“Tunnels are all ruined.” Tempest angrily announced as she pulled herself up from the dirt and brushed her fur off. “Most of the first floor of the castle is gone. It’s just one giant hole filled with monsters and those crystals.”

Rose wasn’t really paying attention to her fellow survivor. She was still consumed with the realization from earlier in the ‘day’. Princess Celestia and Princess Luna had let this corruption climb into the heavens. That was the reason everything felt so wrong. That was the reason the sun refused to move. So that left only one solution, the princesses had to be dealt with.

That also meant, tragically, Parade had been right and so had Bulwark and Golden. They had been right for the wrong reasons but they had been right nonetheless. Rose should’ve let Parade kill Celestia. Maybe that would have prevented the spread and slowed the heavens from being tainted. Luna still would’ve been a problem of course, but it would have been a start.

“Rose!” Tempest waved one of her fuschia hooves before Rose’s face and snapped the lanky pegasus from her musings. “Did you hear me? My escape route is out of the question. We need…we need something else.” The unicorn sat on her haunches and buried her face in her hooves and let out a long frustrated groan. “Nothing is easy. Nothing is ever easy here.”

“What about another distraction?” The explosions came to Rose’s mind again. “We could set something off on one side of the city and make a break for it towards the other side.” There was no way Rose could run at her top speed or even close to it anymore, her wing being ripped from her back had done some serious damage to other parts of her body, most likely permanently. They could still try, though.

“I spent two days getting all of the explosives I could find in that concert hall.” Tempest got back on her hooves and began to pace. “I was in those tunnels more than I was on my hooves and I barely slept. I don’t know if we can sustain that kind of activity and I doubt there’s any more explosives anywhere. Unless you know of some secret bomb factory in Canterlot.”

“Well…there’s always the train station?” Rose was just as desperate as Tempest was at this point. “They usually have some of those carts you move on your own. If we could just get there we might be able to let gravity do most of the work?”

“Stand on your back legs and raise your front hooves above your head.” Tempest looked down at Rose sternly. When the pegasus didn’t comply, Tempest grabbed her and pulled her up. “Come on, let’s see.”

Rose grumbled and pushed herself into the bipedal stance. She wavered a bit at first but quickly steadied herself. When she was sure her balance was under control she tried to raise both of her hooves above her head as instructed. The right one was fine and did so without issue. The left one staunchly refused. Her shoulder blade caught on something in her back and every time she tried to push it past that spot she was met with stiff resistance and that blinding pain she so loathed. In tears, she returned to all four of her hooves.

“Yeah.” Tempest nodded and sighed. “Okay well…I don’t know. Are there any paths down the mountain that aren’t the gates? Some side areas or something that don’t require a lot of climbing.” Neither of them were ready for freehoof mountain climbing.

“No.” Rose shook her head. “After the Changeling invasion we did our best to lock down every unofficial avenue in and out of the city. Any of the trails we destroyed or blocked off.” Rose sighed and grumbled. “We missed the tunnels, obviously.” It didn’t help their cause that Princess Luna was gladly using them to smuggle things into the castle. What good was their security if the ponies they were trying to protect undermined them?

“Okay…so after we sleep we’ll go checkout the train station.” Tempest acquiesced to the one plan that was at least possible, if not viable. “I need a little rest before I go crawling through there again and I just…I need to get ready in case we face those things again.”

Rose hadn’t even thought about that. They had gone for so long without fighting or running from any hostile unicorns. They had seen them from atop their little pillbox, but they had not been noticed yet. They had been in no danger for what had to be going on a week or more now. There was the omnipresent tension and the unrelenting heat, but those were different from being face to face with those things.

What surprised Rose was Tempest’s need to prepare for it. The mare seemed seasoned when it came to combat and danger, but this was the first time that she seemed genuinely shaken. That was worrying. Tempest’s cool confidence had been a rock to lean on and rely on.

The two mares went to their respective ‘beds’ and laid down and lost themselves in their own thoughts. Rose was focused on her own internal struggles with the truth that had been revealed to her. It wasn’t pleasant and it wasn’t something she relished, but if it had to be done then she would carry out the grim task.

Day Twenty-One

“Tempest, what were you doing in Canterlot?” There was no telling how much time had passed before Rose decided to ask the question. If her hunch was right, which it probably was because why else would somepony invade Canterlot, then she might be able to work something out with the other pony in the room with her.

“Does it matter?” The nonchalant and bored answer came back.

“Yes.” Rose answered. It actually mattered a lot. “I’m not going to be mad at you and I don’t think it matters…but I want to know.” She repositioned so she was sitting on her haunches and looking up at Tempest, who was sleeping with her back turned to her. “Please?”

“It was a scouting mission.” Tempest answered after a few silent moments. There was still something, it sounded like conditioning or training, that was attempting to hold back more. “I was supposed to get in and find anything relating to big plans or events, guard details, everything. I was supposed to find an opening…” The breath that was sucked in before the next words was audible. “...for an invasion.”

Yeah, no surprise. Canterlot getting invaded wasn’t anything new now. They would have at least had experience for this one, or at least that was the hope. If Rose was to decide on when to do it, the Friendship Festival in a couple of months would’ve been her target. Big gathering of ponies, security stretched thin. It would’ve been ripe for chaos.

“Why?” Rose wanted to keep the questions simple. There was no use in pressuring Tempest and making her retreat back into her shell. Rose needed the mare to be open with her intentions.

“We need the magic.” Was the simple response that came back. “My boss needs it, and therefore I need it.” One of Tempest’s hooves went up to her horn and her whole body tensed.

The magic? That would mean taking away alicorn magic too, right? That was certainly the most potent of all of the magic in Equestria. That would also solve Rose’s problem. After that then nopony could meddle with the sun or the moon, at least not those alicorns. The corruption had taken them and now they were no longer worthy of the honor. If this got fixed, and that was still a pretty big if, then Rose would need help taking it from them.

There was the solution Parade and the others had settled on, just killing them. That was not in the cards given the current situation. Not unless they caught the princesses napping again and Rose would not bet on that happening. Beyond an ambush, there was no way to kill them. There were no more siege weapons that Rose knew about in the city, the explosives were all gone, and doing it with traditional weapons would take skill that Rose did not have. She needed another option and one was now presented to her.

“...could I join…?” The question was heavy and would mean leaving so much behind. It would mean destroying her oath and betraying everything she thought she stood for. Then again, what she had stood for was rapidly crumbling beneath her hooves and she was moments away from freefall with one good wind. A lifeline was sorely needed.

“I’m sorry, what?” Tempest sat up and turned to the pony on the floor. There was an incredulous smile across her face and it broke out into a fit of giggles. “R-rose…” She managed to get out between bursts of laughter. “...you’re a Royal Guard, and a fanatical one at that. You think I would just take you back to my boss and just trust you not to run right back and tell everypony what you saw?”

“What’s left for me here…?” Rose asked the question softly. It was genuine, but it was also carrying a lot more behind it that she wouldn’t, and might never, tell Tempest. “Especially if none of this gets fixed, what am I supposed to do? Stay here with the monsters?”

“If none of this gets fixed, then the planet cooks.” Tempest answered crudely. “Half of it does anyway, the other half will freeze. Which would be the half I’m headed to…” Tempest puffed out her cheeks and let out a breath.

“Okay…so take me with you anyway. If whoever your boss is was planning on invading Equestria, then he has an army. He can deal with these monsters, right? He has to have a way to get the magic, so he could drain it from all of the unicorns and make them easier to handle, maybe it would even fix them.”

The prospect of being drained of magic was not a fun one. Rose had already experienced that once at the hands of Tirek. It was worse than what she was going through now by magnitudes. It was as if her soul had been ripped clean from her body and she was a wandering corpse. To inflict that on other ponies had once been unthinkable, but now it seemed like a mercy.

“Why?” Tempest hopped down from her bed and approached her fellow survivor with narrowed eyes. “We talked about you getting out of Canterlot and I’m okay with that, but why this? You’ve been a guard for how long and now you want to switch sides?” Tempest shook her head. “I saw you kill a mare to protect Celestia after she became a pony-eating monster.”

“I’ve been thinking about what you said the other day-” Rose had no time to think. The more time she spent thinking then the more suspicious it would become. The first thing that came to her mind was immediately spewed forth. She had to roll with it and try to convince Tempest it was the truth no matter what. “-when you asked if I was really blessed?” Rose looked back to where a wing should be on her back. “I’m alive but…but I’ll never be the pony I was again. Celestia took that from me. She took so much and gave so little…”

She wanted to throw up. With every half-truth and heretical word that spilled forth from her lips she felt more and more sick. She deserved to choke on these words, and maybe she would in Tartarus eventually. That would not be today though, and it would hopefully not be for a very long time. She would have plenty of time to chew before she was forced to swallow her sins.

“I-I have given Equestria my whole life. I’ve given Canterlot my whole life.” Rose continued and she choked back a sob. Real tears were falling from her eyes, tears of pain from betraying her faith not from the pain she was lying to Tempest about. “I joined the Royal Guard when I was nineteen years old and I go on leave once a year for Hearth’s Warming and that’s it.” Rose swallowed more of her lies and took a deep breath. “I have given everything to this job, to this city and to the princesses. Look where I am. Look what I am now. I’m a Royal Guard with no royals and a pegasus who can’t fly! What else is left for me? If this all gets fixed, do you think I could look at Celestia again the same way?!”

That last part was not a lie, not even a little bit of one. After this was fixed Rose knew that she would never look at Celestia or Luna the same way ever again. She didn’t even look at the same right now, not like she did at the beginning of this. That was the truth, and her intentions towards the alicorns would be genuine. Not for the reasons that Tempest thought, though.

“Sweet Celestia, that's the most sense you’ve made since I met you…” Tempest closed the gap between them and put a hoof on Rose’s shoulder. “I’m not promising you anything because he gets the final say, but I’ll introduce you to my boss. Okay? That’s all I can do.”

It worked.

Rose smiled a genuine smile and nodded and then wiped her tears away. Surely this was the light shining down on her and blessing every sanctimonious word that came from her mouth. In what other way would this work? Tempest was a pragmatist and would not be fooled by the crocodile tears she had shed. This was a blessing.

“Deal.” Rose held out her right hoof and smiled softly up at Tempest.

Tempest took the hoof in her own and gave it a shake.

“Deal.”

A thud came from the front door and some of the boxes moved from the impact. Both mares suddenly froze, their breath stayed in their chest, and they stared at the barricaded front entrance. There was yet another thud, this one more forceful than the last. When the door didn’t budge, a frustrated growl came from the other side.

Quickly and quietly, the two ponies backed away from the door and scrambled for some cover. The only cover they had was more crates, so that’s what they took. They had been right to do it too, as a bolt of magic ripped through the door and the boxes that blocked it. Some bricks across from the door were now scorched, but that was the extent of it. There were more frustrated growls and huffs, but the monster didn’t try to break down the door nor did it unleash any more magic.

They couldn’t make any noise now, not with the hole in the door. Anything they did would be fully audible to whatever was out there. For now they were both scared to even move. The two ponies looked at each other and exchanged a knowing glance.

The train station would have to wait. They needed to make sure their hideout would stay secure before they moved. That meant making sure whatever was out there would lose interest, and that meant not moving. It was yet another delay, but that seemed to be the story of their lives right now

Author's Note

Short chapter again! It was giving me fits. It was double the length but it just didn't flow right so I chopped off the back half and that's gonna be the bulk of the next chapter.

I'm glad I'm noticing the flow issues, it's just annoying lol.