when worlds collide

Chapters

a dangerous business
the journey begins
Changelings And Changed Hearts
Izzy's flashbacks.
do-over
Home At Last
The fight heard around Equestria
Confrontation
fight or flight
repossession
Off To The West

a dangerous business

today was going to be a normal day. That's what sunny told herself. Ever since magic had returned, it seemed every day, tehre was something new that needed to be dealt with. But no, the ponies of Maretime Bay didn't want just anypony's help. Of course they wanted their problems solved by the amazing alicorn who had triumphed over her tribulations.

It was fun at first maybe, but it was a life one could soon grow tired of. She looked out the window noticing that everything was somewhat noisier than usual. As she trotted out the door, she made sure to grab hold of her bag and took one more glance around the room.

The lighthouse had been fixed up by her and her five friends, Izzy Moonbow, Hitch Trailblazer, Pipp Petals, and Zipp Storm. They now all shared a room up at the top floor of the lighthouse. The rainbow light emitting from the unity crystals ran through the mile of the room.

As she took one last look around, she noticed that everypony was still sleeping.

Everpony that is, except for Izzy.

As Sunny walked the streets of Maretime Bay she definitely noticed that ponies were more excited than usual. She made her way towards the beach. She wanted to meet up with Izzy. She knew that in the morning, Izzy always got up early to bounce around on the beach.

"Helps get the blood flowing to your brain" she always said, whenever anypony asked her why she did it.

With each thing Sunny heard, she got more and more curious. She kept on hearing little bits and pieces of the new story from everypony who walked by. She knew that gossip spread fast in Maretime Bay but she didn't know that it spread overnight as well. it made sense though, it was the summer and there were probably a lot of ponies out enjoying the night.

When Sunny finally reached the beach, just as she had expected, Izzy was there bouncing around and saying hi to all of the little colts and fillies who were relaxing and building sandcastles. When Izzy caught sight of Sunny, her eyes widened and she bounced over to her excitedly while asking in a sort of singing voice, "have you heard the big news?"

Sunny grinned and trotted over to her. "That's actually what I was going to ask you about. I know you do everything you can to keep up on all of the gossip in Maretime Bay."

Izzy laughed "yeah, I'm really good at that. And I was also hoping that you hadn't heard because I am dying to tell you. A bunch of Archaeologist ponies found a strange statue on the outskirts of Bridlewood forest and the histoian ponies think that it's from over one-thousand years ago!"

Sunny's eyes got wide and her mouth fell open. She couldn't believe it. Ancient equestrian artifacts! ponies hadn't found anything good before. If anything, all they found were small pieces of hay that scientists traced back to ancient equestria because of their DNA. But this ccould be a HUGE discovery!

Izzy was practically shaking, loving the fact that her friend was so happy with what she had told her. she decided to go into more detail. "I was actually in Bridlewood when all of the commotion started. The only problem is that the statue is like SUPER cracked and they need to be careful bringing them up because if these really are from ancient equestria, they don't want to break them."

A thought quickly crossed Sunny's mind as she spoke nervously, "Izzy you said you were there, what did the statues look like?"

Izzy shrugged and said "I think it was a statue of like three different creatures. One was some sort of shriveled up looking creature. I think it was like half a pony, half a bull. another one looked like a unicorn, it had a horn and it had holes all throughout it's body. The strange thing is that the last one looked like a little Pegasus filly. and they all looked pretty scared."

Sunny's face went white. her normal orange color, beginning to drain into a dark tan color. she began to gallop back towards the lighthouse as fast as her legs could carry her. She screamed back "Thanks Izzy!" and then left her friend standing very confused on the beach.

Izzy stood confused on the beach. Her friend was acting really strange considering the really fun news she had just told her. and why did she look so scared? Sure the statue was a little creepy. It had almost scared Izzy when she saw them digging it up. Whatever it was, she did notice that it looked all cracked and broken.

This incident actually really worried Izzy. most ponies thought she was a careless and free spirit. the truth was that she was often very worried. she had care and emotions and worries but she put on a carefree disguise to hide it.

She began trotting back towards the lighthouse. Earlier today, she thought she would be walking with Sunny at her side. probably with her talking about ancient Equestrian things that Izzy pretended to be interested in for her friend's sake. She had learned some things from her friend that she found interesting. The things that interested her were mostly the strange actions usually surrounding a pink earth pony named Pinkie Pie.

This pony was somepony that Izzy would probably love to hang out with. she always seemed to do strange things. she somehow managed to make mountains move with just a megaphone and she turned her hoof into something she called "fingers." the thought of that made Izzy shudder.

She continued thoughts like this until her head bumped into something. she was already home and she hadn't even realized it. she opened the door with her magic, encasing it in a blue glow. once inside, she shut the door and began running towards the upstairs. before even realizing what was about to happen, she collided head first with somepony. she just didn't see who.

"woah Izzy you need to watch out!"

she recognized the voice of her best friend Hitch Trailblazer.

She finally looked up and noticed he had a hoof over his cheek. She thought it was a small little bump but then gasped when he remove the hoof.

"Oh no Hitch I'm so sorry! I really didn't mean to I'm so sorry" she exclaimed frantically realizing that she had scratched his cheek with her horn. it wasn't very deep but it was very long.

"Izzy it's really okay. I had to go through much worse pain when I fell off a tree. sprout had pushed me because he got mad at me and I almost broke my hoof."

Izzy was practically crying at this point. she dug down deep inside herself to try to find her happy disguise but couldn't seem to find anything. suddenly she felt hooves around her as Hitch pulled her into a tight embrace. she couldn't help but blush heavily. she hoped to God that it would be gone before Hitch saw.

"what's got you in such a rush Izzy?" Hitch asked letting go. he thought maybe he saw her blush but that was just is fantasies going out of control. he knew in his heart that a mare that nice was way out of his league.

Izzy was out of breath from crying but she managed to stammer out "S-s-sunny is acting weird. I n-need to check on her."

Hitch looked almost relieved. "Good thing you're here. she woke me and the pegasus sisters up because she was running around and throwing books all over the place. I told Zipp and Pipp to go flying around so that they wouldn't try to strangle her. you knwo how much they hate waking up early."

Izzy chuckled. the last time somepony woke Zipp up early, a big magic storm had almost been caused because of the argument that occurred.

Hitch continued "good luck with her though. she won't talk to anypony right now."

Izzy smiled and walked upstairs. "don't worry. I'm her best friend she has to listen to me. it's the best friend law."

Hitch called up after her, "I'm her best friend Izzy. Nice try!"

Sunny had been going through books for almost twenty minutes at this point. Her dad had left her a lot of old books about ancient Equestria and she had read all of them in her spare time. She knew the descriptions of that statue sounded very farmiliar and she knew she had seen it before, but she just couldn't put her hoof on it.

she had just tossed aside another book and began looking at a very charred old book called "Supernaturals." her dad said that this book had once belonged to Twilight Sparkle herself and was salvaged from the ruins of the Golden Oak Library! she then heard a set of hooves coming upstairs.

she yelled "Hitch I told you I'm busy" and turned around and was surprised to find herself face to face with Izzy.

"Surprise Sunny!" the unicorn exclaimed.

Sunny was overjoyed. she began talking frantically. "please help me. I know in one of these books, I've seen a picture of the statue you described. I just need to find which one."

Izzy nodded her head and went towards the bookshelf. Since Sunny was clearly scared, she figured this statue was something very bad, so she decided to start with a book entitled "Troublemakers of Ancient Equestria."

She then exclaimed, "I've found it!"
She then read the book out loud. "this statue depicts three of Ancient Equestria's biggest troublemakers. Tirek, Queen Chrysalis and Cozy Glow. each of these three did some very bad things on their own so they decided to team up and try to take over Equestria together. In the end, they were defeated by Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, and the chaos lord, Discord. they werre turned into a statue and left to rest forever. while at this time the statue remains lost to time, people still fear the return of these three. after the return of Discord from the same kind of prison, some ponies believe the same thing could happen to these three."

Sunny's eyes widen as Izzy continued flipping through the book. she found another picture of a strange creature. the picture was titled "Discord the Lord of Chaos before his return." Izzy soon became very nervous. "wait a second she said. this statue is really cracked. just like the one from Bridlewood."

sunny's eyes can't get any wider at this point. "you don't think.." she started.

Izzy's eyes finally understand everything. "Come on Sunny! we need to get to Bridlewood and warn everypony before it's too late.

when they finally reach Bridlewood Forest, Izzy's heart drops. she sees police tape around the dig site and a lot of red stains on the equipment. she walks up but a police pony stops her.

"I'm sorry ma'am we are going to have to ask you to step back"

never once has Izzy ever abused her relationship with Sunny, but at this moment, everything went out the window. as she begins to speak in a demanding voice. "This is Sunny Starscout. She is the alicorn who brought back magic for everyone and she demands that we have a look."

the officer looks at the orange earth pony. everypony knows at this point that Sunny is not a full time alicorn but everypony knew who she was. he asks her "is this really the wish you have made known to your little messenger over here?"

Sunny is really surprised that Izzy would just use her fame like that but Sunny could tell that she had to see what had happened.

she nodded her head.

the police pony let them both through and Izzy gasped when they saw what laid on the ground in front of them.

somepony had written in blood "your turn" and right in the middle of the text was a pony lying on the ground.

there were entrails everywhere and the victim seemed to have multiple stab wounds. wounds that seemed to be made by a very jagged knife. Or something else...

they suddenly heard somepony yelling "Everypony the statue is gone."

Sunny looked over and sure enough, the statue was now a pile of debris. she looked back to the dead body in front of her and she too gasped. But not at the body. something troubled her even more than that.

what they saw that day was a dead body.

with two blank flanks...

(to be continued...)

the journey begins

Izzy screamed and began to sob. she collapsed to the ground crying. Sunny picked her up and shielded her eyes with her hoof. Sunny led her away from the crime scene. Izzy cried for a long time. Izzy finally got herself together enough to talk to Sunny but she was still crying.

"T-t-that was m-my friend G-Geode!" Izzy rests her head on Sunny's shoulder. Sunny couldn't explain it. But it felt really nice. Izzy's tears began streaming down Sunny's coat as Sunny tries to turn herself into an alicorn. She hasn't quite mastered this skill yet but she manages to do it and she picks Izzy up with her magic. They begin going back to Maretime Bay.

When Izzy is finally strong enough to stand, Sunny places her down on the ground gently. Izzy immediately throws up and starts crying again. the two of them walk in silence for about half of the journey until suddenly Izzy speaks up.

"I'm not the pony everypony else thinks I am." she says.

Sunny looks back at her shocked. She wasn't expecting her to say anything. let alone something like that.

"What do you mean Izzy?" sunny asks. "most ponies see you as a happy and fun pony and that's definitely who you are. I swear sometimes I wonder if you've ever had a care in the world."

Izzy sighs shakily as she continues to sob softly. she turned to Sunny and says " the only reason everypony thinks that I'm that way is because that's what I make them believe. the truth is Sunny, most of the time I am thinking about things more than I am enjoying anything."

Sunny is confused. she can't even believe that this is the same pony that was just bouncing around on the beach and playing with fillies not even hours earlier. She tries again to bring the unicorn to see her true self. "Izzy that's not true. everypony loves you. except maybe Posey but she hates everypony."

Izzy continues to cry softly and doesn't say anything until the crystal brighthouse comes into view. she runs forward and yells, "Sunny we need to warn everypony!"

they burst through the brighthouse door yelling "everypony I have an announcement you need to come here." it took her a second to realize that someone was going for her. Zipp was charging her full force. Sunny stepped out of the way and Zipp crashed into the door.

Zipp starts yelling "Sunny Starscout if you ever wake me up like that again, I will throw you off the balcony."

Sunny ignores her and continues talking about what she was saying before. by now, both Hitch and Pipp had heard the yelling and crashing and were in the main room.

Hitch looks towards Sunny. he can tell that she looks frantic. "what's wrong Sunny?" Hitch asks while looking at the two of them to see if anypony is hurt. He is the sherriff after all. If someone is hurting ponies, it is his job to help.

It took about twenty minutes for Sunny to explain everything that had happened. everything about the statue, why she was looking through books so early in the morning, and most importantly, the villains are back.

Pipp looked incredibly confused. that didn't happen very often. "so wait. you're saying that this half bull half pony creature is stealing pony's magic to make himself more powerful, and that there are two more of these villains, and you think one of them use their horn to stab one of Izzy's friends?"

Sunny nodded and looked over to Hitch and Pipp. They both looked paler than they usually were. But Hitch of course was the first to react.

"alright everypony," he said with a lot of authority in his voice. "we need to get out of here. we can warn everypony else about what is about to happen and then we're leaving. go pack your bags."

everypony began slowly walking upstairs. everypony that is, except for Izzy who sat there on her haunches. she appeared to be deep in thought. Sunny wanted to tell her friends about Izzy's identity crisis. but she asked me to never mention our conversation earlier. Her entire situation was very confusing at the time.

when sunny went upstairs, Pipp was live-streaming to the entire town and everywhere so that everypony would know. Within a half hour after, they went outside and began their journey. When they were finally out in the feild between Bridlewood and Maretime Bay, they finally heard Izzy speak.

"No"

Everypony else was confused. "No what?" Hitch asked.

"I'm not going back to Bridlewood." Izzy said as she sat down to make it evident that she would not be leaving this spot.

Sunny sighed. "Listen Izzy. how does this sound? We're going to stop here and make camp for the night-"

"but we can't stop now!" Hitch interjected. "If we're going to get any leads, we need to be to Bridlewood by tonight."

Sunny held up a hoof to silence him. "Hitch your friend is having a hard time and we need to do anything we can to help her. So Izzy," she said now addressing the mare in front of her. "We will set up camp here tonight, and if you still don't want to go in the morning, then we can go back to Maretime Bay."

Izzy looked down at the ground for a while. she slowly nodded her head. Hitch was about to object, when he heard a sound. A sound he had never wanted to hear. Very softly, Izzy was crying.
***
Hitch didn't sleep at all that night. He couldn't stop thinking about everything that was happening. He thought every bit of it was crazy. But he did know one thing. There was one other pony not sleeping that night. The whole time Hitch was thinking in his sleeping bag, Izzy was softly crying over in hers. Eventually, he got up and walked across the campsite.

His voice was a low whisper but he still spoke "Alright Izzy get up."

She looked at him with tear-stained eyes. And he looked back with the kindest smile he had every given anypony.

Izzy got up and they began walking through the field. Izzy was glad that it was dark. There was no way that Hitch would be able to see her blushing unless the moonlight hit her in the right way. As sad as she was at the current time, she was glad that of all ponies, she was walking through the moonlight with Hitch.

Hitch looked at her and Izzy could see something was bothering her. He decided to try to speak. "Hey Izzy, how are you feeling?"

Her face changed expressions quickly. She now looked hurt again. Her voice became choked and sad again. Hitch immediately regretted this decision.

"I don't really want to talk about it." Izzy said. "How did you know I was up?"

Another tough question. Hitch didn't want to tell Izzy how he felt. He knew deep down in his heart that she was way too good for him.

"well, you see, I uh..." He started. he couldn't think what to tell her. "I just um-"

He was cut off as he tripped over something. It was a black orb of some sort with a lens on one sight and a button on the other. What is it with ponies always littering? He suddenly heard Izzy gasp.

"Oh my gosh Hitch! Are you okay. Oh no this was probably my fault wasn't it?"

Izzy was beginning to have a mental breakdown because of this whole situation. And Hitch could tell.

Hitch got up quickly so Izzy wouldn't be scared. He went over to her and hugged her once more. This time, he tried to make it last as long as possible. Izzy blushed again but quickly pushed off of him. she was breathing heavily and she started shouting.

"NO! I CAN'T HURT YOU AGAIN!" She screamed before collapsing to the ground sobbing. Hitch quickly came up behind her and held her. He made sure she was calmed down before he let go. He could feel her tears staining his coat, but he didn't care. Once her breathing had steadied, he let her go.

"you could never hurt me." He said reassuringly.

Izzy pointed a forehoof to his cheek. "Look what I already did to you!" she half-yelled. She sat down and began to cry softly." Hitch couldn't stand it. This mare that he had been admiring for months now was crying because she thought she had hurt him. He embraced her once more, but this time, he never let go. Izzy cried herself to sleep in his hooves. He fell asleep soon after.

They only awoke by a shocked voice. "Oh my gosh! What are you two doing!"
***
Zipp always woke up early, it was part of her morning routine to go for a fly. She had never really gotten the chance to fly around this field before. She had always meant to, but never got the chance.

This morning however, she noticed something very odd in the field. Two ponies sleeping on the ground. One had a coat of a faded purple. The other, of a bright yellow.

She landed and confirmed her suspicions. these two ponies were Hitch and Izzy.

"Oh my gosh! What are you two doing!" she exclaimed, still trying to get over the shock of this sight.

They both snapped awake quickly. They quickly realized that they were still holding each other and let go quickly. Hitch was the first to speak although he did so in a rather shaky voice. He knew what Zipp was thinking and he had to make sure she knew it wasn't true.

"Zipp! I-it isn't what it looks like I s-swear!" He said frantically.

"Did you two-?" She asked not wanting to say the word.

"W-what!" Hitch began. "With her. Absolutely not!" He hadn't thought about those words until they came out of his mouth. His heart dropped when he turned around to see Izzy looking hurt once more. What he didn't know was that these words had completely destroyed what was left of her heart.

Izzy laid herself down as she buried her face in the ground. Hitch and Zipp didn't even need to listen to know that she was crying again. Neither of them could figure her out anymore. She used to be so happy and carefree, and now she was acting defeated and sad.

"Listen Zipp." Hitch began. "I know what this looks like. It isn't like that and I'm going to need to ask you to leave please. I need to make sure that she is okay."

"Fine!" Zipp said. "But only for Izzy's sake. we are so not done talking about this." she looked down at this moment and she spotted the orb that Hitch had tripped over the previous night. "Hey what's this thing?" She asked. "I think I've seen a picture of this thing in a book back at Zephyr Heights. Mind if I hold onto it for a bit?"

"Fine. Just get out of here"

And with a nod and a glare, Zipp took off back towards the campsite. she had better keep her mouth shut about this to the others Hitch thought as he sat down beside Izzy. He tried to put his hoof next to hers when it was immediately slapped away. Hitch exclaimed with a shout of pain. Izzy stood up and began to walk away. Never once casting a glance at Hitch.

"Hey! Where are you going?" Hitch asked.

Izzy's pain had now turned to rage. And unfortunately for Hitch, He was about to catch it all.

"Why do you even care?" She began to say. Her voice getting louder with each word. Hitch could still hear in her voice that she was crying.

"Because you're my friend and I care about you." Hitch said. He knew he had messed up with what he said to Zipp. now it was up to him to fix it all.

"Am I really your friend though?"

"W-What"

"Have you ever really cared for me? Last night? the past few months? Tartarus , you're harder to read than old ponish text! Admit it Hitch Trailblazer. You never really cared for me. It's all been an obligation that you do for sunny's sake. Last night, you were just trying to make believe that everything was okay. Guess what? It's not okay. One of my friends is now dead thanks to these villains and we don't even have a lead on how to find them. But no, let's just put everything in the hooves of a small town sheriff. Surely he'll be the one to save everypony. Just like how he was the hero to save everypony from the evil unicorn when she came to town!"

"Izzy, you know it isn't like that." It stung Hitch that she really felt this way about him.

"No Trailblazer!" Izzy was practically spitting her words at this point. "It is like that! Why don't you explain it to me then? Why would you never be with a pony like me? And don't even TRY to pretend that you never said that! We both heard what you said to Zipp. Oh wait a second. I know why. Because NOPONY WOULD EVER BE WITH A STUPID UNICORN LIKE ME!"

She was crying by the end of that. She began walking towards the direction of Maretime Bay as she looked back. A mixture of fear, anger, ad sadness in her eyes as she said softly, "go to Tartarus Hitch Traiblazer." She then began running as fast as her forehooves would take her. That way Hitch would never process her words in time.

And she was right. by the time Hitch had worked everything over in his mind, he could no longer see Izzy.

***

Hitch walked back to camp with his ears down low. As his friends came into view, he saw Sunny running up towards him. [igood he thought. Ireally need a friend right now. but instead, Sunny smacked him hard with her forehoof.

"HOW COULD YOU HITCH!" She screamed. "HOW COULD YOU DO SUCH A THING TO SUCH AN INNOCENT MARE!"

Hitch rubbed his head as he answered, "let me guess, Zipp told you?"

Sunny smacked him again. Harder this time. "YES OF COURSE SHE TOLD US! WHY WOULDN'T SHE TELL US?!"

Hitch began to yell back "YOU STILL THINK THIS IS ABOUT ME SLEEPING WITH IZZY? SHE'S GONE NOW SUNNY! SHE LEFT FOR MARETIME BAY! AND IT'S ALL MY FAULT!"

Sunny's look of anger began to disappear. "Wait, so nothing happened then?

Hitch looked at her. "Come on Sunny. You know I'm not that kind of stallion. But now after I told Zipp that I would never do that with Izzy, she took off running and I don't think she's coming back. She's probably already back in Maretime bay at this point. We didn't make much progress yesterday."

"Fine Hitch. We'll just have to go on witho-"

Sunny's words were interupted by a strange sound. the sound of hundreds upon hundreds of beating wings. The ponies looked towards the sky to see an army of black creatures flying through the sky.

"CHANGELINGS!!!" Sunny screamed.

But they weren't heading for them. They were on a course...

straight to Maretime Bay

Changelings And Changed Hearts

Zipp was the first to spring into action. She took off with incredible speed, flapping her wings desperately to try to catch up to the changelings. Pipp knew her wings weren't going to move fast enough so she followed with Sunny and Hitch on hoof. They all knew where they were headed. They all also knew they wouldn't be there in time.

* * *

Izzy had finally arrived at the lighthouse. She had cried the whole way there. She knew Hitch didn't mean it like that. He was probably just flustered. She knew though, that in her outrage, something was true. Hitch would never want to be with a pony like her.

She climbed the lighthouse onto the balcony and she stared down with tears still in her eyes. I could end this all now She thought. She hated herself for thinking this way. She didn't know what to feel anymore. She wanted to believe, deep down in her heart that there would be ponies who would mourn her death. But the only image in the front of her mind, was an empty funeral hall.

She turned away from the balcony. She went back inside and looked to her left. She saw cans of paint still left over from when they had remodeled the brighthouse. She used her magic to levitate the can towards herself and looked inside each one until she found what she was looking for.

Black. Pitch black.

She threw the paint all over the glass doors leading out to the balcony. If I can't see it, then I can't think about it. Out of sight, out of mind. She knew the others would probably get mad at her for ruining the glass but she didn't care. She slowly walked into the bedroom that the five of them shared and walked towards her bed. She surveyed everything she saw. Fluffy pillows, craft supplies, and a strange amount of googly eyes. She encased the googly eyes in her purple magic and levitated them towards herself, as she grabbed them with an outstretched hoof. She walked over to the balcony and threw them off. She thought that she could at least throw something off of the balcony today. She just needed to make sure it wasn't herself.

She sighed with satisfaction as she heard the shattering of the glass below her. And the rattle of plastic as thousands of googly eyes spilled everywhere. Suddenly, she heard the beating of wings. But these weren't pegasus wings. These wings sounded different. Like those of a fly you would swat away without skipping a heartbeat. She looked up to the sky and suddenly found herself wishing it were just flies. Hundreds of changelings began to turn the sky black.

There were a few that landed right next to her. She quickly kicked them with a hoof and raced inside. She locked the doors on both floors. she thought her friends had surely seen the horde, and were on their way back now. But she didn't know if they would come back to save a pony like her.

She collapsed onto the bed. And began sobbing once again.

* * *

Hitch was the first to reach the brighthouse. After a while of flying, Zipp had to join them on the ground. The others were still a few meters back. They all came rushing up hoping that the changeling horde hadn't seen them.

"Everypony look." Hitch said while surveying the ground in front of them. "Broken glass and... Googly eyes?" He was confused. he was sure this was probably one of Izzy's strange possetions. But why is it out here? And why is it shattered?

Pipp breathed a sigh of relief. "Oh thank goodness." she breathed out. "That was just Izzy's googly eye jar. Thank god she finally got rid of that. It's been creeping me out for ages now."

Pipp gave a small wince of pain as she was smacked by her sister. Hitch's thoughts however were on other things. I really hope Izzy hasn't hurt herself at all. He thought as he was reaching for the door. He put a hoof on the door only for the knob to jiggle and the door to not open. This was strange. They never locked the brighthouse under any circumstances. He figured this was a good excuse. there was a giant changeling mob terrorizing Maretime Bay and she probably didn't want to see him anyways.

Zipp and Sunny kicked off the ground and flew up to the glass door. They couldn't understand what they were seeing though. The door had been splashed with some liquid. Whatever it was, they definitely couldn't see through it.

"Watch out Sunny!" Zipp yelled as she landed, turned around and bucked the door as hard as possible.

There was a sound of glass shattering, and a scream of pain.

Sunny looked down to see that the door had in fact broken. But a piece of glass had lodged itself in Zipp's hoof. Sunny landed next to her as blood began to pool around her leg. She looked inside and Izzy was lying face down on her bed.

Izzy didn't even care if the changelings broke in at this point. Let them kill her. It wouldn't matter in the slightest to anypony anyways. She perked up though, when she heard Sunny's voice from the other side of the now broken door. She looked over to see Zipp lying on the ground and Sunny panicking, not knowing what to do.

"Okay hold on Zipp" Sunny was saying. "Maybe we can find a medic pony or somepony like that." Sunny began to put pressure near the top of Zipp's hoof in an attempt to stop her from bleeding out. Zipp winced at the pain but made no movement to stop her.

Izzy rushed over and gasped at the sight in front of her. By now, Zipp's back legs were covered in her own blood. Zipp was going to pass out if this continued. Izzy got down to get a better look at the glass. It had broken through the soft part of her hoof but it had made a clean cut. Izzy used her magic and began to wiggle the glass. Zipp was screaming with every movement but the piece of glass was soon out.

Pipp had flown up now to see what all of the commotion was, but looked down to see her sister passed out and covered in blood. "What happened!" Pipp yelled while looking from her sister to the piece of glass still being held in Izzy magic.

"Your sister tried to buck the glass door open and ended up with a shard of glass stuck in her hoof." Sunny explained. "Not really the brightest idea but it kind of worked I guess."

"Are we gonna have to fight off all of these changelings?" Izzy asked with sadness and fear glistening in her eyes. She was certain Sunny would want to help the citizens of Maretime Bay as much as possible so she turned to walk inside to gather a few things when she heard her answer.

"No."

"Wait really?" Izzy was shocked. This was incredibly out of character for her friend. Usually she would spring into action at the first chance she got but this time, she was standing here refusing.

"The best way that we can help all of these other ponies, isn't by temporarily holding back the threat. It's by taking it out at the source. We need to find a way to destroy these three. I think our first target should be Tirek. He will become more and more like a god as he sucks magic from other ponies."

Izzy silently nodded and went downstairs. She looked out the window and saw Hitch standing outside comforting some of the other woodland creatures. Izzy hesitated for a few moments and then reluctantly opened the door.

Hitch raced inside and shut the door quickly. "Oh Izzy! Thank God! I really need to talk to you. Back at the campsite-"

"Not now." Izzy cut him off. Mostly because she didn't want to hear his apology. No she thought in her head. I'm just not ready to hear this right now. "Zipp is in trouble upstairs and we need to leave as quickly as possible."

"Leave!" Hitch asked surprised. "I thought we were going to fight off these changelings to help everypony else."

"No." Izzy replied. "We are leaving to find something to defeat the three villains." She made sure to make her tone of voice sound as angry as possible but what she didn't want to admit to herself was that she wasn't really mad at him, she was just mad at everything else.

They walked upstairs and Hitch raced over towards Zipp. After Sunny explained to him what happened, his brain immediately began working. "We need to get her to a hospital or something!"

Sunny looked at him like he was a colt. "do you really think there will be any openings at hospitals? These changelings are wrecking havoc throughout the entire town and you think we can get room at a hospital!"

As she was saying this, Pipp yelled over to them and pointed her right forehoof towards the rest of the town. To Sunny and Hitch's horror, Maretime Bay was in flames.

* * *

Hitch couldn't believe it. The town he was born in. The town that he and Sunyn had become friends in. The town that could even withstand Sprout's childish wrath. And it was all being burned to the ground.

On the floor, Zipp awoke with a start and jumped to her hooves before immediately collapsing to the ground. It took her a second to remember what had happened to her. She looked down at her hoof and breathed a sigh or relief when she saw that the glass piece was gone.

She drew in a shaky breath and began speaking. "You guys know that hooves can take multiple moons to heal right? We're going to need some serious healing magic or I'm going to be out of commission for the rest of this mission."

Izzy gave a half-hearted smile. "I know a really good healer back in Bridlewood. If we could get back there, she could easily heal your hoof. You'll still need to rest a few days but it would definitely be better than waiting moons for it to heal."

Zipp shoots a skull-piercing glare at Izzy before shouting, "We were already on our way to Bridlewood! But no, the great and self-important Izzy needed to run back here just because a dumb stallion hurt her feelings! We wouldn't even be here if it weren't for you Izzy! My hoof wouldn't be hurt and we would probably be in Bridlewood by now!"

Izzy couldn't believe this hostility from Zipp. She had seen her get into fights with her sister but even those never resulted in screaming. Izzy found herself getting angry as well. "Well excuse me! At least I didn't accuse my friend of having sex with another friend!" she spat back.

Hitch could tell he was blushing at the moment. On the bright side, no one was looking at him. All eyes were glued to the heated exchange between the unicorn and the pegasus.

"Fine Then! Explain it to me! Why were you sleeping with Hitch then? And why were you two holding each other that way! Excuse me but if that's not bucking suggestive, I don't know what is! If you ask me. In fact if you ask ANYPONY they'll tell y-"

"He was helping me through a tough time!" Izzy cut the pegasus off. She didn't want to hear it anymore. "I don't know if you noticed princess but my best childhood friend was just murdered. In fact, I didn't see anypony lifting a hoof to help except for him! And I will not stand by while you accuse the best stallion in the world of doing a horrible thing he didn't do!"

Hitch found himself turning that last line over in his head. Did she mean that she liked him or that he was just the only stallion she was close to at the time. This mare was harder to read than any criminal he had ever dealt with.

No one spoke for a while. Sunny sat up and said "Alright everypony. Let's just forget what just happened okay? We need to get out of here fast. Izzy, We can put Zipp in your unicycling cart and we can pull her along. Let's go."

* * *

they walked in silence for a couple hours. Sunny was using her magic to pull the cart along because her magic was much stronger than Izzy's. The motor cart had run out of gas about sixteen miles ago. Hitch tapped Izzy with his hoof and gestured for them to fall back.

They began to walk slower than the rest of the group for a few seconds to let them get about thirty feet ahead of them. They still spoke in whispers even though they were pretty sure it would be hard for the others to hear them.

"did you mean what you said?" Hitch asked. "About me?"

Izzy thought back for a second trying to remember what she had said about him. There were a lot of things said during that conversation. "Yeah I did" she replied.

Hitch sighed. "Listen." he started. "About what I said. I didn't mean it like that. I really do like you. You're one of the best friends I've ever had. You really are a great pony Izzy. I know you've been going through some hard times lately. Just remember that I'm always here to help."

Izzy choked back some tears. One word he had said hurt her more than any changeling or centaur could have. friend. She looked at him and said softly, "thank you. You're the best friend I've ever had too."

Hitch almost winced at that word. friend. When he had said that, he was testing her. The last thing he had wanted to do was to tell her that he loved her and then have her reject him. He would be the laughingstock of the friend group forever. Not to mention things would get awkward between him and Izzy. He decided to try to pull her away from the "friend" mindset. "What about Sunny?"

Izzy replied, "Sunny's great and all but what I said back there was true. Sunny barely even tried to comfort me. We sat outside Bridlewood for a while but we never really talked about it. You didn't just comfort me but you held me. You made me feel like I was finally safe."

Hitch smiled at her and she smiled back. The first genuine smile he had seen on this unicorns face for a while.

Izzy ran forward and caught up to Sunny. "Sunny I'm tired. can we set up camp here? We're about halfway there."

"Yeah sure Izzy. I'm pretty tired as well. Hey everypony we're going to set up camp!"

* * *

They all sat around the campfire that they had made. Zipp was laid down on a sleeping bag and she was already asleep.
They didn't bring much food and there was nothing to cook over the campfire. Sunny and Pipp were laughing about something on Pipp's phone while Hicth and Izzy sat in silence next to each other.

Sunny looked over towards Izzy and said, "Hey Izzy, if you don't mind talking about it, what exactly was your connection with Geode."

The question instantly sparked tears. Izzy began crying once again. Hitch and Pipp glared at Sunny who put her hooves up in defense. "Hey! I was just asking. you don't have to answer if you don't want to Izzy."

Izzy sniffled and looked up. "n-no." She stuttered out. "It's okay." She drew in a long shaky breath.

"you see..."

Izzy's flashbacks.

"Race you!" A pinkish grayish colt was yelling to the filly behind him.

"Not fair! You have a head start!" The filly yelled back.

"Fine." The colt slowed himself down and let the filly catch up to him. The filly was the most gorgeous pony he had ever laid eyes on. She had a faded purple coat with a blue mane. She wore the most adorable crystal bracelets around her hooves and she had the most amazing purple eyes he had ever laid eyes on.

"Man Geode," The filly started. "You are one of the fastest colts I have ever met.

Geode found himself blushing. He knew that he wanted this mare to be his marefriend. He had told his parents a while back but they always said he was too young to be feeling feelings like this. He was thirteen moons old though. And he knew the mare he loved.

"Thanks Izzy. I bet if you really tried you could catch up to me though," He replied which caused Izzy to smile back at him.

Izzy saw his expression change. From kind of prideful to completely sincere as he continued talking.

"Izzy, we've known each other ever since we were small. I don't know about you, but I always feel such a strong connection to you. I thought at first it was just a silly fantasy. But I see the truth now." He took Izzy right forehoof in his. "Izzy Moonbow, would you like to be my marefriend?"

Izzy stared at him with a smile still on her face. She blushed heavily as she said, "Gee Geode, I was wondering how longit would take you to ask." She giggled. "I thought I would have to mare up and ask you myself. Of course I will!"

Geode looked at her with a dumbfounded look on his face. "Honestly. I thought you were too good for me."

Izzy looked a little bit hurt. You don't actually think I think I'm better than somepony do you?"

Geode laughed, "No I was just making excuses as to why I haven't asked yet."

Izzy laughed at him and they continued walking. After a while, they came upon Izzy's favorite place in all of Bridlewood Forest. A few miles outside the village, there was a bridge over a stream with the most beautiful looking waterfall a little ways behind it. She stopped walking and leaned on the railing of the bridge with her two forehooves. Geode quickly noticed she had stopped walking and walked back to her.

"This is the most beautiful place in the entire forest." Izzy said while overlooking the waterfall and the river it created.

"I don't know about all that," Geode started saying. "The Bridlewood race track is pretty great."

"yeah but you're the only pony in Bridlewood who has enough energy to use it." Izzy said.

"Do you ever see anypony else coming out here?" Geode asked.

"Touche."

They sat in silence for a while. After some time, they both looked at each other. Geode began speaking again. "Izzy. I'll be honest. There's something I've wanted to do ever since I laid eyes on you."

He quickly brought his muzzle to hers and kissed her. Izzy's eyes widened surprised at first, but then she returned the kiss.

* * *

Sunny widened her eyes. "Oh no Izzy! I get it now. He was your coltfriend and then he was killed. That's awful."

Izzy was still crying softly. "Well, for a time yes. But that's not where the story ends. You see, about five moons later..."

* * *

"Wow Geode!" Izzy was saying. "That was the best dinner I've ever had. How could you even afford it?"

"Well I had a dinner like this planned for a couple months now. It doesn't take too long to save up enough bits."

She smiled at him. She had had a great day so far and this was just icing on top of the cake.

"So are you coming back to my house?" She asked him.

"Uh," Geode was unsure what she meant by that. "What for?"

"For the party of course! My parents have this big party planned. Yes it's a little childish but I haven't grown out of loving my parents." Izzy smiled at him. She had been dating Geode all the way through middle school and high school. It was their senior moon. Izzy was excited she would be graduating in less than a moon.

"Why are you guys throwing a party? What's the occasion?" Geode asked.

Izzy looked at him with sadness in her eyes. That was the one look that Geode couldn't stand. She started feeling tears welling up in her eyes. "Did you really forget?" She asked.

"I'm really sorry Izzy I don't know what's going on today."

"Even after this big dinner? I thought this was all because of today?"

"No. I had just finally gotten the money saved up."

"Never mind I'm going home."

Izzy got up and walked away from Geode towards her house. Geode stood in front of the restaurant not fully comprehending what was happening.

He decided to go to her house. He knew he would be able to find out what the party was for eventually. When he got there, he looked at the door and saw something that made his heart drop. A banner hung above the door reading HAPPY BIRTHDAY IZZY!

Geode immediately panicked. He ran back to his house as fast as his legs would carry him. He found the box that he kept his savings in. He quickly counted out around one hundred twenty one bits. I think I can find something he thought.

He ran to the Bridlewood jewelry store. He looked around quickly and found a necklace that looked a lot like her bracelets. The picture of the pracelets was often in his mind because he thought they suited her well. He grabbed the necklace and paid for it. He ran quickly to Izzy's house. He caught his breath for a minute and then knocked on the door.

A mare and a stallion answered the door. The mare looked immediately relieved. "Oh thank God you're here Geode. Izzy's been no fun without you here. No matter what we do she won't cheer up. Please go talk to her."

The mare practically shoved Geode into the living room where Izzy sat in a chair among all the ponies having a good time. He ran up to her quickly.

"What are you doing here?" She asked.

"Listen Izzy. I messed up. You're right but I got something for you that I think will make up for it." He pulled out the necklace and he saw Izzy's eyes widen.

"Geode! You've saved for months to take me out to a fancy dinner! How could you afford that?"

"Doesn't matter. It's yours now." He went behind her and put the necklace around her neck. She took his hooves in hers and kissed him gently.

"I forgive you this time." She said. "But don't let it happen again." She gave him a stern look and then grinned. She kissed him again this time more aggressively.

She heard a gasp from behind them. Her parents stood in the doorway. Their faces aghast. Izzy went pale because she had forgotten that her parents were nearby. They were against any kind of big romantic gesture outside of marriage. And Izzy had just done what they thought to be the end of the world.

"THE PARTY IS OVER!" Her mom yelled. "EVERYPONY OUT!" She walked over and grabbed Geode by the neck. "And that includes you." she hissed at him.

Geode began to walk away as Izzy held up her hoof. "Geode. Stay."

Izzy's mom looked at her with a severe gaze. "Oh so now you decide what runs in my house?"

Izzy looked back with the same look in her eyes. "Mom you're overreacting. Geode is the best stallion I've ever met and he's the one that I'm staying with."

"Over us?" Her mom asked raising an eyebrow.

"What do you mean by that?" Izzy asked with a sudden sadness in her eyes.

"Let's put this simply," her mom began. "You have to make a choice. Him or us."

"Mom that's not fair!"

"Life's not fair."

Izzy began sobbing. Geode walked over to her. With the greatest sadness Izzy had ever heard, he said, "Izzy I refuse to come between you and your parents. If they don't want us together, then we can try again when we're older."

"Geode! What is this?" Izzy asked, more tears welling up in her eyes.

"Izzy, I'm breaking up with you."

It was at this moment, that Izzy's heart shattered. She ran up to her room and kicked the door shut. She heard lots of shouting from downstairs. She had lost a piece of herself that day. A piece that would be difficult to recover.

After a few months, she graduated. She moved out of her parents house soon after that. After the incident with Geode, tensions had been high in the family. She never ate dinner with them and started finding every excuse to be out of the house. She found a house out on the outskirts of Bridlewood forest. She figured no one would bother her out here and she could let her creative instinct spark.

"La Villa Izzy" She mumbled to herself as she walked through the door of her new home.

After a couple of weeks, she heard a knock at the door. She walked over and opened it. A sudden look of shock spread itself across her face.

"Heard someone's free?" Geode asked her.

Izzy looked both happy and sad at the same time. This wasn't what Geode had expected. He had expected her to rush into his hooves.

"Listen Geode, I need to tell you something," Izzy said. She and Geode sat down outside the door. "Listen Geode. I think the time that I spent away from you has brought the situation into perspective. I know I have some really bad parents but I don't want to abandon them. I don't think we should be together anymore."

"Izzy please don't be hasty." Geode looked heartbroken at her decision. "I think something is clouding your view. But if it's really what you want, then so be it."

Izzy looked over to Geode again. A single tear fell down his face. She leaned over and kissed him. She withdrew and apologized. "I'm sorry. I had to feel it. One last time."

Those words hurt Geode more than anything had ever hurt him before. One last time. Her mind would not be changed. And he would never grow old with the mare he loved.

Izzy spoke again. "I know it sounds cliché, but I really do want to stay friends. I'm really sorry Geode."

He got up and looked at her. He smiled and nodded, and then began to walk towards the village. Izzy then went inside her house.

She glanced over to the table at the craft she was making. She had been making some sort of unfolding tea set. If only I had more friends to use it with. She thought as she walked past it up to her bedroom. She laid down on her bed and cried herself to sleep.

* * *

Izzy would still see Geode every other day. They would hang out in the crystal tea room. Things were never awkward between them anymore. They would laugh and play just like they had when they were foals.

After around three months, Geode came to the tea room with some news. He had met a mare named Lucky Star. He began coming to the tea room less after that. The number of times they met went down to about once per week.

One night, Izzy was sitting on her bed working on a quilt. She sighed and looked over to her bedside table. There she saw something she hadn't thought about in ages.

When he and Geode were foals, they were playing around some of the crystals in the forest, when Geode tripped over something. Izzy recognized the object as one of those old floating lanterns that would be lit with heat and fly off. She saw a note attached to it. She helped Geode up and they read the note together.

It seemed to have been written by a child around the same age as them with a pretty nice drawing on it. It said "Dear unicorns and pegasi! You have friends in Maretime Bay! Come visit us!"

Geode had let Izzy keep it and promised that he would go with her some day.

When Izzy saw the letter after all this time, it made her think. There's not much left for me here. Sure the crystal tea room is nice and Alphabittle is friendly but I could definitely use a change of scenery.

She considered going to see if Geode wanted to come with her. She thought maybe he would honor his promise from moons ago. She walked over to his house and caught a glimpse through the window before reaching the door. What she saw made her stop dead in her tracks. She saw him sleeping on the couch.

With Lucky Star in his hooves.

She walked off fighting back tears. She walked out of the forest and took one last look at La Villa Izzy.

"I'll be home someday." She told herself. Not even fully believing it herself. She began walking in the direction of Maretime Bay. She knew few things about the small town. She knew it was strictly earth ponies. She wanted to make a good first impression on them so she thought about happy things on the journey there. She knew she could act like everything was fine if she pretended it was to herself.

Thoughts clouded her head as she walked the lonely field. She dismissed them and continued walking.

* * *

Sunny's eyes widened again. "Oh so that's why you came to Maretime Bay?"

"Yeah that's what started everything."

Sunny still couldn't quite understand. "But if you didn't like him, why are you so sad he died?"

Izzy widened her eyes as well. "Are you kidding? I never hated him. It just kind of hurt me when I found him sleeping with another mare. I wasn't jealous or anything like that it just really brought into perspective for me that there are some things that can just never work out."

A thought quickly came to Sunny. "Wait is this why you go out to Bridlewood every couple of weeks?" She asked.

"Yep!" Izzy said. "I go and see him and then stay in La Villa Izzy for a few days."

"One question Izzy," Pipp said from Sunny's right. "How long has it been since you've seen your parents?"

"I don't want to talk about that." Izzy replied. "Let's just say we don't keep close contact."

That ended the conversation. Zipp had fallen asleep during the story. Hitch sat awake for the second night in a row. But just like last time, he knew one mare was awake, Because the sound of a soft crying hit his ears. He got up and walked over to Izzy's sleeping bag and tapped a hoof to her shoulder.

"Come one Izzy get up. We're going for a walk."

do-over

Izzy and Hitch walked through the field. Izzy was carefully inspecting the ground this time making sure nothing could trip Hitch.

"You know this feels kind of familiar." Izzy said lifting her eyes from the ground to Hitch.

"Consider it a do-over." Hitch said, his eyes meeting Izzy's. "Listen Izzy. I know you've been going through a lot and I know that you and I have had some tension recently but I hope you know that I will always be here for you."

During that entire sentence, Hitch thought to himself Please take the hint Izzy.

Meanwhile, Izzy was thinking, was that a hint? Does he love me too?

Izzy nodded her head quietly and returned her eyes to the ground.

"What are you looking for?" Hitch asked.

"Anything that could trip you. I sure don't want that to happen again."

"Don't worry Izzy. We went a lot farther today than we did last time. There's no way the same thing is out here again."

"Well you never know"

"Fair enough." Hitch decided now was the best time to ask her. She was in a good mood. Who wouldn't be on a beautiful night like this. "H-Hey Izzy?"

"Yeah?"

"I was just thinking do you maybe-"

"I KNEW IT!"

Hitch was interrupted by a yell from behind him. He turned around to see Zipp, standing on three hooves while limping with her fourth. She wore a look on her face unlike one Hitch had ever seen before. She was genuinely mad at them.

"Knew what?" Izzy asked. A look of concern now spreading across her face.

"I don't know what the tartarus you two have with this field, but I caught you this time." Zipp's look was growing more and more angry every second.

"Caught us doing what?" Hitch asked. He could tell Zipp was angry but he couldn't tell quite why.

"Stop acting dumb!" Zipp was yelling. She pointed a forehoof towards Hitch angrily. "You were going to sleep with Izzy again!"

Hitch put a hoof up to slow her temper. "We were not going to do that. We didn't even mean to last time."

Zipp's glare turned down but was still very angry. "Really? Why are you two out here then?"

Neither Hitch or Izzy looked amused. Izzy spoke first. "He is trying to help me feel better about everything. Last time, he tripped over some weird black orb thing and I thought it was my fault. I started having a panic attack and Hitch helped me calm down by hugging me. I kind of fell asleep while he was doing that and I guess he did too. You caught us at a bad time."

Zipp looked down towards the ground. "I am so sorry. I thought you two were doing something behind our backs. I didn't mean to start any trouble." Zipp laid down, softly whimpering because of her broken hoof. Her ears perked up after a short moment. "Wait a second. Did you say weird black orb thing?"

Izzy shrugged. "Yeah that's what I said word for word."

Zipp nodded and looked back towards the ground.

Hitch spoke up, "Zipp I can't quite speak for Izzy but I forgive you. I understand what you thought but I can assure you that me and Izzy have never done anything like that."

Izzy nodded her head in agreement and Zipp smiled weakly. They began walking back towards the campsite with Zipp leaning on Hitch's shoulder for support. Izzy couldn't help but feel a small twinge of jealousy. She thought that part of her did want to sleep with Hitch again tonight. She remembered how comforting it was sleeping in his hooves. She dismissed that thought quickly. She was still convinced that he had eyes for Sunny. Why wouldn't he? They were childhood friends and of course Sunny was a very attractive mare. This made her softly shake with jealousy.

When they reached the campsite, Zipp had Hitch walk her back over towards her sleeping bag. She looked up and said, "Hitch, can you go into Izzy's cart and grab my bag and bring it here."

Hitch began walking towards the cart which was parked about thirty feet off from the campsite. Zipp looked over to Izzy who had laid down on her seeping bag with a lightly angry expression on her face. Zipp decided that she would try to talk to her. "What's wrong Izzy? You look pretty angry."

Izzy looked down at the ground, her expression softening. "It's nothing Zipp. Why do you even care? I thought you were still mad at me."

Zipp shook her head. "No Izzy. We may disagree sometimes but I could never stay mad at one of my best friends for long. That's what the magic of friendship is all about isn't it?"

Izzy looked up and slightly nodded. They returned to silence for a few seconds when Hitch returned. "Here's your bag Zipp. I really don't know why you need it this late. We really should all be getting back to sleep."

Zipp shook her head. "No. You both need to see this. When I woke you up yesterday morning, I saw some weird black orb thing laying there on the ground. I thought sonepony had just littered and I picked it up. I was going to throw it away when we got to Bridlewood but I noticed upon further inspection that it looked like a more high-tech device." She reached into her bag and pulled out the orb. "As you can probably imagine, being stuck in that cart with nopony to talk to gets pretty boring after like five minutes, so I started playing with this thing."

Hitch was nodding his head but he still looked confused. "What does this thing have to do with anything important Zipp?"

Zipp held up a hoof to silence him. "You didn't let me finish Hitch. I decided to try to press the button here and it started making things disappear. But then whenever I tapped the button again, the item would reappear wherever I pointed this laser thing."

Izzy looked up. "How much stuff did you move around? I had everything in that cart organized."

Zipp held up her hoof again reassuringly. "Don't worry Izzy. I put everything back the way I found it. The point is, I remember reading almost every book in the Zephyr Heights royal library and I specifically remember reading a book called "Rare Magical Artifacts and How To Make Them. Of course, the book was meant for unicorns but they didn't have the magic to make any of the artifacts either. Anyways, I remember an artifact called dead matter."

Hitch's look of confusion grew greatly. "What is dead matter? I feel as though I remember the name from a book that I read in Maretime Bay but I'm not quite sure."

"It's almost like extra holding space," Zipp began explaining. "You can hit someone or something with the laser and then if you hit it again, it will put the held item somewhere else."

Izzy's eyes grew wide. "This thing is amazing! I could move my entire crafting cart without needing to pay for gas for the motor cart!"

Izzy began to rush forward to grab the ball but Zipp held up a hoof to stop her.

"Hold on Izzy. We don't know a whole lot about this stuff. And I heard somewhere that this thing could be extremely dangerous. I propose that nopony touches it until I have it figured out completely." Zipp looked towards Hitch and Hitch nodded his head in agreement. He looked towards Izzy.

"I'm sorry Izzy," he said. "I just want to make sure that nothing happens to you or anypony else."

Izzy's thoughts began to race. Why did he specify me? Was it just because I was the one trying to grab it? Or does he really care about me? Was that another hint? Why am I so bad at picking up on these.

Izzy and Hitch walked back to their sleeping bags and laid down. It was already three in the morning but the excitment of finding such a rare artifact was incredible. Hitch was actually pretty tired, so he fell asleep almost immediately. When Zipp was sure that Hitch was asleep, she whispered over to Izzy.

"Izzy?"

Izzy's head perked up. "Yeah Zipp?"

"I think I know why you looked so angry earlier."

Izzy looked backwards a little bit as she began to look nervous. "Oh really?" She asked nervously. "Why?"

Zipp raised an eyebrow. "You know you're horrible at hiding things right? I knew that something was wrong I just couldn't tell what. Then I figured it out." She sighed for a second and then said softly, "You wanted to sleep with Hitch again tonight didn't you?"

Izzy's mind was doing cartwheels. How did she know? Am I really that predictable? Izzy sighed. "Yeah. I guess part of me really wanted to sleep with him again. It was comforting and I really liked it."

Zipp chuckled slightly. "Sounds like more than just a part of you wanted to sleep with him. You love him don't you?"

Izzy looked shocked. She sighed in defeat as she said, "Yeah. But you are never allowed to tell anypony or I will hunt you down and kill you in your sleep."

Zipp laughed. "Okay. Okay. Word of advice though, Keeping your feelings inside won't help anything. They might just cause pain and regret."

"How do you know?" Izzy asked.

Zipp sighed again. "I used to have feelings for somepony. But that changed. Remember those two guards you met the day you and Sunny came to Zephyr Heights?" Izzy nodded her head as Zipp continued. "Those were our bodyguards. They were on break when they found you. My guard was named Thunder Flap. He was the one who forgot to read the manual remember? Well I had feelings for him. But I waited too long to talk to him about it. When I finally got the courage to ask him to be my colt-friend, I found out he had been dating Pipp's guard Zoom Zephyrwing. I haven't had feelings for anypony since."

Izzy looked down towards the ground sadly. "I'm sorry Zipp."

Zipp sighed. "Don't be. It was a long time ago. All I'm saying is don't wait to long to ask Hitch out. Because a stallion like him will be gone in a wingbeat." With that, Zipp turned around and fell asleep. Izzy lay awake for the rest of the night, thoughts zooming through her head as fast as they could go. Most of all though, she thought about the upcoming day. Tomorrow she would be home again and she would have to face the best healers in town.

After almost an entire moon, Izzy moonbow would have to face her parents.

Home At Last

Izzy still hadn't fallen asleep when the sun began to peek up from underneath the horizon. She heard Zipp attempting to get up beside her. She half closed her eyes to make it appear as though she were sleeping as she watched the pegasus. Zipp was trying to kick off the ground hard enough to take flight but her legs were collapsing under the pain of her broken hoof. She watched Zipp lay back down and to Izzy's surprise, small tears began welling up in Zipp's eyes.

Zipp shook her head to stop herself from crying and got back up. She beat her wings as fast as she could and finally managed to get up in the air. everything was easy after that and Izzy watched as she flew off. Hitch stirred soon after. When he woke up, Izzy got up with him. She sneaked up behind him and tackled him. Hitch yelled as Izzy scared him.

They both got up laughing. Somehow, the noise hadn't woken up Sunny and Pipp. Hitch had always known Sunny to be a late sleeper but he didn't know Pipp was one as well. He tapped both of them with a hoof. "Come on girls! Time to get up, we only have about ten miles left to Bridlewood!" He looked around the campsite. "Hey where's Zipp?"

Izzy perked up. "Oh yeah, she went off for her morning flying."

Pipp squeaked slightly. "What is she doing out there! She could get hurt! Izzy how could you let her go?"

Izzy shrugged. "I didn't think it was such a big deal. She's a skilled flier, she'll be fine."

Just then, the group heard the beating of wings. Zipp was flying towards them with a very worried look on her face. "Everypony! This was a bad idea! I can't land or I'll hurt my hoof more!" Suddenly, Zipp felt a jolt of pain. Because of how long the wound was exposed, it hurt more than it ever had. Zipp's wings wobbled and she began to fall.

Pipp screamed and everypony looked away. Everypony that is, except for Izzy. Izzy leaped towards Zipp's bag and grabbed the dead matter. She rolled over to quickly turn around and faced the sky. She aimed her shot quickly and got a clear hit. Zipp was pulled into the dead matter. Izzy aimed the ball down to the ground and set Zipp down.

Hitch breathed a sigh of relief. "Good thinking Izzy. That could have been really bad."

Zipp was trying to process what happened. She looked towards Izzy. "Yeah Izzy, thanks. I don't know how many more injuries I can take." As she was saying this, Pipp came up behind her and hit her on the back of her head with a hoof. Zipp yelped as Pipp started yelling.

"You moron! What do you think mom would say if you died because you fell out of the sky! I don't know what to do with you anymore!"

Zipp held up a hoof to stop her. "Look little sis! Everything is fine!" Pipp glared at her but resigned because she knew Zipp was right. Sunny on the other hand, was more interested by the object Izzy held in her hooves.

"What is that thing?" Sunny asked, poking it. "It doesn't look like anything I've ever seen."

Izzy looked back cheerfully. "It's called dead matter. It's like a holding place for something."

Sunny's look of confusion grew. "Well that was definitely some quick thinking. Good job Izzy."

They packed up their small camp and they resumed their journey towards Bridlewood. After about five hours, they had finally reached the edge of the forest. "We can drop everything extra off at La Villa Izzy." Izzy said walking up towards the cottage.

"One problem." Sunny said. "We still need to take Zipp in the cart."

"Nonsense." Izzy replied. "We can hold her in the dead matter."

Zipp looked back. "I don't know if I want to spend a whole lot of time in there. I don't even remember what it was like in there. It was almost like I didn't exsist."

"You'll be fine," Izzy said with a small shake of her hoof before pulling Zipp into the dead matter by pushing the button. "Just in case though, we might want to hurry. It's like a twenty minute walk through the forest."

They began walking through the forest, greeting some of the ponies they knew on their way through. Posey was here on a flower delivery. Sunny felt a small feeling of happiness that at least somepony was out of town when it had been destroyed. Sunny climbed up on a small pillar in the middle of the road and called out to the ponies surrounding her.

"Everypony! Maretime Bay has been destroyed! Sunny called out, seeing worried and confused looks spreading throughout the gathering crowd. "A group of ancient creatures called changelings have trashed the town. I would advise that everypony stays here until we get everything all sorted out and confirm that Maretime Bay is safe again."

Just as she had expected, Posey was the first to walk forward. Angrily, she shouted, "So what! You expect us to just sit here waiting for you five to gallivant around Equestria? I haven't ever even heard of a changeling and I don't think anypony else here has either. I demand to go home."

Sunny continued to speak calmly. "No one is stopping you from going home Posey. But we are warning you that there might not be much of a home to go back to. And it could be seriously dangerous."

Sunny climbed down from the pillar and walked back over to her friends. "I figured the best thing I could do was warn them all." She said as she received nods form everypony.

Izzy jumped. "Come on everypony! We're almost there." They continued walking until they had reached a small house with a blue front door. The house itself was built into a giant tree with a red first aid symbol painted on it. Izzy wakled up to the door and immediately hesitated. She looked back to her friends. "You know, maybe Zipp's hoof will heal on its own. We don't really need the healers do we? They're probably busy."

Sunny looked confused. "What do you mean? We need them to heal Zipp if we're going to have any chance of defeating Tirek, Chrysalis, and Cozy Glow."

Izzy let out a small sigh and then tapped a hoof to the door three times. A blue mare opened the door. She caught sight of Izzy and shot her a glare. "What do you think You're doing here. Have you finally come to apologize?"

Izzy shook her head while not breaking eye contact, a glare forming on her face."No!" She practically spat out. "I'm here as a paying customer." She held out the dark matter and the blue mare backed off clearly unsure if this was a bomb or not. Izzy set Zipp down on the ground in front of the cottage. She showed her back hoof to the blue mare, to which the mare gasped.

The mare shot Izzy another glare. "Fine but you had better be paying greatly for this."

The mare used her magic to lift Zipp into the house with her and slammed the door. Izzy glared at the closed door and waved her hoof in a very rude gesture towards the door. "Buck you!" Izzy yelled at the door before kicking a rock off the front porch with such a force that it left a small dent in the house it had struck.

She stomped back towards her friends but passed right by them. Sunny spoke up. "Izzy what's wrong."

Izzy turned back around "Shut the buck up and don't follow me!" She yelled as she left in the direction of the crystal tea room. Sunny withdrew back towards her friends. None of them could understand quite what had happened. Izzy was fine until she saw that blue mare at the door. Then looking at the door, it all made sense. A sign hung on the door that read...

Moonbow Medical

Sunny began to run towards Izzy but Pipp grabbed her and pulled her back. "Don't do it Sunny." Pipp said. "She doesn't want to be talked to right now. Let her get out whatever unholy anger got into her somehow."

Sunny looked back. "No! You don't understand! That was her mom. From her story last night. That's why she hated her so much. See the sign says Moonbow Medical." Sunny walked towards the door and knocked on it. This time, a red stallion opened the door.

"I'm sorry. The doctor is busy. Please come back later." he said.

"We're close friends with the patient. May we please come in?" Sunny asked.

The red stallion raised an eyebrow. "Really? You three have nothing better to do in Bridlewood than watch your friend get medical treatment?" Sunny shook her head.

"No we aren't local so we don't quite know anypony else."

The stallion sighed putting a hoof up to his head. "Leave it to that disappointment to bring strangers into this forest." He grumbled while leading them inside.

* * *

At the crystal tea room, Izzy sat at the counter speaking with Alphabittle. "So anyways, they expect an apology from me even though I didn't do anything. I wasn't the one who gave my only offspring an ultimatum like that."

Alphabittle sighed. "Geode really ruined your life didn't he?"

Izzy's eyes widened as she looked shocked. "No! I was the one who told him it wouldn't happen. I know that I have some horrible parents but none of that was his fault."

Alphabittle laughed a little. "Well don't worry. That stallion is like a symbol of bad luck now. He's ruined two mare's lives now." He pointed a hoof across the tea room. Lucky Star was sitting at the table across from the counter. Izzy got up and walked across the restaurant. She sat down in the seat across from Lucky Star.

"If you're here to offer comfort of whatever, don't bother just buck off." Lucky Star grumbled.

Izzy actually laughed a little at this. "No. Listen to me. You probably don't know me but my name's Izzy."

"Oh yeah!" Lucky Star yelled while perking up. "Geode almost never shut up about you while we were hanging out as friends. No offense but I was pretty happy when you two broke up."

Izzy laughed again. "None taken. Anyways, I don't know about you, but my life was completely ruined by hanging around Geode. All I'm saying is don't let your feelings for him stop you from continuing your life."

Lucky Star sighed. "Oh trust me. I was completely fine yesterday until they found something near his body." She slammed a box down on the table with her name on it.

A ring box

Izzy gasped and said, "Well he completely destroyed my relationship with my parents so I think he screwed me over more."

Lucky Star laughed. She could tell Izzy was trying to make her feel better by turning her misery into a friendly competition. What she didn't understand was why this mare got through to her so easily.

They laughed and talked for a while until the sun was beginning to set. Lucky Star eventually left saying she had to go home to her parents. Parents, Izzy thought. Wouldn't it be nice to have some of those.

As Izzy began walking back towards the medical building, thoughts swam around her head. Her parents had abandoned her in her time of need. They had given her the choice between the love of her life and them. And she had chosen the former. Was she in the wrong here? Maybe she shouldn't have let them go.

Izzy shook her head clear of these thoughts as she almost walked nose first into the door of the medical office. She looked around and saw that her friends weren't anywhere in sight. They must have gone inside, she thought to herself as she tapped the door with a hoof. The blue mare answered once again.

"Oh it's you again. Figured you wouldn't come back. Thought you had abandoned your friends just as you abandoned us last moon." The mare smiled knowing she had easily agitated Izzy.

"Buck you" Izzy said waving her hoof in a rude gesture. "I'm here for Zipp. How is she?"

"The pegasus is no longer any concern to you. Your friends are already taking care of her now get out of here." The mare pointed a forehoof away from the house. "I thought you had your own house. You can sleep there tonight. Since you were so eager to get away from us that should be easy for you."

Sunny walked outside to see what all the commotion was. Shee saw Izzy and her eyes widened. "Hi Izzy. Glad to see your back!"

Izzy grabbed Sunny's forehoof and began leading her away. "Come on Sunny," She said. "We're sleeping in La Villa Izzy tonight."

The mare behind them laughed. "Oh! Is that what you're calling that ugly shack?" She leaned towards Sunny while saying. "Better watch out. She's known to leave friends and family behind. Better keep an eye on her."

Izzy turned around. The look of shock on her face was unmatched by anything Sunny had seen. Izzy's shock quickly turned to rage as she began charging at the mare. A loud pop was heard.

As a single forehoof connected with the blue mare's face.

The fight heard around Equestria

Author's Note

No the dead matter is not a pokeball. It was an idea that just popped into my head and I incorporated it into the story. Just wanted to clarify. Enjoy!

The fight heard around Equestria

Sunny couldn't believe what she had just seen. Izzy had kicked her own mother. Not only kicked, but she had dislocated her jaw. Izzy's mom stopped and her horn glowed a brilliant blue. Her jaw fixed itself. Healing magic is truly incredible, Sunny thought.

"Isabelle Moonbow! How bucking dare you! I dealt with you for so long! I allowed your rude language! I even allowed you to run away for some absurd dream of going on a trip to Maretime Bay! And this is how you repay me?"

"Allowed me? No way!" Izzy snapped back. "I left because you all were horrible to me!"

The mare looked back at Izzy. "You watch your next words young mare! I have your friend in there and magic can easily be undone!" She hissed.

Izzy kicked the mare again. This time right to the top of her head. The mare fell down and was knocked out. Blood began pooling around her head. Sunny looked towards Izzy. Izzy was completely unfazed. "That's what you deserve," Izzy said. "Making me study herbs for eight hours a day and kicking me out of the house. All of it lead up to this."

"Is she gonna be okay?" Sunny asked.

Izzy nodded. "Yeah she'll be fine but that wound will leave her with serious headaches for the next few days. She used to make me study wounds and cures I know all about head injuries. Now of course, unicorns have magic so all of the knowledge I gained has gone to waste."

The two of the walked towards the house to get their friends when the red stallion walked out of it. "What's all the commo-"

He gasped when he saw the mare laying on the ground. He looked up at Izzy and glared. "You did this didn't you?" He yelled. "How could you do this to your own mother?" Izzy nodded again with no remorse in her eyes.

"Just let me take our friends and you will never see me again." Sunny had never seen Izzy be so horrible to anypony but this was beyond horrible. This was cruel.

The red stallion walked inside and escorted Hitch and Pipp out with Zipp in his magical grasp. Izzy threw about twenty bits at him and started to walk away. As they all were walking away, they heard the stallion shout, "Nopony ever loved you Isabelle! And nopony ever will!" They all heard the sound of the door slamming as Izzy stopped dead in her tracks. She turned around and rushed back towards the door. She began pounding on it with her forehoof.

"Open the door you bucking coward!" She screamed right before Sunny walked up behind her and began dragging her away.

"Come on." Sunny said. "We don't want to get into trouble. we should just go."

Hitch stepped forwards towards the rest of the group. "Go where? Mrs. Moonbow said that Zipp would be asleep for the next couple of days as a result of the spell. We also aren't quite safe here. If the changelings found Maretime Bay, they could easily find Bridlewood.

Sunny shook her head. "My dad used to have an old spell book used by Princess Celestia. In the book, there was a spell that they used to make the Crystal Empire invisible to outsiders. I think I studied it enough times where I could pull it off." Sunny concentrated for a long time. Suddenly, there was a small explosion of glitter as the orange earth pony sprouted wings and a horn. She kicked off the ground and beat her wings until she was high above the forest. She had never really done anything outside of a little levitation magic but she knew that for Izzy's sake, she had to do this. She concentrated and after a while, the entirety of Bridlewood was encased in an orange bubble before the town became invisible.

Sunny flew back down towards the town and it came back into view as she crossed the threshold of the town's bubble. She turned to the rest of the group while looking stunned. She breathed a sigh of relief as she said, "I can't believe that actually worked. Anyways, let's head back to La Villa Izzy. We can rest there until Zipp recovers fully."

They walked in almost complete silence towards the unicorn's house. Sunny's wings and horn had disappeared by now. She could only wear them for a short time before she ran out of magic energy. The horn and wings were a beautiful translucent orange. She wished she could have them forever.

When they reached the house, Izzy unlocked the door and they all stepped inside. "I'm sorry everypony," Izzy started. "I only have three beds so some ponies will have to share. I also wouldn't quite recommend the couch, It's made of wood and thin pillows so it isn't very comfortable."

Pipp raised a hoof. "I can take a bed and lay Zipp down on the floor next to me. That way if she wakes up in the middle of the night, I will be right there." Hitch, Sunny, and Izzy nodded and Pipp hauled Zipp onto her back. She began walking up the stairs of the house towards the first guest bedroom.

Sunny looked at the Hitch and Izzy. "Izzy can take the bed in her own bedroom. Hitch can take the second guest bedroom. I'll sleep on the floor in Izzy room." They both nodded and went off to their rooms. Izzy and Sunny walked into Izzy's bedroom and Sunny laid her sleeping bag from the night before out onto the ground. Everypony had silently agreed that it was time for bed at this point. Sunny was sure that Pipp was already asleep. Izzy walked into the bathroom and levitated a toothbrush with her magic towards her.

Sunny looked around Izzy's room. A piece of paper on the table caught her eye. She walked over to it and grabbed it with a forehoof. "Is this really the same letter I made with my father?" Sunny asked as the memories all came rushing back into her head.

Izzy walked out of the bathroom while saying. "I think so. I don't know how many lanterns with hoof made letters come floating by in Bridlewood." A smile spread itself across Sunny's face.

"I could do just fine without the sarcasm Izzy."

Izzy shrugged and flopped down on the bed. Sunny had brought both of their suitcases upstairs but she was rummaging through Izzy's. Izzy jumped up with a start. She yelled, "Hey what are you doing!" She ran over and shut the suitcase but not before Sunny found what she was looking for. Sunny turned the dead matter around in her hooves.

"Where did you find this thing? Where did it come from? How many things can it hold at a time?" Sunny questions spilled forth from her mouth with no end in sight. Izzy snatched the orb back from her and set it on her bedside table.

"Don't touch it Sunny. It could be really dangerous." Izzy said.

"Why not? You touched it?" Sunny said laughing.

Izzy cracked a smile. "You know you really act like a foal sometimes."

Sunny opened the suitcase again. "What are you looking for now?" Izzy said.

Sunny laughed. "I just wanted to see what other things you packed." Sunny's eyes widened and she stopped laughing. Izzy stopped laughing realizing what Sunny just saw. Inside the suitcase, there was a piece of paper with six words messily written on it.

Good Luck In Maretime Bay!

- Geode

"What's this?" Sunny asked. "I thought you left Bridlewood without him knowing? Why would you have this?"

Izzy sighed and took a step towards Sunny. She took the piece of paper and stared at it for a while. " After he realized that I had gone, he sent me a messenger bird with a letter on it. There was a letter that came with this. But I never wanted to see it again because it made me look back on the past. It made me think of things that could never be." Izzy dug around under her bed and pulled out a longer piece of paper. It read...

My dearest Izzy,
I see you have left town. I don't know if
it was because of me but if it was, I want
you to know. The time that I spent with
you was the best time I ever spent. If I'm
being completely honest, My relationship
with Lucky Star has been falling off lately.
I wanted you to know that I think I still love
you. When or if you come back, I hope we
could maybe give it another chance. If you
do not wish to continue a romantic
relationship with me, then I will leave it at
rest. I will probably marry Lucky Star and
that will be that. But please think about it
okay? With this letter, I enclosed a little
extra message for you. I hope all is going
well with the earth ponies.

Best wishes, Geode.

As Sunny finished reading, she could hear Izzy sniffling over her shoulder. Izzy took the paper back and put it back under her bed. "What I don't understand is why." Sunny said as Izzy turned back towards her.

"Why what?"

"Why wouldn't you go for it? He said in his letter that he would break off everything with Lucky Star if you came back. If he really was the stallion of your dreams, then why didn't you come back for him?"

Izzy sighed and said, "By the time I received this letter, I had already fallen for somepony else."

Sunny eyes widened as a smile spread across her face. "You love Hitch don't you?" She yelled while snickering a little bit.

Izzy sighed again. "Yes I do. Why is that so bucking funny to you?"

Sunny stopped laughing and turned to Izzy with a serious look on her face. "Let me just say Izzy, You won't want to wait too long to tell him. He has a lot of mares who would go after him in Maretime Bay. Just make sure not to miss your chance."

Izzy sighed and walked to her bed. Zipp gave me the same advice, she thought as she climbed into the bed. Maybe they have a point.

* * *

The next few days went by perfectly fine. Hitch and Pipp didn't say anything to her so Izzy figured Sunny had kept her word and hadn't told anypony about how she felt. Although Sunny making sure that Hitch was sitting next to Izzy at every meal was not going unnoticed. "Real subtle," Izzy hissed as Sunny grinned.

After a few days, Zipp woke up. She was able to walk around perfectly fine now. They all went down to the crime scene together. The officer there told them that only two can go down at once and that they would be heavily supervised to make sure they didn't tamper with the crime scene at all. Sunny and Zipp decided to go down and look around.

"Find anything big?" Sunny asked while picking around some debris that looked as though it could have come from the statue.

"No. Keep looking."

Zipp was more interested in examining the body of Geode when she suddenly asked, "What do you think made this stab mark?"

Sunny walked over to take a look at the body. "I'm not quite sure."

"Do you think it could have been Queens Chrysalis's horn?"

"Impossible she would have had to turn her head completely upside down for that to work. There's no way she would have been able to get underneath him to make a stab this clean."

"Can changelings do that?"

Sunny thought back to her research on the monsters of ancient Equestria. "I think it could be possible."

The two of them left the crime scene and told the others their theory.

"You know," Pipp started. "There is a huge library in Zephyr Heights. If we could get there, maybe we could find some news on what's going on."

They decided that they would leave tomorrow morning. Just then, They heard a crash and they looked behind them. Three figures stood before them. A minotaur, A changling.

And a pink filly...

Confrontation

They all stood before the trio shocked. Izzy was the first to take action. She began running towards the trio. She was stopped by Sunny pulling on her tail. Izzy turned around and began yelling at Sunny, "They're right here! Let's take care of them now!"

Sunny shook her head. "Izzy! I need you to calm down for a second and think. They found us even though I hid this area. That's something even King Sombra couldn't do when he was trying to return to the Crystal Empire. They must have some incredibly powerful magic on their side if they found us so easily. Look at them Izzy! They look confident. They definitely know something we don't."

Izzy scoffed and looked at Sunny. "Really Sunny? It's just a few troublemakers. We can take care of them."

Sunny pushed Izzy back towards the group. "Izzy! These 'trouble makers' have committed murder and destroyed an entire town! The best thing we can do right now is not engage with them near Bridlewood." The thing that confused Sunny the most though, was that the three villains weren't advancing or even doing anything really. They were just watching the argument between Sunny and Izzy.

Sunny pulled her group into a huddle and began whispering quickly to them. "guys we need to do everything we can to lure these three away from Bridlewood." She got nods from everypony in the group and they walked up to face the villains, who were now slightly laughing, watching them try to formulate a plan.

Before anypony could say anything, Izzy stepped forward and yelled, "LISTEN UP YOU THREE! GET THE BUCK OUT OF HERE BEFORE I STAB YOU ON MY HORN!"

Queen chrysalis let out a laugh and Cozy Glow and Tirek followed suit. Sunny was taken aback by her friend's aggression. When they had first met, Izzy wouldn't harm a fly. But since Geode had died, Sunny had barely even seen her smile.

"Is that what you think we did?" Chrysalis jeered at Izzy. "You unicorns really have a good sense of humor."

Sunny pulled Izzy back again and this time she began trying to turn into an alicorn. She succeeded and flew up towards the sky. She remembered studying another spell from the book of magic that her dad had owned. She concentrated hard and she heard a yell from below. It was Queen Chrysalis. "TIREK! STOP HER!"

They were too late though. A pink magic barrier sprung up between the villains and Bridlewood.

Queen chrysalis ran up to the barrier and began banging on it with one of her forehooves. "Not this Celestia-damn protection spell again!" She yelled as she gave up trying to break through the barrier.

Zipp tilted her head in confusion. "How does she know about that spell?" She asked, turning towards Sunny.

"About a thousand years ago, She and her changelings tried to invade Canterlot. But Princess Mi Amore Cadenza and Shining armor had put up a protection spell to try to stop them. Queen chrysalis had to sneak into Canterlot and trap Princess Mi Amore Cadenza. She took her place and weakened the force field until eventually, her changelings could get through to destroy the city. Twilight and her friends stopped them all just in time though."

Zipp nodded silently when Sunny finished her mini history lesson. "Well, if everything here is protected, we need to find a way back to Maretime Bay. We need to make sure the Unity Crystals are all safe."

Sunny nodded her head. "Yeah," She said. "The Unity Crystals are probably already casting some sort of protection spell but we should probably make sure."

"But how?" Izzy asked. "Those three are waiting right outside the barrier and they'll probably attack us if we leave it. So unless somepony just magically knows how to teleport, I think we're kind of stuck here."

"Actually Izzy," Sunny started. "Twilight used to teleport all over the place. She detailed the big parts in her spellbook. What you have to do, is concentrate incredibly hard on your magic and have a clear picture in your mind of where you are teleporting to. She warned that if a unicorn isn't used to doing it though, they will probably be really tired out. I can try it if we all agree."

Pipp stepped back. "Guys, This is crazy! What if we end up miles away from anywhere! We could be killed!"

Zipp wrapped a wing reassuringly around her sister. "Don't worry Pipp. If we can trust Sunny, then we can trust that she knows what she's doing."

They all went back to Izzy's house to get ready. All of the ponies gathered around in a circle. Hitch wrapped his left forehoof around Sunny's right forehoof. Izzy did the same with Sunny's left forehoof. Zipp took Izzy's other hoof and Pipps hoof. Pipp closed the circle by connecting hooves with Hitch. They all watched as Sunny closed her eyes and her horn began to glow.

Suddenly, they began to feel strange as golden magic enveloped them. With a flash of light, They were teleported out of Izzy's house and when they opened their eyes, they were in the field about two miles from Maretime Bay.

Hitch looked around and then looked to Sunny. "Why are we here? I thought you were going to teleport us to the brighthouse."

Sunny shook her head. "What if the brighthouse was damaged or still under attack. I couldn't risk throwing us from one dangerous situation right into another one."

They all began to walk in the direction of Maretime bay. Everypony was silent. Zipp tapped Sunny on her shoulder. "Hey Sunny. Something's messing with my head right now."

Sunny turned to look at her friend while they both continued walking. "What's up Zipp. Is something wrong?"

Zipp nodded and said, "I was thinking. Do you remember what Queen Chrysalis's horn looked like? It was all jagged and rough looking right?" Sunny nodded while Zipp continued. "Then there's no way that she could have used her horn as a murder weapon."

A look of confusion spread across Sunny's face. "What makes you say that?"

Zipp continued. "Do you remember the stab wound? It was a clean cut. Straight through. If Queen Chrysalis used her horn, the wound would have looked all rough and messed up. The wound almost looked like a knife or a sword of some sort."

After Zipp finished talking, Sunny was silent for a few moments. Zipp thought she was just thinking this thought over. Sunny turned to Zipp and nodded. "I think you're right. But what else could have killed him? There hasn't been medieval weaponry in Equestria for thousands of moons."

Zipp nodded. "You're right. I don't think I've ever even seen a sword outside of pictures. I'll keep thinking about it but one thing's for sure. It wasn't chrysalis's horn. We've figured that much out at least."

Sunny nodded and the walk continued in silence until they reached Maretime Bay. Or rather, what was left of it.

The changelings had gone. Chrysalis is probably using them to try to break into Bridlewood, Sunny thought. There was charred wreckage everywhere. There were some apartment buildings and houses on the west side of town that hadn't been touched. Sunny figured the changelings just hadn't gotten there yet.

They heard a loud noise coming from the beach. Sunny grabbed a stick and ran over towards the noise. the other ponies followed her and they all cautiously approached the beach. They leapt down onto the beach from a small cliff with Sunny in front brandishing the stick. Sunny's eyes widened when she saw what was in front of her.

The citizens of Maretime Bay were all standing around seven coffins. There were also seven holes dug deep into the sand. Sunny rushed over yelling. "Oh my celestia! What happened here?" The funeral director said nothing but instead gestured to the caskets. Sunny walked over and opened one. What she saw inside, was a dead pony with one leg missing and a dent in his head. She opened the next five and saw very similar things. Most of the corpses had slight burn marks. Sunny remembered the fire she had seen coming from the town as she and her friends ran.

When Sunny opened the last coffin, She gasped. Unlike the other six, she could identify this body. The vast majority of her fur was burned off. Her skin had melted to her bones and she was almost unrecognizable. But the one thing that remained was her cutie mark...

A ring of tulips.

Sunny fell back on her haunches and found it harder to breathe. It wasn't like she was close to Posey but it seemed harder to see a dead body when you knew the pony who died. She apologized to everypony for interrupting the funeral and started walking off the beach. She turned back and gestured for her friends to follow.

"Who died?" Hitch asked Sunny.

"P-P-Posey" Sunny stuttered out with some difficulty.

Hitch looked taken aback at her words. They all walked in silence towards the brighthouse which was somehow still standing. They all went upstairs towards the crystals. The crystals were safe, though they looked strange. They were no longer shimmering bright.

"I think the crystals are trying to protect themselves," Zipp said. "But at least they're safe here."

"So what are we supposed to do now?" Pipp asked turning to her sister.

Zipp shrugged and looked towards Sunny who shrugged as well. "I'm sorry everypony," Sunny started. "I have no idea what we need to do here."

"Well let's think about the situation," Hitch began. "We are up against three powerful villains who almost certainly want us dead, We have no idea what kinds of powers they have on their side, and we have absolutely no leads on where to go from here. Sounds really promising to me."

"You know we could do without the sarcasm right now Hitch!" Pipp said almost yelling.

Suddenly the crystals grew incredibly bright. They were brighter than they had been before, almost blinding. They began spinning and suddenly, an image of a purple alicorn had appeared in front of them. Of course, this had happened before but this one looked different. It actually looked alive.

"Everypony," Twilight said in a loud voice. "Believe me when I tell you that I have to keep this short. If you are seeing this message, then recent events are just as I feared one thousand years ago. Be forewarned, this will be the hardest battle you ever attempt. I think your best idea is to try to turn them against each other." The alicorn in the prisbeam energy paused almost as if it was contemplating something. After a minute or two, she opened her mouth and said, "Screaming Caverns."

The alicorn disappeared almost as suddenly as she had appeared and Sunny looked towards her friends. "What does she mean by Screaming Caverns?" She asked.

Pipp raised a hoof eagerly. "I know where the screaming caverns are!" She yelled. "Or, at least I think I do."

Zipp raised an eyebrow at her sister. "Really Pipp? I know where almost everything is here. There isn't any place called the screaming caverns."

"Not if you don't look hard enough." Pipp started. "Do you remember all the times I went missing?"

Zipp nodded. "Yeah you did it like every week for about three months. Why?"

Pipp nodded excitedly. "Well you see, one time when I was a filly, I tried getting out of Zephyr Heights. I remember it had been a long day and I just wanted to go for a walk around the rim of the mountaintop. I remember, before the guards got to me, I saw a cave at the base of the mountain."

Zipp nodded. "Did you ever go inside it?" She asked.

Pipp shook her head. "No when I started sneaking out, I was going looking for it. I thought it would be something fun to livestream. But when I got back to where I had seen it, it was gone. I tried looking for it like every week but eventually I just gave up."

"That's crazy!" Sunny said. "A cave can't just disappear! Where would it have even gone?"

Pipp shrugged. "I don't know but I was definitely checking in the right spot."

Zipp was now very silent. Just by catching a glimpse of her concentrating face, you could tell she was thinking about something. "I think I have an idea." She said. "But it's a bit of a stretch."

"Well any idea is a good idea at this point." Izzy said. She and Hitch were listening while inspecting the crystals, which had now gone back to their dimmer lighting.

"What if," Zipp started. "The cave really did move."

Sunny actually laughed a little. "Come on Zipp! You and I both know that's impossible."

Zipp nodded. "That's what I was thinking. But what if it wasn't impossible?"

Sunny was very clearly confused. "What do you mean by that?" She asked.

"Well, what if nopony was ever supposed to see that cave. Maybe there's something in that cave that nopony should know about. So maybe when Pipp saw the cave, something intervened to move it. Magically."

"Zipp that's crazy talk!" Pipp said. "This happened multiple moons ago. This was way before magic came back. It was way before we even met Sunny and Izzy! There's no way the cave could have magically moved."

Zipp laughed. "I'm not talking about normal pony magic! I was talking about something a lot more powerful." Sunny and Pipp looked at each other, clearly confused. Zipp sighed and said, "I was talking about alicorn magic."

Sunny shook her head. She sighed and said, "Zipp the only alicorn that would have been alive at that time was Opaline! She already told us that Twilight took her magic from her and put it in the crystals along with everypony else's!"

Zipp nodded. "Yes. But do you really think that Twilight put her own magic into the crystals? After the creation of the crystals, she ruled the kingdom for about fifty moons."

Sunny was confused. She looked at Zipp and said, "Yes and then she went missing. One pony named Wild Strikes was accused of murdering her!"

Zipp nodded and said, "Yes. But what if there was more to the story! You know all about ancient equestria! Do you know anything about the trial."

Sunny's eyes widened. She ran downstairs and grabbed a big book titled "The Trial Of Wild Strikes" As she came back up the stairs to the crystal room, she was saying, "I'm so glad you're finally taking an interest in ancient Equestrian history. I keep telling everypony it's all true but they always say something's wrong or that it doesn't line up with something they learned in those fake history classes! I can't wait to show you everything."

Zipp sighed and laughed a little. She knew she should have known what she was getting into asking Sunny about the times of ancient Equestria.

They all began looking through the book Sunny had brought up. It turns out, it was more of a photo album with small captions, but of course Sunny could explain every single little detail of what was happening in each photo.

About a quarter of the way through the book, Zipp stopped Sunny. "While it's cool that you know all of this stuff, just looking through all of the pictures isn't getting us anywhere. Can you tell us the important parts about the trial? The prosecutor? The plea? The verdict?

Sunny gave a small sigh and closed the book. "The prosecutor was A mare named Apple Bloom. She was very old but she was good friends with Twilight. Wild pleaded not guilty and his lawyer was a blue pony with a really weird looking mane named Pheonix Wright. The trial only took two days. That's because after the first day, Apple Bloom was murdered in her sleep. The jury seemed to think that Wild did it to try to escape the trial for Twilight's murder and he was convicted."

"Aha!" Zipp yelled, getting a small jump of surprise from Pipp. Zipp continued talking, ignoring the glare her sister was giving her. "There was never any real evidence that he killed Twilight was there? That means that he could very well be innocent."

Sunny thought about it for a minute and then said, "You may be right, but it doesn't matter anyways, Wild Strikes is long dead." Sunny thought for another moment and then came to a realization. "Are you suggesting that Twilight might be alive!?"

Zipp nodded and smiled. "What if Twilight is still alive and she's just hiding somewhere? It seems to make sense."

"Except for one part Zipp!" Izzy said, jumping into the conversation."Why would Twilight go into hiding for no reason and let another innocent pony take the blame for her death? She's the princess of friendship. That doesn't sound very friendly to me."

"Actually Izzy," Sunny started. "I think there would be a reason for Twilight to go into hiding." Sunny flipped to the middle of the book, getting a small groan from Zipp. Sunny ignored her and continued flipping until she found the picture she was looking for. "If you look at this piece of 'evidence' it says that Wild Strikes was a part of a secret organization that was trying to overthrow the princess. If you look at the evidence, it is very clearly fake. The judge even ruled it as fake. But the organization was very real. They were all caught and captured about two moons later. They were all thrown into prison for treason."

"But why would anypony want to overthrow the princess?" Izzy asked.

Sunny smiled. "Maybe a certain princess took away their magic and they were getting restless. It all makes perfect sense now! Twilight would have to get away from Equestria if her life was actually in danger!" Sunny got up and started walking towards the door.

"Wait! Where are you going?" Zipp asked, standing.

"I'm gonna go find that cave!" Sunny replied.

"Now hold on a second!" Hitch was now intervening in the conversation. "This is all just wild speculation! Come on Sunny! Come to your senses. You and I both know that Twilight Sparkle is dead! There is no screaming cavern! There is no secret! She's dead! And I don't know about you, but I don't want to be too!"

Sunny looked at Hitch with sadness growing in her eyes. "Listen Hitch! Alicorns don't die! We have some pretty solid evidence that she wasn't murdered! So she must be alive somewhere!"

Hitch sighed and eventually nodded. They both looked to the others, who also nodded in agreement. They all went downstairs. They packed some saddlebags with food, drinks, and crafting supplies (in case Izzy was ever back to normal.)

They all walked outside. And once again saw the trio of villains standing right in front of the brighthouse...

Zipp gulped. "Anyone else getting deja vu?"

fight or flight

"Teleportation? Is that the best you could do?" Chrysalis was taunting Sunny and the other two were laughing behind her. "Let me tell you a little story. Twilight and her friends were a pain in our sides. We thought we would be able to finish what we started when we were returned from stone. Lo and behold, Canterlot and Ponyville are no more! Now what we want is to rule the entirety of Equestria. But there are still five ponies in our way. Five ponies who thought they could stop us by casting a protection bubble around that town in the forest."

"WHAT DID YOU DO TO BRIDLEWOOD?" Izzy yelled with a fire in her eyes that wasn't there about five minutes ago.

"Oh don't worry small one." Chrysalis said with a mocking voice. "We haven't done anything yet. My changelings are working to break the barrier as we speak. They did it to canterlot's barrier. What's different about this one? But I'll tell you what. How about we tell you what's going to happen next." By this point chrysalis was speaking to them as if they were children. "Tirek is going to drain all of the magic from your bodies. That includes your pitiful alicorn magic Sunny. Then, while you're weak, I will feed off all of the love in your bodies. But Cozy Glow gets the best part. You see, Twilight and her friends stole a part of Cozy Glow's childhood by forcing her to spend time in Tartarus. But Twilight and her friends aren't here anymore. So instead, Cozy Glow is going to tear you five limb from limb until finally killing you all off, leaving us free to rule Equestria!"

Cozy Glow stepped forward and stomped at the ground twice with her hooves. The ground shook slightly and a sword began to rise from the depths of the ground. The sword was black as night and about twice the size of the filly. As Cozy Glow grabbed it with her mouth, the sword shrank down to be more easily usable by her.

"You see ponies," Cozy Glow said. "While I spent time in Tartarus, I heard the voice of an entity. A demon if you will. And he told me that he would aid me one day if I would pledge allegiance to him. I figured things couldn't get worse than they already were, so I agreed. Now, one thousand moons later, he has given me this artifact as a sign of his help. And now is the best part. I am going to rip you all apart and take my revenge!"

They heard a scream from above and saw a white pegasus being held by Tirek. As they were talking, they didn't realize Zipp had been trying to sneak attack them. Apparently Tirek noticed though. Cozy Glow smiled. "It seems we even have a volunteer!" Tirek began to open his mouth to drain Zipp of all her magic when he suddenly dropped her. When they looked at his hand, there were many kitchen knives sticking out of it. Izzy had used her levitation magic to stab tirek with the knives.

Cozy Glow let out a yell of rage and charged at the group, followed closely by chrysalis and the, now recovered, Tirek. Zipp got back up and flew behind the trio. She bucked tirek in the head and flew downwards at a velocity fast enough to knock Chrysalis down by knocking into her.

Cozy Glow however, would not go down so easily. Zipp was still fighting on the ground with Queen Chrysalis and Tirek was out cold. Cozy Glow took advantage of the distraction and ran forward brandishing the sword in front of her. She lunged and sliced the sword along Hitch's left front leg. Hitch yelped and fell to the ground.

Izzy turned around and bucked Cozy Glow directly in the face. The small filly was thrown back about ten feet from the force of the buck. Had Izzy been able to fully build up the adrenaline of her rage, she would have easily dealt a lethal blow to the small filly. Izzy went over to Hitch, who was bleeding heavily. The sword had cut him very deep and they would need to get this bandaged up soon.

Izzy bent down over him and began inspecting the wound. Pipp watched from the other side as Sunny went to help Zipp overpower Queen Chrysalis.

Hitch's vision was fading in and out from the pain. It was beginning to be harder for him to realize what was going on. All he could feel was the immense pain in his leg. He saw Izzy come over and winced in pain as she picked up his leg. But the next thing he saw, he would never forget.

His vision was fading more and it got to the point where he couldn't make out specific details. just shapes and colors. He could see Izzy very clearly because she was so close. He saw something behind her though. It seemed that in the distraction of Hitch being cut by Cozy Glow and Zipp and Sunny fighting with Queen Chrysalis, nopony had noticed Tirek quietly wincing as he pulled the kitchen knives from his hands.

It was what Hitch could see and hear that made this moment one he would never forget. He could hear Izzy reassuring him. "It's okay Hitch. I think I got one of them. I think we're gonna be alright." He heard a scream. He saw a sword push its way through Izzy's chest and he saw her being lifted into the air by the sword still going through her body. He saw a Minotaur laughing as he raised the sword above his head.

He felt a splash of blood cover his face and coat. The mare who was now impaled on the sword was pulled off the sword and dropped on the ground. He then heard sounds from behind him. He remembered that Pipp was right behind him and had probably seen the whole thing as well. He heard the sound of Queen Chrysalis's laugh. He could tell from the sounds that she was beating both Sunny and Zipp. He watched as the Minotaur opened his mouth. He saw what looked like a glowing vapor being sucked out of Izzy and into his mouth.

He dragged himself over to the unicorn, now barely breathing, on the ground about five feet away from him. He began desperately trying to cover the wound but to no avail. He heard squeaks of pain from Izzy below him. He felt her put one hoof to his head. He heard her whispers. "Hitch. It's okay."

Hitch couldn't bear to hear her sound so defeated. Hitch saw and heard one more thing before he fainted.

He saw a single tear running down Izzy's cheek. And as he heard the mare's last words, he could barely breath.

"Hitch..."

"I love you."

The unicorn's hoof fell to her side and her breathing slowed until it eventually stopped. Hitch's brain was working overtime comprehending everything that had just happened. Eventually, the pain in his leg caused him to black out. And he was unsure if he would ever wake up again.

* * *

"Look everypony! Hitch is waking up!"

Hitch could hear Sunny calling everypony over to come check on him. They were glad he was alive. But he wasn't. It should have been me! His thoughts kept shouting at him. He assured his friends that he was okay and nodded at their questions but he wasn't even really hearing them. If Izzy wasn't there, Tirek would have stabbed me.

Hitch's guilt was sticking with him. He never wanted to get out of bed or even talk to anypony ever again. Then, a thought occurred to him and he looked up at Sunny. "What happened with Tirek, Cozy Glow, and Chrysalis?" He asked. He realized there was almost no way that they defeated them. They were far too powerful.

"Well, believe it or not, they retreated. They grabbed Cozy Glow and ran off. Bad news, I think they were heading in the direction of Zephyr Heights."

Hitch sat upright. "Really? We need to get there now!"

Zipp shook her head. "No. We have more pressing matters at hand. Pipp warned mom to completely evacuate the entire city. All of the pegasi are on a mass migration to Bridlewood."

The name Bridlewood stung Hitch once again. Anything relating to Izzy was too much for him to bear. "What matters could possibly be more important than saving an entire city of ponies?"

"This." Zipp tossed something on the bed with Hitch. It was the dead matter.

"Where did you get this?"Hitch asked.

"Izzy packed it when we teleported here. She thought it would be useful. I remember when I was in there, it didn't even seem like I existed. I also didn't feel any pain or blood loss or really anything. It was almost like some sort of stasis chamber. Sunny said that back in the days of ancient equestria, there were zebras who knew how to connect with the afterlife. They know how to brew a very special potion. One that can reunite one's soul with one's body. So we put Izzy's body in here to make sure it doesn't decay or lose too much needed blood."

"Wait," Hitch said. "So let me get this straight. We're going off the hope that some race that no one has seen in forever still knows how to brew a potion to perform necromancy?"

Zipp smiled a little. "Yeah that's about right. Sounds pretty morbid when you put it like that."

Hitch stood up and realized that his leg had been bandaged up and was feeling a lot better. "Listen. If there's any way we could bring Izzy back, then I will take any risks necessary. Sunny, teleport us there."

Sunny shrank back and said, "Well, that's the thing. You aren't going to the old zebra town."

Hitch stood taller as he fixed his posture. "What do you mean?"

Sunny looked at him and said, "Well, you see, we all realized that we wouldn't be able to help Izzy if we brought her back to life. She would bleed out almost immediately. Pipp said she saw the wound. She had a giant hole through her chest and-"

"Spare me the details please and get to the point." Hitch said. He didn't want to hear anything more about Izzy's death.

"Zipp and Pipp are going to start the journey to the Zebra land. You and I are going to Izzy's house to try to get her parents to help heal her." Sunny looked at Hitch as if he were going to yell about wanting to stay in a group or something. But Hitch just nodded slightly and grabbed hooves with Sunny. Sunny nodded at them and they walked out of the room.

Here we go, Hitch thought as Sunny's horn glowed. Suddenly, they were back right outside Bridlewood Forest. It was just as Queen Chrysalis had said. There were changelings over top ramming themselves into the barrier. It seemed Sunny's magic was doing perfectly fine on its own though. They hadn't even made a dent.

They began walking towards La Villa Izzy. When they got there, Sunny began looking for a saddlebag to hold the dead matter easily. Hitch, meanwhile, was just looking around at everything in the house. He began whispering to himself, "Don't worry Izzy. You'll be back home before you know it."

"What was that Hitch?" Sunny asked him, now appearing right behind him.

Hitch blushed. "Nothing!" He then caught sight of something behind Sunny's back. "What do you have there?" He asked her.

Sunny held up the item in her hooves. A saddlebag. It was purple. And the clasp was a blue heart with a button in the middle and three sewing pins on the right side.

"You miss her don't you?" Sunny asked Hitch. Hitch nodded slightly.

"Every time I think of her, I can only think about how it should have been me. Tirek would have stabbed me had Izzy not been there. Now the best mare in the world is dead."

"Now hang on a second Hitch! You don't know that Tirek would have stabbed you. It could have been anypony." Sunny's attempts to comfort him weren't working and she could see it. She decided to try a different approach. "She had feelings for you, you know."

Hitch nodded slightly, a tear now falling from his eye. "Yeah," he said. "I know. Those were her last words. I loved her too. But now it's too late."

Izzy last words were still echoing in his head. Her small whispers confessing her love. His biggest regret was that he had never had the courage to ask her out before.

"Maybe not!" Sunny said from his side. "Did you forget why we're even here! We're trying to bring her back. Maybe things can work out in the end."

Hitch said nothing. He stood absolutely still. He then walked over to the door and walked out. Sunny followed and they headed in the direction of the Moonbow house. They saw many things as they walked around. The biggest being that Alphabittle had closed the tea house. Izzy had told them that even in the worst weather, Alphabittle always kept the tea house open.

They finally reached a house in a tree at the end of the forest. Hitch and Sunny both paused upon seeing the sign. "Moonbow Medical"

"Hitch. It's going to be alright. She's their own daughter."

Hitch sighed and nodded. Together, he and Sunny both raised their hooves and knocked.

Author's Note

This chapter actually hurts to write. I love Izzy's character so much that killing her off was horrible. But the real question is, will she live or die permanently?

P.S. I took a little bit of inspiration for her death from Eddie's death scene in IT chapter 2. If you haven't seen it, go look it up on youtube and you'll understand the similarity.

repossession

Author's Note

Sorry it took me so long to make this chapter. I was really busy and then I took a weekend off for easter and it took me a while to get back to this. But don't worry, I made up for it with a great chapter

repossession

The smoke-like creature roared with laughter.

Pipp cowered in the corner, unable to look the creature in the face. Sunny, Hitch, and Zipp watched, horrified, unable to do anything.

* * *
Forty-five minutes earlier...

Zipp and the others rushed back into the zebra village. She presented the dead matter to the zebras and said, "Here is the dead body."

The head zebra that they had spoken to earlier grew very confused. "Forgive me pony, but I cannot animate a ball with a soul. Animating inanimate objects is a very powerful magic that none of us possess. The only one known to have completed such a feat was the Ancient Chaos Lord of Old."

Zipp shook her head. "No! This is more of a storage container." Zipp pressed the button to lay Izzy's corpse out on the ground. "This is the one we need to revive."

The zebra looked at the corpse and nodded. She gestured for them to follow her as they walked towards the fountain in the center of the town.

The fountain was beautiful. It was a pool of water with a tower rising from the center. A waterfall was constantly pouring from the top of the tower. The base was lined with beautiful gemstones of green, red, and blue.

The zebra walked up to one of the gemstones and pushed down on it, revealing it to be a secret button. The waterfall stopped. The tower in the middle lowered down into the middle of the fountain until the entire thing was completely level. When the tower in the middle was level, the entire fountain began to sink into the ground. It went down about two feet and slid into a big compartment to the side, revealing stairs going into a very deep and dark hole.

The zebra went inside a nearby house and returned with a lantern. They all silently followed her down the stairs. Hitch clutched the dead matter tightly under his right hoof. When they reached the bottom, there was just an empty room with a round stone near one of the walls.

The zebra walked over to the stone and stood in front of it. "Alright ponies, listen up. This chamber is a very sacred place and you must fulfill one requirement before going in."

Sunny nodded. "Yes ma'am. What do we have to do?"

The zebra's expression looked grim. She looked at the ponies and said, "Nothing unholy can happen in this chamber without severe consequences. The gods and goddesses watch this place very carefully. To be able to enter, you must take an oath by blood."

The zebra pointed at the stone. She withdrew a dagger from her cloak and held it up. "Who's first?" She asked them. Everypony backed off, scared by the dagger. Hitch however, stepped forward, his expression never changing. "You must place your blood upon the stone when it is drawn. Be aware though, that it takes more than just a drop."

Hitch nodded and grabbed the dagger. He set the dead matter down at his side and ran the dagger a short ways along his right leg. He pressed his leg to the stone and the blood stained it. They all watched as the blood seemed to soak into the stone like a sponge. Hitch saw the stone move aside and he walked through into the next chamber. However, the other ponies did not see the stone move because they had not given their oaths. It looked to them as if he had just passed through solid rock.

Pipp began panicking. Her breathing became heavy and Sunny stepped forwards next. She did the same as Hitch, letting out a small squeal of pain as she cut herself. She too, passed through the stone and Zipp walked forwards next. She also squeaked a little as she cut herself. She walked through the stone leaving only Pipp and the Zebra outside. Pipp backed away from the dagger until she was back against the wall.

The zebra approached her with a sympathetic expression. Pipp was beginning to break into tears. "Listen little one, you do not have to follow in the path of your friends if you do not wish to."

Pipp let a few more tears fall and shook her head slowly. "No." She said, her voice still choked with tears she was trying her best to hold back. "I have to follow them. For Izzy's sake."

The zebra nodded slowly and held the dagger out to Pipp. Pipp took the dagger, her hooves shaking and held it up to her right leg. She yelped as she cut herself and walked over to the stone. Finally, she walked through the stone and the zebra did the same as all of them and followed.

The stone had appeared to roll back as they all stepped inside. They were all in pitch blackness. Then, one by one, red flames sparked up magically from candles that they could now see lined the room's walls. The zebra looked at Hitch and nodded. Hitch used the dead matter to lay Izzy's body out in the middle of the floor.

The room was circular and there were hieroglyphics lining the floor. As the light grew even brighter, they could see that Hitch had placed Izzy in the middle of a small circle in the middle of the room. Suddenly, the room began to glow green.

It started with the candles. Their flames becoming a very bright green. The hieroglyphics began to glow green as well. Lines of green glow began to spill from the hieroglyphics and branched off at sharp angles all around the room. They all met, however, right in the middle of the room. Finally, the area that Izzy was laid in was glowing the brightest.

The ponies began to feel dizzy. Green mist was now filling the room as the zebra was sitting on the floor with her eyes closed. Suddenly, they saw something coming out of the mist. A translucent figure was walking through the mist towards the dead body. Hitch smiled because he recognized the spirit. It had a beautiful purple coat and an amazing blue mane.

The zebra began to speak, "Hear our calls spirit and return thyself to thy mortal body!"

The spirit looked around frowning at all of the ponies in the room. "What's happening! Why isn't she coming back!" Sunny yelled towards the zebra.

"She is regaining her memory of you all. If she cares for you, she will have the will to return." The zebra turned to face the ghost. "Spirit! Dost thou have care enough to return to this mortal plane?"

The ghost of Izzy looked around the room, silent. She frowned as she looked at each of the ponies. Her eyes met Hitch's and she smiled. And nodded. She walked forward toward the body, her spirit becoming clearer the closer she got. She reached out to touch the body when she was jerked back by an unseen force.

"What's happening to her?" Hitch yelled.

"I don't know!" The zebra yelled back. "I feel a disturbance in the spiritual connection! There's another spirit here!"

"Is that even possible?" Pipp asked, still clutching a hoof to her leg where she was cut.

"It shouldn't be!" Yelled the zebra. "I am sensing a very dark magic!"

They continued to look through the mist at Izzy. Her spirit was now lying, unmoving, on the ground. Then, they saw a creature of purple smoke going towards the body.

The smoke-like creature roared with laughter.

Pipp cowered in the corner, unable to look the creature in the face. Sunny, Hitch, and Zipp watched, horrified, unable to do anything.

The creature made contact with Izzy body and the entire room lit up with a flash of light, temporarily blinding everypony in the room. When they woke up, the room was no longer lit up green. The only light entering the room was from the now open stone that they came into the room through.

They all looked horrified at Izzy body, laying on the floor the same as it was when they had brought it here. Hitch approached it slowly and turned the body to lay on its back.

Suddenly, Izzy jumped up and threw Hitch onto his back. She began choking him as he vainly tried to push her hooves away from his throat. His vision began to grow hazy but he saw something strange. Izzy's eyes were not their usual beautiful crimson but were instead, a deep red with purple smoke trailing from the back of them.

Hitch fainted, losing his breath but before he could be completely killed, Sunny jumped towards Izzy, knocking her off of Hitch. They both rolled around on the floor and Izzy got up quickly.

She ran out of the door and up the staircase back towards the village.

"After her!" Zipp yelled, her and Pipp running out the door. Sunny stayed behind attempting to wake Hitch up. Hitch came to quickly and jumped up yelling.

"That was not Izzy! Her eyes! They aren't right! She would never do that!"

"It's okay Hitch," Sunny said. "We'll figure out what happened to Izzy in due time but first we need to-"

Sunny was interrupted by loud sounds from above. Crashing, screaming, and crying.

The zebra, Sunny, and Hitch immediately ran up the stairs. They gasped when they caught sight of what was before them. Izzy was destroying everything in the village with lasers she was shooting from her horn.

Hitch shot a quick glance at Sunny, "Told you unicorns had lasers."

Sunny glared at him. "Not the time!"

They ran towards Izzy and tackled her to the ground. She fought back raising her head from the ground and letting out a loud roar. "Careful!" the zebra next to them yelled. "If she is killed there will be no way to bring her spirit back to her body."
Suddenly, as the others were fighting with Izzy and Zipp was attempting to use her wings to put out the fire, the other zebra surrounded the head zebra with their spears in hoof.

Shouts of "We trusted you!" and "You caused this" filled the air. through all of the commotion, a small scream was heard coming from inside one of the collapsing houses. Zipp flew forward and crashed through the window of the house. Another scream was heard from inside one of the bedrooms of the house.

Zipp saw that burning debris had bushed itself against the door trapping the screamer inside. Zipp flew up above the debris and bucked at the top of the door until a small hole was created. She looked through to see a small zebra filly. The filly looked at her with terrified eyes. "It's okay! I'm going to get you out of here!" Zipp continued bucking at the door until there was a hole about the size of the filly.

Zipp put her forehooves through the hole. "Come on! Jump up to me and I'll carry you to safety!" The filly ran up to Zipp and started trying to jump but couldn't get herself high enough. Suddenly, a small cracking noise was heard from above. The roof above the filly dropped down.

The filly jumped out of the way but her right back leg wasn't so lucky. A sickening snapping sound was heard followed by an ear splitting shriek from the filly. Zipp gasped and turned to get out of the house. More pieces of the roof fell down, almost hitting Zipp but she escaped through the window she entered through.

Inside the house, the filly's leg was beginning to catch fire because of the burning piece of debris she was still trapped under. Soon, she saw a white pegasus flying in through the roof of the room. Zipp quickly bucked the piece of debris off of the filly, suffering a short burn. She picked the filly up and flew her outside of the house laying her down on the ground.

"It's okay." Zipp whispered. "Everything will be okay now."

"Is it over?" The filly asked.

Meanwhile, Izzy was pinned on the ground by Hitch. She was only able to move her head as Hitch was stepping on each of her hooves. She looked over and saw a white pegasus setting down a zebra filly. She pushed her head far enough to aim her horn and shot a single laser beam.

The filly's scream was cut short as she was turned to dust in front of everypony's eyes. Sunny and Hitch ran over to Zipp who was in shock over what had just occurred. Izzy took this chance to make an escape into the woods.

The zebras had lost interest in trying to attack the leader and were instead turning their attention to the ponies gathered around the pile of dust and blood. "My daughter!" one of them yelled dropping to their knees in front of the pile. The other zebras were beginning to approach them, spears at the ready.

The head zebra ran past them and yelled, "Follow me!" To the rest of the group. They all ran towards the forest.

Hitch stopped right before they entered the forest. "Wait a second!" He yelled. "So we're just gonna run into the same place as the pony-vaporizing monster!"

Sunny nodded. "Sounds about right."

Off To The West

"She's gone completely crazy if you ask me."

Zipp sighed. Pipp had been complaining ever since they left the lighthouse. She turned around and said, "Well no one asked you Pipp! So would you please stop whining and give me the map!"

Pipp scoffed. "What difference will it make? We're completely lost!"

As Pipp was saying this, They got to the top of a hill they were walking on. Ahead of them was a barrier of trees with one pathway through it. Zipp looked back at her sister and smirked. "Has the princess suddenly lost her voice?" Sunny had told them to go west until they found a barrier of trees with a path through it. That was the entryway to the "Undiscovered West."

Pipp was at a loss for words. Finally, she said, "I thought this place would have been unrecognizable like the rest of ancient equestria! Are we going to go in?"

Zipp rolled her eyes. "Pipp we traveled all the way across equestria to get here and one of our friend's lives is depending on us. Of course we're gonna go in!"

Pipp glared at her sister. "Well there was no need for the sarcasm. I personally think we should come up with a plan for if the zebras are hostile when we get there."

Zipp rolled her eyes again. "Sunny said the zebras were peaceful in ancient equestria. We should be fine. Let's go."

"A thousand years is a long time to change." Pipp mumbled to herself as they walked towards the forest.

* * *

After hours of traveling to the west, they finally came upon a forest. They wandered through it for hours. They were not just going west now. Sunny had told them about a zebra named Zecora. Zecora had been from this very forest. Finally, as the barely visible sun was setting over the horizon, they saw a town with houses made of what looked like birchwood. They walked into the town and saw nopony.

"Oh! Look at that! Nopony is even here! I knew this was a waste of time!" Pipp was getting more and more negative as they continued to look through the village. They finally stopped in the middle of the village near a bunch of trees. "Well? What now Zipp?"

Zipp sighed. "I guess we have to go back to Sunny and tell her the bad news."

As Zipp was saying this, They saw blurs of black and white as strange striped ponies dropped from the trees behind them. They surrounded them and put spears up to their bodies. This was an ambush. They must have seen them coming from far away.

"Told you!" Pipp said as the zebras pushed their spears closer to their bodies.

* * *

The blue mare opened the door and glared at the two ponies she saw. "What! Did one of you get hurt already! You better not have brought that disappointment back here. I can't believe it was even possible to give birth to such a bi-"

She was cut off by Hitch smacking her in her head. Not very hard but still with enough force to get her to stop talking. "Listen!" He yelled at her. "She's the reason we're here!" Hitch took the dead matter from the saddlebag Sunny was wearing. The blue mare backed off as if it were some sort of weapon. Hitch pressed the button and expelled the dead corpse from the sphere. It wasn't messy or anything. At this point, it was a unicorn with a hole through her chest and a red stained coat.

The mare looked at the body with unchanging eyes. "Oh good." She said. "It's dead. There's one less thorn in my side."

Hitch's jaw dropped along with Sunny's. "WHAT!" Hitch opened his mouth to start yelling before Sunny ccould have any chance to react to the words that just came out of this mare's mouth. "THAT'S YOUR BUCKING DAUGHTER!"

"Not anymore!" The mare said with a smile, eliciting a growl from Hitch as he looked about ready to charge. He didn't have to though. What came next would shatter the mare's heart forever. And nopony would need to lay a single blow.

The shouting had drawn the red stallion out of the house. He began to speak, "Now what's all this shouting abo-" He was cut off by his own gasp. Seeing his own daughter on the ground dead, he had no words. He ran over to the body and bent down over it. He could do nothing but grab hold of her in a hug and cry.

He looked over to the mare on the doorstep, watching over him with disapproving eyes. The mare scoffed at him. "I don't see how you could be so sad about this. That thing was just a disappointment. I swear! I gave her food for eighteen years and she walks out on me the second she gets the chance. Some ponies are so ungratefu-"

"SHUT THE BUCK UP!"

Sunny looked up. She thought it was Hitch yelling but it turns out that it was Izzy's father. He stood up, tears still in his eyes and walked over to the unicorn on the doorstep. "Have you ever stopped to think that maybe you were the reason she left?"

The mare was taken aback as she scrambled for something to say. "How dare you!" She yelled back. "I was nothing but nice to this pony and she turned her back on me! And on you!"

"No," the stallion said. "I think you turned your back on her."

"That's insanity! I gave her the world and she threw it all away!"

"No Ocean! You isolated her from this family over a small kiss!"

This was the first time Sunny had actually heard any names in this family. She knew Izzy's but she had not known her parents' names. Ocean. Sunny turned the name over in her head. She had lived near the ocean her whole life. How could somepony so cruel hold the same name as something so pure? She wondered to herself as the argument continued.

Hitch meanwhile, snuck over and put Izzy's body back into the dead matter. It was losing more blood fast.

"I thought you were supposed to be on my side!" Ocean shouted at the stallion. "Through thick and thin! You promised me! In sickness and in health!"

"Don't you dare bring my vows into this!" The stallion shouted at the mare. "If you ask me, I think I kept to them pretty well until now. I even ignored my own daughter for a year because you have some crazy belief! Do you know how hard it was for me to treat her that horribly? I had to act as though I didn't care for her. Just because I cared for you more. But after everything that went down a few days ago, I made a phone call."

The mare stood silent. "Really?" She asked. "To who?"

The stallion sighed and pointed towards the interior of the house. "Why don't you go look in the drawer of my bedside table."

The mare rolled her eyes and ran inside. She came out with wet eyes, a small card levitating in the blue glow of her magic.

The stallion's expression stayed the same as it had been most of this time. His face seemed like a mixture of sadness and disappointment. "I only talked about it. But after this little stunt you pulled today, I'm going to finalize it."

The mare dropped the card as tears began streaming down her face. Sunny read the card that had dropped near her face.

"Bridlewood Divorce Attorney
865-058-8257"

The stallion looked at the mare. "Ocean Aura, I want a divorce."

The mare looked as though her entire world had been ripped away from her. "A-A-Aura?" She asked with a shaky voice. "No. My name is Ocean Moonbow. Right?" She looked around as if this were all some sort of bad joke. "I'm a Moonbow right?" She continued looking at the stallion.

The stallion shook his head slightly. "Not anymore. Of course, you aren't obligated to change back to your maiden name, but you will never again be considered a part of this family."

The mare said nothing else. Sunny watched the two of them staring at each other for what felt like hours. His eyes were cold and unchanging. Her eyes were pleading and sad. Finally, the mare ran inside. They could all hear sobbing from outside.

The stallion turned to Sunny and Hitch. Sunny backed off as if she were scared he was going to attack her. instead, he opened his mouth and said, "I'm so sorry you two had to see that. The truth is, I had been thinking about divorce for about six months now. I missed my daughter. She was a cruel pony to keep her from us. Now I'll never get to see her again."

The stallion began crying once more about the loss of his daughter. Sunny said, "Actually Mr. Moonbow, that's what we were here to talk to you about. We think we may be able to help you bring Izzy back."

The stallion rose and said, "Please, call me Moonlight."

Hitch snickered for a second. "Your name is Moonlight Moonbow?" Moonlight's expression hardened and became disproving. Hitch covered his mouth and shrank back behind Sunny.

Moonlight nodded and looked to Sunny. "I'm sorry Sunny but I don't see how that's possible. We can't bring a pony back to life. Our magic works off of the body's healing stamina. There's no energy in a dead body."

Sunny looked over to him. "I think there may be another way."

Moonlight looked confused and asked, "What kind of magic would be able to bring a pony back from the dead?"

Sunny stared at him and said, "Ancient Magic."

"Ancient magic?" Moonlight asked. "First of all, where would somepony even find ancient magic? Second of all, if you have ancient magic that can somehow bring ponies back from the dead, then why did you come here?"

Sunny answered with, "Our other two friends are looking for Zebras in the Undiscovered West all the way across Equestria. Nopony has ever even been farther west than the borders of Bridlewood though so we don't quite know how their adventure is going. Second, we came here because the potion they are trying to retrieve will only bring her back from the dead. If we brought her back to life in her current state, she would just die again to blood loss. We were wondering if you could heal her body before we give her the potion."

The stallion nodded. Hitch gave him the dead matter and all three of them went inside, ignoring the sobbing still coming from the bedroom and went to the operation table.

* * *

Things weren't looking too good for Zipp and Pipp. They were pressed up against a wall by about ten zebras with spears. One pulled its hood off and stared deep into their eyes. "What are you doing here? This is a sacred zebra town where ponies are forbidden to walk."

Zipp's face fell in confusion. "Wait. Sunny said zebras only talk in rhymes. Why aren't you?"

The zebra looked to her side and said. "Someone tried to come up with a legitimate rhyme for the word silver. But that's beside the point. Why have you come here?"

Zipp sighed. "We were told that you all knew of ancient necromancy magic."

The zebra dropped her spear and motioned behind her for the others to drop theirs as well. "That is correct. But why should we help some ponies who trespassed into our land?"

Pipp was starting to panic. "We didn't know it was sacred! Honest! We're really desperate and we need some help! Our friend died in battle. We just need the potion to help us bring her back."

"Who ever said it was a potion?" The zebra asked.

"Our friend Sunny did."

The zebra shook her head and sighed. "Listen. I think I can help you. But the body of your friend will have to be here as well."

Zipp nodded and they began to walk out of the town. They could feel the eyes of the zebras watching them through the entire walk. "Looks like we're going back to Maretime Bay."

Pipp groaned and they continued walking.

* * *

five minutes earlier

Sunny and Hitch were exiting Moonbow Medical as Sunny spoke. "Thank you so much Moonlight. We will make sure Izzy hears the entire story and comes back to visit as quickly as possible."

Moonlight chuckled a little. "There's no need to thank me Sunny. You are already doing so much for Bridlewood with the spell you put around us. Those changelings haven't been able to make a dent."

"Well, nopony will be safe until we can guarantee that Chrysalis, Tirek, and Cozy Glow are taken care of."

"Well then, you best be off. Make sure to tell Izzy I'm sorry."

Sunny nodded and Hitch asked her, "How are we supposed to get to Zipp and Pipp quickly?"

Sunny smiled. "There's an old spell that can help me see them. Then I can just concentrate on their surroundings and we can teleport there."

Hitch smiled and nodded. "Sounds like a plan."

* * *

Pipp and Zipp were only walking for about two minutes when they saw their friends fall out of thin air in front of them. Hitch landed on top of Sunny in what looked like a giant ball of orange and yellow.

Hitch groaned. "I vote we never do that again. It was way too inaccurate."

"Well excuse me," Sunny said indignantly. "I had to teleport twice today. I'm also really freaking tired. Get off me!"

They untangled themselves and Zipp smiled. "Perfect," She said. "We need Izzy's body! The zebras said that they could help us save her if we brought the body back to them."

They gave Zipp the dead matter and they all began walking back towards the zebra village.

"Boy do we have some Bridlewood gossip for you two!" Sunny said smiling.