Chapters Author's Note
Hey there I'm Abyss
The Fallen Nightmare
A unicorn mare sat atop a hill overlooking Canterlot Castle, reading “Equestria’s Known Legends and Myths.” the page flipped by magic to show the story the mare was on,
-A thousand years ago, two regal sisters ruled Equestria together, the eldest of day and the younger of night. To maintain balance, the older sister raised the Sun while the younger brought out the Moon. Over time, the younger sister was shunned by most of the ponies they protected. Out of bitterness, she transformed into a wicked mare known as Nightmare Moon, blocked the Sun with the Moon, and vowed to plunge all of Equestria into an eternal night. The older sister tried to reason with the younger one, but the younger one was not so easily moved. The younger sister had fallen to her own Darkness, and to keep Equestria safe, the older sister had to use the most powerful artifacts in Equestria, the elements of harmony. With their powerful magic, the older sister banished the younger in the Moon for a thousand years. Since then, the older sister took on the younger sister’s role however, it is said that the stars shall aid in her escape on the thousandth Moon of the thousandth year.-
-Since time immemorial, rumors have circulated proposing the existence of an alicorn who guides the stars, cooperating with Princess Luna to commence the night. While the royal sisters never confirmed these rumors, they have implied more alicorns may exist elsewhere in the world. So there might be a third sister out there, one for the stars themselves.-
-Five thousand years ago, during the Era of Migration, from the oldest Equestrian records which are still decipherable, originates an ancient prophecy: In the distant future, a crisis shall arise in which two mares will deliberate a decision that shall decide the fate of Equestria. An ancient alicorn, older than the Sun and Moon sisters, will reappear and wreak havoc upon Equestria. Should the oath be said and the two killed in that order, the darkest days shall appear. The records of the time are still being deciphered but one thing stood out among the rest. A title, the Alicorn killer… from what we have deciphered that title was a constant among most of them.-
She closed the book because she was called by her mentor, so she made her way over to the castle’s throne room. As she stepped inside, “Princess Celestia, you wanted to see me?” The pony asked,
“Ah, Maroon, you’re here! Did you read that book I sent you?”
“I had just finished the stories you marked for me when you called.” Maroon said,
“I noticed that you never hung out with anypony here in Canterlot, so I'm sending you over to Ponyville to make friends and help with the Summer Sun celebration.” Celestia said, shocking her, but Maroon thought about it and smiled
‘Maybe I can get a fresh start there?’ she thought to herself and nodded.
“Your chariot leaves soon, so I recommend you head there after packing,” Celestia said as Maroon ran to her room, happy she was finally getting a fresh start. After packing and getting on the chariot for the way down, she got lost in her memories as what happened to her would have been companion replayed in her head.
It was back as a filly before she got into the school of gifted unicorns, when she was doing the entrance exam. She had made it to one of the final tests and it was the test where she met her little Terrar, thanks to a pony named Windigo. A test was designed explicitly for failure since he didn't take it well. She was about to give up and apologize for wasting their time when the Rainboom happened. The next thing she knew, she had a magic flair that caused her to hatch the egg, turn her parents into papers, lift the proctors, and suddenly grew the being that had just hatched to a giant size. However, she didn't have control over her magic which caused her an unending amount of pain from the magic entering her body at a rapid rate while having her exert enough to drain her completely yet she stayed alive enough to know what's going on. She would have died due to the overload in an explosive manner with the radius being from all of canterlot to the far edge of the everfree. Thankfully, princess Celestia got there just in time to stop her and undo everything she did except for hatching the egg. She then pointed at the cutie mark that now adorned Maroon’s flank, a constant reminder of how she failed her son not long after she took him home. Her parents killed him and set him up for dinner as punishment for being disobedient. It was a day she'd never forget for the rest of her life. She started to cry as she went down, but she had to stay strong for him. She only wished she could have saved him and seen him grow up. She knows that would never happen anyway.
She was about to spiral as she felt her chest tighten and her breath quicken. As her vision was going to blur the colors together, the chariot hit the ground, jolting her out of that downward spiral. She was shaky while getting off the carriage due to the sudden stop. She thanked the guards who flew her down after getting off the carriage. After she started walking towards the town, the guards flew back to Canterlot.
She went off to do her duties for the celebration while checking her list of what to do. As she walked into town, the first pony she encountered was a pink cotton candy maned and tailed earth pony mare. When she tried to talk to the mare, "Hello?" she said, but the pony just gasped and ran, which confused Maroon before shrugging it off and going to the Apple family farm.
When Maroon got to the apple farm, she saw a mare with an orange coat, blond mane and tail, green eyes, three apples for her cutie mark, and wearing a Stetson. The mare was right there as she walked to the farm gate. “Uhh, hello?”
“Well, howdy there, what's your name? Mine’s Applejack,” she said
“Oh, my name is Maroon Ripple, and I’m here to check in on the food for the celebration,” Maroon said with a smile,
“Well, you're also just in time for the reunion!”
“Reunion?” she asked, confused.
“Yeah, we’re going to build a bigger barn! Do you want to taste-test the food while you’re here?’
“Sure, why not? I did forget to eat breakfast this morning,” Maroon said with a shrug.
“Soups on everypony!” she said as the family showed up for brunch. She said the names of her family that showed up “Apple Fritter, Apple Bumpkin, Red Gala, Red Delicious, Golden Delicious, Caramel Apple, Apple Strudel, Apple Tart, Baked Apples, Apple Brioche, Apple Cinnamon Crisp, Big MacIntosh, Applebloom, Granny Smith, Apple Cider, Apple Cobbler, Apple Honey, Apple Munchies, Gala Appleby, Jonagold, Lavender Fritter, Peachy Sweet, and Perfect Pie.” After sitting down at the table, all of the food was put on it and she ate enough that she overstuffed herself. As she walked away, she walked to find the weather manager as she regretted having too much pie for brunch.
Maroon decided to check on the weather next. “Watch out below!” a pony said from above, spooking Maroon to do a quick teleport out of the way only to be covered in mud from the cyan pegasus hitting a mud puddle for the cushion. Now that Maroon had a closer look at the mare, she saw a light-blue pegasus with a rainbow mane and tail, her cutie mark was a cloud with a rainbow lightning bolt and that she had magenta eyes. “Heh, sorry ‘bout that.” she said as Maroon looked at her with an expression that was to say ‘really?’ while the other rubbed the back of her head with her hoof, chuckling as Maroon sighed.
“I’m Maroon. I’ve come to check on the preparations for the summer sun celebration. What’s your name?”
“The name is Rainbow Dash, and I am the fastest flier in all of Equestria!” she said confidently.
“And you aren’t bursting the clouds... Why?”
“The ponies at Cloudsdale want them to stay an hour longer, so in the meantime, I’m practicing my skills for the Wonderbolts!”
“You mean the best flyers in all of Equestria?”
“That’s them!”
“Alright, but I’ll believe it when I see it,” Maroon said
“Oh, let me help you clean up,” she said before Maroon could have time to process what was happening. Rainbow flew off and grabbed a raincloud to put above Maroon. As she was going to say,
“That's not necessary-” she was drenched, then surrounded by a rainbow tornado, causing her mane to be wild like Dash’s, she sighed as it was already over.
“How do you like that?”
“I was going to say that it was unnecessary and that I could clean myself, but thank you for the help,” Maroon said as she used her magic to fix her mane and tail.
“Sorry?” Rainbow said while confused and ashamed at the same time.
“Apology accepted. Also, if I was pregnant, you could have killed a foal with how much force you came with on your way down.” Maroon said, shocking Rainbow Dash. This helped her understand her situation of why maroon was being snippy with her. Maroon left Rainbow to think about what was said as she went to the town hall.
At the town hall, she saw a white unicorn mare with a curled purple mane and tail trying to decide what ribbon to use. “Uh, hello?”
“Sorry, I’m in the zone, as other ponies would say,” the mare said.
“Oh, that’s fine. I’m just here to check on the preparations for tomorrow’s celebration,” catching the mare's attention.
“Oh, you must be…” the mare said while turning around before looking like she saw the most horrendous thing imaginable. “what happened to your mane!?!” Before Maroon could respond, the mare brought her to her shop which was conveniently nearby.
“It’s fine, miss… what is your name?” Maroon asked her as she was taken to the back, where she was set down on the stage.
“Oh, sorry for being rude. My name is Rarity Belle. What is yours?” she said while getting her measurements to make her a dress.
“My name is Maroon Ripple,” she said while looking at the mirrors. She saw a unicorn mare with a maroon coat, magenta eyes, and a bluish-silver mane and tail, and tuning herself to the side, she saw her cutie mark, which is a silver clock with a reddish-purple star pointing at six points of time on it. Suddenly, Rarity tried to put on and tighten a corset around Maroon’s midsection, which nearly killed her as she couldn't breathe due to how tight it was. “I came all the way from Canterlot to see the progress for the summer sun celebration,” Maroon choked out, which caused Rarity to stop and fall on her back.
“Canterlot!” she said, surprised, before running off somewhere in the building as she was going to grab something, Maroon guessed there would be a lot of gifts like the nobility, which made her spiral into a panic attack.
‘Is she going to get me gifts because I’m Celestia’s student?’ her breathing started to become more and more shallow. ‘Could they find me here? No, I don’t want them to find me!’ She began to run as her body felt colder and her chest was tighter, the colors of the room blended together as she started to run out of the place. She didn't know or care about where she was going. All she knew was that she had to get away from there.
After a while of running, she was brought out of her panic when she heard music. She followed the song to find it came from a flock of various different birds singing a harmonious melody. She checked the list that she had on her to see that this was where she needed to be for the music. She watched from afar as a beautiful butter-yellow pegasus mare with a pink mane and tail was practicing the song that would be used for the celebration with the birds, which impressed Maroon immensely. She also respected the mare before her and Checked off the list while listening. Maroon then pulled out a piece of paper and wrote.
-Hello Miss, my name is Maroon. If you look down the trail, you’ll see what I look like. I am very impressed with what you've done with the birds. They sound beautiful, almost like you.-
She then floated it over to the mare, who started to read it. Hence, the pegasus landed “Hello?”
“Hello, miss. May I ask such a beautiful mare her name?” Maroon flirted.
“M-my n-n-name i-is Fluttershy,” she said, growing red as she remembered what Rainbow Dash told her while her heart sped up…
“Yo Flutters, you know, with a voice like yours you could pick up any stallion or mare with how soothing it is” Rainbow Dash said while flying next to Fluttershy after moving to Ponyville.
“I-I d-don’t think I-I would be able to t-talk to anypony like th-that,” she said, stuttering and blushing hard.
“Heh don’t rile yourself up Flutters, you would make a great wife to that special somepony someday and you will know if you want to spend the rest of your life with that one pony, or who knows, you could have multiple of either or both!” Rainbow said, causing Fluttershy to pass out.
“Well, Fluttershy, I believe the animals can agree that you have one soothing voice.” She looked at the birds and asked, “Right?” The birds agreed by chirping excitedly while flying around their caretaker as Fluttershy couldn't help but get redder and redder as soon as she was almost as red as one of Applejack’s apples before Maroon left. She turned her head to Fluttershy and winked at her, saying, “I’ll be in the library if you need me,” and she was there.
After walking a ways away, Maroon realized what had just happened and blushed so hard she almost lit up like a light bulb. She was embarrassed, but she had a smile on her face. After a while her smile fell when she remembered what her birth parents told her if she were to get with a mare, and she got worried about what would happen if they found out. She wanted to be finally happy, to have that fresh start to be herself. Still, that single memory she had on the way over to Ponyville flashed in her mind and caused her eyes to glaze over as if she were remembering something while her breathing slowed to it being barely there. Still, it was the same scenario only; instead of her son, it was Fluttershy who was killed and cooked by her birth parents. It was close to the end of the sunset's golden hour when she got to the library, which would be her temporary home, or so she Thought. Still, Maroon wished it was her actual home. Once she opened the door, the pink mare from earlier suddenly popped up, surprising her. When she looked behind the pony, she saw a whole party just for welcoming her to town, but that confused her to a significant extent cause it's only been a few hours 'how did this pony get all these ponies into the Library without me noticing on the way back?' She wondered. 'Then again, it is the hour of Twilight, so it couldn't have been that long that I was out.' She thought, perplexed.
“Were you surprised?” the pink mare asked exited,
“I certainly was but what's your name?” Maroon asked,
“My name is Pinkie Pie,” she said before bounding off somewhere. As Maroon looked around she saw some familiar faces in the crowd. She decided to chat with them while looking at the books so that if she did stay down here or away from her birth parents and their controlling nature somewhere, she could run as the librarian. That thought of her being a librarian far away from her birth parents made her smile, and the ponies around her noticed, so Pinky bounded over with a drink on her hoof and set it down right in front of the lucky pony, which just so happened to be her so she looked down and saw the drink before deciding, 'eh why not' and lifted it up to her lips, right as the liquid hit her mouth she started chugging hard and fast, finishing the glass and letting out a good sigh of satisfaction. At the same time, the rest chanted "CHUG!!!" and cheered when she was done.
She found a book on the elements of harmony in the legends section and decided to take a read just in case it would be handy later on. She kept conversing with others while reading before accidentally tuning everypony out.
Before the Sun was about to come up for the celebration of the longest day, all of the ponies funneled into the mayor's building, where the celebration would take place. Maroon started looking around and hoping that her mentor was right and that it was a foal's tale when she looked up at the Moon and noticed that the four stars to aid in Nightmare Moon's Escape were getting ever so closer to the Moon, which confused her.
Everypony else was excited and couldn't wait for the Sun to rise as the mayor gave the speech for Celestia to raise the Sun. The music was about to start as the curtains opened only for no one to be there at first, then there was Blue Smoke. It confused everypony until it became a mare for Maroon to recognize who the pony was. It was Nightmare Moon, and there was only one way to defeat her. She needed to find the elements of harmony. The book she read at the party stated that they were in the castle of the two sisters, in the Everfree forest. Nightmare Moon declared, "The night shall not be shunned anymore, for it shall remain eternal!" Panic would rise in everypony, and they started to run outside. Maroon ran over to the Everfree when the mares she met joined her and asked her.
"Where do you think you're going?"
She told them, "There is only one way to stop Nightmare Moon. We need to find the Elements of Harmony. That is our only chance to stop the nightmare." The five nod and join her, and the trials that come with the first adventure are passed with flying colors. Still, Maroon had gotten the spark wrong at first, and that caused a spell battle. Maroon was surprised at herself for keeping up with an alicorn in magic and speed. The first fight ended when Nightmare Moon summoned two pony-like creatures who introduced themselves as Fallen Ember and Midnight Nova to both there as Maroon took in what they looked like.
Fallen Ember looked like a mare with a red coat, flame-like mane, and tail, phoenix Wings sprouting out of her back, eyes were slit and green, and embers were falling from most of her body, including her mane and tail. Her frame was a power-thin type of pony, and she was pretty fit.
Midnight Nova looked vastly different. Her coat was dark purple, and her mane and tail were on fire. The flame was a teal-ish green, and so were her eyes, wings, and most of her body, which seemed covered in runes. Her frame was very alluring and showed she would be tough to fight.
Maroon fired a shot at Nightmare Moon while running past the two newcomers, not wanting to scuffle with them. They most likely disappeared after the fight as it started back up for round two. After another spell-slinging match, her friends showed up. Nightmare Moon smashed the elements on the ground but the elements formed into their gem selves on the necklaces when Maroon realized she wasn't trying to extend her hoof out to them like they did for her. Meanwhile, something saw this happen and tried to jump into the middle one's body, which sadly was Maroon's. The dark figure got injured along the way and missed landing on the ground, thanks to the two hidden in the shadows with no pony knowing where they were. They bonded to the six elements, sending the Rainbow through them. Then something from dark magic flew out of the shadows and hit the elements, forcing whatever it was that tried to jump into Maroon away. That didn't mean it didn't leave after-effects.
The Rainbow hit Nightmare Moon, and in a flash of light, in her place was another alicorn covered in the shell of what was Nightmare Moon; her mane looked like the night sky, and her body was sleek and graceful like the fantastic night breeze. Still, this one was not much bigger than them. Celestia entered through the window and said, "I'm proud of you, my student, and I know, now, I have some unfinished business to deal with." She turned to the other Alicorn before kneeling, saying, "sister, we were never meant to rule alone." The other Alicorn was Celestia's sister, and it shocked them.
The other Alicorn says, "I'm so sorry, sister." It was odd when Maroon heard the ponies talking about Princess Luna, as her name was now revealed to them. Maroon felt something was off with herself but didn't know what it was now.
Maroon shook her head and said, “I’m perfectly fine here. Though I don't think my birth parents would let me stay down here if they still had custody over me. They have no control over me now as I'd like to study the magic of friendship more. I need space from them, though I know the restraining order won't stop them till I'm back with them under their ideals. I know they will come for me someday, but something bad might happen if I don't stay here with my new friends, and I want to be with them when it happens." This confused everypony except Celestia, who smiled and accepted it, knowing what it's like to be under something else's control. Hence, she left with Luna to get her reacquainted while warning her about the nobility. Without a word, Maroon asked Luna who Midnight Nova and Fallen Ember were.
Luna said, "The nightmare summoned them to aid her? Then, thou must be something special. We do not know much about them, as everything we heard was through a friend, but we did learn that they are part of a myth. However, not everything is the absolute truth. Be wary of that, as we learned it the hard way."
On the way back with the princesses, Luna said, "sister, I think it's time for the Shadowbolts to come into play."
"And how do you plan to accomplish this?" Celestia asked, curious about what her sister's plans were.
"With your help, I was thinking they could be under us and not the Wonderbolt council you put into effect, not to mention we would need a captain and a squad," Luna said, shocking Celestia, who smiled.
"Alright, Luna, maybe some candidates will show up in the Young Flyers competition, that is coming up?" Luna was shocked before she smiled and thanked her sister.
I was hanging in the library with Fluttershy while getting to know her better, when I got an invitation to the Grand Galloping Gala through the candle on the table. I knew what it was like there so I stopped Fluttershy from even trying to take the ticket by sighing, “the gala isn't as great as others say it is.” I told her up front which confused her at first, “I should know, this is not the first time I've gotten one of these. I don't even feel like going to them knowing what awaits me there…” I muttered to myself but Fluttershy heard and asked me,
“Why? Wouldn't it be great to go there?” I looked at her to see that she was confused.
“That’s the thing Fluttershy my birth parents are going to be there and I don’t ever want to see them at all. Not everyone has had a happy life. I know that better than anyone.” I respond as I walk up to my room, Fluttershy flew off so I walked over to the table to light the purple candle on the table, while getting out a pen, some ink, and some paper before starting the letter with,
-Dear princess, I would like to excuse myself from this year's gala because my birth parents will be there this year as they always will be. I know that they want to see me again but I feel like I will be put back under their hooves if I see them again.-
Through the purple candle holding a green flame on its wick, I let the letter burn till it was smoke and fly away. I stayed looking at the flame for a good minute letting my mind wander. I saw something that I didn't know was a vision at the time, the room faded till there was a barren wasteland of ash all around me as eight figures stood in front of me and before I was dragged to see more, there was a knock on my door, which caught my attention as everything faded back to normal. I snuffed out the flame on the candle before heading over, and opening the door to find my friends on the other side so I asked “do you need anything, girls?” as I let them in to join me at the table in the middle of the room, after sitting down one of them opened their mouths,
“Uhh yeah we were kind of wondering why you want to skip this year’s gala darling?” Rarity asked curious to know why,
“We may not know you all that well but it seems that you don’t enjoy it.” Applejack said as I sighed,
“All you girls need to know is that my birth parents, Star Clock and Grand Clock are horrible ponies. They never let me do the things I wanted to do. They never let me be who I am! They had me under their hooves till I became Celestia's student and gained who I wanted to be with the help of my mark! I was constantly belittled everyday and night so I want to have no contact with them at all! The galla will give them the opportunity to have me back under their hooves so that's why I wish I had never been born! Yet here I am and I had to deal with it for several years!” I yelled at them spilling my guts out but I was confused on why I was telling them. It was almost as if I couldn't hide anything from these girls and it started to freak me out when I realized that fact. My breath grew shallow, as I saw the lines between the color fade in and out of my vision. I looked around and asked myself “why did I say that?” The rest were confused at me questioning myself which showed on their faces.
“Why are you questioning yourself?” Fluttershy asked, a bit worried noticing something was wrong.
“It's because whatever is going on with me right now is making me spill my secrets, I-I don't like this…” I said, as I was hyperventilating, and the lines fully faded leaving everything as blurred colored dots. I needed to get away, as I felt trapped by being there so I ran to my room and locked the door with a terrified look on my face from what I could see in the mirror in front of me, my vision somewhat returned to normal as everything was still somewhat blurry. My hyperventilating calmed down a bit only to return at full force when I gave myself time to think, as both thoughts and memories replayed and clashed in my head, I started to talk to myself to get a grip on reality. “Could all of this happen because I answered one of their questions bluntly and honestly? Could it be that this came from not having control of what I was saying that scared me?” Not long after that I tried to calm myself so that I could peek out of my room to check on the girls while hoping I didn't worry them too much.
“Ya think she’s alright?” Applejack asked curiously.
“I don’t know but she looked scared of herself, darling” Rarity said worried.
“What could have caused this reaction from her?” Rainbow Dash asked before there was a knock on the door.
After a slow creak that I forgot was there, let me know that there was a pony outside. “Hello princess to what we owe the pleasure of your visit?” Pinkie’s excited voice rang.
“Maroon had sent me a letter on the reason she doesn't want to go to the gala. She didn't want to be reminded of anything before then so I came down to make sure she is all right.” Celestia said from what I could hear but it was muffled so I opened my door halfway to hear the conversation happen.
“Well she has been doing a lot to help us but when asking about the gala she started to freak out while answering…” Fluttershy recounted only to stop, hearing the princesses sighing.
“She has Agoraphobia” Celestia said and there was nothing to stop them from knowing now.
“Ag-ora-what now?” Applejack asked confused
“That's the fear of control or anything that has to do with it.” Fluttershy said which Applejack nods before asking
“What does that have to do with it?”
“Please understand that Maroon is a slow trust pony and this caused her to most likely relive some traumatic events.” They looked at Celestia, curious about what she meant. “She had to be separated from her birth parents as they were parading her like a trophy and there was nothing she had control over in her life. So it's best to be patient with her in case this happens again” she clarified
“So that’s why there were times when she acted… off? Like she was a puppet on strings?” Rainbow Dash said but I winced at the metaphor used and felt my panic rise again, I barely managed to push it back down “do you know anything that could do that?”
“I only know of one thing that can do that as it was what gave me an outsider’s view of the world cause I was trapped in my own body.” The girls and I were confused as I quietly came down the steps.
barely fighting back the attack I was just having to ask “What do you mean by that princess?”
“Maroon, are you ok?” Celestia asked as the rest looked at me worried.
“Yeah I'm fine as long as nothing like that ever happens again though I'm just barely fighting the attack back” causing Celestia to worry till she used a calming spell on both of us which certainly helped.
“It's what caused me to lose my sister all those years ago. I have no clue what it is for it is far older than I. All that I know is that it can enter your body without permission to hide in or have control of.” Celestia said concerned for her student and her friends. “But how are we certain that this won't happen again?”
“Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye” the five girls said while marking a cross across their chest, before the motions for flight, and then acted out actually putting a cupcake in their left eye which confused us.
“What was that for?” I asked which Pinkie Pie explained,
“It's a pinkie promise and if we break it we will lose your trust forever” I decided not to question it as I was tired thanks to the panic attack exhausting me mentally and emotionally.
The next few days were relatively normal or well as normal as it can be in Ponyville. The girls avoided asking me stuff that would be very personal which allowed me to tell them when I was ready, which meant that they were doing well on their promise. I don't completely trust them yet, but they are getting there though that didn’t stop me from learning about them as they learned about me.
I found out that Applejack was and still is very stubborn about doing something for the farm, after Big Mac injured himself during work and needed to rest. Though Applejack learned an important lesson in humility about asking for help. Though it came after a few accidents, such as; causing Rainbow to crash into the library so hard she might have broken something by going through a wall and had a bunch of heavy books fall on her, giving a bunch of ponies food poisoning with baked bads along with Pinkie Pie, and caused trauma to baby bunnies who stampeded into the town and wrecked a lot of things though it was mostly gardens. All because it was applebuck season. In the end she learned her lesson and asked us for help. Things went faster and soon the orchard was clear of apples.
An old friend of Rainbow and Fluttershy’s came into town a few days later. A griffon named Gilda came to hang with them and was actually really nice to the two she knows, though Fluttershy had somehow managed to sneak up on Gilda and scared her but she was a bit rude to the other ponies however that was due to the way she grew up and had needed a change of pace. I had gotten comfortable around Fluttershy and our friends could see that there was something more brewing between us. She moved in not long afterward and ended up getting a party from Pinkie that very night. She got to learn more about the rest of us and found out how red Fluttershy could get.
After a few days a showmare named Trixie and a show stallion named Crimson came along to perform a show which ended up in a stage fight in an attempt to show how great they are, it wasn't serious at first but Crimson was stressing out. Then something changed in Crimson over the course of the battle, “well have you ever defeated an Ursa Major?” he asked.
Trixie then said “not yet but I don't see myself facing one so soon” and after a while it ended with Trixie as the winner.
While everypony was asleep. Two colts went and woke up an Ursa Minor but as ‘Crimson’ was about to kill the thing and enact its mothers wrath when I walked over and said
“Are you trying to get the rest of us killed?” as Trixie put the thing to sleep making it seem as if her stories were real but she didn't truly boast about herself as Maroon berated ‘Crimson’ who was snapping back at her like an annoyed child.
“My name is not Crimson for I am Wind-” he was going to say, before he had to run out of the town as the town's pony’s chased them and we didn't see him for a while.
I asked “do you know Celestia personally due to your magic skill?” to which Trixie said,
“Oh you must be her latest student. Nice to meet you. I'm Trixie lulamoon of the house of star, what's your name?”
“My name is Maroon Ripple. How did you know how to use all of those spells and how to take care of a baby one?”
“Oh I didn't take care of it, I just merely sent it back to its mother thanks to those Colts disrupting its sleep. Its mother must have been worried about it and that wasn't a major that was a minor, the majors are much bigger and a lot more dangerous.” Trixie said with a laugh,
“I got that from its appearance alone but that reminds me of why they should read more sometimes” I said, shocking my friends before she picks up her cart and leaves for the Everfree Forest. Everypony else was confused but me and my friends felt like we couldn’t trust anyone with no reason as to why but we were all tired so we went home to hit the hay.
A few days later a dragon had landed in a mountain nearby and had fallen asleep apparently. Fluttershy managed to tell me about it thanks to the smoke it was spewing. After that we got a message from Celestia that there was a dragon in the mountain who had fallen asleep. Its smoke might cover the sky of Equestria entirely and that it needed to be dealt with fast in order for the sky to remain clear. So we headed over to the mountain and started to climb. It didn't take long for Fluttershy to get scared and meek but in the end she pulled through just in time and used her stare on the dragon as my shield spell was about to fall and it was a good thing she did or we would have been roasted ponies. We made it back only to find Trixie there with her cart which was odd since she had left the night before. “Hey Trixie, how are you doing? And why did you go into the Everfree?” I asked.
“Oh I have some family in there and they needed some help with something that I was nearby for, your second question and I'm doing good.” she said with a smile and we showed her around since her last visit was brief and I wanted to learn more about my predecessors but there was a nagging feeling in my head that something was wrong. I decided to ignore it for now as it turned out that she wanted to be nearby just in case that family member asked for more help and Ponyville helped with that.
It’s been thirty moons since Midnight and I had managed to escape the Nightmare holding the princess of the Moon. We saw the dark figure try to enter the newest bearer of magic but we managed to stop it from doing so before disappearing into the woods outside. It didn't take long for us to find a cave that was under a tree nearby, where we remained until the next night where we moved back in but we were cautious about the castle so we decided to make it a temporary base of operations. It wasn't really known that we were here by anypony but we didn't mind and it certainly helped. Over the next few days we looked around the castle and the surrounding forest to see if anything was new since our last time in Equestria from what we remember, as we remembered the first time we picked up a weapon to fight with.
Flashback…
Midnight and I were walking around the demon’s armory when certain weapons caught our interest. Midnight chose a scythe while I chose a sickle sword or at least so we thought… after we showed the demon who saved us what we chose he asked “are you sure?” We didn't know what we were doing and answered in a confident yes. Oh how naive we were, the ones that caught our eyes were known as the Soul Scythe and the Hellflame Sickle and both of us wielded them proficiently and shockingly so. After finding our way out through a random portal and ending up outside the barrier of Equestria which thankfully the demon followed us through with him thanking us for helping him get back here and we earned the right to give ourselves the names that feel right to us. She chose Midnight Nova and the nickname Midnight Reaper which ended up becoming her title. I chose Fallen Ember and my nickname was Fallen Wrath which turned into my title Wrath of the Fallen. We went around the badlands closing Rifts to Tartarus and killing the demons that were already through which were mostly Imps anyways. Otherwise worse demons would come through and kill so we are constantly traveling with no rest thanks to a spell that keeps us awake as we learned under the demon that made the original gate over five thousand years ago. He trained us after finding us in tartarus and he hasn't been let down since he had a great time teaching us and made sure that we formed a devastating duo who could help his friends stop a few old threats from coming back.
Now…
We made a call for help and a pony answered a few days later coming in from Ponyville it was Midnight's cousin Trixie. Though Midnight had a headache for a bit. “You ok?” I asked her as she smiled at me with a genuine one.
“Yes I’m fine, I had just remembered a lot of my past thanks to my cousin” she said, shocking Trixie but I was happy for her.
We managed to convince Trixie to let us possess her and it was well worth it in the end. Due to us having been banished to Tartarus, we didn't need to use our bodies to get a job done as we were only souls. As the process finished we turned into what we were made out of, which was fire for me along with shadows for Midnight, apparently Midnight’s a natural dark mage and I'm an elemental from what we have gathered for our memories. After seeping through Trixies skin we settled in different areas of her body while we watched and waited. We learned pretty fast that a lot had changed from what we remember, which was barely anything sadly, and Trixie was one of Celestia’s students but she left to be a showmare apparently. After getting out of the forest Trixie encountered a unicorn named Maroon Ripple.“Hey Trixie, how are you doing? And why did you go into the Everfree?” she asked.
“Oh I have some family in there and they needed some help with something that I was nearby for, your second question and I'm doing good.” I said, worried that she would catch on but she seemed to buy it. After that she showed me around Ponyville with help from her friends.
The few days go by and we learn more about Maroon and her friends. The group, even us having Trixie help her new friends encourage Maroon to go with her feelings, which actually worked out as after Fluttershy told off a dragon and they got back she confessed. The group noticed that Maroon was really nervous but they proposed that maybe Fluttershy felt the same, so right then and there just popped out of her mouth fully ready for rejection when she was suddenly kissed by Fluttershy. It caught a lot of ponies off guard but they were ultimately happy for them and we could tell that the love between them was genuine.
Trixie, Applejack, Rarity and us, though we are inside Trixies body just hanging there, were caught up in a storm when the latter two started arguing about their sleeping habits. Trixie was trying to calm them down but it wasn't working all that well. Maroon opened her door and invited them inside although she had no experience holding a slumber party, Trixie helped her out with what she didn’t know about them and ultimately they had a really fun time including us but Trixie noticed that we were cautious of Maroon she didn't know why so she used that night to talk to us in her mind asking us “why are you both so apprehensive of of Maroon?”
I told her “Maroon just feels off for some reason. We don't know why but it's almost as if something bad might happen thanks to her. Its not just Maroon it’s her friends as well.”
“Really like what?” this time Midnight answered,
“This is not her destiny as she knows it, she just thinks it is when it’s not. Her true destiny will come and she will know what it truly is when everything fall apart”
Author's Note
Hi everypony! I hope you hade a grand new years!
Revelations
Maroon was wandering around the town with Trixie only for them to notice that everyone was hiding from something which was confusing. She was suddenly dragged into Sugarcube corner with Trixie “wha-” Maroon was going to ask what was going on but was shushed by the rest except for Trixie who looked outside despite the protests. Maroon joined her before blanching at the reason as it was a zebra.
“Why are all of you in hiding?” Trixie asked
All of the ponies except Maroon tell them the rumors of the town about the zebra being evil. “Are you serious?” Maroon asked
“YES!” all say to Trixie and Maroon
“Have any of you thought that it might not be the case?” Trixie asked with disappointment showing through her voice.
“Ah, have but when I try to help her feel welcome everypony else drags me away.” applebloom said as applejack was going to reason with her.
“She is so strange,” Rarity said before the zebra looked in their direction and they closed the curtains.
Trixie stated “and that right there is why Equestria had a lot of wars against the other races in the surrounding lands around us”
“What ya’ mean by tha’?” Applejack asked
“Because of pony kind’s Xenophobia which is the irrational fear of other creatures, and they didn't have to be equine either as before Celestia and Luna came along the pony races were Xenophobic to each other.” she said as a brief history lesson.
“Really? Why? That’s just stupid” Rainbow said doubtful of what was said.
“It was a different time back then. But from what i know is that all the races met here and were weary of the other which lead to disputes down the line. There was trade between the races though it’s unknown where each race comes from… at least at first.”
“What do ya mean?” Maroon asked interested
“Due to the fact that Earth ponies and zebras can learn how to work with the other shows that they might come from the same place.”
“And what about Thestrals?” Fluttershy asked
“They are intertwined with the Pegassi but haven't been seen in the past thousand years due to what is taught as the solar inquisition.”
“Wait, are you talking about the events after the fight with Nightmare Moon?” Maroon asked, confused.
Trixie nods before saying “the house of star has the most accurate depiction of that fight cause before it happened there was a warning that it would happen. I don’t know why it just happened that way. I’ll explain more at another time.” Trixie said. Maroon walks out the door while Trixie distracted the rest with them wondering why it was different but one asked,
“Where’s Maroon?” With that all but Applebloom and Trixie panicked as everything became well and the town returned to normal once the zebra left but they asked Maroon why she did that.
“I have seen evil and I know how deceiving it can be but she is not as all she wanted to do was a little shopping and she is a nice pony when you get to know her though she speaks in rhymes. Though she never could because of all the rumors about her being evil. I actually had a nice chat with her and learned a lot about alchemy which was really interesting in how it is different from our definition of normal.” Maroon said with Trixie walking over asking,
“Really I’ve never tried alchemy but I wouldn’t mind learning about it. You think she could teach me a bit about it?”
“Yeah I definitely think so and I found something to experiment on in the meantime.” she said as she pulled out a strange blue flower and Trixie asked
“A poison joke flower?” She thought about it while putting her hoof to her chin and they decided to learn about the properties of its magic.
“What do you know about it?” Maroon asked
“It has random effects and is made from chaos magic mixing with nature magic and that it only grows in the Everfree Forest nearby from what i remember” trixie said.
“Oh really?” she said interested as she teleported it to the library.
“Yep,” she said as they walked with Applebloom to the stalls that had what Zecora needed.
As they help Applebloom get the things the zebra needs and make their way into the area. However their friends were convinced that something was up with them. So they follow and wind up in a poison joke patch where the zebra warns them about the flowers they are standing on and disappears into the fog. The three who listen recognise the flower that their friends were standing over. The three tell them that they need a specific kind of bath to get the pollen of the flowers off of them.
They brush the three off and head to bed. “They are going to regret it tomorrow”
As the night passed to the next day. The friends were shocked and in disarray as they looked upon themselves they had changed to something or someone else. They made their way to the mages to get help. “We told you yesterday that you need a mineral bath with the help of Zecora.” They were confused but after the mineral bath everything went well.
Trixie managed to warn Fluttershy about the parasprites before they even made it back to town as Celestia was coming to make a visit but Fluttershy didn’t listen and the swarm came to Ponyville from one bug which resulted in Maroon almost changing their diet had it not been for Trixie letting them know that it wasn't the way to get rid of them. In the end Pinkie Pie just had them parade back to the everfree forest. (Since none of the girls are going to the Grand Galloping Gala Rarity doesn't need to design any dresses so the episodes: suited for success, green isn’t your color, and the best night ever don't happen because it won't be a good time if they are not all there. The reason why is because they want to help Maroon with her problems by being there for her and being that shoulder to cry on.)
Maroon was struggling to not use her magic for winter wrap up but managed thanks to trixie telling her ahead of time. Maroon went on a date with fluttershy to pass the time just getting to know her. When the rest of the girls noticed the competition between Applejack and Rainbow Dash they expected the outcome of it to go too far so Trixie told the rest that she is going to enter the race to make them see that they are going too far with this competition. So Trixie won the race and proved that they were being short-sighted with them tying for last and revealed that she is a hybrid of unicorn and earth pony. They asked her a few questions like “isn't there a law for this to not happen?” or “how did you survive?” that sort of thing with Maroon saying,
“It's simple she wasn’t born in canterlot as that law is only followed there and other big areas like Mainhattan so it would be a small town like here right?”
“Nope I was born in Canterlot but my strength did not come in till I was around a few months old as my magic spurted, by then I was already home with my parents, so I could live without anything to worry about except causing a few cracks in the walkway.” that shocked but also confused them greatly.
“You mean you also had to reign in your strength as well?” Applejack asked which Trixie nodded.
“But why is that a big deal hun?” Rarity asked actually confused
“It’s a law that isn’t really followed in small areas like here compared to canterlot but it's also just that, a canterlot law that a noble put in to make sure that there were no impurities which I don't see.” Trixie said nonchalantly. “Also that's the reason why it's a miracle though the main house has thiestral abilities it's also how i have such a hard head.'' She knocked on her head and pinkie grabbed her before bucking the top of Trixie’s skull which hurt the pony through the horseshoes.
“Ow!” Pinkie said
“I was going to warn you not to try it as it was the reason though it was my cousin Twilight who managed to take out Celestia’s back” they gasped “also that was a head of a filly. If it was an adult Celestia knows how much it hurts, no really she had to be taken to the hospital that very day and it was after she raised the sun. It’s also happened more than once.” she said.
Maroon was confused by everyone's reaction to Pinkie Pie having a future sense sort of thing and was going to try and disprove it but she decided to ask Trixie about it. When Trixie heard about the pinky sense she actually wanted to see it in action so they go through with it but maroon ends up getting seriously injured Applejack's farm cellar door opened and she fell down the stairs, had a bunch of things drop on her thanks to Derpy with two of those things being a piano and an anvil somehow. Trixie was actually pretty convinced that it was actually there and Pinkie said that she knew that they were following her so it was actually quite funny, Maroon was getting pretty pissed though but Trixie was having a good time, she then asked pinkie “wait why are you suddenly acting like there's an earthquake going on when there isn't?” Everyone noticed that pinkie was vibrating after it was pointed out.
She said “huh well this is a new one.” sure enough it happened to be over at froggy bottom where Fluttershy was they rushed over and managed to save her with Maroon claiming the Hydra that popped up behind them was the doozy but it wasn't, Maroon got so frustrated that she was mentally exhausted afterward though she accepted that Pinkie had a future sense.
Rainbow was practicing the sonic rainboom outside Ponyville for the young flyers competition with Fluttershy quietly cheering for Rainbow while Maroon was there to help her. Rainbow had been launched to the ground by the mach cone she made for the third time. “Urg I don't know what I'm doing wrong!” Rainbow said frustrated,
“Don't worry about it so much as it seems like you're holding yourself back” Maroon said hesitantly after a bit of thought.
“How?” Fluttershy said while blinking.
“I know that it almost happened again but I managed to fight it back a bit to say it to both of you like that” she said, as the rest of their friends show up to see what is going on,
“What's goin’ on here?” Applejack asked
“Rainbow is trying to recreate the sonic rainboom and has gotten very close” Fluttershy said with Maroon nodding and adding on
“She’s holding herself back subconsciously but I don't know why” the rest were confused about why but decided to help as well. They made their way over to the pony on the ground frustrated with herself. She noticed that she was going to lose at this rate. So to help they decided to go to Cloudsdale with Rainbow to cheer her on. So they made their way to the library inorder to find a spell to help them with it. Maroon and Trixie looked through a few spell book to help give Rainbow confidence in herself and found a spell that gave Rarity insect wings but Maroon was drained after using the spell only once but Trixie found a cloud walking spell and used it on the rest including herself except the Pegasi. After getting there and taking a tour where Pinkie tastes the Rainbow, they find Rainbow scared in the waiting area where Rarity gave Rainbow the idea of her being the distraction. It worked for a bit but right when Rainbow was going to go for the Finale with a Rainboom, Rarity's wings turned to ash thanks to the sun. Rarity was falling to the ground fast, though she also knocked the wonderbolts out due to her flailing, Rainbow heard the gasps from below and looked down to see her friend falling to her demise. She had to save her friend as fast as she could, no time to think or waste otherwise her friend would be paste. As Rainbow’s instincts kicked in at high gear she sped up faster and faster as a mach cone started to form around her fore hooves while time slowed to a halt for a single second…
*BOOM!*
In that single second the impossible was done as Rainbow accomplished the sonic Rainboom to save the Wonderbolts and her friend from certain death. The princess and the Wonderbolts walked up to Rainbow and gave her an invite to both teams which caused Maroon to realize the purpose for the competition. The competition was for the Shadowbolts line up on the princesses end and the Wonderbolts from the ones she saved, Rainbow was chosen to join either of them as a rookie and she was about to refuse the Shadowbolts when she started to think about it and asked the princess “are you picking the team captain from this lineup?”
“No, we already have one ready and are looking for members for the starting ranks and wanted to ask you if you wanted to join?” Celestia said with a soft smile.
She said “I’ll think about it” Trixie and Maroon were certainly shocked along with Midnight and Fallen who were watching through Trixie’s eyes, their jaws had dropped to the floor while Fluttershy just cheered with no care that she accomplished it. She met back up with the girls at the balloon since Rarity couldn’t fly without the wings that were given to her earlier.
“What happened with the Wonderbolts and the princesses over their Rainbow?” Applejack asked
“Turns out princess Luna was actually going to recruit me into the Shadowbolts like the test of loyalty showed me. Though I think that the Wonderbolts also want me now so is it alright if I do some research on the Wonderbolts first?” which Maroon says
“If you join the Shadowbolts you will act under the princesses themselves from what I heard with my last chat with the princesses, and something new but if you go with the Wonderbolts you would be under the Wonderbolt counsel and deal with their regulations.” the rest nod and Trixie adds
“You could help shape the Shadowbolts into something new and help with what is thrown at you or reshape one that already exists and give them a new era. The choice is yours but who knows what the training for both ends will bring” which Rainbow Dash nodded at with a smile.
The CMC were having a bit of trouble with finding out what their cutie marks are and Fluttershy decided to help out as they wanted to see if they would be good with animal care, during the night one of the chickens that fluttershy was looking after disappeared, which ended up resulting in them going into the everfree forest to look for it, only to come across a cockatrice and maroon turned to stone. They called out for help and Fluttershy showed up to see what was going on, only for the cockatrice to try and attack her with its stare, but fluttershy didn't back down while using her own stare as she was turning to stone, she beat the cockatrice in that stare battle. Which resulted in the chicken and maroon to be turned back from stone. The CMC had learned why they should never challenge Fluttershy in a stare battle and in turn it helped Fluttershy become more confident in herself.
Trixie disappeared to canterlot because her cousin asked her to help take care of spike while she was visiting her family on this day, while Rarity just happened to be kidnapped by Diamond Dogs while she was scrounging up gems for her dresses though no one noticed that she was gone at first till Trixie got back and asked “where’s rarity?” so they went to Rarity’s boutique only to find that she wasnt back just yet.. The six made their way to the spot she was last at thanks to Sweetie Belle, only to encounter terrified diamond dogs wanting Rarity gone and had given her a lot of gems. There were seven minecarts full but Trixie asked “can I come the next time you go gem hunting?”
“Sure but why?” Rarity asked for Maroon to respond with
“This little guy is my cousin’s son that she hatched the day an earthquake happened” shocking the rest wich Applejack remarked
“That was my fault,” confusing the rest. “Let's just say I had accidentally eaten something that caused me to get really strong but I used it all in one stomp at least I think I ate something that caused that...” she corrected herself with as the rest blink at that
“Well thanks to that quake she lived past something deadly for us unicorns and became known in Canterlot as the double flare quake.” Trixie said shocking the rest but Rarity asked
“You mean she almost died to familiar loss?” which Trixie nods
“I'll explain more later” she said “and as for the reason why i want to come along is because this guy likes to eat gems.” which Rarity nods
Trixie and Spike had accompanied them to bring one of the Applejack’s apple trees to one of her family members and ended up in a dispute between Buffalo and pony which resulted in a pie battle. In the end a peace treaty was signed that allowed the buffalo to run on their trail through the apple farm and the ponies could help with what the buffalo needed.
During a visit to canterlot fluttershy was tricked by Philomena into taking care of it. Both Maroon and Trixie knew what Philomena was up to and needed to get the Phoenix back to the princess at first but when the princess came looking for it and found it with them Maroon decided to ask “princess why is this phoenix so important to you?”
“Philomina hasn't been with me for as long as you think as she is not my familiar but one of my students that was before Trixie. She was one of my first personal students in a long time.”
“Wasn't my cousin also one?” Trixie asked which Celestia smiled a sad smile with a nod.
“Philomina is Sunset’s familiar and I have been taking care of her while her bonded is away.” Celestia said it has Rarity asked
“Didn't Sunset Shimmer get banished by another student?” Celestia nodded at that
“Crimson Wind wait no that’s not right as he called himself by a different name…”
“Windigo Sonim is his name princess” Trixie said while Celestia smiled,
“Thank you, Windigo Sonim was the reason behind both of their disappearance through using my name he cast them to somewhere I do not know even if I did, I don't know if they're still alive I have hope that they are though” the rest nod while Pinkie asked Trixie
“Was Philomena part of the double flair quake?” which Trixie nods and said
“Yes, remember what I said about my cousin?” she asked as they nod while Celestia got curious “Sunset Shimmer was the other one to have a flare that day” she said, shocking them. They let the Phoenix go back to canterlot with Celestia sometime after that talk.
Though later that night Trixie was conversing with both midnight and Fallen who had barely remembered anything about Equestria at all though midnight remembered almost everything that happened to her thanks to Trixie calling her name, her true name though she still goes by midnight she was happy to know who she was and later when she saw spike all grown up as trixie picked him up from her brothers place which brought her to tears as she had missed so much of her son's life as he grew. Trixie decided to bring a copy of Spike's photo album so that Midnight could learn more about him while she was away.
Inside Trixies mind…
Fallen was spiraling because of these new memories, she doesn't know why but after hearing her true name and seeing Philomena almost everything came rushing back nearly overwhelming her. After a bit almost everything became clear to her as that's when she realized that they were home and she cried for the first time in a long time. Midnight is going to help her in the long run as they figure out who they were as there were bits and pieces missing from their memories that needed to be filled in when they find the last thing necessary for them.
The CMC we're going around to the main 6 and asking them how they got their cutie marks which they actually get the story of how but there was one thing in common till they get to Trixie and maroon who were hanging out so they ask Trixie this “so Trixie how did you get your cutie mark?”
“oh this, hehe it’s came in the first time casting an illusion spell and found that I had a talent for it but that doesn’t mean I didn't study in the other magic types as well cause Illusions can be very dangerous, I found that out the hard way and that day almost made me reject my talent, thankfully my cousins were there to help me get through those hard times and I wonder how she's doing?” Trixie said that with her eyes glazing over and a sad look on her face which got maroon to ask
“Who are you talking about?” Trixie looked over at Maroon and said
“My cousin's name is Twilight Sparkle and she was going to be next in line as the heiress of the house of star. I haven't seen her in a long time not since Windigo first came to Canterlot and became Celestia's student”
“Oh I'm sorry I didn't know that was a sore subject” Sweetie belle said Apologetically.
“No no it’s fine but what about you and your cutie mark?” Trixie said before asking Maroon
“It was during the entrance exam for Celestia’s School I was assigned to do the egg test Like so many before me but mine was different entirely cuz I got a drake instead of a chicken egg though I wish I could have seen him growing up…” her eyes glaze over as if she went back into the past of her memories and a sad look on her face everypony was confused till she clarified absentmindedly with “my birth parents had been and still are, very controlling of me and they made me do things I never wanted to do, I stepped out of line once and I lost him as punishment even now I still remember and worry that it will happen again with somepony I care about” tears start falling from her eyes. “I only hatched him because I had a flare. I wouldn't mind it if my parents died” she sighed before continuing “They only saw me as a trophy, something to brag about and it frustrated me. I wanted a Fresh Start and coming here gave me that chance to finally be free. Anyway I was just about to give up and apologize to the proctors for wasting their time when an explosion happened behind me from outside Canterlot then a rainbow flew over Canterlot which caused me to lose focus and in the end I wouldn’t be here without that random Rainboom.” After she finished her story everyone who heard couldn't help but be sorry for her including Midnight and Fallen as nobody truly understood what this meant for her, now that she told them.
“Wait the library was once under the care of a mare named Winter Star” Applebloom said confusing the rest,
“What do you mean by that Applebloom?” Sweetie Belle asked,
“Oh i know who you mean” Scootaloo said “I wonder how she is doing?” the two older mares looked at them curiously.
“What was Winter star like?” Maroon asked
“She was nice and even read books to the foals in the orphanage nearby and even tutors us with our homework.” Scootaloo said which gave the two mares smiles before shock appeared on their faces at the fact that Scootaloo was an orphan. Though it didn't take long for the news of what Maroon said to get all the way to Celestia.
Trixie hangs out with Pinkie, keeping her distracted while the rest get a surprise party ready for her because it was Pinkie’s birthday while there was a bit of a misconception between her and the girls except for Trixie. After a bit, Trixie was given the go ahead from Rainbow and took Pinkie to the barn where the party was held. Pinkie was angry at her friends and almost attacked them when trixie said “Pinkamena Diane Pie, calm down there was a reason this was hidden from you” shocking Pinkie Pie as she looked around at the decorations in the barn certainly surprised that her friends did all this, Maroon spoke first
“We wanted this to be a surprise for you to show you how much we care.” which caused Pinkie’s jaw to drop out of shock and her eyes widened as she realized what she almost did and felt ashamed of herself.
“Sorry about avoiding you and making excuses” Applejack said as Pinkie looked at their sad faces that were full of regret.
“I'm sorry as well girls as I had jumped to conclusions.” which Trixie smiled and said
“There was a reason why i stuck with you during all of that Pinkie” confusing them
“What do you mean?” Fluttershy asked while tilting her head out of confusion.
“My cousin Twilight almost had the same if not worse reaction as Pinkie here did, and that was her first and only surprise party… she didn't talk to them about the reason why she was angry at them.”
“Really? I find that hard to believe with how much I heard about her while I was staying with her brother” Maroon said confusing the rest with Pinkie asking
“Did they avoid her as well?”
“Not quite” Trixie answered “it was more they left her with her foalsitter and didn’t tell her anything which would have spoiled the surprise though the reason it was her only surprise party was because of what happened a month after her birthday” the tilted their heads in confusion. “The month before her eighth birthday she had found a weasel scurrying around.” Rarity realized where it went and asked
“Is this what you meant by what you told us after picking Spike up and that quake?” which Trixie nods
“The weasel was named Mr.Whiskers by Twilight and had accidentally made it her familiar” with the others eyes widening “around the age of eight or nine a unicorn filly gets a mental shield to help with a familiars death but at the time it wasn’t fully developed.” shock was all that was in the air “the familiar was killed by an unknown pony and in turn put her in the hospital for a month.”
“What happened after that?” Fluttershy asked worried
“Normaly this would have killed the foal on the spot” saddening the rest but Maroon caught on and asked
“How did she survive?” confusing the rest but Trixie smiled and said
“She survived because of Spike helping ground her as throughout her time in the hospital Spike was with her helping her heal through resonance. Though it hit her family hard, including me but ever since that day she was different but a brush with death will do that in more ways than one right Rarity?” She said looking at her and she nodded “she was known as the miracle foal after that” with the rest in shock at the identity behind the miracle foal being Trixie’s cousin. “But today isn’t about her, it's about Pinkie,” she said, turning their attention back to the cause of the conversation before her lesson and the rest had a newfound respect for Twilight.
Though in Trixies’ head, Fallen looked at Midnight and asked “Is that true?” to her while Midnight had gotten a whole new wave of memories. All were the missing pieces of previous ones.
“It is and I had a conversation with death as well and even she told me it's not my time. It's also how I was able to see souls. I can't believe that I missed that!” Midnight said, shocking Fallen who cuddled with her as Trixie fell asleep.
The usual chaos that happens when discord is released Celestia summons the bearers to the castle. Maroon and her friends get a strange feeling as their thoughts have them wanting to trap the being in stone once more. They looked at each other confused. “Did you girls get the same thoughts?” Rainbow asked
“Yeah”
“We might need to talk about this to the princess later but not now,” Maroon said with the rest nodding.
Meanwhile at the same time…
Discord caused a lot of chaos after his release but while the six were going after the elements of harmony Trixie walked up to Discord to chat with him.
“Hello Discord”
“Ah what a surprise are you here to challenge me?”
“No I’m just the messenger and I have a message from an old friend of yours for your return”
“Go on…” he said while holding the eagle claw out
“The message is ‘Welcome back king of cotton candy and chocolate milk!’” He was shocked but understood as he was horrified when he saw what he had become.
“Thank you for bringing me back to my senses.” Discord said
“You started a game with the elements of harmony and they have new bearers so we need your help in convincing them that not everything is as it seems.”
“I see and I will help with this but what should we do about him?”
“We can’t do anything as due to the creation of the first elements backfiring, you both are now linked so if one goes…”
“Both go…” he finished before saying “yes I see the predicament I’m in now but where are my friends?”
“Light is in the heart and needs to be saved before he can be released but the empire won’t return for a while, Nature is over in the Everfree but I never came across her while I was there, while Dark is either in Tartarus or the badlands.”
“I see, thank you but what should I do?” he asked while coiling himself onto a question mark.
“When the elements are about to hit you with a rainbow, teleport away and disappear for a while, drop hints before you go and let the chaos be turned back while you wait. You might find an old friend along the way.”
“Got ya loud and clear” he said while saluting with a smile glad to be himself after a long time.
“Thank you Discord.” Trixie said as she left so he snapped and made sure to act like he did before.
Back with the girls…
Celestia took them to the vault only for the elements to not be there and Discord just laughed with them wondering why he did that so Maroon asked “what's going on?”
“Discord” Celestia said “where have you hidden the elements?!?”
“Oh Celestia you wound me” he said as he appeared in glass of himself before talking “I just have them for my little game” he said confusing them while the element bearers feel the need to find them “I bet you’ve already noticed the slight changes have you not girls?” he continued after his eyes fall out of his face and roll into a new face of himself looking at the girls with Maroon asking,
“You mean…”
“Yes the elements themselves are alive and do the bidding of another, one who has been lost to time.” shocking them “twists and turns are my master plan, you’ll find the elements back where you began” he said before disappearing with laughter echoing through the hall.
“What did he mean by one who was lost to time?” Maroon asked,
“I’m not sure but we must deal with what’s at hoof first” they make their way to the maze but the elements try to pull them to their actual location. So the black being decides to try again and enters the maze after the bearer of magic only to run into a barrier with Discord saying “not this time bucko i'm in the middle of a game with them at the moment.”
“I will get that pony on my side and you will perish!”
“No can do Modi as something else is in our midst” the dark being was confused and showed it “the magical blast that the first elements caused upon their first use and self destruction caused our existence to be linked now” shocking the being “so if I go…”
“I go as well…” the being said before disappearing with the final words. “This is not over yet you unwanted creatine!”
As the bearers got corrupted they acted the opposite of their elements. Except maroon who understood what her opposite ment after seeing the others acting like theirs. So when she got the actual elements that were worried about the bonds snapping, she asked ‘magic’ “what do you want?!?” she got the feeling that it wanted her to put it on and stop her friends from being disconnected from the rest of them. “Fine but because this is too much chaos for me even though I don’t mind Ponyville’s natural chaos” she said causing the elements to call her a liar “if I wanted order I would have listened to my birth parents and returned to them and let them control me by just being what they want me to be” she said which caused the elements to realize that being here was the best thing to happen to her. So she put them on while helping her friends with them asking her why she never succumbed to Discord “I’ll tell you when all of you are here” she said to each of them. Once they got Rainbow dash off of the cloud and back to normal “you’re wondering why I never fell to Discord”s influence? It’s because I knew what my element was because I’ve already experienced it. My element is not magic but trust so my opposite is distrust and it would have caused me to leave and never come back as I wont trust in anything and will most likely die in the end, and I dont trust many fully but you girls are getting there” she said with a smile. That filled the girls with pride that they were getting somewhere with their friend though Fluttershy smiled at her marefriend and just straight up kissed her. Maroon kissed back.
After a while they ask her “so what should we do now?”
“Let's reverse all this chaos!” she said with them going to Discord and blasting him with the rainbow but once the rainbow was finished with its job it disappeared, however they didn’t see Discord as a statue anywhere at all. So they go on with their day as a smile graces their faces. They let the elements go back with Celestia.
Few weeks after Discord’s disappearance, Maroon was put to her mental edge as her birth parents were coming over to try and take her back to Canterlot against her will with a letter sent to her the week before. The letter, let her know she has no choice and that the law of the princess along with her restraining order are null and void as it’s just words and a piece of paper that had already met the shredder. She got the letter while on a date with Fluttershy under a tree on a nearby hill overlooking Ponyville and after reading it she was on the verge of having a panic attack and hyperventilating harder. Fluttershy tried to calm her down by taking her to their friends and getting their help. “What got her this way darling?”
“She got some mail about her birth family coming over and she is afraid that they are coming to take her back to Canterlot” she said quietly but it was understandable enough for their eyes to widen. Sure enough when they got to Maroon’s place she made herself as small as possible while being her normal size before using a shrinking spell. She hid under Flutershy’s wing while her birth parents were calling for her but Trixie asked
“Hello sir and ma’am but what may your business be here in this lovely town?”
“We are here to retrieve our daughter from this mudhole town and take her home” the stallion said his coat was a deep gray with a grandfather clock on his flank while his mane was a deep red. The mare had a pink mane and a light maroon coat with a crown on it.
“Why is a member of the most hated house of canterlot even here? And can’t we see our daughter when we want?” the mare said shocking the seven but trixie then said
“You do realize that there was a restraining order put on you both because of her constant panic attacks from even mentioning you both, thanks to both of you being so controlling of her, oh and I also remember that you, star crown and grand clock lost custody of her to my family? So get out of Ponyville or I will let my cousin know that you are here against the restraining order.” They laughed and said
“That piece of paper is gone now and will not come back” before she teleported, a stallion wearing the captain’s armor and he was a white pony with a blue mane
“Trixie, I was in the middle of something, so why did you teleport me here?.” he asked
“Maroon’s parents are going against the restraining order that was put on them along with claiming custody over her, as well as destroying the papers for that very order.” he looked at them with a glare that silenced their laughter instantly. “I warned you” was all Trixie said before they were arrested and had their rights read to them, after it was all over and her birth parents were gone, maroon came out and grew back to normal size, Celestia came down later that day to ask what happened only to find Trixie with Maroon and her friends, as they were comforting her. Celestia was confused and a bit worried for Maroon,
“Trixie? Is that you?” Celestia asked
“Its me princess there is a reason I dropped off your radar after leaving was to not be tracked by those who would use me to harm my family as that is how maroon’s birth parents found her” Trixie said with Celestia shocked about the birth parents trying to go against the restraining order as she was the one to personally issue the order on them, but understood wanting to protect her family.
“Did they say why they were back?” Celestia asked curious
“I guessed that they wanted me to come back to canterlot and nearly had a panic attack twice today thanks to both a letter and them actually barging into my home and started to take my things. That restraining order did help me a bit as whenever I knew I was going to come across them I would teleport to the other side of the radius of the restraining order, to get home after I was taken in by the stars and became an honorary star. The letter they sent me let me know that they had shredded the papers for the restraining order that they had and that your words and laws are words and paper.” Maroon said with her friends hugging her and Celestia joined in with her accepting the hug.
“I'll take care of this personally, and they will listen this time.” Celestia said.
“Thank you, princess,” Maroon said.
The next few days were a blur as they helped Luna come to terms with a holiday and helped her find a way to have fun with it and Rainbow saying “it will be an honor to be apart of the Shadowbolts so I accept your invitation to them and that I will earn my rank while I serve”
“That is excellent news as I was thinking that they could be stationed nearby as I am hoping that Ponyville would be stationed here rather than cloudsdale” Luna said
Managed to help rarity out with sister problems during the sister hoof social after a fight was causing a rift to form between them, though sweetie bell said something that actually hurt rarity and when she talked with applejack about it Aj admits that her and applebloom don’t always see eye to eye, like what sweetie bell thinks that they have a good sibling but really she acts more like a mother from what granny smith tells her.
Applebloom had her nightmare about cutie marks in the form of cutie pox with it starting off with losing her family then losing her friends for having one, after that it was not having one when her friends had one and losing them that way as well. The nightmare was resolved thanks to Luna helping out.
Rainbow Dash had a pet race at Fluttershy’s and got a tortoise named tank who was determined to the end and even got a propeller hat to help him live with Rainbow.
Hearth’s warming was coming and they were making a play for the holiday to tell the past to which it was certainly interesting when Maroon asked Trixie “what do you know about the holiday?”
“The beginning of a new era, we are doing a play of hearth's warming, is from over four thousand years ago as hearth's warming came into effect sometime after that. Did you know that the Migration era ended, on that very night??? Sense then another era came into play but its name was lost to time, after that was the Discordian era, when that ended was when Celestia and Luna became rulers and more happened from there to where we are now.” Trixie said which shocked them so they wanted to make sure it would work. The play went off without a hitch and was very smooth. Everypony enjoyed the show and the princesses were shocked at the accuracy of the play.
The con artists of Flim and Flam tried to get the apples into a cider off but Maroon asked “did you bring your own batch of apples to make into cider? Cause the contest is about quality not quantity” which the others agreed upon and Trixie said
“Plus if you get the farm the apples will have nowhere to live as they had lost their livelihoods plus they were the first settlers of this very town” and that caused the ponies of Ponyville to run them out of town.
After Rainbow saved a foal while it was falling down a well she got a lot of praise but Trixie knew what this could do for her ego in a bad way “hey Rainbow can we talk for a bit?” trixie asked
“Yeah sure” so they walked out of town a bit “yeah i know i'm awesome but what do you want to talk about?” she said bragging
“Your ego” Trixie stated getting straight to the point
“What about it?” Rainbow asked confused
“The reason the house of star is so humble, is because we know how far we have come from rock bottom but we dont let it get to our heads because all it takes is one wrong thing and next thing we know we have nothing left at all”
“And this has to do with me, how?”
“If you ride your success for longer than today it will come to bite you in the flank. You can ride it out for the rest of the day but remember all it takes is for something bad to happen for it to be blamed on you.”
“Pshh like that will happen” Rainbow brushed off
“Well you just jinxed yourself and don't say i didn't warn you” trixie said leaving rainbow in thought and later on she almost did keep bragging about it and almost paid the price thanks to her not listening at first but when the mysterious mare-do-well appeared Trixies words hit her as hard as how fast she could fly only for her to smack into a mountain. When her ears picked up cracking coming from somewhere nearby, she looked around trying to find what's causing the noise with no luck but found it was in the vicinity of the dam. She flew into town after that worried about how this would affect others so she brought maroon and rarity over to the dam to help her check things out.
“You said you heard something over here right darling?”
“Yeah sense I joined the Shadowbolts I noticed that my hearing has gotten better but not by much”
Maroon walked over and used a quick scanning spell to see what the problem was and found that the dam was close to collapsing. “Well you were right rainbow there is something wrong and it's the dam itself good thing you heard this otherwise it might have collapsed and flooded Ponyville.”
“Should we tell the mayor?”
“We have about a week or less for the dam to collapse and we are going to need all of the water drained out so that the dam can be fixed or rebuilt.” Maroon said as they made their way back to Ponyville to tell Mayor Mare about it
“So you’re saying that the dam is breaking?” Mayor Mare said
“It’s close to and were going to need help to repair or rebuild it” Rarity said
“Alright thanks for letting me know girls” she said as they left and the next day rainbow checked on the dam to see the water was gone and the dam was being repaired by the ponies of Ponyville, some help that Trixie called in from her family, and the Apple family who were in town for another reunion. The next few days were the community fixing the dam fully and once it was done everypony felt satisfied at the hard work they did with Rainbow learning a lesson of humility.
Fluttershy’s friends noticed the fact of Fluttershy being a doormat and wanted to help her. Trixie asked Maroon to help Fluttershy to be assertive in her own way. Which Maroon agreed with. She found Fluttershy being thrown out of her own home by Angel bunny and almost saw Ironwood’s flier for assertiveness so she walked over to Fluttershy and said with a sigh “we need to talk Fluttershy”
“About what?”
“Your being too kind to everypony not that it's a bad thing but you need to know how it affects others like me” she said with Fluttershy’s confusion so they went for a walk around Ponyville so that she can see what her marefriend was talking about. “Also being assertive doesn’t mean that you have to be cruel, it means that you’re standing up for yourself and there are ways to take things too far.” Maroon said “but I know you can do it.” and so Maroon helped Fluttershy be assertive in her own way which worked well.
Maroon created a cycle that does have an end thankfully ‘it’s about time’ but she felt as if casting the time spell after learning what she was trying to tell herself was more natural then any magic she knows and it confused her. It just felt right to her so she looked at her flank and almost forgot the clock part of her cutie mark which made her eyes widen.
Spike ran up the hill to the rest with a letter in his claws. “Trixie, Trixie! I got a letter from the main house!” He said as the rest of her friends look to Trixie while she asked
“Auntie and uncle wrote to me?” She opened it and read the letter stating that her cousin was getting married to Cadence and she got excited. “Girls, we are heading to Canterlot to attend a wedding!” They were shocked but it worked out. As after they got to their jobs cadence did the sunshine sunshine dance with maroon with trixie laughing while shaking her head while there was confusion about it with rainbow asking
“What was up with the dance?”
“It's something Cadence taught those she foalsits and it's something that gets stuck in our heads despite how silly it is, so we use it as a greeting.” she said with a smile as they watch “i need to go check in with somepony so i'll see with you later.” she walked away to somewhere unknown. The rest get ready for their parts of the wedding.
Meanwhile…
Shining armor was wandering around on patrol when trixie came up and said “hello love bug”
There was a shocked face before it turned confused “what are you talking about?”
“Don't worry we are alone and there is one thing i need to tell you”
“What is it?”
“The time is almost near. Do you think loca will be here to interrupt?”
“Most likely but how did you know that it was me?”
“The shield is not up for defense against the others as normally that would be the case”
“I see and if your wondering your cousin is safe and he did cast the shield at the top of the tower after all this is his plan that i'm going with”
“Alright let's get this going and it's good to see you again chryssy”
Things go very well for the wedding till the loco’s hive attacks canterlot brutally injuring shining armor and emotionally drained cadence to get enough magic to overpower Celestia. “Get the elements!” she said but trixie had lept into action with mismatched wings forming on her back out of feather fire and leather shadows.
Maroon and her friends were urged to do what the princess said but instead she pulled the two injured to her and made sure they were safe as they blocked the two form further harm as the disguise vanished revealing another changeling queen the real shining armor burst in with the cavalry and pushed back the invaders as the injured merge to save each other's lives as well as their own.
A new version of an old thing
It had been a month since the wedding and everypony was happy but after the wedding Trixie went back to traveling for now with a smile.
The Crystal Empire came back and they learned the true story behind the banishment was to protect the heart and to save the pony trapped inside as Sombra had given up his title of king and became the advisor to the alicorn queen. Chrysalis is still in charge of the hive from the hive mind but Cadence was in control of the body and they had moved the hive the Changeling queen was ruling over to the empire. At first Celestia was worried for the ponies coming from under the ruler of a vile umbra only to find that he was trying to protect them from his mother only for him to be punished for it.
They get back home and things go well at first but Pinkie had found the mirror pool by listening to what the ground was telling her and caused enough chaos for Discord to come back if he was stone.
Rainbow went to practice with the shadowbolts that night before the next day when a twister was about to endanger a lot of ponies. Rainbow stepped in and smacked Lightning Dust upside the head after dealing with the twister and Spitfire came up and asked “cadet what is wrong with you?!”
“What's wrong with me? What's wrong with her! I was coming over to visit my parents when I saw a twister coming through cloudsdale about to wreck the place!” Rainbow snipped back with a bit of a glare
“It's just training!” Lightning Dust said but Rainbow started to berate the mare,
“No, that’s not training that is being a danger to everyone around you and just by looking at you I can tell you like the extreme but is that all there is? Also that twister was about to hit princess Celestia before destroying all of cloudsdale and that's if the princess didn’t notice it. While I stopped it she was looking right at it so good luck” Rainbow said before flying over to the princess who was actually there “you okay princess?”
“Yes I'm fine Rainbow Dash but do you know where that twister came from?” she asked concerned
“Yeah it came from the Wonderbolts academy and I was on my way to see my family” she said with Celestia nodding
“I’ll take care of this, you may leave and thank you again” Celestia said with Rainbow nodding along with saluting before flying off.
Trixie returned after a familiar stallion and a meek mare came by and caused a commotion by him claiming that he is the strongest unicorn and challenged the strongest unicorns in town to a magic duel while the mare was battered and bruised but the ponies who knew her were shocked. “The name’s Windigo Sonim huns and I challenge the strongest unicorns the town has to offer to a magic duel and the winner gets the mare from me if they win if they lose they must relinquish all of their magic to me” he said and that angered the two mares at his blatant disregard of the mare’s well being but they decided that they weren’t going to lose and stepped forward as he put a strange pendant on and the mare walked over to the crowd unnoticed by the male unicorn.
“I hope they win” the mare said with hope,
“Don’t worry Winter they wont lose” one of the townspony’s said with a smile,
“You're on” they both say a bit pissed at him as they narrow their eyes at him.
“May I get your names as we never introduced ourselves the last time we met?” he said cockly,
“Trixie Lulamoon” “Maroon Ripple” they say with one being faster than the other but it was still understandable.
“Oh some members of the most renowned and hated house in canterlot your awfully far from your family” he taunted before laughing.
“I would have said the same but let's use our best spells eh Maroon?” Trixie said while lighting her horn with Maroon nodding while doing the same. Then Trixie had an idea and started her spell with a grin. Maroon noticed the grin and put the plan into action by distracting Crimson by zapping his hooves. He started firing back on Maroon who was smirking though before he could hit her horn with forbidden magic and nearly broke her horn for good. she threw up an armor spell to protect herself, Trixie fired something at him and he barely deflected it back but then a shield formed around both of them and Maroon launched another magic barrage till he pulled an ace out of his sleeves and used the amulets magic with his forbidden arts to disable their magic and it nearly worked for Maroon as she had gotten it up at a millisecond before it hit her but for Trixie nothing happened. It seemed that the amulet wasn’t helping Crimson it was helping Trixie who said “that’s cute” shocking everyone “you’re out of luck and yes I know what you did so either you give me the amulet or I can beat it off your sorry body plus we already won!” he was a bit scared but didnt let it show but Maroon said
“She’s right you know and judging by your skill you were one of Celestia's students who never left her alone.”
“So what?! she turned her back on me first so it's only fair to do the same as another alicorn will rise to take her place!” he said with Midnight telling Trixie
‘Trixie he's going to try and release the alicorn killer! ’
‘The WHAT?!? ’ she asked but got the response from Fallen
‘She is the reason Celestia and Luna are the only alicorns that are known. ’
‘Ok so she's bad right? ’ she felt them both nod and it made her afraid before glaring with Maroon and he said
“When the sun is dead and the moon is gone, time for the unnatural to reign! You won't live to see another day! The bound and the phoenix are to die for the being of order shall smite them for good! Awaken my queen and take your throne!” shocking everypony there as there was a pulse coming from the place he was standing and it caused Trixie and the amulet to disappear along with the illusion that was there.
Maroon held him in her magic and yelled “WHAT DID YOU DO!!” as her magic started to turn dark and Windigo was going to use more forbidden magic right as Crimson started to leak through while pushing Windigo back, Fluttershy said as Maroon charges Windigo with purple wisps coming from her eyes as they turned a sickly green,
“Rainbow knock him out i’ll handle Maroon” Rainbow nods and they leaped into action before Maroon could do anything Fluttershy openly kissed her which snapped her out of her rage while having her tackle Fluttershy before taking the brunt of the blow as Rainbow knocked Windigo out before anypony could stop her as Crimson came back scared at what the others were reacting to so he asked
“What happened? I’m sorry if he did anything” he said as he found the key on him “what’s this for?” he asked as he pulled it out before looking at Winter and seeing the collar on her “oh”. He unlocked the collar before sitting away from everypony ashamed of himself.
Maroon walked over to him and asked him “what happened?”
“I don't know, all I remember is getting stressed about making the battle boring while being in the battle then it faded to black.” was all he said
Celestia showed up with Luna who was confused due to her sister not telling her anything about this as Shining Armor came in with Cadence to see this while wanting to know where his cousin is. Maroon went to canterlot to tell them what she knew of what happened and made sure Crimson was not at fault as he was almost given a sentence that would cause him to shift back to Windigo. Winter stayed behind and got a welcome back party. She happily stayed with Rarity who caught her up on what happened while she was gone.
Her friends ended up having to deal with their own things such as Scootaloo who getting scared by Rainbow Dash by accident, Winter Star’s return, Crimson’s willing imprisonment vs Windigo’s rioting one and Discord’s reappearance like he just showed back up and asked about what happened to which Fluttershy told him and actually became his friend, he met Winter star and realized that something wasn't right, “i need to do something real fast don’t worry i won’t take long” he said before suddenly appeared in front of Celestia and Luna.
“Discord, how are you here? Why are you here!?”
“Well Sunbutt I just got some news that is bigger than all three of us combined”
“What do you mean?” confusion radiated out of the princesses as worry came from Discord
“He said the oath to release the Alicorn killer”
“Who is the Alicorn killer?” Luna asked
“The Alicorn killer is someone, a friend of mine, banished to the deepest depths of Tartarus. After all, she is the reason you and Luna are the last alicorns till recently.” he took a breath before saying “Let me tell you a story, Over 5,000 years ago during the Age known as the migration era. The pony tribes were coming into Equestria for the first time. After three tribes started to migrate here, there were three outcasts who were sent ahead as either fodder or to scout out a good spot to rest and then lead the rest there, these three were my friends and are the reason behind this they did not mean to leave it to their future but they could only keep this foe away as not even the mineral Orochu could kill it thanks to it using unnatural magic and i mean the forbidden kind that has to be locked away. They were Fighters of the highest class. Yet they were looked down on by others just because they were different. They never held any resentment towards the foals but towards the adults they shake their heads in shame. Three separate enemies and you've only heard about one, the next you've encountered and I'm ashamed that they're still alive for they are my opposite but they cannot die now as thanks to a magical imbalance that was caused around that time, if they go, I go as well and vice versa unless the elements are destroyed, the last one is actually a group one of the first governments of Equestria or a failed attempt of one six ponies all unicorn major egos is locked away in a chest and unknown place. think upon those stories there's more than you know now I gotta get back to my friend just wanted to let you know.”
They were confused after Discord teleported back to his friends and had fun while causing mischief in small ways like pranks. He even got together with Pinkie and Rainbow Dash to prank all of Ponyville at once which made everyone angry for a bit. After Maroon returned home exhausted she turned in as Crimson had been locked up and had his magic taken from him as punishment but she felt it was too harsh and he didn’t know what happened to him after the shift.
The next day she was visited by Winter Star about something “um hello?”
“I'm Winter Star” she said before giving one back but Maroon was shocked before smiling.
“I've heard a lot about your Winter, don't worry it was only good things.” Maroon said with a smile which shocked Winter.
“How much did you ask?” Winter asked confused.
“Actually i asked our friends after learning about you from Applebloom and Scootaloo” Maroon said which shocked Winter “if you want to be here i wont mind having a roommate” she said cheerfully shocking Winter even more.
“How did you know what I was going to ask?”
“I didnt i just guessed” Maroon said “oh and don't worry about the orphans i decided to pay them a visit after learning about it. You can take it back if you would like?” which Winter nods with a smile on her face with how friendly Maroon was, before heading downstairs after noticing a book on the table.
“Why is that book out?” she asked, curious.
“Oh I just got it from Celestia today and she wants me to complete an unfinished spell from it” she said before walking over to it and going back to reading winter made her way to bed as it had been a long day for her. Maroon read the spell out loud near the elements, which somehow Winter didnt notice on her way down, causing the cutie mark, mix up for her friends. After that the ponies were not happy with what occurred but Maroon managed to fix it by showing her friends their true purpose and helping them get their right cutie mark back. After writing about how friendship conquered as she finished, the elements disintegrated her unicorn body while transferring her soul to the realm of ascension where princess Celestia showed her what she has been through and how she persevered through her toughest challenges while remaining true to herself. “Princess?” Maroon said worried for herself and her friends.
“Yes Maroon?” she asked, curious about the question.
“Is it alright to take a break from the elements sometime soon as I feel as if something might happen because of them being alive”
“When did you learn this?”
“Discord told us in his own way and we figured it out from there. We also hear them in our thoughts sometimes and it makes us feel odd. If it's alright we would like to be separated from them for a while and see how it goes?”
“Thank you for letting me know but in the meantime I’m having the guard looking for Trixie as i think something might have happened to her but now is not the time for that” she said as Maroons magic constructed a new body for her as her cutie mark descended out of the library her friends gathered out there to meet her only for her to reveal that she is an alicorn shocking them. Sure it was a surprise but in the end it worked out in the end as Discord popped into the scene with curiosity.
“How long are you willing to wait for this to happen?” he asked her.
“Not too long as i now have my coronation to go to and make sure everything is ok” Maroon said with Discord nodding. Winter was shocked at how all that happened in a day and passed out. The coronation went fine and it was the Shadowbolts first show with the Wonderbolts.
The next few days were interesting as Celestia and Luna were captured and it was the summer sun celebration. Maroon used her magic on the potion before she drank it and her eyes started to glow as she was shown the past. First she was back to when Luna transformed into Nightmare Moon and heard Luna say “the day shall no longer outshine the night that's the pony shun the Moon for the Sun” the moon was suddenly raised “and let there be night forever more!”
“Sister, lower the Moon it is your duty!”
“No sister, this country has no room for two princesses, only one shall rule!” Luna transformed into Nightmare Moon through the darkness that consumed her soul. The fight was seen throughout the place and their, Maroon saw Midnight Star watching from behind the throne of the Moon as the two fought, she watched as Midnight Star gathered the ponies of the night and led them away from the Everfree so she went back inside and saw the banishment of Nightmare Moon to the well Moon and the Alicorn’s face appeared on it as a silhouette as a being of Darkness suddenly when flying out of Celestia’s body right as a barrier appeared on the edges of Equestria. Next she saw Discord's downfall of him being turned to stone for the first time. After that the potion showed the tree of Harmony and its location along with the elements removal of the tree but something was off about the potion as it went further back in time to what she guessed was the Migration era for ponies 5,000 years ago. First it showed the sealing of the counsel into a chest lined with runes and the banishment of the alicorn killer along with the death of the victor who was the Pegasus. Then it showed the creation of the Everfree with a pony's death and her falling on a seed before it sprouted and took over the farm that stretched for miles. Then it showed the creation of the crystal heart out of desperation when the council attacked the empire for the first time. Finally it stopped with cave right in front of her with her curiosity peaked she walked in and heard three ponies talking in ancient ponish but somehow she was able to know what they were saying.
“Twilight, are you sure about this we don't know what we're messing with here.” a crystal unicorn with a changeling horn and legs said as his coat was a whitish silver and his mane and tail were a bright blue that seemed to change to a darker hue.
“The magic brought me here for a reason I have no clue why though” the now named Twilight said though he looked like a mix between a Thiestral, a Pegasus and a Dragon with a dark royal blue coat and a lavender mane and tail that acted like flames.
“Maybe it's something higher than us that was trying to have us come to this place?” a bark brown coated earth pony mare? With a nature green mane and tail said.
“Maybe Everfree maybe, maybe someone else knows though am I right?” The pony named Twilight turned around and stared directly at Maroon with his friends. “There is something going to happen sometime soon. We are sorry for letting you deal with our problems but we couldn't get rid of them completely, we could only stop them and seal them away.”
“Indeed we are truly sorry if you are seeing this it means the oath has been activated and you are unable to prevent it.” the mare now known as Everfree said
“But what does it mean?” Maroon asked them
“It means that Darkness will swallow Equius whole if you do not listen to what we have to say about this well. This well is very old, older than anything we know and we believe it's the start of all magic, it's filled to the brim with arcane magic and we are now its Guardians to protect it from those who try to twist it to their favor.”
“Hey now Crystal go easy on them, it’s a lot to take in after all the plunder Vines are probably going to make it tough for them.” Once it was done the vision stopped as the three turned back around to contemplate and chat about it more but the vision ended there so maroon lead them with the elements to the tree of Harmony where after placing the elements in the tree they decide to drop their connection and see how it goes from there. They ask the princesses if they know any spells that can help with it which they do as Celestia does the unbinding and cutting the threads that bind the bearers to the elements it worked. Then the tree presented the mysterious box but it was ignored as Maroon led them deeper and the tree did try to stop them from missing its box and get their curiosity as a black being tried again and managed to slip in as now all it needed was to wait for the right moment to strike.
“Where are you going Maroon?” Rainbow asked
“There was something more to the vision that needed to be solved as right around here as there is something far older than Celestia. Maybe around Discords age?” Discord appeared as they emerged looking at four places, a cave, a tree, a run down house, and finally a strange dragon statue that made everyone irritated for an unknown reason…
“Did someone say my name?” Discord asked curios,
“Yes I did as the potion that Zecora gave us has shown me something known as the arcane well I think?” at the name he said with his words full of memories.
“Ah yes the arcane well I know of it but first” Discord snapped and Maroon felt something fall unconscious inside her and she was confused a bit but understood that it must have been important. “There we go dont want anyone else to listen to this.” He then looked around the new discovery of his old friend’s homes with a smile and glazed eyes filled with memories of the past and the good times. “This is where my old friends used to live before the counsel came and tried to turn everypony against them” he frowned as he walked over to the farm house that looked awfully like the one back in Ponyville for the Apple family with the others following him curious.
“Were their names Twilight, Crystal and Everfree?” Maroon asked catching the others attention with Discord nodding
“Twilight Eclipse, Crystal Phoenix and Everfree Forest were their names and this is where they lived” something felt off to the ponies as Maroon walked over to two trees that were growing some strange fruit but Trixie recognised one and picked it off the tree with her magic.
“The ancient moon fruit? How long has this tree been here?” she said, shocking them but Discord heard something coming from the cave so he walked over and a timber pony came flying out tackling Discord to the ground.
“Everfree? Wow, you’ve certainly changed a lot since I last saw you!” he said in shock as the timber pony now known as Everfree said,
“It's been over four thousand years and you haven’t visited me in that time to tell me how the other two are doing!” she said angry enough to scare Discord so he said,
“That's not my fault as I was also dealing with the recent magic imbalance and the aftermath of it!” he said causing confusion among the ponies as they looked to the others and shrug,
“It's still good to see you old friend and why did you lead them here?”
“I didn't there is a new alicorn and she was the one to lead us here. While not too long ago my plunder vines sprouted and you know what it does to chaotic creatures like me as it happened to Eclipse…” she sadly nods before noticing Trixie examining the moon fruit while keeping Applejack from bucking the trees out of farmers intuition. The pegasi were flying around the other tree with the alicorns learning about the moon fruit from Trixie.
“So what you're saying is that this is a fruit that night ponies ate a lot of right? But why wont you let me buck the tree?” Applejack said with Trixie stating,
“Because think of these like peaches, you don’t buck those trees right?” Applejack nods “both of these fruits are like that as they must be picked off the tree instead of shaking the tree to make them fall” she sighed “from what was recorded the moon fruit has a tendency to explode if the tree is bucked don’t know about the other one though”
“They will turn into a cloud while falling as the magic of the earth pony race will speed up the process while killing off the seeds of both fruits” Everfree inquired taking a break from her talk with Discord,
“Thanks Miss Everfree!” Trixie said with a grateful smile and got one back.
“How do you know so much about them Trixie?” Luna asked with Celestia saying,
“Because her family is the one that grows them, even back in Canterlot, how do you think I got so many for you on your return home?” making Lunas eyes widen which caused her to ask,
“And what happened to my daughter?” shocking everypony there,
“I’m afraid I dont know what you are talking about sister?” Celestia said when Trixie asked,
“What was her name?”
“Her name was Midnight star” everyone was confused at the shock on Celestia, and Trixies faces till Trixie said,
“Celestia you made your niece the first and only noble house of the night other then the house of the moon” shocking everyone there with Discord saying,
“Well that’s unexpected”
“Eyup” Everfree said just like big mac would say catching Applejack off guard and causing her to wonder if her and Everfree were related,
“Do you know what happened to her after my banishment?” Luna asked Trixie who nodded and said as the rest were quiet and wanting to listen as their curiosity was piqued.
“During the time after your banishment, new laws were being passed by Celestia to protect the ponies of the night but the rest of the ponies didn't like the favoritism and removed a few of them without her knowing for that time because it happened behind her back. It was during this time that went by two names ‘the Solar Inquisition’ is the one that went in the history books while what it's know as by my family and Celestia is ‘the Lunar Purge’ which after a barrier was up we don't know what happened to the Thiestrals and other night ponies out in the badlands. To help them escape as a lot of ponies died in that time she brought the stars to life which is why we have the Ursas as they were the ones that stayed behind out of all of the starbeasts that were created.” shocking all of them with Celestia asking,
“How many died on both sides?”
“The ponies wanting eternal day greatly outnumbered the night ponies on ‘the Starless Night’ she made a big blow to them and she was considered a one pony army before making her way from the southern edge of Equestria all the way to Canterlot while injured beyond what a pony was capable of surviving well after her adrenalin ran out but she marched all the way there and proved to be very determined but once outside of Canterlot she finally passed out at the gates as the injuries had taken their toll on her aching body but she was saved by Celestia who happened to be on a walk around Canterlot and didn't recognise her at all. I'll let Celestia continue from here…” Celestia nods and said,
“At the time I had no clue who she was as to me she was a random pony that needed help and it took a while for me to earn her trust but in the end it was worth it. I learned that she was there during our battle and had taken matters into her own hooves by leading the way to the south for the ponies of the night. When she asked me if she could become a noble house and help with the decisions, I gave her the title and the power behind it. Though I accidentally gave them a little too much including over me but they only use it if it could harm others as some time while Twilight and Sunset were under me a stallion wanted to use an inactive mine in a memorial gravesite thankfully Twilight Velvet had been there to listen to the proposal and used that power to keep that memorial safe.” Celestia said with a smile as the rest were in awe at that but then it turned into a frown “though that pony did not take kindly to that so he foal napped Spike” causing shock which Trixie said,
“Oh... I remember that day yeah, Rainbow she was running all over canterlot looking for him at the speed you get to before you do your rainboom” with that Rainbow was impressed “they found him up north before the empire’s return right?” Celestia nods,
“When we finally found him I actually had to speed up in order to not lose sight of her. I almost did a few times but those times I saw her mane and tail ignited into flames” she said, shocking them except for Trixie.
“That’s actually the most normal thing that could happen with one of the main houses” which confused them “it’s been in our family line for quite a long time. Though it’s long enough that we don’t know when it started.” then Everfree spoke up.
“Actually Eclipse’s mane and tail acted like flames whenever he was truly pissed off.” confusing the rest “I’m not kidding if I remember correctly there was a pony who decided to try and foal nap all of the foals we had, they were at the time only two years old if I remember correctly.” Discord piped in,
“Oh I remember that day as not even the war that came before then could compare to his rage after I had helped find them. Let’s say he was going to use them as test subjects for different spells. I appeared next to him with this guy” he said pointing at the statue “yeah he’s alive but barely enough to generate magic, so he’s just stuck like that and not even I know what he can do but we agreed that the pony was going too far so we told him the location and he is the fastest flier that I know of today as not even sky coat here could keep up with him at his fastest.” shocking them “his mane and tail ignited to the point it was seen all across Equestria at the time before he disappeared only to reappear a few hours later. He returned with a cart full of foals with two being carried by his wings.”
“Do you know what happened to the one who did it?” Everfree asked,
“He actually told us this ‘they can mess with me all they want and I’ll laugh it off but the moment they try and use my family against me I’ll go to war’ I told myself ‘remind my future self to not harm any foals that are connected to my friends as they will go to the destruction of everything and back for their foals’ while Dark Flame was there, he was actually terrified and that's how he turned to stone. We don't know how long he will be this way though he was irritating. Just know if he agrees with something you said like ‘let’s turn leaves into candy’ it will happen as he is a being of the unknown.”
“Anyway we should get back on track what happened after that Celestia?” Maroon said with Celestia nodding,
“Oh thank you Maroon but where were we?”
“We were when you and Sunset nearly lost Twilight up north” Trixie reminded,
“Thank you Trixie." She cheared her throat "When Sunset and I got there, we saw that Twilight was slinging spells around the stallion but never at him till Spike burned him through the bag that was holding him and allowed for Sunset and I to get Spike away from him right in time for Twilight to stop slinging and started bucking and stomping him after he hit the ground. If you’re wondering, no she didn’t kill him but she did cripple him. I feel like we were talking about something else before this” she said while lost in thought.
“Oh you were talking about the first star of the night noble house” Trixie said with Celestia nodding before she continued with the original story.
“Midnight Star smiled at me and made the home that is still used today by her descendants though I won't lie when the Assassination attempts first started I wanted to stop them immediately but she convinced me not to and dealt with them herself by actually challenging them to try harder which impressed her coltfriend enough he asked her hoof in marriage and requested it to be under the moon” they were shocked with Rainbow saying,
“If i was that stallion i would do the same thing” causing Trixie to laugh and Luna asked,
“Who is the most recent heir and are the assassinations still ongoing?” which Trixie answered,
“Her name was Twilight Sparkle and she’s my cousin as well as Shining Armor’s younger sister. No one knew her whereabouts after Windigo came along as both her and Sunset Shimmer, who were both Celestia's students at the time, vanished. As for the assassinations, as far as I know is a yes as it even happens to me sometimes thankfully we of the house of star have actually found that we are actually immune to poison” At the mention of Sunset Shimmer, Maroon remembered something important that was needed to be said but she waited till Trixie was done. “It happens a lot even outside of canterlot as I actually remember aunt Velvet telling me about the first time Celestia joined us for it once and all but uncle Nightlight’s mane and tails burst into flames turned out the poison was from the dragonlands, interestingly enough” Trixie finished,
“Oh I just remembered a message that I was going to tell everyone here only for other things to happen. While I was on the other side I met Sunrise and she had certainly changed after becoming a mother-” “wait WHAT!!!” everyone said after that with Fluttershy asking,
“Why did you pass out after coming back through though?”
“The element actually tried to control my body and it did give the place magic. After Crimson no wait, it was Windigo that threatened to kill Sunset’s niece” the rest were confused at first but memories were coming back to Fallen who was holding her head in her hooves “if you’re wondering about it. Apparently Sunset has a sister named Sunrise Sprinkle though her daughter’s name is Moonrise Sprinkle.” Celestia was shocked before asking,
“Anything else?”
“I managed to gain control of my legs after the element caused their Windigo to turn into a demonic looking beast while forcing the other girls I met, which were you girls, to summon the rainbow. It took a bit for me to regain control but the damage had been done. I ran through the portal at full speed or as fast as I could go while only on two legs. What you saw was the aftermath and I didnt know what was going on when it happened as I lost most of my senses except for what’s in my legs” she said while looking downcast “but Sunrise wanted her daughter to meet her aunt someday and when I mentioned the wedding all of the human versions of us looked at the two curious if it was their wedding when it was Shining Armor’s” she said with a smile before laughing causing laughter from the rest at the thought of it happening there.
Trixie got a message from Fallen stating ‘yes we are married but that is a funny image as Midnight is laughing up a storm here ’ as Trixie could hear the laughter in her head shocking Trixie into more laughter as the negativity was washed away with the laughter.
“So how are Light and Dark?” Everfree asked,
“Light is still in his masterpiece and the empire has returned here so he should be back soon, however I haven’t heard from Dark at all because he is either in Tartarus or outside Equestria. Neither place I can access without getting stuck in or out there.” Discord said which caught everyone's attention.
“Masterpiece? Light? What are you talking about?” Celestia asked, confused.
“We changed our names to help distinguish us better after we settled down right here. I replaced Forrest with Nature which is my element, my friends Twilight and Crystal did the same though the former is Dark and the latter is Light as for how I’m speaking modern Ponish its thanks to this very forrest which is my masterpiece and all that you see from this forrest was actually my farm and it was the largest recorded farm in history. Is it still?” she asked, curious.
“Wait, this forest was your farm? What happened to it to cause it to be this wild?” Applejack asked, confused.
“I created a seed that would become something more but before I could plant it the counsel attacked and accused me for treason. I had no clue why so I ran into the deepest parts of the orchard on my farm and that's where I died right as I set the seed down and I landed on top of it becoming the first thing to be brought into this forest like this as I am the first and only timber pony” she said shocking them with Maroon asking
“Wait, Light, Dark, Nature? Those sound like the types of magic a pony could have!”
“You are correct and the last one is crystal magic” shocking Celestia after learning about it Maroon asked,
“How did you and your friends know I was there?” confusing Everfree for a bit before realization appeared on her face,
“We didn't know anyone was with us till we felt a presence behind us and we didn’t know where you were even when you spoke as the only reason that happened that I could think of is because of the well below and its center is outside the forest that way but it’s not too far.” she said pointing in the direction of Ponyville shocking them but it worked out as they say their goodbyes and make their way back home with Fluttershy and Rainbow getting permission to have a fruit known as ‘skyspace’ so they have one and they were enamored by the taste of it that when Fluttershy shared hers with Maroon who took a bite and she was shocked at the juiciness but it tasted so good. Trixie did the same and nearly melted because of the taste alone but it was for the moon fruit.
Their minds did wander while in the castle of the two sisters but Maroon ended up finding a room of strange runes so when she ignited her horn it ended up spooking the other ponies there as they had let the thoughts get to their heads, but after meeting up with the rest she showed them the room and asked them. “I don’t know any of these runes, any of you girls?” Trixie walked up not igniting her horn and adjusted staring off into space looking at the runes.
“Yep Maroon you found them alright.” Trixie said with a smile, the rest were confused at first till she said “this is Midnight Star’s old room. I forgot to mention that she wrote a book of spells on the stars and shields. She hid it because if deciphered the pony would know how to cast very strong spells.” They looked around to find the book, Fluttershy found it after a while of searching and handed it over to Trixie who thanked her and stored it away in her saddlebag.
Meanwhile…
Archaeologists were running around at a new discovery and wanted to show the princess as everyone worked their way to the area. As there was an ancient chest there and they were wondering what's inside but they needed to wait for the princess to see. Sure enough when Celestia got there she was shocked at the chest and checked the enchantments to find they were for containment and if unlocked whatever is inside will be free. “Keep the chest as is and I’ll bring it back to Canterlot with me” she said, confusing the archaeologists but they shrug and let her have the chest which intrigued Celestia. They certainly got paid extra though for their find.
Back with the group the next day…
Things were going well for the ponies as the CMC were trying to do their performance to be the representatives for Ponyville in the Equestrian Olympics but something stuck to Scootaloo that she wouldn’t be a true pegasus due to her incapability of flying thanks to her bullies. The others were looking for her and when Maroon looked at the last place Sweetie belle and Applebloom saw her on the hill, she saw this and smiled at Scootaloo to try and encourage her but when she hit the ground again Maroon stepped in as the others showed up to see this. “all right that's enough Scootaloo” she said causing the little one to be confused so she said “you can’t force yourself to fly” she said confusing others looking on at this “there are somethings that will be impossible but that doesn’t mean you can learn from the experience” Fluttershy walked over with Rainbow Dash and the latter asked,
“What do you mean by that?”
“I wasn’t alway this good with magic I had to learn to be better but I think I know what might be going on with Scootaloo here” she said confusing everypony
“And that is?” Fluttershy asked
“Her ley lines are hindering her so we need to get those cleaned out and fixed, before then but it will have to wait till after the games.” shocking the rest but it made sense in the grand scheme of things. As Celestia suddenly appeared with a chest?
“I need to get this to Discord as I can tell that something is off about it.” she said with the rest confused but then Maroon asked,
“Isn't that the chest holding the counsel?” she asked, causing everyone’s heads to turn to look at her in shock as Discord’s eyes appeared looking at her. His head appeared with a confused expression on his face,
“How do you know that?” Discord asked
“The potion sent me to three points before the well and one was a draconic thiestral pegasus fighting off six unicorns and an alicorn, from what I remember…”
“So they are trapped in here, best not to let them out and keep them somewhere else right?” Rainbow asked
“It seems like the best solution but what about what's next?” she asked.
Power ponies Maroon replaces Twilight for that adventure and Trixie was left behind in the castle to clean up. After getting out of the comic they decided to clean up Everfree’s place as well while they were over. Though it didn’t take as long as the castle with them splitting up and Maroon decided to check in on the arcane well only to find Everfree there and kept her company before showing what Maroon's friends did for her which made Everfree smile like a mother would when they are proud of the foal’s.
They were about to make a bigger mess than before by using Fluttershy’s stare to help get the bats away but Maroon thought about it a bit more than a few others and said “girls lets do Fluttershy’s idea cause we might turn her into a fruit vampony if I’m thinking about it correctly, did I get that right Trixie?”
“Which spell were you planning on using?”
“The one I was going to use on the parasprites.”
“Then yes you’re correct” so after grumbling for a bit the others conceded but Applejack was stubborn which Trixie noticed and let her know that something bad might happen if not and it could harm the farm more than a swarm of bats which caused her to finally concede.
They made it to Manehattan only to find it to not be as exciting as everything about it was said to be. “There is such a thing as being too generous Rarity” Trixie said
“What do you mean darling?” Rarity asked when Maroon said
“I think I know it's something like ‘if you give away everything that you had, what more will you give’ right?”
“I don't like how that sounded” Rarity said
“That's because you're not supposed to.” Trixie said “it's like… how did you put it when you were talking to your marefriend to get her to stand up for herself Maroon?” Trixie said,
“Oh way back then? Sure it was ‘there is a kindness, like your kindness to others but you're giving too much kindness to others and not leaving any for yourself.’ but I can see that you can use those words in terms of the other elements as they had a lasting effect on us but we are still ourselves now.” she said before glancing at Spike and then getting lost in the past about her little drake with her eyes glossed over and her body on autopilot to follow her friends to the apartment.
Trixie noticed the look along with her friends and saw the downcast look was directed towards Spike. “I miss him…”
“Miss who?” Trixie asked confusedly while the rest remembered the day they made the Pinkie promise and hugged her.
“His name was going to be Terrar which is ground in draconic.” Trixie was confused but the rest looked at her.
Fluttershy spoke up first “We made a promise not to mention anything and let her trust for us build”
“So you wont mention anything to do with it?” the rest nod at that. “I see but why?” she asked which Rainbow said
“We know she has PTSD from her birth parents right?” they nod “last time this happened was sometime ago after Maroon first got here that we found out somethings” she said which Trixie concluded,
“Something caused a panic attack?”
“Sorta, we were curious and found out more than we should in fact before you teleported Shining Armor to us I was actually about to throw hooves.” she said, snapping Maroon out of it and she looked directly at Rainbow shocked before hugging her. The promise was still intact yet it was strained but not by very much.
“I got lost in my memories again, didn’t I?” she asked the rest who nodded. She then sighed “sorry guess Spike reminded me of someone did I say anything?”
“Yeah you mentioned the name Terrar and you said it was going to be draconic for ground” Trixie said with Maroon nodding
“He was going to be for me like what Spike is to you is the best way to say it.” she said with a sad smile before it turned somber.
“You don't have to if you don’t want to Maroon” Applejack reminded,
“You’re right but it's best to get it out now.” she said looking at them “remember what I said to the CMC Trixie?” she nods “they didn’t want him in the house and tried to have me get rid of him. That’s the first time I had ever refused to do what they said and so they made him that night's dinner right in front of me as punishment.” she said, shocking everyone including Spike who actually wanted to know about what happened to this other dragon but wished he never did, now that he did.
Rarity’s mood was down while she made her dresses along with the whole line up while being on autopilot when a pony came by hoping to make a pony fail the competition and managed to get Rarity’s fabric which was loaned to her and designs by looking at them, on the first day of the competition. Rarity was so lost in thought that she made a different set out of things she found in the hotel that night while on autopilot. So when she saw what another pony did with her original designs she looked through her designs to find the reason she was tired and it was the set of dresses she made in the night so she submitted those and won the competition with one asking her,
“How did you make all of these dresses?”
“To be honest I didn’t even know I made them as I was in my own head while my body was on autopilot and only found out why I’m so tired this morning during the competition when the designs I originally made for this competition were used by someone else though I don't remember who because yesterday and last night I might have given the fabric I used for my originals to somepony else. Now if you excuse me I need to go find my friends at the play nearby” with that she got her reward and everypony was shocked that she didn’t even know she made them. It worked out in the end as a thanks for not letting her employer win a pony, gave her a spool of rainbow thread and ended up getting the job for designing costumes for the plays with help from Rarity after learning that the mare was the one who managed to copy her designs down to the thread.
The Apples of Ponyville were about to go on a ride with Pinkie Pie to find out if the Pie’s are part of the same family when Maroon found out about it though she decided to ask Discord about it. “Yes I did have one but I was on the edge of what you knew me as before I changed. I had to give her up in order to keep her safe” He revealed
“What was her name?” Maroon asked, curious
“Her name was silly string and before I tipped off the edge I saw her wedding with a pony named Apple Pie.”
“Thank you Discord”
“Your welcome” he called out to her as she walked away
She found her friends that were just about to go on the trip and said “I had a chat with Discord and found out there might be an Apple named Apple Pie, does that sound familiar?”
“Actually yes it does” Pinkie said with the rest shocked so they decided to visit Everfree to find out more. “Hey Everfree, it's been a while.”
“Indeed it has also why do your friends look uncertain and who are these three?” she asked.
“They are my family, the big red one is my older brother Big Macintosh, the filly here is my little sister Applebloom, and that's Granny Smith my grandma” Applejack said,
“Nice to meet you”
“Are my old eyes playing tricks on me?” Granny Smith said confused while looking at the timberpony.
“Enope” Big Mac said,
“Well then nice to meet you too!” Granny Smith said with a smile.
“Wow you’re amazing but how strong are you?” Applebloom asked with wonder in her eyes.
“Strong enough to buck all the apples of an entire orchard of apple trees with one forhoof” Applebloom was enamored by that and really interested in the timberpony “Now why are you here Maroon?” Everfree asked Maroon while playing with Applebloom who was having fun playing with Everfree.
“I ended up finding out that their families might be related and ended up going down a rabbit hole with Pinkie being related to Discord and I’m now curious if the other farm families are related in any way?” Maroon said with Everfree nodding and said,
“I did have a lot of kids and named them after the parts of the farm they could help with so yes here let me get something from Lights place to help with the visualization of what I’m talking about.” she said before going into the tree house and coming back out with a book and helped translate it for Maroon by using her own magic to help translate the ancient Ponish. Maroon cast the spell on Applejack and sure enough it worked out better than she thought as it showed her the entire family tree with Everfree being the start of all the farm families with shock on their faces but she saw Everfree have a smile on her face “thanks for the help with the mystery Everfree.” Maroon said with Everfree nodding,
“Once the barrier is down I plan on teaching the newest members of the families some old tricks that have been lost to time.” she said as they walked away before Applebloom split off to have her lessons with Zecora in alchemy.
Rainbow Dash was practicing with the Shadowbolts for the games when the Wonderbolts came over and tried to sway one of them over but Rainbow said “Keep up the good work everypony I'll handle this if that's alright?” to the pony that was in charge of the Shadowbolts joining the olympics who nods to her.
“You have five minutes” was all that was said to her.
She flew over to the Wonderbolts to see what they wanted, they tried to bribe her and Rainbow was tempted but gave it thought and realized that if she did that she wouldn't be loyal to her team and Spitfire was happy that she was thinking about it till Rainbow replied “that doesn’t sound very loyal of you” with a deadpan stare which shocked everypony there as they stopped what they were doing to listen to what's going on “your friend is injured yes?”
“Yes he is” Spitfire said
“How would he feel if he knew what you were doing? How would you feel if he did what you are doing? Think about that… I may have been the element of loyalty but even I have a line in the sand on who I am loyal to.” Everyone’s eyes widened and jaws hit the floor with Rainbow finishing with “now get back to practice or do I need to tell everyone what happened with the academy?” the Wonderbolts who knew paled before going back to their area to practice. “LET'S DO OUR BEST EVERY CREACHER!!!” she holared with every racer there giving their loudest ‘YEAH!’ before joining back with her group and going back to practice. Sure enough word got back to Soren, when he heard it he was disappointed, a bit angry and felt betrayed by Spitfire. He did chew her out for it and made sure that Spitfire learned that being loyal is not replacing team members in major events like this for ponies that are not originally on their team when they are injured. Rainbow earned a lot of respect from the rest of the groups and earned a lightning bolt pin from Soren who thanked her for her help.
Maroon got to hang with Cadence while Spike was sick so Trixie couldn't come. While they hung out she had a nice chat with them while having a picnic. Though she tried not to stare at her sitter she was failing miserably and it seemed that the others were having a good time teasing her about it. After a bit Maroon got a question that she did need to ask “hey Chrysalis?”
“Yes?” she responded curious,
“How does this whole situation you have with Cadence work?” Maroon asked while looking at them.
“Oh well, first off I could do this at any time if I wanted to but it’s mostly a thing to do if you’re in love with another race or on death's door and you're not willing to die. Even though we Changelings have this ability we don’t use it because it gives us a second chance with that creature if both agree they share the body. Not to mention it’s what is keeping us alive.”
“What do you mean by that?” Cadence asked,
“What I mean is we can’t split even if we wanted to for some fun times… we can’t otherwise we will die. Think of us being like this as a second chance for both of us but we will die sooner or later and I’d like to leave a queen just in case I find out.”
“So you’re saying we could have actually died?” Cadence asked, worried.
“There still is a chance of us still dying even now.” Chrysalis answered somberly,
“So you both can still die but would it be harder to do so?” Maroon asked,
“Yes but sadly this is the final life as yes both of us can live for a long time alone but this caused a lot of problems as while I am making sure things go well in the hive and she is out here we are vulnerable even with my carapace but its cracking so think of it like us being in symbiosis but the injuries we gained before hand are still there and are able to kill us.” she said with a somber tone as she sighed with both catching on that something is wrong with the body.
“What's wrong?” Cadence asked,
“We are slowly dying Cadence and there is not enough time to stop it but there is enough time to make sure that we can give life to another.” Chrysalis said somber at first, shocking them before giving hope with her other statement. They take a few bites before changing the topic of the conversation only for Cadence to leave sometime afterward.
Then sometime after that things went well for everypony as it was Rainbow's birthday and it became a birthday battle between Pinkie Pie and a certified party planner named Cheese Sandwich for the two party ponies. They ended up becoming friends in the end.
When the writer Trenderhoof came by Ponyville things went well for him till he fell in love with Applejack which was shut down by Rarity who said “uhh Applejack I think you gained a pony vying for your attention.” when she said that Applejack looked their way
“Thanks for telling me that Rarity also I will need some help later in the orchard outback.” Which caused Applebloom to say
“Wait WHAT!!??” she was confused and had the wrong idea of what was going to happen so her face was also red, but Applejack started laughing at her sister knowing what she was thinking before saying
“What have I told you about listening in on others conversations Applebloom?” while walking over to her as Rarity walked over to the back after escorting him somewhere else for the finale.
Fluttershy still sings for the concert but is still shy when Gilda came over and told her “think about singing to Maroon at the event with what you want to convey” which Fluttershy with confidence sang on stage with the other singers joining in with her song.
Maroon gets a hoof full when the CMC were having trouble with their studies. Thankfully she managed to help them out with their studies by getting them interested in the subject they need help with. Maroon then asked “hey Applebloom just wondering what you were thinking about when you heard your sister ask Rarity for help out back?” causing her to blush the other two were curios and were about to ask when Applebloom said,
“I thought that they had started to date” causing Sweetie to say,
“That would be a bit awkward now right Bloom, Scoots?” both nod but Maroon picked up on what that meant and said,
“Congrats and thanks for helping me win a bet” causing confusion,
“What was the bet?” Scootaloo asked,
“Whether or not you would get together and with whom. I bet that all three of you were together while Rarity though it would be Scoots and Applebloom, Applejack thought it would be Sweetie and Scoots, Rainbow thought it would be Sweetie and Bloom, while the rest were split on the who” she said causing their jaws to drop and so the next day their studies work out very well but they couldn’t believe that there was a bet about them.
Fluttershy helped with the Breezies while remembering the words Maroon told her before they followed them as Breezies. Fluttershy earned a flower.
Trixie helps watch over Applebloom so that the rest of the family including Applejack went on a trip. Trixie helped Applebloom take a delivery over to the town that asked for apple pies without anything standing in their way.
Sweetie Bell was not happy at all about the dresses outshining their play. Even though she asked for her sister to make the dresses she was frustrated that she and her friends were in the background while the dresses were in the spotlight. So when she sabotaged the head piece it would have fallen apart. She went to sleep only to have a nightmare that was purged by Luna but there was an odd voice where the last bit was held. “Who are you?” Luna asked,
“You will know who I am soon, for you were the one to tether me in your plane!” the figure said before zipping over to the filly and said “you don't know the consequences of what you have done so allow me to show you what could!” They said with Luna trying to stop her but it was too late so she ran after the filly and the mare only to catch Sweetie Belle after she saw some dolphins.
“Are you ok?” Luna asked worried,
“I'm fine but I didn’t know that the damage would be that extreme.” Sweetie Belle said, scared out of her mind.
“It’s not yet you just need to fix your mistake” the figure said before disappearing with Luna helping out. So the CMC traveled to canterlot and saved Rarity’s business. While Luna was wondering who that pony was and what she meant by what she said.
When the cure for all tonic came in from Flim and Flam the ponies of Ponyville were skeptical about it till they saw it in action but a few were not convinced namely Applejack but she was strong-armed into having the tonic be sold. After she heard a voice in her head say “You better stop the nonsense fast or your Grandma is going to dive into a bucket of water too small to take her, she thinks she can do it with the tonic but really it’s about your mind” with that Applejack walked out of the tent. She refused and straight up said to everypony “the tonic is a fake!” after saving Granny Smith from doing something dumb she explained what really was going on and the duo ran out of town for the second time.
Rainbow dash has been worked to the bone by her team leader. When she saw the Wonderbolts going through their own tests she looked the other way for a bit and nothing happened so she continued on her merry way. The trades go well for everyone who got what they wanted for what they didn’t.
Inspiration manifestation was solved before it could begin as Spike forgot to think before he spoke and told Rarity “sometimes form over function is not the way to go and could cause more problems later on, so go function before design and the problem will be solved…” he realized too late about what he said and before he could apologize Rarity decided to start the project over thinking about the function before the form like Spike said which pleased the client. The puppet show cart looked a bit more like Trixie’s stage cart but was used more for the puppet shows the client wanted.
“Thanks Spike!” Rarity said
“Um… you're welcome?” he said, confused as he didn’t know what he said.
The Equestria games happened with everything going how they wanted to with Ponyville winning the games though with Discord’s help they managed to free Light Phoenix and fix the Crystal Heart before he could go on a rampage. Though it was quite the challenge that Maroon, Cadence, Celestia, Luna and Chrysalis took on as they poured magic to stop the corruption in the dark magic from the heart and making sure that the stallion made of light was fine. Which he was “thank you for fixing the heart” he said before passing out.
The next few months went by as normal and Maroon got a good laugh out of Discord through her story of trying to disprove Pinkie’s Pinkie sense. All of a sudden out of nowhere ponies were reported to be missing their souls and magic with only their body’s left behind. They went to Celestia for knowledge on what's going on and found that it was another of the students she had. “Who do you think it is?”
“All I know is that this work is one of a dark mage and a natural one at that. I don't know how they got passed without me knowing.” she said as a shadow appeared behind her. Discord lept into action stopping the pony from doing anything and shocking all there with Celestia asking “what's going on Discord?”
“It's the same thing that happened to me and an old friend of mine” he said,
“And that was?” Maroon asked,
“You're going to have to destroy the elements because their effects on us are what causes this insanity. Though judging by the magic she is using she's a dark natural mage and they normally don't go insane with power as it's usually the dark crystal ones and those who know the forbidden. First you're going to need to find her opposite if I remember correctly her title is ‘Wrath of the Fallen’ over in Tartarus but her prophesied name was the phoenix mare. Either them or Dark Eclipse, the first known user of dark magic. His remnant should be with his family after all he connected himself to it through his soul.” Discord said while holding Midnight back before teleporting them somewhere else.
Trixie fell to the floor as flames burst out of her but she teleported away before Fallen could escape…
“What?” Applejack asked,
“Looks like she has been with us this entire time but we need to find Dark’s descendants,” Maroon said before remembering something and running as the rest followed her. They watch her run through the barren streets jumping over the fallen.
Celestia asked herself “Why are we heading to the house of the star?”
Right then Cadence appeared with Luna confused on what was going on. “Sister, what is going on?”
“I do not know but it appears that the elements need to be destroyed along with the tree.”
“Why though?” Luna was even more confused.
“Something has happened to my students and the only way of getting them back is to destroy the tree and the elements themselves.” the two alicorns were in shock but Cadence asked,
“Which?”
“Sunset and Twilight!” Celestia said as Cadence's eyes widened at the only two names that could bring her to tears. Which did happen though, at the names the door swung open and there were Twilight Velvet and Nightlight ready to help them out in what seemed to be military gear. Sure enough Maroon got there and they heard Celestia say her name and knew what it ment. After a while they managed to locate Trixie who was fighting Sunset and keeping her at bay with some help from Everfree. She was in the Everfree forest so they made their way over as fast as they could thanks to Pinkie’s strange abilities.
Once there they see Everfree stopping the fires while attacking with the very ground itself along with the actual forest through the trees. It impressed the earth ponies. Velvet cast a spell from an old book by the looks of it but there was a strange orb floating next to her. Sunset fell to the ground unconscious and there was no movement coming from her and when they looked at who it came from they saw purple wisps of natural dark magic coming from Twilight Velvet's eyes but it shocked Everfree that her friends’ descendents survived for so long. They saw her and smiled at her before the book floated over to her “hey Nature! How’s everything?”
“It’s so good to hear you again my dark friend” she said as she hugged the book as it laughed. She said, “What's going on?”
“The bound has lost it thanks to those blasted elements”
“Do you know of any way to destroy them?” Maroon asked the book who nodded.
“Yes the well of magic is below the tree itself and will only unlock if the rest are on. The first is past the test area that they used on me up north then go from there as trust is in the center”
“What do we do when we activate them?” Maroon asked
“You will need to match the appropriate element to the well it comes from and once all are active it will change some things as for one I’m outside Equestria and can't enter if I want to end up the same as Discord did unless the barrier is no longer there.” he said with them managing to help Discord with knocking out Twilight. Discord walked over to the edge of the Everfree Forrest to talk to Everfree and dark explained why they went insane and the reason they can’t go anywhere outside their areas is because of the same thing and he would really like to see how his home looked. So Discord helped them get to the vicinity of said wells and within a few moments they find out who was where and activate all the wells starting with kindness, then heading to honesty, generosity, loyalty, laughter and finally trust. Once lit the tree exploded and everything went down hill for the odd being. The sky was littered with sparkles of magic and then Twilight's body started to shake and bend before both souls and magic went flying from her mouth and spread all across Equestria. Light and Dark zipped over ready to hug and smashed right into Everfree and all three exploded into their elements before reforming with laughter on the ground as they were excited to see each other after so long. Dark turned to the two unconscious ponies and released them of their magic induced slumber.
“Ugh it feels like I was hit by Tirek at full power through twenty mountains what about you Fallen?” Twilight said shocking the rest but Discord finally felt like himself after a long time.
“Urgh Midnight I think that you are right on that end of things” Sunset said calling Twilight… Midnight? But it didn't affect the family that she had as she was swarmed by her family in a hug.
Author's Note
Hey, Abyss here, and I'm just letting Everyone know that I'm taking a break from writing for a while as Writers block has kicked in but I want this to do well. Sure there will be loose ends but I want to clear some of those up and I might rewrite the book to do so but for now the storys will be on hyatus.
It's been a few months since the barrier broke and the Thestrals were outside it the entire time so they settled in Ponyville to help out. With another alicorn who the two sisters were shocked at seeing as they had thought she had perished. “Stella?” Celestia asked
“Is that you little sis?” Luna asked with the now named Stella smiling and nodding with the two suddenly tackling her to the ground. Maroon felt off and had been quite distant without meaning to be.
“How are you doing, my Roon?” Fluttershy asked while looking at her lover.
Maroon was lost in thought when the magic called them somewhere off to the North East. They gathered the girls and asked “Do you girls feel it too?”
“If yer talking about this strange pull then ah feel it” Applejack said.
“Same here darling” Rarity said
“Its telling me something is happening around a desert with how dry the air feels” Rainbow said
“Nothing feels funny about this” Pinkie said as if she was doing an impression of her sister Maud.
“Alright how about we head over to check it out?” Maroon suggested,
The rest nod and on the way out they find Midnight already there looking around by being a shadow so they walk over and into the town to draw the attention away from her before she gets spotted.
The town that was in an equal shape and all houses were the same color which was odd enough. They end up learning about Starlight Glimmer while meeting the mare. “Oh I didn’t expect any new guests to arrive. My name is Starlight Glimmer and I welcome you to our little town.”
All of the girls were genuinely worried about what’s going on in the town as it looked like the ponies were missing something but they couldn't tell what. Maroon then noticed that all of the cutie marks were missing and that everypony is smiling a forced smile from what Pinkie said before they even made their way there. “The magic called us here because something is going on.” Maroon said, catching everypony’s attention.
“Oh is that so?” starlight said before leading them to a cave with Midnight following behind them.
At the far back of the cave there is a wall of cutie marks and in front of it is a stick. “This is the staff of sameness, it’s what allowed for this to happen. I’m sure you have noticed that all of our cutie marks are the same.” she said as she lifted the stick up into the air with her magic. She smiled before turning it to them and used her magic to start tearing off their marks. Then it stopped as Midnight revealed herself holding Starlight’s mark in her magic. “Wha- how, WHO ARE YOU!”
“That’s a neat trick but here’s a little lesson on dark magic.” Midnight said as she caused starlight pain by twisting the mark and having it bend in unnatural ways. “That spell is of soul magic a subsection to dark magic in its natural form, by removing the soul mark as they were once called, you're carving out a big chunk of the pony’s soul” she said walking up to her before destroying the vault of marks with everypony getting theirs back. “Think of what you're messing with next time before something like this happens again” Starlight ran away out of fear while Midnight let her mark fly back to her.
The girls walk over to Maroon who was hit the worst by the magic and Midnight used the same spell to heal Maroon’s soul allowing for her to wake up. She felt off and after helping the town get back on their hooves the seven left after a few days.
Maroon wanted to know if something was wrong with her so she made sure to ask Discord to check and keep the being at bay which all he did was knock it back out with what felt like an anvil falling through her and hitting something in there.
Maroon decided to move out of the Ponyville library and return it to Winter’s care but now that she is a princess she has been coming from the everfree forest a lot more often everypony is confused as to why but none have asked her yet. Till Fluttershy asked during a date in the Everfree Forest. “Say Maroon?”
“Hm? Yes, my Shy?” Maroon responded
“Why have you been coming out of the Everfree more often now? You're not leaving us are you?”
“No I’m not it’s just” Maroon sighed as she tried to find the words to explain her situation “yes I love the library but that’s not my home so I decided to move into the castle of the two sisters.” shocking Fluttershy before she thought about it and asked
“Did you talk about this with Celestia?”
“Yes, in fact she was the one to let me handle the castle. So I was going to fix it and modernize it but decided against it as it's part of our history so I’ve been hanging out in a tree castle that Everfree made that's actually close by. It feels a lot more like a home to me, like it’s actually my home but there’s a lot that is unexplained about it so I have to find what those are.” she said shocking Fluttershy
“Do you think if we get married I and my animal friends could move into the castle and live with you?” Fluttershy asked causing Maroon to smirk and say,
“Sure we can even start a family as well” with just the thought alone makes Maroon smile and causes Fluttershy to blush at the image of a happy family.
“I’d like that” Fluttershy said with a smile and Maroon nodded with her own and letting out a giggle.
After a few months, Maroon called all of her friends and the princesses to her new castle which actually shocked them at how well it looks. It was a single spired castle that had more rooms and a lot of space. She showed them the throne room and more “how did this appear? How did we not notice this, sisters?” Celestia said shocked,
“I have no clue how we missed this sister.” Luna said
“Most likely a concealment spell” Stella said “if you’re wondering how I know that is because Dark actually helped with counseling where I was keeping the thestrals to help keep them safe.”
Right then three figures emerged “you are correct stella this was my doing” Dark said shocking them.
“Again I thank you three for your help,” Maroon said with them smirking. Maroon shows them more of her castle to them and shows that there is space for all of them, hell all the residents of Ponyville could fit in this castle. Though it was impressive that Maroon got all this
“Why didn’t you use the old castle Luna and I were in?”
“Because it is deeply rooted in Equestria’s history. And with me being there it would not be considered a national monument.”
“I see,” Celestia said thoughtfully.
Everfree had come back after meeting another line of her descendants only to find that the apple orchard has rainbow apples so she walked up to one before being approached by Applejack. “Hey Everfree, it’s been a while since we saw you. How have you been?”
“I’ve been good though, why are the rainbow apples here? Is it that time of year already?” Everfree asked
“Ya mean them zap apples?” she asked confused
“Is that what they are called now?” Everfree asked while Applejack nodded “hmm how long does it take to get them all?”
“We can’t get them all in time sadly so we get as many as we can” Applejack said with Everfree shaking her head
“Here, focus on yourself for a bit after closing your eyes once you got a feeling for it push it to your hind hooves and buck the tree when I say” Everfree said with Applejack confused as she left so she closed her eyes and focused on herself only to feel a strange sensation coming from herself. It shocked her but she continued by putting it on her hind hooves. Everfree set up a bunch of baskets in order to help with what she was teaching Applejack and when she got back “now buck” was what Applejack heard and bucked with all her might only to hear something shake and multiple things falling so when she looked she saw that her one buck had traveled through the connected roots of the ordered along with the mushrooms connecting the entire orchard together.
“Did I do that?” Applejack asked astonished
“We as earth ponies are connected to the land itself while pegasi are connected to the weather and unicorns are connected to the world’s mana, you just need to find out how to use your own magic that has been and always will be inside you.” Everfree said shocking Applejack who looked behind her only to find that she in that single buck had cleared all the zap apples off the trees into the baskets that Everfree set up “and you cleared out all of the zap apples in one buck too on your first try. Great job for your first time, but how do you know they are coming?”
“Granny Smith is the reason as throughout her life she found how to tell when the zap apples come by the timberwolves howling and other factors.” Applejack said
“Sense you can tap into your own magic now, try to put a pulse throughout the ground. It's how I did it back then because I didn’t have timberwolves. So I made sure to send one out during the start of the season which would tell me where it was going to land so that my kids and I could get a head start on them.” she said shocking Applejack
“I’ll try it later now we have ta’ gather all the apples to make zap apple jam.” she said while swinging her foreleg.
“Have you tried making zap apple cider? It's the only thing Dark likes for some reason and he actually helped me with making two types of cyder from the two fruits back at my home.”
“Not yet but we can try to now that we have enough of ‘em. Really huh might have ta’ get the recipe and let trixie give it a shot.” Applejack said as she saw her friends come over with Light and Dark.
“Woah what happened to the zap apples?” Rainbow Dash said
“Is that what you call the rainbow apples now? Honestly that's a good name for them” Dark said,
“Yeah then again Fulmen malus was what we knew them as back then” Light said shocking the rest,
“Huh that’s interesting,” Maroon noted. “But how did Applejack clear the trees?”
“Oh Everfree taught her how to use her inner magic and told her to buck the tree” Pinkie said recounting what happened
“Woah is that how you got so fast Dark?” Rainbow asked
“Yeah in a way but i’m impressed that you managed to do the sonic rainboom without accessing your inner magic” Dark said causing Light and Nature to look shocked at Rainbow Dash “then again there's more to magic than you think.”
“Yes as your actually gathering the magic from the world around you to do those spells in fact that's what nature magic revolves around” Light said shocking them “crystal magic you add your emotions into the mix and boom now you can shape crystal but it only works if you have been crystalized like the ponies in the crystal empire.” shocking them further.
“Wait, is there another kind of magic out there?” Maroon asked which Dark nods
“It's unnatural and fights against the natural magic here and it's one that I was made from. Yes, I can use it but I choose not to because then I wont be better than the one who made me. We called it forbidden because of what it does to others if used.” he said, shocking the ones that didn't know as they made their way around the orchard to get the baskets and it worked out for them.
“How were you even made Dark?” Maroon asked “sorry if it’s a sensitive question…”
“Nah it's fine honestly it’s been a while since I even thought back that far” Dark said as they sat drinking some zap apple cider that became a huge hit for the Apple family as Fallen and Midnight walked up curious with their own mugs, wondering what they were talking about. “In fact we came in during the era of migration.” Dark said, causing them to look at him shocked.
“Wasn’t that over five thousand years ago?” Fluttershy asked,
‘It’s been that long?’ Dark thought confused as he had forgotten about time.
“Yep,” Everfree said, “I came from the south west with my tribe.”
“I came from the north with my band of sorcerers,” Light said “we made it to what is now Equestria first as we were the scouts for our respective parties.”
“I came from the east with the warrior nomad pegasi and the thiestral assassins. it took almost a few months for them to make the trip over the sea due to the clouds ever changing direction before they flew, not to mention the young needed time to grow during the flight and the elderly along with the wounded.” Dark reminisced when he first woke up after hatching. “it was a mountainous area going through the clouds where we were living, the Pegasi were on the clouds while the Thestrals were in the caves that are all over the mountain range which connect to one another but there was a lot of spite that had brewed between the two before I was even created. I was made in a cave by the alicorn killer before she killed her own kind, to be a weapon of destruction.” They gasp including Light and Everfree as they didnt know that last bit. “the leading general at the time decided to take half of the population and find somewhere else after a dispute with the leader and that general is the ancestor of the one you know as commander hurricane.”
“Really I wonder if i’m related to him as well then as there is a hand me down from a thousand years ago that has been in my family for a long time” Rainbow mused.
“Maybe yes, maybe no” Dark said “anyway I was made from two foals and a dragon egg. One from the thestrals and the other from the pegassi. After the spell was complete I hatched a few days later during an eclipse at the hour of twilight which is how I got my name.” he said giving a good laugh to the rest “when I got here there was more to it but basically many types of government tried to come in only to fall because of the ideals of the leaders… which include the counsel that was sealed away in a chest”
“Yeah that chest was found but not opened” Discord said as he appeared causing Dark and Lights eyes to widen “don’t worry they told Celestia about it who brought it to us and I hid it again” he continued with Dark and Light shocked that it was found.
“How was it found?” Everfree asked curious,
“Some archaeologists found it while digging out south east by the border with the badlands. They called Celestia who checked the enchantments and then brought it to us which Maroon here identified as the one you used on the counsel in your final battle while viewing the past.” Pinkie said without breathing but Dark got the gist of it and got confirmation from Everfree and Discord thet that was what happened.
“When the three of us met we didn't trust each other at all in fact we actually fought each other.” he said shocking them “though that’s how we found out we were on par with one another and the fight was actually fun” the other two nodded with a smile at that. “Though there were some insults that also came from that day” he laughed
“Yeah laugh it up feathered leather” Light said before saying “lets get what happened with Everfree and I out of the way before we go any further with your end.” he said with a grin. “Anyway it's a lot colder up north as you know but you don't understand how cold it gets… I was born during a famine and a very harsh blizzard that would have required all the Windigo’s to make which killed a majority of the unicorn race. Half of the remaining ponies wanted to find somewhere nicer to live so that we could find a way to survive.” shocking them as they didnt know that “the rest however, resorted to cannibalism and those were the ones who wanted to stay. So half of us who managed to not resort to it traveled south to find food with me going ahead to see if there was any. To this day I can’t feel the cold even when I was alive. I couldn’t and I have no clue what happened to the rest back there. As we made our way south we came across other unicorns who were faring better than we were. I told them what was going on with us and they gave me enough to help feed the ones who were hungry before I led the group to the villages. Thanks to being a scout I was able to go ahead in the harsh storms and always managed to find a nearby village willing to lend us some food before we continue on our way, never staying in the same place for long. Till I came here but what happened on your end Dark?”
“The reason we split is because of a civil war that happened between the pegasi and the thiestrals which ended up causing the civilians to be caught in the crossfire and nearly destroyed the homes that were made and it only got worse after a while with both sides losing their homes. That’s the reason we came here then with all of the thestrals and half of the pegasi.” he said shocking them “yeah not the best time to grow up as it was night vs day, feather vs leather when I showed up and stopped the war alone. I almost didn’t survive due to my dragon side but it intimidated them enough to stop. I don’t know what happened to the other half though.” every pony there was shocked “yeah not the first time it happened. Though the ones who don’t heed history are destined to repeat it.” he said before looking at Everfree “what about you?”
“We split up as where I was living is now where Unyasi is” she said shocking everyone “the zebra’s were invading our homes and that’s why only half of us ended up escaping by boat with my mother being one of the ones captured but she sent me onto a boat well after it left port, from what I remember from being a little foal. We didn’t get back in contact with the rest because of the major gap that was the ocean and it took a long time as we didnt know what to do with a boat at all so we let the waves take us wherever we were going only to end up in the badlands some months later. We traversed it till we got here where it was greener, trust me it was harsh. Now though I hold no hate for them I only have a few questions however” she said with her friends understanding that they were all on edge sense then and wanted to make sure that things would be better then they were. she thought about it for a bit “our past was dark and bleak but our future is bright and welcoming, could it be the opposite though?” shocking yet confusing the rest…
“Anyway” Dark said “let's get back to what we were talking about before that” with the rest nodding
“Where were we?” Light asked
“You were at when you first met?” Midnight said
“Thanks” he cleared his throat “remember what happened when we first met?” he asked
“Yeah but how did you get that hard of a head?” Light said as he rubbed a spot on the back of his head.
“It’s part of thiestral anatomy as we sleep upside down a lot so our internal clock is our wake up by falling to the ground though sometimes we are lucky and wake up before we hit the ground. However it makes for a good dive bomb attack.” Dark said laughing as Midnight said
“Hey Fallen, remember back when we were Celestia's students before Crimson’s shift and after he was introduced?” catching the others attention
“Which time?”
“The morning after our sleepover?”
“Oh yeah I do remember that… princess Celestia was in a lot of pain after that and you only fell from the chandelier if it was from the roof you would have broken her spine!” shocking them with Maroon asking,
“How hard is a thestral skull?” Midnight then had her head turn black before showcasing her own skull, scaring most except for Dark, Light and Everfree with the latter two looking disapprovingly at him.
“What?” he said while looking at his friends confused.
“A thestrals skull is really hard and I mean hard enough to crack crystal that a crystal pony had made for armor and Alicorns have the tough skin of a crystal pony along with the sturdy bones of an earth pony so yeah if I hit her head I would have broken her horn and crushed her entire head, and that was me at ten years old. fun fact: Thiestral's skulls become harder as we grow up” Midnight explained while showing off her skull and spooking the rest before she regrew everything that she tore off with whatever the black stuff was. “Yeah only those with dark blood can regenerate from our blood and bones” she said casually which caught a few ponies off guard. “Anyway, did Dark dive bomb you?”
“No I was actually blinded by something flashing right in front of me which caused me to dive to get to the ground and I ended up hitting Light as he was in a battle with Everfree and while I was blinded, I only relied on my hearing and magically connecting with the air to help me know where they were the entire time.” he said which caught the other two off guard
“No wonder you were dodging my attacks but why were you getting hit by Light’s magic?”
“I couldn’t sense it as I would have to be connected to the mana of the world to sense that.”
“Ah I accidentally blinded myself which forced me to use the mana sense in order to find you both but how did you know where I was at all times?” Light said to Everfree
“I could sense you through the ground… your heartbeat gave you away.”
“Oh huh” he said, lost in thought before asking “how did that fight start in the first place?” the other two blink before Dark said
“I have no clue because I was the last one to get there” with Everfree trying to remember only for it to be blank for a bit before a page of memories showed the reason why.
“It was because of the xenophobia that we had from our own races and that the other was unknown to us.” she said with the other two thinking about it before Dark said
“Though we learned more about each other through those fights which did help us down the line after the war started…” they thought about it as they fell into silence.
“Huh no wonder you had us fight each other while we were in Tartarus.” Midnight said with a fond look
“I was right that it would help you both grow in terms of all that as it helped for me and sometimes a fight is what we need to understand better about our lovers or friends.” he said which got them thinking about it.
“But what's this war that you mention?” Maroon asked but all he said was
“Oh that we will tell you that in time as we have been here for half the day so go get some food!” he said while bringing notice to the time before saying “we will help with teaching you what we know.” with a smile that gave all of the alive ones pause with him thinking ‘maybe we should spar with the princesses to see where they are on the combat scale, I’ll bring that up to the others after the rest leave’ after a while only Everfree and Light remained with him.
“What are you thinking about?” he asked with Dark stating
“It's almost time for the choice.” ominously with the others eyes getting wider before they look forward
“How much time do we have?”
“Not much as it will occur soon I don't know how soon though” Dark said somberly. As they made their way to their old homes to rest.
Maroon had learned a lot from Light in terms of magic and thanks to his friends and hers she managed to learn how to use the different pony races’ magic. She found the reason as to why she felt like she was able to use time magic so efficiently was because it was her destiny to be the alicorn of time not magic. She learned how to use time magic from them and it certainly helped her out as she had mastered the time zone bubble alone. She wast prepared for what came next…
Maroon had just gotten to her castle while Fluttershy was out with friends but Midnight and Fallen accompanied her into her castle only for them to split up which allowed Maroon to find Starlight sitting in a chair heading back in time to change the past she made it back to the double flair quake which was not where she wanted to be but knew it would be disastrous if this never happened as two of her friends would have died if not for the quake she failed the first few times being sent to different timelines that were not hers till she got back each time but when she finally brought starlight through the portal they landed in a barren wasteland with only one pony there sitting alone. “Dark?” Maroon asked with Starlight confused at who he was
“Maroon?”
“Yes it’s me i’ve been trying to stop the past from being changed”
“Yes and you have done a great job at that" his voice was dripping with sarcasm "but this is our future and I have already seen it so before Equestra becomes this you must reset everything and take your title as the alicorn of time.” he said shocking them,
“What even happened here?” Starlight asked, confused.
“Modayus the last orderling happened as the bound and her lover never made it past foalhood. All of Tartarus broke loose after Trixie became an Alicorn and Equestria was destroyed but in order to save you Discord erased himself and Modayus went with him.” shocking both of the ponies.
“Wait, the wells were not destroyed?”
“Sadly they weren't so the bond remained intact” Dark said while shaking his head but his eyes widen at that and look at her shocked “wait if your not from my timeline…” he started
“In my timeline we managed to find all of the wells and activated them which destroyed the tree and saved them from the barrier’s insanity” she said with him nodding and saying to Starlight,
“There are always consequences to your actions” the portal opened up and a few more events of fighting in the past and Starlight seeing more of her consequences and sure enough after going back to the past one last time Starlight came to her senses and out of rage showed why she was like this. It was because of losing a friend to someone you never knew.
“Friendships come and go but you’re not the only one to feel this way…” Maroon said confusing Starlight,
“What do you mean?” she asked
“What I mean is that my friend Fallen has a sister who thought that she abandoned her only to find out about the banishment and tried to find ways to bring her back only for her to be kicked out of the castle. She ran away and ended up in another world where she learned about her faults and became better. I would like to show you what I mean but the question remains, is it what you want?” Maroon said shocking Starlight as she extended her hoof out which was taken and starlight was pulled into a hug as the time portal opened up and sent them back to their original timeline.
“Hey Midnight do you by chance still have those gems that you got from the sirens?” Maroon asked
“Yeah I do, why?”
“I got a message earlier today that we have a death's door problem on sunrises side and I think it's the sirens.”
“Yeah got them right here and i was thinking that we could head over for a visit”
“I'm down for that,” Maroon said with a smile.
Maroon got the mirror out and put the book at the top of the machine and walked through to find their friends on the other side… “hey girls!” Maroon said and got a smile from them as well and midnight handed over the three red stones to Sunset.
“Who are these for?”
“These are for the dazzlings, don't worry I modified them with some help from a friend, instead of causing hate and pain they will cause the opposite to happen.” Midnight said “have them try it out at their usual place.” Maroon got caught up on what was going on only to say
“Urg why does this feel like it's happened before?”
“Maybe it has? Let us know through the book if you remember what it was.”
“Will do and have a good week everyone!” they wave back and after getting back is when it clicked “gabby gums! That’s why it was so familiar!” she said but noticed she was actually out of ink and knew it wouldn't be till tomorrow that they restocked. She sighed before using the last of the ink in the pen to write.
-hey just remembered what it was, it was gabby gums which means…. Darn out of ink!-
Was all she got through to say to them but it was confusing. Yet it gave them what they needed to know and got to the point when they asked,
-Who?-
She remembered that there was a drop of ink in her cup so she dipped the pen and wrote back.
-CMC-
And that was all she could write with the last drop hoping it helped.
The girls were walking over to learn more about the history of Equestria but they had a special guest coming to help tell the tale along with some new listeners. After a bit of walking along a trail to the homes of the three elementals. “Do you think we might hear about the war they keep mentioning?” Rainbow asked.
“Don’t know Dash but it's interesting to learn about what happened not to mention we get to train in those techniques though.” Applejack said as they came through the brush to see the amazing view of the place. They walked towards the statue and waited patiently or as patient as Pinkie could be. As they let their eyes wander around the scenery they hear the flapping of wings from above. As they look they see the celestial princesses. Maroon noticed that cadence, shining armor and Sombra are there as well which confused them. Maroon watched as Midnight trotted over to Cadence and did the sunshine dance before getting embarrassed. All of them gathered and were about to chat when the three appeared in front of the group who were all sitting around the statue’s base.
“Today you’re going to learn about the war with the Orderlings.” Dark said “the story is one we don't know the beginning of but our friend discord does” he continued before discord appeared out of confetti. “It might take a bit for me to tell this one but I feel better showing you what happened rather than telling it.” he said snapping, causing them to travel back in time while invisible.
The conflict began with the Chaosians who were minding their own business and going about their days when out of nowhere the Orderlings appeared at the edge of the city, at first they were nice but then there was bloodshed as the new creatures attacked with order magic while killing off any Chaosian they see as an extermination process. Discord miraculously survived the massacre and took it upon himself to warn the other creatures of the imminent danger posed by the Orderlings. The Orderlings mistakenly believed that without the Chaosians, the world would finally achieve balance. However, their actions had actually upset the balance in the first place, leading to a war in which all the races saw them as trying to take over so they came together to fight a common foe.
As the war ensued, the races united to combat the Orderlings and defend their world. Battles were fought, sacrifices were made, and lives were lost. The cost of the war was high, with Dark Flame ultimately being turned to stone and many other deaths occurring in the final battle. Some races even faced extinction, and the majority were left endangered after the war's conclusion.
In their relentless pursuit to defeat the Orderlings, Discord uncovered a revelation—a weakness or secret that could be exploited to bring an end to their reign. With Discord's plan in motion, the remaining fighters confronted Modayus, the last surviving Orderling, in a final climactic battle. The conflict pushed the races to their limits, testing their strength, resilience, and determination.
Ultimately, Discord’s efforts proved successful, and all but Modayus were eradicated as Modayus went into hiding for the time being promising that he would return. The war came to an end, but the toll it took was immense. Dark Flame’s transformation into stone served as a permanent reminder of the sacrifices made. The surviving races, mourning their fallen comrades, began the arduous process of rebuilding their societies. They vowed to honor the memories of those lost and to cherish the lessons learned from the war against the Orderlings.
Though scarred and endangered, the races emerged from the conflict with a newfound appreciation for unity and peace. The legacy of Twilight Eclipse, Crystal Phoenix, Everfree Forest, Discord, and the fallen Dark Flame would forever be etched in the history of their world—a testament to resilience, courage, and the enduring power of friendship.
Dark flame was put on a pedestal of marble while in his pose to defend the world by his friends who won't ever forget his sacrifice for the world.
As they were brought back to their original time before looking up at the statue behind them saddened by the risk and cost of his life. “How many were killed?” Stella asked worried,
“Combined the death count had been at 30,573,894 creatures in total there are now very few hives of changelings left even now but there had been up to 50 thousand hives all over the world and now the number is only single digits as there was only one hive left so light here helped out with it. The rest were luckier than that as there were more that were endangered for a few hundred years for the most part. Then my creator came and wiped out most of the alicorn population with only your parents surviving and a few others who are unknown. Along with the thousand years after that the changelings had to deal with their empress and more happened.” Dark said sadly, the rest of the listeners felt their jaws hit the floor and they looked at the statue that now has a new meaning behind it for them. ‘The will to sacrifice everything to save who you hold dear.’
The months drained on while Starlight was getting better though nothing new was coming till Midnight and Fallen were killed with Trixie as the being inside maroon used her body to do these things she then fought back against the orderling who caused them to teleport to different areas and caused havoc everywhere by accident while accidentally opening the chest that Discord hid which set the counsel free, they made it back but the counsel followed them. When the counsel showed up and tried to take back what's theirs, they were backed up by the alicorn killer Amitera. Discord almost sacrificed himself the originally planned way but maroon hit the orderling out of her body saying “when the elements were destroyed it caused the bond to snap. He’s no longer tethered by your existence so it would only be in vain!” She was free and she saw the damage that was done and saw the sky falling apart so she ran to the well facing obstacles along the way. She was nearly killed by the enemies with Discord taking the alicorn and the orderling out with him in a combined magic bomb causing purple, black, and golden blood to rain down on the land below and a blast that was going to destroy the planet. Maroon was under constant spell fire from the council which was hindering her in getting to the well the three blocked and killed five of the six and only one snuck past them and fought her over who would use the well. She was struck in the vital point of the gut but she got him back by ripping his head off which was the final blow before wobbling over to the edge and falling into the well close to death's door right as her last thoughts played ‘My friends, my family, I’m sorry I will make things right and for the better!’ she plopped in the well and a beam of light shot out of the ground to hit the hole in the sky on canterlot high’s side and everyone was confused at first but then it went white…
We pan to an oddly familiar woman on a train to Canterlot worried about being late on her first day of college? Wait what happened? Oh the reset merged the two universes of human and pony so now we are in for a treat. The story is not over yet…
In the past Twilight Eclipse, got a strange feeling “why do i feel like i'm having deja vu?” with that a series of memories flood his mind of two very different lives…
Now we wait for the next book to come out and as something new comes into the fold…
Author's Note
Hey there, its me Abyss.
Thank you for reading this story. I don't know if i'm going to rewrite this sometime in the future but if i do and i got better at it then great!
I'm currently working on the sequal of this and its sister book EqG Before the reset. If it never gets posted though either i forgot about it (unlikely) or i gave up on it.
The orderling was trying to fight Maroon for control as he was going to kill Midnight and Fallen for good when Maroon started to fight back against the orderling while forcing the spell to backfire for her own extreemly unstable spell, she got control of her wings and launched herself into the air while hitting Fluttershy with a spell that didn't do anything just yet. “Thank you for giving me the best time of my life and I left a present for Fluttershy as that spell will give her something she will love very much. Don't forget me girls as I know you will miss me and I'm sorry that I wasn't able to do much but I'll miss everypony” was the last thing anyone heard before a deafening boom happened from where Maroon flew then it started to rain. It confused the other ponies but the ones who knew what the rain ment, started to cry after a bit as to save them Maroon sacrificed herself to destroy the last orderling once and for all. The news of Maroons' sacrifice spread far and wide in Equestria and even got into the human realm confusing Sunrise's friends at her sudden breakdown till they learned what happened to princess Maroon on that day. It turned out that the spell gave Fluttershy a foal. It was another born alicorn and now Flurry heart had a playdate. The other enemies were stuck in their prisons never to escape then everything faded to black.
In the void a person looks on at the timeline seeing it become unstable before completely shattering before they could stabilize it as the alicorn of time’s sacrifice was for all for nothing. “Darn and I was wondering what could happen if things turned out this way but I guess the timeline became too unstable for even me to fix” the figure said as he watched the original timeline merged with the Equestria girls one before sending everything to the beginning of the timeline… “I wonder what's going to come next?” was all that was said sounding thoughtful before it faded to the next scene.
