The Corpse Has Left The Building

“You found one?!” Cranky asked, setting his coffee mug aside. He joined Pinkie by the opposite side of the room and squatted down to look, as if he could see anything. “Who is it?”

“It’s Rarity! I can tell by how my knee knocked and my spine tingled while my heart went all pitter-patter.”

“Well, good.” Cranky thought for a moment, then went over to the wall and pulled out a containment device, handing it to Pinkie. “Here, get her in this, if you can. We need to keep them in place till Twilight gets back.”

“Caaaaan do!” Pinkie tossed off a jaunty salute and proceeded to use the device to scoop up the molecule-sized Rarity, imagining her shouting out her signature “Wa-hah-haaaah!” upon soaring what must’ve felt like hundreds of miles into the air.

And just as she finished, her lungs seemed to expand, her eyes fluttered one after the other, and her earlobe tugged. “Ahah! Rainbow Dash, there you are, you silly girl.”

Cranky flashed her a thumbs up. “Good. Keep working. I’m going to reach out to Twilight.”

He pulled out a cell phone and dialed, getting no response. “Huh, that’s weird.” He tried the call several more times, then grimaced at it before nabbing his cup and knocking back the last of his coffee. “Ugh, she’s not answering. Okay, let’s try Shimmer.”

Sunset picked up on the first ring. “Twilight?!”

“Sorry, it’s just me,” Cranky said dryly.

“Oh, Mister Doodle! Sorry, I’m just really worried about Twilight. She’s somewhere on the ship and I can’t find her.”

“Ship? What ship?” He scratched his head, then nearly tugged his toupee off. “Wait, are you two on the cruise ship?”

“Yeah, why?”

“You need to get out of there!” he bellowed. “Now!”

“But -- oh my Celestia, are you--”

“Sunset?” Cranky heard naught but static on the line, before the telltale blip of the phone disconnecting. “Sunset?! Damn it…” He gave Pinkie a firm nod. “Keep at it. I’ve got to go rescue those two before it’s too late.”

“Okie dokie loki!”

As Twilight opened the door, she beheld a wondrous sight, far more beautiful than she expected. “What… what is this?”

This turned out to be a massive crystal tree, growing into every corner and crevice of the reactor room of the ship, its roots tangled and knotted up within the wiring, branches shooting out covered in crystalline leaves. It sang with the force of its magic, striking Twilight’s ears with a song that lifted her heart and sent it into overdrive, while the rest of her organs felt like they were squeezed in a vise by the sheer physical force of the thaumic energy it was outputting.

Twilight Sparkle.

“H-huh?” A light surrounded Twilight’s body, yanking her forward. Her breathing, already shallow, became so strained it was as if she had an entire house on her chest. “What… what are you?”

I am your scion. Birthed from your own actions, so long ago.

Her vision swam, beginning to gray at the edges. “I don’t understand. Scion? How?”

You ripped holes in the fabric of our reality.

“You mean, when I was Midnight?” Every breath hurt now, like her lungs were wrapped in razor wire. “But, does that mean you’re from Equestria?”

Yes. One of the dimensional tears was in the cavern of Harmony, below the Castle of the Two Sisters. Unlike the rest, it was torn not just through space, but through time as well, to when the Tree of Harmony was destroyed by King Sombra. A seed, one of only two to survive, fell through the crack, and took root in this ship.

Everything was gray now, consciousness becoming a fleeting thing. “But how did you grow? Why are you so powerful?”

The Storm King’s magic. Just as it threatened to sink the other ship you were on, it affected this one. It gave me a sense of purpose.

“A-and what’s that… that purpose?”

The destruction of your world.

Twilight tried to budge, but it was no use. She was fading, and fast. Her life began to flash before her eyes. “No, please… please, we didn’t… didn’t do anything to deserve…”

Your world lacks harmony. I will create it anew, using you as my vessel.

The last thing Twilight knew, she was being brought into the branches of the tree.

Sunset, on the deck of the cruise ship, stared in horror at the figure hovering before her, her phone a smoking ruin at her feet. “Midnight? But how?”

Midnight Sparkle, lowered the hand she’d used to fry the phone, her eyes flashing with a ghostly light. “You are Sunset Shimmer.”

“Uh, yeah?” Sunset gripped her fists and summoned her power, ponying-up. As her magic flared, she began to float off the deck. “What’s it to you?”

“You will be suitable as my second vessel.”

“Vessel? What--” Sunset cut herself off, as she only then noticed that there was something sticking out of Midnight’s back. An ethereal branch, poking up out of the deck, so transparent it was barely visible. “You’re not Midnight. Who are you? What have you done with Twilight?”

“She will be one of the few who will survive the destruction of this world. You will also be among their number.”

There was a shattering of the metal behind her, the only warning she had as another branch burst up, lancing forward, ready to pierce her from behind, far too fast for her to dodge.

Only to be severed as Cranky Doodle came flying through the air and tackled her, sending them both sprawling. “Sunset, you idiot!” he groused. “You should’ve asked me before coming here!”

“How was I supposed to know this ship was haunted?!” Sunset shot back as they both sprang to their feet.

Midnight Sparkle stared at them, her expression devoid of emotion. “How curious. What do you hope to accomplish?”

“Three things,” Cranky said as he held up a curious device. “One, send you back to Equestria where you belong. Two, get the energy we need to restore Sunset’s friends. Three, go home and take a nap.”

“I hear that,” Sunset said as she deftly used her magic and dodged another branch that tried to snag her. “How’d you know it was here?”

“Same way I knew how to help Pinkie, and do everything else we’ve done today. Luna recruited me.” Cranky leapt out of reach of one of the roots that swung at him like a whip. “Now, keep her in place! We gotta free her first.”

“Right!”

Sunset flew up to Midnight, who twirled in the air, summoning up a shield of radiant crystal light to block her. “You will not succeed.”

“Shut up and stop possessing Twilight, you weird… tree… thing!”

Midnight fired a beam of energy from her palm, which Sunset countered with one of her own, deflecting it into the ocean, where it produced a huge plume of water. “I will not be stopped.”

“Oh really?!” came another cry from the ship’s deck.

The sound of a cannon mixed with a party horn erupted, and a mixture of sprinkles flew into Midnight, exploding in her face, sending her sprawling.

Pinkie Pie, now ponied up, flew up to join Sunset in the air, linking hands with her. “Hi, Sunny!” she said. “I figured you could use the help.”

“Wait, what about our friends?”

“Down there! They’re all in the containment thingie, ready for us to free them!”

Midnight climbed to her feet, the first sign of real emotion on her face as she frowned ever so slightly. “This is becoming tiresome.”

Sunset smirked. “That’s the power of friendship for you! Now hold still.”

She and Pinkie raised their free hands to point at Midnight, firing twin beams of energy to stop her in her tracks. “Now, Cranky!” Pinkie called.

Cranky raised the device he’d brought, pointing it directly at Midnight. He opened his mouth as if to say some sort of badass quip, then thought better of it and simply hit the button. A wave seemed to propagate from his device through the air till it struck his target.

“No…NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”

Midnight fell to her knees, clutching her skull, till the branch embedded in her back withdrew with a plop. The instant it was removed, Midnight’s appearance changed, shifting back into Twilight, who collapsed like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

“Twilight!” Sunset and Pinkie cried, both dropping down to assist her. “Are you okay?”

“Ow…” Twilight moaned as she sat up, still holding her head. “That was… not fun.”

“Well, it’s not over yet,” Cranky said as he brought his device up again. He shifted a few dials on it, adjusting the settings. “We gotta figure out where the core is at. Twilight?”

“Reactor room… I’ll… I’ll show you.”

The four of them headed below decks, and soon came to the door that Twilight had opened before. The tree awaited them, roots aimed at them like weapons.

Why must you resist? Your world lacks harmony. It cannot bring you joy.

“That’s where you’re wrong,” Twilight declared, her voice strong despite the weakness of the rest of her body. “Even if our world isn’t perfect, it’s still ours. We can always make it better. But we won’t let you destroy it!”

You will not--

“Oh shut up already,” Cranky groused, his voice dripping with sarcasm as he activated his device again.

The tree’s branches all quivered and quaked like they’d suddenly been slammed with gale force winds, another keening cry filling the air. A beam of energy formed, sucked from the tree like water through a hose, which Cranky then redirected into the containment vessels that Pinkie brought along. Soon enough, the rest of Twilight and Sunset’s friends had emerged, one by one, each of them ponying up in turn.

“Whoo doggy, that sure was somethin’, bein’ shrunk like that,” Applejack said.

“Oh my, yes,” Fluttershy agreed. “I don’t want to repeat it.”

“Yeah, me either. It was sooooo not cool,” Dash added.

“Darlings, as much as I agree with you, perhaps we should focus on the task at hand?”

“Right!”

Cranky stepped back, and as one the seven ponied up friends joined together, summing upon the real harmony magic in a huge rainbow laser, which struck the tree right at its core. It crumpled, every branch curling inward, shrinking down, drawn inward further and further until with one last cry, it vanished entirely, the only remnant left behind being a single crystalline leaf.

A leaf that Twilight immediately crushed under her foot.

“Well, that’s that,” Twilight said with a happy sigh. “We’ve got everyone back, and the day’s been saved.”

“All in a day’s work,” Sunset agreed, bringing everyone into a big group hug. “You know what this calls for?”

“Pizza?” Rainbow suggested from the bottom of the cuddle pile.

“Pizza!” Everyone else cheered.

Except Cranky, who gave them one look and groaned. “Ugh. I’m going to go get that nap now. Kids.”

Author's Note

Thank you all for joining us on that silly, goofy ride. Special thanks to all participants once again for working with me on writing this story, and I hope it made at least a few of you laugh, cry, or somewhere in-between.