We arrived to Manehattan right before the sunset, the megalopolis stretched in the horizon with a multitude of buildings the setting sun bathed the streets with an orangish glow that stuck to the eye from a hill far from it, the city was good looking. Sunset was absolutely enamored with the sight so much so that she asked if we could stop there to look at it some more, I reluctantly agreed.

“So, where to?” I asked after a minute or so.

sigh “Do you always ruin good moments? Can’t you lay back and enjoy the scenery?” She asked.

“I don’t see why, we are here to find Moondancer and find a way to kill Celestia, not to look at the scenery.” I bitterly said.

“Fine.” She huffed annoyed. “Follow me I’ll take you to her, but I will need some kind of camouflage I can’t be seen by the guards and start a whole operation to find us in here.” She said.

“Let me check if they have standing orders to find and capture you, wait for me here, stay hidden and if anyone comes here beside me either hide or kill them.” I ordered her, she visibly winced at the last word but nodded nonetheless hiding behind a tree. I on the other hand turned into the first guard I consumed and tweaked his facial features a bit so that he could not be recognized.

I made my way into the city and looked around, the city was fairly similar to my Manhattan, lots of people and lots of cars. That Celestia was worried about my escape though was evident, there were patrols all around. ‘Taking one of them might be difficult, I can’t just blaze in it and kidnap one like in the game, I don’t think they have Alzheimers here. What to do…’ I continued to look around until I found one guard that was detached from the patrols.

He was a tall muscular brown unicorn, he had blue eyes and a speck of blonde mane could be seen coming out of his helmet, he was wearing a much more complex suit of armor, it was black as the others but had lots of extra padding and metal straps. I approached the stallion calmly, he saw me but didn’t acknowledge my existence, he just looked up then took out a small pad on which he started to push some buttons.

“Hey.” I started the conversation.

“What do you want? Who are- wait… You are one of the ELDS aren’t you? I heard that some experiment went really bad up there. What happened?” He asked looking up from the pad.

“Shit happened, a rogue experiment got free and freed all the others. We are going around searching for them now. Hey I just arrived ya know, I was wondering if any new info went through. Do you guys have any orders from the higher ups?” I told him trying to sound friendly enough.

“Shit mate, well yeah we do.” He said and showed me his pad. “Look at this shit, they want us to patrol the streets 24/7 can you believe it? I’m absolutely drowning in papers, not only that but they want us to report if we see this girl.” He said showing me a picture of Sunset, it was a bit outdated but it was clearly her.

“Truly a pain in the ass I know. Oh wait.” I feigned an incoming transmission. “Yes, yes sir. Immediately, over. I have to go man pleasure talking to you.” I said and went to walk away when his hand stopped me. I almost ripped his head off but I got myself under control just in time.

“Hey name’s Blaze Sword. If you want to hang out you can come up to our base here in Manehattan, 21st Alicorn boulevard can’t miss it.” He said with a smile.

“Sure mate, and name’s Shield Fortress.”

I returned back where Sunset was hiding I disposed of the disguise and searched for her. Fortunately she was still where I left her although sleeping. I nudged her awake.

“Uh… wha?” She said groggily, she looked around and saw me glaring at her.

“So, how would you have gone into hiding while sleeping exactly?” I asked her.

“I had an alarm spell set up, if anyone except you walked towards me it would have awoken me.” She said smugly. “I may not be a super being like you but I’m not an idiot.”

“Alright sorry.” I said a bit ashamed, I also heard a faint giggle coming from the Element of Kindness. ‘Oh haha laugh you little…’ I stopped my thoughts and returned to reality I had things to say. “Ok so yes they are searching for you, the city is basically a fortress right now guards are everywhere.” I told her.

“What do we do then? We have to find Moondancer.” She replied starting to think it over. “What about a disguise?”

“Too risky, if anyone notices that you are indeed masking your face they will get suspicious. No we need something radical and far more difficult to identify. Can you magically change your face?” I asked.

“Some master illusionists can, but that’s not my field of expertise.” She replied shooting down the idea.

“Well I could biologically change your face, it would be fairly easy for me, but possibly very traumatizing for you to look at yourself and seeing someone else.” I told her.

“Can’t you just, I dunno return my face as it was?” She asked actually thinking about it.

“Well yes but the operation would be fairly long, while I could completely replace all of your cells I don’t want to risk rejections of any kind, that means having to change the skeletal structure and the fur completely by hand, the mane is easier at least.” I told her going through the whole operation in my head.

‘Uhm, can’t we just go in at night?’ The voice of Fluttershy asked me.

“Nice to hear you again Fluttershy” I told her.

“Who are you talking to? Is this one of your powers too?” Sunset asked looking at me.

“No, no. I’m talking to Fluttershy the Element of Kindness.” I replied.

‘Give her my gem.’ She said, I obliged retrieving it from inside my body.

“She told me to give you this.” I replied handing it over.

Sunset took the stone with trembling hands. “I can’t believe I’m holding one of the most precious treasures in the world…” She said in awe.

SUNSET

‘Hi, I’m Fluttershy.’ The element told me.

“Oh, uhm hi! I’m Sunset shimmer.” I awkwardly replied.

‘Oh, uhm I knew that already heh, I uhm overheard what you were saying before and why don’t you just sneak in the city at night?’ She told me.

“Well… Uhm…” I said trying to come out of a very awkward situation where I got outsmarted by an Element of Harmony. “Right, didn’t think of that. Hehe.”

‘There is nothing wrong with it. Everyone needs a hand sometime. I will need yours soon as a matter of fact. But now is not the time. Please return me to him, I really like you but I can’t stay too far from him for too long without a body. She said. I immediately handed the gem over to Phil and he took it with a look of surprise.

“I thought you would have wanted to ask her some questions.” He said putting the gem back into his chest.

“Well yes, but she told me she can’t stay too far from you for too long.” I replied.

“I see, well she told you how she wanted to go in right? Can’t believe we didn’t think of that.” He said with a trace of merriment in his voice.

“Right.” I said laughing a bit at the silliness of it all, we almost made an extremely difficult to complete plan when we could have just done that.

“Alright then, we wait for nightfall then. Where does Moondancer work?” He asked me.

“Well last time I checked she was still working in an underground lab at 21st Alicorn boulevard.” I replied.

“Oh, I see…” He said with a thoughtful look on his face. “Then we may be in luck.”

PHILIP

I then proceeded to tell her how I met a guy that possibly works there and how that could grant us some sort of access to the facility if we played our cards right. “He doesn’t know who you are by name, he only knows your face, he knows me by a pseudonym and will let me through. I can tell him that you are my charge or one of the runaway lab experiments. This way I will probably have an excuse to mask your face.” I explained.

“Well I mean sure, but what if he starts asking questions?” She replied.

“In that case let me talk, you don’t utter a word ok?” I asked her.

“Fine, I’ll be good.” She accepted sitting down. “Now I would like to clean my magical conduits thank you very much.” She told me. At which I got confused, there was no knowledge on those magical conduits anywhere inside that guard’s memory. He was a unicorn though so why didn’t he know?

“What are those?” I asked her making her open her eyes in annoyance but then she smiled in glee.

“Well, magical conduits are metaphysical representation of where the magic flows. They are not entirely physical nor entirely magical in nature. They serve as a bridge to link us to the Mana around us, when a unicorn uses a lot of magic like I did it has to clean those conduits or face a decreased efficiency and in extremely rare cases even death from magical poisoning.” She explained conjuring a floating blackboard and drawing on it the open section of a unicorn. The canals were highlighted with blue while the body was entirely white, the canals were mostly in the cranium right under the horn and then they spread out through the body.

“Interesting…” I said. “Is there a way to block them with purely physical meanings?” I asked.

“Not completely but yes, as I said they are partially physical, the more powerful a unicorn though the less they are that way. In my case specifically eighty percent of them are purely magical, so even if you hit me in a node filled with those I would be able to use magic still.” She explained.

“What about Celestia?” I asked, she stopped immediately, sighed and cleaned the blackboard.

“I don’t know a lot of it, what I know of is because I needed her for an early theory on the spell, what I do know is that her conduits are entirely magical and have a strange substance mixed in it too. We codenamed it Ambrosia, unfortunately I don’t know anything about it.” She said making the blackboard disappear.

“That’s ok, we are going to this Moondancer just for that right?” I told her reassuringly.

“Yeah.” She said with a little smile. “Now please let me focus.”

Windy Wind

Me and Daisy were sitting at the lunch table without uttering a word, she asked me where the muffins went and I just blatantly lied to her telling her that an animal came inside and took them all. She actually believed it blaming the forest itself, she then prepared a good looking lunch. And that’s how I ended up with a nice meal in front of me but the terror of eating it.

“What’s wrong?” Daisy sweetly asked. “Something you are allergic to?”

“Oh, no no.” I hastily replied.

“Then come on, dig in!” She happily said chomping down on a very appetizing piece of veggie, still though the fear remains. I grabbed a fork from the table and without even thinking or even noticing it I snapped it in two.

“Oh!” I shouted in alarm.

“My goodness Windy, you ARE in shape!” Daisy said with a mouth full of food.

“Uhm, sorry… I shamefully told her, I put the fork down with as much care as possible.

“Oh it’s no problem Windy!” She said waving off. “I have so many forks after all. Why do I have so many forks?” She asked actually perplexed.

“Oh, no no please I have to refund you… Somehow.” I said looking down, I didn’t have any money after all. “Do you need any help around?” I asked hopefully.

“Well I do have to move some very heavy pots filled with dirt…” She said, so I immediately shot up and went to the door.

“Show me where then, I can totally help you!” I said, I grabbed the handle and ripped it off. “Hehe, oops?”

“Windy… I can see you are such a cute and caring mare. But don’t try to play me as a fool, I may be just a flower mare but I’m not an idiot.” She said standing up and putting her hands on the table. “How are you that strong?”

“I-I don’t know!” I shouted almost in tears. “I’m sorry.” I told her kneeling down.

“W-wait you don’t have to cry please.” She said immediately coming down to me. She touched me on the face and immediately took her hand off as if I burnt it. “What the-! You are absolutely scalding!” She said in horror.

“W-what?” I asked confused I felt fine after all.

“You are extremely hot. Not in that sense…” She said.

“I feel fine though.” I told her.

“This is so strange, Windy where do you come from?” She asked sitting down on the floor in front of me.

I sighed and told her my story.

PHILIP

Night finally fell on a tired Manehattan, the inhabitants lazily went back to their homes after a day full of work while we set off to start ours. We used the shadows to enter the city avoiding the patrols, when all roads were blocked we simply used the roofs. With my agility and speed it was a matter of minutes before we arrived at 21st Alicorn boulevard, there we saw a building taking the majority of the space, it was surrounded by a tall wall and iron fences, tens of guards were patrolling around the building. The building itself was fairly simple, a boring rectangular shaped building completely grey with little windows.

“Ok we are here.” Sunset whispered.

“Perfect, now we will go down there, remember-”

“No talking. I know.” She deadpanned and put the mask I created back before we entered on her, the mask was simple enough, it had the number 357 on it and displayed a mouth sealing device that from a distance seemed to impede speech, the mask left only a really
small gap for the wearer to see from.

“Wonderful.” I told her, I grabbed her and descended the building, that done I put on my disguise and went on the front of the guards headquarters in Manehattan. “Hey you.” I called one of the guards.

“Who are you?” He asked obviously.

“My name is Shield Fortress from the ELDS, I’m here to meet Blaze Sword, he asked me to come here after my turn and I gladly accepted.” I replied. “I would have called but my comm was destroyed when I captured subject 347 here.” I said pulling Sunset in front of me.

“Who is she?” He asked reaching forward with a hand.

“Woah dude, slow down, if you want your hand to be vaporized then go ahead but if not I would keep my hands well away from her face.” I said to him blocking his arm.

“Uh, yeah right we were briefed.” He said with a scroll of his shoulders. “Sure here you can use mine for now.”

I put in the number of Blaze and dialed him. In three tries he picked up. “Hello?” He asked.

“Hey Blaze dude, it’s me Fortress.” I replied.

“Fortress my friend, why the call?” He asked happily.

“I finished my job here and I was calling to know if I could come in the headquarter to talk for a bit before going to a nice bar.” I offered.

“Sure thing mate!” He said.

“You heard him.” I told the guard.

“Sure enough, open the gate!” He shouted, immediately after the heavy iron gate opened up letting us in. We entered the building without a problem, Blaze was there in the lobby probably waiting for us.

“Blaze!” I called him. He turned around and immediately greeted me.

“Fortress, it’s good to see you all in one piece, who’s she?” He asked.

“She is subject 357, I recently captured her and subdued her. She is no danger for now.” I told him, “So how is it going?”

“Oh well all right I guess.” He told me starting to walk along the corridors. “I had my whole slice of work, papers mostly. I also did some research around to possibly help you out on your mission, I’m glad you were able to do it all by yourself though, less work for me haha!”

He said merrily walking us to his office. He opened the door and closed it behind him. “So, he said in a much more serious tone.” He sat down on his chair and stared at us with a cold unflinching expression. “Who are you?”

“What?” I asked feigning confusion.

“Don’t play me for a fool. An ELDS in Manehattan and no one told me? I did my research as I told you before, and turns out dear fortress is dead, killed in the accident in the Canterlot central laboratory.” He said putting a stack of papers on the desk. “Care to explain?”

I sighed, I can’t believe my cover was already blown. ‘I guess this is what happens when you use a dead guard as a disguise…’ “Alright, you got me.” I told him I dropped my disguise and returned to my true form. “My name is Philip Mercer, you can call me Hunter though.” I told him.

He didn’t even flinch he just stared. Then he asked a question. “What do you want?”

“Honestly?” I asked, he nodded. “I’m here to meet Moondancer, I need her knowledge.” I told him.

“For what?”

“To kill Celestia.”

“... I should kill you for what you just said, but I’ll humor you. Why would you want to do that?” He asked.

“You may believe me, or not. But Celestia is not the good Goddess you may think she is, she literally wants to encase the entire world in a sort of bubble that will stop everyone from moving or living ever again. She wants to do that for her demented idea of perfection.” I told him.

“Right, I don’t believe you. Do you have some proofs?” He asked.

“I can vouch for him.” Sunset said.

“Oh, so she is not really subject 357?” He said with no hint of surprise.

“Forget it, it’s true, listen to me I was working on that spell when Phil rescued me, believe me, she really wants to do that.” She said removing her mask.

“You are Sunset Shimmer.” He said in monotone.

“Yes, now please believe us, I can even show you part of my memories if it helps!” She said.

“How do I know they are not tampered with?” He asked actually showing some emotions.

“You should have with you your mind ring, I should know, I created it. Used to be certain when mind magic was used upon someone, you will see that it will not activate for I will use magic on myself.” She clarified to him.

“Alright, I’ll humor you. But if you try something…” He said clearly threatening her. I decided to not say anything, threats will just alienate him further, and he doesn’t seem to be a bad guy, just doing his job more than anything else. ‘I also need him, having an ally in her military will prove incredibly useful, I’m not at all ready to create my own Evolved yet.’

And thus Sunset used her magic, she was covered with a deep orange aura around her whole body and Blaze’s eyes immediately rolled back but he remained immobile otherwise. After a second or so, he closed his eyes and opened them.

“Impossible…” He said in disbelief. “She really has gone mad. You must forgive me Phil, I really didn’t want to believe it but confronted with such crushing proofs I can’t defend her anymore. You need to visit Moondancer right? Come with me. After this I’ll make my resignations… “ He said sounding so defeated.

“No.” I told him firmly. “If you want to help us take her down you have to stay here. I will need your help and at worst you can feed us useful info.” I told him putting a hand on his shoulders.

“I don’t know if I can or want to.” He said.

“You followed your guts and discovered me though didn’t you? You were able to find me out in a matter of hours. You are good Blaze, don’t let those gifts go to waste.” I told him.

“It’s true Blaze, you are a good stallion I can tell, we might need your help in the future, especially if we need any military information. You can help us all, you can save Equestria.” Sunset told him grabbing his hands.

sigh”Fine. I’ll do it, but just because a pretty mare asked.” He said smirking when Sunset promptly blushed. “Come now.” We followed him to a nearby elevator which brought us down to the last floor in the basement. “Here we are, she is in the third room usually.” He said and returned in the elevator. “I have to go now, it was nice knowing you Phil.”

“Same.” I replied when the doors closed.

“Let’s go.” Sunset simply stated and so we moved onward. We reached the third door and opened it, inside we found a lone unicorn mare with a razzled mane and thousands of papers all around the room.

“It reminds me of your room.” I told Sunset. She shot me a glare but said nothing else. The unicorn in question had a cream coloured fur with a three toned mane, the red was the most prominent while the purple and lavender were much less present, she was wearing a pair of black square glasses and a lab coat over her purple shirt, she also wore a pair of jeans too big for her.

“Moondancer?” I called her.

“Yes? What do you want?” She asked annoyed shooting us a glare.

“We need to talk.” I replied closing the door.

“What about?” She said fully turning around. I dropped my disguise leaving her speechless.

“I have a god to kill.”

WINDY

After the explanations Daisy sent me to retrieve those pots, we decided that I could remain with her until I found a job in exchange I would had to help her around the house. It wasn’t a problem at all seeing that I was incredibly strong and durable right then, as a matter of fact I picked up the pots effortlessly and brought them in her garden without a sweat.

“You are insanely strong!” Daisy said from the back window of her house. “You can leave them there, I’ll prepare the spot for them later.” She said closing the window.

“I’ll go around looking for a job ok?” I shouted much louder than I would have liked.

“Jeez yes, stop shouting like that.” She replied opening the window again. “You do that, let me know if you find anything.” She said with a smile afterwards. “Good luck!”

I waved her off and jogged in the city to the town hall, while I was walking around I saw many ponies all going around happily, there were lots of families with foals running and playing around. One such foal ran into me and ended up with his rump on the ground.

“Oh, I’m sorry little one.” I said crouching down, I almost offered a hand to pick him up but then remembered my strength, so I desisted.

“Sorry miss.” He said, he was a cute little colt with a brown mane, a white fur dotted with brown spots, he went back on his hooves and waved at me. “Sorry again miss.” He said and ran off with his friend. I returned to walking with a little smile on my face, life was good.

I entered the town hall and looked at the job applications, there were severals but unfortunately many required things I simply didn’t know how to do, like candy preparation, baking and so on… I was almost out of applications when I saw one that could truly work for me, mailmare sounded nice enough. I took the piece of paper and ran off to the mail office, unfortunately I forgot that I was actually pretty fast too and so I knocked a mare over. “Oh, I’m so sorry miss.” I said in a panic on if to land her a hand or not.

“Oh it’s alright, don’t worry dear.” The mare said, she wore a nice suit and had a pair of good looking glasses, she also had a grey mane and a pale coat, the most prominent piece on her was a strange green piece of clothing around her neck.

“I’m so sorry miss I didn’t see you there.” I said apologizing again.

“Oh as I said it’s alright, my name is Mayor Mare and I am the hehe mayor of Ponyville.” She said offering her hand once she returned upstanding. I was in a panic right there, ‘I could refuse, but then it would be suspicious. Ok Windy, deep breath and use the utmost care.’ I thought, I took her hand and shook it as carefully as possible.

“A pleasure to know you, I’m Windy Wind and I’m hopefully a soon to be mailmare.” I told her letting her hand go.

“Oh heavens yes, the last mailmare retired a month ago and we are swarmed by complaints about missing letters, I’ll be more than happy to hear you got the job Windy. Now excuse me but I’m quite busy, see you soon!” She said with a smile and walked on the upper floor.

I walked, emphasis on walked, out of the town hall and asked directions on where the post office was. After getting my indications from a nice mare I went there, I knocked on the cozy looking building. I opened the door and entered, there was a lot of ponies there making a line to a single stallion that was sweating bullets trying to calm the most of them down.

“We don’t have a mailmare yet! We cannot send you letters I’m sorry!” He said almost on the verge of crying himself from stress.

“I’m here for the job!” I shouted loud so everypony could hear. The stallion looked at me like an angel sent by Celestia herself.

“Thanks the heavens!” He shouted, “You are hired I don’t care just deliver these!” He pointed to a stack of letters.

“Sure thing!” I said happily, but then I stopped immediately and looked back. “How much do I get?”

“3000 bits per month plus 50 for every ten letters delivered fine?” He said absolutely devastated by the thought that I could say no.

“Ok!” I sweetly said and took a bag hanging from a wall, a single cap with an M on it and put it on my head. “Ready!”

PHILIP

“We need your help, we must know about Ambrosia.” I told Moondancer.

“What the hell are you?” She shrieked.

“That’s not important. Tell me what you know.” I told her.

“Alright, but don’t come near me! Please.” She said scared to death.

“Fine. Start talking.”

“We don’t know much about Ambrosia, what we know is that it acts differently from normal magic, Ambrosia is so impossible in its existence that normal magic can’t even pick it up. We had to create very special Thaumoscopes and even from that we picked up very little. Ambrosia can be used to fuel up spells that are magnitudes stronger than the strongest spell we normal unicorns can use.” She said all in a rant.

“Furthemore Ambrosia is so volatile that when it goes out in the thaumic atmosphere of Equus it gets dissolved almost instantly. From what we know, only Celestia herself is capable of using it at all, and also the only one able to produce it as well, her powers were so impossibly high that our own most advanced Thaumoscopes were blown off by it. To our current day we don’t know how powerful she really is.” She continued.

“If you wish to even fight her you would need to be able to produce Ambrosia yourself, our theories says that the stellar beasts can indeed produce Ambrosia too. Unfortunately we never managed to study one or even get near one. So if you want my own opinion you should hunt down those.” She said finally.

“You are awfully talkative about something that might kill your princess.” I said.

“I don’t care about politics, I only care about my research, if there is nothing more I would love for you to fuck off.” She said annoyed.

“I guess. Bye.” I told her walking away, my mind was already making plans. ‘Kill the beasts, kill Celestia.’ The plan was simple.

MOONDANCER

I waited five minutes for Hunter to get out of my room, then I picked the phone up and dialed.

“Yes?” The voice asked.

“He came, just like you said he would.”

“Did you tell him what you had to?”

“Of course, he knows about Ambrosia and where to get it, he will go there now.”

“Fantastic work Moondancer, your loyalty shall be rewarded shortly, maybe we do need a new lead scientist here in Canterlot, especially with the disappearance of Sunset Shimmer.”

“She might have been here too, Hunter had a mare with him.”

“Wonderful news, two birds with one stone. Keep up the good work and if he returns obey his orders.”

“Yes, my Princess.”

Author's Note

Here you go guys, I hope you'll like it. I had a bit of a writing block so yeah a long time passed I know. I hope you'll like it though so let me know if you do! As always stay tuned for next chapter see ya!

Edited by: Classy fox