It was gone.

Did a single unicorn just erase a country?

"What?...What happened? How is this possible?" Twilight wondered her thoughts aloud as she stared over the empty expanse.

"Ah don't rightly know, sugarcube," AJ said from her airborne position through the rope she still held between her teeth. "However, ya'll think ya could git me down from here?"

Twilight used her magic to pull Applejack in closer and after a few failed attempts of running her magic over her, she just sat there rubbing her head in confusion. "I don't know what this magic is. I can't feel any spells on you."

"Yeah that's the problem with Ret's magic," said the Twilight Double as she staggered over with Fluttershy's assistance. "However, it'll wear off on it's own eventually."

"How long is eventually?" Applejack raised an eyebrow while she continued to float at the end of her rope.

"Twenty-four hours would be my best guess," said Spectrum flatly.

"A full day?! Ah gotta float around like this fer a full day?!" Exclaimed Applejack in disbelief.

"And I have to stay this positively dreadful orange color? No offense Applejack." Said Rarity apologetically.

"None taken," said an annoyed Applejack who definitively wasn't offended.

"Wait a minute," said Twilight, perking up. "Does that mean..."

"No," said Spectrum cutting her off. "Ret poured everything she had into that spell. The Crystal Empire is truly gone unless the spell is undone. As for Applejack, I think I know a temporary fix."

"What exactly are you thinkin?" Asked Applejack a raised eyebrow.

Applejack was glad to have her hooves firmly on the ground, her body still felt strangely light and this stuff she was wearing didn't feel all that good on her fur.

"Why Applejack," said a blushing Rarity. "You look simply dashing as a royal guard."

"If'n you say so, I don't rightly feel myself wearin all this metal, even if it does weigh me down." Complained a now armored Applejack. "So why you helpin us? Why'd ya stop yer friend from hurtin Twi? Don't mean to sound ungrateful or nothin, but why?"

"Clover doesn't want to see anypony get hurt and I take it as a point of pride that so far, nopony has." Spectrum said weakly.

Applejack had him pinned up against a wall by his throat so fast that Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash barely had a chance to stop her from pounding his face in. "Mah brother is in the hospital because of this Clover. And Ah still don't even rightly know if he's alive or not."

"Applejack, stop!" Twilight grabbed hold of her shoulder despite her own pain. "I'm worried for my brother too, but hurting him isn't going to help anything."

"You're brothers are fine," Spectrum choked out. "Shining's probably waking up right now and Big Mac will probably wake up within the hour once Smokey finishes kicking Celestia's flank."

Applejack glared at him as she reluctantly lowered him back to the ground, not once taking her eyes from him, "Ah'll hold ya to that partner."

Twilight however, just tensed up as the rest of what he had just said registered in her head. "Smokey's doing what?!"

The seven of them rushed back to the throne room as fast as they could with two of their number severely injured. Twilight's back still hurt immensely, but at least the bleeding had finally stopped.

When they got there, they found Shining Armor standing guard over Cadence. His colors were still looking a bit faded and if the look on his face was anything to go by, he looked like he was going to drop at any minute.

"Shining Armor!" Shouted Twilight, crying a bit. "You're ok!"

"I'm fine little sis," said Shining without taking his eyes off of the golden unicorn in front of him. "However does anypony wanna explain what's going on?"

"Random Fact was Clover the Clever," Twilight gasped out between breaths. "Where's Princess Celestia?!"

"Ah Twilight," said Clover. "I see that Ret finished her mission...What happened to you?!" He exclaimed after noticing her bandaged state.

"Ret happened," Twilight's twin gurgled out. "She lost control and I had to intervene. Don't worry, she still managed to remove the city."

"Spectrum, my friend..." Clover shook his head, a look of concern on his face. "You look terrible. Are you going to be ok?"

"I'm going to need some major healing after everything's done, but I'll survive for now." He said through painful breaths.

"Clover!" Shouted Twilight. "Where's Princess Celestia?!"

"She's uh...taking a smoke break?" Clover offered unhelpfully.

"That was bad, even for you," came a new voice from the corner of the room.

Twilight followed the sound of the voice to the corner of the throne room. She had missed it before but now she could see a golden cloud of smoke billowing in the corner of the room.

"Princess Celestia!" She cried out as she ran up to the edge of the cloud.

"I wouldn't get any closer if I were you, Twilight," cautioned Clover. "That spell was specifically designed to take down alicorns."

Twilight skidded to a stop as she snapped her attention back to Clover, "what have you got against Princess Celestia?"

"The two of them have some less than pleasant history together," came the voice from inside the dissipating cloud. "I'm done here."

Out from the smoke cloud strolled a face that Twilight hoped never to see again, causing her to jump back as the earth pony, Smokey Vines, stepped in front of her. His glowing body quickly dimming as he looked to Clover. "My best guess is Celestia will be of commission until midnight. Sorry, but that's the best I can do."

"Don't worry Smokey, it'll be enough time to finish this up." He nodded to the last of his holders.

Smokey pointed a hoof at him as his face narrowed into a concerned scowl, "you be careful. This is a dangerous game you're playing." At those words the color rushed out of him as his body quickly turned into black crystal before falling to pieces. Same as the other two holders, as the crystal piled up, Big Mac's green apple cutiemark appeared for a brief moment before disappearing.

Twilight looked past the pile of crystal to the mass forming where the golden cloud of smoke was clearing. Disregarding her own safety, she rushed to the side of her mentor as soon as she could make out her multi-hued mane.

"Princess Celestia!" Twilight called out when she came to her side. However as she stood there, she had to steady her breath when she saw the state of her teacher.

"Twilight?" Celestia responded weakly. "How bad is it? I don't feel quite myself."

"Um..." Twilight blushed sheepishly. "I don't know of any other way to put this, but you seem to be a bit...uh...beside yourself?"

Celestia had diminished quite a bit in stature, but that wasn't the strangest part of it. Twilight was now looking at three normal sized ponies, all with white coats and Celestia's mane colors. However they were split into one of each pony tribe.

Confusion painted Celestia's face as she slowly sat up and looked at her two doppelgangers. Confusion slowly made way for anger as all three of them looked back to Clover, who was currently biting back a laugh.

"What's the meaning of this, Clover!" All three of the Celestias shouted at him.

"Celestia," Clover snickered. "You look good. Why, you could be your own buckball team!" Clover started to roar with laughter.

The rest of the ponies in the room didn't find this particularly funny as they started to rush him in mass. He couldn't take all of them, right?

Clover was still buckled over laughing and holding his gut with one foreleg when he noticed their sudden desire to pound his face in. "Oh...hehe, none of that now."

Emerald light glowed around his horn as a web of ephemeral chains collected in the air around him. Without warning the chains shot throughout the room. As the green chains snaked through the room, anywhere they found a limb, that limb soon found itself tightly bound. Twilight and the three Celestias found themselves covered in chains in a matter of seconds. As the chains collected on the bodies of her and her friends, their charge quickly ground to a halt as the chains left them suspended mid air and mid run.

The chains did more than stop their movement as Twilight and the unicorns in the room soon found themselves unable to use their magic.

"You know, I really don't like seeing ponies get hurt," Clover said calmly like he hadn't just stopped a dozen ponies with a single spell. "Sigh...you lot at really making it hard to not want to gloat like some kind of super villain from a cheesy comic book." He turned to the Celestia trio, "we really need to talk about what you're teaching these ponies, cause this is just embarrassing."

The unicorn Celestia was the first to speak up, "so what happens now. You don't plan to keep us locked up forever, do you?"

Clover ignored her question as he looked over to the corner of the room. Twilight followed his gaze to see Princess Luna standing the corner of the room with her eyes shut tightly in concentration. Sweat was pouring down her body despite how cold it was in the room and the chains cast by Clover seemed to have left her alone.

"It looks like Luna will hold up for a bit longer," he said as he looked to Twilight.

"What exactly is she doing...ahhh," Twilight suddenly found her chained body flying over to where Clover was standing.

"Don't you touch her, Clover!" Shouted all three Celestias in anger.

"Celestia, you really need to relax," as Twilight grew close, the chains turned her body so her back was facing him.

Twilight started to fight harder against the chains as she struggled to see over her shoulder, "what are you doing back there...Cold!!!" She shrieked as she felt a cold hoof rest between her injured wings.

"Ret really did a number on you, Twilight. I blame myself for that and I can't in good conscience leave this untended." Clover said somberly.

Twilight suddenly felt a shock go through her whole body, making every part of her go numb. While she hung there limply, she had the unsettling sensation like a hundred tiny snakes were crawling under her skin and pulling on various parts of her back. She felt her body warm up as Clover did whatever he was doing. About a minute passed before she could feel her limbs again and once she could, everything ached with a dull throb.

"What did you do?!" Twilight loudly protesting her rough treatment.

"How are your wings feeling?" He tenderly asked her. "Do they still hurt?"

She took a moment to calm down as she processed his words before slowly extending her now unbound wings and slowly flapping them. "No...they feel fine. A bit sore, but they don't hurt like they did before. Um...Thank you...I guess." She said sheepishly.

Clover nodded to her before floating her chained body back to rest by Celestia.

"Ah don't understand ya," said Applejack from across the room. "You start all this trouble, but then you turn around and patch us up when we're all beaten and bruised. What exactly's yer game?"

"I told you before," said Spectrum from his place on the ground. "He doesn't wish to see anypony get hurt."

"Spectrum's right, you know," Clover said softly. "I really wish there was a more peaceful way to go about this, but this mess is more tangled than any of you can possibly realize." He staggered a bit as he buckled over, holding his chest. He didn't seem to be holding his chest in a fit of laughter this time. Clover scrunched his face up in pain as light started seeping out of his chest.

*Cough* "...it looks like I'm out of time," he spit up a small amount of blood as he held the long glowing fissure that was forming on his chest.

*GASP* Luna suddenly fell to her knees from her corner in the room, her eyes shooting open as she did so. "I'm so sorry," she apologized quickly as she fought for breath. "I can't hold it back any longer," she paused in confusion as she looked at the other ponies suspended in the room. "Did I miss something?"

"Hnurrr," Clover's breathing was very labored. "Just a small disagreement. You did well Luna, although that thing was always going to get free, you bought the time I needed to make sure the city was out of the harm's way." He staggered up to where Sombra was shaking with his head in his hooves.

"Onyx," he said quietly to the tyrant sitting before him. "Have you prepared yourself?"

Sombra looked up at Clover with black tears streaming down his face, "will it hurt?"

"I won't lie to you. It's going to hurt a lot." He leaned forward and placed a comforting hoof on his shoulder.

Sombra nodded his head stiffly while he still trembled, "I'm...I'm ready."

Clover turned to face the room, determination painting his face, "let this be a lesson to all of you. When your teachers give you a warning, there's usually a good reason behind it. Spectrum..." He focused on Twilight's double for a moment. "I'm counting on you."

Spectrum nodded to Clover, "may Chronos watch over you, my friend."

As Clover stood there, his eyes turning black with the appearance of a star filled night sky. He reached out and a starry dagger with an unearthly glow appeared in his hoof. The room fell silent when, in one fell swoop, he plunged the dagger deep into the fissure in his chest.

Author's Note

Well, that escalated quickly.

Day 3 of the finale.
See you all tomorrow.

(Not gonna lie, I kinda want a picture of the annoyed Celestia triplets.)