For what was somewhere between the thirteenth and thirtieth time, Spike the dragon found himself absent mindedly tugging at the waist of his very new, very expensive and only mildly uncomfortable suit, resisting the urge to flare his wings. It was getting difficult not to get bored. Blinking hard and fighting back a yawn, he forced himself back into vigilance. Presently, he was at the far right side of the main chambers most everyone was gathered in, watching Twilight open her gifts from visiters domestic and foreign in between bites of their dinners.

There was still the quiet murmur of a few dozen little conversations from the collective tables. Nopony had to watch her open all of the presents, or any of them, really, but it would be considered rude not to be present for the opening of the...presents. Everyone was at least interested in seeing Twilight's reaction upon opening what they had brought, and in seeing the reaction to the gifts of anyone else they might care about. Seeing whether the ruling princess liked their gift more than some rivals was just the sort of petty competition the nobility ate right up.

Spike wished this evening would be over. As he had yet to accomplish the feat of time travel through sheer will, he decided to pass the time as best he could. Once again, he slowly dragged his eyes from one side of the massive room to the other, letting them fall on anything that might catch his attention. Not much did. Next, he took stock of all the guards, making sure they were keeping on their toes, or tips of their hooves, whatever those were called. Security was light enough that they could do their jobs while staying out of the way, and largely out of sight if you let yourself forget about them. Unless you knew were all of them were supposed to be.

The guards in full uniform and dress armour were easy enough for anyone to spot. You were supposed to see them. In addition to them, there were about a dozen dressed as part of the wait staff and castle servants. Out of the lot of them, as he was not actually a part of the guard, Spike's role was unique. Those in uniform were posted to specific locations, and the others in disguise had to blend in. He, however, could move freely, as most everyone here assumed him to be one of the guests. Well, this was technically true, but if he had to be here, he might as well do his job in the meantime. Spike had just spotted Clodhopper helping herself to more of those tiny sandwiches at the snack table when a commotion at the thrones snapped his head to, in time to see Twilight seal one of the gift boxes in a forcefield.

The contents of the box then exploded, and the brightly glowing sphere briefly lit up the room. A murmur of concern and confusion passed through the crowd, dying down once the offending object was dumped with open disdain into the nearest bin.

Spike's concern lingered, as well as a kernel of anger. He'd been around enough unicorns in his life to recognize a pyrotechnic prestigitation, and knew that an object bearing an active enchantment like that should have never made it through their screenings. Someone somewhere in the line had mucked up horribly. The dragon flagged down two of the wait staff, who were actually High Tide and Low Blow, two grey coated unicorn stallions. The latter wasn't quite pulling off the disguise of being a waiter, as his uniform was about two sizes too small for his muscular frame. By the glances some of the female servants had thrown his way over the course of the day, he was sure he'd done this on purpose.

"Low Blow, you look ridiculous. High Tide, you go to Celestia, discreetly," Spike commanded quietly, "Tell her we should put things on hold until we can rescreen the rest of the boxes."

Both of the not-waiters nodded, and High Tide moved to make it so. Spike could have done it himself, but as he had said, he wanted it done discreetly, and as large as he'd grown, physical subtlety was getting harder to perform. He made his way back to the nearest wall and watched the thrones, waiting to see their answer. After a minute or so, High Tide politely came around behind Celestia's throne and beckoned at her like an appropriately apologetic servant. He whispered something in her ear. The ex-princess but still current deity said something in response and just as politely waved him away.

Spike could already tell well enough from where he was that the answer was 'no'. It made a measure of sense. She might not have wanted to worry the guests, or ruin the flow of the evening, or insult anycreature by insinuating anything. The prestigitation would have been largely harmless even uncontained. Spike would still have preferred to open and search every package before they'd even gotten to that table, and after that fiery display, do it again right now even if it meant doing it in front of everyone.

Then again, he'd also suggested that they put up a tuned dispellation field around the castle to prevent any of the changelings present from shapeshifting, and that had been shot down, too, so he was getting used to the frustration. At least that one he could agree with, on the grounds that the dispellation was something any changeling would be able to sense, and that its effects of preventing a shift or dispelling them back to their natural forms was highly painful. A few years ago he might have pushed harder for it, the field or the rescreening, even to Celestia, but by this point in his job he was used to making suggestions that nobody liked.

His life had taken an interesting direction once Twilight had taken the throne. She'd ascended to crown princesses of Equestria, and what amounted to burgeoning godhood. He, meanwhile, had followed along as he always had. After seeing just how many threats there could be to her and to the crown during their adventures together, Spike had taken an interest in her safety, and by extension, the security of Equestria. While she had become a princess, once an adult he had taken the title of Lord Protector. It was a somewhat archaic, stuffy sounding title that some ponies still believed he had made up, but in truth it had existed for centuries, but left vacant and forgotten.

In essence, Spike's job was to ensure the safety of whoever was on the thrown. The lord over any resources relevant to the protection of the land's ruler or of the land itself. The Lord Protector. It turned out that the authority it came with was almost comically vast. He might as well be a prince in his own right. Though he was not a member of the castle guard, or the military, and was outside both of their command structures, he could give orders to just about anypony in either one if it pertained to the safety of the princess, or if he believed it might, or if he could convince somepony it might.

If somepony worked for the government, Spike could command them where relevant. He could commission a castle to be built in the middle of the Everfree Forest, if he could come up with a reason for why it made Twilight or Equestria safer. The only other persons with more totalitarian authority in Equestria was the princesses. Actually, thinking about it in those terms made it sound bad. It was true that his position had the potential for massive abuses of power. Probably why the job was left open for so long, come to think of it.

Anyways, what was important to him was that it kept him close to Twilight, as he'd worried they would grow apart as they grew older, and it gave him an important, very well paying job to do, which he felt he was good at, despite still being younger than many of the ponies he could give orders to.

At the end of the day, he still only had as much authority as the princess or princesses allowed. Which was why there was no anti-changeling field, and why they were still opening presents even after one of them had burst into flame.

Thankfully, the next several packages were much less exciting, at least from his distant perspective. Eventually, he was able to convince himself to relax again. That had been the pattern of the day; stretches of boredom broken by spurts of excitement. Another wish that wouldn't be granted was for Gabby to be here. That alone would have made this entire ordeal much more enjoyable. Then again, that was part of why she wasn't. As much as Twilight had asked him to act otherwise, he wasn't here to enjoy himself, and having her around would be a delightful distraction, but a distraction nonetheless. There was also the reason that Gabby simply didn't have a reason to be here, and so she'd gotten no invitation. That was a little bit funny. Well, he'd thought it was, she didn't, but it was objectively funny, probably, considering that she lived in the castle. The areas where the party was being held were just off limits to those uninvited for today.

He gave his watch an impatient glance. At least he'd had more to do earlier in the day, when things were still kicking off. It was kind of a fun job then, too. As a fellow party attendee, he'd made sure he was one of the first creatures that everyone met upon their arrival. It was a chance to size them up and look them over to see if he could identify any weapons or ill intentions they might be hiding. Not that he really had any reason to expect the latter, it was just something to do. He was getting a lot better at sizing people up without their realizing that was what he was doing.

The bodyguard for the Griffonstone envoy who had been doing a downright stellar job of pretending to be a mousy little personal servant was carrying a dagger which he had decided not to call attention to. The earth pony Copperpot had tried to sneak in a neat little stubby device inside his coat called a flintlock. A word to the nearest guard afterwards had seen it confiscated. Princess Morning Glory had what he had determined was probably some kind of blade in a sheath expertly woven inside her dress.

She could keep it, as she would have to split the back of her dress open to draw the thing. Spike was fine with guests having their little blades if it made them feel safe. He had claws longer than some of the knives he'd spotted and could breath fire, so he could hardly blame them. Items like the flintlock, or more fanciful weapons were a no-go. Anything ranged or arcane, really. However, if anyone actually pulled a weapon, he was prepared to very rapidly educate them on the error of their ways.

The only attendee he hadn't been able to get a read on was the other dragon here, the envoy from the Bloodstone Isles. After somehow sneaking past the announcer at the entrance, he'd made a point of avoiding Spike. He was a slippery figure, able to tell that Spike was trying to approach him, and always finding a way to put someone or something in between them. It was only when he'd cornered the burgundy dragon while he was getting a drink that he rather condescendingly stated that he 'wasn't here to associate with the help'. Spike had kept a close eye on him after that, but saw no reason to bother talking him up. It was unfortunate, really. As the only other dragon here, albeit from a place Spike had never heard of, he was hoping he might have been more friendly.

Spike blinked, surprised at a detail he'd missed, and gave the room another once over. Spike had no idea where Redclaw was. His seat at the table where he'd been was empty, and he wasn't anywhere else he could see. A dragon in a room of mostly quadrupeds is usually an easy thing to spot. That bothered Spike. Not wanting to waste time trying to flag down one of the pretend staff, he strode straight towards the nearest uniformed guard, an aqua coloured pegasus mare with an unfortunate name.

"Puddles," Spike addressed her curtly, "did you see where Redclaw went?"

She leaned to one side to look past him. "Which one was Red Claw?"

"Redclaw," he corrected. "The dark red dragon. A bit taller than me."

"Oh, him," Puddles straightened out. "He left a couple minutes ago. Some griffon mare, or....hen? Whatever you call a fe-"

"They're called formels," Spike injected, something of an expert on the subject, "like eagles or hawks. They also accept griffoness. Hen is an insult. Most of the time. Kinda...It's complicated."

"Wait, but they're only half bird," Puddles pointed out, getting completely off topic. "The other half is some kind of cat, right?"

"Half lion," he specified, trying not to get irritated at their digression. "The upper half with the brain is the bird half, so they use bird terms, and that bird most resembles an eagle or hawk. If your butt was a cat's butt, you'd still have a pony brain. Now, what did the griffon look like and where did they go?"

Puddles scratched her chin. "Like a griffon? I dunno, they all kinda look the same to me."

Her eyes shot wide the moment the words left her mouth.

"Sorry," she blurted, as if suddenly remembering who exactly she was talking to. Puddles jabbed a hoof at the doors leading to the gardens. "But they went that way. By the look of him, he was on his way to something important."

Wonder what he's doing out there. Either they were still out in the gardens, or had used the relatively smaller side door to slip away and were intending to leave entirely.

It was by no means unusual for anyone to slip away for a minute for one reason or another, but Spike wanted to check. Something about the dragon sat poorly with him, and he didn't like him being out of sight. Luna had warned him about Redclaw being one of the few creatures here that might make a ruckus, and he wanted to make sure he was never unattended. Not wanting to make a scene out of it like a dragon going straight through a fancy dinner, he made his way around the outer perimeter of the massive room.

Spike was nearly to the doors that would lead to the castle gardens when he spared another glance at the princesses. Twilight stepping away from her throne, by her course he guessed to get something to eat or drink. Celestia and Luna were still sitting, the former the apparent recipient of a large pink box covered in an overabundance of ribbons and complicated bows that was big enough to briefly block her from view until she'd released it from her levitation. The deity was making a small show of trying to figure out which bow to tug on first to begin opening it.

Turning away from the display, Spike reached the threshold of the outer doors. He still didn't see Redclaw. The gardens were vast, but only so much was accessible to the guests tonight, and he couldn't have gotten far unless he was trying to. Spike stepped outside.

It was at this moment that the explosion occurred. A sudden blast. Spike spun towards the princesses as debris was sent scattering across the entire chambers. Something small and metallic bounced off his shoulder and rolled away, skittering across the floor. The spot he'd seen the three princesses just a moment ago was covered in a thick cloud of smoke, which was rapidly expanding into the now panicking crowd.

Without hesitation, Spike flared his wings and took flight, quickly landing at the edge of the cloud of smoke. To their credit, both High Tide and Low Blow were almost right behind him.

"You, with me," Spike commanded, pointing at the former, and to the latter, "evacuate the area!"

Not waiting for the guardspony to follow, Spike strode into the smoke, shouting for any of the princesses. None of them answered. A part of him was still hoping against hope that this was just another moron's idea of a firework's display, but there was no fooling himself. What had started as a dense black veil was already beginning to thin out in the massive room, enough that he could barely see where he was going.

Still, Spike had almost immediately lost sight of High Tide, but could hear him coughing somewhere off to his right. A few good pegasi might be able to clear this out, but doing so without knowing the state of the princesses might be unwise. One voice did answer. A male voice. Changing direction, Spike found the servant who had been attending the princesses during the gift opening, at the end of a slick trail of red. He was dragging himself across the floor, his rear legs hanging limp.

Kneeling down, Spike called out for High Tide as he gave the injured stallion a once over. There was a deep slash across his left rear calve, and a piece of jagged shrapnel lodged in his right, having apparently been sent slicing through one leg before getting stuck in the other. When the guard appeared from the cloud, Spike ordered him to get the servant clear, and he dutifully complied.

Spike was far enough in now that he could see the outline of the thrones. Or what was left of them. He could see no sign of their occupants. Slowly, a mare sized figure lying still appeared in the thinning haze, far off to his right. The figure in the smoke stirred. It shuddered as it was wracked with a wheezing, hacking cough. Spike froze as the mare began to wail. A low, keening moan that rose in pitch and intensity, broken only by gurgling coughs as the mare woke to a pain indescribable.

"G-!" Spike steeled himself as best he could as he moved to close the distance. "Guards! To me!"

Almost immediately, he heard a nearby pony run to his side. Turning to give his orders, Spike was surprised again when he saw who it was.

"Blueblood?!" Spike balked. With every creature in a rush to get away from the blast zone, Blueblood was the absolute last pony he would have expected to find running in the other direction, and getting here faster than some of his guards, no less. "Get out of here! Evacua-"

"I can help!" Blueblood quickly shouted. His jaw dropped when he spotted the wailing mare. "Auntie Luna!"

The prince galloped ahead to her side, crying for any medical staff. The blast had thrown her free of her throne, and she'd landed heavily several meters to the side. The wailing princess, now fully awake, was lying broken in a puddle of her own blood that was spreading at an alarmingly rapid pace. Spike made to help her but stopped, not sure how to even begin moving her.

Her left foreleg hung limply at an odd angle, while her right thrashed about in panic and agony. Her right cheek was a flap. She coughed and retched, and jets of ichor shot from her mouth and a hole in her throat. Worse yet, a massive gash went along her entire barrel, deep and wide enough that Spike could see things one would hope to never see outside an operating theatre.

As she was, the wound at her side was so grievous she looked like she might spill out of herself if she rolled the wrong way. That she was alive at all was a cruel miracle. It was all Blueblood could do just to try and hold her still, to keep her from making it worse.

The prince's horn flashed in a blinding pulse of magic that even Spike could feel, and Luna finally, mercifully fell unconscious. He staggered at the exertion but kept to his hooves.

More guards were joining them now, who brushed past them, quickly wrapped Luna in a formfitting field and lifted her from the floor. The team of six rushed away, levitating her between them and chattering worrisome details of her wounds.

Blueblood was left standing there, shuddering as he rocked back on his haunches and stared blankly at the blood smeared over his hooves. Not wanting to waste precious time feeling bad about leaving him there, Spike turned away and did exactly that. There were still two princesses. There was still no sign of Celestia. Thankfully, Twilight was exactly where Spike had last seen her before the explosion, midway to the snack table. She was lying face down, completely still.

"Twilight!" Spike ran to her, taking a knee and reaching down to her.

"Wait!" The warning came from Blueblood, who had surprisingly broken free of his shellshock and kept pace with him. His pristine white coat and expensive suit were smeared red. He was shaking heavily, but trying to keep his composure. "Don't move her yet."

When Spike was about to ask why, the prince cut him off with his answer. "Her head's been struck. See? There. Be careful you don't harm her."

Blueblood pointed a hoof, and true enough, there was a cut on the back of her head, deep enough that Spike could see bone. While he was no doctor, Spike had learned enough about medicine to understand the royal's meaning. He gently checked for any neck or spinal damage. As far as he could find there was none. She was breathing, but was still knocked out cold. Bleeding, but only from her head wound. Those always bled a lot. What concerned a great deal more than the blood was the smaller amount of clear fluid mixed with it.

Lifting and cradling Twilight into his arms in what a biped would describe as a bridal carry, Spike made ready to rush her to the castle doctor. By now, the smoke had lifted enough that he had a clear view of the entire chamber again. Of the three thrones, Celestia's was completely missing, as was its occupant. Spike tried to see where she might have been thrown to, when he nearly tripped over something. Something metal that gave a dull clatter.

It was one of Celestia's shoes. The limb that was still attached ended at the knee.

His vision unobscured, he was able to quickly find three more, even larger portions of her. Like her throne, Celestia had been blown apart.

Spike stood there, dumbfounded, his brain unable to reconcile the apparent impossibility of an immortal goddess suddenly dying in the blink of an eye. There was a steady ringing in his ears as he struggled to comprehend the scene around him.

Celestia could not be dead. That simply didn't make sense. She'd been alive for somewhere around ten thousand years. Had faced and survived innumerable threats. That she was gone now, and so instantly, was beyond reckoning. She was an immortal, and immortals don't die. They just don't.

And yet here she was, scattered across the floor.

Someone, somewhere far away was calling his name, barely heard over the deafening sound of his own breathing. It was Blueblood, right next to him.

"Spike!" He shouted, snapping his attention to him.

Right. Twilight. Needed to get her to a doctor. Spike dumbly shambled forward. The motion did him good, like each step brought him a little further out of his mental fog. It was something to focus on. They were out of the main room and halfway down one of the corridors when they were intercepted.

"Sir? Sir! There you are," came a small voice from behind.

Spike turned to see one of the guardsmares. A teal earth pony with a close cropped mane a few shades lighter. One of the newer ones he hadn't memorized the names of yet. She was small enough that he didn't believe she should have the job, but that wasn't his call unless he forced it to be. He trusted the captain enough to know what she was doing.

She galloped over to them as quick as she could, skidding to a halt. "Sir, there's been an alarm. One of the vaults has been breached!"

Trained cogs spun into motion in Spike's mind. A single explosion was an attack on individuals. An assassination, most obviously. Now, with a vault broken into, this changed the entire landscape of the situation. They were under attack. They were still under attack.

"Which one?" Spike's mouth asked before his brain could put the question together.

"The Crypt Arcanum!"

That should not be possible. There were several vaults in and under the castle. Some contained historical documents and ancient objects of great value. Things that were worth too much or were to fragile to trust to a museum. Some simply contained precious metals, bonds, and hard money. A few contained weapons. Arcane trinkets of great power that were more often than not unique, only to be taken and used when necessary.

Then, there was the oddly named Crypt Arcanum. This was where only the greatest of items lay. The vault of secrets. Nobody even knew what was in there, save for a select few. Arcane knowledge beyond mortal minds. History long past recorded memory. Powerful items best forgotten. The only ponies that could access it or the list of its contents were the princesses, and the head caretaker, and even the latter was only let in under supervision.

Whatever their attacker was after, it couldn't be good.

Spike was torn. He needed to look after Twilight. Her safety was literally his duty, but he may be able to assist at the vault. His indecision did not go unnoticed.

"I can take her," Blueblood offered, his horn glowing as he prepared to levitate her.

Spike hesitated. He did not know Blueblood, and therefore he certainly didn't trust him with the wellbeing of someone so precious to him. The royal was being so very helpful. More helpful than he would have ever expected, given what he'd heard about the pony's character in the past. Then again, that was long in the past, and it was natural for somepony to want to help where it was needed. At least, that's what Spike thought people should do. On top of that, the only other pony here was a small earth pony, who would be completely incapable of carrying a growing alicorn.

"Alright," Spike relented, allowing the unicorn to levitate her out of his arms. His next command was to the mare. "See Blueblood to the castle hospital, then see that he stays there."

The prince was about to voice some question or protest, but Spike quelled it before it could be given voice.

"Your help is appreciated, but we're still in danger," he explained sternly, making it clear he would not budge. "Stay there, and help keep them safe."

Spike doubted the blueblood would be of any use in a fight, but the comment would no doubt ease his ego. There was also the very real possibility of their attacker targeting the hospital to finish off their victims. He was already regretting passing Twilight off to him.

Leaving them, Spike took off and ran full tilt towards the vault. Anything in his way knew well enough to get out of it. Still, it took over a quarter hour to descend through the multiple levels to where the Crypt Arcanum lie. In fact, there were no levels any further down that this, and it was three stories below anything else, buried under solid rock, a two meter thick steel plate, and a magically inert layer of a material Spike couldn't even pronounce the name of. As far as he was aware, the same layers of materials surrounded the vault on all sides within the walls and floor like a box.

The corridor to the Crypt Arcanum was thirty meters long, and only lead in two directions. To the dedicated elevator which lead straight up to its only other stop, the entrance to which was inside the restricted portion of the castle library. And to the vault entrance. Bisecting the corridor at the halfway point was an intervening wall and door of enchanted clear crystal so that the two guards stationed there could see anything as it approached.

There were always two guards here. Two of the absolute best, most trusted guards in all of Equestria. Unicorns trained in a list of combat arts and lethal spells, and practiced to perfection in every one of them. Only the best for the most important vault in the known world. It was, to be fair, no doubt also one of the most boring jobs in the known world. Still, the two guards here should have been capable of turning this hallway into a veritable kill zone. For any intruder, it would have been like walking into a blender.

Which was why it was incredibly confusing to find that these two guards were the only dead bodies here. There wasn't even any signs of combat on the way, save for some scorch marks on one of the walls nearby. The vault door was wide open.

"Report," Spike commanded as he met the pony in charge.

She was a typically white Canterlot unicorn mare with a greying charcoal mane kept in a simple bun. Her name was Snowpiercer, and she taken the role of captain of the guard about six years ago. She was a cold, no nonsense mare, with steel coloured eyes that always felt like they were looking through you instead of at you. Spike thought she was a perfect fit for the job, and liked her quite a lot, though he sensed the sentiment was entirely one sided. Probably because he was one of the only people in Equestria that could swoop in and give her orders.

"Two casualties. Both dead when we got here," she answered, her voice pure business without a hint of emotion, which one might find worrisomely detached if they didn't know her. She gestured towards the deceased. "Whoever got in only triggered the alarms when they set a fire inside."

That made no sense at all. Getting in should have been impossible without melting a hole through the door, which itself would have set alarms ringing. To attempt to destroy the contents made even less. Except the door was undamaged.

"How did they break in?" Spike looked over the door. A three meter tall slab of enchanted stone rated to deflect blasts from Celestia herself. It was a heavy door, but it would open itself when properly prompted.

"They didn't," she answered. "They used the key."

Disbelieving, Spike walked up to the door and checked the keyhole, or what passed for it. It was in the shape of, and contained a golden bangle. A piece of jewelry that did not look like a key. You can't pick a lock in the mundane sense when it doesn't have any tumblers, and he personally knew nothing of how to pick a magical lock. He assumed the shape of the key was another layer of secrecy. The only easy way in is with the key, and it's hard to fake or steal a key without knowing what it looks like.

But their attackers knew.

He entered the vault. He'd never been in here before. Inside, it was a two story tall square box, around thirty meters by thirty with items in display cases lining the walls with more, larger cases dominating the center of the room. Several of these cases were open. What Spike found strange was how many of them contained books. He'd been expecting it to contain more of things that were more...well, more than books. While there were several trinkets and artefacts that he couldn't identify, the vast majority of the items were ancient looking tomes. It was like a small library where each book deserved its own pedestal.

There was still some wisps of smoke hanging in the otherwise stagnant air.

Snowpiercer followed in after him. "From the remains it looks like they burned more than they took. Mostly old books in here, anyways. Plenty of flammable old parchments, but the automated fire suppression system magically seals any flame larger than a candle inside a bubble until it suffocates. That system is what set off the alarm. Looks like they used a chemical accelerant to set the fires, though. Something that self oxygenates."

Breaking into this vault must have taken a great amount of planning, preparation and expertise. Knowing what was in the vault. Knowing how to access it. Being able to acquire the key. Being able to quickly kill the guards. Doing so while the castle was in a panic over an explosion. There were so many layers to this ordeal. It was bizarre to then undermine it by setting several fires. It couldn't be so simple as a smash and grab. Did they intend to hide what they took, or destroy something that might be used against them? Who alive even knew what was in here to use against a hypothetical foe?

Celestia and Luna did. Twilight might. The only other person was the caretaker.

Whoever they were, they had set the fires knowing that not only were they destroying priceless artefacts, but that doing so would alert the castle to their presence down here. If they hadn't, they could have been in and out without anyone knowing until the next time the guards were due to check in or rotate. In the chaos topside, that was sacrificing precious time they would have otherwise had. This had to be worth the tradeoff.

Was the bomb just a distraction to allow them into the vault? Perhaps they didn't expect a simple explosive to be able to kill a goddess. How valuable were the contents of this vault to do something so beyond the pale just for access to this?

"Far as we can tell by the remains," the mare continued, "they burned a bunch of books and scrolls, and, by the slag, melted down two other objects."

That was borderline suicidal. Depending on what gave them their power, melting down an artefact dangerous enough to be in this vault might very well release all that power at once, killing everyone in who knew what sort of radius. With what might be in this vault, that could have been everyone in the room, maybe the city. They might have opened a portal to some nightmare dimension, for all he knew.

What they took and what they destroyed were problems for later. The vault was deep, and whoever had come down here still had to be in the castle somewhere. There was still a chance they could catch them.

"We need to lock down the castle!" He shouted, exiting the vault. "Nobody leaves!"

He was about to sprint back to the elevator when something about the area near the vault door caught his attention. In a pile next to the wall was a bunch of plates full of food. By their condition it looked like they were dropped there in a hurry. In fact, he recognized some of the finger foods as the same stuff from one of the tables upstairs. The little mound of foodstuffs and shattered fine china were close to one of the corpses. And in his pool of blood, Spike could see two streaks near its edge that left long spots on the floor in regular intervals towards the elevator until they thinned out.

Spike never considered himself a genius detective, but he arrived at the conclusion remarkably quickly.

"They're hiding the artefacts in a food cart!"

Their attackers must have brought down a food trolley stolen from the kitchens. Unless they off loaded their loot into something else in the castle, at least now they had an idea of what they were looking for. It certainly helped explain why they didn't just steal the things they had destroyed. Now they knew they were probably only taking enough items to fill a food cart.

Leaving a few guards to seal the vault, Spike took the captain and the rest of her squad back topside. The ride was unbearably long. Every second was a second lost. An eternity stuck waiting for the doors to open. It was almost long enough for Spike to be reminded of the horror he'd seen in the blast zone. At least the elevator wasn't capable of playing any inappropriately upbeat musak. Silver lining. After three minutes that felt like three hours, the doors finally opened and they poured out, spreading in every direction to relay and carry out his orders.

Sealing off a castle by mundane means would be incredibly difficult, nigh on impossible, when members of a few of the species in attendance could fly. Thankfully, it was only five minutes after he'd gotten off the elevator that Snowpiercer was able to get the cogs in motion to lock the castle down in a more substantial way.

It started with a long, loud alarm, like the sort you'd hear for a storm warning. After half a minute the horn died down. The air around the castle shimmered a deep purple, and with a thunderclap of displaced air, a bubbled forcefield enveloped the entire castle and the surrounding walls.

It was one of the first things Spike had implemented once he'd taken the role of Lord Protector, and one of the few things he'd done that Snowpiercer unambiguously appreciated. He'd gotten the idea from the field Shining Armour had used to protect his city during the changeling invasion, coupled with what he'd learned of electrical circuits from the alternate universe he'd visited a few times. Instead of being powered by a single unicorn like Shining's field, there was a crystalline capacitor the size of a tool shed near the armoury. This fed power to a series of field emitters buried around the perimeter. Any unicorn with the knowledge of how to activate it could trigger the system, almost instantly surrounding the area in a protective barrier capable of repelling attacks, or in this case, sealing everything in.

In theory, so long as it wasn't being drained by bombardment, the capacitor could keep the castle sealed for a month. He made sure the system was charged weekly, which the unicorns commissioned to do complained was an exhausting job. It was hideously expensive to have designed and built, half from the capacitor itself, and half from the feed lines running to all the emitters. He would have had them transmit the magical energy wirelessly, but that lead both to a lot of wasted power, and the problem that this might theoretically generate enough background radiation to give everyone within a couple hundred yards of the transmission tower cancer. Still, he had been proud of it. It's official name was the Ancile System, though most ponies referred to it as 'The Snowglobe'.

The first order of business was to round up all the party guests, servant staff, and anyone else that was supposed to be at the party into the castle's underground safe rooms. Ostensibly this was to keep them all safe, and it would, but it was also to get a head count of who was missing and maybe run across someone who didn't belong. That alone took a few hours, between refusing to shut down the barrier for the ones demanding to be let out, to gently but firmly coaxing out a couple of mewling ponies who believed the castle was under siege that had barricaded themselves in one of the kitchen freezers. It was difficult to convince someone that it was both safe enough to come out of their hiding spot, yet dangerous enough that they had to go into a reinforced bunker.

Confident that Snowpiercer could take command back from here for the larger picture, Spike removed himself from the ongoing top to bottom search of the castle and headed towards the outbuilding hospital. It was the first time in the last couple hours where he'd been alone, without any adrenaline rush or immediate, pressing purpose to busy his mind. Free of distraction, he was finally able to fully process the reality of the situation. To grasp something his mind had been refusing to acknowledge despite having seen with his own eyes. Celestia was dead.

Those three words made him stop in his tracks. He staggered over to the nearest wall, mind numbing with shock, leaned against it and wept. For Twilight, the princess had been a mentor and secondary mother figure. For Spike, she was something like a beloved aunt. Though they shared no blood, this was a death in the family. He'd seen the princesses be endangered several times, but it was always with the belief that everything would be okay. That the villain would just lock them up or give a monologue long enough for them to turn the tables. This was so much more sudden. So much more brutal and straight forward.

He set his jaw and shook his head to keep his brain from shutting down from grief. There was no time for this. Not yet. Twilight and Luna still needed him.

Shoving off from the wall, he resumed his march towards the hospital. He could collapse and cry later. Latching onto that simple concept, he lost track of how long it took to get there, his steps blending together.

The hospital was located well behind the castle and its gardens, within the greater walls. It had its normal above ground entrances, as well as tunnels that lead directly to the main structure itself. Other than for the occasional checkup they took more for the sake of it than any need, the royal sisters had never been admitted to his knowledge. Being immortal god ponies, they never got sick, and bounced back so rapidly from any injury that they were back on their hooves by the time any normal crisis was over that no further medical attention was needed. In what was probably ten thousand years, today was unique.

It came as no surprise that the hospital was one of the first places to be locked down. There were guards at every entrance and pegasi patrolling its aerial perimeter. None of them challenged Spike as he strode straight past them. He was one of the few dragons living in Canterlot and was the Lord Protector. Being able to recognize him was often all the credentials he needed. He only slowed long enough to nod to the sentries at the entrance, stopping at the desk of the receptionist. She was a justifiably nervous looking mare in her mid thirties that appeared near panicking from osmosis. Skipping any pleasantries, he gave a simple command.

"Take me to Twilight." It came out more brusque than he'd intended, and the mare flinched in turn. He added, more softly, "Please."

Coming out from behind her desk, she nervously smoothed out her uniform, a simple off-white one piece outfit, and gestured for him to follow her.

"Right this way," she said. Spike didn't bother reading her name tag as he walked beside her.

It didn't take long for her to start bursting with questions. "I'm sorry, sir, but nopony's telling me anything after they locked us down. Are we still under attack?"

"I don't know," he answered honestly.

"I heard there was an explosion," the mare directed them to take a left. "Who would do something like that?"

The same answer. "I don't know."

"I saw them wheel in Princess Twilight and Luna," she hesitated to ask the next question, nervously looking up at him as they walked. "They're going to be okay, right?"

"I don't know."

They stopped at the door to one of the patient rooms, outside which were four of the same squad of guards that would have been on the rotation for the Crypt Arcanum. Normally that would make him feel secure. They parted, moving with almost mechanical precision, but Spike could still sense their unease.

Giving his thanks to his guide, he made to enter the room, pausing when she spoke up.

"I didn't see them bring in Princess Celestia," the mare hurried the words out, "but I've heard....things. Is she okay?"

Spike had no idea how to answer that. The obvious thing would be the truth, but how do you tell someone that a goddess is dead? She would find out eventually. News like this wouldn't take long to spread across the entire planet. At the moment, he couldn't bear to utter the words to tell her.

"Go back to your post," he said gently, placing a hand on her shoulder, "everything is going to be-"

He choked on his words, unable to finish the lie. He didn't insult the mare by trying again, leaving her as he entered the room and closed the door behind him.

Inside was a typical room like you'd expect to find in just about any hospital, save for it being a touch larger than average. The floor was polished to an antiseptic sheen. The walls and ceiling painted that soullessly calculated shade of not quite pure white. There was a single window opposite the door, closed with the blinds drawn. Beside the single bed was a menagerie of monitors, each giving their own little tone in a steady, reassuring rhythm. Connected to them was the bed's occupant. Twilight was unconscious, her head wrapped in a copious amount of gauze and bandages. Her expression was too serene, almost slack, but her breathing was strong.

Turning to Spike as he entered was the doctor, monitoring his patient. He was a middle-aged unicorn with a neatly trimmed pencil mustache. Near the bed was a chair. Standing beside this was the petite guardsmare that had escorted Blueblood here, and in said seat was said prince.

"What are you doing here?" Spike dumbly asked. He had thought Blueblood would be with the other nobles in one of the bunkers by now.

"Huh?" The prince snapped out of his fugue, looking up from the floor he'd previously been staring at. "You told me to stay here."

Oh, right. Spike gave the prince another once over.

With nothing else to say, Blueblood turned his eyes back to the floor. Somehow, the unicorn looked like the worse off out of the lot of them, save for Twilight. The blood he'd gotten on his hooves from Luna had long since dried, smudged into his coat. By his behavior, Spike guessed he had already gone into shock. There was no need to shake him out of it just yet. Actually, everypony in the room looked beaten down and depressed. Considering the evening, the reason was no mystery.

"Is he alright?" Spike softly asked the guardsmare, who answered with a sidelong glance and a shrug.

Blueblood gave no reply, verbal or otherwise of his own.

"He's in shock," the answer came from the doctor, confirming what Spike had deduced, "but yeah, he'll be ok."

Stepping over to the bed, Spike looked down at it's occupant. Despite her recent growth spurts, she somehow looked...small.

"And Twilight?" The question was asked with unhidden trepidation.

The doctor started to speak, paused, roughly cleared his throat, and tried again. "It's not great. Not horrible, but not great. She has a nasty skull fracture on the back of her head. Bad enough that she lost some cerebral fluid. Not a lot, but more than none. By the fragments it left, I'm guessing she was hit by a stone with some weight to it. Still, it could have been much, much worse."

A chunk of one of the thrones, if Spike was to guess the projectile. "But, how bad is it? Shouldn't she be in surgury or something?"

The doctor waved a hoof in a placating gesture. "She was. We've done what we can to close the wound. She'll take it from here, for the most part. Lucky for her she's an alicorn. They're a lot tougher than we are. Honestly, if she wasn't her head would have been caved in, but she's already recovering, and I expect she'll be right as rain. Eventually."

That was...sort of good news. Somewhat.

"She'll have a scar," he continued, "but with time and magic that can be reduced, or maybe healed entirely. Only ever found a couple scars on Celestia during her check ups and they were from long before my time."

The doctor flinched at saying the princess's name. Apparently he'd already gotten the news.

Spike reached a hand out and placed it against her cheek, gently. The princess didn't react at all. He hadn't been trying to wake her, but he expected at least some response.

He frowned. "How long has she been under? How long until she comes around?"

"Um, sir, she's not sleeping or anesthetized," the doctor shuffled his hooves as he fidgeted, "she's in a coma."

"How is that 'right as rain'?!" Spike snapped.

The pony held out his hooves. "I said she'd be right as rain. It's a minor coma. C-considering th-"

"The hell is a minor coma?!" There was a moment of tense silence, punctuated by the knuckles in Spike's hand cracking from the fist he hadn't realized he was clenching.

"The, uh, kind you wake from?" The doctor took a couple involuntary steps back. The guardsmare was trying her best to appear like she was engrossed in reading the posters on the wall regarding the importance of washing one's hooves. Blueblood just kept staring at the floor.

After spending his entire childhood hanging around ponies older than him, looking up at all of them, a dragon can occasionally forget how much larger they've grown until he's glaring down at one of the little ponies as he tries his best not to shrink away.

"Sorry," Spike deflated, embarrassed, "I'm...sorry."

He took a long, deep breath, taking a moment to finally read the doctor's name tag, which bore the name 'Stitches'. Curiously, his cutie mark was the laughing and frowning theatre masks.

Properly collected, Spike asked, calm as he could, "Okay, how...minor, is her coma?"

Stitches cleared his throat. "Hard to say. Her being an alicorn makes things difficult to predict. She could wake up tomorrow, in a few weeks, a month, or by the end of this sentence."

They both turned to Twilight as he finished speaking, and were immediately disappointed.

Stitches gave a quiet 'huh', like he'd been hoping for her to provide his punchline. "Point is, my prognosis is good. Don't worry about her too much. She just needs time."

Confident that she was as good as she could be, given the circumstances, Spike moved on to the question he'd been dreading.

"Thank you. Okay, then, tell me. How's Luna?" With how bad her injuries had been, Spike was less than hopeful. Alicorns were hardy creatures, but her wounds looked outright crippling at best. "I mean, how bad is she?"

He hadn't thought it possible, but the mood in the room instantly sank even further.

"Luna's dead," Blueblood said, almost too soft to hear, not lifting his gaze from his reflection in the floor tiles.

Spike snapped his head towards the dejected prince, then back to Stitches, hoping against hope that the answer was somehow wrong.

The doctor gave a shallow nod, confirming the grave news. "I'm sorry, I thought you knew. She died a little over an hour ago."

Stitches voice trembled. "Her injuries were too severe, lost too much blood. I'm sorry, but there wasn't anything we could do for her. It's-...she was-...we tried..."

As much as he'd tried to prepare himself for the worst, the news still struck Spike like a punch in the gut. It was all he could do just to stay on his feet. Nobody ever expected to be present for the greatest loss in their civilization's entire history. For a long couple minutes, the only sound in the room was the steady rhythm of medical instruments.

"Who," Blueblood started, "who would do something like this?"

It was a question that had been pressing on Spike's mind whenever he was free enough to dwell on it. Equestria had faced many threats and villains in his life, but nothing like this. To skip straight to murder was unlike anything he'd ever come across. The closest he could think of in terms of outright violence was Lord Ramshackle the Slaver, except he'd been dead for years. True, some of their villains had a tendency of returning, but as Spike had personally seen the old goat's head turn into a pink mist he doubted he was the culprit.

The other question was who could do something like. There were too many moving parts for it to all be the act of a single person, pony or otherwise, but whoever was in charge knew things that nopony should, and have access to places that nopony should. Two exploding gift boxes, one with fireworks, the other with the more deadly explosive, should have never made it through their screening. There had to be somepony on the inside, a traitor or infiltrator.

"I don't know," Spike finally replied, coming to hate those words, "but we will find out."

"You, uh," he addressed the diminutive guardsmare, realizing he still hadn't caught her name, "you..."

"Thimbleskip," she offered.

"Thimbleskip," he resumed, "escort Blueblood to his home. Take a few other guards with you and make sure he's protected."

"Why?" The prince asked flatly.

"Whoever is behind this has attacked our royalty. You're a potential target, prince." Spike saw no need to inform him of the attack in the vault. "You can't stay in the hospital forever. If you have a safehouse you prefer, now is the time to go to it."

Blueblood shook his head, being given direction apparently taking him a little further out of his shock. "Yes. Yes, I do. But, is there not something I can do?"

The look in his eyes was something Spike could sympathize with. He wanted to be useful. Unfortunately, he wasn't. Not here and not now. While Spike was grateful for his assistance thus far, he wasn't about to leave him with Twilight again. The drake didn't suspect him of anything, but at this point he couldn't rule out anyone. The prince picked up on this unspoken insinuation surprisingly quickly.

"You, you don't really think-" Blueblood started, pompous offense creeping into his voice before he stifled it. He broke eye contact and bowed his head. "I'm sorry. I understand. You don't really know me. Best to leave nothing to chance."

The prince stood up, brushing himself off and half heartedly trying to make himself presentable. "I'll go, but please, if I can do anything, do not hesitate to call on me."

That was decidedly more calm, mature and accommodating than one would normally get from most nobles. It was true that Spike had never known Blueblood personally. This was because, despite having lived in Canterlot for the past ten years, he had never made a point of getting to know him. He'd heard enough from Rarity back after the Gala and had made his mind up there. From what little he had bothered to hear about him since third or fourth hand, he had had no reason to reconsider his opinion or seek him out to expand on it.

Spike flinched when he saw just how petty that was, and when he remembered just who the prince was. 'Auntie Luna', he'd called her. For Spike and Twilight, they'd lost what felt like family. Blueblood had lost more literal family, distant though it was.

He placed a hand on the prince's shoulder. "Be ready. I will."

They shared a nod, and the prince dutifully followed Thimbleskip out of the room. Spike went along, stepping outside to address the guards.

"Nobody gets in this room but the hospital staff or myself," he leaned in and spoke in hushed tones. "From here out anypony you let in is to be given a full dispellation scan, illusory and polymorphic. Even myself. Especially myself."

One of the guards replied in the perfect volume to ensure that only the three of them could hear it. "Are we expecting changelings, sir?"

"No," he replied a little too quickly, "but at this point we haven't ruled anything out."

The doctors wouldn't like that. Neither would he, really. Illusory dispellations were harmless. More skillful illusions could be crafted to resist the dispellation, but he was confident that his guards could handle most anything short of a master wizard. A polymorphic dispellation scan was a newer concept, and was decidedly more uncomfortable to endure, changeling or not. He'd had it cast on himself a few times for various reasons, but supposedly Snowpiercer had explained the sensation best. She'd said it was like holding your hoof over a candle flame for a few seconds too long, except it felt like it was burning your skin from the inside, and it felt like that over your entire body. Most creatures found this unpleasant.

From here, Spike wasn't sure what to do with himself. He watched Blueblood a few seconds before reentering the room. Snowpiercer would be capable of coordinating the castle lockdown. He could insert himself into that, but he didn't want to disrupt her chain of command, and he didn't know where she was. Informing her of his movements without disrupting hers could be an issue. More than once, Spike wished Equestrian technology was closer to that of the alternate world he'd visited a few times, where talking to somepony else, no matter where, was just a button press away on a plastic brick.

He couldn't head home, not yet. No, his place was here, with Twilight. As Lord Protector, and as her friend. He wasn't lying when he told Blueblood he might be a target. Having both remaining royals in one place was unwise, and it was possible someone might try and finish the job. If they did, he would be here.

It occurred to Spike that he was still dressed in his party attire. The only weapons he had were the benefits of being a dragon. He thought of the two dead vault guards. Their enemy was not one he wanted to face empty handed.

He opened the door again and poked his head out. "Guard."

"Sir?" They both replied.

"Go to my armoury," he picked the one who spoke faster, fishing a key out of one of his pockets. He gave him this as well as his signet ring. "Fetch me my armour, spear and sword. Bring four more guards, too. Scan each of them before bringing them."

"Sir," he said again, accepted the offered items, and galloped off with appropriate urgency.

With nothing else for the moment, Spike strode across the room, took the too-small-for-him chair, placed it by the bed, and sat down. In all the chaos no doubt still going on in the castle at large, the hospital room was a bubble of relative quiet. She coughed in her slumber, giving him a start. It was such a weak, fragile utterance, so at odds with the Twilight he knew and loved. Soon, there was nothing but the quiet ticking of the clock on the wall, the rhythm of Twilight's pulse, the doctor, until he excused himself with promises that he would be returning soon, and the occasional anxious tapping of Spike's foot.

Author's Note

The chapter in which a pair of immortals abruptly and sequentially experience mortality, much to the surprise and displeasure of most but not all witnesses.