After Moondancer and Asha were released from their prisons, rescuing the agent went about as well as expected while the rescue of the unicorn in the real world ended on an awkward note.

As Pinkamena neared Moondancer’s location, there were a lot of laser weapons firing along with the agonized screams of Zin and what seemed like Zin screaming in panic for some reason.

The door that separated Pinkamena from Moondancer opened suddenly as three Zin started running out of the room in a panic before they were grabbed in Moondancer’s aura. “Where do you three think you’re going?” yelled Moondancer from across the door. “I’m still frustrated and you three have been drafted to be my catharsis!”

The three were pulled back into the room and the door closed. The agonized screams resumed along with the sounds of bones cracking.

Pinkamena decided to wait for a few minutes until Moondancer had calmed down.

Once the screaming stopped, Pinkamena entered the room beyond the door. Moondancer immediately caught sight of the madmare and ran toward her before the two embraced one another and shared a kiss that lasted for at least a minute, tongues dancing with one another.

Once finished, Pinkamena and Moondancer returned to the ship, with Moondancer being briefed on what happened since she had been imprisoned. While the unicorn pouted a little about being the last one to be rescued, Pinkamena defended that her prison was the most guarded between the six of them and that it took the combined efforts of Kinzie, Matt and Vinyl to get into her prison.

“I wonder if Matt’s still scared of me after what happened,” Moondancer mused.

“Dunno, the only thing Playa told me about Matt’s simulation was that it involved a lot of Kinzie typing in commands to see what worked and that the rest involved a text adventure where Matt had to fight Killbane by himself.”

“After I crushed him in cyberspace, he’s still more scared of Killbane than me? I don’t know whether to be glad he’s not scared of me or insulted that Killbane is still scarier than me.”

“Whatever, that’s in the past. For now, I’ll need your help to break into another simulation, one that neither Kinzie, Matt or Vinyl can break into.”

“Really? Who else is left? I know that the other Saints are saved and so are our friends. So who’s left?”

“I suspect that it’s my sisters.”

“Whoa, I knew Zinyak was crazy, but I didn’t think he was suicidal.”

Once back on the ship, Moondancer was greeted by her friends as the ship made another daring escape from the Zin.

With their friends rescued, the Saints focused their full attention in disrupting Zinyak’s simulation. Once Moondancer found a way into the Pie family simulation and the sisters rescued, Pinkamena would begin plotting her revenge against the alien overlord.

For now, it was time for another series of tasks from the Saints. Kinzie swore that she only had one last list of stores to hack while Pierce had one last list of fun activities for Playa. Asha also had some objectives that she wanted completed, but she wanted them to be done by Octavia. While Ben had not made any lists yet, he did mention that he was considering a sequel to his old book, ‘Regicide’.

Vinyl said that she would handle Kinzie’s store hacks so the ones going into the simulation this time would be her, Octavia and Playa. Pinkamena decided to make use of the downtime to have some fun with Moondancer.

Inside the simulation, Vinyl headed to New Colvin to help Kinzie set up her last gateway into the city while Octavia headed to Stanfield and Playa headed Downtown.

Vinyl had no problems hacking five of the remaining six stores in the simulation. She had hacked a Friendly Fire in Camano place as well as a Leather and Lace and one of the Rim Jobs. She hacked a Planet Zin in Rosen Oaks which turned into a Planet Cyber. Finally, she hacked a Rusty’s Needle in Espina.

The last store under Zinyak’s control was a second Rim Jobs in Camano place. Since it was the last store in the simulation to hack, Vinyl debated about whether or not she should hack it despite the fact that one of the other Saints likely had a plan to have it hacked later.

After some consideration and the fact that the place was nearby, Vinyl decided that she might as well go ahead and hack the store. The last puzzle offered the most difficult challenge that Zinyak had to offer but it was still no match for Vinyl’s puzzle-solving skills.

Once she was finished hacking, Vinyl headed to Western Espina and defended the place using her electricity-empowered superpowers and her special Wubstep Gun that had more features than the Dubstep Gun was capable of.

Once the virus was uploaded, Vinyl headed for the nearest gateway.

Octavia had to admit, getting into the field again had done wonders for her physique since she joined the Saints. Being back in shape had made the race that Asha had her do seem like a morning jog.

Her new time distorting powers allowed her to eliminate a Zin patrol in Ashwood trivial and while she was defending an area while Matt uploaded one of his viruses, she was able to use her telekinetic powers like a cannon, though given the speed the objects or enemies were thrown it was more like a railgun.

Her last task for the first of Asha’s set involved shutting down one of the remaining Hotspots. Using her stomp, she slowed the enemies around each generator before she pulled out an assault rifle and shot each alien in the head and used her AT rifle to demolish the shield generator.

Once the generators were destroyed, Octavia pointed her AT rifle at the main controller for the large maintenance device and blew it up from far away, deactivating the device.

With her mission accomplished, Octavia headed back to the ship.

While Playa was getting back from his list of tasks from Pierce, the Saint not looking too happy that he was asked to play in traffic again, Asha gave Octavia a new weapon for her troubles. The agent found it while she was exploring the Zin mothership before the Saints picked her up. The weapon was a handle that projected an energy-based sword. Octavia happily accepted the gift.

Pinkamena noticed that Pierce was looking guilty. When she asked Kinzie, the hacker explained that Pierce was making Playa do his chores under the guise of relaxation therapy. The latest tasks that Pierce was supposed to do involved another Zin patrol, killing a rogue program that looked like a sex doll, playing in traffic and destroying things in Rosen Oaks using orbs held in his telekinesis. Pierce couldn’t do that last part but Kinzie wanted him to try anyway for her amusement.

Playa overheard what was said and when he returned to the ship, he glowered at Pierce, “Pierce...I’m gonna kill you later.” Playa headed to the cargo bay to cool off.

“Hey guys, you might want to see this,” Kinzie said with a hint of nervousness.

The Saints and Ponies within earshot approached the hacker to see what she found. What they saw was met with a mix of surprise and nostalgia as Steelport was being flooded with nine different gangs: Vice Kings, Los Carnales, Westside Rollerz, Ronin, Brotherhood, Sons of Samedi, Morningstar, Deckers, and Luchadores.

Johnny was the first to comment, “Please tell me they’re all pissed and lookin’ for a fight. ‘Cuz it looks like Zinyak delivered my Christmas present early.”

Seeing all the gangs around gave Pierce an idea. “Before we resolve this, there’s something I wanna do with the Boss. I wanna bring Gilda too for this.”

Pinkamena looked at the Saints promotional agent with a bit of suspicion. “Why do you need Gilda?” she asked warily.

“I need her for an idea that involves the Brotherhood. Plus, I get to spend some bro time with the Boss.”

“Fine, go ask her if she wants to come with you. For now, I need to help the others find a way to breach my sisters’ prison.”

“I might have an idea,” Moondancer declared. “I think I can link our consciousness to one of these devices so that we can access the simulation together from one device, leaving the others free to access the simulation from the other devices. Inside the simulation, unlocking the prison isn’t going to be easy. I need memories of the subject or subjects to use as a focus and a massive amount of data to construct a cypher powerful enough to breach the quarry simulation.”

“The memories shouldn’t be a problem since me and Pinkie have plenty of those.” Pinkamena put a hoof to her chin. “If we lured the clones flooding the simulation to you, would that work?”

“That’s going to be dangerous. I won’t be able to defend myself while constructing the cypher. I need you near me the whole time while I do so because of the focus. However, while the large number of clones will help with the main construction, if the source of the clones were to be found and marked, I can directly siphon from the source and not only get the cypher built faster, but I can also cut off the flow of clones into the simulation.”

“Sounds like a plan. Here’s what we’re going to do, Since Pierce seems insistent on his bro time with Playa, those two will be watched by Gilda while they have their fun. Meanwhile, me and Johnny are going to head to The Broken Shillelagh with Moondancer to play King of the Hill with the clone army while Vinyl, Treehugger and Octavia are going to work with CID to locate the source and mark it. Once we have the cypher made, destroy the source.”

“You always know which parts of your plans I like,” Johnny commented.

With their plan made, Moondancer placed herself inside the chair while the other Equestrians gathered around her and made themselves as comfortable as possible. The unicorn lit her horn and linked their subconscious with hers. Playa, Pierce and Johnny took their positions in the other chairs.

Inside the simulation once more, Gilda took to the skies and followed Playa and Pierce to the docks where Pierce wanted to disrupt a Brotherhood operation.

The griffon watched the two drive a car to the docks while she had to listen to the two sing ‘Opposites Attract’ along the way.

At the docks, Playa used his Telekinesis to smash trucks into other trucks or hurl them into the digital sea.

After that, they drove to the nuclear plant which gave Gilda the impression that Pierce wanted to reenact the whole Brotherhood campaign for some reason. While Pierce was being secretive about who they were going against, Gilda was still smart enough to know that Maero was going to be at the end of their little tour.

On the way to the plant, the duo started to sing along to ‘Just a Friend’ until Zinyak started singing to it which led to the duo complaining that Zinyak had ruined Biz Markie for them.

At the plant, after killing some Brotherhood clones, the duo searched the crates and found some toxic waste.

With the waste in hand, Playa and Pierce tailed a Brotherhood vehicle to the airport where Maero was. Gilda had a feeling that Pierce wanted to see a reenactment of the Brotherhood leader’s death as well so she waited for the Saint to spot her prey.

“There he is!” Pierce pointed out. The duo started shooting up Maero’s Atlasbreaker vehicle until it blew up.

Maero emerged from the wreckage ready to crush his enemies. Gilda also noticed that he was shielded and likely had superpowers but they would be no issue for her.

“Hey Maero,” Pierce called out. “Wanna see a replay of how you died?”

“What are you…?” Maero questioned before his eyes widened and he turned his head to look upward to check for any sign of the griffon but saw nothing.

A whisper behind him sent a chill down the Brotherhood leader’s spine, “There’s a reason my clan name is Grimfeather.”

Before Maero could react, a blackened talon broke through Maero’s shield and into his back. Gilda grabbed Maero’s heart and crushed it. Maero collapsed as his body broke up into the data fragments it once was.

After Maero was destroyed, Pierce’s appearance changed to where he wore some sort of Asian fighter outfit.

“Why do you look like Kung Lao from Mortal Kombat?” Playa asked.

“Fuck if I know, but the one difference between him and me, I make it look good.”

Gilda rolled her eyes before she flew away, hoping to get some real action before the mission was over.

Johnny, Pinkamena and Moondancer arrived at the front of The Broken Shillelagh. Moondancer took her position at the front of the bar.

“Make sure to keep them off me while I work,” Moondancer instructed. “And remember, the more you kill, the more progress I make on making this key. Pinkamena, you will have to stay near me so I can access your’s and Pinkie’s memories of your sisters.”

“I take back what I said,” Johnny began. “This ain’t just Christmas, it's all my favorite holidays packed into one big battle royale.”

“I’d hold off on that Christmas part though, we still have the DLC of that to go through.”

Johnny ignored Pinkamena’s foretelling of future events in order to focus on the nine types of gang vehicles headed in their direction. Johnny knew that this day was going to be the best day ever.

CID was late for the operation. Based on what Kinzie said, the robotic orb was negotiating a deal with Kinzie on who she would date in exchange for helping the Saints with their clone problem. Kinzie flat out refused and Asha had her standards. Present Shaundi had her eyes on Johnny. CID had no interest in men but she would never get between active relationships such as Pinkamena and Moondancer or Octavia and Vinyl. CID had a feeling that Gilda would treat her like a yarn ball, so that left Treehugger and Past Shaundi.

After considering the options, CID had decided to go on a date with Past Shaundi despite the warning that the digital Saint was likely very open with sexual partners.

Of course, if CID had the option of a lasting relationship with a living being, she would consider dating Treehugger or Gilda. CID hated how her life had ended up as a metal ball.

CID’s arrival was late enough that Gilda had returned from her mission with Pierce and Playa, who had decided to provide assistance to Moondancer’s group.

Upon CID’s arrival, Octavia gave a sigh of impatience. “Miss CID, in the future, would you kindly refrain from putting your personal matters ahead of the group. Need I remind you that this group is the best chance you have of claiming your revenge on Zinyak?”

“I am aware. However, I am not as close to you or the Saints as you are to each other. Just as you don’t trust me, it is only fair that I extend the same courtesy. If you should fall to Zinyak, then I shall find another who might have better luck. I have all the time in the universe to fulfill my revenge, unlike all of you.”

The Equestrians shook their heads in disappointment and headed off to begin their search. CID picked up on this and asked, “I do not understand this reaction.”

Treehugger stopped and turned to face CID. “It’s not that we don’t trust you, it’s that we want to trust you. The problem is that you don’t trust us and you don’t want to trust us. We are putting our lives on the line to defeat Zinyak. The least you can do is to not belittle the risks we’re taking. You are our friend, and friends don’t condescend to their friends.”

After Treehugger had said her piece, CID hovered in place for a moment. What the voodoo mare said had struck the robotic sphere in a place where she thought no longer existed. She never thought that she would feel guilt again after Zinyak had destroyed her body.

However, there would be time to contemplate how much of her actual emotions still remained within her after she had completed her objective. She followed the Equestrians and began instructing them, “Now that Gilda is here, I need her to carry me up to a high vantage point so that I may scan the area. I cannot maintain a high altitude and scan at the same time because of the limitations of this form.”

Gilda did as told and flew high into the air while CID scanned the area. “Thank you, can you carry me to one more location? I believe that I have located nearly all of the relays interfering with the scans in the area.”

Gilda flew to the next area while Octavia, Vinyl and Treehugger headed to where the first relay was located. Treehugger incinerated the guards in the area while Vinyl overloaded the device with electricity, causing it to explode.

Once the group finished the relay, CID relayed the locations of more relays. The next set of relays were placed on a hovering platform. Using their Super Jump and Glide abilities, the Equestrian group jumped up to the platform. Octavia landed first and stomped, slowing the time of the Zin guards while Vinyl arced electricity between the guards and the relays. Half of the relays were blasted by Octavia’s AT rifle while a few fireballs from Treehugger destroyed the rest.

The next set of relays were protected by a shield generator on another platform. CID requested to be placed where the generator was located so that she could disable it. Meanwhile, the others dispatched the Zin guards.

“Just so you know,” CID began while she was disabling the generator. “I am risking my life as well while within this shell. If I should be destroyed, I risk having the remainder of my being erased. I would like to ask a favor of you girls, if it is not too much to ask.”

“What is it?” Treehugger asked.

“In this form, I am mostly defenseless with the exception of a low level electrical discharge. I would like to request your assistance in procuring a murderbot and deleting its programming so that I may upload myself to it. This way, I can defend myself when this C.I.D.’s functions are no longer necessary.”

“So you are asking us to trust you?” Octavia asked.

“Correct.”

“Very well.”

Kinzie chimed in to complain, “What?! We can’t just give CID a murderbot body! That’d be asking for trouble.”

“We have already decided, Kinzie. Even if you refuse to help us, Vinyl or Moondancer can handle the task as well.”

Kinzie sighed in defeat, “Fine, but I reserve the right to say ‘I told you so’ if this blows up in our faces.”

Octavia giggled, “Noted.”

After the shield generator was disabled and the relays destroyed, the Equestrians repeated the task with the final relay. However, they also encountered a new enemy, a large metallic sphere that opened to reveal a huge attack robot. The Equestrians soon discovered that their attacks weren’t getting through its armor. Once Octavia realized that, she had the others distract the attack robot while she inspected the other parts of it until she discovered a large opening behind the upper body of the machine. Using her AT rifle, Octavia hit the vulnerability and the robot exploded.

Once the last relay was destroyed, Kinzie locked on to the location of the source of the gang clones.

The group headed to the source and discovered a large metallic ring that was generating a Zin portal where the clones were coming from.

“By the way,” Kinzie began. “I’ve isolated the cause of the manifestations of the gangs, they seem to match the mnemonic mapping of the boss.”

“How is that possible?” Octavia asked.

“I’m not sure, I think Zinyak somehow copied the boss’s mnemonic profile before we were able to get him out of the simulation, but that’s merely speculation.”

Since the information was of no use to them, the Equestrians started throwing clones back into the portal while Kinzie relayed the portal’s location to Moondancer.

Johnny and Pinkamena were having the time of their lives.

So far they had killed five hundred clones each and more were coming. The burden of defense was lessened thankfully when Playa and a powered up Pierce showed up to assist in defending the unicorn.

It was only ten minutes after they arrived that Kinzie informed Moondancer of the portal’s location. Focusing on the location, Moondancer found the portal and began tugging at the near limitless energies being produced by the device. Once she had established a link, she began to siphon the portal’s power and used it to finish the key into the Pie Sisters’ prison.

A few more minutes of siphoning was all it took for Moondancer to finish the cypher before she used the remainder of the energies for herself.

The energies altered her form. She grew larger and more majestic before she gained a pair of wings. She soon resembled the alicorn form she took during that time when she defeated Matt Miller in cyberspace.

Once the transformation was complete, she turned to face the remaining clones before she used the excess energies she took from the portal to unleash a powerful stomp that deleted the remaining gang clones throughout the simulation.

Pinkamena turned to see how her marefriend was doing after that. While she seemed alright, the madmare wanted to be sure. “That was amazing! Are you alright?”

“Yeah, though I don’t think I’ll be able to do another stomp of that magnitude. I used the last of the source’s energies to delete the gangs from the simulation so I only have the powers I have gained with this form to use.”

“Still, I can’t wait to see what you can do with your new superpowers.”

“Speaking of superpowers,” Kinzie chimed in. “I’m picking up another Warden nearby and they have a new power you guys might like.”

“I feel like I’m bein’ spoiled today,” Johnny commented.

With that, Johnny, Pinkamena and Playa hunted down and destroyed the Warden to fill their empty power slots with another power. They gained the ability to temporarily place a field around themselves that harmed enemies by being near them and caused their ammunition to become infused with that power. The power was shared with everyone else.

On the way back to the gateway back to the ship, Pinkamena noticed that Pinkie was growing restless. The madmare knew better than to let her sister’s issues fester. “What’s the matter?”

“Well, I know that our friends all have their superpowers because they completed their Loyalty Missions but I think there’s one more for us to do before we see our sisters again.”

Pinkamena had a feeling that she knew what Pinkie was about to say, but she asked anyway. “Who’s Loyalty Mission do we need to do?”

“Ours.”

Author's Note

Princess Moondancer (Not an alicorn in the real world):
Superpower element: Digital
Blast: Deletes enemies hit by Blast area.
Telekinesis: Converts object in telekinetic grip into another form.
Stomp: Turns enemies into glitches and makes them fight for her.
Buff: Turns nearby enemies into allies. Ammunition from allies spreads the effect while Buff is active.

All Buff abilities unlocked.