Chapter 1 - Back In Business
The normally quite empty Castle of Friendship was packed to the brim. Music flowed around the halls, and apple cider flowed from large wooden kegs like water. The polished crystal floors had been temporarily overlaid by piece upon piece of colourful lighted tiles, and the chatter of ponies discussing a million happenings rose and ebbed like waves crashing upon the shores of a beach. All in all, it was an excellent party, one to remember for days, months and maybe even weeks after the final note had been played and the final glass of cider had been drunk.
Twilight Sparkle was in the middle of it all, earnestly chatting with her friends about countless past happenings and dusting off their precious memories.
“Do you remember that time when we defeated Discord?” she asked, the ghost of the last joke still on her face.
“Yeah, it was so crazy!” Rainbow Dash agreed, acting out the battle using her hooves, complete with muzzle-generated sound effects.
“Ah guess we learnt that friends should always stick together, am I right, Twi?” Applejack added, but Twilight wasn’t listening.
Twilight was staring at a shadowy figure, skulking around the edges of the party. The figure noticed her and motioned her over. Normally, Twilight would have called the figure to her and her friends. However, this was different. Twilight knew where the figure was from, and that place was a part of her history she tried to forget. A part of her history that she definitely did not want her friends to find out.
“Um, guys, I gotta go.” she said hesitantly.
“Why? What for?” Rainbow Dash asked, confused.
“Um, super special princess stuff?”
“Ooh, ooh, can I come too?” Pinkie squealed.
“Um, this super special princess stuff requires you to stay right here, Pinkie.”
“Okay dokey loki!”
Twilight followed the figure into one of the many vacant rooms of the castle. She shut the door, drowning out the music.
The figure pulled off her mask and took a piece of paper from a pocket on her chest. "Twilight Sparkle?" she asked in a raspy tone of voice.
"Yes." Twilight said tersely.
The figure breathed a sigh of relief. "Ohmygosh! Finally! Like, do you even realize how many rooms this castle has? You should really consider labelling the doors, it took ages to find out where you were!"
"Um," Twilight was taken aback. "Yes, I'll take that into mind."
The figure squealed with glee. "I can't believe I'm actually meeting you in person! The Twilight Sparkle, the best agent the Arcane Spells Division ever had!"
Twilight sighed deeply. "Uh huh. Now, if you'll excuse me, I kind of want to go back to-"
"Anyway," the figure continued, completely ignoring Twilight's protest. "I'm Ruby Moon, Junior Spellcaster. The ASD sent me to, like, pick you up. Celestia just activated the Tier One alert - I know, crazy, right?"
Twilight racked her brains, digging up memories from long ago. She knew that a Tier 1 alert was very serious, but she couldn't recall what exactly it meant. Not wanting to make it seem that she had no idea what she was doing, she answered with a simple "Uh, yes?".
"Okay, cool. Now you need to follow me, we've got your old gear all ready in a van outside-"
"Whoa whoa whoa. Let me stop you right there." Twilight held up a hoof. "In case they didn't tell you, I'm retired. Like retired retired. Resigned, quit, left, gave up. I'm not a part of the ASD anymore, and I never want to be again."
Ruby Moon appeared visibly disappointed, which Twilight guessed didn't happen often. Twilight took a deep breath, and continued.
"So, if you'll excuse me, I'll be going back to my friends now. Goodbye."
Twilight turned her back and shut the door on a protesting Ruby Moon. She made her way over to her friends, and was greeted by squeals of delight.
"We thought you would be in that room forever!" Pinkie Pie said. "For a second there, I was worried you would be pulled into a secret mission of utmost importance to save Equestria or something!"
"Oh." Twilight said nervously. "Don't know why you would think that! Just had to take care of the super special princess stuff, that's all!" She grinned a too-large grin.
Before her friends could begin to be suspicious, their thoughts were interrupted by a loud crash.
"It's coming apart!" Rainbow Dash screamed as the large chandelier on the roof of the Castle of Friendship crashed to the floor, spraying crystal shards everywhere, sending ponies panicking and running for their lives. Everywhere windows shattered and doors fell off their hinges. Twilight instinctively grabbed her friends in her magic and sprinted through the main doorway of the hall, dodging crystal shards and rubble as she went. She ran for their lives, through endless stairways and endless halls until at last they made it out of the Castle of Friendship and onto a grassy hill. There, they watched as the Castle of Friendship sank downwards into a large crack in the ground. Even from that distance, Twilight could see a strange, yet faint green glow enveloping the base of the castle as it sank. She turned around.
"Well, that's one way to end a party." she muttered to herself.
She made her way through a sea of panicking ponies and found Ruby Moon amongst them.
"Twilight! I've been looking, like, everywhere for you!" Ruby said, obviously relieved. "Now do you see what I was talking about?" She brushed some rubble from her suit.
"You certainly have my interest now, Ruby Moon." Twilight said, still breathing hard from the unplanned sprint. "Talk to me about this Tier One alert."
"Well, I'm not exactly the person you should talk to about this-" Ruby began.
"Listen, just give me a quick overview, okay?" Twilight said harriedly. "I need to get a sense of, of what this is all about."
"Alright." Ruby began in an unsure voice.
"I was sent here to pick you up because recently, Equestria has been experiencing large magical surges that rip the ground apart, like what happened to that castle-"
"My castle."
"Right, and at each site, witnesses reported seeing a strange green glow coming from the cracks that appear. We don't know what exactly this is about. All we know it that you had experience with this sort of thing before, so the logical person to contact was you."
Twilight considered this. "In that case, why haven't I heard about those other magical surges before?"
Ruby smiled. "Memory erasure is a simple task, Twilight. I'd thought you would, like, have remembered."
"So, you want me to get back in the business?" Twilight asked.
"In short, yes. If you, like, really want to."
"Well," Twilight sighed. "Guess I don't really have a choice."
They shook hooves.
"Welcome back, Agent Sparks." Ruby said.
