more. But there was one lesson Celestia had drilled into him from a young age. Be patient with these animals. They are not yours to pet, for they were rescued from poachers and others who’d mistreat them, and they’d have little chance to survive in the wild anymore.

His one attempt at disobedience was also the rare time he could remember Celestia punishing him with severity. The lesson had stuck. Ironic, then, that a few years later, the stampeding of these same creatures at the Grand Galloping Gala had coincided with him getting more than he’d bargained for in taunting a gold-digger.

Those gardens were Celestia’s. In those gardens, he’d found his skill at the centre of the Maze, But he’d known what he was looking for then. Right now, he couldn’t say he did. With Awesome Fire and Shieldwall busy on their own projects, and Basil away in Gallopoli, Blueblood was left to his thoughts. Maybe he was looking for tranquility of mind. Beyond the pillars of the pagoda, the Sun began to cloak along the horizon, as the cycle transitioned from Celestia to Luna’s rule. In the last two weeks, Luna had made the Hall’s gardens her own. Unlike Celestia’s, they held no living creatures he knew of.

The sound of running water alerted him that he was coming to a fountain. Stopping, he considered it, then went ahead. If he couldn’t drown himself in a bottle tonight, perhaps the water’s sound could drown out unwelcome thoughts.

It was to his surprise, when he stepped around a hedge to the fountain square, that he found he wasn’t as alone as he’d believed.

The human woman lay facing away from him, on the great fountain’s plinth, basking in the last rays of sunshine. Squinting, Blueblood strained to see her face. Less than a dozen humans had crossed over from Earth since Luna’s return, of varying ranks and purpose. He did not think this one of their leadership. Too open to exposure here, even if the Hall of Unity was nominally safe.

He wondered if he should just turn back. Obviously she’d chosen to be alone, likely for reasons he dare not imagine. But compulsion overruled him. This could be his first, if not his only occasion to approach a human outside a formal environment.

Thus, tidying back his mane, checking his growing beard, and brushing his snazzy new longcoat, he walked over.

“Beautiful evening, isn’t it?”

“Wah! Oh–” the human yelped, catapulting up. In seconds, she went to cover herself with her arms. She turned to face him. “Oh, my go– I am so, so very sorry…”

She drew her legs up, leaving her seated in a foetal position upon the plinth’s rim.

“Hi, um,” said the human. “Y-yeah. Beautiful evening. How’re you? Sorry, erm, I… I should probably, probably– gah, I’m so sorry,”

Despite her startled, babbling tone, Blueblood noted her pronunciation of Modern Equish was close to flawless, with only a hint of accent, one he couldn’t quite place yet which struck him as unexpectedly familiar, comforting.

This made him happy. He’d been kicking himself for automatically using Equish to greet her, rather than the Common Tongue. But he much preferred speaking the former, so that it was a mild regret of his that Basil only spoke Common.

The human’s hand reached towards a piece of armour on the ground. It was odd, Blueblood thought, to happen upon a human outside their omnipresent armor or fabric. This one looked oddly small without them.

That was when he noticed her head of hair – he wasn’t sure if humans would call it a mane. It was a shade of brownish-red, a pleasing colour, and cut short, which was less pleasing. But neither of those were what caught his attention. Although it had dried quickly in the Midsummer heat, tiny droplets of water still matted her hair, too many to just be splashes from the fountain. Enough droplets covered what else he saw of her to confirm his suspicions.

“Ah,” he said. “Apologies, I didn’t realise.” He paused, considering teasing her along, but decided this might be a conversation-dampener. “Don’t worry, I won’t tell a soul. It isn’t allowed, true, but I’ve bathed in fountains a fair few times myself– with a bottle stuck over my horn, more often than not. Crazy nights.”

“... Aah, you… you snuck around, too?” Her hand stopped short of reaching for her armour. She kept it held out, fingers trembling, before slowly pulling back. She had big, warm blue eyes. “Yeah, erm… thanks for… covering for me, I guess. It-it’s been a long few m-months, and... well, I c-couldn’t resist.”

Blueblood nodded, feeling more sympathy than he’d suspected. “I understand war doesn’t do much for creature comforts…” he said, taking a seat a small distance from her on the plinth. “It must be a shock, going from that to… Well, this.”

His forehoof swept over the intricate garden.

“Luxury,” he finished. “I’ve known it all my life, you know.”

“Th-that’s nice...” the human said, shakily. “One of my f-friends is rich. Well, um, richer than me. Or… or my other friends. Actually, I d-don’t know if she s-still is. But she’s still around, so that’s… that’s good.”

While she’d got over her surprise, he picked up on her continued nervousness. Aunt Celestia had explained that in war, it wasn’t uncommon for fighters to develop what she called a ‘twitchiness’. Yet the human was speaking plainly enough. So, could it be his station which made her nervous? Now wouldn’t that be a change from his would-be suitors...

Idly, Blueblood dipped his forehoof into the pool, watching the ripples trace.

“Oh, I’m not just a loafer, I’ll have you know,” he said casually. “Took the initiative to earn my own bread once, me and some friends. For a whole year. ‘Course, it was meant to be fun, too. We’d… borrowed ourselves a big ship, see, and went storm-hunting around the world… Know what prices they’ll offer for harvested lightning, on the Ryupponese black market?”

The human shrugged. “Mmm, no, not really,” she said. She remained tucked up, but her shakes had receded somewhat. “How much were they offering for… lightning?”

“More than enough for bed and board,” Blueblood smiled. “And a month’s worth of supplies for twenty mouths. The authorities didn’t like it, obviously…” He chuckled and slunk down to rest. “But isn’t that part of the life? The thrill of having them on your tail at any moment.”

While she remained unmoving, the human smiled crookedly.

“I can relate to that,” she said wistfully. “Well– the thrill. I get different sorts of thrills, but… out in the ocean, being pursued n’ all that? I know the feeling.”

“Huh, really?” Blueblood said, looking at her curiously. “What are the odds? Didn’t think it was exactly a common experience.” He whetted his lips. “Are you saying you’ve been around pirates?”

“Mmh, kind of,” she said, with matter-of-factness that sounded forced. “We don’t… don’t really have swashbuckling pirates anymore. But I dealt with Imperials out at sea with a… well, a rag-tag bunch. Soldiers, smugglers and… me, a chemist.”

This was getting more and more interesting, and in such a small space of time.

“Yeah,” Blueblood acknowledged. “Auntie made it clear that it’s a mess on Earth, everything a life-or-death situation… I suppose my pirate talk must sound quaint to you.”

She was a chemist, was she? On instinct, Blueblood glanced at her hip. He found himself a little taken aback to see nothing except a few water-drops clinging to her skin.

“Ah, my bad,” he muttered. “They don’t have cutie marks either… Had to be sure.”

Her cheeks had gone red, he noticed.

“N-no, no we, we don’t,” she stammered. To Blueblood’s regret, she had tensed up once more. “We… we don’t get cutie marks, um...”

She quickly glanced at his own flank. “I, ah, see yours is… fitting, eh-heh, heh,” she said, maintaining her grimacing smile.

Yes, there was a discomfort here. Maybe now was his cue to paper over it, make this more than a Prince indulging a nameless commoner.

“Well, I’m sure you know who I am,” Blueblood said amiably. “Prince Blueblood by title, Astron by first name. And you’re right, mine’s a fitting mark for the high seas. Now, it’s going to be of great service to Equestria, on this expedition of Madame Heartstrings’. You must’ve heard of her. But, tell me. What’s your name?”

She didn’t say anything, at first. Then, softly, she spoke.

“Ana.”

* * * * *

She shouldn’t have done it, Ana thought, tightening her grip. Shouldn’t have pranced her way into the gardens. Shouldn’t have basked in the evening Sun. Yet… Somehow, the guy didn’t seem to mind at all, in spite of her current state.

“Ana,” he repeated. “That’s an easy name to remember. Even shorter than Auntie Luna’s.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Ana said, letting out a small chuckle. “It’s actually longer than that, way longer, but Ana will do for now. Ana Bjorgman. That’s with a ‘j’, by the way. Sorry. Force of habit. I’ve had to go through lots of ID checks.”

“ID?” Prince Blueblood sounded confused, before he apparently remembered. “Ah, yes. Fascinating cultural distinction… You know, passports aren’t too common on this world, except for Ryuppon and some other places. So... in a way, you do have a mark.”

“Oh,” Ana said simply. Something about how he said it, she found rather welcoming. “That was… kind of you, really. I suppose we do have our marks, in that we… make them.”

Blueblood nodded. “Sounds like the Minotaurs and their artisanship.” He glanced upwards. “I never did ask if I was named after that character, Asterion, from their myths… My father didn’t like people much, but I think he had a soft spot for Minotaurs.”

There was an old tone in his voice, of longing and remembrance of days gone by. She was beginning to feel her arm’s grip around her legs ease up. After a hesitation, she let go, letting her palms slide down to the plinth’s rim.

“Asterion is a fine name,” Ana said sincerely. “Perhaps your father… well, I assume he was well-read, perhaps he intended for your name to be a well-remembered one.”

Never mind that she didn’t know anything about an ‘Asterion’, but the little voice in her head was guiding her way.

“My name… isn’t as old as yours,” Ana began. Tentatively, she unfolded a leg, lowering it to touch her foot upon the grass. “But I suppose my mother also had a soft spot for the old days… I was named after a princess… Duchess Anastasia. She died young, and… and my grandfather and mother agreed to name me after her. So that even in death, she’d be remembered. I suppose that’s what she– we, that’s what Ann– it’s what all of us want, really. Remembrance.”

For a moment, Ana recalled the ambitious, grumpy yet loving Hanne Adler, who’d gone on and on about human legacy, during the times they’d spent together as friends and more in their university days.

“What’s so funny?” asked Blueblood.

She must have burst out laughing. “Nothing, nothing just… an old friend. Well, I say ‘friend’ and we’ve… She’s, she’s weird in her own way.”

‘Look who’s talking, silly.’

“Weird,” Blueblood repeated.

Ana brushed away a bang, pondering. Only as she did so did she realise she’d let her hands relax.

“Well, she’d go on about how legacy is most important,” Ana began. It was easy to recite, considering Hanne’s penchant to reiterate her ambitions. “So she went on to do the one thing that fits. Photography! Goodness, she’s got such a keen eye. Oh, you should see her photos... the Barrier one is everywhere! She hit it big. Everyone’s seen her photos, read what she writes... I ought to read her columns more often. She’s… she’s one of the only friends I’ve got left, and...”

Her hands fell to her sides, dejectedly.

“Would that be the one you said was rich?” Blueblood said curiously. “Sounds like someone who chose not to simply let life offer her things on a silver platter.”

“Yeah. And I… guess she didn’t.”

Blueblood sighed, casting his gaze down at the grass before the fountain.

“Enviable,” he muttered. “You know, in three-thousand years of unbroken lineage… well, fair enough, nothing’s ever that neat, but still… I’m the one-hundred-and-eighth Prince of Equestria to bear the name ‘Blueblood’. It’s hard to find what makes you stand out, with heritage like that.”

Ana saw him look towards what was left of the setting Sun, a gold outline tracing the hedge tops. She wondered if he was thinking about his ancestors, or Princess Celestia.

“The last Blueblood to bear a nickname was Blueblood the Challenger,” the Prince told her. “And he was an explorer… Can I even claim that, or measure up to him? All I’ve got is what my friends call me, ever since our little joyride aboard Auntie C’s flagship… Bluenose.” He chuckled weakly. “Sure, I’m fine with it. It’s cute. But is that going to make the history books? I doubt it will.”

Looking at him, Ana thought he looked like a child, whose dreams had slowly eroded over the passing years. Slowly, she reached out to place a hand on his shoulders, and formed what she hoped was a comforting smile.

“Wouldn’t know before you tried it, would you?”

* * * * *

Blueblood asked himself why he was being so open with this human. Perhaps there was a side to this ‘Ana Bjorgman’ which he found invited frank presentation, a sense of baring yourself. If he was honest with himself, while both males and females had their attractions for him, he’d always felt easier in male company – Cadance and his aunts being honourable exceptions, or his father, with whom it had been the other way around.

Most females were too blinded by his princely title to see the real stallion. With males, like sweet Basil, he’d usually be given the chance to seek them out, and see if they genuinely reciprocated. He had the feeling that, whatever her anxious reaction when he’d come across her, Miss Bjorgman’s worry had little to do with him finding her enjoying personal use of the Hall’s grounds. That made him inclined to like her more.

“No, I suppose you wouldn’t know it before you try,” Blueblood acknowledged. “But... You know, I used to believe it was so daring, taking off on that ship with Sooty and Wally. A year on a Grand Tour, like the gentry used to do… I thought that, if I never experienced anything like it again for a hundred years, the feeling would last forever... But then I came back. And nothing had changed.”

He sighed and looked at her.

“I’m sorry. I’m talking about myself again,” he said. “I do hope that, however short your respite here may be, Miss Bjorgman, it’ll help you in this war.”

The serene smile she wore tugged at her lips. “Oh, don’t worry, Your Highness,” she said gently. “I like hearing stories, much as Hanne likes recording them. Any rest, well, I’d take anything for a good night’s rest, every day of every week. And I’m sure all of us do, really.”

She leaned back, but Blueblood thought he saw faint traces of a blush.

“I mean, look at me! I mean–” Ana said, rapidly. Her arms had been outstretched, as if she were presenting to the whole wide world. Blueblood wondered at how she flipped back and forth between a common sort of wisdom and whatever this was. ”I-I’m sorry you saw me like… this,” the human said, folding her arms across her chest. “Just… there’s no easy way to put it. We’re all tired and… and I thought I’d indulge a bit, in what I used to do before all this. Being free.”

“Ah,” said Blueblood. “What did you use to do, before all this?”

“Well, uh, music?” she said quickly. “Playing the guitar under the stars, with friends and– don’t mind me, this is just– me indulging, how I prefer to be. But I like music.” She giggled. “There was this one time when… I decided to play a song. It’s a good one and I might show it to you one day, but anyway– so, I played it, right? Everyone sang along and… there it was. Reindeer in the fire.”

Blueblood stared at her. “Pardon?”

"Sometimes I feel like there's something weird, y'know?” Ana continued glibly. “For most people, life on Earth, well, it seemed so… so normal, they’d sort of wish something weird would happen. Then, once it did… Well. But I wonder... when the same weirdness keeps happening to you, does that make it normal?”

“Like what?”

“Like Reindeer...” said Ana. “Always, always there in my head. What’s their deal here? I feel it… got more, um, frequent when the war started. Do you, uh, have any idea why that might be?”

* * * * *

“No… I have no idea,” said Blueblood, stroking his beard. “Sounds like it’s another mystery.”

She met her gaze with the Prince’s. His eyes, she thought, were remarkably blue. Here, though, they darted left and right, briefly, as if he’d rather be anywhere else. He seemed stricken. As though something in her words had reached out to him, more deeply than any other they might have shared in all of this. An intimacy which she hadn’t suspected. And yet, look at her, talking like she was. To royalty, no less… Mind you, this was Equestria. From what she’d seen, all the Princesses showed the same openness as Lady Cadance. She just thought it wasn’t what she’d have expected from this Prince.

As it was, he opened his mouth. Then he closed it again. She let it pass, and shrugged.

“Maybe,” Ana pondered. “Ah, well, not all questions need answering, eh?”

“Madame Heartstrings would disagree,” said Blueblood. “But what I can agree to, Miss Bjorgman, is that sometimes you just need to take a break from it all… if our little chat here hasn’t made it blindingly obvious.”

He stood up.

“Often, I’m good at a quick sip of the bottle,” Blueblood said. “Still, I’ve been trying to cut back on this trip… Sailors drink often and plenty, anyway. So I’ve sought relaxation in other places, some more acceptable than others,” he winked slyly. “Lyra Heartstrings is a gifted musician, though. Shame she didn’t make it to the Royal Orchestra. But as it happens, she… had suggested a small get-together this evening.”

And now, Ana felt sure her smile was finally genuine.

“If it’s… not too much to ask,” she said, tentatively. “Any room for a guitar?”

“I was hoping you’d say that,” Blueblood said genially. “I know for sure Madame Heartstrings would be pleased to have a human around.”

“Oh, I’m sure she would be,” Ana said wistfully. The memory of Ambassador Heartstrings resurfaced as it often did.

Once again, Ana saw him give the fading sunlight an inquisitive glance.

“I’d say we have half an hour,” Blueblood commented. “Enough to set you up. If you don’t mind. I won’t take offense should you decline.”

“Sure,” said Ana, shrugging. “I don’t mind. I... just need to stretch a little first, if you don’t mind?”

“Naturally,” said Blueblood. Right as Ana stood up, his eyes fell upon the gear she’d left lying in the grass. “Hm. Some of this equipment looks quite heavy. If you’ll allow me…”

He didn’t wait for an answer before his horn shone gold, lifting the whole of it in a glowing aura, which he brought to circle around him in a ring of levitation – then close in on itself, as the material appeared to compress into thin air.

“Wait, wait, wait!” Ana cried, reaching out frantically. “W-what are you doing?”

Blueblood smiled and didn’t stop. “Oh… I thought you’d seen magic before. Don’t worry,” he said reassuringly. “This won’t damage it. I’m merely storing it in my null-space. A trick known to all the most gifted unicorns.”

He gave a single flick of his horn, and before Ana’s bewildered eyes, everything he’d picked up – her combat fatigues and armour, her new cap, even her basket and guitar – vanished into a tiny white dot, with a single, chiming gleam before dissipating.

“There,” Blueblood said happily. “Much easier to carry things this way.”

“That’s not– that’s not what I–” Ana stammered, chewing upon her knuckle. Then she let her shoulders slump. Looked as if she’d have to make do without any clothes for now. Hanne would be so proud.

‘Sure she would,’ tittered the voice in her head. ‘Nice going, ya big goof.’

She shuffled nervously on her feet. The grass felt coarser than ever, tickling her soles. At least Hanne or Harwood wouldn’t be there to scold her silly.

“I… I probably should put something on–” Ana began, but Prince Blueblood cut her off with a casual nod.

“That won’t be necessary, Miss Bjorgman,” said Blueblood, not unkindly. And Ana realised he must have thought this a courtesy. “This is not a ball or anything, there really is no need for formal attire.” He tugged at his jacket beneath the longcoat. “I just keep this on out of habit. I prefer the naval dress code, frankly.”

“I-ah– alright, um.”

Ana thought about it. She shrugged. After all, this was not Ambassador Lyra Heartstrings she’d be going to meet, she told herself.

“Thank you for agreeing to this,” said Blueblood. “I’ll show you the way, Miss Bjorgman.”

“Just call me Ana, yeah?” Ana said awkwardly. And deep down, she could somehow hear the little voice in her head giggling with impish mischief. “... Actually, uh, may I borrow your longcoat, please? I like coats.”

~ Gallopoli, Equestria ~

The day was practically spent, yet the streets of Gallopoli in Summer remained warm at night. Lamps began to light throughout the town. Together the two dragons strode through the streets, undisturbed by passers-by. So too had Ember and Garble been giving each other the silent treatment, since the embarrassment at the cliffs. But his beatnik gear was now tucked safely in her burlap sack, next to Spykoran’s canister.

They entered the harbour office. It was mostly empty, this time of day. Only a tall, grey earthpony mare was there, fast asleep at the porch. Her braided mane and tail hung to the side, her forehooves covering a large brown envelope.

“Looks like someone’s had a long day, huh?” Garble opined, but Ember said nothing.

A long wooden desk, going from wall-to-wall, cut the room in half. A wall of filing cabinets occupied the space behind the desk. As did a khaki-coated Kirin in naval uniform, with a notepad upon the desk.

“We’d expected we’d see you here a lot sooner, Your Highness,” said Overseer Kenji.

A Kirin of lower rank than those Ember had known in Court, he nonetheless did not employ the Common Tongue any more than the Language of the Cherry Blossom to address her, but the form of speech known as Low Ryupponese.

Ember, however, stuck to Common in her reply, so it would be understood by everyone present.

“I’ve got someone for you,” said Ember. “My bodyguard.”

Garble nearly choked. “What–”

“Hm.” Kenjii tapped his pen against his notepad. He now spoke Common in turn. “A military vessel is no place for tourists, Highness. You may be dispensed as royalty and ward of our Mikado, but we don’t need extra mouths. We need sailors.”

“Oh, Garble here’s a sailor,” Ember smiled. “Ain’t that right, Garble?”

“But– no, I–”

“Sure you are,” Ember nodded at Kenji. “Check his bags, Commander.”

Before Garble could react, the Kirin’s aura pulled out the striped shirt. Kenji nonchalantly examined the attire.

“That’s good enough for me. You’re in the crew now, dragon.”

“But that pony–” Garble protested, pointing out the sleeping earthpony.

“–has to go through customs,” Kenji said curtly. “She’s a citizen of Equestria, and you are not. You don’t have a passport. Fair game.”

~ The Hall of Unity ~

Music was a delicate art. Lyra Heartstrings knew that quite well. And although she had a reputation as an oddball theorist with a passion in cryptozoology, in Ponyville, many knew her for a busking musician. The lyre within her aura’s grip sounded a gentle melody, as its strings plucked in harmony with her thoughts. It was her calling. Here, away from the stage where she had spoken to the world, she was in her own world.

For this strange little gathering, she sat atop a table covered in white cloth, her legs crossed and eyes closed, lightly bobbing her head, following the melody she played. It was a song she’d discovered one day, in-between perusing tomes to back her ideas down at Golden Oaks Library. A song that playfully told the story of a hapless prince and the flower with which he sought to charm a princess of old.

Lyra wondered which of the two Royal Sisters it could have been, but if she had to guess, she’d have said it was the very Princess of the Moon now in attendance by Twilight’s side, listening to her play the soothing tune in awestruck silence. Well, time to impress, then.

The melody picked up. It flowed, rose and fell, it following her will and dancing as Lyra saw fit. She knew Bonbon was watching, too. Best to make her prouder still. Her magic weaved, plucking the strings. It coursed through her, enticing, embracing. In a company of old friends and new visitors from strange lands, Lyra Heartstrings’ talent shone bright as her mark. Just as it rose one final time, the melody slowed, ending with the last few gentle plucks. All around the dining-room, her audience applauded, whether by hoof, hand, paw, or claw.

All of it the same to Lyra’s refined ear.

“Thanks,” she smiled abashedly, setting down the lyre to take her bows. “And that was The Winds That Move The Aurora, which I came across one day while researching the history of the Crystal Realm, and the Frozen North.”

To cap it all off, Lyra had said this in Common, her Upper Canterlot accent out in full force. Bonbon went up to plant a small kiss on her cheek. “Beautiful, love.”

This made Lyra blush, but the scattered laughs this attracted were benign.

Afterwards, amidst the gathering’s varied attendees, it didn’t take long for Lyra to lose Bonbon in the crowd again. But it didn’t matter. There were plenty of faces to see, to mingle with.

Kiku, the Captain of the Expedition. Princess Luna. Headmaster Nexus. The Erklasses and Proxenos Darkhoof. The two hippogriff delegates. Prince Haakim. The other-Moondancer…

Or the fellow who’d spotted her just now.

“Lyra!” called the scruffy thestral stallion, who wore a hat with its brim pinned against the sides, exposing large, tufted and incredibly soft ears.

Lyra gasped, both forehooves to her cheeks. “Is that…”

She gasped, taking in the stallion. He was a dull grey-blue, with a grey mane streaked through with brown. On his flank lay the mark of a bookshelf.

“It is!” the thestral said, a warm smile on his face.

“Professor Shriek!” Lyra cried out, her face breaking out into a grin as she jumped towards the batlike pegasus. “It’s been too long!”

“Tell me about it,” Shriek laughed. “I was thinking you would’ve upended Equestrian history much earlier! You, in Ponyville, living near the Bearers of Harmony?”

“The time sort of gets away from you in Ponyville,” Lyra said sheepishly.

“Ah, don’t worry,” Shriek said. “Had I a bit for every day I didn’t upend Equestrian history, I wouldn’t have to beg for grant money! And isn’t that mud in the eye to ol’ Catseye!”

They laughed, as if sharing a private joke, although mention of her old classmate did give Lyra a twinge of unease.

“Oh, I’ve missed your classes so much,” said Lyra.

“According to campus police, anyway!” Shriek said, and they both let out a hearty laugh.

“I mean, honestly,” Lyra wheezed, “Dunno how wearing a buckball cap and prescription glasses fooled them so long!”

“And… the… the moustache!?” Shriek choked. “How… why… Where d’you even geta moustache in your mane colour!”

“Pinkie Pie,” Lyra said. “She’s, ah…”

“The Bearer of Laughter? Planned my niece’s mark mitzvah?” Shriek asked, his lime-green eyes twinkling with happiness. “Wait, wait. Never mind. That explains everything!”

He burst into laughter yet again. Lyra, after a moment’s pause, joined him. She didn’t understand it herself, but they’d shared laughter so often before that it didn’t matter at all. Between bouts of laughter, forehooves around one another, Lyra’s eyes panned left and right, taking in the sight of the attendees, all busy in their corners, but as content as she hoped they would be.

There was Bonbon, who’d gone off to converse with Professor Nexus near the door. Perhaps she was prying for stories from him. No matter. Lyra could certainly ask around for her embarrassing stories, too. Then there was Twilight, chatting animatedly and excitedly with the Princess of the Night, who looked glowing tonight, in spite of her all-too-evident exhaustion, and Ilsa the Snow Maiden, both of whom listened with vested interest. It’d have something to do with amulets, Lyra wagered.

‘Never change, Twi’…’

Luna and Ilsa weren’t the only leaders present, but from the way they carried themselves, one could be forgiven for thinking this was as Lyra wished it to be, a gathering between friends.

As she parted ways with Shriek, however, one thing gave Lyra a pang of regret. She no longer could see the PHL’s Moondancer.

“They’re over there, for the love of…”

It was a sleek-grey griffon by her that spoke, jabbing a talon in the direction of Queen Novo and General Skybeak, who looked as comfortable as any of their reclusive kind could get, chatting over a few drinks at their table. The hedgehog before her nodded hurriedly, and went away, tray in hand.

But it was the longcoat-clad, guitar-bearing figure by her side that caught Lyra’s eye.

“Hey, Professor? I got some… research to do,” said Lyra. “Catch you around later.”

“Anytime!”

Lyra turned, approaching the figure with confident stride. This one was not Alex, but a human was a human. And by her luck, the human was only with her companion, the fierce-looking griffon. Who looked fiercer still with heavyset brows and a sneer upon her beak.

“I swear, Ana,” the griffon grumbled, magenta eyes still trained on the hedgehog waiter, “those guys are pretty fuckin’ oblivious.”

“Aw, Frieda, come on,” the human replied, plucking her guitar, “he wasn’t that bad.”

“Hey, I dunno how you can mistake me for a hippogriff, Ana. Only that hedgehogs don’t exactly have the best eyesight,” said the griffon, her tail flicking at the human’s nose. “Nor does anyone else here, apparently. You’ve really gotta put something more on.”

“Easy for you to say, psh, just, don’t worry about it, I’m feeling just fine...” the human began. But then her eyes, large turquoise-blue eyes, fell upon Lyra. “Oh my, here she comes… Ahem, Madame Heartstrings, good evening!”

By Celestia, her voice was so warm. She didn’t look as heavily armoured as Alex would, with her pale skin only partially covered by the longcoat. Her kind eyes and short-cut, strawberry-blonde hair completed a welcoming image.

Lyra broke into a friendly smile. “Hi! I’m Lyra.”

Pause. They’d already known that. Stupid, stupid. But the lady chuckled. “Heh, been a tiring day, I’ll bet,” she said. “I’m Ana, Ana Bjorgman, and this is Frieda.”

“Howdy,” said Frieda. “Yeah, not the only one busy today, ma’am. Ana’s here been busy.”

“Oh, quiet, you.”

“Ahah, just Lyra is fine, thanks, ahem…” said Lyra, chuckling. “So, uh, how’d you guys, sorry, whaddaya think of, you know, this Equestria?”

“Oh, it’s been fun!” Ana said eagerly. Frieda’s sly glance at her back didn’t escape Lyra’s notice. “Just, you know. Lotta, lotta stuff to think about, gosh…” She cleared her throat. “So um, wonderful performance you got there, ma’am. Lyra. Lyra, yeah. I liked it. Frieda, too.”

“She plays the guitar,” Frieda cut in, thumbing at the woman’s instrument. “What she means, is that she appreciates music.”

Lyra shook her head. “Who doesn’t? I mean… it’s a fine art and all, and…”

She drifted off. Her eyes fell upon Ana’s left hand, upon her hip. Then down to her fingers holding the guitar...

“Hey, wanna know the funniest thing?” Lyra said. “I actually liked hands way before I’d heard about you guys. See, I got curious about this lyre-thing after reading about in some book on Minotaurs– I’m sure Twilight recommended it to me or something. But I figured I had to… Y’know, I wanted to try it. So I tinkered around with a couple of spells, until finally, I’d molded a nifty floating hand… Kind of like a familiar, you could call it? I named him ‘Handy’. And then, just in time for show-and-tell, I turned up with Handy and a lyre, and…”

She glanced at her flank, where she knew Ana’s eyes would be looking.

“Ooh~” said Ana, nodding.

“Yeah. Personally I thought the song I played wasn’t that amazing, but the class disagreed. Clearly, so did destiny. Funny thing, ain’t it?”

“Yeah, well, heh,” said Ana, pausing for another musical giggle. Frieda rolled her eyes. “Not exactly our thing, you know. I mean, you can see… Well, um, actually, I hope you don’t…”

Seeing her blush, Lyra waved her off. “Nah, don’t worry about it,” she assured. “I can tell ya right now that anyone who calls you a blank-flank is probably just a kid, or hasn’t grown out of that phase yet.”

Ana laughed, and so did Lyra. Frieda looked befuddled, but Lyra didn’t think much of it.

“What is it that you do, exactly?” Lyra asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Oh, I’m, Frieda and I, sorry,” she stammered. “Ahem. We’re here to test the waters. So to speak. I’m not sure I have the clearance but, that’s the gist of it– see how things are, report back…”

“She’s here cos’ she speaks Equish, ma’am– Lyra,” said Frieda. “Eases things, you know. I’m here cos’ I can crunch the numbers.”

Somehow, Ana managed to look a little serious. “But I used to teach chemistry, you see, before the war,” she explained. “And… Well, Cultural Preservation’s planning this big exhibition, right, to commemorate humanity here on Equus. I was thinking… No, requested that I might take a teaching job once more.”

“Ah. Fancy,” Lyra stated. “I know Twilight would like that…”

A polite cough interrupted them. Lyra turned, and saw Lady Cadenza and Twilight stand there. She wasn’t sure how long they’d been around.

“I’ll take it from here, Agent Bjorgman, Agent Pinfeather,” Cadenza said primly. Twilight waved at Lyra, accompanied by a friendly little smile.

“Oh, oh, I’m sor–” Ana began, but the PHL superior shook her head.

“No, it’s… quite alright, actually,” said Cadenza. “I recognise the longcoat.” Could that be a cheeky grin shimmering beneath the surface? “This is so like Astron, he always did like the exotic. And goodness knows everyone here needs a release… Especially if they’re human, Miss Bjorgman. But, I was hoping I could talk to Lyra for a bit?”

“We got a table,” said Twilight. “Princess Luna said we could take it, she had to leave early. You wanna come?”

There wasn’t much anyone there could argue against that. Before long, Lyra found herself walking by Twilight and Cadenza, towards one of the tables already prepared. The mood wasn’t exactly tense, she felt. Just a little uneasy. When was the last time, she thought suddenly, that Cadenza had spoken with her Twilight…

Most of her worries faded, when the three of them took their seats, far away from the murmurs of the crowd. Lady Cadenza rested her hooves on her chin, eyes moving back and forth between Lyra and Twilight.

“So! Lovely performance, Lyra,” said Cadenza, smiling. She nudged Twilight. “Don’t you agree?”

“Hush, of course I do!” Twilight retorted. “I haven’t heard Lyra play in a while either. I probably missed a lot, too.”

“Thanks, Cadance, and don’t sweat it, Twi’,” said Lyra. “Didn’t get much chance to pluck strings either these past few weeks… But I’ve still got it.”

“You know, honestly,” Cadenza said, shaking her head, “I’m not surprised Astron's got a threesome planned already.”

“Really?” said Lyra. “I'm sure he wouldn’t jump to that so quickly. Pretty sure Miss Bjorgman's just friendly with everyone. She seems the type.”

Cadenza gave her a curious look. “Um, Lyra… I don’t know if this ever came up in your research… But, ah, you know humans usually wear more clothes than that, everyday, right?”

“They do? Wait…”

Lyra nearly choked on what she’d just drank, as only now did something she’d never thought of, but which should have been starkly obvious, catch up to her.

“Yes, I…” said Cadenza. “You know what, don't worry about it. I’m sure whatever Astron does with his partners is his business.”

Now Twilight, on whom a look of bewilderment had grown throughout their exchange, piped up.

“Uhhh, what’s a threesome?”

As she felt her shock subside, Lyra saw the funny side of this, and had to hold back laughter. “You'll find out later, Twi’,” she told her friend. “So, Cadance. You… You should totally set them up, by the way.”

“What?”

“Yeah, you know,” said Lyra, nodding towards where Ana stood with the Prince and the griffon. “Over there. Bluenose and his new paramour. Throw in Frieda too, while you’re at it. Admit it, Cadenza.” She wiggled her eyebrows suggestively. “You were imagining them all together.”

“I was not!” Cadenza spluttered. “I’m the Princess of Love, not… whatever this is!”

“Hey,” said Lyra. “If you’re gonna matchmake, go for it! I ain’t judging, heh-heh.”

But Twilight was still looking querying. Only now, her attention was focused on Cadenza. And Lyra, having known Twilight in school, recognised this as Twilight’s look when she had a knotty problem she was trying to solve.

“Twi’? What’s up?”

“One thing bothers me,” said Twilight, staring at Cadenza. “You… you’re Princess of Love, right? Where you’re from.”

Cadenza looked back at her. “Yes?”

“Well…” said Twilight. “Cadance… Princess Cadance, you say she told you the Prismia story. And… that didn’t ring any bells.”

Sighing, Cadenza shook her head. “No. Sorry. All I know is that, one day, Celestia– she was still Princess, back then– came for me in Florentina. There was no mysterious traveller. No harsh Winter… No Plane of Images.”

“Here’s what I don’t get,” said Twilight. “How come… you got a horn?”

Cadenza eyed them, a calculating look.

Wordlessly, her horn began to glow, but it wasn’t the familiar baby-blue of Princess Cadance. Instead, Cadenza’s horn glowed a pleasant rosey pink. As it glowed, Cadenza reached up and brushed her mane aside. She fumbled a little, nudging something. And when she was done, she leaned forwards, giving Twilight and Lyra a clearer view of the horn’s base.

Lyra’s eyes widened. It was no unicorn’s horn. It was crystal, beneath what she thought was skin.

“Fancy, isn’t it?” said Cadenza. She pulled back, her hoof fixing the fibre back to where it was, and brushed her mane back. “Celestia had it gifted to me, a few years after the Crystal War. It was either this or a pair of wings and… well, I didn’t want to take up two prosthetics, not when one could be given to another in need.”

“Whoa,” said Twilight. “Is that… is that some sort of fiber covering it?”

“Mhm. Maretonian, at first. Then after I’d joined the PHL, the guys at R&D improved it further. As for the aura’s colour… well, it reminds me of Florentina. Just a little bit of everything, you know.”

“I’ve heard of Saddle Mareabians doing something like this…” said Twilight. “This kind of… of horn graft. But it only works on stallions, who are a product of generations of artifical magical-imbibing, thanks to powdered crystal…”

“I am a pegacorn, descended from Luna,” Cadenza noted. “That’s why it took to me so well.”

“Turned out this went further than we knew, though, didn’t it?” said Lyra. “With those runes of Alex’s. Which you’re now going to learn more about, Twi’. Betcha Rarity will be pleased her guess was spot-on. Not to mention… Saddle Mareabia! I can just hear her,” she grinned, affecting Rarity’s most excited voice. “‘Ooh, darling, how wondrous! The household of a greater sorcerer!’”

Her friend looked cross. “Technically, it isn’t the stallion’s household in Saddle Mareabia…”

“It’s so like you, Twilight,” Lyra remarked, “to know about Saddle Mareabian herd dynamics and politics, but need to be told what a threesome is.”

Twilight’s frown was deepening. “So. Is anyone gonna explain, or...?”

Lyra smiled tolerantly. “Twi’, pal, there's a lot you need to catch up on.”

~ Holy City of Farsina, Saddle Mareabia ~ Day 12 of the Convocation ~ Twenty-First Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

The al-Husan Estate was massive, covering a large space of land in Farsina.

The corridor Amira strode down was rich, floors of exquisite sandstone sheathed in marble, and lined by the alcoves that held plinths for old statues from around the world. All purchased at great expense, naturally. The surrounding walls were painted the familiar orange, while redstone lined the mantles that separated the walls’s tope from the vaulted ceiling. The arches were classically Mareabian, with only the slightest hint of Minotaur influence visible in the mantles attaching the stone arch.

It was a visible symbol of her husband’s wealth and privilege, demanding awe from those who visited or even lived within these walls for the head of this household. And yet, none of this had kept him from being taken away, imprisoned for his own negligence and arrogance.

“After a year of damage control, this family still has to make sacrifices...”

Amira was muttering as she walked. She knew the conversation ahead of her was a necessity, but that didn’t make the prospect any more pleasant, or less challenging. At the end of the corridor was the great door that led to the reception parlour.

Years ago, she and Qabil had agreed that when the time came for serious family talks, they’d be held in that room. Anything which required consulting all other members of the household was, in her eyes, as important as hosting guests. But short of Qabil getting taken hostage or him passing away – the Lady forbid – Amira had never imagined such a discussion would be in her husband’s absence.

Stopping in front of the golden heartwood doors, Amira took a moment to compose herself. For this situation, she had to be at her most authoritative. For a moment she read the script inscribed into the doorway. The old Mareabian writing spoke about the al-Husan household’s great achievements and right now she was responsible for them. Prince Haakim’s support was welcome but token.

Finished, Amira let out the breath she’d been holding, and pushed the door open.

The parlour was beautiful and well-lit and in the middle were several silken sofas. Over in the far corner was a small pool, surrounded by potted plants and shaded by a stately palm tree, Naiya’s favoured haunt. It sat serene and clear at the moment, the faintest of ripples being set off by the flow of freshwater slowly piped in. Sunlight streamed in through a glass-sheathed skylight, illuminating the room.

The others were waiting inside, sitting attentively on the sofas. Heads turned as Amira entered, most of them looking curious. They were all here. Naiya, Haifa and Tahira, the other wives of her husband’s harem.

‘Those left of it, anyway…’ Amira thought to herself, trying not to go sour.

“Greetings, my dears,” she said, moving to take a seat on her own private sofa. “I thank you for heeding my message. If we are all four of us assembled, as wives of the al-Husan family, I’d like to open this discussion.”

It was the barest formality, but a requirement to start on.

The three’s reactions ranged along the gamut she’d expected. Despite knowing the portentous nature of the event, Haifa gave her a cheerful beam. Naiya’s head-bob, by contrast, was rather more sluggish – already she looked to be nodding off. Tahira merely inclined her head, not trying to hide her frown.

“Very good,” said Amira, reclining into a comfier position, so both her forelegs stretched upon the sofa’s armrests. “Now, as you are aware, two weeks ago, I was summoned by Her Esteemed Majesty, to serve as her companion and her voice to a… familiar acquaintance of ours, Princess Celestia of Equestria.”

She waited to see what reaction this’d provoke. Not surprisingly, even Haifa’s smile faded. But Amira was intrigued as to what Tahira would say. Her curiosity was left unsated, though, when Tahira only steepled her forehooves and remained silent.

“The Sun Princess has sent out a Call to all in our world who’ll listen,” said Amira. “A Call heard by our Malikah, of which the duty to interpret would normally fall to her… court sorcerer,” she faltered a little. “Though, in Qabil’s absence, she had to ask me to lend her Jabir and Hanan.”

If there was one thing all the wives agreed upon, it was their low opinion of Qabil’s royally-mandated apprentices, so she was able to carry on without interruption.

“I’ll keep this brief,” Amira stated. “We travelled to the Hall of Unity. There was a Call of the Concordia Maxima. Over three days, much was said which might sweep in great changes… If you haven’t yet, soon you may hear what news the Convocation has to send… And as I wrote in my message, I was given the chance to petition Princess Celestia to review our beloved’s sentence.”

This caused some stirring, including from Naiya, whose eyes suddenly showed no droop. True to form, Haifa was back to smiling, a proud, glowing smile. Yet it was, as she foresaw, Tahira who finally spoke up.

“And what was this Convocation about… milady Amira?” Tahura said softly, a sharp intent in her eyes that didn’t match her tone. “We all know our beloved would have dearly attended… But, out of us all, you were privileged to go, and be his eyes there.”

“You will learn today,” Amira said evenly. From beneath her caparison, she drew three envelopes. “Yet, before we tread the parched sands of business, a little something to refreshen our hearts… I bring messages from Qabil to all of you.”

Haifa, Naiya, Tahira, each picked the envelope with their name on it, peering at it inquisitively. Amira waited patiently as they opened up and read. A husband they may share, but some things were for one wife’s eyes only. Or their ears. She smiled fondly, resisting the urge to rub her own ear where Qabil had last nibbled it.

Reading the letters was quickly done with, however. Somewhat to her surprise, Haifa was the first to fold hers up. Perhaps Haifa just couldn’t bear the feeling of separation. Tahira was next, Naiya was last, which was no surprise – one was swift and sharp where the other was languid.

“Any questions, before we proceed?” said Amira.

“No, I’m fine, thanks,” said Haifa. “But… this letter, it’s sweet and all, but he makes no mention of what you talked about at the Convocation.”

“Same here,” grunted Naiya.

Tahira again did not speak. Yet from the look in her eyes, Amira suspected Qabil’s letter had hinted at their personal news.

“Alright,” Amira said. She’d speak with Tahira soon enough. “Then here is the great news from the Convocation, in which our family will have its part to play. The Thirteenth Family has returned to our world… and it calls itself ‘Man’.”

“You can’t be serious?”

Amira turned to Tahira, to find the dark-coated mare’s usual composure had dropped.

“I’m most definitely serious,” Amira said in response. “One of them was introduced at the Convocation, where they petitioned every delegate for aid.”

“And what does that mean?” Naiya asked. Her eyes were still open and alert, but Amira could see her azure-coloured spouse was already leaning back to lounge in her seat.

“That the world is going to change, and our family will be at the forefront of this new era.”

Amira knew her spouses would be confused – and so they were, if the looks on their faces were of any evidence, but she’d decided a little bit of dramatic gravitas was necessary. She needed to emphasise the political benefits that were going to come their way, especially if she was going to get Tahira onboard.

“There’s too much I cannot talk about yet,” Amira continued, leaning forward as she could in her reclined stance. “Nor am I certain you’d understand it. It’s taken me long to understand it myself. The focal point, though, is that the Thirteenth Family’s… dying.”

Until she’d put it this way, it had not seemed like the apparent thing to say. Yet in spite of what she knew, that Man’s fate was no death in the physical sense, calling it their death felt like the most honest assessment.

“Dying, but defiant,” she added. “And they have so much to offer. It just happens not to be in their power to stave off their fate, unless Equus offers help in return.”

“What exactly do they want from us?” Tahira asked.

“She means us, us, by the way,” Haifa added, getting a nod from the younger mare.

“Well,” Amira paused, carefully thinking over what she was permitted to reveal. “Whether you believe it or not, the human visitor had runes embedded in his skin, our husband’s runes.”

It took a second for her declaration to sink in. But once it had, each their eyes widened in shock.

“But… how?”

Haifa was Qabil’s second-oldest spouse, having married him at nigh the same time as Amira, and knew well how secretive their husband was about his family’s mysterious arts.

“I don’t know,” Amira lied. “They could be zebra counterfeits, or something they acquired with their own abilities, but what matters is that their representative possesses them and lacks any real understanding of them. He has no actual idea of the powers he is channeling into his body.”

“That’s a problem?” Naiya asked. She was sitting upright and attentive, but seemed to be more interested in being told the news, rather than figuring it out for herself.

“For him it is.” Amira saw Tahira’s eyes light up as she figured out what was going on.

“So, we get to be responsible for saving the life of a recently rediscovered tribe?” Tahira practically declared. “Is this representative their leader, or some other figure of importance?”

“He is a warrior,” Amira replied carefully, “but an important one tied to their highest leadership.”

That seemed to dull Tahira’s enthusiasm. “Then I suppose this endeavour will be some kind of… confederacy, an effort shared between the nations, won’t it?”

“Why would you say that?” Haifa asked, more for the sake of improving her younger spouse’s mood again. Amira knew she preferred it when Tahira was feeling happy and inoffensive.

“Do you really think that a strange creature warranting a gathering of the Convocation would just leave the matter of saving, possibly, his life and race to one family, from one nation?” Tahira’s voice was even, but everyone could feel the hint of condescension in her tone. “There’ll be a committee overseeing everything, at the least.”

“That may be the case,” Amira interrupted before Tahira could continue, drawing a deeper frown from her spouse, “but the fact is, the Convocation cannot actually access our family’s archives without our permission. Qabil has already given his consent, yet I want all of you to be involved in this decision.”

The room returned to silence. Haifa and Naiya were looking to one another for any hint of what the other was planning, while Tahira was staring off into the distance, a calmly ambivalent expression on her face.

“I know what you’re going to ask,” Amira said quietly. “Yes, the runes were what Celestia had to consult Qabil about. And as repayment for giving her access to the archives, we got her to reduce his sentence to just one more year.”

“Inside, or outside?” Haifa asked glibly.

Naiya gave her an odd look, but Amira knew that if it’d been her asking the question, she’d have lacked the jokey, self-aware spin Haifa was trying to put on it.

“Outside, of course,” Amira stated reluctantly. “But his record’s been clean enough that it won’t feel much longer for him, either.”

“A fat lot of good that does us,” Naiya grumbled. “After two years already…”

“Will you please be quiet?” said Tahira. “I say Lady Amira got more out of it than we dared to ever dream of.”

“It’s wonderful news, Amira,” Haifa said, hurrying before Naiya could reply. “But surely you must’ve managed to get a few added goodies thrown into the bargain.”

Amira felt she had reason to smile. Despite Naiya’s grousing, things were going alright. Tahira had spoken positively of her results, and Haifa knew her well enough to see she had done more... Haifa, sweet thing. For the longest time, Amira had thought finding a suitable bachelor for them to marry would only be a formality, a means to appear together in the public eye. Yet Haifa had insisted it must be a stallion they both could love, or it’d be a marriage to drain their souls.

She had strongly doubted it, but chosen to follow Haifa’s wishes. Then she’d met Qabil, and her greatest worry had become that he’d have eyes for only one of them… Or worse, Amira reflected with some mischief, that he’d overshadow Haifa in her eyes.

Fortunately, it had turned out a perfect wedding and a perfect marriage. At least, this was what she’d led herself to believe. Right until she’d witnessed Princess Celestia come forward to say, even with all the cool politeness and compassion Celestia was reknowned for, that her husband was being taken away for a while.

“Amira?” Haifa called from afar. “D’you hear what I just said?”

The words cut into her consciousness. “Sorry,” said Amira, shaking her head. “You’re right. A reduced sentence– it’d feel a bit paltry as the only reward, wouldn’t it?” She gave a carefully-studied smile, but sensed Tahira had noticed her slight hesitation. “Well, there are a number of advantages I managed to secure our family. Priority on delivery from the al-Husan owned crystal mines, travel permits to Equestria’s national treasures, such as–”

“This was all approved by Her Esteemed Majesty?” interrupted Tahira.

Amira felt taken aback by her bluntness. “Nothing was discussed that the Malikah hadn’t formally told me she’d approve of.”

“Well, that’s good,” Tahira said lightly.

Yet when Amira stole a look with Haifa, she saw the golden mare could tell she hadn’t yet told them all she had to tell. Haifa provided her a subtle, intentional nod.

“Then we’re done here?” Naiya asked, yawning.

“Not quite.” Amira gave them all a look. “I just have two questions. The first is, will you support me in opening up the family library to the Convocation? This will mean our estate will be hosting representatives from Equestria and elsewhere, should they send them.”

Everyone nodded. The matter had been settled, but Amira wanted proper confirmation. It helped settle her stomach for the second question.

“Alright then,” she began. “Now that’s out of the way… do you trust me?”

“Of course, my dear,” Haifa said unhesitantly.

“Of course,” Naiya parrotted.

“Yes,” Tahira replied, suspicion in her voice. “Why?”

“Well, you see… I recently made a proposal to Princess Celestia, a very important proposal.”

Amira paused to take a breath. She could speak for her nation in front of the most powerful beings on Equus, or manage a family that, at its largest, had nine spouses including herself, not to mention fourteen children. But right here and now, she felt nervous.

“I requested that we send one of our children to be fostered by the new Royal Family of the Crystal Realm,” Amira finally admitted. “It would improve relations with Equestria, revive our family’s ties with the crystalponies, help us recover our reputation in the eyes of the Court and the wider world, and show the Convocation how ready we are to enter this period of co-operation between the peoples.”

“Which of our children will you be sending?” Tahira asked. Amira sighed. Her youngest spouse’s tone was low and the frown on her face had already become a sharp glare.

“I decided Hadia would be our best choice,” Amira said in response.

“And you didn’t think to consult me first?” Tahira hissed.

“Tahira’s right,” Naiya said. “This is just… not like you. Why didn’t you tell us about this?”

“I had to run this by Her Esteemed Majesty first, and Princess Celestia, and our husband,” Amira undauntedly answered. “I’m sorry. I really am, but this is important, and Hadia’s the best choice.”

“Why don’t you send one of your children?” Tahira spat. “Why should my daughter be thrown at the Equestrians?”

“Tahira, please…” Haifa began, only to be cut off.

“Oh, don’t you try to defend her,” Tahira snapped, turning to her spouse. “This is exactly what…”

“Stop it! All of you!” Amira shouted. Every face in the room turned towards her, and when she realised what she’d done, she sighed. “I’m sorry,” Amira said contritely. “I’m sorry for springing this on you so suddenly, but I had to move quickly. Everything I told you, all of my reasons why I’m suggesting this, are true. This is our chance to take part in the changing world. Your part, Tahira. And Hadia’s.”

Amira saw Tahira’s glare turn back into a mere frown. She had to suppress a grin as she knew the dark-coated mare was beginning to come around.

“Tahira, the Princess has assured me her niece is experienced in raising children, second to none, practically.”

“Is she a mother?” Tahira drawled, her frown deepening again.

“No, but she has taken care of other ponies’ children.” Amira was a little hesitant to answer, yet honesty was now the better policy. “And Hadia will be in the centre of a realm saturated in magical power, likely more well guarded than she is here.”

“She has a point,” Naiya said.

“I thought you were on my side,” Tahira whispered.

Naiya shrugged. “You said you liked me better quiet. Pick one.”

Tahira glared at her fellow spouse, before turning back to Amira. “If this princess isn’t a mother, then are there any in her court with children? Will my daughter have any peers in this place?”

“You normally seem so worried about dear Hadia being distracted by things like that, Tahira,” Haifa spoke up.

“She’s just trying to get out of sending Hadia away,” Naiya drawled.

“Naiya,” Amira snapped, drawing an apologetic nod from the mare.

In truth, the issue of peers was one that concerned her greatly. From the inquiries she’d made, Amira had learned children were not lacking in the Crystal Realm, at least. But except for the Crystal Princess, she’d found no evidence they bothered with families of old blood.

Letting out a tired sigh, Amira rubbed her forehead, then turned back to Tahira.

“I’m sorry, my dear, but I’m afraid I don’t know if there are any children in Princess Cadenza’s Court. It’s only just returned from a horrific limbo and tyrannical grip of a monstrous sorcerer.”

Haifa chuckled. “Heh. Sorcerers. Don’t we know ‘em.”

Amira’s gaze flicked to her closest spouse and silently begged her to stop. She then fixed her youngest spouse with the strongest, most sincere look she could produce, the kind she broke out for the most delicate of negotiations.

“It will be perfectly safe,” she said, “and I’m sure Hadia will thrive. You’ve worked hard to ensure she is strong and intelligent.”

“And independent?” Tahira said, stating what Amira wouldn’t have said. “Yes. That, and what else you’ve listed, is true enough. But a palm tree standing tall amidst dwarven palm trees is no feat. If I had to do this, I’d want peers for my daughter who can meet her halfway, at least.”

Amira had to give her allowance on that. The same worries floated about her mind regarding Qabil. Sometimes, she wished Celestia could have done them the favour of being less indiscriminate with the structure of Erebus. Simply because he was to be sequestered from the world for years, didn’t mean he should lose out on social equals.

She occasionally wondered if Qabil had told her about all the company he kept in prison.

Naiya frowned. “And how undiluted is the Amore bloodline, really?” she said. “Quite apart from having had no realm to rule in centuries, from what I understand, Cadenza wasn’t even raised by Celestia. She grew up in a village.”

They each stared at her in surprise.

“You’ve been paying attention, Naiya,” Haifa commented, an eyebrow raised.

“They say she’s got dreamweaving skill,” Naiya stated, with an airy yawn. “This does interest me. I still have no idea if it’s true, but if it is, that’s a mark of quality, I’ll grant you.”

“Again, I cannot say,” Amira admitted. “This isn’t a matter Celestia would share easily. But Princess Cadenza is an alicorn, like her royal aunt. To answer your question, I doubt it gets any less diluted than that.”

“That still doesn’t answer my question,” said Tahira. “For one thing, her husband. A captain in the Equestrian Guard…”

“The Captain of the Guard,” Amira corrected her. “From a Canterlot family that has also produced his sister, Celestia’s personal student, and one of the people we’ll soon receive. I believe those credentials ought to suffice.”

Tahira huffed and leaned back.

“Fine,” she said. “Then the Crystal Princess is in good standing, both on her own merits, and by her male spouse. But here’s the problem.”

There was a pregnant pause. Ominous, yet Amira suspected it was in fact the dark-coated mare who was gathering her own courage. Then she went for it.

“You’ve given me no assurance that Hadia couldn’t be any lonelier, milady Amira,” said Tahira. “The sacrifice a mother makes, when they choose to send their child to live as a ward, is one long-accepted to those of our rank. The beauty of it is that, whereas the child’s guardian may not fill the role of mother, there are others who can. But the Equestrians do not live that way.”

She let them digest what she’d said.

“So,” Tahira concluded. “How can you convince me my child won’t be lacking maternal affection, or the company of those peers her age? Will our family truly gain from it, if my Hadia returns from this a malcontent?”

Amira thought on the issue. Then, after several different ideas ran through her head, she spoke.

“When I brought up this proposal to Princess Celestia,” Amira said, “she confirmed that her royal niece was dedicated to caring for children, and never lost the desire or the talent.” She fixed Tahira with a soft glare. “If you worry about Hadia’s attitude, however, you could always send her off with a full curriculum. You do love to plan her extensive education, after all.”

Tahira blinked in confusion, before she rose an eyebrow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re so involved in raising her, you have made it clear you are her mother,” Amira continued. “Think on the presence you must have with her. No other mare in this household has directly watched over her like you, and you’ve made it clear what you expect from her. I’m confident your lessons are quite ingrained. She will remember her manners.”

“She also might enjoy the chance at new company,” Haifa added. When everyone turned to her, the golden mare continued. “Honestly, how often has she been taken to court, since our beloved was imprisoned? She’s been locked in her room or the library, taking her lessons, coming out only for meals, or to wander the grounds. She hasn’t left the estate in over a year and I can’t remember the last time I talked to her by myself.”

“Yes,” Amira concurred, feeling a little ashamed and troubled. “I did notice.”

“Maybe,” Haifa continued as she turned to give Tahira a comforting smile, “it will do her some good to get out the house. She may not get to meet many peers in the Crystal Realm, but would that be so different to what she has now?”

And there it was. What Amira had couched in diplomatic language, Haifa stated more openly – but always with a smile. Tahira shifted in her seat. It was clear she felt a circle closing in.

Yet despite her stubbornness, Amira hated to think of Tahira feeling ganged up on. They were meant to be a family. There was good reason all in this room, including Naiya, hadn’t abandoned Qabil after the misfortune that befell him.

A reason in which Princess Cadenza was well-versed, incidentally.

“Tahira,” Amira said, leaning forward, her tone more gentle. “Maybe you’re right. It is a risk. Despite what Haifa just said, Hadia is used to a certain environment– an environment that’d be very different in the Crystal Realm, where families comprise only two spouses and the land is one of ice and snow. But she’s our youngest daughter, and you know what Princess Cadenza can offer that we cannot?”

As Tahira had done before, Amira waited so the others could contemplate. Interestingly, Naiya’s eyes were the first to light up in understanding. Perhaps it had to do with missing Mahala. Amira hadn’t overly cared for that spouse, but she’d had the virtue of making Naiya a little livelier and far happier, back in the day.

Amira let the coin drop. “Hadia needs more than a mother or mothers, Tahira. She needs a father. I was able to shave off another few years for Qabil, but…” She sighed. “At Hadia’s age, a year still is a long time.”

It looked like Tahira had also figured it out, or if she’d already thought of it long ago, and was finally acknowledging it. Princess Cadenza was married to a stallion of repute, if his military career was anything to consider.

He wouldn’t be like their Qabil, a consummate scholar and explorer. But a masculine authority figure could provide plenty in and of itself. What’s more, he was a powerful unicorn, the older brother of Princess Celestia’s protégée, and so had to be adept enough in magic to help in Hadia’s lessons if she needed.

Tahira still looked like she wanted to argue, but the conviction behind it was wavering. The younger mare’s mouth opened a few times and snapped shut. Despite the inadequacies she likely perceived in the Crystal Realm’s rulers, it seemed she agreed some kind of nuclear family was better than what her daughter had now.

“Very well,” Tahira conceded. “But if I am consenting to this, then I’ll be planning her curriculum, in detail. I will also be informing her what’s expected of a daughter of this family. If she does return as a malcontent or troublemaker, I will not tolerate any of you interfering with my right to correct my daughter as I see fit.”

“That’s acceptable,” Amira said in response. Spare the rod, spoil the child.

‘She’s posturing,’ Amira thought as Tahira raised her head in haughty self-righteousness. ‘And Qabil will intercede if she does actually get out of control. Hadia is his daughter as well.’

“I guess that just leaves one more thing,” Haifa piped up, her expression bright and relieved. “Who is going to tell Hadia?”

“I will,” Tahira declared.

“Of course,” Amira said. “That is perfectly alright.”

With that, the room settled down again. Tahira was still grousing, yet overall Amira felt everything had gone well. Without a word, typically, Naiya was the first to peel off, heading for her pool. Tahira looked like she still wanted to say something. But eventually, she got up, muttering she’d go find Hadia.

Then Haifa walked over to Amira’s side, taking the seat next to her.

Amira smiled warmly as the mare she’d shared so many years with settled down and leaned upon her. She did the same, settling her chin over Haifa’s as Qabil so often did with her. Not everything was well, but at this moment, she couldn’t complain. Setting aside the innumerable matters she had to work on, Amira shut her eyes and simply took comfort in the horse that she loved second only to Qabil.

~ Aboard the Kaikishoku, Docked in Gallopoli ~

Captain Kiku, Ryouchi of Ryuppon’s skies, bane of all pirates who dared to sail the heavens blue, grey or black, let out a sigh. It was her only indication of how tired she felt that she’d reveal to the world around her. She was reaching the end of a week filled with frantic activity like she hadn’t experienced in several months. With the new lack of piracy in Ryuppon’s territories and investments, she’d been left with little more to do than patrol. But old habits died hard, and were it just active duty, she wouldn't have been anywhere near as exhausted.

No, it was the ‘special circumstances’ she was being ordered to deal with, and the paperwork that came with it.

‘At least something is finally happening,’ she thought to herself, as she wandered down the corridors of the Kaikishoku to the primary holding bay.

The ghost of a smile crept on her lips. The last few days had been so busy, she hadn’t had any real time to think, merely obey. Supplies had to be requisitioned, maintenance had to be cleared, checked and rechecked, and everything had to be prepared so the Kaiki could be crewed with the bare minimum of personnel. All of her old energy had returned once the frustratingly unchanging routine had been upended. Placing no truck in rumours, Kiku had refused to allow idle gossip to spread, and had informed every Kirin under her command of the bare facts about their mission. Still, it felt good to do something different. She almost felt like the Ryouchi again, even if she wasn’t going to wage war on piracy this time.

That last thought that killed her smile in an instant. She’d never been the type to wish for war – never complaining when pirate wars came her way either, mind you – but the fact she and the Kaiki were being given a civilian assignment did get under her skin. Then there was the fact the Kaiki, her Kaikishoku, was going to be retrofitted, by foreigners no less. That particular piece of news had almost made her consider demanding Commander Katashi lodge a formal complaint to His Majesty.

The few members of her crew she did come across moved aside to let her by, making way so she could finally make it to where the new replacements were waiting. Pushing open one last bulkhead, Kiku stepped into the spacious expanse of the primary hold and beheld the fresh meat that stood awaiting her.

Overseer Kenji stood on the other side of the bulkhead, and he’d taken care to line everyone up. He nodded courteously at his Captain. There were three rows, all told, one for each sky-turtle. A quick headcount of the first row, which matched the two behind it in length, showed just enough people to supplement the skeleton crew she’d been forced to ship out with. At least whoever in Equestria organised this had remembered to do the numbers.

‘Two-hundred-odd crew members.‘

What a waste that’d be, if she had to kick anyone off.

At first, Kiku felt some small reassurance to see the expected equine figures in the crowd. While the average pony was smaller and stockier in than a Kirin, their body structures were similar enough that, once whipped into shape, they should adapt to a sky-turtle without much difficulty. But her heart sank as she focused, and saw distinctly non-equine figures jutting from the lot.

Two bipeds, the taller one standing head and shoulders above the rest, while even the shorter one exceeded those around him by about a head-and-a-half. A Minotaur and a dragon, both barely out of adolescence. Although the Minotaur stood straight, bronzed arms behind his back, eyes gazing forward, Kiku would sooner have ten more like the slouched and surly red drake. You could trust a dragon to be moody. You couldn’t trust a Minotaur to be anything. And then Kiku started when she noticed the next outlier. Her forehoof was halfway to reaching her sword, before she realised this wasn’t a pirate who’d had the audacity to board her ship. Not a parrot, but rather a bright-eyed young griffon, her plumage an oddly inviting shade of grey.

Resisting an urge to shake her head, Kiku swept her gaze over the rest. She found only ponies. Yet whereas many ponies displayed hints of nervousness – twitching hooves, chewing lips – the three others showed anything but. There was the Minotaur’s placidity, while the dragon gave a contemptuous snort. And unless Kiku was mistaken, the griffon girl was actually smiling, as carefree as a sky-whale riding the lightning.

Her frown must have turned into a glower by now, Kiku thought to herself as she saw nervous looks convert into anxiety. Stepping away from the bulkhead and Overseer Kenji, she walked up to the new recruits.

Commander Katashi was already there, a clipboard in the grip of his magic as he marched along the front row, checking off whatever items were on the inventory. Unlike Kenji, he did not seem to have noticed her arrival, or the sudden shift they made in her presence.

“Commander,” Kiku called out in a stern tone. “What do we have with us today?” She had called out in Low Ryupponese, and could see a few individuals in the rows blink as her likely-incomprehensible words registered with them.

“Captain,” Katashi responded, turning to face her and bowing his head. “It is an honour to witness your presence. This one has finished orientering the recruits to the basic requirements of the mission and completed their individual evaluations in preparation for your arrival. Every one of them is awaiting your assignment.”

“Good,” Kiku replied. Flicking her head a little, she dismissed the commander and turned to properly regard the ranks.

“Listen up,” Kiku shouted, switching to the Common Tongue. She’d have preferred the more elegant Modern Equish, and it always felt hard on her to use this pidgin talk, but she had no excuse for letting Katashi do all the talking. “Every single one of you is now aboard the Kaikishoku, my Kaikishoku! And as long as your hooves, your feet or whatever it is you crawl upon, walk its boards, you take orders from me. I am the voice of the Heavens for all of you now, and you will take every word I say as if were given by the Lady Herself. Am I clear?”

“Yes, ma'am!” the ranks replied, most of them standing to attention. Those who didn’t at least looked like they were paying attention.

“The Kaiki will be put in the ground-docks in one day for…”

She trailed and proceeded to curse under her breath as the right word escaped her. The flow of her speech had been broken.

“This one believes the word is ‘retrofitting’, Captain,” Katashi whispered helpfully.

“Yes,” Kiku continued in a tone that, whilst still stern, was much slower and more deliberate.

Curse it that while she had as fine a head for numbers as any Kirin, letters were not her forte. With the dressing-down she’d originally planned no longer an option, better she just state her message and finish the whole ordeal.

“The Kaiki will be sent for retrofitting to make it fit for this expedition to the Frozen North. You will all be assigned important duties for this. Any failures or incompetence will result in you getting kicked off this ship.”

Despite the slight hiccough, it seemed the recruits understood the grvaiity of what she declared. Turning to Katashi, Kiku gave him an expectant look and he nodded in turn.

“Commander Katashi has your assignments listed down,” Kiku then said. “You shall be given them along with a billet aboard the Kaiki. Make a note of them and where each and every one of you is supposed to be and where you shouldn’t. If I find any of you in a…” Another pause before the word came to her, “in a restricted area, you get kicked off. Am I clear?”

“Yes, ma’am!” the response came loud and clear once again.

“Good,” Kiku snapped, giving them one last stern glower before turning away from them all.

“I want them billeted and ready to work by tonight,” Kiku said to Katashi, switching back to Low Ryupponese as he walked back to the front. “The sooner we get this over with, the better. I also want it clear that I expect the best.”

“This one understands perfectly,” Katashi said in response.

“And keep the dragon away from the lightning relays,” Kiku added almost absently. “The last thing we need is a thunderblast before we leave. In fact, keep him away from any of the exposed wiring while the Kaikishoku is getting retrofitted.”

“This one will make sure to assign the cabin-boy Garble to safe areas,” Katashi replied.

“Keep the griffon away from me, too.”.

“Of course, Captain. This one understands completely.”

* * * * *

In the lull that followed the Captain’s pronouncement, there was time for mutters to arise.

“Well,” said the griffon girl. “Boss’s a tough customer, ain’t she?”

Several around her grumbled in agreement, but Galatea offered a mere nod.

She began tapping the wooden deck, gently, letting the sound fade into the crowd’s noises. The familiar texture of Ryupponese pine welcomed her chapped hooves. Relatively soft to the touch, though not built for comfort. She glanced to the metallic plates covering the ceiling, ornately carved with scales, arranged to be aesthetically pleasing, yet designed for protection. All around her this pattern repeated, with a wooden deck reinforced by metal, woven within the other...

The newly-minted crew were dispersing, one by one, to where they were needed. Galatea was, for the most part, standing alone on this deck. So she walked off at a brisk pace, taking the sight in of all around her. The Kirin had changed throughout periods of stagnation and progress. But what never eluded them, even as they grew driven by profit motive, was the artisanship which marked their culture so distinctly, in peace and in wartime.

The sky-turtle was worthy of its name. Few windows offered a look outside, and what little it did have were reinforced, crisscrossing metal and shutters substituting for fragile glass. If Galatea’s eyes didn’t deceive her – and they rarely did – only a few, retractable platforms offered access to the outside world on this deck, for protection remained of paramount importance. Whatever earned the Kirin’s wrath, Galatea mused, would have to be a patient foe indeed.

Gingerly, Galatea followed the steps leading to the lower decks. It was a different story here. Metal overcame wood, and as she walked, the crew’s steps were interrupted by a metallic ‘clang’ whenever they stepped on the metal plates that separated the compartments. She did not mind the cold emanating from the hull. It was a familiar feeling to her, shaped by centuries of sleeping beneath the stars, accompanied only by the cool night air and the dying embers of a campfire.

Shaking her head clear of those memories, she strode up to the crew’s Overseer, a Kirin stag who was standing by the bulkhead that split off into different staircases to the various decks.

“Excuse me, guv,” she spoke. The Overseer looked at her. “D’you know where I can be givin’ me noggin’ a rest? Could do with a kip.”

‘A touch too blunt,’ she thought, as soon as the words left her lips. ‘I suppose it has been two years. Longest time I’ve spent away from this lifestyle of mine…’

The Overseer, thankfully, was familiar enough with the accent to give her a nod. Good. He was a well-travelled stag, then. But his eye turned towards what she wore on her forehead, and he raised a brow in askance.

“Ah, ah,” Galatea spoke up hastily. “Don’t worry, I got a permit for this. Got the ol’ princess’s hoofprint and all tha’. So don’t mind the goggles, jus’ a lil’ bit o’ a personal touch from the Isles.” She looked down her own form, clad in the same, blue-and-white striped shirt worn by the common crew, and back to the stag. “I’ve got the uniform part ‘andled right, yeah?”

The Overseer considered this a moment. But her explanation seemed to satisfy, if reluctantly.

“It’ll pass,” said he, in a rough, gravelly voice. “Just be sure to stick to what you need.”

“Aye, well,” Galatea said. “S’ppose you will be seeing more o’ mine face ‘round ‘ere. Anyways, what I needs is a lil’ shuteye. No offence, guv. But I got time before me shift.”

After an indifferent shrug, the Overseer gestured curtly towards the right, indicating one of the various staircases leading further down into the ship’s belly.

“Much appreciated,” she said politely. “‘Ave a good one, and cheers.”

He merely granted her another prim nod. Off Galatea went, passing various faces on her way. Many seemed just as uncertain as she’d been, scrambling to find their way from the loading bay. She could not blame them. New environments were new experiences. Blinking, Galatea reached up to absent-mindedly brush against both her braid, and her safety goggles.

Even she could not so easily let go of a few old mementos…

So distracted was Galatea, she didn’t see the griffon flying down her way. Or she did, in the last few seconds, at least. But the griffon did not, tumbling into her, leaving the two of them sprawled on the wooden deck.

“Oi, careful, lass,” Galatea said, hopping back to her hooves, dusting off the griffon. “You good?”

“Sorry! Dunno how I didn’t see ya there, lady,” the griffon replied hurriedly, flashing her a cheerful smile. “Guess I am a little jumpy today– sorry, gah, just, it’s all so exciting!”

The griffon, by now, had hovered up in the air without a feather out of place, gesturing wildly, her satchel forgotten on the floor. She too was clad in the same uniform Galatea wore, albeit one tailor-made to match a griffon’s build.

“Can’t say I blame ya, lil’ bird,” said Galatea. She lifted the griffon’s satchel, with a small smile offered too. “Hold on to tha’, experience tells me it won’ be a walk in the park, ay?”

“Absolutely! Thanks! Catch up with ya later, uh…”

“Shale,” said Galatea smoothly. “Jus’ Shale will do.”

“Gabriella!” said the griffon. “But you can call me Gabby– oh, I need to hurry, see ya later!”

And she was off, dashing along the boards in a grey blur.

Watching her go, as it now occurred to Galatea, the grey griffon couldn’t be that old. Fifteen at the most, a year below the age of accountability.

Serving at her age was nothing unusual. Galatea had witnessed youths of many years less working aboard ship, on the fields and in the factories, around the world. But Galatea was, at heart, a denizen of Equestria, and there were places where it always felt wrong to see children work so young…

“Such is the way of the world,” Galatea muttered, unwillingly slipping out of her accent.

She checked herself. In this form, the old worker dialect, native to the Griffish Isles, was second nature to her. Slipping up like this was unusual. Meeting her sisters for the first time must have influenced her mindset past expectations. Then again, change was always the world’s lot as well. And unwavering as she was, she too was part of it.

A snippet of conversation reached her ears. The griffon girl’s voice and another, male but young, barely even broken yet.

“I can't believe it,” whined the teenage male. “I'm being made to work on a Sunday.”

“Oh?” said the griffon girl, in a tone clear of guile. “That's rough, dude. I didn't know dragons had work days."

What else they said was lost to her. Galatea waited a moment, then moved on. Still, she decided, it seemed the griffon girl had perseverance. She’d do fine.

Her walk resumed, and it did not end, not until she’d reached her lodgings for the time being. There were a few others here, but Galatea paid them no heed for now.

A hammock was a far cry from the soft, sinking feeling of a mattress, the fabric thin to her touch. A little part of her did enjoy the suspended feeling, aboveground with its gentle sway, following the waves. A sky-turtle was no luxury yacht, rougher in sustained flight, and not at all designed for comfort.

Most of all it reminded her that, often, this came at the end of a hard day’s work. And there would be many days like that in the future. Although plenty welcomed the relief it gave them from their harsh, driven lives, Galatea welcomed her rest as a sign at least one more brick had been laid down that day. Or mortar poured.

She took off her goggles, placing them over her chest, along with Celestia’s resealed letter. She’d have time to read it again, discretely, when the Sun rose. With a flick of her braid to her side, she permitted herself to recline, staring up at the ceiling, accompanied by evening’s wind and the creaking of the sky-turtle. Then, she stretched out one rear-hoof, and pushed the hammock, letting it swing gently from side to side, and only then did Galatea truly feel content.

~ All Along The Plane of Images ~

In the realm just before the beyond, all is silent. All is well. It has been ever since she arrived here. She is free from that which bound her in the remainder of her life. No longer duty-bound in service or by oath. Her mind and soul, unshackled.

In life, her name was Redheart. And since her life’s end, she rests in peace.

Without regret, or conscripted to act.

All is–

“I see you there,”

Redheart’s eyes opened, or rather, figuratively became aware that she wasn’t alone. There was someone here. Someone else who could see her.

‘Who is there?’ Her question came, simple to ask when facing an unknown.

“Just someone who needs your help for a moment, Nurse. A bit of unfinished business, that had been left behind before your untimely passing.”

‘What business could that be?’ Redheart found herself asking in turn, ‘I was resting soundly before your intrusion.’

“You were, and for that I apologise. The silent ones were never something I was allowed to grow accustomed to. It’s the restless that tend to associate with me.”

‘You have my sympathies, but you haven’t answered my question.’

“It concerns something missing, something deceptively simple. Apparently, in life, you gained possession of a locket. There are those who would very much like it back.”

‘I see. Are they associated with the human?’

“They are; no lies offered, no lies spoken. By equivalent exchange, provide me the truth I require.”

Redheart’s non-existent mouth twitched in response. This request was a bit demanding to force an honest answer.

‘The last keeper of the locket I saw in life was Icewind.’ Redheart answered and yet felt something. A twinge of regret, perhaps?

“Native to this Equestria, no doubt. If he had the blasted thing, then it would have been felt.”

Redheart couldn’t help but notice the frigidness of the figure’s voice. Whomever this “he” was, those two had bad blood.

‘Who are you?’ Redheart found herself asking again, ‘and why do you care?’

Somehow, despite the nature of this realm and the boundaries between, Redheart could see the figure’s tight and worn fake smile and feel the coldness surrounding him.

“As I said, I’m just someone who required your help, Nurse,”the figure said, a coldness in his words hardly concealed. A coldness harsher than any Winter that Redheart could recall in life. “And I care in service to the dream. A dream that shall become truth in time. So, resume your rest. You have fulfilled your service.”

And like that, the other presence was gone. All that remained in this realm beyond was the everlasting trace of Redheart and her lingering regrets, over the goodbyes she never had with her family, nor the date that never came to be with the stallion named Icewind.

~ The Hall of Unity ~

Before Redheart’s tomb at the Hall of Unity’s pagoda gardens, an equine figure sat still on the ground as his horn dimmed. His eyes were glassy yet focused on the tomb. The only tell that he belonged to the living was the blood running down his snout. This stillness did not last forever – the quiet was broken by the figure exhaling. This act was followed by focus returning to his eyes.

“Easier, but not by much,” he muttered, before a nearby rag, suspended in his magic, attended to his bleeding snout. The throbbing in his head wasn’t that bad, which gave him some time. Some time to think and reflect on what he’d gained.

His eyes closed for a moment, allowing him to embrace a wonderful sensation.

‘A scent of lavender, oh Moon Princess?’ the figure thought, with a sad smile as the rag continued its work. ‘If only it were true for us.’

Prematurely aged and so tired, his eyes opened wearily to see reality as it was.

A name. He had a new name now. Icewind. But in a world where information still had yet to experience digitalisation, going on a name alone could still lead to a prolonged, faltering search.

‘A dream like this shouldn’t be sullied,’ he thought, lavender’s scent still in his mind. The rag removed itself, its job done, but was now rather filthy with his blood. ‘A beautiful, most wonderful dream of Harmony.’

While this Equestria had flaws of its own, this was still an amazing place to him. It was almost exactly like the dream, but moreso. Three alicorns, rather than the two sisters. Well, three publicly-known alicorns… No extermination, no wars that scarred the lands, or perversion of what he knew. Of what he remembered. His heart didn’t feel like it was going to be marred any further than it already had.

“Trixie…” He sighed, lowering his head. “You just had to be a troublemaker, didn’t you? Who’ll be her friend now?”

Pained, he tugged at his Amulet. The ultimate tool of the Architect’s. Elusive as ever nowadays, but only the Watchmare had mattered to him, and she was dead in his world.

Of all things, Miss Lulamoon had managed to get sent a whole year earlier to Erebus here than in the world he knew. For different reasons, to boot. She was but one name, though, amongst those who at different points had studied under him at Princess Celestia’s School.

Lyra and Twilight, each victims, one way or the other, of the Solar Tyrant. Or the fiery-headed girl whom the once-Princess Celestia had for a student, who’d disappeared through the Mirror. That last girl, once they’d met, who reminded him so much of another little girl, the most precious one of all, yet who’d never been a student…

Or, and this made him shudder, the pale creature who’d once been his own student. No doubt his path would cross again with the Weaver’s. He didn’t know what he’d do then. Yet he would find the Watchmare, and he would act. The chorus demanded such after everything.

“If by shadow, or by light, there must be action done,” the Headmaster said, as if reciting a nursery rhyme. He stood, his spell fading away, as he began to leave the pagoda gardens.

This he’d do for Equestria. For his students and the dead. For Sire’s Hollow, and his goddaughter.

‘Till the dream comes true for all.’

~ In Night’s Garden ~

The Princess of the Night drifted in her sleep.

Though she had her duty to vanquish nightmares, there was always time to unwind. Time was irrelevant in her realm, for it was as she willed it. She rarely truly dreamt, though. Her memories were enough – there were plenty to relive, lament and celebrate. Then she heard her sister’s voice, the first memory of Princess Celestia in a thousand years, flow past her, and embrace her as she had on the dawn she returned as Princess Luna.

“I saw the signs of Nightmare Moon’s return, and I knew it was you who had the magic inside to defeat her. But you could not unleash it until you let true friendship into your heart…”

Memories of days long since passed. Memories she’d treasured. She was not like Twilight, as she let them roam free in the stars. Here she sat in the open moonlit field, amidst tall grass, sunflower and lavender drifting lazily in the wind, watching windows open and close, the stars greeting her with tales of old. They descended, they mingled, flowing around her in a cloud of stardust. Many drifted in and out. More than a thousand years of life to cherish.

Her oldest and newest memories were those she treasured most. Her first time raising the Moon, her first planted flower, her first telescope...

She saw the first snowball fight she had with her sister, a glorious battle for the ages. She smiled upon seeing their nanny Ilsa, stuck upside-down on the ceiling, thanks to her, her sister, and Anna. She saw Celestia and herself atop a mountain, wishing upon the first lucky star she ever saw, and she wanted to be with her sister forever.

Her first garden, planted and nurtured by her under Mistmane’s tender guidance, in one secluded corner in their home at Canterlot. She saw herself chant and dance and laugh, to Starswirl’s ire, one starry night. Strict as Starswirl could be, she missed him, as she did Mistmane, and so many. None ever knew where the old Pillars of Equestria went to.

“Loosen up, forget your worries,” Luna sung softly. “Dance with me, the night is young...”

Luna laughed. She saw herself at the Crystal Realm, many years before Sombra’s time, singing that very song to Orion, her beloved, as they taught and danced and bestrode mountains, beneath the constellation that would one day bear his name. She saw her family flourish, her daughters, the warrior Tranquility and healer Equinox coming into their own, defending the land, curing the sick. Sacrifices made in blood. Sacrifices for a peace they never lived to see, for the good of Equestria, even as their mother started to turn, little by little.

Then Amore, the Realm’s greatest leader, one borne of Equinox’s line, stood before her and Celestia, beaming happily, with her daughter Radiant by her side. She presented them both with her creation, a Heart of Crystal, to shine as a beacon against the forces of darkness encroaching from the Frozen North, and to cleanse the Crystal Realm, this garden she called home. Little Radiant Hope, so gentle, loving and kind, sung a lullaby to let the Crystal Heart shine bright, even as her friend grew twisted into the Dark King.

All of them, gone too soon. Only Cadance, sweet Cadance, remained. But she too would flourish and blossom as they all did.

A window opened, and there Luna saw a young saffron pegasus, untouched by war. As she should have been. Luna wondered what became of her little friend, in the battle that had raged.

“I’m afraid Rainbow Dash will find out I’m not as tough as she thinks I am...”

“Everyone has fears. Everyone must face them in their own way. But they must be faced, or the nightmares will continue…”

Nightmares. She had to face her own, puppets without strings, crawling at her from all sides, reaching onto her– She blasted the Newfoals apart, as they crawled out of one of the windows. Here, she reigned. Here, she was untouched. And yet, here, she was alone.

Alone after a fashion. Cadance was busy around this time, and they hadn’t yet arranged another walk through dreams together. Her descendant had such potential. It had been a welcome surprise for Luna when Cadance had unexpectedly marched into this realm of hers. Figuring out where Cadance belonged in the convoluted family tree was another matter entirely, and they had settled on calling themselves aunt and niece.

Cadance was family, through and through. That was all that mattered to Luna. But, perhaps Luna never was alone. Especially whenever she gazed into one of her favourite memories of recent times.

”See? They really do like you, Princess!”

“Can it be true? Oh, most wonderful– I mean, oh, most wonderful of nights.”

Now, Twilight was a curious mare. Literally and figuratively.

Luna giggled to herself, letting the memory dissipate and embrace her. Twilight was not her first nor her oldest friend, but she was one she cherished the most in the time since her return. And… perhaps, something more.

She sighed. There were other priorities to handle.

Equestria, Earth… The war.

Celestia’s plan, now that too felt like a distant memory, with the changing times. She looked up at the orb that held it. It had not yet faded into the starry fields. She stood there with her sister, with news of Sombra’s return fresh in their minds.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to go as well?”

“Yes. Princess Cadance and Shining Armor are already there. The others will be joining them soon.”

“The Realm's magic is powerful. It cannot fall again, my sister.”

“She will succeed at her task. And when she does, we’ll know that she is that much closer to being ready.”

‘Ready…’ Luna echoed.

She remembered how at first, she’d scoffed at Celestia when she spoke of her plan for Twilight, and then had gone back to tinkering with her telescope. But Celestia kept bringing it up time and again, with little prompt, until Luna had settled on it being very important to her sister.

Perhaps she ought to ask her about it again. Perhaps it should be important for her, too. But then, with everything coming together so hastily… Twilight need not another burden upon her mind. And, after her talk with Cadenza, perhaps she ought to put more faith in her descendant, too...

A defiant voice passed her.

“I’ll tell you what we’ve learned, Discord. We’ve learned that friendship isn’t always easy, but there’s no doubt it’s worth fighting for!”

‘Wait.’

This was no memory of hers. For it was none other than Twilight Sparkle’s voice that she heard. She glanced around. In the starry skies, not a light shone above the others… Save for one.

Dreams could so often drift past so quickly, she’d fail to latch onto them. But this was her realm and it belonged to her. She stood up, and spread her wings. The voice had come from a lonely star – there, up amidst its brethren.

It echoed on, and on, and Luna knew what to do.

She soared, high up in the air. Her dream was hers to control, but to pursue a lost memory, her thrill-seeking side yearned for the chase. The star remained where it was, lavender light twinkling. It wasn’t in Twilight’s nature to let the library within be so lost, this far and wide. Maybe this was her own memory, a passing thought turned reality.

But Luna knew better. She pursued her flight, her wings leaving traces in the starry night. She flew, to where the star resided. Only, it wasn’t a star at all. It was an open window.

Luna did not hesitate for one moment. She stepped through. The light grew more distant, for she now stood in a void. Before her, the light shone, a starry path forming in its wake. Guiding her. And it wasn’t the only light, though she knew what to seek. All around her, spread in the void, stardust, in every colour. It coalesced, danced, and flowed to an unheard melody, painting the void so vividly with luminescent glow.

She heard Twilight’s voice again. The stardust whispered to her, its voice familiar and welcoming.

‘No, Luna,’ she said to herself, shutting her eyes. ‘Don’t let your path be cast astray…’

The voice that guided her here faded, but the first light remained. Even as she pressed on, the allure was great, and her eyes drifted to the stardust. It showed memories and dreams that weren’t hers to own or to create.

A lonely childhood, a faithful student...

Luna trode on. She saw her sister and Twilight stand before the stained glass windows of Canterlot Castle... It must have been after the Crystal Realm had been saved–

“You weren't willing to risk the future of the citizens of the Crystal Realm in an effort to guarantee your own. Far better that I have a student who understands the meaning of self-sacrifice than one who only looks out for her own best interests.”

“Does this mean...?”

It passed in a flash, and soon more followed.

Six Elements. A Gala. A Nightmare Night. The Canterlot Wedding.

Then, she saw the stardust coalesce into a battle. A titanic figure of red and black, clashing against someone that flew past with a speed that would have done Rainbow Dash proud. But it wasn’t a memory she knew of. For Twilight Sparkle had never stood as tall as she did in this one.

Nor did she have such a crown and–

“You’ve been wondering what you are meant to do as a princess. Do you know now?”

“As Princess, I believe I have the power to spread the magic of friendship across Equestria. That is the role I am meant to have in our world. The role I choose to have…”

The vision disintegrated into stardust, joining the eternal dance surrounding her. But what she heard and saw lingered. A Princess. A future yet to come. Truly, how absurd to see Twilight dash across the battlefield, meeting a great foe in a clash of magical prowess that eclipsed even Tia’s…

‘Focus, Luna, focus, this is not your path to tread…’

The light was there, at the end of the tunnel. Something pulled at her once again. The light grew brighter, brighter still, the tug was such that Luna felt compelled to take a look. So she did, turning to her side, breaking into a run.

Before her lay a vast field, under cover in starlight. Shadows stirred, and she saw the forms of the three tribes of ponykind, hippogriffs, griffons, even yaks, dragons and Kirin and Changelings of many colours. And Luna witnessed Twilight soar up high above them all, surrounded by faces old and new, before three shadowy figures that could only be her foes.

Luna flared her wings, taking flight. All those around her flickered, faded in and out, but Twilight, only Twilight remained, speaking so triumphantly, her voice a melody to her ears...

“The Elements showed me and my friends how strong our friendship could be. Together we work to bring harmony to Equestria! But there will always be more to do, which is why we teach others about the magic of friendship…”

Stardust flowed through Luna, pulling her to all sides. But she felt neither pain nor despair, for she flowed with them and embraced them. She was torn away from the memory, overwhelmed by the images that passed.

All the races, together in harmony, taught and guided by those who came before. And at last, Luna beheld her in full. A lavender alicorn, as tall as Celestia was, standing on a hill at sunset, together with her closest friends…

Then all was quiet within the void. The voices that had followed her, the memories that belonged to neither her nor Twilight vanished into stardust, with the first steps of her hooves past the open gate, welcomed by the light, into the library she had visited not so long ago.

Right there in the rotunda, Twilight Sparkle stood before a bathroom mirror.

~ Canterlot, Equestrian Solar Empire ~ Twenty-First Day of the Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~

As the night of the Grand Galloping Gala went on, Archmage Twilight grew restless, for the pain in her head bit into her. It had begun a mere headache, as these things usually did. The doctors had warned her of recurring pains, both from her lingering injury, and the depletion of her magical reserves in battle. She’d replied it was a calculated risk.

‘... Me and my big mouth,’ Twilight thought, resignedly. ‘I need… a shower. Yeah, that’s what I need…’

So she excused herself early on, distracting Captain Gallus by calling Lady Silverstream over to their table. Few would question it, she mused. Even with her organisatorial skills, the Gala still remained a dull affair. Luna’s presence had alleviated it, Twilight reflected. The two of them had found better things to discuss and to do in the late night hours.

A stroll in the gardens, which bloomed once a year and on this night alone, the Autumn Blossoming as it was known, did little for her on this trip down memory lane.

Still aching in every joint and her mind still scattered, she turned her back on the lingering scent of lavender in the gardens and returned inside, making her way to up the stairs carefully, holding onto the railing, grimacing at the dull throb of her head.

She needed to ease the pain, and this was why, reaching upstairs with effort, she headed for the bathroom adjoining her bedroom.

But it was there, near the sink, that she stumbled. She reached for the sink’s edge in time, fighting the urge to slump. The stinging pain grew and grew, until she could no longer hold it back, when her eyes fell upon her reflection.

She was looking haggard, with dark circles beneath her eyes. The hole where her ear used to be had healed, they had told her. That the numb, stinging feeling in it would dissipate with the healing process.

Yet even Philomena’s tears could only do so much now.

‘So much for that,’ Twilight thought angrily.

Stomping upon the bathroom tiles, she yelled at her own reflection. “I can’t take it, okay! Okay. Twilight, focus, get some… painkillers…”

But as she reached for the bottle next to the sink, something caught her eye in the mirror, as the scent of lavender became so strong as to be overwhelming.

Right behind her, stood the Princess of the Night, faded yet present, unchanged save for her light blue bangs upon her forehead, and her brilliant, glowing eyes…

Twilight shrieked in fright, falling onto her back. Dazed, she scrambled back to her hooves and looked where the alicorn had stood.

There was no-one there.

Luna's eyes fluttered open.

With bated breath, her eyes darted around her room. Empty, save for her belongings as usual. Nothing was out of place, as it should be. Nothing lurked in the dark corners of her room.

Only the cold chill of the wind blowing from the open window interrupted the stillness.

Whatever it was that she had seen, nonetheless, made her chest feel tight, naked and vulnerable as she was without her armour.

She released her held breath, her voice gentle and soft as she whispered into the night.

“Twilight?”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

A chapter that was created from splitting the prior Chapter Twenty-Two (‘Unveiled’) into two chapters.

This chapter features no noteworthy modifications, other than the split.

Spectrum 2.0 - September 24th 2020

Sledge115:

(Credit to Amarynceus’ artwork for the freckles inspiration. And the folks in the Fimfiction Discord, SockPuppet and Raleigh especially, for convincing me (directly and indirectly) to go through with it. Yeah. She has freckles now. And dapples. I just felt like it, honestly :twilightsheepish:)

Hello there! This chapter was truly a delight to write, from Luna’s time with Twilight, Ana and Blueblood’s hijinks, and, of course, the dreamwalk. A rather quiet chapter, for the most part, but that’s why it was such an enjoyable one to write :twilightsmile:

Apart from Luna and Twilight’s scenes, I’ve found Galatea and Thorax’s scenes to be quite the standouts to write, too, with their introspective outlooks. Poor, poor Thorax…

The scene in Luna’s dreams is perhaps the most complete summary of Spectrum!Luna thus far, who I’ve come to define throughout Moonrise and stories outside of Spectrum, such as Moonbug and The Dreamwalker’s Lament, though this scene’s initial draft precedes both of them.

The characters of Equinox and Tranquility are based on SockPuppet’s Luna’s Daughters– with some adjustments, of course, given the considerably different time scale. It’s an excellent story, and I thought it fitting to give it a seamless tribute here :twilightsmile:

Speaking of Luna’s descent - yes, you read that right up there. Radiant Hope, in the Spectrum continuity, is Amore’s daughter. We do like to streamline things.

The scene between Ana and Blueblood was the first one completed, and remains mostly the same - an exploration of two rather quirky characters, and some old fashioned poking at social norms. Also, no, I have no idea what the hell we were thinking but I do hope it reads about as much fun as we had in writing it :twilightsheepish:

Now, the final scene… well, what more can I say? It came to be soon after the series finale, and now coincidentally, the chapter’s published almost a year to the day the show concluded. I thought it fitting to give a love letter of a scene to the wonderful show that brought us all here, as it deserves. No matter how long it’s been since it’s started, never shall we forget it.

Oh, and one last thing; The First Second of Eternity has updated at last, and Galatea’s story thickens, ever so slightly. Have a look :twilightsmile:

Cheers, and stay tuned!
~Sledge

P.S.
How the Magic of Friendship grows…

RoyalPsycho: Hello everyone. I’ve never been a major member of this group but several scenes have been included introducing my contributions to the story – the scenes involving the Saddle (M)Arabians and Kirin: brilliantly co-authored with regular Spectrum writer VoxAdam (thank you for all the help Vox) – and so it seems like you’re going to see a lot more of my work in this story.

I hope you all like it and have a great time.

VoxAdam: Well. Where do I begin with this chapter?

I’ve written longer author’s notes for previous chapters, yet this is one of the chapters in all of Spectrum which feels the most personal to me, following Chapter Twelve (‘To Seize The Day’) and the ‘Child of Crystal’ Interlude. And now I’m here, not knowing what to say. I guess that much of it was already said my fellow writers in the notes preceding mine, though.

This chapter was always intended as a more slice-of-lifey chapter, the middle part in a three-parter, bridging the gap between Chapter Twenty-One (‘So Say We All’) and Chapter Twenty-Three (‘Here’s To You’) as the PHL establish contact with Earth and Lyra prepares to leave on her Expedition Into The Unknown, to the Sunken Dream Valley. Perhaps most interesting to note is that there’s a lot of material in this chapter which was months in the making, even a couple years in some cases, going so far as be written way before Act Two started publishing, let alone was fully planned.

As Sledge has stated, well, we could begin by talking about Ana Bjorgman’s comic-relief scene with Prince Blueblood… But, let’s say the scene speaks for itself and call it a day, right? For the ever-required purposes of posterity, I’ll only state that I recall us co-write that scene back in April and May 2019. So, you can see how long we’ve been sitting on that one, heh-heh…

While Royal is not one to write lengthy author’s notes, there is so much I could tell about the background to the three scenes co-written with him which appear in this chapter, if I had the time or the space.

It’s possible the most attentive readers might recall they’ve met the al-Husan family before, in the opening scene of Chapter Eleven (‘Those On Pilgrimage’), in an extended Early-Bird Cameo to continue showcasing who was coming to attend the Concordia. Qabil actually made his original appearance in a collaboration of mine with Royal, Inmates of Erebus, retroactively combined with the Spectrumverse. About half the exchanges I’ve had with Royal have involved building upon our imaginings for Saddle Mareabia, and though you may only see so much of it in the finished Spectrumverse, the worldbuilding is there.

As a final note, I may have mentioned this before, but Garble’s secret hobby of beat poetry only became canon in early 2019, ergo when TheIdiot and I had already written a couple scenes for the character accompanying Ember to the Concordia and had our own characterisation in mind. However, I’ve found it not that hard to integrate this surprisingly appealing canon addition to the Spectrumverse. And I hope this chapter earned a few chuckles with it.

Cheers,
~Vox

TheIdiot: I won’t lie in saying that doing this chapter was not easy. There were things that needed to be paced, scenes considered, ideas determined, and all manner of prospects to look at. While the real world has been getting quite scary (even though we’re a week or so from October), we hope you all continue to enjoy our bizarre Fimfiction story. And hey, we managed to update monthly (kinda) this time around. So, that’s a step forward, don’t you think?

As per usual, my thanks to you, our loyal readers, for sticking with us in the meantime. We here on SPECTRUM are grateful for your continued support.

Also, my thanks to VoxAdam and Sledge115 for their continued efforts. Especially since the latter has a sidestory or two you should give a read if you haven’t given it a chance.

And lastly, my thanks to RoyalPsycho and Doctor Fluffy for pitching in here and there during production.

With nothing else said, try and remain fortitude until November. Because if we’ve survived this year this far, then we can make it to November and then December. Just one foot infront of the other, one step at a time. As we all continue our journey into the unknown in this fimfic and in real life.

Without else to say,

Carpe diem, everyone.
(P.S. Yes, I’ve updated my icon. It’s always been an eye.)

Act III ~ Chapter Twenty-Five ~ Family

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy

VoxAdam

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Twenty-Five

Family

Dedicated to Mary Jane Begin

* * * * *

“Democracy is not the law of the majority but the protection of the minority.”
—Carnets III, Mars 1951 - Décembre 1959, by Albert Camus

~ The Crystal Realm, Northern Domain of Equestria ~ Day 15 of the Convocation ~ Twenty-Fourth Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

When she’d reclaimed the Crystal Throne, Cadance had soon discovered she faced three immediate concerns. Firstly, how the crystalponies would reintegrate into a world that had moved on a thousand years. Secondly, though she came from Amore’s line, whether they’d accept her as ruler. And, thirdly, a combination of the prior two concerns – what place would her new realm occupy on the world stage?

The former questions had proven less a worry than she’d thought. She should have known that if Luna could return and be accepted as Princess by Equestria, her birthright would hold true in the Crystal Realm.

Now the issue of its relations with the rest of the world stood before her in the flesh.

“I do wish I could stay longer, Your Highness,” said Lady Amira, her eyes tracing over the crystalline structure of the station. “Crystal and glass aren’t a strange sight in my country, but I’d never thought I’d live to see a whole city of it… If my esteemed husband were here, he’d have more to say than I ever could.”

It was diplomatic flattery, of course, yet spoken sincerely. Cadance allowed a small smile. It did not escape her notice, however, that both the ambassador and the filly by her side were draped in a double layer of caparisons. Although the weather within the magical dome was what she considered cozy, it required passage through a blizzard to reach. Accustomed to the desert, the Saddle Mareabians would be feeling a constant chill, even under the dome.

Cadance had to wonder how the girl to be her ward, Hadia, felt about that. Having lived all her life in blazing-hot Saddle Mareabia, what would it mean, getting sent this far up North? Possibly like exile to the edge of the world.

“Thanks, Milady,” she replied, shoving away that thought for now. “I… understand you may only be able to visit my ward at certain intervals. But you’ll be welcome at any time.”

She didn’t mention what she knew about Qabil al-Husan. He was the girl’s father, and that was all that mattered. More worrisome was the looming threat from another world.

‘I’m receiving a lot of new guests later,’ Cadance thought, pondering the other passengers who’d arrived on the Crystal Express.

A prisoner and his guards. Captain Plow of the Imperial Trailblazers, captured in Boston. She’d negotiated with Amethyst Star to take him in. Him, and another. Spike. Larger than the little infant drake she knew, so horribly twisted by the Tyrant…

Any plans she had for a child with Shining would be on hold for the foreseeable future. In a way, Lady Amira’s fosterage proposal was a boon. A chance to spend another three years doing what she’d always done best.

“I thank you for your consideration,” Amira said, bowing her head. “It means so much to me and to dear Hadia’s mother, if you would let her accompany me on these visits.”

“Of course.” Cadance brightened. This was closer to her comfort zone. “She’s more than free to.”

“Lady Tahira would definitely appreciate that,” Amira chuckled a little. “She worries so about her daughter’s growth as a young lady.” Hers eyes turned serious. “She has, in fact, prepared a full curriculum, with assistance of my own son, to ensure Hadia doesn’t slip in her studies. I’ve taken the liberty to prepare a copy.”

“Oh. Well, thank you.”

This also wasn’t unfamiliar to Cadance. She’d babysat enough children of gentry and go-getters that she understood how many parents expected the world from their children.

“Now, I suppose proper introductions are in order.” Amira gestured, and the filly stepped forward carefully.

The filly in question was taller and lankier than a pony her age would be, giving away her horse heritage. Her coat was of subdued blood-orange with hints of crimson, whilst her mane and tail, tied into ponytails, were pitch-black. Like Amira, the caparisons she wore were richly-coloured light greens shaded with off-colour yellow, accentuating her body’s darker colours. Her head was adorned by a cloth circlet which Cadance recognised as the frame for a face-veil, though the circlet’s thinness meant such a veil would have been gauzy. There, Cadance saw Hadia was the rare she-horse with a horn.

But what actually got Cadance's attention was the anxious frown on her face. Hadia was trying to hide behind a poise not uncommon to Canterlot’s upper-classes, but her real feelings were filtering through.

“This is my dear spouse and sister-wife’s daughter, Hadia-bint-Tahira of House al-Husan,” Amira intoned with indulgent warmth, looking down and smiling encouragingly. “And this, Hadia,” Amira turned back to Cadance, “is Princess Mi Amore Cadenza.”

“It’s an honour to meet you, Your Highness,” Hadia said. Her voice was small and sweet – and the nervousness amplified by the tremor in it.

“And it’s nice to meet you,” Cadance replied, bobbing her head in greeting, “young lady.”

She complemented her words with a slight curtsy. Hadia seemed surprised, which Cadance had expected – ordinarily, this show of respect was required of her ward, not the other way around. But at a glance from Amira, Hadia curtsied in turn.

The girl did smile, yet it looked forced and thin around the edges.

“Now, Hadia,” Amira began as she turned back to the filly, “your mother expects you to keep up with your studies in your time here. I should visit in another month, with news of your father. Your mother and Aynuk shall be doing the same around that time, so be on your best behaviour for Her Highness.”

“Yes, Lady Amira,” Hadia said.

“We are willing to offer of our own porters,” Amira offered, “to bring Hadia’s luggage up to your palace, if you would like the assistance.”

Cadance risked a glance towards the train, to see several well-dressed horses standing by a large collection of bags, boxes and cases.

“That won’t be a problem.” Cadance said politely. “My majordomo can take care of that. But I thank you for the offer.”

On cue, Autumn Gem, flanked by two members of her staff, approached the convoy. Whilst they began conversing with Amira’s servants, Cadance returned her attention to the foreign nobility.

Amira seemed quick to move on. “Fair play,” she said. “Here is the copy of Hadia’s schedule that I’d mentioned.”

She proffered a collection of papers bound together. Cadance took the notes to look them over. Everything was written in small, tight lettering. It constituted an extensive lists of dates and times, which detailed every little thing Hadia’s mother wanted her daughter to accomplish.

“This is… thorough,” Cadance said. The schedule could have given Twilight a run for her money, especially at Hadia’s age.

“Lady Tahira expects the best from her children,” Amira said somewhat sardonically. “Not that I have any right to complain, of course.”

Quietly, Cadance finished skim-reading the papers. With a sigh, she clapped them together and looked up.

“You have my word that I’ll see Hadia follows her schedule assiduously,” Cadance told Amira. “But, with all due respect, these timetables appear to set little focus on socialisation… Other than lessons on etiquette.”

“I did tell Lady Tahira she should allow for some leeway,” Amira said, her tone not betraying whether she agreed with Cadance. “This is, after all, your household. Yet she’ll know how closely her schedule has been followed.”

Cadance’s mind raced. “Would Her Ladyship deem it acceptable,” she said cautiously, “if I’m able to find uses for her daughter’s time that might actually exceed expectations?”

“Why, I don’t see why she wouldn’t,” Amira said brightly. “What do you have in mind?”

“I’m not sure yet,” Cadance admitted. “But given all we’ve learned about magic in Equestria over the last few years, to say nothing of the encounter with humanity… we may all be required to rethink what we believe in.”

“That is true,” said Amira, but now she was looking sterner. “However, I must inform you of a final specification Lady Tahira made. Considering the many unknowns involved… she does not want Hadia involved in contact with the Thirteenth Family, unless she gives her daughter express permission.”

Licking her lips, Cadance thought back to all she’d seen in Boston, Appleton, and Jarden. The prisoner Trailblazer and the Spike whose healing she was to aid in, both of whom she had placed in a secluded area of the Citadel, far from living quarters.

“I understand. Well. Music, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy...” Cadance said, reciting from memory what had been on the list of studies. “Grammar, logic, rhetoric… Etiquette… Magic… A heavy curriculum, make no mistake, but I’m sure we can manage.”

What she didn’t tell Amira was that ‘magic’ comprised a broad topic. In fact, by modern criteria, many of these fine arts were unnecessary or backward, even for the gentry. With luck, this might give her wiggle-room. No surprise that ‘magic’ should be vaguely-defined, considering how rare true mages were in Saddle Mareabia.

Cadance didn’t know much about Lady Tahira of House al-Husan, yet she’d heard the mare came from a prestigious family of textile artisans. She wondered if Hadia might show a proficiency in weaving dreams. That’d be fun.

Throughout all this, Hadia had merely stood by, silent and shuffling. Maybe even shivering. Cadance felt a pang. In all likelihood, it was nervousness, but perhaps not only that. Even under her double caparison, the girl must be cold. Amira hid it far better, yet she too must have been feeling displaced, so far from her desert home.

“Alright,” said Cadance, gingerly tucking the notes under her wing. “If that is all, Lady Amira, I’ll be glad to take in Hadia. The Convocation will benefit from your speedy return. And, Hadia,” she added, smiling softly at the girl, “take the time you need to say your goodbyes. I’ll just go and arrange our carriage.”

Amira nodded. “I’ll be here.”

To Cadance’s satisfaction, when she went to check on Autumn Gem, her majordomo had performed the feat of moving all the luggage where it needed to go. A small procession of carts would take care of that – her carriage had to travel as light and comfy as it could. Assured all was in order, Cadance convened with her staff beneath the arched doorway a minute more than necessary, before she returned to her guests.

The al-Husans were right where she’d left them, though now Hadia stood in front of Amira, her back to Cadance. They looked like they’d just finished talking in their language, when Amira raised her head in Cadance’s direction and the girl spun around. Hadia looked stressed, as if she were desperately trying not to appear scared.

“Is everything in order, then?” Amira asked pleasantly, eyes flicking down to Hadia.

Cadance kept the frown off her face. The lady before her was the lead mare of a Saddle Mareabian herd, which culturally required Amira to treat all children in the herd as her own – but people were complex, and Hadia wasn’t Amira’s birth-daughter. Chances were that saying goodbye had reassured Hadia she’d be missed, yet it was easier for Amira to give her up whilst reminding the girl of her family name.

“It’s a quick road through the city,” Cadance nodded. “My husband awaits us at the Citadel.” She gave the clock above the archway a glance, then leaned towards Hadia. “Dinner’s served at seven in the Crystal Realm. I hope you don’t mind, Hadia,” she smiled. “I know a few ponies from further South who find it strange, adjusting to the hours in the North. It took me weeks getting used to how late Aunt Celestia’s Sun rises up here.”

“I understand, Your Highness,” Hadia replied in a clear, practiced tone. She did swallow noticeably, however, and her face was stuck in its worried half-grimace.

“You will do just fine, dear,” Amira added in a comforting voice, turning back to Cadance. “But, I’m afraid I must leave now. There’s so much business to take care of back at the Convocation.”

“Well, I wish you a safe return, and that we see you and your family soon.” Cadance beamed. Her expression was genuine, for it was the one she’d broken out to every parent she had foal-sat for. It always worked.

Amira bowed her head one last time, then left and walked onto the train, her porters following. Autumn Gem and her people had already seen to the luggage, so they simply stood at attention until this point.

With a sharp whistle, the train pulled away from the station, to follow the tracks South, leaving Cadance on the platform with her new ward. When Cadance turned, it didn’t surprise her that Hadia wasn’t looking at her. But nor was she staring after the departing train. As if searching for anything else to look at, the girl’s eyes had moved upwards, staring at the peculiar sky of the Crystal Realm.

Moving at a delicate pace, Cadance trotted back to Hadia, following her gaze.

“Quite something, isn’t it?” Cadance said gently. “Long trip to get here, I know. With nothing but ice to see for miles… You could fall asleep mid-way, and wake up with more hours of ice to look forward to. But once in the Realm…”

She paused, waiting to see if Hadia would say anything. When the girl didn’t, she continued.

“I’ve never been to Saddle Mareabia,” said Cadance, pouring a note of regret into her words. “Before I got married, Celestia wanted me to get to know every inch of Equestria… preparing my future duties as princess, you see. But my cousin, Astron, he went on a boat-trip once. Two days over the desert… the big one South, I mean. I remember he described coming across an oasis. What was it...”

Briefly, she rummaged her brain for Blueblood’s words.

“‘Like a mirror, Candy,’” Cadance quoted. “‘Suddenly, it stops mattering how much nothing there is all around, because the sweetest thing’s right there, in front of you.’” She chuckled softly. “Yeah… he’d say that... I know it’s been a long trip, Hadia, and it’s going to be a long stay, but I hope the Realm shall be like an oasis to you.”

“Thank you, Your Highness,” Hadia intoned, looking uncertain now. “My… my father used to visit the desert. He told me about an oasis in the Mumit Desert. He made water sound so beautiful.”

The filly went quiet again, but Cadance smiled. Hadia had finally said something not dictated by etiquette lessons. After foal-sitting so many children, Cadance could spot an anecdote given largely for politeness’ sake, but it was a start.

The two of them set off from the platform, to find Cadance’s carriage waiting for them.

It was, at first glance, a blocky vehicle formed of a single, shimmering piece of crystal that gleamed with a lilac hue. The carriage’s body terminated in sharp, diagonal points that looked as formed from the struts which dotted the city’s borders. Large wheels with thin, delicate-looking rims and spokes held it up, their centers embossed with the bronze caps of two stylised sheep, one on top and the other underneath, chasing one another. Holding up the bridles were curling ram horns, moulded from the body’s crystal, that had been strapped to a team of eight crystalponies standing at attention.

Cadance let Hadia climb in and pick the seat she wanted.

Contrary to the hard lines and sharp edges of the outside, the carriage was much comfier inside. Velvet cushioned everything and the roof was translucent enough to allow light in. The seats were also quite plush, something Celestia had recommended after centuries of experience. Shining had even suggested installing some kind of mini-fridge, and after one particularly long ride in the early days of the Realm’s return, when train schedules were sparse and disorganised, Cadance was tempted to allow it.

The moment Autumn Gem had decided they were settled, she shut the door and bid the carriage begin moving. There was a little rocking at first, but that quickly smoothed out. Judging from Hadia’s poise, Cadance could tell she was used to riding carriages. Silence reigned at first, but Hadia soon couldn’t resist looking out of the carriage windows, taking in the sights of the Crystal Realm. Whilst ice had a wonder to it, there wasn’t much that could beat the shining meadows or crystalline growths of the Realm itself. And though there was still some trepidation, it seemed Hadia was comfortable enough to just watch.

“Lovely, right?” Cadance chuckled, stopping only when Hadia stopped staring, having returned to the intentionally composed position Cadance guessed proper Saddle Mareabian fillies were expected to keep.

“It’s… yes, Your Highness,” Hadia replied. “It is very beautiful.”

Normally, had this been in Canterlot or dear old Florentina, this would have been idle talk, no more substantial than any stabs at breaking the ice – so to speak. In fact, Cadance hadn’t thought beyond her words when she’d spoken them.

Yet now the small exchange, which had seemed trivial, was taking on greater significance to Cadance. She could feel it in her chest. And this only had partly to do with the fact she was talking to a child she’d be expected to take care of for three years.

“Indeed,” said Cadance, looking out in turn, her eyes growing distant. “It is beautiful, this place. But it almost wasn’t. I saw what it could still have looked like today.” She returned to Hadia. “We’re sure it should be safe now. Did your mother tell you much about the Crystal Realm, Hadia? Or… did Lady Amira?”

“My father did, Your Highness.” There was a slight hesitation in Hadia’s voice. “And… my mother’s also given me lessons on your Realm.” The frown the filly had worn all day faded as something in her eyes lit up. A sadness remained in her expression even as it brightened, yet Cadance noticed one of her ears twitch excitedly. “Is it true you and your husband fought the Shadow King?”

Cadance’s mind had momentarily got caught on the words ‘my father did’. From what Celestia had told her, Master Qabil would have been arrested two years before the Realm made its return. But he was a scholar, and thus liable to know the history of her land.

Then the rest of Hadia’s words caught up to her, and she gulped. She should have expected there’d be some excitement from a child in her presence. She’d seen the looks often enough, in the little colts and fillies who wandered these streets of crystal.

“Well…” Cadance began, hesitant. “Sort of. Shining did most of the action, really, him and Twilight Sparkle and friends. I spent most of it in the Citadel, doing what I could to hold up the shield keeping Sombra out. My husband could’ve done that, but…” She bit her tongue. “Last time he took charge of putting a shield up around a city, it didn’t go so well. Besides, the Realm is my birthright, so my magic is attuned to it. I think the most exciting things got was when I had to catch the Crystal Heart in mid-air, before Sombra could grab it. I was too exhausted to fly on my own by then, so Shining… helped me along.”

“How?” Hadia asked curiously.

“He... tossed me,” Cadance admitted sheepishly. “Like a spear. He’s got great aim,” she was quick to add. “He is the Captain of the Royal Guard.”

Cadance almost felt embarrassed from the look of incredulity on Hadia’s face. She could tell the gears were still turning – not from a lack of comprehension, but of all things, actual belief.

“That’s… I, wow,” Hadia stammered. “That sounds amazing.”

Until then, Cadance hadn’t noticed her own shoulders stiffen – almost like she was ready to be tossed all over again, frankly – but now she felt them relax. While part of Hadia’s reaction was clearly overwhelment, she seemed to mean what she’d said.

This less rehearsed way of speaking appeared promising to Cadance.

“I guess it is,” Cadance said, brushing back her mane. “I haven’t thought about it that much. Plenty of amazing stuff happens in Equestria, but most of it involves the Element Bearers. Although… none of them are married, or look to be any time soon… Well, maybe the fashion-designer, Rarity. She’s got dreams of it, anyway.” She let herself pause. “I had talks with Princess Celestia and Lady Amira about this fosterage, you know. They told me how magic works in Saddle Mareabia… but Amira especially loved talking about your father and his powers. I think she may have used ‘amazing’ at least once.”

“Thank you, Your Highness,” Hadia intoned, a small blush on her face. “I am working very hard to match my father and big brother.”

“Aynuk, correct? Lady Amira said he’d be coming to visit,” Cadance recalled. “I do hope you will be able to get all the visits you can from family. Amira had mentioned Aynuk’s shown interest in joining the Concordat’s work, and, well…” She trailed off. “It’s going to be a very complicated time for the world.”

The light seemed to go out of Hadia’s eyes there. Her expression flattened only a little, but Cadance could see something had changed and the filly’s mood had returned to its earlier state.

“I know,” Hadia murmured, her voice barely carrying.

The frown was back. But this time it didn’t look sad. It seemed on the verge of becoming a scowl.

Cadance’s special magic was attuned to one particular emotion, love. Yet a poor child-minder would she have been, if she couldn’t sense a child’s feelings through more prosaic means.

‘Oops… I shouldn’t have mentioned family,’ she thought guiltily. ‘One person Hadia won’t be able to see for a long time is her father…’

She’d actually gone over this more than once with Shining. Considering his poor opinion of Blueblood, he’d been surprisingly quick to accept fostering the child of someone convicted to Erebus. But of course her Shiney wasn’t one who judged by sins of the father. No-one was trying to replace anyone’s mother or father, they’d agreed upon this instantly. Just like before, Cadance was getting a child to look after, only now with a husband by her side. In some respects, she had to admit, Twilight had been a “problem” child – not due to disregard for authority, but quite the contrary, something like over-zealous devotion to it.

What rough patches awaited her and Shining with this filly, they’d find out soon enough. However, Cadance believed that, especially compared to what awaited Equestria based on her glimpse of Earth, having a child to care for would be worth it.

A slight rocking brought Cadance out of her thoughts. The carriage had come to a halt, and a moment later there was a knock on the door, followed by it being opened by Autumn Gem.

“We’ve arrived, Highness,” the majordomo informed them.

Directly ahead was the raised base of the Citadel, the path leading into it flanked by rows of Crystal Guards. Cadance wasn’t one for shows of royal pomp, but her court had insisted on making an official impression. She was just glad she’d got to meet Hadia by herself, before more extravagant features had a chance to overwhelm her. Cadance counted her blessings to spot Shining waiting on the path. Like her, he’d foregone regalia – boy, had that led to argument with Court, worse than welcoming the Crystal Bard – and was standing casually, with a friendly smile on his face that widened as he saw her dismount.

“Hi there,” Shining drawled, the smile turning into an easy grin.

She could tell he was trying to set the mood, and given the cadre of Guards at his back, it certainly made him stand out.

“Hello, Shining,” Cadance said in response. She ushered out Hadia, who walked forward. “Hadia. This is my husband, Prince Shining Armor.”

“An honour to meet you, Your Highness,” Hadia intoned, bowing her head and shoulders with a fait bit of grace for one her age. “I am Hadia-bint-Tahira of House al-Husan.”

“It’s good to meet you too, Hadia.”

Cadance could tell Shining was surprised at how practised the filly’s response had sounded, but he remained easy-going. The two of them had met Canterlot gentry with less dedication to courtly manners.

Shining nodded towards his Guards. “Stand easy, chaps,” he said, “we’re welcoming a child into our home, not the Kirin Mikado. Sergeant Flash?”

An orange-toned pegasus Guard stepped forward. “Yes, sir?”

“You and your people, please assist Miss Gem in having our ward’s luggage brought up, so she may be given space in the hour before dinner-time.”

The Sergeant saluted with a wing and went to attend the task.

Shining took a step closer to Hadia so he stood by her left, while Cadance moved by her right, both of them careful not to hem the girl in.

“Shall we, love?” Shining asked Cadance.

When she nodded, he turned about, proceeding towards the Citadel’s entrance. She matched his pace, quietly gesturing at Hadia to follow. After slight hesitation, the girl did, walking between the two adults.

“We’ve got pegasi working on the luggage,” Shining said conversationally. “They should have it brought up to your room by the time we get there.”

Hadia looked at him. Her next words seemed to slip out before she could help it. “Are you sure that’s safe?”

He smiled back at her. “The Crystal Realm’s been one of the safest, most neighbourly places in all Equestria and its related territories since Sombra was defeated. Ponies here trust each other. And the dome’s there to keep outside dangers at bay.”

“But I understand how strange it can feel,” Cadance cut in, “being in a new place.” And Earth had been strangest of all, she thought. “So if you think you’ll need something, a night-light or a music-box, perhaps, we can see to that.”

An odd look crossed Hadia’s face. “No…” she said quietly. “No, I… think I’ll manage. But thank you for suggesting it, Your Highnesses.”

“Very well,” Cadance said, exchanging a look with Shining.

They were approaching the gateway, soon to cross into the crystalline magnificence of the Citadel, but Cadance suspected a noble’s child wouldn’t be awed by the architecture. What would leave an impression was where she’d be staying the nights.

Shining stopped before the great double-doors, horn lighting up to open them.

“Having you over was my wife’s idea, Hadia,” Cadance’s husband said, turning to speak even as the Citadel’s inside was revealed. “Well… I mean, she’s the one who did all the talking. But I was very happy to agree to it. There still haven’t been many new children to the Crystal Realm, and it’s a shame, when there’s so much love about nowadays.”

Cadance’s magical senses did kick in then. Emanating from Hadia was a feeling of connection to the family she’d left behind, the environment which had raised her in a manner unorthodox to Equestrians – yet, from what Cadance sensed, had not been an lacking in love. And though the Crystal Realm was the love capital of Equestria, she wondered if it could ever fill in for that.

* * * * *

Still neatly packed and closed, the cases were already there, as had been promised.

If the pegasi Guards had brought Hadia’s luggage through the windows, they’d done a discrete, elegant job of it. Her possessions waited in a neat little row by the bed, and the tall arched windows showed no sign of having been opened. That was the first thing which struck Hadia. There was glass in the windows, and curtains. Mother had often proudly told her that no nation rivaled Saddle Mareabia for glass-blowing or textiles – but those were meant for decoration. Curtains were made for beds or doorways, not windows. Where were the wicker shutters that belonged there?

Then she remembered. It wasn’t warm enough here in the North. Nowhere near enough.

At least the bed looked normal. A four-poster, just like hers. There the sameness ended, though. The colours were all wrong. Her room was all in soft orange, the lovely smooth feel of sandstone. This room was all in shades of blue, both dark and pale, its floor covered in the checkerboard tiles she’d once read rich Equestrians favoured. It looked pretty, but it was cool, glacial. Jutting crystals gave it a hard edge. Nothing like her bedroom.

Then finally Hadia’s sights fell on something familiar. A small vanity, just like Lady Haifa’s, only a subtle dark green in colour. And on the little table was a tiny gift-wrapped white box, with the words ‘Welcome, Hadia’ written in gold on the pink ribbon.

Hadia moved towards it curiously. But rather than pick it up, she turned to look at Princess Cadance and Prince Shining Armor, who were waiting in the doorway.

“You can open it,” the Princess smiled, stepping in. “It’s a box of chocolates. Sorry, spoilers.”

Next to his wife, the Prince joined his smile to hers. “I’d suggest waiting a little bit before popping one, though. Dinner starts in an hour.”

Uncertainly, Hadia picked up the box, turning it over in her hooves. “Thank you… thanks, Your Highnesses,” she said, giving a bow.

The Princess came to place a hoof on her shoulder. “We’ll give you your space, Hadia,” she said. “If there’s anything you need, just ring the bell. There’s a pulley next to the bed. I’ll come back to fetch you in an hour. Okay?”

The unknown term momentarily confused Hadia, before she caught the Princess’s meaning.

“Yes, Your Highness,” she said. “This is… this room’s very lovely.”

“We can have it changed as you like, during your stay,” the Prince said, as the Princess returned to the doorway. Then he gently closed the door behind them.

Hadia was now alone, and part of her was thankful for that.

It had been bad enough waiting to arrive, the Lady Amira watching her and trying to remind her that visits would happen, eventually. At least she’d had Lady Amira for comfort on the train, a last little link to home before she was left in this cold land.

Hadia shivered. These caparisons were her best clothes, and her mother had picked them so they’d stand out against her colours without clashing, yet they felt frightfully thin. The train had been thankfully heated, as had the Princess’ carriage, but the crystal castle, for all of its wondrous beauty, seemed to still suffer from the chilling effect of stone in cooler climes. She wasn’t sure if that was really it, yet felt no real wish to intuit.

Not knowing what else to do, Hadia climbed onto the bed, prodding at its fabric. She dropped the sweet-box next to her, unopened.

One last thing she hadn’t noticed. Her new guardians had left her a couple of storybooks. Two picture-books reclined upon the pillows, their covers illustrated in water-colours. Under The Sparkling Sea and The Dragons on Dazzle Island, the titles read.

A weak smile tugged at her lips. The Princess had been thoughtful. And those were truly beautiful water-colours. But she didn’t look at the books for long. It felt hard, somehow.

“Alright,” Hadia whispered as clearly as she could. “Think of Mother. Think of what she said... Think of what Aynuk said. Think of wha… wh… what Baba would have said. This is very important. This is your home… for now.”

Home. Hadia already wanted to go home. This place, though the Princess and Prince had tried their best to comfort her, was too foreign and too cold. She wanted to go back to her room, to hide in the library, to splash in Lady Naiya’s pool, even go do her studies if it would let her stay where she belonged.

‘Studies,’ Hadia thought. And her heart sank at the word.

The curriculum and a reminder to keep on top of it had been one of the last things her mother had given her before leaving. There had been genuine farewells, some hugs and a kiss on the forehead afterwards, but that word was all she could really think about linked to her mother.

‘First I have to study for the family, now I have to leave the family for them.’ Stewing in her bitter thoughts, Hadia felt her legs go weak with every pulsating throb in her temples. ‘How’s that make sense? How does sending me here help?’

Aynuk had once told her a lot was expected of their clan, especially those who were special like he and she were, but also that he believed she could meet those expectations, maybe even exceed them. He’d never once doubted she could become as good at sorcery as he was. She wasn’t sure she was that good, but every time Aynuk had affirmed she could accomplish their father and her mother’s wishes, he was right.

“But what kind of lesson is this?” Hadia asked herself. She was staring at the floor now and felt even colder for it.

Hadia concentrated a moment. Her horn shone. A flicker of flame appeared in front of her. A narrowing of the eyes, and the flame grew in size and heat. Finally she felt warmer, but the magic just reminded her of all the demands made of her in the past year.

Magic was her inheritance. That was what Baba had told her. Lady Amira had explained this trip to the ponylands in a very long and wordy fashion, telling her she’d be fostering good relationships with the land of Equestria, but Hadia had figured out the big reason she was here. She could do magic, which almost none of her siblings could, and Aynuk had to stay home and couldn’t take her place.

Her flame flickered and faded, almost spitefully. Hadia concentrated and conjured it back, but it was weaker now, simply floating in front of her, as if in mockery. Frowning, Hadia intensified her focus upon the magical fire – which noiselessly exploded into a bright sphere of magical energy, tinted blue and green. She flew off the bed, her impact mercifully cushioned by her luggage. Dazed, she looked to see there was no damage to the bedroom. Or her, other than a slight shock. But the sphere was gone, having winked out when it detonated.

Surrounded by knocked-over boxes and bags, Hadia just lay on the cold floor, stewing. Her mind was a maelstrom of emotions and she shivered in barely-suppressed anger.

That was it.

Hadia let out a scream of rage and jumped to her hooves, and she wrapped one of the cases her mother had packed in a magical grip. Lifting it high, Hadia screamed again, slamming it down onto the floor. The case flew open as it bounced off the crystalline surface, spewing out clothing everywhere. Another case rose in Hadia’s magic, followed by another. The first rocketed towards the wall, lid flying off and throwing books onto the floor, even before it impacted by the vanity. The other was chucked at the bed. More and more went as Hadia assaulted the bedroom, picking up anything nearby until she’d covered everything in the contents of her luggage.

Her face twisted in impotent fury, Hadia threw herself at the bed and pulled up the sheets, throwing them to the floor. The pillows, and the lovely picture-books with them, rose up in her magical energy immediately after and flew off in different directions, hitting separate walls.

Hissing every breath, Hadia turned and looked around the room, eyes searching for something left to throw. She felt so tired, so tired. Each breath exhausted her. It was all pressing down on her at once. The anger was not gone, she still felt furious, but had no energy left to do anything. Her throat was hoarse and her hooves shook as she stood on the bed, her head bowed.

“Why?” Hadia whispered after a minute of standing in place.

She knew why, but still struggled to understand.

It was then she spied something amongst the strewn clothing and personal items. A massive plush snake, twice as long as she was and almost as thick, Lfah. The doll was the oldest toy she could remember, and almost every night she had slept with it. For more than a year it had been her lifeline, one of the few things that helped comfort her in her father’s absence.

“Baba.” Hadia whimpered and she collapsed onto the bed. She wrapped her forehead in her forehooves as the tears slowly started to flow.

Lifting her head up again, Hadia concentrated and wrapped Lfah in her magic and pulled it towards her. Opening her forelegs she embraced the snake and let her magic wrap it around her, coiling the plush toy over and over, until it cocooned her body. The velvet head rested against Hadia’s face, soaking up her tears as she shut her eyes.

Like so many nights, Hadia tried to imagine it wasn’t Lfah surrounding her, that it was her father, that he wasn’t in prison, that she wasn’t away from home. She tried to ignore the feeling of soft velvet and imagined they were smooth scales instead, the kind her father wore when he changed his form into the graceful serpent he often showed off for her.

“Baba,” Hadia repeated, finally overcoming by exhausation. As her fatigue dragged her down into unconsciousness, she let out a final whisper. “I want to go home.”

~ The Hall of Unity ~

Back when the Convocation had started, the Hive Queen’s private chambers had undergone a metamorphosis, transforming from the standard aesthetics of any fancy room in Canterlot into a wax-layered lair befitting Chrysalis. But in retrospect, this had only been the tip of that iceberg. Two weeks onward, and any bare patches remaining had now been consumed by this gelatinous, poisonous green, no trace left to show this was ever a bedroom fit for ponies.

Not even, Thorax reflected sourly, the four-poster the Queen slept in with her young charge, Papillate. The once-ornate bed resembled nothing so much now as a wax sculpture, as if four pairs of green stalactites and stalagmites had joined, to form an intriguing pattern around at the far corner of an especially moist cavern.

Princess Celestia had finally put her hoof down and insisted that, if the Queen was set on keeping her captive Timberwolves, the Hall had a menagerie at the ready and Chrysalis could move them there, rather than let the poor creatures suffocate in this stifling humidity. So that was their cages gone. Of course, by then, the Queen had also emptied out the red drake’s cage. It lay right where she’d left it, the wire-mesh door hanging open.

He’d been left here, as well.

‘Because,’ the words hammered at his skull, ‘what else do you have?’

Eyes down, Thorax did not think about where he was going. He let his hooves carry him, as they guided him past open wire-mesh, into the yawing blackness inside. His hooves touched obsidian. Without even a sigh, he turned to pull the door, hearing more than seeing the latch fall.

This was it, then. He’d shut himself in.

He lay down, scrunched up his eyes, and willed himself to shut out the world.

Whereupon, he heard it – three taps on the cage, in quick succession. A blink brought the world back into focus. Thorax glanced to meet the newcomer’s eyes. Her upside-down head stuck out from over the cage’s top, watching him through the wire-mesh.

“Oh, h-hey, Aphid. Didn’t see you there.”

The little Changeling drone rolled her eyes, and crawled down to the cage’s latch. Swiftly, she unlatched it, opened the door, and gestured for him to join her outside.

“No thanks, Aphid. I’m going to stay in here.”

Of course, given who this was, Thorax didn’t expect her to leave. Instead, Aphid dropped next to him and sat upright. She did not look happy, going so far as a quizzical tilt of the head as she faced him.

Thorax thought he read the unspoken question in her eyes.

“What? No, it’s not like that… It’s not. I wasn’t going to… I mean, I wasn’t trying to… I… just want to be alone. Please…”

Aphid pouted, but as she patted the floor in front of her, her expression shifted to concern. Yet Thorax just pulled his forelegs further in, refusing to close the gap between them.

“I wasn’t gonna starve myself to death, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Thorax said stubbornly. “I know I’ve not been… eating properly, lately... The Queen, maybe she’d let it happen, but Pharynx, he… He wouldn’t allow it.”

And then Aphid lunged forward – wax excreting from her forehoof. How she produced it so fast, Thorax did not know, but he was unprepared to resist her grabbing his forehooves and dragging him out of the cage.

He weakly tried pulling back, but gave up after a few short tugs. Aphid might not say much, yet when she wanted a chat, she got it. With her forelegs crossed and the unusually stern look on her face as she let go, Thorax saw no option but to give in.

“It’s not like that…” he repeated helplessly, avoiding her eyes.

Aphid said nothing, yet she didn’t do anything else, either. It was a heavy silence, and one he realised she was expecting him to fill.

“Look, I…” Thorax began, still not looking at her. “She’s a Princess. I’m a drone. Heck, she could’ve killed me! I was never kidding myself… But… Pharynx, he won’t even let me dream. And… maybe she is a Princess and I’m a drone, but I didn’t want to just… you know, just be a Changeling to her…”

He heard a sharp ‘tsk’ from Aphid, making him gaze up. She promptly gestured to all of him, before shrugging confusedly. Then she tapped his chest, and smiled slightly. She touched her own chest, and he knew she was mimicking Ember’s vocals as she made a gagging sound.

“Right… Yeah. Yeah, she’s a bit different around me, isn’t she?” He sighed. “Probably cos’ I said I liked how she plays guitar…”

With a shake of his head, he gave Aphid a sour glance.

“You don’t care what people think, do you, Aphid?” Thorax muttered. “I shouldn’t have said it. Said that about the guitar. I actually thought she might like me, just a little. But they only care for Changelings when we give ‘em what they want... and I told her what she wanted to hear.”

This time, Aphid mimed burying her face in her hooves. Then she tapped him on the chest, firmly, before speaking in Ember’s voice;

“Well… you said… you’re there with Chrysalis at mealtimes?”

Thorax remembered when Ember had spoken those words. It was the last time he’d had a quiet moment with her. Before everything had turned ugly. It had also been back when Garble was the one stuck inside that cage. And he’d been the one who let the dragon out so Aphid could massage Garble’s aching shoulders.

He felt his throat rise into a growl. That mean red drake had never deserved the kindness.

“Okay… I… I’ll keep an eye out for you.”

Having finished her quoting, Aphid next mimicked the plucking of a guitar’s strings, prior to ‘throwing’ it away, and she tapped his chest once again, her expression growing softer.

“Really, huh?” Thorax said flatly. “Special, that’s what you think? Well, you were watching us a long time. So, if that’s what you think of her and me, what do you think of her? You saw her at the campfire, we all did.”

Aphid tapped her chin, briefly, her brows furrowed.

She turned her head over to the side, and breathed fire. Or quite a neat facsimile of it, using Changelings’ green transformation fire to the effect of it pouring from her open mouth. She looked at him again, mimicked strumming a guitar, and Thorax could just imagine what Ember had been practicing that night. Finally, the imaginary guitar was shoved away again, while Aphid bared her fangs.

Her little display, true to her, was capped off with a smug nod.

“Well, I see you got her mannerisms down pat…” Thorax said in a whisper.

Cold-blooded though he was, he was beginning to feel his heat rise. That seemed to be a recurring thing when it came to him and Ember. But whereas that time under the mistletoe had been uncomfortable, yet also kind of pleasant – now, there was nothing pleasant about this rising heat.

He was whispering, and he felt an urge to shout.

“You know… the mannerisms aren’t the same as the person,” he said, speaking louder now. “But… go ahead. Pharynx is right, isn’t he? Absolutely right. She’s a Princess, I’m a drone, pony-tale endings don’t happen, and most of all– what’s the difference? There never was nothing special between us– Do I know a thing about her? If you’re so good at imitating Ember, why don’t ya just turn into her, huh?”

Thorax gave Aphid a shove. She scuttled back in fright. A milestone for him. He was the most timid Changeling in the Hive and no creature had ever scuttled from him.

What little of that thought registered gave him no joy.

“Go on! Do it! Isn’t that what Changelings do? We don’t care for other creatures, and none care about us! You could turn into her right now, it’d make no difference! He’s right, I only liked her for her looks– her looks, ya hear me! It isn’t what’s inside that matters! All we want from them is that sweet, sweet love! And no-one loves a Changeling for… wh-who…”

His final words, which had struggled to come out, were cut off by a burst of green fire.

He found himself face to face with Ember. But it wasn’t Ember. It couldn’t be. It might look like the blue, fierce dragon that was Ember, but this was Aphid underneath. She was plain Aphid, not Princess Ember. The alleged dragon stared upon her form, stretching her claws. She pointed at herself, before shaking her head.

Another burst of green fire consumed her. Now Aphid, small and wide-eyed, sat there, her expression concerned and caring. She pointed to herself with a hoof, and then at him.

That heat which had built up inside of Thorax, having burst out so violently, now dissipated with nearly the same abruptness, leaving him with a hollow feeling. His throat hurt. He felt his lips tremble – his whole body, even. He was shaking all over. The tears began pouring thick and fast. He buried his eyes in his hooves, but nowhere quick enough for her not to see. It didn’t matter. Nothing about it did.

He felt himself pulled into an embrace. A warm, comforting hug. He released the sob he’d been holding in, returning the hug of Aphid’s hooves caressing his back, even as he let it all out.

“I’m sorry,” Thorax said in a hoarse whisper. “So sorry… Sorry for making this all about me… You’re a… I know you care, Aphid. I’m sorry for doubting that… For what I said. That was a horrible, cruel thing to say… We’re… we’re still friends, right?”

Aphid broke away from the hug, her large eyes staring into his. Then her smile grew wider, and the little drone patted his shoulder in camaraderie.

Thorax sighed in relief. “You’re a good friend,” he said, managing to finish that phrase. “I’m… I really am sorry. You’ve been listening to me rant… and I didn’t even think about how I’m not the only Changeling looking for love…”

Another ‘tsk’ from Aphid, but she wore a knowing smirk. He chuckled wryly in return.

“I’m sorry,” he said, having lost count of how often he’d said that. “I shouldn’t have shoved you. That’s not… not something friends do. No hard feelings?”

Aphid furrowed her brows, and scrunched her snout. With a heavy sigh, she raised a hoof, and offered it to him. A hoofshake.

“O-okay,” said Thorax. He raised his forehoof to met hers. “I-I guess this means it’s okay…?”

His word died in his throat, for he felt his hoof stick to hers, still wax-covered. And he hardly had enough time to blurt out a cry of terror when Aphid pulled him in a headlock and began to vigorously rub against his cranium.

It wasn’t as rough as his brother, but Thorax still yelped.

“Alright, alright!” he wheezed, holding in his choking laughter. “You can stop now. Boy, I hate it when Pharynx does that. I’d prefer if you– ow– stuck to your massages.”

As suddenly as it had begun, Aphid fell back and clutched her stomach, 'giggling' with a smile as wide as she could make it, her eyes shut in glee.

Another light jab to his shoulder, and all was settled. Their laughter died down.

His gaze fell upon her fin. Whereas in Chrysalis’ presence, it was the same shade of green as their brethren, in private she tended to colour it purple, as now. She had done it ever since she’d returned from her brief separation from the Hive, and though she’d only responded with a tap on his snout when he’d asked about it, Thorax had a hunch.

Now, with the tension diffused, the chance was his to take.

“So, um, Aphid,” he began. “What’s it like out... outside the Hive?”

In the aftermath of the Wedding Invasion, Aphid hadn’t been found as one of the Changelings blown away by Chrysalis’ side. He – and Pharynx, who’d never admit it – had worried she might have been among the fallen. And yet merely a few weeks before the Call, she had returned to the Hive. A little thinner, a little jumpier, but nonetheless the same, energetic Changeling they knew.

Of course, she’d been quiet about her misadventure in Canterlot, and Thorax suspected she had let the myth grow for the admiration that came with it.

Aphid’s smile faded away, and she tapped her chin. She breathed out a long, long sigh, before motioning a rope around her neck – and tightened it, topped off with her tongue sticking out.

Before Thorax could comment, Aphid had already curled up on the floor, her body shivering and teeth rattling, whereupon she stood right back up and inhaled, pointing to her stomach, her ribs now showing from her sucked-in breath.

“Right... I can imagine it being way colder than we’d like,” Thorax commented slowly. “Guess that’s better than the desert, though… Dunno how the Violet Hive can stand it, down in Saddle Mareabia… no wonder they got cracked chitin…”

He was babbling. He’d really only thought about the Violet Hive from glancing at Aphid’s now-characteristic purple fin. Truth be told, he barely knew anything about other Hives. Chrysalis didn’t encourage mingling.

“Um, say...” Thorax said, realising this was a delicate question. “How did you… get by, finding enough to eat, after the invasion like that? They musta been on the lookout for Changelings…”

Upon hearing this, Aphid leaned forward, hooves on her chin, and fluttered her eyes. Before Thorax could comment, however, she waved a hoof, and changed positions – now she was laying on the floor, her eyes wide and looked up, half-pleading, half-begging.

“You… asked for it?” said Thorax. “How’d it work?”

Aphid looked towards him, and her eyes widened like a hurt puppy.

“Yeah, I can see that working. Lucky you…” His words petered out. “Sorry. I... dunno why I asked. A Changeling belongs with their Hive, don’t they? Pharynx said it… no more stupid dreams…”

From her position, Aphid suddenly sat up straight and moved closer to him, her face filled with utter worry. She pointed at his chest, and then to the door, and she tilted her head.

She was good at reading what was unsaid. She had experience.

“I… don’t know. I don’t know what else to do, Aphid,” Thorax said, rubbing his brow wearily. “I can’t go on like this… I thought I could, but I can’t. Pharynx knows what he wants, and you’ve found your spot, but me… If this keeps up, I’m gonna go crazy… or turn mean…”

Aphid blew a raspberry. It wasn’t mocking or anything, Thorax knew as soon as she pointed at him again, then drew a heart in the air. He wasn’t sure where the squeak she’d emitted had come from either. But then she hissed. Only, it was Pharynx’s hiss.

He knew what she was saying, yet he still wasn’t sure what to make of it.

“You don’t get it,” Thorax said glumly, “I know I’m not like him. He was born tough. I… it makes me feel bad, just doing what the Queen says. It’s okay for you, she likes your fanning and your massages. And… you know how to take care of yourself. I think the only reason I’m still around is cos’ Pharynx is my brother.”

Aphid opened her mouth, then closed it slowly. And for the first time since they spoke here, she looked at a loss of words, as she rested her chin on both hooves. Truthfully, Thorax didn’t expect Aphid to answer at all. Of all their brethren, her devotion to their Queen was such, compared to her irreverent behaviour around him and Pharynx, that it was too jarring a mystery. Without her usual mimicry, he wondered what she was thinking.

An answer came at last. She stared at him, and repeated the same gestures. A tap on his chest, then to the door, topped off by a tilt of the head. Only this time, she had a look in her eyes that was unusually pleading, like she didn’t want to believe something.

That look pained him. Grimacing, Thorax averted his gaze. On instinct rather than purpose, his eyes roved back towards the cage. It still stood there, the same dark hole she’d got him out of, and he made up his mind.

“Yeah,” Thorax said quietly. “I think that’s it. You… you probably don’t wanna hear this, but… I just don’t think I can live for the Queen, and… I don’t think she really wants me in the Hive. You’re my Hive, you and Pharynx. But you’re so good at fending for yourselves on your own.”

And for the longest minute, Aphid said nothing, simply staring back at him with those large blue eyes of hers. Her hoof moved to her saddlebags. From within she withdrew a bottle of water. Thorax shook his head.

“No, no, that’s yours,” he said, even as Aphid pushed it to him. “I can’t…”

But Aphid’s smile told him she wasn’t taking no for an answer. Gently, she reached for his froehoof and guided him into a hug. More than anything, he knew it was goodbye.

He heard it, a whisper so delicate he might have missed it, but he caught it nonetheless.

“... Good luck.”

* * * * *

“Sir, I insist,” Nurse Cross said sharply. “I get what this means to you, but don’t push your luck.”

Blinking through the sweat dripping into his eyes, Alex tried to ignore her, focused upon keeping his fingers laced behind the back of his head. His eyes zeroed in on the end of the exercise mat, then he reclined, struggling to stay balanced. Pathetic. He shouldn’t be perspiring after a mere forty head-lifts, even rapid ones, but there it was. Between muffled gasps, he wondered whether Equus’s laws of physics were to blame. Except that didn’t make sense, as everything Cheerilee or Amethyst had told him suggested Equus was a less physically taxing world than Earth.

No, though he hated to admit it, he could only blame that lousy ‘honour duel’ for knocking his rehabilitation back by several days. The nurse’s eyes silently told Alex as much. Using his runic tattoos made him forget the natural limits to his body. Limits he couldn’t afford to lose sight of. The runes needed recharging as much as human stamina.

“‘Sides,” said Cross, “Maybe it’s your thing now, pursuing these exercises while talking tactics with the big-wigs. But you’ve gotta make yourself presentable once in a while.”

Having lifted his head for the fiftieth time, Alex stopped and stared.

“‘Talking tactics’?” he said. “Why, what’s the time?”

She motioned at his bedside table’s clock, grumbling. Quarter to eight.

“Blast,” Alex muttered, “where did time go… Okay, uh, help me up, please, Sutra?”

“Now you’re talking sense,” Cross said, lifting him by the arm. It was unsteady going, but she got him back into his wheelchair within minutes, offering him a clean towel he accepted gladly.

“I’m sorry to be such a pain in the ass,” Alex told her, as he finished wiping his face. “Guess you’re not used to the military exercise regimen, huh?”

“Nope,” Cross said, grabbing the towel back. “That was more Redheart’s thing.”

Alex noted the shortness of her tone. She’d practically snatched the towel, and hadn’t even looked at him when she did. His lips thinned. Sutra Cross’s bedside manner had began to slip after the Ponyville fiasco, but ever since the spy Redheart’s funeral, the amiable nurse he remembered had turned snappish.

“Sutra,” he said. “Is something wrong?”

She had her back to him, facing the window. “What’s wrong?” she said. “Will you tell me what isn’t wrong? And stop calling me ‘Sutra’. You don’t know me.”

Now this was unfair. “I did know you, back on–”

“No, you knew someone else,” said Cross. “A nurse with my name. You’re a stranger to me, Alexander Reiner. You’ve been my patient for over three weeks, and that’s a good time for a nurse and their patient to get to know each other. But when you look at me, you don’t see me. All you can think of’s the Nurse Cross who wanted to help, and got horribly killed for it– by the people she tried helping.”

Alex felt his guts tighten in a knot. The terrible images floated back up. Not merely the videos, broadcast on the darknet, of what the HLF had done, but the aftermath. Retaliation, visited upon the shantytown of Defiance. Ashes in the snow. A pregnant woman and a bullet…

“They paid for it,” he said, too quickly. “They paid for it.”

“Did they?” She sighed, facing him again. “Maybe they did. But did that do any good?”

As always when he asked himself such things, Alex’s mind went back to how he’d chosen to become a soldier in the first place. More than twenty years ago, now. How Dan Radwick had only hoped he’d come home, but his mother...

Few would have disputed that his mother was a patriot. She’d hung the Stars-and-Stripes over their porch every Sunday, in the various Texas towns they’d moved to during his childhood. A kid of the 1970s, the first vote she’d cast in her life was to give old Ronnie Reagan another term in office, and voted Republican ever since, except those three times – once for Ross Perot in 1996, then for John Kerry in 2004, and finally Barack Obama in 2012.

He’d never shaken off wondering if the Kerry vote was a swipe at him, for enlisting in the military that had eventually launched a repeat of the Gulf War, the same war which claimed his father’s life ten years before.

“I never asked for this…” Alex mouthed, staring at his lightly glowing runes.

“What was that?”

Cross’s eyes were on him, full of consternation.

Alex cleared his throat. “No, that’s not right. I did ask, I guess, when I signed up,” he said. “But… I never thought soldiering was all I’d ever do. I tried, a couple years, you know? After coming back from my third tour. Except, it never felt right. Stayed away from home, couldn’t face it. And the job market sucked, after 2008. So, I re-enlisted. Embassy duty, overseas.”

“And that was where you were, when all this went down?” asked Cross, placing her forehoof upon his armrest.

“Nobody ever knows where they’re gonna be, once it hits the fan,” said Alex. “That’s why I enlisted as a young man… Kid, really. Stupid kid, fresh out of high school. Bastards, they hook you in when you’re too young to know better. But I did it, because I didn’t want to get caught unprepared, next time it happened. Well, that sure as hell worked out.”

In the ensuing silence, the nurse’s bearing remained stoney. Just as Alex was asking himself what else he could say, however, she did something unexpected. Her forehoof moved up the wheelchair’s armrest, to take his hand.

“Alexander,” said Cross. “I can’t say I understand. But perhaps I know how it feels, a tiny bit. Redheart was my friend. Is. And with the newcomers arriving across that gateway, you’d think now’d be the time for a xenobiologist like me to have a field day… You’d think. I guess that’s why I’m not going to be your nurse until you’re done healing.”

“You’re not?” Alex said, surprised.

Cross nodded. “I spoke to the Princess,” she said. “Asked for a spot on that Expedition of Madame Heartstrings’, which they’re now expecting will ship out in five days or so.”

“First Lyra, then you…” Alex shook his head. “Hm. Five days? I gotta admit, we humans love bragging about our tech stuff, but it’s always impressed me how quick Equestrians get things done. A summit and an expedition like this would’ve taken months to prepare, back where I’m from.”

“Yes,” Cross said distractedly, “But five days it is. I’m sorry, but it looks as if you’ll have to complete your re-education on… on Earth. I know you were stretching your stay right up until Lyra heads off... ”

“And you’re going with her.”

“That’s right,” Cross said. “They’ll need a xenobiologist.”

Alex looked her in the eyes. “It’s not just that.”

Her lip quivered. “Sorry,” she repeated. “How could I pass this up? I need to understand what this is about. Why what happened… did. And if they’re gonna find anything, up there in the Sunken Dream Valley, to do with humans… Then I can do something to help.”

There may have been a chance at closure. If there was, Cross didn’t give it to him. Instead, she glanced at the clock and, seeing the time, released his hand with little warning.

She made her way to the door, opening it expertly. Right on time, four figures awaited outside.

“Pardon the delay,” said Cross, stepping out with a token bow to the tallest figure, “we were having a heart-to-heart. The human’s all yours, ladies.”

Alex tried smoothing his uniform, his one item of clothing, laundered over and over again by the tireless Nurse Cross, as the four stepped in.

Princess Celestia and the PHL’s three top representatives, Lady Cadance, Dame Moondancer and Specialist Amethyst Star. They each wore equal looks of bemusement from the strange greeting they’d received.

“Howdy, Alex.” Amethyst observed Sutra Cross’s retreating back. “What’s the matter with her?”

“We had… a talk,” Alex said. “It’s been tough. She’s still coping with the story of how she died in my world. Meeting a different Redheart, then having that one die on her too, it’s not been doing her mental state any favours. I think someone’s gonna need your TLC, Cadance.”

“Please, call me Cadenza,” said she in a measured tone, as she closed the door. “The more time we spend in this place, the better it suits me, don’t you think?”

Alex nodded. He, too, was beginning to think of her as ‘Cadenza’. He just hadn’t got into the habit.

“I get what you’re saying about Nurse Cross,” Cadenza commented. “A victim of both the Solar Empire and the HLF… No wonder it’s messing with her head. What happened to our Sutra Cross was unforgivable. An indelible black mark on the HLF’s reputation. Although… one not undeserved, I should think.”

Moondancer gave her a troubled glance. “The Reav–”

“Oh, yes,” Cadenza said dryly. “The Viking cosplayers who blood-eagle people. Truly paragons of human virtue.”

“You know we’ve only heard of them doing that a couple of times,” Amethyst said. “And it was to people few would shed a tear for.”

Cadenza snorted. “Yes, it’s okay when you only do it to people who truly deserve it. Pretty sure that’s the argument they used for the electric chair.”

Celestia’s brows were furrowing. Evidently, she questioned the direction this was taking.

“Princess Cadance told me she accosted a former member of the HLF during her time on Earth. She described them as quite accommodating. Apparently, Miss Carter relayed all kinds of peculiar stories to her regarding the Newfoals.”

“Vinyl Scratch’s old pal,” sighed Moondancer. “What a character.”

“I suppose it would be fair to say the Carter girl has some personal expertise on the topic,” Cadenza acknowledged grudgingly. “Her being around shows no story’s too wild where Conversion are concerned… Even if she wasn’t converted by the serum, but rather, an incident of her own making when she tried to sabotage our operations.”

“Poison joke,” Celestia said, and Alex felt sure she was hiding a tiny smile on her face. “But isn’t it true that of all those converts affected by a slow-acting variant of the serum, some were still active years past when they should have succumbed?”

“Definitely,” Alex nodded soberly. “There’s documented evidence of that.”

“But then there’s that story of a woman who turned after being splashed by grape juice,” Amethyst cut in suddenly, and rather forcefully, much to Alex’s surprise. “And let me tell you, that’s nonsense.”

“How can you be sure, Miss Star?” asked Celestia, her eye as quizzical as her tone.

“I had my friend, Agent Bjorgman, look into the matter,” said Amethyst. The expression on her face was particularly dark, and he wondered what it hid. “This was at a time of relative détente between the PHL and HLF. Naturally, our relations didn’t stay stable for long, but… Rest assured, whatever lurks inside that cursed liquid, it wouldn’t work through a placebo.”

“Why would anyone claim otherwise?” wondered Celestia.

Moondancer shifted on her hooves. “It is… terribly delicate, Your Highness,” she said, “and I don’t think we should scratch that scar too hard. But… grief, would be a factor.”

Cadenza gave a grim nod, with a face Alex could recognise too well. “Indeed.”

“On the contrary, Your Highnesses,” said Amethyst. “Let’s scratch it.”

“Now, Amethyst–” Alex started, feeling uneasy.

“What the good Captain’s too diplomatic to let me say, Highness,” Amethyst said in a low voice, “is that the HLF high-ranker who set this urban legend in motion has an ego, which won’t let them entertain the possibility their precious supplies could, in fact, get spiked–”

“Dammit, Amethyst,” groaned Alex, “You’re awfully sure about this, after admitting that you’d never finished looking into it.”

“You needn’t play good cop with me, Alex. You know I’m damn right. It’s not like you’ve got any love lost for the Commodore.”

“Hold on,” frowned Moondancer, “should we let personal feelings cloud our judgement?”

Amethyst closed her eyes. She took a deep breath and, when she reopened her eyes to resume her speaking, her tone was somewhat humbled.

“Yes…” Amethyst sighed. “Alright, I admit it. We don’t know.” She refocused on Celestia. “Still, the point remains. I wouldn’t call the Commodore a trustworthy source. It tickles his fancy to pilot those super-ships his corporate overlords gave him to play with. Pride and ambition are all that make him refuse to integrate the PHL, rather than any real moral objection to our lapses.”

“Not that it’s kept him from shaping his branch of the HLF into a PHL knock-off,” noted Cadenza. “Sadly, though, I can understand a few of the reasons that’d lead the Equestrian Stranded to turn towards the Ex Astris flotilla, not us.”

“And those are?” said Celestia.

“Lyra’s one, ironically,” Cadenza said regretfully. “There are people who feel the PHL has grown too cult-like in its devotion to her. What doesn’t help is the key role she played in the Co-Harmony Sphere– some even see her rebellion against the Solar Tyrant as just the act of a false prophet, seeking to overthrow another false prophet.”

“And by that, we mean a lot of humans,” Moondancer spoke, “but ponies as well. That’s how you find Equestrians integrating the more open-minded HLF, such as Ex Astris.”

“Poor souls,” Amethyst sighed. “If they think this way, they’ve escaped from serving under a leader with delusions of grandeur…”

Now Alex heard himself speaking somberly. “Who knows, Amethyst. Maybe it isn’t possible to be leader without buying into your own hype, just a bit. Who can say?”

And Princess Celestia was silent.

“Um, what were we talking about, again?” said Moondancer.

Her question broke whatever dark spell had hung over the room. But where Celestia had chosen silence and discretion before, now she stepped to the forefront, assuming a place which drew all gazes to her.

Cued by a light fizzle and pop and a tang of ozone, the Princess retrieved two rolled-up sheets of paper from the sub-dimensional confines of her null-space.

“We had reports to make, plans to discuss,” Celestia stated. “First, the report. I’ve been informed via telegram that Captain Plow, the Trailblazer officer apprehended in Boston, has been transferred to the Crystal Realm, as has… Spike. Princess Cadance is currently preoccupied with hosting her ward, but will soon look into their cases.”

“That’s… that’s good, Your Highness,” said Alex. “And what about the plans? You got those things we talked about?”

“Yes, Captain.”

In view of the PHL, Celestia unfolded the two paper sheets within her aura. Alex, shouldered by his comrades, leaned forward for a closer look. It was a series of floor plans and diagrams, printed on blue, detailing the outline of an iconic structure of the Canterlot cityscape.

“As promised,” said Celestia. “These are the blueprints of Canterlot Palace. We’ve discussed the limitations of what I can offer you– however accurate these are, we cannot predict how the Palace’s layout might have changed in fifteen years. But if our guess is correct, and the Queen’s had Discord’s statue stashed in the Vault, this’ll aid your agents on their rescue mission.”

~ The Tabletop of The Assistant’s Mind ~

Spike gazes hungrily at the basket of gems while Rarity loads a couple more in. Of course, they are doing this as quietly as possible, given the bats nesting in the cave roof above. And the hardest thing for the young drake is resisting the temptation to sample at least one gem. Because they weren’t for him, and he couldn’t eat a gem quietly.

Rarity’s coat has a rougher appearance than it once did, no matter her delicate ministrations, her eyes less lustrous. But she remains Rarity, wearing a stylised hard-hat with a front-light and bow.

“The last time I was here, I woke them, and ended up with a mane full of… bats!” Rarity whispers. She sighs, stealing a glance at the bats before looking back to him. “Thanks for being my basket-carrier, Spike.”

“Basket-carrier?” Spike parrots out of surprise, “I thought I was your bodyguard.”

“What? Oh, heh, yes, yes, that of course, too,” Rarity says with a light chuckle, as she resumes collecting gems. “You’d make a gallant knight.”

Spike just lets out a quiet huff, scratching his shoulder. It'd be nice for the others to view him in a better light than just a helper. And– there is a terrible itch now that demands Spike’s full attention. Unfortunately, the itch is all around his body and very insistent on being scratched.

Also, for some reason, his scales turn luminescent–

“Spike! Turn that off! You'll wake the bats!”

“I can’t–”

And then everything stops.

Or rather, there is movement from the bats above, roused by Spike’s spontaneous glowing. But even then, it is as if the scene between the young drake and the Bearer of Generosity has simply frozen mid-thought. Spike, caught in the midst of trying to scratch his glowing scales; Rarity, gasping in fright; the bats, awakening.

* * * * *

Now, to one reviewing this memory, this was something which could be done – employing the magic of dreamwalkers to suspend and study the details of the moment. Doing so was useful for uncovering hidden motivation, or locating those obscure details critical to an active plot.

In any event, to the observer of this memory, one Princess of Love, it was perplexing to behold. While Cadance wasn’t a specialist of the mind-delve spell that Luna provided her, she has her own method on how to use it – love. Or rather, a tracing of the various forms of love as a guiding line through one’s mind. It is an effective substitution to match her field of expertise.

But, as Cadance looked on in confusion, there remained the problem of what she’d seen. The memory had stopped on its own without command or prompt. Normally, this did not happen because such was an unwinding presence, like watching a body of water flow by its own velocity.

‘A one-sided, yet powerful affection,’ the Princess mused on what she’d observed of Spike with Rarity. ‘But it stopped dead. Why? Is this Spike’s mind so damaged by they did to him?’

With her horn glowing, Cadance turns her head elsewhere to continue on her descent.

The mind of the older Spike, his physical form safely sequestred in a secret area of her Citadel, manifested itself to her in a straightforward manner. With nice forestry grass beneath her hooves, willowy trees beside her, and a sizable fortress before her. One that was wide open and vacant.

‘Boys and their board games,’ she thought as she crossed the drawbridge, entering the fortress’s courtyard. ‘I told Shiney, Spike would get hooked on this kind of stuff.’

Mind you, the mind-delve spell was not unlike flipping the page around for answers on a crossword puzzle or a cheat key on an escape room. It had its uses.

Where was everyone? If this was a castle, where were the guards? Or servants for that matter? Why wouldn’t the Solar Empire have defenses made? So far, this had been a breeze...

‘Another connection,’ Cadance thought in recognition of a heart-shaped stone archway that lay before her. ‘Hopefully this one lasts.’

With a simple point of magic, the archway glowed and–

* * * * *

“The Gauntlet is dangerous, for I designed it myself!” booms the largest dragon Cadance has ever seen, an armoured brute large enough to bestride a mountain, from atop this very perch. “Only dragons with my ferocity, strength, and determination will be able to finish. We will gather at the cliff when the Sun is at its peak!”

There is cheering from the smaller, younger dragons gather in the valley below, praising the name ‘Torch’, although it sounds forced to Cadance’s ears.

One of them, by far the tiniest, is Spike. The young drake is uninterested in any sort of competition.

“I don't want to be Dragon Lord or dragon toast,” Spike mumbles aloud, “and I stopped glowing, so let's sneak out of here!”

However, as he begins pushing a large rock away, which only Cadance seems to notice has sprouted eyes on its surface – no doubt one of Miss Rarity’s ingenious disguises, the Princess smiles at that – the huge Dragon Lord somehow spots his tiny figure.

“Where do you think you're going, little dragon?” bellows giant Torch.

And, as one, every single other dragon in the vicinity parts away from Spike, leaving him in clear line-of-sight of the Dragon Lord. Put on the spot, a very nervous-looking Spike turns around.

“Oh, uh, hi, Your Lordship,” Spike warbles. “Uh, I was just going home!”

This leaves Torch distinctly unimpressed.

“You don't get to leave unless I say you can!”

But someone comes to Spike’s defense, and Cadance’s eyes widen as she sees another dragon whom she recognises. A lithe she-dragon, her scales a brilliant cyan topped by a pale turquoise underbelly and indigo dorsal spikes, including at the tip of her tail.

“Dad, look at him. He's just a runt,” says Princess Ember, landing by Spike. “Besides, he doesn't even wanna compete. Let him go.”

Cadance has never taken a good look at Ember, but despite the cruelly curved white horns, twin to her father’s, and the red-pupilled eyes, there is kindness in the Dragon Princess’s face.

“He is rather tiny,” Torch agrees, finding amusement in the infant drake. “Heh-heh. I could squish him with my pinkie claw.”

Spike gives an uncertain laugh.

“That wasn't a joke,” Torch says sternly. “When I want you to laugh, I’ll say ‘be amused!’”

“Of course, Your Lordship!” Spike hurries to say. “I, uh, guess I don't understand dragon customs. Another reason why I shouldn't compete.”

“Hm.” Torch sighs. “Very well then, little dragon. I release you.”

And Spike thanks not only the Dragon Lord, but Princess Ember.

However, as he goes on his way, Cadance overhears an argument between father and daughter. Apparently, Ember has a mind to compete in the Gauntlet herself. But Torch is having none of it, telling her she isn’t much bigger than Spike, and her counter-argument that she is smart finds itself promptly overruled. Torch’s entrenched opinion is that it takes a big, strong dragon to lead.

Growling, Ember flies away to parts unknown.

In the meantime, there is conversing amongst the dragons. Each of them has an idea for what they’d do as Dragon Lord, and yet while some are harmless-sounding, others pertain directly to Equestria. In fact there is one drake, a tall red one, who has a rather specific idea.

“When I’m in charge, the first thing I’ll do is get revenge on those puny ponies!” he says with a grin, “they might think they’re tough, but they’ll regret ever having crossed me! We'll take whatever we want from Equestria and then burn the rest to cinders!”

“Like what?” a smaller orange dragonet, herself not much bigger than Spike, actually asks.

The tall red one sighs in irritation. “Whatever we want, Smolder. I heard they’ve got a lot of crystals somewhere– could make for a massive hoard.”

Recognising that of which he speaks, Cadance gasps in dismay. However, before she can speculate on any of what she has just seen, the scene abruptly cut elsewhere.

Namely, it now shows Spike with a pair of binoculars watching over something in the distance. Squinting, Cadence makes out that he is watching a collection of dragons at the top of a cliff, facing Torch and the Celestial Sea. Furthermore, a green flame hovers atop Torch’s head as his unmistakable voice booms out.

“Looks like it’s about to start,” Spike says in an uneasy tone.

He is not alone. Cadance sees her guess was correct. Standing by a discarded rock-coloured textile, Twilight and Rarity hold watch with him.

“You’ve made the right choice, Spike,” Twilight says, in the tone of a big sister telling her kid brother he’s a good boy. She, too, has that rougher look. There is grey in her mane. “After Chrysalis and Sombra, Equestria can deal with anything. Even if Garble were to win, he’d be in over his head.”

Rarity stays quiet. Her face shows less conviction than Twilight’s.

“I guess…” Spike says, resuming his viewing.

Lord Torch gives the starting order, sending the dragons flying over the sea to their destination, a volcano island.

Very soon the contestants are hindered by violent spouts of water, shot by massive eel-like creatures rising from the depths.

Some dragons are knocked into the sea-water, some aren’t and keep flying, but what catches both Cadance and Spike’s eyes is the red one, Garble, who gets knocked back by one water-spout and crashes into a dragon masked in armour.

Garble manages to recover and keeps going.

As for the other, though–

“I want to leave,” Spike suddenly says, putting the binoculars down.

Cadance cannot blame him. Judging by the air bubbles in the sea-water, at the spot where the unlucky armoured contestant fell, slowly fading from view, Lord Torch wasn’t lying when he warned how dangerous this contest is.

And it appears no-one else is going to take notice...

* * * * *

The scene then changes one more time. This surprises Cadance, to say the least.

It is the rocky, barren Dragonlands, again, but under cover of night. All seems quiet, barring two cloaked figures making their way through.

One figure, obviously Spike given the voice, whispers at the mouth of a mountain’s cave. “Alright, this should be the place. She said to meet her here. We should be safe, Rarity.”

“Are you sure, Spike?” The other figure is indeed Rarity. However, something is different about her. The note of anxiety in her voice is familiar, but there is another layer lurking underneath it. “We… we don’t know if this Dragon Lord will be as amicable as she claims.”

“She’s our only hope, Rarity. And trust me, she’ll want to see you.”

Rarity doesn’t look all that encouraged by this, yet before she can respond, there comes a gust of wind from the mountain’s mouth. Thankfully, it does’t rob them of their cloaks, but this does make it difficult to stand in one place. The two of them stare towards the cave mouth, which now sports a lone, glowing green eye amidst the darkness.

“Who approaches?”The voice speaks like a smoldering fire. Despite the display, Spike stands and faces the eye.

“Spike the Dragon.” He then gestures at his companion. “And Rarity of Equestria. We’ve come to request an audience with the Dragon Lord. She should be expecting us.”

There is a pause. A pause that seems to last longer than it should have, as the eye focuses upon Spike and Rarity. And even then, Cadance almost wonders if the eye has seen her as well.

“A pony, and a dragon named Spike… of all the possible names…”The eye closes itself.“The Dragon Lord will be with you shortly.”

Spike and Rarity share a look of confusion.

“So you’re not–”

“I never claimed such a title, young drake. And even then, I’ve no desire to lord over anyone. I am content with what I have, after ages of life. You, raised by Equestrians… hrm… I will tell you who I am. I am the oldest dragon that remains of a time forgotten by most. I’m the Dragon Elder, Spike. I am the Chaoskämpfer. And I remain to guide.”

“Whoa.”

Rarity steps forward. “Dear Elder, I ask you, could you tell us anything about the Dragon Lord?”

“Element Bearer of Generosity, your concerns are born from that which looms over your homeland and people. You hope for asylum and protection, that much is evident. You needn’t fear, for this Dragon Lord is more merciful than many.”

Rarity breathes a sigh of relief at that. In little time after, a flapping of wings is to be heard, as a figure flies to join them. To Cadance’s surprise, she knows who this is.

Dressed in skirted armour and bearing a sceptre strapped to her back, the Dragon Lord comes. Spike and Rarity look to her whilst the Chaoskämpfer opens the proceedings.

“I present to you, visitors from Equestria, the Dragon Lord.”

The orange dragonet lands next to the mouth of the cave, gracefully.

“Smolder.”

The blue light of Cadance’s horn winked out as she brought herself back to the waking world.

She released a deep, deep breath. That had been hard. Cadance wondered how Aunt Luna would have done it. But dragons’ resilience to most forms of mental ensorcellment, she reflected as her eyes contemplated the huge, quietly stirring mass lying in front of her, was not overstated. Although he had given in eventually, no homonculi had been left to patrol, no wards had been placed upon Spike’s mind.

This path remained open to her.

“I’ll be back soon,” Cadance whispered to the other creature in the cave. “Take good care of him.”

The Crystal Bard bobbed its ghostly, kindly head, careful not to let the white crystals which jutted from atop hit anything, least of all the dormant Spike. Its blue eyes twinkled, and it resumed the book it had been reading to their patient when she’d come in, The Dragons on Dazzle Island.

But while Cadance navigated her way back through the maze that separated the Crystal Bard’s underground home from the concealed doorway in her Citadel’s library, her mind was aflame. She had so many tasks at the moment, and Shining would only be back home for a few days, before his duty as High Captain took him back to the Hall. What she was envisioning was tricky.

Yet after seeing one Spike, she saw this with clarity. Hadia reminded her so much of Twilight. Master Sunburst had declined her invitation to take part in Twilight’s research trip to Saddle Mareabia, but he’d been happy to be approached by the Crystal Princess, and when she’d come back to him saying she’d need a tutor for her ward, he’d agreed on the spot.

So, Hadia would now have a tutor. But she didn’t have a Spike. Or anyone else.

If Saddle Mareabia was giving her Hadia, then perhaps she should give this to Hadia. The little Spike, at least, would no doubt be ecstatic to revisit the Crystal Realm, where he was a hero.

~ The Hall of Unity ~

At the foot of Mount Metazoa and its Hall, a most peculiar geographical features of Equus found its source. Here below the North face of the moutain, one of the four waterfalls which eternally poured down all of its faces met the ground and formed a stream. A tiny trickle, truly, by the time the water had finished its long descent, yet resilient as all running water. Further along, on its downward path across the crevices and screes of the Arimaspi Mountains, that stream joined with a multitude of other miniscule tributaries borne from the rock, shaping to become a veritable river. A river in full flood, by the time it roared out of the Arimaspi Mountains, but passage through the San Palomino Desert and Ghastly Gorge quieted it some, until finally it reached a woodland that gave it a name; Everfree.

Sint Erklass observed as Ilsa gingerly deposited Alexander Reiner, whose legs still had not regained full mobility, into a waiting wicker-seat. Testimony to the human’s grit, he didn’t in the least seem shaken to have ridden, bareback, a Reindeer in flight.

Down by the riverbed along the plain, a few leagues away from Mount Metazoa, with the terrain too impractical for Alexander’s wheelchair, a beige carpet had been draped upon the ground, the wicker-seat in its centre.

They were not alone with the human. Awaiting them had been Princess Ember, the coltan canister she carried everywhere by her side. Her arms folded, the Sceptre in one claw, she gave Alexander a characteristically indifferent glance, then grunted a greeting to Sint.

“And hello to you, Princess Ember,” smiled Ilsa. “You said they’ll be here soon?”

“Yes,” Ember said coolly. “If the Chaoskämpfer says they will, then they will be. But if you’d just tell me what this is about– Ah. There they are.”

Everyone stared at the river. Something huge and alive was rising up from the waters, and Sint saw the top of the emergent mass was nothing short of a mop of hair.

“‘Loreal, it’s because you’re worth it,’” he heard Alexander mutter dazedly.

While the exact meaning of those words was lost on Sint, he caught on readily. The intonation reminded him – with some distaste, he had to admit – of the feeling behind the ‘Goops’ natural beauty product which had become such a hit on the Equestrian market recently.

After all, how fitting was that for a plum-purple dragon sporting the most fabulous blonde bouffant, not to mention moustache?

“Oh, hello!” exclaimed the sea-serpent, dripping all over the place, before sighting Ember and her Sceptre. “Your Lordship! I, wow, so sorry, hadn’t realised there’d been a Gauntlet already…”

“I’m not the Dragon Lord,” Ember said, sounding as if the very words hurt to enunciate. “I’m his representative to the Concordia Maxima.” She twisted a knob on the canister. “But with me is the flame of Chaoskämpfer Spykoran, Elder of Dragons. I summoned you on his behalf, dragon.”

“Please, call me Steven,” said the sea-serpent, unabashed. “All my friends do. Oh my, oh my, the Dragon Elder? And who’s that– Oh my, is that– It is! Them Reindeers who bring presents? My mate Cranky told me all about you guys! Yeah, that’s what I said, ‘my mate Cranky’, not my cranky mate, though he is cranky, well, bit less cranky now he’s found his lady-love–”

And then his eyes fell upon Alexander in the wicker-seat.

“Wow, is this an actual, mythical human?” said the sea-serpent, whose exuberance never seemed to abate for long. “Golly, always wanted to see one with mine own eyes… But,” added the serpent, now he’d spotted that Alexander’s legs were limp. “Oh my, this is just terrible!” He gave a mournful howl. “To see a poor wee thing hurt, by my patch of river! Well, not patch, but my riv–”

“Master Steven,” Sint interrupted, in a quiet, yet authoritative rumble, “Do not fret. Yes, this is a human, and he is being well cared-for. In fact, it is so you can help this human that Spykoran wishes to speak with you.”

But Alexander, astonishingly, was trying to suppress a grin from his ordinarily stoic face.

“I’ll be damned,” he said. “A dragon called Steven… Wait until Bauer hears about that one.”

Ember, conversely, looked just more and more irked, even as she finished unlocking the canister. With the final twist, the emerald-green flame rose, a steadily swirling pillar which paused in mid-flow as if considering its surroundings.

“You have come, sea-serpent,” the Chaoskämpfer spoke. “That is good,” He then paused, and a little of his flame billowed Ember’s way. “Thank you, dragonet. You may leave us.”

Ember’s jaw dropped open. “What?”

“I must bid this serpent’s assistance in a matter not for all ears,”, explained the Chaoskämpfer, sounding apologetic. “I do not doubt your valor, Ember. Don’t think this is because you are not Dragon Lord– I’d keep private council on this as much from Torch. This is for the human, and Princess Celestia’s family.”

It worried Sint to see Ember positively seething,her knuckles whitening around her Sceptre. An angry dragon, however small, was never comfortable company. But, all she did was shoot Alexander a furious glare, and spread her wings in preparation of flight,

“This won’t take long,” Ilsa told her gently. “Come back in an hour, Princess.”

The only reply she got was a strangled growl from Ember, who threw the Sceptre to the ground, taking off in a violent gust.

“Oh my,” the sea-serpent said. “I– I’m sorry if I upset anyone–”

“The fault is not yours,” the Chaoskämpfer said quietly. “But I wish you could have been called upon sooner. The ponies say you are not normally hard to find, in the Evefree River, yet you have been missing of late.”

“Oh, yeah… See…” the sea-serpent said bashfully, “My mate Cranky– I told you ‘bout him, right? Seeking his lady-love and all– Well, guess where he found her, in Ponyville’s, that’s right! Right next to where I live! And when it just two bachelors, you know, nothing wrong in hanging out all the time, but when your mate’s found his lady-love, got to give them space, so I took off for a w–”

“And that is noble of you, sea-serpent,” the Chaoskämpfer told him. ”But now I must request your aid in an endeavour nobler still. This human–” The flames billowed at Alexander, “–has lost something precious to him. We believe it fell into your river. But the ponies have searched the Everfree area for weeks and found nothing.”

“‘Precious’?” The sea-serpent’s eyes gleamed with interest. “I mean, I know what it is people think about us dragons, but we sea-serpents aren’t like that at all about shiny things– Now, if it’s sparkly or glittery or shimmery–”

“It’s a locket,” Alexander spoke. “Heart-shaped locket. It’s red. It belonged to my mother.”

That got the sea-serpent to stop a moment.

“Oh…” he whispered. “Oh, oh my… So it’s got sentimental value?”

Alexander glanced away. “You could say that, yeah…”

The sea-serpent drew himself up to his full height, which, seen out of the river, was actually rather impressive, towering a good fifty feet over Sint himself.

“Then fret not, wee human,” announced Steven, “As the Dragon Elder requests, I shall comb every inch of my river, until your treasure is found, no matter how long it’ll take!”

“We would thank you for it.”

But the sea-serpent hadn’t even waited to plunge back in, spraying them with river water.

“Let’s hope he succeeds,” Sint said quietly, wiping himself off. “If not even a sea-serpent who knows every inch of his river can find the locket, we’ll have to conclude it was washed away.”

“Or that Redheart never threw it in at all,” Ilsa noted. “Shame we can no longer ask her…”

“It’s an object of great power,” said the Chaoskämpfer. “I saw it used many times, in days gone by.”

“I…” Alexander hesitated, eyeing the canister. “I still can’t believe you knew her… Megan.”

“Not only her, but her brother and sister, Sir Alexander,” the Chaoskämpfer said softly. “But were it not for Megan, and Firefly the Brave, I forever would have been a slave, to the Lord of Midnight Castle…”

“Tirek the Red,” Ilsa said darkly. “He was from before my time…”

“A blight on the land, Ilsa,” Sint cut in. “Rejoice that you never witnessed his reign. It surpassed Discord’s in deceit. Grogar’s, in cruelty.”

“Firefly, though...” mused the Chaoskämpfer. “What became of her? I heard that in her later years, she retired to live with… You, the Reindeer…”

“And for many, many years, too,” Ilsa whispered. “She lived long enough to witness the coming of Celestia and Luna. This, I was there to see.”

“Aah…” sighed the Chaoskämpfer. “A good place in which to be, at the end… But… I had hoped she and Scorpan would find their happiness together.”

This sent a spark through Sint’s age-old system.

“Scorpan?” he said. “The brother of Tirek? I knew he’d turned, and sought afterward to atone for his complicity… But Firefly never mentioned anything about her and him.”

“Yet it is so. And despite the things he did, I mourn Scorpan. He was my protector from his brother’s worst cruelties.”

Alexander rubbed his chin. “You know, if you know all this and more,” he said, “I’m not sure what exactly Lyra’s gonna do on her Expedition, if she finds this… Dream Valley.”

“She can bring back proof,” said Ilsa. “Relics and artefacts, long-buried remnants that show what life was once like, in a place the Equestrians have consigned to myth and for which even we, long-lived though we are, hold only a piece of the puzzle. Where the past lives only in our memories, the labours of a mortal such as Madame Heartstrings can give life back to it.”

“I get you,” Alexander sighed. “To be fair, I’m not a scholar. But I don’t want my people forgotten.”

* * * * *

Ember was still glowering as she flew up the face of Metazoa.

She hated this. None of them thought her worth taking into their confidences. Not her father, not the Chaoskämpfer – not even Garble, keeping his hobbies hidden like that. Nothing had changed for her since attending the Convocation. As far as they were all concerned, a dragon only cast a long shadow when it had size to match.

These were her thoughts, flying up the imposingly tall, oddly wind-free mountain.

Was it any wonder she hadn’t even sent word to Torch that she’d be joining the green unicorn’s Expedition? The Chaoskämpfer hadn’t even sought to dissuade her there, in fact he’d encouraged it, curious to see Dream Valley again for himself, and his canister needed a carrier. But he wasn’t aware Torch didn’t know.

‘Dad can’t forbid me from doing something he doesn’t know about.’

She could have asked the Chaoskämpfer to relay the news to the Dragon Lord, through his flame. Instead, she’d decided she’d write a letter. Torch had insisted on the Kirin giving her the education he’d never got. Well, then let her father hear it from his secretary. Blacktip should have gone to the Convocation anyway, not her, for all the good it’d done her.

Past the mountainside, the Sun’s rays fell. A flicker of sunlight caught Ember’s eye, bouncing from an odd angle as, weirdly, the light seemed to reflect something in the clouds that wasn’t there. For that instant, Ember thought she spotted the shimmering outline of an airship.

Her mind was playing tricks on her. She shook her head. No wonder, she was obsessing over this.

As she alit upon the landing platform, though, Ember was feeling slightly calmer. Perhaps even the tiniest bit guilty. At one time, Torch wouldn’t have opposed her going on a voyage, let alone one with the possibility of uncovering a sunken ship. He liked ships. At the edge of the Dragonlands, there was a whole creek filled with well-preserved carcasses of old vessels. Collecting the wrecks from the seafloor had been a hobby of his, and her mother’s…

Back when she had a mother.

‘Thorax,’ Ember thought suddenly. ‘I’ll go see Thorax.’

Thorax may be a drone, he was the only person who’d let her confide in him, no strings attached. That wasn’t to say she could tell him just anything, least of all about her parents. But spending time with him helped her relax. He liked it when she played guitar.

This time, Ember didn’t even bring her guitar. She went as she was.

Unfortunately, once she’d reached the end of the hallway to Chrysalis’ personal quarters, she was met by an unwelcome sight.

It was not Thorax on guard at this hour, but his older, tougher, bitier brother.

Pharynx stiffened, eyes narrowing below his helmet. “What do you want?”

“You know what I want,” Ember said coldly. “We’re not gonna duke this out again. I want to see Thorax, and you’re not stopping me.”

“Oh, that’s a shame,” Pharynx sniffed. “Because Thorax doesn’t want to see you.”

Ember had thought nothing could chill her blood. That she could wrestle a drake the size of Razer and laugh off the bruises. But those seven words hit her in the gut harder than any punch thrown in a fight.

“What?” she said. “But– no, you’re lying. Where’s Thorax?”

“Mind your own business, Princess.”

* * * * *

Pharynx was still feeling grouchy after the Dragon Princess had stomped off in a huff. He’d have enjoyed a rematch against her, but now he was under strict orders. Queen Chrysalis blamed him for starting the chain of events which had led to her getting punched by that pink princess pony. But she’d been worse than ever with Thorax. And he could not eternally undermine every humiliation or cruel trick the Queen had planned for his brother. All he could was stand guard.

Of course, although Pharynx had anticipated this very scenario, he still wasn’t quite prepared when something jumped onto his back.

“Aargh!”

His assailant had latched onto his barrel, chitin upon chitin, attached by wax, and Pharynx frantically grappled at it with his hooves. Alas, he couldn’t, for it was small and so annoying to shake off. His horn lit up, reaching at the little bug that refused to let him go even as he kept furiously struggling, and grasped hard at it. Or rather – at her.

With all his strength, he cast Aphid off, and he watched her slide across the polished floor. Undeterred, the little Changeling stood up. He hissed aggressively. As did she. And when they eventually paused, staring each other down, Pharynx harrumphed.

“What are you doing here?” he asked hotly. “Get lost, you parasite.”

He’d called her worse before, but the persistent bug never left his or Thorax’s side. No matter how many times he’d shaken off her near-daily ambushes. Perhaps it was his fault, partially. Making the best of it, he took it as good practice for a real attack, and Aphid’s presence did make the Hive livelier.

Not today, though.

“I’m leaving,” said Pharynx. “I’m not waiting for the Queen. It’s Thorax’s turn.”

The smaller Changeling scuttled past him, sat down in the doorway, and stared at him.

“Go away,” he spat. He was met by a raspberry. Very mature. “I mean it.”

Aphid shook her head energetically, though the ill-fitting, dark-blue helmet she wore didn’t match her head’s movements.

Then a thought struck Pharynx, bringing him to touch his forehead.

“Wait a second. Is that my helmet?”

A pause. She shook her head. She’d always been a bad liar.

“Ugh. I don’t have time for this. Give it, Aphid. Now.”

Another pause. Then, with her head bowed down, Aphid took off the helmet, and gave it to him. Pharynx harrumphed, placing it on his head. He looked around. It should be his brother’s shift. Yet, Thorax was nowhere to be seen.

He turned, and glared at Aphid.

“Aphid,” said Pharynx. “Where’s Thorax?”

Aphid glanced left, and right. Pharynx groaned.

“Listen here, you little…” Pharynx spoke up, but Aphid had scuttled up to him, put a hoof against his mouth. Her eyes were wide and clear. She pointed at the doorway. Her hooves traced a heart, before she cut a line through it. Finally, she pointed out the balcony.

As the gears inside his head were turning, Pharynx saw her retrieve something from her satchel. She held the mistletoe aloft before his disbelieving eyes.

It had a scent to it. Everyone had a scent to them, when their love came up to the surface. Queen Chrysalis smelled of sulfur, scented by the Ebony Hive when her love for them and their conquest of the Wedding poured out from the Palace balcony. The Princess of the Night’s lavender scent sharply pierced Pharynx’s senses when she’d come across him ruin her lavender. Aphid’s, so often did he smell hers before, right before she jumped on him and entered a scuffle, was the morning glory.

Now he smelled wild dandelion coming off the mistletoe, like those that grew infrequently near the Hive before the patrols cleared it. Like those bulbs and seeds Thorax would try to grow in hiding until inevitably, the other drones would come laugh and stomp them… And Pharynx would swoop in, like an elder brother should, and drive them off.

The smell of dandelion and roses was familiar to him, hanging in the air whenever Thorax had muttered thank-yous over and over, holding him in a hug. Now, he…

’What’s this?’

The smell was unfamiliar to him, a musty, herbal scent. Something that reminded him of the Kirin, of the talks exchanged between the Queen and the Dragon Princess, when she spoke of the inane traditions in the Court…

“I told him, to stop with this stupid pony-tale of his…”

Aphid tilted her head. At that, something bubbled hot within him, and Pharynx let out a low, hissing growl.

“Fine.” He slapped the mistletoe hard onto the ground. “Let him have his way, then. See if I care.”

Aphid’s jaw dropped, and she gasped. She shook her head rapidly, her mouth forming little ‘no’s. But Pharynx didn’t particularly care, gritting his teeth and pawing at the ground as his frustration and anger and anxiety bubbled up.

“Stupid, stupid little grub,” Pharynx growled out, making Aphid wince, and he did not care if he meant it for her or his idiot brother. “Why in the Hive would he leave–”

“Ahem,” someone cut in, from the hallway. Its voice was cold as Winter snow, deep and scratchy, “Captain Pharynx. And Aphid. I was looking for you.”

Few Changelings could ever invite such a skin-crawling feeling. Such as the creep who’d arrived. Pharynx turned right around to meet him in the eyes – that cold pair, much like most within the Ebony Hive.

“Coxa,” said Pharynx simply. No need to entertain him with anything further. Where Pharynx tread in the light as a soldier, the spymaster of the Ebony Hive had little need for appearances, preferring to slink around the shadows.

Coxa stood as tall as Pharynx, if a little leaner, and more decrepit. There was no denying that Changeling’s uncanny ability in mimicking a dried husk. Or perhaps that was just how he normally looked, judging by the condition of his rough chitin, weathered from innumerous spy operations. Either way...

The spymaster inclined his head, expression impassive. His narrowed eyes moved from Pharynx, then Aphid, then back at him.

“What’s going on here?” he intoned raspily.

“We’re doing nothing much. Is there a problem?” rebuked Pharynx.

“The Hive tends to its Queen, need I remind you,” countered Coxa. “A soldier and spy...” His gaze moved over to Aphid at that, “should know better.” He shook his head. “Especially if there is a runaway Changeling.”

Pharynx’s blood ran absurdly cold.

“Coxa–”

“Mind your tongue,” Coxa said. “You aren’t in the Queen’s good graces at the moment, Pharynx. You know the rules. The Queen will want to hear about this… matter, of the Hive’s. Our eyes and ears only.”

Before Pharynx could reply, Aphid had already begun to mime, waving frantically, gesturing at Pharynx. What she meant, Pharynx hadn’t time to decipher, for she froze when Coxa threw a withering glare her way.

“Talk, Aphid,” Coxa said coolly. His voice lowered to a dangerous whisper. “I’ve told you, you’re intolerable when you play charades. I get enough of those on the job. Drop the act, now.”

Silence fell. Aphid’s eyes darted between Coxa and Pharynx. When they fell upon Pharynx, they looked almost pleading. But there was nothing for it. She took a deep breath.

“... O-okay,” she said, barely above a whisper.

“Good. I’ll want a word with you later. We need all our spies at the ready,” Coxa said clinically, his stare still fixed on Aphid. “Now, if that’ll be all. Follow me. Don’t try anything funny. I’ll know.”

He turned, disappearing into the green-tinged gloom.

Although neither Pharynx nor Aphid said anything to each other, a part of him wondered just what she was thinking.

* * * * *

Sometime later, Pharynx and Aphid stepped out of the steam-baths, where they’d delivered the news to Chrysalis. As they walked away, Pharynx decided he needed to set the tone sooner rather than later.

“Well, that’s done,” Pharynx said softly. “We shan’t talk about it again.”

Once again, it had happened. It would now be the same as when Kevin had fled the Hive. Thorax, if he’d ever been anything more than a name on a drone, was not even that anymore.

Pharynx tried his best to ignore Aphid’s waving beside him. He was also certain that he’d asked her to stay away afterwards. But Aphid never was one for listening. Once she’d waved too much, tapped his shoulder too often, Pharynx swivelled around with a cold glare.

“You know what I mean,” he hissed, irritated. “Go away.”

Aphid shook her head, sitting on her haunches. She pointed back at the room they had both only just left. Then she tiptoed, lightly bopping Pharynx’s forehead.

He snarled. “‘What do I think’? I think that what the Queen says, the Queen does. Forget it, Aphid. Thorax is gone, and don’t ask me why I didn’t tell Her Majesty you let him go.”

Aphid rapidly shook her head. She mimicked an elephant’s trumpet noise, a little quiet in the hallways, pointed at both his chest and hers, then back at the room.

For a moment, Pharynx wondered what she was babbling about, talking of elephants standing in the room. Until he remembered, it was an expression. He’d heard that Changelings had a reputation amongst other races for literal-mindedness.

“You’ve spent too much time around ponies,” he remarked darkly. “Thinking that way. No, I’m not gonna say why I didn’t tell her. If you had any sense, you’d stop right there.”

Aphid bit her lip. Another pony thing to do. She shook her head, pointed at his heart, then at hers and out the window, her wings buzzing.

It made him angry.

“No!” Pharynx shouted. “He’s no brother of mine! A true brother wouldn’t run away like that. Not from his– Hive.”

He rarely raised his voice that way. Usually he’d lower it, when Thorax was around. Or Aphid. Perhaps she would run away now. Her as well.

Instead, Aphid looked wide-eyed. No tears brimmed there, but she tapped her own chest, and back at his. She moved to pat his shoulder.

And there, Pharynx no longer knew what to say. Ever since the little drone had inserted himself into his life, and Thorax’s, he’d had no idea what to make of her. Somehow, despite the considerably different circumstances of their births, she’d got into her head that she was more than one of Queen Chrysalis’ brood. A sister to two specific drones.

Aphid’s forehoof moved to his chest. She purred, raising a brow.

“Do I look ‘okay’ to you?” Pharynx scowled. “I knew this’d happen someday, I knew it. I’ve spent my whole life dutifully serving the Hive, and now all anyone’s gonna know me as is the guy whose brother ran away. And I fought that human to defend the Queen’s honour, and I lost.”

Aphid bit her lip yet again, hooves tapping the floor. Her mouth began to open, yet fell back shut. This repeated a couple of times. At last her forehoof pointed at his chest, and hers. She reared, mimicking a biped, then lowered her body to the floor, looking back up to where she’d been, emitting a hiss identical to Pharynx’s. She returned to her haunches, blowing a raspberry. She clapped her forehooves, in between pointing to the floor.

Before Pharynx could retort, she had bopped his chest again. Aphid wore a little smile.

Something about all this made him feel unusually weak in the knees. In all the time she’d spent pestering him, he’d never really thought of just why she did it. She may never even have ‘said’ it this expressly before. It was another twee pony expression, and didn’t even make sense. Changelings were naturally cold-blooded.

‘Who cares? You’re still my brother. You’re cool as hell. And I’m still here.’

Pharynx shook his head. “Look… Why are we talking about this? It doesn’t matter. All that matters is the job we’ve gotta do. For the Hive. It’s bigger than any of us. If you don’t mind, I’d like to get back to doing my job.”

For the umpteenth time, Aphid pointed at his chest and hers, then right out the window. All while she smiled gently. This was followed up by a pat on his shoulder, accompanied by a vigorous nod. The smell of morning glory filled the air.

She started to walk away. But it was as he saw her retreat that Pharynx heard himself call out.

“Wait. Aphid? Come back here.”

The little drone circled around, to meet his gaze, eyes twinkling. He sighed.

“Aphid…” Pharynx began, in a subdued voice. “Could you… give my back a massage? I feel like it’s been hurting… Must’ve been that duel against the human. Took it out of me more’n I thought.”

All Aphid had to give was a gentle nod. To begin with.

It was also all either of them had to say for a time. Not when they passed any other creature who was enjoying the bathhouse that day. Not when they passed the doors to a spare steamroom. Not even when Pharynx lay on the massage table, face down, and Aphid hopped onto his back and began her marvelous work with her dainty forehooves.

Only when his shoulders sagged and relaxed. and he let out a deep breath, did Aphid lean closer to his ear, her voice gentle and sweet and soothing in all the ways Chrysalis wasn’t.

“It’s okay~” she whispered, “I miss him too.”

Pharynx said nothing to that. But nor did he need to. It was the elephant in the room.

~ Gallopoli, Equestria ~ Day 16 of the Convocation ~ Twenty-Fifth Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

Teatime by the seaside, Sunny Skies mused, was as fine an activity as any. Here in the premier inn at Gallopoli, The Morningtide Inn, she found herself basking in the Sun, its rays bringing the welcome warmth of the early days of Summer, reflecting off her dull white coat. Perhaps she ought to let it set a little later than usual.

‘Author,’ she reminded herself. ‘I am an author of children’s books.’

Yes, she was indeed. Sunny Skies, five-times-featured author at Equestria Daily, elusive and mysterious, a playwright beloved by children throughout all of Equestria, the Griffish Isles and beyond – and soon, the Crystal Realm, too. To obtain a permit from the reigning Crystal Princess, Guardian of Love, Foalsitter to a Thousand Children, would surely be trivial.

Adjusting her shoulder-length dyed blonde mane, braided halfway, Sunny hummed an old tune. She wondered whatever lay next in store for her. The last few years of her– of Celestia’s rule had been so eventful.

‘Perhaps one of the old classics would do. Hmm… but which one... ’

One glance at Claire, sitting across from her, boisterously recounting her misadventures in touring Equestria, gave the answer. Macintosh Hills’ Tranquility at the Bridge was an old poem, but one Sunny saw fit to adapt for children. For however old the tale had been, the essence and message of a warrior’s stand continued to resonate through the ages.

Both her sisters, Claire de Lune and Shale, would certainly agree.

Filing away the thought of ancient heroes’ tales for another time, Sunny Skies leaned forward, resting her chin upon her hooves, listening intently to Claire’s tall tales. They sat there, all three of them around the coffee-table, idly chatting as they were now, or simply taking in the view of the beaches around Gallipoli.

More on the former with Claire, chatterbox that she was, and more on the latter with Shale, who was listening intently to either Claire’s story about how Equusite politics had so thoroughly changed since her temporary leave, or the wind chime above the table. Either made sense.

“... And sadly, dear sister,” Claire remarked, shaking her head, “the only politics I know better than Sunny here would be Earth politics.”

“Truly?” asked Shale, raising an eyebrow. She shot Sunny a knowing glance. “Well. Perhaps you can fill Sunny in on a few things, then.”

That was her cue, Sunny decided. “Yes, ahem…” she said, rubbing her chin as she did so. “I was wondering about, what was it, the militaristic theocracy in place in the United States of America. How does that work?”

“Oh, it isn’t a theocracy.”

“But the motto is, and I quote, ‘In God We Trust’?”

“I know, right? And please don’t get me started on whatever the People’s Republic of China is. That one is an ideological mess. So much theoretical infighting in the discourse, and that’s from a quick glance.”

“A failed workers’ paradise, is the impression I’m getting,” Shale noted wistfully. “If I’m parsing what you’ve said correctly. But no less powerful for that.”

“You’ll have to lend me your books on this, Claire,” Sunny sighed. “It's all very complicated. And those are the two empires who provide the backbone of humanity’s alliance against the Co-Harmony Sphere? Such feedback does make me wonder about the people we’re helping…”

“I’m certain Captain Reiner can arrange to send us the books we need,” said Claire, huffing. “But this ought to be your side of things, Sunny. You shouldn't feel too worried, really! You’ll catch up in no time.”

That was true enough. In Sunny’s spare time, she had so often read of other, faraway lands, from Neighpon, where Lu–Claire’s old teacher had hailed from, to the treacherous Peaks of Peril, rumoured by some to be where the nefarious Nirik resided.

Another idea for the list, then. But nothing Sunny couldn’t handle.

“I suppose I shall,” Sunny said at last, smiling, to the cheer of Claire, and an acknowledging nod from Shale. No sooner than Claire had returned to regaling tales of strange religions, did Sunny wonder if there was a market for a happy-go-lucky, flighty unicorn mare to write about.

A glance at Claire, who’d slammed the table with all the grace of a rhinoceros, her mane left wildly astray and sunglasses ajar, guffawing at her own joke, provided the answer.

‘Well, Sister,’ thought Sunny, grinning as she took a sip from her cup, ‘I do hope the royalties will be enough… Heh, royalties.’

Never mind the royalties, of course. Claire would, without a doubt, greatly appreciate it, given her flair for storytelling, from days spent under the Northern Lights, wishing upon a star…

Shale, at that moment, chose to speak up. “Allow me to apologise,” she said, adjusting the goggles that rested upon her forehead, flicking her braid aside. “But we have… shall we say, other matters to tend to.”

Sunny blew a loose strand of her own mane away. She had hoped this could wait, but perhaps this hope was for naught.

“Must we speak of business so very soon?” lamented Claire, lowering her sunglasses. But Shale’s gaze only hardened, her hooves tapping in a steady rhythm on the table.

“I truly am sorry, Claire, seeing how I had requested your presences, but...” said Shale, her voice trailing off. She reached into her saddlebags, and withdrew a pair of old journals. “Time is… running short, and though I wish… I wish we had more time–”

“I understand,” said Sunny. “What troubles you so?”

Her gaze shifting left and right, Shale withdrew a sharp breath.

“I met him,” said Shale. “The one called Scorpan.”

A pause. “Scorpan?”

“Yes, a name, repeated within these journals,” Shale explained, tapping the weathered tome before her. “A tired old fellow, with batlike wings and a weathered gaze. Thrice I met him, thrice I turned his offer down, and he went on his way each time. The first was soon after the Pillars of Old Equestria disappeared, and the Tree of Harmony sprouted. The second, when Discord took power and cast you two aside, temporarily. And the third was...”

Her voice trailed off, her gaze turned to Claire. A shadow came over their eyes, Sunny’s face twisting into a frown.

“The Nightmare, yes,” Claire said, teeth grinding. “You turned him down thrice. Why?”

“Because he carries with him a safety-measure, he told me. Something he created with Clover the Clever, from the Tree of Harmony. A great Staff to wield the Sun and Moon, should the right magic be given to it.”

“Why have you not mentioned this before, Sister?”

“It did not seem relevant,” Shale admitted, pushing her cup. The haunted gaze she wore did not escape Sunny’s notice. “But the name has come up too often, like his brother’s, for mine eyes to ignore it.”

“That does not answer my question,” Claire insisted, “on why you turned him down.”

“Because I did not trust him to wield your birthright, Luna. Both of you,” Shale retorted. Her voice grew steelier, an unfamiliar fire flashing in her icy eyes. “Nor did I trust mineself, should he offer me the Staff. So I let him be, but assured him that if he were to harm a hair on either of you, I’d have no choice but to dispose of him.”

“My, a gentle fellow indeed,” Claire mused, chuckling, “if he could provoke your wrath.”

It was then, of course, that Sunny noted the rhythmic tapping of Shale’s forehooves, over, and over again, upon the journal. It was quiet before. Now it escalated, as did her voice.

“What more could I possibly do?” Shale countered. For a second, Sunny saw her lips tremble. “Thrice did I choose not to meet you, mine sisters, after so long. Thrice did I stand at the crossroads. And thrice did I deny him the chance to relieve or add to your burden. And after so many failures…”

Neither Sunny nor Claire spoke a word, when Shale trailed off. Her tea had spilled a little onto the table, prompting Sunny to lift the journal and put it aside.

“I’m so sorry,” Shale spoke, barely louder than a whisper. “But after this long… I should’ve been there when Starswirl and the Pillars disappeared, when Discord took the throne. When…”

She trailed off, and looked at Claire, her expression inscrutable. But a twitch at the corner of her lips caught Sunny’s interest.

“It was not your duty,” Sunny offered, reaching out to touch Shale’s forehoof. Though Shale remained motionless, training her gaze upon her half-empty cup of tea, neither did she withdraw her forehoof.

“No, it wasn’t. But I am your sister.”

Shale’s customary glare softened, and she looked away for a moment, looking out towards the open seas. Sunny thought, fleetingly, that her eyes glistened more than they usually did, the icy glare melted. She cleared her throat.

“May I ask something, Sister?” Sunny asked, emphasising ‘sister’. Shale glanced at her, a curious tilt to her head. “What became of this Scorpan?”

“I do not know,” Shale said. “I chose to remain in Equestria for a long while. I did not tread far from its borders, not after… after the Elements were used a second time.”

“Why?”

“Because that is mine duty,” Shale spoke, her tone even, “and that is reason enough.”

Her eyes had returned to their icy gaze. But, try hard enough to look, Sunny realised, and there was a glimmer of something beneath them.

‘Sister…’ Sunny thought, wishing she spoke aloud. ‘Why must you be so… concealed?’

“And so it is,” Shale stated. “Well, I suppose we’ll keep an eye out for him, just in case.”

“Indeed,” Claire sniffed. “But if he has not made a move, I don’t see why he would now.”

“That isn’t quite true,” Shale cut in. Sunny cocked an eyebrow, and Claire’s gaze too fell upon her. “I am here, after all. What’s another immortal to add to the tally?”

Claire burst out laughing.

“Oh, Shale,” said Sunny, amidst Claire’s futile attempts to stifle her own giggle, “you’ve got plenty more to tell, I sense.”

“Too much,” said Shale. “The people of this realm can be so strange and so mundane.”

“If we must speak of business,” Claire added, “we must assess readiness, you know, when was the last time they prepared for battle, Sunny?”

It was already the point of no return. Their tea was growing colder by the moment.

“Well, there was the Wedding,” answered Sunny. “Still, the Guard’s ranks will need to be bolstered…”

“Hmm, I can’t say I’m familiar with the regular Guard,” Claire said. “What sort do you have nowadays?”

Oddly, Shale spoke here. “Vanhoover has a former weathermare for its Sergeant, I believe. Lieutenant by now, if mine estimates are correct.”

“Hang on, hang on,” Claire interjected, rubbing her chin contemplatively. “How do you know they have an ex-weathermare? I mean, pfft, I didn’t know, but how do you know?”

Shale glanced down at her tea, a moment.

“She and I had ourselves a talk, two months after you returned,” she said simply, taking a sip. “A nice talk.” She looked up, with a raised eyebrow. Claire was scrutinising her. “I meet people, you know,” she added, shrugging. “It wasn’t all ‘boring’, as you might think.”

“I see,” said Claire, clearly unconvinced. From the corner of her eye, Sunny thought she saw Shale hide an uncharacteristic smirk beneath her cup. But the moment passed, and with a shrug, Sunny returned to sipping as well.

Yet, with the chat shifting to the matters beyond their little get-together here, Sunny could no longer maintain the charade. She looked back and forth, between her sisters.

“Luna, Galatea,” she told them, with a sad little smile. “With all that said, well, I believe… our time is almost up.”

As she said it, her blonde mane shimmered, the magic within burning away the dye, letting the colours shift from pink, then turquoise and blue along with it. And when ‘Claire’ and ‘Shale’ looked back at her, Princess Celestia sat where Sunny Skies had been.

“This has been a most pleasant hour,” she said earnestly, her mane returning to its ethereal glory. “But… well…”

“Our task awaits,” Shale finished for her.

Claire, looking at Celestia and the disguised Galatea, let out a tired sigh, before she returned to her true form, as well.

“All good things must come to an end. And yet, I must agree with you, Celestia. It was a pleasant morning. Talking, sharing, drinking.”

“I’m glad you think so,” said Celestia. “I only wish we had more time.”

“And we shall,” Luna said, offering her a wink. “I suppose we’ll gather here again, sometime. We have got our own… matters.”

“Yes, I think we do. Don’t worry, I’ve given Kibitz and Miss Inkwell advance notice. They’ll be happy to ease you in.”

“Funny, Sister, how I once would’ve been just thrilled to rule by my lonesome,” Luna mused, “yet I know not if I should envy diplomatic overtures or menial labour.”

Celestia, they had all agreed, would have to remain in the Hall, overseeing diplomatic proceedings. It was her, after all, who remained as keen and knowledgeable as ever in memorising each and every little treaty Equestria had signed over the centuries.

It had taken a promise from Celestia that every little loophole and law would be taught to Luna, over the following weeks, by letter correspondence, for the other diarch to accept temporary monarch duties over Equestria.

“Don’t fret about mine labour,” said Galatea, shrugging. She alone had remained unchanged, in her earthpony form. “It is not something one should envy, least of all shipboard tasks.”

“Indeed,” said Celestia, feeling a giggle build up. “And, Luna, I really do think you ought to lend Lyra your books first.”

“But I haven’t finished reading them! It shall me take some time to transcribe them...”

“Don’t they have multiple copies? The PHL would be happy to answer your request,” said Celestia, giving Galatea a cheeky glance,“ and Twilight would certainly appreciate extra material for the Hall.”

The freckles on Luna’s cheeks darkened. “Oh. Oh yes, quite, ahem,” said Luna. “Very well, then.”

Galatea was first to stand. “If… there aren’t anything else, I believe we ought to prepare soon.”

Luna cleared her throat, all of a sudden.

“Oh, do you have something else in your mind?” asked Celestia.

Her little sister remained quiet, for a good few moments, under the stares of both her sisters. Then she shook her head, her brows furrowed.

“No, nothing,” she said. “Nothing at all, Sister.”

A moment’s pause. A smile formed on her lips. A sweet, happy smile.

“I saw something else on Earth, Tia, Galatea,” said Luna, her voice light and breathless. “I saw Pipsqueak. He has a family…”

Celestia returned her sister’s smile. Galatea’s listened with interest. All was well.

~ The Hall of Unity ~

“Do we have the tea ready, Luna?” Celestia was saying later on.

“More than enough for the entire Concordat, if I do say so myself,” Luna replied. “It’s too late to go back and shop for any more!”

“Wonderful! Then, we’re all set…”

Exchanging a nod with Luna, who stood at the kitchenette, meticulously setting up the teacups, Celestia gazed over the rest of her room from her bed’s vantage point. Her aura wrapped around the big, fluffy pillows, arranging them into comfortable positions. Close to a dozen people would be attending this little gathering in her chambers, and she wanted to be ready.

Galatea returned from the balcony, silhouetted by Celestia’s own setting Sun. “The flowers have been watered, all according to Luna’s instructions,” she said, lifting her goggles. “I… hope this will suffice.”

She sat herself down on one of the pillows, wiping sweat off her brow. Celestia smiled at her, but it was Luna who spoke first. “Did you arrange them as I requested?”

“I have,” said Galatea promptly. “Have you got any coffee, Luna?”

“Way ahead of you, Sister.”

A cup of coffee passed by Celestia, held in Luna’s aura, to come to rest upon the coffee-table, followed by two sugarcubes and a muttered ‘thank you’ from Galatea. A moment’s quiet reigned while she took a sip.

“Ahh, this coffee tastes delicious,” said Galatea, “but still, I feel…”

“Anxious?” Celestia finished for her. She moved off the bed, joining her sister’s side. All three of them were unadorned, save for Galatea’s goggles. Even her patchwork cloak had been taken off, hung on the coat rack. “I can’t say I blame you, but we are soon to be amongst family. Come now,” she said, draping a wing over Galatea, “we’ve already seen you let your hair down, as it were. Why should this be different?”

“I’m not used to appearing like this in front of so many people,” Galatea mumbled, casting her eyes over her alicorn figure, wings unfurled as she stirred the coffee by her lit horn. “I don’t even have mine travelling cloak on.”

“You showed yourself to our confidantes in the library,” Luna remarked. “And then there was the birthday party.”

“Your birthday party,” Celestia added.

“Yes. One was a formal occasion, the other was…” Galatea briefly hesitated. “Small, low-key. I wasn’t lying when I told you I don’t get to have fun very often. Not as the alicorn Galatea. Actually, I rarely allow myself downtime.”

“Hm,” said Celestia. “That reminds me. Sister, did Luna ever tell you what happened the last time I went as… well...”

The air around her shimmered with an ethereal glow and the light touch of Celestia’s wing upon Galatea’s withers grew lighter. Feeling the shine recede from her body, Celestia knew she stood now before her sisters as Sunny Skies.

“Little old me?” Celestia’s smile had gone sheepish. “It was a year ago. A street urchin had stolen the Alicorn Amulet, you see. So I took it upon myself to find it, I who know the ins and outs of Canterlot, hoping I could get it before the Saddle Mareabian delegates arrived... but..."

“But?” said Galatea.

“It was all a bit much,” Celestia admitted. “I forget how hot the Sun feels when you’re not physically acclimated to it. The day was boiling, my hooves chipped with every wrong step, and I thirst so easily as a pegasus. Worst of all was the anxiety. Goodness.”

Clearing her throat, Galatea idly stirred her coffee. “And then?”

“Well, I found the urchin, set her free from her wicked aunt,” Celestia said proudly. “Although,” she continued, her face falling, “I’m afraid I wasn’t in time to stop Mistress Shadowfall selling off the Amulet, which then turned into Twilight’s problem… But most of all, it’s at times like these that I wonder how many of my ponies live a desperate existence, like young Scarlet Petal, all because Princess Celestia cannot be everywhere at once.”

Sighing softly, she chose this moment to pat Galatea, ruffling her wings, much as she used to do with Luna in the coldest days of Winter.

“When I see you, walking among the people in these historic halls– yes, I see you, Sister– that’s when it gladdens my heart to know all this time, there hasn’t been only an alicorn to take inventory of our accumulated wisdom, or an alicorn to safeguard our dreams, but one who watches over our people– looking out for us.”

Ironically, Galatea seemed unable to quite look her in the eye, contemplating her coffee instead. “That might only be half-right,” she said. “I’m still not sure our Mother planned I should mingle with mortal folk. All I remember is she tasked me to watch you. Nothing but watch, when for so long I…”

“When for so long you what?” said Luna, as Galatea left her words hanging.

Galatea swallowed. “I wanted to meet you. Both of you, mine sisters. And now, that’s done. But… I hadn’t expected to meet a whole family. Believe me, Luna,” she said, eyeing the Princess of the Night. “I haven’t many regrets, yet one of mine greatest is how even after you lost yours, I could not step forward.”

Luna said nothing, but her trembling lips told Celestia enough. Unspeaking, Luna returned to the kitchenette, where the kettle had begun to whistle. Celestia, aware she had not yet reverted her pegasus guise, gazed at her sister’s back, before looking to the other alicorn present. Something passed behind Galatea’s icy blue eyes, her lips parting…

There was a knock at the door.

“I’ll get it,” Luna said, perhaps too loudly.

Which she did, hurrying so that Celestia only just had time to resume her appearance as Princess of the Sun, stepping away from Galatea. A gap remained in their relationship, this much was evident, yet Celestia wanted to believe the gulf was closing.

* * * * *

Some time later, Celestia’s spacious quarters had filled up in short order. Once every new arrival had been received, greetings exchanged, everyone including young Spike given their cup of tea, the late afternoon gathering had become about waiting until her Sun reached just the right angle in the sky for the promised family snapshot. In the meantime, naturally, people split into groups. Luna, by the kitchenette with Sint Erklass. Twilight was conversing with Ilsa by the coffee-table. And Galatea had found herself with Blueblood and Spike.

“I’m glad you were able to come for the day, Cadance,” Celestia smiled at her niece, standing close to the balcony with Shining Armor. “They don’t have days off aboard a ship in sail, you know, and Galatea’s expended all her shore leave-time just so she could be with us today.”

“I would never miss this, Aunt Celestia,” Cadance said softly. “Not in a million years.”

Shining nuzzled her fondly. “You should go talk to Twily, love,” he said. “She’ll be going to Saddle Mareabia in a few days, after Lyra Heartstrings leaves on her Expedition. Last chance you’ll get for a while.”

Cadance’s eyes swept the room. “You didn’t invite Lyra, Auntie?”

“I thought about it,” Celestia admitted. “But it’d have felt… false, I suppose. I love Lyra very much, like I love all my students, but we never had any… special relationship.”

“That all reminds me,” Shining put in, addressing Cadance. “How’s our little ward doing, Candy?”

“Well…” Cadance said slowly. “I’ve left Hadia in the care of Autumn Gem and Master Sunburst while I’m away. He seems reliable, hard to think he’d ever be one of those ponies who committed to the Solar Empire… But I privately told Autumn to watch him closely.”

“Mmh. And Hadia?”

Cadance glanced to one of the other groups. “Hopefully I’ve got that covered.”

She was looking at where Blueblood, Galatea and Spike were talking. From what Celestia heard, Blueblood had been trying to impress them with stories of his joyride aboard the Starspear, but the results were mixed.

“And I’m going to the Crystal Realm!” exclaimed Spike, puffing up his chest. “You should see how they treat me, heh-heh.”

“Oh you silly little drake,” Blueblood said, patting Spike’s head, “how would it compare to an Expedition into the very Unknown?”

Galatea gave a cough. “Now don’t you go saying you've experienced life, not until you've seen others from the bottom, Astron… And you know I'll be looking up at you from the lower decks.” Her eyes glanced at a spot behind his haunches. “It’s quite the sight.”

“Galatea!” Blueblood blushed, his white cheeks a startling pink even beneath his golden beard. “That’s so wrong. You’re technically my aunt…”

“A statement on class struggle,” she smirked, unbothered. “Nothing untoward, don’t you worry.”

“Uh, what?” Spike inquired, scratching his head.

“I’ll let you in on it once you’re older,” Galatea said. “Now, what was that about the Realm?”

Celestia didn’t hear what Spike replied, or reprimand her sister, as she excused herself from Cadance and Shining. Those two, already, were going to say ‘hello’ to Twilight and Ilsa.

Momentarily alone, Celestia crossed onto the balcony and into the open air. She hid her grin. Blueblood, always good for a laugh. Pity he’d never had the chops to be her student. Her eyes beheld her setting Sun.

All her living family were gathered here…

Save one.

Celestia’s grin faded. Luna had never known her, but Blueblood and Cadance missed her dearly. Blueblood, especially, had never truly been the same after losing her to the Crystal Mirror.

Sunset Shimmer. Blueblood’s first girlfriend, and Celestia’s former student, and more.

At times, Celestia still felt hers was the blame. Between those three, there had been affection, yet Sunset’s ambitions had overcome her in the end. Perhaps Celestia should have trusted her more. When she’d taken Cadance from Florentina, she’d believed it was Cadance who’d assemble the Elements and free Princess Luna.

After Sunset too fell, Cadance had shown her the way. A handsome young schoolcolt she’d found love with, who had a baby sister, a magical prodigy. The most promising spark since Celestia’s greatest student, Radiant Hope of the Crystal Realm.

With the vanishing of the Realm had gone Radiant, and Luna, and hope for a new age of crystal. A millenium, haunted by failure, by promise unfulfilled… Until Cadance.

“Cadance…” Celestia whispered to herself. “I always used to wonder. Where you came from. Odds that in a thousand years, you'd be the only scion of Luna's I ever ran across were... astronomical.” Pause. “But now I must look at your old story, your confrontation with Prismia, in a new light… And a suspicion takes root within me.”

She returned inside. Seeing her stride in, laden with purpose, the room fell silent. Celestia glanced at Luna, who’d stopped mid-conversation with Sint. They had prepared for this.

Celestia locked eyes on her niece. “My apologies, Cadance. But… I need you for something.”

“What is it, Auntie?” Cadance whispered, Shining stroking her withers.

“A lullaby, from the Crystal Realm,” Celestia said softly. “A lullaby for Hearts & Hooves Day. It was Princess Amore’s favourite… She used to hum it for her daughter, Radiant Hope, all the time…”

Luna spoke up next, coming over. “Radiant would sing it whenever we paid the Realm a visit. She thought it might make me smile,” she said, wiping a tear away, “and it did.”

With grace in her heart and mind, Celestia began to sing the song of old.

~Join voices, every child,

In Winter turned harsh and wild.~

~There is only one solution,

And we have made our resolution.

We shall lift our spirits to the sky,

Our hearts grow full and our hooves rise up high.~

~Hooves cold, hearts warm. Cold hooves, warm hearts.

Oh, Spring of Garden Hearts, we all take part…~

And when she was done, not a soul dared to speak. Not Twilight, wiping a tear away with a hoof, not Sint, who hung his head in somber silence. Not even Galatea, who’d turned her sorrowful gaze towards Cadance.

“Cadance?” Celestia said.

Cadance’s eyes were glistening. “I know that song.”

Luna touched her horn against her heir’s. “When Cadance and I went on that visit to Florentina, a few months ago,” she stated gently, “she and I dove deep into her memories. She told me she wanted to find her earliest memory.”

“And… and we did find it,” Cadance whispered, smiling through tears that rolled down her cheek. “Deep, deep down… I heard her. I heard my mother.”

* * * * *

It all went by like a breeze. Many stories were shared, between all those who had gathered. Cadance seemed content, at least, to reminiscence about her childhood in Florentina, to a curious Spike and melancholic Galatea. Yet the song lingered in Celestia’s mind, even as the matter passed, with Luna next informing them of Darkhoof’s proud remark about her broken armour, now that it had proven itself worthy on the battlefield.

“And I had wanted the gauntlet fixed,” Luna had remarked, and shrugged, “but I didn’t want to ruin his cheer. I suppose it does have a style to it now.”

Galatea had fewer stories to tell, but what little she did mention, from her time in Manehattan University, to building a bridge at Trottingham, certainly charmed them all.

At last, when all was said and done, they gathered at the close.

A fine photo-camera on a tripod had been procured, and it did not take much for everyone to wrap up their matters and gather for the shot.

It was Celestia who sat at the centre, the only one sitting, as she’d arranged for the photo in the first place. A memento, she told them, one last calm before the coming storm. Then Luna went to her left, with Twilight in tow, fresh off a discussion on succulents to accompany one’s studies. On her right, Cadance and Shining stood, sharing that same, cheerful grin. Maybe, in the end, they’d convinced Ilsa to join them for Ogres and Oubliettes, after all.

The Snow Maiden herself chose to stand by Twilight’s left, flashing both Luna and Twilight a friendly smile. Magicians, the whole lot of them. Whatever collaboration they surely were planning, she could hardly wait.

Next came Blueblood, tidying himself the best he could, both mane and beard, standing by a rather surprised and mildly annoyed Shining Armor, although this evaporated as Cadance greeted Blueblood with a happy smile.

Galatea and Sint were the last ones to enter the frame, both of them tallest of all those present. They stood at each end, Sint to the left next to Ilsa, as always, and Galatea to the right next to Blueblood. She must have spoken to him more than expected. With luck, they’d have a few tricks to teach one another.

Celestia returned her gaze ahead. Now only two were missing.

The little drake she called son was fumbling the camera, telling everyone to hold their smiles. Twilight rolled her eyes, and levitated him over, to be seated before Celestia, right in front of her forehooves and close to Luna’s. Spike threw her a nervous glance, yet Celestia smiled serenely, as her aura lit up the camera.

As for the other…

Well. There was still space, next to Spike, for a young mare. If she was here, and Celestia doubted that she’d want to be, then she’d be there, lying down, resting a forehoof on her chin. Maybe with that usual scowl of hers.

Or perhaps a smile, a gentle smile like all the others. A fool’s hope, to think that Sunset Shimmer could even care. But a hope Celestia clung to, just like how she’d hoped that she would be here, where she belonged...

And, with only a moment’s hesitation, the camera flashed.

* * * * *

It was only when the door closed on the last guest, that Celestia turned to address her sisters. She’d asked them to remain behind once everyone else had left. A moment’s pause, a frown from Luna and a curious glance from Galatea followed, but they’d said yes.

“Luna,” said Celestia, swiftly, “how could Radiant’s lullaby have survived unchanged, down the family line? You and I both know stories change, with each retelling.”

Her sister scoffed at that. “I do not think it so outlandish at all,” she said, “if the Crystal Realm… no… no, wait...” She shook her head, frowning. “Perhaps Cadance remembered wrong.”

“‘Remembered wrong’?” Celestia repeated. “You’re a dreamweaver, so if anyone can ascertain that she remembers right, it’s you.”

“If you have something to suggest,” Luna said, frown deepening, “then out with it.”

Celestia glanced at Galatea.

“Sister. In the years that followed the Realm’s fall, how many crystalponies have you seen? And how many of Amore’s line?”

Galatea blinked, expression twisting into a grimace. “No… I cannot say that I have, to either of your queries. None escaped the Crystal Realm, I’m sorry to say.”

“Are you certain?” Luna cut in.

“Yes. And… Luna,” Galatea said, voice softening, “Believe me that I tried. I went to search. But… Nothing. The only conclusion I could reach was that Sombra’s purge was complete.”

“But– Cadance, what did you make of Cadance? When, when she emerged…”

Galatea shook her head. “I… had presumed she was another disciple, like Miss Shimmer. Nothing more than that, until I met her, and the rest of our family. She may not bear your colours, Luna, yet there is no mistaking Amore and Radiant in her.”

Celestia spoke up. “You said you could sense other alicorns.”

“Only when you first raised the Sun, and when Luna first wove a dream, did our latent connection emerge, Sister. Since then, I’ve watched both of you for a very long time. I’ve watched your family flourish. And I could even see the bonds coalesce around those few talented enough to become your student. I felt it with Radiant Hope. But I did not feel such a bond with Cadance, not until she ascended.”

Luna opened her mouth, but remained quiet.

“I know what it feels like, Luna,” Celestia said, brushing Luna’s mane with a feather. “Losing Sunset has given me time to reflect on the loss of your children. They were my family, too. And Radiant… when the Realm returned, I wanted to find her too. I wanted to set things right with you, once more, and yet… I cannot help but wonder.”

She looked deep into Luna’s eyes.

“What if Radiant did leave the Realm, before it reemerged?”

Both Luna and Galatea let the silence hang heavy, the implications settling in.

“And never come forward?” Luna finally said. “I… I don’t know, Tia.”

“But if you’re saying what I think you are,” Galatea said. “How did Prismia know? Unless… No, this still doesn’t answer how Radiant, or Cadance, could stay hidden from me all those years.”

“The only explanation which makes sense is that someone was hiding them,” Celestia said ponderously. “And what if it were also that someone who one day brought out Radiant? Sisters, if the traveller whom Cadance encountered in childhood truly was the Architect of the lost era, she may be less a stranger than any of us knew.”

* * * * *

Ever since he’d remembered the office at the Hall of Unity, the Headmaster had felt a youthful temptation to revisit it. While it had taken him some time before he indulged, it was no empty pursuit. Back when he’d been the head of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns, there’d been a particular aura surrounding his offices. As Headmaster, he should be grand, at home in his personal study, reassuring. If he ever used his designated office at the Hall, it would be homely. Such an office needed to be inviting to the other peoples of Equus, neither superior, nor inferior, but nicely centered.

‘I never had this office,’ the Headmaster thought contritely, as the pen continued scribbling upon the parchment. ‘How cosy. This Equestria’s Nexus has a sense of home.’

Alas, simplicity was not a quality he possessed. Because this former Archmage, above all else, had become so accustomed to complexities and duplicity, he’d limited himself to writing letters, rather than directly approaching whom the message was for.

‘And, done,’ the Headmaster thought as the pen finished its work. ‘A message to send by magic rather than dragon fire, or electronically… the joys of innovations.’

One more time, he took in the office that wasn’t his, the owner busy preparing for an expedition. Plenty of inviting objects decorated the whole space. Different types of dragonscales, diagrams of various Changeling types, an old wooden Diamond Dog figure, and so much more. Any of these items would invite conversation, or provide familiarity to a foreign visitor. The purpose was simple, to put guests at ease.

But the most imperative items remained on the finely-stained and treated timber desk. Pictures. Their frames custom-made, with appropriate epitaphs. One for the Princesses of Sun and Moon, per his title as Archmage and old friend of the Sun. One for his family – his half-brother, his half-sister-in-law, and his half-nephew. And lastly, one for his students, for those fillies who all had their own potential to be greater, and had accomplished so well.

At least, most of them had on this Equus.

‘Bound without choice,’ the Headmaster thought, in regards to the filly who bore magic. ‘A troublemaker gone astray,’ was his thought about the filly with plenty of showmanship. ‘Murdered without care,’ this thought aimed towards the filly whose lyre was never cut. And, ‘Lost once, found again,’ a thought for the filly whose ambition shined like the Sun.

For the goddaughter become no better than a cultist, all he had was, ‘A disappointment, such a terrible disappointment. Will there be a hope for tomorrow, if any?’

Sighing, he prepared to folded and sealed his letter, preparing to send it–

Part of the parchment found itself literally cut by magic. Or rather, a magical weapon.

“In your dreams, Headmaster Nexus,” said a voice. “That is not how the story goes.”

In lieu of an immediate answer, the former Headmaster chose a different tactic. While his instinctual, or paranoid response would be to retreat first, his eyes moved towards the one who’d spoken. Although he’d found that voice unmistakeable.

The very last of those dear students. With all he’d taught her, the one whom it hurt on the most personal level to contemplate. How could she have chosen this, to lower herself to being the Tyrant’s executioner…

“Really now?” he asked calmly, despite the pain starting.

The chorus was getting restless. Especially since there were plenty of them who’d been on the other end of her weapon.

Her, the pale mare. She wore no hood. Bold as brass, she stood in the shadow of the doorway, though he had heard no door open, or shut.

“You think this is my dream we’re in?” the Headmaster stated, subtly summoning his magic to push away the orichalcum blade which had sliced his parchment. “It is a beautiful one, but not of my making. We’d be dancing now if that were the case. They have parties here, in case you hadn’t noticed. It’s not too late to attend one. Wouldn’t that be just like old times?”

Her eyes glinted humourlessly beyond the edge of a raised weapon. The sheared piece of parchment fell to the desk, as the loose shard reassembled itself with its twelve siblings that together comprised the orichalcum sword.

“Your sentiment has lost none of its charm,” she said, “but you know as well as I the festivities cannot last in this realm, now our fight is brought to their doorstep– It’s too late to change that. But not, I think, to let go of your hold on the past. You’d have Equestria encased in amber, if you could keep it as you want it to be… That did not work out so well for your goddaughter, did it?”

“One disappointment is not equal to another, Weaver,” the Headmaster said briskly, despite the chorus’s call. “And if I could have Equestria as it should, then your hooves would be clean and I would be at peace. But the dream is not dead. And I won’t let you ruin this world as you’ve done to the others. There is a reckoning building against you.”

She listened to him with solemn mien, her aura covering the parchment piece on the desk.

“So. You still bear the Architect’s Amulet,” said the pale mare. “But you’re not alone to hear that chorus in your head– I have known many who hear it. You alone, however, have dabbled in arts forbidden to the Solar Empire, wrapped as you are in the past– in death, over rebirth. Had Redheart succeeded, I would not be here. But then,” she added, eyes lighting knowingly, “that is why you are, isn’t it? Because she died.”

He saw her taking the parchment piece.

’Stop her. bloody her as she bloodied us…’

“Stop,” he ordered. “I’d sooner not fight you. We know what the outcome would be. Yet I shall do it if I must.”

“Tell me,” she said placidly. “My identity is still safe with you? Whatever this parchment’s contents, I feel confident that isn’t what you were writing.”

‘Betrayer, ruiner–’

“It is so,” the Headmaster said. “Because in spite of it all… I remember what you once were… Who you were going to be. It mightn’t be too late to turn before the night falls.”

Despite the face she wore, there was a hint of contemplation in her eyes.

‘‘Punish her! Suffer as we–’

“I wonder…” she said, lowering her weapon. “When this Equestria exists, do you have as much reason to keep the secret? But you’re not the only one who’s been hiding another’s identity.”

He blinked. “What do you mean?”

“You know much, Headmaster,” said the pale mare, smiling thinly. “You know Starlight is far too valuable a prisoner for us to hold the crudest methods over her head as a threat– killing her would be a waste. And her willpower, too strong to risk bending her brilliant mind out of shape. Yet you know too, wondrously, it is in Erebus she came closest to redemption, through love.”

With another of the fillies of potential, yes.

Indignation, his rather than the chorus’s, began to boil. “What are you playing–”

“I have harmed innocents, you know this,” she interrupted. “I do not pretend otherwise. But Miss Lulamoon has been no innocent, even after her release. Nevertheless… I’ve done nothing to harm her, when I’ve long been in position to do so easily.”

“Why?”

“Why do you think? She was my ace-in-the-hole against you.”

As his face turned ashen, the Headmaster understood her game.

“Her secret remains,” she said, pocketing the parchment in null-space. “But… I have not kept every secret. The PHL believe the old Palace blueprints will give Miss Lulamoon an opening to extract Lord Discord… They do not know the Empire has been forewarned. And how do you think Starlight would feel about that?”

The Weaver met his eyes, boring into his soul.

“The door lies open, Headmaster,” she said. “Go, I shall not stop you. Unless you do, after all, prefer that shade of Queen Celestia’s student you extracted from the Mirror, so she can finish replacing your goddaughter.”

At a moment’s notice, his form rippled ever-so-slightly. By Changeling magic, his body changed to become draconic. As he reached out, she reacted in turn by fragmenting her sword into pieces. Pieces that, with precision, would slice through him like shrapnel from a human’s explosive. Despite the pain he would feel, he continued and reached out to grab her in his claw.

His transformed eyes glowered into her own, to which there was a banality. No fear, nothing. Despite the chorus, despite his own irrational response, the Headmaster knew this illusion wouldn’t solve anything. She was ready.

And even then, what would facing her now accomplish?

Taking a deep breath, the Headmaster shuddered the weight as best he could. There weren’t any other options.

“... Damn you,” he whispered as his horn glowed. "Ferrier."

Yet, all while knowing it was bait, he vanished. Pulled back and away, with no trace left behind.

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2.1

VoxAdam:

A chapter that was created from splitting the prior Chapter Twenty-Three (‘Here’s To You’) into two chapters.

Removal of a scene; the PHL Moondancer’s meeting with Twilight and Lyra in the Hall of Unity’s library. See the next chapter for its displacement, which moves it to occur later in the chronology than was presented in the original unsplit chapter.

Act III ~ Chapter Twenty-Six ~ Here's To You

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy

VoxAdam

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Chapter Twenty-Six
Here’s To You

Dedicated to Jeremy Whitley

* * * * *

“No distance of place or lapse of time can lessen the friendship of those who are thoroughly persuaded of each other’s worth.”
— Robert Southey

~ Ponyville, Equestria ~ Day 20 of the Convocation ~ First Day of the Month of Gytrash ~

For the past few weeks, ever since Miss Heartstrings had come knocking at their Ogres and Oubliettes session, things had been quiet in Ruby Pinch’s corner of Ponyville. Of course, Dinky’s campaign hadn’t finished yet, and Featherweight’s indecisiveness had only prolonged it. Where they’d been planning five hours, they were now looking at twenty. Still, it was fun playing. And perhaps Feather really was holding out hope for Dinky’s older sister. Ruby couldn’t be sure.

What she felt sure about, though, was the lack of sense both her aunt and mother showed in their talk over tea. It would’ve been awkward for anyone to see her right now, with one ear nearly glued to the living-room door. But it paled in comparison to what she was hearing inside.

“Look, I-I know all the other parents’ll be signing their kids up,” said her mother’s nervous voice. “And I don’t want Ruby left out. B-but… you know what it’s like, every time they set up something big, there’s trouble.”

“I know what you mean, Berry,” said her aunt. “But try to think of it this way, this is something they’re doing to get everyone prepared for when things really get big. That’s why they’re putting it in Summer, instead of dropping it on us when school year begins.”

Ruby did pay a bit of attention to newspapers. You couldn’t be friends with Featherweight and not keep an eye open, especially with him snooping around. But it had been hard to get interested in what the papers were saying about that convocation of creatures. Ruby had heard her aunt mention it was a meeting “in high places”, and she supposed it couldn’t get any higher than a mountain.

However, instead of pictures or stories of new creatures from around the world, the newspapers were just full of talk about trade deals and negotiations. All that stuff which growns-ups liked to chat about, yet she and friends couldn’t stay awake for. Dinky at least might have been interested if there was some science talk. But there was none, either. So they’d stopped paying attention. Now, it looked as if they should have prepared for the worst.

Classes, in Summer! The nerve of her aunt. If this was as bad as it sounded, perhaps she’d have to find another favourite teacher.

“And besides,” said Aunt Cheerilee. “It’d make a difference for Ruby to get lessons from someone who isn’t family.”

“You really think so?” her mother replied. “Not that I disapprove, no, it’s just she doesn’t accept change that fast. Well, I guess you’ve been teaching her a while... I wonder who they’ll bring in.”

“A pony, I guess?” said her aunt. “Someone who’s had time to do quick research? I mean, this is meant for kids, they’re not gonna pile the higher-level stuff on them, surely.”

“I hope so…” her mother said. “I… Sorry, it’s just you know I get a bit… skittish, when we’ve got strange new creatures about.”

Ruby gasped. So, this did have to do with what Feather saw.

“Yeah, I know what you mean,” Aunt Cheerilee said again. “Let’s hope it’s… I don’t know. Let’s hope this is another Zecora, in the end.”

“It’s got to be, right?” her mother said uncertainly. “If they’re talking classes about it…”

Ruby didn’t wait to hear more. She knew how talks between her mother and aunt went. They’d go over it in circles for hours, but at the end of it, Aunt Cheerilee would talk her mother into this, tell her it was for the best. Grown-ups always liked to do that.

She pulled away from the door. It had been a good day till now, with her friends shouting about whether or not Pip should have used a fireball again. But then Aunt Cheerilee had popped in unexpectedly for tea, and her mother had said they needed to clear the living-room. Just her luck they’d been playing Ogres & Oubliettes at her house today.

And because of this, Ruby thought as she climbed upstairs, it might be the last of the good days.

Ruby opened the door to her room, and hopped onto her bed. The Sun shone between her rose-tinted curtains. Nightfall was still hours away. Maybe Aunt Cheerilee and her mother would have finished talking by then. Her friends would want to know, but Ruby didn’t feel like giving them the bad news just yet. Ponyville had been crazy for the last couple of years, ever since that one Summer Sun Celebration gone wrong. Maybe this was just one other crazy time to pass by, with stranger things yet to come.

A new picture-book rested on her night-stand. Rather than wait to read it with her mother, Ruby picked it up. The Dragons on Dazzle Island.

Leafing the pages, Ruby tried to make her worries fade by immersing herself in the story, about the dragons’ eggs on a gem-filled island, and how Windigoes kept them from hatching until they were warmed by love. But the watercolours of exotic creatures led her mind to stray.

It had been Featherweight who took the picture. He’d taken lots of curious pictures before. Maybe he wouldn't have thought much of this one, if it hadn’t been for his mother requesting she give him that one picture for safe-keeping. His mother was a Forest Ranger, she probably knew what she was doing. Ruby didn’t know much about the grown-up talk going on elsewhere.

All Ruby knew was that it had something to do with the creature Featherweight had caught on photo weeks ago, carried in from the Forest by Miss Twilight and her friends.

* * * * *

At Sweet Apple Acres, Applejack was wrapped up in work, like always.

“Applebloom!” called the farmer to her little sister, “Be sure to keep an eye on the pies, alright? Ah’ve got somethin’ to check up on with Big Mac.”

Whatever crazy cutie-mark seeking scheme the filly had been planning this time, Applebloom came into the kitchen at a quick trot and without needing to be called twice, a sisterly eagerness in her amber eyes. Winona hurried after her, barking excitedly. However, in her haste, ‘Bloom had forgotten to take something off her back which was knocking her pink hair-bow askew.

“What’s that?” asked Applejack, unable to get a closer look while she kept glancing at the oven.

“Skis!” Applebloom said proudly, putting down what Applejack now saw were two blue skis. “Got ‘em this morning. Ah remembered, Rainbow Dash keeps all sorts of her old sport stuff in her dojo’s locker room, and she gave Scoot the key before she left…”

“Say what? Skis?” Applejack said, turning. “It ain’t Winter for another five months!”

“Not those skis. Water-skis,” explained Applebloom. “Me and the girls are plannin’ on tryin’ that out next this Summer.”

“Oh,” said Applejack, getting it now. “Crusadin’?”

“Yep,” Applebloom said brightly, patting Winona. “But also cos’ it looks like it might be fun.”

A momentary urge arose within Applejack to bid Applebloom to take every possible precaution. She instantly suppressed it. But she felt a little shakey. After what Discord had done to her, she’d gone through a period of acting very overprotective of Applebloom, trying to shield her from every possible danger.

Which had almost cost her a sister. Over apple pie, of all things, just like what was baking in the oven at this moment.

“Well, keep watch on what’s cookin’, alright?” Applejack said fondly. “Ah’ll be back in a tick.”

Yet the thought of her baby sister, so stubborn, heading off with a risky apple-pie delivery and wandering right into a dangerous fire-swamp, still made Applejack feel chilly, such as had reawakened within her lately.

And not because it was Winter, which it certainly wasn’t. Though Winter felt like it was coming.

A feeling, speaking of chill, which Applejack found best alleviated by another kind of freshness. On her way out from the kitchen, she stopped just to pick herself a small carton of home-made apple juice from the ‘frigerator.

She couldn’t help giving the fridge a critical look as she closed it. The new-fangled Kirin device reminded her a little too much of the Flim-Flam Brothers, and their darn tootin’ mechanisation, for her liking.

But it sure had its uses, Applejack reflected, sipping from her juice-box as she walked. She found herself wondering about the human world and what she’d heard, in Twilight and Lyra’s letters from the Hall of Unity, of their technological prowess.

It made her frown slightly. On the one hoof, for a people who didn’t have the sturdiest bodies, it was mighty clever to have lasted so long and invented all kinds of means around their handicaps. On the other, Applejack had to ask herself if too much machinery wasn’t too softening.

She was proud of the work she did for the sake of Ponyville, proud of it even if she didn’t always live up to her own expectations, like when she’d attended that Rodeo to win the repair money for Ponyville after Spike had gone on his greed-induced dragon growth spurt. And how many times had she fixed the old barn? A barn that always seemed to be undergoing a makeover of some sort, right down to that time she’d even asked Rainbow Dash to demolish it.

Still, what was more impressive than finding solutions to problems with no magic at all? Twi’ had also said that, with the return of the Crystal Realm, new windows would be opened to Equestria’s use of magic, on what she called the macro and the micro level. Which was simply a fancy way of saying in big ways and small ways.

Now, speaking of big…

“Howdy, Mac,” Applejack greeted her brother, bigger than her in more ways than one, as she came into the living room. She lay down her juice-box on the cabinet below the bookshelf. “Said ya had somethin’ to share ‘bout the accounts?”

“Eeyup,” said Big Mac, with his customary laconic delivery.

What he then showed Applejack, on the other hoof, was rather more descriptive, a familiar means for people who didn’t talk much to express themselves. Ever the head for numbers, Big Mac had written up the latest accounts for Sweet Apple Acres.

Applejack accepted the piece of paper from him. She gasped softly when she saw what it read.

“Whoa, nelly… An order for that many new bushels?” Applejack asked her brother. When he nodded silently, she responded with a shake of the head, disbelieving. “So many apples… Ain’t it a darn shame, the Royal Guard gotta spoil it by bakin’ them into those military biscuits… Looks like they’re stockin’ up, they are…”

She gave the list another look, before casting a glance at Granny Smith. Who, as was typical at this time of day, was napping away the afternoon in her comfy chair by the stairs. But the old mare was far from oblivious to the recent going-ons.

If anything, Granny had needed to get her daily rest a lot more lately.

“Mayhap we should start thinkin’ of packin’ more of our products in tins…” mused Applejack.

Zap Apple Jam, of course, was the first Apple product which came to her mind as something that could be packaged into tins.

Applejack had to smile crookedly at the thought of Granny Smith in her non-standard Royal Guard helmet, processing empty jam jars as if they were the troops. Where had that silly headgear come from, again? Probably her late grandfather, a former Guard.

Except the helmet seemed a lot less silly to think about, knowing what she knew now.

“Okay,” Applejack said, returning the list to Big Mac. “Thanks for tellin’ me. Well, the pies ought be done soon. Hey, Mac,” she added, leaning in to touch his shoulder, “Glad ya agreed to deliver these ones. Ah know, ‘Bloom knows the Everfree and Zecora’s her friend, but… Funny things have been comin’ outta that Forest again, of late.”

Big Mac gave her a quiet nod. She was then surprised to hear him speak. “What about that… other thing we talked about, AJ?”

Right. Their visitor from Manehattan.

“Ah’ll tell Applebloom in town, once she’s with her friends,” Applejack told him. “And when Ah’m with mine too. Heh, Twilight’s already asked me to look after one townie we got comin’ in soon… It’s gonna be strange, havin’ someone else takin’ care of her library. But Ah hope that ‘Bloom and her cousin will get along.”

Applejack really did hope so. When Babs’ parents had written to say their daughter was getting teased in school over her blank flank, naturally she’d concluded the filly and Applebloom would be birds of a feather. She really didn’t get why some foals mocked others for lacking a mark yet. She’d been last in her class to get her mark and this had never bothered her. It was always going to be there one day. Kids just liked finding excuses to shut out others.

Only it wasn’t just kids, Applejack considered sourly. The so-called grown-up world was far too full of people who’d never stopped their schoolyard bullying, except that when they did so, it was no longer just the schoolyard, but villages, towns, entire countries. People who apparently found it such a hard thing to grasp, that a little friendship really was magic.

And, now, this was something which had become an issue of worlds…

“Eeyup,” Big Mac said again, interrupting her thoughts.

Friendship, and family, them’s were Applejack’s values. Her sister and Babs had better get along. Apples stuck together. Thinking this caused her eyes to drift towards the cabinet where she’d left her half-finished juice-box.

Most prominently displayed on it was the framed photo of their parents.

Applejack’s eyes began to go moist. Dad had never been a Guard, unlike his own father. Yet with his strong, strapping golden physique, different only from Big Mac’s in that her brother was red, he could have been. She silently pondered whether Mac might be called into service.

Hopefully it could at least wait until the Harvest Day Parade. And Zap Apple Season, Applejack recalled as she cast another glance at a still-napping Granny, would begin not long after. The Timberwolves would be out then, a yearly period when their farm did have enemies to fend off, more than the usual varmints.

But in ordinary times, afterwards, they’d be able to kick back a while and enjoy a good ol’ Apple Family Reunion. It had been planned for early Autumn this year. Maybe this year, rather than risk cancelling it, the Reunion should matter more than ever. Regardless, it was going to be on a different date than the one they’d arranged to coincide with the thousandth Summer Sun Celebration – two years ago now, when she’d first met Twilight Sparkle.

* * * * *

Rarity was busy taking measurements in her Carousel Boutique.

“What do you think?” the dressmaker asked her client, peering over her red designer glasses. “Given your daily profession, doesn’t this have a certain je-ne-sais-quoi?”

While this was the demeanour Rarity was used to adopting in her relationship with her clients, there was an undeniably odd side to keeping it up with this particular client.

“Mmh, yes, maybe it does,” said Nurse Redheart, patting down the fabric that covered her.

The white-and-ruby garment was still in its unfinished state, lacking the adornments which Rarity had planned she’d slip over the sleeves and the hemline. In this sense, what she had here wasn’t unlike the simple plain dress she’d ended up giving Twilight for her last birthday. A pity that Twilight’s newest assignment from Princess Celestia meant she wouldn’t be spending her birthday this year in Equestria.

Summer in Saddle Mareabia. Rarity had winced to consider how terribly hot that must get. She was loath to imagine what the desert Sun could do to her white coat. Still, if she was planning to go on tour in Twilight’s wake, maybe she would pop by in time to see Twilight for her birthday. Despite the inclemency of the weather, Saddle Mareabia provided some of the most gorgeous products on the market, definitely the most pleasingly fragrant. With the Convocation going on, business would beckon beautifully.

“Hey, Sis?” Sweetie Belle’s voice echoed. “You’re in a trance.”

As it was, her little sister’s squeaky voice snapped Rarity out of it. She found both Redheart and Sweetie staring at her queryingly.

“O-oh, I’m sorry,” Rarity mumbled. “Just the muse taking me at an inopportune moment, is all.”

It was clear that while Redheart may have elected to believe her, Sweetie didn’t really buy it. The little white filly knew her older sister’s buttons too well nowadays.

‘Heh. Button,’ Rarity thought, keeping a smile hidden at the name of the tiny chocolate-brown colt. ‘I wonder when Sweetie’s going to notice that boy has got eyes for her nearly as much as he does those silly arcade games…’

What a thing, to be young and have the brightest dreams, not all of them mere puppy love. Sweetie’s pegasus friend had simply wanted Rainbow Dash to become her sister, and Rarity knew said wish had got granted, during that hike to Rainbow Falls. Trust Sweetie Belle to have roped her into going camping, though. The filly was getting clever, alright.

But the thoughts of youth led Rarity’s mind back to the future, and the glimpse she’d seen of it.

Redheart, her shoulders held between Rarity’s forehooves, must have sensed something change in her dressmaker’s touch, because she cast a meaningful glance back at Rarity.

“I think it’s going to be lovely, Rarity,” Redheart whispered. “With you, it always is. Your work has got a way of brightening the day… One of our biggest pop-stars sure thinks so.”

Too bad Sweetie didn’t know much about pop music. She couldn’t know how much of step on the ladder of Rarity’s career it was to be personal dressmaker for the Pony of Pop, Sapphire Shores. Which reminded her, the season for sapphires was coming up soon. If she was going from Ponyville for a while, she still needed to outsource the gem-digging to someone.

‘Gems… Oh, right now, I wish my gem-tracking spell weren’t so unique,’ Rarity lamented. ‘If only there was some device… Wait, didn’t Twilight say there was a gem-tracker? That’s right, they found one on–’

Her joints stiffened. It was the other-Redheart who’d had a gem-tracker.

“Okay,” said the Redheart before her. “I like it.”

At her hooves, Opalescence gave a contented purr. For Rarity’s demanding white cat to display her approval was a sure seal of quality.

“Glad you do, darling,” Rarity said falteringly, as she gingerly removed the dress. “I’m glad…”

Stepping out of the textiles, Redheart smiled at Sweetie. “Look to your sister as a role model, little filly. It isn’t many who’d whip up a dress I might not… might not wear for a long time.”

Sweetie nodded cautiously. “Then you’re really joining the Guard again, Redheart?”

“Yeah,” said Redheart, hesitating only a little. “It’s hard to explain, but the time… seemed right.”

“I hope you’ll be okay,” said Sweetie. “You know my friends and I need you.”

Rarity began laughing awkwardly. “N-now don’t make jokes about that, Sweetie, dear!” she said. “It’s not like your cutie-mark crusading gets you sent to the hospital all the time!”

“Hey,” Sweetie protested, “that’s not what you usually–”

“Isn’t she precious?” Rarity said, cutting across Sweetie and pulling her away while addressing Redheart. “I cannot wait to take her as my plus-one to the Grand Galloping Gala, after going back with her to Sisterhooves Social this year!”

“Rarity!” Sweetie interjected. “The Gala is before Sisterhooves Social!”

“Oh, my, is it?” Rarity blinked twice. “Time these days! It’s not what it used to be, you know.”

“You’ve been acting weird,” Sweetie said, easing away from her grip. She stared in concern at both grown-ups. “Is it because Redheart’s returning to duty?”

Rarity shared a look with Redheart. “Something like that.”

“It’ll be fine,” Sweetie smiled reassuringly, brushing back her coiffed mulberry-and-pink mane. “If Redheart was in the Guard, she can deal with anything, right? Scoots told me Rainbow Dash was joining up as well.”

“I hope it will be, Sweetie,” Rarity said, to an agreeing nod from Redheart. “I hope so.”

In a minute, Applejack would be knocking at her boutique’s door, coming to take Sweetie and Applebloom to Sugarcube Corner, where Dash had asked everyone to meet. While all three Cutie Mark Crusaders would stay to hang out together, Rarity and her friends had places to go, once they’d left their pets at the Forest Rangers and picked up Fluttershy.

If only, Rarity thought, her gaze falling upon a year-old line of many-coloured dresses still popular this day, she’d spent more time trusting in Sweetie’s help around the shop. This was how she’d come up with Full Spectrum Fashions, for instance.

… It was a good name, really, “Spectrum”.

* * * * *

Rainbow Dash had just flown down into Ponyville Square, returning from Canterlot.

She knew she had a lot to thank Twilight’s parents for lately. First, Twilight’s mother had been so kind to send her that advance copy of Daring Do & The Volcano of Destiny, which she currently still carried in her saddlebags. That was already a totally awesome thing, but even more importantly, a series of lucky breaks had led to it saving Lyra’s life. To her saving Lyra’s life. Now she’d spent a few days boarding up with Twilight’s parents, long after her friends had returned to Ponyville, while she sorted out her application to the Royal Guard.

Dash gave the surrounding skies a quick, critical look. She wondered who’d be replacing her as Ponyville’s main weathermare. Oftentimes, this was a task picked up by Sunshower Raindrops, but she’d heard from the weathermare association that Raindrops had signed on for a place in the crew of Lyra’s Expedition.

It was mad stuff, even for Ponyville, so many things starting to change so fast. Dash had felt bad enough already to leave her new little sister so soon, when she’d gone to Wonderbolts Academy. Once they’d got the paperwork figured out for Dash’s unexpected change of department, the Wonderbolts would be giving her over to an even more demanding institution, and she’d see still less of Scootaloo.

“Rainbow Dash! You’re back!”

Well, speak of the jack-in-the-box. A small orange filly was zooming her way, not using wings, but the red scooter she drove everywhere. Of course Scootaloo would have spotted Dash arrive from above, trailing her distinctive rainbow trail behind her. The girl was her biggest fan.

“Heya, Squirt,” Dash smirked.

She’d have ruffled Scootaloo’s unruly purple mane, except it was covered by a biking helmet. Safety first. So she did the next best thing and patted Scootaloo’s helmet affectionately.

“You’re here to stay?” Scootaloo asked her hopefully.

It pained Dash to disappoint her with a shake of the head. “Sorry, Scoots,” she said. “Like I wrote, I can only take you as far as Sugarcube Corner today.”

Dash couldn’t help considering the filly’s biking helmet. Protection provided against a fall, sure, but worse blows? That’d need a full armoured Guard helmet.

She disliked thinking this way, yet she kept doing so, at the moment. So very recently, on their camping trip, she’d helped Scootaloo face her fear of scary stories that were just stories. Yet, not only had experience taught her there were some truly scary things out yonder, but now she had learnt that scarier than anything she could imagine was what lay closer to home.

And that story she’d been planning to write about an awesome pegasus becoming Captain of the Wonderbolts… Such a thing seemed so quaint.

Witnessing Scootaloo’s unshakeable attachment to her was making Dash regret that unlike all of her friends, she had never taken on an animal companion, perhaps one as sturdy as armour. Someone to whom she could give uncomplicated love and care and who’d always wait for her.

It would be nice to get a pet, someday.

* * * * *

Pinkie Pie was on the job, behind the counter at Sugarcube Corner.

With Bonbon away with Lyra at the Hall of Unity, there was nowhere else in town where the little colts and fillies and even certain grown ponies who loved sweets could buy succulents, so business had got especially busy for Mr. and Mrs. Cake of late. Which was good for Pinkie, because it gave her a packed routine she could enjoy committing herself to, helping her perpetually-active mind to avoid going places she didn’t want.

“Four more éclairs, please, Pinkie,” piped up Dinky.

The pea-sized blonde filly and her family, seated by the window, were spending the afternoon at Sugarcube Corner. Pinkie was aware that Dinky would have loved to pursue the Ogres & Oubliettes session she had going with Ruby and Pipsqueak and Featherweight, but given Amethyst’s recent close shave in the Forest, going with Lyra to confront the other-Redheart, the tight-knit four-pony family had every reason to spend all the time together they could.

Oh, how crazy it all was, Pinkie thought as she served Dinky. Humans and parallel universes and evil Equestrias and ponies who said they were one thing but were not. That last one hurt deep, when remembering how she’d gone a bit crazy – well, crazier, after what Discord did to her and her friends. Made it so she no longer trusted her friends and had forgotten her own birthday. Okay, forgetting her own birthday, she might have done anyway. But losing trust in her friends?

For what was not the first time this week, Pinkie sensed her mane begin to go limp. It was becoming so hard to make new friends these days. Yet she was Pinkie Pie. She lived for friends. Even that aptly-named cranky donkey, she’d managed to befriend earlier this year. Just in time to invite her to her birthday a few months later…

Pinkie gazed towards her pet baby alligator, standing motionlessly on the counter. Gummy was two years old now, and they were beginning to show, his terrible twoes. The little Cake twins would both be turning one year old this Winter.

What did their future hold, these kids? Pound and Pumpkin, Dinky and Ruby and Pipsqueak and Featherweight and Applebloom and Sweetie Belle and Scootalo…

She paused. The last three of those fillies had just entered Sugarcube Corner, to the tune of the wind-chimes above the door, flanked by Applejack and Rarity and Rainbow Dash, all of whom looked at Pinkie quietly.

Strangely even to herself, Pinkie thought of how the last time she’d tried to “make” new friends from the Mirror Pool, this had created an army of Pinkie Pies.

* * * * *

Fluttershy lay huddled in her Chamber of Extreme Knitting.

She’d come in here for hours, upon her return to Ponyville, becoming more reclusive than ever. Surrounded by ceiling-high stacks of yarn in every conceivable colour, a full spectrum of rainbow hue to rival Dash’s or Celestia’s, over the years, Fluttershy had knitted anything and everything. Cutie marks, cloud gremlins, dictionary-sized books, an explosive butterfly creation she felt particularly proud of…

What she was knitting now would seem, to the uninitiated, the most grotesque mish-mash of creatures the world had seen. Goat, bat, eagle, lion and more all rolled into one.

But to Fluttershy, as she finished knitting one of the mad eyes on Discord’s face, it was source of comfort in her sorrow.

A tiny knock sounded at the cellar door. She stopped, lay down her needles, and sighed. Her white pet bunny, Angel, came in.

He glanced at her creation, smiled at her sadly, then gestured to say it was time to go.

“Okay…” Fluttershy murmured. “I’ll be there…”

Shortly after, a picnic basket in her mouth, Fluttershy met her four friends outside her cottage. They had come with the purple Friendship Balloon, ready to set off for the Hall of Unity.

“You brought snacks, Flutters?” said Pinkie, as Fluttershy deposited the basket, next to where a box of apple pies was already placed.

“Um,” said Fluttershy. “It’s just… jam, really. For Alex. I thought he might like it.”

Rarity and Dash stared at her pensively, but Applejack went to nuzzle her.

“Ya holding up, Sugarcube?” Applejack said sympathetically. “Ah get it. Ain’t easy when someone close to you disappears. But sometimes, they come back, ya know. Ah’m still holding out hope for mah Great Grand-Uncle Chilli Pepper.”

“That’s nice, Applejack,” Fluttershy said. “That’s real nice.”

~ The Hall of Unity ~
—Four hours later

“We’re going places, aren’t we, Twi’?” said Lyra. “I’m going to the Arctic. You’re off to the desert.”

They sat facing each other across a table piled with books in, where else, Twilight’s favourite spot in all the Hall, the Great Library. In nearly three weeks of Convocation, nobody had dreamt to displace Twilight’s private hideout of pillows. While Lyra would have preferred somewhere less monumentally quiet, like the dining-hall or karaoke bar, she’d been pleased to discover Twilight was less fussy about silence in a libary so large.

Twilight smiled amiably. “I wondered when you’d hop on that train, Lyra, as it were,” she said. “Studies took up too much time for me to travel much, but Princess Celestia insisted every Summer that I accompany her on a foreign trip.”

“Somewhere sandy, I hope?” Lyra smirked. “With beaches and ice-cream, that is.”

“As a matter of fact, yes,” Twilight said. “The Princess likes visiting her friend, the Duchess of Monacolt, for the Summer.”

Lyra’s head jerked. “Monacolt?” she gasped. “Ohmygosh, Twilight, why don’t you ever tell us these things? What’d you see? The Formula Wave Grand Prix? The Top Carts Collection? The Mistmane Garden?”

“Oh, none of those, but it was still pretty exciting, really,” said Twilight. “The Princess would take me to the Monacolt Magic Academy, where they’ve got the Time Glass.”

Lyra rolled her eyes. “Never change,” she said. “Time Glass… Hm. Sparkler told me about it, once. Local legend, isn’t it? But still, surely you can’t have spent all your Summer holidays studying.”

“Spike went sight-seeing. I’d busy myself learning,” Twilight said, a little primly. “You shouldn’t let whatever you’re doing get in the way of extra knowledge. Take your Expedition, for example. While you’re up there, you ought to make use of it for science.”

“Hold on,” Lyra frowned. “It’s already a scientific exped–”

“I mean for other things,” Twilight hurried to say. “Once you reach the Arctic, you’ll have the clearest view of the night skies of anyone in the world. Are you bringing an astronomer along? You should, Lyra. I understand if it’ll have slipped your mind in all the excitement, but there’s a major astronomical event coming up. Secratariat’s Comet’s will pass us by in twenty-five days.”

“An astronomer?” said Lyra. “No, can’t say that we are… But thanks for the tip. Maybe if you’ll lend us your telescope, if that’s alright by you?” While Twilight nodded, she went on. “Okay, Secretariat’s Comet, now… Blimey, that’s a tri-millenial event, right? The last time it passed by was three-thousand years ago, when the Two Sisters were born.”

“Close to when they were born, but not quite,” Twilight corrected. “Although it feels neater to frame it that way.”

A suspicion arose within Lyra, who looked sideways at Twilight.

“You sound awfully interested in astronomy, right now,” said Lyra. “Anything brought this on?”

Twilight blinked. “Um… No, not exactly. Why?”

“I’d have figured,” Lyra said casually, “We’ve both got trips to make. But maybe nowhere as far as we could be going. It just sort of makes sense to me, you know, that if I were to visit Earth, like I wouldn’t mind doing someday– hopefully when this war is over– then you’d be off to the Moon or something.”

“Off to the Moon, huh? Well, I can’t say the thought hasn’t crossed my mind. It’s funny, but when I was little, I used to think the Mare in the Moon was the Mare on the Moon, so I kind of… wished I could go there, to pay her a visit…”

Lyra held back a snicker. These days, it hadn’t escaped anyone’s notice save for Twilight that the mare who’d once lived up there wasted little time in paying her a visit.

“Honestly, I wouldn’t put it past you to build a rocket to travel there.”

“But would it have enough propulsion…”

“Okay, no,” Lyra groaned, “we are not having this argument.”

“It’s a valid question!” Twilight protested, holding back laughter. “Come on, a little math wouldn’t hurt, would it?”

“Well, most ponies aren’t you.”

“Yeah…” Twilight subtly blushed. “That’s what Cadance always used to say.”

“Twi’?” asked Lyra. Twilight’s ears flicked in response. “I wanted to ask you. That evening during the party, back when we were discussing threeso– Um, discussing humans and your trip to Saddle Mareabia. How’d you get to talk to Lady Cadenza?”

“It was easier than you’d think,” said Twilight. “She… approached me, before we talked to you. Was a nice talk, too. Just cleared the air between us, if you get what I mean.”

Twilight shook her head, then held her forehoof to Lyra’s shoulder, once more. “Besides, she told me that, well, I shouldn’t have worried too much about the Archmage. She knows I’m… well, me. So my path is mine to make. If that makes sense.”

Lyra’s thoughts drifted back to the night before her grand speech, where that brilliant, caring mare they called Cadenza had spoken to her, too. She met Twilight’s eyes with renewed confidence, beaming.

“Yeah. Yeah, it does.”

Yet Twilight’s eyes seemed a bit distant.

“Everything okay?” said Lyra, her smile receding. “You appear… deeply thoughtful.”

Her friend’s gaze came back to reality. “Ah…” Twilight said. “On that evening. There was someone else you were hoping to meet, weren’t you?”

To which Lyra nodded hesitantly. “Yeah… But then I ran across Professor Shriek, and that human, Miss Bjorgman…”

“Well,” Twilight said, wavering, “after we parted ways, I stuck with Cadenza. She knows me, Lyra. She took me to meet…”

Twilight did not finish. But Lyra understood right away. They were in a library. And Twilight had been talking about an astronomer.

“Oh, my…” Lyra whispered, leaning forward. “How did that go?”

Upon Twilight’s face, many fleeting emotions crossed.

“You can ask her yourself. She wanted to come and see you here. Right about…” Twilight took a glance to the side, but it couldn’t have been for a clock. This library aisle had no clocks. And then her sights settled upon a spot outside of Lyra’s periphery. “Now.”

Taken aback, Lyra turned to where Twilight was staring.

As if by magic, the figure wearing the PHL’s colours had materialised before their table. Yet the remarkable discretion, practically noiseless, by which she’d shown up was no feat of sorcery. Lyra knew this mare, and she’d long been at home in libraries as Twilight was. Seen up close, it was plain she looked a little older than Lyra remembered, a little gaunter, the violet-and-amaranth of her mane fading.

However, there was resolve in her purple eyes, amplified by the careworn, square pair of glasses.

The bespectacled mare’s lips curved. “Hello, Lyra Heartstrings.”

Lyra stood up slowly.

“Moondancer…”

“Are you surprised?” Moondancer smiled. “You saw me come through the gateway. Same as Cadance and Amethyst. And Spike.”

“But…” Lyra stuttered. “Wh-what’s going on here? I thought your… thing, was with… Twilight.”

Moondancer laughed softly, even while Twilight looked ashamed. “You’re Lyra, alright,” she said. “Always so humble. You never did get why people made such a big deal out of you. May I sit?”

“Um… Sure…”

Already standing, Lyra moved back, offering Moondancer her seat. Moondancer, after looking momentarily bemused, accepted it graciously. She sat down, yet though facing Twilight, she kept her eyes on both of them.

“Didn’t Twilight tell you?” Moondancer said. Her smile had gone small, yet remained. “I moved past that grudge a long time ago. We had greater concerns to deal with. It was… hard times.” She blew through her lips, softly. “Yet if any good came of them, it’s that it brought us closer.”

“Even with one of your friends fighting on the other side of a war?” Twilight said in a tiny voice.

“Twilight,” Moondancer said, very seriously. “We talked about this. I fought alongside you against the Dark King. I was at the forefront of Lyra’s diplomatic relations with Earth. Some things, terrible as they are, will strengthen friendship like no other.”

“Wait…” said Lyra. “You fought in the Crystal War?”

“I did. My older sister, Morning, she was the Guard in the family, but…” Moondancer sighed. “Six months of hell. Six months doesn’t sound like a lot. But those six months took so much from us. A few merely suffered earlier than the rest.”

There Lyra saw the look in Moondancer’s eyes she could see in Alex’s face. And not only Alex, but Cadenza, Amethyst, anyone who’d crossed through the Crystal Mirror. All, and this included Miss Bjorgman, betrayed a hint of that look.

Seemingly at random, Moondancer picked a book from the table.

“Treatise On Ponies,” she read. “Heh, nice one, Twilight. You get around yet to teaching me Hayscartes’ method here?”

“No…” said Twilight. “I… didn’t know how to break this, but… I tried mending fences with… you. Lyra was there. It… didn’t work out so well.”

“Ah,” said Moondancer, replacing the book. “To be honest, that’s what I thought.” She let the pause hang. “Lyra. About this Expedition of yours. It may not surprise you, but, I’m the one who reminded Twilight about Secratariat’s Comet, if she’s mentioned that already.”

“Um, yeah,” mumbled Lyra. “She kind of did.”

“Were this a few years later, I’m sure I… that is, the other-I, would happily join you,” said Moondancer. “It was madness, going to war. But believe it or not, it brought me out of my shell. You don’t want to wait for something like that to happen. Especially now that it might...”

“What am I supposed to do?” Twilight said, before Lyra could talk. “I tried, and f-failed, because I can still be so bad at friendship. I invited you to come meet my Ponyville friends over dinner. I hadn’t realised, until it got spelt out, that it’d hurt you to see I’d made new friends.”

Sighing, Moondancer removed her glasses. “You’ve got to keep trying,” she said, wiping her glasses pensively. “Aren’t you leaving for Saddle Mareabia soon? Hm. Well, who’s going to be looking after Golden Oaks Library, then?”

“You know ab– Wait…” Twilight goggled at her. “You think… Would that work?”

“Allow me to let you in on something, Twilight,” Moondancer said wryly, as she put her glasses back on. “Sometimes, I feel that so much about both of us could’ve been different, if we’d walked in the other’s horseshoes. You have an older brother in the Guard. I had an older sister in the Guard. And I might have become a librarian, if I hadn’t held myself back for far too long…”

Here, Lyra saw how she could chime in. “It’s true, Twi’,” she said, marvelling. “And maybe… maybe that’s what’d help… y’know, Moondancer. Doing more of what you did. In Ponyville.”

Moondancer chuckled. “On the ball as always, Lyra. And, oh, don’t you worry, Twilight. I doubt I’ll ever be replacing you as Bearer of Magic.”

“But you don’t have to be a Bearer,” reflected Lyra, considering herself, “to be a friend…”

“Yes…”

After she’d seated herself, Moondancer had kept her focus evenly distributed, made sure to keep Twilight and Lyra each within her sights. With that last word, as she drew it out, her gaze rested solely upon Lyra.

The resolve in it had become coupled with something harder to name. Melancholy, perhaps, or regret for things that cannot be said, cannot be made right again.

She got up.

“I’m sorry. I cannot stay,” said Moondancer, averting her gaze. “Lyra, I… wish you luck on your Expedition. I hope so dearly that it’ll turn out better than the last time you boarded a ship… Give my greetings to old Headmaster Nexus.”

Maybe Moondancer simply forgot to also speak farewell to Twilight, or maybe she’d reasoned they’d still get a chance to see each other in the time they had. Whatever the rationale, the PHL’s Moondancer left them to their corner of the library, and did not turn back.

Shortly after, Lyra released her breath, rubbing her temple.

“Hey, are you alright, Lyra?” asked Twilight. Lyra shot her a glance, then shook her head.

“You… you saw what she was like there, right?” said Lyra. “She thinks I’m the Ambassador. You know what I’m saying, right?”

Twilight raised an eyebrow. “I mean, I do, but… listen. Don’t let it weigh you down.” She let out a little sigh in turn. “I see now that she’s looking for the same thing I was with her. Am.”

“What’s that?”

“Closure,” Twilight said. “But Cadenza said to me that’s why she’s avoided seeing Shining. She knows she isn’t going to find it here.”

“I know, I know,” said Lyra, rubbing her forehead. “I really shouldn’t be worrying like this, but…”

Twilight tugged at her shoulder, beckoning her to sit herself down. So Lyra did, laying beside her on her pillow-fort. “Lyra. For you, it’ll be alright. I’m sure you’ll do just fine.”

“You do?”

“Well, if you put your mind to it. Half the time, all you needed to do was just, do that, you know. Besides… Ponyville got us prepared for this, right? Next to what’s going on over there, this is pretty tame adventure fare.”

That, if nothing else, brought a small grin to Lyra’s face.

“Didn’t think of it that way but, yeah… yeah, I guess it is.”

“Hey, if the six of us can bring an ancient alicorn back into the light,” said Twilight, playfully poking Lyra’s chest. “Then you can handle a few sea monsters, Lyra, trust me. You got the world behind you.”

~ Departure of The Kaikishoku ~ Day 1 of the Expedition ~ First Day of the Month of Gytrash ~

From the Hall’s pagoda gardens, Ana Bjorgman watched the three sky-turtles far below, as the Sun’s light gleamed off their metal carapaces, creating a beam that shone between the pillars, one of the very pillars she pressed a hand against, basking in the warmth, savouring the poetic imagery of the moment.

She closed her eyes and breathed the scent of flowers. Ana had stayed clothed this time, taking no chances. She had to be in uniform for later this evening, to respectfully see off Captain Reiner. The least she’d allowed herself was to keep her feet bare, caressed by the grass.

Frieda would come get her, when it was time.

Ana heard a little snicker. Turning, she found that behind her, Princess Luna stood, a gardener’s hat covering her ears.

“I’m… I’m sorry, I didn’t know you were…”

“You’ll see more of me,” Luna said kindly. “The war is not over. But it is my duty to nurture the realm of dreams, and yours have been troubled of late, An-na.”

“Pardon?”

“Sorry,” Luna coughed, embarassed. “Slip of the tongue.”

* * * * *

Outside the Kaikishoku, on the Hall’s boarding platform, Proxenos Darkhoof placed both hands around the shoulders of the young bull he wouldn’t see for ages.

Again.

“Go well,” he quietly told his son. “And make me proud.”

Basil nodded, his eyes shining with sadness, but also a little love. “You have my vow, Father. From the toils of this journey and the learnings at its end, I will attain the gnosis which eluded my grasp in the Labyrinth.”

“Aye,” said Darkhoof, “but when the time comes, just beware that your worldly pleasures do not get in its way.”

“What do you mean?”

“I doubt not that the Prince loves you,” Darkhoof said. “But he is one for whom loves shines twice as bright and half as long. You may think you understand and accept that now, yet no rational processing can prepare one for emotion’s rawnesses.”

“I know that well,” Basil said. “It’s why I must undertake this.”

“Basil,” Darkhoof said seriously. “It is not emotion itself that is to be rejected. Motion is life, and it is through our ability to feel, to perceive that we are alive.” He pinched his nose-ring. “But this is what a true Tauren initiate wears these for. Paradox though it seems, it is through our own discipline that we are not emotion’s slaves.”

His son gave him a thin smile, having heard this often, and then leaned forward to kiss his cheek, un-ringed snout brushing against Darkhoof’s own.

“I’ll seek to learn that,” Basil promised. “Give my love to Thymos. And to Unathi… To Mother.”

* * * * *

“Surprised they’re letting Prince Blueblood onboard,” General Skybeak commented. “Given his track record with the Kirin.”

Shining and the hippogriff had been watching from the stands as, on the platform before the newly-docked Kaikishoku, flagship of the three sky-turtles of the Expedition, Blueblood exchanged farewells with his two best friends, Awesome Fire and Shieldwall.

“I’d agree,” sighed Shining. “But, diplomatic immunity, right? My wife and I have had to grit our teeth every time I walk by a Changeling here, General.”

They both stared further up the stands, where the Mikado and his Prime Minister were observing the proceedings impassively.

“Still,” grunted Skybeak. “Look at them, sitting there. As if we didn’t know they were pulling deals on the side with the Storm King.” He shook his head and looked at Shining. “You were talking Changelings, Captain. Before we even talk about military preparations for this war on Earth, we ought to talk local. Security here at the Hall needs serious ramping up.”

“I expect you’re speaking from experience?” Shining said. “Princess Celestia told me, but I didn’t get the full picture of how you disappeared, all those years ago…”

“The Storm King’s getting clever, alright,” Skybeak said lowly. “Even hiring ponies, now… I remember it like it was yesterday. Two souls, at our gates, one night. One of my guards let them in to see Her Majesty– Stratus Skyranger, his name was. A unicorn, and an… Abyssinian. Yeah, it’d break Queen Saba’s heart, I know… Her Majesty didn’t quite trust ‘em, but she let ‘em stay the night. Well, surprise, that very night, the unicorn tried stealing Mount Aris’ magical pearl. Her Majesty caught her, but before you knew it, Storm Guards had appeared all ‘round the city. Good news is, they didn’t get the pearl. Yet the unicorn, she fought like a devil. Her Majesty had no choice but to ‘port us all out of there.”

While listening quietly, Shining had spared a glance below, as Professor Nexus formally transferred his ceremonial Archmage duties to Professor Inkwell. Not Raven Inkwell, Celestia’s personal secretary – but a similarly-named hero who, decades ago, had helped defend Canterlot from an invasion by Shadows.

An icon for these times.

Skybeak sighed. “Her Majesty made ‘em welcome, because her daughter, little Skystar, was so very young, so curious about the world… A world she’s never seen, and we’ve tried not to forget, but we’re scared will forget us…”

Shining looked at him. “Oh…” he said, picking a book from his saddlebags. “I believe Celestia remembered you.”

The hippogriff took the book in his talons.

“Under The Sparkling Sea,” Skybeak read out, peering at the author’s name. “Written by…” He stopped and looked up. “Sunny Skies. So this is…”

“A pen name, that’s right,” smiled Shining. “She wrote this a year after you guys left. And another book for my kid brother, when he hatched.”

* * * * *

“Scrolls?”

“First thing in the case.”

“Ink and quill?”

“Wrapped and ready to go.”

“Element of Magic?”

“Spike, you know I can’t bring it.”

“Aw… just in case?”

Twilight brushed against Spike’s cheek, chuckling. “No, it’s in good hooves. The best, and you know it.”

Spike laughed, pushing her hoof away. “Pfft, fine, if you say so…”

“I do,” Twilight said, turning from him to all the others present of her little circle of friends from Ponyville, recently expanded to an honourary seventh member she’d known in Canterlot. “Say, Lyra? You pack my telescope?”

“Not in your suitcase, hopefully,” Lyra said jokingly. She glanced at the arched doorway leading out onto the landing platform, where the ceremony was dying down and Bonbon was patiently waiting for her, then back at them all. “Nah, it’s cool. Secratariat’s Comet, check. I’ll make sure to get you some nice photos.”

“Remember to dress up warmly, darling,” said Rarity. “Oh, and Spikey, too,” she added, ruffling Spike’s dorsal fins, making him purr. “You both need it where you’re going.”

“And Lyra, be sure to get Galatea her new chocolate cake,” grinned Pinkie. “It’s a surprise.”

Dash, holding Fluttershy close, was looking at Rarity and her own mass of luggage. “Hope you’re not packing heavy clothing. You won’t need to dress warm in Saddle Mareabia.”

“Just a few essentials, for the road,” said Rarity. “What about you, Dash? They dress heavily in the Royal Guard. How’s that coming along?”

“Um, it’s funny,” piped up Fluttershy. “My brother sometimes talks about joining the Guard.”

Dash rolled her eyes. “Harmony forbid. But it’s cool, Rares. Slow, but my Wonderbolts Academy time should put me on a fast-track.”

“Applejack?” Twilight began. “Listen… um, about the caretaker I mentioned…”

Applejack raised a forehoof. “Show her ’round the place, make sure she’s well fed, and keep an eye on her. Just don’t you worry ’bout it, Twi’, I got you. Well, her. Now you worry ’bout yerself first, ya hear me?”

A moment’s pause. Then Twilight crossed the distance between them, and pulled her best friend into a warm embrace.

“I will,” she whispered. “Just… I’ll miss you guys, so much.”

One by one, all seven of them joined in the embrace, with nothing more but soft sniffles and the cool mountain breeze to break the silence.

Yet, as she waved goodbye to all her closest friends, all that Twilight could think of was the slim hope that maybe, just maybe, Moondancer would be happy after all.

* * * * *

Discoveries in the Everfree Forest, tackles with foreign spies, presentations before the leading figures of the world and evening gatherings had all, collectively, contributed to a backlog in what Lyra Heartstrings considered her “normal” days. Those largely carefree days spent on her cryptozoological pursuits in Ponyville, laying down snares for creatures that never came, or hours on watch for figures so elusive, they were either invisible or non-existent. All of it punctuated by occasional busking with her lyre so Bonbon couldn’t claim she was the only breadwinner in the house.

Not that the money she’d earned ever sufficed for more than the odd book, or drawing material. Even knowing she could turn to her parents for additional allowance, Lyra had always wished for some form of self-reliance. But as a result, funding any project more ambitious than amateur excavations at the Castle of Two Sisters had remained a pipe dream.

Then, almost overnight, the evidence of one of her pet passions had quite literally dropped into her lap, and suddenly, approaching Princess Celestia to request public support for funds had become a formality.

Standing here on the lip of Mount Metazoa, Lyra suddenly longed for a time before all the fame. Her holdover from that time stood by her side, but soon, she’d be leaving even Bonbon behind. Her girlfriend gave her forehoof a squeeze, making Lyra swallow. Bonbon had accepted early on that there was no changing Lyra’s mind, yet now Lyra wished she’d argued harder. It was what her voice of reason should do, right? A few weeks’ physical exercise, ten times more than she’d practiced in a year since finishing school, weren’t going to equip her for the Unknown. And that was just counting what she could prepare for.

In Gallopoli, seeing the ships at the dockyards had given her a small thrill. Seeing them up-close, gliding in to dock at the Hall of Unity, made Lyra feel dwarfed.

The Kirin sky-turtles had been transformed. The old vessel exteriors were still there, of course, with the dragon-head figurehead poking out the bow and steering fins below the gunwales, but the scaled hull had been stripped and refitted with the flat, sealed plating seen on most Equestrian skyliners, plus the two tall masts that held the lightning-harvesters were gone. A network of steel scaffolding now encased most of the body, with galleries circling the vessel. Where the masts had been, there were now a series of low-lying funnels not dissimilar to what Lyra had heard were seen in Cloudsdale’s Rainbow Factory.

And then there were the slogans. Lyra had to blink a few times from the eye-straining, multi-coloured neons that blinked constantly as they spelt out the names of one Kirin corporation after another. Names such as Doteki Omocha, Denki Arashiporu, Senkofuku, and Ryuppon National Shipping, the last written entirely in the Common Tongue. There were neon signs on the hull, neon signs on the roof, even a big neon sign on the bow, placed under the figurehead.

At the very least, that last sign wasn’t for some big company, but instead showed the symbol of the Concordat, a white star within the petals of a sunflower; each petal blinking in sequence before the star lit up.

“Pretty, isn’t it,” remarked Bonbon, drawing Lyra’s eyes back to her. It was plain Bonbon sought to ease her nerves. But Lyra welcomed the thought.

“Yeah…” Lyra smiled awkwardly. “Bit… flashy, though. I hope they turn it off at night. Or, maybe they could not have it on all the time? I mean… I’m gonna be living in there for… for… I dunno how long…”

Bonbon frowned slightly. “Three months, wasn’t it?”

“Right, right,” said Lyra. “But, it could be longer than that. You know.”

“Well, I hope not,” sighed Bonbon. “You mightn’t realise it yet, Lyra, but we’re gonna need you back here, I know we are. Once you do your thing up there, you’ve gotta come back. Promise? You may’ve set this up, but this isn’t the end. Not by a long shot.”

And Bonbon kissed her, and passed Lyra her saddlebags. As they broke away, Alex, who had been conversing one last time with Sutra Cross, rolled up.

“Safe trip,” smiled the human, “John Connor.”

She smiled back at him, while Sutra Cross walked past her. “You know, I still don’t get it.”

“And maybe it’s best you don’t,” Alex said wryly. “Even so, Lyra… even if we don’t meet again, I hope you’ll come visit Earth, one day. I know a lot of people there would love to see you.”

“That’s kinda what I’m worried about,” Lyra said, although she did manage a chuckle. “Well, Alex, I… I dunno what else to tell you, except… good luck.”

“Thank you. That… that might be all you needed to say.”

With the last of her goodbyes said, Lyra turned and, taking a deep breath, followed her way up the ramp which led into the belly of the beast. Or so it felt at that moment. She was only glad that on this occasion, there’d been no big speeches required of her. Of those, she’d had her fill in the early days of answering the Concordia Maxima.

As her forehooves touched the boards, Lyra lightly blew at a loose strand of her mane, trying to keep her eyes straight ahead. Despite the ramp’s width, or the railings, she was currently feeling acutely aware of how little separated her from a sheer drop, should she stumble.

Pegacorn blood or no, the idea of freefall did not appeal…

She kept her pace steady. Here she was, the guiding figure on an expedition of learning. There were others behind her, bringing up the rear. Stumbling was not an option.

At the entrance to the Kaikishoku, an imposing yet utilitarian, rectangular frame within the gunplate metal belly of the ship, the Kirin first officer stood on wait.

“Madame Heartstrings,” Katashi greeted her in finely enunciated Modern Equish, giving the light bow customary to the Kirin. “In the name of the Blessed Mikado, this one bids you welcome aboard the Kaikishoku.”

Lyra stopped in her tracks, trying to draw herself high as she dared.

“Thank you, Commander,” she replied after a second, remembering the etiquette Cadance had taught her of these peculiar people. “This on– I mean, I give you my gratitude for your grace, by which you grant me entrance to and residence in your domain.”

The phrase sounded a trifle stilted to her ears, yet Cadance was formal on the topic, as it were. On first encounters if nowhere else, such verbiage was a requirement to opening relations with Kirin of standing.

“Your cabin has been provided for you on the third deck, Madame Heartstrings.” Katashi handed her a slip of paper. “You will find it under the designation 3C.1, for your convenience. This is your complimentary map and simplified schedule concerning meal times and deck access. This one wishes you a pleasant stay aboard the Kaikishoku.”

“Thanks,” Lyra replied, seeing Katashi already returning to perusing an itinerary chart.

Opening the sheet, Lyra quickly found it larger than she’d thought, folding out several times, until it took up most of her view. It didn’t take too long for her to find the entrance on the map, indicating she was on the sixth deck, and that on top of this, the ship truly was as massive as it had appeared on the outside.

Walking the narrow, metal-sheathed corridors, Lyra found the nearest stairs and climbed them, finding herself on a wider deck lined by wide, metal doors shut with wheeled locks. Each door was marked by a sign in the Common Tongue’s characters, placed over Ryupponese ones. All the map said about this deck – the fifth one, as she found out – was that it was ‘Cargo’. Another set of stairs later and she was on the fourth deck, which was functionally identical to the fifth.

The third deck was, thankfully, different. Wider than the sixth, but clearly built for something smaller than shipping crates. The first door Lyra came to also looked more similar to a Ryupponese sliding door, with a twist-handle added on. Stamped on it was a sign reading 3E.6. To its left was 3E.7.

“Right it is, then,” Lyra muttered to herself, checking the map for confirmation.

Turning right she began to trot down the corridor. She had yet to meet anyone, but there was plenty of noise – aside from the steam, and water rushing through the pipes overhead – to indicate there were in fact other beings aboard the ship.

Finally, Lyra came across the door marked 3C.1, her room. Using her telekinesis to turn the handle, Lyra repacked the map and opened the door.

Lyra’s cabin was reasonably large, the walls covered by wood and the floors made of tatami. There was a bed set into the right-hoof wall, but the materials were decorated to fit with the other aesthetics, and a rather moderately ornate lantern hung from the ceiling. A small door in the left-hoof wall opened onto a toilet and sink, but there was no bath or shower – Lyra had checked the map earlier, to find one of the rooms down the corridor was a shared bathroom.

Modest conditions, then.

Settling herself down on the bed, Lyra retrieved from her saddlebags a captioned photo, one that’d make the rounds of all the Equestrian papers tomorrow morning. Her science team, whom in a minute, she’d go join in the mess hall to continue making their acquaintance.

Left to right -
~ Pr. A.B. Ravenhoof, professional archeologist
~ Brumby Cloverpatch, freelance archeologist
~ Pr. Noctus Shriek, mythologist and mycologist
~ Prince Astron Blueblood, cartographer
~ Lyra Heartstrings, cryptozoologist
~ Pr. Spell Nexus, arcane physicist
~ Princess Ember, cultural attaché
~ Dr. Emerald Vine, botanist
~ Dr. Sutra Cross, xenobiologist
~ Dr. Shale Pie, geologist
~ Dr. Yugame Kazumi, linguist

Lyra grinned at the penultimate name on the list.

Look at that, Galatea had actually managed to block the shot so half her face was hidden behind Sutra, and her cutie mark wouldn’t show.

* * * * *

The Kaikishoku had yet to pull away. But it would soon.

And when it did, the airship would be taking Ember away from here. Away from the Hall of Unity, where she’d hoped that she might leave her mark, a dragon taking her steps towards leadership. Yet although she still held the Bloodstone Sceptre clutched in one claw, the Dragon Princess, sitting cross-legged upon the plated carapace that was the roof of the main sky-turtle, felt she’d come no closer in three weeks to becoming its true owner.

Her moment in the spotlight had been as the first signatory of this new Concordat. A not insignificant gesture for a dragon, to pledge themselves to a shared purpose and a greater whole – the last such pledge went back hundreds of years ago, between Dragon Lord Scintilla and Ulysses, Prince of the Yaks. One people, she noted, who had not showed up for the Convocation. She didn’t feel too surprised by this, though. It may be just as well. Where a dragon might smash when provoked, she’d heard yaks loved to smash whether happy or sad.

Mind wandering, Ember asked herself what a human might do. Obviously, she had witnessed the honour duel between Pharynx and the human soldier, Alexander, and seen the latter win. A praiseworthy feat, considering how tough she’d found Pharynx.

Still, this was only one sample of humanity she’d seen. Now that she was finally here, gazing upon blue skies towards the North, Ember began to regret she hadn’t taken a closer interest in humans when she’d had the chance.

This whole business of a war across the gulf of time and space, brought upon by an alternate Equestria, was indeed surreal to her, stranger than any magic on this world, despite hearing the truth of it from the mouth of the Chaoskämpfer, currently stashed safely in her cabin. But she did not find it unbelievable.

‘With their sanctimony, ponies imposing their values upon others is plausible enough…’

Ember sighed to herself. Upon her crossed legs, she’d lain her guitar, stolen from a child on a caravan across the Bone Dry Desert, although for some reason, she didn’t want to think about this too hard. Anymore than she really wanted to fill her mind with such thoughts about ponies. After all, she’d be spending an expedition with them. Yet even her brief contemplation about Pharynx made it impossible not to think of something else, when she looked at the guitar.

Had Pharynx been telling the truth? She’d thought Thorax might at least come out to see the Expedition as it departed. Alike though all Changelings looked, she felt sure she could have recognised him undisguised, with those puppy-dog eyes of his. Perhaps Thorax had come to see, but behaving like a typical Changeling, he’d not come as himself, and so she could never have found him amidst the crowd.

Well. So much for him, then. At a slow pace, having switched the Sceptre for the guitar, Ember began plucking its strings, eyes closed as she let her mind get lost in the melody, until she was uninterrupted from an unexpected place.

“Pretty music, Miss,” said a voice close by.

Ember’s eyes went open. As she had been playing, the sky-turtle’s carapace had been accosted. By a smaller vessel, a sky-boat in fact, comprising a silver balloon attached to a wooden gondola.

Small enough for her to see the aeronaut at the wheel, exposed to the air. They were a pony, but had no wings or even a horn, though it was possible these were hidden under their attire, as the pilot wore a heavy coat and a top hat adorned by goggles, covering bronze, perhaps sunburnt male features. For a pony, they looked positively rugged. A long mane blonde as strawberry, flowing in the wind, was complemented by wispy hairs on their chin.

“Who are you?” Ember asked, surprised and a little annoyed. She’d expected to be alone up here.

The aerounat doffed his top hat, smiling. “Brumby Cloverpatch, of Alto Terre. At ya service, Miss. And this lady here,” he added, tapping delicately upon the boards of his sky-boat, “is the Reflector, steadfast companion on many an adventure.”

“Adventure, you said?” Ember repeated, feeling a frown coming on. “Then you’re what ponies would call… an adventurer?”

“Well, that ain’t the professional title,” Brumby said modestly. “But, aye, that’s what folks call it.”

Ember felt the frown only deepen. In the typically limited interactions of dragons with ponies, none was either so familiar amongst her kind, nor so notorious, as an adventurer.

What made ponies the most wretched little creatures, her father had said, was when they fancied themselves brave. Because then they either got it into their heads to filch from a treasure trove which a dragon may have preciously guarded for centuries, or more absurdly, challenge a mighty dragon head-on.

The old tale of the Fireproof Shield was particularly well-known to her family. Her own great-grandfather had taken part in that tussle with the pegasus warriors.

“You’re on this Expedition?” Ember said coolly. “I don’t remember us meeting.”

“Ah, right. Ya weren’t there,” Brumby wittered on, oblivious to her demeanour. “For the dinner at the Hall. You dragons are such reclusive types… Shame, ya missed out on a sweet couple o’ melodies by Madame Heartstrings. Mind ya…” he said, slowing slightly. “Can’t say I don’t know what it’s like, closing yourself off for a few years.”

She had a sense the polite thing would be to ask, but Ember didn’t want to encourage him. She wanted nothing more right now than peace and quiet.

“You don’t seem too bothered about talking to a dragon,” Ember said, fixing him a glare. “I thought ponies were scared of us.”

“Heh. A skittish lot, most ponies,” Brumby allowed, holding to one of the ropes that connected his gondola to the balloon. “But I happen to know a dragon myself, actually.”

“What?” This was too fantastical for Ember to believe. “Say that again.”

“I wondered if ya knew them,” Brumby smiled. “Knuckerbocker, he’s called. Ring any bells? Helped me on an adventure, once.”

Knuckerbocker. At first, Ember wanted to say she didn’t recognise the name. Ridiculous that any proper dragon would help out a pony adventurer.

Only, it turned out did know the name from somewhere. She had read it, one time, when a few overly-inquisitive Kirin courtiers in Kyorito had shoved some silly pony book onto her lap, enquiring if its portrayal was in any way accurate of dragons. She’d dismissed it as pure fiction, back at the time.

“Wait a sec…” Ember began. To her dismay, the aeronaut had caught her interest. “The Isles of Scaly– I thought only dragons can reach them, but in a book, it said a pony– that was you?”

Brumbly chuckled gently. “Nay, that be a different story… Though, a fine one too! Yer talkin’ there of Daring Do & The Eternal Flower, Miss. I ain’t had nought to do with questin’ for that pernicious plant… Although,” he noted, looking amused, “we got someone else aboard ya could ask ‘bout that. Emerald Vine, our botanist– her family was seekin’ the Eternal Flower for years, till her uncle got struck down by illness.”

Ember put her claw to her chin. She didn’t get half of what he said, but enough fitered through. “But… Daring Do, those are just books. Make-believe.”

“Some of it’s padded out for a good story,” Brumby shrugged, tugging at the ropes so his sky-boat would stay in place. “But plenty of them folks in ‘em is real people, names used with permission. Miss Yearling likes to do a lot of research. She’s thankin’ her consultants accordingly.”

The urge to shake her head was one Ember resisted. Ponies were truly something else. “When I’m Dragon Lord, I’m summoning this… Knuckerbocker. I’ve got a few questions for him.”

“He’ll come when he’s summoned, aye,” Brumby said, feeling inside his coat to pull out a shell. “He’s helpful like that. Mayhap not up North… Too cold n’ far. But any other time. Aye.”

Frankly, this was all sounding like a tall tale to Ember. Dragons knew a thing or two about those.

“So,” Ember said, eyeing him warily. “Who summoned you here, then?”

She meant it as a jab at him intruding on her privacy, but Brumby took her up on it.

“Well, lass,” Brumby said amiably, pocketing the shell, “when my old friend Professor Ravenhoof tells me there’s an expedition gettin’ put together for the far, far North, n’ said the likes of Noctus Shriek or cunnin ol’ Spell Nexus are goin’ to join the party… How could this explorer resist?” He paused, his eyes gone contemplative. “Even after findin’ what he spent so long lookin’ for.”

Ember wrinkled her brow. “What’s that mean?”

This time, Brumby actually took a moment to reply.

“Higher than my station, she is… ‘The Caring’, is what some folks call her, them Stonecarvers, mainly, and a good name it is… But, for too long, she thought I didn’t care for her. When it broke my heart to leave her… We’ve been makin’ up for it ever since, travelin’ the world. Only, duty calls, ‘n this was one trip she couldn’t be part of. I’d hate to be away from her longer than I must… My cloud countess.”

He went silent then, adjusting the goggles on his top hat.

“Beg pardon,” Brumby said next. “I’ve got to dock my boat inside the ship, afore they leave.”

“Of course,” Ember replied, relieved, stroking her guitar. His last few words, she’d found oddly troubling to hear. “That’s quite alright.”

“Glad we met,” said Brumby. “But if you don’t my sayin’, Miss Dragon… Ya got a look o’ someone waiting to be summoned yourself.”

Now Ember blinked in bewilderement. “Excuse me?” she said, finally feeling her temper leave. “I came here to be alone!”

Brumby nodded, unaffected by her outburst. “Tis’ just what I mean,” he answered patiently. “You’re here on a group expedition, but ya went off to be on your own. I think what yer hopin’ for is someone will notice, and ask where ya are.” He smiled softly. “Well. I noticed ya. Take care.”

And with that, the aeronaut pulled away his sky-boat, leaving Ember to a confused state of mind.

* * * * *

Up above, a crew of Kirin and ponies and other creatures busied themselves on finishing touches before departure. Those lucky enough to be assigned to the upper-decks eagerly awaited the magic moment when, upon leaving, the sky-turtle’s gleaming carapace would be lowered, and they’d be as onstage before an audience, greeted by the clamour of the receding crowd simply for being in the spotlight. Until then, there remained a last gasp, during which if someone had a change of heart and wished to jump ship, they still could have. That is, if it wouldn’t have undermined the image of the whole thing. And if most people onboard hadn’t signed on for this – or got signed on.

It was also the final chance Garble would get to drop off this damn letter.

Lying back in the steadily-swaying hammock, the young drake bit back frustration as, scratchily, he tried once again to set quill to parchment. He’d considered placing the parchment upon the floorboards so he could write lying down. But that’d provide too much risk of getting seen. Anyway, a dragon should never be caught kneeling.

Matter of fact, now was the only time he’d ever really got to himself, even in his hammock. There was no privacy here. Crew members were in constant rotation, six different shifts a day, and whether they came or went, all were quartered down here in one, low-ceilinged room. And the work was tiring, even if you were a dragon.

But that wasn’t why he hadn’t written yet. He just didn’t want them to know.

Maybe, had his neighbour been someone else, he’d have taken a deep breath and played tough. Problem was, not only were the Kirin and ponies who worked as sailors a bit hardier than most, the officers had cunningly picked out where he’d be sleeping. At the hammock to the far end. Which would suit him fine, if it hadn’t been next to a Minotaur. A blasted Minotaur. Not many creatures gave a dragon pause, but Minotaurs were one. Garble gritted his teeth. They knew what they were doing. They wanted to keep him in line.

He had to clear his mind. Eyes scrunching, Garble pinched his brow, then looked once more at the parchment, mockingly empty but for a few inkblots. With a heavy sigh, he let one foot slip over the edge of the hammock, dangling over the boards in a rhythmic sway. Yellowed toe-claws clicked against unvarnished wood. The musicality of the sound, but mostly the slouching, helped relax him, somewhat.

Determined, he began to write, drawing upon half-remembered spelling lessons in Common.

Hey Smol,

Been a wile hasnt it? probibly longer without Me arund, yur Bro noes you miss him.

Stil off with the Dragun Lords welp go see wat ponys are up to. Aparently it werent just us draguns that got messed with, But hey, least I got to fite sum roaches and I won. Almost cookd one that tryed to tackl Me but had to wressel one that turnd something Big. wouldve sqwashed it if there roach Qween hadnt got involvd and ruind it.

And then after that we got to see ponys at this Big mountinnhall. Kinda like the Dragon Lurds thron realy. it wasnt smal but wasnt Big, was like being in a caje. Idve recked it too but the blue welp she wouldve wine about it probibly. printsess Emburs shes just lucky the Kempfer told me Guard her or I wouldve beatn her tail by Now.

Anyway theres this other thing tha t happend with the ponys. Something happend, I dunno wat, but its got the welp on edge. But shes been lookin a lot at that thing the Kempfer gave her. Yu no, the can thing with His green Fyr in it. dunno if shes gonna smash it or stash it but hasnt realy done anything with it sofar.

Oh, I got that packige you sent. Youve no idea how hard I wanna beat from how boaring this has been espeshiuly now they got Me helping out on this airShip. something too do with an Xpedishiun. dunno the ponys arent making much sense, they got others helping but aint telling Me Nothin! Not even the welps saying much. I just no shes goin North an I got to go too, can u belive that! so cold up there. Ur packige is gonna help keep Me wurm Sis thanx

Hows things back in the DragunLands? Has Fizzel or Klump added anything to the Hoard or are they hangin back? Is Promminents getting any new ideas fro the Gauntlet? or is she still just hauling stuff from outSide? coz if she is, she cold get you one of thos prinsess things yu like.

Havent seen Razr yet but wen I do Ill let yu no. Hed probibly figure somethin outby now if he was Here an

There came a mild shake that threw off Garble’s concentration, punctuated by a steam-whistle from up above. If he had to guess, they were going to leave soon.

‘Oh, scorched rock,’ Garble thought, quickly refocusing on finishing his work.

sorry sounds like were gonna be leaven soon. Dont noe how long itll be But Ill beback. Kaempfer only noes wahts got the ponys and the welp so rattled. but He probabli noes what kinda beat Id get out of this.

Will rite back to you soon,
~ Gar-Bro

PS
Make shur the Eggs are hatching. An if they aint then tell Fizzle get onto it. If he aint listening, make him.

With a slight flourish, the drake finished his writing as best he could, before rising from the hammock and folding the letter. Once done, he tucked the letter under his shirt and hoped for the best. Departure or not, Garble wasn’t going to let anyone stop him from sending a message to his little sister.

Thankfully, despite his size, Garble managed to crawl his way through the bottom of the ship without anyone noticing or asking.

Or maybe they noticed, but it didn’t matter. Because Garble, upon reaching the loading bay, saw the bulging mailbag in the same placed he’d spotted it earlier, tucked by the primary ramp. A Kirin of the crew had already loaded it onto a trolley, but seemed busy talking to a pegasus in postal uniform.

Carefully, while their backs were turned, he snuck the letter into the bag.

Relieved, Garble slunk back towards the crew quarters below. He wondered what to do now. His next shift wasn’t for two hours, but he didn’t feel like returning to his hammock.

An opportunity seemed to present itself. Passing by the rows of hammocks, namely, Garble saw a group of crew members had gathered around a low wooden table. They looked like they were going to play a game, cards or dice, maybe. Amongst the Kirin and ponies, someone noticed him. A grey griffon gal. He recognised her. She had a yuckily cheery attitude. The gal dithered a bit, before offering him a tiny smile and an inviting gesture.

Naturally, Garble had the best thought to this.

‘No, thanks.’ That was his thought, as he marched on. Ponies were ponies. And the Kirin were so very weird-looking. ‘Are they ponies or are they dragons or what? Why have they got those branch-things sticking out their heads?’

In all the ship, there was only one place he’d find some relaxation.

Within a few minutes, Garble’s blue-and-white shirt had been left on a hook, and his claws were turning a faucet in a series of faucets. Ordinarily, the crew showered at set hours, so this wasn’t a private place, yet nobody else would come here during launch, he felt sure of it. He tried not to flinch as the showerhead splashed his face.

Turning around, Garble also turned the faucet all the way up, aware he only had a few minutes. Wasting water was a punishable offence.

His back pressed to the tiled wall, Garble let himself slide to a sitting position, legs akimbo, feeling the water trickle unpleasantly down his fins. Through closed eyes, he told himself warm water was just like bathing in lava back home. But of course it wasn’t. Still, his mind went home. Only, now it no longer thought of Smolder. Now his mind went to other faces. Jolly, fat Clump and tall, dandy Fizzle. Long-haired Fume and long-faced Spear… Mottled Vex…

There it was. Prominence, so magnificent, with her sharp cheekbones and chunky legs. Nothing like that shrimp, Princess Ember… Although, Ember did have a nice set of horns, now the teenage drake thought about it… No, focus. He wouldn’t get many such moments alone.

It was going to be a long voyage.

~ Isle of Storms, The Frozen South ~

The Commander stood against the frigid winds.

Here, at the Southernmost reaches of Equus, it was a cold few could endure at length.

Nothing she wasn’t used to.

Feeling the chill throughout her armoured body, the Commander tightened her scarf, resuming her watch over the Isle’s expanse of machinery, toiling away without rest. She had her summons to answer, yet there was little harm in a few minutes’ silent introspection as she waited upon the balustrade that beheld all outside the throne room.

What was once a barren, rocky island had been converted into a mighty fortress, with walls blackened from coal, and cranes overhanging docks where sky-boats would ferry in supplies from the mainland, beside armoured airships fitted where they rested. Within its walls, creatures from all walks of life and all corners of Equus, from Ornithians to Diamond Dogs, worked away under the image of their master, his icy eyes and proud gaze overseeing them all upon banners hanging throughout.

He had his priorities in mind, and so did the Commander. When she’d arrived here, those many, many years ago, she’d set to work as best as she could.

The Storm Guards, hulking beasts that they were, could still be refined. And that she did, overseeing the drills which her tragically-fated predecessors had neglected. Right now, the Guards were marching lockstep across the cobbled streets, before the awestruck eyes of the factory and dock workers.

Truly, an army as fine as any. And then some.

Her brows furrowed, however, upon glimpsing the flashes of a camera operator, somewhere in the distance. How disappointing. She’d have thrown it into the crowd if she could.

The broken stump of her horn fizzled at that thought, prompting a quiet sigh. Perhaps another time. Her master, after all, had his commercial interests in mind, when it came to photographing his armies for intimidation and exposure.

Or, and this was his priority much of the time, merchandising.

‘What a waste…’

She couldn’t say it, though. Best not to trigger another of his mood-swings.

Sometimes, not often, but sometimes, the unicorn wondered if she ought to have listened to old Rambler, on her long-ago trek for purpose. She had found no healing, no crystal-horn in Saddle Mareabia. Only the underworld, which led here. Where she still was, a decade-and-a-half later.

The double-doors creaked open behind her, automatically, granting her passage to her master’s throne room, relieving her of pondering more of this travesty. With a huff, the Commander turned around and crossed the doorway, into the great chamber housing the lord of these benighted lands.

Upon entrance, tall braziers ignited by her sides, illuminating her in the same dim, cold light which silhouetted the great warlord standing off to the side of the throne, peering through a reinforced window to behold his domain.

“Patience, my friend,” whispered her master, using an old language she understood a little of. Not to her, but the tall Staff held between his hands, caressing it with almost-loving affection. “Your time will come. Now…” He turned from the stained-glass window. “Ah, Commander!” he said, now in Common. “Took you long enough. I was beginning to think you might have left us in the lurch, hmm. So, what’s your update?”

The Commander waited for silence before she spoke. “We continue to have a confirmed location for the Hippogriff Queen and her advisor, Your Excellency.”

Her master showed no sign he’d heard her news. “Haven’t you forgotten something?”

Seeing him gesture, the Commander understood his meaning, and without reticence, she knelt to give him the respect he demanded.

“Yes… that’s better,” said the master. His face brightened. “Hmm. Say, how’d that track as ‘intensely intimidating’? I mean, marketing research from our Kirin friends says the new brand’s been testing out well– and if you can’t trust the market, who can you trust? But you know what, I need to back it up. And you know what I need for that?”

Suddenly, his attitude shifted again.

“A storm!” the master shouted. “A real one, a huge one! Can’t keep dazzling the rabble with the same old flashes and bangs forever! With every year, I’m expanding outward, and this thing–” He banged the Staff on the floor, “–gets harder to charge! Sustainability, what’s that!?”

She merely stared at the floor and listened to his rant with emotionless fortitude. She had heard it all before. Just part of the price she paid for his gratitude, she supposed.

The Commander half-gazed upwards. “Yes, Your Excellency.”

Despite her bored tone, this seemed to placate him.

“So. Novo and Skybeak, still at the Hall of Unity, after all these weeks?” Her master smiled toothily. “Clever little birds in a cage… They got patience, I’ll give ‘em that. Surely it won’t be much longer till they head back home… And then we’ll see where they’ve hidden that treasure of theirs. Any signs of movement?”

The Commander gave a small cough. “Actually, that’s what I wished to tell you–”

“Bah,” he cut her off, his thoughts consuming him again. “Pearls, malachite, what good are those? It’s all a stop-gap. I won’t be happy catching those birds. No, thanks to you, my eye’s set on the main goal, those pegacorns– or whatever they call themselves now.”

As his words petered out, the Commander saw her chance.

“Well,” she said calmly. “It seems there are more alicorns than I knew of, when I left Equestria. If two more have made their appearance in the last few years, maybe one more shall follow?”

“But I need four, to truly power my Staff,” the master hissed impatiently, “Not two, not three, four! Otherwise, what am I holding here? A branch, a twig, what!?” He stomped the Staff’s base on the floor, twice, to conspicuous lack of effect. “Might as well ask the Kirin for some bonus– a couple extra lightning bolts would’ve come in handy for this blasted thing. Pah! Did I ever tell you how close, how close I came once before?”

He pinched two of his fingers in front of his brilliant, pale blue eyes.

“This close! I was this close to catching one alive! Sure, she hadn’t grown a horn, but... a real, live pegacorn, this, this close! If only that sorceress, that interloper hadn’t meddled… Twice…”

The Commander remained impassive while her master, knuckles covering his mouth, seethed over an old slight.

“There’s been a development,” she said. “Movement from the Hall. It’s as Grubber reported. Three Kirin sky-turtles departed in the early hours, headed due North. It’s the Kirin, sir… I thought this might interest you.”

She wasn’t wrong. He stopped gnawing his knuckles to look back her way. “The Kirin, you say… Where do they think they’re going?”

“Grubber didn't mention it, but what’s interesting is that it isn’t just the Kirin. It seems we’re looking here at ships packed with creatures from all over. All working together, and all heading the same way. An international expedition.”

The Storm King contemplated this shortly.

“An expedition… Can’t have Kirin poking around where they don’t belong,” he said, snapping his fingers and pointing at her. “Get me Grubber. Now. And you make the call. Just because I built the thing doesn’t mean I can ever get it to work. Blegh. Chemicals and tech I can handle– it’s that ruddy spell which always gets me.”

A brazier was kept in the centre of the throne room, specially prepared for such occasions.

Rising from her kneeling position, the Commander marched towards the brazier, retrieving a vial of glowing, blindingly blue liquid from her armour. She unstoppered it and poured its contents into the basin. Reacting with a fine powder kept at the bottom, dark blue flame instantly erupted, which soon morphed into an image of her spy at the Hall.

Grubber had stayed in wait on the stealth-ship like she’d ordered him to, but it looked as if he hadn’t quite been expecting this call. She saw him jump.

“Oh, hello, Tempetht!” the hedgehog said brightly, cleaning his paws. “Been wondering when you’d call. Want thome thpongecake? The big princeth took a thlice though, tho, not my fault thith time it’th not–”

“Grubber,” said the Commander coolly. “His Excellency wants an update.”

She reached for the brazier and turned it around, bringing their master in full view of the spy.

“Mathter, thir!” the hedgehog yelped. “I didn’t ecthpect–”

“Commander Tempest’s informed me about an expedition. Tell me, where is this expedition heading, Grubber?

By now, the Commander had moved to their master’s side, and she observed as her associate stammered out a few words.

“The Far North, mathter. All… all the way into the Unknown. ”

“What.”

He said this with a flatness so unlike him that, for the first time, the Commander felt a tinge of worry like none of his ranting or raving had caused her.

“The Unknown, is it…” he whispered. “Then why… didn’t you… tell us earlier?”

“B-but, you thaid you only wanted to hear ‘bout the hippog–”

“Silence!”

The Storm King slammed a fist on the brazier’s side, causing embers to scatter and the hedgehog to yelp. But, composing himself, the master hunched forward to peer at Grubber. The brazier’s light cast a colossal shadow creeping up the walls behind him.

“And that puts me at fault for your inability to improvise, does it?” he hissed. “You want to think very carefully on what you say next, grub-eater. Anything else you might’ve missed? What’s this expedition about?”

Grubber gulped.

“W-well,” the hedgehog began, “I, I d-dunno everything… Th-they don’t allow thtaff into the private c-conferenthe roomth… But… B-betht I can tell, they’re l-looking for thith plathe c-called… D-dream Valley, wath it?”

Their master’s eyes had turned into mean, thin slits, and he wasn’t saying a word.

“I… I th-think it’th got thomewut to do with thothe, at the Hall, thothe alien c-creatureth…”

“What did you just say?” the Storm King said suddenly. “What alien creatures?”

“Y-yeah, uh… Can’t pronounthe it, hoominth or humanth or thomething…”

The Commander felt a waft of hot, angry breath wash over her.

“Guard,” the Storm King spoke, dangerously low. A Storm Guard appeared behind Grubber, its hulking physique towering over the little hedgehog. “Strangle him.”

The hedgehog’s eyes shrunk to pinpricks.

“M-mathter-mathter, wait-GACK–”

His words were cut off as the brute reached for his neck, and tightened its grip. Grubber’s limbs were flailing around, his choked-up squeals growing weaker and weaker. The Commander tore her gaze away from the projected image.

“If I may, sir,” the Commander spoke aloud, frowning. The Storm King glanced at her – as did the Guard, and the hedgehog still in its clutch. “It’s thanks to him that we have the information you need, late as it was. And he may still be useful.”

He looked contemplative for a moment. With a scoff, he raised an arm. The Guard released its vice-like grip, dropping the hedgehog to the ground. The whimper Grubber let out gave the Commander some relief.

Then their master reached for his Staff, stomping it once more.

“Make do with what you’ve got, they say…” the Storm King grumbled. “Oh, fine, fine... We set out North at once, Commander. Take the fastest ships and get Grubber to rendez-vous with us… Hmm, at the Griffish Isles. Trottingham Lighthouse, let’s say. I feel the stealth-ship will be useful. No banners. If we hurry, we might just overtake them, those fools… They don’t know what they’re getting into...”

“As you wish… It won’t be a problem.”

“That is precisely what I wish.”

Abruptly, the Storm King’s face took on a cheerier demeanour, as he held aloft his Staff.

“Great! I’ve been pining for some action, dontcha know? Gonna badda-boom, baby, they got no idea what’s coming for ‘em…”

~ The Hall of Unity ~

“I’m afraid our calculations were correct,” said Amethyst. “Retaining its expansion rate of about two miles every day, the Barrier hasn’t stopped advancing. In accordance with the model we set up five years ago, it’ll hit Boston next week, on December 12th. But that thing’s been looming over the harbour for days now.”

In his hands, Alex turned the jar of jam over and over, digesting her words.

“Have we got an exit strategy?”

The question sounded feeble even to him.

“Exit strategy?” Amethyst laughed without humour. “Captain Reiner, the place we’re standing in right now’s the best exit strategy we got. And you’re about to leave it.”

“Yeah,” said Alex. “It’s amazing we’ve even got this. But… feels like it could be more, somehow.”

“That’s war. There’s never enough of anything. Except rubble.”

Amethyst looked up from her iPad. Her eyes darted left and right a moment, before she leaned in closer to his wheelchair.

“I don’t know if our new friends can pull a magic trick, Alex,” she whispered. “But they’d better find your locket soon, or we’ll be losing the Eastern Seaboard. President Kaine has issued the order that New York, Philadelphia and Washington DC are to be evacuated next.”

He nodded, grim, resigned.

“Take me there, Amethyst,” Alex uttered. “Roll my chair.”

There was a procession of honour awaiting them, leading to where in the Wachtower the Crystal Mirror was stored. It wasn’t what Alex personally would have wanted. But he understood it was what they needed. In the military, the parade ground’s ceremony, so divorced was it from the filth and fear of battle, had good reason for existing. On both sides of the corridor, a row of people in PHL dress uniform stood at attention. Each saluted in turn as they passed by.

When Amethyst brought him to the cusp of the Crystal Mirror, he allowed her to turn his wheelchair around, so as to face them, all twenty of them. And there, he initiated what he’d prepared himself for. His runes shone, blue and bright, and with calculated motion, he pushed himself up, to his feet.

It hurt. He hoped it didn’t show. He couldn’t let it.

So Alex made himself focus on the only thing he could. The people in front of him. Humans, mainly, but others too. Privately, he determined to commit their faces to memory. A middle-aged Asian man with a scar on his lip. A short, strawberry-blonde woman who looked Nordic. A she-griffon with dull grey plumage, but blazing eyes. A young African woman, her hand replaced by a prosthetic. A unicorn stallion, a Southerner by the look of him, whose horn was crystal.

And so on.

“I was just the messenger-boy,” Alex told them, simply. “The real work belongs to you now.”

~ San Francisco, USA ~ December 02nd, 2024 CE ~

Earth greeted him, a shock to the senses.

Alex’s first impression was the pain. How acute the toll on his legs felt, compared to Equus! He nearly collapsed on the spot.

What kept him standing was the feel of the air. Never could the air of either world be mistaken for the other. A delicate scent lay in the air of Equus, that tasted like the first lick of cake frost, or cool waters of an untouched forest pond, a place of slow-moving sweetness. Here on this world, even the cleanest air carried a faint tinge of the chemical, the industrial, the dust-laden, and this city had never had the cleanest air. He marvelled that neither Princess Luna nor Cadance had brought this up. Maybe it was politeness.

But this was the air of Earth.

A man in armour was waiting for him in the hangar of High Castle. Alex smiled wryly as he saw Stephan Bauer. His friend smiled back. Without a word, he approached – pushing what Alex had grandly discarded before witnesses on Equus, but still needed. A wheelchair.

He collapsed into it gratefully, his runes dimming.

“A message came in, from inside the Empire,” Stephan said, wasting no time. “The Blue Spy’s on her way back from Saddle Mareabia. She’s been there gathering a team for her rescue mission. Those plans you sent were a great help, Amerikaner. We might still put mud into their eye.”

Alex shrugged his shoulders.

“Well, I’m back.”

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

A chapter that was created from splitting the prior Chapter Twenty-Three (‘Here’s To You’) into two chapters.

Displacement of a scene; see above.

Addition of a set of scenes; a montage of the five Element Bearers in Ponyville going about their day as they prepare to head for the Hall and bid Twilight farewell before her departure to Saddle Mareabia.

Lyra’s own departure on the Expedition is slightly expanded upon.

Addition of a scene; Ember’s thoughts and feelings during departure.

Spectrum 2.0 - January 21st 2021

VoxAdam: Before you ask – no, King Sombra is not Princess Cadance’s father.

January 2021 was not planned to be the month which would see three pieces of Spectrum material published in as many weeks; a new chapter of The First Second of Eternity, a new tale of the ‘verse beginning with In Night’s Garden, both linked below by Sledge; and finally what you’ve just finished reading, unless you start by scrolling down to the authors notes.

In Sledge’s own notes below, speaking of scrolling down prematurely, he specifies he wasn’t as closely involved in this chapter as the last. Unfortunately he uses Ana and Luna’s very short moment together as an example of outsourcing to me, which makes me sound either negligent or corner-cutting. :derpytongue2: Which is funny, considering I’m traditionally pointed to as responsible for making these chapters so big.

Truth is, Sledge sells himself short. For a lot of Spectrum, I find myself acting mainly as an ideas’ guy and then relying on partnership to see those ideas take shape.

Also true is that Chapter Twenty-Three (‘Here’s To You’) was originally going to be published a lot more closely to Chapter Twenty-One (‘So Say We All’) and Chapter Twenty-Two (‘Unveiled’). For instance, the Storm King’s introduction was written back in February 2020. But then a variety of real-life and behind-the-scenes issues got in the way again, of which Sledge’s university is thankfully but a small part.

On occasion, I think it’s something of a miracle that I can still make time myself for Spectrum, even with external factors such as the COVID-19 lockdown theoretically giving me days with only so much else to focus on. This may be the last long chapter in a while. But it’ll regrettably be the last chapter, period, in a while again too, while we dabble away at the upcoming two-parter reimagining of ‘The Answer’. I’m sorry I haven’t different news to give those of you who were hoping for an increase in pace – that’s why I’m personally so thankful that January turned out to be a Spectrum all-around month.

… And if you were one of our readers who found the previous chapter nice and cosy… Oh, that is not this chapter, at least not for about half of it. Even while the war has yet to make its violent return to the forefront, this is a chapter full of regret, sorrow, frustration and lurking threat.

This chapter was also, even with all the typical hurdles, one of my favourites to write. :pinkiesmile:. A major component of this has to do with something you’ve probably noticed. No other chapter in Spectrum, an intended Ultimate Universe, has as much of a Continuity Cavalcade for the whole range – there’s another word for that, I’m sure there is – of the G4 MLP Expanded Universe. Some of these are just meant as loving references or winks to those fans who can recognise them, while others are designed to pay off within the story. I hope you’ll find it fun guessing which is which, about as fun as I found adding them in.

No doubt there are better things in life than ponies, but when you’ve been in restricted conditions throughout 2020, you catch up on all sorts of things. :raritywink:

And that’s why this chapter is dedicated to Jeremy Whitley, lead writer on the concept behind the “Season 10” comics from IDW, writer of Legends of Magic and Nightmare Knights, not to mention those comic stories which gave Tempest Shadow her poignant closure or made Blueblood into an actual rounded character, and the creator of Radiant Hope.

To him I’d say our work owes the last few threads which tied everything together.
~Vox

P.S.
Yep, in the end we timed the Storm King’s introduction to coincide with a real-world mood-swinging, marketing-obsessed public figure taking leave of office.

Sledge115: Hello there! Sorry for the long wait :twilightsheepish: and, well, here we are! This will be the last long chapter in a while. Promise.

I am not as closely involved with this chapter as I was in the previous one, or at least that’s how I feel (Yep, that Ana and Luna scene? Vox’s to write, for an example), but I did my part here alright :ajsmug:. Had a lot of fun writing for the Sisters, and all their banter and such. Unfortunately, university matters take precedence, so, for the most part, it’s been a very busy few weeks for me.

But don’t take the delay as sign that we’ve been laying silent, nay! Galatea’s story, The First Second of Eternity has been updated, yet again, and Luna’s own side story In Night’s Garden, showing her life and times, has been published, huzzah! Because best pony deserves it. Have a look, and enjoy :twilightsmile:

The matters of her family, naturally, remains an intriguing thread to follow. I can’t say much more than that, but, well… there are some things that aren’t quite what they seem, you see. At any case, well, just look at Radiant, and then young Luna! Family resemblance, I tell ya.

This chapter was a fun one, I admit, in tying all the plot threads together, before everyone goes their separate ways. An Ultimate Universe and Continuity Cavalcade, as the TV Tropes go. Just for a quick example, all the members of the Expedition’s Science Team? Most of them canon.

Another highlight of the chapter, personally, is writing the Changelings’ scene, with Vox. Such a precious little trio. It’s nice to see how their personalities bounce off one another, and as always, writing Aphid’s mostly mute dialogue is quite the fun challenge :twilightsheepish:

And, yep. The Storm King has come to play, and as he declares so proudly, they won’t know what hit ‘em. And as Vox said, well, we timed it good, alright, heh. Stay tuned.

Here’s to 2021, and cheers!
~Sledge

TheIdiot: Honestly, what can I say? Twenty-twenty was a terrible year for everyone involved. Yes, there were great things that happened here and there, but no, it was terrible from the start - Australia suffering the largest brush fire in modern history - to the personal, almost the entire state of California on fire at the same time. Beyond that, and COVID, there’s the fact that the previous semester wasn’t kind mid way through with my laptop throwing a fit and I almost hit an utter dead heat.

And while 2021, personally, started out with the first two days being mixed… nothing’s on fire thus far. Instead, we have a transition of power in America, two vaccinations to combat COVID, and a long road ahead for us all to recover, or continue on our lives. And that’s the most important.

Well, almost as important as getting this chapter done and over with for you all to read. And at that, dear reader, I hope you enjoy the work from us here on the Spectrum.

Thus, let’s make this year better. Because no matter how off it might get, it’s still not 2020.

Until next time,

Carpe diem, everyone.

Act III ~ Chapter Twenty-Seven ~ Twilight, Alone

Spectrum

The Team

Sledge115

VoxAdam

RoyalPsycho

TB3

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

With Special Thanks To:

chris the cynic

Chapter Twenty-Seven
Twilight, Alone

* * * * *

“Our lives are not our own. We are bound to others, past and present, and by each crime and every kindness, we birth our future.”
— Cloud Atlas, by David Mitchell

Friends, let us take a step back.

Where were you, on that fateful night of the Summer Sun Celebration, the return of Princess Luna? Where were you, when the Spirit of Chaos broke free of his bonds, and reshaped this patch of the world according to his twisted whims?

… Where were you, when the Royal Wedding was assaulted by Queen Chrysalis? Where were you, when the Dark King re-emerged to lay claim to the Crystal Realm, to Equestria?

I can answer all of these questions. For now, I shall answer only one. I’ll go back to the beginning.

On the Summer Sun Celebration, I was right there. I was in the town of Ponyville, present to witness the appearance of Nightmare Moon, long thought an old tale to scare and delight children. Showdown with that terror, however… The honour, that time, did not belong to me. That night, I was but one more face in a frightened, bewildered crowd.

How strange to think, though! If chance, or fate, whichever you’d prefer, had chosen differently, I may not have been there at all. Although I’d promised my lady-love I’d visit her in Ponyville, business of the day had brought me to Canterlot.

I’ll never forget that moment of me, standing on a bridge next to a friend, waving to Princess Celestia’s personal student as she hurried by, taking no notice of me. Twilight was always so intent on a task, once she’d set her mind to it… How could I have suspected her concern was this very event which, to the rest of us, seemed to fall so out of the blue?

Twilight learned a great lesson that day. Or night, if you like. So did the crisis have a happy ending. We were not always so fortunate…

This is what we’ve created here stands for.

May none of you, from this point forth, think of yourselves as merely a face in the crowd. Through your individuality, our unity is made stronger. Through our unity, may your lives be enrichened. You are not powerless. You are not alone.

Welcome to the new world.
— Ambassador Lyra Heartstrings, addressing the Co-Harmony Sphere

~ Canterlot, Equestrian Solar Empire ~ Twenty-First Day of the Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~
— Eight days prior to the Expedition’s departure

“Archmage Twilight? Are you alright?”

The voice of Captain Gallus, interspersed with his knocking upon the door, brought Twilight back into the reality she stood in. Or rather, how she was laying across the bathroom tiles, panting, with her eyes still fixed upon the mirror.

Luna. Princess Luna had been right here, with her. Twilight’s eyes darted around, seeking twinkling stars, stirring shadows, or those enigmatic, beautiful eyes...

Another knock at the door cut off her thoughts.

“Archmage?” Gallus asked, a touch gentler.

“I’m… I’m fine, I’m fine!” answered Twilight, slowly staggering onto her hooves, dusting off her custom-made star-decorated dress. “Just give me a minute, Captain...”

‘Please teach me how to walk out of this…’

She lamented in silence, biting back a grimace as her aura lit up her horn.

When Twilight opened the door, she was met by the sight of Gallus, impeccably garbed in Rarity’s finest of dress uniforms. Not his usual attire. Much like Shining himself, Gallus was more at home in full armour. For half the night, Twilight had wondered if he too felt suffocated by it all, the decorum. If so, she could hardly fault him. The Gala had never been such a fun occasion, even less now that she had visitors to greet on a regular basis.

“Evening, Captain,” Twilight said, keeping her voice steady. “Something wrong?”

“Uh, nothing, nothing,” said Gallus, the wavering tone betraying his true worries. “They said you went to the bathroom in a hurry.”

“I see,” Twilight said, nodding along. “Don’t tell me you’re avoiding your date?”

A furious blush crept up Gallus’ cheeks. “N-no, no, I was– I was just wondering about you, Your Ladyship.” He punctuated his words by holding up a sun hat – her own, with its prominent lavender-tinted bow and starry-blue veil. “You left your hat behind.”

Twilight considered him. She’d only heard hearsay of the Loyalty Guard’s interrogation methods, feigning compassion as they peeled away the layers of those in their custody. But here, by the dim light of the marble-plated bathroom, she saw nothing but a look of friendly concern.

“Just a headache,” Twilight remarked, gesturing with a weary smile towards her left ear – or where her ear once was. She grabbed the offered hat, placing it to cover the unsightly gash. While Twilight had never been vain, she couldn’t make herself comfortable with anyone seeing this scar, which was beyond healing. “Thanks, Captain.”

“Anytime, Your Ladyship.”

Something about his stiffened, awkward gait resonated with her, though. Clearly, the Captain’s heavy training had not extended to formal occasions. Or, and this she found more plausible, the prime source of Gallus’ anxiety had to do with Princess Silverstream.

Definitely Silverstream.

“Alright, Captain,” said Twilight. “So did she like it?”

“Like what?” asked Gallus, raising an eyebrow.

“The roast salmon,” Twilight continued, smirking. “You told me you’d try offering her some.”

What might have been a squawk erupted from Gallus. “Oh. See, here’s the funny thing. I was thinking that... I could give it to her once I get to Mount Aris.”

That got Twilight to smile. “Gallus, listen. I’ll join your table, alright? Keep the talk going, give you an opening, you get what I mean?”

“I’m sure you’ve got more important business to attend, Lady Archmage.”

Twilight shook her head, leaning forward with a conspiratorial glance. “Word of advice, Captain? The Gala is boring. And everyone knows it. It hasn’t been fun since–”

‘A moment in the gardens far and away, gazing at the stars. The scent of flowers hanging in the air. The warmth of Luna’s coat, her wing draped over– ’

“Lady Archmage?”

“Hasn’t been fun for a while,” Twilight finished hurriedly, shaking her thoughts away. “No, if anything, this detour will help me get a load of busybodies off my back.”

“Ah,” said Gallus. “Alright. If it’s not too much to ask. We still have space.”

“Really. What are friends for?” Nudging Gallus, Twilight adjusted her veil. “Your lady awaits…”

Without glancing at the mirror, Twilight led the two of them out, closing the door behind her.

* * * * *

Perhaps Gallus’ nervousness was well justified, Twilight concluded, not long after she herself had entered into conversation with Princess Silverstream. Not that Silverstream was a particularly intimidating character. As a matter of fact, Twilight found her rather sweet, but keeping up with her energetic chatter was a challenge in and of itself, even to someone who’d spent their formative years around the likes of Pinkie Pie.

Glancing out onto the floor, where she caught stolen glances from prospective social climbers itching to get into her good graces, Twilight decided that she’d rather be here. A pity for the poor Captain, though Twilight chuckled to herself. He ought to be over the Moon…

Across the table, Gallus’ face was dangerously close to getting frozen into a grimacing half-grin for good, as Silverstream pursued her enthusiastic recollection of hippogriff wrestling, described by her as a combination of griffon-style wrestling and what appeared to be finger-wrestling.

“... And then he used his left claw,” Silverstream exulted, almost breathless, “which no one saw coming! Oooh, that really turned the tide!” Shaking her head, she looked at Gallus, beaming. “What do you think?”

Gallus blinked. “Oh. Uh… I’m not sure I’m qualified to, you know, give professional commentary on the subject,” he stammered out. “It’s pretty neat, though.”

Twilight cleared her throat, before Gallus could dig himself deeper. “Actually that reminds me,” she said, as Silverstream looked at her. “Gallus here has done some griffon wrestling, from what Shining’s told me. Isn’t that right, Captain?”

There it was, the opening. An opportunity fast slipping from Gallus. Without missing a beat, Twilight nudged Gallus’ hindleg from beneath the table, eliciting a quick glare that faded the moment Silverstream returned her eyes to him.

“Yeah…” he said, after a moment’s pause. “I have, back in Griffonstone.”

Silverstream’s eyes widened. “Really? Tell me tell me, what was it like?”

Gallus shrugged. “It was…” he began, brows furrowed in thought. “To be honest with you, it’s been a while. And I was never the best at it. You wouldn’t want to see me there.”

He took a sip from his rosewine, and said no more. Twilight, for her part, felt a pang of regret. Gallus never really liked to talk about his past, a childhood spent scrounging or tussling for scraps in the streets of Griffonstone, with only the occasional charity from old Grampa Gruff, if it could be called that, to provide for him on the coldest of nights.

Only through sheer force of will had the young griffon climbed the social-ladder all the way and never looked back at the street-rat he once was.

This remembrance led Twilight to take another look at the two characters she was sharing the table with. Their avian physiognomies aside, like chalk and cheese, there could not be a pair who were further apart from one another in worlds–

A metaphor which made Twilight swallow, temporarily breaking her train of thought.

Silverstream reached over to hold Gallus’ claw, smiling kindly. “I’m sure you did fine,” she said, “but if you don’t feel like talking about it, I won’t pry. You know, you said you wanted to brew me something. What is it? Tell me, tell me.”

For his part, Gallus kept his cool. “It’s… well. Maybe it’ll be…”

His eyes met Twilight’s. Twilight graced him with a tiny, encouraging nod. Gallus turned, and looked at Silverstream’s eyes.

“Maybe it’ll be perfect for… uh, gallery-viewing?”

He winced a little bit, but Silverstream wasn’t bothered by it, evidently, for she had clapped and cheered.

“Oooh, you’re right! That’ll be perfect! Okay, okay, uh, Lady Twilight, how’s the Great Equestrian? Tell me there’s still room there!”

For a moment, that naughty side of Twilight’s, which had surfaced oddly late in her life and may have stayed buried without the wonders of socialisation, pictured a bedroom for two, so carefree was Silverstream in her inquiries. But as she opened her mouth–

‘Wind blew. Lightning-struck wood splintered. The shadowy alicorn coated in mist, reaching out towards–’

“Uh, Lady Twilight?”

Twilight blinked. She glanced at Gallus, whose gaze was knowing. Shaking her head, she refocused her gaze upon Silverstream.

“The Great Equestrian’s gallery is out of commission,” Twilight said sadly. “Sorry.”

“Aw, that’s alright,” said Silverstream. “Means I’ll have fewer paintings to haul. Ugh, see, Dad told me we had to follow the norm here. Which means I shouldn’t fly everywhere, and, gah, stairs! Why so many stairs?”

For emphasis, the Princess stretched out her wings, almost knocking over a nearby waiter. Twilight wondered if little details like this, expressed in Gallus’ presence, reminded him just how unalike a Princess’s mind worked from his. Naturally, because she was Twilight, it shamed her slightly that she couldn’t tell whether this might push Gallus away or simply endear Silverstream to him further.

A Princess could afford to complain about a thing so mundane as stairs. Such was it when you’d had the good fortune to grow up in comfort, free and unafraid, sheltered from outside threat. While Twilight knew her first memories of meeting hippogriffs would always be associated with the Crystal War, their self-chosen homeland in Mount Aris had been spared the onslaught.

How could you compare that with a life on the streets, of an impoverished nation whose people were not renowned for either their sense of generosity or community? Twilight had never found out what the whole story was behind that, which only her brother was privy to. The simple misfortune of orphanhood, or was it abandonment, brought on by parental rejection? No lifetime of research might yield her an answer there.

Chalk and cheese, truly. And yet the Captain’s taciturn nature would recede around the Princess, the sparsity of his words no longer attributable to brooding, but purely to being tongue-tied.

“Well,” Twilight said, once Silverstream’s apologies had died down, “there’s always our magnificent cloud cities. Captain Dash would love to show you around.” A sly glance at Gallus prompted a smirk and a follow-up. “Or Captain Gallus could, actually.”

Cloudsdale wasn’t known for its art scene. But this mattered little, not when the door stood wide open for Gallus.

“Oh, no, you don’t want me leading you around,” said Gallus, sweating beneath his feathers, “I’m… I’m not the best tour guide…”

“Hey, that’s alright,” Silverstream replied. “That means we can both be tourists! Oh, Lady Twilight, you could show us around, too, right? It’d be fun!”

Ignoring Gallus’ exasperation, Twilight beamed. “Absolutely.”

‘Sorry, Gallus,’ Twilight thought, as Gallus turned to smile sheepishly at Silverstream, ‘but sometimes, you need a little push…’

It had been her brother who’d first told the griffon this. Shining had seen his potential, the foreign volunteer for the Guard who wouldn’t go away, and so had been the one to guide him through the trials and hardships of the military, while the Lady Archmage taught him the intricacies of Equestria.

There had been another who’d shown him the gentler side of life, taught him how to dance and open his heart to the one who’d charmed him so. Twilight could just about see her there, sitting opposite her brother in this very ballroom, laughing at some long-forgotten joke.

None would mention her name. They knew what she had done. They knew what she was. Traitor. Turncoat. Heartbreaker.

And yet a friend is seldom forgotten.

Even as the bitterness seeped in, Twilight could only hear Cadance’s laugh and see her smile, her comforting voice and guiding hoof for a child who’d seen the world in her. Sister, she’d called her, before she’d screamed at her, this loving, caring mare, about not deserving her wings…

Trying her best to ignore the headache, Archmage Twilight took a long sip from her glass, gazing towards the ballroom.

* * * * *

To Twilight’s great chagrin, the night saw no shortage of curious eyes, especially once the dance began as scheduled on the ballroom floor, to the tunes played by the four lead musicians of the Canterlot Symphony Orchestra.

Strange it was, though a few years had now gone by, that the late Octavia Melody would no longer appear as the ‘face’ of said band. Officially, Twilight should not even have given thought to Octavia playing such a prominent role in the first place – but some faces are more easily stricken from the records than others. Particularly when there is a degree of connection. A neighbour in a friendly little town, for one.

… Maybe a distant cousin of Pinkie’s, too? Twilight shook her head. She’d never gotten that figured out.

And the dance went on.

Even as Twilight had kept pace with Gallus and Silverstream’s bashful flirting, the gazes of many were all too keenly felt upon her. For the most part, all she could do was hold her hat tighter still. She excused herself from the table, to Silverstream’s dismay. To her own dismay as well, upon feeling the stares from amongst the gentry. Privately, Twilight regretted the Queen’s absence, who’d excused herself a good three or four hours ago. Then again, she hardly could blame Celestia for choosing to avoid the tedium of the Gala in favour of her private chambers.

It was only by a stroke of luck that Rarity took anew to the floor, breaking away from her middle-aged yet admittedly handsome Saddle Mareabian partner.

“Why, thank you for the offer, Lady Archmage,” Rarity had loudly proclaimed, though Twilight made no such overtures to her, “I’d be honoured to take it up!”

She’d swept her into an elegant dance, upon that.

This, for the most part, got most eyes off her back. Few would ever dare challenge the pairing of the Lady Archmage and the Minister of Inspiration.

Before long, having surely crushed the hopes of many suitors, the two of them had given everyone the slip, sharing a laugh between friends at the Palace Gardens.

“Thanks for the help, Rarity,” said Twilight, crookedly smiling at her ‘dance’ partner. “I hope I didn’t disappoint that suitor of yours.”

“Oh, don’t you worry, Twilight, it was no hassle,” said Rarity, “I’m sure he won’t mind at all.”

“Here’s hoping,” Twilight agreed. But the smell of the gardens reminded her of something. “Listen, um, about Discord–”

Her friend shushed her, smiling. “Like I said, don’t you worry, Twilight, we’ll have time to deal with that ruffian when you’re faring better. Now, I’ve got a dance to finish, and you, my dear,” she said, adjusting her friend’s hat, “have got a talk. Go on then, won’t be too long before the next suitor sees you on your own.”

Suppressing a shudder, Twilight embraced her friend. Rarity departed without another word. She hadn’t mentioned where she’d be heading, but Rarity had always been attentive to all her little tells and cues…

So Twilight found herself alone, amongst the autumnal flowers of the Royal Gardens.

All along the cobbled path, that flowery scent coursing the tranquil night air accompanied Twilight in her stroll. The sounds of the Gala faded, drowned by a hush of bristling leaves and flowing water. From the shadows, the curious eyes of wildlife, her only living companions, stared out from within the vines and beneath the rosebushes. In olden times, she’d always been one to give treats, even as her visits grew scarcer.

Still her headache persisted, so Twilight went on her way. Past the hanging vines, hanging exotic flowers from Neighponese chrysanthema to Monegasque carnation. Time had faded them. Even the finest of gardeners in Equestria could never hope to match their original caretaker.

It was there amidst growing bamboo shoots and orchids that Twilight saw her. Standing upon her pedestal, her back against the vine-covered wall and fountain that marked the garden’s edge, nothing much had changed save for a few leaves scattered at her hooves. Her defiant gaze remained frozen where it had been – ahead, facing her assailant.

“Hello, Luna,” said Twilight. Her lips twisted into a crooked, bitter smile. “Fancy seeing you here.”

No answer. Shaking her head, Twilight made her way to the nearby bench. She took off her hat, letting the cool night air brush against her ear – or where it once had been. A stray thought went by her mind. Here deep within the gardens, perhaps an intrepid reporter or two had made their way in, seeing her at her most vulnerable…

There was no one else here. No one but her and the alicorn beside her.

“No, I didn’t bring any books,” said Twilight, sighing. “Busy night, you know. The Gala’s always a hassle. Don’t think you’ll be missing that, right? Don’t answer. Of course you wouldn’t. You used to drag me here every Full Moon. Every time your sister wanted you to attend the Gala and make it livelier. And… you did! You always did. whenever you could, you and that voice of yours…”

Such a waste of time. Perhaps she ought to apologise. That was also silly. Luna wouldn’t hear her. She never would.

‘But that wasn’t true, was it?’ thought Twilight. ‘She listened to you. She’ll listen now…’

Would she, though? Even as she thought so, Twilight felt a flash of stinging pain. On instinct she reached upwards, touching the spot where the bullet had connected. The exposed flesh below her ear had healed well, yet every now and then, the phantom pain made its unwelcome presence felt.

And still she dreamt of the alicorn in blue, wrapped in the endless field of stars, looking at her with that alluring gaze… Or perhaps it was no dream. Perhaps she had been there, whispering. Perhaps she had stood there, beckoning her to–

‘I trusted you!’

Her Luna would never have hurt her. Never tricked her. She was there for her, always there. Like she surely was there when she’d been at her lowest, on countless lonely days. It had to be so. She would be there, reaching out towards her…

“Was that you?” Twilight whispered. She stared into Luna’s stony eyes. “Was that you, Luna?” Quiet as stone, the figure was. Still Twilight persisted. “I saw you there. You don’t need to pretend. I don’t know if it was you. But I know you’re there. I know you’re…”

‘What am I doing here?’ she thought. ‘What would she think? I… I don’t deserve this.’

Yet she was here for answers, whatever they may be.

“There was another you,” Twilight continued, lowering her voice. “We talked. And… and I really wanted to believe it was you. But she wasn’t. She never was. How could she ever be? She doesn’t know me. She’s not you. She doesn’t…”

Twilight winced and groaned, holding her head, eyes closed. She was there at the Royal Gardens, panting, breathing, holding her hat close to her chest. Nothing. Nothing but her, and her ever silent-companion.

“She doesn’t know me,” Twilight repeated, pausing to take a deep breath. “She’s not you. Whatever. It doesn’t matter. You’re here now. You always were and now…”

Perhaps she was seeing things. Because Luna was here, yet never again would she fly, hooves reaching towards the mare she cared very much about, her velvet voice whispering encouragement and sharing her innermost pains…

How could she ever deserve it, indeed. She was just foolish little Twilight Sparkle, grasping at the figments of a distant past.

“I don’t know if I’ll ever find a way,” Twilight whispered. “I’ll just… Forget about it. It’s fine.”

She stepped off the bench. The Moon had reached its zenith. The sounds of the distant Gala had faded and soon many would wonder where she had gone to.

It was only as she stood at the threshold of leaving the secret garden that she looked back, sparing the mare she loved one last glance.

“Good night, Luna.”

No answer came. None ever did.

* * * * *

Night turned into day. And so the week went on, settling into all of its usual routines.

Twilight knew this well. Repetitive to some, perhaps even stifling, yet there lay a comfort in how very secure it was to her. Her mornings were swift. No later than six o’clock would she rise from her bed. A quick breakfast and shower would follow to get the day started. Indeed, a little-appreciated upside to her title was that she could always count on getting a hayburger. Next, off she went to her office just across from her bedroom, where her desk lay surrounded by stacks of books. Perhaps a mess to the untrained eye, but organised chaos was one thing Rarity had taught her well.

Rinse, repeat, so it went.

Each day another day at the office. Each day would be perfect, Twilight told herself, no matter what little deviation came by. And indeed, they almost were.

… Almost.

Medication could only do so much. Her head pulsed throughout every meeting, every shift, every moment in her study. Bless her foresight in requesting a quieter, solitary office as the war effort intensified. Twilight could hardly fathom how she would have fared, had there been more than Sunburst interrupting her precious train of thoughts for the day.

He, for the most part, hadn’t noticed her predicament, so concentrated was he in the daily reports on spellcraft. The same couldn’t be said of Terramar and Shearwater – who, evidently, did not keep track of one another, since they asked her on separate times if she was alright. And then there was Gallus.

The good Captain had been busy with his own day-to-day, as duty beckoned him. Every once in a while, on the few occasions he was on field duty, his path would cross with Twilight’s. One afternoon that same week, they did meet by chance just outside her office.

“Do you know where I can get some flowers?” Gallus blurted out. “Sorry, Lady Twilight, I was hoping to bring this up in private but, you know how shifts are. My apologies.”

Twilight shook her head. “It’s alright,” she said, chuckling. “We do get really busy these days. Anyway, ah, I do know a place in Canterlot. Opens at ten. It’s closed today, I think, but should be open tomorrow.”

The Captain let out a sigh, massaging his temple. “Darn it, I was hoping it’d be open today. My new shift starts tomorrow.” he said. “I… suppose I can wait and all.”

So sullen and crestfallen was he that Twilight felt compelled to reach out and pat his shoulder. “Silverstream’s leaving tomorrow, isn’t she?”

Gallus nodded. “She is.”

“Then I’ll head out myself,” said Twilight. “I’ll be back before you know it. So, what were you planning on giving her?”

That brightened his face considerably. “Carnation,” he mentioned. “She said she loved the scent when we walked near the gardens.” A moment’s doubt flashed by. “I don’t know if she means it or not, though.”

This time, Twilight had her smile at the ready. “Don’t worry, Gallus, she’ll love it. It’s you.”

~ Canterlot, Equestrian Solar Empire ~ Twenty-Fifth Day of the Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~
— Four days prior to the Expedition’s departure

On that afternoon, when the Sun had scarcely moved past its zenith, Twilight excused herself from a routine meeting. Passing the Guards posted throughout the Palace was a trivial affair, as none would question the Archmage, let alone the Captain of the Guard who let her pass. Seeing as in these midday hours, the city was at its busiest, Twilight had the forethought to bring her hat and veil. Most expected the Lady Archmage to be clad in her robes of office. Fewer would glance at a mare wearing a brown tweed jacket topped by a neat little bowtie. There was little harm in dressing properly, least of all here in Canterlot.

With only an acknowledging glance towards the Guards standing vigil at the Palace gates, she took her first ginger steps out of the gates and took in the sight that greeted her.

Much had changed in Canterlot. Twilight had seen the city sights all too often, staring from the Palace windows since her youth, but rarer was the opportunity to gaze upon its towering heights from the streets. Long ago, Cadance had told her of her first sight of the city, this ivory city reaching high into the skies from the mighty Canterhorn. So captivated was she, that the Captain who’d accompanied her to Equestria had to keep her from falling off the sky-boat.

Twilight walked on.

Canterlot, as the jewel of the Canterhorn, had always been imbued with a certain magnificence, the image of the archetypal ivory tower amplified to cover a whole city, perched from the side of the lofty mountain. Nowadays, the Palace alone retained that ivory texture, and this was primarily out of preservation of a classical aesthetic. Modernity had overtaken the capital, paved over the old with its building blocks that poured forth from the North. This world in which she walked, once ivory, had become crystal.

Above it all, civilian airships lazily drifted by, arriving and departing from the sky-port at the far end of the city, ferrying the populace to and fro across the whole of the Solar Empire and its coalition of equine nations. Public transportation, yet vessels greater in size and sophistication than the Royal sky-boat which had brought the Crystal Princess to this place, many years ago…

Ponies still milled the streets, all around her, although Twilight felt glad to walk unrecognised. A curious thing it was, that during those early years of her bearing an Element, she could continue to blend in as another face amongst the crowd. Unthinkable today, when not only she held such a prestigious office, but the government scarcely wasted an opportunity to remind the public.

Even with her face covered, Twilight had to duck with embarrassment when she saw one of the various billboards, which adorned the top of most roofs, flash to life. A moving picture projected from a totem-prole below the board, it boasted a frankly idealised and larger-than-life likeness of her own self, albeit with the grey stripe in her mane restored to the natural red of youth. She hardly bothered to examine what the billboard proclaimed, some inspirational slogan drawn from the “friendship letters” of a more innocent era, most likely.

What Twilight did catch were a few snippets of chatter. These streets were the province of ponies, as they had been fifteen years ago, yet while she might hide her face, a pony’s face had long ceased to be sole representative of this city’s make-up, with the cosmopolitan turn it had taken since the founding of the Co-Harmony Sphere.

Aside from the usual suspects of the unicorns – still the majority here in Canterlot – or the pegasi and the earthponies, hippogriffs and horses also could be seen going about their business, exchanging the latest news as they understood it.

While most of it had to do with local concerns, intermittent mentions of Earth did come by.

“So how long d’you reckon the skirmishes will keep goin’ on for?” asked an unusually short, beige-coloured hippogriff, his question addressed to a pegasus manning a hayburger stand. “They’ve been cloggin’ up the process for, what, four years now?”

“Five,” replied the hayburger seller, a fairly stout fellow, his colours a faded teal. “And don’t expect them to lighten up none, any time soon. It’s a delicate operation, y’know, cleaning up a whole planet. They did say it might take up to twenty years.”

“Yeah,” said the hippogriff, “but think it’d go faster, if there weren’t so many… insurgents?”

The hayburger seller shrugged, applying sauce to the burger he’d prepared.

“I got a cousin in the Guard. He says, most of the natives are right willin’ enough. Thing is, Guard’s stretched thin as it is, watching over a project this big. So whenever trouble arises, there’s only so much they can do.”

Twilight heard no more, the exchange lost to her as she continued steadfastly onwards. At the very least, what she’d heard there confirmed that Rarity’s department did sterling work. Despite relentless distribution of samizdat tracts by the PHL and their associates, the official story remained the one accepted by the general public.

She’d noted that of the two citizens chatting, the hayburger seller wore a star-shaped badge. Shaped after her own cutie mark, as a matter of fact. This denoted him to be a participant in a novel initiative of hers, which had taken off only last year, still finding momentum at present. A friendship credit system.

Perhaps the seller had opted to participate because it’d boost his business. Perhaps he was as true a believer as his comments on Equestria’s military operations suggested him to be. One way or the other, there was a good chance he’d placed himself ahead of the curve, as this new system would gradually become common practice.

Yet, the part of town Twilight was headed to, coming up to sooner than she’d believed possible, for it lay closer than one might to the Palace, was one vestigial of a different time. Synthetic crystal did not yet plate all of the buildings, nor were rainbows painted along the streets. As Twilight neared her destination, fewer faces showed up that weren’t pony, and a little of the old Canterlot style shone through, albeit no longer so polished, in the ivory architectural facade.

Beneath the sights and sounds of the Empire’s beating heart, there was only one place that Twilight sought, quietly walking down the sidewalk.

The little shop down the road which Luna had mentioned on occasion. Despite all her promises, Twilight could never find the time to visit it for herself. Not so much today. The weekend was fast approaching. Bustling as Canterlot was these days, the crowds were less noisy and inquisitive, so preoccupied were they with their day-to-day lives.

Passing by a closed-down teashop, Twilight stopped before hanging flowerpots, set against a quaint little facade. She glanced down upon the address scribbled in Luna’s elegant hoofwriting. Funny, then, to think Luna had come down to such a humble, antiquated shop, one of the last of many lining these streets. Or perhaps it wasn’t such a wonder…

A stinging pain coursing through her head interrupted her reminiscence. With a resigned huff, Twilight adjusted her hat, glancing left and right to ensure none had their eyes upon her.

‘Right,’ thought Twilight, once she’d ascertained that the street number matched what was written on her note. ‘Here we go.’

She knocked gently once, then twice. No answer. Another knock, another pause. Still no answer. Her forehead creased by a frown, Twilight looked up at the door, where her eyes found a small wooden sign hung across;

Lunch Break.

Twilight only just suppressed a long, heavy groan. ‘Of course it’s closed. Of all times… Why pick now, Twilight. Fine, I see how it is–’

“Pardon me, but can I help you?”

Twilight turned around. There stood a green earthpony mare, looking at her with a quizzical tilt. Perhaps she’d stared for too long, though, for there were the hints of a flustered blush on the earthpony’s freckled cheeks, and she looked as if she wanted to retreat beneath her sun hat.

“Oh,” Twilight began. She glanced at the mare’s flank, spying a drooping, brown-potted white flower upon it. “Sorry, where are my manners? You must be the owner, right? Sorry, sorry, I was just looking around.”

The mare nodded. “I am, yes,” she said, her eyes drifting towards the display. “Oh. My apologies. I probably should open the door. Sorry. I don’t normally get visitors at these hours.”

So quiet was the mare’s voice, that it took a glance at where her eyes were aimed for Twilight to realise she was standing in her way.

“Ah!” Twilight said, stepping aside. “By all means, by all means.”

The mare gave her one last quizzical look, before unlocking the door and pushing it open. In Twilight went, following after her. The cool Autumn air dissipated, replaced by warmth from within the flower shop. Hanging lanterns and a couple of crystalline lamps filled the room with their light, and Twilight’s eyes were greeted by the sight of flower pots large and small.

“See anything you like?” said the florist. She took off her hat, revealing her lush, if slightly scruffy dark-green mane, then hung it on the nearby rack. “Still at full stock. Not that, well, anyone’s rushing to buy…”

The mare trailed off, eyes full of reminiscence. Then she blinked, refocusing her gaze onto Twilight.

“Right. I should let you pick, sorry.”

As the florist headed over to the counter, Twilight turned her gaze onto the nearest rack. Rows upon rows of neatly arranged flower pots greeted her. Their scent was alluring, a mix of roses, lilies, even chrysanthema and sunflowers, and other flowers that Twilight could not identify, save for a familiar one that tickled her nose so very much.

Lavender. Lovely, soothing, delicate lavender. Such a familiar sight that greeted her, all the lavender arranged so neatly before her eyes, like they were waiting for her and her alone. Much like how, in nights past, she’d come home to a fresh pot of lavender, accompanied by hoofwritten notes of how much their sender wished her a good night’s sleep.

‘No-one wants them,’ she thought. ‘You took her away, remember? They’re for her…’

Shaking her head, Twilight tore her eyes away. She had a single task and flower in mind. Once she found it, a full bouquet of carnation, she went right on her way over to the counter.

“Will that be all?” asked the florist.

“Oh, yes, of course,” Twilight answered. “Sorry for, you know, cutting down on your lunchtime.”

“It’s fine,” the florist shrugged. “Chamomile from next door would wait on the shop, when she wasn’t too busy herself. Not that her business was all it used to be, either. Same story all along this street, I fear. But she was the best at keeping her head above water.”

“That’s kind of her. Did something happen?”

“She’s moved to Vanhoover. Wanted her and her kid to be with her in-laws. Her husband didn’t come back from Earth…”

The florist sighed, staring down at the counter.

“Anyways, business has been slow for everybody and… yeah. Right. Um. Sorry.”

Twilight offered an understanding smile. “Hey, it’s alright. Guess that I’m the first customer of the day, huh? Believe me, I get being lonely.”

“I see. That’ll be twelve bits. Nothing for yourself?”

“Beg pardon?”

“Forgive me, Madam,” said the florist, clearing her throat. “But… people don’t typically pick a flower this fast. Would you like to pick another one?” She finished by gesturing towards a few flowers, displayed on the other side of the counter.

Awkward and clumsy, Twilight thought. The little part of her mind told her to decline, turn away. But Luna had frequented this place often, spoken highly of the flower bulbs she’d selected, and Luna seldom gave shops such an honour. And this florist…

Twilight regarded the florist for a fleeting moment. She could not have been much older than herself, a mare of thirty-seven, with freckles that belonged to a younger soul. There were, however, deeper lines below the eyes that betrayed nights of weariness, chipped hooves that bespoke days spent carrying a heavier load than a florist ought to.

As with many, it was the eyes that told her the most. Such sad, delicate eyes. They reminded Twilight of Fluttershy’s. But where Fluttershy had remained true to herself, the mare before her had hardened, heart now veiled behind the faded colour of her eyes.

Perhaps a touch of generosity wouldn’t hurt.

“Alright,” said Twilight, nodding, smiling politely. “I’ll have a look, then.”

The mare did not say anything, only nod, but her cheeks flushed with colour. She took a step back from the counter, allowing Twilight’s eyes to glance over at the flowers presented.

Pretty little things. Dandelions, roses and daisies, even a corsage or two. Simple little flowers for a quick purchase. But one flower drew Twilight’s eyes, for reasons she was sure plenty would laugh at, yet all would understand.

“What do you think?” Twilight asked, holding the miniature pot before her. Twenty little flowers, all with that same, graceful purple shade, with the yellow head that gave them their name.

“Aster,” said the florist. “New beginnings. Lovely choice.”

“I felt sentimental,” Twilight said, rather plainly. She winked. “And it’s my colour, too. I think that’s how it works, isn’t it? Don’t tell my friends, I’m a bit new to this.”

An easy lie. Luna had never missed a chance to speak fondly of her work. And, of course, that first pot of lavender she’d been gifted had been welcome company during those long sleepless nights out in the cold, working to end Sombra’s war…

“That it is,” the florist answered, and for a moment, there were the telltale hints of a suppressed laugh. The relief in her brown eyes was as clear as day. “If I may, who told you of my shop, Madam? I’m flattered.”

Twilight looked at her with a tiny smile. “A friend. You might know her, she used to go here.”

“Did she now?”

“Mhm!” Twilight affirmed. “She thinks highly of your work. She also comes here to think and reflect– pleasant company, she said. Well, can’t say I disagree…”

But the florist’s own smile faltered, to Twilight’s surprise.

“Ah… I see,” said the florist. “That’ll be twenty-six bits all in all, Madam.”

Twilight thought of it for but a moment. “Forty, actually,” she said. She deposited the amount without hesitation, before the florist could protest. “For your troubles.”

Yet before either the florist, or Twilight could do so much as muster a thank you or inquire further, the bell on the door rang.

Upon meeting the newcomer eye-to-eye, she froze, as surely she was seeing a spectre. For Twilight had never seen the mare so clearly before as she did now. Pink, vibrant and warm, like the Sun piercing through the cloudy skies. Then her eyes, those dark purple eyes, once filled with care and love…

But it changed little. Twilight Sparkle stood there before a haunting shadow, and she could not find her voice.

“Ah, Miss Blush’s shop,” said her brother’s wife. “What fine taste you have, Lady Twilight.”

* * * * *

The walk back to the Palace proceeded in dread silence. The Sun above her had scarcely moved from when Twilight stepped into the flower shop, yet its rays felt colder still than it had been between the flower racks. No thanks to the mare by her. Neither had said anything to the other, once Twilight had said her final ‘thanks’ to the florist – Wallflower, Twilight reminded herself. Her visitor had given her the name of the florist at last. But Twilight could not dwell on Miss Blush, or what stories she might hold of Luna.

Not when her company could be so suffocating now.

She dared not glance at Ardor, not once during their trek up the road, nor when they finally reached the nearest bathroom within the Palace. Her head hurt now, pulsing, threatening to split her skull with every beat of her heart.

“Excuse me,” Twilight had said simply. Before the other mare could reply, as her head pulsed, Twilight went right in.

The door swung shut. She was alone, as she preferred, as she ought to be.

There, reflected against the mirror, she saw herself. Haggard, tired, her hat ajar. Twilight took it off gingerly, resting it upon the sink. Every line etched upon her face, every strand of grey mane was there to behold.

She was tired. So very tired. She wished the pain had faded with the passing days. Yet that would be too kind for her, as it were. It was there, always there, behind the veil she had woven so long.

Twilight raised a hoof, feeling it move towards the mirror. That part of her still thought of turquoise eyes staring back at her from the shadows, watching her…

“Your Ladyship?”

Twilight felt her chest tighten. She withdrew her hoof, glancing at the exit.

“Ardor,” said Twilight. “Sorry. I’m just… reflecting. Thinking, really.”

The pegasus mare called Andalusian Ardor did not reply at first, merely glancing over at the mirror, then back at her. She stood in the doorway, tall and elegant, clad in full armour.

“You look prepared,” Twilight continued. “I thought you’d be with Captain Armor.”

“Aren’t I always?” Ardor replied in that smooth, velvet voice, tinted with Oleandrite. “And yes, I ought to be. But are you well, Your Ladyship?”

Twilight sighed, massaging her temples. “Yes. Yes, I am. This doesn’t concern you.”

“Oh, but it does.” Ardor took a step closer. “It is my duty, Your Ladyship. I am a guardian.”

Almost on instinct, Twilight’s horn lit up with a low hum. “Don’t do that. Just don’t.”

“I mean no harm,” said Ardor, smiling widely, in what might have been kindness. “That vow extends to you.”

Twilight blinked. Of course. She had been there, reviewing endless Conversion logs. Not least of which was the mare assigned to her brother. “You… remember?”

She knew the answer the moment it left her mouth. It did not make it any less difficult.

“I was corrected,” said the mare, still with that pleasant, unwavering, sunlit smile. “And now, I correct people.”

Her eyes moved from Twilight to the mirror. Twilight felt her breath grow shakier by the passing seconds. Ardor saw her, did she? Alone, staring at the mirror, hoping desperately to see Luna’s eyes stare back at her.

Twilight gasped when Ardor closed the distance. A hoof reached out, brushing against strands of loose mane over her ear – and adjusted the single aster she had worn on her mane.

“There,” Ardor said, full of pride, the kindly tone familiar to her ears yet with a cold touch that permeated every word. “Isn’t that better?”

“What do you want?” Twilight finally said, after what felt like an eternity, gritting her teeth. Ardor merely looked at her contemplatively.

“I only wish to inform you, Your Ladyship. I suppose this is as secure as we can get for now,” Ardor said, chuckling. From beneath her ornamental armour, she produced a rolled-up scroll. “They have found your sword.”

~ Hajnowka, Podlaskie Voivodeship, Former Poland, Colonised Earth ~ November 28th, 2024 CE ~

Crossings to Earth, though her visits had grown scarcer in recent months, had become somewhat rote for Twilight. It went by in a blurry haze of colours and scent, the rich vibrancy of Equus dissolving into the oft drab, though always fascinating Earthen shades. As for the smells, thank goodness for their ongoing efforts, those were much more pleasant than had been only a few short years ago.

Another yell and grunt brought her back to where she was. Standing at the base of the Warden’s Tower, flanked by Shearwater and Terramar. In the few times she had personally come here, Twilight had met with guests from all over, be it dutiful officers of the Crown or ambitious overseers seeking another post.

Today, however, the person in front of her was an earthpony child no older than thirteen, and their meeting hadn’t held much in the way of talk. In fact, Twilight wasn’t sure she was supposed to meet the child at all.

The young farmer – pale, teal in coat and mane – for her part, averted her brown-eyed gaze, looking down at her hooves. Twilight could hardly blame her. Perhaps she’d expected her parents to speak up.

Not that they would, nor any of the good dozen others assembled before her. Earthponies, of varying ages, all of them showing mixed expressions of shame or defiance. Not one had their eyes on the pegasus stallion pacing back and forth before them, eyes fixed in a firm glare.

The Warden of Europe was a patient stallion, but one look at him and Twilight could tell Earth had not been an easy assignment. His green coat had grown faded with age, streaks of grey interweaving his brown mane. Every so often he’d glance at the group, shaking his head and muttering all the while.

It was when his eyes met Twilight’s, though, that prompted him to finally speak aloud.

“Take them to the holding cells,” said Green Fields, raspy voice stern and commanding. “I’ll deal with them later.”

Twilight shared one last look with the young farmer, right as she was escorted in single file with what Twilight assumed had to be her family. Once the last of them exited the courtyard, flanked by a few zebras and horses of the Guard, Twilight turned her attention to the former Trailblazer officer whose visage she’d grown accustomed to over the years.

“Warden Green Fields,” Twilight said. “Shall we proceed?”

“Your Ladyship,” said Green Fields, nodding in return, “if you would follow me.”

There was nothing else either of them said for a long while afterwards, during the long walk up the Warden’s Tower.

When the flag of Celestia’s Sun had at last flown from the Atlantic to the Caucasus, many had expected the creation of a new bastion in one of the former capitals, a testament to their triumph over the old nations of Europe. But few within and without the Empire had anticipated a small town in what was once Eastern Poland.

Twilight knew the reasons very well, for it had been her call to make. Thus it was at Hajnowka they settled, a base for the new Imperial arcology built and grown from crystal. Yet the work was far from done, from what she could see. Workers and soldiers alike, zebras and Newfoals, hippogriffs and ponies, even a few griffon mercenaries were milling about down below.

Her thoughts faded as the great wooden doors – one of the few other building materials in this fortress of crystal – opened at a deliberate tempo, welcoming her into the Warden’s office.

Though crystal was still dominant, from the floor all the way to the hanging chandelier, Green Fields had taken his time in lending the place his personal touch. This included a sizeable wooden desk of what could only be Vanhooverite pine, a beautiful carpet of Maretonian origin, hanging paintings from various locales the old soldier had visited in his long career, and – yes, a grand and well-stocked bookshelf. There was even a fireplace to complete the picture, right behind the desk. This was certainly ornamental, Twilight could tell, for she keenly felt the warmth of the Warden’s Tower, a product of contemporary heating systems ranging from the floor beneath to the walls that surrounded them.

A comfortable abode, very much a cut above the endless crystalline halls or industrial metal hallways in the Empire’s best airships.

She shot Shearwater and Terramar a knowing glance. They nodded in turn, and stopped short of entering the office.

It was only when the door closed, leaving the two of them alone within the office, that Green Fields finally let out a long sigh and broke the long silence.

“Just another day at the office, my lady,” the Warden remarked. He glanced at Twilight, his rather faint smile apologetic. “If you’d pardon the expression.” He gestured with a wing towards the nearest velvet armchair, facing his desk. “Please, please, do make yourself comfortable. I shall retrieve your sword.”

“Thank you, Warden Fields,” said Twilight, removing her hat and seating herself. Idly, from how far she sunk into it, she wondered if the good warden ordered his chairs from wherever the Queen ordered her pillows.

“How are things, Lady Archmage?” said Fields, rummaging through his shelves. “Is Her Majesty the Queen well?”

“All is well,” answered Twilight, nodding along. “You know how the Gala is, Warden, all talk and little fun. Even for… well, especially for her.”

“Right, of course, of course…”

But his words reminded her, and Twilight found it worrying. The Queen had not attended a number of meetings, not in the past week. Although, Twilight reckoned, Gala hangovers were one thing, and Celestia trusted her along with the rest of the Council in their judgements.

All of that faded when Fields sat himself down opposite her. Very gently, he laid down a case, beautifully and intricately patterned with flower motifs.

“Here we are,” Fields announced, almost reverently. “We went to recover it as soon as possible. The frontlines were, shall we say, rather volatile.” His voice rose with pride. “But rest assured, Your Ladyship, it was no difficult feat for our finest Trailblazers.”

Even at peace, Twilight remembered the turbulent waters of the Northern Atlantic. ‘The pond’, her British colleagues had nicknamed it. Such a mundane name for the second largest ocean on this world.

She gave a polite nod. “Thank you, Warden Fields,” she said. “Give my regards to the retrieval team. Are they here, actually?”

“Unfortunately, they’ve had to return to their station at Hollow One. Tight schedule, so I was told.” The Warden bowed. “Apologies. I thought you, of all people, would deserve a better presentation. Thank goodness we have this thaumically sealed, at very least.”

With a flick, the case was unlatched, its contents revealed to her eyes.

The sword lay there, much like it had been on the day the Queen herself had presented it to her. Grey in colour, the shards of the sword lay neatly arranged, polished and cleaned from the ashes of the city it had fallen into.

Then Twilight remembered. A voice, piercing through the clouds, as she held the blade before her, ready to pierce her enemy’s–

‘Remember who you are, Twilight Sparkle. Remember who you were. Come with me. It is not too late…’

Twilight got up from her seat, headache pulsing, her teeth grinding against one another. Striding, with a hoof held against her aching head, she hurried over to the nearest open window, the breath of fresh air it provided a desperately required tonic against the spots dancing in her eyes.

The windowsill was in the clutch of her forehooves as she steadied her sway, gasping. With no other option present, Twilight’s mind dove into an old technique to relax her. Fact-checking. Where else to start, then, that the view which slowly swam back into her perception.

Before her eyes lay Hajnowka, the bustling centre that it now was. There were many airships throughout, whether they were docked on the spires or recent arrivals from the far-flung corners of Europe. A good hundred thousand of the finest troops and personnel from the Solar Empire and her allies lived, worked, and thrived here. Its streets and buildings of crystal spread out like a spider-web, the heart of their cause beating true.

Yet it was neither the towering spires nor the polished roads Twilight had tread on that drew her sights. Near the Tower, where the city faded into the old growth Białowieża Forest, she saw them. A herd’s worth, grazing away at the forest’s edge beneath the light of the setting Sun.

Wisent. Great roaming mammals, akin to bison as Earth’s horses were to ponykind…

“Is… everything alright?”

Twilight looked away from them. The Warden remained where he was, looking very much concerned.

“Yes, just fine, Warden,” said Twilight, mustering a smile. “Forgive me. I was just reminiscing.” She paused. “Do you know why we’ve erected our banners here, Warden, why we’ve chosen this little town?”

She looked back out the window before he could answer, drawing a sharp breath. Her glance fell back on the wisent herd, still grazing away. Only now they had company, in the form of soldiers marching nearby.

“The humans hunted the wisent, whether for meat or horns to drink out of,” Twilight spoke. “Białowieża was the last refuge for them. And when war came to Poland, the one to end all wars, do you know what they did? They slaughtered them. Out of boredom, or spite, who knows. There were so few left the world over, and none in the forests they belonged in.”

Down there, the soldiers, a mix of earthponies and zebras, had come to a halt. Their commander, a robust-looking unicorn, stood at the head, a hoof raised. The wisent herd stood in their path.

“It took another thirty years for them to return to Europe’s forests, starting from here. Their entire history as a species, decided by another.”

The unicorn’s horn lit up with the colour of dawn, and the wisent dispersed, lumbering into the forest. The soldiers marched on.

“I wanted to prove something, I suppose,” Twilight continued, in lecture mode, but this time she felt hesitance seep in. “That we could do better, that we could continue their work with our Harmony above all, and succeed. And so we had to build it here.”

She turned away, facing Fields. She smiled, despite herself. “But you probably knew all of that already. I'm sorry. My friends told me I tend to do this a lot.”

Fields let out a chuckle. “All my experience on the field, Your Ladyship, and I always enjoy a good history lesson.”

“Don’t we all? But I do hope your station hasn’t been dull,” Twilight remarked. She strode over to the chair, reseating herself. “How is your daughter, actually?”

Another bout of guilt, as Green Fields’ face fell.

Given her photographic memory, Twilight asked herself how she could fail to make this connection a lot earlier than she had. Was she simply still not geared to place people at the forefront of her mind-palace? The florist’s words from earlier, only this very day, should rightfully have sparked her to notice the holistic scope she was wading through…

“Ah, Chamomile…” Quietly, he poured a cup of tea, offering it to her. Twilight followed his gaze towards a photograph that lay displayed on his desk. A pretty cream coloured-mare, paired with a handsome, dirty-white stallion in Guard armour, and much more vibrant Green Fields sitting in-between them. “She still writes to me– little Glider’s growing up fast. Her first day of school was just the other day this month.”

Twilight took the offered cup, taking a sip. Sweet, very sweet green tea.

“Thank you for the tea,” she said, “and that’s lovely to hear, Warden.”

“Yes, yes, quite,” Fields agreed, lifting his cup, but his forlorn look did not leave his eyes. “A nice little Vanhoover school. She and Glider moved up there, wanted to be closer to Winter’s family…” He sighed. “If I may share, Your Ladyship, I don’t think she’s forgiven me.”

“Forgive you?”

“Well… I’d made an impression on him when I was stationed at Vanhoover. Convinced him and that rascal Icewind that they ought to join the Guard and… and now both are gone,” Fields recollected. A bitter chuckle escaped his lips. “Our duty for the realm, that’s what I told them. Duty called, and they answered.”

He shook his head, muttering something that sounded like ‘colts’, before taking a long sip. His words remained, however, and Twilight felt her hoof reach up towards her missing ear. And, at that moment, she remembered who Fields had been, and where’d he been before Vanhoover–

‘You don’t deserve to be an alicorn.’

“Cadance.”

Fields set down his cup. “Beg pardon?”

“You brought her to Canterlot, didn’t you? With Celestia, when she was still the Sun Princess, as Captain before Shining.” Twilight continued. She waved it off. “Nothing, nothing. Just… just remembered something.”

“I did, my lady, but what brought this up…” Fields said, as his gaze drifted to where her hoof had been. “Ah… right. Right, nasty business, that,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright,” Twilight replied, shaking her head. “Duty. Funny little word, isn’t it. I still don’t understand why she’d turn so easily.”

‘Liar.’

A stinging pain. Twilight bit her lip.

Hadn’t Green Fields’ final assignment in the Guard, during his renewed tenure with the Trailblazers, involved something to do with Spike? Twilight’s mind was feeling fuzzy. Spike and a truant Rarity. That didn’t sound quite right. She’d lost Spike in Boston – her brave, long-time companion another casualty of war, if not dead as such.

While it was like Spike to stray off the beaten path at times, how could she reconcile that thought with Rarity, the same dedicated mare who’d been promoting the Empire at the Gala, only days–

“Indeed, Lady Twilight,” agreed Fields, who did not seem to have noticed. He leaned in closer. “Here’s a funny thought, then. Would you believe that the farmers we’d caught were growing food in secret?”

Twilight raised an eyebrow. “Food?”

“Yes, food. Grains, all the essentials,” Fields affirmed. “Clever, really. No one would suspect excess food, we’d be too busy rooting out drugs and what have you. They were acting all in accordance with their tasks. But they were too clever by half, mind. We caught onto where they were sending the food.”

“... You caught them smuggling food,” Twilight began, feeling rather incredulous. But then the pieces fell in place, and she understood. “For humanity.”

A million questions passed Twilight’s mind then. Of farmers and soldiers, of scale and magnitude, and of quality of supplies lost and food grown. All very detailed, meticulous, precise. She could envision it clearly, without feeling compelled to launch into a motor-mouthed lecture. Word of such clandestine operations had reached her ears before, of course, yet it was different to be confronted with it directly, even in passing.

“The audacity!” The Warden barked in laughter. “Right under our noses. All that food wasted…”

A rather humbling reminder it was of the limitations of the Empire’s grasp, over such a small thing as food supplies. One-fifth of this planet belonged to them. One-fifth of a new world, an expanse shielded by the Barrier, and for which they only had so much manpower to monitor, regulate and patrol. If there was one single card humanity still held in the technological race, it was their possession of satellites, where the Empire had none.

Until such a point when the Solar Empire caught up on mankind there, with scrying a notoriously complex and unreliable form of magic, what means did they have to survey this newly-conquered territory, beyond the conventional? Even the most powerful of the modern human empires, employing a vast array of technological marvels at their disposal, had struggled to tighten the noose around old-fashioned contraband or guerilla warfare.

Humans could not penetrate the Barrier on Earth. Offworlders sympathetic to them could. She wondered how many networks there were like this. Or how many kinds. Farms, and their produce and the means to transport it. Ships and carts built of thaumon-seeded materials…

But as Twilight’s thoughts drifted further, to the nameless farmer who’d stared at her with such innocence and curiosity, fearful eyes of her party looking at the Warden’s finest, no other question bothered Twilight Sparkle so much as a simple ‘Why?’

“If I may be blunt, Your Ladyship,” said Green Fields. “Did I, and I suppose by extension, my troops, pass the test?”

“Test?”

“Yes, a test,” Fields elaborated, waving a hoof. “You were testing my resolve, weren’t you?”

“Ah. Right. I suppose… I suppose I was,” Twilight answered. “The farmer… what’s going to happen to them?”

“Sent back to the fields,” said the Warden, shrugging. “We still need their food. This time, they’ll be… escorted, so to speak.” He chuckled. “Perhaps a few hours extra on their shifts. All this, my lady, assuming their crimes aren’t as severe as we fear them to be.”

“I see,” Twilight replied. Still the question echoed in her mind, lingering, itching at her.

As her eyes fell on the sword, as her mind drifted between wisents and farmers and the haunting gaze of the Moon, her voice and warmth so alluring, Twilight hesitated. The sword lay there, untouched, ready to serve, as she did. And yet…

The door behind them burst open. Twilight turned to meet their visitor as Fields cried in alarm. The young hippogriff was panting, drawing deep breaths.

“Lady Twilight, Y–Your Ladyship, sorry,” Terramar stammered out. “It’s the Resistance."

The answer came to Twilight right then and there.

She lifted her sword, assembling it piece by piece with a flick of her horn, then sheathed it. She looked at Terramar, her frown deepening.

“Where am I needed?”

“I think they’re looking for me.”

She felt Luna stir. When she opened her eyes, she saw Luna look right back at her, eye to eye, blue against purple. There was now a deep frown etched across her face.

“Are you certain?” asked Luna. Twilight nodded. No sooner had she done so, than the Princess of the Night let out a very unladylike groan. “Must thou return so very soon… Thou hast asked for mine presence in these gardens to soothe thee.”

Twilight felt her cheeks flush as Luna’s wing brushed against it. There was little she could say to the contrary. The past few weeks had seen a flurry of activities, all centered around that strange new world, unveiled to all Equus. Meetings, planning, organising. Even the Gala this year was no exception. Few wanted to ask her questions outside of Earthly matters.

But they were matters for another day. Here and now, her world was this garden, and the alicorn whose delicate hooves allowed it to flourish, a sanctuary just for the two of them.

“Come on, Luna,” Twilight replied, rolling her eyes, “don’t pull the whole archaic diction shtick on me.”

“Why, the gentry seemed to have found it entertaining,” Luna retorted. “And so have you.”

Twilight let out a short laugh. “Touché. But… yeah. I feel like they’re calling me soon.”

"Twilight, dear, what are they going to do? Demand that I release you from my clutches? The Gala can wait. I’ll make sure of it."

"Well, okay then, if you’re so insistent,” Twilight said, in mock haughtiness. She gave Luna a cheeky glance. “I can pull an all-nighter if you really want me to."

"Huzzah! But, do you want to, though?"

Hearing this, all Twilight could do was giggle, as she buried her face in Luna’s fur once more.

"You know I do. It’s you.”

Author's Note

Sledge115: I love these two so much :twilightsheepish:

Hello, all. It’s been a little over a year since the last chapter and, well, quite a lot has transpired. I’ll make it short and simple, or try to at least.

To those not aware, we’ve embarked on a legally required rewrite (ugh) of Spectrum over the course of 2021, delaying our work elsewhere for the story proper. That’s not saying we haven’t done much, either! The first half of this year saw the expansion of the Spectrumverse, especially on the Equestria side of things. Some elements of which you might have seen scattered throughout the rewrites (because hey, might as well tighten things up and polish this story to the fullest while we’re at it), and this very chapter :twilightsmile:.

I stress that they are not required reading, just something that might fill the world further :raritywink:. If I may personally recommend, Celestia Regina is a good place to start with :twilightsmile:. Go check it out!

In other news, you’ll note that we’ve rearranged a chapter or two, and done some edits here and there to finalise the rewrites. I know for a fact there’s a brilliant scene for Galatea and Cadance somewhere in Chapter Thirteen, if you know where to look, heh. Furthermore, Act Three has been retitled ‘The Road Less Travelled’, and we’re set to have it conclude within the next few chapters before kicking off Act Four.

Anyways, my apologies for the late chapter here, things have not been smooth sailing on my end, to keep things simple. But I do hope this little chapter of ours is to your liking – personally, I’ve greatly enjoyed writing Twilight throughout this chapter, and Vox has done some brilliant writing in showcasing the Empire's day to day :twilightsmile:. Stay tuned, and thank you for staying with us through the years.

Oh, almost forgot; a special thank you to chris the cynic for her help in making sure all the kinks have been ironed out in this one. Thanks, chris!

Cheers!

~Sledge

P.S. Yep, working on making chapters shorter, fret not.

VoxAdam: Greetings, all. :pinkiesmile:

So, for many long-time readers of Spectrum, this chapter may represent a special milestone, consisting as it does of the first wholly “new” chapter to be published in a year. For Sledge and I, the period from October 2020 to October 2021 spent on writing Spectrum proper did largely involve reworking what material a former co-author had requested we extract. A good thing for both of us that the year 2021 was so fruitful on the side, with Sledge’s short stories.

As a writer, I regard the chapter you’ve just finished reading as more of a breather. Of course we’re hoping that Spectrum can go on for several more chapters, ideally all the way to the planned ending. But after the large-scale enterprise that was the rewrites, which proceeded in parallel to those shorter projects that proved veritable life-savers, taking the low-key approach on the publication of a new Spectrum update gives me a feeling of right.

Hence, no doorstopper this, as a chapter. Nothing massive published to herald a grand return – I, for one, simply hope you’ll have enjoyed one more, small episode in the ongoing saga.

It does mark a turning-point in dual areas for the story, mind you, that Spectrum now has a chapter dedicated wholly to one POV, and perhaps more strikingly, we finally show an extended glimpse at life in the Solar Empire.

Thanks, once more, to all the readers who’ve kept us going over the years. :twilightsmile:

Cheers,
~Vox

Act III ~ Chapter Twenty-Eight ~ The Age of Crystal

Spectrum

The Team

Sledge115

VoxAdam

RoyalPsycho

TB3

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

With Special Thanks To:

EileenSaysHi

Chapter Twenty-Eight
The Age of Crystal

* * * * *

“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
— Kurt Vonnegut, Mother Night

Friends, allow me an observation.

Crystal is key not just to Equestria’s great leap forward, but to the construction of something beyond metal frameworks or ingenious devices. That vital foundation of civilisation, the thread we unknowingly refer to when speaking of what binds a society together;

Correspondence.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. Aren’t I delivering this speech eight years too late? Surely, it’d have been timelier of me to ramble on about correspondence, exchanges, back-and-forth, what have you, on the day I stood atop a podium like this one to declare the Manehattan-Griffonstone railway line officially open. What has it got to do with a building? A real big building, admittedly, not to mention a glittering one– yet still just a building, isn’t that right?

But you see, correspondence isn’t simply about travel. Since time immemorial, the passing of a message, from one soul to another, is as significant whether they stand a thousand miles apart or merely on two different sides of a wall. With the Crossing to Earth, we’ve seen how such measurements are, truly, relative. What made this crossing possible, if not crystal?

In their mythology, the Minotaurs tell of the great artisan, Asterion, who sought to build a house that could encompass the world. What he had forgotten, we’re told, was to include people in it. Certain creatures are made to thrive alone, but we as a people are social creatures. It is true of all herds in our Family… And I beg you, speak not of free mustangs.

Once, we knew the mythical Thirteenth Family as those who walked alone. We now know this to be their truth as well– in society, each person’s needs are fed by the skills of a great many others, as if our lives were woven together. However, as has been said by wiser people than I, those very connections that make society strong, can also make it vulnerable…

In the ten years since Victory at The Crystal Realm, we have covered our world in cable– in crystal. On this day, the Tower behind me stands as testimony to both, as it does to our Co-Harmony Sphere. A feat of cable-engineering so fine, no single tear could unravel it all. Of crystal walls which, if you choose, become not walls but windows onto the world, all from the comfort of your living space. Our two-way mirrors for our Wellness Centres on Earth.

With this Tower like a city unto itself, I pave the way to make Asterion’s dream one day come true.

— Chief Engineer Krème-Brulée, at the inauguration of Victory Tower in Manehattan, retroactively considered a prototype for Equestrian arcologies on Colonised Earth

~ A Council Chamber, Location Unknown ~
— The aftermath of the Battle of Boston, fifteen days prior to the Expedition’s departure

“Greetings, everyone. It has been a while.”

Delivered in the Prince’s customary bass rumble, these words were addressed to a gathering which ought to have numbered six, the speaker included. But rare was the day now when such a fortuitous occasion came about. On the best of days, they were no more than four. The last time a whole five of them had gathered together was years past. Perhaps not by a great many years, yet each year since had felt elongated with the weight of decades, for that meeting had ended in great acrimony.

Today, they were three.

If there was some small comfort to be had, it lay in the knowledge that the sixth one, who customarily presided this Council, was absent in body alone; by her own choice, by consensus with all of the others who’d sat by her, back when they were a united entity.

Sat in the throne-like crystal chair marked by his tribal glyph, in the interlude separating his greeting words from today’s business, Prince Abraxas the Candid could only do as he always did before these gatherings: hope that his vaunted frankness did not show in his face, for it would have betrayed his sorrow to see they were so few.

“The Starry-Eyed One has sent us a sign,” Abraxas said, the customary words used to open a meeting of the Council. “What knowledge have we which may hasten our ability to decipher it?”

Of the two others present, both sat at their usual seats, opposite his own across a great crystalline table. In sharp contrast to himself, they enjoyed the benefit of sitting side-by-side. Even on good days, the seating arrangements left Abraxas with two empty chairs for neighbours. To his right was what they commonly thought of as the presiding chair, for all that the Council’s chamber had been designed with abstract notions of equality in mind, in the tradition of round tables everywhere. To his left, the chair once occupied by a comrade gone rogue, a friend…

The council member who sat directly opposite Abraxas was first to speak.

“I was hoping I wouldn’t have to answer that, Candid,” said she, ruffling one of her wings in a visible show of annoyance. “It seems that every time we meet like this, I can do less and less to help you. But if we can start by working out why this isn’t my mark floating above the Map, that’ll be something.”

Countess Precipita, the Caring, gave a sharp nod towards the pair of symbols in levitation over the table. It was with a questioning air that her gaze then wandered towards the stately cyan unicorn by her side, whose own eyes were fixated upon the holographic display.

One of the symbols perfectly matched said unicorn’s mark, a glittering teal-blue seashell. And yet the symbol engaged in a mid-air dance with her mark’s counterpart unknown to any of them. They all recognised the beige-and-gold compass-rose of A.K. Yearling, the greatest clue hidden in plain sight that the famed author’s work was at least semi-autobiographical, whenever she’d recount the adventures of the explorer Daring Do.

That same compass-rose mark was engraved on one of the three empty chairs, the last one, beside Caring and Cheerful.

Never had it felt like a greater irony for this to be the mark of the one they’d named ‘Constant’, in a perhaps misguided effort at alliteration, when the name Daring was strong enough as it was. Courageous, perhaps, but her fidelity did not extend to steadfast council attendance.

“What do you make of it?” Precipita asked the cyan unicorn. “That’s an unusual pairing for the Map to make.”

She looked critically at the location above which circled the symbols.

“You, I can understand why the Starry-Eyed One would call on you. But Miss Yearling… Canterlot is the last place I’d imagine she ought to set hoof in.”

Indeed, the distinct holographic shapes of Mount Canterhorn and the great metropolis built into its rock, the heart of the Solar Empire, were those topped by the glittering teal-blue seashell and the beige-and-gold compass rose over the Map Table.

Unspoken beneath Precipita’s query was the added question of why the Map should pair Cheerful and Constant, when previously it was Precipita the Caring who’d so often worked with the latter, she who had originally inducted Miss Yearling into their Council.

An answer was not immediately forthcoming. Instead, Diamond Waves the Cheerful, whose once-fitting codename was these days oft belied by the sadness of her bearing, steepled her forehooves in contemplation of this new mystery.

“It must be related to the Grand Galloping Gala,” said the Duchess of Monacolt. “That’s only a week away. What else could be happening in Canterlot which calls out to me, if not the biggest party of the year? If the rumours from Earth are true, the Empire must be putting out all the bread-and-circuses it can as a distraction.”

Abraxas frowned, feeling a slight flush of heat in his fire-wreathed mane. “If that’s the case, it would’ve been wonderful for Miss Yearling to be with us today,” he noted, not without sourness. “The Starry-Eyed One must’ve been counting on her presence, for any of this to make sense. Until we hear from either Miss Yearling or her, we’ll remain in the dark about Earth.”

Her forehooves still steepled, Diamond Waves gave a little sigh.

“Alas. I fear the loss of the Watchmare is one blow we may not recover from.”

Hearing her friend so despondent, Precipita slid in her chair, allowing a majestic golden wing to brush against Diamond Waves’ withers.

“Come now, Duchess,” said Precipita, forgoing codenames in favour of affectionate formality. “Last we heard, the Watchmare had succeeded in contacting our prospective allies on Earth. Even if it came at the cost of her life, we must assume the Starry-Eyed One told it true, and she got word to the Human Scion.”

While Precipita spoke comfort to Diamond Waves, Prince Abraxas got up from his chair. He needed to think, and sitting still had never come easily to him. Royalty though he was, Abraxas was foremost a zebra of the plains, born to feel the rush of the savannah beneath his hooves. This same boundless wellspring of fiery energy had served him well, in the years of his famed hunt for the dread Grootslang.

Lacking a straight line to pursue within the chamber’s confines, the tried-and-true method of pacing in a circle would suit him just fine. It helped that the concentric layout of the chamber, centred as it was around the Map Table, lent itself perfectly to such an exercise.

Whilst undeniably large, the Council’s chamber was smaller than a layperson might expect, yet nothing about its design was left to chance. Along the single domed wall, thirty-three alcoves had been carved out of the crystal surface, each separated by a ten-degree angle from the other. The one exception to this rule, the remaining thirty degrees of those three-hundred-and-sixty which form a circle, consisted of the arched doorway, closed at all times to outsiders.

Each of the alcoves was occupied by a different item, placed upon a marble pedestal. While a few were bigger than the others, every one was an infamous artefact of great magical potential. Many of the pedestals displayed the actual artefact, the original item. But many more were merely decorated with a holographic representation, lightly shimmering to denote its artifice. On the pedestals was marked the nature and last recorded location of the item in question.

Abraxas felt his lips form a wry smile, as he beheld the shimmering forms of several artefacts. A flower, a shield, a mask. Classics, these were. Followed by a blindfold. And a shovel, of all things. Yes, before there was the Council of Stonecarvers, there had been the Pillars of Old Equestria.

The statue of Clover the Clever, over the arched doorway, was testament to this heritage. First the disciple of Archmage Starswirl, then of the Starry-Eyed One. The first true Stonecarver. And a Gardener of the Tree of Harmony.

Abraxas’ eyes skimmed the inscriptions at the base of the various pedestals. The locations of all these artefacts were known, or suspected, by the Council. Some decentralisation, however, was the standing policy. Although a gamble not without its own risks, in their centuries of existence, the Starry-Eyed One had judged it safer to keep the objects of power dispersed across the world, not concentrated into one spot ripe for the plucking.

Including her Amulet.

In the event this Council should fail in its role of guardianship, better the consequences be an isolated disaster, rather than the full-scale calamity of losing all they held dear.

Of course, the rise of the Solar Empire had edged them towards just such a calamity.

“Candid,” spoke Diamond Waves. Evidently, she had recovered her composure. “Pray forgive me if I sound in a hurry. But we must keep this meeting short. Precipita may regret she can only do so much, yet one in my position cannot be sure they’re being watched.”

Abraxas stopped in his pacing, with some surprise. “Even in Monacolt?” he asked. “I’d have thought, given your independence from the Co-Harmony Sphere, that the Solar Empire would find it harder to spy on you.”

“I worry Monacolt’s independence grows ever more theoretical,” said Diamond Waves. “We have neither the reclusiveness of Cirrostrata, nor the experience of struggle for autonomy like Farasi.”

Precipita looked at her with concern. “I understand what you’re saying, and yet I don’t want to believe it. Surely, the friendship you shared must still mean something to Celestia.”

“It would have, when she was Princess Celestia,” Diamond Waves said bleakly. “Every Summer, I keep hoping that maybe this time, she’ll come visit again. She never does. And did I tell you? I haven’t missed a single Grand Galloping Gala, when Autumn rolls around. It’s been years since Celestia showed her face at one of those.”

Abraxas and Precipita knew well why Celestia, once the Princess of the Sun, now something profoundly different, had stepped away from public life, unless the duty could not be shirked. Why she no longer attended Galas, or even an event like the Running of the Leaves; why she barely made an appearance at the Equestria Games any more, and had completely dropped the weekly ceremony of raising the Sun before an admiring audience.

Had even, according to Miss Yearling, given up her secret yet fulfilling career as a writer…

Rumours trickled down, even amongst the uninformed public who’d noticed the discrepancy of Celestia’s change in policy, once she’d declared war and decreed the Conversion of Mankind. That their formerly benign pony princess must be possessed, for only such a source could explain the about-face in her personality, instituting the regime that ruled Equestria and over half of this world, before expanding into a different world. Equus was rife with malign powers. Absence of evidence was a major hurdle, yet in this case, decidedly not evidence of absence.

If any were qualified to know, it was the Starry-Eyed One and her Stonecarvers. But they were also aware of the true, core reason that lay behind an immortal’s madness was – grief. A motive devastating in how fundamentally mortal it was.

Precipita gave a sigh. “Duchess, don’t blame yourself,” she said, touching Diamond Waves’ elbow. “We all share guilt, for being too blind to act until it was too late.” It was in a bitter tone that her words were forced out of her throat. “The Caring… Hah! Caring, that’s what I’m meant to be, yet I didn’t speak up when I ought have. We should’ve let the Watchmare meet her sister… No, both of her sisters. After what happened. Before… before any of this went down.”

“At this point,” Diamond Waves said sadly, “we might as well come out, and admit the Cunning was right, all along…”

“Don’t let the Starry-Eyed One hear you,” Abraxas cautioned her.

“What else do you suggest we do?” Diamond Waves turned on him. “Do you hear yourselves? No wonder Miss Yearling didn’t show up. We talk, and we do nothing. Because that’s all we do now. All our avenues have been cut off by the Empire, one by one. Contacting the Human Scion was our last resort.”

Even though it was unbecoming of the Cheerful to speak thusly, Abraxas’ own sense of candor meant he could not deny she was, in far too many ways, correct.

Six. Was that not the most magical number on Equus, the number six? Seven, sometimes. Regardless, when six were not properly united, there could be no Harmony. But the ponies who bore the Elements of Harmony for Equestria each lay under the thrall of whatever unholy power had ensnared Celestia. Retrieving those precious stones would be a difficult task in itself, and fruitless, if they did not have the people with which to complete the set…

At one time, there had been a glimmer of hope, when the Bearer of Generosity had absconded. If nothing else, her defection would have denied the Solar Empire a valuable asset. But before they could bring her into their fold, Rarity had been recaptured, after it had appeared she’d be safe under the watch of the Elder of Dragons.

Equestria’s Tree of Harmony was jealously guarded by the Solar Empire, and there were no other Trees they could turn to anymore. Once again, Abraxas had failed as a guardian, when the Tree in Farasi came to be sealed off by an Imperial expeditionary force. So had the Tree in Caninina. Worse, Abyssinia and Ornithia remained under the yoke of the Storm King. And worst of all, the Tree Atop The World was destroyed, along with the rest of Adlaborn.

As for the Tree in Cunabula – the Stonecarvers’ rival order had held out longer than most, but facing the dual threat of the Solar Empire and the Storm King, the Knights of Harmony too had eventually yielded, beaten down by a war on two fronts.

Cursed be Ryuppon, which had no Tree, to be one of the few independent nations left standing. Always in the middle between Solar Empire and Storm King, always profiting.

“But who’s left,” Precipita asked, “whom we could talk to openly?”

“I suggest again that we try approaching Darkhoof,” said Abraxas. “He’s long been a good friend to Equestria, what Equestria truly stands for. The Tauren Islands can still provide the haven we’ve been seeking.”

Precipita shook her head. “Maybe at one time. Not now. Darkhoof’s suffered too much tragedy of his own already. We’ve got too many mistakes on our conscience as it is, Abraxas– the last thing we need is to give the Empire an excuse to break their non-aggression pact with the Isles, and spread their Changeling Purges to the Cyan Hive.”

“That’s what you say every time,” Abraxas told her crossly. “But when all other means fail, what else can be done, except to take a risk?”

“Taking a ‘risk’ is what the Cunning tried,” Precipita answered back. “We all know that didn’t work out so well, did it? At any rate, how can the Minotaurs help? Short of challenging Celestia to single combat and hoping she accepts, somehow, I don’t see how Darkhoof could begin to tackle this problem.”

A dainty, lady-like cough cut across whatever retort Abraxas had prepared. Before either he or Precipita had looked around, they knew it came from Diamond Waves.

“You’re both dancing around the issue,” said Diamond Waves. “Fond as I am of Darkhoof, I doubt a Minotaur would be a welcome presence in Canterlot these days. And let me remind you that I haven’t got much time. Yes, I wish Miss Yearling were among us… But still, we have the means to contact her… Well, at least you do, Precipita. Your husband hasn’t let us down yet.”

“No…” Precipita agreed slowly. “You’re going somewhere with this, Cheerful?”

Diamond Waves nodded. “I am,” she said. “And I like it as little as you do. But, after picking up what I could off Monacolt’s grapevine, I believe more’s been going on with Earth than the papers are reporting. Talks of sighting Nightmare Moon… It sounds far-fetched, pure propaganda. Which makes me think there may be a seed of truth to it.” The ghost of her usual personality flickered into view, as she gave a crooked smile. “A craaazy tale blown out of proportion, to cover a craaazy truth.”

Despite the spark of levity, Abraxas dreaded what she’d say next. “You’re right. I don’t like where this is going.”

Her reply came not in words, but in a gesture. Letting her horn shine with its cyan-blue aura, Diamond Waves reached into her null-space, still accessible to her in this place as an inducted member of the Stonecarvers’ Council, to pull out what resembled nothing so much as a calling-card. A calling-card marked by runic alphabet.

“If we are to take a risk,” said Diamond, “we must start by consulting our estranged brethren. Check out whether he’s already sought to send us a message… To inform us about Earth. And then finally, we might get to the bottom of why the Map says I should go to Canterlot.”

This would not be the first time, in fact, that they had risked this. A move which involved them going behind the Starry-Eyed One’s back. And there had been other messages in the past. That was not their issue with it. What troubled them was the form the messengers took.

“This is a bad idea,” Abraxas whispered. “The Cunning’s done enough damage already.”

To say so made his heart tighten, when he thought of his old friend, but he said it anyway, because it was true.

Precipita’s face was a mask of indecision. Whatever she’d let slip earlier, of this fear of her own obsolescence, her hesitancy only accentuated it twofold.

“I… I don’t think we should be making this decision by ourselves,” Precipita told Diamond Waves. “It doesn’t seem right. If Miss Yearling were here…”

“Except she isn’t,” said Diamond Waves. Her tone was gentler than toward Abraxas, yet retained a note of frustration. “And the fact we’re even going over this counts as a decision. You regret we didn’t act, yet you’re averse to risk-taking. How else can we act, when the time for caution has passed?” She looked Abraxas in the eye. “Well, Candid? You’re our tie-breaker. What’s more, if Yearling were here, we all know how she’d vote, don’t we?”

Once more, Abraxas had to quietly acknowledge she fit the title of ‘Candid’ better than he, today.

The choice seemed obvious. Even so, he did not voice it right away. The mantle of responsibility, conferred upon him by the Starry-Eyed One in her absence, was a heavy load to bear. Such a breach of her trust in him, whether the reasons be good or not, could never sit well with his sense of integrity.

Abraxas inclined his head. “Alright…” He met eyes with Precipita’s. “I’m sorry, Caring. But the Cheerful is right. Think of it as our chance to find out what’s become of the Watchmare.”

She showed no joy at his decision, yet the full meaning behind his words brought acceptance.

“What was it Galatea said? ‘Apathy is death’.” Precipita sighed, her great golden wings drooping. “Very well, Diamond. Hit it. Before I lose my nerve.”

He ached with sympathy for her. The same compassion which gave her a push to overcome her timidity was also the source of her over-cautiousness. Because she understood how every action has consequences. And yet, had it been her mark floating over the Map, she’d have answered the call without delay, every time.

“Oh– I’ll hit it, alright.” Diamond smiled, just a little, as she held up the card. “And don’t worry, I’m perfectly sure the old boy didn’t get it mixed up with a squirt-flower or smoke-bomb, this time.”

Abraxas considered chuckling, for her sake, but opted against it. It would not have been sincere.

Needing no further prompting, Diamond Waves made her horn glow. By no means the sole means by which to activate the card, yet the one most resonant, calling from unicorn to unicorn. It shone its brightest, the vivid cyan reflected a hundred times in the walls of jagged crystal, a perfect match for the colours of its spellcaster.

“~Headmaster, oh Headmaster, have you left us a note…~” Diamond chanted softly. “~If so, let us open the envelope, and see what you wrote.~”

In many such scenarios, it is commonly said that at first, nothing happened.

This proved not the case for Abraxas and his fellow Stonecarvers. No sooner had the intonations of Diamond Waves’ chant died down, did the effect become apparent, in sharp relief, undeniable to their senses.

Between the doorway’s arches, a figure manifested, initially a dark silhouette, until its features gradually swam into focus. An earthpony, a stallion, clad in armour the colour of obsidian, albeit unlikely to be true obsidian, judging by the onyx breastplate and helm of a simple soldier.

They had expected this, yet still they stole uneasy glances with one another. Into this chamber, they had allowed entry for a creature crafted by forbidden arts. A shadow-walker.

Diamond Waves took charge. “As I thought. Here is our messenger.” She gave the figure a hard stare. “Speak, walker, echo that you are. What news do you bring of the Cunn– of the Headmaster, of Earth?”

Upon the shadow-walker’s face, its features indistinct, there registered no surprise at having been summoned, nor interrogated thus. It took no time to gather its surroundings, and showed no sign of curiosity or recognition at those who’d called upon it. Such would have been hard to read in its eyes, it is true, the milky white of the blind.

Yet blindness was not the walker’s affliction. It saw them, just as it heard.

“Greetings, fellows of the Headmaster,” the walker whispered. “A message has awaited delivery. His orders were that you be informed of where he’d gone. He shall return soon, and preparations must be made.”

Abraxas felt taken aback by this last phrase. “Preparations?” he said, frowning. “Does he think we are to be at his beck and call? When he’s the one who split with us, who acts against the Starry-Eyed One’s wishes at every turn!”

“I know nothing of such things,” the walker said blankly. “Any more than I know about a Starry-Eyed One. Only that the Headmaster recently departed. You asked for news of Earth. It is in Boston’s wake that the Headmaster chose to make a Crossing.”

Those words made Abraxas’ breath catch in his throat.

“A Crossing…” said Abraxas. “From one world to another? This is just what I feared. Oh, how much longer does Spell Nexus plan to keep tampering like this…”

“Hold on a moment,” said Diamond Waves. “Walker. You speak of Boston. We know this is where the Human Scion was last seen. Where the Watchmare sought to make contact with him. What can you tell us now? Does the Watchmare live, or has she perished? And the Human Scion… Where has he gone, and did the Headmaster follow?”

“Yes.”

That answer, as simple as it was opaque, surprised them all.

“What do you mean, ‘yes’?” Abraxas demanded. “Do you mean the Watchmare is alive, or not? Or that the Human Scion is here, in Equestria?”

“That isn’t what I asked,” Diamond Waves mouthed to him. “I wished to know if the Human Scion had gone somewhere.”

The shadow-walker replied to both. “The Watchmare is alive and not alive,” spoke the figure. “And the Scion is in Equestria, where the Headmaster followed, but not here.”

Precipita groaned. “Not this…” she said, massaging her temples. “This cryptic double-talk. I thought I knew what I’d signed on for, when I got inducted into a secret council, but this is getting frankly ridiculous.”

But Abraxas had been pondering. “Maybe not, Caring. Maybe we just need to dig deeper.” He fixed his gaze upon the shadow-walker. “Be more specific, please. What happened in Boston, two days ago, to the Watchmare and Human Scion? And what prompted the– the Headmaster to make a Crossing? Speak plainly, walker.”

“As you wish,” said the shadow-walker. “The Headmaster himself does not have all the answers. This is why he departed, last night, to seek his own. During their encounter, Watchmare and Scion each were ambushed, two days ago– one of them in Equestria, one on Earth. But whilst the Watchmare perished, the Scion was whisked away.”

“Away, where?” Abraxas said, unable to contain his impatience, even if pressing was redundant. “And how did the Headmaster find out about this?”

Strangely, the shadow-walker seemed to know just how to respond to that.

“Because the Headmaster knew the Watchmare had perished,” the shadow-walker spoke. “By keeping an ear open, listening for the echoes of those who fell in combat around her. And heard her speak again, through the mouth of the Oracle, just as she had to the Scion.”

“But that’s not…”

“Possible? Perhaps. But ask any soul present, and their answer would be the same. The Watchmare spoke, much as she had in life…” It paused. “From beyond the Mirror, an other Watchmare, an other Equestria. To where the Scion crossed, and the Headmaster followed.”

Neither of the three at the table felt ready to respond in the face of this news.

‘From beyond the Mirror…’

Diamond Waves was the one who found her voice. “A refraction in the Mirror… Harmony have mercy upon us all. This could break our world for good.”

Abraxas, too, fought to keep a tremor at bay. At long last, pieces were beginning to fall to place within his mind, in light of these revelations. What he could not decide was whether the emerging picture brought him comfort, or deepened the pit of dread.

“Tell us, walker. Is this the explanation behind Nightmare Moon? That the manifestation on Earth was no Nightmare? Princess Luna brought forth, sound in body and mind, not from her prison of stone, but out of a different shard of reality?”

“Mirror’s shard remains embedded within the Oracle’s skull,” the shadow-walker declared. “And with it, a window towards the here and then, the there and now. What may seem a dream to one is a waking world to the other– Who else may find their way back up a path not taken, if not the Princess of Dreams?”

They knew then that they’d get little else in the way of plain speaking from their messenger. Already, in the short time it had stood within this chamber, the shadow-walker’s hold upon its form was beginning to loosen, strands of darkness fraying at the edges of its incorporeal figure. Just as its form would dissipate, so too would its mimicry of a rational mind. When rationality fades away, the mind reverts to a realm of the esoteric, of dreams and divine inspiration.

“It’ll have to do,” Abraxas sighed. “Thank you, walker… At least now we know more about what happened in Boston. The Scion’s vanishing, the Watchmare’s death, followed by her reappearance, and Princess Luna… If all these have to do with the Oracle’s shard in her skull– then we can trace the fault all the way back to Headmaster Nexus.”

“Wait. I have a question,” Precipita said softly. “Walker, who were you in life?”

The walker fell silent, as a messenger ought not to be. Perhaps there was a twitch, here and there, of something that stirred beneath, yearning to be heard. The moment faded amidst whispers, as it spoke once more.

“A soldier of the Empire. One whose purpose is better served here,” the walker answered. “Would that be all?”

None spoke, at first. A slow nod ensued. Questions danced at the tip of their tongues, yet they remained mum.

“Then my purpose is served.”

With that, the walker went, its shadowy essence dissolving upon itself in the manner that smoke turns to steam, as though it gave itself up to unseen forces which pulled at its edges all this time, calling it back to where it rightly belonged.

“Harmony have mercy,” Diamond Waves said again. She did not clarify whether she spoke for the walker’s soul, or for the worlds.

Either way, the nod Abraxas gave was one of whole-hearted agreement. Concordantly, his gesture was directed to return attention towards the Map, above which the marks of Diamond Waves and Miss Yearling still pursued their circular dance.

“We have some answers,” Abraxas said. “And a clue, at least, to where we should look next. Diamond, I still don’t know why the Map chose this pairing, when your designated partner isn’t even here. But there is one person, in all of Canterlot, who could tell you more than we learnt from the walker. It shall be… Yes, it shall be risky. Yet she will attend the Gala, and she will speak to you.”

Diamond Waves did not point out that he’d forgone her codename. “You mean Generosity’s Bearer,” she murmured. “The Widow Blueblood.”

“That’s right,” said Abraxas. “Go and meet Rarity. Pry whatever you can from her. It’s time that we finally make good on an old promise.”

The Duchess of Monacolt inclined her head without a word, and a shimmer enveloped her figure, before leaving an empty seat behind, dispelling the illusion she had ever been there. In point of fact, none of them were, bodily.

“And this… breaking of the worlds? What is to be done?” Precipita asked quietly. “Candid, if you’re correct in your theory, the Starry-Eyed One’s work to retrieve the shard has failed.”

“One more failure on a road littered with failures,” Abraxas said, not withholding his bluntness. “But we can be sure about one thing. If the Headmaster crossed over to investigate this refraction, the Starry-Eyed One most certainly did. She won’t give up on healing the Oracle.”

“Understood,” said Precipita. “We shall speak again.”

The Countess of Cirrostrata, too, was enveloped by the shimmer. A minute later, Abraxas was left alone in the chamber. Contemplative, he observed the now-vacant Map Table, of which the inner light had dimmed. Even the marks that had revolved above it were gone.

There was only one window in the chamber, its shape not unlike a half-formed pyramid’s, emulating the Medallion of Scorpan. The symbol of his Order, topped by the Watchmare’s Eye. He wondered where the future lay, now the past had returned to haunt them, in more ways than one, with this manifestation on Earth. He said nothing, as he let the shimmer take him as well. And then the chamber was silent.

The Stonecarvers could only, as ever, put their faith in the Starry-Eyed One, their Architect.

~ Metazoa International Hub, Equestrian Solar Empire ~ Fifteenth Day of The Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~
— Fourteen days prior to the Expedition’s departure

As the curtains fall upon one stage, they are about to rise on another.

For one pony of Equestria, the stage was their lifeblood, their raison d’être. All ponies of Equestria were gifted with a special talent, a mark in plain view, which some theorised to be an earthly representation of the soul. Yet not all saw it as what defined their whole self. That a pony be marked did not make them immutably branded.

But then, this performer was not most ponies.

One could not become Great and Powerful, be it mainly in one’s own eyes, without whole-heartedly embracing what one had to offer the world. Of course, what truly mattered was that the world should offer back twice the worth in admiration, in validation.

Here in this moment, before the raising of the curtain, the performer stood within what certain parties might have dubbed ‘liminal space’, a world between worlds. How appropriate.

Trixie Lulamoon had known there were different worlds, and the narrow space dividing them, long before any talk of doorways to alien Earth. For her, life was divided very simply, into these two worlds. One where she was the Great and Powerful, and one where she was plain Trixie, a baby-blue mare who’d flunked Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns.

She had sought to live as long as possible in only one of those worlds. Yet even in the old days, back in more innocent times, there would come that moment. That interval where she stood only a hair’s breadth from the audience, still as unseen by them as they were to her, and felt herself standing right on the threshold from one world to the other.

An audience experiences the same sensation. Deep down, all but the most gullible know that performance is illusion. Nevertheless, once the curtain rises, such doubts are to be swept away. For this is what draws in audience and performer alike, this world of a reality that is not reality, but something better. This is, truly, what is magical.

And she was readying for a magic show, as always.

“The start of yet another delightful week,” muttered the mare.

Thirty seconds to go. Per habit, Trixie patted herself over, as if to reassure herself that she’d got into costume ages ago and this was how she’d appear to the audience. Even though it would be a bit late to change now, if it did turn out she had forgotten anything.

Royal blue suit, white vest, check. She was wearing that frilled necklace, too, the jabot – and boy, had it taken her a long time to remember what it was called. Same as her old costume, the colours were designed to complement her natural shades. Although she no longer used a robe, her suit’s coat-tails trailed stylishly behind her, in alignment with her actual tail. Possibly the most prized item of Trixie’s outfit, however, was her top hat. Tipping it back slightly, she felt comforted to feel it rest safely atop her head. She would need it to greet the public, after all. This was the greatest difference from her prior magician’s attire, and she was proud of it.

How good to know she still had her pride.

The thought had scarcely concluded, when the curtain rose upon the stage, and all expectant eyes were upon her. And as came to her naturally, once that happened, she was not the Trixie who’d uttered blasphemous doubt in a hidden space, but Trixie the performer – now placing her craft in service of a world where all was a scintillating illusion, a reality better than reality.

“Welcome, welcome! Open your ears, good folk, and let Trixie tell you a tale…”

It was a story she could recite in her sleep, in the Common Tongue, in Oleandrite, in Intisari, in Low Ryupponese, or in Equish with an Upper Canterlot accent as she did now, even as she went through the motions with fanciful sparks and flourish. For she was as familiar with it as a good number of ponies were, through all the years it was proudly presented to them.

A story of a people, seeking a place to call home, from across Equus. Neither equine nor avian, the hippogriffs dwelled in the mountains and the seas.

Then came Mount Aris, and the dream of Hippogriffia that followed, and soon the land flourished, for the hippogriffs found their home, united at last under one banner. All had been well, or so the story went.

“But alas!” Trixie exclaimed. The scene changed again. Another land, another people, a flurry of black and white enriched by shades of purple and blue. “A crisis did come forth! For the Storm King’s eyes were upon Farasi shores, and all the wealth of the Ezebrantsi…”

A pause, for effect. The hippogriffs’ eyes were turned to the distant land, across the sea, where the Storm King, that marauder and ancient warlord, had come at last. Not to their sanctuary, but to another’s home.

Down came the Princess of All Equestria, from the clouds, bearing a message with her.

“Would you join us, spoke the Princess, in our quest to free the people of Farasi?” Trixie recited, for here she felt it was prudent to play it safe, lest there be watchful eyes.

The Hippogriff Queen nodded. And off they went, hippogriffs and ponykind, sisters-in-arms, in the march against the Storm King.

A flick of the horn, and in came the pyrotechnics. Fireworks burst forth, the sparkling performance vibrant in its multi-coloured light. There came the Storm King, tall and mighty, haughty and cruel, standing taller than even the Princess and Queen.

But his efforts were for naught, as Equestria and Hippogriffia triumphed, a victory shared, and their flags flown over Farasi’s liberated people, grateful for the aid given.

“When all was said and done, their bellies full and laughter and joy in the air, the Princess of All Equestria and Queen of Hippogriffia gave their vows– for their alliance will last, and victory shall follow forevermore!”

With one last twirl of her horn, and the deepest, humblest bow she could muster, the lights fell upon Trixie, the sigil of the Sun and the seal of Mount Aris behind her, together as one.

The crowd went wild.

“Now…” Trixie began, struggling here to hide how unenthused she felt, as she slowly recited the closing lines. “Now for a word, from our most generous of sponsors.”

Nothing more, nothing less than she could allow herself to say.

But a few might have just barely noticed the twitch off in the corner of her mouth, as she bowed out and allowed the screen above the stage to present her sponsor.

A figure appeared, positioned to face the viewers, much like a newsreader of Earth.

“Greetings to you, friends.”

Already Trixie was tuning out what followed from that warm greeting, the usual endless list of reports and statistics and official statements.

On the air, every hour, on the hour. Radio may be the favoured means of broadcasting public information across the Pan-Equine Co-Harmony Sphere, yet when the authorities wanted a friendly face to go with the words, here were the screens they used. These were not like the digital or cathodic screens of Earth, with pictures regurgitated from the guts of a complex mechanism stored within. Despite the propaganda benefits of sending curated imagery directly into people’s homes, the Solar Empire still held a cultural disinclination towards television. Instead, like everywhere else in the Equestrian homeland, what showed up was beamed from a crystal pillar, onto the expanse of a flat canvas.

The figure onscreen was a mare in the colours of the sea – ironic, given that she was no hippogriff. Eyes of opal and a coat of aquamarine blended tastefully with her lightly-styled indigo mane. It was a reassuring face, a soothing face. Graceful, yet approachable. A face one might easily pass on the street and be glad to strike conversation with. Much like the sea, seen from a bedroom window, there hung around her the aura of a distance that can never quite be crossed, while inviting one to close the gap.

Naturally, the Solar Empire had chosen her as their citizens’ window onto the world.

“... And finally, in the world of sports,” said Lady Coloratura, “A long-held hope was fulfilled today, when it was announced that the Crystal Realm shall play host city to next year’s Equestria Games. Experts have declared this a ‘symbolic’ milestone, cementing the Realm’s position in Equestria since the Reclamation fifteen years ago, and a final step in healing a great national trauma.”

Trixie held back a snort. Equestria did a lot of things faster than humans, including setting up their biggest sporting events. But on this one, they’d fallen behind the curve. It had taken post-war Germany less than ten years to celebrate its Miracle of Berne at football.

Not that there was a Berne anymore, or a Switzerland. Or much of a Germany. The Imperial colonisation policy of preserving key infrastructure hadn’t yet been fully implemented when the Barrier started expanding out of the Alps.

She couldn’t help but think wistfully of those mountains, the place of her first mission, long ago, to retrieve the contents of Ambassador Heartstrings’ secret bank vault.

The images of the Crystal Realm’s stadium which had been playing onscreen vanished, to be replaced anew by Coloratura directly facing the audience.

“And now, our lead story.”

If Coloratura disbelieved what she had to say, there was no sign of it, only dulcet tones.

“Special report today from the Ministry of Terran Affairs,” said Coloratura. “We have a new and unexpected development, concerning the state of insurgency on Earth. I should like to precede this report with a statement by the Ministry, who assure me the situation has been placed under control. Nevertheless, once you hear what I am about to say, my advice to you is this– friends, be vigilant. For in spite of our precautions, the Nightmare may walk among us once more.”

Upon hearing that last statement, Trixie felt her bubble of disinterest burst. Suddenly, she found herself staring at the screen with the same intensity as everyone else.

There were a few gasps from the crowd, ranging from surprised to even horrified at the news, so unlike the usual stream of good cheer. But Coloratura was unperturbed, speaking as one who understands the news to be grave, yet stands above it, a rock in the sea.

“Do not be alarmed,” Coloratura spoke. “And let your hearts be at ease, those amongst you who care for our Princess of The Night. I am informed Princess Luna remains out of harm’s way, still in her state of remission as of these last few years. As always, we wish her a safe and speedy recovery.”

She was a good actor. Trixie’s initial stupefaction had subsided, and beholding this from a professional perspective, she could tell that this was a master at work. Such fine delivery, such careful choice of words. These may as well have been spoken by Celestia herself – better, even, coming as they did from a mortal’s mouth.

“But the true nature of this dark manifestation, we have yet to determine.” Coloratura paused. “Nevertheless, you may be glad to hear a viable theory, issued by none other than Her Majesty, Queen Celestia. So grievous a mockery of her beloved sister’s image, it is suspected, may be the work of the following individual. Some of you may recognise him.”

Here, Coloratura’s own image was briefly replaced by a ‘Wanted’ poster, which upon sighting, only led Trixie’s unease to grow.

Trixie recognised the wanted individual, alright.

“We remind you that Spell Nexus, former Headmaster of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns,” intoned Coloratura, now back in view, “is a practitioner of the necromantic arts, and other forbidden magicks. In light of this, the Nightmare’s manifestation may be attributed to a form of Nyx or shadow-walker, unseen since the Canterlot Siege of Shadows, nearly seventy-five years ago. I needn’t remind you that such arts are poisonous to Harmony, and thus Equestria. Remember– honesty is vigilance. If you have anything to report, friends, notify the proper authorities.”

Coloratura’s gaze bore into Trixie’s.

“And with that, I thank you. Praise be the Sun, for we are of Harmony, always.”

Her face disappeared from the screen. No sooner had she gone did mutters spread in the crowd.

‘Well,’ thought Trixie.‘I should go pick up a comic later today…’

* * * * *

As luck would have it, in the grand central station the old Hall of Unity had been repurposed as, there was no shortage of the businesses found lining ports and harbours throughout the world.

The majority of these were duty-free, naturally, the better to enhance the appeal to customers. And their wares consisted of the expected range of inexpensive, yet just-slightly-overpriced goods for the hurried traveller – bottled perfume, a cardboard cup of coffee, a sandwich in greasy wrapping. With them were books which more properly belonged stuffed onto the back shelves of a main-street library, but here stood on display in neat rows that listed their bestseller rankings from one to ten, an easy read for a lengthy voyage.

It was true, Trixie reflected, that success will turn a person, or culture, a little more capitalistic. Still, as a licensed entertainer, she enjoyed a discount.

“Afternoon, Heather,” she greeted the pegasus behind the counter. “How’s business?”

The mare, sunk deep into reading one of her own wares, barely glanced up from the page. Obscured as her eyes were by a poofy golden mane, she may not have moved them at all.

“Can’t complain, Lulamoon,” Heather replied, for politeness’ sake if nothing else. “This year’s boom gonna outstrip last year’s, I shouldn’t wonder. You got your audience, I got mine.”

“Uh-huh. Well, if you’re really lucky, traffic will get clogged up from here to Canterlot,” Trixie said, forcing a smile. “Give people something to read on the road, right?”

“Sure, sure,” replied the distracted vendor. “And when do you plan on hitting the road? Slim pickings, I know, but if you don’t get out there soon, you won’t even see the city walls, from where you’re parked.”

Although the remark was apt, Trixie did not enjoy the reminder that the Canterlot authorities would never give her license to perform inside the capital during the Gala.

“Trixie goes where the wind takes her, and the starlight guides her,” Trixie said grandly, slipping into her old third-person affectation with ease. “And always shines bright enough to be seen from the city walls, no matter how far!”

“Yeah, okay. Was there anything you wanted?”

Trixie gathered her wits. “Actually, I wanted to know if any… special deliveries had come in. Before I set out.” She tapped the counter. “It is a long road, and I’d like something to read.”

Still without glancing up, Heather flicked a white wing towards the back of the store.

“No special deliveries. But if you insist, we have got a surplus I didn’t chuck out yet. Take your pick. And then get out of my hair, please.”

An unconventional place for a dead-drop. But a surprisingly useful one.

Mere minutes later, Trixie was exiting the Enchanted Comics outlet of Metazoa International, a rolled-up Daring Do comic tucked into her suit’s pocket. She kept a steady pace, a brisk trot, projecting confidence. As a performer, it was only natural she draw attention. The trick was not to attract the unwanted sort. Nor did she look at the comic again until she got home.

Now as in years past, home for Trixie Lulamoon was her traveling cart, that truest of friends. This meant taking a walk that led her through Metazoa International and beyond, as she stepped out into the open air and onto the bridge connecting the Hall to its Watchtower, long converted into a multi-storey parking lot.

Crossing the bridge, Trixie passed by the many faces which comprised the citizenship of the Pan-Equine Co-Harmony Sphere, heading to and fro. Ponies of all three tribes and offshoots, both from Equestria and other pony nations. Horses and zebras, too, still a strange sight to see mingle with relative concordance. And the odd griffon. Only two kinds were conspicuous by their absence – the thestrals, and Newfoals.

Here on the homeworld, Newfoals were by and large kept out of sight, out of mind, occupying the fringes of society and the front-line of conflicts with the Storm King. Of numbers that counted the thousands of thousands, Trixie doubted there was so many as a hundred Newfoals living in Canterlot itself. Equestria and the Great Continent were to be kept pure.

Once inside her cart, Trixie continued to disregard the comic, putting it to one side, next to this morning’s mail. As she fetched her seaweed-oil stove, to cook a simple late lunch, Trixie told herself she would go through the mail pile in no particular order.

Even if that wasn’t true.

She took her time cooking a quesadilla. Making a meal so heavily influenced by an Earth recipe was toeing the line, yet she hardly cared. In-between jobs, little acts of rebellion such as these kept one going. When it was done, Trixie seated herself, checking her pile of mail while she munched on a slice of cheese-filled tortilla.

Bills, bills, junk mail in blatant disregard of the ‘no ads’ sign on her mail-locker back at the Hall. Leaflets and newsletters, including one asking her if she fancied a place to live in the upcoming Green Desert Project. Aside from the comic, only two letters interested her.

One was a muted orange envelope, marked ‘Roxanne Sunflower Spectacle’. The other was a plain, officious white.

Trixie opened up her mother’s letter first.

Hi Beatrix,

I hope you’re doing well and you’ll get this soon on your travels. Thank you for the bits you sent, they’ve been a great help. Good thing that some folks out there still got a taste for sunflower oil! Maybe someday, I’ll be asking Her Majesty’s Government for a hoof-up, but not today. Plenty of people out there who need it more. While things are going pretty well here in Fillydelphia, I’ve heard at least two mares in my book-club making plans to move for the Colonies next year.

How about you, honey? You make any plans for Hearthswarming yet? I get it, your job keeps you real busy these days, and it’s a shame you couldn’t make it home last year. I’m sorry you lost the Saddle Mareabia gig, I know how much you enjoyed that. But it’s what I like telling ponies about my brilliant girl– she always lands on her hooves.

And if you don’t mind your silly old Mom asking, if you do turn up, should I know if I ought to set a table for three? Because you always did like surprises, and the loveliest surprise would be if you could bring along a new special somepony. I was happy when you said you’re still on good terms with Hoo’far, he was a right gentlestallion, that one. You deserve the best, you know, even if you may not always think you do.

Hope to hear from you soon,

Lots of love,
~Mom

When Trixie set down the letter, the usual mix of emotions was writhing through her system. The tone of what she’d read had been nothing but nice and supportive, yet it was a struggle not to let her lip wobble. She even sensed a tear in the corner of her eye. Such was always how she tended to feel, when she thought of her mother.

For Trixie, who’d grown up within the Equestrian Model, her childhood had been one of living the reality that, even in the world’s most reputed welfare state, there are many people who still need to carefully scrimp and save in order to get by. One such person was her mother, left to raise a child on her own. Working tirelessly, faithfully, without a murmur of complaint.

Not even when her daughter got into scraps with the neighbourhood kids. Or after her daughter got admitted to Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns, only to drop out shamefully. Or after a certain stunt with the Alicorn Amulet had nabbed her daughter a five-year sentence to Erebus. True, that last one got shorn down for good behaviour, then a general armistice, but still…

‘What would Mom say, if she knew what her daughter was involved in now.’

She’d tried telling herself this was different. That for once, what she did was for selfless motives. Nothing less than putting a stop to the xenocide of mankind. And possibly bringing about the liberation of Equestria. If this meant the worst consequences should she fail, so be it.

Except that wasn’t entirely true, either, was it? Because Trixie had a far more personal reason to oppose the Solar Empire. As embodied by the unopened white letter.

‘I’ll… I’ll look at that later.’

Still, she could not keep her eyes from wandering. As usual when she retreated inside her cart, Trixie had removed most of her magician’s attire, left upon hangers by the door. Including her top hat, which she stared at, long enough for the last of her quesadilla to go cold.

She wished she’d met her father. Her life was a rollercoaster of notoriety and fame, and yet never had a washed-up old Las Pegasus magician known he had a daughter. Even though her mother had told her about her father at a very young age.

Not wanting to dwell on it, Trixie decided this was as good a time as any, if she was ever going to look at the comic. With that in mind, she tossed aside the crumpled orange envelope.

‘Snail-mail. How quaint,’ thought the disgruntled Trixie. ‘You gotta wonder, what’s the point of living in a cyberpunk dystopia, without cyberspace.’

A reflection pertinent to the comic she now held in both hooves.

EC were renowned for their special properties. Laced with a variant of the spell popularly called ‘Haycartes’ Method’, the comic enabled readers to actually get into the book, becoming a part of the story. As often, magic had allowed ponies to achieve what technology was decades away from offering humans. In this case, the VR experience.

But no world wide web, no blogosphere, and no metaverse. The Solar Empire was always careful to learn from human precedents. And the conclusion they’d drawn after studying pre-war human society for three years, judging by their subsequent policies, was that it is safer for a totalitarian state to keep its Internet equivalent from ever reaching an Eternal September.

Much to the chagrin of any ponies who might have enjoyed a career as an influencer.

Tracing a forehoof across the paper, Trixie inspected the comic’s title. Daring Do & The Abyss of Despair. An adaptation, no doubt, perhaps a re-issue, given that she recognised the name from one of the novels.

‘Okay, explorer,’ she thought, studying the figure on the cover, who was paddling a raft down violently swirling rapids towards a dark gorge. ‘Show me what you got.’

She opened the comic right on the last page. As expected, that page was blank, save for rows of tiny black dots and dashes in the bottom-right corner. Thirty-six rows, to be precise. A cipher for Latin letters and Arabic numerals.

Now here came the tricky part. Concentrating, Trixie tapped the blank white page, rhythmically, her forehoof using Morse code to spell out a password of her own devising – the key to the hidden level of this interactive comic.

Welcome to Jumanji.

* * * * *

Even in Equestria, on the first couple of go-rounds, the experience of passing through a portal of bright white light is liable to shake someone up. Thanks to crystal-tech, teleportation had only recently expanded in its availability, incrementally at that, going from the domain of extremely powerful horn-bearers to merely a complex and expensive traffic shortcut at select locations. It wasn’t exactly a common mode of travel.

The Blue Spy, not being a technical-minded sort, had never quite grasped the difference between plain old ‘portation and the interdimensional portals. Equestria’s citizens were told only eight stable portals to Earth existed in the world, and nothing in the Spy’s work for the PHL had uncovered information to suggest otherwise.

‘But,’ the Spy thought impishly, ‘what do the letters PHL stand for these days? Ponies For Human Life? Ponies For Human Liberty? Pony-Human League?’

The beauty of initials lies in their multiple possible meanings. And the Spy was well-acquainted with personal versatility.

Before even taking in their surroundings, a pair of violet eyes, most characteristically for their owner’s priorities, saw fit to behold a baby-blue forehoof.

The colour was unchanged, the fur’s texture was unchanged, but there were subtle differences in the proportions. Stockier around the hock and knee, with an unshorn quality to the fetlock which wasn’t present in its owner’s default appearance. For good measure, the same forehoof went to tap the owner’s snout, and found it pleasingly square.

‘Now that’s more like it.’

In spite of the fact that entering these comics was usually a prelude to difficult business for the Blue Spy, it was hard not to breathe a sigh of indulgence for just one moment, the violet eyes closing as short-lived bliss washed over.

When he re-opened his eyes, Tristan Lulamoon was feeling grateful that, though he may carry the weight of the world on his shoulders, the world had given him this much. To be Tristan.

Suitably assured of his current masculinity, Tristan assessed his surroundings.

They were no more or less than what he might have expected, based on the cover of the comic. A boiler-plate jungle landscape for pulp tales, all dense green foliage interspersed with bioluminescent flora, hanging vines, and massive trees with thick barks, their canopy nearly blotting out the sky except for patches through which the sunlight fell at evocative angles. The earth underhoof felt peaty and humid.

Which was hardly surprising, seeing as that is just what it was. A fuzzy, sketchy quality permeated the landscape, thanks to a limited and simplified palette of colours, with few shades in-between, providing the reminder that this was the inside of a comic-book. No leaves were ever so green, no tree-bark ever so brown in the real world.

But Tristan was real. The realest thing in here.

“Doctor Bravestone,” said a voice. “Welcome to Jumanji.”

In defiance of cliché, the voice came not from behind, but in front of Tristan. The speaker was simply well-hidden. Having danced this dance many times, Tristan was unperturbed to see a pony pegasus push her way out of the foliage. This pegasus’s look was famous the world over. The iconic explorer’s hat and jacket, the loamy-toned orange coat, the dashing mane patterned like a rainbow of black-and-grey.

For all intents and purpose, here stood the beloved hero of adventure novels, Daring Do.

Tristan cleared his throat. “Thank you. Feels good to be back,” he said, before uttering the third of the code-phrases. “Still, Zathura is the better movie.”

To Tristan, and everyone else in the PHL, one of life’s great mysteries was how his handler could have captured Daring’s features so convincingly.

Professional Daring Do impersonators such as Teddie Safari or Chestnut Magnifico might have been capable of it, were this the real world. But even they needed to dye their coat and manes. Illusion was Tristan’s great talent, yet all he knew about it suggested such a level of detail ought not be possible, within the comic-space.

This space was not cyberspace, much as he fancied thinking of it that way. If the interactive comic worked like a video-game, then it was an arcade game or cartridge-based. Multiplayer was only possible with people sitting right next to you, rather than the long-distance ‘online’ world that had become the norm on Earth.

In the early days, Tristan had theorised that ‘Daring’ was a recording, a construct. Her ability to engage him in conversation cast this into doubt. A construct who was able to respond so fluidly would be superior to any human-made chatbox, and so far as he was aware, this was one area where Earth technology and Equestrian magic were roughly on par with each other.

He did know of a spell for long-distance communication through avatars. An enchantment typically used on lifelike portraits, or music-box ballerinas. It was a fiendishly complex spell, such that only someone steeped in magical skill could ever have called it ‘simple’. For a pegasus to cast it would mean she was using a rare and valuable scroll or the services of a powerful wizard, of which few were unregistered by the Solar Empire. And given how it required enchanting a facsimile of the speaker to work, the spell was practically useless for concealing one’s identity.

“Agree to disagree,” Daring said, dutifully. She took off her hat. “Now we got that out of the way, we need to talk shop.”

Something about her tone implied ‘Daring’ knew exactly what sort of thoughts had been going through Tristan’s mind. He willed himself to keep a poker face. Which made sense, really. So incisive a perception was a desirable trait in a handler for a clandestine organisation.

As for the hat removal, this was probably formality. Nonetheless, had Tristan hazarded a guess, it was just as likely to show she wasn’t, as a matter of fact, hiding a horn underneath.

“What do I need to know?” Tristan said. “When I saw Coloratura on the news, I reckoned it was ten-to-one I’d be hearing from you today.”

“Ah, then you already know about Boston,” Daring said gravely. “That’s good.”

“Boston?” Trixie shook her head. “No, Coloratura didn’t say anything about Boston. Just spouted off the same old waffle. Said the Empire have things under control, because of course they do. Whatever it was, though, it’s got them freaked out. Sounds like they realise they can’t cover this one up completely. Something to do with Nightmare Moon. Is that true?”

Momentarily, Daring let the silence hang. “Yes, it’s true. To a degree. But you’re not giving the Empire enough credit. By focusing the story on… this alleged Nightmare Moon, they’re drawing the attention away from what really matters to them.”

“And what’s that?”

“All in good time, Tristan,” Daring said. “First, I must brief you on your mission.”

Tristan couldn’t help sighing. “Need-to-know, right?” he said, giving his brow a hoof-pinch. That word seemed to come up a lot in this business. “Okay, I get it. So what do you want?”

“This comes all the way from Command,” Daring told her, pretending to inspect a clump of bioluminescent flora on a nearby tree-bark. “Mister Gladmane himself, with input from Miss Amethyst Star. That’s how serious this is. I felt you should know that.”

“Gladmane and Amethyst?”

Tristan whistled. He hadn’t done a job this big since the PHL’s infancy and Ambassador Heartstrings’ bank vault. Or the illegal broadcast of the Reykjavik video, though the authorities had been quick to dismiss Queen Celestia’s petrification of Princess Luna as fake news. Or that investigation into Doctor Catseye’s assassination, which the PHL and other dissident groups each denied responsibility for, regardless of official statements.

Jobs of this scale were too big to fly solo. A team would have to be assembled.

“That’s right,” said Daring. “I see you’ve guessed it. I need the Great and Powerful Trixie to go out on tour.”

“This had better be good…” said Tristan.

The other mare smiled. “The best. Tell me, how does a heist sound to you?”

“... What sort of a heist?”

“A stone statue.”

Tristan gasped. “A statue? We’re… we’re freeing Princess Luna at last?”

Daring’s smile lost a little of its lustre. “I wish I could tell you we were. Sorry, no. We still can’t get around the problem of finding the right statue…”

“Oh,” said Tristan. “Then… whose statue are we talking about? What could be bigger than Princess Luna?”

“Who do you think?” Daring said, no longer smiling, but solemn. “One who was turned to stone by the Elements of Harmony, not once but twice before.”

He had think of it for but a second. “Wait… You don’t mean Discord?”

Daring nodded. “The very same.”

“How’s that possible?” Tristan said, feeling his coat’s hairs stand on end, more real than anything in this artificial environment. “Every single bit of information we could gather about Discord led back to one conclusion. H-he’s dead. The Empire broke his statue and they’ve used the pieces to power their Earth-portals ever since.”

“Apparently not,” Daring said. Her eyes were dark, and unreadable. “Apparently, there’s a piece to this puzzle we weren’t aware of– but that’s not what’s important. What’s important is, wherever they got it from, the Empire have managed to acquire a brand-new Discord statue.”

Tristan was silent as he digested the full implications of this.

They were too large for him. Over the course of this war, one silver lining for the PHL was that the Solar Empire couldn’t draw upon the full power of Discord at their disposal. The vast majority was poured into maintaining the interdimensional connection, necessary for ferrying troops and supplies across Earth.

In fact, it was only thanks to the theft of one of the eight Discord pieces that the PHL had their own portals at all, held together by spit, duct-tape and a far-too-limited supply of crystals, including crudely-synthesised ones. A theft the Blue Spy had not been involved in. It was before the Spy’s time. If memory served, this was the work of an Imperial defector, but the full details were never provided, down to what had become of that defector. Only that the Discord piece came from the devastated Dragonlands, somehow.

But if the Solar Empire now had twice that power to draw from…

“Damn,” Tristan said. The word felt inadequate. “And they haven’t broken it yet?”

“That, Tristan, is the right question,” Daring said. “So far, we have no reason to think so. However, I’m sure I needn’t draw you a picture of what’ll happen when they do. This statue remaining unbroken is our best chance to nip it in the bud– before they spread Discord’s pieces again.”

“I hear you loud and clear.”

Tristan lifted his head as high as he could.

“I’m guessing this must be the part where you say ‘Your mission, should you choose to accept it.’”

Daring didn’t smile, but her gaze did briefly lighten. “Like you have a choice?” she said. “Although, if you’re telling me you know someone who’s better-suited for this…”

“I beg your pardon?” Tristan said, clutching a forehoof to his chest. “Perish the thought, Miss Do! The Great and Powerful Trix– Tristan would like to meet that someone, whoever they are!”

Pride was still everything to Tristan Lulamoon. Especially professional pride. And the mare opposite him knew.

“Very well,” said Daring. “Listen closely. In a day, maybe two days’ time, you’ll get a letter. That letter shall be an invitation to the Holy City of Farsina, down in Saddle Mareabia. There, you will meet with an old sponsor of yours. Officially, you’ll be putting on a show for the Grand Galloping Gala. This is where you’ll stay, until further notice– but in the meantime, you’ll be collecting information, and associates. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Tristan swallowed, but nodded. “Crystal,” he said. “But… these associates, as you call them. They won’t be doing this for free, you know.”

“Leave that to me,” Daring told him. “By the time you’ll arrive in Farsina, it should all be taken care of.”

“Alright. Thank you.”

“No trouble. And now, if you have any further questions, here’s your chance. Ask away.”

There were a hundred different questions Tristan would have liked to ask. What the deal was with ‘Nightmare Moon’ on Earth, for instance. Where Captain Alexander Reiner had vanished to, in the wake of the ambush at the JFK portal-station. The fate of the Reindeer in Adlaborn. Whether Ambassador Lyra was really dead, or whether she’d come back and save them all, as a few believers claimed she would. If Bonbon Sugarbean had indeed become an Oracle, related to the previous question. Or the true identity of the mare opposite him.

Above all, why had Princess Celestia gone from who she was to tyrannical Queen.

“... Spell Nexus.”

“Sorry?”

As a first for Daring, she actually looked taken aback, even a bit wide-eyed.

In this comic-space world, Tristan still wore the same suit he’d worn onstage as Trixie. Reflexively, his hoof reached for his pocket, from which he pulled out an item. Or rather, a totem. A memento from Erebus. An old, faded die with ‘equal’ signs scratched on it.

“Nexus,” said Trista, turning the die over in his forehoof. “Coloratura mentioned his name. The Empire are blaming him for… well, Nightmare Moon. You don’t suppose there’s anything to it?”

Daring took a little longer to answer than she should.

“I really couldn’t say, Tristan.” Daring gave him an inquisitive, probing stare. “When was the last time you had any dealings with Spell Nexus?”

“Ages.”

Whatever else, Tristan wasn’t about to give a straight answer regarding Starlight’s godfather.

“Last I heard, he’d gone North, to bargain with his… our ‘patron’, was his name for it. ‘Course, that was way before Adlaborn closed its borders, or so the Empire says they did.”

“Yes…” Daring stroked her chin, plainly talking to herself. “The Father of Monsters… Not a ‘patron’ the Order would approve of…”

“Say what?”

“Nothing,” said Daring. “Tristan– If that’ll be all, I’ve got pressing business to attend to.”

He sighed, dissatisfied, yet comprehending.

“Fair enough,” Tristan said, as he pocketed the dice. “Well… Shall we?”

“Gladly,” Daring said, managing another smile. She held out a forehoof. “What do we say now?”

Tristan touched her forehoof with his. They would speak a mantra, rather than a code-phrase.

This was not strictly a necessity. But it was a ritual which many in the PHL, and amongst their human supporters, had adopted, to remind themselves of the true scope of what they fought for.

A mantra which only echoed more and more as the Barrier neared Boston.

“‘When DC falls,’” recited Tristan, “‘It will be the same as any day on Earth for these last five-and-half years.’”

“‘Somewhere on the other side of the world,’” Daring recited back, both solemn and smiling, “‘someone else is fighting for humans' right to live, and most are as human as you are.’”

“‘Or a friend of humanity– All humanity.’”

“Stand on Zanzibar.”

“Yeah. Stand on Zanzibar.”

~ Hollow One, North Atlantic ~ November 18th, 2024 CE ~
— Fourteen days prior to the Expedition’s departure

“Chief Engineer,” saluted the Base Commander. “Earth welcomes you.”

Stepping across the portal-station’s border, Awesome Fire took a moment to gather his wits, hoping it wouldn’t show that he kept a feeling of wooziness in check. Even here, at the heart of Hollow One, there permeated a sound of creaking, the melody of every metal structure exposed to the wild weather of the seas. Yet this was not what bothered him. During his naval career, he had always felt perfectly sure-hoofed, whether on deck or over thin air. However, he never did enjoy crossing over from one world to another.

What popular fiction rarely portrayed about any form of instantaneous transportation was just how disorientating it was. There was a reason why ‘portation was a closely regulated technique, generally discouraged for subjects under or past a certain age. It could be a nasty shock, just finding yourself standing opposite of where you’d been a second ago. Over longer distances, the change in factors such as temperature, atmospheric pressure and air quality required careful calibration, lest it prove overwhelming.

And that was not to mention the scent of ozone, which always accompanied ‘portation. While it was fortunately quick to dissipate, even a mage as mighty as Queen Celestia got into the habit of overlaying their ‘portation with more fragrant scents, like that of roses, out of courtesy for the noses of any other people around.

The portal-network between Equus and Earth was not, technically speaking, teleportation. But the same nausea-inducing factors still applied.

Having let his engineer’s mind clinically run down these facts, Awesome felt he’d sufficiently recovered to speak with proper dignity.

“At ease, Commander Shomari,” Awesome told him. “Let me see what the damage is.”

A trifle blunt and to the point, certainly, yet there was no time to waste on pleasantries. Since making his announcement before the Council, he’d been itching to get back to business. This had only been the day before. Already it felt like years ago.

He sensed his hooves and lips twitch. And although maybe it was a trick of the light, he could have sworn he spotted a spark off his snout. But he didn’t blink. Half a lifetime spent navigating his way towards the upper echelons of Canterlot society had taught him how to keep his emotions in check – outwardly, at any rate. The plain fact was, whenever Awesome Fire got excited about something, be it due to anger or whatever, he felt fit to burst into flames.

The impatience had gnawed at him all through the night and on his way here. Stuck aboard a Guild sky-boat departing Canterlot, Awesome had almost yearned for teleportation as his means of travel. But, tedious as it was, going through the way-station at Rambling Rock Ridge was an understandable precaution. For all of its might, the Solar Empire was not so overconfident as to place the hub of either its teleportation- or portal-networks within the capital itself. Who knew what mischief a foe might cause with a single well-placed bomb, especially one of the atomic city-busters created by humanity?

Awesome Fire had to smirk, as the irony of that last thought wasn’t lost on him. No question of it, the eagerness over why he’d come here was fast displacing his physical discomfort. Meanwhile, unaware of all that was going on inside the Chief Engineer’s head, Commander Shomari gave him a respectful nod and invited him to follow.

Hollow One’s portal-station chamber was the same as any Imperial portal-station’s, designed for utility rather than aesthetics, one vast circular space topped by a domed roof, centered around the all-important platform bearing the world-gate. The Empire’s ubiquitous crystal surfacing was absent here, with gun-metal grey taking its place. From behind protective glass, technicians observed the interaction between Chief Engineer and Base Commander, kept in the dark as to where a meeting between their superiors might take the course of the war.

That said, once they’d passed the sliding-doors leading into the base proper, duly flanked by two Imperial Guards, Awesome felt a nervous twinge. He was tall for a pony, a tall unicorn from Canterlot, but Hollow One was primarily staffed by Saddle Mareabians, who were taller still.

“If I may, sir,” Shomari’s gruff voice cut in, startling him. “While I understand your visit’s purpose, I would still like to know why you went to the trouble of coming in person. You were asking what the damage is. But you must know that even if she took a few hits, the damage sustained by The Great Equestrian is nothing beyond our ability to fix.”

Awesome glanced sideways at the Base Commander. When a zebra was in a position of authority over Saddle Mareabians, one had to wonder if more than a few strings hadn’t got pulled in the name of affirmative action. Still, based on what he’d cared to pick up from the grapevine, Shomari ran a tight ship, yet was respected by the people under his command, all races alike.

“Oh, I promise you, Shomari,” Awesome replied, “Far be it from me to doubt your staff’s ability to patch up our Great Babe– Ah, you didn’t know?” he said with a smile, upon seeing the other’s raised eyebrow. “That’s what old Krème-Brulée used to call her. His Great Babe. And so she was. Yes, you may see his name up on a plaque in front of lots of modern buildings… But vehicles, aah, now those are where my old mentor’s heart lay.”

“An honourable sentiment,” Shomari acknowledged. “Winds may sweep away sand and stone, in the passing of time, but always they carry the nomad towards new places– and there’s no shame in making his journey just a little easier.”

“Hm. Interesting you’d say that, when you’re in charge of a naval base, not a vessel.”

The Base Commander glanced at his base’s staff, going about their duties. “Sea-faring was long a trade favoured by horses, rather than zebras,” he said simply. “And while it is a feat to have built this equine-made island out in the ocean, I see it for what it is, a stepping-stone on our people’s path towards the lands beyond these waters.”

Sure enough, The Great Equestrian would be undergoing repairs at the repurposed Halifax Shipyard in Nova Scotia, recently claimed by the Solar Empire for their planned push into the North American heartland. A narrow success it had been, preventing the humans from enacting the typical scorched-earth policy upon those shipyards.

“Indeed,” said Awesome. “But here’s the deal. I’m not interested in just fixing the ship. No, to honour my mentor’s legacy… I believe I may have found a way to enhance it.”

“Is that so?” said Shomari. “Then, what might be the nature of this… enhancement?”

“Now, now. That’d be telling,” Awesome said. “All you need to know, my dear fellow, is that once we’ve got the paperwork sorted out, I shall be placing Platform 5 under direct supervision by the Guild of Engineers. Your shipyards over in Halifax will make repairs according to procedure, but leave a… shall we say, an open space on the ship, to fit in a new piece of my design.”

Shomari frowned. “That is most irregular, sir,” he said, in a voice which suggested he was not merely questioning the orthodoxy of this action. “If you’re planning to overhaul The Great Equestrian, why here? Why not take her back to Equestria?”

The spectre of impatience prodded at Awesome’s brain, yet he did his best to keep it down.

“Believe me,” said the Chief Engineer. “Very little gives me as much pleasure in this life as taking things apart and putting them back together. But we’re working on a deadline here. I’m not going to waste time on shipping The Great Equestrian piece-by-piece back to homeworld, not for one, tiny adjustment– even if that adjustment’s going to make all the difference. I trust you caught the news from Boston?”

They had reached the middle of the walkway, where it broke off to form a smaller, square platform. An elevator tier, in a facility which reached up to fifteen storeys, not counting the mandatory height above the water-line. Close by, having saluted, one of the Guards stepped forward to open the elevator doors.

Noticing that Shomari had paused to reply, Awesome took a look up, quietly marveling at the Pan-Equine engineering on display. They were merely on the fifth storey, and this area of the facility was not divided into floors. Other than a number of walkways, there was a virtually unblocked view to the translucent crystal ceiling, far above.

He could see it was raining. Seen from below, water turned the ceiling into a mass of rivulets and ripples. Of course. Until the day came when Earth had been wholly converted, the weather would remain wild, particularly on this side of the Barrier. Awesome thought back, wryly, to the many tense debates the Guild of Engineers had held regarding that specific problem. In the end, taking into account how much of the national economy was getting sunk into repurposing human infrastructure and the Newfoal population influx, permanent weather control had been deemed too cost-ineffective, a concern for a later date.

Which, as not many liked to admit, might take at least another twenty years.

But the sight of rain also reminded Awesome of other days, and here he felt his insides begin to tighten uneasily. A more carefree time, a joyride aboard Celestia’s flagship, in the company of best friends, such as Shieldwall and Boiler Plate and old Blue–

“I read the papers this morning,” Shomari said cautiously, speaking as one who knows that the truth is defined by the State. “Nightmare Moon, wasn’t it?”

It was a relief the Base Commander had chosen now to interrupt Awesome’s thoughts.

Collecting himself, he replied, “That’s the official line. No-one’s really sure. After all, Her Majesty has assured us that last she checked, her fallen sister was in safe custody.”

“But if that’s true… Is this really the safest place for repairs, so close to Boston?”

Awesome bit back irritation, stepping into the elevator. “It’s only a danger if the humans know what we’re up to. And while they may have eyes in the sky, I have faith that our counter-measures are more than capable of blocking their sight. Or am I to assume you haven’t kept up with the latest innovations?”

“No-no,” Shomari said hurriedly, even as he stepped after him. “Of course not. Forgive me, sir.”

In spite of Awesome’s confident words, he had to concede the Base Commander’s point. While the newest scramblers may work wonders against satellites, those damned human-made devices which had been spinning around the Earth like mosquitoes for seventy years, they could not conceal what was visible to the naked eye – or a drone sweep. Speaking of insects.

Still. Even nowadays, Awesome found it hard to forget how excited he’d been, when he’d first heard about this world’s technological breakthroughs in travelling to space. If only Equestria had granted him the budget years ago, they might have got a few satellites of their own up by now. Both on Equus for civilian purposes, and on Earth for military applications. The possibilities were endless.

The elevator went upwards. And Awesome Fire, who was still lamenting their lack of sending objects into space, began to feel woozy again.

It had nothing to do with the elevator’s creaking, swaying motions, nor his head for heights. One couldn’t spend months aboard an airship like he’d done in his youth, not without building up an immunity to such discomforts. The problem was the same as ever. He did not like crossing over, in either direction, and Earth made him feel faint. And having left active field duty behind a long time ago, he lacked the frontliners’ practice in adapting to the thaumically-poor environment of this wretched planet.

All Equestrians had that problem, when they visited Earth. Except, apparently, alicorns.

Hoping Shomari wouldn’t notice, Awesome discreetly patted his jacket’s pocket. He relaxed upon feeling the little bag of crystal snuff inside. Like all ponies of the higher brass, ever since the Crystal Realm had brought about a new age, Awesome wasn’t above using a stronger stimulant than coffee to enhance his abilities. This was practically a necessity on Earth, cut off from the innately magical background of their homeworld.

He would use the pick-me-up once out of Shomari’s sight.

The elevator passed through the crystalline ceiling and into a glass shaft, moving up along the inner wall of Platform 1 and towards its destination, the Base Commander’s office, which jutted from the platform to overlook the whole of Hollow One. Peering through the rain-speckled glass, Awesome noted that business seemed to go on as usual. Technicians rushed to and fro, attending to sky-boats covered by tarps as protection from the rain. Lookouts kept watch at their stations, ready to man anti-aircraft and anti-missile cannons at any moment, though the shield-dome which covered the base should repel any bombardment.

On the one hoof, this gave him satisfaction to see. Everything was in place to limit humanity’s chances of getting payback for Operation Maelstrom and all those aircraft carriers the US Navy had lost on Conversion Day. On the other, he could barely hold down contempt at the peons’ unawareness of history in the making.

A chime of the elevator-bell announced they had arrived.

Shomari opened the door, stepping out to usher him in. “Have a seat, sir,” he said, motioning to one of several empty chairs in front of his desk, which faced away from a wall-to-wall window that provided a view very similar to what Awesome had just seen. “And consider Hollow One entirely at your service. In your message, you said you wished to meet with Mister al-Husan?”

“Yes…” Awesome said, brushing past him. He sat down, took a look around, and frowned. “So where is he? I’d expected to see him here. He knew I was coming.”

At that, Shomari swiftly went to the desk, pressing a button on its intercom. “I can promise you it isn’t like Mister al-Husan to slack off,” he said, waiting for the intercom’s bulb to turn from green to red. “As a matter of fact, I imagine he’s out there right now, still working over the ship.”

Awesome clucked his tongue impatiently. “Bits and bobs, Commander, tinker-toys! Please inform Mister al-Husan he’ll be doing a lot more good with his work, if he could just step in here five minutes and hear what I’ve got to say.”

The light turned green on the intercom. “Get me al-Husan,” Shomari spoke into the microphone. “The Chief Engineer is waiting for him.” With that done, turning back to Awesome, he addressed him in the most deferential tone he’d used till now. “While we wait, can I interest you in a drink, Chief? We haven’t got much in stock, yet I keep one or two of the finest brands on the side, in case of special occasions.”

“That’d be welcome,” said Awesome. It would provide him with a more socially-acceptable means to suppress the wooziness, just to name one upside. “I’m partial to any fine vintage, Commander. Though I suppose a sip of Chateau Equitales Unicornia would be too much to ask?”

“You may be surprised,” smiled Shomari, heading for the drinks cabinet.

With Shomari’s back turned, Awesome let his horn glow in silence, rapidly and discreetly pulling out a pinch of the crystal snuff to dab his snout. He breathed in twice, and waited for the powder to take effect.

Grateful to be free of the zebra’s persistent questioning, if only for a short spell, Awesome nonetheless decided he didn’t want to sit around as he waited. Getting out of his chair, he took stock of the office. Fittingly for a military base, the room was utilitarian, functional, with few amenities as might be found in the colonial arcologies. A different space from, say, the Warden of Europe’s quarters at Hajnowka – no fancy fireplaces or carpets.

The item which came closest to passing for adornment rested on the desk, under a glass bell-jar. A sample of the crystal flower, encased in amber to prevent its rapid wilt and decay.

However, for all of that, there were a couple of similarities, common to the workplaces of all officials of the Pan-Equine Co-Harmony Sphere. Much like his own office back in Canterlot, Awesome recognised the portrait of Queen Celestia hanging over the drinks cabinet, a requirement for every important room in the Solar Empire. What pleased Awesome to see was the vast holographic map of Earth, spanning the whole of the starboard wall. Updated daily, maps like this featured in war-rooms, yet also in the superior officers’ work-spaces, a regular reminder of just how the Solar Empire systematically tightened its grasp over Earth.

“Here we are,” said Shomari, setting down three glasses on his desk, into which he began to expertly pour a substance like liquid gold, with the aroma of pine. “Wasn’t Chateau Equitales what you’d asked for, Mister Fire?”

Awesome nodded, granting him a small smile, yet he took the glass wordlessly. Alcohol might help combat his brain-fog, at least in small doses. But with time left to kill, the intellectual exercise of purveying the world map would not go amiss.

Unmistakable, changing subtly over the course of years, was the radius of the pink line that marked the Barrier.

Enveloping a quarter of the planet’s total surface and half of its landmass, what used to show up on maps as a perfect circle had, once the event horizon crossed Greenland and Scandinavia to enter the Arctic regions, turned into something closer to the shape of a bell-curve. A two-dimensional map like this no longer even showed where the Barrier ended in the North, having long penetrated the Russian heartland to the East. To the West, the line reached far enough into North America to consume Hudson Bay. Its Southernmost point currently lay a little under the Equator, eating up half the Democratic Republic of the Congo and edging onto the border of Angola.

He took a sip of his drink, contemplative. Five years of this, with another twenty to go. Was it his imagination, or were the colours on the map scintillating…

Like all such maps, the landmasses were coloured in a range of colours denoting human activity. The standard red-orange-green spectrum, extending from heaviest to lightest. Naturally, many territories outside of the Barrier’s radius were marked in deepest shade of angry red, Africa and Asia being the worst offenders. But whereas at one time, those areas within the Barrier would have been synonymous with a green as pure as freshly-mown grass, this had ceased to be the case merely a year into the war.

Scowling, Awesome shot a glance at the crystal-flower sample, encased in its jar of amber.

They would not be here if it weren’t for the Apostate, the Great Betrayer. Lyra Heartstrings, formerly their Ambassador to Earth. He noted the irony of how, on the night she’d been captured, Heartstrings was at work on one of many projects her PHL had devised to be a thorn in the Solar Empire’s side – the super-ship known as Thunderchild. Because Heartstrings was not the only one who’d read H.G. Wells’ War of The Worlds.

Ever the engineer, Awesome too had seen fit to take a peek into humanity’s classic works of science-fiction. What might be outdated today had once served as someone’s inspiration. Before human culture was deemed taboo by the Solar Empire, he’d found a lot to learn from it. Word was, Archmage Twilight had shown interest in the works of H.G. Wells and Jules Verne, with their charmingly whimsical hypotheses about building a rocket to the Moon.

Celestia had the wisdom to pre-empt the mistakes of Wells’ Martians, even as she’d employed a tactic similar to theirs in other regards. The first three years of tentative peace between Equestria and Earth, above all, had served to ensure that Equestrians would be properly inoculated against the diseases of the human world.

… Then there was the crystal flower. A different kind of inoculation. Their terraforming seed, their proverbial coat of lacquer to spread magic’s essence where none had been, so the Barrier wouldn’t be too indiscriminate in how it erased humanity’s legacy. A functioning Empire needed to selectively preserve the infrastructure of its conquered territories, after all.

With a further sip, Awesome took another look at the map. It stood out starkly now.

At the heart of Europe, the land was a wholesome, healthy, vibrant green. But move further towards the edges, and blotches of orange started to appear. In Türkiye, Ukraine, and Russia. Isolated dots scattered throughout Spain, Portugal, and Greece, and all of Scandinavia.

Meanwhile, while much of North Africa might show up in pleasing green – a deceptive colour, hardly representative of the harsh desert landscape – Egypt, Israel, and Syria clung to orange, even after the Solar Empire had caught up on its delay in erasing the Great Pyramids and the Dome of the Rock. A move which, instead of breaking the locals’ spirits, had galvanised them to fight harder. He’d heard the rumours these people were down to wielding sticks and stones, yet they fought on. Against the Solar Empire, and between themselves.

Most infuriating of all were Nigeria, Kenya and both Congos, so dark an orange it verged on blood-red.

And outside of the Barrier, there were still zones marked by the nuclear radiation symbol, including the entire former Democratic Republic of Korea. To this day, the Chief Engineer wasn’t sure it was true a mass-Conversion sneak attack had succeeded in the region, or whether this had only been an excuse for China and Russia to pre-emptively wipe out twenty-five million hungry mouths from the face of the Earth. Certainly, Equestria had never managed to set up a Wellness Centre inside the notorious hermit kingdom…

Finishing his drink, Awesome tore his eyes away from the map, slamming his glass on the desk, which drew a startled glance from Shomari.

“Sir, are you alright?”

Awesome ignored him, instead giving the crystal flower a thunderous look.

Exposed to Earth, the flower normally blossomed and wilted in the space of a day. All thanks to the Archmage’s design, careful to limit humans’ chances of seizing a fresh specimen, lest they reproduce it. Early tests on live subjects had demonstrated that a method so crude as a thaumon-seeded bunker, or just a full-body suit, whilst one-use only, could protect a human from the Barrier’s effects upon their flesh. A risk deemed acceptable, based on the theory that humanity possessed none of the expertise to reproduce the crystal flower and its seed en masse.

Yet here they were, with swathes of human resistance subsisting within the Barrier.

He gave the map a last glance, shaking his head. Damn Heartstrings. Who’d have thought that against the forces of the Solar Empire and its allies, a mere nine-thousand Equestrians gone rogue could have caused so much trouble – not counting the other Equuistes who rallied to their treacherous cause, be it out of political conviction or as mercenaries. By all rights, they should have met the same fate as most dissenters and malcontents throughout history. Scattered cells, lacking centralised leadership, easy pickings for a superior military.

Instead, the vast majority of these troublemakers had been brought under one banner by Lyra Heartstrings. Sure, Russia and China may have press-ganged a few as stooges, but compared to the PHL, those divisions were cheap knock-offs, out of the race before they even got started.

The elevator-bell’s chime was heard again, and Awesome composed himself, surreptitiously brushing a speck off his jacket. He couldn’t be sure if it was dust, or a stray bit of snuff. What mattered was that he looked the picture of a Chief Engineer in a subordinate’s presence.

As Base Commander, Shomari took care of the greetings.

“Mister al-Husan. Come in.”

Even before he glanced back, Awesome knew the Saddle Mareabian stallion in question would be carefully concealing some distaste at being plain ‘mister’, though one would have thought he’d be used to it by now. Guild members working for the military did have a rank and title, on paper, but it was commonplace for a superior to call them by the ‘mister’ appellation.

No surprise that a zebra officer would happily refrain from using honorifics to address a horse, however, least of all a member of the illustrious al-Husan family.

“Platform Engineer al-Husan, reporting for duty,” the horse said formally, standing at attention, with a slight yet noticeable emphasis on his job title.

Awesome sidled to the front of the desk. “At ease, Platform Engineer,” he said, gesturing graciously towards the third glass of champagne. “And have a drink.”

The crystal snuff was kicking in, making him aware of every movement, and he felt in complete control of his body language. Just as well, really. Height aside, horses discomforted him. In more ways than one, especially seen up-close, with their long faces that made it hard to read their expressions at the best of times. And this was a born aristocrat.

For his part, Awesome felt sure his face betrayed nothing, only poise and an air of aloof dignity. He had a knack for it, better than his old friend, Prince B–

No, no. Focus. He had his body under control. He could do the same with his mind.

“Chief Engineer,” said Master Aynunnaim-ben-Qabil of House al-Husan, stoically accepting the glass from Shomari. “Apologies, I was kept busy. We didn’t expect you’d make it here so soon.”

“That’s quite alright, Aynuk,” Awesome said amiably, noting with satisfaction the small twitch of the horse’s ear, which bespoke surprise at hearing himself addressed so familiarly. He understood the power of given names, albeit likely for different reasons than the noble-born. “We live, as the Kirin say, in interesting times. I called you up here because I’d like to enlist your help in redefining those times.”

The Conversion serum. Platforms out in the ocean. Dreams of satellites. The crystal flower. All of these had shaped Equestria’s campaign on Earth, and in turn shaped their new Earth. But Awesome Fire’s feverish, details-orientated mind would not be satisfied with those alone. He knew the idea he brought to the table would reset the board like never before. And when it did, it would be, what was the word?

‘Awesome.’

~ Mumit Desert, Outskirts of The Holy City of Farsina, Saddle Mareabia ~ Fifteenth Day of The Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~

Throughout the ages, the poets have claimed there is no time of day like the sunset.

Whichever landscape the last light touches, so it is said, shall be enhanced, at this magical time like no other. This claim has been made of mountaintops, where white snows turn the colour of the rose, to those calm seas which create an illusion where daylight’s orb appears unbroken, across the horizon. But these are places to which, despite their own hazards, many would ascribe a natural beauty. Sunset can bring out such beauty even in the harshest, most barren of landscapes. Any soul who has witnessed the sunset of the desert can attest to this.

Perched upon the jutting, sand-blown pillar of a lost civilisation, the great roc which observed the setting Sun wondered why this was so, even though it was a long time since he had felt that beauty for himself. Sharp bird’s eyes, blinking from the light, yet razor-sharp in their focus, took in the view, with a clinical gaze.

Despite appearances, here was no dumb beast. Merely an artisan who wore the guise of one. True, the risk inherent in wearing these guises, as known by all such artisans, lay in adopting a beast’s habits and mannerisms over time. But this emotional imperviousness to the sunset had nothing to do with animal incuriosity.

The artisan remembered a time, a score-and-three years ago now, spent in a sunless place. A penance, well-merited, for a transgression committed in pushing the boundaries of his arts. Endless days spent wishing, with only the slightest ill will towards the Princess of the Sun, for the day he may look upon her Sun’s light again, and his family.

And that day had come, just as promised. But when it had, out he stepped into a changed world, what seemed a colder world. The Crystal Realm had been reclaimed, yet as the crystal spread from that oasis of the North, he felt not its warmth, but a chill which reached even so far as here, the sunburnt deserts of his home.

Through the eyes of roc, Qabil al-Husan, son of Alhurala, stared toward the Sun, and wondered where her joy had gone. Upon the dunes, the familiar colours of gold, scarlet and pink mingled, with a pinch of navy blue on the horizon to the East. He saw no beauty in them.

Finding no reason to stare further, the roc guardedly swivelled his head around. A last inspection of the ruins he called his ‘hidden estate’, although ‘lair’ may have been a better term.

Outwardly, there was nothing of note, besides a few broken pillars like his perch. Remains from before there was a Saddle Mareabia, when the Thracian Empire had extended across half of the Great Continent, the Equestrian Princesses’ most formidable rival as they strove to bring hundreds of disparate little equine kingdoms under one banner.

Before Equestria. Before the Pan-Equine Co-Harmony Sphere.

But of course, this unnotable appearance was precisely as intended. The casual onlooker, and there are not many of those in the desert, would have written it off as some ancient outpost, a temporary shelter at best. If they could make it across the shifting sands. Whereupon any who ventured further would have spotted, to their dismay, what looked like the signs of a roc’s lair – the shedded, shrivelled yet undeniably massive feathers, the bleached white bones of its prey.

All a bit of trickery, admittedly, designed to scare off the foolhardy traveller. Despite himself, Qabil saw some humour in this similarity with a certain stage-magician he knew. Yet his family’s claim on this place went back many generations. For what was of interest about these ruins, due to a geological peculiarity, was that the mound and surrounding quicksands concealed a great pocket of air, large enough to house a Thracian villa. As if the sands had swallowed a whole building, yet retained a space to breathe.

It still served well, as a hideout. He could only lament his overconfidence, all those years ago, when he’d chosen to place the Liber Grogar in his estate’s private library, rather than here.

The sands closest to the roc’s perch undulated, as a shape moved below. He saw a serpentine head pop out, looking in both directions, then up at him.

Not a giant sandworm. As far as he knew, those were myths. Nor was it a Grootslang. No, a Basilisk. One more acquaintance from his time in the sunless place, and possibly a friend. Or at least a trusted custodian of the hideout.

Unable to speak in this form, Qabil communicated with her non-verbally. A flap of his left wing, two flaps of his right wing, two nods and a blink.

‘All clear. And thank you. I shall return in a week.’

Madame Lustra nodded back, before sinking back beneath the sands.

Meanwhile, Qabil turned his gaze towards home, half-wishing that he were not headed there.

* * * * *

Like so many places along the Great Continent, the face of Farsina, Holy City and the seat of House al-Husan, had undergone a change in the wake of the Crystal War – a conflict which had not reached this far down South, yet its aftermath was felt. From a bird’s-eye view, the city lights formed constellations, abrupt and intrusive against the black expanse of a desert at night. Artificial blaze, though dull in colour, powerful enough to blot the light of true stars above. Even the desert in this skyline’s immediate vicinity was artificial, a curated scenery, fine-combed to please the eye of sightseers, no longer the dunes trekked by pilgrims of old.

Qabil flew low. Adulation pleased him, but he had no wish to be a tourist attraction. Fortunately, the estate covered a massive stretch of land on Farsina’s border. He would not be passing by any crystalline skyscrapers, their balconies crammed with revellers, on his way.

Time in Erebus, at least, had not robbed him of his dignity. No matter the shape he wore, the Malikah’s Court Sorcerer wasn’t a beast to be gawked at, whether behind bars or out in the wild.

The landing upon his own balcony, adjacent to his office, afforded one particular luxury. Privacy. Built as it was to accommodate someone of his bloodline’s talents, there was also the space for a giant bird of prey to spread its bulk.

He wasted no time. Reversion began the moment he touched down, with the massive grey wings receding towards the sockets, their plumage dissipating into motes of dust and the limbs knitting back together. Beak and talons undulated, their consistency changing, so that they would reform into the muzzle and hocks of a stallion.

With the diminishment in size also came, gradually, the loss of standing upright. Feeling his hooves take shape, he allowed himself to lean forward, so that they might gently clatter upon the marble floor, their owner resuming a quadrupedal stance.

Feeling his horn emerge from his forehead, in conjunction with his tail at his flank, Qabil focused to let it shine bright. Here was arguably the trickiest part, pulling his garments from the null-space he’d stored them in. Most equines, particularly commoners, may not have fussed overmuch about clothing, but he was a Saddle Mareabian aristocrat.

Mere moments later, the roc was gone. In its place stood an elegant stallion, finely dressed in a turban and robes the light greens and off-yellows of the family coat-of-arms, his golden coat matched by a trim mane and goatee, with a stripe of grey to it.

Qabil paused, the time it took to crane his neck and stretch his spine. At fifty years of age, he remained in good health and had always been remarkably limber, yet he was beginning to feel the signs of strain upon his back. Nowadays, this transformation demanded new effort of him, when once it was smooth as butter.

By the doors leading from the balcony to his office, a young mare was waiting for him, wearing caparisons of similar colours. She also wore an unsurprised, immobile expression.

“Hadia,” Qabil greeted her.

“Father.” Hadia bowed her head slightly, yet her face did not move at all. “Miss Yugame wishes to talk to you. She says it’s important. I’ve arranged the necessaries.”

Qabil knew that his own face, now fully equine again, must have almost entirely stayed in place, but for just an instant, he felt a twitch of the eye.

“Follow me, please,” Hadia said, turning gracefully, formally, and mechanically.

A part of him didn’t want to follow after her. But her lack of awe at his transformation was not what ate at him. She was his daughter, and what might have struck fear in other people was merely part of her world. Had always been.

The instinct of many is to run from a roc. At one time, Hadia’s instinct would have been the precise opposite. A little girl running towards him, be he great roc, serpent or horse, for her father was home.

It wasn’t simply that she was a grown mare now. He’d wanted to believe this was all it was. At least he could have come to terms with that.

But it was not.

He followed her. The sight of this office had grown very familiar to him, over those five-and-twenty years since his late father had stepped down as Court Sorcerer. Already it had been a haunt of his childhood, while he was being groomed for the role. Such a place was less fantastical than many might suppose – no exotic animals stuffed in jars, no arcane tomes placed upon a lectern lit by an eerie glow. This was, after all, an office first and foremost, practical and tidy as its user cared to keep it.

Still, to a bookish child, shelves filled with scrolls and dossiers few others may read are magical in their own right. Qabil had sought to impart this devotion, and nurture the requisite skills, within both of his horn-bearing heirs.

He should not have thought about that. Qabil felt the dark cloud on his brow grow heavier for it. To this day, he wondered whether it had been a mistake, to give in to Amira’s wishes in naming Hadia as his successor. When he looked at the mare before him, that frigidly dutiful being…

And yet, what else could be done, after his eldest son had turned his back on duty.

Hadia did not lead him far. Separating it from the corridor and the estate beyond, his office opened onto an antechamber, considerably smaller, yet with a varnished wooden desk and chairs for those made to wait. At the desk, unusually for this hour, Qabil’s secretary was seated. Instead of working on the stacks of papers crowding the in- and out-boxes, Kana appeared to have taken a break, leaning back as she leafed through a manga.

The Kirin doe glanced as the two horses entered. “Hi there, boss,” she said, with a cheer he knew was affected. “Sorry to bother you, but your schedule’s clear this evening. I thought we might want to discuss plans for this week.”

“Plans?” Qabil said, raising an eyebrow. “What plans, Miss Yugame?”

“Why, the festivities, of course,” Kana said, laying down her manga. “Grand Galloping Gala will be upon us before we know it. Your lady-wife got her invitation weeks ago. Isn’t it time you decided if you’ll be going as her plus-one?”

While not as expensive as Qabil or Hadia’s accoutrement, Kana wore finery too, a black blazer and cravat. As she finished speaking, the Kirin’s horns shone, TK reaching into one pocket to pull out something. Qabil’s mouth went dry. Kana’s uncharacteristic use of ‘I’, rather than a Kirin’s stuffy ‘this one’ in reference to herself, if it preceded what he thought, could only mean one thing.

His fears were confirmed when Kana brought out her totem. A blunted dart with a torn fletch, from when she’d won that contest on games night. She placed the fletch on the table, as though it were the most nonchalant gesture in the world, but her eyes said otherwise.

Old Erebus prison-mates were getting called up.

“I see,” Qabil replied, not missing a beat. “Well, that may be tricky. It always is, you know.” He glanced at Hadia, who had remained – what else – impassive throughout. But he noticed that her gaze did not quite meet his. “What do you think, daughter?”

“I believe you have a choice on whether to go or not for this, Father,” Hadia said tonelessly. “The most important decisions were already made by Equestria.”

Given Kana’s slight wince, Qabil felt sure he hadn’t imagined a subtle emphasis Hadia had put on the words ‘for this’.

“Alright. Thank you,” Qabil said, suddenly feeling angry. “You may go. I shall discuss this further with Miss Yugame.”

Hadia gave him a bow and left.

“I’m sorry,” Kana said, as the doors closed behind Hadia. All false cheer was gone from her voice. “I forget sometimes how hard this is for you.”

“It’s no matter,” Qabil said without looking at her. “Word from our little blue friend, I assume?”

He felt confident no spies could overhear. The Solar Empire may have ears everywhere, including in his estate, yet not for nothing was he Court Sorcerer. If he could not sound-proof his most private chambers, then he deserved for Celestia to arrest him again.

Nonetheless, just as a precaution, from within his robes, Qabil brought out his totem too. This was a scratched red poker token. Despite his disdain for Farsina’s turn from holy to a city of vice, Qabil would have admitted to finding a guilty pleasure in the game. In a different life, where he was the one who’d moved to Ryuppon rather than Kana to his country, he may have been what in the plutocratic lands of Earth or the Storm King was known as a ‘high-roller’.

“Not directly,” said Kana, pulling up her manga. “She’ll be involved, yes, but… I suppose it’s best if I just let you hear it from the, uh, horse’s mouth.”

Qabil then saw just which manga she’d been reading.

“Please tell me it isn’t true.”

“I’m afraid it is,” Kana said gloomily.

* * * * *

Unlike Kana, Master Qabil would not stoop himself to enter Daring Do’s comic-book world. He was fortunate that he had other means at hoof. Perhaps it meant additional effort, but by concentrating the power of his horn, he’d managed to summon the image of Daring out of the comic’s pages, creating a holographic apparition that walked upon his floor.

The mare was remarkably life-like, with no trace that she was an artistic representation plucked from a manga, other than a hint of excess curve around her eyes. Quietly, Qabil marveled at how talented a spellcaster she must have in her own corner, to so perfectly emulate Daring Do.

Sensing his ego vacillate, Qabil also told himself that if she was here, it was because she still needed a thing only one in his position could provide. The brokering of knowledge.

Having given him the rundown about Miss Lulamoon’s upcoming visit, Daring finally paused.

“To see Miss Lulamoon will be a pleasure, I’m sure,” Qabil said. “With my supervision, I’ll be glad to give her access to my family’s library. But what is it that I can do for you, Miss Do? You mentioned a loan.”

“It’s like this, you see,” Daring said. “I’ve got a… contact, whom I plan to meet by the shore.”

Qabil frowned at her choice of words. In their parlance, ‘by the shore’ could only mean one place, less glamorous or glitzy than Farsina, but closer in atmosphere to the prison he’d met Kana and Miss Lulamoon at years ago, something he never cared to be reminded of.

Klugetown.

“And this contact needs money,” continued Daring. “Money I haven’t got. I have many things that could tempt you, Master Qabil– rare valuables, the most arcane additions for your collection. But none of these would be a suitable currency for my contact. Hence I propose a trade-off.”

“What a shame,” Qabil said dryly. “How much money are we talking about?”

Daring was blunt. “Ten thousand bits.”

To Qabil, this was basically pocket change. He could have lost this amount gambling, and neither Amira nor his other wives would have thought less of him. Even so, it was a matter of principle.

“I hope this is worth it, Miss Do. You’re asking me for quite an investment.”

Daring gave him a stare which said she knew just how small the investment was.

“What I’m offering you is worth about five times that amount of money,” Daring said coolly. “And this is only half of what I’m asking from you. When you get your payment, I’m sure you’ll agree it more than covers the remaining half.”

“Which isn’t monetary, I may presume.”

“Indeed not,” Daring said, pacing across the room. “Your Kirin assistant explained to me that you were on the fence about attending this year’s Grand Galloping Gala. I’m here to say you should.”

Qabil narrowed his eyes.

“I’d have to talk to Amira about that. It’s been years, yet my political standing with Equestria remains a thorny issue, as you’re no doubt aware.”

“Please, sir, don’t pretend you couldn’t sweet-talk the Vicereine every time,” Daring told him. “But I urge you to get your hoof in the door fast, because until your payment arrives, time’s going to be running short.”

“Very well,” Qabil conceded. “I’m intrigued. But how do you propose to secure this… payment?”

“You can send Miss Yugame to the shore,” Daring said. “It’s what you do on occasion, isn’t it? Listen, here are my instructions. This Saturday, just before noon, have Kana wait at a comic-book stand in the Ivory Lady’s Bazaar. She knows the one. I shall be sending an envoy. Make sure Kana comes with the right vehicle at the ready– she’ll be making this trip.”

“‘To the shore’, you mean.”

“Correct. She’ll recognise my envoy when they whisper three words to her. ‘Stand on Zanzibar’. After that, they should leave together, and not tarry.”

“This all sounds acceptable, Miss Do,” Qabil said. “But I have got one condition. I’d feel happier if I sent Kana with back-up of my choosing.”

The explorer mare momentarily seemed predisposed to argue, yet she merely inclined her head.

“As you wish,” said Daring. “I look forward to seeing Miss Yugame in around five days.”

~ Gallopoli, Equestrian Solar Empire ~ Seventeenth Day of The Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~
— Twelve days prior to the Expedition’s departure

The coastal city glowed like a totem-prole in idle mode.

Pegasi and hippogriffs weaved between the mid-sized towers that pierced a woollen blanket of cloud cover which nestled over the city. Concurrently, small commercial aerostats puttered along only just above street level, while storefronts gleamed with more goods than anyone could possibly dream of affording in their entirety.

Sculptures occupied every square, of Princess Luna, of the Bearers of Harmony, of idealised incarnations of equine figures. A mural of a smiling Queen Celestia adorned near the entire height of one building, gazing down upon all of her works. The poster’s colours shifted. It was a magical working of some kind – either a projection, or the colours could move autonomously. This was the Solar Empire, and new marvels such as those were revealed daily. Oranges, yellows, blues, and greens bloomed, to reveal a stylised, strangely blocky portrait of Rainbow Dash, wearing the Wonderbolt flight-suit. She was saluting. ‘Your Duty To Ensure Loyalty’, the poster proclaimed, in loud lettering.

And in the middle of it all trotted a blue unicorn mare, clad in unremarkable, rough-hewn clothes that looked like they’d sucked up a factory’s worth of grime. That was not quite right, of course – the process of staining the clothes had been anything but organic, but close enough.

Trixie hated it, all of it. She looked to the face of a statue that stood guard in a bustling square. A brass statue, fighting a losing battle against the verdigris that turned it a necrotic blue-green. It had been dedicated to the memory of the brave pony so-and-so, and how they had so courageously died to make all of this possible.

She was momentarily caught off-guard by the white light and ‘click’ of a snapshot being taken. Turning, Trixie saw what had done that.

A floating surveillance sphere, its trademark pink standing out against the urban environment. Noticing her look at it, the little black screen on the sphere briefly converted to a smiley emoji, followed by the words ‘Have A Nice Day’, before the thing floated away, to bother someone else.

She shook her head and moved on. Foals played in the streets among market stalls, selling goods. Roasted foods, drinks, books, gifts of all kinds. ‘Exotic Goods From The Colonies!’ declared one hoof-painted sign. It wasn’t likely that they had obtained goods from the frost-bitten, hard-scrabble settlements in what was once Europe, ones which starved, were resettled, and starved again as the Empire made a mad dash to beat a world without magically-controlled weather into submission.

As it happened, Trixie had come here looking for a bite. At the actual sight of it, the recollections this conjured up left her with only one phrase in mind.

‘I hate you.’

For all the advancements, for all the talk, this was no different from what Equestria condemned in humanity. All of this had been paid with a generous bounty of blood.

But here Trixie was, back on the road, after her promised-for invitation to Saddle Mareabia had reached the Hall of Unity the day before. The business of vacating her own ‘stall’ at the stage while keeping a lot in reserve for future use had been tedious, yet rapidly resolved. There were benefits to being freelance, and Equestria was still mercifully less do-or-die in the distinction between contract and self-employment.

Trixie thought of the white letter. The other one she had received, the day Coloratura made her ‘report’ about the situation on Earth.

Quite possibly this letter had been doctored, too, but she felt sure it had not. Monitored, yes. Perhaps not censored, per se, yet written under a tacit agreement that certain things are best left unsaid. She could live with that, so long as the words rang true.

My dear Trixie,

Hope this letter finds you well. I miss you, and I miss your visits. As I’ve said before, please don’t worry about me. You know I can look after myself, even or especially in a place like this. You’re the one I worry about, when I don’t hear from you for too long.

Been a rough year all around, same as ever. Still, I’ve been given permission to use the workshop in my spare time. You should get your present in time for the holidays.

I’ve kept count; this year will make it the twelfth Hearthswarming doll I’ll have sown without you. Feels strange, doesn’t it? Just like we take our traditions with us, wherever we go. Or the people.

You may have no fireplace to hang your doll over, if you’re in your cart. It gets pretty cold here too. I’m sure you remember what that was like. But I’ll be thinking of you when I put my doll with the others, and that’ll keep me warm.

Yours with love, always,
~Starlight

P.S.
They’ll want to check first I’m not using the doll to smuggle anything out or whatever. It’s okay, every year we go through this, and every year it works out. I got the headcount to prove it.

And the envelope had been marked with ‘SWALK’.

Well, not exactly. Trixie was thinking of Latin characters when she thought of it that way, rather than the alphabet she had grown up with. But this was its closest equivalent, in the language of her homeland. Certain images had buried themselves into her brain, from when she’d undergone the experience of learning about mankind’s violent history, which was a make-or-break point for Equusites.

One certitude was that, if it was lost, this war would indeed be ‘the war to end all wars’ for the human race. Only future history would tell if sinners like herself made the right call in giving them a chance.

Sometimes, the best chance we get is the one we give each other.

~ Free City of Klugetown ~ Twentieth Day of the Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~
— Nine days prior to the Expedition’s departure

Klugetown was, and always would be, a horrible hole, a stain on the map, and of all of the places that Yugame Kana had the displeasure of visiting, probably the worst. Already her precious Stormchamber-brand car had been forced to soil its wheels with the town’s muck, and she couldn’t imagine just how horrible it would be when the time came to open the door and let whatever foul smells lingered in the air into her vehicle.

‘Oh, I can’t believe I agreed to this,’ Kana thought as her lip curled up in cringe. She could see gaggles of wretches and assorted scum of every tribe eyeing her car and its occupants. The car was probably the cleanest, most valuable thing any of them had ever seen in their lives.

On the plus side, this wasn’t like twenty years ago, where showing up in so shiny a vehicle would have been an invitation to get mobbed on sight. Token though the Co-Harmony Sphere’s presence was here, the hippogriff and griffon patrols had brought a relative level of law and order compared to what was before. All Kana and her companions needed to do was make sure they didn’t get roped into an awkward situation with those same patrols.

They had driven carefully.

“How much further is this rendez-vous you mentioned?” Kana asked, turning to Sharp-Ears, who was sitting at the back, on the seat behind hers.

“Right up the street,” Sharp-Ears said, in her usual quiet voice. “You see it? Over there, squashed between the building that looks like a salt-shaker and the one shaped like a top hat.

At the front, seated next to her, Lustra spoke up. “Gotta squint,” the elderly Basilisk said lazily. “But it’s there. Hard to make out, I know. That’s the idea.”

Kana was sure she detected a con artist’s smugness in Lustra’s tone, the air of someone explaining about how to divert the audience’s attention. Not that Lustra seemed to be paying her much attention, snout glued to the window and not turning back.

“Okay, stop,” Lustra said a few seconds later, as they drew up to the indicated place. “This is where I get off.”

“‘I’?” Kana scoffed, even as she slowed her car down. “As if, Lustra. Do you really think any of us would let you go in on your own? Please. Next to Erebus, how bad can this be?”

This did get Lustra to turn, and much to her satisfaction, Kana saw actual surprise on the Basilisk’s face. That the effect was accentuated by the bulbous eyes of a snake actually helped to make it worth it.

Behind them, Sharp-Ears shifted, the little electric-yellow pegasus showing discomfort.

“You’re not kidding?” Lustra said after a moment. “Places like these… can get kind of rough.”

“What’s your point?” Kana replied, laying her forehooves to rest upon the wheel. “Actually, I’m feeling touched. I didn’t know you cared so much.”

The comment earned her a cough from Lustra. “What I care about is keeping this simple and getting us out in one piece,” said the Basilisk, gesturing at the dashboard with her tail. “How am I meant to do that if your shiny vehicle gets strip-mined by every lowlife to crawl this town?”

Kana snorted. “You really believe these scum would be able to lay a single digit on this beauty?” With a flourish, she swept her forehoof to encompass the entirety of her pride and joy. “This one has ways of keeping her private property secure.”

“Ah. Lightning, am I correct?” Lustra smirked. “Good thing we’re in a desert and there aren’t any ice-palaces for you to melt– though I’d bet a few Cloud Gremlins hang around this town.”

“I told you never to mention that!” Kana snapped. Two decades on, and this little mishap from her past still rankled. It had cost her a position as the Mikado’s student, plus her family honour, plus her career in Kyorito. That and it got her sent to Erebus.

Her eyes narrowed, as she noticed they were coming up to the building shaped vaguely like a giant salt-shaker. Biting back a curse, Kana pulled on the brakes. To the credit of her car’s fantastic design, there was only a slight jolt as they ground to a sudden yet gentle stop, and a not particularly intrusive hiss from the hydraulic suspension to compensate.

“So this is it?” Kana looked out at the building. Viewed up close, it was apparent that if it did look like a salt-shaker, it was one where the glass had been badly shaped and slumped before cooling. The wood was put together rather shoddily and heavily patched, leaving the wall with a pock-marked texture.

“You’ll want to stay in here,” Lustra said as she went to the car door.

“I thought we already went over this,” Kana snipped. She slammed a hoof down on a button. With an ominously audible click, Lustra’s door locked and a barely visible barrier surrounded the air an inch outside of it. She wasn’t going anywhere without Kana’s say-so.

Lustra groaned, the sound worryingly animalistic. Kana’s eye twitched as she felt an upsetting fluttering in her stomach. She focused instead on glaring back at Lustra, who’d spun around and was trying to pierce Kana with a hard stare. The butterflies only got worse, but staying true to her resolve, she tried to ignore them, along with the way Lustra was looming forward, bringing her face a little closer.

“Listen.” Lustra’s voice was firm as she looked Kana in the eye. “We can’t mess around here. This place is dangerous, and I don’t just mean in the ‘people are mean’ sort of way. This isn’t prison with its rules, or guards waiting to break things up. This is Klugetown, where everyone is only out for themselves, looking for a way to get one over everyone else.”

“For the record, I’m quite familiar with these kinds of people.” Sharp-Ears poked her head in from the back seat, getting in between the two and thankfully letting Kana concentrate again.

“I know.” Lustra sounded calmer as well. “That’s why you are allowed to accompany me into this establishment.”

“What!” Kana shrieked, causing Lustra to pull back with a wince. “She gets to go with you, but I have to stay in the car? No! No! This will not do. I won’t allow it!”

With the flick of another switch on the dashboard, Kana opened her door. It rose with a smooth metal hiss, but Kana did not wait to storm out. She barely heard her companions hurry after her, feeling so indignant that she didn’t even notice the mud she was traipsing in until she stopped at the entrance.

“Ugh,” she groaned. “This town, I swear.”

Shaking her head, Kana let her bifurcated horn shine in an effort to remove the mud. No need to let down one’s decorum, even if the establishment was disreputable. Job done, although stains remained, she straightened her gaze and stepped forward.

But she’d got distracted, so she failed to spot the dark shadow which had fallen across her, and nearly walked into the towering figure guarding the entrance.

“Hey, watch it, lady,” growled the figure, in rough, accented Common. “Where do you think you’re going, Fancy Car?”

Halting dead in her tracks, Kana quickly took stock of who’d spoken to her this way. It was one of the many ominous creatures who took up residence in Klugetown. In this case, the best way she could describe it was simply a heavyset biped with a bull’s head. Which may have been funny, weren’t it that as choices went for a bouncer, it was spot-on to pick a Minotaur.

Twenty years ago, if Kana was honest with herself, this might have got her to fall back in shock. Right back into the mud. But a stint in Equestria’s prison for magical offenders, plus friendship with a Basilisk, had a way of affecting your outlook.

Kana didn’t blink, although it galled her to speak Common.

“I have got a meeting…” Kana said coolly, the all-purpose excuse in Ryupponese culture for telling someone they weren’t worth your time. “My associates tell me this establishment plays host to those discussing business. So if you don’t mind, I’d wish to test that for myself, and then maybe I shall give you a decent write-up and recommendation.”

“You should, as the humans might say, get an app on Yelp,” Sharp-Ears quipped, sidling up to her.

“What?” Kana said blankly. “No, never mind. Will you please just tell this ruffian I’ve got a right to be here, unless you’re telling me I don’t fit the dress code.”

“Dress code ain’t the problem, doe-eyes,” the Minotaur bouncer said. His arms had been folded, in the manner of unfriendly bouncers everywhere, but now he gestured his thumb at something behind him. “What I wanna know is who you’re planning on playing cheerleader for.”

“Um, what?” Kana said, for the second time in a row.

“Your champion,” the bouncer hissed impatiently. “This ain’t a public playground. Either you can cough up to keep the club afloat, or you can go back to driving the race-track with that chrome hunk of yours.”

She saw what he’d been pointing at. There was a counter within the entrance, a heavily grated counter which seemed as if it had been wrapped in a wire-mesh of iron, leaving any silhouette from whoever was manning it barely distinguishable. But more to the point, two different posters had been set above the counter, and between them, a chalkboard with rows of numbers upon it.

Honed by the Court of Kyorito, her mind didn’t take long to recognise the numbers as odds.

“He means you gotta place a bet,” Lustra supplied helpfully, and Kana saw her smirking at the corners of her serpentine mouth. “On who you think’s got the better chance of beating the other guy to mulch. Or they don’t let you in.” She paused just a moment. “Still feel up to that?”

Kana’s face scrunched up in disgust. Gambling was not a hobby of hers. She had not been trained to be a stock-broker or investor. She was a courtier, an executive and, if necessary, an accountant. All of her expertise was in a more stable kind of numbers. The last time in her life where she had taken a truly big gamble, it had landed her in a cell in Erebus and derailed her entire life. Kana turned and saw Lustra still giving her that smug, expectant smirk.

“Very well,” Kana sighed. Then she turned to the bouncer, raised her head high, took on her most authoritative tone of voice and readopted her favorite term of self-reference. “This one shall place her bet.” She shot Lustra her own smirk as she saw her pleased expression falter and give way to surprise.

“What’s with the funny way a’ talking?” the bouncer snarked as he went over to the counter.

“It’s no business of yours,” Kana snapped back.

Ignoring her, the bouncer leaned over the counter and hollered into the space behind it. “Oi! Worm! We got two more bets to make. Get over here.”

The bouncer pulled back, and Kana waited for whoever was the clerk for this desk to appear. Funnily enough, there had been no silhouette because no-one was there. Sharp-Ears and Lustra joined her, just as expectant. They waited for several seconds, seeing nothing until they heard a wheezing noise, before a short, squat figure trotted out of the dark alcove behind the counter. It was a hedgehog, a particularly pudgy and rotund example of their species.

“Right, right, no sweat, Baz, I’m here, I’m here! Hey,” gasped the hedgehog, Worm, as he clumsily hauled himself onto a stool that let him actually sit up behind the counter. “Place… oh, ‘kay now… place your bets.”

Kana raised an eyebrow as Worm slapped the counter and then, still trying to catch his breath, waved idly at the scoreboards that hung on the wall above his alcove.

On the left-hand side of the scoreboard was a poster depicting a stout yet well-built griffon, who was flexing muscular forelimbs in a power stance over her head. And beneath the griffon’s powerful chest was the name ‘Gava’, written in broad, metal-coloured letters. On the other side was a cervid figure, covered almost entirely in cheaply-made kusari-gusoku. The only exception was their head, which had a leering helmet and face-mask on it.

It could only be a Kirin, one who leaned on foreign expectations of their heritage to make a spectacle of themselves. It disgusted Kana. And the name ‘Ronin’ that was printed at the top of the poster, directly above the Kirin rearing up in their own strike pose, just served to reinforce Kana’s opinions.

“This one will place her bet on Gava,” Kana said evenly, a frown on her face. She placed several bobs down on the counter and walked off.

Then she remembered that her car was still parked outside. Turning quickly, she found that it was thankfully unmolested, but how long that could last was impossible to say. With a lash of her horn, Kana locked all of the doors and activated the security system. An electric blue sheen of magical aura covered the car in an instant and sank into the skin of the chrome plating.

‘Oooooooh… I really, really hope someone just tries to steal my beauty,’ Kana thought, a sadistic grin splitting her face as she pictured Klugetown’s scum daring to try and touch, let alone steal her precious car.

“Kana, are you done yet?” Sharp-Ears called, none too loudly. “We’re done over here.”

Kana turned and quickly walked into the building.

* * * * *

In the event, the actual match was not the bloodsport Kana might have feared, perhaps on some level anticipated it was.

Wading through the fray of pig-people, walking sharks, cephalopods, half-naked mole-rats, scruffy-looking griffons, upright cats and dogs and tortoises, and all the other denizens of this wretched hive, Kana and Lustra were guided by Sharp-Ears to their seats, which must have been kept free for them until they arrived. This made Kana wonder just what the point was of her needing to ‘pay’ for her entry, really, but in fairness, she was from Ryuppon. She understood the profit motive demanded constant feeding.

What struck Kana was, for all the noisiness and eagerness of the crowd, how peculiarly civilised the whole event felt. No shoving, no jostling. No growls or bared teeth exchanged between members of the audience. Coming in here, they’d passed a cloakroom where knives and other weapons had to be given up. Bouncers such as the Minotaur at the front door must have impressed on the patrons that fighting was to stay in the pit, or they’d be out on their ear – if they were lucky to keep the ear.

Yes, the arena was a pit, Kana could see that. But a fairly shallow one, the sands which composed its floor showing signs of regular sweeping. There weren’t even any iron bars surrounding it.

Kana had her egotistical side, yet she was not vain. Nevertheless, in the drabness of greys, muck browns and sickly-greens commonplace to Klugetown, she could pride herself on her beige coat, chocolate-brown mane and maroon-and-red-striped horns.

“Here we are, guys,” said Sharp-Ears, with a demure gesture and smile.

Hard to believe the electric-yellow mare was once in the military. As Kana surveyed their seats, she was met with a surprise. Their immediate neighbour was also a pony. A pegasus too. But not, contrary to what she’d expected, Daring Do.

Beside her, Lustra spotted the pallid, yet well-built pegasus. “Why, hello there, son,” she said, smiling in a way that was actually almost grandmotherly. “And how are you, Featherweight?”

‘Feather-weight?’ Kana thought to herself.

Belying his name, this pegasus looked to be edging middleweight in muscle and sinew. At least. Which made it pretty comical that his head was such a baby-face, complete with a tiny blue-and-white cap atop a mop of brown hair.

He stared at the Basilisk shyly, and she chuckled.

“Colt of few words, isn’t he?” Lustra noted indulgently to Kana and Sharp-Ears. “But they grow up so fast, that’s always the way.”

Her chuckling must have rippled along her tail, because it knocked against a big grey gerbil, who rewarded her with a subdued yet sharp hiss.

“You may be a bit too– um, grown yourself, Madame Lustra,” Sharp-Ears said hesitantly.

Lustra sighed. “Of course. Sorry about that,” she told the gerbil. “Pardon me, folks, I forget myself. If you’ll just give me a minute…”

A subtle glow flowed across Lustra’s outline, her innate Basilisk magic in motion.

While their giant-serpent friend worked on shrinking herself down to fit more comfortably, Kana turned back to Sharp-Ears, now at Featherweight’s side.

“Where is… our contact?”

“That would be me.”

Timed in a way that must have been deliberate, Kana finally saw the pony she’d come to meet. From above, surely flouting a number of rules against flying within the establishment, there fluttered the famed adventurer, right before Kana’s bewildered eyes, to a seat in an audience who paid her no notice.

Daring Do, straight off the page. And not simply a projection. By all appearances, flesh-and-blood.

To add a cherry on the cake, Daring looked right past Kana.

“And I see you brought your own company, Miss Yugame,” said Daring. “Master Qabil’s doing, I’ll be bound? Fancy finding you here, Lustra.”

“Wait a minute,” said Kana, turning back to Lustra. “She knows you?”

Lustra, shrunk down to only double a pony’s head height, responded stiffly. “Passing acquaintance, more like. We ran across each other maybe once, twice.”

“I hear the whole ‘temple-guardian’ gig didn’t work out for you,” Daring said, tipping her hat. “Mind you, that’s only natural, when you’re pulling a con to fleece amateur treasure-hunters and other would-be-adventurers.”

“Hey,” Lustra growled, “treasure’s only worth what people say it is.” She noticed a snack-seller marching in the rows below. “Look at that guy. Ten bits, could buy one of his dirty little jars. But take one, bury it in the sand for a thousand years… It becomes priceless, something people hunt for and hurt each other for. Like the Idol of Boreas.”

Something about the remark got Daring to wince.

“Yeah,” Daring said slowly. “But it’s not like you’d wait a thousand years. Is it? I just hope growing old in Erebus didn’t feel half as long.”

“Don’t. I’ve only once petrified someone, Do,” Lustra told her, in a quiet voice. “Please don’t tempt me now. It’s been years since I saw my husband or children.”

“Point taken. I’m sorry.”

The two took their seats, at opposite ends. Kana was left sitting between Sharp-Ears and Daring, behind whom the mute hulk, Featherweight, kept his watch.

“Glad we got that sorted,” Kana snarked. “Now can we please get to business?”

“One more thing,” Daring said, holding up a forehoof. “You placed your bet, right?”

“On Gava, yes. What’s that got to do with anything?”

Daring shrugged. “Nothing much, really,” she said, as the crowd rippled with excitement, for the contestants were entering. “Just that if you lost, I’m willing to pay you back, with the money which I hope you’ve brought for me.”

“It’s safe in my null-space,” Kana whispered, surprised by the mare’s generosity. Her eyes were drawn to the pit.

Participation in this match was obviously not set up according to Equestrian weight classes. On the other hoof, neither was this match enforcing the gender-binary categories of Kana’s homeland. By all appearances, this was no less than a free-for-all. Kana thought Gava, the griffon, while not quite so bulky, resembled a sumo wrestler more than a traditional brawler, even in her worn armour and tattered cloak. Meanwhile, ‘Ronin’ was all that the poster promised him to be. A dark, towering figure, whose intimidation factor was negated, she felt, by the tawdry bootlegged Ryupponese armour.

But she paid only limited attention to the action. Her rendez-vous was what truly counted here.

“Good,” Daring whispered. “Well, I suggest we just sit back and enjoy the show.”

Kana groaned, yet obtemperated. “Why are you so invested in this cockfight, anyway?”

Briefly, Daring hesitated, before gesturing a wing towards the griffon. “Take a closer look, Miss Yugame. Don’t you recognise her?”

Peering, Kana gave the stout griffon proper consideration this time. The grey feathers were familiar somehow. And the cloak – the cloak leapt out at her, those scarlet colours she knew from that famed griffon mercenary band, the Redcloaks.

“Oh, my,” Kana murmured. “‘Gava’. You’re not saying that she’s…”

“The Pretender Grizelda’s kid, yes.” Daring sighed. “And I’m the reason she’s here, rather than in Griffonstone waiting to inherit her mother’s throne… Or her mother being on the throne.”

Kana glanced at Daring’s other companions, the two pegasi, hefty and slight. She heard Lustra whisper into her ear.

“And if I’m not wrong…” the Basilisk whispered. “Those two used to be Trailblazers.”

“A pair of Imperial turncoats, and a truant royal…” Kana said slowly, tilting her head inquisitively. “Interesting company you keep, Miss Do.”

~ Canterlot, Equestrian Solar Empire ~ Twentieth Day of the Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~

With the Grand Galloping Gala coming soon, the upper echelons of Equestria and its allies’ respective societies still found reason to gather early, convening in a place barely five paces away from where everyone would meet on the morrow, for the greatest party of the year. This particular corner of the Canterlot Palace Gardens, situated just outside the windows looking onto the ballroom, traditional location of the Canterlot Garden Party. In recent years, the eve before the Gala had become an occasion to gather in support of the cause for Earth. This year, the key group was an all-equine branch of the PER, who stood for what they described as the ‘Promotion of The Newfoal’.

From her seat in the front row, Rarity quietly listened as one of the last speakers said their piece. To her right sat Gallus, he who’d been so courteous as to escort her this evening, whilst to her left was Coloratura, a steadfast companion for important appearances.

Proper lady though she was, the recent days had been trying, and Rarity’s mind could not stay focused on the speech. Thus, her attention wandered. Out of the corner of her eye, despite Gallus’ attempt at discretion, Rarity spotted him anxiously brush a speck of dust off the brand-new red-and-white dress uniform she’d outfitted him with, that very afternoon.

She smiled softly. On the cusp of forty, having known grief and regret, still she remained a romantic at heart. The Captain of the House Guard’s courtship of the Princess of the Hippogriffs was a story she knew well, herself a commoner who’d wooed royalty.

Up on the stage, the plum-coloured earthpony finished her discourse.

“Which is why,” said Berry Punch, “though we’ve seen the strains it places on the welfare state, I truly believe our Earth operations will herald a better, brighter tomorrow for all equinekind. We have tested the natural limitations of the Equestrian Model. Whichever party holds a majority in Parliament next year, whatever new coalitions form out of compromise with our allies, the Third Way will see us through. And at the end, it shall be a New Way, for all.”

While polite applause sounded through the garden, in front of her strode a different mare, the picture of aristocratic white unicorn beauty, and an old acquaintance of Rarity’s.

“Thank you, Miss Punch. And now, to conclude,” said Fleur de Lis, “I should like to bring in our guest speaker for this evening. One I’m sure needs no introduction, he’s here to tell us all how becoming Newfoal was a blessing, washing away a lifetime’s worth of bile, providing a new lease on their sense of self. May I present–”

But Fleur didn’t get to finish, as the guest speaker strutted onstage.

For all that Newfoals were meant to be polite and docile, Rarity could have sworn this one nearly pushed Fleur out the way, conducting himself with the swagger he’d been famous for on Earth, that air of a self-assurance which could declare that black is white, and sound as if he believed it.

“Thank you, thank you! Great to be here, people,” said the Newfoal. “And I should like to start off by telling you all about hooves. We got big hooves, small hooves…”

The mere sight of the guest speaker put a bitter taste in her mouth. Proof that the cosmos must have a nasty sense of humour, this Newfoal was of the rare breed who’d retained distinctive features from their human appearance. As a man, he’d prided himself on honesty. Yet the false earthpony creature Rarity saw, no matter the bizarrely-cut blond mane and orange coat, did not belong in a league with her friend Applejack.

Rarity remembered the Changelings’ invasion of the Royal Wedding. She’d studied the PHL propaganda videos of hordes of Newfoals descending, zombie-like, upon seats of government in the Purple Mist, chanting their saviour’s name. Something about this stallion made her skin crawl. Despite the bluster, the buffoonery, it was as if his words held their own dark magic, capable of inciting similar acts of fanaticism.

As the Newfoal rambled on, Rarity leaned to whisper in Coloratura’s ear.

“Darling, I don’t think I can stand much more of this. Think anypony will mind if we leave early?”

Coloratura, although surprised, glanced around and nodded. Rarity relaxed, and both stood up. They had bonded over the troubles they’d shared in dealing with pushy managers, in their previous careers. Both mares knew about getting out of unwanted obligations.

But as they headed for a quiet area of the gardens, they beheld a startling sight.

A finely-dressed pegasus mare had arrived, evidently late for the gathering. And a little white blur had seen fit to swing towards her, hooves grasped around the hanging leaves of a sturdy weeping willow before he let go, only for her to catch him in her aura.

“Auntie Dia!” the colt squealed with delight.

“Elusive!” Rarity cried out. “What are you doing?”

“It’s perfectly alright, Rarity,” smiled the cyan-blue unicorn, setting down Elusive, who now rushed towards Coloratura’s embrace. “I know youthful spirits.”

A gardener came running up, flustered.

“I am so sorry, Lady Rarity,” Scarlet Petal panted. “H-he got away from me.”

“Don’t you worry, Scarlet, it’s not your fault,” Rarity sighed. “He’s a real pirate, that boy… Just like his father.” Nevertheless, she let a small smile show. “And call me Rarity.”

Rarity ruffled her son’s mane, that punkish blend of blond and violet. Still the greatest memento she had of her dearly departed husband, after he’d fallen as he rescued her from the dragons.

Her attention then turned to the newcomer. A gracious mare, with whom she shared fond memories of one Summer in Monacolt, together with a younger Gallus and Silverstream, wielding a sword to fight off an invasion of giant crabs. The Summer of Royal Waves.

“Hello, Diamond Waves. What can I do for you?”

~ Free City of Klugetown ~ Twentieth Day of the Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~

Daring Do slammed the little chest full of money on the desk.

“Here,” Daring told the club’s owner. “It’s all in here. Every last coin. Count it if you like.”

The owner, an elegant Abyssinian feline with a dark complexion, who wore a stylish red longcoat bearing gold doubloons, merely picked the chest without opening.

“I’m sure that will not be necessary,” Mister Dapperpaws smiled, holding the chest to himself as he reclined in a comfy chair. He glanced at the Minotaur bouncer close by Daring, whose bulk blocked the door from his office. “What do you say, Baz? Miss Daring understands what it’d mean for her, if just one coin were to be missing.”

The Minotaur gave Daring a hard stare and spoke not a word.

“And now we’re done with the pleasantries–”

“Oh, yes, of course.” From his red longcoat, Mister Dapperpaws drew out a small scroll, and extending his claws, promptly shredded it in one swipe. “Done. Consider this contract annulled.” He gazed pleasantly at Daring. “We shall all miss Ronin. He was one of my best combatants. Really, though, you surprise me, Miss Daring. There’s a lot of money to be made, if you’d allow your freelance griffon girl to sign an honest contract.”

“No, thanks,” said Daring, heading for the door. “I’ve seen where that leads.”

She brushed by the Minotaur bouncer, who stood aside and even opened the door for her, but never stopped glaring darkly all the while.

“A pleasure doing business with you,” Dapperpaws called after her. “Hope to do it again soon!”

As she walked away, Daring felt a leaden weight on her heart.

She may have done a few good deeds this day, including but not limited to securing protection for the child of a leading figure in the resistance against the Solar Empire. Yet unless she was much mistaken, here she’d found Basil, the son of Darkhoof, and he was beyond her help.

Back in the club proper, Daring reached a winding flight of stairs. After checking to see she wasn’t being followed, she made her way up, to the guest quarters above the club. As establishments went, this was not the Manefair Hotel, what with the peeling green wallpaper or the worm-ridden, uneven wooden floors, across which crawled tiny things Daring didn’t want to know the name of.

Still, it did its job.

Daring knocked on a bedroom door with a missing number. Some scuffling was heard inside, and then, at the peephole, Daring noticed an eye looking at her. An eagle eye, sharp and piercing. The lock turned, and Gava wordlessly let her in.

Entering the dingy room, which the boarded windows put into a state of constant semi-darkness, Daring found her group waiting, like she’d instructed them to.

“All taken care of,” Daring stated, while Gava closed the door. She looked at Ronin. “You’re now a free stag.”

Ronin dipped his head in thanks. The masked fighter was as silent as Featherweight, with whom he stood in the space by a cracked mirror.

Sharp-Ears was sitting on the bed. Rather bravely, in Daring’s opinion, given its spotty state. “So, that’s it, then?” she said quietly. “What about the others?”

“On their way back to Farsina,” Daring said. “And not a moment too soon, if you ask me. They got what they came here for.”

“I… I’m surprised you didn’t ask them to stay,” said Sharp-Ears, glancing at Ronin. “Say ‘hello’ to a few more people.”

“It’d only have complicated things,” Daring said tersely. “I paid off that contract for a reason.”

At the door, Gava scoffed. “Hah! You betcha,” she exclaimed, pumping one arm. “He wasn’t gonna pay it off by himself any time soon, after the walloping I gave him!”

“Compose yourself, Gava,” Daring told her ward. “I did this to get you a new bodyguard.”

Gava’s mouth fell open, and even Ronin appeared surprised. “Wha-? Are you kidding? Why’d I need a bodyguard whose butt I’ve kicked once already?”

Daring went to drape a wing over her shoulder. “It’s not just about you, dearest. We all know you’re a great fighter. But we need to give you every bit of extra protection we can get. I’ll be going away soon… And I don’t know when I’ll come back from this one.”

She turned to Ronin.

“Sharp-Ears and Featherweight know where to go,” Daring said. “We have means to travel many places– even cross worlds, that the Empire has no knowledge of. Stay by the Princess… But if your path should take you to Earth, you may yet be reunited with your kind, and that way perhaps you’ll finish washing away your sins… Ronno.”

He did not respond, but Daring saw Sharp-Ears cast him a pained glance.

Daring understood too well. By her own unwitting complicity, as well, had she contributed to the rise of the Solar Empire. When she had retrieved the Idol of Boreas, they’d thought she’d done the right thing, she and her fellow Stonecarvers. Until Equestria placed the Idol in the claws of a puppet-king in Griffonstone.

She was still brooding after the rest had left.

It displeased her to deal with Qabil al-Husan. A collector of pernicious artefacts. In her experience, most nobles were cut from the same cloth as gangsters like that Mister Dapperpaws – they’d simply got a fresh dye-job. She hadn’t batted an eye when’d she learned from Prismia the Architect, an eternity ago, that her Order had manoeuvered for Qabil to fall afoul of Princess Celestia’s sting operation with the Liber Grogar.

If only this book and its Inspiration Manifestation hadn’t later found a way to ensnare users like Rarity, or Shieldwall… Or Spell Nexus and Trixie Lulamoon, as if to compound the Alicorn Amulet.

Speaking of books. Pensively, Daring picked a saddle-bag which had been left on the bed, and emptied its contents onto the covers.

“Nebula,” Daring said softly.

From the wall in darkness, an equine shape melted into a view. She was a thestral, her marmalade eyes glowing in the gloom, her left wing missing and replaced by metal.

Daring glanced her way, then at the bedspread. Before her lay spread her many books, all written under the name of A.K. Yearling. And an open copy of The Great Hall of Asterion, by Sunny Skies. On the front page, written in fancy red-and-gold ink, the words ‘For my daughter.’

“Nebula. The time is near.”

~ Holy City of Farsina, Saddle Mareabia ~ Twentieth Day of The Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~

Before a great gate set in a sandstone wall, an old cart drew up, by dusk’s light.

During her early years as a travelling performer, Trixie Lulamoon had long dreamt of Saddle Mareabia, that faraway land of scholars hidden beneath a veil of wind and sand and masked by the scent of perfume and spices. Perhaps it was for the best, though, that she’d only been to visit it sporadically of late. The wonders of the North, long-sealed away, had reached Saddle Mareabia like so many other places, and flourished in the desert sand.

Old stories spoke of dwellings fashioned to withstand the harsh conditions of the primordial Mumit Desert, surrounding the oases scattered throughout the hot expanse. Now, aided by pegasi stormclouds and crystalline technology, Saddle Mareabia’s spiritual heart had expanded, stretching as far as Trixie’s eyes could see. Yet the beauty of its culture was not lost. It endured, from woven carpets hanging from sandstone balconies to calligraphy written into the crystalline walls of towers reaching far into the sky.

A devilish thought crept into her mind. In the years past, she’d have her phone out by now, basking in the attention of all those who’d taken sweet, precious time to follow the Great and Powerful Trixie’s latest exploits. Or, as they called her over there, GPTrix.

A wonder that she’d snagged said username from Twitch to Instagram, but then again, a pony once had exotic privileges on Earth.

Once.

Aware that she stood in the presence of privilege greater than she’d ever know, Trixie pressed the button on an intercom by the gate.

A voice of indeterminate gender buzzed on the other end, speaking Common. “Yes? Who is it?”

Prepared, Trixie held up her invitation to the intercom’s glass eye. “Trixie Lulamoon, entertainer on the road and all-round showmare,” she said, with her practiced stage smile. “It’s for Gala Evening. I’ve got my invitation right here.”

The voice gave no answer, yet Trixie felt the glass eye scrutinise her, with no outward display of cheeky affability like the surveillance sphere back in Gallopoli.

At last, the voice spoke, sounding reluctant. “Wait here, Miss Lulamoon. Someone shall be out to meet you presently.”

That was all.

While Trixie struggled to stay patient, shuffling in place as she waited, she knew they’d have to keep their word. Though first, estate security would want to check her over, and her cart.

They’d find everything safe and above-board. Even if they inspected her null-space, there’d be nothing incriminating to uncover. Her spy-kit and knives were safely tucked away in a stash back in Gallopoli. And what security couldn’t know was that any replacements she might need, she could easily obtain from the master of this house.

Trixie still thought it strange that, fourteen years since her release from Erebus – two shorn for good behaviour, the remaining three annulled when Princess Celestia granted an amnesty in the wake of the Crystal War – there had been no more than five or six occasions on which she’d visited this estate. Of course, she understood why. She may call herself ‘great and powerful’, but Trixie knew performers were not typically guests of honour for a prestigious aristocratic family, let alone a Court Sorcerer. In any case, Saddle Mareabia was never wholly welcoming to people of her ‘particular orientations’, as they would call it here.

A shame, too, considering Trixie had formed a fanbase in the exotic desert country. But these were from amongst the common crowd – although, with a fond little smile, Trixie still recalled one handsome fellow in particular, a lot closer to her age than Qabil al-Husan. One of several trysts since she’d said ‘until we meet again’ to Starlight. She may have been tempted to stick with Hoo’far, if she hadn’t met her true love.

Alas, that Celestia’s general amnesty had made an exception.

* * * * *

The business with security was time-consuming, yet it too eventually came to an end.

Trixie was directed toward a secluded space in the estate’s gardens, reserved for mercantile itinerants like herself. Even at this twilight hour, she could tell the palm trees would offer shade in the Sun, but also shield her from view of the bedroom or living-room windows. Before she left the security-station, one of the guards, who each wore dark glasses despite Saddle Marebians’ resilience to sunlight and the manner with which it clashed with their traditional attire to boot, gave her a stern warning not to wander the premises.

In hindsight, maybe Trixie didn’t regret how little she’d visited Qabil’s estate.

She’d never really liked his family. The only ones to greet her with anything but remote formality were children. Apparently, even the children of a true sorcerer could still be wowed by the razzle-dazzle of a good show. Yet children grow up. And as they grew, so too had they grown into the constrictions of their rank. So, over time, with no sign Qabil would be having any more kids, she had visited less and less. Meanwhile, the world changed – until finally, where else did she wind up, if not once again a renegade to her country.

But when Trixie pulled up in what could be called a parking lot, minus the asphalt but full of flattened red sand like a tennis court’s, she saw the comparison was not so far off the mark. Another vehicle lay at wait in the trees’ shade, considerably more modern than hers, its design closer to Earth’s aesthetics than anything from Equestria.

Upon seeing who reclined against the car, standing ostentatiously on their hind-hooves, Trixie could not say she was surprised.

“Don’t tell me. You trekked all along the desert road in that thing?” Kana Yugame mock-whistled. “You’re braver than I thought.”

Trixie rolled her eyes. “Scoff if you must, Kana. Of course I took the train. Okay, so loading up a cart costs a pretty coin, but it’s still cheaper than having to stop for water every ten miles. Besides, how do you keep the sand off that precious chrome-plate?”

Kana patted her car’s bonnet. “Pretty, isn’t it?”

“For a given value of pretty. Always the same song and dance, though.”

Kana tilted her head. In Trixie’s opinion, Kirin had a knack for this. “How so?”

“Come and behold, our great city in the desert!” Trixie exclaimed, eye glancing left and right. “Our jewel, our pride, grand and sacred, where pilgrims pay their respects to the coin and their lord above!

It was only half-truth, and perhaps a little exaggerated. Yet Trixie thought of skyscrapers looming over holy cities in the desert, chains of islands built for the privileged, all the Meccas for both devout and wealthy.

She wondered if there was anything left of it, cities built on shifting sands and black gold, and the blood and sweat of many who’d never reside there. It’d been a struggle to convince people to leave, even as the Barrier approached.

Now it was Kana’s turn to roll her eyes. “Right. I forgot. You never did go to that human city, what’s-its-name, Dubai.”

“Hey, I live-streamed that stunt on Fast & Furious 7. Close enough.”

“A year after everyone else,” Kana said, going back on four hooves, just the time it took to go and open her car’s boot. “And you’ve got to be careful what you say, Lulamoon. Maybe we’re not in Equestria, but it doesn’t pay to advertise too much enthusiasm for human stuff.”

“Oh, really,” said Trixie. “Since when does a Kirin not advertise?”

“Very funny.”

Yet Kana didn’t sound too irked, which raised Trixie’s curiosity. “You’re in a good mood.”

Kana smiled impishly. “I won big at betting today.” She slammed the boot shut, returning with a package in her blood-red aura. “So. Know what to do?”

Trixie accepted the package, nodding. “Yes. You wait as long as it takes. Hunker down in my cart, even if it isn’t as neat and shiny as your car– just like old times, hmm?”

Kana, it seemed, couldn’t stymie a blush, and Trixie didn’t bother to hold down a little grin. Oh, yes, the Kirin doe might act catty towards her, but Hoo’far was far from Trixie’s only fling since leaving prison. And a right blazing tomcat she was too, in the way of so many people repressed by formality. Very Kirin.

But there was only one who mattered, Trixie reflected, feeling her grin fade. Only Starlight.

* * * * *

Shortly after, a glass eye stared into a Kirin doe’s, tracing a green laser-beam top to bottom.

The Kirin was careful not to blink. She had gone through these procedures dozens of times, maybe hundreds. Here was one of the ways in which the Solar Empire and their Co-Harmony Sphere had liberally taken inspiration from humanity. Scanners such as this, disembodied mechanical guardians at the entrance of any places worth guarding. The modern-day Sphinx who had only one riddle to ask;

‘Prove you are who you say.’

The green laser-beam winked out of existence. And a voice, of the same indeterminate gender as that which greeted visitors at the gates, spoke.

“Welcome, Miss Yugame.”

Her package clutched to her side, held in the red aura of the Kirin she was impersonating, the Blue Spy relaxed as the double-doors before her slid open. Taking a step forward, Trixie penetrated the innermost quarters of the al-Husan family’s estate, a world apart even from the Court Sorcerer’s office.

The stallion in question had been expecting her, seated on a plush couch by a coffee-table. Despite the summary creature comforts, this was no living-room. Although it was wide, Trixie knew this crystal-plated corridor was the sole passage through thick walls, practically bank-quality in their reinforcement. Air-vents aside, no other access existed, and real air-vents tend to be smaller than in the movies. A Breezie couldn’t have snuck in.

Qabil arose. “Miss Yugame,” he smiled. “How was your journey?”

The Blue Spy proferred the package. Simultaneously, reaching into her null-space, she revealed her totem. The old dice etched with equal signs.

“Splendid,” Qabil said, giving a nod, but otherwise no hint he’d spotted the totem. “By the way, I was never told just what you were seeking information on. I’m taking a gamble here, and now that we’re actually present, I’d enjoy an explanation.”

Always the formal aristocrat. Sometimes, Trixie had to remind herself that she’d known him for the better part of twenty years.

On the plus side, Trixie felt she could open up to him about what she needed. That said, she still cast a surreptitious glance around the corridor. There was no knowing who or what might be listening in a sorcerer’s house, and she wasn’t sure who she could trust amongst the household.

“Good to see you too, Qabil.”

“Likewise, Miss. It should be worth repeating that I don’t normally let people see what I’m about to show you. And we are cutting it short– I’ll be attending the Gala in Canterlot tomorrow. So. What can I do for you?”

Trixie a deep breath. “Discord. I’m looking for information on Discord.”

Qabil’s usual charming smile remained, yet he raised an eyebrow. “You mean the Discord?”

“Yes,” Trixie said. “The history, the physiology… Anything. He isn’t exactly the sort of thing you can look up in a public library, savvy?”

He made no reply, not right away. Instead, with a thoughtful air, Qabil gingerly unwrapped the package containing his payment.

An original manuscript of Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell To Arms.

“Come with me,” Qabil said, beckoning.

Like everything else on the al-Husan estate, the doors to the library were ornate, somewhat over-designed and dripping with self-aggrandising symbols that advertised the al-Husan family. A panel showed they were voice-activated.

Qabil prepared to speak, but Trixie got in front of him.

“Wait? Can I try something?”

He looked at her, bemused, but shrugged. “You are my guest.”

She cleared her throat. “Open, sesame.”

Nothing happened. Qabil stared at her. “Was that supposed to accomplish anything?”

Trixie felt herself blush in Kana’s skin. “Sorry. Worth a shot.”

Qabil shook his head and leaned forward, whispering words Trixie could not hear. And the elaborate doors opened like any other doors. But the moment they did, Trixie was shocked.

The overly elaborate and archaic aesthetic vanished completely as polished walls, shining, pulsating lines of crystalline wire, and a tall, glassy pillar that took up the centre greeted them. It was like Trixie had stepped into an Imperial research facility, dominated by crystal machinery that seemed to grow out of the floor, into the floor and over the roof. Spiderwebs of crystal wire crossed the room back and forth, over the bookcases that broke up the metallic walls, over the roof, and over plinths that stood empty but for glass cases that must have once held displays. All growing over and into one another.

It was blinding.

“Alright,” said Trixie. “Let’s get to work.”

~ West Isle of Scaly, Dragonlands ~ Twentieth Day of the Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~

It was all coming together.

Awesome Fire ran his eyes over the readouts and allowed himself to smirk a little as each gauge moved exactly where he wanted it to. After so many years of hard work, he was about to complete his magnum opus.

“Thaumic conduction is proceeding within predicted limits,” a technician announced from his workstation. Awesome had been leaning over him for ten minutes, watching him as he worked, waiting for something to go out of place. He had dismissed so many unsatisfying test crewmembers in the last week, and he stood by each removal.

“Yes,” Awesome replied with a sneer. “And the couplings?”

“Engineering’s on alert for undue stress or wear in the equipment,” the technician replied nervously.

“Carry on.” Awesome waved the technician away dismissively. He needed the ponies for this operation, but Awesome Fire wished he could just take the helm and make sure, personally, that everything moved properly. He had designed this vessel, he knew it better than anyone.

Instead, he wandered over to the central viewing port. A vast panel of enchanted glass allowed the entire bridge to see directly in front of them. It was necessary as, despite Awesome Fire’s brilliance, his work was still restricted to line-of-sight.

“Thaumic batteries are charged,” another technician announced.

“Firing angle is set.”

The bridge crew checked off the preparations.

“Capacitor reserves prepared for feedback.”

“Frame is prepped for discharge.”

“Ready to fire.”

“On my mark,” Awesome declared. He peered through the viewing port at the mountain that lay miles away. He was ready to see a gaping hole torn straight out of it. “Fire!”

A switch was flipped, and the entire frame juddered. Then the great beam of pinkish light shot forward from underneath them. It arced into the air, crackling with energy along its length, curved down and ahead, following the ground until finally, after seconds that felt like hours in Awesome’s eyes, the beam struck.

Awesome Fire was sure that he would have been blinded, if it weren’t for the enchantments in the glass screen. Even then, the intense glare the beam produced forced him to turn away and wince as his eyes burned.

The blast hit them.

Awesome was almost knocked off his hooves as a wave of air struck the carriage with the force of a thousand cannonballs. Alarms sounded, ponies cried out in fear, but all was drowned out as the deafening noise of the explosion arrived a second later. Awesome actually fell over as he tried to cover his ears. He was forced to open his eyes again and, where he lay, prone on the floor, he saw just what he had done.

The entire mountain had exploded. Great chunks of rock were sent flying in every direction, and more still were being torn from the ground. A dust plume had already reached up into the sky, where it was still expanding, whilst a ring of fire at its base grew higher and wider, scouring the earth that was already tearing itself up from where it lay.

Awesome watched, awestruck, as the blast kept on going. For a second he was a small colt again, enraptured as a pair of elder dragons fought one another, flames blaring out in furious gouts that consumed the hills around the battling giants. In his entire life, he had never managed to recapture that vision of power and indescribable, destructive beauty, but this – this made him feel like that colt, the day he’d gained his cutie mark.

The bridge was still rocking, but Awesome barely noticed. He just watched the great chunks of earth rise up higher and higher, then break up and join the immense plume now piercing the lowest clouds and showing no sign of weakening.

“Sir.” Awesome barely heard the voice addressing him, so focused on the growing explosion, but it still persisted. “Sir.”

“What?” Awesome snapped.

The nervous earthpony ensign cringed back in the face of Awesome’s anger. Awesome took a moment of satisfaction at having spooked the pony. He hadn’t wanted to miss even a second of the majesty unfolding in front of him, and this distraction had already cost time.

“Engineering has reported damage to the couplings and the capacitor bank. They say it’s urgent.”

“What do you mean, damage?” Awesome bellowed, forcing the ensign to shrink back further.

“They… there wasn’t enough time. They said they have to talk to you. They’re… they’re on the horn now.”

With a furious snarl, Awesome tromped over to the large speaking tube that led to the engineering deck. He got another glimpse of the explosion and could already tell that it had yet to peak. The beam was feeding into it still, like a psychedelic lance violently popping a boil in excruciating slow-motion.

“Report!” Awesome shouted down the tube.

“Sir?” Aynuk al-Husan answered. “We’re experiencing dangerous rupture to the capacitor banks. Thaumic overcharging has passed the accepted safety levels and the couplings are stressing. The magic we’re channeling is going to tear the entire battery apart. We have to shut it down now.”

“Shut it down?” Awesome said very slowly, dripping with disbelief. He couldn’t believe he had heard it.

“Yes, sir,” said Aynuk. “If we don't, the entire battery will overload.”

There, Awesome Fire’s caution warred with his ego. He couldn’t believe the engine he had personally designed and built was proving unsuitable for the task it was supposed to perform. The very idea was unacceptable. All the same, the possibility of his work being destroyed terrified him. If the Sepulchre was irreparably damaged, his greatest achievement would be ruined and he’d be forced to answer to the Queen. That would be his death sentence.

A long-lost face flashed in his mind, that of a blond-maned, white unicorn stallion. One moment, the face was flesh, wearing a cocky, self-important grin. A second later, it was solid stone, a terrified shriek frozen onto its features.

‘That was the price you paid,’ spoke a treacherous, yet ashamed voice in the back of his mind. And ‘Is that going to be for nothing?’ another added.

“Shut it down,” Awesome commanded. “Shut it all down now.”

Soon, a different alarm sounded and gauges all over the bridge dropped. Turning back to the viewing port, Awesome watched, forlorn, as the beam was cut off. With that the explosion immediately began to decline. Odd colours shone through the dust and debris as it finally started to settle.

Rock rained down on the plain like shots from a million catapults, dozens of them striking the dockyard and shaking the Sepulchre’s frame. Alarms sounded again, spooking Awesome as countless threats to his work fell down to the ground. None of this mattered, however, as he only had eyes for the ebbing crest wave of the largest explosion he had ever seen.

Awesome never noticed the minutes pass by as the dust settled. A dense, dirty brown cloud lingered for even longer before it too dispersed, revealing what had once been the mountain.

There was now nothing but a jagged, broken, asymmetrical crater – a massive gouge in the landscape that stretched in every direction for miles. Awesome’s eyes widened as the dust cleared to show what was inside of the crater.

A great smear of purple surrounded the gouge. Bubbling, viscous, unidentifiable ooze was flowing from the gouge, occasionally rising upwards and over the rim’s lip in impossible rivulets. Great trees of candy-cane burst from the ground, only to turn rubbery as they touched the mutagenic waters. The waters closest to the gouge were even stranger, turning every colour of the rainbow, then inverting before steaming in the heat left after the strike. As it evaporated, the fluid formed great pinkish clouds that began to rain chocolate-milk back onto the ground, or to the side or, in some cases, up into the sky.

Awesome’s face fell. “That is not going to be acceptable,” he mumbled to himself. Out of all of the setbacks, this uncontrolled, backwash spellcasting was going to be the worst. Thankfully, this was not beyond fixing.

It would just take a lot of work. But if he must brute-force some of the process, so be it.

He sighed. No rest for the wicked. Especially not this week.

“Alright. That’s enough for today,” Awesome told the nervous ensign, who’d been hovering in mute fear all the while. “Ready my shuttle. We set course for Canterlot this evening.”

~ Canterlot, Equestrian Solar Empire ~ Twentieth Day of the Month of Ocyrhoe, Year 19 of the Era Imperator ~

The night of the Grand Galloping Gala was not yet come.

Closing time for Saturday evening had come. Evening at Canterlot had retained a certain type of rote for Wallflower Blush. She couldn’t quite discern what kind, though, for she’d grown accustomed to routines from her youth to her looming middle-age, from schoolwork to hours upon hours of writing notes and keeping track of finances with her parents’ retirement.

Perhaps it was that insurmountable gap that remained even through wars and other upheavals, made manifest when the growing elite class gave her sly, judgemental looks. Earthponies were still an uncommon sight in Canterlot’s streets. Only this time, it simply was because there were a lot more new faces, only some of whom were equine.

She didn’t mind them. They never gave her the same cold shoulder. All were the same under Celestia’s Sun, they were told, day by day.

And for that, Wallflower found that Gala Nights were quite welcome. Most years, at least. Stifling though the decorum may be, they were a reliable stream of income, especially with these wartime years dragging on, while Canterlot grew taller with crystalline skyscrapers, shadowing the little shop she called home.

Some entertainment was to be had when it came to those visitors that paid her little shop a visit, their various quirks on display, from haughty members of the gentry with their posh, exaggerated accents, to humble and rough commoners with their plain mannerisms, to foreign customers who seemed unfamiliar with it all.

It did take her a while to pin down which sort the mare who came knocking at her door was, not very long after the Sun had gone down.

“We’re closing,” said Wallflower, without looking up from her notes. Not that they would listen, but nor did she mind much. A late customer could have a hefty order in mind.

Right on cue, the door opened, with the accompanying bell-chimes. The customer wore a cloak with a hood. This was uncommon, yet not altogether unusual. A wandering scholar, perhaps. That said, the mare’s natural dark coat, covered in this fashion, helped to make her features all the less distinct.

“I shan’t be long,” said the customer, humming along to the bells.

Her pace implied otherwise, and Wallflower suppressed the urge to roll her eyes. Once they’d finished their cursorial gaze over the flowers, the customer looked at her with a gaze that was cold despite its marmalade colours, and a smile that didn’t quite reach these eyes.

“Have you got allium? I find they compliment my collection quite nicely.”

Wallflower thought of it for a moment. “As it does. ‘Fraid we don’t get much in the way of allium these days.”

“I doubt it,” the customer countered. “I hear there’s been a good harvest.”

There’s a misstep, Wallflower mused. But none too worrying, or so she hoped.

“None that I’ve heard,” Wallflower replied, shrugging. “These are difficult times. Wishing someone good fortune, then?”

It had taken her some time to adjust, yet Wallflower liked to think she’d grown to understand some of it, at the very least. All the theatrics and charades. Perhaps the key had been to make it interesting to her, and she thanked her good fortunes that the customer’s ilk and her own had much fondness for the language of flowers.

“Hoping for some myself, in all honesty,” answered the customer.

Wallflower gestured to the rows of flowerpots already presented. “Then perhaps another in bloom would interest you, ma’am.”

The customer laughed mirthlessly. “I’ll have to see if they’re to my tastes.”

“As you do,” Wallflower answered, tipping her hat. “I’ve managed, so far.”

“The Gala’s always been lovely for your business, I imagine.”

“You know it.”

“Wonderful,” said the customer, glancing around yet again, shaking her head. “Perhaps, hm, I might enquire if you’ve got monkshood as well.”

“A deadly foe close by,” Wallflower recited under her breath. A little too close for comfort. She glanced at the wall bordering her neighbour’s residence. “No, I haven’t got any, my apologies. It’s been quiet on that end recently. Who are you meeting with?”

“Ah, an old friend,” said the customer. “I do enjoy a tease.”

“I see,” Wallflower answered. “Perhaps another might entice you. I have a shipment coming. Gala-priority. I could allow you a peek, ma’am. See if any of them draw your eye.”

“Do tell,” answered the customer, a cool edge to her voice. She looked left, and right, then back at Wallflower. “I’m on a tight schedule, I’m afraid. Gala, you say. Surely not the same as last year’s?”

“Of course not. This year’s Spring brought quite the nice variety.”

The customer’s eyes twinkled, her expression cooled. “Hm, I would like to see them, yes. Only when they’ve presented themselves.”

“We do not know for certain when,” Wallflower added. “But you’ll know it when you see it.”

Under the hood, the customer’s ears twitched. And although only the outline was visible, Wallflower knew those were the tufted ears of a bat – of a thestral.

“Would it be too late,” Nebula ventured, “to suggest a few others?”

“It’s not up to me,” Wallflower said with finality. She looked out the window, where the Sun’s rays had long faded away. “I’m sorry, but we’re closing now. Would that be all?”

“For today.” Nebula paused, a tranquil smile gracing her lips. “But perhaps, kind shopkeeper, you will allow me to offer you some in return. For good fortunes.”

It had not sounded like a request. It was a statement.

Nebula stepped aside, allowing the companion she’d left outside the shop to cross the doorway.

Yet Wallflower’s words died in her throat then, as her eyes fell upon the few strands of mane upon the mare’s head. A fiery red that clashed greatly with the bright blue eyes staring out at her from beneath their own cloak.

“Hey, Wallflower. It’s been a while.”

Author's Note

Art by dstears
Sledge115: Hello there!

Well, here we are, after two long years. In all honestly, things still haven’t exactly been smooth sailing, on my end at least, which is all that I’ll share for now. But all in all, I’m happy with how this one turned out – though this time around I was only really closely involved with a scene or two, Trixie’s introduction and Wallflower’s shop.

Speaking of whom - Trixie! Or Tristan! Whichever applies at that particular moment! His debut has been something we’ve been aching to do for quite some time, and given her, dare we say, iconic appearance in the original story, we do hope he’s made an impression here, as Trixie tends to do, heh heh.

Otherwise, I’d been occupied with other matters (and as the fanart you see up there implies, Genshin Impact is one of them. Also, new avatar, woo! Thanks, Grace) and works this year, including two contest fics – one of whom, Velvet Quill & Sunny Skies, is entirely canon to Spectrum, as per tradition :twilightsheepish:. There’s also that SCP-8000 contest entry, The Wild Witch of Gravesfield, and an as-yet-unfinished Bluey fic, but that’s a story for another day.

Fret not, though. We’re still working on the story, as always, and there are still secrets left to be uncovered as Act Three comes to a close with the next chapter :twilightsmile: Here’s to the future.

And… well, as a final note, today happens to mark two years since the Invasion of Ukraine begun. As fate would have it, this chapter of ours, exploring the ramifications of a global conflict, is published on the same date. This was wholly unintentional, yet perhaps it would be for the best, all the same, as a commemoration of some sorts.

May Ukraine know peace and victory soon.

~Sledge

VoxAdam: In 2013, the year I discovered Friendship is Magic, I was also getting into Deus Ex. You can tell, can’t you?
:pinkiesmile:

So, that bit of introductory levity aside – I’m not going to mince words. This chapter took a long time to write, and it’s one of the hardest I’ve had to write on Spectrum, in the near-decade that I’ve been writing for this story in one shape or another. Sledge and I were already talking about it being a work-in-progress when he published our ‘How Not to Write Princess Celestia’ riff on the OG Spectrum, back in the Summer of 2022.

In all fairness, this was never going to be one of the simpler chapters, what with having to pull the multiple duties of providing our first full look at the world of the Solar Empire, and introducing a new cast of arc-based characters, and following on from threads set up in earlier chapters on Earth or Sunny Equus, and building up to a clearly-defined payoff for Act Three. But it was further complicated by the departure, on mutually cordial terms, of teammates RoyalPsycho and TheIdiot from the Spectrum Crew, whose characters and ideas were always planned to play a role in the arc’s storyline.

Well, this, compounded by the legally-mandated rewrites imposed by JedR…

I actually found myself taking an unplanned break from Spectrum for a whole year, going from February 2022 to February 2023, the longest time I’ve gone on this story without properly writing for it. This isn’t to say I ever completely distanced myself. I continued my work as editor/proofreader for Sledge’s short stories to get published during the intervening period, and behind-the-scenes chats never ceased.

Truth be told, one reason the chapter immediately prior to this one, ‘Twilight, Alone’, came about was in order to supply a buffer, while I figured out how to proceed. Sledge may say he didn’t contribute much directly to ‘The Age of Crystal’, but the previous chapter ls all him.

And in fact. I’d like to credit Sledge for his part in giving me back my inspiration on this one. Trixie’s little show, telling the tale of the Storm King and hippogriffs in this world – which you may find slightly changed from what you remember of the 2017 Movie – proved to be the first whole new scene written in moths, paving the way for what followed.

What you see here is a product of my efforts over the last few months, rediscovering ‘The Age of Crystal’ in November 2023 and going on from there.

I feel as if there is a lot more I could say, or ought to say. Two years covers a lot of ground. Instead, I’ll content myself with hoping you enjoyed the chapter, and give my thanks to RoyalPsycho for the use of his characters, to whom I’ve striven the hardest to do justice.

Awesome Fire’s test-firing of his super-weapon, not to mention the super-weapon itself, have been a cornerstone of Royal’s plans for Spectrum ever since the story’s debut in 2017. As for Qabil and Kana and Lustra and Ronin, these are characters who either first appeared or were planned to appear in my Inmates of Erebus; this unfinished piece isn’t formally canon to Spectrum and should be regarded more as a proof-of-concept nowadays, but there are fond memories attached to it, of five years spent messing about with RPs on GoogleDocs.

In certain respects, Daring Do and her companions fill in a role that’d have originally been played by TheIdiot’s characters, notably Headmaster Spell Nexus. Who still exists in this story, never fear. It just wasn’t his time.

Lastly, it’s been a long time there, too, but for those who’ve been reading the extended Spectrumverse from the beginning… Yep, Nebula is the same thestral from DoctorFluffy’s Light Despondent, last seen battling a Newfoal with the seeming ability to raise the dead. The choice to bring her back here, into the main story, is not coincidence.

With no date set yet for any chapters after this one, I’m nonetheless happy we could say, with conviction, that Spectrum still had its dance to share today.

Cheers,
~Vox

StandOnZanzibar

Prologue ~ This Burning World

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

JedR

DoctorFluffy

VoxAdam

Sledge115

The Void

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

With Special Thanks To:

Gay For Gadot

RanOutOfIdeas

RDT

chris the cynic

Prologue
This Burning World

* * * * *

“For who would lose,
Though full of pain, this intellectual being,
Those thoughts that wander through eternity,
To perish rather, swallow’d up and lost
In the wide womb of uncreated night…”
— Paradise Lost, by John Milton

There was a time…

Neither the beginning of time, nor of recorded time. But here, tonight, under cold skies, in a period so far gone as to be lost to history, the beginning of the story...

The frozen wastes of the world of Equus.

Snow fell hard upon the mountains, dusting the tops of the great stone edifices in white. Carried by flurries of the wind, the silver flakes howled through the valleys and massed on the slopes, gathering strength like a mustering army. In the light of the setting Sun, the fresh snowfields glowed a hearty red, deepening to the colour of blood as the shadows grew thick.

Shadows…

At the foot of these mountains, a circle of hewn stones, a henge, a gateway to the spirit world.

There upon a high and treacherous path, stood a maroon Reindeer. Young but exceedingly tall and well-built in stature, he stared out across the peaks and onto the spirit circle below, a deep frown upon his face. Across his strong body he wore a fur-lined red cloak, and a single mighty pickaxe was hooked onto a harness he bore.

“Sunflare…” he whispered. “Lady Mother..."

Here, on a peak amongst many in these windswept mountains, he stood before a cavern, sealed by rock and roots intertwined so tightly he could scarcely tell where one began and the other ended.

The Great Stag pressed a forehoof against the wall, tracing circles upon it. He leaned closer, whispering a few words in the language of the Old Ones.

“Come, open up your gates, Winter’s Hearth. Let a friend enter… and blessed be your days…”

The rock parted with nary a sound, the roots retreating. He stepped past the threshold. And there was light.

He found himself standing in a garden. The freezing cold of Winter was forgotten, the howling winds faded. Now, there was warmth, and light and life, safe from the desolate wastelands beyond. Greenery, from bushes to vines that crept up the walls, filled his sight. Glowing lanterns not unlike those of his native Adlaborn illuminated the sanctuary with a gentle yellow light.

Yet, here too something was wrong. The greenery, lush as it once was, had wilted since the last time he had come here. The garden’s spring had gone still, with old leaves turned just as dry falling upon the surface to break its tranquility.

And there, he saw her, sitting before cracked stone doors.

“This twilight epoch, this age of disillusion…” spoke the alabaster mare, contemplating the doors, her gaze hidden by a long, willowy mane of purest red, like a hearty apple in Summer. “I depart the world into an undiscovered country. Mine only companions, shadow and doubt.”

She raised her head a little, though she did not turn around.

“Albeit with some small promise of joy, too, it seems. I welcome thee, friend Sint, but I had rather thou hadst not come.”

Sint Erklass smiled sadly. “What manner of friend would I be, if I did not come to thine aid? Tell me, Lady Sunflare. What troubles thee so?”

It was not Sunflare who answered. From the corner of his eye, Sint witnessed a figure emerge from the shadows of the vines. Only it did not emerge into the light, so much as brought darkness with it, coalescing into shape by the shadows from whence it stepped, a figure of blackest shade.

°The Lady hath spoken, Guardian,° spoke the shadow, in a dark voice that reverberated deep into one’s soul, though it was sibilant, no more raised than a hush. °Her work is almost complete.°

“You… what doest thou mean, shadow?”

°Ask not of us,° the shadow replied, the darkness sounding almost disdainful. °Our purpose is not to enlighten thee, Guardian Of Joy.°

“Then what purpose doest thou hold? Thou art nought but a shadow,” Sint replied, wary and cautious, “stirring in the dark where none would tread. Why now dost thou emerge? Tell me, shadow-creature, whose light doest thou follow?”

The shadow’s eyes glowed, its only source of light. But it was a cheerless white, that appeared to consume all surrounding colour, akin to the negative reflection of those dark pits in the farthest corners of the heavens, once told by now long-departed astronomers to be the graveyards of stars. It spread its great, blackened wings, snarling with teeth like knives.

In the face of the shadow, Sint stood his ground.

“Now thou standst here, like a mockery of the Lady Mother herself–”

“Sint, please…”

Upon his shoulder, he felt the gentle touch of a wing. He turned, and his eyes beheld Lady Sunflare’s own, their wearied gaze aching him so. An alabaster hoof reached up, caressing his cheek. She had the gentlest touch, such as only the Lady Mother of the Land could provide. Her horn lit up, lifting one of last remaining flowers from this decrepit garden – a droopy little thing, yet alive, and of a comforting white.

White as the Lady’s coat at full glory. White as the purest snow.

“Snowdrop,” Sint said, to which Sunflare nodded. “Thou always hadst a fondness for them.”

“Of course. They are beautiful, humble little things, and bless your land come Winter’s beginning,” Sunflare said, beaming. Gently, she fixed it upon his ear. “Thine people look to thee for guidance, Sint, and I have faith in thee, always.”

Kind as her words were, the sorrow that lay beneath them did not escape Sint, that of an artisan forced to leave behind their work unfinished.

“A long path awaits them. I suppose it awaits all of us,” Sint answered. He steeled himself. “I shalt do what I can, take on whatever challenges lie ahead.”

Yet Sint could not help but steal a surreptitious glance towards the stirring shadow, even as Sunflare’s soothing stare was unwavering. An unknown force, drawn from darkness, now company to his oldest friend in her final journey.

He did not let the chill that washed over him show, as he returned his gaze upon the Lady.

“What of our duty to defend this world against the dangers without?” Sint asked. “What of the Krampus, or its accursed progeny? We cannot be certain of their whereabouts. To say nothing of the other, nameless horrors that fester and lurk in the dark places of the world…”

“Alas,” sighed Sunflare. “Mine Architect, too, evades my sight. Out of all who served the Krampus, her enchantments were ever the most subtle, the most beguiling… the most deceptive.”

Sint followed her eyes. Her gaze was fixed upon the stone vault, hidden by leaves and vines, etched with a language only the Old Ones knew.

“The construct which the Architect left thee,” Sint continued. “What shall become of this watcher?”

“I know not,” Sunflare replied wistfully. “The Architect’s works have set events in motion beyond mine control. Yet I have done what I can for it, and I know what I must do. Now, only fate knows what the future holds.”

She stood up to her full height, standing almost as tall as he. The shadow glided to her side, as Sint took a few steps back.

°It is time,° spoke the shadow.

“So it is,” said Sunflare. She looked back at Sint. “Our work will grace this world in due time. But mine time is at an end.”

“Must it be so?” asked Sint. “There is so much left to be done, so many Winters to pass.”

“I wish it were not so, old friend,” whispered Sunflare. “But fret not. For when the storm clouds part, the Sun will shine bright. Come now, even the rain brings its own blessings.”

She spread her wings, majestic and all-encompassing even when faded and dull. And for a moment, the garden looked as beautiful as it should have been, many colours dancing before Sint’s very eyes, the flowers rejuvenated, and none bloomed so lush as below Sunflare’s own forehooves.

Alas, it was only ephemeral. The bloom passed, its lifespan gone by in the blink of an eye, and the colour went out for good from the garden. Last to expire was the patch at Sunflare’s hooves, for the vibrance held on defiantly for a time, only to share in its company’s fate in the end, as it too withered and died.

Sunflare looked down upon the newly cracked, parched earth at her hooves, and sighed. Without further word, she raised one hoof a fraction off the ground, and by the peculiar mechanisms of her kind’s dexterity, there came away the gilded horseshoe she’d worn.

Only it was no longer truly gilded, Sint could see even at his height. One side had tarnished and cumulated the rust of centuries in but an instant, whereas divided by a line of perfect symmetry, its other side had retained the beautiful golden shine.

Delicately, Sunflare’s now bare hoof pushed the horseshoe towards Sint, an offering.

“The flower I gave thee shall die, in time, as all things do,” Sunflare whispered. “But if tended well, other flowers will grow to take their place. Keep mine horseshoe in memory of me, though. In reminder of the boundary between matter and spirit, mortal and immortal.”

Sint cast his gaze around the cavern, one last time. This mountain had been given a name by the Old Ones, once, a long time ago. He knew in his heart that, in his mind, he would only ever know it now as Foal Mountain. Someday, he hoped, the world would too.

“What if I should need thy guidance once more?” Sint asked finally, softly.

Tau Sunflare, the Lady Mother, smiled as a soft light began to envelop both herself and the shadow. “Trust in thineself, old friend, as I do. Live well.”

“I swear it to thee,” Sint said, his voice raising as the light enveloped the two, brightening until they could not be seen.

°Look to see us no more, Guardian of Joy,° the shadow said, its voice of wind and shades raised until it seemed to emanate from this mountain’s very heart of stone. °Never again shall we grace the paths of this world.°

And then, they were gone.

Sint Erklass, Guardian of Joy, closed his eyes and wept.

… Thus did he begin his path, and so, too, was he to meet the end at many a crossroads.

“Wait for the dawn. I will come for you.”

Such a beautiful lie. Another promise left unfulfilled.

Biting back growing pain in her hindlegs, the unicorn mare kept running, one forehoof wrapped ‘round a bundle. The lonely figure cast on the Moon above was their only companion, in the early hours of dawn. It hurt. So much of it hurt. Yet she had to run.

He’d come for their daughter at last. She knew not how the monster had found her after so long. Thrice as tall as a stallion was, with piercing blue eyes in a visage cold as the Frozen North or South, chiselled muscle beneath his armoured hide, there was little she could do as the hulking warlord had swatted her aside, cracking ribs and sending stars exploding in her vision.

Then she saw him pass by, holding a gem-topped staff, reaching for the crib with a large, furred, claw-like hand. Her pain had faded away, as she saw fiery red, and cast a mighty blow with her horn.

All of it, gone by in a blur. She had to run. Had to leave. Call for help.

The warlord was not alone, but neither was she. Her husband had come running back in time. He chose to stand his ground. Clumsy, foolish, stubborn as any earthpony, but so brave of him to hold back, to delay the enemy. He’d shouted at her to keep going, keep their child safe, to live till the dawn came as the Enchantress told them. That was the last she’d seen or heard of him, before she fled their little cottage.

Lightning had struck down, and as wood had splintered and rock shattered, she heard not a whimper from her husband anymore.

She ran, and she ran very far indeed, as far as she could, her daughter held in one forehoof, pressed tightly against her chest. She ran across hills and copses, by evergreen trees and hundred-year old oaks, crashing through the undergrowth, avoiding the open fields.

It hurt. Every breath drawn sent pain coursing through her. Cracked bone moved in unison with bruised muscles. Her hooves were chipped, bleeding against the soil. The pale blue light of her horn grew weaker still. Her lips bled from biting down her pain. But she had to go on. On, till the Sun rose upon these shores. Until the Enchantress could come.

The Enchantress. So many promises. So much to do. And she’d believed her grand words. Believed that her family would be home, after so many years. Believed that she, heir to the Moon, would set it all right, to bring the Two Sisters together, after so many centuries apart. But there was nothing here in the forest. No promises of grandeur, no hope, nothing, nothing but the falling leaves of Autumn...

“Please… please come back,” the mare whispered, pausing to draw a short breath that jolted her with stinging pain, “I just… I just want to go home.”

There was no use, nothing left to be done. The Enchantress’s promise was as distant as the waning Moon above. She was gone, gone like the wind, just like everyone else. What a fool she’d been to think otherwise. To hope otherwise.

When she could no longer walk steady, she collapsed, panting, chest heaving. All the healing spells she knew failed to come to her. Her reserves had dried up. Nowhere to run, nor hide. And the seashore was close. She prayed it was.

How she wished that she could scream her lungs out, to call for aid from any passerby. In this beautiful land, with the shade of olive trees and all warm colours of Autumn, surely someone would come. A fool’s hope. Wishes of a dying soul.

The Sun would rise soon, to cast the land under its light. But the pain in her chest and body and ringing head would not leave her so easily. Amidst her tears and quiet sobs, she heard it. Crying, feeble and soft.

She stopped, and unfurled the swaddled bundle.

Her eyes beheld her daughter. Such a beautiful child. Soft, rosey-pink coat that shimmered like crystal beneath the Autumn Moon. Tiny wings that were tucked tight beneath the cloth. A lush, colourful mane of purple and pink. And her eyes. By Orion above, such warm, kind eyes, like the Sun that reigned over Equestria far far away.

Those eyes were teary now. Her little one was crying. And it was all her fault.

“I’m sorry, Mi Amore,” the mare whispered, parting her little one’s mane, holding her tight. Her Mi Amore, bright and pink and sweet. “Your Papa and I... we wanted to take you home.”

Such a strange notion. A home her little one would never see. A home she would never see again. A dream as distant a thousand years from then and now.

Her daughter’s crying softened, fading as the mist around them did, and that was good.

“Shh, it’s alright… it’s alright… Mama’s here, Mi Amore, Mama’s… Mama’s here for you.”

She felt tiny hooves rub her muzzle. Mi Amore’s tears had disappeared. Only her smile remained. That innocent, toothy little smile. The child’s grip reached for her mother’s horn. How often she had laughed with delight to see the images her mother magically drew in the air. A little show and reprieve from days on the run.

Through the trees, rays of light filtered through. The morning mist had begun to dissipate. The Sun had come. And the mare allowed herself a flicker of hope stirring within. Perhaps the warlord awaited her in the woods, with all his underlings in tow and the storm he commanded. But so would the Enchantress. She would know where to find them.

One last gamble. One last gamble and her daughter would be safe. One last gamble and all would be right. She need only try. She looked down at her daughter. The child’s smile never left. So the mare answered with one of her own.

“You’ll see the Sun rise again,” she whispered, wiping away tears that had pooled, “maybe even the Moon. Live your life, Mi Amore. We love you.”

She pressed her lips against her daughter’s forehead, listening to Mi Amore’s joyous coos, feeling herself smiling through the persistent pain.

Gently, with voice clear as crystal, the mare began to sing.

“Join voices, every child, in Winter turned harsh and wild,” so the song went, a melody from the Frozen North. “There is only one solution, and we… we have made our r-r-resolution.”

She knew she’d butchered the song with her shaky voice. Her own mother had sung it so wonderfully every Winter. But one look at her daughter, her tender magenta eyes staring up at her in marvel and joy, hooves reaching out to caress her cheek, was enough.

The mare forced a smile, as warm as she could muster, and continued, running a forehoof through her daughter’s mane.

“We... shall lift our… spirits, to the sky, our h-h-hearts grow full, and our hooves rise up high.”

She felt it stir in her heart. A primal magic flowing within. It flowed out of her, water down a quiet stream, met halfway there by her daughter, cooing and giggling. The scent of roses and snowdrop filled the morning air.

A heart of crystal had shone bright in the Frozen North so many years ago, she remembered, to cleanse all fears and hold off the coming dark.

“Hooves cold, hearts warm. Cold hooves, warm hearts. Oh, Spring of Garden Hearts, we all... take... part…”

Perhaps little Mi Amore would set it right after all.

There, as the Autumn Sun rose past the horizon, its rays embracing them with a familiar warmth, the mare cast a radiant light.

History does not repeat, but it rhymes.

In what was once Adlaborn, Homeland of the Reindeer...

Ashes swirled in the air as the Queen trotted slowly through a dead forest, settling like grey snow on the living and the dead. Branches cracked beneath her hooves. Bodies, charred and smouldering, surrounded her, and she breathed it in, the scent of burnt flesh, smoke and charcoal filling her nostrils. A twinge of something like sadness flared through her mind, and was swiftly drowned in The Light.

‘I should not feel this way. This was a necessary sacrifice, however regrettable. He would never have understood what we have to do, in order to achieve, at last, the true Harmony we have long sought.’

She took another breath, looking around, and almost subconsciously, a soft smile lit up her face, her eyes aflame with something unreadable.

‘Do you see me now? Do you see me now, that I have laid waste to your friend? That I have cast down what he built? Am I unworthy now, Mother?’

Celestia, Queen of All Equestria, First and Only of Her Name, Sol Invictus and Empress of Europe, merely shook her head, before taking another breath. Behind her, she could hear the crunching of another set of hoofsteps, and she turned slowly, casting a gleaming eye on one of her many Guardsponies, an ugly, elderly greenmane of a pegasus, standing at attention.

“Captain,” she said. “You have a report?”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” the Captain said, bowing low and pressing his forehead to the sullied earth. “I bring the word of your Sword. Her task is done. Sint Erklass is dead.”

Celestia nodded slowly, and deep within her mind, felt a touch of relief that her own presence had not been required to deal the final blow. That, would have been… too much, no matter how necessary, how vital. After all her trials and sacrifices, she was entitled a moment of sentiment. Yes, sentiment, that’s what this was. Not cowardice, or regret…

Those whispers of doubt melted away under The Light, and she drew herself up with pride, as a conqueror should, her armoured raiment blazing bright as the break of day.

“Then we have completed our work here. We shall withdraw the division immediately and install the new garrison to ensure Adlaborn remains pacified. Return to Her Ladyship and inform her troops that they are granted three months’ leave for their successes.”

The Captain smiled crookedly, and saluted. “The survivors will be grateful to hear that, Majesty.”

Something sad and broken underscored his words. Celestia said nothing, turning away to her own thoughts. She heard the pegasus depart, but paid it no mind. Unless relevant, such little things were beneath her notice.

‘This distraction is ended. Now, our attention must once more fix on the primary threat. Witness me, Mother. Witness me burn the human race, as I have burned Adlaborn and the Guardian of Joy. Witness me tear down a broken world and rebuild a new one.’

Her face twisted into a scowl. For an instant, her mane flared, no longer a wispy gossamer of daybreak pastels, a spectrum of light beloved by all, but a brightness so burning as to make black spots dance before the eyes of any who might have beheld it.

‘And when you witness it, you who betrayed me, I hope you feel the pain I felt! I hope that you weep bitter tears at what you helped create! I hope you drown in them!’

I am the Scribe of the Stardust, the watcher of the world.

It is a lonely vigil. Yet it is the reason for which I am made. I have observed the world change, and I have let it continue on its course, while it is the Sun and Moon who spin around the world. To do more was not mine place.

But this… I feel this world’s pain. There is good in pain, I have learned this, when taken as a burden we choose for ourselves. Pain is a saddle not to be cast off lightly, pain is warning and memory… Sometimes, when it stays with us, there can be no greater sign of love everlasting.

Yet why would there be such suffering now, enough to reach me, bury itself in mine nerve endings? That is not natural. It is not a growing pain, it is a pain spreading, like from a mortal wound. Slowly though it creeps, the world shall die, and not know its agony until too late to stop it.

And if it takes another world down with it, then whatever doubt I had left is removed. I can watch no longer. I must act. For Equus, and for Earth.

I am awake.

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

Sledge115: Special thanks to Gay for Gadot, RDT, and RanOutOfIdeas for their feedback in the new segment, adapted from one of the prompts in the Bean Writing Group. Also special thanks to chris the cynic, for her help here and throughout :twilightsmile:

Vox will take you step-by-step regarding edits made for 2.1, the rewrites made, now the author's notes have been restored for the newer readers. We do hope you'll find it great, heh. Also included in the rewrites are, well, the old author's notes, for archival purposes.

Cheers!

VoxAdam: So begins Spectrum 2.1.

In ancient times, told old friends reunite atop a mountaintop, for the final time. Further into the future yet still in our story’s past, a loving mother spends her last moments protecting her child. And within a different refraction of the prism of existence, we are reintroduced to a familiar face, turned dark and twisted.

The first big change is in the title, going from a previously nameless prologue to the addition of the subtitle ‘This Burning World’.

Dialogue between Sint Erklass and Tau Sunflare is considerably altered.

Removal of concept and character; relatedly, the third participant in the conversation is no longer the OC Spirit of Possibilities, but the Pony of Shadows.

The Half-Gilded Horseshoe of Sunflare is introduced.

Addition of a scene; a flashback to Cadance’s mother fleeing for her and her daughter’s lives.

Removal of a scene; the opening monologue by Galatea. This was my own choice to remove as the writer on that scene, which I no longer liked.

The closing monologue by Galatea is reworded to better reflect her characterisation.

Spectrum 2.0 - May 26th 2017

TheIdiot: Hello everyone, this prologue was crafted thanks to our efforts on a rough process of looking over various ideas regarding history and lore. Thankfully, after varying efforts, something was reached and thus this nugget was made. As for what comes next… we’ll see what happens. Until next time all.

Act I ~ Chapter Four ~ Nightfall Over Boston

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot
I AM SUPREME! I AM THE TYRANT SUPREME! BOW BEFORE ME! BOW!

JedR
We interrupt your broadcast for this important message

DoctorFluffy
WOW SUCH MEMES VERY REGRET
(official Boston Advisor for this chapter!)

VoxAdam
Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum

Sledge115
Winter is Here

The Void

RoyalPsycho
I am your Redeemer

TB3

Kizuna Tallis
I can convince small children I’m a witch.

ProudToBe

Chapter Four
Nightfall Over Boston

* * * * *

“For centuries, Alderaan stood as a beacon of hope in the Republic. But the Empire came, and with one savage strike, brought Alderaan to her knees.”
— Jace Malcom, Star Wars: The Old Republic

In the Christian Year 2016, Earth made First Contact.

They did not arrive from the depths of space, however. In the mountainous country of Switzerland, near the city of Geneva, on a field above the great underground ring designed to pierce the mysteries of the universe, known as the Large Hadron Collider, a rift appeared. A gateway to another world.

Nor were the visitors squids, or lizards, as some had predicted. Instead, they were ponies.

They came promising harmony and friendship. They offered to aid mankind solve the problems which gnawed at it. Eventually, they granted the children of men refuge in their homeland of Equestria, at a price; to shed what made them human and be reborn as ponies.

It was to prove too steep a price, and the Tyrant Celestia would take more than she gave.

Out of the rift emerged a new entity. The Barrier. All-encompassing, all-consuming. Destined to choke an entire planet. Nothing borne of Man, be it wood, stone or flesh, crosses its path without being disintegrated.

Humans were now offered a choice that was no choice. Either die, or sell their souls to Conversion, and become less than sentient.

But what Celestia did not plan for, was that not all her people would follow in her madness.

May the Golden Lyre outshine the Tyrant Sun.

— From an early pamphlet by the Ponies for Human Life, author anonymous

~ New York City, USA ~ November 12th 2024 CE ~

Freedom Tower, the official nickname for the World Trade Center.

To a nation never known for its humility, this building was the pride of a people who, merely two decades before, had suffered a gut-wrenching attack at the hands of fanatics. Instead of breaking them, it had spurred on the people, inspired the leadership to build up its military and set out to encounter the forces of darkness…

… Which led into years of getting bogged down in pointless desert skirmishes, against an unseen foe, and widespread shaming from the international community.

But now, at least, events had validated that this buildup hadn’t been a total waste of time.

The new enemy was out in the open, and the same to all. All the warning the planet Earth had received was a portal in the centre of Europe, a few short years of peace with the Queen of Equestria, and the ever-growing concern about the Newfoals. Given the circumstances, humanity had risen to the challenge quite well.

Alas, one thing even the military of the United States of America could not overwhelm with superior firepower was the Barrier.

Cheerilee sighed as she waited for the elevators to reach the Level 5 basement floor. The First Gate to the PHL headquarters.

The doors opened and she found herself staring at three .50 caliber machine-gun nests and a twenty-yard ‘no man’s land’ between them. Two of these heavy guns stood on either side of the steel doors at the far end of the First Gate. The third hung over the entrance, nested in a heavily-fortified perch of stone and concrete. In the spartan space before her, there stood several gas-masked Army enlists, rifles firmly in hand and at the ready. Their presence served merely to let any visitors know they were not alone.

Keeping her eyes trained on them, she trotted forward resolutely.

“Password?” one guard, a woman, asked.

Cheerilee drew a sharp breath. This was always the hardest part. “Celestia is a... big stupid doodoohead,” she said, stifling a giggle.

A snort was heard from one of the guards, yet no one else said anything. Because Newfoals could neither swear nor insult the Tyrant, passphrases always contained either a swear or an insult. Originally, passphrases had contained a profane slight against the Tyrant, but these had increasingly gravitated toward the sexual, the misogynistic, or the misogynistically sexual, and Cheerilee had been forced to put her hoof down. Now the insults were rather more restrained, and they were amusingly childish in an entirely different – far more wholesome – way.

The enlist nodded dutifully. “Miss Cherry, a pleasure as always. God, I love our passwords.”

“Hello, Ramona,” she replied, trying to sound light-hearted. “They…” she tried to force a hint of joy into her voice. “They do add a bit of fun to the job.”
j
Evidently, something in Cheerilee’s voice didn’t convince the enlisted woman. “Ah, Mamí, I’ve seen that look before. Which puto is carrying the news this time?”

“Same puto that tried to turn himself into a shishkebab, yesterday afternoon.”

Cheerilee sighed to herself. She walked to the massive steel doors and placed her face before the scanner. The scanner let out a positive ‘ping’ and the heavy doors slowly began to slide open.

“El Doctor, eh?” Ramona smiled before stepping aside. "Best of luck then, chica.”

“Thank you.”

When the United Nations Allied Command had first proposed their aid to Ambassador Heartstrings in assisting her, an unshakeable pacifist, to set up the military arm of her organisation, they had chosen New York City’s new-fangled underground bunkers as their base location. A decision shrouded in secrecy, to keep the people above unaware of the growing resistance group. The real reason New York had been chosen, a central metropolis to the end, was due to the brimming information brought in by refugees from around the world.

Cheerilee kept trotting forward across the sterile concrete hallway, coming to a drab train car. The Second Gate.

“Identification, please,” droned a synthetic voice.

Her answer was almost equally mechanic, by now. “Cheerilee Cherry, PHL ID N°001, Code: Unity.”

She watched the walls warily – and for good reason. At the Second Gate, like in that classroom game her pupils had loved playing when they thought she wasn’t around, the floor might as well have been lava. The structure’s original design had been provided by an over-excitable human with a desire to ensure anyone sneaking in without permission would die painfully.

Even now, Cheerilee had not forgotten the manner in which the Ambassador had talked said engineer into constructing a system that started off ‘light’ and gradually built up towards the Big Guns. This was under the proviso of ‘putting a pin in it’ for the more radical approach in case the buildup failed. Of course, in typical Lyra fashion, the unspoken idea was that, hopefully, the biggest of the Big Guns need never be used.

At the same time that Cheerilee stood here envying such idealism, she had to marvel at the ingenuity of a brilliant mind guided by a tender heart.

Out of the fifteen different hindrances to hostile progress, each positioned on a gradually rising scale, from the non-lethal to the cruel and unusual, the one she still found the most pleasing were the nozzles programmed to appear in the walls and flood the carriage with the non-lethal and porous, but motion-inhibiting substance which the grunts had nicknamed ‘Repulsion Gel’. Apparently, the name had come about after someone learnt it was a carry-over from a failed dietetic pudding substitute made in Equestria.

Like so much else, this was but one of the many, many references to human popular culture which Cheerilee had learnt, going on, that she’d have to expect throughout her time here. What self-respecting teacher would she be, after all, if she weren’t in charge of controlling a rowdy lot who spoke in all kinds of codes she’d spend half her life deciphering...

“Access granted. Welcome, Miss Cherry.”

With a deep sigh of relief, she boarded the train car. “Hotel Quebec,” she ordered, letting out a groan as she sat down. She had been on her hooves for far too long and without nearly enough sleep.

“Acknowledged. ETA, ten minutes.”

Yawning, Cheerilee slowly began to doze off as the train rumbled on to its destination, her mind a-wandering…

“What was it like, Grandfather?”

The warmth of a fireplace, a mug of hot chocolate in your grasp…

“It was cold, yes, unforgiving to the touch. Those were difficult days, when men made beasts of themselves. But home is home, little duchess, and I always carried a part of it with me wherever I went, for as the saying goes, there’s no place like it.”

… the pleasant winds, the cooling touch of snow upon your cheek …

“I want to go home.”

… the Midnight Sun, the icy bay…

“Oh, don’t you worry about that, Anastasia. You will, you will, soon… but not yet.”

… the bristling pine leaves, and the light touch of grass on your toes.

Yes… wouldn’t you want to see your home, once more?

~ Boston, USA ~

Ana woke up, gasping softly and disoriented.

Strange dreams again, and yet they felt so comforting, tempting and inviting all the same...

The ring of the bell, loud and shrill, called throughout the hallways and the barracks of the underground compound, its echo bouncing off the edges of her bunk-bed. Every morning, every evening, ever the same refrain, for almost a year. And in the years before that, not even this reminder, harsh though it felt, that she was still alive.

The young woman rubbed her eyes, brushing away strands of her tangled strawberry-blonde hair from her eyes. She’d been granted a full day’s sleep. It still never felt like nearly enough, not when she woke to this harsh, unnatural light. The same light, at all hours, except for those hours assigned by the Powers-That-Be to give their grunts some reprieve.

Was it morning, or evening? Evening. Yes, that’s what it was.

‘Helvete, I’ve… really got to cut these bangs,’ Ana thought, yawning. ‘Standard military requirement…’ And her tucked-away ponytail definitely wasn’t up to standards, but Heaven help anyone willing to check everyone’s haircut, or carry a scissor at hand.

Time was of the essence, and any second lost was time given to the relentless enemy, that’s what Tanner always said, every morning, every evening.

Even waking up early was no guarantee of saving time, for she still fell behind compared to her roommates. Whereas they were standing at the ready, she struggled with putting on her woollen socks, shrunken and dulled from hours and hours of reglementary washing. Still, she was fortunate enough to even be among them.

After all, not every soldier got to be a full-blown agent of Lyra Heartstrings’ crowning achievement.

‘Well… guess we’ll have to make do with what we have, heh,’ she thought giddily, as she went on and lined up with the others for inspection.

And if the past few nights had taught her anything, tonight was going to be a long one.

~ New York City, USA ~

It was only after the Barrier had consumed most of Europe that the Ponies for Human Life had openly announced their presence to New York. Thus had began a massive excavation under the City That Never Sleeps, linking the bunkers to the tunnel systems beneath. Subways closed for a time, but eventually reopened with new guidelines about the changes. They were now used to rapidly deploy troops in high-speed train cars, such as the one Cheerilee now rode, across the city.

With the Barrier itself now just off the coast, the last refugees had arrived months ago, people signing up to fight no matter the country they came from. Training was fast but tough, with UNAC drilling into recruits on what was expected of them, with PHL ponies actually volunteering to stand in as Imperial Guards or Newfoals to let the recruits know what to expect in the fight.

Cheerilee jerked awake as the train car screeched to a halt at the station.

“Welcome to the Third Gate. Have a nice day,” the synthetic voice echoed over the speaker.

Shaking her head, she jumped off her seat, moving onward to a pair of very old and rusty bunker doors. But instead of entering that way, she turned left and walked up to the wall, to push a seemingly random sequence of bricks.

The wall parted and allowed her entry.

A rather devious trap, since the bunker doors were sealed shut, and the room beyond filled to the brim with poison gas. Any Newfoal who managed to breach this far without proper knowledge of the hidden door was in for a death sentence. A slow, agonising one, as many people had come to wish upon them. Not the noblest of sentiments, true, yet these were volatile times. More than ever, you needed someone to hold on to, keep you grounded…

“Where are you, Alex?” Cheerilee whispered. “Dammit, we need you.”

She tried to calm herself. It would not do to lose her composure. Not now, not until she had some measure of privacy in this cramped, stuffy place, and certainly not in front of the young, slightly pasty-faced man in uniform who stood at attention, rifle in hand, to escort her down this last lap.

‘Maybe about sixteen... no... fifteen. Too young to fight... but we are getting low on willing fighters.’

“Ma’am,” the teen nodded, eyes looking straight ahead. “The meeting you called for is about to begin.”

“Thank you, soldier,” Cheerilee nodded. “For the record, would you kindly provide a briefing on the full list of those in attendance?”

“Uh… let me see,” the teen said nervously, whipping out his iPad. “From what I’ve got here, that’d be, in order of precedence, Captain Spitfire of the Rogue Bolts 1st Air Battalion, Lieutenant Scratch of the Blue Fire 1st Strike Battalion, Doctor Time Turner of Research and Development, Lady Cadenza of the Department of Psychological and Spiritual Well-Being, Dame Moondancer of the Department of Cultural Preservation, Mister Gladmane of the Department of Equestrian Liaisons, and Miss Nectar, filling in for Public Relations, all present and at order. Captain Thunderwing of the Stampede Fleet is linked up via satellite, together with Admiral Kleiner.”

For a while, the two walked in silence, the only sound that of his heavy boots treading upon the concrete. Soon enough, though, the teen broke the silence with an all-too-patently obvious fake cough.

“Ah, sorry about that, ma’am,” he said hastily. “Is… is there any sign of Captain Reiner?”

Cheerilee only lowered her head, ears flattening against her temples. “No.”

“Oh.”

“I wish I had more to say,” Cheerilee clarified, rubbing her head with her right hoof, in mid-stride. “At the moment, we can only be thankful and pray that Captain Reiner isn’t in the Tyrant’s disgusting hooves.”

“Just MIA,” the young man snorted, shaking his head. “With all due respect, ma’am, the latest reports–”

“I know what the reports said,” Cheerilee cut him off tersely, sounding more like a disapproving teacher than a commanding officer. It still had the same results, as the teen froze up involuntarily. “I know he went missing while on a private mission, and that none of his escort team reported back either. Rest assured, we’ve got our top agents looking for him up and down Equus.”

Of course, none of them had any information on it. Queen Celestia hadn’t made a public declaration of having killed Alex, and none of their allies, be they griffon, zebra or Equestrian Resistance, had any information.

So had Celestia or some agent just vapourised him? No, that wouldn’t make sense. Every possibility Cheerilee considered had too many little logical holes for her to believe. Which left her coming up with more and more options, each more horrible than the last.

They reached a set of iron double doors. Cheerilee reached up to push one of the doors open, but a new, hesitant question gave her pause.

“Is there any chance he could still be alive... after all this time?” The teen lowered his head at his question. “It’s just… we know a human can’t so much as step foot in Equestria without every Guard unit in the area knowing about it and teleporting to their location. At best.”

Cheerilee said nothing. She was afraid that the teen was right, afraid of the implications. Afraid that all they would find of Alex would be the Newfoal that they’d made of him, or his mutilated corpse. She turned back and looked at the teen before her, and all she saw was a young man struggling to breathe, ash consuming his form as he reached out to her, his eyes begging her to save him.

“Ma’am?”

Without even shaking her head, the former schoolteacher willed herself to banish the image from her mind.

“He’s alive,” said Cheerilee. “I know it. I don’t know how, but I do know that he wouldn’t want us worrying and acting like a bunch of chickens with our heads cut off. Right now, we all need to focus on stopping the Tyrant’s armies from advancing.”

She gave him a big warm smile. The teen gave one tinged with nervousness in return.

“Yeah, of course you’re right. Besides,” he exclaimed happily, “those zombies can’t get reinforcements now! Every Newfoal killed is one that won’t get replaced so easily, not by a portal or by potion! We can stop this, I know we can.”

Cheerilee nodded, before finally pushing the door open and proceeded inside. Then she stopped, and turned back to smile at him again. “That’s the spirit. Thank you for escorting me to the conference room, Private… uh…”

The teen snickered good-naturedly as Cheerilee struggled with the name on his coat. Given where her head was located relative to his waist, it nearly was impossible for her to read the label unless she stood several steps away. “Shepard. Private Adrian Shepard, ma’am.”

“Thank you, Private Shepard. My, wasn’t that embarrassing...” Yet despite her words and the reddening of her cheeks, Miss Cheerilee was glad to cause some level of merriment in this bleak period of history.

“You’re welcome, ma’am.” The teen saluted her. She returned the salute, and he walked off.

After watching him march back down the corridor for a little, Cheerilee entered the conference room.

* * * * *

For so vital a place, the PHL room of conference was average in appearance.

Ten chairs, seven of them occupied, were neatly cleaned and organised, the round table was filled with paperwork and reports from various foreign national forces. Yet it was a room of great importance, since all information vital to the PHL passed through here before it was known to anyone else. She had lost count of the many, many sleepless nights spent in here, either sorting paperwork or consulting the large plasma TVs aligning the length of the walls, two of them dedicated to the Blue Force Tracker streaming the current movement of military personnel, along with various surviving news networks or information from the Internet.

“No child should ever become a soldier…”

The unexpectedness of his voice nearly scared the coat off Cheerilee. Standing next to the half-open door, a certain tan-brown stallion had apparently witnessed the entire exchange between her and the teen, keeping silent all the while.

“But desperate times call for desperate measures,” he followed, every syllable laced with bitter sarcasm.

“Hello, Time Turner.”

He dipped his head in polite acknowledgement. “Miss Cheerilee Cherry. Come, sit sit sit, please. Me and the ladies have plenty to tell.”

“Who’re you calling a ‘lady’?” scoffed Vinyl Scratch from her seat. “Maybe that’s the right term for Dancer over here, but I’m sure none o’ the rest of us deserve to be treated with such fancy-schmancy terms, not after all the shit that’s gone down.”

“Vinyl,” Moondancer chided her gently. “That’s no way to speak in front of a teacher.”

“I’d have you give me thirty for that back at the Academy,” said Spitfire, but the former Wonderbolt’s jocular tone made it clear she wasn’t serious.

Lady Cadance, the resident Princess-in-Exile, kept quiet, as she was wont to do these days. Yet there was a twinkle in her eye as she observed them, a small group tied by small bonds.

Pineapple Nectar – or ‘Pina,’ for short – said nothing at all. She just sat there waiting, immobile, the sharp olive-green of her mane, as always, falling over one eye like a willow curtain.

Nodding to them all in quiet greeting, Cheerilee took her seat at the round table. That now made eight occupied chairs. A Texai telepresence device had been placed on the ninth. Thunderwing’s face, dominated by his striking blue eyes against his dark blue fur, filled the viewscreen, making it technically nine.

The tenth, facing the entrance, which Cheerilee sat to the right of, was always kept empty. Some time ago, a seal had been carved into its back, a golden lyre with three strings.

It helped all of them to remember, to feel a little more as if its occupant had never left them...

She tore her gaze away from that chair, returning to the fog of the here and now.

“Hello, is this thing on?” Thunderwing asked, his screen crackling a little. He brushed away a bang of his yellow-and-white mane, somewhat messier than usual. He looked like he was kept only marginally awake through the power of caffeine fumes. “Sorry, I’m filling in for Rebecca here. It’s, uh, very late on this end, and she’s still handling the other officers.”

“Hearing ya loud and clear, buddy,” Vinyl chirped. “Busy day?”

“Oh,” he sighed, “you’ve no idea.”

“Is there anyone missing?” Cheerilee asked, per formality.

“Well, my eldest daughter mentioned she might stop by,” Turner said, “but she’s… busy.”

“That’s one word for it,” Vinyl muttered.

“And there are other officials waiting for a more formal debrief,” Spitfire added, “but they’re waiting until the meetings with the big-wigs later on. With the Barrier at its present location, command’s all about planning our next move.”

“Whatever move we can make,” Turner said. “Options are still more limited than I’d like.”

“Who’re the ‘big-wigs’ coming to the meeting later?” Cheerilee asked.

Vinyl snorted. “Who isn’t coming to that fucker. Oooh, that’s not counting the entire UNSC. Kaine, Putin, Mélenchon and then some. Vanderbilt and Guterres are going all out for this one. And of course, all the shit we’ve had to swallow since the presidential elections... ” She took a big gulp from her hip-flask, then belched. “Yeah, it’s gonna be another goddamn Game of Thrones name-check. Tedious as hell, if you ask me.”

“That’s just the ones present at New York, right?” Thunderwing interjected. “We got Admiral Chirkov, Admiral Jinlong and of course, our very own Rebecca on this side of the world. Premier Jinping should be joining us shortly after, same with Prime Minister Javid. What about Admiral Hill?”

“He’ll be attending with Brigadier Merrick,” Turner affirmed. “They’re the... ah, lemme see, second or third group to arrive, from the Falklands.”

“Noted,” said Thunderwing, “and we still have no word on Minister Odonera attending or not.”

“Is he considering it?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Then count him in, Cap’n, you never know,” Vinyl finished. “Haven’t heard from Brigadier-General Gardner for a few days, and he said he’d be attending!”

Cheerilee gave a wan smile. “Then that’s everyone,” she said. “Except for Captain Reiner.”

This cast a pall on the whole of the gathering.

“Mister Gladmane, no word yet?”

“I’m afraid not, ma’am,” Gladmane said reluctantly. “If my sources are anything to go by, wherever he is, it certainly isn’t Equestria.”

“Which we should feel glad about, I suppose,” Vinyl muttered.

“I agree, ma’am,” Spitfire added, sounding practical. “These whole shenanigans with Alex Reiner remain a headscratcher, but until further notice, our best course of action would be to do as Reiner himself instructed us. Proceed with protocol, maximum efficiency.”

“Well, we had best begin,” Cheerilee willed herself to say. “We don’t want to disappoint the human officials when they show up.”

There were mutters of agreement from all around. On her cue, each of them opened the heavy black dossier to their right, each at the same page, a by now well-ritualised process. Even Thunderwing, who had no dossier at this table, kept one on his person specially for it.

“Now then,” Cheerilee coughed, “to our first order of business. Dancer, how are we faring in keeping what’s left of this world’s history from falling into oblivion?”

“You know how it is,” Moondancer said, tapping her dossier, not without a solemn weariness. “Same as it’s been since the day we initiated Operation Exodus at the Temple Mount. No news I’d tell you today would sound any different from yesterday’s. Whenever we know the Barrier is but a hundred miles from impacting an area, after we’ve done what we can to evacuate the remaining populace and grab all the local resources, sometimes, we’ve got time left to save the artefacts. Even if we have to chip straight into bedrock to do it–”

“You said you wished to talk about something,” Cheerilee reminded her.

“Why, yes, Cheerilee...” Moondancer mumbled, wavering in her flow. A mare of nervous tics, she pushed up her glasses. “I… I had a number of things to talk about, actually. Another relics shipment gone missing in the port of Auckland before it could reach Last Resort, for example. Given that it contained a number of articles from Uttar Pradesh, we’re suspecting either long-range work by the Indian Mujahideen, or the Hindutva wing of the HLF…”

“That’s bad, but nothing out of the ordinary,” Cheerilee interrupted her. “Sorry,” she added, at the pained expression on the history-lover’s face. “I know how much this means to you. Except when you met me in my office last night, you mentioned Time Turner had uncovered… how did you put it?”

Turner was fumbling with a piece of electronic equipment laid out on the conference table.

“Ah. That.” Moondancer sighed, realising there was no stalling. “Well, everyone, I advise you brace yourselves. During one of his routine radio scans last night, the Doctor came across a transmission which got him... hooked, is the easiest way to describe it. I happened to be by his side at that hour, and so I got to hear. It’s…” She shuffled her papers neatly, looking no-one in the eye. “I wouldn’t balk at calling it a most haunting epitaph for mankind.”

A ripple of unease ran through the room.

“You may want to listen to these, Cheerilee,” Turner said. He pulled up a set of data logs from next to his seat, and placed them before him.

“Turner. You were up all night? I told you to get some rest…” Cheerilee warned him, eyes narrowing.

“Wait, before you go on, I found this transmission being sent out into deep space. Very high-tech broadcast, frankly, almost a full twenty years ahead of its time. Originated from Crowe Labs Central, in Rio de Janeiro, I believe.”

He pulled out a very old boombox and inserted a tape cassette inside.

“Wow,” gasped Cheerilee. “That still works?”

As far as she knew, this thing was ancient compared to the tech she had grown accustomed to seeing on Earth.

“Heh, I may have modified it a bit. Plus, who said this old girl needed to retire?” Turner chuckled as he gently patted the old radio.

Cheerilee answered bluntly. “The 80s.”

But the eccentric stallion just scoffed. “Bah! Time makes no difference to me! I could live through the 80s forever, if I so wished. Except that would cause issues, given that I am a pony. Plus running into myself might be a problem too…” He shrugged and hit the play button. “Thoughts for another time, now listen.”

Around the table, the nine of them listened to a man’s words from halfway across the world.

“Is this thing working? Testing, testing. This is Isaac Acevedo…”

~ Boston, USA ~

Ana’s trip to the mess hall, as usual, passed by rows upon rows of propaganda posters plastered on the walls of the hallways, each of a varying quality that were either a hit or a miss with the troops – depending on the reigning mood, of course.

UNITE, read one brightly-coloured, strategically-placed poster.

Conveniently situated between doors where the hallway passed by the pony detachment posted on the base, it featured a nondescript pony and human officer rendered in a highly geometric style, raising their hoof and fist, against a backdrop of Luna’s Moon.

Next to it was a poster made from Johnny C. Heald’s famous photo from the First Battle of Montreal, featuring the HLF defector Viktor Kraber, heavily wounded and standing next to the infamous PHL soldiers Yael Ze’ev and Heliotrope.

Now is not the time to fight over the scraps. Our future lies together.

‘At least those are encouraging,’ Ana thought wistfully, though she shuddered at the thought of Viktor Kraber as she entered the mess hall. The man was said to have all the ferocity of a wolf, and the appetite.

And one needed an appetite, she reflected as she took her tray and her place in a long, long line of recruits waiting for their portion, to force down most of what was on offer these days. Except that wartime tended to work one up, many times over.

As it finally came her turn, and the sullen-looking grey mare behind the counter ladled a portion onto her tray, Ana knew she’d eat what she was given, yet on most days, it would only take the edge off her hunger.

Of course, rations here were less wholesome than in her dreams. Still, caught between the Barrier and the Second American Civil War, she would have to make do with MREs and bitter coffee. It was mercy enough that it wasn’t sawdust. Or worse.

On the plus side, the mess hall wasn’t as dirty nor crowded as her previous station’s, but nonetheless, Ana had to carefully look around the bustling, low-ceilinged room for any empty or half-occupied tables.

‘Not there, not there, too dirty, not there...’

“Excuse me, Miss, I do believe you were searching for a place?” interrupted a familiar voice, speaking in a pseudo-regal tone. “Look no further. Your seat of honour awaits, Little Duchess.”

Ana’s gaze flickered towards a table not two metres to her left.

Even as she approached, Ana saw her turquoise-blue eyes reflected against the man’s tinted goggles, most of his brown hair covered beneath his medical officer’s cap. But it was a welcome sight, for her friend had returned from his seemingly endless shifts in the nearby field hospital. A medic’s work was never done, after all.

“Well, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” Harwood said, gingerly removing his goggles to reveal a pair of green eyes. His sharp features were dented by eyebags and careworn lines that belied his age, but nevertheless, he returned Ana’s smile. “Good evening, Ana.”

“Heh, your evening, not mine. Long shift, I presume? You, uh, kind of messed up the time, again,” she said, setting down her tray opposite Harwood’s. “You look like, I don’t know, like you’ve been through Hell. In the hospital. I hope it wasn’t. Was it?”

Harwood, even when seated, was nearly a full head taller than she was. He leaned slightly forward to meet her eye-to-eye.

“See if you can keep track of the time when you haven’t seen the Sun in hours, my dear. Nothing too bad, today,” he said, clearing his throat. “A few flesh wounds, cuts and bruises, but anything heavier and it’s up Doc Kessler’s alley, thank God. Christ, I’m parched.”

“Ah, well,” Ana replied with affected calm, stretching her arms as Harwood drank his coffee. “It is what it is. But a day well spent?”

“Define ‘well spent’,” Harwood said dryly. “I’ve already had another Sarge get all pedantic today about how I used those very words. So how would you put it?”

“Uh, not-dying?”

“That’s a stretch.”

“Hey, at least Tanner isn’t complaining again,” said Ana, folding her arms. “These days, that has to be a plus, right? Guy never shuts up, ever since we left. I still like him, though.”

“Point taken, Little Duchess,” he said teasingly, earning him a scowl from Ana.

“Uh-uh, not here, Har,” Ana said, taking a bite out of her ration of bread. Bland, as expected, and not a sprinkle of salt at hand. But maybe that was just American white bread. Still, not her lucky day. “Anyways, Har, haven’t seen you here in a while, what have you been up to? Anything good? Anything bad? A little bit of both?”

“Ah, nothing new or exciting. Just fallout from the elections.”

Harwood gestured his thumb towards the overhanging flatscreen a few feet away. The sound was muted as usual, but the news-ticker and the regularly-appearing checklists of info told Ana the essentials. She let out a sigh.

Apparently, news of who was to be President-Elect had been received with acceptance in most States… with a few exceptions. Reports were coming in of riots in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas, of whole districts burnt down in certain towns, and local martial law doubled down in an attempt to stem the furor.

‘Two hundred million guns are loaded,’ she thought, recalling an old song. She wondered what it had applied to, back in the day. Now, with a world gone mad, it remained relevant as ever. ‘Satan cries, take aim…’

He shook his head. “Would you believe it, we’re on the brink, and there are still idiots calling for a recount, based solely on her being one of ‘those people’,” he sighed. “Here we are, equally worthless in the eyes of the Tyrant, and even that isn’t enough for them to get some bloody perspective. Mind you, it’s her opponent I feel sorry for. It must feel pretty rough, knowing you came so close to being the last ever President of the United States. A milestone for the history books… Anyway, she ought to be quite the departure from Mister Kaine. If she ever gets to set foot in office, that is.”

“She was a lawyer, wasn’t she?” Ana remarked curiously. “And her husband... ah, I really ought to catch up on events sooner or later, been years since I saw her. People come and go in politics.”

“The voters don’t, but aye, bit of an unexpected victory, this one is. I suppose with these lower turnouts, people will be talking about her for a while, owing to reasons I’d rather not comment on,” Harwood said, with a poorly-disguised cough. “Still, a minority woman at the White House, of course, is not something you’d have expected even five years ago.” He grinned wryly. “Must be the end of the world.”

“You can say that again, heh.” Ana agreed brightly, sipping her coffee. She gagged. It was a lot more bitter than she was used to. “Helvete! This one’s expired!”

“Tastes better with a cube or two, love. You’d be surprised at how long it can last past expiration these days,” Harwood said, offering his cup. She accepted it gracefully, and pondered if she should ask him who exactly provided the coffee on his side of the barracks. “Doesn’t it make you feel surprised Kaine signed off on retiring soon, Ana? I always thought he’d pull a Roosevelt.”

“Nei, thought he’d continue too. Bit of a load he’ll be shoving in. I suppose he’ll be guiding her in the transition? War’s not coming to a close anytime soon. I wonder if he did plan for it in the end, peacetime and all. However long it’ll take...”

It was a grim reminder. Even as she looked at the image of the famous President-Elect, smiling brightly alongside her no-less-famous husband, Ana wondered what could have passed through her mind, once the results came in.

‘She’ll be inheriting a graveya– no, no, not, not now, Ana, not something you should be thinking of now, stop it. We’ll pull through. She’ll see to it. We’ll pull through.’

“Say, how was your shift, last night?” Harwood spoke up, snapping Ana out of her troubled train of thought. “Frieda’s not too much of a handful, I hope?”

“Wh– oh, well,” Ana said, clearing her throat. “It went well enough, I guess. Nothing to report, unless you’d like to count Frieda asking for more coffee as an incident. You know how she is, Har.”

“I can scarcely imagine how you can last for so long, without rest, without reward,” Harwood deadpanned, with a sip of his coffee. “How do you do it? I’d love to know your secret, Ana. How do you do it without coffee?”

“Not unless you show me your secret first,” Ana replied, smirking. She’d always known when he was hiding something, based on the smallest movement, the smallest adjustment of his fingers. And it was clear as day, he was hiding something quite special indeed. “Come on, Har, speak up. Might as well tell me before bedtime.”

Harwood smiled. It wasn’t quite that smug grin he usually wore, and she suspected he was rather giddy about something. She was right.

“Aha,” she exclaimed, cheerfully. “It’s that knights-thing you’ve been all excited about!”

“Your accent is showing again. Yes, the ‘knights-thing’ indeed, fair lady. And no, it’s not that exciting, Ana,” he replied, though his smile still betrayed his emotions.

“Feh, whatever, come on, show it!” Ana insisted, clasping her hands in anticipation.

“Patience is a virtue for marksmen, you know,” he commented, rummaging through his coat pockets. He produced a wrinkled sheet of paper that, if Ana’s eyes weren’t deceiving her, bore the signature of Major Stephan Bauer.

“It’s genuine,” Ana said, firmly, cutting off Harwood’s explanations. “Yeah, I’ve seen his signature before, back in Jakarta. Don’t ask, long story, as you would say. It was when we met the Dragons of the East, heh, remember that? I miss them, really should get Yon-Soo’s autograph. Maybe someday I’ll tell you more.”

“Ah, don’t worry, we’ll meet ‘em again soon, call it a hunch. Anyways, glad to have a third party confirm it,” Harwood replied, quite sincerely. “I got it in the mail this morning. A pen-and-paper letter, delivered by hand. Probably meant to come in sooner, but they got held up over at New Hampshire since, last week? You know how elections are. Anyway, here we are, and a right proper letter it is.”

Major Bauer, as befitted his reputation as the so-called ‘Knight of Germania’, stood as the chief proponent for a close-quarters-combat unit, a loose order of what could only be called twenty-first-century knights integrated into the UNAC forces. It could have been considered an anachronistic sight, until you realised that the enemy had a massive close-quarters advantage. Too often, soldiers had been cut down by Guardsponies simply because combat knives and rifles couldn’t match trained sword-play and armour.

And Harwood, as it were, would join their ranks.

“Well?” Harwood said, clearing his throat. He seemed a tad nervous.

“I…” Ana said, slowly tracing her finger down each line, mind abuzz with of course, excitement… and worry. The unit, colloquially known as the Teutonic Knights due to its leader’s origins, had a reputation for high-risk, high-reward combat most of humanity would never dare to even attempt. Nevertheless, when she looked up to him, she beamed.

“I’m happy. For you, I mean,” she said. “It’s what you always dreamed of, right, Sir Harwood? All those knightly concepts... I mean, it’s not every day your childhood dream will come true, least of all during an apocalyptic war or something.”

“Hah, of course,” he said bashfully. “‘I’m still assigned to your fireteam, you know. So I suppose you haven’t seen the last of me. You’re not the only one getting a fancy ol’ part-time job, you know.”

“Yeah…” Ana replied. A thought dawned on her. “But, I… we’ll be missing our medic.”

“Ah, don’t worry,” Harwood said reassuringly, with an airy wave of his hand. “I’d still be your medic, the swords only come out in desperate times, extra feature as they say. ‘Sides, I can teach you a few things with this pair of hands, aye?”

“‘Do no harm’,” Ana recited by rote. She laughed. It was the only way she could stave off her blush. “And I don’t think I can. Not after, well, Frieda told me not to. Don’t ask.”

“Eesh. ‘Do no harm’, yep,” Harwood agreed, with another sip of his coffee. “I’d still be in need of an assistant at times, however. You up for it? When well, you’re not working down at the lab, ‘course.”

“Would I?” Ana asked sarcastically, smirking. “Yes, yes I would be.”

“Fantastic. Though, I’m not sure Tanner would be quite–”

Harwood’s reply got interrupted by the mess hall doors opening, and the sound of heavy boots pounding onto the ceramic floor. A hushed silence fell over the room, and without turning Ana knew who had just entered the room.

“Speak of the devil,” Harwood muttered.

Captain Arthur Tanner, or ‘Art’ as some might call him, was one of Harwood’s old compatriots in the SAS. Ana had fought alongside him throughout their time in Indonesia, and though he may not have had her aim nor Harwood’s dexterity, he was an effective soldier, something even Sergeant Jaka had admitted.

‘I wonder how Jaka’s doing, down in New York… guarding the conference must be quite the exhilarating task. Especially if Hanne’s there reporting on it. I should ask him.’

Ana watched Tanner move to position himself in the centre of the room. His steely blue gaze, imposing height and stern face demanded attention by their very nature, and before long, all eyes were upon him.

“Alright, people,” Tanner began. “Situation’s this. For the moment, the majority of the enemy force has withdrawn to their rally positions behind the Barrier, like they always do. Token units, mostly composed of light infantry and Newfoal militia, have been left to harry our groups. For the time being, we shall remain on alert status, but we are not preparing for any immediate offensives.”

There was a murmur throughout the room. That had to be good news, right?

“Don’t mistake this,” Tanner said. “This doesn’t mean we can rest on our laurels. Tactical projections indicate that this might be the prelude to something big.”

“What kind of big, sir?” someone piped up.

Tanner scowled. “We don’t know. Anything from a major infantry offensive to another Fillydelphia-class incursion has been brought up. We just don’t have an adequate read on the situation yet.”

“Does this have anything to do with Captain Reiner’s disappearance?” said someone else.

There was a sudden hush. That rumour had been going round for a few hours now, but there’d been no official word.

This did not go down well with Tanner, who looked sternly at the speaker. “The disposition of Captain Reiner is not up for discussion.”

“But if they’ve got him...” the impudent soul dared.

“If they had him, we’d be screwed already, and the Solar Bitch would be crowing about it,” Tanner said scornfully. “Think it through, trooper. Has she ever been subtle?”

No one had an answer to that.

“Unfortunately,” Tanner said, clearing his throat. “There will be no rest, for now. All of you, back to your stations. Orders from High Command, we are to keep watch for any, and I mean any movements. This is not a ceasefire, this is a lull, and lulls end. Dismissed.”

The room was soon filled with the sounds of marching boots on the floor, plates stacked, and the doors swinging open, as the assorted personnel inside began filing out, not a single mutter to be heard.

“And, Agent Bjorgman? May I speak with you for a second?” Tanner called out, amongst the crowd.

“Aaand there’s my cue. No lab work for today, heh.” Ana sighed, rolling up her sleeves, and tidying up her vest. “I guess, this is goodbye for now.”

‘Well… so much for that break,’ she thought, sharing a knowing look with Harwood. And a fond, bittersweet smile.

“I suppose, I’ll see you around then, now, don’t you go run into the Tyrant or something alright, Agent?” Harwood said teasingly, earning him a playful punch from Ana.

“I’m not!” replied Ana, laughing softly. “So, cheers, as they say?”

“Cheers, indeed.”

The work continued.

~ New York City, USA ~

“I’ll bathe in their blood, and scream for them to stop dying on me.

I doubt it’ll ever happen. But it’s a beautiful dream.

Whoever you are, give the human race an excellent funeral pyre. To the point orbital bombardment qualifies as one.”

The radio went dead, the Crowe Labs wavelength went silent, and the message from Brazil finished at last, leaving the council to muse over what they’d heard. For a few minutes, everyone was silent. Some shivered in their seats.

Moondancer stared at the gathering silently, her face reading as that of one who felt deep regret at introducing them to such woe.

“I think,” Lady Cadance said softly, “That’s about the most disturbing thing I’ve ever heard.”

Those were the first words from her this meeting.

Even Spitfire couldn’t help but shudder. The fire seemed to have gone out of the one-time champion athlete’s mane, hanging limp.

“They’re eating ponies?” she whispered. “Newfoals, even?”

“Damn... I’d thought it was bad over in China already, but this…” Thunderwing said quietly.

Sitting across from Spitfire, Turner shook his head. “Not all that surprising, really. With much of North African agriculture and food ports being erased by the Barrier, and the loss of Central Asia, hard times will follow. If the Barrier gets to Pennsylvania, then it’ll get even worse. He’s right, though. In a few more months it’ll be far worse. I was fortunate enough to pick up the signal while scanning the Barrier.”

“Think anyone else heard it?”

“Not likely, Thunderwing,” Turner replied. “We’re the first ponies to hear of this, and I honestly wish we hadn’t.”

“That bitch…” Vinyl mumbled, resting her face against her hoof. “Oh, that fucking bitch. The things she’s done, the lows she’s forced us to sink to…”

Looking pale and wan, Moondancer ran a hoof up the red-and-purple strands of her mane.

“War brings out certain truths in people,” the erudite little mare said glumly. “Whom among us here hasn’t done things we’d never thought we could do?”

“Me,” Gladmane said. “I never thought I’d be here.”

For that matter, neither did anyone else in the room. Unlike anyone else there, Gladmane had a criminal record. As his business as a hotelier had earned him a large number of connections with Equestria’s criminal underbelly, he’d tried to start a business importing human-made goods to Equestria through his hotel. Until the Solar Empire had violently broken up his operation and confiscated his property during the Hand-In-Hoof Riots. He’d been forced to flee to Earth in the midst of the Imperials’ crackdown on crime and “subversive elements,” soon finding himself working with the PHL.

Lyra herself had personally brought him onboard, taking pity on him. To everypony’s surprise and chagrin, no less his own, he’d proven to be a worthwhile investment on Lyra’s part. He’d put his connections with the remains of Equestria’s criminal underworld to good use during the war, smuggling wartime materials, information, and other useful goods out of Solar Empire territory.

So much darkness, so little light. Strange times make for strange bedfellows...

“Freedom,” rasped a toneless voice. “It is the cure.”

They all stared. Pina had spoken for the first time.

“Humans. Ponies,” she said softly, slumped lazily in her chair. “There is no cure for what has been done to you. Except freedom.” She folded her left hoof across her right polyester limb. “Freedom is what you do with what is done to you. But is it not so that everyone is everyone? Are you not all born guilty and innocent alike? Open your eyes. Will you accept what you have done to yourselves? Or would you rather be a slave to your shadow? Freedom… is to dare look at your shadow. And to see yourself.”

She gazed at each of them in turn, her face unreadable. They waited in vain for some flicker of emotion. They had all noticed, at one time or another, that the cryptic three-legged mare rarely seemed to blink.

“Was I set up for this?” Thunderwing spoke, suddenly. “This wasn’t in the agenda, guys. Is this… am I getting punk’d? Are you going to rickroll me next?”

“Whatever meds she gets,” Gladmane sighed, “It is not enough.”

“Maybe. But this mare can tell you many things.” Pina actually sounded amused. “Such as whom you can thank for sending this spoken epitaph into space. Space? Space.”

A frowning Moondancer was staring at Pina, rubbing her chin. At least she, typically, looked less like she was freaked out than like a person who’d been handed a riddle and wanted to solve it.

“Okay…” Cheerilee said hesitantly, wondering, once again, why they had to let this nutcase in on their councils. Oh, curse how they had to cosy up to the private sector, when hope and goodwill were unable to carry them through this war alone. “So, what’s this is about Crowe Labs, Miss Nectar?” she asked, hoping to change the subject, her snout scrunched up in thought as she tried to place the odd name. “I know Alex mentioned them in conjunction with Blackwater…”

“Was once Blackwater,” Pina answered calmly. “Became Academi. Merged with Triple Canopy. Now subsidiary of Constellis Group. Always PMC.” She chuckled, sounding almost genuine. “Anyway. This Crowe Labs, yes. Advanced R&D contractors for US military. Offshoot of Raytheon-Sarcos. Good with their work. Clean record… assuming intel is up to date.”

And a frazzled Vinyl still saw fit to add her two cents. “Yeah. They’re the ones who made Allie’s HUD visor, and my minigun saddle.”

“Good company,” Pina finished. “Humane…” Again, a twitch of her lips suggested she thought she’d just said something funny.

“Right,” nodded Cheerilee. “Say, Vinyl, weren’t you making something to do with... uh, wubs, recently? I remember you showed me this schematic for some kind of weapon.”

Vinyl grinned, some of her outward cheer returning. “Yuperoonee, Cheery-cherry.”

Turner’s ears perked up at that. “Should’ve sent it to me. I’d probably figure it out in less than an hour. After all, I do have a screwdriver,” he muttered, but then he just shrugged, wincing slightly as something inside him stretched taut.

“You ought to be resting, you know that, right?” Cheerilee spoke, holding a hoof at her chest to make sure her heart hadn’t jumped out. “It’s ridiculous, the way you insist on placing yourself in the line of fire like this. Once in a while, can’t you just take a time out?”

“Take a time out? Of course I can! Who do you take me for? But the faster this is done, the more rest I’ll get when it’s all over,” replied the obnoxious pony as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Cheerilee sighed, about to say something else, but a glance from Cadance told her to hold. The Princess-in-Exile coughed, drawing Turner and the others’ focus to her.

“And does your wife approve of this way of thinking?” the Princess of Love asked, giving him a sidelong look.

“Course she does! Derpy and me, we’re adventurers. It’s how we’ve always done things,” Turner happily answered, eyes showing nothing but mirth.

“So,” Cadance said slowly. “She approves of you being outside a medical facility, when you recently took a big shard of glass to the shoulder?”

She couldn’t help it, there was some small amount of vindication to feel as Turner’s ears folded against his head at that. He rubbed the back of his head, chuckling nervously while he looked at everything but Cadance.

“Ah...” he began. “Well, it’s a bit of a matter of perspective–”

“Whatever, Doc,” said Vinyl, leaning back on her seat with a mischievous look, her shades propped on her horn. “You’re in trouble and you know it.”

Moondancer got up and trotted over to him. “I must concur, Doctor.” She gave his wounded shoulder a slight poke, making him wince again. “Miss Derpy loves you with all her heart, but she’ll bring Luna’s wrath on your head once she finds you missing.”

Time Turner lowered his head, a feeble grin on his face, causing Cadance to roll her eyes. In tandem with Cheerilee’s.

“I guess tigerlily muffins,” he said, “would be the best ‘Sorry I’m an idiot’ apology gift to get me right in the clear?"

All of the mares looked at one another before answering. “Yes.”

“With chocolates,” said Moondancer. “I know a lady down in Boston who’d agree.”

“And her favourite movie,” said Vinyl.

“And a hoof massage,” said Spitfire.

Pina clapped her forehooves. “That mare sees in ways others cannot.”

“Maybe also a spa day?” Gladmane suggested. “I know a few mares and gentlestallions that could help you out there.”

“A spa day and a hoof massage,” Thunderwing finished. “Sorry buddy, there’s no easy way outta this. Trust me, I know.”

Turner only hung his head as Gladmane, Thunderwing and the mares other than Cadance and, of course, Pina, collectively emitted a scatter of giggles, but he was smiling at the small jabs made at him.

“Please, ladies, ladies! You do wound me so.”

The silly little joke was all the indication they needed that he’d be fine. Cadance leaned back in her seat, seemingly content to have helped raise the mood back up. Now, she would likely return to her discreet self for a while.

“Oh, quiet you,” Cheerilee laughed with Turner, enjoying a brief respite before reality descended back onto her mind. “I miss this,” she whispered as the laughter died down, the positive atmosphere slowly dwindling away.

They all heard her statement. None had to ask her what she meant.

Vinyl jumped on her seat, spinning around several times before stopping with a slam of the forehooves to the table. “Alright guys, let’s get this over with. I left a lot of my stuff in Boston and I don’t want anypony touching it.”

Cheerilee was more demure in sitting back down, scoffing at Vinyl’s urge to make haste.

“Vinyl, you are the only pony who can use said gear. Part of me’s glad you blowing out your subwoofers forced you back into using proper weapons.”

“Hey! All my speakers are awesome, you should’ve seen some of those humans fighting when they were cranked up to 15!” Vinyl jabbed a hoof at Cheerilee, while Moondancer and Spitfire only shook their heads.

“Can we get back on track, please?” Spitfire’s calm voice shattered the argument.

Both ponies looked abashed at their conduct. But they knew Spitfire, the only one amongst them to have military experience before the conflagrations on Equus and Earth, was right. Whether in melancholy or in jest, all this had been mere distraction.

They had a war to fight.

“Of course,” said Cheerilee. “Thunderwing, Vinyl, how are our ground and naval forces? What should I be worried about?”

“The Fleet’s holding up, we just cleaned up a couple of PER stragglers in the Solomons,” Thunderwing exclaimed, but his frown told Cheerilee otherwise. “Ground forces… I got the dispatch from the mainland. It’s nothing good. Vinyl’s got the report from the Americas and, well…”

“Best take it up with UNAC,” Vinyl said, ominously. “They’re not going to be happy about this…”

Cheerilee adopted a calm and calculating look, trying not think about what Vinyl Scratch’s mercurial moods might imply. Her eyes only briefly skirted to the empty chair with the engraving of the lyre. Whenever Cheerilee gazed upon this, a strange feeling would pervade her, that like a character in the tale where a fellowship of nine set out to banish great evil from the world, she was but a Steward, a custodian in wait for a King.

She had to wonder, as she saw the discarded radio, if such a wait was a fool’s hope.

~ Boston, USA ~

Ana, for around the fifth time this week, felt amazed at her piss-poor luck.

Was it something she had done years earlier, or was it the war itself? Whatever the cause, being stuck inside a ruined store bombarded by hoof mortars and rapid-fire crossbow bolts that had probably been dipped in potion was definitely not how she had planned on spending the evening. Not that she’d got to plan her own evening, but this was worse.

She wasn’t even sure if it had been an hour past her departure.

‘Frieda’s not gonna be happy…’ she thought, sighing, as she chambered another round into her rifle. ‘Well, at least it wasn’t as bad as the subway? Ach, who am I kidding.’

“Come to us!” the creature called again. “Give yourself up to the Light! You’ll be so much happier when you do!”

Ana wasn’t so sure if it was male or female. She knew that, whatever it might look like, it was most definitely not a pony, and part of the patrol that had oh-so-conveniently spotted her walking amongst the desolate streets.

“Mercy will be granted! Salvation will be yours! Please, don’t be afraid, we only seek solace for you!”

Its words were hardly laced with the malice and condescending compassion characteristic of truly indoctrinated Newfoal soldiers, or veteran Imperial Guardsponies hardened and embittered by years of war with humanity. Perhaps it, and its group, were recently converted civilians, ambushed by an Imperial patrol.

She’d wondered what it had been in life, its hopes and dreams, its family… if it had any. Did it ever say goodbye to them, hold them in its embrace one last time?

‘Not likely,’ Ana thought sadly, peeking out the broken window frame.

No sign of it, or the Imperial Guard actually commanding the unit. By ‘Mercy’ or ‘Salvation,’ they meant that at best, you’d be turned into a barely-thinking drone unable to make your own decisions, and probably die in a pointless banzai charge. Which, despite the Solar Empire’s claim of “saving” humans, was not an uncommon fate for a Newfoal. At worst…

Well, nobody wanted to think about that, not now, or ever.

“Eagle’s Nest come in, Eagle’s Nest,” Ana whispered out to her radio. “Hostile patrol, encamped down the street, South of Checkpoint Chryssie, over.”

“Loud and clear, Nordlys,” replied a voice Ana knew to be Tanner’s. “Closest patrol should be approaching your position, hold your ground, over.”

‘But would they be in time…?’ was Ana’s unsaid reply, as she pondered her options. Her rifle, a pre-war AWM model, was nearly as long as she was tall, and quite cumbersome to sprint with – and she still had no clear sight of the opposing force.

“Understood, Eagle’s Nest. Awaiting further orders, over.”

“Hold your position,” Tanner replied, sternly, but not unkindly. “Eagle’s Nest out.”

And with that final message the radio fell silent, leaving Ana alone with her troubled thoughts, the still air… and the unseen enemy.

Ponies were, in the end, rather different from Earth’s equines in every way. Even their neighs sounded just ‘off’ enough for them not to be easily mistaken from a distance. And so Ana held her breath, listening closely to each little mutter, complaint, and blind praise this Newfoal spewed out.

There had been a time when Ana wanted Conversion, to feel the wind flowing through her wings in flight, flying free high up in the sky. She probably would have, had she not received the all-too-fateful assignment to Indonesia, all those years ago.

Now, she realised, it would have been the death of everything that made Ana Bjorgman an individual as she knew it.

The Newfoals were a curious bunch. They looked, talked, and tried to behave like ponies, but there the similarities ended. So completely disconnected from their past lives and selves that the original person might as well have been dead, and utterly loyal to the concept of Harmony as the Tyrant dictated it. Loyal to a fault, inexperienced with their abilities, and tremendously reliant on potion use in combat, but they weren't stupid either. If they had been, her unseen pursuer would have rushed her position a while ago.

No, they were waiting for her – their lack of activity betrayed their lack of potion – and the Imperial Guard knew better than to immediately terminate a lone human soldier, for any PHL agent had the reputation of a one-man army. Supposedly. Most of the time.

‘If only that was true for me, darnit,’ Ana thought darkly. ‘Oh, if you could see me now, Harwood.’

For all her capabilities behind the rifle, she was more confident on her talents down at the lab, and she doubted that anyone would be intimidated by a shorter-than-average Norwegian woman, nor by her soft, bubbly voice.

Nevertheless, the reputation of a one-man-army might just have been exactly what was keeping those Newfoals at bay, amusingly enough.

Shaking out of her train of thought, she looked out onto the street, still as empty as it had been. Her options were limited, with no smoke or flashbang at the ready. Running out of of cover wasn’t an option.

‘One, five, fifteen, lemme set you down and, drats, it’s not enough,’ Ana thought, with a grimace. There simply weren’t enough sniper rounds to engage the patrol, should she miss. And without guarantee of them staying put, without any attempts at rushing towards her.

She glanced at her handgun. Three reserve mags remaining. Could be enough to cover her escape. She’d have to ditch her rifle, though, unless she had something other than pieces of debris for a distraction...

As it were, fate had its own sense of humour.

“Attention, assholes!” a gruff voice yelled out, unquestionably male and human. “Let the fucking girl on her merry way, or we will blow you all the way to Equestria and then some! Remove yourself from the vicinity right away!”

“Or what?!” snarled a voice Ana took to be the unit’s leading Imperial Guard. He had mostly kept quiet, letting his soldiers handle the latest bit of propaganda. “We have your soldier surrounded, and we’re ready to turn her! Shut your filthy mouth and turn away, now.”

“There is no need for such violence!” the lead Newfoal cried out again before the Guard could continue, to murmurs of agreement amongst its compatriots. “Please, let us do our work and we shall allow her to go on her way!”

“You do not want to reach that point, jou zombified fokkin’ kontgesig,” a second, heavily accented voice replied. The speaker’s nationality was hard to place, but Ana’s first guess was that they were Dutch. “Basically, I see how many assholes I can rip in you with the machine-gun here!”

“You’re bluffing!”

“Aweh, fine, you got me, I’m bluffing,” the heavily-accented voice said.

There was a pause, as if the universe itself couldn’t quite believe that he’d just said that. Ana held her breath, clutching her crucifix in an ever tighter grip.

“Nah, I’m just fokkin’ with jou. Eat my dick!” the thickly-accented voice yelled, and suddenly a machine-gun of heavy caliber, by the sound of it, roared in the afternoon air. There was a scream, a thud, and a crack and Ana realised it must have been the Imperial Guard.

“Target down, open fire!”

Ana wasn’t sure if she wanted to see it. But a distraction was a distraction, and soon enough there were shouts and cries from the Newfoals, spellfire and a hail of machine gun rounds. A stray round whizzed by and struck the wall opposite her, and Ana thanked her lucky stars she was not too exposed, after all.

The yells, the cries and dying screams were soon, again overtaken with silence, once the last, dull thud and whimper was heard.

“Targets are down!” the thickly-accented man yelled. “And… sort of all over the street!”

“Nordlys, come in, Nordlys,” her radio crackled again, her hand fumbling to gain a firm grasp on it. “Hostiles are down. Patrol’s reporting, several wounded, none fatal, over.”

‘Thank God,’ Ana said, with a relieved sigh. Leaning against the wall, she took off her gloves, wiping away the sweat on her brow. ‘Ah, Frieda, sorry to keep you waiting.’

“Understood, Eagle’s Nest,” she replied, gingerly taking a step forward. “It looks secure, over.”

“Copy that, Nordlys. Continue towards the checkpoint, Eagle’s Nest out.”

“Hey, Miss, you alright?”

No sooner had she pocketed the radio than the patrol’s leader, a fellow with distinctly Eastern features – Korean, perhaps? – approached her from one end of the street, eyes hidden behind protection goggles, body clad in the standard body armour worn by UN soldiers. His markings identified him as a Sergeant. “Don’t worry, they’ve been driven off. Sorry for the delay, uh, Miss. If we had known you were PHL...”

“No-no-no, it’s no problem, Sergeant. Really, don’t sweat yourself, if anything I should be apologising for, well, forcing a detour for your team. Really.” She said quickly, smiling in spite of her tired state. And she might’ve blushed out of slight embarrassment, too. “But what on Earth was an Imperial patrol doing here, this deep into the city? How could they have gotten past the checkpoints without being noticed?”

The Korean Sergeant frowned. By all appearances, the same thought had crossed his mind.

“That’s the third we’ve seen today,” he admitted. “And it’s strange. They’re not usually this consistently wasteful. Going against their ethos, about saving people for something better…” He grimaced in distaste. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say they were planning a big one. Meaning all this is just to wear us down, or throw us off the scent. Or both.”

Ana shivered at what a disregard this showed the Tyrant had for any true life.

“Maybe...” she began hesitatingly, “maybe they’re looking for clues as to what happened to Captain Reiner? I mean that’d, that’d explain why there are so many of them about. They must be sweeping the whole area.” She shuddered. “And, and of course there’s the people who couldn’t pull out of the area in time...”

“That’s just what I’m thinking, there’s been rumours of the High Command bringing in units like the Dragons of the East soon, that’s how bad it’s getting, going loud and all,” the Sergeant remarked in agreement, tightening the grip on his rifle. “And if they’re still looking for him, that’s good news for us. It means they haven’t found him yet.” He let her have a moment to catch her breath. “No offense, Miss. I ah, didn’t intend to downplay your troubles.”

“None taken, it’s alright.” Ana said, rubbing the back of her head nervously. “If, uh, you don’t mind, are you heading for the Back Bay, too?”

“We had joined the Germans earlier,” he replied, pointing towards a group behind him. Ana guessed they were the ones with the machine gun support. “They just happened to be passing by, got redirected through the North End, we did. They’re PHL too, miss. Would you care to join us?”

“Don’t have to tell me twice, heh. Hey, what was that about the Dragons?”

‘Not with Imperials about, no sir,’ Ana thought, stepping over the fresh corpse of the Guard that had so given her so much trouble. His pale blue coat stained with blood, his armour cracked and singed from the heavy caliber rounds that had impacted it.

Certainly not the last one, either, especially in Boston.

~ New York City, USA ~

Left alone at the big table, Cheerilee sighed as she stared at maps and briefing documents.

‘Not quite like grading homework,’ she thought ruefully, falling back on irony. ‘I’d take a class field trip with Diamond Tiara over this any day.’

Except she wouldn’t. Partly because, even if somepony gave her the opportunity to teach again and forget the war, she wouldn’t. It just wouldn’t be right. And partly because Diamond Tiara had been murdered during a meeting in her home by Imperial Guards about three months ago, during yet another crackdown on civilian protesters and so-called dissent in Equestria.

Presumably taking a leaf out of some human nations’ book, and rather cynically at that, the papers had spun it as “actions against dangerous terrorist sympathisers”, of “treasonous conduct against the Crown”, because of course they had, but none of that changed how it had happened in Diamond Tiara’s living room in her own damn house.

It was strange, what could set a little twinge of pain through Cheerilee’s heart now.

“Bitty for your thoughts?” came a soft, familiar voice. Cheerilee looked up, to see Lady Cadance looking at her with a soft smile.

“Hi, Cadance,” Cheerilee said quietly. She sat back in her chair. “How goes it?”

“As well as can be expected, which is to say, not very,” Cadance said with a wry smile. “No-one works harder to keep their spirits up than those saddled with people’s morale. But there are worse ways to spend your day.”

“I can only imagine,” Cheerilee said without elaborating. After all, Cadance knew all about worse days.

Of the two of them, the former Princess of Equestria had definitely had it worst. Cheerilee’s losses had been livelihood, lifestyle, home… a sister, even. But Cadance had lost even more. Lyra had been a dear, dear filly to her. Worse yet, she’d lost her husband as well. And she had to live with the knowledge that he’d been forced to perform acts that were utterly terrifying. Acts that even if by some mercy he was brought back to sanity, he would live with forever.

“So,” Cadance said, gazing over the round table. “Ready for the summit?”

Cheerilee sighed. “I’ve a horrible feeling I’m going to spend half of it explaining that we don’t know what happened to Alex, and the other half of it explaining why Alex is still on front-line duty. And, much as I respect her, I don’t look forward to telling the future President what she’s got herself into.”

“At least we’ve got our halves,” Cadance said with a snort. She shook her head. “Doesn’t help that we don’t have an answer.”

“To which question?” Cheerilee harrumphed. “Every time someone brings up the pictures of Defiance and the casualties there…”

* * * * *

… Cries of “Justice for Angelo!” in your ear as you look at the picture thrust in your face…

A woman with a pregnant belly lying next to a child of no more than nine… A random person among the reporters punching you in the face and disappearing into the crowd as the words “CHILD-KILLER!” flash in front of you…

The disapproving glares of your colleagues and fellow officers as you refuse to even consider a court martial for Alex, protests quietly moved away or ‘discouraged’...

The looks of disgust from both sides when they see that you have actually let Kraber into the PHL… A suicide squad, but still… And then swallowing the guilt knowing what you’ve allowed, and all the while Alex is impassive, doesn’t react, if only he’d react…

* * * * *

Cheerilee tried to shake her head clear of the images.

“... Or we have the likes of Verity Carter bringing up what happened to Defiance, or those ‘friendly fire’ incidents, every time, I have to answer the same questions about his competence, his mental state or, Luna help me, morals. And it’s not as if I always have the right answers.”

Cadance sighed. “I know.” She paused. “And what do you tell yourself?”

“Same thing I tell them,” Cheerilee said quietly. “That Alex was a believer in Lyra, that he’s a competent soldier, and he’s helped make the PHL a force in this war. None of us are clean.” She closed her eyes. “And I do mean none.”

Cadance nodded slowly. “I can understand that. I have to admit, though, sometimes…”

“You have reservations,” Cheerilee finished. At Cadance’s nod, the former schoolteacher smiled sadly. “Me too. But for all those things, the Captain’s been with the PHL from the beginning. He helped earn us our funding and our R&D wing. He spoke out against Lindsey Graham on the matter of the letting ICE create internment camps for ponies.”

Cadance remembered that. What Equestrian did not?

* * * * *

“They may be the same race as the enemy, but that’s a shitty way to look at them. I challenge anyone to look at the families, the academics, the pacifists, unionists, and others, and tell me why they deserve to be in a concentration camp.”

“Captain,” said Senator Graham, “this is a facility overwhelmed, not a concen–”

“Bullshit. Look at them. These are people, left to escape into a world that fears and hates them. What are you gonna tell them? ‘Your father may have disowned you, but you still deserve to suffer’? How many of these people have traded out their cushy job as a professor, just so they can do farm labour in a world where they have nothing. How many of you could do that?”

He paused and looked at Senator Graham.

“Yeah. Didn’t think so. As Ambassador Lyra has said, rebel Equestrians are the best allies we have against the Solar Empire. Treating each one that comes to us begging for help like an enemy… Well, I suspect that’s going to create a lot more actualenemies. I suspect it’ll be impossible for that kind of dehumanisation, excuse me, de-sentient-isation… not to have some kind of profound, negative effect. Better we trust ponies and let the PHL advance, rather than rely on a population of captives while giving them no good reason... actually, absolutely no reason to trust us.”

Another pause. He stroked his stubbly chin.

“Queen Celestia would have her citizens believe we’re a bunch of monsters with no compassion. I refuse to live in a world where we prove her right.”

* * * * *

As it turned out, Alex had gone drastically off-script and ad-libbed most of it.

“I’m pretty sure that without men like him,” Cheerilee said, allowing herself a fond little smile, “we’d have been folded into the US military and would’ve become practically a non-entity, and I’d be a second-class citizen at best.”

But even to Cheerilee herself, her voice sounded hollow.

“You don’t sound like you believe that,” Cadance said, picking up on subtleties in that damnable way of hers.

Cheerilee’s smile faded. “Why wouldn’t I believe it. Even with everything we’ve all done, we have to keep going. Alex too, if he’s still alive,” she added with a too-chirpy tone. “After all, Churchill was a drunk, strike-crushing old codger and Roosevelt was practically a dictator, but they were the leaders wartime needed, and let’s not start with Stalin. Yet if these guys all had one thing in common, it’s that they pushed on and kept their people afloat. We have to push on, too.”

The expression on Cadance’s face as she heard that was difficult to describe. She hadn’t exactly been suffused with hope there, but then her expression hadn’t exactly soured, either.

‘She’s got to know I’m bullshitting us both there, but… it’s not like there’s a better answer.’

“Well said,” the ex-Princess finally sighed, resignedly. “Well, I’d best be off. We all have to pay the piper sometime.”

Cheerilee nodded as Cadance left. “Don’t we just, Cadance. Don’t we fucking just.”

~ Boston, USA ~

The trip to the Back Bay was, in contrast to the previous encounter, a rather dull affair. Even climbing up the tower at Checkpoint Chryssie was a daily routine for Ana, and yet it never ceased to be quite so tiring. Thirty storeys of fortified office spaces and other such hastily constructed fortifications, leading up to her own station, a makeshift sniper’s den, overlooking the city. A corporate castle turned into a modern-day watchtower. They’d littered the way up with various traps, a few PHL-made ‘decoy’ enchantments, and claymore mines.

On her way up, Ana cursed herself for forgetting to ask about the Korean Sergeant’s name, or if he knew the Dragons’ own Park Yon-Soo, though his unit’s proximity to the Back Bay might give her the chance to stay in touch.

“Evening, Ana,” said the dull grey griffon on lookout, addressing her in English, though she knew Ana could speak the Common Tongue of Equus perfectly well. “Our little doe-face is running a bit late, I see. Holdup back at the lab?”

Frieda gave Ana that trademark, cheeky smile of hers, which was one of those odd things Ana had never quite sussed out about griffons, how they could curve those beaks of theirs unlike ordinary birds from Earth. Some of the PHL who fancied themselves as biologists had come up with their own explanations, but Ana always sort of assumed it was magic. It wasn’t much, but it was enough for her, knowing that Frieda wasn’t much of the smiling type. Then again, griffons weren’t smilers at the best of times. Or so she’d heard from ponies, and they were perhaps not the best judges.

“Yeah, right, a holdup,” Ana said, chuckling as she prepared the rifle. “Though it wasn’t at the lab per-say... I mean, per se? Nah, wasn’t at the lab. Anyways, had a few delays and, well... you know how these things go, eh?”

“Sure do,” Frieda said, with her usual, welcome gruffness. She slung her own rifle back over her shoulder, if that was the right term. The subtle differences in species’ anatomy could be so confusing. “Isn’t like watching mice scamper in a field, from up here. At least, whenever something dares to show themselves out in the open...”

When Frieda smiled again, it was a rather unpleasant grin, coupled with her magenta eyes, a predator’s leer as she patted her rifle affectionately. Odd, of course. Ana knew that smile very well, and very often it was for her. Now it was a touch uncanny.

“Eyes sharp,” Frieda said, bopping Ana’s nose with a talon, brushing so close past her as to momentarily rub shoulders. “Remember, mayhap they’ve got the winds, but we have the skies. They may shake the earth and burn skin with their magic, no matter, we can do it ten times better. And even if they’ve got the best shields, so what, always that gap between every plating, eh?”

“God, you got a way with words, heh. You know me, Frieda. I always get that mark. Weapons check?” Ana suggested, her lips curving into a smirk. Though it was strained, and not at all genuine, for her work on this perch involved less-than-moral intentions.

“Weapons check,” Frieda replied, equally deviously, and so they did.

The pre-war model AWM sniper rifle Ana wielded, and her USP .45 pistol had served her well since her service in Indonesia, and even before then. Neither had been runically enhanced or enchanted, as the best PHL equipment seemed to be these days. But Ana had full confidence that the .338 round chambered in the rifle could handle anything short of the Tyrant. Besides, someone like Harwood could make better use of runic enhancements to their weapons.

Frieda, on the other hand – or in this case, talons – had gone for lighter weaponry. In this case, a short, stubby M4 with a bayonet, the kind that were a dime a dozen in America, as they were bound to be, even with the economy in the state it was in. As her talons sometimes slipped off the handguards, she’d added a PHL-made foregrip about the same shape as a staple gun. She’d also sprung for a magnum revolver – Smith & Wesson, if Ana remembered correctly – with a thick rubbery grip, along with a bandolier of speedloaders.

With everything all set and secured, they waited.

And somewhere inside those ruined skyscrapers, untouched by the countless security checkpoints below that monitored civilians on the way back from work – or to the graveyard shift, like her – lay their enemies. Stooges for the Equestrian Solar Empire, the human adherents of Ponification for Earth’s Rebirth, and other such characters from both sides.

Ana wished she’d gone to Boston before the war. No, that wasn’t right. Admittedly, the urge had never struck her and she would have been happy either way. It was more that she wished the reason she stood in Boston had nothing to do with the war.

‘They called this the Cradle of Liberty… now it’s just, dust and echoes and ruins.’

Even before the battle was to resume, the city had crumbled from the metropolis it was before, into a dying, decaying urban hell for both military personnel and civilians alike. Yes, this was the face of America the new President-Elect would inherit.

Peering down her night-sight, on a person-by-person basis, at the people of all shapes and sizes clustering at the checkpoint she was guarding, the feeling overcame Ana, as it did every time for the first hour on duty, that she did not relish this task. She was here because she wanted to protect these people. At the same time, her job required her to see every one of the black dots down there, moving between the ruins, behind the fog of war, as a potential threat.

Five years of guerilla warfare and attrition, and ever did the enemy walk among them...

Though she was fortunate, in that she had never personally failed to stop a bombing, too often had Ana witnessed the consequences of the PER run amok.

Old visions behind her eyes. The dead who looked almost genuinely happy and peaceful for once in their lives despite the holes drilled through their bodies. One time there had been the ponified monstrosity they called a Newcalf, its insides shredded. A huge, rhino-like monster, worlds apart from the cute, doll-like, smiling Newfoals touted on PER propaganda, wearing a howdah-like, weapons-toting construction that covered most of its twisted back.

And those were the ones she’d seen… or had been allowed to see.

‘Tanner was right,’ Ana thought wistfully. ‘This is a special kind of hell, for all of us.’

Ana and her unit had been shipped from far-away Indonesia, answering the call for reinforcements sounded by UN officials present in Boston. With the Barrier closing in, preliminary reports had suggested a major offensive would be conducted by the Empire throughout the Eastern Seaboard. With rumours abound of the Element Bearers, or even the Tyrant coming in personally, the campaign took a turn for the worst.

By the time her unit arrived in San Francisco, the rate of Conversion bombings had spiked all along the opposite coastline, two weeks earlier than anticipated. Maybe, optimistically, something had spooked the Empire into hastening. She’d heard something truly horrible had happened up near Halifax as the Barrier advanced. A heist? Super-Newfoals of some kind? The stories that made it through were vague, but apparently it’d thrown a wrench into every faction’s plans – the PHL, the PER, both factions of the HLF, the Solar Empire’s colonists on the other side of the Barrier, and even, it was whispered, the far-off Equestrian Resistance.

Or maybe that had nothing to do with it and the Empire had simply been overconfident. They’d struck midway through evacuation procedures that’d been barely halfway done. Refugee convoys had been headed off and sprayed with potion, towns had been wiped off the map, and the renewal of conflict between the so-called ‘True’ HLF and their former comrades, dragging the PHL into it, had arisen at the worst possible time.

Whatever the reason, it all came down to one driving question, something that the UNAC High Command was trying and failing to keep a secret;

“Where is Captain Alex?”

Could he be dead? Scuttlebutt around PHL personnel had called him ‘disappeared’. Could he have been converted? No, the Solar Empire was too arrogant not to crow about a successful hit like that within seconds. ‘But if they aren’t taking advantage of the opportunity, then why?’ many had asked.

It was a question the High Command would have to answer soon, Ana reflected.

The Sun finally set over the city, casting a blanket of darkness upon it and its inhabitants, resistance fighters and Imperial alike. Each and every soldier within the city knew the stalemate would be broken sooner or later, for the Barrier would not stop. Equestria usually didn’t fight in the dark, not unless they were planning to, and Ana hoped this wouldn’t be one time they did.

Ana felt her grip tighten, and from a glance, Frieda did the same.

‘Well… here we go, Ana. Keep calm and… do what you need to do.’

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

This chapter features no noteworthy modifications, other than the references to real-world political figures and institutions replacing the fictional stand-ins previously used.

Spectrum 2.0 - October 27th 2017

Sledge115: Hello there - Sledge here, and surprise! Chapter’s done!

Apologies for the delay but, we’ve all agreed to post this one after the previous chapter in quick succession to make up for the brief hiatus. But hey - setting this up in advance works, and that’s what matters!

Suffice to say, welcome to SPECTRUM’s Earth. Buckle up.

~Sledge

DoctorFluffy: Yes, that was Kraber yelling “EAT MY DICK!” earlier. For those of you who remember classic Spectrum and most of my writing, I’m sure you’ll approve.

~Fluffy

VoxAdam: If Chapter Three was the make-or-break chapter to bring the initial mystery of the human to a climax in the revamped Spectrum, Chapter Four is the same for us to introduce the teeming, breathing world of Earth under siege. We hope to have delivered.

~Vox

Act III ~ Chapter Twenty-One ~ Nostalgia

Spectrum

The Team

TheIdiot

DoctorFluffy

VoxAdam

Sledge115

RoyalPsycho

TB3

Kizuna Tallis

ProudToBe

Act Three

The Road Less Travelled

Chapter Twenty-One

Nostalgia

* * * * *

“We will freedom for freedom’s sake, in and through particular circumstances. And in thus willing freedom, we discover that it depends entirely upon the freedom of others and that the freedom of others depends upon our own.”
— Jean-Paul Sartre, from Existentialism is a Humanism

~ The Hall of Unity, Mount Metazoa ~ Fifteenth Day of the Month of Rophon, Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae ~

For one who is immortal, there is no greater mystery than death.

Wreathed in a circle of lilies, the white face, cold and blank as ivory now it had lost the spark of the living, filled Celestia’s gaze. There were no open eyes to stare back. Three days had passed since Celestia closed those eyelids. Just like she’d done for so many eyes, over so many centuries.

Where the fuzz of Redheart’s coat had been burnt and scarred, the undertakers had applied a light gauze, concealing the disfigurement so well, only a subtle grey patch hinted at the lie.

Her throat knotted up as she looked away. Celestia knew the body in the casket didn’t belong to one of her people, not truly. It was no less what they might have become. Led down this path, by none other than her, by who she might have been. If there was a soul, had it left Redheart? Or was it still here, in this world, having remained tied to the Redheart who lived?

Some may have thought it odd to mourn, when the one to be mourned had been complicit in what might be called the theft of souls. Yet Celestia had chosen to mourn, nonetheless. Mourn for Redheart, and all that was lost in that bedeviled Equestria.

Celestia turned, and marched to the stage’s edge. Facing her was the crowd who’d packed the Hall’s upper garden, where Luna had dutifully tended to the flowers since the beginning of this Convocation – even last night, upon the evening of her beaten-down return from Earth. Clustered in seats right before the fountain were her student Twilight and her friends, the human named Alexander, and Madame Heartstrings. By the little unicorn sat Miss Sugarbean, holding her hoof.

Sint Erklass and Ilsa Erklass, and Cadance, Shining and Blueblood were in attendance as well. But Luna waited under the shadow of a pillar, a silhouette framed in dawn’s rose light. Princess Celestia felt her cue as her Sun greeted the world, and parted her lips to speak.

“Dearly gathered,” Celestia began. “Today I stand before you, not as a Princess of Equestria, but a friend who grieves…”

Three months ago, Celestia had officiated a wedding. Now, she officiated a funeral.

“I grieve for a lost soul. One directed to act for a cause which runs counter to the values I was taught in my childhood, the values of the Allfather and his people– those same values I’ve sought to pass on to mine. But let us all remember one thing. In that casket lies the body of a soldier. Whatever her sins, Redheart sought to carry out her given duty faithfully, loyally…”

Amongst the crowd, Celestia’s eyes came to rest upon a minty-green face, pale and drawn.

“... And, so I am told, when it was impossible for her to do no harm, she sought to spread as little hurt as she could… In this, Redheart still carried within her some of the true Equestrian spirit…”

Celestia felt Luna approach. Her little sister’s expression had gone mask-like, as Luna’s face tended to in distress. But nowadays, Celestia knew her sister's pain and guilt, even when she hid it away. It had been her voice which carried out the sentence.

For once, Celestia broke formality at this funeral, wrapping a wing around her sister’s barrel, to press her neck against hers.

Eventually, there were no more words. As on the day of the delegates’ arrival, for secrecy’s sake, no band of musicians performed live at the event. From a gramophone, the track played out Octavia Melody’s rendition of Symphony of Moon and Sun as the casket was slowly lowered into the freshly-dug soil.

In the tradition of earthponies, so from the ground Redheart was made, to ground did she return.

* * * * *

“Equestria,” Moondancer said softly, a little wind blowing a strand of mane across her forehead.

The words were upon Lady Cadenza’s lips before she knew them. “‘Land I love,’” she hummed, “A land of harmony, our flag does wave from high above, for ponykind to see…”

Spotting how Moondancer cast her a questioning glance, from behind those large glasses which enhanced every blink of hers, Cadenza supplied a wry smile.

“Sorry, that came out of nowhere. I guess you do need to pay the piper at some point, after the crazy hours we’ve been keeping these past few days.”

Neither she nor Moondancer had found much time for sleep since the events in Boston and what had come after. Accompanying Princess Luna and Princess Cadenza on their flight coast-to-coast across America had been the sole provider of rest, and even the time aboard the aeroplane had involved hasty yet extensive preparations for how they would introduce themselves to this undiscovered country.

Undiscovered, that was what Lady Cadenza thought of this Equestria in the Mirror, when it ought to have felt like homecoming, more than it ever would for her to set hoof again in the benighted land she’d long turned her back on. Although in truth, it was the land which had turned its back on her, a land she no longer recognised from the bright and hopeful days of her youth, when Princess Celestia had come to take her from Florentina, flightless little pegasus though she was.

These memories of thirty years ago merely bore down harder on a chronic fatigue Cadenza permanently fought to keep at bay. She silently marvelled at the seemingly indefatigable Moondancer, who was known for staying up whole nights immersing herself in research and paperwork, looking no paler the next day than her usual countenance. Such assiduity was why the PHL had trusted their Head of Cultural Preservation could whip up a presentation overnight. As Moondancer had done indeed, going straight back to work once they’d been led to their respective quarters, never faltering throughout the dark hours. In her briefcase, stamped with the lyre-in-a-wreath emblem of the PHL, she held stored the vital information in digital form.

“It’s quite alright,” Moondancer said, calm and measured. Never one to smile much, a wistful twinkle of her bespectacled eyes was what assured Cadenza of the truth to her words. “We ought not forget it is the Equestrian spirit we fight for, Lady Cadance. Long have I hoped Equestria might see you return, its Princess once more.”

This was the first indication Moondancer had given that she took in their surroundings with any more gravity than a waking dream.

Cadenza held the silence, her senses cataloguing those surroundings.

They now stood in waiting at the foot of the Watchtower where they’d spent the night, from which they could contemplate the Hall of Unity, that would soon receive them.

Across the bridge linking this nameless peak to great Mount Metazoa, the lower gates awaited, white marble scintillating in the early morning Sun. The dawn that arose behind the pair cast their shadows upon this same bridge, two silhouettes stretching in the direction of the gates, as if urging them to follow on inside.

“The Hall of Unity,” Moondancer stated after a while. Unlike her previous whisper about Equestria, she clearly had more to say. “Built during the second century of the Era Solaris, upon the bones of a pre-existing structure of indeterminate age, believed by some to be the mythical House of Asterion… A joint project between Equestria, Adlaborn and the Tauren Isles, aimed at the creation of neutral ground in which all the creatures of Equus could peacefully congregate. As a venture, the Hall met with some success in its early days, with many historians citing the establishment of a hippogriff homeland in Mount Aris as a notable example… But only about three or four Convocations were ever called, over a period of several decades…”

Affection grew commingled with sadness, in the smile Cadenza still wore.

“You do sound so like Twilight, at times,” Cadenza noted. “That doesn’t mean you’ve got to do everything like her and give me the full lecture.”

“I’m just thinking,” Moondancer said musingly. “Remind me again, what year is it here?”

“As if you wouldn’t know,” Cadenza said, giving her shoulder a nudge. “They said this was the Year 3 of the Era Harmoniae.”

“Right,” Moondancer nodded, with a sideways glance. “Not a year I’d have thought you’d be particularly fond of.”

Cadenza felt her smile fade. “Yeah,” she replied, the tone going out of her voice. “This… was not a good year. For any of us.”

She looked to the sky. Cloudless on this sunny morning, the only traces of the dawn, rosey as her own distinctive coat, was the light which bounced off the rock of the mountain. And that too was fading from view, making way for the open blue.

There was someone she knew who’d have loved that colour, Cadenza realised with a shock, and not simply because it was in his name.

Prince Blueblood had lived for the seas and skies, when he had lived at all.

“But this is not that year.” Lowering her gaze from the skies, Cadenza could also feel a contraction within her chest, both painful and exhilarating. “There’s been no Crystal War here, Dancer,” she said, staring intently at her companion. “That’s what she said… Princess Cadance. What I said. And here, the Wedding Invasion was nowhere near as bad.”

“Remarkable,” said Moondancer.

The statement was as simple as it was neutral, but Cadenza knew the bookish unicorn must be concealing deeper emotions. At least she, Cadenza, had lost no-one that terrible year, a stroke of incredible fortune, all things considered.

Just like Lyra and others, Moondancer had lost family to the Crystal War. Unlike many others, she had gone on to become a frontline combatant, years ahead of the conflict with mankind.

“The last Convocation happened in the Year 253 of the Era Solaris,” Moondancer stated, desiring plainly to get back on topic. “Which, here, would be exactly seven-hundred-and-fifty years ago… A nice round number, or a good one for an anniversary, at any rate.”

“Did you say this in jest?” asked Cadenza.

“I thought you knew me,” said the other, warmly enough to put Cadenza at ease. “I’m not a complete pencil-pusher, you know. That’d be Raven Inkwell.”

Whom, Cadenza could remember, had indeed been a pencil-pusher, but a highly competent and efficient one. What a shame it was, then, that Celestia’s personal secretary had stayed loyal to her boss over the rise of the Solar Empire, eventually rising herself to become Speaker of the Joint Council. Her insider knowledge, or Mister Kibitz’s, would have been invaluable.

“And you’re thinking…” began Cadenza. “Something, about this Convocation.”

Moondancer sighed, her gloom resurfacing. “I’m wondering, that is all,” she said. “Wondering how equipped they are for the task. You’ve seen how it is on Earth even now, where the United Nations are concerned. With the Europeans reduced to scattered refugee camps and the Special Administrative Zones, there is only really a UNAC while there is America and China. And once the Barrier begins encroaching on those two…”

She did not need to finish her sentence. It weighed on everyone’s minds that, although the Barrier needed twenty more years to consume Earth, the fall of the human world’s two major remaining empires would signal a definite breakdown of global society.

“Strange people, humans,” Cadenza said. “They had a century to refine an international community on a level we’d never seen, yet they spent that whole century in deadlocks between rival power blocs.”

“Lyra did use to say it was sobering, being ambassador to Britain, not America,” said Moondancer. “One a former empire, pining for its glory days. The other, a former colony of theirs, become the new empire. And yet one was barely eighty years apart from the other. She knew Britain had its flaws– nasty business, that trial of separation from the European Union– but it galled her, this American conviction of their own exceptionalism. I doubt she ever came to terms with them being the PHL’s strongest ally.”

Cadenza rubbed her neck. “I’m not sure we’re in a position to criticise exceptionalism,” she said. “Equestrians did start this war, after all.”

“Come off it, that’s not how Lyra saw it, when she helped found the Co-Harmony Sphere,” retorted Moondancer. “She saw Pan-Equinism as a stepping-stone towards that international community we dreamed of. Seeing as at the time, its only significant opponent was the Storm King, and few would dispute he’s pure evil… Don’t you think she had a point?”

“Maybe,” Cadenza said cautiously. “But if there was a point, it’s long got subsumed by this crusade for Conversion. And,” she hesitated, briefly, “we all admire Lyra, Moondancer. Except I knew who she was better than most. To be honest, she may have had a rather… rosey-tinted view of monarchy and traditional gentry, hence her soft spot for Britain and its Royal Family. Even after Celestia let her down… maybe especially after, relocating her affections elsewhere…”

“And here I was, hoping you’d go back to being a full-time Princess,” Moondancer remarked. “Still, I knew Lyra too, and you might be right, there was a bit of a discrepancy there. Of course, it’s easier to sympathise with a former empire that’s already suffered for its hubris.”

They fell silent for a moment after that. A gentle wind blew beneath the archways of the bridge, not to mention another strand of Moondancer’s mane.

Sighing, the unicorn pulled it back, adjusting the neat bun she wore her hair as.

“Seven-and-a-half-centuries since the last Convocation,” Moondancer muttered, shuffling closer to Cadenza. “We come to a world less united than either ours or Earth’s, for all their problems. A common foe is a great unifier, but will these people consider the troubles of a wholly separate plane of existence worth their while? Is it even right to drag them into this?”

Cadenza’s eyes were on the lower gates. The words spoken by Moondancer, of course, echoed her own thoughts, but giving an adequate reply would need to wait, for at long last, there was movement at those gates.

Four figures were approaching on the bridge, all of varying shapes and sizes.

A slow, steady sound began to fill her ears. At first, she thought she was hearing the steps of those approaching. But it grew clear that this could not be the case. They were too far away, and her senses, even as the grandchild of Princess Luna, were not so acute. Cadenza then knew that the regular, growing ‘thump’ she heard was the beating of her own heart.

Cadenza’s throat tightened as the tallest of the figures came into focus. His coat a striking maroon, his chest covered by a billowing tuft which she couldn’t quite tell was a beard, and his great antlers that stretched wide, to just barely touch the tip of the heads on the two figures right beside him.

Sint Erklass, Guardian of Joy. Murdered, by Queen Celestia. Yet here, on this world… And to the Guardian’s left, from Cadenza’s perspective, one of the two figures by him, trotting forward with the grace of a resplendent white Princess…

She felt herself falter, her gaze darting away, falling upon Moondancer. Her companion had come to stand at an angle where the Sun’s light, bouncing off the rock of the mountain, refracted through her glasses and rendered them opaque. Moondancer’s eyes could not be seen by Cadenza, but her upright posture and thin lips spoke of a solemnity within.

The sight gave Cadenza her resolve back. She made herself look again at the approaching four. The tall figure on the Guardian’s right, or the right as she saw it, was bipedal. Here was not a person whom Cadenza recognised personally, but whom she’d heard Luna speak of fondly. With those eyeglasses, bulky grey frame and especially the distinct dark hooves, he could only be the Minotaur Proxenos of the Hall of Unity.

Wishing the beating in her chest and ears would stop, Cadenza concentrated on the last figure, rather shorter and squatter-looking than the others, whom she hadn’t identified yet. But there recognition hit her with full force.

Captain Alex Reiner, approaching her in the flesh. He was not marching as a soldier should. He was in a wheelchair. Yet he wore his uniform, he looked healthy enough, the runes dormant yet visibly etched where his skin was exposed below his sleeves, and he was alive.

A human, in Equestria.

The four figures pulled to a step in front of them, at the edge of the bridge to the Watchtower. Cadenza chanced a glance at Moondancer and saw her companion staring ahead impassively. None of the four figures seemed about to speak, and Cadenza thought she ought to bid them a greeting as a guest, until the Minotaur stepped forward.

“Lady Cadance of the Crystal Realm,” Darkhoof rumbled. “And Dame Moondancer. As Proxenos, I bid you welcome to the Hall of Unity.”

And Captain Reiner, as well, came forward to greet them. From his wheelchair, he saluted.

“Cadance. Moondancer,” said Alex, still holding the salute. “Sorry if I don’t get up.” He let his hand fall to his side, and gave a semblance of a smirk. “How’d you guys find me?”

“Alex,” Cadenza said softly. Her mouth latched to the first thing she could think of. “You’re alive.” Her eyes went to Sint Erklass. “And… and so are you, Guardian of Joy.”

“Yeah,” Alex said, shrugging, with an air of exaggerated nonchalance. “Didn’t Luna tell you? Although…” He laughed softly. “Guess it must’ve been hard to think of anything else, when the weirdest thing’s already happened to you, like meeting yourself. Right, Cadance?”

She momentarily looked back at him. “Wait, who told you that?”

“Who else?” Alex chuckled. “You did.”

Cadenza had expected, having adressed Sint Erklass, Guardian of Joy, that the Great Stag’s voice would intone in response to her. But it was another’s voice which spoke.

A voice that once was soothing to Cadenza, a source of wisdom and affection. Now, it hurt her that she could never hear it without a painful ache of betrayal.

“Cadance…” Celestia said quietly.

Her gaze could no longer be averted. Princess Celestia was among them, side-by-side with Sint Erklass, Proxenos Darkhoof, and the human Captain. Cadenza took a step back. For the full picture to sink in, she told herself, even as she knew it was a lie.

There was no hurt in Celestia’s eyes. Yet Cadenza knew her aunt had always been a master at concealing her emotions. What she saw, however, daring to glance, was what she’d hoped she could one day again believe was true of Celestia.

Kindness, and compassion, and love.

“I don’t believe we’ve met,” Celestia said, smiling sadly. “How faded you look... But the sight of you is as precious to me as on that long-ago Spring, in Florentina.”

Cadenza said nothing, a lump in her throat. Then the spell was interrupted by another nudge to her shoulder. She realised it was Moondancer, who wanted her to see something, which the unicorn was staring straight towards, with those great glasses of hers.

The lump turned into a gasp. There were not four people who had crossed the bridge, but five. Only, in the shadow of the Great Stag and the Proxenos, and the Princess of the Sun, her small frame hidden behind the human’s wheelchair, which she had been pushing, the fifth figure was easily missed.

Younger, scruffier, undeniably greener, that was the word…

Emotion overtook Cadenza, as before the surprised gazes of all, the last true Princess of her Equestria kneeled on the bridge, in a manner peculiar to ponies – not bowing on all four hooves, but allowing her forelegs to sink beneath her, her forehooves supporting her, pressing against the stone of the bridge, as she inclined her crowned head.

Behind her, she sensed, after slight hesitation, Moondancer followed suit, solemnly, ceremoniously.

“Captain Reiner,” she heard Celestia say, and Cadenza just knew the Princess had an eyebrow raised on her white face. “I wouldn’t have expected these ponies would greet me thus…”

Alex’s voice was quiet. “It isn’t for you.”

And that was when the little green unicorn pushing his chair reacted.

“Oh!” Lyra Heartstrings yelped. “Oh… gosh, I don’t know what to say… Hi?” She looked shaken. “P-please, you don’t gotta do that. Please, get up…”

It was like hearing a voice from far away.

Even so, slowly, Cadenza stood back up, as did Moondancer. Yet each of them, now, had eyes only for the green unicorn. In this moment, for Cadenza, no-one else was on that bridge – neither Sint Erklass or Proxenos Darkhoof, nor Alexander Reiner, nor even Princess Celestia.

Only Lyra Heartstrings, and two ponies who’d believed in her cause.

“Alex,” said Lyra, bringing his existence back into focus. There was a tremble to her forehooves. “Wh-why are they doing that?”

“Didn’t I tell you?” said Alex. “You’re their John Connor. Their Messiah.”

“Eh?” Lyra blinked. “Their who? Messy-what?”

Alex shared a rare smile. “Cadance, care to explain?”

Cadenza’s reply came in a whisper. “An in-joke,” she said. “We used to call you that all the time.”

“And the Messiah…” Moondancer began. She stopped. “Maybe your own story went much as theirs did, indeed.”

Lyra did not seem to enjoy being the centre of all this attention. Memory started to trickle into Cadenza’s mind as to why. The haze with which she’d seemed to view this Lyra framed by a golden backlight was disippating.

She’d been Lyra’s minder, once.

An old trend from the past came into play then as Princess Celestia, knowing exactly when was the right time to, stepped in, a wing raised.

“Lyra,” Celestia said gently. “And Alex. Go on ahead to the Watchtower. I shall meet you there, in his quarters, when my sister arrives.” She nodded at Sint and Darkhoof. “These gentlefolk shall be accompanying the Lady Cadance and Dame Moondancer to the Hall of Unity.”

Sint Erklass took his turn to speak. “But I, too, will be back, and Ilsa shall come.”

Meanwhile, Darkhoof gave a nod of his own. “If you will follow us, ladies?”

An unspoken understanding passed between all. Cadenza and Moondancer, silently, took their first steps onto the bridge, towards what awaited them on this world. As this was done, Lyra Heartstrings and Alexander Reiner passed them in his wheelchair, guided by Princess Celestia. Neither party shared another glance with the other.

But Proxenos Darkhoof waited, as Sint Erklass turned to Cadenza.

“Dearest Mi Amore,” spoke the Great Stag. “You are not whole… Nonetheless, I can feel that, within, you shine as much like a beacon as you ever did.”

Involuntarily, Cadenza shrank back, wishing he had not addressed her. Whereupon she felt a touch upon her shoulder, gentle as the morning breeze, and she noticed that Moondancer had come to stand beside her, remaining quiet and contemplative.

“Guardian,” Cadenza repeated, nearly struck mute. “I… It shouldn’t be you who calls me a beacon… I’ve… I have tried to do far more than I’ve managed…”

“But you are still there,” Sint said calmly. “Just as now, you are here. And though a hearth’s embers may glow well into the cold dark of night, it is the living which tend the hearth’s flame.”

Air tickled Cadenza’s ear as, even above the heartbeat, she could hear Moondancer whisper, from a place so close to her.

“‘And in the dream, I knew that he was goin’ on ahead,’” Moondancer said, softly, yet not so softly that if subdued, her voice escaped audibility, “‘and that he was fixin’ to make a fire somewhere in all that dark and all that cold, and I knew that whenever I got there, he would be there…’”

This was not like Moondancer, to enunciate thusly. A quote. It was a quote, from human literature, such as Moondancer was fond of reciting from time to time. Cadenza felt sure she recognised this one. An author, wasn’t it, who had written about pretty horses, and old men.

Moondancer turned, a sadness heralded in her eyes, magnified by her glasses.

“‘... And then I woke up.’”

* * * * *

“I… I feel so strange,” whispered Lyra. “I mean, she… tried to kill me. But she hesitated. She said… ‘not like this’. Sh-she didn’t w-want to m-make it hurt… but sh-she… couldn’t stop. She… it didn’t stop. And now she’s dead, but then I look up, and I s-see Redheart, and she’s not, and…”

Helpless, she buried her face in her forehooves.

The human stared at her, she could feel it. Staring at her, with old eyes on what should still be a reasonably young face. The flash of joviality he’d shown on the bridge had now receded.

Nevertheless, he was a slight comfort in Bonbon’s absence. She wished Bonbon was here, though. Following the funeral, Celestia had requested that only Lyra be present in Alex’s bedroom at the Watchtower, for reasons she did not divulge. Lyra had a nagging feeling it had everything to do with Princess Luna, Cadance, and the alien world they’d returned from.

Alex, who’d been standing, or rather leaning by the window, returned to his wheelchair. She saw him hold back a wince as he sat back down, still struggling to find his legs, even after Nurse Cross had commented on his swift progress in the last three days.

Whatever Nurse Cross knew of the Convocation, and wherever she was right now, so far as Lyra was aware, she had not attended the funeral for Redheart. The two had been friends. But here in this world, a Redheart still lived.

“I’m sorry, kid,” Alex said quietly. His palm touched her head, ruffled her hair. “No… not for her. I won’t say that. I can’t. But I am sorry for you.” He sighed. “You should never have had to see this. You wouldn’t have, if it weren’t for me.”

She didn’t have anything to say to that. Her thoughts were scattered. The terrible sight of the broken dragon who’d emerged from the Crystal Mirror, escorted by two very familiar, and yet very strange figures. One of whom was Cadance, older and wearier. The other one, Moondancer. It was hard to determine which had been the greater shock.

But most of all, her thoughts lingered on the funeral, on Redheart. Little else was on her mind, merely the dread that resurfaced, the same dread she had felt when that alien Redheart had so easily cast her judgement… A bitter fate that had befallen her, in that other world. And who could say if one day, the Empire’s judgement wouldn’t catch up to her, too.

Lyra Heartstrings felt nothing short of a sinking, twisting feeling in her stomach, and how small everything in her little world truly was.

“Did she have a family?” Alex asked softly, breaking the silence. “Never knew her that well. She kept to herself.”

“Just a couple of brothers… mother and father and...” Lyra answered. She took another deep breath, pushing the thought of death aside, “I know she once mentioned a boyfriend from medical school, or Whinnyapolis. I don’t know if... look, Celestia would know better. I… I probably know? But… it’s all just a blur and…” Her voice trailed off. She looked back at Alex. “Are they all like that? Bitter and… jaded and so cold?”

“I…”

“Bonbon,” Lyra added hurriedly. She felt her throat strain, so suddenly had she raised her voice. “Alex– in your world, how’s, how’s my Bonnie?”

Whatever answer he held in store for her, however, did not come then. Because at that moment, the door to his room opened, drawing both their eyes in an instant. There in the doorway stood Princess Celestia. She inclined her head as she stepped inside and stepped aside, allowing passage to her entourage.

All of them a sight familiar to Lyra's eyes. The warm, all-encompassing Sint Erklass was the first to come in, but his festive appearance was marred by his unusually shadowed eyes. Then the ever-tranquil Snow Maiden followed just by his side, walking so smoothly she might as well have glided in. Behind her was Galatea, in her disguise as a grey earthpony, who went to stand opposite Celestia, the two of them flanking the doorway.

Princess Luna was one of the last two to enter, still half-clad in cracked black armour.

Her wings were draped over Captain Shining Armor, supporting her. He too looked troubled, with his furrowed brows and tight jaw. Lyra’s eyes were drawn to Luna’s haggard own. Matted locks of mane around Luna’s forehead, turned a pale blue, clashed strikingly with the Princess’s habitually flowing, ethereal head of star-studded hair.

Luna’s gaze was focused on the human. “Alexander Reiner. Your sister says... ‘Hi’.”

* * * * *

There wasn’t much good news that Luna brought, in a soft, somber tone. They each stood or sat in a half-circle, all facing her. Lyra Heartstrings, Alexander Reiner, the Erklasses, Galatea and Shining Armor. Only Celestia stood right by her side, ready to support her weight were she to finally stagger and collapse.

“I saw a child I’d made friends with,” Luna half-whispered, her mind on that night she’d aided a certain little pegasus face her fears and become Rainbow’s sister, “now grown, a soldier for a bitter cause. Cadance saw Shieldwall, who’d committed unspeakable crimes, as a broken prisoner of the PHL. I saw you, Lyra Heartstrings, long gone, but raised upon a pedestal, a beacon of hope. I return here where nothing is out of place, yet everything feels… uncanny. I've procured a prisoner, an Imperial officer who’ll soon be delivered to us, and… and Spike. I've unlatched the lock on Spike’s mind. I reached deep into the Archmage's dreams and convinced her to break the lock on her own. But it will take time for a proper solution, and without finding what the Geas uses as its base, its anchor…”

She blew a wayward strand of her mane away. To her frustration, the locks around her horn remained drained of their thaumaturgic essence.

It was almost too much for her to retell. Everything, from the war-torn world, to the Empire, to how Twilight, now the Archmage, fought with such fervour in defense of her cause. She spoke of how she’d braved the nightmares that plagued the Archmage’s psyche, how she had fought valiantly and desperately, and yet failed so utterly to retrieve Discord. Even engaging contact with humanity’s leaders had felt like a formality, not the victory Cadance told her it should be.

Her legs felt weak, ready to collapse at a moment’s notice. The human, barely coming back into use of his legs, watched her sympathetically. Yet she droned on in a hoarse tone.

“This spell upon their minds, this Geas,” Luna stated, “it is far stronger than any I have seen. Ancient spellwork that binds its victim to it, clouds their memories as an opiate, itself bound to… I don't know, an artefact or a singular spell. Even after turning people into wretched little half-things, something tells them to continue with their lives, to ignore their consciences and go on with their dinner. This Empire's past trauma helps conceal it. A true believer or a brainwashed soul… Where is the difference with the Geas? Where it begins, and where their trauma ends, I cannot say for sure.”

“Clouded their memories… does this explain why…?” Sint said aloud. “How did it compel them to go to such lengths…”

“I’m sorry, Grandfather,” Luna said somberly. “But I could not discern why they did it. Why they continue in this… in this atrocity. Why the Reindeer were slaughtered to the last. The Lady Archmage claims she is not aware of the slaughter… that the Reindeer simply went into hiding.”

“Beyond our borders, there remain many evils in this world,” Ilsa spoke up. “Such as the Storm King. Queen Novo spoke of him as the scourge of the hippogriffs…”

“Quite right,” said Celestia. “You mentioned him as a figure of the Empire's nascency, Captain?”

Reiner, from his wheelchair, nodded. “Yeah… yeah, he was. You’re saying–”

“No.” Luna interjected, coughing. “Not the Storm King. I know it seems that way, but I'm afraid it is not so simple.”

Her knees felt like they were giving away, yet she managed to slump against the human’s bed. Celestia knelt down before her. Just behind her, Luna saw all the others look at her worriedly.

“What did you see?” Celestia said gently, caressing Luna’s cheek.

“What I didn't see, Tia,” Luna spoke gravely, her voice just loud enough, she hoped, for all in the room to hear. “The Storm King is not a foe known for his subterfuge. Even when he tries, you knew, Tia, you and Novo. He left his mark all across the Southern Seas. No. Something else ties it all together. Something that lurks in the darkness where I cannot see. It knows I seek it.”

Memories of the shadow within Twilight’s mind lingered on Luna’s thoughts. The shadow that had eluded the faithful student, tormented her for the years that went by. Luna clenched her teeth, cursing under her breath.

“And for years,” Luna continued, her eyes looking down to the floor. Her breath was shaky and her body trembled, yet few would question the steely edge within her voice, “it has been the true power behind the Imperial throne.”

“Are you absolutely sure?” Ilsa said carefully.

Luna nodded vigorously, eyes looking up at Ilsa. “Not entirely, Ilsa. But there has to be a reason why the Reindeer were put to the sword above even humanity…” she said, grimacing. “And that reason, I firmly believe, is the will of this hidden, accursed evil.” She looked up to where Lyra stood, always next to Reiner. “The Ambassador, Lyra, Reiner spoke of her as if she knew something,” Luna said, pausing to cough. “Perhaps… perhaps she too found that shadow.”

Weakly, she summoned the two journals from her null-space, gently placing them on the floor in front of her.

“These here are your mother’s diaries, written in Old Ponish,” Luna said, facing Reiner. “If Ambassador Heartstrings knew something, then perhaps we can find it by retracing their steps.”

“I’ll… I’ll get to it,” Lyra said, levitating the journals to pocket them in her own null-space. “But, Twilight could help– maybe if we, uh, split the homework?”

“I’ll see if they can copy it,” Reiner said simply. “Shouldn’t take an hour.”

“Aye… do so. We’ve so much to figure out,” Luna bemoaned, rubbing her temples. “And time… when Discord and I arrived on Earth, we were told only two days had passed since Captain Reiner’s mysterious disappearance, that’s two weeks here. Yet when I returned with Cadance, only three days had passed, same as Earth.”

It was Reiner who answered her unsaid question.

“You said you had… church service with Maxine?” he asked, scratching his chin.

Luna noted his use of her name. Not ‘Max’, as her father had called her, but ‘Maxine’. The man who went by ‘Alex’ didn’t see fit to abbreviate his sister’s name. Those two, Luna reflected, hadn’t had a very good relationship. She nodded.

“Yes, on a Sunday.”

“Then that means… time’s…” Reiner began, then shook his head. “That doesn’t make sense, the time between us and the Empire’s always been the same for years…”

“Maxine mentioned that, too. I suppose, I suppose that’s another answer to find,” Luna said. She clenched her teeth, forcing herself onto her hooves. As she did so, she saw Sint and Ilsa, and even Galatea, take a step forward in alarm. “Now, the delegates await us still.”

“You need your rest–”

“No,” Luna retorted, “no… I must see to it that…”

Celestia lay a forehoof on her shoulder. “You can accompany Lady Cadenza and me as we present the case, Luna,” she said soothingly. “But I cannot allow you to exert yourself further. Lady Cadenza’s words will be enough for the Public Assembly.”

Privately, Luna regretted that she hadn’t stuck around to watch how Princess Cadance had presented their case to UNAC. But if Cadance had convinced mankind’s leaders, then of course, so could Lady Cadenza convince mirrors of those she knew.

Reluctantly, she nodded. Something else crossed her mind.

“Tia, about Lady Cadenza– there’s something you ought to know, as well. All of you,” Luna urgently looked back and forth between her companions. “It is imperative we seek out this, this Architect. And the heart-shaped locket. Has anything turned up in searching the Everfree River?”

“None, Your Highness,” Shining was prompt to say. “None so far.”

Luna groaned. “The Architect, confound it! Confound her and… and Prismia. Both of them, if they truly are one and the same!”

There was so much to tell, so little time to move. Now her headache had returned, stinging deep. Something she hadn’t mentioned to anyone yet, not even Celestia. She shouldn’t give her sister further cause for worry.

“Luna, what’s wrong?” asked Celestia, prescient as always.

“It’s her, Tia. Lady Cadenza,” Luna answered. “Cadance… so close, yet, so different. The reason our worlds have turned out so differently. Lady Cadenza didn’t know about Prismia… Twilight, Twilight’s research, you must urge her…”

Her voice devolved into a hoarse, racking cough.

“Yes, I know what needs to be done, Sister,” Celestia said, glancing at Shining Armor, who stood to attention. “Captain Armor, inform your Guards to continue the search for the locket. Remind Twilight of her task. With Discord gone… we must act quickly.”

“Time is of the essence,” Galatea added sternly, eyes darting from Luna to Celestia. “If the Solar Empire has captured Discord, sisters, we mustn’t discount the notion that they’ll extract knowledge of mine involvement from his mind. They already know of mine counterpart.”

“And every advantage we have counts,” Celestia agreed, nodding. “That window is closing fast.”

“Understood,” answered Shining.

“No, Captain.” Luna coughed again, “I shall inform… I shall inform Twilight myself. There is so much she needs to know. She must be eased in...”

Fleetingly, she contemplated what her niece had seen, and what Lady Cadenza’s loss had been. She hadn’t seen the High Captain or his peculiar new wife for herself. But Cadance’s haunted look had told her enough.

‘So many… broken families…’

How Shining hadn’t hesitated in fighting his wife’s spitting image. How Alexander and Maxine had lost their mother to parts unknown, while Dan withered away in his longing. As her gaze fell upon Galatea, who stood quiet and tranquil, Luna remembered something.

“Galatea…” she said raspily, the grey earthpony’s eyes meeting hers. “Come… come over.”

The eldest of three approached her, still serene. Luna steeled her gaze.

“Celestia told me of your invaluable help, when Discord and I needed a lifeline.” she spoke tenderly, “It… it was you who sent Cadance, after all. I... may have spoken and thought ill of you in the past. But I hope we– I, can move past that, from hereon.”

She reached for and took Galatea’s forehoof in her own.

“Thank you... dear sister.”

The grey earthpony’s face stayed impassive. Yet behind those icy-blue eyes, something stirred. A warmth Luna hadn’t sensed before, now uncovered. There, if Luna’s eyes weren’t deceiving her, the ghost of a smile tugging at the grey one’s lips.

Some time passed in silence, with Luna’s companions deep in thought, mulling over it all. It was only then that Luna noticed the single missing constant of Celestia’s vicinity.

“Where is Twilight?”

* * * * *

In the Hall of Unity, where each of the quarters were custom-made to receive visitors from all four corners of the world, Lady Amira could have almost believed she was back home. Although the walls were granite, rather than sandstone, and the air lacked the pure quality of the desert, the architecture here was of remarkable fidelity to the high style of Farsina or Intisar. Perhaps unsurprisingly so, given Saddle Mareabia’s cultural ties with the Tauren Isles. Diligent work had been done to keep the Hall a reflection of contemporary styles by its Minotaur custodian, Proxenos Darkhoof. It did help that the Hall was carved out of mountain rock, like Farsina.

This was how Amira was trying to distract herself, stealing a glance every so often at the gold-leafed frescoes of the ceiling, whose depiction of chubby foals with pony-esque rounded eyes she found so much dearer than her interlocutor’s twaddle.

“... And I repeat, Your Ladyship,” said Grizelda, the Young Pretender, “that Grover’s Crown rightly belongs with my people. To see it restored to Griffonstone would be a gracious gesture.”

Pretending to think about it, Amira swirled the last drops in her cup of rosewine.

“A gracious gesture, no doubt,” agreed Amira, taking her final sip. “But one, to my lasting regret, which doesn’t belong with me. The contents of my husband’s collection are his to determine. I fear we shall have to await his availability.”

Grizelda’s eyes narrowed, as she visibly contained her impatience. “And I’ll be glad to help… free up his time,” she said sardonically. “I can wait until then for Grover’s Crown. All I ask is for the Crown, no strings attached, once the time comes. If you can promise me that, I’ll put in a good word with Princess Celestia.”

“A good word is always appreciated,” Amira said, with a diplomat’s smile. “Indeed, we’ve shared many words in these past days, Your Grace. I assure you, I find the matters of our small, personal concerns a glad diversion from the troubling news brought to us by a far-off world.” Before Grizelda had a reply to give, Amira had stood up, dipping her head subtly. “Yet other guests await my presence, and for them, those troubles have taken on a pressing reality. You’ll understand what duties I owe them as a host.”

She tugged the bell-pull by their table. The chime had barely receded before a servant – picked from her household’s horses rather than zebras, like all of her staff on this trip, out of tact to certain fellow delegates – had entered the parlor to stand at attention.

“Duha,” said Amira. “If you may escort Her Grace to the door? I am expected elsewhere.”

Leaving the Young Pretender to place her claims at the door, as it were, Amira proceeded away, to a separate wing of the Saddle Mareabians’ quarters.

It wasn’t until she’d reached the entrance to the thermal baths that she let her head hang. She’d found the spy’s funeral enough of a new weight on her heart. But the persistence of that griffon! And yet she’d been entirely honest to Dame Grizelda about one thing. Her presence at the thermal baths wasn’t for her own pleasure. She did have other guests waiting.

Nearby at an adjacent balcony framed between two vine-covered pillars, a blond-maned stallion, his coat a tangelo brown, was sat reading a scroll under the rays of a late-morning Sun. Spotting her standing still before the entrance, he rolled up the scroll and got up.

“Greetings, Lady Amira,” said Prince Haakim. “You seem out of sorts, if you’ll pardon my forwardness. Has the Young Pretender kept pestering you?”

Amira nodded wearily, sharing an experienced look with her young colleague. “I fear it is unlikely Grizelda will relent, Esteemed Highness,” said she. “The opportunity is simply too great. How often, truly, do the peoples of Equus all gather under one roof.”

Haakim smiled ruefully. “Aye, and here I’d thought it was such a special occasion, attending that fireworks display with the Sun Princess, last year.”

“Give them this, the Equestrians know how to up the stakes from year to year,” agreed Amira. “After the return of Princess Luna and the breakout of Lord Discord, such happenings as the Royal Wedding and the Crystal Realm’s reappearance, momentous as they were, may have felt lesser by comparison. Blissfully ignorant were we…”

“When this year, the threat we behold is Equestria’s own dark mirror, you mean?” said Haakim. “There’s more to Equestrians than meets the eye, isn’t there… How was it you learned those fireworks almost didn’t go as planned, again?”

Amira’s brow darkened. “I’d sooner not talk about this, Haakim.”

While he was a Prince, Haakim was humble, and looked ashamed at his mistake. “Oh… I beg your forgiveness,” he said, dipping his head. “It should never have slipped my mind.”

“You are not the one at fault, Highness,” said Amira. “I remain grateful to your mother that she permitted me to take on this assignment, showing her faith in me to stay on cordial terms with the Sun Princess.”

To say nothing of her standing in Court, tarnished as it was. Dear Qabil’s arrest had been less than two years ago at the time.

This proposal for an Expedition by the little green unicorn, Madame Heartstrings, which on any other occasion would have been so suitable for the al-Husans to pledge their backing, was the one thing now where stepping forward would cast further suspicion upon, not restore the family’s reputation.

Such a respectable enterprise wouldn’t fancy the infamy of a name currently attached to ethically-flexible archaeology, not helped by conflicts of interest with the likes of Dame Grizelda…

“Mistress?”

Duha had reappeared, coming all this way to find her. Surprised, Haakim stepped aside to give way for the servant. For her part, Amira inwardly frowned at his arrival.

“You wished to speak, Duha?”

“As I escorted Dame Grizelda, I found a new visitor waiting at the door,” explained Duha. “I must apologise, Lady Amira, that I did not know to expect them.”

“No new visits were scheduled for today,” said Amira. “Who is the visitor?”

“With all my apologies for any ill-preparedness, Mistress, the visitor is Her Royal Highness of Equestria, Princess Luna.”

* * * * *

Time spent in the Saddle Mareabian baths was quite different from the Ponyville Spa, and yet, remarkably alike. However she did it, Rarity’s sweet-talking of the Saddle Mareabian delegation over the past week had earned their little group many an invitation to bask in the pleasures of the exotic land from beyond the desert. Invitations they’d kept in reserve, until now.

But for Fluttershy, even after the scarier stories Twilight had told of Saddle Mareabia’s history, the comfort of a nice hot perfumed bath, surrounded by her friends, could not have been more needed than now. As finely-clad attendants diligently poured scented lotion into the great enamel bathtub, Fluttershy tried so hard to let it soothe the pain.

Her friends, bless them, did not truly understand. Only Rarity and Pinkie had suspected what Discord truly meant to her, and even they’d found it baffling. Even Pinkie. Who, at this moment, was at the bath’s edge, holding up a pink balloon and a pin.

“Now, Pinkie, darling,” Rarity said from within the bath, with a hint of fear, “mind the–”

Right then, Pinkie popped the balloon. It exploded in a shower, filled with what turned out to be chocolate milk, which splattered over the tiles. The Saddle Mareabian attendants gasped and muttered disapprovingly, but it wasn’t their approval Pinkie was looking for.

“I’ll clean up myself. Promise,” Pinkie mouthed quickly, her eyes on Fluttershy. “How was that, Flutters? Nothing…?”

“I’m sorry, Pinkie,” whispered Fluttershy. “It’s just not the same.”

“Aw…”

Fluttershy saw Pinkie exchange a helpless glance with Applejack, who gazed down. “Flutters, Ah… Ah can’t say I know why you’re feelin’ it, but Ah know what you’re feeling. No-one’s ever ready to lose someone…”

Of all her friends, Fluttershy knew Applejack was feeling the most ill-at-ease, having never suspected her feelings for Discord, topped off by the farmer’s lingering distrust of the Saddle Mareabians. Applejack was the only one who’d refused any service, standing stolidly by the bathtub, her one concession having been to remove her hat.

Close by, Dash was having her wings groomed, but she appeared to take little pleasure from it, frequently shooting Fluttershy a worried glance.

“Heck,” whispered Dash. “It ain’t easy even if you weren’t friends… Redheart… the badRedheart… I fought her in the Everfree to save Lyra and the others, but she’s gone now, and…”

Never one who knew how to formulate her feelings, Dash let her voice trail off.

But Twilight, whom Fluttershy felt listening in from her spot at the opposite end of the bathtub, couldn’t have found the right words either. Not even with the aid of Princess Cadance, who was presently draping a pair of majestic wings around her shoulders in wordless comfort – the best which she could be offered at this moment.

Of them all, Cadance came closest to understanding. She hadn’t even had to say anything. Fluttershy silently reflected as she sank a little lower into the water. The Wedding was still a fresh memory in her mind. And Cadance had found herself pulled into the fight on Earth, the fight which had claimed Discord. In a war which pitted the Guards of Equestria on the field, it was not hard to guess whom Cadance had seen fighting on the opposite side.

Fluttershy had already seen it, in that terrible vision within the human’s mind, that Discord himself might have conjured up on one of his bad days. Shining Armor, committing evil.

Twilight had witnessed this as well. In a way, this was just more painful to think about. Fluttershy scrunched up her eyes. She was being selfish, she was getting her friends down, Shining was Twilight’s big brother from birth, and what was Discord next to that, nothing but a creature who’d willingly caused them all hurt…

A creak of the door announced a presence to divert all attention, including hers.

“Princess Luna?” gasped Twilight, rippling the water.

Still clad in her armour, the Princess entered the thermal baths, her companion the distinguished personage who’d granted them use of the baths for the day, upon hearing Rarity’s request; Lady Amira, one of the Saddle Mareabian delegates they’d met a year prior, shortly after the trouble which had led to Trixie’s arrest and eventual incarceration.

Fluttershy tried shaking off recollections of offering Alexander Reiner a jam jar meant for Trixie – even though the slowly-hardening stain of chocolate Pinkie’s prank had left, bless her soul, was far too reminiscent of the jam spilled on the hospital floor after Reiner tried to strangle her.

Shivering despite the warm water, Fluttershy made herself focus on the newcomers. Lady Amira wore her customary expression, one of remote, aristocratic benevolence. But Princess Luna looked forlorn as her eyes met a certain unicorn’s.

“Greetings, everyone. And… hello, Twilight. I… well… I’d like to talk to you, if you don’t mind?”

“Princess…” said Twilight, biting her lip. “The PHL’s presentation is starting soon.”

“I know,” Princess Luna replied, “but I’m not attending this particular presentation, I am certain I've heard all I need of their world… I was hoping we could talk on your way there.”

“Oh, that sounds good to me, Princess,” replied Twilight, offering her a friendly smile, which faltered when her gaze fell upon Luna’s bleached tuft of mane, and the new patch of freckles that had appeared upon her snout. She frowned. “But I hope I’m not taking away your–”

Princess Luna cut her off with a weak wave of her wing. “No, no, it’s quite alright, Twilight, I did volunteer for this,” she said. “I shall be heading off to sleep right after I see you off.”

“Jus’ go, Twi’,” Applejack added, “we’ll be fine.”

As Fluttershy saw Twilight glance her way, still not looking so sure, she gave her a small nod. “It’s okay, don’t worry,” she whispered, trying for a brave face. “We’ll see you at the presentation.”

Lady Amira coughed formally, gaining their attention. “Actually,” the Lady said softly. “I would like to request a moment myself, with Mistress Fluttershy.”

The only ones who seemed unsurprised were Princess Luna, and the attendants. Fluttershy registered vibes off her friends that ranged from unease in Rarity and Cadance, who’d both been helping Twilight out of the bathtub, to suspicion in Applejack, who shared a look with Pinkie and Dash. And she felt very nervous, wondering if she’d done something wrong.

Whereupon Princess Luna, pulling a towel off the rack, spoke again. “Lady Amira merely wishes for a word with you, Fluttershy,” she said, not unkindly, while she handed the towel to Twilight. “You might wish to hear what she has to say.”

Whatever this was about, Cadance understood it, unspoken, and nodded at Fluttershy’s friends.

Between people of rank like the Princesses and the Saddle Mareabian noble, there always was this sense of a hidden communication, mysterious to outsiders, where the unsaid mattered as much as the said. Fluttershy would have loved Rarity or Twilight to be with her for this. But Twilight was drying herself off, and so was Rarity, courtesy of an attendant.

Escorted by the two Princesses, the five soon went, leaving Fluttershy in the bathtub, alone with the noblemare as the attendants shut the doors.

Lady Amira glanced queryingly at the chocolate-stained floor, yet refrained from comment.

“Your Ladyship, um...” began Fluttershy. “P-please excuse me if I don’t get up…”

“It is no offence, Mistress Fluttershy,” Lady Amira smiled faintly. “I was in fact hoping to sit and confer with you.”

And Fluttershy, worry in her stomach, wondered what the foreign noble could possibly want from her, as Lady Amira settled herself by the bathtub.

“Maybe you’ll find this hard to believe,” Lady Amira spoke, pondering an ornate pattern on the enamel surface, “but I may understand what you’re feeling. Better than your friends, even.”

These were the last words Fluttershy had expected. “Y-you do? How could you understand?” Then she feared she’d sounded insolent. “I-I’m… Sorry, Your Ladyship.”

Lady Amira gave a quiet little laugh. “Fear not. I found it a challenge too, to keep my composure, when it happened.”

“... When what happened?” Fluttershy asked softly. Behind her cool grace, the Saddle Mareabian’s eyes looked sympathetic, commiserating.

“I know what it’s like to have someone you love taken from you,” said Lady Amira. “Not die, no. But taken away. Are you familiar with my House’s name? Our ways may not be your ways, yet I imagine your friend, Mistress Twilight, must have explained them to you, before I came to visit with His Esteemed Highness last year.”

Fluttershy tried to remember. “You’re, you are from an old House called… uh, Husan, wasn’t it? Um, sorry. I don’t know much about Saddle Mareabia.”

“Al-Husan,” Lady Amira corrected. “My husband’s House. A generations-old provider of sorcerers to Her Esteemed Majesty’s Court.” She smiled, wryly. “Actually I find it elating, to speak with one for whom that name is unfamiliar. It has been source of ignominy, lately.”

“Why?” Fluttershy whispered. “What happened?”

Lady Amira sighed. “We were shamed,” she said. “I find my husband a remarkable stallion, a great scholar and adventurer– but feckless in his desire to possess, to catalogue the unknowable. He acquired something he ought not have... and was duly punished for it. Sentenced... to Erebus.”

At last, Fluttershy understood. “Erebus… I, I know someone who got sent there,” she said, thinking of Trixie. “I’m… I don’t know what to say.”

“You don’t have to. It was a just sentence…”

“Even so,” began Fluttershy. “It’s gotta be hard. Seeing… seeing Princess Celestia, I mean. I…” For one split second, she hesitated. “I… I know it isn’t her, but… It’s weird, but I feel like it’d still hurt, if it’d been her who… turned Discord back into stone.”

“Tis’ an odd thing, matters of the heart,” agreed Lady Amira. “Even when we see those we love for all that they are, knowing the wrongs they’ve committed and woes they’ve caused, we cannot help that we love them.”

* * * * *

Once they’d broken away from the company of friends, leaving the remaining Bearers in Cadance’s care, not many words were shared between Twilight and Princess Luna on their walk. What little Luna had to say was delivered early on and with a matter-of-fact precision. Exhausted as she was, fatigue having by all accounts caught up to her since Redheart’s funeral, Luna nonetheless didn’t beat around the bush.

“Tia wishes you to continue your research into the Amulet, Twilight,” Luna had said. “Following certain revelations regarding the point of divergence, all involving Princess Cadance, it may prove crucial in uncovering this war’s mysteries.”

“Don’t worry, Princess,” Twilight had replied, keeping up a confident smile, “I’ll be right on it in no time.”

Luna had nodded, and that was the end of that. Now they walked in silence, down the hallways, passing by delegates from all walks of life. Some remained where they were, whispering and gesturing at the Princess. The obsidian armour she still wore must have covered hidden wounds. Most people were walking in the same direction, to where the Public Assembly now convened.

However, as they marched up the stairs, towards the balconies, Twilight thought she’d caught Luna stealing little glances her way. Or perhaps it was to a tapestry on their right, or the carpet beneath their hooves, or the flower pots along the walls. Or perhaps even, which prompted a flustered blush from Luna, a strand of stray mane or sullied fur on her flank.

‘I’d like if you just told me I missed a spot, Princess,’ Twilight thought bemusedly.

Never mind that it couldn’t have possibly been why Luna was staring. The Princess had larger concerns in mind, no doubt. Although admittedly she had showered rather hastily in the immediate aftermath of the Princesses’ return, seeing her with the dragon. With Spike.

Twilight shook her head. It wasn’t the time to dwell on this yet. She filed away the matter of Luna’s glances as another question, to be asked in better times.

But entering the Princess’s royal-box, as Twilight brushed against the railings, someone caught her eyes down in the Assembly, prompting her to freeze on the spot. There was no mistaking those glasses, or that primly-tied mane.

A face she’d unexpectedly seen again in the Canterlot Library, mere weeks ago. A face that had grown unfriendly to her, seemingly for good.

Twilight tore her gaze away from the other-Moondancer, and looked to her right. She paused to find Luna staring back at her, eyes wide. The Princess blinked, then cleared her throat and looked away, as expected.

“Apologies, ahem,” Luna spoke up, before Twilight could say anything. “I… um… right.”

“Princess?” Twilight asked. Luna returned her gaze, the freckles on her nose a little darker now. She had beautiful, gentle eyes.

“I was… just wondering. Is something wrong?” Luna asked, her eyebrow raised. “You seemed terribly quiet there. Does my presence… discomfort you?”

“Oh, no, it’s not you Princess. It’s just... nothing, nothing…” Twilight assured, then reconsidered. “I… saw Moondancer down there.”

Luna’s gaze drifted to follow where Twilight’s went. By the looks of her, Moondancer was gauging the stage and the whole chamber. Her eyes looked sharp and calculating when amplified by her glasses.

“An old friend,” Luna surmised. Twilight winced at that. “Worry not, Twilight, I am certain you will have the time to catch up with her.”

Twilight let out a short, bitter laugh. Coincidently, Moondancer was turning to disappear back into the wings.

“Friend… I wish. Thing is, I don’t think she wants to see me,” she said, tapping the railing. “I blew it here, and I’m… I don’t know why it’d be any different, with this Dancer.”

“Ah…” Luna said softly. “I cannot claim much knowledge of… Dancer, outside of a few times that I have walked her dreams. But this other world holds many surprises, in the way of past faces.”

The gentle, mournful tone spurred Twilight’s curiosity.

“Thanks, Princess, I’ll try working something out,” said Twilight, “I guess you know all about reconnecting, huh?”

“Indeed. These days… most of all,” Luna said cryptically, eyes focused on where Moondancer had vanished off to.

Clad in her chestplate as well as her usual regalia, head held high when they’d walked past the many faces of Equus, Princess Luna was the picture of royal dignity. But she must have aged by a good few years in the time she’d spent on Earth. Her eyes grew haggard as the seconds ticked by. And her gait, now Twilight recalled it, was a soldier’s gait, limping ever so slightly on their walk.

“Princess Luna,” Twilight said carefully. Luna’s ears perked up. “I’m glad you were with me, by the way, but I think… you need to rest. I can take it from here.”

Luna cleared her throat. “Agreed. I’d best be on my way. But will you be alright?”

“Yeah… yeah, I will,” answered Twilight, gently shaking her head even as she gave a half-smile. “Don’t worry about me. We’ve got plenty we can talk about later. Just take care, Princess.”

Princess Luna bobbed her head. A ghost of a smile was on her lips. “And you too, Twilight.”

She departed back the way they came. While Twilight beheld the growing crowd, pondering friendship and the wider world, it was the most curious feeling, however. Left staring at the backs of many heads, Twilight could have sworn an image had imprinted on her sight, the faintest glimpse of Luna’s enchanting, dreamlike eyes gazing at her in shadow, like the Moon and stars above accompanying her lonely studies.

But Twilight couldn’t dwell on that, as the Assembly darkened and the stage was set.

* * * * *

To Celestia, Dame Moondancer didn’t look much different from her counterpart, that shy and quiet mare from her School. Indeed, out of her friends, and from what Luna told her of the Archmage, Moondancer may have been the least removed in appearance of all, with her old glasses still perched upon her snout. Only her mane marked her as different, with its strands of grey hair neatly wrapped in a bun, together with her vest in the dark greens of the PHL.

“Are you alright, Your Highness?” asked Moondancer, looking up from her equipment on the table. A computing device, fashioned by human craft, she’d said. “If… it’s not too much to ask, that is.”

“Just another family talk, Dame Moondancer,” answered Celestia. “I am alright, thank you.”

Dame Moondancer smiled. “Lady Cadance is… well, she’s getting ready for you. She ought to be back from the restroom anytime soon, Highness.”

Celestia nodded in turn, her eyes darting around the antechamber. It was small, its ceiling low, with a pillar in each corner and wooden benches lining each side of the wall flanking her, long tables partnered with each bench. Dame Moondancer was seated on one of them now, looking up from her papers.

The doors swung open from behind Celestia. She turned in time to see Lady Cadenza enter and freeze where she stood. Aunt and niece looked at one another, with neither saying a single word. Lady Cadenza did not move, remaining rooted to her spot. Celestia offered her a tiny smile.

“Lady Cadance,” Celestia began, pausing to contemplate. “It’s good to see you. I was just enquiring for your whereabouts. I only wish we’d had more time to prepare for your arrival.”

Cadenza’s eyes remained impassive, calculating, not unlike Luna’s. Celestia spotted the telltale ruffle of wings beneath the vest, stunted as hers were. Carefully, one hoof at a time, she moved towards Celestia. It wasn’t too confident, Celestia observed, but she had to commend the effort.

Once Cadenza was right in front of her, the pegacorn let out a sigh.

“I only wish I could say the same,” she said, with a tilt of her head. “But war is war… I’m sorry. We really don’t have much time, do we?”

She wasn’t afraid. Not openly, at least. Not a bad start.

“That we don’t,” agreed Celestia.

“Yeah. When was the last time…?”

“Officially, a thousand years ago,” Celestia answered. “If you’d call counter-piracy support a ‘war’, then I suppose the 1st Household’s interference at Mount Aris, ten years ago, would count. Twenty-six, by your time, yes?”

“Yes. Celestia’s Own, they called them,” Cadenza replied. “Shining read all about it.”

“So he told me, and Astron, too,” Celestia added, letting a touch of fondness slip into her tone. The twinkle in Cadance’s eyes when she mentioned him did not escape her. “Colts, you know, can be so impressionable...”

“Oh, they are, they are…” said Cadenza, wistfully. But a shadow fell over her expression. “The last time Celestia’s Own were deployed was… Moscow, I think. No one’s seen them since… but if the Great Equestrian was in Boston… ” She blinked, shook her head. “Sorry. It’s just... I’m all over the place. You remind me of… her. But you’re not.”

“Don’t feel bad, Cadance,” Celestia answered at once. She felt the urge to pat the other’s shoulder, but intuition told her that Lady Cadenza wouldn’t appreciate it much. “I’d best be prepared for plenty more like that.”

No answer came, at first. Cadenza pawed at the tiles, biting her lip.

“For what it’s worth,” Celestia added, and Cadenza looked up, “you’re handling this much better than I thought you would.”

Cadenza’s laugh was short and bitter. “I don’t know what’s ‘better’ at this point, Auntie,” she said, before wincing. “Sorry. Force of habit. But… Yeah. I thought I should just… shunt it aside, you know. You’re you, but… also not. And… might as well start this off right.”

“I trust Princess Cadance helped with that, didn’t she?”

“I yelled at her at first,” Cadenza replied, matter-of-factly. “Long story, but we dealt with it. And with you… it’s a clean slate. I guess.”

Moondancer stood up from her table.

“If I may, Your Highness,” the bespectacled mare told Celestia, moving to Cadance’s side. “I knew Twilight Sparkle when I was growing up. Her and Lyra Heartstrings. We all went to your School for Gifted Unicorns together. I always knew they were destined for great things, whereas I felt content to live life with my books and dreams.”

She drank in the sight of Celestia.

“When Lyra was appointed as our foremost ambassador to Earth, I’d never imagined that so much more would be thrust upon her. But even less could I’ve imagined that I’d one day stand where she stood, an emissary to a very different world. To humans, that difference was a shock… I… I hope we won’t be too shocking to you.”

“You are not, my friends, you are not,” Celestia answered, but her voice grew wistful, eyes tracing the strands of grey hair in Dame Moondancer’s mane. “I remember you, Moondancer. I regret that I never could satisfy your questions about oneirology. Now I see you here, carrying your world and another’s dreams. Believe me when I say that I’m just as equally glad to see you here.”

Dame Moondancer’s eyes might have grown misty behind her glasses.

“I only wish that Twilight were here by your side,” said Celestia, “and that Lyra could have seen you both stand in a peaceful Equestria…”

“Not everyone makes it, Your Highness,” said Lady Cadenza softly. “Time takes us all.”

Luna had, in brief, privately described the Lady Archmage following the funeral. How she had been so close, and yet so far, from the faithful student. How convinced and how torn she was over her Imperial duties. Luna’s voice had wavered and trembled, when she so vividly described the dragon that had once been Spike, and Twilight’s last request, before her nightmare pulled her in once more…

Centuries of practice had kept Celestia’s serene smile from contorting into a bitter grimace.

Meanwhile, Lady Cadenza’s gaze hardened. “I’m afraid I need to cut to the chase, my apologies. When we were monitoring the situation in Boston, Your Highness, we… had an encounter. Someone who used Miss Sugarbean– our Bonbon, as her vessel.”

“Yes?” Celestia replied. “And who did she claim to be?”

“Someone named Galatea,” Lady Cadenza answered. “I had prior dealings with her counterpart, but never in person. Perhaps she’s made contact with you, or Aunt Luna?”

‘For someone so private, Galatea,’ Celestia thought, recalling the fate of the other-Galatea, ‘you can be so… careless.’

Pushing the thought aside, Celestia shook her head. “No. I’m afraid she has not. Not here, at least.”

“But– Alex, I mean, Captain Reiner, he was there too, he must have told you,” protested Cadenza. “She’s your sister, or so she claims to be.”

“Ah… I see,” answered Celestia, “Alex did tell us of her. But the only sister I’ve had return to me has been your Aunt Luna. In any case, we’ll keep our eyes and ears open. I suspect she’ll only make herself known if she wants to be.”

Dame Moondancer and Lady Cadenza traded looks of bewilderment.

“Well, then I shall take my leave, Your Highness,” said Moondancer, returning her gaze to Celestia, pushing her glasses up. “We’ve got a presentation to do.”

She bowed, Celestia answering with a bow of her own. With that, the unicorn turned to leave, folding up her computing device and taking it with her.

“Your Highness,” said Lady Cadenza, with a frown, “please, are you sure you have nothing on this Galatea…?”

“I’ve no answer I can give for that, Cadance,” Celestia answered, shaking her head. “But should the truth come to light, I will ensure that you're amongst the first to know.”

“I see,” Cadenza answered, sighing. “Right. I’ll be with Dancer.”

With a nod exchanged between the two of them, they departed the room.

~ Day 6 of the Convocation ~ Fifteenth Day of the Month of Rophon ~

The Hall of Unity’s attendees sat in silence, watching the two PHL representatives on the stage. On the very evening of their arrival, Lady Cadenza and Dame Moondancer had worked all night preparing their presentation, relaying each other to catch enough sleep. Princess Celestia stood by their side, watching as the images projected passed by on the screen, telling Earth’s story once more, to an audience who’d heard it through dreams and nightmares.

‘If only Luna were here,’ she thought. She glanced at her not-niece, smiling wryly. ‘What a fine diplomat you’ve grown into, Lady Cadance.’

Dreams and nightmares had once sufficed, only three days ago. Now reality was there for the Public Assembly to see in full. Behind the representatives of the PHL, beside the screen where the images flashed, left and right, was a large map they had set up. A projection, which obviously had seen frequent use. Nevertheless, this was their most accurate depiction to show how far the Barrier had reached.

Although Lady Cadenza and Dame Moondancer did not partake in Luna’s means of presentation, there was something just as captivating to Celestia about the facts and statistics pouring in from this strange new world.

Where Princess Cadance had revealed an Equestria of the past, without fifteen years of war, expansion, and xenocide, here it was Lady Cadenza’s turn to speak before leaders, her words weaving in and around the imagery. Cadenza had begun with a story, one that must have been familiar to her, yet strange to retell. An Equestria that was made to suffer from Chrysalis’ assault, then beset by Sombra’s war. Others had joined Equestria in its conflict. And not for the last time.

Never again would they be hurt, for they had united the equine nations under the Pan-Equine Co-Harmony Sphere when a new threat emerged. And with the Storm King’s retreat, they had found another triumph. A golden age of discovery and prosperity, under the guidance of Princess Celestia.

Then, a full ten years after Luna’s return, the miracle discovery of Earth, through means only Celestia and the Bearers of Harmony could know, when the year was 2016 on Earth.

An endeavour that once brought hope of two worlds becoming one. That Earth’s wounds would be healed, and its technological marvels shared with Equus in turn. That two worlds could learn from one another, and reach for the stars hand in hoof.

It was not meant to be, for then came Conversion, and with it, the Conversion War. How at first, the serum was a miracle cure for all of humanity’s ailments. But those who took this cure turned to another form, which was all but another person, stripping away their humanity until only a hollow pony remained.

Talks had broken down. The world plunged into the Purple Winter. From the centerpoint of the crossing between Earth and Equestria, the Barrier had emerged. Once the Princess became Queen, with her followed a new Empire. But so too had Ambassador Heartstrings arisen, again calling upon the two worlds to come together, now against the Tyrant Sun.

Yet while Lady Cadenza spoke at length of humanity’s plight, it was the fate of their brethren, which truly drew the eyes and ears of the attendees. How the crystalponies and hippogriffs, Saddle Mareabians, Oleandrites, zebras and even griffons had followed the Tyrant’s lead. None on this other-world knew the fate of the Reindeer. Few cared for the Changeling Hives, purged, burned, or wasted away by the tainted love of the Newfoals. The Minotaur and the Kirin remained steadfast in their isolation, but their time grew nearer. And most dragons were condemned to their obsidian prisons, forever frozen as statues.

There were those who still resisted the Imperial hegemony, whether by letter or by the sword. Those aligned with the Equestrian Resistance, hidden beneath the Empire’s watchful gaze. Grizelda’s Redcloaks and other, independent griffon clans, stubborn in their refusal to join those clans under the Sphere’s banners. But with news slowly drying up with the Barrier’s expansion, this was all the PHL knew from what little information was relayed to them by the Resistance.

From here, Lady Cadenza presented to all the battlefield that was Earth.

“... The Pacific Stampede Fleet cooperates with the Chinese and Japanese navies in combating Imperial presence in the Pacific and polar regions,” Cadenza spoke, indicating several positions on the map with a ruler, in the vast ocean that dominated most of it. “Now, if you look here, the Royal Navy protects the South Atlantic, in conjunction with the French Navy headquartered at Cayenne, down South…”

The projected map displayed a world dominated by the Barrier and Imperial territory, growing out from the region that was once Europe, as Reiner had previously described. Lady Cadenza pointed to the continent across the ocean, barely grazed by the Barrier.

“North America, where Captain Reiner hails from, has roaming gangs of insurgents and others between settlements. Everything North-East of Boston is Imperial territory. The media calls it the Second Civil War. No one can agree what to call it, actually–”

“These red patches,” Grizelda interrupted from her balcony. She pointed at a corner of the map, near the location marked ‘Boston.’ “What are they?”

“Bandits,” Cadenza said grimly. “Not all who fight are in it together with UNAC. You’ll find no heroes among them. Just opportunists and scoundrels looking for the scraps.”

Curious murmurs rose, just for a moment, murmurs that died with Cadenza’s further exposition.

“... The Brazilian Army fighting Imperial frontline units in the Amazon…”

“... China, India’s Himalayan defense network, a huge, risky enterprise that nevertheless may prove to be…”

“... With the International Space Station as our eyes and ears above. With the loss of the Baikonur Cosmodrome– over there, in what used to be Kazahkstan, we’ve resorted to the Guiana Space Centre, that’s over here, in French Guiana, and Cape Canaveral to keep them supplied…”

Humanity’s situation, Celestia surmised, was not beyond recovery – were it not for the Barrier. Lady Cadenza was clinical and precise in her description, and it was consistent with what Reiner had told them. UNAC’s territories circled the Barrier, with armies posted at every chokepoint, anticipating the next Imperial push. They fought tooth and nail, by land and sea and air.

But they simply could not hold their ground. Any progress they made, the Barrier would erase.

Celestia had braced herself for the news, long ago. Yet the confirmation of a losing war brought on a scowl to her carefully maintained mask. The audience remained silent, watching the numbers fly by. They were kept simple, a matter of population counts and military statistics. Numbers that spoke to their sensibilities. Where Equus spoke in terms of millions, tens of millions at the highest estimates, Earth spoke of the hundreds of millions.

At last, Lady Cadenza’s presentation concluded, to an uneasy applause and curious murmurs beneath the ambience of the Public Assembly. She took a step back so that Dame Moondancer could step forward. Her horn glowed, the presentation shifting with it.

“Honoured representatives,” Moondancer spoke, quieting the chamber. “Though humanity fights on nobly, the situation is not so hopeful elsewhere. Where they excel in bullets, bandages and books are just as needed.”

The picture changed, from the gritty battlefields to the huddled poor and starving. Her watchers were fascinated, enraptured and mortified all at once, when her words flowed like water.

“... Starvation risks in China, India, Indonesia, and the United States as well. Now, these places support the majority of Earth’s population, breadbasket regions where most of their remaining crops are grown.”

A picture showed humans and earthponies toiling in green, terraced farmland that stretched to the horizon.

“The influx of refugees from Europe and the Middle East, here, here and here, have resulted in an unprecedented increase of population…”

“... Shortages of medicine in the United States…”

“... Aid redirected from South Africa to Australia, deemed a lower risk for refugees…”

“... Loss of Nauru and Kiribati deemed acceptable…”

“... Funding reduction in non-combat research and development, including the serum research…”

Celestia’s frown grew deeper still. There was a telltale downcast look to the two PHL representatives before her. In the crowd, she spied Galatea, still under the guise of the earthpony Shale. Stoic as ever, yet somehow grown more somber as the lecture went on.

Up on the balconies, Grizelda, off by Ironclaw’s side, did not hide her scowl, anymore than did Queen Novo and Skybeak. The Mikado and his Prime Minister held a hushed conversation with one another, brows furrowed. All around them, the Hall of Unity listened, and contemplated.

“... Antarctic outposts with backups of all we’ve got…”

“... The Cultural Preservation Project, led primarily by what’s left of Europe’s intellectuals, continues our efforts to ensure their legacy is kept intact.”

Moondancer paused, longer than she had before.

“I understand, honoured representatives, if you are afraid,” she said, quieting the murmurs. “Frankly, so are we. The Empire’s reach is far and wide. But every effort counts.”

She glanced at Celestia, and the Sun Princess took this as her cue. The pale unicorn took a step back for Celestia to take her place.

“The war has come, my fellow leaders,” the Princess of the Sun spoke. “And as Dame Moondancer has said, we understand your fears. That this is a war none of you have any stake in. Yet the Empire knows we are here. And sooner or later, they will come.” She held her head up. “But we’ll not face it alone. When the time comes, we will be ready. I do not expect each and every one of you to fight. I understand that the war does not override any and all pre-existing concerns, troubles you wish had been addressed in this grand occasion. And that, I say, is why we are here. The Call was sent out because a world needs help. When that help has been given, the doors will not remain shut. On the contrary, leaders of Equus, they shall remain open.”

She glanced from Grizelda, to Toshiro, to even Chrysalis…

“The Call of a Concordia Maxima may be sent because of war, but why should that mean it must remain only for war? We shall provide, not just for humanity, but to every one of us.”

“But this Empire, they know we're all gathered here...” spoke the Abyssinian Queen, paws curled into a fist. “We know that war’s coming.”

“They attacked your sister, Princess Celestia,” added Prince Abraxas.

“Aye.”

“Aye!”

“What can we do?”

The chorus rose, but quieted down when Celestia cleared her throat.

“Yes. This is why now is the best time for us all to stand firm. When the Empire comes, they will not be facing a squabbling rabble, but a united front. It will only happen, however, if we put our heads together–”

Queen Novo stood up. “And... what if the Storm King comes for us?” she exclaimed. “In humanity’s hour of need, what if the window opens for him to strike?”

“Then Equestria shall come to your defense,” Celestia spoke firmly, “just as we spread our shield to humanity. I understand if you have your reservations. We are not an Empire.” She indicated the screen. “Humanity’s cultural wealth and knowledge will be here, preserved for all. As we provide, they too shall share. That is why, in the days and months, and years to come, Equestria will host a program, a cultural exchange, between Equus and Earth. Though we may gather here in a time of war, my hope is the ties that bind shall remain past the darkest of days…”

In the days which had passed, Celestia had reflected a great deal upon this project. A massive undertaking to transition the most significant of cultural artifacts from one world to another. Prose and poetry, painting and sculpture, music and film, even games – and the technology to make this all feasible. She expected such a shift would have far-reaching repercussions in Equestrian society and beyond, far too many to plan for. It would have to do.

If humanity failed, if they were too late, then there’d be someone to honour their memory. But Celestia hadn’t asked that question, and knew Reiner wouldn’t have been willing to answer.

* * * * *

After the presentation concluded, Princess Ember saw to a matter which concerned her greatly.

That morning’s funeral had felt odd for her to attend, but the Chaoskämpfer had insisted upon it. Nonetheless, she wondered what Garble would’ve thought. Traditionally, dragons rarely spent time mourning their dead. Funerals were a festive occasion, full of breaking open barrels of mead and raucous laughter, a celebration of a life well spent brawling and amassing treasure. Indeed, the fun at a funeral lay in the traditional brawl of divvying up the late dragon’s hoard.

She was old enough to remember one such funeral. Where her father had been every inch the Dragon Lord, boisterously calling for a great display of sadness one moment, partying the next. Yet in private, on that night, little her had seen a different, rarely-glimpsed quieter side of him...

‘No,’ she told herself sharply. ‘You don’t think that way. You’re a dragon.’

Her experience at the Court of Kyorito, Ember mused, should have prepared her for dealing with the other peoples of the world, no matter how indifferent she felt towards them.

Now she stood before the doors to the Hall’s medical ward, thinking on how her experience did not even suffice for her own people. It didn’t feel right to freely saunter into another dragon’s den. Gathering her resolve, Ember pushed the doors open, the Chaoskämpfer’s canister held in the crook of her arm. And she stopped in place at the sight of the enormous dragon.

The space of a whole three beds had been cleared for his bulk, placed upon an oversized Ryupponese mattress. When he had arrived, he’d been covered in armour plates, cracked and dented from battle. Here she saw him as he was. An adult thing that was probably a dragon, whose sleeping head alone must have been as big as her whole figure.

Except it wasn’t an adult. She wasn’t even sure it was a dragon. Ember could only guess at what the ponies that brought him in had thought of his size, but she couldn’t imagine that they considered this a “healthy” dragon.

Something felt off about his size – the scales did not flow gracefully into one another, they looked as if they were pushing against each other, like clumsily-arranged tiles or paving stones in Kyorito. She could see great stitches lining his body in places, and she wondered or feared just what would cut up a dragon and put them back together.

She noted a curious smoothness and roundness to his face. It looked… childlike. There was no other way to describe it. This looked like a child. With the proportions of an adult.

‘That can’t be right.’

But, here this thing was. The slash on his neck had been sown up, yet she sensed this dragon was wounded beyond the surface of his scales.

And he was tied down, as much for his health as their protection. Not in chains – his wings, his claws and his feet were bound in reeds. Reeds that Ember knew as the rare plant to actually grow in her homeland, a commodity prized by the Kirin, with which her father had paid for her education – though he’d have claimed them agreeing to take her in was his price for their safe passage through the Dragonlands.

“Your Highness,” spoke a voice. “How nice. I wasn’t sure when we Kirin would see you again. You left in a hurry.”

For the first time since leaving Ryuppon, Ember had been addressed in the Language of the Cherry Blossom. The voice belonged to a short, willowy stag. He stood by the dragon’s voluminous mattress, a flask aloft in his aura, applying hyle-salve to the slash.

“Master Kenzo,” Ember greeted the Mikado’s personal physician, replying in his language. “You’re here, too?”

The physician nodded disinterestedly. “Never thought I’d be treating a dragon again so soon,” he commented. “Or such a big fella. I swear, Princess, the number of scrapes you got tackling them sky-whales… Hunting’s the only thing where you looked… alive.”

Kenzo’s informal mode of speech made him stick out at the Court, but Ember found it all the more reason he was one of few Kirin she’d liked. It took finesse to apply a stitch to a dragon’s thick scales. Moreso when they were distorted like this.

“I hope you washed your claws,” said Kenzo. “Gatherings like these, you don’t know what sticks to hooves and claws and whatnot.”

Ember just nodded, feeling the canister in her claws. An object worthy of respect, she had carefully kept it clean and polished as she could, from her trip here to her stay at the Hall.

“May I have a moment with your patient?” she said. “As a dragon, he is a subject of my father’s. And I am my father’s emissary.”

Kenzo gave her a shrewd, piercing look.

“As you wish,” he acquiesced, bowing. “But I must ask you keep your distance, dragon or no. He’s been through a lot. And don’t try speaking to him. Even if he weren’t on sedatives, he isn’t one to talk back much. I’ll give you ten minutes, no more.”

Bottling the hyle-salve, he left through the door. Now alone with the big, tied-down dragon, Ember took in his sight one more time, before she lowered the canister.

“Great Chaoskämpfer,” Ember said, switching to High Draconic. “Speak.”

Following standard procedure, the familiar emerald-green fire arose from the canister to form the Kampfer’s distinct visage as it had done before. However, almost immediately after he was summoned, there was heavy silence. For the Elder, rather than speak, had all his attention on what was before him. Even though this was a projection of dragon’s fire, Ember could tell the Chaoskämpfer was in deep contemplation over this. If this was a drake forced into an adult size, this might give him foul reminders of–

“This is what they did to him, didn’t they?” The Chaoskämpfer said in a grim tone. “In the other world, this is what they sculpted out of him. Out of… out of a mere drake.” A heavy sigh came from the fire, with a clear regret apparent on the elder’s visage. “So it is true, then. How terrible to see further proof.”

There was no anger Ember could sense in him. But there was so much sorrow. This was unexpected to her, almost alien. A dragon was a creature of fire, of fury. Her own knuckles were clenched tightly around the canister. He should have been raging at this crime, swearing righteous retribution on those responsible. Dragons helped themselves, but an affront against one dragon was an affront against all dragons.

“Why are you so calm?” she whispered to the Chaoskämpfer, so only he could hear. “Yes… yes, they did this. I never thought ponies would be capable of such a thing… but this is what happened to a dragon. It’s worse than any of those old stories about dragons getting enthralled by sorcerers to serve as their creatures.”

The Chaoskämpfer kept his gaze upon the drake, only slightly turning his head towards Ember’s.

“Unbind yourself from wrath, and use your mind to look beyond what’s immediately apparent,” he whispered back, though his tone sounded like wood cracking within a fire.

And so Ember did just that. She thought about what this could possibly mean. If the dragons of this other-Equestria had known about this, there would have been restitution at the very least. Her father wouldn’t stand for this, nor would she–

If either she or her father were still around, that is. Ember again stared at the crippled, mutilated mass of scales, and she went cold.

Could this be the image of all dragons on that other-world?

“Now do you see, Princess Ember?” the Chaoskämpfer whispered, a thin line of aggression present, if subtle. One that brought to mind the spark before a great fire. “This is what they did to him, and done doubtlessly after whatever they’ve done to us. The form they’ve turned this drake into brings to mind something from my past… doubly so something from my nightmares. I have no doubt as to what my fate might be in that world, for I would choose death before anything like this.”

His words sank into Ember. Unwillingly, she bowed her head, feeling the weight. Even after meeting the human and seeing the vision cast by Princess Luna, speaking of nightmares, a part of her had still regarded the Convocation as some big shadow-show – no more real than the figures playful drakes cast on cave walls, in one of their tamer games.

The living and cowed creature, whose faltering breath filled this room, was too real. And yet, Ember felt herself clinging to old principles.

“I don’t care about their fight,” she insistently whispered. “It’s not dragons’ business. I only want the ones who did this to pay.”

“Then ask yourself, what path is best? One of wrath, or another? For what happens next hinges on your choices,” the Chaoskämpfer whispered to her, simply. He then turned his attention to the drake, seemingly mesmerised by his laborious breathing. Why be so invested–

Ember blinked, staring at the projection of the elder dragon whose head was low and seemingly in mourning. This lasted for a moment, before the emerald fire returned back into its canister, as it usually did. However, what stuck with Ember the most was one simple thing above all else – the soft and rather quiet words that she heard him whisper.

“I’m so sorry, Everett.”

Whatever questions Ember had for the old dragon, however, were interrupted by the door’s opening. She turned, canister in hand, to meet their new guest.

Princess Celestia stood there, with a solemn gaze fixed upon Ember, and the canister she held. When she spoke, with that regal, serene voice of hers, Ember thought it conveyed a deep sorrow.

“Your Highness,” said Celestia, addressing Ember alone, “may I come in?”

* * * * *

Ember didn’t know how much longer she stayed in that room. It had all turned into a series of images that went by in a flash, punctuated by muffled noises. But she knew there were few words she’d needed to exchange with the Sun Princess before the drake. Soon after, Kenzo had come back, wishing to see his patient. Celestia had beckoned then for Ember to follow her out, leaving the drake to his slumber.

So they walked, down long, winding hallways, taking in the ambience of all around them – from the echoes and whispers of delegates and visitors that passed them by, to the mountain breeze which streamed in through the windows, and the now ever-present smell of lavender from pots new and old.

“So,” Ember began, once they passed by the Public Assembly. It was empty at this time, awaiting the next session, “why didn’t you… I don’t know, just enter?”

“Oh, I was waiting for you to be available,” said Celestia. “I didn’t think either Spykoran nor Spike would be too thrilled to see me.”

“I doubt they really minded that much,” Ember said. “Why should you care? You’re… you’re the Princess of the Sun.”

“And Spykoran is the Chaoskämpfer,” Celestia answered, serenely, “We all have our corners. Oh, turn here and…”

They’d reached the dining room, home of those fantastic breakfasts and suppers Ember had found the Hall provided abundantly. Celestia pushed the double wooden doors open, allowing entry to the both of them. They entered the room, mostly empty, save for a few critters munching on leftover snacks.

“The dining room?” asked Ember, bewildered. “Why’d you take me– Hey!”

A small, squat hedgehog had bumped into her, carrying a plate on its head. And upon the plate were a few slices of pink, strawberry cake.

“Watch it,” Ember grumbled. The hedgehog muttered an apology right after, though his evident lisp made it a little difficult to tell.

Celestia, though, had other ideas.

“Oh, thank you,” she said sweetly.

Her horn lit up, and the pieces of cake on the hedgehog’s tray levitated right into her mouth, causing her cheeks to bulge. The hedgehog looked dismayed to see his tray now empty. He hastened his pace and disappeared out the door.

“Mmm, I simply must give my thanks to the chef,” Celestia said, gulping down her last bite. She looked at Ember, with an arched eyebrow. “What? It’s good. Would you like some?”

“I’d prefer a gem myself, honestly…”

“Suit yourself,” said Celestia. With a wing, she indicated an empty table, that still had cake on it. “Let’s take a seat.”

They seated themselves across from one another. It was as large as the table Ember had shared with Chrysalis, days earlier. But Ember now felt quite small, sitting with the Princess of the Sun. Whom she observed was busy nibbling a new slice of cake, with all the appropriate decorum. Which was to say, less than Ember had expected, judging from the crumbs stuck on her lips. Once Celestia had finished, she dabbed off the remaining crumbs with a napkin. She fixed her eyes upon Ember, golden aura moving a spare plate towards her.

“Go on,” said Celestia, her serene smile returning, “have some.”

Ember huffed, pushing the cake back towards the centre. “Like I said, I’d take a gem,” she said, with crossed arms. “I’m gonna guess we’re not here for cake.”

"Actually, we kind of are," answered Celestia. She yawned. "Oh, excuse me. Feeling a little tired."

“Can’t imagine why,” replied Ember, cocking an eyebrow. “I didn’t take you for a heavy sleeper?”

Celestia chuckled. “You should see Luna, then. I do so wonder what she gets up to,” she said, folding her napkin. “Besides, I’m no dragon.”

She paused for a moment, then giggled.

“What?” Ember said. “What’s so funny?”

“Oh, I was only reminded of that sleeping dragon,” answered Celestia. “He was going to cover Equestria in smoke for a hundred years as he slumbered, I told Twilight and her friends. I didn’t want him to get too rude of an awakening. The Royal Guard can be so overzealous…”

She put down the napkin, neatly folded into a little boat. Ember furrowed her brows, rattling her thoughts for names. And one emerged, after a moment’s thinking.

“Razer,” she stated. “You’re talking about Razer.”

Seeing Celestia’s blank stare, Ember rolled her eyes.

“Big red dragon, really can’t miss him. Told Dad about some yellow pegasus asking him to leave when he went back to the Dragonlands. Guess he’s the one you’re talking about.”

“Sounds about right. Dad… hmm,” Celestia pondered, for a moment. “Well, thank you for telling me Razer’s name, Princess Ember. I only recently learned yours. The Mikado was not especially forthcoming about your presence at his Court.”

Ember stared at her, biting her lip, tapping a claw upon the wooden table. The Princess’s gaze, damn her, remained as distinctly welcoming as only hers could. It wasn’t like the aloof smiles which the Mikado or his Court often wore. No, Celestia’s face was enigmatic, warm and teasing all at once. It annoyed Ember, moreso because she couldn’t precisely define it in her own words.

“I have to say, Ember,” Celestia continued, “I didn’t expect the Dragon Lord to send an emissary. Much less his own daughter. Hmm, perhaps a letter or two, but Lord Torch has never been one for writing.”

“Yeah, my Dad really isn’t,” replied Ember, shrugging. “He doesn’t need to. Finds it easy to get people to hear him. If he needs writing done, he’s got Blacktip for that– his secretary. Still, had me shipped off to Ryuppon, cos’ he didn’t want his little girl to grow up bone-headed, he said.”

She tilted back her chair, lifting her feet to the table, where she crossed them with a loud thump, crossing her arms in synchronicity. Celestia said nothing at first, though she did move her plate out of the way.

“Although,” Celestia said, “I must commend your father in his foresight and trust in sending you.”

“Foresight, you call it,” snarked Ember. “I didn’t get a choice coming here, and neither did you, I’m pretty sure. Can’t object much when you get all glowy with the Dragon Lord’s Call.”

Celestia smirked. “Much as I wish I could say I did have a choice in the matter,” she mused, “and no matter how many times I’ve told my students otherwise, our lives are so very often defined by others’ choices, too.”

“Yeah?” Ember replied, scoffing, “I’d rather be the one to make that choice.”

She looked Celestia up and down, resolutely keeping her arms folded and feet on the table.

“I don’t see why you should be worried ‘bout what others think,” Ember continued. “You’re the one who moves the Sun. Ponies worship the ground you walk on.”

Silence followed, unbroken by either of them, but filled by the gentle chimes of the chandeliers. Celestia let loose a long, resigned sigh.

“You’d be surprised…” Celestia said, barely above a whisper. Her eyes looked down, at her near-empty plate. Now, there, Ember saw a different gaze – a haunted look, briefly glimpsed in the hospital ward they’d left.

Silently, Celestia tidied her plate, neatly arranging the utensils around her napkin. Her aura glowed bright, lifting her tiara from her brow to set it aside.

“My little ponies think of me as someone who’s got little time for family...” Celestia said softly. “I'm afraid they are correct. But I would be lying if I claimed that, in many years of my life, I did not view those I’ve taught as children of my own.”

Celestia chuckled, a low and mirthless sound.

“And what sort of mother would I be, if I didn't wish to see my godson safe under my wing, when I could not take care of him in another world…”

Ember pulled back her feet, eyes wide. Garble had mentioned a dragon among ponies before. Now...

“That dragon– ”

“–Spike, yes,” Celestia interrupted, wistfully, “His egg came into my possession many years ago, you see. I knew not from where, or whom his parents were, and they certainly weren’t in a hurry to retrieve him.”

“Well, few dragons do...”

“And you should count yourself lucky,” added Celestia. “Little Spike’s egg was a difficult one to hatch. But not impossible, as my Twilight showed.”

She let out another, sweet laugh, her mirth all but whole once more.

“I entrusted his care with Twilight’s parents. In time, they called him family. Twilight may call him brother and assistant, Ember, but though I only watched from a distance, as I taught Twilight and many others, I saw another child of mine flourish, carrying books and scrolls, and learning life lessons as well…”

Ember rubbed her chin. Strange as it may be, she thought, it was not a wholly unfamiliar story. Not when her own father had sent her, alone, into the intricacies of the Kirin Court, for abstract concepts such as reading, or something so simple as gardening.

All for her, her father had stated, telling her not to question it. And now, before Ember sat one who may well have been like him. She wasn’t sure she felt comfortable with the idea.

“But… that isn’t your son in there,” Ember said quietly, diverting her thoughts elsewhere. “He…”

Her words trailed off when she recalled the Chaoskämpfer’s silence, shared with Celestia.

“No, he is not my Spike,” Celestia replied. “Spike is safe with Twilight’s parents, far away from our dealings. But here lies another, broken and drained, Ember. And if I do not make it right, where my counterpart has failed… who would?”

She looked at Ember, with a forlorn smile.

“I don’t much care about what others would think of me, that is true. I have my duties, my burden, and my hopes for my people. That is what I tell myself. But when I stood there, Ember, a little part of me only wished to hear his forgiveness.”

Her horn shone. From the confines of her aura emerged a scroll. Tightly bound with red ribbon, it looked to be long and winding, should it ever be unfurled.

“Tomorrow comes the day I present this to the Public Assembly,” said Celestia. “To know who would sign it, who would stand with us, and stand for humanity’s sake. And… if Equestria should stand alone, so be it.”

Her gaze fell upon Ember.

“Know it is your choice to make. You won’t be the first, nor the last to make it.”

The answer came easily to Ember, even as her thoughts lingered on her father, and the dragon called Spike.

“Let me tell you, Princess,” Ember said, fixing one last determined glare at the Princess of the Sun. “I’ll do what I think is best for dragons everywhere.”

* * * * *

Garble sat in the same place he had for ages. And of all possible things… It was in a cage.

Not a metaphor, no. He was trapped in a literal cage, and had been for what felt like a month. But then again, ever since the Kämpfer charged him with escorting Princess Ember out of the Dragonlands and to Equestria, it had certainly been the longest weeks of his life. Then again, it had also been the most eventful part of his life so far.

Not only had he got his jaw punched by two kinds of Changelings, but he’d been belittled by just about everyone he’d encountered. First it was Ember – since she was the Dragon Lord’s whelp and all – and then it was those Changelings who, besides being a pain to deal with, had put him in this stupid cage. Because their Queen was afraid of getting sick or something.

‘Does everyone have to be prissy?’ Garble thought bitterly amidst his reflections, which were something he could do a lot of recently. ‘When I get out of this, I’ll make that roach queen wish she was sick.’

Today it had been hours since Garble had seen anyone. There was some gathering everyone had to be at in the morning, and none of the roaches had come back to check on him. He didn’t even know if they’d left a guard at the door. Sometimes, a Changeling would be standing guard right by him, here in their Queen’s personal quarters. Most of the time, however, they’d be placed outside, and so he’d be left alone to stew.

Quite literally. Being a dragon, heat was no issue for him, but the humidity spread by the green wax all over Chrysalis’ rooms was stifling. The only good thing was that his jailors were willing to let him be in different cages. Unfortunately, they were all the same kind of cage and, of course, he was still in a cage. He could barely stand, they were so small.

At the very least, one of the Changelings was willing to do him a favour. And by luck, it was the Changeling who usually was his guard. Weird, since Changelings tended not to do that, but Garble wouldn’t complain in this case. Especially since, if everything had worked out as he liked, he’d be receiving something from Smolder that’d make this far, far more bearable.

‘She better not ask questions,’ the red drake mused with a silent sneer. ‘Cos’ I need my gear sooner, not later.’

He waited, and waited, and waited. His brain was going numb. Growling to himself, Garble tried to do his thing for when he got bored and didn’t have his pals around. Pictures. Scents. Sounds. He had them in his brain and he’d put them together in new ways. But after staring at the same wall for days now, he was trying this for the thousandth time, and his brain felt dry.

If Ember had come through the door with a cart full of gems right then, he could have eaten the lot and he’d still feel starved.

‘Hm… Okay, at least that’s a creative image… Kinda...’

And then, would you know it, the door opened. Blinking, Garble snapped his head its way, peering through the wire-mesh. It wasn’t Ember. It was a Changeling, what else. A purple-eyed Changeling with a red fin. The same guy who’d punched his jaw in, who was head of Chrysalis’ patrols or something. He’d caught the bug’s name at the time, yet forgotten it by now. Their names all sounded so alike.

Garble narrowed his eyes, but saw the red-finned Changeling wasn’t empty-hoofed. No, instead it carried something much better than gems. The brown parcel he’d ordered from the Dragonlands, his care-package.

The Changeling stopped in front of the cage. It did not say anything, all it did was stare at him with its bug eyes. Garble soon saw what the roach’s game was. A staring contest. How cute.

“You can quit playin’, roach,” he said smugly, folding his arms. “I ain’t gonna blink first. Ain’t as if I’m a champion at that or nuthin’.”

The delivery-bug tilted its head. It checked the parcel, then looked back up, trilling.

“Oh, I wasn’t playing with you,” the Changeling said calmly. “Just waiting for you to speak. I hear that’s the polite thing to do.” Saying this, it held up the parcel and gave it two thumps. “This just came in. Aphid’s outside right now, said it’s for you. Wanted to deliver it herself, but… I told her to let me handle it.”

“Roach, you better give me that now!” Garble growled with a glower aimed at the Changeling. “Bad enough your prissy queen’ got me stuck in this lousy cage, but I ain’t gonna let you keep me from my mail! Gimme!”

The red-finned Changeling smirked.

“If you hadn’t noticed, whether you get any mail depends on if I say you do,” remarked the bug. “The Queen still has you listed as a health hazard, so anything that’s come into contact with you’s gotta be processed. So, there are only two ways this can go. Either you tell me what this is, or I’m removing it.”

“It’s mine!” Garble yelled, trying futilely to reach for it. “Either you gimme my package, or I’ll burn this room down!”

“Oh, like you burnt it down ages ago?” the Changeling asked, rhetorically. “If I were you, I wouldn’t think of making trouble after the Queen releases you… If she releases you. I heard how you were all ‘I wanna be Dragon Lord’. Maybe it makes you feel tough to say stupid things like that, but I doubt the Sun Princess would like it… And the Queen beat her once.”

“Yeah, well, she’s a sissy pony like the rest of them!” Garble snapped. “Just cos’ she moves somethin’ doesn’t make her everything!” The urge to let loose some fire was very strong, but it’d probably roast his tools as well. “Just… gimme my package and there won’t be any trouble.”

The Changeling tapped its chin. “Hmm…” The hum dragged out longer than needed. “When you put it that way… You know what, maybe I will.”

“... Really?”

“I said ‘maybe’,” the Changeling chittered. “But, probably. Except I do need to know this is safe, not some ploy to sneak a dangerous item into the Queen’s private chambers… So, since you won’t tell me…”

“You– it’s just something to help me pass the time while I’m stuck in this stupid cage.”

But to his dismay, chitinous hooves were already unwrapping the parcel. “For what it’s worth,” the Changeling remarked. “I believe you. I’m not completely paranoid. Still, it’s the job. Now, what have we here…”

“It– it’s from my sister!” Garble said quickly and uneasily. The Changeling suddenly stopped. “I wanted– needed something from home to make being in a cage bearable, if that’s what I’m gonna spend the next month in.”

And now the Changeling was looking curious. As in, there was a curious look on its face. Wordlessly, it ruffled the parcel’s envelope, turning the package over and over. Once or twice, it gave an experimental tap, until finally, Garble saw his guard staring at him again.

Words were spoken, slowly.

“Rock,” said the Changeling. “This feels like… rock, to me. And unless I’m mistaken… Is that cloth in there?” It didn’t really seem to be addressing Garble, as its eyes glanced up to the ceiling, deep in thought. “No idea what those could be for, unless you were planning to stone or choke the Queen… But I doubt even you’d be that dumb.”

The Changeling struggled with itself, then sighed.

“Fine,” it said, laying down the parcel. “You may have it. Once my brother gets back, I’ll tell him to pass it over to you.”

“Can’t you gimme it now?”

“No,” the Changeling said, harshly. “I’d be doing a bad job if I was. If this was Thorax’s idea, let him finish.” It gave Garble a look. “You oughta count yourself lucky. You only get a brother or sister like that once in your life.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Garble muttered to himself, his eyes focused on Smolder’s parcel.

And so the Changeling left the parcel on the floor and walked away. Still, Garble had to just wait a little bit longer. Soon, he would be able to make this experience bearable. Soon, he would be able to have the second-greatest thing besides freedom. Soon, he would be able to express himself.

All he had to do was wait just a little bit longer for his beat.

* * * * *

Mistletoe was an odd plant.

Contrary to the love-lies-bleeding flower, it possessed no intrinsic property Thorax knew of that’d make Changelings crazy for it, let alone other creatures. Yet the plant seemed to attract an unusual concentration of impassioned feelings, lingering after the people had departed.

It was torture to the senses, when his belly felt this empty.

And not just his belly. Day by day, he’d found himself feeding a little less on ambient love, even though there was so much of it here, but now something else had opened up in him. Something he felt helpless to fill.

Silently, he cursed Princess Luna. She was, after all, the one who’d insisted on putting up the mistletoe branches. He let his tongue dart out, lapping out what sprinkles of love it could get. Surely it wouldn’t be missed, whoever had left it being long gone.

There wasn’t much. Most of it was clustered up there. He tried stretching up as far as he could, his wings giving a soft buzz. Instantly, there was a painful ‘crick’ in his back. Yowling, Thorax dropped back down, hooves clattering to the floor. He sucked in a breath, eyes scrunching up. His back hurt so bad. It all came from serving as living furniture – he may have been letting himself go hungry, but Queen Chrysalis wasn’t getting any lighter.

Of course, he hardly had any time to contemplate his Queen gaining weight, when who but a certain someone should walk up the hallway.

“There you are!” he heard her say. “Thought you were long gone already.”

She wasn’t the last person he wanted to see. But she was the last person he could afford to be seen with.

“P-princess Ember?” Thorax stammered, his back pain forgotten. “What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you that,” Ember just said curtly. “You weren’t at your post. Queen’s orders, isn’t that what you said? So what did that Aphid have to say to get you to leave her with Garble?”

“S-say?” Thorax repeated, speaking blindly. “But Aphid doesn’t–”

Ember hissed. “I was being sarcastic, you–” She checked herself, seemed to think better of it. “Okay,” she began again, her arms crossed. “What’s this all about?”

“What’s what about?” said Thorax. “And… how did you know it was me?”

Ember rolled her eyes. “The whole sad-puppy thing, genius,” she said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Anyone ever tell you, you got those eyes? That’s how I can always tell you apart from other Changelings. But what did I do to make you look at me like that?”

“Um… is, was I–” Thorax stammered out. “You… tried wringing my neck, at that campfire?”

“What?” she glared. “I let you go. And now you listen to me play guitar... only time I ever saw you not looking like a kicked stray.”

“I… I’ve always looked that way?”

Ember blinked. Then she blew her cheeks.

“You’re pulling my leg– you know what?” She sighed gruffly. “I give up. We’d be here all day. Don’t think this lets you off the hook, though. I’ll just ask that... Aphid about it.”

Never mind that Thorax had never heard Aphid talk to someone outside the Hive. It was now that Ember stared around, eyes darting from corner to corner like the cunning predator she was. At last, her gaze fell upon the mistletoe dangling above his head.

He almost took a step back.

“What’s that?” she asked.

Thorax gulped. “Uh… it’s a… plant,” he said. “You… you didn’t notice? The Night Princess’s been hanging them up all over the place, like the lavender… Pharynx hates those...”

Her gaze remained fixed on them.

“Uh-huh…” she said, not quite decided, but not quite doubtful, either. “Yeah, that’d explain all the messed-up flowers lying around. Hm… I’m not sure about the palette. Too… pale and bland. Why mistletoe?”

This actually surprised him. “Well-um… it stands for peace… at least, that’s one thing it’s for. Don’t they have mistletoe at the Kirin Court? Your Highness.”

The dragonet tapped her chin. “Hm, no. No, they didn’t. Huh… As if that sad place could get any more dour.”

She took a step forward. Thorax wished he’d taken a step back. He was feeling increasingly hot below the nape in her presence. And as he was supposed to be cold-blooded, he didn’t know how that was possible.

The uncomfortable heat had to be radiating from the dragonet, somehow.

“Dour?” he repeated dumbly, unable to say anything else. “I… shouldn’t it be like Equestria? They… I’ve seen they got so many colourful things, here…”

“Eh,” Ember vocalised. Her gaze turned to him. “I guess you’re kinda right. Maybe it’s just a pony thing. I don’t really get ponies.”

Thorax tried desperately not to look her in the eye. “What’s your favourite colour?” he blurted. “Mine’s blue– not like the Hive walls, more like the sky–”

He felt his voice die down, when Ember placed a claw against his lips.

“Thorax,” she said, sternly. Her shoulders relaxed. “You need to work on that.”

“W-work on what?” he whimpered, muffled.

“Expressing, I guess? The Court taught me to be subdued, but… Ah, what am I saying. Well, blue’s not a bad colour. Good to know.”

Thorax, meanwhile, lips still pressed behind her claw, held back his tongue before he could point out she was blue.

“Anyways– mine’s purple. I guess. Kind of. Because it’s my flame? I don’t know. I don’t really think much about colours.”

She lifted her claw at last. And there, at the back of Thorax’s head, the urge came. Speak now, or not at all.

“Ember, I– what I meant to say was that, I like y–”

A piercing, bestial screech tore through the hallway.

The heat inside Thorax rapidly dissipated into an icy cold, no less unpleasant – worse, even. He’d only rarely heard that cry, usually aimed at enemies in combat. But on those occasions it had been aimed at him, he’d known he was staring into the face of fear.

Too late, he backed away from Ember, who’d turned, confused yet not frightened, to see where the screech had come from.

“... You!” Pharynx yelled, eyes blazing. “What do you think you’re doing!”

Ember blinked, but she must have noticed it wasn’t her whom Pharynx was glaring at murderously, since she turned to shoot Thorax a bewildered look.

He’d never seen his brother so angry, not even after the defeat at Canterlot.

“Pharynx, wait!” he cried, raising both forehooves as Pharynx stomped forward. “You-you’ve got it all wrong! I wasn’t–”

“Like Tartarus you weren’t,” Pharynx snarled. “Get over here.”

Thorax knew what was coming, yet he was frozen in place as his brother opened his jaws. Which then snapped shut, hard upon his ear. A sharp, stinging pain shot through Thorax’s ear.

“I ‘arned ‘ou once,” Pharynx growled through clenched jaws. “Dat ‘as ‘our only ‘ance. Bu’ did ‘ou listen to me?”

Thorax barely heard him, or even saw anything, through the tears welling up in his eyes. The only perceptible thing was Pharynx dragging him away from Ember, the feeling of polished floor grating against his chitin, and his own nervous, thumping heartbeats.

He heard a vicious snarl.

“Hey!” Ember yelled. “Back off!”

There was a rush of air in the hallway. Thorax felt a violent yank, for one fleeting moment, before the pain faded. He tumbled, settling in a shivering heap.

Snarls and hisses and the sound of chitin against scale filled the hallway, bombarding his ears. A burst of fire seared past him, as did a few drops of Changeling wax. He opened his eyes, just for a moment, to see Pharynx rear up and throw a kick at Ember’s chest – one caught by a claw, and his grimace was answered by Ember’s vicious grin.

Thorax shut his eye again, just as Ember flew forwards and tackled Pharynx, punctuated by a terrible crash against the wall.

‘Please… please stop,’ he thought, whimpering and shivering, hooves pressed against his ears, ‘Just stop it…’

A metallic thump, next to him, made Thorax’s heart skip a beat. Even through his closed eyes, the warmth and sunflower scent of the mare that now stood next to him beckoned him to relax.

He opened his eyes, looking up to see gentle, magenta eyes look back at him. Strange, he thought. There was neither pity nor sneer in her soft, tender expression. Kindness was the closest word he could find.

Then, her eyes turned towards the quarrelling pair before her – where Ember held Pharynx in a chokehold, pinning him on the ground, and her expression darkened.

“Ahem, Ember,” said Celestia, in a low voice, “would you please let go of the Changeling?”

* * * * *

“Thank you for agreeing to this, Lady Cadance,” Celestia was saying minutes later, striding down the hallway accompanied by her niece’s mirror-image. “Based on my niece’s personal history, I’d have understood if you refused.”

“I know, Princess,” Cadenza murmured. “But here I am, talking to you, aren’t I? Where I’m from, those of us who disagreed with the Changeling Purges have found it in our hearts to leave the hurt of the Wedding behind us. If I can handle you... I’m sure I can handle some Changelings.”

“Still, it is courageous,” Celestia said as she tried, once again, not to let a hidden sorrow show. “With all you’ve already got on your plate, I’d hesitated to ask for your assistance so soon.”

“I am the PHL’s Head of Psychological and Spiritual Well-Being, Princess,” smiled Cadenza. “And I feel like I do have a responsibility to prove the PHL can still resolve matters in other ways than violence.”

Nodding in gratitude, Celestia led her to an ornamented door, which opened onto one of the many smaller conference chambers that graced the Hall’s penultimate storey.

Beyond the door, a red-finned Changeling and a smaller drone had been seated at the opposite ends of an extremely lengthy wooden table. Even silhouetted by the backlight of the afternoon Sun streaming through the windows, their expressions were obvious. One looked disdainful, the other as if he’d rather be anywhere else.

“Sirs, this is Lady Cadance,” said Celestia. “She will help on this issue.”

The red-finned Changeling stared at them contemptuously. “What is this?” he muttered. “A feelings circle? Stuff it, ponies. I ain’t having it.”

“Pharynx, please,” whispered the smaller drone.

“You stay out of this,” Pharynx hissed at him. “You’re in enough trouble as it is. Did you know, I thought I was going to give you the day off. But then I had to catch you schmoozing.”

“I wasn’t…” the smaller drone began helplessly.

Celestia and Cadenza were prepared to intervene, when the door re-opened behind them.

“Heard there was a bit of a kerfuffle, involving my drones,” drawled the lazy voice of Queen Chrysalis. As she spotted the Equestrian Royals, she smirked. “Ah, hello again, Tia. And what a pleasant surprise, Candy! Thought we’d never get to talk.”

“Ahem,” Celestia coughed. “You are addressing the Lady Cadance. You saw her present with Dame Moondancer earlier today.”

“Ah, you’re the other one?” said Chrysalis, marching to greet Cadenza. She wore a devious grin. “What, couldn’t get your own, Tia?”

Celestia felt her jaw tighten. She threw a glance at Lady Cadenza, and Celestia saw that her eyes had narrowed.

“The Crystal Princess is busy tending to Spike, together with my sister...”

But the moment Chrysalis’ gaze had swept over Cadenza’s stunted wings, she burst out giggling. “Oh, now this is just rich,” she said snidely. “Didn’t see those twigs before. What makes you think she can fill in?”

It was all Chrysalis got to say before Lady Cadenza's right hook pounded her face.

* * * * *

“So, lemme get this straight,” Alex said slowly, his forefinger raised. “This afternoon, a Changeling and a dragon got into a scrap over petty shit. Then Celestia– the spitting image of the Tyrant tearing apart my world, mind you– steps in to stop this. And then she brings in Lady Cadance for a therapy session. And then, Cadance lets herself get baited by Chrysalis. And now, because Chrysalis’ pride feels stung, I’m being asked to… to…”

He couldn’t make himself finish. His voice died down even as his eyes surveyed each and every face in his bedroom.

Lady Cadance and Queen Chrysalis were sat as far apart from one another as possible. While Cadance at least showed some embarrassment, or maybe shame, there was still a sullenness to her bearing. But it was nothing compared to Chrysalis, who was pure sullenness, pressing a cotton patch to her eye.

Between them sat Princess Celestia and Proxenos Darkhoof, respectively, both sporting expressions of dignified resignation.

“To act as Her Ladyship’s champion, yes,” Celestia finished, throwing Chrysalis a dirty look. “As Her Majesty just stated, she’ll consider honour served by a proxy duel.”

“And be sure that while I question one who speaks of honour,” Darkhoof put in, “so shortly after her failed invasion of Canterlot, Sir Alexander, under the rules of the Hall of Unity, it is Her Majesty’s right to make such a demand.”

For one moment, Alex had to close his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“You’ve so fucking gotta be kidding me,” he said, now glowering. “The hell is the matter with you guys? I was hoping I came here to take a break from… shit like this. Aren’t you meant to be like the goddamn UN? I can’t believe I’m being dragged into an… honour duel. I’d hoped better from you, Cadance. You’re the one who gave me that safeguard to stop me going apeshit.”

Cadance sighed regretfully. “I’m so sorry, Alex,” she murmured. “But even I can underestimate how much I’ve still got to get out of my system.”

Away from her, Chrysalis gave a snort.

“Well, at least I can say you’ve done good for my mental health,” Alex said, his tone softening. “But what about my physical health?” He gestured at himself. “I’m still in a wheelchair here. How’m I supposed to fight any duels?”

“Nurse Cross has informed us you are on the mend, aided by your runes,” Celestia said. “And by the rules of the Hall, your runes wouldn’t constitute cheating in a duel, provided they are employed judiciously.”

“A duel for which I shall be arbiter,” stated Darkhoof. “Where you may be sure of my impartiality.”

Alex breathed out. In his mind, he drew upon the sense of commitment that had seen him through three wars, in Afghanistan, in Iraq, and finally in his own America.

“Okay…” he said, “this isn’t what I was expecting, but… Although it’s Stephan Bauer who fancies himself a Knight, the old Kraut, I will step forward as a champion for Lady Cadance’s honour.”

* * * * *

That evening, one member of the Equestrian Royal Family, at least, had found relaxation.

“What did your father say?” yawned Blueblood, stretching himself under the covers.

Placing his cup on the bedside table, the young Minotaur paused to recollect. Ever the scholar in the making, Basil still held a few sheets of parchment in his spare hand. Blueblood would have preferred if his lover could keep the scribbling at the door when they retired in the evenings, but he wasn’t about to complain. Assiduous observations of the different parties at the Hall were useful to a diplomat, and better that the patient Basil take the time to write it down than he.

“The duel shall be held according to procedure,” Basil stated, as he moved to get in beside Blueblood. “Tomorrow at daybreak, in the central chamber. Anyone who wishes may watch.”

They spoke in Common, though Blueblood found it rough on the tongue, for despite their educations, Basil’s ability with Equish was rusty and Blueblood’s grip on Tauren shakier still.

“Daybreak,” Blueblood groaned. “And it’s Summer. Ugh! Seriously, why did your culture let the morning people run things?”

Basil shrugged, his gesture lightly displacing Blueblood with his muscle. “Oops! Sorry. Well, I imagine it’s that they say Minotaurs used to have poor eyesight. You want to get much done by light of day when you can’t see well, Asterion.”

Hearing Basil’s pet name for him put Blueblood in mind of its mythical origin. “Yeah, I hadn’t noticed all those legends about learning to see…”

“It is possible to still do much without seeing,” smiled Basil. “One of our most famous poets wrote his work while blind, you must know that.”

What Blueblood had noticed was Basil’s tendency to hold his eyes close to his parchments. “‘Used to’, you say. But not anymore?”

Basil blew air from his lips. “If only that were so. We’ve simply… found ways. You saw that Father wears eyeglasses.”

“Oh,” said Blueblood. “And with that kind of setback… What about your participation in Madame Heartstrings’ planned expedition, what did he say about that?”

“My eyesight’s as sharp as a bull’s can get,” Basil reassured him. “Besides, look at me. Do you think I’d be put to the kind of work which requires looking far, or handling delicate pieces? A well-practiced Minotaur is capable of these things. But if this expedition is financed by Kirin, and we can expect it will be, they’ll take one look and all they’ll see is raw strength.”

Blueblood rest his head upon the Minotaur’s chest. “Isn’t that such a shame,” he said. “Just like it’s too bad you’re dead-set on obligingly spending the trip below-decks, with that damn rugged industriousness of yours.”

“Be of no ill grace, Asterion,” Basil commented, affectionately pulling up Blueblood’s muzzle. “If it’s what you want, I can give you a closer look…”

That got Blueblood smirking. His forehooves wrapped around Basil’s considerably bulkier frame, he slided up so his eyes stood a smidge above his lover’s, by princely right. A short interval passed, then he went in for the kiss. Which Basil eagerly returned, lips brushing against the golden stubble Blueblood was letting grow along his chin, joining him in holding on to as long as possible.

The moment was broken by the sound of gentle knocking.

Blueblood pulled away from the Minotaur’s lips, feeling his ears flicker as he turned sharply towards the door. Who, he wondered, could that be at this hour. As in Canterlot, the staff here were under strict instructions – the Prince’s bedroom was his personal kingdom, and he woke at his own leisure.

Having let silence hang, Blueblood shrugged, preparing to return to the kiss. That was, until the knocking sounded again, insistent.

Basil grunted softly. “A visitor calls, love. You should go and greet them.”

“Do I have to?” Blueblood sighed. In answer, he felt the Minotaur muss his mane. “Oh, alright… Look, I’ll be right back. I’ll just go tell whoever it is to leave.”

Slipping out from Basil’s arm, Blueblood got up and marched towards the door. It did briefly occur to him that he hadn’t even thrown on a nightgown. But he didn’t care. If he could lay himself bare before Aunt Luna, whatever nuisance lay at the door didn’t merit half the courtesy.

Irritably, Blueblood unlocked the door.

“Yes, what is it?” he said sharply, slinging it open. “Now’s not the time–”

Then Blueblood saw who it was. Cadance.

He was about to say something then, ready to tell her off for messing with him, just like she used to back when they still lived in the same palace. Yet the urge evaporated the moment his eyes fell upon her wings. Stunted, they were, and she had lines under her eyes where none should be.

“Hi, Astron,” said the elder Cadance.

“Ah, um… Lady Cadance,” Blueblood said. “I say, this is a surprise! What brings you out here at this hour?”

She looked past his shoulder, and whistled. “Keen eye as always, Blue,” she said, smiling wistfully. “Good catch.”

This was so like when Cadance, the Princess Cadance he knew, had come upon him and Celaeno on The Alicorn that Blueblood’s mouth ran ahead of him.

“Don’t tell me this is another dream-visit!” Blueblood snapped. “I’d begged you not to do that unless absolutely necessary!”

Lady Cadance’s whole bearing went stiff, her eyes darkening.

“Oh. I assure you, this is no dream,” Cadance said. “I wouldn’t. I promised you– well, I promised my Blueblood. And since he’s…” She cleared her throat, looking away. “Sorry. I just thought I’d check on you. It’s been too long. But… I guess I’d forgotten a few things about you, is all.”

His cousin, if that’s what she was, sounded hurt, stung. Blueblood’s chest contracted as reality caught up with him, seeing her this way.

She was a Cadance who’d known so much hurt.

“Cadance…”

Blueblood edged out the door, so he could face her in the hallway. After a short hesitation, he closed the door behind him, privately glad that after how he’d just behaved, he couldn’t see the look in Basil’s eyes.

He traced a forehoof along the ground, tied for words.

“I’m… I’m sorry,” Blueblood finally managed. “It’s… He’s a sweet fellow.” He grinned awkwardly. “And I wasn’t thinking clearly. I just… This must be ancient history to you, I imagine. But Princess Cadance always did like making Prince Blueblood the fool for loving too freely. When I saw you, I thought that was your game… I wasn’t, I wasn’t thinking.”

“Hm, did I, now?” Lady Cadance asked. “Well, to be fair, I was young.”

If only he could have told her she still looked young.

“Yeah,” said Blueblood. “I guess you were? You do look like her, you know. Like… like Cadance. Even if you look as if you’ve been through a rough time. But… Maybe you’re lucky. I used to think… that I’d fancy dying young. Sometimes, well, I still do, although that year aboard ship knocked part of it out of me. And now Auntie C’s told me about your world.”

Something changed, ever so slightly, in Lady Cadance’s eyes, at the moment Blueblood named their Aunt, the same way they’d each agreed to call her when Aunt Luna returned. But then it passed and Cadance’s wan smile returned.

“I’m sure she’s told you plenty already,” she said, plainly. “But honestly, I’m not here to talk about my world. I suppose we can catch up some other time.”

“Wait, Cadance–”

“No, no, it’s okay, it’s okay. You’ve got someone waiting for you. And… besides, we’ve got time until you leave harbour on the next ship.”

Blueblood wet his lips, surprised. “‘Leave harbour’? Who tipped you off?”

“Not who, what,” said Cadance lightly. “Favourite barber’s out of town?”

Blushing a little, Blueblood felt for the hairs on his chin. “Oh, this? Yes, I– I ended up growing one last time, and… Well, I liked it. And it doesn’t just look fancy, it’s useful, too, against the cold. You’re a clever lass.”

Strange. ‘Lass’ was a term akin to one Shieldwall might have spoken, rather than his customary parlance as a Prince of Equestria. Maybe the beard did make the stallion.

Lady Cadance seemed to think so, as she chuckled subtly. “I had a good teacher,” she said. “And he’s standing right here. Seems I did remember that part right… You’re still the same big kid playing sailor, Bluenose.”

“Well, then it’s good to see I’ve disappointed you twice over, Candy. Same old me.”

“No, no, you haven’t,” said Cadance. “I like the same old you. And… I’m glad to see you can still find love in plenty of places. It’s wonderful.”

“You’re always so kind.” Blueblood sighed sadly. “But I’m a buffoon, aren’t I? I know I am. Maybe not even that. A proper jester speaks the truth. Easy enough, making people happy by saying things you don’t mean… Harder to be the real you, when you’re… Well. Me.”

His cousin raised an eyebrow, to glance at the door.

“Is that really how you saw yourself, all those years? A court jester?” Cadance said. “What about the Minotaur, then? Have you been telling him things you don’t really mean? Because I think you like him a lot.”

Blueblood tilted his head. “Wait, so you are still the Princess of Love?”

Cadance shrugged. “That’s not me. But both she and I know love, wings or not.”

“Then I’m glad for that, at least. Really, I am,” Blueblood said. “But I’m still a fool when it comes to feelings, like I hurt yours. You know this, or… you used to.“

“Oh, don’t worry about that.” Cadance winked, slyly. “Besides, I’d like to hear it all from him– next time we see each other. I’ll let you get back to him now.”

“Say what?”

“You were a little gruff back there,” Cadance conceded. “It’s more than I felt prepared for. But actually, I did want to mess with you, Bluenose. Just like old times.”

And Blueblood stared at her, not knowing what to make of this Cadance. Older, more worn, yet underneath it, there was still Cadance.

As she readied to turn, he hurried in front of her.

“Wait, wait, please, just a second,” Blueblood said. “I know I’m not a party-planner or anything… Well, alright, I am very good at throwing parties set up by experts. But it doesn’t take a party-planner to tell you could do with some goofing-off, Lady Cadance. If… if you want to keep messing around. I can have something ready in a few hours.”

She tapped her chin, contemplatively. Then she shrugged.

“Took you long enough to ask, Prince Blueblood,” she said, smiling wide. “Sure.”

Discretely, Blueblood sighed in relief. “That’s great. I hope you don’t mind if I invite a couple of friends over? Sooty and Wally– sorry, Awesome Fire and Shieldwall, you remember them, right? From my trip aboard the Starspear.”

Cadance was less speedily responsive to that. A small frown crossed her face, before she chose to give him a nod, once.

“Ah, yes, I do remember,” Cadance said, quietly. “They were your best friends. By all means. Just… If they’re going to come along, I’d really like to see your sweetheart around as well.”

* * * * *

It was unusual for Chrysalis’ chambers to be quiet at these hours. Even more unusual, considering only one of the three Changelings currently present was normally mute. Thorax wished one of them three would speak. But until now, he’d had to be content with Aphid looking back and forth between him and Pharynx, across the floor, her eyes wide and lips quivering.

That wouldn’t do.

“Aphid, it’s… it’s okay,” Thorax began, but Aphid shook her head, and pointed at Pharynx. Meanwhile, Pharynx rolled his eyes, forelegs still crossed.

Then Aphid looked at him too. Pharynx let out a groan. “Alright, fine,” he said gruffly, “I get it. I walked right into it. And I thought I saw something that wasn’t.” He looked straight at Thorax. “Aphid, tell Thorax I… I acted too fast. And he’s not to blame here, either. And I bit his ear… a little harder than I should.”

Aphid returned to Thorax, miming all of Pharynx’s words in quick succession. Thorax nodded, feeling that bit less heavy in his chest.

“Also,” Pharynx added, “tell Thorax he’s still an idiot. And should stop chasing after her already.”

Baby steps, then. Aphid turned her gaze back to Pharynx, as she too let out a sigh. Then she touched Pharynx’s forehoof, and Thorax’s, as far as her little forelegs could reach. She tugged on both with minute amounts of secreted wax.

Thorax stared at Pharynx, with a tiny, uncertain smile. Pharynx’s face remained impassive, with maybe a glower. A glower that softened, just as their forehooves touched, prompted by Aphid, who made them shake gently.

It wasn’t much. But it was enough. Pharynx pulled back slower than Thorax had anticipated.

Aphid’s happy clapping was interrupted, unfortunately, by the door swinging open. The three of them scrambled into where they should be, guarding the cage occupied by the dragon Garble. Thorax only just had the presence of mind to kick Garble’s care-package, which he’d got Aphid to bring back on a little detour by the Dragonlands, into a puddle of wax behind the cage.

But Queen Chrysalis didn’t notice anything, too consumed was she by her current ire.

“Stupid, stunted little whelp.”

It wasn’t the first time Chrysalis cursed and complained about Lady Cadenza’s altercation. She certainly wasn’t about to stop, as Thorax could tell. The Queen was in a mean mood. And when Chrysalis was in a mean mood, someone would get hurt.

Shaking her head with a hiss, Chrysalis turned her gaze towards them all near the cage, lips curling into a wicked smile.

“Aphid, come over!”

Aphid bolted to stand by Chrysalis. Thorax caught a glimpse of Aphid’s adoring expression. In a rapid departure from her usual laidback style, Aphid’s mane changed to the turquoise shade common to the Ebony Hive.

“Did you bring it, dear?” cooed Chrysalis. Aphid vigorously nodded. “Excellent!”

Eagerly, Aphid was soon presenting their Queen with the contents of her shoulder-bag, which contained a medical kit. Chrysalis opened it, taking out a needle.

“Very good, Aphid,” praised Chrysalis, giving her a gentle pat on the head. “Now we can begin. Pharynx?”

Pharynx cast the tarp aside, revealing a snoozing Garble behind the wire-mesh. Tremulously, Thorax unlatched the door, pulling it open. And Garble was caught unawares, yelping as Chrysalis seized hold of his tail with a hoof-full of wax.

“It’s your lucky day,” Chrysalis cackled, her smile turning unnerving as she raised the needle. “Time for your shot, Garble. Though, I ain’t gonna sugarcoat the truth… This is rather unpleasant. Brace yourself, dearie.”

Whereupon she jabbed the needle into Garble’s thigh.

Or rather, tried to, for even as the dragon yelped and thrashed within the cage, Thorax saw the needle hadn’t gone through at all. In fact, it had bent and snapped in half. Huffing, Chrysalis threw it away.

“Confound it,” said Chrysalis, slamming the cage shut again. “Took all that time, and it looks like we got ourselves a faulty needle.”

Pharynx hadn’t even opened his mouth when they saw Aphid fling herself at Chrysalis’ hooves, imploring her Queen with sad-puppy eyes.

“Shh, there, there,” Chrysalis said gently, patting her again. “Not your fault. I forgot dragons have such pesky scales. But it looks like I’ll have to find myself another needle, and oh my, wherever shall I find it?”

The cunning gaze she threw at him, then Aphid, unnerved Thorax. He felt his hooves twitch. Aphid must have travelled far to bring the needle here. And a lonesome Changeling seldom performed well, even scouts like her.

But amidst Thorax’s growing urge to step in, and Garble’s relieved, nervous chuckles, a sound of hoof-steps at the door caught his ears.

It was Papillate, the Harlequin Queen-in-Waiting, carrying a saddlebag by her side.

‘And Chrysalis’ bedwarmer…’ Thorax thought, before he could stop himself.

“I… heard you might need this, Ebony Queen.”

On cue, Papillate brought out an even larger needle than the one Aphid had brought, gleaming at the tip. Thorax knew that he’d forever remember the look of speechless, growing horror on Garble’s face, and Chrysalis’ look of pure delight.

“Ahhh, yes, that will do!” Chrysalis purred, hugging the young Harlequin Changeling to herself. “Such a sweet girl, Papillate. Alright, now that’s been taken care of… Only one tiny thing left to do before our rest, hm?”

Her horn shone poisonously, and she lifted Garble’s tail once again. As the cage re-opened, both Pharynx and Aphid pounced inside, to grab onto Garble’s hindlegs before he could even begin to try and escape.

“Hey! What the– Just– gah, let go, let go!” Garble yelled, but the drones didn’t budge. Their wax-covered hooves did the job well enough to hold him down helplessly.

“Oh, I don’t think so,” Chrysalis said. She raised the needle high. “For your own good. And my own childish amusement, of course. What’re you gonna do, go crying to Tia?”

And Thorax covered his ears.

“When I’m outta here I’m– aaaaaargh!”

* * * * *

Lyra Heartstrings had taken a little over an hour, several hundred paces about, and a reflection on her previous, scripted speech, for it occur that perhaps speeches weren’t her thing after all.

“Okay. How to start… ‘dearly beloved’? No… wait, what are you doing, Lyra? What’s this, a wedding? No. No, no… start over.”

She walked through the hallways and past the ever-present lavender pots, amidst the stillness of the Hall at night, carrying a notepad and quill, scribbling and reciting. At least now she wouldn’t be getting any odd stares. From the sheer amount of rubbish she’d cast into various trashcans – thank Celestia for her preparations – and the thinning amount of paper, it wouldn’t be long before she ran out of time and space. As it were.

“Curses!” Lyra exclaimed, throwing another crumpled-up roll. “How’d I pull it off the other day– how does Twilight keep doing it right?”

She passed by moonlight rays, streaming through the window. The silvery glow and shimmer, beautiful as it was, clearly mocked her complacency and creative sterility. Or at least, that was how it felt to her .

‘Great,’ Lyra thought. ‘I’m starting to daydream. Dream. Whatever. Darn it. Screw you, Moon. Not you, Princess Luna. You. Yeah, I see you up there. Stupid night-orb.’

She stuck a tongue out at the window, then turned the corner, away from the accursed rays. Down, down the staircase she went, down to where perhaps, inspiration, and a little extra waking hour or two awaited. To the pantry, naturally.

Her forehooves echoed down the stairs and throughout the empty halls. Here, she also cursed Bonbon’s talent and penchant for sweet delicacies. How they spoiled her, truly, for nothing else was now on her mind but the various delights that awaited her, from all across the world.

Cake and sweetbreads, chocolate bars and cupcakes, candies and bonbons, always sweet bonbons… Or maybe she was thinking of Bonbon. It didn’t matter. She liked them both, confection and girlfriend.

‘Just… gotta finish this blasted speech and take a slice or two and I’m done…’

The pantry, fortunately or unfortunately, had other plans. One glance within was to leave her little doubt that a slice or two would be far from enough. As Lyra discovered when she pushed the door open, gently, and took in the sight that greeted her.

The pantry wasn’t excessively large, surprisingly. Three long tables, stretching from one end of the room, with short cabinets beneath them. Oil lamps and lanterns alike hung low from above, illuminating the pantry in a dim orange glow. And to Lyra’s nose, the scent of food enticed her, from freshly baked bread, rolls and other, exotic delicacies the world over.

For the most part, it was empty at this hour. There was no reason to steal. Celestia had decreed, the place was open to all.

Including a pony, sitting down with a plate, beneath one of the hanging lanterns only a few seats from where Lyra stood. And few ponies could be so bright to Lyra, in appearance and in effect, for this was at a glance, the spitting image of her old foalsitter.

She sat there quietly, munching down on some cake, her gaze half-lidded. Lyra wasn’t so sure she had ever seen her look so haggard.

“Hey, Lady Cadance,” Lyra finally said, with a sheepish little smile. “How… well, how are you?”

The mare that was and wasn’t Cadance turned to look at her wryly.

“I was just out and about,” she said. It would have been graceful, if her mouth wasn’t half-full. “Astron asked me to find some cake and… well, I thought I’d have a little snack first.”

Lyra looked at Lady Cadenza’s pink-stained plate, and shrugged. She walked over to seat herself, right by Cadenza, resting her chin on her forehooves.

“Pretty big detour you got going here,” said Lyra, nodding at her food. The pegacorn snorted, wiping away a stain on her muzzle.

“Mmm, I couldn’t resist,” Cadenza admitted. She gulped, swallowing the cake, and belched loudly. Her rosy pinks blushed darker still. “Oh, excuse me... I, ah, haven’t had cake in a while.”

The thoughts of Earth quickly came up to the surface, but Lyra brushed them away, for now. She rubbed the back of her head, gears turning on the inside.

“Well, uh,” Lyra began, clearing her throat. “I had guessed. After what you said ‘bout shortages… And, everything to do with the war.”

“Oh, no, apart from that,” Cadenza answered hurriedly. “I haven’t had much cake at all, actually, but I sure liked the sugar lumps the humans kept offering us during meetings. Not that cake wasn’t available, funnily enough, but it sure took a while before anyone on Earth figured out chocolate isn’t actually toxic for equines from Equus. Huh, that rhymes.”

Cadenza let out a sweet little giggle, one which didn’t really befit the tired representative Lyra had seen earlier that day, before the eyes of the Public Assembly.

“Heh, toxic,” Lyra mused. She levitated a nearby coffeemaker, right next to Cadenza. Small wonders of machinery – this one must have had a Kirin-made battery. She activated it with the flick of a switch, letting it pour hot coffee into a mug.

“So, uh, ahem, right. Earth. Fun times,” said Lyra. She snorted. “Sorry, um… I was just… you know, practicing, on the way here.”

“Practice?” asked Cadenza. Lyra nodded.

“Yeah. Making speeches, you know. Tougher than it looks.”

“Oh, I know,” agreed Cadenza. Perhaps it was subtle, but Lyra picked up a touch of regret and longing in Cadenza’s eyes when she said this. “Something caught your tongue?”

Lyra grabbed onto her notepad, waving it around. “A lot,” she lamented. “I mean… not so much something as… everything. I still don’t know how Twilight does it.”

There it was again. The sad little look, one shared by Alex Reiner and Dame Moondancer… and Redheart, too. The downcast, shadowed glance. It passed, as it often did, and Cadenza settled for her usual tranquil gaze.

“That’s Twilight for you,” she stated. She put her fork and knife aside, dabbing away at the stains left on her muzzle. “I wouldn’t advise sticking to her example.”

“Be myself, huh?” Lyra deadpanned, grabbing her cup of coffee. Cadenza laughed. Her musical laugh was the same as Cadance’s, only ever more hoarse and tired in its melody.

“Word of advice, Lyra?” said Cadenza. “Forget about writing it down. You just say what you’ve got in mind. They’ll get it.”

“Would they, though…” Lyra asked, staring into the coffee. She took an uncertain sip. “I’m gonna be addressing the whole wide world. What am I supposed to say?”

“Well, you know, you always had something to say about humans when asked.”

Lyra blinked. “You remember that?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Cadenza said, shrugging. She lightly poked Lyra’s shoulder. “Come on. That’s so you.”

Lyra’s stomach knotted at that. Perhaps it was the coffee, she thought. But where humans once had filled her with a sense of the marvelous unknown, now a sinking feeling crept in.

“Y-yeah, I guess,” whispered Lyra, sipping more coffee. Bitter, but she didn’t particularly mind. Not when there was so much hurt elsewhere. “Just…”

“Mmm, I get you,” Cadenza replied, reaching out to pat her back. “I was wondering where you went earlier, um. Sorry. It’s… still a lot to take in myself.”

“Oh, don’t worry, I was… I was with friends, just… I needed a break.”

“Ah. Well…” Cadenza hummed, tapping her chin. “Okay. So, speech. You need help with that?”

“I… yeah.”

Now Cadenza turned to face her fully, swivelling on her chair. “Okay. Just… right. You know what I’ve told you, right? Be true to yourself. Be honest. And that’s how they’ll listen. I’m right here. I’m all ears. Go ahead whenever you’re comfortable.”

There were plenty of thoughts that crossed Lyra. But now, before the mirror image of Princess Cadance, another figment of her childhood, so very tired and wispy as Cadance was not, a testament of the world that lay behind the mirror, there was only one thing Lyra Heartstrings needed to say.

“I don’t want to go,” Lyra stated. She regretted it almost immediately, when Cadenza looked at her right in the eyes, her eyebrow arching.

“What?” asked Cadenza.

“I don't want to go. There, I said it!” Lyra shouted. Her legs felt weak, but her voice, even as it grew shrill, held firm. “I'm s-scared, alright? I said it.”

“Lyra?”

The days that had gone by returned to Lyra in an instant, voices and vivid images that lingered.

“I saw it... everyone saw it. Princess Luna was hurt and, and I'm dead in their universe, Cadance. I don't... I don't know what I'd do. A-and then here, there are Changelings and that Queen of theirs is around and no-one cares and I'm just a musician and…”

Lyra leaned against the table, breathing in and out rapidly. The dark green chitin and bright eyes of the Ebony Queen haunted her dreams, mocking, taunting, alluring her and her friends to her choking embrace. And all was fine, just fine, she whispered, in that droning voice of hers, echoing for days and weeks after the accursed wedding…

Then the visions of Earth returned to Lyra, the Newfoals and the war, empire and tyranny. Her own corpse, smashed into a million pieces, or hung or eviscerated or whatever horrid thing they had done to her and Bonbon, sweet Bonbon, rambling on and on, forever asking her to be safe...

At last, there was Redheart, always Redheart, who’d been so polite to her, on those many occasions when Lyra had to visit the hospital... Weeks and days and hours before someone that was and wasn’t Redheart wanted her dead.

Feeling lightheaded, her withers heavy and heart sinking into a gaping maw, Lyra reached out for her cup of coffee, clutched to drink it. But her aura sputtered and faded, her head grew heavier and lighter… There came a faint smell of roses, streaming in to tickle her nose.

“Hey, Lyra, Lyra!” Cadenza spoke. She pulled Lyra into a tight hug. “Hey, hey, take it easy, alright? I thought you were talking about that expedition. You don’t… you don’t need to come to Earth. I’m not asking that of you. It wouldn’t be fair...”

Lyra’s breathing slowed down, little by little, under Cadenza’s hug. It was warm, like mornings down at Ponyville, like the first ray of sunlight on Winter Wrap Up. And it too was sweet, like Bonbon’s finest candies, offered for her on each quiet morning...

Then Lyra’s eyes drifted to Cadenza’s horn. It glowed, faintly, with her light blue aura, its invisible threads weaving in with her thoughts, soothing, calming...

“You’re afraid of seeing Bonbon, aren’t you?” Cadenza whispered. What could Lyra answer to that, if not with a nod. A slow, reluctant nod.

“Y-yeah,” she admitted. The regret had set in. She shook her head quickly. “N-no, just, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be, but… I just… Bonbon’s here and-and I don’t know if I can bear seeing her like that on Earth. I’m–”

“Don’t,” Cadenza answered promptly. She pulled away slightly, from the hug, and met Lyra’s eyes. “Don’t be, Lyra.” She shook her head. “I… I’m sorry. Alex must have told you about the Ambassador, hasn’t he?”

“He did…” Lyra answered. “B-but I don’t want to disappoint him or, or anyone! Oh, I’m… I’m such a disappointment to you–”

“Lyra, you’re not beholden to filling her shoes,” Cadenza retorted. “Look… if… you don’t want to, you know–”

“No,” Lyra interrupted, wiping away a few tears. “No, no it’s… it’s something I have to do. I gotta make the speech. It’s something I suggested and… now I gotta own up to it.”

She felt Cadenza’s forehoof trail across her forehead, wiping away a wayward bang.

“I’m not making this any easier, am I?” said Cadenza. “I’ve… yeah, I thought I saw her in you. But that doesn’t mean you’re her, and that’s okay,” she added, when Lyra opened her mouth to reply. “You’re… you. Ambassador or not.” She cleared her throat. “Listen, Lyra. If it makes you feel better. You… remember the whole… actually you know what, okay… okay.”

She looked at Lyra, straight in the eye.

“I punched Chrysalis.”

A pause followed. Lyra tilted her head. “What?”

“You heard me right,” Cadenza answered, lips twitching. “Socked her right in the jaw. I mean, it wasn’t the best call to make. But you know what?” Still with tight lips and clenched teeth, Cadenza leaned closer to Lyra, her eyes fixed in a glare. But the telltale quiver of her lips did not escape Lyra. “It felt real good.”

Lyra blinked.

“What.”

“Yep.”

“So. You went to Chrysalis…”

“... Because Princess Celestia asked to, yeah.”

“And you punched her,” Lyra continued, “the Changeling Queen, right in the jaw.”

“Oh, yes, I did.”

“Huh.”

At first, nothing more was spoken between the two of them. Not a single word. Then, it began with a little snicker from Lady Cadenza, her lips curled into a joyful smile, followed by Lyra’s. Soon the pantry was filled with the sound of uproarious laughter, echoing.

It hadn’t taken long for Lyra to realise she had been crying, too, leaning against Cadenza, her laughter mixed in joyful, mirthful tears that streamed down her cheeks, her shoulders shaking.

“Feel better, Lyra?” asked Lady Cadenza, amidst her own giggles. They broke apart from the hug. “You can… you can come see the… let’s say, compensation match, tomorrow. I’ll save you a seat, what do you say?”

“S-sure, sure,” answered Lyra, wiping away at her nose. She lifted her notepad weakly. “But… I… I still got this cruddy speech to give.”

“Here, Lyra,” offered Cadenza, pulling up a napkin, wiping away Lyra’s tears with gentle brushes. “Whatever you say to them, well…” She tapped Lyra’s chest. “It’s from here. They’ll know it. Trust me on this, Lyra, because I’ll be there with you, as Bonbon will. Go talk to her. She’ll know what to say, better than I do.”

Lyra bit her lip. Many thoughts trailed her mind, passing by in a dash. But there was not much else she could say then.

So she settled for a nod, and pulled Lady Cadenza into one last hug, before they parted ways for the night, on to where they were needed.

For Lyra, there wasn’t much left to think about, in her walk through empty halls. Then she came to her room, and everything did come barreling through her scrambled mind when she took in the sight of Bonbon, who despite her frazzled mane and dozing eyes, was nothing short of the prettiest, kindest mare Lyra had ever met.

She said nothing, leaning against Bonbon, then she threw her forehooves around her neck, and pressed her head against hers, nuzzling and smothering her beloved with kisses.

“Hey, Bonnie?” Lyra whispered to a startled Bonbon. “Can, can you be there with me? Just... just close enough. I don’t wanna mess it up tomorrow.”

She knew the answer of course. Her Bonnie would always be there for her. It did not change just how much she thought of her, here and now, far away from any war. Only she and her, together.

“Sure, Lyra,” answered Bonbon, and she had the warmest smile when Lyra met her eyes again. She tugged at her forehoof, and Lyra was all too happy to follow, with a flutter in her heart. “C'mon, big day’s tomorrow, and you definitely need your sleep.”

So they climbed into bed, together, and there was nowhere else they would rather be.

* * * * *

From her few times spent on her world at the Hall of Unity, this wasn’t one of the places Lady Cadenza could claim familiarity with. Yet it was little surprise that her cousin should gravitate towards this section of the Hall. Prince Blueblood, even with his overly romantic notions of the life aboard ship, had always valued comfort and leisure.

“Wait, the bathing-pools?” Cadenza asked bemusedly, while he stood at the doors, smiling. “What’d you bring me to the bathing-pools at night for? I never remembered Prince Blueblood thinking of me that way.”

Speaking of gravity, Blueblood was currently holding in his aura a massive plate sporting the hugest, most pink-coated cake she’d found in the pantry, at his request. She had not asked what it was for, but it wouldn’t surprise her if he fancied a midnight feast.

Blueblood chuckled good-naturedly. “Nor do I, Lady Cadance. Just because we’re royalty, and cousins, doesn’t mean we should rush into anything.”

“How gracious,” Cadenza deadpanned. “But if a swim was what you’d got planned on surprising me with, you could’ve easily done it during the day, you know.”

“Oh, I’m up for a swim, if you are,” Blueblood said, nudging open the marble-lined double doors, carefully levitating the cake plate forward. “But I fancied showing you something first. I talked it over with my chums, and they agreed this idea might amuse you.”

“And what might that be, I wonder…”

She followed him down the wide, sloping staircase, waiting for an answer that didn’t come. This was indeed the Blueblood she remembered, however, Cadenza reflected as she trotted after him. Here in the middle of the night and in small company, he wore one of his dinner jackets, because this was what a proper occasion demanded.

Cadenza suppressed a roll of her eyes. While Blueblood had never felt shy of skinny-dipping, he’d have worn a formal jacket to a bathing-pool before he wore a striped bathing-suit.

They descended the rocky-walled staircase, illuminated softly by the sea-green glow of cavern-moss. She shivered, briefly, despite herself. The glow reminded her a tad too much of a Changeling Hive. It didn’t help the air grew moist amidst the moss. The only difference from a Hive was that it also grew warmer, as they came closer to the hot springs within the mountain.

It was no long descent. After a few dozen steps down, they reached another set of double-doors.

“Here,” Blueblood said, stopping, horn still glowing, a forehoof pressed to the door. “I asked the lads to get here before us. Hope they didn’t slack off.”

“Friends of yours, slack off?” Cadenza murmured. “The very idea, Astron.”

He contrived to look offended, his horn glow intensifying. “Why, you wound me, Candy,” Blueblood said innocently. “I’ll have you know I’ve found my better half in a Minotaur. Very industrious people, they are. Very hardy.”

“‘Half’?” Cadenza said innocently. “More like twice a head taller, I’d have assumed. Which reminds me. You did say you’d be introducing me to young Darkhoof?”

“Of course, of course,” said Blueblood, looking back to the door. “Just remember to speak in Common. Fire and Shieldwall have met Basil a couple times already, but this is our first proper get-together. Work at the Convocation does take up a lot of the day, believe me.”

Cadenza felt herself unexpectedly smirk.

“What?”

“Nothing,” Cadenza said. “You wouldn’t get it, but… Fire. Shieldwall. It only just occured to me. ‘Firewall’... You’d need to be a human to understand.” To the blank look he gave her, she smiled, if rather wanly. “Heh. Maybe I could get Dancer to show you. Humans have even the Kirin beat when it comes to technological wonders, you should know.”

“So I’ve heard,” said Blueblood. “Though I didn’t imagine they could outdo the Kirin for fires. What’s this you’re describing, a miles-high wall of flames? You should tell Sooty about it. He loves things that burn. Just… just don’t ask him if he’s got any Kirin blood in him.”

Cadenza paused for thought. “It gets…” she snickered. “Yeah. Sorry. Had a pun, but… it’s stupid. Anyways, it’s not exactly what you think. Humans do tend to use plenty of metaphors.”

“And we don’t?” Blueblood retorted. “Please. My family name’s old enough that it’s practically become synonymous with nobility.”

And Cadenza had to chuckle at that.

“Well, you’re laughing. A little,” Blueblood remarked. “That’s a good start. Now, allow me to introduce you to some friends.”

They entered the bathing-room, the cake plate held aloft.

One of several such rooms at the Hall, in fact, but the largest by far. It was expansive, rising by several storeys, such that there were even balconies protruding from the granite walls to overlook the pools. Cadenza counted about four of them, each the size of two tennis fields. But only one, to her right, looked full at this hour. In the faintly-illuminated water, to her surprise, she saw an indistinct reflection of stars.

Cadenza glanced up. Sure enough, the night sky. On the inside of the far-up, cavernous ceiling.

“It’s all done with mirrors,” smiled Blueblood. “No enchantments here. A feat of Minotaur genius, but you’d have to ask Basil about that. Or even Sooty or Wally. I’m not good with this stuff.”

She saw the ones in question waiting by the empty pool to her left. Which one was Basil, she did not have to ask. A young Minotaur, thus only a head taller than the average human, and she’d met plenty. Of a bronze shade of fur, he had kind eyes and a pretty mouth.

This gave her a measure of ease, but she felt guarded to see Awesome Fire and Shieldwall. The two were as she remembered, one tall and the other short, an off-colour yellowish white against pale blue, one’s mane as fiery as his name, the other‘s an odd black bouffant with green stripes. Awesome Fire, she hadn’t met in years, yet she’d had recent dealings with Shieldwall. And so had Princess Cadance, passing off for her to visit him, her impression no more favourable.

“Lady Cadance,” Awesome Fire smiled, trotting over to kiss her forehoof. “It’s an unconventional way that Bluenose proposed we meet, yet I’m honoured to greet you.”

Shieldwall nodded enthusiastically. “A pony from a parallel universe… How cool is that?”

And Basil Darkhoof presented a light bow. “We are happy to see you, Your Ladyship.”

Cadenza plastered a gracious smile. “Likewise, gentlemen,” she said. “Now, Astron mentioned having an… an amusement, in mind?”

“Oh, yes,” said Blueblood, eagerly. “Come over here, Cadance, to see. Sooty, if you’ll explain?”

Fire rolled his eyes. “Always giving me the job,” he muttered, even as they followed Blueblood towards the nearest empty pool.

It did not remain empty for long. To Cadance’s surprise, Blueblood, focusing hard, delicately levitated the plate, multi-tiered cake and all, to manoeuvre down to the deep end of the pool, where it landed with a gentle clatter.

“It’s like this, ma’am,” droned Fire. “You remember a party game that’s been popular amongst the young gentry of our time? The… two-hoofed balancing act, they call it. A favourite of Bluenose’s.” He smirked, glancing at Basil. “Actually, I think he may just have a fetish for bipeds. But anyway. You remember?”

“Yes…” Cadenza nodded, staring at the pink cake in the pool. She felt vaguely disconcerted.

“Great,” said Fire. “Then you’ll remember how it goes. Who makes it across on their hindlegs, without falling down, is the winner. And,” he added with exaggerated distaste, “it’s my sad duty to report my friend Wally here’s a champion at this game.”

“But w-wait, wait. What’s the cake for?”

“Cushioning impact, was the idea at first,” Blueblood put in. “Then we talked it over, and…” He gave the others a playful glare. “Well, given my reputation following a certain cake incident, my friends and I agreed it’d ‘spice things up’ to use it for a dive.”

“What! Are you insane!” Cadenza cried. “You’ll break your necks!”

“Say what?” Blueblood blinked. “Candy, whoever broke their neck from falling that height?”

She prepared to retort, tell him how many horrid injuries she’d seen. But then it dawned on her. This wasn’t Earth. The laws of physics were different here. And she’d almost forgotten that.

It had been so long…

“You’re… you’re right,” she said in wonder. “Here, it’s true.”

“And so we were thinking,” Shieldwall said concludingly. “You have spent time around bipeds, Your Ladyship. I placed a bet with Sooty. He says you can’t do it, I say you can.”

“Do what?”

“Why, the walk, of course,” Shieldwall grinned, gesturing at the lowest diving-board. “Care to do us the honour?”

She didn’t instantly catch his drift. “What do you mean?”

“The balancing act, Candy,” Blueblood said patiently. “Show the lads how it’s done.”

Cadenza began to blush. “Oh, now, really. I don’t think–”

“It’s not that hard, Lady Cadance,” said Shieldwall, standing himself upright, forelegs crossed behind his back. “Here, let me demonstrate.”

He walked to the diving-board, tottering slightly, yet keeping steady. Without hesitation, he placed a hind-hoof to the board, then another, and then further on. This he repeated, each step potentially meaning a fall. When he reached the edge, he did sway, but almost dismissively turned heel, and did what he’d done in reverse.

“See?” Shieldwall said, resuming four hooves. “And I’m an earthpony. You got wings for balance.”

“Try it,” Blueblood said. “Please? It’ll be fun.”

Boys and their idea of fun, Cadenza thought. Shining hadn’t been much different. Yet, she found Blueblood’s eagerness strangely infectious.

“Alright,” she smiled, “I’ll give it a shot.”

Later on, Cadenza wasn’t ever too sure how she’d managed it, but the results were there.

Teetering upon the board put her heart in her mouth. And yet she found an odd freedom in it. This wasn’t about flight, wasn’t about her useless wings. In a way, Shieldwall was right. Few equines could stand on their hindlegs so long, but somewhere, humanity had rubbed off on her. Now what would Lyra say to that.

Finally, she came back to much clapping from Blueblood and friends, though Fire scowled at Shieldwall’s smug grin.

“Wonderful, Cadance,” said Blueblood. “And now, to top that…”

He himself took place on the board. But when he reached the end, instead of turning, he posed in his two-hoofed stance.

“Behold, the big one!”

And he dove. However, rather than a ‘splat’, what rose from below was a loud ‘thump’.

“I'm afraid that was a little too far to the left…” Fire noted mildly, while Cadenza put a forehoof to her mouth.

Shieldwall, too, seemed a lot more concerned, as he rushed to the pool’s edge. “Bluenose! Are you alright?”

Swaying groggily, Blueblood raised himself. He’d missed the cake.

“Fine, fine…” he slurred. His face scrunched up in pain and he rubbed his snout. “Ouch! Oh… Darnit... Now by dose is really godda be blue…"

Quickly, Basil and Shieldwall climbed down after him, their strengths combining with Fire’s aura to lift him out. From her vest, Cadenza handed him a kerchief.

“You know what, guys?” Blueblood said, pressing the kerchief. “I think what you really need for this trick is boots. Fine cavalier boots, perfect for standing up on deck, or on the gunwale’s edge.”

Fire looked at Cadenza. “Well, there you go, Your Ladyship,” he said. “Back to obsessing over clothing and appearances. And here we were worried about him.”

* * * * *

For a time, Cadenza drifted at the pool’s shallow end, idly helping herself to slices of cake off of the edge, while observing the stallions and Minotaur frolic at the deep end. Seeing Basil Darkhoof at the deep end was quite the sight, to her pony eyes. Upright and three times as tall as the others, the young Minotaur stood easily where the stallions lost their hoofing – effortlessly keeping his head level with them, a hint of muscular shoulder bobbing above the surface.

She watched, feeling her heart go out to them. Too long was it since she’d been granted a moment like this. At this instant, she wasn’t seeing who these stallions had become. Only the carefree, a tad foolish souls they had been.

But Cadenza could not feel as if she belonged.

The plain, ugly truth was, this was not her cousin Blueblood. Maybe he mistook her for Princess Cadance, and she felt affection for him over that, for who else could have seen Cadance in her? They were not even the same age. Although Blueblood seemed to wilfully ignore it, she had left him and his friends’ age group behind long ago.

Cadenza felt more than saw the Minotaur’s great head turn her way, at the pool’s far end. He frowned slightly. She noticed him excuse himself from the stallions, and he trudged up the pool towards her, arms swaying below the water.

As she saw the young bull’s upper body emerge, droplets sliding down his broad, powerfully-built chest, Cadenza was surprised to briefly feel a flash of what Blueblood must feel for the Proxenos’s son. Turning red, she rapidly banished the thought. But not fast enough for her liking.

How could she think that way? He was so young, and Shining was never far from her mind...

“You appear lost in thought, Your Ladyship,” said Basil, drawing in a few paces away. He picked one of the last cake slices, and began nibbling at it. “Asterion did say you were more one to use your head than he.” He smiled softly. “After that little display earlier, I think I believe him.”

She had to wait before she could answer.

“Don’t I always,” Cadenza replied, wistfully. “I suppose he’s a little overeager to make himself more familiar, nose and all.”

Basil gave her a sideways glance. “That’s an interesting way to describe it.”

“Well… when he’s everything that my Blueblood was and wasn’t, you tend to linger on what you know, Basil.”

This seemed to get the Minotaur thinking. “Did he change?” Basil asked softly. “It’s funny. I’d probably never even have met him, if it weren’t for… your world. And the Convocation. I know we’re unlikely to be in love forever. But right now, I love him very much.”

Cadenza looked at him, somewhat forlorn. “Everyone changes. And you should count yourself lucky that you got to know him in his best years, it seems. I won’t tell you how much he’s changed in my world.”

‘However ‘changed’ six feet under means.’ the morbid thought arose, yet she shook it off.

She made herself smile. “But I know what you share is real. He’s yours, and you are his.”

From the corner of her eyes, Cadenza spotted the shadows near the pool’s edge stir with the twinkle of starlight.

“Actually,” said Cadenza, nodding at Basil. Holding the edge, she pulled herself out of the water. “I’ll be back soon.”

* * * * *

“Sorry,” said Luna, her voice measured and regal, “I hope I did not startle you there.”

“I wouldn’t be here if you did,” Cadenza replied. “I’ve been wanting to speak with you.”

The two stood at the balcony, just out of sight of Blueblood and his companions. Her ‘aunt’ stood taller than she, and Cadenza couldn’t take her eyes off her ethereal mane. How it flowed freely, when the last she’d seen her Luna, it was faded and dull. Just like the statue she became…

Cadenza shook the thought away. She glanced at the chestplate Luna wore, and frowned.

“Well, I suppose you’re prepared, aren’t you?”

Luna followed her gaze down to her chest. The white crescent moon of her mark was emblazoned proudly upon it now, yet though it was elegant and beautiful, set against the silver-blue metal and obsidian plates, it did not change the reality of what it was made for, nor the battle she had fought mere days ago.

‘A war we brought here…’ Cadenza thought morosely.

“These days, to come prepared ought to be a given, Cadance,” said Luna. Cadenza looked up, where their eyes met. Those cyan eyes had never looked so old before, she thought.

“Don’t we know it,” Cadenza replied. Luna nodded, and there was yet another pause. Her aunt could be so very… inscrutable, yet transparent at the same time. A splash and another burst of laughter from the pool caused Luna to glance downstairs, frowning in disapproval.

“I suppose I shouldn’t–” she began, but Cadenza raised a forehoof.

“You’re still doing that. I said I wanted to talk to you… Auntie.”

Luna let out a sigh, a smile to match Cadenza’s own. “Very well, then. I thought I might, at last, see how you are faring, Cadance.”

“Likewise,” Cadenza said, with a subtle nod. “It’s… nice, to see you up and about. That garden of yours still blooming?”

“Always,” Luna responded, beaming. “I presume it has been a while since you, or, well, mine counterpart has visited it.”

Cadenza wondered if the Tyrant had chosen to place Luna’s statue in her own garden, as mockery, or memorial.

“Well, we are heading to Canterlot sooner or later...” she said, pushing the thought away. Something still tugged at her mind. “But I don’t think you’re here just for gardening talk?”

Luna sighed. “Ah, of course… Well, I… was wondering, what you thought of Princess Cadance,” she spoke, softly. “She told me of your encounter and…”

‘Blunt as always, aren’t you, Auntie…’

“She’s a good mare,” Cadenza remarked stiffly, “and I look forward to working with her.”

Luna rubbed her chin. “Hmm, and of Captain Armor,” she said, “you’re avoiding him, aren’t you?”

‘There it is.’

The bitter truth that she was not of this world came up once more, as it had at the pool. And Blueblood, however fond she was of him, was not Shining Armor.

“I am,” said Cadenza evenly, carefully keeping her bitterness from bubbling up to the surface. “It isn’t that… it isn’t that I don’t want him, no…”

“And yet, you wish to forget–” Luna pressed on.

“I know what it sounds like,” Cadenza snapped. “There is nothing more that I want in this world than to see him safe, to see him as that same, goofy stallion I fell in love with. But I don’t want to replace him.”

She felt tears pool up quickly, just as suddenly as her outburst did, yet she did not care.

“The other-Cadance… Princess Cadance is happy, and I shouldn’t… try filling in the hole I have in my heart with her beloved, and I shouldn’t let him replace one moment of time I should have had with...”

Her not-Aunt said nothing at first, her stare tranquil as it often was, her eyes distant and cold as the Moon she guided.

“I… yeah, I am being foolish,” Cadenza continued, “hanging onto the husband that cast me aside for some… some thing...”

“Have I told you before?” Luna said, abruptly, cutting into her thoughts.

“Huh?” Cadenza said, wiping away her tears. “Told me what?”

“Apologies,” Luna continued, clearing her throat awkwardly. “But… I must ask, did the other… Luna ever tell you, about whom she– I had loved, so many centuries ago?”

Cadenza shook her head. “No,” she said, “we never had that chance. And it never came up. You… you only told me about Princess Equinox, how healing was in our blood, Auntie.”

“Of course I would tell you of the Realm’s greatest healer,” Luna mused. “It was inevitable, knowing how much Cadance– well, my Cadance, pestered Tia about her. A fine healer you’ve grown into as well, just like her…”

Princess Luna sighed wistfully, her mane blowing in the non-existent wind. There was a twinkle in Luna’s eyes Cadenza had never seen before. The Princess threw back her gaze, staring up at the vast expanse of the sky reflected on the cavern’s ceiling, mirroring the starry horizons that covered Mount Metazoa.

“Orion was his name,” said Luna.

“Orion…” Cadenza repeated. The name rang a bell. She followed Luna’s gaze, up toward the night-time skies. “Like the constellation.”

Luna nodded. “Yes,” she said, lips curling into a longing smile. “And when his time came, I wished for him to live on. So he does, in my heart, and across the night sky, so that all may treasure his guidance, as we cherished one another.”

There, up in the sky, in times of Summer, one could just make the outline of Orion Blueblood, that great unicorn tracker from the North, whose shimmering horn of three stars guided those seeking refuge in the Crystal Realm.

“The stories tell it differently,” Cadenza remarked. “Some say he was tricked by Celestia, after guiding ponies astray in Winter. Now he’s up there forevermore, atoning for his misdeeds,” She glanced at Luna. “You know, I don’t know why no-one put two and two together. It’s just… so obvious in hindsight.”

“A little tease between sisters,” Luna retorted, letting out a gentle laugh. “But all in good fun, I must assure you. As long as part of him is remembered, then all is well. Stories are so delightful when they are retold through the ages, through different writers and poets, and that of my Orion is no different.”

“What was he like, then?” asked Cadenza, looking back up to the constellation. “As you remember him. Was he like Astron?”

Luna snorted in mock contempt. “Orion was quite unlike that fop of a prince,” she said, with a haughty yet playful scoff, “save for that new beard, I’ll grant him that. Nay, Orion was light and charming, clever in words and action. A teacher and poet unlike those who came before him, nor those who tread this world after him.”

“Yes, I see he must have swept you right off your hooves, Auntie,” Cadenza blurted out without thinking, and she looked just in time to see Luna shoot her an annoyed glare. Yet her smile betrayed her true feelings.

“He was very much like you, actually,” Luna said, her glare melting into the twinkle in her eyes. “Kind and charming and quite… well, fun.”

“I can tell,” Cadenza replied, returning her smile. Fleetingly, the aroma of lavender enticed her. She wasn’t sure it came from the many pots hanging from within the halls. “I can feel it from you, Auntie. But it’s… faded, a little.”

“Perhaps it has. Our time was short, in the grand scheme of everything, yet the years I spent with him… I may have moved on, but I shall cherish the time we spent with one another. His time came, oh yes, but he passed not on the fields of battle, nor in the hospital, as my children did, but on the bed, with his family around him, and the mare he loved by his side...”

She shook her head.

“Cadance,” Luna said firmly, blinking away tears, “do you truly love him so, your Shining Armor?”

And what could Cadenza do, but nod without another pause upon her aunt’s query.

“Yes, absolutely. I don’t know how long it’ll take. But I’ll bring him back. I promised everyone at the PHL we’ll bring everyone back… and I think that’s how we’d all like it to be.”

“Then we shall see to it,” Luna agreed. “However long it will take.”

“However long…” Cadenza echoed, chuckling. “Not long enough to name the stars after him, hopefully.”

“I was a young and lovestruck mare once,” Luna said, fur and freckles on her cheeks darkening, “And you know how it goes, Cadenz– Cadance.”

“Cadenza.”

“Sorry?”

“You can call me Cadenza, Auntie,” Cadenza said firmly. “That’s one less Cadance for you to remember, in a way.”

Aunt Luna smiled, closing the gap between them, and pulled her into a warm embrace.

“Then Cadenza you shall be.”

For a brief moment, the calming aroma of lavender was joined by the vivid scent of roses, blossoming in that old greenhouse of her youth. And Cadenza, still nuzzling her aunt, wouldn’t have it any other way, beneath the moonlit sky.

* * * * *

In a darkened bedroom somewhere, a briefcase was flung open.

Its contents, a device not unlike the one Queen Celestia had burnt several nights ago, before the very eyes of this Convocation. Its owner, an individual always present, yet seldom noticed.

However, the device differed from its predecessor. Whereas Redheart’s ansible had taken the form of an old typewriter, this one’s keyboard was attached to a screen, nearly indistinguishable from a human computer.

Eyes stared out of a pale face, turned blue by the screen’s glare, to study the equine-adapted keyboard, pondering. She’d assessed the lay of the land. Only now did she feel it safe to write. Finally, she typed a simple message.

I’m in. What are your orders?

The sender did not have long to wait for an answer, as it appeared on the ansible’s screen with the quiet efficiency of all instant messages – albeit a message from across universes.

Follow your directives as before. Remain on alert for the grey alicorn.

Seek to ascertain where time flowed down a separate current in this Equestria – this mystery bears the hallmark of the Architect. Should you have the slightest suspicion of her whereabouts, follow the lead. If you can, you must bring her before me. As for the grey one, deliver my mercy unto her.

Above all, retrieve the heart-shaped locket. They cannot be allowed to wield it.

Trust that I watch over and protect you on your mission.

Regards,
~ C. R.

Her purpose reaffirmed, she closed the briefcase, laying it aside on her bed. She bowed her head in prayer, feeling the covers. Temporarily, she contemplated how it felt to again sleep in a bed such as this, a comfort denied to many for years. But it was comfort she’d chosen to deny herself. Material goods mattered not. Only salvation mattered.

She stood in their midst, a sword poised to strike. They believed her one of them.

And the Weaver, even as she mourned Redheart’s sacrifice, stood firm in her resolve that none of it would be in vain.

Author's Note

Spectrum 2.1 - Autumn 2021

VoxAdam:

A chapter that was created from splitting the prior Chapter Twenty-One (‘So Say We All’) into two chapters.

Addition of a scene; Cadenza and Moondancer of the PHL’s thoughts and feelings as they look upon the Hall of Unity, and thus, Sunny Equestria. Such a scene was never written for the original version. I consider this to have been one of our great oversights.

Displacement of a scene; the ending to the original unsplit chapter, of Weaver contacting the Solar Tyrant via her ansible, is moved to the conclusion of this chapter.

Spectrum 2.0 - August 12th 2020

VoxAdam: Greetings, all. :pinkiesmile:

And here is the first chapter of Act Three, the twenty-first chapter in Spectrum overall, not counting the prologue and interludes, and the second-largest chapter of the story, a status I believe shan’t be exceeded by any other chapter, anymore than the status of ‘Concordia Maxima’ will be exceeded as the longest chapter. In fact, it might help to think of this chapter as essentially ‘Concordia Maxima – Part II’.

If ‘Concordia Maxima’ was like reaching the peak of an extinct volcano’s crest and Act Two was like heading down into the more-or-less even surface of the basin, then consider the chapter you have finished reading as the crest at the opposite end, before slowly descending into the valley. If those metaphors make any kind of sense.

In the notes below, Sledge speaks of how Act Three has been the most advance planned-out Act out of all thus far, and that is true. Nevertheless, for ‘So Say We All’ to grow this big and to coalesce as it did, much at work involved improvisation, late-development changes and luck.

Readers knowledgeable about the side-story Light Despondent – Remixed may be feeling a flicker of recognition at Galatea’s flashback scene to Matinicus Isle, presented from Kraber’s POV in that story. As a scene for Light Despondent, the source material was written with a characterisation of Galatea in mind that harks closer to her portrayal in Spectrum: Redux. In the aims of maintaining the consistency that Light Despondent shares with both the Spectrumverse and Reduxverse, welcome to a scene as seen from a different point-of-view.

And don’t lose sight of the figure whom Galatea was speaking to. As TheIdiot might confirm, they’ll be reappearing…

As for the duel between Alexander Reiner and Pharynx, it may not at all have come about if I hadn’t realised that Alex is meant to be our action-man, yet he was yet to have an action scene to his name. In some respect, this was intentional, considering how distinct we’ve aimed to make Alex from the last guy. But if he has those runes, he’s got to use them at some point. Not to mention that Pharynx is my Best Changeling, from an episode that delivers a surprisingly mature message about the need for a military and the veteran experience. On a pony show. How could Pharynx not once cross paths with Alex.

So that’s where all the rest flows from. Cadenza punching Chrysalis – and boy, is that a satisfying moment for those who remember OG Spectrum – the interactions between Thorax and Pharynx, or Cadenza’s night-time snack with Lyra. All of it.

Incidentally, credit goes here to RoyalPsycho, who rarely writes author’s notes, but had a big hand in co-writing the duel scene. :twilightsmile:

This chapter is set to be the first of three covering the gradual arrival of humans in Sunny Equestria, Lyra’s departure on her Expedition to the Unknown, and a few more arcs beside.

Also, if you’re reading this a while after publication, while the revamp of Chapter Thirteen (‘Concordia Maxima’) from two weeks ago featured this alteration, ‘So Say We All’ is the chapter where Spectrum moved onwards in using the floral page-breaks – the imagery of flowers having become solidified at this point of the writing process, following the ‘Child of Crystal’ interlude and wonderful thematic adaptation by Sledge in his independent stories, Moonbug and The Dreamwalker’s Lament.

Now, to finish, I wish you all to take the best care of yourselves in these strange times, and hope that our work, through quality as much as quantity, keeps you entertained throughout.

Cheers,
~Vox

P.S.
Yep, this was timed to come out on the same day as “Season 10” in the IDW comics of FiM!

Sledge115: Hello, there :twilightsmile:

So! After ample time, here we are with Act Three! While I’ve taken a step back to let Vox take the reins this time, I’ll still be very closely involved – as one could see with the presence of Luna, which won’t be last we see of her. Not when I’m here :twilightsheepish:

As an aside, though, it turns out I find writing someone like Cadance very enjoyable as well. Both Cadances, in fact!

Quite a lot of things have changed in the months that went by, between the pandemic and all. I’ve decided to branch out elsewhere on Fimfic, with contests and whatnot, as well as just chatting around and comparing ideas in the site Discord. It’s good, fun practice, and certainly has influenced my writing for Spectrum, as it were :twilightsmile:

Act Three has been carefully planned out, just as much, if not more than Act Two, and we hope the efforts we’ve put in have been worth the wait. Whereas Act Two is, for the most part, Luna and Twilight’s arc, Act Three brings us back to Lyra Heartstrings’ quest for discovery… though, of course, Luna’s story isn’t done just yet, and neither are plenty others. Including, as so prominently shown here and the chapter before, the two Cadances…

Now, it isn’t just Act Three that we’ve been busy with. Two very different stories for the Spectrumverse have been in the works, in fact, one on Equus and one on Earth – I’m happy to present Galatea’s side story, The First Second of Eternity, a whimsical little fairy tale showing her life and times, while to those wishing to see an insight into the PER, RanOutOfIdeas’ gripping wartime drama, Dissonance is for you.

And not to mention, one more side story from yours truly in the works – no spoilers as to what it is, just yet, but tis another Equus one. It’s been fun working on Equus, of course, especially little standalones :twilightsheepish:

So without further ado, let us go forth into Act Three. And stay tuned!
~Sledge

TheIdiot: Well, this has taken an amount of time to get done. Plenty of events have occurred during this chapter’s production that left some matters needing to be delayed or reworked. In short, it helps to spend some time to plan things out ahead of time and be flexible to change or rework those plans.

Despite so much of these things, however, we’re finally here and the chapter marks the beginning of Act 3. As you can tell, our fair readers, that there is an excitement among us on the Spectrum to get this arc underway. What will come about? Well, you’ll just have to wait and see as we all venture into the unknown.

Or at least, as we begin to make our journey.

Oh, and Vox is accurate. The person in the flashback will be relevant later. Probably. Maybe. We’ll see what happens.

Until next time,
Carpe diem, everyone.