Before and Beyond - Disharmony in an orb

The town hall felt overcrowded, Mayor Bluehooves was surprised at the number of ponies inside. Clocktown never had many inhabitants, but seeing all of them in the same place was a pretty big feat; Yes, she had an important announcement, but this building was only made to house a handful of ponies at the same time, not the whole town.

Bluehooves approached a small microphone attached on her desk, and as she started to speak, everypony stopped chattering and looked at her. “As you may know, my dear ponies, I have decided to retire from my position as mayor. Today, you are all here to know the results of last week’s elections, and I’m proud to announce without more suspense that with sixty-eight percent of all votes, Mister Mc Bookreader is now officially the new mayor!”

Almost all of the crowd cheered, but even though some ponies might have favored another candidate, none were truly devasted by the news. Mc Bookreader was known for being a good manager and as somepony who took the safety of others at heart.

The chatter slowly faded as a large silver-gray stallion walked toward Bluehooves, taking the microphone. “First, I have to thank everypony here who entrusted me, as I won’t disappoint you!” Exclaimed the blue-maned earth pony, putting a pile of paperwork he was carrying on the desk. “Secondly, I would like to talk about what I plan to do, and as you may already know, it’s mostly improvement on our very farm-relying lifestyle, like for example, hum…” Mc Bookreader was clearly struggling with his papers, and was now turning the pages of a large folder, pulling a long list out, “The mechanisation of the too time-consuming unicorn-based tasks!”

Mc Bookreader felt good, this was his time to shine, but that feeling disappeared when a small orange blur passed in his peripherical vision, quickly approaching. The small blur became what seemed to be a broken part of an sphere as it closed the distance with Mc Bookreader. When the shard finally hit, A loud impact sound was emitted and a global “gasp” could be heard across the Town Hall.

The impact didn’t seem to hurt Mc Bookreader much. Quite the opposite actually, he felt great, he felt powerful, like the world could be at his hooves. No, the world SHOULD be bowing down at his hooves! Mc Bookreader normally impartial look shifted to a darker one, as a crooked smile shaped upon his features; The world would be at his hooves.

The shard had lodged itself inside the rectangular purse he carried, where most of the folders resided. It pulsated in a deep, mesmerizing orange hum, the magic coursing around the bag, across the leathery straps, slithering through Mc Bookreader’s features and surrounding his eyes, which started to pulsate in a fiery, malevolent orange.

“Ponies of Clocktown,” Mc Bookreader shouted, “The truth was revealed to I. We must protect our little town from the barbaric invaders threatening it!” Some ponies started to step back, but the majority was intrigued and kept listening; Mc Bookreader’s words were mesmerizing. “Earth ponies, rise at my side! The other tribes just want to take our work freely!” The small bunch of unicorns and pegasi still left in the room tried to back up, but the minuscule mayoral house was too crowded to let them go anywhere; “We must protect this town from every outside invader; The pegasi and unicorns will try to rob us again!” the mob of ponies rushed onto the five unicorns and two pegasi still in the room, quickly able to subdue them by strapping them to chairs or just straight up knocking them out. “Ponies, today we’ll fight for ourselves! Let’s throw those robbers to rot in a cell, so they’ll finally learn this one lesson, No one can push the earth ponies around without getting shoved to the ground!”

The place was engulfed in chaos as an angry wave of ponies rushed across the town, searching for the last few who weren’t imprisoned. Prime witness of the gigantic disorder festival unfolding before his eyes, Bookreader only smirked, the crystal only glowing brighter and brighter.

“So, lemme get this straight, ya don’t know what runefoxes are?” Applejack was staring directly at Rockhoof, a little lost, Twilight seemed sure that Starswirl knew about them, so his friends should surely know about it, right?

“Well, I know they existed, but that’s all, Starswirl was very picky about not asking on this subject. now that I think about it, he always seemed worried whenever someone started searching for any info on the great hills’ war.” Rockhoof answered, the piercing scream of the train engine almost covering his voice.

“And ya ain’t got no information ‘bout that strange orb either?” Applejack was desperately longing for any kind of answers about the hundred question Twilight had just popped in her mind, a strange artifact, lost history, a forgotten war, an exiled species coming back for revenge; It all just didn’t tie up!

Rockhoof was about to try and reinforce the fact that no, he did not have any intel on those topics, But the braking of the train indicated that it had arrived at their station, and that it was necessary to descend quickly, speculation could wait.

“We’re at the Southern Wheat Fields, Two stops left until the last!” The controller voice aired into the background noise as Rockhoof was struggling to get out of his seat that was clearly not designed for this big of a stallion.

The sun was still pretty low, the events of last night had rushed everything, and now Applejack was thousands of kilometers away from ponyville in a completely new environment, accompanied by Rockhoof, former pillar of Equestria and living legend, tasked to find a dangerous broken fragment of an even more dangerous artifact nopony knew nothing about, from what she remembered, Twilight had labelled the town she needed to find as “Clocktown”, it was apparently very ostracised, as most of its inhabitants worked in the wheat industry. “like every single pony in the Southern Wheat Field!” She thought

Rockhoof had just got out of the train with his shovel, almost falling in the process. “So, got a map or anything to where we need to go, because it’s mostly wheat in this direction. And all the others too…”

“Well, I guess that big clock tower ova’here could be tied to somethin’ named Clocktown, don’t ya think?” exclaimed applejack in response, a hoof pointed toward a large tower peeking out above the field, harboring a magnificent golden clock. The tower didn’t seem so far away, only a dozen minutes of walking and they’ll be here, but the only paths seemingly going in this direction all seemed to be blocked or hidden by haystacks and wheat-piles, it was strange, like something was trying to refrain them in going onward, but it wouldn’t be a few stacked blocks of packed wheat that would stop a farm pony and her legendarily strong friend!

Rockhoof shrugged in response, getting his shovel ready before rushing in the hay like a bull, the grain flew everywhere, not being able to even slow down the incredible force of nature that Rockhoof was, and the precarious structure of wheat crumbled, weakened from the impact. Applejack had thought of a more ‘parkoury’ alternative, but she couldn’t deny the efficacity of Rockhoof method. “I guess that worked!”

The low sun only allowed a few quantities of light to shine down in the vast wheat fields, and it almost felt like it was a corn-maze, barely able to distinguish shapes in the semi-darkness, the pair of earth ponies mostly guessed their way around the multiple intersections of path, Rockhoof destroying some haystack blocking the way from time to time, using the towering clock has a guiding point toward what they guessed was their objective.

“A maze? That’s all the magical glass piece gonna do? What a joke!” Exclaimed Applejack, laughing right in the face of the darkness. She knew from Twilight reaction that this thing was dangerous, but like Pinkie would have said, a joke never hurt anypony!

Applejack was immediately put back on track when she bumped into Rockhoof, who was standing still, “I guess it isn’t just a maze.” He pointed out, his gaze high in the air, looking toward something clearly unconventional for a maze. A gigantic electric fence stood tall before him, and opening on a wasteland of ground-level cut fields of what seemed to be more wheat, but it would be hard to tell as not much was left, in the distance could the clock tower be seen in its entirety, standing amongst a cluster of other houses, barns and small buildings, the town was pretty small and could not be inhabited by more than sixty ponies, and even that number seemed too much, and almost felt dead, not a single soul could be seen roaming the streets or harvesting the whatever-left fields around the town.

“Ya got a metal clamp?” asked Applejack, prompting Rockhoof into researching his saddlebag, before finally getting his shovel. “No, but I have this!” he added as he stretched out his shovel and quickly dug a pony-sized trench in front of the fence, digging an underground passage to the other side in the following instants.

Now that they were on the other side, it seemed the place had become eerier, the sound of the crunching stems of the remaining fallen-over plants was like the one of bones, and the atmosphere seem to grow darker as they approached the first houses, the sheer absence of light was strangling, but as the two walked closer, they quickly realised they weren’t alone, rhythmics hoofsteps could be heard coming from within the town, someponies were patrolling the area.

As they crept closer to the sound, Applejack and Rockhoof could see the silhouettes of ponies moving in the morning darkness, walking back and forth between the buildings.

Applejack whispered to Rockhoof, “I’mma be honest, this place gives me the heebie-jeebies, gotta be careful and find that artifact soon.”

Rockhoof silently nodded in agreement, still tightly holding his shovel. As they maneuvered through the narrow alleys and deserted streets, the constant rhythmic sound of hooves clapping on the paved ground could always be heard from a direction or another, it was like the patrols were everywhere around them, this metronomic sound only sometime broken by the wind flowing through the wooden structures.

Some hoofsteps seemed to be closer, and when Applejack finally reached the town square, they also seem to be faster, like somepony was running, Rockhoof looked around, and finally saw the approaching silhouettes of two hearth ponies, one holding a scythe and the other a hoe. “Hey, you two, stop here now!” the biggest one shouted, prompting Rockhoof and Applejack to run as well, taking a sharp turn into the clock tower, as the two tried to catch their breath, voices could be heard coming from the outside of the building.

“Any sign of the intruders” one pony asked.

“Negative, but I was sure I saw them enter this pathway!” another replied.

“We can’t let them escape, it’s just like what the mayor told us!”

“What do you think they’re after?”

“What do you think? We only have wheat and some weird machines!”

“Still, It’s weird, why would anypony come all the way here for wheat and scraps?”

“I don’t know, you can ask them once they are in jail, go search for reinforcement, I’m going to look in the clocktower.”

As the door creaked open, the shadow of pony drawn onto the ground, Rockhoof readied his shovel, and when the pony had fully entered the clocktower, he swung it right into their face, knocking them almost instantly in a loud CLUNK. After that encounter, Applejack and Rockhoof busted the door back open, and ran through the street, it seemed like the mayor was behind all of this, and next stop was the town hall.

The metallic impact sound didn’t come unnoticed, and the ponies patrolling the area were all converging toward the clocktower, Applejack and Rockhoof were forced into smaller and smaller passageways, almost crammed between the walls, they were ponies on both sides of the passage, while Rockhoof was ready to sweep them away with his shovel, Applejack stopped him in his momentum, and whispered, “If we get captured, we go directly to tha leader, so just let’em restrain you.” Rockhoof wasn’t sure of the strategy, but had faith in Applejack, the five patrolling ponies had badly tied them up and were now dragging them toward a small building at the side of the townhall, it seemed like a barn repurposed into a prison.

The room was engulfed in darkness, the sounds of hooves on the cold stone floor reverbing around the barn, the doors of the room were replaced by iron bars. Rockhoof was dusting his shoulders while Applejack was trying to analyse the surroundings room

After a few moments of silence, a voice spoke from the totally dark back of cell, “Are you okay?” A pink unicorn appearing in the small sunrays getting through the planks, her emeralds eyes filled with fear. “Sweet Lily, be careful!” a light brown pegasus shouted from behind before dragging the unicorn back into the darkness, whispering to her “We don’t know what they did!”

The presence of other ponies in the cell surprised Applejack, her green eyes trying to separate the pegasus and the unicorn forms from the darkness of the cell. “We ain’t trouble” she said, walking to what seemed to be the pegasus. “My name’s Applejack!” she added, lending a hoof to the two ponies hidden in the darkness.

A soft breath could be heard before the pegasus accepted the help. “I’m Dustcloud, and this is my friend Sweet Lily” the unicorn rushed to Applejack, shaking her hoof so quickly Applejack thought it might break. “And who’s your big friend behind?” added Dustcloud, brushing off her green mane off her face.

“I’m Rockhoof, pleased to me–“

“Silence prisoners!” shouted a pony on the other side of the iron bars, barely visible. “Mayor Bookreader wants to see you two.” The pony walked closer to the cell, his face almost in contact with the fence, allowing his fierce look to be seen “Separately.”

Applejack took Rockhoof by the shoulder, dragging him farther into the cell, before they were both shrouded in the same darkness that had engulfed Dustcloud and Sweet lily, “Guess we got what we want,” she whispered, “But I don’t like the ‘Separately’.”

“So… Jailbreak?”

“No Rockhoof, we gotta know who’s behind all that.”

“And if I know exactly who’s behind all of that?” Added Dustcloud, joining the conversation. The pegasus had sat so silently with her unicorn friend that Applejack had forgot about her presence, and her interruption almost made her jump. “That old Mc Book as gone rogue since the elections!”

“Who?”

“Mc Book, You know, Mayor Bookreader? The pony who turned this town in a dystopia in less than a day!”

The sudden animosity in Dustcloud was strange, even more than the total absence of reaction from the guard, don’t they react immediately if a convict starts to get a little to angry? “Wait, ya know them?” applejack asked, you wouldn’t give a dictatorial leader an affectionate nickname if you weren’t friend with them.

“Of course, he’s an old friend” interjected Sweet Lily, answering the question instead of Dustcloud, “He’s just been… Strange since that crystal struck him, he keep lying and making stories up, and everypony believe him! It’s not his style at all.”

“A crystal ya said, I bet ya my left ear it was orange!” Applejack was piecing everything together, A whole town led to chaos by one pony, who was in contact with a crystal, all of it starting toward the same time as the intrusion in the friendship castle, awfully suspicious isn’t it?

Applejack suddenly calmed down, she had just realised how loud she was, and felt like an idiot for letting so much info out. Yet no reaction, the guard pony didn’t let a single sound out, didn’t even try to intervene or…

“What’cha you doin’ Rockhoof!” Applejack shouted, the cyan earth pony had his front hooves stretched into the other side of the iron bars, the form of the pony guarded knocked out on the floor.

“I’m jailbreaking!” Rockhoof large body easily pushed the bars out of their sockets, leaving a large opening in the iron fence.

Applejack was fed up, she was trying to think and make a plan but Rockhoof was already on the run again, the large pony had rushed to the lockers and was already retrieving his gigantic shovel and his saddlebag.

“Hey big boy, wait for us!” shouted Dustcloud while rushing out of the cell in a leap filled with energy. The pegasus was quickly followed by Sweet Lily who seemed more cautious and stressed about the evasion than the brown blur Dustcloud had became.

The jail-barn was strangely empty, remarqued Applejack, while Dustcloud and Rockhoof were getting their stuff back from the lockers, nopony had stepped in to stop the evasion, leaving only one pony in guard of the whole prison was strange. The light of the sun shimmered thought the misplaced planks making the ceiling of the barn, it was hard to tell what hour it was, as the fog was diffusing the light everywhere.

“Now that we’re out, what’s the plan big boy?” asked Dustcloud, hovering around the rest of the team, the fog stopping her from seeing more than a few meters away.

“Call me Rockhoof, it’s –“ Rockhoof paused for a moment, readying his shovel as rapidly approaching hoofsteps could be heard “– less strange.” He whispered before swinging the shovel in the air, striking the guard and knocking him out.

The foggy streets became silent once again, if it wasn’t for a light chatter, like a far away discussion, but the words were barely audible and weren’t comprehensible, their presence only peaking the group’s interest, it was clear that something was going on over there.

“We should go see what’s makin all’that noise!” proposed Applejack, and the unanimous nod of everypony present quickly approve the idea.

“Thank you everypony, thank you for coming, because tonight, we are saving equestria from the pest that stole this land from us! Tonight, we’re waging war on the pegasi and the unicorns!” Mc Bookreader eyes were piercing through the fog, the orange corruption flowing across his body like pumping veins.

“But, how do ya plan on winnin’ against them, they’ve got an army, and we got nothin’!” asked a orange pony in trying to walk through the crowd

“Great question my dear, the orb as revealed to me a power beyond understanding, and it show me how to use it!” As he uttered those words, the fog started to dissipate, revealing a large, bulky tractor, with cogs turning in every direction, and two long pipes coming from the sides, fuming with smoke darker than the sky, “This, is my army. No, this is ou– ”

“Now Rockhoof!” the orange pony screamed, plunging at Mc Bookreader’s purse.

“ –What?” Bookreader tried to back off and enter his machine of death, but was blocked by a shovel, and the wall of stallion keeping it. “Wh- Who are you ponies?”

“We’re the one that put a stop to this, and I ain’t liar” Rockhoof snarled, “now give up this shard, will you?”

“NO, I NEED TO HELP MY PEOPLE, I NEED TO SAVE THE EARTH PONY FROM TIRA– “ Bookreader was once again interrupted, this time by Applejack landing a nasty kick in his jaw, sending the stallion flying in Rockhoof’s shovel.

“Well, that shall be enough dontch’ya think?” Applejack said, “you can come down now!”

Dustcloud landed by her side, holding sweet lily while she moved the shard into the magical box Twilight had given to Applejack. “Glad it’s over”

When the shard was finally sealed, The orange veins across Bookreader started to vanish, and as they did, the stallion seemed to wake up from a deep slumber.

“I’ll let ya handle that for us, I don’t want to miss ma train!”

“We’ll do, Applejack, Thank you for your help” Sweet Lily nodded

“And thanks to you to big boy!” Dustcloud continued, shooking the hoof of the legendary hero. “If you ever come back around, come say hi!”

“I’ll do Dustcloud. Goodbye.” Rockhoof finished, before walking in back toward the wheat fields, “But I have a train to catch, and a world to save!”